January 21, 2023 • 33 mins
In the second half of the show, we discuss the viral interaction of police and Keenan Anderson which led to his death. We describe the video, the triggers, and naturally, the aftermath. We also spend some time reviewing one of Dr. Martin Luther King's letters and charge everyone with doing more research into the great reverend.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And now.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
My mic back like that, we can strike waters from
headquarters behind him.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
And then if you're just tuning in the civic sideher,
I'm your host, ramseys jah.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Jah, I am q Ward and here we are again
bro this indeed, back at it. Stick around. We've got
a lot more to cover on the show.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
We are going to be talking about something that has
made its way to the news. We haven't done one
of these in a long time, not because it hasn't
been there, but we're going to talk about another video
where a black man had an interaction with the police
and that black man is no longer alive despite the
police not really being in any danger, well not not
(00:48):
being any danger period at all, not even the threat
of it, and somehow, you know, there's more life lost.
I'm also going to uh talk about the Letter from
a Birmingham Jail, which is one of the one of
my favorite writings from doctor King, and so much more.
But first and foremost, we're going to discuss Baba, how
(01:11):
to become a better ally Baba. Today's Baba is sponsored
by Major Threads. For all the finest in sportswear, check
out major threads dot com. Today's Babba South Carolina HBCU
receives ninety thousand dollars grant to get more black male
(01:31):
teachers in the classrooms. Now, you might be saying to yourself,
ninety thousand dollars is a lot of money. I don't
have that much money to donate. Well, listen, I've been
learning recently that historically black colleges and universities need money.
This is something that I would not have known because
(01:53):
I did not go to an HBCU unfortunately, but I've
come to appreciate their place in the world, and they're
placed in this country in particular. There are certain things
that are just never going to be taught. They're not
valuable enough historically or the lessons or anything like that
to be taught in.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
You know, your normal schools.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
You know, certainly not public schools and public universities, but
historically black college and universities will certainly tell these stories
and again, very necessary. But I'll read a bit. South
Carolina State University and HBCU, historically Black College and University
in Orangeburg, South Carolina, received a ninety thousand dollars grant
(02:36):
for its Call Me Mister program to extend its efforts
in placing more black mail teachers in a classroom. ABC
Columbia reported that the HBC YOU received the funds on
Monday from the Leveraging Innovation for Educator Excellence to help
recruit and train black mail teachers. According to doctor Thelma
so Journer, program director for Life Too, an initiative devoted
(02:58):
to boosting teacher to see, less than two percent of
the instructors currently teaching in the South Carolina schools are
identified as black men. There's tremendous need for children to
see young men coming in and working in the schools.
That's so Journer. So if you can donate to an HBCU,
because they're on the right track and they know exactly
(03:19):
what we need. Now speaking of black male teachers, Man
Keenan Anderson was a younger.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Than me, man and he.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Was tased to death by the police and what we
have to call an incident, an incident of police violence. Normally,
one or the other of us will watch a video
that involves someone's life coming to an end so that
(04:10):
we don't have to experience every single trauma that you know,
we come across that people send our way every video,
but this one we both had to take a moment
and really.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Process this right. We had to look at this video, and.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
If I'm honest, the video left me with more questions
and answers, which I think is probably part of the course.
Typically we don't watch videos and be like, oh, well,
you know that's that. Usually we're like why or whatever.
But this one certainly had that effect on me and
just very disturbing, especially when you know going into it
(04:49):
that you're looking at a person that's not alive anymore.
It's just something that's deeply troubling and unsettling about that.
Let me read a bit to you, So this comes
from yahoos. Chilling video shows cops repeatedly tase cousin of
BLM co founder before his death. Shocking video footage shows
(05:12):
a fleeing Keenan Anderson, a high school teacher whose cousin
is Black Lives Matter co founder Patre's colors, begged for
his life as cops repeatedly taste him several hours before
his death. When he died, Anderson, who at least one
bystander claim had tried to steal a car, became the
third man of color to perish after a violent encounter
(05:32):
with the LAPD in the span of a week. The
department's own chief took the unusual step of quickly suggesting
at least one of the fatalities could have been avoided
when the family watched the video prior to its public release.
Some viewed it in the police station itself, others watched
at home and over FaceTime. Colors told The Daily Beast.
(05:56):
She described her family's initial reaction as devastated and discos
And here's a quote from his brother Chris, just being like,
how did they do that to him? How did this
end up leading to his death? To his sister saying
that was too much, to his auntie, my cousin just
crying uncontrollably. Colors told The Daily Beast, like, it's so traumatic,
(06:20):
I can't unsee that.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
She said.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
No one deserves to die begging for their life. Okay,
so I'll just read this next part. Body camera footge
shows Anderson thirty one, repeatedly yell they're trying to George
Floyd me as cops restrained him in the middle of
the street on January third, One officer held his elbow
on Anderson's neck as he was pinned to the ground. Simultaneously,
(06:42):
after police issued a slew of warnings. Another officer appeared
to he Taz Anderson for nearly thirty seconds straight. So
let's talk about the video. What we saw. We saw
this man, Keenan Anderson, get approached. He was approached by
(07:02):
a motorcycle officer.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
If I'm not mistaken, I wish there would have been
some ten seconds of footage before that because it kind
of is like we joined the story in the in
the middle. Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Yeah, so that was a little strange, but you know, basically,
there's a an officer that is approaching him, and he's
like walking to a corner, and you know, he says, hey, hey,
you know, they're trying to kill me. They're trying to
kill me. And he walks to a corner, he puts
his hands up that sort of thing, and the officer says,
(07:38):
you know, stay there or whatever. And then he's Keenan
says back to the officer, hey, look, I don't want
to go into this corner. Let me come out in
the street where people can see me. And the officer
kind of, you know says, you know, okay, cool, you know,
do your thing whatever, but I need you to calm down.
You need you to stay right here. You know, put
your hands up, that sort of thing. We have to
(08:01):
describe these to you because we need to paint the picture.
But obviously I'm not going to get it one percent right,
and I don't want to ask you to go and
watch somebody get executed. But you know, if you need
it to be one hundred percent accurate, then obviously the
video is available online. But if not, you know, I'm
going to give it to you the best way that
(08:21):
I remember it. All right, So, as he's you know,
now kind of going back to the street off of
the corner, he's still kind of going back and forth
with the officer, and you start to get the sense that, well,
I mean, okay, so Q, you mentioned something while he
was you said he wasn't really in his right mind.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
You got that sense, right. Neither of us are professionals
in any type of clinical psychology or sociology or sure,
we're not practitioners of medicine, mental physical, But this is
just an observation. He didn't seem to be all there.
It could just be because he was terrified. It could
(09:04):
be because of whatever happened that caused the police to
arrive in the first place. It could be because he
has mental health issues. It could be because reasons that
we don't know and never will know. Right, but his
interaction was not It didn't seem normal. It didn't. Yeah,
it didn't seem like he didn't react in a way
that someone might reasonably react. However, if you look like
(09:29):
him and you're being approached by police and you understand
that just those two factors might lead to your death,
then who are we to say that he should have
reacted in any way that's considered quote unquote normal.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yeah, Yeah, it's a lot to deal with. Well, he
then starts to kind of do a light jog. Maybe
he didn't run, and it was he was walking and
kind of like moving quickly, putting some distance between himself
(10:07):
and the officer.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Well, we could say that he ran, just not very
fast or far. Sure, I'd go with that. And I'm
using the word run because Ramses and I have to
always make sure that we're not coloring a picture in
a way to extra victimize or Yeah, we don't want
to make make anybody someone or make anybody else the
bad guy, So I have to make sure that we're
(10:28):
as objective as we can be. He did do what
some people might describe as running. He just didn't go
very fast or very far, and that seemed intentional, right,
he wasn't. He wasn't. This was not based on It
wasn't a panic run, it wasn't a skateboard and survival, right,
he was just putting some distance.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
So yeah, I'm glad you said that. And the officer
of course, starts yelling, and then officers like, okay, he's
a little far away, let me grab let me hop
back on my bike, jumps on his motorcycle and then
starts to pursue a little bit more. And he was
running down the sidewalk. He was running into the middle
of the street where the cars were. So again you're
seeing a person not behave in a way that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
You would deem.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
And you know, hindsight's always twenty twenty. Now we know
he's a teacher and educator, so looking at that, you
know a person this isn't a person who's homeless, a
person who is you know that you would associate, you know,
those types of mental conditions with you know, just kind
of out there, spaced out, and so his behavior is
(11:36):
very very obviously off. You know, you wouldn't run into
the street or I guess run run is such a
hard it's because he was just kind of again use
the running, use the word running.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
He was running not fast enough far ran into the cars,
not just into the street, but like into the most congested.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Part of traffic. And when the officer asked to stop again,
he stopped. He started to kind of get down on
the ground, and it's almost like he's making sense of
what's happening around him. At no point did it seem
like he was trying to flee. He was just trying
to From where I said, it looked like he was
trying to position himself in a way to where he
(12:18):
probably would have the most insulation from the sort of
harm that might be coming his way, best I can guess.
And then after that, you know, the police start to
jump on him, and you know, that's when you get
the elbow to the next thing, and he starts restating
(12:40):
they're trying to kill me. Now it seems a little
bit more like it's about the officers rather than whatever
it was he was running from. When the first officer
pulled up, and then he says, you know, they're trying
to George Floyd me, and you can kind of hear
him kind of yelling and wailing, and you know, now
you're getting the stoppers in staying and all that sort
(13:00):
of stuff, you know, turn over on your side, you know,
this sort of stuff. And again we've talked about this
many times on the show. It's very difficult to do
too much of anything that someone's asking you do when
you know there's you know, five grown men with their
full weight on different parts of your body. It's hard
to comply. It's hard to turn over, you know what
(13:21):
I'm saying. That's just and it literally is impossible to
do that for most people. You know, that strength doesn't exist.
I cannot turn over if the weight of another human
being is on top of me. It's just especially if
I'm lying flat on the sidewalk anyway. You know, they're
telling them all this stuff, you know, as the police do.
I've kind of come to the conclusion that once the
(13:42):
police say stop resisting, that you're pretty much gonna die.
You know, there's no way that you can on they
Once they say it out loud, it's like they've claimed
that you've been resisting, and then everything after that is
just more of the same.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
And in most cases, when they're saying that weapons have
already been drawn, that they've they now have to use.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Right now that's been introduced needs to be discharged in
order to justify pulling it out in the first place.
Who knows? And you know we talk about this every week.
I don't want to be unfair, but you know we
see the same things and it's like, why is there
not a better system here? Notice in this story we
haven't talked about a weapon. He didn't brandish a gun,
(14:23):
he didn't do anything like that. Right, he's on the
ground the office. Good not to cut you off. But
another reason why it's important for us to even say
he ran okay, say he was running as fast as
he could, as far as he could, so then we
should kill him, right, like we don't have to like
(14:43):
have Let's let's let's get the audience to forgive him
for running away like no, even if his full intent
was escaped to bounce. Oh, I'm out, the police are here,
I'm outro and I used to run track.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Out the way of that. Right, he dies for that.
So here's the part because the officers seemed to get
and this is important too, angry at how dare you
not do exactly? But exactly what I say. When I
say it, it doesn't matter why we're here or that
(15:23):
maybe you didn't do anything do what I said right
Oh you're not going to do what I say it
right now. Now weapons are coming out. Now he's screaming,
Now he's angry.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Now there's other police escalated it what I mean like,
and you know there's you know, for for folks that
have traveled internationally. You know, you you realize that the
police here almost across the border bullies. Yeah, there's a
god complex that I've not seen in any other part
of the world.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
The police are absolutely civil servants.
Speaker 3 (15:58):
You know, if you're you know, an knucklehead, if you're
you know, acting crazy or something like that, yeah, the
police are trained to deal with that. But the ready
assumption is not that people are bad. The ready assumption
is that people are good.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
It's almost like the police here, it's kind of like
guilty until proven innocent, and we're going to treat you accordingly.
And overseas it's actually more like innocent until proven guilty. Right.
And for all the freedoms that we say we have
in this country, those must really only apply to you know,
rich white males who are straight in Christian because to
everybody else it does not feel like a free country
(16:35):
when you come up against that criminal justice system. And
you know, when it comes to you know, the police
and other countries, when you talk to them, it's more
of a conversation rather than like, you know, the police here,
it's almost like you said to you like you're you're
almost like you're talking to God and God has commanded
(16:58):
you to, you know, step out of the vehicle, and
you know they got a you know, there's a gun
on you. And I get that. I get that, you know,
having guns at the ready, you know that that can
go to your head, and having a that iota of
tenuous power can can really you know, corrupt people and
(17:18):
across the board.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
I'm not I'm not.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
I think that, you know, sort of the platonic ideal.
You know, the vision that pops in your head is
that there's a white officer when I'm talking about this,
But no officers can come in all colors. This is
a policing issue, as we've said since the beginning of
this show. However, in this instance, one thing I do
need to say is that in theory, a taser would
(17:45):
be a non lethal way of subduing a person who
is not being cooperative, right, unless you do it for hours,
and yeah, if you do it for a prolong period time.
And that was what I was going to say. We've
seen time and time again that actually these tasers aren't
(18:08):
non lethal. The people are dying left and right from
being tased by the police. And you know, again, it's
one thing if you like shoot, you know, a taser off,
you know, somebody drops to the ground, you know, that
sort of thing. But if you have five police officers
and you still need a taser, then you know, I'm
not sure exactly what's going on here, right, because the
(18:31):
police want to be heroes and tough guys and all
that sort of stuff. But none of this makes sense
and it never does in any of these you know stories,
and we end up with more dead people. And as
we've seen that time and again, is that the police
will end the lives often enough of black men with impunity.
(18:55):
This is our reality. And you know, people wonder we
don't have a great relationship with police. Why really, nobody
has great relationships with police unless they are like I said,
those straight you know, white you know, Christian males with
money and you know, that sort of thing. And there
(19:18):
are some exceptions. Why those the wives of those men
often yeah, they often get a kick out of the
police too. But you know, there's a good chunk of
us to see this for what it is, and it's
basically something that really needs an adjustment. You know, we
are not born to die. You know, our lives have value.
(19:40):
You can't just kill us and everybody just be okay
with that. And it happened over and over again. You know,
every time an airplane crashes, they do everything in their
power to make sure that an airplane will not crash again. However,
every time there's a school shooting, every time the police
ends a life of a black man or you know,
(20:02):
a person anybody needlessly, we figured out a way to
victim blame. We figure out a way to pass the buck.
And then it's just kind of more of the same.
And you know, we're not here to profess that we
have any answers. You know, we have a lot of
theories that we discussed back and forth on the show,
of course, but you know, our job is to kind
(20:25):
of point these things out so that you know about them,
because you know, whatever radio station you're listening to us
on it's probably very likely that at no point have
they covered this story. And it's probably very likely that
since we haven't been talking about all of these unnecessary
(20:46):
debts of black and brown people in the country at
the hands of police in the past two or three months,
that you don't know about them. We get them all
in our inbox. We just don't have enough show for
the content that we get. You know, we chose this
one because it's a little bit more high profile, and
you know, it's about time for us to remind you
that this is still very much going on day in
(21:08):
and day out. Now, I do want to read a
last little bit, just because I want to make sure
I'm telling as much of the story as I can.
So this is back to Yahoo News. Los Angeles police
Chief Michael Morris said Wednesday that it's unclear what role
anderson struggle with police played in his death, but we know,
of course saw the video and we saw him getting tased,
(21:29):
and then of course his heart stopped working, so that
was pretty.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Clear for us.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
He said, and Anderson was an altered mental state, which
is something that we could deduce from watching the video
correct and claimed that a preliminary blood test showed he
had cannabis and cocaine in his system. And again the
emphasis there is that he claimed that the preliminary blood
(21:59):
test showed that. Now, from what I understand, I'm not
sure that cannabis creates like psycho know, hallucid, whatever effects
or whatever that stuff is. I don't know the first
thing about you know, cocaine or any of the rest
of that stuff, but I'm pretty sure that it doesn't
have that effect on people. So I feel like these
(22:21):
sorts of things are things that they throw in the
mix to try to again.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Make it his fault that he's dead. They have to
dehumanize you, right, so that people care less about the
fact that you were murdered, right, And that feels very unfair.
But you know, doctor Malina Abdullah, co founder of Black
Lives Matter Los Angeles, said Wednesday that she believes Anderson's
death was the result of police violence full stop. So
(22:50):
I'll read this, Keenan's murder is absolutely horrific, Abdullah said.
As The Guardian reported, laped is not calling it a killing,
but calling it an incustody death. But Keenan was tasted
to death. We know LAPD caused Keenan's death. I again,
I don't understand why it takes this many guys, you know,
(23:15):
leaning on people's necks and you know, holding limbs and
all that sort of stuff to subdue a guy that
didn't look all that big. It probably couldn't have been
any bigger than me, you know, certainly not as you know,
didn't have sort of the mass that you have. Q.
So I don't know how easily you could take on five,
(23:37):
you know, police officers, but that seemed like could be
a tall order. I mean, the truth of the matter
is I couldn't. Thanks so yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
And yet and still he needed to get tasted until
his heart stopped working. And now he's dead and we're
having to talk about this on the show.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
So again, watching the video, the young man got tased
because the officer had already taken his taser out. That's
why I have my taser out, so I'm going to
take figure out when to use it. Yeah, stop resisting
is what. He didn't do anything different like he did.
There wasn't some big move where he threw somebody off
of him or pushed somebody down or anything like that.
(24:13):
I have my taser out, so I'm tasing someone.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Well, it's time for the Way Black History Fact. Today's
Way Black History Fact is sponsored by the Black Information
Network Daily Podcast, and as promised, we are going to
be reading pieces of doctor Martin Luther King Junior's letter
from a Birmingham jail, just to give you an idea
of who the man was, what he stood for, and
(24:42):
help you when it comes to dealing with his legacy.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
So I'll lead.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
April sixteenth, nineteen sixty three, my dear fellow clergyman, while
confined here in the Birmingham City Jail, I came across
your recent statement calling our present activities unwi and untimely. Seldom,
if ever, do I pause to answer criticism of my
work and ideas. But since I feel that you are
men of genuine good will and your criticisms are sincerely
(25:10):
set forth, I would like to answer your statement in
what I hope will be a patient, will be patient
and reasonable terms. In any nonviolent campaign, there are four
basic steps. One collection of the facts to determine whether
injustices are alive. Two negotiation, three self purification and four
(25:32):
direct action. We have gone through all the steps in Birmingham.
Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the
United States. Its ugly record of police brutality is known
in every section of the country. Its unjust treatment of
Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality. There have
been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in
(25:55):
Birmingham than in any city in this nation. These are
the hard, brutal, and unbelievable fact. On the basis of
these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers,
but the political leaders consistently refused to engage in good
faith negotiations. Then came the opportunity last September to talk
(26:15):
with some of the leaders of the economic community. In
these negotiating sessions, certain promises were made by the merchants,
such as the promise to remove the humiliating racial signs
from the stores. On the basis of these promises, Reverend
Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for
Human Rights agreed to call a moratorium on any type
(26:36):
of demonstrations. As the weeks and months unfolded, we realized
that we were the victims of a broken promise. The
signs remained as in so many experiences in the past,
we were confronted with blasted hopes and the dark shadows
of a deep disappointment settled upon us. So we had
no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby
(26:58):
we would present our very bodies as a means of
laying our case before the conscious of the local and
national community. We were not unmindful of the difficulties involved,
so we decided to go through the process of self purification.
We started having workshops on non violence and repeatedly asked
ourselves the question, are you able to accept the blows
(27:20):
without retaliating? Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Now?
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Bear this in mind, because you may know someone listening
to us today. You may know someone that says, oh,
you know, those BLM protesters are all those people. They
always want this, but they're just going about it all wrong. Okay,
this is directly from doctor Martin Luther King. Okay, I'll continue.
You may well ask why direct action? Why sit ins, marches, etc.
(27:49):
Isn't negotiation a better path? You are exactly right in
your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of
direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a
visis and established such creative tension that a community that
has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Boom.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
It's doctor King's words, my friends, I must say to
you that we have not made a single gain in
civil rights without legal and non violent pressure. History is
the long and tragic story of the fact that the
privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may
see the moral light and give up their unjust posture,
(28:32):
but as Reinholden Nieber has reminded us, groups are more
immoral than individuals. I guess it's easy for those who
have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, wait,
But when you have seen vicious mobs lench your mothers
and fathers at will, and drown your sisters and brothers
at whim, When you have seen hatefield policemen curse, kick, brutalize,
(28:56):
and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity, Boom,
when you see the vast majority of your twenty million
Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in
the midst of an influent society, When you suddenly find
your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek
to explain to your six year old daughter why she
(29:18):
can't go to the public amusement park that has just
been advertised on television. And she sees and sorry, And
see the tears welling up in her little eyes when
she is told that FunTown is closed to colored children,
and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form
in her little mental sky, and see her begin to
(29:40):
distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward
white people. When you have to concoct and answer for
a five year old son who was asking and agonizing, pathos, Daddy,
why do white people treat colored people so mean?
Speaker 1 (29:56):
When you take a cross.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after
night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no
motel will accept you. When you are humiliated day in
and day out by nagging signs reading white men and colored.
When your first name becomes the N word, I'll spare you,
and your middle name becomes boy, however old you are,
(30:17):
and your last name becomes John. When your wife and
mother are never given the respected title of missus. When
you are harried by day and haunted by night by
the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at
tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and
plagued with interferes and outer resentments. When you are forever
(30:38):
fighting a degenerating sense of nobodyness, then you will understand
why we find it difficult to wait.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
Wow. There comes a time when the cup of.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Endurance runs over and men are no longer willing to
be plunged into an abyss of injustice where they experience
the bleakness of corroding despair. I hope, sir as, you
can understand our legitimate and un unavoidable patience. I hope
this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also
hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me
to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or
(31:10):
civil rights leader, but as a fellow clergyman and a
Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds
of rachel prejudice will soon pass away, and the deep
fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities,
and in some not too distant tomorrow, the radiant stars
of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation
with all of their scintillating beauty. Yours for the cause
(31:34):
of peace and brotherhood.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
M L.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
King Junior. Now, I do want to say this before
you swim. I know we've got a couple seconds. That's
not the full letter. I had to edit it down
for time, but please read it, put it up in
your room and your office.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Live by it. But I wish the letter could be
made into a visual short film minus the context of
it being white racists wressers versus black people. Make it
anyone else versus anyone else, and the person on the
receiving side of that would be empathized for by any audience. Absolutely, well,
(32:13):
that's going to do it for us here on Civic Cipher.
Once again, I'm your host, Rams's Jock, he is Rams's
jah I amq Ward. Thank you guys for tuning in
with us again for another h ah man, another one
of these very very difficult journeys through some very very
difficult truths.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
Yes, indeed, but you know we're still here, We're still standing,
and we're still doing it for you. We appreciate you
allowing us to have these conversations and let's keep it going.
So tap in with us. Hit our website civicipher dot com,
and uh follow us on all social media at Civic Cipher.
Download this in any previous episodes.
Speaker 4 (32:47):
Subscribe, subscribe, share, subscribe comments all that donate as well,
and submit any questions or any topics that you want
us to cover.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
We do like hearing from you, and you know you
like having a conversation, not just us talking and you're listening,
So participate if it makes sense, and until next week, y'all, peace.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
Y'all, like yo, we handle it. These brothers are fabulous.
It's our lady showing you where vomb traveled. This w
speak to from sunlight to move, busting on stage like
then fights the mole c row my mic back. You're
like that journalist with journalists too. We can strike back
horb borders with orders from head, borders behind in the
(33:30):
beline side, step in the border, the press passage.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
We bring it to you as it happens.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
The streets love mocking from music and rapping, the street
compland the slash week expando. You're gonna fight the slander
with the proper propaganda.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
What's happenings ho, you've got a question to ask if
the news is just a TV show you're passing.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
And this from a white wartime journalist headlines wait, God,
prepas and resist like this like what like this, like
And now.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
My mic back like that, we can strike waters from
headquarters behind him.
Speaker 3 (00:11):
And then if you're just tuning in the civic sideher,
I'm your host, ramseys jah.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Jah, I am q Ward and here we are again
bro this indeed, back at it. Stick around. We've got
a lot more to cover on the show.
Speaker 3 (00:26):
We are going to be talking about something that has
made its way to the news. We haven't done one
of these in a long time, not because it hasn't
been there, but we're going to talk about another video
where a black man had an interaction with the police
and that black man is no longer alive despite the
police not really being in any danger, well not not
(00:48):
being any danger period at all, not even the threat
of it, and somehow, you know, there's more life lost.
I'm also going to uh talk about the Letter from
a Birmingham Jail, which is one of the one of
my favorite writings from doctor King, and so much more.
But first and foremost, we're going to discuss Baba, how
(01:11):
to become a better ally Baba. Today's Baba is sponsored
by Major Threads. For all the finest in sportswear, check
out major threads dot com. Today's Babba South Carolina HBCU
receives ninety thousand dollars grant to get more black male
(01:31):
teachers in the classrooms. Now, you might be saying to yourself,
ninety thousand dollars is a lot of money. I don't
have that much money to donate. Well, listen, I've been
learning recently that historically black colleges and universities need money.
This is something that I would not have known because
(01:53):
I did not go to an HBCU unfortunately, but I've
come to appreciate their place in the world, and they're
placed in this country in particular. There are certain things
that are just never going to be taught. They're not
valuable enough historically or the lessons or anything like that
to be taught in.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
You know, your normal schools.
Speaker 3 (02:15):
You know, certainly not public schools and public universities, but
historically black college and universities will certainly tell these stories
and again, very necessary. But I'll read a bit. South
Carolina State University and HBCU, historically Black College and University
in Orangeburg, South Carolina, received a ninety thousand dollars grant
(02:36):
for its Call Me Mister program to extend its efforts
in placing more black mail teachers in a classroom. ABC
Columbia reported that the HBC YOU received the funds on
Monday from the Leveraging Innovation for Educator Excellence to help
recruit and train black mail teachers. According to doctor Thelma
so Journer, program director for Life Too, an initiative devoted
(02:58):
to boosting teacher to see, less than two percent of
the instructors currently teaching in the South Carolina schools are
identified as black men. There's tremendous need for children to
see young men coming in and working in the schools.
That's so Journer. So if you can donate to an HBCU,
because they're on the right track and they know exactly
(03:19):
what we need. Now speaking of black male teachers, Man
Keenan Anderson was a younger.
Speaker 1 (03:39):
Than me, man and he.
Speaker 3 (03:46):
Was tased to death by the police and what we
have to call an incident, an incident of police violence. Normally,
one or the other of us will watch a video
that involves someone's life coming to an end so that
(04:10):
we don't have to experience every single trauma that you know,
we come across that people send our way every video,
but this one we both had to take a moment
and really.
Speaker 1 (04:23):
Process this right. We had to look at this video, and.
Speaker 3 (04:28):
If I'm honest, the video left me with more questions
and answers, which I think is probably part of the course.
Typically we don't watch videos and be like, oh, well,
you know that's that. Usually we're like why or whatever.
But this one certainly had that effect on me and
just very disturbing, especially when you know going into it
(04:49):
that you're looking at a person that's not alive anymore.
It's just something that's deeply troubling and unsettling about that.
Let me read a bit to you, So this comes
from yahoos. Chilling video shows cops repeatedly tase cousin of
BLM co founder before his death. Shocking video footage shows
(05:12):
a fleeing Keenan Anderson, a high school teacher whose cousin
is Black Lives Matter co founder Patre's colors, begged for
his life as cops repeatedly taste him several hours before
his death. When he died, Anderson, who at least one
bystander claim had tried to steal a car, became the
third man of color to perish after a violent encounter
(05:32):
with the LAPD in the span of a week. The
department's own chief took the unusual step of quickly suggesting
at least one of the fatalities could have been avoided
when the family watched the video prior to its public release.
Some viewed it in the police station itself, others watched
at home and over FaceTime. Colors told The Daily Beast.
(05:56):
She described her family's initial reaction as devastated and discos
And here's a quote from his brother Chris, just being like,
how did they do that to him? How did this
end up leading to his death? To his sister saying
that was too much, to his auntie, my cousin just
crying uncontrollably. Colors told The Daily Beast, like, it's so traumatic,
(06:20):
I can't unsee that.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
She said.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
No one deserves to die begging for their life. Okay,
so I'll just read this next part. Body camera footge
shows Anderson thirty one, repeatedly yell they're trying to George
Floyd me as cops restrained him in the middle of
the street on January third, One officer held his elbow
on Anderson's neck as he was pinned to the ground. Simultaneously,
(06:42):
after police issued a slew of warnings. Another officer appeared
to he Taz Anderson for nearly thirty seconds straight. So
let's talk about the video. What we saw. We saw
this man, Keenan Anderson, get approached. He was approached by
(07:02):
a motorcycle officer.
Speaker 1 (07:05):
If I'm not mistaken, I wish there would have been
some ten seconds of footage before that because it kind
of is like we joined the story in the in
the middle. Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Yeah, so that was a little strange, but you know, basically,
there's a an officer that is approaching him, and he's
like walking to a corner, and you know, he says, hey, hey,
you know, they're trying to kill me. They're trying to
kill me. And he walks to a corner, he puts
his hands up that sort of thing, and the officer says,
(07:38):
you know, stay there or whatever. And then he's Keenan
says back to the officer, hey, look, I don't want
to go into this corner. Let me come out in
the street where people can see me. And the officer
kind of, you know says, you know, okay, cool, you know,
do your thing whatever, but I need you to calm down.
You need you to stay right here. You know, put
your hands up, that sort of thing. We have to
(08:01):
describe these to you because we need to paint the picture.
But obviously I'm not going to get it one percent right,
and I don't want to ask you to go and
watch somebody get executed. But you know, if you need
it to be one hundred percent accurate, then obviously the
video is available online. But if not, you know, I'm
going to give it to you the best way that
(08:21):
I remember it. All right, So, as he's you know,
now kind of going back to the street off of
the corner, he's still kind of going back and forth
with the officer, and you start to get the sense that, well,
I mean, okay, so Q, you mentioned something while he
was you said he wasn't really in his right mind.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
You got that sense, right. Neither of us are professionals
in any type of clinical psychology or sociology or sure,
we're not practitioners of medicine, mental physical, But this is
just an observation. He didn't seem to be all there.
It could just be because he was terrified. It could
(09:04):
be because of whatever happened that caused the police to
arrive in the first place. It could be because he
has mental health issues. It could be because reasons that
we don't know and never will know. Right, but his
interaction was not It didn't seem normal. It didn't. Yeah,
it didn't seem like he didn't react in a way
that someone might reasonably react. However, if you look like
(09:29):
him and you're being approached by police and you understand
that just those two factors might lead to your death,
then who are we to say that he should have
reacted in any way that's considered quote unquote normal.
Speaker 3 (09:43):
Yeah, Yeah, it's a lot to deal with. Well, he
then starts to kind of do a light jog. Maybe
he didn't run, and it was he was walking and
kind of like moving quickly, putting some distance between himself
(10:07):
and the officer.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
Well, we could say that he ran, just not very
fast or far. Sure, I'd go with that. And I'm
using the word run because Ramses and I have to
always make sure that we're not coloring a picture in
a way to extra victimize or Yeah, we don't want
to make make anybody someone or make anybody else the
bad guy, So I have to make sure that we're
(10:28):
as objective as we can be. He did do what
some people might describe as running. He just didn't go
very fast or very far, and that seemed intentional, right,
he wasn't. He wasn't. This was not based on It
wasn't a panic run, it wasn't a skateboard and survival, right,
he was just putting some distance.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
So yeah, I'm glad you said that. And the officer
of course, starts yelling, and then officers like, okay, he's
a little far away, let me grab let me hop
back on my bike, jumps on his motorcycle and then
starts to pursue a little bit more. And he was
running down the sidewalk. He was running into the middle
of the street where the cars were. So again you're
seeing a person not behave in a way that.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
You would deem.
Speaker 3 (11:11):
And you know, hindsight's always twenty twenty. Now we know
he's a teacher and educator, so looking at that, you
know a person this isn't a person who's homeless, a
person who is you know that you would associate, you know,
those types of mental conditions with you know, just kind
of out there, spaced out, and so his behavior is
(11:36):
very very obviously off. You know, you wouldn't run into
the street or I guess run run is such a
hard it's because he was just kind of again use
the running, use the word running.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
He was running not fast enough far ran into the cars,
not just into the street, but like into the most congested.
Speaker 3 (11:55):
Part of traffic. And when the officer asked to stop again,
he stopped. He started to kind of get down on
the ground, and it's almost like he's making sense of
what's happening around him. At no point did it seem
like he was trying to flee. He was just trying
to From where I said, it looked like he was
trying to position himself in a way to where he
(12:18):
probably would have the most insulation from the sort of
harm that might be coming his way, best I can guess.
And then after that, you know, the police start to
jump on him, and you know, that's when you get
the elbow to the next thing, and he starts restating
(12:40):
they're trying to kill me. Now it seems a little
bit more like it's about the officers rather than whatever
it was he was running from. When the first officer
pulled up, and then he says, you know, they're trying
to George Floyd me, and you can kind of hear
him kind of yelling and wailing, and you know, now
you're getting the stoppers in staying and all that sort
(13:00):
of stuff, you know, turn over on your side, you know,
this sort of stuff. And again we've talked about this
many times on the show. It's very difficult to do
too much of anything that someone's asking you do when
you know there's you know, five grown men with their
full weight on different parts of your body. It's hard
to comply. It's hard to turn over, you know what
(13:21):
I'm saying. That's just and it literally is impossible to
do that for most people. You know, that strength doesn't exist.
I cannot turn over if the weight of another human
being is on top of me. It's just especially if
I'm lying flat on the sidewalk anyway. You know, they're
telling them all this stuff, you know, as the police do.
I've kind of come to the conclusion that once the
(13:42):
police say stop resisting, that you're pretty much gonna die.
You know, there's no way that you can on they
Once they say it out loud, it's like they've claimed
that you've been resisting, and then everything after that is
just more of the same.
Speaker 1 (13:54):
And in most cases, when they're saying that weapons have
already been drawn, that they've they now have to use.
Speaker 3 (14:01):
Right now that's been introduced needs to be discharged in
order to justify pulling it out in the first place.
Who knows? And you know we talk about this every week.
I don't want to be unfair, but you know we
see the same things and it's like, why is there
not a better system here? Notice in this story we
haven't talked about a weapon. He didn't brandish a gun,
(14:23):
he didn't do anything like that. Right, he's on the
ground the office. Good not to cut you off. But
another reason why it's important for us to even say
he ran okay, say he was running as fast as
he could, as far as he could, so then we
should kill him, right, like we don't have to like
(14:43):
have Let's let's let's get the audience to forgive him
for running away like no, even if his full intent
was escaped to bounce. Oh, I'm out, the police are here,
I'm outro and I used to run track.
Speaker 1 (15:00):
Out the way of that. Right, he dies for that.
So here's the part because the officers seemed to get
and this is important too, angry at how dare you
not do exactly? But exactly what I say. When I
say it, it doesn't matter why we're here or that
(15:23):
maybe you didn't do anything do what I said right
Oh you're not going to do what I say it
right now. Now weapons are coming out. Now he's screaming,
Now he's angry.
Speaker 3 (15:34):
Now there's other police escalated it what I mean like,
and you know there's you know, for for folks that
have traveled internationally. You know, you you realize that the
police here almost across the border bullies. Yeah, there's a
god complex that I've not seen in any other part
of the world.
Speaker 1 (15:54):
The police are absolutely civil servants.
Speaker 3 (15:58):
You know, if you're you know, an knucklehead, if you're
you know, acting crazy or something like that, yeah, the
police are trained to deal with that. But the ready
assumption is not that people are bad. The ready assumption
is that people are good.
Speaker 1 (16:13):
Right.
Speaker 3 (16:14):
It's almost like the police here, it's kind of like
guilty until proven innocent, and we're going to treat you accordingly.
And overseas it's actually more like innocent until proven guilty. Right.
And for all the freedoms that we say we have
in this country, those must really only apply to you know,
rich white males who are straight in Christian because to
everybody else it does not feel like a free country
(16:35):
when you come up against that criminal justice system. And
you know, when it comes to you know, the police
and other countries, when you talk to them, it's more
of a conversation rather than like, you know, the police here,
it's almost like you said to you like you're you're
almost like you're talking to God and God has commanded
(16:58):
you to, you know, step out of the vehicle, and
you know they got a you know, there's a gun
on you. And I get that. I get that, you know,
having guns at the ready, you know that that can
go to your head, and having a that iota of
tenuous power can can really you know, corrupt people and
(17:18):
across the board.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
I'm not I'm not.
Speaker 3 (17:20):
I think that, you know, sort of the platonic ideal.
You know, the vision that pops in your head is
that there's a white officer when I'm talking about this,
But no officers can come in all colors. This is
a policing issue, as we've said since the beginning of
this show. However, in this instance, one thing I do
need to say is that in theory, a taser would
(17:45):
be a non lethal way of subduing a person who
is not being cooperative, right, unless you do it for hours,
and yeah, if you do it for a prolong period time.
And that was what I was going to say. We've
seen time and time again that actually these tasers aren't
(18:08):
non lethal. The people are dying left and right from
being tased by the police. And you know, again, it's
one thing if you like shoot, you know, a taser off,
you know, somebody drops to the ground, you know, that
sort of thing. But if you have five police officers
and you still need a taser, then you know, I'm
not sure exactly what's going on here, right, because the
(18:31):
police want to be heroes and tough guys and all
that sort of stuff. But none of this makes sense
and it never does in any of these you know stories,
and we end up with more dead people. And as
we've seen that time and again, is that the police
will end the lives often enough of black men with impunity.
(18:55):
This is our reality. And you know, people wonder we
don't have a great relationship with police. Why really, nobody
has great relationships with police unless they are like I said,
those straight you know, white you know, Christian males with
money and you know, that sort of thing. And there
(19:18):
are some exceptions. Why those the wives of those men
often yeah, they often get a kick out of the
police too. But you know, there's a good chunk of
us to see this for what it is, and it's
basically something that really needs an adjustment. You know, we
are not born to die. You know, our lives have value.
(19:40):
You can't just kill us and everybody just be okay
with that. And it happened over and over again. You know,
every time an airplane crashes, they do everything in their
power to make sure that an airplane will not crash again. However,
every time there's a school shooting, every time the police
ends a life of a black man or you know,
(20:02):
a person anybody needlessly, we figured out a way to
victim blame. We figure out a way to pass the buck.
And then it's just kind of more of the same.
And you know, we're not here to profess that we
have any answers. You know, we have a lot of
theories that we discussed back and forth on the show,
of course, but you know, our job is to kind
(20:25):
of point these things out so that you know about them,
because you know, whatever radio station you're listening to us
on it's probably very likely that at no point have
they covered this story. And it's probably very likely that
since we haven't been talking about all of these unnecessary
(20:46):
debts of black and brown people in the country at
the hands of police in the past two or three months,
that you don't know about them. We get them all
in our inbox. We just don't have enough show for
the content that we get. You know, we chose this
one because it's a little bit more high profile, and
you know, it's about time for us to remind you
that this is still very much going on day in
(21:08):
and day out. Now, I do want to read a
last little bit, just because I want to make sure
I'm telling as much of the story as I can.
So this is back to Yahoo News. Los Angeles police
Chief Michael Morris said Wednesday that it's unclear what role
anderson struggle with police played in his death, but we know,
of course saw the video and we saw him getting tased,
(21:29):
and then of course his heart stopped working, so that
was pretty.
Speaker 1 (21:33):
Clear for us.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
He said, and Anderson was an altered mental state, which
is something that we could deduce from watching the video
correct and claimed that a preliminary blood test showed he
had cannabis and cocaine in his system. And again the
emphasis there is that he claimed that the preliminary blood
(21:59):
test showed that. Now, from what I understand, I'm not
sure that cannabis creates like psycho know, hallucid, whatever effects
or whatever that stuff is. I don't know the first
thing about you know, cocaine or any of the rest
of that stuff, but I'm pretty sure that it doesn't
have that effect on people. So I feel like these
(22:21):
sorts of things are things that they throw in the
mix to try to again.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
Make it his fault that he's dead. They have to
dehumanize you, right, so that people care less about the
fact that you were murdered, right, And that feels very unfair.
But you know, doctor Malina Abdullah, co founder of Black
Lives Matter Los Angeles, said Wednesday that she believes Anderson's
death was the result of police violence full stop. So
(22:50):
I'll read this, Keenan's murder is absolutely horrific, Abdullah said.
As The Guardian reported, laped is not calling it a killing,
but calling it an incustody death. But Keenan was tasted
to death. We know LAPD caused Keenan's death. I again,
I don't understand why it takes this many guys, you know,
(23:15):
leaning on people's necks and you know, holding limbs and
all that sort of stuff to subdue a guy that
didn't look all that big. It probably couldn't have been
any bigger than me, you know, certainly not as you know,
didn't have sort of the mass that you have. Q.
So I don't know how easily you could take on five,
(23:37):
you know, police officers, but that seemed like could be
a tall order. I mean, the truth of the matter
is I couldn't. Thanks so yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:45):
And yet and still he needed to get tasted until
his heart stopped working. And now he's dead and we're
having to talk about this on the show.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
So again, watching the video, the young man got tased
because the officer had already taken his taser out. That's
why I have my taser out, so I'm going to
take figure out when to use it. Yeah, stop resisting
is what. He didn't do anything different like he did.
There wasn't some big move where he threw somebody off
of him or pushed somebody down or anything like that.
(24:13):
I have my taser out, so I'm tasing someone.
Speaker 3 (24:19):
Well, it's time for the Way Black History Fact. Today's
Way Black History Fact is sponsored by the Black Information
Network Daily Podcast, and as promised, we are going to
be reading pieces of doctor Martin Luther King Junior's letter
from a Birmingham jail, just to give you an idea
of who the man was, what he stood for, and
(24:42):
help you when it comes to dealing with his legacy.
Speaker 1 (24:48):
So I'll lead.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
April sixteenth, nineteen sixty three, my dear fellow clergyman, while
confined here in the Birmingham City Jail, I came across
your recent statement calling our present activities unwi and untimely. Seldom,
if ever, do I pause to answer criticism of my
work and ideas. But since I feel that you are
men of genuine good will and your criticisms are sincerely
(25:10):
set forth, I would like to answer your statement in
what I hope will be a patient, will be patient
and reasonable terms. In any nonviolent campaign, there are four
basic steps. One collection of the facts to determine whether
injustices are alive. Two negotiation, three self purification and four
(25:32):
direct action. We have gone through all the steps in Birmingham.
Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the
United States. Its ugly record of police brutality is known
in every section of the country. Its unjust treatment of
Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality. There have
been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in
(25:55):
Birmingham than in any city in this nation. These are
the hard, brutal, and unbelievable fact. On the basis of
these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers,
but the political leaders consistently refused to engage in good
faith negotiations. Then came the opportunity last September to talk
(26:15):
with some of the leaders of the economic community. In
these negotiating sessions, certain promises were made by the merchants,
such as the promise to remove the humiliating racial signs
from the stores. On the basis of these promises, Reverend
Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for
Human Rights agreed to call a moratorium on any type
(26:36):
of demonstrations. As the weeks and months unfolded, we realized
that we were the victims of a broken promise. The
signs remained as in so many experiences in the past,
we were confronted with blasted hopes and the dark shadows
of a deep disappointment settled upon us. So we had
no alternative except that of preparing for direct action, whereby
(26:58):
we would present our very bodies as a means of
laying our case before the conscious of the local and
national community. We were not unmindful of the difficulties involved,
so we decided to go through the process of self purification.
We started having workshops on non violence and repeatedly asked
ourselves the question, are you able to accept the blows
(27:20):
without retaliating? Are you able to endure the ordeals of jail?
Speaker 1 (27:26):
Now?
Speaker 3 (27:27):
Bear this in mind, because you may know someone listening
to us today. You may know someone that says, oh,
you know, those BLM protesters are all those people. They
always want this, but they're just going about it all wrong. Okay,
this is directly from doctor Martin Luther King. Okay, I'll continue.
You may well ask why direct action? Why sit ins, marches, etc.
(27:49):
Isn't negotiation a better path? You are exactly right in
your call for negotiation. Indeed, this is the purpose of
direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a
visis and established such creative tension that a community that
has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue.
Speaker 1 (28:07):
Boom.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
It's doctor King's words, my friends, I must say to
you that we have not made a single gain in
civil rights without legal and non violent pressure. History is
the long and tragic story of the fact that the
privileged groups seldom give up their privileges voluntarily. Individuals may
see the moral light and give up their unjust posture,
(28:32):
but as Reinholden Nieber has reminded us, groups are more
immoral than individuals. I guess it's easy for those who
have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, wait,
But when you have seen vicious mobs lench your mothers
and fathers at will, and drown your sisters and brothers
at whim, When you have seen hatefield policemen curse, kick, brutalize,
(28:56):
and even kill your black brothers and sisters with impunity, Boom,
when you see the vast majority of your twenty million
Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in
the midst of an influent society, When you suddenly find
your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek
to explain to your six year old daughter why she
(29:18):
can't go to the public amusement park that has just
been advertised on television. And she sees and sorry, And
see the tears welling up in her little eyes when
she is told that FunTown is closed to colored children,
and see the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form
in her little mental sky, and see her begin to
(29:40):
distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness toward
white people. When you have to concoct and answer for
a five year old son who was asking and agonizing, pathos, Daddy,
why do white people treat colored people so mean?
Speaker 1 (29:56):
When you take a cross.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
Country drive and find it necessary to sleep night after
night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no
motel will accept you. When you are humiliated day in
and day out by nagging signs reading white men and colored.
When your first name becomes the N word, I'll spare you,
and your middle name becomes boy, however old you are,
(30:17):
and your last name becomes John. When your wife and
mother are never given the respected title of missus. When
you are harried by day and haunted by night by
the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at
tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and
plagued with interferes and outer resentments. When you are forever
(30:38):
fighting a degenerating sense of nobodyness, then you will understand
why we find it difficult to wait.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
Wow. There comes a time when the cup of.
Speaker 3 (30:47):
Endurance runs over and men are no longer willing to
be plunged into an abyss of injustice where they experience
the bleakness of corroding despair. I hope, sir as, you
can understand our legitimate and un unavoidable patience. I hope
this letter finds you strong in the faith. I also
hope that circumstances will soon make it possible for me
to meet each of you, not as an integrationist or
(31:10):
civil rights leader, but as a fellow clergyman and a
Christian brother. Let us all hope that the dark clouds
of rachel prejudice will soon pass away, and the deep
fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear drenched communities,
and in some not too distant tomorrow, the radiant stars
of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation
with all of their scintillating beauty. Yours for the cause
(31:34):
of peace and brotherhood.
Speaker 1 (31:36):
M L.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
King Junior. Now, I do want to say this before
you swim. I know we've got a couple seconds. That's
not the full letter. I had to edit it down
for time, but please read it, put it up in
your room and your office.
Speaker 1 (31:51):
Live by it. But I wish the letter could be
made into a visual short film minus the context of
it being white racists wressers versus black people. Make it
anyone else versus anyone else, and the person on the
receiving side of that would be empathized for by any audience. Absolutely, well,
(32:13):
that's going to do it for us here on Civic Cipher.
Once again, I'm your host, Rams's Jock, he is Rams's
jah I amq Ward. Thank you guys for tuning in
with us again for another h ah man, another one
of these very very difficult journeys through some very very
difficult truths.
Speaker 3 (32:30):
Yes, indeed, but you know we're still here, We're still standing,
and we're still doing it for you. We appreciate you
allowing us to have these conversations and let's keep it going.
So tap in with us. Hit our website civicipher dot com,
and uh follow us on all social media at Civic Cipher.
Download this in any previous episodes.
Speaker 4 (32:47):
Subscribe, subscribe, share, subscribe comments all that donate as well,
and submit any questions or any topics that you want
us to cover.
Speaker 3 (32:58):
We do like hearing from you, and you know you
like having a conversation, not just us talking and you're listening,
So participate if it makes sense, and until next week, y'all, peace.
Speaker 2 (33:10):
Y'all, like yo, we handle it. These brothers are fabulous.
It's our lady showing you where vomb traveled. This w
speak to from sunlight to move, busting on stage like
then fights the mole c row my mic back. You're
like that journalist with journalists too. We can strike back
horb borders with orders from head, borders behind in the
(33:30):
beline side, step in the border, the press passage.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
We bring it to you as it happens.
Speaker 2 (33:35):
The streets love mocking from music and rapping, the street
compland the slash week expando. You're gonna fight the slander
with the proper propaganda.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
What's happenings ho, you've got a question to ask if
the news is just a TV show you're passing.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
And this from a white wartime journalist headlines wait, God,
prepas and resist like this like what like this, like
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