The Hijacking of Woke: How ‘Woke’ Shaped and Divided a Movement

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When did woke become such a controversial word? This episode unravels its powerful journey—from a symbol of awareness and social justice to a term used to spark division. Once rooted in the fight for fairness and equality, woke now carries layers of meaning that fuel debates across culture, politics, and workplaces. We explore how this transformation happened and what it says about today's society.

Focusing on real stories and history, we connect the past to the present, asking tough questions about freedom of speech, accountability, and the true purpose of awareness. Are we using words like woke to create understanding, or are they tearing us apart? This episode dives into the heart of listening, learning, and engaging in meaningful conversations. If you’re ready to see the bigger picture and rethink the power of language, this is the podcast for you.

Remember, your Perch isn’t just a place to sit; it’s a place to seek a higher perspective.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Greetings and good day um podcasters perch team.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Perchazoids, I know Perchlings.

Speaker 1 (00:13):
It's our first podcast after the new year, and
the new year has come in.
What is it saying?
Like a lion.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Well, you did your spiel last week in my absence,
right?
Well, when I was on my concerttour.

Speaker 1 (00:24):
That was yeah, so you kind of did a my absence right
Well, when I was on my concerttour.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
That was yeah, so you kind of did a river thing right
.
It wasn't.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
That wasn't a perch moment.
It was cool, though.
I liked that.
It was nice.
Well, thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:33):
It brought me some good zen.
I thought it was nice.
If you haven't seen it, go seeit.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
Well, thank you, babe , but the 2025 has started off,
came in like a lion.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
Like a lion.

Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, in every which way.
So, speaking of that note,remember that when we get into
this podcast topic.
The topic today is thehijacking of woke.
And other assorted tales, thehijacking of woke.
I literally need to pray aboutit and meditate.

(01:05):
I've been wanting to talk aboutthis and it's one of those
things where the saying is takethe emotion out of it.
It's hard to take the emotionout of it when the meaning is so
deep and you're deeplyconnected to it.
So pray for me, I'm going to domy best to take the emotion out
of it, deeply connected to it.

(01:26):
So pray for me, I'm going to domy best to take the emotion out
of it.
But what I won't do is not bewho I am and speak from my heart
.
And they're only my views, andthat's the whole purpose of
Perch.
We all see things from adifferent perspective, so this
is just my perspective andToby's perspective.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
So, as we've shared in the past I mean, we try not
to dodge any topics and so thereare a lot of topics that
there's quite a prevailingdifference of opinion around.
So I would say that I cameloaded for bear, but I'm sure
some bear would be offended andwant to find a safe cave, so I'm
going to avoid using thatexpression.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
You came loaded for bear.
You came loaded for bear, yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Okay, but I don't want to offend any bears and I
don't want them to have to gofind a safe cave.
So I'm going to just say I cameprepared to talk about what's
going to go on today.
So I asked you to slow down soI can catch that.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
But I got a feeling that one's just going to have to
pass me by.
Do you know the expressionloaded for bear?
No, babe, ah, okay, that's okay, don't need to know it.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Anyway, maybe it's my people.
Loaded for bear means ready foraction.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Oh, is that what that means?
Why loaded for bear, hey?

Speaker 2 (02:31):
you're going to have to talk to the bear about that.
I don't know why, but it's anexpression.

Speaker 1 (02:35):
Phil, did you know that one?
Why so many expressions?
Okay, phil knew that expression.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
I'm sure your people have your own expression for
ready to go.

Speaker 1 (02:42):
So, speaking of my people and their expression,
let's get to woke.
Okay, look at this segue Whoa,what a segue.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
You would have thought we planned that Stop it
Before we get into it.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
I really want to start off, to go back to the
tried and true, and we're goingto discuss oh, is this our
friends, the dictionary friends?

Speaker 2 (03:03):
Absolutely Smith and Wesson, wasn't it?

Speaker 1 (03:06):
Merriam-Webster.
I was close?
Not at all.
But anyway, before you get intoit, I want to really quickly
have a conversation aboutMerriam-Webster.

Speaker 2 (03:14):
You are shaking your finger there.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
No, I'm just expressing.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
Because I think at the heart of this is— we decided
they were dudes, didn't we?

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Can you focus?
Okay, I'm sorry, oh my God.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
Somebody just said to me that you know, thank God
you're on this podcast because Isuffer from ADD.
Do you think I suffer from ADD?
Look at you who are?
You talking to I don't know.
Oh my God, Don't make me do it.

Speaker 1 (03:39):
Jesus, take the wheel .
Mer, let me take the wheel.
We're not going to do this,we've got to take you.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
This is a serious topic, it is.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
And we're going to nail it.

Speaker 1 (03:55):
I'm so sorry, I'm sorry.
Okay, I'm sorry.
Okay, I'm sorry I'm back.
Okay, sorry, I have to livewith him.
Honestly, I do Pray for me.
Pray for me.
Okay, sorry, I have to livewith him.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
Honestly, I do Pray for me, pray for me.
We're going to start a GoFundMe.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
Did you get it out?
I think so.
I think I'm good for now.
At the heart of this isMerriam-Webster Because, just a
little context, merriam-websterhas been the quintessential
research reference point for usthe dictionary for 20 years.

(04:36):
For 20 years we have dependedon Merriam-Webster and he's
never let us down.
And how they define words.
Because we because when we makeup words, we'll say what.
What is it?
Is that the dictionarydefinition for it.
So stay with me.
Meron webster wrote stay woke.
What is the expression?

(04:56):
It says and this is directlyverbatim from Merriam-Webster
the new sense of woke is gainingpopularity.
What to know?
Woke is now defined in thedictionary as aware of, actively
attentive to important factsand issues, especially issues of

(05:20):
racial and social justice, andidentified as US slang and the
origin in African-AmericanEnglish, and gained more
widespread usage beginning 2014as part of Black Lives Matter
movement.
Again, remember, this isMerriam-Webster.
By the end of that same decade,it was also being applied by

(05:44):
some as a general pejorative foranyone who appears to be
politically left-leaning, andfor those of you who don't know
what a pejorative is, it's tobelittle the importance or value
of someone or something tospeak slightly about.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Talk about general yes, so now I'm going to put my
foot in it.

Speaker 1 (06:12):
Woke has become a grievance garbage, can.

Speaker 2 (06:15):
Anybody that has a problem with anything now throws
it under the guise of beingwoke.
And they've really, to yourpoint and to the name of today's
topic, they've really hijackedthe, the derivation of woke,
because I think you're going totalk about where woke really
started.
It started with with the blackcommunity right, and woke, by
definition, means be awake, bebe aware, be aware of what's

(06:37):
going on, be aware of yoursurroundings, be aware of how
you're being treated and andinequities and things like that.
And now everybody, everybody'sused it, as I said, as a
grievance garbage, can?
I don't like what you just said, so therefore I'm going to
complain.
I don't like the color of thiswall, so therefore I'm going to
complain.
I don't like the speaker that'sat my campus, so therefore I'm
going to be disruptive.
So it's gotten hijacked, it'slost its luster, because the

(07:01):
more people it tries to appealto, the less broadband support,
because other people push back.

Speaker 1 (07:07):
Yeah, and so I thank you for that.
I really want to give aspecific context, specific.
I really want to be specificbecause it's easy to say well,
it came from theAfrican-American community and
it was hijacked.
I think if people understoodthe roots of why it came and the
necessity for it, I really wantyou to think about it the next

(07:30):
time you try to use it and tryto weaponize it.
So let's just speak in factualterms, and this is according to
the Britannica.
It says the origins of woke.
It started back to give context,sundown towns.

(07:50):
So I'm going to explain to youwhat a sundown town is.
For those that you don't know,most sundown towns arose between
1890, after the Reconstructionera, and in 1986, after the
Reconstruction era ended.
In 1986, when the Fair HousingAct, which prohibited racial
discrimination for sale, rentaland financing or advertising of

(08:12):
housing.
Sundown towns conceded with aperiod in which black Americans
lost the right that had beengained immediately following the
American Civil War between 1861and 1865.
The term sundown townoriginated.
Numerous signs that was postedand limited such towns, warning

(08:37):
African Americans do not let thesun go down on you.
It's kind of like a curfew,right, yes, but why is this
important, say, tresha?
What does that have to do withwoke?
Thank you for asking.
Some of you know the context.
The Green Book Green Book, Ithink won an Oscar, I forgot for
which category, but that's thehistory of a Green Book was

(09:03):
created so black people thatback then, when segregation was
in the South, green book wouldgive you a place.
If you need a hotel, a placethat was friendly to say you can
, you can stay here, places togo to eat.
So when you are traveling inthis vast country we call
America, you still, even aftermovements, there's places that

(09:24):
still did not allow black peopleto live, sleep or eat.
So now, what does that have todo with woke?
So the purpose?
Because of that, they had tosleep in a car.
So we all have done road tripsand we know what it feels like,
and most of the time when you doa long road trip, you typically
break up the day Right.

(09:44):
You say, hey, we're going to goso far and then we're going to
stay overnight.
That was a luxury that blackpeople didn't have by then, so
they would sleep in a car.
So the whole point of sleepingin a car is saying stay woke
because you need to get out ofcertain towns by a certain time.
Woke because you need to getout of certain towns by a

(10:08):
certain time.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
So for all of you who didn't know that, that's where
that term came from.

Speaker 1 (10:10):
It is.
It was like stay woke, be alert, pay attention, know your
surroundings and know when toget out and where, where not,
where to stay and where not tostay.
Don't let the sun down catch you.
Now, even for African-Americansit changed over times where
when it was permissible to stayin the South, they still knew

(10:31):
those pockets they had to stayalert to.
That came up north.
Even in the north there werecertain places, they will say.
I grew up on the west side ofChicago, in the inner city, and
factually at the time in Chicagothey called them Bidox where
the train were, mexicans were onone side, blacks on one side,
don't cross.
So it's like know when you areon the wrong side of the tracks.

(10:54):
So that didn't change decadesafter decades.
So just wanted to give you alittle origin.

Speaker 2 (11:00):
But that's a perfect instance, because here is a term
that was used to specificallydeal with a racial issue or a
racial awareness and then, overthe course of time, it was
changed, it was altered, it wasperverted and it became a battle
cry for simply everybody and,quite frankly obviously not
being black, I would be somewhatoffended if I was a black

(11:21):
person Wait a minute.
You've completely you knowWhitewashed, exactly, you've
completely hijacked thisterminology that we've created
for us to maintain.
You know what we believe isvery important and, as I said
before, you've got all sorts ofother things being thrown into
this bucket and what wasconsidered before a very

(11:42):
legitimate and well understoodconcept is now one where people
get very offended by it.
Now you see everybody talkingabout cancel culture and the
woke and the safe space and allthat kind of stuff which never
had any place in woke before.

Speaker 1 (11:58):
So I'm glad you brought that up.

Speaker 2 (12:00):
Good.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
So then the question becomes well, tricia, you
literally went back to the 1800sand then you went through.
You know, the civil rightsmovement.
Why is that a question now?
Why is this an issue now?
So when you do research, itsays what reunited the topic and
came in.
What happened is 2014.

(12:22):
So I literally went through andI'm not going to give you all
the details.
It's out there, you can Googleit.
But any time that there is amovement and we Shall Overcome
was the anthem.
So when music started to takeplace in 2014, people like

(12:52):
Erykah Badu she did a song andone of her songs she mentioned,
you know, stay Woke and thenChildish Gambino and he
referenced Stay Woke don't letthem catch you sleeping.
So then the young people becamea battle cry during the
movement in 2014 when BlackLives Matter.
So that's why they referencedit.

(13:12):
But I want to really set theground and say, okay, we've been
having issues specifically, why2014.
?
Quick timeline for peopleFebruary 26th was the
anniversary of Trayvon Martindeath.
July 17th.
Eric Garner death.
August 9th.
Michael Brown death.

(13:33):
August 19th was the NationalGuard was deployed to Ferguson.
Tamir Rice death.
November 24th.
No verdict for Darren Wilson.
December 3rd.
No indictment for Eric Garner'scase December 13th the million

(13:53):
march protests on.
Washington.
So I think sometimes, you know,I know visionary, vision is
history.
I think sometimes the world isturning so fast and so much is
going on we don't realize.
When you have events like that,one after another, it creates
this.
What's the word for just thisenvironment?

Speaker 2 (14:17):
for things like that.

Speaker 1 (14:18):
So you got a push of all of these things happen at
one time in a country.
So what happened in that is itwas that battle cry for you to
know and don't look away, bealert, pay attention.
This is America, this is wherewe are now, and a lot of people
want to say enough already.
So you have one side saying toomuch is going on, don't look

(14:41):
away.
This is what we've become.
Stay woke, pay attention andremember.
At that time we were alsodiscovering a lot of America's
forgotten history, the forgottenhistory of where people were
talking about Tulsa.
This happened in America A lotof the things that were left out
of our history books.
All of this conversation was inan ether and you have people

(15:04):
that say I'm no longer lookingaway, and you have people saying
enough already, it's too much.
And that's where attention came.

Speaker 2 (15:12):
But what tended to happen and I think why woke in
general, in my opinion, hasbecome just a dying, a dead
approach.
There are really two things.
One of them is, I think, withwhat's going on with the economy
and inflation and unemployment,people are like I don't have
time to worry about woke anymore, so I think we're going to see

(15:32):
it lose some of its power.
But the other thing is, themore things you pile into it,
it's kind of like a bill beforeCongress.
If it's just to fix the roads,you can get a lot of people
behind that.
But if it's to fix the roadsand to build a stadium, then you
lose a couple people.
If it's a build the roads, fixa stadium and to build the child
care center, you're going tolose some people.
And by diluting a concept whichwas very pure in its in its

(15:55):
creation and its inception byadding you know, uh, whether you
, whether you care for them ornot, but the me too movement, by
by adding you know, equalrights, you know, or women power
, or the rights of trans, andall of those are perfectly
legitimate movements and shouldall have their own legs.
But they all kind of looked andsaid, wow, here's a word, woke.

(16:17):
It's already got some goodtraction.
Let's just throw our stuff intothe woke bucket and see how it
goes, and that's what's createdsuch a visceral response from
mostly the right, although we'lltalk a little bit later that
the left hasn't gotten the fullright to everything that's woke.
There are some things that theright does that are equally woke
.

Speaker 1 (16:37):
So let me dissect that for a minute, because
therein lies the issue for me,and I'll get into the heart of
my stance, which I haven't heardanyone say yet and I wish they
would.
When you say they, theytypically defines a group.
Who are they?

(16:58):
Because what I did not hear andwhat no one could say you heard
is the people that they'reaccusing of being woke, using it
in those terms, so meaning whenit came in, because now they're
saying you know it's, it's aanti-woke, is a leftist movement
, and we're going to get to that.

(17:19):
I didn't define it, that's howit's defined but it's the left
that's saying, some of the leftthat's saying, you know, and
using a word and weaponizing andtaking everything that comes up
and attaching it to woke.
And that's my issue.

Speaker 2 (17:33):
Woke has become a lack of tolerance.
Woke equals no tolerance.

Speaker 1 (17:38):
This is me, this is not Toby's opinion.
Woke is cowardice, because whatwoke does is remove you from
addressing specifically who youhave an issue with, because it's
easy for me to say, instead ofsaying Toby, you know you really
get on my nerve, but there areyour people right.

Speaker 2 (17:56):
I mean, you know when , something like that.
That's why I said woke is anabsence of tolerance.
So I've now decided that wokeis this, is this is this card
that I can play on the hand thatsays I'm not comfortable with
that, you need to be shut down,you need to shut up, you need to
be gone.
So when a speaker goes to acampus and I don't agree with
their opinion, nope, nope, I'mnot going to listen to it.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
I don't need to because I'm woke now, which
means that I don't have totolerate other ideas that I
don't want to hear, but here,even addressing specifically the
scenario that you've set, thatis, on a person who's calling it
woke, it is always on a personwho chooses to put that in a
woke umbrella, because it's theopposite of woke.
You can take it definition,because we're going to either

(18:39):
have to throw Merritt Websterout and just all get to free
ball this and decide and giveword power.
Whatever word we want to make,we want to give it meaning,
either we're going to havedefinitions and agree that
Webster is our point ofreference and we don't get to
recreate a word, because when itcame down to specifically to

(19:01):
college campuses collegefactually is nothing new under
the sun you can say it's gottenworse you could say and I'm not
gonna say it's always beenliberal, my point being my
greater point.
That's your point.
My greater point isuniversities have been the place
where we can talk.

(19:23):
We could disagree, but we cantalk.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
Had been historically .
Yes, Go ahead.

Speaker 1 (19:30):
Yes, had been historically, but the point
being when and if that startedto change.
Here is the problem aboutmaking a will.
We used to used to say okay, atDuke campus, this, this
professor was met with this hothostility on the campus of
Harvard, on a campus of Yale.

(19:52):
Speak to the exact situation,the exact circumstance and
address whatever issue you have.
It's cowardice to say thesewoke children no, the kids at
Harvard, no, the children atYale the students speak to it.
Address the issue when andthere.

(20:12):
It happened across the board.
And this is why, whenever yousay woke, I see you being a
coward, because any time that Ihave an issue, be it in a
corporate boardroom or whereverI sit, I question the source, I
question.
I'm sorry, help me understand,but when you make everything,

(20:34):
when you make woke, negative,you define it, you redefine it
and say that this is now anegative connotation and a
negative and you generalize.
You are doing the same thingthat you're pushing back on,
that you claim that you don'tlike.

Speaker 2 (20:51):
But don't you wonder when we stopped being so
tolerant?
When did we suddenly decidethat anything that I don't care
for has to be eliminated, notanything that we collectively
agree to and I know there's somuch we can get to?
I mean the whole concept ofhate speech.
I think we should probably haveour own podcast just on hate
speech, because that in itselfis a really interesting topic of

(21:14):
conversation.
But it used to be that if Ididn't like something.

Speaker 1 (21:17):
Can we talk about it a little?
I mean, when we're talkingabout words, can we Muy poquito,
muy poquito.
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (21:21):
But before we get to that, what I wanted to say was
that it used to be if I didn'tcare for something, whether it
was a comedian or musical lyricsor a speaker, I would not go, I
would not buy the ticket, Iwould change the channel.
And that was perfectly fine,because what I liked was a me
decision and what you liked wasa you decision.
And now, all of a sudden, ifthere are lyrics that I don't

(21:46):
care for, or a speaker on campusthat I don't care for, all of a
sudden, it's not good enoughfor me to just say I'm not
interested.
I've got to act out, I've gotto protest, I've got to be
disruptive, I've got to go inand throw paint across the
podium.
When did this start happening?
And we forgot that this worldis for everybody, not just you?

Speaker 1 (22:04):
So that's a lot to unpack there.
So just to take bite sizedpieces of it, I do agree with
you.
I do agree.
It concerns me that we don'tleave room for all speech
because if you, I want honesty.
If you, I want honesty.
If you don't like Jews, if youdon't like gays, if you don't

(22:28):
like black, I don't think thesolution is to not hear that.
When people tell you who theyare, believe them.
Let people show you who theyare and you believe them and you
respond in kind.
Don't ask for masks.
We literally had the KKK.
The KKK hid behind sheets andwe had no idea if this person

(22:49):
was our co-worker, our neighbor.
The sheets are off.
I don't want the sheets back andI think that's what we failed
to realize.
It's uncomfortable.
I don't like it.
I don't like hearing when youintolerant to women or gays or
Jews or blacks or anything.
I can't stand it.
But I always want to live intruth.

(23:10):
People, you can't have it bothways, even if we're going to
live in truth and be honest andthen judge people according to
that.
If you don't like it, don't buytheir music, don't buy their
books, don't support them.
If they get to the point wherethey violent or whatever, then
they should be punished to thefullest end of the law.
On the other side of thatspectrum, protest is our

(23:34):
constitutional right Peacefulprotest.
Don't judge people forprotesting.
Don't come out and belittlethem and put them down.
You have the right not to agreewith what they stand for, but
either we're all going to standor nobody stands.
We don't get to pick and choose.
We don't.
Either we're going to be ademocracy or we're not going to

(23:56):
be a democracy, and so I thinkit's important for all and we're
going to have to get away fromsides.
And it's hard because it'sbecome simple to say well,
you're just a liberal, or you'rejust a Republican, or you're
independent meaning ie, youcan't make up your mind.
You know I was like they don'teven want people to have an

(24:17):
independent thought anymore.

Speaker 2 (24:18):
So many of these things are just, and I think
there's a podcast that's calledlike Uncomfortable Conversations
or something isn't there, andthese are a lot of these are
really uncomfortableconversations.

Speaker 1 (24:28):
Because the truth hurts.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
Well, because and it's sometimes hard to reconcile
, I mean, from generation togeneration we have different
values or we perceive things ina different way.
So it's really tough to have aconversation, you know, with our
kids.
Sometimes it's hard, becausesometimes they speak a different
language or they value thingsdifferently, or their idea of
leisure and your idea of leisure, so it's all kind of

(24:49):
uncomfortable conversations.
But when it gets then to alarger sense, a larger scale
whether that's political withour political booth, or what's
going on in Ukraine versusRussia, or what's going on in
Israel versus Hamas, all ofthose are unbelievably difficult
conversations and the answer Idon't think in my mind is to
just deny that the other sideexists or to just dig in so

(25:12):
violently that you can'tunderstand that there are always
two sides to every story.

Speaker 1 (25:17):
And I'm going to oversimplify this and call
myself out before I make thisstatement, and I'm doing it just
for context purposes, becauseI've been challenged on me, my
desire to live in the truth, andI get a lot of pushback because
people want to.
When you have a belief system,they want to push you to show a

(25:40):
chink in your armor, you knowper se.
So, like Tricia, you reallywant to hear the truth, like I
really want to hear the truth.
Do you really want you know theperson told me to tell you that
you fat?
I'm just, do you, would you?
And I'm using that to make anexample when you care for people

(26:05):
and you love people, one, youowe them a truth, but you owe
that truth from a place of loveand kindness.
So, meaning, if you got to apoint where Something about the
person is unappealing orwhatever it is and I know again,
I said I'm oversimplifying thisfor a reason it is nothing

(26:25):
wrong with saying, you know, andpeople do it in different ways.
Some people are like, oh, let'swork out together, or whatever
the case may be.
Or you know what?
I see you and I see you asunhealthy and I really want you
to live a long time.
That is the truth and it maynot hurt you, but why?
Why?
And this is just me and I knowI'm different and I'm okay with
being out there on the island bymyself.

(26:46):
If you don't like me, don't actlike you do.
I'm okay with you being becauseI people know me, I've told
people you know what.
It's no offense you and I justdon't set horses.
I suggest you go your way, I gomy.
I'm not trying to tear yourspirit down, I'm not trying to
belittle you.
So when we have a problem withpeople going back to the woke,

(27:07):
when you have a problem with anissue or a group, whatever
generalization you are making,have the courage enough to
address that specific person,specific group, because we used
to do it and I don't know why wefeel like we have to
institutionalize feelings.

Speaker 2 (27:25):
You know, we institutionalize these things to
the point of like.

Speaker 1 (27:29):
I think we would all agree Institutionalize feelings.
I'll explain what I mean bythat.

Speaker 2 (27:32):
So we all, I think, would agree that when we're
hiring somebody, we want to hirethe most capable qualified
person we can find.

Speaker 1 (27:40):
I'm sitting up for this one, and we do, and it
doesn't really matter.

Speaker 2 (27:44):
Most people I can't speak for everybody, but most
people are looking for the mostcapable qualified person they
can find, but somehow we'veinstitutionalized a program that
somehow tries to force peopleinto behavior that they're not
comfortable with.
I'm a firm believer and I'vesaid this to treat.
If I could get asked for onething to happen in the DEI slash

(28:06):
equality movement, it would bethat no longer applications had
names on them or pictures of thepeople on them, because it
doesn't matter, because whatyou're trying to do is pick the
most qualified person.
So if I'm trying to pick themost qualified programmer, I
want to know what programminglanguage is in a number of years
.
I'm trying to hire a manager.
What has he done before?
Has he done a P&L before?
Has he done budgeting, or shedone budgeting or they done

(28:27):
budgeting, it doesn't matter.
So ultimately that decisiongets made.
But the moment you introduce thenotion of diversity, all of a
sudden you've got this voice inthe back of some people's heads
that say oh, that means I haveto pick the best equipped,
fill-in-the-blank minority andthat's.
I don't think what the movementwas created to do is to create

(28:50):
it to give everybody equalopportunity.
But again, we may do our ownpodcast on DEI.
The last thing I wanted to sayreally quickly was we talked
about corporations and theirlack of personality, or all of
that stuff, when woke gotstarted.
All of a sudden all of thesecompanies jumped on the woke
bandwagon.
What was bud light?

Speaker 1 (29:08):
oh, every time you say woke, I just cringe.

Speaker 2 (29:10):
But in any case, go go now with dylan mulvaney, or
you know, and we saw whathappened with bud light in april
of 2023.
People boycotted bud light.
They went from the number oneselling beer in the country to,
I think, number six, becausepeople pushed back and said we
don't want this.
Your values shoved down ourthroat.
And it's okay to be inclusiveand it's okay to have ideas, but

(29:33):
my ideas are mine, your ideasare yours.
I respect yours, you respectmine.
Cool, we move on.
You have a question?

Speaker 1 (29:41):
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (29:41):
Question over here.

Speaker 1 (29:42):
Over here, hand raised Question.
Oh God, help me, give me thewords to move my ego out the way
and say this Step.

Speaker 2 (29:52):
Donner.

Speaker 1 (29:53):
It is fascinating.
The power of the human ego isfascinating to me because you
literally just spoke for theintentions of a corporation.
That's the problem, Becausewhat people didn't consider, the
people that claim them to bewoke business humans were

(30:17):
created to evolve.
The central base of a businessis to how can we evolve,
revolutionize?
That's a reason for a companyJust hear me out and let me make
my statement Every majority ofany company majority because

(30:37):
some companies don't get mewrong are small.
They want to stay small.
I like my little shop on thecorner.
I don care to grow.
Much respect and love to you,but ideally most company,
especially corporations at theircore, want to grow.
How can we get bigger, stronger, faster, evolve, adjust, be

(30:58):
nimble?
That's what companies do, andbeing that does not.
There is no way to do that, oneway to do that, meaning that's
across the board.
So as you grow, you have anunderstanding, you have
enlightenment, you realize whereyour shortcomings are.
We tried it this way, but thatdidn't work for us.
So the assumption is and notsaying that some didn't do it

(31:20):
because it was trendy and thething that do?

Speaker 2 (31:23):
I'm not.
That would be my opinion, butwhat?

Speaker 1 (31:25):
you can't do what you cannot do.
You cannot speak for everycorporation's intentions.

Speaker 2 (31:31):
No one can Toby Well all I'm saying is large
companies jumped on the waveBecause, as you said, a
corporation's role is to surviveand thrive.
So the idea is, they said,here's a movement, it's gaining
traction, we're going to jump onboard.
I'm going to meet you and then,when it crashed into the rocks
and caused them huge losses ofmoney.
They all bailed on it.

Speaker 1 (31:50):
So I'm going to meet you halfway, Okay.
Corporations historically jumpon bandwagons and not a peep is
heard.
So if we're going to be morelean, driven whatever their
process is, whenever in businesssomeone finds another way to do
it.
Now we're lean, we're AI driven, we're this driven.

(32:12):
Whatever it is that createsbetter, more efficient, nimble
companies is what they do.

Speaker 2 (32:18):
Until it isn't, until it doesn't work.
Can I just?

Speaker 1 (32:22):
finish my point.

Speaker 2 (32:23):
No, no, absolutely not.

Speaker 1 (32:25):
No, what didn't?
Here's the fact.
The fact is and this is thearrogance the arrogance is that
this was something that wastrendy and because you saw what
happened to Anheuser-Busch andbecause you saw what happened to
a handful of corporations,that's fact.
That's the sample size.

(32:46):
So it's hundreds of thousandsof businesses in America alone.
So your sample size is five.
And just hear me out and I'mgoing to make my point.
And so you took that and say,oh, they tried it and it didn't
work.
I hate to tell you this and bethe bearer of bad news, but
before this anti-woke peoplecame along, dei was already in

(33:08):
existence, and DEI is still inexistence in a lot of
organizations.
And not only is it in existence.
Here's a fact.
You can check the data and lookfor the receipts.
Companies who are DEIdrivendriven perform and do
better.
That's just a fact.

Speaker 2 (33:24):
Okay, all I was going to say is the concept of DEI is
fantastic.
The execution of it isappalling.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
But here is why even your statement in there is
appalling.

Speaker 2 (33:35):
There is no model for DEI, so yet again, so how do
you institutionalize it and havea manager of DEI if you're
saying it's notinstitutionalized, it just came
up yesterday I shouldn't sayyesterday, because you may see
this podcast a week from now,two weeks from now, a month ago.

Speaker 1 (33:52):
But let's talk about the Senate hearings, and I'm
only bringing that up for onereason In the Senate hearings
they talked about and this isthe one with what's his
pronounced, his name Pete.
Hexeth Hexeth.
I struggle with Hexeth PeteHexeth, and if I say your name
wrong, forgive me.

Speaker 2 (34:08):
Sorry.

Speaker 1 (34:09):
Pete, charge it to my head and not my heart, but,
pete Hexeth, I try to getpeople's names right.
The point it came up was thestance that he was making on
women and how women weren'tefficient in the Army.
And when asked just to namespecific, where did this happen?
Where did you see women when itcome down to training them,

(34:31):
using a special set of rules forthe way you train women in the
service and where they train, hecouldn't name one.
And that's what.
A lot of times, that's whatwe're hearing.
Set of rules for the way youtrain women in the service and
where they train it, he would.
He couldn't name one.
And that's what.
A lot of times, that's whatwe're hearing.
It's this ideology we hear.
With women pilots.
They said well, they have adifferent set of rules for women

(34:51):
becoming pilots than than menof like.
Show us where it's documentedand this is what.
What's wrong with the internetand misinformation, because you
throw things out there.
And what he did say and I'mgoing to give him credit for it
he goes.
Well, he used the term and Imay get it wrong, but his
terminology was like well, itmay not have been written but

(35:11):
applied, so you can't name itbecause it doesn't exist.
You assume that the only waywomen got there is because we
had to lower the bar for them toget over.
It's offensive to women, andhere's the problem with DEI.
Dei has been weaponized, justlike well.

(35:33):
DEI literally means diversity,equity and inclusion.
And what people don't realize,who are anti.
I know women who are anti-DEIand I'm like you clearly must
not know the definition of DEI.
Dei is saying don't look at meand see a woman, see a capable
person.

Speaker 2 (35:51):
Don't look at me.
See these skill sets, see thesecapabilities.

Speaker 1 (35:54):
Exactly what you said to do.
Strip down all of that and seeme.
And then also, what DEI meansis have diversity of thought in
corporations, meaning everybodycan't be, you know, white collar
.

Speaker 2 (36:11):
They can all lead.
Everybody can't be an alphapersonality.
Everybody can't be an extrovert.
Everybody can't be a takecharge kind of person.

Speaker 1 (36:19):
And I know even in particular I know being in
business on the white collarside.
I've been in rooms where peopleare made fun of who are white
because they come from a ruralbackground and they speak with
an accent.
It was like, no, we don't dothat.
We need someone who's you know,from you know the inner city.
We need someone because we'retouching all of these markets

(36:40):
and all these places and we needto be able to address their
need.

Speaker 2 (36:43):
People, that is DEI and that's why I say the concept
is pure and it's perfect.
It's just when it touches us itgets screwed up, and then we
try to institutionalize it.

Speaker 1 (36:53):
Which us are we touching now?

Speaker 2 (36:54):
Once we try to make it into a position, a movement,
a role, with job descriptionsand saying, okay, now you've got
to go hire 10% Hispanic and 50%Whoa, whoa, whoa.
What ever happened to hiringthe best people possible?
And a quick shout out to ourfriends in California.

(37:14):
Here I'm going to talk aboutwhat's going on in LA with the
horrific fires.
But you know it's come to ahead with fire department in Los
Angeles where they've said thatyou know, when you want to find
a firefighter, you wantsomebody who has physical
attributes.
Okay, and unfortunately for themost part there are obviously

(37:35):
exceptions, but for the mostpart men tend to be stronger.
They're not smarter, they'renot more nimble, they're not
more agile, but they tend to bestronger.
They're not smarter, they'renot more nimble, they're not
more agile, but they tend to bestronger.
So one of the things that cameout and they said if you can't
carry a 150-pound man or womanor whatever, then you should not
be qualified to be in the firedepartment, unless you want to
be a dispatcher or have a jobthat doesn't do that.

(37:57):
So this is where DEI can get inthe way, the
institutionalization of DEI,because they say well, wait a
minute, if you're a man, youhave to carry 150 pounds.
Maybe you're a woman, only 120.
Well, that doesn't help thepoor person who's in a fire,
who's 145 pounds, to know thatthey weren't able to be saved
because there was a DEIinitiative underway.

Speaker 1 (38:18):
Oh, I'm not going down that road.
Yes, probably a good idea,because now I'm going down that
road.

Speaker 2 (38:25):
You told me it was probably a good idea.
She poked her.
Yes, you poked me, there we go.
You poked me, there we go.

Speaker 1 (38:30):
And I fell for it Because it but if that woman has
the same physical capabilities,the audacity of people.
Let's be real.
What is the common joke aboutpolice officers?
Love you, but what's the commonjoke?
They eat donuts and they're outof shape.

Speaker 2 (38:49):
Don't know anything about that.
That was for her.
Stop it.
Send your hate mail over here.

Speaker 1 (38:53):
Stop it.

Speaker 2 (38:54):
We love you.

Speaker 1 (38:56):
But my point being it's petty and trivial, but my
point being it's petty andtrivial meaning these are the
things we nitpick apart toseparate us and say see, the
woman is a weaker vessel, so shecan't do this Physically sure?

Speaker 2 (39:14):
Yeah, I think unless and the military is very much
the same way.
There are many roles within themilitary that women perform
better than men.
In fact, I would take a pageout of the automotive industry
just a quick detour here.
General Motors years ago did astudy and said here's a job, who

(39:36):
is better capable of doing it?
Based on their aptitude, skillset, patience and all of that.
And in many cases they'd saythat's a job better done by a
woman because of the attributeand skill set Doesn't mean it
was all women, but heavily doneby women Apathy, patience,
decision making.
Here's one that takes bruteforce and bloody ignorance.
I just want a Neanderthal to goin there and hammer this nail
into this board.
A man is better qualified forthat.

(39:58):
So you'll hear people like aJordan Peterson talk to that
fact that equality doesn't meanequality, that we're going to
force as many people to hammernails in that are women and men
and as many men and women thatare firefighters.
We need to understand thatthere are physical differences
between us that we can'tlegislate out.

Speaker 1 (40:16):
Here is the hole in your scenario.
We're talking about woke andnow we're getting to the
anti-woke, because that's at thecore of the anti-woke movement.
When you look at the definition, at the core of the anti-woke
is and I think his name is PaulGraham.
You can look it up and I'llattach links to this video and

(40:38):
you can research all of this.
I haven't it up and I'll attachlinks to this video and you can
research all of this.
A high heaven.
But in a, in a op-ed orwrite-up that he did, he he
mentioned the fact and and I andI will meet him half the way
that the reason why a lot of thepushback against the woke
movement is and he used thescenario of discrimination.
He goes most people canhonestly say they know it's

(41:01):
discrimination.
In America you really won't geta debate Like of course there's
racism, you know in America.
Of course his theory andspeaking on behalf of the
anti-woke, if one can, I'm not,but he was, he was His theory

(41:29):
was the problem with it is thatthe woke, they pretty much stay
in a space of the minusculemeaning.
They take the yeah and they makeit bigger, saying well, we know
racism exists, but it's not asbad as they say it is.
And we know there's policebrutality, but not at the rate
that they say it is.
And we know companiesdiscriminate, but it's not at
the rate that they say it is.
And so I'm going to reversethat.

(41:50):
I'm like it's reversepsychology.
So that's what the anti-woke isdoing to the rest.
So you're making a statementsaying well, we know that in
some places maybe some womenphysically aren't at the same,
but we're talking about aminuscule subset and that's
where we're dwelling.

Speaker 2 (42:09):
So you're throwing a baby out you literally are doing
.

Speaker 1 (42:12):
I'm saying to the end , not you.

Speaker 2 (42:14):
No, no, hear me out.

Speaker 1 (42:22):
The anti-woke movement is literally doing
exactly what they're accusing awoke of doing.
They're taking a small subsetand they, and, and when it came
down to books, they did it.
They started banning books,knowing that these books weren't
in children's school.
They knew these books were,even at the term that they had
issues, were taught on collegelevels.
They were never.
Not one case did you find theywere taught in elementary.
They just weren weren't.

(42:42):
And I said see what they'reteaching your kids in college.
They know they're fully grownadults by then.
See what they're teaching.
Because they took a smallsubset of something to apply it
to stoke fear, and that's allI'm talking about.
And the same thing with women.
They did the same thing withthe women.
These women are pilots.
These women are doing thesethings thing with the women.
These women are pilots.
These women are doing thesethings.
And some of these women arejust badass and you won't cop to

(43:04):
it.
And they can do it and havedone it.

Speaker 2 (43:07):
Well, I find one little case.
We need to to your point, we doneed to cop to it, but we also
need to be real about what thejob descriptions are.
To be successful in aparticular job, you know, I
could never be a brain surgeonfor a number of reasons.
But could I be a pilot?
Probably not.
And we need to look at each ofthese and say there are

(43:27):
intellectual skills that arerequired and in many cases,
there are physical skills thatare required.
No, would you not agree to that?

Speaker 1 (43:35):
Here is what?
Because it's laughable to me.
Because this is why it'slaughable Every job has a job
description.
Some of them may be halfthought out by some HR teams,
but hear me out Every job has ajob description.
It is demeaning, degrading andbelittling when people say that

(43:58):
they were a DEI hire.
When people say that they werea DEI hire, the only way you can
even get close to proving thatis if and I'm going to make a
point that counters this.
One is if the job was youneeded a master's degree and
they didn't have one, or youneeded this certain skill set

(44:19):
and they didn't have it.
And when you look at theirresume, especially specifically
some of these people who've beenbought up as another DEI they
even said the vice president ofAmerica would be a DEI hire.
I'm like, look at her resume.
You know how do you say thatwhen you come behind a man that
was never even in politics tobegin with, the math isn't

(44:41):
mathing.
So when you try to make peopleDEI hires just because they're a
woman or because they're blackor because they're gay, if they
resume meester qualifications,you don't get to say that, just
because how important is it thata fireman can carry 150 pounds?
We still on a fireman?
I am right on there.
How important is that On ascale of one to 10, how
important is it that a firemancan carry 150 pounds?

Speaker 2 (45:01):
We still on a fireman .
I am right on there.
How important is that?
On a scale of 1 to 10, howimportant is it that a fireman
can carry 150 pounds In?

Speaker 1 (45:06):
all fairness, and I'm not trying to do this just to
take the opposition.
I don't know.
I personally know a few firemen, but I don't know if everybody
does the same thing.
I really don't.

Speaker 2 (45:24):
I don't know if they're like, so I'm doing it, I
don't know.
Okay, so let's say those thatgo into the fire, not
necessarily those that aredispatchers or those that are
for the actual firefighters, whoare on the front line.
How important is it that they?

Speaker 1 (45:29):
can carry 150 pounds.

Speaker 2 (45:30):
If they have to do it and it's part of a job
description, then they have todo it Okay and if I have a woman
that applied, that can carry140 pounds if she qualified.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
If it says 150 pounds , but again the assumption is,
first of all, again, I don'tknow if that's happening, I
don't know if the bar's beenlowered and I don't know and
again, this is what I don't knowis every fireman that's out?
If every fireman that's on afire truck, does he carry the

(46:00):
ladder?
I don't know enough about thefire department to say so.

Speaker 2 (46:03):
If a gay trans applies and they can carry 175
pounds.
Are they qualified?
Yes, absolutely.
If a man, a white male, cancarry 140 pounds, is he
qualified?

Speaker 1 (46:13):
No, but my point being this is not a difficult
equation here for trans Right.
It's not.

Speaker 2 (46:21):
So why do we have to institutionalize a program and
put a title around it called DEI?
I say here's what you need todo to qualify.
Do you qualify yes, do youqualify no?
Not different goalposts fordifferent types of people.
Let's stop this idea of puttingpeople into buckets and say, oh
, unless it's a Thursday andyou're queer unless it's a
Tuesday and you're a straightmale ridiculous?

Speaker 1 (46:40):
No, it's not ridiculous, because here is the
narrative.
Why was that necessary to beginwith?
It wasn't, so you are tellingme that it was never necessary
for you to take a look aroundyour room and only see everybody
that looked like you.
But you hit it before I wantdiversity of thought.

Speaker 2 (47:00):
I want diversity of thought, I want diversity of
capabilities, but I don't needyou to be an Asian American or a
Mexican.
However, what they do do isthey, culturally, will bring
different diversity into anequation which I find very
important.
You and I know that you and Iwill have conversations and
you'll bring viewpoints to methat I would have never known

(47:21):
because of a different culturalbackground.
The fact that you're black tome and I know you hate when
people say I don't see color,but the fact that you're black
is less relevant than theexperience you bring.

Speaker 1 (47:32):
Why do I hate and I don't like the word hate- but, I
, totally dislike it.
Why do I so?
When you throw it out there,please give context.
I dislike it because we allshould see color.
Color is a beautiful thing.
When you get dressed, you getbored, you look in your closet
and be like everything I have isblack and white.
I need a little color.
Color is a beautiful thing.

(47:53):
See color, embrace color, lovecolor.

Speaker 2 (47:58):
But I'm going to hire you because of what you're
capable of doing and theexperiences that you bring, and
your physical and intellectualattributes and your social well,
you're black, I'm not gonnahire you because you're Hispanic
, I'm not gonna hire you becauseyou're a white, but I'm gonna
bring I want you to bring thatwealth of knowledge to our
organization so let me just putsome some, some facts and you

(48:18):
can research them and look themup.

Speaker 1 (48:22):
There's a thing called science and biology.
People naturally gravitate tolike and that's just a given.
So when you have a corporation,people gravitate to what
they're familiar with.
That's just human condition.
Gravitate to what they'refamiliar with, that's just human

(48:44):
condition.
So because that's in a humancondition, we do need things
like DEI and other things to say.
You have the natural proclivityto share spaces with people that
look like you, of certain age,and that's why when you looked
around in corporate America,corporate America was
predominantly all white, maleand older.
And then corporate Americadecided these guys are a little

(49:07):
too old, which that's a wholenother conversation, and as
ageism, we need younger, fresher, we need a different look.
So they went young, white.
So when you say that there wasintentionality put into that and
we didn't say just let mefinish when when we saw it and
we all saw it, and if you didn'tsee it you weren't in corporate

(49:29):
America there's no way you'vebeen in corporate America for
over 20 years and didn't see the, the age, ism and the
discrimination.
It was right there before oureyes and as a collective body we
said f all nothing, because itwas like it went from young to
old.
And that means, if you didn't,you know, my husband no longer

(49:51):
good for you, but my son is.
And so we were like okay.
But the minute we said okay,now you literally just change
and you went from young to old.
What about giving women a shot?
What about giving people ofother ethnicities?
Let's stop just gravitating tothis and look at everybody.
And so that was intentionalitybehind DEI.

Speaker 2 (50:13):
And so then it does the intentionality, but it was
there all the time.

Speaker 1 (50:19):
And we didn't call it out until we start to became
and it went from women and wewere okay with that because
women went back into whiteworkforce.
This is not me talking, this isme quoting data and stats and
it's all out there.
For anyone to disagree, you canjust look it up for yourself.
When the change women had togive back, white women were

(50:41):
higher, at a higher rate.
That's just a fact.
And it was like okay now,because you're more like my
sister, you know I can see mysister, I have some connection
to you and they'd be like butwhat about people you don't have
a connection to Because they'renot in your communities,
they're not in your church?
So how about looking beyond thepale?

Speaker 2 (51:00):
And that's all it was .
I just don't think that we cansocietally institutionalize good
business practice Becauseultimately, at the end of the
day, good business practice willpredicate that.
You said it before thathistorically we had white men
who ran most businesses and it'snot going to change overnight.

(51:20):
Even if you try to legislate,it's not going to change
overnight.
And that's part of the reasonthat I think people are getting
upset is that they're saying youcan't fix a wrong with a wrong.

Speaker 1 (51:29):
You can't do that.
Let me say two things realquick.
But we're talking about beingwoke though.

Speaker 2 (51:33):
Okay.
So there's an excellent articleI'm going to ask Tree to put on
our website around this.
That was done byhelpfulprofessorcom and on our
website around this.
That was done byhelpfulprofessorcom and I really
think it's a balancedassessment.
It really goes on both sides ofthe equation.
It says this is what the wokefeeling is, this is what the
people who are against it are.
But there's two things I want tocall out where I'm saying that
you can't institutionalizebehavior.
One of them is in Canadathere's a Bill C-16.

(51:55):
It's a bill that forces peopleto use trans people's preferred
pronouns and if they don't,they're in violation of human
rights code.
Okay, you're institutionalizinghow I refer to you.
So if Tree said to me, from nowon, my name is Dave, I could
say nice to meet you, dave.
And if I don't use her properpronouns, I could be in

(52:16):
violation of a human rights code.
So are we institutionalizinghow I behave Now if I don't want
to call her he?
You know she may not or he maynot like me, but that's that's
the decision that we make entrenous, if you will.
The other one that bothers me isthat there's this thing called
a day of absence.
Have you heard about this.

(52:36):
It's a college that asks whitestudents to stay home for one
day a year to discuss and thinkabout their privilege.
Okay, now this isinstitutionalized in colleges.
So again, we'reinstitutionalizing an opinion
that each person should keepinternally.
And we've talked aboutprivilege, and we should have a
conversation about privilege aswell.

(52:57):
I believe that there are thingsthat I am privileged about.
Does that mean I want to be hitover the head with it, with a
baseball bat, once every 365days?
Hell, no.
So why do we institutionalizecommon sense when we should
leave it to be done with commonsense?
And I really the last thing I'mgoing to say, I'm DEI and all
this Because common sense isn'talways common.

Speaker 1 (53:16):
Well then, those people will suffer.

Speaker 2 (53:18):
Those people can suffer the consequences.
But the moment we try toinstitutionalize a misstep with
another misstep, it's fraughtwith disaster.

Speaker 1 (53:29):
A misstep with another misstep.

Speaker 2 (53:32):
If we have a business model right now which is
predominantly white men, byoutlawing or creating quota
systems to get rid of white men,all you're going to do is
create anger on one side, andyou're necessarily not going to
get the best people.
Instead of saying let's just asI said to begin this, let's
just hire the best peoplepossible, get good cultural

(53:54):
backgrounds, get good diversityand stop worrying about whether
the person is Islamic or Jewishor whatever.
And the last thing I'll sayabout that is to be fair, woke
is not just left-leaning.

Speaker 1 (54:09):
Okay, I just quickly wanted to piggyback off that,
because your statement was and Ijust want to make sure if
that's the way you want to leaveit, we can leave it she's
trying to trap me.
I'm not trying to trap you atall.
I'm not trying to trap you, butyour statement is
institutionalizing.
It was like we want to changethe system by getting rid of
white men.

Speaker 2 (54:29):
That was the goal.
That was the goal of all ofthese programs was to, like my
sweatshirt here, make the worldmore colorful.

Speaker 1 (54:37):
And who gets to?
This is why words matter,because who gets to define?
That's what the goal was.
You define.
So how about the goal wasliterally in what it said
diversity, equity, inclusion.

Speaker 2 (54:51):
That was the intention, but that's not what
happened.
That's why I'm saying it gothijacked, because all of a
sudden it became do we haveenough black people?

Speaker 1 (55:02):
do we have enough hispanic people?
That's not the idea.
Do we have enough?
So you have every board roomand decided what conversation
was had in every board would youdeny that?
That's what happened yes, Iwill deny it, because first, of
all, I have to deny it because Ihaven't said it in every
boardroom.

Speaker 2 (55:16):
I've only said it in a few.
Then why does every applicationask you what your race and
gender is?

Speaker 1 (55:20):
Why?
So?
Now, the only thing thatthey've asked how long has race
and gender been on there?
Ten years Lies, Five years Lies, 20 minutes.
I have been working for over 30years and I've always been
asked what am I, what are you?

(55:41):
I'm confused.
Now she's confused.
They're going to put a box inthere called confused.
Black, white, hispanic confused, god, god, god love him, god
love him.
But anyway my point being beforeyou make me lose my thought
again that is to me, that's theway that it's been taken by some

(56:03):
and that was not theintentionality.
The intentionality, but that'ssomething in life we have no
control over Correct.
All of us show up with our ownintentions, and how you receive
my intentions are on thereceiver.
That's it.
So you are receiving thatinformation, as the whole point
of DEI was to cut back on whitemen and I'm going to receive

(56:29):
that in a different light, andthe spirit intention which I
received DEI is the.
The point of DEI is to makespace at the table for everyone
love and not exclude, and Ithink most people would agree
with your intention but if youare the majority and you're
predominant in there to, it'sgoing to balance you out,
meaning, if you are trulylooking at everyone and you are

(56:52):
truly looking at the best andbrightest, there is no way that
the number of white men at thetop can stay on top.
That's just math.

Speaker 2 (57:02):
And that will evolve out.
This isn't a revolutionarymovement.

Speaker 1 (57:06):
This happens over the course of time, right, but the
fear was when they start seeinga change and seeing diversity,
which the numbers are still low.

Speaker 2 (57:15):
It's still low.
Are there more black people incollege now than there were 10
years ago?

Speaker 1 (57:21):
Depending on what poll you look at.
Even as they send, it's goingdown.

Speaker 2 (57:24):
Is it really?

Speaker 1 (57:24):
But then in all fairness and context the number
of going down with Americans incollege.
So that's a whole.
That's another conversation foranother day.

Speaker 2 (57:32):
All I'm trying to get at is these things don't happen
overnight and you can'tlegislate.
You know people's, what arepeople's heads?
Over the course of time itchanges.
I said this on one of ourpodcasts.

Speaker 1 (57:42):
Well, phil said we need to be quiet and wrap up.
Oh, okay, the last thing.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
I'll say is my grandfather was more racist than
my father was, than I will be,than one of my son will be.
Things change over time and ifwe start to look at this and
understand that what we want todo is to get the best people in
the room to make the bestdecisions and we don't have to
legislate that, you know, itshould be common effing sense
that you want the best people inthe room.

Speaker 1 (58:06):
If you're going to go fight the fight and I love you
and I know that sounds good Well, it's no less idealistic than
what you're describing, and I'mgoing to really go out in the
fields with this, because whenyou say that and I know you have
good intentions like I'm lessracist than my father was and my
child here is the realitythough.

(58:27):
I'm here today, my child ishere today, and so I don't have
time to wait, and that's whatyou're seeing on the evolution
of people.

Speaker 2 (58:37):
So you're going to legislate the evolution.

Speaker 1 (58:39):
No, what I'm saying is I just like your point in
position.
A lot of times, people whoaren't in that scenario and
aren't the ones who areliterally being marginalized and
fighting for the seat to get atthe table marginalized and
fighting for the seat to get atthe table.
It's commonplace for the peoplewho've been at the table to say

(59:01):
but it's moving and changehappens slowly and it's a big
boat and all of these sayingsthey have about change happen
slowly and that's yourperspective and you have the
right to say that.
And I have the right to sayfight on.
I have to do because, from whatI know, you get one chance at
this thing called life.
So while I'm here, I don't havetime for you to wait on you to

(59:23):
catch on.
I have to keep pushing, I haveto keep fighting for change and
even in the back of my mind, Iknow what you say to be a truth,
that I don't care how hard youfight, it's evolutionary and
it's going to take time.

Speaker 2 (59:35):
You probably know this, but Don Lemon had Samuel L
Jackson on one day and DonLemon asked Samuel L Jackson how
do we get rid of racism?
What was his answer?
I don't know.
Stop talking about it, stoptalking about it.

Speaker 1 (59:47):
That drives me crazy when people go to one black
person, or Candace Owens, thisone said that's one person.

Speaker 2 (59:54):
That's one person.
Why do we have to continue?
Let's move beyond it.

Speaker 1 (59:58):
Toby, you cannot change.

Speaker 2 (01:00:00):
You can't legislate people's thoughts, you cannot.

Speaker 1 (01:00:02):
The bottom line is perfect example.
We just said it and youadmitted to it.
Had we took the stance that yousaid to take, most of America
would know about Tulsa today.
Yes, that's right have welooked at it and said that was
back then.

Speaker 2 (01:00:15):
Look up Tulsa Black Wall Street.
Very interesting.

Speaker 1 (01:00:18):
Right, but if they took the stance that you say,
tate and let's stop talkingabout race and move beyond, it's
still so much of our historyand our culture and that's every
ethnicity.
The Mexicans can say that, theAsians can say it, the Italians
can say it on their flight, itwas so much left out of the
books and then when we startputting them in the books and we
start banning books, so no,we're going to have to find a

(01:00:44):
way to keep talking and keepsaying it and keep working,
because the bottom line is we,the people of the United States
of America, in order to form amore perfect union.
Even your forefathers knew thatthis was going to be a work in
progress, so let's all get towork.

Speaker 2 (01:00:57):
Yep.

Speaker 1 (01:00:58):
Yep so before we.

Speaker 2 (01:01:01):
I think we mentioned it briefly, but our hearts and
prayers thoughts to the folks inLos Angeles.
As we film this, la is still inpretty tough shape.
So our best to the firefightersand everybody who's been
affected by this and if you canhelp in any way, whether you're
out there and can let somebodystay in your house or provide

(01:01:21):
some financial help I know thata lot of people are on board and
we just want to join that andjust share our thoughts and
prayers.

Speaker 1 (01:01:27):
I absolutely do, and I think that's a great point.
It even ties into the thingtoday about being woke At the
end of the day.
Let's all wake up.
We are our brother's keeper andhardship knows no color and
hardship, knows Absolutely whenmy brother is down and if we're
going to say we're patriotic andwe are Americans, when one is
down, all are down.

(01:01:48):
So, again, more than hearts andprayers, we need to find out
what we can do to help, becauseone day it's North Carolina, the
next day is California and youknow that'll be us.
So, as we wrap and I know we'vedone a perch, perk, peak, at
the end and it's literally, andI was doing it it was very

(01:02:10):
contrite because I'm not aperson that read from a
teleprompter and I don't dosigns, and it was agonizing for
me to look back.
I just want to speak to you andsay again that's just my
position.
Toby has this position, but I dopray that we get back to having
conversations.
I do pray that we stop banningeverything and agree to disagree

(01:02:34):
and understand.
There is nothing wrong with notagreeing.
It's nothing.
What matters is that I listen,I listen, and so that's all we
can do.
Even if you're in disagreement,just listen, show up with the
spirit of listening.
I almost said I'm married tothis man.
We're not married.

Speaker 2 (01:02:53):
Y'all ball and chain over here.

Speaker 1 (01:02:54):
We are not.
Oh calm man, we're not married.
You're balling Shane over here.
We are not.
Oh, calm down, we are notmarried.
But I get up every day andthese conversations that you
hear typically stem fromconversations that happen in our
home.

Speaker 2 (01:03:05):
To be honest, we need to learn to disagree without
being disagreeable.

Speaker 1 (01:03:11):
And I tell Toby that all the time and I say you know
what?

Speaker 2 (01:03:15):
And then she makes me sleep on the couch.

Speaker 1 (01:03:16):
I don't try to agree with him.
I just try to hear him out.
I don't want him to agree withme when his spirit really
doesn't agree.
I just need to know you hear meand you care enough to listen.
And if you care enough tolisten, maybe we'll find a
bubble in the middle.
Until we meet again, take care.

Speaker 2 (01:03:34):
Be well.