In This Episode
Jury finds Alabama police force operated as a ‘criminal enterprise’, Joy Reid’s MSNBC show canceled, Luigi Mangione’s lawyer receives key evidence from HBO doc, and Voletta Wallace, mother of Notorious B.I.G., passes at 78. In the final week of Blackest Book Club, Kaya interviews author Michael Harriot about his book titled Black AF History: The Un-Whitewashed Story of America.
News
Alabama police force put on leave after grand jury says it operated like a “criminal enterprise”
Luigi Mangione’s Lawyer: NYC Mayor Shared Key Evidence on HBO ‘Before Defense Had Even Seen It’
Voletta Wallace, the Notorious B.I.G.’s Mother, Dead at 78
Joy Reid’s MSNBC Show Canceled in Major Shake-Up
MSNBC’s Joy Reid addresses homophobic blog post controversy
Kennedy Center reeling from ‘stunning’ ticket sales collapse after Trump takeover: report
Follow @PodSaveThePeople on Instagram.
TRANSCRIPT
DeRay Mckesson: Hey, this is DeRay and welcome to Pod Save the People. In this episode, it’s me and Myles talking about the news that you probably didn’t hear with regard to race, justice and equity from the past week. And then we highlight one more author from our 2025 Blackest Book Club reading list, in collaboration with Reconstruction and Campaign Zero. And then Kaya sits down with the one and only Michael Harriot to talk about his book, Black AF History: The Un-Whitewashed Story of America. Download the full Blackest book club reading list today. Here we go. [music break]
[AD BREAK]
DeRay Mckesson: Hey everybody! We are excited to be back. Unfortunately, this is another big week of wild things happening in the federal government. But there are some other good things happening in the world. It is me and Myles today, but you will hear Kaya because she has an incredible interview coming up after the news. But this is DeRay at @Deray on Twitter.
Myles E. Johnson: This is Myles E. Johnson at @pharaohrapture on Instagram.
DeRay Mckesson: So Myles let’s just jump right into it. It’s been a lot going on. I almost don’t want to start with the Trump stuff because–
Myles E. Johnson: I feel like it’s been a really slow news week. Like nothing going on. It’s been slow.
DeRay Mckesson: No no they fired, the CIA’s purging people.
Myles E. Johnson: That was that was sarcasm. That was that was–
DeRay Mckesson: Okay I’m like Myles, what world are you in?
Myles E. Johnson: I’m. I’m sorry. You have a you have a you you’re you just got off of a long flight. So–
DeRay Mckesson: I did get off a long flight.
Myles E. Johnson: That was sarcasm, sarcasm, sarcasm. [laughing]
DeRay Mckesson: Okay, let’s start with the Kennedy Center. So if you did not see Donald Trump has made himself the chair of the Kennedy Center Board, he also purged some people off the board. We know that Shonda Rhimes, she she resigned. Issa Rae would not have her uh show be there. And recently, the Kennedy Center has announced that they are experiencing a 50% drop in tickets after Trump appointed himself. And it’s like, you know what people shouldn’t go back there. But it just all seems like one big mockery of of just everything art, culture, the Black History Month thing at the White House just seemed like a farce too. Kodak Black is, the White House official White House is posting Kodak Black looking out the window and making faces. And you’re just like what is going on?
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. If we’re being honest, I found the Obama era stuff just as much as much of a farce. I found that just as strange to see these um–
DeRay Mckesson: Not just as strange. Not just.
Myles E. Johnson: That’s what I, I found it just as strange.
DeRay Mckesson: Okay. [laughter] No.
Myles E. Johnson: I found it I found it just as strange, and just and um more than just as strange. Just as manufactured. That that was kind of like my first. It was the Obama stuff. Where where I first started recognizing how people were going to the White House because it wasn’t really cool to go to the or let me let me put it this way, it wasn’t in the realm of cool in my world to go to the White House and like that be aspirational. But it was during the Obama era where I found, saw more people wanting to go to the White House. Um. Friends as I as I kind of went into different spaces, friends wanted to go to the White House, but then also celebrities and artists wanted to be associated with the president, where that just was not cool during the Bush era, which is my coming of age era. So but looking at it and then seeing people and rappers who I know had deeply political eras and deeply um anti-colonial eras or people who were pro-gay and Obama was, you know, anti-gay for a lot of his for a lot of his tenure, specifically when he was trying to get elected, wanting proximity towards it, it felt just that was when I first noticed, oh, this White House stuff is public performance, and I never consider it that way.
DeRay Mckesson: But what about the Kennedy Center stuff?
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah, I don’t. I don’t think I care.
DeRay Mckesson: Or the post office.
Myles E. Johnson: I don’t think I care about the Kennedy Center stuff. I think what I’m most concerned about is how this stuff and how the DEI stuff is used to capture our attention on things that don’t necessarily affect um your your average Black person. So what I’m noticing is like a pattern to maybe use um celebrities or public artists or public moments to disrespect Black people, to agitate Black people. Where it doesn’t matter what Shonda Rhimes or Issa Rae is or is not doing to the average Black person. And I think that these moments are kind of used to, to, to just to get us kind of riled up and that that’s the thing that I’m hoping that more people wake up to is that, you know, as hard as it might be to maybe elevate the conversation or evade certain conversations because they’re poking at you, that certain conversations are designed to poke at you. Because if you’re talking about the Kennedy Center thing, then you’re not talking about maybe the the the the, the higher risk things that Trump is doing. So–
DeRay Mckesson: I’m surprised at you.
Myles E. Johnson: That’s how I be pacing myself.
DeRay Mckesson: I don’t know, I didn’t think you’d say that only because I, you have made the point before on the podcast, and many times that the um that sometimes we do a disservice to the to the overall work by not understanding the relevance that culture has in manufacturing political conditions. Right. So when I think about the Kennedy Center. I’m actually interested in what happens when, like, you know, culturally, we will just wipe out anything that is not white art from major venues. Kodak Black on the Instagram of the White House feels like distraction to me, but all of a sudden, making something like the Kennedy Center Honors or making the Kennedy Center, which is such a big venue, like–
Myles E. Johnson: Two separate things. I do not care about the Kennedy Center. I do not care about the Kennedy Center Honors. I don’t agree with hierarchal evaluations of art or of culture. And I think that that has been a thing that has like gutted the integrity of Black art um in America. So I abolish all it all. If I if I’m being honest with you. But the thing that I was kind of coming into was me speaking as somebody who’s here on what’s today’s date? February 23rd, 2025. So my tactic this week probably is different than what it would have been, let’s say, in October. What I’m saying now is there’s so much coming at us all at once. And then if we’re talking about DEI and then we’re talking about Kodack Black, and then we’re talked about the Kennedy Honors, what ends up happened, then we’re talking about Tiger Woods. What ends up happening is that we’re always kind of talking about these different things that kind of agitate us because of our parasocial relationship with celebrity and with culture and with art, which is is beautiful. But right now we have other. It just feels like that may not be the best use of our attention and our focus right now, because there’s so many things coming at us at once. I wish that we were in a space where that could be the whole conversation, but we just aren’t. Chopped food stamps are going to have to be.
DeRay Mckesson: So what are what are the big things to you? Is it is it the firings?
Myles E. Johnson: I think–
DeRay Mckesson: Is it the–
Myles E. Johnson: No, I think well. I think the, the firing is the big thing for me because I think so many Black people have federal jobs, and also so many Black people who are in the middle class are having federal jobs. And I, depending on how this all goes, you’re going to start seeing even more Black people who maybe were that paycheck or that year away from their own financial um ruin that’s going to start actualizing. So you’re going to see Black people, were already as Black people in a growing poverty. There’s a growing poverty class in Black America. Period. There’s a stat that shows that Black people uniquely, if you were born out of poverty, or middle class, or upper middle class, as a Black person, you’re more likely to return to poverty class in your lifetime as a Black person. So we’re going to be seeing that. So that scares me. Um. But then yeah. And then the real economic things. So I’m just kind of waiting and seeing about the real economic things as far as um Medicare, food stamps, these are things that social. Yeah, I mean yeah Social Security, these are the things that I’m waiting to see how it comes out in the wash. The other thing that I’m waiting to see, because that $5,000 comment or that that thing. Trump and Elon hinted at there being some type of $5,000 refund to the taxpaying um American for all the things that they cut from DOGE. So DOGE went in and slashed all these programs, and now that gave so, so much surplus of money that they’re going to be able to give um $5,000 to each American. And everybody says, you can’t do that. And I’m sure people who are the same economists who are trying to talk to the American people to not get Trump voted are saying that he can’t do that. But Trump just doesn’t seem to be somebody who um where that works on. So I’m and if you’re plugged into this many billionaires and Elon then it’s like I think you could I think you could ask for some favors specifically if that is to um pacify a public whose rights and systems are being, you know, gutted and and you get the $5,000. That’s what that’s what helped it. That’s what worked with Covid is is that so. If Trump has a chance to give even more poor people $5,000 with his name on it like that, that scares me that that terrifies me.
DeRay Mckesson: Do you think that it will, you know, I heard that too. I’m, I don’t know how long this lasts. I don’t. And a part of me the 5K I think would be a thing, but I just don’t think it’ll come out in the wash in the sense of like 5K and you being unemployed, homeless and no health care won’t feel like anything for very long. And and even the uh, the layoffs or the firings of the federal government felt pretty distant to me. Until I know some people in my life who suddenly are unemployed and like, you know, they they were just a couple of paychecks away, and now they’re trying to figure out what they’re going to do, and a 5K check will do not a thing for them if they have to, but, you know, like it is. I’m interested to see what happens with the aggregate of all these pretty wild decisions. And I’ll tell you, I just flew back from London and I’m on a plane. I’m like not nervous to fly there, I’m like the London people, they feel their FAA’s fine. I’m nervous to come back. I’m just like, goodness gracious, you are still literally laying off FAA workers. And I just don’t know. And granted, they’re not flying commercial so they don’t care, but I just a part of me doesn’t know how long the tear down strategy lasts. Like I just like at a point you will fire like this will start. People will start feeling this in a really personal way soon enough, in a way that poor people are feeling. You know, Head Start is uh Head Start money has been frozen, the food pantry money’s been frozen. So like people are feeling it in some ways, but I just don’t know how long this lasts, I you know. And they they didn’t realize it was tax season and laid off 6000 IRS people. I’m like, what this feels like is going to happen is that they’re going to make a crazy deficit like an insane deficit and then leave. And whoever comes next, it’s gonna be a nightmare if there is a next.
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah, yeah. Perhaps I, I’m just a little bit more cynical about their about their plans. I’m, I’m really cynical about Trump’s election, the legitimacy of it. I’m cynical about um there being any. I’m I’m cynical about somebody being able to go through all of our data and who had access to our voting mechanisms, and now we do have somebody who can just decide what he wants. So I’m just I’m I if you can manufacture consent through tech and technology, you know, then then it’s like you could you could do whatever you want to do. And people can yell as long as they want to and as loud as they want to. But what are you going to do specifically if you can turn, you know, 1000 votes into one million if it’s your prerogative so.
DeRay Mckesson: Is there a voice on the left that you or like a political leader, that you’re like, wow, you really are standing up to him.
Myles E. Johnson: Um. Who’s living?
DeRay Mckesson: Standing up to Trump. Yeah. Or is it or is that even a thing? Like, is that what you expect of the of the politicians to challenge him or to, I don’t know. Oh did you see the exchange with the governor of Maine?
[clip of President Donald Trump] The NCAA has complied immediately, by the way. That’s good, but I understand Maine is the Maine here, the governor of Maine?
[clip of Janet Mills] Yeah I’m here.
[clip of President Donald Trump] Are you not going to comply with it?
[clip of Janet Mills] I’ll comply with state and federal laws.
[clip of President Donald Trump] Well, I’m we are the federal law. Well, you better do it. You better do it because you’re not going to get any federal funding at all if you don’t. And by the way, your population, even though it’s somewhat liberal, although I did very well there uh your population doesn’t want men playing in women’s sports. So you better you better comply because otherwise you’re not getting any, any federal funding.
[clip of Janet Mills] See you in court.
[clip of President Donald Trump] Every state. Good. I’ll see you in court. I look forward to that. That should be a real easy one. And enjoy your life after governor, because I don’t think you’ll be in elected politics.
Myles E. Johnson: And I think maybe the last episode, I was kind of pushed on this too, around me, just feeling this feeling of kind of political depression, specifically among um Black folks and poor Black folks, younger Black folks, and just the people I’ve been in community with and people I’m not being in community with, just [?] like just, you know, rant like kind of random talks. And I felt kind of legitimized when I saw a whole lot of articles come out, come out, talk about the lack of Black people at these protests. And um and I think I see so much of this pushback on Trump that’s public from all people, not just the governor of Maine, but a lot of different people as so, so, so little, so, so, so late. And it just doesn’t move me. And it’s hard and it just if you told me this came from 2017, I wouldn’t know. If it came from yesterday, I wouldn’t know. So I think that Palestine was a leading reason why people didn’t show up to these um to to vote. And I think that all this other stuff that’s going around and all this other stuff that is um being shown to kind of to, to, to, to, to attract people into, into, into more of an emotional response is just it’s just empty.
DeRay Mckesson: Hey, you’re listening to Pod Save the People. Stay tuned, there’s more to come.
[AD BREAK]
Myles E. Johnson: So something I do deeply care about, which is um health care and Luigi, um did you see the tweet DeRay that says Luigi’s lawyer says she was learning about his case from an HBO documentary because the police won’t share the evidence they claim to have, but they’re sharing it on HBO. They’re working to make sure he doesn’t get a fair trial. And I feel like the focus should be more on this than his looks. So this was a response to somebody um posting a gorgeous headshot of Luigi but um one of the things the lawyer revealed is that they have all this evidence, but HBO has this and they don’t which is showing that, oh, they’re trying to sway public attention. Um. How do you feel about that? And I don’t know, do you think that this story is going to be able to even swim with the current news cycle and how, like the news, how the news is right now?
DeRay Mckesson: Oh, that it [?], you know, I don’t I think that they really overplayed their hand. I think they thought he was going to be like this scoundrel, and people were going to be like cold blooded murderer. And then that didn’t happen. And I think there’s no way he gets convicted. Like I, I think that they’re going to try and work every angle to force him into a plea deal. Like that’s what this seems like. Like that’s why you withhold the information. They be like, I got it. The moment we show the jury, they’re going to convict you. Like, I just don’t think this is going to trial. I think there’s no way he gets convicted at trial. That’s what I’m trying to say.
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah, yeah, I’m just, like, curious about what it like, what it means. [laugh] Like–
DeRay Mckesson: You don’t think it’ll you don’t think it’ll get in the air and the like you like the government stuff is too crazy that this just won’t cut again?
Myles E. Johnson: Um. I don’t think so. I’m hoping not. My gut, like my gut is saying that, you know, once everything gets its motion, people will start caring. My my my bigger hope that might just be fantasy is that Luigi is really good. Luigi and Luigi’s lawyers are really good at articulating um concerns. So like I have to be honest with you, I was looking for um uh a courtroom fantasy, so I do. I did want to see Luigi talk articulate frustrations about health care and about billionaire money and even the donation um for $30,000 that went viral, which was from a person who deemed themselves to be independently wealthy, understood that the the the energy around Luigi. Let’s just say that. Um. And I really am excited about that because I’ve. I’ve just been hungry to see a conversation around class that feels deep enough. And this feels deep enough because it is, it is wrapped up in um in in, in, in that crime. And it felt like it was keeping people’s attention. And it feels like nothing else, specifically in the last ten years has really captured people around class. And this felt like a, like a, like a silver bullet. So I’m like, ugh I don’t want it to just float away.
DeRay Mckesson: And it was like all races, all like it wasn’t like, you know, it was like he very quickly became sort of somebody that people across coalition lines that don’t normally all reach the same conclusion. People were like, yeah, this doesn’t really make a lot of sense. Well did you see um I was literally at dinner yesterday when I got the alert on my phone about Joy. Joy Reid’s show being canceled. And I was frankly really surprised because, you know, she’s been on, she’s been on MSNBC for a long time. She’s had a solid show. It’s a consistent listener base. It might not be as high as some other shows, but to say to suggest that Joy’s not like a real presence on MSNBC would just be untrue. Um, and people have a lot of theories about it. There’s some organizing happening to put pressure on MSNBC. And as you know, Rashida, who is the president of MSNBC, a Black women she stepped down. There’s a new guy at MSNBC. So they’re replacing I don’t know if you saw this. They’re replacing her show, which is a 7:00 spot with the panel show that now is on the weekend with Symone, uh Michael Steele and um Alicia Menendez. Jen Psaki looks like she’s getting a new timeslot, as you know, Maddow’s back um and and Chris Hayes’s show. I think still he still Chris still has a show and Ari Melber still has a show. But I’m surprised that um that Joy will and Sharpton still has a show, that Joy will be off air. Uh. What what did what did you think of that?
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. I feel like I wasn’t as much as a regular MSNBC watcher. [laugh] So I think seeing the trends for legacy media um that the the news on its face didn’t surprise me. I was like, yeah, and I’m sure 10,000 other people about to come down the pipeline who are getting fired too. [music break] You know, um and I’m sure they’re shrinking, they’re continuously shrinking until um everybody will eventually get fired um uh but then, thankfully, because of the news and because I knew you were going to bring this up, I kind of went into my own little research rabbit hole, because the last person who really uh captured my attention who was associated with MSNBC was Melissa um H. Perry, and I liked the talk that she had with Bell Hooks and during in that talk, right before she had got fired, she speaks about how the only reason she’s able to articulate these things on television is because a white man said that she couldn’t articulate these things, and I didn’t realize that Joy Reid was her, like, direct replacement um after she got fired. So I thought that was really interesting. And other times where, again, like that kind of era of, you know, and age group of Black people, she had her own homophobia that came to light as well. That was my other interaction with um with Joy Reid in in her work with saying all that, I was like, but what was it? Because I was like it’s not the homophobia. It was not. I was looking at what she was saying, and I was like, I don’t really think it’s the anti-Trump stuff, I really don’t. And then I see that she was one of the very few people to call what was happening in Palestine a genocide. She was one of the very few people to articulate um what was happening in um Gaza as wrong. And I think that it I think that we would be missing the whole point if we don’t see the connective tissue, no matter how you feel about these individual people. But Amanda Seales had Zionists come to her show and say she couldn’t do it in Philadelphia and got her show canceled. Um. Briahna Joy Gray has articulated that what got her fired from the Hill was was, was Zionism. And now we see this Black woman who was on television speaking truth to power about what was happening in Palestine. And we see her erased, too. So I do think there’s a pattern here. And um and just to be clear, the only reason I brought up her homophobia in this scenario was, was because I was trying to search for, like, what was the thing that pushed her out outside of like, let’s say, Symone or something because I just don’t know, and I and and and that’s why I wanted to bring that up. But I think everybody can like, grow and move beyond certain ideas and stuff like that. But I just had to be honest about what I was finding so that that’s those are my first um my first looks. And I think us not naming that is a little bit um dangerous too. Like the not naming the pattern. And I think, yeah, I think I think us seeing that pattern of Zionism and and and speaking out against Zionism and for Palestinian um folks is leading to people’s erasure from um from the media. I think that is an important pattern to um articulate too and to see and to see happening, because it’s not just opinionated Black woman leaves for no reason.
DeRay Mckesson: They didn’t give any official reasons. But I think about like, Don, Don losing his show. I think about um Joy losing her show. I’ll be interested to see what she does next. And you know, like who is Black on news. It’s like Abby is on CNN. Symone is on MSNBC. I literally don’t know who’s on Fox. So I don’t know if there’s a Black person on the Fox network at all. Sharpton is on MSNBC. Is there anybody else? Hey, you’re listening to Pod Save the People. Stay tuned. There’s more to come.
[AD BREAK]
Myles E. Johnson: What I am curious about too is how the pundit class does um uh in independent media. And then I’m also just interested in [breathes in] I just think that Black people on the left’s political voice have been gutted, and I think that people who participated in being a part of this kind of like pundit class of people who slowly but surely, a lot of the rhetoric became um centered around Trump, or centered around their um own kind of like Democratic Party interests have lost a lot of the the sway they’re going to have with other Black people. So I, I’m, I’m, I’m hopeful, but I’m also realistic because I’m trying to see like where it’s just it will just be interesting to see where Joy-Ann Reid, who’s not who’s not Don Lemon [laugh] in a lot of ways where she lands um specifically, I’m thinking in one or two years, I’m sure the response to her immediately will be great and it will be big. But I’m I’m fearful that her dedicating so much time to something that I feel like a lot of Black people were beginning to ignore, or um tune out. It has it has kind of left her with not a whole lot of um huge standing with the with the, with the greater Black community. Um. Who I’m who I’m kind of, like, consistently worried about. Consistent concern about.
DeRay Mckesson: I’m always reminded too that, you know, she came up through blogs. She came she was like a OG like I think she was the Grio.
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah that’s where the homophobia was. Yeah.
DeRay Mckesson: Wasn’t she the Grio, she was the Grio?
Myles E. Johnson: The homophobia was on her personal website, not on the Grio. I don’t know where she–
DeRay Mckesson: Okay.
Myles E. Johnson: –was.
DeRay Mckesson: Yeah. She came up from one of those um one of the and like she was a blogger. So maybe she’ll go back to blogging. But it is, it’ll it is. I am worried about the lack of Black voices on network television, even if it is not the thing that is driving most conversation. I do think voters are watching it, and that is now we need to figure out how to get a set of people who are not voting to vote, and they are not watching MSNBC, but the set of people, I think, who are voting consistently are watching it, which is why it does matter. But let’s go to the news. So my news is about the police just because I don’t want people to, there is so much wild stuff happening with the federal government that I worry that people are losing sight of some of the local things that are happening that are actually, you know, important. Um. And remember that there are 19,000 police departments. Most people know ICE right now because of what Trump is doing. But most of the regular police departments are in communities. They are cities and towns and states. So this is about a small town in Alabama. That is the Hanceville police chief. Jason, and four of four officers. They were indicted by a grand jury, and the entire police department is suspended for a moment because of the indictment. So a couple things came out, but it looks like they just were letting anybody go into the evidence room, that there was rampant corruption. Hanceville only has 3200 people and it’s 45 miles north of Birmingham. But um they had pictures of a hole in the wall and a broomstick that was used to open the door to the evidence room, and people could literally just do whatever they want. One of the things that the grand jury found was that their negligence led to a 2024 death of a dispatcher who overdosed at work. I don’t even know. You’re like, the logistics of that is wild. That’s just nuts. Um. And that the police were selling drugs. That is the short version of what was going on. And I have to imagine they were probably using drugs too, but they were selling them out of the evidence room. And it looks like they have been temporarily disbanded, which is a good thing. Um. And by disbanded, they’re on administrative leave. Um. And we need more of this. Now, the only thing that we got to be careful about is that we’ve seen this happen before. And then when a local, like a town police department gets disbanded, what normally happens is a sheriff’s department takes over, or like some other. And they normally are no, they’re not great either. So [laugh] so that’s not a good thing. But uh you we so rarely see accountability for police in this way. And I’m actually happy that the grand jury was and the prosecutor allowed it because the prosecutor has to convene the grand jury and was like, I want y’all to see this and tell me what you think. And they were like, it’s not enough just to fire or indict these five people, six people. Disband the department.
Myles E. Johnson: The [laughing] that news read so wild to me um and like and you can like DeRay. You know, I was, like, trying to make sure I was understanding specifically the finding of the man, um like OD’d, I’m like, am I reading this correctly? That like, this is this is what was happening?
DeRay Mckesson: So nuts.
Myles E. Johnson: Um. It’s it’s weird because like, like like, you know, I’m a I’m a truly um empathetic, compassionate person. [laugh] So a part so a part of me is, is always like, the police are corrupt, right? And corruption lives inside of the police because the police system is built on corruption. That is just something that I believe. The twist in this story that that that twisted my heart in a way I didn’t think it was going to was the addiction piece. And and it was the like, I guess like the, the, the opioid crisis of it all. Me seeing the pictures of the people again, there’s nothing in me that’s saying oh these people are good people or these people are people who don’t deserve it. But but um I think it complicated the, the, the, the, the the pursuit of power and the sustaining of um of of power through police force [?] when I added addiction to it. Um. When I think that oh no, these people are not only maybe bent towards um racism, right? Or violent racism, but also that’s being fueled by drug use. That’s being fueled by addiction. Um. This just laid it out in a way that felt undeniable and and other times, it’s kind of always hinted at or maybe suggested, but this was clear that I don’t know the these are the same. These are the same people who are judging what to do in a moment’s notice when something when something’s happening that that that scared me.
DeRay Mckesson: And now the the dispatcher, you’re like, we need the dispatchers to be on it, not using drugs during dispatch. I was like.
Myles E. Johnson: Well.
DeRay Mckesson: That is just dangerous for everybody.
Myles E. Johnson: And when we think about the police, you know, I’m not I’m not I’m not a square when it comes to when it comes to drug or alcohol use. But if there was a um a industry. Where I’m like, no, don’t even hit a joint like we need you.
DeRay Mckesson: Literally.
Myles E. Johnson: Clear.
DeRay Mckesson: Yeah.
Myles E. Johnson: It’s the. It’s the police.
DeRay Mckesson: And all the employees inside. You’re like, not the dispatch. Could you imagine calling 911, and the dispatcher is high? You’re like, well, that’s not helpful. You know what I mean? You’re like.
Myles E. Johnson: At at all.
DeRay Mckesson: In a crisis. It’s like.
Myles E. Johnson: At all.
DeRay Mckesson: That is nuts. So that was my news.
Myles E. Johnson: I wanted just to use my time to talk about and think about Voletta Wallace. She passed away. She is the mother of the greatest rapper. One of the greatest rappers. Depending on who you are and what coast you are usually. Um. Notorious B.I.G. And I think how I’ve been reflecting on Voletta Wallace since she’s passed is okay, first thing is, how spooky is it that she passes and then like I think within two hours I don’t know which came first this or the egg, but Diddy’s lawyer drops everything and says, I can’t do this case anymore. With Diddy like, whatever’s happening in Diddy’s file is so nasty and so unwinnable that his lawyer said, I gotta go. Allegedly. So I thought that was interesting. [?]
DeRay Mckesson: And that lawyer represented Osama bin laden.
Myles E. Johnson: [?] [laugh] Okay. So. So I thought that was I thought it was just um one of those spooky, synchronistic moments that um Voletta Wallace had uh passed around that, around that announcement. But um beyond that, when I thought about notorious B.I.G. I thought about how she has been such a good steward to his legacy. And if I’m being honest with you, as somebody who is obsessed with notorious B.I.G. Me and my boyfriend met on the anniversary, March 9th of notorious B.I.G.’s death. Um. We’ve had posters of notorious B.I.G. Like my sister is a huge B.I. like notorious B.I.G. fan. And if I’m being honest, it was post his death that he was able to sit in our imaginations as something to me uh more prominent and more dignified than when he was living. And I think that has so much to do with Voletta Wallace and um I think how she has kept him inside of our um imaginations and how she’s helped with um keeping those things inside of our imaginations has been, has been it has been really, really, really good. And I think it’s it’s something when you’re known because of something bad happening to your son, you know, and just, just even but right before she passed away, she was saying how, like, she wants to slap Diddy. Like she would like like like she was always comments commentating. She was always being a good steward to her um to her son’s legacy. And she also there’s been a few times where she’s commented on the state of hip hop culture or things that were happening that maybe we want to hear from the perspective of somebody who was related to The Notorious B.I.G. And she’s really always been really, really sharp with it. And I think she’s done such a beautiful job at honoring his legacy. And I think that’s really good work. And I think that’s oftentimes feminized work or work that’s usually um donned on women and I and I just wanted to talk about it because she is somebody for, for, for better or for worse, who made her whole entire public life about her son. And I think that is usually work given to women. And I just wanted to honor that she did such a great job, and I think even I get the numbers wrong. But there was some there was a million dollars, I don’t know, I think a couple of million dollars was his um was his value in air quotes on death. And now he has a multi-million dollar um legacy and estate that he’s like leaving them behind. And that is also because of those good financial decisions, so not just a cultural steward, but also a financial and economic one. So I wanted just to bring her um her flowers and, and, and and say thank you to ancestor Voletta Wallace.
DeRay Mckesson: Thanks for bringing this up. I didn’t know she was a preschool teacher. That made me smile. And uh and every and when I see pictures of her, I’m like, I can see you. You are that like Black woman in the neighborhood who, like, raised five generations of of kids at that three to four year old age. Um. And she was 78. She lived a good life. She lived a long life and Biggie has two remaining two two kids, um and hopefully they are well taken care of uh with his estate. And you know, I remember that moment where where, um Miss Wallace and Tupac’s mom did that joint–
Myles E. Johnson: Afeni Shakur.
DeRay Mckesson: They did that joint um thing at the award show.
Myles E. Johnson: Mm hmm.
DeRay Mckesson: Do you remember that? They did that so like that.
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah at the MTV um Music Awards.
DeRay Mckesson: Yeah. And you’re right, she did say she wanted to slap Diddy. I’m like I you give you give Black mom vibes up to the end. So I really appreciate that it is it you know, this makes me think too of like a just a generation of people that I don’t know if younger kids know, but like, you know, you think about I don’t know if you saw the Wayans um. The Wayans family get awarded at the NAACP Awards. But I just think about like that in Living Color era, that whole like time period of people are getting older and um and and what will happen when that art and those the people who made that art goes away. I’m really I don’t know I’ve been thinking about that a lot. Especially when like Irv Gotti died like and he was awful to Ashanti so that is not great. Um.
Myles E. Johnson: Well, not just Ashanti. [laughing]
DeRay Mckesson: Oh, that’s all I, I only know the Ashanti stuff. He was awful to more people?
Myles E. Johnson: Okay. Irv Gotti?
DeRay Mckesson: Yeah.
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. [laughing]
DeRay Mckesson: Um. I just bring him up because he was so young. He died so young. You know, he was what he was 50 something?
Myles E. Johnson: Yeah. And I think that he was just on record talking about, like um, just having diabetes and then um not taking care of himself and being drinking really hard and living really hard and kind of having that [?] ethos. So. Um. I watched too many Dame Dash and Irv Gotti interviews. So just hearing how they talked about their lifestyles, it’s it’s it wasn’t that much of a shocker because I was deep in with Irv Gotti.
DeRay Mckesson: Do you think that’s indicative–
Myles E. Johnson: Um but I get–
DeRay Mckesson: –of that whole moment? Like do you think they are outliers or that was the moment?
Myles E. Johnson: Oh, like the lifestyle choices? Yeah, I think that’s that’s definitely the moment. I think that’s still the moment when you look at the rappers who I mean Future is our biggest rapper, if you listen to what Drake is doing. Like, I think that a lot of when it comes to addiction in this living uh Drake who you only live once, you know what I mean? Like YOLO like that just has been such a huge part of um hip hop culture, specifically when it met glamor. I remember Roxanne Shante said something about hip hop and glamor and hip hop fabulousness and said, well, that really comes from the fact that um we never save for a rainy day, so we just spend on a um because it’s so we just spend on a really, really nice umbrella like that that idea that we don’t necessarily aren’t we we aren’t um steering our own futures. So let’s just spend and and be in hedonistic decadence today. So I think that still is very much so alive, just with worse talent. I think that’s the [laughter] the trade the tradeoff.
DeRay Mckesson: [?] There we go. Got it. [laughter] Don’t go anywhere, more Pod Save the People is coming.
[AD BREAK]
Kaya Henderson: Hello Pod Save the People family. It’s Kaya and I am so excited about our guest today, um we have Michael Harriot with us. Michael Harriot is an award winning journalist, bestselling author, a celebrated poet and public historian who’s hailed as one of the most eloquent writers in America. His New York Times bestseller, Black AF History: The unwhitewashed story of America, is required reading in at least ten universities, and numerous colleges have adopted his race as an Economic Construct curriculum, which examines social structures using history, data, and the laws of supply and demand. Michael Harriot um you might know him from the Grio. You might know him from the Root. Um he influences everything from presidential politics to pop culture. He originated the phrase invited to the cookout. He is widely considered to be the dean of Black Twitter and the Negro Explainer. He and Pharrell created the award winning Drapetomaniax: Unshackled History podcast, and his newest project is called ContrabandCamp. We’re going to get into that in a few minutes. But Michael Harriot, thank you so much for coming on Pod Save the People.
Michael Harriot: Thank you for having me.
Kaya Henderson: Um. We are excited. Um. So we’re here because every February we do a feature called The Blackest Book Club, where the four co-hosts of the podcast um pick books in response to a few questions that we want to share with our listeners. Um. And this year, um Black Black AF History was the book that I chose to respond to the question what book taught me something surprising about Black history and Black culture. And Michael, what you should know about me is I am a longtime educator um who previously ran the public school system in Washington, DC and then left to start a curriculum and technology company teaching Black history and Black culture to young people. So I know a lot about Black history, but when I read this book, it changed my life. And so um that’s why we’re excited to have you on the podcast. We are going to jump right in. And let me ask you, why did you write this book?
Michael Harriot: Oh, it was first it was kind of uh not my intent to write it. So I used to teach a course called Race as an Economic Construct that examined our race and culture in America through through the lens of economics. And uh I was going to write a book about it, and every publisher that I went to was like, yeah, we love the proposal, but what about that history thing you do on Twitter? So the one book deal came, [laughter] so the one book deal became a two book deal. And uh so when I proposed the name of the book, they said, well, you know, it was before, you know, people were really coming at Black history and all the stuff. And they said the people at the publishing company said, I don’t think people would be interested in this obscure subject that you’re talking about called critical race theory, because the the title of my book was, Wypipology: Toward a more Critical Race Theory. And no one had ever. No one was talking about critical race theory then. And so they said, well don’t, why not do the history book first? And so that’s how Black AF history came to be.
Kaya Henderson: Okay. And who’s your intended audience?
Michael Harriot: Black people. Um. I think that we often, we read books and we have books that talk about and the history of Black people from a Black perspective. And we have books, of course, that talk about America from a white perspective. But I wanted to do a book that talks about the idea of whiteness and the idea of America from a Black perspective and the history of that um [?] the history of whiteness in America from a Black perspective. And so I wanted to talk to people, Black people, about it, because that’s always my intended audience. And uh, you know, I I look at it as if. You ever been in a room and like, you feel your feet getting cold or you hear a sound and nobody else feels it and you wonder, like, am I crazy? Or do I feel a draft or do I hear something? And it’s sometimes it feels like Black people are always feeling like, am I crazy? Do I feel this racism and nobody else is saying anything about it, so I wanted so a lot of times that’s how I write. Right? To let–
Kaya Henderson: Yeah.
Michael Harriot: –Black audiences know that you ain’t crazy like this world is crazy. This country is crazy, not you.
Kaya Henderson: That is absolutely. I mean, that is key to preserving our sanity, right? Because part of the thing about racism is it is supposed to drive you crazy, which will–
Michael Harriot: Yup.
Kaya Henderson: –distract you and stop you from doing your work. Um. But your writing style is not like a regular historian. Um. So tell me, like, why do you approach history in this particular way?
Michael Harriot: Well, like when you’re talking to Black people, which is what I intended to do. You know how we are, right?
Kaya Henderson: Right.
Michael Harriot: Like, we could be at a funeral and if somebodys got on the wrong clothes or the wrong, why’d you wear that hat? Why’d you wear a easter dress to my mama funeral, right? We’re going make a joke about it, right?
Kaya Henderson: Yes.
Michael Harriot: Like, sometimes we laugh to keep from crying. And sometimes we laugh just to laugh. And that’s how I’ve always written, you know, I think every writer develops a style. And I learned, like, I don’t try to inject humor into anything, I just try. I don’t feel the need to take it out or to avoid it because I’m talking about something serious. And that’s how my style evolved.
Kaya Henderson: Um. And that’s but that’s not how historians usually write. So somebody had to give you permission or make you feel like it was okay to write kind of the way we talk.
Michael Harriot: Oh, well, I don’t know if it’s permission. I don’t think I ever like sought permission, but I was home schooled for the first part of my education. So the history I learned, part of the history I learned was taught to me, you know, by Black people through word of mouth. And so when, you know, it was only recently when I really started discovering, like, oh, that like Black people really believe this stuff that they tell them in school. I didn’t realize like that people learn about, you know, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson being noble heroes. And then like later on in life, they learned that they were slave masters. I thought that’s how you learned it. So um without like a lot of the times, we I never really had to undo the whitewashing.
Kaya Henderson: Uh huh, I see, I see. Um. That homeschooling at the beginning is it is liberatory, right? Because you are not taught with the constructs that most other people are taught with. Um. That explains a lot. Okay. So what’s one of your favorite stories in the book?
Michael Harriot: I think everyone’s favorite story in the book is Forest Joe uh they everybody loves Forest Joe.
Kaya Henderson: Uh huh.
Michael Harriot: So if you’re listening and haven’t read the book, Forest Joe was a man who unenslaved himself and basically wreaked havoc on Georgia in South Carolina in the early 1820s. And the result? You know, it’s not just like an interesting character, Forest Joe is the origin story of America’s first police force. The first police force in America was created to catch this Black dude um who was, you know. He one of the favorite things about him is he went on to the governor’s plantation and just started shooting at him and told him, like, if I seen you in the streets, you know, we going to have it. And a, so I think a lot of people love Forest Joe and many of the stories that they hadn’t been taught in uh, you know, classical American history, if you will.
Kaya Henderson: So what do you think Forest Joe means for people? Why do people love Forest Joe so much?
Michael Harriot: Because I think that we think that, you know, we a few years ago, that phrase started floating around, I’m not my ancestors. And I think that people think we conceded or capitulated to the oppression that we’ve always experienced, and not that we fought they thought, like there was a period when the Black Panthers uh were fighting back, and that’s about it. But the truth is, like like that has always been the way we survived and resisted. And so I think that is partly why and I think that, like the idea that we tended to our survival by scaring white folks is also interesting too.
Kaya Henderson: [laugh] I love that, I absolutely love that. Um. One of the questions that we ask in the Blackest book club is what book do you think every Black kid should read and why? And I want to ask you that about your stories. Besides Forest Joe, if they if if every Black kid in America could read one Michael Harriot story, either from the book or from one of your podcasts or whatever, what do you think is the most powerful story that we could share with African American young people?
Michael Harriot: Uh. I think uh one of my favorite stories is the story of in it I talk about it a little in the book, but I’ve written about it elsewhere. It’s the story of Moses Dixon. Moses Dixon was a guy. He was a barber. Uh. He was formerly enslaved and was set himself free and traveled on riverboats, cutting hair throughout the South and every state. And he eventually went to every state uh that had slavery and was planning a national slave revolt. And so one night, he and he had basically organizers in every state that had slavery. They gathered in a room in Saint Louis and swore that they would never stop until the slaves are free. And they formed what they call the uh they formed a group, of basically what was a fraternity. And those now, they called themselves knights. And those knights uh eventually didn’t start their national slave revolt because the Civil War had already started and most of the Knights actually joined the Union forces. But the fraternity continued, began accepting women, and they would give a penny a week. And that’s what built the first Black hospital in Mound Bayou, Mississippi, where almost everybody you know from the civil rights movement was trained. Um. Fannie Lou Hamer, even Jesse Jackson. And they hired a surgeon to work at that hospital, T.R.M. Howard. And because of T.R.M. Howard, he he basically created his own police armed police force. And they protected the Black journalists who came to investigate the story of Emmett Till. And that’s how we know what Emmett Till, what actually happened to Emmett Till. Because, you know, a hundred years earlier, a Black man tried to start a national slave revolt.
Kaya Henderson: Huh. I love that. And how do you know all of this stuff? Where are you getting this from?
Michael Harriot: Ah oh, like one you pull threads, um I always go down rabbit holes. Like when I hear something, I said, well, how did that happen? And then how did that happen? And then how did that happen? And eventually get to the bottom of the rabbit hole. So it’s just natural curiosity and the natural desire to read things. I think that’s that’s what where it comes from.
Kaya Henderson: Um. Why are we not more curious as a people? Like we have such a fascinating history. Um. You are helping to illuminate. And I I find when I read these things and I go down the rabbit hole as well, why aren’t more? Why aren’t more of our Black teachers curious in this way? Why aren’t kids more motivated? Now we have information at our fingertips, right? So why aren’t we motivated to figure out more of our own history, to tell our own story?
Michael Harriot: Because that natural curiosity is not even cultivated. As a matter of fact, it’s probably suppressed, right? Because you can’t be teach critical thinking and natural curiosity, and also teach some of the nonsense that we learned in school, right? Like just not even not just in history, but in all subjects. Whether it is like i before e except after C, but like why is C so special? And how about like words like heist um like that doesn’t [?]. Well and and you know it extends to all. I remember when uh I was like a little kid, probably like seven or eight years old. And my mom used to teach Vacation Bible School, and my they had like a math contest, and my sister won. But my mom, like, I went out of the contest in like the first round because I didn’t know my multiplication tables. And my mom was like, embarrassed that I didn’t know my multiplication tables. It’s like, you don’t, you’re going to learn your multiplication tables. And I was eight years old, right? So she didn’t teach me my multiplication tables. She just told me, you better learn them. Well, if you are, if you are, if you’ve never been taught your multiplication tables, you don’t know that they end at 12. Right. Like you learn your multiplication tables so when I started going to public school, we used to have this math test, a timed math test every week. Right. And the, the, the the time would increase the decrease. The time would decrease every week. But the number of questions would increase. And my teacher asked me like, well, you don’t show your work, so it doesn’t count. And I was like, what work? Like, y’all don’t know 14 times 18? Right? And that’s an example of right. Like, if you just allow students to explore their own curiosity and not put like these arbitrary limits on it, you won’t they will learn more, but they might like question you more. Right. Like I really just started I really just learned that people actually believe that George Washington had wooden teeth, right? I thought I thought that that was a thing like the moon is made of cheese, right? Like it was a joke. Like people don’t really believe that, right? I’ve learned that people actually believe that. No, that dude had slave teeth. Right.
Kaya Henderson: He had slave teeth. Yes.
Michael Harriot: So I think the, the, the intent to suppress our natural curiosity is how they teach us. Right. Because they don’t want to teach us 12 times 18. They don’t want to teach us the true history. They don’t want to teach us phonics. So they teach us I before E except after C, they teach us 12 timetables. They teach us that George Washington had wooden teeth, because a lot of times the teachers don’t know.
Kaya Henderson: That’s right.
Michael Harriot: Right. The teacher’s got to carry the one when they’re doing their times tables. The teachers never learned real Black history. The teachers don’t know how to spell unless they look it up in a dictionary.
Kaya Henderson: Mm hmm. That is all very true. And I think one of the things that I’ve tried to do as an educator is not think about what are the skills that young people need to learn, but how do we create young people who are curious, young people who will challenge the status quo like, the purpose of school in my estimation of things, um and this is sort of why I started Reconstruction. I was like, well, wait a minute, all of my Jewish friends go to Hebrew school or Sunday school. All of my Korean friends go to Korean school. Why are we, as Black people, leaving it up to schools to teach our history and our culture, um and what we know is when our young people have a strong identity, when they see themselves in the content that they are learning, not only does their academic progress soar. Their confidence soars, their leadership soars, all kinds of positive indicators. And, you know, we tried to create a curriculum at DC public schools that was turning out problem solvers, advocates, community activists. Um. We believe that we needed to prepare young people to solve their own problems, their communities problems and the problems of the world. But that is not how most education systems are set up.
Michael Harriot: Right.
Kaya Henderson: Um. And we can talk about that for a long time. But um what you just did, which is pull in your multiplication tables, George Washington’s slave teeth and [laugh] and whatever else we were just talking about to illustrate the point, I think, is one of your superpowers. So talk to me a little bit about um one of my favorite things, which are your threads on Facebook and Twitter, um where you are telling a story about you and your sister growing up, or about seemingly innocuous things. And then at the end, you tell us nah that’s, that’s not what this is really about.
Michael Harriot: Like I think, you know, as a person who kind of unknowingly was taught the art of storytelling growing up. That, I think, it’s the easiest way to learn, right? Um. It is. Once you can contextualize things, um you understand them better. And not only aren’t we taught that way. We don’t even kind of use that as a tool in our toolbox to explain things. Well, what happens is like, if you don’t know history because you don’t know stories, then you might think Black people are lazy because you don’t know about redlining and you don’t know about segregation. You don’t know, like, how schools work. So I think that I started using adapting, I, you know, I think of it as adapting storytelling to anything, right? So if I’m on Twitter, I write differently than if I’m writing for a newspaper. Versus a a uh, you know, a book versus writing a book versus writing a script. Right. But it’s all a form of storytelling. And that I started doing it on Twitter to illustrate how things like, not how things used to be, because to me, that’s not what history is. It explains how things are right now and why why it got to be that way. And, you know, because of the character limit, you can only go but so far with a story, unless you, you know, make each so to me I look at each, you know, tweet as self encapsulated in itself. So somebody might tweet the third part of that thread and somebody might tweet the fifth tweet in that thread. Right. So it it has to make sense as a, a lone a standalone tweet. But in context it also tells a different story because that’s how the world is, right? Like if you see somebody crying on a sidewalk, it seems like a sad woman. And then if you know the context of why she’s crying and what happened before, it might tell a whole different story. And so I see the world through through those lenses. Right. Like, we, you know, things are individuals, parts of time, but they are all connected to other things and other actions, and people are too. Right. Right. Like what you do in DC will eventually affect me in some way. Whether it’s this is like a butterfly flapping its wings, um you know, it’ll eventually produce a wave that, you know, floods a city.
Kaya Henderson: Mm hmm. Talk to me a little bit about you and at the time, Mayor Pete.
Michael Harriot: Yeah. Like so that started. Like, I. Like, like people think like you’ll like Pete Buttigieg. And I was like no. Like Pete Buttigieg. So as a journalist um specifically writing for a Black audience or to Black people. One of the things that I’ve always done like, and I think I just inherited this from my family. It’s like correcting the record, right? Especially as it relates to Black people. Right? If you say something about Black people that is patently false or wrong or misguided, then I’m not mad at you. Let me just tell you how stupid this thing was that you said, right? So somebody sent me a clip of Pete Buttigieg when he was running for president, who said that, you know what’s wrong or you know what Black folks need. Because, you know, I always hate that narrative of the things that Black folks need. But what Black folks need is more role models. Well, you know, I mean, anybody who knows Black neighborhoods, or grew up in a Black neighborhood know, like because y’all segregated us.
Kaya Henderson: Right.
Michael Harriot: We got Black teachers in Black neighborhoods and Black lawyers and Black doctors, like, there’s no like–
Kaya Henderson: Doctors. Yeah.
Michael Harriot: Like, we’re not confined by, like, socio economic factors. Like, if you poor and Black, you know, a Black lawyer, you know, a Black doctor because of what white people did. So when he said that. Right. And this guy who went to Harvard, who has been the mayor of a town like, you know you were in a room with them white people saying that because, you know, that’s what the white people hear. I mean, that ain’t even what he believes. So it wasn’t that he was wrong it’s that he was lying. And using Black people in his lie to prove that he was some kind of benevolent merchant of equality for this country. And I didn’t want like it wasn’t that I was trying to tell Black people that Pete Buttigieg was wrong. I was trying to tell Black people that he was a lying motherfucker, because he was a motherfucker who was lying. And to his credit, he called me and said his first words out of his mouth was, well, I’ve never been called a called a lying motherfucker before. And we had a convo–
Kaya Henderson: The title of your article was Pete Buttigieg is a lying MF? Right?
Michael Harriot: Yes. Right.
Kaya Henderson: That’s the–
Michael Harriot: That was the title.
Kaya Henderson: Okay, and so he called you?
Michael Harriot: And those were the first words out of his mouth was like, I have never been called a lying MF before. And I’m like, I didn’t have any animus or like, yell at him or anything. I was just like, well, you know, like, if you’re going to be president, if you’re the mayor of a city, if you’re in a room with white with people who make decisions, you can’t first of all, you can’t perpetuate the lie that has already been used to destroy Black people, like like we don’t we the reason for that all these racial disparities exist is not because white people did anything it’s just that, like, we don’t no Black people who can read, right? So, you know, that was always my point. Like it it had nothing to do with Pete Buttigieg as a person, but what he was doing. Right.
Kaya Henderson: Yup/ And share with us the analogy that you used to help him understand what you’re trying to say.
Michael Harriot: So one of the things that I talked about is that right. I can’t remember. I don’t know which specific one you were talking about because they were like actually two subsequent pieces, but I was I told the story of I lived in a neighborhood that was that was segregated. My town was literally bisected into, and it was 50% black and 50% white. So when they killed the Black, killed off the the Black high school and integrated the schools, it was on the white side of town. So I grew up in a town where Black people literally had to jump a ditch to go to school. And so Black, some of the Black people built the bridge over the school, over the, over the, over the ditch. But, you know, kids would sometimes be, you know, pranksters and just remove the [?] so just to watch people fall in. Right. But my point was that the people who, when it was raining, didn’t jump that ditch or not just, you know, not caring about education, but all of the white people who went to school every day, who got their mamas to drop them off, they never had to jump a ditch. Right? They didn’t even have to wake up in the morning and look out of the window and said, is the rain–
Kaya Henderson: Is it raining?
Michael Harriot: -preventing me from going to school today?
Kaya Henderson: Yeah.
Michael Harriot: And you’re saying we need more role models and not bridges, right?
Kaya Henderson: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Michael Harriot: And that’s the point.
Kaya Henderson: Yeah.
Michael Harriot: Right? Like you.
Kaya Henderson: Yeah.
Michael Harriot: If you don’t have to jump a ditch, how the hell you know what these people need? And that was always my point.
Kaya Henderson: I think I mean that I think is your brilliance, right. That you are able to take really relatable things and use them to help people, help Black people understand um what’s going on, and to call a spade a spade because Pete Buttigieg was lying for sure. [laugh] Um. Tell me this uh one of the other things that I love about your writing is Black people are always the heroes. Black people are always at the center. Tell me about that.
Michael Harriot: Yeah, I think that’s part of, like, just growing up in a Black family, in a Black neighborhood and being home schooled and like I, when I was writing Black AF history, I actually interviewed my mom because I never actually knew why we were homeschooled. Right? And so she told me a quote that I’ll never forget. She said, I did not believe that a Black child’s humanity can be fully realized in the presence of whiteness. And so, you know, I understand that looking back, how she saw that. But, you know, in the world that we live in, like we often forget just how we are seen. And you know how how this world is constructed. And we have to cater to it. Right? Like I think one of the things that I never learned is how to talk to white people like, you know, I think we all kind of cater to whiteness in this subconscious way where we’re careful not to make them mad. We construct our language to have it approachable and and acceptable for them. And I never learned how to do that. So I think that’s that’s a, you know, one of the things that I think just I don’t look at it as centering Blackness. I think of it as centering myself as a human in my own humanity. And like everything else like that doesn’t comport with that must be the enemy.
Kaya Henderson: Mm hmm. That is powerful. Um. One more question about the book, and then I want to talk a little bit about some of the other work that you do. Um. You have questions at the end of every section, and then there’s a homework chapter at the end. What’s up with that?
Michael Harriot: Yeah, I so the idea was to uh write the book as not just a uh a straightforward history book. Right. But to have fun with it, to have questions and tests and to expose, you know, what in the book what are the things that the book does right um is expose how we learn. Right? Like, there’s there’s a subtle thing that I do in the book where, for instance, if I talk about a person who was enslaved, who was enslaved out of Angola, I will call them an Angolan, not a slave, not an African, not an African-American, but an Angolan. And all the white people were just white people. Right. Because.
Kaya Henderson: Yes. [?].
Michael Harriot: It was and what I was. And what I was doing right is when you say English, when you say a pilgrim, when you say a Spanish person, that automatically imbues that person with a history.
Kaya Henderson: Yes.
Michael Harriot: A political motivation, like, you know, like when I say the pilgrims, you know, these are people from England–
Kaya Henderson: Escaping religious–
Michael Harriot: Who moved to Germany, who escaped–
Kaya Henderson: –religious persecution.
Michael Harriot: –a religious persecution. You know their religion.
Kaya Henderson: Yeah. Yeah.
Michael Harriot: You know what they’ll believe in. And when you say Africa, you don’t know anything. You don’t know where–
Kaya Henderson: That’s right.
Michael Harriot: –they come geographically. Right. You don’t know where their, what their religion was. You don’t know what their lineage was. And so the thing I did with the book and the thing that I do, did with those questions at the end, is to show the absurdity of the American education system as it relates to Black people. Right? Right? Um. You know, the questions of like, there are, for instance, you know, terms. And for instance, I ask, you know, what is the difference between a settler and an invader? And the difference is who writes the police report? Right.
Kaya Henderson: [laughing] Yes.
Michael Harriot: And and it seems funny, but it is also uh like an example of how, for instance, we know that the SAT is culturally biased, right? Because of the way they ask the questions. Right. Right. Um. And we’ve learned things like that. Well, we know actually the SAT was not just, like, accidentally culturally biased. It was created to keep nonwhite people out of universities. But we won’t get into that. But that was a point of the book right, trying to expose the other people because you can’t say, like, if you get mad at me saying white people, then you got to also be mad at all of the teachers who say the Africans or the Indians.
Kaya Henderson: Slaves.
Michael Harriot: Or the Native American Americans without a, or who we named all of those Indigenous people to words that will fit in white people’s mouths. Right. Like you got to be mad at all of that.
Kaya Henderson: Indeed, indeed. So in addition to writing books, you are a prolific podcaster. Um. What is Drapetomaniax and why is that the name of your podcast?
Michael Harriot: So Drapetomaniax in 1852, this actual doctor named Samuel Adolphus Cartwright came up with this medical theory that was in books for like the next 67 years. And he came up with the disease called Drapetomaniax, the disease causing slaves, causing Black people to want to be free. Right? It only affected Black people. There was this disease that made Black people want to be free um and it was a medical diagnosis. Even like you can look in newspapers even after, you know, the 1910s and the 1920s, and they would call like Black activists Drapetomaniax, or they were affected by Drapetomania, um even at even the FBI. Like that was the origin of cointelpro. Like that was like the word Drapetomania. So I took that word and Wondered, like if that was actually a disease. Who would be the worst Drapetomaniax? like Ida B. Wells? And so what the podcast did was we got celebrities and people you know, and from the culture to do these funny. Each episode was a different story, with the celebrities acting the parts of these Black stories from history about Drapetomaniax. And each one was its own genre. So for instance, we did Ida B. Wells versus Booker T. Washington as a battle rapper, right? We we did. Um. We did the story of an 1811 slave revolt as if, uh you know, some it was an episode of The First 48. Uh. We we did the candidates who who were people who were candidates for the title of the first African American, this is a century before 1619. The people who were in America and we had a game show, and each of them told their stories and the audience got to judge. So it was fun. We had people like uh Pharrell, um like uh John–
Kaya Henderson: John Legend.
Michael Harriot: John Legend. Um.
Kaya Henderson: Roland Martin.
Michael Harriot: Like just say, yeah. Yeah.
Kaya Henderson: Yeah.
Michael Harriot: Yeah, Joy Reid say, yeah, I’ll do that. Right. And we told these stories in the funniest. These a lot of them were untold stories in the funniest and most entertaining way um with this podcast.
Kaya Henderson: If you have not listened to Drapetomaniax, you should absolutely get it wherever you get your podcasts. So you you’re a podcaster, you are the Black dean of Twitter. Are you still on Twitter? X, whatever.
Michael Harriot: I mean I. I, I tweet out, I use a service that tweets out my articles on Twitter.
Kaya Henderson: Okay.
Michael Harriot: But I’m not. I don’t be on it like that. Like it’s just–
Kaya Henderson: Okay ah right.
Michael Harriot: It’s just not fun no more.
Kaya Henderson: We know. We know. We know.
Michael Harriot: Yeah yeah.
Kaya Henderson: Um, okay. But you’ve also written books. You’ve written curricula. What haven’t you done? What do you want to do that you haven’t done yet?
Michael Harriot: Um. I want to write everything in every genre, so um um like, I want to write a a narrative movie. I’ve written um for docs and I’ve been in docs, but I want to do a narrative movie. Um. I’ve written for late night TV, but I hadn’t written like for a TV series. I want to do that. So every every form of writing, I think of myself first and foremost as a writer. And um I want to explore every aspect of that. And, you know, like, it sounds kind of self-important, but like, you know, I think it’s cool that I want to be, when I am gone from this earth to be to have all of these things in every genre represent me. And maybe somebody will say, yeah, like that dude could write.
Kaya Henderson: Huh. I love that. I absolutely love that. Um. And I appreciate that because one of my questions was going to be, what do you want when you get to the pearly gates? What do you want them to say about you? But there we are. That dude could write. Um. So like everybody else in America, our listeners are trying to survive and thrive during maybe the what might be the greatest political upheaval, at least in recent history. What message do you have for them to help them remain hopeful and to keep fighting the good fight?
Michael Harriot: Well, I think that my uh thing that I always say that is that, first of all, we’re what we’re seeing now is like a part of a centuries long effort like that never stopped. Right like it’s nothing new. It is something it’s a continuum, it’s part of a continuum. But here’s the thing about that continuum. Like you, if you think of everything that has been done to human beings, like there is nothing that has ever been done to a human being that hasn’t been done to Black people en masse. And we are undefeated. Who do you think–
Kaya Henderson: Yes, yes.
Michael Harriot: We beat slavery. We beat Jim Crow. We beat like like all of that stuff. We beat the Red summer. Like we beat it all. Like, not only did we like, we like to say we survived. But no we didn’t just survive like we were the ones who ended it, right? Like we were the ones who made this country a democracy. We were the ones who created the American education system, and we did it with nothing. Right. So the thing that always gives me hope, especially with what we’re seeing now, is and I don’t even like to categorize it as like Black people magic or we have this super power. The truth is, the people who are trying to stop us have been historically incompetent at stopping Black people. Like like they are terrible at doing things right. Like when you think about it right? Like so think about if you have more people, more money, more power, more land, and you still can’t stop the enslaved people from unenslaving themselves. If you still can’t stop the people from building their own education systems and creating their own communities and becoming doctors and lawyers and being better at all of it than you are, right? Are you really kind of incompetent? And we see it played out right now, like they put in like what who they think is the smartest man in the world, in charge of the government. And he can’t do nothing like he’s pushing the Black people out. The smartest man in the world and he can’t do what they do. Like everything falling apart. Right?
Kaya Henderson: Everything is falling apart.
Michael Harriot: Because he can’t do. Like, he got all the white people who were supposedly smart and there’s planes falling out of the sky. And the computers don’t work. And all of that, like like he had he bought he used all of his millions to buy this platform. That and everybody’s leaving it because the Black people made it fun. The Black people made it interesting. And ultimately, here is what the thing that gives me comfort, right? Black people and Black culture and the thing that we have built is a form of wealth that is more valuable than all of the money and all of the stock that Elon Musk holds. Just think about it, right? When Black when Elon Musk bought Twitter, it was Black Twitter that made it valuable. And when Black people started leaving it, everybody started leaving right? When–
Kaya Henderson: That’s right.
Michael Harriot: When the biggest record company in the world had the two most famous artists in the world, and they got to the top of their careers, how? Well they just went into their houses and made music and just give it directly to the people. The white companies didn’t have anything to do with that, right? When when the largest retailers in the world saw Black people out in the streets. They got so scared they put it in DEI. And now their stock is tanking tanking because they took it out. Like our culture and the value that we bring to everything is worth more than all of their money. And I think that we should think of that every time you go into a store and buy something we we should think of it as what are you investing in? What, like you the millionaire? We are millionaires. We’re billionaires. What are we going to invest in though? Are we going to invest our money into these people who want to exclude us? And I think as their world falls apart, we know we’re going to survive.
Kaya Henderson: Mm hmm.
Michael Harriot: But what are we going to build in the meantime? As this stuff falls apart, we have the opportunity to build and invest, and that is the opportunity that we rarely see.
Kaya Henderson: Michael Harriot, oh my gosh, you just set this whole interview on fire. Um. I want to say thank you so, so much for your wisdom, for your wit, um and for the work that you are doing to help us all get free. Um. Pod Save the People family. This has been amazing. A bit of a dream come true for me. I’m totally fangirling. Um. And I’m appreciative that the Blackest Book Club gives us the opportunity to meet our heroes like Michael Harriot. And so if you want to join the conversation, check out Recon.today/blackest-book-club because we are seeking liberation through literature. Michael, thank you so much for joining us. Um and–
Michael Harriot: Thank you for having me.
Kaya Henderson: We’d love you to come back sometime.
Michael Harriot: I’d love to come back. So thank you for having me. [pause] [music break]
DeRay Mckesson: Well that’s it. Thanks so much for tuning in to Pod Save the People this week, don’t forget to follow us at Crooked Media on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok. And if you enjoyed this episode of Pod Save the People, consider dropping us a review on your favorite podcast app and we’ll see you next week. Pod Save the People is a production of Crooked Media, it’s produced by AJ Moultrié and mixed by Vasilis Fotopoulos. Executive produced by me and special thanks to our weekly contributors Kaya Henderson, De’Ara Balenger, and Myles E. Johnson. Our production staff is proudly unionized with the Writers Guild of America East.
