Welcome to another episode of Civic Cipher. I'my host Rams' John.
They called me q Ward and that just so happens to be part of my government named Ramses. What up? Don't a week as usual?
But we got a few things to talk about that aren't just specific to this week.
We got to talk about that.
Have been conversations, if you will, baseless in my opinion, but conversations in the black community for ever, really since I've been born. Clicked on one of them is well, what is the government doing for me?
And I want to talk.
About That's a loaded question, right right, because you know there's you know, there's a there's a good reason to ask those questions. But you know there's there's a you know, a glass half full and a glass half empty way of looking at you know, politics from this vantage point, from a decided from a black vantage point, and so yes, you know, obviously there's some folks that will look at it and think, you know, the government does nothing for us,
We're forgotten you know this, that and the third. And then there's some people who look at the progress, no matter how small, and think, okay, well we're moving in the right direction. This is this is just kind of the hand we've been dealt. It's not perfect, but you know, the world will be a little bit better when I leave it than it was when I entered it, and that is energizing to some degree. The thing is, I tend to be of the latter mindset more often than not.
I I tend to look at, you know, Okay, what has been accomplished in my lifetime? What was the world I was born into? What is the world I'm in now? What will the world look like when.
I leave it?
And you know, there's some things when I look around and I say, okay, well, I've seen a black president. I voted for.
Him twice, you know, two times.
Right, I've seen the first female vice president of the United States was black.
Is black? I've seen.
You know, obviously during the uh, the the dark Trump years, we saw that there's still a lot out there that needs to be dealt with. But you know, overall, I feel very optimistic about the trajectory of this country.
Bless your heart.
Well, you know, that's that's kind of what I'm a casework I do feel optimistic. I think that for the most part, you know, there's enough of you got to bear in mind that Hillary Clinton in twenty sixteen did win.
The popular vote.
You know, so there are more people that will stand opposed to racism and misogyny and all these terrible things that have held black people and round people back. There's more people that will stand against that than there are that will stand for it, as illustrated by the past two elections.
Trouble vote trouble is. I think there's been the case for a long time, but our country has done nothing to correct the system that lets the minority win right, right.
And actively, or it continues to allow we'll call it what it is, the right to disenfranchise voters based on
non since right, jerry mandering, et cetera. You know, there's lots more people that should be voting in these elections, and every vote should count, and the way it works now, I think I saw the Netflix documentary that a white man voter from Wyoming is worth like one point seventy five votes, you know, in terms of its actual impact in the political political sphere, you know, than a person
in California. You know. So it's this these white males, still based on the weight of their vote, still control disproportionately a disproportionate amount of policies and and you know, elections and so forth.
Shout out to the electoral college. No, let's never shut that out.
But you know, there's some there's some people who take a a different approach. There's some people who try to see the world as perfect.
As it is.
They try to ignore the past, and or otherwise they try to condemn the the plight of black people, or otherwise they're extremely critical of black people in their our quest to have to live in a more equal world, a fairer go at life. And some of these people are names that you well know. Candice Owens is one of them, and Marcellus Wiley is another one. And before we talk about what I want to talk about, which is what has Joe Biden done so far with his
executive orders that have affected black people? Because that's a conversation that I've been hearing a lot. You know, Oh all, y'all went out and voted for this man, he still hasn't done nothing for you. Because I want to talk about that, you know, and I want to talk about what executive orders actually are so that you know, people can be educated and we can maintain a little bit of optimism because it seems like a lot of folks are feeling real pessimistic right now, which I understand.
It didn't help that they came into it looking to feel pessimistic, like.
Nothing is good enough sort of people, you know, But you know, we got to talk to them. We're all in this together, so we got to deal with these people who are scared of everything, and I think everybody's out to get them specifically, and that sort of thing. So you had some real strong opinions about some of these folks, so I want you to talk about those before we get to Joe Biden.
Well, I really only want to talk about one of them, all right, and then we just have some examples of people that are from that same school of thought. Okay, I've been ah, I guess fan is the right word. Of this show called Real Time on HBO. The host is a comedian and political pundit named Bill Marr, someone that our former president loathed, which made him a friend of mine off bat like, oh dude, don't rock with
you heavy? Are you my man? Like? But even prior to that, I've been you know, watching him following this show for a long time. He tends to have a pretty pragmatic approach to politics. Rich white guy that kind of always stands up for the little guy, right. He didn't vote, He doesn't vote his best interest. He's a rich white celebrity, the type of person that Donald Trump
went to bat for. He just like I figured all of our friends and colleagues and allies would be smart enough to see that to do wasn't a good person, no matter what he did for you in your bank account, no matter what political plays he ran, he was just an awful person. And you know it was pretty see through. There was no veil. He didn't even pretend. Okay, never mind, because I don't want to take the twenty steps back
that I'm about to. But he had a guest on Friday, and I typically, if I'm working and for you and I every weekend Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. That was the truth. I would always either watch it on DVR in the middle of the night after work, or I would tune into the podcast when I was driving, essentially just the
audio from the show presented as a podcast. And I'm driving home listening to the podcast, and I hear this voice talking about white privilege and systemic racism both being myths perpetuated by left wing extremist forgive me for laughing, people, but it's twenty and twenty one and after. If you were an observer and all you ever saw of America was twenty twenty, it'd be very, very difficult, even with that little bit of data, to say that systemic racism
and white privilege didn't exist. Not. The funny thing is, I'm listening to a podcast, so I can't see who's talking. But the first thing that bothered me is that Bill, the person who typically is on the right side of things, is agreeing with the voice that I hear. And I'm confused at this point, to a point where my stomachs start to like get uneasy, like I was actually upset. So there's a third person on the panel, uh, a white guy who couldn't help himself but to interject like
almost like wait, what are you guys? What are you guys talking about? Like, so we're all sitting here saying that white privilege isn't a thing, systemic racism isn't the thing. Like that's we're on HBO. Sure you want to go down there. That's that's where we are right now. And he doesn't like he didn't riot for he and turned to Huey P. Newton. But you could just tell like he's the he's the bystander that's.
Sitting there, like, Okay, I don't like even I don't typically ride for Black lives matter, but like this is this is where we are right now on Bill Maher's show on the guy who just spent the last four years stumping his feet to get this president out of office.
You're okay, I guess that's where we are. I'll be I'll be quiet. And Bill made reference to something something, something, the white guy, and I said, oh, so one of these guys must not be white if he's pointing out that the white guy is the one that has something
to say. And you know, lo and behold. I google Camille Foster, handsome, articulate, educated black man, and it was like getting punched in the stomach, because in this country, there will always be a camera and a microphone and an opportunity for a well spoken, educated black person that will take that stance. There'll always be a job, an opportunity to check a camera microphone. They will they will help you get that off.
They need that for their contrass. Oh my god, goodness, listen, this one person said it so clearly.
He agrees with me, and he's black, and you know he's not. He's sadly not a singular case. And there's a psychological question that I have to pose to you what happens where, especially in the cases of some of these people that I'm listening, All of these people that I'm listening, what are their names? Candice Owens, Marcellus Willy, Jason Whitlock, and the afore mentioned Camille Foster. They come
from where we come from. They reach some level of success, maybe because we know this in this capitalist society, they make a lot of money, and maybe there daily isn't what it used to be. But how do they forget that it used to be that and or displaced themselves from their brothers and sisters who still experienced that stuff in a very very real way on a daily basis. That's a great question.
I think that, at least for me, it's a matter of what is in your hard Some people like you know these people, there's some people that they get money no matter what, at any cost, right, you know, these type of people, they don't care who they hurt. Who they got to stomp on, what the price is, if someone might come and kill them, if they got to rob whatever it is. There's sometimes there are business people sometimes whatever they will undercut, they will do the most
savage things, right sharks and bloody water. That personality type is something that can be found and people of all colors and people at all different walks of life and
all different stations in life. And I think that most of the time people that adopt black people, that adopt those what I would consider anti black sentiments and then share them with, you know, white folks, especially those white folks that really need to hear that so that they can feel better about their own racist practices, you know, instead of confronting them and really dealing with them. I think that those black people have that sort of personality type.
They'll sell their own children, you know, they'll sell of course, they'll sell their people out, you know. And again, if you're articulate enough, you can make anything sound good. You and I had an experience once upon a time.
This was we were at a school.
I don't know if you remember the story, but there was a woman that worked at the school and I think at the time we were talking about it might have been a police shooting, because this was before there was any Donald Trump or anything like that, so it might have been a police shooting of a black person. And so that conversation was in the air, and you know, you and I were talking about something, and the girl
chimed into our conversation. Suffice it to say that she, like most people are, was intellectually inferior, right, but she needed to get something off in that conversation, and she tried it, and it didn't float, not down this river because I'm not the one, nor am I the two exactly three five, No, do don't try me. But then the next day she came back with a meme, and the meme was of Morgan Freeman.
I believe it to be a quote.
Taken out of context, but he said something to the effect of what should black people do about racism or something, and he said that black people should stop talking about racism and it'll go away, or something like that. Now I don't know if that was taken out of context,
but it was a very small clip or whatever. And she showed this to me to suggest that I was somehow wrong, my lived experience was somehow wrong, and the lived experience of you know, millions of people who have endured these both visible and invisible racist policies, frameworks, you know, et cetera. Because she had one person that said something that kind of you know, supported what she was saying. She thought everything was if I was going to see
that and it was going to be all good. Right, So I get that there are some people that need that. And if there's you know, they're just like actors, right, you can get an actor that will play the most dehumanizing, degrading role if you pay them enough money to do it right. I know you've seen this role before where you're like, why is that person playing that role? Like it doesn't matter. Why would this woman play a dead body, you know what I mean, like a naked dead body.
I'm bad boys too. Why would anybody do that? There's just no dignity in that. But obviously there's always somebody that.
Will take that.
Money is a very powerful motivator, especially in this country because we idolize money and things so much, and so you know, in my opinion, I think that you know, you get the right person with the right personality type that lacks the same you know, whatever conviction and mental discipline and spiritual fortitude. Wave enough money in front of them and make sure they're articulate enough, and they can they can tell you exactly what you want to hear.
Or there's some people that don't even do that. They'll they'll say exactly what you what you write, and so yeah, I get that there's people like that. Will I ever agree with them? I think that, Uh get his name, but I just said it. I think his name is mill Foster or yeah, Camille Foster.
He's the one that said that.
He doesn't self identify as black.
Yes, have you seen him? That his picture? Yeah?
Yeah, no, I know who he is. He will cond of black, bro. Yeah no, we'll kind of forever black. He's banned to black. No, yeah, I know exactly like he was in the tribe.
I saw him. Yeah, yeah, he's doing who like I was. He was in there, bro. Yeah. Man, So.
For someone to say that, just imagine the mind, Like, imagine how far out there you have to be. Imagine who he's saying that to. He's not saying that to somebody who's actually black, Who's you know, well, every day I wake up, I see a black person. You know, he was trying to say something to like, well, uh, race as a construct is not real in the world, you know, And and I get what he's what he said, because there's a medical basis for that race is not
a real thing. It's imaginary. It's something that causes more divisiveness in our species.
Sure than it should in a vacuum. He'd be absolutely right in the United States of America, missed.
Me, bro, That's not how it is, exactly. There is definitely the dividing lines.
You know.
I recall the the meme of Peter Griffin holding up the the color cart, the color chart, and if you're if you're a certain shade of brown, you're.
Good, and you're protesting below a certain shade. If you're below a certain shade, you're a rioter. Yeah, exactly.
So you know, it's it's just those sorts of weird things that these people try to get off. And and Candice Owens is another one. Poor baby, I want to say, she said something like racism is over because she's never been a slave, because she her has never been a slave. And so you can imagine, like I know that what we're doing is we're taking one part of what these people are saying and like making a big deal out of it, but only because it would take us thirty hours to go through everything to.
Really discuss intercept. You know.
There, but you do recognize that these people exist for mostly conservative white folks to feel less bad about what they know is the truth. If they were comfortable with their truth, they wouldn't need these people would not be employable.
You know.
If they were comfortable, they knew without a shadow of doubt that their spirit was unperturbed. You know, if they knew that, hey, I'm morally centered, I'm right with God, I don't do anything I don't you know whatever, they really knew that they wouldn't need anyone else to tell them that these people have jobs. These Canvas owns, these
Camille Fosters and so forth have jobs. Is because it helps people to distance themselves from the fact that prisons are disproportionately crowded by black people, and they know that black people aren't inherently bad any more than any other
human being in the world is. You know, everyone knows that all human beings come from black people, right, So how is it that all the black people in Africa are cool and that black people in America are somehow you know, and why is it that you know, there's you know what I mean, Like, there's certain things that you just cannot escape no matter how much you try to manipulate the facts in the data and so forth.
And these people are just additional examples that allow those types of folks to feel a little bit better about themselves and to further insulate themselves from the reality of other people. These are the types of people that build mansions and gated communities with walls, and you know, they
rarely interact with folks that don't look like them. And you know, when they listen to the news, as long as there's someone black that sells the same thing that they're telling themselves or that Tucker Carlson is telling them, then like, okay, so there's a black person that agrees. So look, we're all on the same pature. Those guys got to get it together. They got to stop, you know, having babies out of wedlock. They gotta, you know, the dad's got to stay in the home with the kids
and raise the kids. They got to stop committing crimes and going to.
Jail, like committing crimes and going to jail. This is this is a real thing, as if we're filling out permission slips to do that.
Man, this is a real thing for these people. And so again the Candice Owens, I want to say that Marcellus Wiley, he said the white privilege doesn't exist as.
Well, and even I mean, it's similar to what you said about Camille when you know the with his basis for the idea of race not existing, Like it's a straw man argument, right, Like what you're saying is based in some truth that just absolutely doesn't apply to the conversation that you're having. Marcellus tried to take the position of look at me, I'm from Compton, and I made it to where I am, I'm rich, I'm successful, I'm famous, And to suggest that there is white privilege is the
same as suggesting that there's a black disadvantage. Yes, that's exactly what I'm suggesting, but he's trying to say it on some like proud black power kind of tip. But it's just like I said, another straw man argument that just based on the context of the conversation that you're having, that position doesn't stand. Like the nuance in the context that you're throwing away to make this really really weak point on television on Fox Network by the way of
Fox Sports, but steal what else would that go? He's just kind of ridiculous, man.
So to anyone listening, first off, thank you for tuning in the Civic Cipher.
I'm host Rams' job. They call me q Ward and that's my name.
Indeed, And if you haven't done so yet, please follow our social media at Civic Cipher on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook. But if you were to go to our Instagram right now again at Civic Cipher, and I think it's on our Facebook too, there's a video that I put up. It's a short video maybe two three minutes, really brief, but for anybody that wrestles with this idea of systemic racism, there's a brief video up there that really shows exactly
what that's all about. Because I think that for the casual listener of our show or listener of you know, news media or whatever, they might hear a term like
that but not know exactly what it means. Like, so there's an actual system of racism that sounds crazy, right, So I think that if you take a few minutes and look into that, it would help explain why Q and I are both so up in arms about these other black people claiming that it doesn't exist, and I think that, to be fair, we should probably do a show on that. So if you're listening again, stay tuned, because I think that we're gonna put that show together.
We're going to make a little deeper.
Yeah, and just so that we can put that together and make sure that we're educating at the same time as we're you know, kind of discussing these things.
And that's that's fair and necessary. I don't want us to just be on air just disagreeing without providing any context and education and to kind of help people understand a point of view that we've adopted because it's fact, not just because we like it right, not just because it serves our purpose or the purposes of this show.
So, and I do want I would I do want you to know that if I needed to have that conversation in an elevator or in passing, I absolutely could. But there is a degree of journalistic integrity that I think that we have in this show that that I want to maintain. And so given the right you know, amount of time to prepare that and put it together, you know, when I talk about redlining, I don't want to just say redlining. I want to kind of help
go through what that means. When it happened, you know, how it affected folks and so forth, and I know in my mind, but I want dates things like that, So.
Stay tuned for that.
But for now, suffice it to say that we take it as as fact that systemic racism exist and that there is such a thing as white privilege. I think, even on this show, just to kind of meet folks where they might be, I've said in the past that white privilege is getting to.
Start at zero.
You know, there's people who started negative two, negative three, negative four.
There's people that start at plus one hundred. Maybe you know, if you're rich there on the other side of that.
Yeah, but you know, just being born and you know, being a white we'll call it a white male, healthy Christian, straight male, we'll call that zero. You weren't born with any strikes against you, and so from someone born at we'll call it a negative. For a lesbian black woman with you know, you know something something else, you know, a few strikes against her, she's gonna.
Have a tougher go at life. It's just facts. Right.
From her perspective, that looks like privilege. But from a lot of white folks perspective, they're like, I was born with nothing. I started at zero, same as everyone else, and so they're not able to really identify.
That panatic que but correct.
Again, I want to make sure that I script the show the right way to where it's not just a couple of seconds of me kind of paying that brief picture. I really want to go into detail.
Now.
With that in mind, I do want to talk about Joe Biden. He's in office, he's his pain is working, you know, so so he's he's moving, you know, and you know, every time I see the news and the news talks about the President Joe Biden, it's a very different emotional response when I see, you know, the president issues executive order than from the previous president.
Yeah, executive order is no longer a trigger, right, It's.
Not like because you remember during those Trump years, you would pick up your phone in the morning it would be something happened at three am, and you're like, oh man, so Muslim people can't come to the country no more?
What does that mean? From my Muslim friends? How do they feel?
Let me call and check on them.
I mean, and the ones that are here need to register for some type of sure.
Mall kind of nonsense, you know, or whatever it was. And now the executive orders it seemed to be a little bit more Okay, we're gonna we're gonna make sure that we foster a culture of otherness and fellowship and brotherhood and sisterhood and love in this country.
Bless his heart because he's riding with that. He's not and I know it's not been a long time yet, but just the fact that he's not wavering on his approach of unity. And I say this every time I get a chance to thank you for Ramses, for helping me to get some type of grace. Right, you cannot defeat hate with hate. No matter how hard you try, it'll never be successful. Now, love does not always beat hate, not always, but it has a higher winning percentage than hate,
sure by far. So. Shout out to our president for maintaining his position on trying to work with and unite with people who have said out loud that they would rather our demise. He wants to unite the country. That's his platform. Form Kudos to him.
And you know that's to be fair that's a tough thing to try to do. There's so many different people and millions, of course, but so many different types of people, even if we're just like breaking them down, and those different types of people have you know, different values and different beliefs and different backgrounds, and you know, it's it's so interesting that we have a two party system in this country and.
We have you know.
It literally there's like millions of people, you know, and you either got to fall into this political persuasion or that one. And this political persuasion encompasses all of these things, and that one encompasses all of these things. And so you might have a little from here and a lot from there. So you're abandoning the things that you care about that this other party, you know, but you got to,
you know, make that choice. Indeed, to his credit, you know, he's he's at least speaking to it, and that matters, i think a lot more than.
What we what we're used.
To now because the previous resident was such a bully, such a well I'm gonna do it my way. He fired everybody he worked with or they quit.
You know, he just anybody that disagree with him, right exactly. And so.
But what I want to do is I want to talk about there's this other type of black person. Right. This person is on Facebook, this person is on you know, Instagram or whatever. It's the it's the one off sort of guy or girl, you know what I mean. Oh, I'm never taking that vaccine one off. But you know, like most people will say this thing. And then there's a person you know, of course is not a one off, but there's we'll call it a handful.
That'll say this other thing.
Right, Perhaps because it's popular, perhaps it's because they're given to, you know, fear things like this. But I'm not talking about vaccines per se. That We've done that show and we probably gonna have to do another one on it. But what I'm talking about is the person that is aware that we have a two party system, at least in the past administration was aware that we had pretty much a vote for Donald Trump or a vote for Joe Biden.
That was it.
Those are the only two realistic outcomes that we were going to have from that election. There's never been any it's never been any different. You know, these are intelligent thinking, they would call themselves free thinking.
And it would be very, very difficult to ever change that system, right, Like that's what we got. Yeah, that's just what it is. Right.
And there are these people who say, well, I'm not voting for Joe Biden because you know, once upon a time in nineteen seventy two he did this one thing. Or you know, Joe Biden is not going to do anything for black people any better than Trump has, So why would I even bother you know, or whatever it is that they need to get off, right, So this not one off, but this type of person that exists, you know, in these groups and you know, various spaces
on the internet. You know, they are just like these sort of like downers. You know, they never have it. Nothing is good enough for them. The whole world is terrible. The world sucks. Even good news is terrible, you know what I mean, Oh, we won the election, Well wait until he sees what you know. Wait, he's never gonna do anything for us.
Ironically, same person that you brought up before, two different issues, but it's the same. It's the same guy. The same guy who's never taken the vaccine is the same guy that's like gogawehka. That's why I don't don't celebrate. Wait, till wait till tomorrow because in that one day he gonna listen.
Man, The thing is, uh, Kamala Harris got a bunch of whatever from Fox and the right wing media because she wasn't this, and she wasn't that when we see black people do it. Oh, she was, you know, she was. She was the top cop and you know, like we still gonna need police.
They bring up her record as the DA and that's the I think she was attorney general. Sure her job was to enforce the law. They bring up that she did a good job of enforcing the laws. They strike against her.
And and to be fair, because I want to be fair here. I understand that the laws are not always like you know, when when punishments are handed out or and you.
Know, you know, police enforce the laws.
The laws are enforced differently from the police on the streets, and the sentencing is done differently from the judges in the courtrooms. But my understanding, she's never actually been a beat cop and she's never actually been a judge. Correct, So when a criminal comes her away, she treats the criminal like a criminal again and not excusing anything, but you know, and it's regnized.
It's not an excuse. It's the necessary context and nuance that needs to be interjected into these conversations.
Okay, so yeah, so she will take a criminal of any color. You know, the criminal is a criminal. We all can agree that of that and then do whatever she does accordingly. Now, if she has a disproportion in amount that looks like this is not I don't believe it's because she's looking for those people. That's you know, a function of policing. And you know the way policing is done in certain neighborhood are overly policed, particularly black
and brown neighborhoods. And then in terms of convictions, obviously that's the way that sentencing is in the whole criminal justice system. And so she was a part of the machine. But the point I'm making is that for all these people to have this such a strong opinion about her, and you know, she's not black enough, and they just it's just one of these things where it's never good enough.
These are the same.
People that had problems with Obama. These the same people that are going to have a problem with whatever else good happens. Anytime a bunch of black people are celebrating something, they're gonna be like, well, that's what black people do.
Y'all all like ribs. That's why y'all got high blood pressure. This's that guy, you know what I mean.
Nothing's good enough, right, and God bless them.
Sadly that group is growing though it's discouraging men.
Yeah, but you know, and God bless them. I recognize that, you know. That's it would be hard for me to wake up every day in the world just be that terrible.
I have joy in my life. I'm happy. I have opportunity. Either it's growth.
I could see progress, like as we started the show talking about like in my lifetime what I've seen, and no matter what, these people aren't perfect people. I don't think I'll ever see a perfect person in my life, you know what I'm saying. When I get to heaven maybe.
And that's also not the expectation, right, and not expect just do effect the best you can. That's it.
I'm not perfect, you know, but somehow, you know, these people get picked on because these certain black people that nothing is ever good enough, you know, they pick on them. So it's to this group of people that I want to talk because we've all heard or seen these folks and one of the biggest things that comes up, at least in my timeline of the things I've seen this well, Joe Biden ain't gonna do nothing for black people. What has Joe Biden done for black people, you know in
his executive orders? So what I want to do is I want to talk about a what is an executive order? And b I want to kind of go through some of the executive orders that he signed and really take this and break it down in such a way that where we can understand that what we're seeing is good and the fact that we haven't seen more is not
necessarily bad. Sometimes you have to be strategic Sometimes things, you know, there's a long game, you know of four hundred years of racism doesn't go away, and the implications and the effects of it in the way the country was built and so for that doesn't go away easily, especially when a lot of the people who still reap the benefits of that enslavement, whether they can see it or not, the benefits.
Are still there.
Their children will reap those benefits, whether they see it or not. To dismantle that in its entire already takes more than.
Just a few days in office. And some executive orders. And so.
Again I want to talk about what an executive order is. So an executive order is not a law. It is a directive from the president to people who carry out jobs in the government. And so there's a lot of power in that, you know, in an executive order. But it doesn't it's not like Congress and the Senate met approved a bill.
It's not a constitutional amendment.
Right, it's not. It's not one of those things. And the truth is what a lot of black people want. A lot of black people want reparations. A lot of black people want, you know, federal mandate. It's you know, and guidelines and things like that for policing. A lot of black people want, you know, into mass incarceration and into the war on drugs, and you know a lot of things like that. Those type of movements take.
Legislation right a time.
You need Congress, you need bipartisan support exactly.
And for for.
All the black people that are so critical of the system that has failed them, and rightfully so, you know, you have a right to be critical. It's the it's the only system there is. It's not that you can either withdraw from it and just take it on the chin for the rest of your life. Or you can engage and get some other people who are like you to engage and elect you know, senators and campaign for people and get people to you know, to that share your vision in office, or run yourself.
You can, even as wide minded as it and and dream minded as it may sound, can sign up and run for office yourself. Say it, let them know. And you know it may seem like a daunting task and beyond your capabilities, but it's not every single person that you see running and getting elected for office every year. They're not superheroes, regular folks. There are regular people like you that wanted to be a part of the system that governed them instead of just a non active participant.
Now let me add this. You might have to if you're one of those people.
You might have to understand that your platform is going to require that you have a little bit of faith in your fellow man. You can't be scared of vaccines and you know all that paranoid stuff. Well, I guess you can do that and still.
Run for office.
You can be, but in order to like really get to the levels in government that are really necessary to help, you know, get these policies and these things that you might want to see across the finish line. You know, you have to recognize that there's going to need to be some compromise in terms of your beliefs. You know, I might think they're bizarre. You might think they're entirely founded.
You know, vaccines give people autism, and you know, uh, the government is bugging everyone and whatever whatever it is.
You know, you remember polio. Have you ever heard of polio?
I've heard of it because I got a polio shot in the eighties.
You remember measles?
I don't remember having it, but I got a measles shot.
I remember chicken pox.
I got chicken pox. I'm really from the eighties. But your babies didn't they because they came out of a vaccine for it, because they came out with a vac Like that's what I'm saying.
Like, like, I know it's in vogue to pretend science isn't real now, but there's a reason people don't die of polio anymore, measles, chicken pox, these things used to kill people. You would die if you got sick. They developed vaccines for them. Not only do we not die from them any more, we don't even get them anymore because they're gone, Okay, I'm just you know, Google is free.
But see, that's the simplest argument. But you know, these type of people, they don't want the simplest argument.
And I owe everybody in an apology that can hear me right now, because that was the worst stance to take. Like, I don't like to make people feel unintelligent by the stances that they take, So that was the wrong way to frame that and presented. But I get frustrated when there seems to be this contingent of contrarians now that want to debunk every myth, every you know, the conspiracy theorists used to have their own like space over here somewhere,
and now they're out front. And there's so much misinformation, so much disinformation, and so little fact checking and actual academic research, that we can write something that's completely unfounded, baseless and untrue, publish it, put it out, and if we articulated well enough it sounds legit. One person will see it. They'll feel away from reading it, not researching to make sure it made them feel away. So now that's what they think now, and that's what they're going
to tell all their friends passionately. I don't even mean to make it left because I know he.
Was going to no, no, no, no, I like that, but I'm not demand we need to talk about it. So yeah, uh, you know, if we want to get into politics. So one example I want to want to share is Mitch McConnell. Mitch McConnell wanted to make sure that when he lost the majority seat in the Senate there was Now there are now more Democrats in the Senate than there are Republicans. Democrats, if you don't know, tend to be voted in the office, and black people's
votes largely tend to go to Democrats democratic candidates. So the expectation is that there's going to be more progressive policies enacted for black folks because now there's a democratic majority in the Senate and in Congress, and since the President is a Democrat as well. Now we have all three branches of government with the Supreme Court is heavily republican now.
But but.
You know, in terms of getting something into law, the Supreme Court can only say if the law is unconstitutional, you know, so provided you know, if the government with all you know, the Senate the House and then the president president they can get something enacted. You know, let's say, forgive student loan debt or whatever. You know, it's not like that's illegal things. So the Supreme Court has no
saying that sort of thing. Anyway. Mitch McConnell is has maneuvered in such a way over the past you know, four years, to where despite there being more Democrats in the House of Representatives in Congress specifically, that he hasn't even allowed for there to be a vote on these democratic you know, he controls it, so he just won't even let people vote on it, even though it might not pass, might not get enough votes, because he had the Senate majority, wouldn't even let it go to the floor.
Right before relinquishing control of the Senate, because somehow that's a thing, you know, they had to like confirm the new people that were voted into office. Some came from Arizona, which is where we're from. So again, really proud of Arizona for that, before even confirming them, so that the actual majority could start you know, governing.
Yeah, exactly. He held it.
Hostage for like a week, two weeks however long. It was just so that he could keep the filibuster. Filibusters basically you get out there and you prevent people from voting.
You know, it's basically what it is.
It's a maneuver that keeps something.
It's the reason that President Obama wasn't the black version of Donald Trump, right. A lot of black people's problems with rockers that they felt he was too too much of his centrist He tried to appeal to both sides of the aisle too much, and he did not have a flagrantly black agenda like they wanted the black version
of Donald Trump. They wanted someone to just go on to office, push for everything that we've been denied for all of this time, and do it now like he was supposed to go in there and not care about the rule of law, proper legislation, actually running things like they're supposed to go. But like this last president, he
didn't care. So that's how I think a lot of not I think I watched a lot of you know, black people people wonder how Trump got more Black votes the second time, being so disenfranchised and oppressed for so long. When Obama won, there is a section of our culture that really wanted him to be like black Superman. Yeah, like if Malcolm X were president, how would he have done it? You know, a strictly for US Black agenda, and there was a lot of things that he wanted
to do. But just like when Trump was in office, they had the majority. Same when Obama was in office, there were a lot of things that were filibuster.
Just for like kicks, just because they didn't want Obama could have been a lot more effective. Everybody could be a lot more effective president if they had the support. The reason why Trump got everything done is because he had a Republican Senate and then for the first couple of years he had a Republican Congress as well.
And he also didn't care that part like he Wow.
So for everybody that always has something negative to say, if you put that energy into getting a two thirds majority in Senate, because some things can pass with a simple majority, which is what the Democrats have now, other things, more progressive things will take a two thirds majority. And you know that means that you have to convince I don't know thirteen Republicans, and again we all tend to
vote along party lines. You have to convince thirteen Republicans to break with you know, their party and vote something in.
The law, not just their party but their constituents.
Sure that part. And so for everyone in these little pockets of their own mind thinking that the world is never going to be good enough and anything that is celebrated is just they just rain on every parade. You know, if they took that energy and put it into like actually getting some more democratic candidates in.
Office, or if your belief, if you really believe.
That, you know, black people need this and whatever whatever it is that you believe, if you run for office and engage in the political system as opposed to withdraw from it, then at least you have a leg to stand on with me, you know, because again, we only have the system for you to say, look, man, well what has Joe Biden done for y'all? So y'all voted him in the office, and he forgot all about y'all. He's signing executive orders about COVID. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I
think COVID comes before a lot of stuff. You know, people are dying from that, you know, and disproportionately Black people are dying from that. So you know, if you if you're looking for it, it's there, you know. And if you're looking for what it is that you think is, you know, you're, you know, you being further disenfranchised. That's there as well. You know you're you're gonna find what
you're looking for. Some of the other things that I want to talk about is actually i'll read down this list. So some of the executive orders that Joe Biden's enacted. The mask wearing was a big one. He wanted to make sure that the vaccines were rolled out. I'm going through these kind of quick just because it's a lot of words here. What else he's uh paused federal student loan payments. Hopefully, you know, if we can get that all the way together, he can relieve student loan debt.
I got a master's degree, so I got a little debt. I would love for that to disappear myself. Some stuff about medicaid, protecting women's health and so forth. Of course, re entered the Paris Climate Agreement. You know, we we all live in the planet together. In executive order to get that back on track makes sense. You know, without a planet, there's no black people either, Okay, y'all, so
let the man do his job. What else, there's an executive order on the revision of civil immigration enforcement policies and priorities. That one's for our Brown brothers and sisters, our Mexican brothers and sisters specifically. You know, there was a lot of nonsense taking place at the border for a long time with ice and with you know, kids and cages and all the things that you know about. We've talked about it on the show, We've you know, seen it on the news.
You know what I'm saying.
You know that that is something that he was able to get that off real quick, just by signing some paper and having it put together. It's a little easier for that to happen. We don't have to feel like we're not a priority because that was done Black people, you know what I'm saying.
Or these specific black people.
Most black people are just happy that we got out of that last phase of our life.
You know.
So most of us are just kind of chilling. We're just you know, the world not being as tense as it once was.
But for those.
Outliers, you know, you know, we gotta, you know, let the man do what he's doing. There's an executive order for trans folks being able to serve in the military, which you know feel how you feel I support that. I think that's dope necessary. You know, everybody should have a right to feel, you know, welcome and have some dignity and you know, have some security in their life.
Especially in a country where not only our military but our police forces are voluntary. You have to you have to volunteer to serve in that matter, it's not we don't draft people. To deny people that want to serve the country based on something that's completely none of your business is ridiculous.
And then that brings me to some of the things that Joe Biden has done that folks might actually like. These these outlier folks. I need to come up with a name for this type of person. But one of them is an Executive Order on Advancing Racial Equity and Support for Underserved Communities through the Federal Government, which includes various directives to promote allocating federal resources and government benefits.
The Executive Order on Reforming our Incarceration System to eliminate the use of privately operated criminal detention facilities, you know, private prisons, for profit prisons. That has an effect on the way policing is done, That has an effect on how many people are incarcerated and what type of people are incarces.
Places have quotas to meet. There you go, you real life. We're not making this up.
We need at least eighty percent inmate.
People in these beds so our contracts can be served, so we can get paid.
That is the opposite approach that people should have when dealing with crime. We need to minimize crime, but a for profit prison means we need to maximize occupancy in the prison, in the jails, so that means longer sentences, harsher policing, and communities that don't need it, you know, because not every black community needs the amount of policing
that's there. But when you put more police in Okay north south, east west, right, if you put all the police officers on the west side, all the crime, the crime is going to be found on the west side. You know, if you share the police equally on all sides of the city, then you know it's gonna be a little.
Bit more evenly distributed.
But you know, just a simple concept there, but hopefully it made sense. And another one is a Memorandum on Condemning and combating racism, xenophobia and intolerance against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders. In the United States, which I think is very important. So my brother Raka for those of you that might know me, I have an older brother's name is Roca. He's in a group called Dilated People's Hip Hop Group.
Before we started this show.
Rocasette with me and he's like, hey, man, make sure that when you do this show that you speak to other people who have supported black people over the years, because they don't always get to the same voice that black people get.
Black people are visible and.
Powerful in this country, right, so I wanted to make sure that I said that here. And I think that that's a win for black people too, because we've been supported by Asian people with the Panthers and all the way up to Black Lives Matter in this past summer,
so that's important as well. And the Executive Order on Ethics commitments by Executive Branch personnel, and you know, I think that those things all together are some things that he can do in the matter of days that he's actually been in office, in addition to all the other things that he's done. But those are some things that at least have accommodated what black folks are at least.
Going to want to see during this administration, and as franchise and oppressed as we've lied to a manipulated and taken advantage of by our government, as we felt has been true. Do some research. Ramses will remind you every week that Google is free. Our federal and state governments employ black people at a much higher percentage than most of corporate America, and that might surprise you. They're the only ones without forced incentive that go out of their
way to employ us at a higher rate. So just another tidbit to add to what we were already talking.
About, and that's going to do it for us. So once again, I'm Ramsey's Jah.
And my name is Quentin, but my friends called me q Ward.
And this is Civic Cipher. Please hit the website civiccipher dot com, submit your questions, show topics. Of course we need your donations. Consider becoming a Patreon as well, and of course follow all our social media at Civic Cipher and you can also download previous shows and until next week, y'all peace,