And now.
Moving my mic back, you're like that.
Strike water head borders behind him.
And then if you're just tuning in the civic scipher, I'm your host, Ramsey's job.
Okay, I said some things earlier, they weren't true. He is Ramsey's job. I am q ward. You are listening to civic sits.
Indeed, we should have stick around. We've got a lot more show left for you. We will be talking about the reverse Freedom Rise. As it turns out, this whole Martha's Vineyard stunt isn't new that once upon a time they used to ship black people into these communities.
Such a thing used to exist and clearly still does. How about that.
And we're also going to talk about Bill Maher and some things that he had to say about slavery. So yeah, it takes some time with that one, definitely. But first and foremost, we like to teach you how to become a better allied BABA, so we will do that right now. This Week's Baba is sponsored by the Black Information Network Daily podcast on iHeartRadio, where you can hear discussions and interviews on topics and news stories important to the black community. Visit biinnews dot com.
All right.
Today's BABA comes via United Against book Bands dot org. We want you to say no to book bands. From January first to August thirty first, twenty twenty two, there have been six hundred and eighty one attempts to ban or restrict library resources, and one six hundred and fifty one unique titles have been targeted. Access to a wide variety of reading materials is critical for student development and well being, and the right to read is on the
ballots across the country. This November book challenges in twenty twenty two set to exceed one record. Take a stand against book bands and visit United Unite against book Bands dot org to learn more access resources and help defend the right for us all to read freely across our nation. And here's another note from our producer, Ms. Maggie aka
Maggie b No she do. There's a click going around Tom Hanks and he's he's uh, someone who's been very vocal about his lack of access to information, particularly black history, which is American history in his estimation and our estimation, of course. And he tells a story in brief about He's like YO, when I was in school, I learned about Custer's last stand, and I learned about you know, wounded me and I, but I never learned about the Tulsa uh the.
Where's it's written here? The Tulsa massacre massacre.
That's what I thought, Tella masacre in Blackwater.
Relation, burning down of black Wall.
Street, And this move against CRT or what they're calling CRT is attempting to sort of whitewash that. And so if you find that video online, check it out again. Tom Hanks talking about the American education system. All right, now, let's talk Bill Maher. You're familiar with Bill Maher very what are your thoughts on him the person?
Once upon a time, I would watch Bill Maher weekly, and I'm talking about every week for years, every Friday for years. My mom and I, both even in different cities,
we watch record recap the show together. Bill presented himself as ally through probably the last five or six administrations or something like that, and most flamboyantly and most aggressively during Trump's presidency, and in his disdain for what he'd watched, the office become I'd formed a bit of a like symbiotic bond with tuning into his show, if even as a form of therapy listening to someone else remind me
that I wasn't crazy. What was what I was watching watching happen to our country and to you know what used to be our highest office, but in the last few years, and really not just in the last few years, but every now and then he'll dip his toe into some really really strange waters. I remember an episode maybe four or five years ago, presented himself as a house in word or something to that, something similar to that.
I remember that, and the following week, Ice Cube came on the show to kind of remind him, like, it's not really your place to you know, you're funny, and I know you've kind of presented yourself as ally and having endeared yourself with us, but that's not it. Yeah.
More recently, after Civic Cipher began, he had a guest on that he kind of urged along some similar lines to this, like, essentially, stop complaining about racism, stop complaining about your history in this country, stop complaining about having gone through all these terrible things, right, you don't need affirmative action, you don't need to be anybody's victim kind
of thing. And the guest on the show was a black man encouraging us to stop being victims and you know, essentially pretend all of these things didn't happen in the wake of you know, mister West saying that slavery was a choice, and just very very similar rhetoric to that. And after that episode we talked about it on Civic Cipher. That had to be well over a year ago. I
haven't watched an episodes since. This is after watching every week for years, because I saw it right there in that space, even though he wasn't the one talking, he was far too pleased with what he was hearing, right Like, he didn't disagree, he didn't object, he didn't he didn't offer any context. He didn't he just not only accepted, but seemed to encourage, Like, Yeah, I know some black
people and that is how they feel. And I'm like, WHOA, you're speaking on behalf of black people, even if based on the direct opinion of some black people that you know, you, sir, speaking on behalf of black people, the both of you, your guest and you, sir, the host. That's a bit far from me. And I could tell, like I said, in his comfort with listening to what this gentleman that was saying, and how ridiculous it was when there were no objections, and not not just no objections, but him
seeming to be pleased with what he was hearing. I understood something had happened, that he'd either been performing all along and he got us, or that something in his ideology and his beliefs was starting to change. And so when this most recent thing came up, I had to hear about it like the rest of us, via social media instead of previously I would have heard it live. But I was not even this surprise as they're shocked,
because I already saw it. I already saw him make that left turn or that right turn however you want to be however you want to see what you did there, And it was disappointing, but it wasn't shocking or surprising. It's it's not a corner that he occupies by himself. It's just one that once upon a time, it would have seemed he never would have stood on.
So this is what uh, this is where I'm going to paint the picture for you, our listener. So he made a few points in this rant. We are going to spare you the rant, but if you want to figure it out, or figure out what he said. You can find it online. There's lots of folks that have lots of opinions on it. You may notice online that a lot of conservative voices have a lot to say about it because it paints a picture that they would
like to call accurate. But for those of you hearing it here first, just bear this in mind if you come across those conservative voices I had. In fact, I talked about this on the Black Information Network Daily podcast. I had to dedicate a whole episode to it because there was so it was so hard for that because I think that's did you did you catch that? One? Of course I did. Man, all right, well, it was such a hurtful thing. Okay, So here's some of the
main points that he made in his rant. He talked about, uh, slavery, when slavery was taking place, okay, says black people own slaves. He says, slavery is a human condition. It existed around the world for since the be any of human beings something like this. It's not necessarily a black or white thing.
It's a human thing.
And then he goes on to say, you know, Africans sold slaves into Africans sold Africans into slavery. Right, So these are the points that he's that he made right, And to anybody wanting to distance themselves from the legacy of slavery, in other words, what does what impact did slavery have that can still be felt today?
Right?
And I don't care who you are. If you want to have that conversation with me, I'm ready, Doctor Westenberg is my teacher. I can do that. But yeah, the legacy of slavery. Anybody that wants to distance themselves from the legacy of the responsibility, the accountability, accountability, thank you
of slavery. Anybody that looks a black people and says, you know, black people have less money, they're less healthy, they die younger, they're they're involved in the criminal justice system at disproportionate rates, informortality rate, infantmortality, you know, on and on.
You know the list.
They live in lower income communities, they pass on less wealth.
You know, they're access to you know, less, less and less in the way of resources, education.
On and on, you know the list. For anybody that knows that to be true and then says, well, it's just because black people are just bad people, bad at being people or whatever, it is that they say are good at being people.
However, it is that they say it.
Those people need what Bill Maher says to be true, because I think fundamentally, if you think about it, you know that that cannot be true. Black people are the people that created all the people, and some of these things are unique to America. So if you go to Africa, you'll find black people and you'll see that these things are not true in Africa. It's not to say that Africa does not have its own problems, but a point that does everywhere in the world. Right, But you know,
Africa is known for being poor, hated. Africa becomes synonymous with poverty. Well, it might have something to do with, let's be honest, the use of gunpowder by Europeans. And I love.
How eloquently and pleasantly you presented that it might have something.
To do with Oh, it definitely has something to do with that. But let's take it a step further. Okay, we know gunpowder is invented by the Chinese, right procured by Europeans, and then that coupled with disease, was used to really change the way the world looked and remake the world in such a manner that it benefits to the white people of European descent the entire world. By the way, sure, I mean, you can go from India
to anywhere, it doesn't matter. Now back to Africa. The point I made is that as we know, Africa is home to the wealth of the world, all the gold, the diamonds, all the oil, the minerals, the you know, the land it's fertile, you know, cradle of civilization, the most ancient of civilizations, the most advanced of ancient civilizations. How is it that at place that was home to Mansa Musa, to all the pharaohs. My my name, the person I'm named after, uh Ramses, one of the wealthiest
people to ever have lived. That's my actual name too. Q said it wasn't that's my that's my person.
I recant it, Yeah you did.
How was it that Africa is so poor? And then when you go and you look at it, you know, the same thing is true with our native brothers and sisters here, same as true of you know, folks in India and you know other large British colonies or otherwise the European outposts around the world. These folks were doing fine until some new folks showed up and they brought disease and gunpowder with them, Right, who was the gun powder for?
For the guns? And what were the guns for?
To kill the people that didn't sign the deals or you know whatever.
I wanted to make sure we were explicit about that. So it was not for trade. I'm going to get back to Bill Maher, but hear me out.
So, you know, you end up doing one bad deal, and it takes a lot of people to really what is the word I'm looking for. Colonize is not the right word, but occupy, that's the word. And so doing this these deals, doing you know, this paperwork sort of stuff where the country does a deal with another country with interest rates that can never be repaid, and you know, you're not allowed to sell finished goods. You can only
sell text tiles and this sort of thing. These are the deals that have caused Africa to remain poor and for the foreseeable future will be poor. It largely benefits, you know, white European countries obviously disproportionately benefits Africans who live where the resources are. And that's what we call white supremacist institutions. Right, So, now that you've had that history less and allow me to finish with Bill Maher.
He talks about people who could afford slaves, affording slaves, including black people, as a way of again distancing himself or this narrative allows the right, or really the country, if I'm honest with the left, to let's be fair to distance themselves from the problems that black people still endure to this day. Again, the legacy of slavery. And again, if you don't know what I'm talking about in terms of the legacy of slavery, one great example that you
can read that will take you. We'll call it twenty minutes. It's not even a full book. It's called How to Make a Slave. It's written by a guy named Willie Lynch. It's purported to be a work of fiction, but it is still very accurate to the mentality brilliance, if you will, and the economics.
Yeah, as a as a tool of societal socioeconomic warfare. Sure, sure, it's quite brilliant, absolutely and has stood the test.
It worked on us, so it's still working. Yeah, And that was the point. So again, the legacy of slavery. I'm not going to develop that because unfortunately we don't have the time to do it, but please, please please give you If you love warfare, if you love me, if not, even if you love any if you've ever met a black person that you can say that you love, please read that to understand the legacy of slavery a little bit better again, twenty minutes of your life. It
will change you for the better, and it'll change you forever. Okay, Now, black people owning slaves in this country. Let's redefine white supremacy for our listeners. So white supremacy isn't something that only benefits white people. White supremacy or white supremacist institutions or whatever, are institutions or societal frameworks that largely benefit white people and are often largely at the expense of non white people.
Are always at the expenses non white people.
Sure, sure, Now, sometimes I'm gonna say I'm gonna say sometimes because sometimes there are poor white people that end up in that system. And you know, we make this argument sometimes on the show rich versus Poor, which is very very much.
Ironically, I'm so glad you brought that point up, because it's more rich versus poor oftentimes, yeah, than black versus white oftentimes. Right, But they've and this is why it's so brilliant. It's been so at expert lee. I might have made that word up, but ride with expertly. It's so expertly executed as a play of black versus white that you convinced the poor white man that the even wealthy black man is beneath him or otherwise his enemy, and you keep him subjugated as ally to the rich
white man whose thumb he's under. How about that?
So let me finish. It is possible, now that we've defined what white supremacy looks like, as long as it largely benefits these groups, this group, and disproportionately affects this other group. That's that's the makings. We'll call it the makings because I can't say across the board, right, I can't say across the board. But those are the makings of a white supremacist institution.
Right, So.
It is possible for black people to participate in white supremacist institution. Yes, it is possible for black people to benefit I e.
Jason Whitlock. If you ever have time to google someone black that benefits from and participates in the practice and institution of white supremacy, there you have it perfect. Now.
He talks about slavery around the world. Now, slavery has existed since people, right, And he's not saying anything that no one doesn't that we don't know, you know what I mean. This isn't some new revelation. It's not like we're like, oh my gosh, there was slavery before, you know, because he goes on to talk about the Bible, and anyone that grew up in this country knows that there were slaves in the Bible.
Right.
The Bible obviously is a lot older than this country. So there you have it, right. But what he's trying to do is kind of dilute what the word slavery means in this country and conflate it with slavery historically speaking, where in this country the slavery was very, very different. It was pure economics. It was we're going to take you from your homeland, right, We're going to change your language, we're going to rape you, we're going to beat you.
Slaves have been beaten, you know what I mean, But not all of these things together. We're going to chop your foot off if you try to escape. You know, this sort this this type of cruelty we're going to make you wear these chains, We're going to make you wear these masks. We're gonna you know, and we need sound economics were most unique to the Americas. We are going to perform medical experiences on you, perform medical experience on you.
But the key above all else, above any other type of slavery that I've seen, And this is something that I've looked into obviously, doctor Westernberg, student, we.
Were not human beings bought and SODA's property, not human beings owned into perpetuity and our children and considered non human beneath those who owned us. He goes on to tell us prisoners of war as property. Yeah, and we cannot work our way out of it. Nothing that was it, that was our permanent condition. Now he goes on to make a point about Slavic people. That's where the word slave comes from.
Again, this is another point that I made in the Black Information Network Daily podcast. Slavic people were white people. That's where the term comes from. And you see how harmful his his rhetoric is intentionally in it.
Oh my god, it's oh Jesus.
But anyway, back to what I'm trying to say here, Slavic people white people. You could show me some white people that endured the type of slavery that was designed to operate in perpetuity for sound economics, so that the slaves won't come kill you in your house, right, the type of slavery in the Americas, in the Caribbean. Show me some white folks that endured that type of slavery. You won't find a such example my point exactly. And then of course you won't find another example of any
other people in history. That's why it's so dangerous that he gives this to the right, even taking it away from black people. And it's almost like a black people, you're responsible for where your station in life. I was born in eighty two into this world and black people a never had no wealth in this country. And it's like, well, it's your own fault. We freed the slaves. What are you going to do with it? Well, no, there's no slaves. What's the problem. We got a lot more to address
than just that. You know, there's some psycho loots, some deeper implications. There's a deeper legacy there. Read the Willie Lynch letter, as I mentioned, and then of course he talks about how Africans sold slaves. Again, we mentioned this before. We know that this is true. I've done the research on this, and the truth is the Africans that's sold
the slaves did not know where they were going. They thought the same type of slavery that they were practicing in Africa would be the same type of slavery they sold their folks into. So not excusing that still an awful thing to do, but that's the extent of their crimes in Africa. What happened in the Americas is really what created the legacy that we have to deal with today. We so experienced it that it's time for The Way Black History Fact. Sorry I have to move on so quickly,
but that's how it goes. When the clock is taken right.
Do what you gotta do.
So Today's Way Black History Fact is sponsored by Hip Hop Weekly Media. You can check out more at hip hopwekly dot com. We're going to be talking about reverse freedom rides to call back to what we talked about earlier in the show, The Martha's Vineyard political stunt by
rondas Antisana Company. This comes via Politico, So I will in the spring of nineteen sixty two, David Harris a short order cook from Little Rock, Arkansas, arrived in Hyannis, Massachusetts, a small but tony vacation village located on Cape Cod best known then and now as the location of the
Kennedy family summer compound. Harris was black, traveled to Hyannis in search of work with funding and encouragement from Little Rock's White Citizens Council, one of many local organizations comprised of middle class white professionals who, while dedicated to the preservation of segregation, styled themselves as the respectable moderate alternative to the ku Klux Klan. Earlier that year, council members in New Orleans and Little Rock dreamed up a public
relations stunt. They would offer black Southerners bus, spare and relocation costs to undertake quote reverse freedom rides to northern cities, where they told their victims good jobs and housing awaited them. The idea was to embarrass and expose the hypocrisy of northern liberals who cheered the real freedom rides, but whom they suspected would blanch at receiving thousands of black transplants
in their own communities. Harris was just the first of roughly one hundred black Southerners whom the Council's shipped to Hyennas. In this particular case, the Citizens' Council had a specific target in mind.
Edward M.
Kennedy, the President's younger brother, who was campaigning for a seat in the United States sent President Kennedy's brother assured you a grand reception to Massachusetts. The council's leadership assured them good jobs, housing, etc. Are promised Kennedy, a summer resident of Hyannis, called the segregationist bluff. The organized a reception for Harris's for Harris, comprised of local residents who
extended a warm welcome. The story of reverse freedom rides assumed a new meaning this week when persons seemingly associated with Florida Governor Ron desant As promised a group of Venezuelan and asylum seekers the good jobs in housing, as well as expedited work permits awaited them in Boston. The migrants were transported instead, without their knowledge, to Martha's Vineyard.
As we mentioned, in an attempt to surprise and expose the hypocrisy of liberals who oppose the Republican Party's hardline immigration stance, the ploy didn't work out exactly as they planned. Residents of the small island only embraced the asylum seekers, much of the citizens of Hyannis welcomed David Harris some sixty years earlier. The two stories share some similar characteristics. In both cases, elected officials attempted to pin their critics
in a corner. In neither case did the deploy immediately succeed, though today's story has yet to play out. In mid nineteen sixty one, the Congress of Racial Equality organized a series of freedom rides in which interracial groups rode greyhound buses through Southern states in an effort to test the efficacy of the Supreme Court's ban on segregated families serving
interstate travel. The freedom riders famously they encountered frequent brutal backlash from local residents and law enforcement officials, who deployed terrorism and illegal arrest and imprisonment. The freedom rides, still in force a year later, proved a costly embarrassment to Southern elected officials and business leaders, who saw the region's
violent lawlessness splashed across papers around the world. The freedom Rides came in a moment when Southern violence generally threatened to become a drag on the region's economic prospects and posed a political conundrum for the administration in Washington, which completed which sorry competed with the Soviet Union for the loyalty of former colonial subjects in Asia and Africa, most
of them non white. When an angry mob held a group of black worshippers hostage inside the First Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, the columnist Murray Kempton captured popular opinion in the North and beyond when he caustically remarked, well, these are proud, brave, and faithful people, and some of them even found time to worry about the wives of pillars of white citizens who were in danger of having
to cook their own breakfast in the morning. The white South had a pr problem entered George Singleman, a member of the Greater New Orleans Citizens Council and aid to Leander Perez, the city's leading segregationist, a man so extreme in his anti black and anti Semitic prejudices that the local Catholic bishop excommunicated him. Single Man's idea was simple. White liberals in the North, he maintained, were hypocrites, and their hypocrisies should be exposed safe in their urban and
suburban enclaves. They could look down their noses that Southern segregationists because they didn't have to live, work, and go to school with African Americans. By busting thousands of black Southerners to northern community, the Citizens' Council could bring the civil rights movement home to the North. Northern whites, he surmised, were no more interested in sharing towns and suburbs with
black people than were Southern whites. It was with this sentiment in mind that the Mississippi House of Representative passed a non binding resolution that proposed to redistribute dissatisfied Negro population to other areas where the political leadership constantly clamors for equal rights for all persons without regard to the Constitution, judicial precedent, and rights of the states.
That was actually what.
It said all right throughout the South.
Citizens Councils as far and wide as Making Georgia and Selma, Alabama's report the Mississippi and Jackson, Mississippi lied with impunity, assuring black residents that jobs and housing awaited them in their new home states. This was never the case, particularly on Cape Cod, where the off season unemployment rate normally hovered near twenty percent. The iron of course, was that the White Citizens Council didn't really need to pull a
cheap stunt. The North already had a large black population, one that had been growing at leaps and bounds since the start of World War Two. To be sure, in the North, black people could vote and build political power, but a complex thicket of discrimination in housing, jobs, credit, banking and policing, and in the provision of public services such as education and infrastructure render black people as second
class citizens in most Northern localities. By the mid nineteen sixties, urban unrest and contests over schools and housing and desegregation would lay bare these inequalities. Singleman wasn't wrong, per se when he observed a certain comfortable hypocrisy on the part of Northern liberals. He was just moronic in the way he went about trying.
To expose it.
As was the case sixty years ago last week, politicians use a group of vulnerable people to change the subject, to shift the political debate any more to more comfortable ground. And here we have it. Nothing new under the sun. As we mentioned, you know, immigration can reform could be something that might help us and help folks that want to you know make a life here in this country, but the way they're going about trying to expose it is cruel and human and it's political theater that does
not deserve applause. And because they know how to work the system, they're getting all the applause. But that's going to do it for us this week on Civic Cipher. So once again, I'm your host, Ramses job.
He is Rams' job. I am q Ward. You have been listening to once again Civic Cipher.
Today's show is produced by our producer is Maggie aka Maggie be Knowing, and we want you to check us.
Out, so subscribe, subscribe, like, comment, share, share all those things. Please, thank you. I appreciate that.
And if you have any questions, any topics you want us to get to, hit Civiccipher dot com. We ask every week we'll ask again. Make a donation to the show. You can do show through the website. You can also hit us at Civic Cipher on your favorite money sending at very convenient. We've made it for you. It helps the show grow and we're growing with your support. And be sure to follow us on all social media at the Civic Cipher And yeah, yeah, I think that's about it.
Anything else, I think that's about it. All right, until next time, y'all pace.
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