Welcome to another episode of Civic Cipher. I'man host, Ramsey's Josh. They called me q Ward and that just so happens to be my name everything in the world. Man, I've been wanting to do the show for a while. A lot of folks don't know as much about the black experience as they would like to a lot of folks don't know as much about black leadership as they would
like to. You know, they get a concentrated shot every year of the same information over and over again in February about MLK, A little bit of Frederick Douglas.
A little bit of Rosa Parks. I think that's kind of it.
Yeah, that's that's that's pretty much.
They don't even throw brother Malcolm in there. Yeah.
Yeah, because and I'm glad you said that. And I think that that has to do with the fact that there is a I believe a what's the word fear is not the right word, But Malcolm X is a little bit more difficult for some folks to digest than is Martin Luther King doctor correct. And the reason is because he had a more militant mindset, a more aggressive approach, and he was very much by any means necessary. In fact, Malcolm X is known for that that.
Statement made a lot of people uncomfortable.
Exactly very good. Whereas Doctor King was he had a softer, gentler approach, and it made it a little bit easier for folks to process that they didn't have to deal with it and also deal with their own fears and insecurities at the same time. They could just say, well, instead of dealing with Malcolm X, we'll just deal with Doctor King because he seems like he's going to cause less trouble. You know, there's going to be less interference with what it is that is sort of the established
status quo. And you know, I've read about that that Malcolm X was necessary for Doctor King to advance the civil rights agenda, and so you know, obviously they're both heroes necessary in what way necessary, so that there was an alternative, a worse alternative to dealing with Doctor King, Like you can negotiate with Doctor King through doctor Doctor King and and reach you know, black folks and and understand the black community's grievances, and that would be preferable
than doing so through Malcolm X. Because Malcolm X was very much again a more militant mind and had the ear of the people, Black people especially, And when you're dealing with folks who are of the same faith, read from the same text, you know, Doctor King, it's kind
of like the devil, you know. Whereas with Malcolm X, and you know, these are religious folks following Malcolm X's leadership, that's sort of like the devil, you don't because it's historically a lot of positions of power been held by Christian folks in this country. So Doctor King just kind of felt safer. But the reason that I wanted to do this episode is because I think that, and forgive the expression, I think that history has very much whitewashed
a lot of what Doctor King actually stood for. That's A and then B some of the things that Doctor King did say. I believe that as his time in the spotlight and it's his time as a leader kind of grew, he was able to learn more, gain more perspective, and toward the end of his life was able to decide that there were other factors that we're having in an adverse effect on the black community, sort of an invisible ripple effect that was affecting the black community. He
began to really oppose the war. He began to really uh kind of go after like economic the economics part of the equation as opposed to like, you know, can we sit down and share a meal at the same lunch counter, Can we use the same bathrooms, the same water fountain. It became to it got to the point
where it's like, Okay, we need some economic equity. We need some we need an equitable a position, something where we can really advance our own and be self determined and not be reliant upon you know, this country in the way that we've been made to rely on this country for you know, everything and so forth. So I think that in order to honor the legacy of doctor King and I know that you know, we're going to
celebrate that coming soon. And also real quick, while I'm here, I want to give a shout out to doctor Kimilla Westenberg. She is at present still organizing the MLKAU celebration this year. It's virtual and we will have all that information up on the website civicside for dot com. We'd love for you to take part in that. It's a very insightful
and informative event that takes place every year. But also I wanted to take some time to review some of the things that MLK said and just kind of let them diffuse into the community so that folks know that this wasn't just a non violent, peaceful, you know, protester. This was a man who was a great thinker and someone that was able to touch on many things that
still affect the black community today. But unfortunately he was assassinated before he got to the point where he was able to really get that off and show folks that a lot of the ideas that we're dealing with right now are not new. In fact, some of them were very much pronounced during the time of doctor King, some
even reflected in some of his words. And so again I thought that was important because a lot of times folks will say to, you know, people on the streets that are protesting, or people that you know, have a very charged way of describing their reality. Black folks, you know, on the other side, you know, whatever their opposition is. A lot of times folks like to point to doctor King and say, well, doctor King was nonviolent, and therefore, you know.
I think they mistake that for him being a passivist exactly exactly.
And again I thought that it was necessity sary for us to have this conversation. One of the things that has been touted more recently is his statement that a riot is the language of the unheard. And I think that that's a profound statement and a lot of folks who don't know this, But some of the protests that Doctor King to pardon or organized, they had some folks
in there that would act up. And when those folks acted up, you know, that gave the authorities and police and so forth license to get in there and use the water hoses and the dogs and all that sort of stuff. If you see this old footage, I don't want you to think that a water hose is going up against a water hose like that is easy. You know, it's like, oh, he got spray with some water, he's wedd He's fine. No, those things hurt anyway.
Law enforcement also didn't always wait for sure those people to act up and give them license. They showed up a lot of times ready to ready for that. Yeah, and we've seen that and would.
Create that excuse even if it didn't exist.
And we've seen that in more recent protests too, and e Cancide examples. But you know, Google's there if you want to look at that. I remember one example that comes to mind is the police officer that broke out the windows in the AutoZone And I forget what city it is, but if you look up police officer breaks windows at AutoZone, you'll be able to see the officer doing that to instigate the riot. And so that, yeah,
you're absolutely right, that's something that's happened as well. But yeah, in the uh, in the past, there were some people that would you know, act up and uh, you know, folks don't that that part hasn't translated. I think a lot of people have this idea that everything Doctor King took part of was super peaceful. Everybody showed up, they prayed,
and then they went home. But this statement that he made that a riot is the language of the unheard is profound because not only does it reflect that during his time there were riots and there was you know, people that were lashing out in a physical manner to challenge authority, the status quo, etc. But it also reflects
the hopelessness that a lot of people experience. You have to think that before people take to the streets, they've already had to live through whatever it is that they've lived through, and it's likely that they've also gone through all of the proper channels to try to suggest some sort of alternative or you know, air out their grievances or get someone to remedy an issue that they're dealing with.
And then after living through it and after going through the proper channels, you know, these things sometimes can take years. Oftentimes they do. Then they take to the streets to protest, to show that there are many of us, and we are going to protest, and we're going to stand in solidarity, and we are going to challenge. We're going to show
that we are all committed to this cause. And then if that happens, and it happens again and again and again, and there's no progress, there's no forward, you know, progression. You know, absolutely there can be a lot of hopelessness in a group like that. You know, when you get out there and you listen to someone talking someone again, you know, in the in the more recent protest that I've taken part in, I've heard, of course, mothers that had to bury their children at you know, the hands
of injustice one way or another. And that sadness and that that hopelessness is something that permeates. It translates to the crowd. Because we're all human beings. We have we have the capacity, if we're healthy mental, to empathize with each other. This is what kind of helps us survive as a species. And so that that hopelessness and that feeling that no one's listening is something that is not new.
I recall having gone to Scottsdale during one of the protests that was out here that immediately turned into eluding. Admittedly you know I have you know, and it was all children. There are all kids at the at the Scottsdale Fashion Square. And again there's articles about what I'm talking about now too, if you care to look them up. Scotts Stale Fashion Square is the name of the mall.
I was there that day. I just happened to be driving by to check on my son who lived across the street from the mall, just make sure everything was okay, see if you needed to come back with me. And I saw so many police and then I saw kids, and you know, I know what kids look like. They don't dress the same, they don't walk the same, they don't look the same as you know, your normal black block dressed you know protesters that were in downtown Phoenix.
These were kids, and to me at thirty eight years old, that's a very scary thing to see police and children because the police don't see children the way I do, especially if they're children of color. You know, they see threats.
I was going to suggest that not only do they not see them the way you do, they don't see them as children. Yeah, they just see them as threats, especially when they look like us exactly.
And make no mistake, there was probably we'll say maybe thirty forty percent of them were children of color, maybe ten percent of them were black. You know, this is this is in Scottsdale, Arizona. There's not a lot of melanated folks out there, majority white children. Based on what I say saw with these eyes, but I still recognize
that those two don't mix, and so I offered. As I was driving, I saw some folks that were walking away from the mall, and I'm like, hey, you know, I'm thinking in my brain, there's police around that corner. And if they see you walking and you're carrying whatever you're carrying, they're gonna think that you got it from the mall, whether you did or you didn't. That is not up to me. I see a human being. I see a child that still has to grow up, you know.
And when I say child seventeen is a child to me, nineteen is a child to me.
You know, it's definitely not a child to them.
Right, you understand. But I'm like, hey, if you guys need a ride to your car, I can help you out. You can hop in, I'll take you wherever you want to go. I just don't want you walking past these people because you know, I don't know what they're prepared to do, and they're just around the corner waiting. I just came from there, and it ended up being the case that I was able to help quite a few of them get to where they were going as they
were walking. And I remember listening to one conversation in the backseat of the truck where one of the kids says, yeah, maybe now they'll listen to us, right now that we've we've dealt with them on an economic level. You know, they don't. They don't really listen when we're saying that we're afraid of the police. They don't listen when we're you know, they obviously the person didn't go into detail
like this. But what I gathered from that statement was that, you know, every conversation that they had had to that point had fallen on deaf ears, you know, as a group. He was not speaking for himself because he said, now they'll listen to us. And I thought to myself that, you know, you know, maybe you're right again. I'm not the judge, I'm not the police. I'm not I'm a human being recognized that there are human beings that if they turned the corner they might get their head split shot.
Who knows. But I again back to my point, I think that that statement by doctor King that you know, a riot is you know, the language of the unheard. I think it really has manifested itself in my life, and I've seen examples of that in my immediate surroundings, where you know, I think that it's just worth mentioning.
So that's one thing that doctor King said that doesn't get brought up enough, even though it's been brought up recently, it doesn't get brought up enough because again, people, I think there's this idea that all black people need to be like doctor King and then all their problems will go away, you know, and Obviously, if you're listening to my voice, maybe this is not a sentiment that you know.
Maybe you're not that shortsighted. But there may be people in your in your life and your immediate family that think that black people's problems are just their own problems, and admittedly some problems are black folks to deal with.
Stop acting black ramses and you'll be fine, do you understand?
And then the example, unfortunately, is that if you act like doctor King or some black person that reflects their worldview, that somehow things will be better for you. And it's just it's very unfair and very shortsighted. And so again this conversation is necessary another such statement, and I want to get your thoughts on this Q. However difficult it is to hear, however shocking it is to hear. We've got to face the fact that America is a racist country.
I was said by doctor Martin Luther King Jr.
What do you think I think that when you use Martin Luther King Jr. As the reference or even the vehicle for that statement. As long as I can look at that statement as having been made fifty years ago as a person, as a member of the group that benefits most from racism. It's always easier to look at it as a really, really difficult blemish on our countries, beautiful on our countries, otherwise beautiful resume, but as a blemish from yesteryear. Then they're very I won't say very.
People tend to be more comfortable and can reconcile easier when they speak about racism as something that used to be a problem in America. Racism from the past, sure, contemporary. Now you're pushing it. You might even be tripping. It might even be your imagination, right if you just and then there's a laundry list of things that they say. Comply, act right, be respect, will be polite, don't do anything wrong,
you'll be fine. In our country's lack of ability to properly reconcile, straightforwardly apologize and straightforwardly tried to correct its original sin is why it has no chance of going away at any point.
If you think about apartheid in South Africa, South Africa had to say, man, we was tripping, and of course not in those words, right, but South Africa had to face itself and say, these are all the things that we did wrong to you, to you, to you.
And then South Africa as a country could self heal and self repair, but they couldn't deny what was going on and think that there was going to be any progress made. Our biggest issue is that denying the original sin, and even those that accept it pretending like it's something that happened to our great grandparents and not something that still happens to our children.
Watch this. So I was reading an article the other day about a woman named Ruby Bridges, and I think I got the name right. But Ruby Bridges was the little girl that had to be escorted to school by the National Guard, then the National Guard of the Secret Service, and.
They segregated her school desegregators school.
Now Ruby Bridges is alive and well, still breathing air on this planet. She's in her seventies.
No, that had to be one hundred years ago.
Right now she is a live and well, it's probably gonna have Thanksgiving, you know, or Christmas or whatever comes next. So again to your point that you know America, you know, doctor King says it is a racist country, and you know we're still dealing with that. Again, I think that the fact that there are people like Ruby Bridges, I mentioned doctor Camilla Westenberg earlier, she came on the show before and she told a story. I'll never forget it. I listened in real time on the air as she
told me the story. She said that when she was a little girl, she could not drink from water fountains, she could not use the bathroom, certain restaurants she could not go into, and it was normal. She said, she could not try on hats, God forbid, shoes to see if they fit. And the kicker, she's still alive. I love her with all my heart. Talked her on the phone two or three times a week.
Yeah, I mean it gets personal.
Yeah, And this is what she said, And this is something that's perhaps the most personal thing of all. She said, when her and her family would go on road trips, they had to carry like a like a bucket with them in the car so that if they had to use the bathroom, they would have some degree of dignity because they were not allowed to use bathrooms like that. And that's just the way it was. And so there
are people alive right now that have experienced that. So for people to and then for people to look back and say it was a racist country. So even if you wanted to say, Ruby Bridges, doctor Westerberg, those folks that are in their seventies, that it's from a different time nowadays, in this year, you know, you know that's a thing of the past. You know, we're very much dealing with it. Obviously this year we've had to deal
with multiple murders, shootings from the police. You know, we've had to come to terms with again, come to terms with the statistics, because numbers don't lie, you know, no matter how many how many people try to fudge the numbers on Fox News or tell a different story with the numbers. If you take things you know for what they are, and you do your own research and just look at them and draw your own conclusions, you end
up with facts. Facts that you know. Uh, black people are three times as likely to be incarcerated for drug offenses as white folks. White folks as a percentage are use drugs at a higher rate across the board, with the exception of crack cocaine, and that is marginal. So overwhelmingly white folks as a percentage, obviously as a number because they're more of the population, but as a percentage
even use drugs more frequently. So how is it the case that black people end up incarcerated at three times a rate. And then we'll take it a step further. The sentences given to black people are so much heavier, so much more frequently. And that's just drugs, the war on drugs. Everything else.
Is The really crazy part about the data is that this information comes from our government.
Yeah, we're not creating this.
We're not going around talking to our friends and polling for our own statistics. The US Department of Justice will give you these numbers. Google is free and will say out loud that it's disproportionate, except it doesn't change, right.
And now we're getting to the point that we're making with this statement that this is a racist country. There there are systemic you know, I know that that's a trigger word for a lot of folks that don't really sympathize with black folks's plight. You know, a lot of and sometimes black folks don't even know, you know, it's it's very easy. And that's the part that has begun
to really really poke at my spirit. I had I had the opportunity to take you to Bibb County, making Georgia, USA, where Reverend Estella Seacrest.
My mother was born and raised.
Georgia, and we got to see this because people think Georgia is Atlanta. There's Atlanta, yeah, and then there's a massive state that's nothing like Atlanta. Atlanta's my mother's from Macon, she's not from Atlanta.
Yeah.
And the Southern experience for someone born in the nineteen forties, and then you think about my grandmother, it's a much different experience than ours. And and and it was much more on its face, flagrant, violent, blatant racism. Through our lifetime, it's been a bit more passive. The idea of racism has been a bit more under the table instead of slapping you in your face. Now, in recent times, it's
gotten horrible, and the statistics will bear this out. You know, during this last few years, for very very obvious reasons, hate crimes and overt racism have escalated to their highest numbers since the nineties.
Yeah.
But you know, you speak about our people not seeing it and being so disconnected from it, that's a lot. You know, you talk about voting in the election and just all the things that we're dealing with, voter suppression. Right, because my mother's eighteen pre nineteen sixty five. So the experience of people that look like us just deciding they're going to have something to do with deciding who's going to run this country was a lot different when she became of age to vote than it was for me.
So a lot of these things, no matter how hard they try to deny, are making themselves a parent in front of everyone, and people either have to choose to see it or choose not to or decide not to rather.
They see it. Yeah.
Yeah, So you know, if you're just tuning in to Civic Soccer once again, I'm host rams is joh My name is ke Ward, Yes, indeed, And today's show we're talking about doctor Martin Luther King because we feel like, or I certainly felt like he's largely misrepresented, and not that that's bad, it's just there's more depth. He's not misrepresented, that's the right word, definitely, because there's a lot more
to him than just you know, we shallow come. Doctor King was a was a thinker, a brilliant man, of course, but doctor King a lot of folks look at him like he was a patriot. And if all black folks do what doctor King did, everything will be fine. And you know, everybody's gonna get along in harmony. But doctor King was very critical of this country and the direction
that it was going in. And I think that it was his being critical that ultimately led to a lot of the changes, but then led to his ultimate assassination. You know, obviously, if you play the middle, you know, you're not gonna upset anyone. But you know, towards the end of his life, again he got a little bit more. He doubled down on a couple of things, and you know, started to take on new initiatives that would really empower
black communities a little bit further. And uh, you know, uh, you know, the conspiracy theory theories start at that point. You know, a lot of black folks can kind of see it because that's just kind of the world for us. But you know, I don't want to get lost in
that rabbit hole for now. The episode is to kind of revisit some of the things that he said so that we can add some depth to this to this man, and so that folks can understand that a lot of what it is that black folks have been championing or campaigning in in you know, this past year and in recent years, a lot of those things are nothing new. In fact, some of them are reflected in some of
doctor King's language. One such statement is, large segments of white society are more concerned with tranquility and the status quo than justice and humanity. And I personally in it now in my life is you know, doctor King was dead and gone before I was even born. I still agree with that statement. You know, the status quo. As long as everything looks like it looks now, we're fine. We don't need to engage. What are they mad at?
You know that they had a black president, you know, all these things, and it it I think that it's it's it's a mechanism that a lot of white folks and and and just people that maybe don't live around a lot of mixture, racial mixture, that kind of you know, have put up their walls and determined that the world looks the way it looks, and they wanted to keep
looking that way. They can they can insulate themselves from this, and they can uh take the responsibility out of their lap and try to place it back into the laps of other folks. And you know, one thing that I know is that it if there's something that needs to be done. You know, Black folks for the most part
will get it done. You know, we've seen that, you know, But again that challenge when it comes to systemic things and to trying to move the needle on a political in a political arena, or to take on huge systems that were built to oppress you. That's a long standing fight. And so again that statement large segments of white society are more concerned with tranquility and the status quo than justice and humanity. I think it still holds up. What do you think?
I mean, absolutely, one thing that I've seen during this year, in particular, as this pandemic kind of sat everybody down and then George Floyd Floyd's murder lit everyone on fire. Our so called allies, yeah, proved not to be like absolutely proved not to be.
Yeah.
And I think one of.
The biggest, one of the biggest hurdles that we've had is that we have had moderate progress.
Right, a black president was elected, So you can point to that and.
Talk about racism, how far we've come, ignoring how far we have left to go. Right, people would would rather us be a lot less progressive, especially with any type of aggression. Don't push forward. Just stand in that line. It's a great metaphor to to no, no, no, yeah. But it's a great metaphor to what we spoke about standing in line outside of the clubs. They don't want us to get to. Just stand in that line. You'll get in eventually.
Maybe you guys, just just be calm, be respectful, take off those air Jordan's, you know, straighten your hair braided or cut it, tuck your chain, tuck your chain, tuck your shirt, pull your pants up, and eventually you'll get where you're trying to go.
How dare you try to push forward? We're already letting you in here. We're already letting you go forward. We're allowing it.
I want to I want to add something to that analogy, because when we had that conversation, that example, one of the most notable elements of it was standing outside of those clubs. You're looking inside the clubs at folks who are not melanated that are doing all of those things. They're wearing, the Jordans they are wearing. You know, they've taken Black culture in there, all the all the things they like our culture.
To a costume that they wear.
Sure, So anyway, go ahead.
And.
At some point.
People that benefit most from the very unjust way that everything is set up have to be the ones to at least help bring about the very necessary change. It's a system that we didn't build. It's a very very difficult system for us to tear down when those that did build itn't want to pretend that they didn't on our backs and pretend that the things that we're fighting for and against don't exist.
Well, again, I really like the fact that these profound statements by this American.
Icon, this.
Model citizen, this great you know, civil rights you know, activist.
If only they treated him that way when he was with.
Us, right, you know. Oh, and that's another thing. I'm glad you brought that up. There were a lot of people that were very very critical of doctor King, you know, the same way a lot of people were critical of Muhammad Ali.
You know.
Now, you know, in death, you know, people look back and they say, oh, yeah, obviously he was a great person. Heroes exactly, but in their lifetime, no, not at all. Doctor King was he was going through it, you know, and then the government they were spying on THEIRS tapes, you know, they were spying, they were trying to intimidate him. The president at the time was trying to intimidate him out of politics by saying that they were going to paint him as a sexual deviate in the smears public
image and so forth. And you know, some folks know this, but a lot of folks don't. And those are the things that I believe will happen with the people who founded the Black Lives Matter movement, you know, those are the things that will happen with And to be fair, Black Lives Matter was never meant to have any real
leadership per se. It was not. They they learned from the panthers not to have any celebrities or superstars in the organization because if you you know, start taking out the leadership, then the movement kind of loses its momentum. And so that's why it's organized by city and by chapter. And you know, nobody knows who the what who whoever is. Obviously if you did a little research, you could find out, but they're not out there, you know, on Oprah, you
know like that. So anyway, uh, yeah, I think that it's it's something that it's worth mentioning that, like those people that say all lives matter versus black lives matter. Right, whenever someone says black lives matter, there's the people that respond that say all lives matter. Those people will ultimately find that you know, slow and steady wins the race, that their their their their argument or their adversarial position
is invalid. I think that on some level you have to know it, you know, because obviously all lives matter, or rather better said, to quote Zara, all lives will matter once black lives matter. Because right now, based on everything that we see, based on the numbers, based on the injustices that we're protesting in the streets and elsewhere, black lives don't matter. So we need to say black lives matter. We need to champion that effort so that all lives will matter.
Yeah, right, right, the the the latter argument is understood, that's the whole point.
Yeah, yeah, want we want that too. We're not trying to say black lives matter more or you know, anyone else's lives matter less. And it's so interesting how that gets challenged.
They want us to say black lives matter too. They want us to have like think about that.
They want us to have to say the two as if they need help understanding what.
We mean, you know what, flip this again. Shout out to everybody that's been supporting this show, Civic Cipher, Shout out to everybody that carries the program that allows you to hear my voice and Q's voice every week. Those are good people. People that understood what my initial charge was, and that was to be self determined. In other words, we black people, using black voices and black intelligence get to say what it is that we are going to do.
And that means that whether we're right or sorry, right, wrong or otherwise, we get to decide what it looks, what is best for us moving forward. And what it does, even if we're wrong, is it emboldens black leadership. It causes black intelligence to come to the forefront. Need black people to be critical of me and you absolutely, so that we can challenge each other to find out our path forward. And I think that what it does is it takes power away from this white savior idea that
a lot of folks have by default. You know, it's not to say that anyone's racist or anything. I think that we're just programmed. We look at all the movies and who comes and saves the day at the end, He's got flowing hair. He looks like thor and he's the god of thunder all this sort of stuff. You know, No, there's you know, we were here first, We had heroes
before there was even anybody else, you know. And so again to be self determined, to be able to say black lives matter and have that be the complete statement, because even if we said black lives matter to I feel like if someone wanted to challenge it, they would because they have blue lives matter, as if there is a such thing, yeah as a blue life.
That part.
So my thinking is that people that want to be critical of black people's self determination, black people's pursuit of fairness and an equitable life, those people really need to figure out what it is that they are afraid of, because I believe that at a lot a lot of racism, at the core of it is fear. And that really for me, you know me q I'm love first, and these racist people come, hell or high water. They're my brothers and my sisters, and they're afraid of me. They're
afraid of my children for some reason. And that means that me being the elder, Remember I was here first, the first human being that walked up right on this planet looked just like me, and his hair came out of his head just like this. And I wear my hair like this so that my ant said, will recognize me from wherever they are. Do you understand the first people?
So I feel like, being older, it's up to me to make sure that I account for the fact that sometimes younger people are afraid and again, being self determined, being able to, you know, decide what our path forward is, being able to come up with our own even if we've been very critical, not very critical, but we understood that defund the police on its face, without any explanation, sounds like Anarchyah, you know, we understand that, and it
takes a second step to really understand that's what that is about. But if all you hear is defund the police, then it sounds like, oh my god, black people don't like the police. I want it sounds like the purge right exactly. But it's if it came from a black mind and it's championed by black leadership, then I think that it has a place. Whether or not it needs to be explained remains to be seen. But I will
always and forever cheer black people championing black initiatives. I follow brown leadership whenever I have to go and take to the streets because of something that's affecting my Brown brothers and sisters, my Hispanic brothers and sisters. You know, the truth is, they know their lifestyle, they know their culture, like I grew up around it. But I'm not Hispanic. Well a little Cuban, but you know, I live in the Southwest and California and Arizona's where I grew up.
So Mexican people are the people that have shaped my life. But I don't speak Spanish as well as them. You know, they know how to get the information. It moves back and forth, and I know to follow that leadership. I don't question it. It's good enough for me, it's good enough for everyone. And I think that some times this idea that whatever black people do, it's not good enough. It should be black lives matter too, I think that that's insulting in its face.
Yeah, and it's not being challenged from a critical standpoint. Those people are being intentionally adversarial to something that's sounded like black and then put any positive statement after it. Yeah, exactly, they're going to take the opposing view of that period yeah, no matter how well it's articulated. You know, Colin Kaepernick said very plainly, I am not kneeling to disrespect our flag,
our military, or our country. I'm kneeling because our country is better than what I'm seeing, and that's black people being brutally beaten and murdered by the police so on television and nothing being done about it. How about some accountability, anybody, And instead a large portion of the population to him to shut.
Up, and instead of taking accountability, they do this thing where they try to twist the narrative, they try to those alternative facts.
It turned into a villain, right, how in the.
World, you know? And I remember reading an article, and not to be too far off topic, but I remember an article about him wearing his hair, which is something that's very important to me. Him wearing his hair and an afro shortly after he started, you know, protesting when he was off the field or otherwise not playing, injured or whatever as a statement, and to me it suggested, like, why is anybody afraid of how your hair grows and naturally grows out of your head? Had there been no mutations,
mutations and not evolution, look it up. Google is absolutely free mutations in human beings. Everybody's hair would look just like Colin Kaepernick's big old afros everywhere. That's what human beings are look like in their natural state. Everything else is the result of a mutation. Again check it. But I don't want to dwell on that too much. Another statement. I wanted to get off because you know I could do that. I'm big on afros. You know both of my sons where their hair the way comes out of
their head. It's just really important to me. I think of it as as as a crown. I like that. We can never be satisfied as long as the negro is the victim of unspeakable horrors of police brutality. Any idea who said that, I'm gonna just guess. Go ahead, Martin Luther the King Jr. That's the one said that if you're just tuning in the civic cipher, I'm your host. Rams's Joah.
They call me q Wharton. That just so happens to be my actual name.
Yes, indeed, And what we're doing today is we are discussing doctor Martin Luther King, who is off then presented as more of a pacifist as only a non violent protester and not the critical thinker that he was, and not a person who was who had charged this country with being better, not a person who was able to identify that this country had some huge shortcomings and had failed to meet its obligation to its black citizens. A lot of times, uh folks think, you know, belack doctor King.
Black folks, if if if you're black and you just belack doctor King, everything will be okay. And they and they say that not knowing that doctor King was just as critical and had just as many charges for this country as some of our you know, contemporary protesters, activist speakers, et cetera. And I think that it's important that we give some some context and some some uh substance to doctor King that may not be taught every February when
they when they glance over, when the gloss over the speech. Yeah, all that sort of stuff. So again, one of the things that doctor King said is that we can never be satisfied as long as the negro is the victim of unspeakable horrors, of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. And twenty twenty alone has shown that there are still very much unspeakable horrors of police brutality and according.
To even just twenty twenty bro November, sure, sure this week, like you know what I mean, I don't even want it to be so vague as to you know, this year had its its challenges. No, no, no, all the time still right now, yesterday, day before.
All the time. And uh, you know when he says that, you know, we can never be satisfied. For those folks that say, be like doctor King, well, in his own words, we can never be satisfied. In other words, we can't just chill at the critic. We got to take to the streets because what we see is unsatisfactory because by deafinite or at least uh, based on doctor King's advice, you know, there's still unspeakable horrors at the hands of police.
And you know why that is and how to deal with that is something that we've covered in the past and will continue to cover in the future. But it's important that people know that if doctor King were alive today, I absolutely believe that he would be out there the same as all of us, you know. And so for those folks who have been very critical of the Black Lives Matter Statement organization, you know, whatever, even people that
think of antifa in that way. You know, people that are critical and just so you know, antifa is anti fascist. If you're a fascist, you're a Nazi. So if you're not a Nazi and you don't like Nazi, than by definition you're antifa. That's the way it works. There's no organization, there is no nothing. It's just people that don't like Nazis and that are very vocal about it. So that's that.
But doctor King, I believe it, if he were alive today, would absolutely be on on the streets, you know, shouting black lives matter, not all lives matter, nothing, none of those other things that you know that people are saying blue lives. There's no such thing again as a blue life. It's so it's so infuriating. It's so hurtful to hear that.
I mean, even more than it being hurtful to hear, there's an intimidation thing going on now where they're flying that flag along with the Trump flag, along with the Confederate flag, along with the swashtikas, all together in uniform
and in concert. Right, you have the leader of our country saying that people antifa in particular and black lives matter in particular are terrorist groups, while his followers, supporters and bass actually care march with swashtikas and Confederate flags, and you know, the Blue Lives Matter flag.
Absolutely, we've already talked about.
It as a direct way to say, two black people carry on.
And we've already talked about how law enforcement gets a lot of their officers from those very right wing nationalist organizations like you know, Nazis and KKK and that sort of stuff, especially in the South. But I also wanted to say another thing, and that's that I remember, I have to do some research on this, so maybe I shouldn't say this. Yeah, vetted out first, but I will preface the statement by saying that I don't know. I just remember reading that you're not supposed to change the
colors of the American flag. I remember that. So these people who are so patriotic, that have so much to say about the American flag that knits all of us for them to take the flag the whole country and then turn it black and white, not red, white and blue, and then put one blue stripe and then suggest that the thin blue line keeps us all. You know, my understanding, police, I've never seen police prevent a crime. I've seen police come after a crime has been committed and try to
fix things, and sometimes they do so. And again, not to be critical of police, I'm not here to, you know, do that. Eventually, I'll have an officer up. We'll have a really interesting conversation with that officer, whoever he or she might be. But you know, I'm not trying to say one thing or another about police right now, but I will say that that flag is, by itself, based on what I know to be true, that's not supposed to be how you display your patriotism for this country, in fact.
Except when black lives don't matter to you. Yeah, and then it's all good if you fly a flag that was designed for the sole purpose of being the antithesis of black lives matter. They designed a flag that's secreted, this sacred flag that they fly, and you know, curse you if you don't stand in pledge allegiance to just as an intimidation and an antagonistic statement opposed to Black lives matter.
How that works. So I got one more thing that I want to talk about, doctor King said, And I'm gonna piggyback off of what we're just talking about with the flag. So some people are that passionate. Either they are intimidated by black folks and don't want to see any progress there, or they have some sort of some reason that they are just in love with the police, whatever that reason is. You know, I'm not calling anybody
a boot liquor, but it does seem like that. You know, if you work in law enforcement or your family or whatever and you got to ride with the police, then there's your case right there. But if you don't, then you really need to really check your why you're really doing that. Have the police ever saved you from from any any crime from happening to you, or have they
come around after it's happened and whatever. Anyway, it's the people who don't take it that far, people that don't fly those weird flags because there's a red one too about the fire department somehow, whoa with a red stripe? You haven't seen those? No, Oh this is Arizona, man, They got those. It's the people that they just don't want to be bothered. They're like, hey, man, you know what, that's them over.
There, our moderate allies.
Huh. So let me tell you what doctor King said about oh man, Okay, the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the KKK, but the white moderate. It was more devoted to order than justice, and I think that it's important to take those two words and look at them separately. Order order means if everything is doing exactly what it's meant to do, that's order.
If the system was designed to oppress black people, which is what we've been telling everyone, and since the inception of the system.
You know why that's so hard to accept, though, correct Talk to me, Well, it's the same reason why you look at some people and you can't, for the life of you figure out how they stand in defense of our president, except they're standing in defense of themselves. I voted for him, I support him, and I think like him. So if you're saying he's a racist, you're saying I'm racist, and I'm not racist. I know Ramsy's jah. I even
go to hashtag lunchbag, so I couldn't possibly be. Those are the ones who would like to maintain order, okay, because they can't see themselves as a part of the problem. Sure, so they're going to defend the status quo because they're a part of it and directly benefit from it.
Well, those are the same people that like a mild mannered Doctor King. And it's to those people people that I say, one more time, a quote from Doctor King, the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the KKK, but you the white moderate who is more devoted to order than justice. And I want to be clear, it's not just the white moderate. There are people who just if it's working for them. This could be black folks who have made.
It, black men that benefit from the patriarchy, This could be a.
Lot of our our Latino Latin X brothers and sisters. I think is a better thing to say, yeah, because it's largely but you know what I will, and this is me putting myself out there. A lot of Cuban people, they tend to be very Republican. I have you know, obviously I'm part Cuban.
So the Mexican, our Mexican brothers and sisters in Texas and California, New Mexico, Arizona are Mexican. Okay, our Cuban brothers and sisters in many parts of the Eastern United States, the Southeast Florida more specifically are white. How about that that's the difference, and not that there are not, sadly plenty of Mexican people and black people who support what's going on. Strangely, and you know, like we can wrestle
with that on a different show. That's how you end up with Cuban Republicans voting against their best interests.
Right.
They're they're they're.
The nerdy kid that's now a part of the cool crew, or so they think, right, and they're looking down at the nerdy kids, like what is their problem?
Yeah, didn't I I think if I if I remember correctly, the Proud Boys was founded by a Cuban man. Wow. So anyway, Yeah, that's a charge from doctor King to in this case, the white moderate someone who you know, if they like you said, they identify with like Donald Trump himself or a person like him. They like the policies, you know, the fiscal policies, et cetera, hyper capitalism. Sure, and they fail to see the humanity around them, that the world is not the same for people who don't
look like them. They just failed as they can't. It doesn't make sense. They're like, hey, man, I was born in the same places everyone else and I worked, and here I am, and I want to keep going, not recognizing that not everybody has a story like that, not seeing brothers and sisters, they see themselves almost like you
know whatever. And if they think that they're coming to hashtag lunch Bag, which is a nonprofit that are a charity event that we do monthly, we employ you to look that up and see if you can help out if you're in Phoenix or in this part of the
country the next time we do one. But if you do come to our event and you associate with black people, and you do know rams's john no qword, and you don't consider yourself racist, but you cast a vote for a person who Donald Trump will just say it, you cast a vote like that, what you need to do is go back and redefine for yourself what racism is and accept a broader definition than what you've told yourself,
and then work on yourself being critical of yourself. If you look at the fact that you share this planet with other folks, that you'll recognize that you know there's a lot more to that than you may know. So with that said, we're going to sign off. We would love for you to hit our website civicipher dot com. Submit any questions topics that you want us to discuss. You can donate. If there's any interviews we need, let
us know about it. Be sure to follow all of our social media at Civic Cipher and until next week, I'll take care of yourselves.
Peace's