In this episode host Erik Fleming interviews Amanda Janoo on well‑being economics — redefining success beyond GDP and designing economies that prioritize people and the planet — and Dr. Karida Brown on the history of Black education from emancipation through Brown v. Board and the ongoing fight against privatization and book bans.
The conversation explores alternatives to growth‑focused capitalism, policy lessons from global well‑being initiatives, the legacy of Black educators like Lucy Craft Laney, and why preserving public knowledge systems matters for democracy.
00:00:00 --> 00:00:06 Welcome. I'm Erik Fleming, host of A Moment with Erik Fleming, the podcast of our time.
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00:01:12 --> 00:01:17 The following program is hosted by the NBG Podcast Network.
00:01:21 --> 00:01:56 Music.
00:01:57 --> 00:02:03 Hello and welcome to another moment with Erik Fleming. I am your host, Erik Fleming.
00:02:03 --> 00:02:08 And today I'm really excited because I have two incredible women coming on.
00:02:09 --> 00:02:16 Both of them are way smarter than I am and really were a joy to talk to.
00:02:16 --> 00:02:23 One has been on the podcast before and another one, This was her first time,
00:02:23 --> 00:02:30 but based on the conversations we've had, she's going to come back for sure.
00:02:30 --> 00:02:33 But I hope that you enjoy their interviews.
00:02:33 --> 00:02:37 One is going to be talking about economics. The other is going to be talking
00:02:37 --> 00:02:39 about the history of black education.
00:02:41 --> 00:02:46 And both of those subjects are very, very relevant to where we are now.
00:02:48 --> 00:02:51 So I just I hope you all enjoy that.
00:02:51 --> 00:02:58 You know, we're still trying to get, you know, our target number of subscribers.
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00:03:55 --> 00:03:59 All right. So let's go ahead and kick it off. And as always,
00:03:59 --> 00:04:02 we kick it off with a moment of news with Grace G.
00:04:04 --> 00:04:09 Music.
00:04:10 --> 00:04:14 Thanks, Erik. Three former Memphis police officers convicted in the death of
00:04:14 --> 00:04:18 Tyree Nichols have been granted new federal trials due to a judge's questionable
00:04:18 --> 00:04:20 communications with prosecutors.
00:04:21 --> 00:04:25 Chicago's Mayor Brandon Johnson has signed an executive order stating that the
00:04:25 --> 00:04:30 city's police will not assist any federal agents or National Guard troops that
00:04:30 --> 00:04:32 President Trump may deploy to the city.
00:04:32 --> 00:04:37 Victims of Jeffrey Epstein demanded at a Capitol Hill press conference that
00:04:37 --> 00:04:43 Congress pass a bill to release all unclassified records related to the disgraced financier. The U.S.
00:04:44 --> 00:04:48 Justice Department has opened a criminal mortgage fraud probe into Federal Reserve
00:04:48 --> 00:04:50 Governor Lisa Cook. A U.S.
00:04:51 --> 00:04:54 Appeals court has ruled that most of President Trump's tariffs are illegal,
00:04:54 --> 00:04:58 though they will remain in effect for now to allow the administration time to
00:04:58 --> 00:04:59 appeal to the Supreme Court.
00:05:00 --> 00:05:05 U.S. Republican Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa has decided not to run for re-election,
00:05:06 --> 00:05:09 a move that could affect her party's chances of keeping control of the Senate.
00:05:10 --> 00:05:14 Missouri's Republican Governor Mike Kehoe has called a special legislative session
00:05:14 --> 00:05:16 to redraw congressional districts.
00:05:17 --> 00:05:22 President Donald Trump has canceled the Secret Service protection for his 2024
00:05:22 --> 00:05:25 rival and former Vice President Kamala Harris.
00:05:26 --> 00:05:29 Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
00:05:29 --> 00:05:34 Has approached Jim O'Neill as acting director of the CDC after firing the former
00:05:34 --> 00:05:38 director, Susan Menares, who resisted changes to vaccine policy.
00:05:39 --> 00:05:43 Florida Surgeon General announced the state will end all vaccine mandates,
00:05:43 --> 00:05:44 including those for students.
00:05:45 --> 00:05:50 The U.S. Air Force will offer military funeral honors for Ashley Babbitt,
00:05:50 --> 00:05:55 the veteran who was killed during the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol.
00:05:55 --> 00:06:02 And in one of Afghanistan's worst earthquakes, over 800 people were killed and thousands injured.
00:06:03 --> 00:06:07 I am Grace G., and this has been a Moment of News.
00:06:08 --> 00:06:14 Music.
00:06:14 --> 00:06:21 All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news. And now it is time for my guest, Amanda Janoo.
00:06:21 --> 00:06:27 Amanda Janoo is a Family Economic Security Fellow at the New Practice Lab.
00:06:27 --> 00:06:34 Janoo is a visionary economist committing to building economies that prioritize people and planet.
00:06:35 --> 00:06:40 Blending expertise in heterodox economics, industrial policy,
00:06:40 --> 00:06:45 and participatory governance, Janoo has dedicated her career to advancing social
00:06:45 --> 00:06:49 and ecological well-being through economic systems change.
00:06:49 --> 00:06:55 As the economics and policy lead at the Well-Being Economy Alliance.
00:06:56 --> 00:07:01 Janoo is a leading advocate for redefining how economic success is measured and achieved.
00:07:01 --> 00:07:06 She works with governments, organizations, and communities worldwide to shift
00:07:06 --> 00:07:10 the focus from economic growth to sustainable well-being,
00:07:11 --> 00:07:17 promoting policies that emphasize long-term prosperity for both society and the environment.
00:07:17 --> 00:07:23 Known for her engaging communication style, Janu excels at breaking down complex
00:07:23 --> 00:07:29 economic concepts for diverse audiences, from policymakers to grassroots organizations.
00:07:30 --> 00:07:35 Will have speaking at international conferences, crafting policy guides or advancing
00:07:35 --> 00:07:40 initiatives like well-being, budgeting, and beyond GDP frameworks,
00:07:40 --> 00:07:46 Janoo's work reflects her unwavering belief in the power of economic democracy
00:07:46 --> 00:07:48 to create a just and sustainable world.
00:07:49 --> 00:07:53 For a master's in philosophy and development studies from Cambridge University,
00:07:53 --> 00:08:00 where she studied under renowned economist Ha-Joon Chang, Janoo brings deep expertise
00:08:00 --> 00:08:02 in industrial policy and sustainable development.
00:08:02 --> 00:08:08 Having worked for over a decade as an industrial policy and structural transformation
00:08:08 --> 00:08:15 expert for UNIDO, GIZ, and the African Development Bank.
00:08:16 --> 00:08:22 Rooted in Vermont, Janoo brings Janoo Bridges global expertise with local impact,
00:08:23 --> 00:08:26 supporting state-level coalition building and advising U.S.
00:08:26 --> 00:08:30 Foundations to help accelerate the well-being economy movement across our country.
00:08:31 --> 00:08:36 Janoo's mission is clear, to inspire a movement towards economic systems that
00:08:36 --> 00:08:41 honor human dignity, ecological balance, and well-being for all.
00:08:41 --> 00:08:45 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:08:45 --> 00:08:49 on this podcast, Amanda Janoo.
00:08:50 --> 00:09:00 Music.
00:08:59 --> 00:09:03 All right amanda janoo am i saying that right,
00:09:04 --> 00:09:10 Perfect. How are you doing? Oh, I'm doing okay. You know, personally good.
00:09:10 --> 00:09:12 Asterix, existentially stressed.
00:09:13 --> 00:09:18 Yeah, that's all of us. All of us are in this thing, but that's why we're in this fight together.
00:09:18 --> 00:09:26 And I wanted you to come on because you have a pretty unique take on economics
00:09:26 --> 00:09:29 that I think people need to be exposed to.
00:09:29 --> 00:09:34 I mean, you're more famous than I am, but I just, you know, for my audience,
00:09:34 --> 00:09:40 I wanted to give you this platform to talk about well-being economics,
00:09:40 --> 00:09:43 because I just felt that sounds great.
00:09:44 --> 00:09:49 I think I think we need to have well-being when it comes to our money and our
00:09:49 --> 00:09:53 personal wealth and all that and trying to navigate through all this stuff.
00:09:54 --> 00:09:58 So what I like to do at the beginning is do the icebreaker thing.
00:09:58 --> 00:10:01 And so the first icebreaker is
00:10:01 --> 00:10:04 a quote and the quote is the
00:10:04 --> 00:10:08 best way to predict your future is to create it what does that quote mean to
00:10:08 --> 00:10:15 you i love that i love that for me and probably because i'm obsessed with the
00:10:15 --> 00:10:22 economy right is i think often the major limitation is our imagination.
00:10:23 --> 00:10:30 And so it's really about like when you can dream it, then that's when you can build it.
00:10:30 --> 00:10:34 And so that's what that quote means to me. But I appreciate that in this moment
00:10:34 --> 00:10:38 when there's a pretty pervasive sense of hopelessness.
00:10:39 --> 00:10:44 Yeah. Yeah. Well, you know, the guy who said that was Abraham Lincoln.
00:10:44 --> 00:10:48 So he was going through some stuff when he was president.
00:10:49 --> 00:10:52 So I'm sure it was the same spirit when he when he said that.
00:10:53 --> 00:10:56 So the next icebreaker is what we call 20 questions.
00:10:57 --> 00:11:00 So I need you to give me a number between one and 20.
00:11:01 --> 00:11:05 Okay. Do I say it? Yes. 18. Okay.
00:11:06 --> 00:11:13 What's one thing we might all agree is important, no matter our differences? Hmm.
00:11:15 --> 00:11:20 In my experience, when I ask people what they love about where they live,
00:11:20 --> 00:11:26 no matter who it is, I would say maybe not 100% of the time,
00:11:26 --> 00:11:31 but pretty like maybe 99% of the time people say it's their people.
00:11:31 --> 00:11:32 The community, and the nature.
00:11:33 --> 00:11:38 And so I think that that's a pretty universally, like, sort of valued thing
00:11:38 --> 00:11:41 in our lives that we view as important.
00:11:41 --> 00:11:47 Okay. So you're saying we all have an appreciation and a sense of community.
00:11:48 --> 00:11:51 Mm-hmm. Okay. Sounds good. All right.
00:11:51 --> 00:11:56 So let's start this interview with a question that you posed in 2023.
00:11:57 --> 00:12:01 Do we serve the economy or does the economy serve us?
00:12:02 --> 00:12:11 Well, first, I think it's helpful to define the economy because it's a term we hear all of the time,
00:12:11 --> 00:12:16 but it's often presented as a pretty abstract force that happens out there beyond
00:12:16 --> 00:12:20 our control when the reality is that we are the economy.
00:12:20 --> 00:12:25 It's just a word for the way that we produce and provide for one another.
00:12:25 --> 00:12:29 And so the economy is really just the means and methods by which we interact
00:12:29 --> 00:12:35 with one another in our natural environment to improve our collective quality of life. But,
00:12:35 --> 00:12:39 Although our sort of obsession with the economy may feel timeless,
00:12:39 --> 00:12:45 it actually only entered the term economy into the public discourse after the Great Depression.
00:12:46 --> 00:12:50 With the development of a system of national accounts, or nowadays what we use
00:12:50 --> 00:12:55 as like GDP, gross domestic product, to sort of measure economic output and national income.
00:12:55 --> 00:13:02 But one of its chief architects, Simon Kuznets, was really clear that this indicator
00:13:02 --> 00:13:06 should not be used to assess the well-being of a society and that any discussion
00:13:06 --> 00:13:09 of growth should be really clear on growth of what and why.
00:13:10 --> 00:13:16 But, you know, we didn't listen since World War II, but particularly since the 1980s.
00:13:16 --> 00:13:21 We've been evaluating not only our economy success, but our societal success
00:13:21 --> 00:13:23 by our level of economic growth.
00:13:23 --> 00:13:27 So by our level of production and consumption and income, assuming that that's
00:13:27 --> 00:13:29 what matters most for a good life.
00:13:29 --> 00:13:32 And so if economic growth is our no star,
00:13:33 --> 00:13:38 we've treated people in nature as inputs into those production processes or
00:13:38 --> 00:13:44 into the economy rather than viewing them as the beneficiaries of this system.
00:13:45 --> 00:13:48 And I will say, though, I think the tides are really turning.
00:13:48 --> 00:13:53 And so surveys have shown, for example, recently that 68% of Americans believe
00:13:53 --> 00:13:57 the economy should prioritize the health and well-being of people and nature
00:13:57 --> 00:13:59 rather than profit and wealth.
00:13:59 --> 00:14:05 And so to answer your question, I think we're in a moment of change where people
00:14:05 --> 00:14:10 are recognizing that we are not here to serve the economy, but are being treated as such,
00:14:11 --> 00:14:14 and that we need to start treating the economy as if it's here to serve us.
00:14:15 --> 00:14:18 So, Amanda, I want you to diagnose my condition.
00:14:19 --> 00:14:23 I believe that private owners should be able to produce goods and services they
00:14:23 --> 00:14:28 can sell in an open market with prices and wages set by supply,
00:14:28 --> 00:14:29 demand and competition.
00:14:30 --> 00:14:34 However, I also believe that health care and education should be provided for
00:14:34 --> 00:14:39 for provided for free or subsidized by the government.
00:14:39 --> 00:14:43 So what am I? And the reason why I ask that is because, you know,
00:14:44 --> 00:14:48 as somebody that's been in politics, as somebody that's had to deal with these
00:14:48 --> 00:14:51 issues and we get labeled. Oh, you're a socialist.
00:14:52 --> 00:14:56 You're a communist. You're a liberal or whatever the case may be.
00:14:56 --> 00:15:00 And then some people are like, you're just a capitalist like everybody else.
00:15:01 --> 00:15:09 But it's not that cut and dry. So based on my beliefs, how would you describe me?
00:15:10 --> 00:15:17 Well, first, I might ask you a couple questions to get a better understanding of your philosophy.
00:15:18 --> 00:15:21 So why do you think that health and education should be free?
00:15:22 --> 00:15:26 I think the wealthiest nation in the world should make sure that their people
00:15:26 --> 00:15:32 are healthy and their people are educated and to perpetuate that wealth.
00:15:32 --> 00:15:38 It's not just, you know, it's to me, it's the ultimate in national security.
00:15:38 --> 00:15:45 I'm looking at all these other industrialized nations have free health care
00:15:45 --> 00:15:47 or free education or both.
00:15:47 --> 00:15:53 And I'm like, here we are, you know, debating whether people should have their
00:15:53 --> 00:15:59 debt retired or forgiven as far as going to school and all that.
00:15:59 --> 00:16:02 I mean, Dwight D. Eisenhower created the student loan program.
00:16:04 --> 00:16:09 As a means of defense, because he wanted to get more Americans into the sciences, right?
00:16:10 --> 00:16:15 So it's like, to me, the general concept has always been you want your people
00:16:15 --> 00:16:17 to be healthy, you want your people to be educated.
00:16:19 --> 00:16:25 And I think the government, you know, government as rich as ours should be able to finance them.
00:16:26 --> 00:16:31 Mm-hmm. Are there any other kinds of goods or services or things that you think
00:16:31 --> 00:16:33 should be provided freely to people?
00:16:34 --> 00:16:37 You know, I had to I had to really think about that. You know,
00:16:37 --> 00:16:40 there's been a lot of debate recently with Mr.
00:16:40 --> 00:16:45 Mamdani running in New York that, you know, public transportation should be available.
00:16:45 --> 00:16:52 And that that sounds like it could be but i just you know and this is the pragmatic
00:16:52 --> 00:16:57 side of me in politics it was just like you know just trying to deal with public
00:16:57 --> 00:16:58 transportation budgets,
00:16:59 --> 00:17:05 making sure that you know in in mississippi jackson was you know now biloxi
00:17:05 --> 00:17:09 the gulf coast has a system but at that time it was primarily jackson and you
00:17:09 --> 00:17:13 know we were debating whether we needed to have a high rail system and all that, that.
00:17:13 --> 00:17:17 And the main thing was trying to figure out how we're going to pay for it.
00:17:18 --> 00:17:19 How is it going to pay for itself?
00:17:19 --> 00:17:23 You know, we've always debated about tow roads and people being able to,
00:17:24 --> 00:17:26 you know, should we have a tow road for a minute?
00:17:26 --> 00:17:31 And then once the construction's paid off, then let it be a free road again.
00:17:31 --> 00:17:38 And in Georgia, you kind of have the same dynamics. MARTA's much bigger than J-Tran and Jackson.
00:17:38 --> 00:17:43 But, you know, It's like there are some communities that don't want public transportation
00:17:43 --> 00:17:47 because they think it's going to bring some kind of element to the community.
00:17:47 --> 00:17:54 So outside of health care, I think health care and education are universal that people support.
00:17:55 --> 00:18:00 And that would be the easier targets to go after anything else, you know.
00:18:02 --> 00:18:10 And it's, you know, people, I don't think people are as, their appetite is not as wedded for them.
00:18:11 --> 00:18:17 Mm-hmm. And why do you believe, like, why do you believe private ownership is important?
00:18:17 --> 00:18:23 Well, I will, you know, as a Black person, and by the way, welcome to the Amanda Janoo show.
00:18:24 --> 00:18:30 I know, sorry. Um, what, what I think that, I think it's important as a black
00:18:30 --> 00:18:35 person, you know, just from our history that we need to establish wealth in
00:18:35 --> 00:18:39 the, in the wealthiest nation in the world.
00:18:39 --> 00:18:44 When a white person has $100, we only have $5.
00:18:44 --> 00:18:50 I think that's very important for us to be able to have assets,
00:18:50 --> 00:18:56 to have homes, to have investments and all those other things, land and all that.
00:18:57 --> 00:19:01 So I think that's important in a capitalist society because you've got to be
00:19:01 --> 00:19:08 able to build communities and establish businesses and not be so dependent on
00:19:08 --> 00:19:10 other people to do what you need to do.
00:19:11 --> 00:19:13 So I think that aspect is important.
00:19:14 --> 00:19:18 So like independence and like freedom and autonomy and yeah,
00:19:18 --> 00:19:20 yeah, I definitely get that.
00:19:20 --> 00:19:24 And what is your take on like cooperatives or employee owned businesses?
00:19:24 --> 00:19:27 You know what I mean? Like, or do you think it's really about like a private individual?
00:19:28 --> 00:19:33 So, you know, I don't have a problem with co-ops. I think co-ops can coexist
00:19:33 --> 00:19:42 in a capitalist market, you know, because I think that if a group of people, say like farmers,
00:19:42 --> 00:19:50 for example, if they want to put together a co-op to be competitive with General Mills,
00:19:51 --> 00:19:54 the Koch brothers, all these other giant agricultural companies.
00:19:56 --> 00:20:00 You know, I think that's, that should be fair game. I think they should be allowed to do that.
00:20:01 --> 00:20:05 Amazing. All right. Well, my diagnosis would be, and this is also what I will
00:20:05 --> 00:20:11 say, like in the sort of what we might call the new economy or alternative economy
00:20:11 --> 00:20:14 space, there are hundreds of different terms,
00:20:14 --> 00:20:17 right, for different kinds of philosophies.
00:20:17 --> 00:20:21 And I tend to try not to use isms, actually, as much as possible, because I don't know.
00:20:22 --> 00:20:30 But I would say I would see you as part nationally of like part of sort of the
00:20:30 --> 00:20:31 progressive economy movement.
00:20:31 --> 00:20:39 Right. where we're looking at ensuring that we create certain foundational social
00:20:39 --> 00:20:44 welfare provisions, whether that's health education, et cetera.
00:20:44 --> 00:20:48 Part of the, there's also like a growing, it sounds like you'd be very aligned.
00:20:49 --> 00:20:50 Have you ever spoken with Derek Hamilton?
00:20:50 --> 00:20:57 He's an economist, but he talks, he's focuses in like stratification economics and a lot of that.
00:20:57 --> 00:21:01 Yeah, I've been trying to get Derek on the show. I know he's big time on the
00:21:01 --> 00:21:03 news school and all that. Yeah.
00:21:04 --> 00:21:06 Hopefully, once he sees that you and I have had a conversation,
00:21:06 --> 00:21:08 he's like, oh, okay, he might be all right to talk to. Okay.
00:21:09 --> 00:21:13 I know. He's amazing. He's such good people. And so, you know,
00:21:13 --> 00:21:17 he frames his work around, you know, economic human rights.
00:21:17 --> 00:21:21 And there is like a growing global movement that's really centered in that, too,
00:21:21 --> 00:21:26 of how do we ensure that people's, everybody's afforded certain basic human
00:21:26 --> 00:21:31 rights as a foundation in our economy or the guarantee movement,
00:21:31 --> 00:21:33 like with Natalie Foster,
00:21:33 --> 00:21:37 which are about, you know, ensuring certain minimum guarantees for individuals.
00:21:37 --> 00:21:42 So I would see you as part of a lot of those, you know, different sort of movements
00:21:42 --> 00:21:44 or paradigms that exist within the U.S.
00:21:44 --> 00:21:50 Or globally. But come in a lot of other names like Social Democrat or,
00:21:50 --> 00:21:53 yeah, Foundational Economy is like a movement.
00:21:54 --> 00:21:59 So many terms, but you can you can choose whichever one sort of resonates with you, too.
00:22:01 --> 00:22:04 I've made the argument that America does capitalism wrong.
00:22:05 --> 00:22:10 It tends to focus on and reward limited accumulation of wealth instead of true
00:22:10 --> 00:22:12 opportunity for attaining wealth.
00:22:13 --> 00:22:15 Am I on the right track with that argument?
00:22:16 --> 00:22:22 Absolutely, for sure. I think one of the fundamental core root issues in our
00:22:22 --> 00:22:25 current economic system is that it's a lot easier to make money off of money
00:22:25 --> 00:22:28 than it is off of actual real work.
00:22:28 --> 00:22:31 So wages have been stagnant for, you know,
00:22:32 --> 00:22:38 30 years or so, despite rapid productivity growth, which has allowed for an
00:22:38 --> 00:22:43 increasingly small group of folks to accumulate a huge amount of wealth and power.
00:22:43 --> 00:22:48 And once you have wealth, you can easily make more wealth off of it,
00:22:48 --> 00:22:53 either through speculative finance, interest-based lending, rents,
00:22:53 --> 00:22:56 and which are all extractive, right?
00:22:56 --> 00:22:59 Like you're not actually providing something of value, just taking money from other people.
00:22:59 --> 00:23:05 And so that is why we've seen such a huge acceleration and such high levels
00:23:05 --> 00:23:07 of inequality in our country,
00:23:07 --> 00:23:15 as well as a very alarming consolidation of wealth and power. So, you know, in the U.S.
00:23:15 --> 00:23:21 Now, every single sector is dominated by less than a handful of corporations.
00:23:21 --> 00:23:28 And all of those corporations are now owned predominantly by three private equity
00:23:28 --> 00:23:31 firms, right? Like BlackRock and Vanguard.
00:23:31 --> 00:23:36 And I was actually I was recently rereading The Great Crash by John Kenneth Galbraith.
00:23:37 --> 00:23:40 He was, do you know him? Yeah, famous economist. I actually met him.
00:23:41 --> 00:23:47 Did you really? Yeah, I met him at Ole Miss. They were doing an episode of Firing line up there.
00:23:47 --> 00:23:51 Wow, that's amazing. He's definitely one of my intellectual heroes.
00:23:52 --> 00:23:57 And so, you know, this book is all around the causes of the Great Depression.
00:23:57 --> 00:24:02 And those two factors, those were two of the five major factors that he identified
00:24:02 --> 00:24:05 as causing the Great Depression in the U.S.
00:24:05 --> 00:24:11 This like what he calls a bad distribution of income and like a pyramiding of
00:24:11 --> 00:24:13 industries in this form.
00:24:14 --> 00:24:17 And so, I mean, I would argue that we're already in economic crisis because
00:24:17 --> 00:24:21 60% of Americans can't even afford basic needs.
00:24:21 --> 00:24:26 But I think we're also headed to a much more severe economic crisis too,
00:24:26 --> 00:24:28 because we are recreating the
00:24:28 --> 00:24:31 exact same situations that led to the Great Depression in the first place.
00:24:32 --> 00:24:35 And I'd be happy to like share those other factors, but I also think I may have
00:24:35 --> 00:24:40 taken us on a tangent here, so I'll pause and see, yeah, where you want to go.
00:24:40 --> 00:24:46 Well, let's define what a well-being economy is for the listeners. Sure.
00:24:48 --> 00:24:53 So a well-being economy is really just an economy that works in service of people
00:24:53 --> 00:24:57 and planets' well-being, right? That's sort of the basic idea.
00:24:59 --> 00:25:04 Now, one of the things I will say is then we have to define what do we mean by well-being.
00:25:04 --> 00:25:11 And for me, as somebody who has worked internationally with a lot of different
00:25:11 --> 00:25:15 countries and cultures and contexts, I think one of the most problematic aspects
00:25:15 --> 00:25:19 of our current economic system is the sort of one-size-fits-all thing.
00:25:20 --> 00:25:23 Economic theory structure when the reality is that, you know,
00:25:23 --> 00:25:26 the way we produce and provide for one another is always going to be influenced
00:25:26 --> 00:25:29 by our culture and context and geography and history and policies, etc.
00:25:30 --> 00:25:34 Right. So there isn't that one size fits all, I think, vision.
00:25:34 --> 00:25:38 But as I work for an organization called the Wellbeing Economy Alliance,
00:25:38 --> 00:25:43 which is a global collaboration of organizations, policymakers, academics, activists.
00:25:44 --> 00:25:50 And so we engage our membership early on to really define what do we believe
00:25:50 --> 00:25:52 that the economy should really be delivering.
00:25:52 --> 00:25:58 And we developed what was called like the five we all needs of dignity.
00:25:58 --> 00:26:02 Fairness, participation, nature, and connection.
00:26:03 --> 00:26:07 And so what that looks like in practice is it becomes a different framework
00:26:07 --> 00:26:09 for evaluating our economy's success.
00:26:09 --> 00:26:12 So when we talk about dignity, we would be asking, does our economy provide
00:26:12 --> 00:26:17 everybody with the necessary foundations to live a life of dignity and purpose?
00:26:17 --> 00:26:23 Or with fairness, we asked, does our economy ensure a just distribution of not
00:26:23 --> 00:26:26 only income and wealth, but time and power?
00:26:26 --> 00:26:32 When we speak about nature, it's about does our economy protect and cherish
00:26:32 --> 00:26:34 and regenerate the natural world?
00:26:34 --> 00:26:39 With connection, it's about does our economy foster meaningful relationships
00:26:39 --> 00:26:43 and connections and right relationships between people and planet.
00:26:44 --> 00:26:48 And participation, I think, is really core of does our economy ensure that we
00:26:48 --> 00:26:57 have an active voice and power in shaping the economic system in line with our values and goals? Yeah.
00:26:57 --> 00:27:03 What steps can be done to achieve a well-being economy? And does government play a role in that?
00:27:05 --> 00:27:11 So my background is in policy. So I'm definitely a bit biased in this regard.
00:27:11 --> 00:27:16 But I do believe policy is important because, I mean, policy is ultimately just,
00:27:18 --> 00:27:24 the government tools that are used to influence behavior in line with collective goals, right?
00:27:24 --> 00:27:28 And so we can see around the world.
00:27:28 --> 00:27:33 So we have, for example, this Wellbeing Economy Governments Partnership,
00:27:33 --> 00:27:38 which includes Canada, New Zealand, Wales, Scotland, Finland.
00:27:39 --> 00:27:45 And Wales is one of my favorite examples of where you can see really visionary
00:27:45 --> 00:27:48 transformation of not only policy,
00:27:48 --> 00:27:56 but also of governance structures in line with this commitment to developing a well-being economy.
00:27:56 --> 00:27:59 So what they did is they went through a process of asking their citizens.
00:27:59 --> 00:28:02 What kind of whales do you want to leave for your children and grandchildren?
00:28:03 --> 00:28:06 And on this basis, they created these seven high-level well-being goals,
00:28:06 --> 00:28:14 which are centered in health, equity, you know, resilience, global responsibility,
00:28:14 --> 00:28:17 cultural connection, cohesion, etc.
00:28:18 --> 00:28:25 And then they passed a legislation that required not only the establishment
00:28:25 --> 00:28:32 of very clear 25-year targets related to those goals and indicators to sort of monitor progress,
00:28:32 --> 00:28:36 but the transformation of the governance structure itself to take more long-term
00:28:36 --> 00:28:37 preventative, integrated,
00:28:38 --> 00:28:40 and participatory processes to achieve it.
00:28:40 --> 00:28:45 And they created a future generations commissioner whose tenure is always longer
00:28:45 --> 00:28:51 than any political administration or cycle to ensure that they were held accountable.
00:28:51 --> 00:28:54 The government was held to account to achieving that next generation vision.
00:28:54 --> 00:28:58 And so what this looked like in practice was that when they wanted to build
00:28:58 --> 00:29:04 a new highway through the country, the future generations commissioner said,
00:29:04 --> 00:29:07 okay, well, tell me how that's going to contribute to our seven well-being goals.
00:29:07 --> 00:29:10 And when they couldn't make the case for contributing to any of the goals,
00:29:10 --> 00:29:15 except for maybe one, they ended up putting a freeze, a permanent freeze on
00:29:15 --> 00:29:18 all new highway developments so that those funds would get redirected into public
00:29:18 --> 00:29:20 transportation and active travel,
00:29:20 --> 00:29:24 which they could make this case for contributing to a more equitable, healthy.
00:29:25 --> 00:29:27 Globally responsible, etc. Right.
00:29:27 --> 00:29:34 And so it's there are ways in which I I personally see our crisis of democracy
00:29:34 --> 00:29:36 and economy as inextricably linked.
00:29:36 --> 00:29:41 And we can't transform the economic system unless we transform our political
00:29:41 --> 00:29:47 system so that we have more democratic management of the economy to begin with. Yeah.
00:29:47 --> 00:29:51 So you use the term resilience, right? And I've noticed that there are some
00:29:51 --> 00:29:57 cities that have a department or something of resilience. And I was kind of
00:29:57 --> 00:29:59 like, what exactly is that?
00:30:01 --> 00:30:04 Well, in Wales, and this is one of my favorite things to their definition of
00:30:04 --> 00:30:06 resilience was based in biodiversity.
00:30:07 --> 00:30:12 Conservation. They viewed it as to be a resilient society, we really need to
00:30:12 --> 00:30:14 ensure that we're protecting biodiversity.
00:30:15 --> 00:30:18 And it was also, you know, it was a sustainable development legislation.
00:30:18 --> 00:30:22 So I think there was more emphasis placed on the environment relative to some
00:30:22 --> 00:30:26 other countries where their vision of well-being is maybe a bit more anthropocentric
00:30:26 --> 00:30:29 and the sense that it's really centered on humans'
00:30:29 --> 00:30:32 well-being and not people and nature.
00:30:32 --> 00:30:36 But working in international development, in a lot of countries to find resilience
00:30:36 --> 00:30:39 around diversification, all right?
00:30:39 --> 00:30:43 And so it's the same with biodiversity, right? We need diverse ecosystems,
00:30:43 --> 00:30:49 but also we need diversity in our economic structures so that we don't have,
00:30:49 --> 00:30:54 for example, just a couple of big corporations that if they fall,
00:30:55 --> 00:30:56 everything crumbles, right?
00:30:56 --> 00:31:01 And so that's always been the case for the need for a diversity of businesses
00:31:01 --> 00:31:05 and activities and things like this that can weather an economic storm. Okay.
00:31:05 --> 00:31:09 Define the concept of seven-generation thinking.
00:31:10 --> 00:31:15 Hmm. Well, this is actually, yeah, this is quite important because I should
00:31:15 --> 00:31:20 also say that the concept of a well-being economy is definitely not new and it is not our own.
00:31:20 --> 00:31:23 So I think it derives very much
00:31:23 --> 00:31:27 from a lot of different indigenous philosophies like
00:31:27 --> 00:31:30 Ubuntu or Suaraj or Buen which
00:31:30 --> 00:31:33 are really about recognizing that
00:31:33 --> 00:31:37 like true progress is living in
00:31:37 --> 00:31:41 right relationship with yourself others
00:31:41 --> 00:31:45 and like the natural world right and it's about not growth but balance like
00:31:45 --> 00:31:50 how do we ensure appropriate balance and so the idea of seventh generation thinking
00:31:50 --> 00:31:55 derives from i mean there's a variety of different i would say indigenous lineages
00:31:55 --> 00:31:58 that is a part of it and And it's about taking,
00:31:58 --> 00:32:03 not only considering seven generations in the future, but also considering seven
00:32:03 --> 00:32:05 generations in the past, right?
00:32:05 --> 00:32:13 So to do justice to our, to future generations and also to our ancestors and
00:32:13 --> 00:32:17 to like honor the, what has come before and what will come after.
00:32:17 --> 00:32:22 And this is something I'll say from my experience working in international development
00:32:22 --> 00:32:25 and then moving to work with high income countries.
00:32:26 --> 00:32:32 I was doing industrial policy before with them and the logic wasn't so different.
00:32:32 --> 00:32:36 I would say the major difference I've noticed is that, you know,
00:32:36 --> 00:32:39 developing countries are much more constrained by our global economic system,
00:32:39 --> 00:32:43 whereas high income countries are constrained by an arrogance that makes them
00:32:43 --> 00:32:46 think they don't need a development plan in the first place. Right.
00:32:46 --> 00:32:53 So we have very short term, just reactive kind of approaches to the crises of
00:32:53 --> 00:32:57 our time without much clarity of like, what are we actually trying to achieve?
00:32:57 --> 00:33:04 How do we think beyond our immediate needs to really consider future generations
00:33:04 --> 00:33:08 when we're making these decisions and to develop? You know, the reality is that
00:33:08 --> 00:33:11 systems change takes time, right?
00:33:11 --> 00:33:16 And so we need to be in it, or as they say, plant the seeds for a tree under
00:33:16 --> 00:33:18 which we will never sit, right?
00:33:18 --> 00:33:23 Like to have that perspective as well to not only achieve the kind of systemic
00:33:23 --> 00:33:26 transformations that are needed, but also the humility, I think,
00:33:27 --> 00:33:31 of not taking ourselves so seriously. Yeah.
00:33:31 --> 00:33:38 Is that going to be hard for Black folks to achieve here?
00:33:38 --> 00:33:44 Because, you know, seven generations back, we were at a very,
00:33:44 --> 00:33:51 very major disadvantage as far as wealth attainment and all that is virtually nil.
00:33:51 --> 00:33:59 I can see us navigating and developing a strategy for seven generations forward,
00:33:59 --> 00:34:04 but how could we apply that kind of thinking?
00:34:05 --> 00:34:11 Yeah. I mean, and obviously, you know, for me, I don't want to speak for Black
00:34:11 --> 00:34:15 Americans, you know, and your experiences as well.
00:34:15 --> 00:34:22 I think in terms of there is an importance of when we think about our ancestry.
00:34:22 --> 00:34:30 One of the things that I've really loved is about like the Black Lives Movement
00:34:30 --> 00:34:35 is also a recognition of not only incredible injustice,
00:34:35 --> 00:34:41 but also of like a celebration as well of incredible,
00:34:41 --> 00:34:42 you know,
00:34:42 --> 00:34:44 cultures and, you know,
00:34:44 --> 00:34:49 innovations and contributions to our society at large.
00:34:49 --> 00:34:55 And I think with thinking about past generations, I think this is where,
00:34:55 --> 00:34:59 you know, notions around and initiatives around reparations, for example,
00:34:59 --> 00:35:05 you start to really see the importance of in order to acknowledge sort of historic
00:35:05 --> 00:35:11 harm and injustice, as well as when we think about future, you know, generations.
00:35:12 --> 00:35:15 How do we one of the things I've
00:35:15 --> 00:35:18 noticed when different countries when they develop their well-being frameworks
00:35:18 --> 00:35:23 will ask different questions and when you ask what matters for well-being people
00:35:23 --> 00:35:30 will often think about like immediate material needs but when you ask what matters
00:35:30 --> 00:35:36 for children's well-being you'll start to get answers related to like play and love And, you know,
00:35:36 --> 00:35:43 and creativity and other types of things that sometimes expand our imaginations in a way.
00:35:43 --> 00:35:48 And so that's one of the powers to the beginning quote that you started with of thinking.
00:35:49 --> 00:35:54 Thinking that far in advance, like allowing ourselves to dream in a much more
00:35:54 --> 00:35:58 radical way about the type of future we want to build and to feel like we can
00:35:58 --> 00:36:00 be a part of that construction now.
00:36:01 --> 00:36:07 Yeah. Well, one of the quotes I used to live by was that a politician thinks
00:36:07 --> 00:36:10 about the next election, but a statesman thinks about the next generation.
00:36:11 --> 00:36:16 And I think that's, you know, when you're talking about the focus on the immediate
00:36:16 --> 00:36:22 needs, people are looking at political expediency rather than looking at what,
00:36:22 --> 00:36:25 what really would make America great, right?
00:36:26 --> 00:36:31 What really would propel us to a whole nother level in the biblical sense to
00:36:31 --> 00:36:33 really be the light on the Hill. Right.
00:36:34 --> 00:36:39 But, you know, I don't know. I just, I've always, I was, I was curious about
00:36:39 --> 00:36:46 that because, you know, we we've had to be resilient in our own way.
00:36:47 --> 00:36:53 And and, you know, a lot of times it's hard for people to get a concept about
00:36:53 --> 00:36:57 thinking about the future when you're dealing with day to day struggles and
00:36:57 --> 00:37:00 you were kind of behind the eight ball from Jump Street.
00:37:00 --> 00:37:04 And although some people have been able to attain wealth and do things,
00:37:04 --> 00:37:07 it hasn't been a collective deal.
00:37:08 --> 00:37:11 I mean, this is one of the things I've really noticed, actually, because I've,
00:37:12 --> 00:37:14 You know, I was working internationally for a long time, and then I've been
00:37:14 --> 00:37:18 focused more in the U.S. for only the last maybe like three, four years.
00:37:19 --> 00:37:24 And I did notice that a lot because a lot of the kind of work related to a well-being
00:37:24 --> 00:37:30 economy is longer-term systemic thinking, which in the U.S.
00:37:30 --> 00:37:40 I've noticed is viewed at best as like a luxury for like, you know,
00:37:40 --> 00:37:45 for a few people who can afford it or at worst as just naive. Right.
00:37:45 --> 00:37:51 And I think that's because our economic system, there's so much precarity here.
00:37:52 --> 00:37:55 Our systems are shot, like our nervous systems are shot.
00:37:55 --> 00:37:59 So we're constantly in a state of fight or flight and we're constantly trying
00:37:59 --> 00:38:06 to just play defense or, you know, focus on, I work on the earned income tax
00:38:06 --> 00:38:08 credit. Right. Like something really specific.
00:38:08 --> 00:38:14 But the whole idea of taking a step back and thinking, OK, where where are we even trying to go?
00:38:14 --> 00:38:19 Can we imagine entirely different forms of government or decision making or
00:38:19 --> 00:38:22 of economic structures that would be better aligned to this?
00:38:22 --> 00:38:25 That, yeah, there's less maybe
00:38:25 --> 00:38:30 appetite for that than other countries or cultures that I've been in.
00:38:30 --> 00:38:32 And I think part of that is, yeah,
00:38:32 --> 00:38:38 just the constant state of sort of precarity that people are in here.
00:38:38 --> 00:38:42 And so that is, you know, it is a very genuine, real challenge.
00:38:42 --> 00:38:49 And I think we're in a moment where the, you know, the majority of Americans
00:38:49 --> 00:38:53 believe that our political and economic systems are fundamentally broken, right?
00:38:53 --> 00:38:58 And so they don't want to just tinker, tinker with it, you know?
00:38:58 --> 00:39:04 And so if we can't take a step back and really provide an alternative vision
00:39:04 --> 00:39:09 for what this country and this economy and like this government can look like
00:39:09 --> 00:39:11 in a way that is aligned with our values,
00:39:11 --> 00:39:14 I think we will end up being lost, right?
00:39:15 --> 00:39:19 And so one of the interesting things for me is, you know, in Europe,
00:39:19 --> 00:39:22 some of the starting point for this, first of all, is a lot more related to
00:39:22 --> 00:39:23 the environmental crisis.
00:39:24 --> 00:39:29 And so the need for really thinking about, you know, we can't keep just producing
00:39:29 --> 00:39:32 and consuming at the rate we're doing and think that, you know,
00:39:32 --> 00:39:35 we're going to have a planet anymore to sustain us.
00:39:36 --> 00:39:43 And here it's a lot more focused on, and for good reason, like justice, equity,
00:39:43 --> 00:39:48 you know, like social sort of focus and considerations But there's also this
00:39:48 --> 00:39:51 growing recognition by a lot of even the welfare states, right,
00:39:52 --> 00:39:54 like the ones you were mentioning before, that.
00:39:54 --> 00:39:58 The standard approach of just growing the economy as quickly as possible so
00:39:58 --> 00:40:02 you can take some of that wealth through taxes to fix any of the damages that
00:40:02 --> 00:40:05 were done to people in the process is also not working anymore.
00:40:05 --> 00:40:10 Like even the richest countries in the world can't afford this approach anymore
00:40:10 --> 00:40:18 because the systems of production and consumption that we've designed are creating so many environmental,
00:40:19 --> 00:40:23 political, social crises, mental health crises,
00:40:23 --> 00:40:29 health crises, name it, that we're going to have to move upstream and get the
00:40:29 --> 00:40:33 economy to do more of the heavy lifting in terms of delivering on like social
00:40:33 --> 00:40:34 and ecological goals itself.
00:40:34 --> 00:40:40 And so for us, the idea of even having universal health care feels so far away, right?
00:40:40 --> 00:40:44 But like others are like, okay, well, actually, this is about how do we build
00:40:44 --> 00:40:48 economic structures that prevent this consolidation of wealth in the first place,
00:40:48 --> 00:40:52 ensure more equitable outcomes and are regenerative by design, right?
00:40:52 --> 00:41:00 And so the spectrum of possibilities, I think, are there, but how do we create
00:41:00 --> 00:41:06 a sense of enough security or safety for us to even start to imagine or dream them?
00:41:07 --> 00:41:11 Yeah. All right. So let's close this out. I wanted to ask you this question
00:41:11 --> 00:41:15 because in my research, I thought, hmm, this is interesting.
00:41:15 --> 00:41:20 Why is it more stressful to purchase something than to give something?
00:41:21 --> 00:41:24 Hmm yeah so this is actually this is based on one
00:41:24 --> 00:41:29 of my favorite neurological research
00:41:29 --> 00:41:32 papers that came out i mean it was from
00:41:32 --> 00:41:36 a little while ago but a lot of our economic like
00:41:36 --> 00:41:40 dominant economic thinking in the u.s which is like neoclassical economics is
00:41:40 --> 00:41:45 what we would call it sort of derives from and is all like this sort of hobbesian
00:41:45 --> 00:41:50 view of human nature that we're like inherently greedy and selfish and you know
00:41:50 --> 00:41:52 and that was sort of the major insight of Adam Smith that,
00:41:53 --> 00:41:57 if it is on the basis of our selfish instincts that we generate the profits
00:41:57 --> 00:42:00 that can be reinvested into an expansion of production.
00:42:01 --> 00:42:07 So in that way, greed is good, and it'll be the source of our prosperity,
00:42:08 --> 00:42:12 which was a huge deviation, obviously, from traditional religious perspectives
00:42:12 --> 00:42:14 and cultural perspectives.
00:42:15 --> 00:42:22 And even nowadays, I think a lot of what's animating that kind of like crypto-libertarian tech.
00:42:23 --> 00:42:26 Worldview in our is also sort of based on that sort
00:42:26 --> 00:42:29 of hopsian perspective and of course we we do
00:42:29 --> 00:42:33 have in all of us aspects of selfishness competitiveness
00:42:33 --> 00:42:37 but we also like the biggest
00:42:37 --> 00:42:42 like root oldest part of our brains we now know is actually altruistic so like
00:42:42 --> 00:42:48 what has allowed for our species real development is that we're pretty hardwired
00:42:48 --> 00:42:54 to want to give and to share and to you know, collaborate with one another.
00:42:54 --> 00:42:59 And so what this paper showed was that when you engage in like gift giving,
00:43:00 --> 00:43:03 which also from like anthropological study is what was really the dominant form
00:43:03 --> 00:43:06 of economics exchange for a very long time.
00:43:06 --> 00:43:13 It reduces our stress levels, it boosts our immune systems, and it reinforces social trust.
00:43:13 --> 00:43:17 But when you engage in a market transaction, which is seemingly very benign, right?
00:43:18 --> 00:43:22 It's almost all of our economic transactions now, The opposite happens.
00:43:22 --> 00:43:29 So it does boost our stress levels a little bit and suppresses our immune systems
00:43:29 --> 00:43:31 and reinforces social distrust.
00:43:31 --> 00:43:38 So there's something about the transactional nature of it that ends up having,
00:43:38 --> 00:43:42 yeah, sort of a negative impact on us in terms of our mental health.
00:43:42 --> 00:43:48 That doesn't mean that, you know, they're still just going out and buying something
00:43:48 --> 00:43:51 from an actual person is good, right?
00:43:51 --> 00:43:56 You know, there's like, there are benefits of engaging with strangers that come too.
00:43:56 --> 00:43:59 But this is something that we're learning more and more as, yeah,
00:44:00 --> 00:44:04 the evolution of like neurological science and things have been developing.
00:44:05 --> 00:44:12 Okay. Well, as you can tell, ladies and gentlemen, Amanda Janoo is a very brilliant woman.
00:44:12 --> 00:44:16 And we've only were able to really scratch the surface.
00:44:16 --> 00:44:20 It's just like, it's like, I see this well, I want to tap, but I can't really
00:44:20 --> 00:44:25 get all the equipment there because it's like, I don't have the time. I can't do it.
00:44:25 --> 00:44:28 But, you know, one of the rules is that once you've been on,
00:44:28 --> 00:44:31 you have an open invitation to come back. And I would love for you to come back
00:44:31 --> 00:44:40 on and continue this discussion because we need to look at where we're going here.
00:44:41 --> 00:44:46 You know, one of the, one of my big things is understanding history.
00:44:46 --> 00:44:50 And it's like, when you start hearing comparisons to like the Gilded Age and
00:44:50 --> 00:44:53 all that stuff, and I was like, yeah, that didn't end well. Right.
00:44:53 --> 00:44:56 And the roaring twenties, that didn't really end well.
00:44:57 --> 00:44:59 Right. And so, you know,
00:44:59 --> 00:45:06 I hate for us to always go back to stuff that didn't work for us,
00:45:06 --> 00:45:12 But it made a few people in power comfortable, you know, and just,
00:45:12 --> 00:45:14 you know, let the rest of us fight it out.
00:45:14 --> 00:45:21 So I always like to get people on who think differently, who think progressively
00:45:21 --> 00:45:26 and, you know, offer solutions to try to get us. And you're obviously one of those people.
00:45:26 --> 00:45:32 So, again, thank you for coming on. And I hope that you accept that invitation
00:45:32 --> 00:45:36 to come back. Well, thank you so much, Erik, for inviting me.
00:45:36 --> 00:45:39 I would love to chat more anytime.
00:45:39 --> 00:45:42 It's been an absolute joy, and I really appreciate it.
00:45:43 --> 00:45:46 All right. All right, guys. And we're going to catch y'all on the other side.
00:45:47 --> 00:46:05 Music.
00:46:05 --> 00:46:12 All right, and we are back. And so now it's time for my next guest, Dr. Karida Brown.
00:46:12 --> 00:46:17 Dr. Karida Brown is a sociologist, professor, oral historian,
00:46:17 --> 00:46:23 and public intellectual whose research centers on the anthologies of systemic
00:46:23 --> 00:46:26 racism and the fullness of Black life.
00:46:26 --> 00:46:32 An educator, public speaker, author, and humanist, she is known for empowering
00:46:32 --> 00:46:39 her readership, students, and organizations to be active participants in driving equity and justice.
00:46:40 --> 00:46:46 Dr. Brown's body of work combines her expertise in data-driven social science
00:46:46 --> 00:46:52 research, her vast experience in navigating complex global organizations, and her love of the arts.
00:46:52 --> 00:46:57 These insights bring actionable and reparative knowledge to the public.
00:46:58 --> 00:47:02 Dr. Brown graduated from Uniondale High School in Long Island,
00:47:02 --> 00:47:07 New York, and attended Temple University in Philadelphia, from which she graduated
00:47:07 --> 00:47:11 with a bachelor's of business administration in risk management and insurance.
00:47:12 --> 00:47:15 After a six-year career in the commercial insurance industry,
00:47:15 --> 00:47:20 Brown returned to school and subsequently earned a master's in government administration
00:47:20 --> 00:47:25 from the University of Pennsylvania and a PhD in sociology from Brown University.
00:47:25 --> 00:47:31 She is a professor of sociology at Emory University, where she teaches undergraduate
00:47:31 --> 00:47:35 and graduate courses on race and racism, sports and society,
00:47:36 --> 00:47:39 and historical archival methods.
00:47:40 --> 00:47:45 In addition to her books, her research is published in various peer-reviewed
00:47:45 --> 00:47:50 academic journals, such as the American Journal of Cultural Sociology,
00:47:50 --> 00:47:54 Social Cultures, and the Du Bois Review. Dr.
00:47:54 --> 00:47:59 Brown is a Fulbright Scholar, and her international research has been supported
00:47:59 --> 00:48:03 by national foundations such as the Andrew W.
00:48:03 --> 00:48:06 Mellon Foundation and the Hellman Fellows Fund.
00:48:07 --> 00:48:12 Brown currently serves on the board of the Obama Presidency Oral History Project.
00:48:13 --> 00:48:18 She has been featured in such media outlets as Politico, Forbes,
00:48:19 --> 00:48:23 the LA Times, Sports Illustrated, and WNC.
00:48:27 --> 00:48:32 Literary Agency Serendipity, forgive me for that, Literary Agency Serendipity
00:48:32 --> 00:48:38 represents her for book projects, and Knowledge Arts Holdings manages her speaking engagements.
00:48:39 --> 00:48:44 Brown lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband, fine artist and illustrator,
00:48:44 --> 00:48:48 Charly Palmer, and their two pugs, Pugsley and Blue.
00:48:49 --> 00:48:53 And I had the privilege of interviewing Dr.
00:48:53 --> 00:48:57 Brown for her and her husband's collaboration, the New Brownie book,
00:48:58 --> 00:49:03 New Brownies book, which won an NAACP award, right?
00:49:04 --> 00:49:09 And so now we're going to talk about her new book, The Battle for the Black Mind.
00:49:09 --> 00:49:16 So we're hoping that, you know, her appearance on this podcast helps her win
00:49:16 --> 00:49:17 an award for that one too.
00:49:18 --> 00:49:22 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:49:22 --> 00:49:25 on this podcast, Dr. Karida Brown.
00:49:27 --> 00:49:37 Music.
00:49:36 --> 00:49:40 Dr. Karida Brown. How you doing, sister? You doing good?
00:49:40 --> 00:49:45 I'm doing great, and it's so good to be back. Well, I'm glad to have you back,
00:49:45 --> 00:49:48 and this time you're doing it solo.
00:49:48 --> 00:49:51 You're not doing it with your partner, Charly, but tell him hi for me.
00:49:51 --> 00:49:57 I greatly appreciate him and the support that he gives you and the support that
00:49:57 --> 00:50:01 both of you have given me by gracing me with y'all's presence.
00:50:01 --> 00:50:05 And hopefully we can have some magic again. The last time you was on the show,
00:50:05 --> 00:50:10 You had written the new Brownies book, and you won an award for that.
00:50:10 --> 00:50:15 We did. And then I messed around and got nominated for an award myself.
00:50:16 --> 00:50:21 So hopefully there's a correlation. So let's see if we can do that again.
00:50:21 --> 00:50:26 I believe so. That was the NAACP Image Award,
00:50:26 --> 00:50:33 and we won in the category of Outstanding Nonfiction Literature,
00:50:33 --> 00:50:38 which that award is also held by the Barack Hussein Obama,
00:50:39 --> 00:50:41 Tony Morrison, and Maya Angelou.
00:50:41 --> 00:50:44 And I credit that to our appearance on your show, Erik.
00:50:45 --> 00:50:48 Well, I'll take all that. Thank you so much.
00:50:48 --> 00:50:52 But yeah, that's some pretty heady company to be a part of.
00:50:52 --> 00:50:55 And hopefully you'll do it again. And I think this book, The Battle for the
00:50:55 --> 00:51:01 Black Mind, is certainly worthy of being considered. And we're going to dive
00:51:01 --> 00:51:05 into the book. and a lot of things you've covered in the book primarily.
00:51:06 --> 00:51:11 But first, we're going to do what I normally do with an icebreaker is that I'm
00:51:11 --> 00:51:15 going to throw a quote at you, and then I want you to give me your response.
00:51:15 --> 00:51:22 Every political movement starts with radical imagination. What does that quote mean to you?
00:51:22 --> 00:51:24 It means freedom dream.
00:51:25 --> 00:51:33 That means that before we put foot to ground, before we come up with a chant
00:51:33 --> 00:51:36 to carry a movement, before we make our demands,
00:51:37 --> 00:51:43 before we actually put our bodies into a movement, it starts with freedom dreaming.
00:51:43 --> 00:51:50 And this is something that Black Americans have cultivated and perfected over
00:51:50 --> 00:51:54 the many, many generations we've been here in these United States.
00:51:54 --> 00:51:58 Political imagination is necessary to,
00:51:59 --> 00:52:05 see a world that doesn't yet exist, okay, in reality or in your current reality,
00:52:05 --> 00:52:12 but to strive towards that thing as though it does, as though it could, as though it will.
00:52:12 --> 00:52:15 And that's what political imagination means to me.
00:52:16 --> 00:52:20 Yeah. All right. Now I've added a new feature in the icebreaker section called 20 questions.
00:52:21 --> 00:52:28 Oh, I like that. Okay. So I need you to give me a number between one and 20. 17. Okay.
00:52:28 --> 00:52:36 What's something about people who see the world differently than you that you've come to appreciate?
00:52:38 --> 00:52:43 Ask one more time. Okay, hold on. I got to pull it back up.
00:52:43 --> 00:52:50 What's something about people who see the world differently than you that you've come to appreciate?
00:52:50 --> 00:52:56 Oh, I appreciate people who can see the tree in front of them instead of just
00:52:56 --> 00:53:02 the forest first, because I'm a forest thinker and I'll see the big idea and
00:53:02 --> 00:53:05 where we're going for the end game.
00:53:05 --> 00:53:10 But I'm not so, it's not my first instinct to then think of the thousand and
00:53:10 --> 00:53:12 one things that need to happen to get to that end game.
00:53:13 --> 00:53:16 And I realized there are people who just naturally think like that.
00:53:17 --> 00:53:23 And I really, really appreciate, shout out to my folks who are not only detail oriented,
00:53:23 --> 00:53:28 but really can get down to the granular step-by-step of how to make a big complex
00:53:28 --> 00:53:32 outcome happen at the ground level.
00:53:32 --> 00:53:38 And I appreciate folks who can do that. Yeah, I had one of my pastors in Jackson.
00:53:39 --> 00:53:44 I used to work for one of my pastors in Jackson and we had that kind of relationship.
00:53:44 --> 00:53:48 Real quick story. He he wanted to buy this lake.
00:53:48 --> 00:53:53 Right. Somebody was offering a lake for the church to have to do stuff.
00:53:53 --> 00:53:57 And he sold me all this. Oh, we can have the church picnic and we can have a
00:53:57 --> 00:54:02 camp and all this stuff. and I said, pastor, how much is the insurance going to be?
00:54:02 --> 00:54:07 And he said, what? I said, bro, you're going to have a lake.
00:54:08 --> 00:54:09 People are going to get out there and swim.
00:54:10 --> 00:54:16 I'm not saying anything bad is going to happen, but did you think about that? And he was like, oh no.
00:54:16 --> 00:54:18 And so we just started going over the thing.
00:54:19 --> 00:54:22 Eventually he turned it down and I told him, I didn't want you to turn it down,
00:54:22 --> 00:54:24 but those are the kinds of things you think about.
00:54:24 --> 00:54:28 So when When you when you gave that answer, that made me think about that moment
00:54:28 --> 00:54:33 because people that have vision have to have people to kind of say,
00:54:33 --> 00:54:38 OK, I see where you want to go, but let's let's chart that path.
00:54:38 --> 00:54:40 So I'm glad that you appreciate those kind of folks.
00:54:40 --> 00:54:46 And shout out to my business manager, R.J. Miller, because he certainly is that for me.
00:54:46 --> 00:54:51 I would just be out here raggedy and wild without him because,
00:54:51 --> 00:54:56 you know, my inclination is to I'm thinking big. My head is in the clouds.
00:54:56 --> 00:55:01 I'm saying yes to everything. He's like, slow down there, Karida. We ain't doing all that.
00:55:01 --> 00:55:04 You know, how are we going to do all of this?
00:55:05 --> 00:55:10 And, you know, that has brought a measure to my life that's allowed me to refine the work that I do.
00:55:11 --> 00:55:16 Yeah. Yeah. Shout out to RJ for my end, too. All right, let's get into the book a little bit.
00:55:16 --> 00:55:23 Why is it important to pursue liberation through knowledge in a system designed to oppress it?
00:55:23 --> 00:55:26 Knowledge is power, and everybody knows that.
00:55:27 --> 00:55:31 The oppressed certainly are keenly aware of that. And in this case,
00:55:32 --> 00:55:34 in the book that I wrote, The Battle for the Black Mind.
00:55:36 --> 00:55:42 Focuses on the history of Black education in the United States from emancipation
00:55:42 --> 00:55:44 through Brown versus Board of Education.
00:55:44 --> 00:55:50 This was certainly the case where African Americans have always been keenly
00:55:50 --> 00:55:52 aware that knowledge is power.
00:55:52 --> 00:55:59 It is a part of the toolkit for our long freedom struggle towards liberation
00:55:59 --> 00:56:03 and equity, but also your oppressors,
00:56:03 --> 00:56:09 those who uphold these systems of power, oppression, and exclusion are all too
00:56:09 --> 00:56:13 keenly aware of that reality as well, that knowledge is power.
00:56:14 --> 00:56:20 And therefore you see then, as you see now, direct attempt to manipulate.
00:56:21 --> 00:56:28 Adulterate, dilute the whole damn American education system, okay?
00:56:29 --> 00:56:37 This is why we see today an attack not just on a school or a type of school or a region of schools.
00:56:38 --> 00:56:42 No, they're going at the whole system and our whole knowledge infrastructure
00:56:42 --> 00:56:49 at the national level, from our schools, to our libraries, to our museums, to data sets, okay?
00:56:50 --> 00:56:56 We've seen this once before in the past during Jim Crow, during time where we
00:56:56 --> 00:57:02 had over a century of segregated and unequal education in this country.
00:57:02 --> 00:57:06 But just back then, it was just reserved for black and brown folks.
00:57:06 --> 00:57:08 Now it's coming for everybody.
00:57:08 --> 00:57:15 Yeah. So prior to the Civil War, I want you to tell folks how perilous was it
00:57:15 --> 00:57:18 for a black person to be educated?
00:57:18 --> 00:57:20 Oh, let me tell you something.
00:57:22 --> 00:57:26 The black mind was a matter of national security.
00:57:26 --> 00:57:36 OK, so during slavery, so prior to the Civil War, it was illegal in every state across the U.S.
00:57:36 --> 00:57:40 South for a black person to learn how to read and write.
00:57:41 --> 00:57:46 Learn how to read and write. There were laws on the books in some states that
00:57:46 --> 00:57:53 made it illegal for Black people to even gather with the intention of learning, right?
00:57:54 --> 00:58:02 So, and these were not only state laws, which they were, but it also was the custom of the day.
00:58:02 --> 00:58:10 So, any white person could enforce these rules in any way that they wanted their women fancy.
00:58:10 --> 00:58:17 So which made education, a Black person acquiring an education back then,
00:58:17 --> 00:58:21 a life or death situation, you literally could be killed.
00:58:21 --> 00:58:29 Okay, for being suspected of not only attaining that kind of knowledge yourself, but passing it on.
00:58:29 --> 00:58:35 This is a part of why after Nat Turner's rebellion,
00:58:35 --> 00:58:41 okay, when he organized and galvanized a group of enslaved Black folks to revolt
00:58:41 --> 00:58:50 and to try to wrench their freedom, they went ahead and killed a bunch of slave owners and overseers.
00:58:50 --> 00:58:54 In that process, not only was Nat Turner executed,
00:58:54 --> 00:59:01 but the white South got together right after that and said and pointed to the
00:59:01 --> 00:59:08 fact that Nat Turner was literate as the reason for why he was able to organize that revolt,
00:59:08 --> 00:59:13 which which made them entrench themselves even more in these laws to make it
00:59:13 --> 00:59:16 illegal for black folks to read and write. Yeah.
00:59:17 --> 00:59:24 So how does Project 2025 with today's book bans attack on the public schools
00:59:24 --> 00:59:28 and moves to defund race conscious education?
00:59:28 --> 00:59:32 How does that echo the past? in so many ways that it rhymes,
00:59:33 --> 00:59:35 it's on beat. Let's say it like that, okay?
00:59:36 --> 00:59:42 So, and I'll refer everyone listening to, go ahead and download Project 2025
00:59:42 --> 00:59:48 because it's free and publicly available on the internet and pull chapter 11
00:59:48 --> 00:59:50 because that is the chapter that.
00:59:51 --> 00:59:57 Covers their plan for the American education system. And it is unambiguous.
00:59:57 --> 01:00:05 The plan is to defund the entire American public education system and to move
01:00:05 --> 01:00:10 us to a model of mass privatization where every school is in some way,
01:00:10 --> 01:00:12 shape, or form privatized.
01:00:12 --> 01:00:21 There are only right now four major charter school conglomerates in the country
01:00:21 --> 01:00:26 that have the lion's share of the education sector under lock right now.
01:00:26 --> 01:00:35 So you can just imagine what that portents for those of us who find themselves
01:00:35 --> 01:00:37 on the other side of privilege in this country.
01:00:38 --> 01:00:44 When you think about mass privatization, I want you to end states' rights,
01:00:44 --> 01:00:52 which are the two rhetorical pillars that they're using to seduce folks into buying into this with.
01:00:52 --> 01:00:59 Those are the same rallying cries that were used during the Reconstruction era, okay?
01:00:59 --> 01:01:06 This is what Southern states' folks and bureaucrats and industry leaders pressured
01:01:06 --> 01:01:08 the United States governments towards.
01:01:08 --> 01:01:14 We want states' rights and we want to have mass privatization.
01:01:15 --> 01:01:20 Well, when you hear states' rights, today or back then, I want you to always
01:01:20 --> 01:01:25 think states' rights to do what and to whom, okay?
01:01:25 --> 01:01:29 And when you hear calls towards mass privatization of public goods,
01:01:29 --> 01:01:33 like education, I want you to think about how did that work out for your water?
01:01:34 --> 01:01:38 Eric, when you were growing up, did you pay for water? No, ma'am.
01:01:38 --> 01:01:43 Was the water still good? Yes, ma'am. Did it hydrate you? Yes, ma'am.
01:01:44 --> 01:01:48 Is there something that you needed for life to sustain yourself? Yes, ma'am.
01:01:49 --> 01:01:53 Today, can you go to your hose and drink that water? Yes, ma'am.
01:01:54 --> 01:01:57 Okay, well, you can't. I can't drink out of my hose, okay?
01:01:59 --> 01:02:04 We're in a situation where we pay for water because it's privatized.
01:02:05 --> 01:02:10 Ask how that's working out for our health care system. These things create structures
01:02:10 --> 01:02:12 and systems of haves and have-nots.
01:02:12 --> 01:02:15 That's what's coming for our education system now.
01:02:15 --> 01:02:20 But we can see that this has happened before, during Jim Crow,
01:02:20 --> 01:02:27 to African-Americans. So that's why The Battle for the Black Mind is a book for everybody. Why?
01:02:27 --> 01:02:30 Because, number one, Black folks have been through this before.
01:02:30 --> 01:02:36 We need to remember our stories and remember the blueprints that our ancestors
01:02:36 --> 01:02:41 and elders gave us and how they survived and thrived through these systems.
01:02:41 --> 01:02:47 Because, I mean, they did the damn thing. But also non-Black folks need to tap
01:02:47 --> 01:02:48 into these stories. Why?
01:02:48 --> 01:02:53 Because they're going to have to roll up their sleeves too, because this system,
01:02:53 --> 01:02:56 this time is coming for everybody.
01:02:56 --> 01:03:05 And we're going to be able to organize, get in community, and save this democracy. Yeah.
01:03:05 --> 01:03:09 All right. So I'm going to get back a little more into the book because you
01:03:09 --> 01:03:15 touched on a lot of things and it reminded me of my work in the legislature.
01:03:15 --> 01:03:21 I never served on an education committee, but education was one of my big issues,
01:03:21 --> 01:03:23 especially educating our children, right?
01:03:24 --> 01:03:32 So explain the Hampton idea. And how do you think modern education still embraces that?
01:03:33 --> 01:03:38 Okay. So, and this is something that I cover extensively throughout Battle for
01:03:38 --> 01:03:45 the Black Mind, these two competing educational ideologies.
01:03:45 --> 01:03:51 One was the industrial education model, which Erik, you're referring to the Hampton idea. This was,
01:03:52 --> 01:03:59 You know, Hampton and Tuskegee as sibling institutions really championed early
01:03:59 --> 01:04:01 on this industrial education idea.
01:04:02 --> 01:04:05 The book goes a lot into why and who was behind that.
01:04:05 --> 01:04:11 But it really was grounded in this idea that Black education,
01:04:11 --> 01:04:16 the curricula should be adapted just for Black Americans,
01:04:16 --> 01:04:23 a special curricula that focused on agricultural labor and domestic service
01:04:23 --> 01:04:25 and the teaching thereof.
01:04:25 --> 01:04:30 So training a generation of teachers who would then go out through schools throughout
01:04:30 --> 01:04:36 the South, Black schools, and teach these skills to local communities and children.
01:04:37 --> 01:04:44 You know, and the industrial education model really was also promoting a depoliticized
01:04:44 --> 01:04:48 educational curricula, meaning that it also emphasized,
01:04:48 --> 01:04:53 I'll be crude about it, to do and not think,
01:04:53 --> 01:05:01 to dissuade African-Americans from pushing for enfranchisement,
01:05:01 --> 01:05:04 for social equality, for civil rights.
01:05:05 --> 01:05:11 So rooted in those ideals, and then you had the liberal education model,
01:05:11 --> 01:05:13 which looked a lot like what you would think
01:05:13 --> 01:05:17 about for any liberal arts education today that yeah
01:05:17 --> 01:05:20 said okay yeah we need vocational training
01:05:20 --> 01:05:23 but we also need training in the
01:05:23 --> 01:05:30 arts and philosophy and engineering architecture beans greens potatoes tomatoes
01:05:30 --> 01:05:37 we need all of it but what what was underlying this liberal education model
01:05:37 --> 01:05:41 was not just the outcome or the transaction of education,
01:05:41 --> 01:05:47 it really was pointing to what are the philosophical aims of education about
01:05:47 --> 01:05:50 cultivating citizens, right?
01:05:51 --> 01:05:52 Who would be.
01:05:53 --> 01:05:57 Have a certain character and sensibility for showing up in society.
01:05:58 --> 01:06:01 How, you know, how are we supposed to be as citizens?
01:06:01 --> 01:06:07 So these were competing ideals that you saw many, many black segregated schools
01:06:07 --> 01:06:11 throughout the Jim Crow South, you know, being pulled,
01:06:11 --> 01:06:18 pushed and tugged in the, to pick a side between this industrial model or this liberal model.
01:06:19 --> 01:06:25 Yeah. And, you know, that was, That was one of my concerns. We had a young man
01:06:25 --> 01:06:28 become the superintendent of education in state of Mississippi.
01:06:29 --> 01:06:35 At that time, he was the youngest superintendent, not only in our state history, but in the country.
01:06:36 --> 01:06:39 And now I think he's the president of the University of Nebraska or something.
01:06:39 --> 01:06:46 He's moved on. But the biggest criticism I had was he came in to speak to the
01:06:46 --> 01:06:51 Black Caucus about this education model where we want, we want,
01:06:51 --> 01:06:53 people in your district to be able to get a job.
01:06:54 --> 01:06:59 And I was like, you know, obviously you, you never watched Star Trek.
01:06:59 --> 01:07:03 You have no idea. It's like, I want my kid to be able to think,
01:07:03 --> 01:07:05 I don't want them to play hopscotch.
01:07:05 --> 01:07:09 I want them to be able to design the hopscotch board. Thank you.
01:07:10 --> 01:07:14 And so it was like, he didn't like me too much, but you know,
01:07:15 --> 01:07:18 but that when you started breaking it down like that, and then of course the
01:07:18 --> 01:07:22 connection with Hampton and Tuskegee, is the fact that Booker T.
01:07:22 --> 01:07:26 Washington went to Hampton and then he started Tuskegee.
01:07:27 --> 01:07:30 So he carried what he had learned at Hampton and basically created,
01:07:30 --> 01:07:35 because Hampton was, I think it was a white guy that was the initial president
01:07:35 --> 01:07:37 of Hampton. Samuel Chapman Armstrong.
01:07:38 --> 01:07:46 And so Booker T. took that model and made a school Tuskegee based off of that same mindset.
01:07:46 --> 01:07:50 And that's why him and Du Bois class and all that stuff.
01:07:50 --> 01:07:55 But anyway, and you get into all that in the book. So that's why I really, really enjoyed that.
01:07:55 --> 01:08:00 Why was white philanthropy both a gift and a gilded cage?
01:08:00 --> 01:08:05 So my aunties now always had this saying, all money ain't good money.
01:08:06 --> 01:08:13 And that is something that was a clear theme throughout this book and the analysis
01:08:13 --> 01:08:15 and battle for the black mind.
01:08:15 --> 01:08:20 White philanthropy in the early days, one thing that's important to note,
01:08:20 --> 01:08:23 fun fact, is that white philanthropy,
01:08:23 --> 01:08:30 big philanthropy like we know it today, was founded on an attempt to repair
01:08:30 --> 01:08:35 and capture the American education system in the South, right?
01:08:35 --> 01:08:42 After the Civil War, there was no public school in the U.S.
01:08:43 --> 01:08:47 South. That's an important data point. What that means is that there was no
01:08:47 --> 01:08:49 public school system for white or black children.
01:08:50 --> 01:08:55 So you have a region of the country that has this clean slate.
01:08:55 --> 01:09:04 You have 4 million newly freed African-Americans who are racing to get themselves some education.
01:09:04 --> 01:09:10 Black folks are building schools inside of churches and makeshift buildings
01:09:10 --> 01:09:15 in their communities, doing anything to grab any piece of education,
01:09:15 --> 01:09:17 formal education that they possibly can.
01:09:17 --> 01:09:20 And the Freedmen's Bureau was helping them to build schools,
01:09:20 --> 01:09:27 was investing a significant amount of money into Black education during Reconstruction.
01:09:28 --> 01:09:35 Okay, so right after the fall of Reconstruction, when Jim Crow sweeps in, states' rights,
01:09:35 --> 01:09:41 okay, you see that support dwindle from not only the federal government through
01:09:41 --> 01:09:44 the Freedmen's Bureau, but also Southern states.
01:09:44 --> 01:09:49 Even though African Americans were paying into the tax system.
01:09:49 --> 01:09:55 Southern boards of education refused to allocate equitable resources to fund
01:09:55 --> 01:09:59 public black schools. So who came and saved the day?
01:09:59 --> 01:10:02 Oftentimes it was big philanthropy.
01:10:02 --> 01:10:07 They would come in and fund many, many black schools, ones that we still know
01:10:07 --> 01:10:12 of today, including Atlanta University, which is now Clark Atlanta University, Hampton,
01:10:13 --> 01:10:19 Tuskegee, but thousands of elementary schools as well throughout the South.
01:10:19 --> 01:10:24 However, these dollars came with thick strings attached Namely,
01:10:25 --> 01:10:30 most of these philanthropies supported that industrial education model And the
01:10:30 --> 01:10:35 deal went like this, Erik If you take these dollars, black principal,
01:10:35 --> 01:10:42 black teacher, black school founder You must, we insist that you adopt this
01:10:42 --> 01:10:44 curricula for your students.
01:10:45 --> 01:10:50 And for Black school founders who were running private schools.
01:10:51 --> 01:10:55 Hey, y'all, during this time, during the early era of Jim Crow,
01:10:55 --> 01:10:59 the majority of Black segregated schools were private schools.
01:10:59 --> 01:11:01 They relied on these dollars.
01:11:02 --> 01:11:07 You stuck between a rock and a hard place. You either take this compromise or
01:11:07 --> 01:11:11 your school could go out of business and there would be no school for the Black
01:11:11 --> 01:11:16 children in your community to attend. So this was the predicament.
01:11:16 --> 01:11:23 African-Americans were keenly aware of the, you know, thorny deal and did a
01:11:23 --> 01:11:25 lot to navigate around that.
01:11:25 --> 01:11:29 And I talk about that in the book. But nonetheless, this was what we were up
01:11:29 --> 01:11:31 against back then. Yeah.
01:11:32 --> 01:11:38 And, you know, it was like when you mentioned about the no public schools in
01:11:38 --> 01:11:42 the South, that was the reason why during Reconstruction,
01:11:42 --> 01:11:48 many of the state legislatures, once they became majority black during that time,
01:11:48 --> 01:11:52 they made those made public education a constitutional right. Right.
01:11:53 --> 01:11:58 Yeah. And that was one of the things that even even to this present day,
01:11:58 --> 01:12:01 when states have been trying to tinker with that in the South,
01:12:02 --> 01:12:07 they haven't messed with that constitutional right because that benefited the white children, too.
01:12:07 --> 01:12:12 Right. And then you talking about there was one particular organization,
01:12:12 --> 01:12:17 the American Missionary Association, who who had a lot of school.
01:12:17 --> 01:12:20 Jackson State, where I went to school, was an AMA school.
01:12:21 --> 01:12:27 And there was a president named Jacob Reddix made a decision that,
01:12:27 --> 01:12:32 you know, during the Depression, a lot of those schools suffered because everybody
01:12:32 --> 01:12:35 was broke in the United States during the Depression.
01:12:36 --> 01:12:40 And so, you know, Jackson State, right at right about the time of World War
01:12:40 --> 01:12:47 One, I mean, World War Two, made the decision to say, OK, we're going to be a state school.
01:12:48 --> 01:12:53 Now, that had a short term bad impact during the civil rights movement because
01:12:53 --> 01:12:56 you couldn't have any demonstrations or any rallies there.
01:12:56 --> 01:13:01 Everybody had to go to Tougaloo because it was too private. And that was an AMA school, too.
01:13:01 --> 01:13:08 But in the long term, Jackson State was able to grow because now it's like,
01:13:08 --> 01:13:13 well, we can get some tax dollars to sustain our mission other than just tuition.
01:13:13 --> 01:13:17 Right. And that was a hard decision for black presidents to make.
01:13:17 --> 01:13:25 And so, you know, it's like, like I said, the beauty of history is you get the
01:13:25 --> 01:13:31 map going backwards. You figure out where you came from and how you got to this point.
01:13:31 --> 01:13:36 And it's so, so important. So that's why, again, I'm really glad that you wrote
01:13:36 --> 01:13:39 this book. And I just want to pick up on that point, Erik.
01:13:39 --> 01:13:42 We got to be able to reverse engineer this thing.
01:13:43 --> 01:13:48 I think that is so important. And I love that you made that keen insight.
01:13:48 --> 01:13:53 We got to know how power moves. We got to know how systems work.
01:13:54 --> 01:13:58 And history is our best example for that.
01:13:58 --> 01:14:03 When we look back to history, we can reverse engineer not only how these systems
01:14:03 --> 01:14:10 are put together, the architecture of them, but also all the actors in a system.
01:14:10 --> 01:14:14 Because rarely is it just the boogeyman that you see at top.
01:14:14 --> 01:14:18 Today, I'll say, you know, that man who's occupying the White House.
01:14:18 --> 01:14:23 Okay. It's really just that figure. It's the whole brigade.
01:14:23 --> 01:14:29 It's the thousand folks who are rank and file, who are keeping the system going.
01:14:29 --> 01:14:34 So we should understand how that works at every level. Okay.
01:14:35 --> 01:14:42 What's the short game and what's the long game? Because then we can move wiser. Yeah.
01:14:43 --> 01:14:47 All right. So I wanted to, there's a particular person in the book.
01:14:47 --> 01:14:50 You introduced us to Lucy Craft
01:14:50 --> 01:14:55 Laney in chapter one, and then you devote chapter four primarily to her.
01:14:56 --> 01:15:00 Explain her contribution to the advancement of Black education.
01:15:00 --> 01:15:06 Oh, wow. Thank you. Miss Lucy Craft Laney, born in 1854 in Georgia,
01:15:06 --> 01:15:09 so during slavery, okay?
01:15:09 --> 01:15:11 But Lucy was born free.
01:15:11 --> 01:15:17 Why? Because her parents were somehow able to buy their freedom and therefore
01:15:17 --> 01:15:22 afford Lucy a different life than most Black children experienced during that time.
01:15:22 --> 01:15:26 As a result, Miss Lucy was able to learn to read and write.
01:15:26 --> 01:15:31 She was able to attend not only elementary school, but she went up through high school, okay?
01:15:32 --> 01:15:38 And then after the Civil War, after emancipation, she became a member of the
01:15:38 --> 01:15:41 first graduating class of Atlanta University.
01:15:42 --> 01:15:48 Which is now Clark Atlanta. So before W.E.B. Du Bois joins the faculty, Lucy is there.
01:15:49 --> 01:15:52 She earned her degree and got a teaching certificate.
01:15:53 --> 01:15:58 Ms. Lucy taught for almost a decade in the public school system in Georgia.
01:15:58 --> 01:16:06 And from that experience, she walked away with conclusively believing that Black minds,
01:16:07 --> 01:16:11 Black children were not safe yet in the hands of the state,
01:16:11 --> 01:16:16 that the public school system was not going to do right by Black children,
01:16:16 --> 01:16:23 so Miss Lucy went ahead in 1881 and founded her own private school in Augusta, Georgia,
01:16:23 --> 01:16:31 which became the Haynes Industrial Institute that served thousands of African-American youth.
01:16:31 --> 01:16:37 She starts that school in a basement of a church with five children enrolled first year.
01:16:38 --> 01:16:42 By year two, she's got 234 students enrolled.
01:16:43 --> 01:16:47 Just imagine this. This wasn't just kids from Augusta, Black.
01:16:48 --> 01:16:52 Families started to hear about this woman, this educated Black woman who had
01:16:52 --> 01:16:54 this school all over the South.
01:16:54 --> 01:16:58 So they would send their kids to go board at the Haynes Institute.
01:16:58 --> 01:17:03 This is how hungry African-Americans were for education, okay?
01:17:04 --> 01:17:09 Miss Lucy's school stays open for a little over half a century.
01:17:09 --> 01:17:14 She builds that thing out from an elementary school to a K-12 institution,
01:17:14 --> 01:17:21 also builds the first Black nursing school in the state of Georgia on that campus.
01:17:21 --> 01:17:26 Her school campus takes up two city blocks in downtown Augusta,
01:17:26 --> 01:17:32 and she's fundraising for this school the whole time, paying a staff of educators.
01:17:33 --> 01:17:40 Offering an education that would be analogous to an international baccalaureate degree today.
01:17:40 --> 01:17:45 Her school curricula offered everything from French, Latin, Greek,
01:17:46 --> 01:17:49 literature, world history, sociology, physics.
01:17:49 --> 01:17:56 She also offered courses in agriculture, cosmetology, carpentry. She did it all, okay?
01:17:56 --> 01:18:02 This was when you talked about political imagination and freedom dreams,
01:18:03 --> 01:18:09 Miss Lucy put that thing into action and showed us what it looks like for Black
01:18:09 --> 01:18:13 people to build our own institutions, to have vision.
01:18:13 --> 01:18:18 She did this in the Jim Crow South as a dark-skinned Black woman.
01:18:18 --> 01:18:23 So don't come telling me that we're too overwhelmed to do anything now,
01:18:23 --> 01:18:28 or that this problem is too big for us to think and act and move through,
01:18:28 --> 01:18:34 because I know the stories of our ancestors, and I want you to know them too. All right.
01:18:34 --> 01:18:40 So the last chapter gets its title from the Bob Marley song, Small Axe.
01:18:40 --> 01:18:45 What was the motivation behind utilizing that song?
01:18:46 --> 01:18:52 You know, I wrote that last chapter of the book the day after this presidential election.
01:18:53 --> 01:19:01 And I channeled all of my emotions, which included heartbreak and disappointment,
01:19:01 --> 01:19:08 but also my infinite belief in our freedom dreams. I poured that all into that chapter.
01:19:09 --> 01:19:16 And I asked myself, Eric, what was the lesson that I learned from these Black
01:19:16 --> 01:19:21 educators that I followed throughout the book, the Miss Lucys of the world,
01:19:21 --> 01:19:24 the Charlotte Hawkins Browns, the Mary McLeod Bethunes,
01:19:24 --> 01:19:27 the Mary Smith Peaks, the W.E.B. Du Boises, and the Booker T.
01:19:27 --> 01:19:33 Washingtons? What I learned was the main takeaway was small acts fall big tree
01:19:33 --> 01:19:40 that Jamaican saying that it's rarely that one big action that we do that's
01:19:40 --> 01:19:43 going to make the change that we want to see.
01:19:43 --> 01:19:48 No, it's the thousand and one little things that we do on a daily basis with
01:19:48 --> 01:19:52 the resources that you have right now that make that difference.
01:19:52 --> 01:19:57 And that's the power. So, you know that saying power to the people?
01:19:58 --> 01:20:04 Well, the whole saying is power to the people, not power to the people in power.
01:20:04 --> 01:20:10 Okay? And that's the same ethos with that saying.
01:20:10 --> 01:20:15 It is that we, at the individual level, at the community level,
01:20:16 --> 01:20:21 at the level of your block, that's where the power for change lies.
01:20:21 --> 01:20:26 And if you remember that, then you got all you need to make this thing shake.
01:20:27 --> 01:20:33 Yeah. All right. Final question. What do you want the readers of the book to take away from it?
01:20:34 --> 01:20:39 Hmm, that the relay must be assured.
01:20:39 --> 01:20:43 I take those words from my elder, Dr.
01:20:43 --> 01:20:49 Jessica B. Harris, and what that means is that the baton is in our hands now.
01:20:50 --> 01:20:54 Our ancestors did their part, and they ran a mighty race.
01:20:54 --> 01:20:58 Our elders did their part, and they showed us how.
01:20:58 --> 01:21:01 And now, the baton is in our
01:21:01 --> 01:21:04 hands the cavalry is not coming but we
01:21:04 --> 01:21:07 have everything we need to do this thing so
01:21:07 --> 01:21:14 you know let us all be encouraged in that but let's also roll up our sleeves
01:21:14 --> 01:21:21 pull out our checkbooks if we can do that but also think about what your expertise
01:21:21 --> 01:21:26 your assets your resources are spiritually,
01:21:26 --> 01:21:32 physically emotionally and skills based and apply it towards something. It's our turn.
01:21:33 --> 01:21:37 Yeah. Yeah. That's great. Dr.
01:21:37 --> 01:21:40 Karida Brown, thank you, not only for coming on the podcast,
01:21:40 --> 01:21:43 but thank you for being you.
01:21:43 --> 01:21:49 Thank you for pouring your heart and your talent into this book.
01:21:49 --> 01:21:52 Tell people how they can get a hold of it.
01:21:53 --> 01:21:59 You can get this book from anywhere that books are sold, online or at your local
01:21:59 --> 01:22:00 independent bookstore.
01:22:00 --> 01:22:05 I do encourage you all, hey, support your local Black bookstore.
01:22:05 --> 01:22:09 So whether that's physically going in and purchasing the copy or going online
01:22:09 --> 01:22:12 or calling them and ordering one, they will ship it to you.
01:22:12 --> 01:22:18 This is one of the ways that we support our ecosystem of small Black businesses.
01:22:18 --> 01:22:23 But get you one of these. This book is good for the soul, but don't just order
01:22:23 --> 01:22:28 one copy, get two, and give one to someone you think would benefit from this.
01:22:28 --> 01:22:34 A teacher in your life, student, a parent who's thinking through these questions
01:22:34 --> 01:22:38 about what is the future of education mean for their children,
01:22:38 --> 01:22:41 and discuss it in your homes.
01:22:41 --> 01:22:48 Yeah. And if people want to get in touch with you other than enrolling at Emory, how can they do that?
01:22:49 --> 01:22:54 Follow me. Dr. Karida Brown is my handle across all social media,
01:22:54 --> 01:22:56 LinkedIn, Instagram, and TikTok.
01:22:57 --> 01:23:01 I'm an avid poster on all of them. I get a little ratchet on TikTok.
01:23:02 --> 01:23:08 I host educational posts on LinkedIn, and I keep you updated on what I got going on on Instagram.
01:23:09 --> 01:23:13 Yeah, and she still knows all the lyrics, all the rap songs from back in the book.
01:23:14 --> 01:23:18 And that's what I picked up on TikTok. I was like, all right, Dr. Brown, go ahead.
01:23:19 --> 01:23:22 Well, look, thank you again for coming on. You already know the rule because
01:23:22 --> 01:23:29 this is your second time being on the podcast. But I greatly appreciate you spending time with you.
01:23:29 --> 01:23:36 And I know I had promised that I would try to connect with you and Charlie off the air.
01:23:37 --> 01:23:42 And eventually we're going to make that happen. But I just want to thank you for coming on today.
01:23:43 --> 01:23:47 Oh, thank you. It's an honor and a joy. Thank you for what you do, Erik.
01:23:47 --> 01:23:51 We appreciate you and love you. You are our community.
01:23:51 --> 01:23:54 Thank you. All right, guys. We're going to catch y'all on the other side.
01:23:56 --> 01:24:06 Music.
01:24:06 --> 01:24:11 All right, and we are back. So I want to thank Amanda Janoo and Dr.
01:24:11 --> 01:24:13 Karida Brown for coming on the podcast.
01:24:14 --> 01:24:17 As I told you all in the intro, they're smarter than I am.
01:24:17 --> 01:24:24 And I'm just honored that people of such intellect and such character and such
01:24:24 --> 01:24:31 commitment are willing to share their thoughts and the work that they're doing
01:24:31 --> 01:24:34 on this podcast. It means an awful lot.
01:24:34 --> 01:24:41 And I look forward to continuing to have conversations with them and any other
01:24:41 --> 01:24:48 interactions we may have off the air, you know, whether it's seminars or whatever the case may be.
01:24:49 --> 01:24:53 Right. But, you know, and just to continue to watch them do the work.
01:24:54 --> 01:25:02 You know, Amanda is very, very committed to making sure that the economy that
01:25:02 --> 01:25:06 we are in serves us, right?
01:25:06 --> 01:25:13 That, you know, we're not just cogs in the wheel or spokes in the wheel,
01:25:13 --> 01:25:15 cogs in the machine, however you want to look at it.
01:25:15 --> 01:25:23 That there's something beneficial to us in this society through economics.
01:25:23 --> 01:25:29 And then, you know, Dr. Brown with, you know, this history about black education.
01:25:29 --> 01:25:34 I think, you know, people need to understand how important that is, right?
01:25:35 --> 01:25:40 And I'm glad we were able to, in the brief time that we were able to discuss
01:25:40 --> 01:25:47 these kind of topics to kind of dig into it a little bit, but it's really,
01:25:47 --> 01:25:51 really important because I think if people understood,
01:25:52 --> 01:25:56 really understood our history as a people in the United States,
01:25:56 --> 01:25:59 I'm talking about understanding black folks, African Americans.
01:26:02 --> 01:26:06 Then, you know, I think the respect would come.
01:26:07 --> 01:26:13 You know, I think it's very lazy to say that we're lazy, or that we're irresponsible,
01:26:14 --> 01:26:17 or that we're innately criminal, or anything like that, right?
01:26:17 --> 01:26:22 I think if you really understood the history of black people in America,
01:26:23 --> 01:26:26 then, you know, it would be.
01:26:27 --> 01:26:31 I just think the majority of people would have a different perspective.
01:26:31 --> 01:26:33 And I think that's kind of the case.
01:26:34 --> 01:26:40 But, you know, we wouldn't have this element of folks supporting these inane
01:26:40 --> 01:26:44 people in politics if it was universal respect.
01:26:45 --> 01:26:51 Right. because, you know, when you look at the history of people from Ireland
01:26:51 --> 01:26:56 or Italy, you understand what they went through to get here,
01:26:57 --> 01:27:01 or people from Cuba or people from Mexico or El Salvador, right?
01:27:02 --> 01:27:08 When you understand the histories of people, the Chinese citizens here,
01:27:09 --> 01:27:12 people of Chinese heritage, if you understand their history,
01:27:12 --> 01:27:14 then you have an incredible respect for them.
01:27:14 --> 01:27:21 And I think that's kind of what's missing, is that all of us have a story to
01:27:21 --> 01:27:28 tell, whether it's an individual story or a collective story as a group.
01:27:28 --> 01:27:32 We have a story to tell. And if people appreciate the story,
01:27:32 --> 01:27:38 then you'll appreciate the individuals that make up that story, right?
01:27:39 --> 01:27:43 So, you know, I just hope that we get to that point.
01:27:43 --> 01:27:47 And, you know, Dr. Brown with her work and even Amanda with her work,
01:27:48 --> 01:27:54 right, are doing their part to kind of get us to have an understanding,
01:27:54 --> 01:27:58 to develop more of a communal relationship, right?
01:27:58 --> 01:28:03 Even though they're using different tracks, their object is the same.
01:28:04 --> 01:28:08 So, anyway, I thank y'all. I'll thank those folks for coming on.
01:28:09 --> 01:28:12 I just want to close out by saying,
01:28:14 --> 01:28:22 if you have been paying attention to what's going on here, there's a lot of
01:28:22 --> 01:28:23 things I could really go off.
01:28:23 --> 01:28:28 I could go off on Robert Francis Kennedy Jr.
01:28:30 --> 01:28:34 Disgracing his daddy's name, right? Now, his daddy wasn't a patron saint.
01:28:35 --> 01:28:38 He was getting there. He was getting there.
01:28:39 --> 01:28:44 And, you know, you know, and I just thought about it, you know,
01:28:44 --> 01:28:46 his mom just passed away.
01:28:47 --> 01:28:54 Ms. Ethel lived a long time and I don't think she was alive to see him get this
01:28:54 --> 01:28:55 appointment and all that stuff.
01:28:55 --> 01:28:59 So maybe that might be part of the issue.
01:29:00 --> 01:29:03 And I say that as some, you know, all of us that have lost their moms,
01:29:03 --> 01:29:07 I think within that initial year or two, we're kind of going to,
01:29:07 --> 01:29:13 we're not ourselves and we're trying to navigate not having that connection
01:29:13 --> 01:29:14 anymore, especially if you're a close team.
01:29:15 --> 01:29:18 So maybe that might be part of his deal.
01:29:19 --> 01:29:22 Of course, he may be just crazy, right?
01:29:22 --> 01:29:27 But because he's had some issues throughout his life, but I,
01:29:28 --> 01:29:32 you know, losing your mom, it, it does something to you.
01:29:33 --> 01:29:37 So maybe that's his issue, but I could go off on that, but that's not really,
01:29:38 --> 01:29:45 that's not really what's on my mind, you know, or, you know, just the stupid stuff.
01:29:45 --> 01:29:48 You got another state, Missouri, trying to redraw their lines.
01:29:49 --> 01:29:54 Indiana is probably going to be dumb enough to do it too, which is a shame.
01:29:54 --> 01:29:56 Speaking about my mom, because that's where she's from.
01:29:57 --> 01:30:07 But the thing that's really bothering me is Donald Trump wanting to send troops to Chicago.
01:30:09 --> 01:30:15 Now, having grown up there and having watched what has happened in the city
01:30:15 --> 01:30:20 from afar over these last, God, 40-some years.
01:30:21 --> 01:30:24 You know i i just
01:30:24 --> 01:30:27 don't understand and and and
01:30:27 --> 01:30:31 you know steven miller is the guy that's pushing all this stuff right
01:30:31 --> 01:30:37 so i guess when he was busy too busy reading meinkauf and all these other books
01:30:37 --> 01:30:45 that he he hasn't studied the history of chicago at all um that's probably the
01:30:45 --> 01:30:48 last city that you want to try to do that in.
01:30:49 --> 01:30:58 You know, the city of Chicago is unique in a sense that it has always been driven by labor.
01:30:59 --> 01:31:02 Now, people are going to make the argument about Detroit and the car industry
01:31:02 --> 01:31:05 and all that stuff and New York.
01:31:05 --> 01:31:09 But New York's the financial capital. It's always been the money city, right?
01:31:09 --> 01:31:13 You know, Wall Street is in New York. Now, you know, you got the Chicago Board
01:31:13 --> 01:31:19 of Trade, but New York's always been considered the money city, right?
01:31:20 --> 01:31:22 But Chicago was...
01:31:23 --> 01:31:26 Forever, the transportation hub of this nation.
01:31:27 --> 01:31:34 And it was a rite of passage to be a part of a union, right?
01:31:34 --> 01:31:38 You know, I was in a union at 16.
01:31:40 --> 01:31:46 And, you know, it's always been about people just trying to work and make a decent living.
01:31:47 --> 01:31:51 You know, the South side of Chicago, especially the neighborhood I grew up in
01:31:51 --> 01:31:55 historically was a wealthy white neighborhood.
01:31:56 --> 01:31:59 And as black people came in, those folks left.
01:32:00 --> 01:32:07 And, you know, so a lot of those two flats and nice houses on the south side,
01:32:08 --> 01:32:14 you know, that was a dream to have an apartment laid out like a full house.
01:32:15 --> 01:32:19 You know You know what I'm saying? That's a two-flat. It's basically two houses on top of each other.
01:32:20 --> 01:32:24 It's not little small box. Like when you talk about apartment now,
01:32:24 --> 01:32:28 you're literally talking about small square footage and all that stuff.
01:32:29 --> 01:32:31 That's not what we grew up in in Chicago.
01:32:32 --> 01:32:37 And, you know, it meant something to have a job.
01:32:37 --> 01:32:43 It meant something to be able to work. work, it meant something to be able to
01:32:43 --> 01:32:47 have a day off and enjoy the fruits of your labor, whether that's going to a
01:32:47 --> 01:32:51 ball game or picnic at the park, play some golf,
01:32:51 --> 01:32:53 basketball, whatever you wanted to do.
01:32:54 --> 01:33:01 The city took pride in the fact that people were trying to live well.
01:33:01 --> 01:33:05 Now, for the black community, it was more of a struggle to do that.
01:33:06 --> 01:33:11 But the block party was everything. Right.
01:33:11 --> 01:33:16 It was like close off the street and, you know, just have a throwdown with your
01:33:16 --> 01:33:18 neighbors, your friends.
01:33:18 --> 01:33:24 And, you know, and I always allude to the parade, you know, to open up Little
01:33:24 --> 01:33:30 League and the Bud Billiken Day Parade and, you know, just all sorts of just cool stuff to do.
01:33:33 --> 01:33:37 And, you know, and there were some parts of the city where they were living
01:33:37 --> 01:33:39 a different kind of existence, right?
01:33:39 --> 01:33:43 Cabrini Green, Robert Taylor Homes, all these places. They were living a different
01:33:43 --> 01:33:46 kind of existence in a sense.
01:33:47 --> 01:33:54 But once they got out of the confines of those housing projects and intermingled
01:33:54 --> 01:33:59 with other folks, whether it be in high school or at a party or whatever,
01:33:59 --> 01:34:01 you got a different vibe.
01:34:01 --> 01:34:10 You know and it was it was it was cool you know everybody kind of understood what was happening,
01:34:11 --> 01:34:16 and you know and and the business people in the business community were were
01:34:16 --> 01:34:19 connected you know and always were trying to do something whether it was like
01:34:19 --> 01:34:21 the black on black love project or,
01:34:22 --> 01:34:29 you know whatever i mean people people related to everybody i i you know tom
01:34:29 --> 01:34:32 joiner was a regular DJ when I was growing up.
01:34:32 --> 01:34:36 Don Cornelius used to do the news before he did Soul Train when I was growing up, right?
01:34:37 --> 01:34:44 So, you know, it was just, Chicago was just a cool place. It just was a magnificent place.
01:34:45 --> 01:34:49 And even though as Black people, we struggled, and Dr. King highlighted that, right?
01:34:50 --> 01:34:56 You know, and Jesse Jackson tried to keep it going as far as fighting for equality
01:34:56 --> 01:34:58 in the economic equality in the city.
01:35:00 --> 01:35:05 We had a black mayor by the time I was 18.
01:35:07 --> 01:35:16 We had power, right? We had asserted ourselves enough where we got political power in that city.
01:35:17 --> 01:35:20 And we did the math. We realized that when you broke it down,
01:35:21 --> 01:35:24 we were the biggest block of votes in the city.
01:35:26 --> 01:35:33 So the last place you want to go in and try to be disruptive is Chicago.
01:35:34 --> 01:35:39 Because Chicago has always been known as the city of big shoulders and all that,
01:35:39 --> 01:35:41 but it's also the city of community.
01:35:42 --> 01:35:46 You know, within Chicago, you have your rivalries between the Cubs and the White
01:35:46 --> 01:35:51 Sox. And, you know, you have your debates about is it a Bears town,
01:35:51 --> 01:35:56 is it a Cubs town, is it a Sox town, is it a Bulls town, is it a Blackhawks town, right?
01:35:56 --> 01:36:00 You know, you have those debates. And, you know, you didn't really have too
01:36:00 --> 01:36:03 much debate about politics. Either you're a Democrat or you're not.
01:36:04 --> 01:36:07 And the majority of people were Democrats. But, you know, the North side,
01:36:08 --> 01:36:11 South side, West side, everybody's got their own little quirks.
01:36:11 --> 01:36:16 And in the Latino community, the Cubans and the Puerto Ricans and the Mexicans,
01:36:17 --> 01:36:21 you know, everybody's got the Dominicans, everybody's got their own clique.
01:36:24 --> 01:36:33 When the city is under siege, when it looks like everybody's got to rally around the city, it happens.
01:36:34 --> 01:36:40 And it's been happening way before I was born. I mean, the city literally burned down in 1871.
01:36:41 --> 01:36:46 And they rebuilt it around the water tower structure that survived it, right?
01:36:47 --> 01:36:49 It survived the Great Depression.
01:36:50 --> 01:36:55 It was a thriving point in the Roaring Twenties. And the roar came primarily
01:36:55 --> 01:37:01 from Chicago because of prohibition, right, and the activities that ensued.
01:37:01 --> 01:37:03 Now, that's when it was a crime problem.
01:37:03 --> 01:37:07 If you wanted to send troops then, it might have been warranted, right?
01:37:08 --> 01:37:14 But they didn't even send the National Guard in when Al Capone and Bugsy Malone
01:37:14 --> 01:37:16 were fighting for territory, right?
01:37:16 --> 01:37:21 But now Chicago is, as the president says, a hellhole.
01:37:22 --> 01:37:28 So automatically, if any Chicago team wins a championship during Trump's presidency,
01:37:28 --> 01:37:32 I would not go. I wouldn't go.
01:37:32 --> 01:37:37 Now, probably likely might not be one, but just in case one of the teams get
01:37:37 --> 01:37:41 hot and they get that moment, I would turn that down.
01:37:42 --> 01:37:47 And I would remind them, you said our city was a hellhole, so this White House
01:37:47 --> 01:37:48 is not where we want to be.
01:37:51 --> 01:37:55 But, you know, Chicago is is a great place.
01:37:56 --> 01:38:00 And the guy who's the governor, his family built their fortune in Chicago.
01:38:01 --> 01:38:07 Right. And I've known of the governor since we were all running around and the
01:38:07 --> 01:38:08 young Democrats together.
01:38:10 --> 01:38:15 And the mayor, Brandon Johnson, is basically a former school teacher who has
01:38:15 --> 01:38:17 elevated to be the mayor of the city.
01:38:18 --> 01:38:22 That's very Chicago, that that could happen, right?
01:38:24 --> 01:38:28 It's really, really a bad idea to go into any U.S.
01:38:28 --> 01:38:33 City with the military, but it's a really terrible idea, strategically and otherwise,
01:38:33 --> 01:38:36 to even think about doing that to Chicago.
01:38:36 --> 01:38:39 It's not going to end well for the president.
01:38:42 --> 01:38:48 Between the lawyers and the political figures and the community leaders.
01:38:49 --> 01:38:52 You know, you got these folks, you know, all of a sudden now they're wearing
01:38:52 --> 01:38:58 red hats and which red sweatshirts, you know, saying, oh, no,
01:38:58 --> 01:39:00 Mr. President, we want you to come and all that stuff, bruh.
01:39:01 --> 01:39:05 Okay, you had your TikTok moment. The majority of people in Chicago,
01:39:05 --> 01:39:10 white, black, Latino, Asian, they're not feeling that at all. They don't need that.
01:39:11 --> 01:39:15 They need the money, the money that you are going to spend.
01:39:16 --> 01:39:21 Put federal troops, whether it's the National Guard or Texas,
01:39:21 --> 01:39:26 Greg Abbott, Greg Abbott, my God, Greg Abbott, or, you know,
01:39:27 --> 01:39:31 whatever Marine group you want to slide in or, you know, like you did in LA
01:39:31 --> 01:39:35 or whatever you're trying to do, whatever resources you're spending on that,
01:39:35 --> 01:39:39 if you gave that directly to the mayor and said, mayor, I want you,
01:39:40 --> 01:39:44 okay, I I understand crime's going down, but I think you can do better.
01:39:45 --> 01:39:51 So we're going to give you this money to go into law enforcement and do what you need to do. Right?
01:39:52 --> 01:39:55 If you want to do more community policing, knock yourself out.
01:39:56 --> 01:40:00 If you want to hire more officers, knock yourself out.
01:40:00 --> 01:40:04 But we're going to give you the money to do that instead of wasting money.
01:40:05 --> 01:40:09 Because the last thing I want to see is that you've got these federal troops
01:40:09 --> 01:40:13 up in Chicago and they're picking up trash like they're doing in D.C.
01:40:15 --> 01:40:19 Chicago is one of the cleanest cities in the nation, so it's one of the best
01:40:19 --> 01:40:21 cities in the world to live in.
01:40:22 --> 01:40:25 So they probably ain't going to have that much to do as far as picking up trash.
01:40:26 --> 01:40:29 I'm just saying, it's a waste of time.
01:40:31 --> 01:40:40 And, you know, I don't know what kind of dreams that Miller has as far as this
01:40:40 --> 01:40:44 authoritarian or this Curtis Yarvin kind of clique or the Peter Thiel's.
01:40:44 --> 01:40:49 And I don't know what y'all expecting, but I think you're starting to realize
01:40:49 --> 01:40:53 that the United States of America is not the country to try to pull that off in.
01:40:55 --> 01:41:00 Think the United States of America is dictator-proof. Now, has he done a lot
01:41:00 --> 01:41:04 of damage, some of Trump and Miller and all these guys? Oh, yeah.
01:41:04 --> 01:41:10 They've done a lot of damage. No more damage than Jefferson Davis and Robert A. Lee, though, right?
01:41:11 --> 01:41:14 But they're doing their best. They're dividing the country.
01:41:15 --> 01:41:19 They're dismantling institutions. They're doing everything they possibly could do.
01:41:20 --> 01:41:26 But the reality is, I think this country is dictator-proof because there's too many people like J.B.
01:41:26 --> 01:41:32 Pritzker and Gavin Newsom and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Jasmine Crockett.
01:41:32 --> 01:41:36 And, you know, there's just too many people.
01:41:37 --> 01:41:41 You know, Gary Chambers or Representative Goolsbee.
01:41:41 --> 01:41:44 You just, you got too many people scattered. In Mississippi,
01:41:46 --> 01:41:49 Bruh, you think you'll have a fight in Chicago?
01:41:50 --> 01:41:53 Try to go to Jackson, Mississippi. Now, you're not going to do that because
01:41:53 --> 01:41:59 there's a Republican governor there who's sending Mississippi National Guard people to D.C.
01:42:00 --> 01:42:03 But, yeah, that would be stupid, too.
01:42:04 --> 01:42:08 It's just too many folks to deal with, you know.
01:42:10 --> 01:42:13 It's just, you know, you got Derrick Johnson and Sky Perryman and,
01:42:13 --> 01:42:21 you know, Mark Elias, who single-handedly is suing you every corner of the country, right?
01:42:21 --> 01:42:23 There's too many people like that.
01:42:25 --> 01:42:28 For a true strongman to win.
01:42:29 --> 01:42:34 Now, I'm not saying that we don't need to be on our guard, that we need to abdicate
01:42:34 --> 01:42:39 our duty as far as being voters and being vocal and active citizens.
01:42:41 --> 01:42:47 But I think I think those wannabes have bitten off more than they can chew.
01:42:48 --> 01:42:50 And it's not going to end well for them.
01:42:52 --> 01:42:57 And, you know, this election cycle, I think you're going to continue to see
01:42:57 --> 01:43:06 turnover in 2026, regardless of how they try to rig it. I think it's going to be bad.
01:43:06 --> 01:43:13 Right. And if they don't realize it by the end of 2026, then they get what they deserve in 2028.
01:43:15 --> 01:43:22 Right. Because a time ago, I got on this podcast and talked about a historical
01:43:22 --> 01:43:27 moment in America called the era of good feelings where one political party was irrelevant.
01:43:27 --> 01:43:32 And the Republicans are trying to make it seem like the Democrats of that party,
01:43:33 --> 01:43:41 but not really, because I always know his history has always shown that these type of Republicans,
01:43:42 --> 01:43:51 these type of conservatives, these type of authoritarian minded folks overplay their hand. Always.
01:43:52 --> 01:43:55 It's just like any comic book.
01:43:55 --> 01:43:59 Right. The villain looks like, oh, we got the hero right where we want him,
01:43:59 --> 01:44:01 and then they try to do too much.
01:44:02 --> 01:44:05 The hero comes back and takes care of him.
01:44:05 --> 01:44:11 And that happens in real life. That happens with these Republicans.
01:44:12 --> 01:44:18 Research. Go back and look. It's like the American people will tolerate you
01:44:18 --> 01:44:22 if you sound like you're about to do something that's beneficial to them.
01:44:22 --> 01:44:26 But when they realize that it is a circus and a total shit show,
01:44:27 --> 01:44:30 they put you back in your place.
01:44:30 --> 01:44:34 And then, of course, they try to regroup and come up with a new scheme as well
01:44:34 --> 01:44:38 as like pinky in the brain is like they always trying to come up with something
01:44:38 --> 01:44:39 new to take over the world.
01:44:39 --> 01:44:45 But the reality is that every time you do that, you're going to be pushed back.
01:44:45 --> 01:44:50 The best thing that you can do is just try to sell your ideas to the American
01:44:50 --> 01:44:54 people and let the nation determine which direction do we want to go.
01:44:54 --> 01:45:01 Do we want to be radical or do we want to slow down and build upon what we've already established?
01:45:01 --> 01:45:05 You know, that's really the difference.
01:45:06 --> 01:45:11 Are we going to push innovation or are we going to settle where we're at and
01:45:11 --> 01:45:15 make sure what we've got is solid before we push forward.
01:45:16 --> 01:45:21 That's really where we are. And then all these other folks that's coming in
01:45:21 --> 01:45:23 and just, you know, well, I don't get it my way.
01:45:23 --> 01:45:30 So I'm going to do political retribution and I'm going to destroy stuff because
01:45:30 --> 01:45:34 they wouldn't let me build a rocket the way I wanted it.
01:45:35 --> 01:45:40 Or, you know, I can't spew out as much pollution as I want, you know,
01:45:41 --> 01:45:43 those people get theirs in the end.
01:45:45 --> 01:45:48 A lot longer than decent people, but they get theirs in the end.
01:45:49 --> 01:45:54 So despite all this craziness, despite all this foolishness, I'm hopeful.
01:45:54 --> 01:46:02 And I'm really, really watching and praying and hoping that the president doesn't
01:46:02 --> 01:46:04 go through with the Chicago thing,
01:46:04 --> 01:46:12 that it turns out to be more of a bluff than actuality because even though I
01:46:12 --> 01:46:13 haven't lived there in a while,
01:46:14 --> 01:46:19 I'm a Chicagoan at heart and I know how Chicagoans are and Chicagoans are going
01:46:19 --> 01:46:23 to fight and they're going to fight hard and they may even fight dirty,
01:46:23 --> 01:46:29 but they're going to fight and you're not going to get them to submit.
01:46:29 --> 01:46:32 You're not going to get them to capitulate.
01:46:33 --> 01:46:37 It's a waste of time. If you really want to be be presidential,
01:46:37 --> 01:46:42 then stop trying to tear down the institutions and utilize them for what they are.
01:46:43 --> 01:46:48 But that goes back to what I was saying about respecting history, right?
01:46:48 --> 01:46:51 If you understand the history of this nation, if you truly understand it,
01:46:51 --> 01:46:55 and you truly understand the concept of why these institutions were set up,
01:46:56 --> 01:47:03 then you would make it work for you instead of trying to destroy it and cast
01:47:03 --> 01:47:05 it in your own image, right?
01:47:07 --> 01:47:14 I hope that makes some sense. I just, I'm tired, but I'm not surrendering.
01:47:15 --> 01:47:21 And I think that's the gist of most of the people that are part of the resistance.
01:47:21 --> 01:47:25 We're not going to give in. Are we a little inundated? Yeah.
01:47:27 --> 01:47:33 But we got it covered. And we have the track record that you're going to overplay
01:47:33 --> 01:47:36 your hand. And when you do, we're going to win.
01:47:37 --> 01:47:43 So y'all just keep that in mind. And as always, I thank y'all for listening.
01:47:44 --> 01:48:32 Music.