Response to Glenn Loury & John McWhorter: Does A Victim Narrative Stop Black Americans from Letting Go of Racial Issues? - Part 2

Thank you for tuning into healing race. In this video, we continue discussing Glenn Lowery and John McWhorter's video about the Harriet Tubman statue that was awarded to a white artist. Can white artists create monuments to the black experience in a way that's impactful and authentic? And our black Americans who say, and authentic? And are black Americans who say no to that question just too attached to a victimhood narrative as McWherter suggests they are? I start the video by asking Andre how he would feel about a white artist winning this kind of commission if it was evaluated in a race blind way by a group that if it was evaluated in a race blind way by a group that included ample black judges. Let's get to that conversation now. Enjoy. If there was a process let's say that this process and, again, I don't know what they did in Philadelphia, but let's say that this process was that people anonymously submit ideas for creations of this statue, and that the people making the decision were some sort of well rounded, including ample participation from black members of Philadelphia, had to come together and critique, discuss, decide on which one most represented what they wanted to get across about the story of Harriet Tubman. Right? And that what struck people was one that was created by a white person. So I disagree. So I'm gonna stop you right here because I already disagree with your premise. When you use the word anonymous, because anonymous would not have been my process. I would have gone to black artists and say, y'all know what? We are creating this statue to honor the life of Harriet Tubman. And I want you as black people to understand her life and submit and submit your ideas for what this monument should look like. I want to see because and the reason it would not have been anonymous in Andre's world, meaning if Andre was running shit, the reason it would not have been unanimous anonymous because I want a deliberate continuity to what she was the acts that she committed and the people who created that statue. Mhmm. You mean a connection the continuity is between what and what? Sorry. The continuity of the black people she was delivering into freedom and the free black people that designed that monument. Mhmm. Okay. So for you, the process would have been because you talked Not anonymous. Well, it wouldn't have only been anonymous. You essentially would have said only black people apply. Pretty much. Yeah. And so that would have been now why is that continuity in important to you? Because of what it symbolizes. What does it symbol? Because it's what does it symbolize? Tell me. You're the people of the book of Exodus. What does it symbolize to you? It symbolizes deliverance. So to you that future that we are that future she was dreaming of. The fact that I'm sitting here on this this technology, which is blow anybody's mind from yesteryear, but the fact we can sit here on these computers and argue with one another and do it in a civil fashion and whatnot. There was a there was a day so, Todd, let me help you let me work with you, baby. There was the way I talked to you, there was a day people would've knocked my teeth out talking to a white man like that. Yeah. You know? That is not lost on me, which is part of the reason why I do it, you people out there in YouTube land. But they exercise my freedom to tell all white folks because we all free to do that and don't ever take that freedom for granted. That's it. That's number 1. Number 2. Number 2, I just feel that sense of deliverance is important because it's almost in the African American story and our evolutions to see look how far we we've come. We don't have now true enough, there are people still deliberately targeting us in in harmful ways because we're black. But it is to a lesser extent the motivation is the same, but it's to a lesser extent, and we are relatively able to live free lives vis a vis our ancestors. Almost like Mikaela said on how to get away with murder, she said, I am my ancestors' wildest dream. Right? And in some ways, we really, really are. You know? And in some ways, we're building the dream for even the generations coming after us. And I want and it just seems so personal to me for that continuity of deliverance. We've now we're living in the environment she was trying to deliver those people into for to have that monument done by an African American artist. So for me, it's an emotional one of bringing the story, you know, I guess you would say 360. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's compelling to me. I can understand that the very act of a black artist creating it is actually part of the story, in this in this particular case. I can see that as being a compelling, meaningful kind of backstory in the future when people see this statue, to kind of but also what I'm saying is that backstory does not take away from anyone who is not African American gleaning a sense of inspiration or light from the life and the acts of Harriet Tubman? So I'm saying the 2 can exist together. Yeah. The 2 can exist together. I have a couple Not mutually exclusive. But you said you said it depends on what the art is. So this is you know, you're telling it Yeah. I do think it depends on the medium. Yeah. Not yeah. Not just the medium, but the story itself. And oh, yeah. Yeah. Harriet Tubman's story is about the story of freedom. Right? And so And American bravery and American bravery. And I particularly, I want black people to look at that and to say, you know what? The same way because I guess this is what I see it when I know the life of Harriet Tubman. Be bold, be brave, be black. So let's take the examples that I brought up. Can I mean, the story of remember the titans is a little bit different because there's actually white and black participants? Now, obviously, black participants in the forced integration were at least theoretically getting more opportunity. There's a lot of dissecting of integration in general, but, but at least the premise, the intention, right, is increased opportunity. But there's but there's 2 you know, there there's white people who experience the integration and connection and overcoming, you know, differences, and there's black people. So there's multiple parts of that story itself. But let's say let's say that we were to angle that story in a way that was more about the black story. In that kind of a case, is it important to for a black person to kind of direct that story? In the case of the hotel Rwanda, is it important that a Rwandan direct that movie I'll give you another consideration that's very tangible. If you know black people, you know one thing is our movie, The Color Purple. That is the done by Steven Spielberg. So a Jewish American told this rural southern, what has become almost like a bedrock of modern African American culture. Every black woman what's your favorite movie? The color purple? The color purple. And the remake great example. The remake of the color purple, and I will be there with my little ticket, launches in December. Because I'm like, who. How do they update it for modern times? Yeah. So on the face of it, they answered the oh my god. I still dwelled at watching the code purple. On the face of it, the answer to your question from me to you is yes. Because clearly, Steven Spielberg did, did that work. Is he entrenched in that? Because I also, if you ever watched the Faye woman's, like, which is the kinda thing that does the story about Steven, I haven't seen it yet, but I've heard wonderful things about it. It's a wonderful film. It's a wonderful film. So clearly, Steven does not have a deliberate personal connection to the African American story when he grew up. Right? But he was able to tap into that common humanity of hope, need, and aspiration, all those things that give us the feeling that we do as black people when we watch the color purple. However, I will say he used superb black talent in that film. So had or should a white woman have played Seeley? No. Didn't that? Because that would have been that would have been disjointed for us. You know? Should Oprah have not played miss Sophia? No. And we see what all that turned into. Right? Yeah. So, like, I guess, I say this to say to hearken back to what I said. It really depends on the context, the subject, and the medium. And you know what? I think what we're really talking about is the sensitivity and the awareness of the individual. So to if you have a white soul, a being, because souls don't have race, if you have a white being who has the awareness to bring respect to the subject, then I could see how the memorial would be, how would you say, would be fine with people. But it's really up to that artist to show, to demonstrate. You're dealing with a highly charged, highly personal thing, and it's up to you to demonstrate. You know what? I understand why you would have my doubts. You have your doubts, and I hear what you're saying, but I do feel I have the capability to execute this with respect, love, and all the thing, and to do justice to what you're looking for in a monument about such a great American. Right? Yeah. I said artist the onus is on the artist, not on us to say, well, we'll see. No. Because you're entrusting, you’re entrusting the legacy of a people. Mhmm. Yeah. So what you're saying is you are part you partially at least earn the trust by showing a proactive motivation to understand the emotionality, the perspective, the experience. That's one way to earn trust. It it's you know, I feel like it's a little bit similar, you know, when you asked me about my grandmother. I mean, all of this we're talking about context and understanding. Right? And, well, this this this portion of the conversation, and you wanna know that there's some mechanism to show that someone cares about that and also some mechanism that someone that that ensures that they deliver on it as well and at least today. And so, you know, the example we talked about with Eminem is you felt like Dre vouching for him. Right? What's the way of saying we can trust that he's coming from the right place, you know, in in in creating rap. Right? Yes. There's some mechanism to earn that trust that there's an understanding of context and that there's understanding generally of the experience that you're depicting. So and that I that I completely that I resonate with a lot. And I to be honest, I almost thought about it also in response to Lowry and McWhorter because McWhorter's so first, let's give let's give Lowry credit for bringing up the employment aspect of it. He said, you know, I can understand the motivation of full, you know, full black employment that this is an opportunity. It's an opportunity that's about a black a black, you know, experience. You know, shouldn't that opportunity be given to someone who's black given the history? So he said he could at least he doesn't agree with it, but he at least could understand that argument more. So let's at least give, you know Credit to that. Yes. Of course. Credit to that. You know? And McArthur felt seemed to understand that as well. You know, one of the things he said was this idea of that we're not just our victimhood. Right? And Marin also expressed that to you because we don't see it as victimhood. We see it as being a that's a victor. As many times as, babe, miss Tubman came and said, no white folks kept trying to get her. That is a baby, that's Victoria. That is So that was my reaction to what when he said that. That's the long run. I had the completely different reaction. I was like, you know, this is a this is someone we look up to. This is this is a story of triumph. Yes. It comes from American bravery. Some of our anger about it comes from some of the pain of the past. Sure. But I didn't get that this was a holding on to victimhood. I mean, I can see a little bit of where he's coming from because he is saying, like, is this is this just our story? Is our story of victimhood, of being slaves and everything came after it? Is it just our story? Is most intimately your story? But he wants to say it's more than just your story. But I celebrate the triumph in black food. So if you ever come to my house, I cook. I kinda I cooked the way our grandmothers used to cook. Cornbread, beans, and pork chop. I like eating that way. And I one day I was I was having good old plate food. I'm like, oh, this is so good. And it's what keeps me and feel connected rooted to our past. So I celebrate African American culture in the food that I cook and the way that I cook it. Yeah. This is where I felt that there was among, and I know their points of view. I've listened to their conversations a lot. I felt like there was an instinctive gut reaction to this. Now I didn't see the tweets that he is responding to. I didn't see the criticism, and I could be completely wrong in understanding his context. But I felt like and so maybe there were people who were criticizing because it's like, it's our pain, and therefore, it should be our creative outlet. Maybe people were saying that. Mhmm. But when I heard him talk connect this to this this connection to eternal victimhood, as he said, this identity of eternal victimhood, I and that and he said, you know, he said a question, which I think is a really compelling question, like, aren't we more than that? And I'll tell you why it's compelling for me is that he asked that question is because I see that sometimes I see that sometimes in the Jewish community. Oh, I know. I know. Are built on remembrance. Your holidays are built on remembering the suffering of the I'm intimated with some of Judaism. Yeah. And you really are. You celebrate I just don't want I don't want Jews. I don't want my daughter. I don't want my, you know, my peers. I don't want them to feel that we need to just sit there feeling like we are always going to be these victims of persecution. I don't wanna forget the past, but I don't want the story, Andre, that that gets told by some in the Jewish community is we are going to be you know, we have been and will be kind of victims of persecution, you know, to us to our end days. It makes it feel like it's this this ever present and will be ever present part of us that that has stamped us. And I do think we're more than that. I don't think we can put that aside. I think it has it has branded our experience of life. We can’t dissociate from that. But to hear it Yeah. Last weekend, my share you shared that video with me, and I shared the article with you about Elon Musk blaming Jews for being the problems of the world. And Jews were the reason that x, formerly known as Twitter, is failing because of their, you know, the ACLU and all this liberal blah blah blah blah. And I said, we should discuss this. And I and that's so, you know, you just brought up how some in the community, but, you know, have this this stamp that we're gonna forever be persecuted and to blame for everybody's everything. And here's this incredibly prominent man whose life biography has just been released by Walter Isaacson. I was watching the coverage this morning. Yeah. And here he is, what, a week and a half ago saying Jews are his biggest problem. So, I mean, there seems to be something to what the community is saying. Because here we are over 2000 years later, because you see I'm wearing a crucifix. Y'all, you know, 2000 years later, Jews are still the problem. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And we had talked about this previously with, I think, Kanye West's comments Yeah. On this. So I don't want to deny, be ignorant, you know, play down the fact that this story creeps up over and over again in many ways, and people try to broadcast and then gain followers for this idea that that that Jews are in control of everything and are the source of whoever's problems. Right? All the world's problems. It that narrative clearly creeps up in again and again. At the same time, you know, we are also accepted by way more people than we were ever accepted by when we first came up you know, relative to when we first came over. And we don't live in, you know, Nazi Germany right now. Like, I'm just saying that, yes, there are narratives that keep coming back and that these narratives inspire bigoted feelings or reinforce bigoted feelings and even lead to hateful acts and hateful violence, I also feel like 2 things. 1 is to focus so much on that is to ignore, you know, the victor narratives, right, and all sorts of other parts of our identity, 1. 2 is it's to deny the progress that's been made in in people embracing us, in people in people when they hear antisemitism standing up and saying that ain't right. You know? Yes. Right. Right. And where that wouldn't have happened previously. I it's to it just ignores and it and it kinda most important, I think, to parts of this conversation, it also has people to enclose the story is to provide a roadblock to other people owning the story as they have. You know? I want people to bring it back to the to the black narrative. I do have a similar feeling to Lowry McWhorter in that we should have we should foster a situation where it's not just black Americans feeling a strong ownership to the Harriet Tubman story. And sometimes the way it can come off, and I know this is not the intention when you have the feelings you do about who should be telling that story, who should have come you know, created this monument. And I and I it resonates when you tell me the meaning of the story and who's delivering who and that the person who was delivered to freedom is now creating. I mean, that that's a beautiful story, Andre. And I'm like, yes. That makes sense for this monument. So I wanna it's really compelling the way you told that. Seriously. At the same time, in a bigger picture way, sometimes when it's like only a black person can tell this story, it creates a feeling of distance who from people who are not black that they could actually own that story in some way. And I hear that, but that's where the trust comes in. Remember when I said that the trust acts? And it's for those who want to feel like I for though you know, imagine someone who's non-African American or non-African diaspora. I they feel this this person feels a sense of movement. They feel moved by what they see or inspired, and that's where the trust act comes in. That's when you do certain things. You say certain things and say, this is not coming. My adoration is not coming from a place of malice or mocking. This is I'm genuinely moved by what I've heard and by what I've seen. And as you see it's appropriate or as I it makes sense; I would love to be a part of this. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think that that feels right to me. It feels like you're open. I feel like in this scenario so what so what I'm taking from you tell me if I got this right. I'm taking I'm taking 3 things. 1 is 1 is in this, you know, in particular cases, there is a greater symbolic story to be told when a black person is the creator of the story. And this is a particular time where it seems like there could have been something, a really compelling story told that fits the theme, if a black person would have created. That's 1. That's exactly what I'm saying, especially since some black lines of lineage exist because of these acts. Yeah. And 2 is you are open to the idea that someone can create some sort of symbolic work of art that tells a story of black people in a compelling way, but that there that there's a process of trust and the developing of an understanding of context that, that should be required and should there should be some accountability around that, so that you don't get a Lincoln monument that's like, hey. I'm the white savior of these, you know, incapable black slaves. Yeah. I completely and that's me because like I said, but YouTubers, please don't be offended. I use comedy to process pain. But if you were to see the statute for yourself, that's exactly what the movements that I just made. That's exactly what it looks like. I've seen it. I've seen it. Yeah. Then I will validate that. The third thing I'm hearing from you is that and this is where I have a question for you, that there is also an idea of leveraging the black story to in increase greater representation in the arts itself. Yes. And I guess I would ask you; would that part of the motivation be less? Let's fast forward to 100 years from now, and you do see greater, you know, proportional representation in various fields of endeavor among black people and others, you know, Latinos and the like, in various fields. When you feel we've reached a place of not perfect we're never getting perfect equality. Things just move, you know, up and down too much, in life, but that we have a much greater sense of equity across cultures that there is true that that's that that that symbolizes, that represents that there's true equality of opportunity. In a world like that where we're seeing greater equity, does the motivation for providing a specific opportunity to a black artist to kinda break through, does that part of it lessen for you when we're kind of there already? Of course, it does. But what did I tell you in the first season? We ain't there yet. And I'll let you know once we get there. Okay. Okay. So there's that other motivation, and it just okay. And so the optics to you, not just of understanding context, but the optics to you of this going to a white person, then part of that optics is, well, you know, black artists struggle so much in this area. Isn't it some is it is it perhaps in bad taste that opportunity doesn't come up a black person's way given the inequity that exists and given the subject matter? That's exactly how I feel. Okay. So those are the 3 things for you in this. And I just, you know, I wanna say one last thing about this Victor victimhood thing because, I think we need to do a whole show on that as a concept. Well, I had a reaction to McWhorter focusing so much because I didn't take, I didn't take the criticism as being one of holding on to victimhood. I really didn't, and he took it there. And it made me think you made me think when you brought up context. You know? If it was a black artist who got commissioned, you know, would they have told the story more of victory than victimhood? I don't see victimhood in that statue. I don't I don't know what face good point. I don't I don't know her face, what her face looked like. Maybe it was both pain and I don't know what it was, so I don't wanna I don't wanna put words on in in Lowry and McWherter's mouth because I don't remember exactly what they said. And I don't quite know what that statue gives off. But would something different have been shown? You know, it is one of courage. I mean, I think she's whole you know, she's, like, carrying someone behind her. So you do get a sense of courage and sacrifice, but, you know, the frame could be different from a certain black perspective. Some might some in the black community might prop up the victimhood or the or the pain. Some might prop up the victor the victory, because there is also diversity in the black community as you said multiple times, but it just makes you it makes you at least think if the if the judges were of a certain kind you know, of a of a of a certain thought, not of a certain kind of people, meaning black or white, if they were black, white, other, and also had different perspectives. If the creator was someone who was black, would it be depicted differently that might get that victory more across? I don't know. But you just made me think of it in terms of context. And, yeah, I think you bring up an excellent point because in the medium of sculpture or sculpture, facial expression is important because that's gonna be one of the main surfaces by which you bring in the viewer, right, through that facial expression. And I'm an aficionado sculptor of sculpture. Andre, what's going on with you today? And I really analyze and hone in on how the expressions were created, the contours of a person's face, and all of that. And I think it's important to say, could those contours have been expressed differently through an African American artist? Would they have chosen to do something different with the cheeks or with the lips or whatever because they're black, and to have those to have all of that integrate into a face that would achieve a different feeling than what a white artist would have created. Maybe at the same time, you know, to kind of prop up their point of view is this sculpture had already previously resonated. There was something that people liked in it. Right? Mhmm. And so their basic point of view is this is resonating. If we wind up finding out that it was created by a white person, if it's resonating with a broad set of communities, including the black community, do we care what the source is? I know you have all your kind of the meaning and all of that. Let's put that aside. But the basic point of a 100 years from now, if someone's gonna look at it and we really feel like it's gonna resonate with people broadly, including the black community, do we at the end of the day care? You know? And, you know, Lowry asked a question, does identity driven motivations and emotions drive the creative process so much? Is it so central that that that, again, only a black person could create something like this that in a way that resonates. And what I hear you saying, let me see if I understand you, is it matters a lot is not the only thing that matters, and you can channel this common humanity if done in the right way. But at the end of the day, it is still gonna matter. I still am gonna tell my grandmother's story in a much more poignant way or maybe another Jewish person who has a holocaust legacy is probably gonna feel that in a particular way that doesn't preclude someone from connecting to it in a deep way, but still has to be given some credence, as a as a factor. That seems to be where you It doesn't have the psychological impact. Yeah. Yeah. I like I feel good about where we've come. I feel like I completely understand this case to you, why it matters so much. I feel like I understand the economic case as well. And but at the same time, I also understand I also appreciate your openness to the idea that people can translate, can feel a common humanity, and translate feelings if do in a way that is proactive in in understanding context. And I love the memorial for a dead queen of a country. I'm not a citizen. Yeah. So, yes, people can draw inspiration from shit that has nothing to do with their background. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Do you have you noticed? Do you empathize at all with the react the kind of reaction that they have from this from this vantage point? They are being, again, Glenn Loury and John McWhorter. Do you feel like there are at least a portion of the black community that does feel like there is a barrier to telling like, a hard and fast barrier to telling the black Oh, yeah. Totally. I mean, we're not some intellectual monolith. Right? So you have as many opinions as you have many black people. Right? You have some people that doesn't matter. Like, trust me. It's gonna run the gamut, and that's what society is. You know? So I don't envy I don't envy the job of the judges who are deciding the winning design. Right? I don't envy that because you have a lot on your shoulders, and you have to get it right, especially since it's got a pretty permanent structure, and people are gonna know your name and talk about you for the rest of your life. Kind of a thing. Yeah. Yeah. And so and in in understanding that there is part that part of the black audience, of the black community, can you understand, I guess, the way that might block certain people who are not black from feeling like they can in any way own parts of black history as their own and therefore appreciate it in a way that that doesn't want there are 2 considerations. So there's a there's a private ownership, and then there's a public ownership. And what you privately do in your home is your business, so you wanna own that in your way. That's privately in your home. When you start taking that out into the world via digital technologies or just out in the street, right, publishing YouTube talk shows, then that's when you're open to critique, and then that's where optics matter. Because what did I tell you though the time during the cornrow conversation? Pete Joe q Public, Joan q Public, they don't know you. So we're gonna see look at you and see this and then assign our own intentions to it even if we are completely wrong. That's why the optics is so important if you care how people perceive what you're trying to do. Now you don't get to see it and find, but I think you should because there's backlash. So when you care, what people are trying to how they perceive it, you got to get the optics right. That means you need to look at things from all perspectives. So I think where they get worried, and I can understand and empathize with this, is should the emotions of people let's take this group of people within the black community who would have a harder fast boundary of who could create anything related to the black story, they're gonna have their feelings. Right? And should one's creative decision in this way be driven by those the emotions behind that group of people or at or just consider and listen to where they're coming from and then make a decision? That's a balancing act within the artist. Only the artist can answer that. I'm talking about you, though. Like, when on me, baby. When we talk about the difference, when you and I know others have you know, Maren has brought it up. Felicia has brought it up. The difference between intention and impact. Yeah? Yeah. And I see. For me personally, Andre, intention, impact, and integrity. Because you also have to you also have to give an integrity to what you're trying to create and in the way in which you are moved to own part of the story. What I mean. And so if yielding toward intention and impact leads you to severely compromise integrity, it's not gonna feel comfortable. That that means it's not you. So you're gonna the artist is gonna have to balance those 3 those 3 spheres. Right? Intention, impact, and integrity. Yeah. Yeah. And so while you could be sensitive to impact, you know and this is where I feel like I could just feel like John McWhorter's feelings about this of, like, let's kind of get over what, you know, he says the eternal, you know, victim of narrative. Like I'm over it. I'm happy to not bring it up. Okay. It's these white folks who wanna feel because I let me deliberately talk about this. Because when he said this need to feel special, I'm like, I don't the black people who are in my life and been in my life for the near 50 years I've been on this planet have not been running around like, I feel special. We were slaves. We that's not how we feel. I think many of us are happy to move it on. But I because when he said that I because remember I said, I'm a reactionary. I had to press pause. I'm like, you need to go tell that to these white people who are, like Felicia say and Felicia's a dear friend, who's a future guest on the show, by the way Yep. Who are clinging to what we call the construct of whiteness. You this is the white people who wanna feel special, who want to feel more than ordinary and all of that. It's their clinging to it. So they have to bring up, you know, you were black. You know, you're getting special privileges. You know, you only got into college because you're black. They're bringing all this stuff. The rest of us are happy to leave that in the past. But until they move on, we are stuck in this e what feels like eternal, to use the parlance of some of the Jewish community, dance of you're not worthy. Why are you here? You're not worthy. Why are you here? You're not giving us rights, and it's over and over and on and on, literally, like atoms dancing in a molecule. So A molecule of hatred. Yeah. So what you're saying is there's a certain set of conditions right now that continue to provide a block and a and a source of stereotypes around who black people are, what they've experienced that provide a block to kind of moving forward toward greater kind of equity, equality of opportunity at the very least. You know? And so someone like a John McWhorter is at least getting the people who feel that, like you and your friends, he's getting he's getting that wrong. In you continuing to harp on the issues harp on the issues of race, he's not understanding the meaning or the source of the motivation of harping on it. Well, he's also not holding the white participants accountable. White people are participants in us having to bring up the victimhood because they're putting out this energy. That's why I was saying that's why I'm like, baby, you need to go tell that to these white folks because you're acting as though that we're just putting it out there without any triggers. There when people walk into a Dollar General that's in a predominantly black neighborhood just to kill black people, that's called a trigger. So now we have to bring it up again. You see this dance this dance. And all we were doing was shopping at the dollar stuff, literally, at the Dollar General. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think I think that makes sense to me, And I will say where I resonate with what he feels because I feel I felt it in the Jewish community. And I'm sure there are there are again, black community is not a monolith, and I'm and I'm sure there are there are parts of the black community that do really do what I'm about to share, I've experienced among Jews, is there is a point in time where, you know, in a in a in an empathetic way, in a patient way even, I feel the need to say the past is the past. Yes. There are current like, you brought up the article. There are still people trying to spout these narratives about Jewish people, but we still live in a different world and we're not in the we're not in the holocaust right now. And I wanna say, listen. I will probably cry every time I tell my grandparents' story. I'm not saying to get rid of your, you know, that you we gotta be these, like, unemotional people who don't feel connection to history and to story, but I also know that I that I, at least in my own in my own sense, in my own right, and for and for and for the rest of my Jewish community, I don't wanna be stuck in that. I don't want us to be stuck people are walking in the synagogue and shooting them up. You're still stuck in it. There are still in the synagogue and shooting them up just because you're Jewish. True. True. But there is an importance in acknowledging the difference of degree. Right? I accept that. We're not in Egypt. We're not in Germany. These things still happen, and they're still they're still threats. I'm not gonna disown that, nor would I do it, of course, for the black community because I'm not black, first of all, so I don't experience it. But even in understanding some of the parallels, I would never discount the threats that still exist. I do think that there still is validity to the encouragement that I feel John McWhorter is trying to give of don't live in that space. I feel like that's what he's trying to say. Don't live in that space. Yeah. You know, at certain points, come to remember that, you know, the way we were persecuted in Egypt. You know? Come to remember that. Yes. But don't have this be a mantra that you carry around with yourself on a regular basis. Saying is at the same time; you go tell the bigot the same goddamn thing. Don't live in a space of hatred. Don't live in the space that Jews are your problem. Fine. I accept what you're trying to say. Say it, baby. But then you go tell that motherfucker the same goddamn thing, and then there we go. I agree with you there. So you feel like it's not that there's not credence to the message of let's not completely live in the past. Let's feel empowered in a new in a in at a new time in a new future. But what you're saying is it feels it feels unbalanced. It feels like it lacks context. Yes. When you don't, in the second breath or in the first breath, say Yes. I understand that people are still reacting because there's something that still exists. Yes. I understand. Okay. It's alright, miss Sandra. Go and help you understand, baby. Tell him I'm a work with you. I'm a work with you. So that that makes more sense to me. So that makes more sense to me. Now I will I will say that, you know, John McWhorter, there are plenty of times in the conversations that he has with Glenn Lowry where he does he does share empathy with the continued experience of black people in America and the way in which, you know, history may have, you know, been at least part of, although he debates this as well. But there is there is an empathy about the experience of black people in America that I do think he shares. But I hope so. But I but I do I do I do understand that when he says what he says, it feels very one-sided and, like, it lacks contents of what continues. We didn't go from a to z to all the problems in the world, you know, racial problems in the world to no problems in the world, and to act as if that, you know, the history that landed who's a future guest, you know, heard where it's like, you know, we beat slavery with the civil war and we beat, you know, we beat Jim Crow with, and segregation with, with civil rights. Boom. We're done. Right? You feel like and it was only white man that did it. Yeah. You feel right. You feel like, that it almost gets across that kind of context. Like, we're in the promised land. That makes a lot more sense to me, your reaction to his comments there. Thank you for watching this episode of Healing Race and stay with us for a scene from our next video. If you wanna see more conversations like the one you just watched, please subscribe to our channel, share this video with friends and family, and like and comment on the video below. If you'd like to be a guest on one of our episodes and have an open real conversation about race, email us at guests at healingrayshow.com. And if there are topics you think we should cover, we'd love to hear them. So please email your ideas to topics at healingrayshow.com. As always, thanks for your support. We look forward to continuing the conversation with you. Now, here's a scene from our next healing race. Part of the psychology the psychology of control that whites often oppress black people with is to make them use courtesy titles with white children. Meaning, you had to refer to a 5-year-old as miss Elizabeth or mister Steve, whatever. And this and you are a 55-year-old black person. Right? That is a thing. That is deliberate psychological control. Right? Whatever you even in the most in the smallest individual, you are not acknowledge our superiority. And going on the point of social norms and pivoting back to race, that changed in the 9 in the 19 sixties seventies. Right? Where now black people who were senior were given their courtesy titles. They were referred to as miss and mister or missus, things like that. Yeah. And it brings with it certain dignity. And there were a group of people who held on to that norm, like, no. You refer to that white child who is 50 years younger than you as niece and mister. Yeah. And they were holding on to that. To watch the rest of that episode, go ahead and click the video below me. To see a different compelling healing race episode, you can click the video below me. We look forward to seeing you in the next video.