Latest / Mechonomist Podcast / Focus On What You Can Control

Transcript

Focus On What You Can Control · Mechonomist Podcast

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_00: I know some of y'all are having a bad day because of Trump's win last night.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that,
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: you know,
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: one of the things that really helps me,
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: because I'm pretty angry all the time,
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: is to focus on things that I can control.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: You know, one of the things that makes me angry is that basically our country is run by cops and capital.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: But I can't control that.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I just don't think about it.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: So your neighbor voted for Trump and is a racist.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: You can't control that.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: A bunch of people are misogynist and voted for Trump.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_00: You can't control that.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: So really you need to focus on the things you can control.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: And one of the things you can control is how you're gonna engage going forward.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: If you're mad because society is white supremacist,
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: start an organization that addresses white supremacy and quit bitching online about
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: how much you hate it.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Do something about it.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: If you're worried about Trump deporting immigrants, start an organization that defends immigrants.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: Put your money where your mouth is.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Put your body on the line.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: Put your reputation on the line.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: Put your career on the line.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: You can't just sit around and bitch on social media about how terrible things are
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: and not do anything about it.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: And that's really where I'm at.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know, Kamala, she's an imperialist, a liberal imperialist.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: Trump's an authoritarian imperialist.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: They're not that different.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Trump's worse, of course, I agree.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: But Kamala's pretty bad.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, maybe liberalism is dead.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that's the freaking good thing that can come out of this,
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: is that we can get to a point where we can have socialism or barbarism.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: We can have those choices.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_00: And I look forward to putting those choices out to the public and making the
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: argument that socialism is actually better.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not on board with some kinds of socialism, but...
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: I'm on board with very decentralized and anti-authoritarian socialism.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: But I go out there and do things.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: I go out there and work and try to create a different society and real meat space.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: I don't just sit online and gripe about how terrible things are.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: Ultimately, it's not up to our leaders to make this a livable country.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's up to us.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Period.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: It's not up to our leaders.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And this sort of
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_00: idea that we should elect kings and they should save us has got to go.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: We got to take the responsibility on ourselves to create the society that we want to live in.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not easy.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to create an organization.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to create an institution.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to organize people.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to get people behind a project or an idea.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: or a program or something like that.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's hard to work.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: It's real hard work.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: And you may have to sacrifice some things to get what you want.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And most of us are going to have to sacrifice something to get the society that we want to live in.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: And if you don't want to do that,
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: and you just want to gripe on social media about how racist people elected Trump,
• 3:25
  SPEAKER_00: I really don't have time for it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: I really don't.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: I really don't have time for it.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Get out there and do something.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Change it.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_00: Make it different.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: And figure out what your capabilities are, what you want, what your capabilities are, what you can do.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: And start worrying about that and worry less about what your neighbor is doing.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: Leave those weird fuckers alone.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: They don't have to do it with you.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: You can do it with other people.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: And I just, I think that's, it's the blame game situation that's bothering me.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: It's the, I blame it on my racist neighbor.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: I blame it on my misogynist neighbor.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_00: I blame it on Trump.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: I blame it on Kamau.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_00: What about us?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: What are we doing?
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, one of the things that we talked about last night was character.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: And any social movement has to have politics, has to have a culture,
• 4:28
  SPEAKER_00: It has to have an economic program.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_00: But one of the things that our social movements haven't had is a different ethic
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: from larger society and one of the one of the ethics is just character just have a
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: good character doing what you say you're going to do following through on your
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: promises taking care of people in your community and we're not we're focused on all
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: these bad actors or purported bad actors you know so many there's so many purported
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: bad actors all of your neighbors are racist
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: All of your fucking neighbors are misogynists.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: You know what?
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: Most of the people who voted in this election probably didn't even pay attention to
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: it until two weeks before the election happened.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: And all they probably did is ask somebody at work who you voted for and they said
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Trump and so they decided to vote for him too.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's how it works.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: It ain't complicated.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: People ain't like us.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: They don't follow politics day in, day out.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: They sort of have a passing understanding of what politics are.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: They don't have a worked out ideology or, you know, thoughtfulness about,
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: White supremacy and capitalism is just like, my life kind of sucks.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to give the other team a shot at it.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: And everybody's life sucks right now.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And we want to blame everybody else but ourselves.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: You know what?
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: It's my fault.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_00: If my life sucks, it's my fault.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_00: If my neighbor's life sucks, it's my fault.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to do everything I can to build a society with the tools that I have,
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: the limited tools that I have.
• 5:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to do what I can with the limited tools that I had to build a society of
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: people that we can be proud of.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to blame anybody.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to blame Trump.
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to blame Kamala.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to blame my racist neighbor.
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not going to blame anybody.
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to take it on myself and I'm going to do everything in my power to build
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: something that everybody can be proud of.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: And I think everybody should do that.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Take some fucking responsibility for this country, for the people in this country, for your neighbor.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: for your family, for your community, for your work.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_00: Take some fucking responsibility and fucking build something and quit blaming
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: everybody else for not being happy.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, that's my two cents.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Tired of it.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_00: I'm tired of, you know, these people, these, there's a line, I say this line all the time.
• 6:56
  SPEAKER_00: In Pirates of the Caribbean, which is one of my favorite movies,
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: the line is basically better was when things were determined by the sweat of our
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: brow and the strength of our back and not by bargain struck with elder creatures.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't, I'm not into making bargains with the fucking powerful.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: I'm into building our own shit.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, I don't expect nothing from them.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: I expect the worst from them.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: All of them.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I expect the best from us.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: And if we're not giving our best, I'm going to call it out.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: And that's it.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_00: Peace out.