Latest / Under the Docs / Accidental Courtesy: Daryl Davis, Race & America | Under the Docs Documentary Review
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: I can't believe these guys hate the boy Scouts, like
- 0:02Speaker 1: you know what I mean, Like, but the hell the
- 0:03Speaker 1: boy Scouts do to anybody?
- 0:11Speaker 2: Under the Dogs, Yeah, under the Dogs very famo, break
- 0:17Speaker 2: your locks?
- 0:19Speaker 3: Funny you could?
- 0:20Speaker 2: They original the shots, They got the dogs, under the Dogs,
- 0:26Speaker 2: Under the Dogs, Yeah, under the Docks, Under the Dogs.
- 0:55Speaker 1: And Under the Docks is backed with black history money
- 0:58Speaker 1: with two white guyes with leeards.
- 1:01Speaker 4: And today we're going to be talking about Accidental Courtesy
- 1:04Speaker 4: to documentary from twenty sixteen. The full title is Accidental
- 1:08Speaker 4: Courtesy Darryl Davis, Race and America. And this is by
- 1:11Speaker 4: Matthew Ornstein, and it comes in at hour and forty
- 1:15Speaker 4: minutes or so. Not too bad, not too shabby compared
- 1:18Speaker 4: to some of the ones that we've watched so far.
- 1:20Speaker 1: I could have watched this twice if it was the
- 1:23Speaker 1: he Brucey Negroes, So that's fine with me.
- 1:26Speaker 4: And I guess I'll wear my heart on my sleeve
- 1:28Speaker 4: a little bit like you should watch this twice and
- 1:30Speaker 4: you'll get way more out of it than some of
- 1:32Speaker 4: the other documentaries that we've seen recently. This particular one
- 1:37Speaker 4: is about a guy named Darryl Davis, who. I think
- 1:40Speaker 4: that I came across him on like a Jerry Springer
- 1:43Speaker 4: show or something, and I swear this is one of
- 1:46Speaker 4: those stories that you hear it and you're just thinking, like, oh,
- 1:50Speaker 4: someone's scripted all this. There's no way any of this
- 1:52Speaker 4: stuff is real. It's the inverse of a Clayton Bigsby,
- 1:57Speaker 4: you know, Chappelle skit where this large black guy and
- 2:02Speaker 4: I don't I don't think infiltrate maybe the wrong word,
- 2:04Speaker 4: but a black guy infiltrates the KKK and ends up
- 2:07Speaker 4: converting the Grand Wizard members into being civil rights activists.
- 2:13Speaker 4: Now that might be a little oversimplified of what's actually
- 2:15Speaker 4: going on, but that's kind of what this guy does.
- 2:18Speaker 4: And he's got if we call these, you know, like
- 2:20Speaker 4: racist scalps, He's got like thirty racist scalps in his closet. Literally,
- 2:25Speaker 4: he's got robes that he collects of all the different
- 2:28Speaker 4: KKK members that he sort of converts. This is a
- 2:31Speaker 4: wild one man, and I didn't think that this was true.
- 2:34Speaker 4: I thought this was just something made up for Jerry
- 2:36Speaker 4: Springer when I first saw it. So this is the
- 2:39Speaker 4: first time watching this documentary, I was like, oh my god,
- 2:42Speaker 4: this wasn't just made up for reality.
- 2:44Speaker 1: TV, No, and it's something totally different, and to me
- 2:48Speaker 1: it's something refreshing. Like I don't agree with everything Daryl
- 2:53Speaker 1: Davis says in the film, or like.
- 2:55Speaker 3: There's a lot I do agree with, but I think
- 2:57Speaker 3: that's the point, right.
- 2:58Speaker 1: It shows you this newive of like trying to change
- 3:02Speaker 1: mindsets and adapting people into thinking like, hey, maybe you're wrong,
- 3:08Speaker 1: maybe you've been in an echo chamber too long.
- 3:11Speaker 4: Also, I got to point out that this documentary is
- 3:15Speaker 4: one of the first in a while that wasn't lots
- 3:17Speaker 4: of archival footage. This is basically Darryl Davis in a car,
- 3:23Speaker 4: Darryl Davis on the street, Daryl Davis in an office,
- 3:26Speaker 4: Like we're following him around and recording his interaction with
- 3:30Speaker 4: other people and then getting their takes on him. So
- 3:33Speaker 4: it's a it's a very like realistic documentary, and it
- 3:36Speaker 4: was just shot in a way that you immediately relate
- 3:39Speaker 4: to every single person that's talking in it. And I
- 3:42Speaker 4: also really like how Darryl kind of wears his heart
- 3:46Speaker 4: on his sleeve too, like you know what he's thinking
- 3:48Speaker 4: and how he's thinking it. He's very frank, he doesn't
- 3:51Speaker 4: play games, and he's he's just like a really relatable
- 3:54Speaker 4: person in general. Like I'm watching this, I'm like, I'm
- 3:57Speaker 4: glad that this, like a person like this exists out
- 3:59Speaker 4: there all right. Plotting the course for this one again,
- 4:11Speaker 4: this one doesn't really necessarily make specific claims. We're just
- 4:15Speaker 4: following Darryl Davis around and getting his story. So his
- 4:19Speaker 4: story starts out with him loaning his van to some
- 4:23Speaker 4: KKK members early on in his life, before Darryl Davis
- 4:27Speaker 4: had a mission or a name or anything, and two
- 4:30Speaker 4: of the KKK members were upset that, like the leaders
- 4:34Speaker 4: of their group would even deal with the black Man.
- 4:36Speaker 4: So they end up leaving. And I guess that's sort
- 4:39Speaker 4: of this seed that gets planted in his mind. And
- 4:42Speaker 4: first of all, where are you at in this life
- 4:45Speaker 4: where a bunch of KKK guys like we need a
- 4:48Speaker 4: van and go to something and you're just like you guys,
- 4:50Speaker 4: can you know borrow mine? You can have mine? I
- 4:53Speaker 4: don't know, like it was. Was he just trying to
- 4:56Speaker 4: be a catalyst early on? Was he experimenting the see
- 5:00Speaker 4: if I could you know, what if I touch the
- 5:02Speaker 4: stove real quick? What if something happens?
- 5:04Speaker 3: Right?
- 5:05Speaker 1: Well, he starts asking him like later on in the film,
- 5:07Speaker 1: like he asked like you know that he had this question,
- 5:11Speaker 1: and he goes in through his life of like I
- 5:14Speaker 1: had this question why.
- 5:14Speaker 3: People would not like being when they don't know me.
- 5:17Speaker 1: That's like the big the premise of like all of
- 5:19Speaker 1: this and where like ties everything in together.
- 5:22Speaker 3: He's like, well, why how could they not like me?
- 5:24Speaker 3: And they don't even know me yet? And and then he.
- 5:26Speaker 1: Goes into his like life story as like where you
- 5:29Speaker 1: know he kind of his dad was a secret service agent.
- 5:33Speaker 1: They flew around everywhere. They kind of lived abroad, you
- 5:36Speaker 1: know what I mean. So he was used to being multicultural,
- 5:39Speaker 1: like he had all kinds. He even says like I
- 5:41Speaker 1: had Japanese, Chinese, Nigerian.
- 5:45Speaker 3: And French.
- 5:45Speaker 1: Like you know, he just starts naming off all these
- 5:47Speaker 1: different races and cultures that he's been around. So he
- 5:52Speaker 1: was a lot more adapted to different cultures than probably
- 5:56Speaker 1: most Americans at that time. And he taught about this
- 6:00Speaker 1: story about him being a boy scout and you know,
- 6:03Speaker 1: he was the only black kid in the troop, or
- 6:06Speaker 1: I think in all of them, because I think it
- 6:08Speaker 1: was like a big parade that they had a bunch
- 6:09Speaker 1: of different troops out there, and he got to hold
- 6:11Speaker 1: the flag and he was super like, you know, he
- 6:14Speaker 1: didn't notice that he was the only black person. He
- 6:16Speaker 1: says in retrospect, now I know, but you know, I
- 6:18Speaker 1: was just so integrated. I thought the Boy Scouts and
- 6:20Speaker 1: he said, people started throwing stuff at him, and he
- 6:22Speaker 1: got you know, the den mothers.
- 6:24Speaker 3: They got him and they covered him.
- 6:25Speaker 1: He's like, well, where he said, my instinct because I
- 6:27Speaker 1: was so like, you know, ignorant at the time that
- 6:29Speaker 1: I was like, I can't believe these guys hate the
- 6:30Speaker 1: Boy Scouts, like you know what I mean, Like, but
- 6:33Speaker 1: the hell the Boy Scouts do to anybody? And then
- 6:36Speaker 1: he goes home and his parents ask him, like, you know,
- 6:38Speaker 1: how'd you fall in? And he explains the story and
- 6:41Speaker 1: this is his first dose of what race and racism
- 6:45Speaker 1: in America look like. They kind of explained to him,
- 6:48Speaker 1: and that's where he kind of gets his philosophy from.
- 6:51Speaker 3: Like they tell you a little bit.
- 6:52Speaker 1: I liked how they told the story because it was
- 6:54Speaker 1: like a real movie where they tell you some stuff
- 6:57Speaker 1: and then they give you the like beginning, like more
- 6:59Speaker 1: twenty thirty minutes into it.
- 7:01Speaker 4: Yeah, it's very like like Tarantino esque, where you're getting
- 7:04Speaker 4: this nonlinear holographic view of Darryl Davis growing up, and yeah,
- 7:09Speaker 4: that's the best place to start. Where's how he was
- 7:12Speaker 4: describing that since he grew up the first you know,
- 7:15Speaker 4: formative years of his life until he was like six
- 7:17Speaker 4: or seven, he's outside the US and he's living up
- 7:22Speaker 4: in all these different cultures where you know it's it's
- 7:25Speaker 4: him in like eight or nine other races. He describes
- 7:28Speaker 4: all of his early classes like little miniature uns. Right,
- 7:32Speaker 4: So there was never a point in which he didn't
- 7:35Speaker 4: realize there's twenty different types of people out there. And
- 7:37Speaker 4: then they moved back to the US and now he's
- 7:40Speaker 4: like the one black kid in the entire class, sometimes
- 7:43Speaker 4: the entire school, and he didn't understand why people And
- 7:47Speaker 4: the other thing that stood out to me in that
- 7:50Speaker 4: story where he goes home and he's and he doesn't understand,
- 7:53Speaker 4: he's why do they hate the boy scouts bomb? And
- 7:55Speaker 4: they're like, oh my god, we have to have this
- 7:56Speaker 4: talk since now we're in America and he's actually brush
- 7:59Speaker 4: up again and he said he said, he was like,
- 8:02Speaker 4: I don't believe you guys like you guys are messing
- 8:04Speaker 4: with me? What's the real reason? Like it could he
- 8:07Speaker 4: couldn't even register this because it was the exact opposite
- 8:11Speaker 4: of his entire lived experience for one hundred percent of
- 8:14Speaker 4: his life. And then he gets this first brush up
- 8:17Speaker 4: with good old American racism and one of our greatest exports,
- 8:20Speaker 4: by the way, and that he like that good old
- 8:24Speaker 4: American racism was so much different that it shattered his worldview,
- 8:29Speaker 4: like he like it was hard for him to integrate
- 8:31Speaker 4: this new information in a way, and that becomes the
- 8:34Speaker 4: fascination for him, and that becomes the reason why he
- 8:38Speaker 4: would loan his van to a bunch of KKK members
- 8:40Speaker 4: is because he wants to more understand why do they
- 8:45Speaker 4: hate him so much? So when those two guys leave
- 8:48Speaker 4: the KKK because their leaders were borrowing a van from
- 8:51Speaker 4: a black guy, that just feeds into exactly why he
- 8:55Speaker 4: would have done that, Like he wants to understand, like, Okay,
- 8:58Speaker 4: well why did those guys leave? Why did why? And
- 9:00Speaker 4: he makes a really good point later I'll get into
- 9:02Speaker 4: the hidden treasures. He makes his point of that he's
- 9:06Speaker 4: like on better terms with the Grand Wizard than the
- 9:08Speaker 4: Grand Wizard is on terms with some of the other
- 9:11Speaker 4: people that are in his own group just because of
- 9:14Speaker 4: these bigger fundamental disagreements that they have. The other things
- 9:19Speaker 4: that we get into is he likens losing racism as
- 9:25Speaker 4: like losing weight, and it's like he's because he's a
- 9:29Speaker 4: large guy. So he's like, if you were to look
- 9:31Speaker 4: at me, and it's like I could get into the
- 9:33Speaker 4: fighting shape if I wanted to, you know what I mean,
- 9:35Speaker 4: But it didn't happen overnight. And you know, going from
- 9:39Speaker 4: being a huge guy into being like a tiny guy,
- 9:42Speaker 4: that's also going to be something that takes a couple
- 9:44Speaker 4: of years of just NonStop work and dedication and discipline.
- 9:49Speaker 4: And he equates that to losing and we say racism here.
- 9:53Speaker 4: I guess this is gonna apply to any sort of
- 9:55Speaker 4: bias that you've been bred into, but that you can
- 9:58Speaker 4: lose racism the same way that you could like lose
- 10:01Speaker 4: one hundred pounds.
- 10:03Speaker 1: Which I do agree with. I mean, like one hundred
- 10:05Speaker 1: pounds you can if you hard work and dedication. And
- 10:09Speaker 1: then he kind of gets into a little bit more
- 10:11Speaker 1: that were like this weight too, Like it's not just like.
- 10:14Speaker 3: It has to be multiple people.
- 10:16Speaker 1: It can't just see this racism prejudice way is a
- 10:19Speaker 1: little different than just like one person solving all the issues.
- 10:23Speaker 3: Another part I really liked about.
- 10:24Speaker 1: The movie is he kind of like is he he
- 10:27Speaker 1: has a music background, that's pretty much. He's a working musician,
- 10:32Speaker 1: piano player, guitarist, like, and he goes into this like
- 10:36Speaker 1: we're talking about which is interesting, Like I'll get into
- 10:39Speaker 1: the I'll leave that for the hidden fact. But he's
- 10:42Speaker 1: at a country bar and he's doing his piano stuff
- 10:47Speaker 1: and he walks in and then like this guy's like,
- 10:49Speaker 1: oh man, I never heard a black guy play like
- 10:51Speaker 1: Jerry Lee Lewis, you know what I'm saying, Like, and
- 10:53Speaker 1: he's like, well, Jerry Lee Lewis, learn from.
- 10:55Speaker 3: A black guy.
- 10:56Speaker 1: Like That's where I like is that he's a straight shooter,
- 10:58Speaker 1: like you know how he could have been like avoidant
- 11:00Speaker 1: and then he like went in it. And then I
- 11:02Speaker 1: think like his character that you see how he talks.
- 11:05Speaker 1: He's like stern but funny, like you could take them serious,
- 11:09Speaker 1: but he's lighthearted enough where you don't take them serious
- 11:12Speaker 1: enough as a threat. So then he's talking, he gets
- 11:15Speaker 1: invited to the table, he doesn't even drink, and then
- 11:17Speaker 1: the guy's like this is the first time I ever
- 11:19Speaker 1: had a drink with a black man. And he's like,
- 11:21Speaker 1: how why is that? And he's like silence, and then
- 11:23Speaker 1: he says his buddy's.
- 11:24Speaker 3: Just elbow and don't come on, man, tell him, tell
- 11:27Speaker 3: him where you from. And then he's like, I'm in
- 11:29Speaker 3: the KKK.
- 11:30Speaker 1: And it turns out he's like a leader of the KKK,
- 11:32Speaker 1: and he's just like and he's laughing it off because
- 11:35Speaker 1: he's like, oh way, man, Like it's so surreal that
- 11:39Speaker 1: moment for me, because I'm just like, that is just
- 11:42Speaker 1: how life is, right, like some randomness that's like the
- 11:44Speaker 1: randomness of life. You're like, okay, bro, you're a grand
- 11:48Speaker 1: Wizard for the KKK. Yeah, sure thing, man, how many
- 11:52Speaker 1: drinks have you had? And then it turns out to
- 11:54Speaker 1: be super true.
- 11:56Speaker 4: And not just that, but he ends up becoming like
- 11:59Speaker 4: good life lifelong friends with multiple grand Wizards and Imperial
- 12:04Speaker 4: Dragons and all the different names, and even to the
- 12:07Speaker 4: point where again he is more in common with some
- 12:10Speaker 4: of these KKK leaders than like his like, you know,
- 12:13Speaker 4: his own sort of people from his neighborhood. And one
- 12:18Speaker 4: of these things that they're talking about is that even
- 12:22Speaker 4: the ones that he doesn't convert into giving up the KKK.
- 12:27Speaker 4: They end up looking to Darryl as the authority because
- 12:31Speaker 4: Darryl knows so much about the KKK. There was one
- 12:34Speaker 4: guy that we're talking about. It gets promoted from to
- 12:38Speaker 4: like like I would just say like Imperial Grand Dragon
- 12:41Speaker 4: or something, and the guy is too embarrassed to tell
- 12:45Speaker 4: the rest of his KKK groups like I don't know
- 12:47Speaker 4: what that means, Like I don't know what I'm supposed
- 12:50Speaker 4: to do now that you've given me this fancy title.
- 12:52Speaker 4: And it turns out like they like he was expected
- 12:54Speaker 4: I don't like, run the books or something. He was
- 12:56Speaker 4: supposed to do something and Daryl told him that because
- 12:59Speaker 4: Daryl knew. So now you've got people in the KKK
- 13:02Speaker 4: calling up this big black guy that converts KKK members like, hey, man,
- 13:07Speaker 4: can you can you give me a job description of
- 13:08Speaker 4: what I'm supposed to be doing right now? Here's my rank,
- 13:11Speaker 4: here's my file. And he's like, oh, yeah, well you're
- 13:13Speaker 4: in Kentucky. Okay, Well that means you have to do
- 13:14Speaker 4: X y Z like he's he actually is one of
- 13:18Speaker 4: the world's you know, leading most experts on the infrastructure
- 13:23Speaker 4: of the KKK, even though he's the antithesis of it,
- 13:27Speaker 4: right that he's he's sort of dissolving it with I
- 13:32Speaker 4: guess like the whole premise of you catch more with
- 13:34Speaker 4: honey than you do with vinegar. Like he's an embodiment
- 13:37Speaker 4: of that, and he puts it to the test at
- 13:40Speaker 4: the highest levels you can imagine, right, black guy goes
- 13:42Speaker 4: into the KKK and walks out converting. And the one
- 13:46Speaker 4: there was one example where he's on the Heraldo Show,
- 13:50Speaker 4: which I think might have been the one that I
- 13:51Speaker 4: that I originally saw him on, and they do a
- 13:55Speaker 4: check back in with the family and like the wife
- 13:58Speaker 4: left the wizard and the daughter left and married a
- 14:01Speaker 4: black eye, like everything that was the opposite of what
- 14:05Speaker 4: they originally were proclaiming on this show. And they all
- 14:08Speaker 4: credit everyone credits Darryl Davis as the catalyst that like
- 14:12Speaker 4: change the trajectory in their lives.
- 14:14Speaker 1: And I think also important thing to lay out in
- 14:17Speaker 1: this film, especially being Black History Month, I think Darryl
- 14:20Speaker 1: gets a bad rap from his own community, from the
- 14:22Speaker 1: black community as far as where they're thinking, like this guy,
- 14:27Speaker 1: how could he He's betrayed us, you know what I mean,
- 14:30Speaker 1: Like he's converting, he's going to enemy lines, and he
- 14:33Speaker 1: does do a decent job. Like I don't agree with
- 14:36Speaker 1: everything that he says because some of the things I
- 14:37Speaker 1: think are propaganda.
- 14:38Speaker 3: But that's a whole other topic.
- 14:40Speaker 1: But he goes through the plight of African Americans or Ados.
- 14:44Speaker 1: A lot of people call ados the American descendants of slaves.
- 14:49Speaker 1: Like he goes through like, hey, man, nobody wanted slavery
- 14:53Speaker 1: was terrible, Jim Crow laws like these are realistic things,
- 14:56Speaker 1: and he takes these and he tells them to these
- 14:59Speaker 1: people that are running these organizations, like the heads of
- 15:02Speaker 1: Klan clan members. I forgot the guy the Nazi party
- 15:05Speaker 1: guy from Detroit. He has a good core with him,
- 15:10Speaker 1: and he's like even presses him like where he goes
- 15:13Speaker 1: what kind of music do you like? And he's like, well,
- 15:14Speaker 1: I like grunge, you know, metal, like all these rock genres.
- 15:18Speaker 1: And he's like, well, that was invented by a black man.
- 15:19Speaker 1: He's like, come on, man, like.
- 15:21Speaker 3: You know what I mean. He's like you thought. He's like, yeah,
- 15:23Speaker 3: everybody says that stuff.
- 15:24Speaker 1: And he's like seriously, like you know, Chuck Berry, He's
- 15:26Speaker 1: like Elvis invented and he's like, well, even Elvis the
- 15:29Speaker 1: way so I like how he he's putting it.
- 15:32Speaker 3: It's not like he's bowing down. That's why I just
- 15:34Speaker 3: want to be known.
- 15:35Speaker 1: That's not like he's going into there and like, yeah,
- 15:38Speaker 1: whatever you want. But he's pushing his philosophy and sticking
- 15:42Speaker 1: to his guns. He's just being understanding enough to be like,
- 15:45Speaker 1: I'll hear you out, but then you're going to hear
- 15:47Speaker 1: me out.
- 15:48Speaker 4: He has such a such a clever way of going
- 15:51Speaker 4: about it too, where music is usually his foot in
- 15:54Speaker 4: the door, but in this case, music is just a
- 15:57Speaker 4: stand in for culture, where he's basically going to these
- 16:00Speaker 4: KKK guys or any racist guy and he's like, tell
- 16:03Speaker 4: me your favorite part about American culture and they list
- 16:06Speaker 4: off some stuff and he's like, that's black culture and
- 16:08Speaker 4: they're like, what you know? And the and he I
- 16:11Speaker 4: mean the way that he presents that it typically goes
- 16:14Speaker 4: through music. But you can extrapolate that to see that
- 16:18Speaker 4: you can't really differentiate, Like the things that you enjoy
- 16:21Speaker 4: about culture in America also are a shared culture with
- 16:25Speaker 4: black culture, and that you can't separate the two because
- 16:28Speaker 4: we don't really live in a vacuum. Even if you
- 16:31Speaker 4: think you are so isolated that you're a grand Wizard
- 16:34Speaker 4: or the name of that one guy I was talking
- 16:35Speaker 4: about is a great Titan that then went to an
- 16:40Speaker 4: Exalted Cyclops or maybe vice versa. They have fun they're
- 16:43Speaker 4: fun names, right, they're fun names. But like even then
- 16:47Speaker 4: Exalted Cyclops in the middle of Kentucky and the KKK, like,
- 16:52Speaker 4: you are still influenced by black culture. If you if
- 16:55Speaker 4: you like Elvis, then you also like Chuck Berry, whether
- 16:58Speaker 4: you like it or not. All right, let's just do treasure,
- 17:09Speaker 4: hidden treasure in overboard moments. So I'll let you. I
- 17:12Speaker 4: want to know what you didn't like about the movie,
- 17:15Speaker 4: if there's anything at all. Were there any overboard moments?
- 17:18Speaker 1: I could say some of the overboard moments? And this
- 17:20Speaker 1: is just me because of like my propaganda. I think,
- 17:22Speaker 1: like some of the like lights of like the African Americans,
- 17:27Speaker 1: like which is true, like as things that did happen,
- 17:29Speaker 1: but like my conspiratorial mind, I believe a lot of
- 17:32Speaker 1: the civil rights stuff was propaganda and like pushing to
- 17:35Speaker 1: like divide people in general, like not that that had
- 17:40Speaker 1: anything to do with Black Americans at all, but I'm
- 17:43Speaker 1: saying like they were just a pawn, just like as
- 17:45Speaker 1: these racist white pawns Americans were and just a little bit.
- 17:49Speaker 3: That's just me being nitpicky though, right, Like I'm not.
- 17:52Speaker 4: Like typical.
- 17:55Speaker 1: Typical white guy. Oh does that guy have blue eyes?
- 17:58Speaker 1: We know what he's talking about. But if I go
- 18:01Speaker 1: to the Hidden Treasures, I do have a lot on
- 18:03Speaker 1: the Hidden Treasures.
- 18:04Speaker 3: I thought one of the really good moments.
- 18:06Speaker 1: I think it's the same where you're talking about the
- 18:09Speaker 1: I don't know all the things the Cyclops Titan guy,
- 18:11Speaker 1: I don't know the exact titles, but he goes like,
- 18:15Speaker 1: how did you get in it? I grew up in
- 18:16Speaker 1: a black neighborhood and I was getting beat up all
- 18:19Speaker 1: the time, and like I was, I needed reinforcements.
- 18:23Speaker 3: I needed to align with a group.
- 18:25Speaker 1: And I think the one thing that people don't talk
- 18:28Speaker 1: about when you're talking about KKK because they make it
- 18:31Speaker 1: seem like the KKK runs, you know, the United States,
- 18:34Speaker 1: because there has been powerful people in the KKK, but
- 18:37Speaker 1: over time it's changed, and like even like a lot
- 18:39Speaker 1: of these white supremacist and white national groups have changed.
- 18:42Speaker 1: It's the same as the Bloods and the crips and
- 18:44Speaker 1: the Mexican gangs and the Cuban gangs and the Italian Mafia.
- 18:48Speaker 3: It's like the same story, Like.
- 18:50Speaker 4: It's like the Peckerwoods. That's basically just the KKK outside
- 18:54Speaker 4: of the jail system.
- 18:55Speaker 1: It's the same thing, and it's like, what does every gang? Well,
- 19:01Speaker 1: we banded together because there was more of this other
- 19:04Speaker 1: gang or this other race and we were getting beat up.
- 19:07Speaker 1: So it's like the ironicness of like how it's all
- 19:11Speaker 1: put together and the other really hitting gym.
- 19:13Speaker 3: I thought was cool.
- 19:15Speaker 1: He was talking about that John Travolta Cowboy movie that
- 19:18Speaker 1: comes out and how it influenced everybody to change their
- 19:23Speaker 1: clubs and bars into like cowboys stuff and that's how
- 19:26Speaker 1: we like met the KKK guy.
- 19:27Speaker 3: But I just thought it was interesting.
- 19:29Speaker 1: I know it's like a side and it doesn't really
- 19:31Speaker 1: have to do with the movie, but I'm like just
- 19:33Speaker 1: the influence that movies have that people always talk about,
- 19:36Speaker 1: like have, how movies change people's perspective in mind, and
- 19:40Speaker 1: in this case, it changed bars and clubs to where
- 19:43Speaker 1: everybody's like, well, bring the Country bands in because even
- 19:46Speaker 1: says like, well, you know, being a working musician, I
- 19:49Speaker 1: have to adapt with the times, and right now at
- 19:52Speaker 1: that moment, country was super hot, So I'm in a
- 19:54Speaker 1: country band, which in turn like put him into position
- 19:59Speaker 1: to meet a lot of these KKK people and kind
- 20:01Speaker 1: of like start this journey that I don't think he
- 20:03Speaker 1: planned on doing, but it just like kind of unfolded.
- 20:07Speaker 4: I like that, and just going into like every walking
- 20:10Speaker 4: up to every guy in a country bar, like you know,
- 20:12Speaker 4: this music's black right, like what I'm thinking, all pissed
- 20:15Speaker 4: off constantly. That guy's name, by the way, was Gary,
- 20:19Speaker 4: the one that and his story was that he went
- 20:23Speaker 4: from exalted cyclops to a great titan, and that a
- 20:27Speaker 4: great titan essentially means county leader. And he was the
- 20:29Speaker 4: one that was like, Darryl helped me out. I don't
- 20:31Speaker 4: know what I actually need to do, Like what are
- 20:34Speaker 4: my my job responsibilities? Now? I thought that was like
- 20:37Speaker 4: one of the biggest ones. I really loved how they
- 20:41Speaker 4: were talking about his history, so like yeah, his dad
- 20:44Speaker 4: was in a secret Service and then he goes into
- 20:47Speaker 4: the International Secret Service. It's like, all right, Darryl, guy
- 20:50Speaker 4: that's in the music industry with intelligence connections, Like I
- 20:55Speaker 4: guess it does breed for some pretty interesting personalities, I guess.
- 21:00Speaker 4: So now he's included in the CIA potentially music industry
- 21:06Speaker 4: for at least Darryl Davis's. He also has this one
- 21:09Speaker 4: part where they're talking about Ferguson and they're talking about
- 21:14Speaker 4: Michael Brown getting shot and like the whole Trayvon Martin,
- 21:17Speaker 4: you know, at the Black Lives Matter movement. He kind
- 21:20Speaker 4: of touches on it briefly, but when he touches on it,
- 21:24Speaker 4: he talks about how he feels safer surrounded by KKK
- 21:29Speaker 4: members than he does going down in the Ferguson, you know,
- 21:33Speaker 4: like protesting or just being among people that he thinks
- 21:37Speaker 4: that he's aligned with, and that he feels less safe
- 21:39Speaker 4: in that environment. And this is kind of emphasized towards
- 21:43Speaker 4: the end of the movie. He sits down with these
- 21:45Speaker 4: two black guys that are sort of advocates of the
- 21:48Speaker 4: the BLM movement, and he starts saying some very real
- 21:53Speaker 4: stuff to them, and they do not take it at
- 21:56Speaker 4: all man like. In fact, they're kind of painted in
- 21:59Speaker 4: this documentary, the only two black guys that he even
- 22:02Speaker 4: talks to end up hating him and refuse to go
- 22:05Speaker 4: on camera anymore. They get up and leave, and then
- 22:08Speaker 4: some guy that's with them that helped coordinate that interview,
- 22:11Speaker 4: he sits down and he starts brating Daryl Davis for
- 22:14Speaker 4: having some of the opinions that he has, which I
- 22:16Speaker 4: thought was a very clever inclusion in this documentary to
- 22:20Speaker 4: just show like, and here's proof of people that you
- 22:24Speaker 4: would think like, oh, of course these guys are going
- 22:26Speaker 4: to be aligned with darro Day. Here's this guy that's
- 22:28Speaker 4: going out here and converting KKK members into maybe not
- 22:32Speaker 4: being civil rights leaders, but at least like, hey, I
- 22:35Speaker 4: don't do that hood stuff anymore, man. And the argument
- 22:39Speaker 4: was like, okay, how long have you been doing this
- 22:42Speaker 4: since what the nineties? So in three decades, all you
- 22:47Speaker 4: got are what thirty robes? You've converted thirty people, and
- 22:50Speaker 4: you're spending all this time with KKK members, Like why
- 22:54Speaker 4: haven't you spent those thirty years more dedicated to some
- 22:59Speaker 4: other you know, platforms and some other initiatives. And they
- 23:02Speaker 4: get I mean, they get really, really heated over this,
- 23:04Speaker 4: and I'm still trying to understand it, Like I get
- 23:07Speaker 4: where they were coming from, but it was like, how
- 23:10Speaker 4: who are you to look at someone and be like, hey,
- 23:12Speaker 4: this thirty years of work that you've dedicated your life to,
- 23:16Speaker 4: I don't find any value in that. And now I'm
- 23:17Speaker 4: mad at.
- 23:18Speaker 1: You also too, I think that they could not come
- 23:22Speaker 1: to an understanding it. To me, it's because a lot
- 23:24Speaker 1: of people have watched documentaries like Hebrewce Negroes, and they
- 23:28Speaker 1: feel a certain way and they can't see a different approach,
- 23:31Speaker 1: Like they're not even attempting to understand his approach and
- 23:35Speaker 1: where he's coming from. And then your argument could be back,
- 23:37Speaker 1: which I wish I know Darrel Davison didn't want to
- 23:39Speaker 1: say like this. My argument back would have been, Hey,
- 23:42Speaker 1: you guys been doing this for what sixty seventy years,
- 23:44Speaker 1: and you keep saying that white supremacy and all this
- 23:49Speaker 1: is more prevalent today than ever, So what have you done?
- 23:52Speaker 4: Then I got a whole bunch of notes of this conversation,
- 23:56Speaker 4: so just here's some of the highlights. I think this
- 23:59Speaker 4: is maybe and I guess this goes to show how
- 24:02Speaker 4: good this documentary is. But even if I were to
- 24:05Speaker 4: spoil this whole segment, like, you still have to watch
- 24:07Speaker 4: the rest of the documentary and even get why any
- 24:09Speaker 4: of this stuff matters and that the whole thing is
- 24:11Speaker 4: worth watching. But so he taught. He sits down with
- 24:15Speaker 4: these two activists and they have a debate essentially for
- 24:19Speaker 4: about fifteen minutes. And the reason that these two activists
- 24:23Speaker 4: even get popular, which funny enough, is a Heraldo Rivera.
- 24:27Speaker 4: So the same show that makes Darryl Davis, you know,
- 24:31Speaker 4: known to the rest of the world, he also makes
- 24:34Speaker 4: these two activists at the Ferguson riots, and basically they
- 24:38Speaker 4: get popularized because Heraldo Rivera is asking them something and
- 24:42Speaker 4: they basically dress Heraldo down for trying to sensationalize all
- 24:47Speaker 4: this stuff, and they kind of become like, oh man,
- 24:49Speaker 4: that guy was badass for talking back to Heraldo on
- 24:51Speaker 4: live TV and all this, so they become these, I
- 24:55Speaker 4: guess unexpected leaders in this BLM movement sit down with
- 25:00Speaker 4: Daryl Davis and immediately this is where he was like
- 25:03Speaker 4: how many robes you got? When they hear like what
- 25:05Speaker 4: you collect? KK gairoes, Like how many you've got, He's like, oh,
- 25:08Speaker 4: twenty six since nineteen ninety and these are the quotes
- 25:12Speaker 4: that's longer than I've been alive.
- 25:13Speaker 1: Is that?
- 25:13Speaker 4: It like like immediately it was like, oh, I'm not
- 25:16Speaker 4: very impressed with that. And then one of them his
- 25:19Speaker 4: friend's like that sound like a fetish Like now they're
- 25:22Speaker 4: starting to not only like make fun of him, but
- 25:25Speaker 4: they're they're actually demeaning him, and it blew my mind.
- 25:28Speaker 4: I was like, damn, these guys came in hot. I
- 25:30Speaker 4: don't I didn't understand why they were so angry. One
- 25:33Speaker 4: of them, the activist guys, and he's like talking about
- 25:37Speaker 4: how he's a college dropout. So like when he they
- 25:41Speaker 4: introduced him, like, so, who are you and he's like,
- 25:43Speaker 4: my name is so and so, and I'm a college dropout.
- 25:45Speaker 4: He kind of says it tongue in cheek, right, like
- 25:47Speaker 4: he's a little proud of it. Then when Darryl Davis
- 25:49Speaker 4: brings it up a little bit later in that conversation,
- 25:52Speaker 4: the guy gets pretty angry and he like stands up
- 25:55Speaker 4: and he leaves because he was like, well didn't you're
- 25:58Speaker 4: the one that said that you dropped out of college.
- 26:00Speaker 4: And he's like, man, Bill Gates dropped out of college,
- 26:02Speaker 4: Steve Jobs dropped out of college, Like I always why
- 26:05Speaker 4: are those always the examples. It's like they dropped out
- 26:07Speaker 4: of college because they had already found like something that
- 26:11Speaker 4: was going to make them more money than a college
- 26:13Speaker 4: degree was going to make them. It wasn't just that
- 26:15Speaker 4: they dropped out because they're too smart for this anyways,
- 26:18Speaker 4: he and Daryl Davis is like, you're nothing but ignorant.
- 26:21Speaker 4: He just drops that one on them, and it's funny because,
- 26:25Speaker 4: like you were saying, he still says it in this
- 26:27Speaker 4: very approachable way. He's not militant about it. He makes
- 26:31Speaker 4: everything that he says makes it sound like it's an
- 26:34Speaker 4: open invitation to like sit down and talk to him.
- 26:36Speaker 4: And these guys have completely had it. And as they're leaving,
- 26:40Speaker 4: they say, don't come to Baltimore, and then his friend's like, man,
- 26:44Speaker 4: this man hate himself. Right. They're like they're just NonStop
- 26:47Speaker 4: chastising them, And then the producer comes to the guy
- 26:51Speaker 4: that like had the two activists sit down and he
- 26:54Speaker 4: literally tells them, if you follow this dude, then you
- 26:57Speaker 4: got a problem. So there they're talking to like the
- 27:00Speaker 4: cameraman like, hey, if you keep making this documentary about
- 27:04Speaker 4: this guy, now me and you have problems, cameraman. So
- 27:07Speaker 4: it was sort of like a very surreal moment in
- 27:10Speaker 4: this whole documentary of like physical violence was on the
- 27:15Speaker 4: table just because of Darryl Davis's views. This guy that
- 27:18Speaker 4: converts KKK members into not being KKKA, and he.
- 27:22Speaker 1: Even goes as far as to say like, hey, it's
- 27:25Speaker 1: he's used to it because he says, just as KKK
- 27:30Speaker 1: members hate like the guys that have converted out, like
- 27:33Speaker 1: have changed their ways, they hate them more than they
- 27:37Speaker 1: hate the Jews or black people or whatever else. Is
- 27:40Speaker 1: that their enemy because they're traders and that's how they're
- 27:43Speaker 1: treating him. And that's how you get you know, like
- 27:46Speaker 1: this Uncle Ruckus characters in Boondogs, right, I think that's
- 27:50Speaker 1: what they're associating Darryl Davis with and because they're like, oh,
- 27:53Speaker 1: you're breaking bread with the enemy, but they they're not
- 27:56Speaker 1: even taking the time to actually see what he's doing.
- 28:00Speaker 3: He's using a different approach.
- 28:02Speaker 1: But because they don't like that approach, they're like, no,
- 28:05Speaker 1: you're a trader to us, and now you're worse than them.
- 28:09Speaker 4: Dam is Uncle Ruckus based on Darryl Davis.
- 28:13Speaker 3: I started to think that watching like.
- 28:15Speaker 4: Visually and the voice and all that, man, that's if not,
- 28:20Speaker 4: it's an unfortunate coincidence, right, And then I guess I
- 28:24Speaker 4: was left with one like parting thought, and this was
- 28:28Speaker 4: at the end of that huge debate he gets into
- 28:30Speaker 4: with these two guys, and essentially it boils down to
- 28:34Speaker 4: that they didn't believe that people can change. That if
- 28:38Speaker 4: you are, you know, a scumbag at one point in
- 28:41Speaker 4: your life, then you always will be and the only
- 28:43Speaker 4: difference is how well you can lie and cover it up,
- 28:45Speaker 4: and that if you take that approach, which is the
- 28:48Speaker 4: opposite of what Darryl Davis believes, right, Daryl Davis wouldn't
- 28:51Speaker 4: do what he does if he didn't think that he
- 28:53Speaker 4: could actually convert a grand Wizard into being just like
- 28:56Speaker 4: a normal person again. So that was what they were
- 28:58Speaker 4: angry about, is like, you've wasted all this time trying
- 29:02Speaker 4: to change people that can't actually change, and he's trying
- 29:04Speaker 4: to be like, no, no, no, they really can change
- 29:06Speaker 4: if you give it a chance. And they were just
- 29:08Speaker 4: at an impasse like that neither one of them was
- 29:11Speaker 4: going to change their minds towards the other direction. But
- 29:14Speaker 4: it felt like that's what they were getting so heated over.
- 29:18Speaker 1: And he made a good point too, when they were
- 29:19Speaker 1: like saying, oh, wo's you know, you haven't done anything
- 29:22Speaker 1: only twenty six since the nineties, and he's like, yeah,
- 29:24Speaker 1: I took out a grand Wizard. Now there's not even that,
- 29:27Speaker 1: Like in Baltimore, there's not that KKK presence anymore. I
- 29:31Speaker 1: did that right by taking the head of the snake
- 29:33Speaker 1: kind of deal. But also I think it's ironic that
- 29:35Speaker 1: they don't realize where they're saying people can't change, and
- 29:38Speaker 1: that is the same message that the racist people are
- 29:41Speaker 1: saying about, like, hey, these these black criminals, are these
- 29:45Speaker 1: black whatever like you know, put ever in a box,
- 29:47Speaker 1: whatever box they put him in. They said they can't change,
- 29:50Speaker 1: and you have the same message and they can't even
- 29:52Speaker 1: see that.
- 29:53Speaker 4: It's funny that one example too though, he got fact
- 29:57Speaker 4: checked live because he was like, there's no, there's not
- 30:00Speaker 4: a KKK in Maryland anymore, and within thirty seconds, the
- 30:04Speaker 4: guy from off screens like, I just looked it up
- 30:07Speaker 4: on Google. And then I was like, hold on, so
- 30:09Speaker 4: I pause, and I looked it up on Google. Sure enough,
- 30:12Speaker 4: there's definitely a presence of the KKK in Maryland. So
- 30:15Speaker 4: maybe Darryl was explaining a vacuum that existed for all
- 30:20Speaker 4: of thirty seconds. But I don't think that Darryl Davis
- 30:24Speaker 4: took out the entire KKK of Maryland. I think that
- 30:26Speaker 4: that's not crazy. So again, he's not infallible. He says
- 30:31Speaker 4: some things that maybe requires him like I believe that
- 30:35Speaker 4: he took out one of the you know, the biggest
- 30:37Speaker 4: chess pieces, but he didn't stop people from playing chess
- 30:41Speaker 4: in Maryland. All right, sink or swim, Where are you
- 30:52Speaker 4: out on? This one?
- 30:53Speaker 3: Is a swim?
- 30:54Speaker 4: For me?
- 30:54Speaker 1: I recommend this film. It's in my top ten of documentaries.
- 30:58Speaker 1: I think it's well produced as a good message and
- 31:00Speaker 1: it's something different.
- 31:02Speaker 3: It's not the same old, same O.
- 31:03Speaker 1: It's a different whether you respect the approach or not,
- 31:06Speaker 1: it's a different way of trying to convey the message.
- 31:10Speaker 3: So for me, it's to swim all the way.
- 31:12Speaker 4: One hundred percent. This is talks about music history. It's
- 31:15Speaker 4: got like a personal connection all the things that I'm
- 31:19Speaker 4: realizing as we do this series that I don't like.
- 31:21Speaker 4: It doesn't have that. It's not big on archival footage,
- 31:25Speaker 4: and I absolutely learned new stuff I didn't even know
- 31:28Speaker 4: about exalted Cyclops and all these different names. And like
- 31:32Speaker 4: one of the examples too, is that they're showing the
- 31:35Speaker 4: actual cross on one of the KKK robes and it
- 31:39Speaker 4: has these little like black corners in each of the
- 31:42Speaker 4: divots inside of the cross, and he's like, well, if
- 31:45Speaker 4: you look at it, those are actually all k's and
- 31:47Speaker 4: really it's Nights of the klu Klux Klan. There's four
- 31:50Speaker 4: it's not KKK, it's KKAKK. And there's just like a
- 31:54Speaker 4: whole bunch of cool stuff that Darryl Davis just happens
- 31:57Speaker 4: to be an authority on all of this stuff. So
- 32:00Speaker 4: I just thought that was really interesting. And they even
- 32:03Speaker 4: have a quick little clip of Andrew Pendergraf from whitepride
- 32:09Speaker 4: dot com, which you've probably seen in memes here and there.
- 32:12Speaker 4: But it's like this little white kid that does movie
- 32:14Speaker 4: reviews and stuff, but he's you know, family, like a
- 32:17Speaker 4: KKK family. So they do a movie review of Princess
- 32:21Speaker 4: and the Frog and he's like, yeah, it's a nice movie.
- 32:23Speaker 4: It's about a black princess, but the prince is white.
- 32:26Speaker 4: So it's really about race mixing and if we race mixes,
- 32:29Speaker 4: there won't be any more white people. Okay, see you
- 32:31Speaker 4: next week. Like that's the whole So the documentary, it
- 32:37Speaker 4: doesn't take itself too seriously. It's also really good, Like
- 32:41Speaker 4: I'm sure that Darryl Davis has been in heated arguments
- 32:44Speaker 4: with way more than just these two guys that were
- 32:47Speaker 4: activists at Ferguson but the way that they included it
- 32:50Speaker 4: at the very end of the documentary as like, and
- 32:54Speaker 4: here's the proof of what we've been saying this entire time,
- 32:56Speaker 4: that Darryl is truly is good friends with KKK. Even
- 33:00Speaker 4: the ones that haven't left it yet, they still see
- 33:03Speaker 4: him as a peer. Maybe not an equal, that might
- 33:06Speaker 4: be a little too far, but they see him as
- 33:07Speaker 4: a friend. And here's someone that you would expect to
- 33:10Speaker 4: be on the same page as him clearly not being
- 33:13Speaker 4: on that same page. So it's so many good different
- 33:17Speaker 4: conversation starters on this, and it blew my mind because again,
- 33:20Speaker 4: the first time I saw Daryl Davis, I thought it
- 33:23Speaker 4: was just made up for reality TV. I had no
- 33:25Speaker 4: idea that this was an actual guy that really did
- 33:28Speaker 4: all this stuff on the Horizon. I am not your negro.
- 33:42Speaker 4: You are just fun to say. It is a fun
- 33:46Speaker 4: thing to say. It's an interesting title, for sure. It's
- 33:51Speaker 4: a documentary about James Baldwin. It won some documentary awards
- 33:56Speaker 4: and made some waves. This is Black History months, so
- 33:59Speaker 4: it seemed like a good one. And this this is
- 34:01Speaker 4: represents I guess what the Internet says, Like what if
- 34:04Speaker 4: you ask the internet, what's a really good Black History
- 34:07Speaker 4: Month documentary. It's gonna suggest I am not your negro?
- 34:12Speaker 4: Or was that the Internet talking back to me?
- 34:15Speaker 3: It was either or man.
- 34:17Speaker 4: All right, well we'll see you for that one.
- 34:19Speaker 2: Please under the dukes, yeah, under the docks, very looks
- 34:39Speaker 2: undon the ducks. Undon the dukes.
- 34:42Speaker 4: Yeah, under the docks. On the do.
- 35:08Speaker 3: Just buy something, Just buy something.
- 35:16Speaker 5: From parent, nor Americans something just by something from parent
- 35:28Speaker 5: or your American, some merch, buy some artdealingk to cars.
- 35:34Speaker 2: Say you're back, need that print?
- 35:37Speaker 4: Now your hair?
- 35:38Speaker 3: You consent by.
- 35:40Speaker 5: Your comic three, your four, think to start, I want more,
- 35:45Speaker 5: Buy a stick from the store, think the start.
- 35:49Speaker 3: I want more?
- 35:52Speaker 2: Something just bything.
- 35:58Speaker 5: From hearing, shot from paring, noid amering.
- 36:15Speaker 6: No, no, I screw led my life away drifting the
- 36:25Speaker 6: right to page.
- 36:26Speaker 4: Will any light to bring?
- 36:27Speaker 7: If you're the flight of the plane papers.
- 36:29Speaker 3: The highs are blaze somewhat.
- 36:31Speaker 4: Of an amazing field.
- 36:32Speaker 7: When it's real, the real, you will engage in your
- 36:35Speaker 7: favorite a pause, the lord of an arrangement. I gave
- 36:38Speaker 7: you the proper results to hit the pavement. If they
- 36:40Speaker 7: your emotional hate.
- 36:42Speaker 4: Maybe your language, the game?
- 36:43Speaker 7: How they playing it well without lay because evading whatever
- 36:46Speaker 7: the costs.
- 36:47Speaker 3: They are the shape.
- 36:48Speaker 7: Shifting thanks to get to cappectated. That is the apex
- 36:51Speaker 7: executional flame. You walt lookular bombs distributed in war rather cruising.
- 36:56Speaker 3: For eyes to see.
- 36:57Speaker 7: Max him out that I like my trees went off
- 37:00Speaker 7: in the face. You're despising me for what, though calculated,
- 37:03Speaker 7: the rather cut throat pery, Lord American.
- 37:06Speaker 3: Must be all the blunt smoke for real.
- 37:08Speaker 4: Lord, give me your day, your way.
- 37:09Speaker 7: They cake, they wait around, they hate whatever they say. Man,
- 37:13Speaker 7: it's not in the least bit we get heavy rotate
- 37:16Speaker 7: when the beat hits. Some things because you well, for
- 37:19Speaker 7: Uncle Niggas for Rell, you welcome.
- 37:21Speaker 3: They ain't ever had a deal.
- 37:23Speaker 7: You welcome, man, They lacking a pill.
- 37:25Speaker 3: You welcome, Yet they going. It's still You're welcome.