Louder with Crowder - March 20, 2015


Black Conservative Rips Starbucks a New One! || Louder With Crowder


Episode Stats


Length

20 minutes

Words per minute

182.92207

Word count

3,756

Sentence count

329

Harmful content

Misogyny

7

sentences flagged

Toxicity

32

sentences flagged

Hate speech

25

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Join Jemele and Jemele as they discuss the controversy surrounding Starbucks' new initiative, Race Together, and why they don t want to have a conversation about race before they have even had their first cup of coffee.

Transcript

Transcripts from "Louder with Crowder" are sourced from the Knowledge Fight Interactive Search Tool. Explore them interactively here.
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:02.000 So, Kira, you wrote a column over at louderwithcrowder.com, which means that Fun Dip did not read it.
00:00:10.000 Hey, why are you saying that?
00:00:11.000 I've read things on there before.
00:00:13.000 Oh, come on. 0.87
00:00:14.000 I read at least one thing on there before.
00:00:16.000 Yeah, if I tell them...
00:00:17.000 Fun Dip, you should read this one.
00:00:18.000 You'll like this one.
00:00:19.000 I promise.
00:00:20.000 Well, what's it about?
00:00:21.000 It's about Starbucks, but it's funny, and I think it's probably the best thing you'll ever read in your whole life.
00:00:29.000 I don't want to oversell it.
00:00:33.000 I do agree.
00:00:35.000 It's pretty incredible.
00:00:36.000 It got a lot of people read it.
00:00:39.000 Kira, listen, I know you hate this, being pigeonholed, but I think it struck a chord with a lot of people because you're a black conservative.
00:00:47.000 And right away, people are, their ears perk up and go, wait, hold on a second.
00:00:51.000 This is an opinion from someone, you know, who we can't accuse of being a racist.
00:00:54.000 And so conservatives want to hear what you have to say.
00:00:56.000 And liberals have to listen because they can't just use the go-to strawman argument of racism, right?
00:01:02.000 So tell us from your point of view, the Starbucks, what it is, this race together, and why you were so worked up in a tizzy about it.
00:01:11.000 Well, the Race Together, if you haven't heard by now, you've been living in a hole, but it's Starbucks' new initiative proposed by their CEO, Howard Schultz.
00:01:20.000 The idea is to get people talking about race by putting a hashtag race together on the cups of customers in order to initiate a conversation with customers about race and advance race relations in the United States.
00:01:35.000 Now, I don't want to belittle the idea that it's constructive to talk about race relations.
00:01:44.000 We've been talking about a national conversation about race for as long as I can remember.
00:01:52.000 We've never been able to have that conversation, honestly, in my opinion, and I don't think we ever will.
00:01:57.000 But I know one thing.
00:01:59.000 I don't want to have that conversation at 5.30 in the morning with my barista before I have even had my first sip of caffeine.
00:02:09.000 That's like a giant no!
00:02:12.000 No!
00:02:13.000 What's the female term for Uncle Tom? 1.00
00:02:15.000 Is it Aunt Tomlin?
00:02:17.000 Aunt Jemima.
00:02:20.000 I want waffles, man.
00:02:23.000 I'm hearing some Aunt Tom-ness going on here. 0.98
00:02:27.000 You say, okay, here's my ignorant white guy view, right? 0.81
00:02:32.000 I was watching MSNBC, actually, a clip you showed me, and this lady's saying, at least this should start the race dialogue. 1.00
00:02:38.000 Being raised in a post-racial America... 0.75
00:02:41.000 Where there were no riots.
00:02:43.000 There was no segregation.
00:02:44.000 There was no established, enforced racism. 0.99
00:02:47.000 You get racist jackasses everywhere. 0.97
00:02:49.000 I feel like there's been nothing but a dialogue. 0.99
00:02:53.000 Like, let's start a dialogue.
00:02:55.000 I'm going, where have I been?
00:02:56.000 Everything's been about race.
00:02:57.000 This is everything.
00:02:58.000 I totally agree.
00:02:59.000 I feel the exact same way.
00:03:01.000 And I get fatigued.
00:03:02.000 I'm to the point where I am fatigued about talking about this.
00:03:06.000 Because like I said, we're never going to have the honest conversation.
00:03:10.000 The national conversation in quotes about race that we keep having is white people bad, everybody else good. 0.68
00:03:18.000 Now, I'm not here to defend white people or to say that white people never do anything wrong and people need to get over that. 0.57
00:03:26.000 But what I am saying is that this is a nuanced debate.
00:03:28.000 And if black people want to have this conversation, we need to be willing to have some uncomfortable conversations and make some uncomfortable admissions as well. 0.84
00:03:37.000 And I have yet to see anybody who's willing to do that.
00:03:41.000 I mean, Bill Cosby, God rest his soul.
00:03:44.000 I know he's not dead, but...
00:03:46.000 But it depends on how much of his own coffee he's been drinking.
00:03:48.000 He may be in a stupor, wake up nine months from now.
00:03:51.000 Yeah.
00:03:52.000 But, you know, he had the nerve.
00:03:54.000 And Bill Cosby is by no means a conservative.
00:03:57.000 He is not a conservative.
00:03:58.000 He hates conservatives.
00:04:00.000 He is not by any stretch of the imagination. 0.99
00:04:02.000 But he had the nerve to come out and say, look, black people, we have some responsibilities here.
00:04:08.000 We need to stop this horrific... 0.93
00:04:12.000 Out of wedlock birth rate that we have, because the family is the bedrock of any successful society, and when you break down the family, you break down that society, and that's what we're seeing in black America. 1.00
00:04:25.000 We've got to stop these terrible crime rates.
00:04:28.000 We have to stop these horrible dropout rates.
00:04:31.000 We have to look inside our community.
00:04:33.000 No one is coming in and pulling our boys out of school.
00:04:36.000 Yet we have a 50% dropout rate nationwide among young black males.
00:04:41.000 That's huge.
00:04:42.000 That's 50%.
00:04:43.000 Half of young black males don't finish school. 0.98
00:04:45.000 I have yet to see one Republican come into the hood and pull a young black man out of school and say, son, you're just not going to finish. 0.89
00:04:54.000 So there's some responsibility that we have for ourselves.
00:04:58.000 And white people also have a responsibility.
00:05:01.000 I'm not for this idea that we shouldn't talk about race at all or that it doesn't matter.
00:05:06.000 I don't believe that either.
00:05:07.000 But I do think that there's got to be some uncomfortable conversations that have to be had if we're going to really have a national conversation about race, but we sure as heck are not going to have them at Starbucks.
00:05:20.000 This is true.
00:05:21.000 Yeah, I don't want to leave the 19-year-old dropout hipster barista in charge of race relations. 1.00
00:05:28.000 I do not.
00:05:29.000 I don't think that's the right place to go.
00:05:31.000 You know, it's funny you mention that.
00:05:33.000 There's a real correlation, actually, between French Canadians.
00:05:37.000 And black Americans. 0.56
00:05:39.000 You might not know this, Stephen.
00:05:41.000 I'm not sure if you know, but I'm Canadian too.
00:05:43.000 I do know that.
00:05:44.000 We talked about this yesterday in our pronunciation of dollars.
00:05:48.000 But French Canadians, it's almost a 50% dropout rate.
00:05:51.000 They don't get married.
00:05:54.000 The abortion rate is one of the highest in the industrialized world.
00:05:58.000 very similar to black Americans who have about the same chance of being born as they do of being aborted in America right now.
00:06:04.000 So you see a lot of those correlations in the French Canadian community that you would see with the black American community, which tells me, again, having been a witness to that, it's not a race issue.
00:06:15.000 In that sense, those numbers aren't a race issue.
00:06:19.000 You're not born black and decide to not be a father. 0.75
00:06:22.000 It's a cultural issue.
00:06:24.000 And do you feel like while we're talking about co-opting, people saying you're co-opting blackness if you're white, like Eminem.
00:06:30.000 Well, isn't the whole hip-hop culture a co-opting of blackness to begin with? 0.96
00:06:36.000 This idea of BET and gang-related imagery and symbolism and culture, even if a black person is doing that, how is that not co-opting blackness before white people do it? 0.63
00:06:49.000 Well, I disagree with you.
00:06:51.000 I wouldn't say it's a co-opting, but I would say it's an expression of black men's.
00:06:57.000 But I'm not really excited about this idea.
00:07:00.000 I think some people do co-opt the culture.
00:07:04.000 It happens all the time.
00:07:06.000 And I know Katy Perry got a little bit of trouble by co-opting Asian culture in an MTV Awards performance that she gave recently. 0.98
00:07:15.000 But I think there's a difference between co-opting and honoring.
00:07:18.000 And it's all in how you approach it.
00:07:20.000 Some people really respect the black culture.
00:07:23.000 Beastie Boys, great group, you know.
00:07:25.000 Let me clarify my point.
00:07:27.000 My point is that that's not emblematic of all black culture. 0.85
00:07:31.000 I mean, people act as though when they say, well, black culture, you know, if you...
00:07:33.000 Well, no, no, it's not black culture. 1.00
00:07:35.000 For example, black culture, Fundip wants to say something, but hold on one second, Fundip. 0.83
00:07:39.000 The blues are black culture.
00:07:41.000 Rock and roll is black culture. 0.62
00:07:44.000 These things came to us from the black community. 0.51
00:07:44.000 Bluegrass. 0.51
00:07:46.000 I don't know why now we act like the current trend is emblematic of all black culture in the country. 0.95
00:07:53.000 Because, I mean, you look at what blues did for America.
00:07:56.000 I mean, what were you going to say, Fundip?
00:07:57.000 You're a music guy.
00:07:58.000 Yeah, I was just thinking about blues and Motown music.
00:08:02.000 Motown's phrasing of how they described their music wasn't, this is for black America. 0.59
00:08:07.000 It was, this is for young, the music of young America.
00:08:12.000 And everyone, black, white, you name it, was putting on the Supremes, the Four Tops, the Temptations.
00:08:19.000 The whole nation was embracing that music that came out of Detroit.
00:08:23.000 And I'd hate to think that every time I strap on my Fender bass and try to play Bernadette, and nowhere near what Jamerson did, that I'm co-opting.
00:08:33.000 Because that's the greatest bass line of all time.
00:08:39.000 I don't want to say I'm co-opting.
00:08:41.000 I love it.
00:08:42.000 I agree.
00:08:43.000 I think you should be right.
00:08:44.000 I do.
00:08:45.000 I don't think Katy Perry or even Gwen Stefani, she went through a phase in her career where she was all into these Japanese Harajuku girls. 0.97
00:08:53.000 I don't think that you should be accused of co-opting culture that you admire and you want to participate in the expression of that culture.
00:09:03.000 And I think Funded brings up a great Point about wanting to, you know, participate in that and being a fan.
00:09:13.000 I mean, there's no, it's not offensive, and it shouldn't be offensive for someone to say, I love the way you express yourself.
00:09:21.000 This brings me joy.
00:09:23.000 And I would love to see the black American community get back to the point where we are significant contributors, positive contributors to American culture.
00:09:36.000 I mean, we have literally built this country on our backs.
00:09:40.000 We have been a part of the history of this culture and this continent.
00:09:44.000 You know, for hundreds of years, and yet these days we don't conduct ourselves with that level of pride.
00:09:50.000 We have so many issues in our community.
00:09:52.000 I want to get back to the place where we are considered great contributors to culture.
00:10:00.000 Can you stay for another segment here, Akira, or do you have to go to your spin class?
00:10:05.000 No, spin class.
00:10:06.000 I got time.
00:10:07.000 Okay, yeah.
00:10:08.000 Kira, actually, she's up very early.
00:10:09.000 She's on the West Coast for us. 0.97
00:10:11.000 And we will be back with Kira Davis, Ladder with Crowder.
00:10:13.000 Stay tuned.
00:10:18.000 Find her.
00:10:20.000 You can find her.
00:10:21.000 What are you pointing at me, Fun Dip?
00:10:23.000 Because I pointed at you, but I had my hand on the music and forgot to turn on your mic.
00:10:27.000 Oh gosh, and we had that beautiful intro.
00:10:30.000 This is why we can't have nice things, Fun Dip.
00:10:34.000 I've only had two cups of coffee, so I'm kind of slow today.
00:10:39.000 Miss Kira Davis, you can find her at ftrradio.com and her recent column at ladderwithcrowder.com.
00:10:45.000 Thank you for being back with us, Kira.
00:10:47.000 And I apologize on behalf of Fundip.
00:10:50.000 So, before we left, we're talking about the Starbucks deal.
00:10:52.000 And you mentioned that you think there needs to be an honesty in the race conversation if we're going to have it.
00:10:57.000 If you have to pinpoint, where is that?
00:11:01.000 Like, what is it that needs to be discussed most that is not being injected into the issue right now?
00:11:09.000 Well, I think on the part of, and I can only speak on this from the point of view of a black person and white America.
00:11:19.000 Sure.
00:11:20.000 I know there's other races, but that's the only part I can speak on.
00:11:23.000 But I think as a black community, we need to be willing to address the fact that sometimes we play a part in the fear that people have of us.
00:11:32.000 We have high crime rates in our community.
00:11:34.000 We have high murder rates in our community.
00:11:36.000 We have high abortion rates.
00:11:39.000 High dropout rates.
00:11:41.000 There's a lot of things that we are doing that we are solely responsible for, that cannot be blamed on other people, that we need to recognize, make it more difficult for us to be successful in this country.
00:11:54.000 We're kind of our own worst enemy.
00:11:56.000 I think on the part of white people, a lot of white people need to recognize that, A, We don't need you to roll over on the race debate.
00:12:04.000 I think that's just as offensive as not wanting to discuss it at all.
00:12:09.000 I hate it when I hear a white person say, well, you know, I'm not qualified to speak on this subject.
00:12:15.000 I'll just defer. 0.96
00:12:16.000 No, that's the chicken way out.
00:12:18.000 That's the chicken.
00:12:19.000 I think white people need to be honest.
00:12:22.000 Right.
00:12:23.000 And part of that is on us to not make, if we're going to have an honest debate and an honest discussion, and if a white person says, well, you know, I do have these questions, I do have these problems, we shouldn't ridicule them right away and judge them right away.
00:12:34.000 You're racist. 1.00
00:12:35.000 You're horrible. 1.00
00:12:36.000 You know, we should be willing at least to listen to them. 0.98
00:12:39.000 Don't you do that every now and then when you just really want the person to shut up?
00:12:42.000 You use it every now and then.
00:12:44.000 You must.
00:12:45.000 I can't lie.
00:12:46.000 I can't lie.
00:12:48.000 It's like Wanda Sykes in Curb Your Enthusiasm when she gives Larry David a script.
00:12:53.000 She goes, did you get them a script I sent?
00:12:55.000 He goes, yeah, I did.
00:12:56.000 They weren't.
00:12:57.000 Did you tell them I was black?
00:12:59.000 Why would I? Larry, you need to know when to use the race card.
00:12:59.000 No.
00:13:03.000 All liberal and liberal and crap. 1.00
00:13:04.000 They're going to love that black writer. 1.00
00:13:06.000 Go give me a script.
00:13:07.000 They're going to buy them a script.
00:13:08.000 You got to know when to use it.
00:13:10.000 And I was like, eh, thank you.
00:13:11.000 I feel like it's true, you know, just like I'm a woman and there's some of my womanly wiles that I'll use to get ahead sometimes.
00:13:17.000 I'll tell you where my favorite place to use it, though, is.
00:13:20.000 It's with other liberals.
00:13:22.000 Yeah, of course.
00:13:22.000 It's with liberals.
00:13:23.000 Because they can't stand being called racist.
00:13:25.000 So if I get into, like, a situation where liberals are, like, getting all high and mighty, I'll be like, well, you know, I guess, what do I know?
00:13:32.000 I'm just a little old black girl and you're the intelligent, you know, oh my gosh, no, I'm not racist at all.
00:13:37.000 My best friend is a black person.
00:13:39.000 When I was a kid, I went to school with two black people, and one of them was my best friend, and I defended her against insults.
00:13:47.000 I'm not a racist.
00:13:48.000 And then what you do to make them feel really bad is act really submissive.
00:13:51.000 Like, yes, sir.
00:13:52.000 No, sir.
00:13:52.000 I'll make you some pancakes, sir.
00:13:54.000 No, no, no, no, no.
00:13:55.000 Could you turn on the nightlight?
00:13:56.000 Mr.
00:13:57.000 Jingles gets a little scared of the dog sometimes.
00:14:00.000 Yeah, sometimes.
00:14:03.000 Well, it's not fair.
00:14:05.000 It's not fair, but it works.
00:14:08.000 It just doesn't work throwing out the Irish Were Slaves 2 card, because I've tried that.
00:14:13.000 No. 0.99
00:14:15.000 Especially not with a black person. 1.00
00:14:17.000 Yeah, it doesn't work at all. 1.00
00:14:18.000 I'm like, darn it! 0.99
00:14:19.000 I read that whole book on Irish being slaves and I got nothing. 1.00
00:14:23.000 White people, let me just say this. 0.98
00:14:26.000 When you're arguing with anybody about race, be they conservative or liberal, we don't want to hear about how black people participated in the slave trade, too. 0.74
00:14:38.000 And there's a lot of slavery going on in Africa right now.
00:14:41.000 Everybody knows that, but as soon as you bring that up, it's just a non-starter situation.
00:14:46.000 It doesn't add to the conversation.
00:14:48.000 I know you have valid points, and I recognize that it's a valid point, but you sort of stop the intellectual trajectory of the conversation when you go there.
00:15:00.000 It doesn't help.
00:15:01.000 I think the purpose that it does serve is not saying, well, there's slavery somewhere else, but I would say, you know, listen, the United States is not unique in that it engaged in slavery, but it is singularly unique in that it had a revolution to end slavery.
00:15:12.000 Sure, which is a great point.
00:15:13.000 Right.
00:15:14.000 Well, for example, you know, both of us being, you know, Canadian, I find it funny.
00:15:17.000 I had someone one time actually call in, I think, to this show, and Fundip was here, and he said, you know, my grandfather was a black guy.
00:15:23.000 I said, you know, my grandfather fled slavery to Canada.
00:15:25.000 And I said, do you know what they would have said in Canada?
00:15:28.000 Great, more slaves.
00:15:29.000 I mean...
00:15:32.000 Where did this start where they thought there was no slavery in Canada?
00:15:35.000 I know.
00:15:37.000 I did a video back in 2012.
00:15:41.000 I have a YouTube channel, by the way.
00:15:42.000 You can look me up on YouTube, Kira Davis, K-I-R-A Davis, where I do a lot of political commentary, just me and my webcam, kind of like you see now.
00:15:50.000 But it was during the 2012 campaign, and I think Touré from MSNBC It had accused Mitt Romney of being a racist.
00:16:00.000 So I made this video about, you know, when you call someone a racist, you lay all this history at their feet.
00:16:07.000 You don't really know what racism is.
00:16:09.000 And I talked about my experience, which we were talking about during the break, Stephen, in Eastern Canada growing up as the only black person On this little island and pretty much got called the N-word every day and got beat up every school day.
00:16:26.000 I related a story about being in a diner with friends one time and this drunk guy like an adult coming in and yelling at me about picking cotton and going back to where I came from, going back to Africa.
00:16:38.000 And I was like 12 years old, you know?
00:16:40.000 And so I told that story.
00:16:43.000 And what a lot of people reacted to was that it happened in Canada.
00:16:47.000 They couldn't.
00:16:47.000 They were like, what?
00:16:49.000 But Canada is this oasis.
00:16:51.000 It's like this utopia.
00:16:53.000 Canadians aren't racist.
00:16:55.000 Canadians aren't mean.
00:16:56.000 Look, I have been all over this continent.
00:16:59.000 I have lived a few decades.
00:17:02.000 Not going to say how many right now.
00:17:04.000 But I have a lot of life experience.
00:17:07.000 And I can tell you this.
00:17:09.000 A-holes are everywhere. 1.00
00:17:10.000 No, they absolutely are.
00:17:12.000 And then you have to take into account that Canada, most places, just doesn't have the same kind of color palette that we have in the United States.
00:17:18.000 Like you said, you're the only black person.
00:17:20.000 It's very homogenous.
00:17:21.000 Where I was raised in Montreal, we had a very large percentage of my school was Arabic.
00:17:28.000 And then quite a few Asians.
00:17:30.000 And honestly, I could count on one hand the amount of black kids in the entire school.
00:17:34.000 There started to be more toward my senior year because of the French language laws.
00:17:38.000 Again, big government discriminatory laws.
00:17:40.000 You know how that works with the language police in Quebec encouraged a lot of Haitian immigration, right?
00:17:45.000 Because they speak French. 0.99
00:17:46.000 And French Canadians are the most racist people on the planet. 1.00
00:17:49.000 Then they were trying to figure out how to get rid of Haitians. 0.99
00:17:53.000 And now we have all these people, these Asian, damn it, we don't want them taking our business over, so we're going to give them a poll tax or something like that. 1.00
00:18:02.000 They were furious about it. 0.97
00:18:06.000 And it's okay, I have a French-Canadian past, just like Kyra Davis has her...
00:18:12.000 French Canadians are the ghetto French of the world. 1.00
00:18:16.000 They're just like the French French, just they're more ghetto. 1.00
00:18:19.000 Yes, exactly. 0.91
00:18:21.000 Don't tell that to Celine Dion, though.
00:18:24.000 Don't tell that to Celine Dion in her expensive dresses. 1.00
00:18:28.000 I know.
00:18:29.000 I tell you what, though.
00:18:30.000 When you want a song sung properly, you get Celine to do it.
00:18:33.000 Only in French, though.
00:18:34.000 I don't like when she sings in English.
00:18:37.000 Yeah, I know.
00:18:38.000 But I'm just saying, compared to when people say the best singers of all time, Mariah Carey, Whitney, I'm like, no, none of them are close to Celine as far as hitting notes.
00:18:45.000 You can cover up a lot with vocal gymnastics, and that's what Mariah Carey does, where she goes on this, but it's like, have you ever actually just held a note, Mariah?
00:18:53.000 I've never heard it.
00:18:53.000 Yeah, Celine is a pro, and I know we're supposed to hate her because we got overloaded with Celine during the Titanic years, and I don't own any music by her, but she's definitely a pro.
00:19:06.000 Yeah.
00:19:06.000 Yeah, there you go.
00:19:07.000 You don't mess with Celine Fundip.
00:19:09.000 She's a national treasure.
00:19:10.000 She's a national treasure.
00:19:12.000 The only stuff I own by her, she's singing in French.
00:19:15.000 Oh, there you go.
00:19:17.000 Celine Dion and Michael J. Fox lay off.
00:19:20.000 Oh, yeah.
00:19:22.000 And John Candy.
00:19:23.000 John Candy is like a god in candy.
00:19:26.000 Oh, yeah.
00:19:26.000 I don't know.
00:19:27.000 I met him.
00:19:28.000 He was the nicest man I ever met.
00:19:29.000 Of all the celebrities I've ever met, and I've met a lot of them because I worked as a stagehand at the Just for Laughs, and my mom was a costume designer before I ever performed there.
00:19:37.000 John Candy was the kindest person I had ever met, and he died about two months after I met him.
00:19:43.000 Oh, wow.
00:19:44.000 Yeah, so I was one of the last people.
00:19:45.000 Anyways, we have to let you go, Kira.
00:19:47.000 So where can people find you most effectively?
00:19:50.000 People can find me online.
00:19:52.000 You can find me on YouTube, K-I-R-A Davis.
00:19:54.000 That's Kira Davis.
00:19:55.000 Check out my radio show, which airs Tuesday nights on FTRradio.com.
00:20:00.000 And you can also look me up at IJReview.com as well.
00:20:05.000 Thanks for having me on, Stephen.
00:20:06.000 I really had a good time today.
00:20:07.000 Oh, we're so glad to have you on.
00:20:08.000 And hopefully we'll see more of your work at louderwithcrowder.com because the audience loved it.
00:20:12.000 And we will be back after this commercial break from our sponsors.
00:20:18.000 Hey, if you enjoyed this video, subscribe by clicking my face or click this video next to me.
00:20:23.000 It's playing right now in a box.
00:20:26.000 How do we do that?
00:20:28.000 That's the magic of the internet.
00:20:29.000 Is it still playing?
00:20:30.000 It's still playing.
00:20:31.000 I don't want to look at it.