The Comedy Cellar: Live from the Table - A Frank Discussion on Floyd and Race

Episode Date: May 31, 2020

A Frank Discussion on Floyd and Race: Seaton Smith, Myq Kaplan and Coleman Hughes

We're happy to see. You're on. Who's on? I'm on? Is that no? Everybody's on. We're recording. Okay, go.

Let me know if you would like me to do it, or you can do it. Yeah, you can go ahead and do it. I don't think it's good to have the American flag behind me today, so I'm going to just go ahead. I'm not taking any chances. Go ahead. Okay, this is Live from the Table, the official podcast of New York's world-famous comedy seller, coming at you on Sirius XM 99 Raw Dog and on the

Ryecast podcast network this is Dan Aderman with me the owner of the world famous comedy seller Mr. Noam Dorman coming to us from his estate in Westchester County and boy what a show what did we have today it's going to be a hot one folks so uh buckle up we have Seton Smith comedy seller comedian Seton Smith Mike Kaplan he's, Seton Smith, Mike Kaplan. He's a regular on this show bringing a more liberal point of view typically and frequently crashing a crossing swords with known our producer, Perry L. Ashen brand and Coleman Hughes, who has been, I guess, described as a public intellectual.

And he recently was hired by the Manhattan Institute to write for City Journal which is their commentary on urban policy politics and culture and congratulations by the way Coleman recently graduated from Columbia class of 2020 the the cursed class of 2020 congratulations and welcome news obviously we're going to talk today about what the entire world is talking about. Of course, the terrible tragedy in Minneapolis. Noam, why don't you start things off for us and get us rolling? Well, I mean, I don't know how to start it.

And by the way, we don't have to limit it to Minneapolis. Minneapolis has all sorts of, you know, that's the worst of them all. But there's a bunch of things that have happened in the last couple of weeks between Arbery and the woman in Central Park. And maybe they're related. I mean, in the same conversation. I mean, we've had some conversations with on this show and on the Comedy Cellar podcast. And it was very difficult for me to kind of remind me of the time I was hanging out with Stephen Calabria. You guys know Stephen Calabria? Most of you know Stephen Calabria.

And I was complaining about my wife. And I really was complaining about her. And he says to me, I know, she really is like that. I'm like, motherfucker, that's my wife. Like, you can't talk about her that way. And that's kind of the situation. It's like there are certain things that just can't come out of a white mouth right now, for the most part. Even questions, you know, I don't mean advocating something horrible. I mean, just to question things without being received emotionally as you shouldn't be.

It is really hard to be white today. It's always hard to be white. So yesterday I was having this conversation with Will Silvins and Artie Fuqua. Now you have to know that Will Silvins and Artie Fuqua are like two of the most integral people in the comedy cellar. These are deep, deep members of the comedy cellar family and history. They've been extremely generous with the club over the years, continue to be. They're responsible, you know, for contributing to the success of the club, even the roof over my head. And yet when we were speaking, I realized, you know, that, that there was, it was, it was a tough situation. I had to choose between challenging on certain things that I just didn't agree with right or wrong and challenging

and then imagining them withdraw and say, oh, he's just another white guy, just like all the others. Or kind of like nodding my head and pretending that I'm in full agreement and sacrificing actual, the sincere intimacy of the friendship, which is a real cost of that, even if nobody ever discusses it. Because when you really are a friend with somebody, you don't feel like you have to pretend about something important and can live a whole life where you tell them things that you know they expect to hear from you, but it's not really how you feel. And that's a cancer on a friendship.

So I found that unpleasant. And I opted to be honest because I think in the long run, that's way, way the better, the better way to be. And I think the friendship, I think as the dust settles, people remember that and they forgive you. That's been my experience in things that I've had. So anyway, having said that as a preface, you can take this conversation anywhere we want. Seton. Yes, sir. Oh this conversation anywhere we want. Seton. Yes, sir.

Oh, I don't know. What is your whole take on all this? How does it make you feel? I emailed you earlier in the week. Yeah, man. And I asked you, you know, I said you must be very, very angry. And that's not just because your email address is, what is it? Greatness in Black.

Greatness in Black. Yeah, I thought of that at 17. I just never let it go. And you said something to me, and I was surprised. And like I was talking about before, I presume you're being honest, that you said it was more important to you that justice was done. That would make you more angry, that the incident itself didn't make you as angry. So I don't know if you've changed your mind.

Oh, yeah. I got a lot of layers on the whole conversation. So I don't know if you've changed your mind. Oh, yeah. I got a lot of layers on the whole conversation. Go ahead. I'm going to try the first one. First one is the shock of the video. The shock of the video is a legitimate, like, scare. Like, that's horrific. We all agree on how horrific it is.

And then the second thing is I completely agree with the riots. I'm actually – I'm annoyed with people who say we shouldn't riot. I'm just like, well, fuck it. Should we wait until a college championship game before we riot? Fuck you. Let's riot. Define riot. Define riot.

Does riot mean? I would go with social unrest that lets go of a certain amount of frustration. Does define riot mean burning down? Yes. That needs to be happening. Burn down as much as the white kids do at the college courts. They burn down the equal amount.

We can do that, fine. Yes. So wait, so let's say it spreads in New York and they burn down the olive tree. You would look at me and say, that's okay, it's cool now. If our rioting had the ability to burn down the entire country, then I think race relations would be completely different in the first place.

So I don't even think that's a valid parallel. I could own the business. I could own any one of those businesses. I'm not saying that. That's not my point. My point is, if we had the ability to riot, and the riots went from all the way from there, all the way here across the country,

then that's a whole, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Our conversation would be completely different, because that would be, we as black people would have a lot more power than we do right now. Okay. That's my second point. Third point is this, and this is all, I think in the conversation that what you were related to, I think what's not being factored in is, and this is an analogy.

I don't know if anybody wants to agree with this. Let's take out race. Let's take out black people for a second. If you send a soldier over to Iraq and he goes through some shit, comes back here, we take the time second. If you send a soldier over to Iraq and he goes through some shit, comes back here, we take the time to train them to be a soldier, but we never take the time to train them to actually deprogram them to trauma. You took all this time to train us to be slaves. Then you just said, let us vote for free and go, all right, be free now.

But there's no social, psychological structure to take away from the trauma. And therefore, generation after generation, people have trigger points to these traumas. And we all in this group, it's had to take away from the trauma. And therefore, generation after generation, people have trigger points to these traumas. And we all in this group, it's had to take psychology before, we all know what triggers and associations are. And it's clearly what's going on right here. But to say, I don't know, white person of value, crazy.

Well, yes, we are crazy because of these triggers here that needs to be addressed. And so, yes, I don't think that the riot is gonna help with progress. I think the progress has already been happening with Obama years, where the FBI is actually, they have a system now where the FBI goes in and changes these things and actually puts them under investigation. So I don't, I think, but I think emotionally speaking,

hey, man, I've been fucked up by cops before, too. I understand the anger. That's crazy. I just say, Noam mentioned before, honesty versus, you know, saying what you want to hear. But I didn't really mean it. I didn't mean it, Steve. What the fuck's the matter with you?

I'm saying, Steve, are you ready for Noam's complete honesty? Oh, I mean, I think I already can guess it. I've already been on the show a couple times. Oh, no, no, no. I've never with an issue this sensitive, I don't think. You're always this sensitive to me. I always believe my life's on the line. I don't have any outlandish positions on this, by the way.

I mean, I hope I didn't, you know, I might've made it seem like I have a worse position than I do. But I mean, my positions will come out, I think, as they come up. So Coleman, you want to respond to that? Or what are you for? Or take it anywhere you want. Coleman, can we hear him? Can you hear me?

Oh, yeah. Not well, Coleman. Get off you. Can you hear me now? Yeah, I hear you now. That's good, yes. Okay, so what's happening now is in many ways similar to what happened in 2014 in Ferguson.

A black man was killed, and there was riots as a result. And I went to Ferguson about a year ago because there's some folks who've been making a documentary about it for several years. And they took me around and they showed me every business, many of them black owned, that used to exist on the street just around the corner from where Mike Brown was killed. And to this day, most of them are abandoned buildings. And that's the thing I think people don't realize about riots is that it's in the heady passion of the moment, it's perfectly understandable to try to just understand the rage rather than to condemn it. I totally understand that instinct. But at the same time, five years from now, when those businesses still haven't returned, where there's fewer employment

opportunities in that neighborhood as a result, and it's not you or I opportunities in that neighborhood as a result. And it's not you or I living in that neighborhood. We're not the kids growing up in the circumstance where two out of three buildings are abandoned. That's the long-term consequence of the riots that almost nobody talks about when the riots are happening. Cities don't just bounce back from this, and it's not us that have to live with the consequences. And so I think people want to support the riots because they understand the anger of watching this cop murder this Black dude. And I understand that anger, but I don't think you should conflate the anger with the support of the riots themselves. Yeah. I mean, I want to say that it's funny because I had emailed Coleman about this writing thing and I had foreshadowed exactly this conversation

because I'd had this conversation before where somebody, a friend of mine, this was during Ferguson, said, I said, well, what if I burned down the olive tree? And she said, yeah, well, you know, and, and I was like, holy shit, you know, but, you know, think about what you're saying. First of all, yet another, you know, Israeli bar mitzvah is blown up by a Palestinian terrorist. So some Israelis go and they burn down some Palestinian neighborhood. None of us would think that was an appropriate reaction. Because there is a, I mean, Coleman is making, couldn't have prevented, and might have worked even against, then we should really figure that out, how you're going to do that arithmetic, because that upends everything I thought I knew about morality. I mean, that upends the argument

against terrorism. That upends everything about too wrong, so make it right. What you're saying is that if these people do something outrageous, I can turn my anger at any innocent person and just take away everything they have. No, can I say something? Yeah. Yeah, I can say something. I actually don't think you believe that. Go ahead, Dan.

That's, I think, a warm... You know, if you think of it in terms of a war, as some people might, then the ends justify the means, just like you might agree with the Hiroshima bombing. No, even in war, that's not allowed. Even in war, that's not allowed. What do you think of the morality of the Hiroshima bombing?

Yeah, well, many people think that was wrong, but war, you are not allowed to target civilians in a war. But go ahead, Seton. Okay, here's my point. I don't, listen, I didn't say I agree with the riots. I said I understand where they're coming from. When you put a bunch of negative energy to a situation, a bunch of negative energy is going to bounce back.

And that being said, I'm going to go on a bigger level. I personally don't agree that the police should exist in the way it does. I don't believe in our justice system. And when the way it does. I don't believe in our justice system. And when I say our justice, I don't believe in justice. I think the term justice is a dark part of somebody, of the human mind that's all about revenge. And revenge begets more revenge begets more revenge. Every time I see somebody that gets justice,

they get horrible things happen for them. They become more of a criminal, their family gets more messed up, and the economy gets more messed up. I don't believe in the prison system. Plus, the prison system was created after slavery. So we have the biggest, we had the biggest slavery system in the world before, and now we have the biggest prison system in the world, which is also no coincidence. So I don't believe in the prison, I don't believe in justice. But if you're going to go around shooting Black people, they're going to act out and go crazy too, just like every other group of people. I mean,

one more thing I gotta say, have you noticed that our police force policy is similar to all our international policies? They go and they go into a country and they take over and they kill people and then they just stay there for a while. And anybody who acts up against the new regime, I mean, our ghetto policy and our Afghan policy is the same. And I'm done now.

So let's get Mike Kaplan. Now, Mike is like a woke white guy. And if he's like most woke white guys I know, he's read about black people in books. So what do you want to say, Mike? Bam! Noam, thank you for that introduction. I think you have been very fair and measured.

Fair and balanced, I might even say. When you said at the beginning how difficult it is to be able to say what you want to to your black friends for fear that they might judge you based on what you are saying, that made me initially think of how I imagine it is for black people to perhaps interact with, let's say, the police in situations where they are treated unfairly and they are afraid to say what they believe is true and fair and kind and just and right for fear that the police might misunderstand their intentions and the police might not want to be friends with them the way your friends might not want to be friends with you. And I think the stakes are equivalent. So I would say, I think there's a lot of,

so to speak, black and white thinking that humanity engages in on issues like this. Whereas it's not that you, when Seton says, I understand why people riot, I understand why there is anger. We can all understand why there is anger. We can also, all reasonable people, when in safety, in a reasonable place, I think most people that we know and care about, regardless of your political beliefs, would say, I would prefer there to be

fewer buildings burned down, fewer people harmed, fewer innocent people harmed, of course. And so what is the cause? What is the root? Why did people start rioting in this situation? Because how do we get to the root of the problem, which in this case was a man murdering another man, which is a thing that has happened like this and has roots going back so far as, you know, 16, 19, the origins of our country. And I know you might

be saying, okay, but where are we now? How do we move forward from here now? But you're starting in the middle. You're starting in the middle by saying like, what if they burned down my building? Well, then let's try to make it so that there aren't as many people doing things that make people be so angry. It's not a measured decision to burn down a building. Hold on. I'm not starting in the middle. I'm starting from the historical reality that the civil rights movement made tremendous strides in the face of much, much, much more regular

and equally horrible daily abuse and hatred without violence. There was nothing more powerful ever than nonviolent protests. So I'm not trying to relegate anybody to hopeless and futile gestures. Can I jump in real quick? Just a quick Martin Luther King quote. He said that a riot is the language of the unheard. Please continue. He may have said that. Yeah, but okay.

He said that in the one time in 67, but there's literally 10 years of him giving the same speech about why nonviolence is the way to go. So I think that's cherry picking. For sure. Yeah. And so I'm not trying to say that anybody, that they shouldn't,

I'm not trying to force them to say, well, I'm going to give you this option, and I know it's not really going to, it really won't work. I guess what I'm saying to you, Noam, is when you're saying like, what if people burn down this, People should stop burning things down. They shouldn't be violent. I think a more important place to start is the cops shouldn't be violent. That is important to say. We can start there.

Let's start with the cops. So I don't, I mean, I think you're using like a rhetorical device there. The more important part, it's not either or. I'm not trying to talk about one and not the other. No, I think it's more important that the powerful shouldn't be violent because they can do more damage. Seton brought up the riots. So that's why we talk about the riots.

I didn't say let's start with the riots. That's not fair to me. That's not, we can start with the riots. I don't think we're attacking you. I think y'all are having a great fight. I want y'all to continue fighting, but I don't want you to feel attacked. Let's just say in the course of this podcast, we have to talk about both issues

and give them both lots of time, regardless of the order. It's not to say one is more important than the other, but let's just decide on one for now. Yeah. So, okay. So let's just finish up with the rise. I mean, Mike, I don't know.

Did anybody in your family own businesses? What kind of family do you come from? My parents, most of my family has been teachers. My grandmother was a nurse and my parents and my grandfather and grandmother were teachers. Well, do they have houses? Yes. I grew up in a house. So let's say they come in a riot and they burn down your house um i i can't believe that there's a large constituency of people out there that think this is okay i i you know and and it's not only is it counterproductive the neighborhood it loses you as soon as you as soon as you advocate that you you lose 30 of the people who were with you. Like, okay, but you know what? I'll see you when you get back. Because if you're talking about burning down people's

businesses now, you've lost me. I'm not quite with you anymore. Noam, I think that nobody here is advocating burning down businesses. I am for nonviolence. I don't want any businesses burned down. I think what Seton said and what I also agree with is we understand where the anger comes from that leads to that. Here's the thing, though. I understand all of it. I understand the anger of the protesters. Well, rioters, I should say, in this case.

But I also saw a woman on the news who lives in Minneapolis. She seemed like 50 or 60-year-old Black woman who lived in a building that for mostly disabled people, it seemed. And she was crying for two minutes about how the riot, how the rioters were destroying the only shops that were close enough for her to get to in her position. This woman is in tears, right? I also understand her side of it too. And it's worth noting that like, what percentage of the residents of this place are actually rioting? It's got to be in the single digits, right? So a lot of out of town has been arrested. You're right. A lot of out of town has been

arrested for these things. So that's what the mayor said. And that's happened at a lot of riots. I'm told by the people making the Ferguson documentary that a lot of folks came in not from Ferguson and then and had their fun and then left. But it also seems like I saw some conflicting evidence that a lot of folks were actually from Minneapolis. So I'm not sure what to believe about that now. I think we just got to wait for the full thing. But that's the point I'm making. I think just harping on this riot and calling it, like, the worst thing in the world

is definitely a distraction from the main point. I mean, there's a bigger point here that's going on, that this riot is going to be forgotten. I mean, yes, there's been a bunch of riots. Let's go, hey, there's going to be a bunch more riots. And they're all going to come from a real legitimate reason. Maybe I'm the only person in this room that has house busted by cops and folks.

But this is, like, a psychological thing that if they don't address, it's gonna keep happening. So to blame the victims is going on in circles. Only, listen, I'm not actually mad at you, Coleman. It's just, uh, Noam sent me a link earlier of John McWhorter saying the same argument, and I'm annoyed more with John than I am with you. But I do think that it's missing the point.

Like it's just blaming black people. And also just again, white kids riot every fucking season. Every month they drive by the car. Why is it, I mean, sports center, like highlight. Why is this such a bad thing when they- Dayton, lean forward, because when you lean back, we lose your audio. No, not that part.

Okay, I think I agree with you that the best way to prevent the riots are by fixing the systemic problems with the police. Right? That's the most likely place where we're going to prevent a riot. Once a black person gets killed,

murdered, and that video gets killed, murdered, and that video gets out, there's very little that one can do at that point if people want a riot. Unless you happen to be from the community, you're respected, you know, like Killer Mike gave the speech in Atlanta, people like that potentially can calm a riot.

And I saw a video about how, you know, James Brown may have prevented a riot when Dr. King died. Like a couple people have the clout and standing to do that. But for the rest of us, you just, you know, we're, it doesn't matter how much I condemn it, you know, it's not going to matter. But you know, we could also say that about, there's not that much any of us can do about any of this individually but the the point that um uh i was i was getting to a point that i all right it's locked down we do this shit the best way to stop the riot oh sorry sorry all right what what i'm saying is the riots are a huge huge huge problem that people don't if you care about unemployment, all of the issues that people care about in terms of inequality, unemployment, like abandoned buildings, cycles

of poverty, like the effect that a single riot has on this in a city can last for decades. And no one is out there 10 years from now when- But is this one that bad? Is this one that bad? I mean, listen, I know what you're saying. I live in D.C. The 68 riots didn't even get cleaned up until 2002. I remember seeing that show. That is what I'm saying. That's what I'm saying.

And who suffers? But is this one that bad? The people in the community. Is this one that bad? I don't know. I don't know. Noam, back up because we can hear your audio. That's one mic.

I want to say one other. Mic one, nothing. There's about 100 people who get killed unarmed by the cops every year and last year last year was a little under 100 and nine of them were black um 19 of them were white and if you adjust for population you find that a black person is somewhat more likely to suffer that fate than a white person is but overall the numbers are very low. Every single one of those numbers. May I question those numbers? May I question those numbers? Only because if you look at all the videos where cops say one story and the video tends to always say there's another story. So like, for example, the South Carolina dude, remember that dude who got shot eight times in

the back and then the cop shot him and then he dropped the gun right next to him instead of dude. Yeah, he was armed. So like that that that is only scary that only because that exists and that has happened a lot that the statistic thing bothers me here's another thing that bothers me about the statistics is that they say more black people create more crimes that's where more cops are there but the fact that more laws are created geared towards black people seems to also be forgotten a lot. I hate that phrase, but it always is forgotten. For example, guns aren't allowed in cities. That started with black people in the 60s. Crack versus cocaine. Crack and cocaine are literally the same

thing. That whole popular drug, the war on drugs in general, which replaced the Jim Crow laws. These are all laws that are specifically and gained and compounded to get black people. And then, you know, you can put a gun on them and plant them and shoot them so um i mean i'm sure we all know all this stuff right now but i don't believe those statistics it's scary so let so let me share some of the statistics that i've seen because this is kind of where i get into trouble which is that you know we're not here to play it safe no i'm especially so go ahead tell me your your point. It's because I don't want to work from faulty statistics, but we do all want data. It reminds me of

comparing cops to you can't, it's going to come out wrong. Can I compare the cops? The thing that comes to my mind is when you read about pit bulls being dangerous and you don't, to this day I don't know, are they really more dangerous or is it just because we focus on pit bulls and then the stories of the pit bulls being dangerous and you don't and i to this day i don't look are they really more dangerous or is it just because we focus on pit bulls and then the stories of the pit bulls hit

the hit the news all the time and so you want the data just like with covid we want the data and unfortunately the data now this data could be wrong but this is the data that's available to me and if there's other data i really want to see it i've asked perriel to find it whatever and she sends me you know poetry but anyway um excuse me npr okay come on npr can you see it no just tell me what the study is oh npr new study says white police officers are not more likely to shoot minority suspect that was an an NPR. And then a couple years ago, there was an article in the Sunday Times by a black guy from Harvard, who I recall from the article, said it was the most surprising finding in his career, which found that although police are much more likely, and you can see it here,

if you can see it, to use hands with black people, 17% more likely. Push into a wall, 18% more likely. Use pepper spray, 25% more likely, although it was only five cases as opposed to four. But we're less likely to shoot black people than white people. So these are the stats that are out there and it's very difficult question i gotta ask i didn't get to see that follow-up was that question that the article stated that black police are less likely to shoot black people or they have shot less black people what was that colman more uh the roland fryer he looked he looked at a huge database of police shootings.

I think, what was it, national or was it just in the city of Houston? And he tried to compare apples to apples in every case and see how likely the cops are to shoot a black suspect versus a white suspect in the same scenario using the whole aggregate data. He found that black cops were more likely to put their hands on a black suspect, rough him up, but less likely to actually pull a trigger. And that was the result he called the most surprising in his career. I got to look more into that. I'm very curious. I'm curious. I want to know if it is Houston or

if it's national. And I also want to know if it is Houston or if it's national. And I also want to know, again, about what exactly the stats are writing down, because, again, the cops have been proving to plant guns on motherfuckers the entire time as a policy. So I can't agree with their words, because everything they've done. Not everything, but most of what they're doing is showing that they...

And here's the thing, too. None of them... Well, I'm glad the cops are finally coming out and apologizing. But, I mean, 90% of this whole out and apologize, but like, I mean, 90% of this whole thing is relationship and also it's that whole justice system thing. So I don't know. I also don't think this answers my question about the compounding of laws

that are addressed towards black people. It actually doesn't apply to that at all. But I'm glad. I just wanted to offer like the part of them being more likely to use force is also, you know, a large problem that like in the past day, like with some of the videos that I've been seeing, like where police are just like shoving like hard people like out of their way, like small people, women, all genders of people like this is a I mean, it seems like the way that like when we were talking about the way that soldiers are trained the way that the police are trained or aren't trained like

what goes into becoming a police officer what goes what is in a person who wants to be a police officer why do they want to be and what are their thoughts about like protecting and serving the community like a mile from my house you know at the Barkley Center last night there we I heard sirens all night there were I mean it's the videos coming out of it it's it's horrifying that like of the people who are I don't know I don't know what happened before but they're every video that I've seen where somebody's like I just like a cop said get out of the way and then immediately like shoved people and they hit their heads, they're in the hospital, they're, like, it doesn't, it's, it's, it's, it's mind boggling. Like, what is, what is happening in the police? Yeah. Back to your whole pit bull analogy.

Let me pull one more thing. That's what they are. They're pit bulls who aren't managed well. Go ahead, Dom. Hold on. Let me read one more thing into the record. So this was in New York Magazine. It was referencing the Washington Post study on this stuff. This was during the time that Kaepernick was in. It says, the Post has indeed found that there's a strikingly consistent number of fatal police shootings each year, close to 1,000 people of all races. But that figure includes the armed and the unarmed. Fatal police shootings of the unarmed, the issue Kaepernick and Reid cite, are far fewer. In the first six months of this year, for example, I suppose that was 2018, the Post found a total of 27 fatal shootings of unarmed people, of which black men constituted seven. There are 22 million black

men in America. If an African American is not armed, the chance that he'll be killed by the police in any recent year is 0.00006%. If a black man is carrying a weapon, the chance is 0.00075, which is too many, but it seems to me important to get the scale of this right. Our perceptions are not reality. Now this is where, and this comes to think like, I'm not saying the perceptions are not reality, but perceptions can be,

I mean, I don't even know what the perception is. Between a perfect situation, a slight problem, a medium problem, and the problem we seem to think we have, the truth could be anywhere in that range. now if you want to go on record and say hello are we sure it's quite as bad as we think it is even to say that it's not to say that it's not there's not a problem to get you in trouble and there's a so Coleman sent me he was doing some research on this and I can play it I played yesterday there's an almost an identical incident it's on video and I can show it right here, of a white guy who is, I mean, it's identical. He's held underneath a policeman by his knee, on his neck, I think, or on his head

and he dies in Dallas. Never even was in the news. But there's a lot of black murders that are not in the news either. Not by cops. That's an example of why, of that specificity. Oh, wait, I'm sorry, go ahead's actually, I don't know if that's a good example of why, of that specificity.

Oh, wait, I'm sorry. This way? Go ahead. Well, I guess what we're saying, I mean, so just to be clear, what I've always felt, and it bears out my experience in life, and it makes sense to me,

is the following. That the cops treat black people like shit. And that the sadistic cop has an easy time of it. You arrest the guy, he's in the back of the police car, you kick the shit out of him cops and the cop assumed that they were the guy who the police had been called about and just have them right up against the car. And I had to say, no, no, no, that's it. And I've seen this and I believe it and it makes common sense to me. What I've never been sold on is that the cop who shoots somebody in front of everybody with the cameras rolling and with

is is likely to have just woke up that day so i'm gonna murder somebody today and i and i've always felt that much much more likely when a when a trigger is pulled to shoot to kill that is a situation of panic or um mistake you know i actually thought you saw the gun or whatever it is, because, like I said, because the hateful sadist has a much more clever way to get his rocks off than by getting arrested, having to turn... What do you say in this case in Minneapolis, where a gun was not used, but a knee was used on the neck? What do you think Officer Chauvin's intentions were?

I mean, he's been accused of assassinating, murdering with intent, but I imagine you believe that that certainly was not his intention. Who are you asking? You, Noam Dorn. No, I never, I thought his intention, and believe me, I'm not mitigating the intention here I thought his intention was

a sadistic torture I don't think he thought the guy was going to drop dead because I think he's done this many many times before and I presume from the reaction of the other three cops who just stood on watching you know I mean, this may be going a little too far, but it wouldn't shock me that they've seen him do it before because they didn't seem to react like, holy shit, what are you doing? You know, cut it out.

They just sat there. And the autopsy since then kind of bears that out that they don't show that he was choked, but that he died from a combination of a preexisting condition and maybe intoxicants in his blood. Wait, I got to cut in now. I got to cut in with this. I got to cut in with the coronary report because that is the way they've written that is a bullshit thing.

When you put somebody, if you put your knee on somebody's neck and put their arms behind their back, you are choking them. You're putting pressure on their chest and you're creating that. He created that fucking heart attack. You might be right. And also, too, the fact that we've also pointed out these cops that constantly lie and bullshit, we cannot trust their statistics. They've proven the fact in every video they've put out. And let me ask you,

let me ask you, hold on, Mike. So you think that the intention of the cop there was to hold him down until he died? I'm asking you seriously. No, no, no. I'm going to down until he died. I'm asking you seriously. No, no, no, I'm gonna explain this. No, explain, this is what makes black people mad.

You're taking so much time to figure out his intention. Deadass me. Hold on, hold on, you've already dismissed all the rioters. You've dismissed all these other thugs as being bad people. And I'm just saying that, I'm just saying, here's my point. I answered only the deadass me. The same kind of love you got for this dude should be the love we have for all the sides.

We need to see all the- Nobody has any love for this dude. We're trying to assess whether this was cold-blooded, premeditated murder or manslaughter that's relevant to the punishment that this man is gonna receive. And it's also relevant to the, just overall to the question of the cops intentions. And we're happy. That's not the point.

Here's the thing. And we're also happy. But black people aren't afraid of white people intentionally going out and shooting people. We're not afraid of cops with the intention. That's never been our thought. Like they're going out there and, you know, we just know at any moment they can kill us.

That's much worse. Do you understand that? It's not a premeditated. It's actually something I can deal with because I can convince moment they can kill us. That's much worse. Do you understand that? It's not premeditated. It's actually something I can deal with because I can convince you not to kill me. It's the fucking flick it off. Like, ah, fuck it. I can kill him. I can move on right at all.

That's what's freaking us out. I don't care about his intention. It's the fact that he can do it. It's the problem. I just want to say, just for the record, because the second time it kind of happened in this conversation, I'm only answering the question that was put to me about what is intended. Because no one, but no one brought up the intentions of the cops that shoot. Yeah.

And he said he believes that they didn't intend to kill, they didn't wake up in the morning intending to kill. And I asked him if he felt the same way about Officer Shulman. Yes, Seton, one white man asked another white man a question, so don't get upset. Let me, Mike, that was it. Can I make a point?

I didn't think that was on page. Please call me, go ahead. Can I make a point? I didn't think that was on page. Go ahead, Colin. Go ahead. The Black Lives Matter movement, which has done a lot of good things, including popularizing the idea that the police should wear body cams, which is still not the law in every state,

but I think should be pushing for, you know, outside review boards so that when there's a police misconduct allegation, it's not the police investigating themselves, which obviously is going to yield a biased result. Unfortunately, that's still allowed in lots of cases. So like these are like systematic issues that you know are not reducible to simply bad apples and there's a lot of areas of reform that like need to happen and I think that the anger should be channeled there. At the same time when the conversation too often just becomes about the alleged racism of the cops in a particular instance. And I think that that is a mistake for the following reason. Every single video I've seen of a black person getting killed by the cops,

whether it was Tamir Rice or whether it was Alton Sterling or whether it was George Floyd. I have seen an identical video that never went viral, that never went to your social media feed of a white person getting killed the same way. Dylan Noble, Daniel Shaver killed begging for his life. This guy Tony Timpa suffocated for 13 minutes my point my point is that there is a problem that goes so so far beyond race and when we make it all about the racism of the cops when we pretend that we know for sure that he wouldn't have done that

to a white person a we don't know that because they have done it to white people. And B, the moment we do that, it puts white people, I think a lot of white people at least, on the defensive because they feel like you're attacking them for their racism when really it could be a conversation about how do we reform the systemic problems with the police so that we are all safer. Can I jump in real quick? I just want to say one thing I didn't get to say that I will stay out for a good long time. You guys can all do it. I just want to make clear that video was the most horrible thing I've ever seen. I don't ever remember being affected by a video like that. He killed that guy regardless of what his intention was. But for some reason, even though you'd think that

like the guy got shot in the back, what's the name of the guy got shot in the back in South Carolina? Oh, which one? Oh, I don't know. Anyway, the cop shot,

even though you would think that would be the most, the more horrible, like, no, even if, even if even if um uh floyd hadn't died this the pure sadism that's and torture that was going on for whatever reason was very almost impossible to look at and so do i think that he was torturing him with the intention of killing him? No, I don't.

Just like the Vietnamese torture in the prison camps, whatever happened to John McCain, let's say, was not with the intention of killing him. It is not any kind of excuse for what went on or is in no way meant to show some sympathy for the guy who did it. I just don't think death was the, his intended outcome. That's all I'm saying. That guy should go to jail from what we know now. And that look, I mean, he's begging for his mother's, I mean, it's impossible. It's impossible to comprehend that. So I just want to make that clear. Now go ahead. Did he lie about that in the police report? Did he lie? I don't know. Does anybody know, does anybody know what, when somebody is handcuffed on the ground, what the standard procedure is

with regard to the police? That is to say, once a guy is on the ground, face down and handcuffed, is the standard operating procedure to simply stand up and leave him on the ground handcuffed or put him in the car? What are they supposed to do at that point? Does anybody have any insight into that? Well, regardless of what the official policy is. I just want to know if, you know, it's been said that he was on the ground handcuffed, therefore there was no reason to do anything.

But I'm just wondering if that's the case and what police procedure is. And I don't know anything about holds and holds are authorized and holds are unauthorized. I mean, I think either way, if it was- That was not police procedure, he's in handcuffs. No, but when they're in handcuffs, are you supposed to just back away and not touch at all? Or is there ever a reason to further immobilize a guy that's in handcuffs?

I think it's a good question. It's a good question. I don't know the answer. If he's hurting himself. I mean, I think, I'm guessing. But there are situations I've seen where people are hurting themselves or they're having seizures. But from the video, from the whole video, I've seen the one where they actually took him in cuffs

and he never resisted. There was one part he fell. But there was no explanation of why he fell. He actually, if he had a heart situation, then fell, or if he fell and then the situation started, it was one of those kinds of things. So right before we came on, I saw a new article, the police reports come out, or maybe it's the, yes, the police report came out. Did you read it, Coleman? And there's some weird facts in there that he was already in the car and they may have taken him what we might be seeing is after he was already in the car taken out of the car for some reason then threw himself down on the ground so there's some weird factual

pattern there there's clearly more that went on than we that we've seen so far in that video none of which to my understanding would um would explain or excuse why that guy had his knee on his neck for that amount of time on the ground. I haven't read anything which would put that into doubt. But there clearly was a longer story to this than we've seen in that video. So you can Google it or I'll send it to you uh afterwards so all right so callman so callman brought up you know like a really important question is you know how how do we know that this was racism seaton i think that these are questions that i don't know, for me, if they're important.

The fact that it happened, and it's happened so much, with no real hope of ending, it sounds legitimately like this. That's what it is. It's one of those, like, we all are sitting there, all of us Americans sitting there, like, God, stop. None of us know how to stop that shit. That creates a riot. In a country of 300 million people,

unfortunately, the answer to your question, I think, is it probably won't stop any more than freak accidents will stop or the occasional airline crash will stop. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you're right. I'm just saying it won't stop. You have a country of...

I'm sorry. I'm just saying, slavery and a random clay trash. No, but wait a minute. To defend Dan a little bit, at least the NYPD has kept stats for a long time on unarmed civilians killed by the cops, and it has been going down steadily for decades. It's way less than it was in the 70s and 80s.

So it's not... Again, there's a video of a dude in South Carolina putting a gun next to a dude he just shot. So these stats are proving over and over again to be iffy, at the least, iffy. Okay, I mean, I think that- Four dudes watched a dude kill another dude on the ground, and those goosetracks wrote more stats.

So I'm just saying that our stat motherfuckers are a little questionable. So I'm done saying that. Would motherfuckers are a little questionable. I'm done saying that. Would you be ready? I've had a theory I should have mentioned earlier. But you tell me what you think of this theory. My theory for a long time has been that if the cops day to day didn't treat black people in such a dehumanizing way. And by the way, they treat a lot of people in a dehumanizing way, but especially black people. If they hadn't built up all that resentment from the day-to-day black

treatment, the treatment that you've had, the treatment that people we know have had, that I believe when these shootings happened, black people would say, well, you know, I know the cops. They're usually pretty fair. This guy must be a bad apple. I think that much of what we see in the reaction to these shootings is the resentment of all the day-to-day indignities that the cops dish out that's i've always felt that way what do you think uh uh i think again it's still much more deeper i think it's again it's the laws that have been put in the black community that are that are i mean yes i think it's part of that i think it's just over and over dignity but it's a systematic structure of

black people do like black people do, like black people do this specifically, so let's make this outlawed, which is being chronicled throughout our history. I mean, again, the two big ones, which is the guns and the crack. Guns and cocaine. I've met so many white people who do cocaine

and they're fine in life. And they're fine in the sense of they're not going to jail. They just let go. You say that like someone who didn't live through New York during the crack epidemic in the 90s. I mean, I know white people do, and black people do cocaine, but crack was something different altogether.

I mean, even Spike Lee did a whole movie where that was a big theme in it, and it wasn't just like a bunch of people in their living room passing around cocaine. It was crack houses, lives being ruined. It was serious. I'm not saying the drugs weren't ruined,

but again, I mean, the crack, why is the opioid crisis being handled different than the crack epidemic been wrong? Why? Those people are being treated like a motherfucker. Different. No, that I actually agree with you. That I agree with you.

Again, that's a different. What I don't agree with you on is that treating crack different than cocaine was a racial thing, but I do think that you're absolutely right. That was written down and that was literally put in an article. I mean, the Clinton administration released that. But I do think, I do believe that if it was black people dying of opioids as white people have been dying, you would see a different reaction.

I do think that that's, my gut tells me that you're right about that. Go ahead, Coleman. Coleman had something to say. I was just going to say, the laws that penalized crack heavily were very popular amongst black people at the time. It's hard to find a black politician who wasn't in favor of them, fact and those people end up being sort of vindicated but at the time a lot of the push was coming from from the black community um these are the same okay all right the thing with the thing with crack and this is insidious and this is what i think happened is that people generalized now i I knew this wasn't true. Just, you know, I had, there was

a guy who used to manage the comedy cellar before your time. His name was, and he was from Guyana and he, he was the number one student in the history of Guyana or something. He, he, he got the highest score in the history of the, they did, they give like a standardized test there. And he got the highest score in the history of that test. And he came over, we were friends. He used to manage my band. Then he became manager of the comedy cellar. He was very, very like a goody two shoes. And he wound up a crack addict.

And his life was ruined. And the way the story played, he's still alive. We're still friends. But the way the story played out was tragic. So I'm aware that what I'm about to say is not true. But I think that people in their ignorance conflated crack abuse with the criminal element. And for that reason, he didn't feel sorry for these people whose lives were being ruined by crack.

I don't want to say it's racism based out of hate of race, but it was race ignorance for sure. And, and a lack of curiosity maybe to be sure that thing and, and, and the opioid thing, it's like, well, these are, these are like, these are wholesome white people dying. Correct. Holy shit. Let's set up, let's set up a flag, you know? So different world now. Yeah. Yeah. So I, so I actually really, truly deeply agree with you about that. So, so we can flake that. We have cops. We have the drug policies.

We have the crazy economic thing and just crazy pressure. But I don't want to get in a rant. But I'm just saying that, like, you know, that's why people go crazy in riot. Because it's just a lot of shit. And it's like, how do you start? And, Noam, when you were talking earlier about, like, the motivations of this particular police officer, whether he was intending to murder the man or whether he was simply intending to sadistically torture the man,

like those are both, I think we all agree, those are both bad motivations. And whether the person is black or white, we don't want the police treating anybody like that. Of course, our country has systemic racism that makes many problems worse for black people that come out differently for white people but in this in this case in particular like aren't there laws that say like if you kill someone in the commission of a crime like if you're committing a bank robbery even if you're

the getaway driver in certain places if somebody kills somebody on the inside you can go to jail for murder even if you didn't do it now this man even if he wasn't intending to murder this guy he was clearly breaking the law violating this person's right assaulting this person like there is a there is there is a there is a murder charge which fits this looks like reckless homicide or there is a when you do something which is so reckless that you should have known somebody could be killed there There is a charge of murder. It's not a life sentence charge. It's like a 15 year charge or whatever it is. But yeah, that's absolutely a murder charge. You're referring to the felony murder rule, but it's a similar

philosophy in a way. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So I'm just saying that the in this particular case, it doesn't matter to me so much. I think like Seton was saying, was he intending to murder the man or was he only intending to sadistically torture the man? Like, those are so close that I complete them. You know what, Mike? Can I say something? And maybe after I say it, we'll all notice it. There is always a tendency to say, it doesn't really matter, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but I don't think that's right. I think everything does matter. It's important to get all the little details right. They come to bear in ways that you couldn't predict and they come to bear in future ways. It's not good to build up a pattern of events which are portrayed to be something which they weren't quite. And then on the sixth event, everybody reacts as if it's the sixth time it's happened, when actually, if you take a microscope to the

previous times, well, each one had its own thing to it. So I'm not saying that it matters in a sense of he's less guilty or less atrocious or, you know, less of a Nazi. But I do bristle at the idea that trying to just get the details right for the sake of getting the details right, or less of a Nazi, but I do bristle at the idea that trying to just get the details right for the sake of getting the details right is somehow an insight into somebody's point of view on something. I don't care which way it comes out.

Every detail should not be glossed over. We should get every detail right. I agree. As long as we don't harp on the details and get on a sidetrack to actually what's important. That's all I agree. So long as we don't harp on the details and get on a sidetrack to actually what's important. That's all I agree. So where do we go from here? I think we have time enough

to parse all the details. I think if you're intellectually curious, if nothing else, you want to slice and dice the details. Dan, can I jump in and say I disagree that we have time to parse all the details infinitely. So you sincerely must choose how much time in our limited lives we spend on in

in a given conversation in a given day. Like, where do you start? How much time do you allot? And what details are you focusing on at the expense of what details you're not? Can I say that I love Mike Kaplan because he is his own dude, all right? I don't know another guy like him, and he's very pleasant too. All right, so listen, I mean that. Thank you. I appreciate it. I thought you were going to say something nice about me, but anyway, hold on. So going back to the statistics for a second,

and then maybe to go from this. I don't think anybody should be, by the way, penalized for asking a question. Because a lot of people merely ask questions and get... Dan, I'm not penalizing you. I'm just doing, as Noam said, I want to be precise. Okay, enough, enough. I posed the question,

did he have an intention to kill and was castigated? I think all questions are valid questions. I want to get back to the statistics and I want to use that as a way to getting into what is the answer here to heal race relations. We should have started with that. The thing about the statistics, which is so frustrating and confounding, is that if those statistics are true, and as quite a few inquiries have come back with these counterintuitive results, that would do more than anything one would think to calming people down. What could be more calming than to find out, oh shit, it's really not as bad as we thought. So I think it's urgent that we get to the bottom of those statistics, because if it turns out that we have a police problem, more of a police problem and less of a racial police problem, that will be, okay, you're just being paid. Let me point out, I know you're a good person, but if I did not know you and you said the sentence, we need more evidence, I, as a black man, would be like,

well, what else do you need exactly to show that the cops are after us? Yeah, well, just to be clear, I never said we need more evidence, but as a person who reads and i mean this new york times thing this was the front page of one of the sections of the sunday times and you read these things or you see on npr you say well i mean you have two options you can say oh that's bullshit you know don't give me that shit but then you say well it's the times and it's npr and say say, uh-oh, what if this is true? What does that mean? I either have to refute it

or I have to integrate it into my thinking. And what most people do is just pretend it didn't happen. Okay, can I say something when you're done? Can I say something? I did instruct Periel early on that we have a full panel tonight and that- You instructed me? I understand. i just said that

especially if you don't see the video it's going to be hard distinguishing who's who so we don't want too many people talking but go ahead um and really noam had said that you know he asked me to send him things and in response i sent him poetry which um i you know i take great issue with because first of all, I don't believe that James Baldwin would have considered himself a poet. But in addition- The James Baldwin thing. I've read James Baldwin. Go ahead. In addition to that, so there are the statistics which you say that, or to me, you said, I don't care about those things, And therefore, I'm not serious.

Or if one doesn't care about those things, then they're not serious. And so I think that... I said that to Perrielle. I said, if you're not ready to deal with... Go ahead. So I think that that's one thing. There are the numbers, okay? And I never said that those aren't important.

But I think that what is equally as important is my distinct understanding is that there is a Black experience in this country that has been going on for decades longer than that, of course. Centuries. Centuries, thank you. It's not safe in many situations to be black in this country. And the perception of that is real and the experience of that is real. And I think that that's- What do you mean it's not safe?

What do you mean it's not safe? I'm not being flippant. Wait a minute, wait, can I say something? Can I say something? I understand what you're saying. I understand what you're saying. But I think part of our job as reflective people who don't simply obey their first instinctive reaction to an issue is to say, does my fear match up with reality?

And in order to do that, you have to look at the numbers. If you are afraid of plane crashes, which a lot of people are, and then you look at how likely you are to die of a plane crash, that can actually have an effect on how fearful you are. Like you should be much more fearful driving in a car. That's like, you know, I guess it's sort of common knowledge. Here's another example. That's even a better example. Jihadist terrorism. A lot of people are, you know, more on the American right have made claims about how afraid they are of jihadist terror, or even better in Europe when the bombs were going off in France in 2015. And if you actually look at how likely you are to be killed by a jihadist,

it's very, very low. And it matters that we don't exaggerate those risks because A, you make people paranoid when they should not be. And then the reaction to it becomes its own issue to deal with. So the reason I asked you about unsafe, and I don't want to, I really don't want to bring up this issue, but I don't see any way to not bring it up in at least in a... Well, I think one weekend, even during the pandemic, it is extremely, it's 10 times or something more or eight times more unsafe to be black in America than white. But unfortunately, and tragically, it is not because of the treatment by whites. And so when you want to bring up that black people feel unsafe in America, I wanted to know what you mean, feel unsafe when they walk down the street and they see white people or feel unsafe because they're likely, because they live in violent neighborhoods. Like what do you mean?

I'm talking specifically about white people. Well, that's where the numbers are crucial. Because there's a kidnapping in Iowa, and now my wife won't let the kids walk to the bus stop. This is actually true. She heard some story about some kids that got picked up waiting for the school bus in Iowa. She will not let our kids take the school bus. And the only argument I can make to her is, sweetheart, I know you hear these stories on the news,

but here's the actual data. It's just that every story gets a headline. Okay. What else can I say to her other than that? Noam, I really feel like your kids should not be going to school during a pandemic. I think you should be keeping them inside. And I do just want to say one nice thing to you, for sure. I am very grateful to be here in this conversation. I always am. And I'm on, I'm certainly aligned with Perrielle and her thinking a lot of the time. And also, it was funny that you said she sent you poetry. That was a very funny thing.

It certainly rubbed off hanging out with a lot of comedians. And Dan Natterman, what you said was very funny as well, when you were like, Perrielle, don't speak because we won't be able to tell whose voice is whose. Perrielle's voice is the most different than, she should be the only one speaking. I don't know if you listeners at home, Perrielle is black. I can say that about-

Oh, yeah. Mike, that's not a good point. That's a great point. Perrielle's voice is the most distinct. Maybe I just enjoy insulting her and I need to look within. Seton, you want to say something? Seton, if you could be a dictator of America for 10 years, dictator, and the only thing you wanted to do was at the end of that 10 years. Dictator. Okay. And the only thing you wanted to do

was at the end of that 10 years you wanted to fix the race problem in America. And you do it in a moral and decent way. What would you do? Where would you start? What would you actually do? I'd remove the police department, the justice system,

the school system. I'd make universal health care. I'd teach kids how to actually make money. And I'd actually figure out a new way of justice. That's it. So let's start with the first one. We have no police. I had to figure out a...

I don't know how to transition to that point, but, no, I don't think... Like I said, I don't think justice is a valid form of actual human society. I think it's a flawed form. I think it's... I think there's a point. There's actually, there's been evidence of smaller tribes. There's one tribe, I want to say South America

or Africa, I apologize. There was one where when there was, when one villager fucked up, did something horrible, all the villagers would put him in the middle and every villager would sit down and tell him one good thing about him before, you know. So get him to just fucking change his mind. All we do now is when somebody fucks up,

we just tell them how horrible they are, and we throw them in a cage, and we curse at them, and then we treat them like shit, and we expect them to come back to society and to be good people. So no, I just think justice is actually a flawed premise. And that's why right now, that's what the whole idea about,

of course the cops try to create justice on black people, but then black people want more justice to get these riots, and now other black people are mad at those black people. And there's nothing, everybody's looking for justice and nobody's ever going to be satisfied. So I don't like justice. Have you guys, are you familiar with, I think it's restorative justice. I remember watching Wyatt Cenac's show on HBO, Problem Areas. And it's amazing. He covers like in the first season, it's all about, you know, racial injustice and every episode from a different angle. And there was one particular episode

where they sat down with an older couple whose child, whose daughter had been killed by her boyfriend or her ex-boyfriend who had been maybe drunk, angry, whatever it was, and he had been sentenced to, I think what would have been 40 years in jail. And then they, through a program of restorative justice, they sat down with him they don't want him like they know that he is sorry they know that like it doesn't bring

their daughter back and so they sat down with him and had like these you know therapeutic sessions wherein like that he was then i think now only in jail for 20 years because and they all the parents of the dead woman were like, came out of this feeling, you know, happier as much as they could with being able to connect with this person. So in situations where that is possible, like so many people whose, whose children have been killed, like don't want the death penalty, even for the person that killed their, their loved one, because they don't want the, they don't want violence to beget violence. They don't want the grief to beget more grief. So, I mean, certainly I don't want the they don't want violence to beget violence. They don't want the grief to beget

more grief. So I mean, certainly, I don't know how we get to no prisons, no mass incarceration, no police, but it's certainly incremental. It's not like make them disappear immediately. But definitely one step at a time. Call more than one thing. I don't know if y'all read outliers. I'm sure everybody in the circle has read Outliers. But there was a, I was just reading that chapter about the Hatfields and the McCoys, about there was a whole trend of white people killing each other, white people all over this justice stuff. So I just also, I just

want to also harp on the point of like black people killing black people. Yeah, but white people kill each other for years, much more. So that's just the cultural, the cultural guns in our country, the bigger problem. problem but again justice is the main course oh i was just i was just gonna say i think i think we need the police um but i think we conflate police and prisons those are two different things uh we can have a robust and well-trained and you know a lot of police you know part of the reason they can be so awful is because um they're overworked like there are not enough of them can be so awful is because they're overworked. Like there are not enough of them to police a certain neighborhood. So they're, they're not sleeping enough. And even, even the better half of cops, you know, on, on overwork can, can sort of mess up. So like having

police is one thing. Prison is a different thing. We over, we, we, our sentences are longer than, you know, the vast majority of European countries. And it does very little to deter crime. It doesn't make sense, you know, especially because a lot of, a lot of people who commit crime in their 20s, by the time they're 40, they're a completely different person. They have less testosterone. They're just like a very different person. And yet we have this thing where your, you know, your third crime can get you a longer sentence when you're much less of a danger to society in your 40s and 50s. So there's all kinds of, and that's been like pretty, pretty known in criminology for a long time. It's just a matter of, you know, politicians always being able to win on these tough on crime

policies, which is, which is a very big problem, but different than getting rid of the police. I don't think that would work. That would just create chaos. What am I saying? Do what you can. Who would dictator Coleman? What would dictator Hughes?

How would you fix race relations in America? I couldn't fix race relations in America, but what I would do is, is I would legalize weed. To, to, so, so that cop, you know, cause it just creates so many problems. I would decriminalize probably all drugs unless I got a really compelling argument for, for with one of the more dangerous ones, why it should remain criminal. I would, I would, you know, mandate police body cams. I would try to create independent outside review boards, not like civilian review boards, where it's like Joe Schmo telling a telling a cop with 20-20 hindsight what he's done,

but like experts that have no like ties to the police adjudicating them that are independent. So, and I mean, that's what, those are the immediate things that I would do on the police issue specifically. The fire department, they would be, they're not in the police and they would be very, I think, measured and objective.

Also, maybe we have it be like, prison be like the Israeli military, like everybody goes to prison from 18 to a couple years later, and then they come out when they're less likely to offend, you know, like everyone should have a service job, everyone should go to prison, and then we'd make prison a little nicer. I say as a joke, I mean, also, sincerely, bail reform would be great, because I think bail mostly doesn't do much. Like, most people show up when they've, like, hardly anybody's jumping bail. Like, they're like, hardly anyone's, like,

doing voter fraud. Like, all the things, the fears are overblown. And it used to just be, like, the sheriff arrests you, you know, long ago, and then they'd be like, all right, now, come back on this day. And most people would. And then like so many innocent people, so many poor people, so many, you know, people not yet proven guilty and who might never be proven guilty because they're not guilty will, you know, rot, will just like wait in jail. Some of them die in jail because they can't afford, you know, the however many, even a small amount of money.

So I think I would, I would, I know I wasn't asked to be a dictator and I don't wanna be, but I would dictate bail reform as well. How about we turn the question to Noam. Noam, if you were the dictator. I don't know that top-down much can be done. I mean, all the things that Coleman said in terms of laws, I would agree, and doing body cams especially.

But you know, Dan, I think I said that about body cams 10 years ago. I think that Coleman and I read this article recently, but I kind of had felt the same way, that intermarriage and inter interracial encouraging the races to mix more and more would be a really, really, a really, really good thing as we come out of it on the other end to, to, you're admitting defeat. You're admitting that live together unless we're all the same, admitting that there is a part of human nature which is never going to go away which which sees the world as us versus them and we all we all notice it in ourselves and and it's that's never going to go away so maybe that would solve it or maybe we're

just people just divide on other things but at least if they divide on other things it's not quite as ugly as race i get i would i would try to, I mean, you see this both in the white community and the black community, although right now I think it's having a more harmful effect in the black community. I would try to get fewer single parent homes. I would try to see what can be done. We know that a child of a family where the mother and father are together and have been and have stayed married i mean colman might know the stat by heart but it's a huge difference in their um prospects for success in life than one who didn't and that at some point is a decision that somebody makes

i'll be able to handle it or whatever it is i have that that close to me in my own family, but... You realize now, the extension of what you're saying is the complete destruction of certain communities that enjoy being those communities, the Jewish community, many of them. Yes, yes, yes. I think, you know, that's fine. That's what America, if you want, if it means that much to you, you don't have to stay in America. I mean, that was gonna force you, but that's the thing. And finally- Do you agree with them that like the crack, the drug laws is actually what took the black men out of the home from the first place?

I don't know the answer to that. Here's the thing with that. That's the truth. People think they can solve mass incarceration by legalizing drugs. They can't. Jon Pfaff wrote a great book about this. You just look at the numbers of people in prison,

ask how many of them are there for homicide, aggravated assault, drugs. The people that are there for only drug crimes, it's less than one in five people in prisons in America. You could release them all and we would still have probably the highest

incarceration rate in the world. Are those homicides drug-related? How many of those homicides are not drug-related? That's a good question. I mean, some of the homicide is enabled by the fact that drugs are illegal to begin with. I just know a person who shot

a dude over a weed deal. So I'm just saying people are crazy. Not that i'm defending anybody but i'm just also uh listen i didn't get my last day out but i just want to say i have kids now and i've said this before and i've said to my wife like i can't even imagine it takes up all our time my wife and and me together and we have means and we live in a very safe neighborhood where we don't really worry about the influences and their peers and we have means and we live in a very safe neighborhood where we don't really worry about the influences and their peers and all that stuff. And still, I know if I didn't devote,

if I didn't see parenthood as basically a full-time job, my kids would be sacrificed. They would not do their homework. They wouldn't amount to anything. And so, you know, I can't even imagine what it must be like to be an unwed black woman in a poor neighborhood where the peers and the neighborhoods are violent, whatever it is. We are, these kids are being relegated to hopelessness, hopelessness. And it's like my grandfather, when I was a little boy i went to israel with my my father to visit my grandfather and at that time in israel uh there was a lot of uh people dying in car accidents in tel aviv and my grandfather said to my father says you know menachem in israel jewish life is very very precious but only when it's threatened by Arabs. And that is very much a human nature, meaning that yes, it's very important and very ugly to see racism,

especially racism that leads to death. But we also have to worry about the car accidents that are happening within the community, which I'm referring to the violence within the community, the children growing up without hope, even if they never saw a white person. And, you know, these are things that not easy for a white guy to say. And I'll add to it that I can't imagine how the crime rate doesn't drive a resentment with the police, even if the police were angels. If you have like in New York, where 98.6% of shootings are in the non-white community, according to the FBI statistics, 98.6, you're going to have cops constantly interacting suspiciously with the community of color, constantly, every day, over and over, until they can't fucking take it anymore because most

of them are innocent 90 99 of them are innocent but this is an untenable situation to have crime stats like that and no matter how good the cops are just the interactions alone are going to make people boil over i'm i worry so i argue that they would the situation wouldn't boil over. I worry. I argue that the situation wouldn't boil over if they didn't have as many laws. I'm not just referring to drug laws. Let's talk about social distancing. It's in the paper now. The difference in the social distancing

execution alone. I saw that video. There was a dude thrown on the ground hanging out while other white people were jogging. You're going to like me now. I said 25 years ago when they tried when they want when they pass a seat belt law oh yeah it's just gonna give cops another excuse to pull black people over yes more people think that more laws creates a better society and more laws creates just more criminals that is the thing more laws does not create more safety yeah no may i say

here is where i agree with you I like the idea of the two parent household in fact I like it so much I think mandatory polyamory mandatory triads at least quads sincerely people children being raised in those households I would love to see the data on when there's more than two parents available

how much that helps the children sincerely of course I'm into data for you. I also like Coleman, when you talked about how police are overworked, certainly decriminalizing weed, decriminalizing drugs, prostitution, sex work, all of these things will give police fewer, like if they have fewer laws, fewer crimes, fewer things to look for, then they can hopefully get more rest and not have to worry i will fix the race problem again i will fix the race problem i forgot i've said this many times

and i've totally forgot it there should be mandatory two years public service not necessarily military but with it you know a draft where all americans are thrown in together, black, white, Asian, whatever it is, and get to know each other and get to build real relationships with people other than themselves, I believe. Because one of the problems with even discussing this stuff often is that the people discussing it have no common love for each other. They just don't. And, and black people need to get to know white people just as much as white people need to get to know black people and understand that I teased Mike, but I do feel that way. That's not just that they're just not something you read about in the papers and in books, you know? And I do notice that a lot of really, really woke people, they actually have very few close relationships with anybody that they're fighting for.

They don't really have deep relationships with black friends and stuff. Do you have data on that, Noam? No, I said I don't. I will notice that. I will say it's a lot easier in America to not talk to a black person than it is to not know about white people.

I know a lot more black people who know white people just as a rule. We gotta know where y'all are at at all times. And white people are gonna be like, are there black people in the room? So that's a little bit of a difference there. Come on, nodded no at National Service and he also wanted to say something, go ahead.

I just don't, I hate the idea that I wouldn't get to choose how to spend two years of my life, but. Yeah. I'm a dictator, so that's why I did it. Well, there are a lot of people in prison who don't get to decide as well what they do with a few years of their life. That's not the same thing because they committed a crime to get there. Not everyone in prison.

He's a comedian. Yeah, exactly. Some of them did. Some of them had to throw a gun thrown on them by a cop. It's true. Not everything that I say is backed by data as well. So go ahead, Coleman. Do you want to say something else? I was going to say, you know, this, you said, you know, with the overworked police officers,

we take them off of these petty drug cases that are literally solving nothing. And they would have time to actually focus on their jobs. And one of their most important jobs is solving homicides and violent crimes. And there are places in this country where the majority of homicides go unsolved. And by the majority, I mean, like in the worst, most dangerous neighborhoods in Chicago, there are estimates sometimes of over 90% of murders going unsolved.

So quick question. So basically, if there were no police, they would solve about the same number of crimes as with the police. No, there'd be more crimes. And what percent of those homicides are of black people? Almost 100, almost 100%. Yeah, let's be clear,

lots of white people down around the country too. Let's not lie. We just don't talk about it very much, but they're shooting each other constantly too. Yes, but okay, so if you look at it, look at what is the number one cause of death for black men. Let's see, I'm, what am I, 24? Black men, 24, number one cause of death,

according to the CDC, is homicide. That is not true. That is not true of white men, Hispanic men. In fact, it's worse than that because the number one cause of death for Black men in their 20s. American Black men. American Black men kills more than numbers two through 10 on that same list. So it's just like, it's completely focused on this one demographic. It's even an age-based thing. Like it's 15 to early 30s with a focus on the 20s.

And that's... I hated being 24, nigga. I ain't gonna lie to you. I hated it. I hated every second of it. I hated how cops fucked with me. I remember one time, just a random story, random cop story since we're just hanging out.

I remember one time I was coming from work. It was about 2 in the morning. I walked right outside the hotel. I was walking to the hotel. I had my hoodie on. I remember this plainclothes cop car pulled out. Five dudes jumped out of this car and fucking grabbed me. And they pulled my head off. And they were like, oh, that's not you. And they were like, get a haircut. Just kind of pushed me and told me to move on. I know it's not a horrible police

story. It's just one of those, ah, it happens all the time. I just got to get used to it. Don't bury the lead, though. I think that's serious. That's exactly my point. I think that's very serious because for those few minutes, whatever it is, your entire body, all your vital signs are at maximum. And it's angering. And then, go ahead. And these neighborhoods where 90% of murders are going unsolved, the cops, even when the cops are trying to do their jobs and are doing it well, if you have a neighborhood that's been over-policed on petty drug crime and situations where people's hair has been grabbed and the detective comes asking questions, you have no reason to believe that these people

really care about you, that they have your best interests at heart, that when they say they're going to put you in witness protection and protect you, that they're actually going to make good on that promise. And that all contributes to why the crime rate is so high in some of these places. What about having the police live in the communities? Is there any data on that? I don't know that I've seen data on that, but anecdotally, yeah, like the best detectives are the ones that know people by name, know business owners by name, are respected and trusted. They know who to talk to. They have confidential informants. What do you think about increasing, making an effort to increase the black presence in the police force? Do you think that's a solution? Well, they tried that in the 40s.

Yeah, yeah. A lot of places have done that already. Yeah, in the 60s too. I don't know. I mean, I haven't seen so much evidence that black cops are any different than white cops. Yeah, but the incidents are less hard to watch.

I mean, there's a whole rule. There's a rule, though. Every rap song back in the early 90s was like, yo, black cops are much worse than white cops. Right, but if Floyd had his head under the knee of a black cop, it would have been riots. That guy would be in jail already,

because they already got that other black cop in jail. But would there have been riots? I think that's a really interesting question to ask because I don't know the answer to that, but it does seem like because of the way we think about race, the optics are everything in these cases. You see a white cop do the same thing to a white person and it's barbaric and it hits you hard, but there's some extra little judge that actually doesn't have even if it's just as cruel yeah if i saw if i saw a gang of um any color asians blacks whatever to beating up a jewish guy with a yarmulke on i can't help i would i would try to um control myself and not jump to conclusions but viscerally you say those those those fucking Asians are beating up the Jew, right?

But if I saw a bunch of Jews beating up one of their own, it's a totally different thing that I'm seeing. It's really night and day. It's completely different. And we are all slaves to that visceral reaction within us. I don't know how you can train it out of us. No, you said we're all slaves? Okay.

We're all slaves. That was a weird choice of words. But I will say, though, back to the psychotherapy shit. We are, as a nation, we need to have a revolution about how we handle our minds. We don't do religion no more, and we don't really accept therapy. Half of us do, half of us don't.

There needs to be a revolution on that because the trauma triggers that we're talking about now are so apparent. You said it, I'm like, we need to figure out a way to solve that problem. It's definitely a mental problem. Seton, can I ask you a question? It's going to sound important, but it's not going to be.

I'm just going to be joking. Just in that situation, I'm so sorry that you've experienced, you know, the violence and the fear that you have. But did you get a haircut? That's my question. Yeah, man, I did. Okay, thank you. I employed a Negro. And come over. And yeah, man, I actually want this. I kind of want my barber to come to my house. I'm sick of going to barbershops like this.

I mean, I think also what we need, I think what you said about therapy, what you said about, you know, addressing like not only historical trauma, but like, you know, life in our lifetime, the things, the way that we are socialized as humans, but also certainly as men, like the way that men are socialized in our society

is like the people who are like, I don't like therapy. I would say, I don't have the data, but my guess is that more of them will skew male like the idea of, you know, older, older men, like, I don't I don't know what the numbers are, like, certainly more, more people that I know, are saying things like you're like, therapy is good. Addressing trauma is good. And talking about, you know, talking about your feelings is a better way of addressing your anger than being violent, which is what a lot of people do the reverse of. Yeah, man. Yeah.

I have a Zoom show in 15 minutes, but we all don't need me. I don't know if we're wrapping things up or. We have to, we're all don't need me. I don't know if we're wrapping things up or we have to, we're way over time. Anybody else have any final thoughts they want to share? Hopes, dreams. I see Coleman. I see you, man. Great to see you too,

seen. I would like for the new dictatorship of America to be a team of Coleman and Seton and Perriel. That's what I want in charge. Try on correct, if you will. Thank you, Mike. I appreciate that vote of confidence. Can we share Mike and Seton's new album information?

Do we have? Yes, of course. Yeah. Seton's schedule. I have it here. So this is, I don't want to get that off there. Seton Smith's new album, Comedy, the Lockdown Special. Yeah.

Available where? YouTube.com, Seton Smith. Available at YouTube.com. Mike Kaplan, a.k.a, that's a dove on his head. Oh yeah. He signed. And that, but you would,

what a shock that this would be woke comedy. So those are two. And where's yours available, Mike? You can download on iTunes. You can stream it wherever you stream albums. You're listening to this. I believe if you search for my name and AKA,

you will find it. Don't forget to read all of Coleman Hughes' articles at City Journal. Is it Coleman? Yes. Are you no longer writing for Quillette? No, no longer. We're friends, aren't we? You never

mentioned it to me. And Noam, what do you have against birds? Nothing. You're talking about that privately. Coleman has a podcast as well, Conversations with Coleman. Conversations with Coleman. I kind of wish we were all hanging out

because I don't really want this to end, but we have to end. We'll see each other again in person. Don't worry, man. Racism's not going to win. We can talk again. I believe I think that racism, yeah, there's no cure for it. It has to be managed, like diabetes. But that's what I think.

I think... I have to say that I think the overwhelming majority of people of every color, even if they have certain views, chauvinistic views about their people, I don't want my son to marry one of whatever it is, are abhor racial violence like this. I think it's very little constituency in 2020 for wanting to see anybody hurt, beaten up, horribly mistreated based on their race. And it pains me that this is becoming

kind of the rap on America. I think it's deeply unfair without regards to the problems within the police department. I think America is by no means a collection of mostly bad people, I really don't. I think if you don't address, I mean, I think the lack of addressing them after slavery this whole time, I mean, I think saying apology, just apologizing is not the solution.

I think there's a more of a systematic structure thing. And that's why the bad, I think, I don't know. I think the bad reputation is. Well, then Dictator Smith ought to have, ought to have some better suggestions because that was my question. How do you address it? That's what I'm saying. Getting rid of the police.

I was in a certain way calling that issue. Like, okay, you say we should address it. We've wasted our time. We haven't done it. Like, okay, what would you do? It's not, the answers are not that apparent. That's all I'm saying. Eliminate all the bullshit laws that are putting black people in the position they are,

which I've said a thousand times. Most of the violence is coming from men, so let's just put women in charge of everything, and I think let's try that for a while. That's not a bad idea. Good call. Good call. Okay, also you can send comments and suggestions to podcast at comedyseller.com.

Tell us what you like, what you don't like about the podcast, and who you might want to see on, who you might want to see back. Do you want to see Mike Kaplan back on? Well, we can't read your mind. So we'll see you next time.

We have Howie Mandel will be with us, I believe, on the next show. Is that right, Perio? I think there's a brief case and you get to decide whether you want Howie Mandel or a different person. Yes, Howie will be on. Howie Mandel will be a little bit less charged. And follow us on at live from the table on Instagram.

All right, everybody. See you next time. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Good night. Good night. Whoops.