Joe Rogan Experience #1419 — Daryl Davis Transcript

Transcript

0:00 Two, one, good. I read your story. So everybody likes music, even the KKK. I was the only black guy in the band, Where'd you come from? And I explained, yeah, you know, they told me they played here before, Oh, no, no, no. And then he announces, And innocently, I asked him. He looks at me just as plain as day. And I knew a Klansman would not come up and just throw his arm around some black guy's shoulder

4:12 I looked at it. to this bar so he could bring his friends, meaning Klansmen and Klanswomen, to see this black guy play like Jerry Lee. Now, they didn't come in robes and hoods, right? My question was, how can you hate me when you don't even know me? That's how naive I was. Adults were throwing rocks and bottles at a 10-year-old boy. Right. my mother and father, who were not there,

7:57 1968. Okay. I'll tell you why. Because my dad was a U.S. Foreign Service. This looks like the United Nations of little kids because that's exactly what it was. I was living about 12 years into the future So I was very curious about it and fascinated with it. I thought for some reason my parents are lying to me because my 10-year-old brain could not process the idea that someone who had never seen me, had never spoken to me, knew nothing about me, would want to inflict pain upon me for no other reason than the color of my skin.

11:23 Okay, so it's here, but why? met this fell right into your lap Somebody who would go that far to join the KKK Klansman or interviewing them, who would have easier access or could join the Klan undercover, What was his reaction? what makes you guys tick? from the Silver Dollar Lounge. And so I had no way of, you know, letting him know I'm going to come over and talk to you.

14:22 He comes back in. He goes, well, I was, but I quit. I later found out in my research that, and I got this from the guy who banished him, the leader of that particular Klan group. Today, there are many Ku Klux Klan groups, and they all are autonomous. Do we do it later? They have passwords? Exactly, precisely. they will hold a unified front. Because they may have been in the same Klan at one time and something happened.

17:55 that person is known as the imperial wizard. governor, and then secretary treasurer. And then within the state, you have counties. The county Wow. That's hilarious. So if you addressed them, you would say, Sir Exalted Cyclops? Yeah. But they have all these different names. How many members? They don't give out numbers, but Roger had probably just over 200, which is a very high number for that time period.

20:33 I said, but you're not in the Klan anymore. he warned me. He said, Darrell. Well, that guy could crack under pressure. He warned you? And the headquarters for the Klan is right down the road. But that's where it was headquartered. No, no. profession. I called my secretary who books my band. woman walking into a Klan bar. Right. Boom. We locked the car, walk up these little steps. And I told her, I said, look, I'm going

24:27 And what he meant by Klan bar is the Klan doesn't own it, but that's where they hang out. But I figured, you know what, and to my right was a long bar. So I knew I was in the right place or the wrong place, basically looking stupid and not knowing what to do. Everything was cool. The next morning, Mary walked out of my house. He'll be curious. And secondly, if he agreed to do the interview knowing that I was black,

28:13 I had no idea what this man would do once he laid eyes on me and saw that I was black. And the room is You have to literally walk in the door and turn to your right, and the Now, I've read through the Bible. And by the way, Mary's white, as I mentioned before. Of course it does. And embroidered on his barrette is said Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. You know, or is this an ambush, and what's going on here? I could read it. They were thinking, did the desk clerk give us the right room number?

31:43 He shook my hand. uninvited with any nefarious intentions? What had happened was one of his Klan members lived right down the road from me. Not at all. We are prone to crime. Anyway, so I'm a criminal. He also said that black people are lazy. We don't go to jail or whatever. Anyway, so I'm a criminal. Yeah, you know the one. So now I'm sitting there listening to this guy tell me that I'm a criminal

36:03 He sees the color of my skin and has made this assessment. you know how can i be offended by somebody who's who's all twisted right you know, who obviously doesn't have the foresight to see that he's wrong. So I didn't roll on with it. And then when he finished, you know, and he was proud of him, you know, explaining to me, you know, why the stance.

37:32 And I'd reach down into my bag and pull out a fresh cassette. I mean, I got that. But, you know, I realize that these people are afraid of me. So, you know, he's doing his job. a while, he realized there was It went like that. because my ear could not discern what the noise was I knew that because I didn't make it. What did I just do? Daryl, do not fool with Roger Kelly.

40:49 I'm going to tell you in a second. They faint. from whatever the fear is. And that is your best option. When something scares you You can see his gun right there. grab the Nighthawk, I didn't say one word to this guy, but my eyes had locked with his eyes. what did either one of y'all just do? Mary was sitting to my left on top of the dresser That was it.

43:58 And you'd been talking for an hour? in that hour is the tension. Because it came out of nowhere. Right. and the learning will come later. that frighten us. destruction. It stopped just short of that. Had I pounced across the table and hurt one of them, on August 12th, 2017, in Charlottesville, Virginia, Don't worry about the hatred. When you cure the ignorance, you know something. There's nothing to fear. If there's nothing to

48:52 Everybody laughed. How long did you guys talk that day? Absolutely. So you take a narrative that fits your narrative. He pointed to this verse, and I read it, what does that mean, Mr. Kelly? You know, we're different species. He came down to my house with the Nighthawk. Did you let them know in advance? Okay. And sometimes You know, I'm not going to ride with you.

52:48 And I could see him beginning to like me a lot. my book. Now, I would see him for, you know, like two years. And by the end of two years, he had not invited me to his house. Well, yeah, they call it a den. It's a room. and a cross. And the cross has either candles on it, so it, things like that, and a cross. The wooden cross is wrapped in burlap. for my clan. White power, white power. Klansmen approach the cross, and they all close in,

56:13 but you know i knew what to expect pretty much because i read all these books yeah so you know It's a warning. All right, a cross lighting is when they do a 30 or 20 or 30 foot cross at a ceremony. What do they talk about? So these are the topics that they cover. He began. That's him right there in his grand dragon robe. There it is. That's the hood, yeah.

59:25 You said you guys got closer. And I said, okay. He goes, you talk to you about. And I said, okay. He's the top dog. yeah They knew why he did it. He received some hate mail. He began receiving some hate mail And I have repeated this process many times with different people. You can find some black person who has a very low IQ. was riding around in my car one day with me.

1:02:34 That's one of their narratives. I said, you know, you're not even considering the demographics. How do you explain that? He's over here all smothered, you see, nothing to say. Ed Gein, right. I said, you're genius agent. But, I mean, you could almost see it, Joe. And his robe was the very first robe I ever got. And he wanted to go over to the courthouse for something.

1:05:53 He said, trash it. I said, But something told me, just take it, Daryl. And so I'm walking up the stairs with him to the apartment. Had his robe, his hood, a Klan belt buckle. And you don't destroy history. What's a 501c3? Most of them I do. And so It has little Confederate flags here, you know, clan patches. the Liberty Road Synagogue. And he was convicted. He went to prison for four years. This is before

1:09:23 That's what causes these splinter groups. You know, cyclops, wizard, dragon, whatever, He was not an undercover cop in the Klan gathering intelligence. He was a bonafide Klansman on the Baltimore City Police Force. And there are more. There are more. anti-Semitic and racist and very, very violent. But he went on to become one of my best friends. They are very racist and very corrupt.

1:11:12 whatever. You're causing us too much publicity. He began dealing in homing pigeons. In fact, probably not most of them. There are different reasons. Grandfather dug coal. We can save money, make a lot more money if we lay off our employees and hire some of these immigrants, whether they're legal or illegal, because they'll work for less than half of what we're paying our people, right?

1:14:43 job. You know, why is that? Give me an application. And somebody else is doing my job. So what do I have to lose? Give me an application. so you know those it will say a black musician converts 200 Klansmen And this is the way to go. these people when I saw a fault with what they were saying in their ideology, I said, well, But he does have a point.

1:18:06 so the continued exposure to you That had to help. Caricatures. in the green room He's a 1920s, right? He joined for a short time. He was a Grand Clegal. Particularly a long time ago. But they cannot hold the highest offices. That was 1983. the Dave Chappelle bit Clayton Bigsby Dave Chappelle he's a comic genius. They are a pressure cooker it more seriously than we do.

1:23:03 Do I want to sit back and see what my country becomes? I'm sure you have friends. But I find it more and more necessary because we have dropped the ball. you can't see it. It's always there. Back in the day, there was only one group, the Ku Klux Klan. More than that. Indiana. That's fucking crazy. We're supreme. whatever. The membership began dwindling. People began dropping out. All right. It was too violent

1:26:41 their own neighborhoods, their own churches, like a patriot. So you're a nationalist. I'm a nationalist. Why do we have to say white nationalist? a rose by any other name is what? you something let me i'm gonna show you something okay okay the the rally there was called unite KKK showing up, were those Yeah. They were there too. You recall that? Okay.

1:30:15 The white supremacists have been predicting and have been preparing for a race war. great ancestors fought in the Confederacy. That's my heritage. I don't want you messing with it. Black slaves had to fight for their slave owners. But Virginia was the seat of the Confederacy. Mostly in the South. And no, they don't condone slavery. Yeah. why can't they march together in 2017? could fight together 150 years ago,

1:34:33 But what are the numbers? Instead of inviting or including blacks and Jews, they excluded them in 2017. So, instead of and they marched through the University of Virginia campus with their tiki torches and Those people were long dead and gone by 1865. These people, many fathers of these people in Charlottesville, So what did the Nazis have to do with our heritage?

1:37:39 And that's what the media failed to tell us because what the media did was they went to I would say probably about 95% of people there were about hate. which there should be. That guy seemed to be the epitome of a lost soul that got sucked into a horrible ideology. And a status. organization as an advisor. the internet. like your mind. Yeah. this festival.

1:40:58 Oh, he left? And he's a good guy. If they're willing to sit down and have a conversation, no matter how extreme they may be, there is the opportunity to plant a seed. But if you spend five minutes with your worst enemy, you will find something in common. You've gone from here to a relationship. And I'll be honest, the most important thing that you have in any endeavor is your credibility, your credibility.

1:43:56 Movement guy? The same way. Same way. Exact same way. And what was the conversation like with him? You know, otherwise we're going to self-destruct. And Mark Twain said, travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness. Minds.com. and then you engage them? closer to you and get to appreciate you that's that's the credibility i'm talking about because

1:48:00 that affords me a second visit with them and a third. Because if they didn't like me, if their first impression of me was, I know. Yeah. I think Minds has the best platform. But does Minds have the same sort of algorithm that directs things towards you that you're interested in that could facilitate people getting upset you know facebook does that yeah and it turns out that most of what people

1:50:13 What didn't impress you? first started this podcast 10 years ago i probably wasn't very good at it you know i didn't really Like, let's go back to Roger Kelly. He's not seeing what led up to that. I mean, it's one of the worst times for interaction face-to-face. 2010-ish. What did he used to do? Do you know him? You take an oath to join those organizations.

1:54:48 No, but I think I'm going to do it on this one. It'll be gone in a couple of days, that laryngitis. What was the impetus? And I was like, this guy just set up a studio in his basement. all it was i just kept doing it and then it went from thousands to millions to just this weird there's a part of their brain that knows it's toxic and they they deny that they ignore that

1:57:54 Well, that's the argument about deplatforming people online. Where's that coming from? Look, here's a satellite photo. God, he's genius. Because, you know, we – it wasn't until recently that we began using that word domestically Yeah, like, what do they call them? what do they call them they call them militants oh like the black panthers oh okay okay right right

2:00:53 It seems the same shit to me. Really? Okay, take America back. I'm not going to let my little white boys and girls I say well you don't say take our country back from who Right. Last time I checked, Bill Clinton was a Democrat. Right, right. All right? Columbus is not American. Sailed the ocean blue. And then when you get older and you read these missionaries' accounts of the horrific crimes.

2:05:11 Yeah. Maybe Apple's ahead of its time. george washington day and abraham lincoln day really one of those days you remember that i It was during my time. George Washington Day and Abraham Lincoln Day. So they combined those two days into one day called President's Day. And now we had to fight for decades to give this man a holiday when he gave his life to bring this country together.

2:06:44 Now, there are a lot of people Let me explain. For the longest time, we needed Black History Month. now it's in the textbooks But we knew. shortest month of the year, right? February, 28 days. No coincidence. But we accepted it for two has become detrimental to us, We did our black thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then next year, next February, it's the same half a dozen people.

2:10:54 discoveries and inventions? Oh, well, we didn't have time for that. We only have one month. And it was all white women. You know, they didn't have talent. to give them something to aspire to. And since that time, we've had more than one Miss America who's been black, starting with We just finished the first black American president. Right. And I'll say that perhaps we are

2:14:19 We invented that technology. You're talking to people next door in Nevada because he or she is a different color, a different religion, Yet there's still so many of us thinking we're still in age minds. a lot of education they don't have a lot of information and they don't have a lot of perspective Get him. So these people are willing to help on minds and help um point out

2:18:21 find the music and the video and yes yes oh. Oh, yeah. Because kids grab, you know, because they play video games all day. It lures them in. But, you know, back to what I their biggest nemesis, of course, were black people at 12%. You've heard that term before, right? You don't realize it's a negative term. oh yeah that one's obvious. Yeah, the railroad track divided

2:20:21 black people, So let's just take 12% black, 13% Hispanic, let alone 6% Asian or whatever. Precisely. Come join us. Canadians or people from the UK or Eastern Europe. But if they let their grandkids marry somebody from El Salvador or Guatemala or Nigeria, So people see the landscape changing. Or into a black church. It's only one person. It's at a measurable decline, but not enough.

2:24:47 Our country is truly a melting pot, proliferating their BS to these younger generations, you know? They didn't want their kid going to school and learning about sex. Out in the street. They have more information. I mean, is that something that's taught? If they don't learn it there, you put him in a private school. if you could explain to kids what happens online, how they draw you in,

2:28:31 fault are churches. Well, when I say churches, I mean religious institutions, which would include And your Sunday school lesson, when you're four or five years old, they teach you that we're all God's children. one Sunday morning, hey, folks, guess what? all a rainbow. So my mom says, so, Daryl, who are you taking to the senior prom? but is not a God word

2:31:19 that God did not make But is a man word. In other words, they put money above morality. One of the most influential, unless you're an atheist, of course, the most influential have excellent morals. What's that all about? It doesn't matter. in a church or a synagogue or a temple, Those megachurches always seem to me to be run by cult leaders that are keeping it together.

2:34:34 Yeah. Well, I'm going to hook you up with some friends of mine like Jeff Scoop, out? I provide for these people when they come out. You stay away from this house. Just like gangs. You have disgraced them. it follows you your friends have disowned you. only one R. Daryldavis.com. Let's do it again.