How Do You Talk a Klansman out of the Klan? Ask Daryl Davis.

28:09And on the breaks, I'd make my way, you know, over to his table, thank him for coming. I'd meet some of those people. Two of them would get up and walk across the room when they saw me coming. So the message implied was, you know, we don't want to shake your hand. We don't want to touch you or even talk to you. We just want to look at you. That was fine. So, you know, I talked to the ones who were there at the table. And then when I'd go back to the bandstand time to play, those two would come back over and sit down at the table. So this went on until the end of 83. And I quit the band, and I went back to playing rock and roll and blues and R &B and whatever else was going on.

28:47I forgot about him. I really had no reason to go hang out with the Klan in Frederick, Maryland at that time. That would come later. But then a few years later, it dawned on me, Daryl, you blew it. The answer to your question that's been plaguing you since the age of 10, how can you hate me when you don't even know me? It fell right into your lap and you didn't even realize it. Nobody else had been able to answer that question. All the books that I have talk about racism, but they don't tell you why. And when I would ask people, how can somebody hate somebody when they don't even know them? Because I didn't grow up that way, right?

29:29People would say to me, oh, Daryl, you know, some people are just like that. That's just the way it is. That's not an answer. So it dawned on me, Daryl, you blew it. The answer to your question fell right into your lap and you didn't even realize it. Who better to ask that question of than someone who would go so far as to join an organization that has over a hundred year history of practicing hating people who don't look like them, who don't believe as they believe. Get back in contact with that Klansman and see if he'll fix you up with the leader of the state. A state leader is called a grand dragon.

30:07A national leader is called an imperial wizard. So see if he'll fix you up with the Grand Dragon and then the Imperial Wizard. And then interview that guy, travel up north, travel down south, travel to the Midwest and west, and interview different Klan leaders and members and write a book. Because no book had been written on the Ku Klux Klan by a Black author at that point. There had been two books written by Black people that dealt with the Klan. One detailed how he escaped a lynching in the 1930s, and the other one talked about how he escaped a lynching in the 1940s. And so I wanted, but not from the perspective of sitting down face-to-face with their prospective lyncher and asking them, how can you hate me?

30:51Right? So I wanted that experience. So I had to track the guy down. I found his number. You know, I hadn't talked to him in years. And I found the number, but it had been disconnected. So it took me a while to track him down. He had moved and he didn't have a phone, but I got an address. So I went by his apartment one Sunday evening, unannounced, because I had no way of reaching him, right? And I knock on the door. He opens the door and he sees me. He goes, Darrell, you know, what are you doing here? And he stepped out into the hallway and I looked up and down the hallway as though, you know, if I'd brought anybody with me or something.

31:28And he's surprised I showed up at his apartment because he had since moved from where he was in Frederick. And when he stepped out of his apartment, I stepped in. So he turns around, he comes back in. He goes, what's going on, man? Are you still playing? What's going on? I said, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm still playing. But listen, I need to talk to you about the Klan. He says, the Klan? I said, yeah, you remember, right? He goes, well, I was. And he told me he had left the Klan and so forth and so on. And I said, well, where's all your Klan stuff? He says, you mean my robe and hood? I said, yeah. He goes, well, they came and got it.

32:01I said, what do you mean they came and got it? You don't own your robe and hood? And he told me this story, which I later found out to be true. When you join the Klan, you get the handbook and all kinds of materials and a robe and hood. All of this stuff costs money. And you can buy it outright, and it's yours to keep. If you don't have all the money at one time, you put in a little bit of money with your dues, extra money with your dues, until you pay it off. You can still take it, but you're paying it off along with your dues. And he had not paid off his robe and hood, so they repoed it. And he told me that when they came to get it, he couldn't find the mask that covered the face that attaches to the pointed hood.

32:46But he had since found it, and he needed to return it. I said, well, let me see it. He went back in, I guess, to his bedroom or somewhere down the hall. He came back and handed me this mask. And I'm holding it. I'm looking at it. I said, look, man, you know Roger Kelly? Yeah. Roger was my grand dragon. I said, well, listen, I need you to hook me up with Mr. Kelly. I'm going to write a book on the Klan, and I want to interview him. Oh, Daryl, I can't do that, man. I can't do that. I said, why not? He goes, I'll get in trouble. I said, you're out of the Klan. You told me you left the Klan, right?

33:20It doesn't matter. I cannot bring a black man to the Klan, to the Grand Dragon. We both will be in trouble. And he was genuinely concerned. I said, look, you got to return this mask, right? He goes, yeah. I said, give me Mr. Kelly's address. I'll go to his house. I'll return it for you. He snatched that thing right out of my hand. He said, no way. And I begged and pleaded with him for about 20 minutes to please give me Mr. Kelly's address and phone number. He finally gave it to me on the condition that I not reveal to Mr. Kelly where I got his personal information. I said, okay. And then he warned me.

33:55He said, Daryl, do not go to Roger Kelly's house. He will kill you. I said, well, that's why I need to speak with him. Why would he kill me? Just because of my skin color. You know, this is what I'm not understanding. And maybe he can explain it to me. So he warned me, you know, don't go and don't give him my name and number. I mean, don't tell him who told you all this.

34:13Coleman Hughes:Can I just ask you what, like, so putting myself in that situation, I would have a voice in my head saying, okay, if there is a 5 % chance you get killed by this guy, it's not worth it. Let's just end the journey here. Why did, did you not have that voice or did you have it and ignore it? I waited out, but I was thinking this, okay?

34:40If he had not approached me in the Silver Dollar Lounge, you know, the way he did, and let's say somebody in the band, you know, who's been playing there, you know, longer than I have, says, you know, that guy over there at that table, you know, five tables over to your left is in the Klan. I probably would not have approached him because I know the history of the Klan. I know it very well. I know the violence and the atrocities they've committed, you know, since 1865 when they were first formed. All right. I would have had that mentality. But how it happened was just some guy in the bar liked my piano playing, wanted to buy me a drink.

35:26Turns out he was a Klansman. I was shocked because he did not fit the stereotype that I had in my mind of the Klan. Okay? And obviously, I did not fit the stereotype that he had in his mind of a Black person. so that kind of counterbalanced you know that trepidation of approaching a klansman now granted um you know over the years i've had some violent confrontations with some of those people i've put some of them in the hospital i put some of them in jail for putting their hands on me okay fortunately those incidents have been you know few and far between but yes that can definitely happen your concern is definitely validated.

36:08But you know what? No risk, no gain. So, you know, that's, you know, that's how I look at it. My curiosity was more important than my safety at that particular juncture.

36:26Coleman Hughes:So when you get to know these Klansmen and you eventually get to know the, uh, not the Imperial, but maybe the up, up to the Imperial wizard, the grand, um, you know, whatever these weird grand dragon, um, in, in many cases, these people, you end up persuading these people or whatever residue you left on their soul eventually leads them to leave the clan and give you their robes, uh, symbolically at that point, once they've left, what, What story do they tell about who they were when they were in the Klan and why they were in the Klan? They were ashamed of it. You know, like Roger Kelly. He was a grand dragon when I met him.

37:16He rose to the rank of Imperial Wizard, national leader. And then, you know, he came out when he was an Imperial Wizard. You know, I asked him, you know, during interviews. because we would get together, we'd go out and have dinner even, even have lunch, things like that. After I got to know him a little bit, he was still in the Klan and still setting his ways, but I could see some changes happening. But I never thought he was going to leave, especially when he got to the rank of Imperial Wizard because now he oversees a lot of people. He was in charge of 13 states. And anyway, when I asked him early on, how can you hate me?

37:59You know, you don't even know me. And Mr. Davis, you have to understand one thing. Black people are prone to crime. And it's a fact that there are more Black people in prison. The data shows us there are more Black people in prison than white people. He's 100 % correct. Not that Black people are prone to crime, but there are more Blacks in prison than whites. And so that's all he needs. He already thinks that we're criminals. Now, the data shows there are more Black people in prison, so that is what he needs to reinforce his thinking. The data doesn't tell you why they're in prison. It just tells you that they're there.

38:37So a lot of them are there innocently. All right? So anyway, I just sit back and I'm listening to him. I'm not agreeing with him, but I'm applying one of those five core values. Allow him to be heard. Okay? Show him that respect. Not that I respect what he's saying, but I'm respecting his right to say it. And see, normally, most people would jump up and defend themselves and attack. You know, when you say, you know, you're prone to crime because of the color of your skin and things like that, then the fight would be on and it would not be productive and you each go away hating the other. All right.

39:13So that's not productive. So I'm applying those five core values. I'm listening to him. He's wondering why my buttons aren't getting pressed, because he's used to pressing buttons, and I'm not reacting. Right. All right? And then he goes on to say that black people, which I've heard many times since then, are born with a smaller brain than white people. Now, at that time, there was a book that had come out, which was a crock of nonsense, called The Bell Curve, and it said something similar to that. So the Klan quickly adopted that as their Bible, you know, and their resource for eugenics and things like that.

39:53So anyway, he's telling me that black people are born with a smaller brain than whites. And this is evidenced by the fact that every year black high school kids score lower on the SATs, scholastic aptitude tests, than white kids do. Again, he's 100 % correct. not that we are born with a smaller brain, but yes, overall, black kids do score lower. All right? Why is that? I don't tell him why it is yet. I'm just listening to him. All right? He's not realizing where do most white kids go to school? In the suburbs. Where do most black kids go to school? In the inner city. Inner city schools are not as well funded.

40:37They don't have the facilities, the computers, the textbooks, et cetera, et cetera, or the quality of teachers, all right, that the white kids do. Black kids who go to school in the suburbs can score just as high, if not higher than some of those white kids. White kids who go to school in the inner city can score just as low, if not lower than some of those black kids. It has nothing to do with the color of the kid's skin or the size of the student's brain, but it has everything to do with the educational system in which that child is enrolled, which is why, you know, whenever your parents moved around when you were growing up, first thing they wanted to know was, are the schools here in this area good for my little Coleman to go to school, right?

41:22Same thing with my parents. You know, that's why we got the heck out of Boston and went to Belmont. When we came back from overseas, we lived in an area of Boston called Roxbury. and my dad was getting his master's degree in anthropology from BU, Boston University. So he wanted to live close to the university. And when I came home after a couple of weeks and told him, I thought it was funny. The kids in my fourth grade class in Boston, Massachusetts in 1968 were still learning their ABCs. I'm not joking, Coleman. all right i knew my abcs in kindergarten i thought it was funny as anything that these fourth graders did not know their abcs so i came home i told my parents thinking they would think it's funny they didn't think it was funny they were like we're out of here yeah so we moved to belmont all right and you know and everybody there knew their abcs so another another question related to

42:25Coleman Hughes:this, I think a lot of black people or almost anyone sitting across from a Klansman having this conversation, hearing the KKK guys say black people are inferior, brains are smaller, all this stuff would be filled with rage. Exactly. And that's what he's used to. Why is it that you were not filled with rage? Does it have something to do with being maybe more secure and confident in yourself? So there's no part of you that actually feels like what he's saying could ever land on you because you have such a sense of confidence in yourself that you don't need to get mad. Like, how do you explain that?

43:07Coleman Hughes:Okay, yeah, that's part of it, Coleman, absolutely. I know who I am. And if you're going to go into a situation, the best thing you can do is prepare yourself for it by learning your opponent's other side. Put yourself in their shoes. understand where they're coming from so you know what to expect, but know who you are. Because if you go into a situation not knowing who you are, they're going to tell you who you are, and you might walk out of there believing them or getting enraged. So let's say you brought up a very good point. So yes, part of it is my own security and knowing who I am. But another big part of it, which is very important, that people need to understand is this.

43:57My upbringing. Most Americans, white or black, have not done the amount of travel that I have. In fact, that's not an opinion. That's a fact. According to our U.S. Census Bureau, less than 40 % of Americans even own a passport. So we don't travel out of the country. Europeans, they're always traveling, always going somewhere. That does not make them better human beings and somebody with less travel. The fact that I travel a lot does not make me a better human being. But what it does is it gives me a better perspective on humanity to have been exposed to all these kinds of people. All right? I'm going to give you two—make an analogy real quick.

44:39Like, if I had been here my whole life in my own country, and my first encounter with white people was having rocks and bottles and soda pop cans thrown at me. And you've got to keep in mind, you probably don't remember this because you're a lot younger than I am. But back in the 1960s, soda pop bottles were made out of glass, hard glass, not plastic flimsy stuff we have today. All right. So these glass things hitting me in the head and my body, they hurt. All right. If that had been my first encounter with white people, would I be doing this work today? Maybe not. Maybe to your point. I would be totally enraged, you know, and not wanting anything to do with these people other than beat them up or something.

45:27But that was not my experience. I experienced white people, my fellow Americans in the embassy, my classmates from Germany, Finland, Norway, the UK and Australia and wherever else who did not treat me that way. So I had a different perspective. For example, if I invite you over to my house and I give you directions, you know, come down this street, make a left, and I'm the second house on the right. there'll be a chain link fence in my yard and my pet pit bull will be running around the yard or my pet poodle my little poodle dog be running around the yard just come on in the gate and knock on the door you're going to do that and you're not going to think anything of it but if i tell you that my pet pit bull is running around the yard you might have a little trepidation because of what you know about pit bulls and not all pit bulls are mean and evil and so forth and so on There are some very friendly pit bulls.

46:24I've experienced some. But just the idea that a pit bull is running around the yard might give you pause. And you're going to say, is your pit bull cool? Something like that before you open my gate and come in my yard. So I didn't have that experience with white people before this incident. I'd already had many positive experiences. So I could not paint everybody with a broad brush. Right.

46:52Coleman Hughes:was with the Klansmen and neo-Nazis that you met and befriended, were there any that dismissed you as an exception to the rule and said, hey, I've talked to you, I've gotten to know you, Daryl. You are one of the good ones. But that doesn't change how I feel about Black people in general. I could tell you're different. You're an exception. Yes, absolutely. But it's not going to change my ideology. Yes, absolutely. And that's a very good point. And here's something that, yes, I've experienced that a lot because I did not fit the mold in their mind. And so, you know, they have to justify their hate.

47:28Like, oh, well, you know, you know, Daryl's OK for one. You know, he's different.

47:32Coleman Hughes:No, I'm not different. OK. What I do in that case is I've had plenty of Klansmen and neo-Nazis right here in my living room. Even some of those guys who planned Charlottesville. OK. Nasty bunch of people. um when i feel that i can trust somebody i'll invite them over okay because i want them to you know to experience me socially all right um and then i'm not i'm not afraid of them physically myself i realize that you know they may pose a threat to some of my jewish friends or some of my other black friends or some or even some of my white friends who totally disagree with their ideology. When I feel that they don't pose any kind of physical threat or thing like that, not only will I invite them over, I'll invite over some of my Jewish friends, some of my other white friends who don't align with their beliefs, and some of my black friends who I know won't get bent out of shape and have a fight in my living room.

48:33Because I want them to see that Daryl Davis is not the exception. Maybe they are the exception with this stupid ideology that they have going on. So, you know, you show by example. Right. Because, listen, every time you have a conversation with somebody, even today, you know, when we finish and you go home and you go to bed or whatever, before you go to sleep, you know, you're going to reflect on all the things that you did today. You know, and one of the things you did was interview me. So you might reflect on some of the things that we talked about or whatever else you did prior to me or whatever else you do after me today.

49:06You're going to reflect on that before you go to bed. They're going to go. They do the same thing. and it becomes a cognitive dissonance. They think, damn, you know, I just had a three-hour conversation with this black guy, you know, and we didn't come to blows. And what that Daryl guy said, you know, it makes sense. You know, they don't change overnight because, you know, it took them a while to come into that ideology. It's going to take them a while to get rid of it. You know, they're going to question, they're going to research and so on, but it causes a cognitive dissonance. And then, you know, toss and turn.

49:42And then not only did Daryl fit the exception, but this Jewish guy that he had over fit the exception. Another black guy he had over. So that works on them. And then they realize that what they saw here was true. What they have been believing was false. So they have to make a decision. Do I continue living a lie or do I quit the Klan and follow the path of the truth? I'll give you a quick example. So one time this exalted Cyclops, that means district leader, was with me in my car. And I'm driving, he's sitting over here in the passenger seat, we're riding around, whatever. And we got on the topic of black crime, which is really a crime of opportunity because we don't hear about white-on-white crime, right?

50:31But anyway, he said, he made the statement, which I've heard again a million times from these people, that black people are born with a gene that makes us violent. You know, what are you talking about? He says, well, who's doing all the carjackings and drive-bys in Southeast? He's referring to Southeast Washington, DC, which is predominantly black. There's some whites that live there, but it's predominantly black. And yes, it's very high crime-ridden. I said, okay. I said, it's black people, but you're not considering the demographics. You know, that's what lives there. Who's doing all the crime up in Bangor, Maine?

51:11White people, because that's what lives there. I said, you know, you're not considering that. Oh, no, no, no, Daryl, you guys are born with this gene. I said, look, man, I'm as black as anybody you've ever seen. I have never committed a carjacking or a drive-by. How do you explain that? He didn't even think about it. He answered me like that. He said, your gene is latent. It hasn't come out yet. It almost came out.

51:37Coleman Hughes:You know? I mean, they have all the answers, right? How do you argue with that? How do you argue with that when someone— Exactly. My point exactly, Coleman. When they're playing tennis without the net. How do you argue with that? Okay? And he was so far out in left field, I couldn't even bite onto it and chew on it. It was so far out. And so I'm sitting there speechless, dumbfounded. He's sitting over here like all smug, like you got nothing to say. You can't argue with that, right? I realized I could not bring him to where I was. I had to go to where he was. All right? So this is how you answer that question.

52:09This is what I did. All right? I said, he said my gene was laid and hadn't come out yet. I said, you know, he used the figure of authority, the world's greatest authority that nobody's ever heard of and nobody's ever seen. That person's name or that group's name is they. They say that all black people have a gene. They. We never know who they are. They say if you take this, you do that, blah, blah, blah. Right? So I used his figure of authority. I said, well, you know. It took me a minute to think about this before I responded to him because he just cut me out of left field. I said, well, you know, they say that all white people have a gene within them or born with this gene that makes them a serial killer.

52:58He said, how do you figure? I said, name me three black serial killers. He couldn't do it. I said, here, I'm going to give you one. I named one for him. There are more. I named one. I said, just give me two. He couldn't do it. I said, look, Jeffrey Dahmer, Charles Manson, John Wayne Gacy, Henry Lee Lucas, Ted Bundy, David Berkowitz, Son of Sam, Albert DeSalvo, the Boston Strangler, on and on and on. I said, they're all white. I said, son, you are a serial killer. He said, Daryl, I never killed anybody. I said, your Gina Clayton hasn't come out yet. He says, well, that's stupid. I said, well, duh.

53:43I said, you're right. It is stupid. But it's no more stupid for me to say that about you than what you said about me. And he got very, very quiet. I could tell his wheels were spinning, right? He didn't know how to respond, right? And then he changed the subject. But within four to five months after that conversation, he quit the plan based on that conversation, seeing how ridiculous it was. And his robe was the first robe I ever got.

54:10Coleman Hughes:What's most interesting to me about these guys is we think of them— Yeah, and women, yeah. Is that we think of them as hateful, and they are. But they're also—they also feel hated, I guess. I mean, that's my analysis, at least. Tell me if you agree. It's really big to them that you don't hate them. They're like, this black guy doesn't hate me. And the fact that you don't hate them has an effect on them. It has an effect that melts their hearts, which means that when they're still under the sway, they must feel hated by the world as well. they feel yes um and that's the case with with many of them um but a klansman or a klanswoman or any white supremacist is not stamped out of a standard cookie cutter you know they try to put us in a box like you know all black people are the same you know they all know each other they all look alike all that kind of and they all think alike you know they all voted for obama and you know they have all these different you know that things that they put on us because we all do the same thing, right?

55:20That does not apply to them. They come from different varying levels of education, socioeconomic status, and reasons for joining the Klan. Like this, it's not cut out of a standard cookie cutter. Some join because it's a family tradition. My grandfather was in the Klan. My daddy was in the Klan. I'm in the Klan. My kids are going to be in the Klan. So family thing, you know, passed down. Other times, you might move into an area where it's like a Klan stronghold, good old boy network. So, you know, if you want to assimilate in that town, you know, you got to join the local Chamber of Commerce, local country club, and the local KKK.

56:02So like, you know, some parts of Los Angeles, you know, if you move there, you got to affiliate with one of the gangs that controls that neighborhood, you know, if you want to get along. So it's a thing like that as well. Also, take, for example, this happens, I've seen this happen, a depressed coal mining town. Most of your coal miners in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, et cetera, traditionally have been white. And they go there right out of high school. Either they drop out of high school or even after they graduate, they go right to the coal mines. Their granddaddy, great-granddaddy working the coal mines.

56:40It's just a family thing, right? These people are not racist, not one racist bone in their body. They're happy. They're getting paid. They're feeding their family, clothing their kids, paying their bills. You know, they don't have any animus towards anybody else of a different color, religion, whatever else. They're happy to have a job. They're happy to be able to live and thrive, all right? Then I've seen this. The companies that own these coal mines, that employ these people for generations. They see immigrants coming into our country, whether it's illegal or illegal, doesn't matter to them.

57:16But their mentality is, you know what? Those people will work for this much money because this much money is a lot of money in their country. We're paying our guys this much money. Let's lay off our guys and hire those guys. So they lay off these white guys and they hire these other people who are working for that much money. and the company is making tons of money in greed and not paying them what they're due, et cetera. So now these people who are not racist, they can't get another job. All they know is mining coal. They're not qualified for any other kind of work. So now the bank is knocking on the door for their loan, for their car, for their mortgage.

57:56The car company is going to repo their car because they can't work, right? The Klan sees this and the Klan will come into a town like that and hold a rally. And I've been there. I've seen them. And they'll say, the blacks have the NAACP. The Jews have the ADL, B 'nai B 'rith, et cetera. Nobody stands up for the white man but the Ku Klux Klan. Your job is not gone. Your job is still there. But why does this Hispanic epithet or this black epithet have your job? Your family's been there for over 50 years, for generations. Why does he have your job and you're here and you can't put food on your family's table and clothe your child's back.

58:36Come join us. We'll get your job back. I've seen that, all right? And so these people who are not racist, they're at wit's end. You know, they're right. My job is still there. It wasn't like my job was terminated, but I got terminated, and now I don't have any money. The dealership came and got my pickup truck, and the bank is knocking on my door for the mortgage, and I'll foreclose on my house. What do I have to lose? Here, give me an application. some get in that way okay um you know we you know when we see the clan on tv on some of these daytime talk shows and i know some of those people too because i've been on those daytime talk shows um they get the the worst of the worst because you know they want ratings they want these people having fights and throwing chairs and all that kind of stuff all right um but so you get the third grade dropout but you know and and yes there are third grade dropouts on the clan But guess what?

59:32There are Klansmen who have become presidents of the United States. President Harry Truman, before he became president, he joined the KKK for a short time. He didn't like it. He got out and then went on to become president. Senator Robert Byrd of West Virginia, who was the last oldest living senator, he was in the Klan in the 1940s. He was a grand legal, which means a state recruiter, bringing in new members. All right. He later on went on, he left the Klan, he disavowed it, and went on to do great things for civil rights. So, you know, they come from Supreme Court Justice. Hugo Black from Alabama was in the Klan when he got the appointment to sit on the Supreme Court as a justice.

1:00:16He had to leave the Klan because you can't be in a subversive group to be in the Supreme Court. So there are many, you know, notable people, governors, doctors, lawyers, et cetera. So it's not just, you know, the third grade dropout. That's why I say, you know, they're not stamped from a standard cookie cutter. They all don't think the same way, but they all do have that ideology in common.

1:00:35Coleman Hughes:So one of the trends that I see, and I opened this up by saying my listeners are always asking me, how do I deal with political disagreements with people in my life that I care about, right? One of the trends you see now is people going what's called no contact with their parents. and sometimes there's a good reason for this if you have legitimately abusive parents and you're putting yourself in danger around them or they're just impossible to be around. But it seems like the threshold for going no contact in the culture is going lower and lower to the point where it's, you know, my dad voted for Trump and I don't want to go home to Thanksgiving and so forth.

1:01:22Coleman Hughes:I'm curious, at what point do you think you should cut somebody off? And have you ever got to a point with someone where you said, no, it's too much. I just can't have this person in my life. I'm going to stop trying. Some of my crazy girlfriends a long time ago. But no, not any of the racists. Now, yes, I've had some physical violence with some of those people, and some of them have gone to their grave. Being violent, racist, and hateful, and whatever else never changed. Not everybody's going to change, and you accept that. But when I encounter people like that, I don't give up on them. I simply move them down my list of priorities.

1:02:13My mission has never been to convert them. like you know the media will say you know black musician converts you know 200 kkk members or white supremacists or whatever that is false i didn't convert even one i am the impetus for over 200 of those people to convert themselves all right i never set out to to tell them get out of this give me your robe and hood etc um they came to that conclusion themselves after i interacted with them. And it's not overnight. It's over time, most of the time. So yeah, I don't give up on those people. Even one of the ones I had a fight with came back to me and apologized.

1:02:55Not all of them. But so never say never. But the ones who are just as hateful, but are willing to sit down and have a conversation and tell you why they hate you, I'm willing to listen. Because I know my interaction with them plants a seed. The seed does not take growth when I leave the room or they go home. It takes growth over time. But you've got to come back and nurture it. You've got to pour water on it to make it grow. So, you know, I'm continually doing that. But back to your original question about, yes, I hear that all the time. I'm not going to Thanksgiving because my sister voted for so-and-so and I voted for this one.

1:03:34You know, listen, whoever is going to be president is only going to be there for a minimum of four years, a maximum of eight years. How long have you been with your family? You've been with your family for decades. Are you going to throw away a decades-long relationship because one of your members voted for somebody that you didn't vote for? Looking at me, and you see how I look, the color of my skin, if I can go to a Klan rally and talk to white supremacists, you can certainly sit down with your family at Thanksgiving dinner table. and have a conversation. But again, you know, you got to apply those five core values.

1:04:14People want to be loved. They want to be heard. They want to be respected. They want to be treated fairly and truthfully. And they want the same things that you do. All right? So listen to that person and do more listening than you do talking. And you might find out why your sister or your dad or whoever it was voted for that guy. Not that you have to agree with him or her or whatever, but at least you know why. And then it might dawn on you. I get it now. I wouldn't vote for him, but I can see why you would because he did this and that affected you this way and so forth and so on. So I get it.

1:04:49Like a lot of people say, you know, I don't like Trump. You know, he's a, you know, anti-women. He's anti-black, you know, but he did this and he's a good businessman and whatever else, you know, whatever they want to believe. That's why they voted for him. All right. Because I have a lot of friends. I'm not a Trump voter. I would never vote for that guy. I played for him one time, but I would never vote for him. All right. But I have friends who do. And what's interesting about him is every presidential candidate that you and I know, other than Trump, has one base of people. Everybody in that base likes their candidate, whether it's George Bush or Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan or Richard Nixon or John F.

1:05:34Kennedy, whoever. They have one base of people. They all like the candidate, the same candidate, and they all like each other. You come to Donald Trump, he's kind of an exception. This guy has two bases of people, all right? Both bases like the same guy, but the bases don't like each other because you have every racist that I know voted for Trump. but i also have a lot of friends who are not racist who voted for trump okay and and my my non-racist friends don't like the kkk and neo-nazis and those people that voted for trump okay even though they have the same candidate in common because they don't like racists and and these these people over here that i deal with the racists they don't like my friends because they might have intermarried with a black or a jew or a muslim or whatever else whatever it is they don't like, or they're gay, or whatever.

1:06:28So you got these two groups that don't like each other, these two bases, but they're like the same candidate. Why? Because Donald Trump has the ability to speak out of both sides of his mouth. He tells them what they want to hear, and he tells them what they want to hear. And he reaps the benefit. Okay? So when you listen to somebody who voted for Donald Trump, or whoever, you know, that you may be in disagreement with, if you let them talk long enough, you'll figure it out. You'll figure out, you know what? But I can see it now. I understand why you voted for him or her. I don't agree, but I understand now.

1:07:04And then, and once you listen to them, chances are they will reciprocate. So let me tell you why I voted for, you know, Joe Biden or Kamala Harris or whoever else, Obama, whatever. and then they'll be willing to listen. They're going to reciprocate because you sat there and listened to them and then maybe they will see why you voted for that person. So you don't have to agree on things, but you can agree to disagree. And furthermore, if you allow them to talk and allow them to expose why they voted for that person, that gives you information as to how you can take what they've given you and address it and possibly give them another perspective where they can change.

1:07:43Okay? So, like, for example, let's say you have a little kid brother, seven, eight years old, and he goes to a—because, you know, these people are convinced about different things. You cannot tell them—don't tell them that they're wrong. Don't do that because that's an attack on their dignity, on their integrity, on their intelligence. Okay, you tell somebody that they're wrong when they think, you know, this is the greatest thing next to Jesus Christ or sliced bread or whatever, right? So, you know, nobody wants to be told they're wrong.

1:08:21Let's say you had this little kid brother, and he goes to a magic show with his buddies. And he comes home and tells you, Coleman, you're not going to believe this. You know, this magician on stage, he asked for a female volunteer, and 50 women raised their hand. He looked around. He picked one out of the audience, brought her up on stage. What's your name? Where are you from? And then he had her climb into this long box and stick her feet out the hole at this end of the box and put her head out the hole at that end of the box. And then he closed the lid. He took a chainsaw and went right through the middle of the box.

1:08:53He cut the woman in half. The chainsaw came out the bottom of the box. He cut her in half. And then he told her to wiggle her feet out the hole. And she wiggled her feet. and you say, listen, it didn't happen like that. Yes, it did. I was there. I saw it with my own eyes. You have caused him, you have insulted him. You're telling him he didn't see what he saw. And he's right. You were not there. You didn't see it. He was there and he saw a man cut this woman in half. He knows that's the truth. So how dare you tell him, you know, something different? What you do is this. Don't tell him he's wrong.

1:09:31Just, you know, say what you say to him is, listen, I hear what you're saying. I understand what you're saying. But let me ask you a question. Do you think that just maybe, just perhaps it's possible that when this magician on stage asks for a female volunteer and all these women raise their hand and he picked out one out of the audience, do you think it's possible maybe she works for him? Maybe she knows the trick. Maybe she goes all around the country with them on tour and sits in that same theater seat everywhere they go. And your brother says, hmm, you know, that might be the only way that could work.

1:10:11You have offered him a better perspective for him to consider. He considered it. He arrived at the same conclusion you did. That's what I do. I don't tell people that they were wrong. I offer them a better perspective and allow them to figure it out for themselves. And I think that's what gives me the respect that I get from them.

1:10:33Coleman Hughes:And you frame it as a question as well. Do you think it's possible that, which gives them the opportunity? It puts the ball in their court. It means what you're saying to them is, I want to hear your thoughts on this. As opposed to when I say you're wrong, well, what's the follow-up there? The follow-up is, I'm not really interested in your thoughts. I already know that they're wrong and that I know more about this than you. So you can choose to speak, but it's almost inherently combative if you choose to speak rather than an invitation. I think that's a very, very good, I mean, trick is not the right word, a very good technique for pulling things out of people and opening people up rather than closing things down.

1:11:16Absolutely. And, you know, the thing of it is, is this, Coleman, you've heard the expression, one's perception is one's reality. Okay? And that's so true. You know, your kid brother perceives this man, cut the woman in half. That's his reality. That's what he knows. So rather than attack somebody's reality, try to offer them a better perspective. One question I have for you is, what should we teach children, if anything, about racism?

1:11:45Coleman Hughes:This is one of my ongoing debates that I've sort of been having with the more woke, progressive contingent. So someone like Robin DiAngelo will argue in her book that white kids are born racist. They drink it in with their mother's milk, and so they have to be aggressively deprogrammed from their racism at a very early age and taught that race matters, that their whiteness makes them ignorant, that their whiteness is a rich part of their identity that is actually a negative, and that they have to work continually to interrupt their whiteness. That's the language that's often used. Whereas my belief has always been, and this partly comes from experience of growing up in a very interracial town, is that kids are born not caring about race.

1:12:47Coleman Hughes:and you often notice, parents often notice this, that your five-year-old will be friends with a five-year-old of a different race and literally will not really notice that they're of a different race because race is not a concept that's in their mind yet. They can understand that you have a different skin color, that your skin is like chocolate and my skin is like vanilla, but it's no deeper to them than that. And then as they grow older, race becomes more meaningful. So my view has always been that kids, by default, have the right attitude, and that innocence should be protected by not talking too much about it, except for, I think, the occasional reinforcement of that Martin Luther King ethos.

1:13:32Coleman Hughes:I think Martin Luther King Day in schools is a great opportunity to do that. But it doesn't need to be heavy-handed because the default is correct. What do you think about that? Okay, that's a lot to unpack there. I love the question. And you and I know that every human being's DNA is 99.9 % the same. We don't learn that in elementary school or high school. We learn that in college if we learn it there. All right? But that's a fact. That needs to be taught in this country because our country is a little different. I mean, every country has their, every country has history, the good, the bad, the ugly, and the shameful.

1:14:19And all of those cards need to be turned face up on the table and addressed, okay? You know, we certainly have our ugly, bad, and shameful, slavery being one, racism, Jim Crow, all these things, okay? I think that they need to be discussed as part of history, sure, okay? But I think that starting in elementary school, of course, we tone down the lecture, not at the college level when you're dealing with elementary school kids, but it's important to stress that no matter what these people look like, whether they look Asian, whether they look Hispanic, whether they look black or like you white or like this person, Eskimo or Mongolian, whatever, Native American, we all have the same 99.9%.

1:15:07percent DNA. That needs to be taught in elementary school while children's brains are sponging information. Don't wait until they get to the college level. There are ways you can explain that to a young child. And then every year, you increase the explanation so by the time, you know, they're in high school or whatever, you know, they got the concept, you know, and by the time they get to college, their brains are obviously, you know, convinced. Because, you know, you try to convince somebody later on after they've already developed an animus towards someone because of their skin color or something like that, it's kind of hard to change it.

1:15:43So it needs to be taught early on in elementary schools. I think all those things have to be addressed. You know, and at the elementary school level, it could be like, okay, you know, so there is a black Chevy Impala and a red Chevy Impala and a white Chevy Impala. Well, guess what? They all run the same. They all feel the same if you sit in the seats. You know, they all drive the same. It's just a car, that's all. You know, you dumb it down. I don't hate to use the word dumb it down, but you take it down to that level, you know, depending upon the age demographic. And then a couple years later in middle school or junior high, I hate junior high, I don't have that anymore.

1:16:26High school, whatever, you know, you add more things into it. So because they're still sponging information. But don't wait until college and stuff like that to try to program somebody into believing something that wasn't around back then. You know, we often make the mistake of not telling true history. I live in Montgomery County, Maryland. Montgomery County, Maryland and Fairfax County, Virginia, which is only about 30 minutes from here. for the longest time, back in the 1970s and 1980s, were the best public school systems in the entire United States. One year, we're number one. And the next year is Fairfax County.

1:17:08Then it was us. Then it was Fairfax. Back and forth, back and forth. Today, in 2026, Montgomery County is like ranked number eight or nine or something, last time I checked. All right. So we've fallen down the meter. But back in the 70s and 80s, we had the best, us in Fairfax County had the best school systems. I graduated in 1976 from high school. I did not learn until I was in college that we had internment camps in this country for Japanese Americans. I was incredulous. I'm like, no way. No, come on. No way. My teacher said yes. I didn't believe my teacher. I asked my mom and dad. They said yes.

1:17:47I'm like, what? How come this is not in the history books. Today, it is in the history books. Kids learned that today, but we didn't learn it, all right, because we try to hide the bad, the ugly, and the shameful and just teach the good. Now, the Tulsa race riots are not in our textbooks yet. They should be. They happened. You know, we need to learn the truth and address these things. You know, nobody should hold somebody accountable today for what their great-great-great-grandfather did or whatever, because he owned so many slaves or whatever. I'm not saying those people should be held, the kids today, the offspring should be held accountable, but they need to know.

1:18:28We all need to know where we came from, what the journey was, et cetera, and then move forward together because a lot of the benefits that these people have today, we still don't have because of the stepchild of slavery. which was segregation. Okay, well, I can't own you anymore. You know, I got to pay you to pick my cotton, my tobacco, but I'm damn sure I'm not going to let you drink from my water fountain or use my restroom or even think about, you know, going to school with my daughter. You know, these things need to be addressed. They need to be learned and then move on, not brushed aside.

1:19:13But now to your point about not making it so heavy or so obvious, some of the questions I get asked during the Q &A session at my lectures. I'll show the Klan robes that I have, some of them, or whatever, swastika flags, and then I do a Q &A. They will ask me, well, how come your parents never warned you about what can happen? And you were blindsided, literally, by the rocks and bottles. You didn't know what was happening. You know, just about every black kid in this country would know what was happening. Well, they're right. Most black kids in this country would know what was happening. I didn't know what was happening because that was not my—I had no precedent for it.

1:19:57I was around interracial people my whole life. So I didn't know why people were throwing—I thought they didn't like the scouts. I thought they were throwing things at the scouts until my troop leaders came and only covered over me. No other scout was getting that protection. Now I'm wondering, well, what did I do? You know? So how come my parents didn't warn me? I thought about that. Now, my parents are gone now. But, you know, so I couldn't very well ask them. But, you know, I know my parents. And the best answer I can give, of course they were aware of that. They had to drink from a separate water fountain.

1:20:38They had to endure all kinds of Jim Crow and all that kind of stuff. But I'm feeling this. They did not tell me about that to that depth because they did not want to prejudice me towards anybody. If they had told me, you know, you got to be careful. You know, there might be some white people who may not like you because of your skin color. I believed everything my parents told me because they're my parents. You know, they know everything, right? So if they told me that, how would I know if that white person might not hurt me, but that one right over there would? I might be suspicious of everybody because I've already been prejudiced, prejudged, preconditioned to this.

1:21:26So they knew at some point I would experience racism. They didn't know how or where or when. but I feel that if they had forewarned me, I might not be the person that I am today.

1:21:41Coleman Hughes:Yeah. Okay, well, that comes to the end of my questions for you, Daryl. Thank you so much for coming on my show and it's been great to chat with you. Man, it's been my pleasure, man. Hope we can do it in person sometime again without Cornell or somebody or something like that. It's always great to see you, Coleman. Appreciate it. Absolutely.