“You don’t get into your car, close your eyes and just start driving and hope that God takes you to the grocery store. That’s not how any of this goes. Do you know what I mean?” -- Brooke Thomas

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ROB RICHARDSON
Welcome to Disruption Now. I’m your host and moderator, Rob Richardson. With me today is Brooke Thomas. -- Brooke, how are you doing?

BROOKE THOMAS
I’m doing well. You know, this whole working where you only have to dress up from the waist up, that works for me. So I’m doing great. Wet pants on the bottom, you know, fancy on the top just works for me.

ROB
You look good. It all works. It all works. Look, I’m in my home studio doing the whole quarantine thing, doing all stay at home, doing my part because I believe in experts and I believe in data. But everybody doesn’t which is part of our--

BROOKE
Everybody doesn’t. We are selfish people, let me tell you.

ROB
We are, right?

BROOKE
“Cut off your nose to spite your face.” That’s the phrase of our nation these days.

ROB
It is. It is. -- You can find her @brookeonair. You can find her on YouTube, Instagram. -- Is that your Twitter handle as well?

BROOKE
Yes, it is. “Brooke” with an “E” -- B-R-O-O-K-E -- on air, uh-huh. (@brookeonair)

ROB
I want to talk to you about this coronavirus. Would you have thought, I don’t know, even three weeks ago, we would have been at this point? What’s been the most surprising thing that you’ve seen in terms of how Americans have kind of reacted to this coronavirus?

BROOKE
I think the most surprising thing is how long it took our government to do anything. I’m not surprised by the fact that a lot of the people at the top including our president just don’t have the skills. I’m not surprised about that. I’m surprised at just how long it took to take this thing seriously because--

It doesn’t benefit anybody in the government to have people dying all around. It doesn’t benefit anybody. The state of our economy right now doesn’t benefit anybody. The sooner we could have gotten ahold of this, all across the board, the better. So that’s been the most surprising thing -- how long it took. Like the fact that Mardi Gras wasn’t cancelled; the fact that it took New York State so long compared to other states to cancel schools.

ROB
Right.

BROOKE
And no shots to Governor Cuomo because he’s done most everything better since then. But the fact that the mayor of New York City was saying, “This is not going to change your life…” If anybody had just watched any of the reports coming out of China, even… We know that we don’t get everything especially when it comes to something that--

We know that we don’t get everything of what’s going on in China because of how the country operates. We don’t get to hear everything. We don’t get to see and hear everything. So knowing that, right? And looking at what we did know, the people at the top should have been horrified. Everybody should have been.

ROB
Should have been.

BROOKE
And it’s so easy to say, like in New Orleans… And I hate what’s happening in New Orleans. My sister lives in New Orleans. You know, you hear the leaders of the city say that “We didn’t get the word from the federal government. So we trusted that.”

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
Why?

ROB
That’s a good question. I mean have you seen who’s running the White House?

BROOKE
Right. You know, I think that everyone should have been terrified of the cor--

ROB
But it’s hard, right? It’s... yeah.

BROOKE
Yeah. That’s a big surprise for me -- how long it took people in charge to take this thing seriously.

ROB
Right.

BROOKE
There have just been a lot of missteps. It is easy to say how someone who’s an elected official could do better. But it’s also easy to not run for office when you know you don’t have the skills.

ROB
There’s a lot of people that run for office that don’t have the skills.

BROOKE
Right.

ROB
[Laughter] [Indiscernible - 03:59] skillset to run for office than to run the office.

BROOKE
Right. Yeah.

ROB
Yeah. And most of those skillsets, unfortunately, don’t usually align together. And now we have a most unusual leader.

Speaking to your point, I do think it matters what you say at the top. We know who we have for president. It’s a president that is… “Unorthodox” would be a nice word. “Unqualified” and “Corrupt” would be the way I’d say it. But say what you want to. You have this person who’s running the White House and he thought it was a hoax and everything else and then there is this belief set in.

And I think part of what we’re talking about here today and part of why I believe it was such a long response is because there’s been a long narrative. And this has been the narrative of some of those on the right, that everybody that is an expert has a conspiracy against you, that the media is against you, that all these institutions that have any type of specialization is against you. “They’re against me so then they’re against you.” When it actually comes to a time, when you have a crisis and a pandemic, when you actually need to listen to the experts, it becomes much harder.

I think that’s part of what happened. Whether or not folks were critics or allies of the current president, I think people still want to believe that something at this level, we would have had competency there. I think there were. I should say there’s competent people within the CDC. There were competent people that were saying, that were ringing the alarm, they just didn’t have the amplifier. The president has that. That’s why we have presidents. And the word didn’t come down clearly enough. So now I think people have been programmed and conditioned.

There’s an article that I’m going to cite too within the podcast.

Social distancing, I think, is becoming less of a cultural war -- I hope. But initially, when this happened--

And still some today, there are people that believe that this is still a hoax, that this is something that has been designed as a New World Order to bring down Donald Trump and make him look bad, like the NBA and the NCAA will stop making millions of dollars just to make Donald Trump look bad. I think they care about money. That’s neither here nor there.

But there is this belief that people have actually built up and I think that’s because it’s been intentional that this is something that is being done. It’s being overhyped by the media.

And Brooke, you see it play it out in really several ways. One, I’ve seen it play out from, “This is just like the flu. Why is everybody worried about a few thousand deaths when the flu killed 34,000 people?” How do we respond to people when you hear those type of arguments? At least I see it and I hear it. What’s your response when you hear that and how do you think we’re going to be able to navigate this whole space we found--

BROOKE
What’s my response -- Absolutely silence. I’ve gotten to this place in my life where I don’t argue with absolute idiots. We can’t have all of this scientific information coming down and have someone look me in my face and say, “Grass grows purple.” And I am going to have an actual conversation with that person. Can’t do it anymore, okay? They hear… You know, on this platform, it’s different. And it is upsetting because there’s a lot of people who--

You know, jokes aside, there are a lot of people who… Their intent is not to be awful. And they’re putting themselves in harm’s way and other people around them because they are believing what someone who they believed to be smarter than them is saying.

You know, this is frustrating. You talk about like the politics in this, right? This is not about politics. And there are so many things… A virus is not about politics. One of the most easily communicable--

ROB
Yeah. Yeah, it is not going to wait to see like, “Oh are you a Republican” before it infects you. No, it doesn’t [act like that - 07:42].

BROOKE
No, it doesn’t work like that. It’s something that is so easily spread, right -- more dangerous than we’ve seen anything in our recent lifetime. Ebola is scary and people weren’t getting it like this in the U.S.

ROB
Correct.

BROOKE
You know, people being like, “Oh it’s like the flu. You just want to get at Trump.” It’s so frustrating that it’s just taking people having to harm themselves in order to take scientists seriously.

You know, I feel bad for -- I think all of us a bit should be -- climate change activists. I feel bad for people whose life’s work is climate change activism because if you can’t get people to care about not getting sick and possibly be hooked up to a ventilator, how can you get them to care about the earth and the damage to the earth? You know what I mean?

ROB
Right. Right.

BROOKE
Franklin Graham [crosstalk - 08:43]--

ROB
How do you get them to care about something that they can’t directly feel… even though we do feel but they don’t directly feel the impact when you have something that is killing people all around you and people are still doubting if that’s actually happening?

BROOKE
Franklin Graham opened Liberty University back then…

ROB
Yeah. I mean… my god.

BROOKE
…in support of Trump and some weird solidarity. And boom! 12 kids… a dozen kids sick immediately. It’s ridiculous. Distorted.

ROB
And very irresponsible. You think about--

BROOKE
It is irresponsible.

ROB
It is irresponsible.

BROOKE
And you know what? Your leaders, in whatever capacity, whether it be church, whether it be school, you should care if they care about you.

ROB
Amen.

BROOKE
And if they put you at risk and your family at risk, maybe they’re not being led by the Christianity that you believe in…

ROB
Hey, preach sister, preach.

BROOKE
…because it doesn’t sound like the one that I study. It doesn’t sound like the faith that I follow.

ROB
Yeah. You’ve seen that play out. I mean people are really like… We have a church here in Ohio. That was Solid Rock. They have a big picture of what they think is Jesus, I guess. It’s been struck down by lightning once and it might get struck down again because they have… It’s a big mega church. And they’re having another service again despite knowing the risk, despite the governor of Ohio… I should say, the governor of Ohio is a Republican and a Trump supporter who essentially did the opposite of what Trump has done. So I will give him credit for that.

But again, once you program these things in people, it’s hard to get it out. And there’s also this religious, I guess, play really being emphasized on this where people are saying, “Well if you don’t show out then you’re showing that you don’t have faith. You’re giving in to fear.”

BROOKE
That’s not what faith is. Faith without works is dead and we learned that and we know that and it means nothing. You can’t just have blind faith. That doesn’t work. Like God doesn’t just give you “As” on your tests. [Laughter] [To be put as that - 10:41]. You know what I mean? You have the wherewithal, the ability to study, and that’s what you’re supposed to do. Like you don’t get into your car, close your eyes and just start driving and hope that God takes you to the grocery store. That’s not how any of these works. Do you know what I mean?

ROB
[Laughter] Yeah. I’m trying.

BROOKE
Like, sure, when someone breaks an arm, you pray about it and you also pray thanks that there are doctors around that can help. Do you know what I mean? So this is stupid. It’s stupid. It’s fake [indiscernible - 11:10] and it’s not… You know what I mean? It’s not at all what I believe in. It’s not the faith that I have. I feel like God doesn’t just… At least my Christianity doesn’t just sit us up here and everything around is just magic. That is stupid.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
That is one but the biggest criticism about Christianity from people who think it’s--

ROB
That’s why a lot of people don’t become Christians. They’re like, [crosstalk - 11:31].” [Laughter]

BROOKE
Yeah, exactly.

ROB
“We can’t be Christians if we believe in science? Why? We can’t do both?”

BROOKE
Right. Ah! All of it is so stupid. And I just wish that a lot of these leaders out there cared more about their people because if you cared, you would be forcing people to stay at home.

ROB
Amen. One of my favorite scriptures is “God didn’t give us the spirit of fear.” Here’s the next part: “He did give us a sound mind.” And to some people, use your brain.

BROOKE
Right.
ROB
Please, please, don’t let any leader say it’s about having faith. They want the paycheck. This is about the money. That’s all it’s about.

BROOKE
That’s it.

ROB
They want people to come to give some--

BROOKE
At this point, that is absolutely what it is. That is 100% what it is. That’s absolutely what it is and you couldn’t convince me otherwise. And that’s so upsetting for vulnerable people within whichever community we’re talking about. That’s so upsetting because that’s absolutely what it is. You’re showing that you don’t care about the people in your congregation.

ROB
America likes to say it hates socialism. Half of Democrats don’t like socialism and Republicans thinks it’s the worst thing ever.

Last week, we just passed a $2.2 trillion bill -- I think that’s more money than we’ve ever spent, ever, on any bill in history -- giving money directly to people and people seem to not complain about it. So are people just hypocrites and just really actually like socialism but want to call it something else or are they just disliking it for the moment? What do you think is going on?

BROOKE
That’s like racism and also selfishness. Like I said, I’ll say it over and over, this is just a really big show and that we are selfish people in this country.

I always say that if you can’t afford to pay people a living wage, you can’t afford to be in business, and I believe that. I truly believe that. And I know that if minimum wage gets to where it’s supposed to be in this country, a lot of businesses will go under, and that is upsetting. If you can’t afford to pay people a living wage, you can’t afford to be in business.

Now there are a lot of different ways that people learn that they can’t afford to be in business. Unfortunately, taking care of human beings who help your business thrive, that’s just not one of them just because of the way this country operates is seen as the viable reason, you know. But people don’t care about things in this country until it affects them.

ROB
Until it affects them.
BROOKE
And that’s just what it comes down to. No, people aren’t hypocrites. They’re selfish. People don’t care about things. No, no, of course, they’re hypocrites because that’s just like the definition of it. But they’re selfish. People don’t care about things until it affects them.

ROB
Well there’s a saying, “What you love in others is what you see in yourself and what you hate in others is what you fail to see in yourself.”

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
And often, people don’t see how selfish they actually are. I think people would like to believe that, “Okay, of course, I do what I can for others. I try to help others.” But often, that’s actually not the case, if you look at how this is playing out. Like we were fighting in this country, still are, over Obamacare which was just a little bit of what it should have been to actually cover people. And people are still fighting over that.

We’re having an argument right now about public health. I like part of the bill that says you get covered for sick leave. Your employer has to cover that if you are found to have the coronavirus. My question is, “Well why wouldn’t that be for anything where you couldn’t actually work?” The fact that we don’t have that law is one example of many. So this brings me to my next point.

In the United States of America, right now as we see the coronavirus is starting to hit its peak, we’re seeing jobs, Brooke, shed faster by a lot than any other nation. Just last week, I believe a record for unemployment was set about 3.3 million.

BROOKE
Wait. It went from something like 228,000 nationwide to 3.3 million…

ROB
Something like that. There’s a lot.

BROOKE
…in a week. Those numbers that came out last Thursday were horrifying and well expected.

ROB
Yeah. But other nations aren’t seeing this. Italy is not seeing this. Britain is not seeing this. The question is, “Do we have to have a system that operates this way?” This is my understanding of how it operates -- long story bearable. Places like Britain where you have a whole industry just like America--
You know, if you’re working in the restaurant industry, through no fault of your own, you have no job right now. So essentially, unless you get takeout… But essentially, about 90% of the whole restaurant industry is gone. It’s already a hard industry to make money in. But it is gone. Poof! Nobody is really doing anything. Nobody is eating out, clearly. But in Britain, they decided that the government will take care of 80% of all wages for everybody that works in restaurants. In America, we say, “Okay, we’ll give you some unemployment benefits” but that’s it.

BROOKE
You have to get fired first, right.

ROB
Yeah. Exactly.

BROOKE
You have to get fired first and you have to also go through the stress of getting fired. Then you have to wait what could be three to four weeks looking at how overwhelmed the unemployment systems are, nationwide now. You know, in every state, you have to wait possibly weeks longer than you normally would for things to be processed because the systems are so overwhelmed. You have to go through that stress. You have to be fired. Nobody wants to be on unemployment.

ROB
No.

BROOKE
I think that’s how this country operates. And just as a nation, like our thought process here, overwhelmingly, is poor people deserve to suffer.

ROB
That’s exactly right.

BROOKE
And that is how things operate.

ROB
Or if you’re poor is because it’s your fault. It’s because you didn’t work hard enough. You’re a lazy bum.

BROOKE
It’s what you deserve. Yeah, it’s what you deserve. You know you shouldn’t go to college free because college is for the exceptional. No. “You shouldn’t make a living wage because…” Listen, working at factories is probably one of the hardest jobs that ever exists.

ROB
Oh it’s hard.

BROOKE
Mentally especially because people are awful.

ROB
People are awful.

BROOKE
People are awful.

ROB
I’ve been a waiter. I’ve never worked in fast-foods, something I don’t want to do but I can tell you, it’s the same way when you work as a waiter or a waitress. People are bad to people that are serving them, in general, because they thought that they are helping them.

BROOKE
Wait. It all comes down to like this idea that poor people deserve to suffer and that’s awful. And people are willing to cut off their nose to spite their face so often here.

Think about how a lot of people who even consider themselves like moderately helpful, how they talk about free college. Well rich people will be able to go for free. Rich people [crosstalk - 18:33]--

ROB
Already go for free. Where in the world do you live in? [Laughter]

BROOKE
Okay. Wait -- everything for free. Where have you been? Okay? [Laughter] [Crosstalk - 18:41]--

ROB
I hate that point. I hate that point. Like, “What are you talking about?’

BROOKE
Or like this super argument that I don’t think people at McDonald’s should be able to make a living wage because that means that they’ll be paid the same as a paramedic. Listen, if you think paramedics deserve to make more than they currently make, I completely agree with that. I think first responders deserve all the money you can give them. So give them more. What I’m not going to do is play “Oppression Olympics” and say, “You deserve to not be able to eat three times a day” because that would make you be in the same… It’s just awful.

ROB
It is a comparative… That’s how we think about--

BROOKE
It is awful. So much of like this idea… that everything comes down to this idea that poor people deserve to suffer and so many people in power are okay with that. Look at how… was it Mitch McConnell talking about issues with the stimulus, this bill, was that… the idea that people are going to be making more money on unemployment than they make working. Who cares? They’re still not going to be rich.

ROB
No.

BROOKE
They’re still going to be barely scarping by. They’re still going to be stressed out to no end wondering if they will be able to go back and get their job.

ROB
My problem with that argument is that they have no problem giving companies that use this tax break, right… took money from the tax break that they got, spent it all on themselves, giving money to their own stocks then paying themselves back in CEO salaries. And now they’re broke. And now we got to give them another $500 billion to bail them out. But that’s fine?

This is what I’m talking about. How do people reconcile to the fact that… That, to me, is like a thousand times worse than… Let’s just even play this out to say they were saying a person didn’t work as hard, doesn’t deserve to make as much. But you’re saying a person that is literally taking from the system, taking advantage, splurging, and then he’s going to do it again and again, like that seems to be much worse to me. I just don’t like this selective outrage. I don’t get it.

BROOKE
You know, this has been so interesting to see -- all of the systems here in this country represent elitism, right? All of the systems that represent this idea that, “Hey, poor people, you need to be saving up six months. You need to have six months emergency funds. I don’t know why you can’t? Maybe stop by [indiscernible - 21:00].”

ROB
Right. Right. Right. Yeah.

BROOKE
Think of all the things that’s real. Stop buying avocado toast. All of this are really stupid snarky things, those same companies and systems are also themselves not practicing what they’re preaching.

ROB
No.

BROOKE
So many companies that represent elitism are begging for government help right now or possibly go under because they, too, are… Their businesses are operating paycheck-to-paycheck.

ROB
Because there are also--

BROOKE
[Crosstalk - 21:25] never coming back for this.

ROB
Yes, because they’re also appointing--

BROOKE
They’ve been operating paycheck-to-paycheck.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
Look at the airline industry…

ROB
That’s an example.

BROOKE
…for the umpteenth time, begging for money. Even the cruise lines who also avoid taxes because all of them are based in other countries and--

ROB
Are asking for taxpayer money to help them out but don’t want to pay taxes to the government that has to bail them out.

BROOKE
[It’s something, too - 21:53].

ROB
I mean people don’t find the absurdity--

BROOKE
It’s sad.
ROB
It is absurd. And I believe a lot of the problem is not telling narrative right. I think Democrats share just as much responsibility as Republicans for a lot of reasons. I don’t think they own the narrative about actually representing workers. Half of them don’t believe in it and the other half is too weak to actually advocate the argument, so that leads to where we’re at.

So I do think there are some structural issues. And the reason why countries like Britain and others don’t have to just shed their whole workforce when they go through a crisis. You know, a crisis really exposes the best and the worst of leadership, the best and the worst of systems. And I saw this online where somebody says… they say, “Look, either millions of people will survive or our current system will survive but both cannot.”

BROOKE
The idea that we’re even contemplating, kind of opening the country back up state-by-state… The fact that every state has totally gotten where it should be, the fact that we’re even contemplating before the president was even contemplating and a lot of people in support of that, opening back up the country knowing that that means… Now essential workers, people on the front lines are going to die…

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
…and we care more about companies in this country. And of course, I don’t personally believe this but I say “We” because I’m a part of this country. This country, as a whole, cares more about companies as a culture…

ROB
It is “We” because it’s… as a culture. We do.

BROOKE
Yeah. …more about companies and big businesses than it does people. And it has been showing you that. Look at the people who make these companies grow. Look at how little they’re being paid. Look at how they’re not being taken care of. And we’re seeing other countries who are showing like, “Hey, we’re going to…” We’re not perfect. We’re not going to call any country “perfect.” “We’re going to take care of our people first because we know that that’s actually smarter in the end.”

ROB
Right.

BROOKE
It’s all big business decision but it still makes more sense to take care of your people first.
ROB
Do you think the coronavirus will… Unlike other, I guess, tragedies or big moments in America recently, this seems, at least, have been across the board. It doesn’t matter where you’re from. You can’t hide from it no matter how rich you are. It can reach you. It can affect your family members. So in some ways, there’s a common experience which offers an opportunity for us to grow and go to another direction and actually embrace a common collective whole versus the individualistic approach.

I’m not sure how that’s going to play out given how ingrained, as you said, in our culture particularly the culture wars and differences between us and the use of race and how that’s been weaponized since the beginning of the countries. That’s nothing new.

BROOKE
You know, I still don’t see it as an equalizer. Of course, everybody is vulnerable to this. Everybody can catch this. Everybody can get this. And everybody should be doing everything they can to protect themselves from this. But things are still not equal at all. The people who are keeping this country running, the people who are on the frontlines going to work every single day, those are the people who are overwhelmingly living… not even making it paycheck-to-paycheck. Those are the people in this country who--

Think about like we’re able to get not only food deliveries but the grocery store is still open. So the people who are shopping for the food -- you know what I mean -- and then delivering it to your house, the people who are at the checkout aisle, people who are still working at the grocery store, those are the people working on the front lines -- people who are still working in restaurants right now, people who are still working in essential government, like people who work on the electric grid, things that I don’t even fully understand.

ROB
Right. And we’ve been programmed to believe, Brooke, to your earlier point, that those people aren’t important. But guess what? In the middle of the crisis…

BROOKE
They’re the most important.

ROB
…they’re the most important -- your nurses…

BROOKE
They are the most important.

ROB
Yeah. …people who deliver your groceries, who take care of your groceries. Nobody is looking for the entrepreneur to say, “Oh my gosh…” or the big CEO to say, “What can you do to help me right now?” People need to--
BROOKE
Of course they can’t look at him because he’s at home.

ROB
[Laughter] Exactly right. I’m a pragmatist and I’m an optimist depending on the day but I try to lean a little bit more towards being an optimist because, otherwise, I’ll just drive myself crazy.

BROOKE
True.

ROB
My hope is that people, at least, will see this moment, understand that those are essential people and they deserve to be respected. They deserve to be taken care of. They deserve good wages.

By the way, I have no problem with a CEO making a lot of money. I have a problem with his workers not making the money with him or her. That’s the issue.

BROOKE
Right. It doesn’t even ended... It’s not enough. It’s like they can’t make enough. They can’t make good money. They can’t even make livable money.

ROB
They can’t make little money.

BROOKE
Also, they can’t make breaks when they need to. They can’t take off when they don’t feel well. They have such insane quotas that they’re exhausted. They’re physically harmed, mentally harmed. People talk craps. It’s just there’s so much.

And honestly, I like your optimism. It’s not going well [laughter] because right now we have Amazon workers, Instacart workers -- you know, hoping they’ll technically be like Amazon workers -- all in strike to get the bare minimum.

ROB
[Applause] Oh.

BROOKE
Look at what they are asking for.

ROB
I’m glad they’re on strike. But listen, part of the reason though… Let me speak to that as a union person. A lot of the reasons... I won’t say “all of the reasons.” But a big majority of it is that people have decided that this is what it’s supposed to be.
BROOKE
Yep.

ROB
This is how it should be in America and this is the best system for America. But we have been programmed to believe that standing up for workers’ unions is somehow against capitalism. No, it’s not. It makes capitalism actually work when you have an inclusive economy.

BROOKE
Correct.

ROB
But we’ve been programmed to believe the opposite. So workers go along and they go along with whatever they’re told.

BROOKE
Because they have to.

ROB
And voters vote for people that vote for these crazy policies.

BROOKE
Right. That’s true. I mean it is… Ah. This is so frustrating because we should be smacked into just realizing who deserves all the praise, who deserves the money, who is taking care of us. And we can’t even get to the point to where we all agree that this is not the flu. Okay? We can’t even get to that point let alone get to the point to where like these companies that are just making--

I said this the other day. Jeff Bezos makes $6000… no, no, no. Not six... $2000 every second. Before I even finished the sentence, that was $6000.

ROB
[Laughter]

BROOKE
You know what I mean? You have people going on strike, risking their next meal so that they can get hand sanitizer and a couple extra dollars an hour.

ROB
He is one of the richest men ever in history.

BROOKE
Ever. And he’s making so much--

ROB
He’s trying to get workers, to your point, to trade their vacation time instead of actually just giving them more money which is insane.

BROOKE
Give them more money. It’s going to be fine. Even if you lose $100 million, you’ll be okay. You know what I mean? Like, he’ll still be fine.

ROB
Listen, here’s what people don’t understand -- you’ll get it back. Costco, a place that I shop, does take care of their workers and they’re making gangbusters money. Like this is a false choice.

BROOKE
And [indiscernible - 29:12] to a certain extent because Buzzfeed had that big article about Costco, too.

ROB
Okay.

BROOKE
They’re all raggedy.

ROB
Okay. They’re all bad. I guess this is all relative. It’s one between this one and that one.

BROOKE
It is. Right, right, right. It’s like, “Who is…” Like people--

ROB
But the point is you can take care… But you can take care of your workers a lot better than--

BROOKE
You can do it. You absolutely can. [Crosstalk - 29:31]--

ROB
I guess it has such a floor when you’re comparing it to, what, Whole Foods and other are doing, that they are not taking care of workers.

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
But again--
BROOKE
And you know, I think mental health… We’re talking about like… I have a roommate and we talk about… [Katie Ann - 29:44]. We were talking about like keeping your mental health up while staying in the house because we both are luckily able to work from home. We’re safe. We’re healthy. There’s somebody else in the house and like… We’re still talking about ways to take care of yourself like mentally.

Just the trauma of the people… because like even if I have to go in to the studio, I would be okay. I will be okay.

ROB
Right. Right.

BROOKE
Any companies that I’ve been working for currently, I know that they would take care of us; that there will be precautions. Sure, you’re taking a risk because the virus is risky and the best way is stay at home when you can. But I would still be okay. I wouldn’t be dealing with the type of trauma…Just the type of stress and… You know, they’re going to have to shake this.

Can you just think about like working at a grocery store every single day with all of the people… especially like the first few days of--

ROB
Or how about working as a nurse every single day?

BROOKE
Or working as a nurse every single day. All of these people… And how once this is finally over or at least contained or under control once we get a vaccine, that’s when they’re finally going to get to work through that mentally. That’s when they’re going to get a break, to finally like cope with what they’ve been dealing with and how scary and terrifying it has been.

And when it comes to like grocery store workers, maybe they won’t because they’re still not making a ton of money.

ROB
No, they’re not.

BROOKE
You know what I mean? And this is not bashing grocery store owners because I know that there are like locally-owned grocery stores who are still doing everything they can when it is just like--

I want to point out that the people who are helping our lives be as normal and as happy and as safe and healthy as possible right now, those people… Like I just worry about the stress that they’re under and how scary this is.

ROB
So there’s a way to do this. As you said, we can have capitalism but like when… especially if we’re going to inject… This is how I feel about it. If you believe in actually the totally free market… Most people don’t. They’re lying because they’re showing right now... Hey look, if you believe in the free market, do as you will that the market go… Why is the government spending $2.2 trillion most of that on big business? Like why -- because they don’t actually believe… because it actually doesn’t freaking work.

BROOKE
Right.

ROB
It doesn’t work.

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
It doesn’t work. You need the government intervention. You need regulation. You need those things to have a functioning economy that’s actually inclusive because the market was just… Hey, we can just say let the market go. Let everybody crash. That’s exactly what they’re saying works, right? Am I missing something here?

BROOKE
No.

ROB
We know, A] this doesn’t work. But what often doesn’t happen is you don’t have enough people with enough political courage to actually say that and then have policies that will work for people.

So look, when there are corporations that get through this, okay, if we do… because look, we couldn’t let a bunch of corporations fail at once, too. That would be bad, too. All I’m saying is A] there should be some strings and B] when there’s some massive profits which will be again, they need to be taxed or they need to make sure that they’re actually doing things that are fair to their workers. I don’t understand why that’s controversial for Democrats or people to actually say like, “Why are we going to give you $2.2 trillion” and then let you lay off workers then not pay healthcare?” Like, what?

BROOKE
Right. It’s just like… Let’s give it like a little… I like you like now.

ROB
Okay. Yeah.

BROOKE
So let’s say like you have a great job. You’re making really good money, like really good money. Business is booming, right? Your mama knows that, right? So everything crashes, lose your job. Your mom is not going to let you be homeless. She’s just going to pay your rent and take care of you if she can, right?

ROB
Right.

BROOKE
But when it’s all over, she’s going to be like, “Yo, look, we need to sit down and have a talk because you were making half a million dollars a year and you weren’t saving a dime. That is ridiculous. You are putting yourself in a position…” So why can’t we have the same motherly talk with these companies?

ROB
Yeah. And then motherly consequences. If you don’t it, there’s going to be consequences. “Look, if you’re not going to home on time… I’m not going to let you be homeless but there’s going to be different rules under my house.”

BROOKE
Right. There’s going to be different rules. Exactly, because [indiscernible - 34:06] shouldn’t come without strings.

ROB
But so far, it has.

BROOKE
Then I’ll say over and over again. [Crosstalk - 34:11] repeat it exactly.

ROB
Over and over and over again. And… over and over and over and over again until I think, Brooke… This is my theory that I hope is wrong but I think the system crashes because I don’t see how you can just keep doing this. You can make up money but you can’t make up value. So at some point, you keep doing these things and so… We get to a point where we really get stretched again. We’ve already put low interest rates out there. We’ve already injected all this money into the system but we haven’t made the fundamental reforms and so… If your concrete is not poured right in your building, your building falls.

BROOKE
But it’s working because the people at the bottom are the ones who pick up the slack.
ROB
Oh yeah, yeah. So they just keep doing it again. I guess my saying is there has to be enough people that are still be willing to invest in the economy because we’re about 70% a consumer economy.

So if people actually do what people are telling them to do all the time, like “Save up all their money. Don’t invest in the economy,” the economy crashes because this is how the economy works. People invest.

If people are investing money into the system, more people are making money. But if people actually stop having faith in the system… This is what a lot of the capitalists has done. I’m a capitalist, too. But well the current system of this capitalism, which is not working for people, is not working. They have to understand that if people stopped trusting in the future, everything stops. And I believe that--

BROOKE
Yeah. But the problem is that like… Things are going to continue the same as long as we don’t care about the people that it’s already not working for.

ROB
Right.

BROOKE
It’s not working for so many people. But we don’t hear about those people.

ROB
We get those people to start… I guess what I’m saying is here… I agree with you there. My hope is that those people will start recognizing what’s going on and direct their anger… It’s not towards the immigrants. It’s not towards black people. It’s not towards gay. That’s not the problem. The problem are these economic policies. But they can tell you all day, every day, that it’s… as the black person has taken away this one problem from me or the Mexican that came over the board, no. You guys are fighting over like two proms and they took the whole mall and you guys are fighting over crumbs.

BROOKE
Right.

ROB
So figure out what’s going on with the mall and you’ll figure out all your other problems. But these cultural wars, I think… Are they going to use corona to find another example of that? I don’t know. Do you think--

BROOKE
That right there, that’s the fit. That’s my optimism is that we will start getting these people out of there.
ROB
Amen.

BROOKE
Get these people out of there. And local elections are very, very important.

ROB
Preach, sister.

BROOKE
Think about like when… We’re talking about rent right now. Right? Look at your city council. Look at your alderman. However your city operate, look at those people and listen to what they are saying because there are split votes right now. People are disagreeing and people agreeing. Think about like how you like the outcome of that and who said what? Pay attention to that. Get these people out of there at all levels of this because--

ROB
Yeah, I agree.

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
This is where it doesn’t go Democrat or Republican. Listen, there’s a lot of bad democrats, too, period. And you got to--

BROOKE
Get these people out of there.

ROB
I’m saying, in general, I tell my black folks, we generally don’t vote as much in the primary. I tell people, “That’s the most important one. That’s when you get a lot of your options.” So you’re right.

And then look at the local level. Every election is about the presidential election. 95% of the decisions that affect you have nothing to do with the president. It’s more important who your prosecutor is, I can tell you, because they have the power to put you in jail… or not put you in jail… who your judge is and who your mayor is because they will most likely directly influence how much money goes in your pocket, not who the president is.

I think we get lost in the sauce about what’s really important. You’re so right -- in politics, this is a long game. It’s not a short game. That’s why we have to evolve.

BROOKE
It is. Look at your district attorneys. Look at your city mayors. Look at your governors. Look, I’m horrified by what’s happening currently at Rikers and what’s about to happen.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
I do think we’re going to get to a point that’s going to be so bad that they’re going to have to finally let a bunch of people out of jail -- people who are not convicted, who are awaiting trial; people who are there for ridiculous probation violations; people who have a year less for nonviolent crimes.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
And the point that you should take from that is these people didn’t belong there in the first place.

ROB
Amen.

BROOKE
Look at your district attorneys in different cities who are still prosecuting the dumbest things.

ROB
For no reason…

BROOKE
Look at that. Pay attention to that.

ROB
…other than the black, poor… black and brown people in jail….

BROOKE
Absolutely.

ROB
…because it is a system of corruption and a construct that’s used to oppress people.

BROOKE
Get these people out of there.

ROB
This is what I hope is the takeaway from the coronavirus because at the end of the day, it doesn’t discriminate. As Dr. Martin Luther King said, “What affects one directly affects all indirectly.” I believe that quote is even more applicable now. And I would say what affects one directly, it all affects directly.

This one virus started off in a remote part of Wuhan, China and it has now affected the world in a matter of months. Just think about that for a minute. So when we think about those people don’t matter because they’re there in Rikers Island and they made their mistakes or whatever, it allows us to have a cognitive dissidence to say like, “Okay, well, we will never be there.” Here’s the truth, if we don’t take care of that injustice, it permeates everywhere…

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
…eventually. That’s what this virus is to me personifies. If we don’t take care of the people that are right there, that are incarcerated that shouldn’t be, if we don’t understand the humanity in them, then the virus comes to everybody and then it affects all of us directly. So yes, stop the spread.

That reminds me, I’m going to put a link in there that everybody can sign to stop the spread because the virus, we’ve talked about how it affects a lot of people but we’re still ignoring the most vulnerable populations. And by doing that, we’re still exposing ourselves the most. I think you make such a great point on that.

So final point on this as we kind of conclude, where do you think this goes? How do you think this affects the election? Will this change mindsets or is everything just pretty much baked in? What do you think, Brooke?

BROOKE
The election is not on pause but hasn’t it felt like it has a little bit?

ROB
It has. Yeah, it has.

BROOKE
The big election that everyone is worried about. But I do hope that this creates more people caring and more people paying attention. And I understand, I’m never going to like get down on people in marginalized communities because not only do you have to oftentimes go and vote for somebody who has not shown any care whatsoever for you directly--

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
I mean people around you, people in your neighborhood not even made a phone call. You got to push through that, to focus on the best policies. But also, you have to push through voter suppression tactics like running rampant around you. And I get that. But I hope that this changes… Especially with younger people, I hope that this changes their focus. And I hope that there is a new push to look at the people in Congress -- all across the board there.

Look at the people running your city. Who’s your mayor? Who’s your district attorney? Who’s your state attorney -- whatever it’s called in your state. You know what I mean? I want that to matter more to people.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
You know what I mean? I want to be much more excited about the people who don’t necessarily get big ads.

ROB
No. I agree.

BROOKE
Let’s care about that.

ROB
What I hope is that people understand that the so-called “Cultural wars,” what they call “Identity politics,” all of those things, all of those taglines, all those are… All people are trying to do is get you distracted from what’s really going on.

These cultural wars are not the real war. The real war is economic equality. That is the real war. Do not lose sight of the real war and everything else is a distraction. Everything else is a distraction.

BROOKE
Which is funny. Talking about it is a distraction because--

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
I’m not one of those people who thinks the economy is the only thing. I’m not one of those people whose only focus is on class. Race is oftentimes connected and oftentimes [still separated - 42:29].

ROB
To me, they are one and the same. I’ll just say this, and I’ve said this on prior shows, Brooke, that racism is a byproduct of pure economics.

BROOKE
No. I think it started with race.

ROB
No, no, no. Let me--

BROOKE
I think that will be the opposite.

ROB
Okay. Good. We have a debate here. Let me tell you my theory and why. You know, black folks didn’t become slaves because white folks and others thought, “Oh we hate black people. This is what we want to do because we hate these people.”

BROOKE
No. I disagree.

ROB
Okay. Okay.

BROOKE
I think [indiscernible - 43:01] a bunch of poor white people here and [indiscernible - 43:04]…

ROB
I can explain--

BROOKE
…all the way to another country and they took that big old truck on those raggedy ships…

ROB
I can explain because--

BROOKE
…and brought back a bunch of black people.

ROB
It’s very simple because it was much harder to do when they had common language and they can speak to one another and things like that. And when sugar was just being started, they needed a population that was able to go out and be resistant to malaria. We were. And we were centrally located. It was a lot harder to go to Asia--

BROOKE
It wasn’t that hard. Listen, 2020, how we treat women, how we treat poor people in society today… in modern society, it wasn’t that hard--

[Crosstalking] [Indiscernible - 43:40]

ROB
You’re actually proving my point. I mean what I’m saying is everything is a construct that’s made up. So racism was the construct that was needed to make other white people feel better about why this was happening; why it was justifiable to do this. And at the end of the day, there were tons of people that weren’t even in America that were making tons of money and no one cared as long as the money was being made is what I’m saying.

Yes, racism is real because it is a real thing. Technically, race is not real but racism is very real. So we have made--.

BROOKE
Oh yeah. Just like when you make race secondary to the class where you want to [crosstalk - 44:19]…

ROB
And you don’t. I think it’s the… We agree.

BROOKE
… and I can’t do it…

ROB
I agree with you on that.

BROOKE
[Laughter]

ROB
So we have no argument there. What I’m saying is, to make people understand, that at the same time, we have to get others to understand, particularly white people, that this all made up and this is not helping you, either. That’s really the point I’m trying to make.

BROOKE
Right.

ROB
The point, when they try to get us distracted about things that don’t matter, like… Race only matters because we have racism, right? That’s all I’m trying to say. And we need to fight racism and we do that by being self-aware and understanding how we got here. We got here purely because racism is used to preserve an inequitable economic system that hurts everybody. So I tell people, we--

I hear you. You don’t divorce the two. I think you have to talk about the two together. I think it’s a mistake many progressives make. I am not one of those. I understand--

BROOKE
Yeah. You have to fight them separately. They both have to be important here because when you say like look… Listen. If you--

ROB
You like them in tandem. It’s just like this because like--

BROOKE
You have to. And oftentimes, people don’t because [crosstalk - 45:22]--

ROB
No. Most of the time, they don’t because they’re scared of offending people in doing so.

BROOKE
Right.

ROB
But what I’m saying, if you don’t actually address the issue, it will get worse and it will get worse and it will get worse.

It can be done. I think it has to be done. I think it goes back to where we started. The reason why we have such an insane system is because we can make people feel, “Oh that’s not me. I’m not that black person. I’m not that Mexican. I am now better than that person.”

And here’s the thing, you also see… What worries me, you see some black people buying to that when they talk about things, too. We can’t buy into that at all.

BROOKE
For sure. Well there’s so many more of us who don’t buy into that. [Crosstalk - 46:02].

ROB
Oh I agree. I agree.

BROOKE
Serena Williams, that was a big example. She didn’t find herself fighting for her life and not being listened to after given birth because of money. She made more money than anybody up in there. It was because of race.

ROB
It’s because of race. Oh there’s no question. You’re preaching to the converted.

BROOKE
Right? You know what I mean?

ROB
You’re preaching to the converted. I am with you. I am with you. I am with you.

BROOKE
[Laughter]

ROB
But I’m just trying to say that we -- and I’m talking about black people Americans -- have to make sure that we understand it, too -- this culture wars and all that stuff.

I mean we can’t not discuss it because… It is an effective marketing strategy that has been employed in America since the beginning of America and it has done a great job dividing us. And we have to make sure that we understand the tactics and how they’re implemented so we can beat them. That’s really my only point.

So don’t fall for this. Don’t fall for any of these new strategies. You’re going to hear them. You’re going to hear people say, “Well we should have shut down all of our borders. That’s the reason why we got the coronavirus.” It is not. It’s because we have incompetent people leading us and we didn’t listen to scientists. So do not listen to any of those--

BROOKE
For sure, yeah.

ROB
That’s not the reason we’re here. We’re here because of bad leadership, not listening to scientists and not taking the steps we should have earlier on. There are some things we could not have prevented… I would say it’s not the total fault of the people in the White House and the people in office but it is their responsibility. But it is our responsibility to stay vigilant and make sure we hold them accountable from here and going forward.

BROOKE
Yeah. Listen, what is happening right now in the state of this country is absolutely… and it has gotten to the point where it’s the total fault of this White House because it did not have to be this way.

ROB
Right now, it is.

BROOKE
We had such an intense warning.

ROB
Yep.

BROOKE
It did not have to be this. The numbers in New York are horrifying.

ROB
Yeah.

BROOKE
It didn’t have to be that way.

ROB
It didn’t have to be that way.

BROOKE
It is absolutely at fault of the people at the top in so many different levels.

ROB
And it matters to you, too.

BROOKE
Huh?

ROB
But it matters to you, too.

BROOKE
Yeah.

ROB
It matters to who you vote for. It matters if you don’t vote because you still get who you don’t vote for. I hope people understand that. -- Look, Brooke, I got to have you on next time. I want to have you--
BROOKE
I know. Is it over? I just got [inaudible - 48:14].

ROB
I know, right? I got to be on your show, “Controlling Our Narrative.”

BROOKE
[Laughter]

ROB
Brooke Thomas @brookeonair. I appreciate you. Maybe I’ll see next time on Roland Martin.

BROOKE
This is good. This was so fun. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

ROB
Thanks, Brooke.

[END OF TRANSCRIPT]