The booksigning session, but that book is going to be on sale and you can fine it easily enough. I cant promise you that shell come over to your house. But ill sign i in any way i can. Thank you very much. [applause]. And back tv on cspan 2 is live at the Los Angeles Times festival of books, its held on campus of univer. Southern california. Its been here for the last several years. Prior to that held at ucla. Its currently in its 22nd year. Now, weve got a full day of coverage coming up in about a half hour is a panel on the [inaudible conversations] corey fields who writes about black republicans and peggy grande who served as Ronald Reagans executive assistance after leaving the white house will be on that panel coming up in half an hour. Here on the campus, we are joined by author and professor Michael Eric Dyson his most recent book is called tears we cannot stop. Dr. Dyson, why did you make this sermon to White America . It is great to be here. I left messages for peter slen and he is a great guy. I wanted to write this book because i think it is a time for honest discourse and conversation between black and White America. What i am trying to say from my heart to the heart of White America, i want to talk about Police Brutality, racial discourse and be honest about the fact we feel deeply infringed on the other side and find ways to talk about it. Here were in the age of trump and not being politically correct. Can you take that both ways and as White Americans endure brutally frank conversations from black americans trying to say this is the stuff we want to say we talk about behind your back and i want to talk about it in front of your face. These are the challenges i want to levy and the kind of conversation i want to engage by being open and honest in a way that doesnt occur. Not nasty, preaching down from the pulpit. I believe getting in the trenches with the people to say what can we do to lift the burden to make things better. Michael eric dyson is an ordained baptist minister. In your book, you write whiteness grows more shameless, more cruel, more uncaring by the day. Yes, i think that is a tough statement. But i think when we look at this present white house it is hard to deny. I think donald trump is the face of white innocence, of the aggressive White Privilege that is interrogated. We passed a tax day and most americans have to pay taxes and prove they did if they are in the Public Office but not donald trump. Donald trump to me represents symb symbolically the face of a white unconscious of his privilege. You know the saying you were born on third base and think you hit a triple. When i think about whiteness growing harsher every day despite the fact mr. Trump says i want to reach out to black america and be concerned. We have an attorney general who is rolling back many gains under the Obama Administration in regard to Police Brutality and tension with black and brown communities or working out the better relations between Law Enforcement and black and brown communities is withdrawing support with Jeff Sessions of the department of justice in regard to taking on texas in regard to id laws which we think are if not unconstitutional serm against the nature of progressive freedom and democracy that voting should betoken. Steve bannon t in the white house represents the altrights voice in that administration. For me, i think it is important to acknowledge whiteness as an institution and force has been brutal in america to black and brown and also to white people. This election was said to be a referendum on the White Working Class. You want to talk about a referendum for the White Working Class . I want to say to the White Working Class please join black, brown and red people. Donald trump is not your friend. An administration that hires bill bill billonaires is not your friend. Unions and progressive groups in the grassroots are who is serious about that. I wanted to challenge the unconscious bigotry and privilege in america to say lets join together. 202 is the area code. 7488200 for central and eastern. 7488201 if you live in the mountains or pacific time zone. One more sentence from your book before taking calls. One of the greatest privilege of whiteness is to not see color, race and not pay a price for ignoring it. You know, many White Americans say why are people so obsessed with race . If you want to get beyond race stop seeing it. But that is not a privilege we poses. Police people remind us of it, people at jobs remind us. You are different. Your hair cant be worn here. If you sport locks that is unacceptable. There is a constant and repeat reminder. People say microaggressions are small. Well a paper cut is very small but it can bleed to death. Many White Americans are not conscious of the fact they have a particular kind of privilege. Even a more white person. If you engage a Police Person and live to tell about it that is a privilege not predicated on economic equality but rather a white identity that may be respected in certain quarters. The privilege of not seeing race. I am color blind. I dont see anything. That is another privilege. We have to in america acknowledge those differences. I dont want people to transcend crase but rather what they believe about the races. I want people to not associate by blackness with things they think are negative. We can acknowledge our differences, our common core of American Values is not obscured by the embrace of being black, brown or yellow but the white in the equation is different historically and leveleraraged the ethnicity. Part of what it means to be white is not going you are white. The privilege of not thinking about race the way black and brown and yellow people have to Pay Attention to. Host Michael Eric Dyson is our guest and tears we cannot stop is his book. We will hear a small delay but it will be fine. Bill in bolder, colorado you are on tv. Caller i was wondering if you could comment on the priva i privatization of prisons and how it relates to race relations. Really enjoyed you on face the state this weekend. Guest this is unprecedented in an era where we have had many unprecedented things like president obama being the first black president of america. Now donald trump bringing his family onboard, he is not disclosing of the nature of his affiliations with certain businesses especially on foreign soils, we dont know the extent to which President Trump is involved with russia and that has grave and serious Foreign Policy consequences and even in america refusing to acknowledge on our soil some of his relationships to economic interest. The refusal to acknowledge and disclose his tax returns obsc e obscures the financial interest this president has. That is only one slice of it. But the caller is absolutely right. The privatization of the presidency when we need public oversight to be accountable. Donald trump resorts to twitter to display and disclose his inner most thoughts refusing to engage in the political substance of shaping policy thaz will have a serious consequence and debating it back and forth. I think it is one of the most negative consequences of this. Host the producers back in washington was asking about the privatization of prisons. Oh, i am sorry, prisons. The privatization of prisons even more so is problematic. It didnt begin under President Trump but it continues and we see with attorney general sessions reigniting the war on drugs which is a war on black and brown people and an increase in prisons that are farming out to collective entrepreneurs woo are taking place in the business of housing people. We know the disproportion of black and brown people in the prisons suggest the privatization of prison means a greater entrepreneur spaces and poor white and black communities which are the beneficiaries mean there is a transfer of wealth from the economy into the coffers of the working class of the white people. The privatization of them ultimately in a place like california with the supermax prisons and others with privatization has been a surge on american democracy. Michael eric dyson is a professor at georgetown university. Carolyn in broken arrow, oklahoma you are on the air. Caller good morning. I could not disagree with you more in everything you have said. I have watched you and many of the other black leaders mislead these people for years. I am a 78yearold white woman and i have worked with every color in the world and we could get along except that you and the black leaders keep wanting to tell these other black citizens how deprived they are when quite frankly right now they have more money, more industries, more leadership, in the television and the papers and magazines, they are being hired ahead of other people because of their color and i wish you would stop this hate speech you keep telling these people because this is not right. Host carolyn, we are going to get an answer from Michael Eric Dyson in just a second. But would you consider buying his book tears we cannot stop . Caller no, i wouldnt because quite frankly it would be more of this poor white people getting money off of the blacks so why would i want to hear about how i am taking havent advantage of them . Guest thank you for being forthright and honest in your belief. I think this is the alternative universe we live in. With all due respect, the facts you created bear nothing in regard to reality. The fact is black and brown people dont control any industry in america not even the Recording Industry in which they par adverti participate in extraordinary numbers. Where are the black and brown people in control of managjor corporations or on the top of the list of the forbes 500 . When you do the breakdown economically you will see that is not true. When you look at ordinary africanamerican versus white people the number of people who are wealthy diminishes and pail in comparison. When you look at the Household Wealth of black and brown versus white people black pail in comparison. In none of indexes, to make the claim atmosphere wealth from White America to black america, can be really supported or substantiated by your argument. I would ask the calling to think seriously. Black and brown people are not getting jobs ahead of white people. The Fire Departments are dispoportional white and construction workers are disproportionally white. There is no increase in africanamerican and latino people in every group in america. When you look at congress people, senators, president s, across the board. I think unfortunately this is what donald trump has brought us alternative universes of facts and fake news and unfortunately white innocence has been the ultimate fake news. And even if you dont buy by book barrow it or go to the library. Martin luther king, jr was in jail and his white jailer came to him with an alternative fact. He said dr. King, his warden and jailers, segregation and right and integration is wrong and your movement is wrong. Dr. King said no, that is not true and dr. King asked the poor white people how much money do you make and after they told him he said my god, you need to be out there marching with us because you are just as poor as we are. You have more in common with working class brown and black people than you do with the overlords who have been put in office as a result of President Trump where you have billionaires like betty devos and rich people like Rex Tillerson who are helming our government now. There is much more in common between working class and white people and working class and brown and black people as well. Host Michael Eric Dysons recent book is called tears we cannot stop his book las year was the black presidency and barack obama. And martin the next call is sammy in kingston, north carolina. Caller when republican senator mcconnell made a statement that he would make president obama succeed in the last half eight years to me there was time during the civil war there was a declaration of secession from the union. People today know it is kind of like that. The Republican Party in general is just for the last eight years of president obamas term they did everything and you just imagine if we Work Together how better it would be. No, i think that is an extroidinarily important point. There is many kinds of internal secession among far right groups succeeding from america. Not necessarily literally or politically in terms of organization but politically in terms of beliefs and ideals. The spectrum of beliefs and ideology suggest the far right wants to succeed from the nation and repute and reject the core beliefs we nurture and maintain as the best of americans. That discussion is impulse and has led many to believe they are apart from america because they believe they are superior to what is left in the vast lands of america. I think that is a problem. Then your point about president obama facing such extraordinary odds and there is no doubt that. When Mitch Mcconnell said i want to make him a oneterm president. When people on the first day of inauguration tried to plot and make him a oneterm president this isnt investment in america. We know we have political differences but all of us should want the United States of america to succeed. If we have differences with the president we should articulate them but i dont want to undermine or distort projects or succeed from the nation. I want to stay here and rec reconstitute it. I think it is important to acknowledge the Birther Movement that took place, led by the present president of the United States, was the most hideous and vicious expressions of antiamerican ideology one could imagine. The true democrats and republicans are those committed to the policy of American Society arguing about our differences but maintaining and preserving the fabric of your union together. Host sal in newtown, north dakota. Good afternoon. Caller good afternoon, gentlemen. Great topic, michael. I am a native american man. I live on the ford birth reservation and i am here to let all of america know racism is alive and well in north dakota and as far as how the government has treated native american throughout history. We were the first people here. Native means native. Let me point out a couple things that the government, i feel, has wrongly treated the native american. Lets go back to the flooding of the garrison dam. The natives were flourishing on the bottom land and crops were good and everything was good. But the flooding of the garrison dam they moved all of the native americans up to higher grounds. We are not farmers. We were meant to live off the land and put us there in a whole different area. Number two, i would like to bring up is the pipeline and standing rock. How the government handled that i think was really racism allaround. Let me point out host sal, i tell you what, lets leave it at those two but let me ask you something. That was all during the Obama Administration why . Caller a zebra never changes its color is my answer to that. Regardless of the administration, racism is going to be here regardless. Host lets hear from dr. Dyson. Thank you very much. Guest i think he is making an extroidinarily powerpoint and the suggestion you made at the end points out something that was said. A zebra doesnt change their strikes and regardless of the administration in Office Policy toward first nation people has been poor. We know obama dressed this but not as effective as necessary. Even with immigration, people tend to forget he was known as deporter is chief for a while. The far more grave points, far more important point, is first nation people have not been recognized. The racism and groups or identities against the interest of first nation people needs to be addressed and it is more than giving them bingo stands and casinos to get rid of them. It is about the fundamental practice of justice and two things with the pipelines and driving under their sacred grounds is impeding on native territoryies and not recognizing their sovereignty but humanity. We talk about black lives matter, red lives matter, brown lives matter all lives matter that have been marginalized. He makes a powerful point and we have to figure out ways to address it systemically and individually the plight of the native people in the country. Host donald, from stanton, pennsylvania you are on the air. Caller this is something that should be shared with all of america is the main reason for the problems is because of slavery. If you look at slave and how it affected america, oppression, segregation, discrimination, all of these things have been generated by slavery. We learned about slavery and about racism all through slavery and that is where it was all developed from. It was legal. Our government made it illlegal segregate and do all things they did to slaves and top the racism and prejudice through all over races. Host all right. Donald, thank you very much. Michael eric dyson . Guest it is a compelling and powerful point. Some argue it was predated slavery. The idealogical views of differences fuelled slavery but the reality is he is right. There has been a lingering effect of racism in the country even in terms of the histories we apply to. In tears we cannot stop i talk about the fact america loves history when it is about recreations of the civil war or talking about lincoln or frank