Leadership Lessons From The Great Books – Their Eyes Were Watching God (Part 2) by Zora Neale Hurston w/Tom Libby

1
00:00:00,399 –> 00:00:04,065
Hello. My name is Jesan Sorrells,

2
00:00:04,160 –> 00:00:06,832
and this is the leadership lessons from the great books podcast,

3
00:00:07,584 –> 00:00:10,325
episode chronologically number 111.

4
00:00:11,264 –> 00:00:14,724
But this is actually going to be part 2 from episode

5
00:00:14,785 –> 00:00:18,560
number 108, where we will continue with

6
00:00:18,560 –> 00:00:22,240
our conversation with Tom Libby around Zora

7
00:00:22,240 –> 00:00:25,505
Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching

8
00:00:25,725 –> 00:00:29,105
God. When we stopped our previous

9
00:00:29,165 –> 00:00:32,740
conversation in part 1, which has already been released, you should go back and listen

10
00:00:32,740 –> 00:00:36,120
to it. We had been talking about,

11
00:00:37,620 –> 00:00:40,985
several different areas that were involved with the book,

12
00:00:41,785 –> 00:00:45,165
including the links between language, dialect, and intellectual

13
00:00:45,225 –> 00:00:48,745
capacity. This idea among the African American

14
00:00:48,745 –> 00:00:52,379
community of talking white or acting white. And, Tom had

15
00:00:52,379 –> 00:00:55,600
brought up the idea of identity based on a card

16
00:00:56,780 –> 00:01:00,425
coming from the federal government. And we both came to the conclusion

17
00:01:00,425 –> 00:01:03,565
that these are nonsensical ways of viewing identity

18
00:01:04,104 –> 00:01:06,939
viewing group, group,

19
00:01:07,960 –> 00:01:11,659
what’s the word I’m looking for group loyalty or measuring group loyalty,

20
00:01:12,039 –> 00:01:15,634
or even just strange ways of

21
00:01:16,015 –> 00:01:19,695
looking at class and looking at

22
00:01:19,695 –> 00:01:22,890
class structures. And we were moving

23
00:01:23,510 –> 00:01:27,030
very gradually into the back end of their eyes were watching

24
00:01:27,030 –> 00:01:30,250
God and really exploring, Janie’s

25
00:01:31,444 –> 00:01:34,765
Jesan marriage, the back end of her Jesan marriage,

26
00:01:37,064 –> 00:01:40,890
and then the beginnings of her connection to her

27
00:01:41,190 –> 00:01:44,950
to her 3rd marriage. So Janie’s Jesan marriage, just so that

28
00:01:44,950 –> 00:01:48,405
you can all get caught up, was Tom Joe Starks. Joe

29
00:01:48,405 –> 00:01:52,104
Starks moved Janie in their eyes were watching God to Eatonville

30
00:01:52,325 –> 00:01:55,924
in writers Florida. In Eatonville, he set her

31
00:01:55,924 –> 00:01:59,590
up as a well, as

32
00:01:59,590 –> 00:02:03,270
a fourth of a kept lady, operating the store in

33
00:02:03,270 –> 00:02:07,024
Eatonville while Joe went out and moved and

34
00:02:07,024 –> 00:02:10,785
shook as an entrepreneur and eventually put the first light in the

35
00:02:10,785 –> 00:02:14,005
town, set the first road and became its first mayor,

36
00:02:14,800 –> 00:02:18,240
which is a role that I’ve said this before on the podcast that I

37
00:02:18,240 –> 00:02:21,540
often aspire to. I aspire to no higher

38
00:02:21,835 –> 00:02:25,675
than mayor of a town. Don’t wanna

39
00:02:25,675 –> 00:02:28,955
be mayor of like Boston or something. That’s insane. I don’t wanna actually have to

40
00:02:28,955 –> 00:02:32,500
run things, but you’re ever a small town? That’s

41
00:02:32,500 –> 00:02:34,920
kinda cool. That would be that would be

42
00:02:36,500 –> 00:02:39,685
that’s a I think if you just buy a if you buy a big enough

43
00:02:39,685 –> 00:02:42,805
piece of property, you could be the mayor of your own town. How’s that? Well,

44
00:02:42,805 –> 00:02:45,340
I’m buying 5 acres coming up here fairly soon, so I’ll be the mayor of

45
00:02:45,340 –> 00:02:47,980
my 5 acres. It’ll be and Libby be outside the county so no one can

46
00:02:47,980 –> 00:02:49,120
tell me what to do anyway.

47
00:02:51,420 –> 00:02:55,225
Yeah. One of our colleagues actually were talking with him the other day

48
00:02:55,225 –> 00:02:57,945
on another project that Tom and I are involved in. He has a,

49
00:03:00,870 –> 00:03:04,170
large tract of land that is is called a compound.

50
00:03:05,349 –> 00:03:07,849
Yeah. Hashtag not a cult.

51
00:03:08,885 –> 00:03:11,385
Anyway, back to the book. So Jamie

52
00:03:12,565 –> 00:03:14,905
Jamie’s life with Joe Starks.

53
00:03:18,920 –> 00:03:22,440
Jamie’s life with Joe Starks turned on turned turned

54
00:03:22,600 –> 00:03:25,560
well, on the one hand, was sold to her. Right? Because Joe Starks is a

55
00:03:25,560 –> 00:03:28,985
good salesman, was sold to her as being one turning.

56
00:03:29,235 –> 00:03:33,075
But ultimately and fundamentally, Joe and Janie wound up hating

57
00:03:33,075 –> 00:03:36,780
each other. And that’s explored in the book. And she talks

58
00:03:36,780 –> 00:03:40,240
about how the spirit of the marriage left in the bedroom,

59
00:03:40,845 –> 00:03:44,205
and, you know, it moved into different parts of the house and

60
00:03:44,205 –> 00:03:47,825
eventually moved out of the house altogether. I think that’s a very

61
00:03:51,150 –> 00:03:54,909
stunning way of explaining how love

62
00:03:54,909 –> 00:03:58,430
can die in a marriage or the beginnings of love can die in a

63
00:03:58,430 –> 00:04:02,085
marriage. And, based off of what 2 people are doing

64
00:04:02,145 –> 00:04:05,765
to each other or not doing for each other in that

65
00:04:05,985 –> 00:04:09,799
in that situation. Janie’s marriage ended with

66
00:04:09,799 –> 00:04:13,560
Joe’s death in the book and her moving from being a

67
00:04:13,560 –> 00:04:16,459
young married woman to an old widow.

68
00:04:17,425 –> 00:04:21,024
And I put old in quotation marks because I am 5 years

69
00:04:21,024 –> 00:04:24,785
older than Janie is in the book. And I don’t feel old

70
00:04:24,785 –> 00:04:27,509
when she is widowed in her forties.

71
00:04:29,009 –> 00:04:32,710
This is a period of Tom. And Zora Neale Hurston explores this.

72
00:04:32,930 –> 00:04:36,705
And, in the back half of their eyes were watching

73
00:04:36,705 –> 00:04:39,925
God, in chapters 9

74
00:04:40,145 –> 00:04:43,190
through 13, where

75
00:04:43,570 –> 00:04:46,949
she looks at and where she begins

76
00:04:47,250 –> 00:04:50,930
to understand after Joe’s funeral that she has a certain measure of

77
00:04:50,930 –> 00:04:54,435
freedom that she never had

78
00:04:54,435 –> 00:04:58,275
before, not even with her grandmother when she was 16, not in her first

79
00:04:58,275 –> 00:05:01,819
marriage when she didn’t really understand love, and definitely not in her Jesan

80
00:05:01,879 –> 00:05:05,479
marriage gradually over time, with, with Joe

81
00:05:05,479 –> 00:05:09,180
Starks. She

82
00:05:11,095 –> 00:05:14,055
one of the lines that Zora Neale Hurston has, and I’ve underlined it in their

83
00:05:14,055 –> 00:05:17,735
eyes or what she got. I’ll quote from it just very briefly. When

84
00:05:17,735 –> 00:05:21,560
Janie emerged into her morning white, she had hosts of admirers in and

85
00:05:21,560 –> 00:05:25,320
out of town, everything open and Frank men of property

86
00:05:25,333 –> 00:05:28,460
Tom among the crowd, but nobody seemed to get any further than the store.

87
00:05:29,285 –> 00:05:32,725
She was always too busy to take them to the house to entertain. They were

88
00:05:32,725 –> 00:05:36,405
also respectful and stiff with her that she might’ve been the empress of

89
00:05:36,405 –> 00:05:39,580
Japan. They felt that it was not fitting to mention

90
00:05:39,800 –> 00:05:43,480
desire to the widow of Joseph Starks. You spoke of honor

91
00:05:43,480 –> 00:05:47,225
and respect. And all that they said

92
00:05:47,225 –> 00:05:50,905
and did was refracted by her inattention and shot off towards

93
00:05:50,905 –> 00:05:54,330
the rim bones of nothing. Close

94
00:05:54,330 –> 00:05:58,169
quote. At this part

95
00:05:58,169 –> 00:06:01,630
of the book, this part of the story, Janie is in a weird spot because

96
00:06:02,564 –> 00:06:06,085
she’s single for the first time in a very, very long

97
00:06:06,085 –> 00:06:09,764
time. She’s not looking to overthrow social

98
00:06:09,764 –> 00:06:13,590
conventions, but she’s also not looking to go along. But just

99
00:06:13,590 –> 00:06:17,430
being what she is, being in that turning space is a space

100
00:06:17,430 –> 00:06:21,145
of throwing off social conventions in and of itself. Yeah. I get the feeling

101
00:06:21,145 –> 00:06:24,985
that she didn’t feel compelled to worry about social conventions just out of

102
00:06:24,985 –> 00:06:28,550
the simple fact that, like, she wasn’t because all of a

103
00:06:28,550 –> 00:06:32,230
sudden, she’s not poor. All of a sudden, she’s not for

104
00:06:32,230 –> 00:06:36,035
wanting. Like, she’s she’s very comfortable in her situation,

105
00:06:36,035 –> 00:06:39,475
so she really doesn’t care what anybody else thinks at this point. Right. But she

106
00:06:39,475 –> 00:06:43,235
can’t say she doesn’t care. Right. But she can’t say that, right,

107
00:06:43,235 –> 00:06:46,850
to the culture. She can’t be like, ah, I don’t really care. She’s she’s

108
00:06:46,850 –> 00:06:49,490
not in a space that we are in in our culture right now, which is

109
00:06:49,490 –> 00:06:52,975
why I guess it resonated with me in this part of these chapters. She’s not

110
00:06:52,975 –> 00:06:56,655
this space that we’re at in our culture, which I described a few

111
00:06:56,655 –> 00:07:00,389
years ago as the I do what I want kind of culture. Yeah.

112
00:07:00,389 –> 00:07:04,069
Which Tom me strikes me very much as like the fourth to 7 year

113
00:07:04,069 –> 00:07:06,569
old’s approach to life. Whereas

114
00:07:07,965 –> 00:07:11,345
Hurston’s writing about or portraying Janie

115
00:07:11,965 –> 00:07:15,505
in a way that is counter to the convention of 1930s

116
00:07:15,965 –> 00:07:19,789
African American culture, which is, and by the way, not just

117
00:07:19,789 –> 00:07:23,229
African American culture, just 1930s culture, period. In general. Yeah. In

118
00:07:23,229 –> 00:07:27,005
general, writers? Where there are certain proprieties you will

119
00:07:27,005 –> 00:07:30,845
uphold. You will you will wear black in mourning, not white.

120
00:07:30,845 –> 00:07:34,465
And by the way, wearing writers, just like that threw everybody off in in Eatonville.

121
00:07:35,819 –> 00:07:39,439
But you will wear black. You will show appropriate deference,

122
00:07:39,900 –> 00:07:43,435
to the death of your husband. And then, of course, the thing that will happen

123
00:07:43,435 –> 00:07:46,415
at the back end of that is because you’re a woman of property and means,

124
00:07:46,715 –> 00:07:49,995
you will, of course, get married because a woman of property and means can’t possibly

125
00:07:49,995 –> 00:07:53,819
manage that herself. And by the way, you’ll marry someone that’s socially acceptable to

126
00:07:53,819 –> 00:07:57,020
all of us in the community because we have a vote. Which is why she

127
00:07:57,020 –> 00:08:00,595
was getting courted by all the, quote, unquote, right people. Right? That’s correct.

128
00:08:00,655 –> 00:08:03,475
That’s right. Exactly. Exactly.

129
00:08:04,655 –> 00:08:08,450
And so I kinda like the way that that, that,

130
00:08:09,630 –> 00:08:13,310
that the author I I I just lost her name. I apologize. Fourth, the others.

131
00:08:13,310 –> 00:08:16,665
Zoran. Yes. To Earth Thurston. I like the way she just kinda was like, just

132
00:08:16,665 –> 00:08:20,425
gonna write this how I want. Yeah. I’ll do what I want. Well She she

133
00:08:20,425 –> 00:08:23,945
basically did the same thing writing it as her character did in the book. She

134
00:08:23,945 –> 00:08:26,690
just said, I’m just gonna do it the way I want. This is I’m gonna

135
00:08:26,690 –> 00:08:30,050
pretend I’m in New York Libby. I’m doing it my way. This is this goes

136
00:08:30,050 –> 00:08:33,365
along with who she was. I mean, one of the things that Hurston said, and

137
00:08:33,365 –> 00:08:36,645
this is one of the things that you note fourth of about her life, and

138
00:08:36,645 –> 00:08:40,460
it ties in at a deep level into their eyes are watching God,

139
00:08:40,460 –> 00:08:44,300
particularly later on when she’s in her finally in her third marriage to Tea Cake, because

140
00:08:44,300 –> 00:08:47,815
we’ll talk about that today. But there was a

141
00:08:47,815 –> 00:08:51,515
moment where a hurricane comes, comes through west Florida.

142
00:08:53,095 –> 00:08:56,295
And, we’ll talk about this a little bit more, but there are Indians or Seminole

143
00:08:56,295 –> 00:09:00,060
Indians that are escaping the hurricane. And she

144
00:09:00,060 –> 00:09:03,899
has interesting thoughts about the Indians, which I want to get

145
00:09:03,899 –> 00:09:07,595
into that, that Hurston puts into Janie’s brain, basically.

146
00:09:08,375 –> 00:09:11,975
But one Tom, and I’m tying these 2 ideas together. One Tom, I think Hurston

147
00:09:11,975 –> 00:09:15,510
was interviewed and she said that, like, yeah, I

148
00:09:15,510 –> 00:09:18,390
couldn’t couldn’t find the quote on Google. Someone will go out and find it for

149
00:09:18,390 –> 00:09:22,070
me. But she said something to the effect of I’ve been the only

150
00:09:22,070 –> 00:09:25,905
African American in the room that didn’t have that

151
00:09:25,905 –> 00:09:29,425
didn’t have, that didn’t have a teepee or feathers in my

152
00:09:29,425 –> 00:09:32,865
background or something like that or didn’t claim it because every African

153
00:09:32,865 –> 00:09:36,530
American claims that there’s some Indian in their background. Every

154
00:09:36,530 –> 00:09:40,070
single one. I’ve never been in a room where there hasn’t been one. It’s weird.

155
00:09:40,130 –> 00:09:43,945
Right? And she was very proud of that fact. She was very

156
00:09:43,945 –> 00:09:47,065
proud of the fact that I can trace all my ancestry back to here, and

157
00:09:47,065 –> 00:09:50,845
she was an anthropologist anyway. I can trace all my ancestry back to here,

158
00:09:51,030 –> 00:09:54,710
and I’m not trying to claim and I I get a sense

159
00:09:54,710 –> 00:09:58,070
this is what she meant. I’m not trying to claim extra oppression here to win

160
00:09:58,070 –> 00:10:01,644
some weird game. I’m just I’m

161
00:10:01,644 –> 00:10:05,404
violating social conventions by not doing that. Because everyone in the Harlem Renaissance

162
00:10:05,404 –> 00:10:07,805
was running around claiming that they were really good, so they were really bad. She’s

163
00:10:07,805 –> 00:10:10,810
like, no. Come on. I guess, be real here, people. And so you get that

164
00:10:10,810 –> 00:10:14,490
with Janie. You get that that that that flying in the face of social conventions

165
00:10:14,490 –> 00:10:17,805
in, in this part of the book, which I love. Yeah.

166
00:10:17,945 –> 00:10:19,485
Same. I love that.

167
00:10:23,065 –> 00:10:26,300
In our time, of course, we’re consumed more with race than we are with class.

168
00:10:26,459 –> 00:10:29,260
We’ve kind of talked about a little bit on the podcast. We talked about a

169
00:10:29,260 –> 00:10:33,019
little bit in, To Kill A Mockingbird, the episode that comes in between this

170
00:10:33,019 –> 00:10:36,845
one, by Harper Lee. And, of course, we’ll talk about it

171
00:10:36,845 –> 00:10:40,605
again. There’s no wants to talk about there’s a loss of things

172
00:10:40,605 –> 00:10:42,785
to talk about with that. But

173
00:10:44,570 –> 00:10:48,010
I think the fact that we are consumed more with race than with class is

174
00:10:48,010 –> 00:10:51,709
a triumph of the approach to culture, by those in the political

175
00:10:51,769 –> 00:10:55,445
activist camp of African Americans, the W. E. B. Du

176
00:10:55,445 –> 00:10:58,745
Bois camp. And

177
00:10:59,605 –> 00:11:03,130
I don’t know what to make of that. I think it’s very interesting

178
00:11:03,190 –> 00:11:06,950
that in

179
00:11:06,950 –> 00:11:10,524
a class based life evolution occurs more

180
00:11:10,524 –> 00:11:14,285
subtly. People adapt more subtly. And you

181
00:11:14,285 –> 00:11:17,024
and I were kind of talking a little bit about this earlier.

182
00:11:18,410 –> 00:11:22,250
You know, when you have the ability to when

183
00:11:22,250 –> 00:11:25,370
you have the ability to take your life savings and put it into a business

184
00:11:25,449 –> 00:11:28,795
take a business venture, that’s a class based

185
00:11:28,935 –> 00:11:32,535
act. There’s something there that, quite

186
00:11:32,535 –> 00:11:35,675
frankly, I mean, you mentioned earlier on this podcast

187
00:11:37,519 –> 00:11:41,360
in the previous episode, but also subsequent podcast you’ve mentioned, you’ve talked

188
00:11:41,360 –> 00:11:44,480
about this. And with To Kill A Mockingbird that you talked about this, Tom, how

189
00:11:44,480 –> 00:11:48,245
you grew up poor. Right. I grew up working class. Like

190
00:11:48,385 –> 00:11:52,065
my parents were turning class poor. Right. I don’t think my

191
00:11:52,065 –> 00:11:55,740
mother made it, made, made any more than $32,000 until the time she

192
00:11:55,740 –> 00:11:59,520
was, like, 50. That’s the same. Right? Yeah.

193
00:11:59,580 –> 00:12:02,960
Uh-huh. And raised 4 kids and everything else. Right?

194
00:12:03,564 –> 00:12:07,245
fourth years ago, $32,000 a year was actually not terrible.

195
00:12:07,305 –> 00:12:10,745
Like, that was Not terrible? What No. No. No. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not

196
00:12:10,745 –> 00:12:13,989
I’m not saying that you were upper middle class. I’m just saying, like, it was

197
00:12:13,989 –> 00:12:17,695
survivable is really what I should say. And let and let me frame this this

198
00:12:17,695 –> 00:12:19,425
way. My kids know what arugula is.

199
00:12:24,225 –> 00:12:27,990
Like, I get that arugula on it’s very it’s rolling fry. I

200
00:12:27,990 –> 00:12:29,370
get that arugula on layaway.

201
00:12:31,670 –> 00:12:34,230
So to your point, I mean, I grew up very poor. I didn’t know what

202
00:12:34,230 –> 00:12:37,815
quinoa was until I was an adult. My kids knew what quinoa was.

203
00:12:38,355 –> 00:12:42,195
That’s what I’m saying. They were. Right? Like, this so, yeah, I

204
00:12:42,195 –> 00:12:45,875
get it. So it’s only got better than we did. Oh,

205
00:12:45,875 –> 00:12:49,600
what? Oh my gosh. Please. Please. A feast

206
00:12:49,600 –> 00:12:53,440
of riches. I tell this to them all the time. When my when my boy

207
00:12:54,435 –> 00:12:56,595
or not even my boy. I pick on him a lot on this. I do.

208
00:12:56,595 –> 00:13:00,274
I I’d write him a lot. But but my middle daughter, my my youngest I’m

209
00:13:00,274 –> 00:13:03,495
dumb. Not middle daughter. Youngest daughter, when she’s laying on the couch

210
00:13:04,030 –> 00:13:07,870
just, oh, should I watch, like, Avengers for

211
00:13:07,870 –> 00:13:11,650
the 4th time? It’s another 899 on Amazon.

212
00:13:12,270 –> 00:13:15,904
Dear god. Yeah. How many

213
00:13:15,904 –> 00:13:19,665
times you gotta watch Infinity War? You

214
00:13:19,665 –> 00:13:23,400
already got the plot. Yeah. When my kid so to your

215
00:13:23,400 –> 00:13:27,240
point, my kids are going, oh, should I watch cable or prime, or should

216
00:13:27,240 –> 00:13:31,015
I find something on Netflix or Hulu? Like, no. I I’ll check

217
00:13:31,015 –> 00:13:34,535
Disney Plus. And I’m thinking to myself, I had, like, 4 channels, and they were

218
00:13:34,535 –> 00:13:38,140
all just disgustingly staticky. The Remember

219
00:13:38,140 –> 00:13:41,660
the remember the UHF channels? We didn’t have a color TV in my house

220
00:13:41,660 –> 00:13:44,160
until I was like, the until I was adults.

221
00:13:45,605 –> 00:13:49,365
I knew it was out of control when I when at one point

222
00:13:49,365 –> 00:13:51,925
in time and this doesn’t exist anymore, but at one point in time in our

223
00:13:51,925 –> 00:13:55,670
house, we had, like, 4 remote controls. Oh, yeah. I knew it was out of

224
00:13:55,670 –> 00:13:59,430
control. I was like, this is this is this is this is nuts. This is

225
00:13:59,430 –> 00:14:03,195
out of control. We gotta stop this. Like, somebody’s gotta put the brakes

226
00:14:03,195 –> 00:14:06,875
on this. But, yeah, like, your kids know what quinoa is. My

227
00:14:06,875 –> 00:14:10,389
kids know what arugula is. I mean, they’re living better

228
00:14:10,389 –> 00:14:14,069
lives than we lived. And to to our

229
00:14:14,069 –> 00:14:17,589
credit, I think that that’s because we worked hard at it. I don’t believe in

230
00:14:17,589 –> 00:14:21,335
luck. For sure. But I also think

231
00:14:21,335 –> 00:14:25,175
that there are certain evolutions that occur as you

232
00:14:25,175 –> 00:14:28,560
move up or down the class structure. I think

233
00:14:28,560 –> 00:14:31,920
Hurston was sensitive to that. I think any creative is sensitive to

234
00:14:31,920 –> 00:14:35,300
that. And I think leaders should be sensitive to that. So

235
00:14:36,024 –> 00:14:39,545
I guess I’d like to sort of officially open up the question

236
00:14:39,545 –> 00:14:40,045
here.

237
00:14:43,120 –> 00:14:46,960
Just like leading people in in with any other differences, right, leaders

238
00:14:46,960 –> 00:14:50,725
have to be aware of class literature. But we have a real

239
00:14:50,725 –> 00:14:54,084
struggle wrapping our mouth around those ideas, you know, in

240
00:14:54,084 –> 00:14:57,900
America. Because I was telling you this is somebody who I was talking to a

241
00:14:57,900 –> 00:15:01,500
few days ago who’s from, who’s a Dutch person from,

242
00:15:02,780 –> 00:15:06,585
from, from England. And I had to

243
00:15:06,585 –> 00:15:10,345
explain to him that everybody in America thinks they’re middle class from bill gates

244
00:15:10,345 –> 00:15:13,885
to the homeless guy in San Francisco. Who’s mainlining, like,

245
00:15:14,220 –> 00:15:17,920
you know, heroin with a touch of Fentanyl. Like, you know? Like

246
00:15:18,060 –> 00:15:21,579
like, I mean, you know, he thinks he’s middle class too. He thinks he’s

247
00:15:21,579 –> 00:15:25,415
just he’s just one more syringe away from hitting

248
00:15:25,415 –> 00:15:29,175
that middle class dream. And

249
00:15:29,175 –> 00:15:33,000
so talk a little bit about that dichotomy because I’ve

250
00:15:33,000 –> 00:15:36,680
never I came to that conclusion years ago that this is how people

251
00:15:36,680 –> 00:15:40,265
think, but, I don’t know if I’m

252
00:15:40,585 –> 00:15:44,145
maybe I’m an outlier on that. So let’s start with that. Like, what do what

253
00:15:44,145 –> 00:15:47,245
do how do we think about class in America?

254
00:15:49,690 –> 00:15:52,810
Well, I mean, you know, I I think it’s funny. When I grew up, I

255
00:15:52,810 –> 00:15:56,110
always I always had to hear about you know, there was the

256
00:15:56,455 –> 00:16:00,135
there was the the low like, you had low class, then you

257
00:16:00,135 –> 00:16:03,975
had lower middle class, then middle class, then upper middle class,

258
00:16:03,975 –> 00:16:07,410
and then upper class, then you had rich people. Right? Yes, sir.

259
00:16:07,744 –> 00:16:11,430
Turning about lower class, there was, like, there was even, like, these

260
00:16:11,649 –> 00:16:15,205
subsets of lower class. Right? There was, like, you’re just basically living in

261
00:16:15,205 –> 00:16:18,725
poverty. Like that like or like or you’re not even living at all. You’re a

262
00:16:18,725 –> 00:16:22,560
you’re a homeless guy in in San Francisco. I mean, you’ve got nothing

263
00:16:22,560 –> 00:16:26,240
except the shopping carriage you’re pushing down the street. That was even different

264
00:16:26,240 –> 00:16:30,000
than being poor because being poor just meant you didn’t have extra money.

265
00:16:30,000 –> 00:16:33,675
Right? Like, you you could you could survive on your basic needs, and

266
00:16:33,675 –> 00:16:36,815
then that was it. That was like you you were literally living

267
00:16:37,435 –> 00:16:40,700
day by day on whether or not you could or couldn’t afford food, but you

268
00:16:40,700 –> 00:16:44,320
still had a roof over your head and, you know, whatever. Right? So,

269
00:16:45,580 –> 00:16:48,380
I I I think that I think that those most

270
00:16:49,515 –> 00:16:52,955
I think we we’ve tried so hard to eliminate most of

271
00:16:52,955 –> 00:16:56,235
those variances or subset of of,

272
00:16:57,040 –> 00:17:00,720
of classes that, like, we just want there to be an upper,

273
00:17:00,720 –> 00:17:04,240
middle, and lower class and that’s it. Like, we just want it to be those

274
00:17:04,240 –> 00:17:07,665
three things. And in in order in in trying to do

275
00:17:07,665 –> 00:17:11,365
that, we’ve just blurred the lines even more. Like, we’ve just basically said,

276
00:17:11,425 –> 00:17:15,159
you know what? The class you belong in is the class

277
00:17:15,159 –> 00:17:18,919
that you feel most comfortable in. How’s that? Like, if you if you made $40

278
00:17:18,919 –> 00:17:21,905
a year and you think you’re middle class, then go for it. Call yourself middle

279
00:17:21,905 –> 00:17:25,424
class because nobody’s gonna argue. Right? Like, that’s kinda where we’re at at this

280
00:17:25,424 –> 00:17:29,184
point. It’s essentially where you’ve declared yourself and not

281
00:17:29,184 –> 00:17:32,880
really where fourth actual Well, except the problem

282
00:17:32,880 –> 00:17:36,400
is reality with that. Right? Like, if I’m making 40,000 a

283
00:17:36,400 –> 00:17:40,045
year, that means my take home is 40,000 gross. That means

284
00:17:40,045 –> 00:17:42,385
my take home is, if I’m lucky,

285
00:17:43,645 –> 00:17:47,260
32. I was thinking closer to 27 or 28, but sure.

286
00:17:47,260 –> 00:17:50,320
32. Sure. That’s why I said if I’m Libby, 32. Right?

287
00:17:50,860 –> 00:17:54,460
Depending on and by the way, 32 in Arkansas goes a hell of a lot

288
00:17:54,460 –> 00:17:58,305
further than 32 in Chicago. Absolutely. Yes. Okay.

289
00:17:58,305 –> 00:18:01,425
Which is probably where really where more of what that comes from is what we

290
00:18:01,425 –> 00:18:04,405
were talking about a few minutes ago. Yes. Exactly. You know?

291
00:18:05,260 –> 00:18:07,600
So if I’m making 32 in Fayetteville, Arkansas,

292
00:18:08,700 –> 00:18:12,139
my class is and by the way, Fayetteville is not a bad town. I don’t

293
00:18:12,139 –> 00:18:15,705
have a problem with Fayetteville. It’d be writers for Fayetteville. That’s a great place to

294
00:18:15,705 –> 00:18:19,485
live. Very inexpensive. I would encourage you go from Chicago,

295
00:18:19,625 –> 00:18:23,259
not to move to Fayetteville, but, like, just consider

296
00:18:23,259 –> 00:18:26,503
it. Anyway, get out of New York. Well, if at least if you’re making fourth

297
00:18:26,539 –> 00:18:30,240
grand a year in Chicago, you’re not serious. Exactly.

298
00:18:30,485 –> 00:18:33,525
Get yourself out of Chicago. My god. You’re dying. You think it’s a good year

299
00:18:33,525 –> 00:18:36,725
in Chicago, you’re living on south side. Right? Like, it looks like south side Chicago

300
00:18:36,725 –> 00:18:40,430
that is not a very good neighborhood apparently. You might you might actually be

301
00:18:40,430 –> 00:18:43,410
in one of those tents we’re talking about earlier.

302
00:18:44,830 –> 00:18:48,285
Because that’s all you could afford. Yeah. But $32,000

303
00:18:48,665 –> 00:18:51,245
in Fayetteville, Arkansas, $32,000 take home.

304
00:18:52,985 –> 00:18:56,580
That goes a lot further in Fayetteville. Yeah. I I think

305
00:18:56,580 –> 00:19:00,419
the challenge, particularly of the last 20 years in in our era, has

306
00:19:00,419 –> 00:19:04,055
been the envy machine that is the mobile phone. Because I

307
00:19:04,055 –> 00:19:07,755
can look around and see it was easier maybe

308
00:19:08,055 –> 00:19:11,735
maybe 30, 40 years ago. In our historical memory, it was easier. Because

309
00:19:11,735 –> 00:19:15,220
like when I was a kid, I didn’t know that there were other

310
00:19:15,220 –> 00:19:18,920
people who lived the way that I did that were like

311
00:19:21,255 –> 00:19:23,895
across the world or across the country. I didn’t know that. I just knew the

312
00:19:23,895 –> 00:19:26,855
people essays thing with you. I just knew the people in my neighborhood. Like, I

313
00:19:26,855 –> 00:19:30,590
didn’t I’ll be honest. Like, I didn’t know you. Like, I like, the the

314
00:19:30,590 –> 00:19:33,730
concept of talking to somebody. Like, my father

315
00:19:34,670 –> 00:19:38,095
was a huge radio guy and would have loved the Internet, would have loved podcasts,

316
00:19:38,095 –> 00:19:41,934
would have loved all this. Like, if I had told

317
00:19:41,934 –> 00:19:45,775
him that I could have a chat with somebody in London, he’d be like,

318
00:19:45,775 –> 00:19:49,440
why? It’s Why do they what do you

319
00:19:49,440 –> 00:19:53,060
care with somebody in London? Is that gonna change your life somehow?

320
00:19:53,600 –> 00:19:57,265
Like, what do you and and he wouldn’t have asked the why for, like, an

321
00:19:57,265 –> 00:20:00,784
economic end. It would have been the why from, like, you’re getting an

322
00:20:00,784 –> 00:20:04,320
English degree. Why? You speak English? The hell’s your

323
00:20:04,320 –> 00:20:08,080
problem? Yeah. Yeah. So it goes

324
00:20:08,084 –> 00:20:11,695
Tom that same space. And so where class ties into that is

325
00:20:11,915 –> 00:20:15,515
when I can see someone that I use this example, because it’s the most

326
00:20:15,515 –> 00:20:18,975
recent one, but when I could see one of my quote unquote friends in Fayetteville,

327
00:20:20,100 –> 00:20:23,700
who went to Little Rock this weekend to go see a Taylor Swift

328
00:20:23,700 –> 00:20:27,524
concert and I know Taylor Swift tickets cost $1,000, and he

329
00:20:27,524 –> 00:20:30,804
took 6 people to the Taylor Swift concert, and they took a bunch of pictures.

330
00:20:30,804 –> 00:20:33,684
They took a bunch of videos, and I see the highlights. I can go to

331
00:20:33,684 –> 00:20:36,730
Ticketmaster and see that those concert tickets are $1,000.

332
00:20:37,750 –> 00:20:41,590
And now and I’m making $32,000 a year in Fayetteville, or I can

333
00:20:41,590 –> 00:20:43,290
see that,

334
00:20:45,625 –> 00:20:49,225
you know, Brad Pitt shot his new movie in Chicago when I can see all

335
00:20:49,225 –> 00:20:52,985
the shots in Chicago because they’re all on Brad Pitt’s Twitter Twitter feed.

336
00:20:52,985 –> 00:20:56,330
Right? I can see all of this stuff now. And so

337
00:20:57,110 –> 00:21:00,789
the envy that maybe wouldn’t have been there for that lifestyle, for

338
00:21:00,789 –> 00:21:04,405
that class, now comes downstream to me.

339
00:21:04,405 –> 00:21:07,285
And by the way, the biggest purveyors, I think, in our time of this crap

340
00:21:07,285 –> 00:21:10,245
actually aren’t the cell the cell phones. I think well, no. I think it’s the

341
00:21:10,245 –> 00:21:12,830
cell phones plus the Kardashians. I’ll put those 2 together.

342
00:21:14,490 –> 00:21:18,010
What the hell? I’ll blame the Kardashian and all that and and and Fourth and

343
00:21:18,010 –> 00:21:21,309
all that entire crew of nonsense that’s going on over there.

344
00:21:22,345 –> 00:21:25,885
Because I think those people made they made envy

345
00:21:25,945 –> 00:21:29,390
cool. Sure. Them and the Real

346
00:21:29,390 –> 00:21:33,230
Housewives of whoever the hell, wherever. Like, it’s never the Real Housewives

347
00:21:33,230 –> 00:21:36,965
of Fayetteville, Arkansas. It’s never that. Right. Yeah. Like,

348
00:21:36,965 –> 00:21:39,845
who cares? Like, you wanna see The Real Housewives of, like, Dubai. Well, why do

349
00:21:39,845 –> 00:21:43,365
we wanna see The Real Housewives of Dubai? We went from lifestyles of the rich

350
00:21:43,365 –> 00:21:46,890
and famous to the Real Housewives and Kim Kardashian. Can we just

351
00:21:46,890 –> 00:21:50,490
say, like, I missed that show? I really missed that show. I don’t know why.

352
00:21:50,570 –> 00:21:53,595
House is rich and famous. Yeah. Maybe it’s just Robin Leach’s voice. I don’t know,

353
00:21:53,595 –> 00:21:57,195
but I actually do miss that show. And I think the

354
00:21:57,195 –> 00:22:00,955
Kardashians ruined it because they basically became that show. Like, it took over

355
00:22:00,955 –> 00:22:04,700
and whatever. But anyway Well, okay. Is that like what what

356
00:22:04,700 –> 00:22:06,540
was it? The the MTV show about,

357
00:22:08,300 –> 00:22:11,965
the the, the the the MTV show that that

358
00:22:11,965 –> 00:22:15,485
toward the rich people’s houses. Like, I forgot the name of Cribs. Thank

359
00:22:15,485 –> 00:22:19,325
you. I love that show. Between that show and the Kardashians and Tom

360
00:22:19,325 –> 00:22:21,460
My Ride, Robin Leach had no shot.

361
00:22:24,800 –> 00:22:27,784
I wonder I wonder what Zora Neale Hurston would think of Pimp My Ride. I

362
00:22:27,784 –> 00:22:31,065
wonder what she would think of that. I wonder what she would say. I don’t

363
00:22:31,065 –> 00:22:34,024
know the woman myself, but just based on some of the stuff I’ve read about

364
00:22:34,024 –> 00:22:37,390
her, I think she’d had problem with this. She might’ve had an issue. She might’ve

365
00:22:37,390 –> 00:22:40,190
had a challenge. If this was one of her children, I think she would’ve just

366
00:22:40,190 –> 00:22:42,795
smacked it outside the head and said, what are you doing? Fix the car. Fix

367
00:22:42,795 –> 00:22:46,475
the car. Stop it. Okay. So

368
00:22:46,475 –> 00:22:50,315
what do leaders do with class envy then? Like, because we see

369
00:22:50,315 –> 00:22:54,159
a lot of it now, and it’s it’s driven by this like you

370
00:22:54,159 –> 00:22:57,840
said, we’ve tried to flatten everybody into the middle class, but then we have

371
00:22:57,840 –> 00:23:01,039
that other tension on the other side, which is I can look at what everybody

372
00:23:01,039 –> 00:23:04,855
else has. Yeah. And and and I think I think

373
00:23:04,855 –> 00:23:08,375
that this beholds leaders to even be

374
00:23:08,375 –> 00:23:12,020
more diligent about treating people based on their merits

375
00:23:12,080 –> 00:23:15,680
and not Yeah. Yeah. Their not their optics. Right? Or

376
00:23:15,840 –> 00:23:19,440
Yeah. Any optic, by the way. I don’t care what it is. I don’t care

377
00:23:19,440 –> 00:23:23,155
if it’s race, color, creed, class, whatever it

378
00:23:23,155 –> 00:23:26,595
looks like from the outside, and basically being and and saying to

379
00:23:26,595 –> 00:23:30,400
somebody that we are going to treat you

380
00:23:30,400 –> 00:23:33,760
based on your actions, your

381
00:23:33,760 –> 00:23:37,520
your actions and reactions and and how you and and how you perform for

382
00:23:37,520 –> 00:23:41,195
the company. It’s really that simple. And I think that leaders have to be

383
00:23:41,575 –> 00:23:45,414
that much more diligent because it’s so easy. Right?

384
00:23:45,414 –> 00:23:49,140
It’s so easy to get distracted with this other stuff that we’re talking about. It’s

385
00:23:49,140 –> 00:23:52,740
easy to get distract my opinion this is

386
00:23:52,740 –> 00:23:56,580
strictly opinion, by the way. If I as a leaders, as a person who

387
00:23:56,580 –> 00:24:00,165
has run sales teams and so on and so forth, I refuse. I will

388
00:24:00,165 –> 00:24:03,625
not go on anybody on any of my sales rep’s social media.

389
00:24:03,925 –> 00:24:06,839
I do not wanna see what they’re doing on social media. Now if I happen

390
00:24:06,839 –> 00:24:10,679
to see on our company site that they shared one of our company posts, I

391
00:24:10,679 –> 00:24:14,360
might like it. Great. Put a thumbs up on there. But I’m not going

392
00:24:14,360 –> 00:24:18,145
down a rabbit hole looking at their social media because that could potentially

393
00:24:18,205 –> 00:24:21,585
very heavily influence the way I think about them the next day.

394
00:24:21,885 –> 00:24:25,620
Right? And videos of them on the some table in a bar

395
00:24:25,620 –> 00:24:29,140
drinking and whatever. And if I’m if I’m a recovering alcoholic, which I’m not, by

396
00:24:29,140 –> 00:24:31,625
the way. I’m just saying, if I’m a recovering alcoholic, I see that kind of

397
00:24:31,625 –> 00:24:34,505
behavior, I all of a sudden have this trip wire, and I don’t like that

398
00:24:34,505 –> 00:24:38,205
person tomorrow morning. Right. I have been pretty diligent

399
00:24:38,264 –> 00:24:42,110
about not going down the rabbit holes of looking at social

400
00:24:42,110 –> 00:24:45,630
media of my employees. And I think that that’s wisdom. That could

401
00:24:45,630 –> 00:24:49,375
potentially be something that other people don’t do and gets them in some trouble.

402
00:24:49,835 –> 00:24:52,715
So I think that’s wisdom. I mean, a lot I train a lot of, a

403
00:24:52,715 –> 00:24:56,095
lot of groups of employees and managers and supervisors,

404
00:24:57,180 –> 00:25:01,020
And I’ve done that work for quite some time and through my

405
00:25:01,020 –> 00:25:04,380
consultancy and particularly in the civil

406
00:25:04,380 –> 00:25:08,005
service, like, it’s it’s they are encouraged to

407
00:25:08,005 –> 00:25:11,524
keep their social media on lockdown, which is

408
00:25:11,524 –> 00:25:15,250
hugely important. And

409
00:25:15,250 –> 00:25:18,150
I know that when I was in higher education as well,

410
00:25:19,330 –> 00:25:22,610
I was not and this is in the early days of social media before everything

411
00:25:22,610 –> 00:25:26,355
sort of got to where it is now. But you could see you can begin

412
00:25:26,355 –> 00:25:28,755
to see the clearing at the end of the path, you know, on some of

413
00:25:28,755 –> 00:25:32,355
this. I was encouraged, and I took the posture with my

414
00:25:32,355 –> 00:25:36,090
employees who were 18, 19, 20 years old. I said, I’m not gonna

415
00:25:36,090 –> 00:25:39,850
be, we’re not gonna be friends on Facebook. That was a big thing at the

416
00:25:39,850 –> 00:25:43,535
time. We’re not gonna be friends on Facebook until after you’re graduated

417
00:25:43,595 –> 00:25:47,434
and already done. Because I if you’re drinking in your room with

418
00:25:47,434 –> 00:25:50,475
peers or you’re drinking in a place where you need to be drinking at and

419
00:25:50,475 –> 00:25:54,240
you’re doing it irresponsibly. I never said that. But if you’re doing it irresponsibly, I

420
00:25:54,240 –> 00:25:58,000
don’t wanna know. Yeah. Right. I really don’t wanna know because what I have

421
00:25:58,159 –> 00:26:01,755
what I know about, I have to do something about. And if I don’t know,

422
00:26:01,755 –> 00:26:04,555
I don’t have to do anything about it. I don’t even follow my own kids

423
00:26:04,555 –> 00:26:07,275
on on social media for the same reason that you just mentioned. I don’t wanna

424
00:26:07,275 –> 00:26:10,780
know. I don’t know if they’re doing it like that. Well, and for kids for

425
00:26:10,780 –> 00:26:14,583
my kids, I I solved that problem in a different kind of way.

426
00:26:14,583 –> 00:26:18,387
I just banned all cell phones. But, I’m working on I’m working

427
00:26:18,387 –> 00:26:22,135
on a deeper cut than even that. But my point is that

428
00:26:22,555 –> 00:26:26,355
those kinds of boundaries between leaders and

429
00:26:26,355 –> 00:26:29,815
followers have to be maintained. But what do you do when,

430
00:26:34,080 –> 00:26:37,920
what do you do when followers are friends with each other on social media?

431
00:26:37,920 –> 00:26:41,425
And now because this has been happening quite a bit over the

432
00:26:41,425 –> 00:26:45,265
last 5 to 7 years where I follow you

433
00:26:45,265 –> 00:26:48,840
on social, I’m your co worker, and you post

434
00:26:48,840 –> 00:26:52,540
something I don’t like. Oh, yeah. The this

435
00:26:52,840 –> 00:26:56,395
I can only imagine what some of the yeah.

436
00:26:56,395 –> 00:26:59,035
Anyway, go ahead. Sorry. And that right. Right. Right. Right. Oh, you know where I’m

437
00:26:59,035 –> 00:27:02,555
going with this. And and now we’re all policing each other in this

438
00:27:02,555 –> 00:27:05,920
weird pseudo virtual environment that, again,

439
00:27:06,220 –> 00:27:09,680
doesn’t have anything to do with with with the material

440
00:27:10,060 –> 00:27:13,825
real world we’re all living in instead is a reflection,

441
00:27:13,825 –> 00:27:16,165
a highlight reel of reality.

442
00:27:17,345 –> 00:27:20,725
But because human the human brain can’t

443
00:27:21,040 –> 00:27:24,640
distinguish between what’s real and fake without being told, you have to be

444
00:27:24,640 –> 00:27:26,500
told what’s real or fake. Right?

445
00:27:29,335 –> 00:27:32,935
People don’t have good critical thinking skills to be able to tell themselves that or

446
00:27:32,935 –> 00:27:36,480
to be able to make those delineations. And so, you know,

447
00:27:36,780 –> 00:27:40,560
my my coworker posts essays, well, I mean, the month we’re in,

448
00:27:40,620 –> 00:27:44,300
so I might as well just go for it. My my coworker posts a rainbow

449
00:27:44,300 –> 00:27:47,835
flag right in their bio or whatever fourth writes

450
00:27:47,835 –> 00:27:51,674
some post about something. And I didn’t know

451
00:27:51,674 –> 00:27:55,290
that thing about my coworker. I never asked that thing about my coworker,

452
00:27:55,290 –> 00:27:59,050
but I’m friends with my coworker. And maybe I have

453
00:27:59,050 –> 00:28:02,695
a difference of thought. And so I write something

454
00:28:02,755 –> 00:28:06,434
that’s opposite to that. And I respond to my

455
00:28:06,434 –> 00:28:10,280
coworker. By the way, these things happen. The leader

456
00:28:10,280 –> 00:28:13,880
is usually the last to know by the time this stuff

457
00:28:13,880 –> 00:28:17,605
explodes. What how do leaders deal with that? This is a huge Jesan this

458
00:28:17,605 –> 00:28:19,830
stuff explodes? Because usually they’re the last they’re not invited they’re not invited to the

459
00:28:19,830 –> 00:28:20,735
original posting. I think,

460
00:28:26,630 –> 00:28:29,990
I think one thing, you know, let let’s let’s take a step back for a

461
00:28:29,990 –> 00:28:33,370
second. Sure. I I I think I think if you can

462
00:28:33,904 –> 00:28:37,265
find a way, shape, or form Tom get ahead of

463
00:28:37,265 –> 00:28:40,725
it with some really good written company

464
00:28:40,784 –> 00:28:44,529
policy to begin with, this may not end

465
00:28:44,529 –> 00:28:48,049
up becoming a problem in the first place. Right? So Yeah. What I mean by

466
00:28:48,049 –> 00:28:51,565
this is, for example, you know,

467
00:28:52,505 –> 00:28:56,345
maybe it’s a a company policy of not I

468
00:28:56,345 –> 00:28:59,304
don’t know. Maybe I don’t think we could do this, but I’m just saying, like,

469
00:28:59,304 –> 00:29:03,049
you’re not allowed to follow fellow employees that are that are

470
00:29:03,049 –> 00:29:06,570
in the same group that you are. Like, again so, like, somebody in the

471
00:29:06,570 –> 00:29:10,205
finance somebody in the finance department wants to be friends with sales and they follow

472
00:29:10,205 –> 00:29:13,085
each other, fine. Because guess what? If they get mad at each other, they’re probably

473
00:29:13,085 –> 00:29:16,045
not impacting each other’s day. Right? Like, you can you can stay away from each

474
00:29:16,045 –> 00:29:19,800
other. But somebody on the in the finance department following another finance department

475
00:29:19,800 –> 00:29:23,640
person may be a bad idea. Right? Like, so let’s let’s avoid that. Now,

476
00:29:23,640 –> 00:29:26,505
again, I don’t know if that’s actually even legal, to be honest with you, to

477
00:29:26,505 –> 00:29:29,305
tell somebody they can or can’t follow each other on social media. But let’s just

478
00:29:29,305 –> 00:29:33,145
say that it’s not legal and you can’t do it that way. You

479
00:29:33,145 –> 00:29:36,639
can still you can still put some sort of company policy in place that

480
00:29:36,639 –> 00:29:40,399
says that fourth and and be very

481
00:29:40,399 –> 00:29:44,065
clear about it. Your personal things,

482
00:29:44,065 –> 00:29:47,825
where where again, whether it’s your personal belief systems or your personal

483
00:29:47,825 –> 00:29:51,425
social media, your personal family life, whatever that is, is not

484
00:29:51,425 –> 00:29:55,169
allowed to implode the

485
00:29:55,230 –> 00:29:58,610
the the workplace. And by implode, you list them out. Like,

486
00:29:58,910 –> 00:30:02,615
if you see something if a coworker’s doing something on social media you don’t like,

487
00:30:03,155 –> 00:30:06,695
that’s okay for you not to like it, but it cannot impact your workday.

488
00:30:06,915 –> 00:30:10,350
If and and literally list out some, like, really clear

489
00:30:10,570 –> 00:30:14,250
versions of this. Now that being said, even in doing that, I don’t know if

490
00:30:14,250 –> 00:30:18,010
you’re gonna avoid that problem. I still think there’s a possibility you’ll avoid that problem.

491
00:30:18,010 –> 00:30:21,595
So in that case, but but at least the leader has

492
00:30:21,595 –> 00:30:25,035
something to defer to as a guiding principle as to how to handle the

493
00:30:25,035 –> 00:30:28,810
issue. Right? Sure. So employee a and employee b come into my

494
00:30:28,810 –> 00:30:32,490
office. What’s going on? Well, they posted something on social media and they posted

495
00:30:32,490 –> 00:30:35,735
something on social media and we didn’t like it. Okay. Let me refer to this

496
00:30:35,735 –> 00:30:39,575
policy right here. Do you remember signing off on this? So tell me

497
00:30:39,575 –> 00:30:43,370
what about this policy you can’t live with and and and, like,

498
00:30:43,370 –> 00:30:47,149
and kinda make it make it more a a matter of fact thing than

499
00:30:47,289 –> 00:30:50,890
a, like, a personal attack on either one of their belief systems because you

500
00:30:50,890 –> 00:30:53,635
certainly don’t wanna get certainly don’t don’t wanna go down that rabbit hole because if

501
00:30:53,635 –> 00:30:56,914
you attack either one of their or even if you allude to what looks like

502
00:30:56,914 –> 00:31:00,274
an attack on either one of their personal belief systems, you forget about

503
00:31:00,274 –> 00:31:04,010
employee problems. You’re opening yourself up to lawsuits. So you

504
00:31:04,010 –> 00:31:07,289
can’t do that. But, again Well and this is and this is the brave new

505
00:31:07,289 –> 00:31:10,835
world because you’re also into, like again, remember I said, the

506
00:31:10,835 –> 00:31:14,595
leader usually doesn’t find out about this Yeah. Until after

507
00:31:14,595 –> 00:31:18,370
the problem is already, like, begun. Right? And we’re well

508
00:31:18,370 –> 00:31:21,990
down the road. We’re well down the road. I mean, I’ve read

509
00:31:22,210 –> 00:31:25,830
stories about employees doxing and harassing each other,

510
00:31:26,205 –> 00:31:29,825
you know, gaslighting, and just all kinds of nonsense. Right?

511
00:31:30,205 –> 00:31:33,660
And again, the

512
00:31:33,660 –> 00:31:37,500
manager, the supervisor, usually the last in line to even

513
00:31:37,500 –> 00:31:40,460
realize that this is going on, although increasingly and a lot of this I think

514
00:31:40,460 –> 00:31:42,835
was broken during COVID because

515
00:31:43,855 –> 00:31:47,455
remote workers are working so much on instant messaging systems like

516
00:31:47,455 –> 00:31:51,230
Slack or chat or whatever your internal system is. And

517
00:31:51,230 –> 00:31:55,070
we saw this at Google actually with the employee, the employees who

518
00:31:55,070 –> 00:31:58,905
organized and Google. So here’s what Google. Instead of having

519
00:31:58,905 –> 00:32:02,745
everybody follow everybody on social media or on Google because Google doesn’t do social,

520
00:32:02,745 –> 00:32:05,405
there are surveillance and data scraping company.

521
00:32:06,105 –> 00:32:09,570
Instead instead, what they oh, everybody

522
00:32:09,590 –> 00:32:13,250
knows. Instead, what, what they did was

523
00:32:13,470 –> 00:32:16,450
they instituted sort of a Slack and internal Slack

524
00:32:17,215 –> 00:32:20,655
where they allowed people to kind of blow off steam and kind of unite in

525
00:32:20,655 –> 00:32:24,095
the internal Slack, thinking that that was going to be the thing that was going

526
00:32:24,095 –> 00:32:27,740
to eliminate conflicts, particularly around 2020 and DEI

527
00:32:27,880 –> 00:32:31,640
and social justice and all these other sort of hot button social issues that are

528
00:32:31,640 –> 00:32:34,265
going on in the culture. And, of course, Google’s in San Francisco. So, of course,

529
00:32:34,265 –> 00:32:37,725
everybody’s got an opinion about these Sorrells issues because they’re not in Fayetteville,

530
00:32:37,785 –> 00:32:40,605
Arkansas, where people would just be like,

531
00:32:41,760 –> 00:32:45,120
go outside. I don’t know. Like, leave it what?

532
00:32:45,120 –> 00:32:48,960
Stop. Okay. So, and I’m not saying that

533
00:32:48,960 –> 00:32:52,265
when you get people that would get upset about DEI, payable, Arkansas, but the the

534
00:32:52,265 –> 00:32:55,145
vast majority of folks there are going to be probably a little bit more down

535
00:32:55,145 –> 00:32:58,285
to earth than the folks who are in Mountain View.

536
00:32:59,440 –> 00:33:02,500
Okay? Now

537
00:33:03,840 –> 00:33:07,525
that didn’t work out for Google. That internal

538
00:33:07,525 –> 00:33:11,365
Slack channel didn’t work out. As a matter of fact, it didn’t work

539
00:33:11,365 –> 00:33:15,125
out so well that some Google employees decided they were

540
00:33:15,125 –> 00:33:18,680
going to protest, the Palestinian, Hamas,

541
00:33:18,980 –> 00:33:22,440
Israeli, Gaza war in the offices

542
00:33:23,060 –> 00:33:26,545
of people who weren’t even in their work group, leaders who weren’t even their leaders.

543
00:33:26,925 –> 00:33:30,125
And so they went and they boycotted the offices or not boycotted, but they went,

544
00:33:30,125 –> 00:33:33,580
they barricaded themselves in the office and basically

545
00:33:33,580 –> 00:33:36,800
disturbed the workday. And I’ll give you the punchline.

546
00:33:37,500 –> 00:33:41,054
This happened probably about a month and a half, maybe 6 weeks ago, and all

547
00:33:41,054 –> 00:33:42,434
those employees were fired.

548
00:33:45,054 –> 00:33:48,630
I don’t think Google had a policy for that. Google didn’t

549
00:33:48,630 –> 00:33:52,470
have the Google didn’t have the Google didn’t have

550
00:33:52,470 –> 00:33:55,990
the the in case the people decide to take the thing off the internal

551
00:33:55,990 –> 00:33:59,765
Slack and go and barricade themselves in the office of people who don’t even supervise

552
00:33:59,765 –> 00:34:02,885
them policy, I don’t think they had that written down, and I don’t know how

553
00:34:02,885 –> 00:34:06,090
HR even covers that. Yeah.

554
00:34:07,269 –> 00:34:11,109
Yeah. I I yeah. Good question. Right. I got it. I

555
00:34:11,109 –> 00:34:14,150
I yeah. I don’t know. But it was one of the more ridiculous things that

556
00:34:14,150 –> 00:34:17,975
I saw, And I suspect that and again this

557
00:34:17,975 –> 00:34:21,655
is related to class if you work at Google, you’re of a

558
00:34:21,655 –> 00:34:25,159
different class than someone who works in I picked a lot on Arkansas today, so

559
00:34:25,159 –> 00:34:28,840
I won’t. I’ll move along. I’ll move across the country. You you

560
00:34:28,840 –> 00:34:31,900
probably are of a different think of yourself in a different

561
00:34:32,514 –> 00:34:36,275
class structure or in a different class distinction than

562
00:34:36,275 –> 00:34:40,089
someone who works in Memphis, Tennessee. For

563
00:34:40,089 –> 00:34:43,449
sure. Good, bad, ugly, or indifferent, you probably think of yours even though you both

564
00:34:43,449 –> 00:34:47,275
may make the same amount of money, you know, a $150,000

565
00:34:47,655 –> 00:34:51,255
in Memphis, Tennessee and a $150,000 in Mountain View is still

566
00:34:51,255 –> 00:34:54,889
$150,000. Alright. But in Mountain View, you’re living in a shack, and

567
00:34:54,889 –> 00:34:58,590
in Tennessee, you’re living in a mansion. Correct. But you

568
00:34:58,590 –> 00:35:02,190
still but living in that shack, you think that you’re of a better class because

569
00:35:02,190 –> 00:35:05,925
I work at Google. Meanwhile, the person in Memphis, Tennessee may work

570
00:35:05,925 –> 00:35:08,585
for a plumbing company that’s been there for 150 years.

571
00:35:10,005 –> 00:35:13,650
For sure. So class is weird and I think Hurston hit on it.

572
00:35:13,790 –> 00:35:17,390
By the way one last point on this, so I

573
00:35:17,390 –> 00:35:19,655
follow a I follow

574
00:35:21,315 –> 00:35:24,995
a magazine, I guess, a newsletter called Pirate Wires. I’m gonna give a shout out

575
00:35:24,995 –> 00:35:28,610
to those guys here. They probably won’t hear this, but I’m gonna give a shout

576
00:35:28,610 –> 00:35:31,750
out to those guys. You should subscribe if you’re listening to Pirate Wires Daily.

577
00:35:32,370 –> 00:35:35,810
They are very, very book, and they track a lot of this sort

578
00:35:35,810 –> 00:35:39,335
of in the sort of interesting things that occur

579
00:35:39,795 –> 00:35:43,635
around, the intricacies of class

580
00:35:43,635 –> 00:35:47,050
in tech, along with many, many other things in tech. And it’s one of

581
00:35:47,050 –> 00:35:50,730
those daily newsletters that I get. And Mike Solana is the,

582
00:35:50,970 –> 00:35:54,684
the editor in chief. And, one of the 3 takes, I get a I

583
00:35:54,684 –> 00:35:58,204
get a daily update. It’s 3 take daily update. They have 3 articles in one

584
00:35:58,204 –> 00:36:01,380
newsletter. And the one that I happened to see, dated,

585
00:36:03,620 –> 00:36:07,000
today, got it at 5 am, 10 hours ago as of this recording,

586
00:36:07,775 –> 00:36:11,075
which is, June 14th, flag day, 2024.

587
00:36:11,775 –> 00:36:15,570
Mike Solana wrote yesterday scales and

588
00:36:15,570 –> 00:36:19,410
scale as an AI company. I think scales, Alex Wang fourth announced

589
00:36:19,410 –> 00:36:22,870
his company’s new hiring policy. And we’re talking about this

590
00:36:23,695 –> 00:36:26,675
MEI fourth merit, excellence, and intelligence

591
00:36:27,375 –> 00:36:30,995
explicitly banning race, gender, and identity based hiring from the company,

592
00:36:31,299 –> 00:36:35,140
quote, that means we hire only the best person for the job,

593
00:36:35,140 –> 00:36:38,980
the founder controversially explained, and, quote, hiring on merit

594
00:36:38,980 –> 00:36:42,575
will be a permanent policy of scale, he further controversially added.

595
00:36:43,275 –> 00:36:47,055
Partly a public gesture of this kind was inevitable following years of DEI backlash.

596
00:36:47,434 –> 00:36:50,950
Partly, it’s probably close to the law at this point following the supreme court’s

597
00:36:50,950 –> 00:36:53,930
ruling over Harvard’s racist admissions practices.

598
00:36:54,950 –> 00:36:58,654
But mostly, it’s just interesting how few people melted down over his decision.

599
00:36:59,035 –> 00:37:02,714
No massive media backlash, no staff exodus. The man

600
00:37:02,714 –> 00:37:05,690
said, quote, we are hiring smart people. I don’t care if they look alike. I

601
00:37:05,690 –> 00:37:08,430
don’t care what they look like. And everyone said,

602
00:37:09,530 –> 00:37:13,050
okay. Then he got a bunch of love

603
00:37:13,050 –> 00:37:16,575
online. Stay losing, Robin D’Angelo

604
00:37:16,635 –> 00:37:20,375
obsessed HR cat ladies. It’s the revolution of the same. That’s

605
00:37:20,375 –> 00:37:23,135
fourth Mike Salata. Those are not my words. Closed quote.

606
00:37:24,810 –> 00:37:28,350
Merit, excellence, and intelligence, m e I.

607
00:37:31,225 –> 00:37:34,825
I mean, welcome to the 21st century. Like, shouldn’t everyone be out? What the hell?

608
00:37:34,825 –> 00:37:38,665
Who can are we we’re gonna applaud him for something that, like,

609
00:37:38,665 –> 00:37:41,350
everybody should be doing anyway? What the hell?

610
00:37:42,530 –> 00:37:45,090
This is where we’re at. Something like that. He wants a button. He wants a

611
00:37:45,090 –> 00:37:48,610
like button. Well but but see but see now you can you can look at

612
00:37:48,610 –> 00:37:52,435
his posting, that was somewhere. I think it was on Twitter that he

613
00:37:52,435 –> 00:37:56,035
made this announcement. And you can like it and or you can look at it

614
00:37:56,035 –> 00:37:59,720
and not like it and feel envious. Hey.

615
00:37:59,720 –> 00:38:03,100
Yeah. Hey. Sure. This is the envy machine of social media.

616
00:38:04,600 –> 00:38:08,335
Oh my gosh. Alright. I lost

617
00:38:08,335 –> 00:38:11,375
I lost the the ability to have envy when I realized that when I when

618
00:38:11,375 –> 00:38:14,015
I was a kid that everybody had more than me, so I would be envying

619
00:38:14,015 –> 00:38:17,750
the entire world if I like, it’s a useless emotion. I’m

620
00:38:17,750 –> 00:38:20,250
not gonna worry about envy anymore. Just skip it.

621
00:38:21,590 –> 00:38:24,685
This is gonna skip envy and go straight to jealousy on the people that I

622
00:38:24,685 –> 00:38:27,585
know I can support. There you go.

623
00:38:28,845 –> 00:38:32,685
Well, this is One of the things I sometimes

624
00:38:32,685 –> 00:38:36,470
will talk on our solo episodes, I sometimes talk about this, whenever

625
00:38:36,470 –> 00:38:40,170
we talk about sort of more theologically oriented books like Mere Christianity

626
00:38:40,310 –> 00:38:43,530
by CS Lewis, or we’ll talk about Reinhold Niebuhr,

627
00:38:43,810 –> 00:38:47,525
fourth even Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Right? You know, anything by a

628
00:38:47,525 –> 00:38:50,645
theologian. I I

629
00:38:51,390 –> 00:38:54,050
I’m fascinated by the fact that

630
00:38:55,070 –> 00:38:58,450
almost no one in our culture, our modern postmodern

631
00:38:58,590 –> 00:39:01,974
culture, uses those old school words like envy and jealousy

632
00:39:01,974 –> 00:39:05,734
anymore, even though we know what those emotions are. Right? And we seem to

633
00:39:05,734 –> 00:39:09,510
have lost that language. Greed. Oh, we know

634
00:39:09,510 –> 00:39:13,350
that word fourth sure. Like, greed, please. I mean, who is it that said in

635
00:39:13,350 –> 00:39:16,470
the 1980s, you know, quote, unquote greed is book? I think there was some movie

636
00:39:16,470 –> 00:39:20,317
Wall Street. You know? Yeah. Oliver Stone put that put those words

637
00:39:20,317 –> 00:39:23,938
in Michael Douglas’s mouth. So greed, we absolutely know, and greed, we could

638
00:39:23,938 –> 00:39:27,450
spot like dimes on the highway. But the other ones interchange greed with

639
00:39:27,450 –> 00:39:31,290
capitalism. Right. But the other ones, we don’t. We don’t interchange,

640
00:39:31,290 –> 00:39:34,910
like, vanity with the Kardashians. Right.

641
00:39:35,744 –> 00:39:38,964
Like, we don’t interchange envy with social media.

642
00:39:40,144 –> 00:39:43,839
We don’t interchange lust with pornography. We don’t. No.

643
00:39:43,839 –> 00:39:46,500
We don’t do that. It’s just empowered sex work.

644
00:39:47,279 –> 00:39:50,924
Okay. Please, let’s be real, People, come

645
00:39:50,924 –> 00:39:54,684
on. And so we have all these old school human nature things,

646
00:39:54,684 –> 00:39:58,365
which Hurston would appreciate because she came out of anthropology. And

647
00:39:58,365 –> 00:40:02,190
there’s nothing fourth. There’s no other field, I

648
00:40:02,190 –> 00:40:05,790
think, that clearly shows exactly man’s inhumanity to

649
00:40:05,790 –> 00:40:09,575
man at a visceral level than anthropology. Probably psychology

650
00:40:09,714 –> 00:40:13,315
gets there too. But, like, human beings are driven by these

651
00:40:13,315 –> 00:40:17,075
base appetites, and then we just try to put masks and levels and

652
00:40:17,075 –> 00:40:20,910
layers on top of them. And and and those

653
00:40:20,910 –> 00:40:22,930
masks and layers and levels we call civilization.

654
00:40:24,750 –> 00:40:27,755
Like we just do. That’s what we call civilization. Because if we if we strip

655
00:40:27,755 –> 00:40:30,474
all that away I mean, we’ve seen this in war zones. You strip all that

656
00:40:30,474 –> 00:40:33,970
away and the guy or the guy you’re into something

657
00:40:33,970 –> 00:40:37,650
else. The the take all those emotions, wrap them up in a in in a

658
00:40:37,650 –> 00:40:40,390
version where you can control, and we call that humanity.

659
00:40:41,035 –> 00:40:44,875
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And things still and things still leak out the sides. Like,

660
00:40:44,875 –> 00:40:48,315
forget it. You can’t Yeah. Exactly. I mean, this is

661
00:40:48,315 –> 00:40:48,815
why

662
00:40:56,220 –> 00:40:59,885
this is why it’s interesting that they’re called the 7 deadly sins and not the

663
00:40:59,885 –> 00:41:02,705
7 kind of fourth of maybe dangerous sins.

664
00:41:05,245 –> 00:41:08,810
I mean, just take out all of the other vernacular. Just say the 7

665
00:41:09,050 –> 00:41:11,710
dangerous sins would even be, like like okay.

666
00:41:14,090 –> 00:41:17,775
They’re kinda maybe not great. You don’t wanna

667
00:41:17,835 –> 00:41:20,735
maybe do this. No. Like, pride.

668
00:41:21,595 –> 00:41:22,975
Again, the month we’re in.

669
00:41:25,430 –> 00:41:28,810
If we’re using that term, when we really mean dignity,

670
00:41:29,590 –> 00:41:33,350
we fundamentally misunderstood what’s at the bottom of both of

671
00:41:33,350 –> 00:41:36,787
those words. And we’re literature leadership

672
00:41:36,787 –> 00:41:40,635
podcast, so words matter. The word pride,

673
00:41:41,015 –> 00:41:44,840
just like the word vanity or envy or lust or

674
00:41:44,840 –> 00:41:48,520
jealousy, there’s a darker thing at the root

675
00:41:48,520 –> 00:41:51,945
of all of those words. But words like

676
00:41:51,945 –> 00:41:54,925
dignity and honor and duty and,

677
00:41:55,945 –> 00:41:59,540
well, and faith, there’s something that’s not dark

678
00:42:00,020 –> 00:42:03,540
at the bottom and the root of those words. And we used to kind of

679
00:42:03,540 –> 00:42:07,365
understand that, I think, in our culture. I I also think and I I

680
00:42:07,365 –> 00:42:10,885
said it I I made this comment on the, episode,

681
00:42:11,125 –> 00:42:14,745
the part one of this of this podcast episode with with Thurston.

682
00:42:15,780 –> 00:42:19,320
Words have the power that we give them.

683
00:42:19,780 –> 00:42:22,839
So if you’re gonna take pride and turn it into a negative,

684
00:42:23,385 –> 00:42:26,845
that’s because we’ve given it that kind of negative power.

685
00:42:27,305 –> 00:42:30,985
There’s there’s a there’s there it’s

686
00:42:30,985 –> 00:42:34,410
not a sin to be prideful of something that that you have worked

687
00:42:34,410 –> 00:42:38,170
your tail off to accomplish. Like, you can be being

688
00:42:38,170 –> 00:42:41,644
prideful of that is not a sin, but we give

689
00:42:41,644 –> 00:42:45,404
that word, that negative power or the sinful power based on

690
00:42:45,404 –> 00:42:49,164
other things, not being prideful about something you’ve worked on. It’s a different kind

691
00:42:49,164 –> 00:42:52,940
of so we gotta be careful how we how we, assign the

692
00:42:52,940 –> 00:42:56,560
words, basically, in in in the in the the

693
00:42:56,620 –> 00:43:00,285
manner in which we’re using them and deploying them for certain

694
00:43:00,285 –> 00:43:04,005
things. Like, it that all matters. Right? Like, to Tom my point earlier in that

695
00:43:04,125 –> 00:43:07,750
the first fourth first episode of this podcast, The words

696
00:43:07,750 –> 00:43:11,510
have power that we give them. Like, it’s we we give them that power. The

697
00:43:11,510 –> 00:43:15,210
word pride does not have power all by itself standing there. The

698
00:43:15,270 –> 00:43:18,934
the word dignity, the word the gluttony fourth any of the other

699
00:43:18,934 –> 00:43:21,974
7, almost dangerous sins that we

700
00:43:23,335 –> 00:43:27,040
we’re we’re giving them that power. It’s it’s us we’re we’re giving them

701
00:43:27,040 –> 00:43:30,880
that power. It’s not it’s not as like, we can take

702
00:43:30,880 –> 00:43:33,825
those same exact words and move them into a different segment.

703
00:43:35,244 –> 00:43:39,085
It turns into something different. So I would like to use this opportunity to give

704
00:43:39,085 –> 00:43:42,799
the to give the the makers of Ozempic some

705
00:43:42,799 –> 00:43:46,400
marketing advice. Call it a

706
00:43:46,400 –> 00:43:49,940
gluttony reducing medicine, and we will be fine.

707
00:43:50,454 –> 00:43:53,915
People will line up around the block for it. That means fine.

708
00:43:55,175 –> 00:43:58,990
Sure. Because what we’re doing is

709
00:43:58,990 –> 00:44:02,510
we’re actually using this drug to reduce our

710
00:44:02,510 –> 00:44:05,425
appetite so that we are not gluttonous,

711
00:44:05,425 –> 00:44:09,135
Sorrells. I feel good about putting those two

712
00:44:09,135 –> 00:44:12,815
words together. I feel just fine about that. So, you know, at the

713
00:44:12,815 –> 00:44:16,520
dinner table or, you know, quite frankly, anywhere else. Yeah.

714
00:44:17,620 –> 00:44:20,980
You know, I understand that there’s many, there’s very few

715
00:44:20,980 –> 00:44:24,740
things, and this Seth Godin said this years years ago, we wrote it in a

716
00:44:24,853 –> 00:44:26,964
book, fourth might have written it in a blog post or I might have heard

717
00:44:26,964 –> 00:44:30,265
him say it. Might have been in a blog post or maybe a book. But

718
00:44:30,325 –> 00:44:33,924
human beings don’t like and you’ll appreciate this, Tom, being in the

719
00:44:33,924 –> 00:44:37,740
marketing space. Human beings don’t like things being marketed Tom that marketed

720
00:44:37,800 –> 00:44:41,480
to them baldly. They don’t like being told the full

721
00:44:41,480 –> 00:44:45,265
truth of a thing. That’s why we have marketing. And of course

722
00:44:45,265 –> 00:44:49,025
he referenced back to, as I always do, the graffiti on the

723
00:44:49,025 –> 00:44:52,810
walls of Pompeii advertising ladies of the night. Like there’s very

724
00:44:52,810 –> 00:44:56,330
few things that human beings want to have marketed to

725
00:44:56,330 –> 00:44:58,510
them as the truth of the thing.

726
00:45:00,545 –> 00:45:03,925
But 99.9 percent of everything else,

727
00:45:04,865 –> 00:45:08,680
people want a gloss on it. They don’t want the word used.

728
00:45:08,680 –> 00:45:12,300
That’s why Ozempic is a weight loss drug, not a gluttony

729
00:45:12,360 –> 00:45:16,075
reducing pill. That will probably screw you up later. By the

730
00:45:16,075 –> 00:45:19,915
way, I’m waiting for Ozempic just like olestra. Anybody remember that? I’m

731
00:45:19,915 –> 00:45:23,115
waiting for the for the devil to come due on that. Waiting for that class

732
00:45:23,115 –> 00:45:26,270
action suit to be filled? Oh, I’m waiting. It’s I think and I think I

733
00:45:26,270 –> 00:45:29,150
I don’t think I’m gonna have to wait really long. I think it’s gonna come

734
00:45:29,150 –> 00:45:32,130
right around the corner. Yeah. You might be right.

735
00:45:33,070 –> 00:45:34,770
Anyway, back to the book.

736
00:45:36,675 –> 00:45:40,515
Back to their eyes are watching God. By the way,

737
00:45:40,515 –> 00:45:44,340
a great title, You might

738
00:45:44,340 –> 00:45:47,780
wanna research where she got that where she got that title from. It’s an interesting

739
00:45:47,780 –> 00:45:50,520
little story. It’s funny that you say that because I was gonna I was gonna

740
00:45:50,555 –> 00:45:53,675
ask that because I found the I I didn’t I didn’t research where it came

741
00:45:53,675 –> 00:45:57,434
from, but I remember thinking to myself, I really like to

742
00:45:57,434 –> 00:46:00,940
know how she came up with it. Like, what what is the impact to her?

743
00:46:00,940 –> 00:46:04,700
Because there there seems to be a story there for her on the title, not

744
00:46:04,700 –> 00:46:08,540
for the story itself. Yep. Yep. Well, this is one of the

745
00:46:08,540 –> 00:46:11,984
lines that that they actually

746
00:46:12,125 –> 00:46:15,265
say here, in

747
00:46:16,204 –> 00:46:19,265
the they could see is it close to the end,

748
00:46:20,119 –> 00:46:23,099
Maybe. Yeah. Feet cake dies

749
00:46:23,640 –> 00:46:27,174
and, and sort of the the

750
00:46:27,174 –> 00:46:30,875
circle gets closed. Right. And she talks about

751
00:46:31,414 –> 00:46:34,775
well, she essays, Jane Janie talks about several different or or not talks about

752
00:46:34,855 –> 00:46:38,609
reflects, on her life and on the nature of her life.

753
00:46:38,930 –> 00:46:42,690
And so that’s sort of where that idea gets to

754
00:46:42,690 –> 00:46:46,505
be gets gets closed in. The other thing is the end of the

755
00:46:46,505 –> 00:46:49,545
end of the novel, which we’re wandering towards the end of the novel, the end

756
00:46:49,545 –> 00:46:53,130
of the novel and the beginning of the novel Libby together quite tightly,

757
00:46:53,130 –> 00:46:56,730
which is just like just like the end of, the beginning of the end of,

758
00:46:56,970 –> 00:47:00,650
To Kill a Mockingbird linked together quite tightly. And so which is the

759
00:47:00,650 –> 00:47:04,045
sign of, a writer who did not lose the

760
00:47:04,045 –> 00:47:07,805
thread, of the narrative. She didn’t, she didn’t

761
00:47:07,805 –> 00:47:11,350
lose the, she didn’t lose the narrative. And, I could

762
00:47:11,350 –> 00:47:15,190
appreciate that. So the back half, right, of their eyes are

763
00:47:15,190 –> 00:47:18,915
watching god. So Janie and TK get married. Well, actually, before that,

764
00:47:18,995 –> 00:47:22,675
Janie meets a woman. Not meets a woman, but well, yes. She

765
00:47:22,675 –> 00:47:26,326
meets a woman, and there’s other people who are, like, sort of floating around her

766
00:47:26,326 –> 00:47:29,000
turning to get her married off and and all this kind of stuff. And she’s

767
00:47:29,000 –> 00:47:32,599
like, I’m a woman in my forties. I’m really enjoying having this, having this

768
00:47:32,599 –> 00:47:36,055
shop. I’m really enjoying having my freedom. I’m not really looking for a man. She

769
00:47:36,055 –> 00:47:38,954
doesn’t really say that, but that’s what she Jesan. That’s what she means.

770
00:47:39,734 –> 00:47:43,575
And she’s hanging out. And all of a sudden, this guy comes rambling down

771
00:47:43,575 –> 00:47:46,840
the road. And his name is, I love this name, Virgible

772
00:47:47,540 –> 00:47:50,760
Woods, aka

773
00:47:51,220 –> 00:47:54,105
tea cake. And

774
00:47:55,285 –> 00:47:59,045
he courts her not by chasing after

775
00:47:59,045 –> 00:48:02,540
her money and not by chasing after her

776
00:48:02,540 –> 00:48:06,320
body and not by chasing after

777
00:48:07,180 –> 00:48:10,975
any of the sort of material things

778
00:48:11,755 –> 00:48:15,455
that may be in an environment

779
00:48:15,675 –> 00:48:19,300
like that, you would, you would anticipate that a man would come

780
00:48:19,300 –> 00:48:23,140
along and chase after a woman if she had them. Right. He wasn’t interested in

781
00:48:23,140 –> 00:48:26,955
her class. He wasn’t interested. And this is something that women need to pay

782
00:48:26,955 –> 00:48:30,715
attention to. And I thought it was interesting how Fourth hit on this in

783
00:48:30,715 –> 00:48:34,155
the book. Tea Cake was not interested in

784
00:48:34,155 –> 00:48:37,900
Janie’s money. Janie thought that Tea

785
00:48:37,900 –> 00:48:41,660
Cake was interested in her money. As a matter of fact, there’s an interesting literature

786
00:48:41,660 –> 00:48:44,800
moment that they have when they move from

787
00:48:45,484 –> 00:48:49,105
Eatonville to the West Everglades where Tea Cake is going to go make some money.

788
00:48:49,165 –> 00:48:52,925
And, Janie brings basically her life savings pinned

789
00:48:52,925 –> 00:48:56,680
inside of her dress And she wakes up and she finds out

790
00:48:56,680 –> 00:49:00,059
that it sees that it’s gone. And it turns out that,

791
00:49:01,079 –> 00:49:04,865
he goes and gambles it and he loses some of

792
00:49:04,865 –> 00:49:08,405
the money, but he brings back, you know, more, money.

793
00:49:08,944 –> 00:49:12,760
And, you know, she’s freaking out, you know, and she

794
00:49:12,760 –> 00:49:15,720
doesn’t understand that he’s a gambler because he didn’t tell her this from the jump.

795
00:49:15,720 –> 00:49:19,480
He just sort of presented himself as being this jokester kind of

796
00:49:19,480 –> 00:49:19,980
guy.

797
00:49:23,404 –> 00:49:26,125
And she starts losing her mind about the money, and she starts losing her mind

798
00:49:26,125 –> 00:49:29,740
about him going on and on with another woman. And he comes back to her.

799
00:49:29,740 –> 00:49:32,700
He says, I don’t really need I don’t need your money. I just use it

800
00:49:32,700 –> 00:49:35,820
as a stake to start me off, but I can make my own money and

801
00:49:35,820 –> 00:49:39,075
watch. And he goes and he does. And he’s a hard worker,

802
00:49:39,775 –> 00:49:43,155
in addition to being a gambler. He’s a guitar player

803
00:49:43,695 –> 00:49:47,480
and, took any odd job he could possibly be offered to make

804
00:49:47,480 –> 00:49:50,840
any money. And these days, Seacake would be called a

805
00:49:50,840 –> 00:49:53,900
hustler, not a scammer, but just a hustler. Right?

806
00:49:54,680 –> 00:49:58,424
Hustled into his work, did hard work, and he

807
00:49:58,424 –> 00:50:01,944
was an honest hustler. Right? He was even an honest gambler, which

808
00:50:01,944 –> 00:50:05,380
is which is so strange for Hurston to

809
00:50:05,539 –> 00:50:09,380
structure TK’s personality this way because I’m sure the

810
00:50:09,380 –> 00:50:13,000
vast majority of African American gamblers she ran across

811
00:50:13,435 –> 00:50:16,815
were guys who were on the make. Guys who were,

812
00:50:17,515 –> 00:50:20,955
not to put you find a point on it, but guys who were pimps, writers?

813
00:50:20,955 –> 00:50:24,510
Who were who were, were money

814
00:50:24,510 –> 00:50:27,950
hustlers, who put on a good show but could lose it all on a

815
00:50:27,950 –> 00:50:31,785
Saturday night. I’m sure that’s the milieu that she was writing

816
00:50:31,785 –> 00:50:35,545
against with Tea Cake’s character. He also possesses a deep

817
00:50:35,545 –> 00:50:39,050
devotion to being married to Janie in chapters 13 through

818
00:50:39,050 –> 00:50:42,430
20, a devotion that runs so deep that when a hurricane comes through,

819
00:50:44,490 –> 00:50:47,925
he tries to well, they try to move to higher ground.

820
00:50:48,105 –> 00:50:51,845
Writers. And, they get the warning that the hurricane is coming, but they

821
00:50:51,845 –> 00:50:55,285
don’t they don’t take it

822
00:50:55,285 –> 00:50:55,785
seriously.

823
00:50:58,850 –> 00:51:02,210
And and they don’t take it

824
00:51:02,210 –> 00:51:06,050
seriously because, well, because they’re quite frankly, living

825
00:51:06,050 –> 00:51:09,265
the high life. Writers. They’re making friends with Bahamian workers.

826
00:51:10,765 –> 00:51:14,440
They are figuring out how their culture goes. But as the

827
00:51:14,440 –> 00:51:18,120
hurricane begins to draw closer, they notice that the animals are

828
00:51:18,120 –> 00:51:21,960
starting to migrate. Right. And the workers are starting to really realize the workers who

829
00:51:21,960 –> 00:51:25,285
are familiar with how hurricanes come through the Everglades are starting to pack up and

830
00:51:25,285 –> 00:51:27,945
leave. And there’s a moment that happens in Chapter 18

831
00:51:28,885 –> 00:51:32,480
where Janie is at home and t k is off in the field

832
00:51:32,480 –> 00:51:36,080
working, trying to get his last few dollars that he can get before the hurricane

833
00:51:36,080 –> 00:51:39,855
comes. And this happens, which I thought I thought of Tom when I

834
00:51:39,855 –> 00:51:43,235
read this actually, in chapter 18 and I quote,

835
00:51:44,255 –> 00:51:47,680
so she was home by herself one afternoon when she saw a band of

836
00:51:47,680 –> 00:51:51,200
Seminoles passing by the men walking in front and the

837
00:51:51,200 –> 00:51:54,900
laden stolid women following them like bureaus like burrows.

838
00:51:55,505 –> 00:51:59,184
She had seen Indians several times in the glades in twos and threes, but this

839
00:51:59,184 –> 00:52:02,865
was a large party. They were headed towards the Palm Beach Road and kept

840
00:52:02,865 –> 00:52:06,590
moving steadily. About an hour later, another party appeared and went the

841
00:52:06,590 –> 00:52:10,430
same way. Then another just before sundown. This

842
00:52:10,430 –> 00:52:13,390
time she asked where they were all going. And at last, one of the men

843
00:52:13,390 –> 00:52:16,992
answered her. Going to high ground, saw grass book,

844
00:52:17,615 –> 00:52:21,214
hurricane coming. Everybody was

845
00:52:21,214 –> 00:52:24,980
talking about it that night, but nobody was worried. The fire dance kept

846
00:52:24,980 –> 00:52:28,740
up till nearly dawn. The next day, more Indians

847
00:52:28,740 –> 00:52:32,395
moved east unhurried, but steady, still a blue sky and fair

848
00:52:32,395 –> 00:52:36,075
weather beans turning fine and price is good. So the Indians

849
00:52:36,075 –> 00:52:39,830
could be, must be wrong. You You couldn’t have a hurricane where you’re making

850
00:52:39,830 –> 00:52:43,350
7 $8 a day picking beans. Indians are dumb

851
00:52:43,350 –> 00:52:46,890
anyhow. Always were. Close quote.

852
00:52:50,185 –> 00:52:52,925
I did. I sat there, and I I underlined it, and I thought,

853
00:52:54,745 –> 00:52:57,680
okay, Zohra. Alright.

854
00:53:03,020 –> 00:53:05,900
But this is the overlap. I mean, we ran into this when we read black

855
00:53:05,900 –> 00:53:09,714
Indian slave narratives. Narratives. Right? Like we this is the overlap between

856
00:53:09,714 –> 00:53:13,315
cultures in America. And it’s so subtle what

857
00:53:13,315 –> 00:53:16,450
she’s doing there. You know, Janie’s perception

858
00:53:17,630 –> 00:53:21,390
and then the Indians as the warning and not taking the warning

859
00:53:21,390 –> 00:53:25,171
seriously. Like, why wouldn’t you? Right? But then the Bahamians were

860
00:53:25,171 –> 00:53:28,715
fourth the books from from the Bahamas who were there, they didn’t take it seriously

861
00:53:28,715 –> 00:53:31,695
either. They were staying out in the field, making 7, $8 a day.

862
00:53:32,474 –> 00:53:36,030
And as that sort

863
00:53:36,030 –> 00:53:39,870
of unwound, Hurston did a really good job in these back

864
00:53:39,870 –> 00:53:43,565
chapters of the book, dripping

865
00:53:43,565 –> 00:53:47,245
out that drama, that was happening. And so the

866
00:53:47,245 –> 00:53:50,980
hurricane did come, and it did sweep away everything

867
00:53:50,980 –> 00:53:54,580
that wasn’t on high ground. And the Indians weren’t dumb. They did

868
00:53:54,580 –> 00:53:58,180
know things. You should have listened. You should have paid

869
00:53:58,180 –> 00:54:01,685
attention. But it swept away everything and

870
00:54:01,685 –> 00:54:05,205
fundamentally wound up, well, Tea Cake and

871
00:54:05,205 –> 00:54:08,990
Janie tried to escape, successfully escaped for a little bit,

872
00:54:09,470 –> 00:54:11,650
and then wound up in a spot where,

873
00:54:14,430 –> 00:54:18,045
well, Janie almost drowned. And in the process of saving

874
00:54:18,045 –> 00:54:21,665
her, tea cake got bitten by a rabid dog

875
00:54:23,930 –> 00:54:26,750
in the face. No Jesan. Now

876
00:54:27,850 –> 00:54:31,610
that bite doesn’t kill him immediately. He shakes

877
00:54:31,610 –> 00:54:35,325
off the dog, fights the dog, whatever. But it winds

878
00:54:35,325 –> 00:54:38,785
up being a problem much leaders, as

879
00:54:38,845 –> 00:54:42,145
rabies moves through his body.

880
00:54:42,900 –> 00:54:46,440
And, eventually, Janie has to do the thing

881
00:54:46,579 –> 00:54:49,859
that you do with a rabid dog, but she has to do it with tea

882
00:54:49,859 –> 00:54:52,465
cake. By the way, after the hurricane

883
00:54:53,645 –> 00:54:56,705
well, the physical hurricane anyway is over.

884
00:54:58,619 –> 00:55:02,460
Their Eyes Are Watching God ends with Janie becoming

885
00:55:02,460 –> 00:55:06,240
a whole Jesan, weirdly enough, and winding up back where she started

886
00:55:07,315 –> 00:55:10,935
at her home where her grandma was.

887
00:55:11,235 –> 00:55:15,020
And she becomes a whole person who

888
00:55:15,020 –> 00:55:18,540
can live by the truth of herself rather than

889
00:55:18,540 –> 00:55:21,440
seeing herself through other people.

890
00:55:23,935 –> 00:55:27,455
And the challenge I think that Zora Neale Hurston puts forth in Their Eyes Were

891
00:55:27,455 –> 00:55:31,210
Watching God is this one: how do you find meaning in relationships

892
00:55:31,270 –> 00:55:35,030
with other people? And how do you in spite

893
00:55:35,030 –> 00:55:38,790
of class, in spite of cultural differences, in spite of race,

894
00:55:38,790 –> 00:55:42,405
in spite of how much money you have or don’t have, where’s the

895
00:55:42,405 –> 00:55:46,245
actual meaning in a life? Right? Where’s the actual meaning in a life

896
00:55:46,245 –> 00:55:49,849
from, like, 16 to fourth or 16 to 50?

897
00:55:50,230 –> 00:55:53,670
And the only place I think where you find that meaning is

898
00:55:53,670 –> 00:55:57,349
in marriage. And I think Zora Neale Hurston was a big fan of marriage. I

899
00:55:57,349 –> 00:56:00,914
think she thought that that was the social construct that was going to hold

900
00:56:00,914 –> 00:56:04,694
together not only African American culture, but all cultures in general.

901
00:56:05,075 –> 00:56:07,414
And we live in a weird spot where

902
00:56:08,580 –> 00:56:12,260
marriage and familial behaviors and behaviors that lead to marriage have

903
00:56:12,260 –> 00:56:15,785
been unraveling for about the last 100 years. And that

904
00:56:15,785 –> 00:56:19,385
unraveling has created a sense of deep chaos between men and women. I mean, we’re

905
00:56:19,385 –> 00:56:23,145
seeing it right now in in gen z, you know, the youngest generation that’s

906
00:56:23,145 –> 00:56:26,950
in America right now. The rates of virginity are going

907
00:56:26,950 –> 00:56:30,470
up. Like, it’s not just not dating, people not

908
00:56:30,470 –> 00:56:33,965
having sex. Now pornography use isn’t going

909
00:56:33,965 –> 00:56:37,105
down. You know, that continues to trend up as a matter of fact.

910
00:56:38,285 –> 00:56:41,960
Studies show that in general this is why I banned

911
00:56:41,960 –> 00:56:45,740
phones from my house. In general, a child,

912
00:56:45,880 –> 00:56:49,615
a young man, has his first touch with pornography these days at the

913
00:56:49,615 –> 00:56:53,375
age of 7, which is insane. And

914
00:56:53,375 –> 00:56:55,555
for young women, it’s at the age of 10.

915
00:56:58,779 –> 00:57:01,760
There’s something broken in that, and

916
00:57:02,460 –> 00:57:05,395
I suspect what it is. Actually, I know what it is. I have a good

917
00:57:05,475 –> 00:57:09,155
or I have a good idea of what it is, but you

918
00:57:09,155 –> 00:57:12,935
can’t in can’t give that to a 7 year old or a 10 year old

919
00:57:14,980 –> 00:57:18,740
via the dopamine inducing machine known as social media, known as the

920
00:57:18,740 –> 00:57:21,435
cell phone, without creating downstream

921
00:57:22,295 –> 00:57:25,755
chaos in an institution that’s designed to find meaning.

922
00:57:27,255 –> 00:57:30,470
And meaning is hard to come by a social and moral environment

923
00:57:31,890 –> 00:57:35,490
where we don’t want to sacrifice ourselves in favor of

924
00:57:35,490 –> 00:57:38,974
responsibilities to somebody else. And even childbearing

925
00:57:39,035 –> 00:57:42,795
itself is on the decline. I Jesan, the United States is now below replacement writers.

926
00:57:42,795 –> 00:57:46,400
And what’s weird is, globally, most

927
00:57:46,400 –> 00:57:50,080
countries are below replacement rate. And this does not bode

928
00:57:50,080 –> 00:57:53,440
well. I mean, Elon Musk talks about how to save civilization, you have to have

929
00:57:53,440 –> 00:57:55,975
babies. Everybody laughs at him. He’s right.

930
00:57:56,915 –> 00:58:00,675
He’s exactly correct. Now I have 5 kids my I have 4

931
00:58:00,675 –> 00:58:04,370
kids myself. Tom had 5. I think Tom’s got had 2 marriages under

932
00:58:04,370 –> 00:58:08,130
his belt. You know, I was a divorce and family mediator for

933
00:58:08,130 –> 00:58:11,625
many years. I saw people’s marriages fall apart. And so by hook or by crook,

934
00:58:11,625 –> 00:58:14,265
I’m staying married to this woman even if I gotta move into another how part

935
00:58:14,265 –> 00:58:16,125
of the house. Like, it’s gonna happen.

936
00:58:20,185 –> 00:58:24,010
But I also think that this is an individual thing. Right? So the meeting crisis

937
00:58:24,010 –> 00:58:27,770
is at the 50,000 foot level. Marriage and family is probably a little bit

938
00:58:27,770 –> 00:58:31,515
above that, or or maybe it’s right in there. But I think all these things

939
00:58:31,515 –> 00:58:35,275
linked together in Hurston with Janie Was trying

940
00:58:35,275 –> 00:58:39,090
to show I think that that marriage and family and and and even

941
00:58:39,090 –> 00:58:42,630
children, even though Janie didn’t have any, can drive

942
00:58:42,770 –> 00:58:45,670
where you wanna go and can give you a solid life.

943
00:58:47,015 –> 00:58:50,855
I don’t know that love solves everything. I don’t necessarily believe that. I’m

944
00:58:50,855 –> 00:58:54,615
too old for that. But I do believe that relationships can be

945
00:58:54,615 –> 00:58:58,290
the beginning of how you, well how you

946
00:58:58,290 –> 00:59:02,050
can have your eyes watching God just in real

947
00:59:02,050 –> 00:59:05,715
life. I think she makes that relatively evident by the fact that think of the

948
00:59:05,715 –> 00:59:09,395
timeframe that this book was writers. The idea of a woman being married three times

949
00:59:09,395 –> 00:59:12,890
was almost non existent, But she didn’t she couldn’t

950
00:59:12,890 –> 00:59:16,730
envision a, a world with with this strong of a woman not

951
00:59:16,730 –> 00:59:19,825
being married. So I to your to I think to your point, and and the

952
00:59:19,825 –> 00:59:23,285
only relevance I’m making there is I think you’re right that she valued

953
00:59:23,585 –> 00:59:27,220
the institution of married very highly marriage very highly. And I think

954
00:59:27,220 –> 00:59:30,840
she had I think she had, had tied that

955
00:59:31,940 –> 00:59:35,434
to not just her own moral compass,

956
00:59:35,434 –> 00:59:39,115
but what she felt should have been society’s moral compass. Right? Like, she

957
00:59:39,115 –> 00:59:42,654
felt Right. Because if not, then she wouldn’t have written it in 3 times. Like,

958
00:59:43,200 –> 00:59:46,960
she there was plenty of opportunity, especially when the second husband

959
00:59:46,960 –> 00:59:50,180
dies and she’s got that wealth status

960
00:59:50,725 –> 00:59:53,685
money. She’s got all that stuff that she needs. She’s got everything she needs to

961
00:59:53,685 –> 00:59:57,225
live the rest of her life in a in a positive

962
00:59:57,365 –> 01:00:00,610
fashion, but yet still finds a way to get married

963
01:00:01,090 –> 01:00:04,530
marries her off in the book to to another person. So I I do think

964
01:00:04,530 –> 01:00:08,095
you’re right. I think she does value that institute very highly. Well

965
01:00:08,175 –> 01:00:11,395
and there’s something else, and I think it’s a subtle point that

966
01:00:12,015 –> 01:00:15,855
most people miss in any kind of analysis of any form of

967
01:00:15,855 –> 01:00:19,440
entertainment, whether it’s, literature or

968
01:00:19,440 –> 01:00:23,119
film or television. As forms

969
01:00:23,119 –> 01:00:26,695
of entertainment, creators put forth ideas

970
01:00:27,315 –> 01:00:31,155
into these vehicles that can move culture. We talked a

971
01:00:31,155 –> 01:00:34,535
little bit about this with To Kill a Mockingbird. Right? Sometimes you’re too early,

972
01:00:35,330 –> 01:00:38,390
sometimes you’re too late, and sometimes you’re right on time.

973
01:00:41,410 –> 01:00:45,255
And that individual creator

974
01:00:45,395 –> 01:00:49,155
imbues that product with their own moral view.

975
01:00:49,155 –> 01:00:52,690
Okay, cool. Atticus Finch. Right? Perfect

976
01:00:52,690 –> 01:00:56,290
example. Into Kill a Mockingbird. Atticus Finch, you know,

977
01:00:56,290 –> 01:01:00,015
raising 2 kids with Calpurnia, who’s the

978
01:01:00,015 –> 01:01:03,775
stand in for the mother because the mother died, and Atticus stands as

979
01:01:03,775 –> 01:01:07,234
that whether we like it or not, I mean, he’s the the paternal

980
01:01:08,520 –> 01:01:12,359
moral compass of that book. Right? Whereas in

981
01:01:12,359 –> 01:01:15,820
their eyes are watching God, Janie is the maternal

982
01:01:16,835 –> 01:01:19,895
moral compass in this book. And

983
01:01:20,675 –> 01:01:22,615
Hurston herself never had kids.

984
01:01:24,700 –> 01:01:27,760
And I believe, if I remember her biography correctly,

985
01:01:28,860 –> 01:01:32,560
she was no. I might be confusing her with Catherine and Porter.

986
01:01:33,015 –> 01:01:35,495
I have to go back and look at that. But I don’t I don’t think

987
01:01:35,495 –> 01:01:38,855
she was married fourth she was married. It was only once, and it didn’t work

988
01:01:38,855 –> 01:01:42,360
out. But be that as it

989
01:01:42,360 –> 01:01:45,880
may, a good creator and this is a

990
01:01:45,880 –> 01:01:49,585
subtle distinction in our culture, and I think we’re missing it. A good

991
01:01:49,585 –> 01:01:53,185
creator or creative looks at the

992
01:01:53,185 –> 01:01:56,865
structures of culture and essays, even though those didn’t work for me and

993
01:01:56,865 –> 01:02:00,690
my individualistic situation, They are still good for the

994
01:02:00,690 –> 01:02:03,349
vast majority of people. Yeah. Yeah.

995
01:02:05,170 –> 01:02:08,815
And I think as our culture has become more and more individualistic and by the

996
01:02:08,815 –> 01:02:12,515
way, individualistic, meaning because it’s good for me, it must be good for society.

997
01:02:13,535 –> 01:02:17,130
And so what’s good for me has to scale up to society. But what’s good

998
01:02:17,130 –> 01:02:19,849
for society doesn’t have to scale down to me. Screw those guys. They don’t know

999
01:02:19,849 –> 01:02:22,349
what they’re thinking. It’s it’s the whole idea

1000
01:02:23,849 –> 01:02:27,645
that the state is is messed up and I’m fine. And

1001
01:02:27,645 –> 01:02:31,485
if the state would just change, then I’d be good. Except the

1002
01:02:31,485 –> 01:02:35,089
problem is you’re screwed up. Like

1003
01:02:35,089 –> 01:02:38,790
like, we’re all individual. I’m screwed up. Tom’s screwed up.

1004
01:02:40,215 –> 01:02:43,815
All of our listeners, we’re all screwed up in our own individual ways as Charles

1005
01:02:43,815 –> 01:02:47,335
Dickens would would say fourth Neil Tolstoy, actually. You know,

1006
01:02:47,335 –> 01:02:51,040
every family is, you know, uniquely dysfunctional in its own

1007
01:02:51,040 –> 01:02:54,880
uniquely dysfunctional way. Right? Like, we’re all we’re all

1008
01:02:54,880 –> 01:02:58,575
dysfunctional. We’re all screwed up. But that doesn’t mean that I can

1009
01:02:58,575 –> 01:03:02,115
take my screwed up ness to society and be like, it’s your fault. Fix it.

1010
01:03:03,215 –> 01:03:06,515
Or the choices that I’ve made in my individual life

1011
01:03:12,549 –> 01:03:15,609
it would be arrogant to the point of unbelievable

1012
01:03:16,285 –> 01:03:18,625
to ask the laws to match my life.

1013
01:03:20,525 –> 01:03:23,905
And yet we do this all the time in our postmodern society, our postmodern

1014
01:03:24,045 –> 01:03:27,750
culture. And I think Hurst didn’t re re I think she saw that

1015
01:03:27,750 –> 01:03:31,510
coming in the 19 thirties and the 19 forties, and I think she

1016
01:03:31,510 –> 01:03:34,905
rejected all of that in a way that, like, a Richard Wright

1017
01:03:34,905 –> 01:03:38,285
didn’t, or the way that a Ralph Ellison

1018
01:03:38,345 –> 01:03:41,890
didn’t. And I think that fundamentally was the

1019
01:03:42,049 –> 01:03:45,490
the the thing that caused Wright to have a problem with her and

1020
01:03:45,490 –> 01:03:49,089
Ellison Tom, like, just totally, completely kind of kind of book her off, kinda be

1021
01:03:49,089 –> 01:03:52,845
like, oh, that’s interesting, but I’m I’m going in a different different direction. Like her

1022
01:03:52,845 –> 01:03:56,165
and particularly her and Richard Wright, they like they butted heads because they were like

1023
01:03:56,205 –> 01:03:59,105
they they fundamental their fundamental world views were just different.

1024
01:04:02,800 –> 01:04:06,580
How can leaders stay on the path with leadership

1025
01:04:06,720 –> 01:04:10,555
lessons from their eyes watching God? What what should leaders take from

1026
01:04:10,555 –> 01:04:13,455
this book, Tom? Well,

1027
01:04:15,915 –> 01:04:19,050
I don’t know. We’ve talked about an awful lot with this. We have talked a

1028
01:04:19,050 –> 01:04:22,650
lot a lot all the time. It’s, it’s taken up, you know, 2 episodes of

1029
01:04:22,650 –> 01:04:26,195
the podcast. So, I’m I’m hopefully you know, the

1030
01:04:26,195 –> 01:04:29,875
the the problem for me is I I don’t think I have, like, this

1031
01:04:29,875 –> 01:04:33,560
this epiphany about about leaders with this book other than the

1032
01:04:33,560 –> 01:04:36,460
fact that, like, some of the things that we’ve already talked about, like,

1033
01:04:37,320 –> 01:04:41,099
being able to judge people based on their merits, being able to

1034
01:04:42,194 –> 01:04:45,974
keep, you know, the keep the the the the the

1035
01:04:46,035 –> 01:04:49,494
insanity at bay by kind of

1036
01:04:51,150 –> 01:04:54,750
the the the whole, you know, lead by example situation where, you know,

1037
01:04:54,750 –> 01:04:58,589
she’s writing this stuff because she feel we just talked just 2

1038
01:04:58,589 –> 01:05:02,325
seconds ago, She feels that the institution of marriage is important, so she writes

1039
01:05:02,325 –> 01:05:05,545
about it. She leads by example there. Like, she’s trying to give everybody

1040
01:05:06,244 –> 01:05:09,880
some insights into her own, you know, her own, worldview.

1041
01:05:10,260 –> 01:05:14,099
And I think that leaders can do the same thing by by being

1042
01:05:14,099 –> 01:05:17,744
true to themselves and being able to I I think

1043
01:05:17,744 –> 01:05:20,724
there’s a I think there’s a really hard thing to

1044
01:05:21,265 –> 01:05:24,565
disassociate yourself from from the

1045
01:05:24,625 –> 01:05:27,390
the chaos, but still

1046
01:05:28,490 –> 01:05:32,250
be a guiding light to get people through it. I I I think there’s a

1047
01:05:32,250 –> 01:05:35,795
very this very difficult version of people that they

1048
01:05:36,115 –> 01:05:39,095
we’re all capable of it, though. That’s the thing I find the most interesting about

1049
01:05:39,155 –> 01:05:42,275
us as, you know, as as a as a society in general. I think we’re

1050
01:05:42,275 –> 01:05:44,940
all capable of it. It’s just whether or not you choose to do it. And

1051
01:05:44,940 –> 01:05:48,780
I think for leaders today, they have not they have to they have to

1052
01:05:48,780 –> 01:05:52,615
be able to based and judge people on their merit and,

1053
01:05:52,755 –> 01:05:55,335
again, to your point a few minute a little while ago,

1054
01:05:56,115 –> 01:05:59,790
including things like their class, their social status,

1055
01:05:59,850 –> 01:06:03,530
their their social media activity, their race,

1056
01:06:03,530 –> 01:06:07,145
their color, the all of that. And and I we

1057
01:06:07,145 –> 01:06:10,525
kinda poke fun a little bit at that founder of of of scales there.

1058
01:06:10,744 –> 01:06:13,705
But the reality of it is that should be the norm. Like, we should be

1059
01:06:13,705 –> 01:06:16,509
able to do that. Like, why are we? Jesan.

1060
01:06:17,490 –> 01:06:20,290
I I I tell I made a joke one day. It didn’t go over too

1061
01:06:20,290 –> 01:06:24,095
well. But, you know, one day I I said I

1062
01:06:24,095 –> 01:06:27,695
said, I’m not racist. I’m an equal opportunity hater. Right. And

1063
01:06:27,695 –> 01:06:31,215
people were like, wait. What? Like, I don’t care if the person’s black, white, red,

1064
01:06:31,215 –> 01:06:33,750
brown, whatever. If I don’t like them, I don’t like them. I don’t care what

1065
01:06:33,750 –> 01:06:37,350
color they are or what race they are or whatever. And it it

1066
01:06:37,350 –> 01:06:40,790
struck them as because they were expecting me to say something different,

1067
01:06:40,790 –> 01:06:43,865
like, that, you know, that I’m not racist because I love everybody and all that.

1068
01:06:43,865 –> 01:06:47,325
None of that. I can I’m still allowed to not like people. I don’t care

1069
01:06:47,385 –> 01:06:50,660
that they’re a different color than me or a different like, that doesn’t matter. I

1070
01:06:50,660 –> 01:06:54,359
still should I should be able to base that on your merits as a person,

1071
01:06:54,579 –> 01:06:58,260
not may base it on your merits as whatever race, religion,

1072
01:06:58,260 –> 01:07:01,984
color, creed, sex, whatever. If I don’t like

1073
01:07:01,984 –> 01:07:05,184
you, I don’t like you. And it the leadership should still look at that and

1074
01:07:05,184 –> 01:07:08,910
and from both sides of that coin. You should like or dislike your employees

1075
01:07:08,910 –> 01:07:12,589
based on their production, based on their importance to the company,

1076
01:07:12,589 –> 01:07:16,355
their willingness to be a company person, drink the Kool Aid, whatever

1077
01:07:16,355 –> 01:07:20,115
the however whatever phrase you wanna use. But most of those things

1078
01:07:20,115 –> 01:07:23,335
should apply to and and and warrant

1079
01:07:23,650 –> 01:07:27,170
your thought process based on their merit, not anything else. I

1080
01:07:27,170 –> 01:07:30,610
think I think Thurston as an author

1081
01:07:30,610 –> 01:07:34,015
kinda got that. I think she understood that. And and we talked

1082
01:07:34,015 –> 01:07:37,775
about her own quotes and her own life in the last section of the

1083
01:07:37,775 –> 01:07:40,835
episode. And I think just from her own statements

1084
01:07:41,470 –> 01:07:45,230
and her anthropological research and all this other stuff, she already had that

1085
01:07:45,230 –> 01:07:48,990
worldview in 1930. So, I mean, the the fact

1086
01:07:48,990 –> 01:07:52,755
that we’re still talking about it in fourth, to me,

1087
01:07:52,755 –> 01:07:55,655
is completely and utterly asinine that we still

1088
01:07:56,355 –> 01:07:59,960
have people deciding whether they like or

1089
01:07:59,960 –> 01:08:03,480
dislike somebody based on the color of their skin fourth based on their their social

1090
01:08:03,480 –> 01:08:06,860
scale or based on their economic fourth socio Sorrells socioeconomical

1091
01:08:07,934 –> 01:08:11,535
situation, it blows my mind. It just blows my mind that somebody from

1092
01:08:11,535 –> 01:08:14,515
1930 can already have this thought and we haven’t learned this lesson yet.

1093
01:08:17,109 –> 01:08:20,649
So I think I think we can learn something from her dramatically, actually.

1094
01:08:21,109 –> 01:08:24,170
Yeah. Yeah. I I agree. And I think that

1095
01:08:32,139 –> 01:08:35,659
I think that the only way we’re going

1096
01:08:35,659 –> 01:08:38,800
to get there is

1097
01:08:39,420 –> 01:08:43,185
at a one to one level. Sure.

1098
01:08:43,325 –> 01:08:46,945
You know, if you wanna sure. Books,

1099
01:08:47,564 –> 01:08:51,260
movies, plays, operas, songs. These things

1100
01:08:51,260 –> 01:08:54,939
have meaning, right? These, these things have weight. They

1101
01:08:54,939 –> 01:08:58,034
influence and impact the culture. And And one of the things we’ve talked about this

1102
01:08:58,034 –> 01:09:01,154
month is sort of where do, where does a leader find their moral compass from?

1103
01:09:01,154 –> 01:09:04,774
We talked about this with to kill a mockingbird. You know,

1104
01:09:05,030 –> 01:09:08,729
we just, we just, came off of,

1105
01:09:09,430 –> 01:09:12,090
D day, the 80th anniversary of D day, a truly

1106
01:09:13,055 –> 01:09:16,435
amazing act of military

1107
01:09:16,895 –> 01:09:19,875
prowess, and just national will,

1108
01:09:22,260 –> 01:09:25,479
that we kind of don’t understand, fully.

1109
01:09:26,260 –> 01:09:30,020
We are in June, so, of course, Father’s Day is coming up. You’ll probably

1110
01:09:30,020 –> 01:09:33,385
hear this podcast episode after Father’s Day. So for all of you out there who

1111
01:09:33,385 –> 01:09:36,444
are fathers, including Tom, happy Father’s Day.

1112
01:09:37,830 –> 01:09:41,670
I know. Worst there’s a comedian, and I think I’ve mentioned this to

1113
01:09:41,670 –> 01:09:45,350
you fourth. Worst holiday ever. Like, worst

1114
01:09:45,350 –> 01:09:49,014
holiday ever. And you can go find that joke somewhere.

1115
01:09:49,014 –> 01:09:52,614
It’s floating around TikTok somewhere. Or Instagram reels. I don’t know. That might have been

1116
01:09:52,614 –> 01:09:56,135
where I saw it. But my point

1117
01:09:56,135 –> 01:09:59,550
is, when we talk about where

1118
01:09:59,850 –> 01:10:02,590
a moral compass comes from and when we talk about,

1119
01:10:04,489 –> 01:10:07,994
how do leaders get something and stay on the

1120
01:10:07,994 –> 01:10:11,435
leadership path while also treating everybody

1121
01:10:11,435 –> 01:10:15,170
equally, right? We have to acknowledge that

1122
01:10:15,170 –> 01:10:18,310
people have biases, and that’s okay, by the way.

1123
01:10:20,370 –> 01:10:24,035
And our biases, I think, are strongest Tom

1124
01:10:24,095 –> 01:10:27,715
your point when they are against people who are just

1125
01:10:28,415 –> 01:10:32,230
not behaving well. And I don’t think

1126
01:10:32,230 –> 01:10:35,610
it’s hard for us to determine what bad

1127
01:10:35,670 –> 01:10:39,430
behavior is, but it’s become harder over

1128
01:10:39,430 –> 01:10:41,370
time because we’ve allowed

1129
01:10:43,255 –> 01:10:46,235
I think, we’ve allowed the removal of

1130
01:10:46,855 –> 01:10:50,640
not just books but also ideas from our culture. We just talked about

1131
01:10:50,640 –> 01:10:54,239
the 7 deadly sins, you know, in this episode. Right? We’ve we’ve

1132
01:10:54,239 –> 01:10:57,844
removed that language, and so we struggle

1133
01:10:57,985 –> 01:11:01,665
to put words next to these things that we see. Or even more weirdly

1134
01:11:01,665 –> 01:11:04,324
enough, like vanity, we don’t talk about vanity.

1135
01:11:05,810 –> 01:11:08,950
Like I, I, like I just mentioned, Ozempic should be like a gluttony

1136
01:11:09,410 –> 01:11:13,250
reducing, reducing disease. Well, you know, Botox should be a vanity

1137
01:11:13,250 –> 01:11:17,054
helping dizzy helping tool. It’s a vanity helping tool. You wanna have thick

1138
01:11:17,054 –> 01:11:20,815
lips and you don’t wanna, like, go have a baby with somebody else

1139
01:11:20,815 –> 01:11:24,510
who has thick lips genetically? Well, guess what? We’re gonna help you out because you’re

1140
01:11:24,510 –> 01:11:27,010
so vain to paraphrase from Carly’s side.

1141
01:11:28,750 –> 01:11:32,315
Or or Kate Hudson from Or Kate Hudson. Sorry. Donathan’s

1142
01:11:32,315 –> 01:11:35,615
got 10 days. Bro, that’s right. Like,

1143
01:11:35,995 –> 01:11:39,675
we’re not marketing it that boldly, but it is a vanity cure

1144
01:11:39,735 –> 01:11:43,430
fourth or or a, a comb over

1145
01:11:43,490 –> 01:11:46,950
or a, or a bald baldness treatment.

1146
01:11:47,010 –> 01:11:50,855
Right? These are all solutions to the problem of vanity. I

1147
01:11:50,855 –> 01:11:54,615
wanna look good to other people, but I also wanna

1148
01:11:54,615 –> 01:11:58,460
look good to myself. Right? And we wonder

1149
01:11:58,460 –> 01:12:02,220
why there’s a rise in narcissism in our culture. Well, it’s it’s not really

1150
01:12:02,220 –> 01:12:05,765
an accident. So I think

1151
01:12:05,765 –> 01:12:08,965
leaders have to pay attention to these kinds of things. I think Hurston gives us

1152
01:12:08,965 –> 01:12:12,805
the way Tom your point about her her anthropological research. I

1153
01:12:12,805 –> 01:12:16,050
think that that that as I said all the way at the beginning of our

1154
01:12:16,050 –> 01:12:19,890
last episode I think that that undergirds everything

1155
01:12:19,890 –> 01:12:23,385
that she did. She she knew something deep about the human

1156
01:12:23,385 –> 01:12:27,145
condition. Yeah. And she tried to put that in her books and in

1157
01:12:27,145 –> 01:12:30,289
her writers. So hats off to her, and,

1158
01:12:30,770 –> 01:12:34,610
read the read the rest of her of her, resume. You know?

1159
01:12:34,610 –> 01:12:37,765
Get all of it underneath you. The more I the more I read about her,

1160
01:12:37,765 –> 01:12:40,565
I gotta be honest with you, the more she crept up my list of people

1161
01:12:40,565 –> 01:12:43,525
in history that I would like to have lunch with. You know, like, you always

1162
01:12:43,525 –> 01:12:46,389
ask that question. If you could pick one person from history, who who would it

1163
01:12:46,389 –> 01:12:49,690
be? And and my list is relatively long, by the way,

1164
01:12:49,750 –> 01:12:53,590
but she was not even on it. And now, like, I think she’s crept up

1165
01:12:53,590 –> 01:12:56,745
quite a bit. I think Yeah. I think if I let let me rephrase it

1166
01:12:56,745 –> 01:13:00,585
this way. I would definitely not say no to it if if somebody

1167
01:13:00,585 –> 01:13:03,785
said to me, she’s the only person you go back in history and have lunch

1168
01:13:03,785 –> 01:13:06,010
with. Would you be willing to do it? I would do it in a second

1169
01:13:06,010 –> 01:13:09,610
without even thinking about it. Yeah. Like so

1170
01:13:10,090 –> 01:13:13,445
She was great. She was great. Well, with

1171
01:13:13,445 –> 01:13:16,824
that, I’d like to thank Tom for coming on for part 2.

1172
01:13:18,724 –> 01:13:22,505
Oh, the leadership lessons from the great books, Their Eyes Were Watching God.

1173
01:13:22,950 –> 01:13:26,090
And, with that, well,

1174
01:13:27,430 –> 01:13:28,250
we’re out.