Episode Summary

Former police officer and F.B.I. agent Dr. Erroll Southers, director of Homegrown Violent Extremism Studies at the University of Southern California, reveals how to transform racist police departments from within, his motivations to join law enforcement, and the “ticking clock” which domestic white terrorists use to countdown to the year 2045, when America's population is expected to become majority P.O.C.

Plus, in Office Hours, hosts Dr. Cornel West and Professor Tricia Rose explore the structural limits and spiritual thresholds of America and ponder the existential question: Is America even capable of treating the masses of Black people with decency and dignity?  

 

Cornel West

Dr. Cornel West is Professor of the Practice of Public Philosophy at Harvard University. A prominent democratic intellectual, social critic, and political activist, West also serves as Professor Emeritus at Princeton University. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard in three years and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. in Philosophy at Princeton. West has authored 20 books and edited 13. Most known for Race Matters and Democracy Matters, and his memoir, Brother West: Living and Loving Out Loud, West appears frequently on the Bill Maher Show, CNN, C-Span, and Democracy Now. West has appeared in over 25 documentaries and films, including Examined Life, and is the creator of three spoken word albums including Never Forget. West brings his focus on the role of race, gender, and class in American society to The Tight Rope podcast. 

 

Tricia Rose

Professor Tricia Rose is Director of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America at Brown University. She also holds the Chancellor’s Professorship of Africana Studies and serves as the Associate Dean of the Faculty for Special Initiatives. A graduate of Yale (B.A.) and Brown University (Ph.D), Rose authored Black Noise: Rap Music and Black Culture in Contemporary America (1994), Longing to Tell: Black Women Talk about Sexuality and Intimacy (2003), and The Hip Hop Wars: What We Talk About When We Talk About Hip Hop and Why It Matters (2008). She also sits on the Boards of the Nathan Cummings Foundation, Color of Change, and Black Girls Rock, Inc. Focusing on issues relating to race in America, mass media, structural inequality, popular culture, gender and sexuality and art and social justice, Rose engages widely in scholarly and popular audience settings, and now also on The Tight Rope podcast.  

 

Errol Southers

Dr. Erroll Southers is an internationally recognized expert on counterterrorism, public safety, infrastructure protection, and homeland security. He serves as Director of the Safe Communities Institute and of Homegrown Violent Extremism Studies at the University of Southern California and Professor of the Practice in National & Homeland Security. 

 

Insight from this episode:

Explorations of the possibilities of the 2020 election in the context of the apparent helplessness of the current moment. 

Surprising statistics about America and its homegrown violent extremism. 

Strategies for activists looking to change law enforcement policy and create systems of accountability. 

Information on the power of police unions and other barriers to true accountability in law enforcement. 

Insights into the hope and patriotism that music and its boundarylessness produces.

 

Quotes from the show:

“Spirit [and] solidarity pushes back despair and despondency, so we have some sense of possibility.” –Dr. Cornel West The Tight Rope Episode #13 

Quoting his father on why he joined law enforcement: “You can’t change the castle from outside the moat.” –Erroll Southers The Tight Rope Episode #13

“When you train people and dress people for war, they go into a neighborhood to do battle… They’re in a warrior culture, when they need to be in a guardian culture.” –Erroll Southers The Tight Rope Episode #13

“Police unions and police officers are afforded more protections than the people they arrest. And I ca