in the court case, they ask, what does that stand for? it stood for quinnith paul. the white people use to just call him jordy and they would call his son, boy. even the teachers and the faculty members of my school said they never called him buy anything other than his first name. and he was a professor of alabama state. so i have seen all of that change. it is an attitude change. and as my sister called it, a cosmetic change. they say, dixie had a cosmetic change. they have the same mental attitude haas racists, but they

cannot call you girl and gal anymore. to me, they are over-polite. in my experience in the hotel -- ms. colvin, how can i help you? it is a little over-polite, and i get tired of it sometimes. [laughter] now, you remember i live in new york, the big apple. help me to stay the word -- say the word -- i do not want to sound like sarah palin -- [laughter] what is the word for many races? multi-cultural, yes.

they could not care one less if you were white or black. let mayor bloomberg tell you what their value is, the money. in new york, every night, racism raises its ugly head and you have these killings, racial profiling, like we had sean bell. anyway, we see racial profiling. one of my neighbors said, yes, they are always going to find a psychological reason why the white child is bad, but an

african-american or child of color is just a badass. that is true. they do not think you have any value. they think you do not know what life is, you do not have any goals or dreams. you know why i am telling you that? i am basing it on my family. i wanted you all to know that my grandson graduated and will be the first doctor in my family. [applause] i do not like to put labels on it, but i want to thank all the liberal white people that helped us in the 1950's that helped us

get through this struggle and social change and help america get rid of some of -- one of their flaws. just like my sister said, it is a cosmetic change. we still have got to work on it. it is not just a one deal. [applause] >> we have heard about cosmetic change. bryonn bain, i want to ask what has happened since this struggle here and why we are still where we are, beyond the cosmetics. what has led to this situation that you described in new york city? >> i think racism has evolved and adapted. as the movement grew in strength and folks became more

conscious, races and became more institutionally embedded. they found new ways to basically sustained slavery. michelle alexander calling it the new jim crow. between the 1960's and 1970's, the prison population across the country doubled. in the 1970's and 1980's, it tripled. in california, and build no new prisons between the 1960's and 1970's, the height of political action. between the 1970's and 1980's, they build more prisons in california alone and in the past 100 years. one thing that has happened is the warehousing of black folks in these facilities. if you think about what slavery is, the parallels, it is not just a metaphor when you talk about modern-day slavery. slavery denied black folks the ability to be mobile.

you were trapped on one location, in a plantation. it broke up our families. it subjected us to daly wants and violence. anything can happen to you -- an example to you for somebody else. it exploded us for our free labor. all of those things happen in prison today. the u.s. has 5% of the world's population and over 25% of the world's prison population. that is a big part of the equation. i am not waiting for superman, but somebody might be. if you look at the conditions of our schools, our schools have not been restructured, have been left alone to become the perfect feeder to prison prefatory. public schools are designed -- if you have any spirit, the spirit of a claudette colvin,

they do not want to adapt to you. folks always ask, where are our leaders? they are in rikers island, san quentin, some of the greatest minds which had not found a space to tap into their genius. that is a big part of what has happened. not talking about the prison industrial complex as well as the military industrial complex. rikers island has 1400 people -- 14,000 people. i worked at a high-school that had a mural on the wall. there was a figure, a man dressed in green, split in two. the front have has a gun, a rifle in his hand, military

fatigues. the back half has the prison inmate uniform. on top it says choose your dream. so those are your options. we have seen it hurts our families apart. women are the fastest growing population to be incarcerated. we see women's prisons, men's prisons, teenagers -- they have a baby prison for the babies. they build a prison every year based on third and fourth great test scores in black and latino communities around the country. that is a fact. i can give me the documentation on that. so when the police are grabbing us up, it is a function of capitalism. white supremacy and capitalism, they have had a very long dance together. the police are filling the prisons because prisons operate like hotels.

they do not make as much money, so police are agents of the state. not only where they serving the interests of the white people, they are protecting those who have and keeping the have nots out of their house. ultimately, that is the biggest thing i can put my finger on. it affects education, access to health care, you do not get mental health treatment, drug addiction treatment. that permits through every aspect of black life in this country. >> so when you were sitting down, challenging, you said you wanted to make a difference. did you ever think it would come to this? >> we have gained a lot of ground, but this generation is

regressing. what i feel -- i told you, i am not an expert. my opinion is this. i am using my family as a criteria. it has to begin with the parents. you are not going to get it from sending that child in front of a tv. african american couples are using all their quality time, their leisure time -- they should be spending with their children -- but they are working two jobs for material things. sneakers, designer jeans. you have to and still in your children the value of education. tell them the story of martin

luther king, in new york, malcolm x. some day, some time -- and a lot of black people go to church. those ministers in church, i tell them, do not preach about the hereafter, preach about none now. we are losing too many young minds. do not tell me that there are no good african-american doctors. my grandson became a doctor. there is nothing there to stop him -- he is supposed to graduate in april. [laughter] what i am saying is, the

american school of public system -- the american public school system, the lower income population is not playing the role they should play. we are not adequately educating these children. the classrooms are too crowded -- that is all over the tv in new york. they blame it all on teachers. i think the youth deserve better. that is what i think. [applause] we have to start not when they are a teenager, but pre-k. [applause] >> you have said what families need to do. as a person in school, we know how much of our children's time is spent in school.

we are often the surrogate parents for a length of time, so we have a particular responsibility in schools to get some of this truth out. i just want to throw this out for black history month. we need to ask ourselves, what information is being shared that is worthwhile, that will help young african-americans, and others, understand the nature of the society we live in? many useless activities are engaged in in black history month. i am sorry to say. it is still early. we have a chance to review. but i want to be clear. when you listen to the kind of statistics bryonn bain put out, the way that the structure still works, it is important we put that kind of information into the hands of young people to understand what we are addressing and also what we need

to do to change it. in canada -- i recently did some work in nova scotia. their slogan for black history month is educate 12 months, celebrate one. so we have a lot to work on, to look back to, and to look forward to. i just want to say, that is something we cannot miss. when we talk about episodes like bryonn described, if it happened twice, it is an accident, twice, an accident. but when it happens three, four, five times, it is a pattern. we need to ask how we can address this pattern of injustice and racism. i want to ask what difference does it work has made as an artist in this field? we understand things can be different, you know. >> i am actually doing a show

talking about my experiences. i worked with a talented group of other artists to tell the story of my experience of being thrown in jail for a short period of time, alongside the story of a brother on death row, the father of the crips, should have been pardoned. the excused him. after being nominated for the nobel prize. he left los angeles, was in texas. he went along with a drug deal. it went bad. somebody got shot. he was locked up for 18 years of his life and was on death row

until 2005 when the supreme court decided you could not execute minors. you cannot even be part of the european union if you have capital punishment. and we are still killing kids in this country. this blew my mind. ia read -- i read his poetry and store it and i shared his story alongside mine. i knew that it would do more than if i just talked about my own personal experience. that story, we started working on it -- we have been rented for seven years. we did the show in houston, his family came out. people came up after the show and said, 31 years i have been locked up. i have never felt more like a thief because i got this show for free. during the thanksgiving holiday, -- we have been doing the show for a full year now.

we went to singapore, the netherlands, belgium a federal court judge then announced that mr. william should be released from prison. [applause] he is currently still in prison because the state has an appeal, but the judge basically said, it will be remanded to the same judge at said the evidence was bogus. the police department basically botched all the evidence. they executed more people in harris county than in many states. the judge says by next year this time, they fully expect him to be home with his family after being locked up for more than 18 years, more than half his life. so even just a small part of this victory on the horizon, that has been a blessing and an honor to be a part of that.

i have a friend who is a skinhead -- was a skinhead. he was a white guy who used to beat up black people and gay people in texas. when he was the same age of the guy that got into trouble with the law as well, they used to hang outside of dallas. they would wait on a park bench, send a guy out, and when somebody came out to flirt with him, they would beat him up. that was their weekend fun. they would go gay bashing. a situation happened with -- jason was his name. he went out with two of his buddies. they jumped a guy. the guy knew martial arts or something and started within their ass -- whipping their ass.

it would be a great story if it ended there, but one of the skinheads pulled out a gun, shot the man, and killed him. the judge immediately said, the guy who pulled the trigger got life in jail. the other guys, since you boys were on drugs or whatever, you could either do life with your friend or one year in a drug detention treatment facility. you see the difference already, right? when he tells the story, we toured together. he says, "i have white privilege. he said -- i learned about white privilege from this experience." he was totally change because they put him in a cell with a gay black man who was hiv- positive, and he watched this man die, and it just changed his life. he came out, left the movement, married a woman from thailand, had a bunch of brown babies.

[laughter] had to quit his job at the pornography store because having daughters was not going to make that work for him. and he started poetry. i heard him in 1999, the same situation -- the same year the situation happened. said his daughter is part ti, part laotian, part redneck, part hick. he said she would walk down the street and great people in multi-cultural phrases. he uses the story to say something that people often do not here when i say it. that there is such a thing as white privilege as much as there is male privilege. those with any sense of freedom and justice have to find a way to reconstruct their privilege, if we want to actually make the better world -- the world a better place for our children and their children. [applause] >> we have had pieces of these

very interesting lives that can show us what the state of things happens to be. i year over year that the signs were up, of what you could do. the laws in some ways were clear on the books. one difference is that the laws are not as clear on the books, but just as active. here, people were struggling. they knew they had to fight. they knew they had to stand up, but we are still in a certain amount of denial about this. those of you who have read michele alexander's booke, it says that this needs to be a national conversation. part of the national conversation, i hope, is here. that is why we are going to turn it over to you, to engage in

some conversation with our guests. >> i just want to say to the young people today, especially teenagers, boys and girls, some of whom might have been incarcerated, what advice would you give to them? >> first thing i would say -- believe in yourself. if you do not believe in yourself and have some kind of faith and try to work hard, and listen to your teachers and take advantage of all the resources that you have, learning resources. >> today is super bowl sunday. what can our black men in the nfl do to help us have some great people? that is the only place i get to see a positive role model is by watching sports. i think we have a lot of cultures we could really bring together, but we are not joining. >> great question. in 1968, when we saw the black

system in the air, that did not happen in a vacuum. it happened in the context of a broader movement. i think we have to remember that. because the building of that movement, the movement for progressive action, revolutionary action --, you know, if we are going to talk about revolution and fundamental systemic change in society, we have to really understand the that is about building consciousness, building awareness, and being committed to the grimy role that is not always going to be on super bowl sunday on the big screen. it will not always capture that. if you want to push the revolution now and start handing of guns, you might shoot me, right? we do not have an understanding of exactly what needs to happen and how it needs to happen. i think education is critical. we have to push for an education

that we're just not receiving for the most part. there are pockets of that happening, but i think that awareness will produce the next scenario -- the next generation of folks in entertainment, in the arts and all these arenas that are high-profile but with the embedded with this consciousness that will demand the stand up and say something. no more of the michael jordan cannot speak out because politics is not a good thing to speak out against. it will be the jamaican musicians, the peter toshes and bob marleys -- the people -- the politicians had to be responsive to what people were saying and doing because there was a movement around these high- profile folks. they cannot just represent the movement. they have to come out of the movement. it has to be present in our communities and schools and prisons even for that to happen.

otherwise, we end up with the tail wagging the dog. these boats we have artificially created to be our saviors, and we need to be our own saviors. [applause] >> how do you see -- and this is to either one of you -- do you see the new disciplinary action, the prison system at this point, and where do we go? because you are doing wonderful work in the system. where we go to make that not happen anymore? >> i also want to throw out because sister davis is here and working with restorative justice for youth, to invite her voice into that question as well. >> what we are doing in oakland is to try to break the school to prison pipeline by coming up with alternatives to

incarceration. in this case, restorative alternatives. instead of saying a young person has a fight and hurting someone, instead of sending that young person ought to be incarcerated immediately, what we do is we put him or her and supporters, family members in a circle with the person who was harmed along with their family members and a facilitator, and that young person has the opportunity to sit face-to-face across from the person that was harmed and hear that person say, "you have devastated me. this is how. here are the human consequences of his or her actions, and the circle all together will come up with an action for the person to repair the harm. this is just an example -- say it is a case of a young person who has burned down a building, someone's home or business. instead of sending that person off to be incarcerated, he or she could be by the circle

sentenced to serve 200 hours, being the personal assistant for a burn patient. that is the kind of thing that will really transform lives. [applause] in oakland, what we are trying to do is engage in these restorative actions, have restored a justice instead of punitive justice. with punitive, we just add more harm to the harm, and it gets greater and greater. we are trying to have a justice that heals the harm so we can begin to transform not only lives but transform the systems because the systems need to be healing systems. as obama says, we need to start uttering healing words. president obama said that at the tucson memorial. we have to start uttering healing words to one another instead of wounding words. what we are trying to do is create systems -- school systems

and juvenile justice system is that he'll instead of juvenile justice systems and school systems that continue to wound our youth. >> can i just say something about the systems of discipline in schools? so that before it even gets to the place where it is an issue, is that those systems definitely need changing. the question that parents need to ask when they have been told that their child has been involved in some misbehavior is to ask what was happening? what were the conditions? what were the circumstances? what were the antecedence that led to this behavior? because if we do not fix those, we will seed the systems you talk about. [applause] it is amazing how many young people can be turned back from negative behavior if the situation is appropriately addressed in schools.

looking at the circumstances that give rise to boredom and bad conduct. so i encourage parents and teachers to ask what conditions are being created that contribute to the conduct. just want to say that because we could stop it earlier. [applause] >> i want to thank the panel for being here today. i was in the civil rights movement as well. we marched in -- down on canal street. down at woolworth's. we closed down the university. then, from there, we sat down. we could not leave. they threw pies at s. from there, we got jailed three times.