WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.480 Imagine running a global operation that pulls 00:00:02.480 --> 00:00:04.799 in a hundred million dollars in funding. Right. 00:00:04.940 --> 00:00:07.820 And it mobilizes like up to 26 million people 00:00:07.820 --> 00:00:09.660 in the streets. That's a staggering number. But, 00:00:09.919 --> 00:00:12.769 and here's the catch, you have no CEO? You have 00:00:12.769 --> 00:00:15.509 no official headquarters, and you have absolutely 00:00:15.509 --> 00:00:18.570 no control over who uses your name. Yeah, I mean, 00:00:18.570 --> 00:00:20.649 it sounds like an organizational nightmare, honestly. 00:00:20.769 --> 00:00:23.089 Completely. You can't fire anyone. And literally 00:00:23.089 --> 00:00:25.410 anyone with a smartphone can claim they speak 00:00:25.410 --> 00:00:28.350 for you. It defies basically every traditional 00:00:28.350 --> 00:00:32.310 rule of how human beings build movements or wield 00:00:32.310 --> 00:00:35.710 power. Welcome to today's Deep Dive. Today is 00:00:35.710 --> 00:00:39.570 Monday, March 23, 2026. And we're looking at 00:00:39.570 --> 00:00:42.240 the history and the immense societal footprint 00:00:42.240 --> 00:00:45.320 of Black Lives Matter. This is a phrase that 00:00:45.320 --> 00:00:47.560 started as a really simple social media hashtag 00:00:47.560 --> 00:00:50.600 back in 2013, and it erupted into one of the 00:00:50.600 --> 00:00:52.939 largest, most decentralized protest movements 00:00:52.939 --> 00:00:55.520 in American history. The sheer scale is just 00:00:55.520 --> 00:00:58.619 unprecedented, but it's that very structure or 00:00:58.619 --> 00:01:00.880 really the lack thereof that makes it so fascinating 00:01:00.880 --> 00:01:05.000 and honestly so volatile. Exactly. So our mission 00:01:05.000 --> 00:01:08.299 today is to chart the evolution of this movement 00:01:08.299 --> 00:01:11.430 for you. We are going to unpack the statistics 00:01:11.430 --> 00:01:14.030 and the strategies that fueled it. And we'll 00:01:14.030 --> 00:01:16.930 examine the intense national reactions, the counter 00:01:16.930 --> 00:01:20.329 movements, and the really fierce internal criticisms 00:01:20.329 --> 00:01:22.769 it has sparked over the last decade. Right. But 00:01:22.769 --> 00:01:25.189 before we jump right into the timeline, a quick 00:01:25.189 --> 00:01:27.329 but very important note for you, Liz. Yes, definitely. 00:01:27.769 --> 00:01:30.329 This is a highly charged topic. The materials 00:01:30.329 --> 00:01:33.030 we're analyzing today, they contain deeply divided 00:01:33.030 --> 00:01:35.810 perspectives. And they touch on some of the most 00:01:37.130 --> 00:01:39.209 sensitive cultural and political nerves in the 00:01:39.209 --> 00:01:41.569 country. Absolutely. Our goal today isn't to 00:01:41.569 --> 00:01:43.230 take a side. We're not here to tell you what 00:01:43.230 --> 00:01:45.569 to think. We are simply acting as your guides 00:01:45.569 --> 00:01:48.329 to unpack the history, the underlying mechanisms 00:01:48.329 --> 00:01:51.269 and the intense debates exactly as they are documented 00:01:51.269 --> 00:01:53.109 in the research. Right. We're looking at the 00:01:53.109 --> 00:01:56.129 architecture of the movement and the data surrounding 00:01:56.129 --> 00:01:58.390 it. We just want to understand how it all works 00:01:58.390 --> 00:02:00.590 mechanically and socially. OK, let's unpack this. 00:02:00.909 --> 00:02:02.870 We have to look at how a string of text on the 00:02:02.870 --> 00:02:05.790 Internet transforms into this sprawling global 00:02:05.790 --> 00:02:08.349 network. Yeah, because understanding the actual 00:02:08.349 --> 00:02:11.229 mechanics of how this movement was built is really 00:02:11.229 --> 00:02:14.210 the only way to understand why its messaging 00:02:14.210 --> 00:02:17.810 is both omnipresent and constantly contested. 00:02:18.090 --> 00:02:21.550 Right. So the origin point is 2013. The catalyst 00:02:21.550 --> 00:02:23.669 was the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the 00:02:23.669 --> 00:02:25.789 fatal shooting of an African -American teenager, 00:02:26.050 --> 00:02:28.669 Trayvon Martin. Right. And in response to that 00:02:28.669 --> 00:02:31.789 verdict, three activists, Alicia Garza, Patrice 00:02:31.789 --> 00:02:35.030 Colors, and Ayotamedi, they spearheaded the hashtag, 00:02:35.469 --> 00:02:37.569 hashtag Black Lives Matter. And it's important 00:02:37.569 --> 00:02:40.430 to note, the initial goal wasn't to create a 00:02:40.430 --> 00:02:43.430 traditional nonprofit. It was simply to provide 00:02:43.430 --> 00:02:46.830 a shared set of principles. A rallying cry, really, 00:02:47.050 --> 00:02:49.710 for activists who were feeling just immense frustration. 00:02:49.909 --> 00:02:51.810 But the way they designed it is what really sets 00:02:51.810 --> 00:02:53.770 it apart. You know what this structure actually 00:02:53.770 --> 00:02:55.990 resembles? What's that? open source software. 00:02:56.449 --> 00:02:58.870 Oh, wow. Yeah. Think about it. With open source 00:02:58.870 --> 00:03:01.210 code, the original developers build a framework 00:03:01.210 --> 00:03:02.990 and then they just release it into the wild. 00:03:03.789 --> 00:03:05.930 Anyone can take that code, in this case, the 00:03:05.930 --> 00:03:08.229 hashtag and the core slogan, and apply it to 00:03:08.229 --> 00:03:10.870 their own local issues. What's fascinating here 00:03:10.870 --> 00:03:13.909 is how perfectly that analogy holds up. Because 00:03:13.909 --> 00:03:16.370 when you release open source code, you allow 00:03:16.370 --> 00:03:19.830 for massive, rapid, just unprecedented scaling. 00:03:20.069 --> 00:03:22.759 Exactly. People adapt it instantly. Right. But 00:03:22.759 --> 00:03:25.460 the trade -off is severe. The original developers 00:03:25.460 --> 00:03:28.199 can't control the bugs. They can't control how 00:03:28.199 --> 00:03:31.060 the software is used out in the wild. Who modifies 00:03:31.060 --> 00:03:33.960 it or who claims to be like an official developer? 00:03:34.360 --> 00:03:36.699 Which is exactly what happened here. The founders 00:03:36.699 --> 00:03:39.939 deliberately avoided policing who is and isn't 00:03:39.939 --> 00:03:42.199 part of the movement. The sources note there 00:03:42.199 --> 00:03:44.840 are about 40 recognized chapters across the U 00:03:44.840 --> 00:03:48.139 .S. and Canada, but local chapters are entirely 00:03:48.139 --> 00:03:50.659 autonomous. No formal hierarchy at all. None. 00:03:50.960 --> 00:03:53.180 And that is a massive departure from historical 00:03:53.180 --> 00:03:54.719 precedent. I mean, think about the civil rights 00:03:54.719 --> 00:03:57.000 movement of the 1950s and 60s. Ray, the contrast 00:03:57.000 --> 00:03:59.900 is wild. Yeah, that era was defined by a highly 00:03:59.900 --> 00:04:04.139 visible rigid hierarchy. You had central undeniable 00:04:04.139 --> 00:04:06.539 leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and you had 00:04:06.539 --> 00:04:09.520 legacy organizations like the NAACP. Very top 00:04:09.520 --> 00:04:13.000 down. Exactly. Clear top down leadership trees. 00:04:13.740 --> 00:04:16.899 If someone claimed to speak for the NAACP but 00:04:16.899 --> 00:04:19.740 violated their principles, the leadership could 00:04:19.740 --> 00:04:23.279 definitively publicly expel them. But Black Lives 00:04:23.279 --> 00:04:26.250 Matter can't really do that. If a local chapter 00:04:26.250 --> 00:04:28.610 or honestly just a random individual holding 00:04:28.610 --> 00:04:30.910 a cardboard sign does something controversial, 00:04:31.610 --> 00:04:33.990 the media and politicians immediately attribute 00:04:33.990 --> 00:04:37.009 that action to the entire national network. Because 00:04:37.009 --> 00:04:39.810 the human brain naturally looks for a leader 00:04:39.810 --> 00:04:42.769 to hold accountable. When there isn't one, the 00:04:42.769 --> 00:04:45.170 actions of a few are easily painted onto the 00:04:45.170 --> 00:04:47.769 whole. But despite that structural vulnerability, 00:04:48.170 --> 00:04:50.769 the financial mobilization they achieved is just 00:04:50.769 --> 00:04:52.730 staggering. I mean, how do you even manage funding 00:04:52.730 --> 00:04:55.170 without a central treasury? It's a huge challenge. 00:04:55.250 --> 00:04:57.910 Look at the numbers in 2020 alone. The Black 00:04:57.910 --> 00:04:59.889 Lives Matter Global Network Foundation raised 00:04:59.889 --> 00:05:02.250 90 million dollars. Ninety million. And this 00:05:02.250 --> 00:05:04.069 wasn't just corporate billionaires writing checks. 00:05:04.209 --> 00:05:06.370 The average donation was just thirty dollars 00:05:06.370 --> 00:05:09.069 and seventy six cents. Wow. That is millions 00:05:09.069 --> 00:05:11.230 of everyday people opening their wallets. And 00:05:11.230 --> 00:05:13.110 it scales up even further when you look at the 00:05:13.110 --> 00:05:15.740 broader movement for Black Lives Coalition. Right, 00:05:15.839 --> 00:05:17.699 the umbrella group. Yeah, it's an umbrella network 00:05:17.699 --> 00:05:20.899 of over 50 associated groups. That coalition 00:05:20.899 --> 00:05:23.720 received over 100 million dollars in funding 00:05:23.720 --> 00:05:27.000 commitments from massive institutional entities. 00:05:27.000 --> 00:05:29.560 Like the Ford Foundation, for example. That's 00:05:29.560 --> 00:05:31.279 incredible. The financial infrastructure had 00:05:31.279 --> 00:05:33.920 to evolve incredibly quickly just to catch up 00:05:33.920 --> 00:05:36.019 with the digital viral nature of the hashtag. 00:05:36.319 --> 00:05:39.300 So if this decentralized open source structure 00:05:39.300 --> 00:05:42.040 is the vehicle, we need to talk about the fuel. 00:05:42.060 --> 00:05:44.879 Right. How did we get to 90 million dollars in 00:05:44.879 --> 00:05:48.240 donations? We have to move from how it's organized 00:05:48.240 --> 00:05:51.889 to the specific catalysts, the flashpoints and 00:05:51.889 --> 00:05:54.310 the intense statistical battleground over police 00:05:54.310 --> 00:05:57.069 use of force. Right, the data points to 2014 00:05:57.069 --> 00:05:59.649 as the moment the hashtag truly manifested in 00:05:59.649 --> 00:06:02.050 the physical streets. This started in Ferguson, 00:06:02.069 --> 00:06:04.110 Missouri following the death of Michael Brown. 00:06:04.209 --> 00:06:06.449 Which was a huge turning point for national visibility. 00:06:06.569 --> 00:06:09.410 It was. And shortly after, you had the death 00:06:09.410 --> 00:06:12.389 of Eric Garner in New York City, which directly 00:06:12.389 --> 00:06:15.230 gave rise to the I Can't Breathe chant. And then, 00:06:15.290 --> 00:06:17.069 of course, the global explosion in the summer 00:06:17.069 --> 00:06:19.490 of 2020 following the murder of George Floyd 00:06:19.490 --> 00:06:21.769 by Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. 00:06:21.930 --> 00:06:25.370 Yeah. That specific video was the catalyst for 00:06:25.370 --> 00:06:27.550 protests that erupted across three different 00:06:27.550 --> 00:06:30.470 continents. But beneath these highly visible, 00:06:30.790 --> 00:06:34.370 tragic individual events, there is a very dense 00:06:34.370 --> 00:06:37.339 academic and statistical debate happening. right. 00:06:37.879 --> 00:06:40.740 The movement's core grievance is rooted in statistics 00:06:40.740 --> 00:06:44.209 regarding structural racism. For example, the 00:06:44.209 --> 00:06:47.129 Washington Post began compiling a massive database 00:06:47.129 --> 00:06:49.569 of police use of force. Right, because there 00:06:49.569 --> 00:06:51.990 wasn't a really unified federal one. Exactly. 00:06:52.089 --> 00:06:55.189 And their data showed that in 2019, police officers 00:06:55.189 --> 00:06:58.370 shot and killed 1 ,001 people in the United States. 00:06:58.410 --> 00:07:00.529 And when you break down the demographics of those 00:07:00.529 --> 00:07:03.310 1 ,001 people, the disparity becomes the focal 00:07:03.310 --> 00:07:06.050 point. The rate of deaths for black Americans 00:07:06.050 --> 00:07:09.209 was 31 fatal shootings per million. For white 00:07:09.209 --> 00:07:12.569 Americans, it was 13 per million. Black Americans 00:07:12.569 --> 00:07:14.550 were being killed at more than twice the rate. 00:07:14.769 --> 00:07:16.889 But the interpretation of why that disparity 00:07:16.889 --> 00:07:19.870 exists is where the academic world completely 00:07:19.870 --> 00:07:23.240 fractured. How so? Well you had a prominent 2015 00:07:23.240 --> 00:07:26.819 study by Cody Ross at UC Davis and that study 00:07:26.819 --> 00:07:29.899 found a significant measurable bias in the shooting 00:07:29.899 --> 00:07:33.019 of unarmed black Americans relative to unarmed 00:07:33.019 --> 00:07:35.879 white Americans. Okay. But then you have a 2019 00:07:35.879 --> 00:07:38.220 study by researcher Joseph Cesario and others 00:07:38.220 --> 00:07:40.360 that concluded something entirely different. 00:07:40.920 --> 00:07:43.560 They found no systematic evidence of anti -black 00:07:43.560 --> 00:07:46.660 disparities in fatal shootings once you mathematically 00:07:46.660 --> 00:07:49.540 adjusted for local crime rates. Wait, I need 00:07:49.540 --> 00:07:51.120 to push back on this for a second because the 00:07:51.120 --> 00:07:53.279 data gets incredibly muddy here. I was reading 00:07:53.279 --> 00:07:55.699 through the source stack and it mentions another 00:07:55.699 --> 00:07:58.540 major 2019 study published in the Proceedings 00:07:58.540 --> 00:08:01.000 of the National Academy of Sciences PNAS that 00:08:01.000 --> 00:08:03.680 went even further. It claimed that black people 00:08:03.680 --> 00:08:05.959 were actually less likely to be killed by police. 00:08:06.509 --> 00:08:08.389 If you're listening to this and you've seen those 00:08:08.389 --> 00:08:10.550 exact headlines used to dismiss the movement 00:08:10.550 --> 00:08:13.550 entirely, how does the research reconcile that 00:08:13.550 --> 00:08:16.029 mathematical claim? This is one of the most important 00:08:16.029 --> 00:08:18.509 technical concepts to grasp in this entire debate. 00:08:19.050 --> 00:08:21.509 The sources explain that this specific conclusion 00:08:21.509 --> 00:08:23.670 that black people were less likely to be killed 00:08:23.670 --> 00:08:27.170 was found to be heavily flawed. due to a mathematical 00:08:27.170 --> 00:08:30.129 illusion called Simpson's paradox. Simpson's 00:08:30.129 --> 00:08:32.889 paradox. Walk us through how that actually tricks 00:08:32.889 --> 00:08:36.230 the data in this context. Right. So Simpson's 00:08:36.230 --> 00:08:39.429 paradox happens when a trend appears in isolated 00:08:39.429 --> 00:08:42.809 groups of data, but completely reverses when 00:08:42.809 --> 00:08:44.909 you combine the groups and look at the big picture. 00:08:45.070 --> 00:08:49.250 OK. In this specific study, the researchers only 00:08:49.250 --> 00:08:51.389 looked at the probability of death during an 00:08:51.389 --> 00:08:53.570 active police encounter. They didn't look at 00:08:53.570 --> 00:08:56.080 the whole population. So just focusing on the 00:08:56.080 --> 00:09:00.059 encounter itself? Yes. And it is true, mathematically, 00:09:00.779 --> 00:09:03.120 that a white person might be slightly more likely 00:09:03.120 --> 00:09:05.620 to be killed during an encounter. Wait, why? 00:09:05.860 --> 00:09:08.399 Because white people, on a population level, 00:09:08.899 --> 00:09:10.679 interact with the police much less frequently. 00:09:11.820 --> 00:09:13.559 When they do have an encounter that escalates, 00:09:13.899 --> 00:09:16.340 it is statistically more often for a highly serious 00:09:16.509 --> 00:09:18.850 violent crime, like an active shooter situation, 00:09:18.909 --> 00:09:21.370 for example, where lethal force is highly probable 00:09:21.370 --> 00:09:24.149 from the start. So the context of the encounter 00:09:24.149 --> 00:09:26.990 is heavily stewed from the jump. Exactly. The 00:09:26.990 --> 00:09:29.049 source material highlights that Black Americans 00:09:29.049 --> 00:09:32.029 face systemic structural issues like proactive 00:09:32.029 --> 00:09:34.529 policing in minority neighborhoods that lead 00:09:34.529 --> 00:09:37.169 to vastly more total encounters with police, 00:09:37.870 --> 00:09:41.029 often for petty crimes, traffic stops, or honestly, 00:09:41.409 --> 00:09:43.600 no crime at all. So the denominator, the sheer 00:09:43.600 --> 00:09:46.179 number of stops is just massive compared to white 00:09:46.179 --> 00:09:48.799 Americans. Yes. So while the percentage risk 00:09:48.799 --> 00:09:51.779 of dying in one single isolated traffic stop 00:09:51.779 --> 00:09:54.360 might mathematically look lower, their overall 00:09:54.360 --> 00:09:56.899 population risk of being killed by police is 00:09:56.899 --> 00:09:59.779 vastly higher. Just by the sheer volume of stops. 00:10:00.039 --> 00:10:02.440 Simply because they're subjected to an exponentially 00:10:02.440 --> 00:10:05.480 higher number of interactions. Wow, that completely 00:10:05.480 --> 00:10:07.740 flips the headline. It does. And it's crucial 00:10:07.740 --> 00:10:11.059 to note that the authors of that 2019 PNAS study 00:10:11.419 --> 00:10:14.139 actually retracted their paper. Really? Yes. 00:10:14.500 --> 00:10:16.600 They explicitly stated that their work was being 00:10:16.600 --> 00:10:19.639 misused by politicians and media to support the 00:10:19.639 --> 00:10:22.139 idea that there are no racial biases in policing. 00:10:22.879 --> 00:10:25.159 They admitted their data set, which only looked 00:10:25.159 --> 00:10:27.080 at people who had already been stopped by police, 00:10:27.460 --> 00:10:29.519 was completely inadequate to make that broader 00:10:29.519 --> 00:10:33.210 claim. So what does this all mean? You have these 00:10:33.210 --> 00:10:36.830 intense, deeply complex statistical debates playing 00:10:36.830 --> 00:10:39.330 out in academic journals. Right. But when that 00:10:39.330 --> 00:10:42.250 frustration spills out of academia and into the 00:10:42.250 --> 00:10:45.450 streets through direct action, it loses all that 00:10:45.450 --> 00:10:48.870 nuance and inevitably triggers massive cultural 00:10:48.870 --> 00:10:51.350 and political counter movements. Yeah, because 00:10:51.350 --> 00:10:54.110 direct action is designed to be disruptive, not 00:10:54.110 --> 00:10:57.789 nuanced. The tactics used by BLM were meant to 00:10:57.789 --> 00:11:00.029 force society to pay attention. Right. They were 00:11:00.029 --> 00:11:03.259 impossible to ignore. Exactly. You had massive 00:11:03.259 --> 00:11:06.379 hashtag activism. We're talking nearly 48 million 00:11:06.379 --> 00:11:09.620 tweets utilizing the hashtag by mid -2020. 48 00:11:09.620 --> 00:11:12.639 million. Yeah. You had protesters staging die 00:11:12.639 --> 00:11:14.519 -ins, physically shutting down major highways 00:11:14.519 --> 00:11:16.539 and shopping malls, and of course, the widespread 00:11:16.539 --> 00:11:19.350 use of the slogan, defund the police. And the 00:11:19.350 --> 00:11:21.309 public reaction to those tactics has been a total 00:11:21.309 --> 00:11:23.190 roller coaster. If you look at the polling data, 00:11:23.690 --> 00:11:25.990 public support peaked during a George Floyd protests 00:11:25.990 --> 00:11:28.929 in the summer of 2020, with 67 percent of American 00:11:28.929 --> 00:11:31.409 adults expressing support for BLM, which is a 00:11:31.409 --> 00:11:34.730 huge majority. It is. But by 2024, that broader 00:11:34.730 --> 00:11:37.409 national support had steadily declined to 45 00:11:37.409 --> 00:11:40.809 percent. Crucially, though, it remained incredibly 00:11:40.809 --> 00:11:44.450 high among African -Americans sitting at 81 percent 00:11:44.450 --> 00:11:47.789 in 2023. Right. And that decline in broader national 00:11:47.789 --> 00:11:50.649 support didn't happen in a vacuum. It was partly 00:11:50.649 --> 00:11:53.009 fueled by the rise of highly organized counter 00:11:53.009 --> 00:11:55.720 movements. the most prominent early one being 00:11:55.720 --> 00:11:58.639 All Lives Matter. Which BLM supporters heavily 00:11:58.639 --> 00:12:01.080 criticized. They argued that saying All Lives 00:12:01.080 --> 00:12:03.940 Matter intentionally dismisses and erases the 00:12:03.940 --> 00:12:06.620 specific structural dangers faced by black people. 00:12:07.159 --> 00:12:09.120 Co -founder Alicia Garza specifically addressed 00:12:09.120 --> 00:12:11.940 this. She said the BLM slogan doesn't mean other 00:12:11.940 --> 00:12:13.919 lives aren't important. It means black lives 00:12:13.919 --> 00:12:16.000 are currently treated as less valuable by the 00:12:16.000 --> 00:12:19.039 justice system, and that specific disparity needs 00:12:19.039 --> 00:12:20.820 to be addressed. And following that, you had 00:12:20.820 --> 00:12:23.120 the Blue Lives Matter movement. This emerged 00:12:23.120 --> 00:12:25.740 as direct pro -law enforcement counter movement. 00:12:26.240 --> 00:12:29.100 It started gaining traction after two NYPD officers 00:12:29.100 --> 00:12:32.139 were killed in 2014, but it really exploded into 00:12:32.139 --> 00:12:34.980 a massive cultural force after five police officers 00:12:34.980 --> 00:12:37.259 were killed in a targeted ambush in Dallas in 00:12:37.259 --> 00:12:40.500 2016. But the sources note that Blue Lives Matter 00:12:40.500 --> 00:12:43.519 faced intense accusations of hypocrisy just a 00:12:43.519 --> 00:12:45.740 few years later. Oh, absolutely. Specifically 00:12:45.740 --> 00:12:48.779 during the January 6th Capitol attack in 2021, 00:12:48.899 --> 00:12:52.820 you had pro -Trump rioters actively physically 00:12:52.820 --> 00:12:56.450 attacking Capitol police officers while simultaneously 00:12:56.450 --> 00:12:59.289 carrying and wearing Blue Lives Matter flags. 00:12:59.470 --> 00:13:01.450 Yeah, that was a very visible contradiction. 00:13:01.809 --> 00:13:04.210 Critics argued this proved the movement was often 00:13:04.210 --> 00:13:07.429 more about opposing minority protests than actually 00:13:07.429 --> 00:13:10.009 protecting law enforcement. If we connect this 00:13:10.009 --> 00:13:12.590 to the bigger picture, we really have to look 00:13:12.590 --> 00:13:15.129 at the media's role in fueling this polarization. 00:13:15.670 --> 00:13:18.309 The sources reference a vital media theory called 00:13:18.309 --> 00:13:20.710 the protest paradigm. Define that for us because 00:13:20.710 --> 00:13:22.789 I think it explains so much of what the listener 00:13:22.789 --> 00:13:25.169 might have seen on the evening news. The protest 00:13:25.169 --> 00:13:27.529 paradigm is the tendency for news organizations 00:13:27.529 --> 00:13:30.250 to focus heavily on the drama, the deviance, 00:13:30.350 --> 00:13:32.649 and the violence of a protest rather than the 00:13:32.649 --> 00:13:34.690 actual grievances or policies the protesters 00:13:34.690 --> 00:13:37.970 are fighting for. The camera lens naturally points 00:13:37.970 --> 00:13:40.929 at the broken window, not the thousands of peaceful 00:13:40.929 --> 00:13:43.090 marchers. Because the broken window gets ratings. 00:13:43.509 --> 00:13:46.379 Exactly. Studies cited in the material, including 00:13:46.379 --> 00:13:48.559 exhaustive research from the Washington Post 00:13:48.559 --> 00:13:50.980 and the University of Connecticut, found that 00:13:50.980 --> 00:13:55.980 93 to 96 percent of the 2020 BLM protests were 00:13:55.980 --> 00:13:58.679 entirely peaceful. Wow. Over 90 percent. There 00:13:58.679 --> 00:14:01.480 is no violence or property damage at all. Yet 00:14:01.480 --> 00:14:04.220 opponents and certain media outlets actively 00:14:04.220 --> 00:14:07.120 capitalize on that remaining four to seven percent. 00:14:07.220 --> 00:14:09.399 And to be fair to the data, that four to seven 00:14:09.399 --> 00:14:12.279 percent was historically destructive. The riots, 00:14:12.559 --> 00:14:15.519 arson and looting that did occur caused an estimated 00:14:15.519 --> 00:14:18.240 one to two billion dollars in insured damages. 00:14:18.679 --> 00:14:21.179 That is the highest amount of riot related damage 00:14:21.179 --> 00:14:23.860 in U .S. history. It is a massive number. But 00:14:23.860 --> 00:14:26.659 the protest paradigm explains how opponents weaponized 00:14:26.659 --> 00:14:29.559 those specific isolated images of burning buildings 00:14:29.559 --> 00:14:33.159 to portray the entire decentralized 96 percent 00:14:33.159 --> 00:14:36.049 peaceful movement as a violent hate group. and 00:14:36.049 --> 00:14:38.470 into that polarized media vacuum steps foreign 00:14:38.470 --> 00:14:41.330 interference. The information war was global. 00:14:41.730 --> 00:14:44.470 Because the movement has no central PR department 00:14:44.470 --> 00:14:47.429 to correct the record, it was incredibly vulnerable. 00:14:48.009 --> 00:14:50.629 The sources detail how Russian operatives tied 00:14:50.629 --> 00:14:53.529 to the Internet Research Agency actively played 00:14:53.529 --> 00:14:56.230 both sides of the debate on social media. And 00:14:56.230 --> 00:14:59.210 their goal wasn't to help BLM or to help the 00:14:59.210 --> 00:15:01.470 police, for that matter. No. Their explicit goal. 00:15:01.659 --> 00:15:04.200 according to the intelligence reports, was to 00:15:04.200 --> 00:15:06.539 stoke a race war in the United States. They would 00:15:06.539 --> 00:15:09.580 literally promote BLM events while simultaneously 00:15:09.580 --> 00:15:13.039 creating fake conservative accounts to encourage 00:15:13.039 --> 00:15:15.919 armed antagonism against those very same events. 00:15:16.179 --> 00:15:18.820 You even had trolls on the anonymous message 00:15:18.820 --> 00:15:22.440 board 4chan creating a fake violent fascist manifesto 00:15:22.440 --> 00:15:26.220 from 1919 and rebranding it online as the official 00:15:26.220 --> 00:15:28.980 Black Lives Matter manifesto just to discredit 00:15:28.980 --> 00:15:31.730 the activists. It became a pure digital battleground 00:15:31.730 --> 00:15:34.210 where the actual on the ground goals of the movement 00:15:34.210 --> 00:15:36.549 were constantly being drowned out by deliberate 00:15:36.549 --> 00:15:39.169 disinformation. Which brings us to a really crucial 00:15:39.169 --> 00:15:42.129 phase of this history. It wasn't just external 00:15:42.129 --> 00:15:45.350 opponents and Russian trolls pushing back. As 00:15:45.350 --> 00:15:48.029 the movement aged and as it accumulated that 00:15:48.029 --> 00:15:51.389 massive 90 million dollar treasury, it began 00:15:51.389 --> 00:15:55.470 facing severe internal critiques and unprecedented 00:15:55.470 --> 00:15:58.169 political collisions. And this brings us right 00:15:58.169 --> 00:16:00.690 up to the present day. This raises an important 00:16:00.690 --> 00:16:03.960 question. What happens when a raw grassroots 00:16:03.960 --> 00:16:06.799 street protest matures into a wealthy institution? 00:16:07.460 --> 00:16:09.679 You inevitably face a crisis of authenticity. 00:16:10.179 --> 00:16:12.659 And the first major crack was a class disconnect. 00:16:13.000 --> 00:16:14.980 The sources highlight serious critiques coming 00:16:14.980 --> 00:16:17.620 from working class black community leaders. You 00:16:17.620 --> 00:16:19.840 have the mayor of Newark publicly calling the 00:16:19.840 --> 00:16:22.360 defund the police slogan a bourgeois liberal 00:16:22.360 --> 00:16:25.039 solution. That's a very specific phrase. He's 00:16:25.039 --> 00:16:27.179 essentially arguing that it's an idea born in 00:16:27.179 --> 00:16:29.600 wealthy academic circles that doesn't actually 00:16:29.600 --> 00:16:32.299 reflect reality on the ground. Right. City council 00:16:32.299 --> 00:16:34.639 members in places like New York pointed out that 00:16:34.639 --> 00:16:36.879 their constituents working class homeowners and 00:16:36.879 --> 00:16:39.539 tenants in minority neighborhoods actually want 00:16:39.539 --> 00:16:42.240 safe, effective, and present policing. They want 00:16:42.240 --> 00:16:45.139 better policing, not zero policing. Exactly. 00:16:45.259 --> 00:16:48.659 They felt that affluent outside activists were 00:16:48.659 --> 00:16:50.679 lecturing them about the realities of their own 00:16:50.679 --> 00:16:53.139 neighborhoods. Alongside that ideological class 00:16:53.139 --> 00:16:55.700 divide, there was massive financial controversy. 00:16:55.850 --> 00:16:58.289 The Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation 00:16:58.289 --> 00:17:01.769 faced intense grassroots backlash for purchasing 00:17:01.769 --> 00:17:04.490 a six million dollar compound in Southern California. 00:17:04.529 --> 00:17:06.529 Yeah, a luxury compound with a swimming pool 00:17:06.529 --> 00:17:08.970 and a soundstage. Yeah. The leadership stated 00:17:08.970 --> 00:17:11.809 it was intended to be a black artists fellowship 00:17:11.809 --> 00:17:14.960 space, but the optics were brutal. It sparked 00:17:14.960 --> 00:17:18.440 outrage from local street level organizers who 00:17:18.440 --> 00:17:21.279 felt those millions of dollars should be distributed 00:17:21.279 --> 00:17:24.119 directly into impoverished communities, not tied 00:17:24.119 --> 00:17:26.680 up in luxury real estate. We also see critiques 00:17:26.680 --> 00:17:29.319 about the movement's focus and its blind spots. 00:17:29.740 --> 00:17:31.740 The Say Her Name campaign is a prime example 00:17:31.740 --> 00:17:34.220 of this. How so? Well, it had to be created as 00:17:34.220 --> 00:17:36.079 a completely separate initiative, specifically 00:17:36.079 --> 00:17:38.259 because the deaths of black women at the hands 00:17:38.259 --> 00:17:41.039 of police were largely being sidelined by the 00:17:41.039 --> 00:17:43.680 media and the movement, mostly in favor of narrative. 00:17:43.630 --> 00:17:46.750 surrounding black men. Furthermore, local organizations 00:17:46.750 --> 00:17:50.650 highlighted that BLM largely ignored the vastly 00:17:50.650 --> 00:17:53.430 disproportionate number of unsolved civilian 00:17:53.430 --> 00:17:55.809 murders and missing persons cases in the black 00:17:55.809 --> 00:17:58.809 community. They chose to focus their massive 00:17:58.809 --> 00:18:02.269 megaphone almost exclusively on instances of 00:18:02.269 --> 00:18:04.589 police violence. It really shows the limits of 00:18:04.589 --> 00:18:07.369 a hashtag. It can highlight a specific systemic 00:18:07.369 --> 00:18:09.609 issue, but it struggles to address the broader 00:18:09.609 --> 00:18:12.150 everyday systemic failures affecting the community. 00:18:12.380 --> 00:18:14.579 Here's what gets really interesting, especially 00:18:14.579 --> 00:18:16.660 from a political science perspective. Looking 00:18:16.660 --> 00:18:19.299 at recent events, the decentralized power of 00:18:19.299 --> 00:18:22.200 BLM actually turned its sights against its own 00:18:22.200 --> 00:18:24.380 traditional political allies. Yeah, this was 00:18:24.380 --> 00:18:28.119 huge. In July 2024, the BLM Global Network Foundation 00:18:28.119 --> 00:18:30.480 publicly and aggressively opposed the Democratic 00:18:30.480 --> 00:18:33.759 Party's decision to essentially anoint Kamala 00:18:33.759 --> 00:18:35.920 Harris as the presidential nominee without a 00:18:35.920 --> 00:18:38.519 primary vote following Biden's exit. That is 00:18:38.519 --> 00:18:40.819 a stark pivot. We have a movement whose supporters 00:18:41.240 --> 00:18:44.539 heavily lean Democratic attacking the DNC. But 00:18:44.539 --> 00:18:46.660 if you look at their structural DNA, it makes 00:18:46.660 --> 00:18:49.400 perfect sense. They called the DNC's process 00:18:49.400 --> 00:18:52.539 hypocritical and demanded they host our virtual 00:18:52.539 --> 00:18:55.039 primary so everyday voters could participate. 00:18:55.400 --> 00:18:58.589 Because of how they operate. Yes. Here's a movement 00:18:58.589 --> 00:19:02.589 built entirely on decentralized bottom -up open 00:19:02.589 --> 00:19:05.930 source democratic participation. They are fundamentally 00:19:05.930 --> 00:19:08.170 philosophically incompatible with a top -down 00:19:08.170 --> 00:19:11.210 party elite appointment. They challenged the 00:19:11.210 --> 00:19:13.490 democratic establishment on the exact grounds 00:19:13.490 --> 00:19:16.049 of democratic principles. And the political friction 00:19:16.049 --> 00:19:19.490 didn't stop at party rules. Moving into 2025, 00:19:19.750 --> 00:19:22.869 we saw the physical erasure of one of the movement's 00:19:22.869 --> 00:19:25.779 most iconic symbols. This detail really stood 00:19:25.779 --> 00:19:28.380 out to me. Back in 2020, Washington D .C. Mayor 00:19:28.380 --> 00:19:32.079 Muriel Bowser painted Black Lives Matter in massive 00:19:32.079 --> 00:19:34.460 block yellow letters directly on the street leading 00:19:34.460 --> 00:19:36.039 to the White House. Right. Everyone remembers 00:19:36.039 --> 00:19:38.160 that imagery. She officially renamed it Black 00:19:38.160 --> 00:19:41.019 Lives Matter Plaza. But the sources note that 00:19:41.019 --> 00:19:43.799 in March 2025, just about a year ago for us sitting 00:19:43.799 --> 00:19:46.619 here today, city crews quietly began removing 00:19:46.619 --> 00:19:49.000 the mural. It's a striking reversal. How did 00:19:49.000 --> 00:19:50.940 the local government justify scrubbing their 00:19:50.940 --> 00:19:53.769 own monument? What blows my mind about the removal 00:19:53.769 --> 00:19:56.809 of the mural is that it wasn't a local organic 00:19:56.809 --> 00:19:59.990 decision. It was essentially forced by federal 00:19:59.990 --> 00:20:02.730 threats. Oh, wow. Mayor Bowser stated it was 00:20:02.730 --> 00:20:05.450 due to intense pressure and explicit threats 00:20:05.450 --> 00:20:08.170 of massive federal funding cuts from the Republican 00:20:08.170 --> 00:20:10.789 controlled Congress and President Trump. So they 00:20:10.789 --> 00:20:13.349 used federal leverage to force the city's hand. 00:20:13.410 --> 00:20:16.170 Exactly. A bill was introduced in Congress to 00:20:16.170 --> 00:20:18.690 withhold crucial federal funds from the city 00:20:18.690 --> 00:20:24.000 unless the plaza was renamed and all BLM references 00:20:24.000 --> 00:20:26.579 were scrubbed. Unbelievable. The mayor essentially 00:20:26.579 --> 00:20:28.640 admitted they couldn't afford to be distracted 00:20:28.640 --> 00:20:30.779 by congressional interference or risk losing 00:20:30.779 --> 00:20:33.549 federal jobs in the district. It shows how local 00:20:33.549 --> 00:20:36.470 protest art literally became a national political 00:20:36.470 --> 00:20:39.230 hostage. When you synthesize all of these internal 00:20:39.230 --> 00:20:41.210 critiques, the financial scandals, and these 00:20:41.210 --> 00:20:43.869 high stakes political collisions, it paints a 00:20:43.869 --> 00:20:46.609 very clear picture. Managing a movement that 00:20:46.609 --> 00:20:49.329 transitions from a decentralized outcry into 00:20:49.329 --> 00:20:52.170 a multi -million dollar political entity is a 00:20:52.170 --> 00:20:54.829 nearly impossible tightrope. It really is. Looking 00:20:54.829 --> 00:20:56.789 back over the source material today, the journey 00:20:56.789 --> 00:21:00.190 is just incredible. From a single hashtag typed 00:21:00.190 --> 00:21:03.829 out in 2013, sparked by a tragic acquittal, to 00:21:03.829 --> 00:21:06.569 a sprawling entity that generated over $100 million. 00:21:07.470 --> 00:21:10.130 It mobilized tens of millions of people globally. 00:21:10.569 --> 00:21:12.670 It completely reshaped the cultural dialogue 00:21:12.670 --> 00:21:15.950 on policing. And it has weathered intense political, 00:21:16.309 --> 00:21:19.029 statistical, and internal battles. Regardless 00:21:19.029 --> 00:21:21.390 of how public opinion polling has fluctuated 00:21:21.390 --> 00:21:24.390 over the years, the structural and cultural impact 00:21:24.390 --> 00:21:26.890 it had on the landscape of American social justice 00:21:26.890 --> 00:21:29.920 is undeniably permanent. Which brings me to a 00:21:29.920 --> 00:21:31.740 final thought for you to mull over as we wrap 00:21:31.740 --> 00:21:34.819 up. Historically, social movements like the civil 00:21:34.819 --> 00:21:37.259 rights era we discussed earlier were defined 00:21:37.259 --> 00:21:40.160 by clear leaders who sought very specific, clear 00:21:40.160 --> 00:21:42.259 legislative victories. Right. The Voting Rights 00:21:42.259 --> 00:21:44.019 Act, the Civil Rights Act. Exactly. There was 00:21:44.019 --> 00:21:46.279 a finish line. But in an era where movements 00:21:46.279 --> 00:21:49.640 are built like open source software, decentralized, 00:21:50.259 --> 00:21:53.220 algorithm driven, and constantly open to modification 00:21:53.220 --> 00:21:56.240 by anyone with a smartphone, can a movement ever 00:21:56.240 --> 00:21:59.089 truly end? That's a great question. Can an open 00:21:59.089 --> 00:22:01.809 source movement ever officially achieve its goals 00:22:01.809 --> 00:22:04.789 and shut down? Or is it destined to permanently 00:22:04.789 --> 00:22:07.950 exist as a digital battleground, constantly morphing 00:22:07.950 --> 00:22:10.690 with the endless news cycle? It's a structural 00:22:10.690 --> 00:22:12.910 paradigm shift that we are honestly still trying 00:22:12.910 --> 00:22:14.849 to understand. Thank you so much for joining 00:22:14.849 --> 00:22:16.630 us on this deep dive. We'll see you next time.