The Daily Show: Ears Edition

I wrote this book, part of it came out of the grief and loss that I felt at the start of the pandemic.

But it also, I felt like I wasn't getting any recognition for it. We were hearing about essential workers, healthcare workers, sanitation workers who are yes essential but we were never hearing about parents and we were hearing about the 24-7 trying to take care of their families trying to keep communities safe.

The idea that domestic labor is somehow less valuable than quote unquote professional work is that it's not just about the child care crisis. It's about the child care crisis and the child care crisis. And I just think it's a myth.

if women in America were paid for domestic labor that they do unpaid right now it would be worth $1.9 trillion per year.

Our country American capitalism relies just as much on the labor that happens in the home as any other labor that happens in the office or on a job site.

The last time that we spoke, you had written a book called, I believe, The Sixth Extinction.

And it was about how we were all going to die.

I told him that all this stuff was bulls*** and about election fraud. And, uh, you know, it was wrong to be shoveling it out the way his team was.

He was obviously getting very angry about this. I said, okay, well, look, I understand you're upset with me and I'm perfectly happy to tender my resignation. And then boom. He slapped the desk. He slapped the desk and he said, accepted, accepted. Don't go back to your office. Go home. You're done.

After the election, he went off the rails. He wouldn't listen to anybody except a little coterie of sick of fans who were telling him what he wanted to hear.

I certainly have made it clear. I don't think he should be our nominee and I'm gonna, you know, support somebody else for the nomination. But if he is the nominee, and you have your choices, Donald Trump or whoever's running on the Democratic side, would you vote for him? Because I believe that the greatest threat to the country is the progressive agenda being pushed by the Democratic Party.

It's inconceivable to me that I wouldn't vote for the Republican nominee. So even if he lied about the election and threatened democracy as you write in your book, well, it's better than a Democrat.

And I read a book called When Affirmative Action Was White, a book by Ira Katz-Nelson, a professor out of Columbia.

And there are two chapters in it that focused on the GI Bill and essentially this wide social welfare program right after World War Two that enabled many people to gain access to zero via back home, also the ability to buy a home for the first time, the ability to go to school.

Today I'm joined by Emmy nominated Daily Show writer Ashton Womack and author of the book One Drop, Shifting the Lens on Race. Dr. Yabba-Blay, they're gonna both help us answer the question, can you define blackness?

It's kind of like the given background for academics. You gotta show your books.

Your oppression will not save you

So I had to throw all of that away and completely be open to new information

Barry sent me stuff to read, he sent me audio tapes to listen to, audio tapes of former enslaved people

and it's when I heard them, like the sound and how they spoke, that something in me really shifted

because here I was listening to people who are 75 years old, 90 years old, but they sound 16

and the broken English that they spoke, in English, that if you went to South Africa today or parts of Africa, that's how people in the rural areas or in the townships speak today

It's the book that I wish I would have had when I was in eighth grade.

I grew up in conservative rural northern Michigan where I did not know any out people. I thought that I had a sort of disease. I thought something was wrong with me.

And this book is an opportunity to tell young people that there is nothing wrong with you. There are millions of people out here who love you, who will support you.

And if you want more of me, you can pick up a copy of my book or audio book. It's called You Can't Be Serious.

It's a difficult time to be a man in America.

Men today are probably where women were in the late 50s. We're about a half century behind women in terms of being understood, in terms of having options.

I've never been so happy to have gone through menopause.

Two minutes, \$60,000? Wow.

You know, one of the most vulnerable moments in this book is when you're talking about your interview with Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

I think what he's doing is dumb and it was irresponsible.

Going There Comes Out in Paperback June 28th

And there's an amazing one that was recommended to me by a friend of mine in the neighborhood that's called Moonshot, which is about the moon landing, the Apollo 11 mission.

I was blown away by the technical achievements of a real moon landing and how the stages of the rockets work.

start with moonshot, work your way up to Leica. Get the order right guys. Yes. Your kids will thank you. Your kids therapists will thank you.

I actually share a story in the book with a Hollywood director who calls me and says, you know, I'm gonna give her some media training.

And they said, well, her husband.

I said, well, excellent, anybody else.

President Obama, both phenomenal communicators, legendary communicators, both men.

It's one of the many reasons I wrote this book is to explain to the country what it is to be an American Muslim.