#107 Bakari Sellers: It Might Not Be Okay

NICK FIRCHAU: It might be a little difficult to think back almost four years ago to the last week of May 2020, but indulge me here for a second as we start this episode of the podcast. I'm not sure if you can remember where you were, but that week was one of the most dramatic and consequential stretches in my memory.

Monday, May 25th was Memorial Day. It was also the day that George Floyd was murdered at the hands of a police officer, outside a convenience store in Minneapolis. By Tuesday, May 26, a makeshift memorial was set up at the site where Floyd was murdered, and the video of Floyd's death began spreading on social media and on cable television.

On Wednesday, May 27, peaceful protests in Minneapolis turned violent, as five people were shot and firefighters responded to approximately 30 fires set in the city during the night. All of this came against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which was raging across the world with more than 100,000 new reported cases every day. In fact, the United States reached the grim milestone of 100,000 deaths on May 27, the same day the Minneapolis protests took a violent turn and began dominating headlines in the US.

On Thursday, May 28, Bakari Sellers put on a crisp navy blue suit and a purple tie, and sat down in front of his computer from his home in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he was isolating with his wife and three kids. Sellers, who is a former state legislator from South Carolina and the son of a famous Civil Rights activist, had only just begun an interview on CNN when he broke down in tears discussing the connection between Floyd’s murder and his children’s future.

Four years later, Sellers, the guest on this episode of Paternal, is still trying to figure out how to talk to his children about what’s happening in America. Now 39 years old and living and working as a lawyer in Columbia, South Carolina, Sellers is also a regular political commentator on CNN. He’s also the author of two books, including a new one entitled The Moment, which looks back at those events of 2020 and what’s happened in the years since, including a reckoning on race that never quite materialized as some people expected.

Sellers has largely been in the public eye since 2006, when at just 22 years old he became the youngest member of the South Carolina state legislature and the youngest African American elected official in the nation. During the 2008 democratic primary he was courted by Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama, all seeking his endorsement ahead of the South Carolina primary. In 2016 he spoke at the Democratic National Convention and outlined some of the details of his life story, including growing up in the rural town of Denmark, South Carolina under the care of his mother Gwendolyn and his father Cleveland Sellers, a civil rights activist who in the 1960s played a leadership role at the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), and befriended iconic figures of the civil rights movement like Stokely Carmichael, Julian Bond, John Lewis, and Martin Luther King, Jr.

In fact, Bakari Sellers has a photograph from March 1966 when his father and other activists were arrested in New York City for protesting apartheid in South Africa. It cost $250 to spring Cleveland Sellers and the other SNCC members out of jail, and the men who put up the bond? Harry Belafonte and Sydney Poitier.

And that’s where I want to start this episode, with some of the lessons Sellers learned from his famous father. In his 2016 memoir “My Vanishing Country” Sellers wrote that “I see my life as an extension of my father’s journey. I am a bridge between his work and the achievement of our common goal of racial equity,” and when you’re talking to Bakari Sellers about fatherhood, you’re talking to a man who truly is a link between generations, who feels the pressure both from who his father is, and who he wants his kids to be.

But what happens when that pressure sometimes feels like too much? What happens when an incident so devastating brings you to years on national television, and that common goal of racial equity feels out of reach? And what happens when despite all the work you and your father have done to make it so, you simply can’t tell your kids everything will be okay?

Here’s Bakari Sellers, on Paternal.

BAKARI SELLERS: It's something I have to really be intentional about and do a better job of. And it's hard really, cause I have twins and not just, not just one, but my dad was really intentional about, you know, making sure that I was with him when he went places and had these experiences and, you know, work. And in particular, when he was in his cohort of pioneers of the movement.

And so I knew them all and they all knew me. And so it was fascinating for, for me to be able to, Have a relationship, my own relationship with Julian Bond for me to have my own relationship with Marion Barry or Judy Richardson. And it meant a lot because he was always there. And I guess they always say I was on his knee because my dad was a big believer in making sure that you could touch and smell and taste and feel.

And you could, uh, begin to articulate, you begin to cultivate your own ideology and your own ideas. And we were, I would, you know, I wouldn't necessarily be at the table with the adults, but I would be there with their children and their children. We all became a part of this fraternity for lack of a better term, but.

You know, you're talking about Bernice King or the children of Malcolm X or, uh, you know, the children of Julian Bond or all of these individuals. And you're able to hone your thoughts and, and learn so much. And my mom and dad, both in our household, they were, they taught us two very, very simple things.

But the first is that you could be anything you wanted to be in the world as long as you were a change agent. And the second was you got to always have this insatiable desire to learn as much as possible. Once you stop learning, you're dying. And, you know, I always ascribe to that notion. 

NICK FIRCHAU: Were there other lessons or other things that, that were important to your dad that stick with you now? Maybe, you know, all these years later, now that you're in your thirties and now that you're a dad. 

BAKARI SELLERS: Yeah, my dad is a big proponent of making sure that you hug, you kiss, say the words, I love you. We had a household that embraced that type of love and many people don't know, but that was also one of the ethos of the movement of SNCC.

And part of that in the movement was you didn't know if you were coming back. I mean, that, that was a different, you know, you're in Mississippi, I mean, you're in Alabama, you could get gone quick. You know, King was a big believer. And one of the things that I say that I've kind of honed, which is a very King-ish type of, of mantra is that you have to rededicate yourself to loving your neighbors, even when they don't love you.

And so for Sadie and Stokely, they hear, I love you from their parents every single day, it's fulfilling this household with love, because when they go out into this world, It may not be as kind.

NICK FIRCHAU: If you’re a regular listener to this show you might know that a few episodes back we had psychiatrist Dr. Dennis S. Charney appear on the show to discuss some of the ways we can instill resilience in our kids. Dr. Charney has spent decades researching resilience and and among some of the strategies that he and his colleagues identified was the idea of helping your kids identify core beliefs and values for your family, so when things get tough, they have a moral compass they can rely on to overcome adversity. 

Part of that moral compass is also intertwined with family history and the importance of understanding what kind of challenges your ancestors have faced or what they overcame in their lives.

Bakari Sellers knows those stories about his ancestors, especially his father. One of the stories Sellers knows well comes from February 1968, when nine highway patrolmen and one city police officer opened fire on a group of African American students at South Carolina State College in Orangeburg, South Carolina. The students were protesting the segregation of a local bowling alley. Three students died in the Orangeburg Massacre, 28 were injured, including Cleveland Sellers, who was shot, arrested and spent seven months in jail for allegedly inciting the riot. 

Orangeburg still looms large in the mind of Bakari Sellers, you’ll hear him talk about it a little later, and so do many of the Civil Rights-era stories he heard from his father. And while they almost certainly instilled a sense of purpose and resilience in Bakari Sellers, make no mistake, there are two sides to having a father you can read about in history books. 

BAKARI SELLERS: You know, it's one thing to read the stories. It's another thing to hear them and experience them. And that's also a benefit of growing up in the south, because growing up in the south, when you're at the barbershop, there's always somebody who can tell you when King came to town, they can tell you when they were arrested, fitting in, they can always tell you these stories.

You know, I'm a, I'm a product of the proverb “It takes a village to raise a child.” And, um, my village is just so dope as I tell folk. And my dad would always, always, always, always, he'd just sit there and he'd be like, you know, back, I remember when me and Marion were doing this or Ella once came in and told us this.

And I was in Mississippi that time and I didn't have a shirt, and King gave me his shirt. You know, all of these kinds of fascinating stories that you become anchored. And for me, it gave a sense of pride, but it also built a whole hell of a lot of pressure because you now live your life, and you don't want to let them down.

And you're, you're not talking about letting down your neighbor across the street, you're talking about letting down these luminaries who gave what Abraham Lincoln called, ‘the last full measure of devotion, right? It adds a little bit of pressure to your life, but at the end of the day, it makes it enriching and rewarding because I have 22 tattoos and one of my tattoos is an Einstein quote that says “only a life lived for others is a life worthwhile.” And I wholeheartedly ascribe to that notion. 

NICK FIRCHAU: You hit on that idea of expectations and pressure, and I'm glad you did. I think you call it ‘the weight of the torch.’ Whether they're placed there by you or by others, how do you cope with the expectations placed on you by being your father's son?

BAKARI SELLERS: Your question is so hella presumptuous! You, you, you make, you make the listener believe that I cope, right? You know, people ask me all the time. They like Bakari, how do you, how do you find time to, or how do you balance? And I'm like, your question is so just fucking presumptuous. Like what makes you think that I, that I have balance? I don't, I don't.

I am not a good person to ask about where I'll be in five years. I just can't. My anxiety does not allow me to live like that. I live one day at a time, 24 hour increments, man, trying to, trying to do the best I can do today. When you talk about coping with that pressure, it really, it boils down to just the daily task of trying not to let anybody down and the daily task of even more so making them proud.

And I don't want my son to have the same shackles of anxiety that I have, and I'm trying to work through how to ensure that neither of them do. 

NICK FIRCHAU: Are you any good at being good to yourself, like telling yourself, you know, Hey, nice job on that interview, or the, the hit on CNN, whatever it is. Can you stop and give yourself credit?

BAKARI SELLERS: No, I'm not good on that at all. I, I, I think. You know, one of the things I'm working on is making sure that I give myself more grace and give others more grace. I think grace is probably one of the more fascinating words we have, but I mean, I, I, you know, at 39 years old, man, there's just, There's so much I got to get better at that. I'm just working through it every day. 

NICK FIRCHAU: I think you're onto something with the idea of grace, which is something that I know I struggle with. And other men have said as much on this show before, it's that ability to stop for a second, just for a second and say, it's okay. You're doing fine. Your kids are okay.

BAKARI SELLERS: But I mean, but you never, I mean, I, I, I don't know for me. It's like, you know, like you people like, do you rest? And I'm like, no, I never stopped taking care of my family. I never stopped providing. I never stopped, you know, trying to make sure they have what they need. I never stop thinking about what tomorrow will behold for these little people, that they can make sure that they are going out and being successful. So it's like your, your world never just, pauses. 

NICK FIRCHAU: There's another pressure here that you've discussed, uh, and then you've written in the past and I want to quote you here, “when you're black and you're from the South, failure affects more than you. You're letting down parents, communities, the church ladies.” Can you elaborate on that? 

BAKARI SELLERS: Yeah, because your community poured so much into you. Right? And there aren't many of you that have the opportunity. The, the great American poet, Clifford Harris, also known as T. I., always talked about a trap, right? It was more than just a dope location, like a place where you sold dope. It was more than just a trap house, but it was an environment, a community. 

It was a proverbial trap, one that you could not get out of, that you would try to climb, you would try your damnedest to get out of. And I don't think people understand sometimes the grasp of poverty. For me, when I go back home to Denmark, You have to understand they're people who Are not my cousin, but are my cousin. The entire community who now take some level of pride in the success or semblance of success that I've been able to ascertain.

I mean, if they know I'm coming on TV, they watch it just because that is their boy. They're going to support me and watch me because they poured into me and watch my upbringing. And it's also a sense of pride. And it's a sense of, if he did it, I can do it. And, you know, I don't want to let those people down either.

You carry a lot. And then, you know, on the flip side, you know, my dad used to carry a picture of Emmett Till in his wallet, you know, that he was a part of the Emmett Till generation. And for me, You know, I carry those pictures of George and Eric and Alton and Walter and Keith Lamont Scott and all of these other people, and you want to live for them.

You know, these people weren't able to necessarily watch their kids grow up or walk down the aisle or go to college or have a career and you want to, you want to live for them as well. You feel like you have to stand in that gap. And so, yeah, that pressure mounts. 

NICK FIRCHAU: I have to ask you about something that has come up on this show, uh, with other men a lot over the years for many different reasons.

And that's anxiety. You have spoken quite openly about dealing with anxiety and you have for years, and I think it helps to hear men talk about issues like this or to normalize it as much as you know, or as Much as you're willing to share, uh, where do you think your anxiety comes from? 

BAKARI SELLERS: So I think it comes from a few places.I think, I mean, I talk about, uh, post traumatic slave disorder, and talk about the The generations of trauma that are associated with that. I talk about just the fact that, you know, my father was literally shot by law enforcement. Went to prison twice. There is a great deal of angst and anxiety that's passed down.

My mom is rapid cycle bipolar. I think I compared it to, uh, like Forrest Gump, because when he said life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you're going to get. Like my mom, you never know when you have, when you're dealing with somebody that's rapid cycle bipolar, you really never know what you're going to get.

You know, you could find the most loving person in the world, or you could end up with, you know, your hand in a, in a snake pit, right? So, you know, just dealing with those things. I want to break those generational curses. I'm trying to figure out how, and you know, I talk to my therapist about that all the time. I'm a big believer in therapy, man. Nick, I go to therapy for people who don't go to therapy, right? 

So, you know, I, I talk to my therapists all the time because sometimes, you know, you just, the pressures of the world kind of get to you and, and you still have to perform.

NICK FIRCHAU: I want to ask you a couple of questions about activism and politics and change and what you think it means today to make change. In the new book, uh, the moment you write that you got into politics, “to change the way people got healthcare, build new schools, repair roads, fix the water. Put people to work, raise minimum wage, and take down a confederate flag.

I wasn't jaded by reality yet, and I didn't understand how difficult those challenges were going to be.”

You're no longer in politics at this point. Why do you think politics was not what you expected when it came to making the change that you wanted? 

BAKARI SELLERS: Part of it was my youthful naivete and the want to have things so fucking fast, like you want things to happen right now We figure we put the work in, we want this and you cannot see truly or appreciate without some age why people feel the way they feel about what you see as just a glaring necessity.

Like expanding Medicaid. Explain to me why we don't want the 40, 000 jobs. Explain to me why we don't want the billion dollars or even more importantly, why is it okay for rural hospitals to shut down? If I start from the premise of like, I would like everybody to have access to first class education and quality healthcare. Like if we start from that premise, maybe we can end up, but I mean the outward rejection of that premise to me, I don't understand that at all.

I sponsored a bill to take the confederate flag down. You see how it makes me feel. So, for me, it was an inability to, to be able to conceptualize the challenge to what I believe to be right. And understand the varying opinions. And, I still believe that, I, I love Julian Bond. And I believe, as he believed, that you have to have people in the system, within the system, those structures, to deconstruct them. 

And I began to be somebody who began to work across the aisle and, and believe in the practicality of politics and who understood the change was gonna be incremental. It wasn't gonna be overnight. Um, my goal was to make tomorrow better than yesterday. And so I had to reorient myself.

And then, you know, you talk about jaded about reality. So there's a picture right when I first got elected, 'cause I was a, I was a child, I was 21. And I'm leaning back. I'm looking up at the rotunda and the L A Times photographer gets the shot of me. And I remember what I was thinking. I was like, man, I can't believe I'm here.

And then after about two weeks of being elected, I was like, man, I can't believe you're here. I can't believe you're here. How did you get elected? The talent of our cadre of elected officials in this country leaves a lot to be desired. Bless their heart, as we say in South Carolina. 

NICK FIRCHAU: And on the term activist, it feels as if there are so many different ways now to maybe make change that was different than when your father was doing it in the 60s.

You have a platform on CNN, you have a podcast, you have all these social media accounts. Do you think the idea of what an activist is and how an activist can connect with a community has changed? 

BAKARI SELLERS: Yeah, I think the, I think the level of celebrity that's creeped into it has changed it, and I think that there, I think that that came with the election of Barack Obama, and it's the same thing in politics.

I mean, you have individuals who run for office or have individuals now who call themselves social activists just for the celebrity that's associated with it just for the Instagram followers, just for the invites to the receptions or whatever it may be. And so you find yourself in this position where people are doing the work.

I'm not saying they're not, but they're doing the work for an alternate means. And for me, you know, politics was always about public service. I also came up in a different time, and then you're like, Bakari you’re only 39. Like, what do you mean you came up in a different time? But like when I got elected to office, I looked up to Deval Patrick, current governor of Massachusetts, and we felt like that was the pinnacle.

Deval Patrick was my hero. You know, Barack Obama was just somebody who gave a great speech. We didn't have Snapchat or Instagram or Twitter and all these other things, or text messages. You know, the text messages you get from candidates. We didn't have that. You had to knock on doors and go out and go to churches and things like that.

And so, it literally was a different time frame. And, for me, it um, you know, I don't knock it. Everything changes. You just have to adapt. 

NICK FIRCHAU: Do you and your dad ever discuss how activism has changed, like how it's different from his generation to yours, not for better or worse, but how it's different. 

BAKARI SELLERS: No, it's not better or worse. And he acknowledges the change, but he also says like, look, you, you know, I'm in the thick of it, and, you know, in a few years, it's gonna be time for me to move out the way. And he's very, very clear about the fact that you always have to allow young people to lead. Every movement we've ever had in this country, a successful movement, has been led by young people. Gay rights movement, women's movement, civil rights movement, all led by young people. 

NICK FIRCHAU: You write at one point in the memoir that, “President Obama may have had the dreams of his father, but I inherited the anger of mine.” You're talking there about the anger that leads to change, that leads to energy, but what's your relationship to anger?

BAKARI SELLERS: Anger is not a sin, man. I tell people that all the time. Anger comes from a righteous place. It's not a sin, but you can't let it paralyze you either. And that's the biggest thing that a lot of people do. A lot of people allow anger to paralyze them. And when they get angry, they can't control it. It manifests itself in very weird ways.

And for me, anger is just something that makes me want to go out and just change the world. The anger, I'm more angry about February 8th, 1968 than my dad is, right? My dad has kind of dealt with that, processed it, and he lived through it. And I'm like, I can't believe somebody would do this to my dad, but it's righteous.

And I kind of got that theory from John Lewis. John Lewis was a believer in the righteousness of that anger. I look at the word as sobering. I believe that we're in a nadir. I believe that we're in a, in a ditch, like we're in the, we're in a ditch right now. And it's regressive. I mean, let's talk about the 1600 books ban or the attack on DEI or the elimination of scholarships for black students at Duke or the abortion law from the 1800s in Arizona.

I define white supremacy in the book as when equality feels like oppression. And there are a lot of people who believe that our journey and fight for equality is oppressive to them. That means that they are probably part of the problem. And the disappointment was that I thought we were on the brink of a third reconstruction. And here we are just fighting to survive again. 

NICK FIRCHAU: Do you feel like your male peers feel the same way? Like, I assume this is something that you talk about with them. 

BAKARI SELLERS: I mean, my peers, we're like, we're still, this is funny because we all have kids now. But we're still, we're still reconciling the fact that millennials are parents now. Like, I have to not only like espouse to my children the virtues of OutKast, being the greatest rap group of all time, but I also like have to prepare them for society.

And, you know, raise little black kids in this, in this world. And I talked to my, I talked to my peers and, and, and recognize that, that we may be the only generation that leaves this world worse than we inherited. 

NICK FIRCHAU: And that's a tough pill to swallow. I think for a lot of parents right now, like I'm a little older than you and we have different life circumstances, obviously, but, but I feel the same way that I can't promise to my kids, the world will be in a better place than when I got it.

And that's, I mean, to be honest with you, that's like what keeps me awake at night. 

BAKARI SELLERS: It does. And I mean, it's like, we're fighting and we're fighting and we're fighting. And sometimes it feels like you're pissing in windmills, man, to be honest with you. And then those people that are supposed to be fighting with you are old and lack the vision.

Who won't get out of the way and, but you can't give up. I mean, I, I am from a household that would never, they never gave up. My mom and dad never gave up. And so I might take a break. I might go to Atlantis and play some ultimate Texas Hold Em and drink some beer by the pool. But. I'm never going to give up. And I want my kids to have that same  veracity and never giving up. You can take breaks. They're necessary, but just stay in the fight.

NICK FIRCHAU: You have a daughter in college, but you also have these two twins that you mentioned early in the interview, a boy and a girl, Stokely and Sadie, and they're five. You certainly can't talk about all the details of what's happening in the world and why you feel like we're in a ditch, as you mentioned, but what are you talking about with your kids? How are you discussing some of this stuff? 

BAKARI SELLERS: You plant the seeds, man. You, you tell them that their granddaddy was a, your granddaddy was a great man. You're not telling them much. You're just trying to get them to experience him and be in his presence. Cause he's a really cool dude and he's really laid back and you know, he's slowing down a lot, but he don't get angry over much.

And you know, just allowing them to be in the presence of great people and great people aren't always the ones that society lifts up, but great. We have a lot of great people in our own community. You know, you teach them about loving everybody at their school and giving people hugs and. Um, you teach them about respecting your teachers and making sure it's okay to be the smartest person in your class, right?

You know, it's, it's okay to, to read and enjoy those good things in life. And it’s just giving them the space to be like, I don't, I'm not molding my kids to go out here and, you know, some people try to mold their kids to be king or mold their kids to be Bryce Harper or, you know, whatever. I just want my kids to be.

NICK FIRCHAU: You know, there is, there is optimism in this new book, but there really, there is also a hint of resignation about the things we were just talking about, how we can't promise a safe world for our kids.

The closing song to your podcast, the Bakari Sellers podcast, the song is “Might Not Be Okay” by Kenneth Whalum and Big K. R. I. T., which is not an optimistic song, but it's a realistic song. And you use that at the end of every episode of your show. I, I just have to believe that that idea permeates where you're at in your life right now, that it might not be okay.

BAKARI SELLERS: It's honest. And what I never want to do with my children is lie to them. and help them analyze the challenges that may loom ahead and be prepared for them.

We're fighting a battle and things may change, but there's, as K. R. I. T. said, is a realization that we might not be okay.

NICK FIRCHAU: That's author, attorney, political commentator, husband, father, and son, Bakari Sellers. If you want to learn more about his work, we'll put a link in the notes for this episode where you can find more information. His latest book, The Moment, is available now wherever you buy books. 

Paternal is written, edited, and produced by me, Nick Firchau. You can email me with your thoughts about the show at nick at paternalpodcast. com, or I'm on Twitter at Nick Firchau.

Paternal guest illustrations are created by Sarat Moharana, web design by Laine Carlsness, and the Paternal logo is designed by Trevor Port. 

BAKARI SELLERS: Words like love, hope, truth, justice, peace, I believe they're verbs. I believe they're action items. And I do that very well in my life. Making sure that those words have the requisite action with them.