Q&A with Don Samuels

Editor's note: This interview was originally published in an edited format in the November 2006 issue of Mpls.St.Paul. Here's the uncut transcription.

In a year of violent crime and racial recriminations, north side Minneapolis City Council member Don Samuels, fifty-seven, has staked out a contrarian position on most of the hot-button issues—from crime to racial profiling to the value of white guilt. In an op-ed piece, he wrote that the north side is “suffocating under a tightly woven canopy of complicity between ultra-liberal whites and militant blacks.” We asked him to expound on the thesis.

This white liberal/black militant thing is a great conspiracy theory.
It’s interesting; the history of racism is such that it sets up a lot of guilt in the white community. And sometimes that guilt morphs into resentment and it’s not dealt with honestly. And it sets up the potential for a lot of anger in the black community. All of us, all black people, to some degree or the other have a little residual anger. And all white people to some degree or the other have some residual guilt. And so those are two human qualities which are designed to lead us to something positive. But in the hands of immature people, or people who are resistant to growth, and will defy even the facts, they become very destructive qualities. In terms of the black community, black people who are angry—as we all are to some degree—and are committed to a kind of more immature and anti-growth orientation in the world, they will look at the counter, which is white guilt, and say, “I’m going to use my anger at historic injustices to manipulate that guilt. And I’m going to use it within the black community to create a movement that I can lead. I’m going to tap into that anger at the white shame, and I’m going to manipulate it.” So that black leader is tapping into the black anger and white shame as a two-pronged kind of strategy. On the white side, you have this white person who is not necessarily looking for change, but is looking to alleviate their guilt. That’s their main motivation. So they’re thinking, “How can I alleviate my guilt? I just feel so bad about this situation.” I don’t know if you read in my letter to the editor about this guy Cap Catch who’s running for DFL. He got beat up canvassing on the North Side. He was on the news saying that he wasn’t going to press charges or encourage the cops to find the kids because he’s hoping that they will realize the trouble they’ve done by just watching him with his patch on his nose and see it as an opportunity to change their ways rather than getting in with the laws and all that kind of stuff. Now to me, that’s white liberal bullshit. OK. This person is not strategically looking to see how we’re going to change the minds of these hard-core young men. As a parent would. “What am I going to do about this stupid son I have?” They’re like, “Well, you know, they can’t do any better. I’m so guilty I can’t hold them accountable. I’m just a nice guy, I wouldn’t do anything to hurt these already hurt people. So let them destroy the world because we deserve it.” Whatever. It’s nasty and lazy. He’s a great dance partner for the angry black leader. They sit in a room and he goes, “Beat me, please beat me.” And he’ll go, “Yeah, I’ll beat you.” They’re going nowhere. They’re playing this ancient game, and they are having a wonderful time together but they are leading us down a path of destruction.

So do you feel patronized by Nick Coleman?
Oh, absolutely. Yeah! I mean, when I talk to people here, we’ve been so silenced by the militant component of the community which has defined militancy as racial sophistication. And anybody who is doing anything less radical or destructive is a sell-out. And any white person who is demanding accountability on the other side is a racist. So between these two feared labels of “Uncle Tom” and “Racist” they got us shut up.

So do you think that white liberalism is helpful or harmful at this point?
It’s harmful. It’s particularly harmful because the black community is actually the opposite of [liberal thinkers like Coleman]. The black community, within its own confines, is much less liberal, much less democratic than the white community. We don’t raise our children democratically, as white people do. Our churches are certainly not run as democratically as white people’s churches are. I can assure you that Reverend McAffee’s church is run much more autocratically than Nick Coleman’s church, if he goes to one. You don’t question what the pastor says. So here’s the paradox: you have the white liberal coming along interfacing with the leader of a community that is autocratically run, and it’s a joke. It’s a joke! There’s not a common thread of culture. Don’t you ever believe that. This guy keeps control of his group and he dictates what happens there. And then you have this liberal guy over here, “Well, nobody should be paid anything to anybody.” Oh, it will drive you crazy, the inconsistencies of this. And I’m not saying that autocratic style is not come by honestly. It’s firmly grounded in southern social politics and the southern way of life. You call everybody “sir.” And in the north, many black families will not allow children not to address an adult as “sir.” You never question your pastor. And this school teacher is like god. Those things don’t happen in the white community! In the black community, especially among poor blacks, that’s the way it is. So Nick Coleman’s way in the world is totally antithetical to the internal politics of the black community. But it’s totally consistent with the black community’s relationship with the white community in the last thirty years: Black community demands its rights in the political sphere from the white community. Demands accountability. Openness. Equality. But the irony of the whole thing is it’s not yet happening in the community!