Episode 2057: KEEN ON America featuring R. Derek Black
How seriously should we take the white nationalist threat in the United States? Very seriously, at least according to R. Derek Black, a young man who knows a thing or two about the US white nationalist movement. The son of a Grand Wizard of the KKK and a close family friend of David Duke, Black believes that white nationalism is no longer a fringe feature of the Trumpist Republican party. And it’s this fear of the mainstreaming of overt racism that triggered Black’s new book, The Klansman’s Son: My Journey from White Nationalism to Antiracism, an account of his rebellion not just against racism, but against his family, particularly his Grand Wizard father, Don Black.
Derek Black is an American former white supremacist. He is the son of Don Black, founder of the Stormfront online community, and godson of former Ku Klux Klan Grand Wizard David Duke. He publicly renounced white nationalism and chronicled his personal journey away from his family's beliefs.
Named as one of the "100 most connected men" by GQ magazine, Andrew Keen is amongst the world's best known broadcasters and commentators. In addition to presenting KEEN ON, he is the host of the long-running How To Fix Democracy show. He is also the author of four prescient books about digital technology: CULT OF THE AMATEUR, DIGITAL VERTIGO, THE INTERNET IS NOT THE ANSWER and HOW TO FIX THE FUTURE. Andrew lives in San Francisco, is married to Cassandra Knight, Google's VP of Litigation & Discovery, and has two grown children.
Keen On is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit keenon.substack.com/subscribe
Bruce Usher on Good News on the Climate Front: We Finally Have the Technologies to Confront the Crisis
Simon Morrison on the Life and Work of Stevie Nicks: A Great Artist or a Footnote to the Glory Years of the Sixties?
Mauro Porcini on the Human Side of Innovation: The Power of People in Love With People
Tricia Hersey on How Best to Resist Capitalism and Racism? Wake Up, Rest, and Dream
Nora McInerny: Why America Needs a National "Bad Vibes Only" Day In Which We Can All Be Totally Miserable
Lecia Cornwall on That Fictional Summer in Berlin: When a British Aristocrat, and Her Camera, Revealed the Truth About the Nazi Regime
Michael Tomasky: No. Don't Laugh. Why Joe Biden, In His Embrace of Progressive Economics, Might Be the Next FDR or LBJ
Sean Kingsley on Confronting Colonial Amnesia: Dredging Up the Sunken History of the Transatlantic Slave Trade
Stacy Schiff: What Made Samuel Adams Both the Most Essential and the Least Understood Founding Father
Melissa Urban: Does Self Require Us to Be Selfish? How Setting Boundaries In Our Relationships Can Set Us Free
Thomas B. Pepinsky on Pandemic Politics in the Covid Age: Why American Democracy Has Been Infected By a Plague of Partisanship and How to Cure It
Adrian Geiges and Stefan Aust: How Xi Jinping Is the Most Powerful Man in the World and What This Means for the United States and Europe
Kay Harel on Examining Charles Darwin's Soul: A Singular Case of Biophilia