The Psychology of Far Right Extremism

(upbeat music) - Welcome back to Invisible Hate, Amasad Butt. - And I'm Sabia Khan. - Invisible Hate is a weekly true crime podcast in which Sabia and I attempt to uncover the ugly truth behind various hate crimes both recent and historical, or at least that's usually the case, but this week we're actually doing something a little different. - Yes, we actually don't have a case for you today, but that's because for the first time since this podcast began, we are interviewing not one, but two guests. Today we are joined by Matsun and Taunee Browning from Mesa, Arizona. They are husband and wife, and they're also intimately familiar with the world of hate crimes and their perpetrators. - Yeah, that's right, Sabia. That's because throughout his career in law enforcement, Matt spent many years as an undercover detective infiltrating white supremacist organizations in particular. His wife Taunee often assisted him despite the risks. And you know, just a note to our listeners, the Browning's are in fact white, as I'm sure you could probably guess, but really if their true identity as detectives were discovered while undercover, that would still put their lives in jeopardy. And according to Matt himself, many people have indeed tried to kill him. - Right, as said, and last year in July of 2023, the Browning's released the hate next door undercover within the new phase of white supremacy, a book documenting their experience. Since then, they've appeared on various podcasts and news networks. And then they reached out to us to reflect not only on their experience, but also on the larger implications of their work as well. - We do ask them a whole lot of questions, questions like, are we seeing a rise in extremism? Why and what does extremism look like today? And how do we combat it? - That's right, Saudeo. It was a great conversation, and we can't wait for you to listen to it. - You got an automatic weapon, you're going to get a phone and a sitting on it. - This morning allegations of a white supremacist plot to bring the predominantly black city of Baltimore to its knees. - They're getting in to the Capitol tonight. - We begin today's show in New Zealand. - We're 49 people have died after a gunman attacked two mosques in the city of Christchurch. - Stories caught on cell phone camera. He made racial slurs at a local Filipino family, and then that encounter turned very violent. - Take a look. - Saturday led by 100 members of the white supremacist Patriot Front carrying shields in a banner that read "Reclaim America." Rested for fatally stabbing a 66 year old black man with a sword. - He wanted to make a statement. His intentions would have come here to home male blacks. These troops are all formed of mostly males who are fearful and feel inadequate in some way, until they've not been heard and now they're being heard. - Hi, Madden Tani. It's so good to have you on Invisible Hate. And as Asad was mentioning before, he started the interview. This is our first ever interview on Invisible Hate. So welcome, welcome. - Really excited to have both of you here. - Thanks for having us. Wow, we're excited to be your number one. That's nice. - The number one. - Exactly, exactly. And hopefully we'll have you back as well, yeah, totally. You know, let's start from the very beginning. Can you talk a little bit about the impetus for the book and why you decided to write it? - Well shoot, it's starting more as a therapeutic thing when I was getting out of law enforcement to get all this stuff out of my head. - I mean, let's just be real and vulnerable and what it is. I mean, he was having nightmares and things, you know, once you get into this hate-filled world, it really can change your brain and the neural pathways. And I was like a really good way to get this out is to write about it. So he started writing about it. And I mean, I think maybe somewhere in your mind you thought it might be a book that I never wanted to share some of these things. - Why? - 'Cause this is my family. You would think that I would be the one that would want to share and do that kind of thing. But these are my people. This is my family. And that was, I had spent his whole career kind of protecting us, the home. And that wasn't really something that I wanted to put out to the world until we really got into it. - So don't you want changed? - I guess what really changed for me is I didn't want anybody to fill alone. I didn't want families who found their family members in hate groups to fill alone. I didn't want law enforcement families to fill alone. And I wanted children and kids to know, look, there's a better way. Talk to me about your undercover work. You were in these groups for what, almost two decades? - Yeah, pretty much, yeah. - How did you gain their trust? How did you get into these groups? - Well, you know what, it's not that hard really. You just have to hate. I mean, if you hate, you can get into any hate group. I mean, that's what their cornerstone is is hate. What got me started in all this was I had a fresh cut skinhead try to kill me. You stuck a gun in my chest, we wrestle over the gun. We fought over the gun. I went home, he went to jail. And two weeks later, he shot another cop in the back. So it was when something like that happens, it, you know, I want to know, why would you want to kill me of all people? Why would you want to kill me? And so that started going and the doors opened up, met with national alliance from there on out. It's just you created back story that works for every group and that's hate. I didn't have to do anything else, but hate. Can you elaborate on your back story a bit? When I met with the national alliance, I went in with no back story and be quite honest with you. I totally forgot about having to have a back story. And so I sat down at the dinnies and as we were talking, they asked me, well, why do you want to be a part of us? And it's like, oh crap, why do I want to be part of the national alliance? So I kind of flipped it around and made them talk more than I understood what was going on with their minds and where they're at. Because we're in Arizona, the border has always been an issue in Arizona, not just now, but it's always been an issue with illegal immigration. And they hated the Mexicans. And so my back story didn't flip to I ran a landscape company because at the time we were doing landscaping at our house. And so I could throw rakes and shovels in the back of my truck and all is good. And all the guys I had working for me were Mexican nationals. I went on vacation, they stole my equipment and went to Mexico. So now I hate Mexicans. Oh, wow, that's simple. Yeah, that's simple. The images that I get are from movies, right? And it's interesting to me that you met at a dentist. I feel like we always see that scene of people at a coffee shop. At a diner. Or a diner, or that's where they're meeting for the first time. You know, I chased down some crews, guys, just looking to fuck up, get busted back at you. You must have worked some lip shit crews. I worked all kinds. I wish I could sit here and say we met at cool places, but we did. Every meeting was at a dinners or a Lakinta Inn. And it was just, yeah, sorry, dinners. I mean, I can't eat the moons over my hammy anymore. I can't do it. It's really interesting to me as well. I guess never been a police officer. I've never had to fake personality. Like were you nervous that first time or first couple times? Were they suspecting that a police officer were there? The best way I can say it is like this is like, right before we go on this podcast, I'm sure you guys were thinking, well, I hope this is going to work out. I hope these are good interviews. I hope I can say the right things. And this is the same way in undercover work. You know, we go in there and the adrenaline is going, but as soon as you sit down, everything slows down. And you just get in that role. And then once the meeting is over with, then the anxiety and paranoia comes back. Am I being followed? I need to go this way. I need to do this. And all the other things you do to protect yourself. Tony, I mean, as a wife of a police officer, you already have a level of anxiety every time he leaves the house. What is it like to know that he's leaving the house to do undercover work like this? I mean, call me stupid or naive or whatever. I really didn't think that much about it. I kind of, I felt like he had been placed in this position. And if not him, who? He kept us, say, you know, physically. And my job was to keep us safe emotionally. I mean, I really didn't think about that safe. I was more worried about his soul than I was his safety. Can you expand on that? Why? Because that's something that I have not thought about until, you know, coming across your book and this, like, why were you worried about his soul? Because that hate is so corrupting? Well, I've got five kids. I need him to be the man that I married, not the one that hate or the streets, you know, create in all of us. Because the thing that I really learned through this journey is I thought he was like God's soldier and that he was going to go out and do good, you know, and that he would be protected for doing so. But really what I learned is these guys are human. They're not robots. And they're affected just like the rest of us, you know, they just put themselves into danger. The rest of us kind of hopefully run away from they put themselves into it, but they're not immune to the effects of hate and basically the streets, just like anyone else. If I can add some to it in the book, there's a quote that says, you know, when you fight monsters, you have to see to it that you don't become a monster. When you fight hate, you become hate. You're indoctrinated in that hate. And studies have shown that hate will chemically change the brain waves in your brain and your mind and you become what you are. So in the process of becoming who I was becoming, Tony saw it. She, I mean, she told me many times. She goes, can you just be you? You know, why is it taking two days to get back to who you are, just to have to go back to work? I think she plays it down a little bit more than really what, and that, but that's Tony. But what Tony did for me in this whole undercover scheme was, yeah, I'm the protector, I'm this, I'm this, but Tony was my protector. Tony was the one person I could go to, and she would actually talk me and walk me through the detox process of hate. I mean, and let me add, now we're onto this, but I grew up, I mean, I grew up in Phoenix. I grew up in a place called Glendale, which is highly Hispanic and thank goodness, because I didn't know, I grew up since a child, you know, just loving my friends. And I didn't like what I was seeing in this man, it was very foreign to me. So it was, it wasn't going to be tolerated or something that we needed to have in this home. So that's why I say I want to protect a soul, because I want to beauty in my home, not hate. I feel like everybody defines hate differently. Although it is this one strong emotion and we all think that we know what hate is. What is hate to you? Hate is disliking a person because the color of their skin or nationality, sexual orientation, religion, is hating somebody that is not me. Hate is an extreme dislike to where you want to hurt somebody because of who they are and because you don't see it as the caliber that you are. Hate is extremely hypocritical. How so? Oh, come on. I go to meetings. If there's a, here's a funny thing. I go to a big meeting at the park, we talk about it in the book. Cortez Park is the neighbor that I grew up in. Tony's family went to that park growing up. I went there, we all fed the ducks. And I go to this park and I meet with these guys and what I do in minor cover work is I don't just go and key in on one or two people but I'm taking care of everything. Scanning the park, scanning the people, reading tattoos, looking at the cars. And as I'm looking at the cars of these big violent white supremacists who believe that if you're not American and if you're not right or white, then you should be destroyed. Driving Toyota's or Hondas. Hypocritical. It makes those up. It's your Ford, where's your Chevy, where's your Dodge? But then when you find out, well, you know, the Ford Motors made Mexico or all this stuff. There's no safety for the haters because they live in a hypocritical world that they create. I like that point. Matt, we want to talk a little bit about the inner workings of these white supremacist groups once you were in. What was it like? You know, as a police officer, as an undercover police officer, you cannot have a crime committed in your presence. You have to stop the crimes from occurring. I didn't know that. So my job was to make sure I could stop the crime, but get enough of it to where we could charge for it. Right. I did it. I wasn't going to buy a 20 rock on the corner or buying a pound of wheat or whatever else. I mean, I bought some steroids and things like that. But mine was to gather the intelligence that we could then use to where if another agency called and said, Hey, we just had this crime committed. And here's a tattoo and I can say, yeah, that's cracker. Cracker did that or that Sammy or Josh or whoever. And so my undercover work was more based upon intelligence gathering and really, really getting to know who these people are. And when they commit a crime, where are they going to go? What did you find out about them? Anything that surprised you? Yeah, you know what? I was going to say there are a bunch of idiots, but the true fact of the matter is they are idiots except for one or two are extremely intelligent people. They all live in one apartment because only one person works and the guy that works pays the rent and buys the beer. And then they'll have a guy that runs the crew. Like, have you seen American history X enough for a while? Yeah, the guy that drives them or say these and he where he tells them that Edward Norton, what to do and what to say. That's spot on how it was here in Phoenix. And so I was surprised by the stupidity but the intelligence that these people have. And Tony, Tony dealt with not just knuckle dragging thugs. Tony dealt with guys that were extremely smart. They taught me vocabulary. I mean, not that I'm the smartest egg in the, you know, but I was just, I just didn't, I didn't expect that. I expected the knuckle dragging thugs, the type of serial typical white nationalist mentality. That's when I really wanted to be involved in them. Like, how did you get here? I think that's a question that we talk a lot about on the podcast. It's easy to get to the point of hate, unfortunately. And then there's that next level, at least from our perspective of getting to that point of acting on that hate with violence. And is there anything that you could share for our listeners? Like, either one of you, how does that cross over from, you know, thinking or talking about hate into then committing that act of violence? I'm not a good mathematician, but we've created this little formula that is just now, it's a rhetoric equation. If you take the ideology of a group, and then you add the rhetoric of things that we say to other people. And then you multiply that times a little bit of religion. That's the recipe for violence. As soon as you have all that stuff, you will have violence guaranteed without a doubt because violence or the religion is a thing that makes a person believe I'm indestructible. God told me to do it. All of told me to do it. Odin told me to do it. Whoever it is told me to do it. And because of that, I will be in Vahala with the Valkyries and hanging out with the Vikings and the other warriors drinking and fighting. But the ideology is what we have to take out of it. And so that's where we learn that the ideology of hate is a learned thing, whether it comes from an uncle, a family member, an indoctrination online, the rabbit holes. Because there's been mass shooters that have shown up that we had no idea about. And this all online indoctrination. And I think that's why our words matter so much because if there's this ideology and then someone spouting, oh, I feel that way or, oh, yeah, then they feel empowered to do some of this as well or to seek it out. And that's that's really frightening to me because sometimes, you know, they're drowning before they even knew they were in the water. Matt, you talked about religion. It's an interesting dimension, right? And it's often cited as one of the reasons for people to commit violence against people who don't practice the same religion or don't look like them. And I wonder if in your presence there, you noticed if these people were really religious or were they weaponizing religion to further their ideology because there is a difference, right? Oh, there's a big difference. That's a great question. The one that makes me have to pause for a second and think back because you have Catholicism, you have Christian identity, you have Odinism, pretty much every religion can be part of a group or crew except for Judaism. Now, if you go with the Sharpies, the skin has Guest Racial Presidus, then you can have Jews that are part of those groups. But I think true Christianity cannot have hate. You cannot promote and practice hate because if you believe in Christ, then you believe in love. And then love is the opposite of hate. So that's when Odinism comes in. That's another religion that has been hypocritically taken and twisted paganism twisted into what they've wanted. Because they look at paganism as just a bunch of crazy Vikings out there destroying and just killing people. And that's not a Vikings for farmers. Yeah, they would go and they do their thing, but they started out as working farmers. So I think that religion is twisted and turned and we can see through history that religion has been the cause of how many wars and how many battles and how many fights just because I don't believe in what you believe just because I think my God is more powerful than your God. Just because I'm a Christian in your Jewish means that you killed Jesus so I want to kill you. And that's how a lot of it is. And then when you throw into your Christian identity, that's when it gets all jacked up. You know, I thought some of the guys that I was talking to, they 100% believed. So in the religion that they were spouting, which was very like Matt said because some of it was Christian identity. A lot of it and it's like, well Christ was about love. I don't get it. Can you help me understand? And they really they really never could. And just going back to the book, you know, the title is the hate next door. And I'd love to hear your thoughts on why you decided to name it that. And I mean, I think I know why. But I would love to hear your thoughts on that. Yeah. Well, like I said, I grew up in a very diverse community. Again, I had no idea that that was a blessing, but it truly was. And I just didn't understand or know that people hated like that or could comprehend that in my little in my little space. And you know, I don't think that Matt, like I said earlier, Matt would never have put himself in those hate field positions. If he didn't have a job to do so was kind of far away from our kind of thinking our Disney-esque world that we tried to create or lived in the hate next door is when Matt started working this. I was like, what? How did I never see this? And then once we started our eyes were open to some of these things. It was all around us. Yeah, and just building on that, how did you realize that it was all around you? Like how could I walk out this door and know who is out to potentially harm me? It's like it's like I said earlier, if you're going to hang out with monsters, don't become a monster, but you're going to see who the monster is. or maybe just don't hang out with the rest of the story. - Yeah, just don't hang out. But I mean, I could go to the grocery store and there'd be a guy in front of me with tattoos. I'm reading tattoos and yeah, he might have Nazi tattooed on his forearm in Runeck writing or he might have a 14 or a letter or something to signify as him as a hater, you know, or a member of a different crew or group. I could go to my kids football game and the guy holding the chains could have a screwdriver t-shirt on. Well, if you're gonna wear a screwdriver t-shirt, then you're gonna be involved in the hate music and hate scene. So it turned into going to church, man. I was reading license plates and bumper stickers and patches on people's clothes. And next thing you know, you know, it's literally, do you really know your neighbor? You know, do we really know who we live next door to? - This is why I saw the "I Doesn't Leave the House" by the living room. (laughing) - Well, and my family members, I come from a family of six kids and you know, at our dinner table one day, there was someone that had a 1488 on tattoo and it was just, okay, what are we doing? - Wow, that's fantastic. I mean, I wouldn't even know what that was before, you know, reading about your book. - I wouldn't either, but he's the thing. Now, we've talked about how there are some physical manifestations of hate. You can see whether tattoos or other symbols, right? But as one of you mentioned previously, there is prejudice and there is bias, which then somehow culminates into hate, which is quite ubiquitous in American society, right? So surgeons, doctors, you name it any profession, there may be white supremacists, there may be people who may hate other people for the way they look. And hence, a lot of things that happen are happening in our society, are as a result of that. How do you parse that out? From people who visibly look like monsters or, you know, hate is? - How do you live life? Because hate is so, it's like this. I don't like little dogs. I think they're annoying and I think they've, yeah, I'm a big dog person. I like big dogs. But I don't go around hating the small dogs. I'll still play with them. I'll still, I just prefer not to have one. I don't like lowered cars. I like big trucks. But I don't go around shooting at cars that are lowered just because I don't like them. And that's the same with people. We all have things that we like and things we don't like. I cannot stand rap music. I like old school punk, probably because of all my time undercover. But I don't go around disnod people because they listen to rap music. So we all have our prejudices and we all have the things that were against. However, I don't let that, the rhetoric or the ideology pushed me into the violence realm. Once you cross that line, now it's criminal activity. The violence you're going to hurt people and you're going to end up ruining your life and the other person's life also. So I think locking yourself in your house isn't the way to take care of it. You just have to be aware it's there. And know the signs and the clues of, yeah, I think. It's like when your hair stands up on the back of your neck. Yes, time to get out of here. This is the same thing. Conversations create the same feelings. I just think we need to love each other. Just know each other. I mean, if you can just know each other, you just don't even have those biases. And if we love each other because we love each other, it has nothing to do with skin color. It has to do with, I mean, I don't mean to sound tri. But it really does have to do with what's inside. I don't disagree with that at all. And I think education and community, you know, make a big difference. And you know, I don't think you can just know each other. I think you can just know each other. And you know, I think you can just know each other. in grade school, you know, where we're singing songs, do-or-songs like "Combat the menorah," I mean, it was just fun. We were learning how to do the for a. And, you know, and of course, I told you about the Hispanic community. I just I didn't realize how much those teachers and coaches and parents and community had such a huge part on us. Our anti-hate movement that they were just being good people because you knew them as people, right? You knew them personally rather than hearing about them from politicians or media. Exactly. And I remember I remember there was a kid that was to help a witness and the only presence I had against him is I wanted to sneak him when there was a birthday. I wanted to sneak him, you know, some of our what we were celebrating. I only felt bad for him. I didn't think he was someone to hate. I just think that when you said when you know someone, you just it's just a whole different dynamic. You know, after 9/11, they're in Mesa. There's a guy drinking at the bar. He was watching everything on the TV. And he got upset when he got a gun and he drove by a gas station in Mesa that was owned by Sikhs. And he automatically thought, "Oh, they're Middle Eastern, they're Muslim." And he shot and killed the guy. We covered that story. You know what? This Sikh community is amazing. They are great people. And you just can't lump them into the same thing as all this other stuff. And I think that's what we need to get out of. It's like Tony said, "Why can't we go back to being third and fourth graders and love and everybody?" But you have to create that environment in third and fourth grade. Our matsman will be on teaching at high school and things because we have to keep those community feelings as youngsters is harder with older we get. Yeah, no doubt. How much over the last 20 years that you've been doing this work or even longer, how much influence that social media had on the rise or the acceptance of hate speech, you know, in your opinion? When I started this, when I started my undercover work, I had to go to a back alley and buy a disc that was like net gear. And I had to put that in my computer just to get the internet. Yeah, sure. And then I had to get all kinds of approvals from the city just to do that. Now, I mean, you can do anything you want online. Now, I think social media is one of the greatest tools, but it's also one of the worst things that we can do. We can get the message out of acceptance and love and caring and kindness. But at the same time, there's just as many, if not more people saying, "Let's blow them up, let's kill them all," type thing. Yeah. We just wrote an op-ed in December and I was shocked because what was coming in on Facebook and Instagram is what I only used to see or only knew was really available in the white for white only spaces of the internet. Wow, that's fascinating. And I would see some of the same memes and caricatures that I was seeing only on the white only disgusting on the white only websites. And there was mainstream Facebook Instagram. Do you think that's causing more indoctrination or what? Except look at Dylan Roof. Who was Dylan Roof before he shot up the church in Charleston? No, we knew Dylan Roof was. He's online. The guy who shot up the synagogue in San Diego, all online. The guy in Pittsburgh, all online. All these guys are getting it online. It's true. social media. I was doing some research at first because Matt was working really it was really him that was kind of doing this thing a good backup and things like that but really was Matt who was working white supremacy in the valley you know one of the main guys and I'm like you can't do this alone so I while he was at work sometimes I do research and the exact pictures that I was doing for his PowerPoints and things like that are the ones that I'm seeing now so it was shocking to me that I only had to go one place to get it it's all of our children everyone can get it and really really fast now. Man I want to go back to your book and the title also says the new face of white supremacy right what is new about the current brand or form of white supremacy versus 20 years ago? Well it's not boots and braces anymore it's khakis and camels you know back in the day you could tell us skin by the boots he wore the dock Martin boots with red laces and the braces you know they're their suspenders but you call them braces and then that's how you knew it the dude was a skin but now it's all it's gone on the college campuses and so you got the khakis and camels if you look back to Charlotte'sville nobody was laced and brace everybody was wearing khakis you know the camels because it's going more underground it's going more at the border it's going more in a militaristic manner and that's the new face now it's going to morph again and I predict that it'll go back to the laces and braces and then it'll morph again and then it'll morph again but what stays constant stays the same besides you know what kind of boots they wear is the ideology of hate never changes do you think it's becoming more mainstream versus the days ago? Oh hands down yeah and that's why Matt was streaming you know back in the 90s like 90s pay attention pay attention pay attention because you know we there's always going to be that fringe elements but it needs to stay fringe when it's seeping in like it is this is not okay it changes our hearts and minds hate doesn't we've come too far to allow that are these groups interconnected are they talking to each other are they that's actually a really good question because if they would talk to each other we would be in a lot of trouble oh interesting problem with the hate movement is you have a bunch of little little skin crews all throughout the cities and you know they don't coordinate they don't do anything they just run and beat up people but on a national level you have your groups like you know if you go back to national alliance or you go back to your hammer skins or your volksfront villenders those are international national groups and they communicate they have leaders if you go look at guy like Nick Fuentes who actually has a huge following on his YouTube channels his group is connected national social movement they're a heck ordered out of Florida he's got guys all over the place that they do talk but the ones you need to be aware of is not yeah it's the guys who listen to him but then just go off back to the social media and they hide off those are the guys that aren't aren't communicating with people but yeah if they would talk more together we'd be in a lot more world of hurt than we are now one thing that I'm so fascinated that they were fighting with each other I was glad that they would fight because hate breeds you know that kind of dissension yeah and when they would fight with each other at least you know they were fighting with each other and set of you know taking it to the out into the world so they would be besties and they do like great big festivals together and the next year or even before the festival came they hated each other you know what's fascinating and even mind-boggling to me all the information that you're giving I had no clue which tells me that there is very little coverage of what's happening within these hate groups and how white supremacist groups are permeating and they're becoming more mainstream do you think it's important to have these conversations out in the open so that people have more information and they don't just assume that these groups still exist on the periphery or fringes well you can't combat or you can't fight against something that you don't know is there right you have to shine a light on it Tony always said if you shine a lot light on the road just they're all gonna go and scamper away well when it comes to hate we necessarily don't want them to scamper away because we know where they're at we know who they are but if you shine a light on it like when we shut down an organization that we we shine the light on and it was through embarrassment that this organization dismantled people don't have to go to jail they just need to leave the movement and so it's like well we're gonna jeopardize their jobs we're gonna jeopardize their families we're gonna jeopardize everything about them so they leave the movement that's what exactly what you just said we have to talk politicians need to quit yelling at each other and they need to talk about solutions we need to get into the schools and talk about how do we protect our children this is our children we're talking about we're not talking you guys in college or that's a different level but if we get to the high school kids the junior high kids who then can go to college with this understanding of what they need to do we can change the world get into the college is now and we have to teach tolerance we have to teach understanding we have to teach that I can express my views you don't have to punch me in the face and that's the problem we're having now is just people would rather argue rhetoric mixed with the ideology leads to the violence and if you have anything in that equation it's going to equal the violence I just wanted to build on that some of the stuff that I read or listen to podcast that I listen to talk a lot about this generation of young men where a lot of them in America especially maybe even abroad they're just kind of like going nowhere have no hope have no really great job prospects or career or family prospects and I wonder if you know back to your point of kind of teaching tolerance and went on high school I wonder if there is stuff that we need to do kind of as a society to kind of uplift you know this generation of I'm thinking young white men you know just based on what you're talking about in the book to give them some sort of hope and not be easily steered into this world of hate I mean I think we can talk to this because we have five children and four of them are boys and so all of my boys have been in dysports except for my oldest one and so what is the interest in you know and he was interested in cars so Matt made sure and it was effort because they they weren't doing it just at school but it was like how do we get him a car how do we help them work on this stuff what do we do you got to give them some place that they belong and something that they're good at so they're not seeking the hate they have successes in their life and so our other kids we've got two boys playing right now college ball and a daughter that dances but it really was about keeping them involved and it wasn't just us we had to have outside community members help us raise these boys I love that yeah after we talked about in the book you know and and after we go through all the stories and all the southern stuff we go into the mental health we go into solutions and different things in part one of the solutions is you know if you have a son daughter failing member this involved in this stuff first of all you don't sit them down and yell at them and tell them they need to knock it off you know that's the problem that's why they're there to start with you have to understand what they mean what they want one of our boys was state champion football player last year what happened was they were horrible their freshman year they were like nine and one and nine horrible come their senior year the coach sat him down and said nobody leaves this room and he sat down the white guys the black guys the Hispanic the Jewish the Catholic a guy from Ukraine all these different nationalities and religions sat him down in a room and said nobody's leaving here till you understand each other they took what they learned on the football field and they want to stay championship because they knew each other and they were brothers and they fought for each other they blood for each other because that one meeting the coach minutes to down understand and I don't know why we can't do that if they can do that at an on a high school level football team that's why I say okay let's say the world one football team at a time but it could be one fire one podcast one you know there's something that we can uniquely all do to make sure that give that kid that lacrosse stick instead of fighting indoctrination online listen I've had my butt kicked I've been to the shows I've been in the mosh pits death threats all kinds of things that we've been through and what it comes back to is this we've been there listen I can tell you exactly what's going to happen if you go down the road of hate we put 19 people in prison for murder and attempt to murder in Arizona alone because of hate and it's a road to destruction it's like hot and cold if it's too hot you got to put a little cold into it if it's too hateful just throw a little love in it throw a little kindness in it it'll fix it and that's what we need to do but it starts at the top it starts with our politicians it starts with our community leaders it starts with our families and then the kids are gonna see this they're gonna say oh okay I don't have to listen to this person because you know for whatever reason um madden tani wik and people find this book wherever books are sold you know bond to noble amazon that kind of thing and you can certainly find it on our website as well which is mat and tani dot com m a t t and t a w and i you know guys this was so good I had a lot more questions we'll have you back for sure - Right, in the future. - We'll definitely have you back and it's tough job to create empathy, for shared humanity. It doesn't happen, it's not happening right now and we're all seeing it and we're all being impacted by it. But you're trying and that's a huge thing. So thank you for doing that. - Thank you. - I have to say this, if not us who, and if not you who, we can all make a difference really. And we know if you look inside that there's something that you can do and if you're moved to do that, we need to do it. - Absolutely. I mean, love the talk to you guys about breaking down the crimes of hate. I mean, let's do it. - Yeah. - Yeah, we'll definitely have you back and if you hear stories that we think we should cover, please let us know. And yeah, this has been a really interesting conversation and thank you for everything that you've done. - For sure. - Thank you. (upbeat music) - Thanks so much for listening to Invisible Hate. If you want to learn more, check out links in the show notes about the book. Please email us your thoughts on this interview or any other story that we've covered previously. You can reach us at [email protected]. You can also tweet us or hit us up on Instagram, just search for Invisible Hate podcast. - That's right. We'd like to thank Tony and Matzen for joining us today. We also would like to thank you for listening. If you like what you hear, please share with a friend. Invisible Hate is a joint production of Refallion Media and Immigrant Lee. We'd like to thank our team, which includes Michele Strather, Emmanuel Moynihan, Lindsey Gamble, and Prometrach Prverthy. Our music was sung by Simon Hutchinson and we'll be back next week with another hate crime for our Stanalyze. Until then, I'm a sad boy. - And I'm Simon Yohan. (upbeat music)