ZIWE INTERVIEWS CAROLINE CALLOWAY TRANSCRIPT 6/18/20
Ziwe: Well, well, well.
Caroline Calloway: Hi. I'm so happy to be here.
Ziwe: Thank you, I'm happy that you're here. I think you are one of the most fascinating people on the internet so it’s a privilege to ask you about race.
Caroline Calloway: I mean it is… I do feel like you're going for the low-hanging fruit. Like I do feel like you're trying to bait the most easily baitable and easily cancelable person online. But you know, this is a really stressful time for Black people, and I'm really glad that you can have this emotional rest by having me on the show.
Ziwe: Totally and when you say black people, do you capitalize the B?
Caroline Calloway: Absolutely because otherwise it's a color.
Ziwe: Performative. Now first question for you Caroline is I watched your
Cambridge Union interview today, and you said that famously you discovered racism in 2018. What were you doing for the first 25 years of your life?
Caroline Calloway: I didn't say I discovered it like Christopher Columbus discovered America. I said, I was careful to say I began my journey with racism in 2018, and honestly I was fucking around for First 25 years of my life. I was literally such a dumb white girl. I would shudder to think if you could have 25 year old Caroline on the show. It would, it would not be funny.
Ziwe: I see.
Caroline Calloway: It would be awful.
Ziwe: and what in 2018 after 25 years of life woke you up to the fact that racism was a problem that existed?
Caroline Calloway: Honestly, um I started following women online like Rachel Cargle, like Layla Safad and just learning about the fact that like the women who I had idolized like Susan B Anthony like these sort of like incredible monumental figures of white feminism when I started seeing that they had actively spoken out against black people. That they had spoken in favor of the superiority of the white race. I was like, holy shit everything I know is a lie and that, you know, the women’s rights movement and the Civil Rights. I mean didn't go as far as I thought I did.
Ziwe: Wow. I really appreciate that thoughtful answer. Now I saw on your Instagram that you are promoting black authors, like Wesley Lowery who wrote “They Can't Kill Us “and “The New Jim Crow” by Michelle Alexander.
Caroline Calloway: Austin Channing, let’s fucking go. Layla Safad….
Ziwe: Exactly.
Caroline Calloway: Let’s go!
Ziwe: Now you’re a vociferous reader, how many of these books have you read?
Caroline Calloway: Honestly, of the nine books that I recommended on my Instagram I've read four.
Ziwe: Wow.
Caroline Calloway: But I've ordered the other five from black book shops, so I would like my ally cookie now.
Ziwe: There are no cookies in this game. Now can you tell me who Marcus Garvey is?
Caroline Calloway: Never heard of him.
Ziwe: Never heard of him. Okay, interesting. What about Huey P Newton?
Caroline Calloway: Is he a poet of the Harlem Renaissance? Because otherwise, I don't know him.
Ziwe: Absolutely not.
Caroline Calloway: Okay, cool.
Ziwe: Fred Hampton?
Caroline Calloway: I don’t know any of these names.
Ziwe: Angela Davis?
Caroline Calloway: Angela Davis is civil rights activist…
Ziwe: (cut off) Could you elaborate?
Caroline Calloway: Who is still alive, and it's weird to me that we're not listening to her more? Like why are we listening to like, I don't know like Glennon Doyle and Reese Witherspoon talk about activism when Angela Davis is literally still alive. Like... it's so weird to me.
Ziwe: I love that you are plugging Angela Davis who she honestly needs all of our flowers. She's the one who deserves the cookies.
Caroline Calloway: Truly, like both, like actual fucking cookies. Do you know what I think is really weird about your show?
Ziwe: What?
Caroline Calloway: Well, I was, I've been watching since 8:00 p.m. And I think it's really weird that white women come on this show and they're like, I'm not racist when I really think white women should be coming on the show and being like I'm so racist because I think everyone is very racist, and I think that people who deny that they have that poison in their brain are lying to others and especially to themselves.
Ziwe: I love, I love woke Caroline. I think it's really powerful. What was the last racist thing that you did today?
Caroline Calloway: Umm, the last racist thing I did today was not know who the three people you asked me before Angela Davis were. Like literally never heard of em.
Ziwe: Good. Good answer, good answer.
Caroline Calloway: I’m honest. We stan an honest queen.
Ziwe: We stan an honest queen. When was the last time you said a racial slur?
Caroline Calloway: Never.
Ziwe: Never?
Caroline Calloway: Truly never
Ziwe: Caroline Calloway, you've never said the n-word listening to rap song be honest?
Caroline Calloway: Okay, this is where you got me though. I hate rap. I don't like rap.
Ziwe: This is feeling really problematic and I would say racist. Why do you hate rap?
Caroline Calloway: I know, I know, I know it's really… I don't like a lot. I also don't like classical music so I feel like that balances it out.
Ziwe: Why does that balance it out?
Caroline Calloway: It really does.
Ziwe: Why?
Caroline Calloway: Like I hate, like I hate Beethoven. Yeah, I really liked…I was so unpopular in middle school that I was not I didn't want to go to the dances cause it was like socially stressful to me. So like I never went through that phase in like, you know, 2005, 2004 that like a lot of
white influencers are having trouble with now, we're like all these tweets are resurfacing of them like going off on like, you know in fucking Middle School like I just did I have friends. I didn't, I didn't keep up with the Middle School culture. I still don't really like rap.. It was never a problem for me. My biggest problem is that I don't like rap.
Ziwe: Your biggest problems that you don't like rap and that you don't know that Beethoven is black, which is another problem of yours.
Caroline Calloway: Huge.
Ziwe: Huge problem. Qualitatively, what do you like about Black people?
Caroline Calloway: Mmm… qualitatively, as opposed to…? Qualitatively. Um…….. I mean, mm, I don't really know. I mean I've never met a Black person so like it's really hard to say.
Ziwe: Okay interesting. I walk with you on this joke that you're giving. How many Black friends
do you have Caroline?
Caroline Calloway: Um, very many, so many.
Ziwe: Very many?
Caroline Calloway: Yes, as Donald Trump would say: huge, a huge amount of Black friends. That's why my Instagram grid looks so Black. As you know from going to Andover there were just like a huge like there were most of the people were Black at boarding school.
Ziwe: So we went to rival high schools. You went to Phillips Exeter Academy and I went to
Phillips Academy Andover. Which is really interesting. We've kind of ah, kind of two roads diverge because you have gone on to get a book deal and then host these creative workshops where you charge $165 a head.
Caroline Calloway: [laughs]
Ziwe: And you know a story about your life sold for I believe 1 million dollars in Hollywood. Now, my question is: how and why not me, a Black woman?
Caroline Calloway: Well, I mean, it's really hard to say. I mean my creativity workshops Google them. They were such a success. My book deal. I'm definitely not paying that back currently and in debt because of it. So another resounding success. And the movie deal. I mean that definitely hasn't been postponed because of Corona and come to a total fucking grinding standstill so I mean like I don't really know what to say. I'm just so much more successful and it just kind of like it's hard to sleep at night knowing that I've accomplished so much.
Ziwe: Wow, self-deprecation. Now, I would consider you and don't take this as an insult, please as one of the poster children for White Privilege.
Caroline Calloway: Yeah, I think so too.
Ziwe: What does white privilege mean to you?
Caroline Calloway: I think white privilege to me means blindness in its truest form. It's unfortunate that I have become associated with it. And it's something that sort of sucks because you know, like I've been posting about white soup-remacy, which was a radical term back in like 2018 when I discovered racism.
Ziwe:[cut off]
Caroline Calloway: AKA, when I began my journey, but like when I started posting about it, it was like a weird thing for influencers to, it was too radical and I…I was and even though it was radical I was so late to the game. I was centuries late to the game. I was 25 years too late to it. And like I understand it at once, at once I understand it and also feel like I don't know. I'm trying my best. We're all trying our best we're going on Baited. We're letting ourselves be canceled for the good of the cause. We're bringing in those fucking views. Let's go 1,000 views on this show.
Like let's get this up even more tell your friends and I’m being cancelled like tell them to get on Instagram live. Let's get this to 1200 bitch. Like let's go.
Ziwe: Caroline Calloway, did your family own slaves?
Caroline Calloway: [pause] They must have right?
Ziwe: I don't know. That's something that you should know.
Caroline Calloway: I don't know that but.. um... I am, I’m really. It's probable. You know what I'm gonna go with yes because my dad's side of the family has roots in North Carolina, and they've been here since the 1700s, and that's the reality of what was going on in the 1700s.
Ziwe: Really? Wow.
Caroline Calloway: That's the way it must have been. It must have been. Like that's what I hate about this show. I feel like you have white people on and you ask them questions like did you own slaves? Are you racist? They're like me, no never! And I just feel like we'll never address these problems if we aren't like yes, everyone has these biases. Yes. This is the reality of the history we all share.
Ziwe: So you would say you're a proud racist?
Caroline Calloway: I would say that I am racist and very ashamed of it and anyone else who says that they're not racist is lying to themselves and others.I.. in order to like uproot this poison. I truly believe that we have to face it head-on.
Ziwe: Would you consider yourself the white savior of influencing and promoting Black talent on Instagram?
Caroline Calloway: Yes, I would say that I discovered Black talent like I discovered racism.
Ziwe: 2018 racism was born. I actually think that that's a really really interesting detail. Now here have you ever hooked up with a black person before?
Caroline Calloway: Yes, I have.
Ziwe: Tell me about that experience.
Caroline Calloway: I don't kiss and tell.
Ziwe: But actually I would say that you do kiss and tell because I've followed you on Instagram.
Caroline Calloway: Yeah, I mean, well I date and tell. I feel like if you date me you're signing up to a life in the public eye. It's like let's have a relationship. You're my boyfriend. You get the deal but like you asked me if I had hooked up with a black person not if I dated them and like when you hook up with me and like sort of a random way, I don't feel like it's fair to bring you into the public eye in that way, and I just I just feel weird about dragging the people who I've had like casual moments with into….
Ziwe: So you'd say you don't date Black guys... Okay, that's interesting. Ok, Caroline Calloway, can you name five Black people?
Caroline Calloway: Absolutely, Toni Morrison. Zora Neale Hurston. Maya Angelou. Oprah Winfrey. Fredless, Frederick Douglass. Those are my favorite authors. James Baldwin.
Ziwe: You read James Baldwin?
Caroline Calloway: Yes. Are you kidding!
Ziwe: In public?
Caroline Calloway: I feel like I'm the only white person ever who read “If Beale Street Could Talk” before it became a movie.
Ziwe: You're giving yourself too much credit, but, sure.
Caroline Calloway: I really am I really am I'm like, can you see my halo above my head? Like I am I’m the perfect white savior.
Ziwe: Oh my goodness, what a wild time to be alive. I listened to your podcast with Hannah Berner as well who I absolutely love. (cut off)
Caroline Calloway: Isn’t she so great? She was in the comments section earlier being like I am sweating for these white girls like this is stressful.
Ziwe: I've interviewed her before and (cut off)
Caroline Calloway:I love Hannah. Hannah if you're out there. I'm fucking simping for you so hard. We have the same manager.
Ziwe: You have the same manager. Oh, yes. Cool, nice. Hollywood. I love paying people. (cut off)
Caroline Calloway: Hollywood.
Ziwe: Shout out. Now. Let's talk about… let's talk about. Okay, so why did you say yes to this interview in the first place? I'm really interested in this.
Caroline Calloway: You know, it's actually a speaking of our management team. I did not tell my manager that I was coming on this podcast because I just felt like I am like a really polarizing incendiary internet figure -
Ziwe: (nodding) I agree.
Caroline Calloway: - and I feel like that's it's a superpower of mine while also being a complete fucking weakness, and I'm just like…I have a lot of trauma to unpack from being canceled because it's just like I really think it's scrambles your brain when you've received like enough hate messages in like a small amount of time, but I just really… I don't know. I just seeing all the protests and just seeing honestly seeing all the way people who come on your show who are like, I'm not racist it just, It just upset me because I just think that it would be I think that doing the work is really reflecting on the times when you have been racist and being honest about those times to yourself and learning how to carry that shame and not projecting it in weird ways on your Black friends on Black people online that you follow which like I've also been guilty of like I just I didn't address it for a lot of years and like the past two years. It's just the only way to deal with, with anything is to just address it head-on .
Ziwe: Totally and just out of curiosity, how many Black people do you employ on your team?
Caroline Calloway: Zero right now.
Ziwe: Oh!
Caroline Calloway: My last personal assistant was black and queer. So I did get extra benefits from the government for employing somebody who was marginalized.
Ziwe: Ay yai yai yai yai. Oh my gosh, Caroline you give me so much stress. Okay. [screams] Okay. So you have zero Black friends and you don't employ any Black people.
Caroline Calloway: Exactly.
Ziwe: …and you don't like Black music, but you are a proud racist. Now, you dispel cancel culture. That's something that you are consistent about, what justifies someone getting cancelled? Like if I were to commit a hate crime, is that a justifiable reason to get canceled?
Caroline Calloway: [long pause] That's a really tough question, honestly. I'd never thought of that. I honestly I'm going to I sort of feel like being I feel towards cancel culture as I do towards the death penalty, which I'm sure people will find very provocative, but just like, I mean, my dad killed himself, I've really struggled with suicide. I've never had the profound misfortune of being cancelled at the same time that I was going through like a suicidal downturn but I can so easily imagine how if you like lined up being canceled with just sort of like a really bad depressive spell like that would be the same as a death sentence and I just don't think that anyone deserves to die for anything they do. I think they're different ways to hold people accountable.
Ziwe: (pause) That is an opinion. Now…
Caroline Calloway: Yeah.
Ziwe: How have you decolonized your mind?
Caroline Calloway: I mean learning is forever. It's… the question how you decolonized your mind makes decolonized past tense as in something that I've finished doing, but I think yeah, it's I've read books. I follow people and I think it's really dangerous to look at decolonization in the past tense to be like, this is something I finished doing I've completed this course and I'm like done with the learning but like really I'm decolonizing my mind by continuing to follow people. I have five books on the way from the reading list that I haven't read, and I just I'm really open to the fact that I will discover new parts about my mind that will be very unsavory but like very worthwhile and unpacking and dismantling and just addressing head on.
Ziwe: I definitely, I welcome anyone who's willing to read and educate themselves on the disease that is racism in the country so shout out to ordering the books but not having read them yet… I think that that’s (cut off)
Caroline Calloway: I think that it's the best way to be it's like they're on the way. It's like the check is in the mail like, you know, like that's the vibe.
Ziwe: Exactly. We’ve got a bunch of questions that have been submitted. Let's see what we have. Okay, will you… okay here's a question. Will you pay reparations?
Caroline Calloway: I already have, do it all the time. I have literally I have venmoed more money just straight up sending money to Black women for their self-care then I have to actual charitable donations. Like I just send 100 dollars to the Black women in my life being like take care of yourself. This is I just, I just say for your self care with a little heart emoji with the gold star and like I do that more often than I give to actual donation like actual like what is it a NC 3-0 or like whatever the like government like designation is.
Ziwe: $100 is what you'd say is the value of black plight in America. That's seems low.
Caroline Calloway: I'd say that is the lowest amount you can give. I would say that is the one dollar bill of reparations is the 100 dollar unit.
Ziwe: I have not received a venmo from you just for the record.
Caroline Calloway: Yeah, you have not, but I will send you one.
Ziwe: Thank you. Thank you. Ok here is another question. Ok I will say that your fans are really upset. Your fans are very angry. Your fans are very very upset with you.
Caroline Calloway: [LAUGHS]
Ziwe: and I have only gotten comments once before like this in my DMs talking about the image that you posted of Natalie with the hook-nose. Problematic.
Caroline Calloway: I've never posted an image of Natalie with a hook-nose.
Ziwe: That was like a tweet. It was like a tweet like….
Caroline Calloway: Oh no, I posted. Okay. This is so crazy!
Ziwe: It was called an antisemitic.
Caroline Calloway: Yes.
Ziwe: I got harassed about that.
Caroline Calloway: Yeah, everyone does. My actual friends get every single day my like, the boy I'm dating, the people I'm friends with in my life --
Ziwe: Would you like to apologize for it?
Caroline Calloway: -- Reddit is very organized and the Reddit sends out like mass listserv Instagram DM's they just copy and paste the same message to I've gotten it screenshotted a million times where they're like, how could you like be associated with this person? And I didn't not for the record post a hook nose image of Natalie. That's insane. I post, I reposted this image on a turquoise background of a hook nose person with money bags and umbrella, and I didn't realize that it was antisemitic. I literally found it by scrolling the hashtag things rich people buy.
Ziwe: (disturbed, upset)Oh no!
Caroline Calloway: and yeah, I just reposted it. But I really, I really don't umm, I don't blame people for being mad about that initially because it's something that I apologized for and I meant that apologize .. apology but like yeah the messages that you're getting is like very common for people who associate in any way with me to get hate about me.
Ziwe: Did you also discover anti….
LIVE VIDEO ENDS ABRUPTLY “thanks for watching!”
Caroline Calloway:I know we're too powerful.
Ziwe: Too powerful. Oh my gosh, I'm sad because I have to like call Facebook to see if I can find the first half of that.
Caroline shows off her Spindrift
Ziwe: Oh Spindrift, but what is that?
Caroline Calloway: It's half Spindrift, half white wine.
Ziwe: Oh my gosh, wild. I can't believe that it just deleted like that. The streets were not ready for this phone heat. Guys, what a time to be alive. I have a couple more questions. Do you have time or are you busy?
Caroline Calloway: Z sorry, Can you?
Caroline keeps freezing.
Ziwe: Hello. Guys. Hi.
Caroline Calloway: Hello. Can you see me?
Ziwe: Yes, I can see you.
Caroline Calloway: Okay.
Ziwe: Can you do more questions or do you have to dip?
Caroline Calloway: Amazing. No, I'm here. Honestly, whatever you want. I'm here for you.
Ziwe: This is wild. This is a wild time. This is a wild time. You are getting, so I will say that your fans remind me a lot of Mary-Kate. I took a photo a year ago with Mary-Kate Olsen and people attacked my DMs and people have similarly responded in my DMs. What do you think about you as a white woman polarizes people so much?
Caroline Calloway: Well, I think once you've been cancelled once let alone twice, [sigh] the bar will forever be lowered on what it takes to anger people about you again, like once hating your first and last name is no longer a hot take like it's forever. It's forever something that's easier to hate. But I also I try to be controversial and that's...
Ziwe: What I find interesting about you is the way that you use gender when discussing kind of in defense of your online persona, like well, “if I-- if I was a man, I would not be judged”. How do you think that your whiteness plays into your persona?
Caroline Calloway: I think my whiteness plays into my Persona the way honestly, I mean it permeates everything every white person does like it's it's always there like it's…It's always permeating it. You know, like of course, it's always there. It's always an issue.
Ziwe: Okay, we have again.We have a bunch of questions. Let's see what we got. I want to I want Caroline to rate her white guilt on a scale of 1 to 10.
Caroline Calloway: 10.
Ziwe: That's how guilty you feel about being white?
Caroline Calloway: Yeah for sure.
Ziwe: Would you like to apologize to all the Black people that you've ever offended?
Caroline Calloway: (long pause) Yeah, I think… it's I don't think …the answer is yes, but like this is not the way to apologize to them and I'm aware of that. Like this show is not going to be like the way that I like really like say something sincere to anyone I've ever offended. Have you seen that account @blackatandover?
Ziwe: Yes. I have seen it.
Caroline Calloway: What do you think about it?
Ziwe: I think that I think predominantly white institutions are very hard for minorities across the board. So I've been through several predominantly white institutions. I think that's part of the reason why I am successful and like appreciated. It's because I've assimilated in that sense, and I think that that, that has to do with like the abuse that you experience all over the place.
Caroline Calloway: Do you know it's so fucked up is that I recently had to takeover of my account from so I… since I've been trying to like leverage the way that I it's like, okay, so people think I'm a poster child of white privilege.
Ziwe: Yes!
Caroline Calloway: Fine.
Ziwe: I do!
Caroline Calloway: How can I use that to my benefit to like dismantle this motherfucker and burn It to the ground? So I've been really and I'm going to make some posts about the Black at Exeter account and the Black at Andover. Is that what the handle is? You guys should follow them. In fact, just Google Taylor Lorenz's Black at Exeter and there's a whole New York Times article that was published two days ago about all the accounts at all the elite schools. Like accounts that are exposing faculty, other students, just like institutionalized racism, but I have this account of POC students at Cambridge take over my account and something that I was so struck by was that the creator said that's though the girl who had created it said that people often blamed students of color for applying to that institution. They like victim blame them for experiencing racism. It's like if you didn't want to experience racism. Why did you come to such a fancy institution? And that's the craziest shit I've ever heard in my entire life.
Ziwe: How did you, how did you contribute to any stories of Black at Exeter while you were at Exeter?
Caroline Calloway: I don't know. That's something I haven't reflected on, but it's something that merits more reflection. And I think anyone who deflects that question is kidding themselves.
Ziwe: What's really interesting about this interview, I would say is you're sort of— you are really peeved at the idea that anyone white could come on this interview and say anything. other than that, they are violent racist and kind of claim that so what makes you so... why are you so steadfast about this?
Caroline Calloway: I just think that the... I just think as someone who has really struggled with a lot of um..I don't know. Let me start that sentence over. I think that you can't… You know who said this? Fucking James Baldwin! was like “No problem.” “No problem that isn't addressed can't be faced.” Like that's the paraphrasing of that quote, like you need to face a problem to address it, and I just think it's really, you know in “White Fragility” by Robin…um
Ziwe: A book you’ve read or a book you’ve ordered?
Caroline Calloway: A book that I’ve actually read.
Ziwe: Ok, great.
Caroline Calloway: Robin said that the more that white people associate racism with evil the less they'll be able to accurately judge their own actions or even dismantle it within themselves because if I feel attacked when you're like this is the whole premise of your show, you're like I baited you. Oh my God. Um...When someone's like I baited you… um…I'm so sorry. My manager is calling me. I should go soon. But um…
Ziwe: Are you able to get offline?
Caroline Calloway: Yeah. Yeah. Can you please say something very nice about what ---
Ziwe: About you?
Caroline Calloway: About what just happened? Because my... I think my manager is very mad.
Ziwe: Okay, your manager shouldn't be mad. I don't know what to tell them. I have managers and agents as well. And I love them. I love my team. I don't know what to tell them you pay them. I don't know. [laughs]
Caroline freezes. Pause
Ziwe: Guys, what a fantastic show. I think we might have lost Caroline. Oh, Caroline’s back? No, we lost her. What a fantastic fantastic show. I'm so sad that I could not, that that deleted. So please if you anybody recorded any of that, please send it to me because that was the joy. That was so much fun. Shout out. Next week. We have fantastic guests Alison Roman, Jo Firestone, and Nick Ciarelli so I'll see you guys next week. Thursday's 8:00 p.m. Eastern.