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Patti Harrison TRANSCRIPT 8/6/20

 Ziwe: Oh, hello.

Patti Harrison: Hey! What's up?

Ziwe: How are you doing, Patti?

Patti Harrison: I'm good I'm, I'm tired, but I I'm, you know, having a day. It's pretty, pretty warm. Yeah. How are you?

Ziwe: On a scale of tired, are you sick and tired of being tired or sick and tired of racism?

Patti Harrison: Um, I am, I'm tired of both. And I also, and I also have like terrible sleep habits, and I eat food late, so it's like a combination of a lot of a lot of stuff.

Ziwe: Okay, Patti, are you a racist, for the record?

Patti Harrison: For the record, I'm going to say, I'm going to say no. In a colloquial understanding of racism, but I do have ingrained biases that I think will take a lifetime for me to, to work out. I really do.

Ziwe: Patti, how many black friends do you have?

Patti Harrison: Um, I have, I do have them. I would say four to five. I'm kidding. Um, I. It's four, um. No, I don't. I have black friends, and I don't want to name them, but I do have them.

Ziwe: Okay. I don't know if they exist, but I'll just have to take you at your word on that. On June 19th, you tweeted “Happy Juneteenth.” How did you celebrate Juneteenth?

Patti Harrison: Um, I felt, I was like, by myself. And so I like ate. I was like in bed I think most of the day. And also, I was trying not to, you know, do a, a blackout Tuesday square sort of situation. I kind of, I really like did not know a lot about Juneteenth, so I kind of wanted to like, read what people are doing and like what's appropriate. I didn't want to be like front and center it'd be like, yes, everyone come over for Juneteenth! It's my day. So I, I think I spent most of that day in bed.

Ziwe: Okay, I think that that's an interesting way to celebrate black liberation is to, you know, be prone. Now, Patti, who are your favorite black authors?

Patti Harrison: Okay, so, I hate, I hate to, to, of course, be this asshole again but I really, I really very rarely read, but, um, I, I like, I think of like the five books that I've read. I liked, which I don't even know, does it count as a book, if it's in book form? A Raisin in the Sun, if it's a play?

Ziwe: We're gonna count it for your sake.

Patti Harrison: I, I did, um, I own the book, Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler, but I haven't read it yet. So, so that that's got to count, right?

Ziwe: [Inaudible] said you and him slap box on Juneteenth. Now, you, you, you, you make great music on Las Culturistas, you were discussing like your songwriting process, and you improvise the ditty, “Trump is a beautiful man with a beautiful butt and a big fat dick.” Now can you improvise a song? Can you improvise a song about race for my audience today?

Patti Harrison: A song about race for your audience.

Ziwe: Yes, please.

Patti Harrison: The only prompt that I get is that it has to be about race. Um, okay. And just acapella?

Ziwe shrugs.

Patti Harrison: [Singing] “Race is complex, and race is here, we have to pay attention to that. It is in our conversation, more than ever, which is good, which is good, that's good. I think that there is too much stuff going on in our world that is really fucked up. And in order to address it, we have to talk about one of the things is race.”

Ziwe: Wow, wow that was beautiful. That was a beautiful, beautiful song. The comments are going absolutely apeshit. So, thank you. I, please, hope, I hope that you put that on your record when you eventually drop that.

Patti Harrison: It's actually, it is, it's trademarked, and my label is going to be invoicing you.

Ziwe: Now, so you've gone on the record saying that you will be “voting in the general election, and you will be voting for Joe Biden,” so –

Patti Harrison: Yeah.

Ziwe: Are you a centrist devil that hates black people and also women?

Patti Harrison: Um, no, I don't think so. I say no. I, yeah I I very nervously have, I think, been being kind of. It's not as bold as I could be about, you know, saying that I'm voting for Joe Biden because I do think it's I guess important now that I have a bigger platform than I have in the past. It just seems like the better for the greater good, or best possible and most realistic option. I'm not obsessed with him in any capacity, and I hear that and –

Ziwe: Okay.

Patti Harrison: -- empathize with that. And I, I'm like with those people who are like pissy too, but also, I'm tired of feeling, feeling like in this like negative hole of like complaining and then me not doing anything about it I guess.

Ziwe: Okay, “voting.” Now, what do you qualitatively like about the black community?

Patti Harrison: Qualitatively, I mean, I think, again, you know, Lie-za said it. Oh my. I'm like, I'm messing up, Lourza said it. Decapitate me again. Um, qualitatively you can't really, you know, the. There's diversity, it's overgeneralizing to qualitatively pick something, but I would maybe say the cultural contribution to art, I think is really incredible. From from black people.

Ziwe: Oh, I heard you. Now, do you believe that I should use my platform and offer billionaire and author of the world's famous, world's most famous best-selling children's book, JK Rowling, an opportunity to be on my show?

Patti Harrison: Um, yes, I think that, I think JK Rowling is just one of the greatest out there. She inspires so many people to be their wacky, magic selves, and I think she really, and she's like so broke and like doesn't have a platform at all. So I think it's really important like no one's letting, no one's giving her space to talk. It's really fucked up. No one's giving JK Rowling a platform to talk, and I think you could have really an interesting opportunity to invite her to come in and kind of like, you know, give her the mic for like, one second.

Ziwe: You know, I don't know if I would do that because I give my platform to people who are perfect. Now, which is after you, of course. Now, question for you. What does black love mean to you?

Patti Harrison: Um, I think it can mean, I think it can mean a lot of things, and I think, you know, I don't know if I necessarily have the, the agency to define it because my perception of it is, you know, from the, from an outsider point of view. I think it means, the love shared between black people in the way that that is felt, but also represented in in the media sometimes, and also that connection that of warmth that black people feel as a community with each other.

Ziwe: On the You're Making It Worse podcast, you said you have a white father, and you described yourself as a crazy mixed smoothie, a moon juice. What side of the race war are you fighting on?

Patti Harrison: Um, I am. I'm in the race war. Um, you know I don't, I don't really, I don't want to give an answer yet like I'm pretty sure like I'll vote for Biden but I'm still kind of like on the fence. Definitely. I truly, that was so, I can't, I like hearing that joke now, I'm just like, oh that's hack of me.

Ziwe: No, it’s funny on the podcast, but you’re right, it is hack--

Patti Harrison: You’re, you’re, you’re kind, I, I, yeah, I don't know. Can I, can I get back to you about the side?

Ziwe: Sure. What, can you name five black women?

Patti Harrison: I can, um, I can. Do you want me to do that?

Ziwe: Please.

Patti Harrison: Okay. Um, Toni Morrison. Um, uhh, Rihanna. Um, shit. Regina Hall. You, Ziwe.

Ziwe: Oh, thank you.

Patti Harrison: Yeah, I know. Maybe like, maybe like Oprah.

Ziwe: That was, that was the longest it's ever taken.

Patti Harrison: It's like, there’s, I watch the show, and there's so much nuance about like, you know, it's like I don't want to go too deep cut, I don't want to like –

Ziwe: Oh, what’s a deep cut black person, by the way?

Patti Harrison: Um, like someone like, only, I would personally know.

Ziwe: Oh sure, like name a deep cut black person that you only personally know that exists, for sure.

Patti Harrison: I don't want to do that because I would want to check with them first to make sure it was okay I said their name on your show that a lot of people watch.

Ziwe: Patti, I'm gonna name some civil rights people, and you tell me who they are.

Patti Harrison: Okay.

Ziwe: Shirley Chisholm.

Patti Harrison: I don't know who that is.

Ziwe: Barack Obama,

Patti Harrison: Former president of the OOSAY.

Ziwe: Ida B-- Oh, that reminds me, Barack Obama. On November 5, 2019, you tweeted “just got Obama's birth certificate in the mail today, turns out he's 100% that bitch” Do you think it's funny to call the first black president a bitch?

Patti Harrison: Wait, what? Oh yeah! Oh it's the, but that's decontextualized with the photo, you should show the photo that I tweeted with it. Okay? Because it is, it is a joke, but I don't know if, I don't know, and decontextualized, it just sounds like I was saying that about, about nothing but, you know, you're, you're, at this point you're a journalist, and you’re asking the hard hitting questions. Um, I don't, I don't think so. I don't know.

Ziwe: Okay. Louis Farrakhan, who's that?

Patti Harrison: Um, he was…I think, the leader of the Nation of, is he currently the leader of the Nation of Islam? And he's like very problematic. I think he like refers, has referred to Jewish people on multiple occasions as like Satanic Jews.

Ziwe: Yeah, he's very not okay. Where do you stand on Booker T Washington and W.E.B DuBois?

Patti Harrison: Um, you know I also with Lie-za, I don't, I don't have a stance on it but to say, I will after today.

Ziwe: Okay, well thank you. We have a couple of questions before I let you go because you’ve been so funny. Now, ooh, let's see. Has Patti ever voted before? Patti, have you voted before?

Patti Harrison: I have.

Ziwe: Okay, well we cleared that up. Oh, are you team light skin or team dark skin?

Patti Harrison: I, I'm. I'm. I wish there wasn't, you know, a delineation. I would say I'm, I'm pro both. But I’ll also say that my opinion doesn't really matter much.

Ziwe: Okay, nice to know that you support dark skinned women like myself. Thanks, Patti for going out on a limb. Ooh, here's a question, name five white women.

Patti Harrison: Oh god. Um, Saoirse Ronan. Umm Ellen. Maybe. Um, I'd say JK Rowling. And…um…Hermione Granger and. Okay, that's a bit, but never mind, that's a different thing. Um, and well, Emma Watson, right! And, and Emma Roberts.

Ziwe: That was much quicker than the black woman, for the record. Patti, you've been such…you firstly, you are one of the funniest people I know, truly. So, thank you so much for doing the show. One last question for you, which is why did you come on the show today?

Patti Harrison: Why did I come on the show. Well, when you asked me, I initially felt like a little nervous about it. And that was like that was I think a good moment to ask myself why I’m nervous about it. But also, you know, it seems exciting. And I love you –

Ziwe: Oh, stop it!

Patti Harrison: -- so much. And I miss you a lot, and –

Ziwe: Stop.

Patti Harrison: It's good to gab and maybe, maybe there is a world where we get our catch-up gab that is not streamed.

Ziwe: So, I would love that. Guys please give it up for Patti Harrison, who is one of the funniest people online. Go follow her. She is absolutely genius. Next week at Thursday at 8pm Eastern, we have Josh Sharp and Taylor Nolan, winner of Bachelor in Paradise. I will see you guys, same time, same place, stay safe. Go donate to Impact Lebanon. Bye.