Saul Williams on Pop Culture: "We're all Donald Trump's F--king Apprentice" | Big Think
Trump is not shocking to me because if you look at the signs, if you look at the signs as far as what’s been resonating with all different types of groups of people in America, in terms of entertainment, in terms of literature, in terms of popular culture, and now in terms of politics, you know.
Like why did the Tea Party thing resonate the way that it did for so many people? When the Oprah Winfrey show was enormous, and she had like racists and skinheads on, like clan members and skinheads on once. And I remember her asking and the children are there who no longer identified with them.
And there were three children on stage I think. I mean I’m remembering from way back watching this thing as a kid, and there were like three kids on stage who had all continued their education, right, and no longer identified with being racist or having parents in the clan or their skinhead friends, right.
And so she asked the audience, who was composed of all clan members and skinheads, how many people here graduated from high school? Two or three raised their hands. How many of you went to college? Nobody raised their hands.
Asked the three kids, you know, who no longer identified with their upbringing how many of you graduated from high school? How many of you went to college? So all of a sudden they have interacted with more people in their life. They got out of their little circle and suddenly saw the world differently.
That’s why cults try to keep you in. They try to keep you from seeing what’s out there so that you can maintain this perspective, regardless of how warped it may be, you know. As you can see, I’m really into the idea of education. I think it’s the key to all of this, and I think when I see people following Trump, I think it’s just a lack of that, you know. It’s that simple.
And because it’s funny. Because it’s funny. I mean we’ve learned to laugh at stupid shit, you know. Like I said, we equate entertainment with escapism. Well, what the fuck does that mean for Bob Marley? What the fuck does that mean for Nina Simone or Fela Kuti or Jim Morrison or the Beatles?
Like these guys weren’t necessarily Bob Dylan. These guys weren’t necessarily trying to escape. They were digging into what was happening in the culture. Like look at what’s happening around you. Look at what the fuck – I mean listen to the words of like "Satisfaction" by the Stones, you know.
The man on the TV says this dah, dah, dah, dah. Like these are people who are counterculture even though, you know, questioning authority, questioning what’s going on, you know. Whereas now you have a pop culture that’s centered around this sort of thing of just like rooting for the winner, which is crazy to me.
Like essentially rooting for the underdog, you know. But you look at like the thing in pop culture like Meek Mill and Drake, for example, right. And people were like the guy who’s winning – that’s the guy I want to win, you know, as opposed to the guy who actually comes from the real fucked up situation who actually has something to say.
No, I want the guy who’s winning to win, you know. That’s where we are right now. It’s a fucked place in pop consciousness, you know, and Trump is the perfect example of that. Like we’re all like his fucking apprentice right now. It’s a damn shame.
But it was a damn shame when he was on that show and everybody was fucking watching it. All that shit was a damn shame. This is the outcome of that. This is the outcome of that. The shit we were laughing at and calling our guilty pleasure, you know.
Somebody fucking expect. What do you expect? No, he won’t get elected as president. He won’t. He won’t. I mean like if he does, call me back here, and I’ll be like, oh, I don’t know. But you’ll have to buy me an international ticket.