Daryl Davis

Daryl Davis (born March 26, 1958) is an American bandleader, musician, activist, and author known for his efforts to improve race relations.

Daryl Davis in 2017

Quotes

Accidental Courtesy: Daryl Davis, Race & America (2016)

• Let's say you and 20 other people have this group that is anti-racist and all you do is talk about how bad racism is. What good is that group doing? All you do is preaching to the choir. If you and I agree, I'm not accomplishing anything by trying to convince you of what you already know. The way you resolve that is you invite somebody to the table who disagrees with you so you understand why they have that point of view. Then, perhaps, you will figure out a solution to disuade their fears.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 6m47s)

• Always keep the lines of communication open with your adversaries regardless of what the topic is. When two enemies are talking they are not fighting. They might be yelling and screaming and shouting an beating their fists on the table, but at least they're talking. They're not fighting.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 13m15s)

• How can you hate me when you don't even know me? Throughout my life, I've been looking for an answer to that. Well, who better to ask than someone who would join an organization whose whole premise is hating people who do not look like them? So I began seeking out members of the Ku Klux Klan.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 18m5s)

• [On his collection of Ku Klux Klan robes and memorabilia]: Peple always say to me 'Daryl, how can you have this stuff? Why don't you burn it?' Well, no. As shameful as it is, this is a part of American hisotory. You don't burn our history regardless. The good, the bad, the ugly. And the Ku Klux Klan is as American as baseball, apple pie and Chevrolet.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 23m20s)

• [On why he prefers to meet Ku Klux Klan memebers face to face]: They can't know the real me through e-mail or through Facebook. Just sitting across from somebody, meeting somebody, getting that sense of them, that's the key right there.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 34m51s)

• If you have an adversary, someone with an opposing point of view, regardless of how extreme it may be, and believe me I've heard things that cut me to the bone, but give that person a platform. Allow them to air their views. And when you do things like that there is an excellent chance that people will reciprocate.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 35m15s)

• Davis: My end goal is to bring people together. Bring white supremacists together with their nemesis. Unless we learn how to get along with one another, this country is about to...
• Kwame Rose: Why do I have to get along with them?
• Davis: Because they are our fellow Americans. We all have to live in this country together. We do. Otherwise we're going to end up self-destructing.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 1h17m41s)

• [If he feels disconnected from black millenials]: I've met people like him before and have had confrontations with people like him before, not many. A klansman hates a white person who 'sells out', so to speak, more so than they hate a black person. Just like the young boy hated me more than he hated some white guy, because he felt that I've sold out my own race. He was very definate that white people could not change. How is he going to advance any agenda in this country, as diverse as it is?
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 1h24m40s)

• When I first began interviewing klanmembers, oftentimes they would answer the question but they wouldn't turn around and say 'What do you think?' They felt i was inferior. I had nothing to offer in terms of my opinion. But then over time, as the relationship develops, slowly but surely they began asking me questions. That was the first clue that the tide was turning. 'Oh, all of a sudden my opinion matters? Let's see where this is going.'
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 1h32m45s)

• I never sat out to convert anybody. I just set out to get that answer to my question: 'How can you hate me if you don't even know me?' And in my quest to have that answered, they couldn't answer it. And some of them ended up converting themselves.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 1h33m54s)

• I would hope that by the time I'm gone, things like this will not be as prevalent. But if they are, perhaps this film will encourage others to do the same and do a better job that I've been able to do.
  • Accidental Courtesy (2016) (at 1h34m53s)

Other quotes

• The lesson learned is: ignorance breeds fear. If you don't keep that fear in check, that fear will breed hatred. If you don't keep hatred in check, it will breed destruction.
  • Dancing with the Devil by Bob Massey, Special to The Washington Post, Sunday, July 5, 1998

• I am a musician, not a psychologist or sociologist. If I can do that, anybody in here can do that. Take the time to sit down and talk with your adversaries. You will learn something and they will learn something from you. When two enemies are talking, they are not fighting. They are talking. It's when the talking ceases that the ground becomes fertile for violence. So keep the conversation going.
  • "Why I, as a black man, attend KKK rallies. | Daryl Davis | TEDxNaperville", YouTube, 8 December 2017.

• What I have come to find to be the greatest and most effective and successful weapon that we can use, known to man, to combat such adversaries as ignorance, racism, hatred, violence, is also the least expensive weapon, and the one that is the least used by Americans. That weapon is called communication.
  • "Klan We Talk? | Daryl Davis | TEDxCapeMay", 9 January 2018.