The Nightly Show - Panel - Pepper Spray Science, Race and Facial Recognition & Tribal Beginnings

Bill Nye, Ricky Velez and Mike Yard chat about pepper spray's effects on white people, an anti-police T-shirt in Baltimore and whether racism exists in the animal kingdom.

** Watch The Nightly Show Mon. - Thurs. 11:30/10:30c on Comedy Central.

[fundifferent]

It's just really annoying because what Bill said was really deep and the way he said it was pretty poignant but Larry totally ruined the punchline by trying to be funny himself. Then after Bill repeated and elaborated it seemed like the panel didn't really get it. "I'm dizzy!" the on one guy said. ...I just rolled my eyes.

[memadog]

Bill Nye is actually Brilliant and is speaking SO MUCH TRUTH. It makes me so angry how people are laughing, making jokes, cutting him off, etc. If they truly listened to his words they would see that he is right at the end of the day we are ALL PART of the HUMAN RACE.

[victorwade]

They always manage to find a way to downplay intelligence...

[aaaer]

Bill Nye. he was awesome when I was a kid, still awesome today

[dannilamf]

Most of you seem to be misinterpreting what Bill is saying, or maybe I am. How I see it is we are all different, yet the same. A wild cat that grew up in Norway will be different from a wild cat from America in how their bodies have adapted to their environment. Their body structures will be different while they are still cats. Race is a human made concept built on different cultures which had different morals, they met and then clashed, that is why race exists as a concept, so the people could separate themselves from what they don't like. It is only a part of the psyche. We are animals, too.

[hey]

Billy N speaks the TRUTH. there is no race just 'tribes' and 'clans', family groups. Also, the children from that couple tend to be beautiful. I know, I group up knowing two couples (Norwegian + African) who had beautiful kids. Blonde and pale with biggest Afro and straight brown hair with dark skin. Absolutely gorgeous. I was so jealous when I was a child. I wanted to one of their children.

[marcjones]

FACT #1: Recent studies in human DNA have shown that there are as many genetic differences between two random people of the same ethnicity as there are between two random people of different ethnicities.

FACT #2: It takes approximately 100 generations (2, 500 years) for skin color to fully adapt to its environment. That means if all Africans relocated to Europe, and all Europeans relocated to Africa, by about the year 4500 AD the former Europeans would all be "black" and the former Africans would all be "white."

[MeliGirlM]

Best comment ever "When a guy from Norway has sex with an African woman, racism is over" you would think it's that simple.

But on a side note, I love Bill Nye's explanation of tribalism. The whole controversy about race stems from a "us" vs "them" mentality that is not specific to race. We all identify with a favorite team, sport, group of friends, city or state. We have to see each other as equal, period. And when that becomes true, it'll show in our actions.

[iluvchoccymicky]

Bill Nye is brilliant, but everyone else isn't very smart. They just made a jokes about his explanation. They didn't even understand it or attempt to... Bill was probably frustrated, but that's show business, simple, stupid and funny.

[mixtapeheart]

Er .... my father is Norwegian. My mother is African.

It's true, I am a human. (I also have good hair.) But racism is totally not over. Damnit.

[josephdavis]

While Diana Ross's husband isn't NORWEGIAN (Swedish, I he's CLOSE. Or does it HAVE to be a Norwegian guy? I mean, can't we REVERSE those?

I just want racism to go away, that's if there ARE folks fitting the above criteria, NEEDS YOU. thanks to Bill Nye for educating me on ultraviolet light.

[gpd]

Did he really in all seriousness say that everyone is the same?

[jesseversluys]

He sort of avoided the question to some extent, but I like that he pointed out the absurdity of the term "race". At the same time, however, the concept of "species" can be just as confusing, as most people don't realize it is a continuum rather than a finite thing. Basically, all populations are on their way to becoming a new species, given enough time and separation. The same would be true of humans, if we had stayed separate for a few million more years. Now that globalization has taken hold, the populations are becoming homogenized and genetic variations less obvious between groups of people (which is most likely a good thing, where racism is concerned).

[adawong]

I think he was trying to say that when one tribe sees the deficiency, (or lack thereof), of anther tribe's ability to survive in a given environment, they become "racist", which is evolution trying to select the best candidate for survival in that In other words, there is no such thing as "racism", only the force of evolution trying select the most probable survivors.

[equinoxsssk]

where is the part about pepper spray?? someone needs to change the title

[SeppukuDoll]

I wish they would shut up and listen while Bill is talking.

[MrGlinvad]

The Nightly Show? More like The Black Black Blackity Black Show with Black Host Larry Wilmore Talking About Black Things. And Also Black.

[CappitranoBellephant]

Omg Bill was about to say something interesting about our skin color and he just cut him off. Thank God this show is cancelled.

[KeymoEmbryo]

did that one guy say 
"I'm if-fy ? " 
o_O

[Dinuial]

Race is slightly more than skin color and cartilage construction - various groups breeding in isolation developed various quirks, some useful, some which can cause serious problems (eg there is a tribe in the southwest US that is inordinately prone to diabetes because there is so little sugar in the plants native to the area) - but a great deal less than species. Subspeciation/pseudospeciation, one of the more common thought processes at work within racism, is idiotic and entirely unfounded.