"Part: 12 Listen to Michael Davis's In Search Of Heroes Interview" by Ralph Zuranski
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Michael Davis: We were on the honor system back then.
Ralph Zuranski: Yeah.
Michael Davis: I did kind of atone for it. I was fortunate enough to help create the Comic Arts Festival out here in Los Angeles in conjunction with the LA Central Public Library. I was fortunate enough to do that and to help in that endeavor when they started.
Ralph Zuranski: Who are the heroes in your life now?
Michael Davis: Well, my cousin, William T. Williams will always be my hero. My mom is my hero. She is retired now but she’s lived a real life.
She is a real, real good person. A lot of people who would have faced what she faced would have just given up. Those are my personal heroes.
There are some people who I really, really admire. I don’t know if I would call them my heroes but I admire them. I like Bill Gates on a business level because Gates is a smart guy, and love him or hate him, I can’t deny his accomplishments.
The stuff that he’s doing with AIDS and the stuff that he’s doing with education is just phenomenal. To have that kind of bank it’s really easy to sit down and go give a couple of million dollars a year to charity because it’s a tax shelter. This guy is giving billions of dollars and he’s devoting the rest of his life to his main thrust, which is going to be helping humanity.
You create something like Microsoft and then you decide at the height of your career that you are going to now help humanity? That’s a hero! People are still taking shots at him for a variety of different reasons. You know, love him or hate him, business is one thing but he’s a real man. He’s a man.
Another person I admire was Frank Sinatra. Frank Sinatra back in the 40s and 50s, before the Civil Rights movement really got its national television push, was advocating equality for African Americans and Latinos. Frank Sinatra would refuse to play places if they didn’t let Sammy Davis, Jr. sit in the audience.
And you know, it was really 60s. There was something very sexy about being involved in the Civil Rights movement. It was the thing to do. He did it way before it started to become a big thing in this country.
One of the things I admire about him, Frank Sinatra was the biggest star in the world and he lost it all. He went back to playing saloons. Imagine selling out stadiums and then a couple of years later you’re playing saloons in Hoboken, New Jersey. But when he got back on top he never forgot his friends. Love him or hate him, he knew what he wanted. You knew what kind of person he was.
But basically my heroes are, like I’ve said, my cousin, my mom. From a business standpoint I love what Bill Gates is doing. Batman. (Laughter)
Ralph Zuranski: Well, let me ask you this question because you have been through some tough times. You’ve seen life in the inner cities. Would you say there is racism going in both directions in our society?
Michael Davis: Well, I live in Los Angeles, and I am a New Yorker, basically, though I live in L.A. I can tell you, when I drive my car in certain areas of the city, I am very conscious of the police because there is just a stigma out there that young black men driving really nice cars are out there doing something wrong. I don't know if that is racism or racial profiling.
When I first moved here I lived in Beverly Hills. I listen to a lot of audio books. I was listening to an audio book outside my house once, about two o'clock in the morning, and the cops came up behind me, put the lights on, asked me what I was doing. I told them I was listening to an audio book. They asked me where I was going, I said I was going home. They asked me where did I live and I said, “I live right there,” pointing to my door.
The guy said to me, and I will never forget this, “What do you do to live in that kind of a house?” And I made a really bad joke, because I though he would get the joke. He did not get the joke. He made me get out of my car and put the key in the door to make sure that that was my house.
Now, again, I don't know if that was racism as opposed to racial profiling, but I do believe that racism still exists in this country. I think it really is territorial and generational. I think it’s stupid. I think the single dumbest thing on the planet is religious wars and racism. I mean, come on. It is the stupidest thing. But on the flip side of that I think that today's kids really don't see color. Well, most kids don’t see color. You know, the media always gets blamed for certain things, but I think, taking a look at advertisements and TV shows, and you see more racial diversity.
You see more mixed couples in shows and in commercials, you see them in print ads, and they just put it out there. If you take a look at some of these dating shows, which are horrible, you will often see two people dating who come from different races and it is never brought up. In my opinion, and I am not a psychologist, if you just let it be, people also will at some point start to just let it be.
But yeah, to answer your question, I still think racism exists, and I think a lot of it is so generational and so bound up in people. I don't think the LAPD is racist, but just like the NYPD, a lot of these guys' dads were cops, and their grandfathers before them, and there are all these things. You get stories. “You know, once we had to break up this fight over on Crenshaw Boulevard and all these blacks …” You get this stuff embedded in you and after awhile you start making decisions based on what your forefathers have told you.
Now before I moved into the house I’m in now, I was in another one. And the first day I was there, this guy comes across the street and introduces himself. He is very nice and very pleasant. He is now one of my best friends. But when he introduced himself he asked me what I did, and I told him, and I asked him what he did and he said he worked for the city.
Later on when I was talking to my wife, I told her I just met the neighbor across the street, and I said I thought he was a cop. Now, he was a cop. And the reason he did not tell me he was a cop was because as an African American male in L.A., there are just these racial overtones, and he feels it. He is not responsible for it, but he feels it and is cautious about letting me in on that. I guess he thought I would figure it out.
Normally you don't say, "I work for the city.” You say you are a city planner, or "I work for sanitation,” or, “I work for the Port Authority.” He said, “I work for the city,” as opposed to, “I’m a cop.” He didn't want to start off on the wrong foot. He is literally one of my best friends now. I would take a bullet for him, he is such a great guy, so cool. But when he gets out of his patrol car, he feels that tension. I just think a lot of this is generational, Ralph.
But in the stuff we’re doing in the Guardian Line, if you take a look at the bible, the creative bible, not the Bible Bible. We've got maybe 300 characters and it is probably the most diverse universe in comics. It really is. It is very diverse. Urban Ministries is a Christian company. My books are really about good versus evil and doing the right thing. They are a Christian company, but in these books there are Jews and Muslims, we talk about racial, religious, political things.