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I'd heard Derek Black, the former white-power Arab parent, interviewed before about his past,

but never about the friendships that unfolded over two years with other people in their 20s that changed him.

David Duke was Derek's godfather. Derek designed the kids page when he was 11

for what is known as the first major internet hate site, which his father created and still leads.

But after Derek's ideology was outed in his first year at New College in Florida,

one of the only Orthodox Jews on campus, Matthew Stephenson, invited him to Shabbat dinner.

What happened next is a road map for navigating some of the hardest and most important territory of our time.

It wasn't just I'm angry and you're angry. Once we were quiet enough to talk about it,

there were points to be made that white nationalism was incompatible with a free society.

And it wasn't the first time I had heard that. It wasn't the first time that somebody had told me

that racism is bad. It was just the first time that I've been willing to listen to it.

And I think it's also worth pointing out that over those two years I was legitimately friends

with Derek, even when I frankly didn't know, is actually where he stood.

I'm Christopher Tippett and this is on Being.

I interviewed Derek and Matthew together at the invitation of the United States Holocaust Memorial

Museum in a room that included many Holocaust survivors. The world in which Derek Black was raised

...