Thanks for posting this. I watched the whole thing because though I believe Noah is a thoughtful and sincere guy. He also gets things absolutely wrong on a pretty consistent basis. He gets facts wrong and therefore derives wrong conclusions. I understand why he believes what he believes, but I maintain that any objective review of facts that are readily available to anyone who cares look for them show quite conclusively that he is wrong in the picture he draws of modern America.
Let's begin with something he gets right. Society most certainly is a type of contract and because of racism, black people in America have historically not been able to participate fully in society and have suffered due to systemic injustices. I don't know any reasonable person who would disagree with that assessment of American history. But to hear Noah and his ilk, you would think there had been no progress since 1619 when the first black slaves were brought to the continent. Since 1968 black people have been equal under the law. From the civil rights act on, it has been illegal to discriminate based on race. That is, racism was taken out of the system of laws which set the rules for how we live with each other. I don't for a second suggest that racism was eliminated. I do say however that with the passing of the Civil Righst Act a last major step was taken in fulfilling the promise made by Jefferson to all future Americans, that all men are created equal and entitled to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
But Noah (representing the majority view), looks around and says, "wait, blacks are still poorer, still being disproportionately killed by police, living with crime, lagging in education, therefore systemic racism still exists". This is where he goes wrong. The facts do not support the conclusion that disparate outcomes in society are due to racism. If that were true, you would not see almost every immigrant group-including from some black societies-outperform multi-generaltional black Americans and in many instances out performing whites.
If you want to begin to understand why black men are killed by police at 2.5 times the rate of white men, don't be lazy and just chalk it up to "systemic racism". Instead, ask why police are coming into contact with black men at so much higher rates than they do with other groups. Look into why those interactions are happening. I've shared these stats before, but really consider them seriously. Police kill about 1000 people per year in the U.S. Of that number, about half are white, 25% are black and the other 25% are latino and mixed. Of the number of blacks killed by police--about 250--less than 10% are unarmed. Weigh that against the millions and millions of interactions police have with black people each year and then explain to me how we live in a society where blacks are justified in believing that it's open season on them, that they are at risk of police violence every time the go out doors. Again, i don't say that there aren't horror stories and bad cops, but anecdotes are not science. If you go by the stats, the problem that Noah is almost moved to tears on does not exist.