In the summer of 1989, I joined the KKK. I never formally quit, so I guess technically I’m still a member. Shit, I never thought of that. I’m in the KKK.

The 80s was an interesting time for TV news media, the end of an era. News magazine shows were about a fresh angle on the news. A more in-depth and sometimes dangerous angle. It’s not easy to get advertising when you’re talking about things like corporate corruption, so there was only really 60 Minutes and 20/20.

Of course, the early 90s brought Maria Shriver and all the other big players that are still running the show today and with them came pap news. How to remove soap scum and how to put your children to bed replaced an hour with the mob and dinner with Yasser Arafat. Advertisers were no longer scared to get involved and dozens of news magazine shows appeared on every network.

As an associate producer for the biggest news show on ABC at the time, I was totally unaware of how bad things were becoming and was determined to continue the tradition of biting news commentary.

The cold war was coming to an end and America was already desperate for a new enemy. For a brief moment it was decided that Nazi skinheads were taking over the country. Sensing that this was bullshit, I offered to go undercover to infiltrate hate.

I spent weeks researching hate groups and became an expert on the difference between the Neo-Nazis, the Aryan Nation, the National Alliance and, of course, the KKK. During this research I discovered that Pennsylvania was the hate-crimes capital of America and the KKK was trying to set up a chapter in a town called Yukon because of it. Before I knew it, I was on my way there.

Yukon is a working-class town that is very redneck and very prone to being exploited by the government. That means toxic-waste dumps, corporate pollution and very few social services; the perfect place for the KKK to recruit members.

My first stop in town was the local gay bar. There, the locals regaled me with stories about how homophobic the town was. The customers complained that the bar’s windows were constantly being smashed and their cars were often vandalized. The strange thing is, in a town this dangerous, the gay bar was the safest place to be. Sure, the walls could cave in at any moment, but at least the person next to you doesn’t want to rape and kill you.

Shortly after my arrival in town, a stranger on a white horse (I’m not kidding) came galloping down the main street making an announcement. The town was to come to a rally the next night to talk about the government’s hatred for the people of Yukon.

The next night, following the horseman’s instructions, I went to the KKK recruitment meeting at a nearby campsite. With me were two of my network colleagues, who were there as my back-up.

As I approached the gates of the compound (with a hidden camera in my baseball cap), I was a little nervous, but they waved me right through without so much as a second glance.

You see, the KKK is not hard to infiltrate. It is not a secret society. On the contrary, these are people desperate to get new members. The reason they are so pressed for membership is simple: These are the least articulate and charming people you’ve ever come across. They simply don’t understand the concept of spin.

When the Republicans (the real KKK) say things like, “Tax dollars aren’t the government’s money—it’s your money,” people prick up their ears and take notice. It’s a message that’s easy to digest. If the Grand Wizard really wanted to recruit people, he could talk passionately about government corruption, corporate pollution and unmonitored immigration. He could rail against Reagan, shopping malls and Gary Coleman. Instead, that night at the campsite, all he talked about was...I don’t know what he talked about, actually. He was an unintelligible and insufferable bore.

After what seemed to be an endless rant, most people got in their cars and went home. I told someone in a white robe I wanted to stay and find out more, and he directed me to a cabin where I’d be staying the night. I sent my two partners back to the gay bar but told them to stay by the phone in case there was a problem.

At this point, I have to admit, it was getting a bit scary. All the cabin had was a cheap-looking cot and an empty chest of drawers. I was told to wait there for further instructions.

An hour or so later a man walked in to my cabin, cordially introduced himself, and handed me a rifle. I was to put the gun under my thin mattress, strip naked and go to bed. I did as I was told (well, I kept my bra and panties on) and tried to get some sleep. Then rifle shots started going off.

Apparently my initiation had begun, and that included a dozen men surrounding my cabin and shooting guns into the air. It wasn’t as scary as it sounds. Like building a haunted house in your basement, it was one of those things that was so meant to be scary that it just wasn’t. I should mention, however, that upon hearing the shots a mile away, my assistants jumped into their cars and drove back to New York, leaving me to rot with the KKK for an entire summer—thanks, guys.

The next morning I awoke at dawn, ready to complete the second half of my initiation. Two cars pulled up and we drove into town. I was handed a stack of “monkey money” (essentially Monopoly money with a monkey’s face on the center of the bill) and told we were going on a drive-by.

As we drove by an old black man, everyone threw the monkey money at him and yelled “Here’s your monkey money, monkey, now go back to Africa.” The old man didn’t seem fazed by us; I don’t even think he could hear anything we were saying. He seemed more confused than scared—a reaction that was typical for the Klan.

After about an hour, they seemed satisfied and we went back to the camp. I’d like to tell you more secrets about the Klan. I’d like to write a tell-all about their immense white power and their horrible plot to take over the world, but I’m afraid there’s nothing to say. The next two months were an excruciating combination of painfully boring lectures and pointless road trips.

We were taught about the cryptic symbols on our dollar bills, about the Jews’ stronghold on the government. They tried to peer pressure me into getting a white-power tattoo that said, “I hate niggers,” but I told them I was allergic to needles.

Toward the end of the summer, I wasn’t even using my hidden camera anymore. I had my Betacam on my shoulder for every event and was never questioned about it. I brought it to the cross-burning pictured here thinking there would be some real action going on, but the whole night seemed like a pantomime of a cross burning. It was held in the middle of an empty field so as not to disturb anyone, and everyone was going through the motions, looking at their watches, and passing time. Lines like, “Do not turn your back on the cross” (which they all did) were spoken in the routine monotone of a high-school assembly. These people were not the personification of evil, they were the personification of low-IQ rednecks with nothing to do. Though the barbeques were tasty, that summer was a lifeless bore with very little to redeem it. My only solace was that I was going to debunk the myth of the KKK’s power and have some of the most unique footage the network had ever seen.

Of course, this is late-80s TV, and we were embarking on a new epoch of newslessness. When I returned, I showed my boss some of the highlights and awaited my instructions. I got a phone call the next day and was told my summer in hell was a total waste of time. They were not running the piece because they were concerned that I had committed a hate crime by throwing the monkey money and that violated the network’s standards and practices.

When asked what they thought was going to happen when they sent me to join the KKK, they told me that the real reason they killed the story was that the anchor who originally had wanted to do the story didn’t want to do it anymore. Another explanation they gave me was that not enough people had been recruited by the KKK, so it wasn’t newsworthy.

I knew the truth. My story was cancelled because TV news was over. 1990 was approaching, and infiltrating the KKK has nothing to do with the new fad diet or the problem with Mondays.

That was my last summer working in corporate television and, as I see it, the last year TV news really meant something.

LISA PAULEY

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