Why Do Black People Define Blackness & Black Progress So Narrowly? - Kehinde Andrews & Sean Goode

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;24;29 Speaker 1 Hello. Welcome to the Baldwin and Co podcast. I am DJ Johnson. I am the founder and CEO of Baldwin and Co. We are a coffee shop and bookstore located down here in New Orleans, Louisiana. We're in the Marina area right outside of the French Quarter. So next time you're in the area or in the city, make sure to drop by seven intellectual stimulation seven days a week from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.. 00;00;25;01 - 00;00;57;03 Speaker 1 It's just a good time. Good vibe. Make sure to drop in. We have a great podcast for you today to amazing intellects. We have Sean. Good. Sean is a writer and a cultural thinker whose work interrogates black identity, power, and political meaning. Embedded in pop culture. And he's joined in conversation with Candy Andrews, who is a scholar of black studies and author whose work challenges liberal myths of progress and exposes the structural realities of racism in capitalism. 00;00;57;06 - 00;01;22;09 Speaker 1 And in this conversation, it is less of a debate than a confrontation with Uncuffed, Sean and Candy. They move fluidly between culture, politics and history, and they argue that the West is not broken, but is actually operating exactly as it's designed to operate, and that liberation can not be found in proximity to power or personal successes, powerless narratives. 00;01;22;10 - 00;01;34;29 Speaker 1 It's a fascinating conversation. One I think you will certainly enjoy. So, as always, please like it. Please subscribe and, make sure you share with at least one person. Enjoy. 00;01;35;04 - 00;01;40;21 Speaker 2 Kinda kinda. Andrew's a professor of black studies and author. 00;01;40;23 - 00;02;01;20 Speaker 1 Yeah. That works. Sean, the founder movement makers. Whoa. What's in a name? I prioritize even getting started. I'm over here, like, working it through my head because names matter so much to me. In fact, I'm one of those people that, like, is notorious for calling everybody brother, sister or family. Because how quickly I lose a name. 00;02;01;20 - 00;02;03;27 Speaker 1 Yeah. But kinda. 00;02;04;02 - 00;02;04;24 Speaker 2 Yes. 00;02;04;26 - 00;02;06;29 Speaker 1 I where do they come from? 00;02;07;02 - 00;02;09;21 Speaker 2 It's a lot in their name, actually. It's a urban name, a Nigerian. 00;02;09;21 - 00;02;10;08 Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah. 00;02;10;14 - 00;02;25;14 Speaker 2 Many people still think I'm Nigerian. Yeah, I'm actually not my family's Caribbean, but I grew up in British Black power. So all of us have African names, and I'm actually misnamed because the name is supposed to be a twin name. Okay. But in the book, anything before the internet, right? I'm just saying it's like a moon, which I am. 00;02;25;14 - 00;02;30;14 Speaker 2 A second woman is no twin. So it's supposed to be the Taiwo there is not unless there's an evil Taiwo running around. 00;02;30;19 - 00;02;39;28 Speaker 1 Yeah. I mean like one would love to believe, right? Or there's like the other side of you. They have you have you name the other part of you like that, the shadowy side of you. Maybe you could just call that the twin. 00;02;39;28 - 00;02;41;01 Speaker 2 Yes, that's a good idea. 00;02;41;01 - 00;02;41;29 Speaker 1 And I mean like, yeah. 00;02;42;03 - 00;02;43;05 Speaker 2 So how many is Taiwo. 00;02;43;09 - 00;03;02;16 Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah. I had no like romantic like or cool story of my name. Sean means gift from God. And so I grown up with that impression about my life, which sometimes feeds into like my the narcissism in my family. No. I'm kidding. You know, one thing. My mother did tell me that my name meant gift from God. 00;03;02;16 - 00;03;22;15 Speaker 1 But what she also told me, with whom much is given, much is required. Okay. And so I've had the fortune of living a life where I find myself in service wherever I can be, to those that I care deeply for. Yeah. So cool to be in space with you. You just wrote a thing, about Malcolm X, and I am deeply curious how a brother from the UK, like, meets Malcolm. 00;03;22;15 - 00;03;34;00 Speaker 1 Yeah. And also, like some of the context that you operate out of. Yeah. So, like, I met Malcolm at a really pivotal time in my life, but, like, when did you meet Malcolm? 00;03;34;02 - 00;03;48;15 Speaker 2 I mean, it's hard to say lazy. Malcolm was a kind of figure. Just always been around. Like I said, I grew up in British black power. So, you know, we had Malcolm Garvey. We had in the bookshop. Actually, I used to work at the Harriet Tubman Bookshop. Okay, I say work it. I was volunteered to work in the bookshop. 00;03;48;16 - 00;03;51;08 Speaker 1 Volunteered to work at a bookshop, got it, got my backpack. 00;03;51;13 - 00;04;08;25 Speaker 2 And so all these things are just kind of in around I mean, specifically, I picked up the autobiography, probably I want to say 16 probably. And it was a pivotal time, actually, because people who know me now would be surprised, allowing for a proper, what do you call a hare Oreo? We say bounty bar or anything but Oreo White. 00;04;08;27 - 00;04;09;28 Speaker 2 I went for a proper white face. 00;04;10;03 - 00;04;12;00 Speaker 1 I have. 00;04;12;03 - 00;04;13;07 Speaker 3 Like a full on. 00;04;13;07 - 00;04;16;15 Speaker 1 Fast, fast fast fast fast. Okay, so. 00;04;16;15 - 00;04;19;07 Speaker 3 Like we just need the cultural. 00;04;19;07 - 00;04;19;27 Speaker 1 Context. 00;04;19;27 - 00;04;22;14 Speaker 3 Right? Are you like, you start the activity. 00;04;22;14 - 00;04;28;25 Speaker 1 Much on Twitter because they're all, like, growing up as a multiracial black man. As loud as I am. Like words like Oreo, right? 00;04;28;25 - 00;04;35;12 Speaker 3 Like that's that's opened up. So hold on, hold on. So in the UK, tell me, what was an Oreo face? 00;04;35;15 - 00;04;36;26 Speaker 2 So what was it they call it? 00;04;36;26 - 00;04;37;28 Speaker 3 What was it? What do they call it? 00;04;38;02 - 00;04;43;29 Speaker 2 Which is, bounty or coconut? Coconut? Bang. Bounty chocolate bar. Nah, it's like coconut inside. 00;04;44;00 - 00;04;46;23 Speaker 1 Okay. So, so like, like an almond Joy as well. 00;04;46;23 - 00;04;48;11 Speaker 3 Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. 00;04;48;12 - 00;05;04;23 Speaker 2 So there's but you know, but I do I know some of these things are like, what is black, what is white. But I went through a phase where all my friends away, everything I wanted to do was white. All the music was white. Let see these. Entire senior collection. The the the the low point was Amber Hanson. 00;05;04;25 - 00;05;06;12 Speaker 2 But it didn't matter. 00;05;06;14 - 00;05;08;15 Speaker 3 But it it was. 00;05;08;15 - 00;05;09;07 Speaker 2 Like a trigger. 00;05;09;07 - 00;05;13;22 Speaker 3 It supposed to, you know, to finish that. Don't do it to me like that. It's too far back. Okay. 00;05;13;28 - 00;05;21;01 Speaker 2 Put me back in. Got you know, but I'm the album. It's not, not nothing. I went to a sample album, you know? 00;05;21;03 - 00;05;22;04 Speaker 1 So you bought, like, the whole CD? 00;05;22;11 - 00;05;24;26 Speaker 2 Yeah, the whole album from Tower Records was. 00;05;24;27 - 00;05;26;00 Speaker 3 It was that. You got. 00;05;26;06 - 00;05;28;00 Speaker 1 It. Oh, that was Rock mum. 00;05;28;03 - 00;05;35;15 Speaker 3 Now. Okay, we'll get into the Malcolm thing in a minute. Right. But I think kind of connect with this book for different reasons though. Right. 00;05;35;19 - 00;05;43;25 Speaker 1 Like what sent you down the path? And I don't necessarily want to call it, like, de-identify, but, like, leaning into white identity in that way. 00;05;43;28 - 00;05;59;22 Speaker 2 Two things. One, so I said, my I grew up in Black Power. My dad obviously is very, you know, pro-black, probably, and partly just like a I'm a teenager. I don't want to do my dad was going to be. But the main thing really was the schools. So into a school, it was so, so context here. 00;05;59;22 - 00;06;19;28 Speaker 2 Birmingham is, big black community, hands with where my dad grew up. And I'm Handsworth Wood, which is kind of the nice part of then, but it's you so black and brown. But the schools were so bad back in the day that we weren't allowed to go to a local school. So we got essentially got bus like most, to a school in the white neighborhood, and there was black box. 00;06;19;28 - 00;06;36;12 Speaker 2 Basically, they took the black into this white school. And as soon as you got into the school, it was really, really clear. If you black, you do badly in school and you what you do well and I'm like, well look, I do well. So I'm going to be with the white kids there. And it really was the thing was I was like a actual I have to reject the black kids because I do it in the school. 00;06;36;14 - 00;06;38;25 Speaker 2 Yeah. And so for a good few years in school, I was just like, everything. 00;06;38;28 - 00;07;04;02 Speaker 1 Everything was what? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, I took a different path. When I was nine, we left my father. Yeah. And my father caused a ton of harm in the house, and he's. He's my father's black. My mother's white. And so growing, like, at that point in time in my life, like, everything that was blackness was held inside of my father's identity. 00;07;04;05 - 00;07;17;28 Speaker 1 And so when we left him, I was like, I'm renouncing all aspects of that. And I did everything I could to, like, to to really lean into white culture. One of the funny stories is, there was a period. 00;07;17;28 - 00;07;20;01 Speaker 3 Of time in the, in the late. 00;07;20;01 - 00;07;26;23 Speaker 1 80s, early 90s where kids were having these side spikes, where they were part the hair one way and part of the other, and then spike up the middle. 00;07;26;24 - 00;07;27;23 Speaker 3 Okay. 00;07;27;25 - 00;07;30;12 Speaker 1 And I tried to give it a go, and I had, like, a side fro. 00;07;30;19 - 00;07;40;02 Speaker 3 I don't know why, because it was just like, I just because it is the texture and is what it do, what it did with the other kids weaving. I even tried to like, use LA looks gel. Right. 00;07;40;02 - 00;08;00;21 Speaker 1 Like which is dried out the mess out of the hair. I had no clue what I was doing because, because blackness was like this, this embodiment in my father who had caused harm. And it and it took some time for that to be redeemed in a way where I could experience blackness as a fuller expression of who we are. 00;08;00;28 - 00;08;15;10 Speaker 1 Yeah. But, man, like, you know, we talk about pendulum swings, like, you know, you go from one identity to the other identity. And I imagine, like, I don't know what it was like for you going from your, your Oreo or Almond Joy, as we call it. 00;08;15;12 - 00;08;16;05 Speaker 3 Phase. 00;08;16;07 - 00;08;22;06 Speaker 1 But like, when that pendulum swung back the other direction, coming from a black power family, like, what did that look like? 00;08;22;08 - 00;08;37;25 Speaker 2 Yeah, it was with. I mean, and it's interesting to my hair because the actually when I really realized it was I really wanting white hair, I really wanted to constrict. And then I was thinking, this is wrong. Something's going really wrong. You. And because I was in because, like, my mom, my mom and dad's house just bear books everywhere. 00;08;37;26 - 00;08;54;27 Speaker 2 Yeah, and every books. But. Yeah, so I just I was actually walking past the bookshelf. And so Stokely speaks, and, oh, original stuff because he's got glasses on, he's got a little afro and I'm gone. He looks ridiculous. So I actually picked up the book and it's going to be funny. Yeah. Joked yeah. So yeah, book started reading it and honestly everything changed. 00;08;55;04 - 00;09;09;13 Speaker 2 And Malcolm talked about when he was in prison. And then this change in his thinking was a switch to snow off a roof. Yeah, that's what it was like. It was literally like one me to say anything that is. Yeah, completely different. Yeah. And so even my music collection complete everything. But yeah, I had to get rid of all of these. 00;09;09;13 - 00;09;22;16 Speaker 2 I spent loads of money to get. Yeah, I was in Hip-Hop, R&B, all this stuff just. Yeah, but it was. I always say it like it was always there and I was pushing it away. So when it, when I went back to it, it wasn't, it wasn't foreign because I grew up in black was working. 00;09;22;17 - 00;09;27;25 Speaker 1 Yeah. What was it about that, that narrative that drew you back so, so quickly? 00;09;27;27 - 00;09;44;06 Speaker 2 It was just on this, like the way that Stokely was talking about blackness and. Oh, so you hang around white kids enough. You you can try and ignore the racism. I always, I felt he was saying microaggressions, but the actual racist. Yeah, you try and ignore it. But then when you hear it, when you read somebody say no, it's like, oh, okay, I get that. 00;09;44;06 - 00;09;46;17 Speaker 2 Understood? Yeah. You see, the first time and he was the same the first time. 00;09;46;17 - 00;10;05;08 Speaker 1 I mean, yeah. Because, in some cases, like enough to forget. Yeah. All right. Where like, white kids get super comfortable and would start, like, saying things and, and engaging in ways that are deeply problematic because they forget like that. I'm not them. Yeah. And I also was going to a school that was really, really, really white. 00;10;05;08 - 00;10;29;05 Speaker 1 And as a result, it was easy to, like, blend and hide, which, you know, like at that season, a life was, was what I felt like I needed to feel safe. Yeah. And to stand out was to feel like you were in danger. For me, it was when my brother, my brother was, when he was, when he was young, was, incarcerated until he was 21 years old. 00;10;29;07 - 00;10;55;18 Speaker 1 So from 13 to 21, he was locked up. And when he got released, he came to the house, and he became he, like, he was the catalyst for me then having something else to ground. Black identity in that then created a much more expansive experience that did absolutely start with, like for me, I started it with like rap music and rap culture and being in the West Coast of the States, it was like West Coast gangsta rap, right? 00;10;55;18 - 00;11;22;19 Speaker 1 And I always talk about like, man, like, I feel like my first teachers of black culture wasn't, scholars or authors or revolution areas in a traditional fashion. It was like spice one. It was Richie Rich, it was E-40. Yeah, it was POC, right. And these were poets that had a different, a different message. Yeah. But it was a message that was still crying out for a freedom. 00;11;22;23 - 00;11;25;08 Speaker 1 Yeah. A freedom in the only context that they knew. 00;11;25;11 - 00;11;43;26 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, Let's Get Free has a Dead praise has a special place on that. Yeah. That album really unlocked a lot. Yeah. And the hip hop, the hip hop music, we don't give that work enough credit. It's like it's intellectual labor. Yeah, and it's passing on. There's a song common as a song on his album for common. 00;11;43;29 - 00;11;51;27 Speaker 2 Common, basically. So there is a big shame and there is like lyrically difficult to talk to come and lyrically. Yeah. But he proposed that Like Water For chocolate is still. 00;11;51;28 - 00;11;53;10 Speaker 1 One of the. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. 00;11;53;10 - 00;12;05;00 Speaker 2 And that song, song for a Saturday night, I know it was named this night after a massage ago that I never would have had a massage were it not for that song. Anyway, he blends in the autobiography with this poetry, right? 00;12;05;01 - 00;12;41;14 Speaker 1 Yeah. I mean, he definitely one of the greatest poets in hip hop. In fact, Jay-Z gave him a shout out. And when his lines you said, truthfully, I rhyme like common sense, but I did 5 million. I have been rhyming like common sense. All right, and I paraphrase, I probably got part of that bar wrong, but like, but yeah, you know, like there is a deep history of deep thinking authors, poets, writers within hip hop that, that often don't get the same credibility as revolutionaries who are leading a way out of, like, abstract poverty and, out of dire circumstances, situations and, and blazing a trail. 00;12;41;14 - 00;13;16;09 Speaker 1 Maybe not like the healthiest trail or the most pro-social trail, or the trail that provided the liberation for many, but yet looking for a way out of no way. I mean, that has been the history of, black Americans. Which, like, brings me to a curiosity I, I know a lot about, like, my experience as a multiracial black man and, and the privilege that I've held in my pigment and what that's played out like, and the places where it hasn't served at all, and all the complexity that lies in that, what is that been like for you in a UK context? 00;13;16;11 - 00;13;35;27 Speaker 2 Well, I mean, this is one that's, my mum's, born in the UK, so most, most, most people in the UK, black people in UK is migration, is the reply. My dad came from Jamaica in the 60s. My mum was actually born here in Fowey in the 40s, late 40s. And her mum's English and her dad was black, Arab, Jamaican and interestingly we actually a mum. 00;13;35;27 - 00;13;55;16 Speaker 2 That was the revolutionary. My mum was the one who went to met all the Pan-African leaders because up in Manchester, where she lived there, we had to have a social club and so she literally had letters from that and Cruella, Mugabe, people like that. And then that was probably reactionary, like even told her we made a documentary for the Malcolm X book, called Nobody Can Give You Freedom. 00;13;55;19 - 00;14;24;00 Speaker 2 And I interviewed my parents. Mum told the story about she said when then dad said, when you get to ten, you can, straighten your hair like it was a pride. That and it'd be white. This whole thing would be way be white. Getting lost. But thankfully, my mum took the opposite way, right? She was like, nah, I'm going to embrace blackness, you know, got involved in Britain better married my dad, etc., etc. so for me it's interesting because in the UK now like probably earlier than here, multiple like mixed race or biracial, we say mixed race, not really by race. 00;14;24;00 - 00;14;43;11 Speaker 2 Who became a thing, but I never have a mum say that one black leg is better. No, no, you just would never. It's not language even is aware of. All right. And so that's, that's the cauldron that I grew and blackness is such a big part of this is a big part of like Birmingham. If you don't know, Birmingham is a hugely important place in terms of movement. 00;14;43;13 - 00;14;51;18 Speaker 2 Black power in, in the UK. So I'm, I'm lucky to grow up there because that's, that's the base anyway. That's where I'm here. My parents Birmingham. That's, that's what gets me to be in this place now. 00;14;51;21 - 00;14;53;18 Speaker 1 So how does Colourism play out there. 00;14;53;20 - 00;15;10;05 Speaker 2 Or does it is it 100%? I mean, it's just like in the Caribbean though, like light skinned, dusky. And there's a huge colorism issue. And even me, I'm I'm relatively light skinned. Right. So no, there there's a kind of I don't know that is benefits of to same as is that I always say racism is the global system. 00;15;10;07 - 00;15;24;10 Speaker 2 So anything you see in here, you're going to see in the UK, particularly because the UK really is going to the architect of America, which is the. Yeah, as well. So you know, color is a is a is a massive problem. But so I think that's why it's powerful when people who could take the privilege. 00;15;24;10 - 00;15;25;00 Speaker 3 Route. 00;15;25;02 - 00;15;42;23 Speaker 2 Don't and actually say, nah, you know what? I know for a fact that one of the reasons my mum married my dad, because it's you, he's a very, very like she was the only. I even went to black. And that's a political thing, right? Blackness is a political thing. And their choice an important choice to me. 00;15;42;25 - 00;15;43;13 Speaker 3 Well. 00;15;43;16 - 00;16;15;03 Speaker 1 Fun to conversation from too lightly. Melanated. And so another lightly melanated. Back to back to Malcolm. Yeah. Right. Now, when did I met Malcolm? Is Detroit red? Yeah. Because there's something like we all love a good, reclamation story, right? Where, the whole started from the bottom. Now we're here. Yeah. And no matter how great the writing is and the authorship, it never truly captures the journey. 00;16;15;06 - 00;16;35;15 Speaker 1 But we're all I. I. I'll speak for myself. Looking for someone to identify with who, like, has gone through, overcome much and then found themselves out on the other side, more locked into their identity. I think about my upbringing. I grew up in a household with two parents that navigated mental health issues. My father a schizophrenic. My mother suffered from dissociative identity disorder. 00;16;35;17 - 00;16;58;16 Speaker 1 Right. The trauma that ensued from, like, the nature of their relationship and, and, and how that became explosive at times. The leaving of that relationship, the transient nature of our life that then followed, right. Like the the mixing in and out of groups of people who very well could have, like if I were to stay tapped in with, I could have chosen a dynamically different path. 00;16;58;18 - 00;17;17;24 Speaker 1 And yet, in the midst of it all, I hear I get to be. Yeah. And because in this, like in a business of who I get to be in the space, there's it feels like a responsibility to that. A responsibility for those that didn't get to be, and to those who were part of the ecosystem that allowed me to grow to this place of fruition. 00;17;17;27 - 00;17;43;11 Speaker 1 So when I, when I met Malcolm, from Detroit Red and even in his early childhood narrative, I can begin to see myself reflected back. Yeah. Absent the carceral stint. But then, like this radicalization that then turns into a realization of what always has been true. Yeah. And that feels so much of the narrative arc of Malcolm. 00;17;43;11 - 00;18;11;16 Speaker 1 Yeah. As a black American, his story for me is more compelling than than Martin Luther King Jr story. And in some ways more honest. Yeah. Because there's a texture to it. Really not similar to his comic, that is, but a texture, a texture to it, that, that allows for it to feel real. 00;18;11;17 - 00;18;47;26 Speaker 1 Yeah. And I don't think that, like, unfortunately, he only gets to live in martyrdom often. Right? It's like you hear, vitriol, you hear black nationalism, you hear pro-black, but you don't get the nuance. Yeah. And then you hear murdered. Yeah. Right. And then, like, conspiracy connected to murder. Where with, Martin, you get a full breadth of narrative and, supporting stories that position him as something that actually, as history tells it is a little less accurate. 00;18;48;01 - 00;18;52;02 Speaker 2 Well, they're actively trying to suppress any of the thinking of man, right? 00;18;52;06 - 00;18;52;28 Speaker 3 Yeah. Yeah. 00;18;52;29 - 00;19;07;29 Speaker 2 Deeply flawed. Yeah, yeah. But let's bottom left, part of the myth of Malcolm. Right? There's a whole myths of it, which is this empty cartoon character where he's angry black man, he's white people, goes and embraces Islam, kind of changes his mind and gets killed, and that's it. 00;19;08;06 - 00;19;08;15 Speaker 3 Yeah. 00;19;08;21 - 00;19;26;19 Speaker 2 And then there's this entire story, right? Right, right. Oh that's it dude. There's no substance to it. And it just becomes this figure of this is what revolutionary. Is this just a dead end, right? That's not my accent. I'm. The more I think about it, the more it's probably a conspiracy to. You need. Representing Malcolm in that way does a lot of damage. 00;19;26;19 - 00;19;30;25 Speaker 2 Yeah, because it puts us off. Yeah. I should be saying already, Malcolm. What it more the actual thing. Right. Oh, the actual bullet. 00;19;30;26 - 00;19;54;02 Speaker 1 Right, right, right. It's And then, how strong the narrative was. I played Malcolm, in a play with that was about Malcolm and Martin meeting in a hotel room. Excuse me. And, and having a conversation for the first time. And so much of the dialog was, Martin, sharing where he thought that he had been wronged. 00;19;54;02 - 00;20;11;19 Speaker 1 And Malcolm, expressing like how the harm that Martin's done to the movement in many ways. And my mother in law, when she found out that I was playing Malcolm, she was like, why? Because so ingrained in her memory was, the vilification. 00;20;11;21 - 00;20;13;05 Speaker 2 The horns. Right? Yeah. I can feel the horns. 00;20;13;07 - 00;20;50;26 Speaker 1 Yeah. Of Malcolm X, right. And how he caused harm to the movement because of his, violent and, and explosive ways, and I, I like I embody the mess out of that role so much so that I began to, like, espouse nationalist viewpoints that weren't necessarily in alignment with where I am. Yeah. But, like, I held it so tight because of how much of Malcolm I was listening to and and internalizing, what I left with was he loved black people so very much, and that love was greater than any hate that he had for any other. 00;20;50;29 - 00;20;57;20 Speaker 1 Yeah. And it was because he loved. Yeah. So big that he despised those that would cause harm to those he loved. 00;20;57;23 - 00;21;10;13 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, really he said it's love teaching. It's not hate teaching is love teaching. Yeah. I wouldn't tell you this unless I loved you. Yeah. And I think we miss that because we, we hear something like as Negro. And you think that's just an insult? Yeah. I kind of hear you kind of in his lesson with the British. 00;21;10;15 - 00;21;25;29 Speaker 2 Right. But the reason is, as you say, no, you're missing the point. Like this, this you're going to do, you're going to crash. This is. Yeah. You can't make it society. You should be. We're know. Yeah. That's the point. Yeah. Region is that's why I've always. Even though I used to get cool Dante coconut, all this stuff that was out of love. 00;21;26;00 - 00;21;30;06 Speaker 2 Still I get it. No, I get it. You're telling me I'm going wrong and I'm missing now. 00;21;30;09 - 00;21;31;24 Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah I was. Yeah, you're right. 00;21;31;24 - 00;21;44;08 Speaker 2 Yeah I know I don't feel upset by that. All right. Because that's about Love is back. It's about. And that's what Malcolm really was. Sometimes you have to give people tough love. Right. And if you do if you go in the story tell someone they're going the story. Yeah. And make it plain. 00;21;44;14 - 00;22;07;16 Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah. Where I think there's an invitation for curiosity though is how narrow blackness then gets defined in. All right. Because we can, you know, joke about like our pop culture, dives into what would consider whiteness, but like, historically like that, we run into that right as blackness becomes this really narrow lane that then, like, you have to be able to travel down in order to be considered black. 00;22;07;18 - 00;22;26;23 Speaker 1 And if you live outside the margins of what is defined as blackness, then all of a sudden, like, you're not the right kind of black. And some of that, fortunately has dissipated over time. And what blackness gets to be in 2025 is so much broader than what it was when you and I were teenagers or in our early 20s. 00;22;26;25 - 00;22;46;13 Speaker 1 I mean, I know that I age really well, so I clearly like my father's melanin is in here somewhere. Right? But like but but it there is a pause in that narrative where we can see at a time where blackness was being weaponized in such a way that folks are trying to get their hands around what is black. 00;22;46;13 - 00;23;02;16 Speaker 2 Yeah, but that's the key thing of Malcolm. No is this Malcolm gives you the blackness that isn't cultural. Actually. What the I actually identified in Malcolm's transformation, not because his life was like mine was not very much that went into it was like mine in the sense of black power growing up. He rejected that power. Right. I relate to Black Bear. 00;23;02;16 - 00;23;07;14 Speaker 2 And when they write what they write right here the about. 00;23;07;17 - 00;23;09;19 Speaker 3 But did it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00;23;09;23 - 00;23;30;09 Speaker 2 He went to the streets. Yeah. But that street is just is just as much of rejection as blackness. And that's rejecting black power. You're in the streets. You also when you go into prison that's not that's that's one when we think about House Negro we always think about the middle class. But actually this map we're looking at Malcolm that that's, you know, instead of something else, there's another way to be has, which is actually the hostility of what they want you to be. 00;23;30;12 - 00;23;34;11 Speaker 2 And that image of blackness is not the image we need. That's not from us. Yeah. No no. 00;23;34;14 - 00;23;35;11 Speaker 3 No no, I'm top. 00;23;35;12 - 00;23;50;13 Speaker 2 Right. So yeah. Well Malcolm. Yeah. So why of Malcolm is he has this refer rejection and says let's go to blackness. And what does this mean. It means being politically connected to other black people. Yeah. Doesn't mean about it's not about what music is into. It's not about where you go. It's not that it's about being politically connected. 00;23;50;16 - 00;23;54;03 Speaker 2 And if we keep that as what blackness is, then we're fine. 00;23;54;05 - 00;23;54;13 Speaker 3 Right. 00;23;54;13 - 00;24;25;17 Speaker 1 Well, and where I so where I can agree with you. Is blackness as a social construct, created by those who were in power to disenfranchize a population of people, an effort to move them out of the way? Yeah. And so and that is the, the justification for the construct. Then there's an invitation to leverage the construct to build political power across the globe where we stand united, despite the context that we may have been born into. 00;24;25;20 - 00;24;58;09 Speaker 1 I can't even front, though, when you equated like, house Negro, to growing up in context where, alternative methods to survival are normalized. Because that's what they want us to be is, is, that that's challenging for me. Because what I witnessed growing up wasn't necessarily a clear choice point and more so of response to what the environment dictated was necessary for survival. 00;24;58;12 - 00;24;59;24 Speaker 2 But that's exactly the same in middle class. 00;24;59;27 - 00;25;00;12 Speaker 3 What? No, no. 00;25;00;12 - 00;25;03;00 Speaker 2 I think what I'm about is, the house is always about mentality, right? 00;25;03;00 - 00;25;03;12 Speaker 3 Well, I. 00;25;03;18 - 00;25;11;13 Speaker 1 Mean, if we're going to go back to the plantation. Right. And the house Negro, the house Negro, there was a benefit that the house negro reap from its proximity to whiteness. 00;25;11;18 - 00;25;12;11 Speaker 2 But not much of a. 00;25;12;11 - 00;25;14;24 Speaker 3 Benefit. Right, right, right, right, right, right, right. 00;25;14;24 - 00;25;53;13 Speaker 1 Still, it's still enslaved. Right. But there was a perceived benefit. Yeah. Okay, a perceived benefit. And in the house, Negroes proximity to whiteness. And I do believe that white adjacency, has and continues to be a, a very nuanced temptation for people who are looking for quick access to power. Right. What I wouldn't say is that those who are growing up the furthest away from historical power are somehow becoming adjacent to that power, because they're falling into the trap that has been intentionally set for their own demise. 00;25;53;15 - 00;26;03;23 Speaker 1 It feels much less like being a house Negro, and much more like being enslaved in a context where you don't actually know that freedom's available to you. 00;26;03;26 - 00;26;07;01 Speaker 3 And the same as Negro Land. That's what it is, you know? 00;26;07;06 - 00;26;14;24 Speaker 2 So, for example, if it has, you know, your choice to be an educator in the house, right? You're being given these choices, and that. Correct. Because the thing that house is actually about mentality. 00;26;14;25 - 00;26;19;07 Speaker 1 Why I would just what I would say is that I, it's much easier for me to see middle class. 00;26;19;10 - 00;26;20;14 Speaker 2 And know blessed we see it. 00;26;20;16 - 00;27;01;05 Speaker 1 But I but far less to see the plantation and I what I'd offer is that like, it's harder for me growing up in that context to see that as plantation or as house, right? When it feels much more like the plantation, when I'm traveling, when I'm supporting organizations and and community leaders who are working in context, where people haven't lived outside of the blocks that they've grown up in, and there's no social or economic mobility for them to move outside of those spaces, and then they will live in those spaces, they will die in those spaces, and many of them die early on in their years before they have the chance to fully express 00;27;01;05 - 00;27;24;28 Speaker 1 themselves. There's no there is no notion or hint of privilege that they're leaning into, as a result of their acquiescence to the, the system. That's been set before them. In fact, there's not even there's an awareness that the system has been created to produce these outcomes, but there's not necessarily an access point to beat to off road. 00;27;25;00 - 00;27;25;11 Speaker 1 Right? 00;27;25;16 - 00;27;42;07 Speaker 2 Yeah. But the point I'm making is that it's a bad mentality, right. More than stock. So structurally, it hasn't, you know, damn it, I'm in a position which is way more privileged. And most people. But it's a mentality, right. And obviously it's not. And the whole point of failure is we we think imagining it as an insult. 00;27;42;07 - 00;27;43;29 Speaker 2 I'm trying to say don't think of as an engineer. 00;27;44;00 - 00;27;58;05 Speaker 3 No, no, I think I got you. But you said it. And I got to say, man, I know. And so now we're going back and you go like, oh yeah, well I'm like, well I, I know that, I know they use different language in the UK. I mean, it's like it's but no, that because I hear you because. 00;27;58;05 - 00;28;12;27 Speaker 2 One of the things you do if you can't if, if it's not always authentic because it's a verb, in fact, it's not a lot of the stuff in the food is not authentic, rising, authentic. And so more so I actually use that in this context, not more so with the people who don't have a choice that if you look at between our choices. 00;28;12;29 - 00;28;23;05 Speaker 2 But when we think about gangsta rap, think about someone like little Wayne, sorry, you you address that as Negro. I don't know what to say. I don't even know what to call it other than that, when you're going in there rapping, moving like a slave. 00;28;23;10 - 00;28;23;23 Speaker 3 I mean. 00;28;23;26 - 00;28;24;10 Speaker 2 Like a club. 00;28;24;11 - 00;28;36;11 Speaker 3 Like that would not be. I think if you I know. What did you like? I mean, now you're going to bring him in here in New Orleans, right, like I do. I know what your neighborhood is asking. Well, you know, and there's folks that there's folks. 00;28;36;11 - 00;28;59;06 Speaker 1 That would agree, because you're continuing to promote a particular narrative that may be out of alignment with the life that you're actually living now. Right? But, like, I don't know what what makes like I mean, sure, I mean, Lil Wayne, writes music and creates music that he doesn't don't think he writes. He makes up freestyles. A lot of what he does. 00;28;59;09 - 00;29;00;11 Speaker 3 He creates. 00;29;00;14 - 00;29;08;23 Speaker 1 He creates music that speaks to his audience, that continues to allow him to be gainfully employed in the hip hop profession. 00;29;08;26 - 00;29;17;12 Speaker 2 Yeah, but that's the same. By the same token, Candace, Candace Owens, right? Right. So forth in that let allows the beginning and they both do the. 00;29;17;12 - 00;29;19;02 Speaker 3 Same thing, right? I mean, but like. 00;29;19;04 - 00;29;27;14 Speaker 1 So, which, so who isn't? Like what is through that. Right. Which one of us isn't? In some way. 00;29;27;14 - 00;29;35;12 Speaker 2 Some of us are trying to be one. Hopefully some of us are trying to say, well, how do we benefit? How do we move our community forward? Right. That's a Malcolm message. How do you move your community? 00;29;35;15 - 00;29;36;05 Speaker 3 Can can you? 00;29;36;05 - 00;29;36;18 Speaker 2 When I stuff I. 00;29;36;18 - 00;29;38;00 Speaker 3 Knew in the beginning, I mean, can you. 00;29;38;00 - 00;29;59;09 Speaker 1 Do that like positionally, right. If you're like, can you benefit from capitalism, in a construct that has historically caused harm. Yeah. And leverage the benefit that you're having from capitalism to move a collective people forward, even if you're propagating a message that may be inconsistent with the direction that you want the people to go. 00;29;59;11 - 00;30;14;04 Speaker 2 No, no, you can't. I mean, if you if you if the way you make money is to is to prevent is to present a, a narrative that holds us back, whether that be more in the field of more than as you point find a problem. I think we should and I think we should be okay to say that's part of the problem. 00;30;14;06 - 00;30;16;23 Speaker 2 So, actually, Lil Wayne wouldn't even care. That's the only. 00;30;16;24 - 00;30;24;09 Speaker 3 Thing I know. What? I'm just I'm I'm I'm tugging on it for the sake of tugging on it, and not necessarily because I, like I disagree, disagree, but I think. 00;30;24;09 - 00;30;40;07 Speaker 1 Curiosity, right? I do curiosity because I think about like, man, the, the privilege that I get to live with in this season of life. Right? I got, I got two kids, an 18 year old daughter who's in college, a 23 year old son who graduated from college. I'm married to the most amazing woman in the world. 00;30;40;07 - 00;31;05;06 Speaker 1 I, this year I've traveled to, I've been in London. I've been in Nigeria. I'm going to spend a month in Johannesburg. I'm going to spend a week in Mexico City. Like, I get a chance to move around the globe and journey with humans in a variety of different ways. And, and I'm and I'm living all right now, you know, I we we are we are a black family that owns our home. 00;31;05;09 - 00;31;08;22 Speaker 1 I do drive a Prius, like, for whatever that means. 00;31;08;25 - 00;31;09;27 Speaker 3 And, and and. 00;31;09;27 - 00;31;11;11 Speaker 1 We have, like, we have no. 00;31;11;11 - 00;31;14;02 Speaker 3 Debt, right. 00;31;14;05 - 00;31;37;18 Speaker 1 And I am very much aware that there is a sense of wanting other people to be able to live in this type of liberty, but also wanting to protect what it is that we've had the privilege to live in to. Yeah, for the sake of like my children and my grandchildren. And so there's, there is a unique holding of a tension of. 00;31;37;18 - 00;31;59;02 Speaker 1 Yes, like there needs to be a collective of us and that I'm moving towards the direction of freedom. And we've already witnessed strategies that don't work, like uplift suasion. All right. You know, and like we know that that's not that's not that's not going to work. Right. Like it's not like the talent intent is going to somehow like, like rescue the rest of us. 00;31;59;04 - 00;32;20;29 Speaker 1 So like if it's not about leveraging capitalism, in some form or fashion to create enough resources that then we get to reinvest back into our communities with intention, that then creates the power block, both socio economically and politically, to establish voice that can move things. Then like. 00;32;21;03 - 00;32;47;13 Speaker 2 This. The world, Malcolm tells us the opposite of that is revolution. That this is why I love Malcolm. Malcolm makes it plain a system can normal provide freedom for black people than a chicken? Can they adopt it? So what do we do? We should do something radically different. Revolutionary given, which is not just in America, is about uniting across the world is a thing, is a black nationalism, which is global and says, look, this America is never going to be further free without Britain is never going to be. 00;32;47;13 - 00;33;03;23 Speaker 2 For me, that's not it's never going to happen. But there is alternatives to that. We could make it work if we organize collectively, etc., etc. but that does mean reaching out. And actually, interestingly enough, Malcolm spent so much time reaching out to the masses, right, saying we need to do something differently. It was amazing. It really wasn't even for the field Negro, particularly. 00;33;03;23 - 00;33;18;15 Speaker 2 One more for the field Negro. Say, look, we have a responsibility to do things differently. And that's about all the leveraging our power collectively to, to to create something new, not just trying to fix something is a broken. America is not broken. America is the America is racism. It's always going to be racism is always going to give you right. 00;33;18;16 - 00;33;25;25 Speaker 2 It's never going to there's no end point to this where you have freedom in America. So once you accept that, you never say, what do we do differently? Yeah. 00;33;26;02 - 00;33;27;27 Speaker 3 Well, yeah. So Malcolm gives, I think, what. 00;33;28;00 - 00;33;37;11 Speaker 1 It's like for you to, for you to say that, like, as my daughter was, say, ten toes down, I, it sounds different, right? Because you're going to hop back across the pond, do. 00;33;37;12 - 00;33;39;29 Speaker 3 What I say, you know, say no, no, no, I just say. But like the context. 00;33;39;29 - 00;33;49;09 Speaker 1 Is different though, right? The context is different because you get to hop back across the pond and say, like America, like y'all, like, y'all are going to stay on the field as long as like you're in America. 00;33;49;10 - 00;33;51;25 Speaker 2 Like it is the same in Britain. 00;33;51;28 - 00;33;53;25 Speaker 3 It is the same same. It's the same, right? 00;33;53;29 - 00;34;05;20 Speaker 1 It is what it is until we decide like like. But there's a complicated tension there, right. 00;34;05;22 - 00;34;08;12 Speaker 3 When does. 00;34;08;15 - 00;34;22;18 Speaker 1 I'm. I'm trying. I think the best way to capture this curiosity. When does the field, no longer become fruitful? And those that have benefited from the reaping simply choose to leave. 00;34;22;20 - 00;34;24;20 Speaker 2 So I leave. Leave the field. Leave. 00;34;24;22 - 00;34;53;21 Speaker 1 Leave the field. Right? I mean, I feel like in America, right? What we're experiencing is an inflection point where holding this narrative a field. Right. Plantation. Yeah. Right. Blackness. Yeah. That there is a groundswell that's becoming even more pronounced, folks from dominant culture who are no longer reaping the fruit. Yeah. From the field that they once thought would perpetually feed them. 00;34;53;24 - 00;34;54;08 Speaker 3 Yeah. 00;34;54;10 - 00;35;14;16 Speaker 1 And as a result, are looking to leave the field and create their own entity inside of the context that no longer needs any of us with. And so and so that's part of like the tension of the moment. That's now is there so much conversation in this country about right and left? 00;35;14;16 - 00;35;15;23 Speaker 3 Yeah. 00;35;15;25 - 00;35;40;24 Speaker 1 And left, because of the way that democracy has been sold and Black Spaces becomes the place that many black folks inhabit. Yeah. Then we become part of a culture war that fundamentally has nothing to do with us. Yeah, but it does, because we we historically become the scapegoat for all the fears that the dominant culture has. 00;35;40;24 - 00;35;58;25 Speaker 1 And so, a part of this is me thinking out loud, right? Like if, if we play the plantation forward, right, I can see clear correlations, right. Like, the ability for black folks in this country to move based on socioeconomic status. We have more black folks with degrees now, but we also have more black folks now. 00;35;59;00 - 00;36;19;14 Speaker 1 We have more black millionaires now, but we also have proportionately more black black folks living in poverty. Right. And so the numbers in and in, incremental as they may be percentage wise on swinging, black health outcomes. Right. Are is just is the fact, right. Nothing is necessarily improving. All of that is true whether it's Republican or Democrat. 00;36;19;16 - 00;36;35;15 Speaker 1 And what we are also experiencing is a demographic shift in our country and a very real feeling that if we stick to this plantation narrative, that the number of people who are living on the plantation are soon going to outnumber the people who own the plantations. 00;36;35;17 - 00;36;49;04 Speaker 2 That's if you think that Latinos, white lack of own, that this is the one of the most ahistorical things ever, where a big chunk of the Latino population is just white light and identifies as white in both way. Right. So as you made new America will continue, I promise. 00;36;49;11 - 00;36;50;07 Speaker 3 But I'm not I'm not. 00;36;50;07 - 00;37;02;17 Speaker 1 Talking about the reality of the demographic. I'm talking about the perception of the demographic that's been driving the decision making from those who feel like they should have a right to the fruits of the of the field, simply because they are. 00;37;02;19 - 00;37;16;25 Speaker 2 But but this is the thing a map, I'm told, is like, I'm not a Democrat or Republican. I'm not even an American and have sense enough to know my goal. And you know, you can if the political landscape changes to some extent, but it's always the same thing. America's. And I'm not saying I mean what I say. 00;37;16;25 - 00;37;38;22 Speaker 2 America, America and Britain include Jamaica. I can't even go to Jamaica because, like, I'm so negative about it because it's the same thing, just in a different phase, right? It can't provide like when we look at these things. So the difference being Malcolm and Martin, really the Martin believes that America is not living up to its ideals. When you give all those stats about black people say, look, we can fix this, we can get into it, reform it, fix it. 00;37;39;00 - 00;37;55;17 Speaker 2 Whereas map of looking at say, no, America, that is America living up to its ideals. So there was that racism. The idea was a Britain that racism, no matter what you do, is always going to be the same. So this is why we need revolution, not reform. And revolution is about how do we collectively do something different, not just in America but collectively across you? 00;37;55;17 - 00;38;05;28 Speaker 2 Malcolm said Afro-American. You mean everybody that was in Africa? Basically, what how do we do? How do we collectively make something new when we can actually be free? Because it's never going to be free? Well, this is old. 00;38;05;29 - 00;38;44;29 Speaker 1 You and I both spent time traveling on the continent. Yeah. And I, and I was most recently in Lagos and Abuja. Yeah. And I was listening, because, you know, we do a little bit of internet stalking, right? I was listening to an interview where you were talking about life expectancy in Nigeria and like the movement of young people on the continent who are active politically, using their creativity, using their genius to not only build wealth, build business, build enterprise, but to bring voice is something like it's not being experienced anywhere else in the Western world, that's for sure. 00;38;45;02 - 00;38;57;21 Speaker 1 When we think about Malcolm, and Malcolm's imagining, how much of that do you witness on the continent and the voices and minds of these young revolutionaries that are seeing things different? 00;38;57;24 - 00;39;05;07 Speaker 2 Certainly to some extent. There is a, you know, Africa, I mean, even Africa is the youngest continent, is the youngest God in the world. People die early. 00;39;05;08 - 00;39;06;11 Speaker 3 Yeah, I know, I just I. 00;39;06;12 - 00;39;17;06 Speaker 2 Mean, something to celebrate it. Just not that many people. Yeah. Right. Because because and I always have to preface this conversation by saying all the problems we have a white supremacy here are actually worse on the continent. Like it's. 00;39;17;09 - 00;39;19;04 Speaker 1 It's it's nefarious in different ways. 00;39;19;07 - 00;39;26;16 Speaker 2 But the outcomes are actually worse. So if you look at life experience over 50, for sure, sure. Even traveling, try traveling from like 100. 00;39;26;21 - 00;39;28;04 Speaker 3 You've been, you know, gotta tell me, right? 00;39;28;05 - 00;39;29;03 Speaker 2 Colonialism is a. 00;39;29;05 - 00;39;30;05 Speaker 3 Really, really. Yeah. Right. 00;39;30;07 - 00;39;46;25 Speaker 2 Yeah. So people are making the best in that terrible situation and people are trying. But to be honest, I think a lot of that still is in the context of how do we do capitalism? Well, how do we build a any that's Malcolm is how do you do the turning right not right. People do some great work. I don't I don't dismiss all the work's happening because there's loads of great, great stuff. 00;39;46;25 - 00;39;53;10 Speaker 2 Activism, movement, that feeling stuff happening. But is it in the sense of are we trying to create a different world and. 00;39;53;15 - 00;40;01;10 Speaker 1 So can we. Is it possible to do capitalism in a way that still provides for liberation? No, this is this is. 00;40;01;12 - 00;40;06;28 Speaker 3 This is, I have to admit, like there's there's like some irony, right? Like there's some irony, right? Like I can't there's. 00;40;06;28 - 00;40;24;09 Speaker 1 So much irony here. Like number one, like we're sitting in Baldwin and co. Yeah. Right in New Orleans. Yeah. Right. A black owned bookstore. Right. That sells coffee, sells books and brings in community. Right. And, and its existence is predicated on a system of capitalism. 00;40;24;10 - 00;40;36;11 Speaker 3 Right. Well, I for my right. Yeah. I think I mean, like, you just wrote a book, right. And the book's out. And part of the reason why you're here, right? It's all because of capitalism, right? 00;40;36;14 - 00;40;42;22 Speaker 1 The freedom for us to have this conversation exists because the Constitution as it stands today. 00;40;42;24 - 00;40;44;19 Speaker 2 No, we can have freedom with. Okay, we can have. 00;40;44;22 - 00;40;45;03 Speaker 3 I mean, but to. 00;40;45;03 - 00;40;53;12 Speaker 1 Have this conversation and to put this conversation and for people to be able to watch this conversation, right, like there's a freedom of speech that we're entitled to where we can be critical today. 00;40;53;15 - 00;40;56;11 Speaker 3 Right? Right. Today's the day they start. 00;40;56;13 - 00;40;58;03 Speaker 2 Today. They start talking about Charlie Kirk. Right. 00;40;58;08 - 00;41;11;22 Speaker 3 Sorry. We're not even. You can talk about that if you want and then lose the pine because I'm not saying the thing was right, but like on September, what, September 16th of the year in two 2025. Right. Like this is okay. 00;41;11;25 - 00;41;28;02 Speaker 1 And and there's still something that sacred and special about that when I travel to other places around the world. And I'm not saying that it's the right system, but what I am saying is in every system that I've seen, what's inevitable is harm. 00;41;28;05 - 00;41;31;04 Speaker 3 And and what I also see and what I find. 00;41;31;04 - 00;41;44;12 Speaker 1 Solace is that in creation, in nature or wherever harm is, healing is always proximate. Way in the northwest where I live, there's this thing called, stinging nettle. Yeah. That if you brush up against it, you get a little rash. 00;41;44;12 - 00;41;45;06 Speaker 3 Yeah, but. 00;41;45;06 - 00;41;55;27 Speaker 1 What you find next to the stinging that all drought is a is a bracken fern. Yeah. And you rub the fern along the rash and it goes away. Right. So there's there's the medicine that's always proximate to. 00;41;55;28 - 00;41;59;22 Speaker 2 We haven't seen most of that medicine here. Well, I mean, it's like I don't know what I say here. I mean, the West. 00;41;59;29 - 00;42;02;11 Speaker 3 When the Western, you know, I and I think and my curiosity. 00;42;02;11 - 00;42;10;20 Speaker 1 Is, is like, is that because we spend so much time focusing on the harm that we lose presents to the fact that healing is there. 00;42;10;23 - 00;42;30;02 Speaker 2 Now because it is healing, because, like you said, like and again, 60 years after civil rights, where you have all this apparent healing, look at all the statistics. They're all battered, right? Like a few of us are doing better but mostly bad. Right? And that's the same around the world. So I think look, this is kind of like but if you think about it, a plantation metaphor was a good one, right? 00;42;30;07 - 00;42;46;08 Speaker 2 If you go on a plantation, you have to work in the plantation. You're really going to you on the plantation. We're in capitalism. I don't have a choice. I can't eat or live without capitalism. We can't do anything without capitalism. So everything we do is at the behest of captain. Now, that doesn't mean the plantation is great. Still, the plantations to the slave plantation. 00;42;46;08 - 00;43;06;10 Speaker 2 You still want to get off the plantation to do something else, right? And the same way now. Because if you think about it, was one of the beauties of Malcolm is that he gives us the answer to this. Right. So this is a short range program and a long range program in a short range. We're here. We have to organize, do what you can, etc. but we should be putting that in the context of the long range program, which is the actual revolution. 00;43;06;17 - 00;43;20;11 Speaker 2 So yeah, you can we can do that. We have to do that within capitalism. Capitalism is everywhere. But it should be part of a much broader strategy to say, well, let's see, how do we get out of this thing? Because capitalism still kills us. A child dies every 10s just a few more. Let's copy. 00;43;20;11 - 00;43;21;03 Speaker 3 That. Yeah. 00;43;21;04 - 00;43;38;21 Speaker 2 All right. And the biggest irony I think that has on field is really the field is the African continent. The field is life has been as effective and the society here not for everybody because some people are locked out 100%. But for many of us in the West, we're now kind of holiness. Right. But we have some predictions. 00;43;38;21 - 00;43;48;05 Speaker 2 We get some here and there. And actually and I've said it before, we have blood on it and the same bloodlines. I'm one of the wealthiest people in the world. And I don't get much money. 00;43;48;05 - 00;43;53;07 Speaker 3 Right, comparatively. I mean, I talk for I forget what did the top 4%. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know I you're. 00;43;53;07 - 00;44;13;02 Speaker 2 Doing that was money, right? Oh, people and so little that that put me in the top 1% of it is. Well so I'm equally culpable. Right. If if capitalism produced black and black then pays my wages I'm kind of responsible. Right. So that's the contradiction that we have to do. Right. And the only way to do it is to say, well, we try to create a society. 00;44;13;03 - 00;44;13;20 Speaker 2 It is not the case. 00;44;15;11 - 00;44;40;06 Speaker 1 Yeah. There's there's beautiful poetic irony that two light skinned brothers who are invoking a third light skinned brother to talk about, plantations and houses and and capitalism, as we both benefit from the very system that's causing harm to our also melanated siblings that are around the world, absent of like, an answer. Right? 00;44;40;06 - 00;44;45;01 Speaker 1 Because I don't know that we have one, that's defined what I hear is. No, no. 00;44;45;03 - 00;44;48;27 Speaker 3 Well, let me tell you what I hear. What I hear is like, it begins with having intention. 00;44;48;29 - 00;45;08;22 Speaker 1 Yeah. And having an intention. That's revolution. Right. And then building to that intention with intentional experiments along the way to see, like, does this help us get free? And if it works, then, like, let's do more of that. And if it doesn't, let's change our approach. And it requires a critical mass of us to be engaged in a collective action in order for the. 00;45;08;22 - 00;45;28;25 Speaker 2 Needle to move. Yeah, but I'd go further, though, because this is one of the reasons I wrote a book about Malcolm. Malcolm, give us a blueprint. Is Agave Blueprint largely an organization of Afro-American unity, has a blueprint. It says, look, we organize chapters in York, in Kingston, around the world. We collect, we bring us stuff together. We pay taxes into this organization. 00;45;28;25 - 00;45;34;08 Speaker 2 We create an organization that can represent us globally. And that's the vehicle of how we go forward. That that's how you. 00;45;34;09 - 00;45;37;28 Speaker 3 Well, well, then how do we do that? Because I got you I got I got I. 00;45;38;01 - 00;45;51;12 Speaker 1 Will call the organization, I don't know, movement makers and let's, let's have, the founder, the brother out of Seattle, Washington. And then I'll just open up the doors. You can run me the checks, all right? And I'll. And I'll work. 00;45;51;12 - 00;45;57;02 Speaker 3 On, like, just trust me. All right? That's not the way right there. I mean, no, no, no, no. 00;45;57;04 - 00;46;24;14 Speaker 1 Right here it lies, right. Where we where we come to like the the crux of, the curiosity is that the blueprint is there as a blueprint. Right. And it's a Garvey esque blueprint. Like, how do we take us and allow secure us a place where our otherness can thrive, absent of the gaze of dominant culture and the historical harms of racism? 00;46;24;16 - 00;46;48;26 Speaker 1 Offer this reflection that I witnessed in South Africa. And then, this and then we can work to that close of our time together. You know, South Africa, post-apartheid. When I was, what I witnessed was that although the system of apartheid is no longer there, the economics of apartheid prevail, and there's a muscle memory that lives within the people. 00;46;48;29 - 00;47;01;11 Speaker 1 And whether that's through epigenetic trauma, right, or lived experience that continues to play itself forward and colourism that you can remove the constraints and still have generations that have to filter through. 00;47;01;13 - 00;47;02;20 Speaker 2 Because there was times when I moved. 00;47;02;20 - 00;47;04;08 Speaker 3 Right. Well, I, when I, when I. 00;47;04;10 - 00;47;12;15 Speaker 1 Well, what I'd be curious about is that even if we took a collective of people and we and we, we, we found our place. 00;47;12;15 - 00;47;13;00 Speaker 2 Here. 00;47;13;02 - 00;47;29;21 Speaker 1 And we created a system that honored what our needs were. How many generations would it take for the field to work itself out? So we no longer were living in the mentality of those that were restricted to that particular context? 00;47;29;24 - 00;47;45;11 Speaker 2 That's a question you can't answer with that dude, right? I mean, but does it ever does the worst example? Because that's a perfect example where actually the restraints, when we needed it, it was the the illusion of the space being lived. It wasn't ever. It is actually the actual problem, the economic domination. The economic domination is still there. 00;47;45;12 - 00;48;02;10 Speaker 2 Yeah. In fact, one of my favorite Malcolm, like, I'll be spending a lot of time doing like, you know, who wrote a book on Malcolm X? Malcolm? Political philosophy. What? What did Malcolm not see that would have been really helpful for him to comment on. Nelson Mandela is number one. Yeah. But not yeah, yeah. We'll go back to someone who tells you he sells that. 00;48;02;11 - 00;48;26;05 Speaker 2 Talk about slavery. Yeah. Malcolm would have called uncle Tom leader. Yeah. Like who literally gives you this transition to political power in theory. But no economic power to Mandela is one of the. I mean, Malcolm would have been so mad at Mandela. Yeah. Some has rightly put Mandela at the end of the Malcolm X movie. And one of the things I learned right in the book was that, you know, at the end of the film where it's, via Malcolm X and Malcolm X, now Mandela gives this. 00;48;26;08 - 00;48;43;12 Speaker 2 Yeah. He's supposed to say by any means necessary, and it cuts to Malcolm saying. And the reason he doesn't say is because he refuses to say it. Because it's this the two violent. Yeah. And divide and that should like but we still we still venerate someone like that every time I say, listen, all because I'm, I'm, I will I don't understand. 00;48;43;13 - 00;48;48;20 Speaker 2 This is why we need people like Malcolm X, because that analysis is really, really important to show us what actually happened. 00;48;48;22 - 00;48;51;18 Speaker 3 Yeah, well, well, me I what what. 00;48;51;18 - 00;49;03;16 Speaker 1 Offer is this? If I we as a collective, could come together and produce the same harmony as Hampson and that my song. 00;49;03;20 - 00;49;09;14 Speaker 3 Can I. Everything, everybody and everything would be. 00;49;09;16 - 00;49;22;16 Speaker 1 Oh, okay. Brother, thank you for, like, sharing space with me. It's really a gift to get to know you, and, to know that, like, when I. When I pull up to London, I got somebody else that I can. 00;49;22;20 - 00;49;23;10 Speaker 2 Tell you in Birmingham. 00;49;23;14 - 00;49;28;08 Speaker 1 Well, Birmingham. So somebody when I get to the UK, I got somebody I got holler at to get a different experience. 00;49;28;08 - 00;49;45;17 Speaker 3 So when I'm in London right now I think of like the two of them. Right. Even are going to represent and I'll be in Birmingham okay. Different in London, I'll be in Bristol, Birmingham. People have to come see me, come see me. Okay. Ask about this. All right. I when I pull up to the UK, I got somebody I got holler at in Birmingham. 00;49;45;21 - 00;49;51;22 Speaker 1 And trust and believe whenever you make it to the west coast of the US. I got you. And it's a gift to be espaces. You. I appreciate you, brother. 00;49;51;23 - 00;49;52;02 Speaker 2 It's 00;49;52;02 - 00;50;19;16 Speaker 1 Thank you for spending time with us and for being a part of the Baldwin Co community. Every listen helps to keep the conversation alive. So thank you for listening. 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