Queer as Folklore (with Open Mike Eagle)

M m m. There is the ed is there is? Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another spectacular episode of My Mama Told Me the podcast. But we dive deep, deep into the world of black conspiracy theories, and we finally work to prove that Ty Dollar Sign is the devil. You can't trust the black man with eyes like a rare yugiokard. They're too late, they're too light. There's no reason for that giant black man to have them blue. Evil wise, he's the devil, and I know it. Ty

dollar Sign, that money symbol can't fool me. You are evil. Sir, h I am your hosts like Stan Kerman as always. I'm excited to be here. My guest today. Oh, we have a great guest today. He's he's hilarious, he's talented, he's exceptional. We were just talking about how good he is the fucking pad like a sound pad, and how terrible I am. But that doesn't matter. You know him from the New Negroes on Comedy Central or Wonderful Show. You know him from his brand new album Anime Trauma

and Divorce. He's an exceptional artist. You're gonna love him. Please give it up for my guest, Mr Open Mike Ego. That was probably the best introduction I've had all all pandemic. Hell yeah great. You mean when the period when no one's introducing you to anything. I love that. Usually usually the attempts are just they're just sad, you know, they're just like, I don't even know if this is his real name. I guess his name is Open. I'm excited you're here, man, Let's let's get into it. Let's just

real quick. I saw your TV the other day on the Boys and I love an audible Yale. Oh it's great. They made me get buff for that role. And then I just sat there and you and you really acting too. It's great, man. I had to be a creepy dude with muscles. It was nice. It's a fun time. But we don't have time for that. We gotta get into this goddamn conspiracy because you came to me with one that I guess sort of connects even to the question of a person acting on television. The conspiracy theory you

brought was my mama told me Hollywood has a gay agenda. Yeah, talk to me about it. Tell me my mama didn't tell me. But every barber I've ever had, I mean Chicago to l a different shops, it don't matter. They always believe that because they always have something on TV, either the news or BT and and they are commenting on what's happening. And once anything even like I won't say slightly homosexual, was just like anything that's not a

traditional manly man Madrid. Yeah, hetero normative ship that's a better word. Oh my god, thank you. Once anything slightly less than hetero normative happens, then um, you know than outcomes to you know, they only want to show us in certain ways because you know, they tried to emasculate

the black man, and but two thousand years right. Yeah, it's always and for our our listeners at home, who have not yet been privy to the wisdom of a barber, it is always rooted in this conspiracy that by making black men gay or we are somehow undermining the black community, that it is like the destruction of the nuclear family, as it were, and and that gay images are intentionally reflected back to us in order to make us more

gay over time. Is the other other part of the theory, guess, So we become more gay and then subsequently and I know this is always a part of it is and it's not always a part that maybe is articulated. It's that we become more gay and then we become weaker because of that gay. Of course, it's it's all. It's all very negative perspective. So it's very They very much believe that hetero is the way to be sure, and that anything else is a programming error and it needs

to be fought against. That's fair. Yeah, it's never like a good thing. They're not like, you become more gay and then your apartment is going to be real clean and smell a little better. You know none of that. Yeah, they don't. They don't see anything but what they consider to be the dark side. You're gonna become more gay and then you're gonna get some of those sweet abs that all the gay men have. And that's pretty cool.

I hope you like it now. It's it's a fascinating I think conversation almost like a checkpoint that every black man goes through in their experience of like, you're gonna have an older black dude at some point sell you on this idea, and the question really becomes how bought in do you do you want to be to the premise that Hollywood is trying to make you gay? I guess my question for you is how bought in were you the first time you heard this? How much were

you believing this to be true? I mean, I've always known a lot of gay people like and and I've never um never been like judgementel or never thought that it was somehow lesser than so this always sounded ridiculous to me. And the other thing is, I mean I feel like this conspiracy theory, like most of them, also kind of reflects my brain wants to say education level, but that's not it. It's it's more like how much information,

like real information, somebody has at hand or somebody has consumed. Yeah, it's like it comes from a place of like, oh, I don't really know what's going on, but I'm gonna stay here in this barbershop and make shut up. And then when people come in here saying some ship it sounds interesting, I'm just gonna stick with that. But I'm not gonna really read anything, and I'm not gonna go have other experiences other places. I'm just gonna perpetuate this

ship because it sounds cool. It makes me feel smarter, Yeah, I do. And to that point, some of it also feels like a lack of control. Do you know what I mean? That? Like you don't have control in certain parts of your life because the government and poverty and all the reasons why we often feel like we don't have control. And so subsequently you go, well, where do I have control? And part of that is just making

up your own truth. You go like, well, if I can make this true, and if I can convince other people that it's true, then I have a power that I otherwise wouldn't have, because you know, I'm broke and I don't know how to fix that, right, And and it's yeah, you're right, because it's it's reflective of of not understanding how systems work. You don't understand how systems work, then it just looks as if everything is being puppeteered by some force that's just right outside of your grasp.

And if somebody comes along saying something that checks the box of explaining that somehow, but also aligns with any other beliefs you have, Like if you happen to believe, uh, somehow that that being gay is also bad, and also you were told that these forces who you can't see are pushing that on you, well, then that checks a couple of boxes. And you know like, okay, yeah, that

makes sense. That's how the world works, you know, right, And I think there are also those weird to your point, there are those weird affirming moments that make your ideas feel at least somewhat valid, that then force you to go even further down that tunnel of your belief right. Yeah, I got a haircut, um right after uh it had to be the week that Moonlight won that oscar. That

was a bad bad shop man, bad bad day. Because I'm sitting there and they're saying that ship and I'm just like, Yo, that movie is amazing though, it's so good, Like it's really good. And the whole time that I saw the movie and I'm and I'm reveling and celebrating and its accomplishments, I'm thinking, how awesome it is that we have a black gay story with that sort of

representation and it's getting that sort of recognition. Yeah, And I'm in the barbershop and they just think this is the end of the world to them, you know what I'm saying. And I know I have to believe they were going down the train of like you know, they wasn't even supposed to win. They didn't even call out their name, but somebody got in the earpiece and was like, no, give it to the gay people, so we could make

the niggas gays like, oh, you know, it's wild. And then I remember, and maybe you similarly have this memory. I think my first sense of this quote unquote gay agenda came out of like the conversation about black men and dresses. That like, there was that whole theory that anytime they put a black man on TV in address it was sort of like a transition in his career, Uh,

Martin Lawrence, the you know, the Eddie Murphy's whoever. It was that they stopped being connected with the black community and we're suddenly now like Hollywood elites who were being puppeted by the white man, right, and they were willing to like they were basically showing they were willing to do whatever it takes yes to be you know, to

be rich, to be positioned that way. And and and that was a signal that they were willing to turn away from, you know, the traditional idea of of black manhood in order to do what the white man thinks it's funny, which those people also think is by self detegration, you know, making fun of yourself to that degree, right, And I guess I wonder the question I have for you is

how much of that? Because I found myself, and this is a better way of framing it, I found myself even as a kid being like, I don't hate gay people. I like gay people. I don't or certainly don't have any you know, hard feelings in any direction about like them based on the fact that they like kissing somebody of the same sex. But I also don't want to be a sellout. I don't want to be like a

person who, like my peers, would view that way. So yeah, I'll never wear a dress, I'll never commit to any of these homo erotic images so that nobody could ever question my commitment to the black man and black community

and all that stuff. I think. Yeah, I think, and and if you're getting at what I think you're getting that, I do think there's that kernel of something that resonates in that um about when you are a black man entering the entertainment industry, you do feel, especially if you're not doing you know, shows with black writers, black producers, you know, black showrunners, you're on guard to make sure that you're not being put in a position that's gonna

cost you your credibility. So like, even though you're not bringing a homophobia to it or transphobia to it, you do feel a certain sense of needing to protect your image, and so you're kind of on the lookout for stuff like that, right, Yeah, you're constantly sort of on edge for this thing that, even though it's not coming from your own hatred, is coming from someone else's hatred and yourself like trying to not articulate it, but it's coming

out either way. It's yeah, it's a fun up dance that we find and that you know, And that's the thing. You know, people argue against the idea of privilege, like that's one of the perfect examples. It's not like privileged means you automatically have it easier. Privileged means there's just

certain inner conversations you don't have to have. You get to devote that brain power in brain space into something else you don't have to worry about, like wearing the whole weight of a culture shoulders every time you get an opportunity like that sort of thing. I mean, it's and that's you know, in some sense it is what makes those artists who are able to escape that so groundbreaking.

But right like like young Thug wearing a fucking, you know, beautiful gown on his album cover is a groundbreaking decision no matter how you want to spin it. But then the danger of that goes back to that same question of like how much responsibility does he still have to the community that then judges him or wants him to

do something different than the choices that he made. Yeah, I mean, you know what goes on in mainstream rap now is really interesting on that level because you know, ten fifteen years ago, I guess you just have to say fifteen now, it was just unheard of for somebody to be positioned or depicted in any way other than just like the hardest to hard dude. I mean, in the nineties you had rappers who were positioned to be a little lighter like a mc hammer or fresh prints

like where they weren't super street. But then you know, after like two thousands, it got so homogenized that everybody was really leaning into that. And so if you look at that versus now and how much room mainstream rappers have to express themselves visually all these different ways, it's really interesting. But it does feedback into that conversation. We're like the dudes in the barbershop were like, wait a minute,

can I still like this? You know what I'm saying. Yeah, it's it's I think they're asking themselves, can I still like this? And the even scarier part is out loud, they're definitively going nobody should like this. This is it's and you know that's the old headship where they go like, Nope,

I don't funk with it. That's some new ship. That's these young kids they are they're the product of the gay agenda that sort of was already at play during the the younger hip hop era or the older rather hip hop era, and now you're just letting the gay agenda live live out. It's you know, it's worse our worst fears is living out in front of us through an oozy, through a young thug, through a Frank Ocean

whoever the funk it is. That sort of is kind of just being themselves or at least the Yeah, it's just really but really reflecting, because the interesting thing is to they're reflecting the street culture of now to like, the street culture of now isn't super baggy pans and big hoodies or even long white tease like it's like fitted clothes and really expensive belts. Right, It's a it's a different vibe in the streets now, and of course you know mainstream map is going to reflect that too.

But then, you know, I do wonder for people who believe that stuff, how do they bridge that? You know? How do they bridge I guess, but I guess it kind of leads into what you're saying, where like they look at it, they look at the tight pants and they're like, oh, there you go, Agenda. Um. It's funny too that you mentioned old heads because it makes me think about Lord Jamar from Brand Nuby and who is

like the mascot. He's like the quintessential old head and he's one of the main ones that are always using their social media, using their their YouTube, you know, doing dj vlad interviews, tearing down things that seemed to from their perspective, come from that place. But lordam was on odds M. If I'm not mistaken, Laura mars Entire, Penis was out when he was walking around to jail, and it's like, if you wasn't part of the gag in, how are you so sure that everybody else is now?

You don't think having your dick meat out on HBO attempted If the presumption is that literally seeing dicks, seeing anything that is homo erotic is going to tempt me into homosexuality, you having your dick meat out had to do something for me. It had to give me in some direction and right. And on the same episode there's you know, all sorts of stuff stepping, you know, with with with men on men um touching, so you know

it's It's just it's always struck me as hilarious. He's out there finger wagon against people doing the slightest bit

of you know, gender expression. He was on he was on the gay Show on television as time, right, And I will say there's a there's another layer of irony in going on a lad TV to to complain about the gay agenda when you're talking to a white dude who is essentially like appropriating black culture and hip hop culture for his own benefit, like you're complaining to in theory, the oppressor while about his oppression about what you're seeing

as like something oppressive in your community, right, and using his platform to do it when he don't give a damn about what happens to none of us. Right, He's not invested in the beef that Nick Cannon started. He's just gonna get Nick Cannon to say whatever the funk

he can. M I. I guess one of the parts that always fascinated me with this is I do a hundred percent believe that there's I don't believe in any way, shape or form that there isn't fact they quote unquote gay agenda right, that we are by showing us gay imagery or or homo erotic imagery we are somehow being tempted towards becoming gay people. That's not how that works.

But I do wonder how much you believe about Hollywood undermining black celebrities, Like how much of it do you buy in in that way, even if it isn't rooted in sort of like gayness, if you will, well, you know, I tend to push back against that kind of argument because I look at Hollywood for the most part, like a giant conglomeration of different corporations, and at the end

of the day, they want to do what makes money. Uh, you know, like if you're if you're Warner Brothers, Universal Parent, whatever, whatever company, it is the end of the day, Like if you're a higher high level executive, you're trying to keep your job, You're trying to get your bonus, You're trying to show that quarter earning, whatever it is that

has to happen. Like, are you really gonna take the time out of your day to knock down an entertainer or somebody who could be making your money just because they're black, Like I don't, I don't, Like I think in the past that definitely could have been the case in some sense just out of like personal feelings that people have about other other races and other cultures. But it's like now, I just I can't see I can't

see them taking the time out. I can't see them putting the energy into doing that kind of thing when at the end of the day, they're always trying to do whatever it takes to to make one more, one penny more than the next man. Yeah, I think to your point, it probably it's very likely that there are individuals in all industries who are like, I don't want niggas reading around me. That makes me angry. I'm gonna do everything I can to make sure that these motherfuckers

don't be reading. But in the grand theme of things, that doesn't mean that the industry as a whole, like had a meeting and a read on that. It just means that one dude has a passion for making sure black people don't read, and he's gonna do his best to work that out however he can, even if that means putting a dude in a dress and then making him not read. Effective, put that dress on, close that book, motherfucker. We've got work to do, all right. We're gonna take

a break. We'll be back with more hoping Mike Eagle and more. My mama told me, are you do you can? You? You? You could? You want? You want him to do you so much? You could do any Yeah, we're back here were more open my giggle and more. My mama told me who who does? Who did the intro? Oh? Is this amazing? Dude. He's a comedian. He's an artist, much like you. He has more talents than I care for. I very angry at you, sort of like multi hyphen

it people. But his name is Nick Chambers. He's very funny, very talented. I gotta, I gotta, yeah, I gotta, I gotta find out more. Man that that intro is brilliant. Oh thanks man, No, he's fucking he's the best. I gave him like very little information. I was like, hey, I need an intro song and here are five words to include that he went crazy. So yeah, he's very dope. Um and if you guys are listening, follow Nick Chambers. Show him all the love because he's very talented. Anyway,

funck Nick Chambers. We gotta get into this research, Nick Chambers, get stuck, my dick. I got research to talk about open my giggles. You're right, you're right, My bad, my bad, all right. I really found myself sort of deep diving into the history of gayness in television and just sort

of it's presentation. And one of the things that got really interesting for me was the fact that and I you know, you don't think about this stuff until you actually have to research it, but the first appearance of a homosexual person sort of openly homosexual, at least on television, was in nineteen seventy three on the Mary Tyler Moore Show. Did you know that? Did you know anything about? Nah? And I'm trying to I guess I never really saw

a lot of that show. I considered myself a TV head and I grew up watching tons of reruns and stuff. But I think, um, I don't think I called but a few episodes of Mary Tyler Morris. I'm not sure which which character that was. I watched it a lot.

Nick and Knight was my ship for a while. And uh, yeah, I watched the Mary Tyler morrishow And apparently there was a character in the show who was the brother of one of her friends, who then tried to her friend tried to set her up, set Mary up with this brother, and then it became it was later revealed that the brother was in fact gay and he was holding this big secret. And so that was just the arc of

an episode. But over so over the course from nineteen seventy to nineteen eighty, there were only twelve shows that at any point introduced a gay character. So twelve in an entire decade, right, And then here's where it gets crazy because you compare that to two thousand ten to two thousand twenty decade the odds? Is this the odds? What? What do you call that? The I guess what people call it the odds. I try to avoid talking about it altogether, just because their names so stupid. But sure

you're making the right choice. But it goes from twelve shows, uh in nineteen seventy two now in two thousand and ten, a hundred and nine shows that include lgbt Q characters. So there's clearly a progression happening here. There's an increase, Right, What do you do with that? What do you do with it? You celebrate? Right? Like? I mean, you know what what you're hoping? Because I don't know that you know? Of course I don't know what ratio or percentage that

is the total number of shows is made. But you know you're wanting there to be in like a reflection of the percentages in real life. You know, you wanted to be approaching that kind of level. And even if it's more it's like, that's cool too, it's I don't know, it's it's to me, that seems only like a good thing.

And it seems like the only reason that it wasn't so much before was because everybody thought that that was somehow a negative for everybody was trying to um avoid dealing with that sort of issue when it's something is real in life, and exactly I think those people, yeah, exactly, those people should be represented. I think that's exactly right. And you know, in in terms of the actual percentage.

I did some research on that. GLAD, which is the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, does like this tracking every year of the number of gay or lesbian, trans queer people in broadcast television and uh this time this in two thousand nineteen, of the eight hundred and seventy nine regular characters expected to appear in broadcast scripted prime time programming, ninety were identified as gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender

or queer. And so that's basically ten point two percent, which is the highest percentage GLAD has found in the fifteen years that it's been reporting all these numbers. Which is it, Like you said, that's progress. Yeah, but I guess then my next question would be what it is? What is the reported percentage of you know, people who identify as gay in society? Uh. And of course whatever that number is, you'd have to up buy some percentage anyway,

because everybody's out. But well, I'm glad, I'm glad you're saying that, because internationally, as it's reported, it's somewhere between one point two to six point eight percent of the population identifies l g B t Q. And to your point, that doesn't account for the massive, massive amounts of people that are not saying anything at fear of judgment, ridicule or whatever. Yeah, I mean, especially if you when you're

expanding it globally. I mean, there's some cultures in which it's it can still be lethal to be seen is gay publicly. So there's no way anybody would ever um answer that question honestly in some cultures. So yeah, you'd have to, you'd have to increase that number, but some factor. Yeah, it can't be one point to. There's no fucking way that one point too of the popular Asian is gay anywhere is gotta be more. And y'all got to make peace with that Nigeria, get over yourself, Russia, and let

these people start kissing each other. Y Uh. One of the more fascinating things that I sort of found in some of the research. I don't know if you remember this, but that New Beauty and the Beast came out three years ago. There was a new Beauty and the Beast, the live action quote unquote Beauty and the Beast, and everybody lost their minds because one of the characters ended up being gay by the end of the movie, The Lafou. Do you remember who Lafu is? I don't. Was he

like a candlestick or something, remember now? But he was the uh Gaston who's a big buff dude who hates the Beast and hates that that old girl wants Beauty wants to be with him. Uh. Lafu was his like sidekick, his his main homie who like would run around and sort of big up him at all times to be like you are so buff Gaston. I love your Adams Apple, oh that delicious Adams Apple. And everybody, he's clearly gay. Your feelings for Gaston are clearly being expressed at all

times and in everything that he does. And everybody got upset that. Uh it turns out they actually made him gay and didn't just like leave him with these feelings smothered underneath. So who's upset? Who's Who's mad? Families? Who's mad? Christians? Yeah, a lot of Christians. There was a drive in theater in Alabama, Uh, the Hannager Theater that basically took to Facebook to say, you can feel free to come watch a wholesome, wholesome movies without worrying about sex, nudity, homosexuality,

and foul language. And uh, they refused to play The New Beauty and the Beast, saying that that fell too close to their rules of of engagement. You know what I mean, implied beast reality. In the movie, there find with perfectly okay for the lady to be with the lion man. It's all good. Let that big ass cursed yak stick is weird dick inside of this this beautiful young girl. But don't you dare show them boys kissing

each other, be furious kursi yak. Yeah, it's it's a weird dance that that, Like, I think people are constantly playing. And to your point, it's this weird dance of almost not allowing our imaginations to go Like it's a movie literally about people's turning into two household objects. Would you let your imagination go that far and then you you cut it off at sexuality? That's absurd. I don't know, it's so weird because what are you afraid of? You're

afraid of having to talk to your kids about it? Like, what is what is the what is the concern here? I mean, it's funny, it's like you said, yeah, like so many other elements of this thing are completely fantastical, you know, even the fact, you know, people just break out in the song. Yeah, it's a weird world, you know, and all of that. All of that's fine, but then this this thing that you know happens that real human beings have have feelings for people of the same gender

not allowed. I've never once been walking down the street and a bitch just breaks out into rhyme, you know what I mean, like just a full song. I've seen some people freestyle, but not a full fucking three bar you know, three stands a song, right, and strangers are joining in, you know, went back and forth and reins and all of that. No, it doesn't happen. It's not real.

So even if you are in fact homophobic, right, let's say you truly don't believe that gay people should be getting married or have happiness, whatever it is that helps you sleep at night, the fact that you do that in the middle of a fantasy, you should just be able to say, like, well, this is fantasy, so it's

not real and therefore doesn't threaten me. But the fact that you can't even dispel it in that just means this is rooted in real hatred and not Yeah, and this actually brought me to what you were bringing up earlier about the issue of OZ. Right. OZ came up a lot in sort of this this fear of homophobia

or rather fear of queerness um. And part of it that they sort of explained in the OZ scenario is that they don't actually consider images like the ones you see in shows like OZ or The Wire to be part of the gay agenda because those men are not consensually being a part of gayness or of queerness. Right that because they're being raped, or because they're being there in the closet, or because is there somehow treating gayness is something you should be ashamed of. It isn't working

towards the gay agenda. I don't know. I don't know how much wied and people watched Man because Omar wasn't ashamed of nothing. Omar used to walk around with his boot and do crimes. They used to do crimes together and then go home and do what they do. They was cool, that's fair. Nothing Omar was whistling. And it wasn't just because he was murdering people because he got some dick, right, yeah, he was. He was fully satisfied man. So yeah, he I don't you know that's that's that's

a weird kind of cognitive dissidence. They're talking about their man, because I feel like that's one of the real brilliant aspects of Omar's characters, specifically, is that he wasn't ashamed

of anything. And he was he was the scariest dude on the block, but his lifestyle and how he lived it was complete his business and and and something he wasn't afraid to wear at all, even though you know, he's in a situation where he knows that he's surrounded by homophobic people, he was choosing to live his life.

And and and to that point, you're hearing all of like the the language around the way that they talked about Omar right that like, you know, they're using derogatory language when referring to him, right, But their argument, I guess, at its essences like that that derogatory language protects us from the cell of of homosexuality, when in fact, to your larger point, that's not the big takeaway of the

of the Wire. You're not supposed to watch it and go you know what, Stringer Bell was right, he was really nailing it. Oh man, Yeah, Marlowe speaks for us. All right, Yeah, that's not the thing. And so I mean, why can't these people just say that's a really good show and it's and it's got gay stuff in it, and that's okay, you know what I'm saying, It's all it's all this thing. What they're trying to do is

make excuses for shows that they think are good. They can they can keep watching the show that they think is good, and they can have you know, reasons that they hide away with to make it okay, to excuse

it for him. But it's so strange you have to jump through all those hoops to engage with a television show where where something really, I mean in OZ is is weird Because in OZ it was a lot of non consensual Uh it was almost it was used as a weapon in a way to dominate people in a lot of senses, and I think they're worth some genuine relationships in that setting too, but it was also weaponized and was and it was also it was using a

lot of different contexts than just you know, normal sexual behavior. But you know, I think, I think specifically the way they did that in a wire was was was beautiful because even even in the presentation of it as a real life thing that just happened to be a part of this guy's character, they also didn't go the step of making a huge deal about it like it was some triumphant thing that they were doing. They just presented it as normal. Just like there's heterosexual sex scenes in

that show. There's homosexual sex scenes in that show, and they were both kind of like treated equally, and neither were trumpeted as some grand accomplishment. It was just showing you life in this scenario, and sexiest part of life. If anything, I would say that the heterosexual relationships were more toxic than even like the ones that Omar had, Like, if nothing else, his relationships were almost the healthiest part of him. And then you know his his choice is

beyond that although fucking coolest ship probably weren't necessarily as admirable. True. One of the things that that really got me excited, probably in the wrong ways, but I I couldn't help but enjoy was I ended up down a YouTube tunnel of like all the like hotep conspiracy theories. Oh here we go. It's fun. It's a fun time, probably not

in a way that it's supposed to be. But one of the things that basically a lot of people argue is that there's no way into Hollywood, there's no way into real success in Hollywood without committing to sell your soul, uh through some version of homosexuality. M hm hm. And I think that's if I'm understanding correctly, then that's also kind of points back to the dress thing, right, like that you make you choose the dress, and you have

to choose a dress or else you won't have a career. Yes, yeah, I mean and okay, and and this is I'm gonna tell you this gets harry for me because when you asked me this question earlier, what my mind went was to how at the end of the day, all the corporations just want to make money, right, so, and that it kind of filters out some of the conspiracy bs

for me. But I do think there is also a long documented history of like people in Hollywood doing nasty stuff behind the scenes, and that also the nastiness of that also gets into hiring and casting choices, and and that in many ways has interfered with the money making on that level. To that point, I think, I think what we're seeing is that humans are horny as fuck, right that like, despite it being heterosexual, homosexual, whatever is in between, it's just a du being Like I'm trying

to see something and I'm gonna make this this. You know, I've got enough money to make this person with talent show me there's something for my benefit. So, yes, the nastiness as exists, but is that rooted in like a

want to undermine a community. Probably not. It's just a do being a yucky person, it is it is and and and it's not to undermine a community, but it is in a way systemic, but it's systemic in in the same way as its systemic, and government in the same way as systemic, and like megachurches, like wherever there's cult of personality, there's people using their position to take advantage of other people. And you know, in the entertainment industry,

there's just a long, nasty history of it. And I think that if you look at the occurrences of disgusting things there and ways that people's lives have been ruined, it's easy to also conflate that with something something along the lines of the hotel philosophies, where you know where you you got to choose to go gay or else.

And in some in some situations where there are some casting directors or some managers or some agents that are gay or omni or whatever, they do use their position to make sure that they have that sort of access to their clients, and they put those clients in the best positions. But that's not like a contractual thing. I'm saying, when you're right, when you when you ink a six picture deal where there's a clause, you know what I'm saying, it's not that thing. You didn't sign this in Booty Blood.

This is just h This is just the thing that happened to come up. And so you decide whether or not you're gonna continue and be a part of it or not. And that's okay in either direction. I will say, my absolute favorite suggestion that I saw in one of these videos was there was one dude who claimed that the reason Chadwick Boseman died was because of his unwillingness to continue his commitment in the gay agenda, that like Hollywood had him murdered for not wanting to be gay again. Wow. Oh,

that reminds me. This is how I really. At one point, I thought I made it because there was a very old hotel on YouTube who made this whole video about how Comedy Central was making this show called the New Negro and it was and it was it was to amass further emasculate black Oh. I thought, Oh, man, I thought we had a ride and that was the whole video.

That was the whole video. He saw an advertisement for our show and could not wait to hop in front of his computer and talk about how they were doing it again man, And so was the suggestion that y'all were gay? What was that? What Paul his His wasn't gay,

It was just about it. It would be more along the lines of the emasculation by like wearing a dress or like we were cool, you know, like that that direction for Comedy Central exactly, and that we are somehow we were somehow tools viacom trying to subjugate our own community on behalf of them. That's wild. Did you did you ever have a part of you that wanted to respond? Did you right under under the comments? Did you do anything? Man?

But I I showed Barren, and I wanted to show everybody like I wanted to like really run with it on YouTube. But I also I think once I saw that though, it also kind of gave me pause to like it was a situation that caused me to look

at what I was doing from a different perspective quickly. Yeah, like oh people could really think that, yeah, I'm saying like and so that was that was interesting too, like to be inside of it and to know exactly what it is, um, but then to all so see something that makes me look at the title of our own show like oh, oh dang, Like I wonder if other people are, well, that's that you're bringing up something really fascinating that that I think is sometimes hard to articulate.

But but maybe this will be a great entrance, is that I don't think there's a way to exist in Hollywood without being a coon at some point? Do you know what I mean? Like for somebody, that doesn't mean that you are in fact a quote unquote coon. It doesn't even mean that. I think we have a an objective definition of what that actually is. But there's it almost is a certainty that somebody's gonna be like, man,

he's a sellout. He don't believe in black people. Look, he could have done it this way or that way, and it's like, nah, I gotta show and I put black people on. I don't understand, Like, at what point did this become you know, uh, detrimental to to my own community? Well, you know, I think I think the stark realization for me and for Baron was um was the realization that the problem is you you don't get to have the conversation with everybody who has those thoughts.

Like they see a title, they see an ad, they may watch the show, they may not ever watch the show, but their thoughts are going to form based on the information they're presented and whatever kind of person they are already, and you don't get to explain to them the power that we had that we're executive producers, that we got to have, you know, as many black people as we could find to work on the show, to be on the show, and everything that it meant to us to

do it, and the ways we went about that. We don't get to actually open that part of it up for people. And so in some ways, like you're saying, you can't control what people take it wrong with because you don't. You don't get a chance to sit with them and tell them what really happened. There's nothing you can do that can into me that that lady Flow from Progressive ain't an asshole, I think you know what I mean. Like to me, that is an asshole the

human being. She's a piece of ship. I'll never forgive her but what she's done. But the reality is Flow as a real person who might have real say in the way that these ads are being shaped, and like the messaging and being able to creep, you know, add humor to a thing that otherwise might have been just a straight ad read and that's an unfair judgment that's being placed on her much in the way that you guys are dealing with And so I apologize Flow, but

fuck you. At the same time. All right, we're gonna take more, more break. We'll be back with more open Mike Eagle and more. My mama told me, and we are back. If you want to reach the kids on the street, and you gotta do a rep, do a hip hop beat. So I gave my swimming an urban kick. My rhymes are flying, my beat is sick. My crew is big, and it keeps getting bigger. That's because Jesus Christ. Yeah, we're back here with more Mikey more. No, no, no,

what was that? Who was who was that? I don't know. It's just a man I saw on YouTube spitting bars open say, oh my God, of course he said it. He's not a He's not a coward. Jesus Christ. I think it was genuinely meant to be like a tutorial or like a thing to get young people involved in the church. And boy did it go wrong. But I've had fun with it. I love dropping it wherever I can. I thought the show was going real well. Now hurt well, it's only gonna get worse because now we're gonna play

a game. This is I'm gonna play a game with you. This is a very fun game that I like to call white lies ugly. You're disgusting. I'm gonna kill you. Give me two white lies. This is a fun game where I am going to present to you a conspiracy theory mostly supported in the white community. And what I would love for you to do is to really unpack it and figure out why you think white people are so invested in this conspiracy thing. What do they Yes,

it's great. Tell me what these sneaky motherfucker's are up to? Do? You know what I mean? Alright, so the the conspiracy theory. I don't know how much you track Qua nine, I don't know if you're okay. Beautiful is hious. There's some of the funniest people on the Internet, and they don't

get enough credit for being hilarious. But one of the things that Q and on me bers have started to sort of believe and maintain and circulate is that JFK Jr. Or he still alive and uh for some reason, is now a Trump supporter who is going to be showing up at his rallies or events now that he no longer is president. My question for you, why do you think it's so important for these white people to believe

that JFK Jr. Is still alive? Oh man? Because they they really want to believe that the tables have turned to where you know, a lot of these people probably used to be Democrats, um, And they really want to believe that the the left and the Democrats have become evil and they eat babies and they throw children out

a window. Um. They really want to believe that. And and one of the things going to help them believe it is if somebody who they used to love, who was part of you know, uh, the last probably democratic gimee that they really respected, somebody on that side sees it all clearly and it's gonna tell on everybody. And they're waiting like that's gonna be their savior. That's what's gonna make everything makes sense for them. In their head.

It already exists, so that's what has made it makes sense for them, But they need JFK Jr. Help it make sense for all of us. That's that's that's very astute. I had. Okay, that makes a lot of sense to me. So it means that JFK Jr. Is sort of like the last semblance of like a truth that they do believe about Democrats and about sort of like what Democrats

used to represent. It's like how Republicans still bring up Abraham Lincoln as a way of like justifying all the evil that they've done since, because it's like, no, remember, our boy freed the slave. So so we're still good. We're still we still the good guys, no matter what. It's no, it's it's a little more complicated than that place. Boy. Yeah, he freed the slaves. I don't even know if he wanted to. And that's a different and that was many

hundreds of years ago, right, it wasn't recent. Yeah, but I love that. So they're sitting here going if JFK Jr. Is still alive, then he'll come back and he'll show the Democrats what's what and what they should have been and what they could have been. I think we did it. I think we nailed the episode. What a great time. Uh. Could you tell the people where where they can find you on the internet? Cool ship you've got going on? Whatever? Yeah, man, just put out the album like you said anime A

Trauma Divorce, which is out everywhere music is legal. I have a podcast network called Stony Gotland Audio and there's a bunch of shows that we have on there that are mostly from the hip hop perspective. What else and and that's really it. And I'm always on Twitter Mike underscore Ego, letting people know all of the ship did I get up to and my weird thoughts about what's happening in the world. Fuck yeah, And as always, you can follow me at Lankstein Kerman and follow you know,

can subscribe on the podcast. And if you have drop ideas or if you have conspiracy theories or art or whatever it is that you like to send, please send it to my Mama pod at gmail dot com. We would love to see your ship. And uh yeah, this has been amazing. Open Mike Eagle, everybody, okay by my crop chips in your hands us racists, money stuff, I can't tell me