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Welcome home. You're so happy here.
For those of you who Jay I remember last year, Tip and I made a breaking news announcement that we were not authorized to break it that time, but it was about this.
Very podcast, Native Lamppod.
So to those of you, you who were at the beginning of the home, before the home even started, we say.
Welcome home, Welcome you. So we're going to be here, and before we even jump into the.
Substance of the podcast, let's roll that clip. Let's roll that clip over there. I think y'all wrote that clip.
We need to hear blond's beach blonde that's built body blond, bad built pleach blonde, bad built bush bodyach blonde, bad built blond that built pleach blond, bad built bush bottom.
I'm curious.
Hey, Hey, that's where we're up against these days.
We're up against a whole lot of beach blonde, bad built. About to say, but we want to replace one of those B words, but we can't stop in ourselves. Apologies.
Can you please warn the people that they are on TV?
And yes, it sounds like you're warning them now.
Yes, Well, Angela was supposed to give y'all a legal note that if you're in this room, you've agreed to be on TV. And so if you find yourself in our YouTube release of the show on Thursday evening or maybe Friday morning, please do not sue.
Kim.
Your presence is your consent, and we thank you in advance for yes.
And even more so for those of you who engage.
This is a town hall takeover as Brandon by our good friend Kim Blackwell. Thank you, sister for having us at this incredible conference. If you ask a question this Mike is right here in the center.
Of the room. You will state your name and where you're from, and you are.
Also authorizing us to record you on audio and video, so we are very grateful for that.
Can I say real quick, Yeah, I want to say welcome home to the people in the audience here live with us, but also welcome home to all y'all who are listening who are not here at this conference.
Come home, everybody.
Yes, we are going to accelerate her in Miami. It is our first live.
Show of this election season. We're going to be campaigning on our own because campaigns right now a little dry. So on that what we really wanted to talk about today. We normally spend a lot of time in politics. What we believe is that politics are everywhere, and we talk about that on every single show. And one of the things that has been very present, especially for people in this room, are the attacks on DEI.
We know that there are up to eighty.
Bills and roughly twenty eight states that are attacking diversity, equity and inclusion, and since January fourteen of those bills have been signed into law. We know that there are out of all the fortune one thousand, there is one Fortune one thousand CEO and she will be honored at this conference. Her name is Tashanda Decade for those of you who all do not know, and she stands alone right now, there's only one black woman CEO. Two percent of the c suite for the Fortune five hundred are
black women. Four percent of board seats of companies in the SMP are black women, and eighty six eighty six of those seats were filled after the reckoning with George Floyd in twenty twenty. We also know that last year the Supreme Court had a disastrous ruling against affirmative action, and since then a lot of the companies that said black lives matter said, actually.
Y'all don't matter that much. I ain't trying to really have you in here like that. So we have to face those attacks as well.
We know for black women when if and how we have children is under attack, to how we wear our hair, to how and where we learn and what we and what we learn, and we also know that how we fund our businesses is even under attack. And you all will hear from Arian Simone about what she's experiencing and the fight that she's up against at this conference. So That's kind of how I wanted to to put this the context of this conversation and lay that out there.
We know that we also are under tremendous attack, even in the legal field. We have spent a lot of time on our podcast recently talking about our dear sister and friend, Marilyn Moseby. I'll be leaving you all tomorrow morning to go to her sentencing in Greenbelt, Maryland.
We are fighting for her every day and the reason for that, thank you. The reason for that is because Marilyn is not the only one.
I've talked about it on the podcast often. Andrew, who's sitting next to us, could have been in that number. Andrew was acquitted, he had to pay a hefty legal fee to make sure that he was adequately defended. But it's not just the two of them. There was Aaron Mesayala and Monique Wordell and all of these black women prosecutors, Kim Gardner, Rachel Rollins. We are under attack on every side.
And part of what we know are call to action is when we come here every year that Kim wants us to sure is that we are figuring out how we support each other so that when the attacks come TIF. We talked about your attacks last year. When the attacks come, we are ready to mount a ready defense and that is what we want to talk about today.
Thank you for setting it up that way, Angela, and I know we don't have to tell y'all in the room the state of DEI, but it truly does cast a dark shadow of influence over so many sectors. And just to add to make sure you all understand that the center of this conversation, it is a conversation with us. But we're here live because we wanted to be a conversation with you, So y'all are not being talked at today.
We want to talk with you all today.
And as we give calls to action to our audience watching at home, we are also open and receptive to the calls to actions you all have. I want to thumbtack or add on to what Angela said about DEI. There are proactive attacks happening. Last year, thirteen attorneys general sent letters to private sector companies asking them to re examine their DEI policies in wake of the law. That's what I would call a threat. It's not a request, it's a threat. And so there are people who are
responding to this. So whatever happens in politics, it definitely impacts the private sector, and it should not be incumbent upon the private sector to play a political role in upholding are just our guaranteed rights. But increasingly so, that's what's happening. And I know a lot of the people in this room, in those listening at home, you all
hold the line for us. So I do want to say thank you to everybody in this room and everybody who's at home, who has stood up for someone who was their subordinate, who has supported someone who was their superior, who has opened a door for someone who looked like them, who has hired.
Themselves over and over and over, because that's what it takes.
And it's a lot of fear driven responses now and we have to get ahead of that as well. So thank you all for being here and enjoying the conversation. There's a microphone right there, so as y'all have thoughts, comments, questions, please.
Feel free to jump in and be a part of the conversation as well.
Yeah, and I'll just add and I just want to thank you all for creating this space. I was blown away by some of the background and the work that you each do. And of course my thought immediately ran to, well, who the hell is carrying a little while y'all are here? As I think about the roles that you play every single day in somebody's life. If it's not at the boardroom, it's ensuring payroll works out this month. If it's not that,
it's client development. If it's not that, maybe it's home and taking care of all the things that require your attention because for some reason.
Nobody else knows how to do it.
And so in that spirit, I just want to say thank you, thank you for the service, and also thank you for being. What is any irrational request of any of society to have, but you all often rise to it and go above it, and that is that we expect you to be superheroes every day in every aspect.
Of your life.
And when that doesn't come through quite the way that you would like it too, because we on the benefactor side are like, thank you, keep it moving, and you allt to like, that could have gone better, And if I had just the second more, this is how it could have been done. I just I think it's an amazing attribute to you and it deserves and acknowledgment.
And then the only other thing I.
Would say is, and I learned this through my experience having gone and fought the federal government and trial, and that is, there are the people who you expect to show up for you and to have your back, and maybe even some of you expected that you might lean out in a different kind of way. And I guess to satiate that a little bit, I would say, we
all have roles to play here. And the people I was mad at who didn't show up at the courtroom, I didn't consider for a moment what risks they may be putting themselves in that might impact their ability to bring home a check next month, the month after, or the month after. And so seeing those people where they were, I think it helped me to get over very quickly
the fact that it isn't always about us. Sometimes it's about them, and the way they show up is how they can show up for you, because that's the best they can do.
In that moment.
I heard it preached one time, and I'll stop that because we may be lions, we may be folks who are going to show up squad formation every time somebody finds themselves in the crosshairs. We are expecting the people.
Who we ride with to do the same.
And guess what, a lot of those people have been camouflaging as lions and lionesses.
And they are hyaenas.
And you can't expect a hyaena to perform like a lion because it just doesn't know how. And so in the way that they perform, they're just doing what they know how to do. And I think if we have grace in that way and in our own way, keep the pressure around to show up every time that we can and the most persistent and helpful way we can, I think it goes a long way.
We notice it, and the people who you stand in the gap for notice it.
Can I ask you and you and Andrew a question because I take your point. You've said that a lot.
Andrew counseled me when I was going through things, and you know, he said to me, you expect hyenas to be lions to our lioness and our lion on stage. I'm just curious and to the people in the audience, I kind of do expect us to be lions, you know, because it is challenging when we are ten percent of us are lions protecting ninety percent of hyaenas. It's exhausting, And I just think the more people if we all
speak out, we all hold the line. If we all do something, they can't cancel everybody, they can't fire everybody. They literally can't live without us. So I'm just curious, as you say we should have grace from you all's thoughts, like where do you fall on that? Like how what is the expectation from the folks in this room, the folks who are listening, who do operate out of a righteous and understandable fear, But we're saying, no, you have to check your fear and lock arms with us.
I don't even know if you have to check your fear. I think that you have to move anyway, you know. And I think the other thing is so funny that you're like, I have a question, because I was going to ask this question and I will kind of do this as a focus group whole with the audience.
How many of you all are exhausted by the attacks.
Like that?
I mean, it doesn't give any real room.
And so if you know that you're sitting next to your sister or your brother or your friend, and you're like, I know, that I'm tired, and I know that you're tired, but maybe we're not tired in the same way.
How can I support you like you might find an extra.
Little boost of energy and support from that, like one of the things that I'll give you all really as a testimony and to me, all of these folks are lions. I have a professional development program that I talked to you all about last year too.
These young people, y'all have blown my mind.
Joe Teika is nodding because when with black women, there are another source of constant strength, a source of lines, and that is a reflection of Joe.
That's how she is.
She doesn't expect anything else but excellence from us, even in our weakness.
And the time I'm about to cry talking about I'm not doing.
This, but thank you, Joe, I see you, I love you, And I'm thinking about these young women who were like Maryland Moseby could be us. They have shown up doing graphics better than any graphic I could have imagined. Kim's a testament about control. That's what we talk about all the time, like showing up like videos a social campaign. They've been like they ordered T shirts with the QR
codes on like they are ready for tomorrow. And it was there were things that I hadn't even considered in my exhaustion, And in my exhaustion I leaned up against some young folks who were tired, but they were tired in a different way and got covered Maryland got covered in ways that we couldn't have even imagined.
So I think the lesson in that is in your exhaustion. One, you don't have to do it all because you can't, you know.
And I think the second thing would be if you ask some one for help, it might be the best thing you could have ever done, because they probably can do it better than you do, you know what I mean, Like you really might be blown away. So not only are we lions, they might be cubs, but they're in development. Everybody ain't a hyaena. Every want a hyaena? And stay the hell away from me though, Andrew, Yeah.
When I say hyenas, I don't say it as a judgment against them. I say it from some people are living their lives wherein they are accountable to somebody else for how they get paid, whether they can show up at the job site the next day.
I just want to acknowledge that.
Bold bodacious, incredible ways in which we try to show up for each other.
There's a sense of liberation and freedom that affords that. And everyone doesn't have the same thing, but we all have something.
And I guess the requests they asked would be that we lean more in to the something that we might be able to do. No, you can't stand on the corner for me, because your boss drives that way every day and if he sees you out there holding a pro sign for me, you may face some consternation. But could you write a check or at least ask four your seat mates at church to pass you with twenty five dollar check for this young man who you believe how to get there and you've got limitations on the
ways that you can do that. Or could you be the CEO and instead of leading the protests, maybe through your procurement policies, you are changing rules and contract negotiations and bid agreements so that the people who then get access to the opportunity to compete, their lives are transformationally altered forever, and their children's children and their children's children's children will be the benefactors of it. So there are ways in which I think all of us have a
role to play. We may not be marching today, but you might be in the in the boardroom changing some policies that then creates a whole new generation of black millionaire.
That's such a great point. I want to Speaking of black millionaires, we got some in this room and some that have questions.
I'm gonna call on Jewel.
Jewel told me she had something she was gonna say, so I'm gonna call her up so she can come to the mic.
And I'm gonna call on Britney too. I don't know where Britney and Joe Taga.
I know we've talked about Y'll take Edi on this podcast a few times and she told me her question in the in the hallway, So yes, I want Y'll take her to.
None of them going up to the mic. What's going on?
Like I wonder if they just deep thought what Andrew said preached so good, they were just arrested in the spirit. Yes, ma'am, say your whole name and where you're from, because you are a legend.
Oh wow, thank you. Hello everyone.
My name is juel Burg Solomon and I am managing partner at Collab Capital, which is in the early stage venture capital fund investing in black lead innovation companies across the US. Yes, and to the points about lions and hyenas, I'm experiencing.
That in my day to day.
What I want to talk about and get you all's opinion on is giving away early victories. I'm seeing that where people are afraid they don't want to be the next target for some of these lawsuits, and so they are making changes. They're changing their policy, they're changing their website, they're changing their purpose. And we have made a stand that we're not going to do that. We are very intentional. We understand the need for black entrepreneurs and so we're
not changing anything. But by other people giving away those early victories and making those changes, it does put us more of a spotlight on us and what we're doing. And so I guess it's an urge to people who do have control and power to not just say, Okay, Edward blooming your posse, you got it, will make the adjustment. We don't need to make the adjustment because we're on the right side. So curious about you know how you all see that? And encouragement for those of us who
want to stand as lions. But maybe in an even worse spot because folks are already kind of giving the victory away.
I love that question.
I'm gonna just because we just talked about this, I want Joe Taka to offer some answers on that question. And while she makes her way to the mic, we'll jump in. But Angela, I think that's a good place for you because I was just thinking about your Angela.
She will.
Don't let her deflect. I'm gonna tell y'all, Angela is the chiefest staff to the Blacks. We always say that her because she will jump out there and be in charge of something. And with this entire Marilynd Moseby situation, like she has coordinated, she has spearheaded all of this.
Then she has an ability in leadership. When she asks, people will deliver.
And even asking asking hyenas to be a lion, they might not even know they were a lion, but they become a lion when you empower them. So, having worked on Capitol Hill and you know had all this, I'm curious how you get people when you call and ask they say.
Yes, well, I love you. But I'm not about to answer that question. No, I'm not. I want to answer Jewel. I love Jules question Jewel.
I'm gonna say something controversial and people might stage walk out, So we're just gonna have to roll with this. You know what, white folks really got us beat on strategy. They really got us beat on strategy. Why do we have to tell them on our websites, on our social media everything that we are doing that we intend to do.
I think that there are things that we can do that are strategic where we still decide what businesses were going to fund, what people were going to hire, what kids are going to get the scholarship, how we're going to organize.
And they don't need to know our business.
For example, America First Legal that was stood up by Stephen Miller. They say on there that they are protecting our patriotic duty to do whatever bs. I ain't gonna cusco with my daddy and then listen to get mad. But like they ge to say that and beat the patriots, why can't your fund be the fun patriots?
Do they have us beat on strategy or do they have US beat on power?
They have us beat on both.
So I hear people in the audience saying both say it to my bank, Yes, I.
They can also fund their strategies. Like I'm right, we're brilliant. We're brilliant with less.
That's what I'm saying.
Like sometimes black folks, it's like I'm trying to figure I got some note in the mail that my mortgage company with switched.
I got two kids in school and cousin JJ and need money for the prom.
And on top of that, I gotta care about climate change and Trump and my local elections in.
The school board, you know.
And I think even when we talk about Republicans have having better messaging and strategy, it's like, no, you're just talking to a dumber crowd. We have more things on our hands, and you're the people you're speaking to. I say, are less curious about things happening? If I can lead with the racism, I'm already sold with white folks. That's how it goes with us. I think we're just a little more curious about things. Yeah, but I disagree, Okay, do you disagree with me all the time?
And then it is I think.
White people's power in this country, in this world has had so much time to experiment, pass, fail, reinvent itself. But what is insatiable about them is their addiction to power, and your addiction to power will allow all kinds of creative, innovative, illegal.
Ideas to percolate, and you.
Get to try them things out without any consequence because you own it all and for us where and we may not own it all.
Every step we take may be risking at all. You don't tend to want to commit suicide.
You want to exist, Your body wants to exist, You want to thrive one day, and all of that can be upended by us making just one false move. And when I say false move, it could be the right move. It could be the right move. But the person, the purveyor, the one who has the ability to give it and take it, has determined that it's the wrong move.
And then that's it.
And so I don't think we're less curious. I think we have less capacity for creativity because of the conditions in which we exist.
I was saying they were less curious, not us. We are curious. They are.
I don't know that they're less curious or that it matters. I think what they are is addicted to power, and that addiction allows them to create.
All the solutions.
The second, third, fourth tertiary option that don't work. You know, they can do it because there's nobody coming up right behind them that they they nearby fear losing their power to Even the rise of the majority of black and brown people doesn't scare them by itself, because the world is all always been run by a smaller group of the bourgeoisie that haves, and it's only about ten percent of them.
The rest of us just on the board. The rest of us are just pieces on the board that can be moved.
Okay, speaking of movie, I'm moving, where'd y'all take it go? She's like, I'm sitting down, I ain't got time for go.
We're gonna go to Joe.
But I just want to remind y'all, Jule's question was not about white people's powers, about how to use ours.
Go ahead, Joe, Well, good evening.
I'm Joe take Edie, strategist, investor and founder of hashtag Win with black women. I wanted to and I totally agree with Joel in terms of we have to be careful about pre empting the attacks. I do also want to talk about this notion of power because in these attacks that we are facing, particularly as black women, and I believe we were in a conversation. I think Britt
is going to talk in a minute. But what we see over and over again, whether or not it is our sisters injustice, our sisters in corporate wherever, it is the same strategy. And it is about the allure, the control, and it's all about power and the fear connected to that desire for power leads to a very ambitious, very well funded strategy to attack and we have to be very careful. I call it the three d's. First, they will work to discredit, largely a black woman. That will
be a discredit a smear campaign. Second, a detachment, and that is the most dangerous aspect of the strategy is when we are detached from our root and our base. Because once you are isolated, and you're talking about the lions and the hyenas, but anytime you are in the wild, an animal that is isolated is most easily attacked. And so once you are detached from your people and your roots. Even if you are detached from the roots of where you know you come from and your strength, if you
are mentally detached, then they can destroy you. And so we have to be very careful that we cannot afford to let not any one of us be attacked, because an attack on one of us is attack on all of us, and it is an attack on us as a whole, as a people. And so that is why we always have the truth, speak truth to power, even if it's uncomfortable, even if it's not necessarily the most popular thing to do, because that is how we will remain resilient, and that is how we have to remain as a people.
Thank you, Joe, Joe, Thank you Joe.
You do realize you're being attacked in this way because you are being so successful in so many others. The shot has to be fired over the bow so that anybody who's looking at you, who's inspired by you, who thinks they can come behind you and have the temerity to do the same thing that they see out loud in public, for everybody to know this that if you come for that crown, this is how we level you.
Some people blame Fani for everything that's happened in Georgia and the derailing of that case, and I submit, and I said it on our pod. It doesn't matter what she did or did not do. This will have always been the strategy. If it wasn't true, they would make it up. What they make up, they then go further to fabricate and to continue to perpetuate, and they they have no shame about lying left right, backwards, upside down.
But it's our lives, our credibility, our community. And then too often sometimes we're the first ones to say, now you should have known better, and then we're gonna be loud about you should have known. But you should have known better is inside the house conversation. It's not for everybody.
Yeah, we said about FAM. You ain't talking about FAM. You to y'all, you don't care about it.
You ain't you go there.
You ain't no rally, you.
Don't get no money, you don't give anything, you don't pay no rent. There's no way you are occupying space. So some of our conversations have to be internal. But I just have to say, there's a poem that that one of those lines is it's when things seem worse that you mustn't quit.
That's how you know. You getting close to the line, that's how you That's how you know they scared. That's how you know that they are.
They are right for their existence, and the ones who are in alignment with them, are the ones who have closest proximity to them. That's how we lose white women voters. They're getting killed over here. Yeah, but because they're married to a white man and they have a white child who's maybe a son, their proximity keeps them connected to this system that doesn't love them, doesn't respect them, does
nothing for them. Into the passage of those men in their lives, They're back to where they were at the beginning.
Shame.
And I think, Brittany, Yes, where's britt britt The bishop got a word?
Bishop, We had a word.
I mean I had, I had a question you want me to.
I do think though, to first of all, Jule, last week I was going through the Atlanta Airport and who's face that I see on the ad yours? So I just want to honor the work that you are doing and the impact that you are making on us, our people, our communities, because even amidst all of the attacks, baby, you are shining, and we love to see it because we all shine with you when you shine. The other thing I think to this point about attacking black women is that in every era of and Angela, I want
you to know. I just finished my video about our sister Maryland. So I talked about this in the video and I'm about to post it. But what we know throughout history is that in every single era of progress for marginalized people, there is a promised backlash. It is swift, it is thorough, and it is precise. That pattern will always repeat itself. Right, Jim Crowd reconstruction, right, Trump was
the answer to Obama, These things consistently happen. So after twenty fourteen through twenty twenty, now we're experiencing that intense backlash. And the goal is always to make the status quo permanent, right, that the folks who hold power are able to hold it forever, and anybody who would dare try to snatch
any morsel of it from their hands be damned. So if we know that that's true, and we know the backlashes promise, and we know that that's their blueprint, the good news is that we also know our ancestral blueprints.
We know our history's blueprints.
We know what we've written, we know the stories that we've shared with each other, we know the lore and the legacy that we are able to push through our not just and to Joe take 's point, not just through our written words and our formal leadership, but through our connectivity, through our community, through those ancestral, rooted practices that we've been doing in that white supremacy separated us from right. The function of whites premicy really is to
separate us from our own knowing. And going back to our own knowing helps us sustain because the truth of the matter is they come after black women because they knows that nobody else can be taken down quite as swiftly as a black woman. They know that we're not defended. They know that we're not protected. Malcolm X already told
us that, right. So if we get so impenetrable, if we get together so tight and link our arms so well that nobody and nothing can come in between us, that we are the lions that they are afraid of, permanently and perpetually, they can't come for us because they'll know they can't win.
And that's the work we have to do.
That's the purpose of accelerate her right, so that we're actually building those connections intergenerationally, and we're not just saying you got it, good luck, cist, but actually saying.
No, I'm linking arms so that we can come along together.
Come out, preacher. Thank you Brittany Pagnet cutting down the doors of the church. Now, oh geez gets to it the question again.
But speaking of my question and speaking of us moving along together, to move up political for us. Second, even though the personal is political for black women, shout out
to the kambah Hea River Collective. There is an understanding that I think we all have in this moment ahead of this presidential election where not only is the top of the ticket important, abortion rights are on the ballot, voting rights are on the ballot, the futures for our young people are on the ballot, guns are on the ballot, Climate change, all of that stuff is on the ballot, up and down.
So we know how important this election is.
And we know that we've seen some of the polling that if the election we're done today, that there are a number of black people who said they will sit out. The good news is the election is not happening today, and we still got time to engage with our people, not con to send our people into voting, but to listen, to engage, to understand, and to meet folks where they are, to invite all of us into a different way of being to move forward.
So this is my question. In the era that we have right now, we know that black votes are.
Consistently taken for granted, and if we are going to get our things, not only on the agenda, but the policies that truly benefit us past consistently that we have to show up, like all of these other groups and all of these other issues, with the level of force and power and fully operating that power. And we also know what will happen to us and the rest of the world if body loses.
So how are you all?
And we've talked about this, but I would love for the room and your listeners to hear how you all are threading that needle and having those loving, respectful conversations with our family members, with our cousins, with the folks we sit next to on the plane wherever, about how to thread that needle to say, yes, we need to stand in our full power, and we need to make sure that we engage that radical pragmatism that black people use all the time to set the conditions for our fight.
Because I'd rather fight Biden than fight Trump. I love that.
Feedback on this tiff.
Under Hey, I'll you know what I always talk about the same thing. Thank you for that, Brittany Pacnet Cunningham. For the folks who are listening and can't see you appreciate that. So I think one of the wonderful things about our podcast is we feel avoid and so something that I take very seriously, and like you said, britt it is professional. It's my professional grooming, but also my personal commitment, and that is disrupting the narrative that the
white run mainstream media puts out there. And so something we've talked about was this narrative that you know, all the black folks, but particularly black men, are running to vote for Trump. Yes, that is, there are people out there who are considering voting for him. But I looked at this in the media and I thought I would no sooner lay the failure of this democracy at the feet of black men. And you ain't said lock about
the white conservative folks across every socioeconomic demographic. And you want to keep promoting this narrative and pushing that out there and pushing that out there, and the disrespect it is when black men ninety eight percent of whom vote Democrat, and of course black women do overwhelmingly, so They also will plug people who don't have a background in politics,
are not well versed, not well formed. But you put this person on to be the voice of what you want to talk about in serious issues for us, and they only do that in the black community. Tell me when the last time was that you heard Joe Rogan on CNN talking about policy. Tell me when they ask Amy Schumer's opinion on what's happening in the Middle East. But you have no problem putting a comedian on, an actor,
on a rapper on to talk about serious issues. I think we have to demand more respect for ourselves and support independent media, and for those of who still work in media, who are in decision making positions in media, let your voices, let our voices be heard. It should not have to be it's okay for us to speak
a truth only after white folks say it. Only after white folks make it acceptable to drop a cultural reference or hip hop music on and then the rest of the black folks can do it, and now it's okay.
That erodes our trust in media.
And when we saw that happen in the twenty sixteen election, there was an overwhelming amount of people who started getting their news from social media, and we later found out this was the Internet Russia agency pumping false narrative because they spent two seconds here and said, oh, I know the way to mess up the election. They treat black folks really messed up over there, So let's make that our narrative.
So that's my personal commitment.
Every time we talk about something, I'm constantly giving pushback on what the media says.
So thank you for that question.
I think this is a good time for us to open up really into solutions. One thing I know that we all are clear about is the challenges that we're up against. But this is a very unique, unique space for us every year to come together, even as Jovian challenged us this morning around stating our intentions, being clear about what we want and making sure we're creating this space, it's a safe space here.
Native lampod too, is a safe space.
We say welcome home because we want people to feel like this is a safe space to discuss your issues, to raise your questions. But I think even beyond that, beyond this room, beyond this particular session in time with this live podcast, we want you all to feel like this convening is a safe space so there's something you need from this room. If you're under attack right now and you haven't said it out loud, you've been afraid to say it out loud.
You know.
If you are like I don't want to be under attack, how can I prevent That's what jul is saying. Really, I don't want that attack because my mission in life is not to be fighting them. It is to be providing a pathway for us. What is the safest way that we can ensure that? Those are the kinds of things now, with the time we have remaining that I want to make sure you all are sharing with us. I'm calling on them for help because, as I said, I've learned a remarkable lesson in this season in life.
I think I know a lot of the answers I've learned. I don't have them all, and I'm good with that. You know, ye, I see your hand. I would love for you to make your way to this microphone because that is what we have, so you'll be on camera. A reminder that you stepping up here means you're on camera and you have a consentant, is that Jessica?
Yes, yeah, Miss Jessica.
Where you're from? For the people who can't see you on the podcast listening.
Hey everyone, my name is Jessica Nabango, and I love that you brought up the idea of solutions and that's just what I want to speak to because for me in this era, in the last basically since twenty twenty four, for me, I've been talking to friends about the blacklash and specifically financially because for a lot of us who are creators or you know.
Work as gig workers.
Essentially where gig workers looking for speaking engagements and brand deals and whatnot, it has it hasn't dried up completely hopefully like luckily for me, it's not completely dry, but we've definitely seen it scale back.
And so one thing we need to discuss I feel like.
More of and I'm going to work with Kim for next year for this, and I love the announcement of the venture fund is I think we have to discuss finances more but integrated, right so we know, like there's Tiffany the Budget Nesto, who's amazing, we know about the podcast that exists, but I think we need more integration. I think that black people generally don't like to talk about money. They definitely don't want to talk about debt. They don't want to talk about all of these things.
But I think it's enough of it.
You so what.
Right exactly say it's not enough of it, But it's like, how do we take what we have and grow it without having to wait for more income?
Right?
So I'm someone I've been investing in the stock market for a long time and I have like a variety investments, whether it's art, it's stock, it's real estate, whatever it is. I think we have to have more open conversation about that in a very practical manner, but also integrated into social justice conversation because the only way we're going to
survive is if we can take care of ourselves. And in order to take care of ourselves, we have to be able to have the money we had, no matter how little or how much, we have to be able to take that money and grow it. Like I love the brands that are hearing, there's so many things that we can purchase, and I'm here to buy.
All of the things.
But I also want to know if I see you with a Chanel bag, I know you better have investments ten times that and if you don't, that's a conversation that we need to be having.
You heard some feelings.
No, it's not.
It's on the podcast again as a reminder it is being recorded, but it is a family conversation.
I love this so much, Jessica, in part because you were.
Like, I have investments, and you listed the variety of investments for so many people who are serving as influencers and even are on shows.
That is not the case.
I'm gonna tell you. I hope I'll get in trouble with our with our girl thread, but we have some of the folks in here who are on it. We had to have a conversation about tax lawyers.
I was just talking. I was having lunch and talking to people about tax strategy.
We had to have a conversation about tax lawyers because of tax leans and tax debt and not and not knowing that once you left your job, now you're responsible for paying quarterly taxes.
It feels really basic to people who grow up in business. It was not basic for some of us, or for some of us.
I'm gonna put my daddy business others some of us who had dads who did businesses and still just collected the tax debt.
You understand.
Sorry daddy but like this is the thing. We have to have these conversations. I'm gonna come find you because I'm gonna come learn.
Oh yeah, forty four.
And don't know enough about this still out here reckless okay, So thank you.
I'm twenty four and don't know enough about it. So thank you.
I love it, Tim, It's so fun being your mentor.
Thank you, thank you, my sister. I would I'll just say, this isn't a solution. This is a problem.
But a lot of us, Jessica to talk about public speaking, and a lot of us our income is clunky, you know. So you may get a big load of money from January to March. And I know, for me, i'm you know, hood rich sometimes and it's not that I'm balling. I don't own a Chanel bag, I'll tell you, but I'm not giving the government my money because I'm gonna hold on to this money because I have to. I used to wait till the last minute to pay bills because I never knew when the ground was gonna drop from
under me, and I need that money to eat. Twenty years later, I still have that mentality and that PTSD. Growing up poor and black in this country is traumatic. You carry it with you for a long time. And so now if I get a big pot, if I get six figures of income, I'm not giving that half to the government. I'm waiting until I get the next big income to put half of that money away because I'm nervous about when I'm going to get another check. So that's my reality. I think that's a lot of
the reality for a lot of people out there. So of all the people who are in this room from financial institutions, please come find me or I will come find you.
That that that fear, and I like it makes sense for all of us. But it's not just individual it's because the system is acting to protect itself. The reason why they don't worry the same way we worry is because they know about all of those safety nets that exist for them, and those same safety nets don't exist for us, the same way you misuse some funds from that recovery. I saw black folks being led through the federal courthouse in my area, Like, you know, there.
Was a I ain't gonna be staff that that'd be uh.
I was gonna say, like it was a fish fry, but it was my and what I was going to say about that was horribly stereotypical.
But I love fish, and I'll throw a fish try anyway.
But the but the point, the point is is that they were marching us through there like it was the marching one hundred a Florida and m University right on. These little puny nothing nothing, nothing, but they get the education. They fall into the loop, They fall into the whole first, and then they create a salve so that they never have to fall into it again.
But for us, this no south. We were a distraction in the first place.
I see Lovey walk up.
And since we're and since we're in our time where we're we're getting some solutions, we're gonna get one.
I know she got a good one.
This sister, if you don't know, is in New York Times best selling author four times, yea four times. And Lovey is gonna be my one sister friend today. Who's gonna say her name and where she's from? Because the rest of y'all ain't following no directions. What's up with that, y'all?
Like you know who I am? Look me up me ba, go ahead.
So I'm loving Jay Jones and I'm an author, speaker and book advisor.
I am from Chicago by way of Nigeria.
And one of the things that I think is a solution to a lot of our problems as a community is vulnerability. Whether it is our community building, whether it's in finance, whether it's in books.
It's about our inability to be siloed.
One allow ourselves to be soilo because I think officially becomes a choice that we choose over and over again.
Right, we know the ways of systems, we know the games that are being played.
We see the playbook, and yet we're saying, how am I surprised that this game is being played? So I think one of the things that we need is to just start telling the truth, even when it scares us, and I mean the truth of I feel lost, I'm drowning, I'm overwhelmed, i am broke.
My company is crumbling.
Mine did last year shout out, and what saved me was vulnerability to my TPG sisters, to my mentors, and I was like, listen, I am drowning.
I'm about to be bankrupt in three months, I'm.
Firing my whole team. And as it's happening, them holding me is what saved my life. Them giving me advice, but.
It started with me saying I need help.
Now.
What's happened is it's been beaten out of us, it's been traumatized out of us. We've been told not to trust each other, and then we walk around walking alone when none of this.
Was ever supposed to be alone.
And I've had the privilege of having access to some rooms where I'm like, let me really figure out what's happening here so I can tell my people what's going on. So one day last year, I ended up in a room where it was an invite only room for best selling authors. To be in the room, you had to either have been a New York Times bestseller or have sold two hundred and fifty thousand copies of your books.
In that room, there were only two black women, and the other black women there was there because I made sure she was there, and I'm sitting in this room and we spent nine hours exchanging all the tips on how we all became bestsellers. And what I realized is all of them were best sellers because whenever one of them was coming out of the book, they would all take a week and sit with this person and say, so, what are you doing for your book, and then we
wonder why we are not winning. There's an intentional I need your help.
Please show up for me. What do you have. I need us to really start being honest with each other.
Don't flex about the Chanelle bag if you're struggling. Also, I need you to say, hey, I need your help, because when I would say personally, anybody who's coming out with the book, I'm gonna.
Do a book session after this.
But I have been so upset for the last year when all these books by black women are coming out and failing, and I'm.
Like, why didn't you call me? Yes, I could have helped you.
Like after the fact, I'm like, I could have helped you, and they're like, I.
Just didn't think you would.
I'm here so I need all of us to really start being honest with each other, show up for each other for real. And when somebody tells you I will help you, believe them. And I stand here today. One thing I know I can help everybody within this book and in this room books. I don't want one person to come out with a book in this room and it tanks because I have all our numbers. Now I know what every book is selling. Our books are failing,
and it hurts my feeling every time. I'm like, y'all could have called me so number one solution, let's just start being honest and vulnerable with each other and know we are all here to be helpmates and that's how we shift culture, and that's how we shift everything.
Thank you. I love that. Thank you for your vulnerability.
Can y'all do me one favor because I think it's so important Again, Jovin, I'm still in all your material today, but can you just look at your neighbor and say I need help? That's all I need y'all to say, because we're still recording this podcast, but I think it's so important to say that, to do that because we have to be vulnerable. Lovey, you are so right. So that's a great place to start. So we know our first solution is vulnerability, being honest about your text it
and your chanail bag, being honest. If you need help with your book, let me said, I'm here. That is a New York Times bestseller four times over.
That's a formula. She got it figured out. Why you want to ask her? What is were talking about?
Getting Angela in space is well? First of all, on the books. I just want to shout out real quick doctor Sharon Malone, who has a book out right now, girl Women's Hea Doctor Malone wa wave in there so I ain't know. Yeah, so she has a book out. I talk to Lovely if you haven't already, sare okay?
Good.
So I just wanted to say really.
Quickly thank you to Kim Blackwell because this conference is a setting of vulnerability. And last year Angela and I were on the stage with doctor Joy, who moderated a conversation with them. That's okay, well, why you come up with something I want to say on that stage. I mean, it was really just like a conversation. And I'll shout out Angela again. She'll deflect again. I'm gonna shout out again. Angela is a kind of sister who you don't have to say I need help. She sees you and says,
I know you need help, and I'm showing up. And there's something about that because if you say, well, what do you need, that's a burden to me because now I'm trying to think of it. Sometimes it's helpful to say here's what I think you need, and I'm gonna do it. You know I'm gonna uber eat you dinner tonight, or I'm gonna you know, I'll keep your kids, or I'll come over and cook you dinner.
Whatever that is.
So last year I talked about, you know, I have a lot of business in New York. I work in New York, I live in DC. I have to be there half the time. And right when I walked off the stage, Susan Chapman, wave your hair hands, Susan Chapman, she came up to me and said, I have an apartment in Brooklyn. It's yours whenever you need it, and I have not moved out since I've been there for a year.
No, I'm kady, but it's beautiful.
It's beautiful.
The air.
But I did. I took Susan up on that. I stated her her beautiful place.
But that is the kind of thing where she didn't wait for me to actually just showed up and said, Okay, I heard you say this, I have this, and we have to be that for each other in ways like Angela, I will say, does it the most, but in ways that it stretches us and bends us. Now, my moment
of vulnerability is when I have extended myself. I've gotten my feelings hurt a few times, I've been betrayed or somebody say something slick to me, and at this age and stage in life, I retreat, you know, And it's like, I'm insular. I'm grateful to be surrounded by women who
I know, I trust. I'm you know, cocooned in that space and I appreciate it, and men who have you know, Andrew has definitely been a source of inspiration and listening ear and personally and professionally, but I have I can get to a place where it's like, if I don't know you, I don't want to talk to you because I've had too many times, or somebody I can talk to you, but I'm not. I might not share something as personal because I've had somebody say something slick and it bothers me.
Uh.
And I've pushed through those moments. But I know after my show was canceled, I retreated. I didn't want to hear from people. There were so many people saying things about me and speaking about me with certainty, and it had never met me before. I was under attack and it just put me in such an emotional hole. And thankfully I've been surrounded by people that I'm climbing out of that. So I just want to say, if you've been in that space, you're not alone in that space either.
And when I see other people and I can tell you in that emotional hole, my vulnerability is to share mine and then extend a hand to you to lift you out of that place, because I know what that feels like.
We see Bevvy. Thanks to we see Bevvy, Bevy Smith. Hi, I'm Bevy Smith. I'm from Harlem, USA. Yes you are to say I was from She's from Harlem to TV show as well, if you're.
Okay, I'm a.
Young actress as well. I'm an angel new But I wanted to say, Kim, what you've done here is so beautiful and it's very very powerful.
But I will tell you this, I've been doing a lot of hello and hi to everyone and smiling, and I've not always received it back. So what I want to say is I want to challenge everyone in this room to say hello to every single black woman that you see. Okay, I shouldn't even have to say that, but you should. And the other thing I want to challenge us because it's a lot of us in this
room who know each other. It's a lot of powerful and I'm just gonna say, it's a lot of powerful clicks up in here, but not everyone is a part of a little.
Crew and a click and a club and all that.
I'm very fortunate I know a lot of y'all, so I could go up in all the spaces. But because I was once a nerd girl who was bullied, I'm very sensitive when I see people that are shy, that are a little you know, insular, that are sitting at the table bull and it's kind of like along, like kind of off to the side tonight.
When we see any of those people, can we bring them into the phone. Yes, that's a good life lesson.
We have to do that because there's so many of us who are suffering, and chemists built this right. But if we let those little people just sit on the sidelines by themselves, they won't come back next year, yeah, because.
They'll be like, yeah, it was nice.
But if you don't know the people, if you're not in the crew, if you're not in the clique, it's not really good. That's what happens out a lot of conferences. So I want to make sure that folks feel welcome, and so that's my little I.
Love that, Bevy. Thank you, thank you, Bevy.
That's easy. We talked about vulnerability. We're talking about transparency, trusting someone to be your help when you need help, being able to say that we see. Are you coming at Nikki?
Okay, Nikki, you got Nikki a boss, a real boss from my heart in the building, Nikki, tell everybody your name where you're from.
My name is Nicky Sparrow. I am from Baltimore, with Baltimore, not Baltimore for the people. That's not from Baltimore. But I live in North Florida, Saint Augustine area. So I'm so glad to be here. Miss Kim, you are absolutely jewel. And as you was talking Tiffany, I was sitting there like Tiffany, I are a lot alike in the way that I'm very protected with my emotions, but I help everybody naturally. I just want to make sure everybody happy, eat and everything else. Oh, for goodness, what is tip?
As I said it, But.
Last year I came here kind of like not knowing anybody.
I was gonna be in the corner.
Melissa and I have become like this first of all the the yes, thank you, the the CMO of the Atlanta Hawks, and then also yes, looks she had to take a quick call, but she'll be back. But even from there, just the call, look at you. I'm the Melissa who I have since connected to and when I'm in Atlanta, making sure that I connect with her. And then Kim, no, I'm like him if it's anything here, this was going on, this is who and everything else. So I wanted to tell and I said this to Kim.
I have never experienced sisterhood like this. I have been traditionally the only one that looked like me in the room, and that has become some of my protection of not allowing all of the sensitivit because I got to be strong, because I make sure in the room. I got to make sure Melissa get in the room. I got to make sure doctor Kee get in the room, and everybody else and making sure that I'm plugging them in. So sometimes when you don't see somebody being sensitive, it's not
that they're not sensitive when inside. It's because first of all, you don't know what they have to do even to be in the room, yes, and to maintain everything that comes along with them when people don't.
Want you in the room.
But I'm getting a little sassy now that I'm over fifty because when people say who are you, I said, you can google me.
And her support pages.
That's me because I can tell they're not asking anybody else in the room who they are because they feel like they belong there.
So thank you all for being you.
Kim, you are absolutely a jewel, and so thank you for being you, your vision and everything else. Thank you to all of my iHeart family out here, doctor joy Derby and my Native Pot.
And I wouldn't be me if it wasn't like whatever.
And any of your business people that want to sponsor the Native Pot let us know.
Thank you, Thank you. We're talking about right as.
You were talking about early we had these conversations like in order for them to be supported and you want to hear them talk authentically and be honest, it absolutely take the sponsorships because you have so many companies say we want that, but then we don't want that because then they don't want to be associated with that. And the part of it is is not we don't want this, we need this in order for us.
To have this.
It does. Let's sake sponsorships.
So if you're interested, I'll be right over there, or you can talk to one of them and we can make sure that sales starts and we'll make sure that you're well taken care of.
Thanks, we love you. In the last five minutes that we have, we do really.
Want to open it up for folks who are feeling that kind of attack we were talking about earlier. It's not that you would be a case study, but it gives us something to work toward. Even as we leave this when we leave Native lampod our safe space, it doesn't mean that we have to walk out of safety. It doesn't mean that even after we walk out of
these ballroom doors, that you're on your own. What we hope that we model from here and out of the good teaching of Jovian and brit We had two preachers with us today, that we stay in that intention and that we model that intention throughout this conference and throughout our lives. So if you are feeling attacked or a different type of pressure, we invite you to come forward.
We will talk to you, and we'll also make sure that our sisters and our dear brothers, the brothers that are around here two will also surround you.
I can I offer one brother on the stage is I was thinking as the women were talking in so many powerful testimonies about what keeps me from sharing of vulnerability, And part of it is is too many experiences where you've heard from other people who weren't part of the assist to you all about the assist, and then some because somebody didn't ran and told that, which.
Certainly causes me to shut.
Down that I don't want to I don't want to make myself available in my crisis to ask for help. Then you offer it and you do it, and then the world knows about what went down when it was never their business. And so I think part of it has to be a level of trust, one intention. If I help you, saying way I feel about loaning money, I'm almost writing it off in my head that I'm never getting that money back. But you came to me in a moment of need, and I hope to have met that need for you. And what.
I ain't give you no money, you cause me problems in my house.
So the the I just think if we disassociate ourselves from outcome. So the thing that I did to help you I did it because I love you, I care for you. I want you to thrive, go forth. And what if they go on and go thrive, that's great. If they go get a Chanell bag because they felt great and they needed to celebrate, then I'm not mad at that Chanell bag. The season was different when they bought that bag, and now the season's changed, and that's not an indictment on their priorities.
And so I just if you're doing the if when.
We go outside of ourselves to extend something to somebody, I just feel like Mother Earth wants us to be giving it as an off, not with an expectation of the return, the outcome, the well since I did that, she ought to be doing this is that in the thirty you shouldn't have no bills that are late now because it's not and all of us.
Suffer from it.
But it's a real inhibitor from people showing up as their full selves and their need and their vulnerability and their hurt and their absence of grace because they know you may be talking with four tongue because eventually now you're shaming me for my need.
I only a gift with the receipt I want to.
We have two and a half minutes remaining, and I want us to close out with calls to action.
So Andrew, why don't you start us off?
Release judgment? Release the judgment. It ain't got nothing to do with you, nothing to do with you. Those hateful comments that show up in the inbox. You don't know me well enough to hate me like that. Now, maybe something about my life has pricked you, and so you're getting your rocks off on me because you can't tell the person who you need to be telling. So just let the judgment go. Doesn't advantage you.
I love that.
I'm gonna follow up on what Lovey said, Let's make black women bestsellers. So my call to action is go by doctor Sharon Malone's book Please Girl and Women. And she's talking about stuff that we all experience in here. I'm about ten degrees hotter than everybody else. I don't know, that's what I feel like.
I'm twenty four, not at twelve.
I have early early perimental Paul, Okay, got it is that a thing?
Doctor Malone? She said?
No, Well, can I say?
I was in DC and doctor Sharon Malone walked up to me and she says, you know you're Perimantal Pauls, A'm like, what hell?
And I was she was looking out, She was just looking. My call to action is about these attacks that we're witnessing. Marilyn Moseby. Please get familiar with her name. If you're not, please sign the petition. If you haven't, we are requesting a presidential pardon for Marilyn Moseby. I'm telling you all, she is not the only one. I can give you a list of black women prosecutors, a list of black elected officials who have been targeted. Please get familiar with
that case. My last call to action is to support what Bevy stated. I hear you, Sis, I love you. I'm gonna make sure I work overtime. This is a reunion for me, so I am so excited to see my friends, but it would be so much better and richer if my friend circle grew in this room, in at this conference, and so can. We will lift you up and honor your spirit in that way, making sure we're bringing everyone in. And as we always say on this podcast, if y'all are a wake back there, we're on a music y'all.
Always say on this podcast, welcome y'all. How many days for that election.
Morning.
Thank you for joining the Natives intention of what the info and on little latest regulum mccross connected to the statements that you leave on our socials. Thank you sincerely for the patients reason for your choice is cleared, so grateful it took to execute roads. Thank you for serve, defend and protect the truth.
Even in peace. For welcome home to all of the natives wait, thank you, Welcome y'all.
Welcome.
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