![60 Second Headlines ft. Brandon (@regularrevolutionary) [EP 91] - podcast episode cover](https://assets.metacast.app/images/episode/artwork/xh2xOCH6)
Sexty Hello the news, right.
Or the song song?
Hello?
What's going on? What's going on?
Brandon? Let's give you your supplies? So what's what's that? What's that?
I know you got thoughts on things, of course always recently, the thing that's been that's been at the top of mind for me is there's been a lot of like suppression, especially on these like apps that people tend to cling to for this sort of information, and that's been a bit difficult to navigate in terms of like how is the best way to still present the people with the knowledge and the information that they need when the means that we usually use to you know, divvy out the
information is being suppressed. So that's been at the top of mine recently, and.
So how how have you been experiencing that?
For myself, just a very apparent like drop in terms of my views recently. But with that being said, I've kind of like built community in other ways, like I have mutuals that are kind of tapped into the network, and through them I've been able to still contribute to I feel like fruitful conversation and it's just pivoting as it comes.
What do you think the suppression is attributed to.
I think the most glaring thing, especially with TikTok, as we look to the top of the year, when it was a bit contested as to whether or not the app would still be available in the US, and then it was kind of bought or some like back behind the scenes deals with cut and I think since then it's been pretty apparent that probably played a role in terms of how the algorithm's going.
Now, Yeah, but what is what was that about?
Oh, that initially I believe was due to their to your conversation or to your points earlier around Zionism, to their being such like a tangible level of outreach in terms of like the conversation around the en campus and everything and so on and so forth. That was spearheaded by TikTok. And I think that's when people were saying, oh, yeah, we have to like actually address this because it's having like real consequences.
Well, let's listen to what this jackass has to say about it.
Students, smart, well educated young people from our own country, from around the world.
Where were they getting their information.
They were getting their information from social media, particularly TikTok. That is where they were learning about what happened in October seventh. What happened in the days, weeks and months to follow. That's a serious problem. It's a serious problem for democracy, whether it's Israel, the United States, and it's a serious problem.
For our young people.
And it was Frank Now, yeah, yeah, it really gets my goat.
And they use buzzwords like democracy. How is that a problem for a democracy that's literally indicative of a democracy.
Yeah, but of course, and that's glaringly obvious to me. You know, goes back to that old saying of you know, the system's not broken, it's working for who it's meant to for, who's supposed to work for. And I think when we look at that, like I got a couple of my little degrees behind me now, but it's just
like be it with TikTok, whatever these platforms are. We have like the most educated populist we ever have had, so to suggest that these people that are speaking on these algorithms and on these platforms have garnered them and do not have possess any like you know, quantitative training, And that's just that's just not true, that that's hearsay, you know.
But so I saw a story of a guy in Texas who was actually being charged with a felony, and like there's like time possibly attached to him creating a zine.
You know what a zene is, Yes, I am familiar.
Yes, So for those who don't know, zines are essentially independent and they're like pamphlets, but that are propaganda, but it's propaganda that is anti fascist propaganda. They are typically politically based and have messaging that is passed through networks
in an organic way. And so this man, because in the First Amendment we're allowed to do that, they essentially are charging him because someone was transporting his zines and got arrested at a protest, and they attached that they were transporting the zines to the arrest in some form or fashion. And so that's already an attempt to crack down on the spaces that people are going to eventually go back to once these spaces are no longer available.
And I would also add that when you came on last time and you were talking about Meta, I mean no, you were talking about Musk and what they're building in Memphis. All of that ends up connecting because that is attached to AI, and AI is now going to render these apps. I mean it's maybe a bit alarmist, but you're not going to be able.
To know what's real or not.
Yeah, And I mean I don't think that hyperbolic in any sense or any capacity. You know, that's very real, And especially me being in the classroom now and having had time with my students and seeing the way in which they rely on artificial intelligence, because it is something that they're like, that's a part of their foundational understanding
of just society at large. And I know, without a shadow of a doubt they will not be able to tell three to five years what is real or what is and what's credible, especially like I'm ready to be in the classroom now. We're talking about like, oh, where'd you get the information from? Cause now you look something up on Google, the first thing that comes up is the AI overview, and people just take that to be gospel,
and I'm like, well, what's the source. You know, let's check, let's see what their credentials are, because there are people behind these algorithms that have their own vested interests. And it's those lines that you're talking about, and the fact that they're like accrediting whoever it was in Texas to the equivalent like carrying contraband, Yes, what the accreditation was, Yeah,
And I mean it goes back to them. That's why I think it's understated, like how much we fought for education to get it to where to where it is. How how much of a criminal acted was, especially on the plantations, to find a slave that was reading, that was able to you know, discern these things that are going on. I think that's something that we've lost. We
now have gotten to special. It's like if you have money, or if you have some like notoriety, these are the things that we desire and so on and so forth. And in that we've kind of like lost our fervor for education and the tool for liberation that it is.
I mean, I'm watching Venezuela right now doing what it seems like the best they can to try to basically arm themselves for whatever's coming. Right We're seeing that there is an actual imminent strike, that a ground invasion or from the sky, et cetera is impending. And even though there seems to be, of course no real plan that we are able to see from Venezuela side on how are going to fight this in like a real challenging way they're still like, but we still don't fight.
Though, absolutely absolutely right though.
So you know, now there is this story that's come out about heg Seth, and I don't know if you all know that there was another boat strike and there were survivors who were clinging to wreckage. And the word on the street is that Pete Hegseth, the head of the war Crimes Unit, no, the head of the war unit the Department of War, gave a verbal order to quote unquote kill them all, which is considered a war crime. I don't know why it's not a considered a war
crime that you shot the boat in the first place. However, it then became well, this could actually be a war crime, and there's not going to be any way to get around this, and so you know, we may have to impeach Hegseeth. And so you know, my question to you becomes, when you're seeing these types of things, what does your where does criminality? That's not the question I have for you. What are you talking when you see that?
I think for me, and I've been sitting with this for a while, it is like people's disillusion to the establishment, to the rule of loss on and so forth, because these things don't have any teeth, these like consequences that people say, oh, this could happen. You know, things have been found to be crimes against humanity since I don't
know there were things to count them. Yeah, we have the systems to do it, but it's really a matter of you and what army and when we have pete he said, in the protected position, and.
We do not have a.
Mean, like any means of actually enforcing that, say decision came down. Who's to say they can't just say, oh, well no and just move the gold post again. And I think to that point, you really do have to get a bit more creative, like with what Venezuela is describing. And I think that's why so much of the history of like Haiti and the history of a Cuba, and the history of these places that have fought successfully Vietnam, that have fought successfully against imperialism with none of the
technology and so on and so forth. That's why that history has been so hidden, because there is a way and it's real, it's not fantastical. So when I hear the criminality of it all, I mean they're all criminals, you know. The presidents of fell and so on and
so forth. It's not lost on me. And that's why with all the talk around the Epstein files, it really doesn't move me very much, not for the severity of the issue, because it's incredibly serious, but they're criminal enough, you know, it won't be a new thing that comes up that's like, oh, this is the reason that everybody's gonna say, oh, we can't, we can't tolerate this anymore. So I think that's what comes up for me is like, how do we actually move to a space of holding
these people accountable? And what does that look like in a twenty first century where you know they have access to nuclear arms and you know, storming the Capitol isn't a viable option.
Would you venture to say that all presidents of the United States are criminals.
At least war criminals by the stressity and like the things that they were doing in their foreign policy, which everybody kind of just like throws in that hidden box that nobody talks about with any sitting US president. But yeah, one thousand, I don't think we've had one that has reached that position without having had to partake or at least look away from something that was absolutely a crime. And if you're an accomplished then I hold you accounta below the sign.
Do you include Obama in that.
One thousand percent? And this is something that you know, it gets me on the hot seat when I talk to people a lot of times because what he did, I mean, I think and the data may be skewed now with everything with ice, but for the time being, he deported the most people in US history, like during his presidency. They don't know that, like the kids in Cagous things started under Obama, you know, and we all attribute that to Trump because you know it fits the
image more. And he did it in such an egregious and nasty way. But Obama did it in a way that Malcolm said the Democrats would you know that they'll smile on your face and you know, stab you in the back. And to me, I can look at him a nuance of a person that appreciate what he was and what he meant to black people and to black he means.
To black people because this and I just want to this has nothing to do with it? Does everything has everything to do with anything?
Yeah, Because this is.
What's been concerning me about what limits our ability to be able to even identify that there's a fight to be fought his because what always ends up happening is we turn to what he means for black people. Oh yeah, however, I'm like, yeah, but what he quote unquote means for black people is also made you know.
Yeah, it's it's a fantasy, his Obama at this point in a real way, it's black Jesus, Like, it's not even in the sense of like regardless as to whether or not this was a real person who did these things that people ascribe to him the story. And I visually remember at that time, I know my grandmother like, you know, Lord rest her soul, but she cried, you know, at the thought that like a black man like is
the president of this country? You know, and just conceptually from a people that were enslaved to see that, mind you, he is, I understand. And I hate I hate to pull the puppet the rail back. Yeah, I hate to tell him somebody pulling the strings. But let's just have it. Let's just talk about it for a second. Well we'll see it in that in that light. But yeah, in terms of what you're asking with what he means to black people, I think most people don't want to know
that he's not a descendant of chattel slavery. You know, most people don't want to hear that that's not a some of that you're gonna be applauded for at the Thanksgiving table.
Thanksgiving.
That's real, that's real. That's real. And I think like in order to move that demographic, the demographic that I'm referring to being those that say, oh Obama was this, you know, amazing, so on and so forth, we should all aspire to be the Obama's and in our country, so on and so forth. I think I can see that the images. I guess, Okay, if you don't look too hard, if you squint and spend around three times, and do it from a thousand and nine view, the
black man is the president. But if we're engaging with it critically, if we're trying to get somewhere that's true liberation, that can't be where it stops, you know.
The president of trash like, it's like what you're the president of is what matters? Right Like Adrian is in here in our chat saying that she likes seeing Iris Alba as president in House of Dynamite. He was also a warmongering regular present, So then we have to ask ourselves with them, why did you like seeing him as President Holstinama. Let me tell you the show Ozark has nane black people in it except one lady who's a fed. But everybody else who is actually doing all of the dirt,
not one black person. And people say to me, why you don't why you like that show Game of Thrones. Ain't no black people in Game of Thrones. They're like, why you like Gaming Thrones? Ain't no black people in there? And I'm like, because I don't even want black people in that world. I'm fine with their not being black people in this mess of a world, right, And so when I see black people in the government, you know,
we're seeing Stacey Plasquet hemmed up with Epstein. She is the US Vision Islands representative, and you memmed up with Epstein. I'm just like, it's not valuable to be put in positions of power over terror, oh yeah, not ending the terror.
And I think to me at that point, that's where Africa serves as such a good like reminder oftentimes that black people get me there, get me there. Yeah, Yeah, a lot of people don't look at things from a pan African view, you know, if you look at it and strictly a US context, and this is the first time we've seen a nigga get in this position and while out you know what I'm saying, and do something crazy. But when you when you recognize that you are not
and lord, I'm divged into a different territory. Let me realize, you see, I sat that, But I was just gonna say, this is where a lot of people, a lot of black people specifically, when they are growing their consciousness. I feel like it's very easy for them to trail off into these friends groups, be it Hebrew, Israelized, bere It, foundational,
Black Americans, whatever the case may be. And in those spaces you lose sight of well when you recognize that you are a descendant of Chattle slavery often signs from western Central Africa, and you look to these countries and see that we're from the most diverse continent you know, on the globe. So it makes all the sense in the world that we have such variation in our taste,
in our expressions, on and so forth. And it's why for me, I don't feel the like the push or the I no longer feel like why can't we all see things the same way? Like we all black white people say that I haven't liked this Nigga people for eight hundred years before before I spoke this language. I didn't like what they was on, you know what I'm saying.
And I think now when I'm bringing that back to like Uni from an African perspective and seeing the amount of corruption that they have in these completely black places, and you don't even have to go to Africa. You look to Atlanta, but whatever the case may be, and you see that oh, like like the lady said, I believe it. It was at Clark's graduation. You know, black faces and high high face high spaces won't save us. Its not. It's not a new phenomenon. That's been the
case for centuries. So for me, now I don't have to Obama as the sole proprietor of prosperity. I can look to people and say, oh, we had people before now that showed there was corruption in these spaces. That's not enough. It's not enough for you to just have more melanine than the average Caucasian. It's not enough. That doesn't give me anything.
I've been really trying to on this book tour for my book, what would the ancestors say? I've been really trying to expound upon the themes that I talk about in the book, like psyops, like black excellence as a false you know, directive of progress, talking about really just the concept of what it means to be black and American right and is that something to take pride in or is that something that we need to do more
work to to redefine for ourselves. And last night someone asked me, well, what are like the ways in which we can get the world to care about Black America and like what we're going through? And you know, my answer was like, well, no, no, no, that was the question. The question, The question I wanted to bring up was someone asked me, how do you get black people to essentially like wake up to the rest of the world. That was the first question, Yeah, and care about the
rest of the world. And I was like, you know, and I really have been putting a lot of energy into this is that we are at this point. We've we have seen blackness become simply a very shallow layer and a veneer that we are like trying to exist in. It's like really thin that has no depth that is literally just identity politics, and it becomes a weapon that is weaponized against us, so we literally become the weapon
that is killing us. Right, And in that I'm trying to disassociate people from black maness in that form and connected to blackness as a form of indigenity that has connectivity to the world. Right, that's connectivity to all indigenous indigenous folks that are anti colonialism. And in that regard, it's trying to also then attach those folks to us and back and and I don't I don't have words.
I don't have words. Okay, okay, okay, okay okay, and and so forth, right and so forth henceforth, there really is a necessity of political education that has to be more I feel advanced, like you were saying, in terms
of identifying ways in which in this current climate we fight. Right, So you are teaching the kids, what are the limitations of your classroom to be able to infuse the type of learning that you feel that they would need to actually be able to be armed when we have an education department that has now been displaced into labor and is actively saying we're all about just getting kids ready to go to the workforce.
Yeah. Yeah, so I smile when you ask that question because it's something that I wrestle with a lot. Especially. I'm grateful of the school that I'm at. It's a charter school, and in that I do, I have a bit more flexibility than the average K through twelve public school educator. And in that each day we actually watch the news, which is something I think is incredible because each day we have real conversations about things that are
going on. I don't working. I teach a lord. I teach the sixth and seventh grade so oh no, yeah, yeah, I teach sixth and seventh grade science. And in that those science I do. I teach sixth and seventh grade science.
Yes, So you were talking about boiling point.
So that's more what at least in my school, that's more for eighth grade, that's physical science or chemistry. So for me, we I teach a wool Earth and space science. So we're talking moon phases, so we're talking like.
Absolutely absolutely, yes, dioramas.
Yes, yes, making sun dials outside, you know, all the things proving that the Earth is not flat. But it's so important, it's so important. The success. Yeah, I promise it's not flat, but in that we watch the news each day and we've had some really transformative conversations that I in no way attempt to like infuse my own views, whatever the case may be, but just spark curiosity and simply ask. We did a project recently where I asked them to cite their sources. You have to cite your sources.
Whatever information you give me, it is a zero. I will give you a zero if you do not cite your source. Because they love to just look stuff up. Look, I look up the same thing. I'm like, I know where you got this I problem. I can pull up
the same words verbatim. But in that I would say the biggest limitation is just the structure of school, in that you do have a finite amount of time, and it's structured in the sense that I can't really give them the space to, uh, let's take a break, like let's all just talk thirty minutes, let's chill, let's sit on a couch. Have you eaten today? Half of my kids you have, there's so many of my kids that don't eat throughout the day. They snack, they're eating hot
fries from the store, they're eating can right. No I'm in I'm in Atlanta.
Oh you are where are you?
I'm in Atlanta.
Yes, y'all you know I'm in Atlanta next Saturday.
Yes, I'll be out here. I'll be out here. But in that, you know, I also teach in the like I'm not gonna get too much information way by. I teach like in the more improverish community. And in that a lot of my kids don't have proper they haven't bathed in a little bit of time. So you're getting all these things. And it's like, I'm trying to tell you about all these things going on. My boy need to eat. My boy needs to eat. He can't, he can't have a conversation. And that's why for me, my
lessons are a bit different. I really won't penalize you. I'm gonna give you the space. My baby they she ain't paying attention because she's been taking care of her baby sister at twelve years old, and she's being abused in the home and all these things. And in that I have to be as an educator. I have to sit there and say, my party right now is to be a guardian for you, is to let you know, hey, come tell me what's going on. Put your head down,
we'll fill out some paperwork. Don't worry about this lesson, you know. But I say that's the biggest barrier for my kids because they care, but they don't have what they need met in order for them to care, like enough to be engaged with these things. They're not eating, they don't have proper hygiene because they aren't being taught. Yeah, yeah,
they're not being They're being neglected in different ways. And I wouldn't even I'm not even attributing this to the parents, but just socially, they have been all put in a position where they can't be cared for, and that puts us in a niche spotter's educators in terms of like growing them content wise.
I see people in the comments talking about homeschool and I need y'all to understand that that is a privilege. And I don't know why y'all don't see that. Maybe you do see that, but I'm going to reiterate it. Homeschool is a privilege. Like there was no version of life where my mother was going to be able to homeschool me. She literally had to go to work, and
in addition to that, she was not an educator. Right, So this idea that everybody has the ability to be an educator is really also disrespectful to educators because everybody does not have the ability to educate. And I'm gonna keep it a buck with some of y'all. You shouldn't be homeschooling football actually do not have the skill set to homeschool your kids.
Send them kids out, send them kids.
You're really teaching from a place of ego. And that is one of the things that I noticed what you said, was that you will have conversations with the kids where you're not necessarily you know, putting your mindset into the space. And I think that's something that is really hard for any parent to do and for most adults to do, right, Like, I ain't gonna.
Lie to you.
We had a little twenty one year old come up to us last night when I was done doing my talk, and it was me and Brianna Joy Gray and Olivia Odinucci, who is she's an organizer, and there was another friend of them there and so this little twenty one year old from Heart from Howard came up and she was like, what's up. You know, I just wanted to say hello, you know miss Deals. I was at the talk and it was really great to meet you. And I was like oh, and she was like, can I go to
Howard University? I was like, oh, what do you do at Howard? And she was like in finance? And we were all like.
I didn't want to say nothing. I didn't want to say nothing, and I went are you in finance?
I said, why are you in finance? She said, We're the money. So you know, anyone who knows me at this point in my life, I've checked out.
Yeah, of course naturally I've checked out.
But anyone who knows Brianna knows she has checked in.
She's like, really, so ny.
And so she was like well, she was like, what year are you? She said, well, I'm a senior and you know, so my next phase is I'm going to law school. So Brianna was like, oh okay, because she is a lawyer. She was a lawyer, a lawyer. Ye, so what are you going to law school for? She was like, right now, I'm going for venture capitalists, private equity.
Yet did she come to the right talk?
I genuinely I'm like going through my head like did you acknowledge any of this? Like did you mention any of this, because I was. I was fascinated by it. Wasn't that she was coming up with curiosity. It was more so that she was coming she was flausing it. And I just saw someone in the chat say, there's nothing wrong with the monies. The thing about it is that if your whole trajectory is about getting money, there
is absolutely an issue with that. And I was trying my best to not you know, my thoughts on it, kept talking, and finally, y'all, my uber came and I was like, brother Amir was like, oh, it's arrived. And I said, private equity is the devil.
There you go, there you go. That's really y'all needs to be said.
And her reasoning was I want to make enough money in five years so that I can travel the world.
Okay, And now I thought she was I thought she was gonna bend that corner. I thought she was going to come back onto a black capitalist, buy back the block type of energy.
But it was that's eventually where it goes, right, Yes, I mean, And when people say I'm going to do something in five years, I was like, you don't even understand because the first time with the first thing, she I said. When she said I'm going to go into finance, I said, well, I don't know that that's a field that's going to be in existence in the way that
you are in it right now in five years. And you know that's that the five years that people think for the last five years, that's not the next five years. So the whole by the block back even that is like, what's the plan. Y'all been buying the block back for the last forty years.
There's not a plan, and a big thing. I try to not just tell my I haven't told my kids this, but it would be something if I am able to teachigh school at some point that I would like engage in them with. Is the concept that you will be influenced by who you're around. So to suggest that you're going to get into this space and you're gonna retain every ounce of whatever care you do still possess with the finance and the venture capitalism already there, the seed
is planted. All they need to do is pour a little water and just stick you out of the sun and you're gonna grow it. Look, it's already it's there. So I think in that regard a lot of people are I think overconfident in their ability to not be like the people that they're around. And it's not like an attack. It's not me saying, oh, you're weak. Whatever it is. I know consciously, psychologically, I'm going to be
influenced by the media. I consume, the people I'm around, the songs I listen to, and I know, even with everything I have, if I'm around venture capitalists all day, like and I'm some at some point they're gonna say something that makes a little sense to me.
One of two things happens, right, You either adapt or you diminish, Like that's what really happens, you know, that's why you realize, like, oh, when you're in certain spaces. And I can say wholeheartedly that since I removed myself
from Hollywood, I exist differently. My brain has expanded exponentially, and I can only attribute that to, Oh, I'm also not surrounded constantly by all these impediments by the nature of the business I'm in that would make me not be able to expand right, to expand right, because before I can get to thoughts about socialism, right in front of me is yeah, but you need to get a deal, you know, like before I can get the thoughts about independent artistry, it's no, you need to you need to
be famous, you know, So, like these things are immediate priorities of your entire circle. They're going to impede you or they're going to infest you.
Absolutely, it's such a grind to maintain stability, let alone to grow in any field. So to think that you're going to maintain the time outside of that to like offset it to like whatever it is, Like even with me teaching now, it's that I'm grappling with, like looking at it as a long term profession, do I have the time outside of my K through twelve stuff to dedicate what I want to dedicate to online activism, to
real world activism and organizing. Because the school it's a full it's a full time job that's twenty four hours.
Well that's its own type of activism, it is, it is, right, So like that's its own trajectory of activism. People ask me how am I maintaining mentally? How am I managing? And it's really because I don't work for nobody no more. And that doesn't change the fact that that means I'm
constantly having to work to sustain myself. But at least I get to be in control of my life, so to speak, at present right, I do feel though, that it's not necessary to be in like when you're talking about long term, like as someone who is twenty years your senior, there's no need to do things long term.
Praise God. Say it again. I just I just need to hear it.
There's no need to do things long term. Yes, yes, okay, you do it as long as it is purposeful. Life is long.
That's what they don't tell you. It's short, but it's long.
It's not short. A butterfly lives for three days. Life is long.
That's real. That's real.
It's all perspective. Yeah, you know, because people will tell you, oh, I did this thing because I didn't want to, you know, miss out on it. And then or I didn't do this thing because I was afraid, right, and then they're like, dang, life is short. And it's like, yeah, but what if what if you did it? What if you did a thing and you were doing it not with genuine reason, just because it was like a stupid thing to do,
and now you're living with that regret forever. Or if you don't do the thing because you were afraid and now you've living with that forever. Like it's just teaching, is at this point a sacrifice?
Boy, I tell you, my kids think it's a game. I tell you, so you know, I commend you.
I want to play this video before we go. Have you heard of the DIA theory.
I don't believe I have no.
Okay, So there is a scientist name James Lovelock. All right, So James Lovelock is basically he's an inventor. He's a scientist as a biologist. But he was the one who, with a couple of other scientists challenged the Darwin theory with the DIA theory. So the Darwin theory is, of course, you know that we evolved, but it was survival of the fitness. So those species that existed and live longer
do so because natural selection they made it through. Daiga theory challenges that and says, no, the Earth is a symbiotic ecosystem and those that survive or those that exist, are not existing because they were the strongest, but because there are other balances happening within the Earth system that allow for these things to happen. That it is a symbiotic. Symbiotic is really the best word. That's a symbiotic system of balance. However, humans are not doing our role in the symbiosis.
Oh this right up my alley. Anthropology is right up my alley.
Okay, So he's like, bring it up, so let's listen to this.
Lovelock's ideas are at the heart of understanding how humanity is now changing those stabilizing mechanisms, and they brought him to a controversially bleak view of our future.
From a Guian point of view, when we first started interfering with the atmosphere, nothing much happened. It was encompassing it by its ordinary regulating mechanisms. When it gets too much, can't cope with it.
DAYA is the Earth? Yes, yes, okay, right, guy is there.
And this is why I'm afraid. I think it's going to play absolute mayhem with our civilization in the next ten or one hundred years. And when you see the whole picture, it is really fearsomely bad. I mean things like the very rapid melting of the floating ice near the North Pole. As the floating ice melts so less sunlight is reflected back to space by the dazzlingly white ice,
and more and more sunlights absorbed by the ocean. Just the melting of the floating ice in the Arctic Ocean will add as much heat to the Earth as all of the CO two we put in the atmosphere to date. And this is why I'm afraid. I think there's very little we can do about it, all of our efforts to reduce emissions or as nothing. There's no morality about it. If the Earth improves as a result of our presence, then we will flourish. If it doesn't, then we will
die off. I fear that not many of us will survive, perhaps at best about a billion, possibly a lot less than that. Now, how they will die, It'll be by starvation, by war, by disease. Who knows the four horsemen really ride when conditions like that happen. Isn't an easy subject, is it. And people say to me, well, you can say that kind of thing easily because at your age it is not going to affect you anyway. You'll be
dead before it all happens. And that's true. Although I'm not so sure that if I live to one hundred, I think a lot of things may happen before then. But I do have great grandchildren and it's fortuny. The name of the is the name of.
The game here.
So you have all white men that are like, y'all, what are we doing? And I think about the kids in your class and what it means to teach science in the context of this, and has any has there been any application of awareness of climate in your teaching?
This is perfect, this is right up my aley. Yes. So in my Earth and science class, really in both we talked about initially we're going over body system, so respiratory, circulatory, so on and so forth, and in that respiratory the organs, the lungs. So I asked the class, raise your hand if you know somebody or you have been around somebody that smokes. They all raise their hand, and they when I brought up the concept of pollution, some of them
knew what that word was. And then just explaining that a bit more and talking about the AQI, which is the air quality index in Atlanta, which notoriously is some of the worst in the country. Be it because Atlanta is one of the most card dependent cities. At you like what happened? Yeah, or you have to be like downtown downtown, which nobody lives downtown because it costs three arms, three legs to live downtown. And in that regard, we've
talked about this on several occasions. So what he was referring to, uh we in my anthropology degree, we talked about like the different eras and epochs, So you have like the Pleistocene, the paleot scene. We now live in the anthropos scene, which I tell them prefix and suffixes,
so prefix anthroat anthros humans we talked week. So what we're talking about with the anthroprescene is the environment is being changed and altered due to our influence, Like the anthroposcene is, we are now evolving because of our influence on our environment, which is real trippy inception type of stuff, but in a real tangible way. What I expressed to them is that like, it's not and this is where
I tie it back in. I don't influence them with any of my views, but I'll say it's not by coincidence that everybody here just raised their hand to say you've been arrested by the smokes before. If I go somewhere else in this city, they won't say the same thing.
You know, and that right there. You could I could ask my entire school because of where I'm at, because of you know, the type of school that it is, and they're all going to raise their hands because they've all been in that environment and talking to them about secondhand smoke and so on.
And so I did a campaign with truth Remember the Truth Ads.
Yeah, Yeah, I did campaign.
With them where we went to different parts of Baltimore and we looked at the advertised in different parts of Baltimore. And you go in one part of Baltimore, it is predominantly higher income, et cetera, and there is not a single cigarette advertisement, not a single Dutch Master advertisement anywhere. You go to the hood and they're massive, like and I mean the Menthols are lining the wall. I mean the store is basically for Menthos.
Absolutely absolutely. And i mean I'm from Virginia, so I'm from the tobacco capital really of the US, so in that everybody talks about Newport's like, you know, I frequent the seven five Soport Newport News, Virginia and Virginia absolutely, So when we talk about all of these, all these concepts, it's really for me just planning the seed of that critical thought. I recognize their twelve and thirteen. It's not all gonna land right now. You're not dealing with the
immediate consequences. You're a child, or rather you are, but you're not aware of how that's impacting on and all, like most of us who has asthma, that that's not uncommon in my school, and that's all they know, so that's their norm. So to speak of a world where that isn't the case to them, it's fantastical. It's like, that's just what that's just what it is. Here's now
they don't feel this disadvantage because everybody hears disadvantage. And I think in that way it's sad because also a lot of my students haven't left at Lena or have never seen another place where the air is different, where people here live in a different way, and just hearing that, I mean it's something about you know, old white men with these like gong level of soundtracks, like y'all come on now. I mean, it's bad, but we dragging it a little bit here.
Wait a minute, I was thinking that to myself, like they really are laying it on thick with these.
Monks, oh for sure, for sure, And I mean what I hate to say about it. I also know this is true. I mean, marketing and everything. It's also a cash thing. It's like people are more invested when they see an old white men hear some Nordy comes in the background. Oh he got to know what he's talking about. This is some next level shit, you know. But in comparison to somebody on TikTok that looks like myself. Oh he's just talking, you know, but not here, no there.
But I bring that up just because like for me and I brought this like last time, you asked me, like what would the ancestor to say? And my thing was, there's nothing new under the sun. And for me now I still look at this and say, although this is crazy, like this is a very serious issue, and I won't act like it's not. We have faced insurmountable things, you know, I don't know we have I promise, not this one, not this one.
I just say this. We have never faced extinction, and Homo sapiens have never faced extinction.
I'll say that's true. But I'll say as black people, specifically African people. I read this book called The Destruction of the Black Civilization by Chancellor Williams when he's like kind of like, uh dating, everything that took place like that lied throughout just kind of Africa's evolution over time, and we have been facing like environmental struggle and strife for centuries. So the concept of like movement due to so on and so forth to these things isn't like
foreign to us, you know in that way. And yes, it hasn't been to this degree by no shape, by no stress of the imagination.
That's there's something there though, because I feel like the black people that I know in the United States, there's either people who are like avid travelers or people who don't leave the block. Oh yeah, it's literally. I remember years ago when I had put out a tweet that said, if you have money for Jordan's and tracksuit and Nike tracksuits and you don't have a passport, you're losing. The attack that came down on me, mind you, I didn't say nothing about black people with the attack that came
down on me. I'll never forget this one tweet that said, Amanda Seals is a petty bourgeoisie, a leanist is attacking and shaming the disenfranchised and passport shaming the disenfranchised black community of course, and here we are, and I'm like, we don't have a culture of movement anymore, and we need it.
I think a lot of that, though, for most Black folks, is due to it never having been voluntary. Like the history of like movement in them has always been as
a result of like famine, war, death, destruction. I've never been in a space where like I feel good here, now let me go see something else, but like I don't feel good here, so then me traveling to me like I'm not able to see it in that same regard, you know, like, and I think I do encourage everyone to travel, and I have a travel I'm really want of them around the black niggas to be honest right, Well, for me, my family never traveled. I like I we traveled traveling for them.
You were twenty six, are you not?
No, I'm twenty three.
Oh Jesus, you're seven years old. Where do you want to go? Do you have a passport? Brand?
I do have a passport?
Yes, where do you want to go?
Okay? Tangent here? But I'll be nervous about traveling a lot of times because of my dietary restrictions and.
I mean, now we in the whole other can you tell us are you willing to tell us?
Yes, it's just peanuts. It's just peanuts, So.
Don't go to Thailand.
But for real, and it's it's it's it's that in combination with just I am the first in my family to kind of like like I we just don't do that. That's not something my family does. It's like does your traveling. I didn't have that model for me.
You know, like where do you want to go?
I want to go to my advice we're talking about Guadaloup. I want to go to Guadeloup.
Guadaloup the island. M h. If you pay for your hotel, I will buy you a plane ticket to Guadeloup.
Let's do it. Let's do it. I mean, like financials is a big thing. I'll probably try more if I had to break it.
But bread, so people use that all the time, and that is bullshit. All it takes is it's it is. It is bullshit because if you want to go see places, you can get there the amount of because they want they need tourism. They use tourism. So it is very easy if you have a desire to to find a way to get places. It just means that you may not be seeing in a luxury but who cares. So you find a place to stay and I will book you a fly to Guadeloupe.
Let's do it. Let's do it. And I mean it is bs to the sense that like obviously, while I mean I have the most liquid, you know, money at my disposal, I'll be going out. I'll go to it, I go to a spot, I get a bottle, We'll do the whole thing.
You know.
Let's you go out three times a week. By the time you go out at the end of the month, you done spent what it would cost you to fly coach. And you know, don't get me wrong, Like there are places that you can go that are going to be less expensive than other places.
Right.
A lot of people go to Thailand because yeah, the plane ticket be a grit. But then once you get there, everything is five dollars, you know, But you don't go to Saint Bart's because everything there is fifty thousand dollars, Like,
you know, It's just the way it goes. So the reality, though, is that you also have to expand your consciousness to be able to even expand the consciousness of the children around you, Like, that's just a real And you know, when I see folks that have the intellect that you have but you haven't had the opportunity to even like just get out of your space, it's like that is part of the oppression, right the and it tricks you. It tricks you. It tricks you into thinking this is
all there is. So figure it out and do not forfeit my offer.
Don't play with me, Okay, I won't because.
Don't nobody else get people offers like this. And you know if I had, I had somebody to do that with me recently, and I.
Was like, hey, I won't do it. Look, I'll get to looking right now. I ain't got to tell me. I getut, I get up out of town. I got.
Brandy gonna come back. I found my wife. I'm speaking French. I'm staying.
Different.
It's different, all of that, all right, So just so, just so y'all know when you're buying books, this is the type of shit it go to. Okay, this is the type of shit when y'all buy books, it goes to and again as agents as which as Chituba says, don't let your family story limit you so let it inspire you. Let it inspire you. My family never went, so I have to go.
Yeah, feel me.
So we have this on the books, y'all. It is now witnessed that Brandon has committed to finding a place to stay. And if anybody here knows of any affordable housing in Guadaloup or any affordable hotels in Guadaloup, please let us know so that we can get Brandon out of Losa Statos Junidos to experience something different. I actually think I may have a connect for you.
Perfect.
I'm gonna hit my homegirl be on the Compton of know you're Caribbean. She know everybody. Okay, Brandon all was a pledge. Like literally, when I looked on the schedule and I said you were coming on.
I was like, oh yeah, I'm glad.
My fellow nose ring lots gang. Absolutely absolutely, So we will be in touch and make sure you take a lot of pictures.
I will, I will, all right, yet,