Level Us Up ft. Josephine Gilbeau [EP 93]

We have Josephine Gilbot with us, and I'm gonna show y'all a little bit about Josephine because I don't think y'all understand we're dealing with a real wine. We're dealing with a real wine. Okay, So let me just show y'all how Josephine moves.

Miss Josephine Gilbo. I'm a seventeen year Army veteran. I recently got out of the military last year.

For one year, I have watched andreel bun children alive. You don't care about veterans, you don't care about American values.

You are destroying this company.

This country may not give you the moral courage to do the right day. Having that background as an intelligence officer and understanding what defense actually is, I can see clearly that this is not self defense.

Shay on you.

So we just approached Brian matth and are you spying for Israel? We need veterans from California all the way to New York to stand against what we are witnessing right now.

All right, guys, breaking news.

Congress has just passed FY twenty twenty six National Defense Authorization Act, which authorizes nearly nine hundred billion dollars of American taxpayer dollars to defense, but spending ride up.

Ride up, America, Rid up. It is time to take back this country.

From these corrupt politicians. Amen.

Good, Yeah, we are, we are.

Hello Joseph, Hello Amanda, it is good to see you.

Oh my god, what a question that is.

So I am located about half a mile from Roosevelt Roads Base in Puerto Rico.

It is a base that.

Was closed down in two thousand and four and the United States military has recently opened it back up in order to orchestrate this it's imperialism on Venezuela. And so I am actually here joined investigative journalism to see exactly what is going on here and to also show solidarity with the people in Puerto Rico that they have a right to resist this.

This is their island.

The United States does not have the authority to use their island as a forward operating base to fight this you know, war as they like to call it, with Venezuela. So I'm here just getting some grassroots actions off the ground.

And yeah wow, I mean I had no idea that was going on. And that is why investigative reporting is so necessary because the goal is to keep it quiet, and you are putting it on blasts. Thank you so much for your service in that regard as well as in the military. What even brought you to the military.

Actually, you know, I grew up really poor in America.

My father was a disabled veteran and you know, if anyone in your audience doesn't understand how they collect a check, like it's based off of you know what percentage you're disabled. And you know, I watched him fight with the VA my entire childhood to collect like liveable wage money because he was in severe pain all the time from an injury from the military. So we were really really poor living off of that. And when I turned eighteen, I wanted to.

Go to college.

Both of my parents had not graduated high school, so this was like a huge goal and like, you know, something I wanted to do, and the only path that I really saw that could be possible was to join the military because at the time, they had started introducing the free college and Senate, so I was basically a part of.

The economic draft into the military, you.

Know, seeking the ability to go to college.

When did this flip happen for you?

I think like in all.

Honestly, it wasn't like a one time situation. I think that like over time things were started happening in my life, like seeds maybe getting planted, and then like something else would happen and it would go back and like kind of water that idea that had come in my head before, and I think really like the biggest impact as far as it comes to understanding what's going on, but with the genocide and Gaza specifically, which is really what pushed

Through Habeas Corpus to for your legal right to be freed.

And many of the detainees and Guantanamobay are still there almost two decades now without any charges. So I was a part of that team and some of the information that I was reading was really kind of shocking my consciousness, Like some information all the way back that now has gone public about torture camps and black sites and you know, Abu graves, like all of those things I was kind of reading about from the inside, and it kind of

Forward to October seventh.

I'm following these media outlets and literally on my phone is video after video after video of mass slaughter of children. I mean what I was witnessing children's body parts everywhere, Like I was just like in shock, and in a matter of two weeks witnessing this and then also witnessing my government, my leaders, western media outlets lying literally what my eyes could see.

So you're telling me my eyes are lying. This was not self defense.

I've seen some really crazy things in the US military but I had never seen anything to this scale of devastation of death and destruction.

And from our leaders to say that this was justified as self defense.

That we were going to normalize this. I was like, hell no, not under my name. I have four children. We are not going to normalize this.

Like what we do there will always come back here. Hell no.

So this is like what pushed me out to start speaking and saying, you know what I'm gonna I'm gonna say something like publicly it's and I'm going to use my credentials to say, look, I was a part of it.

I get it.

So you know, people love to use their kids as a reason for why they won't do that. People love to say, well, I have kids, so I just I can't speak out. How does that work for you.

I'm doing this in part for not only my kids, because I have an instinctual feeling that.

All children are my children.

I'm doing this for the future of our children, for the future of our speed, for the future of humanity.

If we don't do this the like this is, you know, things are going to get worse. I mean, I'm not trying to be like a doomer, but things are going but.

Things are going to get worse, Like I came here to Puerto Rico to study the military escalation only to find out a whole nother shlew of things that are happening on this island to these people, by US government, by the elite, by corporations like this is you were talking about it right before I came on. This is happening internationally on a global scale. The leaders in Japan have been brainwashed and corrupted, The leaders in Puerto Rico

So when we see that, where do we pivot to? Because I'm curious, Actually, did you know that you were going to Was it a plan to pivot to journalism? No?

I was a cybersecurity engineer working for a centure like making over two hundred thousand dollars a year.

I quit everything.

And you know the reason I quitted a centre I was trying to do both was because I emailed them and I asked for full transparency if they employed IDF soldiers, because we have a cyber lab in Israel, what company does and I was like, Uh, I'm not comfortable working for a company where I may be in the presence

So I pivoted. I was like, okay, bye, and then I was like, what am I going to do?

So, you know, I knew I wanted to do something that I could use my voice, I can inspire other people to use their voice to like get out of the sheep mentality, to become like, you know, leaders and people who are guiding everyone into the right direction.

I knew I wanted to do that in some way. And how do you not go?

Because here's the art, Jessephine, Like, I could talk to you about like the politics of it all, but what really is fascinating to me about you is you right, Like watching the passion that you speak with and watching the conviction that you have committed to is the thing that I'm trying to get people to find in themselves right, and so tell me this before we even talk about that once they said, okay, it's a wrap, you're resigned. What was the space between that and then okay, I'm

Well, I mean, what is journalism? Speaking truth is what I'm doing. Journalism?

I guess I call it that now. It's the easiest word to use. I think that like a use word. We using this language that describes I guess what we're doing. But I really just feel like I'm just speaking truth to power. That like if that's journalism, then that's journalism.

But you say I'm here.

Because I feel like your audience.

Would understand, you know, like, I'm.

Here to find out the truth and then I'm gonna tell y'all about it. That's what I'm here to do.

Where are you from? Where are you from?

Where are you from? I'm from Louisiana, Okay, we saw it.

Just now I'm here to find the hands.

I'm here to find.

Out and then I'm gonna tell y'all And now.

We're gonna go from there.

Like you know if that's journalism, put it.

In my title.

Okay, how did I get here?

Because I cannot sit back. I cannot sit back to.

You in that. Like you have four kids? Did the people that are I mean, I don't know if you have a partner or not, but like, did your family did they support you in this?

Oh?

No, My family actually stopped talking to me November of twenty twenty three because of my advocacy for Palestine.

Like my family are devo.

Catholics, they are all they all have been programmed to be Christian Zionists and didn't even know it, did not even understand that they were underneath those layers. But over two years of very very much patience, I have finally peeled those layers back and they.

Support me now.

And after two years of them cutting me off, we spent things giving together.

They're ready for our revolution. Look tell them this.

Neither wait till you.

Oh we talked about it. Oh, believe me. I was at the table talking about it. Sure, I was.

Opening up the Bible my aunts and uncles outside, I was that.

I was that one at the table.

Of course, that makes perfect sense, That makes perfect sense. I'm so happy that you've been able to bring them around. That's tough, you know, that's tough. It's like you're already fighting the world and then you're having to fight your world, and it's like it just feels oftentimes very isolating. But I'm really happy that you've been able to break through and and now you you are finding your path in

I mean, you know, I had been so hyper focused on what was going on in Gaza and this genocide that there were these like macro and even micro situations that I wasn't aware of that really was the puppet masters of everything going on. And I think that as Americans, we have for the past two years really come to this awareness of what's going on across party lines.

There's really an opportunity right.

Now for people that are decolonizing, that are deconstructing these narratives that we've been told and there's a vacuum. And I really do feel like we as people who are fighting for humanity no matter what party line color, race, religion, no matter what, we have to fill that vacuum with truth, and we have to fill that vacuum with love, and like this, understanding that another there could be another vision

You know, we talk about my family two.

Years it took to deconstruct their colonized minds and that wasn't easy, but doing it with love. We didn't call each other names, we didn't argue with each other. We took a distance, and then when when I could, I would meet them where they were, try and pull them a little bit more. Because what you hear that that's the military. That's some of the military from Roosevelt Roads.

We have to meet people where they are, we really do. That's that's the work. That's the hard work. You know, you can't preach to the choir. That's not going to work.

You know, if you're talking to someone that already agrees with you, then what kind of work are you doing? You have to talk to people that disagree with you, meet them where they are, don't scream at them, don't call them names, just say, like, just present a better vision, a better option for the world, because this is going to take generations to change, because we are deep, deep, deep in the horrors of our species.

Just mean, I feel like you're yelling at me, because.

Why do you call people names?

Sometimes they can't help it.

That grace and mercy, we have to have grace and mercy. Those are like, hey, grace and mercy, that's what I say. And and that's doors for me, like learning about Jesus, learning about the teachings of Jesus. After all these layers deconstructed out of my mind of all this bs I've been taught, raised, raised as a Republican super white supremacist environment, like with you know, patriotism is almost like a sacrifice, like a sacrifice, like a ritual to patriots, to the country.

And after I colonize a lot of those things, what.

Was left was the teachings of Jesus, almost like a manuscript, like, oh, you know, if we do some of these things, he was talking about y it really makes sense that we could bring heaven on earth, we could get rid of these you know this, these ways of thinking that our elite are trying to pressure all of us and in doing that or.

Getting rid of the indigenous communities.

And that's the part because their brains are decolonized. So who do they want to get rid of the most, the ones who still who are not in the matrix. They are targeting these communities on purpose, knowing that they're the ones that still exist that are decolonized.

You know. It's so I feel like I had no real understanding of what indigenous communities were until the context of Palestine as an indigenous community. It's like I felt like I was just understanding that, you know, there are folks whose land was stolen and you know that, But I didn't understand the knowledge and the uniqueness of what it means to be an indigenous community. Where did you get that insight from and that knowledge?

Yeah, I think understanding the plight of Palestinians really made me understand that too, because if I'm being honest in my mind, I thought indigenous communities were just people that still lived like you know, in like African villages like in the rainfown untouched in Jungles.

I always kind of just like assume.

That's an indigenous community, But no indigenous communities are people that still live in harmony with the Earth, that still see humanity as a priority, that still believed that we are all one, We are all one family, and that karma goes around, and that energies go around, and what we do here can affect there, and like they truly most indigenous people, I mean don't believe in killing our own offspring.

This is a human being, like human beings, human species. These literally kill their own offspring.

What other mammal does that besides a lion when it kills the male cubs.

You don't find it often.

Where there's mammals that mass slaughter their own offspring.

They reject.

They may not slaughter, but they reject. They they may reject. I'm not really with you.

Go if we're supposed to be the most advanced species, the most conscious species, and we're doing this kind of thing, you know, we have to ask ourselves are we really evolved as a species. And the indigenous people really teach you to have that harmony back with Earth, and you know creation, in God's creation of who you are and what you're really meant to do here, and I think we're really erasing that sacred knowledge.

How do you connect this to your kids?

Oh?

Number one?

Number one, it's because it's not easy to decolonize while also trying to raise children to not be colonized.

It's not easy. You know.

I have four children and my oldest is sixteen, So to a degree, I'm starting a little bit later with her, and I do get a lot of hesitation because I think capitalism and like material things and like Lululemon tights, like for her that she was homecoming Queen this year.

She's still in this like oh's girl. Yeah yeah, So.

It's a little bit harder with her, but for sure she's for free Palestine one percent.

Ok.

We love ame Queen Palestinian.

We have it exactly, and you know she has. She her and her friends boycott Starbucks. They don't go to Starbucks for coffee anymore.

All the cheerily giving.

Credit like that's big because that's I've done.

So I think, so hey steps, baby steps. Now I have a two, four and five year old, so this is really some crucial times for us as mothers with young children, where we are imprinting on them like forever, and so I am very careful in what we're teaching them, what we're saying, what they're watching is so important, especially when you got YouTube running for three hours with whatever it wants to put in your algorithm, like everything, like in their environment, I'm hyper focused on because I want

I mean, because Josephine, we here at Views from Mandolin, do consider you a hmm hahih quae Letty white?

And that is a very.

That's a big deal.

Okay.

So I mean I'm at some point I'm going to do a book of high quality whites and.

You're in it. Yeah, my first preh.

Yeah, No one needs to know about peace prize gets you a high quality white prize. Yeah.

I don't want to have my four kids like that, because that is where I can make the first difference, the number one difference I can make for the future of this world is my kids like I have direct access and control over what goes in and out of their little brains and their hearts.

And so number one for me is a mother. That is a priority.

Like I am hyper focused on making sure that I'm talking about things with them, even about food, healthy food, unhealthy food, happy food versus healthy food, that's what we call it. And like I'm deconstructing all of these things because i want them to carry on.

This knowledge and these ideas.

And I hope other mothers like if they feel like, oh, I can't go to protests or I can't you know, do any of these things. The one thing you can do in your home is decolonize your children.

Yeah, heard that that's the one thing you can do in your home. Can you give people any tips on beginning that process? I know one you said it's also about what they're It's about what they're watching.

Yes, watching cultural things like putting things on TV that talks about another culture or like a cartoon that is placed in like another culture. I really love Bluie and you know, if you have like a two three year old, it's the perfect one. Bluey is so I mean they're they're from Australia and they have, you know, the little funny accent. It's gonna probably be your kid's first time hearing a different accent. But they're such a nice family

What books are you reading to your kids that night? What do the characters look like?

Are you picking books with all white as a white weather of all white children? Or am I picking books where the people look different and dress different and maybe speak differently. That's important too, because that's imprinting in their mind. We read books every night, So my books are about I get books about Ramadan, I get books about Palestine.

You know, to like why is mommy saving the children?

Well, let me tell you about the still children Mommy's trying to save, and like introducing them to that and also taking them to events like story times that are in a community of people that you might not normally

Like farmers farmers markets, the farmers.

Markets, like, go into these different communities and introduce your kids to them, because I'm telling you, the minute that your child grows up, for example, with a Muslim friend, any propaganda about Muslim they're gonna be like, what are they talking about, Like I'm not a Muslim friend, right, that's not right.

And the other one that you named is decolonizing their palate, right because this the food that they're eating, right, welcoming them, introducing them to different foods. And you know, my first grade teacher, I'm still in touch with her, and she said that she ended up leaving education when she stopped being able to be creative with how she was bringing

Right, So I'm not surprised to hear that.

I'm honestly not surprised to hear that, because in America are like like the Department of Education and the curriculum that they pushed down our throats is very much to colonize us, very much, to put these walls between us and these other ideas about people or to extend love to other people. They definitely from a young age in our public schools start that brainwashing.

Absolutely. I mean, I feel very fortunate to have been to public school in the early eighties before things got really really crazy. Like I remember us learning how to make guacamole because there was mad Mexicans in the class. Yeah, so we had to learn how to make guacamole. And at the time, my palette was not developed yet. Josephine and I was like, this is nasty, and now you cannot keep me away from guacamole.

I just had some here.

I went to the rash and I said, uh, do you have guacamole not from the bag, because I don't use guacamolely from a bag, Like if you didn't make that guacamole.

From avocado like two hours ago, I can't touch it.

So where do you find yourself? I mean I don't like asking people what's next because you're already in the midst of what's next right Like you're literally in Puerto Rico and you are working with the people. I guess the question I have for you is what is an interest that has that has come into your horizon that you feel like Americans don't know about but need to.

I think running for office.

I think people need to understand how impactful it is to run for school board, to run for local city council, to run for Congress, to run for mayor, and don't under like not to under ask maate themselves. I have met so many people right now that are running for positions in Congress, and like, if we back them, and these are people with like humanity principled in their heart?

Do I agree with them about everything? No? But do I see that at least principled in their you know, its souls? It is humanity.

If we get around and like primaries are coming up, March primaries, if we can get five to ten candidates that we can all grassroots throw our efforts behind to promote we could start showing these politicians that have been corrupted that we do hold the power. And I think that's one of the biggest things is people need to understand we hold the power. We do. They've tried brainwashing us to believe that we don't, but we really do do. I think we can vote our way out of this.

No not as no, no no.

But if we're not gonna have if we're not at a seventeen seventy six revolution, then we need to use the tools that we do have right now to at least.

Slow down what is coming, like down the pipeline, the.

Death and destruction that is increasing across the planet, both here at home with immigrants getting separated, mothers and children getting separated, and then this, you know, nation is claiming Christianity. It's all being done under the name of Christianity. Do you like I talk to people who support the ice and immigration, I'm like, you, as a Christian, are supporting

So how is that christian? It's Christian? They're not Christian.

They're abusing the religion of Christianity, just like Benjamin Netanyah who has abused the religion of Judaism to perpetrate an agenda. And of course I'm not going to leave about the fact that there are Muslims that abuse is to perpetrate agendas. It happens across the board, and recognizing that and calling that that out is so important. So if we're not going to have a seventeen seventy six revolution, we got to start voting for people until we could get there.

Well, we appreciate you and thank you so much for all of your efforts and for always being willing to raise your voice, put your body on the line, get arrested, and also for actually taking a very direct and proactive effort as a parent to raising people right because people think about kids. No, you're raising adults that are carrying forth and need to understand that the world they're coming into is going to require them to actually be the ones that shift it. So that is not lost on me.

Just be protected, Everyboddy, I just told I'm here.

I met up with a friend in Puerto Rico who's been on this journey with me, and I literally left her house and told her mom and Anne.

I said, all right, we're going get in trouble now.

Yeah, say say. It's a silly way to send you off. So be protected and just know that we're all here rooting for you.

Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.

Free Puerto Rico, free Palestine, free Turtle Island.

All the above. Thank you so much, Josephine, You're so lucky, y'all.

Bye Bunia,