Power of the Platform

we gotta put some sage on the internet. It's it's what they say when y'all well, I can't say y'all because I don't want to put you in this category. But some men when like a woman has what like when they'll say a woman is she's she's like um, like like you know, she's she's she's done, like she's been too many people are some stupid thing that y'all say or not you. But people say there's a word that they use. They say it's um. It's no, I

can't think of it. But there's a word that I've heard that I would like to reapply to this and take off of women um. But I've heard it be said like she's done or done for or something like that. Something something like that. That shouldn't be said again about women. But we applies to the Internet. The Internet is used and abused. It's a rat it has bubbled, it's out of control, it's unsafe. Um. The Internet is really actually

a very violent place. But it's a major distraction for your life, Like if you're supposed to be working on something and really building, especially if you are in a social space, you can find your mind being consumed with people's thoughts and conversations versus being able to accomplish whatever your goals are. And I think folks really have to be careful about that because it's dangerous on the net. It really it's at one time, No, you're right, and I think I think it's it gives us access to

information at such a fast rate. But I think that the danger, the biggest danger for me on the Internet is misinformation and people who have big platforms who constantly spell misinformation right. And I think the danger in that is when there's nobody a challenge or correct the misinformation. Because unfortunately, we live in the town where most of

these people get their information from the internet. Right, there are people who because they follow a star or something that has twenty million view I mean followers, and the star says something, they take it as law, They take it as it got to be true because this person

said it right. And if there's nobody to combat that ship, it becomes it gets so dangerous and it's it's it's it shows in the way that the youth moved right, because the youth again information and they follow the biggest stars and they follow people have these big platforms, and a lot of them are sending off the wrong messages. You know what, what they what they glorified. What they only focus on is how much you have? What you have? How do all the things that and you can see

that transformed into our babies. So for me, as much as I hate the Internet and and I see it, I'm gonna always speak truth to problem. I'm you're not gonna get over on on me like I'm gonna use my little files when it does and followers and I'm gonna tell them the truth and hopefully they can, you know, spread the truth to somebody else. But I'm just not gonna I can't sit back and allow people to just make up ship and lie and spread misinformation on my watch,

I just can't. I try to too. I mean, I think it's all about balance, you know, And that's all I'm gonna saying. It's all about balance. You know. You lean in, but you also gotta figure out how to lean out, and not just lean out a few times a day, but actually lean out on some days completely and really focus on building whatever else it is that you're supposed to be doing that The internet is uh uh, the Internet becomes a place to in my judgment, it

becomes a place to showcase a finished product. But there's a lot of things that you have to do. But I go back, social media becomes a place to showcase a finished product, maybe pick up a few tips along the way. But there are other ways on the Internet that you can build what you're trying to accomplish. And I think we have to focus on one, you know, not so much on social media, just as people in general,

because it's becoming accessable. But anyway, I was saying though that this weekend, Yeah, the past weekend, it was really busy with a lot of things that happened, you know, one just Jeezy who we must make sure we get him on our show. Uh. He was actually ready to do it in the past and we just for whatever reason, it never was confirmed. But he had his annual Snowball, which is his gala for his foundation, which is also also coincides with his birthday. UH. And the foundation UM

does a lot of great work with youth. They're focused on young people from impoverished communities. UH. And you know, it was a great event. A lot of UM people, but celebrities and business in the you know, business folks, just different types of people came out to support him. And I think, you know, my thing with with Jeezy is that he's such a solid or authentic person, Like every time I speak to him, the same he reached out to me to say, hey, I want you guys

to be there. You know, it's not a through his assistant. UM. You know, you call him and you can't get him on the phone, and he not he's not really trying to engage. No, he's like and and several times we've called him and he's shown up at things. So I don't feel you know, I I uh invested at the event, I donated, and I don't and I feel good about that investment because I know that whatever he's trying to do,

he's gonna authentically do it. And of course Genie mine my girl was there, who I love so so much now it was it was a beautiful event. Man, Just Jeezy is the definition of evolution, Like just watching somebody evolved from pretty much the bottom and go to that next level. You know, he's one of He's one of the interviews that I want to do for my sit down with the stand up you know, serio is that I want to do because he's pretty much like a

poster boy for that. Like somebody came from nothing, you know that literally he came from backyards a bunch of people. That's route like he tells that story. So watching him evolved into this, you know, this man that's doing business, was focused on helping kids and evolved even involving his message in his music. Right, you know, he is not stagnated. Yeah, you know, we know where you come from. He still speaks to the realities and the row, the royal things

in the street. But there's so much music about black empowerment and and and and move into the next level and you know all of those things. So this is watching him you know, I've always been a fan of his music. But when you meet it's very few, it's very seldomly that you actually meet a lot of these artists and then who that you thought there was, you know, and Jeez is one of those individuals. Man, So shout

out to Jeezy man. Yeah. Absolutely. Uh So, then we went to the b ET Awards at Joe who was our brother. He's hilarious. He was the host, and I think Joe did a good job. You know what. The funny thing about it is, as I was watching him up there, and you know, I have the same thing where I have these moments when my brain just freezes and I'm like, wait a minute, which I'll say I'm supposed to say what huh? And I realized me just getting older, right like, so at this point you're doing

the best, give me the line, huh. Joe just be having a good time. Man. It's crazy that at this age and the stage in his career, you could tell that he's probably having more fun than ever. He's enjoying himself, he's telling his stories, he's around people, he's he's getting acknowledgement, and he's actually he's actually increasing like as a lot of artists, you know. And that's what I told people.

Hip hop started out in the seventies, a lot of people before it wasn't an older person's game, Like people are, oh, you old, you out of hipp No. Now, the people, the pioneers of hip hop, they weren't able to really, you know, be celebrated because hip hop was so young. Right, But now hip hop has sixty and seventy year old fans, right, it's it's six fifty year old people who grew up

on hip hop. So as you mature in hip hop, there's an audience for you, right, and and and as you mature, and you still stay connected to the youth, you you you like the balance you and so you get the best of both worlds. So Joe is one of those people that personifies what that looks like. Right when you watch him, he's growing gracefully, he's enjoying life. He's able to mingle with the youth and able to go to the main the you know, the adult events

and and just merge those two worlds. So just watching Joe Man, seeing him up there doing hip hop awards, knowing how much he enjoyed it and how much he was honored to do. It was dope. And then my boy Nori got his first Simple Up award. Man, it's my brother. Man. I just I was happy, you know, and to be there in the building to shake his hand and telling my love him after you know, always been my guy. Man. It's like one of the first

people in this industry from the beginning. I tell always tell people about the battle with me and Sean and Normy was right there. Man. He was always one of those people who supported me and showed genuine love man throughout my career. So well. Shout out to Connie Orlando and her team, um even uh our brother Jesse for a great show because it actually was a really good show. I was want to see the show because we did. We watched the show there, but I haven't seen which

meant it was two damn long. It was. It was a lot was going on. Man. You did honor tren that she got her you know, her flowers, you know, the young girl Glo Rilla. She was probably like the star of the the night. Everybody was loving her. She got her five old statement when people were trying to say he was robbed, and he put out a statement that said, I wasn't robbed that Glorilla one because she deserved it and I'm proud of her and I support her. And

I thought that was very very just dope man. And I love Favo and and I wanted to see five yo win that award. I stayed. I'm like, yeah, I think Fabo, but he didn't. And as like a true g you know New York individual who put his work in, he you know, he accepted it, and I know great things coming for five year old man. He continues to work hard. I love him as and he's like one

of my little brothers. Man. Every time I've seen me, like big bro, we give me Hub is real genuine love and he's a good person, you know, so shout out to him. It was it was just so I've seen so many different people I hadn't seen a while. It was just it was a dope vibe. Man. It was a good good It was a good man. I mean, it was you know, I have things that I wanted to say, So I'm going to meet with Connie so I could talk to her about some stuff that I

think could help make it even better. Um, because you know, again, I have no critique to say this was terrible or how could this be? But I can't say that are stronger deliberate and intentional focus on some of the educational pieces that we need has to be, you know, should be rather built into the show. Shout out some joyy bad ass who had one of my favorite performances. Man, and all of them, young Jesus, all of them, all

of them. Even though I'm in the hip hop era, you can put me in the blues and the and the the R and B and whatever is before R and B because I like that kind of music. So I'm more to play with little thing MP came out there that was one of like, huk, I ain't gonna lie on man, I grew up on gangs to rap. How about I'm more of a soul train of words, uh person. But I still enjoyed this show, you know

what it's if there's so many things happened. It was hard to pick things to talk about today that you know, I know our folks wanna hear about, you know, and I don't have any intention on talking about Jeffrey Dahma, but just watching between Jeffrey Dahma and this and that and dad and this and this and that it was just so much happening this week again, you could really you can't focus if you understood on social media or that you can't do no work, you can't make no

no money on doing what you're supposed to be doing. If all you if you read in comments and following the Shave Room and ball Alert and Jasmine Brand and all hip hop and this one and that one, and then my song is breaking it down and helping people understand that you want to go over this you could get some authentic information maybe to meet and Mallory jumps in the chat Tesla and Figure Road got something going on. Breakfast Club is dropping their perspective. That's a lot of information.

It's an overload of in for mate shown. But there was a few There was a few things that I thought we should mention, And one is how devastating Hurricane iron Um has been in Florida and other places that hurricane. But you know, and I thought because I saw on the news. I don't know which student. We were somewhere and the news was on, and I remember you saying, well, how can there be a tropical storm if it's doing

this much damage? And then I saw later on that it had been upgraded to a or it was being re established as a category one hurricane. But when I was talking to Trade Trade, the truth I was explained, you know, asking him about it, and he said, no, it hit landfall at some point, and it was a hurricane. It was a category four. And he said that it went out wherever into the water and came back and basically did more damage. So this was a real serious hurricane.

And it seems that there were a lot of people black, white, up down left right, poor rich that were not necessarily prepared for it. And then all the boats, Like when I saw the boats, I knew right there that we were Like when I saw the boats piled up on top of each other, on top of one another, pushed into buildings on the grass, I knew right then, like, oh no, they're black folks that must have been hit hard if the rich people's stuff was gone in that way.

And you know, some of these people worked their entire life to get those boats, their entire life. That's the one thing they're gonna retire with a boat. I know, man, it was, it was. It was real devastating and just looking at the news seeing people go through what they went through. Man, I pray for them once again. Trade was out there man doing what he did. That's what it's him in the relief game, you know, shout out to Trade and Elite Shapiro, who was a woman that

we met during the Women's March. She went out into her own community in Naples, Flarida, which is a place where a lot of rich people. A lot of rich people live in Naples, um and I mean it's a rich town. But she went out and tried to find the shadows. Really, that's what that was the language she used that if okay, if this we were in this rich area, but there's gotta be pockets somewhere where there

are people who have been hard. And of course she found some housing developments, housing projects as we always have called them. And she found some other areas where black people and brown people live, garbage piled up, cars, ruined, medicine being thrown out because there's been no power for days, no elected officials going to their areas, no real relief services coming in. And she set up shop there. And so Alitia and now some of my other friends is

the Vanessa and others. They are, you know, working in this particular community. It's a lot. It's a lot. My prayers go out to everyone who was effective. Man. I hope you know they get the relief they need. Families who lost loved ones, My condolences, man. These these are hurricanes. Man, Like, that's that's one thing for me. Like I love to

visit Miami. I love all of these beautiful places, but I don't want to live there, like I don't really Like you were telling me about Hurricanes Sandy, and don't that they did this to you. I don't recall New York ever having I just don't. It was one. I don't know if this has ever happened before, but you should look it up because Hurricane Sandy was very devastating in New York, especially of course in the Rockaways because that's where the water is. But people who live in

housing developments lost power. There was flooding in certain But in fact, I used to be a consultant for UM East Coal uh Heating Company and well they basically installed boilers. So East Cole Boiling Company, a boiler company something like that. But anyway, East Cole was that was the name he called at all the time. UM and they they were

because of Sandy. They had to go out and like installed boilers all over the place because the water had ruined boilers in many of the Nightsia housing developments across the city, and of course in some of the homes. So it was like a real devastating situation. People lost property, people, I think people died. I can't remember how many. But it wasn't it wasn't a good thing. The global warming

is a real issue, you know, climate change. You know things that some of the folks that people ask us, well, why did you vote for Stall and so, Well, we would like to see that someone invests in trying infrastructure and other things that try to help us save lives in these moments when you have hurricanes. I mean, there's so many issues. Anyway, that's a whole other conversation, a

whole different thing. Louisiana Senator John Kennedy. I don't think he's um related to the Kennedy's he but you know, I can't say for sure if I was just saying I don't think so. He made a statement in an ad that was released that if you hate cops and you need help, call a crackhead. So since you don't, you don't call the cops call a crackhead, and I don't even understand what a crackhead like. I wasn't the I am trying to draw the connection between the police

to crackheads. Wow, No, I mean I am too, just wild, That's all I can said. As well. And I was watching it. When I watched it, there was a lady who was a covering crack at it. It was it was offensive, like, you know how, like this is somebody in leadership and you use that to the mean people

who have real addiction issues there. Okay, I can see if you say, if you want, and why do you say, called an opioid user, right, because I bet you they have more people using opioids today than there are people using crack, right, I would I would have. I mean, I'm pretty sure because a lot of people have turned away from pipes and all of that and they're taking pills.

Maybe I'm wrong that it's not a majority, but hey, if you're going to zero in on something, why not zero in on a drug that too many people using. By the way, white folks use crack as well. So cut the ship, cut the ship. But I do. But here's what I will say, is what I will say, the fact that from policing, I could go to call a criminal, call a murderer, call but the crackhead piece, it's very intentional and I don't have a real answer. But I'm trying to figure out what made that come

to life for him. Well, I think when it may come to life for him, was that he was stupid. Stupid ship. Yeah, sometimes we we just we can't really give the answer to stupid ship because it's stupid ship. And when we try to answer stupid ship, we sound stupid. Sometimes I just don't want to, nor do I have the capacity to make sense out of, as you said, ignorant stupid ship and moreover, that extreme racism that exists

within so many. But when I think about it, it kind of brings me to my thought of the day because talking about connections and drawing sort of lines and and and and being able to understand things, it's really troubling to me. M It's troubling to me that people are either intentionally or mistakenly trying to allow this idea around Black Lives Matter movement versus organization to be misconstrued.

That for me is I see people who I thought or think um are intelligent, thoughtful individuals who claim to love black people, who claimed to be about black lives, who claimed to believe that black lives do in fact matter. And when I see people say that you know or or lean into this concept that black lives matter is a scam, it really is troubling to me. It also also in every organization that I've ever been a part of, right, there's always an internal conflict, especially when it comes to

an influx of money coming in the door. There is internal conflict, always has been, always will be. That does not mean, and what that means is that sometimes you get it right, sometimes you get it wrong. You gotta go back to the drawing board. You gotta try to figure out how to correct some of the things. You make decisions and think back while maybe we shouldn't have done this, we should do that. That happens in businesses, organizations, households, families,

anything you do. You even walk out your house sometimes and say I'm going ten blocks away and get distracted, and somehow I'll end up doing something over here and not where you were supposed to be. And then you say, oh, ship man, I gotta turn around, and I was supposed to be over here, there's resets, there's room room for mistakes and what what have you along the way, Right, that's the way that I feel every organization has had

internal conflict. Some internal conflict has come down to the point where people have actually accused one another of real crimes. So when I hear people say even this, this idea that Black Lives Matter as an organization is a scam, I'm still trying to identify who are the individuals that declared that. Where did it come from? Mhm? How was it declared that? Go ahead, you were gonna say something, No, I mean, And that's a good question. And you know

how I was declared? Right? It was declared by people who clearly have an interest in dismantling and discrediting a movement that was so powerful that it shook the core of this nation, just like the you know what they did with the Women's March, that has been proven right when we when they did the New York Times article. If you haven't read the New York Times article where they showed how Russian bots had intentionally targeted one of our co founders, Come Until Freedom, which was one of

the four coaches of the Women's March. Then to start sault, which eventually just branched off into the dismantling of the Women's March. It's intentional, right, so they once they see power in something, when you know, the movement of Black Lives Matter had people in the street every day saying, we're not gonna stand for this. You're gonna have to give us equity. You're gonna have to give us justice.

Were tied to being this and and and it shifted this country, shifted the consciousness of this country, the world, the world, I mean the world is shifted into where every corporation realized that we we can't just have a diversity inclusion. We have to put black people in leadership, in power, right. Blacks are not just gonna be comfortable

just being in buildings, right. And everybody wanted to do the right thing because for the first time they were able to see what we were talking about, and they were able to feel the anger of the nation. And that's not something that people wanted to do. And the and the and and and this is my but it was very and I know that I know that there are people even among our close teams that will say to Mika, stop, you know, explaining about an organization that

you're not a part of. You don't get money from Black Lives Matter, You're not a part of the organization. You have nothing to do with that organization, So stop speaking on it because you are putting yourself in the midst of something that you have nothing to do with. But see to the point that you made. You have made several times that we have to be careful with how information gets out there, because once information begins to spread, it does not It's like having cancer in your stomach.

If it is not addressed, the cancer will move into a woman's reproductive system and the next thing you know, it's all over your body. So you can't sit back and allow lies to be told on an organization, a movement, or anybody that is in close proximity to what you do. And beyond that, my son, I am becoming an elder

in this movement, believe it or not. When you think about Mary pat Hector, Nyla and Chelsea Miller and Tiffany Loften, Steve even Green, all of these younger people that we work with, they are coming into the movement and and really becoming leaders in their own right. And us forty something and beyond we're moving towards fifty, We're moving towards our own level of being sort of an elder in this movement, especially for someone like me who's been doing

this work for thirty years. So I can speak to what I see happening around. It's not so much defending or not, but we need to be honest in what we say. So when you have people out there who are using words like it was a scam and it did terrible things to us and all of that, I want to know who's determining that. How is that? And I'm not saying I'm not saying that I can change

anyone's mind. There are people who have fundamental ide ideological issues with BLM, the organization, how it got started, and what the women who led the organization stood for, and what they were pretty much proponents of. But you but I I feel and and and what I would say is there are people who feel that way about almost every organization and movement. They feel the same way. There's ideo ideological issues, right, people didn't like the dr King

was trying to integrate black people into American society. They didn't like that, so there was conflict about that issue. There has always been confidict. But what you cannot do and what I just can't sit by and allowed to happen on my watch while I'm alive and I have influence and amount. It's for people to erase the fact that three women came up with a slogan that they came up with this is their slogan. You can say whatever the hell you want, Oh, I don't like this

one and that one. And they came up with a slogan that helped us to communicate to the world our affirmation of self. Which is a slogan, which is which is the child Black Lives Matter is the child of I'm Black and I'm proud. It is the child of the Black Power movement. These are in direct connection, one after the next. We have always had powerful slogans. Now perhaps they may have. Maybe in another life, the organization could have been named you know something else to separate

the two. But it wasn't. And I am hoping that people who claim to be intellectual, intelligent individuals, that they would not sit and uh and and and and denigrate an entire movement because they are either too egotistical, too lazy to learn, or are part of the same damned

system that's trying to oppress us. To be quite honest, because co and Tell pro operates in all levels of this movement, that we would not be able to clearly state the difference between the two things and the importance of upholding something of such value like black Lives Matter, that has meant so much to so many. So that's what I that's my rant for the day, you know. And and I said I was done with my rent, but I'm not. I'm gonna take it to my own

live later today. But you know, the same tactics of divide and conqueror is happening to us right before our eyes. We are falling into the same track. And there are individuals who believe they have the answers. They believe that they have the answers for what needs to be done. See I've never said that, right, I've never said I have all the answers. What I've said is we're playing our role, We're putting forth our effort, and this is

the way in which we choose to show up. And this is what is This is our passion and what God has given given us the strengths and talents to do well. Right, But I've never said we have the answers, because if I had the answers, if I knew everything and I was the smartest, the brightest, the best, and the most knowledgeable, and and everybody else stuff is fake or not whatever. If that was mine, if that was the situation, I would have fixed it, because I've been

doing it for long enough. None of us have all the answers to any of this stuff. None of us

we are. We are a work in progress, and we are best in my judgment, when we unify and figure out ways to push multiple ideas, concepts, thought processes, tactics all at the same time, and that we respect one another and go offline to have conversations about what we could be doing better and ways that we can find tune the process, but to just go out and feed into what these people want from us anyway, And we sit there and say we don't want to feed into it,

but all of us are feeding into it. So it's are we not or are we? Which one are we gonna do? So? I am very disappointed and discouraged by some of what I have seen in the aftermath of Kanye because the only reason why Kanye West matters is because he has an international, a global, a super a super powerful platform. Anybody else, it's a damn right. People can wear white lives, green lives, all lives, whatever they want. But when you have the attention of our youth and

our people and you do it, it means something. And for him to go put to Mika Palmer's name, Brianna Tailor's mother in the midst of some attention seeking menstrual show bullshit. It shows you even more how he will use anybody and anything when he feels that his back is up against the wall. We people say. We had people say white lives matter to us with guns in their hands while we were protesting. It's not a little thing. And I think that I think that's what my response

has been. I think that's the reason why I responded in the way that i've and in the amount of times that I have, because I need clarity on every level. Everything that you say right, And I think, you know, it's sad. I think Kanye has his own issues. You know, he's a black man, and I don't want him to deal with he's dealing with. But I think that is dangerous because people are hailing him as a genius right.

So when you start calling people a genius and the average person here is that, then they take what you say as some level of law. They take it as it has to be correct. So when you when you when people are classifying a person as a genius whose ideologies they're not just flawed with their wrong right, his

his his facts are wrong. Right? When when when he utilized his his platform to to bring shock value to post you know, because that's pretty much what it is, is shock value, and he wants to get the internet talking and it once again, it makes him be more relevant, able to sell proud of ups and have a level of power over this era. When he does that and he s fused misinformation, it's harmful and and and and

and a lot of times I dis ignore. But when you go into the realm in which I live my life in right where we put out our lives on the front line, when you start talking about activism and you start talking about white lives matter, when you do what you just said as how white people, white supremacists have been and I would miss with guns screaming white

lives matter. You know, where we had to we had threats on our lives and they were talking about white lives matter, and he and he kept doing it, right when we know how triggering that is and how those phrases have been used to perpetuate acts of potential violence against us. Right, it's not just okay, it's not just Kanye can wear a T shirt. Right. And then when you realize after after that doesn't work in the backlash, then you want to attack a whole old movement. Right.

You want to attack a movement and say that it's a fake and it's a scam because you want to deflect. You want to deflect because you thought you were doing something that was gonna be embraced and you was gonna get something. And then when when the kitchen gets too hot, it goes to, oh, well, you ain't saying that when he was taking my kids? Oh yeah, yeah, even what about my kids? I went to your offer. Hell, oh you know what black Lives matter scam? Even Brianna Taylor's mother.

You just started saying anything anything you can to get the pressure off the bullshit you did. Right. So it's a strategy, but it's not okay for us because Brianna Taylor's mother is somebody that we call our sister, Right, that we cried with that We've been on the front line and we understand what it is that she represents right, and she wanted to know, does my daughter's black life

not man exactly? She wanted that's the that's the that is actually the parameter for which we thought, does Brianna tail is black life? Man? When you say white lives matter, guess what. All the white people involved in the case, they were protected protected them. The black attorney general protected them. Some of the people the white supremacists protected them. They protected themselves. The system in general protects police all the time.

So there's no issue about whether or not white lives matter. And we don't need to say it to trick this. Some ship don't never need to be changed Dr King's speeches that he made, speeches that have been made from leaders ROSA Parks, and what she was doing when she sat on that bus. Those things don't need to be changed up by black people who have influence in order to make some other type of points. But we need

to go into our guests today. One thing though, before before we go into I just want to I want to clarify this because this is this is really important man to utilize your voice in your platform to diminish the real fights and sacrifices that people made without even proper education is one of the most dangerous things. You can't do. To call yourself a leader, to call yourself uh freese mind, to call yourself God, whatever you want to call yourself, to call yourself any of these things.

But to utilize your platform to try to lessen somebody else's it makes no sense. And we don't have we don't have the luxury as black people right now, we don't have that luxury. We don't Even when you say free thinger, if you're free thought contribute to the demise of our people, then it's actually free, right, What is it actually cost him? Because if you're freely thinking and you can contribute to the demids of black the black civilization, then it's costing way too much, you know. So for me,

I'm not gonna sit there and allow it. I'm always gonna speak truth to power. You know. Hopefully our brothers can understand that and stop being attention hors and stop seeking to, you know, to have a hit minute and say anything to get a viral moment. Hopefully, well we'll get to that point where that's not more important than the liberation and equity of our people facts. I think that's great. It takes us right to the business of

street politicians. So let's get into our guests. So, you know, I mean, I love how we've really been trying to focus on this financial education thing. I mean, I've been learning so much from the tax uh what she attacks advising. I have some other women in that area that I met recently as well that I want to bring on.

And then just people who have been talking about credit like I literally have been applying the strategies, and I know you have as well to some of my own stuff from the credit card like when you're supposed to make the payments to UM, you know, the issues around taxes and how to deal with your finances and all of that, and then of course recently a lot around investments.

And so I hope that people who have been listening to the show that they're actually like tactically applying the strategies because I think a lot of times what we do is we listen and we we hear it, but then we don't do anything with it. So I think that's you know, for me, I'm just telling y'all listening out there in the world that I am actually applying the strategies based upon all the folks that we've been

interviewing for the last however longs. Yeah, I have to, and I've been very intentional about focusing on finances, investments, you know, understanding credit, understanding, you know, crypto, all of the things, because I understand this is the future. And a lot of times, as activists and artists, we focus

on just the work we do. Right Like, as artists, a lot of times you just focus on making your music and putting out the art and and we don't focus on the financial aspects of And that's why you see a lot of issues with artists now talking about people jerked them. A lot of a lot of artists didn't get jerked. They just weren't financially a stupid so they didn't know to do certain business, They didn't know to make certain investments, they didn't know to put their

money in certain places. You know. So what we're doing right now this you know, financial revolution that we're entering into, and we're utilizing and combining the finances with activism and making it cool for activists to focus on money and being able to be financially stable and being able to have wealth. You know, it's just I think any people, the people who fight for our people should never be

destituted broke, and we should not even normalize that. So I'm glad that we're taking these steps in focusing on finances and utilize that our platform to educate our listeners on the same thing. Yeah, we're not doing broken destitutes not happening. It's a new day. We believe that we should have um, we should be plentiful, we should have wealth, we should have resources, uh, and that our families should

be left with something. The one thing that we have to break down, if you will, is this idea that the way Dr King died was you know, honorable. It's not honorable even for us as as a people to be okay with how he left this earth. And so therefore, um, you know, we just we just ain't with it. We we are one against the idea that being a leader means that you have to be broke in order to

be authentic. But anyway, in that same vein today we are being joined by two brothers that we love, that we trust, um, you know emphatically, we know what they do and how much they love and care for the black community. UM, and I'm happy to have them here. This is the first and we've been talking for months about something that they're doing that is revolutionary, UM, and today we get an opportunity to bring it before our audience. And I'm excited to have on street politicians for the

first time, but certainly not nearly the last. Uh Fahim and Michael of Oasis Investment Group, Thank y'all so much for joining Street politicians. Thank you Tamika and my sign for having us. We we appreciate. We're excited. Like you said, it's a long time coming. So uh, we just we're ready to get right into it. So yeah, Bridge, where this Oasis? Where did you guys come with the name? How do we How did you guys say yourself? You know, we want to create this investment group and you know

who is the target market? Like give us give us the rundown or is that the always his investment group is okay? I mean started well, uh like you was saying, you know, to make a you know, economics is a part of the movement. It took a while for us to get here, and I think we took all the necessary steps as a people, we had to go through

what we had to go through. But as you also mentioned Martin, you know, uh Mr Dr King, you know, towards the end of his life he was getting the economics and at a certain point we have to have a discussion about economics. Uh. It goes hand in hand with the social movement. It goes hand in hand with the revolution. It has to be financed, and we can't

rely on others to finance the movement for us. So in these conversations that we've always found human I we've always been into I guess you can say social justice, making our communities a better place to live. And in this mission, it just came like, you know, we have to buy our communities. These are stuff that these are terms that we've been hearing at least a decade, you know what I mean. But even more all the way back,

we got to buy our community. We need ownership, all these terms, but there's actual steps you have to take that. It isn't something that just happens by saying that. You can say it for five to twenty years and then you know, I walk by my street in l A, Manchester and Vermont, the street that I'm very familiar with, and it's been looking the saying for twenty years. I walk by it's like, damn, but we're talking all this stuff, but nothing changes so far. Human. I said, you know,

what is an actual step into buying our community? What's an actual step into putting grocery stores? Um? And that's where the term oasis come from, because an oasis it's a place of refuge in the middle of a desert. It's it's life, it's hope, it's beauty. And our communities are deserts. You know, food deserts, educational deserts. Uh, anything you can think of that we need. We're deprived of it with this deserts. So we want to start building hope, uh,

life in the middle of these deserts. So when we looked at it and we said, you know, step by step, what is the first step we can do? Um, Fahim had the idea of, man, let's just start real estate. Let's just put our little money we have businesses. And it started were just putting our own money together and saying,

you know what, let's just buy this property. Um. And doing that it grew into for us something that we didn't expect because we kept putting our money in, putting making the profit, putting the money in, until we bought one property, four property, dozen properties, and the portfolio started to grow, and we said, you know, look at what we can do, and look at we're just we're just two, three or four people, you know, and every now and then we brought someone else in UM and we've seen

that this is something we can logically do the steps to do it as far as just saying those words, if you want, yeah, I think we captured it. You know, that was it. It was like we you know, as you know, we we we all met, we all connected because we wanted to make a difference in our communities. So like that's been a driving force behind most of what UM you will see us doing, and Oasis was

no different. We we saw, of course, the opportunity to generate money and make money, but then we saw in that there was like job creation, there was changing of the communities. There was this opportunity to give people a place to live that never lived in these type of places. So you started seeing all these other results of the work that we was doing. It's like, yo, this is

actually something that's pretty impactful. Um to the point now where we've created dozens of jobs, we you know, made so many families and gave them opportunities to live in these type of environments, and ultimately that changes the way people think and live. You know what I mean? When you got these little five six year old children in Chicago is different, Like, you know, these sisters are still having eight babies out there. You know what I'm saying,

it's a trip. Like so you're seeing all these young children and they're coming from the slim lorerd type of properties into our properties. Um, it's hard to even call it social justice because I look at it like, man, if if your cousins or your family or somebody was funked up, you want to look out for them, you want to take you wouldn't call this nothing. You would just do what makes sense and what was right in

that moment. And I think in the basic sense, that's kind of what Oasis is like, it really just makes sense. And then we're able to do it on a larger scale when there's more people invested in it. So we we did what we did, and we could continue to do what we're doing, And we said, how would this look if there were ten of us, How would it looked up there was a hundred of us. How it looked there's a thousand of us, all pooling resources, which

coming back to the group group economics. Then I'm glad you guys brought up some of your your your backgrounds, and you talked a little bit about it. Uh Michael, But I would love for you to to tell us a little bit more about the inspiration, like how did you to grow up and and what does that mean in terms of when you got a little bit of change you said, oh I want to go and do

this thing and to make my community better. To talk a little bit about that, because you know, people are really connected when they learned that you know and understand where they come from. And I think we have a problem. We face a challenge of folks thinking you've got to be you know, some big celebrity, some big rich person, somebody who came from wealth in order to start creating past um for your community and for your own family. So talk a little bit about where you come from.

Find him and I, um, we've been We pretty much grew up together. Our parents knew each other, you know, our parents were students of the Honorable minutes to lo as far kind together. So when you know we grew up, you know, uh, just being around each other. Um, and we start we first started doing business together. Um yeah, And this is a whole crazy story. But he was in college and I was working for Michael Jackson, which

is a story itself. But I because I know him and I trust him, I wanted to put people I trust around MJ because he's such a beautiful soul and gets taking advantage of man. You know, I called fighting. I didn't. I didn't really reach out to a lot of people. Um, but I always had a love and admiration for him. Just growing up. We've always just been solid. Um. We fight sometimes I always win because of my power and strength of my will. But outside of that, you

know me and fighting is just solid. So I called him. He left school. He had like one semester left and he left school to come work for m J. He ended up in his degree for everybody like he left school. He wouldn't he got it. But ready to say, wait a minute, what happened we were working out. I was about to say for him, you was about to go back to school next week. So that's all we needed that's a whole crazy story too, how like that was a that's a whole story. But yeah, it worked out

where I got with a degree. Um, I was able to have that experience working with m J. And Uh, I mean ultimately and let us to where we had. Now. You know, we grew up. You know, you hear the stories of like you know, we grew up no different than probably ninety percent of young black people in America. You know what I'm saying, fathers incarcerated or fathers and you know, and mothers just trying to struggle. His mother

had three children. My mother had three children. Um, but they were friends and they still maintained their friendship to this day forty plus years. You know they've been fred before we were born. But you know, growing up and I grew up in Watts, California, went to high school

and Watts Inglewood. Just these these areas, you know what I'm saying, Where you have these experiences, um, where especially a storm being students that are minister you, you develop a passion for one to change what's your experience in you know what I mean? And UH and I and UH I grew up he grew up in South Central

my mother moved us south to suburbs. So I was raised around a lot of Asians, had a lot of Asian friends, but on weekends I was with them, so I got to see how communities on one end in the suburbs were beautiful and build and then I would exit. That's why I mentioned Manchester and Vermont. That would be the exit we would take. And it would be depressing every time I hit that block because I just came from the beautiful suburbs and now I'm over here in

the hood. And that really always stuck with me. And like our communities are, They're gross and they never changed decade after decade, year after year. UM. So us just working together. We've always had that passion of like how can we help? And we done different things. We've had different careers, built businesses. Um. But I think what's important is trust. We trust each other and but we had to build that through work. And I think one thing our people have to learn how to do is how

to work with each other. You know, we have to sometimes force that work because it's not easy. There's trust issues. Uh, there's years and generations of being taken advantage of. So by nature, you know, we're a little insecure when it comes to working especially with our with our own UM. So we had to find a way to make it work. But it started with trust, It started with respect, started with integrity UM. And what we wanted to do was

show what two people can do UM. And now we have a whole team who works together of people we grew up with and then people knew UM. But we have to learn how to work together. And that's what FA him and I figured out how to do. It's been a great team effort, but it starts with with with trust, with inte pretty and with just just jumping out there and I can imagine YouTube to making my side have an idea of what I'm talking about is

working together and struggling together. When you do that, and when and when you do that, you build that camaraderie that is needed to UH to be successful UM. And that's what we want to encourage people to do as far as pull your resources, because what I'm doing I couldn't do by myself. Why he's doing he couldn't do by himself. You know, we I probably would have made

it pretty far. I would have did pretty good for myself and he would have did good for himself, but we can go so much further together, which is why we push unity and group of economics. So we're just an example of what we want to uh inspire others to do. Just listening to what it is that you guys established is beautiful, you know, just just the demand state right, demand state up saying you know, I want

to utilize resources that I have. I want to do it with somebody that I trust and build for people that I know don't have as much, you know, And and I think that's what a lot of us want to do, you know, but a lot of us are scared to do it. I know most people don't. They don't like the process. Right. A lot of times people be like, yo, I want to do this, but nobody wants to go to that process. So at first I want to commend you on just doing it, you know. Um,

so what what would it look like? How? What is it that you guys want to do? Do you want to bring on a bunch of people? Do you want to just have people that you know when you trust, to invest with you? Are you looking for ten people? Are you looking a hundred people to create like this this black oasis that everybody can be involved in, Like what is what is the goal? Well, the goal is big, the long term vision is big. But like I said in the beginning, we are doing it step by step,

break by break. So in the as of right now, before for Human Eye brought this, you all are our first park official podcast, by the way, so thank you for having us, you know. But before we reached out to anyone, we wanted to see like, hey, does this work? Can we scale this? So we started with of course just me and him, uh, investing our own money, then bringing in another person uh and seeing like okay we can get ten units. Hey that we have twenty units,

let's try to get four or five more. Let's bring two people. So once we've got a formula that works as far as investing, because now we're talking about investing, we have different We got the job creation. We have to beautify the community. But if we're talking just the business side, it's investing with us and what we do. We have an entire team who goes to work, purchase property, renovate,

rent out all all that good stuff. Um, so right now, what we're looking for after we tested it for nearly three years, built a nice multimillion dollar portfolio has not have a nice size uh the nice units on the south side of Chicago, and want to mention that right now, we're focusing on Chicago UM for several reasons. And I'll quickly touch on why Chicago. UM. We know the area. It's a great market, UM, business wise and runners wise. UM. We have a construction partners out there. UM. So we

know that we're able to deliver on two investors. You know we can give it. We can. We know we're confident we can get a return. So that's our first thing. We have to build up trust in our community. So people who are investing with us, we want them to have a great experience as far as getting what we said we would give them as far as a return. But to answer your question, my son now is a long way of pretty much saying, UM, we are open for the mass majority to invest. We did the groundwork

with a few people, dozens of people UH investing. We got them to return and we said, you know what, let's build this up so we can open it up to the public. So we qualified with the SEC. That was a heck of a process, you know, UM, going back and forth, and they tightened it up over the years. But we have a great team, great lawyer team, great legal team, great business team, was able to push that through.

And shout out to Jay Morrison. We're the He's the only one that we know, someone black was able to accomplish such a feat. Uh see why a lot of black old companies don't do it. It's very difficult, but but we did it. We qualified and we're actually ready to accept investments. So we are accepting investments UM as they come. We're capable to accept them by the hundreds and by the thousands UM based off building this foundation for the past few years UM and I think so

that that's and that's where we're at right now. So we have what they called regulation, a fund that's open people can go to always just dot build. They can invest in the fund. UM. Short term, we want to acquire ten thousand units doors apartments between single family homes multi family homes in the Chicago area. That's our short term. That's like UM one of our goals, big long term vision is to take this formula and apply it into

down trotten neighborhoods across America. So take the same away to the formula and bring it to New York, Bring it to Los Angeles, bring it to Atlanta, bring it to the areas where job creation will decrease the violence that's going on the streets. Um changing the way people are living will change their mentality. You know what I mean.

When these young brothers right now, when they're living in Chicago or from Chicago, they come, they get a chance to work on these houses and we teach them about equity, teaching them about land ownership and the value of that. It changes the mentality. And we're just doing it by fuse right now. So as the program, you know, ten thousand our homes, that's a lot of renovation work, you know. So that's on the thousands of jobs. So now you've got a lot of people eating and a lot of

people that are physically invested in the community. Like not hold long. We're not shooting here because we live here. We built that. We just painted that, bro, Why would you shoot that? You know what I'm saying. So we're we're looking to it's a multi tiered approach. Well how this this is gonna affect people. But long term we want to take awaysis and bring these homes into the communities across America that need it. And then we have another piece that we're rolling out UM and we're working

with a couple of major Chicago organizations. We don't mention them now for someone government whatever, but we're gonna be helping these people get into home ownership. So some of these same tenants, we have a program where now we'll be taking people who have been on Section eight for ten twenty years and we'll be able to roll them into home ownership, which is a whole another topic. And it's like there's a lot going on right now in

the house of market. I mean, there's a lot of them that you see as far as interest rates UM, as far as UM what's happening. But there's a lot of major funds that have been school been up, particularly single family houses like the thousands. You know, there's some major companies and this is a big difference between like what was happening in the two thousand and eight and

what's happening now. Single family homes are considered an asset class for big money for hedge funds UM, so people are these companies are buying them up by the thousands, which means these homes are not going to be available. So like right now you know, you can still get home. But in ten years, twenty years, this may look completely different.

If things continues to go as they are. When you start having funds that are backed by billions of dollars on the single family homes, yes, but you're not going bankrupt, you know what I'm saying. They're not They're not getting rid of that inventory. So that inventory when it's not available, particularly in the black community, Now you don't have homeownership on a on a high level. And as we were talking, there's this thing going on called the Great Transfer of Wealth.

I don't remember the number. I think it was like seventy killion dollars. It was like a astronomber, Yeah, astronomical number. Most of it is tied in the real estate. Um, that's gonna be happening because the the baby boomers who are sixties, seventies, and eighties are going to be dying off. They have all this real estate they own, and it's going to be transferring down into our generational generations below us. So there's this opportunity here for Black people to level up.

And if we're aware, um, if we're united, um, if we snatch this stuff up, particularly with something like a fun like when we have where we could raise up the seventy five million and it's one fund which could represent tens of thousands of homes, UM and then do it again, duplicate the process and then release the inventory back into our communities. Um. You know it's a great thing.

I mean, I could go into what being a homeowner has done on a personal level, how access to that homeline equity line of credit has helped me scale up other businesses. Um, have an access to be able to just go and get liquid when you need it, you know what I mean? You know, cash flow is keen in these businesses, and there's a lot of little things that just having a property, owning the property can do for you on a personal level, to allow you to

grow your wealth. But once that opportunity is gone and there's nothing available for purchase for our people which is coming, then how will we be able to do some of the other things that have an access to that equity would allow us to do. So we're attacking this. It really is a war. It's a financial war because we're being attacked. Don't even know what A lot of us are just asleep, UM, not understanding what's happening on the back end, and what's happening with this big money that's

all in our communities already? Is we speaking? I love it. I love it, you know, I mean it sounds it's very clear. It's not you know, to me, I'm very clear as to what you're saying. And I don't know if you mentioned this earlier. Um, but how will this impact those people who are formally incarcerated and specifically people who may have felony convictions? Haven't thought about that in our data? Yeah? Definitely. Yeah, Well we'll we'll jump right

into a program that we have, the build programs. So one thing that finally mentioned is job creation. And it's one thing to say, and I know, you know, uh, we're fighting on different fronts. You know, we were asking the government to pass bills and some jobs happy they created through that, um uh. And this is a different angle as far as Okay, while we're fright fighting over here, because they owe its jobs, they should create jobs, how can we also create jobs ourselves? So one thing that

we found was renovations of these properties. Now there's tens of thousands of properties in Chicago alone, fifty vacant properties and This isn't vacant cities. These are properties on nice streets here and there where we're able to buy them and renovate them. So someone coming out of prison, you may have a felity, it may be difficult to get

difficult to get a job. However, we partnered with one of the best training schools in the country, Genesis Construction Training Center, and what they do is they accept students. You learned all the trades from carpentry to h VAC to lighting and too. Uh I can't name them all, but you know they're training. You can certify you in these and you get paid to fix our properties, so you're actually learning and not only learning, you're getting certified.

So now you're a skilled worker. So now you can actually get uh work elsewhere. But you can build our properties. Every property we buy, we try to buy them dilapidated so we can fix them up. So we're creating jobs. And you know, one property may create five six shots, so imagine what tens of thousands of property. And that's just one aspect, because then you've got the management aspect, you got the administrative aspects, You've got all these aspects

to what it takes to fix these homes. Now, this is just one angle, but it's angle that works, you know. Um, And we actually have already started um and you know, I think it'd be different than to try on what we've done with the bill program, because it's not just that's one thing. Our brothers and sisters incarcerated who are

coming home and need work. That is, you know, we're able to help accommodate that the more we're able to buy, but also our students who are coming out of high school, who who may not uh go to college or don't feel like they're able to go to college. So we experimented with the program called the Build program. Yeah, and I just on the incarcerated piece. I'll touch on the

real quick. So we have two brothers now forming incarcerated who wouldn't otherwise probably be working, that are on the team that work daily, um, and actually living in some of our property. So we're gonna attack that from a couple of different agles. That's probably another twelve to eighteen months out, but we're gonna be opening up what they call halfway houses. And we've already been in touch with some of the prison ministries in Chicago who are ready,

you know, what I mean. So they have these pipelines people who need housing, need job, need these different things that will will be able to offer. But what what we did UM as a start the build program, we started with high school students, students that we knew who may otherwise you know that it's such a weird window, you know what I'm saying, like that seventeen two twenty something where especially if you don't go to college, that's

where you get caught, you know what I mean. So, knowing what we knew, UM, and then knowing that we had all of these young brothers that we have been in their lives since they was thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, UM, we wanted to have something for them, especially the ones that weren't like on a college type of trajectory. So we we created the BILD program and UH, we bought a house, we renovated it, We moved them, some of them from different parts of the country Los Angeles, UM, Oakland.

We moved them into that house and put them in that program. UM a year ago. So the program has been going for a year. It's six of them and us in there right now. UM. It's a five there room house. They all got their own space. But to see the growth and if you go to our I g H. You'll see some of the young brothers on that page and to see where they grow. Like I go out there here, we're learning from them now one

year and he's a young man. I'm not going to say that we're gonna necessarily downward or negative trajectory, but who knows. You know, you know what them years can do when you just out there and you've got time and you're not on nothing in particular, Um, it could it could just cause a whole lot of trauma in

your life. So we want to scale that as well. Um, not just for the young men in our community, but for the young men in these communities that were operating in and uh and and catch them ones is eighteen nineteen not doing nothing, give them something to do. But man, the thing about that I learned, and I'm learning more. Our young brothers are not lazy, you know what I mean. They're not bad people. They're not negative people. They're not

violent people. They're just in violent situations there and then you know, and they're fearless. And you know what I'm saying, They just stuff happens, you know what I mean? You know, I'm sure we could all attest to that. So when you give them something productive to do, like the young brothers that are with us, they wake up at five am. Um, they're out the door five fifteen and they're working until four o'clock, five o'clocks, six o'clock. It's not a lot

of time for foolishness, you know what I mean. On weekends, I go out there sometimes we go to Chiclogo, just a kicking with them. They don't even want to kick it, like we're gonna rest up. We got a busy week, we got this renovation, we this, we started this new project. These are eighteen year olds, you know what I mean that I'm thinking like this. We started them their own LLFC. They got tens of thousands of dollars saved in their LLC.

We're buying them their first property that they're going to own before this year. Is how we We may do it earlier in the next year, just because we're looking at the rates and everything that's happening depending on the deals. But nevertheless, we put them in position with an LC today owned to buy their own property, and we're going to continue to do that. We're teaching them ownership. We're giving them what no one was able to give to us, like the game, Like this is the game. This is

how you do it. It's how you leverage it. It's how you put the money out. This is what you do with the money when you get the money out. We're not even buying them with We're not buying jewelry, none of that. We're gonna get another property and then we're gonna do that again, and I'm gonna show you how to continue to leverage it where you're not over leverage. You know, you're under seventy for sent anything ever happens with the market, you in position to sell or whatever

whatever you want to do. We would like to be able to put these brothers in position and do that. And if we had that at nineteen, where we got at thirty, where will we be at you know what I'm saying. So our sons, we got sons, they'll have this at fifteen sixteen. It's just information and information is power, as we know. So that's that's our plan. That's our plan for our incarcerated brothers. That's our plan for you know, our young brothers coming up in our communities. There's trillions

of dollars in this industry alone. We're not even talking about all the other industries. And one of the things that we talked about, particularly for the young dudes, is this, you can still go and be what you want to be. Like give us, like I was telling them, look, give us seventeen to twenty give us eighteen to twenty one. And then if you choose to go and do something totally different, You've got a couple of properties that you

own so you financially stable. You've got the knowledge base that you gain from learning the trades and doing these different things, so you know you can always do hustling. Doing something negative doesn't even look like a Bible option. Now, why would I do that when I got five dollars a month. Brother in there, I'm free to think. I'm not in survival mode. I don't have to take these type of risks to be up. I can give my

mom's money if she needed. There's no pressure, you know what I'm saying, to go and do something illegal or something that catchs you up. So, um, you know that's kind of that's that's our game. Well, I love it, man. It sounds so much aligned with what it is that I do. And you know in the Boycutt Black Murder, you know initiative that I'm I want to utilize and bring around the world because we need those type of

outlets and we need those opportunities for them boys. Just like you said, you know a lot of them don't want to do nothing negative. They just that's all they've been given. So when you have those type of opportunities, brothers like yourself, with stand up individuals that they can look like that look like them, understand the language with the uniform, then you know, are able to speak the language of the people. That's what we need for especially when it comes to our youth and and and a

returning citizens. You know. So I just once again, I just want to commend you, brothers, because this is the work like this is the work that we talk about. This is what what it looks like when you transform in your community and you're buying back the hood and you're utilizing everything, and you're teaching one you know, the whole concept of giving me two to three years and then I could teach you how to fish. Now if you don't want to fish, after I teach you, you

know how to fish. Your worst come to worst and you gotta hold another thing you want to do, but you always know how to fish, you know, So that's that's just that that mindset in itself is you know, it's just amazing man. You and I know your brothers, so you very detailed and very thorough. So I know that you took the tie and went through this very organized. So that's why I'm I'm gonna invest. I need to

be involved in this, you know what I'm saying. I definitely want to be involved in this, and I just want to commend you. So how can people get involved? What is what is the steps for people to get involved? We have an app and the app you can uh search in the App Store or Google play Store. O Wastis Investments. You can download our app. That's the easiest way. You also can go to our website O Wastis dot build and you just click get started. And because we

are an SEC qualified complying company. Um as you all know, because you know, I'm sure you've you've done something like this before. It's not it's not a cash app or a quick you know, send me something to help me some bread. You know, we gotta get we gotta note have know your customer laws and moneyline at time money

lundering laws. So we need people's information. And the reason we did it like this is because you know, I think there's a lot of trust issues in our community and we wanted to make sure that we built this company um as by the book as possible, and there was no further way the you know, uh qualifying with the SEC. So you gotta enter your information. Of course everything's gonna secure server um and then you invest. We

have the minimum investment at a thousand dollars. And the reason we did that is you know, we know everyone kink uh it may not be in a position to invest, and that's okay. We want people to get in the mindset of starting to save and uh, this is something that's valuable. You know, this is something to work towards. And it's perfect time because as you mentioned earlier, this is a financial movement that's going on economic revolution UM.

So a lot of education. You've got a lot of great people um from earn your Leisure and all these brothers who are doing for a part of this financial movement. Like you said, credit and financial literacy. So we're encouraging everyone to learn more and the sisters and man, thank you powerful systems. You know, Um, it's a whole movement that's going on. It's it's it's unity. It's beautiful to see. You know, I have to revote summit to make you

did a great job. By the way, if to revote summit, and you know, and when one of the key things was for me, you know, unity over uniformity and at the end of the day, let's all come together. No matter what you're doing. You could invest. And one of the reasons we wanted it investments instead of the you know, normal donation or or some different ways for people to understand that, you know, this isn't just you doing something out the kindness of your heart. You this is something

you're gonna get a return on. This is this is business as well. This is how we should we want to start eating our communities to think like this, to think down the line. Um, it's not an overnight investment. It's not the stock market where you can check tomorrow and you may have made fifty dollars or and we and we let people know clearly, that's not how wealth works. That's not how change works. Change takes time, you know, um, and we got to start learning these things as a community.

As far as delayed gratification over instant gratification, UM, these are It all goes into why we picked a thousand dollars was very we we we thought about that, why we want to do that, um And everyone may not be able to make it right now, but eventually you may be able to. This is for those who are in a position where you have a few thousand dollars and instead of letting it sitt in the bank doing nothing, you invested and we put it to work. You see,

you know, you see buildings transformed. You know. That's why we document everything. Our production team is very heavy in our company because we like showing you the tenants were like showing you the brothers and sisters working. We like the actual show the progress to see what your money is doing, whether it's besides sitting in bank of America Chase,

it's actually working, it's going to work. And the thing look, American Chase are doing what your money what we want to do there doing the same thing you just yeah, so it's like your money's working for somebody, let it work for you and let us let like you know, and we know that there's a thing with trust in our community, and we overstand that. That's why I mean initially hated Yeah, I know, I know, you know, but

but look, it took us years. You know. Itpects me like like I don't even you know, I never have done anything like this, but I'm passionate about it and it's real, and it took us years of like really build it up, being confident about it, seeing like all right, this is not something that we're guessing that we're not like trying to feed. We do this, this is what we do. This is what we've done. Track record speaks for itself, and now we're comfortable bringing other people to it.

So like, um, we we want to we want to earn our people's trust. We don't expect it to be given, but we want the opportunity to do that because we have we believe we have a good formula. We've been on the ground doing this work and this is no different than the work we were doing six seven, eight years ago with you all. This is the same approach, same mentality. It's a solution to problems that exist in the community, and that's all that we're doing, you know

what I mean. Of course, it's even better that we make money while doing it. It's even better that will be willing to help other people make money while they're doing All of those things are added botuses, But overall, our mission has always been to change the condition of our people. You know what I mean? I think I think for me right, just knowing you individuals you and knowing your personally and knowing how practical you are, right,

like you ain't chasing no dreams. This ain't trying to like for y'all to be here and said that we come on podcasts and we're gonna put our name on something like y'all did the research, like you know, you ain't going out there there's some money. Three called Molly you and say put your money, not like this is something that y'all you're putting your name behind. So and I know that you both individuals are stand up or

practical individuals. So I'm and I would I would advise anybody to you know, to get behind it because it sounds like what our people need. Man so appreciates say the the app again. And before you do that, let me just say I'm very proud, you know, because even though I'm probably I don't know if I'm older than y'all or not, but it feels like my brothers, my

little brothers, are doing something really big. And I appreciate the fact that we're not looking at one another saying, well, this is the right way to get our people towards freedom and your way is wrong. Right. I think fall into a trap when we start looking at one another and judging and or trying to discredit and tear people down, and instead there are lanes for everyone. If we don't make noise in the streets, we would not even be able to get the type of attention necessary to push

people in your direction. Right, Because folks that are protests and marching, frustrated, organizing, they're out there raising their concerns, voicing their opinion, and then they're looking for solutions. What do we do next? And there's a number of things. We've got black folks that are an elected office that it's important to have people on the front lines from that perspective that can vote for laws that that keep

your community safe and clean and functioning. But then also there is a point that comes where legislators have to sit down and do work that is directly in line with what you all are doing because we could have people pass legislation that blocks us out of the system completely that red minds us again, or people have people passing legislation that will help to ensure that the policies put in place provide access for folks who would not generally have acts us. So there are multiple lanes to

this movement. And I'm just proud to see you all in yours and still understanding the importance of collaborating with people like us and others. So tell us the website, Thank you brothers, thank y'all so much for him, Michael come back again, and we're gonna be investors. We've already talked about it, and we need to just follow up and figure out what we can do to get started right away. Yes, yes, man, Uh, I have to say

I can't leave. I'm gonna go over the app. But I have to commence you to on the work you're doing, UM, And I'm glad you said that this is a war. We're fighting on multiple fronts and it's gonna take all of us together attacking from different angles. But what you all did, specifically the work you put in for our dear sister Um, who was murdered Brianna Taylor. The work you all did and the results you did prove that

different avenues are necessary, different aspects are necessary. Um, and we want to and we're and we are honors to work and fight alongside of you all in this lane that can compliment your lane as your lane compliments this lane. But it's all the same struggle. So with that, thank you all. Appreciate both of you. The app is Oasis Investments.

Check that in the app store, Google play Store again typing Oasis Investments, or go to our website Oasis dot build and we have dot build because that's what we're doing. We building, We're working. Uh, it's time for us to get busy, so we're gonna continue to get busy. We appreciate YouTube, um and like this is, but this is the beginning we're saying. We're saying, buy off the Zoom. But we're gonna get to work after this and we're gonna stay in touch. You know, we appreciate you and

keep doing the work. Man can't wait. We want to We want to advice both of y'all to Chicago too, you know, so we want you to invest. Of course, we want you to come and see what we're doing. Meet the team, meet the brothers, get to understanding or what it is we're doing, how we're doing it. We would love to make that happen also, so we'll got that out. It's done, all right, all right? Man shout

out to our brothers for he and Michael Man. Just watching these brothers evolve into this, you know, knowing them from being on the front lines and doing a lot of different works. Seeing this, like I said, this financial revolution and seeing your entry point different entry points and movement. You know, it's like you said, it's not uniformity, is unity and connecting what it is that we do, what you do. You know. I'm just in a good space.

You know. I have to have to invest best. My mind just started to transform because I've seen a lot of people saying and doing things that I know I could do, but for some reason, we feel like we got this hold on us that we can't do and the process is too on And it's like anything else I'd say all the time, like when you got a dirty room. You walk into the room and everything's all over and you look like, yo, you just gotta pick

some up, right. Just the thing is you just gotta pick some up and then you start put it away next to you know, it's getting clean. And I think that's what it is in this financial space. Man. You gotta just get involved. You gotta do your research. And I just jump in, But you gotta do your research. You gotta say, Okay, I want to do this. Let me find out what it takes to do this. Let me talk to people who know. Let me utilize my common sense along with knowledge that I'm learning, and say

what is best for me? Where should I be investing? You know, what do I able to understand? You know, make sure that you're invest in things with people that you trust and also things that you can understand, right, because you want to understand the process of what you're doing. So I think what they just said to me broke it down so eloquently. It was good. It was really good. It was very very clear, and I feel like I walked away knowing exactly you know, what they're doing and

how you can get involved. And then how people not just from a financial like you know, not just from a like ownership perspective, but how other people on the fringes, people all around the formerly incarcerated community, people getting jobs people from different perspectives. I mean, you know, I'm sure they didn't. We didn't have enough time to really cover it. But insurance right now, there can be black insurance agents

that can get involved. And of course that I do know that they have black contractors and you know others who work in the space. So anything that has to do with purchasing land and a home or renting homes, renting apartments, so what have you, from nuts to boats, from all the different aspects, you can learn and and get a trade in those things and then go work

with Oasis Investment Group and other people. And I love the fact that they mentioned Jay Morrison, right because oftentimes once we start something, we try to act like it's the first time it ever happened. And I'm sure you know, Jay knows of other models prior to his where a collective came together to purchase property or purchase land, um

you know. And so I I am I'm happy to see and we just know them to be those types of individuals that will always sort of pay homage to people who have already tried to figure out the model, um you know, and just and and that's it. So just good people. So that stand up individuals man, you know, and I woant to stay no shade to anybody, there's no shade. But Jay Morrison was the first person that

I've seen doing financial literacy. Every I love all of I love, you know, I love the whole earner a Leisia. I love all of them, him, all of the brothers. I've watched them and they are dope. But what Jay was doing was revolutionary. He was going to he was given financial literacy and real estate literacy on the corners in the hoods, and he was and he utilized that model, and it was for us. And I had never seen or even understood any of that until Jay was doing it.

So and I and and I appreciate that when we were at Arni Aalisia, we saw Jay there in the space. If we fall into the same traps that have been used and that has been imposed upon us by um, you know, uh, a racist society, white supremacy, and the tool of divide and conquer. In fact, I'm gonna be talking about this um for a few days on my live right because this idea of divide and conquer has been being used against us since any movement you you name,

the movement, and it's always happened. And so people who think in this moment that they are the brightest and the best and the realist and everything else is fake and this and that and the third, the same tools that have been used to destroy us will be used again, even in this moment, and even what they are trying to do will be destroyed, because there is no community that can be great when people within it who claim to be leaders spend time trying to tear down and

destroy other people. So when you talk about Jay Morrison, it's important for us to uplift his name and make sure that the that the Tulsa Real Estate Fund is a part of the conversation around how people started thinking about sort of putting their resources together to buy these properties and do some of these things doesn't mean it's the first time it was done. It just means Jay was bring He was really pushing us to per anticipate in that in this generation some time ago, and of

course they the tools always work. The SEC and the FBI launched an investigation against him, and I can remember friends people who I know have also been through their own investigations and they want people to side with them and understand that the system is just working against them. These same people said, oh yeah, I knew something was wrong.

It was a scam. I knew it wasn't right. And of course both the SEC and the damn FBI came out and said they didn't find anything and for them folks to go ahead and continue to do their work. So with that being said, my only advice in this moment, and you know this is my second time talking about this in the show. Already know, but I have to

say it again because you know, repetition maps. We cannot be so cocky and our approach that we think we're the only ones that had the answer, because guess what if you got the answer, fix it by yourself. Fix it. I think, I think what happens is in everything, the

ego plays a part. And I think as you grow you start to realize that, as you get older, you start realizing that when people when people start to get a level of success and notoriety and they get celebrated, what happens is you start to believe your own height. Moving along brings me to my I don't get it.

The internet has had some crazy things that I haven't even chose to discuss, didn't want to discuss, But this right here took the cake being the father, you know, being someone interested in helping the youth evolved and giving them Jews and all those things. When I found out that the alleged shooter of pnb Rock was actually driven two the robbery by his father and the father drove him to get away, I think that was one of the boasts biggest confusions I've been in a long time,

Like what father? They said that the father was there and pnb Rock came, the father drove to go get his seventeen year old son to commit a robbery. After the son did shot pnb Rock and left for the chain, the father then was the getaway dropped. And I'm so confused as to what what part of fatherhood is that I don't know the father just shoot him himself. But this is what I'm trying to see, my things. If you thought you you was one to throw your life away,

you was this tough guy. You want why you didn't just completely throw your life? Why would you take your offspring, the person that you brought into this world, that you want to have a better life than you, that you want to be successful, Why would you bring him in complete chaos to destroy his life. It was gangster, he was all at What made you go get your child, your seventeen year old child, to throw his life away. I mean, I don't know, but I think it's a

real serious question. It's it's it's it's it's what I call coward culture, right, because you wanted to be you wanted to do all this. You was tough. I think it's a dumbishi in the world. But if you make a conde decision as a man, adult man, that you're willing to take that risk and do some dumb ship, why you didn't do it? Why would you involve your child in some bullshit like that? You know what I'm saying. And then people like your's, people that grow like anybody

that grows up like that, it's being this. That's child abuse. It's complete. And this is why I'm for the right to choose, because everybody shouldn't doesn't supposed to be a parent. They're just not supposed to. And it's a classic example. I would definitely rather someone to board the fetus then bring a child into this world where you throw his life and put him in prison for the rest of

his life. I just that's just my personal opinion. Everybody's not gonna gree but everybody has to understand that everybody is supposed to be parents, and this man it's not supposed to be a parent. Man. It's the it's the biggest miscarriage of manhood and misdirection and just or everything wrong was in how society happened that day, Everything that that I call us wrong and I will never get it. And anybody who condones this is stupid. You're not a man,

you know. Anybody who thinks this is a culture that people should live by and take my son and do some negative ship to destroy his life is it's not even a man's Well here, here's the deal. It's not just a man bringing his son right. There's there are mothers that have their daughters out, you know, basically pimping them to make money and to attract uh certain types of men. I mean, I think that. And you've got people who will, um you know, get their kids involved

in drug dealing. In fact, that happened within my own family. UM So I think you know, I don't have much to say about it other than to make the point. Then we just as a people, we just have to find a way to move closer to consciousness because we're so you know right now is just it's just such a level of m just dis joining to your point,

a lack of kind justness. And not to say that these things weren't always happening, but when you see it in the side in the light of the PM but PM b Rock situation, it just really makes it's sad. And as a community of people, just as black folks in general, you know, we have to look at that and say, where are we going wrong? And look to your family and neighbors and others and really do a gut check on whether or not this is the type

of behavior that exists around you. I was too young to deal with the fact that, you know, I had a family member who was allowing their children to get in the drug game, one by one by one. And I'm talking about maybe five or six kids, including something that are in prison right now and their dad has gone on UM. But I was too young to do anything,

if you will, about that. However, I know that it exists, this pipeline to incarceration, death failure, uh that exists within families, and I think we just have to call it out. I think we do, man, And with that said brings us to another episode of Street Politicians. Shout out to fa him and Michael. You know, make sure that you invest in our a system brothers. They got it all set up and I can't wait to put my money in it. And a lot of issues that we talked

about today. Man, our people, I'm gonna have to deal with it, so I love you. Make sure you'll make Street Politicians the number one podcast in the world. We're gonna keep doing what we do. I'm not gonna always be right, Tonka Mallory is not gonna always be wrong, but we will both always and I mean always be authentic.

Listen to Street Politicians on the Black Effect Network on I Heart Radio and catch us every single Wednesday for the video version of Three Politicians or I Women dot TV that's own