I'm Tamika D.
Mallory and it's your boy, my son in general, we are your host of t M I Tamika and my Son's Information, Truth, Motivation and Inspiration.
New Name, New Energy.
What's going on, Tamika D. Mallory.
Life is happening life, It's life in yes, cut, I'm in a real good period in my life. I was having such a good time these last few days, even though I don't know, like it's a lot of problems going on. But if you, you know, if you got good friends and good people around you, you still can figure out how to create like these slither moments, real small moments of peace and joy.
I'm dealing with teenagers, you know, so that's male. Teenagers are very strange thing.
You know.
It's thirteen thirty girls, you know, thirteen fourteen year old. They have this mindset. So I got my son who's about to be fourteen, and then my nephew is about to be thirteen. And then my other two's my other son who's eleven, and my other nephew that is I think nine or ten. So all of these boys, and it's just dealing with all of these energies and it's just a lot. But you know, I'm loving it because you know, you just gotta I love molding young men.
I love watching young boys grow into young men. You know, a lot of times they hard headed, but then they get very attentive and they pay attention to things that you don't think they're paying attention to. So just watching it's crazy that all for of these boys is at like different stages. And they're like one between one and two years apart, so they're at different stages and you just see the different stages in each of them.
So it's a thing watching that.
So that's been pretty much with Yeah, that's pretty much what I've been dealing with for this.
Nothing better than cousins though, Like cousins are the best because even your siblings fight.
You don't always agree, you know, but they.
All fight though, But like what happens.
What happens is that the cousins fight against the kids, like the brothers, Like the cousins will join forces against the little brothers, like the big cousins George forced against the little brothers, and they all start picking on the little ones and then you gotta fight and then they join together and just it's just be too much.
It's a lot going on.
It's politics. Everything is political. Everything even kids hanging out its political. But it's still like I just think about during the summertime, getting to go to my cousin's house in the stadium and go.
You know, I didn't care, and they would treat me so bad.
Sometimes some of my cousins would treat me so bad and guess what, you know.
And I was also talkative.
I thought I was smart, I knew everything, so they would treat me pretty bad.
But I still wanted to go. I don't care. I still wanted to be under them.
They want you to be quiet, I want you to stop.
More than that, it was more than that. It was more than that kids be just mean.
Your kids are definits these kids say to each other. It's just like yeah, but you.
Know, I'm still Probably maybe I was a mean cousin to it, so maybe it wasn't. I don't know, though I don't think I was really mean to my younger cousins.
I don't think I was.
We still got in a mischief.
It was a couple of my cousins that was really mean to me, and like I always kept getting back, Like I used to tell them I don't want to go there ever. Again, some of them I wanted to hang around. Like it was a couple of my cousins that was real cool, that we always had good times, but it was a couple of them, I don't want nothing to do. And this girl it was girls too. The girls cousins was way meaner than my boy cousins
was to me. So I had an issue with that, but I grew out of it and we're kind of cool.
Now, Okay, cool, now, yeah, that's good.
So we are still doing our pull Up for p series. You know, last week we had Lakeisha Yuri and our brother at Mitchell Man in their interview cre At in his campaign and we talked about their book and the work that they do and it was a very dope interview. So if you didn't see it, go back and watch that. And today we got another person who was at the Pull Up for Peace conference who is a hip hop legend historian.
He's an educator.
You know, he is definitely one of the premier people when you talk about what's going on in New York. You know, he's one of the founders of twenty four hours of Piece, you know, and he's a friend of ours, you know, Hakeem Green from Channel Live, the legendary group Channel Live. So that will be the interview that features today, the interview that I have because you weren't there.
You was going handling something else, so I said.
I listened to a lot of it though I was there. In and out.
Okay, well I sat down.
It was a great interview.
I mean, all the content from Pull Up for Peace has been powerful, and I'm so thankful to Jamilla, doctor Jimillar, T. Davis, and to our team Janis Rodriguez and others that we
were able to do that. Because there's one thing to bring people into the studio or to you know, do a zoom interview, but it's something else to be able to pull people right in the midst of them doing their work when they're feeling inspired or maybe even feeling upset or whatever they're experiencing, to be able to share with them in the moment, and Pull Up for Peace with such a sacred space where people anybody who was
there it should have been. You can't always say what everybody is going to do, because that's not a thing. Everybody doesn't do any one thing at any particular time. But the majority of the people who showed up for pull Up for Peace were there for a progressive reason, for a positive engagement with other people who are putting their lives on the line to address the needs of our community. And I think, you know, being able to
give space to something like that, it's powerful that. Until Freedom was a part of it, we had a beautiful white party that.
Was amazing, amazing, amazing, amazing.
And Haiken was there at the white party with us, so, you know, and and what people say, what is a party? Yeah, the conference was long. The conference had many pieces. Until Freedom had panels, we were involved in multiple discussions. You know, we helped with with the curating some of the ideas around that. But our people deserve enjoyment also, that's.
I mean, that's what the conference is.
If you look at most of the conference I'm going to, there is a plethora of information, education, building next steps. And during the nighttime there's parties, there's things to unwind. You don't want to nobody wants to feel all stuffy all the time, you.
Know, stuffy.
Yeah, we had Janis came to some of the parties. She was outside with us. She had a little white outfit or.
A right she just happened to have white pack because be sure didn't take the time to explain all of the They were just like meet us in Atlantic City, We.
Got you a peace.
But it was actually a really good conference, and I think the content is so strong. I can't wait to see the documentary or the little docuseries, not little, the docuseries that comes out from the conference.
So I'm looking forward to that.
Yeah, that's good.
So that's gonna be our interview for today, Hakeem Green. But before that, we got to get into some topics. So much stuff happening. Oh my mama, you could just take a piece some straws and pick one and say what you want to deal with today, because there's so much that's happening. And I think, you know, we've been saying a big part of what's going on in this nation is to keep people distracted by having everybody spending in a cycle that every day is something different.
You know, you're fighting on every end.
And we also have things we're dealing with just in our local cities.
And I hope that folks.
Around the country are paying attention to their local politics while this national stuff is happening because the Big nasty, disgusting Billionaire Bill, the BBL, could not have passed without local politicians voting for it. So you could sit and say Trump because Trump has a mindset that is the is the the spirit behind some of this cruel and disgusting behavior. Nonetheless, people can stop it if they want to. And so your local politics matter because the local elected
officials are the ones who made the bill pass. So they are the ones who helped Trump to sign into law some of the most regressive policies and decisions from our government ever in terms of going backwards, right, like you've never gone back this far, but it certainly is taking us to a place where we start. They're trying to get back to that. Please, so we you know the local politics. We can't express to you all enough how important it is for you to be monitoring finding out.
Who voted for the bill. What are you know.
Which congressional members, which senators supported this bill and not waiting because they say that the impact of it, the effects of the disgusting what is being called by the Trump administration the Big Beautiful Bill, But we are saying the BBL, which is the Big Billionaires Bill, because it is absolutely designed to put more money in the pockets of billionaires and left and to rob you.
In order to do it, you.
Have to be paying attention to your local politics, paying attention to what's happening in your community, find out who voted for it, when are they up for reelection, and how do you join those who will fight to keep them from being re elected.
To your local communities.
So let's talk about my the end of the day, which is off topic completely, but it is something that is so real to me, and I know you experience it. I talked to Jannis about it all the time. For those who may be like Jannis jen Yes, don't you ever forget. Janis has been the producer for our show for I don't know how many It's been years and years and years now. So you might not see you on camera one day. We'll get over here, interviewer, but
we talk about it. And I have many friends who are now entering the age of and the stage of being the parent to the young adults. Right, so we are now the parents of the young adults. You talked about teenagers. Teenagers, As far as I'm concerned, little babies are easiest, even though people think little babies is so hard because it's so much work. They're easiest to deal with teenagers.
They get it.
It's a little harder, but still, but it's the young adults. When you're the parent of.
A young they don't have to listen to you.
That is the part that is the more that could give you real serious heart palpitations.
They're gonna argue back, and they don't live with you, and they live outside, and nigga on the phone and you and they hang up and all types of stuff. You cuss them out and then they don't cuss you, oh back, but they want to.
They still do whatever you want to and make whatever decisions. And I think that all it says to me is two things. It says to me. One is that I definitely have forgotten a lot about me right Like, I'm being reminded of how much I did not listen to
certain things that my parents said at that time. And obviously my book I Live to Tell the Story it covers it, and and a lot of my writing there were moments when I was just like, oh my god, like, yeah, I didn't listen, and if I had, things would have been a lot different and much better in certain places of my life. But the second thing it makes me do is say I truly And I have said this for years, my son, I've been saying, I'm so sorry to my parents, but I mean when I tell you
I'm sorry, I am. I wish there was a way that I could repay them for the stress, aggravation, the worry that they have gone through, even things that I that wasn't me being defiant but just living my life, right, like just living every day.
Your parents are sitting there holding.
This major bag of worry and concern, especially when we know that that as a young adult, your discernment is not exactly where it should be, and we know that from the little things. It doesn't require a big old mess. We can just tell by little things that you do that your discernment is not where it should be. And so when you're operating in the big grown up world but still walking and doing things that are not big and grown up, it really, really, really really can take old a person our age out.
It really can.
Like I you know, you start feeling like, well, you know, I've been saying lately, I'm up in age.
I cannot handle all of this.
It's not the same when I used to get a call about my son did this or this happened or that happened, or if he called me mine, ma is the worst thing ever when the kid says my mine, bru, it's horrible. And when it was before, I would be like, what, it's fine. Now MA can literally send me into.
Like a what happened?
Huh?
I don't know. It's bad.
Yeah, it's a lot, man, as you get older, and I think men deal with it better because, especially when you're dealing with men, you know, I been blessed or fortunately, I wouldn't say, well not to have a girl, because I think if a girl was calling me and stressing me out, I would be stressed. I just think that since my son is in his twenties and I've been twenty and I give him the information and you don't listen, I've done my job right and I understand that you
gotta go through. So I think, man, we realize that men have to go through something, especially young boy, y'all have to go through because you're not gonna listen. You think you know more, you think we, oh, we don't know that now you don't really, and you gotta go through it to really understand that I know exactly what you're going through and I'm trying to give you the information.
Now you're gonna take it or you not.
My mother used to always say a hard head make a soft ass, and sometimes they need that little soft ass. So what I do is I the mother calls me, Oh my god, I'm like, what happened? He will he will Okay, he'll be fine.
What do you mean before? No, you will? No, because he will. He gonna have to figure it out.
You can't save them from it right now because we gave them the information, we told them not to do that.
You're not gonna call me and stress me out about no. Grown folks.
Yeah, almost very stressful because you know why, because you're taking on the responsibility of these grown folks and you can't because they gonna be grown.
Yeah.
When grandchildren are part of these grown folks business and their decisions, that can really really make you feel like I gotta I have to be somewhat involved because somebody's gotta be the voice of the child.
There's nothing wrong with being involved, but understanding that your involvement is limited and ultimately they gotta make their own decisions and choices. The only thing you can do is provide them with the proper information and let them understand the reality. And once you do that, you can I can sleep good. I sleep good at night. My son could be calling me this and that. I pick up the phone and say what's going on, because I know if something went wrong, it ain't because of me, because
I told you. But whatever you call me about, I know I probably already told you about this. I'm one hundred percent sure that if you call me and something went wrong, I told you not to do what went wrong already.
So I have a clear conscience.
I could sleep well and I could look him in the face and I can actually say I don't have nothing else to do with it. His mother calls me and she's all a raiding, Oh you need to do this, and I'll be like, no, I don't need to do anything. I've done what I was supposed to do. He is actually twenty seven years of age right now. I've given him all the knowledge. I've give him tools, I've given him the alternatives. Whatever he chooses to do at this point,
it's not on me. And I can sleep good. Yes, I want the best for him, but sometimes he got to go through this valley to get to the peak.
And that's on him. But it ain't on me. And it's not on you either, And I tell all, it's not on you.
Yeah, but it's all work like that for us as mom.
No, you have to understand.
It's like you have to understand.
And because the decisions that they make, we ultimately get involved at some point, whether whether we want to or not.
That's the problem. You ultimately get involved, and you're trying to save them from learning.
Right.
You can give them all of the information, and when they don't take the information, the only thing you doing is driving yourself to early grave. You taking on the stress. You can't see. I watch mothers. I've watched people's mothers be torn down by the kid, like because the mother's trying to do everything, she losing her hair, she's giving every dime she's trying to save and you can't.
It ain't gonna work for you.
Well, one thing I will say is I ain't going to the point of losing my hair. I'm just saying that your nervous system is very much so attached to your young adult children, right like your nervous system because again, you can't control what they're gonna do with decisions they're gonna make, even when they even when they could be doing everything wonderfully, but just a move I'm going out at night, you just like, oh my god. But it's very hard, especially for a mom, when you see your
children moving about. You don't know who's the driver of the car. You're worrying about whether or not people you know, somebody it got some beef that your child don't even know about, and something can happen. It's so many layers of things. I just I know, for me, I'm glad, you know, I have my granddaughter. I love my granddaughter, and I'm glad her parents are the first layer of defense. But even with my son, my parents are just as
worried about everything that goes on every day. They the grandparents, They still be like, Hey, you talk to that boy, Is he all right? What do he do with this? What happened with that? Is this taking care of Do they got the right food down there? They had a blackout in Atlanta a couple of weeks ago, and they didn't They were in the dark now, And it occurred to me, oh my god, he doesn't have a survival kit, like, he needs the flashlights, the candles, this, that, and the third.
So you know what I'm doing, putting a survival kit together because I know he needs this stuff. So and my parents, my dad's like, he down there, it's weird. This happened the night.
Of my birthday party.
So I'm in my birthday party twirling around and my dad is like, did this boy get him a flashlight?
Down there?
He's texting us while in the thing like hey, it's still a black a blackout. It's very high. Everybody's high. We may have to get in the car and drop. I'm in the in the birthday party looking at the text message like, oh man, okay. Then I go over
my dad's like, did that boy get a flashlight? This is happening in real time with the elderly, But that's what But I'm saying, it's the same thing because at the end of the day, they should know I need to get a good flashlight in my house, but they don't. Oh unless you tell them. That's why you have to
stay involved as the parent. You can't just be like, well, I done told you to take care of important things, get your business in order, and then you don't do it, then it's on you, not while you got my granddaughter in the middle of a blackout.
SPE's for grown folks and let grown folks be grown folks.
Well they got it straight.
Now that's it. They got the flash.
Man raising or being a part of young adults development.
It's hard work. That's my thought of the day.
Good luck with that man.
So let's see the TA and my Lord have mercy.
H the tm I is it too much or some people might say it's not even enough. Deportation in the United States says clearly that they are considering how to deport American citizens. And I ain't talking about an American who was naturalized here or an American who was you know, born from two different parents that maybe from you know, a different country and they came here and then they were born. And now that I'm talking about everybody and
my family right straight up black folks. We was brought over here, stolen to this land, right, trafficked, as they would say, to this land. He is saying that even those types of people parents didn't come.
From Jamaica or.
Brazil or Belize or Dominican Republic or any of that. They the parents and the parents' parents from here, who's from North Carolina, Alabama? Right here, he's saying, if they committed certain types of crimes, he should be able the ice should be able to go I don't know.
Maybe he didn't say ice. Maybe he just said.
Some department should be able to go in and arrest these people and deport them, or if.
They already arrested, they should be able to be deported exactly.
That's right.
That's probably more of what he's saying. They in prison, they committed a certain type of crime, they can move them out because, by the way, even the prison system, while they definitely want to use you know, man power or labor, human power to make their products and answer the phone for the social certain not soces like a motor vehicles and all of that in different states, they still want that. They really don't want to have to
maintain massive facilities. So the new thing is putting the tracker ankle bracelets on people's legs and sending them home and then basically incarcerating the whole house because folks are showing up there anytime, day and night.
Check the house.
Anybody else got something going on and it ain't supposed to be happening. If it's going on under the roof of a person who is in home confinement, everybody can be arrested.
Right.
It's not the same as you needing a warrant to get into Grandmama's house and maybe you know if you have a warrant because you think Uncle Billy Bob is in there doing god knows what. It ain't that, it's if you are on home confinement. Everybody agrees that if you are being sent to that home to do your time, that they now have the right to come up in your house and search your stuff and go through things and make determinations of who may be doing what.
Right.
So this is one of the new forms of incarceration is so many people are being sent home to be on home confinement because they don't want to maintain taking care of people, feeding them three meals a day and
having to keep these big facilities open. Okay, so while they look at how to reduce costs, it doesn't mean you're not still incarcerated in that they still don't make money somehow from the machinery from you having to check into a building for program for work release for this, that and the third and in some States.
They're saying that they let.
Incarcerated individuals out of the jail at different times throughout the day to go work. They let them go go take the train, the bus, go where you need to go and go work for these companies. And meanwhile, they don't believe that you should be released to.
Go home to get a job and get yourself together.
So you know, now the man is adding the layer of calling people homegrown terrorists and talking about potentially putting people who look like you and me, and nobody's gonna believe that. They're gonna say no, no, no, it's a criminals and they look different from us, they shouldn't have committed a crime. Meanwhile, these people are unraveling our constitution right before our eyes. And were just sitting up here being like it might be for some good, not we, but some people are saying.
It's very strange. He also was talking about how the people who are here that's undocumented, that be working on farms for years, no yeah, and that now they can have they can pretty much whoever they work for could be their owner and they can give them temporary and they won't have citizenship. They could just give the It's pretty much slavery like and then just say slavery to I mean servitude where they can be here underneath this person as the owner of the person sciences they owned
for them. They can't actually ever have citizenship, but they could just be here as long as they're doing that job and that person has to sign for them and be in complete control and every monitor where this is unbelievable, Like that is the weirdest shit I've ever seen. And people are like, well, I'm saying, you just got.
No they said, when he said ownership, he's talking about owning the farm, not the people. I'm like, oh wow, y'all are really messed up. Like the propaganda has settled in so much that even you are acting like you don't understand. This is the reason why we know because if somebody wrote a comment the other day on my page and my response was so good, even I gotta say that I gave good one. They said, you know, people don't do enough research and y'all don't be knowing
what y'all are talking about. And I wrote them back and said, I hope you don't think that I have not researched an issue that this was about the target boycott that I am so firmly standing on all of you.
Don't think that I haven't done research, because not only have I done research, I know too much about the historical reason for why this thing is happening and what it looks like when said companies will say we're standing on diversity ecting inclusion, and then some companies go align themselves with the white supremacists right and white supremacy, and it's all its ways informed.
I know too much about that.
So guess what when we hear Donald Trump talking about the ownership piece, basically you keep and maintain your people who work for you, we know what he's saying, not because we're trying to interpret it as as new information.
This is what always was happening.
Our people fought and died to get us away from this particular mindset. And guess what when they say make America great again, they are talking about going back to a time when a worker, when a person owned a farm which is in essence a plantation, and the people who worked on it. You are assigned to the assigned to those owners who were at that time called masters, and they were responsible for your comings and goings.
You think, for me, it is so strange Why people think that would make sense? If a person has been working on the farm for fifteen ten years, and they've been doing their their job and their due diligence, and they be paying these taxes and all that, why wouldn't that person have a path to centicienship. Why wouldn't Why wouldn't you want that? They've already shown that they are capable of doing the job, they're reliable citizens, Like, why why would the first thing that you want is somebody.
To own those individuals who have already been reliable? Why would like this? The mind state of it alone is just.
Like to see people as property or not see think people are valuable enough to integrate into America who've come here looking for a better life, and they've shown that they're trustworthy doing the things that's necessary. Why would you want to take that from these people and then put them on the ownership of another individual?
Why would people think that.
Should But the reason why they want to do it is because, again, if you read the nine hundred page document called Project twenty twenty five, they are literally talking underline it's not obvious, but it's obvious about returning to some forms of slave enslavement in this nation, and they are putting things in place to make it real.
And that is one of those things.
And my issue is the reason why they have to do this model that he's talking about is because they realize that deporting all of the people who are in the immigrant population. Deporting all of those people, and for those who are listening, I'm doing air quotes, they can't get their jobs done. Their businesses will fail if they don't have people working in the hotel industry, they don't have people working in farm farming and other jobs like that.
And you know what they now are beginning to realize since they called it black jobs, because remember he said they taking a black job. The black people ain't gonna do it. The black people ain't going back to the cotton field. That's not gonna happen. So all your technology that you've built, you don't have what you need to be able to take the place of real hard work in folks that get out there in that heat and do them jobs. And you might get there, but you
ain't there right now. And that means that his big business people, okay, we ain't talking about because the black farmers, they don't respect the black farmers either, But I ain't talking about black farmers because they if it's the black farmers, is suing and doing everything. I'm talking about people who own the big great companies and the big watermelon companies and the big you know, rice fields, and we're talking Uncle Benn's level, right, We're talking about big, big packaging companies,
big super industrial business. Yeah, okay, all of them businesses.
They like, we need our workers.
So now they want to shift the concept because the white folks, right, and the big rich people are telling them, if we don't have people to do these jobs, these industries are going to shut down.
And the black people said, well, we're not gonna do it.
And now black people are meeting about how do we take care of one another outside of whether these models continue to work. So it's canned. It's a it is what you call the ship show.
Oh, it's definitely the ship for real.
AnyWho is it too much y'all? Or do you think, like you know, you're one of those people that's like Trump's doing the right thing. Just let the let the let the plantation owners, the masters, let them own the the big folks who are out there doing the job. Make them pay taxes. Is that they pay tax.
But they can't ever be citizens. This is it I never heard of.
But you know, some of your people love it.
None of my people love it. Now all the skinfolk ain't kinfolk. So I want you to tune into this interview of my brother and uh Hakeem Green from Channel at the pull Up for Peace conference.
Say what really?
We bring you live from Atlanta City at the Pullet for Peace tool I under sitting here was a legend, a hip hop legend, historian, brilliant thinker. And my brother, my brother first and foremost, the incomparable Keen read How you doing today? I mean, I'm doing a great man. Subalute to you. Think you were happening with the team my show.
Yes see anything we knew it to me, go off the couch, me that you here today.
She's liking she's.
Running around working, and I just wanted to sit down and talk to you, not only about this conference, but this is about hip hop and all the things. You know, we always have conversations about this was going in the world, and I was like, well, wow, I got a chance to have my brothers actually sit down the couch. We meet four hour show and under selemat to sit you down and let's have a conversation.
Man, how are you feeling about the conference.
It's amazing, amazing to see this coming to fruition, like you know, coming from an idea to an actual thing. You know, you know, my history and hip hop culture has always been about using the art form to push for peace, to raise the viperation.
And you know, going through decades, uh it being.
At a low vibration to see the vibration raising, you know, steadily.
You know, we push your faults.
It's folks like himself to meet the Lakeisha Juri City in New La City, all the cities around the country coming together to.
Pull out for peace. This is an Atlantic city. It's amazing. It's something that couldn't have been thought of or you could.
You could think think about it, but could you actualize it ten bills of years ago properly not. But it's a testament to the dedication of folks like us pushing for peace.
It's amazing.
And you've been doing this work for soul, Soul sable on you done twenty four hours of piece in New Orbit is spending a sample in the community and just just listening actually just watching and seeing the evolution.
Of peace, right, Like, like I keep saying that that.
Hasn't always been something that we since it around in our community and in our culture. Right, we thought peace meant that you saw, right, it was we knew was how we say it was corny to be peaceful, right, And now we set in a whole new trend. Yeah, you know, and that's what the trend and the hip hop should because like you said, it was we it's so much focused on low vibration and the ain't know
what they're doing. They know that they keep us all over vibration and they have us award with each other and killing each other, glorifying.
And marketing black murder. Then they know that they're gonna they could continue to control us.
You know.
So this narrative, the shifting of the narrative.
I've seen people that I know was in the streets years ago that was dangerous notorious to now get warriors for peace, And it's an amazing thing.
And I just want to talk about how do you think we're going to make this touch on it? If?
Well, I think just being it, you know, show and prove, you know, be the example, put things on the platform. That's why we're creating twenty five urs A Piece to put peace on the platform, to market, to promote it so young people the next year ration could see success, could see talent, could see you know, people excel by pushing peace, by being peaceful, by exemplifying what it is.
To be peaceful.
And I think people need to understand when we talk about peace being soft, it's not. Piece is about having peace of the mind to navigate through whatever situation you might find yourself. And you know, when you're at or you know, you want to be clear of mind, clear of thought. You want to be able to strategize. You want to be able to see the layer of the land and know how to get from point A to point B. And you can't do that with chaos, can't do that with confused spinds. They have to be at
peace with yourself. So Piece is something that's inside and it helps you navigate whatever circumstance or situation you might find yourself in. It's not about submission, though there is power and submission. That's a whole other conversation, and it is It's one of the most powerful thingures that you can do, is to be peopul They say that the measure of a warrior is to actually never have to inflict calm. That is the goal of any real warrior.
You never want to have to inflict calls around here. You have the skill, you how to understand it, but you never want to actually have to utilize, you know.
So we loved it about how gun violence has plagued hip hop, you know, has taken away something about greatest young and elder artists throughout the years.
And I was looking at the status.
It's the craziest things to people that the leading cause of death for black males twenty five and under is gun.
Yeah, that is crazy to be hondicide of them us the leading culture.
So that is really just taking out our tiging out our whole, our soldiers and being killed what us And and if we understand that, there's no way that we should be pushing and promoting that to our bands. Yeah, well the enemy has done a great job of programming us to look at each other as the enemy. Uh, they put us in these conditions, they put us in this in these environments. Can they step away and they watch us kill each other.
There's so many valuables that go into weird from education to health, the wealth is to what we eat, the diet, whether they you know, eating food or what you.
Visualize, what you see, what you're taking to your mental study.
And you know, we're being bombarded constantly by stimuli that's actually coming from outside ourselves, like people studying us as a community.
And they go, Okay, we want these people to be ten to fifteen, twenty thirty years from now.
If these people can compete, then we're done. And they put us in a situation that takes away our government competition. We're busy competing with each other, that are unifying with each other to compete with the real enemy. And I think you know what we're seeing now and what we what we have and seeing is something that's been planned and mapped out decades ago. They saw the power to civil rights movement, they saw the power lack power movement.
They saw the power of how we've organized they came together in the sixties.
And seventies, and what advances we made instead, Okay, how do we get these people off track? How do we do the way where our hands are not dirty, our hands out And they've turned us against each other, so we have to show each other, for example, the love that we have for each other, the love that we have for the community, and how success is bred that way.
We put that on a platform, slowly, pushurely, we can change it around. That's right. It's funny. I was watching I don't even know the man's league. It was a white man.
He was doing a TED talk and he was talking about how black murder is one of the top marketing too and strategies like he said, you can get on any radio station and talk about how you're gonna kill a black he said, but as soon as you talk.
About killing a dog, yeah, a white talking or anybody else, SPC is gonna be at chade coming for you.
But you can say, you could say the most creative ways that you won't kill it black version.
Any of this marketed and is promoted its page.
And you know, I was listening to lead you all on the Records Club and he was talking about how, you know, the violence and hip hop and how he capitalized.
He said, you know, I'm astrot knowledge with you got goutnomy has been vertical. But this is it's not just him, it's but this is the lid state. So the industry and the culture that we looked at.
So Channel lives to a meet at that Chai on Top Hop went to nineteen ninety eight, and you know, just after the Captain.
Deal, after Matterson, when you look Poottil.
Sat down to Tie played him in demo like Carl Thomas all over with Denmom before he was all bad boy, before he came out of bad Boy.
Time listened to the demo, Tie goes, oh my god, this stuff. He's a guy we like to be.
But you guys not locking down the block. Guys, ain't you know you're not beat enough for dust yat You know this is not gonna work here. And it didn't register to me and Toughy like were like, what you're not locking down the block? Or it's supposed to be selling the rugs. We're supposed to be killing each other. We're supposed to be pushing the activity. It can't just be about the music has to be about a messaging.
Not to say that Tide Older New York is part of any you know, behind the scene, the conspiracy.
There was a private meetings. I don't know about that.
All I know is that I see what happened from that point in hip hop to where we are now from the hands that are evolved. It has to be bigger than the music, has to be bigger than just putting out good mixing. It must be something about keeping the community locked into a negative vibration, a low vibration. And that's what we then, really since the mid nineties, got a low vibraation. So you know, I don't know, I don't ever want to seem like a point plinty of things. You're thinking blame.
It's about, you know, just looking at what's going on, who benefits, who sufferers, and then.
Navigating according Yeah, and the Internet doesn't make it any better.
This incident is hybrid hybrid violence or it promotes violence and beef and a high level it's the algorythm is so weird toward negativity, like and I realized when I put things on and it's not controversial, it's not a negativity positive it's like and it's not that people don't want to be it's that the algorithm won't let you know that it's it right, that's crazy.
We have an.
Algorithm, especially in our communities, that only focuses on whose beefing with who? Who sets up silver and it's to give you. How I know that is Jim Jones is just having a conversation about it. He was saying pretty much, he's saying things that he knows it's gonna been to our work, right because it's negative. It pitch you will against your brother. So everybody wants to see that now. When he said it was a little crazy and jem
is my man. I love him to death, but I don't think most people will know hip hop wouldn't say that he is a better rapper or artist than.
Not, so I have even had a more impact. Gimp has definitely impacted hip hop, right.
He's from absolutely from culture, from the style to dress, fashion, fashion, all these things.
He's definitely has been a save, especially in New York hip hop.
But when you talk about nas is a pretty munch of pioneer, right, And he's a pioneer and nazis hip hop just literally if you are lyricists, he's a poet exact. If you are lyricists, nah setting the table for you. If he set the stand and it was Rob Kennys and the right, it's gonna say else. There's really nothing else you could do. So and I get it, but that's what it takes, right. I take it for you to say if I was, if we and that's what Laurie,
they will say. She said, you can add a mother fuck it's gonna hit your business, gonna hear me, and.
That's what they need. They he figured it out and that's what most of.
The people have to They figured out that if I created controversy in the algorithm, the algorithm is gonna put me here and the next you know, somebody's gonna hear from me. I don't get paid to do an interview. I can market and promote myself. And it's sad and that's what we want to do it.
I mean, it is what it is, right. It's a few different points you touched on.
One is the algorithm, right, and as natural and organic as the algorithm seems, it's not.
It's programmed. Is that it's programming. Pick up on certain words, certain phrases, certainly energies.
And then you push that right and if that's where your mindset is, that's what the algorithm is going fij and you know this is what's going on, This is what's happening. Know that that's where your mind is at. So it knows the feeds where you think you want to see. All right, that's first.
The other thing is like the context of music and how we got to where we are, right, So we go.
I'm a little bit a bit older than you, right, I remember a time where black artists, black people were not.
On mainstream nothing, main street and TV. If you grow up main stream TV, you are criminal, will pick up a prostitute.
I just love it.
That's the only way you were uh portrayed on TV and nfilm right on the radio. Black artists were not played in mainstream just didn't happen. And then you hip hop artists, no, people had to go away and kick down on the boards A curtains.
Glow, Holdini run DMC, A loll j NAS.
We opened up the door to a point where now hip hop music and black artistry is bitness.
You can't turn on the TV without seeing us.
Unfortunately, too many times still in the drug dealer paying push your you know, tighten.
But we're going off top.
So for Jim Jones to put out a record and it'd be instantly accepted by the main street across the board, it's because NAS kicked down the door. Because there were people who said, no, we don't play that because we don't play hip hop.
We don't play that because it's too black. You don't play that because it's too urban. You don't play that because it's too street. To Now we put our record.
And you're gonna get the attention to folks because of the negative imagery, the negative messaging.
So you know, Jim Jones talks about him himself versus nas.
I think you gotta, you know, include that historical context that Gym is writing on the show. Limits of a nods and even in that he doesn't sell more, he didn't rank higher on goboard. Is Championship trouble? Yeah, Yeah, And that's what and that's what it's become. And it's it's a very dangerous, very dangerous situation that I was having this conversation with my friend because.
We normally just go online and we see that that is the new trend.
People decide to get on the internet and say the most negative things they can't about someone that they probably don't even know, right, and they garner attention from it.
It's actually I know.
People who have built five units of that yeah, would become which they can go innocient influences because they talk about somebody that they've never seen, and they saturday their TV and the basement for four and five years and built four hundred thousand five munchers that do file just by talking.
Maybe about somebody so, and it's a new thing.
They call itself content creators, and they figure this is a way to success.
And it's sad because a lot of them will gaining success doing it. But how long if that success lasts?
It's a short lived is it for the bullet Because when you can nurture and create something that's strong, you know your content, your art is really about something.
And though you may.
Slow walk into the success, you may slow walk into the numbers. It seems to have more staying power than somebody just does something for the likes it clicks. And then because you always have to outdo that last, you have to outdo yourself. You got even constantly trying to figure out what outrageous setup you can.
Come up with to stay relevant, and eventually you run out of content.
Where if you really just leaning on the music itself, the art form itself, the content itself, you have more staying power.
I think you know you're definitely right and I say that all the time.
Like I said, I put the content of my character over content on the Internet, and a lot of people don't and they don't care, right because I've had conversations, I've seen it done or watching done on a day to day basis, and I'd be like, you don't even care what you said, You don't care how you view, you don't care about anything. They just want some motions. The quote, yeah you don't. You know, I always get
one point defender. You don't want to pick on people, but you have you know, artists who play out on record that might be you know.
Over sexualized, you know, over overly violent.
You know, they have that one hit record they hit for the moment, but then they gone the next and You're like, wow, this saw some other art form that they are Really wasn't It wasn't about real lyrics as somebody compare sexy brands Little Ken and he said sexy breds the Little Ken, And I'm like, well, yeah, little Kim sold you sex.
But the bars was there.
Music was there, like the artist that he was there that it was just more substance to it and just sex just wasn't.
You know, everybody like this is what we're doing, and it was you know, it was thought process behind it.
There was something that bringing into little kids worlds who want to find out more about little Kim.
And I think that's the the risk with doing things just for the likes.
Saying things just for the X becasu devaluing yourself when it's time coming that next thing.
It's like, what do you do now? Yeah? Can I say?
I say that all it's about substance. And I think when we talk about hip hop, I just want to ask you this question. Do you think it's evolving or you think this is I think hip hop is evolving. I think hip hop is in a great place. Hip hop is and what we do is how we do it.
I see breakdancing in the Olympics, but I see for feed art of what we see is hip hop is buying graphic art design and the many places that that exists.
It continually evolves.
When you look at DJ, when you look at you know, termatilism, look at you know be juggling and scratching, and it's constantly evolving. I look at true mcman ship, true lyricism. I see, you know, what Kendrick's doing.
When I see adult she is doing.
It's crazy artists out there that's spitting, you know, things that resonate to our spirit and then doing it in a you know, I think hip hop is evolving, not a rap music business, not so much. You know, rap music business is like, you know, when we were first creating this thing we called hip hop, what the mainstream was into their opinions, They thought it did mat recon Selle, the mad Gold, platinum, None of that mattered.
What mattered was respect on the block. Did you have them lars? Could you basket? Could you win a mill? Could you let me see your your top to bottom?
Your burner?
You know, what is the train look like when it goes by? Like That's how hip hop was judged. So that's how I judge hip hop. I don't judge hip hop about what the mainstream says. When I start doing that, then I'm not hip hop anymore. So, Yeah, question, hip hop is a great place. It's just what me considered hip hop.
I agree.
I just at some point I get disappointed by what they trying to make mainstream where they try to tell us is hip hop. You know, since we grew up in hip hop, and I know the feelings. I know
the essence of it. I know that it's about being able to say something in the way that resignates with the world that they can feel in the most creative way possible, right, And I know that when they try to take that creativity out of it and simplify it and just give us something they called advct the store and the wall pain and tell us that it's hard. Sometimes it's frustrated to me, right as somebody who who
cherishes it about who loves the game. Who if I'm going to write a music or I'm going to write a verse. I wanted to beat something that is our I wanted to be something that's heartfelt. I wanted to be creative. I want other lyricists to hear it, people who love the music to hear it, to say, wow, he put effort into this, right. So a lot of times I listened to artists and they try to even
the young artists. And I don't mean I can't fault the artists, right because in my mind, if I'm telling you that it's good, it's telling you that this is
do over. Then you saw the belate better. Then you got young kids following the same trending to where they I don't want to think about them, right, And then it brings you to the point where like bring me going back to genderize right, when he's saying that, oh, they're not checking fornas right, and it's like, I understand what he means because it's not that he didn't say anything.
Want they're not checking for gus the young generations because they're not They've been told that that's not how right. They've been told that the person that says I'm gonna shoot you and spend a block thirty four times and there's no creative The words don't even rhyme, there's no kidence to the be, there's no flow, there's nothing I mean listening to, I mean asking myself did they even hit the me when they rapp into these songs?
So, man, these songs don't even have any level of melody anything. It's just they just throwing words.
How I'm there, right, And when you've been told that that has music, you will look at it saying I don't want to hear nuns too.
I don't want to think about all that, right.
So when we've been trapped into that bond state, it determs me like it's like I love music. Right, I'll be sitting down, I'm ready writing some stuff and I'd be like, this is fire. And then I'd be like, ain't nobody like listen to this? And then I and then I'm approached by hundreds of people there and they're saying, Yo, we want some more boss with general place and this is fire.
We need some more, we need some more of that. So I get the energy back up. And then I turned on the radio or I'm going to a blog and said, think someone, this is the out this new wrap. Yeah, and we'll see.
Now I feel the same way, right, and I get that, you know, discouraged. Ain't nobody checking from my par I'll put this music out of the court. I'm doing video, so nobody checking for this, right, I'm move fall back. And then I see my son spin a par like, oh speak you back hit hop back.
I see it's hot right now because hip hop respect hip hop, right, So if I'm paying attention to what that outside is doing, then I get discouraged. But when I see people from who comfort where I come from, blah blah blah, who know what this is putting down? Then I can inspire it. And then I want to put music out to be some people like yourself will recognize if needs something. When you hear something, you be like, y'all all the son I've heard that, I'm going to dig that that needs more than me.
Then saying going to a.
Flex and getting a cold signum for Flex because you know, no disrespect to Flex, but you know he's made street. You're gonna do with the main street telling it. You know, it's just we got to get back to doing it for we really doing this for we doing it for, you know, our sound appreciation. Then you got through roops, you guys, you know, don't show you gussy as you're gonna have to do things that's gonna compromise who you are as an artist, who you are as a hip
hop for real. Uh And it is a nonstist too. There is a way to make great music with a great message. And you know, but I think Kendrick Lamark what he was going.
To do over the last two years is like just phenomenal. I told supports on social media.
I said, one MC moves to party, let's trade one MC moves society.
And as Kendrick and whether you get the Kendrick Ganna.
I can't not the fact that he's got America and they stream America thinking about things and haven't really thought about in a little time. So it is great, you know, you got ass that and hopefully the young a generation of artists will look at what he's been doing and you know, find value and going and it's a back of ration, I suppose, just within the party.
Well that's what I've been saying when we have to create this new culture, you know, as we got this.
Pull up peace conference and we're pushing things as positively highlighting people that do positive things and the messages. You know, we don't realize that words or spells, like when you when you say things, you put those days on your life.
And I never realize that things. A lot of the things that I sayd when I was young, I call those things into fruition, right, And I just and I said, and that's why when we looking and we see our young rappers dying at such high rings, and then you listen to the music that they had, right.
They pretty much call those energies all the and then not that they.
Were bad people, but you don't even understand how powerful worlds I don't think nobody, but words are the most powerful things that we had. Like if you look at the strong beligers through our history, the most powerful people have been words. Yeah, it's not the strongest person. It's not this person the most money. It's he who knows how to utilize those words. So I called myself a
word smith. You know, I've been gifted with the ability to utilize words, and I want to do it for something that's positive and brothers like yourself inspired me every day. It's wants to say thank you for always. You've always been on this mission, you know, ever since the beginning, shann a lot of it. Like you said, it wasn't lacking the black, that was lacking your conjects. Right, You've
always called you to be a high frequency. So I just wanted me to be a flyers king and say, you know, I was just trying to move in the trajectory that you had. So I'm glad to hear that you improved me. Oh yeah, without doubt. You know, the first time I mentioned I don't know if you can come nineteen ninety seven tramps, it was Kars when I read it and show this Chris, like, yeah, that's the first time I got a.
Chance to meet you. Everything yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
It's like we play that back of my head because you know, once you've been to the culture of MC's at that time, I mean you had really pop yat. You had to you know, you know, put out the records yet. But the buzz was like doing my solens. Next, he's the next one, He's the next one. So I got a chance to meet you. I was with KRS one. We already don't care. Rest one is your culture. So and then through Chris Lightning and it's like, okay, I'm
checking for him. And then you know, you had things that happened to you.
You have to go through your process, and you came back out and like at that point, like I'm lead deeping the activism and le deeping the community.
Work, you know, doing that work.
You come out and you writing in the trenches doing that work. It was kind of opposite of how I remembered you, and I remembered you was being more of a you know, are sure you're worring in purses. Definitely with the rhymes and bars. You came out and challenging black men and black women. Then they'll kick themselves up
and be better version of themselves. I'm like, oh okay, wow, I ain't know I'm getting fault off of various people going you see my SIGNI my sis, this is my silence dad, my son, I said, be patient, watch this.
Watch I got something bout his brother. I know it's gonna be special. And you know what that inclination, It was just.
That like he've been doing some real special stuff for our people. Hit mop and as junior brother appreciateure, man, they started being here. It's always a pleasure, man, little bit people to do work and we all going to get that we got into that's to get that's all the new. Yeah.
Oh wait, wait too, I'm gonna start beating certain She'll send you some stuff and then you follow your lead out of the let's go all right there, so shut up to my mother.
How to keep green?
Man, It's always a pleasure when you're talking to people who are like minded, who are really genuine individuals and also lyricists as well, and it's coming from the hip alcoholch.
He always has positive things, you know, when communication all just came on a lot, but.
Just being able to sit there and have this conversation is a blessing that so follow Jakem reed he is one of those whethers on the front line who's always about equal, always when that's right. And like you said, that's a good interview.
You know, I think you and Hakem are two of the people who I admire that are very very very clear, like where you stand politically. And also it might not be reported today, right, it's not today. No, people might not respect it, but I think there will come a time when you will see a number of folks acknowledging that y'all were very much so consistent that a whole bunch of dumb shit is going on, and you know, and and not everybody does that because some people are
afraid to be on the wrong side. But Hakim is definitely one who I look at when I go to his page, just like he gets it. He knows that what we're seeing in this nation, in this moment, and even within our own communities, that there's a lot of healing, a lot of work, and a lot of fighting and advocating that has to be done.
So I thought it was a great interview. You Scott should do more together.
Shut out to my brother Haquen. So now This brings me to my I don't get it. There has been a common divide that I always see happen between Blacks and Muslims, and it is now it is trickled into our mayor.
Race, which is for the new nominee zorharn Mom, Donnie.
Now, I've been listening to the brother for the last few weeks and it just sounds simple. It sounds like he's for the everyday person. He sounds like he's speaking to the realities, what's going on and the you know a lot of people that I say that the democratic people have forgot about, you know, just the average everyday person, and he's speaking to that.
So to me, like it makes sense. But now there's this divide.
They wantn't played the Blacks against the Muslims, you know, they want to make it everything into this.
Socialist thing. Now socialism and this is the worst word in the world.
He's a socialist because he wants average people just be to have a right to live, people to have be able to pay for their groceries, people to live places and be able to pay for the rent, you know. And it's crazy to me that we fall for this same thing every time they're dividing us and we're all going through the same hell, but they have us divided, you know. And I'm listening to what they're doing to him, and it's reminiscent of what happened at the Women's March, right,
and I've seen this whole playbook. We need you to say this this way, We need you to use these words this way, because if you don't say that, that means that you meant this, and you don't get to tell us what you meant even though you said it. We get to tell you what you meant, right, and we can. And now that we're seeing what you meant, you're not for us, you're against us all and you're the bad guy. And it's crazy that we fall for
the same thing. And I don't understand how do we constantly fall for the same banana and the tailpipe?
Like?
How is how is it that this government and people are able to pin marginalized communities? Because what happens is when you see Trump talking about deporting the man, right, when it's the government, when you when you really when you watch the media, you know that's what.
I would blame it on.
I'm not saying that Trump didn't say those things, but it is. The media does not have to cover it. They want this type of divide between us because you got to look at who owns the media. And I think in New York it's more than the government that is engaging in xenophobia and trying to create the vision. I think it's about special interests, business interests in certain communities feeling that they're better than others.
That's what I think, and that's what it comes down to, and we always fall for it.
In every situation, we find ourselves pitted against each other, and we the ones that's always going to lose in the end, and we and we fight against our own interests, like when you listen to what the man is talking about, like how could the average everyday person who lives in New York not listen to that and say, well, that's just fair. It just sounds like fitness to me, right. But we would go against this one. This is how we got Trump. We got Trump because we were They
pitted the black people against each other. They pitted us against Kamala and said, oh, you know, you can't be with her because she has a white husband, or you can't be with her because she's a woman, or she's not really black, she's this, and we fell for.
It's the same, and we fail for it.
And now we got this fucking in office that had never said nothing that benefited us, and people's talk and the crazy thing. People that would have bought the policy, and nobody was ever able to tell us what Trump's policy was. But they couldn't tell us the policy that benefited them. Never, never did they tell us anything that benefited them. Now we can sit there and listen, and
this man has a clear vision. And rather than say, Okay, this is the nominee we're gonna ride with, they still haven't even endorsed the man.
No, well, some people have. Here's the thing.
You got a lot of dynamics happening in New York at the same time. One thing that we have to think, you know, talk about is there is a generational shift, if you will, where people who are older folks who.
Know the Cuomo's very well.
Mario Cuomo was a total different Cuomo from Andrew Cuomo, his son, but he still has that family brand, right, and so when black people hear the name Cuomo, and it's not to say that Andrew Cuomo didn't do one or two things, three or four or five things that black folks fought for wanted, you know, looking at in New York.
He was the first mayor, I mean, first governor of any state.
I believe, to institute the policy that if a police officer kills somebody, you know, I think it's unarmed. I think it's an unarmed individual. But don't get me wrong, but I know that in police involved shootings.
Right.
He put a special prosecutor in place because he recognized that the relationship sometimes between the local prosecutors and the police department is too close for them to properly investigate and holds accountable these officers. So he made it law that they would be a special prosecutor in New York State.
And the Attorney General, who's Tiss James at this time, it is basically generally her responsibility unless she moves it somewhere else, depending upon the conflicts that may be in her office.
Right.
So there's a lot of layers to that. But black people who.
Were fighting for police accountability in New York, remember when Andrew Cuomo led that, and it's been some other things. And so when you have that, you have a group of people who are just like Bounty paper towels and Rentolds wrap and you know, drop a can of orange juice and lift in iced tea. These are brands that they know well and they appreciate these brands. This is their brand that they know from their grandmother's grandmother introduced them to this brand, or it was in her house,
in the cupboard or wherever. Right.
So therefore, some of us just operate on what we know, what we know.
And when you introduce a new person like mom Donnie into the conversation and folks don't know him. And let's be very honest and saying that there are interactions that black people who have had in their local community with Muslims who run the store, or a Jewish person who might own the building, or another black person who doesn't talk to them well, doesn't respect them, or the Latino community is like, I ain't black.
They've experienced all of this stuff, and of course white supremacy, and so when they meet these new people, they like, mm mmm, don't trust you. I don't know you. So we have to give some of it to that.
But the other side of it that our people have to be mindful of is that they don't even change the playbook. They do the same thing. They start going after your race, whether you are, like you said, are you black, not black?
Where you're really from?
You ain't really one of us. This and that we start going right into that. The man when he was a boy put the wrong thing on an application for college or denied application. He's seventeen, eighteen years old, tops fills out the application and says he's African, American and Asian. Right, I don't know what other categories were there, but people want to make this be Oh I know what that means. You know, he can't be trusted. Come on, like, if that's the worst you could give me, let's move on
to the next thing. But y'all ain't got nothing. So that's why you here with this. So you know, they start that Kamala ain't black. Same thing. Next they start trying to different communities. Oh, he ain't for you, He's not for you.
He's not for you.
And my thing is what we should be doing. And it's not just for Mamdannie. But Eric Adams is gonna run as an independent. Then Clerdis Sleewah is out here getting ready to be the publican candidate Black folks ought to be demanding from everybody that's running that they address our issues. Everybodyani, We don't need to argue about your race, what you selected on the application, all of that.
Don't even worry about that. I don't even hear that. This piece of paper here we want to talk about.
And let's see how you feel about violence, prevention, police accountability, affordability, when food deserts, our benefits, health benefits, keeping our.
Streets clean, you know, rats, That's what we want to know.
What you're going to do about those things. And so if we put all of that on the table, this should be no divide. We should be able to make clear and concise decisions. And guess what, It is not easy what Mondannie is saying he wants to do. What Zorhan Mamdannie is proposing, is not easy to get done. I understand what you were saying. It's easy to understand what he's saying, got you, But it ain't easy to
get those things done. He's gonna have to go through a whole lot of hell to work with the Assembly, which is where he is currently, and the New York State assembly person, and to get the city Council and all of these different entities on board for his ideas. But I'd rather have somebody who has ideas that speak to my real needs versus people who are just going to manage the status quo and leave things as it is, if not make it work exactly.
And that's that's my whole thing.
And I don't understand why that's not an easy choice for everybody, but it's not. We've we've shown that we will go against our best interests for the dumbest shit ever, like we really have. We really got Trump in office because people said, you know, that she wasn't black, or
she wasn't smart, like shit. That that is so crazy to me that every time I listen to like, I go back and a new meme pops up every day about shit that's happening in America that Trump is, you know, ruining that she said last year, and it's just a new meme every time, and then I just look at it and be like, Yo, how did we get here? How did we get tricked into some stupid shit like this? Like I just don't understand it.
But man wants to deport for him to even say.
That's why My thing with Donald Trump is that their mindset is so nasty, it's so cruel that if you support them, I can't deal with you.
I can't deal with you.
It's not about it's not about policy, it's not even about government. It is about humanity.
It's not about government efficiency. It's about humanity.
It's about humanity. For me, it's like if I can't look at you and see that you have levels of humanity and human decency, like I don't even understand how we allow someone like this is this is a representation of our nation, and I know that other nations is looking like this. This is one of the worst human beings that I've ever seen.
He's going to try to deport, which he won't, but he wants to even put out into the universe that he would like to deport a mayoral candidate in New York City, one man. But you know what, when Mandani wins, he is going to be the mayor of the most powerful city in the entire country. And by the way, he will be probably what thirty four thirty five years
old when he takes offense. And so that is what That's another thing in the generational divide that people don't even believe that when you and yet that young into your thirties or your mid thirties, that you can even have that type of power. But I tell you, I think that if the brother is as smart as I believe he is, he will set up a cabinet of individuals who will help him to know what he doesn't know.
And right now he's beginning to align himself with the right individuals that I know will help him to run this city the right way, or at least I believe that. But I guess I want I want to state this for the record. Sure the city is not in the worst place. I'm not gonna sit up here and say that Eric Adams is the worst mayor ever and the city is terrible and this and that, because that would be dishonest.
It is not the case.
I know people who are deputy mayors and other positions within the within the administration, and they are actually doing a good job, and they are attempting to keep this city running as best as possible. But what people need to understand is that folks are tired of the same old thing. People are looking for their needs to be met.
They want to shift away from what we consider to be establishment politics, and they are looking for new life, new breath, new energy, new ideas, radical ideas that might take a while to get there, but it is somebody actually working on it and talking about it and addressing it. And if we don't catch up there, a whole bunch of other people are going to because they don't already
caught up. So a lot of other people from other communities are going to take us to places, and we as black folks are still gonna be sitting around arguing about who didn't call us right on the phone and why we weren't invited to the thing, and then and then ultimately still trying to hold on to power that has shifted.
In a good representation that is me and Brandon Scott in Baltimore and what he's done. And I just want to shout him out to you know, I met.
Him really cool and we got to find y'all.
We've gotta find my pictures are proposed to.
But he has the fewest homicides ever in Baltimore twenty twenty five as a mayor, and he's probably he's in his thirties.
Too, So we and he arrested some ice agent.
Yes, this is this and this is the radical shift that people want. They want people who are for the people. They want to see youthful mentality, they want people who are not going with the status quo. Is just not gonna happen no more. So, you know, you know, if y'all don't get on board, we're going to lose the people. If we do not start electing the people that the people want, Yeah, it ain't gonna work.
There's that I mean.
And I'm not suggesting that we relinquish our, you know, as black folks, our position in all of this, because I think that we've got to be clear about our demands again. Now, the black Print is a document that is being worked on by a number of individuals. It's started without THEA Stevens in the City Council, you know her. She She and others, a bunch of people, including Angelo Pinto are co found at Until Freedom, have worked to build the black Print. That's what we got to focus on.
And it's not to say we don't have, of course people. Eric Adams has folks who are gonna vote for him, right, They're gonna vote for him.
They've been with him a long time.
You got some black people who really feel like they have nobody to vote for because they don't necessarily know and or trust yet Mandannie. But then they don't also want Eric especially. You know, when you have Mayor Adams that is that has a flirtatious let me say a little. I don't know what you call his relationship with Donald Trump.
I don't know, but I know that a lot of people don't like it, and so and so when you have those two things where they they feel like they don't have anybody, they don't know who they're gonna vote for.
That's okay.
It's okay to even say I'm standing with Mayor Adams, I'm with the black man, I'm gonna be with him. It's okay to say that. But when we start turning it into personal tax on people, that leans in the direction of Islamophobia, or we get ourselves involved in other community issues and start trying to uplift that as this big issue, to make Mamdani's look like he's anti this community or anti he's a hater of all people and he's violent.
That's not cool. Just get your issues and argue the issues.
I saw a conversation going on on Facebook with bishoply A Daughtry, but she was talking about if you freeze rent and you have landlords who still have to pay inflated heat like gas, you know, all the property, all the taxes, all the other things. How do you deal with that if they don't have an ability to use the money that's coming from rent to pay the higher costs for everything else that's increasing, Like, how do you balance it out? That is a question that Mamdannie needs
to answer. Right, that's something that's that's a policy conversation that needs to happen. But now you start sharing articles from the Tablet magazine, which done called us anti semitic fifty thousand times over at Women's Mark, and you know, is a magazine that's pretty much a rag. You start sharing articles from them in the New York Post that's calling the man all kinds of things. And now you're into whether or not he checked the wrong box here
or it there. You don't really have a policy argument. You trying to do personal stuff versus dealing with the policy.
And I hope black people don't don't do that.
You in the smear campaign and.
Thing, Okay, there you go, that's the right word.
So it is what it is, it's gonna be what it's gonna be that brings us to the end of another episode, an amazing episode. Shout out to our brother Hakim Green for his interview, and I hope that you took something back from this interview. You know, me and Hakim talked about a lot of political is as well as hip hop, but we also talked about just the state of America right now and it was real deep man, and I hope that you and you said that you enjoyed the interview, so that brings us to the end
of another episode. I'm not gonna always be right, Tamika D. Malory and I could always be wrong, but we will both always and I mean always, be authentic