I'm Tamika d Mallory and it ship Boy my son in general. We are your host of T m I, t.
Mika and my Son's Information, Truth, Motivation and Inspiration.
New Name, New Energy. What's up my son?
How are you doing?
To Mallory, I like that that's.
Okay with the.
Drum Rizzie, what's up?
What's up? What you got today?
Shout out to my brother at Mitchell, who we're gonna be interviewing a little bit later. But he had this dope event this weekend that I went to with my kids.
You know.
It was the Peaceful Summer Fest. Shout out to my brother Fresher on Star Little Mama. You know, it was just it was a really really dope event. The kids were out there, they played, they had games, food, and it was just beautiful energy. Man, my kids don't be liking me nowhere. And this this is the second year in the road that we went to. And so when I was taking them, they're like, where we going?
Dad?
Why don't you just let us stay home. I'm like, no, you're not staying home, and they're like, where are we going? I'm like, remember the event we went to last year where they had the toys, they had the games and it's oh yeah, yeah, I like that, but I'm gonna go there.
So you know, they went out there, they was playing football, they had games, came home with medals.
You know. Yeah, it was dope.
You know a lot of these kids got music and it was it was it was a turned up show.
Shout out to Armstar, Armstar, my young little brother man.
He is one of those people that knows how to hype the party up. Like he's one of them young brothers and he's positive and he's dope. He dances like none other, you know, onstars just like a yeah. So watching him and he brought his wiffle group up in there all dance and one of these kids did the hat.
He did something with he he flips the hat with his.
Knees and his foot and he keeps landing on his head and I was like, like, kids are talented.
Peaceful Summer, the.
Peaceful summer Fast.
Shout out to my brother Freshia, who's another artist and he's from Brooklyn, but he was the he was the MC of the night, you know, the master the ceremony. So he did a dope job and you know, just introing everybody making people keeping the energy. It was just it was a dope event man. You know, I go out every now and then too things like that. So shout out to at he gave back to Brooklyn. I was a part, you know, I did my couple songs and we had it was just it was a dope event.
Man.
Well that's good. I mean, you know, I think that.
Showing these young people talent, like that's what the community is missing, that kind of stuff. I think that's kind of what we've been talking about, is trying to provide our you know, our young people with.
A way to see something.
Yeah, positive experience fun.
Was they doing a lot.
Of No, it wasn't no it was it was It was not no talk and it was it was a couple of songs. It was a couple of songs, like they did some drill music. They had their little thing this, you know, they do this little stuff they go like this and all that. But it wasn't no talk music.
You know.
So they was dancing, but it was kid friendly. But they even they were doing, they wasn't doingn't I didn't hear get it sexy in the part, Actually I didn't, But there was it was like a kid friendly event.
I like that.
There was a couple of artists that you know, had a couple of songs that you're like, okay, you got But for the most part it was.
A kid friendly cool love it, love it at.
He'll be here with us, Sure, yes, my brother at.
Let's see my thought of the day today.
So thinking about and I don't I don't have even the slither of energy necessary to sit and go through the disgusting, vile behavior of Marjorie tail A Green. This is a woman who time at the time is disrespectful to people of color. And not only that, and she's from Georgia, so she has embedded in her some of that you know.
Deep state stuff. She's just she's.
Really, in my opinion discussing in my opinion, you know, she's actually like a danger to the American public right like she she is and to her colleagues because sometimes she's so disrespectful. And we know, we saw what happened with Jasmine Crockett that she a mess around and get you out your your peace and your space and you beat them, put your hands on her because she's that disrespectful.
And you know everything that I know every time I see Marjorie tail A Green speaking on issues, it's almost like she goes out of her way to be as anti progressive as possible. Like she's attempting to, as far as I'm concerned, restore beyond conservatism. Like it's more than that, it's like just deeply respect racist, sexist practices and policies. And so, you know, if people don't know, if they if you're like, who is Marjorie Taylor Green, just go
look her up, read some articles. Look at the way that she conducts herself on the hill and the way that she has been put out there and has been sort of propped up as a bully in the legislature.
So who's going to counterbalance that?
Right?
So you don't want Jamal Bowman because they say he wasn't moderate moderate enough. He you know, leans too much towards the left, and his constituents are not people who overwhelmingly support that. Now they're going after the same people. The APEX and all the GOP funded groups and other special interest groups are now going after Congresswoman Corey Bush.
And you know, here's another individual that is like Jamal, willing to speak out, willing to She's just as extreme about righteousness and justice as Marjorie Taylor Green is about racism and her and her antics. And what I'm trying to understand from some of our people is, you know, what do we do to balance this beyond maga mentality that we're seeing as part of those who are responsible literally for making laws that will impact our lives for decades.
How do we but balance that. Yes, you do have AOC of course, Alexandria A.
Cassio. You also have uh Ihan Omar.
You have Rashida, you have you have people there, but in summerly you have people there who are considered to be a part of a very progressive squad. But you also need to have people, multiple people who are willing to ping pong this nonsense that's happening within the government in Washington.
And I feel like.
I would like to hear more about how what is what is what? What is the strategy of the more moderate community around how as they get more people elected they are running people for office and various places around the nation.
And I feel like we already have a number of moderates. We have more moderates than anything else.
We've got a lot of people in elected office that know how to toe the line and walk the you know, and and try to negotiate and be in a community with these people. What we have, what we lack are more people who if you talk crazy, I can talk crazy too. So let's talk crazy because what I'm talking crazy, it's the right thing. And I don't want to make
a false equivalency because of Corey Bush. She might when I say she talk crazy, it's nothing crazy about it, but she's strong enough to be able to really go hint toe to toe, toe to toe with a Marjorie Tailer Green type of person. So I just just I don't really have a finality, Like there's no point, no
finishing point to my statement. I'm just trying to understand what are we going to do and how are we going to balance what we're up against and the fact that some of these people will not negotiate and it's not unfortunately they are becoming increasingly a majority within the
Republican Party. So what do we do when there's more of those types of voices, or those voices are stronger and louder and beginning to muffle the voices of those people who are considered to be more Republican moderates, who, by the way, the.
Republican Party, they don't do enough. If i'm if I you know, from my perspective, they.
Don't do enough to quiet some of their own extremists.
They don't. That's that's never the thing.
So what they do is hide behind them, right, So they speak, Yeah, they speak for them, right, because those are things they want to say. They just can't say it out loud. So they just sit there and they let them do it, and they just vote with him. They don't. They don't.
They're not very vocal.
They just give their votes and and and show you where they stand and take back all of the laws in the in the ground that civil rights and all the things we got. They just quietly vote and take them back. And they do it.
And it's not all of them, but it's a large and it's a lot.
Of times, you know, we have to be as strategic. Although we do need those people that allowed We need those people that's gonna vote with us every time and never have.
To say a word.
We just need those people that's gonna say, okay, yeah, let him say it, right, but we got to support right, that's what.
They said, Well, we don't want Jamaal Bowman to be an activist. We want him to be a legislator. And I don't disagree that he needs to be more or he Yeah, he should be, and they should be more legislated than anything else. But I don't hear the Republican Party saying we don't need these loud, extreme voices. We need you to be more moderate and conciliatory.
Because they never had to, right, because they understand that for the most part they've been in control of you know, how this country has been ran because racism and you know, division is as American as apple pie.
That's that is the basis of America.
And they're not trying to, you know, take away the foundation of what America is.
So they're going to always quietly just support it. It's not gonna let.
You know they support it. We have to put certain voices who can be loud, right, and but the thing is we can't fold.
But we can't fold when they.
Get loud and support them.
You got to support them. You got to go all up to a lot of people scared to support them. And no, he's too loud.
People will say it's not no support because there's many that support, but it's not enough to stand just like they do. They line up behind, like you said, may not be loudly, but they line up behind the one who are considered to be radical, but they are radical in a direction that's hard.
It's like what they did with Kevinaugh.
Like just look at how they got Kavanaugh and like the people, they didn't a lot of people.
They say, okay, you're gonna have your hair in your people. People already know that they were voting that man, and they didn't care nothing about that hearing. They said he here to do a job, and he said, oh, no, no, I wouldn't do anything road Wade.
No, no, maybe he did say how you know that?
I don't know that. He said he would not give you.
He made a statement that implied that he wouldn't. But everybody had already known that he was already one of those judges who was anti Rob Wade already. But when they was questioned him, his statement just moved around there like, no, you know, I would uphold this and this and the findings of this and that. Look it up, because he definitely he wiggled around there. And what happens is he got right in there and he did what they put him in there to do.
I think a good example of what you're saying is like the Tulsa, Oklahoma exactly hearings, because that's what they did. The court, the justices, several of them appeared to be in support, and I wonder how they voted, because I know that the end result was that they tossed the case for those those I don't want to say, yeah, elders who are still looking for reparations and justice for what happened in the Tulsa bombings. But I don't know
exactly how all the judges voted. I just know that the end result was whoever may have voted against it, they didn't win.
They know how to play the position until they get back home.
The systems that we have with the Supreme Court and the higher courts of all the states, and the two party system and all of that has to really I mean, if we're going to really get serious about making some changes, we're going to have to really dig deep and look at line items. That's what they do when there's when there's problems with the business. They get the budget and they go line by.
My music segment today comes from an artist that I actually met at the event that.
I did.
At the Peaceful Summer. I've heard the music of his song before, but I actually met him. And this song is such a dope song and I want you to make sure you google it. His name is Mo Dub and the name of the song is called Same Heart. It is such a powerful song. Mo Dub M O dot d U b B. And this song is just basically talking about we're all going through something, but we all have one heart, like our heartbeats at the same time, You're not the only person going through what you're going through.
It's such it's such a powerful song. We played the like three songs in a row. The whole crowd was just like it just is one of those songs. And it's been like a big song on TikTok. A lot of people are doing the song over but seeing him performing and just seeing the energy go look up Mo Dub, same hard, beautiful song. You know, I was moved, like, Yeah, we gotta work together because that's the type of music that I want to create, and I know we're gonna create.
So we're gonna be in the studio and in this couple of weeks. So shout out to MODEB. Follow him is mo dot d u bb on Instagram. And today we have another one of our friends, more like my brother.
You know.
He is the founder in chief of executive officer of man Of Inc. He is also appointed by Mayor Adams as the first New York City Gun Violence Preventions are and the co chair of the Gun Violence Prevention Task Force. My brother Andre T. Mitchell Man, a k a. A. T. Mitchell Man. What's going on?
Game old, right, but it goes there. It's a reason for it. It's good to see you both be here with y'all again.
Yes, when you in the studio the last time.
Never know, this is my first. I was just visual during.
COVID pendant on with two people.
My mom, my dad, my mother, my father, and I was actually in this. I was in her belly during this when the shot. She was pregnant with me.
So, yeah, how did you find that?
My family gave it to me. You know, you got uncles and you know family always they got those old pictures and they can tell you exactly what was going on at that time. And that's when I was like, oh, I gotta have that. I never kind of had a picture with my mom and my dad together, and it looked like they was like in love, you know what I mean. So at least I feel good. I was conceived with some love, you know, so I had to have it.
So how you been at you know, I've been with you, I guess was talking about your event that you had this weekend, Safe Summer Peace Peace my fault, the Peaceful Summer Fest.
Yes, I've been good though. Bro. You always got a VIP access card, all access card whenever you choose to pull up. But yeah, it was it's our way of closing out. We closed out Gun Violence Awareness Month on the twenty ninth and thank you again nice for always pulling up and being a part of the program. And it was a great way to conclude this month thirty days.
As you'll all know, it was an extension of our work, you know, Tamika of creating Peace Week at the beginning of the year, and then in the middle of the year, during the month of June, we deem it gun Violence Awareness Month. And that's for all the members of the Gun Violence Awareness movement to kind of get down to
raise awareness around gun violence. So we had that big program in Kanassi, Brooklyn, this past weekend, and so it was good to have you and so many others join us on stage and us just celebrate you know, gun violence away Iness month.
It was a pleasure to be there. Man The work that you do is phenomenal. We've talked about it before. Some people may not, I don't know unless they're under a rock somewhere that don't know what you do. You know what Man Up does explain to them what it is, how it started, and what you you know contributing Man Up, Inc.
It's a blessing of organization twenty years now. Young organization established twenty years ago, two thousand and four, after the unfortunate shooting and killing of an eight year old his name is Dashawn day Dee Hill in Brooklyn, New York, in tragic afternoon, we heard that these children that got shot,
that's the word on the street. Myself, I responded with my local council member, Charles Barron, to that crime scene, rushed to the hospital and that's where I met that family in the trauma area in the hospital where he was unfortunately passed away from then and I was already an activists, but I felt even as one that was already doing work on the ground that I wasn't doing enough.
If we're not going to be able to stop, you know, the shootings to the degree where nobody, like the women and the children are safe, then I felt there was more that could be done, and that's what happened. Man I think became a part of that work. Man and now twenty years later, multi million dollar nonprofit, close to one hundred employees, not including the youth employees. We have about fifteen locations now throughout the city, mostly in the
Borough of Brooklyn. We're in the detention centers with the young bros in there, We're in the hospitals, we're in the schools, and we are on the streets as you know it. So, like you said, unless people have been under the rock, I don't know why they wouldn't probably know about Man Up, but you know here we are.
So I asked you about your parents and your family because I think that you know, a lot of times people know us for what we do, but they have no idea of our stories, like where we come from. And you've told they were at the time it was
street politicians. But now tiam I, you've told our followers and listeners in the past about your story, But would you give us, you know, another briefing on at and where you started and then where you are today, how you feel about where you are today going from your beginning point to now being reguarded by communities and by the mayor and by other leaders across the country, as you know, one of our most effective organizers around gun violence awareness.
Well, thank you. I mean, I'm my story. I'm sure it's like most you know. Was a little boy born into a single parent household, my strong mom who had eight kids all together. I was the third of eight kids that was blessed to be born. So we grew up in Brooklyn in this case, mostly in Brownsville in East New York, Brooklyn. And so that's a pretty tough neighborhood's pretty you know, rough, and so we had to
you know, fin for ourselves. But you know, just we learned a lot of how to really share, We learned how to you know, care, how to really you know, just really love on each other. You know. I didn't have like maybe some people who come from like a low like maybe a single like to they the only kid childhouse. I had like five six other brothers and sisters. So we loved on each other, you know, and uh, you know, just growing up in in the communities and
that part of Brooklyn was pretty hard. But at the same time, you know, it taught me, you know a lot. I mean, I was the kid, believe it or not, I loved to learn. I loved school. So I was that young man. I couldn't wait till summer was over so I can go back to school to learn. So you can, you know, consider me a nerd because I did homework, I studied, and I did well. I got good grades, so you know, I just wanted to be
down too. Though at the same time, most of the time, the girls that I don't know if they're still less way today, they don't. They don't want to talk to to the nerds, you know. So I had to figure my way out. And that's when i've you know, I realized that it was about being partially part of the streets, and so I entered into that realm eventually, you know, by being in the streets. I've been shot before, you know, I've been you know, imprisoned. I was actually put you know,
in prison for a crime I didn't commit. It was charged with murder and a homicide in Brooklyn. I went to trial because I thought, you know, that was my first and only time that I experienced something like that where I assumed that the justice of the scales of justice was fair. But I know now that I didn't know then that if you don't have no money, you come from poverty, you don't have the knowledge of the law, then you're gonna be railroaded. And that's what happened to me.
I got found guilty of a crime I didn't commit, and I was sent to prison, and I worked my way out from prison. To be very honest with you, I mean, you know, I felt my way into a maximum security prison, and I had to realize that if I'm going to you know, get home in one piece, I had to figure that lifestyle out, as you know, mice, It's real like that. But I always just you know, just really still. I was able to get back to school. I was able to go back to school, back to
college while in prison. And then while in college, I was given a chance to come home early because I was doing so well. And I came back into my community where they glorify a prison, you know, the young bros And people was like, oh, yo, it was happy. You know, they wanted all those war stories. I wasn't giving it up. I was like, you crazy, it was wild, it's whack, and I'm not taking nothing, nothing away from
some good brothers and sisters. That's behind the wall. But I think they would even agree that prison is really for suckers. It's not really what we want our young people to to end up the rest of their lives. And just started getting busy every day since then, and so my mindset was different, and I just continued to beat the ground and change the hopefully the trajectory of other people following them out shoes like that. How long
did you do all together? I served sixteen years. Sixteen years, I have six altogether, meaning I had start five years in prison and I had to serve eleven years on parole. And so people, most people don't count that parole time, but mice, you know that once you are on parole, they remind you you are still a state property, you still state property, and that you can go back to
jail at any dingy get time. So I had to serve the entirety of my duration of time, and it's actually hard dr to do it on parole than it is to be inside here.
I heard yah.
Because they regulate everything inside so you pretty much they make sure you go here and there. But when you're outside, those probation if you got a probation officer or parole over so that don't get along with you. You know, they put stipulations on you. They say you violated this. They make everything hard for you. They tell you can't go to certain jobs, you can't go to certain places, you can't be here.
You have a curfew, and out.
Here you gotta. You gotta take care of everything yourself. In prison, things have provided.
You and then fit with because in prison you can.
Tell you conduct your responsibilities. Out here if your dad you know you got responsibilities.
Them is like yeah, alone, I see I saw you walk in.
You better deliver.
It's a very.
Powerful way to express it.
You have to deliver.
You gotta deliver if you if you really about your life and you say you're a man, that you say that you are, you gotta and then not only just for your kids, but then you go back, like I said, in two communities where we come from, you know where they have friends, and you gotta be able to look out for everybody. Now kids. And so that's that's again, that's how I started in this work. And I don't
regret it. You know, I used to complain I was better because I got you know, I went to prison for somebody and do but I realized my purpose though you know, I understand it now completely. So been a blessing.
So this work that you've been doing, like you were one of the architects along with Tamika and Erica, the architects of this this what we call the crisis management system in New York City. Yes, you know, and and you said where it came from? You said, what this what happened with young Dade? And I seen you at an event that you were promoting the book, sir, that you know that I've seen that the mother Dade's mother had wrote and give us some background around.
The well, like you said, myself, my dear sister Meka, Tamika uh and of course our sister Erica. You know, we like to pride ourselves. We were, you know, the three amigos. You know of that time where we committed, well before there was any bread, any money, that we would stick together, we would playing together, we would we would just do everything together. And we did that. You know, we wanted to raise the bar again. It was like
raising the awareness around gun violence. And so in the in the process of our organizations that we were all affiliated with, you know, we was able to strategize and really get the City of New York at that time to pay more attention to the work that we've been doing for so many years. And that at that time, Speaker Quinn was the Speaker of the City Council. Mayor Bloomberg was the Mayor of the city. They was able to we created the task for us. You know, it
was the first task force. This task force our culture now was one that I sat on then, you know, back in twenty like thirteen. And you know, in that task force effort, we was able to really put the real meat to the work and really added more resources. That's the birth of the crisis Management system. And so yeah, we're real proud of that. Today's over eighty nine million
dollar initiative in the City of New York. It funds about forty organizations, so many different agencies are affiliated with it, and so many jobs have been created. Now it's more like a job for most folks, you know, versus when we were doing it. It was a mission driven sort of effort. And that's the hard part now because you don't know who's in it for the mission and who's in it for the money. Most are in it for
the money, you know. But that being said, man, you know, like you said, Dayday's mom, she actually has always been and she can attest to the twenty year commitment that I made to her when I met her twenty years ago, because when she wrote this children's book called Day Day Games, It's Wings, which was a centennial it was our little twenty year anniversary book, and we published it and now it's out, you know, on Amazon and all of the
places you can about books. Our Department of Education Chancellor David Banks has now purchased over ten thousand copies of this book to disseminate throughout the city in the different schools. But it's a story about your little data eight year old little Day They like most kids, just being kids and then I'm wanting to go outside and play in this case, you know, coming home from school, and that's when the try agedy happened, just on his way home
from school. And it's a beautiful book the way that you could tell it through the lens of young people without them being so frightened because it talks about the pain and then it talks about the purpose, and then you know the triumph that came out of it. The community rallied around his little boy's life. And today, like I said, now we are we would like to consider ourselves a stickler or a staple in our neighborhood.
It's a beautiful thing.
So being the gun violence preventions are like, what do you what are you seeing inside the city as far as gun violence.
That's interesting, man, because when I got this appointment by Mayor Adams, now two years ago this time, if y'all remember, we walked over the Brooklyn Bridge together and we took over the steps. That's never happened before, especially for an appointment by the mayor. He would attest to that he's never seen that many people come out to stand in
support of the appointee in that case. That that was two years ago, and you know, going back into government, because I was already a council member's chief of staff, I was counseled, I was chief of staff the council number Charles Barnon. I've been inside the walls in the halls of government just never like this. So now interesting, like you said, what it's like, because there's actually a divide in there. You know, there's the mayoral side is the blue side. Then there's the speaker in the city
council side, which is the red side. Believe it or not. Literally they got red rooms and blue rooms, and so I used to be on the red room side. Now I'm over with the folks on the blue room side. And you wonder the wide things all the way they are in our neighborhoods.
Now you just see it clear.
You can see it there like this bottleneck. So much division, you know, so much unnecessary. I mean, just beef and we want our kids to stop beefing. You know, we gotta work it from the top. So I'm now, interestingly enough, I come from the boots on the ground. And so that's what was really surprising about my appointment because out in grassroots and I'm going back in and I'm talking about this issue that nobody really wants to talk about,
called gun violence. The mayor did something unique. He said, I don't want you just to be on the task force. I want you to co chair this task force. Like literally, you're gonna leave. You're gonna sit at the head of the table, and I'm gonna put every commissioner at your table, every deputy commissioner at my table from all the city agencies, and everybody got to go into their tool kit. Everybody got to go and look and see what they could do about this issue called gun violence. And so that's
been like I said, now two years. At first, you know, it was it was getting to know you better kind of thing. They didn't know why the mayor would pick me. And he'll tell you in a minute. I know at like I know my son, I know Tamika. I know that we are on the ground, and he wanted somebody from the ground to be in the mix. Today were
moving along. Man. We've actually we created a blueprint, a community plan that's seven strategies that we focusing on the top six precincts in the City of New York where most of the gun violence is coming from. It's actually thirty precincts all together, it's seventy seven precincts, and out of the seventy seven precincts, thirty of them are responsible for ninety eight percent of the gun violence. And out of the thirty six of them are responsible for over
thirty percent, So we call those the top six. And so what we're doing is really laser focusing in those neighborhoods at first, and then we're going to move on to the other communities and pouring mad resources. Bro, It's really like we got to really have if there's mass shootings, we need mass resources.
Well, I remember you used to be very particular about how police were engaged in your work, right, you were very particular about that. You was just like, I can't overdo it because your model is community safety, not policing absolutely, But now that you work with the government, I wonder has it shifted or how do you deal with their desire to be.
The only ones?
And then I think Mayor Adams is a little bit different because he does cite sometimes that there are groups around the city that are doing great work. But Deblasio was he failed to even though he gave money, lots of money, poured resources in and showed a lot of respect to us off camera, But whenever he would do a press conference, he would always talk about the number safety and the numbers of violent incidents going down and speak about police. Never did he marry the two. So
I'm just wondering with the ins and outs that you see. What, how have you evolved in that area or is it pretty much the same?
Well, I'm still me. I'm just another elevated version of me. That's why my last name has been hyphenated. Right, I'm going through like.
A midlife christ.
Like milikas my moment. You know, most people don't know who Malik, you basses, that's Malcolm X, right, and so when he went to that next level, that's why I believe I am now So like you said, we were coming from protests, were coming from activism. So I know how to stand tald. I know how to look them in the eye. I'm not intimidated when I go into
those rooms. The difference is today I have access to the top chiefs and all of the departments across the city, and so with them, they got to learn how to deal with me more so than I got to learn how to deal with them. And so I speak for the community right. When I understand what issues come about, I know how to articulate it. I'm now seen another side too, which is their side of the equation. You know,
we are under surveillance New York City. Like literally it's about ninety almost ninety nine percent under surveillance, meaning the moment you step out your house, they got odds on you. Whether it's in the sky through the drones or whether it's through the towers.
They doing something stuff like nobody.
Knows I'm seeing I'm seeing the movie, right, So you heard me, Like our people can tell us anything. But then when I see what they like, all on for a second before you go off, let me take a look at this, And I'm like okay with that all the time, So you know, I still know. My mama told me, if we're gonna lie, you know, make sure we go and lie together. Right, they don't tell me the truth. So now I'm looking stupid and I'm out there fighting and they ain't telling me all the other
stuff I already know. So you be knowing what I'm saying. But I'm still me and I'm gonna always remain You know, that's sticking because the police still have a long ways to go before we could build a bridge before you know, there's a real divide and and that I'm I'm pro community. I tell them that all the time, Like you said, system into community, safety, not just public safety. I'm more into community safety.
I was just gonna say the commissioner Coban, I actually like him, you know, conversations that I've had with him, he gives the impression that he really gets it. But no matter which commissioner you put in place, the systems are archaic, and the desire to remain a terrorizing, occupying force is something that is deeply embedded in law enforcement across the nation.
I'm not just saying in New York.
So you could come in there and be like we're gonna do this and that, and do this and that and the third and you should make significant shape like we are putting you in position or you have been put in position to fight against the wind at all times, and that's what we want to see. And if you don't do that, then there's challenges. But I've also learned because obviously under the Raymond Kelly administration, when we work very closely with Phil Banks, I used to be in
law City Hall every day. In fact, I would be no in one police plaza. I would be in want police plaza, arguing or working on a plan or trying to figure out the community. What is it called the community safety, what was the Blue Shirts.
Called the community trying to work.
With community affairs and doing all my work, and then if I had a conference call that had to do with something completely different, I find your little office, going there and do my work and then go outside the building and protest them at five o'clock, six o'clock. And I did, and I mean, and I would go inside and tell them like, y'all are just wrong, Like you
just are wrong. We would have debates, conversations, arguments, all of that, and I would still take my ass outside and say, and I'm going to protest against y'all because you know, some of these people are good people, Yes, good people. Phil Banks, great guy, but still has, in my judgment, his mind set on that system at times. And you have to be willing to work with them, but you also have to be willing to call their assets out.
When they're wrong. And there's no two ways about it, right, And so you're like me, I'm on it, just like that, I call a spade a spade. You got to be the system. You can't. You can't be the system without a system, which is also part of why we created the crisis management systems. Right and Erica talks about that all the time, so that we could use that as a weapon, because really we're talking about systematic oppression on our people. The police department is an example of it.
As my sister mentioned, all of them that may be in that department are not all bad people, but just like anything, you have your minority of those that just need to go like straight up, and they make it look bad for every fact, you know, and so that few and until they're willing to call their own out, and really we want to see that as a community, see how they handle their own you know, don't think it's going to be a lot of progress made in
the streets, right, because that's what we as a community be looking for, is just and accountability. So, like I was saying, under this current administration versus the previous administration around and I've been around since Juliani, right and not seeing how it's been played out since nine to eleven.
And I can attest that this administration with the mayor at the helm him coming from the community side of things when he was also on the job he co founded one hundred Blacks and law Enforcement who Cared and him knowing what that's like to make sure that police violence and misconduct and things like that has to be addressed.
I can honestly say that they are more like you said, they're more understanding, and I think we're a lot more closer to respectfully making some policy changes, because that's really what you have to change. The majority of the department. Those are the middle managements I would think are the problem. It's not the heads of shop. It's not the CEOs or the chiefs. They the white shirts, they get it. It's not community affairs officers, the sky Blues. I tell them,
they understand. It's the people who are out there in charge at the prect level, at the desk, the desk sergeant, those that oversee the street patrol right, those that have those the authority on the ground is where we need
to the most impact. Because even the rookies, right they're coming out of the academy and undergoing some innovative training, but if they're putting to a precinct and they are paired up with an officer who've been on the job for twenty five to thirty years of doing it the way that they've been doing it, a lot of even what they which trained to do, they can't do because the people who are out there on the ground are
going to be the ones that trump them. And so that's where I think we need to focus our attentions on that.
I never thought about it that way.
Yeah, And it doesn't mean that we're saying that the activists and the organizers should not continue to raise whole hell, because you can't change a system unless the lights are
on and the pressure is being applied. And so certainly I'm not you know, I would never I would never suggest that because I believe from my conversations with Caban the commissioner, that all of a sudden, I would not oppose violence because police violence is still happening and it's very real in this city and again across the country. But I do know that I could have a better conversation with him, because in the past we couldn't have conversations at all.
And and by the way, Raymond Kelly, you know, he.
Was a nice guy, but he was a stickler for the system remaining at you know, with the police having the power, that's a big part of the problem is that they want all they want power that.
Is unchecked, and that's what Trump is talking about.
Impunity for police office is and that's and that's a mindset that we've had to crack.
So we still want to be outside as.
We should, and I think we should always encourage young activists. I'm excited when I see that they are, you know, taking it to the streets right, you know, and getting their boots you know, on the ground, because that's the only way, like we know that some people in power are going to honorably respect them and really take what they're saying serious.
So I would I just want to know, being doing this work and during gun violence away in this month, how is gun violence like, what is going on the streets?
Hot? Is it summertime?
You know how it is? Like it's hot, it's still hot. We are far from where we all want to be, but we also are not where we want was either. You know, if you look at the numbers in the eighties and the nineties and the early two thousands when it related to like homicides and shootings in the city of New York were like almost two hundred per sent
less decreased than it was back then. This era, we are in the arrange around two hundred to something homicides with averaging it, but even though all those are just numbers, right and not people. We always got to remember every person that we every prody we talk about as a human being that represents a family. So we really want to continue the efforts that we're doing. We're heading in
the right directions. You're seeing a lot more stabbings and that's you know, something that a lot of people don't understand. That says that there's a culture shift happening. When people are having disputes where they used to go run and get the gun and handle their beef with a gun, they're now choosing different weapons. So there is a shift that is happening. That's actually not a bad thing. And again, I've been stabbed too, so I know a stab woond,
I've been shot. I know the difference, and be honest with your stab wound is to me, is more worse than the gunshot wound. However, the people, the behavior changes happening. You know, people are changing their mind. People are getting sick and tired of going to jail. People are beginning to also learn earn that we could talk that these things out, these these disputes, these beefs that men were talking a minuscule beef they beefing over nothing off of
something that can be talked out. And that's the work that the men and women of the crisis management system is doing here in New York City and all across the country. You got violence interruptors, you got people that are hospital responders and people that are out there working in case management positions, and they're just coaching the public on how to resolve your conflicts without it happened to result with violence. And I think that's a good sign. So
we are much safer, that's the reality. But the perception is that it's still unsafe out there.
It's people are especially when you're getting people knocking you in your face on the train and people.
Getting pushed on the training tracks. So a lot of peoples and rightfully, you hear gunshot. This is the you know, fourth of July week in coming up, so we always cringe around this time of the year because of the fireworks, and that triggers a lot of people, you know, when they hear these loud booms. A lot of people are afraid. Our families have been so living in trauma for so long that the time they hear something like a firecracker,
they they're jumping into their their tubs. You know how they're training their kids to duck, you know, roll and all of those because they could be because it could be right, and we're not going to stick around and see if it wasn't. So, yeah, we are heading in the right direction. Things are getting much better, I think as a city collectively, everybody is doing their part, but we also got some still a way to go.
There's some areas around the city where you know that things have gotten better. The data is clear that violence has reduced significantly, and communities are safer. And the other question, because if you know, I try to think the way that I know some of my super brilliant listeners they are and they and sometimes they like to be ornery and and and and trolling me, but they're really brilliant,
you know what I'm saying. And so they ask criticals questions that feel like they're trying to be contradictory, but they're actually not. They're really just trying to get to the bat line. So if I say to you, do you know some places where things are better? Their response would be, oh, that's because it's gentrified, right, That's what they would say, Like, oh, the white people moved in and of course it got better. But I don't think that that is one hundred percent truth.
So give us some very much not true. So where we are, where the crisis management system organizations, men and women, boots are on the ground, we can and this is by data. We can show you from all the way up from the South BRONX and or Senior, other parts of the BX, and throughout Central Harlem, East Harlem. You know, you go through Queens in South Jamaica, you go to
far Rockaway. We could go into Brooklyn where I am in East New York, and in Brownsville and East Flatbush and other parts and even just like for example, in Staten Island this past Sunday, I had the privilege of being out there with my brothers and sisters of the True to Life team out there headed by my brother I and Mike, Perry and Rachel. They just celebrated one thousand days of no shooting, like literally no shooting in that precinct area. Now, this is the difference inside the precincts.
We don't cover the whole precinct. But where we are the organizations, I'm mentioning the CCDs, the King of Kings, the East Saved East Harlem's not another child's ink, the Brags and the SOSS and all of us those organizations, the elite learners and the bevos and all of us. Where we are is statistically safer. And that's data that can back that up. Because that's one of the things that I receive on a weekly basis is the data I get the pin maps. I look at the maps.
I can sell you where where we are, where we are inside the precinct. The precinct might be up, but in the areas where the groups are, it's down. And that's the evidence that we have at our disposal to kind of dispute anybody that would.
Love to do to spend it takes resources to do more work. So if people say, well then why don't y'all do it over there, well, why don't you donate?
Don't you give up?
And why Monday?
We're doing this in one shift to day. Literally, this is only happening eight hours out of one day normally three ships.
Yeah, we said that. We were saying that the other day about what strategies we think. We think violence is happening mostly at twelve and beyond beyond early morning time. So you know, the city and the states need to fund organizations that can.
Have seven day week because violence.
Is having twenty four hours, and you know, the people in the communities know that there are times where the violence is highest. You know, And I was going to ask you pretty much the same thing, but what do you think of some effective strategies that you've been using that in certain areas you see that it works.
To me, I.
Think the effective strategy, the most effective strategy that we've been using today to minimate the violence is using the credible messages by us literally looking at a body of people who are residents of our city who have never been asked to participate in anything positive for the most of them in their lives. We have able to go to people who are influent, you, people who have been there and done that, and we're able to approach them
and say, look, we need you. Now. We've tried police, everybody, we tried all the type of what we haven't tried is how about you getting involved in that fight and having that type of individual with that type of credibility, having that type of influence that can talk straight to the element and be able to say yo, pause when when they call for a pause or ceasefire. To me, is it's our secret weapon. We've never had this done before.
And now this is why this is catching wildfire all across the nation, the utilization of credible messengers, right, people who come from them same neighborhoods, who have that lived
experience like myself. I've been shot, I've been jailed, I've been out there, and I'm the one that can relate with the population of people who may be in that life today, approach that individual and talking to them not in an aggressive fashion, like a threatening fashion, but in a realistic like yo, bro, real conversations and reasoning like I can understand. Like, we don't go to them with no bullshit, like we're not asking them to put down a gun if we ain't got nothing to replace it with,
because that's unrealistic. We know what it's like. We hustled. We understand that we got to feed. Like I said, I came from a big family. What I wanted to do was go back in the crib and help my moms, right, and most of the others that are out there, they're thinking the same way. So by having these men and women that are braived, they don't have vests, they don't have guns, they don't have shields or radios or helicopters or drones. They just got big hearts and they're not
and they're not scared of their own element. That has been the biggest fact though, And now people that have been in that lifestyle have changed their lifestyles around their transforming and emerging into all different types of other professions. There's spinoffs in colleges, like there's spin offs in business, there's spinoffs in community based they're having their own nonprofits. To me, that's been the blessing of the work that we have been able to found systems shift the real proud.
Of what we did together.
And I am you know a lot of times you have to keep telling me the story because they say that the best way for people to remember and for history to stick is to continue to tell the story. Until I found myself having to say we created the crisis management system in New York almost one hundred million dollars and having to come and people are like, what that's you know, amazing, But you know, I would say that if I had to give another thing that you said,
what are the strategies? I would say another piece with the credible messengers, which is number one, is the consistency. And it's the same thing as last week when we interviewed the women from l Ees and they have an educational program. They go into schools. Then you guys, actually you should be partnered with the les folks because what they do is going to the schools and receive the data of the children who are not showing up.
And they find the kids. They find them.
They could be in what they were saying that they found kids in Yemen. They found kids, they're in Africa, somebody you know, they're pregnant, don't have a babysitter, don't have food, don't have whatever. And they find solutions to you know, helping to get these kids back in the schools.
And many of the schools that were on the.
Watch list have gotten better as a result of the work that they are doing working with families and pinpointing problems even within the system and then reading the policy of the system to find a loopholes to get these children the type of help that they need.
I mean, this is powerful.
We went to all to do whole way mentoring, hall way way monitor mentoring, but they have you know, brothers from the community that go into the school and pretty much Whollway monitors and they build it with the brothers and the sisters, and they build relationships so they make sure when they come to school, they walk in them too. The class they're able to sense and see what's going on. If it's something going on, they get ahead of it.
So they build a whole community model that is ensuring that our kids get the best education and they're safe at the same time.
And I think that what Erica always wanted. Erica Ford for those people who are listening, she's our sister and she it was the three of us that work tirelessly to create this model and Erica. You know, I think about Erica now because she just recently did a lot conversation, a live video where she's talking about her health and how her health has been ailing and she's been through a lot to try to get herself better. And we know from looking at Erika from being around her, that
she really is dealing with some serious health challenges. But one of the things about I promised that if there was some scientific, I don't know person around that they could pinpoint.
Those moments when she was.
Literally birthing the crisis management system from like her soul and doing the work at the same time to how it takes you down, like it can take so much from you that she was fighting to help people understand that a holistic approach. And that's why I brought up l e s because all things have to work together. And that's what's wrong with government. Sometimes we go in to talk to legislators and they don't have no idea about other pieces of legislation that's coming out of different
offices or other things that's happening. It's not all connected. And I think that so that's one. So I think the connection is one. But the commitment, the consistency of being like on the wall, like a young person knows I'm gonna see Ray or John or Lisa or so, and so even if I don't even really like that person, they have to care to keep coming back here all the time, you know what I'm saying, Yeah, yeah.
You can't. Somebody you know didn't give up on us, right, this is while we're sitting here, right, And so if you're correct that that practice is key in this work with.
How do you keep your teams consistent because they have problems too.
Life is happening? Are?
They are our first participant, right to get the body of people that we send out into the streets, they got to be a minimum working on theyself to go into a community that's troubled and say I want.
To help you.
You know, you're not helping yourself, so you know, healing people, heal people, you know, and so you correct. So what I do, and I know others are following and doing the same thing, is we constantly pour our resources into them, right, We test drive them, We take them around the block first, and then if it's working with them, then we know it works because they now can go into a community that they come from and speak from experience, you know,
And consistency is the key. We often have to have what I care, constant reinforcement training, right because we've been out there for so long. A lot of the crime genitive attitudes that we possess in our heads are in
our DNA. So sometimes you could walk into a supermarket and you see the grapes and you see the fruit, and you start, you know, nibbling away at the fruit and the grapes, and you're not paying for it, right, you know, or you might see a stick of gum it up or a bag of chips in the store, and you just naturally, you know, realizing that if you got to check out with that, you got to pay on your way out, because if not, you're on camera, going back to surveillance, and they're going to be able
to pick you up. And so we got to realize that some things that we have been doing since we were children, we got to flush that stuff out our system. We got to teach our new behaviors in terms of how we go. Like when we were raised as by moms, she taught us that if someone hit you, you what hit them back, right, And now some of our families got even deeper that like pick up a bottle, brust
them upside their head like a lot. We've been taught that growing up, and now we got to retrain and reteach ourselves that that that may not necessarily be the best way to handle that strife. Because if that person bleeds and goes to the hospital out that person bleeds out and does that's a homicide.
That has happened to people we know.
And people only doing what they were taught to do.
We were forced here through violence absolutely, and then we have been through the most violent practices and the most violent A study, if you are a study.
Hasn't can continue to be.
Done about the violence that we had to suffer. How hard is it to get a people to give up and be stripped of everything they know and be willing to bow down and be forced to tend the land, raise the kids, you know, feed the babies, have to have sex and be raped, you know, against our will. The violence that it took to break us is the violent attitude that so many have passed down from generation. And so when you think about that, man, we're going, you know it's deep.
I don't want you to leave.
Without us talking about the business of this. If I'm the mayor and I'm sitting here, if I'm the mayor from Ville, Alabama was a town where my mother is from. And I'm watching this right now because Hey, I like my song. I listen to his music. I love to listen to the show. Talk about I'm the mayor. What does he or she need to do? How can they participate in this? What does the business of an operation
like this look? And I know there's many sides because you got local groups, your local organizations which you can speak to. But then it gets bigger as you start talking about city participating.
I think New York City is the best example. You know this mayor, Mayor Eric Adams did something bold, Like I said, he appointed somebody from the streets and made that personal part of his administration. Other mayors around the country needs to really consider that. Right now, they're being advised by people who really don't understand that. Study the book and they learned it in school, but they never
really lived through it and understand it completing. They may not have the connections most of these mans needed, and that is to the streets, right, And so I think that's a good example. We need to use our playbook. They need to look at who they may have in their city, and then they need to think about how do we replicate what we know is working. There are a number of models across the country that is working, and I think that's something that a lot of mans
I see as I travel are utilizing. But again, it's back to a holistic approach, right, there's no one way out out of this situation. We have to look at that and also say that those mans like they got to be willing to put their money where their mouth is because gun violence is very expensive. You know, it's that on the average, it's about a million dollars per
shooting victim that the city will actually expense. You think about it, right, a person gets shot, how many responders, how many emergency responders respond to, how many police officers, how many firefighters got to clean up the blood off the street, how many our ambulance in tease folks? How
many people in the hospitals that are waiting doctors? And then somebody on the other side of the gun, right, who is the perpetrator, has to Now there's a DA's office that's going to investigate right in the police department. Then that person may get captured and have to go through the courts, right and all those court officers, and then that person may have to be detained. That's now
correctional facility. And so there you see all of the plethora of different moneies that we as people that pay taxes, are investing in the one person. One person being not talking about that person dies at a whole level. If they live, they got hospitalization. You know, the cost of hospital bills today to treat you know, a person we have is expensive. So if we got that kind of
money to, you know, to dole out and commit. We need to also look at how much we commit in the alternatives to violence, Right, how do we do the alternatives to police and models like what we have here in New York City, the community violence and divention model that we have in New York City, like the Christ Management System. Mayors across the city and across the country can do that. They can make a commitment because they are in control of their own budget and make that
wise investment, just like they do in their security cameras. Right. They that stuff costs money and they just need to look at it from that end. And then it's a part of public sit it's a part of public saty. It's an investment. It's a real investment. But you got to use the people from those communities. You can't have people that just represent that community. You have to have people who have literally come from those neighborhoods.
Well, listening, Tee, we can talk for hours like we always do. My brother, I'm always in awe at the work you do and how you constantly stay boots to the ground. You know, you're a mentor, You're a motivator, you know, and a true leader. You know, when I started doing this work, you're one of the first people that I modeled myself after watching how you move and how you conduct yourself, how you move honorably, and how you're consistent and always authentic, and everybody would say the
same thing about you. So you know, you you've definitely earned everything that you got in this work, and you continue to do the work, sir.
So I just want to say that we appreciate you, man.
It's always a pleasure to talk to you, man, and we're gonna be on that battlefield with you change.
When you got the city. And it's not even a job.
No, it's not even a job because you don't even guess not I do not even if this is a mission right that I'm on that we're on. I mean, they couldn't even pay us enough.
But I know that how much does it cost to run one of your sites at minimum?
Effectively half a million dollars a year, just at minimum, that's gonna get you just maybe about maybe eight to maybe ten employees.
You think about it, Not everybody is outside.
We have to have a back office and things like that. So it's not enough money. And that's only for one shift, remember only one eight hour shift. We can only employ them up to eight hours, and after that the rest of the day, the neighborhoods left on their own right, and so we really got to work. We still got more work to do. It we need to just working alongside y'all, knowing that I got comrades like y'all that are you know, back in call and vice versa. Y'all
know that we pop out boycott black murder. You know how we get down and you know, it makes me know that when I'm doing I'm not doing a loan, you know, because that's that's the part of it, you know, being a general who leads from the front, you know, just knowing that I got back up, I got my peoples whenever I need them, as we've seen demonstrated this past Saturday, as you you know, will always do, you know, Tamika, when we got to go in front of any crowd, I appreciate this opportunity.
Yeah for sure. I you know that how much I love and admire what you do. And you know we're talking about Erica and her situation, but you can look at each one of us and see where this work has taken so much from us, you know, just we've given and given and given, and I would do it again, you know, I would do it again. But I know the points in our lives when we were near death, trying to save somebody else, trying to save organizations, save whatever. And you know, I don't know. I guess we go
round and around in circles. But it feels good to know that we're getting to the place where at least we could try to take care of ourselves while doing the work at the same time. So it's good to see you take the care of yourself.
And.
We appreciate you.
Man.
You've got to open door policy anytime. Hen thank you.
For those people who are listening. This is literally how we do our work. We hear things, we get inspired, and we start putting pieces together and the next thing, you know, you all get to see the finished product, or at least the development product of you know, of us, of strategy. And I think the coalition, like I said, it's the gumbo, like everything is in the pot, and I think it's going to be fulfilling.
Yes, shout out to our brother at Man for always coming through. You know, he's really like a big brother to me. Calls me all the time. I ask advice, you know, and he has the lived experience and he does, you know, And he's always got he's always just authentic man. And you never see a more positive brother. You very rarely hear At raised his voice.
You know, he's very passionate. I've seen it, but I don't. I mean, I've seen it too, but I very rarely see it. Man.
He knows he's a people person, you know, you know how people know how to communicate. Yea.
He knows how to get away from people too, when he feels like they're taking him to that place. Like he said, the first uh, the first client is you. You gotta work on you before you could go out and do work for other people. And we constantly are holding one another accountable for that and until freedom in our larger spaces that we have to be mindful of. Like you, nobody's perfect and saying AT is perfect, certainly
we're not. But we do have to be more mindful of how we carry ourselves as we claim to be leaders of other people. And you know, I've had to learn conflict resolution skills within me.
I'm talking about my own conflict with myself.
Forget about conflict because you conflict with you, I have then, exactly, and then you can't get out of conflict with nobody if you don't start the conflict with you. And that's exactly how I ended up being addicted, because there's a conflict within And if you don't have the skills to be able to acknowledge that you're being triggered to the point where you're making.
Bad decisions, you will go.
I mean, things could get really, really, really bad. You have to have the skill of saying to yourself, Okay, is it the bottle of alcohol that I need?
Or is it prayer? Or is it meditation? Or is it what? And it's a fight again, it's a fight against the wind.
Listen, you you've mastered that. I mean you you well, I won't say the word master, you overcome. But I think that you're very aware, you know. And I think what they.
Say behavior, yeah, yes.
Yeah, I just think that you're a lot more aware.
And I think they say in order for someone who's an attic, you have to acknowledge you're an addict.
You have to always be aware of things that trigger you, things that set you with that, and you seem very aware of those things.
You know, you always acknowledge this, and I know this and that, and I know I'm not doing that and I'm gonna stay away. So you know, that's that's part of growth, that's part of you know, identifying the conflict within yourself.
But what happens when the addiction becomes food?
I mean, that's that's one of the biggest addictions in the world.
For real.
You have to figure it out. So now I don't get it today, It's it's pretty much simple. I just don't get why in the hell we only have these two seventy and eighty yeo men as our candidates to president. I just don't understand that. Like I don't understand how we got ourselves in the clusterfuck. This is what we call a complete clusterfuck. Like you have to choose between Joe and Donald Like you don't have to know. I'm saying some one of them is going to be the president.
But I'm just saying, if you choose to go with Joe Stein.
I'm talking about but yeah, and I love doctor Cornell West and and you know how.
Many other people are right in for president.
Problem Yeah, but I'm trying to tell you doctor Cornell West would be I would love that doctor Cornell West. But I'm talking about realistically, when we having a conversation about who's going to be voted as the President of the United States, is Joe or Donald? And none of them to me are fit to that just this my personal event. They don't fit the criteria what it takes
to be have leadership. Now, when I look at both camps, I say to myself, so maybe maybe I don't think Jason Tatum is the best player to me, maybe I don't think he's like the best leader. But I can look and see how the Bosston Celtics can win the championship because I might be like, oh, now Jalen Brown is dope and for Zenias, oh and they got Drew Holliday.
Like there's a team.
And that's how I look at and this this is the that's the only benefit to me. When I look at Joe's team, I know that he's surrounded by smart, brilliant individuals who have you know, credentials and who actually want to do good.
You know, I don't.
I mean right, I mean we know them.
Exactly, so that that that's the plus.
I don't see the only thing Trump does is higher people that he thinks he can control, and he thinks he's smarter than and if he's smarter than or he's it's racist all those things. But I'm saying, but if he's smarter than the people that he hiring, then that's crazy to me.
I don't either.
It's try to break it down because I don't even know.
I don't even want to break it down.
I just want because I just don't understand because when I'm looking, I'm like, I'm watching these people debate and watching them move and watching them talk, and I'm like, this, this can't be life. It's like, nah, this can't really like be life. But it is, you know, And in November people have to make decisions. There's no way that I'm not going to vote. But I just don't understand how this is what we've come to. And this is
what I say after this election. If we're not intentional about creating something that combats with the system, is the quote unquote something different. If we're not intentional about creating something different, then we just deserve whatever we get. Because I thought that was everybody's strategy after the last election. When people say, oh, we don't want this now cool. Whoever gets is who is our you know, the person that we're gonna fight against. We ain't got none of
these people as our allies. We're gonna fight against that. We're gonna push them, We're gonna create our own structure system. We're gonna create something that forces them to do what it is that we want them to do. And then we're gonna put the people that we want in place in place.
That's that should be distracted.
I mean, that's that's really good. But it takes more than four years, and I don't know if it tasts.
It does because when you start talking about putting a structure and a system in place, and and you have a portion of First of all, we have to identify, just as you know, as an organizer for all of these years, the first thing that we have to do is identify who's really really with us, which whittles down and then we also have to be willing to look at those people who who look like us, who are
an imminent threat to what we're attempting to do. Then you have to figure out how to separate the two because a lot of times, and you mentioned this before, you look at that you know, you look at well, we just said it.
You you think people.
Are with you and you're traveling with them down the road, and then you find out that their interest and the way in which they line up.
Is so is it?
It's actually it pulls us backwards. So first of all, you've got to identify who who are, who is the day? Who is the we that even wants something different, because some people just want comfort, they don't want different, and difference means pain.
It's going to be painful, that's true, I think.
But I think there's a lot of people that want something different.
I think I think there's so many people that feel underrepresented and unseen within this current structuring system that if people were very intentional about creating and building and really doing the work necessary to create something different, it would be possible.
So what do you think happened to all the people who really did try.
What usually happens with movements and structures. There's too many chiefs.
So you don't think that that's the same that.
I don't know.
I just think the way that you go about it, right is really create sitting down with like minds.
Right.
It's like anything you create a team, you keep on Okay, you say you want to be in the team. Oh yeah, you're not. Really you don't want because you want to do what you want to do. But this is what we need you to do for this team. And a lot of people don't understand. And America got this way because they created something and everybody probably wasn't on the same page, right, So we have to have the same steadfastness energy, like what it's going to take to to
break the system. It's going to take this saying energy that they put in to make the system. So if we just complacent, you know, and we just sit around and we just saying, Okay, you know what, I'm tired. He don't want to listen. They don't want to listen. I'm just tired. It's not gonna work like that. And with that said, we've come to the end of another episode.
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