The Importance of Male Role Models

I spent uh a lot of time with my own mama, and I guess that's really all you can ask for. I thought a lot about your mom, you know, on Mother's Day. Um My home girl, Patricia Lennon. So I know yesterday was probably a tough day for you and your family members. Hopefully you had a chance to be with your loved ones and to celebrate your mom. You know, it was kind of tough started earlier, but I was with the baby the whole day, so you know, that

kind of helped a lot. And I'm playing soccer and I was a soccer dad, so yelling it all gain with the rests and getting energetic kind of just took

my mind off it. But it was a period early yesterday morning that that was really tough for me, and me and my brother were here and my brother stayed with me this weekend, and we were just talking about my mother's and I posted one of our videos for dancing, which we always I love to dance with her and she would always laugh because I always would make her dance,

So that was like our little things. So you know, it was tough, but you know, I just pictured her dancing in my mind and it got me through it a lot better. Yep, Patricia is a legend that lives

on so UM. So what happened this weekend was pretty cool because all of last week I was a little I don't know, I want to use the word high strong, but that's not really the word, but just on edge because I had a real important speech to make UM on Saturday where I was the commencement speaker for Virginia Union University UM, and I also received an honorary doctorate degree UM from the school, and so I was all like, oh,

first of all, I have it. You know, I like my props, this is my degree, my deploy my degree creat that's right. Wait a minute, I'm gonna show you guys what that was that just fell. This is it, and what fell out of it that I didn't even remember. I have is a piece of art that was was actually created while I was speaking. So there was a gentleman who he drew this while I was speaking. So anyway,

it was a really powerful day. First of all, Virginia Union has produced some of the most UM prominent preachers, black preachers UH in America. And UM, so the school is a it has a real holy spirit about it. UM. And so the singing, the choir, everything was so good. And then it was my turn to speak, and I UM, of course, since we came back from Africa, I think I know everything about Africa, UM. And I talked about, you know, this idea that we can't forget who we are.

We cannot forget and we must learn more about our lineage UM and understand that we're connected to one point twenty six billion people across the world, on a continent with fifty four countries, and you know, we're bigger than what they try to make us here in this country. And you know, I talked about this idea that we're

not one another's enemies that that was created. When we stood in those dungeons, I saw immediately exactly how the Atlantic, the trans Atlantic slave trade created the division that we deal with that we fight against every single day within our own community. I'm not talking about what the Europeans

is doing the Caucasions and you know. And so basically I spent some time really focusing on this idea that we're not one another's eat enemies, you know, And being in those dungeons is where I really had an opportunity to see, like I could feel it in my heart that if I was a woman, an African woman, and I saw my man or a man, any African man passing by me while I was in while I was captured and being abused and whatever, no matter how much

I understand that you can't do anything, there's gonna be a level of resentment that that that is inside of me. And I'm sure there's a level of shame and frustration that built up in the African man. And so that is where it started this division. I'm sure They're always was tribalism, and there were always some issues between men and women and people in general in African culture, and

in every culture. But in that moment when we were in those dungeons, as the Rabbi who took us around and Um, Rabbi Cohen, as he showed us you know, Cape Coast, he was talking about how all the things about us they started they developed that stuff right there, that all these things that we have that makes us look at one another as our enemy as and and all of these differences. And so with that being said, UM, I tried to talk about that and and as best

as possible in my commencement speech. And I also learned just a few days before showing up at the school that Virginia Union is actually built on top of the grounds of a former slave jail. So there was a woman, um Mary Lumpkins, who was She was a black woman, an African woman, a black woman who was married to her slave master, and when he died, she inherited all of the land, um, and so she started Virginia Union

in the basement of the jail. And so, you know, my whole point was that everywhere around us there's things that would would really beat the life out of us. But we have to realize that we've never died. We always continue to rise. No matter what our conditions are. And so that was the message. And I received honorary doctor, which is my second The first was from Wilberforce University, which is the third. We wait, that's the third oldest

HBCU in the nation. So I got a lot to say about my list self today going on, congratulations manum, you never ceased the amazement. You continue to flourish and grow and keep being great. So we appreciate you, you know, and just listening to you know you're I just know the speech was amazing because I know, I remember how we all felt in those slave dungeons and how you were very I just wanted to get all the information

so I know you put that together. Hopefully somebody will showed it somewhere and we'll be able to see it. But if not, you know, it's it's on the Virginia Union YouTube page. But you don't mean I'm never gonna you'll never tell us that un your YouTube and watch the clip. Somebody's gonna get a clip. We're gonna we're gonna have to go put a clip up on that.

Not me, but but go ahead. And I just wanted to give a little a little bit of you know this weekend on Friday, I celebrated with my friend as he released movie Respect the Jokes has urban you know, it's urban thriller, and I'm proud, you know, just knowing who Anthony is Tone a k. Pretty Tone is, and

where he's come from and where he's overcome. We have a dope interview on my YouTube channel, you know, starting my new series called sit Down with the stand Ups, which is basically sitting down conversations with stand up individuals who overcame so much adversity, prison, near death experience and have evolved into businessmen and successful directors and all types of other things. So he's the first person that I interviewed, and his interview was compelling and new to me, even

though I've known him for over twenty pleas years. I found out so many things about him that I never knew, and um, a lot of people in the streets and the industry know him. So please tune into that. Go to my YouTube page at my song YouTube, at my son and why general watch that. Make sure that you stream Respect the Jokes is on all streaming platforms right now. Let's support, you know, brothers, that's doing something positive. Man. We always talk about the negative and who's doing all

of the stuff. This is somebody who who changed his life around for the positive. So I just wanted to give him a shout out. And unless you know about that, well you he I mean, we we definitely featured some of your interview UM last week, and I want to go back and listen to the Old Street Politicians episode.

You can hear UM a little bit of the interview with my son and tone, But in addition to that, you should go and share, share, share like like like on my son YouTube page and listen to the entire interview. There's a lot of stuff happening, and I want to help us kind of speed through this next portion of the show because we have a guest who's actually already on and wanting and eager to come on and talk

about some of the issues that we're covering today. But a lot has been happening with my own family, UM, with some of my friends. I. We have a very close friend you and I whose son UM has been dealing with violence in school. He actually was jumped a couple of days ago, and eight boys tried to beat up on a kid who's really a good kid. He you know, We've tried to do everything we can to find out because you know, I'm not one of those parents that's like, oh, not my child, No, my child too.

So I'm trying to understand what exactly has he done wrong? And literally no one is able to explain it. Um. And you know, it's just a lot. And I see a lot happening with black men. There's a mental health crisis, there is an anger crisis, there is a just so many things, finances, everything is just this a lot, and I'm really concerned about what we are going to do,

you know. And so UM, I want to talk about another a news story and two things in particular that are different, but it's something to be said about both of them. The first story is a brother named Deshaun Carter. He was an inmate at Riker's Island and he died in custody by suicide. UM. There's been a lot of conversation about this because he's the fourth victim this year, and incarcerated individual who was known to have mental health issues.

He had been hospitalized. UM. And there's so many issues and it's like you could talk about Wriker's Island to jail in New York city as one issue, and that is one thing, but it's the conditions of the people, and particularly young black men, that we're really trying to talk about today. Um. Suicide rates are up for a lot of people, and it's not just suicide, it's also murders, death, everything. Every time I scroll on my timeline, somebody is dying.

The phone calls coming through, people are committing people are dying by suicide. I have to remind myself not to say committing suicide. There is this a lot happening with people losing their life, not just violent incidents or folks getting locked up, but I'm talking about people actually dying, and I'm counting the numbers in my head of black men UM that this has been happening too. So it's

an interesting phenomenon. Then you have something as controversial as the conversation around Kevin Samuels, and I don't think we'll get a chance to really talk about that right now before we bring our guests to them. Hopefully we can

talk about it later. But you know, I've watched I've been watching the division online where there are some people who are celebrating ke Kevin Samuels, and there are other people who are helified angry um and have said some pretty nasty things about him, which I don't agree with that particular thing, um, But some of the things that Kevin Samuel Will said and the way in which he presented himself in the world, I'm not gonna lie that.

When I see some of the brothers that I respect celebrating him, it hurts me because I know what his words did to some of us as women, and how demeaning it was to us and how we felt um. And so I see why there are women. I had a friend send me a clip of Kevin Samuel Will saying something that I thought was crazy because I don't listen to him, but I saw some do. She sent me that. In addition was the like that I could see of a person that she and I both love

and respect. And she said to me, you see, this is why I can't This is why I can't funk with us, right, which really what she meant was, this is why I can't funk with our brothers. And there's there's a and and and and I'm thinking the mental

health crisis, the challenges we're facing. We're losing so many of our young black men, and then there are Black women who are really really building up a level of disdain and anger with our men, and there's such a big disconnect that I feel like we're in a place

where we really got to do something about it. Well, you know, I want to give a little pushback to that, because I definitely understand that there are definitely things that Kevin san You said and I was like, that's the stupid of ship you could have said, right, But then there were definitely things that he said that when he were a hundreds sent on point as from perspective as

a man. Right, So I look at that as there are a lot of women that I respect that women have that follow women that have said things about men that I'd be like, how do you even listen to ship like that? How do you think that's okay? And women to be like, yeah, that's right, and they're going int page and be like that's right, and they'll celebrate women that I think so so much male bashing that it doesn't even make sense that you would ever say

anything about them. Right. And then when we think about that, we look at farricon, right, we look at how we want to be able to say, you know, honorable minister Lewis Farrakon. How we can look and say Farrakhan has done this for the community, he said these things, he's empowered, he's done these things. But these things right here, we just don't agree with you. I don't agree with everything that anybody says, right, but there are things that people

say that are correct. So we have to we have to be able, right, We have to be able to be consistent. Right. We can't be inconsistent and we it's okay for us to like some of the stuff that somebody says, but we can't like none of the stuff that somebody else says because it doesn't fit our narrative. Right.

I have to be able to respect that women are gonna like things that some women say that that I think a completely bashed meals that have absolutely hate black men, and and and I go on pages and I see likes from women that I loved every day on the pages of women that I think hate black men. Right, and then so I have to respect that. I don't disagree with you, but I think that where the challenge comes in. I know some black women right that have

said things that really triggered and upset black men. They didn't make their whole career demeaning black men. This makes this man's his portfolio. That's the poor photo that you see. I can I can give you videos where he attacked black men. I'm not I'm not talking about and I'm saying that. What I'm saying is whether he was attacking black men or black women. I don't think that it was helpful to do either, right. I think there is

a way. I think there is a way that you can communicate with someone to help them understand things without calling them fat and saying that at thirty five you are leftovers. There are certain words and then and I could go on, I could pull out a list, and I promise you that some of these black women you talk about, if you tell me you know who they are, I know some of them that have said some things

that really triggered them, triggered black men. But I will tell you that I do not know of them using certain language, potent language that is extremely demeaning. Kevin Samuels was making a living off of trying to be as nasty as possible to to say it in a way that really impacts and hurts you. It's okay to say since you gotta be in shape. If you're gonna be with a certain kind of man, you need to be in shape. You gotta get yourself together because you need

to you know, first of all, be healthy. That you can speak like that. But when you start using words like fat and unattractive and and nobody wants you. You that to me to make a living off of speaking to people like that, it's not helpful. It actually breaks us down more than we already are. And I don't support any black woman that does that. I don't support any black man that does that. I think anybody that

does that is disgusting, quite frankly. And so that's what I'm saying, and I'm not trying and I'm not saying that he couldn't see he didn't say some things that are right, And I don't put him in Minister Aaricon in the same position, because while Minister Faricon has said some things that I don't agree with, he has spent his life building us up, not tearing us down. This

man was doing the opposite. But I don't I don't agree with that because you you have you have women right who have taken who followed Kevin Samuels and then when you say that the value wasn't shot, So what are we talking about? Listen to what I'm saying. I'm not saying. I'm not talking about an opinion about something.

I'm talking about if I'm if a woman can listen to Kevin's in and she can find a benefit in benefiting herself and saying what he said made me a better person, It made me reflect on myself, it made me do better. Right, And let's let's table this and go back and talk about it because we both have so much to say. So let's put our guests through on this issue of dealing with black men. So I'm so, so, so so excited that today we have with us a gurgle,

a dude from from Brooklyn. That's our brother. We have a joke on this show that it's all of our friends, because we have so many friends doing so many impactful things. UM and Cavane, We're so happy to have you on Street Politicians today. Let me give you your proper acknowledgements. You are from Brooklyn, New York. You're a community leader,

not just an organizer, but a leader. You are CEO of Community Capacity Development UM, which is your organization that does justice and healing work um for black folks and other people of color in our communities who are dealing with serious trauma. You also are one of the members of the Crisis Management Team and a leading voice in helping to be you know, strategic in terms of the work that's happening with anti violence groups around New York. So thanks for having for allowing us to have you

today on Street Politicians, The Privilege and Big Mice Without Groske. Listen, Man, you know how it is, Man, I do it to me. It tells me she's the boss here. You know. She woke me up and said, Kabin gonna be on the show to this all right, Well, I got one of my brothers here so we could both take a little bit of this abuse to the Absolutely absolutely listen. It's a privilege in our honor. I really respect you know, the dialogue and the platform that you have created here

in other spaces. I know we're gonna talk about male fee mail, brothers and sisters and how we communicate or don't communicate properly, but I just want to say it's refreshing. Something that we said kind of in our intros in our great room, was that YouTube you, brother and sister, y'all have a dialogue, and it's not always in unison. I think that's the most healthy, that's the dopest thing that could be happening right now. It's not always about

a grind. Dialogue is a two step process where there's reflection and then there's action. Right So the fact that we have challenging discourse that puts us out of our comfort zones, that's fundamentally important in these moments. That's so important in these moments because we don't need the yes

men approach. There's a history of trauma, there's a history of intergenerational intentional disconnect and so we're we're dealing with all of that compiled and exacerbated through pandemics, through gun violence, and all the different ways in which we address community issues. The bottom line is there has to be some out the comfort zone, comme So thank you for having me here amongst the dialogue and the leadership. So we were just in this debate before you came on Cape Baine,

which we had the table. We're gonna get back to it later when we were talking about um, specifically about Kevin Samuel's who just recently died. This is a man that I don't know if you know him or not. Some people do, some people don't. But he became a controversial figure on social media. UM, and you know a lot of his commentary which we don't have to get into today. UM, there's a split feeling within our community

about whether it was helpful or harmful. UM. A lot of times he used language that I thought was was was painful for black women to hear. And there are some people who say, well, you know, sometimes it's tough love and it might not feel so good, but we have to have those conversations. The reason why this is important is because what I know is happening, which always happens with us, is this riff that starts between women and men, black men, blended black men and women, and

we start arguing and going back and forth. And I think it's a dangerous time for us to find ourselves with any more division because there's so much of it, and there's so much pain within our communities that in a lot of ways, I feel like all of it, the lack of our unity and togetherness is why we're losing so many of our young people, and particularly young black men, because we're not even able to settle ourselves to get focused on how we have to work together

UM in order to really try to impact young men. We just talked about this young guy or this man, Deshaun Carter, who was UM an incarcerated person at Rikers Island who died by suicide. He had mental health issues, and the list goes on. And in fact, over the weekend, I was with the state's attorney and she and I were talking and I came. I came back and I'm, you know, basically, which is what I do to my son, poor my son. I just, you know, I beat up on my brother so much, but I just have to

place my frustration somewhere and he takes it. God, bless you, my son, bless you. So I came back and I and I had four For three days. He and I have been in heated dialogue, most of it agreeing, but definitely some contentious places about black men and what we're gonna do right, especially for young black men, because I've got a twenty three year old and some things that

he does and says, it's it makes me. I'm I'm not always happy, right, And so we were going back and forth about it, and when I was talking to her. She said this and not let you guys take it from here, because I'm much more interested in your conversation, she said, you know, uh she She started off by saying, the elderly women in the room are very concerned for their lives, and she therefore is dealing with more of us contacting her older women contacting her about, um, you know,

locking up kids in their community because they're afraid. And I get it when when kids are knocking you over thehead, people getting their bones broke, they purses stolen. She said. The sweet spot is between fourteen and seventeen years old, and they're in the street, terrorizing elderly people. She said, But I know I cannot lock them all up, and I have programs. But what this is an important piece, she said. If I keep them inside, I can. If I keep them detained, we can influence them by forcing

them to go to programs and doing other things. But when I turned them back to their parents and give them a schedule of where they're supposed to be and what they're supposed to do, they're not often showing up. And that what she found while she sat and where she sits in the courtroom. She said, most of the time of the time it is a mother, a grandmother, and maybe a home girl. And then in other situations

it's probably just a mother. That is almost never a father or a black male, the teacher or somebody present for these boys who have done something life changing where they may spend the rest of their lives in prison. So I said, no, we gotta we have to talk about this more. We know the issue is there, but something more has to be done. And when we're fighting each other, how do we focus? So you guys, that's my frame. Let's take it and kind of chop it up and try to see what are some of the

things we need to be doing. You know, what I want to say is that you know, I also had a panel conversation this weekend with UM. The d A. Dr cl Clark came to this Boys to Me ends UM conference that we had in the Bronx orchestrated by UM former council member Andy King, who's done a lot of work with the young boys in the communities, and

she was talking. She's pretty much said the same thing, but she she she took it from fourteen to thirty and said that there are so many black men are coming to her court, and and she she doesn't want to lock them up, like she doesn't want to just be the person lock them up, but she she has to be the person to make sure the streets are safe. She's not gonna let people out here that are killing people.

And you know, and what I started to realize is that there's so much trauma, right, And there's this thing where our culture has gravitated and morphed into something that respects and advocates for and actually perpetuates and markets negativity. Right.

And I was having this conversation and they were talking about drill music and talking about all these things, and I was like, if we are not celebrating positivity, right, if we're not celebrating growth, and we're not celebrating the positive things, that we don't have any structures that are visibly seeing because what we can't see, we can't be right.

And if we're not seeing people being celebrated for doing positive things, and we're not seeing people being elevated for doing the positive things, and the only thing we see being celebrated as negativity, how do you expect us as young man? Because is there there's an innate nature in a man to be powerful. Right. That's why sports, when you look mostly male dominated sports is about the competition, is about overcoming. It's about being number one. You you're

going against an adversary. Everybody is screaming, this is the innate nature of a man. We want to be able to compete. We want to be successful. We want to be seen as successful, we want to be celebrated. So when the positive things that we're talking about, the anti violence, that nonviolence, all these things are seeing are shunned and seeing that so off and not seeing as powerful, how do we not seeing right and not seeing period? How do we expect these young boys to gravitate to those things?

Where is the incentive to be that type of individual, to be the stand up, the person who's doing the positive things. Where is the incentive We have to start incentivizer. We can't sit back and always criticize said, oh that's negative or they're doing the wrong thing. We don't have the positive rappers. When I started doing positive rapping hip hop, people start making fun of me. Nobody wants to hear that you're going to this. You know, there's some holy

other down and you're preaching. Now, Malcolm X and Mom, Luther King, nobody was advocating for that. We're not getting the same platforms that the drill rappers. Again, we're not getting the same respect that you know, the people that are talking about destroying and killing everybody is. So how do I, as an individual look at a young boy who wants to be successful, who wants to be respected, who's looking for this power and his fame tell him to do something that the world is telling him is

not gonna be celebrated. If I could add on, so, what you're talking about is identity, that's the umbrella, but it really breaks down to understanding the six fundament mental or universal human needs. So food, clothing, and shelter. Let's put that to the side. We know without that everything is off the table. Now let's go through those needs. Security safety. When I was fifteen years old in front of a judge facing facing fifteen years in prison, it

was because I didn't carry one. I carry two firearms to feel to meet that need to feel safe for security. Second, human needs spontaneity. It's like the flip side of that coin. So as much as uh we've been in, let's think about a stable relationship you had right there's a level of stability. You must call it this time, you must checking at that time, you must be at this location. But also there's a level of risk or spontaneity. You

gotta switch up to tempo. Any relationship you have for duration has a level of stability and the level of spontaneity. These are human needs. The third of the six human needs is acknowledgement. That's what you're talking about, mice. When you say, when I shoot a basketball into a hoop, the whole world sees. You can't deny me that. When I shot a gun as a young man in downtown Brooklyn, I shot out of fear. I was in the controversial situation. I let it guard. I turned my head like this,

and I ran. I ran faster than the bullet. But what the hood did. They said, Cabine is crazy, he's a killer. He's out here, shoot the mac tent. They said, I reloaded and let the police. I didn't do nothing that right. I did it and I ran away. But the point is people acknowledge that behavior because it meant that need for significance. Our next need loving connection. Sometimes we joined families or street organizations for that matter. Some people call them gangs because we're meeting a need's a

human need. If you don't need to need, you die. Loving connection. The next human needs of growth. Every living thing must grow. It doesn't mean that it's progress, but it's gonna grow. Last human need is contribution to give us to get So these needs will be met or

we will die. And these are universal human needs. The work that we do revolves around the fact that if you're in Chicago, south Side, West Side, Downtown, Brooklyn, East New York, Brownsville, if you're in Trinidad, these are the human needs that are either being met or not met. And when you talk about the need for acknowledging, you can meet that either in short term destructive ways or you can meet that need in long term positive community legacy building ways. But that need will be meant, The

need will be met. I mean, I feel like your organization and so many of the others man up. I mean, there's a list that I could go on with just thinking about organizations across the nation. The New Black Panthers that are out in Chicago. Um, you got some folks. I forget the name of the organization. In fact, they're

the Vegas chapter in Las Vegas, brother Minister Stretch. There are black men across the nation who are working at it, But I do think that the level of support, that acknowledgement, if you will, has to be increased somehow, And I wonder caving. I think in New York we've been able to do it to some degree because there is some

level of a collective body. Do you think that the potentially the issue is the disconnect between the states and like sort of how tribal we can become in our particular areas, or do you just think like the government just ain't trying to really fund us, Like what do you think is the real problem? I appreciate the question.

I read somewhere recently. I think it was Dr Rose at Brown University said, structure racism is the normalization and legitimization of a wide ray of dynamics historical, cultural, institutional, and interpersonal that routinely benefit whites while producing cumulative and chronic adverse outcomes for people of color. That's what she's said, and so let's look at that historical, cultural, institutional, interpersonal structural racisms at the base of it. Mike said it best.

He said, it seems intentional because what gets highlighted. What gets brought to the forefront is the bullshit. What gets brought to the forefront is the most negative, the most buffoonish clown behavior. Again, my introduction to you all was a salute and to say, I appreciate you all allowing me into your dollargue because I truly respect what you represent. It's refreshing to see black men and women leaders like yourself having out of the comfort zone, out of the

box conversations. This is what raises a community, this level of high level of conversation and dialogue. So I think to your to your question is intentionally done that way because of systemic structural racism. It allows for our demands were we are definitely under attack, and so that's why everything we do at CC do we are unapologetically black, brown, Indigenous people of color. And I and I respectfully in one of the co architects of the New York City

Crisis Management System. But it was built on the lens that we approached it. When we talk about stopping shootings for three hundred and sixty five days, for example, in the largest housing development in North America, all could be the world Queensbridge Houses. It's because I followed. I followed some pillars and some principles called human justice that Eddie

Ellis taught me. That Dr Divin Pryor and other great minds from the Attica Uprising from the green Haven Think Tank, those brothers who did the Seven seven Neighborhood studies, who did the language of it. They are the reason we used terms like formally incarcerating. They are the rehumanizers. So I say, we are the human justice lens. So when I do this work in Chicago, Hon Duras TRINITYA as

I mentioned, you pick a continent. We're successful because of these needs that we talked about and approaching them with the Human Justice Lynch has been a great successful us. What's different is we have to get what we've done in New York City that has worked to be replicated in another space. It we put our political structure in the headlin. We hold them account of wealth. You talk Bloomberg, the Blasio, now Adams, we advised them, but we regulate.

We understand that. You know, human justice is an equation human rights. That's consciousness plus human development, that's resources equals human justice. Don't just give me information and don't just give me don't even just give me the resources. I read somewhere once that if the tooth percent, that control of the wealth on the earth was to be taken from them and distributed equally, in a short amount of

time will be back in their hands. So it's about the information, understanding wealth, intergenerational wealth, understanding how we build that out. I lead a multimillion dollar nonprofit organization because I understand those principles and apply them. We opened the thousand bank accounts in black and brown housing developments in New York City because we understand that not just to open the accounts, but the fiscal aptitude, the financial literacy

that was connected to those accounts. You understanding of credit, you know, what does it mean to have that? When we was in the stream, people like myself and brother my song, hustling and scrambling and survival mode, we did a cost benefit analysis and we saw that we weren't

getting opportunities to be employed. I tried to get a job, but my course benefits analysis said, and I know that, it said, you know I can make forty dollars in a weekend talking net I'm not talking gross right, without any school, without any So these are the things that young people. We talk about that demographic, that high risk population from fourteen to twenty four, even thirty years of age. They're doing this cost benefit analysis, but they're not factoring

in the risk reward. They're not. Nobody's telling them, like my son is, this is what it feels like the first day when you step behind those bars. This is what happens to all your homies when you're sitting up there your first six months and your girl disappeared. You know, your the people supposed to ride with you not there. There are some people that are that are speaking at unpopular truth. And so I think, to your point, we gotta turn that up and turned down the bullshit. Yeah,

So can I just ask one more question? And then I want you guys to finish it. And maybe I'm changing the direction both One of the things that something so I is my son is not the only man that I drive crazy with all of my thoughts when I whenever something hits me, especially when it comes to black men. So I call another black man and I explained, you know what I experienced and what the lady said I was at the graduation. There was so many black mothers.

There wasn't really it was plenty, you know, some black men, but not as many as black women. And I was like, something is wrong here. And the person said to me that the biggest challenge he had with trying to be there to support his son was a relationship between him and his mother. That it caused him to want to you know, he wanted to be between him and the

child's mother, child's mother, his his his child's mother. He said, he wanted to be there, but it was very different, a cool and sometimes for me, I'm gonna be honest, I know that there, I know it. I know we can be difficult. I've seen some of my sisters do some real crazy stuff. I've seen it. But I also feel like it's a cop out for something, for something, not all, but for some. And so I want to talk about that because to me, again, the relationship between us,

whether we are together in a relationship or not. Because my argument with my son is that a lot of men do not know how to operate as a parent unlessed in a relationship with the mother, and and and vice versa the mothers too. So I just because I'm I'm from the mindset that the breakdown in our family has something to do with how our kids are slipping through because they we're not on the same page. Well, for me, there's there's a lot in what you said, right,

I want to read this thing first. That Charlemagne post is the data. So that's so you know on point about what we're dealing right now, he said, Trauma in the person decontextualized over time looks like personality. Trauma and the family decontextualized over time looks like family traits. Trauma and the people decontextualize over time looks like culture. Right. So we're dealing with so much trauma that it is morphed into what we call our own personality and we

don't even identify it as something wrong. Right. So and that so now to give what you're talking about as far as relationships, as as a man, most men look for peace and stability, right, we want we don't We don't want to deal with drama. We don't want to deal with arguments. We don't want, especially with somebody that we actually care for or we don't that we feel like we have some level of connection with. We do

not want to be an adversary to that individual. So, when you're in a relationship with somebody and you sever that relationship ships based on the fact that there's no peace, and there's no tranquility, and there's always argument and and there's always vile situations. It's very unlikely that a man

wants to re enter that situation all the time. Right. So, if you have a woman that you were in a relationship with who is the mother of your children, you go through you try, right, because I've seen many men try to be as peaceful as possible. Why we can't know f being peaceful? You need to do this or do that, right, So what happens is most men, when you leave that situation and you find a peace of mind, and you find a level of stability and comfort and peace,

you don't want to keep entering into that. And when you find somebody who has made a conscious decision that don't matter what happens, I'm not going to make this comfortable for you. Right. Over times, the average man will separate itself from that situation completely. And it's not because he doesn't love the child. It's not because he doesn't

value his child want to be there. Is that he realizes that his own mental state is to him more important because if he's not mentally stable, if this, if his situation is able to put him in a position to it jeopardizes his life, his mentality, his freedom because of this relationship with the parents, then he separates itself.

When you realize that when you see that woman, uh and in men who have somehow come to terms and they're able to co parent peacefully and the peacefully coexists, you see a lot less a lot more men in those relationships with their children, right. And it it takes time and maybe over four or five years, you know what happens. Like me and my baby mother used to argue all the time. We were at odds. And it wasn't because I wanted to be with her. I wasn't trying to be with her. It just that she had

whatever it was. I'm not blaming her and me, but for some reason, there was always contention. Every time that we spoke, or we are trying to deal with the kids or trying to show up, it was always some type of contention. When that contention disappeared, we were able to co parents so well, we became best friends. Our son benefited from it. And I've noticed that over time with most people. So I don't know. I've never been a woman, so I can't give you the prospective of

a woman exactly how she said. But I know as men, we really just want peace. We do not want to be in contention every time that we're dealing with somebody. Nobody wants to do that, and we will. And and then average man will completely sacrifice any relationship, even with

his kids. I know men who have had those interactions with their kids when when you and the kids start fighting and I gotta kick you up, they separate themselves from their children until they're able to have some level of civility because they do not want to deal with that. Women don't do that. Women will argue with the son, the daughter, their fight every day. They're being the street. You're doing that, man, if we're not wired that way,

m a passion. You had a question in the brother's perspective, he's speaking from where he's lived. I mean, it's hard to argue make a very compelling stance. I'm gonna say further so in my intro they talk. You talked a little bit about me being, you know, in this anti gun violence work, but that's just a byproduct human justice work is I'm mentioning is about communication. It's about providing our youth and our women are sisters, everyone with advanced

tools to communicate because we didn't have that. We don't have that foundation in our homes a lot of the time, we dam sure on't got it in the schools. So it's about what we do is gift tools for people that have had lives lost between them, have had bloodshed between them, and truce agreements and peace agreements, abilities to communicate right means to communicate. So one of my businesses

is a law firm, Claudia and Associates. Less than five percent of attorneys in this country are of color, less than two percent are women of color. I'm a co founder owner of a law firm in Queens, New York called Claudian Associates. It's a matrimon to your firm. We focus and specialized all women of coloring that run this

firm on parental alienation. What is that? That's because what Mike was talking about, this is not only of visceral response to being in complete total just contentious behavior back and forth. There's also prison at the end of that. There's also a jail cell at the end up being where summer to day or allegation or a threat. There's also a kidnapp in charge if you take your child from school without permission, so in and to add on to the brow like this, there's another level of consequence

when these things are not handle certain ways. And I'm not making excuse or justification. Look, since mice being personal, I would take and this just keep this between us and the listeners. I would take any level of disrespectful in the queen she could do. She gotta. She gott a great as long as my children that's me, that's me and my relationship like the golf of then she take this in row. But I don't think she's that person. But if she did it, so I'm gonna work with

my children. You know, my youngest is eight, So no matter I made that had a mother, I would true that your mother western your mother who was like you see what I'm doing. You see the sacrifices I'm making. Your father's not here right, so that when you have a family. She taught me I was six seven, eight years old, so that you don't make excuses. You beat there for your children. That's superseded, that comes before. So

that's my personal approach that we gotta work yourself. If I got to sleep in this room or you and I'm not going what hopes at the house on fire. I ain't leaving, that's me. But everybody got to make their decisions and work. They work, but until minds are old enough to take care. But the bottom line is, it's about communication. It's about communication in the court system. Men and women right have an entirely different set of privileges in the court of law as as it pertains

to matrimonial on the family law. Absolutely, and I don't disagree, and but I still here something and I and I understand that point that there are certain people you just can't be around them because they're dangerous. And it's just my cousin literally just got out of prison because he went to his you know, child's mother's home and something happened and the next thing, you know, he got locked up. In fact, I have another cousin who was just sentenced and I'm not sure how long, but he was just

put in prison. He might not be older than twenty three for rape because of something that happened with his baby mother. And so this is very serious. I get it. It's life threatening but I have to say that I know some men and a lot of them where the women are like I, Like you said, your mother, the doors open. You could come and be here and take your child and do what you want. But you need to stop trying to sleep with me when you come

in this house. You need to stop sending me crazy messages, and you need to be accountable for things and for for your actions. What hurts me is that I have any friends that they are raising sons, and they are constantly saying things like ask your father, see what your father says? Like can your father help? Sometimes? Can your father is your father? And the fathers are there when they want to be. My girlfriend just told me the other day, Oh, Christmas time he shows up big time.

But in fact we don't really need him. That Christmas is much because everybody's giving himself a Christmas. What we need is just a regular Tuesday visit and and not a holiday visit. And I told my son that I get the sense that even this man, who's a good guy, and I don't know when his you know, maybe he

never had Christmas. You know, who knows. But maybe it's the lack of older men being in a stable position enough to teach younger men what it looks like to be a father who's able to navigate through dealing with an upset or trauma. Phil Mother like your point about a healing network or organization, And you brought up Charlemagne. That's important because he's been talking so much about black men getting help. I feel like we would do ourselves, um,

all of us as a community, some some justice. Look I'm and I know I'm talking long, but let me go and say this. When I go around black women, we spend a great deal of time talking about our issues, being me being checked by my aunt or some other women about my behavior, what happened. When I'm a fly on the wall listening to men, I hear a lot of conversations about sports, about you know, just cool and breezy.

But I don't necessarily here men really getting into with young men in these settings, conversations about life and so that. And maybe I'm listening, but I see with with with with women, we have empowerment spaces this day, that conference, we do all that we can do to try to empower ourselves, and I don't see the same with black men. But I could be wrong, not not that it doesn't happen at all. I don't see it as much. You gotta you gotta hang out at C C D sometime.

I want to right go for you to come out. We gotta office in every ball, but the main one is on something for the board and Queens. I wanna write you to come out. Even in Queensbridge we do. We do the hell of Justice circles. We just have one and it's mentorship. It's really like there's people taking off their masks, you know that that have black mikes, have have lived and been through some things. I know my songing probably going on almost like I've been in

closing him Fat Joe and the front. I've never heard this portion of him or a bit like and that's my brother, somebody I've known and respected for a long time. But we to your point, we don't always find those moments to be like, Yo, how long I've been dealing with my partner, my be besting partner for twenty eight years. She's been in my life since I was fifteen sixty years old. But I don't speak about that to my brothers.

Were talking about a whole lot of other things. So I think there's spaces when we when we work with the young people, to youth builders as we call them, we do have these conversations. We do talk about how to communicate. But but a lot of the self kid

is self love has to happen first. You can't know how to speak to somebody else when you alund yourself to be dehumanized, when you walk around in the world feeling powerless, when you walk around the world being dictated to every step of the way, when you can't even get decent food in your body, but your mind is supposed to be in these elevated positions that you're describing, it's not really realistic. A lot of design for us, right.

So I remember being with my girl, like I said, from those teenage years, and at one point, you know, it gets rockey, you kind of get caught out there. You should ain't adding up this way and that way. And she's like, yeah, what's up with you? She said, Kay? You the loyalists, dude, Like you don't do nothing without your guys, Like you're on the phone everything, your word is everything. But with me, and I said, I never

saw that. I never got that training. I know how to be stand up, I know how to stand on my word. I died for my word, but I didn't. I've never seen and I wasn't copying. I wasn't trying to copy people. I was telling her, I like that ain't part of the manuscript that I inherited from the streets I never saw, not in my house and not in people around me. You understand I'm saying. So I'm telling her, like, you want me to do things with you that I've never seen, experience, witnessed, or been a

part of. So she was, you know, she's like, yo, but with the guys, you know what to do? Is this way? Never? I don't know, We're not. It's all written in the code, she said. She said, where is the code for me? And I think that's the point. We gotta establish the code for us as brothers and sisters in relationships. Really, I just want to I just want to end it by saying, you know, we do.

We have a lot of these conversations. Like you know, I take a lot of my my brothers, my nephew, like I I've sat down with them, every every young man is in direct contact for me, and any young guys that I mentor, I sit down and have real conversations just based off, you know, my reality in my life and what I've been through. And I tell all

of them like I'm a cheat sheet through life. And if you just take, you know, some of the influence and understand in the wisdom that I got, you don't have to make the mistakes that I mean, you know. And unfortunately, there are a lot of young guys that I sit down and I have conversation, and I know that they're powerful and the note. But unfortunately some of them I have to gonna go through a little They

ain't gonna get their hand burnt off. They're not gonna do a bunch of years in jail, but they're gonna get arrested one or two times, and then they're gonna come back to me and say, I know, I understand what you're saying. At twenty years old, it was the first time that my son ever admitted to me that I was always right. I see you on the Facebook post he called me. He didn't say your dad you right, he wrote on the It was like, you know what, today is the first day I realized that my dad

never told me anything that was wrong. Everything he ever said to me was one that's a beautiful falling, and that's where it comes to. And I tell, and I tell a lot of women. I tell to me because you gotta tell. These boys tell us and I'd be like to Meka. Unfortunately, men are whired a little different, right, They're gonna have mentors that they listen to and they take in their information. They're taking it in. You don't know they're taking it in. It's one day that it

clicks in you. An opportunity for them to navigate and see things because unfortunately they don't believe. They don't always believe anything that everybody says right, So they gotta go through certain things and see certain outcomes for themselves to be able to go back and say this, this is exactly what my mother, This is exactly what makes you say it to me. So all our job is to

to to be like the right. It's like you know, in the bowling alley, we're making sure that it don't go into the the put the rails up for the for the new beginning, to make sure they don't go in the gutter. We're just making sure don't go in the gutters. So we just were right there. We we can't do all of it. These are gonna be men, and they're going to their want to have their old egos, and they're gonna deal with certain things. But we're just gonna make sure that they don't go too far leftl

or two far a right that they even listen. You said everything right, because you definitely do mentor speak to and try to help young men. And I know that all the black men around me are really doing all

that they can. I guess the point that I've been trying to get to and what is on my spirit is that we've got to expand this, you know, um, expanding work, expand these conversations, because there's something wrong when a fifteen year old young black kid is able to break the bones of a woman who looks like his grandmother, and it's happening every single day, So there is a missing link. Um. And I know the system is responsible.

I know it's all these things, but we just like we as as I said, black women, I think I think black men can learn something from the way in which black women organize ourselves. The ways in which we work with one another. Doesn't mean we don't go left and right. Because my mom and them tried to tell me, don't do this that in the third and I did all those things, including love the wrong guys. I mean,

you name it. We all, like you said, Mike, but there's something about us right now that has Black women are the as the leading entrepreneurs, the most graduated. You know, in these different classes. We're seeing black women graduating like crazy. We're seeing black women leading households also, um in a very powerful way. And and yes, certainly is structural. And there's always been a division between us that has been

manufactured by this nation. We know that. But I think that, like the underground railroad, we gotta figure out how to institute some of whatever is in the soup that we're cooking as black women, and do it you alway the way you all have been doing it, but just expanded and get y'all's voices out everywhere more often. I want to hear Cabin every week or somebody's national podcast talking what you're talking and dropping that knowledge. I appreciate more

than you know, the opportunity to be amongst greatness. It means the world that you would include me and your dialogue. This is sacred. We call people like you real models. We don't call you role models. We call your real models because you've been through some things and you're authentic. So the youth with Mike said, when you plant that seat, it's gonna germinate. It's it's undeniable when you're dealing with people who are coming from their hearts like you too.

So again, privilege and honor. There's a tool I'm gonna leave you with this. It's a tool that CCD. It's called the Sustainable Growth Plan. The next time y'all have me on, the next time you'll passed by the shop so we can chopping up in person. I want to talk about this tool that is the bridge from survival mode mentalities that we come from to ones of creation where we're defining and designing our identity and our actions for ourselves. Thank you, Kabang, thank you for coming on today.

We're certainly gonna have you um to be back and we're definitely going to come out and visit you and maybe we'll do street politicians right from inside or I would love it. I would love it. Respect to the Guard to Beautiful as always Queer shout out to Kim Baby my brother man. He told you we have a long standing history brother that I've known for years. And just watched him evolved and elevate from these streets in which you know we both come from, and just understanding

that there is elevation. That's what I try to tell you all the time. These kids gonna get it to Mika, because we got it. We had to go through some things. I know, you look, you know when you're looking, you like them. They're not on the right path. But as long as they ain't in jail, as long as they enough in the streets shooting and killing and all that, they have an opportunity. So they are. But they are. That's the problem. I'm just trying to tell you ours

are not. I wasn't not I wasn't, but I include ours has to include way more. And that's what I'm saying. We're in a danger. Black murder is our campaign, and that's why we're gonna grab these young boys up. And that's why I'm raising kings And you know, I can't kill my brother because I love all of these things that we're going to implant in our kids and and retrain the culture to what it really looks like for success and unity. Man. So that's the next stages of

what it is, man. So it was supposed to debate about Kevin Samuel. So what I'm challenging you to do is next week we should I think we have somebody booked for next week, so yeah, but we can figure it out next week if possible. I think that you should bring someone to the show, and I will try to bring someone. I don't know, but I'll try. So we could have a conversation about our brother. And I still call him my brother because I don't you know, I don't believe that people should be like, oh, I

don't care if he died. That's that's too much for me. I would never do that. I thought Kevin Samuels at there were times when you're right, he did say some things that I was like, Okay, I can see that, but I just think the brand um that was associated with him, it was distorted and what you know, what it is what I what I learned. I've been playing sports my whole life, right, and you have different coaches, Right. You have coaches that pull you off the court and

said you're playing like ship. You like you're playing like ship and you're gonna sit on the rest of the bench. You're bummed out of what you're You're too heavy, you're slow. I don't even know how you got to this team right. And it worked for certain people. There were certain people that elevated their game because that Minister of aericon will do yeah and it, and he called them every name

possible in front of everybody, and they came back. And me, I was one of those people when you told me those negative things about me, it's I'm gonna show you that. I'm gonna show you I'm better than And I came back and I competed twenty times harder. And those are my favorite coaches. I didn't need the coach that made it. You know, hey, can you can do a little better? I'm not looking you know what I'm trying to tell you is That's what I'm trying to tell you. Kevin

Samuels has a model that worked for some people. When he talked about black dudes, he said, okay, so why shouldn't you have a woman? You're fat, you don't make no money, you don't really look that good, Like do you have a big dick? It's probably small? Like what what? What? What can you offer a woman? Let's just be realistic, my I. You know, it's fine. We should debate the issue next week, because you know, I y'all told me that a black woman, a black man needs life spoken

to him by a woman. You know, she needs to be built this woman, yeah, this woman. Yeah. Well, but you know, I'm just telling you that there were some times it didn't. It didn't, It didn't make me. It's for someone to tell me that as thirty. If I'm over already five, I'm leftovers that I get something. And I'm just trying to say, I could give you so many of those types of statements that but I can give you so many says that he did. He made that word like that, I don't think, so bring that.

Let's bring that to the show. Let's do it next week. You know what I'm saying, so um, what I want to do is the way I want to end this show is usually an ending with my I don't get it. There's so many things I don't get this week, you know, after traveling to Ghana and traveling to Africa and just really just reflecting, Man, I really don't get how us as a people with so much greatness, so much power, so much ability, just don't get it right. I just

don't get it. Like when when I when I'm traveling and I'm seeing I look at the power. When you look every field, Black people excel. They create everything, they come up with the ideas, They the best athletes. We all of these things, and we don't utilize that and put it together to become the superpowers and the gods and that we're supposed to be. I just don't. It's sad, but it's not us. It's really it's it is at this point because we should know better, but really we have.

It took four hundred plus years to break us down and to create this thing where we can't work together or where we don't work as much together as we should. I mean, you you know, words are powerful. We can work together, and we do work together, but we don't do it as much as necessary to change the conditions to our people of our people. That's what I'm focusing on with these questions that I'm asking because I see us and we we we we we know how to

argue one another. Damn built up because our kids are in the center of it. And I and I think that we have to recognize that this is being done to us on purpose. Our communities have been built and structured a certain way, and our relationships in a lot of ways have also been tampered with, so hopefully we

can get that. It's so crazy, Like I watched all every like I've been really doing historical studies, and every person deemed as a leader who has taken on any you know, pressure to say hey, I'm gonna do something to change my people has been demonized and crucified by its own people. And I don't know how we got to that stage. It's it's it is the weirdest thing that I've ever seen. But you know, my purpose is different. So I'm gonna continue to move through the fire and

take whatever comes with it, you know. So I'm gonna love my people despite my people or despite what we've been through, because we have to recognize the trauma. With that being said, I'm not gonna always be right. Jamika married is not gonna always be wrong. We both always and I mean always, be authemic.