Black Lives Matter

from urban life to hip hop and sports and everything in between, this is a podcast inspired by and for the culture. Episode Three Black Lives Matter.

We're going to start this episode off with a 42 second moment of silence for Chadwick boseman. Alright man, let's get to it, bro. It's gonna be a very emotional episode. A Lot went on this week. And this won't hurt man. Like if we thought if we thought the COBie one was bad, early in the year. I think this will probably hurt me even more, bro, to be honest with you. Chadwick boseman, if you asked me this guy was a national hero, bro. The fact that he was battling with cancer for four years and was working the entire time, bro. He was making movies the entire time. Normally, somebody gets diagnosed with something like this. They're like, I you know, I'm gonna take a hiatus You know, I'm gonna go away. I'm gonna step away for now to go battle this. Nah, dude kept making movies throughout the entire four years and not regular movies. They were important movies, bro. You know what I'm saying? He played Jackie Robinson, and the 42 movie, which is why we, you know, appropriately did the 42 second moment of silence. This is Jackie Robinson weekend to honor him as well. So he played him he played James Brown on the on Get on up, he played Thurgood Marshall. First black judge. He played Black Panther. Which was you know, basically, consider the first I don't wanna say the first black superhero, but the first, you know, blockbuster black superhero movie, you know what I'm saying? Because there was all this before that. But this was like the first blockbuster hit,

let's say the most recognizable. Right, right, because I mean, the first Marvel one was actually blade. But we don't think of it like that. But again, so it was

right, because black panther takes place in Africa, you know what I mean? And the whole thing. It was it was a big deal for the culture. Yes. And the whole movement, you know what I'm saying? So when I say this guy was a national hero is because of his importance to the culture. This whole time, you know, you sit back and you look at his career now that he's, you know, passed. And you're like, wow, oh, his roles were important roles. He wasn't just taking on you know, any role. These are historic roles that he was taking. You know, when you go back and you listen to his Howard University graduation speech. I encourage anybody to go on YouTube and look that up if you want to feel uplifted or inspired. You go look up his Howard University graduation speech. Or you can look up chadwicks Denzel Washington speech when they did the tribute to Denzel Washington, the one year at the award, and you go listen to that speech. And this guy, everything he said was just inspiring. uplifting, positive. This is this is sad, bro. This is tragic, bro. What are your thoughts man?

I wrote this earlier that evening, when he passed. Well, not when you pass it guess when you heard about him passing. And I say that I remember going to ghosts. I remember going to the theater to see Black Panther. Now, if anybody knows anything about me, I'm a big cinephile. I just loved the movies. I really do. Remember going there, and remember black people of all ages. I mean, I've seen With from all the way down to toddlers, the grandparents and likes it, some were wearing black panther t shirts, some were can't take log. And they were just there and they were united. And it is beautiful experience. And like I said, I would not be shocked if none of them have ever seen a Marvel movie before that. Like I said, it's, that's what it was. I mean, it's a superhero movie. twice, simply nothing more than like a superhero movie. But it's just having that role. And that country? Well, if you don't know, I'm talking about speaking of Wakanda, which in Marvel is a fictitious African nation who's like technologically advanced and ahead of the curve and everything. And scene is brought to life in front of people. And seeing the audience there. Like I said, it's a bunch of people who like, say, all ages, and they just sit there and thrown by his performance, seeing what he's doing, for him to seem so dedicated and loyal, and noble. And brilliant. If as an act of period to pull that off, is one of the things once I heard it coming out, I said, if they're going to do Black Panther, they have to cast the right guy. And when he picked chat with him, he's a perfect guy, because he has no gravitas to pull it off. So we're watching this whole movie, everyone's enjoying it movies over it ends, not a person in their seat moves. At the end of the movie, they played Kendrick Lamar has all the stars. And everybody's sitting there listening to it. And watching the credits roll by. Now the rest, everybody stayed, stayed to the very end, y'all got up. So round of applause. And that's watch, not just amazed by this. Because they seemed so amazed by the fact that it took a movie, of course, and it's fiction, of course. But a place where black people can be free, where they can thrive, where they don't have to worry about racism and police brutality. And something I said degree, I think always wanted to get across about Black Panther is that there were issues in the movie, if you watch it, there were conflicts, there was war, there was violence. But in the end, they all kind of stood together, they all united under this one bigger thing that we want to hold and preach the importance of our people and appreciate importance of the strength of our nation. And it did that and moving and watching people just enjoy so much. And watching Chadwick in that role just doing such an amazing and outstanding job to let us know, like, you know, you can be regal, you can be proud, you can have shrimp you can show what you are, you can be who you are, unapologetically. And you can act and feel and be royalty. And to see that on a screen and seeing kids inspired by it and know the weird things like seeing like, young kids now like, like, they're sad, because, you know, he died. And I mean, they don't really know him outside of that context. But it was so powerful and so important, like, is something that's going to be a member. So yeah, believe it or not like this actor that you didn't know that you didn't know that was suffering through colon cancer for four years. He matters to a lot of people, even if they've never met him. And I mean kids, and I mean adults and I mean grandparents, all these people imagine them because he showed them something that they always wishing, wanting to attain, they wanted this ability to be free. Knowing that he suffered with this for four years, and did movie after movie after movie, as if he knew I got much time. So let me get out as much as I can. Clip because I believe we move from stage three to stage four, so it got worse. So I don't know. I can only imagine what he endured over this period of time to get to bring this part to all of us because he didn't have to. He could have just stepped away and tried to fight it. And people clown them because they sound like no he looks a little frail and skinny not knowing what is going through. I think that's one of the lessons should probably take from it. Don't Don't question or worry about the things that a person is dealing with unless you unless you want to get involved. Unless you really want to know and if they want to share what you're doing they could share with you but I say people like look at Chad with his old skinny looking all crazy like, right but it's not a roll like is because he's sitting there fighting for his life. He's looking like this and he's still here performing Doing whatever he needs to do. But he said, because he might not have much time left, he just want to put out as much as he can just to have the world enjoy what he's done. So and I mean if and that and in working with the same regard to that,

then the towards the end when he was getting frail and, you know, skinny, a lot of people thought it was, you know, big four apart. I feel like he's getting ready for a part, you know, just like 50 cent did years ago when he was playing a cancer victim or whatever, he got real skinny. But even then, when you know, when I'm watching, he's playing these bigger than life characters like Black Panther or he's in 21 bridges. And, you know, I saw him strong, healthy, you know what I'm saying? I wasn't thinking like, oh, he looked at something. He looked sickly. No, this guy was looking strong to me when I'm watching him in these movies. And now knowing that he was going through this, like, wow, this guy's this guy, for lack of a better word is a legend, bro.

You know, that's an actor. If I'm sitting there going through all this shame, I can make it look like I'm perfectly fine. That's right. Right there.

I mean, so the guy. He's a an actor, a producer, philanthropist, you know, motivational speaker. Like I say, yeah, go listen to his speeches, bro. And this is a motivational speaker. So he's a hero on and off the screen bro. Very talented guy inspiring. hearts go out to the Bozeman family. This guy, he's gonna leave a legacy. In the short time that he was around, he accomplished a lot. I mean, 43 man, that's tough. He was 43. But nobody needs to go that early.

What what should be sad is that, from this would occur. If your privates are fucking around child and get a checkup, man.

I'm getting a colonoscopy, immediately. I'm 36 I haven't gotten one. I need to go get one immediately. Because this is serious. And it runs it runs in my family too. And that's

a big part. I can't play around with that. No, it's I mean, it's not none to play around with in general, like, even if it wasn't part of history, like some people escaped like, but some people do not want to have a colonoscopy because they think is gay, which is probably the dumbest you'd ever heard in my entire life. So you rather worry about frail masculinity than dying or something that you pray you might be able to get control of. But you might be able to catch ahead of time. Just because I don't want anybody playing them is like, it's to save your life. It's like it's kind of like one fucked up things like, like my grandmother told me back in the day, she had to make sure that you know what he lived that they could find a quality of black doctor because she didn't want to go to a white one. Because when the cultural they want to treat them properly, like if I if I go across town to this doctor, I'm not sure if they're gonna be better or not. But I'm not certain just because I'm black. If they're going to give me the proper treatment, I observe or understand my whatever, right? But you know, things about cancer. It's not even a weird thing, that truth about cancer is that it's not racist. It's very equal opportunity. If you if you have the genetic markers for it, you can get it no matter what it might be. So it's one of the things you got to take care you out. It's important to get those things and get those check ins and not worry about any kind of silly stuff like, Oh, I don't want anybody playing near my butthole. Like, look, it's not that the person's profession, they're a doctor. Their job is to do this, I don't think they want to do this all day and keep looking at buttholes all day in and out think, enthusiastic to them or anything remotely sexual. They're just trying to look out for your best interest in the guy for your help. You gotta take this shit seriously, like I said, data 43 you would assume that this was a guy who would have a long 3035 year career ahead of him. And like that, scoring, there's one thing you got to take care yourself. Cuz you never know when it's going in.

Yeah, man, so rest in peace, to Chadwick boseman. He's gonna live forever. And that's gonna segue right into our next topic, which is, it's a very important one right now, socially, nationally. And I'm gonna get right to it. You know, I usually try to keep things light hearted. And I've avoided getting political in this platform, at least for the last couple of episodes we have done. But this time is different. Because it's not only a sports related issue at this point, is a national and worldwide issue. And what I'm talking about is this past Wednesday, when number Waukee bucks boycotted their playoff game versus the magic and protests with the shooting of Wisconsin native Jacob Blake a week ago, the hands of police and decided to sit out the game. In fact, they didn't even take the court. And I'll be honest, and it wasn't a popular opinion. But my first initial reaction was to say why Why now? What What is this going to solve? You know, there must be a better way. And I expressed as much to people in the backlash was almost immediate. My point of view at the time was, you know, them sitting out this game does nothing for anybody improves nothing. They'll just play tomorrow and nothing will change. I was in the mind frame that, you know, if you want to actually make a change and cancel the entire season, I just want game and you leave the NBA bubble and you go protest and March at the step of lawmakers and demand change. You know, you do like Martin Luther King did. And you go out there and make a difference, not just sit out one measly basketball game. You know, I even texted you and asked you, I was like, Hey, what's the point of Whoa, you know, what's the point of doing this? You know, one of the questions I had was if the shooting took place three days ago, why do the boycott now? Some said, well, they were waiting to get the facts from the shooting, which didn't make much sense to me at the time, because a week later, we still don't really have any, you know, any more information than we did back then. Now, I wish I would have waited a couple more hours and allowed the incidence to unfold before you know speaking on it, because it turns out and the Bucs spoke on this when they had their their speech as to why they decided to sit out. This was a calculated move by them. This was thought out. They planned, they pulled out you know, they pulled all all emotion and feelings aside. And once they Calm down, they made the decision. So they took the time before reacting. I commend them for that because what they did sitting out during a playoff series is sparked the movement across the entire league and across all sports. Actually, LeBron spoke out, the rest of the league stepped up and stood together in unity and decided to all boycott, a lot of major league baseball teams followed suit the W NBA follow suit and canceled all their games. And now we're really talking about a movement. You know, I underestimated these guys with my initial reaction to the boycott. And for that, I apologize. Because had I just waited a couple more hours, I would have understood that by then boycotting that one game. It started an industry wide movement that can that can and you know, hopefully ultimately will lead to something bigger, like putting pressure on the sports owners to get together and force them to have a sit down with their political buddies who they donate millions to and discuss actual change. Now was I in favor of sitting one game and then starting back up in a day or two? No, but I am in favor of this bigger movement that the one game eventually started. So I guess you do have to crawl before you walk and it has to start somewhere. So yeah, my initial reaction was premature and misinformed, but we are back on the right track. Now look, I'm gonna be honest, you know, obviously, I'm not a white guy. I'm Dominican, which technically makes me an afro Latino. But I will not sit here and pretend that I know what it fully feels like to be a black man in America because I don't you know, I have been influenced by the culture. Yes, some of my best friends are black. I grew up idolizing and watching black athletes, I grew up listening to black music. But I won't pretend that i've you know, had to hurdle some of the same obstacles that you have. With that being said, I do understand. I grew up, you know, I do have family members that are darker than me and get stereotyped all the time. You know, or they have been harassed by cops on multiple occasions. I do have relatives that have had these experiences. And I do understand that I'm you know, you got understand that I'm here with y'all. I know, sometimes my opinions get misunderstood, or perhaps I don't really, I don't relate them properly. But rest assured, I'm on the right side of racial and social justice and equality for all. You know, and can attest to this, you know, I'm very much in favor of inclusion and diversity. I've always have been, I'm that guy at the party who mingles with everybody. Anthony, you notice we party together? You know, we've been to parties where all the blacks are sitting in one corner, or the whites on the other side, or the Latinos are in one area. And I'm that guy that walks around the entire party mingling and partying with everybody and introducing myself to everybody. Because I've never agreed with, I've never understood the idea of not all being one, like we're all in the same party, we should all be partying together. And I use the party metaphor to say that we're all in the same world together, we're all inhabiting the same place together. So why can't we all coexist together? This question has been asked forever, and we still don't understand why but it needs to start changing ASAP because this is not the world that I want my baby boy living in or growing up in. You know, it's crazy to me that in 2020, we're still having these issues that the NWA Public Enemy Tupac. These are the same issues that these guys rapped about, and their songs 30 and 40 years ago, you know, when I was watching, you know, all the stuff on this on this ESPN. The one quote that made me tear up was when coach Doc Rivers when he said he was all teary eyed and he said, we keep loving this country in this country doesn't love us back. So let's be part of the change. Let's make whatever effort we feel needs to be taken if it's voting to make sure we get the right people in offices both locally and nationally, then let's do that. Let's go out and vote. If we feel that peacefully protesting outside the city hall offices of your town is the first step that let's do that. whatever we need to do to spark awareness and continue the movement is what we need to do. This week. It started with sports next week, we might be at the steppes of Congress. You know, anyway, I just wanted to share my feelings and explain my stance and apologize at the same time not only to the African American community for everything that they had to go through, are they still having to go through but from my initial reaction to this whole boycott, which, you know, came premature, was uninformed. You know, and the floor is yours, man.

You don't have to apologize. I mean, it's happened. It's, you're dealing with a very complicated situation, it's not easy to just say, this is what's gonna happen, this is what we're going to do. Or this protest seems a bit far fetched, like it wasn't thought out. Like that. I don't want to. I mean, even if you read over the past few days from various reporters, there still be some consternation of how they wanted to go back to like, the Lakers and clippers wanted to be out, like, Nah, season's over, like, I can do whatever I want to but like, say you can't eliminate those two teams, and all of a sudden, you kind of mess everything up. But that's not really the point. They don't really care about what you think or what you feel about them as athletes or them as basketball players, because in reality, what a truly it will come down to, quite simply is that when they leave their leave their homes, and people are going to make this argument. What do they have to complain about? They're rich, they're millionaires, what do they need to worry about race? That's bullshit. It just is. Mr. Brown who was born in Milwaukee Bucks. He's a basketball player. He was pulled over the team by cops and put down and facedown on the ground. But Brian James, who probably the most popular player in the league, and probably the best player of our generation, moved himself to California to my Roatan negros on the front gate to his wolves. What is gates, right? So our money and our prestige or our whatever does not hide us or protect us, I guess you can say, from the dangers of racism, and the possibility that literally nothing more than the color of our skin can be a death sentence, I can die just for being black. And I don't want to hear anyone's kind of rationale for saying like, that seems ridiculous. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Again, Briana Taylor was in a household sleep, she was shot to death. Your floor was outside. Eric Garner was outside. They were killed Tamir Rice, he was killed. Michael Brown, kid, kids, kids. adults don't show any bounce dead. We can't walk down Mr. Harbor, we can't jog down the street. Because we seem threatened. We can't do any of these kinds of things. So when doc says something about why this nation just won't love us back. He's not speaking of a place of emotion. He's speaking to a place of intellectual intelligence because he sees it. The things that most people don't even think about what you can kind of say they take for granted. Those are things that we can die from, like I said, the reason why I stuck in my head right now cuz I remember watching them are very literally just jogging down the street, these guys coming up on a pickup truck because they felt that he should not be in that area. Or he looked like someone who might have been doing some crime before, was good enough to draw down a weapon on him and kill that man industry. And this is the things that we deal with all the time. And this is why we get frustrated. And people complain about you know why they're losers and everything else like that. Those are just a couple. Those are just people just taking advantage of a particular situation. But we like to see things burned to shore, it's on so forth. That's just anger and rage. And if you don't get a chance to express it, and it gets built up, it explodes. Just like this. So I don't wanna hear like, Oh, no, you know, you know, when they were fighting for servers before it was peaceful? No, they burned down Detroit, they burned down NORC because of the sizing and they were called race riots. Because like I said, you can't keep denigrating people, beating them, killing them, mistreating them, treating them like animals, taken away all their rights, their liberties, all the things that are supposed to be guaranteed by this country. You could take away willy nilly, and not only do you do so, there is no consequence for none, none. It is not the fact that these officers killed these people of color is an issue to itself is a bigger issue that they don't deserve right behind bars. That's the harmful thing like there is no there is no justice. There is no peace because like I said, this continues to be a consistent pattern of behavior. And it gets ridiculous. Now we're dealing with this and the thing that is troublesome You know what, I'm not gonna say his whole name. Let's just call it a killer Kyle. Let's just leave it like that. Okay, keep killing so killer Kyle was a kid who after these protests and so for for going on in Kenosha, Wisconsin decided to leave the comfort of his home in Illinois. Let's know. Carla 17. Yep. Kyle leaves Illinois with an assault rifle. To go to Kenosha, driven there by his mother, remember, he's a kid doesn't have a license. It wasn't even from there. No, he was Illinois. His mother drove him there. Because he felt if they're not going to do anything about this, I need to go out here and I need to protect the people. What kill a cow does what you know, kill a zoo, kill people kill two people he's arrested. It's pretty much named Dana, me black and white, I guess you could say it's probably going to prison for the rest of his life. But the thing that people I don't necessarily get the dichotomy. I don't get how people talk about like, we need to support the police, and they're doing their job, and so on and so forth. But for some reason, this kid thought it was a good idea for him to go about his merry way. Open who from what I read, wanted to be a police officer. And he felt that this his version of law and order wasn't to like, try to stop protesters or flag down police to tell him like something's going on over here. No, he decided to literally take the law, quote, unquote, take the law into his own hands. And basically, because of his actions to people that did because of some misguided sense of justice that this young man had. And this is the shit that we're talking about. Because if I walk down my block with a right, yeah, what a writing. Yeah, I'm going to say we mentioned Tamir Rice, he just like a young kid playing in the park. With a toy gun out of his backpack, I'm hoping I'm not getting him confused. But there have been so many young children of color killed. Sometimes the names get crossed by my head, which is really sad. But he's in a park playing with a toy gun, a cop pulls up to him and he shoots him dead. But this kid walks around town with a semi automatic rifle, untouched by police. He shoots some people puts his rifle out and puts his hands up. They treat him with all the kindness and courtesy in the world give the man a bottle of water.

I was gonna say a little saw video of them offering him water saying, you know, thanking him for his service for helping him out. Yeah,

he's not a fucking patriot. Not a patriot. He's not a soldier. He's not a cop. There's no service that was done. If unless you call him just murdering two other American citizens know the villainous vigilante. Yeah, but but but but it was simply we're calling him a patriot. You know that there's a set like there's a GoFundMe i did i think that's read like $9,000 for him. But for why, why? Why? What he did wasn't patriotic. What he did was murder. And I wish they will call it that I wish there was Stop acting like what he did was special. It wasn't. He went out there and on his own free will. And Nicole went out there until people can never go home to see their family and loved ones ever again. Because this young man just thought it was a good idea to go here and just do what they need to do. I need to go here and protect the people. No, you just do at home? No, no, you know, hold different say stay home. Don't Don't do this. Don't go out here and think that you're going to be the savior that you're going to be you know, because we're just talking about chat with some type of superhero. And not. Don't do that. And like I said, that she's just sad. But

Bodie, that's the sad part is that we all know that if this young kid was African American or colored or minority for that. He's probably dead right now. Today, we're probably speaking it of him and past tense. Am I right? Is that safe to say? Yes. You know, I'm saying walking around with a rifle shooting people. If he has any semblance of color in them, he's probably dead. He's probably getting shot. So, you know, to think that racism doesn't exist or prejudice or bias, at the very least, you know, there is a double standard. You know, I've had white people tell me, you know, when they get pulled over, they'll scream at a cop. They'll talk shit to a cop. No curse a cop out because then they don't fear they don't feel your life. They don't feel further like you know, they don't fear the guy Oh, either just get a ticket or just tell them to be on his way. You know, slow down or whatever the case may be that same person You know, is an African American, he's pulling over and he doesn't know that might be his last day. You know what I'm saying? You got to walk, you got to follow all type of rules. If you're an African American, you got all right, show your hands, you got to be the most polite person ever, that this cop has ever encountered. You know, you got to follow these protocols to maybe maybe, you know, not get harassed or not get beaten, or worse, not get shot quick, well, that another person might not have to deal with question.

Did your parents ever have to give you the speech? Which speech? And they probably didn't give it to you?

Which one is this? About? If you get pulled over? Do this, this and that? Yes, yeah. I've gotten that speech,

where the whole thing like like when, when you're black, and I say that your parents give you the speech, you are automatically know exactly what we're talking about,

you know, the obey, you know, say what they tell you this and that. And when I first got my license, my dad would tell me that because I used to get stopped all the time. When I first started driving, and I was speeding, I was I was, I wasn't wearing my seatbelt. I was driving around without inspection, and a call, I have paper, I was just reckless. And I was always getting pulled over. And my dad would always get when you get pulled over. Make sure you show your hands on the dash on the wheel. You know, don't get loud with the cops. You know, he will tell me these things. And I'm like, No, no, if the cars blah, blah, blah, he pit You know, I'm saying, you know, your inclination is to be belligerent, like, he stopped me for no reason. You know what I'm saying I used to get stopped because I had a sports car back in the day, I had a Mazda six. And it was fully loaded. You know, had the tinted windows, it was loud, I had the lights, I had the system, so that you know, you're a target. So I was tired when I was getting pulled over. And I used to be like, ah, I used to come home and my dad, like what happened to you, I got pulled over, they stereotyping me, it's because I have this car isn't that my dad was like, yo, you need to calm down, like it's gonna happen. But you know, and then he will give me that speech that you're talking about, like, you need to just make sure you do this, this and that and obey so that you can walk away, you know, I mean, and come back and come back home safely to me.

That's the whole thing. He tells you that you have to have that speed, so you can walk away, because there's a possibility to fear that your life is in danger.

And granted, like I said before, I'm light skinned it. So I know that it's 10 times worse for you know, my other relatives who are darker Dominicans, you know what I mean? Or for even, you know, being an African American, you know, it's tenfold.

The rule booklet is even bigger. It's not, it's weird, because like, even if I know, all of my paperwork is fine, I don't have a ticket, my registration is up to date, my wife is clean, and so on, so forth. For some reason, even now, even even at my older age. Whenever I see a siren in my rear view, I panic a little bit. Like there's like, there's like a tinge of fear. It's probably nothing. But they've been conditioned to the sense that it might not be and like I said, they keep showing evidence more and more than knew that. Yeah, if you keep saying like, you know, everything's probably be fine, but it might not be.

But if you see a car behind you does does does a little part of you inside, you know, starts questioning yourself like, what would I do something?

Yeah, but but but no reason. I think that's part of having like that speech when I was a kid like, but when I see the light for some reason, like I'm my left hand goes across my chest, it's make sure I got my seatbelt on, right. Like, if I know I have it on the entire time, it is like just a reaction. Like, it's so ingrained in me like, like, it's my seat when I was like in my blinkers and the lights on like, everything just kind of fires off my brain. When I don't need to, like it's so unimportant, but it's what happens. So it's like, what do you do? I mean, you comply? You listen, you put both hands in the wheel. It's Yes, sir. No, sir. It's ridiculous. It's like, like I said, and like I said, you're trying to be as respectful as possible, and you're trying to be open and listen and, and follow the officers demands. But if he's just having a bad day, and you just might be victim number, whatever, he just go and get it. And I mean, we speak in the nicest way or whatever, he just might not like your tone, or your skin color, or the way that you look at them or whatever. Always something it's never just simply the letter of the law is always something more. And like I said, if that's difficult for people of color to deal with every single waking day of their lives and just continues on and on and on, and we just get sick of it. And it keeps happening. And that's the frustrating part. It just keeps happening. The protest started because of George Floyd. And your figure, like, we're going to paint black lives matter in the court. We're going to wear t shirts, we're going to keep the message out there. We're going to keep the fight going and even sewing all that like say It can't it cannot protect us from racism, the thing that I find important about protests, and a lot of people have always said, like, yo, you guys been protesting for years? What does it do? It doesn't do anything? No, it does two very important things. One, it brings attention to the light of the issue that you would like to address. Secondly, most importantly, is disruptive. You know, marching and protesting, and sittings and boycotts. It's disrupting to a person's nature. This is Robin because it this mantle's the flow of how people think life should go, or how a precious think life should go. So when I started those characters, and they were being yelled at spent on food thrown on and everything else that it disrupted businesses, people didn't want to attain there, it kept the tension there. And it kept growing and growing and grow to something was done about it. So it does matter. So I don't, I'm not really a fan of when people say, you know, there's no point in protesting it does, because you need to find a way to get your message out. one lone idiot on the internet yelling about how bad the world is, it's not gonna make a difference. But a million of them all united under a particular cause that can do it. So what we can take of anything I notice kind of a roundabout way from how to how we get from cars to here, or how to get from, you know, being pulled over to here or from Kyla here is simply that we kind of get frustrated by the lack of response in regards to the ills of society. We like, again, all this time, Brianna's Taylor's killers have not been charged, they have not been arrested. They walk freely. And I'm not saying as if I want any harm done to them. I'm just saying by the letter of the law, if I kill someone, I go to jail, cop kill somebody, he goes on vacation. There's something really wrong with that scenario. But that's something that continues on call to get paid administrative leave. However, it might be, it's ridiculous. But it's something we have to struggle with every day. Like I said, I applaud the NBA for making those changes. I say, you know, EFF off the conflict corner here and thinking that he's a patriot, and murdering people. I applaud those who still to this day, try to fight to make change in this world, that they are not unheard. They are not disregarded, that we hear you, we see you we listen to you, we are beside you. Were allies, we're brothers, we're sisters, we're together. And people have to recognize like, this is not a simple problem is something that's going to take a very long time to get to. Because you did mention a point about NBA owners need to talk to their like their millionaire friends

and their politician friends

and politicians to do something about this. Okay, I didn't didn't I'll be very clear. Those niggas on that plantation to call the NFL. That's not going to happen. Oh, well.

I mean, at least the NFL, you know, runningback levy on Bell tweeted the other day, we've been protecting the shield, it's time for the shield to protect us. And I think just with that tweet, he's putting pressure on Roger Goodell. Because out of all the sports, I mean, obviously baseball is also known as, you know, one of those, those leagues, where they, they they're, they're always blind to these cultural issues. NBA has been always on the forefront. They've always gotten it. But Roger Goodell, two out of all the commissioners, I think he's the most dictator ish. You know, that's, that's the right word that I could use. You know, he's he he's out of all the leagues. He's the one Commissioner that's always been in control of the League. He owns the players basically, you know, he doesn't allow them to, to kneel, for example, or to stand up for what they believe in. So, levy on Bell with this tweet, I think it's putting pressure on Roger Goodell to say, Hey, man, you know, we got to start doing something. We can't be taking your crap anymore. You know what I'm saying? Um, that was cute. That's cute. What he did, it's not gonna work. Well, some has to work. Eventually. We got to do something. No, it's not gonna work. Then I guess the players are gonna have to boycott just like the NBA players did.

They'll try to work? Here's the thing. You call Roger, the dictator? Yes thing. Rob is far from it. Right is more puppet than the dictator. Brian is not in the most powerful person. Roger is an employee of the owners, right? They elected Commissioner is not the other way around. So if they want to replace Roger, they can do so. The most vocal person, most powerful person in NFL is probably Jerry Jones. And through all his protests, and everything that's going on. He's the one guy who's been eerily silent. Not a word from one of the most popular franchises in the entire world from Dallas Cowboys owner, not a single word about telling, very telling, and it's going to be and none of the owners really spoke out about it because they're not going to They don't care. It's up to them. I know it's it's a terrible analogy to make put down and want to make it. If you play in a field that seems like a plantation, there's a bunch of black people out there playing for you. How much you stand behind them. You don't really you don't have guaranteed contracts. I said they're labor. They're disposable. Like say you like to prep your hometown, like, what a contract worth half a billion dollars. Hang on with me. Right? But maybe only like a quarter of it was actually guarantee. Right. But yeah, I'm not exactly about number, but I'm just saying. I said they play funny money with the math and they'll suddenly think everything's fine. With thriving, we're taking care of this. No, you're not. You're not at all. But you want to make it seem like you're doing something. But these are all just empty promises. I don't I don't see the league owners talking to these people opia out and about in front of you like like Arthur blank people that nature. Sure. But Arthur blank was always like that. These are only Atlanta Falcons. If you don't know. He's always been that kind of person. But I said your most powerful guys, your birthdays, your Robert crass, well done. So that's some things on, you know, work with Meek Mill in regards to police reform, film, and so forth. But that's great. And I'm glad you're there. But as you said, these are all public spaces. These are public rooms of politicians, and celebrities and athletes. We kind of needed to go behind closed doors, to the people who influence decisions, who make decisions. Who if you're if you feel that you've earned this money, and you're that powerful, that you can influence them to make change. And that is something that's don't feel very comfortable about. That's something I just I don't believe that the possessed the integrity to do so. Because it's easy to jump on a public wave to do what's right in public. But are you able to do it in private? And like I said, when when George Floyd got murdered, I saw so many white people talking about Black Lives Matter, and putting up their their shirts and their signs and their posts and everything else like that. And I'm like, Yeah, you're not you're not making this a movement, you're making this a meme, like you're doing, you're just riding a wave of what's popular right now. Like, do I feel still carrying that same energy months later? A few, but not all of them. Because if there was more, it'd be just as much outrage about this. But it's not, this is still an ongoing continuous situation, the problem that, in the end, black people are going to have to solve for white people. And that shit is frustrating. We didn't cause this problem. But it's us out there marching, is us out there protesting, it's us dealing with this. Why? Because you guys say that you want to do something, but you're not there. We need you out and about all the time, I don't need you to make this a popularity contest. I need to do what you feel is morally right. And one of the right things that if you if you cause this problem, either directly or indirectly, I needed to come help fix this. As a matter of fact, you're supposed to be the main one fixing it. But again, the people you see out there marching are people of color. Like say just, I don't want you to be like, but I was out there greet you out there. Where was everybody else? Where was your family? Where was your friends, wherever your coworkers. Because, you know, when a martyr approached us, I'm like that were always there. My family, my friends, my co workers, my associates, were all out there trying to try and be a part of something, we all try to make a way to make change. So it's not really on us. But it always falls upon us. Like I said, that become frustrating. But it's neither here nor there.

But you know, if we go to baseball, I feel like obviously, there's not that many African Americans left and baseball. So I feel like these teams and these team owners, they don't get it. So, you know, besides hockey, I think Major League Baseball does the least for the culture. As a Mets fan, how do you feel about you know, the Mets management got caught on the Hot mic, you know, discussing how to how to stage, how to possibly stage you know, a mini movement or something to show that they care without having to cancel any games. And then they retracted back and then they blamed the commissioner, like it was a whole It was a whole mess. how you felt about that?

That's just white people, white people. That's it. I mean, I can't get any simpler than that. It's simply white people, white people, but you guys can't even come up with a proper strategy to fuck up properly, which is dumb, like, like, again, this but that's why I stated that. This to me. It's a societal issue. I understand that. But it's a moral issue is simply choosing between what is white right or what is waiting, what is right and what is wrong. And what you want to do is that if you know that this is wrong, and you see that there is a particular course of action that People are showing to show how wrong it is. And that they're actively fighting against that wrong. There should be no question that you should join along with whatever homework protests that they're doing, whether they're sitting out games, whether that's marching, whether that's no, not supporting certain businesses. Yeah, you should. Why do you need a strategy to denounce? You know, violence and racism? I don't understand. It's actually pretty stupid. Because you know what it is, like I said, you saw that video, you saw what occurred, you saw how wrong it is it Look, no matter whatever questions might come up afterwards, from just a visceral view, you know, this wrong? So why do you need a strategy or something to figure out how to go about this properly, they weren't worried about that. All they're worried about is, you know, we want to do this when we make sure these games get played. Because like I said, in the end, they honestly don't care as much, who might think that these are, you know, upright, outstanding people. They haven't given us any evidence or credit to say that they are struggling. It's super troubling. And I just like saying trolling, because I don't want to call anyone else. Anything else. Besides that? I just rather use that word, because it just doesn't make full sense to me where something is so simple and direct, where you know what you need to do, but you need to think about it. It's not a thought,

I mean, it will go home. If you get caught trying to put together a publicity stunt, then you're in no way shape or form about the movement. No, you're not about it.

But you're not about it. And then you're trying to pass the book, like, you get caught. Rihanna and I was other people thought like, No, just there's only like, we didn't know how to react upon it. We react to react upon it ridiculously and in a very, you know, insensitive and dumb manner. And we apologize. And we're in the following statement, with they always say like, we'll try to perform better and future actions. And I want to see that put to work. But this wasn't a mention that they just they dropped the ball on this one. They don't do smart idea, but they ruin it.

You know, and let's go back to the NBA, because it seems like you know, they're the only ones that are doing anything remotely resembling a, you know, movement of any sort. So apparently, score for the black guys, but

you expect,

yeah, but apparently the players got together with the owners and came to some type of agreement where the player, you know, where the owners made some promises. Anthony Davis forward from the Lakers tweeted the other day, if they don't keep their promise, we won't play again, it's as simple as that. And among the action items that were agreed to were the establishment of a Social Justice Coalition made up of coaches, players and team governors to promote voting access, and civic engagement and advocating for police and criminal justice reform. You know, they're also suppose they also agree to, you know, to make the arenas, the NBA arenas, locations for, you know, voting voting stations, for the upcoming elections. But Anthony Davis basically said, Hey, if they don't, if they don't hold up their end of the of the promises, then we're going to sit out again. How do you feel about that?

We weren't big on try. But here's the thing that I don't have an issue with it. And don't even question it. Because I understand what they're let me say this the right way. But they're asking for basic, simple civility. They're not asking for Reparations. They're not asking that every white person apologize for the wrongs that they did. They're not saying that every cop is a terrible person. Not saying this, asking just for simple things. As a matter of fact, we think about asking for change, they're like, this is what we need to do. We need to form a coalition, that these problems that we want to have addressed that they are addressed by the proper people. And that includes everybody that is inclusive, coaches, players, owners, whatever you want that we want. We want to make sure that we reinforce our constitutional right to vote, and that people have a place where they can go do so and have access to it. Again, in hindsight is kind of a ridiculous request. Because it's something that's so basic, and that because you're a person of color, even your constitutional right to vote can become an issue. like where do you vote? How do you vote? Can you can you vote here, like I've known people who have attempted to vote and also the polling place they've gone to for eight years ago, miles away, and they can't get that now they can't vote. That's the kind of thing that they pull all the time. So I understand what they're doing, actually applaud them. And always applaud the MP and I always support them. Because like I said, we have a league full of black Players who deal with this day in day out. And people wonder why, like, you know, why did they protest come back because it's always there. They're always the first ones kept running cap, capping the situation is different. Because a lot of people didn't even know the protests until he actually spoke him about it like he was kneeling weeks before like someone actually called him and asked him the question. So it's not really shocking or surprising. But again, he he did that to protest or bring light, about police brutality, these gentlemen are trying to do their best use their influences and their platforms to let them know like, you know, we're past the point of no, literally playing games. If we don't have particular demand Smith, we know that your league fully completely depends upon us, your revenue streams, everything is built upon our backs. And there are some things that we would like to have addressed and taken forward. And if we don't do that, then we plan. So for them to take that stance and to really put their careers on line. And what I don't think is a political side. I think it's how they honestly feel more power to them.

Yeah, I mean, you know, this has been a very, I want to say strong week for me, emotionally, between the sports broadcast to the Chadwick boseman. Passing, I woke up yesterday, I was just off, I was in a bad mood, I was just off. Oh, everything was bothering me, I had to get out and get some fresh air drove around for no reason. And, you know, you took me to the gun range, for the first time you took me to the gun range, and they were out of Glock 19. So I ended up with a 45, which has a little bit more drawback. But I basically just took out my frustrations. They had the gun range yesterday. And, you know, obviously, I felt better. But, you know, you wake up the next day, and it's like, okay, you know, you're still living in the same world, like, not much has really changed. You know, I'm saying, Yeah, and I have a three year old baby boy. And it scares me knowing that, you know, by the time he gets to conscious age, so he might still be living in this society where stuff like this is still going on. And I think that worries me that scares me. Like, I don't want him, you know, I don't want him growing up in this world, bro.

What do you do about it?

That's the question. What do we do about it? Like, where do we go from here? You know, I mean,

like,

you know, the NBA made some noise, but then they came back to play this weekend. You know, I still don't know how I feel about that. Like I said, I, I wish they would just cancel all sports. So we can really concentrate. You know, I mean, I was thinking of things that really matter. And try to force these owners to pay attention. But what do we do from now?

I mean, in regards to your own thing to pretty much do for him it is to make sure he learns to be respectful and courteous of all people of all races, genders colors Creed's that he treats people like humans before anything else that he doesn't see. Well, I don't like the term see color, because you're always going to see it. But just be understanding and respectful of everybody, no matter what background they come in, no matter what they do. Because like I said, with them, you don't necessarily understand or know what kind of life they're leading. Again, we lead up we lead this off with Chadwick boseman. Thanks for our view, from our perspective, a young, brilliant, successful actor with on his way up. But we begin the show by saying, you know, he's got

these did.

But we don't know his life. We don't, we never understood his background. We just like to when people make fun of him and jokes, when we just didn't make a whole lot of sense. You got to treat people like the humans first. And we all go through things, we were all going to go through something and it's going to be harsh. And life is unforgiving. But you got to learn to forgive yourself. You got to learn to be caring to others, you got to respect others, you always have to be that you can never give up on that. Want to teach your son anything. always teach him how to to enjoy and how to be a good person before anything else. To respect others, to be a good human, to always love his family, and to love himself. A matter that he'll be fine. Just stuff the stuff life life, we're going to teach him. And and you really do about that. Like I said, your parents and my parents gave us both to talk. It still didn't avoid us dealing with you know, difficult police officers won't do anything life is going to go the way it is going to go. It's how you handle and how you deal with it. It's going to matter. The first thing and do that no matter what. You got to treat everybody with the respect that they deserve, even when you don't deserve some time. Because just perspective somebody just might save your life. And the most important thing you probably want to tell your son love your family. Love yourself. Keeping you. That's really,

amen. And also, I forgot to mention before rest in peace to Cliff Robinson, who also passed this weekend. This week suck. That's what I'm saying, bro. I've been depressed all weekend. And they say def comes in threes. I'm afraid to even find out who the third person is going to be, bro.

You know, whoever came over there, I'm gonna slap the hell out of here, but it seems to always come true now. Yeah, that sucks.

And, you know, speaking of Cliff Robison, I actually had the privilege of meeting him years back at a Lauryn Hill concert. You know, I was there with some, some people, some some friends of mine, he was there with his peoples. And we, you know, Laura hills notoriously is known for coming out late, late. So we're in the place, starting at 8pm. The doors open, she didn't come out till like one or two in the morning. So the whole time we're just there drinking, listening to the DJ playing music. By the time she comes out. We're all beat, you know, we're ready to go. So he's there, he approached, he actually approached me We were just dive into the music that was playing. And he approached me he was a Hey, man, you having a good time, I was like, Yeah, man, what's going on, he was a Hey, and he introduced himself. He's like, my name is cliff, he shook my hand. And I was like, I know who you are, man. You know, nice meeting you whatever. And I kind of always look back. And I always kind of wish that I didn't allude to knowing who he was. Because I felt like that day, he was just trying to be a regular person. You know, he didn't want to be a celebrity, he didn't want to really be recognized. And I told him, I know who he was, you know, we chopped it off, we hung out a little bit, we had a couple of drinks. And we even took some pictures, I have no idea where those pictures are, who hasn't, but I remember taking pictures with him. But after that, you know, once the crowd started recognizing he was an NBA player, you know, he started, you know, staying keeping to himself. And he started drifting away. And I was like, dang, if I were to just, you know, not even told him that I recognize them and just conversate with him, like a regular Dude, I probably, you know, I'm saying I probably would have chopped it up with him more, but rest and peace to him. I mean, we're just cutting the culture is just losing, we're just losing too many brothers and sisters, man. And so I'm gonna give something gotta give but you know, between police brutality between, you know, our health, I think we got to do a better job of staying healthy, whether it's eating better, whether it's working out, you know, being more conscious of what you put in and out of your body. Like, I think we got to do a better job, and we got to live longer than this man. But, great. I'm gonna end this episode with a, quote, quote of the week by Martin Luther King, Jr. And he said, There comes a time when silence is betrayal. So that being said, That being said, we'll see y'all next week.

Just to follow up with what Dr. Dre said,

We live in a country, the country now looking back,

okay, correct. There's a specific quote by James Baldwin that states following. I love America more than any other country in this world. And exactly For this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. You can love this place. And we can love this country. But that doesn't eliminate the fact that if we see something wrong, we should still be able to have their power, their ability to say something about it. So when it gradually doesn't be a plan for at least trying to do something about it, we hear you. We're listening. We're trying, we'll keep fighting. That's it, man. We got to do better. be doing better. We buddy, get off this, this call and do whatever we got to do to start there.

So we'll see it. We'll see you next week peace God.

I know when I think of going to work every day, and the passion and the intelligence, the resolve the discipline that everybody show. Also think of two questions that we all have received during the course of multiple publicity rounds. And one is did we know that this movie was going to receive this kind of response meaning wasn't going to make billions of dollars go but it wasn't gonna make a billion dollars? Was it going to still be around during this award season? And the second question is, has it changed the industry? Has it actually changed the way this industry works? How it seizes him? My answer to that is to be young, gifted and black. We all know what it's like to be told that there is not a place for you to be featured. Yet you are young, gifted and black. We know what it's like to be told to say there's not a screen for you to be featured on the stage and for you to be featured on. We know what it's like to be the tail and not the head. We know what it's like to be beneath and not above. And that is what we went to work with every day. Because we knew not that we would be around during award season that it would make a billion dollars. But we knew that we had something special that we wanted to give the world that we could be for human beings in the roles that we would play that we create, we could create a world that exemplified a world that we wanted to see. We knew that we had something that we wanted to give. And one thing I do know what did it change the industry. I know that you can't have a black panther now without a two on it. So we love you. We celebrate