WEBVTT - The Covenant with Black America Part 2 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:02.639 My League Buds has all the knowledge you want. 0:00:02.840 --> 0:00:04.400 My League Buds has. 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.120 All the knowledge you need League, But yet. 0:00:07.040 --> 0:00:08.240 They have all the books that. 0:00:08.280 --> 0:00:10.680 The whole wild world one up read. 0:00:10.880 --> 0:00:11.960 My League buks. 0:00:12.520 --> 0:00:17.200 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome to Malik's Bookshelf, bringing a world together 0:00:17.480 --> 0:00:21.520 with books, culture and community. Hi, my name is Malik, 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:27.280 your host of Malik's bookshef Woo. We had an eventful week, 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:33.640 an All Star week and community events that were hit, home, run, 0:00:33.880 --> 0:00:40.240 electric and amazing. Well, the Covenant with Black America twenty 0:00:40.320 --> 0:00:47.840 years later was very informative and quite enlightening, and I'm 0:00:47.880 --> 0:00:50.880 going to feature in some of the conversations that took place. 0:00:51.840 --> 0:00:54.000 Tavis Smiley has. 0:00:54.160 --> 0:01:00.280 Updated this new book with new essays contributing Covenant. Yes, 0:01:00.720 --> 0:01:03.440 we're at the event and they spoke and I was 0:01:03.480 --> 0:01:06.840 able to record some of their words as Tavis Smiley 0:01:06.959 --> 0:01:08.280 was the keynote speaker. 0:01:08.640 --> 0:01:10.759 So I want to feature some of that. 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:17.800 Most enlightening conversation and talk that took place. So I 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:22.880 want to definite make that my main subject for this 0:01:22.959 --> 0:01:29.000 particular episode. I want to also feature at a later 0:01:29.080 --> 0:01:34.760 time the Jay Ellis event that we hosted that had 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:40.199 over four hundred attendees, and it also had a mini Insecure. 0:01:41.360 --> 0:01:42.759 Reunion that took place. 0:01:43.959 --> 0:01:47.360 I'm going to probably address that next week, but this 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:54.440 particular episode this week, The Covenant with Black America Twenty 0:01:54.520 --> 0:02:04.560 years Later by Tavis Smiley and contributing Covenant authors. We 0:02:04.640 --> 0:02:07.600 had a community event this week and the title of 0:02:07.640 --> 0:02:11.560 the event was called The Covenant with Black America Twenty 0:02:11.600 --> 0:02:15.519 years Later, and the keynote speaker and contributing. 0:02:15.080 --> 0:02:19.520 Author and editor is Tavis Smiley. 0:02:20.000 --> 0:02:24.560 So this event had Covenant contributors and their names are 0:02:24.639 --> 0:02:30.840 Connell West, Melina Abdullah, Connie Rights, Mark Willie Thomas, Elisa o'doona, 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:32.120 and Tyrone Howard. 0:02:32.400 --> 0:02:33.200 All of them. 0:02:33.520 --> 0:02:37.280 Spoke just a little about the essays that they contributed 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:41.480 to in this new book, because it's been revamped and 0:02:41.520 --> 0:02:44.920 the essays been updated, and it's called The Covenant with 0:02:45.040 --> 0:02:50.360 Black America twenty years Later by Tavis Smiley. I was 0:02:50.400 --> 0:02:52.359 able to record some of the words of the Covenant 0:02:52.440 --> 0:02:55.600 contributors at the event, so I'm going to feature that 0:02:55.720 --> 0:02:56.720 on this episode. 0:02:56.919 --> 0:02:58.720 I'm gonna start with Tavis Smiley. 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:01.400 This book has done a lot of work over the 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:02.440 last twenty years. 0:03:02.840 --> 0:03:06.040 So here we are now twenty years later with this 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:07.400 new edition of the text. 0:03:07.919 --> 0:03:08.720 And so we have. 0:03:08.800 --> 0:03:11.960 Reached into the best of Black America to get a 0:03:12.040 --> 0:03:16.440 variety of persons, thought leaders, opinion makers, influences to write. 0:03:16.240 --> 0:03:20.640 New essays for this edition twenty years later. 0:03:21.080 --> 0:03:23.680 We are fortunate that a number of these contributors in 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:25.359 the book, for those who already had it. A matter 0:03:25.360 --> 0:03:27.080 of fact, turn if you got a book, we gotta 0:03:27.080 --> 0:03:29.959 make my Bible studies being the church. This Bible study 0:03:30.440 --> 0:03:32.440 you got if if you got your Bible, if you've 0:03:32.440 --> 0:03:33.960 got your book, I'm sorry, I hold your book up. 0:03:34.040 --> 0:03:35.880 Let me see this. Get that shot, Get that shot. 0:03:35.920 --> 0:03:38.640 Pren you that shot, Get that shot, get that photo. 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:44.000 Hold you from something high everybody where your book sitting, hold. 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:49.240 Yours in there, and way you just do care. So 0:03:50.160 --> 0:03:52.800 we are fortunate. And it didn't really I didn't plan 0:03:52.880 --> 0:03:53.360 it this way. 0:03:53.680 --> 0:03:56.120 I just reached out to some of the best and 0:03:56.480 --> 0:03:59.640 most brilliant people that I know, asking them twenty years 0:03:59.680 --> 0:04:02.480 later if they were to consider writing a new essay 0:04:02.920 --> 0:04:05.920 for this text on these particular companies. 0:04:06.080 --> 0:04:07.720 Tyrone Howard, can we. 0:04:08.240 --> 0:04:11.200 Show some serious and not give me some serious love 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:13.279 attention effects for brother Tamas. 0:04:13.040 --> 0:04:17.360 Right out of time like gim like, what are we 0:04:17.560 --> 0:04:19.680 to give host the flowerpots? Were not to give the 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:23.320 flowers the brothers, There's not happening with our use your 0:04:23.480 --> 0:04:26.680 vision and your commitment, your position and my mind, your 0:04:26.760 --> 0:04:29.480 love for us, and so I just hope we love 0:04:29.560 --> 0:04:31.200 on you the way you love on us. And so 0:04:31.279 --> 0:04:33.279 I just want to say thank you for the vision, 0:04:33.320 --> 0:04:34.760 thank you for allowing me to be a part of this. 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:37.680 As you all know, for those who know me, for 0:04:37.680 --> 0:04:39.320 those who don't, our education. 0:04:39.000 --> 0:04:40.679 Have been my passion for a long time. 0:04:41.040 --> 0:04:44.440 And essentially what I've tried to capture in this particular 0:04:44.560 --> 0:04:48.599 essay is that education has always been a harveuser of 0:04:49.320 --> 0:04:51.680 basic human rights in this country. 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:54.359 When you want to look at whenever Americans. 0:04:53.800 --> 0:04:56.600 Tried to show how it feels about black costs, all 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:58.680 you have to do is look at at schools, and 0:04:58.760 --> 0:05:01.240 so the goal will be showed me the schools public 0:05:01.360 --> 0:05:04.000 education that are done right, and then you can start 0:05:04.040 --> 0:05:06.200 to tell me about how this country is serious levet 0:05:06.240 --> 0:05:08.599 doing right by black folks. And so what I raised 0:05:08.600 --> 0:05:11.480 are some real compelling questions that we must think about 0:05:12.000 --> 0:05:13.719 moving forward when it comes to public education. 0:05:14.000 --> 0:05:15.160 One is this. 0:05:15.160 --> 0:05:19.320 Racial recording that we have seeing a massive and unprecedented 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.200 racial transformation in our schools in this country, and black 0:05:22.240 --> 0:05:24.960 folks are becoming less and less and less the flavor 0:05:25.000 --> 0:05:27.440 of the month, despite the fact that black folks have 0:05:27.560 --> 0:05:30.159 always been the ones at the forefront of ensuring that 0:05:30.200 --> 0:05:32.880 we have the highest quality of public schools. So part 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:34.839 of what we have to recognize in this country is 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:38.360 that Black folks, while our numbers continue to decrease in 0:05:38.480 --> 0:05:41.600 terms of public schools, we have still had the most impact. 0:05:41.640 --> 0:05:44.120 We have still had the most for force and fight. 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:45.160 And so I want to. 0:05:45.080 --> 0:05:47.440 Make sure that we don't lose the ways in which 0:05:47.720 --> 0:05:50.039 black folks have been at the forefront of creating the 0:05:50.040 --> 0:05:52.200 public schools that have the highest of quality. 0:05:52.720 --> 0:05:54.200 Second thing I'll talk about. 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:56.120 Real quick is I want us to find a way 0:05:56.160 --> 0:06:00.280 to begin to be really unapologetic about the end of 0:06:00.360 --> 0:06:07.440 the criminalization of black children in schools, in anything primalization, 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:09.960 because there's too much data that still shows the ways 0:06:09.960 --> 0:06:14.719 in which black bodies are scrutinized, black bodies are surveilled, 0:06:15.000 --> 0:06:18.279 black bodies are policed all in public schools. 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:19.320 You look at the data on. 0:06:19.320 --> 0:06:22.240 Who's most likely to be expelled, it's black children. You 0:06:22.240 --> 0:06:24.360 look at the data, who's most likely to be suspended, 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:27.080 it's black children. You look at who has the highest 0:06:27.160 --> 0:06:31.160 suspension rates of babies in pre school is black children. 0:06:31.880 --> 0:06:35.480 I'll say that again, suspension of babies in pre school 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:38.080 is black children. So until we begin to have these 0:06:38.080 --> 0:06:41.880 serious conversation about ending the criminalization and the policing of 0:06:41.920 --> 0:06:43.680 black children, we're not going to be serious about that. 0:06:43.720 --> 0:06:45.840 So the Covenant talks about how we have to. 0:06:45.760 --> 0:06:49.200 Get serious about making sure public education is right, that 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:52.200 we lift up the important role that racism has played 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:54.640 and continues to play in public education, and how we 0:06:54.680 --> 0:06:58.600 create up more bright, better affirming, and loving public education systems. 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:04.920 Melina Abdullah, Hey everybody, Tabis, thank you for including me, 0:07:05.000 --> 0:07:07.680 and thank you for look, I'm gonna just expose who 0:07:07.720 --> 0:07:08.680 I am. 0:07:09.200 --> 0:07:10.560 I like to follow through. 0:07:10.440 --> 0:07:12.920 On things that I'm also a hell of a procrastinator, 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:15.920 But you can't procrastinate with Tabas tennys Is. 0:07:15.960 --> 0:07:19.320 Like you said at five o'clock, it's seven o'clock, right, 0:07:19.480 --> 0:07:20.400 And so thank you for me. 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:22.560 I'm patient looking me and thank you for including me 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:25.040 in the book, and so many things that have been 0:07:25.080 --> 0:07:27.520 really really important, not just for me, but for this 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:32.640 movement and many of you have heard on streets that 0:07:32.760 --> 0:07:35.280 Black Lives Matter is a thing of the past. 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:40.000 Right what lives matter moments is over? Say she looks, 0:07:40.080 --> 0:07:42.640 they're liars. They're liars. We were getting. 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:43.440 It's not over. 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:49.360 It is not over when mainstream media, when corporations, when 0:07:49.400 --> 0:07:51.280 white supremacy turns it ten. 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:52.920 It's because we're affected. 0:07:53.680 --> 0:07:56.080 And so we have to remember that we are lions 0:07:56.120 --> 0:07:58.840 who tell our own stories. And I'm so so grateful 0:07:58.880 --> 0:08:02.120 to Brother Tabs for giving us a platform to tell. 0:08:01.960 --> 0:08:04.480 Our own story. But this is not a drill. Every 0:08:04.520 --> 0:08:08.080 single Saturday on kb LA, we're. 0:08:07.880 --> 0:08:11.360 Always including an uplifting movement and everything that he does. 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:15.840 So he asked me to write an essay on community policing, 0:08:16.120 --> 0:08:21.040 which I absolutely do not believe in. And the reason 0:08:21.080 --> 0:08:23.840 I don't believe in community policing is because I know 0:08:24.040 --> 0:08:29.080 that police don't create safer communities resources too. And so 0:08:29.240 --> 0:08:32.360 the essay that I wrote comes in the name of 0:08:32.440 --> 0:08:35.000 Wakisha Wilson, And so if you could say her name 0:08:35.040 --> 0:08:40.000 with me, I'd appreciate it. Wakisha Wilson, say your name, 0:08:41.559 --> 0:08:42.200 Say your name. 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.079 Wakisha Wilson was a thirty. 0:08:45.880 --> 0:08:51.000 Six year old black mother who was taken to Metro 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:52.400 Detention Center. 0:08:52.200 --> 0:08:54.640 Here in Los Angeles for a very very. 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:59.000 Reminder crime or so called crime for basically telling somebody off. 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:03.600 And her family didn't have a lot of extra money. 0:09:03.679 --> 0:09:06.400 Her mother's an in home care worker, and so like 0:09:06.600 --> 0:09:09.360 many of our folks, they made the decision that she 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:12.000 would stay in until Monday, when she could go in 0:09:12.040 --> 0:09:12.480 front of a. 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:16.240 Judge and then be released on a walk. She didn't 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:17.040 live that long. 0:09:18.240 --> 0:09:22.520 She was killed inside LAPD Metro Detention Center and the 0:09:22.679 --> 0:09:26.640 tape that surveiled her cell was deleted. There were twenty 0:09:26.640 --> 0:09:30.960 two minutes of missing video. Here's what's worse is that 0:09:31.040 --> 0:09:34.040 they never even bothered to tell her family. So her 0:09:34.080 --> 0:09:37.720 mother frantically searched for her for four days before she 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:42.640 discovered that her daughter had been killed inside. So this 0:09:43.000 --> 0:09:45.880 essay is written in the name of Wakisha Wilson in 0:09:45.960 --> 0:09:49.680 collaboration with sister Lisa Hines and sister Shila Hines, who's 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:53.120 her auntie has been struggling for justice in Wakisha's name 0:09:53.200 --> 0:09:55.920 ever since Wakisha was killed in twenty sixteen. 0:09:56.400 --> 0:09:59.320 The premise of the essay is when we fled our. 0:09:59.200 --> 0:10:04.479 Communities resources with things like housing with things like quality education. 0:10:04.480 --> 0:10:08.640 With healthcare, with livable wage jobs, with all the. 0:10:08.640 --> 0:10:10.920 Things that our communities want, neat and deserve. 0:10:11.520 --> 0:10:16.120 Then we can remove police who cause harm from our 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:20.640 communities and instead have communities of care. So community policing 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:22.760 is different for me than. 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:24.400 It is for many others who. 0:10:24.240 --> 0:10:28.040 Advocate having cops with guns and badges in their neighborhood. 0:10:28.120 --> 0:10:30.920 That's never made me feel safer. I don't think it's 0:10:30.960 --> 0:10:32.679 made most black people feel safe. 0:10:33.320 --> 0:10:36.560 What makes us feel safer is resources, and so I 0:10:36.679 --> 0:10:39.880 encourage it to enter the essay for us to consider abolition, 0:10:40.320 --> 0:10:44.240 which means tearing down systems of harm and building systems 0:10:44.240 --> 0:10:46.640 of care that really nurture black people. 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:49.160 When black people get free, everybody else off. 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:53.920 So I'm grateful to be able in Connie Rice, of. 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:54.920 Course of nature. 0:10:55.520 --> 0:11:00.360 You know, you galvanize, you organize, you mobilize. I've never 0:11:00.400 --> 0:11:04.240 seen anybody, and I've been all around the country. No 0:11:04.280 --> 0:11:08.840 one uses the media more strategically to fight some good fight. 0:11:09.200 --> 0:11:12.640 I'm telling you a good fight, I'm telling everybody knows about. 0:11:15.920 --> 0:11:17.199 It's wonderful to be here with you. 0:11:17.280 --> 0:11:17.800 I did. 0:11:17.880 --> 0:11:20.480 You can skip my essay. All I did was I'm 0:11:20.520 --> 0:11:24.280 in I'm in uh Taviss, like, can't you make it broader? 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:26.520 Cause I said, no, No, we got one thing to 0:11:26.559 --> 0:11:29.959 do this year. We we we cannot let a white. 0:11:29.760 --> 0:11:32.240 Nationalists supremacist get in the White House. 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:32.520 That's all. 0:11:32.640 --> 0:11:37.400 That's how I got. If you want me to write something, 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:39.199 that's all. I feel like frightening you're gonna have to 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:42.280 do so anything. You forbting me. I'm surprised you inviting 0:11:42.360 --> 0:11:47.080 me back. I don't expect any that find My message was. 0:11:48.679 --> 0:11:53.040 Justice is a relay. My my grandmother told me. She said, 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:56.679 because I started to complaining about Raven. Okay, she said, 0:11:58.600 --> 0:12:01.560 you don't have the right to complain. You have learned 0:12:01.559 --> 0:12:02.280 the right to complain. 0:12:02.480 --> 0:12:05.959 M until you've had to sit in your kitchen. 0:12:05.760 --> 0:12:10.120 In Birmingham, Alabama, with the lights out and a long 0:12:10.200 --> 0:12:13.439 gun over your knee, waiting for the klan. Mm I 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:16.160 wanna hear you can play about anything. All you have 0:12:16.200 --> 0:12:18.240 to do is walk through the doors we died to open. 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:23.120 So justice is a relay. You take that Batona, don't 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:25.240 drop it like my guard folks did in Paris. 0:12:25.240 --> 0:12:25.560 I don't know. 0:12:25.640 --> 0:12:34.640 That's not the women's teams dat I can remember crack 0:12:34.760 --> 0:12:35.320 swimming and. 0:12:35.400 --> 0:12:37.800 Drop your not drop the batonas I'm like. 0:12:39.280 --> 0:12:42.240 My grandmother said that justice is not a sprint, it 0:12:42.360 --> 0:12:45.520 is a relay, and generation to generation you hand out 0:12:45.559 --> 0:12:48.480 the town on and you run like the wind. And 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:51.719 so now on our watch, this is our watch, it's 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:54.480 our watch. Our folks had a my grandparents and my 0:12:54.480 --> 0:12:57.679 great grandparents. I'm the great granddaughter of slaves and slave owners. 0:12:58.040 --> 0:13:01.520 Just great, not great, gready, just great. It's been four 0:13:01.559 --> 0:13:04.960 generations from my family. That happens if you were the 0:13:05.000 --> 0:13:07.800 youngest of the of ten and fifteen kids and they 0:13:07.840 --> 0:13:09.920 all lived in ninety that's how that happens. 0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:14.520 But you know, it just hadn't been that long. When's 0:13:14.559 --> 0:13:15.400 the person. 0:13:15.080 --> 0:13:20.360 Who's the child of slaves, the last child of slaves 0:13:20.400 --> 0:13:20.839 to die? 0:13:20.880 --> 0:13:21.200 Do you know? 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:27.200 When he died two years ago? Two years ago, died 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:30.280 in Washington, DC, and they documented that. 0:13:30.280 --> 0:13:34.520 His father was born into slavery. 0:13:34.679 --> 0:13:37.679 So it has not been that long. But we have 0:13:37.840 --> 0:13:40.319 come a long way, with much much further to go. 0:13:40.800 --> 0:13:43.600 This is our watch. It's never been easier to fight 0:13:43.679 --> 0:13:47.960 this fight. Many some of us face dead, but not many. 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:52.280 All our great grandparents face dead trying to vindicate African 0:13:52.280 --> 0:13:57.480 American rights and so my little essay, I'm sorry to have. 0:13:57.520 --> 0:13:59.680 Us say, you know, it came in. I said, this 0:13:59.720 --> 0:14:00.880 is all I'm gonna do. 0:14:01.080 --> 0:14:05.680 Yeah, I said, I love I love folks expressing their opinions. 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:10.600 We are one job because it's bad. Somebody said, why 0:14:10.600 --> 0:14:11.600 do you do a why do you. 0:14:11.559 --> 0:14:14.600 Support the constitution and enshrined your inferior already as a 0:14:14.600 --> 0:14:16.720 woman and as an African American? 0:14:18.000 --> 0:14:18.800 Why do you fight? 0:14:20.520 --> 0:14:23.280 I said, because without that document we probably do. 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:24.520 Be pub pickn. 0:14:24.600 --> 0:14:32.440 Cotton freed slaves and escaped slaves, freed themselves and made 0:14:32.480 --> 0:14:34.600 Lincoln realize that he had end slavery. 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:39.000 We gave him that idea, our ancestors gave him that because. 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:42.760 He needed to free us in the rebellion States to 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:43.400 win the war. 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:46.920 It was out of any altruism. I don't know whether 0:14:46.920 --> 0:14:48.880 you believe. You know, he wanted to deport us after 0:14:48.920 --> 0:14:49.480 we were free. 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:53.040 So let's understand we were freed by all white supremacist 0:14:53.080 --> 0:14:55.800 but we don't know. Let the second one get in, all, okay, 0:14:56.800 --> 0:14:59.840 So I my little lessay is you vote for whoever 0:15:00.200 --> 0:15:02.280 is and get to two hundred and seventy, two hundred 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:05.320 and seventy if we can count electoral College one of 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:06.880 the artifacts of slavery. 0:15:06.920 --> 0:15:09.320 It locked in the power of the Southern States. We 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:10.320 still have it. 0:15:10.320 --> 0:15:15.400 It's still tilted toward the anti African American liberation forces. 0:15:16.080 --> 0:15:19.000 The electoral college is one thing, the filibusters Another's a 0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:20.920 whole drop down many of the things we have to 0:15:20.920 --> 0:15:22.119 do to fix this democracy. 0:15:22.280 --> 0:15:25.120 But we got to have a democracy to fix. Okay, 0:15:25.440 --> 0:15:28.160 so that you know I'm all for it. Listen, It's 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:29.480 not gonna be my candidate. 0:15:30.240 --> 0:15:33.800 You know, folks I want probably can't get elected in 0:15:33.840 --> 0:15:37.520 my lifetime, but we better go. 0:15:37.680 --> 0:15:38.640 We've got a much of it. 0:15:39.360 --> 0:15:41.760 Harris has put us back on the board and back 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:43.360 on the court, and. 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:47.800 She's making three three point shots and we need to 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:49.800 get behind here. I don't care if you'd agree with 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:53.200 everything about her. That's how we get the democracy. So 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:55.600 that's what my essay is about. In Tavis, thank you 0:15:55.640 --> 0:15:58.120 for inviting me back. I'll probably be dead at the time. 0:15:58.200 --> 0:16:02.920 You can do it in another twenty years, Alissa o'donah. 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:04.680 Sometimes you wake. 0:16:04.600 --> 0:16:06.920 Up in the morning and you're wondering, are we making 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:09.280 a difference, How do we sustain ourselves in the work. 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:11.160 How do you not get burned out when you see 0:16:11.200 --> 0:16:14.080 so many of our brothers and sisters, aunties and mamas 0:16:14.080 --> 0:16:14.880 out on the street. 0:16:15.280 --> 0:16:16.840 And I remember my uncle Ray. 0:16:16.840 --> 0:16:21.200 Who growing up in this community with experienced homelessness after 0:16:21.240 --> 0:16:23.720 World War Two, and I remember my mom. We would 0:16:23.720 --> 0:16:25.840 always go to a local barbershop or a bar to 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:28.800 look for him. And at that point our community was 0:16:28.880 --> 0:16:32.000 able to sustain enough or we had some resource. 0:16:32.160 --> 0:16:33.240 Not all doctor Villa. 0:16:33.320 --> 0:16:36.040 We need more always, but at least there was a 0:16:36.080 --> 0:16:38.520 sense of community where we could look after each other. 0:16:38.640 --> 0:16:41.280 And back then, we didn't know something of being uncowled 0:16:41.400 --> 0:16:44.240 or the term of homelessness. We just knew this was 0:16:44.280 --> 0:16:46.560 our loved one and the community helped us take care 0:16:46.560 --> 0:16:49.160 of him because he didn't want to come inside. So 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:51.920 fast forwarding to that where we have four out of 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:55.680 ten people experiencing homelessness across this country are our brothers 0:16:55.680 --> 0:16:56.280 and sisters. 0:16:56.760 --> 0:16:57.880 When we look at the state of. 0:16:57.800 --> 0:17:02.120 California, every counting, I literally the data, we are disproportionate 0:17:02.240 --> 0:17:06.240 compared to our census count in the homelessness population. Only 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.840 Native Americans come after us. So this is a real crisis. 0:17:10.920 --> 0:17:14.520 And Tatus and Supervisor, I'm really thankful because we don't 0:17:14.560 --> 0:17:15.320 talk about. 0:17:15.040 --> 0:17:16.240 It as a national issue. 0:17:16.400 --> 0:17:18.800 We talk about it when it's on our doorstep. We're 0:17:18.840 --> 0:17:21.119 wondering what do we do about it. But when you 0:17:21.280 --> 0:17:23.320 look around the room, and if we ever had time, 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:26.359 maybe there were days of dial up to understand how 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:28.760 many people where homelessness has been a part of their 0:17:28.800 --> 0:17:31.000 own story. Maybe they live in the car, maybe they 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:33.720 live with a friend. At some point you understand the 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:37.400 structural It's not a personal responsibility issue. And so I'm 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:39.280 so glad that we're able to take it tonight to 0:17:39.320 --> 0:17:40.200 a national level. 0:17:40.440 --> 0:17:42.960 So thank you, Mark Ridley Thomas. 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:46.240 I'm simply in the context of the state of Felipe, 0:17:47.000 --> 0:17:50.199 although it should be appreciated that this state has the 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:54.200 largest proportion of homeless people across people within any state 0:17:54.440 --> 0:17:59.560 in the United States. It is a crisis across the nation, 0:18:00.000 --> 0:18:07.280 basically disproportionately African American. And it's interesting today not this 0:18:07.680 --> 0:18:14.560 in terms of no matter what city, county, state, you 0:18:14.640 --> 0:18:20.040 find yourself that the disproportionate skew is toward African Americans 0:18:20.320 --> 0:18:26.399 facing this crisis, and that has prescriptive implications in terms 0:18:26.440 --> 0:18:31.080 of how we address it. And so for us in 0:18:31.080 --> 0:18:35.320 this essay, we try to make the point that homelessness 0:18:35.359 --> 0:18:42.840 is the manifestation, the contemporary manifestation of structural violence. It 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:46.880 is essentially to say that Black people have to contend 0:18:47.080 --> 0:18:49.040 with the. 0:18:48.320 --> 0:18:53.800 Rough edge, the hard edge of poverty. It is called homelessness. 0:18:54.640 --> 0:18:56.959 And I know if I want to survey the room, 0:18:57.280 --> 0:19:00.840 somebody here would raise their hand and say either they 0:19:01.000 --> 0:19:05.000 know someone who has been or is homeless, the homeless, 0:19:05.200 --> 0:19:08.440 who has experienced homelessness with themselves. 0:19:09.280 --> 0:19:10.760 This is what I want to leave you with. And 0:19:10.840 --> 0:19:12.080 I'll step aside. 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:15.320 Cornell west yea. 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.040 Who is holding up the bludstay Ganna. 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:22.720 To support this book. Just movement. We know the Black 0:19:22.800 --> 0:19:24.000 street of movement. 0:19:23.680 --> 0:19:27.680 Has always been the eleven in the American Democratic lowest 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:28.680 tide of Drew. 0:19:28.640 --> 0:19:32.639 Tellen and Justin c and Brother Tamas. I want to 0:19:32.680 --> 0:19:35.040 begin by saluting you, my bride. 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:36.639 You have been. 0:19:39.880 --> 0:19:42.560 We have been blessed to be brothers now for over 0:19:42.800 --> 0:19:44.600 thirty five yeah. 0:19:44.480 --> 0:19:47.840 Old of the countrict and the world, trying to be 0:19:48.080 --> 0:19:49.760 true to Frederick Douglas and I to. 0:19:49.800 --> 0:19:54.720 Be Wales, Martin King and Patty Nohema and so many others. 0:19:56.000 --> 0:19:58.320 I wanted a little to court mark really common and 0:19:58.440 --> 0:20:07.280 I think I heard the game, and I give it 0:20:07.359 --> 0:20:09.440 as the biggest love up before. 0:20:09.240 --> 0:20:12.480 We can buy stuff from the part of it. 0:20:12.680 --> 0:20:14.400 Both dynamic duo. 0:20:14.200 --> 0:20:16.520 When it comes to forces of good in the. 0:20:16.920 --> 0:20:29.359 Plos and July, oh Lord have pursed. And then my 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:30.480 running made my. 0:20:30.520 --> 0:20:38.720 Dear sister my day. I'm doing together, but the. 0:20:38.800 --> 0:20:42.200 Others in solidarity with the president Brown family. 0:20:42.640 --> 0:20:45.640 So the kind of running it's hard to find out, sharper, 0:20:45.760 --> 0:20:51.639 legal and social kind of drink into our struggle and 0:20:51.720 --> 0:20:55.160 it goes on and on and on and so many 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:57.560 others there. I don't want to take your time. 0:20:57.600 --> 0:20:59.880 I want the book signing to be in but. 0:21:00.119 --> 0:21:03.280 Heat in mind that twenty. 0:21:03.000 --> 0:21:05.160 Years later we're still on fighter. 0:21:05.680 --> 0:21:10.480 Twenty years later, we still as committed, as dedicated and 0:21:10.480 --> 0:21:10.840 as do. 0:21:13.320 --> 0:21:13.600 People. 0:21:13.840 --> 0:21:16.439 But you ain't on the chocolate side of town and 0:21:16.560 --> 0:21:20.720 before working people around the world. And yes we're toys bears, 0:21:21.119 --> 0:21:22.679 Yes we're relay brunners. 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:25.879 Yes we loved witers, Yes your freedom. 0:21:25.560 --> 0:21:27.880