Speaker 1: I kind of feel like I had a hard time
Speaker 1: picking like the analogy for this one because it fits
Speaker 1: in so many different ways in our world and even
Speaker 1: in our childhood, whether we're talking sports, religion, politics, gang banging,
Speaker 1: hip hop music, mainstream versus indie and underground. This thing
Speaker 1: that we're all existing in in our politics right now.
Speaker 1: That again, as the premise of this show is, it's
Speaker 1: like you actually understand this more than you do. It
Speaker 1: is because when the op is the op, that's just
Speaker 1: the op. That's the opt. The you're gonna be the op.
Speaker 1: They're gonna always be the op. Now'll never want to
Speaker 1: be a part of that, and they do. But oftentimes,
Speaker 1: if you were blessed enough to not have to move
Speaker 1: a lot, you know, or or stay in a particular
Speaker 1: side of town from for you know, the most part
Speaker 1: of your childhood, most likely the kid on the other
Speaker 1: side of the gun, on the other side of the
Speaker 1: you know, robbery or whatever the case may be, like
Speaker 1: you kind of know them. Y'all was in the same
Speaker 1: head Start program, y'all played the same little little league
Speaker 1: baseball if he was from South Central, like you know,
Speaker 1: we was looking at the same even if he was
Speaker 1: across town. It was like, yeah, they're like Sunday like
Speaker 1: little track meets, you know, all the little stuff that
Speaker 1: they would do that after school, the summer camps, the
Speaker 1: vacation Bible schools. You kind of know these kids, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. They made not to be the
Speaker 1: ones from YO block, but you kind of know. And
Speaker 1: then middle school happens and he recruited you. You join
Speaker 1: your thing. I can say specifically, like I remember specifically
Speaker 1: school ending in the summer coming back and I could
Speaker 1: think of two particular dudes that were like all of
Speaker 1: the sudden looked out in my mind. It was all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, now we couldn't kick it no more.
Speaker 1: And now he's trying to like he always got something
Speaker 1: to say every time I walk around, you know, And
Speaker 1: it took me a second to like really like, because
Speaker 1: you know, we're kids, to really understand, like, man, when
Speaker 1: did I become the opp And even though like when
Speaker 1: nobody around, sometimes we walk over school together giggling, laughing,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, because like fam like we
Speaker 1: grew up together. You know. Now I happened that since
Speaker 1: I happened to move a lot by the time we
Speaker 1: was finally settled. Is is around this this time of
Speaker 1: my life, you know, so I was able to know
Speaker 1: someone a little longer. You know, my story is like
Speaker 1: a lot of people's stories where your your time was
Speaker 1: split between whether it was divorced parents or my grandmother
Speaker 1: you know, essentially like watched me and my cousins for
Speaker 1: a lot of our child So like there's kids that
Speaker 1: I grew up with that were in my grandma's hood,
Speaker 1: who I would see them weekends or whatever. Right, but
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, like there was this time where
Speaker 1: it was like, Okay, things have actually changed. You know,
Speaker 1: we are now at war no matter how we feel
Speaker 1: about each other. Where I war, and sometimes that's a
Speaker 1: cold war. Sometimes that's a peaceful war. Sometimes there are beautiful,
Speaker 1: fleeting moments of agreement. Like I said, like when I
Speaker 1: was walking home, you know, talking basketball or just cracking
Speaker 1: jokes about like Ms Williams, you know what I mean,
Speaker 1: in fifth grade, like just whatever it was. But when
Speaker 1: lgs come around, everything changes. You know. I go to
Speaker 1: my side, You go to your side, and that's just it.
Speaker 1: You You you pick your heill you die on and
Speaker 1: you just die on that hill. And the point I'm
Speaker 1: making is even if it don't make sense, even if
Speaker 1: you know the person on the other side of that
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. That's the ay. Even if it's actually detrimental
Speaker 1: to all of us, don't matter. That's the OP. When
Speaker 1: I got into hip hop, which was my kind of
Speaker 1: exit out of this sort of you know, sort of
Speaker 1: gang situation, is like you was either mainstream or underground.
Speaker 1: You know when people talk Biggie Tupac, We was like
Speaker 1: boot camping Wou Tang. We was like k her as
Speaker 1: One Snoops our favorite rapper. We were like far side,
Speaker 1: Common Souls a mischief. We were backpacking. We didn't listen
Speaker 1: to the radio. You know what I'm saying. You weren't
Speaker 1: allowed to. Like jay Z, you weren't allowed to even
Speaker 1: if a song come on. He was just like, I
Speaker 1: don't no, man, he's kind of spitting up. You know.
Speaker 1: The lines were very clear. Jiggy rap, radio rap, commercial rap,
Speaker 1: was like, you don't they're the ops. They're destroying hip hop.
Speaker 1: He we talked about mass P, mass P and Puff
Speaker 1: Daddy destroyed hip hop. That's that was. We're backpackers, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, Like you just close minded backpackers.
Speaker 1: They always dips where at war to save hip hop
Speaker 1: with our rapidi raps, you know, save it from the money,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying the mainstreamers. I was a
Speaker 1: true believer, you know what I'm saying. Then along comes
Speaker 1: somebody like a Kanye West who was like, well, I
Speaker 1: came from backpacker. I don't know, like he was his
Speaker 1: I don't know if you watched his his documentary, but
Speaker 1: Rouckess records with like most and quality and Pharaoh maage
Speaker 1: and just like these like spiders, like he was kind
Speaker 1: of came from that, but he was also he was
Speaker 1: also Imphan's bleak. You know. Jay Z is also jiggy,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, like commercial rep like he
Speaker 1: liked fashion, you know. So he was this first like
Speaker 1: hybrid at the time that we had never seen, which
Speaker 1: gives birth to somebody like a Kendrick Lamar who can
Speaker 1: do uh. And now, like it's it's such a stupid
Speaker 1: thing to talk about now because at least hip hop,
Speaker 1: in my mind, has gotten over it. We all see
Speaker 1: it all as beautiful. Unfortunately our politics have not. Let's
Speaker 1: talk about what it means to be in a culture
Speaker 1: war hood politics. All right, that was a long intro
Speaker 1: for this, But politics, y'all, I want you to understand
Speaker 1: some of the stuff that's like happening, especially again going
Speaker 1: into this election season. These are things that like some
Speaker 1: terms you're gonna hear that my desires that you really
Speaker 1: understand what that is and you can draw your own conclusions.
Speaker 1: I plan on for the most part, holding my opinions
Speaker 1: about these things to myself unless I think that it's
Speaker 1: like absolutely necessary to express them for the context of
Speaker 1: the show. I've never wanted to develop a show that
Speaker 1: is that is to kind of chew your food for
Speaker 1: you and say, hey, this is what it tastes like,
Speaker 1: but more like, let me give you the ingredients that
Speaker 1: you cook your own meal. Because sometimes we may feel
Speaker 1: like people are talking over our heads and I just
Speaker 1: want again, I keep coming back to this, like nobody
Speaker 1: is talking over your head. You actually understand this stuff,
Speaker 1: you know. So this is one of those episodes because like, okay,
Speaker 1: make it makes sense. Republican Congressman Glenn Thompson, right, goes
Speaker 1: to his son's gay marriage three days after voting against
Speaker 1: federal protection of said gay marriage. Make it make sense?
Speaker 1: Is there a cognitive dissonance there. Well maybe maybe it's
Speaker 1: like I said, some people ain't true believers, they just
Speaker 1: playing the game. Others are like, well, how like, how
Speaker 1: does this work? Tell you how? Because we're in a
Speaker 1: culture war. Culture wars, politicians will say stuff like the
Speaker 1: soul of our nation is at stake, the single most
Speaker 1: important issue of our time. You know, these grandiose statements
Speaker 1: that are designed to be exaggerated. You know, they're they're
Speaker 1: they're hyperbole, hyperbole. I love that word, hyperbole, hyperbolic, hyper believe.
Speaker 1: I digress they are because they're they're they're trying to
Speaker 1: get your attention. They you know, they want to get
Speaker 1: you on edge. And being on edge, you know, ignites
Speaker 1: a certain part of your brain that flight or flight
Speaker 1: you're you're amygdala, you know, the part of your brain
Speaker 1: that says, I have to make a decision right now.
Speaker 1: You know, I have to feel this. I'm convincing you
Speaker 1: that your life is in danger, your very futures in
Speaker 1: that your children they in danger, you know, And who's
Speaker 1: the danger? Them fools? The the OP is always coming
Speaker 1: to get everything You've got, dao problem you feel, I'm saying, look,
Speaker 1: try it like this. Basically, if you want to translate it.
Speaker 1: It's very simple. We are at war for what the
Speaker 1: culture ought to be. Now, let's do some history and
Speaker 1: some animalogy about the term culture and where we got
Speaker 1: culture war from. All right, okay, we're back now. Culture.
Speaker 1: I honestly believe most of us don't even know what
Speaker 1: that actually means. Like when you say, well, what is culture?
Speaker 1: You know what it? What it? It's such a large question.
Speaker 1: Now I feel like, you know, especially among like you know,
Speaker 1: urban communities, we were like, yo, we did this for
Speaker 1: the culture. Uh, it's the culture. You know, you gotta
Speaker 1: wrap the culture. No, man, like you gotta do this
Speaker 1: for the culture, Like, well, what do we mean by that? What? What?
Speaker 1: Here's what's crazy? We we know what we mean. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, like, you know exactly, we know what
Speaker 1: we mean. But it's very you know, tricky to put
Speaker 1: words to it. So this woman helped, y'all do Let's
Speaker 1: put words to a culture at its very most simple
Speaker 1: academic definition. It's too humans trying to figure out how
Speaker 1: to survive. We are the one species on the planet,
Speaker 1: you know, due to our large frontal lobes. I don't
Speaker 1: know that aren't necessarily born with everything we need. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you leave a baby in the woods right after
Speaker 1: it was born, it dies. We we don't have all
Speaker 1: the faculties already. We don't have everything we need already.
Speaker 1: You could look at I'm gonna give you a couple
Speaker 1: of books on this one if you're ready to do
Speaker 1: some reading. This is from his book called Sacred Canopy.
Speaker 1: When I was writing my terraform book, also I got
Speaker 1: telephone coffee, you know what, telephone cobrew dot com. But
Speaker 1: when I was writing the book, this was some of
Speaker 1: the source material I used for research. And it talks
Speaker 1: about how culture is made, what is culture, how it's made,
Speaker 1: and then how it makes us, you know, like deers, horses,
Speaker 1: like other mammals, fish like whales. See what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: Like a whale is born swimming, but he already know
Speaker 1: how to swim. You know. You see horses and cows
Speaker 1: and they give birth that baby walking in an hour,
Speaker 1: like just within the hour, it's already walking. They got
Speaker 1: everything you need you already in the pack. It already noticed.
Speaker 1: Stay in the pack, you know what I'm saying. And
Speaker 1: of course you got the motherly you know, fatherly instincts
Speaker 1: that we see all across the animal kingdom. Whatever quote
Speaker 1: unquote air quote culture they have is us imprinting our
Speaker 1: experience on them. Won't know what they're doing. It just
Speaker 1: looks like what we're doing humans. However, we had to
Speaker 1: create language. We built, shelters, we built cities. Are familiar units,
Speaker 1: are family ties? Like for example, what is your mama's
Speaker 1: brother to you? Your uncle? I guess why? I mean,
Speaker 1: what that fool got to do with you? That's just
Speaker 1: your mama's brother. Like what what do you care? What
Speaker 1: about your mom's brother's children? Those are your cousins. Why
Speaker 1: as far as sir, cousins is always trouble? You know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, We didn't all we're all getting troven
Speaker 1: day around. What difference does it make what they are
Speaker 1: to you? Well, when we was traveling to African Savannah,
Speaker 1: trying to like not get eaten by a tiger, the
Speaker 1: thought was, I need to make sure that the people
Speaker 1: around me are going to not give me a poisoned berry,
Speaker 1: that you somehow care about who I am as a person.
Speaker 1: That so you're you're developing safety when you have to
Speaker 1: travel in pacts. I gotta understand that this track, this
Speaker 1: pack is safe, and then I need to know that
Speaker 1: when I meet another pack, there's a way to communicate
Speaker 1: with them. That's the language I gotta be able to
Speaker 1: communicate with this. This is just we're just trying to
Speaker 1: survive here, you feel me. And then we create aided
Speaker 1: art to express ourselves the motions that we have that
Speaker 1: we can't necessarily put into words. And then if I
Speaker 1: need to communicate across time and space, we developed language.
Speaker 1: These are all ultimately culture, the collection of all this stuff,
Speaker 1: the rules for which are rules of engagement are familiar
Speaker 1: ties are our our our languages. They're all listen and
Speaker 1: they don't exist in nature. We made them up like you,
Speaker 1: like you, I can't stress us enough. Culture is made up.
Speaker 1: It's all in our heads. The American culture, you know,
Speaker 1: it didn't always exist. We made it up collectively us. Yeah,
Speaker 1: nobody wrote ap wrote it down on a piece of paper,
Speaker 1: but we That's how culture is made, right. And then
Speaker 1: what's crazy about how culture works is what's this stuff
Speaker 1: is made and enough time goes by, then it starts
Speaker 1: making us. What do I mean by that? When I
Speaker 1: gave you the example of you know, uncle and cousin,
Speaker 1: the thought I'm sure, the thought never crossed your mind
Speaker 1: that wait, there was. It wasn't always like that, Like,
Speaker 1: that's just what it is. Were you're talking about, That's
Speaker 1: just what it is. There's no way for you to
Speaker 1: look at your uncle and not see him as your uncle,
Speaker 1: because it's made us now, right, even if you've never
Speaker 1: met him, You're like, well, that's my uncle. You ever
Speaker 1: thought about the fact that, like, there are people with
Speaker 1: no uncles and cousins because both their parents were only children.
Speaker 1: Yet of course there are millions of people that do this,
Speaker 1: but like, it's just a weird thought to me. But yeah,
Speaker 1: or you form cousins from friends auntie's and uncles from
Speaker 1: family friends. If you brown folks, half of your cousins
Speaker 1: ain't your cousins, you stand, I'm saying that was your
Speaker 1: mama's friends kids. Half of your aunties and uncles ain't
Speaker 1: your aunties and uncles? There your family friends and they
Speaker 1: or they just people you went to church with. Are
Speaker 1: you following me? We made them up, you know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying? Like, yeah, And I dare I dare you
Speaker 1: to run up on somebody to be like, that's not
Speaker 1: your real cousin. You're like, oh, word. It's not my
Speaker 1: real cousin. Okay, that's my cousin. It's just it is
Speaker 1: what it is because we make them up, and then
Speaker 1: they make us because we had to find a word
Speaker 1: for that person. These this, these extended family members that
Speaker 1: ain't really blood family, Well what else do I call them?
Speaker 1: Except for family? Culture made us. Cultures also include an
Speaker 1: origin story, who we are, why we understand who we are?
Speaker 1: That's all culture. We made that up. Like I can't
Speaker 1: stress us enough. The American origin story of our pure meritocracy,
Speaker 1: that if you stand up for what's right, if you
Speaker 1: work hard, you'll succeed. Now we all know that that
Speaker 1: is a fairy tale, you know what I'm saying, Like
Speaker 1: who already now? Who who's sitting right now listening to
Speaker 1: this podcast at work, whether you in the office or
Speaker 1: you're working from home, and it's somebody you got an
Speaker 1: email right now who might be making more money than you,
Speaker 1: that you know is dumb as a bag of rocks
Speaker 1: that only got that job because they know somebody they
Speaker 1: earned that. You're telling me, the person that show up
Speaker 1: on your street, if you're from l A, the person
Speaker 1: that show up on your street, the hard working toughest nails.
Speaker 1: Mexican man. I'm just look, I'm not trying to be
Speaker 1: y'all understand what I'm saying. That's just how the city work.
Speaker 1: The person that comes cutting your grass, that's a Mexican man.
Speaker 1: He working four times harder than you. But you you're
Speaker 1: sitting down working from home. The it's a it's just
Speaker 1: a story we told ourselves. You know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: It's not right or wrong. It's just a creation, myth.
Speaker 1: We formed our identity by it. We have to believe that,
Speaker 1: like our nose is better than anybody else's nose. That's
Speaker 1: why when gas prices change, we think it's an American
Speaker 1: president doing it. Like as you crazy gas prices, that's
Speaker 1: a global commodity foods thinking. It's like it's an entire
Speaker 1: planetary conspiracy to keep Trump out of office. You think
Speaker 1: the whole planet care. It's because of what we tell
Speaker 1: ourselves that's formed our identities. I know some old g's
Speaker 1: my whole girl's dad like a triple O G. Right,
Speaker 1: we man who's going somewhere? And he was like immediately
Speaker 1: he was like, oh where you live now? And I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, yeah, I'm over here. I live on
Speaker 1: this street in the street and he names the hood
Speaker 1: immediately he's like, oh, yeah, no, I don't go over
Speaker 1: there no more. And I'm like, bro, it's like hundreds
Speaker 1: tens of thousands of other people here that don't care
Speaker 1: at all about any of these politics, any of that,
Speaker 1: like literalhood politics. They don't care. But that's like, that's
Speaker 1: your world. When you're in that world, that's it shape
Speaker 1: your whole identity. It's grocery stories. You don't go too
Speaker 1: because you got enemies over there, like bet oh no,
Speaker 1: I got Opts over there. And I'm like, man, yo
Speaker 1: Op is picking up their child from eighth grade right now,
Speaker 1: And I'm like, I'm trying to tell you right now,
Speaker 1: like you're good. But that's your world. That's us in America.
Speaker 1: We think everybody care, everybody watching, you know what what I'm saying, Like,
Speaker 1: and people care in the sense that you are on
Speaker 1: the planet. But like fam, we don't control the gas
Speaker 1: prices Spain, like no, we you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: You can't even tell me nothing about their history, but
Speaker 1: you expect when you go to Spain that they all
Speaker 1: know our history. That's just because we loud, we make culture.
Speaker 1: The culture make us. But the origin stories, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, and most and what happens is like
Speaker 1: if you don't, you don't understand the origin story or
Speaker 1: how this stuff works. A lots on don't even notice
Speaker 1: it's happening. He has his motif where he says, look,
Speaker 1: if you were to ask a tropical fish like, yo,
Speaker 1: what do you think of the cold waters of the
Speaker 1: deep that fishes answer, if it could talk, would be like, uh,
Speaker 1: what's water? Because you're just in it, you know, I'm saying, like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I'll point at it. I'm just just
Speaker 1: in it. So that is culture that makes sense. Now
Speaker 1: culture war. Oh this is ah a motif that kind
Speaker 1: of came from twenties thirties. You could say John Birch
Speaker 1: society and then I think you know kinda got It's
Speaker 1: coined its phrase from dudes like James Dobson, Chuck Coulson,
Speaker 1: these like elder statesmen that are like really at towards
Speaker 1: the end of their life. Now you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Like Chuck Coulson was involved in like Watergate. He was
Speaker 1: one of the guys that kind of had to go
Speaker 1: to jail. He took. He took the fall. You know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, somebody had it. They needed blood. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm saying somebody had to go. He kind of ended
Speaker 1: up taking the fall. He went to prison. He started
Speaker 1: this thing called prison Fellowship. You got somebody like James Dobson,
Speaker 1: which is, you know, you come from like American evangelicalism,
Speaker 1: that man walk on water. Uh. He started a thing
Speaker 1: called Focus on the Family, you know, and it was
Speaker 1: kind of became like a a hammer for that Western
Speaker 1: evangelical zeal to get into politics. That's saying this sweeping
Speaker 1: you know, lean towards liberalism and not American values is
Speaker 1: destroying our families and the way that we raise our kids.
Speaker 1: They believe that the pinnacle of how society stays well
Speaker 1: is a healthy family, which is of course a marriage
Speaker 1: between a man and a woman who's raising their children. Purity, culture,
Speaker 1: all this stuff, like a lot of this stuff came from,
Speaker 1: which means it would follow that the problem with the
Speaker 1: black community is that there's not enough fathers. The fathers
Speaker 1: aren't in the city. If the fathers were in place,
Speaker 1: it's not the police, it's that the fathers aren't in place.
Speaker 1: You following me, James Dobson, focus on the family. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, so and and and the premise
Speaker 1: is we are at war for the soul of the nation,
Speaker 1: and the war is waged with our children, you know,
Speaker 1: so like and you could get you could you can
Speaker 1: trace all these seeds back to like, you know, desegregating,
Speaker 1: taking prayer out of school, like all this stuff, you know, abortion,
Speaker 1: like all this stuff for them was mission drift to
Speaker 1: say that, like, we need to fight to bring America
Speaker 1: back to something. So if you're against that, you're the
Speaker 1: app Flip it on its other end with more of
Speaker 1: the sort of liberal leaning progressive movements, which are like,
Speaker 1: are y'all crazy? We need to adapt and change and
Speaker 1: get rid of these demons or we're never gonna go
Speaker 1: forward right there, Like, look, I'm trying to exercise these demons,
Speaker 1: like these are things that like and anybody that speaks
Speaker 1: to any ideal that feels to us regressive is the
Speaker 1: op We all know that progressive you can't even talk to, like,
Speaker 1: don't it just we can't even have a regular conversation
Speaker 1: because like it's just all war. Nothing anyone else has
Speaker 1: to say, even you who might agree with him makes
Speaker 1: sense and can ever be repeatable. Nothing y'all saying makes sense.
Speaker 1: And we are in the same culture at war with
Speaker 1: each other for the soul of that is a culture war. Now,
Speaker 1: how do you interpret your place in this? Coming up next? Yea,
Speaker 1: all right, here's another book recommendation. This guy's name is
Speaker 1: Michael Sandow. He's from I think it's Harvard. He wrote
Speaker 1: a book called What Is Justice? I absolutely recommend this.
Speaker 1: I think I've mentioned like pieces of this and informer episodes,
Speaker 1: but like I want to give like a full thing
Speaker 1: on it for you. He explains this idea of when
Speaker 1: we talk about what is justice and what is just work,
Speaker 1: oftentimes we find that there are, at least in America,
Speaker 1: three different definitions of what we mean when we say justice.
Speaker 1: Depending on what you mean by that will a lot
Speaker 1: of times tell you where you are in this quote
Speaker 1: unquote culture war. And then I'm gonna, I think at
Speaker 1: the end of this episode, uh, blow up the whole
Speaker 1: motif of like the war. This is one of episodes
Speaker 1: I'm an actually tell you my opinion. So he would say,
Speaker 1: there's three basic motifs here. If what you mean by
Speaker 1: justice is the greatest amount of good for the most
Speaker 1: amount of people, Right, what is the best thing we
Speaker 1: can do for everyone, which may not be actually everyone,
Speaker 1: but the but if it's the best we can do
Speaker 1: for the most amount, then we've done the right thing.
Speaker 1: So those things usually tend to be left leaning in
Speaker 1: liberal universal health care, you know, free public education, free
Speaker 1: college tuition, eliminating debt, because that's doing the best we
Speaker 1: can do for the most of it. There are people
Speaker 1: that can afford to these things, so if we could
Speaker 1: provide ways for them to get to then it's the
Speaker 1: greatest amount of good for every just you know, wealth redistribution,
Speaker 1: like like spread the wealth around, like it shouldn't all
Speaker 1: be sitting in one place, because now only a few
Speaker 1: of us in our world are actually getting the things
Speaker 1: that we need. And how can society go forward? How
Speaker 1: can culture be healthy if all the resources are focused
Speaker 1: is only on a few people. And a lot of
Speaker 1: times that you know, your perception is those few people
Speaker 1: that got on the research, they ain't get them. Honestly,
Speaker 1: they got them by stepping on the people that ain't
Speaker 1: got the resources. Does that make sense? Like you didn't
Speaker 1: get rich on your own again, meritocracy, you got rich
Speaker 1: standing on the poor, So like that can't be this.
Speaker 1: We we can't survive like this. So the greatest amount
Speaker 1: of good for the most amount of people is one
Speaker 1: one sort of motif. It's usually liberally, And a second
Speaker 1: motif is justice is the ability and freedom to flourish
Speaker 1: without any hindrances. Right, So it's like, just leave me alone.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do the right thing because I understand that
Speaker 1: if I'm succeeding, if I'm doing what I got to do,
Speaker 1: if I got all the tools I need to do
Speaker 1: what I gotta do, and you got all the tools
Speaker 1: you need to do what you gotta do, just leave
Speaker 1: us alone, and if it works, it works. If it fails,
Speaker 1: it's my fault. But don't get in my way. Let
Speaker 1: me make that decision, you know what I'm saying. Look,
Speaker 1: if if it ain't no school for me, let me
Speaker 1: figure out how to do it, and I'll make it succeed.
Speaker 1: I don't need you all to do it. Like, look,
Speaker 1: if I need to put more money into my local school,
Speaker 1: I'll put my money. You don't make me put my
Speaker 1: money in my school. I'll do it. Usually, now this
Speaker 1: is your more libertarian approach, and to be honest, with
Speaker 1: you libertarian? Is this idea of like, look, I got
Speaker 1: sense it, don't it don't do me no good for
Speaker 1: me to have a seven bedroom house on a block
Speaker 1: when everybody else is starving. That just don't do me
Speaker 1: no good. Like I'm of course I'm gonna like, Look,
Speaker 1: my neighbor's kids is hungry. I'm a feed him, Like,
Speaker 1: I don't need you to tell me this because you know,
Speaker 1: I'm like, I can't have them disease written. You know why,
Speaker 1: because that's gonna get my kids sick. So it just
Speaker 1: makes sense. If we're out in the forest, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. If I'm chopping wood you need what?
Speaker 1: Of course I'm gonna give you wood, I like and
Speaker 1: dove you need water, you'll give it to me, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, I just gave you wood. I need some water,
Speaker 1: Like I don't understand, don't we both want to survive.
Speaker 1: I don't everybody tell me that. I don't need a
Speaker 1: government to tell me this. I don't need you to
Speaker 1: take the wood from me, Like I got sense, And
Speaker 1: if I fail, I failed. I've always said to that, Like,
Speaker 1: if it wasn't for racism, I'd probably be a libertarian.
Speaker 1: I'd be like, y'all leave me alone. I got sense,
Speaker 1: I figure it out. But because racism, I can't trust
Speaker 1: my neighbor to do the right thing. Like people like,
Speaker 1: here's here's the The official misunderstanding of affirmative action is
Speaker 1: this is people feel like in race called is people
Speaker 1: feel like, Okay, you got in just because of the
Speaker 1: color of your skin. And I'm like, are you serious
Speaker 1: if a black man got into Yale University. I didn't
Speaker 1: get into Yale. I'm black, I don't got the grades.
Speaker 1: It ain't got nothing to do with It doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that you're not capable. What it means is I don't
Speaker 1: care how capable you are. They wasn't gonna let you in.
Speaker 1: So what the government is coming in and saying it's like, yo,
Speaker 1: I'm compelling you because they would have never chose you
Speaker 1: no matter how qualified you are. It don't mean you
Speaker 1: not qualified. It means they was never gonna choose you,
Speaker 1: whether you was qualified or not. That's how affermative action were. Now.
Speaker 1: I remember our first time, like triving to through Memphis, Memphis,
Speaker 1: Tennessee and really trying to understand like why y'all act
Speaker 1: like this? And one of the os was like listening.
Speaker 1: Here's the thing. It's like he was like, Yo, my
Speaker 1: dad worked at the electric company thirty years, never got
Speaker 1: promoted the manager. Why he was like, because none of
Speaker 1: them white boys would listen to him. They would never
Speaker 1: accept no matter how much more skilled he was. They
Speaker 1: would never take directions from a black man. He's like
Speaker 1: in the and and it and the bosses was like, dog,
Speaker 1: you're right, like you are more qualified. I just can't
Speaker 1: make them listen to you. He explained other situations where
Speaker 1: it's like, again, I don't qualify. I don't care how
Speaker 1: qualified you are. We just don't promote black people. I'll
Speaker 1: be like, Danny, don't you all want to get to
Speaker 1: the money? They're like not like this, which is why
Speaker 1: you needed laws against discrimination. I know, I got I
Speaker 1: know the college I went to is because they had
Speaker 1: race quotas. I get it. It would but listen, I
Speaker 1: still applied. So they had the grades. You know what
Speaker 1: I'm saying. My cousin ain't go. He ain't got the grades.
Speaker 1: So it's like, don't like, don't conflict this. But anyway
Speaker 1: that that like freedom to flourish is usually the like
Speaker 1: the libertarian approach. And then there's a third approach. That's um,
Speaker 1: what things ought to be is the ideal. Now, this
Speaker 1: is the stuff you hear Jordan Peterson and them say,
Speaker 1: the ideal what things should be, That there is a right,
Speaker 1: a right way for things to work, and it is
Speaker 1: outside of us. It is fixed, and it is eternal.
Speaker 1: And what we are to do, no matter what any
Speaker 1: of us think, is to bend our will to what
Speaker 1: is right. Yeah, and sometimes I may not like it,
Speaker 1: but that's what that's what, that's what's right. This appeals
Speaker 1: to the conservative and I mean clearly if you say
Speaker 1: that the those that are staunchly religious, is because it's
Speaker 1: appealing to this ideal of a divine rightness that is
Speaker 1: outside of us, and it is our job, no matter
Speaker 1: how we feel about something, to conform to that. And
Speaker 1: this is why when you look at the culture wars,
Speaker 1: we end as far as like things like gay marriage.
Speaker 1: Right now we're really getting into the meats here, abortion,
Speaker 1: gay marriage, trans rights. These people are gonna tell you,
Speaker 1: well know, I'm just saying like they're gonna try to
Speaker 1: come with the like libertarian approach where it's like, well no,
Speaker 1: I'm just saying that, like I don't think government should
Speaker 1: be involved in any of our relationship. No, it's because
Speaker 1: that's not really the way you feel. You don't think
Speaker 1: these things should exist in a perfect world. According to
Speaker 1: this world, everybody's hetero because that's the way, according to you,
Speaker 1: we were made, that's the way we ought to be.
Speaker 1: Into them. It's like full dune, like I don't understand,
Speaker 1: look at our genitals, Like what are you talking about?
Speaker 1: Like this any sort of deviation from what is the norm?
Speaker 1: You know, subtexts middle class white like if you don't succeed,
Speaker 1: it's because you're the malady, You're the the the variance.
Speaker 1: So there must be something wrong with you, because in
Speaker 1: a proper society, you would be over there and we
Speaker 1: would be. It just it just feeds so much naturally,
Speaker 1: fitting perfectly with the racist white supremacists, homophobic for some reason,
Speaker 1: it just fits so well because of their definition of
Speaker 1: how things ought to be, and they feel like, well,
Speaker 1: they're letting go of things too. It's like why I
Speaker 1: wish everybody was wealthy. I wish I didn't have to
Speaker 1: pay taxes. But you know, things fall apart. We live
Speaker 1: in a fallen world. Some things go wrong, and yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, but look everybody's got to take You know,
Speaker 1: this isn't a perfect world, but if it was, it
Speaker 1: would look like this, which but what ends up happening
Speaker 1: is now we're not even arguing like the merits of
Speaker 1: the right, the argument the worldview. It's like it ends
Speaker 1: up being where you're arguing my right for existence. You
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, Like it's not the only thing
Speaker 1: I should have rights. You think I shouldn't exist, yo,
Speaker 1: But since my non existence is not an option, you
Speaker 1: just try to minimize my presence in your world. Right.
Speaker 1: But with that worldview again like putting yourself in their shoes,
Speaker 1: they're like, look, I ain't make the rules, do you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying. I just like, I'm just it's
Speaker 1: just this is just you know, when you try to
Speaker 1: explain to somebody like sort of some of these these
Speaker 1: these views that we're at, we're just like, I but
Speaker 1: I don't look, man, if you don't have corn, plant corn,
Speaker 1: I just why should I have to give you corn
Speaker 1: that I plan it if you ain't go outside and
Speaker 1: plant your oh corn. This is just how it works.
Speaker 1: That's why they begets so far it But now you
Speaker 1: got stuff like trans people in community and rights. That's
Speaker 1: just a brain breaker. It's not that y'all shouldn't have rights,
Speaker 1: is that y'all shouldn't exist. This shouldn't be so in
Speaker 1: their mind, it's like, well, if I can make the
Speaker 1: culture like form itself to what things ought to be
Speaker 1: in this world. Again, because you're talking about what it
Speaker 1: ought to be. If you're a boy and you don't
Speaker 1: think you're a boy, something wrong with your thoughts according
Speaker 1: to them, because that's not how things ought to be.
Speaker 1: But here's the problem. What they do exist. You you're
Speaker 1: trying to end gay marriage, it's not because you don't
Speaker 1: believe in marriage. Equality is not because you don't believe
Speaker 1: in marriage. It's because you believe in marriage. Only like this,
Speaker 1: it's actually homophobic. Now again if we're talking culture will
Speaker 1: now getting no way, let me finish this. So that
Speaker 1: is the third way of what you mean by justice.
Speaker 1: Justice is what things ought to be right, And you
Speaker 1: might find yourself somewhere in some of these places. Now,
Speaker 1: what a culture war does is says that anybody in
Speaker 1: these other motifs don't get it. So that if like
Speaker 1: like let youse, let use the gay marriage thing as
Speaker 1: an example, right, if in this election cycle. The conservative
Speaker 1: movement is gonna take this on because they they've floating
Speaker 1: on this Roe v. Wade victory. Right, And then Clarence
Speaker 1: Thomas was like, well, let's look at this stuff, let's
Speaker 1: look at birth control, let's look at this right, Whereas
Speaker 1: the majority of like the populace is like, well, I mean,
Speaker 1: if we're if we're talking conservative populace like following me,
Speaker 1: they're like, well, we think it's weird. Weren't reel with
Speaker 1: it religiously, But like, I mean, what what do I care? Like,
Speaker 1: get the taxes, you know what I'm saying, It's fine
Speaker 1: if this is an institution that you believe. Again, a
Speaker 1: loving family is like the cornerstone of our society, and
Speaker 1: why would you take it away from people that agree
Speaker 1: with you, Like you have these LGBTQ couples that are like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you're right, a healthy family. I'm in love with this person.
Speaker 1: I want to solidify it, pledge my love, and I
Speaker 1: want to bring some children into this place. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of people, well there's a lot of kids out
Speaker 1: there ain't got families. We agree, but we can't because
Speaker 1: you're the eyes. It took me a long time to
Speaker 1: get to this part of this pot. I hope y'all
Speaker 1: stuck through me. But like, this is where I was saying,
Speaker 1: But what if the makes sense what they're kind of
Speaker 1: saying the same thing. This is the perfect example of that, right,
Speaker 1: Or let's go back to universal healthcare. You know you're like,
Speaker 1: well it sounds like socialism. Well, I mean like maybe,
Speaker 1: but you know, if you think that this is just
Speaker 1: like a black brown like a minority issue, It's like
Speaker 1: man talked to that toughest nail, you know, sawmill logging.
Speaker 1: He ain't got no insurance, can't afford no healthcare. That
Speaker 1: company showl ain't giving him nothing. Y'a don't see all
Speaker 1: them commercials about Mezzo Theaoma from working in them cold mines. Bro,
Speaker 1: you think your company care about you? Don't You wouldn't
Speaker 1: you like, don't you think? Don't you think it'd be
Speaker 1: kind of cool? It's like, you ain't have to rely
Speaker 1: on this company that don't care about you anyway for
Speaker 1: your safety. It's crazy to me to have to rely
Speaker 1: on somebody that I know don't care about me for
Speaker 1: my security. That's ridiculous to me. I don't trust you.
Speaker 1: You don't trust me? Why the hell would I trust
Speaker 1: you for the health of my children? Now I need
Speaker 1: to talk to somebody else. And then somebody else's argument
Speaker 1: might be like, woll, why would I trust the government
Speaker 1: for you for the health of my children? My argument
Speaker 1: would be because the government needs you, that company don't
Speaker 1: need you. The problem is I also agree with them
Speaker 1: by saying, well, what government program work? Well that's what
Speaker 1: Look you see how the options making sense to each other.
Speaker 1: But I can't because you're the eye culture awards. Now. Lastly,
Speaker 1: as you'll go into these voting boosts, as you'll think
Speaker 1: about where you want to go next, I would suggest
Speaker 1: to you to not let yourself. I don't care where
Speaker 1: you fall on the spectrum, not let yourself fall into
Speaker 1: this motif. Let me tell you why, because these people
Speaker 1: are talking as if culture is something separate from us,
Speaker 1: like as it's its own entity that we're fighting to save.
Speaker 1: When culture is us, We made it. It's not separate
Speaker 1: from us. We are it. If you're trying to save culture,
Speaker 1: I can't consider half of you my enemy because you're
Speaker 1: making it and the fact that we're fighting is why
Speaker 1: our cultures. Wait, is you know what I'm saying now,
Speaker 1: I'm not saying stop fighting. What I'm saying is fight
Speaker 1: for the right things. You get in there, you do
Speaker 1: your homework of your local elections, you put the right
Speaker 1: people in office, you know what I'm saying, and you
Speaker 1: apply to pressure on them. And of course this is
Speaker 1: like Pie in the Sky talking. I'm just trying to
Speaker 1: tell you, man, don't let these listen again. Don't get
Speaker 1: into this motif where the op is always the op,
Speaker 1: because I don't know if any of us, like mainstream media,
Speaker 1: like you got a point now, I know some things
Speaker 1: are non negotiable, like my right to exist. You feel
Speaker 1: me like, that's not nothing. I'm willing to be and don't.
Speaker 1: But if I drop a disk track on Trump, you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, don't be like well Biden and
Speaker 1: I'm like, man, I know, yeah, what is Cupcake like? Now?
Speaker 1: I'm cool. I'm cool on on old Brandon. You know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. That boy is beige Saint a Biden.
Speaker 1: Stand Come on, fan, don't fall into the motif because
Speaker 1: culture not separate from us. Culture is us. So if
Speaker 1: you had war with culture, Loki, you at war with yourself.
Speaker 1: Little politics. Yeah, this here thing was recorded by me
Speaker 1: propaganda and East Low Spoil Heights, Los Angeles, California. This
Speaker 1: mug was mixed, edited, mastered, and scored by Matt Osowski.
Speaker 1: I can totally say his name, guys, it was it
Speaker 1: was a stick. He's going by Matt now again because
Speaker 1: he got into legal situations with the name headlights. You know,
Speaker 1: comment used to be called common sense. You know tipp
Speaker 1: t I was tipped sometimes it happened. Executive produced by
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