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Speaker 1: Hey, what's up everybody. I'm Jamel Hill and welcome to politics.

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Speaker 1: And I heard podcasts and unbothered production. Time to get spolitical.

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Speaker 1: Let's talk about dix as in the plastic kind. While

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Speaker 1: this WNBA season has had a lot of twist and turns,

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Speaker 1: I never could have imagined that a conversation about dildo's

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Speaker 1: would be necessary. But over the last few weeks, multiple

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Speaker 1: WNBA games have been interrupted because someone threw a dildo

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Speaker 1: onto the court. Now, some people have dismissed these incidents

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Speaker 1: as just an attention grab, some have labbed, some have

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Speaker 1: cracked jokes. A representative for a mean coin called Green

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Speaker 1: Dildo claimed responsibility for these incidents. A spokesperson for the

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Speaker 1: group told USA Today that members of their communities started

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Speaker 1: throwing green sex toys at the games to coincide with

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Speaker 1: the launch of their meme coin. The spokespersons said it

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Speaker 1: wasn't about disrespecting women, but going viral to garner attention.

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Speaker 1: We didn't do this because we dislike women's sports or

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Speaker 1: like some of the narratives that are trending right now

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Speaker 1: are ridiculous, the anonymous spokesperson told USA Today. Creating disruption

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Speaker 1: at games is like it happens in every single sport, right.

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Speaker 1: We've seen it in the NFL, We've seen it in hockey,

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Speaker 1: you know, fans doing random.

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Speaker 2: Things to more or less create attention.

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Speaker 1: We know that in order to get a voice in

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Speaker 1: this place, we had to go out and do some

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Speaker 1: viral stunts to save us from having to pay that

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Speaker 1: influencer cabal, sacrifice our souls and the fate of the project.

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Speaker 1: And that is why my daily prayer is for Shame

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Speaker 1: to make a Michael Jordan come back, the first Michael

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Speaker 1: Jordan come back, not.

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Speaker 2: The second one, the one with the Wizards. Now.

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Speaker 1: Despite what the dildo dumbass told USA today, this is

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Speaker 1: about a lack of respect for women and more specifically,

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Speaker 1: the lack of respec say for a league that showcases

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Speaker 1: the best basketball talent in the world, there is a

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Speaker 1: long and unfortunate history of people in prominent positions using

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Speaker 1: the WNBA as a punching bag.

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Speaker 3: After closing out a successful first season, the WNBA is

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Speaker 3: considering several changes to improve the level of play in

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Speaker 3: the league next year. Among the proposals extending the playoffs,

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Speaker 3: increasing salaries, bringing back the three point line, and replacing

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Speaker 3: all these feemale players with guys. The WNBA officials expanded

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Speaker 3: to ten teams this week, adding franchises in Detroit and Washington, DC.

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Speaker 3: But before you get too excited about the new additions

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Speaker 3: to the league, remember all of the players are still women.

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Speaker 3: They stink at basketball. That's the problem. Other than that'd

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Speaker 3: be a good, good game, but they're They're all horrible,

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Speaker 3: So I make for a boring.

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Speaker 2: Game that was normal on Saturday Night Live. Now.

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Speaker 1: I have a pretty good sense of humor, but there

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Speaker 1: is a rather dumb consistency to jokes about female athletes

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Speaker 1: and about the WNBA. These jokes usually aren't terribly creative.

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Speaker 1: They punched down rather than up. Comedian Shane Gillis, who

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Speaker 1: hosted Theastpiece this year, spent a chunk of his monologue

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Speaker 1: making jokes about female athletes, which might have been a

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Speaker 1: lot easier to take had he not mispronounced Diana Tarassi's

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Speaker 1: name wrong within the first forty five seconds of his monologue.

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Speaker 4: WNBA legend Deanna Tarassi's here give it up her. My

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Speaker 4: bad on that.

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Speaker 1: So, because laughing at women's sports has been so culturally accepted,

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Speaker 1: it's not surprising that people would have the audacity to

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Speaker 1: throw sex toys on the court, which isn't just about attention,

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Speaker 1: but reminding women that they deserve laughter more than respect.

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Speaker 5: You guys know what the object is. And I just

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Speaker 5: want to comment on this has been going on for centuries,

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Speaker 5: the sexualization of women. This is the latest version.

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Speaker 2: Of that, and it's not funny.

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Speaker 6: There should not be the bother of jokes on any

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Speaker 6: radio shows or in print or any comments. The sexualization

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Speaker 6: of women is what's used to hold women down and

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Speaker 6: this is no different.

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Speaker 5: This is just its late export and we should write

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Speaker 5: about it in that way. And these people that are

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Speaker 5: doing this you hold accountable and not We're not the

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Speaker 5: butt of the joke.

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Speaker 2: They're the problem. And what you take that.

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Speaker 1: Donald Trump Junior, who has nine point seven million followers,

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Speaker 1: posted a photoshop image on his Instagram account that showed

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Speaker 1: his father, you know, the President of the United States,

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Speaker 1: throwing a sex toy from the roof of the White

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Speaker 1: House onto a WNBA court. It was classless, embarrassing and

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Speaker 1: giving his unfortunate stature in his father's administration, it gave

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Speaker 1: this stupid trend undeserved legitimacy and providing yet another example

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Speaker 1: of how decency has gone out the.

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Speaker 2: Window with this current regime.

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Speaker 1: Now, if the White House finds it funny, then that

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Speaker 1: gives permission for everybody else to make fun of women

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Speaker 1: who just want to play basketball without sex toys on

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Speaker 1: the court. So far, two men have been arrested in

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Speaker 1: connection with these incidents, and neither of them were connected

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Speaker 1: to that mean coin nonsense. Their ages were eighteen and

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Speaker 1: twenty three, certainly old enough to know throwing a sex

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Speaker 1: toy on a basketball court is.

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Speaker 2: Not only stupid, it's dangerous.

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Speaker 1: The twenty three year old quarterly told police that he

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Speaker 1: did it to go quote viral. Social media has allowed

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Speaker 1: us to construct the reality in which attention has become

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Speaker 1: our society's most valuable commodity. During a time where we

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Speaker 1: have unprecedented technology, unprecedented access to information, the low comprehension

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Speaker 1: and need for attention have given people unearned boldness. In

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Speaker 1: other words, it's too many of y'all out there who

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Speaker 1: never got your ass whoop and it shows.

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Speaker 2: I'm Jamel Hill, and I approve this message.

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Speaker 1: My conversation with today's podcast guest was so good, so

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Speaker 1: wide ranging, that I decided to break the episode into

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Speaker 1: two parts. So today's episode is Part one, and then

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Speaker 1: early next week I'll drop part two. Now I work

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Speaker 1: with my guests when I was at ESPN, and he

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Speaker 1: since become a good friend.

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Speaker 2: His path into sports media was quite unusual.

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Speaker 1: His original dream was just to be in the front

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Speaker 1: office for an NBA team, a goal he actually achieved,

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Speaker 1: But after leaving a NBA franchise, he found himself being

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Speaker 1: pulled into media because he offered thoughtful, introspective and bold opinions.

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Speaker 1: But while basketball is the expertise that got him put

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Speaker 1: on at ESPN, it turns out he has a multitude

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Speaker 1: of media talents, especially when it comes to spicy takes

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Speaker 1: about movies and entertainment. You could find him in the

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Speaker 1: Dan Lebertarre universe, and as a person he is as

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Speaker 1: solid as they come. Coming up next ons politics, A

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Speaker 1: mean el hasseg I mean, thank you so much for

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Speaker 1: taking the time out. It's like we always see each

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Speaker 1: other in passing. We have great conversations. But I'm like,

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Speaker 1: I need to have him on the pod, just because

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Speaker 1: it's so many things that are fascinating about you, your career,

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Speaker 1: how you grew up, and which we'll get to you later.

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Speaker 2: You have some of the spiciest movie takes.

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Speaker 1: I've remember heard you got a whole podcast on It's Cenophobe.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's a great podcast. And so your movie,

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Speaker 1: your movie takes I often look forward to. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: so thanks for joining me. But before we get started,

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Speaker 1: I want to ask you a question I ask every

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Speaker 1: guest that appears on politics, and that is, name.

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Speaker 2: A moment or an athlete that made you love sports.

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Speaker 4: Oh wow, you know what I'm gonna be basic? I was,

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Speaker 4: I was thinking of all these I remember when I

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Speaker 4: was seven. I'm gonna keep it real simple. A spectacular

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Speaker 4: move by Michael Jordan. Like I knew I liked basketball,

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Speaker 4: but then when I saw that, I was like, oh yeah,

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Speaker 4: this is this is this is for me right here.

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Speaker 4: Just and it's funny. I don't even have to describe

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Speaker 4: what play or what everybody knows. Let's say a spectacular

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Speaker 4: move by Michael Jordan, and that tells you, like, that's

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Speaker 4: a moment, that's not some obscure hipster pick. That's something

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Speaker 4: everyone can relate to.

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Speaker 2: Okay, that's I assume you mean when he switched his hands, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: slagging in here, Okay, gotcha? All right?

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Speaker 1: I mean that for a lot of people that is

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Speaker 1: one of the definitive, if not the definitive Michael Jordan's move.

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Speaker 2: So is that is.

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Speaker 1: That when you like really fell in love with basketball

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Speaker 1: or had it happened before then?

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Speaker 4: Like I said, I liked basketball, I was interested in basketball,

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Speaker 4: Like I remember watching like the tail end of Celtics

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Speaker 4: Lakers as a kid, and I like being aware. I

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Speaker 4: knew obviously Magic and Bird and Kareem and all those guys,

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Speaker 4: but I like the you know what it probably now

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Speaker 4: i'm thinking about it. It might have been earlier one of

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Speaker 4: them Jordan tapes. I got a blutleg and like Michael

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Speaker 4: Jordan's Playground or come Fly with Me or one of those.

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Speaker 4: I don't remember. It's been so long, I don't remember

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Speaker 4: the order. For the younger kids, there used to be

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Speaker 4: these things called tapes, right, it would be so like

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Speaker 4: the NBA would put these things out like in the summer.

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Speaker 4: It would be like a best of players or of

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Speaker 4: like the league NBA. That's what I called entertainment or whatever.

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Speaker 4: And there was these Michael Jordan ones, these like Michael

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Speaker 4: Jordan mixtapes, but they were like officially made by the league,

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Speaker 4: and if you got your hands on one or if

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Speaker 4: you're like me, you got your hands on a copy

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Speaker 4: of one. You watch this thing over and over and

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Speaker 4: over again, and you learned all these great Michael Jordan moments.

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Speaker 4: It was YouTube for us, basically for our generation. And

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Speaker 4: so I think, I want to say it was probably

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Speaker 4: one of those tapes that really really got me into it.

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Speaker 4: But when you said moment, I thought of the one

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Speaker 4: moment in one moment I thought about was a spectacular

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Speaker 4: movement going up, He's about to dunk. No, he's not

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Speaker 4: change hands, just because not because anything happened, because I can't.

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Speaker 1: Now, you grew up in Sudan, I mean, so how

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Speaker 1: did being there and I know you grew up with

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Speaker 1: a lot of unrest that was there in your in

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Speaker 1: your country, So how did you balance that you have

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Speaker 1: this unrest happening in your country and you're developing sort

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Speaker 1: of this other passion as a sports fan, or particularly

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Speaker 1: a basketball fan.

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Speaker 4: So yeah, I mean, you didn't know any better. Like

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Speaker 4: it's the crazy thing. I like, I listen, man, I

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Speaker 4: listen to you talk about your childhood and I'm like,

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Speaker 4: that's crazy, And they're like, you don't know any better.

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Speaker 4: You're like, this is just life because everyone you know,

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Speaker 4: is going through a similar thing, and you just think like,

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Speaker 4: all right, well this is how it is. And and

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Speaker 4: I really I think like when I watched movies as

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Speaker 4: a kid, I just thought like, oh, that's just movies.

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Speaker 4: Like I didn't realize there were actual places with picket

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Speaker 4: fences and front lawns and like people walking the dog

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Speaker 4: and then paperboy throw and a milk. I thought it

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Speaker 4: was just like, oh, this shit they made up for

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Speaker 4: the movies. I didn't realize people actually lived like that.

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Speaker 4: I grew up originally, like I first eight years of

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Speaker 4: my life. I grew up in New York City, so

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Speaker 4: you lived in the city in an apartment building, and

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Speaker 4: that's all I knew. And then I moved to Sudan

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Speaker 4: when I'm eight, and it's as as culture shock as

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Speaker 4: culture shock can get, like rolling blackouts at last weeks

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Speaker 4: if not months, sometimes lack of running water for weeks

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Speaker 4: if not months, sometimes you know, just all types of stuff.

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Speaker 4: And then maybe two years in there was a political

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Speaker 4: coup and what was a democracy got overthrown by a

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Speaker 4: religious dictatorship. So not only not too far fit right

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Speaker 4: now for most American citizens, but imagine a ruler who

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Speaker 4: basically said I'm in charge, and there's and if you

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Speaker 4: against me, that means you against God and so what

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Speaker 4: not only you're an infidel, you're gonna go to Hell

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Speaker 4: or whatever. So you know, it's against this backdrop. I'm

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Speaker 4: kind of growing up at eight, nine, ten years old,

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Speaker 4: and you begin to realize, like, you know, these things

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Speaker 4: are that's just life. And so you know, when I

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Speaker 4: talk about getting those tapes again, like I'm seriously thought about,

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Speaker 4: like people have to smuggle the tape. You have to

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Speaker 4: get a tape and copy it, and like, oh, I

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Speaker 4: got a copy of this thing. And it wasn't just

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Speaker 4: basketball games, it was it was movies, it was TV shows,

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Speaker 4: it was all every anything you could get your hands

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Speaker 4: on that was like from America was called music music videos.

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Speaker 4: You know. I remember the first time I saw the

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Speaker 4: Snoop video for What's My Name? It was on like grainy,

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Speaker 4: like someone got your MTV raps recorded and then they

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Speaker 4: copied that copy, and then they copied the copy, and

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Speaker 4: then you finally get it and it's like yo. And

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Speaker 4: this was on the heels of hearing the chronic I'm like,

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Speaker 4: this guy already has his own song. And I was

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Speaker 4: like they're turning into dogs, and like it was mind blowing.

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Speaker 4: But like again, this was all how everything was funneled.

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Speaker 4: There was no internet. There was satellite TV, but that

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Speaker 4: was only for wealthy people. We didn't have satellite TV,

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Speaker 4: so everything you got was kind of like someone's cousin

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Speaker 4: came home for the summer from you know, from New

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Speaker 4: York or from la or whatever, and they had this

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Speaker 4: gold on them and you just worked this black market

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Speaker 4: kind of sharing everything.

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Speaker 2: But culturally, what was that like for you to go

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Speaker 2: from America to.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it was hard. Man. I didn't speak the language,

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Speaker 4: like I had to learn Arabic, Like I spoke a

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Speaker 4: little bit at home, more understanding than speaking. But you know,

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Speaker 4: you get dropped into an environment where nobody speaks English,

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Speaker 4: have to learn and so kind of marvel when I

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Speaker 4: think of my Like, I know when I got there

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Speaker 4: as an eight year old that didn't speak, I could

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Speaker 4: not have a conversation. And I know by the time

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Speaker 4: like a year and a half later, I was fluent.

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Speaker 4: And you know, it worked out in that way. But

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Speaker 4: even as you we're going to speak the language, and

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Speaker 4: obviously I'm Sudanese, so like I don't look any different

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Speaker 4: to people there. Obviously, culturally I'm very different, and there's

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Speaker 4: a lot of things I don't understand a lot of

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Speaker 4: things about me that they didn't understand. And to this day,

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Speaker 4: I think there's a lot of things, like, especially my parents' generation,

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Speaker 4: like they didn't understand. I tell my mom things and

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Speaker 4: it's like, no, that's not true. I'm like, no, it's true.

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Speaker 4: You guys just didn't understand that I really did not

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Speaker 4: enjoy this or I didn't like this. This cultural thing.

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Speaker 4: I'm not talking about obviously, any hardships with it. I'm

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Speaker 4: talking about like just the way people treat you or

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Speaker 4: the way that people do this or that whatever. And

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Speaker 4: then the crazy thing was move and back to New

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Speaker 4: York as a fourteen year old. Now, obviously I speak

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Speaker 4: English pretty much the way I've always spoken like this,

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Speaker 4: So the kids in that I'm going to school with

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Speaker 4: and I'm dealing with, they look at me and they

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Speaker 4: hear me. It's like he's from here. But there's cultural

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Speaker 4: things now that I don't that I almost got went

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Speaker 4: too far in the other way, and now I'm getting

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Speaker 4: a fight to school because of cultural misunderstandings rather than

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Speaker 4: you know, me actually trying to look for a fight,

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Speaker 4: and it was just, you know, it was it was tough.

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Speaker 4: I won't lie. It was it was like your shape

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Speaker 4: one way, and then you go somewhere completely different, fish

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Speaker 4: out of water. And by the time you finally kind

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Speaker 4: of at least get your bearings enough to blend in enough,

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Speaker 4: you get thrown backfishing out of water somewhere else, and

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Speaker 4: now you're having to struggle to figure out how to

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Speaker 4: blend in again.

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Speaker 1: So that blending in process, I imagine that had to

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Speaker 1: be difficult because for somebody who maybe lived in Sudan

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Speaker 1: in their whole lives, because you were coming from America,

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Speaker 1: did they look at you as Sudanese or did they

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Speaker 1: look at you as American?

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Speaker 4: They looked at me as America coming back here or

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Speaker 4: they're are here in Sudan when in Sudan, I went

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Speaker 4: to Amriki. That's the American kid. They call you the

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Speaker 4: American kid. I'm Sudanese. My parents and Sudanese. I'm born

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Speaker 4: in Sudan, like I'm full buttered Sudanese. But they call

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Speaker 4: you the American kid or Hawaijia. Hawaji means foreigner. You know,

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Speaker 4: It's kind of like you know in the in the

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Speaker 4: movies or like Kung Fu movies or a white guy

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Speaker 4: they called Gwi lo right, same ship, like hauaja is

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Speaker 4: the is the word they use in Sudan hawaji or

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Speaker 4: mriki whatever. And it's like it's one thing when it's

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Speaker 4: like kids at school or whatever. It's the only thing

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Speaker 4: when you got family members like uncles and that, and

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Speaker 4: they think it's like ha ha, like oh, he doesn't

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Speaker 4: like to eat that thing. And I'm just like it's old,

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Speaker 4: it's tired, man, like I get it, okay, all right,

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Speaker 4: Oh look at the way he does this everything and

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Speaker 4: it never wore off. And if there was any kind

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Speaker 4: of anything. So I'll give you a great example. Drinking

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Speaker 4: tea is big and Sudan people love tea, particularly red

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Speaker 4: tea like no milk and it just red hot like

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Speaker 4: tea or whatever, not really a tea drink. I'm just

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Speaker 4: I don't drink coffee. I don't drink I don't think

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Speaker 4: any hot drinks, to be honest with you, that's just me. Obviously,

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Speaker 4: there are millions of people here who drink coffee. You

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Speaker 4: drink tea or whatever, and all over the world, but

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Speaker 4: in Sudan, because I don't drink tea. It's like, I

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Speaker 4: look at the American kid, he's not even like, no,

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Speaker 4: that's not I'm not representing for a population over here

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Speaker 4: that doesn't know what tea is. I me, even if

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Speaker 4: I was born here and lived here my whole life,

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Speaker 4: don't like this. And not everything is tied to that,

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Speaker 4: but it's like that is constant everything that you do

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Speaker 4: that diverges even slightly from whatever the mainstream was. It's like,

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Speaker 4: it's the American boy. Like I said, it gets old

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Speaker 4: aft a while.

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Speaker 1: So when you go back to America at fourteen, did

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Speaker 1: they look at how did they look at you?

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Speaker 4: It was the same problem. So so so I come

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Speaker 4: back and like I said, because I don't, I don't,

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Speaker 4: I always say this. If I spoke with an accent,

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Speaker 4: I think I would have had a much easier time

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Speaker 4: because people would have just dismissed it as just a

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Speaker 4: kid from he's a kid from another country or whatever, like, yeah,

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Speaker 4: they might pick on your teaser or whatever, but at

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Speaker 4: the end of the day, they're not really gonna mess

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Speaker 4: with you in a you offend me kind of way.

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Speaker 4: For the most part, because I looked and sounded the

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Speaker 4: way I did. The assumption was you know better, right,

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Speaker 4: and so you're gonna say that, you're gonna, you're gonna,

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Speaker 4: you're gonna say this to me where I'm I'm just

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Speaker 4: I think I'm having a friendly conversation, but my word

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Speaker 4: selection is not appropriate for the moment, and so I'm

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Speaker 4: getting in the fights and arguments and things like that

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Speaker 4: because they didn't you know, there wasn't there wasn't enough

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Speaker 4: of a buffer of people to say, that's just a

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Speaker 4: foreign kid. He doesn't know what he's talking about.

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Speaker 2: M because you know how it is here in America,

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Speaker 2: we are constantly we often play the game of well

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Speaker 2: what are you?

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Speaker 4: Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Right, you know, interesting to figure out like where do

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Speaker 2: you fit?

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Speaker 1: Because the only reason sometimes that we're doing that because

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Speaker 1: we're trying to understand where do you fit in the

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Speaker 1: racial hierarchy, ie somebody that's below me or above me?

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Speaker 1: And yes, really that what the entire conversation is about.

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Speaker 4: So growing up in New York. Living in New York

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Speaker 4: spares me one thing, and that there's so many person

359
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Speaker 4: of all, there's so many nationalities there. Right, you say,

360
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Speaker 4: like I grew up in New York, I didn't know

361
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Speaker 4: any black kids. I knew Jamaicans, I knew Haitians, I

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Speaker 4: knew you know, Nigerians, I knew you know, I knew

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Speaker 4: you know, Bahamians, Traineis. I didn't know any white people.

364
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Speaker 4: I knew Germans, I knew Italians, I knew like everybody

365
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Speaker 4: was something. And obviously, you know, you say Hispanic boom,

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Speaker 4: that's entire Latin America. Everyone's there. It's like, now, culturally

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Speaker 4: we might all act the same, at least at our

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Speaker 4: age group. But the idea that like you would see

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Speaker 4: someone because some of these nationalities are kind of like

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Speaker 4: you see Dominicans, a lot of them. I look like

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Speaker 4: a lot of Dominicans. As a matter of fact, I

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Speaker 4: got when I was in high school. I literally learned

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Speaker 4: Spanish because I got tired all as asking me directions

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Speaker 4: and I said, I don't speak Spanish. And then they say, oh,

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Speaker 4: you you come to this country and you forget your language,

376
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Speaker 4: and I'm like, it's not my language, and like, oh

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Speaker 4: my god, so you think you're American. Now you've just

378
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Speaker 4: forsaken all. Like, lady, I'm not Dominican. I'm from another

379
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Speaker 4: country where we don't speak Spanish. And it's just easier

380
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Speaker 4: just to learn Spanish and give her the directions and

381
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Speaker 4: have her go about her day. But as a result,

382
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Speaker 4: like I said, this kind of general look, wasn't that.

383
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Speaker 4: Rare went to college in Atlanta, and that's when I

384
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Speaker 4: found out that I had quote unquote good hair. The

385
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Speaker 4: first time I ever heard that in my life was

386
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Speaker 4: as a college freshman. Everyone kept saying you got good hair,

387
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Speaker 4: and then asking if I was mixed with Indians, and

388
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Speaker 4: I thought they meant like, no, man, my parents ain't

389
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Speaker 4: from no India. But I later learned like, oh no,

390
00:21:17,119 --> 00:21:19,959
Speaker 4: they meant like, because in the South, if you got

391
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Speaker 4: good hair, either Creole or your part Native American. And

392
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Speaker 4: so they're trying to figure that out, like you look black,

393
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Speaker 4: but what's up with the hair? And I was like, oh,

394
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Speaker 4: I get a nod from another place. Yeah, so, but yeah,

395
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Speaker 4: to kind of put a button on that, Like it's

396
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Speaker 4: just one of those things where I had a culture

397
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Speaker 4: shock going to see that, and I had a culture

398
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Speaker 4: shot coming back. But I came back to New York

399
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Speaker 4: and then I had another culture shot leaving New York

400
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Speaker 4: and discovering what America's really like.

401
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Speaker 1: So what were your early observations about America that you

402
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Speaker 1: noticed is particularly after spent years in Sudan, were you

403
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Speaker 1: how did that maybe shape how differently you thought about

404
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Speaker 1: America as opposed to Americans other Americans.

405
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Speaker 4: So this is so this is literally plane has landed

406
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Speaker 4: from Sudan at JFK back in New York whatever in

407
00:22:19,840 --> 00:22:22,960
Speaker 4: line at the passport thing, you know, the guys the

408
00:22:22,960 --> 00:22:25,080
Speaker 4: little windows or whatever, and the one dude at this

409
00:22:25,200 --> 00:22:28,560
Speaker 4: window is talking to his homie over there and he's

410
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Speaker 4: asking him, what are you going to do with your

411
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Speaker 4: tax refund? The other guy says, I didn't get one

412
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Speaker 4: and Uncle Billy held on to for me this year.

413
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Speaker 4: And then they started laughing, and I'm like, and then

414
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Speaker 4: it hit me that they're talking about Bill Clinton, the

415
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Speaker 4: President of the United States. And I was like, and

416
00:22:48,200 --> 00:22:51,159
Speaker 4: I swear to god I had I was overcome with

417
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Speaker 4: like shock and fear because these two government employees are

418
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Speaker 4: making jokes about the president in the airport, which is

419
00:23:00,359 --> 00:23:03,800
Speaker 4: notorious in shitty countries, the airports were all the spots

420
00:23:03,800 --> 00:23:06,399
Speaker 4: are at you never seen nothing. You never seen nothing

421
00:23:06,520 --> 00:23:09,320
Speaker 4: in general and public, but like especially the airport, that's

422
00:23:09,320 --> 00:23:12,399
Speaker 4: where the shit really goes down. And so I was like, Oh,

423
00:23:12,480 --> 00:23:15,600
Speaker 4: where's the secret police come? Dragging these people away. How

424
00:23:15,680 --> 00:23:19,439
Speaker 4: dare you make jokes about the president? Not because I

425
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Speaker 4: like I thought the president, but like just the idea

426
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Speaker 4: that the leader.

427
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Speaker 1: I remember when I went to me and my husband

428
00:23:25,119 --> 00:23:28,520
Speaker 1: with the Hong Kong last year, and we were very

429
00:23:29,200 --> 00:23:35,200
Speaker 1: cognizant of the fact that you cannot openly discuss certain

430
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Speaker 1: things the way that you might if you're in America.

431
00:23:38,040 --> 00:23:40,480
Speaker 1: Even though, to be honest, I was really surprised when

432
00:23:41,119 --> 00:23:44,399
Speaker 1: I was there and one of the servers at a

433
00:23:44,400 --> 00:23:46,800
Speaker 1: restaurant we were at just asked me about Donald Trump.

434
00:23:46,880 --> 00:23:50,280
Speaker 4: I was like, why why you asked me about?

435
00:23:51,080 --> 00:23:52,800
Speaker 2: Because I was thinking, like, y'all are about to get

436
00:23:52,840 --> 00:23:56,200
Speaker 2: me over here. I was like, what do you think

437
00:23:56,200 --> 00:23:56,560
Speaker 2: about it?

438
00:23:57,800 --> 00:23:58,199
Speaker 4: About me?

439
00:23:59,440 --> 00:24:01,800
Speaker 2: He asked us? We thought, I was like, what do

440
00:24:01,880 --> 00:24:04,600
Speaker 2: you think? You show me your ID?

441
00:24:04,840 --> 00:24:08,520
Speaker 1: Basically okay, so y'all are not about to get me

442
00:24:08,560 --> 00:24:12,760
Speaker 1: caught up. So your father was a diplomat, correct?

443
00:24:12,880 --> 00:24:17,640
Speaker 4: Yeah, yes, my father worked in the Foreign Ministry, which

444
00:24:17,720 --> 00:24:20,639
Speaker 4: is basically the State Department first wud So.

445
00:24:21,160 --> 00:24:23,960
Speaker 1: I mean he had a type of career where he

446
00:24:24,119 --> 00:24:28,600
Speaker 1: traveled extensively, and you know, there was you know, clearly

447
00:24:28,640 --> 00:24:31,400
Speaker 1: with I think from what I read and what I've

448
00:24:31,400 --> 00:24:33,440
Speaker 1: listened to with other interviews you've done, Like he had

449
00:24:33,440 --> 00:24:35,320
Speaker 1: to live in other parts of the world while you

450
00:24:35,359 --> 00:24:37,080
Speaker 1: and your family may have been somewhere else. There was

451
00:24:37,080 --> 00:24:40,600
Speaker 1: some separation. So how did that impact you, know, the

452
00:24:40,600 --> 00:24:42,480
Speaker 1: way that you grew up, the fact that your father

453
00:24:42,600 --> 00:24:44,800
Speaker 1: had this government position.

454
00:24:45,600 --> 00:24:51,040
Speaker 4: Well, well, first of all, obviously my father you want

455
00:24:51,040 --> 00:24:52,760
Speaker 4: to talk about someone you want to interview. Last the

456
00:24:52,800 --> 00:24:55,200
Speaker 4: guy you want to interview, he lived a full life.

457
00:24:55,200 --> 00:24:58,879
Speaker 4: My father grew up in a village by the Nile,

458
00:24:59,760 --> 00:25:06,600
Speaker 4: uh literally barefoot. Neither one of his parents I think

459
00:25:06,960 --> 00:25:13,280
Speaker 4: were educated beyond like a primary school education, and he

460
00:25:13,359 --> 00:25:16,919
Speaker 4: went on to at a young age he went to

461
00:25:18,880 --> 00:25:20,560
Speaker 4: it was a boarding school. He didn't stay at the

462
00:25:20,560 --> 00:25:23,520
Speaker 4: boarding school, he stayed with family, but it was hundreds

463
00:25:23,560 --> 00:25:25,679
Speaker 4: of miles from the rest of the family. And then

464
00:25:25,720 --> 00:25:27,960
Speaker 4: from there he went to college. He was the first

465
00:25:28,000 --> 00:25:30,720
Speaker 4: one to go to college, and in the middle of

466
00:25:30,840 --> 00:25:34,399
Speaker 4: college decided he wanted to go to Europe with like

467
00:25:34,440 --> 00:25:37,040
Speaker 4: two dollars in his pocket, so he hitched hike from

468
00:25:37,040 --> 00:25:42,840
Speaker 4: Sudan to Europe. Yeah, like, so from Sudan to Port Sudan,

469
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:47,240
Speaker 4: take a boat over to Saudi Arabia or whatever. It

470
00:25:47,320 --> 00:25:48,399
Speaker 4: was called Bay. I don't even know if it was

471
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:52,160
Speaker 4: a country back then then up through Lebanon and then

472
00:25:52,240 --> 00:25:56,119
Speaker 4: up through Turkey and Greece, and it'll like, this is

473
00:25:56,160 --> 00:26:00,439
Speaker 4: a a college student who's broke, who does not speak

474
00:26:00,680 --> 00:26:02,560
Speaker 4: any of the languages other than English, and most of

475
00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:06,080
Speaker 4: those places nobody speaks English. Right. Once he talks about

476
00:26:06,080 --> 00:26:08,600
Speaker 4: going into restaurants in Turkey and like they just took

477
00:26:08,640 --> 00:26:10,600
Speaker 4: them to the back and show them, like what's what

478
00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:14,399
Speaker 4: they're cooking. He's like, hmmm, this right, that's how he

479
00:26:14,440 --> 00:26:18,399
Speaker 4: did it. So for him, he graduated and then he

480
00:26:18,400 --> 00:26:20,679
Speaker 4: gets a job in you know, the Foreign Ministry, and

481
00:26:20,880 --> 00:26:23,040
Speaker 4: it wasn't exactly what he was wanted to do, but

482
00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:25,359
Speaker 4: it's like it was a job. And then he gets

483
00:26:25,400 --> 00:26:27,480
Speaker 4: to travel the world, and you know, he starts a

484
00:26:27,520 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 4: family and for the most part, like we didn't travel

485
00:26:34,040 --> 00:26:36,199
Speaker 4: when we went went them to New York obviously, and

486
00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:39,240
Speaker 4: we stayed there, we came back. He'd gone so many

487
00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:42,119
Speaker 4: other different places, but like those were just places where

488
00:26:42,160 --> 00:26:45,399
Speaker 4: we hear stories and so a great example, I was

489
00:26:45,480 --> 00:26:49,480
Speaker 4: my uber driver the other day mess He's from Bulgaria

490
00:26:49,560 --> 00:26:52,679
Speaker 4: and I'm like, oh, Sophia, right, Like that's the capital,

491
00:26:52,720 --> 00:26:54,040
Speaker 4: and he's like, oh, yeah, how'd you know? Look at

492
00:26:54,080 --> 00:26:55,760
Speaker 4: my dad has been there, He's told me about it.

493
00:26:55,920 --> 00:26:57,800
Speaker 4: My dad's been a progue like that, there has been

494
00:26:57,800 --> 00:27:01,080
Speaker 4: a Moscow. My dad's been everywhere all over the Papua

495
00:27:01,119 --> 00:27:05,239
Speaker 4: New Guinea. But it's all kind of secondhand information, like

496
00:27:05,520 --> 00:27:08,600
Speaker 4: I haven't been to most of those places, but I

497
00:27:08,640 --> 00:27:11,600
Speaker 4: think it it definitely gives you an advantage in terms

498
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:16,680
Speaker 4: of like having a more worldview about things, about why

499
00:27:16,760 --> 00:27:18,520
Speaker 4: things are the way. I remember Dad when I was

500
00:27:18,560 --> 00:27:22,720
Speaker 4: ten talking about globalization. It's like globalization I changed the world.

501
00:27:22,880 --> 00:27:24,880
Speaker 4: And I said, and he told me, and I said

502
00:27:24,920 --> 00:27:28,639
Speaker 4: that are you four or against globalization? And he said,

503
00:27:29,040 --> 00:27:31,920
Speaker 4: it's like saying are you for against gravity? It's happening,

504
00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:35,760
Speaker 4: Like you don't have to accept it, agree believe in it,

505
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:39,159
Speaker 4: but it's happening. It's happening whether you like it or not.

506
00:27:39,440 --> 00:27:42,639
Speaker 4: And so I think kind of thinking of things in

507
00:27:43,080 --> 00:27:47,200
Speaker 4: those ways that definitely impacted how did you How.

508
00:27:47,119 --> 00:27:50,400
Speaker 2: Did it shape your political beliefs?

509
00:27:51,680 --> 00:27:54,960
Speaker 4: I mean I had to write like I always think,

510
00:27:55,040 --> 00:27:57,960
Speaker 4: like no, no, I like my ideas and my opinions

511
00:27:57,960 --> 00:28:01,320
Speaker 4: are mine. But at some point, right, you don't just

512
00:28:01,359 --> 00:28:05,240
Speaker 4: grow up thinking certain thing. I mean I say this,

513
00:28:06,760 --> 00:28:09,280
Speaker 4: I think growing up as Sudan shape my political beliefs

514
00:28:09,280 --> 00:28:14,719
Speaker 4: a lot more than you know my parents did. And

515
00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:17,840
Speaker 4: I say that because I'm always so. I have a

516
00:28:18,080 --> 00:28:22,000
Speaker 4: very very very fine tune too. Whenever someone tells you

517
00:28:22,400 --> 00:28:25,800
Speaker 4: because that's what God wants, I don't trust you man

518
00:28:26,400 --> 00:28:28,680
Speaker 4: like you want to. If you want to be spiritual,

519
00:28:28,680 --> 00:28:31,520
Speaker 4: if you want to be religious in your home life, sure,

520
00:28:31,840 --> 00:28:36,719
Speaker 4: once you start using it as a method of governance

521
00:28:37,000 --> 00:28:40,920
Speaker 4: at best control at worst, automatically, my antenna is up

522
00:28:41,000 --> 00:28:43,960
Speaker 4: like you're full of shit, because I live somewhere where

523
00:28:43,960 --> 00:28:49,800
Speaker 4: they use religion to justify anything and everything, including genocide

524
00:28:50,320 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 4: and torture and kidnapping and assault and all these things.

525
00:28:54,920 --> 00:28:58,600
Speaker 4: So anytime someone because to me, the purpose of your

526
00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:01,960
Speaker 4: argument saying that's what God wants is so that we

527
00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:04,480
Speaker 4: don't have to argue about this no more. Hey, it's

528
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:06,600
Speaker 4: a higher being that wants this. We're just doing the

529
00:29:06,640 --> 00:29:09,240
Speaker 4: Lord's will as opposed to is this the right thing

530
00:29:09,280 --> 00:29:12,240
Speaker 4: to do? It's just a fair thing to do. But

531
00:29:12,720 --> 00:29:15,520
Speaker 4: I would also say those opinions probably mirror very close

532
00:29:15,560 --> 00:29:19,080
Speaker 4: to those of my father, So maybe that is we're

533
00:29:19,160 --> 00:29:22,080
Speaker 4: shaped it but I'll tell you one thing I know

534
00:29:22,160 --> 00:29:25,520
Speaker 4: for sure shape kind of the way I look at

535
00:29:25,520 --> 00:29:28,800
Speaker 4: things overall, and and it applies to politics as well.

536
00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:34,920
Speaker 4: My dad said, I can't. It was something something some

537
00:29:35,760 --> 00:29:38,680
Speaker 4: kind of ritual or something we're doing, and I did

538
00:29:38,720 --> 00:29:41,360
Speaker 4: something a little bit off or whatever and my dad

539
00:29:41,480 --> 00:29:43,600
Speaker 4: and I was like, I was stressed about. My dad

540
00:29:43,680 --> 00:29:46,480
Speaker 4: was like, do you do you really think an omnipotent,

541
00:29:46,680 --> 00:29:53,480
Speaker 4: all knowing, all powerful, beneficent deity who rules and sees

542
00:29:53,480 --> 00:29:59,040
Speaker 4: everything would care so much about semantics. Oh, I did

543
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:01,440
Speaker 4: this before that, or it's like you know what it's like.

544
00:30:01,480 --> 00:30:03,800
Speaker 4: It's like people who are like don't believe in premarital sex,

545
00:30:04,320 --> 00:30:07,000
Speaker 4: and so they get like just like a courthouse wedding

546
00:30:07,800 --> 00:30:09,480
Speaker 4: just to have sex, and then they have it in

547
00:30:09,480 --> 00:30:13,040
Speaker 4: all trust be their religious people of all religions who

548
00:30:13,160 --> 00:30:16,959
Speaker 4: actually go through these extra steps. And I always think

549
00:30:17,000 --> 00:30:19,440
Speaker 4: to us, you think God is like, damn, they got

550
00:30:19,480 --> 00:30:21,920
Speaker 4: me on the loophole where they got married, all right,

551
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:24,400
Speaker 4: you in this time humans like no, man, It's like,

552
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:30,239
Speaker 4: come on, man, like these rules are these you know

553
00:30:30,600 --> 00:30:33,120
Speaker 4: kind of things that we live by because we believe

554
00:30:33,120 --> 00:30:37,520
Speaker 4: in a higher power. It's not run by a bureaucrat, right,

555
00:30:37,640 --> 00:30:40,360
Speaker 4: it's not someone who's gonna get caught up and like,

556
00:30:40,560 --> 00:30:43,200
Speaker 4: well the legality checks out. I guess you're cool. So

557
00:30:43,960 --> 00:30:46,240
Speaker 4: I think that part my dad definitely instilled in me

558
00:30:46,280 --> 00:30:48,680
Speaker 4: of like be common sense about these things rather than

559
00:30:49,440 --> 00:30:50,880
Speaker 4: very stuck to kind of what the letter of the

560
00:30:50,960 --> 00:30:51,320
Speaker 4: law is.

561
00:30:51,920 --> 00:30:55,959
Speaker 1: Now as someone who's a Muslim, and you know, as

562
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:59,720
Speaker 1: you mentioned that with any faith, you're going to have

563
00:30:59,760 --> 00:31:02,120
Speaker 1: your streamer is you're gonna have people.

564
00:31:01,880 --> 00:31:04,040
Speaker 2: That maybe who are like you are more common sense.

565
00:31:04,480 --> 00:31:07,560
Speaker 2: But did you ever find yourself because you do have

566
00:31:07,640 --> 00:31:12,000
Speaker 2: fairly progressive views in conflict, you know, with your.

567
00:31:11,880 --> 00:31:17,360
Speaker 4: Faith every day? I don't you know. There's a there's

568
00:31:17,400 --> 00:31:20,840
Speaker 4: an old joke right where it's like, man, I think

569
00:31:20,840 --> 00:31:23,200
Speaker 4: it was a YouTube video actually I saw, but it

570
00:31:23,280 --> 00:31:26,200
Speaker 4: was like it's a skit and a guy sitting on

571
00:31:26,240 --> 00:31:28,560
Speaker 4: the on the bench with his partner mentioned his buddy

572
00:31:28,600 --> 00:31:31,120
Speaker 4: and they're like, oh, Ramadan's about to start, Like yeah, man,

573
00:31:31,160 --> 00:31:33,440
Speaker 4: I don't know if I'm ready, and the guy says, yeah,

574
00:31:33,520 --> 00:31:37,560
Speaker 4: thirty thirty days without with that, you know, obviously you

575
00:31:37,600 --> 00:31:41,080
Speaker 4: don't eat or drink while the sun is up. But

576
00:31:41,120 --> 00:31:43,200
Speaker 4: then the guy says, also, thirty days without having to

577
00:31:43,240 --> 00:31:44,960
Speaker 4: drink alcohol and that's gonna be tough for me to

578
00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:47,280
Speaker 4: go thirty days And the other guy's like, wait, you

579
00:31:47,360 --> 00:31:51,760
Speaker 4: drink alcohol because alcohol is forbidden and the guy's like yeah, man,

580
00:31:51,800 --> 00:31:54,960
Speaker 4: and then he's like, also thirty days without like hitting

581
00:31:54,960 --> 00:31:56,720
Speaker 4: the blunt at least once, you know, to call my

582
00:31:56,760 --> 00:32:00,720
Speaker 4: nerves like you smoke weeds? Like yeah. So then the

583
00:32:00,720 --> 00:32:03,280
Speaker 4: guy says, wait, do you eat pork? And has stop

584
00:32:03,320 --> 00:32:05,040
Speaker 4: for a lot. How could you ask that of me?

585
00:32:05,320 --> 00:32:07,320
Speaker 4: I'm Muslim? Why would you ask me that? And so

586
00:32:07,360 --> 00:32:14,040
Speaker 4: that's like the universal tie among all terrible non practicing

587
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:18,080
Speaker 4: or semi practicing Muslims like myself. It's like we'll break

588
00:32:18,120 --> 00:32:20,160
Speaker 4: every one of these rules and I'm like, that's life. But

589
00:32:20,160 --> 00:32:22,160
Speaker 4: then it's like there better not be no pork in

590
00:32:22,240 --> 00:32:25,280
Speaker 4: this because I'm devout when it comes to this.

591
00:32:26,480 --> 00:32:29,880
Speaker 2: I mean, admittedly sometimes I do.

592
00:32:30,160 --> 00:32:33,760
Speaker 1: As somebody who grew up Baptist and still identidvise as

593
00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:34,320
Speaker 1: a Christian.

594
00:32:35,000 --> 00:32:37,680
Speaker 2: You pick the easy ones that are easy to stick to.

595
00:32:38,160 --> 00:32:41,440
Speaker 4: Okay, you're like non negotiable.

596
00:32:41,360 --> 00:32:44,160
Speaker 2: Like sorry, I mean like sex, all right, God you

597
00:32:44,200 --> 00:32:47,040
Speaker 2: got me? What what you got me?

598
00:32:47,080 --> 00:32:48,800
Speaker 4: On? That way? Lord forgives me.

599
00:32:49,280 --> 00:32:51,960
Speaker 7: You're right, but I won't do this, and it's just like,

600
00:32:52,000 --> 00:32:55,400
Speaker 7: all right, okay, a bridge, a bridge too far, too far,

601
00:32:55,480 --> 00:33:01,000
Speaker 7: always hilarious, that's for sure, now clearly and now growing

602
00:33:01,080 --> 00:33:01,600
Speaker 7: up in Detroit.

603
00:33:01,640 --> 00:33:07,080
Speaker 2: Detroit has the largest air population. So my name is Jamel.

604
00:33:07,160 --> 00:33:08,600
Speaker 2: It was supposed to be jam. You know, that's an

605
00:33:08,760 --> 00:33:09,360
Speaker 2: Arabic word.

606
00:33:09,440 --> 00:33:11,440
Speaker 1: Yes, my mother was a practice and Muslim at the

607
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:15,000
Speaker 1: time where she where she had and you know, so

608
00:33:15,200 --> 00:33:19,800
Speaker 1: like my level of comfort, I've never been uncomfortable being

609
00:33:20,880 --> 00:33:24,560
Speaker 1: around Muslims, being anywhere near Muslim culture. But you know

610
00:33:24,600 --> 00:33:27,880
Speaker 1: how America is, and even though you were grew up

611
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:28,760
Speaker 1: in you know, you.

612
00:33:28,720 --> 00:33:30,040
Speaker 2: Spent a lot of time in New York.

613
00:33:30,920 --> 00:33:35,440
Speaker 1: I'm wondering what your experiences were, uh though people were

614
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:39,880
Speaker 1: playing the what is he game? And especially once people

615
00:33:40,080 --> 00:33:42,960
Speaker 1: understood that you were a Muslim, and just seeing how

616
00:33:43,080 --> 00:33:47,240
Speaker 1: in general the level of Islamophobia here in this country,

617
00:33:47,400 --> 00:33:49,320
Speaker 1: what were your experiences.

618
00:33:48,720 --> 00:33:52,320
Speaker 4: Like, Yeah, I'll tell you it was not so bad

619
00:33:52,400 --> 00:33:55,280
Speaker 4: up until specific data. I can't remember what day it was.

620
00:33:55,360 --> 00:33:58,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know it's hard for them to recall the

621
00:33:58,040 --> 00:33:58,480
Speaker 2: one that.

622
00:33:58,920 --> 00:34:04,920
Speaker 4: Probably sometimes in two thousand on that time, but before then,

623
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:07,760
Speaker 4: I mean, some of Whobi was still around, obviously, but

624
00:34:07,800 --> 00:34:10,480
Speaker 4: it felt like a far festing. So in the eighties,

625
00:34:10,520 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 4: I remember, I remember kids in school he'sing me, called

626
00:34:16,239 --> 00:34:19,520
Speaker 4: me Kadaffi or whatever, and this is right around like

627
00:34:20,440 --> 00:34:22,920
Speaker 4: when Kadaffi was going crazy and Liby and all that stuff,

628
00:34:23,080 --> 00:34:25,680
Speaker 4: and like you'd hear stories back in. I mean, it's

629
00:34:25,719 --> 00:34:27,120
Speaker 4: crazy kind of now and you think about it. In

630
00:34:27,120 --> 00:34:30,520
Speaker 4: the eighties, hostages on an airplane was kind of like, oh,

631
00:34:30,520 --> 00:34:32,640
Speaker 4: that's in the news all the time, and the hijacked

632
00:34:32,640 --> 00:34:37,080
Speaker 4: another airplane or whatever, but it wasn't It never felt here.

633
00:34:37,200 --> 00:34:40,239
Speaker 4: It was like something happened somewhere far away. Come back

634
00:34:40,239 --> 00:34:43,160
Speaker 4: in the nineties, you got the first World Trade Center bombing.

635
00:34:43,239 --> 00:34:45,840
Speaker 4: That's the one with the with the U haul trucks

636
00:34:45,880 --> 00:34:49,240
Speaker 4: and all that, and it's like and you got movies

637
00:34:49,280 --> 00:34:52,680
Speaker 4: like True Lives or whatever. True Lives was the first one.

638
00:34:52,719 --> 00:34:58,759
Speaker 4: That's of course it is, but it's also like cartoonish.

639
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:02,719
Speaker 4: It's not even it doesn't feel real or rooted in

640
00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:06,480
Speaker 4: any sort of reality. The Siege was probably the first

641
00:35:06,520 --> 00:35:08,399
Speaker 4: movie I saw. It was like, oh, that's some shit

642
00:35:08,440 --> 00:35:11,200
Speaker 4: I could see happen. So The Siege came out nineteen

643
00:35:11,280 --> 00:35:13,759
Speaker 4: ninety eight, right, and it's the idea that like a

644
00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:18,759
Speaker 4: terrorist attack makes America respond with martial law and in

645
00:35:18,800 --> 00:35:22,040
Speaker 4: tournament camps and all that stuff and Muslim bands and

646
00:35:22,120 --> 00:35:24,320
Speaker 4: all this thing that I was like, this feels a

647
00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:26,200
Speaker 4: little too realistic. And then a couple of years later,

648
00:35:26,239 --> 00:35:31,200
Speaker 4: obviously nine to eleven happens and that's when boom, everything changed,

649
00:35:31,520 --> 00:35:35,600
Speaker 4: like having it a quote unquote funny name was was?

650
00:35:36,440 --> 00:35:38,839
Speaker 4: It used to be like, oh I can't boom boo whatever,

651
00:35:38,920 --> 00:35:40,880
Speaker 4: how'd your name is it? Now it's like, oh, yeah,

652
00:35:40,960 --> 00:35:43,200
Speaker 4: you're one of them. Where are you from? Da Da da?

653
00:35:43,200 --> 00:35:46,320
Speaker 4: And like and people asking you know, how this is Jamel?

654
00:35:47,080 --> 00:35:51,719
Speaker 4: When now you've become like a representative for so now

655
00:35:51,719 --> 00:35:54,440
Speaker 4: I'm a representative for black people, I'm represented for Africans,

656
00:35:54,440 --> 00:35:58,479
Speaker 4: I'm a representative for Muslims, right, And so the first

657
00:35:58,480 --> 00:36:00,319
Speaker 4: thing I want to know is, like, how you feel

658
00:36:00,320 --> 00:36:03,640
Speaker 4: about al Kada. I'm like, Doug, I live here, Well,

659
00:36:03,680 --> 00:36:06,840
Speaker 4: like why would I want? Well, why would I identify

660
00:36:06,840 --> 00:36:10,160
Speaker 4: what anything these people are about? Right? And so there's

661
00:36:10,200 --> 00:36:13,800
Speaker 4: a lot of that for sure. But then there's the

662
00:36:13,920 --> 00:36:19,200
Speaker 4: other thing, which is funny is friends who were like, oh,

663
00:36:19,200 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 4: but you're different na man, Like, it's a billion of us.

664
00:36:23,160 --> 00:36:27,120
Speaker 4: There's a lot of different types of people within this right,

665
00:36:27,560 --> 00:36:33,640
Speaker 4: and I shouldn't have to answer or for Ossam bi

666
00:36:33,680 --> 00:36:35,640
Speaker 4: Lad any more than a Christian person who have to

667
00:36:35,680 --> 00:36:38,920
Speaker 4: answer for David Koresh Right, Like, if we're going to

668
00:36:39,040 --> 00:36:42,200
Speaker 4: pick the crazies, y'all got them too. Everyone's got him,

669
00:36:42,520 --> 00:36:44,360
Speaker 4: everyone's got them, and everyone's doing in the name of

670
00:36:45,040 --> 00:36:47,600
Speaker 4: this faith or the other. So it was just kind

671
00:36:47,600 --> 00:36:52,000
Speaker 4: of seeing people not understand that even as they think

672
00:36:52,000 --> 00:36:56,680
Speaker 4: they're complementing me, it's still that's still a slamophobia. It's

673
00:36:56,760 --> 00:36:59,440
Speaker 4: just it's just like you're trying to be gentle about it.

674
00:36:59,480 --> 00:37:02,279
Speaker 2: I guess, yeah, I mean it is.

675
00:37:04,160 --> 00:37:09,239
Speaker 1: It's amazing sometimes how the casual bigotry that people kind of.

676
00:37:09,360 --> 00:37:13,640
Speaker 2: Have in this country. It you know, as as black people,

677
00:37:13,680 --> 00:37:15,719
Speaker 2: we get it often all the time.

678
00:37:16,040 --> 00:37:19,000
Speaker 1: I call it the Sal's Pizzeria theories right from doing

679
00:37:19,000 --> 00:37:22,560
Speaker 1: the right thing, where He's asking John Toturo, why do

680
00:37:22,600 --> 00:37:24,600
Speaker 1: you have all these black people in the wall and

681
00:37:24,880 --> 00:37:26,400
Speaker 1: still calling us niggas?

682
00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:26,839
Speaker 2: All right?

683
00:37:27,040 --> 00:37:31,560
Speaker 1: And I'm like, well, yeah, they especially if they feel

684
00:37:31,560 --> 00:37:35,080
Speaker 1: like you're talented or you're only different, because they're like, oh,

685
00:37:35,400 --> 00:37:37,880
Speaker 1: guys can be productive like yeah, like a lot of

686
00:37:37,920 --> 00:37:40,799
Speaker 1: us are kind of like that, and it winds up

687
00:37:40,800 --> 00:37:42,239
Speaker 1: being actually.

688
00:37:41,960 --> 00:37:45,480
Speaker 2: Far more insulting than calling you a slurber, right.

689
00:37:46,080 --> 00:37:49,520
Speaker 4: And the interesting thing also a lot of times when

690
00:37:49,640 --> 00:37:55,120
Speaker 4: they don't realize who's Muslim who's not, like either one's black,

691
00:37:55,160 --> 00:37:57,799
Speaker 4: because it's like pretty obvious, like you know for the

692
00:37:57,800 --> 00:38:01,200
Speaker 4: most part, but like, oh, you didn't know Dave Chappelle

693
00:38:01,239 --> 00:38:05,120
Speaker 4: was Muslim? Okay, like you didn't know that, you know, Uh,

694
00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:07,960
Speaker 4: this athlete is Muslim. Or they're like this this actor,

695
00:38:08,160 --> 00:38:11,320
Speaker 4: this and this comedian and this, and it's like across

696
00:38:11,320 --> 00:38:13,759
Speaker 4: this musician, oh, you know, a most death was Muslim.

697
00:38:14,200 --> 00:38:19,319
Speaker 4: You you love all these people, but you hate Muslims.

698
00:38:20,280 --> 00:38:23,279
Speaker 4: That doesn't it doesn't seem to add up there. And

699
00:38:25,000 --> 00:38:27,279
Speaker 4: the worst version of it, obviously is like, hey, these

700
00:38:27,320 --> 00:38:30,680
Speaker 4: people exist for my entertainment and that's why. But I

701
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:33,680
Speaker 4: think the reality for most people maybe this is me

702
00:38:33,719 --> 00:38:37,000
Speaker 4: being an optimist, it's just ignorance. It's when you say

703
00:38:37,000 --> 00:38:39,600
Speaker 4: the word Muslim, just like when you see the word

704
00:38:39,760 --> 00:38:46,359
Speaker 4: black in their mind, word association, scary, whatever, And they

705
00:38:46,600 --> 00:38:49,719
Speaker 4: don't ever think of like all the interactions that they have,

706
00:38:49,840 --> 00:38:54,360
Speaker 4: whether it's direct or indirect with people of this scary

707
00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:56,759
Speaker 4: type who don't scare them at all, who they're very

708
00:38:56,760 --> 00:38:58,440
Speaker 4: comfortable around. It's like, why is that? I was like,

709
00:38:58,440 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 4: well I know him, Well yeah, no shit, and by

710
00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:04,520
Speaker 4: that token, you should be scared of it. Crazy white

711
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:08,520
Speaker 4: people and like there's no difference again, like there's it's everywhere.

712
00:39:08,560 --> 00:39:13,040
Speaker 4: So rather than have his knee jerk reaction and paint

713
00:39:13,080 --> 00:39:16,959
Speaker 4: the entire thing with this one brush, maybe take people

714
00:39:17,000 --> 00:39:18,359
Speaker 4: at their value, you know.

715
00:39:19,200 --> 00:39:21,759
Speaker 1: If only they were that easy for some people. Well,

716
00:39:21,800 --> 00:39:23,279
Speaker 1: I have a lot more that I want to ask you.

717
00:39:23,360 --> 00:39:26,080
Speaker 1: I mean, we do have to take a very quick break,

718
00:39:26,400 --> 00:39:28,520
Speaker 1: and on the other side, I definitely want to get

719
00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:31,520
Speaker 1: some spicy NBA takes from you. As at the time

720
00:39:31,520 --> 00:39:33,880
Speaker 1: of this recording, just saw that Men's health cover that

721
00:39:34,040 --> 00:39:38,480
Speaker 1: Luca's on, like boy looking, I was reminded of the

722
00:39:38,560 --> 00:39:40,319
Speaker 1: Kloye Kardashian show Revenge Body.

723
00:39:40,400 --> 00:39:41,880
Speaker 2: Luca got his revenge.

724
00:39:41,480 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 1: Body right now, he's out here, So I want to

725
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:47,480
Speaker 1: ask you about him and the Lakers and some other

726
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:48,040
Speaker 1: fun stuff.

727
00:39:48,040 --> 00:39:49,400
Speaker 2: But we're just going to take a quick break and

728
00:39:49,400 --> 00:40:01,680
Speaker 2: we'll be right back with a mean el hassen. I mean,

729
00:40:02,560 --> 00:40:03,640
Speaker 2: before we took a break.

730
00:40:03,680 --> 00:40:07,759
Speaker 1: We were talking about such very you know, non complicated

731
00:40:07,960 --> 00:40:15,040
Speaker 1: light stuff as racism and Islamophobia. But you know, right now,

732
00:40:15,080 --> 00:40:18,360
Speaker 1: there's a complicated situation politically happening right now in America,

733
00:40:18,400 --> 00:40:23,760
Speaker 1: and there's also one in Sudan where there is an

734
00:40:23,800 --> 00:40:28,080
Speaker 1: ongoing genocide that has killed hundreds of thousands of people,

735
00:40:28,800 --> 00:40:32,440
Speaker 1: and it's not something that is even remotely in the

736
00:40:32,520 --> 00:40:34,120
Speaker 1: radar of American consciousness.

737
00:40:34,160 --> 00:40:35,920
Speaker 2: I don't think that's an exaggeration.

738
00:40:36,160 --> 00:40:41,480
Speaker 1: So as someone who is Pseudanese and then seeing how

739
00:40:41,960 --> 00:40:46,279
Speaker 1: Americans are blissfully unaware, how do you process that?

740
00:40:46,920 --> 00:40:51,239
Speaker 4: So when it comes to overall general American ignorance, right,

741
00:40:51,280 --> 00:40:53,760
Speaker 4: because Europeans always like to say Americans don't know anything

742
00:40:53,800 --> 00:40:58,320
Speaker 4: that happens outside of America, I said, there's two really

743
00:41:00,280 --> 00:41:02,719
Speaker 4: really pivotal reasons. I'm not trying to give excuses, but

744
00:41:02,800 --> 00:41:06,080
Speaker 4: reasons why. Number one is the sheer size of America.

745
00:41:06,320 --> 00:41:09,000
Speaker 4: Europeans say that because you know, if you're from Luxembourg,

746
00:41:09,040 --> 00:41:11,120
Speaker 4: you know what's happening in Spain and German Italy. That's

747
00:41:11,160 --> 00:41:13,479
Speaker 4: because if you add up all of the European Union,

748
00:41:13,800 --> 00:41:17,239
Speaker 4: it's still smaller than America. So they can't fathom They

749
00:41:17,440 --> 00:41:21,799
Speaker 4: just like they can't fathom. La and Phoenix are pretty close. Yeah,

750
00:41:21,880 --> 00:41:25,479
Speaker 4: it's a five hour drive five hours and five hours

751
00:41:25,520 --> 00:41:27,560
Speaker 4: you can get from Spain or like Sweden or whatever

752
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:29,680
Speaker 4: the hell you know. I know someone's going to factor

753
00:41:29,680 --> 00:41:31,479
Speaker 4: you go. Actually, but that's not the point. The point

754
00:41:31,600 --> 00:41:34,680
Speaker 4: is our distances. The size of our country. There's the

755
00:41:34,760 --> 00:41:38,840
Speaker 4: number of people, and the different cultures within the country

756
00:41:39,680 --> 00:41:43,040
Speaker 4: make it just for on all else being equal, it's

757
00:41:43,239 --> 00:41:47,040
Speaker 4: very difficult to keep up with everything happening here, let

758
00:41:47,080 --> 00:41:48,960
Speaker 4: alone things happening all across the world. Now that's not

759
00:41:48,960 --> 00:41:51,400
Speaker 4: saying things across the world aren't important, aren't worth attention.

760
00:41:51,840 --> 00:41:56,520
Speaker 4: I'm just highlighting the difficulty of the information processing. Number two,

761
00:41:56,600 --> 00:41:59,640
Speaker 4: and this is perhaps a lot more to blame now,

762
00:42:00,239 --> 00:42:04,359
Speaker 4: is because of the way the media is run and

763
00:42:04,480 --> 00:42:07,680
Speaker 4: things are depicted, and we're a country that exists on

764
00:42:07,840 --> 00:42:12,359
Speaker 4: archetypes and talking points, and so even if you had

765
00:42:12,400 --> 00:42:16,080
Speaker 4: the appetite and the ability to process information, your ability

766
00:42:16,120 --> 00:42:20,759
Speaker 4: to find that information is infinitely more difficult because they

767
00:42:20,760 --> 00:42:23,799
Speaker 4: are putting up all sorts of obstacles and roadblocks and

768
00:42:23,880 --> 00:42:27,200
Speaker 4: things to distract you so you don't get interested in

769
00:42:27,239 --> 00:42:31,480
Speaker 4: some of these things. Within that, you got Sudan, which

770
00:42:31,520 --> 00:42:33,520
Speaker 4: is a country at the best of times most people

771
00:42:33,560 --> 00:42:35,719
Speaker 4: can't point to on a map. They don't know where

772
00:42:35,760 --> 00:42:38,080
Speaker 4: it is. They don't know anything about it history wise.

773
00:42:38,360 --> 00:42:40,279
Speaker 4: It's not like Egypt. Oh I know Egypt, that's where

774
00:42:40,280 --> 00:42:43,840
Speaker 4: the pyramids are. But the oldest pyramids in Africa, perhaps

775
00:42:43,880 --> 00:42:47,000
Speaker 4: even the world, are in Sudan. Right, that's where the

776
00:42:47,000 --> 00:42:50,160
Speaker 4: pyramids are. And what's in Egypt are like the culture

777
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:54,480
Speaker 4: that thousands of years ago the ancient Egyptians learn from

778
00:42:54,600 --> 00:42:57,080
Speaker 4: the Kushites, because oh, that's how they do it. We

779
00:42:57,080 --> 00:43:00,480
Speaker 4: should start doing that over here. But again, Egypt is

780
00:43:00,520 --> 00:43:03,359
Speaker 4: a great tourism hub, so people know about that. It's

781
00:43:03,440 --> 00:43:08,239
Speaker 4: it's it's more known than Sudan. There's there's that part

782
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:12,480
Speaker 4: of it. So then you have this horrible genocide. This

783
00:43:13,080 --> 00:43:15,600
Speaker 4: conflict can't call a civil war because a civil war

784
00:43:15,600 --> 00:43:19,600
Speaker 4: would would would make it seem like one side is

785
00:43:19,640 --> 00:43:21,560
Speaker 4: for the people or some of the people, whereas this

786
00:43:21,640 --> 00:43:24,200
Speaker 4: is just a power struggle that has people caught in

787
00:43:24,239 --> 00:43:26,520
Speaker 4: the mix. But the other part of that power struggle

788
00:43:26,560 --> 00:43:29,719
Speaker 4: is a power struggle that is funded and operated by

789
00:43:29,960 --> 00:43:34,320
Speaker 4: outside actors, right in terms of equipment, in terms of training,

790
00:43:34,360 --> 00:43:37,120
Speaker 4: in some cases even in terms of personnelity. These are

791
00:43:37,160 --> 00:43:40,320
Speaker 4: people who are not Sudanese, but they have a vested

792
00:43:40,360 --> 00:43:43,560
Speaker 4: interest in one side over the other winning for their

793
00:43:43,640 --> 00:43:48,279
Speaker 4: own purposes. And that's the part that really overly complicates it,

794
00:43:48,320 --> 00:43:52,160
Speaker 4: because it's not an easy North Vietnam versus South Vietnam

795
00:43:52,200 --> 00:43:55,239
Speaker 4: type of thing where you can you can say, you know, oh,

796
00:43:55,560 --> 00:43:58,440
Speaker 4: these people want this kind of government. These people don't.

797
00:43:59,320 --> 00:44:03,440
Speaker 4: It's basically two sides struggling over who gets to be

798
00:44:03,480 --> 00:44:08,920
Speaker 4: the asshole in charge, under which everyone still struggles and

799
00:44:10,239 --> 00:44:15,200
Speaker 4: has to kind of make do. And so when you

800
00:44:15,239 --> 00:44:17,080
Speaker 4: add up all those factors, there's a lot going on

801
00:44:17,120 --> 00:44:20,040
Speaker 4: in America. Hey, even if you want to know, the

802
00:44:20,120 --> 00:44:21,560
Speaker 4: media is set up in a way where they're not

803
00:44:21,600 --> 00:44:24,319
Speaker 4: going to inform you without you being extra vigil and

804
00:44:24,360 --> 00:44:29,319
Speaker 4: finding that information. And then three, the conflict itself involves

805
00:44:29,840 --> 00:44:34,680
Speaker 4: outside actors who also have influence on point two. That's

806
00:44:34,719 --> 00:44:37,239
Speaker 4: where we end up. And then you time it with

807
00:44:37,880 --> 00:44:45,400
Speaker 4: other crises happening that are equally deserve attention, although I

808
00:44:45,440 --> 00:44:49,000
Speaker 4: wouldn't say deserve more attention or all the attention, not

809
00:44:49,080 --> 00:44:52,360
Speaker 4: because they're not worthy, but because my people deserve to

810
00:44:52,480 --> 00:44:53,560
Speaker 4: have attention as well.

811
00:44:53,960 --> 00:44:58,799
Speaker 1: How much personal responsibility do you feel to be a

812
00:44:58,960 --> 00:45:02,759
Speaker 1: voice that that makes us more aware? I know it's

813
00:45:02,960 --> 00:45:06,439
Speaker 1: tricky because like obviously with you being in the Lebatary universe, yeah,

814
00:45:07,560 --> 00:45:10,560
Speaker 1: you know, you all don't spend hours talking about genesized

815
00:45:10,680 --> 00:45:14,719
Speaker 1: generally speaking, But do you feel a sense of responsibility, like, hey,

816
00:45:14,760 --> 00:45:17,200
Speaker 1: I got to let people know what's going on.

817
00:45:18,080 --> 00:45:25,799
Speaker 4: I do, And also I am I don't think I

818
00:45:25,840 --> 00:45:27,279
Speaker 4: do a good job. Let me say that. Let me

819
00:45:27,280 --> 00:45:28,879
Speaker 4: start there. I don't think I do a good job

820
00:45:28,920 --> 00:45:35,120
Speaker 4: of it. I do some, but also I find myself

821
00:45:35,200 --> 00:45:38,560
Speaker 4: because it's you know, when you realize the scope of

822
00:45:38,920 --> 00:45:43,360
Speaker 4: how awful everything is. And I'm talking about my family

823
00:45:43,360 --> 00:45:47,560
Speaker 4: home destroyed, my family scattered across the world. People family

824
00:45:47,560 --> 00:45:52,240
Speaker 4: members have died in this, and it's like you build

825
00:45:52,560 --> 00:45:56,920
Speaker 4: a psychological walls within your head in order just to

826
00:45:57,120 --> 00:46:01,479
Speaker 4: get through it. So you're not if I thought about

827
00:46:01,520 --> 00:46:03,919
Speaker 4: it the extent I should think about it, I don't

828
00:46:03,960 --> 00:46:06,600
Speaker 4: know how many days I would make it without breaking

829
00:46:06,640 --> 00:46:09,600
Speaker 4: down and crying, on how many days I would not

830
00:46:09,719 --> 00:46:14,040
Speaker 4: be in a serious, deep depression. And you know, and

831
00:46:14,800 --> 00:46:17,960
Speaker 4: for me, I feel it doubly because I think my

832
00:46:18,160 --> 00:46:24,120
Speaker 4: sister does an incredible job of not only being a

833
00:46:24,239 --> 00:46:27,360
Speaker 4: voice but also being a source of information for people,

834
00:46:28,440 --> 00:46:30,960
Speaker 4: particularly people. Soon these people will spreadut across the world

835
00:46:31,000 --> 00:46:34,919
Speaker 4: trying to figure out what's really happening. And she's she's

836
00:46:35,040 --> 00:46:38,520
Speaker 4: kind of like this figure that people turn to, that

837
00:46:38,719 --> 00:46:42,080
Speaker 4: like kind of I don't call ambudsmen, but someone like

838
00:46:42,080 --> 00:46:46,680
Speaker 4: who verifies information and disseminates it and lets people know

839
00:46:47,360 --> 00:46:50,439
Speaker 4: and then externally explains what's happening to people who don't

840
00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:54,360
Speaker 4: know what's happening in Sudan. And so it's difficult for me,

841
00:46:55,719 --> 00:46:57,680
Speaker 4: you know, to not only not be good at it,

842
00:46:57,760 --> 00:47:01,560
Speaker 4: but to also be related to someone who's excellent at it.

843
00:47:01,560 --> 00:47:05,600
Speaker 4: It makes me feel the guilt. And it's a cyclical thing.

844
00:47:05,640 --> 00:47:09,080
Speaker 4: And then you know, I again, I do. It's not

845
00:47:09,120 --> 00:47:11,040
Speaker 4: that I don't do anything, but I don't think I

846
00:47:11,160 --> 00:47:11,600
Speaker 4: do enough.

847
00:47:12,440 --> 00:47:15,960
Speaker 1: And you and your sister, your sister Sarah, correct, you

848
00:47:16,040 --> 00:47:20,640
Speaker 1: all worked on a project together that discussed maybe a

849
00:47:20,680 --> 00:47:23,120
Speaker 1: lot about like how you grew up, how did that

850
00:47:23,160 --> 00:47:23,640
Speaker 1: come together?

851
00:47:24,160 --> 00:47:26,320
Speaker 4: So she didn't work on the project. She was a subject,

852
00:47:26,880 --> 00:47:33,600
Speaker 4: but she didn't know we me and my cousins, we

853
00:47:33,600 --> 00:47:37,200
Speaker 4: we're working on a bigger documentary. I'm not gonna I'll

854
00:47:37,239 --> 00:47:40,080
Speaker 4: tell you after we're off the air what the topic is.

855
00:47:40,160 --> 00:47:44,879
Speaker 4: But it's kind of like in our little incubator, trying

856
00:47:44,880 --> 00:47:49,640
Speaker 4: to get content made. We got funding from the African

857
00:47:49,640 --> 00:47:52,480
Speaker 4: Film Festival, the New York African Film Festival, and so

858
00:47:52,560 --> 00:47:55,200
Speaker 4: we did a short, like a thirty minute doc It

859
00:47:55,239 --> 00:47:58,040
Speaker 4: was about my sister Sarah, about a little bit about

860
00:47:58,200 --> 00:48:03,560
Speaker 4: our upbringing, but more so geared towards what she does,

861
00:48:03,680 --> 00:48:07,040
Speaker 4: what her life's work is, and her impact of so

862
00:48:07,080 --> 00:48:10,800
Speaker 4: many people. And she, again she didn't know. I was

863
00:48:10,880 --> 00:48:12,840
Speaker 4: just like, hey, we want to do this. Then I

864
00:48:12,880 --> 00:48:15,440
Speaker 4: asked you some questions and she went along with it.

865
00:48:15,640 --> 00:48:19,840
Speaker 4: She doesn't like these kind of things where it's focused

866
00:48:19,840 --> 00:48:22,680
Speaker 4: on her, so I know that wasn't a very comfortable

867
00:48:22,719 --> 00:48:29,320
Speaker 4: situation for her, but we did it because it was something.

868
00:48:30,360 --> 00:48:32,560
Speaker 4: I admire my sister greatly. I don't think I ever

869
00:48:34,040 --> 00:48:35,919
Speaker 4: told her that. I definitely didn't tell her that before

870
00:48:35,960 --> 00:48:41,440
Speaker 4: that video for that documentary. I admire her greatly. I

871
00:48:41,480 --> 00:48:45,120
Speaker 4: think she is smarter than I am. I definitely think

872
00:48:45,160 --> 00:48:48,839
Speaker 4: she's stronger than I am, but I never said that.

873
00:48:48,920 --> 00:48:52,400
Speaker 4: And because I'm her older brother and our relationship has

874
00:48:52,400 --> 00:48:55,280
Speaker 4: always been nah haha, like send her me and whatever,

875
00:48:55,760 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 4: make fun of her when we were little, and so

876
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:01,279
Speaker 4: I've never really had opportunities then. So then in many

877
00:49:01,280 --> 00:49:03,200
Speaker 4: ways that was like my thank you to her and

878
00:49:03,480 --> 00:49:05,279
Speaker 4: my way of letting her know that was very proud of.

879
00:49:06,960 --> 00:49:11,560
Speaker 1: Given everything that is happening here, there has certainly been

880
00:49:11,600 --> 00:49:16,080
Speaker 1: an increasingly strong religious right movement that is firmly entrenched

881
00:49:16,080 --> 00:49:20,160
Speaker 1: in our government, especially right now seeing how things are

882
00:49:20,239 --> 00:49:23,360
Speaker 1: unfolding here. How triggering is that for you as someone

883
00:49:23,400 --> 00:49:27,600
Speaker 1: who grew up in a political climate which religion, as

884
00:49:27,640 --> 00:49:31,239
Speaker 1: you said, because said a few moments ago, became the

885
00:49:31,400 --> 00:49:33,480
Speaker 1: justification to do some pretty awful things.

886
00:49:33,760 --> 00:49:37,800
Speaker 4: Right, and the trampling of individual rights and the transfer

887
00:49:37,840 --> 00:49:40,200
Speaker 4: of power, the concentration of power with one person or

888
00:49:40,200 --> 00:49:44,440
Speaker 4: one office, all of these things, I mean, even the

889
00:49:44,560 --> 00:49:49,400
Speaker 4: way it's funny, it's like I've seen this all before,

890
00:49:49,440 --> 00:49:51,600
Speaker 4: even the idea of like I don't have to tell

891
00:49:51,600 --> 00:49:52,920
Speaker 4: the truth. Not only do I not have to tell

892
00:49:52,960 --> 00:49:55,479
Speaker 4: the truth, my lie doesn't even have to be clever.

893
00:49:57,080 --> 00:50:00,640
Speaker 4: I can tell an unclever clearly see through life and

894
00:50:00,719 --> 00:50:02,120
Speaker 4: the reason why I was like, what are you going

895
00:50:02,160 --> 00:50:07,440
Speaker 4: to do about it? And so I saw somewhere recently

896
00:50:08,000 --> 00:50:10,759
Speaker 4: the last couple of days, Trump was being asked again

897
00:50:10,800 --> 00:50:14,560
Speaker 4: about the epstcene stuff and he said, oh, well, you know,

898
00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:17,840
Speaker 4: I didn't really know him like that. And actually he

899
00:50:17,920 --> 00:50:20,080
Speaker 4: came to my thing and we had him kicked out

900
00:50:20,120 --> 00:50:22,920
Speaker 4: of mar A Lago because he was acting like a

901
00:50:22,960 --> 00:50:25,880
Speaker 4: creep or whatever. And it's like, okay, so you knew

902
00:50:26,000 --> 00:50:28,720
Speaker 4: this guy was up to no good all those years

903
00:50:28,719 --> 00:50:30,840
Speaker 4: back then, and you didn't do anything. But now that

904
00:50:30,840 --> 00:50:32,960
Speaker 4: he's dead, now you're saying I always need it. So

905
00:50:33,040 --> 00:50:37,279
Speaker 4: it's like your lies aren't even you know. It was

906
00:50:37,280 --> 00:50:39,240
Speaker 4: like when we asked him, hey, what's your favorite Bible

907
00:50:39,320 --> 00:50:40,880
Speaker 4: versus all of them?

908
00:50:42,400 --> 00:50:43,240
Speaker 2: My favorite answer?

909
00:50:43,239 --> 00:50:46,040
Speaker 1: When he did that, he was asked this is when

910
00:50:46,120 --> 00:50:48,080
Speaker 1: I think he was still campaigning. I think it might

911
00:50:48,080 --> 00:50:52,000
Speaker 1: have been his first, his first presidential run, when he

912
00:50:52,120 --> 00:50:59,360
Speaker 1: said two Corinthians and I was like, oh lord, I

913
00:50:59,440 --> 00:50:59,759
Speaker 1: just won.

914
00:51:00,080 --> 00:51:02,960
Speaker 2: This is I was like, my man, don't even know

915
00:51:03,000 --> 00:51:03,600
Speaker 2: a second, but.

916
00:51:04,719 --> 00:51:09,520
Speaker 4: Two Corinthians walk into a bar. But it's like, but

917
00:51:09,560 --> 00:51:14,200
Speaker 4: these are the things, like these very blatant lies, like no, dude,

918
00:51:14,239 --> 00:51:17,080
Speaker 4: we're not idiots, like we know. But that's why I

919
00:51:17,120 --> 00:51:21,319
Speaker 4: realized they don't even care for idiots or not. They

920
00:51:21,360 --> 00:51:23,080
Speaker 4: just want to get done what they want to do.

921
00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:26,520
Speaker 4: The only difference I see is, for the most part

922
00:51:26,560 --> 00:51:29,160
Speaker 4: what was happening in Sudan, there were supporters, but they

923
00:51:29,200 --> 00:51:31,959
Speaker 4: wanted that many, like the vast majority of the people

924
00:51:32,040 --> 00:51:35,000
Speaker 4: are like this is awful, but we were also afraid

925
00:51:35,040 --> 00:51:39,320
Speaker 4: for our safety and all that. And here there seems

926
00:51:39,320 --> 00:51:41,160
Speaker 4: to be people who have the pom poms out to

927
00:51:41,200 --> 00:51:42,640
Speaker 4: the death of them, and I'm like, this is kind

928
00:51:42,640 --> 00:51:45,399
Speaker 4: of wild. So for instance, ice raids that I.

929
00:51:45,280 --> 00:51:46,600
Speaker 8: Did, and they can come and scoop you up and

930
00:51:46,920 --> 00:51:51,040
Speaker 8: take you out, like yeah, man, the secret police in

931
00:51:51,120 --> 00:51:54,600
Speaker 8: Sudan they dress like regular citizens. They hear you talking

932
00:51:54,640 --> 00:51:56,919
Speaker 8: about something whatever, they grab you and they take you away.

933
00:51:56,960 --> 00:51:58,960
Speaker 4: And they used to take them to the places called

934
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:02,040
Speaker 4: ghost houses, the ghost houses. That's why they torture you.

935
00:52:02,520 --> 00:52:05,360
Speaker 4: I lived across the street from a ghost house. So

936
00:52:06,080 --> 00:52:08,040
Speaker 4: the way suit in Theese houses are, it's like kind

937
00:52:08,040 --> 00:52:09,840
Speaker 4: of the house and then there's like a courtyard and

938
00:52:09,960 --> 00:52:14,680
Speaker 4: like like a low wall basically and at night because

939
00:52:15,160 --> 00:52:17,760
Speaker 4: again because of rolling blackouts and lot just sy expensive whatever.

940
00:52:18,320 --> 00:52:21,319
Speaker 4: For most when we sleep outside, you got beds that

941
00:52:21,640 --> 00:52:25,279
Speaker 4: stay outside. You bring the mattresses from indoors outside, lay

942
00:52:25,320 --> 00:52:27,120
Speaker 4: them out, and then you sleep under the stars. Right.

943
00:52:28,480 --> 00:52:32,160
Speaker 4: I could hear the screams of people getting tortured from

944
00:52:32,160 --> 00:52:36,120
Speaker 4: across the street at night. And again it's like it's

945
00:52:36,200 --> 00:52:39,880
Speaker 4: weird because I'm like, oh, yeah, I have vivid memories

946
00:52:39,920 --> 00:52:45,279
Speaker 4: of this, but I never remember like being traumatized in

947
00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:48,080
Speaker 4: a way like it was just like, oh shit, they're

948
00:52:48,120 --> 00:52:50,880
Speaker 4: at it again, you know, But also with the knowledge

949
00:52:50,920 --> 00:52:52,600
Speaker 4: that hey, man, you gotta watch that, you gotta watch

950
00:52:52,719 --> 00:52:56,000
Speaker 4: what you say around who because you don't know what

951
00:52:56,040 --> 00:52:58,319
Speaker 4: the consequences might be. And so when I turn on

952
00:52:58,360 --> 00:53:01,920
Speaker 4: the news and I see people particularly like things like

953
00:53:03,400 --> 00:53:07,520
Speaker 4: college students picking up the phone calling ice about other

954
00:53:08,120 --> 00:53:11,360
Speaker 4: legally in this country college too, but because they have

955
00:53:11,400 --> 00:53:15,839
Speaker 4: a difference of opinion on a certain issue, they're getting

956
00:53:15,920 --> 00:53:20,960
Speaker 4: dragged away without due process, taking the places where God

957
00:53:21,040 --> 00:53:25,160
Speaker 4: knows human treatment probably is not the norm. It's like, yeah,

958
00:53:25,160 --> 00:53:28,520
Speaker 4: I mean, I've seen all this before, and it's wild

959
00:53:28,680 --> 00:53:30,360
Speaker 4: to me. Like I said, the thing that's wild to

960
00:53:30,400 --> 00:53:33,720
Speaker 4: me is that the number of people have pom poms

961
00:53:33,719 --> 00:53:36,120
Speaker 4: out for any of this behavior, for any of these

962
00:53:36,160 --> 00:53:39,319
Speaker 4: trampling of civil liberties or human rights or whatever to

963
00:53:39,360 --> 00:53:43,000
Speaker 4: be like, yeah, man, that's cool, Like I just it's

964
00:53:43,760 --> 00:53:46,879
Speaker 4: it is weird to me that there isn't a kind

965
00:53:46,920 --> 00:53:52,000
Speaker 4: of a feeling of I'm not with this, even if

966
00:53:52,040 --> 00:53:54,399
Speaker 4: you're like, hey, I voted for Trump, I vote from

967
00:53:54,400 --> 00:53:56,320
Speaker 4: a third time. Even if you're one of those people,

968
00:53:57,560 --> 00:53:59,799
Speaker 4: isn't there a party that says, Okay, I didn't vote

969
00:53:59,800 --> 00:54:02,000
Speaker 4: for that. That ship though, like that's kind of weird.

970
00:54:02,200 --> 00:54:04,600
Speaker 4: That's not what I wanted or whatever. I guess we're

971
00:54:04,600 --> 00:54:06,720
Speaker 4: seeing a little bit of that now from some people,

972
00:54:06,800 --> 00:54:09,520
Speaker 4: but there's been a lot of stops along the way

973
00:54:09,560 --> 00:54:10,960
Speaker 4: to mail. I don't know if you feel the same way,

974
00:54:10,960 --> 00:54:13,120
Speaker 4: where it's like it's okay for you to still roop

975
00:54:13,160 --> 00:54:16,319
Speaker 4: for your team and say the coach sucks. You don't

976
00:54:16,320 --> 00:54:18,279
Speaker 4: mean you you don't mean you're you're a Red Sox

977
00:54:18,320 --> 00:54:20,720
Speaker 4: fan all of a sudden and you just abandoned the Yankees.

978
00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:22,480
Speaker 4: You could say like, yo, I'm a Yankee fan through

979
00:54:22,520 --> 00:54:26,879
Speaker 4: and two, But I don't like what's his name? What's

980
00:54:26,920 --> 00:54:30,960
Speaker 4: my man? It's a home run, I'm old. Oh what's

981
00:54:31,000 --> 00:54:34,839
Speaker 4: the manager of the Yankees currently? The one that Aaron Boone?

982
00:54:35,640 --> 00:54:36,879
Speaker 2: I was like, you mean the current brand?

983
00:54:37,760 --> 00:54:39,239
Speaker 4: Yeah, like, like, you know what I'm saying, Like it's

984
00:54:39,280 --> 00:54:41,319
Speaker 4: okay to be a Yankee fan and not like Aaron

985
00:54:41,360 --> 00:54:44,480
Speaker 4: Boone or not like that, you know, or to like, uh,

986
00:54:44,719 --> 00:54:47,520
Speaker 4: to be a Knicks fan and think TIBs might be

987
00:54:47,520 --> 00:54:50,319
Speaker 4: playing the guys a little too much, Like you don't

988
00:54:50,360 --> 00:54:52,040
Speaker 4: have to be like well, if TIBs did it, then

989
00:54:52,080 --> 00:54:53,759
Speaker 4: that means it must like you don't have to be

990
00:54:53,880 --> 00:54:56,360
Speaker 4: like that. They make mistakes too, It's all right to

991
00:54:56,400 --> 00:54:56,879
Speaker 4: admit it.

992
00:54:57,760 --> 00:55:01,600
Speaker 1: The problem, though, is it's it's very appropriate you use

993
00:55:01,600 --> 00:55:04,279
Speaker 1: a sports example, because I do contend that part of

994
00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:08,440
Speaker 1: the reason why Americans are largely unfazed by the potential

995
00:55:08,480 --> 00:55:11,759
Speaker 1: consequences of what is happening is because we cover politics

996
00:55:11,800 --> 00:55:15,400
Speaker 1: like sports. Whereas this team versus this team, I was like, no, no, no, no,

997
00:55:15,440 --> 00:55:18,480
Speaker 1: there's real fucking people involved here whose lives will be

998
00:55:18,520 --> 00:55:22,000
Speaker 1: destroyed by this, and in the process, you are voting

999
00:55:22,040 --> 00:55:24,400
Speaker 1: against your self interest or you know whatever.

1000
00:55:24,480 --> 00:55:25,520
Speaker 2: Like there's there's.

1001
00:55:25,280 --> 00:55:30,480
Speaker 1: A there's a lot of scenarios where we look back

1002
00:55:30,520 --> 00:55:35,680
Speaker 1: on this time and feel woefully ashamed of what we

1003
00:55:36,360 --> 00:55:41,880
Speaker 1: allow through apathy, through selfishness, through this rugged individualness individualism

1004
00:55:41,960 --> 00:55:45,319
Speaker 1: that has been a part of the American identity, but

1005
00:55:45,360 --> 00:55:48,520
Speaker 1: can be really toxic when you take a couple of

1006
00:55:48,560 --> 00:55:52,760
Speaker 1: steps back. So it is it's sort of by design

1007
00:55:52,960 --> 00:55:56,120
Speaker 1: that Americans are just like, oh shit, is some fascism

1008
00:55:56,120 --> 00:55:57,520
Speaker 1: going on, all right?

1009
00:55:59,760 --> 00:56:03,000
Speaker 4: And the flip side of that is like when I see,

1010
00:56:03,040 --> 00:56:07,120
Speaker 4: like what's happening in New York City with the mayoral race,

1011
00:56:07,239 --> 00:56:12,640
Speaker 4: right and mom Donnie seems to have a lot of momentum.

1012
00:56:13,440 --> 00:56:18,160
Speaker 4: And again it's like the things he's running on, it's

1013
00:56:18,160 --> 00:56:21,960
Speaker 4: funny to me, like the platform that he's running on.

1014
00:56:23,560 --> 00:56:28,840
Speaker 4: If I were a Republican, a conservative, small government Republican,

1015
00:56:29,960 --> 00:56:34,839
Speaker 4: there is no shortage of policy that I would disagree

1016
00:56:34,880 --> 00:56:38,600
Speaker 4: with him on. And yet they just go, he wants

1017
00:56:38,640 --> 00:56:41,160
Speaker 4: to make us all Muslim. I'm like, that's what you

1018
00:56:41,239 --> 00:56:44,560
Speaker 4: got out of this? This dude he's openly saying I'm

1019
00:56:44,600 --> 00:56:47,479
Speaker 4: a socialist, and you're like this Muslim. I'm like, that's

1020
00:56:47,480 --> 00:56:50,760
Speaker 4: what you got out of it. It's but again, it's telling.

1021
00:56:50,920 --> 00:56:55,520
Speaker 4: It's telling that the lack of any sophistication really in

1022
00:56:55,640 --> 00:56:59,719
Speaker 4: terms of whether it's the audience or the communicator of

1023
00:56:59,760 --> 00:57:02,680
Speaker 4: what the argument should even be. I don't even mind

1024
00:57:02,680 --> 00:57:05,120
Speaker 4: it thinking about it in a sports term, but again,

1025
00:57:05,200 --> 00:57:08,560
Speaker 4: like I said, even in sports, there are cowboys fans

1026
00:57:08,800 --> 00:57:12,680
Speaker 4: who think Jerry Jones is sucking up. They're like, it's not.

1027
00:57:13,239 --> 00:57:16,160
Speaker 4: In Jerry, we trust every single day. And so the

1028
00:57:16,240 --> 00:57:19,120
Speaker 4: idea that like anyone in this in this country, of

1029
00:57:19,160 --> 00:57:23,160
Speaker 4: all countries, would blindly follow someone no matter what they said,

1030
00:57:23,240 --> 00:57:25,800
Speaker 4: even if they said, hey, you're the enemy. Now look, hey,

1031
00:57:26,120 --> 00:57:28,040
Speaker 4: you must be right, I must be the enemy. That's

1032
00:57:28,080 --> 00:57:28,800
Speaker 4: just insane. Me.

1033
00:57:30,320 --> 00:57:32,720
Speaker 2: I want to pivot a little bit and talk about

1034
00:57:32,760 --> 00:57:33,840
Speaker 2: your NBA career.

1035
00:57:34,960 --> 00:57:39,360
Speaker 1: I did not know, upon doing research for for our conversation,

1036
00:57:39,840 --> 00:57:42,760
Speaker 1: I did not know that you were once an engineering student.

1037
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:48,760
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you lived another life as an engineering student.

1038
00:57:49,400 --> 00:57:51,560
Speaker 1: He went to Georgia Tech, of course, which is one

1039
00:57:51,560 --> 00:57:55,400
Speaker 1: of the best schools in the country, and engineers.

1040
00:57:54,960 --> 00:57:55,440
Speaker 2: Tend to go.

1041
00:57:56,360 --> 00:58:01,560
Speaker 1: So knowing, I guess I have enough friend who you

1042
00:58:01,600 --> 00:58:05,960
Speaker 1: know who come from immigrant families. Yeah, I would love

1043
00:58:06,000 --> 00:58:07,720
Speaker 1: to know how that conversation went.

1044
00:58:07,960 --> 00:58:10,720
Speaker 4: You know what, this is horribly when.

1045
00:58:10,560 --> 00:58:14,640
Speaker 1: You told your parents or maybe even specifically your father, Hey,

1046
00:58:14,680 --> 00:58:18,240
Speaker 1: you know this engineering thing, leave that alone and going.

1047
00:58:18,040 --> 00:58:23,120
Speaker 4: To sports, it's you know, it's funny. You're absolutely right.

1048
00:58:23,240 --> 00:58:25,760
Speaker 4: Every single child of immigrant has a story. I talked

1049
00:58:25,760 --> 00:58:29,240
Speaker 4: to Janey Maka about this, and Jenny with the number

1050
00:58:29,240 --> 00:58:32,160
Speaker 4: one overall pick, and her father's reaction was like, does

1051
00:58:32,160 --> 00:58:33,760
Speaker 4: this mean you're not going to medical school? It was

1052
00:58:34,160 --> 00:58:36,840
Speaker 4: something along those lines, like as the number one overall

1053
00:58:36,880 --> 00:58:39,000
Speaker 4: pick in the WNBA draft, her dad was still like.

1054
00:58:39,560 --> 00:58:45,280
Speaker 9: Came out of Stanford, Yeah, like a factory, a basketball factory, right, yeah,

1055
00:58:45,480 --> 00:58:48,280
Speaker 9: but like it's true, it's like we grow up and

1056
00:58:49,440 --> 00:58:51,520
Speaker 9: because they come.

1057
00:58:51,360 --> 00:58:55,760
Speaker 4: From a place of scarcity, the idea is that you

1058
00:58:55,880 --> 00:59:00,200
Speaker 4: got four options basically doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect, which when

1059
00:59:00,240 --> 00:59:04,760
Speaker 4: you want, right, that's it, right, because because the idea

1060
00:59:04,800 --> 00:59:06,280
Speaker 4: is that you're going to go to college and you're

1061
00:59:06,280 --> 00:59:08,560
Speaker 4: going to get a degree that is going to guarantee

1062
00:59:08,600 --> 00:59:13,240
Speaker 4: you employment and guarantee you income, like good income. And

1063
00:59:13,360 --> 00:59:19,720
Speaker 4: so I never had any aspirations to work in sports

1064
00:59:19,760 --> 00:59:22,520
Speaker 4: growing up. Sports was cool. I loved it, I played,

1065
00:59:22,760 --> 00:59:25,200
Speaker 4: I followed, I did all those things. It didn't even

1066
00:59:25,200 --> 00:59:28,320
Speaker 4: occur to me that this was an opportunity that regular people.

1067
00:59:28,360 --> 00:59:31,680
Speaker 4: To me, everyone who worked in sports was either a

1068
00:59:31,720 --> 00:59:36,600
Speaker 4: former athlete or my daddy's the owner, where I'm the

1069
00:59:36,640 --> 00:59:39,680
Speaker 4: nephew of the star pulled the franchise player or my

1070
00:59:39,840 --> 00:59:42,360
Speaker 4: uncle is one of the parts, like it's that's that's

1071
00:59:42,360 --> 00:59:44,960
Speaker 4: who the people work in sports and the rest of

1072
00:59:45,040 --> 00:59:47,600
Speaker 4: us we just watch right. And so I was good

1073
00:59:47,600 --> 00:59:50,000
Speaker 4: at math, I was good at science. What do you

1074
00:59:50,000 --> 00:59:52,240
Speaker 4: want to be? You want to be an architect or

1075
00:59:52,280 --> 00:59:54,200
Speaker 4: an engineer. I didn't want to be a doctor. I

1076
00:59:54,200 --> 00:59:57,440
Speaker 4: didn't like blood and all that stuff. I didn't want

1077
00:59:57,440 --> 01:00:00,720
Speaker 4: to be a lawyer. Or I did, but my parents

1078
01:00:00,760 --> 01:00:02,400
Speaker 4: stopped me out of it when I was younger. So

1079
01:00:02,680 --> 01:00:06,800
Speaker 4: that's another story for another day. Either way, So engineer

1080
01:00:07,120 --> 01:00:09,120
Speaker 4: or architecture, Like, well, I'm not good at drawing. I

1081
01:00:09,160 --> 01:00:13,000
Speaker 4: swear to God, this is the sophistication decision tree of

1082
01:00:13,000 --> 01:00:15,680
Speaker 4: amino acid. I'm not good at drawing, so baby, architecture

1083
01:00:15,720 --> 01:00:17,800
Speaker 4: isn't for me. I'll do engineering, all right? Where do

1084
01:00:17,800 --> 01:00:19,880
Speaker 4: you want to go to school? The year I was

1085
01:00:19,920 --> 01:00:22,520
Speaker 4: a senior in high school, I think it was junior senior.

1086
01:00:22,640 --> 01:00:24,560
Speaker 4: There's a massive blizzard in New York. It's like one

1087
01:00:24,560 --> 01:00:28,840
Speaker 4: of the heaviest snow days of ever. And I'm still

1088
01:00:28,920 --> 01:00:31,400
Speaker 4: kind of fresh from Africa. So this idea of it

1089
01:00:31,560 --> 01:00:34,280
Speaker 4: being cold and snow and all this sudden like fuck

1090
01:00:34,440 --> 01:00:37,120
Speaker 4: that I'm never going to do this again. Take me

1091
01:00:37,200 --> 01:00:39,640
Speaker 4: somewhere where it's sonny all the time. Take me where

1092
01:00:39,680 --> 01:00:43,880
Speaker 4: it's nice, where we don't have anything. And so I

1093
01:00:44,320 --> 01:00:50,800
Speaker 4: applied to Miami, Okay, Florida A, and m Okay, Rice,

1094
01:00:52,840 --> 01:00:56,680
Speaker 4: Georgia Tech, and then Mit because my mom made me.

1095
01:00:58,640 --> 01:01:00,600
Speaker 4: And so I was like, all right, I'm gonna just

1096
01:01:00,680 --> 01:01:05,280
Speaker 4: to just to throw my hat in that ring. And

1097
01:01:06,320 --> 01:01:08,880
Speaker 4: so I think I got into I got into Florida

1098
01:01:08,880 --> 01:01:13,400
Speaker 4: A and m I got into Miami. I got into

1099
01:01:13,440 --> 01:01:17,080
Speaker 4: Georgia Tech. I got waitlisted at RICE and m I

1100
01:01:17,160 --> 01:01:20,280
Speaker 4: T so I said, waitlist, I can't go down Boom,

1101
01:01:20,280 --> 01:01:22,360
Speaker 4: that's off the list. I wanted to go to Miami.

1102
01:01:22,480 --> 01:01:24,680
Speaker 4: My mom the only thing she knew about Miami was

1103
01:01:25,840 --> 01:01:28,400
Speaker 4: the news from the nineteen eighties, and that's like scarface

1104
01:01:28,520 --> 01:01:32,600
Speaker 4: shootouts and the street and stuff. She thought. She thought

1105
01:01:32,640 --> 01:01:34,960
Speaker 4: I was got caught and crossfire. Now mind you, we

1106
01:01:35,000 --> 01:01:37,320
Speaker 4: live in New York City, but in her mind, Miami

1107
01:01:37,360 --> 01:01:40,800
Speaker 4: that's really really crazy. Never mind the University of Miami

1108
01:01:40,800 --> 01:01:44,600
Speaker 4: is in Coral Gables, which is like, yeah, and it's so,

1109
01:01:44,640 --> 01:01:48,400
Speaker 4: But Miami was off the list. Rice waitlisted off the list. Also,

1110
01:01:48,400 --> 01:01:49,800
Speaker 4: I didn't want to live in Texas. I thought it

1111
01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:54,000
Speaker 4: was gonna be nothing but racist there. And so by

1112
01:01:54,800 --> 01:01:57,640
Speaker 4: came down to Florida and m and Georgia Tech, and

1113
01:01:57,680 --> 01:01:58,840
Speaker 4: I said, I don't want to go to a small

1114
01:01:59,160 --> 01:02:02,920
Speaker 4: small town Tella Haas, I'm going to Atlanta. And all

1115
01:02:02,960 --> 01:02:06,240
Speaker 4: I knew all the black people in Atlanta. Jermaine dupraz

1116
01:02:06,280 --> 01:02:10,280
Speaker 4: so so deaf was in Atlanta, Stephan Marbury, Georgia Tech. Basketball.

1117
01:02:10,480 --> 01:02:12,800
Speaker 4: I had no idea. You said, Georgia Tech is a

1118
01:02:12,800 --> 01:02:15,280
Speaker 4: great engineering school. You're absolutely right. You know who didn't know?

1119
01:02:15,560 --> 01:02:16,320
Speaker 4: This asshole?

1120
01:02:17,280 --> 01:02:17,760
Speaker 2: You didn't?

1121
01:02:18,120 --> 01:02:23,080
Speaker 4: I didn't know. Wow, I thought. I thought, okay, so

1122
01:02:23,120 --> 01:02:26,720
Speaker 4: they're engineering focused. How good are they? Who knows? Right?

1123
01:02:27,320 --> 01:02:32,600
Speaker 4: But like I said, basketball, really big, Georgia Tech, Marbury,

1124
01:02:32,600 --> 01:02:35,680
Speaker 4: All that's cool. Number two in a big city. Didn't

1125
01:02:35,680 --> 01:02:38,160
Speaker 4: want to live in a small town. Number three. And

1126
01:02:38,200 --> 01:02:41,680
Speaker 4: this is key, Jamal. The weather is awesome all year round.

1127
01:02:43,240 --> 01:02:45,400
Speaker 4: Did not know that it got cold in Georgia in

1128
01:02:45,440 --> 01:02:47,400
Speaker 4: the winter. I thought I was gonna be like t

1129
01:02:47,560 --> 01:02:48,720
Speaker 4: shirts and shorts every day.

1130
01:02:50,640 --> 01:02:52,040
Speaker 2: I thought you were going to say the women is

1131
01:02:52,120 --> 01:02:53,480
Speaker 2: a point, like, oh.

1132
01:02:53,480 --> 01:02:57,760
Speaker 4: No, I mean, look, that's that's true. I thought about

1133
01:02:57,800 --> 01:03:00,560
Speaker 4: that for Atlanta, and then I got to Tech, and

1134
01:03:00,600 --> 01:03:04,880
Speaker 4: I realized, oh, this is a bubble inside of Atlanta.

1135
01:03:04,920 --> 01:03:08,440
Speaker 4: Inside this bubble, this very inside, this very black city

1136
01:03:08,560 --> 01:03:12,800
Speaker 4: is a very not black bubble right where it's not

1137
01:03:12,880 --> 01:03:15,240
Speaker 4: an exaggeration. If you went to Georgia Tech, like in

1138
01:03:15,280 --> 01:03:17,920
Speaker 4: the nineties and the early two thousands, you may not

1139
01:03:18,000 --> 01:03:20,960
Speaker 4: know every black person by name, but you knew every

1140
01:03:21,000 --> 01:03:23,280
Speaker 4: black person. There wasn't gonna be a black person walked by,

1141
01:03:23,360 --> 01:03:25,880
Speaker 4: like who's that you knew? Kind of oh even if

1142
01:03:25,880 --> 01:03:27,760
Speaker 4: you man, we had names for people like, oh, that's

1143
01:03:27,800 --> 01:03:32,120
Speaker 4: that's the running man we helped do the running You

1144
01:03:32,240 --> 01:03:34,160
Speaker 4: knew who he was. You didn't know him, but like you,

1145
01:03:34,440 --> 01:03:37,960
Speaker 4: I know that dude or whatever. So like I got

1146
01:03:38,000 --> 01:03:40,320
Speaker 4: there and there's a culture shock of again, moving in

1147
01:03:40,440 --> 01:03:42,680
Speaker 4: Atlanta from New York. It's like, oh, everyone here is

1148
01:03:42,720 --> 01:03:44,560
Speaker 4: either black or white, and they don't play none of

1149
01:03:44,600 --> 01:03:48,080
Speaker 4: that you Haitian or whatever, none of that shit. Right

1150
01:03:48,640 --> 01:03:54,480
Speaker 4: Number two, there's zero intermingling. So again, in New York City,

1151
01:03:54,520 --> 01:03:56,240
Speaker 4: I had all types of friends and it was like

1152
01:03:56,560 --> 01:04:02,040
Speaker 4: it was commonplace you would see these multicultural groups of people, right,

1153
01:04:02,640 --> 01:04:08,560
Speaker 4: None of that in Atlanta. Number three, very white, Georgia Tech,

1154
01:04:09,720 --> 01:04:13,960
Speaker 4: very white, like it shocked me. And these were white

1155
01:04:13,960 --> 01:04:18,320
Speaker 4: people had never seen minorities before. These weren't like white

1156
01:04:18,360 --> 01:04:20,600
Speaker 4: people from New York. These are like, whoa, here's a

1157
01:04:20,600 --> 01:04:22,760
Speaker 4: black guy here, like that that kind of white person.

1158
01:04:23,440 --> 01:04:26,120
Speaker 4: And then number four, which probably the number one. It

1159
01:04:26,200 --> 01:04:29,280
Speaker 4: was two thirds male, which is like the opposite of

1160
01:04:29,360 --> 01:04:32,200
Speaker 4: every college in America. Every university of America is more

1161
01:04:32,200 --> 01:04:34,760
Speaker 4: women than men, except like Georgia Tech. And it's like

1162
01:04:34,840 --> 01:04:39,640
Speaker 4: it's a sausage factory at all times. But because it's Atlanta,

1163
01:04:39,680 --> 01:04:41,040
Speaker 4: all you have to do is step off campus, go

1164
01:04:41,080 --> 01:04:43,680
Speaker 4: to auc and now it's like and balance is restored.

1165
01:04:44,200 --> 01:04:48,440
Speaker 4: So like it was just it was a lot to

1166
01:04:48,640 --> 01:04:51,880
Speaker 4: kind of process. And I went to school. I was young.

1167
01:04:51,960 --> 01:04:54,840
Speaker 4: I was seventeen years old. As a college freshman. I

1168
01:04:54,960 --> 01:04:59,520
Speaker 4: was not mature enough emotionally and was not mature enough

1169
01:05:00,080 --> 01:05:02,520
Speaker 4: and know what I wanted or even mature enough to

1170
01:05:02,720 --> 01:05:04,920
Speaker 4: keep my options open. So I was an engineering student,

1171
01:05:05,280 --> 01:05:08,720
Speaker 4: and I was predictably a terrible engineering student because I

1172
01:05:08,720 --> 01:05:11,520
Speaker 4: didn't know how to be a good student. And what

1173
01:05:11,640 --> 01:05:15,000
Speaker 4: I and I did learn this was that everyone here

1174
01:05:16,000 --> 01:05:17,920
Speaker 4: they came to do this shit for real. Like so

1175
01:05:18,040 --> 01:05:22,200
Speaker 4: my freshman roommate, I remember, he took a part in

1176
01:05:22,240 --> 01:05:24,680
Speaker 4: the clock radio and now kids at home, we used

1177
01:05:24,680 --> 01:05:27,520
Speaker 4: to have these clocks that would also have like an

1178
01:05:27,560 --> 01:05:29,960
Speaker 4: AMFM station and you can listen to the radio and

1179
01:05:29,960 --> 01:05:33,240
Speaker 4: it sadden they wake you up with music. So but

1180
01:05:33,760 --> 01:05:35,360
Speaker 4: he took it apart and I said, why are you

1181
01:05:35,400 --> 01:05:36,880
Speaker 4: doing that? He said, I just want to see how

1182
01:05:36,920 --> 01:05:38,600
Speaker 4: it works. And then you put it back together. And

1183
01:05:38,640 --> 01:05:41,400
Speaker 4: I realized, oh, this nigga really want to do this shit. Man,

1184
01:05:41,560 --> 01:05:44,360
Speaker 4: Like I'm just here because they told me there's a

1185
01:05:44,400 --> 01:05:47,680
Speaker 4: paycheck at the end. He's really interested and started meeting

1186
01:05:47,680 --> 01:05:50,960
Speaker 4: people and like all of these people really or they like,

1187
01:05:51,080 --> 01:05:55,480
Speaker 4: there's been my dream to go to Georgia Tech, are

1188
01:05:55,520 --> 01:05:59,040
Speaker 4: your dream? Like I just found out he was a

1189
01:05:59,040 --> 01:06:02,560
Speaker 4: good school and I got man, so all of these things,

1190
01:06:02,640 --> 01:06:04,320
Speaker 4: I'm like, I don't think I'm gonna be good at

1191
01:06:04,320 --> 01:06:07,480
Speaker 4: this engineering thing. And then like all the usual stuff,

1192
01:06:07,520 --> 01:06:10,240
Speaker 4: I was oversleeping, I was playing video games, I was

1193
01:06:10,280 --> 01:06:12,680
Speaker 4: out with my buddies, and like I didn't take it

1194
01:06:12,720 --> 01:06:16,720
Speaker 4: seriously enough. And then I got a part time job

1195
01:06:16,760 --> 01:06:19,720
Speaker 4: working for the Hawks, and that was when everything changed,

1196
01:06:19,720 --> 01:06:22,760
Speaker 4: because I realized, oh, there are people doing this shit

1197
01:06:22,840 --> 01:06:24,840
Speaker 4: full time. This is your life is your career. But

1198
01:06:24,960 --> 01:06:27,040
Speaker 4: who are you related. You're not related to anybody. You

1199
01:06:27,200 --> 01:06:30,120
Speaker 4: just you went to school for this and now you

1200
01:06:30,160 --> 01:06:32,280
Speaker 4: do this for I'm like, this is what I want

1201
01:06:32,320 --> 01:06:34,560
Speaker 4: to do, and so I told my parents I want

1202
01:06:34,560 --> 01:06:37,320
Speaker 4: to do this, and it's like coming home and say, Mom, Dad,

1203
01:06:37,520 --> 01:06:43,240
Speaker 4: I'm joining the circus, like I could. They almost died

1204
01:06:43,320 --> 01:06:46,480
Speaker 4: man hearing me kind of give the sales pitch and

1205
01:06:46,480 --> 01:06:48,640
Speaker 4: you're like, you're ruining your life. You're throwing away your life,

1206
01:06:48,680 --> 01:06:51,320
Speaker 4: and da da dah. I'm like, and that's the only

1207
01:06:51,400 --> 01:06:54,760
Speaker 4: time I think my dad ever gave me the They

1208
01:06:55,320 --> 01:06:57,880
Speaker 4: like I'm paraphrasing here, I ain't trying to hire no

1209
01:06:57,960 --> 01:07:02,480
Speaker 4: niggas Like He's like, you're black man, ain't nobody hire you?

1210
01:07:02,520 --> 01:07:06,800
Speaker 4: Like that's basically your In his way, he was saying, like,

1211
01:07:07,000 --> 01:07:11,800
Speaker 4: if you do something technical like engineering, it's undeniable. It's

1212
01:07:11,800 --> 01:07:14,240
Speaker 4: a technical thing. It's an undeniable thing. And also there's

1213
01:07:14,240 --> 01:07:17,160
Speaker 4: always a need. The beggars can't be choosers. They have

1214
01:07:17,240 --> 01:07:20,560
Speaker 4: to hire you, right Versus sports, everyone wants to do

1215
01:07:20,600 --> 01:07:26,000
Speaker 4: it like they're a lotment of diversity comes from those

1216
01:07:26,160 --> 01:07:29,720
Speaker 4: who play and the regular people get to do this.

1217
01:07:29,880 --> 01:07:32,400
Speaker 4: But you ain't one on the regular people. And so

1218
01:07:32,560 --> 01:07:34,479
Speaker 4: the only way I kind of sold them on it

1219
01:07:34,560 --> 01:07:37,280
Speaker 4: was my brother was going to Arizona State at the time,

1220
01:07:38,160 --> 01:07:40,120
Speaker 4: and I said, I want to transfer to Arizona State

1221
01:07:40,160 --> 01:07:42,160
Speaker 4: and I'm gonna live with my brother and my parents.

1222
01:07:42,320 --> 01:07:43,800
Speaker 4: That was the one thing. They were like, well, they'll

1223
01:07:43,800 --> 01:07:46,640
Speaker 4: be together, brothers living in the same house. They wanted that.

1224
01:07:47,360 --> 01:07:50,840
Speaker 4: And I was gonna go to a ASU business because

1225
01:07:50,880 --> 01:07:53,160
Speaker 4: ASU had a top twenty five business school, but they

1226
01:07:53,160 --> 01:07:55,360
Speaker 4: want to Like at first, my dad was like no,

1227
01:07:56,280 --> 01:07:59,320
Speaker 4: and then like it took people convincing him that oh,

1228
01:07:59,440 --> 01:08:02,600
Speaker 4: there's really good careers in finance and marketing and all that,

1229
01:08:02,600 --> 01:08:05,160
Speaker 4: and it's like okay. But all the while, my my

1230
01:08:05,240 --> 01:08:08,880
Speaker 4: real goal was to get into the sports business program.

1231
01:08:08,920 --> 01:08:11,000
Speaker 1: So h and well, and you would have been in

1232
01:08:11,000 --> 01:08:14,960
Speaker 1: Atlanta where late nineties, early two thousands. Okay, yep, you

1233
01:08:15,000 --> 01:08:15,640
Speaker 1: go to Freaknick.

1234
01:08:16,320 --> 01:08:20,040
Speaker 4: Of course I saw. I witness I witnessed the slow demise.

1235
01:08:20,080 --> 01:08:23,760
Speaker 4: I went from Freaknick is awesome to it's cool, it's

1236
01:08:23,760 --> 01:08:26,360
Speaker 4: not as good as us last year though, to oh man,

1237
01:08:26,400 --> 01:08:29,320
Speaker 4: it's really falling off this year, to I remember the

1238
01:08:29,840 --> 01:08:32,960
Speaker 4: last time I went. The last time I won't say went.

1239
01:08:33,280 --> 01:08:36,400
Speaker 4: I was out with my buddies and one of our

1240
01:08:36,479 --> 01:08:39,720
Speaker 4: younger friends I never a buddy named Vaughan. We used

1241
01:08:39,720 --> 01:08:41,200
Speaker 4: to call him Presto. I don't know why they call

1242
01:08:41,280 --> 01:08:43,400
Speaker 4: we called him Presto. I think he was just impatient

1243
01:08:43,600 --> 01:08:46,280
Speaker 4: or whatever. But Presto was like at one point, I

1244
01:08:46,320 --> 01:08:48,240
Speaker 4: was like, man, where are the hole's at? And I'm like,

1245
01:08:48,280 --> 01:08:51,400
Speaker 4: what are you talking about? And my buddy Ben was like,

1246
01:08:51,880 --> 01:08:54,280
Speaker 4: he thinks it's Freaknick because it's supposed to be this

1247
01:08:54,320 --> 01:08:56,439
Speaker 4: weekning weekend. And I'm like, oh, dog, that she is

1248
01:08:56,479 --> 01:08:59,680
Speaker 4: dead man. It's never it's never coming back. But like

1249
01:08:59,760 --> 01:09:04,040
Speaker 4: to to, I'm happy to say I seen it. I

1250
01:09:04,080 --> 01:09:06,880
Speaker 4: saw what it was, and it was. It was glorious.

1251
01:09:07,160 --> 01:09:09,760
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm embarrassed by the fact since I went to

1252
01:09:09,840 --> 01:09:11,519
Speaker 1: college be more toward that.

1253
01:09:11,720 --> 01:09:14,439
Speaker 2: Like, my first year of college was nineteen ninety three, and.

1254
01:09:14,360 --> 01:09:19,000
Speaker 1: So when the heyday of Freaknick was like during that

1255
01:09:19,120 --> 01:09:19,880
Speaker 1: time right.

1256
01:09:19,760 --> 01:09:22,360
Speaker 4: Then the next ninety four was the peak, right, it.

1257
01:09:22,439 --> 01:09:24,759
Speaker 1: Was the peak right, And so there was a caravan.

1258
01:09:24,840 --> 01:09:26,519
Speaker 1: I went to Michigan State. There was a caravan of

1259
01:09:26,560 --> 01:09:30,280
Speaker 1: folks because Freaknick was not during our spring break.

1260
01:09:30,280 --> 01:09:31,720
Speaker 2: But people just said, fuck it, we're going.

1261
01:09:31,800 --> 01:09:32,760
Speaker 4: Okay, we're going down there.

1262
01:09:32,760 --> 01:09:36,960
Speaker 1: We're going down there, you know, classes attendance be damned

1263
01:09:37,040 --> 01:09:37,479
Speaker 1: or whatever.

1264
01:09:38,080 --> 01:09:40,120
Speaker 2: And I could have gone. It didn't go.

1265
01:09:40,200 --> 01:09:40,600
Speaker 4: You can go.

1266
01:09:41,479 --> 01:09:43,200
Speaker 2: It's one of the regrets of my life.

1267
01:09:43,560 --> 01:09:45,439
Speaker 1: I did not go because I could have definitely gone

1268
01:09:45,479 --> 01:09:48,400
Speaker 1: to ninety four because they literally had like these posters

1269
01:09:48,400 --> 01:09:50,439
Speaker 1: that they put up like yo, we all going to freaknik.

1270
01:09:50,479 --> 01:09:52,920
Speaker 2: Yeah pay this, like we mobbed up this and that.

1271
01:09:53,040 --> 01:09:55,519
Speaker 2: I was like, am I dumb ass? Didn't go?

1272
01:09:56,280 --> 01:10:00,799
Speaker 4: So yeah this that time obviously fre being in Atlanta,

1273
01:10:00,800 --> 01:10:02,759
Speaker 4: it was just you just go outside and it was easy.

1274
01:10:02,760 --> 01:10:05,320
Speaker 4: It was right there. But we did Daytona one year

1275
01:10:06,280 --> 01:10:09,760
Speaker 4: and I'm gonna tell you like it. It's the road

1276
01:10:09,800 --> 01:10:12,120
Speaker 4: trip part of it. I think makes it a more

1277
01:10:12,160 --> 01:10:16,000
Speaker 4: memorable experience, Like just just being on the road and

1278
01:10:16,040 --> 01:10:18,760
Speaker 4: remember all the dumb stuff and what hotel we stayed at,

1279
01:10:18,800 --> 01:10:23,479
Speaker 4: some terrible hotel that was miles from the streep. Yeah, well,

1280
01:10:23,520 --> 01:10:26,160
Speaker 4: I mean, and then getting separated. That's that's once you

1281
01:10:26,240 --> 01:10:28,280
Speaker 4: hit the strip. And I know this happened in Atlanta

1282
01:10:28,280 --> 01:10:30,360
Speaker 4: all the time. Once you get into the thick of it,

1283
01:10:31,439 --> 01:10:34,679
Speaker 4: people disperse and this is before cell phones were really

1284
01:10:34,720 --> 01:10:37,920
Speaker 4: a thing. So it's like we lost track of you,

1285
01:10:38,000 --> 01:10:40,840
Speaker 4: We lost track of you, and we ran into you again,

1286
01:10:41,120 --> 01:10:45,360
Speaker 4: and so that was it was a great It was

1287
01:10:45,360 --> 01:10:46,120
Speaker 4: a great experience.

1288
01:10:47,120 --> 01:10:50,040
Speaker 2: Will never know anything nothing about that. They will they

1289
01:10:50,040 --> 01:10:50,599
Speaker 2: will not know.

1290
01:10:50,720 --> 01:10:53,120
Speaker 1: So once you you know, you get on with the

1291
01:10:53,120 --> 01:10:55,360
Speaker 1: Hawks and in general, as you said, you would tell

1292
01:10:55,360 --> 01:10:57,920
Speaker 1: your Arizona STATEIU and you know you started making your way.

1293
01:10:59,280 --> 01:11:01,720
Speaker 1: What would you say was your first big break in

1294
01:11:01,760 --> 01:11:03,559
Speaker 1: the NBA? Was it the Hawks or did you feel

1295
01:11:03,560 --> 01:11:04,679
Speaker 1: like it came a little later.

1296
01:11:04,840 --> 01:11:07,479
Speaker 4: The Hawks is always going to be the biggest break

1297
01:11:07,560 --> 01:11:11,400
Speaker 4: because I've told the story before, but it's very important

1298
01:11:11,439 --> 01:11:13,679
Speaker 4: to me to always tell the story because my roommate

1299
01:11:13,760 --> 01:11:16,479
Speaker 4: Kendrick Cummings was the one that woke me up on

1300
01:11:16,520 --> 01:11:18,280
Speaker 4: a Saturday morning and said, hey, man, the Hawks are

1301
01:11:18,280 --> 01:11:20,559
Speaker 4: having a job fair. Let's go down there. And because

1302
01:11:20,560 --> 01:11:22,559
Speaker 4: it was Saturday morning, I told him to go fuck

1303
01:11:22,640 --> 01:11:26,519
Speaker 4: himself because I'm sleeping. Man. We was out last night. Dad.

1304
01:11:26,760 --> 01:11:28,120
Speaker 4: He's like, come on, man, da dada, and I'm like,

1305
01:11:28,120 --> 01:11:30,200
Speaker 4: they're not going to hire us, and he kept saying

1306
01:11:30,200 --> 01:11:32,320
Speaker 4: come on, da da da. And I'll never forget the

1307
01:11:32,400 --> 01:11:35,880
Speaker 4: thing that made me say okay was He said, who knows,

1308
01:11:35,920 --> 01:11:38,360
Speaker 4: we might be able to go to some games for free.

1309
01:11:39,120 --> 01:11:41,599
Speaker 4: And I remember thinking that I'll be cool, and so

1310
01:11:41,760 --> 01:11:43,760
Speaker 4: I got up, I washed my face, da da da,

1311
01:11:43,800 --> 01:11:45,320
Speaker 4: and we went down there. It was like five hundred

1312
01:11:45,320 --> 01:11:48,280
Speaker 4: people showed up and they hired six, and me and

1313
01:11:48,320 --> 01:11:50,280
Speaker 4: my roommate were two of a six and at the

1314
01:11:50,479 --> 01:11:52,799
Speaker 4: and we were it was the most entry level position.

1315
01:11:52,840 --> 01:11:57,639
Speaker 4: It was street team like we were going from the Yeah,

1316
01:11:57,840 --> 01:12:00,639
Speaker 4: so you go on the on the weekends to the mall.

1317
01:12:00,760 --> 01:12:03,040
Speaker 4: You would set up all this like this traveling caravan

1318
01:12:03,080 --> 01:12:05,880
Speaker 4: of shit, like hey, put your hand up against the

1319
01:12:05,960 --> 01:12:08,759
Speaker 4: ken Bam Tumbo's hand, and put your shoe up against

1320
01:12:08,800 --> 01:12:11,559
Speaker 4: Alan Henderson's shoe size, and Steve Smith's the wingspan and

1321
01:12:11,560 --> 01:12:16,000
Speaker 4: all that, and then there's a basket like a like

1322
01:12:16,120 --> 01:12:19,160
Speaker 4: not a popa shot, but like a regulation size thing.

1323
01:12:19,479 --> 01:12:21,800
Speaker 4: And if you made two out of three feet throws

1324
01:12:21,840 --> 01:12:24,240
Speaker 4: that gave you free tickets. That gained good ass seats too,

1325
01:12:25,000 --> 01:12:28,160
Speaker 4: and did that, and then midway through, like the dope

1326
01:12:28,160 --> 01:12:29,760
Speaker 4: boys would be like, man, how much for just for

1327
01:12:29,800 --> 01:12:34,120
Speaker 4: the tickets? And then I started my very lucrative scalping

1328
01:12:34,160 --> 01:12:38,559
Speaker 4: operation where I was like, oh, another winner and I'm

1329
01:12:38,640 --> 01:12:41,960
Speaker 4: just making money, right, And then they had the foot locker.

1330
01:12:42,000 --> 01:12:45,320
Speaker 4: Employees are like, Yo, what can we do here as

1331
01:12:45,320 --> 01:12:47,479
Speaker 4: a quick procal So now I'm getting shoes and stuff.

1332
01:12:47,760 --> 01:12:50,160
Speaker 4: But at the end of that year, got promoted to

1333
01:12:50,360 --> 01:12:53,240
Speaker 4: Innerna and so then when I was in Erna, that's

1334
01:12:53,240 --> 01:12:56,519
Speaker 4: when I started like finding out that people do this

1335
01:12:56,640 --> 01:12:58,960
Speaker 4: for real and getting to know people. And I always

1336
01:12:59,000 --> 01:13:05,439
Speaker 4: tell people NBA people I knew first Rick Mahorn, Jimmy Jackson,

1337
01:13:05,760 --> 01:13:09,760
Speaker 4: and Jason Terry, and by God's grace, all three of

1338
01:13:09,800 --> 01:13:15,800
Speaker 4: those dudes even like remember me from them. I've like

1339
01:13:15,960 --> 01:13:18,519
Speaker 4: I remember at various times in my career in the

1340
01:13:18,600 --> 01:13:22,400
Speaker 4: media running into each one of those guys and then

1341
01:13:22,479 --> 01:13:24,360
Speaker 4: being like, man, I thought it was so crazy. I

1342
01:13:24,360 --> 01:13:27,679
Speaker 4: saw you on TV and which is which is super cool?

1343
01:13:27,840 --> 01:13:30,160
Speaker 4: And then the weirdest thing about that is one of

1344
01:13:30,200 --> 01:13:33,240
Speaker 4: the ball kids who's working back then is now an

1345
01:13:33,240 --> 01:13:36,280
Speaker 4: exec with the Warriors, and I saw him for the

1346
01:13:36,320 --> 01:13:39,000
Speaker 4: first time at one of the Warriors championship parties and

1347
01:13:39,040 --> 01:13:40,800
Speaker 4: I'm like, Ryan, what are you doing here? He's like,

1348
01:13:40,960 --> 01:13:43,760
Speaker 4: I work here. I'm like what, And so in his

1349
01:13:43,840 --> 01:13:45,360
Speaker 4: mind he's like, how does he remember me? When I

1350
01:13:45,360 --> 01:13:48,000
Speaker 4: was twelve years old. I'm like, it's weird, but that's

1351
01:13:48,000 --> 01:13:50,640
Speaker 4: the NBA. It's such a small place. But to me,

1352
01:13:50,840 --> 01:13:53,280
Speaker 4: Atlanta is what started. It made me believe this is

1353
01:13:53,400 --> 01:13:56,320
Speaker 4: something I could pursue. It made me meet people who

1354
01:13:56,960 --> 01:14:00,200
Speaker 4: were very instrumental and influential, and then everything from there.

1355
01:14:01,120 --> 01:14:03,519
Speaker 4: Everything is a big break. Obvious, anytime you get a job,

1356
01:14:03,600 --> 01:14:06,000
Speaker 4: anytime you get promoted within a job, it's a big break.

1357
01:14:06,080 --> 01:14:08,519
Speaker 4: But the first one I got to shout out my homie,

1358
01:14:08,560 --> 01:14:11,439
Speaker 4: Kindrick Coomings. So when you.

1359
01:14:11,360 --> 01:14:14,600
Speaker 1: First got into the NBA, in your mind, what was

1360
01:14:14,640 --> 01:14:17,280
Speaker 1: your ceiling, what was the position you were going for?

1361
01:14:19,240 --> 01:14:22,160
Speaker 4: Director of player Personnel? And I thought there was an

1362
01:14:22,200 --> 01:14:25,240
Speaker 4: outside chance I could be an assistant general manager. I

1363
01:14:25,479 --> 01:14:29,760
Speaker 4: knew I would never be a GM because again, funny name, right,

1364
01:14:29,840 --> 01:14:31,920
Speaker 4: I was like, okay, so not only going to hire

1365
01:14:31,920 --> 01:14:34,879
Speaker 4: a black guy who didn't play in the league, Okay, whatever,

1366
01:14:35,200 --> 01:14:37,320
Speaker 4: and then he's got like a foreign name. And this

1367
01:14:37,479 --> 01:14:40,479
Speaker 4: foreign name also is like post nine to eleven is

1368
01:14:40,520 --> 01:14:42,920
Speaker 4: like a nine to eleven name as they call that.

1369
01:14:43,600 --> 01:14:45,960
Speaker 4: There's like, there's no point in trying to do that.

1370
01:14:46,439 --> 01:14:49,640
Speaker 4: What my mission was was to be well, actually my

1371
01:14:49,640 --> 01:14:52,759
Speaker 4: mission was to have an influential voice in the front office.

1372
01:14:53,160 --> 01:14:54,800
Speaker 4: I didn't want to make decisions. I wanted to be

1373
01:14:54,840 --> 01:14:57,479
Speaker 4: part of the decision making, and I got to be that.

1374
01:14:58,120 --> 01:15:00,519
Speaker 4: My highest thing I got to was assistant director by Swaps.

1375
01:15:01,080 --> 01:15:04,000
Speaker 4: If things hadn't changed in Phoenix the way it did,

1376
01:15:04,120 --> 01:15:07,000
Speaker 4: I believe I would have eventually been director of Basketball Ops,

1377
01:15:07,000 --> 01:15:09,160
Speaker 4: which was pretty much where I wanted to end up,

1378
01:15:09,160 --> 01:15:10,920
Speaker 4: and I would have done that position for the rest

1379
01:15:10,960 --> 01:15:14,080
Speaker 4: of my career with like nominal raises and stuff like that.

1380
01:15:14,360 --> 01:15:16,479
Speaker 4: I didn't need titles. I just wanted to be somewhere

1381
01:15:16,479 --> 01:15:19,000
Speaker 4: where my work was valued. And I was there until

1382
01:15:19,000 --> 01:15:21,320
Speaker 4: he had some changes and then everything kind of shit hit.

1383
01:15:21,360 --> 01:15:23,439
Speaker 1: The fan final question to me and I called this

1384
01:15:23,479 --> 01:15:26,120
Speaker 1: the messy question. This is the one where we will

1385
01:15:26,160 --> 01:15:28,519
Speaker 1: make the blogs. This is where the Shade Room will

1386
01:15:28,560 --> 01:15:30,080
Speaker 1: write negatively about you.

1387
01:15:31,160 --> 01:15:34,520
Speaker 2: And here's the question. You have a great movie.

1388
01:15:34,240 --> 01:15:38,560
Speaker 1: Podcast, Cenophobe that people can check out on YouTube or

1389
01:15:38,560 --> 01:15:44,400
Speaker 1: wherever you get your podcasts. Give me a popular black

1390
01:15:44,479 --> 01:15:49,519
Speaker 1: movie that everybody loves but you think is just okay

1391
01:15:49,880 --> 01:15:51,080
Speaker 1: or maybe even bad.

1392
01:15:51,439 --> 01:15:53,760
Speaker 2: What is your spiciest take?

1393
01:15:53,960 --> 01:15:55,920
Speaker 4: This is the one. Look. I said a lot of

1394
01:15:55,960 --> 01:16:00,559
Speaker 4: controversial things on this podcast, I said, I've been apparently,

1395
01:16:00,600 --> 01:16:04,600
Speaker 4: I've been a part of two sexual harassment lawsuits. This

1396
01:16:05,120 --> 01:16:07,360
Speaker 4: is going to be the worst thing I'm going to say.

1397
01:16:07,439 --> 01:16:09,160
Speaker 4: And I hate that you asked me this, and I

1398
01:16:09,200 --> 01:16:10,960
Speaker 4: hate that when you asked me, you asked me I

1399
01:16:11,000 --> 01:16:12,920
Speaker 4: actually asked me earlier full disclosure. You asked me at

1400
01:16:12,920 --> 01:16:14,680
Speaker 4: the beginning so they have time to think it over,

1401
01:16:14,720 --> 01:16:17,920
Speaker 4: and I had the answer immediately. This is a movie

1402
01:16:17,920 --> 01:16:19,800
Speaker 4: that when I first saw it back in the day,

1403
01:16:20,000 --> 01:16:22,080
Speaker 4: loved it, thought it was great, thought it was awesome.

1404
01:16:22,800 --> 01:16:24,240
Speaker 4: And then I hadn't watched it for a while. Maybe

1405
01:16:24,240 --> 01:16:25,880
Speaker 4: it's some clips here and there, but you know, like

1406
01:16:25,920 --> 01:16:28,520
Speaker 4: oh yeah, yeah. And then we did it on Cinophobe

1407
01:16:30,280 --> 01:16:40,320
Speaker 4: and I watched it and all star cast, all time greats,

1408
01:16:40,600 --> 01:16:43,800
Speaker 4: funny people. Every one of these people I love individually.

1409
01:16:44,160 --> 01:16:46,040
Speaker 4: I love the movies they've been in. I love their

1410
01:16:46,040 --> 01:16:49,280
Speaker 4: stand up for the stand up comedians. I watched this

1411
01:16:49,360 --> 01:16:52,479
Speaker 4: movie again, like maybe a year or two ago, and

1412
01:16:52,560 --> 01:17:01,719
Speaker 4: I was just like, Harlem Nights. Sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

1413
01:17:02,400 --> 01:17:03,960
Speaker 4: It's like ladies and gentleman.

1414
01:17:04,120 --> 01:17:05,400
Speaker 2: I may never speak to him.

1415
01:17:05,920 --> 01:17:09,439
Speaker 10: I'm just saying, look, if you you have Eddie Murphy

1416
01:17:09,479 --> 01:17:14,720
Speaker 10: and Richard Pryor and and Red Fox and and and

1417
01:17:14,760 --> 01:17:18,080
Speaker 10: then and and it's just like and and and even

1418
01:17:18,080 --> 01:17:20,240
Speaker 10: our seno in a cameo, and I'm.

1419
01:17:20,120 --> 01:17:24,360
Speaker 4: Like, that's the best you could do. I felt like

1420
01:17:24,439 --> 01:17:27,600
Speaker 4: it was so low hanging fruit. I was like, oh, man, like,

1421
01:17:27,680 --> 01:17:33,759
Speaker 4: I'm looking for these, like these really really really really

1422
01:17:35,160 --> 01:17:38,240
Speaker 4: high end, like THESS comedy geniuses at work, and I'm

1423
01:17:38,240 --> 01:17:41,400
Speaker 4: just sitting back and watching them cook. And instead it's like,

1424
01:17:41,479 --> 01:17:44,439
Speaker 4: ha ha, look at Red Fox's glasses. He can't see.

1425
01:17:44,479 --> 01:17:49,120
Speaker 4: I'm like, man, come on, we can do better.

1426
01:17:51,640 --> 01:17:58,639
Speaker 2: I mean, whatever wrath you receive.

1427
01:17:57,840 --> 01:18:00,960
Speaker 4: He ain't even black. This is why we can't Africans

1428
01:18:01,160 --> 01:18:03,439
Speaker 4: in our space. They don't understand our culture. Dot.

1429
01:18:03,640 --> 01:18:06,280
Speaker 2: You're about to break the diaspora right now.

1430
01:18:07,520 --> 01:18:08,000
Speaker 4: That is it?

1431
01:18:08,360 --> 01:18:12,240
Speaker 1: Any I mean, has ruined any possibility of their being

1432
01:18:12,400 --> 01:18:14,400
Speaker 1: piece across the diaspora.

1433
01:18:14,560 --> 01:18:17,640
Speaker 4: Bar that BT Awards invite is rescinded.

1434
01:18:19,560 --> 01:18:25,000
Speaker 2: We do don't show up. You're not welcome there. That

1435
01:18:25,400 --> 01:18:27,880
Speaker 2: I have to say. I thought of a thousand of

1436
01:18:28,120 --> 01:18:31,160
Speaker 2: different movies you could pick. I never would have got.

1437
01:18:32,080 --> 01:18:35,559
Speaker 4: It was instantly because because you know why, because I

1438
01:18:35,600 --> 01:18:40,400
Speaker 4: expect better. I expected better of like of them.

1439
01:18:40,760 --> 01:18:43,439
Speaker 1: So did you think that Life lived because that's another one,

1440
01:18:43,439 --> 01:18:44,200
Speaker 1: a bunch of comedians.

1441
01:18:44,240 --> 01:18:45,519
Speaker 2: You got Bernie Mack, you got Martin.

1442
01:18:46,520 --> 01:18:49,280
Speaker 1: Did you think that actually lived up to the comedic

1443
01:18:49,360 --> 01:18:51,840
Speaker 1: talent that was in this in that movie.

1444
01:18:52,120 --> 01:18:54,880
Speaker 4: No, but I thought they did a better job. And

1445
01:18:54,960 --> 01:18:57,519
Speaker 4: because and this is what I know happened in Life,

1446
01:18:57,560 --> 01:19:00,439
Speaker 4: and I'm not sure, I'm not sure happened. I can't

1447
01:19:00,439 --> 01:19:03,519
Speaker 4: remember happening. But Life had a bunch of scenes where

1448
01:19:03,560 --> 01:19:07,439
Speaker 4: they just let them go, just let them go. They're funny,

1449
01:19:07,479 --> 01:19:09,400
Speaker 4: and let them I think, I'm I'm almost sure. I

1450
01:19:09,439 --> 01:19:12,559
Speaker 4: heard guy Tori talk about this about yeah, them just

1451
01:19:13,000 --> 01:19:16,040
Speaker 4: going and like cracking up and not being able to

1452
01:19:16,040 --> 01:19:18,400
Speaker 4: breathe between takes too, they laughing so hard, and I

1453
01:19:18,400 --> 01:19:23,120
Speaker 4: feel like Harlem Knights. I wonder if, like, if it

1454
01:19:23,160 --> 01:19:25,559
Speaker 4: had been a different director. I think Eddie directed, and

1455
01:19:25,560 --> 01:19:27,679
Speaker 4: it's like was that. I think Eddie even talked about

1456
01:19:27,760 --> 01:19:30,439
Speaker 4: it being too much to direct and also be in

1457
01:19:30,479 --> 01:19:32,760
Speaker 4: the movie was too much. I wonder if it had

1458
01:19:32,760 --> 01:19:36,120
Speaker 4: been a different director who would have maybe given a

1459
01:19:36,120 --> 01:19:38,400
Speaker 4: little bit more leeway there. I don't know, man, I

1460
01:19:38,640 --> 01:19:43,439
Speaker 4: can't call it. I just think that Life delivered more

1461
01:19:43,840 --> 01:19:47,040
Speaker 4: comedially than than Harlem Knights. Is based on the potential.

1462
01:19:48,760 --> 01:19:50,320
Speaker 2: But it sounds like you didn't think Life was a

1463
01:19:50,320 --> 01:19:50,679
Speaker 2: good movie.

1464
01:19:50,720 --> 01:19:52,439
Speaker 4: No, I do. I like I like Life. I like

1465
01:19:52,479 --> 01:19:54,880
Speaker 4: that I like but but I also felt like it

1466
01:19:54,880 --> 01:19:57,880
Speaker 4: should have been better. It should be even better, I thought.

1467
01:19:58,120 --> 01:20:00,519
Speaker 4: And also like there's a part where they just kind

1468
01:20:00,560 --> 01:20:03,840
Speaker 4: of speed up the story, like like they could have

1469
01:20:04,000 --> 01:20:06,240
Speaker 4: they could have been better told as a story. But

1470
01:20:06,360 --> 01:20:11,759
Speaker 4: it definitely, it definitely lived up to a higher percentage

1471
01:20:11,800 --> 01:20:14,760
Speaker 4: of its potential than Harlem Nights. There's no way I

1472
01:20:14,760 --> 01:20:15,960
Speaker 4: can fix this. Everyone just.

1473
01:20:17,760 --> 01:20:19,880
Speaker 2: You know how they say we listen and we don't judge,

1474
01:20:20,400 --> 01:20:21,120
Speaker 2: and I'm judging.

1475
01:20:21,720 --> 01:20:22,920
Speaker 4: What what's your answer?

1476
01:20:24,720 --> 01:20:30,280
Speaker 1: So I would say, you know, it's funny because I

1477
01:20:30,320 --> 01:20:33,679
Speaker 1: can't really it's hard for me to think of a

1478
01:20:33,800 --> 01:20:36,280
Speaker 1: black movie that I had, like such a high expected

1479
01:20:36,439 --> 01:20:38,960
Speaker 1: expectation for a got Lit now not know. In general,

1480
01:20:39,000 --> 01:20:41,240
Speaker 1: my answer is Napoleon Dynamite, Like I.

1481
01:20:41,200 --> 01:20:41,640
Speaker 2: Just don't know.

1482
01:20:41,920 --> 01:20:47,000
Speaker 4: I need, I need a black movie, you know, giving

1483
01:20:47,040 --> 01:20:50,479
Speaker 4: me no damn indie movie. It was for seven dollars

1484
01:20:50,520 --> 01:20:51,320
Speaker 4: with Uncle Rico.

1485
01:20:52,840 --> 01:20:54,920
Speaker 1: You know, I used to think it was baby Boy,

1486
01:20:55,280 --> 01:20:59,240
Speaker 1: and what I did, I did not love Baby boy,

1487
01:20:59,320 --> 01:21:02,240
Speaker 1: the first probably five times I saw it, but it

1488
01:21:02,240 --> 01:21:04,479
Speaker 1: go on me so I didn't come around.

1489
01:21:05,000 --> 01:21:08,120
Speaker 2: I was like this traumatic pseudo psychle.

1490
01:21:08,280 --> 01:21:12,400
Speaker 4: What the Ellice Snoop talking about? You put yourself a

1491
01:21:12,400 --> 01:21:16,800
Speaker 4: little poor? Huh? You know?

1492
01:21:17,000 --> 01:21:21,200
Speaker 2: I just I was so yeah, I was very very

1493
01:21:21,200 --> 01:21:22,360
Speaker 2: traumatized by that one.

1494
01:21:22,400 --> 01:21:25,479
Speaker 1: But and this is not to suggest that I love

1495
01:21:25,520 --> 01:21:27,400
Speaker 1: every black movie that comes out, But when.

1496
01:21:27,320 --> 01:21:31,360
Speaker 2: You think about the expectators, these the.

1497
01:21:30,760 --> 01:21:33,840
Speaker 4: Ones that we're not talking about Tyler Perry is why

1498
01:21:33,840 --> 01:21:36,000
Speaker 4: did my shoelaces get untied or whatever?

1499
01:21:36,920 --> 01:21:39,760
Speaker 1: We're talking about the ones something that is that is

1500
01:21:40,240 --> 01:21:42,040
Speaker 1: near and dear to black culture.

1501
01:21:42,360 --> 01:21:44,200
Speaker 2: I'll give you. I didn't love Poetic Justice.

1502
01:21:44,720 --> 01:21:48,479
Speaker 1: No, I didn't love poetic I love it.

1503
01:21:51,080 --> 01:21:55,759
Speaker 4: Was like it's a flimsy premise. It's a flimsy premise,

1504
01:21:56,600 --> 01:21:57,080
Speaker 4: very much so.

1505
01:21:57,680 --> 01:21:59,479
Speaker 2: And there's plenty parts, but it's like.

1506
01:22:00,520 --> 01:22:01,880
Speaker 4: I thought it was. I liked it.

1507
01:22:01,960 --> 01:22:03,519
Speaker 2: I like they should have done better.

1508
01:22:03,680 --> 01:22:06,320
Speaker 1: I mean they if you're going if we're going by

1509
01:22:06,360 --> 01:22:08,960
Speaker 1: the barometer of a movie that you thought maybe going there,

1510
01:22:09,040 --> 01:22:11,519
Speaker 1: like oh this ship not killed, it's like, you know

1511
01:22:11,600 --> 01:22:14,639
Speaker 1: pak at that point in his career, No, Janet Jackson

1512
01:22:14,760 --> 01:22:17,800
Speaker 1: has some acting jobs Regina King. That was really the

1513
01:22:17,800 --> 01:22:19,760
Speaker 1: first time we saw her sort of break out in

1514
01:22:19,800 --> 01:22:21,840
Speaker 1: the like well Boys in the Hood before the ND,

1515
01:22:21,840 --> 01:22:23,920
Speaker 1: but like she was really breaking out different.

1516
01:22:24,240 --> 01:22:27,520
Speaker 4: She was no longer a more adult role like correct.

1517
01:22:27,280 --> 01:22:29,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, she was no longer Brenda from T two. So

1518
01:22:29,280 --> 01:22:32,360
Speaker 1: like we're good on that, but like that movie just

1519
01:22:32,360 --> 01:22:35,200
Speaker 1: just oh you know what, I know it, this is

1520
01:22:35,280 --> 01:22:37,720
Speaker 1: the answer. I did love Poetic Justice, but I can

1521
01:22:37,800 --> 01:22:40,519
Speaker 1: take Poet of Justice. The movie that black people love

1522
01:22:40,680 --> 01:22:43,040
Speaker 1: that I cannot stand is Belly.

1523
01:22:43,520 --> 01:22:46,920
Speaker 2: That is the movie. Belly is bad people.

1524
01:22:47,000 --> 01:22:51,600
Speaker 1: I'm tied of y'all lions just because you love the cinematizes.

1525
01:22:52,640 --> 01:22:55,400
Speaker 4: Look, hey, it's a visual medium. It's a visual medium

1526
01:22:55,400 --> 01:23:00,679
Speaker 4: person for anyone can tell as far I will.

1527
01:23:00,439 --> 01:23:03,959
Speaker 1: Never, I will never. They will pay for their crimes.

1528
01:23:04,200 --> 01:23:07,040
Speaker 1: They will pay for their crimes. That old Malcolm X

1529
01:23:07,080 --> 01:23:11,840
Speaker 1: plot in There Are You kidding Me? That movie was terrible.

1530
01:23:12,160 --> 01:23:16,479
Speaker 4: Yeah. One of my favorite lines is what he's like

1531
01:23:17,040 --> 01:23:19,639
Speaker 4: Tommy or as we called him, Buns. I'm like, wait

1532
01:23:19,720 --> 01:23:25,559
Speaker 4: a second, there's no exposition just like this, And why

1533
01:23:25,560 --> 01:23:27,320
Speaker 4: did you just make his name like Benny or some

1534
01:23:27,400 --> 01:23:30,519
Speaker 4: ship like that, so like Buns would be na Tommy

1535
01:23:30,640 --> 01:23:33,439
Speaker 4: or as we called them, buns, Like am I sled

1536
01:23:33,439 --> 01:23:37,000
Speaker 4: to see the connection here? No, man, it is that

1537
01:23:37,120 --> 01:23:40,880
Speaker 4: movie's easy. I just want to see what we can do.

1538
01:23:40,960 --> 01:23:42,439
Speaker 4: So that's how we found out method Man was a

1539
01:23:42,439 --> 01:23:45,759
Speaker 4: good actor. Sometimes you got it. That's how we discovered

1540
01:23:45,760 --> 01:23:49,080
Speaker 4: webe Hassan Johnson like, great act. There's a lot of

1541
01:23:49,280 --> 01:23:53,280
Speaker 4: Tarrell Hicks. I know she was in the Bronxdale, but like, still.

1542
01:23:53,080 --> 01:23:53,559
Speaker 2: She was great.

1543
01:23:53,600 --> 01:23:54,400
Speaker 4: She was great that movie.

1544
01:23:54,439 --> 01:23:56,160
Speaker 2: Because they failed all of it.

1545
01:23:56,400 --> 01:23:57,960
Speaker 4: We found out. This is what we found out. We

1546
01:23:58,000 --> 01:24:01,000
Speaker 4: found out t bos No, maybe not so much like.

1547
01:24:03,600 --> 01:24:07,200
Speaker 2: Africa Far. Africa's far lives in my head, rinfree, That's

1548
01:24:07,200 --> 01:24:08,439
Speaker 2: all it lives in there.

1549
01:24:08,880 --> 01:24:10,960
Speaker 4: He gave he gave Shorty his chain and then the

1550
01:24:11,000 --> 01:24:13,120
Speaker 4: next scene he's walking and he's got the change back.

1551
01:24:13,200 --> 01:24:16,160
Speaker 4: I'm like, damn, would you let him hold it for

1552
01:24:16,160 --> 01:24:19,920
Speaker 4: a second. It's a great comedy, you gotta it's a

1553
01:24:19,960 --> 01:24:21,559
Speaker 4: great I was like, but.

1554
01:24:21,560 --> 01:24:25,080
Speaker 2: It wasn't supposed to be. It's it's like they never

1555
01:24:25,160 --> 01:24:26,320
Speaker 2: drew that up as a comedy.

1556
01:24:26,320 --> 01:24:29,280
Speaker 4: I was like, So, so we reviewed We reviewed it

1557
01:24:29,320 --> 01:24:31,799
Speaker 4: on Cenophobe. The behind the scenes and that is crazy.

1558
01:24:31,840 --> 01:24:35,200
Speaker 4: So any scene where they're smoking weed in movies. Typically

1559
01:24:35,240 --> 01:24:39,080
Speaker 4: they're smoking like a regular relic, some like some incense,

1560
01:24:39,280 --> 01:24:41,000
Speaker 4: something that burns and looks like weed, but it's not

1561
01:24:41,000 --> 01:24:44,080
Speaker 4: real weed. That did not happen in Belly. He used

1562
01:24:44,080 --> 01:24:47,679
Speaker 4: realhole and real weed. They were high and drunk hat

1563
01:24:47,760 --> 01:24:51,920
Speaker 4: the whole time. The uh DMX's house I think was

1564
01:24:51,960 --> 01:24:56,040
Speaker 4: actually his real house in Miami. It was all like

1565
01:24:56,160 --> 01:25:00,639
Speaker 4: it was. It was terribly run as a business. As

1566
01:25:00,640 --> 01:25:02,519
Speaker 4: far as let's make a movie, it was.

1567
01:25:02,560 --> 01:25:03,880
Speaker 2: Just me shocks.

1568
01:25:04,120 --> 01:25:07,640
Speaker 4: They blew the budget on alcohol, weed and shippers and

1569
01:25:07,680 --> 01:25:10,519
Speaker 4: all that, and then that's why it's like the first

1570
01:25:10,520 --> 01:25:14,240
Speaker 4: fifteen minutes are so pristine, and then it's like, yeah,

1571
01:25:15,520 --> 01:25:16,759
Speaker 4: gotta get this in the can.

1572
01:25:18,400 --> 01:25:20,320
Speaker 2: Oh man, All right, well, I guess we both go

1573
01:25:20,439 --> 01:25:21,960
Speaker 2: get canceled. But I feel like you're you.

1574
01:25:22,280 --> 01:25:25,920
Speaker 4: Mine's worse, no, yours way worse than Well.

1575
01:25:25,960 --> 01:25:28,080
Speaker 2: Listen, my friend, thank you so much for spending this

1576
01:25:28,160 --> 01:25:30,280
Speaker 2: time out. I kept you a long time.

1577
01:25:30,360 --> 01:25:32,320
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed talking to you, as I always do

1578
01:25:32,360 --> 01:25:35,519
Speaker 1: whenever we see each other off air in person. So

1579
01:25:36,040 --> 01:25:39,360
Speaker 1: continue good luck and success in the day in Lebatary universe,

1580
01:25:39,439 --> 01:25:42,080
Speaker 1: or as you're creating your own universe as well, and

1581
01:25:42,160 --> 01:25:44,320
Speaker 1: so you all to make sure you check them out.

1582
01:25:44,400 --> 01:25:47,040
Speaker 1: You got about seventy billion, fifty eleven podcasts.

1583
01:25:47,080 --> 01:25:52,240
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm all workingmand immigrant immigrant you are.

1584
01:25:52,520 --> 01:25:55,120
Speaker 2: Look at your fitness type. So anyway, good luck of

1585
01:25:55,200 --> 01:25:56,320
Speaker 2: mean and I will see you.

1586
01:25:56,280 --> 01:25:58,200
Speaker 4: Down the road. I want to say right now, real quick,

1587
01:25:58,280 --> 01:26:01,160
Speaker 4: thank you, because you and Michael had me on His

1588
01:26:01,240 --> 01:26:05,559
Speaker 4: and Hers way before anybody was really giving me like

1589
01:26:05,760 --> 01:26:09,120
Speaker 4: proper TV tick, like I was doing Sports Center, and

1590
01:26:09,200 --> 01:26:11,160
Speaker 4: you know, Sports Center's gone Da da da dah and

1591
01:26:11,280 --> 01:26:13,920
Speaker 4: two minutes and then you're gone, and there's not a

1592
01:26:13,960 --> 01:26:16,680
Speaker 4: whole lot of room for personality in those hits, and

1593
01:26:17,000 --> 01:26:21,200
Speaker 4: His and Hers was the first place I got to

1594
01:26:21,240 --> 01:26:24,479
Speaker 4: be on a show and show my personality and be

1595
01:26:24,640 --> 01:26:27,160
Speaker 4: something other than just an expert talking about a trade

1596
01:26:27,240 --> 01:26:29,400
Speaker 4: or whatever. So I always say thank you to you

1597
01:26:29,520 --> 01:26:32,360
Speaker 4: and Michael for looking out for to this day. I

1598
01:26:32,360 --> 01:26:34,280
Speaker 4: don't even know how y'all booked me, but y'all did.

1599
01:26:34,200 --> 01:26:36,519
Speaker 2: So we are scared of you out of town. That's

1600
01:26:36,520 --> 01:26:37,680
Speaker 2: what Mike used to say, all of that.

1601
01:26:37,960 --> 01:26:40,400
Speaker 1: So yeah, it was our pleasure and especially to see

1602
01:26:40,920 --> 01:26:43,000
Speaker 1: just how you just continued to blossom.

1603
01:26:43,040 --> 01:26:46,760
Speaker 2: So thank you, my friend, and enjoy it one more

1604
01:26:46,800 --> 01:26:49,240
Speaker 2: segment to go coming up next the Final Spin.

1605
01:27:01,960 --> 01:27:04,800
Speaker 1: Time now for the final spin, the topic what it

1606
01:27:04,840 --> 01:27:07,759
Speaker 1: will cause NFL fans to watch games this season?

1607
01:27:08,040 --> 01:27:11,800
Speaker 2: The spin, There is no price a NFL fan won't

1608
01:27:11,840 --> 01:27:15,080
Speaker 2: pay to watch a game. The truth. They're right.

1609
01:27:15,680 --> 01:27:18,840
Speaker 1: I saw an interesting stat recently. If an NFL fan

1610
01:27:18,920 --> 01:27:21,800
Speaker 1: wanted to have access to every game this season, they

1611
01:27:21,840 --> 01:27:25,440
Speaker 1: would have to pay eleven hundred dollars. That includes subscriptions

1612
01:27:25,479 --> 01:27:30,320
Speaker 1: to Peacock, Amazon, YouTube, ESPN, among others. Is it absurd,

1613
01:27:30,439 --> 01:27:34,160
Speaker 1: of course, But will NFL fans pay, Yes, and they

1614
01:27:34,200 --> 01:27:36,719
Speaker 1: pay more than that. We keep waiting for the NFL

1615
01:27:36,760 --> 01:27:38,960
Speaker 1: bubble to burst, and it's never going to happen, at

1616
01:27:39,000 --> 01:27:42,320
Speaker 1: least not anytime soon. The NFL is the most valuable

1617
01:27:42,360 --> 01:27:44,240
Speaker 1: and profitable sports league in America.

1618
01:27:44,600 --> 01:27:47,400
Speaker 2: It is the national obsession, and fans have shown.

1619
01:27:47,160 --> 01:27:49,519
Speaker 1: Time and again they are willing to pay the price,

1620
01:27:49,840 --> 01:27:51,920
Speaker 1: no matter how much the price of the brick is

1621
01:27:51,960 --> 01:27:54,960
Speaker 1: going up. Now, last year, the NFL wrick did twenty

1622
01:27:55,040 --> 01:27:56,040
Speaker 1: three billion dollars.

1623
01:27:56,360 --> 01:27:59,040
Speaker 2: The owners know they have the fans in their back pocket.

1624
01:27:59,479 --> 01:28:02,000
Speaker 1: There will predictably be a lot of complaining about the

1625
01:28:02,040 --> 01:28:05,120
Speaker 1: staggering rise and what it costs to watch a game,

1626
01:28:05,760 --> 01:28:09,799
Speaker 1: but they will complain and they will pay. This concludes

1627
01:28:09,840 --> 01:28:13,200
Speaker 1: another episode of Politics. You can reach me across all

1628
01:28:13,280 --> 01:28:17,160
Speaker 1: social media platforms or via email. I met Jamail Hill

1629
01:28:17,200 --> 01:28:20,639
Speaker 1: on every social media platform, Twitter, Instagram, fan based, Blue

1630
01:28:20,640 --> 01:28:21,559
Speaker 1: Style and threads.

1631
01:28:21,880 --> 01:28:23,640
Speaker 2: Please use the hashtags politics.

1632
01:28:24,000 --> 01:28:26,440
Speaker 1: You also have the option of emailing me as Politics

1633
01:28:26,439 --> 01:28:29,439
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four at gmail dot com. You can also

1634
01:28:29,600 --> 01:28:32,559
Speaker 1: video me a question, but please make sure it's thirty

1635
01:28:32,560 --> 01:28:35,240
Speaker 1: seconds or less. Don't forget to follow and subscribe to

1636
01:28:35,320 --> 01:28:39,040
Speaker 1: Politics on iHeart, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your

1637
01:28:39,080 --> 01:28:43,080
Speaker 1: podcasts and follows. Politics pod on Instagram and TikTok. Politics

1638
01:28:43,120 --> 01:28:45,680
Speaker 1: is felled s po l I t I c s.

1639
01:28:46,040 --> 01:28:49,720
Speaker 1: A new episode of Politics drops every Thursday on iHeart Podcasts.

1640
01:28:50,080 --> 01:28:53,880
Speaker 1: This is politics where sports and politics don't just mix,

1641
01:28:54,280 --> 01:29:02,280
Speaker 1: they matter. This is the production of iHeart podcast and

1642
01:29:02,320 --> 01:29:06,959
Speaker 1: The Unbothered Network. I'm your host Jamel Hill. Executive producer

1643
01:29:07,080 --> 01:29:10,080
Speaker 1: is Taylor Chakoigne. Lucas Hyman is head of audio and

1644
01:29:10,200 --> 01:29:14,639
Speaker 1: executive producer. Original music first Politics provided by Kyle VISs

1645
01:29:14,880 --> 01:29:16,120
Speaker 1: from wiz Fx