Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to wok EP Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody pre recording from the Home Bunker. Well, folks,
Speaker 1: it is the fourth of July, so happy fourth to
Speaker 1: all who choose to celebrate. And if you don't celebrate,
Speaker 1: at least you have the day off, So have some cocktails,
Speaker 1: do a meditation, go for a walk, spend time with
Speaker 1: friends and family. I hope that you're doing all of
Speaker 1: that also while listening to me. Continuing on our theme
Speaker 1: for this week on wokf's Cookout, I am very excited
Speaker 1: for today's conversation with my friend, musician, composer, creative director,
Speaker 1: just all around artist, activists, bad ass Toshi Reagan. Now, friends,
Speaker 1: if you are a longtime listener of WOKF, then you
Speaker 1: know that I have had the pleasure of interviewing Toshi before.
Speaker 1: Toshi has a wonderful place in my heart because many
Speaker 1: years ago, and I say many because time is a
Speaker 1: construct and pre COVID time just seems so so distant.
Speaker 1: But probably back in around twenty fifteen twenty sixteen, I
Speaker 1: had the awesome opportunity to interview Toshi for the first
Speaker 1: time for NBCBLK and it was a wonderful experience because
Speaker 1: Toshi introduced me to the one and only Octavia Butler
Speaker 1: and her writings. And it was during that interview where
Speaker 1: Toshi said to me, you must read Octavia Butler's Powable
Speaker 1: of the Sewer and then we'll have a conversation about it. Well,
Speaker 1: lo and behold. Some years later after I would read
Speaker 1: Powable not once but twice and its companion book as well.
Speaker 1: Toshi would turn Powable of the Sewer into an opera,
Speaker 1: which she has been traveling around the country and is
Speaker 1: currently in Washington, d C. And will bring the opera
Speaker 1: to the Lincoln Center in New York City later in July.
Speaker 1: And throughout this conversation that I have with Toshi today,
Speaker 1: you know, we talk about what it means to be black,
Speaker 1: queer and free. You know that freedom is truly about
Speaker 1: a state of mind and a state of being right
Speaker 1: that what does it mean to move free and to
Speaker 1: think free outside of systems that were created for your oppression,
Speaker 1: suppression and depression. Right throughout her years and throughout her work,
Speaker 1: Toshi's voice. If you've never heard her music, my god,
Speaker 1: you know, please go on anywhere that you stream music
Speaker 1: and pull down some of her albums. But anytime that
Speaker 1: I have ever had the pleasure of hearing her in person,
Speaker 1: it's nothing short of soul stirring, you know. It's that music,
Speaker 1: that voice that comes straight from the great beyond. And
Speaker 1: in this conversation we talk about so very much just
Speaker 1: this complicated relationship, this complicative and abusive relationship that we
Speaker 1: have as black queer people with the United States of America.
Speaker 1: So take a listen to my conversation with my friend
Speaker 1: Toshi Reagan. Folks, I am very happy to welcome back
Speaker 1: to wok F, which I think it has been years, Toshi,
Speaker 1: welcome back to wok F Daily. Toshi Reagan, who is
Speaker 1: a singer, songwriter, producer, creative director, creative, brilliant mind but
Speaker 1: behind uh Parable of the Sewer the opera which you
Speaker 1: all know that I have talked about Parable of the
Speaker 1: Sower my God probably every week since I started Okay
Speaker 1: and Daily. And Toshi is the reason why I got
Speaker 1: into Octavia Butler in the first place. Because Toshi, I
Speaker 1: don't know if you remember, it was like five years
Speaker 1: ago I didn't interview with you for NBCBLK and you
Speaker 1: were like, yeah, you need to go readout it, but
Speaker 1: it's parable of this seller and and wrap your mind
Speaker 1: around that, and then we can have another conversation. And
Speaker 1: my god, what a preamble to the current state of
Speaker 1: the world that we are living in. I'm so grateful
Speaker 1: that you gave me that book as a guide. So
Speaker 1: I just want to start off by saying to you,
Speaker 1: you know, there has been a lot that has happened,
Speaker 1: a lot that is going on. We are in the
Speaker 1: thick of things as we are about to celebrate, you know,
Speaker 1: the nation's independence, and I'm just wondering for you, as
Speaker 1: an artist, as an activist, as a queer person, what
Speaker 1: that means. How does that land for you America's Independence day?
Speaker 2: Independent from what you know, I think it's you know, yeah,
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of conflict between the foundation
Speaker 2: of this country and the reality of existence.
Speaker 3: You know how.
Speaker 2: A lot of us have unfortunately been an abusive relationships,
Speaker 2: and you know, at the heart of an abusive relationship
Speaker 2: is a very big lie about what the terms are.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: That something is happening that's really harmful and hurtful, and
Speaker 2: then you're told it's not or you're told it's your fault,
Speaker 2: or you're told that, you know, if only you didn't
Speaker 2: have a certain behavior, if only you weren't a certain way,
Speaker 2: then this wouldn't have to happen, or that this abuse
Speaker 2: that's happening is actually good for you and it's making
Speaker 2: things right. And so unfortunately a lot of us as
Speaker 2: just individuals, have had this experience in our lives, and
Speaker 2: everybody who's had that experience knows how horrific it is,
Speaker 2: and especially if you can't get out of it. To
Speaker 2: have somebody celebrate and anniversary of their abuse is really
Speaker 2: like outrageous, you know, And I think, like I am,
Speaker 2: I am down for the complexity sometimes of what this
Speaker 2: July fourth means, because there's a lot of revolutions that
Speaker 2: have happened inside of what America thinks is the revolution.
Speaker 2: You know, there's a lot of revolutions and evolutions, and
Speaker 2: all kinds of people have a hand on that. And
Speaker 2: if they choose to say, like, you know, what, this
Speaker 2: is actually what has given us some meaning and meaningful independence,
Speaker 2: then I you know, I don't I don't like to,
Speaker 2: you know, rain on people's.
Speaker 3: Parade of that.
Speaker 2: But the reality is that we have all been suffering
Speaker 2: with the the energetic you know, I liked call it
Speaker 2: the energetic awesome of the idea of this country's independence
Speaker 2: because it's just based on so much brutality and violence,
Speaker 2: and it's we live on stolen land, and we live
Speaker 2: on stolen land that you know, it's cultivated and by
Speaker 2: stolen people. And we've been really bad with the planet
Speaker 2: as we've developed things. We've treated the planet like it's
Speaker 2: just something we can do whatever we want, and we've
Speaker 2: had an abusive relationships with ourselves. You know, we're water people,
Speaker 2: like we need water, we're made of water, we need air,
Speaker 2: we get to breathe like it's you know, like most
Speaker 2: of the living things on the planet, and we've been
Speaker 2: so abusive to both.
Speaker 3: And that same energy, those same lies.
Speaker 2: That you know started the country, which is that there's
Speaker 2: like one race of people that's superior to others. There's
Speaker 2: there's one gender a person that's superior to others, that
Speaker 2: there's some kind of righteous right to all of this
Speaker 2: is the same thing that's holding us back from evolving
Speaker 2: out of the you know, horrific circumstances that created this country.
Speaker 3: And so that's what I think.
Speaker 2: About what did ly you know, it's there, you could
Speaker 2: do what you want, but you know, there's no way
Speaker 2: you will ever be able to really not come to
Speaker 2: the honesty of, you know, what has really happened with
Speaker 2: the creation of this country and where it leaves us now.
Speaker 1: You know, I think that when you speak of America
Speaker 1: and the relationship being abusive, I think that that's probably
Speaker 1: the most resonant relational example I can actually wrap my
Speaker 1: mind around about America, about the toxic behavior of telling
Speaker 1: us as black people, as queer people, as people of color,
Speaker 1: that everything is okay, that what we're experiencing and what
Speaker 1: we're feeling and what we're being subject to is not
Speaker 1: actually really happening. We're making it up in our head.
Speaker 1: Everything is actually okay. So for us to not want
Speaker 1: to celebrate the fourth of July or to say that
Speaker 1: we have a complicated relationship or I remember when former
Speaker 1: First Lady Michelle Obama said that she was proud of
Speaker 1: her country for the very first time, and the far
Speaker 1: right lost their mind. How dare you say that this
Speaker 1: is the first time that you're proud of your country?
Speaker 1: And it's just like we all don't have the same experience,
Speaker 1: Like are you crazy? Like my ancestors were hanging from trees,
Speaker 1: their bodies were literally ripped apart, babies were ripped out
Speaker 1: of wounds, and families were broken up, and torture persisted
Speaker 1: right for centuries. Oh do you think that we look
Speaker 1: at the red, white and blue of the flag and
Speaker 1: recognize that the red is only has been, you know,
Speaker 1: through the shed, the bloodshed of our ancestors. And so
Speaker 1: I find it so I find that this this place
Speaker 1: that we are consistently pushed and pulled in with America
Speaker 1: is one that is on balance of being infuriating, just
Speaker 1: filled with rage, and then on the other side still
Speaker 1: the beauty that particularly black people, indigenous people have created
Speaker 1: out of the brutality and like not being able to
Speaker 1: part and parcel those real heavy sentiments and just the
Speaker 1: the the paradox of it all right, And so it's
Speaker 1: I feel like, you know, for America. You you are
Speaker 1: an artist and and have created so much art, so
Speaker 1: much song, so much beauty, and through your music you're
Speaker 1: able to, I think, mirror in a lot of ways,
Speaker 1: like the pain and the beauty that we all like
Speaker 1: try and wrestle with. How do you think as a
Speaker 1: as a black queer artist, Toshi that like you've been able,
Speaker 1: like has it helped you, I guess, be able to
Speaker 1: kind of move through this relationship with this with this
Speaker 1: nation state, Like how does it help you understand and
Speaker 1: convey the complexity and the dichotomy and the polarization that
Speaker 1: we all embody.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think being alive and living and being inside
Speaker 2: of circles of diverse circles of people of who have
Speaker 2: different gender identities, who come from, you know, different parts
Speaker 2: of the world, like having having a global vision and
Speaker 2: not just like so focused on you know, this country
Speaker 2: has really been helpful. And obviously, like doing being creative
Speaker 2: is really helpful. I mean I come from the people
Speaker 2: of Grace, you know, Like I come from the people
Speaker 2: of Grace, And there is a certain part of the
Speaker 2: population that has to have weapons, that has to have
Speaker 2: the right to murder, that has to have rights over
Speaker 2: other people's bodies, that tries to make like huge differences
Speaker 2: between queer people and straight people. I just like, I
Speaker 2: don't even think straight makes any sense to me anymore,
Speaker 2: you know, Like I just like people, you know, gender
Speaker 2: identities and sexualities are very fluid, and they know it,
Speaker 2: even if they don't want to say it out loud.
Speaker 2: People who are against freedom but say the word freedom
Speaker 2: all the time. People who create a money currency that
Speaker 2: is out of control, like they can't even really keep
Speaker 2: up that.
Speaker 3: People who build homes and apartments and don't solve problems around.
Speaker 2: Homeless as people who you know, poison the water, poison
Speaker 2: the land, poison, poison, poison, poison, poison.
Speaker 3: It's outrageous.
Speaker 2: I don't have to I see how bad these systems
Speaker 2: are so clearly, and I don't need any more evidence
Speaker 2: to really understand a freedom within myself, the freedom within
Speaker 2: you know, my relationships with people, the freedom within you know,
Speaker 2: the eyes of my grandparents when I was born and
Speaker 2: I was the first child in a generation of our
Speaker 2: family that didn't pick cotton, and not that picking cotton
Speaker 2: is like, you know, the worst thing if you want
Speaker 2: to pick cotton, but if you have to pick cotton
Speaker 2: and you don't want.
Speaker 3: To, it's horrible.
Speaker 2: If you're used to found an economic system that you
Speaker 2: can't have, you know, like not only can you not
Speaker 2: have a part of, but it's against the law. You know,
Speaker 2: if you're upheld in institutional prisons, whether they be like
Speaker 2: you know, you have to work here, you have to
Speaker 2: work here or there's no way that you cannot get
Speaker 2: out of it.
Speaker 3: It doesn't all have to be a jail. It's very
Speaker 3: clear to me.
Speaker 2: That once people found the bottom of a slave ship,
Speaker 2: that is where the intention of most people were supposed
Speaker 2: to be in the conditions of a bottom of a
Speaker 2: slave ship, and what in order to build a land
Speaker 2: that where people you know, have like the right to
Speaker 2: be at the bottom of a slave ship means you
Speaker 2: will poison and kill yourself. So a lot of our issues,
Speaker 2: no matter how much money currency someone has or political
Speaker 2: power someone has, literally killing themselves.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 2: In Texas right now, they have a heat wave that's
Speaker 2: like and Texas is hot, you know, so to think
Speaker 2: of Texas having a heat wave that affects everybody, they
Speaker 2: don't just affect the people you don't like. But did
Speaker 2: the governor go, like, you know, break something where they
Speaker 2: can't be no water breaks for people? And I'm like, wait,
Speaker 2: what does it mean you can't have water breaks, like
Speaker 2: at the same time as there's a heat wave, like,
Speaker 2: you're killing yourself, you know, people working on boats, people
Speaker 2: working on that They say sixty percent of the people
Speaker 2: are from Latin X communities and He's like, no, we're
Speaker 2: going to cancel a water break.
Speaker 3: You're killing yourself.
Speaker 2: And this is why I really see, you know, this
Speaker 2: particular land, this gigantic piece of land, as a part
Speaker 2: of land for the global community and not like the
Speaker 2: citizens of America. This is land that was stolen from
Speaker 2: indigenous people. And you know, we don't own it, you know,
Speaker 2: and we never will. And people from all over the
Speaker 2: world are always going to come to this land and
Speaker 2: there is there is nothing that the Institution of America
Speaker 2: can do about it.
Speaker 3: They will try.
Speaker 1: It's so funny because I went down over to Dumbo.
Speaker 1: There's an exhibit that is made out of the same
Speaker 1: steel bars that are used to make the border wall,
Speaker 1: and the artists made this a huge structure that reads
Speaker 1: land out of this border wall. And the whole idea
Speaker 1: is about the fact that you borders are man made, right,
Speaker 1: Like what are you talking about? Right? The only real border,
Speaker 1: the only real borders are are are water right Like
Speaker 1: that are you know, like that where the land meets
Speaker 1: the water and you can't actually go and let you
Speaker 1: have a vessel, right Like That's really like everything else
Speaker 1: is just made up because people wanted to claim space
Speaker 1: to your point, that is not theirs, right, And I
Speaker 1: feel like in so many ways what we are experiencing
Speaker 1: with climate change, and we saw a snippet of it
Speaker 1: in COVID where mankind was forced inside, humankind was forced indoors.
Speaker 1: And what happened to the waters, what happened to the air, right,
Speaker 1: what happened in certain I mean this was all over
Speaker 1: the world. What happened in certain places that hadn't seen
Speaker 1: fish in canals that hadn't seen you know, serious blue
Speaker 1: skies that hadn't seen all of these things. Because we
Speaker 1: did it right. And so when we see these wildfires
Speaker 1: and historic tornado after historic hurricane, after historic this, that
Speaker 1: and the other thing, we see a glow that is trying,
Speaker 1: that is literally fighting for its life rights, that is
Speaker 1: trying to fight back against humankind that thinks that we
Speaker 1: have another planet to go to, right, And I just
Speaker 1: feel like there is just I never really understood. I
Speaker 1: feel like until recently, how sick the quest for power
Speaker 1: and land and property really is, How like devoid of empathy,
Speaker 1: of kindness of you know, humanity this quest really is.
Speaker 1: And you know, Toshi, like, I get so enraged when
Speaker 1: I think about the coverage that we saw a few
Speaker 1: weeks ago. Now with you know, billionaires who decided to
Speaker 1: try and go to the bottom of the ocean, which
Speaker 1: man has never been to before. Because I've conquered everything else,
Speaker 1: because I'm so fucking bored with my life. I've conquered
Speaker 1: everything else. Let me go do this thing. Wall the
Speaker 1: wall coverage of their demise. Seven hundred migrants, hundreds die
Speaker 1: drowned because they are literally on a voyage to seek
Speaker 1: better life, opportunity and a future, right, the ability to work,
Speaker 1: to build, to exist. No one cares, right, those billionaires,
Speaker 1: they were explorers. Those migrants, Oh, they were just you know,
Speaker 1: poor people on a search for something. It's just the
Speaker 1: way that we look at our humanity. Do you think
Speaker 1: that it is possible that we will ever really truly
Speaker 1: understand our connectedness and not just like our oppression, right,
Speaker 1: that we will understand the like there is no real
Speaker 1: top and bottom, right, that we're literally all breathing the
Speaker 1: same air, drinking the same water, and we need each other.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think most people know that. Honestly,
Speaker 2: I do think most people know that. I when we
Speaker 2: did the opera, I started a journey called the Parable
Speaker 2: Path and the parable path was so I could go
Speaker 2: in to the communities where the opera was and have
Speaker 2: like more intensive communications around some of the issues the
Speaker 2: conditions that the opera brings up. And all I meet
Speaker 2: is incredible people, like all kinds of people. People are
Speaker 2: doing so many things. People are living in so many
Speaker 2: different beautiful ways. People are designing infrastructures in their towns
Speaker 2: and in their cities that are more imbalanced. People are
Speaker 2: doing a lot of the hard work.
Speaker 3: You will not see this on the front pages. You
Speaker 3: won't see it on CNN.
Speaker 2: You won't It's the kind of long term, every day,
Speaker 2: you know, work that is not made for commercial media
Speaker 2: because they have to make money and they have to
Speaker 2: feel like they're appealing to something. And but I think
Speaker 2: every the good news that everyone should take in probably
Speaker 2: somewhere right near you or wherever you are when you
Speaker 2: look at this good people, is that there are people
Speaker 2: who are like no like we live on planet Earth,
Speaker 2: and we need to live inside of a of a
Speaker 2: of a harmony together or we'll just be at war constantly.
Speaker 2: You know. Adrenaline is really really powerful, the adrenaline to
Speaker 2: do violence, the adrenaline of fear, the adrenaline of like
Speaker 2: trying to run away from things that are like right
Speaker 2: behind you, the adrenaline of denial, you know, the search
Speaker 2: for like goals or the idea of like enough currency
Speaker 2: that you would be more powerful than anyone else that
Speaker 2: you know. A lot of the things are really simplistic. Oh,
Speaker 2: a color of somebody's skin is making them so much
Speaker 2: different than somebody else. You know, the right to have
Speaker 2: a weapon versus the right to decide what you know
Speaker 2: you could do with your body. We're gonna we're gonna
Speaker 2: save children by like you know, oppressing trans children.
Speaker 3: However, we're not gonna we're.
Speaker 2: Gonna let guns be in schools and murder kids every day.
Speaker 3: Like some of these things.
Speaker 2: Are really so simplistic and so violent and so like
Speaker 2: like it's like there's two choices instead of like the
Speaker 2: billions of choices that we all have to exist. And
Speaker 2: then the absolute ignoring ignoring of the natural world, which
Speaker 2: is like we are a part of the natural world.
Speaker 2: We are we have a place in the natural world,
Speaker 2: We have a place in the ecosystem. Like in natural
Speaker 2: world does not care what our skin color is. They
Speaker 2: care that we are human bodies on planet Earth and
Speaker 2: what we are doing with our time here. So there
Speaker 2: is a lot of genius and a lot of room.
Speaker 2: There is a lot of care, There is a lot
Speaker 2: of love. There is a lot of you know, people
Speaker 2: of all kinds doing the work to get in right
Speaker 2: relationship with this planet that we have. And the thing
Speaker 2: that has always messed that up is really really systemic
Speaker 2: and outrageous violence.
Speaker 3: So I'm always telling.
Speaker 2: Every people, you know, when we go somewhere, we like
Speaker 2: really try to break down these systems, you know, economic
Speaker 2: systems and currency.
Speaker 3: What is currency? It's not just money, you know.
Speaker 2: We try to look at like how how we are
Speaker 2: inside of an ecosystem, like how much space are we
Speaker 2: taking up with our food, with our like you know,
Speaker 2: with our water needs, with our you know, what do
Speaker 2: our with our cars or with our like modes and
Speaker 2: transportations spiritual life like how are we spiritually in relationship
Speaker 2: with the world and and how are we like what
Speaker 2: are we doing with our spirits when we are being
Speaker 2: so unkind all the time?
Speaker 3: Like how what is.
Speaker 2: The effect of that on everything? You know, there's a
Speaker 2: lot of deep work being done. There's so many brilliant people,
Speaker 2: a lot you know, I've talked to neuroscientists.
Speaker 3: I'm talked, I'm like, what's wrong with us?
Speaker 2: You know, like breaking down was like I talked to
Speaker 2: a neuroscientists and a political scientist, and like all kinds
Speaker 2: of sciences, I said, what is wrong with us?
Speaker 3: Like why are we like this?
Speaker 2: Why are we so suicidal? Like why are we killing ourselves?
Speaker 2: Why are we killing the planet? Why are we Why
Speaker 2: when did like having this certain level of profit like
Speaker 2: like obliterate like having the joy of living and on
Speaker 2: a clean planet. You know, why why so much cancer?
Speaker 2: Like why do we have to have all these cancers?
Speaker 2: Why are you you know, selling us things that could
Speaker 2: give us cancer and then making us, you know, use
Speaker 2: the chemo that the same company built, Like all of
Speaker 2: these things come on. These are the things like all
Speaker 2: humans have to take responsibility for in their own ways,
Speaker 2: which means like in your way. You may not like
Speaker 2: know how to solve any of these big problems because
Speaker 2: they are huge. There are collaborative big problems, but they're
Speaker 2: small accessible doorways where you are to something and you know,
Speaker 2: you I ask people to find the small accessible door
Speaker 2: that they can walk through to, you know, to work
Speaker 2: on the issue that.
Speaker 3: Is closest to their heart where they are.
Speaker 2: And I also ask people to like really acknowledge like
Speaker 2: when they have a level of currency that's more than
Speaker 2: other people in any way, it's not always money, you know,
Speaker 2: and that they like make room for other people and
Speaker 2: lighten their load, like do something to help somebody else,
Speaker 2: like get through some places.
Speaker 3: And then I ask people like.
Speaker 2: When you see a justice, Like when you see like
Speaker 2: that there's law, you know, infrastructure that really makes it
Speaker 2: very difficult for certain people to actually survive, that you
Speaker 2: consider yourselves that person. You know, if someone is making
Speaker 2: up laws that you know against trans children or trans people,
Speaker 2: or gender non conforming people, or women who want to
Speaker 2: have people really who want to have the right to
Speaker 2: have abortions, consider yourself that person. Like give yourself the
Speaker 2: opportunity to feel the outrage is somebody naming you as
Speaker 2: a person that is dangerous to society and that you
Speaker 2: even though you you and your family have done though
Speaker 2: right things and pay your taxes and you know, pay
Speaker 2: your bills and live that you can't have the one
Speaker 2: hundred percent access to your body and what your body needs.
Speaker 2: Consider yourself that person, you know, and get out there
Speaker 2: and like be really outraged because if anybody took something
Speaker 2: away from you, you would lose your mind. Like, these are
Speaker 2: the things that that people can do. They have to
Speaker 2: be like you know, know everything. They don't have to
Speaker 2: be like you know, have the answer to every big,
Speaker 2: big problem.
Speaker 3: Don't.
Speaker 2: Don't have the answer to every big problem, but access
Speaker 2: what is right next to you. That is the scariest
Speaker 2: things to people who are trying to run something very big.
Speaker 2: It is togetherness and the kind of empathy that would
Speaker 2: make you stand in front of people who are different
Speaker 2: from you.
Speaker 3: It is the scariest thing.
Speaker 2: It is also participating in the system that they create
Speaker 2: that they're trying to get you not to participate in.
Speaker 2: So like I'm always telling people, oh, why won't you
Speaker 2: get a party together and go and vote, Like show up,
Speaker 2: show up, show up, show up like, make it cute,
Speaker 2: make it hot, make it fun, go and show up,
Speaker 2: bring your brilliant self to it. Because the system is
Speaker 2: designed to depress you and make you not participate so
Speaker 2: that more and more, you know, horrific kinds of people
Speaker 2: can be running the entire country because they do.
Speaker 3: They make laws and they pay attention to them.
Speaker 2: So if you don't become a part of it in
Speaker 2: any way, then the laws will get worse and worse
Speaker 2: and worse.
Speaker 1: Folks understand that they are a part of it, regardless
Speaker 1: of whether they participate or not. It's how you want
Speaker 1: to be a part of it, right do you want
Speaker 1: to be? It to be by choice or by force?
Speaker 1: Because either way you are participating. Last question for you,
Speaker 1: my friend, No, it's not even a question. I just
Speaker 1: I want you to give folks who I try and
Speaker 1: tell to read the Powable who I try and tell
Speaker 1: to really get a guide and an understanding of, you know,
Speaker 1: how the forces come to be. Tell folks about your
Speaker 1: opera and about you know it being you know, based
Speaker 1: on Octavia Butler's book Powable of the Sewer. But like
Speaker 1: why it's so extraordinarily timely, why it's so extraordinarily necessary
Speaker 1: in this time?
Speaker 3: Sure, I mean octav E.
Speaker 2: Butler's parable the Sewer, I have to imagine, you know,
Speaker 2: comes from research that she did in the eighties, in
Speaker 2: the early nineties. This is the thirtieth anniversary of the
Speaker 2: publishing of the book. It was released in nineteen ninety three.
Speaker 2: And this book, you know, really it's it's extraordinary. I've
Speaker 2: been reading it since ninety seven, and so when I
Speaker 2: first read the book, I was like, no way, you know,
Speaker 2: this can happen. But she she tells the story of
Speaker 2: a community that has you know, walled themselves in, an
Speaker 2: upper middle class community in Los Angeles outside of Los Angeles,
Speaker 2: and they walled themselves in.
Speaker 3: They got all their houses.
Speaker 2: They never meant to be a community that was walled
Speaker 2: in together, but things had gotten terrible and so in
Speaker 2: order to like, you know, have some safety, they wall
Speaker 2: themselves in and slowly but slowly, they kind.
Speaker 3: Of revert to kind of almost a rural life. Everybody's
Speaker 3: gardens and they're like growing their food, and they used
Speaker 3: to have dogs and stuff.
Speaker 2: They just set the dogs free in the streets because
Speaker 2: they can't feed the dogs then feed themselves, and it's
Speaker 2: very dangerous to just you know walk around and be
Speaker 2: in neighborhoods. And the infrastructure the country really really falls apart.
Speaker 2: It's you know, privatization everywhere, the you know, leadership that
Speaker 2: just basically doesn't care about people, and the end of
Speaker 2: social services. So all of these things where somebody is
Speaker 2: being socialist is like a horrible thing. But that's how
Speaker 2: we you know, have garbage picked up. That's how we
Speaker 2: our schools are designed there. You know, we pay into
Speaker 2: it and everybody gets to go type of situations, all
Speaker 2: of that disappears. You have to pay for the fire department,
Speaker 2: pay for the police, pay for every service that.
Speaker 3: Used to just be available.
Speaker 2: And she makes a fifteen year old girl see God
Speaker 2: as changed, and she makes a fifteen year old girl
Speaker 2: create a belief system called earth Seed, which is based
Speaker 2: really on her understanding of nature and the planets and
Speaker 2: and kind of our true relationship to to the world
Speaker 2: and to the universe. And so that's that's really like
Speaker 2: a very short version of it. What makes it so
Speaker 2: timely is that Octavia did this thirty years ago, and
Speaker 2: she kind of nailed it.
Speaker 3: She nailed like our conditions.
Speaker 2: And she never got on the New York Times bestseller
Speaker 2: list when she was alive, but she got on it
Speaker 2: in twenty twenty, you know, when we were in the
Speaker 2: heart of the pandemic. And I always read this book
Speaker 2: and as we when we first started, it was twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: and I insisted we got to start at twenty seventeen
Speaker 2: because we got to need to be ready.
Speaker 3: But I didn't know what we needed to be ready for.
Speaker 2: I wanted us to be out telling this story. I
Speaker 2: wanted us to be singing and rooms full of people.
Speaker 2: I wanted people to be together here and hear us
Speaker 2: sing this story. I wanted to work around the performances
Speaker 2: and activate in different communities. And that idea that you
Speaker 2: talked about earlier is like, how do we bake break
Speaker 2: these borders and really see that we're all kind of
Speaker 2: in it together type of vibe.
Speaker 3: So I wanted to do that.
Speaker 2: But I never understood how twenty twenty four could happen.
Speaker 2: And then when the pandemic happened, I was like, oh,
Speaker 2: because something really traumatic has to happen to like rev
Speaker 2: up this like you know thing.
Speaker 3: Where everywhere where infrastructure gets scared.
Speaker 2: Oh, the people have seen that if they slow down
Speaker 2: and they do less, that they can stop pollution. If
Speaker 2: they slow down and do less, they can feed each other.
Speaker 2: If they insist that that money is spread around, you
Speaker 2: can take people out of poverty.
Speaker 3: If we, like we all.
Speaker 2: Learn this is our superpower of the pandemic is realizing
Speaker 2: that we actually have what we need to take care
Speaker 2: of each other, and we really do, like right now
Speaker 2: we have it.
Speaker 3: It's not like yeah, yeah, so, so.
Speaker 1: It's not for it's not for the lack of knowing.
Speaker 1: It's just for it's for the lack of desire. Right
Speaker 1: for those that are in power.
Speaker 3: We are in wars.
Speaker 2: The wars are against us. The wars are against the
Speaker 2: people of planet Earth. They are it's governments talking to
Speaker 2: each other. But the wars are on our bodies, on
Speaker 2: our houses, on our land, on our water, on our infrastructure,
Speaker 2: They're on everything, and they're happening everywhere. And if people
Speaker 2: can like really find a way to have that understanding
Speaker 2: that we all know actually that we can live on
Speaker 2: this planet and balance, and that we're being kept from
Speaker 2: it by people who run many of the countries, which
Speaker 2: is like a group of a small group of men
Speaker 2: in every country all over the world doing this, you know,
Speaker 2: that's the way we will have to go to get
Speaker 2: somewhere we want to be for the future. So very
Speaker 2: important for Octavia's story to be out there. All of
Speaker 2: her books really talk about us in really amazing, wonderful ways.
Speaker 2: There's also Adrian Marie Brown's work, and I really love
Speaker 2: Alexis Pauline Gums work. I collaborate with both of them.
Speaker 2: Adrian and I have a podcast Octavia's Parables, where we're
Speaker 2: reading every chapter of everything Octavia is written. And I'm
Speaker 2: doing the podcast this year with Alexis Paulling Gums and
Speaker 2: we're reading Kindred.
Speaker 3: So amazing. But there, Octavia is not the only one
Speaker 3: out there.
Speaker 2: There is a lot of other writers and storytellers who
Speaker 2: are really saying the same thing, from multiple cultures and
Speaker 2: multiple languages. We are really trying to reach each other,
Speaker 2: and I just my biggest thing is to say, keep
Speaker 2: reaching out your hands to each other and keep being
Speaker 2: in alignment with this planet as the best you can.
Speaker 2: We all can't do the same things, and we all
Speaker 2: kind of in a system right now evolving, but do
Speaker 2: your best and really fight for the water and fight
Speaker 2: for the air, and don't let these like kind of
Speaker 2: racist lines. Fight for the people, fight for each other,
Speaker 2: fight for the trees, fight for you know whatever, fix something.
Speaker 1: But you know you, Yeah, my friend, thank you so
Speaker 1: very much. Thank you for your work and your activism
Speaker 1: and your art and your time. I'm very excited. I
Speaker 1: am going to see uh Powable later in July. I
Speaker 1: got my tickets and I'm super excited to.
Speaker 3: Lincoln Centner.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm so I'm so excited. I cannot wait. So
Speaker 1: thank you so much to shi Uh for your time,
Speaker 1: for your brilliance, for your space. I appreciate you so
Speaker 1: very much.
Speaker 3: I appreciate you.
Speaker 2: I always I always needed a good dose of outrage
Speaker 2: every day. So I'm so glad to in to you
Speaker 2: and get it because you be on fire and I
Speaker 2: love it and I'm grateful for you. Somebody got to say, hey,
Speaker 2: what about it? So I'm thankful to you and thanks
Speaker 2: for having me on.
Speaker 1: Thank you. That is it for me today, dear friends
Speaker 1: on Woke a f as always Power to the people
Speaker 1: and to all the people. Power, get woke and stay
Speaker 1: woke as fuck.