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Speaker 1: Hey. The Black Market is an initiative created by any

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Speaker 1: five Self Media to highlight, amplify, and showcase leaders, entrepreneurs,

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Speaker 1: and educators from our community. The show tapes monthly at

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Speaker 1: our studio in Atlanta, Georgia. To submit you or your

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Speaker 1: organization for consideration, go to eighty five self show dot

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Speaker 1: com backslash black Market Free. Yeah you already know this

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Speaker 1: is a special one for me, man, you mean special

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Speaker 1: special one for me. Man, hold on, man one drop,

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Speaker 1: lady drop, ladies, keep doing got We don't need to

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Speaker 1: be that man. We got to work front of you off, sweetheart.

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Speaker 1: I'm just making sure you have a little stream. You know,

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Speaker 1: we're getting you straight over, making it right. But like

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Speaker 1: I said, man, this is a very special one for

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Speaker 1: me because you know, as as everybody knows, it's eighty

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Speaker 1: five percenters, I'm going to raising Washington d C. Stop playing. Yes,

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Speaker 1: indeed uptown the big Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's I mean,

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Speaker 1: ain't know, but this dude right here is a product

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Speaker 1: of Washington d C. Um. You know, a lot of

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Speaker 1: people are big on activism and and being walking helping

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Speaker 1: black people now, but it's a lot of people that's

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Speaker 1: been doing it before. It was cool, and this brother

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Speaker 1: is one of the man He's from a neighborhood that

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Speaker 1: I'm very familiar with. I went to high school done

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Speaker 1: By High School that's you know, close to this neighborhood.

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Speaker 1: And this dude has always been active, always been a

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Speaker 1: product of trying to stop a lot of the violence

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Speaker 1: and a lot of the things that go on in

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Speaker 1: our city. And it's being a helping hand to the streets.

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Speaker 1: And it's something that I think needs to be. You know,

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Speaker 1: a spotlight needs to be put on this brother man,

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Speaker 1: a bigger one that already has. Man. So I need

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Speaker 1: everybody that's in here to make some noise from my

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Speaker 1: big home. Tony. Look, it goes without saying, but that's

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Speaker 1: exactly what this platform is for. That is the show

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Speaker 1: love and respect to the people that we love in respect. Man.

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Speaker 1: So we'll to the trap. South Chicko holds you very

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Speaker 1: high regards. So you know, um, we'll tell him a

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Speaker 1: little bit about who you are. Background. I'm from the

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Speaker 1: Nature's Capital. Um. I've been a a voice, a supportive

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Speaker 1: pill in the community for the last twenty one years.

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Speaker 1: I'm forty, right, So that's that's half my life. The

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Speaker 1: work saved my life. Um. But but my history as

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Speaker 1: relates to Washington. UM, I come from you know, and

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Speaker 1: I say this with all you know, so the difference

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Speaker 1: in humility and not I'm not somebody to glorify any

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Speaker 1: of that. But I come from a street hand over

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Speaker 1: place that was anonymous of the drug trade, really sort

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Speaker 1: of the first open air drug market, and I see

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Speaker 1: uh and my family members were very responsible for that,

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Speaker 1: right Uh. And my father would would grow to be again.

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Speaker 1: You know, somebody who was regarded as a drug kingpin

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Speaker 1: went to prison when I was nine years old on

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Speaker 1: the biggest drug conspiracy in the history of our city. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, I got life without the possibily parole right,

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Speaker 1: been in prison thirty two years. Uh. That was significant

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Speaker 1: for me. Uh, changed the trajectory of my life. My mother,

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Speaker 1: Uh pretty much you know, start the battle seven mental

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Speaker 1: illness we're growing up in. And the d C. You know,

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Speaker 1: Crack impacted the whole country, every urban community in the country,

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Speaker 1: but nowhere. Uh it didn't impact anywhere like what he

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Speaker 1: did the d C. Right. Um, you know when we

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Speaker 1: talk about inconsperration rates, addiction, uh, murder rates, UM, infomortality,

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Speaker 1: all of the all of that data speaks to how

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Speaker 1: to crack epidemic. Uh punished us in our generation, right, Um.

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Speaker 1: And so I was able to navigate through something that

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Speaker 1: most people wasn't weren't you know what I'm saying. Um,

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Speaker 1: And and being able to become a public servant violence interrupted,

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Speaker 1: being able to become the person that women and women

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Speaker 1: return from inconceerration that I was there along with others

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Speaker 1: obviously right to help get people stayed, able to uh

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Speaker 1: make sure that when those mothers and fathers returned to

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Speaker 1: the community, they wouldn't leave again. Um. Somebody who's who

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Speaker 1: spoke up you know in the correlation between another thing,

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Speaker 1: DC has become so the gentrification capital or the country right,

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Speaker 1: and it is a is a real parallel between being

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Speaker 1: the crack capital or in the murder capital through the

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Speaker 1: nineties and now where we're seeing with gentrification. So I've

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Speaker 1: been a bridge, I've been a translator. Um, I've been um,

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Speaker 1: somebody who has ensured that legislation and policy changed in

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Speaker 1: order to preserve the protect Yeah, because it's not just

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Speaker 1: about making noise with me, right, ain't just about making noise.

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Speaker 1: It's about being able to deliver solutions and holding people

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Speaker 1: that are in positions to change things accountable for doing that. Um.

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Speaker 1: We've in in the age of social media, which is

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Speaker 1: an amazing thing, right, I don't I love it? Right.

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Speaker 1: I think it is is able enabled people to connect,

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Speaker 1: which is beautiful. But I think, Um, I come from

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Speaker 1: a place where activism is personal. Activism is something you

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Speaker 1: do every day. Um. And you gotta have a base, right.

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Speaker 1: So if you walk through d C people out, they

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Speaker 1: may never heard of me. But if you walk through

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Speaker 1: d C with me, UM, you know, I'm probably one

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Speaker 1: of the most recognizable people because I've helped people, right,

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Speaker 1: thousands of people. I've helped them. People from Grandma to

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Speaker 1: the kids, to the uncle who just came home from

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Speaker 1: doing thirty years. I've done something for them. UM. And

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Speaker 1: I say that to say this, UM, is that I

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Speaker 1: take a lot of pride in that, right Um. And

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Speaker 1: sometimes the work and being so attached and connected to

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Speaker 1: the to the issues, it's really gotten a way sometimes

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Speaker 1: of me being able to do things like this. So

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Speaker 1: I'm just so happy, um, and honored to be here. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And I really salute and respect what you guys do. UM.

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Speaker 1: You said something that stuck out to me. You say

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Speaker 1: you're violence interrupt them. Yeah, yeah, before you even go,

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Speaker 1: I want to say something to that too. That's the

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Speaker 1: point that I was great, make uh. In the city

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Speaker 1: that we come from, d C is a very violent

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Speaker 1: city by nature, you know what I mean. We grow up,

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Speaker 1: you know, very valent. You know what I'm saying. I

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Speaker 1: come out of the streets and was active and lost

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Speaker 1: plenty of family members that you know that I love

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Speaker 1: the whole dear to me that and shed blood in

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Speaker 1: those streets. And what a lot of people don't understand

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Speaker 1: is we have a hard time respected people who don't

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Speaker 1: come from where we come from and don't understand the

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Speaker 1: things that we go through. No matter where you're from.

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Speaker 1: You could be an activist from Atlanta or activists from Chica,

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Speaker 1: but if you don't know the streets of DC and

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Speaker 1: how things operating the d C were not trying to

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Speaker 1: hear that. So him being a person that can say

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Speaker 1: he's a valid violence interrupter, it speaks to his character

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Speaker 1: because he comes from the streets and he's respected in

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Speaker 1: that space. So when he walks into these neighborhoods, people

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Speaker 1: look at him as somebody who understands what we're going through.

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Speaker 1: And we're dealing with you know what I mean that

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Speaker 1: under that it's not just coming in for the photo,

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Speaker 1: coming in and be able to say I was here

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Speaker 1: and I did this for a quota. He actually coming

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Speaker 1: in because he understands that what you're going through, I'm

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Speaker 1: going through. And if you lose your uncle or your

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Speaker 1: brother and sister, I know what you're gonna feel because

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Speaker 1: I felt that pain and that's very rare in our city.

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Speaker 1: So no, yeah, I appreciate that, but that's that's it. Right.

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Speaker 1: And so being able to be in a position to

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Speaker 1: save lives right or at least attempt right, to have

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Speaker 1: that sort of buy in and connectivity where at least

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Speaker 1: somebody would come to the table at least to try

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Speaker 1: to squash something right that could lead to somebody losing

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Speaker 1: their life, and then growing that to being able to

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Speaker 1: influence legislation that would create programming that because so now

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Speaker 1: when I walk in the community or there's other people

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Speaker 1: that came behind me, being able to have something actually

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Speaker 1: to offer to right, so put put that gun down

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Speaker 1: or pick this up? Right, Having programming as leading to

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Speaker 1: UH family sustaining employment, entrepreneur you opportunities and grants for businesses,

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Speaker 1: um housing, support things of that new tech right where

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Speaker 1: it's comprehensive, and because we really