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Speaker 1: Oh you, that was the beautiful Natasha Brown. She's a

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Speaker 1: political activist. She is considered the person in which you

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Speaker 1: want to make sure you have on your side if

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Speaker 1: you are getting ready to run for any office, especially

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Speaker 1: in the South. She's joining us on this edition of Naked.

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Speaker 1: Every champion and then carry Champion is to be a champion,

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Speaker 1: a champion and carry champion and carry champion the champion

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Speaker 1: and carry Champion and carry Champion rais, raiders and sports

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Speaker 1: and entertain making Naked weird in the world were vulnerable considered,

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Speaker 1: we come and remove the vail from entertainment elite. It's

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Speaker 1: a difference between what it's real and with the public seas.

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Speaker 1: So here's your favorite celebrities behind the scenes. It's refreshing up.

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Speaker 1: Then the whole story specific life ought to rendivents to

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Speaker 1: shake the person that you carery. Gotta champion and carry

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Speaker 1: champion the girl you didn't. It's the greatest in sports

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Speaker 1: and entertainment connected with very champion and carry champions. To

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Speaker 1: be a champion, a champion, they carry champion, They ca

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Speaker 1: chay yan a champion, They carry champion and carry champion Radius,

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Speaker 1: raiders and sports and entertain making. Naked everybody, welcome back

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Speaker 1: to Naked. I have very intentionally been interviewing people who

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Speaker 1: I am obviously friends with, but people who I admire

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Speaker 1: and people who I respect who are in the political arena.

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Speaker 1: And that is purposeful because I feel like now is

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Speaker 1: the time to make sure that we're paying attention and

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Speaker 1: understanding what it means for us to vote, to be

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Speaker 1: a part of society. And I don't want to hear

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Speaker 1: voting doesn't matter, it doesn't count. You hear the same response,

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Speaker 1: which is if it didn't matter, they would not work

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Speaker 1: so hard to stop our vote. Today on the podcast,

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Speaker 1: creator co founder of Black Voters Matter, Natasha Brown, will

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Speaker 1: be joining us, So here's a little cheat code for you.

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Speaker 1: She is a friend and I as just well black

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Speaker 1: woman to black woman. I adore her and everything she represents.

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Speaker 1: She has a certain genes a qua about her. Her

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Speaker 1: spirit especial and you can feel it. So when I

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Speaker 1: see her and I talked to her, and I asked

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Speaker 1: her about being a political activist. That word for many

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Speaker 1: people can be off putting, or people could feel insecure

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Speaker 1: about describing themselves as an activist. And that was one

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Speaker 1: of the first things in which I asked because she

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Speaker 1: is activated did when I am around her, I want

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Speaker 1: to do more. I want to be more, I want

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Speaker 1: to be better. And when I say her heart is

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Speaker 1: pure and that she is doing it for the people,

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Speaker 1: and you hear that often, but listen to me. This

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Speaker 1: next hour is some change. Get your spoon, get your four,

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Speaker 1: get your knife. You're about to be fed. She is

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Speaker 1: talking about why it matters, especially in the black culture,

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Speaker 1: to vote, vote, vote, find your power, use your power,

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Speaker 1: have leverage, vote, vote, vote. It's not about being for

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Speaker 1: the red team or the blue team, as you put it.

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Speaker 1: It is about really taking agency over your own person

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Speaker 1: and using your power for good. And if we understand that,

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Speaker 1: and we just didn't get distracted with whether I'm a

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Speaker 1: Republican or a Democrat, we would be winning Latasha Brown

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Speaker 1: with the word chepian and chepian and chepi. So I

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Speaker 1: have some research here not and sometimes everything you read

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Speaker 1: on the internet it isn't true. I can also ask

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Speaker 1: our friends what I have. But I want to go

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Speaker 1: with UM the very beginning. UM, And before I describe

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Speaker 1: you to everyone, I think a lot of people referred

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Speaker 1: to you as an activist. What is that? What does

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Speaker 1: that mean to you that word in itself, that's an

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Speaker 1: excellent I don't think I've ever been asked that question

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Speaker 1: in that way. You know what when I hear it you,

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Speaker 1: what it means to me is a person that you

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Speaker 1: know that is dedicated to moving people to action. You

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Speaker 1: know that, Um, when I think about activists, is interesting

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Speaker 1: that you ask me that question, because when I think

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Speaker 1: about activists, I remember the first time I was called

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Speaker 1: the activists, and I was thinking to myself, I don't

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Speaker 1: know if I deserve that title yet, because I was

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Speaker 1: thinking about UM people like um Dr Marl Luther King,

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Speaker 1: and I was thinking about Angela Davis and others, and

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Speaker 1: I didn't see myself in that same kind of category.

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Speaker 1: And so it was such an esteemed position to me

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Speaker 1: around someone that's an activist, and that means you and

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Speaker 1: down right. And so for me, what I realized, though,

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Speaker 1: is that all of us have the opportunity, if we

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Speaker 1: choose to be activated, like, to use our power, to

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Speaker 1: use our energy to activate, activate ourselves and activate others.

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Speaker 1: And so I have dedicated my life UM to activate

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Speaker 1: in others because I think that's what the real power is.

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Speaker 1: How do we activate the human spirit? How do we

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Speaker 1: activate love, How do we activate some power? How do

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Speaker 1: we shut some stuff down? So at the end of

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Speaker 1: the day, that's kind of how I I see it

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Speaker 1: around that part of me um that wants to do something,

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Speaker 1: that wants to see action, and so I use that

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Speaker 1: energy to activate myself so I can activate others. So

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Speaker 1: that's what I think of when I think about actives

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Speaker 1: growing up as a kid in the South Selma specifically,

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Speaker 1: to me, it makes sense that you would be an

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Speaker 1: activist based on where you lived, on what you know,

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Speaker 1: if you paid attention to your history, if you were

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Speaker 1: involved in your community, how did you grow up? You know,

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Speaker 1: I's uh, that's true, I think on some level around someone,

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Speaker 1: but believe it or not, my family would you know,

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Speaker 1: my family felt like they were very clear, you're gonna

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Speaker 1: go to school, you're gonna get a degree, you know,

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Speaker 1: get your husband, You're gonna get your good job with

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Speaker 1: some good benefits, and that's how it's gonna roll. Right.

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Speaker 1: And so even early on, my activism wasn't necessarily something

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Speaker 1: that my family is like trying to push me towards.

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Speaker 1: A matter of fact, you know that seen activists be murdered,

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Speaker 1: that people activists in our community had had financially were struggling.

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Speaker 1: The activists in our community oftentimes were embittered, and many

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Speaker 1: times they were beat down. And so you know, they

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Speaker 1: wanted me to go another mainstream route because they thought

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Speaker 1: they were brought it would bring protection to me. And

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Speaker 1: I would love to say that it was my environment

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Speaker 1: that created and maybe something on some level that's true,

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Speaker 1: that created this space for me to become an activist.

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Speaker 1: But the truth of the matter is, I you know,

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Speaker 1: it's kind of in the in the words of lately

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Speaker 1: God God. In some ways, I think I was born

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Speaker 1: this way. I never think I'm serious. Like I remember,

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Speaker 1: I remember being a little kid. I always tell this

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Speaker 1: story about, Um, I like, I like Easter shoes. I

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Speaker 1: guess I still like shoes, right, this is where it

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Speaker 1: all stars from. But I had these padd leather Easter shoes.

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Speaker 1: Do you remember the paddle leather shoes that the stuff them.

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Speaker 1: They would have the black mark stuff mark on that. Uh.

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Speaker 1: I had these padd leather Easter shoes. And I was

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Speaker 1: a little kid. I was like in kindergarten or something,

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Speaker 1: and um, I would always I never ever ever could

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Speaker 1: stand seeing people take advantage of other people. I don't

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Speaker 1: know what what something about me would get activated when

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Speaker 1: I would see this. And so I remember one Easter,

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Speaker 1: I got these white padd leather shoes and some socks

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Speaker 1: with some ruffles around it. And you can tell me nothing.

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Speaker 1: It didn't matter if I had on jeans, and no

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Speaker 1: matter how I had on shorts, I was wearing my

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Speaker 1: Easter shoes right to the point where even if my

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Speaker 1: family was kind of like a joke, it was like

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Speaker 1: she gonna put them East shoes on, I shoe was

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Speaker 1: And and so I remember there was this fight. There

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Speaker 1: was this these on my block. There was um, these

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Speaker 1: big boys that were getting ready to um that were

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Speaker 1: messing with this little boy right who I knew was

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Speaker 1: scared and who was afraid now Here I am. I'm

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Speaker 1: the I'm the runner bunch. I'm the smallest of the bunch,

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Speaker 1: and I'm a girl a boy the way right, And

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Speaker 1: there was nothing in my mind that I had any

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Speaker 1: concern whether they beat me up or not. The only

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Speaker 1: thing I was thinking about is damn, I'm gonna scuff

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Speaker 1: up my Easter shoes. Other than that, I was ready

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Speaker 1: for it. So I say that to say in some ways,

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Speaker 1: I never remember it always my entire life. It always

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Speaker 1: I was always kind of obsessed with two things, you know.

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Speaker 1: The first thing was I never like to see people

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Speaker 1: be treated unfairly or treated in a way that I

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Speaker 1: thought that that's not right, you know. I had so

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Speaker 1: this this kind of sense of you should treat people well, right.

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Speaker 1: And then the second thing is I always had this

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Speaker 1: fascination with power. There's an also running joke of my

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Speaker 1: family that anywhere we would going out often would go

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Speaker 1: with my grandmother, because I lived the first part of

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Speaker 1: my life actually in Bobila, Alabama, my grandmother we would

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Speaker 1: go wherever we would go, I would say, I called

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Speaker 1: a mama. I was like, Mama, who who owned this?

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Speaker 1: You know, who who owns this? And she was like,

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Speaker 1: what we would be in Kmar? I said, MoMA who

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Speaker 1: owned k Mark? And She's like, maaybe, I don't know.

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Speaker 1: People like why you ask me? It didn't matter, right.

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Speaker 1: So I always had this desire and I and I,

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Speaker 1: you know, it was a desire. Now as I'm older,

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Speaker 1: I realized I always had this fascination with power. I

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Speaker 1: wanted to know who had the power to do things.

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Speaker 1: And I always had the sense of that's something that

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Speaker 1: you are not supposed to use You're not supposed to

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Speaker 1: use that against people. And so throughout kind of growing up,

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Speaker 1: I mean, I had, for the most part, a relatively

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Speaker 1: kind of normal childhood. I had a my family is

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Speaker 1: the bomb. Let me say that again. My family's the bay. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, they were working class. They were working class,

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Speaker 1: just really good people. Um. That that that lad. I

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Speaker 1: think at the end of the day, more than anything,

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Speaker 1: they didn't have money, but they really had a wealth

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Speaker 1: of ethics and belief on how you treat people and

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Speaker 1: how you move forward, you know. And so I had

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Speaker 1: and it was interested because I had this, I had

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Speaker 1: the extended family experience. It was my grandparents, um, and

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Speaker 1: my grandparents were always oh my granddad was born in

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Speaker 1: nineteen oh five, my grandmother was nineteen ten. So I

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Speaker 1: was like, I saw a picture when they were young,

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Speaker 1: and I was like, well, who are these people? They

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Speaker 1: were always older people and old and so you know,

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Speaker 1: I had this wisdom of these older people that you know,

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Speaker 1: I kind of grew under. And I think that was

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Speaker 1: part of the shaping. Um, that was part of my shaping.

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Speaker 1: It was my brother and I you know, I think

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Speaker 1: that that was part of my shaping. And then as

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Speaker 1: I this kind of natural inclination I had towards this,

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Speaker 1: this kind of understanding power and feeling like we could

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Speaker 1: you know, and I was it was a happy child.

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Speaker 1: I was a child. I was like, everybody supposed to

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Speaker 1: be happy? Aren't you supped to be happy? Like? How

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Speaker 1: can I make you happy? And so all of those

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Speaker 1: things I think shape who I am, even as an

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Speaker 1: activist before the policy ticks, you know, the it was

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Speaker 1: bout humanity that actually shaped who I am. And it

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Speaker 1: was the politics that kind of gave me some texture

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Speaker 1: around okay, how how it was necessary, how this whole

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Speaker 1: thing around power, how it plays itself out, for what

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Speaker 1: I could actually do to actually shape that, And so

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Speaker 1: that was part of you know, that was part of

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Speaker 1: kind of how I grew up. I had. I grew

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Speaker 1: up with this notion of you know, and then seeing

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Speaker 1: these different things that I didn't have the politics to

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Speaker 1: understand it at the time, but I remember thinking, what

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Speaker 1: is so magical about the rail road tracks as something?

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Speaker 1: No matter where I would go, right on this side

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Speaker 1: of railroad tracks, the houses look a certain kind of way,

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Speaker 1: and that's where white people live, right And then on

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Speaker 1: this side of railroad tracks. That's where black people are,

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Speaker 1: people of color lived, and so there was something about

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Speaker 1: that I had a deep sense of I don't know

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Speaker 1: how to explain it, but that ain't right, something right

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Speaker 1: about this, and so I always had kind of disinclination,

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Speaker 1: which I do believe that is just a part of

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Speaker 1: kind of a calling. And I'm not so certain that

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Speaker 1: that's not in all of us. You know, when I

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Speaker 1: when I talked to children, you know, yeah, it's right

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Speaker 1: from wrong um. The ability to see the difference UM

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Speaker 1: in a positive way in a negative way. You learned

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Speaker 1: that right away as a child. I I could see

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Speaker 1: you looking at these world world tracks saying, well, why

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Speaker 1: is that like that? And this is like this? When

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Speaker 1: I grew up, because I grew up in l A.

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Speaker 1: I remember telling my mom watching the news, I would

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Speaker 1: only see black people as gangsters and and robbers and

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Speaker 1: prostitutes and pimps. And it was always this image watching

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Speaker 1: the news, and I was like, that doesn't represent my family,

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Speaker 1: doesn't represent the black people I know. And while you're

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Speaker 1: not you're not able to articulate it. Those images sit

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Speaker 1: in your spirit. And I ask you, because when I

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Speaker 1: asked you, what an activist is or was? And do

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Speaker 1: you consider yourself one? I think about your story and

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Speaker 1: how you have arrived to where you are today, and

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Speaker 1: we're getting there. But you go to college, you don't

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Speaker 1: finish college because you get pregnant at that time, how

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Speaker 1: did you see your life? Could you have said to

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Speaker 1: to pregnant single Latasha that you would have an influential

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Speaker 1: voice in shaping how the South would be perceived for

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Speaker 1: voting rights and and and fighting for people who can't

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Speaker 1: speak for themselves. You know this is gonna sound different.

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Speaker 1: I was getting ready to say one thing, but just

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Speaker 1: kind of my spirit yes and no. No in the

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Speaker 1: sense that in that moment, I felt so deeply embarrassed.

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Speaker 1: This is my last year of college. I'm the you know,

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Speaker 1: I'm the grandchild. I am the in some ways, the

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Speaker 1: golden child. And my family always had good grades and

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Speaker 1: you know, I didn't really get in trouble. I was

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Speaker 1: actually a pretty good kid. And here it is that

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Speaker 1: it's kind of like the worst fear for the girl children,

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Speaker 1: for our families, like like you did pregnant, what you know?

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Speaker 1: And so I remember my family respond not respond at

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Speaker 1: all like I thought they were gonna respond I was scared.

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Speaker 1: I was literally probably almost three months pregnant before I

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Speaker 1: told him. I was terrified, um of how I would

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Speaker 1: tell them. And what was interesting is I remember calling

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Speaker 1: my grandmother because that's who I didn't want to let

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Speaker 1: Mama Dawn like I didn't everybody, I mean, like my

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Speaker 1: own mother, my un all of them, but my grandmother,

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Speaker 1: I'm like, that's my soul mate. And I remember calling

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Speaker 1: her and I remember she was like, she's like, well,

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Speaker 1: a baby, I guess we're gonna have us a new

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Speaker 1: little baby. That is not what I expected. I don't

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Speaker 1: know what I expected, but that's certainly wasn't it right?

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Speaker 1: And so all of they never created a space for

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Speaker 1: me to stay and to live in shame, even though

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Speaker 1: you know, I thought in high school if I got pregnant,

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Speaker 1: they were gonna kill me. Like that was point, like

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Speaker 1: it was just gonna be it was gonna I was

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Speaker 1: gonna be dead. I was it right, And so, you know,

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Speaker 1: but once I was in college, they were and I

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Speaker 1: remember my my my grandmother saying, baby wrong you that

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Speaker 1: like we're gonna be fine. We're just gonna have us

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Speaker 1: a new little baby, and and it and it that's

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Speaker 1: probably one of the times that my family showed up

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Speaker 1: for me in a way that I just that I

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Speaker 1: really understood the power of family because it was it

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Speaker 1: was very difficult. I wasn't just embarrassed for you know

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Speaker 1: how how they would receive it, but I was embarrassed

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Speaker 1: on myself. I was shamed. I was I was ashamed.

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Speaker 1: I felt I had let myself down. I felt like, okay,

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Speaker 1: now how I'm gonna continue and I'm gonna had this

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Speaker 1: little baby to take care of, and you know, it

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Speaker 1: was just all those things that that as a as

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Speaker 1: a young person, and and at the end of the day,

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Speaker 1: you know, I got one of those kind of families

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Speaker 1: care I got one of those families that everybody married,

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Speaker 1: even the people that don't like each other, they get married.

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Speaker 1: Everybody gonna get married, right uhh. The fact that that

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Speaker 1: I was single and I wasn't married, like it was

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Speaker 1: just you know, all of those things, which I think

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Speaker 1: is important for us to kind of realize how much

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Speaker 1: sometimes this fear we're hold in our head and it's

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Speaker 1: not really real, it's in our head. And so out

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Speaker 1: of that though, that one that was the best decision

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Speaker 1: I made in my life, though, to go forward right,

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Speaker 1: because I had to own my power. I had to

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Speaker 1: own I actually learned in that moment around only your

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Speaker 1: your what you perceived as a mistake, and how you

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Speaker 1: could really embrace it in a way that it would

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Speaker 1: come you know, that it would become a blessing, you know,

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Speaker 1: I you know I often. I don't know if I've

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Speaker 1: ever publicly shared this story. I think you know. I

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Speaker 1: actually had seriously contemplated, but I wasn't making a lot

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Speaker 1: of money in the time. I think I was making

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Speaker 1: like six six dollars an hour. You know. I had

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Speaker 1: attempted to have an abortion, and the challenge with it

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Speaker 1: was I raised them. I came up with the money. Um,

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Speaker 1: my son's father was really clear about he wasn't gonna participate,

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Speaker 1: Like he like I wouldn't even tell him, like he

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Speaker 1: was like he wasn't gonna participate. And so I saved

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Speaker 1: up the money and I had gone to his interests.

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Speaker 1: I had gone to a m and Arby's on my

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Speaker 1: way to the place and had some food and got

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Speaker 1: to the place which was two hours away, the clinic

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Speaker 1: two hours away, and my purse was gone. So all

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Speaker 1: of this money, this money that I had saved it

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Speaker 1: was a big deal for me because I wasn't making

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Speaker 1: it many it was done, it was gone, and so

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Speaker 1: you know what happened, Like I do the money, I

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Speaker 1: just like my purse was gone. I don't know where

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Speaker 1: my purse was, no nothing, um And so you know,

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Speaker 1: I was like, okay, I will say this. You know,

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Speaker 1: it's a it's a very long kind of story around

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Speaker 1: how this happened. But when I was seven months break

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Speaker 1: that I got a By this time, I had moved

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Speaker 1: back home. You know, we're excited, we're about to have

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Speaker 1: the baby. Baby, and I this particular day, I decided

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Speaker 1: that I was gonna go pick my baby's crib. I

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Speaker 1: was gonna go and get all this stuff in his

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Speaker 1: crib because at that point I had leaned into it.

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Speaker 1: And I got a letter in the midil from Arby's.

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Speaker 1: And I opened up the letter and it's like a

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Speaker 1: seven hundred dollar check. I'm like, what is this? Where

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Speaker 1: is this from? So it's what essentially happened, which I

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Speaker 1: had no idea earlier, the um my purse. I had

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Speaker 1: left my purse in in Arby's and the manager and

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Speaker 1: one of the workers stole it and split the money,

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Speaker 1: and so the manager. The worker got caught stealing, and

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Speaker 1: the manager fired him, and so the worker turned on

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Speaker 1: and so I literally arbies wanted me to testify against them.

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Speaker 1: I didn't, um, but but that was the money. That

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Speaker 1: was your same money. It was the same money. So

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Speaker 1: they gave you your money, that gave me my money back, right,

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Speaker 1: So it was just you know, that's why, Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: think like moving, just move. Part of part of what

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Speaker 1: I really understand is I also understand I am a

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Speaker 1: spiritual being having a human experience, and there's some things

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Speaker 1: that I control and there's some things that I do

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Speaker 1: not control, right, and so whenever I'm kind of led

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Speaker 1: in spirit to move towards something right, and even that's

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Speaker 1: that like I and even the sense of justice. You know,

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Speaker 1: I didn't need anybody to politicize me to tell me

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Speaker 1: that these houses don't look like these houses, and the

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Speaker 1: people over there don't look like those folks. I didn't

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Speaker 1: need a whole political story. I'm just looking at him

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Speaker 1: like some name, right with that why these people can't

364
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Speaker 1: have houses like that? Right? And so I think I

365
00:19:17,280 --> 00:19:19,840
Speaker 1: think on some level it is all each of us

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Speaker 1: have this sense. There's an innate sense, there's of course

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Speaker 1: we're socializable. Some things are right and wrong, and that

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00:19:25,920 --> 00:19:29,040
Speaker 1: comes from variety of things, but there's some basic pieces

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Speaker 1: that a child like like hits another child, that child, No,

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Speaker 1: that's just not right. You're causing pain. And so I

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Speaker 1: think that part of all of us. I'm hoping that

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Speaker 1: even with my work, which is more it's less political

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Speaker 1: than it is around how do we awaken kind of

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Speaker 1: this humanity in us to move us to action so

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Speaker 1: that we're willing to actually be able to protect and

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Speaker 1: prevent other people from causing harm. That's it, That's all

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Speaker 1: I wanna do. You talk about humanity in such a

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00:19:59,359 --> 00:20:03,760
Speaker 1: beautiful way, because because this is the basics, like we are,

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00:20:03,920 --> 00:20:05,960
Speaker 1: we're born with that, we know that we have that

380
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Speaker 1: in us. How do we activate it is a beautiful

381
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Speaker 1: question because everyone has to care and what ignites us

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Speaker 1: to care. We can get into a list of things

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Speaker 1: that are happening right now, But for you, what was it?

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00:20:19,240 --> 00:20:23,120
Speaker 1: What was it that the single mother decided to do

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00:20:24,400 --> 00:20:27,760
Speaker 1: that really puts you on the trajectory of essentially being

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Speaker 1: the activists that you are today. Listen, this is a

387
00:20:31,680 --> 00:20:34,480
Speaker 1: this is a funny story. I when I moved back home,

388
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Speaker 1: I went and found the job. I was uh seven

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Speaker 1: months pregnant. The same time, I was seven months pregnant,

390
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Speaker 1: and I decided I'm gonna work. I'm just one of

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Speaker 1: those foulls. I was like, I just can't be sitting

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Speaker 1: at the house, like I gotta give you a job.

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Speaker 1: So I literally went and found me a job at

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Speaker 1: seven months pregnant, got hired UM and within three days

395
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Speaker 1: I got a promotion from UM and hired me as

396
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Speaker 1: a sales clerk. They took me to be becoming a

397
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Speaker 1: manager by the end of the week. UM. This Korean

398
00:21:01,280 --> 00:21:03,920
Speaker 1: family that I worked with was like, you are like amazing.

399
00:21:03,960 --> 00:21:06,480
Speaker 1: I was like, okay, great, so this was more money.

400
00:21:06,600 --> 00:21:08,960
Speaker 1: It was fine, mind you, I'm seven and a half

401
00:21:09,000 --> 00:21:12,600
Speaker 1: months pregnant now, but UM, the in in that space

402
00:21:12,640 --> 00:21:16,080
Speaker 1: what was interesting? I worked at this I worked at

403
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Speaker 1: this UM Korean clothing shop and they were actually really gracious.

404
00:21:20,560 --> 00:21:23,320
Speaker 1: I learned a lot from them around family can answer

405
00:21:23,440 --> 00:21:26,320
Speaker 1: question where were you selling? What? What? What? What were

406
00:21:26,320 --> 00:21:30,560
Speaker 1: you selling? In the listen the chief jeans that we

407
00:21:30,680 --> 00:21:35,359
Speaker 1: like in you know, the Call of Jeans, and and

408
00:21:35,440 --> 00:21:39,760
Speaker 1: so as you was that rainbow before rainbow listen? It

409
00:21:39,840 --> 00:21:43,479
Speaker 1: was okay, this I was that fact. Listen, it was

410
00:21:43,720 --> 00:21:45,760
Speaker 1: that is the best way to describe it. It was

411
00:21:45,840 --> 00:21:49,200
Speaker 1: the fashion nobody at the time, right, And so I

412
00:21:49,240 --> 00:21:53,040
Speaker 1: was managing this, this this clothing store, and I'd like

413
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Speaker 1: to read. I'm an avid reader. Um. Even though I

414
00:21:55,960 --> 00:21:57,520
Speaker 1: think the Internet and messed me up a little bit,

415
00:21:57,520 --> 00:21:59,359
Speaker 1: I don't read as much as I used to. Um

416
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Speaker 1: outside of but I was an avid reader. I always

417
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Speaker 1: take three books. I always have like a spiritual book.

418
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Speaker 1: I always have a non fiction in the fiction book.

419
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Speaker 1: And so it's in in this. It was a platform

420
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Speaker 1: at this store that I worked worked at, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of folks, like you know the the Korean stores

422
00:22:13,920 --> 00:22:16,160
Speaker 1: where they have a platform high so you can look around,

423
00:22:16,240 --> 00:22:18,320
Speaker 1: they can watch the whole store was having the whole store.

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Speaker 1: So I would always um, I had had my baby,

425
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Speaker 1: I would always read these books, but I would always

426
00:22:24,720 --> 00:22:28,320
Speaker 1: have create like the soapbox. I would always tell people

427
00:22:28,320 --> 00:22:30,160
Speaker 1: about the books I read. And so I was stand

428
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Speaker 1: up on the platform to the point where my customers

429
00:22:32,520 --> 00:22:33,680
Speaker 1: would come in and I was like, well, what did

430
00:22:33,680 --> 00:22:36,159
Speaker 1: you read this week? And so this particular week I

431
00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:39,080
Speaker 1: had read before the Mayflower and so it had blown

432
00:22:39,160 --> 00:22:41,680
Speaker 1: my mind. I was just like I had blowed my mind,

433
00:22:41,720 --> 00:22:44,280
Speaker 1: and so I stood. I was at the counter and

434
00:22:44,400 --> 00:22:47,280
Speaker 1: I was sharing all this information I learned from before

435
00:22:47,320 --> 00:22:50,359
Speaker 1: the Mayflower and this little the crowd, my customers. It

436
00:22:50,400 --> 00:22:52,800
Speaker 1: was like five of them, these sisters were sitting around

437
00:22:52,840 --> 00:22:54,320
Speaker 1: and we were talking about it, and I was it

438
00:22:54,359 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 1: was like I was holding court, like I'm telling them

439
00:22:56,119 --> 00:22:58,879
Speaker 1: about I'm doing a book review basically right yeah, you

440
00:22:59,040 --> 00:23:01,960
Speaker 1: like I'm opens Boo Club right now. I am listening.

441
00:23:02,200 --> 00:23:07,159
Speaker 1: I am the book club right now right and and

442
00:23:07,240 --> 00:23:11,520
Speaker 1: this is the n and you're doing it. I was

443
00:23:11,560 --> 00:23:15,160
Speaker 1: doing it, and so I am. As I'm doing that.

444
00:23:15,200 --> 00:23:17,680
Speaker 1: There's this woman who doesn't say anything. She I knew

445
00:23:17,680 --> 00:23:19,200
Speaker 1: she went from the area and she just standing in

446
00:23:19,280 --> 00:23:22,520
Speaker 1: the cut. After everybody, I ring everybody up. She gets

447
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:25,680
Speaker 1: up and she says, you know, I have this program

448
00:23:25,760 --> 00:23:29,480
Speaker 1: on Friday UM in the local housing UM community and

449
00:23:29,520 --> 00:23:32,480
Speaker 1: the public housing community, and you should really think about

450
00:23:32,520 --> 00:23:35,600
Speaker 1: being an organized because people like to listen to you.

451
00:23:35,720 --> 00:23:39,040
Speaker 1: And I and I was like, um okay. I was like,

452
00:23:39,040 --> 00:23:41,360
Speaker 1: oh about my books, right, And she was like, no,

453
00:23:41,520 --> 00:23:43,439
Speaker 1: I think you you know, I think people would like

454
00:23:43,480 --> 00:23:45,199
Speaker 1: to listen to you, and so you should come to

455
00:23:45,240 --> 00:23:47,160
Speaker 1: this program. I would love for you to speak. I've

456
00:23:47,200 --> 00:23:50,119
Speaker 1: never spoken in public in that kind of capacity before.

457
00:23:50,520 --> 00:23:52,520
Speaker 1: And so a couple of days later, I show up

458
00:23:52,520 --> 00:23:54,680
Speaker 1: to this program and I was so nervous about it.

459
00:23:54,720 --> 00:23:57,159
Speaker 1: I remember writing this speech. It was for young people,

460
00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:00,080
Speaker 1: young people who lived in this house, this public, the

461
00:24:00,080 --> 00:24:03,159
Speaker 1: same community. And so I show up and I worked

462
00:24:03,160 --> 00:24:04,960
Speaker 1: on this speech and I wrote this speech because that's

463
00:24:04,960 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 1: what you're supposed to do. You supposed to write out speeches.

464
00:24:07,000 --> 00:24:09,320
Speaker 1: And I wrote this speech and I'm sitting in the

465
00:24:09,400 --> 00:24:12,840
Speaker 1: audience and and i go up to the podium and

466
00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:14,720
Speaker 1: I look in the audience and I'm just and I

467
00:24:14,760 --> 00:24:17,639
Speaker 1: see black kids everywhere, and I'm like, damn, want to

468
00:24:17,680 --> 00:24:19,720
Speaker 1: hit this speech. And so I get up to the

469
00:24:19,760 --> 00:24:21,720
Speaker 1: microphone and I was like, listen, y'all. I worked on

470
00:24:21,760 --> 00:24:24,800
Speaker 1: this speech all week because this is like my first

471
00:24:24,840 --> 00:24:27,240
Speaker 1: speech in this way. I was like, but y'all don't

472
00:24:27,240 --> 00:24:29,560
Speaker 1: want to hear speech. Y'all want somebody. I was like,

473
00:24:30,080 --> 00:24:32,280
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna share, share what I feel. And I

474
00:24:32,400 --> 00:24:35,199
Speaker 1: tore the speech up and the kids loved it. There

475
00:24:35,280 --> 00:24:38,720
Speaker 1: was like okay, okay, and so um. Right after that,

476
00:24:39,000 --> 00:24:42,480
Speaker 1: right after that event, the same woman who worked with

477
00:24:42,480 --> 00:24:44,600
Speaker 1: this Organzaztion called always Sence Too. She was like, I'm

478
00:24:44,640 --> 00:24:47,920
Speaker 1: serious about being an organizer. You know you should. Actually

479
00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:52,320
Speaker 1: we're doing this project where we are organizing residents of

480
00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:55,280
Speaker 1: of public housing to become a part of this this

481
00:24:55,400 --> 00:24:59,119
Speaker 1: public housing um of Residence Council to create this governing body.

482
00:24:59,680 --> 00:25:02,119
Speaker 1: And and I was like okay, And I started working

483
00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:04,399
Speaker 1: with them, and I was actually really really good. I

484
00:25:04,440 --> 00:25:06,959
Speaker 1: was started being really good and I loved it. I

485
00:25:07,000 --> 00:25:09,800
Speaker 1: loved talking to people. That's where it was, was like, Okay,

486
00:25:09,800 --> 00:25:12,639
Speaker 1: this is power. This is like I'm talking to black people.

487
00:25:13,040 --> 00:25:15,480
Speaker 1: I'm like, okay, I like this. And I remember I

488
00:25:15,520 --> 00:25:17,440
Speaker 1: didn't quit mother job, and I was still as ends.

489
00:25:17,480 --> 00:25:21,040
Speaker 1: It still was over at Fashion Noble, right, But I

490
00:25:21,560 --> 00:25:24,159
Speaker 1: was doing this on the side and I loved it.

491
00:25:24,160 --> 00:25:26,000
Speaker 1: I did it in a tuskeee and I did it itself.

492
00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:30,400
Speaker 1: But and then that experience really changed my life. There

493
00:25:30,440 --> 00:25:33,240
Speaker 1: was a woman named Miss Carolin. I often tell this

494
00:25:33,280 --> 00:25:36,800
Speaker 1: story about how I became an organizing. I was organizing,

495
00:25:36,880 --> 00:25:39,239
Speaker 1: but this is how I became an organizer. There we

496
00:25:39,240 --> 00:25:42,160
Speaker 1: were having in one of the housing communities. They had

497
00:25:42,200 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 1: a they had a meeting at the end of the

498
00:25:43,880 --> 00:25:46,639
Speaker 1: month and they needed to have people attended meeting so

499
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:49,560
Speaker 1: they could set up this governing body. And so everybody said,

500
00:25:49,600 --> 00:25:51,320
Speaker 1: if you want folks and range day to come, you

501
00:25:51,359 --> 00:25:53,240
Speaker 1: gotta have miss Carroll. I was like, they were like,

502
00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:54,800
Speaker 1: you gotta go to miss Caroliny told me where Miss

503
00:25:54,800 --> 00:25:57,840
Speaker 1: Caroline lived. I had gone around in Campas the whole area,

504
00:25:58,200 --> 00:26:00,520
Speaker 1: and so I went to Miss Caroline's house, knocked on

505
00:26:00,560 --> 00:26:02,320
Speaker 1: the door. She was like, come on me and baby.

506
00:26:02,320 --> 00:26:04,760
Speaker 1: She was an older black woman, and I came in

507
00:26:04,880 --> 00:26:07,080
Speaker 1: and I'm giving her my whole spiell. She said she

508
00:26:07,160 --> 00:26:09,639
Speaker 1: never looks at me. One time she got younger wrestlers,

509
00:26:09,640 --> 00:26:11,560
Speaker 1: she was like, you look at the younger wrestlers, maybe

510
00:26:11,600 --> 00:26:13,040
Speaker 1: you need to look at what Jack and nick are

511
00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:17,840
Speaker 1: doing right now. And I was like, oh, so every

512
00:26:17,840 --> 00:26:20,720
Speaker 1: time I try to talk about this thing, that this

513
00:26:20,720 --> 00:26:23,639
Speaker 1: this residence council, she won't. She cuts me off. And

514
00:26:23,640 --> 00:26:26,160
Speaker 1: she donna say about the Chancellor and Jack and Nikki

515
00:26:26,440 --> 00:26:30,240
Speaker 1: and like Victor. And I was like okay, and I don't.

516
00:26:30,280 --> 00:26:31,520
Speaker 1: I don't know what to do. I don't know how

517
00:26:31,560 --> 00:26:33,560
Speaker 1: to get out of it. And so she was like,

518
00:26:33,560 --> 00:26:35,160
Speaker 1: you want something to eat, She's gonna give me something

519
00:26:35,160 --> 00:26:37,800
Speaker 1: to drink and then literally any time I opened up

520
00:26:37,800 --> 00:26:40,000
Speaker 1: my mouth, she started talking about it. So I sat

521
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:42,400
Speaker 1: there for a little while and I was like, Okay.

522
00:26:42,720 --> 00:26:44,480
Speaker 1: I left and I was like, I'm gonna go back.

523
00:26:44,800 --> 00:26:47,800
Speaker 1: So a couple of days later, I'm back at the house.

524
00:26:48,320 --> 00:26:50,360
Speaker 1: I do the same thing. She does the same thing.

525
00:26:50,760 --> 00:26:53,280
Speaker 1: She cuts me off, and it's not on TV now,

526
00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:54,480
Speaker 1: but she still want to talk to me about the

527
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:57,600
Speaker 1: younger wrestlers. So after a while, you know, after that,

528
00:26:57,640 --> 00:26:59,800
Speaker 1: I was like, I gotta get miss Caroline. And so

529
00:26:59,880 --> 00:27:01,760
Speaker 1: I kept going by there, and we kept going through

530
00:27:01,760 --> 00:27:03,960
Speaker 1: this little dance. Now I realized she was hazing me.

531
00:27:04,240 --> 00:27:06,760
Speaker 1: I kept going by, going through this little dance, and

532
00:27:06,840 --> 00:27:09,960
Speaker 1: so at some point I actually just enjoyed her. I

533
00:27:10,040 --> 00:27:12,000
Speaker 1: just like really enjoyed her when I would go back there.

534
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:13,600
Speaker 1: So I'll go back there, I try to talk to

535
00:27:13,600 --> 00:27:16,200
Speaker 1: her about it. She'll talk about the younger wrestless and

536
00:27:16,240 --> 00:27:18,840
Speaker 1: then we'll just talk. We'll just talk and then I leave.

537
00:27:19,240 --> 00:27:22,600
Speaker 1: And so this particular day, I go in, I have

538
00:27:22,760 --> 00:27:24,960
Speaker 1: my note bed, I put in my book bag. I

539
00:27:25,040 --> 00:27:27,840
Speaker 1: go in. This is after about two weeks. I go in,

540
00:27:28,000 --> 00:27:30,720
Speaker 1: I put my book bag down, and I sit down

541
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:32,119
Speaker 1: in a chair, and I said, what what Jack and

542
00:27:32,240 --> 00:27:35,480
Speaker 1: Nick did the day? Um, miss Caroline? And she said,

543
00:27:36,000 --> 00:27:40,760
Speaker 1: real serious? Where is your Where is your clipboard? I said,

544
00:27:40,960 --> 00:27:44,920
Speaker 1: my clipboard? She said your clipboard? I saw I put

545
00:27:44,920 --> 00:27:46,159
Speaker 1: it in my bag. But why you don't have it?

546
00:27:46,200 --> 00:27:47,840
Speaker 1: Then the people have you? Are you? Are you supposed

547
00:27:47,840 --> 00:27:50,159
Speaker 1: to be organizing? I said yes, ma'am, yes, man. She

548
00:27:50,160 --> 00:27:52,240
Speaker 1: said where you clipboard? Don't you want me to sign it?

549
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:54,879
Speaker 1: And I said yes, ma'am. So I take the clipboard

550
00:27:54,880 --> 00:27:59,200
Speaker 1: out and she signs it right, And so that what's

551
00:27:59,240 --> 00:28:03,200
Speaker 1: little lesson? What is the lasson? The that lesson? And

552
00:28:03,280 --> 00:28:06,600
Speaker 1: that was it was the moment that I showed up

553
00:28:06,760 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 1: for her, the moment that she knew I came to

554
00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:12,280
Speaker 1: her house, not because I wanted something for her from her,

555
00:28:12,600 --> 00:28:15,359
Speaker 1: but that I showed up like I saw her and

556
00:28:15,400 --> 00:28:18,439
Speaker 1: I was with her right that that moment is the

557
00:28:18,520 --> 00:28:22,119
Speaker 1: moment that literally I organized. And from that day it

558
00:28:22,160 --> 00:28:25,159
Speaker 1: has changed my life that I never let them that

559
00:28:25,280 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 1: whatever I'm organizing for, it is never greater than the

560
00:28:28,280 --> 00:28:32,040
Speaker 1: people that I'm organized. Sometimes people are organizing, you're asking

561
00:28:32,080 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 1: you to say something. You know, you're just a number.

562
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:35,719
Speaker 1: They're just trying to get their numbers up, or they

563
00:28:35,800 --> 00:28:37,159
Speaker 1: just like they don't care about you, they don't care

564
00:28:37,200 --> 00:28:38,920
Speaker 1: about your day, they don't care what's going on with you.

565
00:28:39,360 --> 00:28:41,960
Speaker 1: It was in that over that period of two weeks

566
00:28:41,960 --> 00:28:46,280
Speaker 1: that Ms Carolyn Hays me essentially I learned to care

567
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:49,160
Speaker 1: about her and love to spend time with her. And

568
00:28:49,200 --> 00:28:50,960
Speaker 1: so the day that I walked up in her house

569
00:28:51,000 --> 00:28:53,520
Speaker 1: that I didn't care nothing about her signing that paper, right,

570
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:55,239
Speaker 1: that was like at the end of the day, I

571
00:28:55,320 --> 00:28:56,840
Speaker 1: was there because I wanted to spend time. I want

572
00:28:56,840 --> 00:28:58,880
Speaker 1: to see Miss Caroline. I was like, I wanted to

573
00:28:58,880 --> 00:29:00,960
Speaker 1: know how she was doing. I wanted to hear about

574
00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:03,800
Speaker 1: what she was interested in. That was the moment that

575
00:29:03,840 --> 00:29:06,840
Speaker 1: I organized her And two days three days later, when

576
00:29:06,840 --> 00:29:09,000
Speaker 1: the meeting happened, it was packed. And guess how we

577
00:29:09,040 --> 00:29:11,160
Speaker 1: got packed because Ms Carolyn got on the phone and

578
00:29:11,240 --> 00:29:14,360
Speaker 1: called the folks. And so I have never forgotten that.

579
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:16,960
Speaker 1: And I think we I think anything that we do,

580
00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:19,200
Speaker 1: I mean that's the part of kind of the humanity

581
00:29:19,240 --> 00:29:21,760
Speaker 1: of peace, anything we do. But that has also been

582
00:29:21,800 --> 00:29:23,520
Speaker 1: my approach with Black Voters Matter, and the way that

583
00:29:23,560 --> 00:29:27,160
Speaker 1: I organized that. If I'm organizing, I've seen people who

584
00:29:27,200 --> 00:29:30,200
Speaker 1: are registering folks to vote and then someone says, well

585
00:29:30,240 --> 00:29:32,440
Speaker 1: I got a felony and they were like oh, and

586
00:29:32,440 --> 00:29:35,440
Speaker 1: they just walked down. That ain't my position, right, Like

587
00:29:35,520 --> 00:29:38,120
Speaker 1: you matter because you matter, Like you don't matter even

588
00:29:38,120 --> 00:29:40,320
Speaker 1: that this phrase around. You know, if you don't vote,

589
00:29:40,320 --> 00:29:42,840
Speaker 1: you don't matter. That how disrespectful that is. At the

590
00:29:42,920 --> 00:29:45,040
Speaker 1: end of the day, you matter because you're a human being.

591
00:29:45,440 --> 00:29:48,120
Speaker 1: Right you're voting? Is you using that agency to come

592
00:29:48,160 --> 00:29:50,600
Speaker 1: out of that? And so that has been my organizing

593
00:29:50,640 --> 00:29:54,480
Speaker 1: approach from that day forward that I would never organize

594
00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:57,440
Speaker 1: in a way that at the very that that did

595
00:29:57,520 --> 00:30:00,520
Speaker 1: not put the people who I'm organizing first, that they

596
00:30:00,520 --> 00:30:03,320
Speaker 1: would be centered and then the issues and everything else

597
00:30:03,360 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 1: would be a wrapped around there. Then you and so

598
00:30:05,680 --> 00:30:07,920
Speaker 1: you have led me to where I was going to go.

599
00:30:08,480 --> 00:30:11,720
Speaker 1: That is a beautiful statement. It's about the people first

600
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:15,200
Speaker 1: and everything else after that. Um and and doing large

601
00:30:15,200 --> 00:30:18,680
Speaker 1: part why you have been able to have the audience

602
00:30:18,680 --> 00:30:21,160
Speaker 1: with the people you have audience with, or how it's

603
00:30:21,360 --> 00:30:23,800
Speaker 1: why you're able to make phone calls and be influential

604
00:30:23,840 --> 00:30:28,080
Speaker 1: and presidential races, um and and and and really truly

605
00:30:28,640 --> 00:30:31,080
Speaker 1: work from a place of what do the people need?

606
00:30:31,880 --> 00:30:35,920
Speaker 1: You ran for elected office twice in Alabama. UM, it

607
00:30:35,960 --> 00:30:40,120
Speaker 1: did not come to fruition to my to my naked eye,

608
00:30:41,200 --> 00:30:43,520
Speaker 1: that was great because it puts you in a position

609
00:30:43,560 --> 00:30:47,800
Speaker 1: to meet people, to realize that you're what other qualities

610
00:30:47,840 --> 00:30:50,560
Speaker 1: you have as in consulting, so you start these businesses.

611
00:30:50,880 --> 00:30:52,960
Speaker 1: I mean you've I mean you out here moving. But

612
00:30:53,320 --> 00:30:57,160
Speaker 1: arguably probably the most notable is Black voters Matter. Talk

613
00:30:57,240 --> 00:31:00,560
Speaker 1: to me in sixteen. How that all came about? Obviously

614
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:02,560
Speaker 1: based on the work that you have been doing years before.

615
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:06,120
Speaker 1: You know. At one, I'm glad you you raised that

616
00:31:06,120 --> 00:31:10,240
Speaker 1: I've run from office. I had been a organizer. I'm

617
00:31:10,280 --> 00:31:12,920
Speaker 1: a youth organizer, and every issue you can name, from

618
00:31:12,920 --> 00:31:15,520
Speaker 1: criminal justice reform to education, all of those things that

619
00:31:15,520 --> 00:31:17,680
Speaker 1: I worked on on some level. The first time I

620
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:21,080
Speaker 1: ran for office, I didn't think that I was at

621
00:31:21,200 --> 00:31:23,840
Speaker 1: at anyway. I didn't think I would be a Bible candidate. Um,

622
00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:25,640
Speaker 1: it was really around. It was for the Board of

623
00:31:25,760 --> 00:31:27,840
Speaker 1: Education because of the way that they were treating young

624
00:31:27,880 --> 00:31:30,280
Speaker 1: people and the way that there was this inequity of

625
00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:33,320
Speaker 1: how certain schools were funded and others weren't right. And

626
00:31:33,360 --> 00:31:36,280
Speaker 1: so I wound up getting in that race to actually

627
00:31:36,320 --> 00:31:39,400
Speaker 1: create a platform to literally be able to talk about

628
00:31:39,440 --> 00:31:41,560
Speaker 1: the issues that I didn't hear anybody else talking about, right,

629
00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:45,240
Speaker 1: and so UM, ultimately, in that race, what I did,

630
00:31:45,320 --> 00:31:48,240
Speaker 1: that's how I got introduced to voter suppression, which goes

631
00:31:48,280 --> 00:31:51,160
Speaker 1: back to kind of UM with with foundation of black

632
00:31:51,240 --> 00:31:53,800
Speaker 1: voters matter. You know, in that race, long story short,

633
00:31:53,840 --> 00:31:56,840
Speaker 1: and that race, you know, it was so hard to

634
00:31:56,880 --> 00:31:58,720
Speaker 1: call that it took from seven days to call the race,

635
00:31:58,760 --> 00:32:03,160
Speaker 1: and I ultimately lost by UM at the time, it

636
00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:06,000
Speaker 1: was a hundred and seventeen votes, and so the race

637
00:32:06,080 --> 00:32:08,600
Speaker 1: was called on the seventh day, which means, you know,

638
00:32:08,640 --> 00:32:10,720
Speaker 1: and I thought that I lost, it was fine. I

639
00:32:10,800 --> 00:32:14,000
Speaker 1: moved on. I called my opponent and said congratulations, and

640
00:32:14,080 --> 00:32:16,440
Speaker 1: so the race was certified at twelve. At twelve or five,

641
00:32:16,480 --> 00:32:19,040
Speaker 1: I got a phone call from my mentor, who was

642
00:32:19,080 --> 00:32:21,800
Speaker 1: a senator. And then at five minutes later, I got

643
00:32:21,800 --> 00:32:24,200
Speaker 1: a phone call from the head of the Democratic Party

644
00:32:24,200 --> 00:32:27,840
Speaker 1: from the States saying starting off apologizing to me, saying, Latasha,

645
00:32:27,840 --> 00:32:30,160
Speaker 1: I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry, and like, Okay, I'm

646
00:32:30,200 --> 00:32:31,840
Speaker 1: thinking to myself, well, I know I lost, but I

647
00:32:31,880 --> 00:32:33,560
Speaker 1: was like, well, you know, he was like supporting me

648
00:32:33,640 --> 00:32:36,040
Speaker 1: like that. UM, But that's not what he was talking about.

649
00:32:36,080 --> 00:32:39,320
Speaker 1: What he was talking about was a sheriff in one

650
00:32:39,320 --> 00:32:43,760
Speaker 1: of the counties called and said that he forgot that

651
00:32:43,880 --> 00:32:47,320
Speaker 1: he had eight hundred ballots, absolutee ballots that he had

652
00:32:47,440 --> 00:32:51,200
Speaker 1: placed in a safe and so in my naivety, I'm like, oh,

653
00:32:51,200 --> 00:32:53,200
Speaker 1: well that's good because that's a county that I carried,

654
00:32:53,280 --> 00:32:56,320
Speaker 1: and so of course those votes were cast before the election,

655
00:32:56,400 --> 00:32:58,440
Speaker 1: so I'm thinking they're gonna count the votes. He was like, no,

656
00:32:58,520 --> 00:33:00,640
Speaker 1: the race is certified. I was like, what does that mean?

657
00:33:00,640 --> 00:33:04,120
Speaker 1: It's like that that is that that means they don't count.

658
00:33:04,480 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 1: And so it was really at that moment I remember

659
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:09,800
Speaker 1: feeling hole powerless. I'm like, y'all just gonna let them

660
00:33:09,800 --> 00:33:12,080
Speaker 1: still erase. They're just gonna still erase. And there was

661
00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 1: no repercussions for that, right, And so that was like

662
00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:18,480
Speaker 1: one of my first like in my face around how

663
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:20,880
Speaker 1: voter suppression and it was. And then I found out,

664
00:33:20,920 --> 00:33:22,960
Speaker 1: even after that had happened to me, I was talking

665
00:33:23,000 --> 00:33:25,280
Speaker 1: to others that that was so common, that it was

666
00:33:25,320 --> 00:33:27,240
Speaker 1: a common, like what we saw happen with Stacy A.

667
00:33:27,360 --> 00:33:30,760
Speaker 1: Rams and eighteen and across the board, that in these

668
00:33:30,800 --> 00:33:33,600
Speaker 1: places we see this kind of backlash. And so ultimately

669
00:33:34,040 --> 00:33:37,160
Speaker 1: in two thousand and sixteen, Cliff Um, Cliff Alright and

670
00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:39,720
Speaker 1: I who is the other founder of Black Voters Matter,

671
00:33:39,760 --> 00:33:43,320
Speaker 1: we have been doing organizing work up from two thousand together,

672
00:33:43,360 --> 00:33:45,040
Speaker 1: from two thousand together all the way to for the

673
00:33:45,040 --> 00:33:48,000
Speaker 1: sixteen years. And so what we wanted there was three things.

674
00:33:48,040 --> 00:33:49,680
Speaker 1: We were very clear. We were like we were we

675
00:33:49,680 --> 00:33:52,320
Speaker 1: were tired of this narrative like black people in the

676
00:33:52,320 --> 00:33:55,720
Speaker 1: southware powerless. The second thing is that we knew that

677
00:33:55,840 --> 00:33:58,480
Speaker 1: as organized as part of part of when you're challenging

678
00:33:58,520 --> 00:34:03,040
Speaker 1: power outside of we couldn't depend on just a political party.

679
00:34:03,080 --> 00:34:06,120
Speaker 1: We were like, this is about black, independent, black political power,

680
00:34:06,480 --> 00:34:08,279
Speaker 1: and in order to do that, we've got to really

681
00:34:08,320 --> 00:34:11,279
Speaker 1: be able to control the mechanism. We can't wait for

682
00:34:11,360 --> 00:34:13,560
Speaker 1: this person to send us five hours. We've got to

683
00:34:13,560 --> 00:34:17,200
Speaker 1: figure out how we're gonna build infrastructure ourselves, because oftentimes

684
00:34:17,520 --> 00:34:21,200
Speaker 1: in those elections what you would see is some resources

685
00:34:21,320 --> 00:34:23,279
Speaker 1: may or may not hit the ground, but if they did,

686
00:34:23,280 --> 00:34:25,560
Speaker 1: it was three weeks out. It was too late. It

687
00:34:25,600 --> 00:34:27,160
Speaker 1: was like, just round the negroes up and let's go

688
00:34:27,239 --> 00:34:30,520
Speaker 1: about our business. And so we were right and we

689
00:34:30,520 --> 00:34:32,160
Speaker 1: were not down with that it was like, no, no, no,

690
00:34:32,200 --> 00:34:35,239
Speaker 1: we're trying to build black This ain't about participating, this

691
00:34:35,320 --> 00:34:38,280
Speaker 1: is about how you build power. And so we created

692
00:34:38,320 --> 00:34:43,239
Speaker 1: this organization Black Voters Matter and Black Voters Matter FUN. Ironically,

693
00:34:43,239 --> 00:34:44,600
Speaker 1: we don't have any money at the time, but we

694
00:34:44,640 --> 00:34:46,960
Speaker 1: were really clear that what we wanted to do. We

695
00:34:47,000 --> 00:34:49,400
Speaker 1: wanted to create a mechanism that would do three things.

696
00:34:49,400 --> 00:34:51,480
Speaker 1: That one would putting money on the ground, that we

697
00:34:51,520 --> 00:34:54,240
Speaker 1: would fund grassroot groups too, That we would actually craft

698
00:34:54,239 --> 00:34:56,359
Speaker 1: a message that black people have power, that we would

699
00:34:56,440 --> 00:34:58,839
Speaker 1: be centered in that message. And three that were willa

700
00:34:58,880 --> 00:35:01,680
Speaker 1: mobilize us toward us that power. That would not be

701
00:35:02,239 --> 00:35:05,600
Speaker 1: um it wouldn't be contingent upon a party or a candidate,

702
00:35:05,760 --> 00:35:07,880
Speaker 1: That we wouldn't be candidate centered, that we wouldn't be

703
00:35:07,920 --> 00:35:10,040
Speaker 1: party centered, that who we would be we would be

704
00:35:10,040 --> 00:35:13,400
Speaker 1: Black centered. That we would be centered around we're engaged

705
00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:15,719
Speaker 1: in this political process and we're the first. I'm the

706
00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:18,279
Speaker 1: first to tell you neither Cliff or I think that

707
00:35:18,719 --> 00:35:20,799
Speaker 1: black liberation is gonna come through vote, and that's not

708
00:35:20,840 --> 00:35:23,920
Speaker 1: what we believe. What we do leave though, is that

709
00:35:23,920 --> 00:35:27,560
Speaker 1: that voting is a vehicle, at the very least to

710
00:35:27,640 --> 00:35:30,480
Speaker 1: reduce the harm happening to our community, that anything that

711
00:35:30,560 --> 00:35:32,759
Speaker 1: is governing us, we have agency, we should be a

712
00:35:32,760 --> 00:35:35,200
Speaker 1: part of that process. Um. And in three that it

713
00:35:35,360 --> 00:35:37,560
Speaker 1: is also a vehicle to be able to get resources

714
00:35:37,560 --> 00:35:40,400
Speaker 1: in our community and policy that impact our lives. And

715
00:35:40,440 --> 00:35:42,560
Speaker 1: so that's why we created it in two thousand and

716
00:35:42,600 --> 00:35:45,040
Speaker 1: sixteen with those three things in mind. We're gonna move

717
00:35:45,080 --> 00:35:46,759
Speaker 1: some money, We're gonna create us a message, and we're

718
00:35:46,760 --> 00:35:51,440
Speaker 1: gonna mobilize some black people. The biggest, biggest victory thus

719
00:35:51,440 --> 00:35:54,279
Speaker 1: far that you have been able to look back on

720
00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:56,640
Speaker 1: and say Black voters matter. Did that We we rallied

721
00:35:56,680 --> 00:35:59,360
Speaker 1: around the people. We we we took our power and

722
00:35:59,400 --> 00:36:03,520
Speaker 1: we used it. Are good. Ah, that's hard, But that's hardland, Um,

723
00:36:04,040 --> 00:36:06,200
Speaker 1: I was. It's a hard one and it's not you know.

724
00:36:06,239 --> 00:36:09,480
Speaker 1: The one that's probably most obvious is the Senate race. Listen,

725
00:36:09,520 --> 00:36:13,480
Speaker 1: we worked our tells off in the Georgia twenty twenty

726
00:36:13,680 --> 00:36:17,880
Speaker 1: one Centate race like that. Listen, that was a heavy lift.

727
00:36:17,960 --> 00:36:20,160
Speaker 1: This is after because I want to give people contact.

728
00:36:20,600 --> 00:36:24,120
Speaker 1: This is after the election, right, which we already know

729
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:27,480
Speaker 1: was intense, right, this is intense to get people out.

730
00:36:27,560 --> 00:36:30,799
Speaker 1: We have been working none stop for years and so

731
00:36:31,719 --> 00:36:34,040
Speaker 1: is normally after presidential election, that's used the time that

732
00:36:34,080 --> 00:36:37,919
Speaker 1: you're like you take a deep breath. Instead, here we've

733
00:36:37,920 --> 00:36:40,120
Speaker 1: got these two Senate seats, and it's not just as

734
00:36:40,160 --> 00:36:44,480
Speaker 1: like it's two Senate seats just locally. Now it has

735
00:36:44,560 --> 00:36:48,960
Speaker 1: national implications. It will determine who actually controls what, who

736
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:53,319
Speaker 1: controls Congress. Right, And so we immediately like just we

737
00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:55,600
Speaker 1: never stopped. Matter of fact, we went hard in the pain.

738
00:36:55,760 --> 00:36:58,080
Speaker 1: Like this was like we were like, you know, this

739
00:36:58,160 --> 00:36:59,840
Speaker 1: was the playoffs. We was like, no, no, no, this

740
00:36:59,880 --> 00:37:03,400
Speaker 1: is the championship game right here. And so we were

741
00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:07,480
Speaker 1: plain the finals, but we gotta win, right, And this

742
00:37:07,520 --> 00:37:09,960
Speaker 1: is I want you to be mindful, this is COVID

743
00:37:10,239 --> 00:37:14,680
Speaker 1: is happening. This is we got Thanksgiving coming up, we

744
00:37:14,800 --> 00:37:17,040
Speaker 1: got Christmas coming up, Like this is the holiday. The

745
00:37:17,040 --> 00:37:20,799
Speaker 1: election is the week after the first of the new year,

746
00:37:20,920 --> 00:37:23,640
Speaker 1: like who votes in the new year? Right, And so

747
00:37:23,880 --> 00:37:26,600
Speaker 1: we have all of those dynamics. But we were so

748
00:37:27,800 --> 00:37:31,160
Speaker 1: we were so committed to literally at the end of

749
00:37:31,200 --> 00:37:32,840
Speaker 1: the day, we were like, we're gonna fight for power.

750
00:37:33,000 --> 00:37:34,640
Speaker 1: At the end of the day, we were like we're

751
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:36,400
Speaker 1: gonna leave everything on the floor. We're gonna give it

752
00:37:36,480 --> 00:37:39,520
Speaker 1: everything we got blood, sweat and tears. And so probably

753
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:42,680
Speaker 1: the most um, you know, the most that we're known

754
00:37:42,719 --> 00:37:45,839
Speaker 1: for and had the biggest impact, I would say, would

755
00:37:45,840 --> 00:37:48,439
Speaker 1: be that Senate. That's the Senate, the two Senate seats

756
00:37:48,480 --> 00:37:50,839
Speaker 1: in Georgia. At the race that I think actually put

757
00:37:50,920 --> 00:37:53,000
Speaker 1: us on the map though was in Alabama and it's

758
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:54,759
Speaker 1: a it was a Senate seat. I don't know if

759
00:37:54,800 --> 00:37:58,520
Speaker 1: people recalled at two thousand and seventeen, there was a

760
00:37:58,560 --> 00:38:04,480
Speaker 1: Senate seat in a state now that is um seventy Republican,

761
00:38:04,880 --> 00:38:08,959
Speaker 1: right the state that you got population of African America's

762
00:38:09,040 --> 00:38:10,920
Speaker 1: you know, that was a heavy heavy lift. But we

763
00:38:10,960 --> 00:38:13,720
Speaker 1: had we knew we had some perfect storm issues working.

764
00:38:13,760 --> 00:38:16,239
Speaker 1: We knew that there was a Republican candidate that was

765
00:38:16,320 --> 00:38:20,520
Speaker 1: deeply flawed. We knew that it We had this really

766
00:38:20,560 --> 00:38:23,720
Speaker 1: moment because of because of that UM And it's funny,

767
00:38:23,719 --> 00:38:25,880
Speaker 1: it wasn't around about the candidates. What we did is

768
00:38:25,920 --> 00:38:28,680
Speaker 1: we shifted and created That's why we see the back

769
00:38:28,719 --> 00:38:31,360
Speaker 1: of black Pottles Matter shirts. It says it's about us

770
00:38:31,400 --> 00:38:33,480
Speaker 1: that we wanted to shift this kind of this this

771
00:38:33,520 --> 00:38:36,319
Speaker 1: model around. Let's let's center us. It wasn't even about

772
00:38:36,320 --> 00:38:38,279
Speaker 1: the candidate. I mean Doug Jones is a really nice guy.

773
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:41,399
Speaker 1: Like him. I think he didn't extra every job right,

774
00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:44,560
Speaker 1: but it wasn't about him, it was about right and

775
00:38:44,640 --> 00:38:48,520
Speaker 1: so we tested our message and our methodology and as

776
00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:50,400
Speaker 1: a result, we were able to flip a seat that

777
00:38:50,480 --> 00:38:55,040
Speaker 1: was essentially impossible, right, and so impossible to flip. And

778
00:38:55,080 --> 00:38:56,960
Speaker 1: then just my way of background for those who are

779
00:38:56,960 --> 00:39:00,399
Speaker 1: listening in it, because politics isn't always everybody's. You talked

780
00:39:00,400 --> 00:39:04,000
Speaker 1: about the election, a lot of people voted for Biden

781
00:39:04,040 --> 00:39:06,160
Speaker 1: because you just didn't want Trump. That that was the

782
00:39:06,239 --> 00:39:08,920
Speaker 1: end result for a lot of people, myself included. But

783
00:39:08,960 --> 00:39:11,320
Speaker 1: then you find the fact that just having him in

784
00:39:11,400 --> 00:39:13,799
Speaker 1: office isn't gonna help. We need some power and that

785
00:39:13,880 --> 00:39:16,600
Speaker 1: is why you say the Senate races are important because

786
00:39:16,640 --> 00:39:19,239
Speaker 1: you wanted to control and so and you wanted to

787
00:39:19,320 --> 00:39:22,960
Speaker 1: control as long as Trump's cronies, if you will, are

788
00:39:23,000 --> 00:39:25,080
Speaker 1: the people who this is me speaking, the people who

789
00:39:25,120 --> 00:39:27,560
Speaker 1: support him and still try to flesh out his agenda

790
00:39:27,600 --> 00:39:30,120
Speaker 1: are not in control. There's that's when you can see

791
00:39:30,160 --> 00:39:33,840
Speaker 1: some significant change. And here you are working to uh

792
00:39:33,880 --> 00:39:38,840
Speaker 1: to really make sure that us we are focused. And

793
00:39:39,120 --> 00:39:42,880
Speaker 1: I think that you're important and especially people who are

794
00:39:42,880 --> 00:39:46,080
Speaker 1: on the ground can also people people don't realize those

795
00:39:46,120 --> 00:39:49,439
Speaker 1: are the heroes. If I hear another person say voting

796
00:39:49,480 --> 00:39:53,120
Speaker 1: doesn't matter, it frustrates me beyond and especially in the

797
00:39:53,160 --> 00:39:55,120
Speaker 1: world and where I come from in sports. You know,

798
00:39:55,160 --> 00:39:57,200
Speaker 1: a lot of athletes didn't start voting. Their very first

799
00:39:57,239 --> 00:40:01,080
Speaker 1: time voting was when when Barack Obama ran for president UM.

800
00:40:01,200 --> 00:40:04,200
Speaker 1: Then people were thinking, Snoop had this big campaign to

801
00:40:04,239 --> 00:40:07,080
Speaker 1: get his record cleared because he wants to vote. He

802
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:09,080
Speaker 1: there were all of these people, as you know, you

803
00:40:09,080 --> 00:40:10,480
Speaker 1: know as better than I did. They were all of

804
00:40:10,480 --> 00:40:13,600
Speaker 1: these people who really decided to be activated. So I

805
00:40:13,680 --> 00:40:17,719
Speaker 1: go back to the original question in which I started with,

806
00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:21,840
Speaker 1: how do we get people who could care less about

807
00:40:21,880 --> 00:40:26,160
Speaker 1: Senate seats in Georgia and in Alabama UM to be

808
00:40:26,239 --> 00:40:29,760
Speaker 1: activated to help them understand that we are We're in danger.

809
00:40:30,320 --> 00:40:33,520
Speaker 1: Everything is on the table now, Yeah, how do we

810
00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:36,480
Speaker 1: give people to care? I think we have to really recognize.

811
00:40:36,480 --> 00:40:38,840
Speaker 1: I think it's two words, white supremacy. We have to

812
00:40:38,920 --> 00:40:42,840
Speaker 1: beat white supremacy at all costs. We have kindly recognize

813
00:40:42,880 --> 00:40:45,719
Speaker 1: this is this isn't about you know, this isn't about

814
00:40:45,760 --> 00:40:48,000
Speaker 1: like this, These false equivalent se as well, you know,

815
00:40:48,080 --> 00:40:50,239
Speaker 1: the Republicans of the Democrats and X y Z. Yeah,

816
00:40:50,280 --> 00:40:53,439
Speaker 1: I understand all that, and I can and I can say, yes,

817
00:40:53,520 --> 00:40:56,080
Speaker 1: there's the Democratic parties. Let us down a Republican. But

818
00:40:56,160 --> 00:40:58,399
Speaker 1: let's be real clear what we up against, and let's

819
00:40:58,400 --> 00:41:01,000
Speaker 1: be clear about what Trump brought in. Right at the

820
00:41:01,120 --> 00:41:03,000
Speaker 1: end of the day, what we have seen is we've

821
00:41:03,040 --> 00:41:07,960
Speaker 1: seen and intensified kind of racialized environment. Right that you're

822
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:11,680
Speaker 1: just gonna openly be racist. You're openly gonna go against

823
00:41:11,760 --> 00:41:14,400
Speaker 1: the rights of women of l g b t Q,

824
00:41:14,640 --> 00:41:16,960
Speaker 1: community of black We need to understand we under attack.

825
00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:19,560
Speaker 1: When you add water, you don't have the luxury of

826
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:22,200
Speaker 1: saying that you ain't gonna fight somebody coming into your house,

827
00:41:22,200 --> 00:41:23,719
Speaker 1: and you ain't gonna fight. If I ain't got nothing

828
00:41:23,719 --> 00:41:26,000
Speaker 1: but a water bottle, I'm gonna beat the hell out

829
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:29,600
Speaker 1: of you his water bottle, right right. And so I'm saying,

830
00:41:29,760 --> 00:41:34,440
Speaker 1: when you are under attack, when your community is under attack,

831
00:41:34,920 --> 00:41:38,640
Speaker 1: you have to protect your community at all costs. And

832
00:41:38,680 --> 00:41:41,000
Speaker 1: so at the end of the day, whether you care

833
00:41:41,200 --> 00:41:43,640
Speaker 1: or you know about all of the policies, I understand

834
00:41:43,640 --> 00:41:45,880
Speaker 1: that I understand some people get turned off from that process.

835
00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:48,560
Speaker 1: But we also have to recognize this ain't about participations.

836
00:41:48,760 --> 00:41:50,360
Speaker 1: See there's something that want us to think this is

837
00:41:50,400 --> 00:41:53,680
Speaker 1: about participating, right now, this is about power, and you

838
00:41:53,760 --> 00:41:56,799
Speaker 1: gotta use every single tool that you have. It's kind

839
00:41:56,800 --> 00:41:59,160
Speaker 1: of like how I am about my pay check, right?

840
00:41:59,239 --> 00:42:01,360
Speaker 1: I remember it in the job and I had a

841
00:42:01,400 --> 00:42:05,160
Speaker 1: paycheck left for maybe like twenty seven dollars. I know

842
00:42:05,200 --> 00:42:06,640
Speaker 1: there ain't a lot of money, but I wanted my

843
00:42:06,680 --> 00:42:09,560
Speaker 1: twenty seven dollars and my third or six cent. I

844
00:42:09,600 --> 00:42:13,440
Speaker 1: wanted every single nickel, dime penny that was on my

845
00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:16,600
Speaker 1: check because that's my check, right, that's my power. And

846
00:42:16,640 --> 00:42:18,120
Speaker 1: so at the end of the day, we have to

847
00:42:18,160 --> 00:42:20,040
Speaker 1: be the same. We have to be the same way

848
00:42:20,360 --> 00:42:22,920
Speaker 1: you you think money is power, Like how do you

849
00:42:22,920 --> 00:42:26,400
Speaker 1: think you what you think if? What policy is governing?

850
00:42:26,400 --> 00:42:29,200
Speaker 1: How you get money, policy governance, What money is in

851
00:42:29,200 --> 00:42:33,600
Speaker 1: your pocket? Policy governance, if the cost of your home?

852
00:42:34,360 --> 00:42:37,799
Speaker 1: Policy governance, how much you get paid, of the inequities

853
00:42:37,800 --> 00:42:40,440
Speaker 1: of whether a white person is doing another person that's doing,

854
00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:42,840
Speaker 1: and if it and a person of color gets paid differently.

855
00:42:43,160 --> 00:42:46,520
Speaker 1: Policy determines every single aspect of our lives. And so

856
00:42:46,960 --> 00:42:49,840
Speaker 1: what my position is is I am not I'm the

857
00:42:49,960 --> 00:42:52,040
Speaker 1: I'm the main one to say that I don't believe

858
00:42:52,080 --> 00:42:55,879
Speaker 1: that politics is a panacea, but you cannot afford to

859
00:42:55,920 --> 00:43:00,279
Speaker 1: not pay attention when people are literally using a use

860
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:03,880
Speaker 1: of power to oppress your community, and you not respond

861
00:43:04,200 --> 00:43:06,200
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, like you might hit

862
00:43:06,280 --> 00:43:08,560
Speaker 1: me like my my my uncle used to say, he

863
00:43:08,640 --> 00:43:10,279
Speaker 1: used to whisper. He was like, baby, they hit you

864
00:43:10,440 --> 00:43:12,200
Speaker 1: hit him back, like you might hit me, But you're

865
00:43:12,200 --> 00:43:14,480
Speaker 1: gonna get hit back, right at the end of the day.

866
00:43:14,680 --> 00:43:17,919
Speaker 1: There is a space that we have to really get

867
00:43:17,960 --> 00:43:21,800
Speaker 1: out of this framework of saying politics just as this

868
00:43:21,960 --> 00:43:25,759
Speaker 1: kind of of um uh, this this this back and

869
00:43:25,800 --> 00:43:28,640
Speaker 1: forth between two political parties, right that, yes, there's some

870
00:43:28,719 --> 00:43:30,840
Speaker 1: element of that that is true, and there's some element

871
00:43:30,880 --> 00:43:34,080
Speaker 1: around we don't have kind of some of the pieces

872
00:43:34,080 --> 00:43:36,040
Speaker 1: in place that would make us happy. We've all been

873
00:43:36,040 --> 00:43:38,520
Speaker 1: disappointed in this process. But at the end of the day,

874
00:43:38,560 --> 00:43:41,919
Speaker 1: as long as policy is governing how much money comes

875
00:43:41,920 --> 00:43:45,840
Speaker 1: in my pocket, as long as policy is governing where

876
00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:49,120
Speaker 1: I live and if I have I get fair treatment

877
00:43:49,239 --> 00:43:52,880
Speaker 1: or whether my college gets resources, I have no choice

878
00:43:53,160 --> 00:43:55,520
Speaker 1: but to engage in that process. So I'm hoping people

879
00:43:55,560 --> 00:43:58,440
Speaker 1: are more elevated than they're thinking to really understand what

880
00:43:58,520 --> 00:44:01,080
Speaker 1: time this is. If nothing else, you've got to use

881
00:44:01,160 --> 00:44:04,440
Speaker 1: this vehicle to stop the harm that's happening to your community.

882
00:44:04,480 --> 00:44:05,839
Speaker 1: Because at the end of the day, if you think

883
00:44:05,840 --> 00:44:08,399
Speaker 1: politics don't matter, listen, come go to court with me.

884
00:44:08,719 --> 00:44:11,120
Speaker 1: I can tell you what the difference is when a

885
00:44:11,200 --> 00:44:13,759
Speaker 1: certain d A is in office that people have put

886
00:44:13,800 --> 00:44:16,600
Speaker 1: in place from that community, and when other d as

887
00:44:16,640 --> 00:44:18,640
Speaker 1: in office. That can make the difference between somebody get

888
00:44:18,680 --> 00:44:21,480
Speaker 1: five years in prison or whether somebody gets a lifetime

889
00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:24,120
Speaker 1: sentence for the same exact thing. Right, I can tell

890
00:44:24,160 --> 00:44:26,160
Speaker 1: if you don't think that that matters, I can tell

891
00:44:26,200 --> 00:44:28,640
Speaker 1: you where there's been people who have literally fought to

892
00:44:28,680 --> 00:44:31,920
Speaker 1: make sure that their communities get resources, and others have

893
00:44:32,120 --> 00:44:34,840
Speaker 1: not or actually worked against those communities. So we're not

894
00:44:34,880 --> 00:44:37,399
Speaker 1: gonna act like it ain't real and it doesn't matter now,

895
00:44:37,440 --> 00:44:39,480
Speaker 1: will it be? Will it solve all of our issues?

896
00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:42,600
Speaker 1: Absolutely not. I don't believe that. I've never thought that, right,

897
00:44:42,960 --> 00:44:45,480
Speaker 1: But what I do know is that when I am

898
00:44:45,520 --> 00:44:50,160
Speaker 1: at war, I have to use every single tool available

899
00:44:50,280 --> 00:44:53,320
Speaker 1: to be able to protect my community and move us forward.

900
00:44:53,400 --> 00:44:55,960
Speaker 1: And so voting is one of those vehicles. It is

901
00:44:56,000 --> 00:44:58,160
Speaker 1: one of the most powerful tools. That is why so

902
00:44:58,280 --> 00:45:01,360
Speaker 1: much has been done throughout you string to turn people off.

903
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:04,040
Speaker 1: It ain't by accident that people don't vote. Folks don't

904
00:45:04,040 --> 00:45:06,239
Speaker 1: want you to vote. I mean, that's just the truth, right,

905
00:45:06,360 --> 00:45:08,320
Speaker 1: So that there can be a small group of people

906
00:45:08,600 --> 00:45:12,680
Speaker 1: that control the process, so they can control the resources.

907
00:45:12,840 --> 00:45:15,279
Speaker 1: I told y'all, I don't I don't like to kick it.

908
00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:17,680
Speaker 1: I told you she'd give us a word. We will

909
00:45:17,719 --> 00:45:20,880
Speaker 1: be back with more, Latasha Brown. Every champion and carevery

910
00:45:20,960 --> 00:45:23,600
Speaker 1: champion is to be a champion, a champion and carry

911
00:45:23,680 --> 00:45:26,920
Speaker 1: champion and carry chapion. A champion and carry chappion and

912
00:45:27,040 --> 00:45:29,560
Speaker 1: carry Champion rais, raiders and sports, and then the taming

913
00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:33,719
Speaker 1: cannake it work. Very champion and carry champion is to

914
00:45:33,840 --> 00:45:37,120
Speaker 1: be a champion, a champion, they carry Champion, the chappy

915
00:45:37,160 --> 00:45:40,560
Speaker 1: yo Champion, they carry Champion and carry Champion Rai, raiders

916
00:45:40,600 --> 00:45:42,480
Speaker 1: and sports, and then the tame ain can naked work.

917
00:45:43,080 --> 00:45:47,440
Speaker 1: Welcome back, Natasha Brown, still around. I was rhyming. I

918
00:45:47,480 --> 00:45:50,320
Speaker 1: don't even know it. There you go, I'm a poet.

919
00:45:51,040 --> 00:45:55,480
Speaker 1: Take it away. If you haven't paid attention for those

920
00:45:55,520 --> 00:45:58,600
Speaker 1: who are listening, they are fighting left and right to

921
00:45:58,680 --> 00:46:03,480
Speaker 1: take away our voting rights. You were very eloquent and

922
00:46:03,600 --> 00:46:07,400
Speaker 1: very also passionate about being disappointed about voting rights not

923
00:46:07,520 --> 00:46:11,279
Speaker 1: passing legislation classing under Biden, and how he promised that,

924
00:46:11,360 --> 00:46:14,520
Speaker 1: and how you for my understanding and give me the background.

925
00:46:14,560 --> 00:46:16,759
Speaker 1: You met with Kamala, you met with you met with

926
00:46:16,800 --> 00:46:22,600
Speaker 1: President Joe Biden. You all were really promised some good

927
00:46:22,680 --> 00:46:25,160
Speaker 1: if you will, how do you all see How do

928
00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:29,200
Speaker 1: you see this playing out now? I know you're disappointed,

929
00:46:30,200 --> 00:46:33,799
Speaker 1: but where is the hope for you? The hope for

930
00:46:33,840 --> 00:46:36,080
Speaker 1: me is in people. We who believe in freedom hell

931
00:46:36,320 --> 00:46:39,240
Speaker 1: shall not rest until it comes. Listen, I'm a black woman. Literally,

932
00:46:39,280 --> 00:46:41,800
Speaker 1: just put it in context. I am a black woman

933
00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 1: from the Deep South, and there's oftentimes the only thing

934
00:46:45,040 --> 00:46:47,080
Speaker 1: that me and my people ever had a hope. The

935
00:46:47,120 --> 00:46:48,880
Speaker 1: only thing that me and my people ever had is

936
00:46:48,920 --> 00:46:52,200
Speaker 1: a relentlessness that we're gonna continue and continue until my

937
00:46:52,280 --> 00:46:54,759
Speaker 1: community is free, until we get what we deserve. At

938
00:46:54,760 --> 00:46:56,160
Speaker 1: the end of the day, I'm not putting my hope

939
00:46:56,200 --> 00:46:59,959
Speaker 1: and one president or one administration. Ultimately, it is by job,

940
00:47:00,239 --> 00:47:03,760
Speaker 1: what I believe, is to continue to organize, to build

941
00:47:03,800 --> 00:47:06,880
Speaker 1: more power, to make it so that literally, we have

942
00:47:07,000 --> 00:47:08,759
Speaker 1: so much power that you ain't got the chance to

943
00:47:08,800 --> 00:47:10,680
Speaker 1: tell us know, And so we're gonna have to get

944
00:47:10,719 --> 00:47:13,480
Speaker 1: to this place of like, you know, I'm real clear

945
00:47:13,520 --> 00:47:15,839
Speaker 1: around you know, and there are people who are saying, well,

946
00:47:16,080 --> 00:47:17,840
Speaker 1: you know, Joe body should have done this, he should

947
00:47:17,840 --> 00:47:20,040
Speaker 1: done Absolutely, you're right, But at the end of the day,

948
00:47:20,080 --> 00:47:22,040
Speaker 1: are you trying to make them because I am at

949
00:47:22,080 --> 00:47:24,000
Speaker 1: the end of the day, if you're we're not using

950
00:47:24,000 --> 00:47:27,440
Speaker 1: our power and our leverage to make people show up

951
00:47:27,840 --> 00:47:30,560
Speaker 1: right to make those things that we want are real,

952
00:47:30,800 --> 00:47:33,239
Speaker 1: that's how things happen. And so we've got to use

953
00:47:33,360 --> 00:47:36,920
Speaker 1: literally our capital, like not just our resources and money,

954
00:47:37,200 --> 00:47:41,080
Speaker 1: but literally all of our human capital to push forward. Yes,

955
00:47:41,200 --> 00:47:44,279
Speaker 1: I'm deeply, deeply disappointed that we didn't get in voting rights.

956
00:47:44,440 --> 00:47:46,319
Speaker 1: We're seeing some of the fall out of that right now,

957
00:47:46,360 --> 00:47:49,640
Speaker 1: this attack, this current attack on Roe v way, did

958
00:47:49,680 --> 00:47:51,359
Speaker 1: we not think that was gonna happen? What we We're

959
00:47:51,360 --> 00:47:53,719
Speaker 1: gonna start seeing attacks on the firmtive action, mark my words,

960
00:47:53,760 --> 00:47:56,640
Speaker 1: We're gonna start seeing attacks on on gay marriage, all

961
00:47:56,680 --> 00:47:59,719
Speaker 1: of those things. Because once you start letting democracy road

962
00:47:59,800 --> 00:48:02,400
Speaker 1: and such a way, when you start letting people be

963
00:48:02,480 --> 00:48:05,319
Speaker 1: punished because they showed up and voted. Then what you're

964
00:48:05,320 --> 00:48:08,080
Speaker 1: doing is now you're you're you're also letting there be

965
00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:10,400
Speaker 1: a corruption of power. And so, at the end of

966
00:48:10,400 --> 00:48:13,279
Speaker 1: the day, if we want change, what my belief is,

967
00:48:13,360 --> 00:48:15,600
Speaker 1: it's not a it's not a matter of what what

968
00:48:15,719 --> 00:48:18,200
Speaker 1: person is in office. Is a matter of do we

969
00:48:18,280 --> 00:48:21,520
Speaker 1: have the power to literally be able to get the

970
00:48:21,600 --> 00:48:23,759
Speaker 1: change that we want to get the people that we

971
00:48:23,840 --> 00:48:26,439
Speaker 1: want in office, and even those that we won't don't

972
00:48:26,480 --> 00:48:28,680
Speaker 1: want an office. If you've got big enough stick, you

973
00:48:28,719 --> 00:48:30,959
Speaker 1: can you can get the kind of change that you want.

974
00:48:30,960 --> 00:48:33,360
Speaker 1: And so I think a stick or carrot. And so

975
00:48:33,480 --> 00:48:36,440
Speaker 1: my point is part of what we have to see

976
00:48:36,560 --> 00:48:39,839
Speaker 1: is I don't engage in this process of a transaction

977
00:48:39,880 --> 00:48:42,319
Speaker 1: of an election. I don't think one election is ever

978
00:48:42,360 --> 00:48:44,600
Speaker 1: gonna change everything. That's not what I think. We're you know,

979
00:48:44,680 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 1: we're we're hundreds of years of oppression in this country,

980
00:48:47,760 --> 00:48:50,960
Speaker 1: a system that has been rooted in white supremacy that

981
00:48:51,040 --> 00:48:54,080
Speaker 1: we've got to unravel every single aspect of that. And

982
00:48:54,239 --> 00:48:56,799
Speaker 1: part of the unraveling is that when people who have

983
00:48:56,880 --> 00:49:00,040
Speaker 1: been disenfranchised, that people have been a press that the

984
00:49:00,160 --> 00:49:02,080
Speaker 1: end of the day, when we show up, things are

985
00:49:02,080 --> 00:49:04,480
Speaker 1: gonna have to change. When we show what we can

986
00:49:04,520 --> 00:49:07,319
Speaker 1: literally change the trajectory of this country. But first of all,

987
00:49:07,560 --> 00:49:09,319
Speaker 1: we're gonna have to believe. We're gonna have to believe

988
00:49:09,320 --> 00:49:12,239
Speaker 1: in our own power. My getting people to vote isn't

989
00:49:12,239 --> 00:49:14,920
Speaker 1: about me believing in the system. Is about me believing

990
00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:18,000
Speaker 1: that people have the power to change things. And so

991
00:49:18,120 --> 00:49:20,200
Speaker 1: that's the work that's gonna move us forward. That's what

992
00:49:20,239 --> 00:49:21,680
Speaker 1: we did in Georgia. People don't know what we did

993
00:49:21,680 --> 00:49:24,200
Speaker 1: in Georgia. That's what we did in Georgia. And we

994
00:49:24,000 --> 00:49:25,799
Speaker 1: we knew we were in the state that they are

995
00:49:25,880 --> 00:49:28,560
Speaker 1: openly cheaters, right, We knew that we were in the

996
00:49:28,600 --> 00:49:30,279
Speaker 1: state that they will try to take an election, that

997
00:49:30,320 --> 00:49:33,239
Speaker 1: they will move hundreds of thousands of people. But it's

998
00:49:33,280 --> 00:49:35,040
Speaker 1: it's kind of like if you come you know, if

999
00:49:35,160 --> 00:49:37,520
Speaker 1: if you go low, we're gonna go hard. And so

1000
00:49:37,560 --> 00:49:39,239
Speaker 1: what we did is we went hard in the pain,

1001
00:49:39,320 --> 00:49:41,560
Speaker 1: and that's what we will continue to do. You cannot,

1002
00:49:41,680 --> 00:49:45,120
Speaker 1: we cannot allow anybody to outorganize us. And we've got

1003
00:49:45,120 --> 00:49:48,600
Speaker 1: to be sophisticated enough to know that we need multiple tools.

1004
00:49:48,680 --> 00:49:51,200
Speaker 1: We need economic tools, we need political tools, we need

1005
00:49:51,239 --> 00:49:54,560
Speaker 1: politic judos that we need institution building tools and that

1006
00:49:54,600 --> 00:49:57,879
Speaker 1: if we're not working on those things collectively around how

1007
00:49:57,880 --> 00:50:00,759
Speaker 1: do we build independent black political power o world in

1008
00:50:00,760 --> 00:50:02,920
Speaker 1: this context of nothing else, if you don't believe in

1009
00:50:03,080 --> 00:50:06,200
Speaker 1: and and engaging in this political process for nothing else

1010
00:50:06,440 --> 00:50:09,000
Speaker 1: and least see it as a harm reduction strategy so

1011
00:50:09,040 --> 00:50:12,320
Speaker 1: that we can stave off some of the dangerous policy

1012
00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:16,359
Speaker 1: that impacts our people for years and their families. If

1013
00:50:16,400 --> 00:50:19,320
Speaker 1: you don't believe in the you don't believe in the process,

1014
00:50:19,400 --> 00:50:21,399
Speaker 1: that's fine. But if you engage in voting, you can

1015
00:50:21,440 --> 00:50:23,880
Speaker 1: see what happens. You could see that there is a

1016
00:50:23,920 --> 00:50:26,320
Speaker 1: way to stave off the harm at least for now.

1017
00:50:26,400 --> 00:50:29,880
Speaker 1: That's how we combat that's how we combat white supremacy.

1018
00:50:29,920 --> 00:50:32,080
Speaker 1: That's why we caught how we combat all out of tacks.

1019
00:50:32,400 --> 00:50:36,160
Speaker 1: And people can't understand that, they don't understand why their

1020
00:50:36,320 --> 00:50:38,800
Speaker 1: vote matters. And then at the same time, and you

1021
00:50:38,920 --> 00:50:41,799
Speaker 1: hear it's so cliche, as you just mentioned, why they're

1022
00:50:41,800 --> 00:50:44,160
Speaker 1: fighting so hard to take it away from us. And

1023
00:50:44,239 --> 00:50:49,799
Speaker 1: so when our outlook is bleak, you truly rely in

1024
00:50:49,800 --> 00:50:51,839
Speaker 1: the goodness of people, in the hope of people, because

1025
00:50:51,880 --> 00:50:54,280
Speaker 1: you've seen what people can do is what you're saying.

1026
00:50:55,200 --> 00:50:57,839
Speaker 1: It is it's it's it's not just the the it's

1027
00:50:57,960 --> 00:51:00,560
Speaker 1: this is this level of humanity. But it's also I'm

1028
00:51:00,560 --> 00:51:03,880
Speaker 1: a visionary, so I I actually believe I often talk

1029
00:51:03,920 --> 00:51:07,040
Speaker 1: about the radical reimagining now. Anywhere I go to talk

1030
00:51:07,040 --> 00:51:09,720
Speaker 1: care I ask people my first question almost in every

1031
00:51:09,760 --> 00:51:11,919
Speaker 1: talk that I do. I asked people to close their

1032
00:51:12,000 --> 00:51:17,239
Speaker 1: eyes and imagine what would America look like without racism?

1033
00:51:17,360 --> 00:51:22,320
Speaker 1: Who most people that I asked that question nine percent

1034
00:51:22,360 --> 00:51:25,239
Speaker 1: of a time, most of time, like, most people have

1035
00:51:25,280 --> 00:51:27,839
Speaker 1: never been asked that question. And so then my next

1036
00:51:27,840 --> 00:51:29,640
Speaker 1: piece around they have never been asked that question, And

1037
00:51:29,680 --> 00:51:31,399
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, how are we serious about any racism?

1038
00:51:31,440 --> 00:51:33,319
Speaker 1: So we're just gonna live with this, Like we're just

1039
00:51:33,320 --> 00:51:35,240
Speaker 1: gonna live with this system, Like how are we serious

1040
00:51:35,239 --> 00:51:38,520
Speaker 1: about racing? There's never been anything that's been brought into

1041
00:51:38,520 --> 00:51:41,080
Speaker 1: existence in the physical world that was in person vision,

1042
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:44,439
Speaker 1: not an iPhone, not even this technology that we're using

1043
00:51:44,560 --> 00:51:47,239
Speaker 1: right now. Someone had to envision it. So it has

1044
00:51:47,280 --> 00:51:50,040
Speaker 1: to be some of us that are creative enough have

1045
00:51:50,160 --> 00:51:53,040
Speaker 1: the audacity to actually have a vision that is greater

1046
00:51:53,080 --> 00:51:55,719
Speaker 1: than what we see now. And that is that is

1047
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:58,399
Speaker 1: what Herrod Tupman's off right. This is a woman who

1048
00:51:58,440 --> 00:52:01,279
Speaker 1: could not read nor write, who had never seen the North,

1049
00:52:01,320 --> 00:52:04,080
Speaker 1: had never seen freedom, but there was something innate around

1050
00:52:04,320 --> 00:52:06,719
Speaker 1: her humanity that she knew that she was supposed to

1051
00:52:06,760 --> 00:52:08,360
Speaker 1: be liberated, and she was supposed to be free, and

1052
00:52:08,440 --> 00:52:10,759
Speaker 1: she had a north star. We're talking about a star

1053
00:52:10,960 --> 00:52:15,280
Speaker 1: up in the sky. Yeah, like like literally, the magnitude

1054
00:52:15,640 --> 00:52:18,280
Speaker 1: of what she really was seeing was a vision towards freedom.

1055
00:52:18,320 --> 00:52:20,200
Speaker 1: And so what we have to do is we have

1056
00:52:20,239 --> 00:52:22,560
Speaker 1: to really recognize and because this is what I believe,

1057
00:52:22,640 --> 00:52:25,480
Speaker 1: I don't believe that black liberation is contingent upon white acceptance.

1058
00:52:25,640 --> 00:52:29,360
Speaker 1: That's not what I believe, because it won't happen. But

1059
00:52:29,400 --> 00:52:31,240
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, what I also believe

1060
00:52:31,719 --> 00:52:35,279
Speaker 1: is that I do believe that in black liberation is

1061
00:52:35,320 --> 00:52:38,640
Speaker 1: the liberation of all people. That I believe that fundamentally,

1062
00:52:38,760 --> 00:52:42,799
Speaker 1: as I fight to stand and the recognition of my humanity,

1063
00:52:43,080 --> 00:52:45,960
Speaker 1: that as I fight is standing my agency, as I

1064
00:52:46,000 --> 00:52:49,120
Speaker 1: have the audacity to challenge those very systems that have

1065
00:52:49,200 --> 00:52:52,759
Speaker 1: sought to oppressed my community, oppressed me, that in that

1066
00:52:52,760 --> 00:52:55,319
Speaker 1: that there is something liberatory in that, and that that

1067
00:52:55,360 --> 00:52:57,640
Speaker 1: will not only ignite the humanity and me with and

1068
00:52:57,680 --> 00:53:00,560
Speaker 1: the humanity and others. And if enough of us wake up,

1069
00:53:00,840 --> 00:53:03,239
Speaker 1: if enough of us are ignited, how the hell can

1070
00:53:03,280 --> 00:53:07,520
Speaker 1: things not change? Girl? You've given me a word, a

1071
00:53:07,640 --> 00:53:13,240
Speaker 1: whole word. Okay, So I haven't imagined America without racism.

1072
00:53:13,280 --> 00:53:15,359
Speaker 1: What does that look like for you? I don't even

1073
00:53:15,400 --> 00:53:20,200
Speaker 1: know why. I don't know why why. I mean, how

1074
00:53:20,239 --> 00:53:23,719
Speaker 1: would we know what it looks like? Right? Right? It is?

1075
00:53:23,920 --> 00:53:27,680
Speaker 1: It is so, it is, it's it's we've not seen that,

1076
00:53:27,760 --> 00:53:30,040
Speaker 1: We've not we've not been there before. What I can

1077
00:53:30,080 --> 00:53:32,359
Speaker 1: tell you is, I know a work, a work, they

1078
00:53:32,360 --> 00:53:35,879
Speaker 1: would look different, That's what I know. What I know

1079
00:53:36,160 --> 00:53:40,400
Speaker 1: is the way that we actually kind of exploit human beings.

1080
00:53:40,480 --> 00:53:42,600
Speaker 1: I know that would be different. You know. I know

1081
00:53:42,680 --> 00:53:45,840
Speaker 1: that institutions would look They're very different. I know the

1082
00:53:45,960 --> 00:53:49,480
Speaker 1: justice system would look very, very, very different. We might

1083
00:53:49,560 --> 00:53:52,120
Speaker 1: even have a space around where we've seen other countries

1084
00:53:52,120 --> 00:53:56,359
Speaker 1: that have actually eliminated, right, jails that don't shut jails down, right?

1085
00:53:56,800 --> 00:53:59,279
Speaker 1: You know what I know? And I think that that's

1086
00:53:59,320 --> 00:54:01,319
Speaker 1: part of the reason why I ask the question. It's

1087
00:54:01,360 --> 00:54:03,480
Speaker 1: not so much around the vision of what I have

1088
00:54:03,640 --> 00:54:07,000
Speaker 1: because I'm speculating like everybody else. It is really around

1089
00:54:07,920 --> 00:54:11,120
Speaker 1: the power in the question. We should be in that

1090
00:54:11,400 --> 00:54:15,040
Speaker 1: entry of what it looks like, what the possibilities so

1091
00:54:15,080 --> 00:54:17,200
Speaker 1: that we can actually have our north star or really

1092
00:54:17,239 --> 00:54:20,360
Speaker 1: what we're fighting for. I'm not fighting for uh it

1093
00:54:20,480 --> 00:54:22,319
Speaker 1: to be the blue team or the red team next

1094
00:54:22,360 --> 00:54:24,560
Speaker 1: year for the next four years. I don't want just

1095
00:54:24,640 --> 00:54:28,440
Speaker 1: a transactional change. I want to complete transformation of change,

1096
00:54:28,719 --> 00:54:30,600
Speaker 1: the whole notion of Like at the end of the day,

1097
00:54:30,600 --> 00:54:32,839
Speaker 1: why do you have we're working forty six day hours

1098
00:54:32,880 --> 00:54:35,040
Speaker 1: a week. Seriously, like at and at the end of

1099
00:54:35,120 --> 00:54:38,520
Speaker 1: the day, there's technology. Often talk about just using your imagination,

1100
00:54:38,920 --> 00:54:42,040
Speaker 1: Like what you know, we've got technology now that can

1101
00:54:42,120 --> 00:54:45,240
Speaker 1: actually ship can do what a thousand people you should

1102
00:54:45,239 --> 00:54:46,520
Speaker 1: be able to do in a week. What did we

1103
00:54:46,600 --> 00:54:48,600
Speaker 1: do if there was a thousand people and now the

1104
00:54:48,680 --> 00:54:51,439
Speaker 1: technology came along and you only needed a hundred people.

1105
00:54:51,480 --> 00:54:53,520
Speaker 1: You know what the companies did. They let off the

1106
00:54:53,760 --> 00:54:56,000
Speaker 1: They fired the nine hundred people and kept the hundred.

1107
00:54:56,400 --> 00:54:57,839
Speaker 1: You know what they could have done, what they could

1108
00:54:57,880 --> 00:55:00,239
Speaker 1: have done, It's kept all one thousand of the people.

1109
00:55:00,480 --> 00:55:03,880
Speaker 1: Haven't worked ten hours a week, make more money, right,

1110
00:55:04,160 --> 00:55:06,759
Speaker 1: use the technology, work people less and so that the

1111
00:55:06,840 --> 00:55:10,760
Speaker 1: means of production, that the technology that created the expansion

1112
00:55:10,760 --> 00:55:13,839
Speaker 1: of the means of production, some of that benefits could

1113
00:55:13,840 --> 00:55:16,120
Speaker 1: have gone down to the workers, Like, there's no reason

1114
00:55:16,200 --> 00:55:18,320
Speaker 1: why we can't do that. But it's going to require

1115
00:55:18,440 --> 00:55:21,680
Speaker 1: us radically reimagining what a workday would look like, what

1116
00:55:21,800 --> 00:55:23,600
Speaker 1: a work week would like. What would be so wrong

1117
00:55:23,680 --> 00:55:26,760
Speaker 1: with people working ten hours a week, getting paid, spending

1118
00:55:26,800 --> 00:55:30,040
Speaker 1: time with their families, spending times with their children doing

1119
00:55:30,080 --> 00:55:32,239
Speaker 1: the work. What's so wrong with that? I would say,

1120
00:55:32,400 --> 00:55:34,360
Speaker 1: rich people don't think nothing wrong with it? Right, So

1121
00:55:34,600 --> 00:55:40,440
Speaker 1: I think rich people are like, Yeah, we've been doing that.

1122
00:55:40,600 --> 00:55:44,400
Speaker 1: What'll do that? I'm working, I'm working in about these

1123
00:55:44,480 --> 00:55:47,960
Speaker 1: this week, right, And I think I think that's why

1124
00:55:48,000 --> 00:55:50,640
Speaker 1: it has to be. We have to radically reimagine and

1125
00:55:50,719 --> 00:55:54,359
Speaker 1: recognize that every single system and this nation has been

1126
00:55:54,440 --> 00:55:57,759
Speaker 1: rooted in white supremacy. Right. There's just like every single

1127
00:55:58,080 --> 00:56:02,160
Speaker 1: give me one education, find it politics, give me one

1128
00:56:02,480 --> 00:56:05,719
Speaker 1: right every I'm saying that, every single one that what

1129
00:56:05,920 --> 00:56:08,799
Speaker 1: are the possibilities that exist that if people were able

1130
00:56:08,840 --> 00:56:11,479
Speaker 1: to operate in the fullness of their power and part

1131
00:56:11,560 --> 00:56:14,719
Speaker 1: of eliminating racism. I will say to you that we

1132
00:56:14,840 --> 00:56:19,120
Speaker 1: have no idea of how amazing life could be. We

1133
00:56:19,200 --> 00:56:22,120
Speaker 1: have no idea of what could be created. Think about

1134
00:56:22,160 --> 00:56:25,319
Speaker 1: what we've created right when people have been not even

1135
00:56:25,400 --> 00:56:31,480
Speaker 1: being free. Think about the amazing artists in our community

1136
00:56:31,800 --> 00:56:33,440
Speaker 1: that has never been able to get the kind of

1137
00:56:33,480 --> 00:56:36,280
Speaker 1: support that they need right to develop that. Think about

1138
00:56:36,360 --> 00:56:40,840
Speaker 1: the what happens to you know, um, a genius that

1139
00:56:41,080 --> 00:56:42,719
Speaker 1: is in comes out of a certain kind of way

1140
00:56:42,719 --> 00:56:45,480
Speaker 1: into some people, it may look like autism right because

1141
00:56:45,520 --> 00:56:47,480
Speaker 1: they haven't had the support or have the kind of

1142
00:56:47,560 --> 00:56:50,160
Speaker 1: things that they need to move forward. My point is

1143
00:56:50,760 --> 00:56:53,640
Speaker 1: it just boils down to this that if we want

1144
00:56:53,719 --> 00:56:57,360
Speaker 1: something different, while we are moving to create, we have

1145
00:56:57,480 --> 00:57:00,440
Speaker 1: to move and create the environment that should makes it

1146
00:57:00,520 --> 00:57:03,520
Speaker 1: more conducive for us to have the freedom of expression,

1147
00:57:03,760 --> 00:57:06,000
Speaker 1: for us to have the freedom of creativity, for us

1148
00:57:06,080 --> 00:57:08,839
Speaker 1: to actually pumped on that question. Yeah, because we don't

1149
00:57:08,880 --> 00:57:11,959
Speaker 1: have that. Because we don't have it. So we should

1150
00:57:12,000 --> 00:57:16,280
Speaker 1: be asking ourselves every single day what would America look

1151
00:57:16,400 --> 00:57:21,200
Speaker 1: like without racism? We should be having those discussions. We

1152
00:57:21,240 --> 00:57:24,640
Speaker 1: should be thinking about what it would take right, not

1153
00:57:24,920 --> 00:57:27,200
Speaker 1: not how do we eliminate racism? But I got that,

1154
00:57:27,360 --> 00:57:29,360
Speaker 1: I mean that's part of my work. But I'm asking

1155
00:57:29,440 --> 00:57:32,320
Speaker 1: another question, what would it look like, right, what's our

1156
00:57:32,480 --> 00:57:35,720
Speaker 1: vision of that? Right? And until we're able to actually

1157
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:38,840
Speaker 1: vision different components and all of us are that we're

1158
00:57:38,840 --> 00:57:41,560
Speaker 1: gonna have different aspects of that. That's okay, right, That

1159
00:57:41,800 --> 00:57:44,520
Speaker 1: that gives us something that allows us to transcend this

1160
00:57:44,680 --> 00:57:47,120
Speaker 1: what we see and go to the next level. That

1161
00:57:47,280 --> 00:57:49,600
Speaker 1: is the same thing that those brothers and sisters that

1162
00:57:49,760 --> 00:57:52,880
Speaker 1: my ancestors that were in Alabama and Mississippi and sitting

1163
00:57:52,880 --> 00:57:55,920
Speaker 1: on a plantation somewhere saying I ain't never seeing freedom

1164
00:57:55,920 --> 00:57:58,400
Speaker 1: of my children gonna be free? Right, there was somebody

1165
00:57:58,480 --> 00:58:00,760
Speaker 1: that saw that. When I think about afro futurism, when

1166
00:58:00,800 --> 00:58:03,120
Speaker 1: I think about even when I think about probably this

1167
00:58:03,240 --> 00:58:04,760
Speaker 1: is part of the reason why I love the comic

1168
00:58:04,840 --> 00:58:07,320
Speaker 1: so much and why I love you know, Marvel movie.

1169
00:58:07,320 --> 00:58:10,960
Speaker 1: It's like, there's something powerful with using our creativity and

1170
00:58:11,000 --> 00:58:13,880
Speaker 1: our imagination because it's boundless, and we've got to think

1171
00:58:13,920 --> 00:58:16,840
Speaker 1: about that when it comes to racism and other things.

1172
00:58:17,400 --> 00:58:19,680
Speaker 1: I didn't believe in Wakonda until I saw it. I

1173
00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:22,440
Speaker 1: didn't believe in my my black superhero until I saw it.

1174
00:58:22,640 --> 00:58:25,240
Speaker 1: So I appreciate you for saying that, and you left

1175
00:58:25,320 --> 00:58:28,640
Speaker 1: us with while so much to think about. I love

1176
00:58:28,720 --> 00:58:32,600
Speaker 1: that question. Imagine in America without racism. I'm going to

1177
00:58:32,760 --> 00:58:34,760
Speaker 1: go to work on that, Latasha Brown, because I don't

1178
00:58:34,800 --> 00:58:36,320
Speaker 1: even know what that looks like and that and that

1179
00:58:36,440 --> 00:58:38,880
Speaker 1: makes me sad for me, but I know that I

1180
00:58:38,960 --> 00:58:40,960
Speaker 1: can envision it, if you can see it, if there

1181
00:58:41,000 --> 00:58:44,840
Speaker 1: are others who can see it, That's what gets us activated.

1182
00:58:45,200 --> 00:58:48,000
Speaker 1: Listening to you talk and be so passionate. Everyone listening

1183
00:58:48,120 --> 00:58:50,280
Speaker 1: right now should be activated. If they're not, I feel

1184
00:58:50,320 --> 00:58:51,760
Speaker 1: sorry for you. That means you don't have a soul

1185
00:58:51,840 --> 00:58:55,880
Speaker 1: because I have been moved. Um, Latasha Brown, Um, what

1186
00:58:56,040 --> 00:58:57,920
Speaker 1: can I tell people to look forward to for you

1187
00:58:58,080 --> 00:59:00,440
Speaker 1: before we before we let you go? Because I appreciate

1188
00:59:00,480 --> 00:59:02,280
Speaker 1: all the time you gave me today, says I really do.

1189
00:59:02,840 --> 00:59:04,800
Speaker 1: But I know that you have a couple of things

1190
00:59:04,880 --> 00:59:07,240
Speaker 1: coming up if you if you'd like to announce here

1191
00:59:07,320 --> 00:59:08,680
Speaker 1: or we could do it later. I don't know what

1192
00:59:08,760 --> 00:59:12,680
Speaker 1: you got going on, So I've got some cool stuff happening. Um.

1193
00:59:12,960 --> 00:59:14,880
Speaker 1: You know this is a this is a space of

1194
00:59:15,680 --> 00:59:18,000
Speaker 1: of of that I'm going into at this stage of

1195
00:59:18,040 --> 00:59:20,720
Speaker 1: my life around creativity and speaking truth to power and

1196
00:59:21,200 --> 00:59:22,960
Speaker 1: and using this moment to be a hope. You know,

1197
00:59:23,000 --> 00:59:25,440
Speaker 1: we we talked so much around you know, policist can

1198
00:59:25,480 --> 00:59:28,560
Speaker 1: be draining because we talk about so much around what's

1199
00:59:28,640 --> 00:59:31,200
Speaker 1: wrong and how this is happening. You know, something's got

1200
00:59:31,280 --> 00:59:34,000
Speaker 1: to be exposed, something's got they got to die. I mean,

1201
00:59:34,040 --> 00:59:36,480
Speaker 1: they's just got to die on the But so something

1202
00:59:36,800 --> 00:59:38,520
Speaker 1: can come in this place. And so that's why I

1203
00:59:38,560 --> 00:59:41,280
Speaker 1: think it's dangerous for us just to focus on the

1204
00:59:41,400 --> 00:59:43,760
Speaker 1: here and now and to not be imaginative. And so

1205
00:59:44,360 --> 00:59:48,120
Speaker 1: in that space, I'm actually doing more work. I'm really excited. Um,

1206
00:59:48,480 --> 00:59:51,400
Speaker 1: I got my first commencement of dress this weekend, and

1207
00:59:51,480 --> 00:59:55,400
Speaker 1: then I also, um, will be a I'm really excited

1208
00:59:55,400 --> 00:59:59,200
Speaker 1: about keynoting for the black Harvard graduation. So I, um,

1209
00:59:59,480 --> 01:00:04,920
Speaker 1: I excited. Excuse me to you, however I did. I did.

1210
01:00:05,800 --> 01:00:10,360
Speaker 1: That's that's so it is. I'm not that's what That's beautiful.

1211
01:00:11,000 --> 01:00:17,480
Speaker 1: Like seriously, that is the black student, black graduation. I mean,

1212
01:00:17,560 --> 01:00:20,280
Speaker 1: come on, the black graduation on don't you know better

1213
01:00:21,280 --> 01:00:23,800
Speaker 1: said high It's just there. I don't know. Like, so,

1214
01:00:24,200 --> 01:00:27,080
Speaker 1: so I'm so I'm excited about that. I'm excited about

1215
01:00:27,120 --> 01:00:29,120
Speaker 1: the work that we're doing in Communist Like look, now,

1216
01:00:29,240 --> 01:00:31,080
Speaker 1: y'all know we got the blackest bus in America. If

1217
01:00:31,080 --> 01:00:33,200
Speaker 1: you don't know about it, go google it. The blackest

1218
01:00:33,240 --> 01:00:35,400
Speaker 1: bus in America. We go we in these streets. Now

1219
01:00:35,480 --> 01:00:37,760
Speaker 1: we go on. We're gonna be in these streets. So

1220
01:00:38,080 --> 01:00:40,160
Speaker 1: if you listen, if you want to know how you

1221
01:00:40,240 --> 01:00:43,000
Speaker 1: can be down with Black voters matter. And at the

1222
01:00:43,120 --> 01:00:44,960
Speaker 1: end of the day, all you gotta do is text us.

1223
01:00:45,280 --> 01:00:47,680
Speaker 1: You know, text to two, five to to five. If

1224
01:00:47,720 --> 01:00:50,000
Speaker 1: you forget that number, just fill it out black on

1225
01:00:50,120 --> 01:00:54,720
Speaker 1: your phone. It spills black. Um, so text text black,

1226
01:00:54,880 --> 01:00:58,560
Speaker 1: text to two, five to to five or voting to black,

1227
01:00:58,880 --> 01:01:00,640
Speaker 1: and so you can keep vote with what we're doing.

1228
01:01:00,920 --> 01:01:02,720
Speaker 1: Um follow me on social media. I put a lot

1229
01:01:02,800 --> 01:01:04,400
Speaker 1: of the work that we're doing because we're gonna do

1230
01:01:04,440 --> 01:01:07,320
Speaker 1: a lot of activations. I do think this is a moment,

1231
01:01:07,760 --> 01:01:09,960
Speaker 1: and I say this often even though I do a

1232
01:01:10,000 --> 01:01:11,960
Speaker 1: lot of political work here. At the end of the day,

1233
01:01:12,280 --> 01:01:15,840
Speaker 1: it's not our politics are gonna save us and we're humanity.

1234
01:01:16,280 --> 01:01:18,480
Speaker 1: You said, it's not about the red of the blue team.

1235
01:01:18,640 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 1: It is about our humanity. Don't get yes and our humanity.

1236
01:01:24,200 --> 01:01:26,920
Speaker 1: We gotta say this is enough. We've we've got to

1237
01:01:26,960 --> 01:01:29,919
Speaker 1: say no. We're not gonna keep stop, stop piling where

1238
01:01:30,040 --> 01:01:31,800
Speaker 1: some people got to sleep in their cars and go

1239
01:01:31,920 --> 01:01:34,960
Speaker 1: to work every day, while others don't like literally a

1240
01:01:35,080 --> 01:01:37,560
Speaker 1: living whatever life. I want everybody. What's wrong with everybody

1241
01:01:37,600 --> 01:01:40,200
Speaker 1: being prosperous on some level? Right? What's wrong with everybody

1242
01:01:40,200 --> 01:01:42,800
Speaker 1: having their basic needs? Man? What's what's so bad about that?

1243
01:01:43,320 --> 01:01:47,440
Speaker 1: It will not happen unless people force it to happen.

1244
01:01:47,840 --> 01:01:50,840
Speaker 1: And so we've got to really recognize what we're up against.

1245
01:01:50,880 --> 01:01:54,160
Speaker 1: This is a matter of around you know what political party.

1246
01:01:54,240 --> 01:01:55,760
Speaker 1: At the end of the day, we've got to really

1247
01:01:55,800 --> 01:01:59,280
Speaker 1: make this entire system. We've got to transform this entire

1248
01:01:59,360 --> 01:02:01,880
Speaker 1: system up. Whatever we gotta do, abolish it, replace it,

1249
01:02:01,920 --> 01:02:04,480
Speaker 1: whatever we need to do to make sure that our

1250
01:02:04,680 --> 01:02:08,600
Speaker 1: humanity is always respected and that our agency is respected,

1251
01:02:08,800 --> 01:02:11,480
Speaker 1: and that we literally create the kind of nation that

1252
01:02:11,600 --> 01:02:13,840
Speaker 1: we desire and that we deserve. And the only way

1253
01:02:13,920 --> 01:02:16,040
Speaker 1: we're gonna do that is we gotta be activated. And

1254
01:02:16,160 --> 01:02:18,200
Speaker 1: we was promised it might not have been for us.

1255
01:02:19,640 --> 01:02:24,800
Speaker 1: Thank you, in the pursuit of what happiness, all of that,

1256
01:02:25,240 --> 01:02:28,000
Speaker 1: all of that, and I'm up here with you. Give

1257
01:02:28,040 --> 01:02:29,920
Speaker 1: me ten hours of work week, and I give me

1258
01:02:29,960 --> 01:02:31,800
Speaker 1: all the money. I just need ten out two I

1259
01:02:31,880 --> 01:02:34,919
Speaker 1: can't get shipped done in ten hours. Y'all for the week.

1260
01:02:35,280 --> 01:02:40,440
Speaker 1: But all right, Latasha Brown, thank you so much for

1261
01:02:40,560 --> 01:02:43,920
Speaker 1: Jody we I appreciate you, thank you for having me.

1262
01:02:44,040 --> 01:02:47,840
Speaker 1: I really, as always, I enjoy you and they just

1263
01:02:47,920 --> 01:02:49,520
Speaker 1: bringing so much joy and light to the world. You

1264
01:02:49,560 --> 01:02:53,240
Speaker 1: bring so much joy. Voting matters, guys, and I hope

1265
01:02:53,280 --> 01:02:55,480
Speaker 1: that that if that's not the one thing you took

1266
01:02:55,520 --> 01:03:00,040
Speaker 1: away from this entire podcast, Voting matters, they wouldn't I

1267
01:03:00,160 --> 01:03:01,880
Speaker 1: fight so hard to stop you from voting if it

1268
01:03:02,000 --> 01:03:04,439
Speaker 1: did not matter. If you pay attention to the state

1269
01:03:04,480 --> 01:03:06,920
Speaker 1: in which you live in, and you'll see all around you,

1270
01:03:07,520 --> 01:03:10,200
Speaker 1: whether it's obvious or not so obvious, little ways in

1271
01:03:10,280 --> 01:03:13,800
Speaker 1: which they are removing the ability or black and brown people,

1272
01:03:13,920 --> 01:03:17,240
Speaker 1: for marginalized people to be left without a voice and

1273
01:03:17,320 --> 01:03:21,200
Speaker 1: a vote. It is important that we pay attention. I

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Speaker 1: know there are primaries coming up in different people's neighborhoods,

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Speaker 1: depending on where you live. Um, and I really want

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Speaker 1: you all to know that it is important no matter

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Speaker 1: what it what it looks like, it is important. Read

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Speaker 1: a little bit once at night, you know, maybe before

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Speaker 1: you walk into that voting booth, pay attention to who

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Speaker 1: these people are, who are trying to actually represent you

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Speaker 1: in this world that we live in today. Black Voters

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Speaker 1: Matter co founder Latasha Brown gave us a litany of things,

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Speaker 1: a few things of which rather that you could go

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Speaker 1: and check out and possibly help with and look out for,

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Speaker 1: especially when it comes to her and with the work

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Speaker 1: she's doing. But check out Black Voters Matter. It really

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Speaker 1: is important, folks. I appreciate you for letting me get

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Speaker 1: on my soapbox Carrie Champions signing off, I'll talked to

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Speaker 1: y'all next week on Naked