Latest / Get Real with Jim Weiss / W. Kamau Bell, Comedian & Activist

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W. Kamau Bell, Comedian & Activist · Get Real with Jim Weiss

0:09
Speaker 1: I'm Jim Weiss, chairman and founder of Real Chemistry, and
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Speaker 1: this is the Get Real with the Chairman podcast. Today,
0:20
Speaker 1: I'll be discussing healthcare and broader community citizenship and engagement
0:24
Speaker 1: with w Camal bell, a multi talented comedian, writer, and
0:28
Speaker 1: social justice advocate. Many of you know him from his
0:32
Speaker 1: Emmy winning CNN series United Shades of America, which delves
0:37
Speaker 1: into America's rich cultural tapestry. Camal and I share a
0:42
Speaker 1: commitment to initiatives like the Black Coalition Against COVID, which
0:46
Speaker 1: tackles misinformation and vaccine hesitancy in the black community. We
0:50
Speaker 1: also revisit our conversation on gun safety as a national
0:54
Speaker 1: health issue, a discussion spark last fall during a Brady
0:58
Speaker 1: United event at Chase Center, come Out interviewed coach Steve
1:01
Speaker 1: Kerr about his personal experiences with gun violence. Beyond healthcare,
1:06
Speaker 1: Comeal is passionate about boosting film and TV production in
1:10
Speaker 1: his hometown of Oakland. I deeply admire his commitment to
1:14
Speaker 1: leveraging his platform to challenge norms, inspire change, and make
1:18
Speaker 1: a tangible impact during these critical times. It's great to
1:23
Speaker 1: see you again. It's been great running into you here
1:25
Speaker 1: and there. We met, as you may remember, with Steve
1:28
Speaker 1: Kerr and the gang from the Brady Initiative. Let's start
1:32
Speaker 1: with talking about making the world a safer place relative
1:36
Speaker 1: to gun violence, and not again necessarily take every gun away,
1:39
Speaker 1: but more about how can we operate as a society
1:43
Speaker 1: with gun and safety. Now, the Surgeon General just talked
1:46
Speaker 1: about it being a health priority, and obviously that's been
1:50
Speaker 1: one we've been working on. I like that angle, of course,
1:53
Speaker 1: because we're in healthcare, so to me, it is just
1:56
Speaker 1: something that could make again our country in the world
1:58
Speaker 1: a healthier place.
2:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course, many thoughts on that. First of all,
2:02
Speaker 2: even in following the news, I follow a lot of
2:04
Speaker 2: international news sites, and the thing that always happens on
2:08
Speaker 2: those sites or those podcasts or shows, whatever a gun
2:11
Speaker 2: tragedy happens in this country, that is notable is that
2:14
Speaker 2: they sort of go, why does America do it that way?
2:16
Speaker 2: And so I think that's an interesting perspective that a
2:18
Speaker 2: lot of people in this country don't have, is that
2:20
Speaker 2: the way we do guns here is not the way
2:23
Speaker 2: most other countries who are at our level do guns.
2:26
Speaker 2: And I think the more we as a society can
2:28
Speaker 2: understand that, like there are other ways to do this.
2:31
Speaker 2: Places like Australia, they don't feel less safe because they
2:34
Speaker 2: have less guns on the streets. And I think that
2:36
Speaker 2: we've somehow connected guns with safety in a way that
2:38
Speaker 2: the evidence does not bear out. And on top of that, again,
2:42
Speaker 2: I'm not here trying to take away everybody's gun either,
2:44
Speaker 2: but certainly I think it always polls well that people
2:47
Speaker 2: think there should be a level of responsibility and investigation
2:50
Speaker 2: to anyone who buys a gun. People the country is
2:53
Speaker 2: generally for that, but the powers that be have used
2:56
Speaker 2: this as a wedge issue, and the manufacturers of guns
2:59
Speaker 2: have usuess as well wedge issue and uses as a
3:01
Speaker 2: scare tactic. So I would like to think that people
3:04
Speaker 2: who normally I feel like don't understand the fact that
3:07
Speaker 2: guns don't equal safety will hopefully come around to that idea.
3:11
Speaker 1: Do we sell fewer cigarettes than we used to? I
3:14
Speaker 1: just always wonder why the industries, even in farmers, there's
3:17
Speaker 1: a tendency to want to protect what you've got, but
3:21
Speaker 1: in essence, if you embrace healthier use of those things.
3:25
Speaker 1: One of the things I was impressed by recently is
3:27
Speaker 1: the obesity drugs were looking for proper use messaging, which
3:32
Speaker 1: should only help, right if everyone uses these things better, Yeah,
3:36
Speaker 1: everything should go a little better.
3:38
Speaker 2: Well, as we learned with the prohibition, like just saying
3:42
Speaker 2: something illegal doesn't actually make things better, It just gives
3:44
Speaker 2: criminals a job market. So I would say that the
3:47
Speaker 2: same thing with guns is that you might find that
3:49
Speaker 2: if people see guns as being a thing that is
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Speaker 2: guns that are owned by people who are responsible and
3:54
Speaker 2: also want to be responsible, which most gun unders do.
3:56
Speaker 2: I want to be clear about that, maybe it becomes
3:58
Speaker 2: not such a scary issue overall. But I think right
4:01
Speaker 2: now is the fact is is that certainly knowing the
4:04
Speaker 2: health effects of cigarettes doesn't stop people from smoking, but
4:07
Speaker 2: it does put people who don't want to be around
4:10
Speaker 2: cigarette smoke in a better position. I'll say that. So
4:12
Speaker 2: I would like to think that like putting more restrictions
4:15
Speaker 2: on guns doesn't stop you from owning guns, but it
4:18
Speaker 2: means that I might be around less people with guns
4:21
Speaker 2: who shouldn't have guns. That I currently am right because I.
4:24
Speaker 1: Was in Vegas this weekends and there's like full sections
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Speaker 1: of smoking. Now you can avoid that, there's non smoking areas,
4:30
Speaker 1: but it was definitely like WHOA, I can't believe God.
4:33
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is different than California. I mean, I remember
4:36
Speaker 2: when I moved to California in nineteen eighty seven. In Chicago,
4:39
Speaker 2: you could smoke everywhere. At that point i moved from Chicago,
4:41
Speaker 2: there was I mean there was just bars were filled
4:42
Speaker 2: with smokes. In California at that point, they had a
4:45
Speaker 2: law where you could only smoke at the bar area
4:48
Speaker 2: of You can only smoke if it was a bar,
4:50
Speaker 2: but you couldn't smoke another venues. But I worked at
4:52
Speaker 2: a comedy club, and what would happen is that because
4:55
Speaker 2: of the way the law worked in California, people who
4:57
Speaker 2: are sitting down and enjoying that the comedy would get
4:59
Speaker 2: up and have to walk back to the bar and
5:01
Speaker 2: smoke right next to the bar, even though they were
5:04
Speaker 2: like twenty feet from where they've been sitting. When the
5:06
Speaker 2: laws don't make sense, that's also a problem.
5:08
Speaker 1: It is a problem. Does comedy help any of this.
5:11
Speaker 2: Well, let me just say this. I think comedy is
5:12
Speaker 2: the best way to communicate, whether you're stand up comedian
5:15
Speaker 2: or not. Every public speaker wants to open on a joke.
5:18
Speaker 2: It's the best way to connect with people. If people
5:20
Speaker 2: are laughing, you know they're paying attention. If they're not laughing,
5:23
Speaker 2: you can think they're really listening to you, but they
5:25
Speaker 2: could also be thinking about their laundry. Humor is the
5:28
Speaker 2: best way to communicate because you know people are paying
5:30
Speaker 2: attention if they're laughing. Now, comedy can't solve America's ills.
5:34
Speaker 2: If that was the case, George Carlin would have already
5:36
Speaker 2: done that. He addressed every problem we had. And still
5:39
Speaker 2: we're sending those clips of George calling around because they
5:41
Speaker 2: still make sense.
5:42
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I think when you sit in a concert
5:44
Speaker 1: or you go to a show, it brings you together,
5:47
Speaker 1: like having dinner together or any of these things. So
5:50
Speaker 1: is that the secret sauce of what you do come out?
5:53
Speaker 1: Is that your mission?
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Speaker 2: The secret sauce of what I do? It's funny as
5:56
Speaker 2: a stand up comedian when I'm on stage join that.
5:59
Speaker 2: I do think there's a powerful thing that happens when
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Speaker 2: a group of strangers are in a room together, all
6:03
Speaker 2: taking in the same thing and learning, Like, huh, that
6:06
Speaker 2: person I would have judged is laughing at a thing
6:08
Speaker 2: that I'm laughing at. Maybe we're more the same, or
6:10
Speaker 2: that person is laughing really hard at a joke I
6:12
Speaker 2: don't get. So that joke is funny, but I just
6:14
Speaker 2: don't get it, you know what I mean? So it
6:15
Speaker 2: can help you think differently. Now, what I do in
6:19
Speaker 2: sort of most of my life at this point I
6:20
Speaker 2: find is actually not talking, is actually listening and using
6:23
Speaker 2: humor as a way to grease the skids of a conversation.
6:28
Speaker 2: So I will be funny in conversation with people as
6:31
Speaker 2: a way to let them know I'm a human being.
6:32
Speaker 2: I'm here with you, I'm paying attention. I'm paying attention
6:35
Speaker 2: to you and what you said. So I'm making jokes
6:37
Speaker 2: about it, but I'm not making fun of you. Humor
6:39
Speaker 2: is just helping you break the ice. And then at
6:41
Speaker 2: that point, the more I shut up, the better the conversation,
6:44
Speaker 2: as I find, and.
6:45
Speaker 1: I guess that builds some of the trust and maybe
6:47
Speaker 1: eliminate some of the fear. So one other area I
6:50
Speaker 1: know where we have common ground as the work you
6:53
Speaker 1: did around the COVID nineteen vaccine. We helped launch one
6:57
Speaker 1: at my firm and then work with Read Tucks and
7:01
Speaker 1: at the Black Coalition against COVID to help and dispel
7:04
Speaker 1: some of those issues. Do you think when in that
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Speaker 1: work comedy was.
7:08
Speaker 2: Away in I mean in that work. If anything helped,
7:11
Speaker 2: I think it was just there was some belief that
7:13
Speaker 2: people who'd be watching those videos, and certainly they were
7:15
Speaker 2: targeted at black audiences, would have some sense of who
7:18
Speaker 2: I was and what that meant. Now, I don't tend
7:20
Speaker 2: to overinflate my level of fame or connection to the
7:24
Speaker 2: At the time, I was like, couldn't you get anybody
7:26
Speaker 2: more famous than me? Was my general thing. I kept asking, like,
7:29
Speaker 2: was Kevin Hart not available? But even if you don't
7:31
Speaker 2: know me, I think there's a way in which I
7:33
Speaker 2: deliver things that can make people feel more comfortable. So
7:35
Speaker 2: even if you don't know who I am, I'm not
7:37
Speaker 2: trying to be the expert. I'm trying to be the
7:39
Speaker 2: curious person who wants to know what's going on. And
7:41
Speaker 2: so it's funny. Those videos were certainly not meant to
7:44
Speaker 2: be funny. They were meant to be accessible, and again,
7:46
Speaker 2: humor is a part of being accessible. But that's one
7:49
Speaker 2: of the times I sort of a joke. I was subpoena,
7:51
Speaker 2: so I showed up, and that's just a joke. But
7:52
Speaker 2: there are times in my career where I feel like
7:54
Speaker 2: if I am the person that I say I am,
7:56
Speaker 2: I have to show up for this thing, even if
7:58
Speaker 2: I don't fully understand why I'm being asked. I've worked
8:00
Speaker 2: with the ACLU for over ten years now, because they
8:02
Speaker 2: asked me to work with him. I was like again,
8:04
Speaker 2: I was like, I'm the person you want. Okay, we'll
8:06
Speaker 2: try it, and we've been together for over ten years.
8:08
Speaker 2: A friend of mine got a job writing those COVID
8:11
Speaker 2: videos and he's sort of like, basically I helped put
8:14
Speaker 2: people together to like make those videos happen. I hooked
8:16
Speaker 2: him up with a director and da dah, and then
8:18
Speaker 2: I sort of stood back. At some point my friend
8:20
Speaker 2: reached out and goes, yeah, they want you, and I
8:22
Speaker 2: was like, what do you mean they want me? But
8:24
Speaker 2: I've heard from more than one doctor about the fact
8:26
Speaker 2: that somebody who was nervous about getting the COVID vaccine
8:30
Speaker 2: was shown one of the videos that I was in.
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Speaker 2: Now I'm not doing the heavy lifting. I'm just talking
8:34
Speaker 2: to doctors, but shown one of the videos I was in,
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Speaker 2: and it helped them get over the fear of getting
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Speaker 2: a COVID vaccine. And so for me, that's one of
8:40
Speaker 2: those things, like when I started to do comedy, that's
8:43
Speaker 2: not a thing I've had on my bucket list or
8:44
Speaker 2: a thing that was on my list of goals was
8:46
Speaker 2: help the medical community be more accessible for people who
8:49
Speaker 2: are afraid of the medical community. But certainly it does
8:52
Speaker 2: feel like the kind of thing that my mom, who's
8:54
Speaker 2: eighty seven, is like, Yeah, that's what we do. That's
8:56
Speaker 2: part of our family work. You're a comedian, I'm a
8:58
Speaker 2: writer and editor, but that's part of the family business.
9:01
Speaker 1: I call it health citizenship. That's how we've come together.
9:04
Speaker 1: That's the why we're on this together because I have
9:07
Speaker 1: seen in action that idea that humanizing it, putting a
9:11
Speaker 1: face on it or a name or something or someone
9:15
Speaker 1: that makes it more relatable to that audience. I mean,
9:19
Speaker 1: it's one thing for me to come along and do
9:22
Speaker 1: it or somebody else as opposed to Again, we always
9:25
Speaker 1: say meet the people where they are and that tends
9:29
Speaker 1: to help things. So take us back, how'd you get
9:32
Speaker 1: into comedy? And then more importantly, I want to then
9:35
Speaker 1: hear a little bit how did that lead to the
9:37
Speaker 1: CNN show? Because a lot of people do what you
9:40
Speaker 1: do and they end up on Saturday Night Live or
9:42
Speaker 1: in movies or TV show. So walk us through the
9:47
Speaker 1: genesis of your career.
9:48
Speaker 2: I call those the lucky ones. At some point you
9:51
Speaker 2: look at your path where you're on, and then you
9:53
Speaker 2: look at the path you thought you're going to be on,
9:55
Speaker 2: and there's a point that you go, I can still
9:56
Speaker 2: get over there. And now I'm like, there's no evidence
9:59
Speaker 2: I'm on this path. That path is over there. Good
10:01
Speaker 2: for those people. I know people on that path. I'm
10:03
Speaker 2: happy for him, but I'm on a different path.
10:05
Speaker 1: Tell us your path.
10:06
Speaker 2: So yeah, I mean I was a kid who grew
10:08
Speaker 2: up when Eddie Murphy was still on Saturday Night Live,
10:10
Speaker 2: And I always joke about the fact that I've been
10:12
Speaker 2: saying Saturday Night Live hasn't been good since the seventies,
10:14
Speaker 2: like so since since Lorraine Newman was in the cast.
10:17
Speaker 2: I've just been a fan of comedy my whole life.
10:19
Speaker 2: And when Eddie Murphy was an SNL and blew up,
10:21
Speaker 2: I mean, he was in his early twenties, but I
10:23
Speaker 2: was a kid, and it felt like he was the
10:24
Speaker 2: first time I seen somebody el TV who looked like me,
10:27
Speaker 2: who seemed closer in age to me. He didn't seem
10:29
Speaker 2: like an adult like the rest of the cast, and
10:30
Speaker 2: was a black guy. So from that point forward, I
10:33
Speaker 2: was like, that was one of the things I wanted
10:34
Speaker 2: to do. I wanted to be a comedian or spider Man,
10:36
Speaker 2: but you know that's or Bruce Lee had a few options.
10:39
Speaker 2: And then, as I've talked about, and I've certainly done
10:42
Speaker 2: a lot of work on Bill Cosby's Cosby Show is
10:44
Speaker 2: a big inspirational point for me as a culturally, racially
10:47
Speaker 2: and comedically. For anybody who doesn't know, I did a
10:49
Speaker 2: four hour doc about Bill Cosby. So if you're like,
10:52
Speaker 2: but what do you think about you can it's all
10:54
Speaker 2: in the doc.
10:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, years ago I worked with him on an
10:57
Speaker 1: initiative to raise awareness around heart disease. So I interacted
11:01
Speaker 1: with him.
11:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, anybody who's worked with him, who's seen it, it
11:03
Speaker 2: felt like I really sort of understood something from me
11:06
Speaker 2: because I never met him. But certainly it's about how
11:08
Speaker 2: do you accept all of the truth? Right, the good truth,
11:10
Speaker 2: the bad truth, the ugly truth.
11:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, that'll be a good one to look up.
11:13
Speaker 2: We won a Peabody Award, No big deal. But anyways,
11:17
Speaker 2: but I would say that, like, I was a black
11:18
Speaker 2: kid growing up in the eighties who at that point
11:20
Speaker 2: black culture really was blowing up the era of Michael
11:23
Speaker 2: Jordan becoming Michael Jordan, Oprah becoming Oprah, Bill Cobb becoming
11:26
Speaker 2: Bill Cosby, and all these major cultural figures that would
11:29
Speaker 2: become international icons. And then I want to do stand
11:33
Speaker 2: up comedy. But when I started, I was just any
11:35
Speaker 2: other person trying to do stand up comedy. I started Chicago,
11:38
Speaker 2: and I was not very good at it for like
11:41
Speaker 2: a while, and then I moved out to the Bay Area,
11:43
Speaker 2: where I was like, I want to go someplace where
11:45
Speaker 2: I hear people can grow, and so I moved to
11:47
Speaker 2: the Bay Area because San Francisco Bay Area comedy scene
11:49
Speaker 2: has always been known as a place for people who
11:51
Speaker 2: have a little more artistic ben Robin Williams is from here,
11:54
Speaker 2: and then a lot of the alt comics Mark Maron
11:56
Speaker 2: spend time here, Janine Garoffolo. There was just always a
11:59
Speaker 2: sort of a artistic bent. Ellen DeGeneres won the Sarvas
12:02
Speaker 2: of Comedy competition. It's just the thought of as a
12:04
Speaker 2: place where comics of the more individual sense come from here.
12:07
Speaker 2: So I moved here, and I got better, and then
12:11
Speaker 2: sort of got all the things you sort of get.
12:12
Speaker 2: At a certain point, the Montreal Comedy Festival got to
12:15
Speaker 2: be on a show on Comedy Central, and then at
12:17
Speaker 2: that point that was all I got, Like, nothing really
12:19
Speaker 2: got bigger than that, And that's when I sort of
12:21
Speaker 2: took my career in my own hands and wrote this
12:23
Speaker 2: solo show called The w kmal Bell Curve, ending Racism
12:27
Speaker 2: in About an Hour, which was a live stand up
12:29
Speaker 2: show with PowerPoint, and that show ended up being the
12:33
Speaker 2: thing that got me attention Chris Rock saw. It helped
12:36
Speaker 2: me get my first TV show called Totally Bias, which
12:39
Speaker 2: is like a late night talk show in the vein
12:41
Speaker 2: of the Daily Show, when the only late night political
12:44
Speaker 2: talk shows were John Stewart and Stephen Colbert on the
12:46
Speaker 2: Colbert Areport. That was the air that I got to
12:48
Speaker 2: show in, so there weren't a lot of them. Now
12:50
Speaker 2: there's a lot more of them. To give you an example,
12:52
Speaker 2: Trevor Noah's first American TV appearance was on my show
12:55
Speaker 2: Totally Bias, So oh wow, that's how far back we're going.
12:57
Speaker 2: He's a very nice person, and it's always given me
12:59
Speaker 2: too much credit for his American success because I was like,
13:02
Speaker 2: you were going to be successful anyway, sir, So yes,
13:04
Speaker 2: it was just a different era, and that show got
13:07
Speaker 2: canceled after a year, and then I ended up in
13:09
Speaker 2: the offices at CNN. They had just signed Boordaining, they
13:13
Speaker 2: had just signed Morgan Spurlock, Lisa Ling, Mike Rowe. Those
13:17
Speaker 2: shows had been successful, and then they were like, can
13:20
Speaker 2: we build a show from the ground up? Basically because
13:22
Speaker 2: all these people had pre established shows elsewhere, but can
13:24
Speaker 2: we start a show here? And I was the first
13:27
Speaker 2: and I think, if you look at it, the only
13:29
Speaker 2: one that was really actually lasted up until Stanley Tucci,
13:33
Speaker 2: which doesn't really count because he's Stanley Tucci. But I
13:35
Speaker 2: was like basically an unknown person who got this show
13:37
Speaker 2: and was there for seven years. We did seven seasons
13:40
Speaker 2: and did a lot of good work and got a
13:42
Speaker 2: lot of award And that's the thing I'm at this
13:44
Speaker 2: point most known for.
13:46
Speaker 1: What do you think the impact? What was that that
13:48
Speaker 1: caught fire there?
13:49
Speaker 2: The thing that makes me most proud about that show
13:51
Speaker 2: is that now if I run into somebody in the
13:53
Speaker 2: streets who recognizes me from the show, the thing they
13:56
Speaker 2: say is thank you for your work. It used to
13:59
Speaker 2: be like a The first episode was me talking to
14:01
Speaker 2: the KKK. For years, I would get, man, that KKK
14:04
Speaker 2: episode was crazy, like that was the thing I got like,
14:06
Speaker 2: and I was after a while you sort of like,
14:08
Speaker 2: is that all I'm known for? But now people have
14:11
Speaker 2: recognized generally the body of work is what they appreciate,
14:14
Speaker 2: like the fact that every week they tuned in, I
14:16
Speaker 2: would take them somewhere where they had probably never been
14:19
Speaker 2: before and have conversations that they would never be able
14:22
Speaker 2: to have in their own life, whether they agreed with
14:24
Speaker 2: me or not, or agreed with the first years talking
14:26
Speaker 2: or not. They got to be a tourist in America
14:29
Speaker 2: in a way that most people don't get to be
14:30
Speaker 2: a tourist, Like instead of just going to like the
14:33
Speaker 2: mall in that town, you actually go to the most
14:35
Speaker 2: impacted neighbor in that town, with people who have something
14:38
Speaker 2: to say about their lives. And so I think that's
14:40
Speaker 2: what people appreciate it. Like if you tuned in, I
14:42
Speaker 2: might be in Appalachia talking to white coal miners. I
14:46
Speaker 2: might be in Puerto Rico talking about we should Puerto
14:49
Speaker 2: Rico be a state or not. I might be in
14:51
Speaker 2: Canada talking about what's your view of the United States.
14:53
Speaker 2: I might be at the US Mexico border talking about
14:56
Speaker 2: how it used to be easy to legally get across
14:58
Speaker 2: the border and back and now it it takes a while.
15:00
Speaker 2: There was no predicting where I would go, and I
15:03
Speaker 2: think people appreciated the level of conversations and the fact that,
15:06
Speaker 2: like some people want to see people yelling at each other,
15:09
Speaker 2: and people who wanted that didn't like the show, But
15:11
Speaker 2: people appreciated the fact that no matter who I was
15:13
Speaker 2: talking to, I was having pretty easy, generous conversations where
15:17
Speaker 2: I would let people get their viewpoint out even if
15:19
Speaker 2: I didn't agree with them right.
15:20
Speaker 1: And I think that was something that was appealing to
15:23
Speaker 1: me as I met you and got to know you,
15:25
Speaker 1: and why I wanted to do on the podcast because
15:27
Speaker 1: I think you've got more work to do on this front.
15:29
Speaker 2: That's what I keep hearing from people.
15:31
Speaker 1: Well, here's where it comes in. I've worked in medical
15:34
Speaker 1: and pharmaceutical communications for many decades and one of the
15:38
Speaker 1: continued issues is how do we design both health systems
15:42
Speaker 1: as well as clinical trials and drugs that are applicable
15:47
Speaker 1: to different needs of different populations. And that's what that
15:52
Speaker 1: show The United Shades talked about. That's something we have
15:55
Speaker 1: to consider as we're designing medicine, as we're thinking about
15:59
Speaker 1: health care and access.
16:01
Speaker 2: When we did the can episode, I was like, a
16:02
Speaker 2: lot of that episode was about healthcare in Canada versus
16:04
Speaker 2: healthcare in the United States. And the fact is is
16:06
Speaker 2: like as much as some of us in America may
16:09
Speaker 2: like think their healthcare is like, oh, it's so perfect,
16:11
Speaker 2: they're like, no, we still got problems up here too.
16:12
Speaker 2: So I think the idea being that, like the grass
16:14
Speaker 2: is not greener on the other side, it may be
16:16
Speaker 2: better grass, but it may not be greener every day.
16:19
Speaker 2: We did many episodes that were about health care or
16:22
Speaker 2: health outcomes, and we did an episode of Milwaukee, Wisconsin,
16:26
Speaker 2: interestingly enough, and oh man, we didn't have one in Pittsburgh,
16:29
Speaker 2: talking about like a white person in Pittsburgh is going
16:32
Speaker 2: to have a much different quality of life than a
16:34
Speaker 2: black person in Pittsburgh, and a lot of it is
16:36
Speaker 2: health same thing in Milwaukee. We did an episode on
16:38
Speaker 2: toxic environments, like people who grow up in places near factories.
16:42
Speaker 2: I talked to you an environmental activists and he said, look,
16:44
Speaker 2: if you tell me the zip code you live in,
16:46
Speaker 2: I can tell you how long you're going to live.
16:48
Speaker 2: I can tell you the range of money you make.
16:49
Speaker 2: I might be able tell you when you're gonna die,
16:51
Speaker 2: you know what I mean, Just how we don't think
16:52
Speaker 2: of ourselves as being that tied into our circumstances in
16:55
Speaker 2: this country. We like to think that we can sort
16:57
Speaker 2: of that we are our own individuals. But it's the
16:59
Speaker 2: fact is is like a lot of your life is
17:01
Speaker 2: going to be determined by where you're born and where
17:03
Speaker 2: you live. And I think that people knowing that it
17:07
Speaker 2: sort of helps you understand what you have to do
17:09
Speaker 2: to get beyond that. It's not about like, oh, I'm
17:11
Speaker 2: going to try. It's not always about I'm going to
17:13
Speaker 2: try real hard. It's like I might need to like
17:14
Speaker 2: figure out how to pick up and get out of here,
17:17
Speaker 2: or I might need to figure out how to change
17:19
Speaker 2: where I'm at so it doesn't do this to everybody
17:21
Speaker 2: in this community, which is kind of what I want
17:22
Speaker 2: to do here in Oakland. I would like to let
17:24
Speaker 2: Oakland sort of be the place that it has been
17:26
Speaker 2: I know it can be. One of the things that
17:29
Speaker 2: I've been working on for just over a year now
17:32
Speaker 2: is making Oakland a more accessible and attainable place for
17:36
Speaker 2: filmmakers to work. That's the big local initiative that I've
17:40
Speaker 2: taken on in the last year or so, and we
17:41
Speaker 2: just found out that the city Council has passed the
17:44
Speaker 2: initiatives we asked for, which is like tax rebates for
17:47
Speaker 2: people who work here and discounts on certain services if
17:50
Speaker 2: you work in certain neighborhoods or hire certain communities. Many
17:53
Speaker 2: people understand that, like Atlanta has been transformed by the
17:57
Speaker 2: fact that they've been allowing filming there, and lots of
17:59
Speaker 2: play are trying to do it. Oklahoma's doing it, certainly
18:02
Speaker 2: plays in Canada they are doing it, but everybody's trying
18:04
Speaker 2: to do it.
18:04
Speaker 1: I always think of Vancouver and Toronto.
18:07
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, they started doing it early. They were early adopters.
18:10
Speaker 2: There's many movies that take place in New York that
18:12
Speaker 2: are shot in Toronto because Canada understood if we make
18:15
Speaker 2: it easier on you and cheaper on you, then we
18:18
Speaker 2: get the benefit of the work you do.
18:20
Speaker 1: Right. And Wilmington, North Carolina, oddly enough, was another marker
18:24
Speaker 1: where I had an office, and I remember that was
18:26
Speaker 1: a big push for them.
18:28
Speaker 2: The thing that we have in Oakland that a lot
18:30
Speaker 2: of those other places don't have is that we're actually
18:32
Speaker 2: close to la We're actually like, you don't have to
18:34
Speaker 2: leave the state.
18:35
Speaker 1: Right, And I think that what you're talking about is
18:38
Speaker 1: how do we create healthier communities. What's the role of
18:42
Speaker 1: business in that. I mean, I'm involved in something called
18:45
Speaker 1: Life Science Cares and that was part of my ulterior motive.
18:48
Speaker 1: And I know you is how do I pull you in?
18:51
Speaker 1: Because the local communities for the biotech and pharmer industry
18:55
Speaker 1: is Oakland, is San Francisco, is San Jose. Can we
18:59
Speaker 1: help get more kids into STEM? Can we get them
19:03
Speaker 1: internships at some of these companies? These are some of
19:06
Speaker 1: the most progressive, high tech important companies. And you know,
19:10
Speaker 1: is that a way to unlock your voice to help
19:12
Speaker 1: improve the community.
19:13
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think that. One of the things we talk
19:15
Speaker 2: about in this work we're doing with the Film Initiative
19:18
Speaker 2: is like film is just sort of the trojan horse
19:20
Speaker 2: for all these other fields. So if there's more filming
19:23
Speaker 2: going on here, maybe you want to be a director
19:25
Speaker 2: or screenwriter, but maybe you want to be the guy
19:27
Speaker 2: who owns the trucking business that drives the equipment in
19:30
Speaker 2: you know what I mean? So I think that did
19:31
Speaker 2: being like right now, there's not really pathways here, and
19:35
Speaker 2: this is true of a lot of urban cities. If
19:37
Speaker 2: you're a kid who's like, I love the city I
19:39
Speaker 2: live in. I want to live and thrive here. There's
19:43
Speaker 2: not a pathway for that. There's just sort of a
19:45
Speaker 2: like I hope I get a job, or I hope
19:47
Speaker 2: I get into college. There's not really like whereas we
19:49
Speaker 2: want to really create something that is like if you
19:51
Speaker 2: are interested in these ideas, and certainly a lot of
19:54
Speaker 2: the film industry is stem. You can't make all those
19:56
Speaker 2: Marvel movies without knowing something about science and technology and math.
20:00
Speaker 2: So if you can create these programs, you like this program, Now,
20:04
Speaker 2: here's the internship, here's the summer job, here's the person.
20:08
Speaker 2: We're going to bring in somebody from the local film
20:10
Speaker 2: community who is successful to talk to you about how
20:13
Speaker 2: to get into this industry. I have to like type
20:16
Speaker 2: in with my local community activists, are other artists, other
20:19
Speaker 2: filmmakers who go, how can we do this together? Because
20:22
Speaker 2: if I just want to make it happen, I'm gonna
20:24
Speaker 2: be like on my deathbed, like, man, I should have
20:26
Speaker 2: made that happen, you know, So I wish somebody had
20:28
Speaker 2: done that. And I think that I'm at the point
20:30
Speaker 2: in my career where it's like the list of things
20:31
Speaker 2: I want to do is pretty small, but I have
20:33
Speaker 2: to make sure that it's actually serving what I wanted
20:35
Speaker 2: to serve. So I want to feed and how's my family?
20:38
Speaker 2: That's top of the list, But I also want to
20:40
Speaker 2: if I'm feeding and how's my family, I want that
20:42
Speaker 2: to do that in the community where people can also
20:45
Speaker 2: feed and house their families. So it doesn't make sense
20:47
Speaker 2: for me to feel like I am doing a good
20:48
Speaker 2: job of that and then to walk outside my house
20:50
Speaker 2: and see other people not able to do that, and
20:53
Speaker 2: I could have done something well.
20:54
Speaker 1: Citizenship, We've been talking about it. Whether you're a health
20:57
Speaker 1: that is, it's all health, financial health, and able's healthy health.
21:02
Speaker 1: Like you said, it's all in the zip code. If
21:04
Speaker 1: you don't have good hospital and healthcare and all that
21:06
Speaker 1: in the area, you're gonna end up in trouble at
21:10
Speaker 1: some point.
21:11
Speaker 2: And the problem is you might think it was your
21:12
Speaker 2: fault when really it's like, it's not all your fault.
21:15
Speaker 2: We talk about this with like food deserts, or you
21:17
Speaker 2: live next to a factory. You didn't decide to live
21:19
Speaker 2: next to a factory, but you end up at the
21:20
Speaker 2: hospital and you're like, I have asthma and it turns
21:23
Speaker 2: out I can't breathe.
21:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
21:25
Speaker 2: A lot of black kids are born with asthma because
21:27
Speaker 2: a lot of black kids are born into places where
21:29
Speaker 2: the air is bad. So it's like, that's not my fault,
21:31
Speaker 2: but I don't know that by the time I get
21:33
Speaker 2: to the hospital or fix it.
21:34
Speaker 1: And look, you know, I worked with the first company
21:37
Speaker 1: that developed the first sickle cell drug and now there's
21:41
Speaker 1: much more. But a lot of that came from like
21:44
Speaker 1: Oakland community activism.
21:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, the Black Panthers were working on that.
21:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, but now there's drugs for it, and now it's
21:52
Speaker 1: not necessarily the death sentence that it had been. Cystic
21:55
Speaker 1: fibrosis is another one. There's actually a few good exams
22:00
Speaker 1: apples of where the community and the industry can work together.
22:04
Speaker 1: I guess that's why you're focused on bringing the industry here.
22:08
Speaker 1: How can industry help bring more industry here?
22:11
Speaker 2: Well, I would say this, first of all, I do
22:12
Speaker 2: love the fact that the Brady Initiative wants to show
22:14
Speaker 2: responsible gun ownership in film, because the funny thing I've
22:17
Speaker 2: learned in my time I've whenever I interacted with people
22:20
Speaker 2: who are responsible gun owners is they hate when they
22:23
Speaker 2: see people in film doing things with guns that are
22:26
Speaker 2: like not safe. They tend to like, you know, they
22:29
Speaker 2: they love the fact that it's they can tell the
22:30
Speaker 2: Kyata Reeves has trained like that. They're like, oh, he
22:33
Speaker 2: actually knows what he's doing there. They hate seeing people
22:35
Speaker 2: do things where it's like that's not how that would work,
22:37
Speaker 2: because it doesn't feel good to you as somebody who
22:38
Speaker 2: knows what's going on. It's the same way with like
22:40
Speaker 2: seat belts and cars, just showing more people in movies
22:43
Speaker 2: doing that putting on their seat belt. It changed seems
22:46
Speaker 2: so simple, right, it seems and yet so I certainly
22:48
Speaker 2: think that's the way to go. But I think that
22:50
Speaker 2: for me, the idea of like again, the film thing
22:52
Speaker 2: is a trojan horse for all industry. Right now. If
22:55
Speaker 2: I worked in tech, i'd be doing it in tech.
22:57
Speaker 2: But I think right now it's a film industry connects
22:59
Speaker 2: to every other industry. Everything you do in film is
23:02
Speaker 2: connected down to Like the food you eat is catering,
23:05
Speaker 2: so that's food service. How do you get the big
23:07
Speaker 2: rig from this to hear? That's a union, that's trucking services.
23:10
Speaker 2: How do you make the picture look as good? That's tech,
23:13
Speaker 2: that's editing. And then on top of that, how do
23:15
Speaker 2: you make all of that filmmaking responsible and make sure
23:18
Speaker 2: all the people who are working on the film feel
23:20
Speaker 2: taken care of. That's about making sure that everybody has
23:23
Speaker 2: good insurance, you know what I mean, and making sure
23:25
Speaker 2: that these are good union jobs that come with good insurance.
23:28
Speaker 2: So I think the idea being that it's not about
23:31
Speaker 2: if you make a good film, but everybody got ran
23:34
Speaker 2: through in the making of that film and doesn't paid
23:36
Speaker 2: equitably and didn't have good community services, who cares about
23:39
Speaker 2: the film. I'd rather make a bad superhero movie where
23:41
Speaker 2: everybody got paid equably than a good movie that nobody
23:44
Speaker 2: got paid equably.
23:45
Speaker 1: Well, So how do you do that? Is there an
23:47
Speaker 1: organization set up? And tell us a little bit about that.
23:51
Speaker 2: So when we first started working on this, the first
23:53
Speaker 2: thing when I got the mayor over a year ago
23:55
Speaker 2: reached out to me about, like, I want to talk
23:57
Speaker 2: to you about how do we get filmmaking in Oakland? Wait?
23:59
Speaker 1: Which mayor was the mayor? The current mayor.
24:02
Speaker 2: Is confusing, right, Yeah, I don't know the current mayor.
24:05
Speaker 1: Okay, got it?
24:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I will give her credit. She reached out
24:08
Speaker 2: to me. Now there's always going to be a new
24:11
Speaker 2: mayor of Oakland, but luckily the city council is all
24:13
Speaker 2: on board too, so it's luckily the whole local government
24:17
Speaker 2: is on board, so it doesn't all rest on the mayor,
24:19
Speaker 2: and she has worked hard to get this message across.
24:22
Speaker 2: So the first thing I did when I realized I
24:25
Speaker 2: was going to be with the mayor was I reached
24:26
Speaker 2: out to pastor Michael McBride, who's a local community activist
24:30
Speaker 2: and he's got a gun violence prevention organization called Live
24:33
Speaker 2: Free that me and Steve Kerr on the board of
24:35
Speaker 2: directors of. He put me on the board of directors,
24:37
Speaker 2: and I was like, whatever you want me to do,
24:38
Speaker 2: I'll just do it. So he put me on the
24:39
Speaker 2: board of directors, which just means he gets to use
24:42
Speaker 2: my name, I think, which is fine with me. But
24:44
Speaker 2: I sort of immediately reached out to a community activist
24:46
Speaker 2: because I was like, I don't want this to be
24:48
Speaker 2: a thing where camal Bell, who identifies with being for
24:51
Speaker 2: Oakland but he's not born and raised here, suddenly starts
24:53
Speaker 2: looking like he's making money or come up off of
24:56
Speaker 2: Oakland and is not sort of doing it their perage way.
24:58
Speaker 2: So immediately reached out to past Mike because I knew that, like,
25:01
Speaker 2: he wants young people on the streets who are currently
25:04
Speaker 2: caught up in gun violence to have other opportunities. So
25:07
Speaker 2: this thing becomes a way for people who are caught
25:10
Speaker 2: up in a life that they don't want to be
25:12
Speaker 2: caught up in give them something another possibility. And so
25:14
Speaker 2: that's the first thing idea was reach out to Pastor
25:16
Speaker 2: Mike because he sees this as like a generational change
25:19
Speaker 2: for Oakland that is bigger than just doing movies here.
25:23
Speaker 2: It's about like currently there are young people in the
25:25
Speaker 2: neighborhoods who don't feel like they have a way out,
25:27
Speaker 2: and so they resort to things that they feel like
25:29
Speaker 2: they have to do, to criminal activities. And then I
25:32
Speaker 2: reach out to Faveana Rodriguez, who's an artist and activist,
25:34
Speaker 2: who's another person who has an organization that is also
25:38
Speaker 2: involved in like how do we create new opportunities for artists.
25:40
Speaker 2: So we have been collectively come together with some other
25:43
Speaker 2: filmmakers with called the East Bay Film Collective, which is
25:46
Speaker 2: a collective of local filmmakers, artists and activists. Boots Riley
25:50
Speaker 2: is on it, Chryl Dunnie, Steph Curry just signed on
25:53
Speaker 2: to it. His company Unanimous just signed on to.
25:55
Speaker 1: It, right because he's doing a series.
25:57
Speaker 2: Right, They're producing a lot of content out of there.
25:59
Speaker 1: Yeah, well they do that all here in Oakland.
26:01
Speaker 2: Or well, see, we just got the initiative past and
26:03
Speaker 2: now it's about like dotting the eyes and cross the t's.
26:06
Speaker 2: We hope within the next few months we'll be able
26:07
Speaker 2: to announce some projects that are filming here. We have
26:09
Speaker 2: plenty of real estate that can be turned into studios
26:11
Speaker 2: and if anybody's listening, who's interested. That's the idea is
26:14
Speaker 2: that the city has sort of greenlit a certain amount,
26:16
Speaker 2: like I think it's half a million dollars for film incentives,
26:20
Speaker 2: but it's also set up in a way that people
26:21
Speaker 2: are allowed to raise outside funds. It changes the nature
26:24
Speaker 2: of the city because people are like, I don't have
26:26
Speaker 2: to live in LA you know what I mean? And
26:28
Speaker 2: so the thing I like about Oakland is that you
26:30
Speaker 2: could live here and still go to LA in an hour.
26:32
Speaker 2: You're subject to the laws and things of California that
26:35
Speaker 2: you are already subject to, so it's not you have
26:37
Speaker 2: to like figure out a new what is life here?
26:39
Speaker 2: So it's called the estpay Film Collective. You can check
26:42
Speaker 2: it out right now. Our home is on Instagram at
26:44
Speaker 2: make it Bay, make it Bay, m ak e it
26:47
Speaker 2: b a y and we're currently working on talking to
26:51
Speaker 2: people are interested in contributing financially in some way, but
26:53
Speaker 2: really also just getting people who want to be in
26:56
Speaker 2: our I say rollerdecks because I'm old school, but basically
26:58
Speaker 2: our spreadsheet of like people that we need to know
27:01
Speaker 2: who live here or in shouldn't be a part of
27:02
Speaker 2: this currently. That's what you can go find out at
27:04
Speaker 2: to make it Bay Instagram page. You can sign up
27:06
Speaker 2: and figure out how to connect with us there.
27:08
Speaker 1: And is this taking up all your time or what
27:11
Speaker 1: else are you doing?
27:11
Speaker 2: I Mean, the funny thing is, like I said, this
27:13
Speaker 2: is taking up a lot of my time, maybe more
27:15
Speaker 2: time than it should. But it's not my job. This
27:17
Speaker 2: is all just work that I'm doing for the sake
27:19
Speaker 2: of the community. So I'm still also doing my day job,
27:21
Speaker 2: which takes me all over the countries.
27:23
Speaker 1: So yeah, what is the obvious? You still doing stand up?
27:26
Speaker 2: Right?
27:26
Speaker 1: Yeah?
27:26
Speaker 2: I just started doing stand up again and I'll be
27:28
Speaker 2: doing more stand up and actually I'm about to write
27:30
Speaker 2: a big piece for the Washington Post and it's a
27:32
Speaker 2: video piece. It's first time I have done anything for
27:34
Speaker 2: the Washington Post. I'm pretty excited about it.
27:36
Speaker 1: What is it about, are you allowed to say or not?
27:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a funny thing. I'm allowed to say. It's
27:40
Speaker 2: about helping people understand government and why it's important to
27:43
Speaker 2: understand government even in these hectic times, I'll say that.
27:46
Speaker 2: So it's like about the boring parts of government that
27:49
Speaker 2: we should not be so bored by.
27:50
Speaker 1: Right, So it's like Schoolhouse Rock from the next gen.
27:54
Speaker 2: Basically, Yeah, it's whatever president we have next has the
27:57
Speaker 2: ability to hire and fire lots of people, and sometimes
27:59
Speaker 2: you see these numbers, Oh they fired all those people.
28:03
Speaker 2: But you need to know why that department needed those
28:06
Speaker 2: people and why that's going to affect you the next
28:08
Speaker 2: time you let go to the grocery store and go wait,
28:09
Speaker 2: why does this cost so much? Now he's right, How
28:12
Speaker 2: can we connect the dots from we think of inflation
28:15
Speaker 2: or all these sort of market forces just being market forces,
28:18
Speaker 2: not understanding like no, no, no, it's connected to this department
28:21
Speaker 2: here that is understaffed.
28:22
Speaker 1: Well, we know there's an argument between more and less government,
28:26
Speaker 1: right now, so why some government is good.
28:28
Speaker 2: It's important to have some level of government because if not,
28:31
Speaker 2: then it becomes the Old West. We've all seen those
28:33
Speaker 2: pictures like how did eggs get to be so expensive? Well,
28:36
Speaker 2: maybe there's not people who are able to pay attention
28:39
Speaker 2: to that in the way they used to be.
28:47
Speaker 1: Now, I want to shift into a section I'm calling
28:50
Speaker 1: so what's it all mean? Where we hear about your
28:52
Speaker 1: work and action and how it's playing out in the
28:55
Speaker 1: real world. What would you like to get more involved
29:03
Speaker 1: in going forward to make a difference. What's the mission?
29:08
Speaker 1: What's the camal Bell mission for the next year? And
29:12
Speaker 1: where can some of our audience plug you in?
29:16
Speaker 2: That's funny, the camal Bell mission for the next year.
29:19
Speaker 2: It's like, oh, my brain is swimming. But I'll say
29:22
Speaker 2: this a guy. I have people come up with me
29:23
Speaker 2: pretty regularly because they know me and do my work,
29:26
Speaker 2: and I will say things like is everything going to
29:28
Speaker 2: be okay? And here's the thing. If people ask me
29:30
Speaker 2: my optimistic I'm only optimistic if we do the work.
29:33
Speaker 2: If we don't do the work, then optimism is not
29:35
Speaker 2: doing you any favors. So I was like, it's everything
29:37
Speaker 2: gonna be okay. I was like, no, just gonna be okay, Well,
29:41
Speaker 2: then what do we do do we just trust that
29:43
Speaker 2: things aren't as bad as we're told they're gonna be. No,
29:45
Speaker 2: we don't do that either. We don't. We don't just like, well,
29:47
Speaker 2: it's gonna be bad, but maybe won't be as bad.
29:49
Speaker 2: And he said, well, what can I do? And I
29:51
Speaker 2: was like, where do you live? And he told me
29:52
Speaker 2: where you lived. It was somewhere in the bay. And
29:54
Speaker 2: I was like, your job is to go home and
29:57
Speaker 2: look up all the local community organization in your community
30:01
Speaker 2: and figure out how to plug in with some of them.
30:03
Speaker 2: And whatever your skill is. Maybe your skill is I
30:06
Speaker 2: got a big truck so I can help them move things.
30:09
Speaker 2: Or maybe your skill is I know how to do websites,
30:11
Speaker 2: or maybe your skill is I'm a secret billionaire that
30:13
Speaker 2: nobody knows, like you know, whatever your skill is, or
30:16
Speaker 2: maybe your skill is I have hours free that I
30:18
Speaker 2: can volunteer. I encourage everybody to go vote. Make sure
30:21
Speaker 2: you're registered to vote, make sure you know when the
30:23
Speaker 2: voting is, make sure you know how to vote in
30:25
Speaker 2: your community and where you have to vote, because they
30:27
Speaker 2: move that around in certain spots. But also make sure
30:30
Speaker 2: you know who's the most important elections I would say
30:32
Speaker 2: for anybody is local elections. So make sure you know
30:35
Speaker 2: locally who's running, why you're voting for them. Yes, sometimes
30:38
Speaker 2: you get in there and there's like fifteen judges and
30:40
Speaker 2: you got to pick six, and you're like, ah, I
30:42
Speaker 2: understand that. But anything you can figure out, there's all
30:45
Speaker 2: sorts of voting guides, and you can look up no
30:47
Speaker 2: matter what side of the aisle you're on, but also
30:49
Speaker 2: start to figure out how you can do more than
30:51
Speaker 2: you're already doing, because local community is going to be
30:54
Speaker 2: so important in the next era of America. Making sure
30:58
Speaker 2: that you can take care and be of service your
31:00
Speaker 2: local community is way more important than following the news
31:02
Speaker 2: that's going on in Washington, DC. So that's the thing
31:04
Speaker 2: I'm focused on, and that's why I was saying that.
31:07
Speaker 2: Now realizing oh, that's what I'm doing with the Oakland thing,
31:09
Speaker 2: I sort of forget, like that's why I'm doing that,
31:11
Speaker 2: because it's like, I don't know what's going to happen
31:13
Speaker 2: in America as a whole. But if I don't work
31:16
Speaker 2: harder to make this Oakland better for people of Oakland,
31:18
Speaker 2: then I've misunderstood the assignment.
31:20
Speaker 1: I couldn't agree more. Where you live is America, and
31:23
Speaker 1: making that work well is our role as health citizens.
31:28
Speaker 1: And I would tell my friends the same thing. Biting
31:31
Speaker 1: your nails and cleaning your teeth is not action, right.
31:35
Speaker 1: You got to get out. The only way I feel
31:37
Speaker 1: there's agency and empowerment is to go out and do something.
31:41
Speaker 2: You can walk into any house of workship, no matter what,
31:44
Speaker 2: and go is there something I can do here? Like
31:46
Speaker 2: I always encourage people to google the phrase mutual aid
31:49
Speaker 2: and then your zip code of your community, because mutual
31:51
Speaker 2: aid is just like do you have extra diapers? And
31:54
Speaker 2: can you bring them to me? It can get really small,
31:57
Speaker 2: but really helpful. Because also the other thing is important.
32:00
Speaker 2: We need to meet people outside of your regular circle
32:02
Speaker 2: who are in your community totally. Because the more you
32:04
Speaker 2: understand that your friend group and your work group is
32:06
Speaker 2: not the extent of your community, the more you will
32:09
Speaker 2: build a sense of empathy and togetherness in community. Because
32:11
Speaker 2: I feel like the thing that is currently broken right
32:13
Speaker 2: now in America and I don't know if we can
32:15
Speaker 2: invent a drug for this, we've sort of lost a
32:17
Speaker 2: lot of empathy for our fellow citizens, and I believe
32:21
Speaker 2: we need a vitamin B twelve shot of empathy, and
32:23
Speaker 2: one way you do that is just by meeting people
32:25
Speaker 2: who are outside of your regular space.
32:27
Speaker 1: Empathy is super healthy and one of the things I
32:30
Speaker 1: read today some advice I saw was if you really
32:34
Speaker 1: want to change your life, you change your inner circle.
32:38
Speaker 2: We all think if you get a certain age, you
32:39
Speaker 2: don't think about it like it's too hard to meet
32:41
Speaker 2: new people. But one way you can meet new people,
32:43
Speaker 2: it's just by figuring out how to be of service
32:45
Speaker 2: in your community.
32:46
Speaker 1: I don't know any better way to end on that.
32:49
Speaker 1: Thank you, and I look forward to collaborating with you
32:52
Speaker 1: on many of these initiatives.
32:53
Speaker 3: Thank you, Hey, everyone, thanks for listening in today. The
33:02
Speaker 3: Get Real with the Chairman podcast is a production of
33:05
Speaker 3: Real Chemistry. I want to thank my team, led by
33:08
Speaker 3: executive producer Kate Voss, audio engineer Nick Murphy, and composer
33:13
Speaker 3: Matt Lipkins, and special thanks to Danielle Clark Brown and
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Speaker 3: the amazing team of Real Chemistry.
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Speaker 1: please subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss an episode. Again.
33:29
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening, and we'll see you on the road.