Latest / The Breakfast Club / Mysonne, A.T. Mitchell & Angelo Pinto Talk Gun Violence, Lyrics In Court, Community Unity + More

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Mysonne, A.T. Mitchell & Angelo Pinto Talk Gun Violence, Lyrics In Court, Community Unity + More · The Breakfast Club

0:00
Speaker 1: Morning. Everybody is DJ Envy, Angela Yee, Charlemagne the guy.
0:04
Speaker 1: We are the Breakfast Club. We got a special guests
0:06
Speaker 1: in the building. That's right. I know he's back. He
0:08
Speaker 1: was here what two weeks ago? Yeah, yeah, the brother
0:10
Speaker 1: my song, welcome my song. What's happening King? Yeah, we
0:12
Speaker 1: were gonna bring you back to you did say that,
0:14
Speaker 1: and we wanted to talk about all the violence that
0:17
Speaker 1: was happening, you know, in our communities and you know,
0:19
Speaker 1: in the industry, and sadly it's only gotten worse since
0:22
Speaker 1: then with the passing the P and B Rock. Yeah,
0:24
Speaker 1: that's that's crazy, man. I brought today my brothers the
0:30
Speaker 1: official guns are of New York. Brother at Mitchell. He's
0:34
Speaker 1: been appointed by the man to pretty much focus on
0:37
Speaker 1: gun violence in New York City. So he's the man,
0:40
Speaker 1: the top man in that regard. And this is also
0:43
Speaker 1: a co founder of Until Freedom, my brother Angelo Pinto,
0:46
Speaker 1: Attorney Angelo Pinto. You know, so where do we start?
0:50
Speaker 1: I guess you know, Well, the first reason why we
0:53
Speaker 1: wanted to bring you up because everybody was talking about lyrics, right,
0:55
Speaker 1: and rappers were talking about lyrics, and in DA's using
0:58
Speaker 1: their lyrics against him in court, um, so I wanted
1:02
Speaker 1: to talk about that first. So what are your thoughts
1:04
Speaker 1: on that, especially you're from all of your your from
1:06
Speaker 1: the Bronx. Jesus Christ, don't start the trouble from the Bronx.
1:13
Speaker 1: Of course, you're a rapper, you were signed with violated signs,
1:15
Speaker 1: so many times you had records and you got arrested.
1:17
Speaker 1: But what are your thoughts on them using lyrics against
1:21
Speaker 1: you or any rappers? I mean, I mean, we know
1:24
Speaker 1: that it happens, right and if you and you're engaged
1:27
Speaker 1: in a certain lifestyle, you're in the streets, you actually
1:30
Speaker 1: actively committing crimes, and then you're talking about them, then
1:34
Speaker 1: you're telling on yourself. I mean, that's just common sense.
1:36
Speaker 1: I think anybody. People don't see it like that though,
1:39
Speaker 1: but if you, I'm saying, see the difference is if
1:42
Speaker 1: if you're just entertaining, you're a rapper and you're rapping
1:45
Speaker 1: about what you've seen and a lot of a lot
1:47
Speaker 1: of these rappers ain't living that life and they're just
1:49
Speaker 1: making stuff up. So those those situations don't they don't
1:53
Speaker 1: fit into what we're talking about. It we're talking about
1:56
Speaker 1: when you're actively involved in the streets, you're actively involved
1:59
Speaker 1: in crime. They have videos what you're doing, things, you
2:02
Speaker 1: running around with people, where they have enough to put
2:06
Speaker 1: your lyrics to say, hey, look this is him right
2:09
Speaker 1: here doing this, and this is him saying he did that. Right,
2:12
Speaker 1: If you're just rapping about something that you didn't did,
2:14
Speaker 1: there's no there's no trail, there's nothing for them to follow,
2:18
Speaker 1: so them they can't just use your lyrics as evidence
2:21
Speaker 1: in chief. Yeah, it's not like they hurt. It's not
2:23
Speaker 1: like they're listening to rappers and saying, oh, he's rapping
2:26
Speaker 1: about killing somebody, let's go lock them up. They already
2:28
Speaker 1: that's just another piece of evidence that they're collecting, the
2:31
Speaker 1: evidence in chief. That's the key to it is not
2:33
Speaker 1: it can't be evidence in chief if if it supports
2:36
Speaker 1: what they already know and they have people to collaborate
2:38
Speaker 1: and all those things, then you gotta be smarter than that.
2:41
Speaker 1: But let me ask you the question, how would the
2:43
Speaker 1: DA know the difference? Right now, I'm listening to some
2:46
Speaker 1: of the stuff that's going on with Young Thugs case
2:48
Speaker 1: right now. The attorney was like, yeah, he said, after
2:52
Speaker 1: judge your honor, like he's talking to judge. Of course
2:53
Speaker 1: he wasn't talking about that judge, but that attorney made
2:56
Speaker 1: it seem like that that case is something different. But
2:58
Speaker 1: then I think, Scharlomagne, that's not a crime that you
3:01
Speaker 1: understand I'm saying. So what that does is what I'm
3:04
Speaker 1: trying to say, is everything that you say at your
3:06
Speaker 1: mouth is gonna be held against you. If before if
3:09
Speaker 1: I say yo, my wife, get out of line, I'm
3:11
Speaker 1: a smacking the mouth. And then and then you smack,
3:14
Speaker 1: she goes and says domestic violence, and then they pull
3:16
Speaker 1: it up. You've made You've made a contage. These are
3:19
Speaker 1: things that you already said that you're willing to do,
3:21
Speaker 1: so you get you're allowing them to use things against
3:24
Speaker 1: you that come out your own We have to be
3:26
Speaker 1: a lot more mindful in the days like I got
3:28
Speaker 1: locked up for crimes and they try to utilize stuff
3:31
Speaker 1: in my trial too. So I'm aware of these things,
3:34
Speaker 1: and I think as artists for twenty plus years watching
3:37
Speaker 1: artists get have these lyrics used against them all the time,
3:41
Speaker 1: especially when they're committing the acts, and they're able to
3:44
Speaker 1: show the mind state that you're willing to do certain things.
3:47
Speaker 1: If you're not making contract decision, as you know, what
3:50
Speaker 1: some shit I'm just not gonna talk about. You know
3:52
Speaker 1: what I'm saying. I understand it's certain things I've even
3:54
Speaker 1: I've engaged in certain things. I know people engaging in
3:57
Speaker 1: certain things. I'm around certain things, and I understand that
4:00
Speaker 1: what I say, ken And will be used against me
4:03
Speaker 1: in the court of law, like they say all the time.
4:05
Speaker 1: And also these guys are being very specific, like they're
4:07
Speaker 1: naming actual names, actual crimes as dates. So it's like,
4:13
Speaker 1: what do you expect as only here from the attorney.
4:16
Speaker 1: I mean, I think to Mice's point, anything you say,
4:19
Speaker 1: Kennon will be used against you in a court of law.
4:21
Speaker 1: And you know, the hip hop police have existed for
4:23
Speaker 1: a long time, so in any scenario, people build cases,
4:27
Speaker 1: so they're probably following you for an extended period of time.
4:30
Speaker 1: And it seems like this is a pattern that departments
4:33
Speaker 1: are now practicing. So artists should say, hold on, wait,
4:36
Speaker 1: let me protect myself. We were talking about it earlier,
4:39
Speaker 1: even in the context of the violence right, whether or
4:42
Speaker 1: not you think violence in lyrics actually leads to violence
4:45
Speaker 1: in the streets, one of the biggest targets are rappers
4:49
Speaker 1: of the violence we see in our communities. So at
4:51
Speaker 1: some point, as an artist, you would think you would
4:53
Speaker 1: want to protect yourself right from the violence that could
4:56
Speaker 1: potentially happen because people are listening to your lyrics. So
5:00
Speaker 1: to Mike's point, it's like, at some point, protect yourself,
5:03
Speaker 1: don't say this and lyrics and don't have this particular
5:07
Speaker 1: content that could potentially create an atmosphere in your environment
5:11
Speaker 1: that you fall victim too. Why would you continue to
5:14
Speaker 1: do that because in essence, you're acting against your own
5:16
Speaker 1: best interest. Let's stay here for a minute. So what
5:19
Speaker 1: are your thoughts on people trying to ban it and
5:22
Speaker 1: to stop, you know, the government from using their lyrics
5:26
Speaker 1: because you know, like what I said, some people are
5:27
Speaker 1: telling all themselves. So what are your thoughts on them
5:30
Speaker 1: actually doing you mean, like the legislation that they're trying
5:34
Speaker 1: to pass that says you can no longer use these
5:36
Speaker 1: lyrics against folks. I'm not gonna lie. I'm torn in
5:40
Speaker 1: that scenario, right, I think that to Mike's point, if
5:46
Speaker 1: you're telling on yourself, right, unless you use a disclaimer
5:49
Speaker 1: and say everything I'm saying here is entertainment, there's nothing
5:52
Speaker 1: here I'm saying that it's real, then they're in a
5:56
Speaker 1: lot of cases, even like if you have a gun
5:58
Speaker 1: on you, there's a die, you know where they say
6:00
Speaker 1: if it's in plain sight, right, I don't have the
6:03
Speaker 1: ability to search your vehicle except when a gun is
6:06
Speaker 1: in plain sight or something illegals in plain sight, then
6:09
Speaker 1: I have the ability to search your car. So if
6:11
Speaker 1: you're not not just playing sight, your language is saying
6:14
Speaker 1: that you're doing something, then I have to say, maybe
6:17
Speaker 1: they should be able to use it. And then my
6:20
Speaker 1: other thought, right, and then the question is why would
6:24
Speaker 1: you not want them to use this? If somebody's saying this,
6:28
Speaker 1: I think for me, it comes for me. Is I
6:31
Speaker 1: come from the streets, Like if you're a street dude,
6:33
Speaker 1: we knew you. Don't put stuff on record. We not
6:36
Speaker 1: took them on crime. We don't even want to do interviews.
6:38
Speaker 1: Most street dudes that we knew, you've very seen them
6:40
Speaker 1: on kid, very seldomly seen them on camera. They didn't
6:43
Speaker 1: talk a lot because they still to this day the
6:45
Speaker 1: ogs are there. Ain't even in the street no more.
6:47
Speaker 1: But I am trying to know anybody I want to
6:49
Speaker 1: talk about a like I don't like they don't live
6:52
Speaker 1: that life. So I don't know what made this error
6:55
Speaker 1: think that you could commit crime in plain sight and
6:58
Speaker 1: be free. And and and I've been saying that I
7:00
Speaker 1: don't understand what is the moond state like when you
7:03
Speaker 1: when we talk about the pnb Rock situation, Right, it
7:06
Speaker 1: has to be levels of mental health. Right to say
7:09
Speaker 1: that you're gonna walk in broad day and just in
7:12
Speaker 1: the middle of nowhere shoot and kill somebody for a chain.
7:16
Speaker 1: You you can't even be thinking, because what are you
7:19
Speaker 1: going to do with that chain? How far are you
7:21
Speaker 1: gonna get with that change? After you? Every everywhere we
7:25
Speaker 1: live in police states now, everybody got a camera. Everybody
7:28
Speaker 1: got a phone's cameras all over. They could pretty much
7:31
Speaker 1: track you everywhere you go. I tell people this every day.
7:34
Speaker 1: I'm like, Yo, you don't realize that every crime is
7:36
Speaker 1: on camera. Somewhere somebody got a phone camera, there's camera's
7:39
Speaker 1: connected to the store. They could literally trail you to
7:42
Speaker 1: where you go. So the mind state that you took
7:45
Speaker 1: a change, what is you think you're gonna You pretty
7:48
Speaker 1: much gave up your whole life for a change. But
7:50
Speaker 1: the thing that you're saying, the idea that we know
7:52
Speaker 1: anyone who knows knows if you're doing crime, you don't
7:55
Speaker 1: say you're doing crime people, that's a basic rule. So
7:58
Speaker 1: then the question becomes why would people actively compromise themselves
8:02
Speaker 1: like that, And from my perspective, it's because someone else
8:05
Speaker 1: is making you do that. There's something else that's making
8:07
Speaker 1: you do something. You're going against a basic rule, and
8:10
Speaker 1: that don't make sense. I think Mike said something earlier,
8:12
Speaker 1: and it's something that I've been saying so many people
8:15
Speaker 1: was fronting for so long, especially in rap music, and
8:18
Speaker 1: being rewarded for it. So if you're pretending to be
8:21
Speaker 1: the biggest super thug criminal in the world on these records,
8:24
Speaker 1: if I'm a dude that's really doing it in the street,
8:26
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, I want to get paid too, because
8:28
Speaker 1: I'm really living this life. So I think that's where
8:31
Speaker 1: people started. That's when it started. The line started getting
8:33
Speaker 1: blurred between the streets and rap. But even in that,
8:36
Speaker 1: you still got to work smarter and not harder, right,
8:38
Speaker 1: And I think that goes back to the personal responsibility
8:41
Speaker 1: of the individual and his or herd camp. I don't
8:45
Speaker 1: usually look at the artists because they're artists like that,
8:48
Speaker 1: but I do blame the people who they surround themselves with.
8:51
Speaker 1: Somebody has to be in the camp smart enough to
8:54
Speaker 1: be able or bold enough to say that we're not
8:56
Speaker 1: doing this, but you're not saying that. The problem is
8:59
Speaker 1: a lot of these artists around themselves like yes, man, right.
9:01
Speaker 1: They get rid of the people who say, yo, we
9:03
Speaker 1: shouldn't be doing that, Yo, that that doesn't make sense
9:06
Speaker 1: because everybody is perpetuating and making you feel like you're
9:09
Speaker 1: the man because they need something from you. That one
9:12
Speaker 1: or two people, a lot of them have to get
9:14
Speaker 1: rid of them and come back because they have to
9:15
Speaker 1: make mistakes. Like you watch these when we all came
9:18
Speaker 1: into the game, all of us came into the game
9:20
Speaker 1: with posses. It was a hundred of us. Everybody had
9:23
Speaker 1: one hundred dudes. I was walking the club with a
9:24
Speaker 1: hundred dudes, and it would be a dude that barely
9:27
Speaker 1: even knew me would get us into a fight and
9:29
Speaker 1: get me banned from a club. Then I started realizing, like,
9:32
Speaker 1: why am I bringing all these people. I gotta pay
9:35
Speaker 1: for y'all. I gotta be responsible for you. I gotta
9:37
Speaker 1: do this, and then when it all goes wrong, it's
9:39
Speaker 1: on me. And those circles start to get smaller and smaller,
9:42
Speaker 1: and then you go back to the original people who
9:44
Speaker 1: try to tell you you didn't need those people from
9:46
Speaker 1: the beginning. So it's a real process, and I think
9:48
Speaker 1: it's harder now because the violence is way more incentivized.
9:52
Speaker 1: Like if you look at the artists that are being
9:55
Speaker 1: signed right now, every one of them has real beef.
9:59
Speaker 1: The songs they took them out, it's real beef. It's
10:01
Speaker 1: real things that people know what's going on the streets.
10:04
Speaker 1: So they're being rewarded for having real beef. So when
10:07
Speaker 1: they getting killed or they're getting locked up, like Dan,
10:09
Speaker 1: that's messed up. No, it's not that messed up. Y'all
10:12
Speaker 1: signed him because you know we had beef and then
10:14
Speaker 1: you made the song they had beef with Platinum, So
10:16
Speaker 1: the dudes he shot or robbed didn't forget about it.
10:19
Speaker 1: You made them more angry because now they like, we're
10:22
Speaker 1: gonna get the drop on you. So now the beef
10:24
Speaker 1: elevates to another level. Or they gotta do something to
10:26
Speaker 1: protect themselves, so they locked up or they dying. And
10:29
Speaker 1: this is the cycle that we continue in it. But
10:31
Speaker 1: the labels are using it too, because you could say
10:33
Speaker 1: this is not the type of sound we're gonna go after,
10:36
Speaker 1: because not only does it elevate the sound, it elevates
10:40
Speaker 1: the beef. So if you make a strategic decision that
10:42
Speaker 1: that's what you're gonna do, you realize that that's profitable
10:45
Speaker 1: and that's how you're choosing to make your money. The
10:47
Speaker 1: sad thing is, you know, at the end of the
10:49
Speaker 1: day is the record label and the record industry is
10:51
Speaker 1: a business, right for sure. So look at these kids
10:53
Speaker 1: that can come from places where they don't have much
10:56
Speaker 1: and they have beef, and they're going back and forth
10:58
Speaker 1: and they're looking at these stream numbers going up, and
11:01
Speaker 1: then in a label looking at it as okay, well
11:03
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make money off of this, and they put
11:05
Speaker 1: more money into it, and you know, hopefully, you know,
11:08
Speaker 1: they hope that this artist goals for ten years. But
11:10
Speaker 1: a lot of times they don't like what my son says.
11:13
Speaker 1: This record that you just talked about shooting me or
11:15
Speaker 1: killing me or robbing me just sold a million records.
11:18
Speaker 1: But like you said, businesses protect their investment. So even
11:21
Speaker 1: if I know I'm gonna sign an artist who has
11:23
Speaker 1: a likelihood of dying because they got beef now and
11:26
Speaker 1: even you see other corporations do it, I'm gonna take
11:28
Speaker 1: an insurance policy out on there. So even in the
11:31
Speaker 1: event of your demise, which is probably gonna happen, I'm
11:35
Speaker 1: gonna protect my asset on the back now because I've
11:37
Speaker 1: been I've been seeing that floating around. But then it's
11:39
Speaker 1: just like they was like, that's not true. They keep
11:41
Speaker 1: saying that about Empire, but Empire is not even a label,
11:43
Speaker 1: it's a distribution. That's that's that's true. I mean I
11:45
Speaker 1: would sign the Epic records, and when I got signed
11:48
Speaker 1: the Epic Records, they wanted me to sign uh, get
11:52
Speaker 1: a life insurance policy on me. The artist acts have
11:54
Speaker 1: to sign off on it, though I didn't sign off
11:56
Speaker 1: on it, but absolutely positively. They give you a big
11:59
Speaker 1: up money and they want to make sure that something
12:02
Speaker 1: happens to you. They don't get that money back. So
12:04
Speaker 1: they look at it like, if something happens, we'll get
12:05
Speaker 1: life insurance policy to get our money back if you
12:08
Speaker 1: don't have to sign it. No, I didn't sign it,
12:09
Speaker 1: but I've seen it with corporations like Walmart. There's a
12:11
Speaker 1: little documentary that talks about like Walmart taking out small
12:15
Speaker 1: policies on their workers who are not necessarily worth as
12:18
Speaker 1: much as a hip hop artist would be worth and
12:21
Speaker 1: still making good on their investment in the event that
12:24
Speaker 1: someone dies. So these corporations are doing that, right, How
12:27
Speaker 1: much responsibility do we put on the industry and rappers
12:30
Speaker 1: for creating this coaching? I think on the industry and
12:35
Speaker 1: I think they have not equivalent amount of responsibility because
12:39
Speaker 1: we just talked about who benefits, right, and so at
12:42
Speaker 1: the end of the day they walk with all the
12:44
Speaker 1: bags while at the same time, back into you know,
12:47
Speaker 1: in the neighborhoods, we have to deal with a lot
12:49
Speaker 1: of this this this trauma, and that's where you don't see,
12:52
Speaker 1: you don't get. All of this stuff lands right back
12:54
Speaker 1: in our lap. And at the end of the day,
12:56
Speaker 1: the industry walks with the bag. And so, yes, they
12:59
Speaker 1: should have responsibility, if not equal responsibility. You know, I
13:03
Speaker 1: was going to ask you a question at Mitchell. Yes, sir,
13:07
Speaker 1: I have a huge problem with New York's gun laws, right, sir.
13:09
Speaker 1: Let'm explaining to you why. Right. So, I'm a license owner, right,
13:13
Speaker 1: I can carry my gun and I think thirty five
13:15
Speaker 1: thirty seven states legally carried on my hip not a
13:19
Speaker 1: problem New York. I have a problem. My son, a
13:21
Speaker 1: propertator saying because we kind of came up at the
13:23
Speaker 1: same time. Most of the times when people carry weapons,
13:27
Speaker 1: it's not to do something aggressive. It's defending. Right. So
13:31
Speaker 1: if I'm walking around New York City and I walk
13:33
Speaker 1: out this building and somebody tries to rob me, I
13:35
Speaker 1: can't defend myself, you know what I mean. And people say, well,
13:38
Speaker 1: you get security. Okay, yeah, that sounds good, but a
13:40
Speaker 1: lot of people can't affod twenty four hours, seven days
13:43
Speaker 1: a week, of security, right, you know what I mean.
13:44
Speaker 1: And that's a problem because if I get caught with
13:46
Speaker 1: my gun trying to defend myself, defending myself, not aggressive,
13:50
Speaker 1: not property, not shooting, not doing nothing stupid, just trying
13:52
Speaker 1: to defend myself like I do. When I'm in Georgia
13:54
Speaker 1: or Florida or Texas or any of those other places,
13:57
Speaker 1: I go to jail for three years. That's crazy to me.
14:01
Speaker 1: That doesn't sit well with me. If for trying to
14:03
Speaker 1: defend myself, you know, right right now, I do understand
14:05
Speaker 1: what you're saying, Man as a license gun on it,
14:08
Speaker 1: but you know, and I know that there's a lot
14:09
Speaker 1: of people who are walking around here with unlicensed and
14:12
Speaker 1: that's why we need so at the end of the
14:16
Speaker 1: day with you and hopefully we won't have the experience
14:19
Speaker 1: an okay koral type situation where there's two people out
14:22
Speaker 1: there literally, you know, banging in the middle of Time
14:25
Speaker 1: Square or downtown Manhattan or whatever. Because again you're dealing
14:28
Speaker 1: with people that are legally licensed versus people that are not.
14:32
Speaker 1: And a lot of it has to do with training.
14:35
Speaker 1: You know, you got people that don't know how to shoot,
14:37
Speaker 1: which is part of why we actually got boycott Black
14:39
Speaker 1: Murder because we see this stuff. Again, it winds up
14:42
Speaker 1: back in the neighborhood's lap where people are dying. Innocent
14:45
Speaker 1: people are dying from senseless gun violence every day. So
14:48
Speaker 1: it is, you know, it's almost like it's unfortunate for
14:51
Speaker 1: those of you who are responsible. But I think when
14:55
Speaker 1: you look at a city it's crowded, it's New York City,
14:57
Speaker 1: you know, it can happen anywhere you have a lot
14:59
Speaker 1: more caucus. Criminals are smart. They know, nine times out
15:02
Speaker 1: of ten, if somebody's walking down the street, especially in
15:05
Speaker 1: New York, you ain't got a leagal with guns, right,
15:07
Speaker 1: that's your police officer, correction officers or was able to
15:09
Speaker 1: get it. Now, people are starting to get it, but
15:11
Speaker 1: very few. So they know nine times at the ten
15:13
Speaker 1: they got to drop on you, right, and and I
15:15
Speaker 1: just it just always bothered me with New York City
15:17
Speaker 1: with that. Yeah, man, this is this is a big
15:19
Speaker 1: this is the biggest city out of all cities. And
15:21
Speaker 1: so at the end of the day, man, we want
15:23
Speaker 1: to make sure that everybody's safe. You know, we want
15:25
Speaker 1: to make sure that those of you who have the
15:27
Speaker 1: right and you know, the privilege of being able to
15:30
Speaker 1: arm yourselves versus those people who the majority of us
15:33
Speaker 1: who are not, we want to make sure everybody's safe.
15:36
Speaker 1: And that's the work that we do. So we're just
15:37
Speaker 1: really just trying to keep you know, this work going.
15:41
Speaker 1: These messages, these campaigns, they have to be you know,
15:44
Speaker 1: agatting back to hip hop in the industry. Everybody has
15:46
Speaker 1: to be involved. And how when they're keeping the guns
15:48
Speaker 1: off the street, what's the process and try to make
15:50
Speaker 1: sure they get more guns off the street and think
15:52
Speaker 1: they are I mean, that's another good question. I mean,
15:56
Speaker 1: for like Charlotaigne's point, the illegal guns, the access to
16:00
Speaker 1: weaponry in the neighborhoods right now is crazy. You see
16:03
Speaker 1: the guns they pulled off these bro, literally, why do
16:10
Speaker 1: you have the abilities to get assault rifles? And that's
16:13
Speaker 1: my issue, my challenge around the guns, because I understand
16:16
Speaker 1: the importance of defending yourself and I think that is
16:19
Speaker 1: important and it's the right that people have right Second Amendment.
16:21
Speaker 1: But the issue becomes when there's so many guns in circulation,
16:25
Speaker 1: Like I know, you know when I was coming up,
16:27
Speaker 1: if a couple of people had a gun, it was like, damn,
16:30
Speaker 1: you know who had the guns in the neighborhood and
16:32
Speaker 1: you knew if something would happened, this might happen. But
16:35
Speaker 1: I remember, like you know, not to and too distant past.
16:39
Speaker 1: It's like every kid got a gun or has the
16:41
Speaker 1: ability to get and it's like there's way too many
16:44
Speaker 1: guns in circulation, and the NRA and the folks who
16:47
Speaker 1: produce guns are advocating for more guns to be in
16:50
Speaker 1: communities and I just don't. And the proof is in
16:53
Speaker 1: the pudding. It doesn't make a safer, It hasn't made
16:55
Speaker 1: society safer. So I think we have to take a
16:57
Speaker 1: different approach to responding to how we keep ourselves safe
17:02
Speaker 1: and what we do. Because now every man, woman, child
17:04
Speaker 1: in America has access to a gun, and before like
17:07
Speaker 1: you said it was a thirty eight specially it was
17:09
Speaker 1: a beat up revolver. It was a gun that looked
17:11
Speaker 1: dirty and does Now to your point what you said earlier,
17:14
Speaker 1: I mean they have military equipment. They've got colorful guns
17:18
Speaker 1: that ghost guns extended like the police can't beat them.
17:23
Speaker 1: That's I think what has to happen, though. It has
17:26
Speaker 1: to be a culture ship, right, because the culture of
17:28
Speaker 1: violence is so prominent right now that just defense and
17:33
Speaker 1: you having a gun for defense, it's immediately puts you
17:36
Speaker 1: in more and more danger, right if you put if
17:38
Speaker 1: you got a gun, a lot of people who are
17:40
Speaker 1: not trained in de escalation, and he just a regular citizen.
17:45
Speaker 1: It's regular citizens every day that really kill you for
17:47
Speaker 1: stepping on their foot. You can't give those type of
17:50
Speaker 1: people guns. But you you you I watched in the
17:53
Speaker 1: restaurant with a lady. Shot the lady because she was
17:56
Speaker 1: aguing with a pull a gun on and shut up
17:57
Speaker 1: and say, yeah, you thought you was bad A regular
18:00
Speaker 1: fishfight turn into and she probably was a licensed carrier.
18:02
Speaker 1: It shot the lady dead, and it's like, you can't
18:05
Speaker 1: everybody can't have guns. There has to be psychic psychotherapy
18:09
Speaker 1: things that we do there has to be a strenuous
18:11
Speaker 1: process that you go to to make sure that you're
18:14
Speaker 1: walking around these streets. And because if you just scared,
18:16
Speaker 1: a lot of people shoot you because you're scared. If
18:18
Speaker 1: I'm walking, imagine a racist person, I'm walking behind him,
18:21
Speaker 1: see me, boom woman shooting. It happens, and it happens
18:24
Speaker 1: all the time. So it has to be The culture
18:27
Speaker 1: has to shift, you know, American culture too. I don't
18:29
Speaker 1: like when you know what I mean, But what I
18:35
Speaker 1: will say about hip hop culture right, and this is
18:38
Speaker 1: what I want to do because I don't want to
18:39
Speaker 1: put it on in the music, like music is a
18:41
Speaker 1: result of the reality, not the opposite. The reality is
18:45
Speaker 1: not a result of music. These kids are talking about
18:47
Speaker 1: what they're actually going through because that's what I did.
18:49
Speaker 1: I would be hypocritical to act like I don't understand
18:52
Speaker 1: that I came in here mikes on lefty, gun in
18:53
Speaker 1: the right, palm popping niggas and they sleep so they
18:55
Speaker 1: dot com. So this was what This is what I
18:58
Speaker 1: knew at eighteen years old. This was our reality. But
19:01
Speaker 1: I do have to say, at what point, right, once
19:05
Speaker 1: that reality shifts and you become a young millionaire, right,
19:09
Speaker 1: what are you doing Because the industry and everybody is
19:12
Speaker 1: invested in us killing each other and that's dying. That's
19:15
Speaker 1: they're making million dollar investments in there. What responsibility do
19:19
Speaker 1: the artists who get rich have to invest in us living? Right?
19:24
Speaker 1: What are you willing to give? Because we know, okay,
19:26
Speaker 1: that's entertainment. We're saying, this is entertainment. This is what
19:29
Speaker 1: we're talking about. We ain't living that. So now, in
19:31
Speaker 1: real life, like the actors do, right, the actors play commando,
19:34
Speaker 1: they do this rather than Neroll does this, and he
19:36
Speaker 1: goes back to this community and he invested in that community.
19:39
Speaker 1: He invested in making sure that the people around him
19:42
Speaker 1: are better. So I want to see artists, right, I
19:45
Speaker 1: want to see artists. When I put this boycott Black
19:47
Speaker 1: Murder thing together, it was saying to myself, I want
19:51
Speaker 1: to see artists, athletes, everybody, prominent, regular community activists, you know,
19:56
Speaker 1: brothers from the community who are doing the work, sit
19:58
Speaker 1: down and say, okay, what we need to invest in
20:01
Speaker 1: our communities to make sure the realities that we talk
20:03
Speaker 1: about in these this music, they don't have to experience
20:06
Speaker 1: that no more. Right, let me ask you my song.
20:08
Speaker 1: You know what do you say to somebody to say that,
20:11
Speaker 1: now you're the old man. And the reason I say
20:12
Speaker 1: that is, you know, the first time people say is oh,
20:15
Speaker 1: they could get security, you know. And I know coming up,
20:18
Speaker 1: a lot of artists faked it right. You look like
20:20
Speaker 1: you had everything, You got the nice car, but you
20:23
Speaker 1: didn't really have it. You show it out because it
20:24
Speaker 1: made you look good. It got you into that club,
20:26
Speaker 1: it got your song player, that got this, that in thegether.
20:29
Speaker 1: They really have it. A lot of times, a lot
20:30
Speaker 1: of people they run with fifty people because they can't
20:32
Speaker 1: afford security. Fifty people is free. They're gonna ride regardless.
20:35
Speaker 1: So what do you say to those people, Because a
20:36
Speaker 1: lot of these artists are doing that. They can't afford that.
20:39
Speaker 1: You can't afford the protected, you can't afford to wear it.
20:41
Speaker 1: And that's what I'm saying. And that's the reality of
20:45
Speaker 1: exactly what. No. But the thing is, I wasn't like that,
20:48
Speaker 1: and I wore it, but I would I understand. I
20:51
Speaker 1: wasn't wise. I didn't have a lot of people around
20:53
Speaker 1: me that told me different things. And the one person
20:56
Speaker 1: who did me and him would go back and forth
20:57
Speaker 1: and argue about and he like you can't do this.
21:00
Speaker 1: You can't do this, and and Mike, you also built different.
21:02
Speaker 1: I mean, it was people I don't want to talk about.
21:07
Speaker 1: That wasn't really what I wanted to say I'm talking
21:08
Speaker 1: about on the cover. But I still wasn't. I still ye,
21:12
Speaker 1: I was just a different breed of individual. I would
21:14
Speaker 1: be by myself. I never needed fifty people. You understand
21:17
Speaker 1: saying I was willing to deal with ever consequences. But
21:20
Speaker 1: even that was didn't make much sense, right because I
21:23
Speaker 1: was always on edge and it created more situations. But
21:26
Speaker 1: I'm just saying, at this point, hip hop, the hip hop,
21:30
Speaker 1: the culture of hip hop, is so much bigger. It's
21:33
Speaker 1: not just the music, it's sports, it's everything, right, and
21:38
Speaker 1: we have to invest in our lives the same way
21:41
Speaker 1: that every other community does so, and that's what boycott
21:45
Speaker 1: black murders. Okay, we make the music, we're saying that
21:48
Speaker 1: drill music, and none of that is what's responsible for
21:50
Speaker 1: the violence. Then we have to I want to see
21:52
Speaker 1: these artists, or the drill artists or the top artists say, Okay,
21:56
Speaker 1: I'm going back to the communities. I'm invest this right,
21:59
Speaker 1: We're gonna put this in amount of money in the fund.
22:01
Speaker 1: What do our communities need, these communities who are feeding you,
22:04
Speaker 1: making you millionaires, making you rich. What are you willing
22:06
Speaker 1: to invest to make sure the kids don't kind of
22:08
Speaker 1: go through the same thing that you got to do.
22:10
Speaker 1: What are their circumstances, trauma that's going in those in
22:13
Speaker 1: those communities. What are you willing to invest? Are you
22:16
Speaker 1: gonna do some concerts that do some concerts in the
22:18
Speaker 1: community so that we could take that money and we
22:20
Speaker 1: could give it back in those communities, build these these
22:22
Speaker 1: centers that they have be able to employ the mental
22:25
Speaker 1: health whatever's going on, because every other UM coach and
22:28
Speaker 1: everything is invested, and we are not investing in that.
22:31
Speaker 1: And that's one of my problem is I don't I don't.
22:33
Speaker 1: I don't know mad at drilled music. Nah, I came
22:37
Speaker 1: up on street music, I came up on the locks.
22:41
Speaker 1: I came up with MP like, it wasn't nobody harder
22:43
Speaker 1: than MP. They it wasn't nobody harder than Fred Roll
22:46
Speaker 1: and them. Like. So I understand that that's a reality.
22:49
Speaker 1: But now we understand that people are dying every day,
22:51
Speaker 1: and these kids are dying at thirteen. This is their
22:54
Speaker 1: only way out, this is what they only see this
22:56
Speaker 1: way out. So if we're not giving them something else,
22:58
Speaker 1: then they're gonna keep killing each each other and we
23:01
Speaker 1: just killing ourselves. I'm glad you said that, though, because
23:04
Speaker 1: we often have revisionist history as older people and act
23:07
Speaker 1: like we didn't grow up on the worst ship known
23:09
Speaker 1: to fucking man. Wasn't that propensity? Like I was thinking,
23:13
Speaker 1: Oh no, I don't know. I can't say, Hope you
23:15
Speaker 1: listen to me. When you walked into a club where
23:17
Speaker 1: MP was on up, it wasn't they were snatching the change.
23:24
Speaker 1: We weren't getting shot with it, shop throw your guns
23:29
Speaker 1: in the air and all of that shit like that.
23:31
Speaker 1: That was one that was not like, I don't think
23:35
Speaker 1: it wasn't the propensity that we see now. It wasn't.
23:37
Speaker 1: That's the access wasn't. But we're acting like I haven't
23:40
Speaker 1: been doing to stop the violence. Records self destruction record,
23:43
Speaker 1: but we need the last time, we need to self
23:46
Speaker 1: I'm reaching out to old artists. We need to self destruction.
23:49
Speaker 1: We need one of those right now, and we need
23:51
Speaker 1: it from prominent pe. We need young dudes. Yes, I
23:54
Speaker 1: need Dirk on the song to my I've been through this,
23:56
Speaker 1: but I realized we can't be killing each other right now,
23:59
Speaker 1: I need Chief Keith to get I need those h
24:02
Speaker 1: because that's where these people think that they following them
24:05
Speaker 1: and not saying that they're responsible with it, but they
24:07
Speaker 1: think these young kids want to be y'all and not
24:09
Speaker 1: knowing that your reality is different. You live in mansions. Now,
24:12
Speaker 1: you away from violence. You ain't outside beef. That's what
24:15
Speaker 1: you had to go through to get to. So now
24:17
Speaker 1: invest to make sure that these kids don't have that.
24:19
Speaker 1: And even evolution, right like certain people, you'll eat a
24:22
Speaker 1: certain thing and then at some point history will say, hey,
24:25
Speaker 1: you can't keep eating that because you'll die. You don't
24:27
Speaker 1: say eat more of that. So even in the context
24:30
Speaker 1: of music, I think at some point, and you see
24:32
Speaker 1: it happen with artists after they make it, they say,
24:34
Speaker 1: I don't want to make music like this no more
24:36
Speaker 1: because it's dangerous and it's gonna cause these issues. But
24:39
Speaker 1: no one allows that to get visibility. So there is
24:43
Speaker 1: something that is also impeding the process of evolution that
24:46
Speaker 1: would naturally happen where I think you would get less
24:49
Speaker 1: and less music like this. So as a result, you
24:51
Speaker 1: get more and more music like this, and then the
24:53
Speaker 1: other things start to happen where the community is impacted.
24:56
Speaker 1: And we're not just talking about violence, because I think
24:58
Speaker 1: in every facet of life, violence happens and that's a reality.
25:02
Speaker 1: But we're talking about hyper violence, what hyper equipment to
25:06
Speaker 1: cause violence. So we're talking about violence happening at a
25:09
Speaker 1: propensity that we have not seen before and where you man, no,
25:16
Speaker 1: it's fun. Statistically your correct shot a man. Right, there's
25:19
Speaker 1: way more people that got shot and killed in the
25:21
Speaker 1: eighties and the nineties than they are today. We are,
25:25
Speaker 1: statistically speaking, we're much safer now than we were back then.
25:30
Speaker 1: But because of the social media now, we didn't have
25:33
Speaker 1: that back then. So when you pour more of the
25:36
Speaker 1: put more of the social media on it, it just
25:38
Speaker 1: magnifies it. So that's back to his point. This is
25:41
Speaker 1: a different level and who because it's like if children
25:46
Speaker 1: are if people are still dying. We say sometimes in
25:48
Speaker 1: the community, one death is too much, right, and we're
25:51
Speaker 1: not just seeing one death. Even when we were talking
25:53
Speaker 1: about Labor Day weekend in Philadelphia in Chicago where you
25:57
Speaker 1: talking about mass shootings, this wasn't necessar certainly something that
26:00
Speaker 1: you saw before where three, four or five, seven, ten
26:03
Speaker 1: people are shot at one time. But we're dealing with
26:06
Speaker 1: a different kind of I think, a kind of hyper
26:08
Speaker 1: violence that we haven't necessarily double before. But but but even then,
26:11
Speaker 1: but even in early on, like you would see different things,
26:15
Speaker 1: but now I'm seeing like innocent people being killed, children crazy.
26:21
Speaker 1: It was at one time, and I know robbery and
26:24
Speaker 1: violence is no respect, but it was more respect. You
26:26
Speaker 1: don't mess with kids. There was cold people seem like
26:30
Speaker 1: all that's out the window now, but people with one leg, anybody,
26:33
Speaker 1: anybody can get it now. Unfortunately, is the is the
26:36
Speaker 1: mantra amongst you know, the perpetrators. Right, there's no morals,
26:41
Speaker 1: there's no colds anymore. Whereas we did have this color culture.
26:45
Speaker 1: It was a color culture. It was that that's what
26:47
Speaker 1: seems to be the hype. You know, this is why
26:49
Speaker 1: again we need to all collaborate, we need to all
26:52
Speaker 1: bond because there's there's there's a number of us that
26:54
Speaker 1: be knowing how and these young people most of which
26:56
Speaker 1: I mean, I say, they don't even like to blame generations,
26:59
Speaker 1: but they're the misguided missiles, right, they really are there.
27:03
Speaker 1: They don't know until at the end of the day.
27:05
Speaker 1: The work that we do, you know, with the crisis
27:07
Speaker 1: management system, the work that we do in the Cure
27:09
Speaker 1: Violence Global movement around this country. We see these young
27:12
Speaker 1: people every day and we work to meet them where
27:15
Speaker 1: they are and will hopefully be able to convince them
27:17
Speaker 1: that what they're going to path with it they're own.
27:20
Speaker 1: That's not going to end well. But as we all know,
27:22
Speaker 1: it's somebody's going to throw a break, right, and then
27:24
Speaker 1: they're going to find themselves in a situation where then
27:27
Speaker 1: now they're realizing from the back end that they, you know,
27:32
Speaker 1: it wasn't worth it, and so we're just we're trying
27:34
Speaker 1: to do it. And the deep thing about it is, now,
27:36
Speaker 1: when we talk about violence, we talk about in the
27:38
Speaker 1: context of it being a public health issue, like violence
27:41
Speaker 1: is a disease the way it spreads, right, So even
27:44
Speaker 1: when we think about something like the coronavirus, people could
27:47
Speaker 1: have easily said, well, there's been the flu before, and
27:49
Speaker 1: some people did. They said, you know, we've had these
27:52
Speaker 1: issues before, it's not that big a deal. And then thousands,
27:55
Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands, and millions of people perish because of
27:58
Speaker 1: that mentality, and then at some point the people who
28:01
Speaker 1: are responsible and who are in leadership have to say
28:04
Speaker 1: we have to devise a real strategy to respond to
28:06
Speaker 1: this because we have to save lives. And we're the
28:09
Speaker 1: folks who are saying we don't want people to die.
28:11
Speaker 1: And I think we're in the same situation. Sure, maybe
28:13
Speaker 1: violence has happened at a higher propensity before, but we're
28:17
Speaker 1: still in a situation where an epidemic exists. But unfortunately,
28:20
Speaker 1: we don't have an epidemic response. We don't get the resources,
28:23
Speaker 1: we don't we don't have a real response system. And
28:25
Speaker 1: in fact, people are saying, let more of this flourish.
28:28
Speaker 1: So that's my In certain neighborhoods or in certain communities,
28:33
Speaker 1: like mass shootings do require mass resources. So when we
28:36
Speaker 1: see mass shootings in other communities, we see all of
28:39
Speaker 1: the people that attached to that community come out. Has
28:43
Speaker 1: been mentioned, But in our communities, what happened like the
28:49
Speaker 1: Parkland shooting, and you know, the list goes on in Northing,
28:52
Speaker 1: you go back to columbind you can go up to Newtown.
28:54
Speaker 1: You can look at you know the Vegas when when
28:56
Speaker 1: the shot, when when they're at the concert. The new
28:58
Speaker 1: data joint those neighborhood and communities came out, I mean
29:01
Speaker 1: literally a newtown, the community of Newtown, Connecticut said that
29:05
Speaker 1: they were not sending their kids back into that school.
29:08
Speaker 1: So what they did as a city is they tore
29:10
Speaker 1: down a demo to school and built a whole new
29:13
Speaker 1: school for their kids because they would they're animate. My
29:16
Speaker 1: kids are not going to be re traumatized the differences.
29:19
Speaker 1: And this is why I go back to your point
29:21
Speaker 1: about where hip hop I think is our secret source
29:24
Speaker 1: when these things are happening every single day in our communities,
29:27
Speaker 1: our artists, our personalities, our you know, our superstars, our
29:32
Speaker 1: leaders don't come out in that same manner. We don't
29:35
Speaker 1: organize the benefit concert yet, you know, we don't have
29:39
Speaker 1: it so that we have the ability to raise millions
29:42
Speaker 1: of dollars in the school park. Oh man, they've been
29:48
Speaker 1: now since day one, they've been raising one hundreds of
29:50
Speaker 1: millions of dollars. I mean, quiet money. This is what
29:53
Speaker 1: they do and I respect it. But what I'm saying
29:56
Speaker 1: at the same time, when you do that research, that
29:57
Speaker 1: we could do something similar if we banned together. And
30:00
Speaker 1: what's fascinating is it's communities who don't experience the same
30:03
Speaker 1: propensity of violence who are able to get even more
30:06
Speaker 1: resources than ours who are experiencing violence at higher rates
30:10
Speaker 1: and we don't even get the base level of what
30:12
Speaker 1: they get, and it doesn't make sense. At some point,
30:15
Speaker 1: you're right, but then you know it's because the judicial
30:18
Speaker 1: system is big business, from the prisons and everything it does. Yes,
30:22
Speaker 1: So it's just like they said, you ain't meant to
30:24
Speaker 1: survive because it's a set up. So you're set up
30:26
Speaker 1: to not only die, but to fuel an economy that
30:30
Speaker 1: thrives off you die. And that at that point you
30:33
Speaker 1: got to realize we have to do something different, which
30:35
Speaker 1: is what we say all the time, and this is
30:37
Speaker 1: part of what we're saying, because it can become normalized,
30:41
Speaker 1: it can feel like this is something that always happens.
30:43
Speaker 1: It's not a big deal. That's exactly when I looked
30:48
Speaker 1: at p and b Rock, right, and I was looking
30:50
Speaker 1: at some of the comments and I was just seeing
30:52
Speaker 1: and I'm like, wow, this is this is looking like
30:55
Speaker 1: deja vu. And most people are like, yo, well that's
30:58
Speaker 1: what happens. That's what happens. And it's like and I
31:00
Speaker 1: was having a conversation with me and he was really
31:02
Speaker 1: in a dark place and he was just like, Yo,
31:03
Speaker 1: this is not okay. You know, this is one of
31:06
Speaker 1: my brothers from my hood, Like, this is not okay.
31:08
Speaker 1: And I was talking to him and communicating with and
31:10
Speaker 1: I understand that this is very dangerous in this moment.
31:13
Speaker 1: What happened to him? You know, it's different codes is
31:16
Speaker 1: things involve pop smoke like these things, these are dangerous
31:19
Speaker 1: and we have to And that's why I want to
31:21
Speaker 1: call for a hip hop summit, because we need leaders,
31:23
Speaker 1: we need hip hop artists, we need people to come
31:26
Speaker 1: together and say, look, we are united, right, We're not
31:29
Speaker 1: trying to We're not promoting anything. We know that bad
31:31
Speaker 1: things happen, but we want everybody to know that this
31:34
Speaker 1: is a community, you know, and we're gonna protect each other,
31:36
Speaker 1: and we want to make sure that people feel safe
31:39
Speaker 1: that we're looking out for each other if nothing else,
31:41
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying. So I just wanted to
31:44
Speaker 1: I agree with everything y'all saying. I just wanted that.
31:46
Speaker 1: Being that we know systemically all of these socioeconomic conditions
31:50
Speaker 1: were created to have these brothers even go to a
31:53
Speaker 1: life of crime. Are we able? We can't recreate that,
31:56
Speaker 1: you know, we could create a system. You gotta like
31:58
Speaker 1: Angelo says this all the time. We have to have
32:00
Speaker 1: a system to combat a system. But that's what I'm saying.
32:02
Speaker 1: We can create a system, but it's not gonna be
32:04
Speaker 1: like the government. You know, it's not gonna be the government.
32:06
Speaker 1: It's gonna be it has to be grassroots. It has
32:09
Speaker 1: to let everything we've done, like the fact that we
32:11
Speaker 1: create culture, right, the fact that somebody can wear dreads
32:14
Speaker 1: today and everybody's win dreads, somebody wins a bed today,
32:18
Speaker 1: somebody's doing this and that that means that we have
32:21
Speaker 1: the power to change influence behavior. So it has to
32:26
Speaker 1: be those people who are influencers not to say, Yo,
32:29
Speaker 1: this is not my fight. I can't be involved in that.
32:32
Speaker 1: I'm doing this. No, they know that's what you want
32:34
Speaker 1: to say. They know that you're more in invested in
32:37
Speaker 1: protecting your personal assets. Right. So, so once we say
32:41
Speaker 1: to ourselves that it's not about me, it's about the
32:43
Speaker 1: greater good of all of us, let me utilize Now.
32:46
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna use everything. Okay, you know we have
32:48
Speaker 1: Harry Belafonte, who funded a movement, say okay, I'm gonna
32:51
Speaker 1: make sure Mama the King is able to do this.
32:53
Speaker 1: I know you're doing this, so let me make sure
32:55
Speaker 1: that you're able to do this. Freely without being shut
32:58
Speaker 1: down and this and that. Because when I get on Instagram,
33:00
Speaker 1: they're gonna shadow band me because I talk about certain things.
33:03
Speaker 1: When I talk about the Pencilly and violence in our
33:05
Speaker 1: communities and talk about stopping boycot black murder, it gets
33:08
Speaker 1: two or three views. Is I can't go live for
33:11
Speaker 1: six months like these are things that's happening. So if
33:13
Speaker 1: we're not creating our own platforms and we're not empowering
33:16
Speaker 1: our own leaders, in our own voices in our community,
33:19
Speaker 1: then we left to get whatever they give us. So
33:22
Speaker 1: we have to say, yo, I see these people doing this,
33:24
Speaker 1: and I know that's what needs to be done. Let
33:26
Speaker 1: me even if I got to quietly find this, let
33:28
Speaker 1: me quietly fund that. If I got to build something
33:30
Speaker 1: and be a donor and something, let me do something
33:33
Speaker 1: that contributes to making sure that we say so, I'm sorry, brother,
33:36
Speaker 1: but but Mice is speaking to is like practice today.
33:40
Speaker 1: Like when you look at the armed forces, right, you
33:42
Speaker 1: have the Marines, you have the Army, the Navy, the
33:44
Speaker 1: Air force, and they don't play the necessarily the same position,
33:48
Speaker 1: but they together they're the armed forces. So this everybody's
33:51
Speaker 1: job is not to be on the front line, right,
33:53
Speaker 1: And so we don't expect for just any average person
33:55
Speaker 1: to say I'm gonna hit the streets tomorrow. I'm interrupt violence.
33:59
Speaker 1: That's not your lane. But bring us those of us
34:02
Speaker 1: that all the Marines that are willful to go out
34:04
Speaker 1: there without a vest, without a gun, make sure that
34:06
Speaker 1: we got the aid that we need. We shouldn't have
34:08
Speaker 1: to be relying upon government and other people to be
34:11
Speaker 1: able to keep the work going on the streets when
34:14
Speaker 1: we are hip hop you know, we come from that,
34:16
Speaker 1: this is our culture. And so with that type of support,
34:19
Speaker 1: that may be your contribution to the work that's going
34:22
Speaker 1: on on the ground, and it would be well received.
34:24
Speaker 1: And we're at is saying, which is deep that analogy,
34:27
Speaker 1: and we talk about all the time, is that you
34:29
Speaker 1: have to also realize you're at war at some point.
34:32
Speaker 1: You have to realize that you're under attack and you're
34:35
Speaker 1: experiencing something that others don't experience. Because if you if
34:38
Speaker 1: someone's fighting a war against you and you don't think
34:40
Speaker 1: you're at war, you just dying in silence. And we're
34:44
Speaker 1: saying that at some point, and this is the point
34:46
Speaker 1: for us, it's happen. We've been doing this for years,
34:48
Speaker 1: but we're saying it must be the point for the
34:49
Speaker 1: rest of us to say, we're at war and we
34:52
Speaker 1: have to respond accordingly. The artists are so important because
34:55
Speaker 1: what people know is that art imitates life and light
34:58
Speaker 1: imitates art, so they know art impacts lifestyle. Say, no,
35:02
Speaker 1: art impacts lifestyle. So they say, if we can get
35:04
Speaker 1: artists to do X, Y and z, this is going
35:06
Speaker 1: to impact lifestyle because they know lifestyle is culture and
35:10
Speaker 1: that's really what's happening. And I've had the opportunity to
35:13
Speaker 1: talk with brothers who have spent long times and even
35:15
Speaker 1: created gangs, and what they some of them over years
35:18
Speaker 1: say is that the lifestyle that they're living is not
35:21
Speaker 1: really a lifestyle. It's a death style. And at some
35:25
Speaker 1: point you have to come to that realization, and then
35:27
Speaker 1: you say, if I want to stay alive, I have
35:29
Speaker 1: to have a lifestyle. It can't be a death style
35:32
Speaker 1: because this is going to take us down this direction.
35:34
Speaker 1: So we talk about the problems. I was gonna say, so,
35:36
Speaker 1: what are the solution? Yeah, that's why I want to
35:37
Speaker 1: talk about man up and what exactly? Oh, man man up.
35:42
Speaker 1: It's like you said, brother, it is one of those
35:45
Speaker 1: solutions it's a it's a community based nonprofit, you know,
35:48
Speaker 1: street organization that I found it now eighteen years ago
35:52
Speaker 1: after the unfortunate shooting of an eight year old named
35:55
Speaker 1: Dashawn Hill in East New York, Brooklyn. Already being on
35:58
Speaker 1: the front line, I mean, you know, I felt that
36:00
Speaker 1: when that little boy got shot and killed, I wasn't
36:02
Speaker 1: doing enough, and so I had to do more. I
36:05
Speaker 1: literally just started by babysitting his older brother and sister,
36:08
Speaker 1: his little brother and sister that was actually with him
36:10
Speaker 1: when he got when he died. And so I just
36:13
Speaker 1: created an after school program that spent into a summer camp,
36:16
Speaker 1: spent them to an athletic tournament, and spent them too.
36:18
Speaker 1: What we have now eighteen years later, you know, a
36:21
Speaker 1: multi million dollar nonprofit that's putting multi millions of dollars
36:24
Speaker 1: back into the community by hiring people from the neighborhood,
36:28
Speaker 1: people who have been there and done that, people that
36:31
Speaker 1: got backgrounds, but they're now you know, they're using that
36:33
Speaker 1: influence that they once had for the greater good. And
36:36
Speaker 1: so that's one of the solutions. We are part of
36:38
Speaker 1: the crisis management system. You've had a lot of my
36:40
Speaker 1: colleagues up here, you know, before Erica Ford, you know,
36:43
Speaker 1: to me come out onto the freedom. You know, we
36:45
Speaker 1: had a list of other organizations citywide that we formed
36:48
Speaker 1: here in New York City and we go across country
36:51
Speaker 1: and we help other people do the same work in
36:53
Speaker 1: their neighborhood. So that's part of the solution. But the
36:56
Speaker 1: support for these type of organization is shot. You know,
36:59
Speaker 1: we are Unfortunately, we're vulnerable because we get our money
37:03
Speaker 1: from the government. Again, if we had our superstars like
37:07
Speaker 1: what we've seen happening in Florida and Connecticut and other people,
37:10
Speaker 1: you know, they've actually come out to support the work
37:13
Speaker 1: that's going on on the ground, then we can fill
37:15
Speaker 1: up a lot more confident in the work and the
37:17
Speaker 1: efforts that we're doing. And talking about the czar position,
37:19
Speaker 1: so I mean, I'm the first jar that was ever
37:22
Speaker 1: appointed in government here in New York City. I've worked
37:24
Speaker 1: under four different mayors in the past, and this particular
37:27
Speaker 1: Mayor Eric Adams, he did something historic, right, He said
37:30
Speaker 1: he wanted to be different. So he sought out, you know,
37:33
Speaker 1: a person here that he knows that comes from the ground,
37:35
Speaker 1: that works in the community, that in the trenches, and
37:38
Speaker 1: he says, I want to give you an appointed position.
37:40
Speaker 1: I want to bring you into my administration place you
37:42
Speaker 1: alongside my other high level government officials, and I want
37:47
Speaker 1: you to lead this city in this particular charge. And
37:50
Speaker 1: so I became the Guns Are Gun Violence Preventions are
37:53
Speaker 1: Us in June of this year. And you know, it's
37:56
Speaker 1: been it's been amazing. I mean just I didn't even
37:58
Speaker 1: know that much more about my own city now that
38:00
Speaker 1: I've traveled now throughout the rest, I'm up in the
38:03
Speaker 1: Bronx and queenstat knowledge Brooklyn all over, and you know,
38:06
Speaker 1: we're thinking about the solutions. We have one hundred plus
38:09
Speaker 1: milli billion dollar budget. You know, we're figuring that we
38:12
Speaker 1: have the resources, but they're caught up in the agencies,
38:16
Speaker 1: and we need to loosen up the pipeline so that
38:19
Speaker 1: we make sure that the people who are on the
38:21
Speaker 1: ground actually getting some of those resources. But again, we
38:25
Speaker 1: cannot rely solely on that. And I just want to
38:27
Speaker 1: say part of the reason the czar position is so
38:29
Speaker 1: important is because oftentimes, even if you look at New
38:32
Speaker 1: York City, where there are a lot of organizations that
38:34
Speaker 1: are doing crisis management addressing violence, they often working in
38:37
Speaker 1: silos and they're not working together in a network always
38:41
Speaker 1: So creating the czar position allows you to centralize those
38:44
Speaker 1: things and connect people together. So the same thing is
38:48
Speaker 1: true in New York with Keisha Jori, who's running the
38:50
Speaker 1: Office of Violent Preventions, which just happened maybe a year ago.
38:53
Speaker 1: So this work has been happening across the country, but
38:55
Speaker 1: it's often happened in small pockets. So to create a
38:58
Speaker 1: position like the tsar for at now you have someone
39:01
Speaker 1: in leadership who was coordinating these efforts. More from the
39:05
Speaker 1: differences in addition to my brother, is that people like myself,
39:09
Speaker 1: normally we weren't placed in government right because we were
39:12
Speaker 1: on the menu. You know. Now we literally were at
39:15
Speaker 1: the table, and we are literally chairing the table. So
39:18
Speaker 1: that's the difference. And so I appreciate the opportunity to
39:22
Speaker 1: represent the city in that regard, and I believe that
39:25
Speaker 1: when we all come together, my job, just as the
39:27
Speaker 1: brother said, is to centralize everything to bring everybody together.
39:30
Speaker 1: I appreciate, you know, this opportunity because again, our work
39:33
Speaker 1: has been you know, kind of swept under the rug,
39:36
Speaker 1: and you know, people have been dying and they've got
39:37
Speaker 1: this mindset that that's what's supposed to happen, you know,
39:40
Speaker 1: and their enables. You're supposed to kill each other, but
39:42
Speaker 1: that's not so. If even if one person still continues
39:45
Speaker 1: to die, that's one death too many. That's why I
39:47
Speaker 1: love what Mike started with the boycott. Break that down
39:51
Speaker 1: for us, well, it was it's pretty much just an
39:53
Speaker 1: extension of what at does. Right is that me having
39:57
Speaker 1: an influence in the hip hop coaching, also in the streets,
40:00
Speaker 1: and also being on the front line of this movement
40:03
Speaker 1: and just understanding that violence is so many different directions.
40:08
Speaker 1: It comes from. We boycott against police violence, we voted
40:12
Speaker 1: boycott against community violence. It's so many different ways, and
40:15
Speaker 1: it all boils down to black violence because Blacks are
40:17
Speaker 1: the leading people who are dying from gun violence every
40:20
Speaker 1: day in this community. So we have to have the
40:22
Speaker 1: same energy for both, right the same way we're going
40:24
Speaker 1: out there marching and we're saying we need to have accountability.
40:28
Speaker 1: We need to have accountability in our own communities. So
40:30
Speaker 1: what I wanted to do was utilize because there are
40:33
Speaker 1: so many different leaders across this nation at and and
40:37
Speaker 1: like he said, Keisha Yuri, and also there are brothers
40:41
Speaker 1: out in Vegas as we're working with right now. So
40:43
Speaker 1: we want to connect with all of the like minds.
40:46
Speaker 1: You know, Pastor McBride, Chico, Yes, you know all of
40:50
Speaker 1: these brothers. They are brothers who have a lot of
40:52
Speaker 1: them are formally cars rated, some aren't, who understand what
40:55
Speaker 1: it is needed in this time right. And I want
40:57
Speaker 1: us to come together and created this whole initiative and
41:00
Speaker 1: go to communities and empower the people in those communities
41:05
Speaker 1: who have the voices, who have the ear is of
41:07
Speaker 1: the communities and say, okay, what do you need in
41:09
Speaker 1: these communities? Right? And then we do what we can
41:12
Speaker 1: to bring those resources to make sure that the murders
41:14
Speaker 1: in the violence and stop. Because we understand that poverty
41:17
Speaker 1: is violence. You know, it's not violence does not happen
41:20
Speaker 1: where well to do people are, It doesn't happen everybody.
41:23
Speaker 1: You need as much police. I've been all around this
41:27
Speaker 1: world and I realize that the safest places do not
41:31
Speaker 1: have police. There are no police on the corner. So
41:33
Speaker 1: that's a myth. So what happens is the safest communities
41:37
Speaker 1: or communities who don't have poverty, they have the resources.
41:40
Speaker 1: So what we want to do a boy cut black
41:42
Speaker 1: murder is utilize every voice, every community leader, every you
41:47
Speaker 1: know um violence interrupted and come together and say, okay,
41:50
Speaker 1: we're going to your community. We want to utilize We
41:53
Speaker 1: like the Wu Tang claim of gun violence right, and
41:56
Speaker 1: everybody is has their own voice, everybody has their own
42:00
Speaker 1: but it's not working in silos. It's us coming together.
42:02
Speaker 1: We want to come to your community, and we want
42:04
Speaker 1: to show up and want to bring your favorite artists
42:06
Speaker 1: to your community. And we want him to sit with us.
42:08
Speaker 1: And he wanted him to tell you what we don't
42:10
Speaker 1: tell you. So we want to collaborate with artists and
42:13
Speaker 1: with influencers and and all of those and come together
42:16
Speaker 1: and create this movement that's going to take a lot
42:18
Speaker 1: of these guns and take the violence out. So if
42:20
Speaker 1: you even look like I got brothers like P and B,
42:22
Speaker 1: you know that was one of our own. That brother
42:24
Speaker 1: was one who literally would come to the community, that's right,
42:27
Speaker 1: would be on the streets out there at the schools,
42:30
Speaker 1: you know. And that's something that's why this this particular
42:32
Speaker 1: death is real personal to us because it's like, you know,
42:35
Speaker 1: now you're taking out the good rappers, you know, you're
42:38
Speaker 1: taking out the good artists, those that are involved in community,
42:42
Speaker 1: you know, and that's really something that's hit us hard
42:44
Speaker 1: when we heard of the brothers passing, and so we
42:47
Speaker 1: hope that we don't want to see another P and B.
42:49
Speaker 1: You know, we want to make sure I didn't want
42:50
Speaker 1: to see another. But it's a disease, Charlemagne, and nobody's
42:56
Speaker 1: exempt or immune to it. So I mean, this brother
42:59
Speaker 1: was sitting down, I just happened to lunch with his family,
43:02
Speaker 1: you know. And so if we don't want to see
43:04
Speaker 1: another then that's where again we all got to come
43:06
Speaker 1: together so we can prevent it. We can't guarantee, you know,
43:10
Speaker 1: but we can at least feel good that we've made
43:12
Speaker 1: every strong effort in the process. And I agree with
43:15
Speaker 1: all of that. I still think though, it still has
43:17
Speaker 1: to be some type of self. I mean, you're worth something.
43:21
Speaker 1: You gotta move like you're worth You can't be, but
43:24
Speaker 1: you got to feel like something. And I say it
43:26
Speaker 1: to people all the time. We often confuse cost, worth
43:30
Speaker 1: and value, and for for young folks, it's hard to
43:34
Speaker 1: feel like you're worth something if you have no value
43:36
Speaker 1: and there's no value in your community and your community
43:39
Speaker 1: doesn't have resources, which is why most young people and
43:41
Speaker 1: I felt the same way. You don't think you're gonna
43:43
Speaker 1: live past twenty one and you might not be in
43:45
Speaker 1: the army, But why do you feel that way? Why
43:47
Speaker 1: does your community produce that kind of trauma in young
43:50
Speaker 1: black boys and young Black girls. It's because there's no
43:53
Speaker 1: value in their communities. And precisely what we have to
43:56
Speaker 1: do is not only infuse those resources, but when Mice
43:59
Speaker 1: talks about building a movement, we're talking about building that
44:03
Speaker 1: system that transforms that very thing where young people say,
44:07
Speaker 1: I do have value and I do have a reason
44:09
Speaker 1: to live, and I shouldn't pick up a gun, and
44:11
Speaker 1: I should also tell this other brother, don't pick up
44:13
Speaker 1: a gun and don't use that gun because I value
44:16
Speaker 1: you and I value you. And Malcolm said it way
44:19
Speaker 1: back when he's like, who taught you to hate yourself? Right,
44:21
Speaker 1: that's the question we have to ask ourselves, because you
44:24
Speaker 1: don't kill somebody you love or someone you care about
44:29
Speaker 1: you and you and you kill someone because you don't
44:31
Speaker 1: think they're And that's what I say. And we have
44:33
Speaker 1: to identify each other as brothers again. Right, we took
44:36
Speaker 1: the neighbor out of the neighborhood and we just said
44:38
Speaker 1: the hood, so we don't even see ourselves as connecting
44:41
Speaker 1: the more. So we gotta put the neighbor backing hood.
44:43
Speaker 1: We got to identify each other as brothers. I'm dropping
44:46
Speaker 1: the song today called Boycott Black Murder. In the video
44:49
Speaker 1: drops is very powerful. I want you to see the video.
44:52
Speaker 1: Hopefully you'll play the song envy, you know, quote unquote
44:55
Speaker 1: hopefully you can't do it if we're gonna try to
44:59
Speaker 1: ask in situation, that's what we're in a situation. Really,
45:04
Speaker 1: I really want us to understand that the dynamics of
45:07
Speaker 1: our community is very serious. Right, we are at war
45:11
Speaker 1: against the system and then we at war with each other. Right,
45:13
Speaker 1: you know, the minister said, I don't even know who
45:17
Speaker 1: the enemy is. Right, you make it very hard for me.
45:19
Speaker 1: You know what I'm saying, We when we're going against
45:21
Speaker 1: each other. So we have to reidentify each other and
45:24
Speaker 1: see each others as brothers again and connect with each
45:27
Speaker 1: other's because when you see somebody as your brother, you
45:29
Speaker 1: don't want to take his life. You wanted to do
45:32
Speaker 1: everything you can to protect and make sure that that
45:34
Speaker 1: person is safe. So let's put the neighbor back in neighborhood.
45:37
Speaker 1: Let's start community, build community, unity and community again. We
45:42
Speaker 1: are so separated, like people got beef with the next
45:44
Speaker 1: door neighbor. You can't come up at your house. They
45:47
Speaker 1: had war. You're my next door We got and I'm
45:49
Speaker 1: like what he left next door? My next door neighbors.
45:52
Speaker 1: Our doors was open. They used to just walk in.
45:54
Speaker 1: You cannot get a cup of sugar yo yo ya
45:56
Speaker 1: got middle con infrigerator, go get it like we lived
45:59
Speaker 1: any community. That's not happening no more because the culture
46:03
Speaker 1: has told us that that's the wrong thing. And you
46:05
Speaker 1: got to think about this, just really think about this.
46:08
Speaker 1: You can't value your life when you're willing to kill
46:11
Speaker 1: somebody and take a chain that you know you're throwing
46:14
Speaker 1: your life away. Listen Trump saying ninety percent of the
46:18
Speaker 1: people who kill somebody or rob somebody in our community
46:21
Speaker 1: is going to do twenty fifteen, twenty years. And they
46:23
Speaker 1: made a conjured decision that that chain, that one second
46:27
Speaker 1: or whatever it's worth that. How much do you actually
46:30
Speaker 1: value your life like that? I want to know how
46:33
Speaker 1: did we get so poison that we put those the
46:36
Speaker 1: value in that more than our freedom in our lives
46:39
Speaker 1: and tricking you out of your life. And I want
46:41
Speaker 1: to just again, I want to reinforce and I want
46:44
Speaker 1: to give a shout out to my brothers and sisters
46:45
Speaker 1: that man I've incorporated because if you came out to
46:49
Speaker 1: where we are, and we're in East New York, we're
46:50
Speaker 1: in the seven five, which is run of thee not
46:53
Speaker 1: right now top of the city unfortunately, but in pockets
46:55
Speaker 1: where we exist, we called each other brother We called
46:58
Speaker 1: each other's system. You know, from as young as five
47:01
Speaker 1: year old babies, they come into our programs, they adopt
47:04
Speaker 1: that mindset when they come and they leave out, they
47:06
Speaker 1: see each other's family. Because that's what it's about. We
47:09
Speaker 1: literally are and I'm going to put that out there.
47:11
Speaker 1: We are biologically related, every single one of us, even
47:14
Speaker 1: in this room. You know, there's one race. There is
47:17
Speaker 1: a human race, and we have to stop thinking that
47:19
Speaker 1: we are separate. And like when you go to the
47:21
Speaker 1: you go to the funeral, you go to the family reunion,
47:26
Speaker 1: you bump into people that you realize that you are
47:28
Speaker 1: related to us, not knowing that we really all come
47:31
Speaker 1: from the same you know, sort of. And that's what
47:33
Speaker 1: we're doing and we have to continue to do that.
47:35
Speaker 1: We have to raise that ball so that we build
47:37
Speaker 1: that community back. And that's how you create transformation because
47:40
Speaker 1: when you look at the Cure violence model and what's
47:42
Speaker 1: so successful As they recognize areas or precincts or floor
47:45
Speaker 1: block radius that they say there's high rates of violence,
47:47
Speaker 1: and they say, we're gonna show up here, create supports,
47:51
Speaker 1: and we're going to reduce the violence. And that's in
47:53
Speaker 1: fact what happens. You create a culture and a small
47:56
Speaker 1: block radius that reduces gun violence and it works, but
48:00
Speaker 1: we don't get the resources to do it in the
48:02
Speaker 1: places that it needs to happen. This isn't a formula
48:06
Speaker 1: that we're making up. This is a formula that's worked
48:08
Speaker 1: for a decade, and we're saying we just want more
48:10
Speaker 1: resources to continue to do it and end violence in
48:14
Speaker 1: our communities, to keep people alive, to show them their value,
48:17
Speaker 1: to put the neighbor back in neighborhood, and to create
48:20
Speaker 1: transformation that makes other people feel safe too, because if
48:23
Speaker 1: this four block radius doesn't feel safe and it's violence,
48:26
Speaker 1: it's going to spill into your four block radius. So
48:28
Speaker 1: do the right thing here so that everyone can feel safe.
48:31
Speaker 1: Muhammad used to say. Momma used to say, a neighborhood
48:34
Speaker 1: can change a city. A city can change a state.
48:38
Speaker 1: A state can change a nation and nation can change
48:40
Speaker 1: the world nation building. Let's introduce the soul place today today.
48:47
Speaker 1: It's called this song is called Boycott Black Murder. It
48:50
Speaker 1: is a testament of what's going on communities. The video
48:54
Speaker 1: will be dropping today too, is a very powerful video.
48:57
Speaker 1: So I hope that it has the impact that I
48:59
Speaker 1: wanted to have. Man and first, go to Boycott Black
49:02
Speaker 1: Murder dot com. Take the pledge. We need everybody. Take
49:06
Speaker 1: the pledge man and say I can't kill my brother
49:08
Speaker 1: because I love my brother. How do we donate the
49:09
Speaker 1: man up? Man? They can go to our website. It's
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Speaker 1: manapink dot org. That's M A n U p I
49:15
Speaker 1: NC dot org. They can go to my website at
49:18
Speaker 1: dash Mitchell dot com as well. Um, and you know
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Speaker 1: all donations are tax deductible. We got the same status
49:24
Speaker 1: that Red Cross, Salvation Army all the other charities have.
49:28
Speaker 1: We have the same charity status. I don't want donations,
49:30
Speaker 1: we want investments about that in us living man. All right,
49:34
Speaker 1: well it's the Breakfast Club. Good morning, Yes, sir,