The What Had Happened Podcast: Is this thing on? Is this on, y'all? I'm here and it's been a long time coming, but welcome to the What Had Happened Podcast. It was just so crazy for me to say. Not that I didn't think I was gonna be able to do this, but child the trials and tribulations. learning in general how to put a podcast together solo is been a ride, but What's up y'all? My name is Ashley Brianna, also known as Ash Cash, also known as Ash the Alchemist, whichever you prefer, depending on the day on one or the other. And some days I'm all three. I like to think today that I'm all three, but I am so happy to be here. I'm so happy to finally launch this thing. Wow, I guess I should tell y'all what the podcast is about. And give me some grace because I don't know what I'm doing, y'all. But we are in the season of doing things scared, and you know, not having the answers. I don't have the answers today. But we're gonna find the answers. Because what? what had happened and we're gonna find out what had happened. This podcast is an exploration space rooted in black radical tradition, cultural memory, and creative inquiry. Each episode will begin with the revolutionary devotional that prepares each episode with radical spiritual and historical guidance for the African diaspora. It then senses a historical topic, person or place through the ABCs of our history, then bridges that history to modern music, film, politics, and cultural moments as what is. Hosted by Asher Brianna, me. The show blends research, reflection, and community dialogue, treating you as a listener, as a fellow classmate in a collective study of black life, resistance and imagination. So, more to story all, this is like a really, really black podcast. And we're gonna be talking about a lot of black things. I'm gonna be as real and authentic to myself. because there is a lot that we're gonna unpack and uncover. and I hope that you all understand and get the gist of this is gonna be not me coming as an expert around black history because this is gonna be rooted in black history globally, right? So not just black American history, but really, you know, this essence of Pan Africanism is gonna be kind of the vibe a bit. Meaning we're gonna be talking about black life, black struggle. Yes, we're gonna talk about, you know, the inventions, we're gonna be talking about the people, the places, we're gonna talk about tragedies and trauma. That's just what it is, especially if we're gonna be discussing the real, right? Because we know that the real hasn't always been a part of our education, if you grew up in America. I'm not quite sure, you know, if you're in a different country, what your I guess understanding of blackness and black people and the history and the origin and all the things. I don't know what that looks like in other countries, but I know as far as America as when it comes to our educational institutions, public institutions, the history is very much intentionally, by the way. hyper water down, romanticized, just even to the point of just removing, not telling the truth about certain histories and just complete omission, There's a lot of omission around what it is to be a black person on this earth, right? Like so this is not me coming as some expert or your professor because I am on a learning journey as well. and so this is going to be us coming together as classmates, as my peers, my peers in revolution, my peers in, you know, curiosity, you know, my peers in just untangling some of the mess, some of the chaos, some of the untold stories and truths about our people globally. And of course, you know, there are gonna be there's gonna be times where we're intertwining and discussing and mixing in other histories, Because to tell the whole story, we know that these things do not and have not happened in a vacuum, but we're talking about certain historical moments, movements, we're talking about just like black life, how that looks across the globe, across the earth, does not exist in just bubble, Not impacted by whatever else the world has going on and and other people and other cultures. So we're definitely gonna be talking about those things. So think of it as your favorite history class that you never got, And there's a focus though on, you know, history that is rooted in your culture, your history, your people. and also this podcast is not just for us, This podcast is also for people who are invested, in the fight, invested in telling the truth, invested in taking down white supremacy, 'Cause we can't we can't talk about why we're here, why I have to have this podcast in the first place, without talking about the systemic oppression, especially, like I said, I, come from an American educational background. And so there has always been this not even attempt, this reality of suppressing who we are, where we came from, what we've done, especially when it has come to building a lot of these colonial I guess you could say countries, So, telling the stories in a way that provide a bigger picture and doesn't have the same people who look the same way. but yeah, it's for people, you know, across the map who are invested in black liberation, black radicalism, revolution, you know, really being curious and doing the knowledge, your own knowledge, not waiting for somebody else to do it, but going to seek it yourself. And so this is a space for us to do that together and super open to because we are peers, we're classmates, share feedback, Like if if whatever we're talking about in this podcast, like you want to explore more, maybe you want to challenge, maybe you want to unpack or kind of get a little bit more into the nitty gritty of things. maybe some things that, you know, like check me. Like, you know, well, I would say check me. Call me in. I'm Aries, by the way. So you gotta call me in, okay, in a certain way. You can't just, you know, This is all peace, love, and chicken grease, okay? So yeah, call me in. If something isn't isn't historically accurate or you have the information knowledge, share that, Super open to that. Again, this is a collective study space. But we're also gonna have some fun and we're gonna laugh too. this is not like school. this is not like your average college course or anything like that. we do have some segments 'cause we're gonna we're gonna try to stay organized. I want to get into our revolutionary devotional for today. So So for our first revolutionary devotional or affirmation, I don't want anybody getting offended. Okay. I will give this this disclaimer. on this podcast, I will acknowledge multiple religions. So understand that I will personally not I personally will not 'cause I'm trying to say this in the right way. I personally will not anchor this podcast in anything that has a specific faith practice. I will say my background is Southern Baptist Christian. I grew up as that up until high school. And then after high school, well I would say my junior senior high school until the beginning of college, maybe freshman year, a little bit of sophomore year, I was a practicing Hebrew Israelite. That is a podcast f for a whole other day. I I we don't even have time. But I guess you could say denounced or whatever that religion as a whole around my like sophomore year college. again in another podcast we'll get into what that was like my experience and why I left. but right now I guess you could say I'm a traditional spiritual person who who does honor, acknowledge and have roots in Christianity, specifically Black Baptist Christianity, Southern Baptist Christianity, with a little understanding of Islam, and then some moderate understanding of, you know, the theology around the black Israelites, the black Jews, Hebrew Israelites, all that stuff. it's more so just a collective, I guess you could say, understanding beliefs, value systems, that pertains to the development, and the forward movement of our people that I find very insightful, possibly very helpful, you know. hope they're hope they are productive. and again, I'm reading these affirmations or devotionals from specific literature. and the authors of these pieces of literature, I may not always I may not all the way I would say agree with their full beliefs in in in their practice and discourse around certain things, but I can admire and appreciate contributions that I feel could be productive to the community and to just anybody who's listening. I know we're new here. We're we're we're just we know we're not besties yet. You know, we have to grow and and gain that trust, but I just want to just give that little note. But y'all I'm not gonna know how to say everybody's name correctly. And then and see this is the result of colonialism and the translatic slave trade, We have been separated and removed from our original languages And been forced to speak English for generations. And now we can't even pronounce certain traditional African names. Okay. So if I butcher this name, I deeply apologize to this author. but the book is called I wanna say in Yan Susim. Maybe the N is silent, maybe it's Yawn system. Mm-hmm. We're gonna go with that. And then the author is Walamu K. Bomani Baruti. I actually practice his name because I was trying to say his name a couple months ago when I got this book. By the way, I got this book. if you're from Richmond, Virginia, Electra Folklore Society, shout out to them. love them down. You're really trying to tap in and get connected. to all things African tradition, all things rooted in knowing who we are and where we came from, I will highly suggest that you suggest that you visit the cultural center there on Broad Street. but this is where I got this book from and it's it stood out to me because I was just in there looking at the book section and on the front it has a title but it also says a calendar of revolutionary daily thoughts. And I was like, wow, that's what I need because for me, like I just said, I grew up with the Bible, but baby I need a bullet too, and anybody who knows me know that's that is my that is one of my belief systems. Okay, we can have faith and we can get it popping if we need to strategically, When it's productive, So, today's affirmation or lesson, 'cause they're all dated. this first quote is by Fanny S. Clark. I do not know who Fanny S. Clark is, y'all, but we're gonna look her up. Let's get into what Fanny S. Clark said. Fanny said, As an African person, I call upon the spirit and wisdom of our ancestors and cosmic forces of truth and justice to be with us, to strengthen our sense of responsibility and to help us recapture our minds, to restore the knowledge and the love of self, to learn, to study. To create, to build, to plan and to work together for our survival as individuals and community. Now I don't know who Fanny is, we're gonna find out, but Fanny, right on. Okay. First of all, it's so I think that quote is so important. not only because it's Juneteenth, right? because if we're talking about Juneteenth, we're also talking about the spirit and and the forces and the wisdom to to Black people, we have this amazing, yeah, this amazing trait about us, and I really feel like it's deeply entrenched in our DNA. We damn sure know how to turn something that is so evil and so sinister into something that can be utilized as joy and expression and memory. I feel like this is deeply rooted in the why, I'm very, very passionate about being in touch with who we are, whom we came from, the wisdom. I'm very connected to using that knowledge and that wisdom to be proactive to practice the things, to have self-love, 'Cause a lot of the things that we ha we experience amongst each other, Our internal issues, one of the things that that comes from is this lack of self-love, And so how can we love each other if we don't love ourselves, As black people. And also like valuing learning and studying. Like even you don't have to be in school to learn, to read, to study to go to the library, to be knowledgeable, to be intellectual. you don't even need a you don't need a degree, we have free will. And I think that we need to be using that free will more to discover, It doesn't stop when we start becoming children. I I I hate the idea that us as adults we start to lose that curiosity as we age. And it's unfortunate and also bel I I truly believe that the powers that be Are counting on that, especially black people. They're counting on us to not be curious, to not be interested, to not be tapped in on what is going on and what happened. Period, think we've we even if you don't realize it, we have been programmed to associate intelligence and and scholarship to white people, It's a white people thing. and and this podcast is ten toes on dispelling all of that. if you have seen the title of this podcast, we're gonna be talking about Asada Shakur today. AS for Asada. And so we gotta get to Asada. We gotta get to the first lesson, y'all. But I wanna wrap this this devotional up with we are nothing without our ancestors, for we are the combination of those who came before us. Who make up our lineage. No truth is more fundamental to the African sense of self, community, and nation than this. Africans understand themselves as spiritual beings first in physical entities. Second, we measure our worth and essence from that which comprises of our highest state of existence, the spiritual self. So the Sphinx symbolizes the human transformation, spiritual supremacy rising out of ignorance and rule by physical appetites. It represented the power of human discipline in overcoming bazar temptations. and understand that the temptations were there to challenge you into a deeper moral consciousness in higher spiritual existence. Every step toward a knowledge of our spiritual self is an elevation. If we look at our ancestors, spiritual development, we have no choice but to assess the current rule of body over mind this is what y'all should be carrying with you along with other things from this episode. But this is the affirmation for today. And just like say it to yourself. I measure my worth in essence from that which comprises my highest state of existence, my spiritual self. To me, that means my value comes from my mind. My power comes to my mind. To me, it it feels like it just reminds me of all of the physical trauma and violence and what's it called baser, baser experiences that us as black people have experienced physically. the way that we have endured those things, but our spirit has never died, even you know, through all the eras of just so many attempts to literally kill us, to you know, segregate us and then try to integrate us, but then when you integrate us, you treat us like, you know, we are subhuman. you've treated us like we were subhuman for the moment that we touched out on these shores. But my point is through all the physical atrocities and and pain and the bloodshed and just like the horrendous acts against us in our bodies, on so many levels, our spirit is just the way like it's kinda and this is why I can't really like even though I have left the Christian church, for me what I valued from being From being a child and growing up in that space, in that faith practice, is the resiliency of black people's spirit. Even if it's anchored and guided by, you know, questionable deities in imagery. but the spirit, our spirit is just like undefeated and in unc in conquerable, right? We have been conquered in so many ways in the physical realm. But spiritually, we are inconquerable. And that's what I love about us the most. So I affirm that moving forward, that we as people measure our worth and in essence, from our highest self, which is our spiritual self. And if we keep that healthy, keep that aligned and in tune, everything else will fall into place. So, yeah, that's our revolutionary devotional for today, y'all. Okay. So that was our revolutionary devotional for today. definitely let's reflect on that. Let's come back to that. I know that's that specific affirmation spoke directly to me. and just feels like alignment with everything with this, with all the things that I am walking into. And so I appreciate that. so yeah, all right. So we're getting into our segment. the ABC is about history. I got this inspiration from one being raised in a very pro black family. And I remember having this black history game. It was based on black inventions and it was like a memory game. And you had to match the inventions with the the eventer. And there were also these cards that had the alphabets, but they were like based on our culture and black people and they had like little black kids on them. And so like it'd be Jay for Jazz or B for Beautiful and have like a, you know, a beautiful black girl. and so I knew that during this podcast I wanted this I wanted this to be a learning space, similar. to, you know, going to class and school and all that stuff. but I wanted to I wanted to be creative one and I wanted I wanted it to connect to my childhood because black history is one of my earliest first loves when we're talking about like what we gravitated to growing up. I enjoyed the book fair. I enjoy reading about our heroes, our ancestors. our leaders. I enjoyed just being a student. and so I wanted to tie all that into the core of this podcast. And so I was like, yeah, I wanna do the same thing with the cards, but you know, kind of highlight people, places, events. that I feel like are not fully told, whether they weren't told at all. So they're omitted from history, on a mainstream, larger scale. like you're not gonna be reading about this in like the traditional public school textbooks. Like that's what I'm going for. Like things that you're just not gonna find your children reading about or learning about in your traditional school systems. and so I wanted the cards To reflect the topics I wanted to discuss. And so, today is a it's for Asada. And I chose Asada as the first episode for many reasons. One, Asada was truly one of those, like when I I feel like I first learned about I first learned about Asada maybe right before I went to college. I was like, who is this black lady? Like I didn't even know there was any black woman who had America running Giving the government a run for their money. I had never heard of, what it meant to be exiled and and why did that matter? And like, wait, she escaped from jail. Like it sounded like some type of movie. Like this really happened. Like this black woman. did that and she's still alive. Well, obviously at the time she was still alive. But we know Asada passed away, transitioned unfortunately. so we'll take a pause for that. Just to our ancestor. she has done so many incredible things, Earthside, but I know that as an ancestor in the next realm, she is just as powerful, just as valuable. And so I'm gonna take a moment for Asada, her legacy, her life, her sacrifice. And just being ex an example of what it looks like to, walk the walk and not just talk the talk. It's easy to say that you are, absolving yourself from the systems and you want reform and you want this and you want that. But to actually like go through the fire and then be able to escape, Is it's incredible. but also she's human and there are things that came with that. So, yeah, that's I wanna take a moment. Osalis foresado. And we just want to thank her. with understanding that a lot of these revolutionary leaders, they were somebody's sons and daughters, you know, somebody's mother, father, you know, grand grandchild, right? Like they put their life on the line, for liberation, Asada is like one of the beginnings of understanding who I was, just like informing my experiences as a black woman. especially under, you know, white supremacy in a country such as America and then institutions such as education institutions. going to college, I went to PWI and my experiences there were horrendous. And, I felt like on a campus that I paid tuition to be on and to learn from and get a degree from, I felt like an enemy of the state. I feel like an enemy of the campus. I feel like the enemy of administration. And we're gonna dive into that, you know, hopefully, I wanna share more about me and my journey and how I got to this point and just about, my background or where my passion comes from. But yeah, like I read a lot of the I read a lot of her autobiography during that time where I was a black student on a white predominantly white campus. I mean, it was over twenty K students at the time when I was going to this particular college. And I'll I'll, you know, at some point say their name. 'cause they I ain't never been scared. I won't scare then I ain't scared now. but I want to focus on what we focus on. But there were twenty K plus students on that campus. It was only eight hundred black students. Right, to the point that we were in a group chat, like a group meeting group chat, like that's that's how small the number, And so while I was there experiencing that, her autobiography got me through one of the pieces of literature that got me through college. So that's one of the reasons why I wanted to start with her, but also you know, again, black women's stories are rarely highlighted in the struggle for freedom and black liberation. And I'm gonna take every opportunity chance I can, especially on this platform, to raise awareness and not only raise awareness, but putting some of the things that they have done in practice. I think a lot of times it's easy for us to learn and, you know, admire, the work that someone has done, especially black women, but to put into practice the principles that they stood for, that's how they how that's how you truly honor. the ancestors. That's how you truly pass on, the baton. and I think also two other reasons as to why I wanted to focus on the Sada, is understanding the in separation of the personal versus the political as a black girl, as a black woman. And we'll we'll dive into a bit of that as we explore the beginnings of her life, how she got associated and connected to the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army, what happened with the you know New Jersey Turnpack shooting and, you know, what did what did that trial, multiple trials actually, trials and manhunt. What is that what did that man hunt or woman hunt, I'll say, what did that look like? And what what narrative did did that present, not only to this country but the world about how this country feels about black people in our I guess you could say not even desire like our constant fight to be free that we're still fighting to this day. and then lastly just as a pop cultural little thing, her connection to Tupac. if you didn't know, Tupac's mother, so I'm gonna break it down. Tupac's mother of Phoenix Shakur was married to Dr. Mutulu Shakur, who is Asada's brother. So Asada Shakur is Tupac Shakur's step aunt, because her brother married Shakur's mom, but her brother is not Tupac's biological father. also Asada and Afini were both members of the New York City Panthers, So that's how they got connected and and and became to know each other. and we'll talk a little bit more about Affini a little bit in again, another black radical woman who was like she was on that. Okay. I didn't even know her story. and it's a very interesting what I know about Tupac's mom is mostly through his music and the the narrative and the music and reading about her life outside of his narrative is very interesting. And also wanna point out that Tupac does talk about his step aunt. 'cause I was like, dang, I feel like, you know, I d I didn't read too much or hear too much about, Tupac speaking on Asada and vice versa. And I was able to find some archives and interview where Asada does talk about Tupac at the time in the nineties when he's like this big rap star, hip hop star. and what's going on. this is like post his I wanna say this is post the shooting in the studio with big and diddy, you know, that that event. and she s she talks about all of that. but yeah, but Tupac describes his step aunt Asada in Words of Wisdom, which came out in nineteen ninety one. So yeah, just wanted to get that little tidbit. I find it very important again, as I said earlier, a lot of things that we're talking about did not happen in a vacuum. And I find it very important to talk about what is circling around happening around or may have predated a bit the topics and the people that I'm gonna be talking about. But I find it super important to understand the context of these other historical events and people, et cetera, to kind of tie all together and understand what's happening in the background and some of it coming to the foreground when discussing for instance in this case asada shakur's life and her exile and all those things so yes let's get into it I am going to we're going to talk a little bit about what happened in the 60s and then we're talking a little bit about what happened in the 70s. I chose these two decades to launch talking about Asada because it's a lot of important historical markers that I want to tap into and just have y'all like thinking about in the back when I talk about. Asada in her story and things the things that come up, you know. So let's get into the sixties. So we're gonna start with the nineteen sixties through the nineteen seventies is when the rise of second wave feminism comes about. So keep in mind in the mid twentieth century, you know, black women. We have always been involved in the civil rights movement. We've always been involved in anti war movements. we've been involved with the black power movements and express like our like feeling of being alienated, right? Like we're doing the work, we're, we're organizing, we're, you know, also still showing up in the d in the domestic spaces while fighting the good fight. And in all of these movements, whether it's the black power movement, civil rights. the anti-war, the feminist movement, is experiencing the racism and the sexism throughout all of that, even in, when we think about SNCC, the Suit Nonviolence Coordinator Committee, like that was a lot of that going on too. It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows, okay? one of the main things is like the sh this struggle of not being taken seriously, in in the issues that we face. And also When it came to like feminism, second wave femin feminism, which was more of a focus on obviously white women, I believe feminism in general is just for white women. But the second wave focused more on white women, specifically white middle class women in having their right to work, In this fight for the workplace, But if you look at the history of black women in this country, we have always worked. We haven't we've had no choice but to work. whether that is unpaid work and shadow slavery, right? whether that's extremely underpaid work. We're thinking about black women becoming sharecroppers as well. People don't talk about that. Women black women were sharecroppers just like black men. We're talking about, post emancipation proclamation, where black people were trying to figure out, okay, what do we do now? How do we support and sustain ourselves, And so They are experiencing firsthand what it means to be a somewhat of a citizen, if you wanna call it that, in this country. But what it what does it mean to work and provide for the family? And so you have black women in cotton fields picking alongside her husband and all and other black men, still nursing white children, taking care of white homes, doing domestic work for white women. So why white women are screaming for the right to work, they are having black women in their homes, you know, nurse and feed and teach and raise their children, raise their their husbands and taking care of you. So our issue was not not having the right to work. It was the right to one be paid fairly. And I don't mean just like relation to men, but also, you know, white women, other women who are getting paid more than black women. the racism that that we experience, and so there's this like disproportionate reality. and so that is significant in when we talk about Sada also want to mention that same era of fueled some of our greats like Audrey Lord, Bell Hooks, Love Bell Hooks Down. Okay, Bell Hooks just she gonna get me together every time. both of those women, you know, pioneers of black feminist thought, and arguing for radical, political and societal changes. so just wanted to mention that. moving on, we have the return of the Negro Digest in nineteen sixty one. Why is that important? I'm gonna tell you. So originally The Negro Digest was launched in nineteen forty-two. basically, if y'all know what the Reader's Digest is, I don't know what generations we have listening, but I remember my my grandmother still reading the Reader's Digest. my grandmother is in her nineties now. So, it's like the black version of that. Based out of Chicago, originally founded by John H. Johnson, who later is known to have published Ebony and Jet. Don't know who John H. Johnson is, look it up, y'all. but it was revived in the 1960s. and at this point, when it's revived though, it changes its its its approach to journalism. originally it was kind of like this like good old boys, kind of like, don't go against the status quo type energy, very good news policy. Where in the 1960s, which very much is an alignment with with what's happening in America, everybody's just radicalizing everything, even the white people. Okay. At this point, America America, the people have had enough. Everybody has had enough. Whites, blacks, Asians, Hispanics, you know, everybody is done with the government, right? And so when the Negro digest comes back in the sixties, it has a more pan Africanist like kind of approach and narrative and it's very more combative, especially under the editor Hoyt Fuller. Fuller was very much like he was concerned about embracing the vision and the terminology of the Black Power movement. So he was all for that. And so a lot of those visuals, a lot of that language you can find in the magazine. and I wanna point out also I try to look up so there's some FBI files on the Negro Negro Digest. Why? 'cause we're gonna get into later the surveillance of black people in black organizations and businesses. But the reason why the Negro Digest was being surveillanced by the FBI is because of the power again that they knew they had when it came to informing and inspiring and motivating the people on what's going on and had a lot of language around the black power movement which at that time and just in general the government was like on black people's ass. this time period from I wanna say the nineteen forties, early nineteen forties to the like mid late nineteen seventies, the government had exhausted so much resources and money, taxpayer dollars, specifically on the surveillance of black life. Specifically black life that was very interested in being liberated. So that meant anything. That meant people, that meant businesses, that mean that meant magazines, that meant journalists, that meant whoever, anybody could get it. Okay. So that is why the Nico Daja is is is is has been or was surveillance by the FBI because we also know that knowledge is power, language is power. we know that especially at this time before technology was super advanced, like literature, was very important for propaganda politically, socially. and so America was not having that. and also wanted to speak on the fact that, this magazine had a huge impact on the black arts movement. and was really big on showcasing black artists, which is very important. and it was very interested in getting rid of these like rigid binaries. as far as like at the time like one of the big discourses and even still, as the black people are still talking about it, is, what does it mean for black people to be integrated versus maintaining nationalism? about who we are and what does that look like. And so they had those conversations. They had public debates. They had black power symposiums, they had, a diverse group of like black leaders from like, organizers to state leaders, politicians, other journalists, historians. they even like created like a massive archive, full of, you know, scholarship, historical artifacts. that again progressed who we are and focused on again black power and liberation and so definitely shout out to negro d digest i also want to note that one of their frequent contributors and writers was sonia sanchez I love Sonia Sanchez down if you know anything about Sonia you've read any of her work you get it if you don't know who Sonia Sanchez is do the knowledge honey So we s we still we still in nineteen sixty one. JFK is inaugurated as thirty fifth president of the United States. We're not gonna get too deep into that, but just wanna note that. so I'm gonna note that this time JFK is the president. Also in nineteen sixty one, we have a protest at the United Nations in New York in support of Adele Castro and Patrice Lomba. I need y'all to keep Fidel Castro in your pocket. and Patrice too, but definitely Fidel. Okay. So what happened at the United Nations protest? I'ma tell y'all. In 1961, over 400 supporters of Fidel Castro marched into the United Nations plaza and protested against the United Nations in praise of Castro. and the late Patrice Lombomba. understand at this time we are literally still in the middle of the Cold War. Why does that matter? Because the Cold War was focused around dominating any landscape around this earth with American influence, especially around technology. America basically was toe to toe with the Soviet Union. which is now Russia, and not just around ideology and belief, but also around technological dom dominance. America is if y'all don't know, America is very big on being number one and being the big, bad everything. And so the Cold War was very serious and had Plenty of events, battles, and significant things that happened during that time period. it's a couple decades long, but I want y'all to understand in the background we have the Cold War happening throughout all this. but for Dell, it's important. One, because again, we're in the Cold War era. JFK is the president. We have the Bay of Pigs. Which is basically a failed military mission. On America's part, basically America dropped the ball when trying to invade Cuba. why does America hate Cuba? Mm, we don't have time for all that, but let me try to sum it up. At this point, Cuba is in alignment with the Soviet Union. they are basically pro communism. And so America one does not like anything that is not on their program. They run a strict program. Just think about like that. And so America is all these things around capitalism and quote unquote democracy and anything that's not that, which is deeper than that, it's not about democracy. it is about capitalism. It is about trying to maintain capitalism for sure. but anything that's against that this point, they're not going for it. And any country can get it. And so because Cuba basically aligned themselves with the Soviet Union and along with other countries, America and Cuba are not besties, basically. So what happened was JFK P messed up. This is all backed by the CIA, okay. they basically took a whole bunch of Cuban exiles, so Cubans that escaped Cuba and came to America and so basically used them as pawns to try to overthrow Fidel. but it was a failed attempt and Fidel got them up out of there. It was really bad actually. you should read up on it. It was just horrendous. one of the worst failures of American military history. it's a lot of those. We gotta talk more about The many times America has sucked. We love to praise ourselves being this huge military power. But we need to get into the to the times that it was just quite embarrassing how we showed up as a as a military. So let's move on. right now we're back into s nineteen sixty one. That's where we was. Nineteen sixty one, y'all. And let's go back to the people in the United Nations are basically protesting for Fidel and basically also sorry, they are also protesting in support of the assassination of Patrice Lamba now. Who is Patrice Lamba? Patrice Lomomba is this revolutionary leader from the Congo, he was a leader of the Congolese national movement, and so he was assassinated. Why was Lemomba assassinated? We will again like a lot of things have to get into that into details later. But to summarize it, Lemomba was a African nationalist. He was prank Africanist and he was highly against and opposed the colonization of Belgium and co in the Congo. If you know anything about what Belgium the occupation of Belgium in the Congo, It's like one of it's it's just it's sinister. It's just playing flat evil. what Belgium has done to the people of the Congo and the impact and residue of that, to this day. And what they're still doing to this day. and so basically La Momo was against that. and he tried to revolutionize and free his people from a very corrupt government. You gotta understand that a lot of African leaders, especially at that time, not him but presidents and and high ranking government leaders were corrupt. and not to generalize because I know there's that's this like stereotype that these all these African leaders, were corrupted by the Europeans, but a lot of them were, because of capitalism, Greed and willing to sacrifice your own people for whatever treasures and pleasures that European man or woman promised. that's how we got into child slavery in America. That's how we got the ch transited slave trade, the trickery and not even all the time of trickery, the blatant, like, yeah, I'm going to sell my people. The blatant, yeah, I am going to allow you to control my government for a check, for cash out, sometimes it's it's not even about money, it's about just like political power. in exchange for that. And so, yeah, basically Lamba was not on their program. And as we will learn and should have learned by now is that when you are not on the program of white supremacy, you gotta go. You gotta go. And that's what basically happened. but they were so sinister when it came to the assassination assassination of La Bum Mumba, to the point where they assassinated this man and then like decades later returned some of his body parts, like his ears, to his family. And then, I guess Belgium finally acknowledged and were held themselves accountable for their role in his assassination. And it's just a bunch of BS. And honestly, if I was his family child, we're gonna stage another coup. We're gonna stage another coup, because the audacity. just very vile and sick things that have occurred because of colon col colonization. So that is who Patrice Lamba is. This is why people were basically, protesting in defense of his assassination. so that's what that's about. So that's happening in the background. Okay. And then you have the Civil Rights Act of nineteen sixty four. We should all know why that's important. why is Fidel Castro important? Fidel is extremely important, especially when we're talking about Asada, because we're talking about Cuba, that's where she exiled to. And he was the leader of Cuba at the time, and he actually granted her political asylum in Cuba. So it's like, hmm, we gotta know more about Fidel Fidel Castro was known to approve Cuba's public health and educational systems. he was known to achieve universal literacy for the Cuban people and reduce infant mortality. he also was not for the racism stuff. So that's one thing they didn't rock with when it came to America. They wasn't they wasn't rocking with like Castro wasn't rocking with all the the the the systemic racism, like He just wasn't for it. and it's just added another thing that they hated about the US. and also I feel like that also contributed to his accepting of Asada. knowing that he definitely was watching her, especially during the manhunt, knowing that he definitely got the reports on what was going on, definitely had connections to whoever she was connected, so that she could be granted political asylum when she got there. and so I could see how that played out. however I am reading or I have read about, this other side to Castro. and I don't know many Cubans. I don't know any Cubans, what I'm talking about. I don't know any Cuban people. But I would be interested to hear directly from Cuban people, people who you know, actually lived there, maybe their parents, grandparents about that time and like what was the discourse, you know, about Castro because everything I've read on this side seems like, he was doing some radical stuff. But then I'm reading about other things where like he was authoritarian, he was a dictator ultimately. And so, you know, he was very strict. He had his own program. Okay. And a lot of that imposed on, Cuban civil liberties. not having the freedom to be politically opposed, so there's a lack of democracy. and ultimately blaming him for kind of like being stagnant when it came to the economic development and and growth of Cuba at the time. So just a little bit about Fidel Castro, y'all. just a little appetizer, but definitely wanted to Highlight him. Next, 1965. We have the Watts Rebellion, y'all. The Watts riot is what they call it, but I like to call it the Watts Rebellion, okay. I want y'all to look into all the things I'm saying, but definitely look into more detail because I can't like I wanna go into detail about every little thing, but I'm trying to you know, make sure we have time to talk about all the things. But why is the Watts Rebellion important? It's setting a tone for regionally, The West Coast, California, the Watts community. what's happening politically and socially with black people, especially in connection to local government and the police. And so the the rebellion basically came about when there's like know, cop and the cop basically is suspicious that he is drunk. People start gathering around, assess, how we be like what was going on, especially now, like when we see a white cop pulling over a black person in a neighborhood, I know I'ma look I know I'ma see what's going on. yeah, at the very least, it needs to be recorded and we need to document what's going on. Because again, just like then, but especially then, but also now, black people and the police Ishes. It's just a treacherous history. and so obviously the police, you know, he gets aggressive and the people of Wasp is not having it. and they basically went crazy and there's this outbreak and you know, of course, it's it's the media is categorizing as, you know, this outbreak of violence, right? But to me, a lot of times when I'm reading about these riots that we happen in these communities. especially assessing the time period we're in. You know, we're the nineteen sixties, you know, like yes it's nineteen sixty five, but only a year ago, remember in nineteen sixty four, the Civil Rights Act is implemented or put into action and or made a law, but we also know from Juneteenth that just because something's put into law don't mean it's reality, especially for black people. And so there's this constant delay of like us being able to exercise our agency and audacity. And so it's only a year before the rebellion that the Civil Rights Act is put into place. So, you know, it's not like overnight, yeah, white people just stop being racist and the cops, you know, are now understanding how that presence and how they show up as a a organization, a systemic organization, has impacted black people in black communities. And so, the people ain't having it. Also ca you have to understand that at the time, Watts is a very poor community. So we know we have a lot of poverty. We're gonna have violence. That's just any community. You know, that's why I also I can't stand the discourse around black and black crime because in my opinion, one, people of the same races kill each other just 'cause of proximity. But also too, if you are constantly keeping black people in in in in impoverished communities and and in the systems are created to keep us oppressed and to keep us from not being able to make enough money, not being able to freely walk around our neighborhood and our city, not being able to raise our children properly in a healthy way, not being able to educate our children. in a healthy way, not having the medical care and and and health resources that we need, right? People are going to tear shit up. And then it's always this narrative all they're looting. Look at them. Look at those black people destroying their own neighborhoods. The neighborhoods that the ghettos that y'all put us in. basically cages. Who I get the notion of wanting to keep your neighborhood and community beautiful with whatever you have at the same time. This was never our like we didn't ask to be here. We were forced into these project homes in what we call the ghetto and these urban communities are just not up to par. So, if they wanna Tear up the community, if that's what it takes for people to take black people serious, I'm all for it. Tear the shit down. None of this stuff matters. It's material stuff. This is not the community that we built for ourselves. So yeah, we're you're only saying that 'cause this is your property. You don't want us tearing up your property. And it's exactly why I think we should tear it up. But anyways, the Watts Rebellion happens. and At that time also we know that the Black Panther Party is created a year later, So it's very interesting, we're in this time frame where and the Watts the Watts Rebellion, the Watts riot ain't the only w riot and rebellion that was happening in this country. Black people all across the country in different regions were not having it. one the biggest lies that history has programmed us to be to believe in is that black people have been so docile and we just kind of been waiting and twiddling our thumbs for freedom and for liberation. No, we've been fighting tooth and nails. We've been, we've been, we've been throwing hands. We've been, we've been we've been, yeah, outside. And so this is just a culmination of just black people being fed up. And so a year later you have the Black Panther Party that comes to fruition. In between both of that, the W in between the Wasp Rebellion and the Black Panther Party coming to fruition, Michael Mas is assassinated. Black people have had enough. You killed our leaders. you're beginning, you well, you've been killing our leaders, but then you kill one of our most prominent ones, because you gotta remember, three years after that, Dr. King is assassinated. So this is where we at in the country. This is this is this is this is what's going on. I also wanna point out and we'll talk about the Black Panther Party in more detail and and and how it came about and what it's about. but another assassination it's just like for me is just like, okay, it just seems like I feel like the sixties was a heavy year. Sixties and the seventies is a heavy year of losing a lot of our black revolutionary leaders. And so in nineteen sixty nine, you have the assassination of Fred Hampton and Mark Clark. if you haven't seen it before, please go check out Judas and the Black Messiah, you have Daniel Kaluya who plays Fray Hampton. I think he does an incredible depiction of Hampton. I'm not really fond of Hollywood's I guess you could say, interpretation of black radical and revolutionary events and leaders, but I will say this one was very bearable and I think he did incredible. Lake Stanfield is also in this movie along with Dominique Fishback and Ashton Sanders, he played in Moonlight and he also played in the Wu Tang Saga TV show series. So a lot of great actors and actresses in this film. But yeah. if you ever seen if you've never seen Judas and the Black Messiah, I will suggest you go check that out. but Fred Hampton is assassinated I mean he's only twenty one. I mean barely an adult. and we're gonna get into later why this is important to understand, like all the assassinations, the uprisings, you know, the Black Panther Party come into into fruition, like why all of this is important. it's also important to note that when Fred Hampton was killed and murdered by the Chicago Police Department, he was sleeping in bed with his fiance who was eight months pregnant. fortunately she, survived the baby survived, but the plot against black revolution leaders was at a all time high at this time, to the point that you would kill this man in front of his pregnant wife while he's asleep. It's very cowardly. Very cowardly. 'Cause that's the only time you could get him when he was asleep. now we're the nineteen seventies, y'all. I wanna note a couple things in nineteen seventies that's going on. You have the uprising of the or the creation of the Black Liberation Army, super important. you also have the manhunt for Angela Davis is happening at this time. please look look into that. next we have Basically the apparatus of the Joint Terrorism Task Force, the JTTF is created. in nineteen seventy three. Why is that important? I do wanna stop here In this time frame, a lot of the work that is being done by the government to dismantle black liberation movements fostered and created a lot of the groups in I would say, operations that the government uses and has uses to this day but has used to surveil the American people. So it's kind of like you create this crisis or you create this enemy. And right now the enemy is black power, black liberation, revolutionary leaders. And so you have your enemy, you have your crisis. so now we have to create this structure, this system that can not just control the enemy, but to completely remove them, to completely obliterate them. And so we're gonna create these operations, we're gonna create these task force, we're gonna create these, you know, surveillance teams to bring them down the JTTF is an American locally based multi-agency partnership between the federal state and the local law enforcement. So you have the feds, you have the state And you have local police teaming up together to investigate crimes that are terrorism related. However, they are led by the FBI and the US Department of Justice. So it's a collective effort between all these entities, but the big dog is the FBI and the Department of Justice, the DOJ. the official structure or task force emerged in the eighties. it's the result of what we know now as COINTELPRO, All these things are connected. The CONCELPRO operations and the surveillance is a part of this this larger picture that makes up America's efforts to fight against terrorism or fight against terrorist enemies, whoever they deem that to be, whether they live in this country or not. And at this time we're talking about black liberation leaders, black revolutionary leaders being categorized as terrorists, at this time. And then lastly in the seventies, I want to point out how Roots, the television series, first airs. Again, you have in the seventies, sixties and seventies this increase of, what it means to be beautiful and to be black. And so you have the Black is beautiful movement, and this is where black people are embracing the Afro and our natural texture. And we're dressing, in Afrocentric style clothes and we're getting more in tune with who we are and who we were before slavery, And so we have this this influx of interest in that. And so roots coming out around that time. It's just like very on time. and so shout out to Alex Haley. also we can't forget and I mean this man literally raised me. But we also have to shout out Lavar Burton who was just like incredible as Toby slash Kunta Kente. so these historical markers I believe to be important in when we're discussing all the things that's happening with Asada in her story. As I'm going through Asada's life, I do have a information here, key moments and dates And so the objectives of this for today's episode is understanding Asada as the whole woman. Right? how the state criminalizes black resistance and imagination, and why America loves surveillance, especially of black people, the core principles and functions of the Black Liberation Army and the Black Panther Party, what political exile means for radical black women, how a side of the story echoes in today's culture, and how America defines terrorism, I wanna start with a quote by Asada And it says No one is going to give you the education you need to overthrow them. Nobody is going to teach your true history. Teach your true heroes if they know that the the knowledge will help set you free. Let me say it again. No one is going to give you the education you need to overthrow them. Nobody is going to teach you your true history. They're not going to teach you your true heroes. If they know that the knowledge will help set you free. another reason why she's the first topic. It's the core of why I'm doing this, why I want to continue to do other things around history, education. When it pertains to us because knowledge will set us free. And that's why we have to do the knowledge. Okay. So born in July 16th, 1947, Joanne Deborah Byron. I guess she would say her master's name. That's master's name. she's born in Flushing, Queens, nineteen forty seven. She was raised by a school teacher mother, her grandparents and her aunt Evelyn Williams, a civil rights worker. I wanna know that her grandparents were living in the south at the time. So when she would go and visit her grandparents, she, according to her book, her autobiography, she had these experiences of what it looked like to, you know, be in the segregated south, And and comparing that to how I was in New York, you know, up north. And even though she noted a lot of the racism, the Jim Crow laws that were, very much in full fledged operation. But one of the things that she pointed out that I remember is even for instance with the schools being segregated, Like she noticed the education being different, having actual black teachers to teach black children and the impact that made. So even though they were segregated and under this, I mean, sinister political system. they were able to learn things in a way that ultimately they couldn't do in a more integrated school, especially up north, The teachers didn't look like you in New York. also, she was shown like her grandparents were business owners, they were business people. And so experiencing, seeing their grandparents, like they had like this parking lot that they had bought. and pay for the pay for the land and, you know, white people down there, terrorizing them, tearing up the lot, you know, just giving them hell for no reason, ultimately for being black watching her grandparents be resilient in that, right? Even though she talks about her grandmother very much being you know, respectability politics type, but at the same time was very resilient too. So you have those different worlds. this is also where she's introduced to the NAACP same as me. she wasn't really rocking with the whole nonviolent thing, but she did appreciate, black people organizing and stepping up and doing trying to do something about what was going on in our worlds. Also wanna point out her relationship with her aunt, which is very critical and very important 'cause this relationship carries out even through the trials that she has from her arrest, with the Turnpike shooting. Her aunt was, you know, one of her legal counsels and lawyers. and so wanted to pinpoint the importance of the village, In nineteen fifty, her parents, her biological father and you know, her mom got they got divorced and at this time they a actually moved to North Carolina with her grandparents for a while before moving back to Queens, where they live with, her mom and her live with their stepfather. But wanting to emphasize the relationship that she had with her aunt, who was a civil rights worker, so you understand She's living in New York, born in New York, but then she has this connection to the South with her grandparents, And seeing some type of like civil rights organizing through the NWACP down there, but also through her aunt who's a civil rights worker, So she's as a child is being immersed, without her even knowing at the time, into this trajectory, that we ultimately see unfold later in her life. And so, in her book she talks about her aunt being the heroine of her childhood. her aunt was the youngest of, her mom's siblings. and always talked about her being like sophisticated and her just being very brilliant and knowing all the things. she would take her to the museums and like take her to the library and showing her it's important for you to be educated like her aunt was not playing. this also pinpoints why it's important to foster, encourage children at a very young age to learn, to create the environment at a very early age, when people say, my kid don't like to read or My kid ain't gonna that's because you haven't fostered and nurtured the space for that kid or that child to want to do that, to find the value. I don't even think about it's it's about all the time the motivation, like sometime it's not about I love books. Sometimes it's we understand the value of reading books. So here we're seeing some of that, some of the beginnings of that in her early childhood and in the people who played a role in that. when she moves back to Queens with her mother and stepfather, things get rocky and, she will often like run away from home, And in those times that she would run away from home, she would live with her aunt who lived in upper west the upper west Manhattan. and this is also the time period where she's inspired, to go to the museums having access to those things, encouraging her to attend Catholic school. and so while she is in Catholic school and just in public school, the public school system, as well, 'cause she goes back and forth, she's having these awakenings through these institutions, And so she's watching, she remembers, Dr. King being assassinated, the boycotts, the bus boycotts, you know, Rosa Parks, the lynch mobs, the Little Rock, Arkansas kids, you know, who were being harassed by by white people, and lynching mobs. it started to create this fire in her and it impacted her understanding of how, the world treated black people. This is Beginnings of her understanding of that, She even quotes, I didn't know what a fool they had made out of me, and so I grew up and started to read real history. I can relate. Same sis, cause like what is going on? What happened? but she gives her GED thanks to her aunt. and she ends up attending borough of Manhattan Community College, and then she ends up going to City College of New York in the mid 1960s. Now, when she's in school, she originally wanted to study business, and she had got this job and marketing and advertisement. However, she changed her major in classes to like things around history and psychology and sociology because she was interested in the political consciousness that ultimately would change the trajectory of who she came to be in her career, her activism. and this is also the time period where she begins to get involved with political activities around protests, she was doing sit ins. she was connected and engaging with black Muslims, the Garveyates, which are, people who support in the belief and the values and the practice of Marcus Garvey. she joined the Smith OMEX organization, for black students. I mean, she was all in. She was all in. Okay. Again, she's only in college at this time. So I wanna kinda go back to earlier childhood, like middle school, high school, before she went to college. It's the time that she's like running away. there are times where she was not living with her aunt and she ran away. and so this time frame, I wanna focus on just like the complexities of strife. in disconnect specifically around the patriarchy in men, So developing some initial conflict with men, understanding patriarchal values and how they impacted specifically black women. And so she grew up again, she went back to Queens after living with her grandparents, and she's living with her mother and stepfather, this first time she runs away, she meets this boy named David and he let her stay with her. However, he was trying to push up on her basically, like trying to attempt to have sex with her, was threatening her, harassing her, and she was like, Mm mm, it's not safe, and so she went to go find somewhere somewhere else to live. her already developing mind and discernment around what a safety look like as a black woman, even in this like rough place right now where you you don't have home or home is rocky, moving forward, she then meets this other boy. He's in this gang child, and she likes him a lot, but then realize child This man is a drug dealer. He's a gang member. I'm trying to be an activist. You know what I'm saying? I'm trying to, you know, progress my people. You are actually going against that by what you do. So at that point she was ready to go home. another time when she ran away, she ended up staying with another man. I'm glad she got up she got up out of there, but these were some strange men. She stayed with this man, apparently he was paranoid as I don't know what and he threw her out the first night. After that, she gets a job at a diner but then she's harassed sexually by her boss. Jesus. She quits, but then her boss refused to pay her last check. She basically embarrassed the hell out of him in public and then forces, him to pay her for the work she did that day. After that moment, she meets a woman named Miss Shirley, who's actually a transgender woman, Miss Shirley is basically taking in all these like youth who are without home. so Miss Shirley helps her get a job, and gets her a place to stay. the girl was working at a bar basically. Asada was working at a whole bar underage. but Miss Shirley protected her. Michelle is also taking care of some other kids, And these other kids would take Asada to basically do this game called the the Murphy game. They would run this run the Murphy game on white men. And the idea is a white man would approach a black woman sexually, so p for some sex, work, okay, from s for some sexual exchange. and so what Osaka would do was wait for him, wait for the white man to approach and ask for, what's up, what you trying to do? Blah blah blah. And when she would lure him to the building and they was gonna do the thing, basically the two friends who also live with Miss Shirley would basically come out and Asada would disappear and they would basically rob the men. And honestly, I'm not mad at it. Rob them. In the nineteen fifties, yes. We robbing white men. I definitely would have been robbing white men in the nineteen fifties. Are you crazy? You already got Jim Crow, You already got the the the the FBI, okay, surveillancing us. before it was crack it was heroin, okay. Heroin had black people in the show code, okay? And then you have regular racism. That's just all throughout the country. Not just the South. I'm absolutely robbing white men in the nine in the nineteen fifties. So they did that. But Miss Shirley won't rockin' with that basically. basically kicked her out. but the last the moment that Asada definitely was like, okay, this is this ain't the life of me. she goes to this party with them same two kids, who was writing them games on a white man. And he when they get to this, you know, party, there's this guy, this boy that Asada likes. And he's talking to her to whatever. She leaves with him. He's talking about, it's gone I got a better party in my place, yada yada yada. but then the party turns into, it's a bunch of yo friends who basically are planning to rape me. Whoa. That's not a party. That's that's not the party I wanna be at. And so basically Asada started breaking shit. She's just started destroying the whole apartment, going crazy ballistic, 'Cause they are in the boy who lured her there is basically his mom's home. And then he had no business being in there, let alone about to commit a crime. It's just too much. And so she destroys the entire apartment. She's screaming. She forces them out to the hallway and made them knock on a neighbor's door and basically she you know, so she can locate an adult. And I'm just thinking like, dang, like I'm thinking about her past experiences, helped informed the the ability and capacity to problem solve her way out of these situations. as a little black girl, like this is she's a child at this point. the way that she has has to do these mental Olympics to get herself out of situations that she should never be in in the first place and ha and should never be exposed to at such a young age or just at all like rape. you've been fighting for your life since you was born, honey. she really realized That was her fight. Her fight was men. Her fight was the the programming of the patriarchy, not just in society as a whole, but deeply entrenched in the neighborhoods and environments, the black neighborhoods and environments that exist in. So now we're talking about Ms. Noor. And so keep that in mind when we're talking about Asada and the experiences that she has. in her political journey, her activism journey, her revolutionary journey, she is constantly going to be experiencing massage and or even in these liberating movements. Ultimately after that time, she ends up going back to live with her aunt. basically she tells her aunt, like, I'm tired of being grown. I want to be a kid again. And I couldn't agree and relate to that more. I just put on threads like there's certain things that I've experienced and found out as an adult where I'm like, you know what? I would like to go back to a child's place. I would like to and and stay there. Our parents and adults was hitting the cook with that one 'cause I would like to go back. So yeah. now She has gone from Joanne Deborah Byron to Joanne Chesamar. Why? Because in nineteen sixty seven, she marries Louie Chesamar. she meets Louie I believe in college when she's a part of one of these like black organization groups. I wanna say yeah, she's in one of those like activist groups on campus. going back to that though, I'm going back and forth, y'all. Just this is what I'm gonna be doing. when she's in school, so before she marries this man, she's still in school and This is when she starts to become interested in communism. And this is based off this like debate that she attends, at Columbia University, with several African students. And so this idea of anything non American, Anything anti capitalism, anything anti America. She starts to develop some of I guess you would say this is really what's going on. This is what America didn't teach you. she discovers the myths and illusions of the civil war and the fact that again, Abraham Lincoln ain't ain't ain't do nothing for black people. he is not no savior, you know, he did not free the slaves. Because he loved black people so much. He thought it was so wrong. No, it was it was a political and economic move. basically the union, states wanted to take control of the southern economy. but the southern economy is rooted in slavery. And so The South was fighting to hold on to what was keeping their economy running. And so that's what the civil war is about in super like surface breakdown. But basically Abraham Lincoln ain't dead shit for black people. And so she's coming to this realization as a student, this is also when she gets her first arrest, She's arrested with a a hundred other black students who get charged for trespassing. Basically, they was chaining and locking the entrances of one of the college buildings to protest the fact that there weren't enough black professors on campus and there weren't enough black study programs on campus or for their college. so yeah, anyways, in the midst of all that, she meets her man, okay? And they get married, but it was short lived, honey. That man ain't know who he was marrying basically. even though he was also an activist and involved in the same organizations, what he was looking for was a more traditional wife. So y'all are doing the same type of work and organizing activism, but you wanted her to take a seat and step back and play the traditional housewife role. And first of all, Sarah didn't even know how to cook. We just talked about her childhood. Nowhere in her childhood did we talk about domestication. this wasn't a situation where she was her mama was teaching her how to cook and No, it was none of that. And so ultimately they got divorced, basically over a year later. So that, grand opening, grand closing, I guess. So Boom, she's free from this man, And then she goes to California. And this is when she's introduced to the Native American occupation of Alcatraz, which I didn't know anything about. it was a nineteen month protest by Indians of all tribes, IAT, Alcatraz was once like this maximum security federal prison, in like the early nineteen hundreds to the mid nineteen hundreds, it closed down. Alcatraz had prisoners like Alcatone, So a lot of mafia mobsters like were sent to Alcatraz. so anyways, after the after Alcatraz shuts down, the land is not occupied. And so basically the native activists were claiming that because it's abandoned land and there's this treaty The Treaty of Fort Laramie was a series of agreements between the United States and Northern Plains Native American tribes, primarily the Sioux, the Cheyenne and Arapaho. Mm. I think I'm saying that right. But yeah. So basically it was this treaty. between America and a few Native American tribes and basically in that treaty there is supposed to be something around, Native Americans being granted a right to reclaim unused federal land. Alcatraz was was a unclaimed federal land. So they felt like they had the right to occupy that space in their land. Asada also was cool with the Brown Berets. The Brown Berets is a Chicano paramilitary organization that emerged during the Chicano movement in the United States during the late 1960s. David Sanchez and Carlos Mantez co founded the group modeled after the Black Panther Party. So look at that, the influence. the Brown Berets is part of the Third World Liberation Front. The Chicano movement also referred to El Mova. Mm, I gotta get back on Duolingo. Also referred to as El Movimiento, Spanish for the Movement was a social and political movement in the United States that worked to embrace a Chicano identity and worldview that combated structural racism, encouraged cultural revitalization, and achieved community empowerments by rejecting assimilation. In Oakland, California, when Asada goes to Oakland, and I can't determine if she was just visiting or moved there. I couldn't the the the research wasn't solid enough. but she either is visiting or moved to Oakland, California in nineteen seventies. This is where she is introduced to the Black Panther Party. Nineteen seventy, Oakland, California, the Black Panther Party. What is the Black Panther Party? I'm glad you asked. The Black Panther Party is Huey Newton and Bobby Seal, two brothers from Open California, political activists, college students, and basically they fed up with the conditions of how black people are being treated and the failure of the civil rights movement. Because also you gotta understand the civil rights movement did a lot of focus on southern relations and a lot of the northern or west coast communities, not saying that the civil rights movement did not branch off it all it definitely did, but the impact or the focus was definitely the South and so a lot of urban communities and neighborhoods outside of the South were experiencing you know, the same oppression, the same white supremacy but in a different way. of course that was police brutality, aggression for the police in all the regions, but it's something about how it looked in like a Oakland, Or like in a in a Queens or in a Harlem that made it unique to that region and made it unique to that community of black people. Huey and for Bobby, they were ultimately not rocking with the fact that okay, y'all had the civil rights movement, y'all got the nineteen sixty four and civil rights act. Dr. King did all this stuff, did y'all kill him? And all these other leaders, ain't nothing happened. We still in the same shit. so their response to that is the Black Panther Party. And one of the main things is like this focus on the brutality, against protesters and this long tradition of like police violence and and state oppression. we want black people to have the needs, the basic needs. that are required to just simply survive. But also we want to address the fact that y'all not finna keep beating us and we're not gonna retaliate. Y'all y'all not gonna keep sick and dogs on us in water holes, And we're not gonna bear arms and protect ourselves and our families and our children and and the women. So they begin organizing, mostly organizing with a lot of young, poor, like Kids from around the way. You gotta understand the beginnings of who was a part of the Black Panther Party was a reflection of the environment they were in. These were not scholars and, these political leaders. These were kids from around the way who had the same sentiments, who experienced the same thing, who were equally as tired of what was going on. Conditions of black people, especially black people in their neighborhood. So that was who was organizing. This also shows what why it's possible, regardless of the environment, regardless of the conditions, it there's always opportunity and a possibility to organize and get it together and to fight for liberation. You don't need to be rich, you don't need to have all the resources. You don't need a sign up sheet. You don't need a newsletter. You don't need a social media post. You don't need the president. Okay? You don't need congresswoman, congressmen. you need the people. That's what you need. You need the people. And that is basically what that reflected when, the Black Panther Party was created. Also, a lot of the local chapters of the Panther Party, were often led by women. And there was this focus on community and programming, So this is where we get the free breakfast program, That fed thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of children and families every day. The free food program, support of the elderly, schools that they would sponsor, legal aid. clothing drives, organizing transportation, medical care, health clinics. at the time sickle cell was a huge, a huge health crisis for black people And so they had a lot of testing centers in different cities, for sickle cell, like direct responses to what the people are experiencing and what they need, So it's deeper than the guns, it's deeper than the the the militant outfits and the all black and the the intimidation, the confidence, It's all these programming, these efforts, these community resources that were led by women that were honestly the meat and potatoes of the movement. This is what really supported the community. but they also campaigned around prison reform. voter registration. they was doing giveaways, they were creating freedom schools. and this was a threat. The government was like, hold on. The black people is getting free health care? Hold on. They're getting free food? Hold on. Free education? Hold on. The kids is is is being trained to to to believe in themselves and love themselves and find themselves beautiful. Hold on. the women, you know, actually, are able to now all the time, 'Cause we know that there was a lot of misogyny happening in the Black Panther party. cases of harassment, cases of assault, cases of rape, all kind of stuff. So we're not gonna ignore that like that didn't happen. And there were a lot of cases where women were respected in their roles, were acknowledged, and and were lifted, and and respected for their work, not only in the party, but this whole ideology around black women, being somewhat of the roots of the progression of black people. And we saw that in the ways that they led not only these programs, but it's at some point I read that two thirds of the Panther members were women. Okay. I thought that was interesting. so back to Osada. before she leaves the Panther Party this is where she meets Zayd. Zayd Malik Shakur. Nope, everybody's name is Shakur, honey. Everybody's name is Shakur. I wanna go back to after she remember she was married to that man, her name was Joanne Chazamar. Some at some point between then and the new Jersey Turnpike shooting, she changes her name to Asada Alubalah Shakur. I hope I'm saying that right. I was doing research and I was trying to figure out when exactly she changed her name. A lot of the stuff was telling me that she changed it in honor of Zaid. who we're talking about now, who she meets in the Black Panther party. but I'm like, okay, what was her name when she met Shakur? I mean Zay Shakur. Was it still Joanne? Was she still going by that? 'Cause then I saw research that told me she was going by Boomy Olade, Ala Delay. And at one point she was also going by Shakur, Alukbala Shakur. So listen. At some point Asada went from Joanne Chesamar, divorced that man, maybe and then she changed her name a couple other times and then it was Asada Shakur. Okay. If anybody knows the actual time date or whatever when she actually did it, please let me know. and maybe I missed that in the book. Maybe I need to go back and read the book. She eventually is the party due to like how we talked about how, the leaders were getting sent letters, COINTELPRO is at a all time high. COINTELPRO is twenty four seven, honey. the infiltration due to the successful attempts of divestment, separation, destabilization, the formants, all of that, contributed a lot to the fall of Dire Panther Party and Asada was experiencing the residue of a lot of that a lot of members in leadership were like disillusioned, like there were a lot of internal conflicts, like it was just a lot going on. And Asada was just like, I I gotta get out of here. It's just that's just what it is. and there's a note in the book about her receiving a warning from friend that the police were like waiting for at home. so this is the time period where we see Asada beginning to go underground, Asada ain't stupid. She know that they was gonna be monitoring her. They've been monitoring her the whole time. They definitely monitor her house. They monitor her family house, so she had to go into hide and there was no other choice. and so she, goes underground. So after Asada goes underground, this is where it gets real. So she becomes real paranoid and concerned about the surveillance, the harassment. And at this point, they're trying to connect Asada to mad crimes. Anything dealing with Black liberation and activism, they put an Asada's name on it. And this is also the time period where she joins the Black Liberation Army. But when she learned that the police was looking for her and her making the decision to go on the ground, she had to trust heavily on networks, on community, safe houses, to avoid being arrested. So everybody she came into contact with, they had to be vetted. She could not risk infiltration, no spy. She couldn't risk dealing with some coon who wanted to sell her out. And so this is like where she really, really gets deep into the work. And it's so ironic to see this play out this way because it reminds me of the times when you really are in your calling and it's like really time to like, it's really like go Tom, the way that God or your higher power, whoever you honor will put you in a hiding place. Hello? Cause now I'm about to go, now I'm about to go to church. will put you in a hiding place, And you're not in that hiding place just cowering over and scared and crying. mean, yeah, humanly, yes, I would be scared too. Like what? The police is like, no, you're just the police. The entire government is at my net and trying to kill me. So yeah, I'm scared, but you're in that hiding place developing, really being in your studies, really 10 toes and what your purpose is. And that's exactly what she did. She went on and laid up, just chilling and kicking it. She was in there still educating herself, still reading, still learning about revolutionary movements. She was learning about, anti-colonial struggle. She was learning about economics. She was learning about politics. what's the alternative to the education that we have been given in this country? how do we uproot ourselves from traditional institutions? she was doing that work, even in hiding, even scared, know, even terrified, not knowing if she was gonna make it the next day or if someone was gonna betray her or, she was gonna get arrested. And so this is also where she continues to develop her belief in political education. she's so serious about that and how that lack of education is deeply rooted racism, to poverty, to oppression. And when you have that education, you have that knowledge, you're able to be empowered, which ultimately leads you to be able to organize and create change. And so now you're not just reacting to injustices, you're doing something about it. We got to do something, we got to apply the knowledge. The knowledge is useless if you're not applying it. And just also, again, the humanness of her having to move around, her being separated from her family, but also that made her strong, her conviction strengthened because of that. also she joins the Black Liberation Army. in the 1970s. a little bit about the Black Liberation Army. So the Black Liberation Army began early 1970s. similar to the Panther Party, but their influence was around anti-colonialism. liberation around the world, Not just the struggle of black people in America, but the struggle of the oppressed globally. And they were specifically interested in or influenced by the Vietnamese resistance and in their fight for independence. Keep in mind, we're talking about the Vietnam War. we have no time again to be in a war, just heavily motivated by so many things. So another historical marker you should look into. And also look into the amount of black radical leaders who always go back to what's happening in Vietnam at this time. anyways, for the Black Liberation Army though, the key difference between them and the party is their belief that traditional organizing alone was not enough to protect them, Whether that's from police violence, whether that's from government state repression, whether that's from racial injustice, like Their advocacy was around armed self-defense and underground organizing. That is what made them different from the Black Panther Party. It really is the underground organizing. The Black Panther Party had the armed self-defense, but the underground organizing is what really separates the two. So once Asada leaves the party, goes underground, she associates herself with, individuals in the Black Liberation Army, and that's how she joins. I know I mentioned how I wasn't sure but another record mentions that she changed her name during this period specifically. this whole idea of, you know, her rejecting her birth name and viewing it as like a slave name and cultural displacement. so her changing her name to Asada was more of a description of the broader political and like cultural... transitions that she was having and it connected to how she felt about African history and identity and liberation. So it just it just basically suited her better and I was I would agree. I look at you know understanding who this woman is it doesn't give a Joanne you know no offense to Joanne. My momma named Joanne but what she had going on it wasn't giving Joanne it was definitely giving Asada and it definitely gave Shakur so Now, getting real, it's getting real nasty because in 1971, this is when, at this point, Assault is a target enemy of America from 1971, I mean, honestly before then, but 1971 onward, honestly up until her death, her transition this year. But it wasn't until 1971 where she was, shot in the stomach at a Hilton Hotel in She had a fight with a gas or something. Because she was already on the radar, though, for all her participation in the liberation movement, they was on her ass. So this had nothing to do with the movement. But they had already had her on the radar, and so they needed something. And so... She ends up becoming one of the most surveillance black activists in America. Local, federal, everybody was looking for her. Trying to link her to any crime they wanted to. Any crime that, reflected black liberation, army activity, whether she was there or not. Asada did it. She's the culprit. And that reflected heavily in media coverage too. So painting her as this villain. And the media was very strategic as well. I mean, they inflated her role, like they made it seem like she was just like the leader of the army and she is the general And that's just so ironic why they chose her to be a part of that narrative. But it was all exaggerated. And so. we understand the Cointel Pro was a government funded, taxpayer funded operation that was illegal. We have to understand who created it in the first place. And that is no other. The Edgar Hoover. the notorious and not in a way, not B.I.G. kind of way, notorious as he should have been set on fire in a chamber where the fire never goes out, just constant hell in a chamber. That's how I feel about Edgar Hoover. But to understand Quintel Pro you would understand Edgar Hoover FBI director from 1924 to 1972 this man was causing hell for basically 50 plus years. Not only that what people don't know is Hoover built his career around the Red Scare era. Which was still ongoing obviously into the 60s and 70s, but disbelief that communism, radical politics, and black liberation movements were a threat to American society and authority. Why are black liberation movements a threat to American society and authority? Because black people were never supposed to be free. Black people was never supposed to be free. This was not supposed to happen. The Civil War was not supposed to go how it was supposed go. So there's an alternate universe where black people are not free from slavery. And as far as chattel slavery, okay, let's be clear, because we ain't free from all of it. But that was an alternative reality where we are still slaves in 2026, chattel slavery. That is what they foresaw for our future. And so, yeah, it's a threat for you to be asking for rights, to stop injustice, to, you know, defend yourself. How dare you? You ain't even supposed to be free. You're not even human. That's how they felt. That's how Edgar Hoover felt. And so in 1956, he created COINTELPRO. And it was a secret FBI operation. it was illegal. And they lied about it. And they kept it underground for years. And it was supposed to neutralize political orgs. But that was their way of saying, we got to get rid of the blacks, in the late 1960s also it's important to know that Hoover declared the Black Panther Party one of the greatest threats to the US internal security. Hilarious. By June 1973, an apparatus that would become the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force was issuing nearly daily briefings on Shakur's and all the allegations against her. So when we talked about the Joint Terrorism Task Force, the government trying to capture this woman, trying to find this woman, their efforts and work in doing that, all that surveillance, all the operations basically originated what we know as the Terrorism Task Force. A Black woman, a Black woman inspired these folks. to create a task force that is still in operation today. They needed a task force of local, state, and federal agencies to find this woman. They own her. They own her real bad, While she's underground, we have the New Jersey Turnpike shooting, May 2nd, 1973. The story goes. Asada was traveling on the New Jersey Turnpike with other Black Liberation Army members, Sundiata Akoli and Zay Malik Shakor. Remember she met Zay when she was in the Black Panther party. Zay left the party and became a member of the Black Liberation Army, They are stopped by a New Jersey state trooper for a traffic violation. Somehow a shootout goes, just erupts and the the state trooper dies, And then Zay dies, Her friend. another state trooper that was on site is wounded but she don't but he don't die and then Asada was shot but doesn't obviously die. So the troopers they pulled them over for a broken tail, like but keep in mind, Asada is underground. I'm also sure that Zaid and Sundiata are also very much on the government's hit list as well. If at the very least they're aware of their membership to the to the army and they have been surveillancing them too, if they have been surveillancing Asada. when they get pulled over, which I personally believe they knew that who they was pulling over and they used the whole traffic violation as an excuse. Either that or when they pulled them over, they realized who it was and that's when it went crazy. And I think that was a struggle. I think that the police officers got aggressive, was about to be on the same BS that the police be on. And they are members of the Black Liberation Army. So what do they do? Defend themselves with their guns. And so that's the shootout happens, but Asada has her hands up and she is shot in the chest and in in the arm. and to the fact that they they like, You should have died, basically like we wish you we wish you died. We wish you were dead. This is what they're saying to her. as they're you know, they had to take her to the hospital and all this stuff. But now she's under arrest. And even though there's no there was no medical and forensic evidence, she was still held accountable. Somebody had to pay the cost. You know, you don't you don't get to defend yourself as a black person and not pay the cost. started maintaining her innocence. She like, I ain't shooting no weapon, I ain't even shoot them people. I had my hands up. Done people shot me. Period. I believe it. However, later on the prosecution, argues that she participated in the conversation and contributed to a leading to the death of the police officer. So she's legally responsible. while she's on trial for this, she becomes one of the most watched political prisoners in the US. Like she's she's famous. She's famous. the media, the history that they tell about Asada to try to make it seem like she wasn't a big deal, but she was a big deal. She was a big deal. To the point where her nine week trial for this particular incident because she had to go to many I think she has seven different court cases where they was trying to charge her for different crimes that she didn't she didn't commit and she actually was acquitted by all of them except for one one of was a hung jury. and maybe one or two was acquitted. except for this New Jersey Turnpike incident. But while she was going to the trial for that one, she w had to go to court for all the other charges they were trying to put on her. So she's also just like, This is exhausting, Not only did y'all set me up, y'all been watching me, surveillancing me, y'all kill my friends, you shoot me, damn near kill me. Try to impose on me having, the proper medical the proper medical care that I need, because you hate me because now I'm a cop killer, I'm a cop killer now. And so there's there's that whole thing. And so now you wanna refuse medical care for me. Even as, now I'm in the custody of the state because I'm under arrest. But I'm still, owed the right to proper medical care. So yeah, she's in the hospital at this point and then, she eventually just transferred to a prison to, face all her charges and carry on multiple cases acquitted for all of them. Except for the ones that ended in mistrials and home juries. But she never had to be held accountable for those 'cause they never happened. There was no evidence. you needed the New Jersey one to stick because you couldn't catch her no on nothing else. And this one ultimately led to a actual death of a cop. So it's like the the the the tension is high, the stakes are high, like now y y'all already pissed that y'all couldn't catch her before, Now this cop is dead and y'all feel like y'all have something to prove to make her an example. Which leads to y'all making her a terrorist. and so we all know that all these things were basically motivated by her association with the black liberation organizations. she was retried like three times for this for this case and because then nothing would stick. But The prosecution's argument, which, led to her conviction was she a she was aiding and abetting. And, even though she didn't fire the shot that killed the police officer, she basically contributed to it. And so she was convicted under New Jersey's aiding and abetting laws. also want to point out that she had an all white jewelry. Yeah. Sounds very similar to a lot of cases. she was convicted of first degree murder. which is crazy. Being convicted of first degree murder and you didn't murder anybody is insane. which yeah, we know how that goes. That happens to a lot of people, but like just straight up you didn't shoot anybody. Okay. So she was sentenced to life in prison plus additional years, which never made sense to me because how you already how you already well, I guess like 'cause you can get parole. But my whole thing is like how you gonna sentence somebody to life in prison and then add more years? Life is life. They can't serve time dead. but p wanted to pin out something very, very important. While she was on trial for nine weeks for this case It was so widely publicized that it was even reported in the telegraph agency of the Soviet Union, which is basically like the state the state funded radio station, media station for the Soviet Union in Russia. we talked about Fidel Castro earlier. We talked about his connection to the Soviet Union. we talked about the Cold War. We talked about all these things, And now this black woman's case is is being heavily watched and reported even by the Soviet the Soviet Union, which at the time is one of America's number one enemies. So keep that in mind. while she's in prison though, horrible conditions. Let me just say that. Terrible. Terrible, terrible, terrible conditions. I mean, she spent a lot of time in solitary confinement, high security detention. she spent more than a year in solitary c confinement. and her legal team, her aunt, I mean, was fighting tooth and nail to get, some justice around this because I mean she was literally treated like an animal. Charlie was beating on her, Child Foo was old, beating her old Modi Foo, intimidating her, harassing her. It was a mess. you had the National Conference of Black Lawyers, who were on her defense team. They were filing to change the treatment that she was getting. But also a side gave birth to a daughter while in prison, okay? How did that happen? Let me tell you. So while she was facing the federal charges for a bank robbery case, this is the whole other case. She was tried alongside another activist who was a part of that case. and his name was Kamao Sadiqi. Asada just knew that the judge at the time was just on bullshit, basically. he was openly biased. He already had this preconceived, bias against black activists and just clearly just anti black liberation. anything connected to those movements. And so she noticed that. And so, it was a tension in the courtroom. talking back. They was they was getting busy in there. Like they was not being silent. And it was at one point where before they going in, Kamao has a daughter, right? And he tries to go hug her, embrace her, or whatever, in the courthouse and the US marshals beat on him in front of his family, in front of his daughter, in front of, all his people. And Asada rushed to defend him. like a black woman does, And this caused a larger scene and now the marshals are getting into it with her and the defendants and the supporters, everybody's just fighting each other. It's just a mess. And so they arrest Asada and they arrest Kamao, because they don't want to speak, they basically was removed from the courtroom because they wasn't shutting up. they ain't no ain't no order in no court. Ain't no order in America, so ain't no order in this court. And that's basically how they was going about it. And so they like, hey nah, they gotta get out of here. So they forced them, to listen to the rest of the proceedings in like separate room in a separate room with a speaker so they can hear what's going on in the court but they're not in the court. And so why that's happening, though, they spend a little time. You know what I'm saying? Like We fighting to go fight, Like we fight for black liberation. And sometimes fighting for black liberation can put you in a move and just make you feel away. And so they started to develop a close relationship during the trial. so now started thinking about motherhood, you're in a space in a position where your livelihood and your your freedom is on the line and been on the line. But as far as the legal system. And so you are thinking about how do I carry on my legacy? And how do I get to experience motherhood and all the things that I'm gonna miss out on because I'm fighting for my people, I'm fighting for what's right. And that's what we what we don't talk about when it comes to these political leaders that we admire so much, the life they they miss out on, That, could have been. But they chose sacrifice and they chose a calling that ultimately didn't allow for those realities to happen. so she's thinking about motherhood and she's thinking about surviving, And even though she's like, Yeah, I'm not trying to bring no no kin, no black child into this world, like, look at the shit I just went through. Look at the shit I'm going through right now. it's like flipping it to another side of this is the possibility of life, outside of all that, the possibility of the other side of the coin of that is love and the other side of the coin of that is the possibility of a new life, despite the fears, despite all the stuff that's going on. Even right now, what she's dealing with, she is facing at the point before she gets convicted, she's facing life. how do you conceive motherhood, and and have hope in that? And she did. So yeah, she gets pregnant. And she ultimately gives birth to her daughter in nineteen seventy four. Her daughter's name is Kakuya Shakur. Keep in mind she had that baby in prison. Having children is already ho is already hard. Having children on the outside is hard. Giving birth is hard at a hospital. Giving birth? First of all, being pregnant in prison and then giving birth in prison. Listen, it takes a certain type of person. and unfortunately, like a woman, black women have that experience of reality. Whether they were birthed from mothers who had them in prison or they were the mother themselves giving birth and It's a long history that, So yeah, So of course while she was pregnant, inadequate medica medical care, poor nutrition, resistance from, the prison officials, with trying to get better treatment. Like they just they just was making everything difficult. Like they just making life insufferable. And this is not because she's in prison, this is ultimately because she's black. Period. Period. Period. to the point that when she gave birth, they tried to basically control the whole process. imagine you are well, I ain't never gave birth, but I can imagine you are giving birth and you have the nurses and the doctor that's your doula, or your whatever coaching you, guiding you. on what to do and they're facilitating the space so you can have a healthy, safe birth. Imagine prison authorities doing it while you're trying to give birth in a prison. I mean, and then they try to restrict access to like her doctor and he was trying to separate her from her newborn. after delivery, 'cause and they could have gave her some more time but no. But of course she couldn't keep the baby in prison, so yeah. So yeah. That's what she goes through. She is transferred to a whole bunch of correctional facilities, So let's get to the best part of this entire story. Let's get to the best part of her journey. And then the best part is to escape. Not because it was fun, but because I love when the people escape. I just do. I do. I love a good runaway story. 'Cause I mean prison basically slavery, honey. institutionalized slavery. So I love a good runaway story. I love that. I eat it up every time. So yeah. In nineteen seventy nine, what they will call the family, which were a group of members from the Black Liberation Army, began to plan Shakur's escape from prison. these people came to the visitors area, which I'm like, what kind of security y'all had? Fa s for y'all that had hated this woman so much and wanted her locked up so bad. Y'all didn't think to like have better security in the visitors area. But anyways, they go into the visit area 'cause at this point she's in Clinton correctional facilities. So She at first in 1977 through 78 is at Rikers. Then she is transferred to Alderson Federal Prison Camp in West Virginia. Then a year after that, she's transferred to Clinton correctional facility for women in New Jersey. she was transferred to that facility earlier in that year. Literally in November, fall of that year, she escaped. How did I do it? So the family, they took the correctional officers hostage, they took their weapons, they escorted her out to prison without killing anybody. Very clean operation. We love that. We love that, okay? But a couple guards was like injured, of course. I mean, yeah. But nobody was killed, right? She escapes. Like and in the book I wanna tell y'all, she don't of course talk about how she escaped because you you're gonna implicate. they never gonna be done with you. So you you describing how you got away in the book just that wouldn't make sense. and so All we know or all all I was able to find out is they basically walked in their guns. the people who helped her, one of them was her brother, so Mtulu, so Tupac Stab Daddy. I think it was another black man who was a part of the movement and three white people. And that's how you gotta do it. The whites have to risk their lives. If you wanna be an ally, truly if you really want to stand for black people, you wanna be at the cook out, you gotta risk your life. Your life is online. That's the only way. That's the only that's the only price that's suitable in my opinion. So and that's what the white people did. So shout out to 'Cause that's what they were supposed to do anyway. But yeah. That's basically what we know. They walked in there with their guns. they used fake IDs they held the, guards who were overseeing like the visitation hostage, took their weapons and walked out. Walked out, got into a van and drove off. I also want to note that the group, Maine, the May 19th Communist Organization, played a huge part in her escape as well. this is also heavily woman led very communist, very Marxist, very much we bad about it, okay. and what I wanna know about this group is again when Asada is speaking about coalition building and at the time, she's having these like engagements with these other races, these other cultural struggles, political struggles with other communities, other races and for me that was important because she was able to understand the the the usefulness of of of coalition being a key tool to true liberation. It gets to a point where it's beyond it's beyond organizing simply just based off race, race is a huge part of it, It's not the whole And so for me, I'm going to use, these other organizations who are just anti government as as me, whether because, they're communists, whether they are anti capitalist, whether they are fighting against colonialism, whatever. Like it's a it's a global struggle. And these are the people that help her get out. So I always question like, okay, when she escaped, what happened? Like what she escaped and then she just got on a boat to Cuba? No. after she escaped, Asada spent many years in between safe houses. So Again, the stakes are higher now. You escape and avoid imprisonment. I mean they really gonna kill you now, girl. Like that's just what it is. Like they really own you now. And so you have no choice but to figure out a way to get out of the country 'cause there's no going back. There's no you can't stay here, if you wanna live you have to get out of America. That's where we at. And so she's moving through different safe houses and networks, trying to avoid being captured, but she also has this system of people who are providing housing, travel, money, medical care, security, support. Like it so this village comes up again, The same village that raised her, That contributed to her upbringing, her background, that foundation that led to who she is at this point. you have this other village, right, who was helping in the transition to this next phase in her life, To this next part of her journey. And I thought that was very interesting. and also keep in mind, of course, when this time, she's not seeing her family. she's separated from from her daughter. that's also hard too. while also plotting and knowing that she has to leave this country soon. And then lastly, we're gonna get into, this political asylum in Cuba. So she gets political asylum in Cuba after being underground for years in nineteen eighty four. So five years of her just being a ghost and navigating that. Imagine. Could you do that? could you trust the people around you enough to do that successfully? I need you to understand how tactical this woman was. In fact, I mean, she was b she's she's She is somebody that America probably would've wanna have you. Want America probably wanted to have you because she's that good. This black girl from Queens. Dodging y'all for years. Gets gets convicted, imprisoned. And y'all do y'all y'all do y'all whatever one too that y'all do. Okay. Oppress. Okay. And then she escapes. Because y'all so dumb. And you know, y'all thought this was over. She escapes right under your nose. She disarms your own officers or the people that she that plan her escape, they disarm. How is it how is it that easy for them to to disarm police officers in a correctional facility? Mm. You can be racist, you could be white supremacist. you can be oppressive, but that don't mean you're smart. That don't mean you're bright. That's insane to me. but I'm glad it worked out that way. so yeah, in nineteen eighty four she gets political asylum. Fidel Castro, grants that to her and his argument is that she's a victim of political persecution, racial injustice and the repression of The United States, which I know the US was like, I know you lying. America was pissed, teed. 'Cause at this point, now America's in a frenzy trying to catch this lady. They can't catch for five years. That's on the run, that escaped prison. So because of the political asylum she was granted, she was able to live in Cuba freely. she was able to continue her education and at some point she was reconnected with her daughter. And then she was able to write her infamous autobiography, Asada. And while all this is happening, the US is making so many attempts to get her sent back to the country. Serve her time. And honestly, they way past serving time. how dare this black woman escape? She not supposed to do that. How she how was she able do that? 'Cause also we underestimate the power, the will, the resistance, the intellect the brilliance of black people when we organize the right way and we take calculated risk. That's why they have to keep us dumb. That's why they have to keep us uneducated, 'cause then we're gonna start moving like a sodder. They don't want that. So at this point the US is making so many attempts to get her extradited from Cuba. they have demanded from Cuba that she be sent back. saying she's a convicted murderer murderer, she's a fugitive, the fact that the US is an enemy of Cuba just makes it more sweeter, which I think contributed to them not giving her back as well. And lastly what I would say about America's relation to this is in twenty thirteen Asada is added to the FBI's most wanted terrorist list, which makes her the first woman ever placed on the list a black woman. I think that Asada's life ending in Cuba is not only I would say incredible, but also understand that freedom can feel lonely. the times that she couldn't be with her family, the times before she re reconnected with her daughter, yeah, she did it, but it's lonely, it's isolating, And it just makes me think about this fight for freedom can be very isolating and lonely, which is even more reason why we have to be together. we have to be in unity because it's so easy, while you're doing this work, whether you're trying to escape the American prison system or you're just trying to fight the good fight in your local community, there's this sense of isolation, loneliness that can come about. and I think that to combat that, it is more that coalition, it's more of that collective that Asada is talking about, and checking on your leaders and, checking on the activists and the people who are doing the hands on boots on the ground work and what do they need, 'Cause like what they do we benefit from and so how are we pouring back into them and for me Asada's story is a glimpse of what that looks like,

Ashley Brianna: So many things that we can say more. I mean, we can unpack this all day long, not just about Asada, but just this whole idea around what it means to be a revolutionary in this country. and so I want to transition into our last segment, which is what it is. I had this plan to talk about Tiana Taylor's role in one battle after another and the discussion and discourse that people are having, trying to compare her character to us to Asada in some way, which I would just say this I think is very dense and a very flat observation of that particular character. In that movie, I also just wanna say I love Tiana Taylor. I think she's incredible as an artist, as a creative director. And then just physically, she just looks amazing. However, the performance in that movie just was very set par to me now because I think that she's a bad actress. because I've seen her do really good acting. Like in the movie one thousand and one, she did incredible. But in this movie particularly, I feel like it was more about the role a character written for her or in or in fact I don't think the character was written for her. and obviously understanding the background context of the movie and what it was inspired from, that would make sense. But I just think it was just like really poorly done. So with me originally wanting to talk about that movie, what felt better for me, was focusing more so on what's happening around The murder that violence and miseducation of black bodies, specifically our black children. And so I can go on and on, you know, and unpack the movie one better after after another. I can unpack why I didn't particularly care for Tiana's character, what I found wrong with the movie, what I found wrong with her character and the other characters, you know, what things I felt were right, what what things I felt were productive. However, I felt in my heart in my spirit that it was more important for me to focus on in this last bit of the pod, this idea of what is the state of the black body today in America, So we talked about what that looks like for Asada, meaning a black body in her case is not to only not to be protected, but also is not deserving. Of self-defense and is not deserving of having to pick up arms or choose arms and whatever that looks like to protect themselves or ourselves. And I see a direct correlation to today. I don't think any of that has changed much. I think that the way we narrate and talk about these things may have shifted. Not that I feel like the consciousness of this country has elevated, but I do feel like because of the access to the internet, access to just overall more information, we can begin to understand in a bit more complex way. But what is essentially s still the at the core of all these incidents is when we're talking about black people getting murdered or killed, whether it's by the police, whether it's by you know, white people, whether it's by non black and non white people, I want to focus on what the state of the black body is today. And for me, it's no different than the time when Asada had to defend herself, had to be on trial, and then ultimately escaped and exiled to Cuba. The same systems, the same environment, the same spirit that existed then, I would say. In the sixties and the seventies, eighty-ish still exists today in twenty twenty-six. In twenty twenty-six black bodies are still not deserving of protection, of self-defense, or the defense of anyone else, not deserving of a fair trial, not deserving of a thorough investigation into our deaths, into our murders. Nothing has changed. And so I reflect on that as we wrap up this lesson as what it is. And what it is is that black bodies are not in any shape, form, or fashion allowed to exist freely and also exist in a way that allows us to claim ownership of our existence, meaning we get to protect ourselves and we get to choose. and manage what it looks like to live, what it looks like to feel safe, what it looks like to be at peace, what it looks like to have agency over our bodies and over our lives and more importantly, over our destiny. so that was very important for me. And before I get into some examples of the black body not only being an immediate threat just by existing, but also not deserving of defending themselves, I want to talk about what makes a terrorist versus what's what makes a revolutionary. What is the definition? The definition of a terrorist according to the institutions that be, a terrorist is an individual who uses or threatens violence, intimidation, and destruction to intentionally create a climate of fear. These premeditated acts are typically designed to coerce governments, influence civilian populations, or disrupt societies in pursuit of political, religious, or ideological goals. Now Keep in mind when we're talking about Asada, she is even to this day, even in her transition, she is still on the top ten FBI most wanted terrorist list. Okay? Asada Shakur then and now is still considered a terrorist to the American government, However, if the Definition of a terrorist is someone or a group of people who uses some force, some type of tool of violence, some type of termination, you know, threatening to be destructive. And also keep in mind this is premeditated. If she is a terrorist, then that will also make one the January sixth protesters, quote unquote, terrorists. according to the FBI, United States Federal Bureau of Investigation defines terrorism as the unlawful use of force of violence against persons, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So the same definition I just read earlier, they have the same definition, however, this idea of unlawful use. In the determination of what is unlawful and lawful is not based on morals, it's not based on conscience, it's not based on good values. They're based on whoever is controlling the machine, whoever either is controlling the machine or whoever was controlling the illusion, right? Whoever is in charge of the veil that is cast it upon society, Whether that's the president, whether that's some other political leader. whether that's a religious leader, right? 'Cause keep in mind there are countries that are highly influenced and led by the religion they practice, An example of that is, the Roman Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Church or the Vatican, yes, is a religious institution and power, but is also a political power and has been for a very long time. And so what makes a terrorist is not really based off this diplomatic universal idea of who's good and who's bad. It's based on who decides and picks and chooses what is considered an enemy of the state. Or a hero of the state. their actions could be the same, Their levels and and and behaviors of what they could what we consider threats of violence, intimidation, and destruction could all be the same. The only deciding factor is whoever is controlling the machine, what that idea or the system's idea of what it means to be an enemy. And in this case. When we're talking about Asada Shakur, when we're talking about any black person in this country. Is automatically by baseline considered a threat, an enemy. So whether we are throwing bombs or throwing flowers, you're a terrorist. However, these fools who broke into the Capitol on January 6, 2021, are considered heroes. In fact, after their trials, after you know they are prosecuted, all but 14 of them. are exonerated by, of course, their ringleader, the fourteen that weren't exonerated, their charges were converted to time serve, which meant they were released immediately. is that the treatment that you give a terrorist? Because if we if we could remember, these people were trying to impede on an election. these terrorists not only breach police lines, forced Congress to evacuate, and then delayed the counting of electoral college votes. People died. Over hundreds of police officers were injured. But Asada, there was one cop that was killed. That she didn't even kill. Compared to multiple deaths in a hundred and what forty police officers were found injured From the chaos of January sixth. However, all of those people Or exonerated or released from jail. When the Civil War ended. the South seceded from the country Which is one of the reasons the Union, the Confederacy were fighting. we know that the Confederate States seceded from the country because they wanted wanted to maintain ownership of slaves. They wanted to maintain ownership of black people. And so they seceded from the country, which makes them a what traitor? with the Confederate States who Positioning of removing themselves or divesting from the country, they were committing an act of treason. They are traitors to the United States. What are you supposed to do to traitors and and people who commit treason? I mean, these are the immigrants and descendants of Rome, of of Portugal, of Spain, of Ireland, of Scotland, people that never played about treason. England never played about treason. If that's one thing I learned when it comes to when it came to the English government, the Royal Kingdom never played. about treason ever. It always gave guillotine. It always gave guillotine. It never gave we're gonna they it never even gave proper trial. It gave immediate death. so this idea that that they didn't understand that that was the protocol is crazy. No, they chose to not serve them with that fate. Cause that's how it should've went. They chose not to do that because ultimately we already should know the union didn't grow a conscience. They didn't say, you know what, slavery is morally wrong and that's why we're against it. The North, the Union, wanted control economically Keep in mind all the states weren't formed just yet. So whatever existed as America at the time, they wanted control. They wanted the South and the North to unionize and and be one major power. So that means also having one major power over the economic status, the economic activities of what was happening in America, It was never about, we feel like they shouldn't be doing that to people. It never gave that. So for me, we have to understand again what we consider unlawful, what we consider a terrorist or act of terrorism, what we consider treason, what we consider or who we consider traitor is a construct. They're not inherently bet embedded into our society because they're constantly being constructed and reconstructed depending on who is in power and depending on if this is something that's really a threat to the status quo, which is the status quo in this country is whiteness. The status quo in this country is white supremacy. So if it is a threat to that, it is automatically deemed as an act of terrorism, act of treason. If it is an alignment or good for the trajectory to continue to maintain white supremacy, then it can easily be reframed and narrated in a different way where the person where the act is considered heroism, i.e., them crazy people who stormed the Capitol are considered heroes in this country to the powers that be. You and I may not agree. But that doesn't matter. What matters is how the country sees these people. And the country does not see black people or give black people the same grace, does not give black people the same leeway, the gap of being able to get that close to committing any type of act of such behavior. Cause I guarantee if those protesters were black, if those protesters were of Hispanic origin. If those protesters were immigrants, they would have been shot dead in the lawn. They wouldn't have made it inside the building. I guarantee that. I put I put every dollar I own on that. So Going back to the Civil War, it's like why didn't why wasn't the Confederate leaders, the Confederacy, anybody who played a part in seceding from the Union, anybody who played a part in committing treason against this country ultimately should have been put to death. There's a couple things, right? One, again, we know that it wasn't that the Union of the North believed that slavery was inherently morally bad. What they believe is that slavery was a very important question that needed to be answered and that needed to be solved fast because one, it it was having a a tremendous economic impact on the north. So while the South is really based on agriculture, and that's where they're getting majority of their money from, how the South, the antebellum south, is being financed is through slave labor and and the products that come from that labor. While in the north it's becoming very industrialized. So you have this industrial revolution that is that is blossoming, that's that's growing. But there's nothing to industrialize. if you don't have any materials or products, i.e. crops, produce, cotton, sugar, Tobacco was a main crop. if they're not receiving those goods to industrialize, then there's no use for the machines if they have no material, Also keep in mind the slave labor is free labor, which means they're not paying these southern plantation owners, these slave owners, they're not paying a a check. Okay, there is no pay stub, there is no W two. Okay, so they don't have to they don't have to worry about payroll. Major. You don't have to pay for your labor. That's a one up compared to, you know, granted, the workers or the workforce during an industrial revolution or or when that was, you know, brewing. It wasn't like they were getting buku money. It wasn't equal fair pay, a lot of free blacks and a lot of in poor whites were working in these factories, were doing the labor, But something still had to be paid. One thing about white people, I mean, yes, there were white indenture servers, but I'm not even gonna get into that right now. One thing about white people, they never played about their money. they never played about getting paid. That's why you have labor unions. Okay, labor unions that are often that often begin from these industrial labor forces. So you have the South who have free labor, and then the North who have these, you know, industrial systems to to fuel the economy, however, if you don't have no product, right, from the south, and you are automatically having a higher balance sheet because you haven't you haven't to pay somebody. You had to pay for the building machines, you gotta pay for the for the people to operate the machines, you gotta pay the people who's managing the people. compared to a slave system where only person who's getting paid is the owner. Maybe, if they have white, what's it called? Maybe though the slave catchers, were getting a little cut. The overseers were were probably getting a little cut. But outside of that, no payroll. So imagine a company today making all this income. I mean, booming. Economy is booming, And they're reaping all the benefits of that. And they don't have to pay for any of their labor. these folks were basically let scot free. These folks were not punished, in fact. a lot of the slave owners were given basically some form of reparations because they lost their slaves. It was basically some form of insurance to say, Okay, hey, sorry you lost the war. I know you lost your slaves, here's a check to make up for that. Because again, slaves were considered property. So it's basically like they lost property in as a casualty of war. And that's how it was seen. And so to make up for that, they received a check for losing their property, i.e., slaves. And then asked me what check did black people get for even being subjected to the American child of slavery. I don't I think that check is still I think it got lost in the mail. so yeah, all that is ironic. So yeah, this this whole idea of who's considered A enemy of this country, enemy of the state, is not inherently tied to consciousness, to morality, to values, is directly tied to white supremacy and who is controlling the systems and the strings in this society. it's hard to talk about some of these cases that I wanna bring up. I'm not gonna dive too deeply into all the details, but I want to want to make people aware of what's going on. if you haven't been keeping up with mainstream media and news, but also if you weren't aware of the almost Identical or just very heavily similar tragic incidences that have claimed the lives of black people, specifically black children. And so for me, what first comes up is Nolan, Nolan Wales. Again, what is the state of the black body in this country, And so with Nolan, you know, I'm I'm I've been y'all, I've been staying up to date. I have been really following this case. It kind of brings me back to how I felt when Trayvon Martin was murdered. I remember being I think a junior or senior in high school. And keep in mind I was very I was a well aware of what it meant to be black in America, but I had never firsthand directly experienced racism in a way that was kinda how it is depicted, like it's this extreme overt like behavior and and slurs. I never experienced that. I didn't know what a microaggression was. So In my mind, I'm like, you know, not that this I didn't think that it was racism was over. Of course not. I was smart enough at that age, but some of the direct violence, being so open, I thought we were past that. And I was really and sadly, I was sadly mistaken. And so I remember when the when the verdict came out, with Trayvon Martin and George Lemonman being found not guilty and just being just an extreme shock. Cause at the time I wasn't Like just hearing the phone call, the nine one one call and hearing Trayvon in the back just like Screaming, you know, and hing the hearing the gunshots, that was traumatic for me enough. I cried for so many days, Because in my mind, well not even my mind, Trayvon and I were around the same age. And so I'm like, you know, what does that mean for for me as a back teenager? But also like over Skittles and a hoodie, like that for me as a as a youth completely just like I won't even say crack open it just exploded like everything inside of me that I thought I knew about how I was supposed to walk and navigate this world. And so when I think about Nolan I think about Trayvon, It's very important to understand that at the end of the day, I don't think that there ever would be a time where black people in this justice system will be truly seen as human in in the legal system, the political system following suit. I don't I'm very pessimistic about this country. It's been so many things that's happened at the at the expense of our bodies and and so unfortunately I don't have a lot of hope. I don't have a lot of hope around Black people getting justice in any form. Does it happen? Yeah. not enough, not often as it should. And so with Nolan, as I'm staying updated to what's going on with him, you know, if you don't know or if you're not hip to the details or hip to just like the core of what would happen. Nolan Wells was an eighteen year old student, an athlete from Ocean Springs, Mississippi. He had a mysterious quote unquote death that occurred on July sixth of this year. Nolan was a recent graduate of Ocean Springs High School. He also played football, considered a standout, and he was preparing to attend Southwest Mississippi Community College on a sports scholarship. Now Nolan isn't the only case I'm gonna bring up, but with Nolan, what stands out to me, is one, we need to find out what's going on with the autopsy officially, I don't believe in buying to this drowning story, however, because people are saying it could have been an accidental death. It doesn't mean that there was foul play, it doesn't mean it was suicide either, it could have just been an accidental death. My issue with that is Even if it was an accidental death, where was everyone? Why was everyone so comfortable with leaving this black boy? Whoever was with him or around him when he accidentally drowned, why did it take so long for them to say or provide the information with the fact that he had drowned or that he had gone missing or whatever the case may be? That is strange to me. Also, all this silence, all this lowering up, like granted, yeah, I get it. Like, You just want to have a lawyer in in general. I could very well see somebody, okay, my child is involved potentially in something, whether they were innocent or not, I need to get a lawyer. However, I also believe that if my child was in a space, in a situation where a friend of theirs or just a student or anyone died or went missing or whatever and they had nothing to do with it, my code is to be honest and to tell the truth and you tell them everything you know. Yes, we're gonna lower it up, but you're gonna tell the truth because you had nothing to do with it. And it and wouldn't take that long for us to get to that point. And so I'm just very skeptical of that. I'm also very skeptical of black children being in spaces with white children and they're the only black person, or it's very few of them. As a black person, not everybody unfortunately has this conversation with their children, but every black person should be having a conversation about what it means to live this life in black in America. I don't care if you feel like race don't matter, which is very un unfortunately as a black person, irresponsible to not be aware and knowledgeable, at least on this on a basic level, of race relations and how that plays into our lives and how that impacts how we live and exist and to just act like everything is just colorblind and I don't care about race. this is unfortunately how we sometimes end up here when we don't take those things seriously, when we don't have those conversations with our children, I'm not gonna tell you that your children shouldn't have white friends. What I will say is that if you know that your child often, frequently is among majority white spaces, whether that's in school, extracurriculars, the neighborhood they're in, their friend group, the the church, whatever, if you are aware of that, if you are aware of of your environments. in the environments you have your children in, you need to be having those conversations. I mean, you need to be having those conversations regardless, but we have to be for real here. We have to be for real. We can sit here pretend like those things don't matter and we don't have to be as vigilant and we don't have to yes you do. Yes you do. It could be the nicest white person in the world. I don't care. I don't care. Because history tells us that we have not been safe. We have not been safe around white people, especially in the majority. That is just a fact. And so I'm not blaming Nolan's parents. I'm not blaming any parents, I don't know what conversations they may have had with that man, that young man or that boy. I this is that's not what this is about. This is more so education around, we need to get serious. We should have been serious, but we gotta get serious about protecting our kids. And it don't always just mean against the police. It could be against their own classmates. I. e. a Carmelo Anthony. Free Carmelo Anthony. Straight up. Because for me, you can't tell me that that boy didn't fear for his life. What does it mean for a black boy to fear for his life? What does that look like? Why is that not good enough for him to feel like he needs to defend himself? Or is it that black boys are not allowed to have fear, are not allowed to protect themselves or others in their community? They're only allowed to be used as tools, and in in characters and in machines for your benefit, whether that's what for sports, corporate, the army, the the prison industrial system. black men and black boys are not allowed to have agency. So they're damn sure, they're damn sure not allowed to protect themselves even against a threat that historically has been a threat for quite some time. Black children in these schools have not been safe. And then when you consider some of the communities and neighborhoods that these schools exist in, Because we talk about, The we talk about the schools in the cities and the public schools and how they're, ran down and not properly funded and the teachers and you know, all those things are true. We also don't talk about the the horrors of black children who attend these predominantly white schools or who are who are always in these predominantly white spaces, the dangers and horrors that come with that. These schools be treacherous. The things that these kids experience at school, just because they don't come home and tell you about it, don't mean it's not it's not happening. You gotta understand. I went to a predominantly white institution, a PWR, James Madison University, named after a slaveholder. James Madison owned about what, over a hundred slaves? Let me fact check that real quick. That's that's James Madison owned how many slaves? James Madison owned yeah. Yeah. Jamie was having a ball, in in the eighteen hundreds. James Madison owned roughly from a hundred to over one hundred and thirty enslaved people at his Montpelier plantation in Virginia. Even in in his death on his even on his deathbed, he had at least thirty six slaves. None of them who were ever freed. So that's the school I went to. That the school I went to was inspired by that man, The entire five years I was there 'cause I was a super senior. That's my business though. I could say that I was terrorized all five years. No exaggeration. If you know, you know. The people who were around me at that time understand and they know exactly what I'm talking about. And they can validate every story that I have. But along with their own stories. Cause it wasn't just me. The the outside of the direct physical violence, 'cause yes, I experienced that. What was scarier honestly was the language they used to talk about black students, the mindset, the microaggressions, j the just very weird, sinister behaviors that really screamed, We don't like you, we hate you actually, and what are you doing on our campus? I was going to that school when Donald Trump became president for the first time. The morning after he was elected, I would never forget. I would never forget the feeling of being on that campus. And I was feeling a sense of fear, not in not in my god, I'm scared for my life, but more so a fear of this is going to unlock and unleash even more the sentiments and spirit of what's already existing on this campus. Him become president just makes it more normal again. is like make America racist again. I mean it never stops but make it in your face racism. And so I was going to class with kids or young adults who I could s I could have sworn are the great grandchildren or great great grandchildren of Confederate leaders and soldiers, Cause it's not that far out actually. So the grandchildren and the great grandchildren of Jim Crow. These are the descendants of the people who were looking to hurt and cause violence against my people. I'm going to school with them. And that spirit did not die. It went it it still lingers and carries on carries on through their lineage, through their children, their grandchildren, their great grandchildren. It still is there. You can create a sense of fear in someone and and make them feel like they are in fear of their life or danger or they are in danger just simply by behavior, just simply by creating a culture of fear. going back to Carmelo Anthony, you take into consideration Austin Metcalf's history of bullying and racist behavior along with his brother. I am not convinced that that boy just pulled out a knife and just stabbed that other boy just because you're not gonna tell me that. It is my belief that he feared for his life and he absolutely felt like if I don't pull this knife out, if I don't protect myself, something is gonna happen to me. i.e. a Nolan Wells. They speak back to each other. Their stories are just mirrors in different ways. And so it's like, damn if you do, damn if you don't. If you're vigilant and protective, you either dead or you either either get killed or you end up going to jail. If you are not vigilant and not protective of yourself and not keeping your head on the swivel, you end up dead. It's a lose lose, it feels like in this country. I think about those two young black boys. I think about the fact that, you have this other case, cause this is not just about white people and it's not just about the police It's layers to this, it's complex, When we think about this other young man who was killed. Cyrus Belton, a fourteen year old black teenager from Columbia, South Carolina, who was shot and killed in 2023 by a convenience store owner. This convenience store owner was Asian American, last month this year, the trial for that murder resulted in that store owner being acquitted. What is so crazy about that, the crazy part about that is the apparent reason for Cyrus getting shot in the first place was his assumption that he was stealing water bottles from the gas station. He was accused of stealing water bottles from a gas station. That prompted him being shot down. Which w what is crazier is the footage from the surveillance showing that he didn't steal the four water bottles. He actually picked up and put back. So for me I don't care if he stole the water bottles. That doesn't justify him being shot in the back, Ps small petty theft. Does not equal death. Let's say it again. Death should not equal death. Theft should not equal death, He never stole the water bottles. So he also just got killed for no reason. And so they're saying that even though even though he didn't steal the water bottles, he just still deserved to die because the store owner and the son apparently chased Cyrus 130 yards before shooting him in the back. The issue with that is, let's see, the store owner Rick Chow. That man is about in his fifties or sixties. 130 yards is a very long stretch. For a man of that age, unless he's like some bodybuilder, like super fit, 50, 60 year old. ain't no 50-60 year old running 130 yards and keeping up with a 14 year old boy. It is my belief that him and his son was chasing Cyrus, but the son was the one who caught up to Cyrus because he was younger. He was like in his 20s. And shot Cyrus. And I think that the father is covering up for him because he's older. And so he's probably thinking about, well, you have more life to live. So I'll take I'll take the, you know, fall for it. Also understand that maybe he thinking that he could get off because he is old and you can play that card of this elderly man who was just trying to protect him and his son in his store from a thief. So I could see how They played, they can play that kind of profile. Ultimately it worked out though because he got acquitted, unfortunately. And yeah, but I think that shooting someone over water bottles is crazy, but also black people having killed for Skittles, for cigarettes, for broken taillight, for license plates. for registration, for going to church, for being in our homes, for being in a park. It don't matter. It don't matter the scenario, it don't matter the the props and the and whatever's going on. It could we could be the perfect victim or we can be a complicated victim. Regardless. It's our fault. Regardless, we are not deserving of justice. Regardless, we are not owed the human right of life and liberty. And also, I want to go back to what I was saying about it's not just about actual white people, It's not actually just about police brutality, This is this is a system. This is white supremacy. This store owner that killed Cyrus was an Asian man. But understand that. White supremacy teaches all races, whatever it wants to teach it. So in America, white supremacy says blackness is bad and wrong. And not only should you steer far away from it, you should be striving towards whiteness. Understanding whiteness is a social construct. It's not really about white skin. Because we all know that race is a construct, So whiteness. even though created and and and mandated and implemented into society by white men in the 17th century, keep in mind, rich land owning white men, to achieve whiteness, to be operating under whiteness, is more so about what the status quo is and what's considered normal. than actual race, think about it like this. White supremacy is like a cancer, Whiteness is the tumor that holds the cancer. And racism, capitalism, xenophobia, all those things are the symptoms of the cancer. Does that make sense? that makes sense. It makes sense to me. So white supremacy is the cancer. Whiteness is the way that it metabolizes in the in the body. So the body is the society or the people. And then the symptoms that you feel from that is racism, sexism, xenophobia, capitalism, anyism you can insert. So that's how I think about it. And also understand that whiteness can be borrowed, So a person of color, we're gonna say a person of color, even though I absolutely hate that phrase, but I'm gonna try to meet y'all in the middle. A person of color or any person who's not white, considered white, considered European, of European descendants, has the opportunity to borrow whiteness to r it's like renting it out. You can rent whiteness out, but you can never fully own whiteness. Meaning you can never have the lease. You can never own it. can never fully achieve whiteness. It's a moving goalpost. So understand that white supremacy, give other races and cultures the permission to commit violence and oppression against black bodies. That's what it is. So it doesn't have to be a white person doing it. It doesn't have to be the state of the police doing it. You know, it could be a George Zimmerman, who I believe was like Hispanic American or mixed with something, but he ain't fully white. It could be a Rick Chow it could be a whoever, At the end of the day, it's about anti blackness, it's about black people were never supposed to be free. Black people were never supposed to own anything. Black people were not supposed to be educated. We were not supposed to, exist in the future. And if we were supposed to exist in the future, it was only to be property. And America still struggles with what to do with black people. And unfortunately, our children keep paying the consequences of that. And I'm quite frankly tired of it. But also, we have to start being more motivated by the love for each other than our hate for the act, for the crime, for the person. Hear me out. What I'm saying is. Yes, be upset, be angry, do all the things. But what I have found or have seen is that us as black people, We tend to be emotional doers, So what I see is a incident happens, a traumatic incident happens, a black person dies, We get upset, we get angry, we rally, we protest, we boycott this and we do that, and we create the hashtags and the t shirts and the AI videos that come to life and all this stuff. And then as time passes and goes on, we go back to business as usual. Which is white supremacy, which is capitalism. We go back to paying bills, we go back to going to work and clocking in, we go back to fueling this economy, we go back to fueling this very corrupt political system, we go back to fueling a society that is just gonna allow what has been done to us to keep happening over and over and over and over again. And so for me. I feel like we need to be more motivated by the love for each other than the emotions and hate that we feel when a tragedy strikes. Because it's not sustainable to just be to be motivated through emotion, When when the the news press goes away, When the the hashtags die, when the the threads and and the Instagram posts are no longer circulating, when when the celebrities stop showing support. When the checks stop coming through, When the attention is gone, what are we doing? We're going back to business as per usual when we need to one be doing a whole lot of unlearning and relearning about everything. We need to be creating infrastructures, We need to be having conversations and shifting mindsets that again, what has happened to our children or just to us in general is not our fault. And we have to be more serious about what protection and safety looks like for our families and our communities. So we don't have another Nolan Wells. Cause guess what? I'm not saying obviously Nolan had black friends, but for me, I don't want my children around anybody who doesn't care about their livelihood or safety. And so we're raising children that understand that You don't need to be around anybody, black, white or whoever, who doesn't care about your well being, who will leave you dry, who will leave you on an island, who will be like, yeah, just come back on another boat and we don't care. We'll just see you later and you know, like it you we wouldn't have a Carmelo Anthony 'cause Carmelo should be at a black track meet. Again, I'm not saying Our black children can't compete and interact and engage with white children. What I'm saying is there should be more than enough options for them to consider, hmm, I actually I wanna play sports amongst my people, I wanna have more friendships and friends who look like me. I wanna go to a school where the kids look like me. There's nothing wrong with that. You know, they have and understand the importance of discernment when you're around people who don't share your culture, who don't share the same morals and consciousness that you share. That's just survival. So again, the gaps in between these tragedies, what the what we're doing in those time frames, in those spaces directly impact the next tragedy, whether that's preventing the next one or creating some sort of plan or system where if this does happen again, this is what we're gonna do as a people. We're not just gonna march, we're not just gonna protest, we need to divest. we need to hold these judicial systems accountable, hold the police accountable, hold these politicians accountable, and what does that look like? And I'm not talking about no letter, I'm not talking about calling a phone. when the black child is killed. And and and also it's being covered up or or the trial for this for this child is is not a fair trial. We need to be holding them accountable. And the tactics need to be strategic, but they need to have heavy power, heavy impact. Heavy strategy, heavy impact. We have to stop just being emotional and motivated only when something bad happens. We have to love each other so much that we want to protect each other and we need to be proactive all the time. I do not believe we can exist in this country. How we need to, if we are not constantly strategizing. And I know people can have conflict with that because it feels like I'm constantly strategizing on how to stay alive and exist in this country. And unfortunately, if you are aware to a certain extent, if you have certain knowledges of you, if you're just tapped in and in sync with this type of knowledge, you're gonna always feel like that. And that's why I believe people choose to be ignorant. People choose to not care. People choose to just push certain things to the side and be like, I'm colorblind and this don't matter no more. And I don't want to be concerned with that. And we're beyond those days because to face the truth is painful. It's it's hurtful. It's it's it it's scary. And then also it could require you, or ask of you to step in and not to save or to play superhero, but to to to find yourself accountable to the cause, You can't hear these stories. you can't be understanding and knowing and exploring the history without at some point being convicted of like, like, what's my role in the liberation of my people? That is why they don't want us to be educated. That is why they don't want us to read. because when you get knowledge, you already are starting the radical and revolutionary process. We just saw that. We saw that with a soda story. The more she educated herself, the more she immersed herself in the knowledge, the more that she sought the truth. She began to radicalize with I I believe involuntarily until it became voluntarily. So that is what they're trying to prevent. This is why information and history and knowledge and data is important because that same information and data and history ends up radicalizing people to actually, I don't know, do something about their oppression. And they don't want that. My child will be in martial arts. My child, when it's an appropriate age, will learn about weapons. We'll learn about self-defense mechanism. Will learn about survival tactics. And that's just what it is because I am not ignorant to the fact that my child can be considered a bounty. in this country can be s considered a terrorist, can be considered a threat, an enemy, at any given point in time. And I need them to have the tools. Even outside this country, I want them to feel safe, be able to protect themselves, mentally, physically, spiritually. And so again, it's important that we equip our children, the most vulnerable in our community, with not only the physical tactics, of self-defense, but the mental too. Cause one thing about martial arts, which makes it a very impactful fighting form or defense form, is is really about the mind. And then the the body falling into that and flowing into that, It's not just about hitting somebody hard or you know, defeating somebody physically. It's about the mind and How you are able to direct and control your mind in connection to your body. And so I believe firmly that all of our children need to be taught that because it ain't no joke. And this country will kill them. Or they will allow others to kill them without blinking an eye. and we'll sit back and allow it to happen over and over and over again. And so us waiting for justice from the from the legal system, the judicial system, from the police, I don't know when that day is coming. So in the meantime, we need to be proactive. All right, beautiful people. That is a wrap. If you have made it this far, listen, I love you with all my heart and all my mind, all my soul. This podcast is a labor of love. Heavy on the labor. But still love. I'm excited for this journey. I'm excited to see what other things be what other things we explore and unpack together. I hope that you all enjoyed this podcast as much as I'm enjoying creating and developing it. Thank you for rocking with me this far for the first episode. We're gonna keep it pushing. I'm still growing. I'm still learning. We're still figuring out, you know, our flow, our cipher with this. But yeah, this is a journey. So hope you stick around and hope you learned something. I hope something excited you. I hope something interested you. I hope something made you mad. I hope something made you sad. I hope something empowered you. I hope something brought you closer. to understanding not only yourself, our people, but also what that looks like and how we can come to a space where we are utilizing this information to create impact and to create new narratives and to unleash and discover. more stories that I find important for the liberation of our minds first and then everything else after. So with that being said, Make sure y'all subscribe to this podcast. Save and subscribe so you're tapped into when the next pod will drop. make sure you sign up for the newsletter so you can not only know when the next podcast drops, but also I will be, dropping some additional gems, having a bit of study hall or office hours, and just carrying on and continuing the the learning. And all other great and beautiful things. I have brewing. So make sure you sign up for the newsletter. Make sure you share with your family, with your boo, with your homie, with your coworker, whoever. Like, I really want this to be a shared space where everybody can come in and be classmates and be peers and just learn and unpack these things together. that's it for class today. So remember, stay free, create good troll, and always do the knowledge. I'm gonna catch y'all in the next class. Bye y'all. Peace.