April 24, 2023 • 26 mins
Host Ramses Ja and Show Producer Maggie B. Knowin review some of the biggest news stories you may have missed over the weekend.
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Here at the Black Information Network, we know how important
it is for you to start your week off energized, engaged,
and enlightened. So we're looking back at the weekend to
bring you the biggest stories you may have missed. Stay
tuned for our weekend recap featuring bi in writer and
producer Maggie b. Knowing. This is the Black Information Network
Daily Podcast and I am your host, ramses Jah. All right, Maggie,
(00:29):
how you doing.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Good morning, Ramsy, I'm wonderful. How are you.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I'm good. How was your weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:34):
It was good.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
It was busy upgrading studio software and you know, just
getting into the nitty gritty of production.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Man, I know all about that, trust me. I know
you've been paying attention to the news.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Too, right, yes, absolutely?
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Oh so I know you had to hear about this
kind of gory, graphic story where and Georgia inmate who
was quote unquote eaten alive by bed bugs? Right?
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Yeah, I mean so just stop right there, eaten alive
by bed bugs. So this story it made news last week.
It is something that quickly, you know, picked up steam.
And at this point, now you know, the token lawyer
for our community, Ben Crump, has taken over the case
along with his team. But this gentleman, it was, uh,
(01:27):
the Sean Tom Thompson, who basically was in the Atlanta jail,
the Fulton County jail, and he you know, was left,
uh moved to a mental mental part of the jail
and basically neglected to the point where between the neglect
and the the squalor in the sense that he was
(01:48):
living in he was he was he was sickened, he
was poisoned, you know, basically infested by bedbugs. So I
was watching this story over the weekend too and saw
by Crump talking about it where he was saying that
it was really a human rights violation that this has
taken place, and literally bugs were coming out of the
(02:09):
orifices of this gentleman's body parts like eyes, ears, nose, mouth,
everything supposedly. And the fact that the autopsy didn't have
the first autopsy that the that the county did basically
it determined undetermined as the close, but had a note
that there was a severe bedbug infestation.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
I mean, when you look at.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
The pictures that have gone around with this story, it
is absolutely horrific and disgusting.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
That's what I was going to ask did you see
the picture? I saw that there were magic click but
I couldn't. I couldn't do it. It's not for me.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Like and when you think about too, just like the
issue with bail for example, right, so black people don't
often have the resources to make bail, so they all
sit in a jail cell until they reach their court date.
And sometimes that can continuating times. Could you imagine if
you actually didn't do something wrong and you were taken
to that jail and that was the room they brought
you to, Like, what what do you even do? And
(03:07):
you don't have any options to advocate? But you know,
he he, I guess you have to think too, you know,
was he trying to ask for help? And then they
put him in the mental you know, ward of of
the area of the hospital or the jail. And basically
Ben Crump referred to this as a human rights violation
and everybody should be outraged. But I'm just like, you know,
(03:30):
this really is a great example of a number of problems.
You know, I just mentioned the bail thing. This is
a black person as well, of course, so there's the
black you know, discrepancies as far as the prison industrial
complex goes, and then the prison industrial complex itself, so
you know there's people profiting from prisons, but they can't
even keep a basic you know, standard of hygiene in
(03:51):
the in the.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Space that's just already a cage.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
And then the mental health piece, so you know, if
he had mental issues and asking for help was moved
to the mental ward, and then this was the type
of environment for the mental health area. I mean, it
defies all logic, it defies science, it defies you know,
law as well. And when we're looking at this from
(04:16):
a more comprehensive, you know standpoint, when Ben Krump is
saying this is a human rights violation, I'm like, America
is a human rights violation. And if we look at
some of these reports which I have done over the
last year just kind of putting together shows for Civic
Cipher and BI in this this daily show, it's there's
a lot of studies from other countries that are looking
(04:40):
at the United States as like really really big hypocrites
and really looking at at things or it is a
human rights violation across the board, and this this case
just highlights it.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
It was it was disturbing.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Well, you know I think that when you mentioned that
you know, the cash bill system in this country really
needs an overhaul. That actually something we've talked about on
the show a couple of times, and it does kind
of this situation. Unfortunately, it came at you know, the
(05:14):
cost of a human life. But it does shine a
light on exactly how dire conditions can be when you
are in a jail. Not necessarily in a prison, but
in a jail. I'm not saying prisons are much better,
but it is possible for prisons to be bad enough
(05:36):
for people to lose their life in there before they've
had their day in court. People are not able to
fight their case from a position of strength. And as
you mentioned, you know it's a fiscal issue. You know,
I don't have enough money to get out of here,
so I'm just being held because I'm being accused of
a crime. Now, from what I understand, this was like
(05:59):
a simple a battery case or a simple assault case,
but basically a fight from what I'm gathering, which is
something that I mean, most everybody can say they've been
in a fight before. And you know it's a disagreement.
I say what happened, You say what happened? We had
a disagreement. It came to blows or fisticuffs and you know,
then it was broken up. We're still both alive, but
(06:21):
this individual ultimately end up losing his life in the jail.
Oh that's the part that it's like super tragic, but fortunately,
I mean, I guess if you want to call this
a silver lining, Colin Kaepernick is stepping in to make
sure that there is a more thorough secondary autopsy performed
on the body so as to determine conclusively whether or
(06:45):
not the jail conditions were a factor in this death.
And so this is kind of what we're standing by
for in terms of like results and outcomes.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Right, So that was interesting. So I didn't even know,
actually until reading this article that Colin Kaepernick has a
whole organization that is really you know, I knew that
he had an organization kind of fighting the social justice issues,
but I didn't realize that he has a whole element
of this organization that.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
Is actually specifically dedicated to.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Doing second autopsies for families. And this is something that
you know, we really should be raising awareness for across
our community as well as you know, just trying to
support however we can, because we see it on the news.
Every day all day, you know, Black people being harmed
and killed unfortunately in a rast array of circumstances, and
autopsies oftentimes are not going to especially when done by
(07:39):
the county or the people that you know perpetuated the crime.
The harm, you know, you just can't trust it. And
to have this, you know, in the community resource, I
think is is invaluable. But to know that that he
did step up to do that, that Ben Crump is
on the case, you know, hopefully it's something that we
will see some change. Already three members of the Fulton
(08:02):
County Jails leadership has resigned, so you know that in itself,
I think it is some kind of acknowledgment of wrongdoing.
So now we do have to, you know, have the
courts play out, the criminal process play out, and see
where accountability is held. But it is definitely sparking some
new conversations as far as the state of prisons and
and jails and who is in them and who is
(08:25):
in charge and who's making these decisions, because you know,
it just seems like there's a lot of gaps that
if we're having prisons and we're having jails, we do
absolutely need to address.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Black information network writer and producer Maggie B. Nollan is
here with us discussing weekends major stories. All right, and
I know you heard what Michelle Obama was talking about.
This is a big deal in your world. She said,
society glamorizes marriage and it's a lot more difficult that it.
(09:02):
Was she right or was she wrong?
Speaker 3 (09:04):
You know, I can't disagree. I am somebody who does
believe in marriage. You know, I'm a product of a marriage,
and in a racial marriage at that. They're going on
forty years this year. So my parents have shown me
what love is and continue to example what marriage is
(09:25):
and what it is made up of every single day.
And you know, it is absolutely not all glamour and glitz.
You know, I recall many times throughout my childhood where
it is. It's it's difficult, and it is dramatic, and
it is something that you know, you can't hide from
your children because I've obviously you know, I'm a witness
(09:47):
now to it, but it's something that you know, I
can see the patterns and where you know it works
for them. But what I can say as well is
that you know, we're in a totally different time than
we were my parents got married in the early eighties
and we're in twenty twenty three, and there's a lot
of there's a lot of variables that have created society
(10:10):
to take marriage in a less serious way, and also
just relationships in general, and even the common decency of
respect and communication and things like that. We have access
at our fingertips, you know, with apps and Tinder and
Bumble and all these things, and just the online itself,
you know, having access to everybody and to share information,
(10:33):
and that whole element I think has created somewhat glamour
and also difficulty for marriage. And with a glamour side.
Not many people know, but I previously have been an
event designer, a wedding planner, doing really high end weddings.
(10:54):
I guess was a five hundred person Indian wedding one
of our fancy hotels here in town. It was the weekend,
you know, they were riding in on elephants and they
probably spent half a million dollars on their wedding. And
this was a couple in their mid to late twenties.
That We did a lot of bridal shows as well,
and there was always like I was so shocked because
I would see children like what I would call children.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
They were like high schoolers.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
They were like nineteen twenty, like not even probably old
enough to drink, coming through engaged and you know, trying
to plan their weddings. And sometimes the dates would be
you know, one or two years out. Sometimes he'd be
like five years out. It's like, are you really getting married?
But I think that, you know, when it comes down
to it, Michelle's Obama's comments, I think are just the
real you know, she's telling what it is.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
She said.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
One of our notes was like if her and Obama
had been married for thirty years, So she said, if
I fell out with him for ten years and we
had twenty great years, I take those odds anytime. And
I think, you know, that's a testament to the value
and the benefits that come with marriage. It's having a partner,
it's having a care mate. But I think that, you know,
when we have the shows that like Sweet sixteen for example,
(11:59):
that was a mini wedding for girls, you know, so
that was a culture that you know, MTV helped create that,
then those same children are now you know, planning their
weddings and are seeing you know, different bells and whistles,
in Kim Kardashian's wedding and like it's the cool thing
to do, but they don't really understand what marriage is.
And as well, you know, marriage just transitions over time.
Like when you say so marriage today is probably not.
(12:23):
You know, women got married forty years ago for different
reasons than they would be getting married today.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
That's I think that there's there's something to that statement.
You know, there's probably different driving factors. I will not
I would do my best not to speak out of
turn here because I'd never been married, I do not
intend to ever get married. I do not believe that
(12:48):
that institution is appropriate for my life at all. But
I think that you're absolutely right. The motivation, the driving
forces behind marriage, they have to have evolved. I'm not
saying that it's no longer an economic institution that kind
of recognizes a family and identifies a family to or
(13:15):
rather delineates that framework according to the state or the
country government. But the individual who is participating, now, there's
something to There's something more to having the big diamond.
(13:42):
There's something more to the grand engagement. There's something more
to the ceremony and the pretty dress and the good
looking spouse. Because we live in an age where Instagram
and Facebook and all these sorts of things. You have
a different audience and everyone is engaged in everyone's lives
(14:03):
in a different way. Were connected in very different ways,
and so the desire to cross that milestone, I believe
the motivations there are different, you know, Whereas once upon
a time, a wedding, you know, led not twenty thirty
years ago, twenty even, you know, there wasn't social media
wasn't such a big factor in these things, because twenty
(14:26):
years ago, let's see, social media didn't really exist, not
in the way that we think of it now. And
so folks that got married in two thousand and three,
they weren't. They weren't in the MySpace generation, because I
don't believe my Space came around until maybe four oh five,
if I'm not mistaken. So three and prior, you know,
people were perhaps getting married with just their family and
(14:48):
friends able to bear witness to that, you know, and
they weren't sharing photos because there was no framework to
share photos with people who you're loosely connected with, nor
to share it with strangers. And so yes, I'm sure
people still wanted that. But now in the age of Okay,
you know, I'm in my mid thirties. I probably should
you know either, you know, Pooper, get off the pot
(15:12):
if you will, and I'm going to get this off
and I'm going to get these photos. You know, you
might be overlooking what Michelle Obama's referring to, which is
the hard work that comes with it. Now me, I'm
an incredibly lazy individual and I do not like hard
work whatsoever. So if I can let that cut pass,
then I will do it ten times out of ten.
And I don't want to work hard for anything. I
(15:33):
like easy stuff. I like to be happy, I like
to be comfortable. I like peace in my home. I
do not want to argue with some other human being
who has brought her face into my environment and has
a different opinion on how much grass should be in
the front yard or whatever. Right, it just doesn't work
for me. Right. I like to have my space, doing
my thing, and that be that. And so again, where
(15:54):
I am and what I do works for me. But
I appreciate Michelle Obama's take on this be because she
does kind of highlight the fact that, yeah, you could
have thirty years with somebody and ten of them could
be bad. And twenty of them be good. And I
say to that, well, why not make all thirty of
them good? You know, maybe it's not as good as
it could be with someone to share it with. But
(16:16):
you know, I'm not opposed to like the what you mentioned,
like the social media apps and that sort of stuff, right,
hear me out. I saw something recently and it was
an experiment right with these with these dating apps, and
it might have been like a tender app or something
(16:36):
like that. This is pretty funny. So they took a
profile of a man, right, a male profile, and he
was like a reasonably good looking man, and you know,
the profile looked great, okay, And after however long, this
man had I think it was like sixty four likes,
(16:57):
which is a good number in the dating app, and
he had I think five or six connections like matches,
so people had swiped on him sixty times, but he
actually connected across six of those, right. And then they
made a female profile. Now the female was a floor.
(17:18):
It was the name was the floor, and it was
a photograph of a floor, like a doorway in there
and the carpet floor, right, and that profile had like
it wasn't even it didn't even show it. They just
started laughing at the amount of swipes that that got.
So that means to me that it is that much
(17:38):
easier to be a woman in that space. And I
know women are dating to marry often and men are
dating for different reasons, and so you know you're going
to get those numbers pretty much every time. But I
think that that suggests that it is possible to exist
in a dating space where things don't have to get
(18:00):
so serious, where you don't have to endure ten years
of stress. Man, if somebody told me, hey, man, you're
going to have a great life, but you got to
go to prison for ten years, I'd like, you know what,
I'm gonna take my odds just kind of going at
it alone because I don't want to go to prison
for ten years. It just doesn't It doesn't entice me.
And so for everybody who's married and is making it work,
(18:21):
if you found your happiness, far be it from me
to interfere with that whatsoever. But it has never added
up to too much in my world. I've seen for
every Michelle Obama's story, which is a fairy tale story
to me, I'll be honest. I love to see her
and Barock together. But for every story I hear like that,
I hear ten stories of people that are miserable, ten
(18:43):
stories of people that are kind of right in the
middle of that miserable. You gotta think ten years is
a long time to go through some stuff with anybody.
And I'm not advocating for divorce or anything like that.
I just think that there's a better way that doesn't
necessarily serve the state, but that is more true and
accurate and representative what it means to have a human experience.
(19:06):
We're born alone, we dialogue, and what we do in
the middle should serve our own idea of happiness. And
especially for me as a as a man, I recognize
that the people around me I need to provide for them,
and the more people I bring into my circle of
more people have to provide for And if they are
weighing me down and compromising my bandwidth, then I just
(19:27):
don't believe that's in exchange that I'll ever make. And
so there's my rant for the day.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But you know, you know, to all of those rams,
I think you know what it sums up is It's complicated,
you know, like the Facebook sudest. So I think that
what Michelle Obama speaking about this does is it allows
us to have these conversations and more in a more
(19:53):
mainstream setting and a more you know, casual, common setting,
like this is a common topic that we all can
talk about. Marriage is kind of one of those things,
like finances, that we don't talk enough about, and especially
in the Black community, I would say, where you know,
these are things that are sometimes taboo and you know,
telling secrets about you know, so and so, and people
(20:14):
get married for different reasons, especially in the black community too.
It's like, you know, some people are raising other people's
children because of different you know, socioeconomic situations, and there's
just lots of skeletons and closets and things like that.
So it's a very nuanced situation. And then you couple
that with, you know, just the modernness of what's happening
in today's time. So we have a social media stuff,
(20:34):
but we also mentioned the economic institution, right, so we're
seeing all these institutions just literally showing themselves to be
not legitimate or not really for the people, not in
the people's best interests. So you know, should we really
even be getting married or should we be you know,
partnering with a caremate or a group of caremates, and
(20:54):
then you know, putting together some private contracts that you know,
basically keep us out of the government's institution systems and
then profiting and telling us what we can and can't do.
Because I would where I stand right now, I feel
like we're kind of moving more in that direction for
me to be as of like gung ho about you know,
all of these government structures that do not belong, you know,
(21:16):
standing on these fraudulent foundations, it's kind of hard for
me to to still fall in line with with marriage,
let me go get a marriage license and pay all
this money to say, oh, I'm married to this person, Like,
I don't feel like I have to do that to
commit my life to somebody or people.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Let me let me let me make sure I jump
in right here. There's there's we'd be remiss if we
didn't mention that. There is definitely a facet of let's say,
our people who believe that one of the strongest ways
that we can help our people, our community, black community
(22:00):
is through marriage, the fortification of the family unit through marriage.
Black women are the least married human beings. I believe
it's Black women and Asian men are the two least
married human beings in the world. And when you look
at marriage as an economic institution, that kind of fortifies
(22:22):
the offspring so that they have a better chance of
making their way in the world. I think that, you know,
there's a logic there, right. I believe in a much
stronger and more profound logic, which is that the purpose
of life is to find happiness and to ensure that
(22:45):
that is not compromised because you only get one life
to live and it's up to you to smile as
often as you possibly can. And if you give that
away to the state or to whatever economic forces, then
at the end of your life, when you recognize I
have smiled as much as I could have, you might
die a noble death, a hero's death, but you know
you haven't, actually, in my opinion, lived right. And I
(23:09):
think that you can do both. You can live and
you can be responsible. In fact, I think that my
life is a testament to that. But we have to
mention that there are people who definitely feel like the
best way that we can serve our black community is
through marriage. Doctor Umar has a lot to say about
(23:29):
marriage in the Black community. A whole lot to say.
And I believe that he's married to a couple of women. Well,
I know it's more than one. I've seen his wedding ceremonies,
and so he, like you, kind of has an alternative
view of what marriage could look like or should look like.
The thing is, I think when you prioritize finances, when
(23:50):
you prioritize the health and strength of you know, your community,
when you prioritize you know, the viability of your offspring,
those sorts of things, it's very easy to end up
at those conclusions. And I'm not saying that any of
those things is wrong. I think that when you prioritize
happiness and filling your cups so that you can then
(24:10):
pour from that cup into those other cups, meaning you know,
into your community, into your offspring, into you know, whatever else,
I think that you might end up with a different formula,
different recipe, because if you can't pour from an empty cup,
if I'm tapped out, it's you know, if I got
to go home and fight in my house, which I've done.
(24:32):
I've been engaged twice. This isn't like I'm not new
to this, you know. Actually I've been engaged three times,
but twice was to the same woman, So you know,
I learned my lessons. But anyway, when you when you
have to go home and fight with someone and then
go out and fight with the world, you might find
that on one end of that spectrum you might be
(24:53):
attempting to pour from an empty cup. And so this
is just me and I know this has gotten deeply
personal here, but you know, I do recognize a couple
of things. One is that there is there's a lot
to be said here, and that two, Missus Obama has
definitely renewed interest in what exactly goes into marriage and
(25:17):
the reasons why people are getting married. So this is
a conversation that you're right, we definitely should have more frequently.
Maybe Chris doesn't yell at us at the end of
today's show, then we might get to revisit it. But
I think that's all our time for today. So as always,
i'd like to thank you for your insight, Maggie. Once again,
our guest is Black Information Network newswriter and producer Maggie
(25:37):
be Known. This has been a production of the Black
Information Network. Today's show is produced by Chris Thompson. Have
some thoughts you'd like to share, use the red microphone
talkback feature on the iHeartRadio app. While you're there, be
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I'm Your Host Ramsey's Job on all social media, and
join us tomorrow as we share our news with our
(25:59):
voice from our perspective right here on the Black Information
Network Daily Podcast
Here at the Black Information Network, we know how important
it is for you to start your week off energized, engaged,
and enlightened. So we're looking back at the weekend to
bring you the biggest stories you may have missed. Stay
tuned for our weekend recap featuring bi in writer and
producer Maggie b. Knowing. This is the Black Information Network
Daily Podcast and I am your host, ramses Jah. All right, Maggie,
(00:29):
how you doing.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Good morning, Ramsy, I'm wonderful. How are you.
Speaker 1 (00:32):
I'm good. How was your weekend?
Speaker 2 (00:34):
It was good.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
It was busy upgrading studio software and you know, just
getting into the nitty gritty of production.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
Man, I know all about that, trust me. I know
you've been paying attention to the news.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Too, right, yes, absolutely?
Speaker 1 (00:47):
Oh so I know you had to hear about this
kind of gory, graphic story where and Georgia inmate who
was quote unquote eaten alive by bed bugs? Right?
Speaker 3 (01:02):
Yeah, I mean so just stop right there, eaten alive
by bed bugs. So this story it made news last week.
It is something that quickly, you know, picked up steam.
And at this point, now you know, the token lawyer
for our community, Ben Crump, has taken over the case
along with his team. But this gentleman, it was, uh,
(01:27):
the Sean Tom Thompson, who basically was in the Atlanta jail,
the Fulton County jail, and he you know, was left,
uh moved to a mental mental part of the jail
and basically neglected to the point where between the neglect
and the the squalor in the sense that he was
(01:48):
living in he was he was he was sickened, he
was poisoned, you know, basically infested by bedbugs. So I
was watching this story over the weekend too and saw
by Crump talking about it where he was saying that
it was really a human rights violation that this has
taken place, and literally bugs were coming out of the
(02:09):
orifices of this gentleman's body parts like eyes, ears, nose, mouth,
everything supposedly. And the fact that the autopsy didn't have
the first autopsy that the that the county did basically
it determined undetermined as the close, but had a note
that there was a severe bedbug infestation.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
I mean, when you look at.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
The pictures that have gone around with this story, it
is absolutely horrific and disgusting.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
That's what I was going to ask did you see
the picture? I saw that there were magic click but
I couldn't. I couldn't do it. It's not for me.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Like and when you think about too, just like the
issue with bail for example, right, so black people don't
often have the resources to make bail, so they all
sit in a jail cell until they reach their court date.
And sometimes that can continuating times. Could you imagine if
you actually didn't do something wrong and you were taken
to that jail and that was the room they brought
you to, Like, what what do you even do? And
(03:07):
you don't have any options to advocate? But you know,
he he, I guess you have to think too, you know,
was he trying to ask for help? And then they
put him in the mental you know, ward of of
the area of the hospital or the jail. And basically
Ben Crump referred to this as a human rights violation
and everybody should be outraged. But I'm just like, you know,
(03:30):
this really is a great example of a number of problems.
You know, I just mentioned the bail thing. This is
a black person as well, of course, so there's the
black you know, discrepancies as far as the prison industrial
complex goes, and then the prison industrial complex itself, so
you know there's people profiting from prisons, but they can't
even keep a basic you know, standard of hygiene in
(03:51):
the in the.
Speaker 2 (03:52):
Space that's just already a cage.
Speaker 3 (03:55):
And then the mental health piece, so you know, if
he had mental issues and asking for help was moved
to the mental ward, and then this was the type
of environment for the mental health area. I mean, it
defies all logic, it defies science, it defies you know,
law as well. And when we're looking at this from
(04:16):
a more comprehensive, you know standpoint, when Ben Krump is
saying this is a human rights violation, I'm like, America
is a human rights violation. And if we look at
some of these reports which I have done over the
last year just kind of putting together shows for Civic
Cipher and BI in this this daily show, it's there's
a lot of studies from other countries that are looking
(04:40):
at the United States as like really really big hypocrites
and really looking at at things or it is a
human rights violation across the board, and this this case
just highlights it.
Speaker 2 (04:51):
It was it was disturbing.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
Well, you know I think that when you mentioned that
you know, the cash bill system in this country really
needs an overhaul. That actually something we've talked about on
the show a couple of times, and it does kind
of this situation. Unfortunately, it came at you know, the
(05:14):
cost of a human life. But it does shine a
light on exactly how dire conditions can be when you
are in a jail. Not necessarily in a prison, but
in a jail. I'm not saying prisons are much better,
but it is possible for prisons to be bad enough
(05:36):
for people to lose their life in there before they've
had their day in court. People are not able to
fight their case from a position of strength. And as
you mentioned, you know it's a fiscal issue. You know,
I don't have enough money to get out of here,
so I'm just being held because I'm being accused of
a crime. Now, from what I understand, this was like
(05:59):
a simple a battery case or a simple assault case,
but basically a fight from what I'm gathering, which is
something that I mean, most everybody can say they've been
in a fight before. And you know it's a disagreement.
I say what happened, You say what happened? We had
a disagreement. It came to blows or fisticuffs and you know,
then it was broken up. We're still both alive, but
(06:21):
this individual ultimately end up losing his life in the jail.
Oh that's the part that it's like super tragic, but fortunately,
I mean, I guess if you want to call this
a silver lining, Colin Kaepernick is stepping in to make
sure that there is a more thorough secondary autopsy performed
on the body so as to determine conclusively whether or
(06:45):
not the jail conditions were a factor in this death.
And so this is kind of what we're standing by
for in terms of like results and outcomes.
Speaker 3 (06:57):
Right, So that was interesting. So I didn't even know,
actually until reading this article that Colin Kaepernick has a
whole organization that is really you know, I knew that
he had an organization kind of fighting the social justice issues,
but I didn't realize that he has a whole element
of this organization that.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
Is actually specifically dedicated to.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Doing second autopsies for families. And this is something that
you know, we really should be raising awareness for across
our community as well as you know, just trying to
support however we can, because we see it on the news.
Every day all day, you know, Black people being harmed
and killed unfortunately in a rast array of circumstances, and
autopsies oftentimes are not going to especially when done by
(07:39):
the county or the people that you know perpetuated the crime.
The harm, you know, you just can't trust it. And
to have this, you know, in the community resource, I
think is is invaluable. But to know that that he
did step up to do that, that Ben Crump is
on the case, you know, hopefully it's something that we
will see some change. Already three members of the Fulton
(08:02):
County Jails leadership has resigned, so you know that in itself,
I think it is some kind of acknowledgment of wrongdoing.
So now we do have to, you know, have the
courts play out, the criminal process play out, and see
where accountability is held. But it is definitely sparking some
new conversations as far as the state of prisons and
and jails and who is in them and who is
(08:25):
in charge and who's making these decisions, because you know,
it just seems like there's a lot of gaps that
if we're having prisons and we're having jails, we do
absolutely need to address.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Black information network writer and producer Maggie B. Nollan is
here with us discussing weekends major stories. All right, and
I know you heard what Michelle Obama was talking about.
This is a big deal in your world. She said,
society glamorizes marriage and it's a lot more difficult that it.
(09:02):
Was she right or was she wrong?
Speaker 3 (09:04):
You know, I can't disagree. I am somebody who does
believe in marriage. You know, I'm a product of a marriage,
and in a racial marriage at that. They're going on
forty years this year. So my parents have shown me
what love is and continue to example what marriage is
(09:25):
and what it is made up of every single day.
And you know, it is absolutely not all glamour and glitz.
You know, I recall many times throughout my childhood where
it is. It's it's difficult, and it is dramatic, and
it is something that you know, you can't hide from
your children because I've obviously you know, I'm a witness
(09:47):
now to it, but it's something that you know, I
can see the patterns and where you know it works
for them. But what I can say as well is
that you know, we're in a totally different time than
we were my parents got married in the early eighties
and we're in twenty twenty three, and there's a lot
of there's a lot of variables that have created society
(10:10):
to take marriage in a less serious way, and also
just relationships in general, and even the common decency of
respect and communication and things like that. We have access
at our fingertips, you know, with apps and Tinder and
Bumble and all these things, and just the online itself,
you know, having access to everybody and to share information,
(10:33):
and that whole element I think has created somewhat glamour
and also difficulty for marriage. And with a glamour side.
Not many people know, but I previously have been an
event designer, a wedding planner, doing really high end weddings.
(10:54):
I guess was a five hundred person Indian wedding one
of our fancy hotels here in town. It was the weekend,
you know, they were riding in on elephants and they
probably spent half a million dollars on their wedding. And
this was a couple in their mid to late twenties.
That We did a lot of bridal shows as well,
and there was always like I was so shocked because
I would see children like what I would call children.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
They were like high schoolers.
Speaker 3 (11:17):
They were like nineteen twenty, like not even probably old
enough to drink, coming through engaged and you know, trying
to plan their weddings. And sometimes the dates would be
you know, one or two years out. Sometimes he'd be
like five years out. It's like, are you really getting married?
But I think that, you know, when it comes down
to it, Michelle's Obama's comments, I think are just the
real you know, she's telling what it is.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
She said.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
One of our notes was like if her and Obama
had been married for thirty years, So she said, if
I fell out with him for ten years and we
had twenty great years, I take those odds anytime. And
I think, you know, that's a testament to the value
and the benefits that come with marriage. It's having a partner,
it's having a care mate. But I think that, you know,
when we have the shows that like Sweet sixteen for example,
(11:59):
that was a mini wedding for girls, you know, so
that was a culture that you know, MTV helped create that,
then those same children are now you know, planning their
weddings and are seeing you know, different bells and whistles,
in Kim Kardashian's wedding and like it's the cool thing
to do, but they don't really understand what marriage is.
And as well, you know, marriage just transitions over time.
Like when you say so marriage today is probably not.
(12:23):
You know, women got married forty years ago for different
reasons than they would be getting married today.
Speaker 1 (12:27):
That's I think that there's there's something to that statement.
You know, there's probably different driving factors. I will not
I would do my best not to speak out of
turn here because I'd never been married, I do not
intend to ever get married. I do not believe that
(12:48):
that institution is appropriate for my life at all. But
I think that you're absolutely right. The motivation, the driving
forces behind marriage, they have to have evolved. I'm not
saying that it's no longer an economic institution that kind
of recognizes a family and identifies a family to or
(13:15):
rather delineates that framework according to the state or the
country government. But the individual who is participating, now, there's
something to There's something more to having the big diamond.
(13:42):
There's something more to the grand engagement. There's something more
to the ceremony and the pretty dress and the good
looking spouse. Because we live in an age where Instagram
and Facebook and all these sorts of things. You have
a different audience and everyone is engaged in everyone's lives
(14:03):
in a different way. Were connected in very different ways,
and so the desire to cross that milestone, I believe
the motivations there are different, you know, Whereas once upon
a time, a wedding, you know, led not twenty thirty
years ago, twenty even, you know, there wasn't social media
wasn't such a big factor in these things, because twenty
(14:26):
years ago, let's see, social media didn't really exist, not
in the way that we think of it now. And
so folks that got married in two thousand and three,
they weren't. They weren't in the MySpace generation, because I
don't believe my Space came around until maybe four oh five,
if I'm not mistaken. So three and prior, you know,
people were perhaps getting married with just their family and
(14:48):
friends able to bear witness to that, you know, and
they weren't sharing photos because there was no framework to
share photos with people who you're loosely connected with, nor
to share it with strangers. And so yes, I'm sure
people still wanted that. But now in the age of Okay,
you know, I'm in my mid thirties. I probably should
you know either, you know, Pooper, get off the pot
(15:12):
if you will, and I'm going to get this off
and I'm going to get these photos. You know, you
might be overlooking what Michelle Obama's referring to, which is
the hard work that comes with it. Now me, I'm
an incredibly lazy individual and I do not like hard
work whatsoever. So if I can let that cut pass,
then I will do it ten times out of ten.
And I don't want to work hard for anything. I
(15:33):
like easy stuff. I like to be happy, I like
to be comfortable. I like peace in my home. I
do not want to argue with some other human being
who has brought her face into my environment and has
a different opinion on how much grass should be in
the front yard or whatever. Right, it just doesn't work
for me. Right. I like to have my space, doing
my thing, and that be that. And so again, where
(15:54):
I am and what I do works for me. But
I appreciate Michelle Obama's take on this be because she
does kind of highlight the fact that, yeah, you could
have thirty years with somebody and ten of them could
be bad. And twenty of them be good. And I
say to that, well, why not make all thirty of
them good? You know, maybe it's not as good as
it could be with someone to share it with. But
(16:16):
you know, I'm not opposed to like the what you mentioned,
like the social media apps and that sort of stuff, right,
hear me out. I saw something recently and it was
an experiment right with these with these dating apps, and
it might have been like a tender app or something
(16:36):
like that. This is pretty funny. So they took a
profile of a man, right, a male profile, and he
was like a reasonably good looking man, and you know,
the profile looked great, okay, And after however long, this
man had I think it was like sixty four likes,
(16:57):
which is a good number in the dating app, and
he had I think five or six connections like matches,
so people had swiped on him sixty times, but he
actually connected across six of those, right. And then they
made a female profile. Now the female was a floor.
(17:18):
It was the name was the floor, and it was
a photograph of a floor, like a doorway in there
and the carpet floor, right, and that profile had like
it wasn't even it didn't even show it. They just
started laughing at the amount of swipes that that got.
So that means to me that it is that much
(17:38):
easier to be a woman in that space. And I
know women are dating to marry often and men are
dating for different reasons, and so you know you're going
to get those numbers pretty much every time. But I
think that that suggests that it is possible to exist
in a dating space where things don't have to get
(18:00):
so serious, where you don't have to endure ten years
of stress. Man, if somebody told me, hey, man, you're
going to have a great life, but you got to
go to prison for ten years, I'd like, you know what,
I'm gonna take my odds just kind of going at
it alone because I don't want to go to prison
for ten years. It just doesn't It doesn't entice me.
And so for everybody who's married and is making it work,
(18:21):
if you found your happiness, far be it from me
to interfere with that whatsoever. But it has never added
up to too much in my world. I've seen for
every Michelle Obama's story, which is a fairy tale story
to me, I'll be honest. I love to see her
and Barock together. But for every story I hear like that,
I hear ten stories of people that are miserable, ten
(18:43):
stories of people that are kind of right in the
middle of that miserable. You gotta think ten years is
a long time to go through some stuff with anybody.
And I'm not advocating for divorce or anything like that.
I just think that there's a better way that doesn't
necessarily serve the state, but that is more true and
accurate and representative what it means to have a human experience.
(19:06):
We're born alone, we dialogue, and what we do in
the middle should serve our own idea of happiness. And
especially for me as a as a man, I recognize
that the people around me I need to provide for them,
and the more people I bring into my circle of
more people have to provide for And if they are
weighing me down and compromising my bandwidth, then I just
(19:27):
don't believe that's in exchange that I'll ever make. And
so there's my rant for the day.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But you know, you know, to all of those rams,
I think you know what it sums up is It's complicated,
you know, like the Facebook sudest. So I think that
what Michelle Obama speaking about this does is it allows
us to have these conversations and more in a more
(19:53):
mainstream setting and a more you know, casual, common setting,
like this is a common topic that we all can
talk about. Marriage is kind of one of those things,
like finances, that we don't talk enough about, and especially
in the Black community, I would say, where you know,
these are things that are sometimes taboo and you know,
telling secrets about you know, so and so, and people
(20:14):
get married for different reasons, especially in the black community too.
It's like, you know, some people are raising other people's
children because of different you know, socioeconomic situations, and there's
just lots of skeletons and closets and things like that.
So it's a very nuanced situation. And then you couple
that with, you know, just the modernness of what's happening
in today's time. So we have a social media stuff,
(20:34):
but we also mentioned the economic institution, right, so we're
seeing all these institutions just literally showing themselves to be
not legitimate or not really for the people, not in
the people's best interests. So you know, should we really
even be getting married or should we be you know,
partnering with a caremate or a group of caremates, and
(20:54):
then you know, putting together some private contracts that you know,
basically keep us out of the government's institution systems and
then profiting and telling us what we can and can't do.
Because I would where I stand right now, I feel
like we're kind of moving more in that direction for
me to be as of like gung ho about you know,
all of these government structures that do not belong, you know,
(21:16):
standing on these fraudulent foundations, it's kind of hard for
me to to still fall in line with with marriage,
let me go get a marriage license and pay all
this money to say, oh, I'm married to this person, Like,
I don't feel like I have to do that to
commit my life to somebody or people.
Speaker 1 (21:34):
Let me let me let me make sure I jump
in right here. There's there's we'd be remiss if we
didn't mention that. There is definitely a facet of let's say,
our people who believe that one of the strongest ways
that we can help our people, our community, black community
(22:00):
is through marriage, the fortification of the family unit through marriage.
Black women are the least married human beings. I believe
it's Black women and Asian men are the two least
married human beings in the world. And when you look
at marriage as an economic institution, that kind of fortifies
(22:22):
the offspring so that they have a better chance of
making their way in the world. I think that, you know,
there's a logic there, right. I believe in a much
stronger and more profound logic, which is that the purpose
of life is to find happiness and to ensure that
(22:45):
that is not compromised because you only get one life
to live and it's up to you to smile as
often as you possibly can. And if you give that
away to the state or to whatever economic forces, then
at the end of your life, when you recognize I
have smiled as much as I could have, you might
die a noble death, a hero's death, but you know
you haven't, actually, in my opinion, lived right. And I
(23:09):
think that you can do both. You can live and
you can be responsible. In fact, I think that my
life is a testament to that. But we have to
mention that there are people who definitely feel like the
best way that we can serve our black community is
through marriage. Doctor Umar has a lot to say about
(23:29):
marriage in the Black community. A whole lot to say.
And I believe that he's married to a couple of women. Well,
I know it's more than one. I've seen his wedding ceremonies,
and so he, like you, kind of has an alternative
view of what marriage could look like or should look like.
The thing is, I think when you prioritize finances, when
(23:50):
you prioritize the health and strength of you know, your community,
when you prioritize you know, the viability of your offspring,
those sorts of things, it's very easy to end up
at those conclusions. And I'm not saying that any of
those things is wrong. I think that when you prioritize
happiness and filling your cups so that you can then
(24:10):
pour from that cup into those other cups, meaning you know,
into your community, into your offspring, into you know, whatever else,
I think that you might end up with a different formula,
different recipe, because if you can't pour from an empty cup,
if I'm tapped out, it's you know, if I got
to go home and fight in my house, which I've done.
(24:32):
I've been engaged twice. This isn't like I'm not new
to this, you know. Actually I've been engaged three times,
but twice was to the same woman, So you know,
I learned my lessons. But anyway, when you when you
have to go home and fight with someone and then
go out and fight with the world, you might find
that on one end of that spectrum you might be
(24:53):
attempting to pour from an empty cup. And so this
is just me and I know this has gotten deeply
personal here, but you know, I do recognize a couple
of things. One is that there is there's a lot
to be said here, and that two, Missus Obama has
definitely renewed interest in what exactly goes into marriage and
(25:17):
the reasons why people are getting married. So this is
a conversation that you're right, we definitely should have more frequently.
Maybe Chris doesn't yell at us at the end of
today's show, then we might get to revisit it. But
I think that's all our time for today. So as always,
i'd like to thank you for your insight, Maggie. Once again,
our guest is Black Information Network newswriter and producer Maggie
(25:37):
be Known. This has been a production of the Black
Information Network. Today's show is produced by Chris Thompson. Have
some thoughts you'd like to share, use the red microphone
talkback feature on the iHeartRadio app. While you're there, be
sure to hit subscribe and download all of our episodes
I'm Your Host Ramsey's Job on all social media, and
join us tomorrow as we share our news with our
(25:59):
voice from our perspective right here on the Black Information
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