October 12, 2022 • 35 mins
Some light reading suggestions:
Identities and Inequalities https://www.mheducation.com/highered/new/product/9781260241037.html?cid=ppc%7CHE%7CPaid-G-Shop%7Cgoogle%7C&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI8vbGn4-D-gIVpsLCBB3m6QajEAQYASABEgK24PD_BwE
A Different Mirror https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/a-different-mirror-a-history-of-multicultural-america-a-back-b
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, listen, it's time to get your bars up. The
news is already in your face all the time. You
already know Trump out here talking about nuck if you buck,
you know what I'm saying, Like, man, you know, pull
up on me then and bust a move. A matter
of fact, I'm gonna hire my guy to come and
look through all the stuff you got, Like, y'all get it.
(00:20):
You know what I'm saying. He facing a palcthora charges
everybody know that. You know what I'm saying. You know,
Afghanistan and a like how it started? How is it
going over there? With the Taliban situation? Like, oh word,
like y'all was gonna be the new and improved Taliban,
Come on, family, like you already knew that wasn't gonna
You already knew they was gonna be the same Taliban
(00:41):
they always was. You don't need me to to you know,
we're about to be in mid terms. You know what
I'm saying. You know, uh biting out here talking about
we need to fund the police. We expect them to
do everything. We expect them to be psychologists and psychiatrists
and counselors and therapists, which is all the reasons why
(01:03):
we're saying we need to defood because you're asking them
to do stuff they died trade and do. So, how
about you hire to train with professionals and fund them
to do that. Take the money you're taking it in.
It's just like you get his whole reason for funding
the police is the exact reason to defund them. It's
pretty funny. But you all need me to explain all
that you already you're already in there. I want to
(01:24):
take time today to give y'all some reading assignments or listening.
It's up to you either way. We're gonna get your
weight up today. You go get your bars up. I'm
gonna give you some book recommendations. Good politics, y'all. In
(02:09):
case you don't know, get your bars up is a
this is gonna. It's it's always weird to like explain
stuff that like you never had to like actually give
an actual definition to because it's like you didn't even
know where to start. It would be if you were
to make some sort of reference to like all the
forces strong with this one, like how many things you
(02:31):
have to unpack to give context for for that phrase
to make sense? Right? And then it it's almost not
as fun anymore. Getting your bars up is a rap phrase, right.
Bars are measurements of song, of sound, of lyrics like
you know, one to three one one two three two
one two three three bars right, and it became a
(02:53):
ubiquitous colloquialism for rapping, right. If you know, back in
the nineties he was like, y'all got sixteen bars. What
you're saying is like I have a verse, right, because
versus traditionally and during that time versus we're sixteen bars,
you do twelve, you do do an eight? Right. Pop
music is a little different. Pop music is usually eight
(03:13):
bar versus eight bar chorus, right, and then now the
whole phrase get to the chorus for you boris right? Uh.
Then the second versus usually four bars into a four
bar bridge or four bars into a course again four
bar bridge or eight bar bridge, big finale a bar
(03:34):
ending pop music. Right. But if we're saying like y'all
get your bars up, like it would be something to
tell a person like man, you need to like practice
your wrapping. You need to get better at what you're doing.
And one of the untold things about hip hop music,
especially if you're gonna do it at a particular level
(03:56):
of excellence? Is it actually require er is a decent
amount of interdisciplinary like sort of Polly Maath knowledge of culture, right,
if you're gonna do it well, you'd be surprised at
how smart a lot of the best rappers are, Like
(04:20):
y'all know, two Chains went to Tuskegee, like like like
these a lot of these people are very, very very
smart people. It's the same with comedy, Like for comedy
to be really as sophisticated and funny as it can be,
you kind of gotta know what you're talking about and no, well,
what you're talking about to be able to point out
(04:40):
absurdities and and and satires and and and make the
jokes and make the connections, you have to know what
you're talking about. Of course there's slapstick and stuff like that,
but slapstick comedy also you kind of gotta know what
you're talking about to know to know how to make
fun of it. So for you know, foods making like
double and triple and quad druple and andres like, you
(05:01):
have to know what you're talking about. You have to
be able to make references from history, pop culture, science,
literature to bring it all together for this all it's
not just like got it out the mug. We're turning
up in the club, you know what I'm saying. It's
not just that even if, because you can only do
that for so many songs. Eventually you're turning up in
(05:22):
the club has to have some sort of similar to it,
like a something, and it can't be something you didn't
say it a million times or is corny right for
for the type of rapping I'm talking about. Of course,
there's something for everybody. You know, there's exceptions to this rule.
Some stuff is all vibe, some stuff is all feel.
(05:45):
And if we were making a comparison to politics, that
would be your Trump's of the world. This is all vibe.
Ain't no content, This is candy and the content he
given is ridiculous, right they he got no bars. It's
all styles. It's all cadence, right, Cadences uh in this
(06:13):
time era if pop, cadence is king. Cadence is like
the way you say your stuff. So that's why you
can remember how a song goes, but not the lyrics.
It's the cadence, you know. Sammonde Damond de Damond, Dan Damond,
You're dumb bo see something Zabama's Dedamina dud. That's the cadence.
(06:34):
And then you just drop words into it. Oh, hey,
who do you know rocking on Mike and I'm killing
that flow? Hey what do you see stepping the crowd
and I'm rocking? It's me. It's just cadence. I didn't
say anything. It's just the cadence. Right, But those are bars.
On the other hand, when you're all bars and no finesse,
this is backpack rapper. This is like there's no there's
(06:59):
nothing to lie latch onto. It's just rapid e raps
and a lot of the rapidi rap stuff, which is
what I came from. Right, You're not gonna bang it
in the car, you know. It's like it's like headphone music.
You know what I'm saying, Like, it's not you ain't
gonna hear it in the club. This the the you know.
(07:21):
I spit similarlys ripped mikes and mentioned me, mentioned me.
I spit similarly top of them Brain Rick in Dye,
Rick and Shorty Border, Rick and Mortar, sort of bipolar
Ryan Thrower Rancher. You know what I'm saying, It's like, okay,
cool whatever I mean. I guess you know. But if
you could put Bars and Cadence together, you get Kendricks,
(07:41):
you get calls you know what I'm saying, and you
get certain elements of Drake right, you get greatness out
of your music when you could put the two together.
So as far as your knowledge of world history, politics,
and the world we're getting into and especially moving into
these mid terms, especially being able to have a decent
(08:05):
conversation about the air quotes, culture wars we have in
some people all Cadence, it's all live liberal shot now
a cave. I'm like, okay, well, what do you what
do you mean by that we kill the black people?
Black Lives Matter? Okay? What do you mean by nord
else is killing black people? I'm saying saturated fats, food, deserts.
(08:29):
Get your bars up. Do you know what we're talking
about here when we say all cops are bastard? Where
you know you're the fund the police? Okay? So why
with the mainstream media? Okay? What's wrong with mainstream un Okay?
Get your bars up. Well you know it's it's critical
race theory. Okay, what is it? Yeah, that's what I thought.
(08:51):
Get your bars up, Get bars and Cadence, know what
you're talking about, and know how to talk about what
you're talking about, because good lord, if you could put
those things together, Dang, you're bad Bunny Rihanna and Beyonce
and Kendrick wrapped in one. Could you imagine that? So, yeah,
(09:13):
this episode, it's a little different than normal in the
sense that I kind of want to give y'all some
like reading material. Some of the feedback we got over
this show is that you guys tend to enjoy the
educational aspect of the show. We talked about like how
something works and histories of things, and and I think
(09:37):
it might be because you know, we're kind of drowning
in news, like sometimes you kind of need to break
you feel me, like, so when we be dropping jokes
or making comparisons, but ultimately like kind of schooling you
on some like bigger picture stuff. It the feedback we're
getting is that's a lot more helpful. And you know,
we can't please everybody, so that might not be true
of you listening right now. You might like, you know,
(09:58):
the hot text about like current events, and I'm not
gonna stop doing that, but I do think a little
more content on like the educational side, Uh would do
a little good. I've been asked all the time, Hey,
what books are you reading? Hey? Where did you get that?
Where did you learn? This? Is so cool? You know,
I think today I'm just gonna lay out a couple
(10:21):
of things Jacker read in your own time and leisure.
But I'm also going to give you a couple of
you know, caveats and disclaimers. All right, so take notes
if you're up to it. If not, just you know,
save this here episode and you can come back to
this list work. All right, let's go. So, as you
(11:23):
know the premise of this show is the merging of
street knowledge with book knowledge. Right, you're urban outside experience
and using that to understand you're in the Ivory Tower experience.
And if you can merge the two, uh, the possibilities
(11:43):
are endless. That being said, you ain't got but so
much brain space, right, So I don't expect you, and
I'm not calling you to derail your hold trajectory and
read these super dense books. Yeah, in between trying to
make rents. That's not what I'm saying. But I do
(12:04):
want to give you a list of books that you
could possibly you know what I'm saying, kind of be
playing in the background, you feel me. Some of these
are very dense and very sort of edge you speech.
Others are simpler reads, a little more narrative. And my
hope is again not to shame you, not to make
you feel like you don't know what you're talking about,
(12:24):
but just to give you some gems so that you
kind of have a baseline for when you're gonna drop
bars on folks about how you feel about things, that
you can actually be like, well, actually, here's this study,
here is this person, here is this thing. Here's what
I understand about how that works, so that nobody like
kind of like, you know, kind of sell you the
wolf tickets. Don't be selling me no wolf tickets, right.
But the list I can give you is on the
(12:48):
educational side, the street knowledge, the urban knowledge. I don't
it ain't in the books. That comes from lived experience,
and I think but ultimately, even whatever your lived experience is,
my hope is that you learn how to tap into
that to help you understand the world around you. I'm
(13:11):
getting a little deep here, anyway, Okay, here we go.
Let's start first with uh culture war stuff. First book.
I want to give you. First person I will introduce
you to is Dr Kimberly Crenshaw, Harvard Grad Law professor
(13:34):
at U c L, A certified g absolutely brilliant black woman.
And the thing about Dr Kimberly Crenshaw is the fact
that you've been hearing her words and people been putting
(13:54):
words in her mouth for the past eight years, which
is crazy because the words that we're putting in her
mouth she wrote many books about and you can just
see what she wrote. There needs to be no mystery
around the things that she came up with, and it
(14:16):
is the leading expert on Dr Kimberly Crenshaw is the
leading expert in critical race theory. We hear CRT. People
have been talking about it and the see this critical
race theory and uh wokeness has been merged together into
(14:37):
one thing, which is absurd. Dr Kimberly Crenshaw in critical
race theory is a law theory. Okay, now I'm gonna
give you some books to read or at least to
listen to, or maybe even just to skim if you
if you don't feel like you could get all the
way into it, you can skim. You know what the
(15:00):
name of the one of the books you could read
that she wrote about critical race theory. It's called critical
Race Theory, the key writings that formed the movement. Yeah,
she wrote a book, y'all. There needs to be no
(15:21):
confusion as to what this means. And when you hearing
your little right wing politicians, your little conservative politicians talk
about how it's a scourge and we don't want to
teach our kids that, you could read what it is
and you could see that I, like almost every other
black person who grew up in the school system, the
(15:45):
American public school system, unless you was in an exceptional
school or had you an exceptional teacher, you ain't know
nothing about this. The extent of what you knew about
your race is that slavery happened, and then Dr Martin
Luther King. That's all we get taught. So for somebody
to tell you you learned critical race theory CD, I
(16:09):
nobody learned. I don't know what that was till college,
and that's because I was at Nick Studies major. It's
a LOWD theory. She has another book that is called
Identities and Inequalities, exploring the intersections of race, class, gender,
(16:33):
and sexuality. Now, this isn't Dr Kimberly Crenshaw. This is
by David Newman, and it's built on some of her work.
The point I'm trying to make is there needs to
be no mystery about what critical race theory is. There's
literally a book about it and multiple books that came
from that. It's like it's and y'all like listen, just
(16:59):
you know, audible, just listen to it. Now for that
book to make sense, you may have to step back
a little further and read something like called the sixteen
nineteen project. Right, um, the year sixteen nineteen. Why that's
so important is it's the the year that the first
African slave set foot in America. It was the essentially
(17:20):
like the beginning of the slave trade, you know what
I'm saying. So there was this whole thing, you know,
when the New York Times tried to do a sixteen
nineteen project during two thousand nineteen, and then that's when
everybody was like, no, sev seventy six project, you know,
all reactionary. Whatever the case may be, at least know
what you're talking about. Here's another caveat. I'm not trying
(17:41):
to tell you that any of this stuff is factual
or true. Or the way you need to see the world.
I'm just trying to say, if everybody talking about the
dangers of critical race, they why don't you learn what
it is and then see maybe they don't know what
the hell they're talking about, which is why somebody like
me most times don't engage when somebody asked me about well,
(18:04):
that's just critical race theory, like, well, you don't know it,
you don't know what that is. So it's a it's
a law theory, a theory about the law. Okay, so
just go check it out. Dr Kimberly Crenshaw Devour everything
she writes. Another book I would recommend is The New
(18:27):
Gym Crow. It's by Michelle Alexander, and it's about, you know,
slave trade to mass incarceration and why mass incarceration is
a thing that the things that are sinister about it,
Like these things are like baselines. This is the background knowledge.
This is like these things when you when when you
(18:49):
hear me talk, right, Uh, these are the types of
things that it's it's almost like if you're watching Game
of Thrones and you've just accepted that dragons exist in
this universe. You're saying and you understand Valerian steal and
(19:10):
you know the Iron Throne, you know, and you just
already know the map, right, and you know the wild
wings in the North Wall. Like if you already know
all that stuff and you're just in the world. But
if somebody just drops in and you're just like, yo,
what the hell is a wildling? It's like I already
know the map, right, you know if I just dropped
(19:33):
you into like a talking story and I was like, oh,
we're gonna go to Rivendale, like what you know what
I'm saying, Like, you gotta know the map already, So
these are things. At least just know the map. Again,
you ain't gotta believe all this stuff. At least know
the map. But these people got our receipts, so you
(19:57):
can at least have your bars up all right now,
this is your These are your law books. Of course,
it's not complete or exhaustive. These are just some suggestions
and you ain't gotta take them all, just you can
pick a few. Next, I want to talk about some
(20:17):
culture books. Let's take a break. M m m all right,
(20:50):
culture books, culture and injustice, I think would be a
good way to put this. One thing you've heard me
mentioned this book before. I highly recommend it. It's called
Simply Justice by Michael Sandow. Okay, it is I think
very I Again, I've talked about this before, but let
me just rehash it. It really helps um frame conversations
(21:14):
when we're talking about what is justice, what is equality?
What is right? Right? And it's it's theoretical, like he
doesn't really take a stance. He just tries to give
you sort of buckets to put your understanding of things.
So he talks about like, if justice means um. I
think I've said this before, but again you need to
hear it. If justice means um the greatest amount of
(21:36):
good for the most amount of people. That's usually like
sort of the liberal and progressive thing to where it's
like you have these big programs that can help the
most people. It's not gonna help everybody because everybody don't
need help, but what is the greatest amount of goods
you could do for the most amount of people. That's
usually a liberal perspective. Then he has that is what's just.
Then he has the staining of like if justice is
(21:57):
like freedom to flourish, where it's like leave me alone,
let me make the right decisions and if I fail,
I fail, and if I succeed, I succeed. But don't
like putting nothing in my way. Just let me do
it right, let me make the right choices. That's more
of a libertarian approach, right, and then the idea of
(22:18):
of the more conservative approach is like justice is what
things ought to be, meaning there is a there is
a right and a wrong, and it's above us and
it is up to us to fit our lives into
whatever that thing is. You know, that's that is what's justice,
That is what's just You You have this idea of
(22:39):
there's a fixed idea of what the world should be,
and we need to submit ourselves to that rather than
we're creating the world that we're in. Right, So what
is justice? And he gives a lot of examples about
that um in this book. So I highly recommend that
So that because I'm telling you this will help you
understand at least the person sitting across from you why
they are outraged about what they're outrage, why they don't
(23:01):
understand when you say, well, I mean, don't send a
cop to a domestic violence thing, you know what I'm saying,
Like you know, or why they're like you know, trans
people shouldn't be in the military. You know, it's like, Okay,
I see why you're saying that. You know what I'm saying,
uh because of their idea of justice or they're just bigoted,
I don't know anyway, So that's what Another book is
(23:24):
called The Sacred Canopy. Now this one is freakishly dense,
but it's about the shaping and the creation of culture.
What even is culture? I think I talked about this
in the Culture Wars uh uh in the Ops episode right,
like what is it? Well? I mean, it's us and
how do you make it? It's very dense, but if
(23:46):
you can even if you can get through like the
first couple of chapters, like I'm telling you, you'll realize
like how silly we sound often everybody because we just
really don't understand our culture is made and where we're
getting our norms. That makes sense. And the last on
this tip is a book called A Different Mirror. It's
(24:08):
very old. I ain't gonna hold you very old, but
sometimes books that are old or out of dated or
some of the takes are kind of like just didn't
age well. It teaches us about culture, period. It teaches
us about where we were. You feel me? Um, can
I get crash with y'all because this is her politics.
(24:29):
And there was a time in hip hop where rappers
would brag about how they don't go down on girls,
that they don't they don't eat the couchie. I know
that's crass. I just need to make a point that
it was considered not hard, not manly. Boy has times changed? YO,
(24:50):
saying like Yo, that take a age? Well, Fam, you
know what I'm saying, uh because uh man listen anyway. Um,
The point I'm trying to make is it gives you
a window into what was going on back then. I
remember the time where rappers will talk about how they
didn't listen to R and B and they don't do
R and B. It's like, oh, y'all niggas don't sing,
(25:13):
y'all don't like girls. Fam, that's what's going on right now. No,
we're hard. I'm like, okay, all right, I guess you
know what I'm saying. Enter Drake one of the biggest
artists in the world. He like R and B. You
feel me? So. So the point is, even with some
of these books that I'm giving you again, like I
keep saying, you ain't gotta take it all. I'm not
(25:34):
saying all of this is like this ain't gospel, you
feel me, But it is any any piece of content
like this is a window into who we are as
a species at that moment of time. It's a snapshot.
It's a polaroid of the way we were thinking about things.
You know what I'm saying. Again, you don't have to
(25:55):
agree with none of the takes. I'm just saying, get
your bars up. So A Different Mirror by Ronald Takaki Um.
It's a book about all of the different sort of
immigrations of all the other ethnic minorities into the America's
(26:15):
it's their stories. It's not just the pilgrims, you know
what I'm saying. So it's just a window into all
these different experiences of people immigrating to America from all
over the world. It's just a good window, you know
what I'm saying. Um. And again, it's very old, so
some of the content is dated, but it it's a
good it's a good anchor snapshot. Another book you could
(26:41):
check out is um, Guns, Germs, and Steel. It's about colonization.
It's asking the question like, Okay, why did Europe go
and conquer all these other places rather than the other
places coming and conquering your were the Spanish concase the
(27:03):
doors a more advanced society. Did they really overpower them?
Was it? It? Was it? Some other stuff? Could it
have been? Maybe something else? So it's a it's an
examination of that. Now again this this book has very
(27:25):
mixed reviews, and it again is also dated. But it's
a good window again into like asking that because I
was a question I asked a bunch of times too.
I was like, man, why why I go this way?
Why Europe going? What? What? What? What was in y'all
that made y'all think you should do this? Is there
(27:46):
such thing as a superior culture? What is what is
high culture? And why would we even use that term?
Goes into stuff like that. And lastly, which is the
probably the most shockingly scary one, is a book called
The Death of Democracy. Now, if you're a fan of
the Bastard's Pod, this book has been used before. And
(28:07):
this book is about the time between uh World War
One and World War Two. It's Vonemar Germany, and it
talks about the trajectory of going from this freakishly progressive
ahead of its time country, but of course it's problems,
(28:31):
but it was way ahead of its time. Vonemar Germany
with with kaiserville Helm in there and there you can
say whatever you want, but do sent into Nazism and
like like, man, what you know what I'm saying that?
(28:51):
And it just examines that. And what sucks is it
looks like, you know, somebody holding a mirror in front
of us. It's pretty freaky. Um, So it's a little scary,
but I'd say take a peek. And last is a
book I just finished listening to. It's a it's a
fiction piece, but it's called Invisible Things. It's super fun.
(29:12):
It's it's it's it's also supposed to be a mirror
to us. But essentially the premises there's a terrari um
like a a human colony fish bowl that's the size
of an American city and its surrounding suburbs living inside
the dome on the moon of on a moon in
(29:34):
Jupiter on Europa, and nobody knows how it got there
and why it's there and how to leave. It's it's
pretty dope because it's and it's like and the the
city and there is just a regular ass American City.
So yeah, I highly recommend that's. Again, it's fiction, but
(29:55):
it's it's supposed to be like a little allegorical for us.
In the biographies, I suggest Frederick Douglas is Frederick Douglas
is a slave who was born a slave and basically
(30:16):
saved America. You think I'm playing. He became super cool
friends with Abraham Lincoln. And the more you understand about
Frederick Douglas and his life, the more you might see that, like, yo,
this man was in Abraham Lincoln's ear who essentially taught
(30:36):
him that the abolition of slavery is the only cause.
Joe said like that, that this is a moral issue
because if you follow Abraham Lincoln's trajectory, he's you know,
he's a dynamic character too, that he was. He didn't
(30:57):
jump on. He's trying to say to you and your money.
He had to be convinced, and he grew and uh
and a lot of his growth was Frederick Douglas. So
I'd say, I'd say, peep that out now. I'm pretty
(31:19):
sure y'all got a list of books too that would
really really help. Oh, I forgot this one. I can't
believe I forgot this one. This one's a biggie. It's
a biggie because it's probably what you might think would
be the opposite of where my stances are. Uh, and
I am with it. Okay. This book is called My
(31:41):
Grandmother's Hands Okay, and it's a book about the privilege
and trauma carried in white bodies. You heard me, white bodies.
This person, this author had been actually giving like trauma
informed therapy to cops and about what's going on in
(32:03):
their bodies and in their their hearts and how if
you are Another therapy book is like if it's called
The Body, Keep Score, um, which is something as a
side note i'd also recommend to. But this this book
is like he's an interviewing cops. Mama told you before
all cops a cab. Okay, well let's let's get in
(32:24):
their brains. I'm gonna leave y'all with this one, because Yo,
you're gonna walk away from that thing, like you know,
the meme of a black dude with his mind blown
leaning back like, oh, that's what this one is. I
was very it. I was shook. Okay. My wife recommended
(32:45):
this one and then she, uh, we did a little
talk on our Patreon about it, and like I'm telling you, dude,
you'd be You'd be surprised how much empathy would grow
in you after you you really understand, um, really, how
how trauma is carried in the body, and also how
(33:12):
the white supremacy project doesn't just hurt non white people,
how it really hurts white people too, and but that
I don't want to get into the book. I want
you all to get into yourself. So here's a bunch
of things. I'll link them in the show notes and yeah,
(33:34):
get your bars up. I know it's a different episode.
But oh, one more book. Read Oliver North's book. Oh yeah,
read his book, all right, y'all Little politics. Yeah, it's here.
(34:03):
Thing was recorded by me Propaganda and he slow Spoil Heights,
Los Angeles, California. This smug was mixed, edited, mastered, and
scored by Matt Ososki. I can totally say his name, guys,
it was it was a stick. He's going by Matt
now again because he got to legal situations with the
name headlights. You know, common used to be called common sense.
(34:25):
You know tip t I was tipped Sometimes it happens.
Executive produced by the One and Only Sophie Lichtman or
Cool Zone Media, and the theme music by the one
and only Gold Tips Gold Tips d J Shawn p
So y'all just remember listening every time you check in.
If you understand city living, you understand politics. We'll see
(34:48):
how next week eight
Okay, listen, it's time to get your bars up. The
news is already in your face all the time. You
already know Trump out here talking about nuck if you buck,
you know what I'm saying, Like, man, you know, pull
up on me then and bust a move. A matter
of fact, I'm gonna hire my guy to come and
look through all the stuff you got, Like, y'all get it.
(00:20):
You know what I'm saying. He facing a palcthora charges
everybody know that. You know what I'm saying. You know,
Afghanistan and a like how it started? How is it
going over there? With the Taliban situation? Like, oh word,
like y'all was gonna be the new and improved Taliban,
Come on, family, like you already knew that wasn't gonna
You already knew they was gonna be the same Taliban
(00:41):
they always was. You don't need me to to you know,
we're about to be in mid terms. You know what
I'm saying. You know, uh biting out here talking about
we need to fund the police. We expect them to
do everything. We expect them to be psychologists and psychiatrists
and counselors and therapists, which is all the reasons why
(01:03):
we're saying we need to defood because you're asking them
to do stuff they died trade and do. So, how
about you hire to train with professionals and fund them
to do that. Take the money you're taking it in.
It's just like you get his whole reason for funding
the police is the exact reason to defund them. It's
pretty funny. But you all need me to explain all
that you already you're already in there. I want to
(01:24):
take time today to give y'all some reading assignments or listening.
It's up to you either way. We're gonna get your
weight up today. You go get your bars up. I'm
gonna give you some book recommendations. Good politics, y'all. In
(02:09):
case you don't know, get your bars up is a
this is gonna. It's it's always weird to like explain
stuff that like you never had to like actually give
an actual definition to because it's like you didn't even
know where to start. It would be if you were
to make some sort of reference to like all the
forces strong with this one, like how many things you
(02:31):
have to unpack to give context for for that phrase
to make sense? Right? And then it it's almost not
as fun anymore. Getting your bars up is a rap phrase, right.
Bars are measurements of song, of sound, of lyrics like
you know, one to three one one two three two
one two three three bars right, and it became a
(02:53):
ubiquitous colloquialism for rapping, right. If you know, back in
the nineties he was like, y'all got sixteen bars. What
you're saying is like I have a verse, right, because
versus traditionally and during that time versus we're sixteen bars,
you do twelve, you do do an eight? Right. Pop
music is a little different. Pop music is usually eight
(03:13):
bar versus eight bar chorus, right, and then now the
whole phrase get to the chorus for you boris right? Uh.
Then the second versus usually four bars into a four
bar bridge or four bars into a course again four
bar bridge or eight bar bridge, big finale a bar
(03:34):
ending pop music. Right. But if we're saying like y'all
get your bars up, like it would be something to
tell a person like man, you need to like practice
your wrapping. You need to get better at what you're doing.
And one of the untold things about hip hop music,
especially if you're gonna do it at a particular level
(03:56):
of excellence? Is it actually require er is a decent
amount of interdisciplinary like sort of Polly Maath knowledge of culture, right,
if you're gonna do it well, you'd be surprised at
how smart a lot of the best rappers are, Like
(04:20):
y'all know, two Chains went to Tuskegee, like like like
these a lot of these people are very, very very
smart people. It's the same with comedy, Like for comedy
to be really as sophisticated and funny as it can be,
you kind of gotta know what you're talking about and no, well,
what you're talking about to be able to point out
(04:40):
absurdities and and and satires and and and make the
jokes and make the connections, you have to know what
you're talking about. Of course there's slapstick and stuff like that,
but slapstick comedy also you kind of gotta know what
you're talking about to know to know how to make
fun of it. So for you know, foods making like
double and triple and quad druple and andres like, you
(05:01):
have to know what you're talking about. You have to
be able to make references from history, pop culture, science,
literature to bring it all together for this all it's
not just like got it out the mug. We're turning
up in the club, you know what I'm saying. It's
not just that even if, because you can only do
that for so many songs. Eventually you're turning up in
(05:22):
the club has to have some sort of similar to it,
like a something, and it can't be something you didn't
say it a million times or is corny right for
for the type of rapping I'm talking about. Of course,
there's something for everybody. You know, there's exceptions to this rule.
Some stuff is all vibe, some stuff is all feel.
(05:45):
And if we were making a comparison to politics, that
would be your Trump's of the world. This is all vibe.
Ain't no content, This is candy and the content he
given is ridiculous, right they he got no bars. It's
all styles. It's all cadence, right, Cadences uh in this
(06:13):
time era if pop, cadence is king. Cadence is like
the way you say your stuff. So that's why you
can remember how a song goes, but not the lyrics.
It's the cadence, you know. Sammonde Damond de Damond, Dan Damond,
You're dumb bo see something Zabama's Dedamina dud. That's the cadence.
(06:34):
And then you just drop words into it. Oh, hey,
who do you know rocking on Mike and I'm killing
that flow? Hey what do you see stepping the crowd
and I'm rocking? It's me. It's just cadence. I didn't
say anything. It's just the cadence. Right, But those are bars.
On the other hand, when you're all bars and no finesse,
this is backpack rapper. This is like there's no there's
(06:59):
nothing to lie latch onto. It's just rapid e raps
and a lot of the rapidi rap stuff, which is
what I came from. Right, You're not gonna bang it
in the car, you know. It's like it's like headphone music.
You know what I'm saying, Like, it's not you ain't
gonna hear it in the club. This the the you know.
(07:21):
I spit similarlys ripped mikes and mentioned me, mentioned me.
I spit similarly top of them Brain Rick in Dye,
Rick and Shorty Border, Rick and Mortar, sort of bipolar
Ryan Thrower Rancher. You know what I'm saying, It's like, okay,
cool whatever I mean. I guess you know. But if
you could put Bars and Cadence together, you get Kendricks,
(07:41):
you get calls you know what I'm saying, and you
get certain elements of Drake right, you get greatness out
of your music when you could put the two together.
So as far as your knowledge of world history, politics,
and the world we're getting into and especially moving into
these mid terms, especially being able to have a decent
(08:05):
conversation about the air quotes, culture wars we have in
some people all Cadence, it's all live liberal shot now
a cave. I'm like, okay, well, what do you what
do you mean by that we kill the black people?
Black Lives Matter? Okay? What do you mean by nord
else is killing black people? I'm saying saturated fats, food, deserts.
(08:29):
Get your bars up. Do you know what we're talking
about here when we say all cops are bastard? Where
you know you're the fund the police? Okay? So why
with the mainstream media? Okay? What's wrong with mainstream un Okay?
Get your bars up. Well you know it's it's critical
race theory. Okay, what is it? Yeah, that's what I thought.
(08:51):
Get your bars up, Get bars and Cadence, know what
you're talking about, and know how to talk about what
you're talking about, because good lord, if you could put
those things together, Dang, you're bad Bunny Rihanna and Beyonce
and Kendrick wrapped in one. Could you imagine that? So, yeah,
(09:13):
this episode, it's a little different than normal in the
sense that I kind of want to give y'all some
like reading material. Some of the feedback we got over
this show is that you guys tend to enjoy the
educational aspect of the show. We talked about like how
something works and histories of things, and and I think
(09:37):
it might be because you know, we're kind of drowning
in news, like sometimes you kind of need to break
you feel me, like, so when we be dropping jokes
or making comparisons, but ultimately like kind of schooling you
on some like bigger picture stuff. It the feedback we're
getting is that's a lot more helpful. And you know,
we can't please everybody, so that might not be true
of you listening right now. You might like, you know,
(09:58):
the hot text about like current events, and I'm not
gonna stop doing that, but I do think a little
more content on like the educational side, Uh would do
a little good. I've been asked all the time, Hey,
what books are you reading? Hey? Where did you get that?
Where did you learn? This? Is so cool? You know,
I think today I'm just gonna lay out a couple
(10:21):
of things Jacker read in your own time and leisure.
But I'm also going to give you a couple of
you know, caveats and disclaimers. All right, so take notes
if you're up to it. If not, just you know,
save this here episode and you can come back to
this list work. All right, let's go. So, as you
(11:23):
know the premise of this show is the merging of
street knowledge with book knowledge. Right, you're urban outside experience
and using that to understand you're in the Ivory Tower experience.
And if you can merge the two, uh, the possibilities
(11:43):
are endless. That being said, you ain't got but so
much brain space, right, So I don't expect you, and
I'm not calling you to derail your hold trajectory and
read these super dense books. Yeah, in between trying to
make rents. That's not what I'm saying. But I do
(12:04):
want to give you a list of books that you
could possibly you know what I'm saying, kind of be
playing in the background, you feel me. Some of these
are very dense and very sort of edge you speech.
Others are simpler reads, a little more narrative. And my
hope is again not to shame you, not to make
you feel like you don't know what you're talking about,
(12:24):
but just to give you some gems so that you
kind of have a baseline for when you're gonna drop
bars on folks about how you feel about things, that
you can actually be like, well, actually, here's this study,
here is this person, here is this thing. Here's what
I understand about how that works, so that nobody like
kind of like, you know, kind of sell you the
wolf tickets. Don't be selling me no wolf tickets, right.
But the list I can give you is on the
(12:48):
educational side, the street knowledge, the urban knowledge. I don't
it ain't in the books. That comes from lived experience,
and I think but ultimately, even whatever your lived experience is,
my hope is that you learn how to tap into
that to help you understand the world around you. I'm
(13:11):
getting a little deep here, anyway, Okay, here we go.
Let's start first with uh culture war stuff. First book.
I want to give you. First person I will introduce
you to is Dr Kimberly Crenshaw, Harvard Grad Law professor
(13:34):
at U c L, A certified g absolutely brilliant black woman.
And the thing about Dr Kimberly Crenshaw is the fact
that you've been hearing her words and people been putting
(13:54):
words in her mouth for the past eight years, which
is crazy because the words that we're putting in her
mouth she wrote many books about and you can just
see what she wrote. There needs to be no mystery
around the things that she came up with, and it
(14:16):
is the leading expert on Dr Kimberly Crenshaw is the
leading expert in critical race theory. We hear CRT. People
have been talking about it and the see this critical
race theory and uh wokeness has been merged together into
(14:37):
one thing, which is absurd. Dr Kimberly Crenshaw in critical
race theory is a law theory. Okay, now I'm gonna
give you some books to read or at least to
listen to, or maybe even just to skim if you
if you don't feel like you could get all the
way into it, you can skim. You know what the
(15:00):
name of the one of the books you could read
that she wrote about critical race theory. It's called critical
Race Theory, the key writings that formed the movement. Yeah,
she wrote a book, y'all. There needs to be no
(15:21):
confusion as to what this means. And when you hearing
your little right wing politicians, your little conservative politicians talk
about how it's a scourge and we don't want to
teach our kids that, you could read what it is
and you could see that I, like almost every other
black person who grew up in the school system, the
(15:45):
American public school system, unless you was in an exceptional
school or had you an exceptional teacher, you ain't know
nothing about this. The extent of what you knew about
your race is that slavery happened, and then Dr Martin
Luther King. That's all we get taught. So for somebody
to tell you you learned critical race theory CD, I
(16:09):
nobody learned. I don't know what that was till college,
and that's because I was at Nick Studies major. It's
a LOWD theory. She has another book that is called
Identities and Inequalities, exploring the intersections of race, class, gender,
(16:33):
and sexuality. Now, this isn't Dr Kimberly Crenshaw. This is
by David Newman, and it's built on some of her work.
The point I'm trying to make is there needs to
be no mystery about what critical race theory is. There's
literally a book about it and multiple books that came
from that. It's like it's and y'all like listen, just
(16:59):
you know, audible, just listen to it. Now for that
book to make sense, you may have to step back
a little further and read something like called the sixteen
nineteen project. Right, um, the year sixteen nineteen. Why that's
so important is it's the the year that the first
African slave set foot in America. It was the essentially
(17:20):
like the beginning of the slave trade, you know what
I'm saying. So there was this whole thing, you know,
when the New York Times tried to do a sixteen
nineteen project during two thousand nineteen, and then that's when
everybody was like, no, sev seventy six project, you know,
all reactionary. Whatever the case may be, at least know
what you're talking about. Here's another caveat. I'm not trying
(17:41):
to tell you that any of this stuff is factual
or true. Or the way you need to see the world.
I'm just trying to say, if everybody talking about the
dangers of critical race, they why don't you learn what
it is and then see maybe they don't know what
the hell they're talking about, which is why somebody like
me most times don't engage when somebody asked me about well,
(18:04):
that's just critical race theory, like, well, you don't know it,
you don't know what that is. So it's a it's
a law theory, a theory about the law. Okay, so
just go check it out. Dr Kimberly Crenshaw Devour everything
she writes. Another book I would recommend is The New
(18:27):
Gym Crow. It's by Michelle Alexander, and it's about, you know,
slave trade to mass incarceration and why mass incarceration is
a thing that the things that are sinister about it,
Like these things are like baselines. This is the background knowledge.
This is like these things when you when when you
(18:49):
hear me talk, right, Uh, these are the types of
things that it's it's almost like if you're watching Game
of Thrones and you've just accepted that dragons exist in
this universe. You're saying and you understand Valerian steal and
(19:10):
you know the Iron Throne, you know, and you just
already know the map, right, and you know the wild
wings in the North Wall. Like if you already know
all that stuff and you're just in the world. But
if somebody just drops in and you're just like, yo,
what the hell is a wildling? It's like I already
know the map, right, you know if I just dropped
(19:33):
you into like a talking story and I was like, oh,
we're gonna go to Rivendale, like what you know what
I'm saying, Like, you gotta know the map already, So
these are things. At least just know the map. Again,
you ain't gotta believe all this stuff. At least know
the map. But these people got our receipts, so you
(19:57):
can at least have your bars up all right now,
this is your These are your law books. Of course,
it's not complete or exhaustive. These are just some suggestions
and you ain't gotta take them all, just you can
pick a few. Next, I want to talk about some
(20:17):
culture books. Let's take a break. M m m all right,
(20:50):
culture books, culture and injustice, I think would be a
good way to put this. One thing you've heard me
mentioned this book before. I highly recommend it. It's called
Simply Justice by Michael Sandow. Okay, it is I think
very I Again, I've talked about this before, but let
me just rehash it. It really helps um frame conversations
(21:14):
when we're talking about what is justice, what is equality?
What is right? Right? And it's it's theoretical, like he
doesn't really take a stance. He just tries to give
you sort of buckets to put your understanding of things.
So he talks about like, if justice means um. I
think I've said this before, but again you need to
hear it. If justice means um the greatest amount of
(21:36):
good for the most amount of people. That's usually like
sort of the liberal and progressive thing to where it's
like you have these big programs that can help the
most people. It's not gonna help everybody because everybody don't
need help, but what is the greatest amount of goods
you could do for the most amount of people. That's
usually a liberal perspective. Then he has that is what's just.
Then he has the staining of like if justice is
(21:57):
like freedom to flourish, where it's like leave me alone,
let me make the right decisions and if I fail,
I fail, and if I succeed, I succeed. But don't
like putting nothing in my way. Just let me do
it right, let me make the right choices. That's more
of a libertarian approach, right, and then the idea of
(22:18):
of the more conservative approach is like justice is what
things ought to be, meaning there is a there is
a right and a wrong, and it's above us and
it is up to us to fit our lives into
whatever that thing is. You know, that's that is what's justice,
That is what's just You You have this idea of
(22:39):
there's a fixed idea of what the world should be,
and we need to submit ourselves to that rather than
we're creating the world that we're in. Right, So what
is justice? And he gives a lot of examples about
that um in this book. So I highly recommend that
So that because I'm telling you this will help you
understand at least the person sitting across from you why
they are outraged about what they're outrage, why they don't
(23:01):
understand when you say, well, I mean, don't send a
cop to a domestic violence thing, you know what I'm saying,
Like you know, or why they're like you know, trans
people shouldn't be in the military. You know, it's like, Okay,
I see why you're saying that. You know what I'm saying,
uh because of their idea of justice or they're just bigoted,
I don't know anyway, So that's what Another book is
(23:24):
called The Sacred Canopy. Now this one is freakishly dense,
but it's about the shaping and the creation of culture.
What even is culture? I think I talked about this
in the Culture Wars uh uh in the Ops episode right,
like what is it? Well? I mean, it's us and
how do you make it? It's very dense, but if
(23:46):
you can even if you can get through like the
first couple of chapters, like I'm telling you, you'll realize
like how silly we sound often everybody because we just
really don't understand our culture is made and where we're
getting our norms. That makes sense. And the last on
this tip is a book called A Different Mirror. It's
(24:08):
very old. I ain't gonna hold you very old, but
sometimes books that are old or out of dated or
some of the takes are kind of like just didn't
age well. It teaches us about culture, period. It teaches
us about where we were. You feel me? Um, can
I get crash with y'all because this is her politics.
(24:29):
And there was a time in hip hop where rappers
would brag about how they don't go down on girls,
that they don't they don't eat the couchie. I know
that's crass. I just need to make a point that
it was considered not hard, not manly. Boy has times changed? YO,
(24:50):
saying like Yo, that take a age? Well, Fam, you
know what I'm saying, uh because uh man listen anyway. Um,
The point I'm trying to make is it gives you
a window into what was going on back then. I
remember the time where rappers will talk about how they
didn't listen to R and B and they don't do
R and B. It's like, oh, y'all niggas don't sing,
(25:13):
y'all don't like girls. Fam, that's what's going on right now. No,
we're hard. I'm like, okay, all right, I guess you
know what I'm saying. Enter Drake one of the biggest
artists in the world. He like R and B. You
feel me? So. So the point is, even with some
of these books that I'm giving you again, like I
keep saying, you ain't gotta take it all. I'm not
(25:34):
saying all of this is like this ain't gospel, you
feel me, But it is any any piece of content
like this is a window into who we are as
a species at that moment of time. It's a snapshot.
It's a polaroid of the way we were thinking about things.
You know what I'm saying. Again, you don't have to
(25:55):
agree with none of the takes. I'm just saying, get
your bars up. So A Different Mirror by Ronald Takaki Um.
It's a book about all of the different sort of
immigrations of all the other ethnic minorities into the America's
(26:15):
it's their stories. It's not just the pilgrims, you know
what I'm saying. So it's just a window into all
these different experiences of people immigrating to America from all
over the world. It's just a good window, you know
what I'm saying. Um. And again, it's very old, so
some of the content is dated, but it it's a
good it's a good anchor snapshot. Another book you could
(26:41):
check out is um, Guns, Germs, and Steel. It's about colonization.
It's asking the question like, Okay, why did Europe go
and conquer all these other places rather than the other
places coming and conquering your were the Spanish concase the
(27:03):
doors a more advanced society. Did they really overpower them?
Was it? It? Was it? Some other stuff? Could it
have been? Maybe something else? So it's a it's an
examination of that. Now again this this book has very
(27:25):
mixed reviews, and it again is also dated. But it's
a good window again into like asking that because I
was a question I asked a bunch of times too.
I was like, man, why why I go this way?
Why Europe going? What? What? What? What was in y'all
that made y'all think you should do this? Is there
(27:46):
such thing as a superior culture? What is what is
high culture? And why would we even use that term?
Goes into stuff like that. And lastly, which is the
probably the most shockingly scary one, is a book called
The Death of Democracy. Now, if you're a fan of
the Bastard's Pod, this book has been used before. And
(28:07):
this book is about the time between uh World War
One and World War Two. It's Vonemar Germany, and it
talks about the trajectory of going from this freakishly progressive
ahead of its time country, but of course it's problems,
(28:31):
but it was way ahead of its time. Vonemar Germany
with with kaiserville Helm in there and there you can
say whatever you want, but do sent into Nazism and
like like, man, what you know what I'm saying that?
(28:51):
And it just examines that. And what sucks is it
looks like, you know, somebody holding a mirror in front
of us. It's pretty freaky. Um, So it's a little scary,
but I'd say take a peek. And last is a
book I just finished listening to. It's a it's a
fiction piece, but it's called Invisible Things. It's super fun.
(29:12):
It's it's it's it's also supposed to be a mirror
to us. But essentially the premises there's a terrari um
like a a human colony fish bowl that's the size
of an American city and its surrounding suburbs living inside
the dome on the moon of on a moon in
(29:34):
Jupiter on Europa, and nobody knows how it got there
and why it's there and how to leave. It's it's
pretty dope because it's and it's like and the the
city and there is just a regular ass American City.
So yeah, I highly recommend that's. Again, it's fiction, but
(29:55):
it's it's supposed to be like a little allegorical for us.
In the biographies, I suggest Frederick Douglas is Frederick Douglas
is a slave who was born a slave and basically
(30:16):
saved America. You think I'm playing. He became super cool
friends with Abraham Lincoln. And the more you understand about
Frederick Douglas and his life, the more you might see that, like, yo,
this man was in Abraham Lincoln's ear who essentially taught
(30:36):
him that the abolition of slavery is the only cause.
Joe said like that, that this is a moral issue
because if you follow Abraham Lincoln's trajectory, he's you know,
he's a dynamic character too, that he was. He didn't
(30:57):
jump on. He's trying to say to you and your money.
He had to be convinced, and he grew and uh
and a lot of his growth was Frederick Douglas. So
I'd say, I'd say, peep that out now. I'm pretty
(31:19):
sure y'all got a list of books too that would
really really help. Oh, I forgot this one. I can't
believe I forgot this one. This one's a biggie. It's
a biggie because it's probably what you might think would
be the opposite of where my stances are. Uh, and
I am with it. Okay. This book is called My
(31:41):
Grandmother's Hands Okay, and it's a book about the privilege
and trauma carried in white bodies. You heard me, white bodies.
This person, this author had been actually giving like trauma
informed therapy to cops and about what's going on in
(32:03):
their bodies and in their their hearts and how if
you are Another therapy book is like if it's called
The Body, Keep Score, um, which is something as a
side note i'd also recommend to. But this this book
is like he's an interviewing cops. Mama told you before
all cops a cab. Okay, well let's let's get in
(32:24):
their brains. I'm gonna leave y'all with this one, because Yo,
you're gonna walk away from that thing, like you know,
the meme of a black dude with his mind blown
leaning back like, oh, that's what this one is. I
was very it. I was shook. Okay. My wife recommended
(32:45):
this one and then she, uh, we did a little
talk on our Patreon about it, and like I'm telling you, dude,
you'd be You'd be surprised how much empathy would grow
in you after you you really understand, um, really, how
how trauma is carried in the body, and also how
(33:12):
the white supremacy project doesn't just hurt non white people,
how it really hurts white people too, and but that
I don't want to get into the book. I want
you all to get into yourself. So here's a bunch
of things. I'll link them in the show notes and yeah,
(33:34):
get your bars up. I know it's a different episode.
But oh, one more book. Read Oliver North's book. Oh yeah,
read his book, all right, y'all Little politics. Yeah, it's here.
(34:03):
Thing was recorded by me Propaganda and he slow Spoil Heights,
Los Angeles, California. This smug was mixed, edited, mastered, and
scored by Matt Ososki. I can totally say his name, guys,
it was it was a stick. He's going by Matt
now again because he got to legal situations with the
name headlights. You know, common used to be called common sense.
(34:25):
You know tip t I was tipped Sometimes it happens.
Executive produced by the One and Only Sophie Lichtman or
Cool Zone Media, and the theme music by the one
and only Gold Tips Gold Tips d J Shawn p
So y'all just remember listening every time you check in.
If you understand city living, you understand politics. We'll see
(34:48):
how next week eight
Host
Prop
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