May 16, 2025 • 12 mins
As Juneteenth approaches, I would like to get ahead of the question I get from y'all on a yearly basis about how to celebrate it appropriately. Basically, y'all be doin too much.
Follow Hood Politics:
https://www.instagram.com/hoodpoliticspod/
Follow Prop:
https://www.instagram.com/prophiphop/
https://www.tiktok.com/@prophiphop
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Media. So I saw this thing on the internet. How
many things in our life start like that? A video
of some sorority sisters doing their black sorority linestepping dance
thing that if you are familiar with black fraternity and sororities,
(00:23):
no big deal. But I kind of didn't know how
I felt about this because these sisters were not black.
Were some sort of persons of color, but they definitely
weren't black. Just kind of left me a little a
little unsure of how I felt about it.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So let's unpack some stuff here, all right. So this
has been a week.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I am in a different location, so if it sounds different,
it's because I'm sitting at my kitchen table because there
was a incredible happening inside our studio, which is just
the back room of my house. I'm like, either I
am in complete misalignment, just completely of the will of God,
or I'm finna get blessings rained down on me because
(01:06):
got Dog finished the Bastard barbecue shot out Scratch Bastard,
probably one of the greatest DJs I've ever met in
my life, and he let me rock there.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
It was a great thing.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
And then I noticed that the carpet in the studio
up under my desk where the sound space is is
sopping wet, and apparently the little copper pipes decided to
break right at the foundation line. So I've been spending
the last few days breaking concrete. I learned a lot. Nevertheless,
he persisted, it has been fixed. I'd like to thank
(01:35):
my Lord it saving Jesus Christ for leading me to
marry into a Mexican family so that I could ask
my brother in Lauchino shout out daxon journey. You know
what I'm saying, for showing up with the journey, showed
up with the tools. I'd ask Dak's questions here and there.
You know what I'm saying, Simmer Simon from East of
the River. It helps, which leads me to the topic
I wanted to cover today, which is about just really
(01:57):
I think, ultimately something called cultural competence tapping in with me.
So y'all may remember during Black History Month, I told
y'all I was not gonna spend any time this Black
(02:17):
History Month educating anyone on blackness. There has been books written,
there's documentaries, there's movies.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
You have the resources. If you want to know, you
can know.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I'm just going to enjoy my blackness and ask questions
of black people, like when are we gonna let go
of this speakerphone thing. It's stuff black people do, but
that's in house. It's none of your business, speaking to
none of your business. There are a few things that
I feel like black people have made into an art form,
which is what makes this next thing something that seems
(02:48):
so intuitive to me. It doesn't seem like something that
you would need to explain. But I think I've examined
why I feel this way, and I've only come up
with a couple answers.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
That I don't know.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
They're kind of anecdotes, but one of which is maybe
there's something about the unique experience that I specifically had
by like growing up in such a multicultural space, not
so much like a lot of people grow up in
melting pots or whatever, or diverse areas, but you don't
really interact with those other cultures.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
They're just your neighbors.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I truly lived tri culturally and shout out rad Mattic
like he was making fun of me for knowing what
the province was bamboo. All these fools have been like, damn,
you might be more Filipino than we are. It's just
because I be in y'all circle. You guys all know
all of the latinos, specifically the Mexican American references the
(03:44):
area I grew up in because I literally have been
with y'all and I'm actually black as hell, And then
you have to we all have to know dominant culture stuff.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Some of that might just be my curiosity, but then
I think there's an element of knowing how to act
when you're in somebody else's house, one of which is
knowing what is my business and is not my business,
and that, my friend, is essential to growing up black.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
You got to know.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
There are so many ways for us to tell you
to mind your business. And something is not my business.
Y'all remember the episode about the Supreme Court. Y'all don't
sign my check nor marinate my chicken, then what you're
doing is not my business. I don't know if that's
I don't know what about our culture values that so much.
But when I tell you stat of grown folks, bis,
when I tell you how your parents drill in you,
(04:41):
some stuff is just not your business.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I feel like you grow up being able.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
To recognize when certain things are When I was up
in Vancouver earlier this year in February, at this like
artists retreat for like faith, art and mental health.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
The lady that was running it gave us this motif.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
She was like, Yo, there's being welcomed, there's being invited in,
and then there's belonging. To me. A good way to
say that is like if I have you over my house.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Yeah, you're you're You're welcome. You're welcome here.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
If I've invited you in, you get refrigerator rights, Like
you can get up and go into the refrigerator. Like
that's you know, you're you're, I'm inviting you in, I
am giving you permission. Belonging is like you ain't even
got a knock. This experience would not be the same
without you, Like something is missing if you are not here.
That's belonging. You're supposed to be here and hopefully that's
(05:35):
like should be the goal of humanity anyway. Now, as
Juneteenth approaches, the question I get every year, generally from
white people, but sometimes there's variations, is how should you
celebrate June teen? Sometimes I give suggestions, But in light
of this video, let me fall back and talk about
a bigger thing now, there's questions around the N word
(05:56):
that you ask ten different Black people, you gonna get
ten different answers. Trust me, I'm going somewhere with this,
and it's important, especially in light of these white South
Africans that just got here apparently being oppressed, and their
oppression is different than everybody else's oppression. There is an
acceptable oppression in relation to our president. Molly has done
(06:18):
an amazing I don't know, twenty part series on Weird
Little Guys about this white South African genocide, which is
a spoiler alert, not actually happening. But let's just say
you're a non black person, white person, you grew up
in black neighborhoods, grew up with black families, and maybe
among the homies, they have no problem with you using
(06:39):
the N word. Now, the cultural competency is to know
the difference between welcoming and belonging. If you truly knew
who we were and understood what we went through, you
would understand that even with that pass, that the past
is non transferable. To me, that seems like a no brainer.
There's a relation. You have to earn that with every
(07:00):
new group of black people, because you truly understand what
it means to be one of us. That is a
cultural competency to me. So I don't know those ladies
or the connection they may have to a black sorority.
They might be a chapter of one. I don't know that.
That's why I said I don't know how I feel
about it. I'd have to do some more investigation. They
(07:23):
are not the point of this discussion. The point of
this discussion is asked answering your question about how you
should participate in Juneteenth and in any other cultural celebrations.
I live five to ten minutes from Monterey Park. Is
the northern part of East Los Angeles, which is I
don't know. I would venture to say one hundred percent Asian,
specifically Chinese. I would venture to say that is probably
(07:45):
the largest population. I'm not checking any of this information.
That is the center of the Chinese American community in
Los Angeles. It's like their Boyle Heights. Every year they
do a Chinese New Year celebration. Now, when I used
to work in Diamond Bar, this is a very la statement.
It's also a large Asian population. You know, parents would
(08:10):
like bring the little red envelope with twenty dollars. You know,
they would dress up, they would do their thing, and
and it was great. I appreciated them inviting me into
the experience, but I kind of knew what was my
business and not my business. I will go to the
Chinese New Year celebration. Sure, I'm gonna bring my kids.
(08:30):
We'll watch the dragons walk by. It'll be a great time.
We'll eat dumplings. But the thought has never crossed my
mind to put on an outfit and get up under
that dragon, because that's not my business.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
That's y'all's business.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Now, if you particularly say, hey, I want you to
handle this, if you walk up to me specifically at
hand me a sparkle and say, okay, way a bit
like this, that is because you specifically right now invited
me in. But I still understand there are certain things
that are none of my business. While I feel very
connected to many cultures, I just understand there are certain
(09:05):
conversations that are just not mine to have. There's some
cultural expressions that are ancestral you, that are sacred to
that community, and some stuff is meant to be shared.
But either way, it's not my position to make them
share things that they may find sacred. Some things come
(09:25):
out of joy, some things come out of oppression, and
some things are just that.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Family.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
The point is, I'm cognizant enough to understand that there
are some things that are just off limits for me
because I don't have the sweat hour. I feel the
same thing about being black. There are certain things that
no one on this earth will understand if they did
not walk, if they don't walk through this world in
a black body, especially in America, there are certain things
(09:51):
that we have created out of our need for survival.
You know why there are HBCUs, it's because colleges were segregated.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
We had to do that.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Why the parts of the pig that we eat is
because that's all y'all would give us. Why our neighborhoods
look the way they look, redlining y'all made us be
over here. These were things that came out of our
oppression of Sure, we made treasure out of our trash.
Sure we made beauty out of chaos. And there are
certain things that we just give and freely and invite
(10:23):
y'all into a lot of that is our music. We
invite you into our music. Please enjoy, sit down, sit
a spell.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Have fun.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
There are things about our music that I've said many
times about being black. It's truly a meritocracy. If you
can sang, you can sang. I have a homegirl that
wrote a poem about she saw this white lady singing
wade in the water and her The reframe in the
poem was what water? What water are you waiting in?
You have to understand where that song came from. This
(10:51):
is about I mean, wade in the water. God's going
to trouble the water. There's a lot of things happening here.
There's a reference to Jesus performing a miracle. There's us
traveling among river lines to get to cross the Mason
Dixon through the underground railroad. There's the waters of us
(11:11):
crossing the Atlantic Ocean and actually surviving. You know some
of our ancestors who decided they would take the ocean
over slavery. When we talk about wading in the water,
there's a depth of pain to this, and if you
truly love us, you would know that you didn't experience this.
So my encouragement this year is just pull back and
(11:35):
say where am I welcomed? What am I invited to?
And where do I be long walking into any cultural situation.
That's all I ask. So listen, put your Jim Bay
drums away, take off that damn daishiki. You look ridiculous
and had us played a barbecue, enjoyed this catfish and
(11:57):
listen to the speeches and dance awkwardly when the DJ starts.
You're welcome. I don't know those sorority sisters. I don't
know their history. They're not the point. All I'm saying is,
have some antendants tap in with me
Media. So I saw this thing on the internet. How
many things in our life start like that? A video
of some sorority sisters doing their black sorority linestepping dance
thing that if you are familiar with black fraternity and sororities,
(00:23):
no big deal. But I kind of didn't know how
I felt about this because these sisters were not black.
Were some sort of persons of color, but they definitely
weren't black. Just kind of left me a little a
little unsure of how I felt about it.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
So let's unpack some stuff here, all right. So this
has been a week.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
I am in a different location, so if it sounds different,
it's because I'm sitting at my kitchen table because there
was a incredible happening inside our studio, which is just
the back room of my house. I'm like, either I
am in complete misalignment, just completely of the will of God,
or I'm finna get blessings rained down on me because
(01:06):
got Dog finished the Bastard barbecue shot out Scratch Bastard,
probably one of the greatest DJs I've ever met in
my life, and he let me rock there.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
It was a great thing.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
And then I noticed that the carpet in the studio
up under my desk where the sound space is is
sopping wet, and apparently the little copper pipes decided to
break right at the foundation line. So I've been spending
the last few days breaking concrete. I learned a lot. Nevertheless,
he persisted, it has been fixed. I'd like to thank
(01:35):
my Lord it saving Jesus Christ for leading me to
marry into a Mexican family so that I could ask
my brother in Lauchino shout out daxon journey. You know
what I'm saying, for showing up with the journey, showed
up with the tools. I'd ask Dak's questions here and there.
You know what I'm saying, Simmer Simon from East of
the River. It helps, which leads me to the topic
I wanted to cover today, which is about just really
(01:57):
I think, ultimately something called cultural competence tapping in with me.
So y'all may remember during Black History Month, I told
y'all I was not gonna spend any time this Black
(02:17):
History Month educating anyone on blackness. There has been books written,
there's documentaries, there's movies.
Speaker 2 (02:24):
You have the resources. If you want to know, you
can know.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I'm just going to enjoy my blackness and ask questions
of black people, like when are we gonna let go
of this speakerphone thing. It's stuff black people do, but
that's in house. It's none of your business, speaking to
none of your business. There are a few things that
I feel like black people have made into an art form,
which is what makes this next thing something that seems
(02:48):
so intuitive to me. It doesn't seem like something that
you would need to explain. But I think I've examined
why I feel this way, and I've only come up
with a couple answers.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
That I don't know.
Speaker 1 (03:00):
They're kind of anecdotes, but one of which is maybe
there's something about the unique experience that I specifically had
by like growing up in such a multicultural space, not
so much like a lot of people grow up in
melting pots or whatever, or diverse areas, but you don't
really interact with those other cultures.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
They're just your neighbors.
Speaker 1 (03:24):
I truly lived tri culturally and shout out rad Mattic
like he was making fun of me for knowing what
the province was bamboo. All these fools have been like, damn,
you might be more Filipino than we are. It's just
because I be in y'all circle. You guys all know
all of the latinos, specifically the Mexican American references the
(03:44):
area I grew up in because I literally have been
with y'all and I'm actually black as hell, And then
you have to we all have to know dominant culture stuff.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
Anyway.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Some of that might just be my curiosity, but then
I think there's an element of knowing how to act
when you're in somebody else's house, one of which is
knowing what is my business and is not my business,
and that, my friend, is essential to growing up black.
Speaker 2 (04:14):
You got to know.
Speaker 1 (04:17):
There are so many ways for us to tell you
to mind your business. And something is not my business.
Y'all remember the episode about the Supreme Court. Y'all don't
sign my check nor marinate my chicken, then what you're
doing is not my business. I don't know if that's
I don't know what about our culture values that so much.
But when I tell you stat of grown folks, bis,
when I tell you how your parents drill in you,
(04:41):
some stuff is just not your business.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I feel like you grow up being able.
Speaker 1 (04:45):
To recognize when certain things are When I was up
in Vancouver earlier this year in February, at this like
artists retreat for like faith, art and mental health.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
The lady that was running it gave us this motif.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
She was like, Yo, there's being welcomed, there's being invited in,
and then there's belonging. To me. A good way to
say that is like if I have you over my house.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Yeah, you're you're You're welcome. You're welcome here.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
If I've invited you in, you get refrigerator rights, Like
you can get up and go into the refrigerator. Like
that's you know, you're you're, I'm inviting you in, I
am giving you permission. Belonging is like you ain't even
got a knock. This experience would not be the same
without you, Like something is missing if you are not here.
That's belonging. You're supposed to be here and hopefully that's
(05:35):
like should be the goal of humanity anyway. Now, as
Juneteenth approaches, the question I get every year, generally from
white people, but sometimes there's variations, is how should you
celebrate June teen? Sometimes I give suggestions, But in light
of this video, let me fall back and talk about
a bigger thing now, there's questions around the N word
(05:56):
that you ask ten different Black people, you gonna get
ten different answers. Trust me, I'm going somewhere with this,
and it's important, especially in light of these white South
Africans that just got here apparently being oppressed, and their
oppression is different than everybody else's oppression. There is an
acceptable oppression in relation to our president. Molly has done
(06:18):
an amazing I don't know, twenty part series on Weird
Little Guys about this white South African genocide, which is
a spoiler alert, not actually happening. But let's just say
you're a non black person, white person, you grew up
in black neighborhoods, grew up with black families, and maybe
among the homies, they have no problem with you using
(06:39):
the N word. Now, the cultural competency is to know
the difference between welcoming and belonging. If you truly knew
who we were and understood what we went through, you
would understand that even with that pass, that the past
is non transferable. To me, that seems like a no brainer.
There's a relation. You have to earn that with every
(07:00):
new group of black people, because you truly understand what
it means to be one of us. That is a
cultural competency to me. So I don't know those ladies
or the connection they may have to a black sorority.
They might be a chapter of one. I don't know that.
That's why I said I don't know how I feel
about it. I'd have to do some more investigation. They
(07:23):
are not the point of this discussion. The point of
this discussion is asked answering your question about how you
should participate in Juneteenth and in any other cultural celebrations.
I live five to ten minutes from Monterey Park. Is
the northern part of East Los Angeles, which is I
don't know. I would venture to say one hundred percent Asian,
specifically Chinese. I would venture to say that is probably
(07:45):
the largest population. I'm not checking any of this information.
That is the center of the Chinese American community in
Los Angeles. It's like their Boyle Heights. Every year they
do a Chinese New Year celebration. Now, when I used
to work in Diamond Bar, this is a very la statement.
It's also a large Asian population. You know, parents would
(08:10):
like bring the little red envelope with twenty dollars. You know,
they would dress up, they would do their thing, and
and it was great. I appreciated them inviting me into
the experience, but I kind of knew what was my
business and not my business. I will go to the
Chinese New Year celebration. Sure, I'm gonna bring my kids.
(08:30):
We'll watch the dragons walk by. It'll be a great time.
We'll eat dumplings. But the thought has never crossed my
mind to put on an outfit and get up under
that dragon, because that's not my business.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
That's y'all's business.
Speaker 1 (08:44):
Now, if you particularly say, hey, I want you to
handle this, if you walk up to me specifically at
hand me a sparkle and say, okay, way a bit
like this, that is because you specifically right now invited
me in. But I still understand there are certain things
that are none of my business. While I feel very
connected to many cultures, I just understand there are certain
(09:05):
conversations that are just not mine to have. There's some
cultural expressions that are ancestral you, that are sacred to
that community, and some stuff is meant to be shared.
But either way, it's not my position to make them
share things that they may find sacred. Some things come
(09:25):
out of joy, some things come out of oppression, and
some things are just that.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
Family.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
The point is, I'm cognizant enough to understand that there
are some things that are just off limits for me
because I don't have the sweat hour. I feel the
same thing about being black. There are certain things that
no one on this earth will understand if they did
not walk, if they don't walk through this world in
a black body, especially in America, there are certain things
(09:51):
that we have created out of our need for survival.
You know why there are HBCUs, it's because colleges were segregated.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
We had to do that.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Why the parts of the pig that we eat is
because that's all y'all would give us. Why our neighborhoods
look the way they look, redlining y'all made us be
over here. These were things that came out of our
oppression of Sure, we made treasure out of our trash.
Sure we made beauty out of chaos. And there are
certain things that we just give and freely and invite
(10:23):
y'all into a lot of that is our music. We
invite you into our music. Please enjoy, sit down, sit
a spell.
Speaker 2 (10:29):
Have fun.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
There are things about our music that I've said many
times about being black. It's truly a meritocracy. If you
can sang, you can sang. I have a homegirl that
wrote a poem about she saw this white lady singing
wade in the water and her The reframe in the
poem was what water? What water are you waiting in?
You have to understand where that song came from. This
(10:51):
is about I mean, wade in the water. God's going
to trouble the water. There's a lot of things happening here.
There's a reference to Jesus performing a miracle. There's us
traveling among river lines to get to cross the Mason
Dixon through the underground railroad. There's the waters of us
(11:11):
crossing the Atlantic Ocean and actually surviving. You know some
of our ancestors who decided they would take the ocean
over slavery. When we talk about wading in the water,
there's a depth of pain to this, and if you
truly love us, you would know that you didn't experience this.
So my encouragement this year is just pull back and
(11:35):
say where am I welcomed? What am I invited to?
And where do I be long walking into any cultural situation.
That's all I ask. So listen, put your Jim Bay
drums away, take off that damn daishiki. You look ridiculous
and had us played a barbecue, enjoyed this catfish and
(11:57):
listen to the speeches and dance awkwardly when the DJ starts.
You're welcome. I don't know those sorority sisters. I don't
know their history. They're not the point. All I'm saying is,
have some antendants tap in with me
Host
Prop
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Ridiculous History
History is beautiful, brutal and, often, ridiculous. Join Ben Bowlin and Noel Brown as they dive into some of the weirdest stories from across the span of human civilization in Ridiculous History, a podcast by iHeartRadio.