May 10, 2022 • 58 mins
Is TikTok secretly making Black people bad at dancing? Langston and guest, Boston rapper Michael Christmas delve into the truth behind trending TikTok dances and how they affect Black culture.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Yeah, there's there's a couple of day smooths that I've seen. Um,
somebody this wild ship the day I can't remember girl,
A little bit of this left, but the listeners at home,
he meant it, he really is. He's taking it straight today. Yeah,
because it wasn't like that much left. Like it wasn't
(00:22):
that much love. It's half a bottom ship, racist money stuff.
(00:47):
I can't tell me. Yep, yep, yep. There it is.
There it is. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another phenomenal
episode of My Mama Told Me, the podcast where we
dive deep, deep into the pockets of black conspiracy theories
and we finally work to prove that the p Intaj
(01:09):
p Henson stands for boy don't play with me. You
know that's what that p is for. You know, Toraj
is saying something sassy from start to finishing that goddamn name.
And we love you to rise, you big fan. If
you ever want to come here and talk some bullshit,
you're welcome this. Sometimes the conspiracies that I spread about
people are harmless. I think this is a pretty harmless one. Sometimes,
(01:32):
like us people of murder and mayhem, But mostly, you know,
you run out and you just make fun of names
and ships. Sup. We're hoping that this is gonna be
a murder conspiracy that I can believe all days. Well,
I'm sorry to disappoint. I guess at least brutality murder
(01:54):
that's actually a pretty good one. Quille O'Neill, for those
of you that don't know, did volunteer after his NBA
career to become a sheriff and and I guess brutalized
the local people in his community. And the possibility that
Shaquille O'Neill killed someone seems pretty high. Yeah, for sure,
(02:15):
he's seven ft eighteen, there's no question with the gun.
He's RoboCop Bro's. Yeah, he's also not a sheriff anymore. So.
It feels like some sort of dishonorable discharged situation, right
because they didn't give him like a medal of honor
when he retired from it feels like he crushed someone's
(02:35):
skull like a great and then they were just like, hey, Shack,
you can't come back here no more. Man. He was
acting like Batman. Yeah, and Bro, we're big fans of
your work, but this ain't gonna work out. You gotta
leave man, you can't knock and take ahead. Well, this
is we've really broken the fourth wall here. We we
didn't do the intro the way intros are meant to
(02:57):
be done, but fuck it, we'll do it live. My
guest today, he's phenomenal. He's an amazing musician, talented artist,
he's a comedian of sorts. He does all this ship.
I love him. Please give it up for my guest,
Mr Michael christ Man. I'm drinking what we're talking about.
(03:19):
What a bold way to come back. Hell yeah, I'm
I'm so excited you're here because you came with a
conspiracy theory that I think I bought into. Like I don't.
I don't know that I've done enough research to know
for sure. But I saw it and I was like,
(03:41):
this guy is saying something. This is this is legit.
I've been thinking about it and it's it feels like
it has like a level of legitimacy to it. And
I won't hold it up. You said, my mama told
me tis secretly trying to make black people bad at dancing. Yes, bro, Yes,
(04:08):
I've had this thought for a long time to like this.
It's it's really kismet that you happen to have a
podcast where you talk about ship like this with no
facts if necessary, because I'm like, man, what a perfect
platform for me to come and discuss how I feel
about this. Yeah, and I should let our our listeners
(04:28):
know that you were You were so enthusiastic about it
that you hit me up and you were like, dog,
I'm sitting on something, what's up? And I was already
thinking about having you as a guest, but then once
you hit me with the conspiracy theory, it felt like, oh,
we have to do this now immediately. Yes, thank you
for allowing me. Yes, TikTok is secretly trying to make
(04:51):
trying to make people black people bad at dancing. Bro,
I see the signs, So tell me more. Give me
the full breakdown of where you discovered the what's making
you feel that way. Let's let's really dive in deep here. Okay.
I think what it started this whole thought process was like,
I know you've seen them now, The TikTok dances all arms.
(05:14):
You know what I'm saying. It's all very stiff boom
pop boo. It's like the mediocre cheerleading squad level of dancing.
But these dances are becoming so popular that now you're
seeing like adults do them because they're popular and you
can get fuse off. So now people are incorporating them.
(05:34):
And when you spend so much time doing this little
stupid ass move, this move get you get used to it,
and then you go outside and then you go to
the club and some good ship is playing and you
start doing TikTok dances. Now now it's spreading right now
all the kids. The kids are on what TikTok? So
our children are growing up with no rhythm. It's it's
it's just it's a massive wipe out and and it
(05:56):
speaks to bigger things. But to start, yes, we're gonna
be bad to dancing if you don't get it together.
I like what you're saying because it reminds me of
a video I saw and it was probably like a
year ago where Jason Derulo I think, was in Vegas
and he was performing and he had like an ensemble
of bad bitches standing beside him while he performed TikTok dances,
(06:19):
and it was a bunch of adults in the crowd
being like, is this naked doing TikTok dancers like you
do regular dance, Jason bro It's not like Jason Derulo
is a bad dancer. He's a pretty good dancer. He's
a fucking loser in a lot of ways, but he's
(06:40):
a god. He's a great fighter, and he's a great dancer.
He's a winner in a lot of ways too. That's
the that part about Jason Derulo. I would love to
hate on Jason Derulo, but then Jason Derulo pull up. Yeah, listen,
I would not say that to Jason Derulo's face. That
motherfucker is big for no reason. I'm trying to go away,
Jameson and the Rulo about to go and well you
(07:03):
gotta start doing TikTok dances in public exactly selling my
soul and see it. But to that point, it was
a a very visceral reaction from the crowd of being like,
this is bad dancing in person. I'm sure whatever it
looks like on the internet is a different conversation, but objectively,
it looks terrible when you're just standing in front of us,
(07:26):
like you said, moving elbows and arms instead of the
thing is it's meant for kids. These challenges are for
eight year olds to do during spring break when they're
at the crib. They're not They're not to be done
by grown people with you know what I'm saying. But
they get you so many views that you as a
fucking forty year old nurse and like, on my break,
(07:46):
I'm about to try to get my TikTok numbers up
and then boom, now you're hitting that ship, you know,
looking crazy. If somebody's walking by and seeing that, do
you think that that this because I I honestly I
feel like this question is almost jumping ahead of where
we're at. But I'm curious because you're talking about it.
Do you think this is an unbeatable challenge? Not to
(08:11):
to make it a pun and ship, but like, is
this is this an unbeatable challenge being presented in front
of us where we are, no matter what, going to
end up becoming bad dancers because of TikTok culture. It's
tough to say. On the one hand, yes, you can
get hell of views by doing these awful dances. You
don't need to do anything else, would do exactly what
(08:32):
they did in the other video, and you're just gonna
pick up steam. On the flip side, what it really
is is about, like this is stuff we're supposed to
know how to do right. All these good dance moves
that we do have, the wobble, the electric slide. This
is stuff that like I don't remember how I learned it,
but I knew it. So partially we have to combat
(08:56):
this with teaching people dances because even you see our TikTok,
they're jerking now, they're trying to lean with it, rock
with and doing our dances from when I was a kid,
and they're not doing them right either. So it's like
it's like, raise your kids. You need where where's the
Casper slide? Man? We need a part part four, Part five.
You gotta save the community. We need the DJs at
(09:19):
the basketball birthday parties to come out and to do
with the trends. You know what I'm saying. And he's him,
he's hitting moves. Bobby Brown used to do dance moves.
That's what we need more of. But you know, anybody,
everybody's looking at their phones. Nobody wants to. Nobody wants
to use their legs. You got to use your Nobody
wants to. All these videos are waste up. They don't
(09:39):
even know that you could do ship with your legs
because it's all waste s up on it. So, Okay,
you're seeing this, you you are, You're recognizing a problem
that's happening. Are you now hitting the streets. Are you
becoming a prophet of this truth? Are you indifferent to
(10:01):
this this sort of like wave that's taking over? Do
you know what I mean? I feel like the Hughey
Freeman of this in the sense that nobody else really
feels me the way I feel me on this saying
like nobody thinks that there's a devastating effect in the
future to this. It's just like the kids doing dances,
you know what I'm saying, but that adults are doing
(10:23):
the dances though, And I don't have a problem with
adults dancing either. The problem is you look silly, and
you're gonna make your kids look silly and twenty years
and they're like, remember twenty years ago and this was
the move. You know, it's just not you know, we
whatever to Also, it doesn't matter, And I will say,
take that gives a lot of access to other ship
I didn't know, like how to put on toilet paper
(10:45):
rolls easy and stupid and ship like that. That stuff
is extremely helpful. But yeah, the dancing it's gonna cause
it's gonna it's a ripple effect, you know, it's a
it's snowball effect. Well, that's that's I think at the
core of the question I want to ask you is
what do you think the ultimate ripple effect is? If
this is full butterfly effect, where are you seeing this
little like you know, wing flap ultimately landing the avalanche.
(11:10):
I think part of my big worry is also rooted
in the fact that this may also just be a
thing that happens to every generation where I'm worried that
erasure is about to happen to the things or like
washing it or like cornballing the things that I'm used
to and the things that I know. And then I realized,
(11:30):
like Brome, I just like an old head, is that
was actually the issue? Or you know what I'm saying.
And then you started to think, damn. When I was
listening to like you know and my parents thought it
was whack? Was it whack? And He's like, nah, it
wasn't wet, But like, yeah, that's the thing. Is like
part of me is like it's a racier and part
of me is like I'm overreacting and it's just me
(11:50):
getting older and not understanding. Well, that was my fear
when I because I immediately, like I said, latched onto
this being a a possible truth. But then another part
of me was like, man, you you're the kids dad.
You're truly an old man yelling about your blood. If
(12:11):
this is where your heart lives, Like maybe they're bad
at dancing or maybe they're fucking phenomenal at dancing, and
I'll never find out because I'm not doing the arm moves,
you know what I mean. Like this might be the
hardest arm hard is moves that anybody can do, and
I'm truly not I'm so much a coward i won't
even try it. They're not they're not hard, but we
(12:31):
can try it if you want. But they're not hard.
I can see that they're not hard because I had
to learn how to jerk and heel toe and do
ship like that stuff that was very difficult to do.
And that's all. That's all I want, Just some like
the last dance that I think that was created that
was cool. It was like the shoot dance that like
a black dude that like a black person at the
crib in his neighborhood. You know, I'm saying broke with
(12:56):
the homies made that dancing ain't got big And that's
a part of it too. It's like the organic ship
like these what you know what I'm saying, who's coming
up with this? And how's it happening? You know what
I'm saying, like pose to Alright, So what I'll say
is that, uh, that sideways moonwalk thing that's that's circulating
that ship is hard fun with that sadeways moonwalk. I
(13:17):
think there are dances out there that I do. Go, okay,
listen to your point. There's a chance that people are
still striving to make cool stuff and like add to
the culture. The frustrating part of it becomes how much
of that is being I guess sort of buried under
a bunch of other sort of like bullshit. Yeah. Well,
(13:39):
one thing that made me feel like the official oldest
nigga around the other day was like this dance moved
the Gritty and the Memphis Grizzlies simply John Muren hit
the hole every time they win a game, and somebody
put a video but Michael Jackson, I don't remember which
Michael Jackson video is, but he's doing that ship all
through the village just sucking. It was like, damn, Michael
Jackson was hitting the gritty early. Either he's a time
(14:01):
traveler or he invented all the dance moves, and like
he invented all the dance moves and he did all
of them. If you see if you see it tomorrow
and you've never seen it before, you've seen Mike doing still. Yeah,
we're just all doing variations of things Mike did. And
he was like, I'm not gonna keep doing that. That's
not the problem is I'm mad niggas is not doing
Michael Jackson stuff. No more like trying to dance like
(14:24):
Michael Jackson. I don't know if you want to end
that sentence where you ended that sentence, Nick starn't doing
Michael Jackson stuff. I don't know. We all my mama
told me, I'm mad Nick is not doing Michael Jackson.
What a way to go into a commercial break. I
(14:46):
love it. We're gonna take a break. We'll be back
with more Michael Christmas and more, my mama told me.
And we are back. Yeah, we're back here with more
(15:08):
Michael Christmas more. My mama told me. We're still talking
about the possibility that TikTok is destroying the black dances.
It's taking dance culture away from our our black youth
and really families and and and society as a whole.
Do you think that there is, I guess, a way
(15:30):
to to introduce the legs to TikTok. Is there a
way that we can start to make this more of
of a reassessment of what is valuable on these apps?
I think I don't have the research on this, I
didn't do any but I feel I feel like there
are a lot of black creators on TikTok who, for
(15:52):
whatever reasons, are not being pushed to the forefront. That's
That's one if I was actually gonna walk up to
the doors and be like hey he Aside from that,
I think the main issue is the leveling of the
dancing playing field. You know what I'm saying. TikTok will
have you believe we all can dance at the same level.
(16:12):
This is incorrect. Niggas is dancing. They ask off in
other places, but you'll never see it because they're not
the cracking this niggas on TikTok. Yeah, so it's interesting
that that's that that's your interpretation because it aligns pretty
well with a lot of what I read about sort
of like what's happening with TikTok. There there are a
crazy amount of articles the people who are very angry
(16:34):
at TikTok or at least assessing what's happening in TikTok,
not just in terms of dance but also music as
a whole. They're real worried about what TikTok is doing
to the music industry and to dance culture. Yeah, yeah,
and that's the That's the other thing I think, aside
from like the old head of Ratio theme is like
it is scary to think that, bro. Like like the
(16:54):
video of Shorty repping with the bud light that went viral,
I don't know. I still I still didn't actually watched
the video for real. I just keep seeing it moving
all my timeline and being like, I'm about to watch this,
but she knew all the words. It went up because
she knew all the words, and like that level of like,
that's not impressive. It's not impressive. But then on the
(17:16):
other end, I do think we create this dangerous space
where we then go, bitch, that's not impressive. You we
shouldn't celebrate this and it's like, yeah, but you're just
telling everybody to go watch the motherfucker when you do
that exactly exactly, And that's my kind of my point
is like the pumping, because you know what I'm saying,
TikTok is the I think probably the number one have
(17:38):
to get followers and used you follow, you follow the
trend and you get followers and views, you know what
I'm saying, And everybody can't spend on the goddamn hit
what you're saying everybody, But what everybody and understand I'm
saying everybody can do is these whack dances, which gives
(18:00):
at playing field the level it needs to put the
hump over people who are actually very talented. And to
the original point you were making, which I think is
one that a lot of these articles sort of address,
is that everybody can do these dances, but TikTok intentionally
amplifies the voices and the dances of specific users, so
(18:22):
they are why while there are a million people learning
to do this ship, only eight people are truly getting
like the TikTok bump and saying like, yo, Addison Ray,
you are the face of these dances or the face
of these things that are very often not created by
the people that TikTok is choosing to amplify. And also
(18:44):
on the on the back to the petty side, like
I'm sick of hearing really good songs get remixed like
five six songs in because of a challenge, like I
want to hear DMX do it, God damn it, yeah,
kick yeah, yeah, don't let me enjoy the song that
(19:06):
it was meant to actually be. Fuck you know what?
Really and this I did not think about this until
this conversation, but it reminds me a lot of like, uh,
that Harlem shake ship. I was going to say, that's
the beginning of this, yeah, of all of this is
that that's the first thing where black young people from
(19:27):
the hood create something and then it's a phrase. But
when you go google Harlem shake, it's not is not
gonna come up. None of them boys that were killing
it in that video are involved anymore going to come up.
And that's what's happening to like everything, And what bugs me,
I think, especially with that one, is that like literally
(19:48):
it has nothing to do with the Harlem shake, you
know what I mean? Like there is if you were
if you were fucking using a bad boy song. If
you were like you even using elements of the thing
that made the thing, then maybe there's a level of
this that I can negotiate with. I don't want to,
but I can hear it out. But it truly was
(20:09):
them just being like, we're gonna use the words you
like and then make a completely different thing that has
nothing to do with it. Yeah, I'm saying and and
it's all you know, my spiraling and the thought process
of this brought me to like thinking about damn like
people using my god damn vernacular, taking the songs that
I love that I grew up with, made by people
(20:30):
that's poor because they don't even own the motherfucker's and
taking them and enrich off of them because you did
a dance to it in a nice little house. Like
you know what I'm saying, these spirrows then get me
the star treatment where I'm like, god damn, this is
all a part of the same thing. Well, no, I
think that's a hundred percent correct, And frankly, it's something
that I I think we've talked about a little bit
on the podcast before, but there is now a big
(20:52):
push from from young people to say that there is
no longer that the way that they speak on the
Internet is Internet talk, and it that there is no
longer like ebonics or a A V. Whatever you decide
to call it, like African American vernacular is gone. It's
just how the Internet speaks. And that's crazy. It's dangerous
(21:13):
because those small passes turn into big passes turned into
you know what I'm saying, somebody being able to go
put on the brownest possible shade of makeup from fucking
Serbia and put on curly hair and it's cool. It's
cool because this is just style. This isn't braids isn't
isn't for anybody people was wearing braids like like, guess
(21:35):
my fucking ass right, you don't need to protective. You
know what the you're doing, like you know what to do.
And it feels like laughing in my face. And this
is why it overall, just be like stop doing this
ship because then it starts to spiral and I'm like,
maybe I'm just a crazy nig in the house. No,
but I think I look, I'm a crazy nig in
(21:56):
the different house because I I hear what you're saying
and it feels correct to me that like, while I
don't want to be an old man yelling about young
people and what they should be doing with like their
bodies and dances, at some point we do have to
acknowledge there is a danger and just allowing culture to
become blanketed where like everybody can access anything at any time,
(22:17):
because part of what makes culture matter is it is
a lived experience for people that like they truly are
a part of these things, like the fact that that
that white girl knows little baby doesn't bug me, but
the idea that like, then a bunch of people are
giving her some version of like a hood pass because
the bitch can wrap little baby. This bich is good
(22:39):
with me wherever. And then you find out, you know
when three years ago she said, and then this little
nigga on Twitter, and then you're like, oh no, yeah,
why did I Why was I okay with this where
you loved it when when light like he was a
But then it's also like, yo, why do we need
I don't need a new teammate. What I'm saying like,
(23:00):
I don't. I got all the homies unkned, like I
got the homies I need, And for sure, I definitely
don't need somebody else coming to eat food at my
fucking cookout. Like, I don't even know why that is
the thing, right, Look, we have a very specific amount
of food here at this cookout. Dirty dirty hamburgers, thirty
how dogs, none of them. It's for you. This bitch
(23:24):
gonna come and she's gonna ask for mayonnaise. And now
what now? Now where are we? You know, it's stressed
me out because I don't want the kids to allow
ship to slide because they think it's cool. Because we
live in that world, and that's where the ultimate danger
is from, is like the kids being like, no, it's cool, pup.
They we all say nigga, Like that was a long
(23:44):
time ago. It's like, no, we don't all say nigga.
We all say nigga. What I'm saying. Yeah, you talked
about this a little bit in the beginning, and I
do think that this is a really important detail that
that I don't want us to just skip over. But
in the research that I was doing or the reading
I was doing, one of the things that they talked
about because I wanted to know why do TikTok dances
(24:07):
look specifically the way that they do, And like you said,
part of it is that the videos are shot vertically,
which is the way that they have to show up
for the app to look normal whatever the fun. And
so because they're shot vertically and for you to be
actually be able to see who the person is, they
have to do it from a certain distance, which means
that they have to cut off their legs. Often sometimes
(24:28):
people figure out ways to do it where they get
their whole body in it. Yeah, exactly, but for the
most part, off your cell phone, you kind of have
to cut off a portion of your body, which is
why they isolate in the arms. And then the other
detail that I think is really important, as they say
that the reason that the arm movements are so sort
of tight into the body is because you have to
(24:49):
keep it inside of the frame, so you can't reach
your arms all the way out extend them fully, because
then they'll be out of the frame and then you
don't get to see the entirety of the moves. So
it really is like a very strategic structure to say, like, Yo,
this is how you can dance and still make it
a well crafted video. Bro. People you just said they
(25:12):
put niggas in a box. Oh ship people, you just said,
brot niggas in a box. You can't move past these parameters.
And now when you're out, you're doing the same dances
and you're still not moving past these parameters. WHOA all right,
So that's how they get okay, yeah, that's crazy because
(25:33):
now we're doing like yeah, fuck all right, that's put
niggas in a box. There are sometimes when metaphors ain't metaphors,
do you know what I mean? When they just they're
just worried. It's just what happened, because your phone is
it's literally what's happening. And somebody's gonna call it a
beta because they don't want to process it. But come on, y'all,
(25:56):
Michael Christmas just woke you the funk up. If niggers
at home just like me, like bro, he's talking bro.
So one of the things that they also talk about,
and this this is something you addressed, is that because
they do and some of these articles talk about the
fact that the dancing is technically not always great, right
(26:17):
that like plenty of the people who are stars on
these apps are not probably great dancers per se. And
one of the things that they said is that TikTok
isn't about talent. Necessarily, TikTok is about enthusiasm and energy,
and so one of the things that they're tracking is
that the the people who are successful in the app
(26:37):
are dressed well. They're giving off a cool vibe and energy,
and that is driving people to want to see more
of their videos much more than whether or not they
can hit the dougie the douggist. You know what I mean.
Let me say this you you sort of talked about
this on another episode where you talked about Jay Hoover. Okay, yeah, yeah, TikTok.
(26:58):
TikTok is the g men bro. It's just following the
it's Abricambie and Fitch bro. It's just like, this is
what we want to show, so we could get more this. Yes,
And I think to that point when they say energy
and they say vibes, they're selecting that energy and vibes
based off of the ship that they like. Yeah, they
(27:20):
want a nice crib right like from the sun hitting
you because you've got a high apartment saying like that.
There's rules to this ship. You can't be in a
dark crib and being on TikTok popp and it just
won't happen. Right kind of thing, you know what I'm saying,
Like while doing dance moves, at least you gotta do
something about why your crib is so dark in order
for that ship to catch on. Yeah, and like even
(27:40):
you know, like you hear about like, uh, these people
who all like all these young sort of like internet
people who like buy a place together and they live
in these communes trying to to create content and ship
and even that is about creating a space that kind
of looks like you're staying with Diddy, do you know
what I mean? Like they never are like in a
(28:02):
fucking like hell hole. All take let's all take our
five thousand dollars and get this fifty thousand dollar house. Yes,
but we all just put in our our last five
and then we're in here, and then we could come
up off of that if we just shoot some videos
by the pool every day it's like always in front
of some giant uh glass like staircase or whatever. And
(28:24):
then you're doing that and now I know you you
have resources even though yeah, you got money, you got money,
you you TikTok. We want to follow you and see
what else you got going on exactly, Like clearly You're
already benefiting from these silly dances, so why would I
not continue down the train of enjoying more of yourself.
Every time there's a challenge, I want to see you
do it. Yes, hold on, I want to see this
(28:49):
one like the crazy legs, like like I want to
see fucking little Loosely do all the challenges. I don't
want to see everybody do all the damn challenges. I
read in one of the uh the articles that I
was reading a person and this goes back to to
your point about sort of like the taking of culture
or the recreation of culture. And a person who I
(29:10):
guess is like a TikTok dancer type person that we're
talking to talking to name mood Ferris been as a mash.
I don't probably fucking his name up bad, but that
doesn't matter. One he doesn't mean anything to me. But
he said, and I thought this was really interesting. He
said that TikTok is weirdly transforming into a dance genre itself.
(29:32):
And I think that that it It has twofold interest
to me because we've already sort of addressed the fact
that they are creating something that's completely of its own world.
But what they also say in the article is that
TikTok is still pulling from things that we recognize outside
of its own genre. So it becomes a way of
(29:53):
sort of softening everybody else's ship while still claiming, well,
this is just something of its it has nothing to
do with you. Well, this comes back to one of
a dance I mentioned earlier and the point I had
daughter before. It's like when Blackboy JB invented to shoot dance.
He invented it, whether somebody else did it around him,
(30:15):
Block what JB did it and made Vegas do it right.
Fortnite took that dance and put it in their game
and didn't ask Block what JB And then that was
a Fortnite dance, and whether they paid that nigga after
or not, and whether they gave him the credit or not,
that dances a Fortnite dance now, and so anything it's
like TikTok is almost like a filter or anything that
(30:37):
passes through it just becomes TikTok. Yes, you know what
I'm saying. Yeah, I think that's I think that's the
perfect articulation of it. It reminds me, you know, it's
push your t losing to McDonald's. You know what I'm saying, Like,
it's it's it's you made the McDonald's song. The McDonald's
song technically is yours, but once McDonald's has it, that's
(30:58):
the McDonald's song. I guess McDonald's b Yeah, like you
sold it to McDonald's. It's like, uh, it's like buying
a beat. I'm rapper, right, I buy a beat. They
can sell the exclusive rights to that beat for five
hundred dollars and then you go make a hit with
that ship. But like you sold the exclusive rights for
five hundred dollars. Yeah, that's my it's mine now yea, yeah,
(31:20):
that's my million dollar banger. You keep your five hundred
dollars and in some ways and that's it's sad and
it's fucked up. But then there's another star that you
go like, well, when would I expect a major corporation
to be like, you know what, we gotta do right
by the little black girl that did the renegade dance.
We got to make sure that she's taken care of
(31:40):
and fed, because that doesn't service their needs in any way. Right,
It's like, um, what the there was a girl who
actually was doing a dance she like made it up
and then like a small white girl got to do
it at the All Star Game. Yeah that I think
that was the Renegade ship, right, Okay, yeah, that was
that ship. That was crazy bro. Right, Jimmy Fallon had
(32:02):
literally brought Addison Ray onto fucking Uh which we're called
the Tonight Show to have her do various TikTok dances,
all of which belonged to different black performers and creators
and all that ship. It's like the on fleet girl, Bro,
This ship happens all the time and then like it
just goes under the radar, Like where's on fleek? That
(32:23):
happened a shorty, bro, because that word was applashed on
everything in Forever twenty one for like a long time.
So like, what how's she doing? Like you know what
I'm saying, she should be living like Madam C. J.
Walker Off and she fucking won't be. Yeah, you want
to know about fleektek. I guess The question I do
(32:46):
ask though myself, and I'm gonna ask you, is what
would be the appropriate compensation? What would be the appropriate
acknowledgement of these people's contributions? Because the reality is that
girl was just talking into her phone. It's not like
she sat and crafted a piece from this ship. She
was just being a similibilly and hit a moment and
(33:07):
that wave went crazy. So like, how do we actually
make sure that people are getting what they deserve without
overdoing it and being like nobody says this because this
my long stud Tanya or whoever the funk she is. Well,
I think the the thing to remember is the problem
isn't people saying her word. It's Wendy's tweeting this new
(33:30):
fucking chicken sandwich is on fleet. The original thing needs
to be acknowledgement, Like whether it's a quick phrase, you know,
I'm saying one of my homeboys, my DJ. He is
one of the biggest memes in the world. I don't
know if you ever seen the meme and the nigger
in the yellow hoodie and he's doing this ship looking mad.
That's my DJ. But you met him at the shop, Yes,
exactly right. Niggas is on Twitter every day. That's Jock Quis,
(33:52):
that's Quevo, that's this person, that's that person. He went
and fucking made sure he got that ship and all
of that so that he gets paid from that fucking meme.
And I think we need to make it clear that
you can do that for people, so when you hit
a wave, you can jump on it immediately instead of
like where the money reside. That Nigga jumped on that
(34:14):
wave immediately, and it was his wave, you know, nobody else's.
He got paid off it, he went got cool with
celebrities off it. You know what I'm saying. That was
his wave. But I think it's not very clear how
to do that versus other people can see it and
be like, oh, I can make all I gotta do
is yeah, I'm gonna take that ship right now, and
then they go get big off of it, bigger they
monetize it. You never got the chance to even try to.
(34:35):
And I would say this additionally, that's the corny thing
that the Internet does, where they go, oh, you should
just be grateful that we're celebrating you, or that you're
getting the attention that you otherwise wouldn't be getting it,
or you offset my life for like six months with
this bullshit and then expect me to go back to
living a normal life while y'all make a hell of
(34:55):
money like that, Having a viral moment like that I've
never had a viral video moment like that. I've had
a couple of stupid ass tweets go up and they
suck my Twitter up for days. So I can imagine
having something as big as on Fleek that's sucking your
life up a little bit. Whether it's a good way
or a bad way, it's in the way, you know
what I'm saying. You have to take a break to
deal with that. In some ways, even being made a
(35:17):
new whether whether it is like you said, good or bad,
you don't get to just go back to the version
of your life that it was. And then that's it's
not even like y'all owe me. It's like if somebody's
getting paid, then y'all owe me. Yes, if nobody was
getting shipped off on Fleek and everybody just used the phrasing,
it wouldn't even be an issue. But that's not the case.
(35:38):
That became branding for some people. That became fucking commercials
for a lot of people, you know what I'm saying. No,
I think that's that's a hundred percent true. I think
about that all the time with like you know it.
I think it used to be more of a trend
and now it's a little more dangerous to pull off.
But like when rappers would use like internet ship for
like interludes and ship and you have to wonder how
(36:01):
many of these people are actually getting compensated for those
internet things or is it just you thought it was
funny you put it in your interlude and these people
just sort of have to be grateful that, like, oh,
they they threw me in there, you know what I mean? Right,
Like I'm I'm I'm something on there real quick, you
know what I'm saying. Like with me, I've used you know,
I've used a million of the motherfucker's I make songs.
(36:22):
You know what I'm saying. I want my computer, of
course I got. I got a whole album about comedians
that I've made about my favorite comedians. Every song starts
and ends with some ship I pulled from YouTube, you know,
saying like that's just what that is. But there's a
reason for it, you know what I'm saying. And on
top of that, I reach out to a lot of
these motherfucker's that I try to involve to be like, yo,
(36:44):
you want to do a sketch on here or something
like I want to miss the hospital to do some
ship I've reached out to about to do some ship.
You know what I'm saying, Uh, Nick COLLETTI We never
used it, but on my second album reached out to
Nick COLLETTI had to make a bunch of joke phone
calls for it. Like I find the people, they're there,
and they're they're willing to listen, you know what I'm saying,
And they're not about to Like I realized a lot
(37:04):
of people are willing to work and for like a
realistic price or for something real because everybody's bullshitting all day.
But I think to that point, it truly is just
acknowledge me, dog, you know what I mean, Like like
you said, acknowledge that that I made a contribution to
the grander cultural imprint. And if you acknowledge that, and
(37:25):
if you compensate that, knowing that you are going to
also be compensated, then if you out bag me, I
I had fun, you know what I mean? Like I
I'm truly not at least and again I can only
speak for myself. I'm not terrified of somebody becoming a
millionaire off of some ship I said. I'm more terrified
of them truly, like pretending as if I don't exist
(37:48):
while be exactly there off of my ship because again
it's it's it's not a it's a principal thing. Bro,
It's like I'm here, like I did that. You know,
I'm saying I did that like so like and so like,
you know, I think about Craig Mac. Somebody's gonna make
a pup and ask Craig Mac TikTok remix and Craig
Mac ain't seeing bred off making his music and how
(38:11):
long you know what I'm saying, And it's gonna be huge,
Like that's frustrating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you think this,
this accountability is something that we are going to have
to fight for for other people because it seems like
at a certain point, either people don't have the resources
or the the Internet doesn't give enough of a funk,
(38:32):
like you're talking about Craig Mac, and I can't imagine
there's about to be like a big wave of people
being like justice for Craig Mac. We Craig Mac made
this song. You guys, gotta nobody's gonna give a fuck,
you know what I mean? If we're being truly honest,
and is that fair? No? Is it right? No? But
that's the reality of where we're at. So like, is
that then something where like we as artists are gonna
(38:54):
have to step in and be like, yo, I don't
want to be a part of this or I'm not
gonna do this unless we gotta jumping We gotta jump
in on this stuff faster. That's the other thing, is
like they need to acknowledge faster, and if they don't,
we need to acknowledge the problem faster and as a
bigger unit. Because this is you know, it's small potatoes.
(39:14):
Now you said something, it got cracking and somebody else
made a meal. You made eight dollars. Yeah, that's trash.
But that's again slippery slopan to deal with it. Deal
with it, deal with it, deal with it, deal with it.
And now you just gotta deal with it. Like you
know what I'm saying. It's just like it's it's not
cool to race things people have done because it doesn't
(39:37):
matter to you what I'm saying. Yeah, it matters to somebody,
and that's that's why we're here in the first nigga
g depth matters to me what I'm saying. Yeah, I'm
little boys with them big ass church and chains. I
love them. Yes, God damn it, flavor in your end.
(40:00):
We're gonna take one more break. We'll be back with
more Michael Christmas and more, my mama told me. And
we are back speak Hell yeah, We're back here with
(40:24):
more Michael Christmas, more, my mama told me. We're still
talking about the possibility that TikTok is destroying homes, specifically
black homes with ship dances that are making grandma's disappointed
in their grandchildren, grandfathers. They lower their heads, they say,
I welcome to Menia. Sooner if it's gonna make me
forget about this bullshit that I gotta see my grandchild.
(40:46):
Do do you think I guess this is going back
to the larger question. Do you feel like this is
a feeling that other generations have had to deal with?
Like were they looking at the whist and being like that,
ain't that ain't dancing? This is this is trash in whatever.
(41:08):
I can only point to the post nineties because I
was born in ninety four, and everything that came out
when I was a kid was an issue to the
people older than me. Always jerking was an issue land
with a rock with it that was kind of a
silly dance walking out. But at the same time, these
(41:30):
dances were all being done way more than like the
mats dances of right now slash like progressively, like I
think the Soldier Boys when older, older people stopped doing
like Okay, well he'll tell I can, He'll tell I
can walk it out, I can check a noodle suit,
but like hitting a choreograph dance move, which is exactly
(41:53):
the problem now. I also think the part of the
problem was that Soldier Boy was the face of the product,
and for older people it felt like, all right, what
are we what game is this? Now? Do you know
what I mean? Like all respective, But but he is not.
If you're an older person in that generation, you're not
(42:14):
looking at this and being like, now that's a man
I'll take seriously. Yeah no. And luckily I was a
kid when Soldier Boy came out, so I got to
enjoy every year of Soldier Boys started uninterrupted while just
being hated on about older folks that don't get it.
But I'm grown now and I funk with the Soldier
Boys still, like I think every dance from then it's good,
(42:37):
I think, is there's something I'm not about to do.
I don't want to do to cup the shuffle like
ever again if possible, Like you know what I'm saying.
But otherwise, like and you know what, when I was
a kid, I went to camp and I don't know
if you've ever heard the song Cotton I Joe. Yeah,
I know Cotton I Joe. Do you know the dance?
I don't know what anymore, but there was a dance.
It was like front step, front step. Yeah, yeah, them
(43:00):
that bullshit. That's that's what TikTok dances look like. Yeah yeah,
but but that's what they will also say that you
get in those groups and you see motherfucker's doing Cotton
I Joe and you're like, goddamn, they look like they're
having a good time. They do look like they're having
a good time, for sure. The group was ten year
olds across the board, but it did look like you
(43:21):
were having a good headtime for sure. But again it
goes back to what we were saying. You have to
strike a balance right where it's like, I am not
at all interested in taking the fun away from anybody,
Like I do want every generation to have their ship,
have their fun. I'm not I don't want to be
the person that stops it at the same time, let's
(43:41):
just figure out a way to make your fun not
feel like it's destroying valuable like uh, just generations of
of work that we've done. Yeah, and and again, Like
the the issue really for me, like this is all
an agenda for me to dig a lot deeper into
how my things are going away without you know, anybody,
(44:04):
anybody's approval from the blacks. You know what I'm saying,
Like like, where where is the most depth in the
red suit with the curly hair on Chappelle's show to delegate, bro,
we need a delegator, we need delegate everybody. Just let's
just slide goddamn Tim McGraw or whoever. Then it was
on the song a little Dirk just doing whatever after
(44:26):
he just got finished saying Nigga somewhere else like hey, hey,
somebody regulates this ship man, And that's what That is
the part that I think I often find myself feeling
frustrated with because I don't want to find myself blaming
black people, right Like I want to be not that
dude who's like Nigga's y'all, y'all should have done something.
(44:47):
But it's like Lebron, don't do that. Don't do that,
you know what I mean? Like when you did you know,
when you do the fucking Harlem shake ship, you're truly
just doing it for views and you're not considering the
fact that you were a kid. Miami kids is gonna
love this, Like, bro, you know what I'm saying, Just
throw the move in there at least just to be like,
(45:08):
I see it. I see that's the thing. That's what
it feels like. It's it feels like as it's always
felt like this as a black person in America. It
always felt like when I make contact with another black
person that we are thinking the same thing. For the
most part, we have the same ideas, we know what
it is. And it's starting to feel just less overall,
like we know what it is as a unit. Yes,
(45:28):
I don't want to lose I just don't want to
lose us all knowing what it is when we get there, No,
And I think it got even weirder because then there's
that wave that we hit where it became cool to
be like, I don't think like other black people think
like I'm not trapped in the same you know, Kanye
did it, Chance did it where they were like, yeah,
why do we have to be like that. It's like
(45:50):
you don't have to be but come on, but come on,
but you know what it is because because for one
and this isn't to come out here or a chance
or anybody in PARTICU dealer. But when you do that,
do not get in trouble or do anything else and
then expect nigga's to come give you a big old
hook b because we're not gonna do it. Bro. Maybe
(46:13):
you said you don't eat coligreenes, you don't eat coligreens
different and you got it. Show me how different handles
frustrating situations turn around and die. Yeah, we'll make it value.
So I guess the last question that sort of has
(46:36):
been living in this for me is I wonder and
I do think that this is the scary thing with
this situation, right is I think that part of the
problem that we're facing is that there is too much
of everything all the time, and so we were inevitably
going to find ourselves getting worse at stuff because we
just have to keep making more stuff. Do what I mean, Like,
(46:59):
there's no a for eight it's fucking loose steel Ball
trying to stuff the chocolates and I love Lucy. Eventually
there's just too much, so you're gonna do a ship job.
And so I wonder I'd love to hear your thoughts
of like is the truly the only way that black
people can get back to being like the true like
heroes of dance and culture is for the Internet to
(47:21):
go away and we just have less stuff. No, And
I think this goes back to an earlier point of acknowledgement,
But this is on the level of the people in
control as well as the creators, because we need to
acknowledge real talent too, you know what I'm saying it
we need to put things on the forefront now because
(47:42):
they adhere to the guidelines of what we want our
viewers to see, but because they're actually good yeah as well.
And I think that's a problem with that platform, is
that it just seems very aimed, like you just see him.
Because the thing is like, you can post all the
same things across your socials, you will not get more
agement then you'll get on TikTok. But it's only if
(48:03):
you do it the way TikTok wants you to do it,
you know what I'm saying. And so I think just
like That's what I mean by by the people who
are in control is like, you know, make it fair.
But also like for the people who are not in control,
I think we we just need more people to be
in Like when I think about my childhood, bro, even
if they weren't the best role models, are black folks
are in charge for real? You know what I'm saying.
(48:25):
They said things and they stuck. You know what I'm saying.
We And it's not to say that all these niggas
are not good. A lot of my heroes a terrible
people growing up and learning, but that's not the point.
The point is having a good voice, or a good
few voices to actually look to and learn from. You
know what I'm saying, I gotta look. I gotta look
(48:45):
at movies where these people who are some of them
terrible people, play incredible characters that can teach me things.
But there's really people out there, you know what I'm saying,
who can teach me those same things. And that's you know,
we need those Like niggas could be mad at they
should pall all they want, but that heat he to
me a lot. But like, yeah, I think about like
Isaiah Washington, where it's like that is a phenomenal fucking actor.
(49:10):
He was real good at acting. Yeah, he had a
whole bunch of other problematic ship that made his relationship
with with a public complicated. But at the at its core,
and I think this is the point you're making. At
its core, we were celebrating a person for their talents,
not just their big personality or like their edginess or
whatever the funk it is. And now, whether we we
(49:33):
can control it or not, there are a lot of
people that are just existing off of their personality more
than an actual skill set. And until we can go
back to celebrating skill sets, we're gonna be chasing our
tails in this ship. I feel like our last like leader.
And I'm saying because we lost a bunch at one
time because of the pandemic, but our last like leader,
(49:54):
I feel like it Nipsey hustle as far as like
at least the niggas, I like, that's the type of
person that I would can that are a leader? Yeah,
a lot of my niggas. Because he'll say things that
will resonate and make you think about your life and
want to change it, you know what I'm saying. And
there's not that many of those anymore. We had a
lot more of those when I was a kid, for sure,
Like these people that even even if they weren't doing that,
(50:15):
like just these larger than life inaccessible personalities. And it's
not to say like obviously the internet makes that a
lot harder to but also these personalities are a little
bit all the same now, you know what I'm saying,
all ruded and kind of the same thing. We all
do this, we all like this, we all go here,
we all like this ship. That's how we live like this.
We just need more standout personalities to take charge in
(50:36):
the black community, thinks. And I don't know how we
we make that, but I do think at least acknowledging
people's skills and their goodness is a is a starting point.
But we need more black comedians to be really, really
famous yesterday. And that's what I mean is like you
know what I'm saying. You know, eight hunted nigga. Everybody
(50:57):
on your list of people on your cast excluding me,
is a goddamn generational talent or whatever it is they do.
This has been a phenomenal episode and I'm a big fan.
You watch your mouth. I know these niggas. When I
went to when I found your podcast just because I Google,
I looked up Zach Fox and I was like, oh,
this is two of my niggas right here. And I'm like, oh,
this is good. Then I started looking at the list,
(51:19):
I'm like, oh, I'm a fan of them. I'm afan
of them. These niggas need to be bigger. And it's like,
it's it's not them, you know what I'm saying. The
talents there, the work is there, it's just the world. Yeah,
it is very hard to be any version of what
your talent is set up to be right that Like,
you have to figure out a almost a scam sometimes
(51:40):
to make the world see you as a talented person
you may already be. And that's the scary part about
all of this game. It's like, truly, we're not just
figuring out how to get good at a job. We're
then figuring out a way to trick someone into looking
at us long enough to go, fuck, he's good at
that job. It's like you gotta spend time getting real,
(52:02):
real good at some ship. Then you've gotta straight away
from that and spend time trying to figure out how
to make people watch you do that ship that you're
amazing at now Exactly, it's a miserables. That's part of
that's part of the hustle. Yeah, that's just life in general.
But I don't want that to happen to people who
have like a quick strike opportunity. Some of these people
are not aiming their lives towards having a viral moment
(52:26):
or having a viral dance, you know what I'm saying.
And so when they get it, I want them to
keep it, yeah, saying when they get it, I want
them to keep it. I always think about, um, the
the lady that uh ain't nobody got time for that?
That that late bro, what's upwhere her? Well, I'll say this,
and this is I think a little bit of a
(52:46):
hopeful ending for for what we've been talking about. Is
she was a lady struggling with drugs. She was in
a fire and then got went viral, and she capitalized
on that moment her teeth fixed and then did fucking
commercials for the dentists that fixed her teeth and got
paid off the ship. And I don't know if she
(53:08):
was able to like to modify it beyond that point,
but I do think that even that is a beautiful
sort of like, okay, this is correct for what she
offered us. She became a meme that we all enjoyed.
If nothing else, let this lady have some new teeth
and some money to be able to like move forward
however she chooses. Yeah, yeah, that's the new ship. Bro.
(53:31):
If you get like, if you have a viral moment,
you should give you, like whatever, the two things you
need most. I love that, and then you can have it, bro.
Then you can put it in the Wendy's commercial, McDonald's whatever,
so long, John Silvers, whatever, and they can put it
go ahead. But yeah, fix my back and get me
a new bed. You don't need to fix. You don't
need to to set me up for life. But if
(53:52):
you know I'm sleeping on a mattress on the floor,
get me a bed frame and help me out. It's
like people who go role for like having some fileship
at the crib or having a file crib and they
throw that ship up on Damn Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy, send
that motherfucker check, bro, so they can stop doing that
(54:13):
this show anymore. Help them, help them, bro, Like they're sad,
Like I remember I've seen. I think I saw Drew
Sky on a five South talking to DC Young fly In.
DC Young Flyer was talking about how he didn't have
the resources to shoot these big videos that King Bacha
was making. He had to just show he had around him,
so he was making vines of the cockroaches on his
(54:33):
wall to which too, because Drew Ski was like, I
remember that he was on VON and he was taking
videos of cockroaches on your wall, and I'm like, is
this nigga okay? Like we need to send in and
he's like and then that was DC's response was, well,
these niggas on Vaughn is making these big production movies
in these six seconds. I ain't got a movie studio,
I't on cameras for no explosions. So I'm using what
(54:54):
I got, you know what I'm saying in here, And
look at him. He's a super He's a goddamn superstar. Now, no,
I mean it, it's crazy and like to that point,
like I even you know, I'm not a person without resources,
but like even just being able to put together a
self tape of like yo, I need another person to
be to set up a camera. I need somebody to
read lines. Maybe it's that same person, but you need
(55:17):
a level of like commitment from your community and from
around you to even make that ship happen. So the
fact that these dudes we're making full production, three camera
productions for internet videos tells you that they were sitting
on profit already, or at least sitting on a cushion
that to the point that d C was making, he
didn't have And unless somebody is gonna come in and
(55:39):
be like, yo, I see a potential in him, and
I'm gonna make sure he gets correctly compensated for that potential,
he's just gonna be a nigga making roach video Roach videos. Bro.
It's like anytime you see somebody do a quick dance
move on the tail, but nobody tagged them and they
weren't the posted person to post it. They were just
caught doing the dance moved. Nike is never my never
(56:00):
even know that he went viral. Well, that he changed
the world a little bit, you know what I'm saying, Like,
that's just crazy. You should be given something for making
kids in Wisconsin do your fucking dance move while you
was outside of the projects. That's just what it is,
pretty straightforward two things you need. I love that. I
(56:20):
think that's the I think that's the thesis, the real
big takeaway. We can leave everybody with, Give people two
things they need for the great things they need in life,
for their contributions, and then do what you will or
we're gonna smack you. That's the new ship, bro, we
gonna start pulling up and smacking people tough. Do that?
(56:42):
Do that dance again real quick? Yeah? All right, I
think we did it. Michael, did you tell the people
at home where they can find you what cool ship
you have? Yeah? Man, Michael Christmas, my birthday is in
like a week. That's like probably my only cool ship.
But I'm gonna trying to should happen around it. Um,
I got dumb music out of music, Spotify that stuff,
(57:05):
Michael Christmas at, Michael Christmas on Instagram, making Christmas on Twitter,
and yeah, go enjoy some of that. I've also been
dabbling and stand up. So if you end Boston, specifically
on a Wednesday night, you walk into an empty bar
and see a stage I might be on. All right,
well go watch Michael do stand up. More importantly, go
listen to his music. It's fired. Support, support, support and
(57:27):
As always, you can follow me at Langston Kerman all
of my bullshit. I don't make no music, but yeah,
it's nonsense either way. And uh, you can uh subscribe
to the podcast, you can review do the thing I
don't know, And if you want to send me your
own conspiracy theories or drops, you can send them to
my Mama pod at gmail dot com. Okay, that's it.
(57:50):
By bit Unclela bears were racist. The Oasto player for
oasting money versions of many turkey stuff in I can't
(58:12):
tell me about
Yeah, there's there's a couple of day smooths that I've seen. Um,
somebody this wild ship the day I can't remember girl,
A little bit of this left, but the listeners at home,
he meant it, he really is. He's taking it straight today. Yeah,
because it wasn't like that much left. Like it wasn't
(00:22):
that much love. It's half a bottom ship, racist money stuff.
(00:47):
I can't tell me. Yep, yep, yep. There it is.
There it is. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another phenomenal
episode of My Mama Told Me, the podcast where we
dive deep, deep into the pockets of black conspiracy theories
and we finally work to prove that the p Intaj
(01:09):
p Henson stands for boy don't play with me. You
know that's what that p is for. You know, Toraj
is saying something sassy from start to finishing that goddamn name.
And we love you to rise, you big fan. If
you ever want to come here and talk some bullshit,
you're welcome this. Sometimes the conspiracies that I spread about
people are harmless. I think this is a pretty harmless one. Sometimes,
(01:32):
like us people of murder and mayhem, But mostly, you know,
you run out and you just make fun of names
and ships. Sup. We're hoping that this is gonna be
a murder conspiracy that I can believe all days. Well,
I'm sorry to disappoint. I guess at least brutality murder
(01:54):
that's actually a pretty good one. Quille O'Neill, for those
of you that don't know, did volunteer after his NBA
career to become a sheriff and and I guess brutalized
the local people in his community. And the possibility that
Shaquille O'Neill killed someone seems pretty high. Yeah, for sure,
(02:15):
he's seven ft eighteen, there's no question with the gun.
He's RoboCop Bro's. Yeah, he's also not a sheriff anymore. So.
It feels like some sort of dishonorable discharged situation, right
because they didn't give him like a medal of honor
when he retired from it feels like he crushed someone's
(02:35):
skull like a great and then they were just like, hey, Shack,
you can't come back here no more. Man. He was
acting like Batman. Yeah, and Bro, we're big fans of
your work, but this ain't gonna work out. You gotta
leave man, you can't knock and take ahead. Well, this
is we've really broken the fourth wall here. We we
didn't do the intro the way intros are meant to
(02:57):
be done, but fuck it, we'll do it live. My
guest today, he's phenomenal. He's an amazing musician, talented artist,
he's a comedian of sorts. He does all this ship.
I love him. Please give it up for my guest,
Mr Michael christ Man. I'm drinking what we're talking about.
(03:19):
What a bold way to come back. Hell yeah, I'm
I'm so excited you're here because you came with a
conspiracy theory that I think I bought into. Like I don't.
I don't know that I've done enough research to know
for sure. But I saw it and I was like,
(03:41):
this guy is saying something. This is this is legit.
I've been thinking about it and it's it feels like
it has like a level of legitimacy to it. And
I won't hold it up. You said, my mama told
me tis secretly trying to make black people bad at dancing. Yes, bro, Yes,
(04:08):
I've had this thought for a long time to like this.
It's it's really kismet that you happen to have a
podcast where you talk about ship like this with no
facts if necessary, because I'm like, man, what a perfect
platform for me to come and discuss how I feel
about this. Yeah, and I should let our our listeners
(04:28):
know that you were You were so enthusiastic about it
that you hit me up and you were like, dog,
I'm sitting on something, what's up? And I was already
thinking about having you as a guest, but then once
you hit me with the conspiracy theory, it felt like, oh,
we have to do this now immediately. Yes, thank you
for allowing me. Yes, TikTok is secretly trying to make
(04:51):
trying to make people black people bad at dancing. Bro,
I see the signs, So tell me more. Give me
the full breakdown of where you discovered the what's making
you feel that way. Let's let's really dive in deep here. Okay.
I think what it started this whole thought process was like,
I know you've seen them now, The TikTok dances all arms.
(05:14):
You know what I'm saying. It's all very stiff boom
pop boo. It's like the mediocre cheerleading squad level of dancing.
But these dances are becoming so popular that now you're
seeing like adults do them because they're popular and you
can get fuse off. So now people are incorporating them.
(05:34):
And when you spend so much time doing this little
stupid ass move, this move get you get used to it,
and then you go outside and then you go to
the club and some good ship is playing and you
start doing TikTok dances. Now now it's spreading right now
all the kids. The kids are on what TikTok? So
our children are growing up with no rhythm. It's it's
it's just it's a massive wipe out and and it
(05:56):
speaks to bigger things. But to start, yes, we're gonna
be bad to dancing if you don't get it together.
I like what you're saying because it reminds me of
a video I saw and it was probably like a
year ago where Jason Derulo I think, was in Vegas
and he was performing and he had like an ensemble
of bad bitches standing beside him while he performed TikTok dances,
(06:19):
and it was a bunch of adults in the crowd
being like, is this naked doing TikTok dancers like you
do regular dance, Jason bro It's not like Jason Derulo
is a bad dancer. He's a pretty good dancer. He's
a fucking loser in a lot of ways, but he's
(06:40):
a god. He's a great fighter, and he's a great dancer.
He's a winner in a lot of ways too. That's
the that part about Jason Derulo. I would love to
hate on Jason Derulo, but then Jason Derulo pull up. Yeah, listen,
I would not say that to Jason Derulo's face. That
motherfucker is big for no reason. I'm trying to go away,
Jameson and the Rulo about to go and well you
(07:03):
gotta start doing TikTok dances in public exactly selling my
soul and see it. But to that point, it was
a a very visceral reaction from the crowd of being like,
this is bad dancing in person. I'm sure whatever it
looks like on the internet is a different conversation, but objectively,
it looks terrible when you're just standing in front of us,
(07:26):
like you said, moving elbows and arms instead of the
thing is it's meant for kids. These challenges are for
eight year olds to do during spring break when they're
at the crib. They're not They're not to be done
by grown people with you know what I'm saying. But
they get you so many views that you as a
fucking forty year old nurse and like, on my break,
(07:46):
I'm about to try to get my TikTok numbers up
and then boom, now you're hitting that ship, you know,
looking crazy. If somebody's walking by and seeing that, do
you think that that this because I I honestly I
feel like this question is almost jumping ahead of where
we're at. But I'm curious because you're talking about it.
Do you think this is an unbeatable challenge? Not to
(08:11):
to make it a pun and ship, but like, is
this is this an unbeatable challenge being presented in front
of us where we are, no matter what, going to
end up becoming bad dancers because of TikTok culture. It's
tough to say. On the one hand, yes, you can
get hell of views by doing these awful dances. You
don't need to do anything else, would do exactly what
(08:32):
they did in the other video, and you're just gonna
pick up steam. On the flip side, what it really
is is about, like this is stuff we're supposed to
know how to do right. All these good dance moves
that we do have, the wobble, the electric slide. This
is stuff that like I don't remember how I learned it,
but I knew it. So partially we have to combat
(08:56):
this with teaching people dances because even you see our TikTok,
they're jerking now, they're trying to lean with it, rock
with and doing our dances from when I was a kid,
and they're not doing them right either. So it's like
it's like, raise your kids. You need where where's the
Casper slide? Man? We need a part part four, Part five.
You gotta save the community. We need the DJs at
(09:19):
the basketball birthday parties to come out and to do
with the trends. You know what I'm saying. And he's him,
he's hitting moves. Bobby Brown used to do dance moves.
That's what we need more of. But you know, anybody,
everybody's looking at their phones. Nobody wants to. Nobody wants
to use their legs. You got to use your Nobody
wants to. All these videos are waste up. They don't
(09:39):
even know that you could do ship with your legs
because it's all waste s up on it. So, Okay,
you're seeing this, you you are, You're recognizing a problem
that's happening. Are you now hitting the streets. Are you
becoming a prophet of this truth? Are you indifferent to
(10:01):
this this sort of like wave that's taking over? Do
you know what I mean? I feel like the Hughey
Freeman of this in the sense that nobody else really
feels me the way I feel me on this saying
like nobody thinks that there's a devastating effect in the
future to this. It's just like the kids doing dances,
you know what I'm saying, but that adults are doing
(10:23):
the dances though, And I don't have a problem with
adults dancing either. The problem is you look silly, and
you're gonna make your kids look silly and twenty years
and they're like, remember twenty years ago and this was
the move. You know, it's just not you know, we
whatever to Also, it doesn't matter, And I will say,
take that gives a lot of access to other ship
I didn't know, like how to put on toilet paper
(10:45):
rolls easy and stupid and ship like that. That stuff
is extremely helpful. But yeah, the dancing it's gonna cause
it's gonna it's a ripple effect, you know, it's a
it's snowball effect. Well, that's that's I think at the
core of the question I want to ask you is
what do you think the ultimate ripple effect is? If
this is full butterfly effect, where are you seeing this
little like you know, wing flap ultimately landing the avalanche.
(11:10):
I think part of my big worry is also rooted
in the fact that this may also just be a
thing that happens to every generation where I'm worried that
erasure is about to happen to the things or like
washing it or like cornballing the things that I'm used
to and the things that I know. And then I realized,
(11:30):
like Brome, I just like an old head, is that
was actually the issue? Or you know what I'm saying.
And then you started to think, damn. When I was
listening to like you know and my parents thought it
was whack? Was it whack? And He's like, nah, it
wasn't wet, But like, yeah, that's the thing. Is like
part of me is like it's a racier and part
of me is like I'm overreacting and it's just me
(11:50):
getting older and not understanding. Well, that was my fear
when I because I immediately, like I said, latched onto
this being a a possible truth. But then another part
of me was like, man, you you're the kids dad.
You're truly an old man yelling about your blood. If
(12:11):
this is where your heart lives, Like maybe they're bad
at dancing or maybe they're fucking phenomenal at dancing, and
I'll never find out because I'm not doing the arm moves,
you know what I mean. Like this might be the
hardest arm hard is moves that anybody can do, and
I'm truly not I'm so much a coward i won't
even try it. They're not they're not hard, but we
(12:31):
can try it if you want. But they're not hard.
I can see that they're not hard because I had
to learn how to jerk and heel toe and do
ship like that stuff that was very difficult to do.
And that's all. That's all I want, Just some like
the last dance that I think that was created that
was cool. It was like the shoot dance that like
a black dude that like a black person at the
crib in his neighborhood. You know, I'm saying broke with
(12:56):
the homies made that dancing ain't got big And that's
a part of it too. It's like the organic ship
like these what you know what I'm saying, who's coming
up with this? And how's it happening? You know what
I'm saying, like pose to Alright, So what I'll say
is that, uh, that sideways moonwalk thing that's that's circulating
that ship is hard fun with that sadeways moonwalk. I
(13:17):
think there are dances out there that I do. Go, okay,
listen to your point. There's a chance that people are
still striving to make cool stuff and like add to
the culture. The frustrating part of it becomes how much
of that is being I guess sort of buried under
a bunch of other sort of like bullshit. Yeah. Well,
(13:39):
one thing that made me feel like the official oldest
nigga around the other day was like this dance moved
the Gritty and the Memphis Grizzlies simply John Muren hit
the hole every time they win a game, and somebody
put a video but Michael Jackson, I don't remember which
Michael Jackson video is, but he's doing that ship all
through the village just sucking. It was like, damn, Michael
Jackson was hitting the gritty early. Either he's a time
(14:01):
traveler or he invented all the dance moves, and like
he invented all the dance moves and he did all
of them. If you see if you see it tomorrow
and you've never seen it before, you've seen Mike doing still. Yeah,
we're just all doing variations of things Mike did. And
he was like, I'm not gonna keep doing that. That's
not the problem is I'm mad niggas is not doing
Michael Jackson stuff. No more like trying to dance like
(14:24):
Michael Jackson. I don't know if you want to end
that sentence where you ended that sentence, Nick starn't doing
Michael Jackson stuff. I don't know. We all my mama
told me, I'm mad Nick is not doing Michael Jackson.
What a way to go into a commercial break. I
(14:46):
love it. We're gonna take a break. We'll be back
with more Michael Christmas and more, my mama told me.
And we are back. Yeah, we're back here with more
(15:08):
Michael Christmas more. My mama told me. We're still talking
about the possibility that TikTok is destroying the black dances.
It's taking dance culture away from our our black youth
and really families and and and society as a whole.
Do you think that there is, I guess, a way
(15:30):
to to introduce the legs to TikTok. Is there a
way that we can start to make this more of
of a reassessment of what is valuable on these apps?
I think I don't have the research on this, I
didn't do any but I feel I feel like there
are a lot of black creators on TikTok who, for
(15:52):
whatever reasons, are not being pushed to the forefront. That's
That's one if I was actually gonna walk up to
the doors and be like hey he Aside from that,
I think the main issue is the leveling of the
dancing playing field. You know what I'm saying. TikTok will
have you believe we all can dance at the same level.
(16:12):
This is incorrect. Niggas is dancing. They ask off in
other places, but you'll never see it because they're not
the cracking this niggas on TikTok. Yeah, so it's interesting
that that's that that's your interpretation because it aligns pretty
well with a lot of what I read about sort
of like what's happening with TikTok. There there are a
crazy amount of articles the people who are very angry
(16:34):
at TikTok or at least assessing what's happening in TikTok,
not just in terms of dance but also music as
a whole. They're real worried about what TikTok is doing
to the music industry and to dance culture. Yeah, yeah,
and that's the That's the other thing I think, aside
from like the old head of Ratio theme is like
it is scary to think that, bro. Like like the
(16:54):
video of Shorty repping with the bud light that went viral,
I don't know. I still I still didn't actually watched
the video for real. I just keep seeing it moving
all my timeline and being like, I'm about to watch this,
but she knew all the words. It went up because
she knew all the words, and like that level of like,
that's not impressive. It's not impressive. But then on the
(17:16):
other end, I do think we create this dangerous space
where we then go, bitch, that's not impressive. You we
shouldn't celebrate this and it's like, yeah, but you're just
telling everybody to go watch the motherfucker when you do
that exactly exactly, And that's my kind of my point
is like the pumping, because you know what I'm saying,
TikTok is the I think probably the number one have
(17:38):
to get followers and used you follow, you follow the
trend and you get followers and views, you know what
I'm saying, And everybody can't spend on the goddamn hit
what you're saying everybody, But what everybody and understand I'm
saying everybody can do is these whack dances, which gives
(18:00):
at playing field the level it needs to put the
hump over people who are actually very talented. And to
the original point you were making, which I think is
one that a lot of these articles sort of address,
is that everybody can do these dances, but TikTok intentionally
amplifies the voices and the dances of specific users, so
(18:22):
they are why while there are a million people learning
to do this ship, only eight people are truly getting
like the TikTok bump and saying like, yo, Addison Ray,
you are the face of these dances or the face
of these things that are very often not created by
the people that TikTok is choosing to amplify. And also
(18:44):
on the on the back to the petty side, like
I'm sick of hearing really good songs get remixed like
five six songs in because of a challenge, like I
want to hear DMX do it, God damn it, yeah,
kick yeah, yeah, don't let me enjoy the song that
(19:06):
it was meant to actually be. Fuck you know what?
Really and this I did not think about this until
this conversation, but it reminds me a lot of like, uh,
that Harlem shake ship. I was going to say, that's
the beginning of this, yeah, of all of this is
that that's the first thing where black young people from
(19:27):
the hood create something and then it's a phrase. But
when you go google Harlem shake, it's not is not
gonna come up. None of them boys that were killing
it in that video are involved anymore going to come up.
And that's what's happening to like everything, And what bugs me,
I think, especially with that one, is that like literally
(19:48):
it has nothing to do with the Harlem shake, you
know what I mean? Like there is if you were
if you were fucking using a bad boy song. If
you were like you even using elements of the thing
that made the thing, then maybe there's a level of
this that I can negotiate with. I don't want to,
but I can hear it out. But it truly was
(20:09):
them just being like, we're gonna use the words you
like and then make a completely different thing that has
nothing to do with it. Yeah, I'm saying and and
it's all you know, my spiraling and the thought process
of this brought me to like thinking about damn like
people using my god damn vernacular, taking the songs that
I love that I grew up with, made by people
(20:30):
that's poor because they don't even own the motherfucker's and
taking them and enrich off of them because you did
a dance to it in a nice little house. Like
you know what I'm saying, these spirrows then get me
the star treatment where I'm like, god damn, this is
all a part of the same thing. Well, no, I
think that's a hundred percent correct, And frankly, it's something
that I I think we've talked about a little bit
on the podcast before, but there is now a big
(20:52):
push from from young people to say that there is
no longer that the way that they speak on the
Internet is Internet talk, and it that there is no
longer like ebonics or a A V. Whatever you decide
to call it, like African American vernacular is gone. It's
just how the Internet speaks. And that's crazy. It's dangerous
(21:13):
because those small passes turn into big passes turned into
you know what I'm saying, somebody being able to go
put on the brownest possible shade of makeup from fucking
Serbia and put on curly hair and it's cool. It's
cool because this is just style. This isn't braids isn't
isn't for anybody people was wearing braids like like, guess
(21:35):
my fucking ass right, you don't need to protective. You
know what the you're doing, like you know what to do.
And it feels like laughing in my face. And this
is why it overall, just be like stop doing this
ship because then it starts to spiral and I'm like,
maybe I'm just a crazy nig in the house. No,
but I think I look, I'm a crazy nig in
(21:56):
the different house because I I hear what you're saying
and it feels correct to me that like, while I
don't want to be an old man yelling about young
people and what they should be doing with like their
bodies and dances, at some point we do have to
acknowledge there is a danger and just allowing culture to
become blanketed where like everybody can access anything at any time,
(22:17):
because part of what makes culture matter is it is
a lived experience for people that like they truly are
a part of these things, like the fact that that
that white girl knows little baby doesn't bug me, but
the idea that like, then a bunch of people are
giving her some version of like a hood pass because
the bitch can wrap little baby. This bich is good
(22:39):
with me wherever. And then you find out, you know
when three years ago she said, and then this little
nigga on Twitter, and then you're like, oh no, yeah,
why did I Why was I okay with this where
you loved it when when light like he was a
But then it's also like, yo, why do we need
I don't need a new teammate. What I'm saying like,
(23:00):
I don't. I got all the homies unkned, like I
got the homies I need, And for sure, I definitely
don't need somebody else coming to eat food at my
fucking cookout. Like, I don't even know why that is
the thing, right, Look, we have a very specific amount
of food here at this cookout. Dirty dirty hamburgers, thirty
how dogs, none of them. It's for you. This bitch
(23:24):
gonna come and she's gonna ask for mayonnaise. And now
what now? Now where are we? You know, it's stressed
me out because I don't want the kids to allow
ship to slide because they think it's cool. Because we
live in that world, and that's where the ultimate danger
is from, is like the kids being like, no, it's cool, pup.
They we all say nigga, Like that was a long
(23:44):
time ago. It's like, no, we don't all say nigga.
We all say nigga. What I'm saying. Yeah, you talked
about this a little bit in the beginning, and I
do think that this is a really important detail that
that I don't want us to just skip over. But
in the research that I was doing or the reading
I was doing, one of the things that they talked
about because I wanted to know why do TikTok dances
(24:07):
look specifically the way that they do, And like you said,
part of it is that the videos are shot vertically,
which is the way that they have to show up
for the app to look normal whatever the fun. And
so because they're shot vertically and for you to be
actually be able to see who the person is, they
have to do it from a certain distance, which means
that they have to cut off their legs. Often sometimes
(24:28):
people figure out ways to do it where they get
their whole body in it. Yeah, exactly, but for the
most part, off your cell phone, you kind of have
to cut off a portion of your body, which is
why they isolate in the arms. And then the other
detail that I think is really important, as they say
that the reason that the arm movements are so sort
of tight into the body is because you have to
(24:49):
keep it inside of the frame, so you can't reach
your arms all the way out extend them fully, because
then they'll be out of the frame and then you
don't get to see the entirety of the moves. So
it really is like a very strategic structure to say, like, Yo,
this is how you can dance and still make it
a well crafted video. Bro. People you just said they
(25:12):
put niggas in a box. Oh ship people, you just said,
brot niggas in a box. You can't move past these parameters.
And now when you're out, you're doing the same dances
and you're still not moving past these parameters. WHOA all right,
So that's how they get okay, yeah, that's crazy because
(25:33):
now we're doing like yeah, fuck all right, that's put
niggas in a box. There are sometimes when metaphors ain't metaphors,
do you know what I mean? When they just they're
just worried. It's just what happened, because your phone is
it's literally what's happening. And somebody's gonna call it a
beta because they don't want to process it. But come on, y'all,
(25:56):
Michael Christmas just woke you the funk up. If niggers
at home just like me, like bro, he's talking bro.
So one of the things that they also talk about,
and this this is something you addressed, is that because
they do and some of these articles talk about the
fact that the dancing is technically not always great, right
(26:17):
that like plenty of the people who are stars on
these apps are not probably great dancers per se. And
one of the things that they said is that TikTok
isn't about talent. Necessarily, TikTok is about enthusiasm and energy,
and so one of the things that they're tracking is
that the the people who are successful in the app
(26:37):
are dressed well. They're giving off a cool vibe and energy,
and that is driving people to want to see more
of their videos much more than whether or not they
can hit the dougie the douggist. You know what I mean.
Let me say this you you sort of talked about
this on another episode where you talked about Jay Hoover. Okay, yeah, yeah, TikTok.
(26:58):
TikTok is the g men bro. It's just following the
it's Abricambie and Fitch bro. It's just like, this is
what we want to show, so we could get more this. Yes,
And I think to that point when they say energy
and they say vibes, they're selecting that energy and vibes
based off of the ship that they like. Yeah, they
(27:20):
want a nice crib right like from the sun hitting
you because you've got a high apartment saying like that.
There's rules to this ship. You can't be in a
dark crib and being on TikTok popp and it just
won't happen. Right kind of thing, you know what I'm saying,
Like while doing dance moves, at least you gotta do
something about why your crib is so dark in order
for that ship to catch on. Yeah, and like even
(27:40):
you know, like you hear about like, uh, these people
who all like all these young sort of like internet
people who like buy a place together and they live
in these communes trying to to create content and ship
and even that is about creating a space that kind
of looks like you're staying with Diddy, do you know
what I mean? Like they never are like in a
(28:02):
fucking like hell hole. All take let's all take our
five thousand dollars and get this fifty thousand dollar house. Yes,
but we all just put in our our last five
and then we're in here, and then we could come
up off of that if we just shoot some videos
by the pool every day it's like always in front
of some giant uh glass like staircase or whatever. And
(28:24):
then you're doing that and now I know you you
have resources even though yeah, you got money, you got money,
you you TikTok. We want to follow you and see
what else you got going on exactly, Like clearly You're
already benefiting from these silly dances, so why would I
not continue down the train of enjoying more of yourself.
Every time there's a challenge, I want to see you
do it. Yes, hold on, I want to see this
(28:49):
one like the crazy legs, like like I want to
see fucking little Loosely do all the challenges. I don't
want to see everybody do all the damn challenges. I
read in one of the uh the articles that I
was reading a person and this goes back to to
your point about sort of like the taking of culture
or the recreation of culture. And a person who I
(29:10):
guess is like a TikTok dancer type person that we're
talking to talking to name mood Ferris been as a mash.
I don't probably fucking his name up bad, but that
doesn't matter. One he doesn't mean anything to me. But
he said, and I thought this was really interesting. He
said that TikTok is weirdly transforming into a dance genre itself.
(29:32):
And I think that that it It has twofold interest
to me because we've already sort of addressed the fact
that they are creating something that's completely of its own world.
But what they also say in the article is that
TikTok is still pulling from things that we recognize outside
of its own genre. So it becomes a way of
(29:53):
sort of softening everybody else's ship while still claiming, well,
this is just something of its it has nothing to
do with you. Well, this comes back to one of
a dance I mentioned earlier and the point I had
daughter before. It's like when Blackboy JB invented to shoot dance.
He invented it, whether somebody else did it around him,
(30:15):
Block what JB did it and made Vegas do it right.
Fortnite took that dance and put it in their game
and didn't ask Block what JB And then that was
a Fortnite dance, and whether they paid that nigga after
or not, and whether they gave him the credit or not,
that dances a Fortnite dance now, and so anything it's
like TikTok is almost like a filter or anything that
(30:37):
passes through it just becomes TikTok. Yes, you know what
I'm saying. Yeah, I think that's I think that's the
perfect articulation of it. It reminds me, you know, it's
push your t losing to McDonald's. You know what I'm saying, Like,
it's it's it's you made the McDonald's song. The McDonald's
song technically is yours, but once McDonald's has it, that's
(30:58):
the McDonald's song. I guess McDonald's b Yeah, like you
sold it to McDonald's. It's like, uh, it's like buying
a beat. I'm rapper, right, I buy a beat. They
can sell the exclusive rights to that beat for five
hundred dollars and then you go make a hit with
that ship. But like you sold the exclusive rights for
five hundred dollars. Yeah, that's my it's mine now yea, yeah,
(31:20):
that's my million dollar banger. You keep your five hundred
dollars and in some ways and that's it's sad and
it's fucked up. But then there's another star that you
go like, well, when would I expect a major corporation
to be like, you know what, we gotta do right
by the little black girl that did the renegade dance.
We got to make sure that she's taken care of
(31:40):
and fed, because that doesn't service their needs in any way. Right,
It's like, um, what the there was a girl who
actually was doing a dance she like made it up
and then like a small white girl got to do
it at the All Star Game. Yeah that I think
that was the Renegade ship, right, Okay, yeah, that was
that ship. That was crazy bro. Right, Jimmy Fallon had
(32:02):
literally brought Addison Ray onto fucking Uh which we're called
the Tonight Show to have her do various TikTok dances,
all of which belonged to different black performers and creators
and all that ship. It's like the on fleet girl, Bro,
This ship happens all the time and then like it
just goes under the radar, Like where's on fleek? That
(32:23):
happened a shorty, bro, because that word was applashed on
everything in Forever twenty one for like a long time.
So like, what how's she doing? Like you know what
I'm saying, she should be living like Madam C. J.
Walker Off and she fucking won't be. Yeah, you want
to know about fleektek. I guess The question I do
(32:46):
ask though myself, and I'm gonna ask you, is what
would be the appropriate compensation? What would be the appropriate
acknowledgement of these people's contributions? Because the reality is that
girl was just talking into her phone. It's not like
she sat and crafted a piece from this ship. She
was just being a similibilly and hit a moment and
(33:07):
that wave went crazy. So like, how do we actually
make sure that people are getting what they deserve without
overdoing it and being like nobody says this because this
my long stud Tanya or whoever the funk she is. Well,
I think the the thing to remember is the problem
isn't people saying her word. It's Wendy's tweeting this new
(33:30):
fucking chicken sandwich is on fleet. The original thing needs
to be acknowledgement, Like whether it's a quick phrase, you know,
I'm saying one of my homeboys, my DJ. He is
one of the biggest memes in the world. I don't
know if you ever seen the meme and the nigger
in the yellow hoodie and he's doing this ship looking mad.
That's my DJ. But you met him at the shop, Yes,
exactly right. Niggas is on Twitter every day. That's Jock Quis,
(33:52):
that's Quevo, that's this person, that's that person. He went
and fucking made sure he got that ship and all
of that so that he gets paid from that fucking meme.
And I think we need to make it clear that
you can do that for people, so when you hit
a wave, you can jump on it immediately instead of
like where the money reside. That Nigga jumped on that
(34:14):
wave immediately, and it was his wave, you know, nobody else's.
He got paid off it, he went got cool with
celebrities off it. You know what I'm saying. That was
his wave. But I think it's not very clear how
to do that versus other people can see it and
be like, oh, I can make all I gotta do
is yeah, I'm gonna take that ship right now, and
then they go get big off of it, bigger they
monetize it. You never got the chance to even try to.
(34:35):
And I would say this additionally, that's the corny thing
that the Internet does, where they go, oh, you should
just be grateful that we're celebrating you, or that you're
getting the attention that you otherwise wouldn't be getting it,
or you offset my life for like six months with
this bullshit and then expect me to go back to
living a normal life while y'all make a hell of
(34:55):
money like that, Having a viral moment like that I've
never had a viral video moment like that. I've had
a couple of stupid ass tweets go up and they
suck my Twitter up for days. So I can imagine
having something as big as on Fleek that's sucking your
life up a little bit. Whether it's a good way
or a bad way, it's in the way, you know
what I'm saying. You have to take a break to
deal with that. In some ways, even being made a
(35:17):
new whether whether it is like you said, good or bad,
you don't get to just go back to the version
of your life that it was. And then that's it's
not even like y'all owe me. It's like if somebody's
getting paid, then y'all owe me. Yes, if nobody was
getting shipped off on Fleek and everybody just used the phrasing,
it wouldn't even be an issue. But that's not the case.
(35:38):
That became branding for some people. That became fucking commercials
for a lot of people, you know what I'm saying. No,
I think that's that's a hundred percent true. I think
about that all the time with like you know it.
I think it used to be more of a trend
and now it's a little more dangerous to pull off.
But like when rappers would use like internet ship for
like interludes and ship and you have to wonder how
(36:01):
many of these people are actually getting compensated for those
internet things or is it just you thought it was
funny you put it in your interlude and these people
just sort of have to be grateful that, like, oh,
they they threw me in there, you know what I mean? Right,
Like I'm I'm I'm something on there real quick, you
know what I'm saying. Like with me, I've used you know,
I've used a million of the motherfucker's I make songs.
(36:22):
You know what I'm saying. I want my computer, of
course I got. I got a whole album about comedians
that I've made about my favorite comedians. Every song starts
and ends with some ship I pulled from YouTube, you know,
saying like that's just what that is. But there's a
reason for it, you know what I'm saying. And on
top of that, I reach out to a lot of
these motherfucker's that I try to involve to be like, yo,
(36:44):
you want to do a sketch on here or something
like I want to miss the hospital to do some
ship I've reached out to about to do some ship.
You know what I'm saying, Uh, Nick COLLETTI We never
used it, but on my second album reached out to
Nick COLLETTI had to make a bunch of joke phone
calls for it. Like I find the people, they're there,
and they're they're willing to listen, you know what I'm saying,
And they're not about to Like I realized a lot
(37:04):
of people are willing to work and for like a
realistic price or for something real because everybody's bullshitting all day.
But I think to that point, it truly is just
acknowledge me, dog, you know what I mean, Like like
you said, acknowledge that that I made a contribution to
the grander cultural imprint. And if you acknowledge that, and
(37:25):
if you compensate that, knowing that you are going to
also be compensated, then if you out bag me, I
I had fun, you know what I mean? Like I
I'm truly not at least and again I can only
speak for myself. I'm not terrified of somebody becoming a
millionaire off of some ship I said. I'm more terrified
of them truly, like pretending as if I don't exist
(37:48):
while be exactly there off of my ship because again
it's it's it's not a it's a principal thing. Bro,
It's like I'm here, like I did that. You know,
I'm saying I did that like so like and so like,
you know, I think about Craig Mac. Somebody's gonna make
a pup and ask Craig Mac TikTok remix and Craig
Mac ain't seeing bred off making his music and how
(38:11):
long you know what I'm saying, And it's gonna be huge,
Like that's frustrating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Do you think this,
this accountability is something that we are going to have
to fight for for other people because it seems like
at a certain point, either people don't have the resources
or the the Internet doesn't give enough of a funk,
(38:32):
like you're talking about Craig Mac, and I can't imagine
there's about to be like a big wave of people
being like justice for Craig Mac. We Craig Mac made
this song. You guys, gotta nobody's gonna give a fuck,
you know what I mean? If we're being truly honest,
and is that fair? No? Is it right? No? But
that's the reality of where we're at. So like, is
that then something where like we as artists are gonna
(38:54):
have to step in and be like, yo, I don't
want to be a part of this or I'm not
gonna do this unless we gotta jumping We gotta jump
in on this stuff faster. That's the other thing, is
like they need to acknowledge faster, and if they don't,
we need to acknowledge the problem faster and as a
bigger unit. Because this is you know, it's small potatoes.
(39:14):
Now you said something, it got cracking and somebody else
made a meal. You made eight dollars. Yeah, that's trash.
But that's again slippery slopan to deal with it. Deal
with it, deal with it, deal with it, deal with it.
And now you just gotta deal with it. Like you
know what I'm saying. It's just like it's it's not
cool to race things people have done because it doesn't
(39:37):
matter to you what I'm saying. Yeah, it matters to somebody,
and that's that's why we're here in the first nigga
g depth matters to me what I'm saying. Yeah, I'm
little boys with them big ass church and chains. I
love them. Yes, God damn it, flavor in your end.
(40:00):
We're gonna take one more break. We'll be back with
more Michael Christmas and more, my mama told me. And
we are back speak Hell yeah, We're back here with
(40:24):
more Michael Christmas, more, my mama told me. We're still
talking about the possibility that TikTok is destroying homes, specifically
black homes with ship dances that are making grandma's disappointed
in their grandchildren, grandfathers. They lower their heads, they say,
I welcome to Menia. Sooner if it's gonna make me
forget about this bullshit that I gotta see my grandchild.
(40:46):
Do do you think I guess this is going back
to the larger question. Do you feel like this is
a feeling that other generations have had to deal with?
Like were they looking at the whist and being like that,
ain't that ain't dancing? This is this is trash in whatever.
(41:08):
I can only point to the post nineties because I
was born in ninety four, and everything that came out
when I was a kid was an issue to the
people older than me. Always jerking was an issue land
with a rock with it that was kind of a
silly dance walking out. But at the same time, these
(41:30):
dances were all being done way more than like the
mats dances of right now slash like progressively, like I
think the Soldier Boys when older, older people stopped doing
like Okay, well he'll tell I can, He'll tell I
can walk it out, I can check a noodle suit,
but like hitting a choreograph dance move, which is exactly
(41:53):
the problem now. I also think the part of the
problem was that Soldier Boy was the face of the product,
and for older people it felt like, all right, what
are we what game is this? Now? Do you know
what I mean? Like all respective, But but he is not.
If you're an older person in that generation, you're not
(42:14):
looking at this and being like, now that's a man
I'll take seriously. Yeah no. And luckily I was a
kid when Soldier Boy came out, so I got to
enjoy every year of Soldier Boys started uninterrupted while just
being hated on about older folks that don't get it.
But I'm grown now and I funk with the Soldier
Boys still, like I think every dance from then it's good,
(42:37):
I think, is there's something I'm not about to do.
I don't want to do to cup the shuffle like
ever again if possible, Like you know what I'm saying.
But otherwise, like and you know what, when I was
a kid, I went to camp and I don't know
if you've ever heard the song Cotton I Joe. Yeah,
I know Cotton I Joe. Do you know the dance?
I don't know what anymore, but there was a dance.
It was like front step, front step. Yeah, yeah, them
(43:00):
that bullshit. That's that's what TikTok dances look like. Yeah yeah,
but but that's what they will also say that you
get in those groups and you see motherfucker's doing Cotton
I Joe and you're like, goddamn, they look like they're
having a good time. They do look like they're having
a good time, for sure. The group was ten year
olds across the board, but it did look like you
(43:21):
were having a good headtime for sure. But again it
goes back to what we were saying. You have to
strike a balance right where it's like, I am not
at all interested in taking the fun away from anybody,
Like I do want every generation to have their ship,
have their fun. I'm not I don't want to be
the person that stops it at the same time, let's
(43:41):
just figure out a way to make your fun not
feel like it's destroying valuable like uh, just generations of
of work that we've done. Yeah, and and again, Like
the the issue really for me, like this is all
an agenda for me to dig a lot deeper into
how my things are going away without you know, anybody,
(44:04):
anybody's approval from the blacks. You know what I'm saying,
Like like, where where is the most depth in the
red suit with the curly hair on Chappelle's show to delegate, bro,
we need a delegator, we need delegate everybody. Just let's
just slide goddamn Tim McGraw or whoever. Then it was
on the song a little Dirk just doing whatever after
(44:26):
he just got finished saying Nigga somewhere else like hey, hey,
somebody regulates this ship man, And that's what That is
the part that I think I often find myself feeling
frustrated with because I don't want to find myself blaming
black people, right Like I want to be not that
dude who's like Nigga's y'all, y'all should have done something.
(44:47):
But it's like Lebron, don't do that. Don't do that,
you know what I mean? Like when you did you know,
when you do the fucking Harlem shake ship, you're truly
just doing it for views and you're not considering the
fact that you were a kid. Miami kids is gonna
love this, Like, bro, you know what I'm saying, Just
throw the move in there at least just to be like,
(45:08):
I see it. I see that's the thing. That's what
it feels like. It's it feels like as it's always
felt like this as a black person in America. It
always felt like when I make contact with another black
person that we are thinking the same thing. For the
most part, we have the same ideas, we know what
it is. And it's starting to feel just less overall,
like we know what it is as a unit. Yes,
(45:28):
I don't want to lose I just don't want to
lose us all knowing what it is when we get there, No,
And I think it got even weirder because then there's
that wave that we hit where it became cool to
be like, I don't think like other black people think
like I'm not trapped in the same you know, Kanye
did it, Chance did it where they were like, yeah,
why do we have to be like that. It's like
(45:50):
you don't have to be but come on, but come on,
but you know what it is because because for one
and this isn't to come out here or a chance
or anybody in PARTICU dealer. But when you do that,
do not get in trouble or do anything else and
then expect nigga's to come give you a big old
hook b because we're not gonna do it. Bro. Maybe
(46:13):
you said you don't eat coligreenes, you don't eat coligreens
different and you got it. Show me how different handles
frustrating situations turn around and die. Yeah, we'll make it value.
So I guess the last question that sort of has
(46:36):
been living in this for me is I wonder and
I do think that this is the scary thing with
this situation, right is I think that part of the
problem that we're facing is that there is too much
of everything all the time, and so we were inevitably
going to find ourselves getting worse at stuff because we
just have to keep making more stuff. Do what I mean, Like,
(46:59):
there's no a for eight it's fucking loose steel Ball
trying to stuff the chocolates and I love Lucy. Eventually
there's just too much, so you're gonna do a ship job.
And so I wonder I'd love to hear your thoughts
of like is the truly the only way that black
people can get back to being like the true like
heroes of dance and culture is for the Internet to
(47:21):
go away and we just have less stuff. No, And
I think this goes back to an earlier point of acknowledgement,
But this is on the level of the people in
control as well as the creators, because we need to
acknowledge real talent too, you know what I'm saying it
we need to put things on the forefront now because
(47:42):
they adhere to the guidelines of what we want our
viewers to see, but because they're actually good yeah as well.
And I think that's a problem with that platform, is
that it just seems very aimed, like you just see him.
Because the thing is like, you can post all the
same things across your socials, you will not get more
agement then you'll get on TikTok. But it's only if
(48:03):
you do it the way TikTok wants you to do it,
you know what I'm saying. And so I think just
like That's what I mean by by the people who
are in control is like, you know, make it fair.
But also like for the people who are not in control,
I think we we just need more people to be
in Like when I think about my childhood, bro, even
if they weren't the best role models, are black folks
are in charge for real? You know what I'm saying.
(48:25):
They said things and they stuck. You know what I'm saying.
We And it's not to say that all these niggas
are not good. A lot of my heroes a terrible
people growing up and learning, but that's not the point.
The point is having a good voice, or a good
few voices to actually look to and learn from. You
know what I'm saying, I gotta look. I gotta look
(48:45):
at movies where these people who are some of them
terrible people, play incredible characters that can teach me things.
But there's really people out there, you know what I'm saying,
who can teach me those same things. And that's you know,
we need those Like niggas could be mad at they
should pall all they want, but that heat he to
me a lot. But like, yeah, I think about like
Isaiah Washington, where it's like that is a phenomenal fucking actor.
(49:10):
He was real good at acting. Yeah, he had a
whole bunch of other problematic ship that made his relationship
with with a public complicated. But at the at its core,
and I think this is the point you're making. At
its core, we were celebrating a person for their talents,
not just their big personality or like their edginess or
whatever the funk it is. And now, whether we we
(49:33):
can control it or not, there are a lot of
people that are just existing off of their personality more
than an actual skill set. And until we can go
back to celebrating skill sets, we're gonna be chasing our
tails in this ship. I feel like our last like leader.
And I'm saying because we lost a bunch at one
time because of the pandemic, but our last like leader,
(49:54):
I feel like it Nipsey hustle as far as like
at least the niggas, I like, that's the type of
person that I would can that are a leader? Yeah,
a lot of my niggas. Because he'll say things that
will resonate and make you think about your life and
want to change it, you know what I'm saying. And
there's not that many of those anymore. We had a
lot more of those when I was a kid, for sure,
Like these people that even even if they weren't doing that,
(50:15):
like just these larger than life inaccessible personalities. And it's
not to say like obviously the internet makes that a
lot harder to but also these personalities are a little
bit all the same now, you know what I'm saying,
all ruded and kind of the same thing. We all
do this, we all like this, we all go here,
we all like this ship. That's how we live like this.
We just need more standout personalities to take charge in
(50:36):
the black community, thinks. And I don't know how we
we make that, but I do think at least acknowledging
people's skills and their goodness is a is a starting point.
But we need more black comedians to be really, really
famous yesterday. And that's what I mean is like you
know what I'm saying. You know, eight hunted nigga. Everybody
(50:57):
on your list of people on your cast excluding me,
is a goddamn generational talent or whatever it is they do.
This has been a phenomenal episode and I'm a big fan.
You watch your mouth. I know these niggas. When I
went to when I found your podcast just because I Google,
I looked up Zach Fox and I was like, oh,
this is two of my niggas right here. And I'm like, oh,
this is good. Then I started looking at the list,
(51:19):
I'm like, oh, I'm a fan of them. I'm afan
of them. These niggas need to be bigger. And it's like,
it's it's not them, you know what I'm saying. The
talents there, the work is there, it's just the world. Yeah,
it is very hard to be any version of what
your talent is set up to be right that Like,
you have to figure out a almost a scam sometimes
(51:40):
to make the world see you as a talented person
you may already be. And that's the scary part about
all of this game. It's like, truly, we're not just
figuring out how to get good at a job. We're
then figuring out a way to trick someone into looking
at us long enough to go, fuck, he's good at
that job. It's like you gotta spend time getting real,
(52:02):
real good at some ship. Then you've gotta straight away
from that and spend time trying to figure out how
to make people watch you do that ship that you're
amazing at now Exactly, it's a miserables. That's part of
that's part of the hustle. Yeah, that's just life in general.
But I don't want that to happen to people who
have like a quick strike opportunity. Some of these people
are not aiming their lives towards having a viral moment
(52:26):
or having a viral dance, you know what I'm saying.
And so when they get it, I want them to
keep it, yeah, saying when they get it, I want
them to keep it. I always think about, um, the
the lady that uh ain't nobody got time for that?
That that late bro, what's upwhere her? Well, I'll say this,
and this is I think a little bit of a
(52:46):
hopeful ending for for what we've been talking about. Is
she was a lady struggling with drugs. She was in
a fire and then got went viral, and she capitalized
on that moment her teeth fixed and then did fucking
commercials for the dentists that fixed her teeth and got
paid off the ship. And I don't know if she
(53:08):
was able to like to modify it beyond that point,
but I do think that even that is a beautiful
sort of like, okay, this is correct for what she
offered us. She became a meme that we all enjoyed.
If nothing else, let this lady have some new teeth
and some money to be able to like move forward
however she chooses. Yeah, yeah, that's the new ship. Bro.
(53:31):
If you get like, if you have a viral moment,
you should give you, like whatever, the two things you
need most. I love that, and then you can have it, bro.
Then you can put it in the Wendy's commercial, McDonald's whatever,
so long, John Silvers, whatever, and they can put it
go ahead. But yeah, fix my back and get me
a new bed. You don't need to fix. You don't
need to to set me up for life. But if
(53:52):
you know I'm sleeping on a mattress on the floor,
get me a bed frame and help me out. It's
like people who go role for like having some fileship
at the crib or having a file crib and they
throw that ship up on Damn Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy, send
that motherfucker check, bro, so they can stop doing that
(54:13):
this show anymore. Help them, help them, bro, Like they're sad,
Like I remember I've seen. I think I saw Drew
Sky on a five South talking to DC Young fly In.
DC Young Flyer was talking about how he didn't have
the resources to shoot these big videos that King Bacha
was making. He had to just show he had around him,
so he was making vines of the cockroaches on his
(54:33):
wall to which too, because Drew Ski was like, I
remember that he was on VON and he was taking
videos of cockroaches on your wall, and I'm like, is
this nigga okay? Like we need to send in and
he's like and then that was DC's response was, well,
these niggas on Vaughn is making these big production movies
in these six seconds. I ain't got a movie studio,
I't on cameras for no explosions. So I'm using what
(54:54):
I got, you know what I'm saying in here, And
look at him. He's a super He's a goddamn superstar. Now, no,
I mean it, it's crazy and like to that point,
like I even you know, I'm not a person without resources,
but like even just being able to put together a
self tape of like yo, I need another person to
be to set up a camera. I need somebody to
read lines. Maybe it's that same person, but you need
(55:17):
a level of like commitment from your community and from
around you to even make that ship happen. So the
fact that these dudes we're making full production, three camera
productions for internet videos tells you that they were sitting
on profit already, or at least sitting on a cushion
that to the point that d C was making, he
didn't have And unless somebody is gonna come in and
(55:39):
be like, yo, I see a potential in him, and
I'm gonna make sure he gets correctly compensated for that potential,
he's just gonna be a nigga making roach video Roach videos. Bro.
It's like anytime you see somebody do a quick dance
move on the tail, but nobody tagged them and they
weren't the posted person to post it. They were just
caught doing the dance moved. Nike is never my never
(56:00):
even know that he went viral. Well, that he changed
the world a little bit, you know what I'm saying, Like,
that's just crazy. You should be given something for making
kids in Wisconsin do your fucking dance move while you
was outside of the projects. That's just what it is,
pretty straightforward two things you need. I love that. I
(56:20):
think that's the I think that's the thesis, the real
big takeaway. We can leave everybody with, Give people two
things they need for the great things they need in life,
for their contributions, and then do what you will or
we're gonna smack you. That's the new ship, bro, we
gonna start pulling up and smacking people tough. Do that?
(56:42):
Do that dance again real quick? Yeah? All right, I
think we did it. Michael, did you tell the people
at home where they can find you what cool ship
you have? Yeah? Man, Michael Christmas, my birthday is in
like a week. That's like probably my only cool ship.
But I'm gonna trying to should happen around it. Um,
I got dumb music out of music, Spotify that stuff,
(57:05):
Michael Christmas at, Michael Christmas on Instagram, making Christmas on Twitter,
and yeah, go enjoy some of that. I've also been
dabbling and stand up. So if you end Boston, specifically
on a Wednesday night, you walk into an empty bar
and see a stage I might be on. All right,
well go watch Michael do stand up. More importantly, go
listen to his music. It's fired. Support, support, support and
(57:27):
As always, you can follow me at Langston Kerman all
of my bullshit. I don't make no music, but yeah,
it's nonsense either way. And uh, you can uh subscribe
to the podcast, you can review do the thing I
don't know, And if you want to send me your
own conspiracy theories or drops, you can send them to
my Mama pod at gmail dot com. Okay, that's it.
(57:50):
By bit Unclela bears were racist. The Oasto player for
oasting money versions of many turkey stuff in I can't
(58:12):
tell me about
Hosts And Creators
Langston Kerman
David Gborie
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