June 4, 2020 • 37 mins
Civil unrest in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, by an officer of the Minneapolis Police Department, has forced to the surface a centuries old struggle. How can we protect and make our Black communities whole? How can we move towards a future where the police truly do "Protect & Serve" all citizens of this country; a future where the police employ mediation and deescalation, not lethal force; a future where instead of locking people in cages, we rehabilitate them and restore their rights. The hosts of Waiting on Reparations, Linqua Franqa (aka Mariah Parker) and Dope Knife (aka Kedrick Mack), share their personal experiences with these issues and a few ideas on how to get the process started.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening waiting on reparations of production of I Heart Radio.
They heard the shot, but I never had the chance
to see the smoking gun, T shirts. Soaking blood is
leaking up over the linoleum, holding onto the bottle. Still.
They could have called the hospital, but they learned the
cops convinced of images of Nigga kids as hostile kids.
This nation hates us and wants us to hate us too.
(00:22):
It's advantageous when niggas hate Asians, and Asians a niggas.
So when a shot keep it faving robbery is an
innocent teenager dump. The system isn't broken, No, it's fully operational.
We watched it work this way so well since way
before that faithful day in April nine two, when we
riot looted, when we raised help, we but finally through
being escape goats for the neighborhoods, you can find us too,
(00:42):
to the grinding lops you assigned us to, with your
griming schools and your crack rocks and your bad cops
and these white jerseys that blindly choose complicity. Who find
shootings in this city so commonplace to sign faiths like
eight balls so flippantly for centuries we stayed calm, but
a new day is done and you best believe at
reeks and napalm. I wrote that verse for Latasha Harlan's,
(01:03):
a fifteen year old girl who was shot in the
back of the head by a Korean grocery store owner
in Los Angeles. We talked a lot about Rodney King,
but Latasha Harland's death too, was a catalyst for the
l a riots that followed in the subsequent year. We
haven't seen violence like that since until now. A uh yeah, yeah,
(01:36):
my name's Dope Knife. What's up? I'm Lingua franca and
waiting on RepA so um. When we started this podcast,
the world and it's a regular state, was just fucked up,
just regular fund up, just regular fucked up. And then
fucking plague hit COVID and we went on lockdown. That
(02:01):
we've been on lockdown for twelve weeks now, and the
whole world has changed. The whole world has changed. Then
last week George Floyd was murdered at the hands of
for Minneapolis p D. And in the wake of it,
we start seeing national protests, civil unrest the likes of
which the country hasn't seen in the generations our whole
(02:21):
plan to launch this show kind of had to go
out the window, and we hadn't had to reassess what
we're gonna do. Because as black folks that are politically
committed to struggle and aware and following not only what's
happening now, but following what has been going on in
this country for decades and following it very closely in
recent years. Uh, we feel it's important for us to
(02:45):
speak out right now and to articulate what our experiences
have been as well as what our vision is for
what's coming next. So this isn't gonna be like our
usual episode waiting on reparations that you guys are gonna hear.
We're gonna kinda just talk from the heart about how
we feel about what's going on. So welcome to it.
My name's Dope Knife. I'm a rapper producer from Savannah,
(03:10):
g A. Well, technically I'm not from anywhere, because I
grew up overseas. My mother's Liberian, my father's American. He
used to work for the State Department, and I grew
up overseas. But um, I moved to the States to
go to college and I've been here since and uh,
I'm an independent musician. My name is Leewoa Franca a
(03:32):
k a. Mariah Parker Um. In two thousand eighteen, I
was elected to the Athens Clark County Commission, where I
have now served for two years on an abolitionist agenda
and a pro worker, pro black um leftist agenda. I'm
also hip hop artist, and I'm a linguist. Actually, I
have a master's in linguistics and I'm getting my PhD
(03:54):
Language and Literacy education at the University of Georgia. So
I look at this for the LNDIP hip up from
the lens of local policy, from the lens of linguistics
and the lens of education. And so we're gonna have
another episode coming out soon kind of explaining more about
who we are and what this podcast has about, as
well as other episodes about the labor movement, about prison abolition,
(04:16):
about sex work, about all sorts of topics that tie
hip hop and politics together. But today we're gonna just
talk from the heart about what's happening in this country,
what our experiences have been, and where we see things
going from here. Talk to me about your relationship with
the police. Well, I guess it's a not unsimilar to
(04:39):
that of a lot of other black males. It hasn't
been too positive of relationship. It's at this point it's
almost like cliche. You know, I've never had a cop
personally smile at me, you know what I mean. When
I was around twenty one, I was walking home from
work and was like walking in the middle of the street,
(05:02):
so not really on the sidewalk, and it was like
maybe like eleven o'clock at night. I got stopped by
two cops and they were asking me why I was
walking so close to the cars that were on the road.
So I was explaining to them, It's like, oh, well,
you know, I'm just walking home. I can get on
the sidewalk if you want. They roughed me up and
(05:25):
you know, I mean got me on the ground. They're
like calling me, I'll sorts of names and ship and uh.
It was it's like I told that story like mad times,
but for whatever reason, they just like it feels a little,
(05:46):
it feels different telling it now was hitting me too,
but um, it's just like the main thing I took
away from it is just like the feeling of like
like powerlessness, you know, what can you do? And especially
in that situation where it's just like me alone and
it's like dark, and it's like literally anything could happen.
I mean, this was way before tray Von and you know,
(06:10):
things like that. But again, at the same time, it's
not like situations weren't known. It wasn't like this wasn't happening.
It was definitely before it was before the like proliferation
of the cell phone camp you know what I'm saying.
So it was something I could definitely tell like my homies,
tell my boys, tell my my mom, I pops, you
(06:31):
know what I'm saying, like, and it was like, oh man, fun, sorry,
you know, but it wasn't necessarily something that it was
just like, Okay, well everybody knows that this is happening.
Welcome to the bottom of the barrel, cops U J walking,
put the glock to your apparel, lock you in the
box for all the pot that's in your marrow, and
even taking walks. Make you a talking for in there. Bro.
(06:53):
I dare you to come let these crackers put you
on a curfew. You could keep it real and let
the silly niggas mrk you. I'll tell you what the deal.
We really ain't got no virtue. Survival requires work, and
nobody really deserves you. When life is throwing them courage
you strike probably solve it all of all the world's
unite people worth the sight. I ain't got ship and
nigger my purses tight. Heard it right, post a picture
made the frame of perfect life. Nothing's worse than hype.
(07:15):
We can all conserve the worst of slights. Financial rigor
mortis got your throwing fits. Now you're ships. The story
that you was talking slick. Now you just sitping. Poor
Ward's trying to penny pinch, of course, which can make
you sick of poor ship, instead of sitting gorgeous creditors
got picks and torches. This gap is massive and there's
nothing to fill. Since that cop called me a fag
and put a gun in my grill, I'm bugging for real.
(07:35):
Prepped ourselves for forty five to touch down. Now we
want to act mad. I don't give a funk now.
I wrote that ship February two thousand and seventeen. You
know when you always hear about when people talk about
how oh will you only hear the bad things about
(07:57):
cops and you never hear the good things about cops
And stuff like that, and it's like, first of all,
that's not true. But second so what like it's like
the default is that everything is supposed to be fine,
Like you're not supposed to get like a cookie. You
do your job, so playing basketball or doing some fucking
breakdance moves exactly, sharing ice cream cone, Great job, you
(08:20):
did your job, so it'll do. I feel like if
if cops want to be like first of all, if
they want to have like an imprint in the community,
then the impression should either be we don't notice you,
or it's positive you know what I'm saying. But like
the fact that it's in so many places to so
many people, it's like a negative force or something that
(08:43):
people think badly of. I mean, it's kind of an
important fucking job, you know. So it's like yeah, straight up,
like I mean the ones that I don't know, it's
just there should be a zero tolerance from within a
good cop calling a bad cop out or good good
(09:04):
police officers like actively like calling out like you know,
the stuff that's wrong with their system goes a long
way in like people's perception of like all cops. Because
like right now, I can tell you this ship seems
like it's a gang, Like people are good, like they're
out for each other. You know what I'm saying that
you know, no oversight, like it's us versus them, and
(09:28):
it just doesn't. It feels like a foreign occupying power.
I mean, when they're using military forces against us, they're
using tactics that aren't even allowed in warfare. They are
an occupying force in our communities. And I, as an abolitionist,
fully believed that our communities are capable of policing themselves.
If you look at what the Black Panthers said in
(09:49):
the Lowlands of Oakland back in their height of power,
chasing the cops out of their community and patrolling them
themselves and holding people accountable themselves for wrongdoing, but also
resourcing folks, giving out food and doing education and making
sure everyone has everything they need so they're not robbing
a liquor store or breaking into a car, and they're
(10:11):
not under so much to rest that they end up
hitting their spouse or yelling at their kids, or having
a mental breakdown and running into the street naked with
a knife. You know, when our community is a resourced
I truly believe that we don't need them at all,
whether they're good people who have to do a bad job. Um,
the whole system is inextricably linked to white supremacy, and
(10:37):
we can build the world, I believe without it, and
I have. I wasn't as open about these views when
I first got elected around a platform of criminal justice reform,
of strengthening their relationships between the community and our law enforcement. UM.
And then I was sworn in on the autobiography of
(10:59):
Malcolm X, which I did not believe was going to
be a big deal, but apparently it was. But in
the aftermath of that, I was getting a lot of
death threats from white supremacists from across the country. UM.
I was warned, you know, not to pick up unexpected
packages off my porch in case they were bombs. UM.
I was being threatened with rape and lynching. And I
(11:20):
was at a really hard crossroads where though I then
even held abolitionist views, you know that I sort of
like dressed in language that was easier for people to
understand regarding police reform. UM, I didn't know who I
was going to have to who I was going to
(11:40):
be able to call if ship went down, Well, the
cops still come. If some if somebody shows up at
my house with an a K forty seven. UM. And
the fact that in this current day, we don't have
the infrastructure socially in place to protect ourselves as a community,
and right now the default is that you have to
(12:02):
call the cops because we don't have a world yet
where we're ready to defend ourselves. And so that's a
little bit about what my recent experiences have been around
the police. I used to always smile away at them
when they drive by, because I knew they knew who
I was, and I felt like, I gotta, you know,
play nice so that they'll come to my house if
somebody sets it on fire. But recently I realized that,
(12:24):
you know, it's a job like any other job. It's
a dangerous job, but it's not one of the most
dangerous professions of the country. UM. I believe sanitation workers
get hurt or killed in the line of duty more
often than police officers do. UM. And so this deference
to them that we should honor them and UM have
(12:44):
and like upholding, like uphold their you know, uphold them up,
will lift them because of the work that they do.
It is something that I've begun to re Jacks because um,
you get posing for selfies with your ice cream cone,
with the little black teenager shooting hoops with kids on
the block, Like, that's just what your job is, and
I'm not here to a plot it. The attitude that
(13:05):
that I feel like a lot of them have with
it is like it's just a job, and it's like, oh,
you're supposed to like respect me and give me difference
because I have this job, And it's like, but you
don't even necessarily live up to it like that, you
know what I'm saying, Like how many how many YouTube
videos can you go on and watch if cops like
breaking the law? You know, they're like all over the place, Like,
(13:28):
you know, just just given given the situation that we're
in right now, we're in a situation where the country
is in upheaval over police brutality. So what's what is
the police solution for that police brutality like on a
wide national scale. Yeah, so let's turn to start talking
(13:49):
a little bit about what we're seeing in the media
right now. For sure, we're recording this on a blackout Wednesday.
It's Tuesday, babe, core teen quarantine. What our day is? Anyone?
So I find it very interesting, Um, you know, both
having watched what has been happening in the media regarding
(14:11):
the upheaval across the country over the last week, and
then having a direct experience with it as an organizer
of a march here in our city over the weekend. Um,
how the media narrative UH obscures blame for the types
of violence that happened UH in these protests. So let's take,
(14:32):
for example, you hear about protesters are arrested, protesters are injured,
protesters are killed. As a linguist, when I read something
like that, immediately identify the fact that it is composed
in the passive voice. The person who is being acted
upon comes first in the sentence, and the agent of
(14:55):
the action is obscured. So who is arresting the protesters,
who is entering the protesters? Who is doing the violence
upon other people? When stories get broken into, when cars
gets set on fire, Um, they want to blame us,
But when we get hurt, it's not as clear in
(15:16):
the way that these things are construed, what the where
the blame should be assigned. And I think that you know,
it comes from a long line of I mean journalistic
practices in terms of just oh, something happened without identifying
who did what to home. But you know, it also
goes into these like these narratives we see of like um,
(15:39):
this this this discourse of uh support the police, you know,
uh smiling and you know, sharing photos of them doing
good work in the community as a way to perpetuate
that narrative. I think all these things work in tandem.
Two help protect us system that is fundamentally broken. And
(16:04):
I understand when I look at that, when I when
I look at um images of indiscriminate violence, you know,
against protesters are towards private property. Um, when I see
headlines like that, I understand how folks can be confused
about who is in the wrong here because the media
(16:24):
is confusing people. I just feel like some of it
kind of comes down to the state and what the
purpose of the police is. Its purpose has always been
like to protect property and rich people, and it's never
really been to serve the community. To us, there's just
never been a point where it's like the police are
(16:46):
like for the people and not for those in power.
And so you're saying that the same way that like
what communism has never worked. People who say policing has
never worked, have never seen policing operate the way that
it is supposed to. I wouldn't even say the way
that it's supposed to, because how is it supposed to work?
Just the whole concept of it is just And that's
(17:08):
my question too, And that's why I'm an abolitionist, because
I'm like, how is it supposed to work? I'm understand
how mental health like resources are supposed to work for
people having crises, and understand how social work is supposed
to work for people that need access to resources. I
understand how some restorative justice works. It's very challenging even
for my imagination when I'm post with questions about abolition
(17:28):
or people like, well, what would you do in this situation,
and it's like, I don't know, but all I know
is what we're doing right now is not working, and
I'm committed to finding solutions that are different. So I
feel you, Yeah, I know, I tell you feel you.
The way that police forces go after street crime, what
if that was reversed to go after white collar crime,
(17:51):
I might not feel too bad about that. I think
it's really interesting to contrast people's reactions to seeing like
an auto zone get burned down. Or um a cop
(18:14):
pelted with the brick, um. And then uh, my actual
experience of organizing and leading march here and Hapthens over
the weekend. You tell us about that. Yeah, so, Um,
over the weekend, I, you know, as an elected official called,
(18:35):
in response to what I've been seeing across the country,
called for a ten year plan to start being developed
here locally that would transition of our police officer positions
to social workers, mental health professional professionals, and restorative justice
practitioners over the next ten years. And in response to
(18:55):
that and some other things going on, UM, one of
my fellow you know, black queer fem organizers in town
was like, Yo, let's have a rally here in Athens,
and let's like center it on those demands, something concrete
to channel people's anger into in this moment. So they
started organizing up a rally. UM. I was somewhat involved,
(19:16):
you know, in the like the group thread, trying to
keep tabs on the developments. And then you know, we
let people know we're gonna have a march for a
while without cops. Told to meet us on the courthouse
steps at five pm. Um, So I show up and
there's about maybe five people there and I'm merely start
(19:38):
yelling in my megaphone, you know, Black lives matter, gaining
them in chance. I take a moment to speaking to
the megaphone, what my my plan is, what my idea is,
and um, folks are you know, calling out with their support,
and we begin to march. We begin to march to
the streets, um, continuing to chant, we take over the street. Uh.
(20:00):
We marched through prominent areas of downtown, meet up with
other folks who were gathered, and they joined us. And
what was beautiful was that I was filled with so
much fear and terror and anxiety and um, almost a
sense of hopelessness going into the scenario, having seen the
scenes of violence on the on the news throughout the
(20:23):
past week, and knowing that we were we were inviting
that on ourselves. We couldn't control if people came to
break into store windows. Business owners online were accusing me,
if anything happens today, it's it's your fault. Um. I
couldn't control if innocent people who would come there to
stand in solidarity with black people across this country. Um,
(20:45):
if they got tear gas that day, if they got
hit with rubber bullets, that day, and so I was shaking,
I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep. Um, but I stood
up because I felt like it was my duty for oh,
you know, people of color, black people, particular of the
black women and black queer folks, to take the lead
in situations like this, you know, as the most marginalized people,
(21:06):
to make the demands and be the face of change.
So I'm out there at one point of standing up
on a Confederate monument um, and the crowd is chanting,
say his name, which one, Say her name? Which one?
At which point I just started. I just broke down
(21:28):
and started sobbing um with the feet, my feet planted
on this relic of white supremacy, and thousands of people
spread out all through the streets in front of me. Um.
And but it was beautiful because we we didn't break
into any stores. We weren't there to do damage or
due violence. The white people there were here to hear
(21:51):
the stories too, of you know, black people in Athens,
the stories of oppression, of marginalization, of prejudice. There shoudn't
for what a better world could be. And um, it
was a truly beautiful thing. But as night fell and
the crowd dispersed and several hundreds of people stayed behind,
(22:13):
and the National Guard came into town Um. They and
the and the folks remaining peacefully occupied the main plaza
in downtown with tents, with their hands up, chanting UM,
just building cambaraderie with one another, talking to one another.
They were slowly boxed in by the National Guard. A
(22:35):
drone flow overhead telling them to disperse. Kurfey was put
in place retroactively UM telling them that they was illegal
for them to be downtown UM, and no one knew
until an hour after it was too late to leave,
and they were slowly being cornered by tanks and with
their hands up and with their arms locked in solidarity
with one another. They were tear gassed and hit with
(22:57):
rubber rubber bullets and arrested. And some of the black
women who who organized the protests where when they got
to the county jail, separated from the rest of the
group in what we believe to be an active retaliation
in targeting for their involvement in bringing those folks together.
And so I saw firsthand how folks coming together to
(23:19):
or to demonstrate as is their right, non violently are
met with violence. I witnessed firsthand how the armed forces,
the arms of the police state, are the agitators. And
I worked this firsthand as well, how powerful it is
when we come together, nonetheless, because we developed concrete demands
(23:43):
for what needs to happen next, and we educated people
about what the world could look like. And we brought
the mayor up who stood beside me on the Confederate Monument,
and we made our demands to him, and we made
very clear that we are committed to the struggle. And
so um, I just I think it's really important for
folks that aren't in the struggle, who aren't out there
(24:06):
in the streets, to be very cautious of what you're
seeing and hearing in the media, the way the headlines
are written, the accounts that they are foregrounding when they
describe what's happening, Because when you're there yourself, you see
for yourself who is doing the agitating, who is doing
the damage, who was doing the harm, And it's not us.
(24:27):
Even if it is us, ain't even there to fucking
like lay blamed anyone that's burning ship down or breaking
in the stores. Because black people built this land for free,
and I think we have every right to express our
outrage about the way we are treated and the way
that our country has run by any means that are necessary.
(24:47):
But UM, too often we get lost in UM media
narratives that obscure who is truly to blame for what
is happening here? And the armed forces are to blame
and white supremacy is to blame. So whatever people do
out in these streets, most of these folks are just
(25:07):
out here expressing their grievances peacefully. But um, they are
not the ones who started this battle. That's all I
want to say. So where you see it going? UM,
I can't you know? I got a crystal ball and
nothing but UM. Here in Athens, we have mobilized around
very specific demands for for our local legislators to to
(25:33):
change the policing, to implement more community resources to prevent
people from becoming criminals in the first place, and if
they do commit crimes, to ensure that they never commit
crimes again because they, you know, they have access to
good jobs, good food, good places to live, good education,
the kinds of things that studies have shown helped decrease
the likelihood of recidivism or offending in the first place nationwide.
(25:57):
It's hard to say. I know that you've been um
keeping tabs on what some of the reactions by the
federal government, So maybe you have a view of what
you think might be coming next that you want to share. Well,
I mean, unfortunately, it all kind of comes down to
with the people in charge or trying to do. And
(26:17):
this is happening in a political year, and it seems
like Trump has given all the signs that he's trying
to go a Nixon route with it, which is on
the law and order president YadA YadA, YadA, blah blah blah,
the thugs. So I don't I see I see the
cops in the federal government in general ratcheting stuff up.
(26:38):
And if Trump does, you know, if he does go
ahead and try to like force the US military onto
the streets, which according to a poll that just came
out like today, percent of the country is in favor of,
then you know what I'm saying, that's is gonna happen,
(27:01):
and it's going to be a matter of wills at
that point. So just be safe out there. People. I
think will achieve. I think we will. We will achieve
policy change. What I've come to understand. And you know,
like I roll with a lot of anarchists who are
down with you know, armed revolution and ship like that.
I'm not even gonna lie, like I don't always agree,
(27:22):
but like I think it's very important listen what they
have to say. And I have become particularly critical of
the that point, having watched the violent repression of the
state go down in the media and then with my
own eyes, um, you know, in Athens recently. I mean
I watched footage of what was happening, you know here Sunday,
(27:43):
but I'm hearing recounts from friends and comrades of what
happened to them. And so I've come to believe that
we cannot take their power away with our hands and
with our sticks and our stones, but we can take
our their power away with our laws and in in
progressive places or even places that might be conservative, but
people are waking up. Local governments and state legislatures can
(28:07):
and I believe will take action to prevent their cities
from burning to the ground. What do you think is
hip hop's relationship to this. I've seen some video of
(28:28):
I saw j Cole marching in North Carolina and wanted
the protests but I haven't really heard too much. Tory
Lanes put out a statement where he was encouraging. He
actually was encouraging like UH rappers and black celebrities like
if if what you have to say about the situation
isn't in support of it, then just shut the fun
(28:51):
shut the funk out, you know what I'm saying. I
folk with that. That's a good statement, but I guess
there's a lot of people who feel the should shut
the funk up then then, because it's been awfully quiet,
which is like kind of weird and kind of ironic
that this blackout thing is happening because it's like, I mean,
I'm doing it because I get it. I get it
(29:11):
for the hashtag and stuff. It gives people further cover
to say nothing. Yeah, it feels like special. I feel
like this is the moment to say stuff. You know
what I'm saying, and and it's gonna be I mean,
this is like obviously way less important, but just the
nerd in me is kind of interested in seeing where
culture goes after this point, you know what I mean,
(29:35):
Like what happens with hip hop after this point? What
happens with like movies? You know what is like I
don't know. Just it's a whole new world. It's complete,
a completely different environment than it was three months ago. Yeah,
like triple full. Really, Um, as a musician, how have
you been affected by both the ongoing pandemic and it's intensification.
(30:02):
I want to wrap in front of an audience so bad? Hey,
you know I had about this live stream ship, like
for real, it's bad. I mean the live streams that
I've been doing a lot of. You know, if you
have the live stream like concert things, it's been fun
and it's always fun when you like, you know, get
on zooms and streams and stuff and connect with people
(30:23):
that yeah, don't get the thought too on the regular
and ship. But um, yeah, like in the independent game,
the live shows is usually like your number one source
of income from the ship. So it's definitely pretty much
put a kabash in that. That's the biggest that's the
biggest issue. But if you have a chance to support
musicians who are hurting as a you know, black musicians,
(30:46):
particularly who are not only dealing with a loss of
income under COVID, but are now dealing with the emotional
trauma of seeing what's happening across our country. Please follow
the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers. We are UMA.
You m a w on Instagram to find out what
some of their demands have been for musician relief. UM.
(31:06):
During this time, UM actually read up on the Black
Lives Matter platform. If you're out there hashtag and black
Lives Matter, find out what these people are calling for,
because things like a whole platform, because things like prison abolition,
things like you know, resourcing our communities. I might sound
fucking wild out here saying this ship, but if you're
out here saying Black lives matter, that's what that ship
(31:28):
is about. So find out what the demands are that
are being made by these organizations. Find out what the
policy asks are and actually stand for that and don't
just like feel sad when fucking black people get killed.
Reparations doesn't have to be a federal project. It could
be an individual endeavor that you can undertake every single
day of your fucking life. So I got some flak
(31:49):
for yes from Sunday at the march, some of my
fellow black organizers started UM asking the people for money.
They started saying, if you're white and you're this crowd
right now, you need to come up here right now
and give us fucking money. And people did. We raised
probably over a thousand dollars. But um, and I understand
the manner in which she was asked made people uncomfortable.
And that's totally fine. You know, a diversity of tactics
(32:10):
is necessary, but like, undertake reparations in your everyday life, Venmo,
your black friends today, Uh, buy them a cup of coffee,
send them some food on you know, grub hub, drop
off some bottle of wine at their house. See what
they need. Because, um, they're in a worse opposition than you,
just because of centuries of white supremacist economic structures, social structures,
(32:36):
educational structures. Um, and they're hurting right now on top
of all of that. They're really hurting right now. And
so another thing I'll ask, Like people are like, donate
to a bail fund, donate to you know, legal defense fund,
and that's great, and do that, but literally send black
send money to your black people in your life, send
money to them. So to close things off, it feels
(33:04):
only appropriate. You know, normally when we get this show,
go and we're probably gonna bust a freestyle or maybe
like a dope verse for you guys as we close
things out, but it only feels appropriate to put it
a song that we did that just kind of feels
like it's perfect for the moment right now, I think
(33:24):
to close it out, we're gonna drop the song called
f Trump America. This is with Western Ruler, Louis Larceny,
Lingua Franca and myself produced by Western Ruler. So check
this out, yo, Trump America. My team is Black Kings
(33:48):
and Nigga mic checked one too, asking every racist in
the town the police come through. I hope my dole
finger when we suck your brow and fuck you too.
There's no we seems for you to think like this
that these presidents ms. Let me call my mind. But
if you cross the lime black power fish brothers, here
is a stick up they can not dismiss us. Just
take in the scripture. I got two black kids and
one black wife and justice touch this, You'll be one
(34:11):
long night. Just when this I'll fright a left jab
and or wright a young Kinney site with black middle
in the mic, the type that they would indict a
sentence of life. They're taking my rights thing on life
because I'm a Malcolmax sub order, steady kicking down the
walls to help my people across the border, black man.
In your every year name something scary year Trump America,
or your middle finger self Trauma America, or your middle
finger stuff Trama Lara, or your middle fingers up from
(34:34):
tramp America, or your middle fingers up from tramp America,
or your middle fingers up frock Trampa America, or your
middle fingers up from Trampa America, or your middle fingers
up fro tramp America, or your middle fingers white America's Captain.
Buster's with me fair, because you gotta crack a couple
of lips to make an omelet. The drama and this comprision.
Then they distributed it upon the darkest skin, and it
ain't gonna get any better from what to nack? The
(34:55):
feller vanished in the flash of fairy dust. The will
the way by optimism, like you, Sagittarius, lift it up,
a little springing coming forward, Kerry's cherry up to Cherity's
just And when niggas thinking very very very much, it's
walking down every street and knocking on every door and
telling the neighborhood we ain't taking it anymore. Restoring the
civil rights of every Bible that you know, get them
runners to devoting telling it to the boats because if
you're senator, won't say that black lives matter till that
(35:17):
guy but bit and get the funk about my ballot.
But they niggas is WoT more than they complained about it.
It's what's the rule up for president in linguin in
the cabinet Trump America or your middle fingers that's been
the hot teas. And you know my little fingers that
funded Trump America or your middle fingers that's happened the
hot tease. You know, my little fingers I fulled Trump
America or your middle fingers I have been the hot tease.
(35:37):
You know my little fingers that fulled Trump America or
your middle fingers are in the hot teas, And you
know my little fingers out into the fixed show of
small fan lazies. Send up stakes to hell, tell them
all head to hades with to kill them. Keep calling
me crazy to in the head chill they hold dead
baby having take hate Manka terrible the averagage, not my president.
Tell me who the terrorists terrible and terrible adjustment re America.
(36:00):
Stop for bringing kids from their parents. It's gonna take amever,
go to stop these animals. Not everybody across the border
is a criminal. Cops, click to shoot the kid. It's pitiful.
It's gonna take a city full of money. Is just
to hold us back. We wear a subliminal I don't
believe the height symbol of the center coole puller, drive
by on the gold light. Don't be fist middle finger
up like with Malcolm x l A swing upon the
(36:21):
steps little fun shop America or your middle fingers up
fun shop America told your middle fingers found chop Amanita,
or your middle fingers up found chop America. Through your
middle fingers found chop America. Through your better fingers up
fun chomp America, or your middle fingers found tramp on America,
or your better fingers up found chomp America, your middle fingers.
You should all come together, which is all quite true.
(36:42):
What can't resist slap the ship out of it? All right, dude,
I don't like you funking ice, murderous pig, burning the
pith with a white of servant chick. I think I
kip a funk about a session. The only con way
I funk with the squeeze and the weapon we didn't
even forget it. Small talk starting to seem a reverence.
If this was all frands, they say we needed but
head and I say this ship because the way they
is a switch play proud boys, y'all may day quick,
(37:04):
I raised this fist since babased kids are meeting colar
greens with a sign of pay paste legs to keep
the dunk of sealed if they sing a song and
we fucking kneel black cock plus your wife turned into
a cup for real talk full more rap, hard radical
people left more than Nascar from America. Throw your middle
fingus up Trauma America. Throw your middle foods or throw
(37:25):
your middle fumus up trapmeric Throw your middle fromous up,
throw your middle fumous up Trauma, Throw your middle fumus
up Trauma. Proll your middle fingus up, throw your middle
fingus OFFA Waiting on Reparations a production of I Heeart Radio.
Listen to Waiting on Reparations on the I Heart Radio app,
(37:46):
Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
You're listening waiting on reparations of production of I Heart Radio.
They heard the shot, but I never had the chance
to see the smoking gun, T shirts. Soaking blood is
leaking up over the linoleum, holding onto the bottle. Still.
They could have called the hospital, but they learned the
cops convinced of images of Nigga kids as hostile kids.
This nation hates us and wants us to hate us too.
(00:22):
It's advantageous when niggas hate Asians, and Asians a niggas.
So when a shot keep it faving robbery is an
innocent teenager dump. The system isn't broken, No, it's fully operational.
We watched it work this way so well since way
before that faithful day in April nine two, when we
riot looted, when we raised help, we but finally through
being escape goats for the neighborhoods, you can find us too,
(00:42):
to the grinding lops you assigned us to, with your
griming schools and your crack rocks and your bad cops
and these white jerseys that blindly choose complicity. Who find
shootings in this city so commonplace to sign faiths like
eight balls so flippantly for centuries we stayed calm, but
a new day is done and you best believe at
reeks and napalm. I wrote that verse for Latasha Harlan's,
(01:03):
a fifteen year old girl who was shot in the
back of the head by a Korean grocery store owner
in Los Angeles. We talked a lot about Rodney King,
but Latasha Harland's death too, was a catalyst for the
l a riots that followed in the subsequent year. We
haven't seen violence like that since until now. A uh yeah, yeah,
(01:36):
my name's Dope Knife. What's up? I'm Lingua franca and
waiting on RepA so um. When we started this podcast,
the world and it's a regular state, was just fucked up,
just regular fund up, just regular fucked up. And then
fucking plague hit COVID and we went on lockdown. That
(02:01):
we've been on lockdown for twelve weeks now, and the
whole world has changed. The whole world has changed. Then
last week George Floyd was murdered at the hands of
for Minneapolis p D. And in the wake of it,
we start seeing national protests, civil unrest the likes of
which the country hasn't seen in the generations our whole
(02:21):
plan to launch this show kind of had to go
out the window, and we hadn't had to reassess what
we're gonna do. Because as black folks that are politically
committed to struggle and aware and following not only what's
happening now, but following what has been going on in
this country for decades and following it very closely in
recent years. Uh, we feel it's important for us to
(02:45):
speak out right now and to articulate what our experiences
have been as well as what our vision is for
what's coming next. So this isn't gonna be like our
usual episode waiting on reparations that you guys are gonna hear.
We're gonna kinda just talk from the heart about how
we feel about what's going on. So welcome to it.
My name's Dope Knife. I'm a rapper producer from Savannah,
(03:10):
g A. Well, technically I'm not from anywhere, because I
grew up overseas. My mother's Liberian, my father's American. He
used to work for the State Department, and I grew
up overseas. But um, I moved to the States to
go to college and I've been here since and uh,
I'm an independent musician. My name is Leewoa Franca a
(03:32):
k a. Mariah Parker Um. In two thousand eighteen, I
was elected to the Athens Clark County Commission, where I
have now served for two years on an abolitionist agenda
and a pro worker, pro black um leftist agenda. I'm
also hip hop artist, and I'm a linguist. Actually, I
have a master's in linguistics and I'm getting my PhD
(03:54):
Language and Literacy education at the University of Georgia. So
I look at this for the LNDIP hip up from
the lens of local policy, from the lens of linguistics
and the lens of education. And so we're gonna have
another episode coming out soon kind of explaining more about
who we are and what this podcast has about, as
well as other episodes about the labor movement, about prison abolition,
(04:16):
about sex work, about all sorts of topics that tie
hip hop and politics together. But today we're gonna just
talk from the heart about what's happening in this country,
what our experiences have been, and where we see things
going from here. Talk to me about your relationship with
the police. Well, I guess it's a not unsimilar to
(04:39):
that of a lot of other black males. It hasn't
been too positive of relationship. It's at this point it's
almost like cliche. You know, I've never had a cop
personally smile at me, you know what I mean. When
I was around twenty one, I was walking home from
work and was like walking in the middle of the street,
(05:02):
so not really on the sidewalk, and it was like
maybe like eleven o'clock at night. I got stopped by
two cops and they were asking me why I was
walking so close to the cars that were on the road.
So I was explaining to them, It's like, oh, well,
you know, I'm just walking home. I can get on
the sidewalk if you want. They roughed me up and
(05:25):
you know, I mean got me on the ground. They're
like calling me, I'll sorts of names and ship and uh.
It was it's like I told that story like mad times,
but for whatever reason, they just like it feels a little,
(05:46):
it feels different telling it now was hitting me too,
but um, it's just like the main thing I took
away from it is just like the feeling of like
like powerlessness, you know, what can you do? And especially
in that situation where it's just like me alone and
it's like dark, and it's like literally anything could happen.
I mean, this was way before tray Von and you know,
(06:10):
things like that. But again, at the same time, it's
not like situations weren't known. It wasn't like this wasn't happening.
It was definitely before it was before the like proliferation
of the cell phone camp you know what I'm saying.
So it was something I could definitely tell like my homies,
tell my boys, tell my my mom, I pops, you
(06:31):
know what I'm saying, like, and it was like, oh man, fun, sorry,
you know, but it wasn't necessarily something that it was
just like, Okay, well everybody knows that this is happening.
Welcome to the bottom of the barrel, cops U J walking,
put the glock to your apparel, lock you in the
box for all the pot that's in your marrow, and
even taking walks. Make you a talking for in there. Bro.
(06:53):
I dare you to come let these crackers put you
on a curfew. You could keep it real and let
the silly niggas mrk you. I'll tell you what the deal.
We really ain't got no virtue. Survival requires work, and
nobody really deserves you. When life is throwing them courage
you strike probably solve it all of all the world's
unite people worth the sight. I ain't got ship and
nigger my purses tight. Heard it right, post a picture
made the frame of perfect life. Nothing's worse than hype.
(07:15):
We can all conserve the worst of slights. Financial rigor
mortis got your throwing fits. Now you're ships. The story
that you was talking slick. Now you just sitping. Poor
Ward's trying to penny pinch, of course, which can make
you sick of poor ship, instead of sitting gorgeous creditors
got picks and torches. This gap is massive and there's
nothing to fill. Since that cop called me a fag
and put a gun in my grill, I'm bugging for real.
(07:35):
Prepped ourselves for forty five to touch down. Now we
want to act mad. I don't give a funk now.
I wrote that ship February two thousand and seventeen. You
know when you always hear about when people talk about
how oh will you only hear the bad things about
(07:57):
cops and you never hear the good things about cops
And stuff like that, and it's like, first of all,
that's not true. But second so what like it's like
the default is that everything is supposed to be fine,
Like you're not supposed to get like a cookie. You
do your job, so playing basketball or doing some fucking
breakdance moves exactly, sharing ice cream cone, Great job, you
(08:20):
did your job, so it'll do. I feel like if
if cops want to be like first of all, if
they want to have like an imprint in the community,
then the impression should either be we don't notice you,
or it's positive you know what I'm saying. But like
the fact that it's in so many places to so
many people, it's like a negative force or something that
(08:43):
people think badly of. I mean, it's kind of an
important fucking job, you know. So it's like yeah, straight up,
like I mean the ones that I don't know, it's
just there should be a zero tolerance from within a
good cop calling a bad cop out or good good
(09:04):
police officers like actively like calling out like you know,
the stuff that's wrong with their system goes a long
way in like people's perception of like all cops. Because
like right now, I can tell you this ship seems
like it's a gang, Like people are good, like they're
out for each other. You know what I'm saying that
you know, no oversight, like it's us versus them, and
(09:28):
it just doesn't. It feels like a foreign occupying power.
I mean, when they're using military forces against us, they're
using tactics that aren't even allowed in warfare. They are
an occupying force in our communities. And I, as an abolitionist,
fully believed that our communities are capable of policing themselves.
If you look at what the Black Panthers said in
(09:49):
the Lowlands of Oakland back in their height of power,
chasing the cops out of their community and patrolling them
themselves and holding people accountable themselves for wrongdoing, but also
resourcing folks, giving out food and doing education and making
sure everyone has everything they need so they're not robbing
a liquor store or breaking into a car, and they're
(10:11):
not under so much to rest that they end up
hitting their spouse or yelling at their kids, or having
a mental breakdown and running into the street naked with
a knife. You know, when our community is a resourced
I truly believe that we don't need them at all,
whether they're good people who have to do a bad job. Um,
the whole system is inextricably linked to white supremacy, and
(10:37):
we can build the world, I believe without it, and
I have. I wasn't as open about these views when
I first got elected around a platform of criminal justice reform,
of strengthening their relationships between the community and our law enforcement. UM.
And then I was sworn in on the autobiography of
(10:59):
Malcolm X, which I did not believe was going to
be a big deal, but apparently it was. But in
the aftermath of that, I was getting a lot of
death threats from white supremacists from across the country. UM.
I was warned, you know, not to pick up unexpected
packages off my porch in case they were bombs. UM.
I was being threatened with rape and lynching. And I
(11:20):
was at a really hard crossroads where though I then
even held abolitionist views, you know that I sort of
like dressed in language that was easier for people to
understand regarding police reform. UM, I didn't know who I
was going to have to who I was going to
(11:40):
be able to call if ship went down, Well, the
cops still come. If some if somebody shows up at
my house with an a K forty seven. UM. And
the fact that in this current day, we don't have
the infrastructure socially in place to protect ourselves as a community,
and right now the default is that you have to
(12:02):
call the cops because we don't have a world yet
where we're ready to defend ourselves. And so that's a
little bit about what my recent experiences have been around
the police. I used to always smile away at them
when they drive by, because I knew they knew who
I was, and I felt like, I gotta, you know,
play nice so that they'll come to my house if
somebody sets it on fire. But recently I realized that,
(12:24):
you know, it's a job like any other job. It's
a dangerous job, but it's not one of the most
dangerous professions of the country. UM. I believe sanitation workers
get hurt or killed in the line of duty more
often than police officers do. UM. And so this deference
to them that we should honor them and UM have
(12:44):
and like upholding, like uphold their you know, uphold them up,
will lift them because of the work that they do.
It is something that I've begun to re Jacks because um,
you get posing for selfies with your ice cream cone,
with the little black teenager shooting hoops with kids on
the block, Like, that's just what your job is, and
I'm not here to a plot it. The attitude that
(13:05):
that I feel like a lot of them have with
it is like it's just a job, and it's like, oh,
you're supposed to like respect me and give me difference
because I have this job, And it's like, but you
don't even necessarily live up to it like that, you
know what I'm saying, Like how many how many YouTube
videos can you go on and watch if cops like
breaking the law? You know, they're like all over the place, Like,
(13:28):
you know, just just given given the situation that we're
in right now, we're in a situation where the country
is in upheaval over police brutality. So what's what is
the police solution for that police brutality like on a
wide national scale. Yeah, so let's turn to start talking
(13:49):
a little bit about what we're seeing in the media
right now. For sure, we're recording this on a blackout Wednesday.
It's Tuesday, babe, core teen quarantine. What our day is? Anyone?
So I find it very interesting, Um, you know, both
having watched what has been happening in the media regarding
(14:11):
the upheaval across the country over the last week, and
then having a direct experience with it as an organizer
of a march here in our city over the weekend. Um,
how the media narrative UH obscures blame for the types
of violence that happened UH in these protests. So let's take,
(14:32):
for example, you hear about protesters are arrested, protesters are injured,
protesters are killed. As a linguist, when I read something
like that, immediately identify the fact that it is composed
in the passive voice. The person who is being acted
upon comes first in the sentence, and the agent of
(14:55):
the action is obscured. So who is arresting the protesters,
who is entering the protesters? Who is doing the violence
upon other people? When stories get broken into, when cars
gets set on fire, Um, they want to blame us,
But when we get hurt, it's not as clear in
(15:16):
the way that these things are construed, what the where
the blame should be assigned. And I think that you know,
it comes from a long line of I mean journalistic
practices in terms of just oh, something happened without identifying
who did what to home. But you know, it also
goes into these like these narratives we see of like um,
(15:39):
this this this discourse of uh support the police, you know,
uh smiling and you know, sharing photos of them doing
good work in the community as a way to perpetuate
that narrative. I think all these things work in tandem.
Two help protect us system that is fundamentally broken. And
(16:04):
I understand when I look at that, when I when
I look at um images of indiscriminate violence, you know,
against protesters are towards private property. Um, when I see
headlines like that, I understand how folks can be confused
about who is in the wrong here because the media
(16:24):
is confusing people. I just feel like some of it
kind of comes down to the state and what the
purpose of the police is. Its purpose has always been
like to protect property and rich people, and it's never
really been to serve the community. To us, there's just
never been a point where it's like the police are
(16:46):
like for the people and not for those in power.
And so you're saying that the same way that like
what communism has never worked. People who say policing has
never worked, have never seen policing operate the way that
it is supposed to. I wouldn't even say the way
that it's supposed to, because how is it supposed to work?
Just the whole concept of it is just And that's
(17:08):
my question too, And that's why I'm an abolitionist, because
I'm like, how is it supposed to work? I'm understand
how mental health like resources are supposed to work for
people having crises, and understand how social work is supposed
to work for people that need access to resources. I
understand how some restorative justice works. It's very challenging even
for my imagination when I'm post with questions about abolition
(17:28):
or people like, well, what would you do in this situation,
and it's like, I don't know, but all I know
is what we're doing right now is not working, and
I'm committed to finding solutions that are different. So I
feel you, Yeah, I know, I tell you feel you.
The way that police forces go after street crime, what
if that was reversed to go after white collar crime,
(17:51):
I might not feel too bad about that. I think
it's really interesting to contrast people's reactions to seeing like
an auto zone get burned down. Or um a cop
(18:14):
pelted with the brick, um. And then uh, my actual
experience of organizing and leading march here and Hapthens over
the weekend. You tell us about that. Yeah, so, Um,
over the weekend, I, you know, as an elected official called,
(18:35):
in response to what I've been seeing across the country,
called for a ten year plan to start being developed
here locally that would transition of our police officer positions
to social workers, mental health professional professionals, and restorative justice
practitioners over the next ten years. And in response to
(18:55):
that and some other things going on, UM, one of
my fellow you know, black queer fem organizers in town
was like, Yo, let's have a rally here in Athens,
and let's like center it on those demands, something concrete
to channel people's anger into in this moment. So they
started organizing up a rally. UM. I was somewhat involved,
(19:16):
you know, in the like the group thread, trying to
keep tabs on the developments. And then you know, we
let people know we're gonna have a march for a
while without cops. Told to meet us on the courthouse
steps at five pm. Um, So I show up and
there's about maybe five people there and I'm merely start
(19:38):
yelling in my megaphone, you know, Black lives matter, gaining
them in chance. I take a moment to speaking to
the megaphone, what my my plan is, what my idea is,
and um, folks are you know, calling out with their support,
and we begin to march. We begin to march to
the streets, um, continuing to chant, we take over the street. Uh.
(20:00):
We marched through prominent areas of downtown, meet up with
other folks who were gathered, and they joined us. And
what was beautiful was that I was filled with so
much fear and terror and anxiety and um, almost a
sense of hopelessness going into the scenario, having seen the
scenes of violence on the on the news throughout the
(20:23):
past week, and knowing that we were we were inviting
that on ourselves. We couldn't control if people came to
break into store windows. Business owners online were accusing me,
if anything happens today, it's it's your fault. Um. I
couldn't control if innocent people who would come there to
stand in solidarity with black people across this country. Um,
(20:45):
if they got tear gas that day, if they got
hit with rubber bullets, that day, and so I was shaking,
I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep. Um, but I stood
up because I felt like it was my duty for oh,
you know, people of color, black people, particular of the
black women and black queer folks, to take the lead
in situations like this, you know, as the most marginalized people,
(21:06):
to make the demands and be the face of change.
So I'm out there at one point of standing up
on a Confederate monument um, and the crowd is chanting,
say his name, which one, Say her name? Which one?
At which point I just started. I just broke down
(21:28):
and started sobbing um with the feet, my feet planted
on this relic of white supremacy, and thousands of people
spread out all through the streets in front of me. Um.
And but it was beautiful because we we didn't break
into any stores. We weren't there to do damage or
due violence. The white people there were here to hear
(21:51):
the stories too, of you know, black people in Athens,
the stories of oppression, of marginalization, of prejudice. There shoudn't
for what a better world could be. And um, it
was a truly beautiful thing. But as night fell and
the crowd dispersed and several hundreds of people stayed behind,
(22:13):
and the National Guard came into town Um. They and
the and the folks remaining peacefully occupied the main plaza
in downtown with tents, with their hands up, chanting UM,
just building cambaraderie with one another, talking to one another.
They were slowly boxed in by the National Guard. A
(22:35):
drone flow overhead telling them to disperse. Kurfey was put
in place retroactively UM telling them that they was illegal
for them to be downtown UM, and no one knew
until an hour after it was too late to leave,
and they were slowly being cornered by tanks and with
their hands up and with their arms locked in solidarity
with one another. They were tear gassed and hit with
(22:57):
rubber rubber bullets and arrested. And some of the black
women who who organized the protests where when they got
to the county jail, separated from the rest of the
group in what we believe to be an active retaliation
in targeting for their involvement in bringing those folks together.
And so I saw firsthand how folks coming together to
(23:19):
or to demonstrate as is their right, non violently are
met with violence. I witnessed firsthand how the armed forces,
the arms of the police state, are the agitators. And
I worked this firsthand as well, how powerful it is
when we come together, nonetheless, because we developed concrete demands
(23:43):
for what needs to happen next, and we educated people
about what the world could look like. And we brought
the mayor up who stood beside me on the Confederate Monument,
and we made our demands to him, and we made
very clear that we are committed to the struggle. And
so um, I just I think it's really important for
folks that aren't in the struggle, who aren't out there
(24:06):
in the streets, to be very cautious of what you're
seeing and hearing in the media, the way the headlines
are written, the accounts that they are foregrounding when they
describe what's happening, Because when you're there yourself, you see
for yourself who is doing the agitating, who is doing
the damage, who was doing the harm, And it's not us.
(24:27):
Even if it is us, ain't even there to fucking
like lay blamed anyone that's burning ship down or breaking
in the stores. Because black people built this land for free,
and I think we have every right to express our
outrage about the way we are treated and the way
that our country has run by any means that are necessary.
(24:47):
But UM, too often we get lost in UM media
narratives that obscure who is truly to blame for what
is happening here? And the armed forces are to blame
and white supremacy is to blame. So whatever people do
out in these streets, most of these folks are just
(25:07):
out here expressing their grievances peacefully. But um, they are
not the ones who started this battle. That's all I
want to say. So where you see it going? UM,
I can't you know? I got a crystal ball and
nothing but UM. Here in Athens, we have mobilized around
very specific demands for for our local legislators to to
(25:33):
change the policing, to implement more community resources to prevent
people from becoming criminals in the first place, and if
they do commit crimes, to ensure that they never commit
crimes again because they, you know, they have access to
good jobs, good food, good places to live, good education,
the kinds of things that studies have shown helped decrease
the likelihood of recidivism or offending in the first place nationwide.
(25:57):
It's hard to say. I know that you've been um
keeping tabs on what some of the reactions by the
federal government, So maybe you have a view of what
you think might be coming next that you want to share. Well,
I mean, unfortunately, it all kind of comes down to
with the people in charge or trying to do. And
(26:17):
this is happening in a political year, and it seems
like Trump has given all the signs that he's trying
to go a Nixon route with it, which is on
the law and order president YadA YadA, YadA, blah blah blah,
the thugs. So I don't I see I see the
cops in the federal government in general ratcheting stuff up.
(26:38):
And if Trump does, you know, if he does go
ahead and try to like force the US military onto
the streets, which according to a poll that just came
out like today, percent of the country is in favor of,
then you know what I'm saying, that's is gonna happen,
(27:01):
and it's going to be a matter of wills at
that point. So just be safe out there. People. I
think will achieve. I think we will. We will achieve
policy change. What I've come to understand. And you know,
like I roll with a lot of anarchists who are
down with you know, armed revolution and ship like that.
I'm not even gonna lie, like I don't always agree,
(27:22):
but like I think it's very important listen what they
have to say. And I have become particularly critical of
the that point, having watched the violent repression of the
state go down in the media and then with my
own eyes, um, you know, in Athens recently. I mean
I watched footage of what was happening, you know here Sunday,
(27:43):
but I'm hearing recounts from friends and comrades of what
happened to them. And so I've come to believe that
we cannot take their power away with our hands and
with our sticks and our stones, but we can take
our their power away with our laws and in in
progressive places or even places that might be conservative, but
people are waking up. Local governments and state legislatures can
(28:07):
and I believe will take action to prevent their cities
from burning to the ground. What do you think is
hip hop's relationship to this. I've seen some video of
(28:28):
I saw j Cole marching in North Carolina and wanted
the protests but I haven't really heard too much. Tory
Lanes put out a statement where he was encouraging. He
actually was encouraging like UH rappers and black celebrities like
if if what you have to say about the situation
isn't in support of it, then just shut the fun
(28:51):
shut the funk out, you know what I'm saying. I
folk with that. That's a good statement, but I guess
there's a lot of people who feel the should shut
the funk up then then, because it's been awfully quiet,
which is like kind of weird and kind of ironic
that this blackout thing is happening because it's like, I mean,
I'm doing it because I get it. I get it
(29:11):
for the hashtag and stuff. It gives people further cover
to say nothing. Yeah, it feels like special. I feel
like this is the moment to say stuff. You know
what I'm saying, and and it's gonna be I mean,
this is like obviously way less important, but just the
nerd in me is kind of interested in seeing where
culture goes after this point, you know what I mean,
(29:35):
Like what happens with hip hop after this point? What
happens with like movies? You know what is like I
don't know. Just it's a whole new world. It's complete,
a completely different environment than it was three months ago. Yeah,
like triple full. Really, Um, as a musician, how have
you been affected by both the ongoing pandemic and it's intensification.
(30:02):
I want to wrap in front of an audience so bad? Hey,
you know I had about this live stream ship, like
for real, it's bad. I mean the live streams that
I've been doing a lot of. You know, if you
have the live stream like concert things, it's been fun
and it's always fun when you like, you know, get
on zooms and streams and stuff and connect with people
(30:23):
that yeah, don't get the thought too on the regular
and ship. But um, yeah, like in the independent game,
the live shows is usually like your number one source
of income from the ship. So it's definitely pretty much
put a kabash in that. That's the biggest that's the
biggest issue. But if you have a chance to support
musicians who are hurting as a you know, black musicians,
(30:46):
particularly who are not only dealing with a loss of
income under COVID, but are now dealing with the emotional
trauma of seeing what's happening across our country. Please follow
the Union of Musicians and Allied Workers. We are UMA.
You m a w on Instagram to find out what
some of their demands have been for musician relief. UM.
(31:06):
During this time, UM actually read up on the Black
Lives Matter platform. If you're out there hashtag and black
Lives Matter, find out what these people are calling for,
because things like a whole platform, because things like prison abolition,
things like you know, resourcing our communities. I might sound
fucking wild out here saying this ship, but if you're
out here saying Black lives matter, that's what that ship
(31:28):
is about. So find out what the demands are that
are being made by these organizations. Find out what the
policy asks are and actually stand for that and don't
just like feel sad when fucking black people get killed.
Reparations doesn't have to be a federal project. It could
be an individual endeavor that you can undertake every single
day of your fucking life. So I got some flak
(31:49):
for yes from Sunday at the march, some of my
fellow black organizers started UM asking the people for money.
They started saying, if you're white and you're this crowd
right now, you need to come up here right now
and give us fucking money. And people did. We raised
probably over a thousand dollars. But um, and I understand
the manner in which she was asked made people uncomfortable.
And that's totally fine. You know, a diversity of tactics
(32:10):
is necessary, but like, undertake reparations in your everyday life, Venmo,
your black friends today, Uh, buy them a cup of coffee,
send them some food on you know, grub hub, drop
off some bottle of wine at their house. See what
they need. Because, um, they're in a worse opposition than you,
just because of centuries of white supremacist economic structures, social structures,
(32:36):
educational structures. Um, and they're hurting right now on top
of all of that. They're really hurting right now. And
so another thing I'll ask, Like people are like, donate
to a bail fund, donate to you know, legal defense fund,
and that's great, and do that, but literally send black
send money to your black people in your life, send
money to them. So to close things off, it feels
(33:04):
only appropriate. You know, normally when we get this show,
go and we're probably gonna bust a freestyle or maybe
like a dope verse for you guys as we close
things out, but it only feels appropriate to put it
a song that we did that just kind of feels
like it's perfect for the moment right now, I think
(33:24):
to close it out, we're gonna drop the song called
f Trump America. This is with Western Ruler, Louis Larceny,
Lingua Franca and myself produced by Western Ruler. So check
this out, yo, Trump America. My team is Black Kings
(33:48):
and Nigga mic checked one too, asking every racist in
the town the police come through. I hope my dole
finger when we suck your brow and fuck you too.
There's no we seems for you to think like this
that these presidents ms. Let me call my mind. But
if you cross the lime black power fish brothers, here
is a stick up they can not dismiss us. Just
take in the scripture. I got two black kids and
one black wife and justice touch this, You'll be one
(34:11):
long night. Just when this I'll fright a left jab
and or wright a young Kinney site with black middle
in the mic, the type that they would indict a
sentence of life. They're taking my rights thing on life
because I'm a Malcolmax sub order, steady kicking down the
walls to help my people across the border, black man.
In your every year name something scary year Trump America,
or your middle finger self Trauma America, or your middle
finger stuff Trama Lara, or your middle fingers up from
(34:34):
tramp America, or your middle fingers up from tramp America,
or your middle fingers up frock Trampa America, or your
middle fingers up from Trampa America, or your middle fingers
up fro tramp America, or your middle fingers white America's Captain.
Buster's with me fair, because you gotta crack a couple
of lips to make an omelet. The drama and this comprision.
Then they distributed it upon the darkest skin, and it
ain't gonna get any better from what to nack? The
(34:55):
feller vanished in the flash of fairy dust. The will
the way by optimism, like you, Sagittarius, lift it up,
a little springing coming forward, Kerry's cherry up to Cherity's
just And when niggas thinking very very very much, it's
walking down every street and knocking on every door and
telling the neighborhood we ain't taking it anymore. Restoring the
civil rights of every Bible that you know, get them
runners to devoting telling it to the boats because if
you're senator, won't say that black lives matter till that
(35:17):
guy but bit and get the funk about my ballot.
But they niggas is WoT more than they complained about it.
It's what's the rule up for president in linguin in
the cabinet Trump America or your middle fingers that's been
the hot teas. And you know my little fingers that
funded Trump America or your middle fingers that's happened the
hot tease. You know, my little fingers I fulled Trump
America or your middle fingers I have been the hot tease.
(35:37):
You know my little fingers that fulled Trump America or
your middle fingers are in the hot teas, And you
know my little fingers out into the fixed show of
small fan lazies. Send up stakes to hell, tell them
all head to hades with to kill them. Keep calling
me crazy to in the head chill they hold dead
baby having take hate Manka terrible the averagage, not my president.
Tell me who the terrorists terrible and terrible adjustment re America.
(36:00):
Stop for bringing kids from their parents. It's gonna take amever,
go to stop these animals. Not everybody across the border
is a criminal. Cops, click to shoot the kid. It's pitiful.
It's gonna take a city full of money. Is just
to hold us back. We wear a subliminal I don't
believe the height symbol of the center coole puller, drive
by on the gold light. Don't be fist middle finger
up like with Malcolm x l A swing upon the
(36:21):
steps little fun shop America or your middle fingers up
fun shop America told your middle fingers found chop Amanita,
or your middle fingers up found chop America. Through your
middle fingers found chop America. Through your better fingers up
fun chomp America, or your middle fingers found tramp on America,
or your better fingers up found chomp America, your middle fingers.
You should all come together, which is all quite true.
(36:42):
What can't resist slap the ship out of it? All right, dude,
I don't like you funking ice, murderous pig, burning the
pith with a white of servant chick. I think I
kip a funk about a session. The only con way
I funk with the squeeze and the weapon we didn't
even forget it. Small talk starting to seem a reverence.
If this was all frands, they say we needed but
head and I say this ship because the way they
is a switch play proud boys, y'all may day quick,
(37:04):
I raised this fist since babased kids are meeting colar
greens with a sign of pay paste legs to keep
the dunk of sealed if they sing a song and
we fucking kneel black cock plus your wife turned into
a cup for real talk full more rap, hard radical
people left more than Nascar from America. Throw your middle
fingus up Trauma America. Throw your middle foods or throw
(37:25):
your middle fumus up trapmeric Throw your middle fromous up,
throw your middle fumous up Trauma, Throw your middle fumus
up Trauma. Proll your middle fingus up, throw your middle
fingus OFFA Waiting on Reparations a production of I Heeart Radio.
Listen to Waiting on Reparations on the I Heart Radio app,
(37:46):
Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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