The System Ain’t Broken, It’s Built This Way

They say it’s about justice. They say it’s about rehabilitation. But when a parking ticket can send a man to prison and the cops tell your mama to leave the door open for the thieves, you start to realize — it ain’t broken. It’s built this way. In this episode, I open up about the probation threats, stolen heirlooms, betrayal by the people sworn to protect, and the scars I carry from trying to be the good guy in a world that don’t give a damn.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
And that's the truth of it. This world ain't built
for second chances. It's built to break you, to test
how far you'll be in before you finally snap. They
tell you rehabilitation, but they mean but what they mean
is punishment, control, and silence. You try to do right,

(00:25):
walk the line, even after they knock your feet out
from under you.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
But it's never enough.

Speaker 1 (00:32):
You miss a payment, you get locked up, You get
a ticket, you get locked up, You breathe it wrong
in the courtroom, they want to hang a sentence over
your head like a goddamn guilty I remember the probation officer,
looking me in the eyes, tell me if I even
so much as get a parking ticket, he was sending
my ass to prison a parking ticket?

Speaker 2 (00:56):
What kind of justice is that?

Speaker 1 (00:58):
After a while, it starts to feel like maybe prison
ain't even the worst any worst thing anymore. Maybe it's
just a different kind of cage, different bars, different guards,
same damn system.

Speaker 2 (01:13):
I've always tried to be the nice guy.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Folks say I'd walk ten miles barefoot in the snow
just to help someone else, and I have. But when
it comes to help myself, man, I drop everything. Always
been that way I stole once, and I paid for it,
but I won't ever do that again because I know
what it feels like to come home and see your

(01:36):
whole world gutted. People literally took the copper wiring and
ripped it out of my house while I was locked up,
had to rewire the place. I didn't know nothing about
electricity back then, but I learned fast.

Speaker 2 (01:52):
And you know what the police said when my mom
called for help.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
Officer Chris Evans, yeah I'm naming his name, told her
just to grab what she wanted from the house and
leave the door open so the thieves get what they
wanted to. That's what protecting serve looks like. That says
you you're in a broken ass world. He even got

(02:21):
my grandpa's pistol, a family heirloom, not a weapon, not
a threat, just a piece of my bloodline I'll never
get back. Same way I lost my uncle Danny's cane
house broken into again, same story, different day. I was
locked up, couldn't stop it, couldn't protect what mattered, And
they wonder, while we're angry, while we don't trust the system.

(02:45):
Boy would walk with her fists clenching her back against
the wall.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
I ain't perfect, never claimed to be.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
But I've lived this, every scar, every loss, every injustice,
and I'm still here, not because of the system, in
spite of it.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
This is grand roll talk, real life