Moj Mahdara Talks The Iranian Crisis, Women's Rights, Propaganda + More

Moj Mahdara stops by and speaks to the Breakfast Club about the Iranian crisis, women's rights, propaganda and more.

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@BreakfastClubPower1051FM

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yes, sir, morning. Everybody is DJ Envy ange Lae, Charlemagne
the guy. We are to breakfast club. We got a
special guests in the building. Yes, indeed, did I say right?
You did? Okay, you've had practice. I did. I tried
to tell him you didn't trust me. But you know,
you know what happens because a lot of times Charlemagne
and tell me the wrong thing on purpose. I say,
I believe you did that to me. A couple of

(00:22):
times he's jealous of you. We're welcome. How are you
feeling this morning. I'm good, I'm happy to be here,
happy to have you man. I am very happy to
be here. I'm very grateful for the time you guys
are about to dedicate to this insane conversation we're about
to have, so thank you. Please inform us on what's
going on. And I ran because there's so much going
on in the world, and I noticed is something that

(00:42):
everybody should be aware of. But what what is happening?
And sometimes it's hard to get accurate information to and know.
Let's talk about it. I'd love first to know what
you guys think is happening. It feels like women's right
to being violated all over the world, and it feels like,
you know, Iran is the episode. I know, everybody's definitely
focused on what's happening here in America where Roe v Wade,

(01:04):
but it feels like what's going on over there is
like just cruel and unusual punishment. I saw the thing
the other day, which I had to research it a a
little bit because I was like, I just can't be
real when they said that they were sentencing fifteen thousand
protests to death. Yes, the parliament essentially gave the green
light to so there's fifteen thousand protesters who've come out
into the streets over the past eight weeks. Over Massa

(01:28):
Gina Emini, whos a Kurdish woman. She had come to Tehran,
which is the capital, with her family to just sight seeing,
have a day out. And she wasn't even wearing she
was wearing her job. She wasn't like taking her she
was wearing her her job, but she had she was
wearing coolts, so her ankles were out. Wow. And she

(01:49):
was stopped by the morality police, which they called the Bastiche,
which have been essentially empower since the Islamic Republic came
into play in nineteen seventy nine. So they took her
into custody. They tortured her, they beat her, and she
unfortunately passed away a few days later well because her
ankles were showing and she wasn't dressed as conservatively correct.

(02:13):
It sounds very conservative already. That is that is a tragedy.
It is a tragedy. It's a morality. Police walks around
looking at what people are dressing in how they're acting. Yes,
so I think is it women or is it men
and women? So it's primarily women. I myself was stopped
there in the mid nine early nineties. When I went there,

(02:34):
my grandmother was passing. I grew up with my grandmother
in the house. We spoke fasting the house. My grandmother
would I would say, it's Iran inside this home, It's
America outside this home. So I grew up very Iranian.
And she was passing. I wanted to go and say
goodbye to her. She was the most important person in
my life and my h my two cousins took me

(02:55):
out for late night Friday night ice cream and we
were listening to Inexus in the car and we were
pulled over and they kept us overnight. So Yeah, that's
what the Bastigi do. They are the morality police. Uh.
They are not necessarily part of the military. They are
part of the um Islamic Republic, sort of guard to

(03:15):
protect that echelon of religious leaders, the Ayatola's um. And yes,
they police your dress, what you're seeing, what you listen to. Dancing.
Women legally have half the right there of men legally, right,
So whether that's being accused of if someone who has
raped you, if you want to divorce, if you want

(03:37):
to choose how to spend your own money. Um, I
sort of try to bring it to American audiences through
the lens of a conservatorship. Right. It's pretty similar to
what has happened with Britney Spears, which is you are
essentially living Spears. Yeah. Yeah, Britney Spears, Well that's another
we should talk about that too. Um. But Britney Spears

(04:00):
lived in what a conservatorship I think for fifteen years
where she couldn't even know, ye, touch her own money.
She couldn't have doors on her own home, she couldn't
you know, she had to work and then still give
her money to business managers and agents and you know,
her father and what have you. I mean, we're all
learning about this now, but this is you know, there's
eighties some million people in Iran, half of the population

(04:22):
or women, and they are living there. And I think
the context of it is this country was living through
a secular leadership up until nineteen seventy nine, right like
women could. My grandmother was a famous singer. She made
her living being a famous singer. I always think of
her as like the uh, like Lana del Rey of Iran,
you know, fifties and sixties, and so women had a

(04:45):
lot of freedoms previous to the Islamic Republican. Now they
are being tortured, raped, terrorized at scale in broad daylight
on video. Um, it's problem what happens when journalists try
to cover this, because, like we were discussing, there is
a lot of misinformation that's out there, and also just

(05:06):
talk about the coverage there because I feel like that's
also not allowed. So we are in an information war.
You have a highly financed group of people in Iran,
the Islamic Republic, their agenda. Iran has eight percent of
the natural resources of the world. We're talking about uranium, copper,

(05:29):
zinc oil, so we're not talking about a country that
is resource poor, and the people who are making the
most amount of profit off of this resource is the government,
So they have a ton of incentive to stay in
power there, and they do that by repressing people and
most especially women. So what's happening is we don't have
journalists on the ground. Every journalist we do have on

(05:51):
the ground is currently in prison. Anyone who covers this
is in jail, tortured. And it's not just like, oh,
you're arrested and your lawyer is gonna and represent you
in some you know, hearing in the next few days.
Your family doesn't know where you are. You are disappeared literally,
and when you are reappeared, it's either bags of bones,
your organs are removed, your family's forbidden from having a

(06:15):
memorial and ceremony for you. I mean, for Iranian people.
This is making us go ape shit. This is making
us go crazy right now, Like I think, I mean,
I've bothered everyone I know. I'm like, hey, they're they're
they're killing little girls, they're killing students, they're killing juvenile
people in prison, and we can't report on it because
we cannot get journalists on the ground. We can't get

(06:37):
sources to all we have. They blocked the internet. Who right,
they blocked the Internet, So how can this be covered
here in the United States? Even so, I think that's
why my friends and I started this this new group
called the Iranian Diaspora Collective. It's literally been it's eight
weeks old. It's a group of people in the diaspora
who are in entertainment and social media and tech. We

(06:59):
got together. We essentially said we're going to stand up
an organization so we can be a resource. We published
this insane document called how to Talk About a Run,
and we updated every day for journalists and reporters and
people who want to report it, and we put it
up on our website. It's been downloaded thousands and thousands
of times to essentially help the West better understand we've

(07:19):
been holding. We held a news conference the other night
with Secretary Clinton and twenty members of the press to
come and essentially have a Q and A with her
and I around how to cover this accurately. And I
think I don't think we need to cover this perfectly.
I don't think it needs to be perfect. I don't
think it I think it has to be about progress
of a perfection. I think you saw the same thing

(07:41):
here when when we've seen atrocities covered around police brutality here.
It's not going to always be perfect the coverage, but
the coverage needs to happen. I think I was going
to say, are they people who've escaped that have come
here that can tell their stories. There are many people
who've escaped who have come here who are refugees. There
are many people they're living in safe houses in Turkey,

(08:03):
they're living here on asylum in the United States. You
have a ton of people here who've been arrested, who've
been in ivin. But it's I think it's just this
is like a crisis of to your point, women's rights
are being rolled back globally, there isn't a global agenda
to roll back women's rights. And I think the Islamic

(08:23):
Republic's largest export right now is their violence against women.
I think we have I think if you do not,
if we do not find a way to shut this down,
there will be copycatting of this behavior all over the world. Yikes.
Do you think those stories like you know, the one
where they say fifteen thousand protests would send us to death?
But they weren't do you think those stories called more
harmed than good, because because when you see that headline,

(08:45):
you're automatically all in like whoa. But then when you
realize it's not real, you probably just dismissed the whole situation.
So I, as you know, I am a little bit
of a internet sleuth. I think that was a Islamic
Republic strategy. I believe from what from what I understand,
they've hired some of the most established blue chip comms

(09:06):
organizations out of Europe, out of nowhere after eight weeks
of no coverage, all this coverage. The the headline was salacious. Uh,
the facts where the parliament gave the guards the right
to execute all fifteen thousand people of those people, so
the facts are those fifteen thousand people are at risk?

(09:26):
They are They could listen, don't The Islamic Republic is
the leader per capita in mass executions. This is not
This is not some organization that's never done this before.
We're not sure. And that headline was if this has
happened before, they've done it before in the eighties. They have.
They have done it two years ago fifteen hundred people

(09:49):
were killed, So why would they not take out fifteen
thousand people now that have been live streaming this protest. Ye,
what is the US doing to help if any Well,
I mean I think the US this isn't It's okay.
France has done a lot. Macrohn basically acknowledged Massy Elenajad
as an activist and leader, and I think he said
something important, which is this is a revolution, This is

(10:11):
not a protest. The US, I think, is trying to
course correct the past. For I mean, the history of
Iran and why these guys are even there is tied
up with you know, the CIA, Jimmy Carter. How the
Islamic Republic even came to be was you know, Iranians

(10:33):
believe they were put there by the United States. Right now,
whether that was intentional, whether everyone had a plan that
this would be the outcome, I don't think that's the case.
I think people make the best choices they can at
the time. But the Islamic Republic would not be in
power without the United States. So I think they have
a huge responsibility to help the Iranian people to remove them. Right.

(10:56):
So the US, I think, is figuring it out. I
think you'll see movement from France, Germany. I think you'll
see Europe move first, but I think the United States
is trying to figure out it's equal footing. I think
part of what my group has been trying to do
is we are trying to be the diaspora partners by

(11:16):
being Iranians who are born here but Iranian, so we
have empathy for the West and relationships to the West,
but also family there. Can we help navigate communications because
right now we don't even have a relationship. We don't
even have a diplomatic relationship with this country, So how
can we help. I think they're trying to figure it out.

(11:37):
Did they even care? You think, of course they care.
I mean, we care about a safe Israel. We care
about a safe Middle East. We need uranium to power
nuclear power in terms of green energy go forward. We
need their oil where we've got them aiding and abetting
Russia and Ukraine. Right now they're sending over drones. I mean,
you can't. I mean, governments care about governments, but they

(11:58):
rarely care about what's happening on ground with the people,
is what I'm saying. Well, that's why we're here, Yeah,
because I think, as you know, I believe culture impacts
policy and government and I think the more chitter chatter online,
the more people posting, the more they believe that the
public at large cares about this is this human rights issue,
not a political issue. I think the US government will

(12:19):
have to stand up with the Iranian people. You've seen
Canada do it, right. What does standing up look like?
I mean, listen, these people's children come here, go to
the best schools, live in the best places. They use
the government's money to do whatever they want. Sanction them,
shut down, revoke their visas, close their embassies immediately. Now

(12:40):
take them off the United Nations, you know, Committee for
Women's Rights. That's a joke. They gotta go. That's completely bogus.
They should be d prioritized on a global level. You know,
people have been arguing FIFA should they be allowed to
play soccer? You know, like there's a lot of ways
to embarrass and shun them. Iranians are very prideful, they
love to be so to basically really really really stick

(13:02):
it to them. I think everyone's got to turn their
backs and stop doing business with them. They've had a
hard two years with COVID. They're barely I don't think
they have a heavy balance sheet, and without the support
of Germany and Europe and China. I don't know how
they're going to do business. So if everyone shuts down
doing business with them, I think you have to starve
them out. And I do want to say too, I

(13:23):
did see where one person that was protesting in the
street actually did get sentenced to death. So yeah, it's
not far fetched that you know they wouldn't do that.
These are the same people that won't let us in
to tell us what nuclear weapons they have or have not. Okay,
if nothing's happening, let's let Amnesty International and Justice for

(13:45):
Iran in to report. Let's let's let them in. Let's
put them in Navigne, let's have them. There are numerous
reports girls are coming out of prison and begging their
parents for abortion pills. Why why, why are people going
with suitcases to run with abortion pills? Right now? There
are people constantly hitting us up for fundraising. Raise money

(14:06):
for starlinks, raise money for abortion pills, raise money for shields,
raise money for helmets, Like I'm a venture capitalist. This
is insane. It's taken over my life for the past
eight weeks. Well, what is an ideal life for a
woman in Iran? Looked like to you an ideal life
for woman in Iran looks like her education is her priority,

(14:29):
her family is her priority. You know, you're living in
a country where sixty percent of the populations under the
age of thirty. They are Instagram tells us that Massa,
I mean, he is the one of the largest hashtags
they've ever had in the history of Instagram. They are
Internet first, they are super plugged in. But what's also

(14:50):
true is that you cannot saying you cannot dance, you
cannot hold hands with your boyfriend, you cannot be gay,
you cannot you know, you need your father's permission to
get a passport, to travel, to get a visa. Right,
your father and your brother, for all intense purposes, are
your conservators. That's what it looks like. And this is

(15:12):
this is, I guess, somewhat common throughout Islamic countries. What's
not what is not common is that when people protest
those regimes, to be beating them in broad daylight and
killing them in broad daylight to create propaganda that we
will kill you, We will murder you and your families.

(15:32):
If you protest this, you have no vote, you have
no agency, You can't design your own life and it's
it's difficult to do that to a group of women
who are so highly educated. Uran has a super duper
high level of women who have been educated in the
arts and stem and sciences. So it's like when you

(15:52):
have a group of people who are educated, but they
have no opportunity. This is why you're having this rage.
If you look at all the content, like what is
the soundtrack to it? It's every hip hop group, you know,
it's every artist you know. You would think these kids
grew up here the way they live on Instagram. What
is I know you're writing a book? Also, yes, what
is your book about? It's a memoir. It's been in

(16:15):
the works for some time, you know. I have a
weird a. My life has been an interesting sort of road.
I left home when I was sixteen. I'm queer, I'm
a little bit of an outsider and a lot of
groups and and I'm a culture I guess student of culture.
So it's really a memoir. And I would say it's

(16:35):
a little bit of lessons and my journey over the
past three years, especially because my good friend Charlemagne told
me three years ago I should go to therapy, and
so it's a little bit of an awakening and it's
a little bit of a discovery and it's a little
bit of a sharing of what it feels like to
sort of spend really the past three years dealing with
generational trauma and a lot of the noises that we're

(16:59):
going on in my head and how to distill that,
make that lessons go forward for people. It's been really
beneficial for you, which part therapy? Yeah, therapy has changed
my life. It is. It's so funny. I sometimes love
my therapist so much, Like I just don't even know
what I would do without those person's, Like I have

(17:20):
night terrors of like what if something ever happens to
this person. It's given me an amazing place to have
a sounding board to. I think when you're I think,
when you're kind of a traumatized human being and you've
been through whether it's physical or sexual, generational abuse, when
you're queer, when you don't you know, like I was

(17:42):
Persian up until eight weeks ago, because I was afraid
to tell people I was Iranian, right, because you think
of the hostage crisis, you think of the Ayatollahs, you
think of terrorism, and so I think therapy for me
has been a place to find out how to be
a better listener, a stronger I think more boundaries. We've

(18:04):
talked a lot about this. I think the boundaries has
been heavy for me, and I think it's given me
a place to process what's happened and think about how
do I want to design my life? Go for it.
I know you guys talk about mental health a lot,
so I appreciate that. It was a huge It was
a huge favor to me a few years ago when
you and I had that conversation. I always tell you,

(18:25):
it's a profound It's been a profound difference in my life.
You know, my therapist always tell me you have to
allow yourself to feel joy. How do you allow yourself
to feel joy at a time like this when you
know what's going on and all ran I have a
four and a half year old that is the funniest,
most hilarious guy on the planet, and he just sees

(18:46):
the world through lens of possibility, and I think he
sees me for who I really am and can be.
And my wife and my son, and my family's growing,
and you know, I think my family is my main
battery on my back. I mean, that's for me my
number one crew in my life and the people I

(19:08):
want to be with all the time, or my family.
How about you say, yeah, I know where we relate
to this. Yeah, absolutely the same. I mean that's where
I find my joy. Yeah, my joy is that. I
actually had a great conversation with my therapist about that.
I'm not I'm not ready to explain it yet, but
when he the way, the way it was explaining to
me about how you experience joy through the lens of

(19:28):
your your family was it was profound only because, like
you know, I think we spent a lot of time
trying to protect ours so much, but you have to
let them go out into the world. You have to
let them go experience things. So we try to have
this sense of control. But he said something to me,
I don't once you're sink saying, I'll get ready to
share it. But yeah, I can't wait to hear it.
I was gonna ask, so, how can people help if

(19:49):
they want to help in your cause? How can they help? Follow?
Donate if possible? Yea, even push things forward. So if
you go to the link in my bio, there's a
link to our length tree. It's just mos MJ made it.
Simple for you. Yeah, you're lucky to get that one.
You must have been on day early. I was early
and friends of so they were, they've been sweet to me. Um.

(20:13):
So there's two things. One is, we took out a
heavily ambitious billboard project between LA and New York. We
took overtime Square, we took we took one hundred and
sixty six billboards across New York, LA and DC to
really drive awareness. But you know what's crazy, these billboards
turned out to be a memorial for people. People have
been going to these things, crying, picnicking, vigils, protests, communion.

(20:40):
I've never I mean, I'm telling you, I have never
in my life seen this stuff. So that's one way
you can help. Or because we're about to take the
campaign into Europe in Toronto. Um, the second way you
can help is just we created this dope document. It's
literally just it's every day. We just add the headlines.
We make it easy for you. We know this is

(21:00):
a complicated thing to understand because language culture. Somehow in
your head you're like, I don't know if these people
are even like me. Maybe they want to live like this,
Maybe they're cool with this situation. So we are basically
spoonfeeding press and talent. Because if you care about women's rights,
if you care about juvenile rights, like you have to

(21:21):
care about this situation. I think, I think this is
a cancer. And so talking about it, asking your senators,
your congressmen, your city officials, like what's your position? Where
do you stand on it? The more you post, the
more you reshare other people's post, the more you talk
about it, you know. Tracy Ellis Ross was like, Hey,

(21:41):
I'm doing a bunch of interviews and I'd like to
bring up a couple of points. What can I say?
Hit me up, you know, give me two things I
can say. You know, these are the kinds of ally
ships and friendships that like resonates so deep for me
on a personal level, to just get the word out.
I was thinking, and I don't know if this is relevant.

(22:01):
So that's why I'm asking you. I read this book
that really touched me a while ago, called the Girl
who Escaped from Isis, And did you read this or
you know I've heard her story, I believe right, And
so I was thinking about it because people always have
this misperception in hearing and reading her story about how her.
You know, she was kidnapped, her family was separated, and
then even when she was able to make it back,

(22:24):
how she was shunned just because she was repeatedly raped
by um. Well this is why the this is why
when women and young women especially are arrested in these protests,
they are then taken to prison. They are then forced
into what they call see the right, which is essentially
a work around. The Islamic Republic has a guide book

(22:45):
on virgins go to Heaven. I hearned it right, Yeah,
so they don't go to heaven. They rapem so they
don't go to the report time reading on Justice for Iran,
which is an amazing nonprofit. That's when spirit heading this
over the past few decades is that the girls are
reporting and a person came forward saying I was one
of the person that they chose to be like the raper. Wow,

(23:08):
he said, they cried more during the raping than they
did right before their executions. I mean that is some
women are killing themselves and scratching out the scratching out
their faces, scratching out their eyeballs, because once you are
de virginized through this lens of rape within that culture,
you can't marry Nope, So then where do you go?

(23:30):
Who has you? How do you what's your upward mobility
once you've lost your greatest asset, which somehow is your virginity.
That's why, right, It's just like that's literally like what
you know this people that keeps screaming because you see
these videos of people being I know, my feet is
like a horrific like I'm sure people just muted me

(23:51):
completely at this point. People are just screaming like you
like you don't know God, you're not God loving person.
And because they are just I mean, I'm talking like
thirty forty people on top of one human being, and
like you're talking about a student just like in school,
because what he's chanting zan Zendi Ozodi like women, life, freedom,

(24:16):
I mean, that's fucking bullshit. Excuse my language, but that's
just it was heartbreaking and that's why. But it was
important I felt like for me to read because, like
you said, it is important to educate yourself through people
who know more than you about what's going on. This
was in a rat though, and I always hear Iran
in Iraq, so is it the same in both? Like
when it comes to what's happening in Iran right now.

(24:38):
Iran is a very different country on the sense that
it is Shiite, it is not Sunni. And the most
important thing I think about Iran to know is, up
until nineteen seventy nine, it was a second you know,
it was a country wasn't perfect. There are many flaws.
The Shaw was not by at all a perfect king
and perfect leader. That's a whole other episode of people

(25:00):
more educated than me can give you all the reasons
why he wasn't perfect. But he did create opportunities of
education and freedom for women. He was a supporter of
women and their mobility within society. Forgot. My mom came
here to go to get an education, you know, under
the Shaw, and was blessed by her whole family. I

(25:20):
mean my family's you know, just like a middle normal
family from Iran. My mom came here, got an education,
her sister got an education. This was a normal thing,
This was a very she came here. She's an entrepreneur.
And that the craziest thing about Iran that I will
tell you is that it's a matriarchal society. There is
I It is a society where the person doing the

(25:43):
bossing and bullying in the household is my mother, It's
not my father, you know. And that's that's how it
is in ninety nine percent of Iranian households. It's the
woman who drives. Yes, is a knows and how it's
gonna be. And and it's worse to catch hell from
her than it is from him. Yeah, how how can

(26:04):
we help, like the amplify more people from Iran's voices?
So listen, this is one of the things that we
have done with this document. We have put together a
panel of people who are domain experts. I'm talking thirty
forty years on this topic. We've also put together a
panel of people who are i would say, more culture driven,

(26:25):
more gen z driven. My friends started an amazing Instagram
called samonis m sam a n I s M. He
creates these insane videos, all tracked to whether it's rage
against the machine or Kendrick Lamar. So it's like he's
trying to make the content very Western, but he's showing
the footage. Our friends started an account called frem Iran.

(26:46):
It's beautiful, it's artistics. She's a master's from Yale, So
you look at this content, you think it's refinery twenty nine,
there's these two young women that started an account called
Middle East Matters. They're domain experts of everything in the
Middle East. I think of them as like our young
vice media. So giving voice to some of these folks
and having them come and talk about what's going on here,

(27:08):
I think is super important. I think, you know you
can make donations to our Getting a go fund Me
was almost impossible. I always have to give a shout
out to go fund me. They went above and beyond
because with sanctions it's almost impossible to help this country
or raise money for this country. We can't give money
to Iran, but we can raise money to help raise
awareness for Iran. So that's one way you can help.

(27:31):
But I think giving exposure too, because again we're not Iraq,
We're not Afghanistan. We are we are adjacent, but we
are something very different because we have nuclear capabilities, because
we have eighty nine million people, sixty percent of them
of under the age of thirty. But we are the

(27:51):
highest users of Instagram within the Middle East. Literally, you
can ask Instagram this. We are hybrid communicators. But I
believe if we don't get this Islamic Republic out of power,
it's not just a how how many more days of
footage are you gonna watch? This is going to embolden
these people. And they've already like they already sent drones

(28:11):
to Russia. Right, They're just they don't care. They think
they can do whatever they want. Dangerous. I'm like, I
know I'm coming in all heavy. I'm like, I did
I have one more questions that you did say? You
have your memoir coming out. I'm working on it. Okay,
it is coming out. We don't know when. We don't

(28:33):
know when you'll you'll be the first to know. And
so for you being queer in your family and culturally,
how was that like as far as how they did
they accept that right away? Was it a conversation? I
mean I was emancipated at sixteen because we did not
have language. My parents have I would say deep levels

(28:59):
of trauma, you know, like people who are exiled from
their country. They don't fit in UM, they don't know,
they don't understand how to assimilate. They did not UM. No,
they were not good about they were terrible about it.
They know that they were terrible about it. They feel
badly about it. I have been through therapy and through

(29:22):
lots of other things, have done a ton of sort
of thought leadership and thinking about it. I think finding
empathy for people who've done you a little dirty creates
a lot of grace. And so we're actually pretty tight
right now. I've been tight for the past. We've been
tight for the past nine or somewhat years, ten years. Yeah,
that was part of the reason you were emancipated. It

(29:45):
was the reason I was emancipated. Yeah, I mean by
my parents were like, you cannot be gay, you cannot
be queer. This is not cool with us. We're not
we won't support you financially. And that's what they were taught.
So I think that's what they were taught. I think
they want to it in America. But I also think
that they did not expect me to be so stubborn

(30:05):
that I would take a trash bag, fill it with tuna,
fish and socks and a couple pairs of parents pants
and march out the door and never come back. I
don't I think they thought I would like change my
mind or something, or suppress it. Yeah, But I think
from the very beginning I was a bit of a
revolutionary personality. All the things I read about the things

(30:26):
I cared about. The music I listened to engendered and
emboldened my sense of being moj and so you know,
we've preyed on it. We've I think what's also helped
as my wife she's Iranian, and my son, I think this,
you know what's so funny. I think they were afraid

(30:48):
that me being gay meant I wasn't Iranian, that I
was like somehow dissing their culture. And then I think
when they realized as I was older, that I was
heavy Iranian, that they were like, oh, like, you still
love us. It's like some sort of weird trauma bond.
I don't know, my therapist, this is what I spend
all this money on. This is what I spent I

(31:09):
spend more money on this than I do vacation. How's
that you should try to get them to go too.
I have tried. I have begged, but they're live the
generation of like, how could you possibly tell about bigness
that they could tell other people that's right? And I'm like, no,
it's confidential. It's legally confidential, Like it's like telling your lawyer.
They're like, I don't tell a lawyer anything either. You're like,
how can they help you. I know what you said.

(31:30):
It's true about grace still because it's like one of
the biggest things I learned, you know, in regards to
my father's it's like, you know, you realize your parents
were people before they were your parents, and when you
find out their stories, it allows you to give them
a lot more grace. I think that, um, I never
trust a person that can't forgive, You cannot forget. Like,

(31:52):
my relationship with them is very boundaried, so I'm like,
this is what we do, this is what we can
talk about. They don't like it because I'm very like boundaried,
but there's a lot of love present, especially now. I've
never seen them so broken as I have in the
past eight weeks. It's almost like they're reliving this trauma
of exile. I think it's I always tell people, I'm like,

(32:14):
imagine you go on a trip somewhere for a few weeks,
and all of a sudden, the middle of that trip,
you're told you can't go back to your home, and
your home the streets have changed names, your schools have
changed names, all your stories that you love are closed.
And I think it's a lot to be exiled from
a place that you grew up in. I think that's deep,

(32:37):
and then it's demonized. I mean, look at the Ayatola,
Like yo, I look at that dude, and I'm like,
he it's hard to believe that that's you know, your country.
It's hard to believe. And look, I think a lot
of people felt that way about Donald Trump in this
country and what you've seen here, whether you like him

(32:57):
or not, you can't argue that this country has gone
in the direction of divisiveness and a lot more hate
present than before. And whether that's true or not, I
think that's just how people feel, right. That's why I'm
not looking for I do not want him back on
the campaign trail. Really, no, that's the last thing I want.
Do you think you can win? I mean, yeah, I
think you can win. But I don't want him back

(33:19):
on the campaign trail because every day we're gonna have
to hear about him in the news cycle. Every day,
it's gonna be something that's stern the pot. Every day,
it's gonna be more divisiveness. Like, I don't want that. Like,
I think I think it's unavoidable at this point. You know,
I think he's coming I think we need to be
prepared like we were for these mid terms. I think
we need to continue to support our local officials and

(33:41):
keep pushing through Congress and Senate and keeping heavy on
our judges to make the right decisions. But yeah, I
think a fight for freedom, for inclusion and democracy is
a global fight right now. You know, I think everyone
needs to put their foot on the gas. So I think,
I mean, you guys know like I'm heavy on a
run because I've been heavy on trans rights, gay rights,

(34:02):
you know. I mean, you know, I don't have to say,
but it's just like, fuck, I can't handle where we're
going as a global sort of thought leadership around women
in general. It just seems wrong. So ask me a
fun question. Please don't make me just answer these heavy questions.

(34:23):
You were here for them, an education we needed. This.
Can I do to help you? Guys? That's my bigger question.
You just did. Is there anything else we can do
as a group that we can help you just did it? Okay,
you can make some copies of those papers. I'm gonna
get you copies of this. I'm gonna send it to
you or something. I'll send it to you. Give you
a PDF I will send it to your friends, and um, yeah,

(34:46):
I mean I think people just need to keep paying
attention because if you look at these kids, they're mega inspiring.
I mean, that's I think that's the one. I mean,
you've seen all the rappers, You've seen their videos, You've
seen how much they love Drake, you see how much
they love Kendri Smart. It's like, I'm really trying hard
to get people from the culture to start to speak
up for these artists and activists over there who are

(35:07):
just living and dying through the lens of the music
that we make here, you know, And that's really what
that's really been our goal. So yeah, well, thank you
for joining us in appreciate you. Yeah. I don't even
work here and I'm here, so I mean, I when
I came in and saw you, I was I was like,
very flattered and happy this to you. What's going on

(35:30):
with you? No, No, she taught me from Martin. Right now,
she says she got a job. We don't believe it's
that's in January, okay, but they will not let me
get off this show. I've been trying and it's a
lot of work. I'm doing double duty right now. I
saw your new show and working here. Are you having funky?
I'm ready to go okay, but I'm glad to have

(35:53):
been here for this conversation. Thank you for having me.
I'm glad you're mister big Time now. You're all doing okay.
God is good and you are just killing on all
of your business endeavors and making your family happy. My
wife is good, I know, and that's beautiful. My wife
is good, not my life. My wife is. That's really
all that matters. I appreciate you guys so much. I

(36:13):
love you guys so much. Without any asking, You're like,
please come, I know what a huge audience you have,
Please please, please, anything I can do, And for all
the listeners you can go to the Lincoln the Bio
and we are more than happy to spend the next
few days just answering questions at MJ at MO chess right.
Love you guys,