Episode Transcript
Thank you for sliding with us on the slide. We joined today , here at Mix theory studios, Jacksonville, Florida, 233, Bay street. Hey, if you don't know, you better find out real, real quick. Cause Duval County, Duval, a hold on
you know, Hey, Hey, this is where it's at. This is where it's going to be. And this is the beginning of something. I think, as a city, right? What we're seeing the transformation of the city of Jacksonville, y'all better open up your eyes. And I'm saying that I'm from Dade County.
Now, Hey, I'm telling you, boy, we'll shoot you in your head. If you, if you call it Miami guards, I'm from Dade County, but I ain't never been nowhere like, like Jacksonville. So if you know something, you might want to fall through here. And if you're looking for a place to relocate to, Hey, let's go ahead and relocate because you know, that's that, that play a role in some things that we may have to talk about a little bit later, right?
You're listening to The Slide Podcast with Tavares Bethel.
What we attempt to do is to always speak, blunt, blood raw, straight from the city of Jacksonville, to connect the economics , politics, education and the streets.
So we slide on every concept, we slide on every topic. We're going to just jump on and we're going to slide.' This podcast is sponsored by Rayzit, a donation platform making change with change.
Thank you all. It's a, honor and a privilege to have an opportunity to spend a little bit of time with you today. To my left I have Mr. Polo, to my right I have Mr. Jesus Vivar, the owner of Mix Theory Studios, and I'm also joined with Mr. Dante. Dante, set it all for us as we come around to Mr. Polo, introduce yourself to the people so that way they'll know who they're dealing with and what they're going to be receiving today. going to be receiving today. I appreciate you, What's up, y'all? I'm Dante Redwood. I also go by Vehriion as an artist, so that's my stage name right there.
I'm 27 years old, man, originally from North Ridgeville, Ohio, about 20 minutes southwest of Cleveland. But, this is what I do, man. I work for Amazon, it's my day job. When it comes to the night time, I'm very on. Cause I'm very on. ha,
Ha
ha.
Oh yeah.
my name is Jesus Vivar. , thank you Tavares for the introduction. I am the CEO of Mix Theory Studios here in Jacksonville, Florida. I am a DJ by profession, transitioned from that and got into producing. And now we own this multimedia studio, originally from New York, a transplant from here, from Jacksonville.
Now I've been here about four years and I've been meeting some amazing people, amazing artists. So thank you for having me on your show.
for joining us. Thank you.
It's your boy, Sean Fountain, aka Ralph, Mr. Polo, Lauren, aka Mr. National Championship for those people that's local in Jacksonville and you football. Tavares, first and foremost, thank you for the opportunity, to be able to put myself out here. I've been told before I need to do things like this because of my outlook on things.
And because I tend to, you know, go against the masses on a lot of, Topics, right? You know, but a little bit of background about me, 44 years old, born and raised Jacksonville, Florida, graduate of the Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University. Yes. Spring of, of 01, uh, bachelor of healthcare management, master's of business administration.
They called me a corporate thug because I've been in corporate America since I graduated college, but this whole time. Once I get off work, if you didn't know me, you think I probably was a dope boy because you know, I had the grills in, I have the cars with the rims, the music, you know, stuff like that.
So that's why I picked up the name corporate thug somewhere along the way.
Yeah, but you know what is we need that. You don't say we need individuals who know how to bridge the gap between, the White House and the trap house. You said that because for us, success lies somewhere in the middle. You don't say so. So so so. Again, people who watch or tune in, they may be familiar with me.
And for those of you all who know, if you don't know, you know, you're going to have to keep watching. Cause I don't think I'm really finna run my bio for you. Cause I'm trying to sell it for $50,000 You know what I'm saying? But no, I'm Tavares. I'm from Miami. I grew up in Carol City. Y'all know me. I completed my formal education in 1993.
That's how I articulate me dropping out and getting that GED. But, you know, I was blessed. I was blessed to have a successful military career. 21 years, 4 months, and 18 days in the United States military. Attaining the rank of First Sergeant. In the United States Army, having served in every level of leadership, and I served as the operations leader for Amazon.
I'm also an author of a book, How to Become a Six Figure Earner. You can find it on Amazon. and I suggest that you get the book, because the book will lay the foundation for a lot of the concepts that we will discuss. During the course of this podcast experience, because important for the success of a community or a cohort is being able to understand everybody in its relative parts, how they all come together.
What is the strategy for us to be able to create a dynamic experience as we move forward? The unique thing about this collection of men that are here today is that the majority of us are in the same cohort. We got the youth represented by Mr Dante, but we're at a pivotal point in society because we get to determine what do we want the future to look like?
Mhm. Right? And what role are we willing to play in shaping those particular outcomes? And I'm going to say this, and I'm going to say this for the record. You ain't going to church nobody to death. You're not going to force us to vote, and you ain't going to try to minimize individuals that's right now making sacrifices and living a life in the streets, because you need all of those parts in order to be successful.
And just for the record, I said I wasn't going to do it, but hey, I'm kind of with the Project 25 deregulation of the Department of Education. You know what I'm saying? Hey, I'm a high school dropout. I ain't really got to be with that. Hey, I ain't really got to
really got to be
ain't really got to be with
did nothing for me. So, so what are you intelligent people feel free to jump in, uh, slide in the inbox, subscribe, complain, explain to me how it makes sense because I ain't seen the Nobel peace prize winner that came from elementary school yet.
So what's all, what's all included in the project 25? Cause I've only heard negative things about it. Where it's always like, Hey, we're not doing this. We're not doing
this.
Hey, I got a shirt and you know, the dread do no politics. Rastafari. Hey, no,
shirt and you
Hey, no, no, but we
Hey, they'll do no politics, the dread, Rastafari do no politics. Hey, hey, no, no, but we got, but we definitely got a political perspective, but if you don't agree with it, then don't be offended and don't try to rock somebody into believing what you should believe.
See, the purpose of these things to be able to have spirited conversations that allow us to challenge each other's ideas so we can reach new frequencies of vibration. It ain't to make me feel bad because I select somebody who you might not consider as the popular candidate. And that's where we make our mistakes.
You know what I'm saying? What'd you
It's all control, though. When you think about school and you talk about politics and religion, it's always been about control. So when you're talking about, you know, deconstructing the education process, that's part of it.
We've always been taught to do something and think a certain way. They don't tell you to think creatively. They don't tell you to think in a certain way to show you and empower you. They take that power away from you. You think about religion itself, and I'm not trying to say that. All religions are like that.
There was always a way to say, let's all be good. Let's all do this. Let's all do that. Let's make sure that we all get together and stuff. But when it comes to education and religion itself, there's always somebody saying, follow me. I know the way I have the answer, right? Instead of saying you have the power to empower yourself and enlighten yourself to become more than what you are.
We can all do this and work together in that. That's not that's not what's being taught now. So education itself, now they're trying to control what you're going to read. Right. They're trying to hide history from us so that you don't learn and enlighten yourself to empower yourself. So you've got to always stay hungry for education.
You've got to be always wanting to learn, but you've got to seek it. You've got to seek it. Don't just stand there and say, teach me what you got because everyone else is teaching the same thing. You're not going to go anywhere else from
To
your point, right? For me, I'm a high school dropout, right? But I didn't stop trying to become educated, right? I didn't stop reading books. I didn't stop thirsting for information. However, you know, um, the way that that educational construct was said, I remember the fourth grade.
When, when, when I met Ms. Bush, I was a straight A student. I met Ms. Bush. She did everything in her power to give me a C because, because why? Right. In order to be able to create that mentality, right. That instead of showing the individual how to do it better, you deal with the youth.
What's going on?
in the streets?
What's going on with our youth? Cause we don't know. We, we make assumptions, but we don't
Listen, man. a parent is the best thing for a kid and the worst thing at the same
time. Overall, these kids today, they are clueless, right? Because they've become so entitled. And I don't blame the kids. I blame the parents, you know, because you have parents who
break their neck, work three, four or five jobs to keep their kids and bullshit designer name, brand shit, shit that the kids don't even really care about it.
A lot of times it's the parents, you know, because the parents want to have the social media likes and stuff like that. You know, I personally, like I said, I've coached you sports for 20 plus years. And, you know, I would see where a parent would invest more in a youth sports, but not a tutor for the child.
You know, it's okay to buy those Jordans every month for 150, but you won't spend 25 an hour for your child to get a MAP tutor. So that's why I said, man, these kids are lost and it's not even their fault. a lot of the parents are you know, and I blame a lot of that on social media, you know, because we look at social media and we see that Fake life and we think it's reality.
We try to make it our you know, so like I said, but overall, the youth today, man, they are lost, which is why now, they say it takes a village
that doesn't apply anymore because people don't want you saying to their kids. You know, they don't. When I came up, my neighbors knew that they saw me at that.
They can whoop my ass.
and
there was no recourse for my grandparents and my parents because they knew that that came out of love. I see you doing wrong. I'm finna check your ass right
right now.
You do that now to a kid, you might end up dead.
up dead.
Yeah.
Or, in jail.
Or in jail. Or in jail, you know. So, like I said, these kids are lost, man.
And
it's not about where we're at, it's about how can we change it. and And,
and I,
and I guess that's where, and I see a y'all blame polo because I wasn't going to talk politics, right? But I got to though,
Man, we going to let you cook,
Yeah. Hey, because political, because politically, right. We, we took the village from the village and the village is now a social program, right? Uh, the village is the office where you got to go and beg somebody.
See before, you know what I'm saying? Oh dude getting bread in the neighborhood. He's scrambling or whatever. Big mama say, Hey, take Sean, take. 35 over there. So she's getting kids some food. You know what I'm saying? The power was in the community for us to be able to attend to the needs of the individuals in the community.
But now, right, we don't, we don't got, we don't got big bro who do his thing and big, big mama that got control or sway with him in order to be able to get the resources where they need to go. Right? That's not the construct of our community no more. If somebody wants some help, they gotta go beg a social program.
And then they gotta wait that time frame in order for that social program to provide the approval or the assistance. But what happens in the meantime while they're waiting and their applications are in these pending statuses, right? That woman or that man, um, financially constrained, are resorting to things that they have to do in order to be able to provide for their families.
We can't judge that. We can't judge a person need to survive, right? Survival is, uh, it, it comes, it's inherent in the species, right? When I was born, I was born to survive. My mama didn't have to tell me to, to nurse from her, her mammary gland, right? That was in me to suck on it. You know what I'm saying?
That ain't really sound right.
Nah, man.
Man, but
I wasn't gonna say shit. I was gonna shake my hand and say yeah. Yeah. Uh,
of ours is man,
thinking about what you just said, right? The the mothers, the fathers, they're applying for these programs to to get assistance. Because they truly need it, not because they're being lazy, right? They truly need it.
But in the meantime, because that system is so flawed with a backlog from, from here to Dade County, right? Like you said, what are they doing in the meantime? By any means necessary. If it's a female, she's selling pussy.
Mm hmm.
You know, I mean, not saying she's like on the street prostitute, but that's what she's doing,
it's it's not
know, I'm sorry, but you know, listen, man, listen, like, I mean, I'm just being honest when you have, when you have, we keep missing 100, right?
You know, you have the mothers there when I say they're selling pussy. It's like, okay, whatever dude has an open checkbook, I'm going to talk to him and give him whatever he whatever he want in order for me to get part of that checkbook, even if his morals and values don't align with mine. I got kids to feed.
I got bills need to be paid from a from the black man's perspective. You know, especially the ones who may not be educated or whatever the case may be. Some of them choose to do things that may not be legal in order to to get money, right? So a lot of a lot of our black kings that are incarcerated right now, they're incarcerated because of situations like this because of because of a flawed system.
You know, and a lot of businesses not wanting to give everyone a fair opportunity. Sometimes they're forced to take drastic measures in order to feed their families. You know, you got a lot of good dudes in jail right now
That's that's that's that's
are not criminals. You can't to me. You can break a law and not be a criminal.
It's
it, it, it really, man, it's, it's hard to say law in America, right? You can't say law in America. We, we, we need to stop playing. I served 21 years, four months, 18 days in the United States military, right?
I defended the constitution of the United States against all enemies, both foreign and domestic. I can say whatever the hell I want to say about the law, right? Because I done sacrificed the better part of my life defending it. You see what I'm saying? And with that I say, in America, right, you can't really say law or legal, right, because there is in nature, right, it's inherently wicked to sell people, right?
And so when you establish the transatlantic slave trade, you inherently made illegal everything that come from the country, right? You see what I'm saying? Because all of the resources of the country are purchased in blood. You see what I'm saying? We don't have the moral compass to give direction or guidance to no nation on the face of the earth.
You see what I'm saying? Hey, now
preach.
Yeah, I did it.
it. And I
And I don't care. Cause see, it is what it is. And that ain't to knock the country. That's so that when we stop being so weak When it comes to dealing with leaders, right? We gotta have a strong conversation. It happened. Slavery happened, right? Black people were enslaved.
What you gonna do now? Okay, white people enslaved black people, but not all white people in it. And for you white people, that emote, stop, right? Because you were broke, right? You didn't have nothing, right? One out of ten white Caucasians owned slaves. One out of ten. One out of four of the one out of ten had successful plantations.
You, you, you, I, I think it was a movie, hey, it was a movie called, Free State of Jones. And in this movie, it's a conversation between this Caucasian man and this black man. he say, Nigga, you can't have none of that, ham. And he said, what make you ain't? And then, so he say, what did you say to me, boy?
And then, and then Matthew McConaughey say, he say, what make you not a nigga, Bob? Right? Because we're all the same. We're all stuck in the same struggle. And until we normalize the struggle, until we normalize our similarities and stop exacerbating our differences, then we get nowhere.
Right? And that's just my opinion.
you know what, Tavars, is something I've been thinking about for the longest. To me,
this country, the foundation of this country. is the constitution, right? It's bullshit. And I think it was written by a bunch of white men who, as you stated, own slaves and black people wouldn't even consider the whole person.
Three fields rule, right? We wouldn't even consider a whole person for one person. So to me, I feel like, man, in order for the, for this country to even start to getting, To be a better place, man, we have to readdress something as old as the constitution that needs to be a living document, right? So much has changed in in so much has changed for us to still let the constitution be the founding principle of how we operate, right?
That constitution leads to the disparity in the legal system with whites and blacks. The people that founded this country don't even believe in don't didn't even acknowledge black people. And we're still. I'm
I got, I got an interesting perspective on that. I'm I'm going to go
to Jesus first though but I got an interesting perspective on that but I want to hear your perspective on on that because I know You
You know what, I'm going to tell you something. The thing is that even though you can talk about the Constitution and the system itself, that system has been in place for years, even before that, even before when you talk about the Roman Empire.
In
And all around the world it's always been about control and how you get to the top and stay at the
and stay
And information and knowledge is everything. When you keep that away from the people, you take their power. It doesn't matter what race you are. You are, if you have the knowledge, you can grow. But if you're keeping everyone under control and you stay in that system, and then you get used to that system, you, you basically are the system.
When I, you know, here's the thing. Back in the days, and we were talking about, you know, I know what it is to stand in line and wait for government cheese and powdered milk because I grew up poor, right? That back in those days was embarrassing. You didn't want to stand in that line. You stood in that line because you needed it.
When you talk about wanting to do something because you need it, you definitely hungry. You're going to stand in that line. But let me tell you something. My parents always said to me, this
is not going to be your life. You need to get up. You need to grow. You need to get out of this system.
We're not going to stay in this system.
So when you talk about the government and the way things are, you're right. Things have changed. But the power lies within our hands and it starts in the community. It starts down at the very bottom. And that is something that we need to wake up to. Because a lot of people don't know they have the power.
They'll just get used to just staying in the system and then stay there. Why would you do that? Why would you stay in that system that you don't even want to be part of? You're lazy or you're dumb and you're not smart enough to say, I need to get this knowledge to get myself out of this system. And that's part of the problem.
It's not just in this country. It's all over the world.
It's not just in
myself out of this city. part of, that's the problem, it's not just in
it's all over world.
It's a dramatic racism. You know what I'm saying? But it's a 305 in it, but I want something with a little bit more funk.
want a carburetor. I
I want something, right?
Harley
Harley
carburetor.
But that's America, right? America is a vehicle with a weak engine, right? Now, we could get a more powerful engine, but unfortunately, you know, the engine that's in there right now is the engine that we're using, right?
It's important for us to be able to understand the engine. Right. And I think that as a community, the black and brown community, even, you know, the poor white community, we really don't understand how the engine operates. Right. All they taught us in driver's ed was you put gas in it. And check the oil, right?
But there's some other things going on with this car, man. You know what I'm saying? I'm telling you right now. There's a tick in it. You know what I'm saying? There's something wrong with the transmission. You ain't tell me nothing about the
transmission. You know
said, check the oil. You know what I'm saying?
Put a little gas in it. And that's what I've been doing. And it's been running fine. Right? Now, you know what I'm saying? We at a time period where, Hey, I want to put, uh, Louis seats in it. You know what I'm saying? And I realize I can't put Louis seats in it, right, because the seats are cheap, right? I can't, hey, I want to put tile on the floor in the car, you know what I'm saying?
And I can't do it, right, because the car is not constructed in a manner to allow for that. Right. So this America, it ain't, it ain't constructed in a manner that will allow for a different mind. I don't care about the color of the individual that's holding the function. And that's where we as a community have to get a little wiser because when Barack Obama became the United States, there was jubilation.
Right. However, I still don't see the improvement in the low socioeconomic demographic communities because even though he was black, he was the president of the United States of America. He wasn't the black president of the hood. You know what I'm saying? He was the president of the United States of America would respond with a measurable power, right?
I say that again, with a measurable power. That means he could have done something. If he had individuals that was ready for him to do something with, at some point, we gotta, uh, uh, be able to accept that the reason why we're in the condition that we're in is because we wasn't ready to be receptive of the individual who could have created an opportunity for us.
And so now we're looking for opportunities to come from an individual who already told you, you ain't got nothing to lose, right? You ain't got nothing to lose. So we, oh, we got offended. You finna, I ain't finna deal with dude. You know what I'm saying? Cause I ain't got nothing to lose. How racist is that?
That's fishing. Why, why are we looking for shit like that?
hey, hey, why, hey, why, why Kamala Harris, uh, uh, hey, hey, why she, uh, why, why she choosing, you know what I'm saying? Hey, why she choosing? Hey, I'm saying she choosing right? Everybody get to choose what they like, right? And she liked what she liked. You know what I'm saying? See, and I ain't, I ain't no advocate for neither one of them because I don't care.
You know what I'm saying? It don't, it don't matter because I realized that whoever said in the federal office can't benefit what's going on on Moncrief. Right. Who's sitting in the federal office. Can't help right now. What's going on on the hilltop?
I think they're on the same team though. Everybody's part of, if you're at the top, they're just puppets man. They're just puppets talking for the same elites. That one percent, they have so much information that they won't even
A lot of people, man, people have to, like you said, it's about research.
Like, you have to understand the Trilateral Commission, Bilderberg Group. You have to understand stuff like that to really understand the structure of the United States. The U. S. is ran by the big banks.
It's corporate.
corporate. The people that really run the United States don't even live over here.
But that's another show.
saying, that's
that's what I'm saying there, and that's why I'm
But, but, but
man,
yeah, but I, but like I say, man, for the people who listening, like I said, after this podcast, go and look up the trilateral commission, the Bilderberg group, you'll, you'll learn something, you know,
listen, that's all I can tell you. And, and keep in mind one thing that I tell my son.
You know, knowledge isn't power, right? Applied knowledge is power, right? I tell all my kids, communication is not key. That's bullshit. Effective communication is key. You know, the things that I grew up on, right? Knowledge is power. Communication is key. Okay, cool. But now, now that I'm old, I realized that that really wasn't true you know applied knowledge, effective communication, you know, things like that. But again, homework for everybody. Trilateral commission, Bilderberg group. Man, look up the Rothschild family. Like, you got to just look these things up,
man. know,
go on a tangent, but you got to. But
that's real though, because I got a question because like we were saying, we like we harped on the education thing. But what year did education become legal and mandatory? What year did that happen? Like, I wonder,
legal and mandatory legal
and mandatory. How many years have we had an opportunity to receive education?
And I ain't even say fair and equal education. I just said education. And what was the purpose when, when education was mandated for the low socioeconomic demographic, what was the purpose of education being mandated for that community? See, when we get ready to trace that back in our mind, I want you to think about this right now, right?
So Dante is
a college graduate. You got a scholarship to college?
Mercyhurst University. Hey,
Hey, act like you know,
you know. Hell yeah.
dog got a tryout with the Cardinals. But I want to, let's walk it back now, because Dante comes from some parents. Those parents, we went to school, it wasn't no thought about whether or not we had to go. School was legal, it was available, we loved going, it was pretty colors.
It was, it was bears and oh my. Right. It was, it was Dr. Seuss books all over the place. My grandparents, did my grandparents experience, oh, excuse me, my parents, did our parents experience the same thing when they went to school? Hell no. They didn't experience the same thing when they went to school, but they had to go.
Their parents, did their parents have to go to school? No, their parents were sharecroppers. The majority of them learn how to read in churches. Right. Reading Bibles and little math books that said that was, that were collected for them, right? What may education mandatory, right? And that's really the question that we have to ask ourselves as individuals, what may education mandatory understanding that if I educate an individual, it gives me greatest access to control their behaviors, right?
So it was education given to us to liberate us and free our mind. As they was telling us that foolishness about knowledge is power. But why he ain't gave us no damn money.
You said
No access to no resources, but you said education was power and I wasted my damn time in college all them damn years to get a job working, making 60, 000 a year right now with 150, 000 worth of school loans.
But education is power. Education ain't power. Our unity is power, right? We'll need to know a damn thing when we know how to put our money together and then double it back. You know what I'm saying? Hell, but then you take the individuals out of our community, the big meats type individuals that can galvanize us, you lock them away forever.
You see what I'm saying? Hey, that's hypocritical and disgusting.
It's a system though. That's the system. That's the system of the society that we've been trained to think a certain way. That you need to go to school, get an education, go to college,
get yourself into debt, get into the system that you're going to always be paying back, work, Right.
You got a nine to five job. You have nothing. You just trying to get by, you grow old and you, and you're retiring and you die. That's what life is about. No,
And you know, you know, well, really,
No, no, no, no, no. Cuz cuz then after you, after you live that your entire day, you're going to go to heaven.
But listen, uh, what retirement age is?
What? 62 65. And then life expectancy is about 70 to 73. So damn it, you get a good eight years to live and you better be in good shape after you retire. You know what I'm saying? It's, it's, it's crazy. Like, but it's, it's crazy, but man, just, you know, piggybacking on, on what you were saying. our community, I don't care about nobody else's community but mine. Point blank. I don't give a shit about what happens in the Ponte Vedras and the Mandarins. I care about the communities I came up in. The Roosevelt Gardens, the Lackawannas, the McDuff area, the H Street areas. It just so happened that I was a product of two parents, That we're together like I'm 44.
My mom and dad been together, but like 46 years, right? So listen, one thing I'll say is I don't have the typical black story to provide. I didn't have that struggle, right? I came up with two parents. I had a support. I had a grandmother support system. I was not poor coming up, right? So and I don't try to pretend like I was to try to fit in and be cool.
That's not me. I don't, I don't have that story. So.
I think, but it is important to know that, well, what's the saying?
If you want to keep something from a black man, what do you do? Put it in the book. Put it in the book.
Put it in the book right now.
Forget hiding in the book, they're taking away the books.
books.
they're taking away the books! Ron DeSantis! They're taking away the books, right? The schools already have half assed taught us and our kids black history. They're half assing that, now they're even pulling that away. Right? You have a very known popular private school here in Jacksonville called the Bold School.
Where a few years ago, they wanted to implement like an African American studies program, right? Those bowls donors
Wrote a letter and pretty much said if y'all implement this program, we're pulling our money
Ask me what happened to that program.
But that shit got swept under the rug because those people from bowls that money it runs so deep in the city of of jacksonville right I'm from jacksonville
Go look at the schools on the north side and the east side and the west side and then go to over on the south side and look at the resources available.
Go look at the libraries. Look at the amount of computers that are available. Go and look at the background of the teachers. You know, that's not coincidental that. Certain keys are honestly being set up not to fail, but to like you said, be able to be controlled because from the very beginning, their information is being limited.
They're trainees.
exactly the resources are being limited there. We're, we're, we're breeding these kids to only be able to work at the Amazon warehouses and the McDonald's and not even on the management level, right? We're, it's crazy how we're, we're, we're training these kids up to expect less, you know? But. Again, that could be another, another topic, you know,
And, and, and, and the thing about it is, is it has to be right. It has to be because we also are a group of individuals that have an opportunity to craft the outcomes of the future. By controlling the information that our children receive, we can make our children, uh, uh, we can grant our children access to technology.
Right. We don't have to ask for permission to do this. Right. These are things that we can do. Right. We can, we can create. And we ain't even got to guess. We're here with the youth. What you need? And that's how this should go, right? Real spill, right? We should just be able to say, Hey man, what you need? Right.
And then our responsibility is just to go get
Go get it.
That's it. That's what we do. We go, we go get it. You know what I'm saying? And so, and so, so that way the youth coming in back of us now have an opportunity to do something that we didn't do. That's how you take us farther into the future, farther, farther, right?
That's, that's how that's supposed to work. You know what I'm saying? So what do you need, what do you need in order to be able to set y'all up for this next iteration of
talent? See, I really think Polo touched on that shit earlier because When you speak about coming up with a father and a mother, like two, a two parent household, a
they're college educated parents in that.
So, I mean,
And I can say the same for mine. Now, my parents, they were going through college as I was getting into my teenage years.
And now they both have their bachelor's in criminal justice. My father is a retired warden. Now my mother is still working. I'm going to say, she probably got a couple more years left before she retired, but my father's 62. My mom is 50, 56 now. So it's like, Oh shit, they're set. They're gonna be retired.
Like, they're gonna be cool. Like, I didn't grow up poor. That wasn't me. But it was about the structure that I had at home. So it's like,
I could tell you what I need, but it's more like on the home fronts. Hey, I need those parents. I need somebody home. Because you're going home from school, right? And your mom's working her second or third job for that day.
She's not gonna be at home when you get there, so who the fuck gonna keep tabs on what you're doing? Yeah, yeah,
are raising
And a lot of kids are raised by their older brothers and sisters who were in the same situation.
but the crazy part is, a lot of the parents, they're working two, three jobs
To be able to afford a bullshit, fake lifestyle though.
Yeah, yeah, definitely nowadays.
nice.
of them are working two or three jobs because they actually have to because, because the rent, prices, everything else.
But speaking from experience, I know people who make enough money from their regular jobs to support a modest lifestyle. But because they want the money.
They went to New Jays. They
new J's. They want the purple jeans. They want all that. Yeah. They want all that or they want their kids to have that. And mind you, sometimes the kids don't even care for the It'd be the parents pushing that agenda.
Oh, a lot
kid's grown out of this
Yeah. Or
don't matter.
Yeah.
Or sometimes.
you, I took my, I took my son. I'm sorry, I'm gonna cut you off. I took my son to Atlanta school shopping for his 11th grade.
Yeah, I was like, I'm finna put my dog in the game. You know what I'm saying? I'm taking her to Atlanta. I'm gonna get him eight to the bottom. You freshen him out. Hey,
up. Yeah, red
we Louis everything. Man, that man hated them clothes. He didn't care. That man wanted to wake up and throw on gym shorts, and
some dry
flops, and a dry fit shirt, and some socks pulled up over his calves.
And I was like, what the fuck? Where are you going?
everything In
I'm doing, I'm doing, I'm doing everything in my power in order to be able to make sure that you have swagger, you know what I'm saying? That you got all the resources that you need in order to be able to run through your few bras. I thought, I thought, I thought I was being a father, you know what I'm saying?
And I was wrong because that ain't what, that ain't what they necessarily require. Hey, when our mom and daddy was working two or three jobs, cause I, I'm a latchkey kid. I can remember being home by myself since 1979. I'm 48 years old, right? I can remember being home by myself in 79. I four. Right? That's how long I've been growing up without a parent.
Right? So, so, so, so, during those times, mom and dad was working two or three jobs. They needed to work two or three jobs to survive. Right? And that was, that was intentional and on purpose. Right? Society is constructed in a way, cause see, here go the real spill. Real spill is a house don't got to cost that much.
It don't. The house I grew up in on 190 ninth Street eight. Anybody who wanna ride by, if y'all at the crib, 1 9900 Northwest 33rd Avenue is still sitting right there on the corner. Hey, and whoever living in it right now, that orange tree, I planted it and I'm coming to sea about it 'cause it's giving up oranges now,
put mango chin.
hey, real
But that house
Hey, but that house right now on, on the open market is going for over 200, $300,000. My ma, when my mom and daddy put money on the house, it was $60,000. Right? What is the difference? The house doesn't been paid for four, five times. Why are y'all charging the people who living in that little ass house right now 300, 000?
Why? Because it's close to the stadium. It's around the corner from a Walmart. Things don't have to cost that much. These constraints are, are imaginary constraints that are implemented in society in order to be able to control the behaviors of people. And when we can get to that place, they say, they just say that you don't have to make money and have no, no dummy.
What I'm saying is that if we just came together in unity, we can make money in our sleep. It's people, it's people right now get paid for less.
You don't get rich off a salary.
Who the fuck got rich off a salary?
way.
I mean, well, unless your salary is say, you know, 300,
That's cause you probably, you probably a C suite
you know, yeah. But you know, you know, what's crazy is this, you know, by JWB, right?
They've brought up. They have a monopoly now with rental homes, right?
Yup.
Instead of minorities, I'm not even gonna say blacks, instead of minorities complaining about it, let's get our own JWB.
Come on, man. Hey,
JWB, right? We get our own JWB, right? But you have to have a diversified group of people. You have to have somebody in there who's street.
Got
That's going to be your muscle. Somebody got to collect that rent. You
Come on,
you gotta, you gotta have somebody that knows how to write, how to write grants, right? You gotta have somebody that, that, that fits the, that fits the mold. That could be the face of the organization to get that money that a Sean or Tavaris won't get.
Goddamn. What's the name
Jesus Hey,
Let Jesus be the face because guess what? He, he might be more likely to get that, that, that loan. You know, it's, I mean, you have to, you have to play the game, right? And, and like I said,
we quit the call out problems, but very rarely do we come with
Solutions. Yep. And and and to your point, the solution is what you just said is unity of the whole and and it ain't that it ain't about everybody agreeing and I think that's our problem, right? Right. Is we we
one person gets mad and now they want to break up and go on the side yeah instead of you know yeah
gonna take my I'm gonna take my ball and I'm gonna go
same thing with religion used to be just one religion every time somebody got mad they went inside of a whole different religion it used to be one church but again another another conversation another conversation
another conversation for another day. Hey, hey, hey, just to let you know we got plenty. You know what I'm saying? Hey, hey, are we coming through? Hey, and even if you want to, you know, come down and be a, uh, be a guest, hey, feel free to reach out to us, right?
Inbox us, slide in our DMs, but make it professional. Because we're not those type of guys. Hey, wait, well, listen, it's been, it's been wonderful to have opportunity to kind of kick it with my brothers on this inaugural conversation, right? Thank you all for, you know, sacrificing a little bit of your most valuable resource, which is your time in order to come up with creative solutions to assist in developing strategies to allow us to live the lives that we deserve to live.
Right. Hey, this is the slide. This is what we're going to do. We're going to slide. You want to slide with it. Everybody should slide. Right. So, so make sure you like and subscribe. Hey, hey, listen, hey, that was out the door. You just say everybody's just slide. So make sure you like and
the studio, right? Hop in next door in the studio.
Hey, hey, gotta get in the booth.
but everybody on our outro, man. Hey, give a few words to the people real quick. We got limited time, but please share word as we get ready to
Hey, I'ma say it every week. I'ma say it every week. Just be great, man. Be the best version of you that you can every single day. You get, you only get one chance at a day. So, make the most of it.
Yeah, writing on that, man. Just stay grateful. Be grateful for everything you have. I don't care how bad your life is. There's always somebody that has it worse than you. So stay grateful. Count your blessings. Everyone has something to be grateful for.
say, man, listen, just whoever you believe in or whatever you believe in, right? Keep that first, right? Instead of, instead of looking at people on the outside and basically just live your life for you, right? That's what makes this world the world. Everyone is not meant to be a millionaire.
Everyone's not meant to be a rapper or a famous person. You know, it's okay with being regular, right? It's okay if you make a Facebook post and you only get 100 likes, you know, it's okay if you don't get a million, uh, Instagram and TikTok subscribers, it's okay, you know, and lastly, people, if we learn to focus more on the message and not the messenger, we'll be a whole lot better.
That was wisdom. That was wisdom for the ages and I would like to just close with a quote from a Mr. Tyrone O'Neal. You can also find this quote in my groundbreaking book, How to Become a Six Figure Earner by Tavares Bethel co author Sandy Johnson. But in that book we articulate a statement that was told to me when I was 11 years old by Mr. Tyrone O'Neal who was the Carol City Middle School band director. He used to say, excuses are the tools of incompetence which build monuments into nothing. And those who specialize in excuses. Um, seldom succeed at anything. So with that being said, let's not make no more excuses. Let's just do what we gotta do.
This was The Slide.
