Dr. Daniel Black: Masculinity That Doesn’t Destroy Us!
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Speaker 1
African people have always known and have always believed that absence from the body is not absence from the presence.
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Speaker 2
Why was it important for the therapist to kind of be be there to kind of be this catalyst, to kind of spur Isaac along?
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Speaker 1
Jacob is ancestral and Isaac cannot figure out how do you extract healing from an ancestor? How does one mend wounds with one who is no longer in this physical realm? So Isaac needs some assistance, and I see this therapist almost as an Orisha, an angel figure of sorts.
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Speaker 1
Who don't treat somebodies heart care less that most of us come from really, really, really divine. Really, really marvelous, really, really amazing people who did wound us at times. That is absolutely true. It's absolutely true. But if you remember the wonder and the majesty of the people we came from, that wonder and majesty will do the healing.
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Speaker 2
Situate. Hey, y'all. How you doing? What's going on? I know I usually say that my grandma said that I would be a pastor, but I actually brought a pastor with me this time. This is Pastor Jonathan. Everett here? Yes, yes, pastor of Rock of ages. It says pastor the Rock of Ages Baptist Church. Yes, yes. And now we have the person who you actually are here to see.
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Speaker 2
Doctor Daniel Black coming back from the back. Yes, yes.
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Speaker 2
Welcome, welcome. Yes. This is the author of Perfect Peace The Coming. Don't cry for me. I mean, so many amazing books. Don't cry for me is the companion text, to the text that we're here to discuss today? Isaac Song and Doctor Black. I mean, how are you doing? You're doing good.
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Speaker 1
Absolutely magnificent when.
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Speaker 2
It gets to the area. We know you got the voice, you know.
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Speaker 1
Magnificent.
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Speaker 2
Yes. There you go. There you go.
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Speaker 1
Hey, everybody. How y'all doing?
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Speaker 2
This is well, good, good. We're glad you're doing great. And that you with the reading glasses? Yes. All right, here you go. You're going to read for us a little bit. We got it. We got a book right here. You want that, right? Yep. Yeah. I mean should.
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Speaker 1
I do that first.
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Speaker 2
Yeah. Let's let's do that first hand. You that. There you go.
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Speaker 3
I think I'll start.
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Speaker 2
Yeah I'll be looking at my tabs in there.
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Speaker 2
In 30. Question.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. I'm a read this or.
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Speaker 1
Weeks after my father died I found myself in a therapist's office. I had lost 10 pounds and hardly slept at all. I couldn't focus or talk without choking up. My mother had died years earlier and I thought nothing else could affect me. She was the person I adored, the one I thought I couldn't live without. Not my father.
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Speaker 1
But apparently that wasn't true. The therapist asked what my father meant to me, and I had no answer. Obviously you love him, she said. Obviously, I was never sure. Well, you can be sure now, she said. Well, that's the thing I can't figure out why I'm so emotional. My father and I weren't close. What does that have to do with love?
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Speaker 1
She saw my confusion. You can feel deeply for someone, especially a parent, and be totally estranged from them. Being friends is not a requirement for having feelings. The heart decides who to love. Not the head. I began to share the ways daddy had wounded me. That might be true, she said, but it wouldn't keep you from loving him.
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Speaker 1
That's what I want to know. What you feel about him, not what he did to you. We went back and forth, but she wouldn't let me blame him for my troubles. You're too smart for that, Isaac. You can't be imprisoned by your father's shortcomings. That's a cop out. I had all the ingredients for success. She said College degree.
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Speaker 1
Good job. Strong history. We don't create our baggage, Isaac, but we can unpack it. Everyone has agency, whether they use it or not. Nothing has ever happened to you that's greater than the power within you. Blaming others is merely an excuse to avoid activating your own personal strength. It'll never work. No one cares to heal you as much as you need it, because that's your job.
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Speaker 1
How smart is it to get mad at a mountain? I've never forgotten that hypothetical question. It shifted my whole perspective. Either climb it or go around it. But don't spend a lifetime waiting for a mountain to move. Only a fool does that. Well, I've been a fool. I explained to her how hurtful my father had been, how his verbal and physical abuse had ruined my self-worth.
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Speaker 1
She stared at me and said, no, it didn't. Self-worth is just that. What you think of yourself. He might have shown you the shallow nature of his self-worth, but yours can only be shaped by you. I didn't agree. Parents won't. Children all the time, I retorted. Then expect them to just get over it. But that hurt seeps deep down and settles in the soul.
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Speaker 1
It's hell getting that out. She nodded. Yes, yes, you're right, it is. But you have to get it out. Not your father, not anybody else. Only you can do that. But how do I do that? She leaned forward onto her desk and said, ask yourself this question. What did pain come to teach you? Her blank stare dissolved my self-pity.
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Speaker 1
Until you can answer that. You're lost. And the answer is not a critique of someone else's behavior. It's the discovery of what you've stepped over or threw away on your journey, trying to protect yourself. I didn't like her right then. She yielded no room for my victimhood. Now she stood with complete authority and asked, did your father want to destroy you?
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Speaker 1
I rolled my eyes. Of course, he didn't want to destroy me. I never said that. Then stop blaming him. Stop hiding behind his limitations. We argued a little more. I'm not trying to avoid anything I said I'm trying to get free. Well, Isaac, freedom doesn't live behind other people's faults. I just want to hold them accountable, and they should be held accountable, she said.
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Speaker 1
But that's not your freedom. It's theirs. Isaac, if your father apologized to you right now, you wouldn't be freer.
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Speaker 2
He would.
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Speaker 1
I chewed my bottom lip. Apologies. Don't heal the wounded. Therefore, the perpetrator. If someone shoots you, an apology doesn't mean the wound. If you don't tend to, it'll fester and kill you. Not the one who shot you. The error is to think that revenge participates in healing. It does not. Most of us could have been healed years ago if we'd stopped waiting for a wounded person to do it.
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Speaker 1
When you cut your finger, the body doesn't, Excuse me when you cut your finger. The body goes to work immediately without your permission to heal itself. It doesn't care who committed the act. It has the power to restore. So that's what it does. No need being mad at the knife. Perhaps it was too sharp. If so, get rid of it.
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Speaker 1
Or just be a little more careful next time. But how imprisoning is it to spend a lifetime screaming at a knife? That was me. But the realization pissed me off. I had wanted my father to do something, to own all the ways he had offended me. To say I'm sorry. To love me differently. I believe, then, that my issues would disappear.
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Speaker 1
My therapist ruined my theory. You need to walk back through your life, Isaac. Every bit of it. And discover the pieces of yourself you threw away. You need those pieces now, ma'am. That's what I came to you for. Aren't you the healer? Sir, you're the only healer you'll ever get. Her laughter felt sarcastic, but I kept listening.
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Speaker 1
My job is to help you discover that nothing can help you. But you. What do I do? She moved from behind the desk and stood before me. Get you a legal pad and write your story. Start from the beginning. Tell it just as you recall it, however difficult. Don't sweeten the painful. And don't sour the joyful. As you write, you'll discover what you missed.
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Speaker 1
Then you'll have the ingredients for healing. Take your time. It's a slow, arduous process, but freedom lies at the end of it.
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Speaker 3
Thank you. And year. That up?
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Speaker 2
Okay. You hold it. You see? Now you see my lights and.
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Speaker 3
Thank you for that therapy session. Just thinking about everything. Thanks for that. Thank you. Thank you. Now, over.
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Speaker 2
So the therapist. I think we should, start there. There's there's a the therapist is a big difference than the way that, Jacob kind of worked his way into healing, right? Yes. Why was it important for the therapist to kind of be be there to kind of be this catalyst to kind of spur Isaac along?
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Speaker 1
Because Jacob is ancestral now, and Isaac Jacob's ancestral. And Isaac cannot figure out how do you extract healing from an ancestor? How do you heal across time and space? Right. How does one mend wounds with one who is no longer in this physical realm? Right. And and so Isaac needs some assistance. And I see this therapist almost as an orisha.
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Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. I see this therapist almost like, an angel figure of sorts, whose function is really to help Isaac understand that you can heal with your mother, your father, even though they're not physically here. Because, of course, African people have always known and have always believed that absence from the body is not absence from the presence.
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Speaker 2
Yeah. Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. And so when Isaac is being reminded step by step by step of, how he moves in the invisible, and if one remembers from the from Don't Cry for me, Isaac has this gift of communicating with the invisible anyway. Yes. Yeah. Like. Yes. But the thing that's really funny is how. How wounds can make us forget who we are.
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Speaker 1
And it can make us believe that even the gifts we have don't really work when it comes to our own needs. Right. In fact, the irony is very often a healer needs a healer.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. And so I think the therapist serves that function.
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Speaker 3
Well that's awesome. Okay. That that the therapist, the the intersections we was talking about a few seconds ago. Yes. To an identity and trauma. Oh, yeah. And. Yes. Yeah. How did that therapists keep Robyn Robyn Isaac of that the responsibility or the opportunity to blame his father?
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Speaker 1
Yes, yes.
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Speaker 3
That blame game. Like how how was that when he was writing it? Like, what was some of those characteristics by which Isaac had to then approach when she say, feel it? Yes. You know, in my context, you know, people tell you filter your feelings, right? But in in this particular narrative, we say, no, you're going to have to feel that this intersection between identity and trauma.
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Speaker 1
In fact, what happened when I first when I first wrote this book, it wasn't this frame in this format at all. When I first wrote it, it was this exact same frame as Don't Cry for me. Isaac was writing a series of letters. Okay. So. Right. But. And I wrote almost 300 pages. Yeah. And realized that it didn't work.
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Speaker 1
And I was mad about it.
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Speaker 3
Did you hear me? I was mad about it. Yeah. Well, I.
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Speaker 1
Was hot about it.
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Speaker 3
Did you hear me? You were.
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Speaker 1
I was like I said, words that I know. Like I say in front of you bastard. Right. I got, I. But I said them. I said them. Yeah. Cause that was a lot of writing.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. You know what I mean?
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Speaker 1
But it didn't work, and it didn't work because that was. That was Jacob's structure. Right. That structure carry Jacob's voice. But it would not reveal Isaac and it and it wouldn't reveal Isaac also because Isaac is not trying to Isaac is really. Isaac is really trying to Isaac is trying to figure out how to get his daddy to, to, to, to materialize in front of him and say I'm sorry.
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Speaker 1
That's really what Isaac was.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah yeah.
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Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. But that's not healing.
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Speaker 1
That's not healing. And Isaac doesn't know what he thinks it is. And that would not change Isaac. In fact have you ever been really mad at somebody like really really mad at somebody. And they apologize to you and it didn't move you? Yeah. Yeah. And now you and you like. Yeah. Because now folks say, well, you weren't really sincere.
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Speaker 1
Well, am I, my God. Like, what can you do?
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
What else are you over the. Because the truth of the matter is, the apology is not what you're looking for. Yeah. Right, right, right. What you really want is to transfer your hurt back to them.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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Speaker 1
That's what we really want, right? But that's not healing either. You can't get heal by wounding other people.
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Speaker 3
Absolutely.
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Speaker 1
Right. And so I knew I needed a different framework. Right. So I called my editor and I said, John, this this, this. It doesn't work. Yeah, this this just doesn't work. I just Isaac is trying to get healing, and he can't get it. And and he said, what do you do? You have a framework that you think could work.
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Speaker 1
I said, I do, but I don't want to write it.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I written 300 pages. Man.
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Speaker 1
God help me. Lord have mercy. And I said, okay, let me just take a breath, let me breathe, and let me just start. And, this other part I just read was at the end of the first draft.
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Speaker 3
Oh.
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Speaker 1
Well, I said it's got to start there.
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Speaker 2
Yeah. And when you talk about the fact that you, you know, you had to write these 300 pages. And Nathan were, and the fact that you had this framework that you knew would work, but you didn't want to quite go through it. There's, there's a lot of similarities there between that and what Isaac is experiencing as it gives himself a little process.
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Speaker 2
Yes. He'll never pay the tax that's in front of him. And I was talking to Pastor Everett. I got a story for you. Similar like what I was telling you, when we last talked. But when Isaac is, trying to explain and blame, trying to heal that way, through his therapist and talking about his father, he starts writing and realizes that he doesn't remember things as they quite were.
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Speaker 2
That's right. So I was telling, pastor ever, about the similarities between myself, and his work. And so all my life, I thought that I hated cheese because I hate my father. Right? I can't stand cheese, I can't touch it, etc., etc.. Because your.
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Speaker 1
Father hated.
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Speaker 2
You. Well, well, hold right with me. Hold on. Okay, so you know, my father left to right, and so he has these visitations. And so the story goes that he made me eat this cheese omelet at Hardee's. And I hate him, so. God, I hate cheese. All right, so fast forward about 30 years. I decided to go to this funeral like I was telling you about.
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Speaker 2
It was eating the French fries I was talking about. But. Yeah. And so I was talking about whether or not I should go. So I end up going. And we're sitting on his ancestral land. Is his uncle's funeral on this random porch. And he's like, did you get something to eat at the church? Church is like walking distance down here.
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Speaker 2
And I said, no, you know, they had macaroni and cheese on there, and that the cheese is in the plate and it touches anything else. I can't eat it. And he looks at me and he says, you know, I hate cheese, too. He said, you know, I can't stand it either. Wow. And so all this time I've been telling myself this story when.
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Speaker 2
Nonsense. I told him, I just don't like the cheese because I'm just like him, right? Or I want him to be just like fire, right? Right. And so I wonder if you can talk a little bit about how those wounds, some time warp, the way that we remember the past?
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Speaker 1
Absolutely. And in fact, most times we're not really remembering anything. Right. We're really constructing.
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Speaker 2
Come on now. Yeah. Yeah. Right.
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Speaker 1
You know how you grow up with somebody and you share a memory, but your memories clash?
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. Yeah. Yeah. You know, back when we was in high school and we were in Mr. So-and-so's class, and, And Mr. So-and-so gave all of us F's, and somebody said, no. What do you talk about? I never got to anything. And you're like, wait a.
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Speaker 3
In.
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Speaker 1
The class. And he gave all of us.
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Speaker 3
No. That's true.
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Speaker 1
No, I had a 4.0. Like like what are you talking about? And what's so funny is like, how is that.
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Speaker 3
Possible? Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. And the question then becomes, who's telling the truth?
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Speaker 3
Truth? Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah.
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Speaker 1
But memory is not an issue of truth. Right. And the point of memory isn't truth anyway. You don't remember a thing in order to hold on to truth. Yeah. Right. Really? The point of memory is for you to reconstruct your history. Yeah. Right. So that you can move forward and have some semblance of peace. Right. We make the memory.
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Speaker 1
There are things we remember that didn't happen at all.
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. And that's not a bad thing. If we'll know that's what we're doing. Sure. Right. If not, will hold people accountable to things that really they may not only not be responsible for. It's not even real. Yeah. But the reason this is important with Isaac is because sometimes it is real. Of course. But when we get wounded, sometimes what ends up happening is it's only the wound we we remember.
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Speaker 1
Sure. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And so anytime you're dealing with parents, the worst thing in the world is to, to dwell upon and to exist in the womb. Because it can make you erase their majesty.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. It can be a parent who pay for your piano lessons. A piano parent who made sure you had shoes, who made sure you always ate. You had Joe all Rome, all the time. You were in their house, right? It could be all of these things. And one day mama got mad and screamed at me as she did.
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Yeah she did. And somehow that screaming at you is the thing you remember as being most grand. Sure. Right. Somehow, somehow, all the money that they spent on the on them dance lessons that you never did nothing with.
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Speaker 2
Went right.
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Speaker 1
To school. I don't know. Now you don't even. It don't even register in your head.
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Right. And so the point of memory is actually, really is actually for you to decide what you're going to remember and decide how you're going to remember it. So you get to be intent. You can intentionally make up your memory.
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Speaker 3
Sure, sure.
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Speaker 1
And to do that is a powerful thing because then you can allow people to be majestic even though they are flawed.
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Speaker 3
Sure. Sure.
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Speaker 1
And it's important to do that. Yeah. And we do it with God. All the time. All the time. Because there are times we pray and didn't hear nothing.
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Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
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Speaker 1
But we don't cuss God out for it. We say, well, everything in his own time. You know, he may not come when.
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Speaker 3
You want to be there right on time.
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Speaker 1
But when your friends are late. We don't say that.
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Speaker 3
Oh, no. You know.
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Speaker 1
And so I, I what I'm really trying to push us to, to to consider the possibility that most of us come from really, really, really divine, really, really marvelous, really, really amazing people.
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
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Speaker 1
Who did wound us at times that it's absolutely true. It's absolutely true. But if you remember the wonder and the majesty of the people we came from, that wonder and majesty will do the healing.
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Speaker 3
So. So.
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Speaker 1
You know, and I have, you know, I have a, a very I had a very contentious relationship with my father, at least. So I thought, you know. But what's funny is, and it kind of got healed in one day. I graduated with a PhD, when I was 25 years old. Right. Now I'm. I'm saying this for a reason.
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Speaker 1
Because a woman asked me, right. Maybe the day after she said, Oh, my God, you must really be exceptional. I said, no, ma'am, no ma'am, no, ma'am. And she said, what do your parents do? You know, in my father could barely read. And I said, well, my father is a farmer. And she said, oh, he must have been a hell of a farmer.
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Speaker 1
I said, what does that have to do? She said, how did you get this? And that's how it clicked in my head. See, I was thinking that I achieved even though I was thinking I achieved, in spite of.
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Speaker 2
Yeah. Yeah, right.
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Speaker 1
Right. And the truth is that farmer planted a seed of discipline in a son. Yeah. Right. That got me to a thing called a PhD. And. And it took me all that time to realize that, really, I was manifesting the thing my father had dreamed.
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Speaker 3
Wow. Yeah. Wow. Well, there was a part Doctor Black in the, in the book where Isaac, his inability to tell his father. Thank you. Oh, God. Okay, let's, let's let's park right to the bicycle. That's right. The tree area. Right. And for him, he had opportunity. That's right. It wasn't the lack of opportunity, but the fact that he couldn't.
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Speaker 3
Vocally. That's right. Have that moment to say thank you. What point? You was driving and you got to tell us. Well, I really want you to go as deep as you could with that one man, because that was like, yeah.
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Speaker 1
You know, I think one of the things we've done as a people, because of our, because of our historical wounds from enslavement, etc., is I think we keep trying to explain away the need for vulnerability.
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Speaker 1
And we, we do it in so many, many, many ways. Right. And it's really ingrained in black culture in so many places. Right. And I think parents do it too. But, but in ways that, that I think end up being very horrible for us. You know, parents even tell us as kids, I want you to I want you to go and do better than me.
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Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. Which is really an insult.
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Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;23;45;18 - 00;23;53;14
Speaker 1
It's really something a parent should never tell a child. Wow. Because it's really saying I'm not proud of myself, but I want to be proud of you.
00;23;54;16 - 00;24;19;25
Speaker 1
Right. But, you know, a a woman who has scrubbed floors for 35 for 40 years. Right. Should tell a child if you are as excellent as I was in scrubbing floors, you would do well. That's really what we should say. Yeah. You know, you work at the post office for 45 years, and you tell a child, do better than you, right?
00;24;19;26 - 00;24;23;10
Speaker 1
How? Let's see. The problem is what we value.
00;24;23;11 - 00;24;24;12
Speaker 3
Sure.
00;24;24;14 - 00;24;42;18
Speaker 1
Right. And then we often encourage each other not to say thank you. Right. We'll say things like, oh, no problem. Don't worry about it. Yeah. Right. Right. Yes. Yes. We'll deflect it away. Because to say thank you. Right. We have to. We have to steal our hearts and open them to each other.
00;24;42;21 - 00;24;44;27
Speaker 3
Just to respond. Right. We don't know how to respond.
00;24;45;03 - 00;25;09;21
Speaker 1
Yes. Because it literally is. It's it's literally asking for your nakedness. Right. And I'm going to show right to look a man in the eye and say brother I really thank you. Oh yeah. It's like oh that's too much. Right. Because, because it's really an announcement right, of my adoration for you. But see even those words we we're not as men allowed to say I adore you.
00;25;09;22 - 00;25;32;23
Speaker 1
Yeah. I can't say you're beautiful. Yeah. Right. There's so many words that men have never been invited to you. Yeah. Right. And those are the words that bar our vulnerability. Right. And so we subs to to vulnerability. Right. For Imma give you a pound instead. Yeah. Right. There all these physicality. Right. They're all these violences. Really. Right. That we use.
00;25;32;23 - 00;25;37;14
Speaker 1
Right. We slap each other's back real hard. Right. Because I can't hold you tenderly.
00;25;37;14 - 00;25;39;13
Speaker 3
Right. Right right right right right.
00;25;39;16 - 00;25;56;22
Speaker 1
And so and so I think it's a question of vulnerability and the ways in which, as a culture, people really don't want black men participating in vulnerability unless it's extreme. Like, if your mama dies at the funeral, you could cry. And it makes.
00;25;56;22 - 00;25;57;17
Speaker 3
It a couple of seconds, though.
00;25;57;18 - 00;26;00;25
Speaker 1
Yeah, yeah. You only get a minute. You can't fall out one tier.
00;26;00;28 - 00;26;23;07
Speaker 3
You fall out? Yes. Okay. That part of the book grab me. Because a couple of things I made. My father is not 14. Wow. Never, never said I love you. Wow. Buried him. I'm sorry, but wow. And so that inability to say thank you, but also the, the under the fellow response system. That's right. In defense of masculinity.
00;26;23;08 - 00;26;38;24
Speaker 3
That's right. To receive any gifts. That's right. Anybody I dated, they can buy me love for Christmas. I'm not like that. Don't bring me no gifts because I don't know how to say thank you. Wow. Wow. Wow. Now I won't give. I tell them all the time. Don't bring me my mother. Nobody. Nobody buys me gifts because I don't know how to say.
00;26;38;26 - 00;26;39;28
Speaker 3
Be vulnerable enough.
00;26;39;29 - 00;26;40;26
Speaker 1
That's right.
00;26;40;28 - 00;26;47;08
Speaker 3
To say thank you. That's right. I tell everybody thank you now. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00;26;47;10 - 00;26;48;10
Speaker 1
That's right. But it is.
00;26;48;10 - 00;27;06;12
Speaker 3
Learned. Yeah. No, it's it's. And I felt like what is wrong with me that I don't want somebody to be kind to me in defense of a masculinity I haven't fully discovered nor went to the depths. So to know that it's okay for people to be kind to me.
00;27;06;13 - 00;27;08;29
Speaker 1
Yes. And a masculinity that's prepared to kill you?
00;27;09;01 - 00;27;10;03
Speaker 3
Absolutely. Right.
00;27;10;09 - 00;27;37;16
Speaker 2
Irregardless of your sexual preference. Because it makes me think about, like, Travis's, response to him saying, you know, that he's beautiful or, you know, he's like, not just only the only call me kind. Rather, don't make me make me out to be emotional. But we're in this relationship, and I and, and speaking of the thanks thing and the excellence thing, I was wondering if you could dive a little bit more into that relationship, like you said, with black men.
00;27;37;16 - 00;27;57;29
Speaker 2
And, like you say, trying to build the thing. Thank you. Because I think about the way that as it kind of reconciles things in the end when he's thinking about all of these things that kind of stripped away, right? The access to vulnerability. Yeah. For all of the men in his lineage. Almost. Right. And I think about just another another conversation I saw you have.
00;27;58;03 - 00;28;10;28
Speaker 2
We were talking about like, women are allowed that that certain level of vulnerability. But it's killed so early in men, you know, like women will say, girl, go to the bathroom with me. And you were with men and I brought you. What was it about that woman?
00;28;10;29 - 00;28;19;24
Speaker 3
Yeah, yeah. And we don't really have. You gotta use the bathroom. You gotta, you know, you gotta come back. That's right. You don't have light, right? You don't have.
00;28;19;24 - 00;28;37;10
Speaker 2
Access to that. Right. And so both these men had, like, blockages when it came to expressing how they felt about each other. Yes. And needed these technologies to kind of work themselves through it. So I guess my question.
00;28;37;12 - 00;29;01;25
Speaker 1
I think it's I think it's the fear of touch. Yeah. And I think is the way in which black men, we have never, ever been given permission. I mean, and an invitation has never been extended to black men to touch each other unless it is in violence. Right. Like you're my brother, right? I can't hold your hand just because you're wonderful or I haven't seen you in a while.
00;29;01;25 - 00;29;21;22
Speaker 1
I'm like, hey, man, good to see you. And I just hold your hand for him. No. Well, we can greet and pow, but then you got to let go. Yeah, right. It's a metaphor. You see, I'm saying like it. Which means the touch can never, ever be extended. Right. And that's extremely, extremely, extremely important. Because to say thank you, the hearts are trying to touch.
00;29;21;24 - 00;29;38;10
Speaker 1
Right. But we're not allowed to do that. Or like your hair which I thought was beautiful. Like really. Of course I can do it because it's me and you. Right. But really technically a man is not supposed to say oh my God. That's just wow. You know.
00;29;38;12 - 00;29;42;25
Speaker 3
Man. See, this feels wonderful, right? Right. Let's see.
00;29;42;27 - 00;30;05;02
Speaker 1
Most brothers not only cannot do that right, but would feel so awkward in doing that. But what it means is then when we need to touch right up, our touch does not carry power the way it ought to. Because it because it's it's it's it's not infused with the eye shape of the people because we fear it. Yeah, we're scared of it.
00;30;05;08 - 00;30;08;13
Speaker 1
But if. But if you cross me, I can fight you.
00;30;08;16 - 00;30;09;17
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00;30;09;22 - 00;30;24;14
Speaker 1
Right. And really, I argue there are ways that we. As I'm a I'm way out on the limb. But there are ways that a lot of times black men, especially young brothers, really create excuses to fight so they can touch and touch.
00;30;24;14 - 00;30;27;07
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
00;30;27;10 - 00;30;27;22
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00;30;27;27 - 00;30;45;13
Speaker 2
Because what I was getting there was like, how do we transmute anything like, like male to male, if not through violence? Yes. Right. So, like, if not through violence, I would think. Is youthfulness. Right. Because I think about, you know, Jacob's last, words, which was essentially tell them I tried failed them.
00;30;45;13 - 00;30;46;07
Speaker 1
I tried.
00;30;46;10 - 00;31;08;14
Speaker 2
You know what I mean? Yeah. And and so, a man kind of attaches his worth to his usefulness. Yeah. Can you talk a little bit about. I think that for all of the men, in the stories, I. I even think Isaac is looking to understand his usefulness, because yet he's grappling with whether or not he can even use his gifts properly.
00;31;08;15 - 00;31;17;00
Speaker 2
Yes. Yeah. You know, and you talk a little bit about, you know, like the book The Men's Relationship of Usefulness in the text.
00;31;17;04 - 00;31;31;15
Speaker 1
Yes. And and I think this is really the crux of the matter. And that is until a person can be clear about their utility on this planet, a person's soul is at absolute dis ease.
00;31;32;05 - 00;31;39;11
Speaker 1
Right. And and Isaac is one of them. But Jacob is one two. See we keep trying to figure out how we can get worse out of work.
00;31;40;15 - 00;32;04;04
Speaker 1
Right. Does that make sense y'all. Right. Right. How what I do can be the value of who I am. That's not it. I do not. What I do is for the sustaining right of this physical world, of this physical life. But God didn't send me here for that to work. Right. The thing God sent me here to do, right, is a spiritual thing.
00;32;04;08 - 00;32;25;28
Speaker 1
Right. That until I find it, that work is not going to satisfy. But I can keep doing the work over and over and over and over and over and over to Hope. Right. But there will always, always be a just rest and unrest in the spirit. Yeah. Right. Because there's a difference between there's even a difference between a person who teaches school and somebody who has the gift to do it.
00;32;25;29 - 00;32;26;10
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00;32;26;13 - 00;32;27;19
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah.
00;32;27;22 - 00;32;31;24
Speaker 1
Right. And too many people don't have the gift, but they have the occupation.
00;32;31;27 - 00;32;34;18
Speaker 2
Yeah. Yeah. Right. Come on.
00;32;34;20 - 00;32;45;15
Speaker 1
And and and if if you ever see a person who has the and and teaching is an occupation. Sure. Inspiration is a gift.
00;32;45;17 - 00;32;46;01
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;32;46;04 - 00;32;51;04
Speaker 1
Right. If you ever get an inspirer who also teaches, it'll blow your mind.
00;32;51;10 - 00;32;52;01
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;32;52;04 - 00;33;15;02
Speaker 1
Yeah. It'll blow your mind. Yeah. It. Absolutely. But most people don't have that. Right. And so what we're trying to do is trying to figure out how my job right, can be the thing for which, yeah, can fulfill me. It'll never do it. Yeah. It'll. Until you find that gift. Right. And that gift is. What is it you would do, right, if not another person on this planet existed?
00;33;15;06 - 00;33;15;25
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;33;15;27 - 00;33;22;22
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. And and even somebody who is an inspirer and inspirer will inspire to trees in the forest.
00;33;22;25 - 00;33;23;19
Speaker 3
Yeah. So?
00;33;23;23 - 00;33;25;14
Speaker 1
So it doesn't have to be a person. Yeah.
00;33;25;15 - 00;33;26;03
Speaker 2
Yeah. Right.
00;33;26;10 - 00;33;50;02
Speaker 1
They just go and and so Jacob's saying, you know, I worked for 45 years at the post office. Isaac. Come on. You know what you're doing. And Isaac's problem is he's now working at Microsoft. Right. But Isaac is really a writer. Yeah. Right. And, of course, he he ends up discovering this, but he's absolutely miserable until he does, because he's also thinking, well, writers don't make no money.
00;33;50;04 - 00;34;02;01
Speaker 1
Right. But the worst thing in the world, as you're looking for a destiny is to, is to think about money. Yeah. Because because you don't you don't follow money to destiny. You follow destiny to money.
00;34;02;05 - 00;34;03;18
Speaker 3
Absolutely.
00;34;03;20 - 00;34;07;20
Speaker 1
Right. So the. If you're in your destiny, the money, the money you need will follow you to.
00;34;07;20 - 00;34;09;09
Speaker 2
You know what my destiny is?
00;34;09;09 - 00;34;15;19
Speaker 3
I'll try to get to know what that's how to get the. To get there. That's what I'm trying to get to the.
00;34;15;25 - 00;34;17;24
Speaker 2
To the money.
00;34;17;26 - 00;34;44;25
Speaker 3
Yeah. Let's say. Absolutely. Absolutely. That could be like, Isaac, leave the bicycle on the front lawn. That come inside that axiom. What a bicycle. And he makes them go stand there and, and in the rain with it. And he says he taught me a lesson and he thought he was taught like in the, in this storyline you talk about how we can miss some of those signals.
00;34;44;26 - 00;34;46;15
Speaker 1
Yes yes yes. Yeah.
00;34;46;16 - 00;35;03;17
Speaker 3
From those lessons from our parents. Yes. Whether or not they embrace our sexuality versus trying to build something new than us. Right. Can you just talk about that for a little bit? Because I think that is vitally important, especially when we. You mentioned how the mother was wearing unfulfilled dreams and absent all those different types. Absolutely.
00;35;03;19 - 00;35;19;14
Speaker 1
And see, we have lots and lots of lots of cultural ways that we teach children lessons. But sometimes the children miss them because we're trying to get children. We're trying to teach in such subtle, indirect ways, because to say some things directly would expose us. As parents.
00;35;19;17 - 00;35;24;16
Speaker 3
You got to do. You have to stay right there. Stay right there. That's that right there. Cold blooded.
00;35;24;16 - 00;35;30;11
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. You know, it's like, you know, how many of us, you know, you went to bed, but all the dishes weren't washed?
00;35;30;13 - 00;35;31;04
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;35;31;07 - 00;35;34;15
Speaker 1
Right. And so, you know, it's, you know, it's got to happen.
00;35;34;17 - 00;35;39;10
Speaker 3
Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Record. You know, it's got to happen, right?
00;35;39;12 - 00;36;01;03
Speaker 1
Now, what's interesting is it's always typically done in a way that's reprimanding. Right. Get show up at that bed and come here. You know you're not going to take your behind, you know, dirty dishes. Right, right, right. But if we're not very careful, we miss it. Because the point is not the notion that you've left dishes in the sink.
00;36;01;04 - 00;36;02;16
Speaker 1
That's not the point.
00;36;02;19 - 00;36;03;08
Speaker 3
Sure.
00;36;03;11 - 00;36;30;08
Speaker 1
See, we're teaching the behavior as if the behavior is the lesson. The behavior that behavior is just teaching the lesson. Right. But, see, most people cannot articulate it. And so a lot of times children just think, oh, mama just hated dirty dishes. Correct. But then we've missed it. Yeah. That's not the issue. The issue. The lesson is, do not my child find peace?
00;36;30;11 - 00;36;34;05
Speaker 1
Don't find peace in a thing. Incomplete.
00;36;34;06 - 00;36;37;04
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00;36;37;07 - 00;37;04;14
Speaker 1
Yeah. That's the lesson. But see, if a child doesn't understand that I just got in trouble because I didn't wash the dishes. You see what I'm saying? Right. And again, you know, the lesson has to be taught, which is why, you know, we came from people who had a thing called proverbs. Yeah. African people had proverbs, and they had proverbs for this reason, because if if a child is not careful in a child's immaturity, a child can miss the levels and the magnitude of the lesson itself.
00;37;04;17 - 00;37;19;06
Speaker 1
Right. So when I when Joseph Jacob tells Isaac, you go outside and stand in the rain with that bicycle, I bought that bicycle. And I told you to put that in the garage. You didn't put it in the garage? Fine. Use is right. And now you stand your ass out there with that bicycle.
00;37;19;07 - 00;37;19;24
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah.
00;37;19;25 - 00;37;28;25
Speaker 1
See what Jacob. What Isaac got out of it is my daddy is meaning my daddy don't love me. Right. He don't even care if I'm sick.
00;37;28;26 - 00;37;30;03
Speaker 3
And you standing there, don't you?
00;37;30;03 - 00;37;49;21
Speaker 1
But he's good at that, though. You're not going to bring your behind back in here until this rain stop. Right. But that wasn't the lesson. That wasn't the. Oh, God help me. That wasn't the lesson. The lesson is don't treat somebodies heart carelessly.
00;37;49;23 - 00;37;50;24
Speaker 3
As I heard and talk about this.
00;37;50;29 - 00;37;59;27
Speaker 1
It was his heart. Yeah. He was saying, my heart deserves to be honored. Because you don't know what I had to go through to get that bicycle for you.
00;38;00;04 - 00;38;01;20
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah.
00;38;01;23 - 00;38;23;26
Speaker 1
So, son, you can't step on my heart like that. And think that's all right. And just go to bed. Yeah. But Isaac didn't get that. But Jacob didn't get Jacob didn't teach that. But he thought he did by just sending him into the rain. Yeah. Right. See so often we think that reprimanding right teaches a lesson. Reprimanding doesn't teach the lesson.
00;38;23;29 - 00;38;30;02
Speaker 1
Reprimanding just sets up the situation whereby the lesson could be taught if you'll step into vulnerability and do it.
00;38;30;05 - 00;38;39;15
Speaker 3
Wow. And then I brought that up because that's a huge disconnect. It is, between those lessons by which trying to be conveyed by people who have limited.
00;38;39;19 - 00;38;41;10
Speaker 1
Capacity, right, and limited capacity.
00;38;41;13 - 00;38;59;01
Speaker 3
Absolutely to really help that person understand it. And I, I know it in so many different ways. Right. You know, they tell me to parent only can give you what they have right. Or what they had. And so trying to understand those dynamics, those intergenerational right harmonies by which we need in order to for the kid to really appreciate it.
00;38;59;03 - 00;39;08;19
Speaker 3
I think the appreciation is more of what I was getting out of that. To your point, not to handle what I had to work hard for so carelessly.
00;39;08;20 - 00;39;28;19
Speaker 1
Right? Right, right. And and if Jacob, if Jacob had had any capacity whereby to say that it would have changed. Isaac changed Isaac's life. It would have changed his life. Again, black people we do if we sit down to eat. Right. It can be Thanksgiving or it can be a bowl of beans. We got to bless this food.
00;39;28;21 - 00;39;57;13
Speaker 1
Yeah, but most children can't tell you why. They can do the ritual. But they can't tell you why. But most parents can't either. Yeah. And see Isaac's job as one who's had a chance to go to school. And really this is really, this is really pastor what our ancestors were dreaming education would do. Teach the children how to explain the nuances of the magic of blackness.
00;39;57;14 - 00;39;59;00
Speaker 3
Yes. Yeah. Yeah.
00;39;59;03 - 00;40;09;05
Speaker 1
But since we went to school and we were taught by the same white supremacists who enslaved them. Right. They didn't teach us the nuances of blackness. They taught us the genius of whiteness.
00;40;09;06 - 00;40;15;11
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we can explain that. You. Yeah.
00;40;15;14 - 00;40;25;24
Speaker 2
I was wanting you to tell us a little bit more about the nuances of blackness. But, but I was thinking, I mean, you went there, right? I was.
00;40;25;27 - 00;40;26;21
Speaker 1
I did, I did.
00;40;26;26 - 00;40;31;07
Speaker 2
The work of education. Right. Because because there's so, as we know.
00;40;31;09 - 00;40;34;07
Speaker 1
See when, you know, and I get excited about this, right?
00;40;34;07 - 00;40;35;22
Speaker 2
I told him that. I told him that's.
00;40;35;22 - 00;40;39;09
Speaker 3
How we know. Yeah. Yeah. You already? Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. When?
00;40;39;10 - 00;40;48;25
Speaker 1
When when Harriet Tubman was running to freedom. Right. She wasn't running to freedom with the hopes that we would drive Cadillacs.
00;40;50;27 - 00;41;28;22
Speaker 1
See, that wasn't the hope of education. When Frederick Douglass was writing by moonlight. It wasn't with the prayer that we'd move into, the master's house. That wasn't what. That was not their dream of education. Their dream of education is that their children would get and that they would understand the magic of the genius of what it has meant to be African in a place where people aren't meant to destroy African, that we would see how they survived and that we would want to do that right and not just survive, but that we would want to live.
00;41;28;26 - 00;41;37;17
Speaker 1
Right. It makes me think of back in the day. Back in the 70s and 80s, black choirs used to march in. Right. Right. Right.
00;41;37;24 - 00;41;39;24
Speaker 3
I remember when we were just back.
00;41;39;24 - 00;41;40;26
Speaker 2
There, I was like this.
00;41;40;26 - 00;41;46;10
Speaker 1
Just if you inquire, you know, you had to row and and you had to march in in rhythm.
00;41;46;12 - 00;41;47;12
Speaker 2
I'm not.
00;41;47;15 - 00;41;50;05
Speaker 1
That rhythm. Had to be. Listen, that.
00;41;50;08 - 00;41;52;07
Speaker 3
I'm on that. Right?
00;41;52;10 - 00;41;52;24
Speaker 1
That really.
00;41;52;24 - 00;41;54;17
Speaker 3
Had to be right. It got to be so.
00;41;54;17 - 00;41;59;13
Speaker 1
Got to be right. It's got to be right. I know, and just because you get to them steps, don't you mess that up.
00;41;59;15 - 00;42;02;05
Speaker 3
Because, the rhythm of the march, the.
00;42;02;05 - 00;42;03;05
Speaker 1
March up the steps.
00;42;03;05 - 00;42;05;18
Speaker 3
And keep that in sync with the tapping of the.
00;42;05;18 - 00;42;13;05
Speaker 1
Heels. That's right. That's right. Betsy, the job of education was for black people to be able to explain why.
00;42;13;10 - 00;42;14;10
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;42;14;12 - 00;42;30;07
Speaker 1
Because he white folks can have a toehold at church and not even have a choir. Yeah. I've always liked Joel Osteen. Church. I he used to have a bad ass choir. All the people in that church. Yes. There'll be a thousand voice choir where they just get in there. And I said, there ain't got no choir at home.
00;42;30;09 - 00;42;33;15
Speaker 3
Kind of church. And all these people.
00;42;33;17 - 00;42;39;08
Speaker 1
Black people can have seven people and three of them, the choir.
00;42;39;10 - 00;42;42;12
Speaker 3
Five. Five.
00;42;42;14 - 00;42;45;21
Speaker 1
But why do we have to have a choir? Right.
00;42;45;28 - 00;42;52;14
Speaker 2
See I go oh God wants you to go. I knew this was going to be easy. They say just have a conversation.
00;42;52;16 - 00;43;06;03
Speaker 1
Why do I have to have a choir. Because black people are doing ritual. And one of the requirements of ritual is music. Yeah. You must have music. If you're going to have ritual, because music conjures spirit.
00;43;06;05 - 00;43;07;12
Speaker 2
That.
00;43;07;14 - 00;43;21;13
Speaker 1
And why was the black choir marching in? Because the black choir was marked the end. Because we were prepared for ceremony. We were preparing for a great coronation. Why? Because we were coming to see a king.
00;43;23;02 - 00;43;30;14
Speaker 1
Right. This is very, very important. It wasn't just for the hell of it. Right. There was a thing we call order of service.
00;43;30;16 - 00;43;31;04
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;43;31;06 - 00;43;37;05
Speaker 1
Right. Because when you go before somebody with that much majesty you don't play with it.
00;43;37;07 - 00;43;38;03
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;43;38;06 - 00;43;44;23
Speaker 1
Right. This is why black kids, you couldn't you couldn't even walk across the pulpit. All right.
00;43;44;25 - 00;43;45;28
Speaker 2
I'm saying.
00;43;46;00 - 00;43;51;10
Speaker 3
Right. You talk about a whooping. No. Maybe you get a whippin. And I like to run around.
00;43;51;11 - 00;43;56;22
Speaker 1
Listen, I've been headed towards the pulpit and got that.
00;43;56;25 - 00;44;28;28
Speaker 1
But it's because we. We made something sacred because we were in our hands again. We were doing ritual and and in sacred places. You don't play with that because the sacred has the ability to transform. Yeah. Right. And so when I think about black genius, all of this is a black genius. But see, if a person doesn't do the kind of the kind of study necessary to, to understand this and to connect this to the ways of which African people were doing ritual on the continent.
00;44;29;01 - 00;44;49;25
Speaker 1
People will think black folks here are just doing this because, well, well, we just started and nobody knows why. No, we do know why. We absolutely know. That's the way we open the service. And there's a thing black people have called benediction. Right. And we tell people you would do well, right, to stay until the benediction. But it's the same way we open ritual and you close ritual.
00;44;49;27 - 00;45;10;12
Speaker 1
Why? Because you are literally opening. Opening a spiritual portal, and you don't want to step outside a portal and not even know who was in it, because that thing follows you when you leave here. Right. See, all of this is genius and all of it's magical. And if we don't know and understand this we'll throw all of this away.
00;45;10;14 - 00;45;34;03
Speaker 3
Oh, wow. I'm at that. I gotta say, I gotta go right back. Oh, I'm not sure. It's. What what is it to, in your opinion, Doctor Black? Is it, trying to defend identity? Was it pride to your point of trying having to explain it or why? What is the why behind it? And why some of those parents or anybody teachers can explain that, right?
00;45;34;03 - 00;45;49;22
Speaker 3
That masculinity that that Jacob portrayed in front of Isaac and not being able to explain the lesson. I want to get back to that. Yeah. And and streamline what is that identity crisis. He had to be going through. Right. Not to be vulnerable in front of his own son. That's in his household.
00;45;49;23 - 00;46;11;05
Speaker 1
Yes. I I'm going to say what I think. Yeah. I believe that the root of that is that when we left the plantation, most people, especially black men, we left with the hopes that the white man's manhood would one day be ours.
00;46;11;07 - 00;46;15;17
Speaker 1
Because that looked like power. That look like influence?
00;46;15;25 - 00;46;17;10
Speaker 2
Is that the lesson of Isidore?
00;46;17;10 - 00;46;35;10
Speaker 1
Story? I think so. Absolutely. That's the lesson of Isidore story. Absolutely. That looked like, that look like telling people what to do. Sure. Right. That looked like access to things. Right. But white male men who? White male patriarchy was first committed to black destruction.
00;46;35;12 - 00;46;36;13
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;46;36;15 - 00;46;43;05
Speaker 1
The fact that black men have embraced in many instances that masculinity, it's still committed to black destruction.
00;46;43;05 - 00;46;45;10
Speaker 3
Sure. Right. Sure.
00;46;45;12 - 00;46;57;20
Speaker 1
Which is why which is one of the reasons it has been so incredibly difficult for us to sustain relationships, to sustain homes, etc. because yes, people want mates, but they don't want a master.
00;46;59;04 - 00;47;10;14
Speaker 1
Right. And the dream has been who gets to be the master the next time. Right. Our our dreams that really be the destruction of the master slave narrative period. Not the dream of my turn.
00;47;10;15 - 00;47;11;12
Speaker 3
Yeah. Which. Yeah.
00;47;11;13 - 00;47;32;07
Speaker 2
Yeah, yeah. Which is why he said a slave had a free. Son raised a free. Yes. Right. Yeah. And I think about, like, even in Isidore story, you know, when, when they kill seven white men. That's right. They they rejoice. Isaac is rejoicing hearing the story. Yes. He's excited. He's like, yes. You stood up only to find that.
00;47;32;09 - 00;47;51;02
Speaker 2
I mean, they're better at that, at this destruction. You know, I mean, they have more, they've just spent more time with it. So when they show up and they say, oh, you didn't get your Christmas gift. It's like a realization, like you said, of of the kind of masculinity we try to buy into. Right. Right. Yeah.
00;47;51;02 - 00;48;12;01
Speaker 1
But as you stand past, one of the things I think is powerful is that Isaac actually introduces Jacob to another form of manhood. And this has been what some of the, the struggle for with us as a people in this society to many young boys. Like if they don't do masculinity, if they don't do manhood the way we've traditionally known it, what they don't know is what's the other option.
00;48;12;03 - 00;48;13;20
Speaker 3
Sure. Sure.
00;48;13;22 - 00;48;37;09
Speaker 1
What's the other thing? I can be that black people applaud that black women desire. What's the other thing? Yeah. Right. For most brothers, they think, oh, it's it's oh, the other thing is, if you're gay, you're right. But but if a person is not gay. Right. But I don't want to be patriarchal. Right. Then what's the thing? I can be right and see.
00;48;37;11 - 00;48;41;00
Speaker 1
The problem is, as black man is, we haven't given an answer.
00;48;41;02 - 00;48;41;26
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;48;41;28 - 00;48;47;29
Speaker 1
We don't know. We even make Jesus patriarchal. Yeah. Right. In order that we can praise him.
00;48;48;02 - 00;48;49;14
Speaker 3
Sure. Right.
00;48;49;17 - 00;48;50;29
Speaker 1
Let me leave because.
00;48;51;01 - 00;48;52;09
Speaker 2
Bliss.
00;48;52;11 - 00;48;59;04
Speaker 3
Go ahead. Go ahead. I'm want.
00;48;59;06 - 00;48;59;28
Speaker 3
I want to talk.
00;48;59;28 - 00;49;11;29
Speaker 2
About, relationships a little bit. I'm thinking about, Isaac, Isaac and the the girlfriend he had. What's her name? The the one that was his soul mate, but no.
00;49;12;00 - 00;49;13;03
Speaker 1
Yes yes yes yes yes.
00;49;13;08 - 00;49;17;28
Speaker 2
So what what was that line is like? She was my soul mate, but not my lover.
00;49;17;29 - 00;49;18;10
Speaker 1
Okay.
00;49;18;12 - 00;49;28;13
Speaker 2
Can you talk a little bit about the importance of that relationship to those two people, when they are still so invested in developing who they are in general?
00;49;28;17 - 00;49;57;20
Speaker 1
What's the Isaac? Of course, as a boy, Isaac has these quote unquote girlfriends because Isaac is trying to figure out how to do masculinity in a way that his father will approve. Right. The problem with this, though, is it requires the abuse of women. Right. Our our form of masculinity requires the abuse of women. Right. And Isaac realizes that and he's like I don't like this.
00;49;57;22 - 00;50;16;01
Speaker 1
This is not who I am. But there's no other form because if he's with a little boy right. His daddy is not going to approve. See. So part of the problem is it's like well then what do you do? Right. If being who I am, my father abhors the people. Abhor. They even tell me God abhors. Right.
00;50;16;03 - 00;50;36;25
Speaker 1
But then I'm with girls. And really, that's not what I want. Right. So what do you do? You force yourself upon them. Right. You try to make it so. Because I'm trying to make myself be what it seems like the people applaud. Right. And Isaac absolutely does this right. He goes from one girl to the next girl to the next girl to the next girl and be like, Isaac, what are you doing?
00;50;36;29 - 00;50;48;29
Speaker 1
What he's doing is trying to get into the kingdom, right? That's what he's doing. Right. I tell folks, it's kind of like the ways in which people.
00;50;49;01 - 00;51;04;22
Speaker 1
The ways in which people think of, like, how God used Mary. Right. Who who didn't necessarily agree to do anything. But seemingly she was blessed just because she was chosen. But that's because a man told his story.
00;51;04;24 - 00;51;06;05
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;51;06;08 - 00;51;12;26
Speaker 1
Right. I don't know any woman who would feel blessed to wake up pregnant.
00;51;12;28 - 00;51;18;02
Speaker 3
You know, I'm not. I'm out on the limb. I know, I know I'm on the lower limb.
00;51;18;08 - 00;51;38;29
Speaker 1
And I know right right out of fell out. But what's funny is, if you think of it in terms of constraint, it works. Yeah, right. This notion of and we say, Hail Mary, blessed are you. Right, right. And but nowhere in the text is Mary has agency in the conversation. There's no you know, Mary's no where in this conversation, but we keep calling.
00;51;39;00 - 00;51;41;29
Speaker 1
Oh, how blessed you are, how blessed. You know. And it's like, whoa, whoa.
00;51;41;29 - 00;51;44;07
Speaker 3
Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa. What?
00;51;44;10 - 00;52;00;04
Speaker 1
It's like somebody who thought that, like, well, oh my God, black people got blessed because even though we were enslaved, at least now we're in America and we're in one of the best countries. What? But, you know, there are people who say that.
00;52;00;11 - 00;52;02;14
Speaker 2
It's the thing. I see it every day on the book of Faith.
00;52;02;15 - 00;52;07;26
Speaker 3
Absolutely. Yes. The book of faith. Yes, yes.
00;52;07;26 - 00;52;32;12
Speaker 1
Yes, yes. And so the problem is that Isaac didn't know that there are new, that there are different ways of being a man. And Jacob didn't know it either. And I think what Jacob is really telling Isaac is forgive me for not being able to see that I'm not the only kind of man that can that can exist.
00;52;32;15 - 00;52;39;05
Speaker 1
Right. But but it's a whole lot of hurt and bruises that happens before Isaac arrives at that place.
00;52;39;07 - 00;52;59;06
Speaker 2
What is the reality? Again, going back to responsibility. Right. Because, like, there's this, this like I said earlier, he wants to be a writer, but. And, writers don't necessarily. I mean, I know he's a millionaire. You a millionaire, right? Oh, you write here. You. So. Yeah. You you would you as Daniel, a millionaire? Omotoso.
00;52;59;08 - 00;53;00;03
Speaker 1
I am rich.
00;53;00;04 - 00;53;00;26
Speaker 2
Okay. All right.
00;53;00;26 - 00;53;03;05
Speaker 3
Yeah yeah yeah yeah.
00;53;03;07 - 00;53;04;06
Speaker 1
I'm not a millionaire.
00;53;04;11 - 00;53;05;02
Speaker 2
Not a millionaire, right?
00;53;05;03 - 00;53;06;08
Speaker 1
No. All right, I am.
00;53;06;08 - 00;53;20;12
Speaker 2
But I am rich. Okay. I'm rich. But the point where you were saying that writers don't make that much money as universe, right? There is countless illusions. Or there's countless times when Isaac's father says, does it pay good?
00;53;20;13 - 00;53;21;09
Speaker 1
Yes.
00;53;21;11 - 00;53;26;05
Speaker 2
Because there's there's an importance on ensuring that he's taken care of.
00;53;26;05 - 00;53;29;01
Speaker 1
Yes. And that he can take care of somebody else and.
00;53;29;01 - 00;53;52;10
Speaker 2
They can take care of somebody else, because it keeps a you ought to be ready for family. They're all right. Right. And through Isaac's healing journey, he learns that his mother wasn't so, so much of an angel as well. Right. And I wonder if you can talk about the sacrifices that both parents may in in, in for their healing.
00;53;52;10 - 00;54;10;28
Speaker 2
Right? Like so like or for Isaac's healing. So they don't fully heal so that Isaac can be healed. Right? Can you talk a little bit about some of those sacrifices? Because, you know, we we mentioned earlier, the mother is walking around like with these dreams that she wish you had, right? You know, Isaac finds out that she actually was dreaming that she was with somebody else at one point.
00;54;11;00 - 00;54;30;01
Speaker 2
Right. And and he felt like at that point, you didn't even really know her. Right. Right. Can you talk a little bit about how they, you know, this, this idea of making sure that they are that he is taking care of. Right. Does it pay good to both his mother and his father?
00;54;30;03 - 00;54;35;16
Speaker 1
Well, the thing that was so shocking to me is how his mother loves his creativity.
00;54;36;07 - 00;54;39;06
Speaker 1
But she does not want him to be gay.
00;54;39;07 - 00;54;40;03
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;54;40;05 - 00;54;59;00
Speaker 1
And how she does not associate the two at one thing. Right. And when she tells the husband yes he's a dancer, you know he can be. But but no I don't want no gay child. And of course I was like mama, like, what are we doing here? I thought he was my ace. You know, you're supposed to be covering me.
00;54;59;00 - 00;55;20;27
Speaker 1
And I thought you, you know. And Jacob, of course, is like, I always knew what you were, right. But I think what's really interesting is one of the things this country does. But black people do, but we do in this country is people are people are trying to figure out how to be kind to gay people without ever believing they ought to be gay.
00;55;23;29 - 00;55;28;13
Speaker 2
Right. Because that feels like what she thinks are absolutely right.
00;55;28;16 - 00;55;54;17
Speaker 1
It's like the funny we're in the store. It's like one of the things that I'm really angry about with the way we do James Baldwin people want Baldwin's brilliance, right? But I have not yet heard of any people who are praying for a child like Baldwin. I've not heard of it yet, but we keep lauding him. We keep praising James Baldwin, James Bell.
00;55;54;18 - 00;56;18;29
Speaker 1
I don't know anybody who's saying, God send me a child like Baldwin. That means we don't admire that man. We don't. We're we're not married. That man. People name their children Langston. People in the name, that name their children. You know, after Dubois, people name the children. Malcolm. We want Malcolm right? We want Malcolm as ears. We want Baldwin's head.
00;56;19;02 - 00;56;27;03
Speaker 1
Right. But we don't want the rest of him. But what somebody is going to realize in a minute is it takes a queer man to be that brilliant.
00;56;27;10 - 00;56;32;10
Speaker 2
Listen, listen, when you were talking about, like.
00;56;32;13 - 00;56;33;29
Speaker 3
Listen up because you talk.
00;56;34;06 - 00;56;44;02
Speaker 2
You was talking about the coming in this relation, right? Like you were you were talking about an inability to see people talk about the destruction that was wrought to black boys. Yes.
00;56;44;02 - 00;56;44;17
Speaker 1
That's right.
00;56;44;20 - 00;56;55;19
Speaker 2
Slave. Right. That's right. And you said you were talking to someone about it and they were like, well, we hadn't written about it yet because we don't think that we could survive or hold up for it. That's right. And you realized that it had to be you.
00;56;55;20 - 00;56;56;02
Speaker 1
Yeah.
00;56;56;03 - 00;57;08;21
Speaker 2
Because you were the only person who could who could weather that storm. Yeah. Which is to the point of, like, what is pain come to teach you? Yes. Right. And so when you when, like you said, we don't want all of the story.
00;57;08;22 - 00;57;31;06
Speaker 1
No. And that's really where I was going. Yeah. We don't want us. We want. We want select pieces. Right. But one of the things, again, that I feel so sorry for Baldwin about is that people don't dream his excellent people don't dream his happiness. We just want the fruit of his intellectual work. We don't dream a mate for him.
00;57;31;09 - 00;57;50;11
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. And I think that's I think that's a horrible I mean I don't know yet that I see anybody who has a ten year old son and in and they say oh wow. You think that little boy's cute? Any. Oh, I think he is too. Yeah. No, no, no. And we say, well, you know, we going to let him develop in his own time.
00;57;50;11 - 00;58;10;05
Speaker 1
And I'm gonna pray to God that, you know, he gets, you know, the God covers him. What we really saying. Right. Is, is, you know he's going to start looking at some girls here at a minute. You know he's coming around. Right. But the other problem was, is that we keep bifurcating individuals right. We keep trying to choose which parts of them we want.
00;58;10;07 - 00;58;17;05
Speaker 1
Right. But when you're talking about freedom and deliverance, and when you're talking about liberty, you can't take a piece of liberty.
00;58;18;11 - 00;58;25;20
Speaker 1
Right. Either you're going to be free or you're going to be enslaved. Right. A little bit of slavery is slavery. Yeah.
00;58;25;26 - 00;58;26;04
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;58;26;11 - 00;58;34;06
Speaker 1
Right. And, and and so I think in this book, what, what Jacob realizes later is that he birthed his own savior.
00;58;35;00 - 00;58;40;09
Speaker 1
But he didn't know it because he never believed that a savior could come in that form.
00;58;40;11 - 00;58;41;02
Speaker 3
Sure.
00;58;41;05 - 00;58;51;04
Speaker 1
Right. Which metaphorically means if we're not careful, you know, we keep getting we keep getting Jesus over and over and over and over and sending Jesus back.
00;58;56;00 - 00;59;04;10
Speaker 2
So you pass there. That's I could come up. I'm just going as I'm sitting. I'm just going when.
00;59;04;13 - 00;59;28;04
Speaker 3
Can't say nothing. Yeah. I think that's the, that's the segue into the, the next question about the healing process. All of those complex relationships that, that he had and some of those relationships, the person he was mad at wasn't the person that he hated. Right? That's right. And so if you could talk about that for a few minutes, that that generational healing.
00;59;28;04 - 00;59;35;20
Speaker 3
Yeah. From the Jacob to your Isaac and all of those other relationships they all in was conflict. That's right. Right. That's right. And it starts.
00;59;35;20 - 00;59;36;19
Speaker 1
Really with his grandfather.
00;59;36;21 - 00;59;37;19
Speaker 2
That's a good start.
00;59;37;22 - 00;59;53;26
Speaker 1
This is an Abraham. Isaac. And Jacob. That's really the biblical story. Oh, I know he's got a pastor. Yes, sir. But, of course, in this case is Abraham. Isaac. Jacob. Abraham. I mean, I Abraham, Jacob. Isaac. So the father and son are turned upside down, right? Because that's what slavery did.
00;59;53;27 - 00;59;54;20
Speaker 3
Yeah.
00;59;54;22 - 01;00;16;07
Speaker 1
Right. And and and talk about healing. What I think ends up happening is like, Oh, sorry. What I think is happening is in this case, and I think in many cases, it will take the son to heal the father. It won't be the father who heals the son because the father doesn't have the capacity. Right. It'll take the son to heal the father.
01;00;16;10 - 01;00;36;03
Speaker 1
Right. And, and in so many instances even in our community. Right. It's going to take the sons to heal the fathers. But we're waiting on the fathers. You know, with my father was never around. Right. My father was dead. Right. What I'm telling 17. What I'm telling 22 year old sons is go get him. Right. We're waiting on him to come.
01;00;36;06 - 01;00;58;24
Speaker 1
But not only is he not coming, he actually can't come. Yeah. He really can't come because. Because of what he's carrying. Because it was on him. But we're so hurt up because. Because he seemed to have lived and seem to have made choices. But he just didn't choose me. Right. The truth was, he didn't choose the mirror that would expose himself to himself.
01;00;58;26 - 01;01;32;22
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. And so and so this this generational healing that needs to happen badly. It needs to happen. And really, that's really what education was supposed to prepare us to do. See what I. The thing I'm clear about is I'm not processing pastor education as a degree. I'm processing and I'm functioning with education. Right. As a means and a tool by which you unlock what your parents never ever could get to because they never got the key.
01;01;32;23 - 01;01;47;12
Speaker 1
The key was supposed to be this thing called knowledge. Yeah. It was supposed to show you something. It was supposed to give you access to something that the other. They couldn't get it. They didn't understand it. If education doesn't do that, you just got a degree.
01;01;47;15 - 01;01;48;24
Speaker 3
You're sure it's.
01;01;48;24 - 01;02;12;14
Speaker 1
Supposed to bring something that says, this is what should should have happened? Oh, I see. So let me get granddaddy. Let me get daddy and let me see if I can begin to work this out. Yeah. Right. But this. But the person said it might be 19 and granddaddy, 72. All right. See if if we don't do that, then education didn't really do its job.
01;02;12;15 - 01;02;36;22
Speaker 1
But again, part of the problem in America is that the education we're getting right is really telling us. Make your own money. Yeah. Do your own thing. Right. A do for self. I mean, the list goes on and on and on. It's not really saying now that you understand. Granddaddy's. Abuse. Right. Go back. It's not telling us, but that's really what education.
01;02;36;23 - 01;02;56;21
Speaker 1
You know, and of course, I did a I did my degrees in black studies. So, as a result of that, I, I got a lot of this. And really, what I got in black studies should really just be the general curriculum, right? Because then it would it would, it would have us here and then as a people, we'd be here.
01;02;56;23 - 01;03;02;21
Speaker 1
Right. And we can understand, you know, the difference even. And why it's so dangerous for us to call each other niggers.
01;03;02;22 - 01;03;04;12
Speaker 3
Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah.
01;03;04;13 - 01;03;07;12
Speaker 1
Why? Why are we thinking that? You know, we're liberating one another?
01;03;07;13 - 01;03;32;28
Speaker 3
No, not at all. Oh, let let me. Just one scene. There's a scene that is just ringing in my head. The father watching football. The mother cooking? Yes. And Isaac in the hall. Oh my God. Say back for me. What? What. That is for the. We see it. This underlining issue. Right.
01;03;32;29 - 01;03;42;15
Speaker 2
And yeah. Been saying that because I think his stories that he writes when he was younger. All right along with that too. Like what is he. What is that. What is that.
01;03;42;17 - 01;03;58;10
Speaker 1
But I think I think he's trying to figure out how to weasel his way into his father's consciousness because his dad loves football. So maybe if I show some interest in football, maybe if I will shout along with him with the with the Dallas Cowboys.
01;03;58;12 - 01;03;58;26
Speaker 2
I think we are.
01;03;58;27 - 01;04;01;18
Speaker 1
You know, with the, New Orleans Saints and.
01;04;01;19 - 01;04;02;17
Speaker 2
The Cowboys and Saints.
01;04;02;22 - 01;04;04;26
Speaker 3
Right. Cowboys. Absolutely. Fine.
01;04;04;27 - 01;04;22;23
Speaker 1
Right, right. Right, right. Or the Kansas City Chiefs, maybe. Right. Oh. Yeah. Oh, no. I've messed it up. But what Isaac figures out is, is if if I can appendage myself to what my father loved.
01;04;22;23 - 01;04;23;24
Speaker 3
Dressing like his mother.
01;04;23;25 - 01;04;43;14
Speaker 1
Right, right. Right. Right. Right, right. Even that put on his mother's clothes. Let's see. People will think, oh, he wanted to be a girl. No. He was trying to figure out, I think my father loves my mother. And maybe if I look like my mother, my father would love me. Sure. Right. It doesn't really work, but.
01;04;43;20 - 01;04;44;25
Speaker 1
But it is logical.
01;04;44;26 - 01;04;45;05
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01;04;45;07 - 01;04;59;12
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. It is logical and it's manipulative. Right. But it's it's manipulative, but it's manipulation of the desperate. Right. And certainly Isaac is that. And of course, as the game really said, nothing about football. Really.
01;04;59;16 - 01;05;00;06
Speaker 3
You know, you like it.
01;05;00;10 - 01;05;10;04
Speaker 1
No no no no no. But because his dad is not a reader, I was just trying to figure out then where it's going to be our point of commonality. Yeah. Right. And he can't find it.
01;05;10;06 - 01;05;29;11
Speaker 3
That was a that was a great scene for for me. Just him begging for attention from his father. Absolutely. As an adult. Father watching football, mother back there cooking. And there's a yearning, a nonverbal desperation that, that that son, one. And we see it amongst our teenage teenage boys today.
01;05;29;12 - 01;05;46;07
Speaker 1
Yes. Oh, absolutely. And in fact, is it's it came out of a real story. I might have been 8 or 9, and I was a reader very young, and my father was a big football fan. And one Sunday dad was watching football and, and the only time my father was emotional was when he was watching football. Right.
01;05;46;08 - 01;06;04;11
Speaker 1
Screaming and hollering. Right. The, the linebacker broke through the. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It would just be. It would just get right. It was really, really, really intense. And, I just thought it was electrifying how this just excited my father. Right. So I decided I was going to watch this football with him. I did it for weeks and weeks.
01;06;04;11 - 01;06;27;04
Speaker 1
I learned all the football teams. You know, I could say their names. I knew that this was back in the 80s. This was Tony Dorsett time and, you know, and Drew Pearson and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, right, right, right. And it impressed my father, right, that I knew these football players names and I could and I could identify every team by their helmet.
01;06;27;08 - 01;06;53;27
Speaker 1
Right. Oh, my father was like, oh, shit boy. And you know. Yeah. And until I'm. Well, here's where I messed up badly. I said, dad. When one person hits another so hard that he knocks the wind out of him. How is that excellent.
01;06;53;29 - 01;07;00;14
Speaker 1
Daddy said you should do something else.
01;07;00;16 - 01;07;05;12
Speaker 1
He said he he's a he's a. You should do something else. So I said oh well I guess well I didn't mess that up now.
01;07;05;19 - 01;07;07;13
Speaker 3
It's not it's, you know.
01;07;07;16 - 01;07;32;17
Speaker 2
So you know, in the end, don't cry for me. You know, we got, you know, his father's history. And there's a scene, I believe Adam goes, to the father's house, and the father sees Adam and Adam is, you know, ravaged by Aids. And. That's right. And it was it was, you know, as a story tells this story of his relationship with his times.
01;07;32;19 - 01;07;43;13
Speaker 2
Why was it important to share his story? As a black queer man and his relationship with Aids and have his father come face to face with it? What? What's kind of happening there?
01;07;43;15 - 01;08;19;12
Speaker 1
I think that was absolutely vital. And I think it was vital because one of the things that this contemporary generation has done, and rightly so, and I mean by like, you know, 90s, 2000 and etc. is we have as a generation of people who were born in the 30s and 40s, we've asked them right, in many instances to celebrate this, this way of being without ever, ever, ever asking the extent to which they either knew or even understood it.
01;08;19;15 - 01;08;44;17
Speaker 1
Yeah. Right. I mean, this this 70 year old man. Right, who sees this ravaged boy? I mean, he's he weighs probably 90 pounds. He has these boils all over him, right? One of the things that I think that's very, very important that Isaac totally misses is the father's fear is Isaac will look like that because all Jacob knows is right.
01;08;44;19 - 01;09;05;17
Speaker 1
This is what happens to gay people, right? And part of the crime of that in the black community is we cannot figure out the utility of gayness in a community. We can't. We can't. We've I'm not even sure we've asked the question of why we need queerness in a in a in a community. I don't mean why it's there.
01;09;05;23 - 01;09;11;19
Speaker 1
That's not the question. The question is, spiritually, what do the people miss by not having.
01;09;11;19 - 01;09;18;22
Speaker 2
That's why he wrote this here. Or to all the Gbtc folks whose parents didn't recognize the gift we did.
01;09;18;24 - 01;09;28;02
Speaker 1
Because really in in his movements, Jesus is very queer like we we make Jesus heteronormative because we can't praise him otherwise.
01;09;29;05 - 01;09;53;18
Speaker 1
Right. But but Jesus's movements you know never had a wife. No people, no sex. No. The right in today's day that would be called gay. Right. But because we can't see but but but we because we can't see that as divine right. We just make Jesus extra holy. Right. But what I'm really suggesting is that in a community, you need marry people.
01;09;53;18 - 01;10;16;20
Speaker 1
You need single people. People just don't know why. It's like if James Baldwin lived on your block, you don't know why you need him. All these kids running up and down the street and and Baldwin lives right there. And we don't know why we need Baldwin. Shame all the people. It's the shame on a people stuff. I mean that I mean that's I mean that that's insane.
01;10;16;23 - 01;10;19;14
Speaker 1
But that's exactly what's happened. What has happened.
01;10;19;18 - 01;10;44;29
Speaker 2
Yes. We're going to move to Q&A. But I have something that I need y'all desperately. Did y'all get those beautiful bookmarks? Beautiful bookmarks they did with the. Get the bookmarks. Let me see. They look like this. Y'all seen the right now I seen that. Okay we can. Yeah. We got bookmarks are coming. They coming. Okay. I was supposed to mention this in the book.
01;10;45;04 - 01;10;50;07
Speaker 2
Why do I have so many bookmarks. That's that's that's not up for debate or.
01;10;52;10 - 01;11;17;04
Speaker 2
Okay. Pass some of these around right here. Yeah. Yeah. And and pass these around. And what I need you to do is scan the QR code as subscribe to their YouTube page so that you can watch this back because, you know, it was a sermon and I'm seeing the spirit still. I'm seeing the spirit still. Right. So you'll be able to watch this back and all the other amazing author chats that we've had.
01;11;17;10 - 01;11;40;17
Speaker 2
If you would just subscribe here. It costs you nothing. So go ahead and scan this and subscribe to the Baldwin and Co, YouTube channel so that you can see this, share all the other chats and the Baldwin and Co podcast that's coming out as well. Please handle that. Tell a friend to tell a friend. All right. And now we'll open the floor for a Q&A.
01;11;40;19 - 01;11;42;02
Speaker 2
Yes. Thank you, thank you.
01;11;42;05 - 01;11;43;09
Speaker 1
Thank you all so much.
01;11;43;10 - 01;11;45;20
Speaker 3
Thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Thank you.
01;11;45;23 - 01;11;48;09
Speaker 1
You brothers are just divine. I just I love both of y'all.
01;11;48;09 - 01;12;14;07
Speaker 3
Thank you for that. For the Q&A. We ask that you stand straight to that question so we can give room for the for the answer to, to be related right back to you. All right. I am from Joliet, Illinois, just outside of to Conroe, and I came out in 1991 after being born in Memphis, after 2020, days after Doctor King was murdered.
01;12;14;09 - 01;12;37;11
Speaker 3
And have lived with eight different states around this country. And my customer rates to obviously I have not read the book, but the curiosity about for me growing up and swimming just outside this area, is that you free? Yes. In our discussion, yes. For up in a black cafe right about this. And my sisters, I'm a Unitarian Universalist minister.
01;12;37;11 - 01;13;04;02
Speaker 3
My sister is Amy Zion. Okay. And just now my nieces are out under the living experience, married my one nieces, 35, and she married her wife and came out to her mom or Facebook mom pop bar for Facebook. So I'm curious about, like, you've navigated some of the just the title of it about being clear and right.
01;13;04;04 - 01;13;06;27
Speaker 3
Would you highlight some without my not having read it?
01;13;07;01 - 01;13;22;13
Speaker 1
Yes, yes, yes, yes. The first thing I want to say is I'm I'm very interested in say, I want to say this very clearly.
01;13;22;15 - 01;13;52;13
Speaker 1
I'm not interested in an announcement of a person's queerness. Yeah, right. That doesn't move me in. And of itself. Right. What I'm interested in is the ways in which the ways in which a person's queerness informs who they are spiritually, right. In other words, I'm interested in I'm interested in the ways in which black people and queerness go together.
01;13;52;15 - 01;14;12;26
Speaker 1
See, too many times when people announced they're queer, all of a sudden now they're not a part of the black narrative anymore. The queer narrative is then the place where they stand, right? What I'm suggesting is, I think it's extremely, extremely important for us to get very, very, very clear that when we tell the black story, the queer when is in it.
01;14;12;29 - 01;14;44;27
Speaker 1
Right? Just. Period. Right. But what I'm also very interested in is us as asking the right question. See, the wrong question is, are you gay? Are you about to say, you know, that's not the right question? In fact, that question is really very immature and very silly. Really. Right. That's not the right question. The question really is why did you come to the planet in that form?
01;14;44;29 - 01;15;13;10
Speaker 1
That's the question because it's the same question for any soul, right? That's the question. The question of why does a person why how a person's desires inform your insight? That's the question I want to know. Right? That's the question. And in this book, that's what I'm trying to wrestle with. And that's what I'm trying to get us as readers to wrestle with.
01;15;13;10 - 01;15;39;09
Speaker 1
Right? That the fact that Isaac is gay is a descriptor for me. Right? That makes sense. Yeah, it's a description. It's not, the, after the second page, it won't move you anymore because it's a descriptor. What is supposed to move us is how Jacob bursts queerness as much as he hates it. But why would he have to birth it?
01;15;39;12 - 01;15;50;03
Speaker 1
Because queerness is going to be part of his salvation, right? As soon as he recognizes it. Yeah. Yes, sir.
01;15;50;06 - 01;15;57;09
Speaker 2
And it was it was like he was rapping right back at you like, yeah, yeah.
01;15;57;12 - 01;16;08;17
Speaker 3
But like, there's so many folk around. I just passed two. Maybe they're getting ready to play devil's advocate.
01;16;08;20 - 01;16;22;16
Speaker 4
Another reason why people may question the why of queerness is we are animals, and animals want to push their DNA into the future. Could that be part of our struggle as well?
01;16;22;23 - 01;16;46;20
Speaker 1
I don't think so. And and I'm gonna tell you why. I do think, of course, recreation is as procreation is past. Is is important. Of course. We, you know, there's no future without it, right? But but the thing that I think is extremely important for us when we start dealing with that is some people are sick. All of us are sent to the planet to procreate.
01;16;46;23 - 01;17;11;02
Speaker 1
Just all of us are not sent to procreate. Humans. Some people are sent to procreate. Ideas. Right. A community with no ideas is going to die sooner than a community full of children. Right. Some of us, we. We're sent here to create art. So the rest of us would not forget who we are. Because. See, if procreation would that important.
01;17;11;02 - 01;17;15;25
Speaker 1
Jesus would have had to have at least one child.
01;17;15;28 - 01;17;23;11
Speaker 1
But Jesus did procreate something. But it wasn't a person. Yes.
01;17;23;13 - 01;17;24;07
Speaker 3
Yeah. Who?
01;17;24;07 - 01;17;30;24
Speaker 2
Who was a question? Over here. Right here. All right.
01;17;30;26 - 01;17;31;13
Speaker 4
Hello?
01;17;31;13 - 01;17;33;12
Speaker 3
Hi. How are you? Good.
01;17;33;14 - 01;17;51;03
Speaker 4
So, obviously you're a big advocate for James Baldwin, and I was wondering how could, organizations that build on, this history advocate for queerness and, you know, align with the principles that James Baldwin maintained during his lifetime?
01;17;51;05 - 01;18;16;13
Speaker 1
My question is probably shocking. I don't know that we need to advocate for queerness. I'm not sure we need you. I do think that we need to follow Baldwin. How? Right. But I think we follow. I think we follow Baldwin. Right. Number one, I think we follow Baldwin by getting ourselves to the place right where when we find sons like him, we glory in it.
01;18;16;16 - 01;18;39;25
Speaker 1
Right now we don't. Right. We glory in smart kids. But he Baldwin wasn't simply smart. Yeah. Right. It's a lot of smart people, right? What I think we do is we advocate for spiritual transformation, right? And I think Baldwin would be included in it. So I don't need a special category for Baldwin. I need people to be clear.
01;18;39;25 - 01;19;05;23
Speaker 1
Right. Why? Baldwin stands at the center of our intellectual trope as a people. Right. Because it's not just gay people who need Baldwin. Heterosexual people. Only Baldwin to see. That's the thing. Right. But but we've got to be very, very clear. Right. That you need the total ity of Baldwin's insight. Right. It's like the reason black people live on the margins.
01;19;05;25 - 01;19;23;04
Speaker 1
We have been pressed to the margins in America. I think all of us know this, but that's really why we are so excellent in so many things. Because the margin when a person lives on the margins, you must live far more excellently. You must live far more carefully, because one foot in the wrong direction and you go over.
01;19;23;06 - 01;19;52;26
Speaker 1
Which means actually being on the margins has been the thing that birthed our excellence. Which means let's give people back the center. We keep begging for the center, but ain't nothing happening at the center. It's the margins where the excitement is going on. Right? Because that's where people are have to be careful about their existence. So the so the thing I would say, number one is let's absolutely look for and beg for some more sons like Baldwin to come.
01;19;52;28 - 01;20;03;10
Speaker 1
That's the first thing. The second thing that I think is important for us to do in terms of Baldwin, right, is for people actually to read him.
01;20;03;12 - 01;20;07;01
Speaker 1
Yes, people laud Baldwin, but they ain't ready.
01;20;07;03 - 01;20;12;28
Speaker 2
Yeah. Okay.
01;20;13;01 - 01;20;17;04
Speaker 2
Hey, what's up colleagues? Hey, how are you?
01;20;17;06 - 01;20;18;06
Speaker 1
Hey, brother. How you doing, man?
01;20;18;07 - 01;20;19;29
Speaker 3
Doing good. Thanks for being here.
01;20;20;00 - 01;20;22;04
Speaker 4
I really admire what you have to say here.
01;20;22;05 - 01;20;23;07
Speaker 1
I appreciate that, brother.
01;20;23;08 - 01;20;37;21
Speaker 4
Yes, sir. My name is also, And I'm curious. First of all, I want to say you're very transcendental in the way that you think. And you're always getting to the purpose of everything from memory to, you know, our collective consciousness as black people.
01;20;37;23 - 01;20;38;24
Speaker 1
Yes, sir.
01;20;38;27 - 01;20;58;04
Speaker 4
The purpose of education. But I would really, you know, I'm really curious as to your, contextualization of, purpose in general. Right. So, like, Isaac goes through this journey of self-discovery. Yes. Trying to assign purpose and meaning to all of these things that he's, you know, been through trauma, right? X, Y, and Z. Right.
01;20;58;05 - 01;21;07;05
Speaker 4
But I'm curious as to what is the purpose of purpose or like what's why is it important to contextualize purpose. Right. So we've like a song.
01;21;07;05 - 01;21;07;28
Speaker 1
I got You.
01;21;08;00 - 01;21;13;13
Speaker 4
So we've assigned like, you know, what's the meaning behind remembering?
01;21;13;13 - 01;21;14;25
Speaker 1
But I got you.
01;21;14;28 - 01;21;15;18
Speaker 3
You see what I'm saying?
01;21;15;21 - 01;21;28;05
Speaker 1
So yes, I got you. Cool. Yes. I will start here. It's. It's because when you come to the earth, you don't come to the earth because your parents have sex. You already existed.
01;21;28;12 - 01;21;29;26
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01;21;29;28 - 01;21;56;15
Speaker 1
You were already a being. Coming to the earth gives you a body. It doesn't give you beingness. You know, before you were in your mother's womb, I knew you. That's what that scripture means, right? You already had a being. You choose the mother and the father through whom you will come. They don't choose you. In fact, when two people have sex, they don't have the slightest idea who's coming.
01;21;56;17 - 01;22;22;02
Speaker 1
They don't even know if you'll be tall. So they know nothing about this being on the way. It's the being themselves who choose the human avenue through which they will come. Right. And here's the reason it's important. The only reason to come is because Earth has need of something that only you possess. The job of life is to figure out what that is.
01;22;22;04 - 01;22;23;03
Speaker 3
Yeah.
01;22;23;05 - 01;22;48;07
Speaker 1
Then if one does, very few people do. But if one does, death has no victory on the other end. Because that's why I came to write. That's why Africans did a thing called initiation. The point of initiation of what people call a rites of passage is to get you intentional about your breath, instead of just you breathing it every day, right?
01;22;48;14 - 01;23;19;28
Speaker 1
The whole. The whole intentionality about breath is you're breathing because it's supposed to be in exchange for the life force you give. Right. For why you're walking this planet. Initiation is really asking you, right? What is it that you possess that others do not? Initiation is really asking you. What is the thing that you can see that's true about you, regardless of the circumstances in your life?
01;23;20;01 - 01;23;42;06
Speaker 1
See, if your mother was on crack. It won't change your gift. It will not shift your gift. In fact, it really is going to set up the framework for you to do it excellently. Right. But you're going to have to go through a process by which you get really, really intentional and really mindful about the notion of what it means to look for this thing.
01;23;42;12 - 01;24;05;06
Speaker 1
Right. Called purpose. And really, without it, a person is all a person's soul is always searching. Always, always, always, always searching. But we can talk more and I do initiation processes and blah blah blah. You know, we can talk more because, it's absolutely crucial and most people miss it. This is really what mourning means when people die.
01;24;05;09 - 01;24;09;27
Speaker 1
The reason we mourn is because we never got the purpose.
01;24;10;00 - 01;24;15;05
Speaker 3
Oh. Yeah.
01;24;15;07 - 01;24;17;13
Speaker 2
Well, y'all got another one to make them do something like that.
01;24;17;14 - 01;24;20;16
Speaker 3
Yeah, that's.
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