Say it Loud No. 6

The speaker, Reverend Kevin Palmer, discusses the importance of overcoming oppression in the African American community. He mentions a conversation on Facebook with Dr. Umar Johnson about this topic. He emphasizes the need for black people to support each other economically and build generational wealth. He also urges listeners to vote in local and national elections and not rely on the government. The speaker encourages a change in mindset and taking action to protect the interests of the community. He warns of the rise of far-right ideologies and the importance of preventing oppression in the future. Peace and blessings, beloved. I'd like to welcome you once again to Say It Loud with PASS. I am PASS, Reverend Kevin Palmer. I am PASS because I'm Ashley and Aaron's godfather. Amen. This is Say It Loud with PASS number six. Today's subject is us, us, people of the African diaspora. I happen to see something on Facebook the day before yesterday. It was a meme on Facebook with Dr. Umar Johnson. I don't know how many of you may know Dr. Umar Johnson, but Dr. Umar Johnson is a North Philly born boy, educated at Millersville College and received his doctorate in psychology from the University of Pennsylvania. He is a black brother who reminds me very much of Michael Eric Dyson. Although Michael Eric Dyson to me has always had that jailhouse cadence. I don't know if any of you know any jailhouse lawyers, but jailhouse lawyers always have this cadence that seems to be to project deep intelligence, but really they get things a bit confused. While Dr. Dyson is not that guy, he often sounds like that guy to me. Amen. Dr. Umar Johnson was on Facebook and he was having the conversation about black folk overcoming oppression in America. It's that same conversation that we've been having for 50 years in the barbershop, but we never really come up with any action to go with our conversation. Why am I talking about it today? I'm talking about it today because it is impactful to me. Not long ago, I was in the Popeye's. Everybody liked Popeye's chicken. I was in Popeye's eating some chicken and we were having that conversation. I was very appreciative of how a young man was demonstrating manners. I said, I made the comment, we got to learn how to help ourselves. A brother said to me, man, we've been saying that for years. He was right. I'm 62 years old and I've been hearing it since I was 12 years old. The reality is, I remember what it was like in the 70s when black folk were somewhat helping one another. Then came the 80s when crack cocaine destroyed black families and black communities, and we didn't recover. The other day, Dr. Umar Johnson is on Facebook and he's having this conversation about overcoming oppression. The question remains, when do we do what is needed to be done to overcome oppression? Let me see if I can make this thing live. Every group that has ever come to America has come to America as immigrants. The indigenous people of this nation, this continent were already here. Then some folk came and took some things from them. Amen. Took some things from them. Then taking some things from them, not taking some things, they took their land, destroyed their livelihoods, killed their food for fun, and all that kind of thing. Then brought black folk here, and brought black folk here and destroyed everything that black folk knew. Everybody's seen roots. My name is Kuta Tente. No, your name is Toby. You follow what I'm saying? All right. We all know these stories. What do we do to overcome these stories? Do we overcome them by education? Do we overcome them economically? How do we overcome? Well, let me throw my little two cents in and then I'm going to get out of your way. It seems to me that every group that has come here as an immigrant has undergone some sort of oppression based on difference. The WASP, white Anglo-Saxon personalities, didn't want to accept the Irish, didn't want to accept the Italian, didn't want to accept the Jewish, didn't want to accept the Chinese, didn't want to accept the Asian. But it goes deeper than that when you talk about black folk, because none of those groups wanted to accept black folk. Amen. Many of those groups do not accept black folk now. That's why I don't use that phrase, people of color. I'm not a person of color, because if I'm a person of color, now what you're saying to me is I'm colored. We don't go by colored no more. I'm a black man. I ain't even an African-American. Why? My heritage may be African, but I don't know nobody over there. Amen. I don't know a soul. They don't know me, I don't know them. I was born here in America, and I'm going to fight for every American right that I have. Now, having said all of that, here's the solution. We need to do what they do. They don't buy from the white man, they buy from each other. All right, I get it. Here's what you tell me. You say, well, pass, all our prices are high and we don't get no deal. Well, you don't get no deal from the white man either. Why do we feel it's necessary that we give each other a break? I'm trying to make a living just like you're trying to make a living. If you support me and then I learn how to support you, then we build our community. Do you know that black folks spend $1.3 trillion? Now, let me see if I can help you understand what a trillion is. If you take the number one and put nine zeros behind it, that's a billion dollars. A trillion dollars is $1,000 billion. You get my drift? That's 12 zeros with a one in front of it. That's the kind of money that we in America, $1.3 trillion, that's $1,300 billion in America, that we spend, but only two percent of that. Listen to me, two percent of that circulates in our community. Let me see if I can make it live for you. Michael Jordan is a billionaire and he's black, but he became a billionaire through a white company called Nike that gave him a brand called Jordan that he now owns and we buy their sneakers and we pay as much for a pair of sneakers as I pay for dress shoes that I only wear on Sunday. Come on, I'm trying to help somebody. Now, he became a billionaire, but the people that gave him the brand were billionaires so they could give him a brand. Y'all didn't hear what I said. You take $1.3 trillion, that's one with 12 zeros, and you give it away. You give it away to people who don't help you, don't support you. When if we learn how to do what other groups have done, Italians, Japanese, Chinese. Man, let me see if I make this live. When I grew up in West Philadelphia, and I know this thing goes national. For those of you who don't know West Philadelphia, I grew up in a place called The Bottom. It's not called The Bottom because everybody was poor. It's called The Bottom because it's the last stop before you get downtown. You could walk downtown to downtown Philadelphia from The Bottom. I wouldn't want to live no place else. The Bottom is Philadelphia's Harlem. Amen. I've always loved The Bottom and hallelujah, glory to God. When I grew up there, most of the businesses were owned by somebody black, or at least somebody black was in the front. I don't know. Maybe the Jewish man who had it before was behind the door. I don't know. I ain't never seen him. But my own family had a business. Amen. Here's the deal. When we had that, I always remember Haverford Avenue as a bustling road. There was always trucks going up and down Haverford Avenue, stopping on Haverford Avenue, delivering goods. There was a grocery store across the food street. There was three doors down from me was Filthy McNasty's ice cream. That man had Mr. McQueen. His name was Mr. McQueen, but everybody called him Filthy McNasty because he was a car mechanic and his hands was always dirty. But that man had the best ice cream anywhere in the world. I challenge anybody to find better ice cream than Mr. McQueen's butter almond. I could, God forbid, that man had some good ice cream. Across the street from us was Ms. Nanny. Ms. Nanny had the best barbecue anywhere. You get your chopped barbecue sandwich for five dollars and man, you understand what I'm saying? We supported one another then because the law said we had to. Hello. Now, watch this. If the law said we had to back then and it worked, common sense ought to tell you we ought to now because it worked then, it can work now. If we're going to overcome oppression of others, we need to un-oppress ourselves, change our mindset. The Apostle Paul writes to the church at Rome in Romans 12, verse 1, he says, be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you might prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God. Amen? If we transform the way we think, that's where it begins in our thought life, in our thought processes. Am I going to change how I see myself? Am I going to change how I see my situation? Am I going to change how I see my brother and sister? Do I see them as competition or do I see them as a partner? Do I see them as somebody I cannot trust or somebody I ought to trust from a business perspective? The only way to overcome the oppression is to change your thought life. Now, here's the deal. Why am I on this today? Well, like I said, Dr. Umar was on and he was talking about it. Dr. Umar is a brother that raises people's hackles a little bit. Amen? Whether I agree or disagree is not the issue. The issue is they were having a conversation and it's the conversation, like I said, that we've been having for 50 years in the barber shop and have never done anything about. But I urge you to pay attention to what's going on now, not only here in America, but across the world because the world is beginning to lean far right. We all understand what far right is. Far right is KKK, Aryan Nation, skinheads. If you and I don't pay attention and begin to do something for ourselves, in other words, protect our own interests, not only, listen, everybody misunderstands Malcolm. When Malcolm said by any means necessary, he was not advocating violence, he was advocating protection. Amen, somebody. Protection doesn't always have to come with a gun. Sometimes protection comes with wealth. Hello. We need to learn how to develop generational wealth. That's what they do. When I say they're yes, I'm talking about white folk. Amen. Y'all know I ain't scared. If you send letters and all that stuff and praise God, that's all right. I ain't scared. We have to learn to be our best interest. We got to get out of the government owes me. Yeah, okay, they owe you, but they ain't going to pay you. Since they ain't going to pay you, you might as well pay yourself. Figure out to do what it is you need to do for yourself instead of waiting for someone to do it for you who is never going to do it for you because it's really not to their advantage to do it for you. If $1.3 trillion becomes 10 percent through the African-American black community instead of 2 percent, then you done took 8 percent out of their pockets. Y'all ain't going to help me. I mean, come on now. You and I know that two things talk in America, the ballot and the buck. We begin to control our dollars as well as we control our vote, then they must sit up and listen. You know what? Then you really don't need to have any negotiations. Amen. When's the last time the Italians wanted to have a meeting with the government to get rid of oppression? They get rid of it for themselves. When's the last time the Chinese wanted to do that? Have you noticed that most of the businesses in your community, the corner stores aren't owned by us. They call Poppy stores now. Do you know there's some phrases that I really dislike. One is Poppy. Yes, I am a father, but I ain't your father, so don't call me Poppy. I don't like that. Call me sir, until you get to know me. Then if I like you, I'll let you call me Kevin. Maybe not. Most of the time it'll be Red. Praise Jesus. Or, I don't like baby's daddy and baby's mama. What the hell is that? I mean, that's the most degrading, stupidest thing I've ever heard people say. That's my baby daddy. What is the world? I mean, what are you just pushing out product or something? All right. I said all of that. See, that's what I mean by changing your thought life. Your baby is not some product of your indiscretions. That's a human being, man, that needs guidance. Your knucklehead child is running around here shooting people and killing people because you didn't give them any guidance. It's not a police thing. It's not a government thing. It's a mama and daddy thing. Do you know my mother, my father would have put their foot up my, I'm going to say it the way I would have said it if I wasn't on here as a preacher, would have put their foot up my ass if they knew I was in the street shooting people. Are you serious? Come on now. I mean, once again, changing our mindset. In the African-American community, we accept criminals. Man, look, if you're a criminal, you're a criminal. Now, I get it. I ain't messing with nobody else. So you want to pimp, pimp. You want to be a hoe, be a hoe. But don't be a hoe in my community. Come on somebody. Don't be the only representation of what my community looks like. Everybody in the hood ain't a gangster. Amen. Some gangsters who want to be gangsters, it's just that, want to be, they ain't really got the heart for it. Come on now. So I said a bunch of stuff today. Y'all know once I get on here, sometimes stuff get to flowing. Because I've been holding off for about a couple of weeks, and I ain't talked to y'all. But listen man, it's 41 days to election day. Now, if you don't get a buffer, you're black behind and go out and vote. Vote your interests. Amen. Your interests right now lie with the Democrats. Just good common sense. They lie with the Democrats. Republicans want to see you're behind in the field. I'm going to tell you right now, some of y'all ain't down, you won't be good at picking cotton. Amen. It'll disrupt you, mess up your nails. You need to get out there and vote. You need to vote in local elections as well as national elections. Local elections impact you far more than national elections. Change the way you think about you. Amen. Look, listen, I don't have no problem with you and I, because I think I do too, have pride in our African heritage. There's nothing wrong with that. But I've got an American heritage. Amen. I had the paper, I gave the paper back, I think, to my cousin. Anyway, my family got a long history here in America. Guess what? A lot of them was preachers. Now, let me just say this. That really ain't no big thing because back in the day, that's about the best a black man could do. Be a preacher or the local Negro doctor. Help me, Holy Ghost. Because they weren't about to let you do nothing else. But we got a long history. Amen. Going back into the 1800s, I saw it, one of them was 1880 something. I think my grandfather was born in 1880 something, my mother's father, my cousin's grandfather. Here's the deal. My legacy is American. Amen. While I'm going to order me some dashikis and stuff, I saw brother was wearing some garb yesterday that I really liked, and I'm thinking about getting some of that. Amen. That's to acknowledge my heritage, but I want it clearly understood. I am American and I'm involved in the American process. Because if I'm uninvolved in the American process, then the American process will overtake me and hurt not only me, but my grandchildren and my grandchildren's children, which I just ain't going to have. Hello, somebody. I do not want my grandchildren to know what it is to be hung from a tree. Yeah, I said it. I don't want that for my grandchildren, and I don't want it for your grandchildren. Make no mistake, if some of these rascals could get that, that's exactly what they would do. Hang your hiney from a tree. You hear me? If you don't get angry and excited about that, I don't know what fires you up. It ain't about having no Gucci bags, no Louis Vuitton, it's not about having your nails did when you ain't got no food in your refrigerator. It's about making sure that your legacy as a black person in this wonderful country of freedom is not taken away from you. Now, you can sit around and talk all that I ain't going to vote, because it don't matter, foolishness if you want to, but you better remember 2016, because 2024 is coming. Everybody woke up on November the 9th disappointed, because they couldn't believe that Gucci grabbing, orange looking, fake hair, wedding, heathen, was now president of the United States. So you better wake up, because he's got some buddies out there, Ron DeSantis from Florida. He's going to run. I'm telling you, he's going to run. And old Joe be a little too old to be running again. So you better be paying attention, before you end up down in Georgia some doggone where singing the blues. Talk about swaying low, sweet chariot coming for to carry me home. Uh-huh. I hear you all right. Listen, I say my little piece, I'm about done. I got to tell you all, I really don't write out no script or nothing. It just kind of happens, because sometimes there's some stuff I just want to say. Listen man, stop waiting for somebody to do for you what you ought to do for yourself. If you don't love yourself enough to change your situation, then get on out the way and let those of us who do, do something. Amen. You know, man, you ought to be tied. I really think so. I think you ought to be tied. I know I am. And since I'm tied, I don't want my grandchildren to be afraid to walk the streets of this nation. I don't want that. I don't want that for my great-grands, if I ever see them, to be afraid. So what kind of a legacy am I going to leave for my babies? I surely don't want them to have the one that my great-grandparents had. And if I don't do something now, that's what's coming. Far right-wing favor is flowing all over the world. And you and I need to do something to stop it, and not wait for it to raise its ugly head. Well, I guess I'll see you next time around. This is Say It Loud with Pass number two, number six. And I'll talk to y'all later. Bye.