Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - The Color of Change Controversy and Conservatism at CNN

Episode Date: May 19, 2023

Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay react to an article that alleges a toxic work environment at the Color of Change organization (10:38), before discussing CNN flirting with conservatism (1:00:00). Plus, Ron DeSantis’s pudding fingers (1:15:23) and the 1975’s lead singer jokes about watching Black humiliation porn (1:19:24). Hosts: Van Lathan Jr. and Rachel Lindsay Producers: Donnie Beacham Jr. and Ashleigh Smith Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yo, yo, yo, thought warriors. What is up? I learned is on. It's I, Van Lathie Jr. And it's me, Rachel and Lindsay. Yeah, I've been, this. Okay. You're okay?

You're having a good week? Should we cook? I'm losing weight. Van. Yeah. I start the journey off. And I've lost. morning I looked. I lost 31 pounds.

That is impressive. Congratulations. That's how I feel. Watch this. That's how I feel about it. And I don't want to keep asking you and making it look like we're watching. So, you know, when you want to update us on your journey, we're here to receive it. And that's, that's huge. 31 pounds. Yeah, I got, I got, I got, I got to lose more. I got to get like, I got a, I'm out there at the gym, right?

And the people at Equinox, you look so great. It's not just that you're losing weight. It's your skin and everything like that. You're glowing. How do you feel, though? Right? How do you feel with the weight loss? I feel like, God damn, it's a little bit more room in the shirt.

I remember how it was the last time I was losing it. But here's a difference. The last time I was losing weight and I was actually peeling pounds off successfully, I didn't have to continuously see myself. Please explain. So I have to see myself all the time because you do a CNN hit, you see yourself all the time.

See, in the last part, when I did this before, you can't really look at your own body in the mirror and really feel it as much. You can feel it a little bit, but you can't feel it as much. So, I mean, literally the last time, even though it took like nine, ten months, something like that, it felt like I went from titties to no tits. It felt like it was just one day, hey, I popped up, no tits. No titbacks to speak of.

But now I'm seeing the gradual reduction of titty. Okay. And it's interesting. You know, certain skin folds. I'm watching them go away. Before, I really didn't pay attention. Literally, I was, before when I lost weight,

I was, like, walking into the office into Capricorn and I was, like, holding my pants up, like, holding my pants up. Like, the belt was on the last thing and holding my pants up. And Jeff was like, man, you need to get a new pair of pants. Like, you're, you're slimming down, brother.

Right. You need to, I was holding the pants of everything and down. Oh, what? But now it's like, you know, because I'm lifting so heavy and I'm doing so much, I'm checking in with my body. And I'll look and I'll see,

hey, look at this. There's a little skin fold and it's gone. And I'll look at that piece of skin, you know, where the fold used to be, and I'll be like, how are you doing? And then the skin will be like, have I been kidnapped? And I'm like, yes, you have.

You have been kidnapped. And I'm here to tell you You've been released And then I take out a little And I wash the old skin Hey look, you can see the sun I go outside I'm also to that age

Where I don't think I care about Having my shirt off anymore And I think that was one good thing about gaining weight Because even before when I had lost weight You know, I had some stretch marks And some battle scars from having lost all the weight So I wasn't all about having my shirt off But now

I've been outside with the shirt off in, you know, some really interesting times. That's the flabiest of the flag. It's good. You are confident in your body. I'm confident. And that's a good thing. I walk outside now. Nipples lactating.

Okay. But it's really sweat, you know, but it looks like it could be milk. You know. Anyway. You like you. You like that. I know. I'm so trying to take you seriously and then you say some stuff like that.

Let me tell you something. You can sweat to a point to where the sweat drips off and the sweat is dripping off. Yes, because it's like dirty. It's like the sweat is dripping off and it looks like it's dripping. And I'm like, that could be milk. I know what you did. I could nourish a baby. Okay.

You know, because the baby would be malnourished. You don't know that. You don't know what's in my sweat. My sweat is probably very high caloric. At this point. What are you doing this weekend besides drinking water? Yeah. What am I doing?

I'm going to dinner with a friend Friday. It's like everybody's birthday is the Saturday. I really thought about going to Houston for 24 hours just so I could hit shout out to Vince Young, his 40th birthday. And then I'm like, nah. They're only 40? Yeah. I'm like, nah. You're doing too much.

Happy birthday, VY. I'm like, you're doing too much, Rachel. Sit down. Sit down. So, Sunday, I have three birthday parties that I'm trying to work in and go to. Three birthday parties. And then Sunday, it's a day of rest. So, you know.

Resting. Yeah. Yeah. So tonight, we want to see a friend's movie tomorrow. I got all kinds of things to do that. I don't remember. But I got a lot of shit to do. I got to look on the count.

And then Saturday is Devin Haney. versus Vicely Lomachenko At 135 We have Mustafa Park Vesile Lomachinko Maybe the finest amateur boxer in history Former three division

Weight champion 135, 135, 1.30, 126 Probably, yes, maybe two, I'm not sure Only two losses to Salino and to Tiafima Lopez up against a young black male named Devin Haney, who is the undisputed champion 135. I can't wait.

Are you going to the fight? Fuck, no. Oh. Well, they got that fight. I'm watching here at the crib, Bozily Wolderly, the Wonderpup of Dogs. Kalika has some sort of styling conference to go to. And so it'll be me and Bozeman.

And guess what? I don't like to eat anymore. It's hard for me to eat. I just had lunch and it was one piece of salmon and I'm full. Wow. what happens. Wow. Welcome.

Welcome. To my world. I had a salad for lunch. Well, Brian's at work. You're cracking somebody's back. Brian's at work. You. So he's not cracking anybody's back.

That's what the way it sounds. That's what the nigger does. She helps people with their backs. You should invite Brian over for the fight. You know, people imagine you to invite him to the game. There's a chance for you to redeem yourself. Chance for me to redeem myself. Hold on.

Wait a minute. How is it a chance for me to redeem myself? You're the one who took Brian, who went to see his team play, sitting courts off. By the way, the heat is so good. If anything, Brian can come over Saturday and we could watch the game, even though I don't think the heat will be playing. I think they'll probably play tomorrow night. They're playing so good.

They're playing so well. He could have seen a court side game in what could be a championship season for the Miami Heat. Well, maybe if you get invited to another playoff game, you can invite him this time. Instead of him having to watch you on your stories. Don't come in me. Look at you. Passing the buck. Don't come at me.

Look at you. I don't have to hook up to playoffs. I want to do an animated movie out of real love. Did you read it? Are you just looking at the book behind me? No, I read it. So I think you could do an animated movie. Yeah.

Well, what the fuck? Why? Okay. You know what? Let's move on because I didn't even give it to you. I read it while I was in New York. I bought the book. So, so, so, so here's, so here's the thing.

All I did, this is my. I'm willing to hear it. I'm willing to hear it. I'm willing to hear this. This is my. moment of gripe. All I get is grief from all of you. I get grief.

This is my, it's bad against the world right now. You, I read the, I just like, you know what, this is a, this should be made into an animated type of situation. I say animated, I'll talk to you off camera about why I think it makes like a cool animation, like a cool type of, you could do like a Star Wars vision type of, not animated. You don't even know what that means. I know, but I'm going to challenge you to know something. How about that?

I'm going to challenge you to know about stuff. But there are different types of animation. Okay, I'm just in Star Wars Visions. There's different type of animation. And there's one type of animation on the news season that like, I thought, oh, it's kind of photorealistic, but at the same time, whatever, but it could work for if we did real love, this animated thing. But I just want to let you know that all of you are against me.

You're against me. Donnie's against me. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Ashley is sort of against me. The only person that's with me is Bozeman. And he's with Kalika-a-or. That's true. That's true. That's true.

All right. A lot of stuff in the news. We've got to get to a lot of different topics. On the other side of it, color of change. The crosshairs, let's just leave it right there. Because we're going to talk about that a little bit more after you take this point. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul predicts. Predict the spread, total points, and even the game winner.

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Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Trimfaya. Tap this ad to learn more about Trimphia, including important safety information. Okay, Rachel, are you familiar with color of change as an organization? I am. What do you know of color of change? Do I need to give like a whole thing on it? I mean, color of change.

No. Have we had, do we have somebody on here for color change? I know we didn't have Rashad. We have. We did have Rashad. Who do we have on? And are they still employed there?

I think so. I'd have to look. For the life of me, I can't think of his name. I like, I don't know why this is. It was a woman. Yes, it was a woman.

Oh, that'd be really. interesting. We actually should have revisited that. Anyways, color change. Obviously, they've been around for what, like 10 years at this point? Longer, like almost 20. Yeah. I don't know if it's 20, but like 15 years. They put together. They put together. The mid-2000s or something. Okay. They put together campaigns. You know, it's a fight. The good fight, I should say. Criminal. They have like different teams like criminal justice and such. And yeah, like their celebrities have been linked to them very involved in. and what they do in their fight for change and bringing awareness to certain things that are happening to us. Yes. Yeah. So here's the deal.

The reason why I, it's important to talk about what we know of them is because a lot of times with organizations like color of change, a lot of people are only introduced to them after something has quote unquote gone wrong. And that is, I do. You think so? Even with this one, just because they're so popular.

Well, I think it's not, that wasn't as true. Pre-2020. Black Lives Matter. With Black Lives Matter. But in this particular case, I think that this organization has a real big platform and a real big deal, but in a very specific area of society, to where if you know this kind of specific movement adjacent sort of whatever, then you would know who they were.

But the average person, they're not like the NAACP or even Black Lives Matter to where the average person would be like, oh, color changes like a thing. You know what I mean? But we'll talk about that a little bit later because the story is that they are facing misconduct claims and claims of,

just worker exploitation worker what should I say how is best to put it misconduct claims and a toxic work environment I should say it's probably the best way to put it um business insider uh did an article or wrote an article this was by uh Sean Campbell who we've had on this podcast it was the same journalists that wrote a couple of different pieces on Black Lives Matter. Why are you laughing, Rachel? You guys remember Sean Campbell. It was a very interesting interview.

But yes, he exposed Black Lives Matter through a few articles. He exposed Black Lives Matter is what you say. I shouldn't say Black Lives Matter. I should say certain individuals within Black Lives Matter, is what I should say. He exposed the Black Lives Matter. Matter, Black Lives Matter

Global Network Fund, which was, we've talked about that, the huge amount of money that was donated post George Floyd, and he did investigative journalism into where the money was going

into a specific home that was bought. And how certain people were spending it. Yes. Patrice Cullors was spending it in ways that he thought were either unethical or incompetent. And he seems to have found

similar problems at color of change. Now, we know that they are an online racial justice organization. They've raised at least $20 million. Or they've raised $20 million in 2020, according to public documents.

They build awareness, various campaigns, various different ways of going about it. They do celebrity outreach. they do grassroots outreach. They do all kinds of stuff. You might see Michael B. Jordan or somebody like that. He's mentioned in an article with Color of Change. These are famous people who are trying to do a good thing, partner with organizations.

And then you might also see them funding people at the more community level. So that's what they attempted to do. So what's happened, according to this article, one topic executive was accused of bullying, harassment, and gender discrimination by multiple women in 2020. But quietly left the organization. the woman who first reported him, according to the article, was terminated. A senior campaign team manager was investigated after allegations surfaced in 2020 that he sexually assaulted an employee.

After being cleared of wrongdoing by the organization's Human Resources Department, he was removed from the organization. The head of color of change sought to address the situation in an all-staff Zoom call on May 12 last year and spoke of the senior campaign director being cleared after the investigation. But still left because of lack of compliance with reform measures related to the investigation. So the person to question here was cleared according to the investigation. However, seemingly did not want to comply with, I guess, measures that were taken after the investigation to make sure the workplace of color of change

wasn't the same as it was before. Didn't want to abide by either new rules or reinforced rules. Okay, so the article goes into great detail. It talks to former members of the color of change team, and it talks to them about while they feel like they've been depowered there, and they also talks about unionization issues that go on there, because the workplace employees there have formed a union. And that seems to have complicated relations between management and the staff there.

And it seems as if there are structural problems there according to this piece. Rachel, did you read? I did. Your thoughts? Well, listen. My thoughts, you sent this information in. and immediately I'm reading the headline before I read the piece

and I'm just like I can't because I am familiar with color or change and it is disappointing that here is another national organization maybe I don't even know if they're global but I'll say national organization that has done a lot of work

why are you laughing that has done a lot of work good work for us and now there is this another scandal with another black organization. And it's disappointing because when I think of two of the big organizations that are about furthering the rights or bringing information or campaigning for social justice, it's Black Lives Matter and it's color of change. Those are the first two that come to mind for me. We already talked about Black Lives Matter. Now here we are dealing something with color of change.

So my immediate response, when I saw the headline, I'm like, I can't. Your response was, y'all mean to tell me this guy doesn't have an agenda. I didn't look who wrote the article at first because I just saw the headline. I was like, I'm going to read this later. I can't deal with this right now. And then I was reading the article and I forgot to look at who wrote it. And then I remember what you said and I went back and I looked and I was like, okay, I'm reading this article.

This didn't seem like an article to me where it was an opinion piece, But it wasn't. It wasn't an opinion piece. It was investigative journalism. The author, Sean Campbell, talked to a number, a number, it seemed like tens of 20s of people who have worked or have works for color of change. And who had very consistent stories of what's been happening there, you know, whether it be they don't like, you know, the leadership at the top and feel like, you know, like the money is being used the wrong way to, whether it's harassment, whether it's a toxic work environment, to whether there's some retaliation towards those who have unionized. Like, there just seems to be a lot, or an HR department that doesn't seem to take the claims by black women or black people very seriously. That's what it seemed, that worked there, the employees that work there. That's what it seems

like. So then my thought is a question for you. When you were like, can you tell me this guy doesn't have, y'all can't tell me this guy doesn't have an agenda, I'm reading this piece. it seemed to be very thorough, very well researched, and that had been, a lot of people had been talked to who were directly affiliated with the issue. So were you, are you mad that he's exposing

this organization? Or are you mad because it seems to be true? First of all, there's no way for us to know what's true and what's not true. And I think that we do that far too often in terms of when we look at things. And I'm not here to defend color and change. I don't.

Well, seems to be true is what I that. And the Black Lives Matter stuff is true. It depends on how you look at it. I mean, it really does. It depends on how you look at it. Like, I could make an argument that even with the Black Lives Matter stuff, that what really happened there was a bunch of people that,

let me finish that thought. A bunch of people who all of a sudden found themselves flush with cash because of something that happened, something that they don't that they raise money on and then made stupid decisions with the money. And when I say stupid decisions, I mean, buying the content house, putting it up there, like having all of these ideas for it, but not understanding how it looks to have this home being bought by Black Lives Matter and have and not really have a holistic use for it off the jump, right? What I can look at is in these organizations which are extensions of people in the way they look at society, they get flush with money.

And just like human beings, they make bad decisions with the money. But what you really get is a narrative that's like really not centered in that. You get a narrative that these people are grifters and that they're evil and that they're and that they're on a, mission to defraud people to get money off the pain of black people, which look, I can't say that that's not true. But what I can say, though, all right, is that if there is somebody whose job it is to look at every single organization that's out there that's trying to help black people, right, at least in their stated purpose, and if it's their job to tell us what's wrong with those

organizations, that makes my antenna go up. Now, that's not for me to say because when I read the article. I mean, I'm not saying that that's his job, but I mean, he got off Black Lines Matter and then went to color of change. Do you know what he's done in between then? You, I guess the only thing he does is go after black organizations. The question is not whether or not I know. It's whether you know.

And the question, and the reason why I say that is because if the only time that he gets any ink or that we even talk about him is when he's taking out a black because this is now, he's not even writing at the same place that he wrote. Yeah, he's a freelance journalist is what I thought. Well, before he wrote the last couple of articles, I think he had mentioned the lady that assigned him to the situation.

But now you look at it and it's, he's with the business inside, right? And that's a lily white place. And the way that these articles get sort of traction is when he's telling us, but when that they represent the notion that black organizations are defrauding people based upon black pain. And that's fine. Look, if you look at the article, there seems to be myriad issues with what's going on there, if you look at it, right? If you look at it, there seems to be that people don't believe they can't trust the HR there.

because it's not like the things that that are alleged in the article weren't investigated. They were investigated. Every single time they were investigated, right? And so when they were investigated, they found that there was no wrongdoing. Now you have to believe that women

are being assaulted at color of change and that they don't care. That could be true, right? Then there seems to be a unionization workplace issue there as well. And this all being wrapped up into the same thing. What I mean by that is there's a specific part of this where people are talking about how much money people are getting paid at Color of Change. That has nothing to do with anything.

That literally, to say that, hey, this person is making X amount of millions of dollars, that doesn't have anything to do with anything. There's another situation where I'm listening to people, and I'm not trying to take away from anybody's experience, but they're saying, they're talking about Rashad, the founder of Color of Change, and they're saying, hey, should he just go buy another fedora

or should he go do another thing like this? there's a there's something in there that's like it there's there's a cultural issue inside of the business that really to be honest with you is typical for cultural issues in a lot of organizations like if you took the color of change off that and went hey like people are mad at TMZ because Harvey 11 makes all of that money and when I thought when I started working there I was making 875 an hour or like I was at one point making $60,000 a year to be on TV for five times, like every morning, like every day and I was making $60,000 a year. Those are things that you would hear anywhere.

I'm not saying that that makes them right, but I'm saying that like, it seems to me that you only hear about him when he's doing this. And I think that's interesting as well. No, you don't only hear about Sean Campbell. It's just the other things he's talking about aren't things that we necessarily bring, like, to this podcast. He's a journalist. I just Googled his name super quick, right?

He wrote a bunch, and he is a freelance journalist. He's written for several different publications, and he wrote a lot about the coronavirus. He wrote what was happening to nurses. He wrote what was happening in nursing home. That's not stuff that we would necessarily cover. We cover issues that impact the culture, black people. So, of course, we're going to talk about him writing an expose,

I guess I'll call it that, on two of the biggest organizations that are, you know, about social justice. So of course we're going to talk about that. So I think it's wrong to say, we only talk about this is all that gets traction. When I Googled Color of Change, I saw one article about it.

This is a story I didn't see it had gone anywhere else. Unless I just didn't do a thorough search, I couldn't really find it anywhere else. But this popped up, this popped up, number one, on my feed, right? And then it popped up again on Twitter. And look, I'm not, I don't know, amongst the people that I talked to,

it was a big deal. So I don't know what to say. It is a big deal. No, no, no. It's a big deal. What's happening is a big deal. I think the, like right now,

I just typed in color change and I did news. There's one article about these claims. It was also, by the way, it also got picked up on Yahoo. Which is another place. Yahoo picks up everything. So what are we doing, though?

Like, so. No. But my point is, what are we doing? I listen to everything that you said. And you're talking about how this guy, Sean Campbell, anytime he writes an article, has to do, and it attacks us, you're saying that his job, you said this, his job is to go after these type of organizations

and see if there's something out there. And I'm telling you, one, that's not his job. He's an investigative journalist. He does other articles. and you said the only time his stuff gains traction is when it has to do with these topics. And I'm telling you that's also not necessarily true. Black Lives Matter went everywhere. That was a huge story and it got picked up everywhere.

This not necessarily. And I'm separating. I'm just addressing what you said about Sean Campbell, not the fact of how serious these allegations are to such an influential and what I believe an important organization. I'm not dealing with that. But I also think you are a little bit minimizing some of the claims that are made by focusing on maybe the frivolous one of the fact that he makes this amount of money

and he wears fedoras and loves to be on red carpets and take pictures. So, but what I'm saying is that, go ahead, I'm sorry. Well, I guess I was just going to say that I think that you have to take these claims serious, even if you're disappointed that it's Sean Campbell who's writing the story. I think it's okay. I'm disappointed at the accusations that are made, but I'm taking it all seriously based on the number of people that talked and based on some of the accusations that are made because even though there was an HR investigation that was done, it was an internal investigation. And it does

seem like they listened, they investigated just from the report, but then there was nothing done. But then they end up firing this person later. And they're like, oh, that's not why we let that person go. Well, it's. So once again, they fired. So there was an investigation done, the person was fired. I do not know what happened. They fired the person later. I know. Well, there has to be an investigation before you can fire someone. So I don't know what we would want. What we want there to not have been an investigation? There was an investigation.

The person was fired. The person was fired after they refused reforms based upon whatever had happened. So, hey, this is how things are going to go now. This is what's going to happen now since there's been this issue. The person said they didn't want to do that. The person was let go. I don't know whether or not. I know that there were accusations made

and I know that people have lost their jobs. I know that there have also been layoffs at color of change which the article says based upon what they say is the economic downturn, right? Which some of the other people there feel like it's not about the economic downturn. It's about them pershing parts of the culture

at the company that they don't like, right? And a lot of the people that were in the article because when I read it, I read it, first of all, I read the article also for the tone, right? The tone of the article, it starts off with color of change. First of all, there's this big picture of Rishar Robinson, who is the head of color of change, and it says sexual assault, all of that stuff, boom, boom, boom.

If I was him, I'd be super fucking pissed off because he is not accused of anything that has anything to do with any sexual assault. I will agree with that. And putting his face right there. And putting his face right there. No, but you shouldn't be. because that, because to, like, in crafting a headline, that is what you do when you're trying to get a conflict click. When you're trying to get a conflict click, you don't want to put a logo up there.

They will tell you straight up, put somebody's face on this, right? Now, if we're saying that Rashad himself or anybody themselves, which was also alleged in the article, should be responsible for all of the misconduct that did or did not happen at color of change, then that's something else, right? if you think that that's fair. I would say that that's probably looking at things in a little bit of a myopic way. Once again, I don't mean to minimize anything because there's nothing to minimize or maximize because all of this stuff like is talk. I mean, it is. Like all of this stuff, it's talk.

It's very serious talk and it's talk that we should kind of look into, but it's talk. It's this happening. Didn't they have a paper trial? They had a paper trail, but a paper trail of what? They had a paper trail of accusations being made. No, I could have sworn I saw emails. They were like, there was stuff that was reviewed in addition to the statements. But they have that stuff happening.

And then they have it being like dealt with in a way that people didn't like. So it's like, hey, the guy lost his job, but only after this amount of time and only because of this. So what they're essentially saying is the people, there's a culture there and the people aren't really listening to us. And even when they move, they're dragging their feet. There was one thing that said, like, they fired, they fired a bunch of people. And then the people made a big deal about it.

And then Rashad came back and was like, I'm sorry I had to let you go. So basically it's like, he's fake. He hangs out with celebrities. All they really care about is money and all of that. And all of that's fine. All of that's cool. I get it.

There's a part of me, and I think people know this, there's a part of me that looks at this in a really specific way. And that's, I'm not saying that they're not issues at color of change. I'm not saying that they're not issues, very serious issues there. There are issues at color of change, I bet.

There are issues at the NAACP. I know so many people at the NWACP that are frustrated with the leadership, that are frustrated for all different types of reasons. You'll listen to somebody talk that's been there for a while, and they'll say, hey, this is an ages place where young voices aren't prioritized. This is a place where it's hard for women to rise up. And I'm not specifically going to get into all of that. And you hear all of these things.

To me, a lot of this stuff is framed in a way that is this is a place that should be working, that is, that says it's working for the betterment of black. people. And so they should be perfect. And that's, and that's the situation here. And that's the situation with Black Lives Matter. And I'm, and I respect and I hear everything that you're saying. I'm sure I'll be excoriated for this. But I'm just letting people know, the longer we hold people to that standard, people and organizations to that standard, we are guaranteeing that they fail us. we're guarantee and if it were me because if this guy were white

we wouldn't be having this conversation right now the only reason why we're having this conversation about what his motives are is because he's black which gives him- Rashad? Oh no not Rashad about Sean about what his motives are

which you think that I'm being unfair and maybe I am maybe I'm too protective over when black people are trying to do good right? But it and that is the thing because in trying to do good, you look at places like the church, you look at places like different

religious sex and organizations, and they need to be purged of the inefficiency and the horrible things that are going on inside of them. I get that. But if he were white and he had gone after Black Lives Matter and basically completely depower Patrice, wherever you think about her after her being an organizer and somebody for X amount of years, she now has no name in it. And he's destroyed her, right? And then moves on to the next organization, there'll be a third. And by the time that we jump up and go,

hey, what's the deal here? The conversation will have gotten away from us and we'll be left just like we were left after other times in American history with nobody left to do the work. And I don't know. I can't, from a historical context, watching the way the media treated every single

person who has ever in life trying to do anything for black people, I'm skeptical. And I don't mean to minimize it. I'm really sorry if I am. I just, like, after watching how every single person has been portrayed in the media that's ever tried to do anything for black people.

Every single person. Every one. Not a one. You might be able to, after they're long gone, after they're long gone, you might be able to find all of these glowing things that were written about them. But that whole time,

the American media system was trying to depower them, was trying to talk about just what a bad person they were, what they were doing in their personal, like the whole nine. So I think I'm not going to say every person because I just don't believe every black person who tries to something good has been vilified or taken down or whatever the word she said in the media. But here's the thing.

If that's the school of thought that I subscribe to, does that mean that then we can't call out any wrongdoing for fear of this is how the media portrays black people who are doing, trying to do something good for black people? Because here's the thing, I will agree with you on certain points. I will agree that in general, people have a problem with separating the corrupt individual from the work that the organization does. They can't just say, this person did something stupid. or ignorant or incompetent or wrong or whatever, or illegal or whatever it may be, but that doesn't take away all the good as a whole that this organization is done.

People need to learn to separate the two. I will agree with you with Rashad Robinson. And when I, before I clicked and read the article, it did make it look like Rashad Robinson was the one who was doing all these things. And I was shocked when I read the article where I was like, okay, yes, being the face and the head of an organization, you're responsible, but not in the way that they're making this article seem. That was very misleading. So I will agree with you on that. But I'm not going to sit here and not act like when I read this article and I saw that there were multiple accusations from senior level positioned people about harassment and sexual comments and bullying and just looped all that into, oh, well, then there were also comments about how he's. spends his money and how he likes and how he likes to be on red carpets. There's obviously a corrupt

individual within this organization. And I am looking at the behavior of this individual, this continuous behavior where women were continuously for years complaining about them and him and nothing was being done. There seems to be that type of toxic culture. And it seems like the HR company was not listening to these women as they were complaining about it. I don't think that because for fear of how the public may vilify a black person of this organization, that we can't call out problematic behavior or we get mad at Sean Campbell for exposing that this organization has a problematic person within it or a problematic culture. I get the fear.

First of all, you say for years, the majority of the people that, how long do we say color change has been around since 2005? The majority of the people that... You said 2005, yeah. I don't know. The majority of the people that were in this had, like, if you read the article, the majority of the people that were in this, they said, it says clearly they started working at color change around 2020.

So the reality, and I'm not saying that there hasn't been dysfunction and stuff that's gone on. But what I'm saying is that when I look at the totality of the article, what I see, it makes two different assertions to me. One is that color of change in and of itself had people inside the organization that were being sexually bad harassing people, right? And that they don't feel like the organization acted with the right amount of vigor in rooting that out. All right. Then I read on the back of it and it says the things were invest.

the person was let go, but only after this way, and they didn't like the way the person was let go. Okay, cool. And you realize there were multiple. It's not one person. Yeah, I understand. So of the multiple people that were there, how many of them are still employed with color?

No, I have no idea. But I mean that there are multiple, it's not, we keep saying like there's one executive that was harassing and bullying, but there was another one that was investigated for, sexual assault allegations. And it was reported in 2020. How long? We don't know how long it had been going on.

But what I was saying is like some of the people that were, that had been working there, some of the stuff that we're talking about, like, these were employees that hadn't been there for like a super long amount of time. And a lot of the people that were let go from color of change that feel like that they were fired in retaliation for some of this stuff. For the union. Yeah. But yeah, for the unionization stuff.

they had been there for like a super long time and they say hey it's because of the economy it could very well be because of the culture all of the stuff like all of the stuff that's going on there I'm sure they need to clean a house and do some stuff what I'm saying is the way that this is depicted it's actually said inside of the article

by one of the people that that was at color of change right it said in the article it says this is an organization that said that it's devoted to protecting black women and protecting black people and it can't even do it in its own fucking office and space. I get that and I understand that sentiment. I really do because this entire article is written from this land of one guy got super famous

and a bunch of people are getting rich and inside people are hoarding all of the money because that specifically said, it specifically said that you have people at color of change that are making $2 million and then it's compared to a different organization where the people aren't making nearabouts

that much money. That just doesn't fucking have anything to do with it. What they're trying to do is they're, like the way that is being, the way that is written, that is written in a way to make you see like, hey, these people are grifters. They're treating people bad

because they don't really care about black people. And what they really want to do is make a bunch of money. They've raised $20 million since this time. Once again, something that's immaterial to the workplace culture that goes on inside of color of change unless the article would be specifically about the money that people are making there. Right? So the framework of the entire thing is this place is shady.

This place. The whole article is about a problematic culture at this organization. Right. And that includes the money. So I get why it was, I understand why it was reference. I understand what they're saying as a whole. There are a lot of problems within this culture. One of the things people have a problem with is that there was $2 million, not one person

received it, but it was spread over like the top people. And this person makes, and just to give you a comparison, the president of the NAACP makes this, and this guy is making, you know, twice as much as that or whatever. I got it in the sense of, even though I get like the fedora red carpet, it's like, okay, like, it's a stretch. I'm not, I'm not arguing with you. I do think the article was supposed to be about that this company has a problem, and there seems to be some shady things, from sexual harassment claims to the way the money is being dispersed, to the unionization of the employees, of it. I, I, that's how I took it. Right. Okay. Look, this is my thing. I, like, I am, there's just a, there's enough history here for me to look at this in real time and just be like, hmm.

Would you feel different if a different person wrote this article? if Ben Johnson wrote this article, would you feel different? Would it change your whole perspective of this information coming out? So a part of this is that we had the guy on here and I spoke with him.

And it's just how I feel. By the way, I don't know. So yeah, I think it's, I don't know nobody over there like talking about. I know, how about this? Let me put you like this. I know everybody everywhere

but I know some people better than others. Like me and Patrice Cullors have never met. Me and Rishar Robinson have never met. I have to go through other people that get to color change. I have not made any money with color change or been involved. I've done a couple of panels with them. I've done a couple of panels with everyone.

I've done a couple of pounds with them. Black Malias for Flint. I've done a couple panels with Black Lives Matter. Done a couple panels with everyone. Everybody black, I work with them. The Dream Defenders, everyone. Right? And so it has nothing to do with this.

It just has to do with the fact that all right, like, okay. All right. This is this, this is no, nobody is going to be good enough, especially when you put a bunch of people together to kind of get some of these, to get some of these problems solved. And it's going to be wash, repeat, wash, repeat every single time. But look, could be being a little bit, uh, could be being a little bit emotional about it. I do get it. But I think he's an agent.

I really do. Well, at least you're being self-aware. I think he's the same type of person that has always been put in places like this to destabilize these types of movements. I really do. Like, that article isn't written at the griot. That article isn't written at the root. That article isn't written for black people.

That article, these places are, these are. Of course it's not written for black people. These places, this is, this stuff is going out in places to where the general consensus on color of change or black lives matter can be that they're frauds. Last thing I say about this. When Kanye West was going through his entire thing, all I heard from him was that black lives matter and everything about it was a fraud because of how somebody bought a house and hired their cousin and all of that stuff. And that's just a minimizing and a reduction of what Black Lives Matter did,

what people did and what they were trying to do that I don't think it's fair. But I agree. You have to separate the individual from the organization. And don't let that downfall of that person take the whole organization down with it. But listen, anytime something, but like the wrongdoing, this is all the last thing I'll say, don't get mad at the person writing the article or don't automatically believe that it can't be true. Like, be mad at the people who are fucking up shit.

I didn't say that. And they're the reason as to why people like Kanye West start generalizing and making those type of disparaging comments. I just think, well, whatever. You got it. You were self-aware. You see what you're doing. Look, I mean, I'll be honest. I'll be honest with you.

And like, look, I'll just keep it all the way real. A lot of the criticism for these different places that you hear, it comes from other activists. But once it gets into the culture and Twitter sphere, it comes from a bunch of people who aren't really doing anything to try to move black people forward other than complaining about white people. and for people that are in spaces like Black Lives Matter,

like color of change, it's mad people that after we did this and put Hawk on that have all kinds of opinions about Hawk, y'all niggas go purity y'all selves right back to the motherfucking field. And y'all are going to literally ain't nobody. I'm not saying that

they're not issues going on there. I'm saying that the issues that are going on there are probably typical issues of any type of company that has fucked up men and greedy people working in. But what the article made sure that it did was it framed

what color of change is around what they say that they are. And it made it seem like it's up there a bunch of frossers. And it, you know, it's the devil's work. I'm sorry. All right. Um, uh,

more devils. Marjorie Taylor Green. We got more in-word discourse. There's nothing I like more than discourse over the N-word. I like it. I like Marjorie Taylor Green. Okay.

I like, to me, it's funny to me. Like, she, like, Marjorie Teller. It's more funny than anything. I'll give you that. Marjorie Teller Green is so fucked up. Is so. fucked up. Let's play play it. She got into it with my brother, Jamal Bowman. She

got into it with them on the steps of the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday. Here's the audio from that interaction. It's small. We've got to save the party. The party's hanging by a thread. The party is hanging by a thread. You got to save the party. Listen, no more Q&N. No more Q&O. Long land now. No more CNN. No more debt ceiling nonsense. Come on now. Save the party.

Save America. Save the children. Save the children. Save the country. Right. The close of order. Come on. Investing the border. What about? What children? What are you talking about? Where are the kids? We're all the migrant children. You guys have lost them. We love them. We love the migrant children. There's kids of thousands missing. You can't find them. What are you talking about? What's talking about? Yeah, migrant children.

I don't know. We don't know. Okay, so she was called. He was even interacting with her. That's what he does, man. He takes people. He takes them on. He takes them on.

She, um, she did not like being called a white supremacist. And so she equated to another word that no one should be called. No black person should be called. This is Marjorie, dropping knowledge on y'all motherfucking phrases. It's all on video. Everyone can see this, but I will tell you what's on video is Jamal Bowman shouting at the top of his lungs, cursing, calling me a horrible knit, calling me a white supremacist, which I take great offense to. That is like calling a person of color the N word, which should never happen. Calling me a white supremacist is equal to that, and that is wrong. Jamal Bowman was down there cursing at me, telling me to get the F out of there. And he was leading the mob right. outside the vehicle I was sitting in. We have this all on video.

And then on the Capitol steps yesterday, he was the one that approached me. Even CNN reported that yelling, shouting, raising his voice. He has aggressive. His physical mannerisms are aggressive. And he just recently shoved Thomas Massey just outside the House chamber. I think there's a lot of concern about Jamal Bowman. So, and I am concerned about it. I feel threatened by him.

She feels threatened by him. Just all the trigger words. All the trigger words. I talked to Jamal earlier. I was trying to get him on here. He'll come visit with us next week. He says to talk about it. I wanted to know if you felt threatened around him.

If you felt threatened with Jamal. I've never been around him. I'll reserve my thoughts when he comes on the podcast. I'll let you know if I feel threatened. It'll be important. Look. You know what? she should have just called him a nigger.

I mean, she talked about the N-word, right? And then she described... Are you shocked? Are you shocked that she didn't do that? She should have just done it. I don't understand. She didn't just say, well, if I'm a white supremacist, then you're a nigger.

That's what she should have done. Because she talked about white supremacy being the N-word, and then she described a nigger. And that's why... That's what gets me about the Marjorie Taylor Grades of the world. The dog whistles are of... such a perfect frequency. Like, she said inward

and then said, but let me tell you what actually is let me paint a picture. A big, threatening black, brute behemoth that almost knocked me off the capital steps with his 13 inch dick.

I almost fell over. I couldn't believe it. is white supremacist the same as inward to you? No, it's not. I mean, just on its face, being a white supremacist, that's something that you choose to be, right? Like, that's based on your beliefs. Whereas when somebody calls you an inward, so if I'm calling you a white supremacist,

it's because you are doing things that further white supremacy, your beliefs. And if you're, if you're calling somebody the N-word, you're calling them that because of the color of their skin, because of how they were born, because of their being black, not because of their beliefs.

So just on its face, no. Yeah, you know what? And here's another thing. White supremacists hasn't been a slur long enough. It's just like from a whole, from a historical standpoint, the N-word been rocking. This is what,

the 15-16-100s? Like, white supremacy just hasn't, you know, It's like white The white supremacists as a slur It's like Americans in soccer It just hasn't been used at a high level long enough To really be good Well you might be able to like make the World Cup

But you can't really do nothing White supremacists as like something that we could throw around Because like It is something very charged to call someone But it's almost always true which is another different. It is something charged to call someone,

but it doesn't have any real history or any real power as a slur. The N-word, you gotta wake up early in the morning, man.

You gotta wake up early in the morning to beat the N-WRWR. Marjorie Taylor Green, she was both so stupid in this, but also deadly, deadly, effective.

I would not be surprised if you don't see a different sort of reaction to Jamal Bowman, moving forward with what he likes to do on the steps of the Capitol and the halls of the Capitol because I think she's kind of put out the Babe in the Woods situation and they might treat them a little differently.

Also, the term white supremacy. We just had Biden call it out, and here we are less than a week later, and Marjorie Taylor, is making this outlandish comment. We're going to keep seeing politicians challenge white supremacy. I think this is going to be on the ballot, and I think that they're going to try to mess up the meaning of the word like they did woke.

I think they are on a mission with the term white supremacy. I'm telling you, that's what I think. Yes, the Jamal Bowman thing as well, but they're trying to figure out how to attack this word and how to make it not what it is. So look, that's a really good point. And I just want one message to the black people out there that listen, just don't help them.

I'll be honest, every single taking back of a word that white people have done, black people have been overly complicit in them taking the word back. Every single time it happens, black people have had a gigantic hand in. All right? A bunch of rappers out there.

Got to call out my brothers in hip hop. If you buy my record, you can say the N-word all you want. All right, nigga. Oh, you know what I mean? You know what I'm saying? I, cool. It's getting, these people,

He's getting a little, whatever. Okay, cool. You know, woke. Now you have a large portion of black people who are out in some way to separate themselves from what they feel like woke ideology is. Because woke ideology to some brothers and sisters means accepting parts of society

that maybe they aren't prepared to accept, right? If woke is about black people advancing and moving forward, that's okay. But if woke is about gay and trans people moving forward, that might be a little bit more sketchy and iffy for some people. So they took woke back. Hey, fake news. Most of the time I hear somebody saying fake news, they're black. All of these things are things that came.

Whenever I hear somebody say, that's fake news, black. Trump made that shit up. You know what I mean? make blank blank great again. Let's just see the hats. Shout out to the brothers around here and I still, the hat was still kind of fire. But it was like, make Crenshaw great again.

And it was like a red hat. I see make South Bat Rouge great again. It's like, don't pick up their shit. That spreads their shit. All right? And if white supremacy gets taken over and it's something that you fucking can't say on cable news, it'll be because somebody goes,

we really got to stop labeling everybody we disagree with as white supremacists. So what? They want to take all the black history out of schools. That's not white supremacists. You know what I'm saying? Somebody going to say that. We've seen it.

Terry Cruz. Perfect. Is that the same? Is that the same? Is that a thing? See? Okay. See?

You defend Sean Campbell. Remember he was like there's black? He's like, black supremacy. He's it. Somebody's going to quote him. Somebody's going to use him. Or, or, or, or they can either do that or they can make black supremacy a thing.

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Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about trim fire. Tap this ad to do. to learn more about Trimfaya, including important safety information. This episode is brought to you by WeatherTech. Everyone knows winter is the MVP and making a mess. You don't need WeatherTech floor liners in the summer, unless you hit the beach or go camping. Then you'd want a cargo liner.

Or a road trip goes sideways, ketchup goes rogue, ice cream drips. Yeah, you'd be pretty happy about those weather tech seat protectors. So just to be clear as the mud, you're inevitably going to step into the summer. You don't need Weather Tech unless you plan on. doing summer. Visit weathertech.com today. Chris Lick from CNN. He's admitting that there were some problems

with the Donald Trump Town Hall. Oh. He's acknowledged internally that there are some things he wished the network would have done differently. This is after CNN has been getting kicked in the dick and balls ever since the...

Not by you. Not by me. It's getting kicked in the dick and balls ever since the Donald Trump Town Hall came out. It's one thing to get kicked in the balls. That hurts. But sometimes it gets like a piece of the dick and then that can bruise.

So CNN didn't just get the balls. Got the dick and the balls. And we should say, it didn't really work for CNN. It was a ratings bonanza, but they haven't really been able to like carry the ratings on till after. Of course not. What did they expect? And I expect, Chris, to double down and triple down.

You have to stand by this. You have to be ten toes down. Because this is, you know what I mean? Like, can you imagine if he comes out and he's like, actually, we made a mistake. We shouldn't have had, we shouldn't have done that. We shouldn't have had a Trump-friendly audience. We should have cut him off the moment he started spewing lies. Oh.

Chris don't bring it. Chris going to have a part too. Chris said that focusing the camera only on Collins when she tried to fight off Trump's lives, lies about election fraud was probably not great. They should have used a wide shot on both Trump and Collins. That way CNN could draw the audience. his focus to the substance of the question rather than the spectacle of Trump.

So does the little bit too spectacle. He also says that he wished the town hall that the anchors had focused on the news that Trump made, such as his claim that he would settle Russia's war with Ukraine within 24 hours or his refusal to weigh in on a federal ban about abortion. Which seems a little naive from Chris, if I'm being honest,

because the substance of Trump is never what people focus on. That's by design. It's always the antics of Trump. So I don't know what, you know, the vagina thing was going to be what people focused on. And he was sitting right there after. Don't laugh, Rachel. He was sitting.

Don't laugh, Rachel. Rachel, don't laugh. Don't laugh. You're laughing. I'm not. I'm not. Yeah. Yeah.

So it seems like CNN might be walking it back just a little bit. A little bit. Are you surprised? No, they're not walking it back. They're not walking it back at all. Oh, we should have done a two shot instead of a one shot. What was the other one? We should have openly questioned the crowd before the town hall began

so the audience could better understand who they were and why they were supporting Trump. What would that have done for you? The fact that they were supporting Trump is all we knew. They were clapping when he was making disparaging marks about the woman he had just, or about the lawsuit that just was against him. or the alleged rape. Like, yeah, similar alleged rape.

So, like, what would, listening to the audience and hearing why they were there for Trump help? If anything, that would have furthered, that would have, like, incited the Trump audience. They would have been more riled up. Yeah, more reason. They would have given all the reasons why they were into Trump. Why did we need that?

This is, just stop. The best thing that Chris can do is to stop talking about it. We got to move on. So, okay. We got to move on. I'll say a couple things. One thing I'll say is about CNN. I think you're going to see,

and I think you kind of have been seeing the more conservative shift from CNN. And I think that's a good thing. I do. The reason why I think... Well, I mean, you work there now. I work at CNN. How do I work at CNN?

Oh, shut up. I think that's a good thing. The reason why I think is a good thing is for two reasons. Number one. I think it makes... I think it's time for people to find different sources. So if people turn, there are really amazing sources of news that are out there.

I think it's time for people to find different sources. So if you are watching CNN and CNN takes the right with shift that they seem to be taking away from, you know, the era of Don Lemon and Chris Cuomo kicking the shit out of Trump every single night seems to be gone. And it seems to be, Because even Collins herself, even though she has these issues with Trump, she isn't what I would call like a left-leaning media personality or whatever.

She's her past is a little bit more conservative. Her past is conservative, right? Definitely. And I personally think she's going to be their person in the prime time spot moving forward. And so because of that, I think that CNN is going to try to be a place that, courts a little bit more of the right-leaning political thinker because they think that there's market share to be gained. Not if Fox has taken a chunk, had a chunk taken out of their ass a little bit.

And there's something else. One thing, another thing is Fox is consistently watched by more people that seem. Yes. And I want people to feel something here. I want people to feel something. There's something to be felt here. Okay. Okay.

We were talking about Buzz Lightyear. The movie came out and the movie flopped. When it came out, it wasn't good. Right? Okay. And part of the narrative behind the movie that weaponized people against the film was that there was the same-sex kiss in the movie, the Light Year movie that came out.

It was the same-s-case-case- Oh, yeah. We talked about it. What did I say? I said, hey, Disney is not going to do anything in a movie because it's the right thing to do. This is a corporation. Corporation don't have no soul, no wrong or right, just money. If you want to see more representation, you should have gone your ass out to see life.

And as stupid as that sounds, that's the reality. The reason why I sometimes buy tickets to black movies that I don't see It's because if I want them to make more black movies or maybe even my black movies Then the movies have to be they have to be successful So my thing is if you guys loved CNN so much the way it was Why is Fox kicking their ass? If you guys love seeing in so much the way it was before Why are they getting their ass bus?

like why? Like why? Like where you have a lot of fun and all of that stuff going on and blah blah blah you don't you don't like Well could it be the change in the people that are on CNN? Fox consistently bust CNN as

since you know what I'm saying? True. I mean I'm just saying it's getting worse that I guess is my point. Now I will say this I will say that that doesn't in a perfect world

in the world that I would like to have that shouldn't have any effect on the journalism that a place does. It shouldn't, right? But on the personalities that it courts, it always will. Because remember, some of these shows are journalism shows, and some of these shows are just first take with politics. Like, you don't go to first take on ESPN to learn anything about the game. You know what I'm saying?

You want to see who's going to win the argument. And like in terms of the report You want a hot take So in terms of the reporting of the news There should be journalistic ideals And integrity that govern that. But as far as the slant of the network... Could there be a...

Could that it also be an argument made that the people who Watch Fox News, the conservative voice is an older voice, a voice that, or an audience, I should say, the conservative audience is an older audience that sits at home and watches their TV as opposed to the other side,

the more liberal, they don't necessarily consume news the same way. Like, I'm not sitting at home watching CNN. I get my news either in articles, social media. Like, you know what I mean? So could there be an argument for that? Like CNN is going to have to almost... Thanks.

Thanks. It's a fantastic point. But one that in the end of the day, doesn't matter. No, you're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. People come home, they race home, they're like, hey,

God damn it. Get this motherfucking blood light out of my goddamn refrigerator Marjorie. I need a motherfuckin fucking Papped Blue Ribbon so I can watch my Tucker Carlson. You know what I mean?

And us, you know, we'd be that ah, nigger. Oh shit, whatever. We're not watching. We only watch Don Lemon if something crazy happened. But no, you're right. But they need that viewer. So either

niggas got put all for left leaning, which I wouldn't call seeing any necessarily left leading. It's another fucking capitalist institution that represents really the Wall Street brand of Democrats that aren't really much about shit anyway, but whatever.

Last thing I'll say about the Trump thing. You know what I realized about the Trump thing? There's a reason why I like when when Trump is on TV. I like when Trump is on TV. Why? Because I don't trust y'all. Why? I don't trust y'all. You don't trust who?

The y'all that is mad that I'm like, put them on, I don't trust them. And this is the bad part. I am Trump. I'm like Trump. I'm very Trump-like. So there's only two. reasons that there's only two reasons that Trump does what he does. Either Trump does what he does because he's

a psychopath which is true. And the other reason why is because he knows that he doesn't really have very much to say. And so he has to use fear. Right? And fear of this always gets people to do something.

That's because he doesn't think much of his electorate, much of his constituency. He doesn't think that if he really broke down and spoke to their needs, that that would work. And he probably doesn't have the intellectual acumen

that really do that anyway. And he's probably not someone who could make the case that what he's doing is great for America in any real way anyway. So it's always going to be about who his enemies are

and all of that stuff. I'm kind of the same. I just don't see people working hard enough. I don't see people doing the, like, doing the required reading

to contextualize where the country is right now, where the country is, been like I talk to people and I'm not saying that I'm the smartest guy in the world, but I'm saying that I try that I try every single day to understand what's happening, to be up on things and get it and to know why and what I'm voting for and how I need to do it. And I get it wrong all the time, but I'm making an effort.

And the only thing that seems to work on other people is fear. And so when I see Trump and I see people getting mad, I'm like, that's good. It's good that they're mad because the boogeyman will make. them pray to God. They won't pray just because they think the pages of the Bible are beautiful or because they feel God in the world somewhere. They'll pray because Satan's in front of them. Or they'll give themselves to God because they see saints in front of them. You know what I mean? And so to me, when I see Trump and I see all you guys up in arms and really upset, I'm like, great. That'll get them out there. Because if we start having conversations about other things that are going on in America

and about how these things are happening, I just see people who give way more of a before. fuck about love is blind. And I'm not, it's not even in a bad way. I watch all kinds of MCU movies and stuff, but like, I try to understand what's happening. So like when I see Trump and I see everybody mad, I'm like, good. That's what we need. But you're not like Trump because you don't lie to people.

Because Trump, people, so, oh, you do. Niggins tell a couple of lies, baby. Tell a couple of lies, baby. Oh, we heard your whole take about color change. Oh, look, that's not a lie. I don't know them like that. I'm just, look, look, girl. You come at the black organization, I just know, what's what you on,

nigga? Well, whatever. Maybe we need to look into it before. Poor Sean. We had Sean on here. I thought it was good. I don't fuck with Sean. I'm beyond.

Sean didn't. I don't, I don't, I don't, to show. I will say one thing that I want to make sure that this is clear. So we know. The two insidences that are that are

outlined in the article, just so people know. Because I think sometimes when I was talking, I might have conflated two different things like Rachel said. One is the senior campaign team manager who was investigated in 2022. that he sexually assaulted an employee.

He was cleared by a wrongdoing by the Human Resources Department. He was removed from the organization a short time later. That is the all-hands kind of thing that we were thought. Rashad came on all hands and did all of that. That's in 2022.

The 2020 issue is a different issue like Rachel said. And it was around someone who was accused of bullying, harassment, and gender discrimination in 2020. That person quietly left the organization after being cleared by human resources investigation. And then the woman who first reported him was terminated. So those are two different situations right there.

One guy is in, one guy I was in senior leadership. You know, it doesn't say if these people were men. that would have to be though, right? They would have to be. I don't know. There was something that I read that I thought one was a woman. But I don't want to say that wrong

because I was like, wait. It doesn't specifically say. Don't specify it. Yeah, it doesn't specifically say that these people were men. So those are two different issues. And you guys can read the article for yourself and come fuck over me later.

All right. All right, let's go. Real quick. No, wait, wait, wait, wait, no, I want to do something. It was in the rundown. I don't want to get into it, but you saw the news that allegedly Ron DeSantis is about to enter into the 2024 presidential race. He's gearing all up for it, apparently rented out a hotel space. I know we're not looking forward to that.

I know it's going to be a battle, but I am looking forward to the battle between Trump and DeSantis. for this reason alone. Donnie hit it. DeSantis has his dirty fingers all over senior entitlements. Like cutting Medicare, slashing social security, even raising our retirement age. Tell Ron DeSantis to keep his pudding fingers off our money. Oh, and somebody get this man a spoon. Rachel, I'm telling you, you like Trump, man.

You, Rachel, right? Hold on. You see this? I've seen it. It is funny. Rachel, you. See? Rachel, you?

Wait. Guys, if you have not seen this, allegedly there's this rumor that Ron DeSantis was eating pudding, which is troublesome enough, which is bad enough. He couldn't find a spoon. So he decided to eat the chocolate pudding with his fingers. So a Trump pack decided to make a video about DeSantis's dirty fingers in everything. you have to watch the video because it's two fingers constantly digging into chocolate pudding

and it ends with empty pudding little pudding things. It's disgusting. And I want to see more of this. I want to see this. This is what I can't wait for. Do you think Desanthus has- I mean there's a lot of other problematic stuff, but this is funny. Do you think that Desantis has what it takes to go toe to toe with Trump?

Absolutely not. I don't think he can get as dirty as Trump is. I think DeSantis, which is the dangerous thing, his response is to continue to do more outrageous stuff because as I've said before on this podcast, he's such a big shot in Florida, except for the Disney thing is really coming back to Biden, but he's such a big shot in Florida

that he's drinking his own Kool-Aid, and I don't think that it's going to have the same impact on the rest of the country. And his way to outbeat Trump is if I keep doing all this outrageous, of stuff to play into this base. I don't think it's going to work. Trump's just going to get down and dirty.

The pudding fingers is the best thing you got to say. We should say that real quick. Disney is trying to put the mouse dick to Florida. They pulled the plug on a $1 billion office complex. It would have been about 2,000 jobs to the region. A thousand employees are meant to be relocated from Southern California. They're going to move from Southern California down there, but not and not because of pudding fingers.

Mr. Putting fingers. By the way, you said two fingers, I think he was getting three fingers up in that thing. I think he was getting three fingers up in that thing. You freaking motherfucker, Ronnie, Ron. Ron and Dean put three fingers in that thing. How do you know that pudding can handle that, Ronnie? How do you know that pudding can handle that?

You got to get that pudding ready. You can't just put their fingers in that dry like that. You look at something, Ronnie. You sexy motherfucker. fingers all in that chocolate. You, Ronnie, Ronnie, what's your doing? Just get ready for a year of Trump calling him putting fingers. I can't wait.

See? That's how we get fucked over. Oh, you know what? So, fine. We will do one more because I want to know what you think about this. I really do. This episode is brought to you by Spectrum Business. Fast, reliable internet means everything for your business.

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Manage your activity with our consumer protection tools. So Matt Healy, do you know who that is? We talked about 1975 because I was not familiar with them at all. prior to this, you were saying how you're a fan of 1975. And I was like, oh, I've never heard of them. Rachel, thank you for reminding the people that I'm a fan of in 1975. That really is going to help me. You may not be anymore.

That's really going to help me with this next thing. By the way, you guys, fuck it. I'm a piece of shit. But you educated me on, you educated me on who they were. I did not know is more of my point. But so, yes, now, thanks to you, I am familiar with Matt Healy. So I love the 1975. I've always liked them.

I was listening to them in FIFA. When FIFA came out and the city was, on there and I'm like, yo, I like the way they sound. And so I've been listening to them for a while. Matt Healy, the lead singer, is an odd bird. Odd for many different reasons. Oh, that's one way to describe him. So look, he is apparently

Taylor Swift's boyfriend as well. I don't know that that's the case, but they're rumored to be in a relationship together. People are mad at Taylor because he said a lot of fucking weird ass shit on a podcast. I want to talk about one specific part of it. He talked about Ice Spice. Okay. And he,

and in talking about Ice Spice, and there are other things that Matt Healy did. Like, he was rumored to have thrown up a Nazi salute. It looks like he throws up a Nazi salute

while saying Kanye's name at a show one time. I think that it was said about that that what he was trying to do because he had Kanye's name in that song, he was trying to criticize Kanye and throwing up the Nazi salute

was him saying, Kanye is a Nazi now. I don't know. Why don't you throw up the middle finger or something? There's so many other symbols. Like if you, that's not it. It's type of shit why people do this. This type of people watch you.

Hey, I threw up a Nazi salute because I'm with you guys. That's basically what he's saying. I did the salute because I'm with y'all. You don't get it. It's a dog whistle. But in this, in this, this podcast, it was called the Adam Friedland show. He talked about Ice Spice's ethnicity. Talked about how attractive people's ice spice is.

Then he goes on to talk about him liking a site called ghetto gathers. Had you heard of this before? Of course. I had not. I know you haven't heard of it. You're not in the life. Okay. At least you admit it.

Hi, I'm Van Lathen. You're not, of course. Hi, Van. I never, I will say this. I will say this. I am not a fan of the ghetto gagger site, okay? Not at all. What ghetto giggers is,

these guys have ever seen ghetto gags, is ghetto gagers, it'll be four or five white guys, and there'll be black talent that comes in, and they essentially destroy the lady, whoever she is. It's normally a multiple guy gangbanks. Sometimes in the back,

there'll be like a Confederate flag. You know what I mean? Damn. You guys, there was a site back in the day, called Springthomas.com and it was a little white girl, her name was Spring Thomas. And at first it started off as,

hey, black guys destroying this little white girl. Then it graduated to fuck me, nigga fuck me. And that... Oh my God. Porn, there's a specific part of porn.

That race play and race sort of degrading is like a big part of it. like a big, big part of it. Like people who want to see white women degraded, destroyed, four or five black guys destroying the shit out of a white girl.

And then there's another part of it where it'll be four or five black guys, four or five white guys destroying the shit out of an Asian lady. And they'll call it like, I don't know, I'm not going to make up a name or something stupid.

This is a part of porn. Because it's playing to people's entire. And then the, dark, dark. The ghetto gagger's thing is, you know, you'd see those sites. Sometimes if you'd be on a message board or something, you'd say, I'd be like, God, damn.

Oh, my God, a message board? Jesus, Van der Leif. I'm not going to be, I was in the life. I'm not in the life. I know. I'm glad you've been saved. Yeah. And so, what I'm saying about this is I, as soon as he said this, I knew which site that as soon as I read it, because they didn't say ghetto gaggers, I knew what site I was talking about. Play the audio, the ghetto gaggers audio,

We can have a little bit of a broader conversation. She was like, I forgot my water bottle in there. So she went back in and Maddie, like, on his phone and then on his like 77-inch OLED, she's got ghetto gagers blaring 30 seconds after the hang. It's just going. Just hardcore pornography. I heard that story. The only part that bothered me was airplane.

Well, that's what you text me. immediately being like, I just need the info on the story. Like, why on earth? Like, why, how psychopathic do you have to be to like, airplay porn to your like TV? I remember when porn on the phone became a thing and everybody's like, oh, this is weird.

And it's like, no, that's what I always wanted to be. I want to jam. I want to be hunched over. Yeah, yeah. Get the phone jammed in my face. Yeah. You know, jacking off on my own face. All right, cut it off.

Okay. Okay, I'm not that much in the life. There's some limits. There's some things there that I haven't gotten to. Okay, ghetto gaggers. Matt Healy likes ghetto gagers. This is kind of in the same vein of the David Cho situation, although David Cho alleged that he actually hurt a black one.

Right. So that makes that situation something much more serious than it needs to be dealt. Question of you. Does it bother you if a white dude's kink is watching a black woman sexually humiliated and like having rough sex with a bunch of white guys with a racial component. Because there's a racial component to get a woman.

Absolutely. Well, no, absolutely. Because the way it's described is it's about humiliating and sexually dominating black women to the point of where physical violence coupled with jokes about poverty, welfare, slavery, putting women in nooses, etc. So you asked me if I'm bothered absolutely by it. Does this problematic absolutely? One, you have a desire to watch it, right? You want to see black women degraded.

And then two, that gets you off. Not only do you like to see it, it arouses you to see black women degraded. I mean, where the fuck is Taylor Swift in all of this? I'm sorry. I am sorry for what Taylor stands for and I know you're like there is, I'm sorry

you think Taylor shouldn't have to say anything this is Taylor has been Taylor has been photographed with this man. He has been at her shows at the very least they are friends and now your alleged friend is I'm sorry a racist. You are aroused

and you sexually get off to black women being degraded in a racist way. Nooses, slavery, welfare, and you laugh about it and you joke about it and then you say it in a public way, which means there's absolutely no shame for you. I would not want to be affiliated with this person. And for the things that, and I'm not a Swifty, and for the things that Taylor, but I do know what Taylor talks about and what Taylor stands for. And I don't understand why you would want to be associated with a person who not on one

occasion, multiple occasions, is affiliated with problematic, racist, anti-Semitic things. This is an issue. This man is disgusting. Beyond that, repulsive. And you're guilty by association in some, I'm not saying this is Taylor. I'm just saying, why would you not want to separate yourself from somebody like this? This is easy. You apparently just started.

Okay. So they've known each other for a long time. So they started the romantic part. They know each other for a long time. Okay, so here's my thing. And I'm going to be honest about this. There's a part of me that's desensitized to this type of stuff. I'm just going to be honest with you.

And, like, I could never, I swear on the life of my father that I've never in life watched a ghetto back or scene. I mean, obviously, that's not the type of thing that I'm going to be into, right? Then what are you desensitized to? The porn or the content of the porn? I'm desensitized to that existing in porn. Because I have. And you don't.

even watch it. Right. But what I'm saying is, I have watched like white ladies. Other ladies being humiliated. Like I have. Not like I don't like to watch it, but that's porn. Like you have not even, not really being humiliated. Let me let me make sure I'll say this right. Because not really being humiliated or degraded. For me, you know what? I actually haven't watched white ladies being humiliated. But it sometimes seems like they're being humiliated because the whole purpose of the scene is look at this big black guy and this white woman, boom. You know what I'm saying?

So like a site like black dot com, it's not really humiliation, but the whole thing is huge black dude white white. You know what I mean? So that's the whole purpose of it. But like anything that has to do with beating or spinning or choking or any of that stuff, like it immediately fucks with me

because I'm like, that looks like it hurts. So I'm not really, I'm not into that. So I'm not, that's not something that I'm into. But I do know that people are. And like people are into it in like a real way. There are other sites. There's a site called kink.com. A site that I can't really enjoy any of the content really on there because it's

ballgags and electrocuting people and people with their eyes like, Like they're about to cry. All right. Scaras running. Do you think it's a problem that you're desensitized? I mean, I was in the life. Okay?

But I'm just saying, I'm not, I'm not, listen, I appreciate your honesty. I'm just saying, do you think it's a problem? I'm only, the shit is massively popular. I have absolutely no qualms about talking about who I am on the podcast. Of course it is. Degrading black women, not popular. Of course. Getto gag is actually not that popular.

when I'm talking about Oh, I thought you were saying that site. The ghetto gackers is actually not that popular because it's not a site And yet he knows of it. It's not a site that gets the top tier talent to go on it because if you do a ghetto gagger scene, I'm just being for real.

If you do a ghetto gagger scene, you're looked at it in a certain way. So ghetto gackers is actually not that popular. It's a site that's more of a neat site that has a strong fan base. But what I'm saying is, porn where people are humiliated and degraded and treated in a,

certain way is popular. And it's not just popular in porn. All of that spit in my mouth, choke me, all of that stuff. There's a fine line between that stuff and what it is that we're talking about now. And there's a racial component, but porn has that racial component. So what I'm wondering, and the only reason why I'm bringing this up is just as a thought exercise, just as a thought exercise. What I'm wondering about is we're told not to kinkshane people. Because in this case, he's not saying that he's ever degraded or humiliated black people.

We're told not to kinkshame people. We're saying, hey, it's a kink. Don't kink shame people. Is there a level to a kink to where you feel like it should be shamed? This is shame. Gotcha. This is shame. It's very particular to, I mean, all the kinky stuff, I'm not even going to get into that,

but this is very particular, a site dedicated to degrading black women. We talked multiple times about how black women are disrespected in this country. And I think my issue, and I want to bring it back to Taylor, I'm sorry. This is the issue that I have. No. I'm listening to you. Taylor stands for women power, girl power. She fights for LGBTQ plus rights.

And I have an issue with white feminists sometimes because when it comes to standing up for black women and how they're treated and looked at in society, there seems to be this silence. And this is very particular what he's doing to do. grade black women. And there hasn't been a peep out of you. And the reason that I brought this, I put this in the higher learning chat, is because nobody, not enough people are talking about it. And it's problematic. And I'm not saying I need an apology. I know that's what y'all probably think. I'm not saying I need an apology from Taylor. I'm not saying I'm not even necessarily, I don't even, I need her to acknowledge it. I need her to acknowledge it. But before you said you wanted her to condemn it before you said you wanted her to break up with her boyfriend. I bet you. Well,

I don't understand why you would want to be with someone like this. I don't even understand what he knows what he's into. Well, even worse, but I want her to condemn this type of degradation against black women. That's what I want her to do. I want her to condemn it. Do you want to start a campaign to get ghetto gagers off the internet? I'm serious. I'm asking me.

By the way, get it. I mean, I'm fully. I'm fully just aware of. Sure. I should say this. I should say this. By black porn facts. Like I said, I was on the message board for a while. The people that know the message board, they know the message board.

Okay. For, for, they have long, long, long, long, criticized, like, uh, fucking attacked and gone at the site for a long time. it's been a hot button issue. A hot button issue to assert to a hot button issue to the degree that if you actually are black female talent and you did one of those scenes,

like they would criticize you and they would reflect on you poorly and they would be like, I can't believe she did this. She's a sellout because she did this and blah, blah, blah. The way that I know that there's the Confederate flag and that they do that is because they were posted still from the scene and go, look what she let them do to her. Blah, blah, blah, blah. So it's long been a site that was when I was still in the life that was criticized. Everything comes back.

See, if I didn't know anything about, see, you judge, but if I didn't know anything about ghetto gackers, I wouldn't have the wealth of knowledge that I have right now. It all comes back. I'm not judging. I literally said I appreciate you for your honesty. But like, we got to talk about stuff like this. Okay, so you say that Taylor should, A, condemn Matt Healy. Condem it.

possibly break up with him? I would disassociate myself. It's not a good look. But I guarantee you a lot of people don't know about it. A lot of people probably don't know. All right. Okay. It's a tough show today.

Me and Rachel have been mixing it up. Okay? I'm going to go to a Taylor concert with a poster. Of ghetto gackers? Matt Healy. Matt Healy watches. Matt Healy degrades black women. No, this is the poster you should write.

Taylor, don't gag on racism. Matt Healy. Okay, that's it. Take thing caps off, but do not stop learning. I'm Van Lathen, Jr. And I am Rachel Lennon.