From Jive Turkey to No Cap: How Language, Love, and Manhood Changed

speaker-0: What is up, y'all? We are back. GMG, grown man game. I'm your boy, Mike. I'm back with my brother from another mother and another father. It didn't pause, we were just waiting for Rod to say his name.

speaker-1: man, my bad, I didn't know. I thought you was finna say something else. Your boy, we talked about that, you a grown man. I'm your boy, I'm a grown man. But I'm Rod, this big Mike, he trippin' right now, it's all good. We here though. Ready to do it.

speaker-0: We here. You're to get it on, It's good, man. How you been? How's everything?

speaker-1: I'm blessed, blessed and highly favored as they would say. I'm feeling good, this weather, this reprieve. We had a little rain last week.

speaker-0: Telling the people about the rain, It never rains in Southern California, though.

speaker-1: Yeah, you're right. You're right. It never rains. That's what they tell me. Yeah. So nice, sunny ⁓ California winter. So I'm excited. I can't complain at all, brother.

speaker-0: Right. Yeah, man, good, man. Same, bro. Same. Feeling good. Weather's finally back where it needs to be. Spoiled, man. Just spoiled. Everything's moving forward like I want it to move forward. Man, you've been doing a bang up job on our social medias, man. This guy, if you see the post, 97.2 % is from him.

speaker-1: Yeah. I seen you get in there throw yourself under the bus though. I was funny. I contemplated putting that on there and I was like, I don't know if that's like, yeah, I don't want to, you know, throw, I don't know how much tip is looking at it. I don't want to, you know, stir up nothing. So I didn't post it and then you posted it. I'm like, oh yeah, okay, game. Let me go ahead and comment on that.

speaker-0: Come on man, yeah, I talked to her first. I ain't crazy. Let me give you some grown man game very early. Communication is the key. You want your relationship to work.

speaker-1: Yeah, one Whatever you think, right? Because you have a pretty good idea of where this is going to go. Like when you post something like that, you have a pretty good idea. She ain't going to really trip. But double check. Like, you know what mean? Measure twice, cut once. Like don't mess around. Throw it out there because you can't get it back. It's going to be back. Ain't no striking it from the record. The jury already heard it, homie. Yeah. Yeah.

speaker-0: Get it off the internet! Yeah, but man, besides that, everything's copasthetic.

speaker-1: What does that even mean? I don't know. That's like an old 80's thing. My dad used to say that. You're copasetic. Copasetic man. You're not slick to a can of oil.

speaker-0: Don't fall for the okie doke man, you better watch out.

speaker-1: And when you was a jive turkey, you just talk like that. Yeah, man, that's is funny how how language changes and like slang changes to stuff is like cool back then. Some of it will come back around. Like I know my kids say some stuff now that we used to say. But just looking back at some of the stuff we used to say or we used to say, think. Black slang, for the most part, other than jive turkey and stuff like that.

speaker-0: Sucker think he bad in me, huh? Yeah. Yeah, man.

speaker-1: It typically lasts longer. Right? Like it's got a longer shelf life. Like I don't think people would say that, you know, that's bad anymore. Like, you remember you talk about something being good, you say it's bad. But like my daughter say tough all the time. That's tough. Nobody used to say that. Or like that's hard. Like, yeah. So some of it will stick around. It'll make a circle, right? It'll go away for little bit and come back in the order. But I don't see Jive Turkey ever come.

speaker-0: Nah, Jive Turkey is gone.

speaker-1: That's such a, ugh, that's such a like, I like it. Even when like we used to watch the, the Blaxploitation movies, like, like Shaft and the Pimp and the Mac, not sorry, not the Pimp, the Mac, Dolomite, all them kind of movies and they'd be talking at that Jive. Man, that was an era. That was an

speaker-0: area.

speaker-1: And we'll never have it again. I guess they tried to create it though with the Brain Rot stuff where they'd be like, not us, this is like social media language with all the little stuff they were saying like ⁓ Skibbity Rizzler and Ohio and all that stuff. Yeah, that stuff is akin to Jive Turkey. This is like, yeah, that don't make sense.

speaker-0: Jesus. Six seven. Hey, it's going away.

speaker-1: Yeah, I'm glad that's starting to die out. Yeah, it's ran its course. It was heavy. It was heavy in the streets. It hit the streets like the crack, like crack. was an epidemic.

speaker-0: when Maddie was getting her number for volleyball and one of her friends got sick seven, everybody went crazy. ⁓ my God. ⁓ All right. All right.

speaker-1: is not a good number and in any unless you play like offensive tackle right six seven is not a good number for any other we can't play hoop at number 67 yeah and now at guard number 60 some man boo get him out of here number 67 get the out of here but yeah I don't know where we going with this but yeah no more six sevens no jive turn

speaker-0: You You More success, dry turkey gone. Yeah. I don't know, man. I don't really remember. I mean, you were clowning me a couple of episodes ago about being off the heezy, you know what saying? the heezy. Yeah, see?

speaker-1: Easy for she. I'm from the Bay though, man. We in Venice lane. Y'all just, y'all just, yeah, we was born in it. Yeah, we were born in it. Yeah.

speaker-0: I'm do that. You all have some amazing, I mean, for Shigadel, I said that a lot.

speaker-1: So your favorite rappers begin a lingo from Got a of a yeah, we we I mean listen you name it we started it

speaker-0: Hella, yeah. Hmm, okay, what about jacking? feel like that's from us, Southern Cali. ⁓ The jack move.

speaker-1: I don't think so. ⁓ Okay. I don't know. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Because y'all was robbing each other left and right. So maybe. Yeah. Y'all had no respect for each other.

speaker-0: car jackins. Come on man. We got jacked. Do try to jack me.

speaker-1: God jack. Yeah, maybe y'all got that. I guess if you wanna-

speaker-0: Okey doke. I don't know. I'm throwing it out.

speaker-1: I feel like Okie Dog came from like Cowboys. Oklahoma somewhere. I feel like Okie Dog was an old, old, old slang. I feel like somebody was chewing on a stick of straws. Don't fall for the Okie Dog. That's like the real McCoy ⁓ way back when. You had on overalls and a cowboy hat, some shit-kicking boots back then. Okie Dog.

speaker-0: See now you trippin'. Yeah.

speaker-1: Y'all, y'all, say that? Yeah. Like like like Ned Flanders, like Okoli Dogoli.

speaker-0: Like, hey, don't fall for the okie-dokie. ⁓ she say she ain't got no boyfriend, man. But I mean, I know she batted and all that, but don't fall for the okie-dokie. Yeah, batted. I don't know if that came from Masterpiece.

speaker-1: Yeah. Who also spent a good amount of time

speaker-0: ⁓ I don't know. I know the ice cream, man. I know that came from Rich.

speaker-1: Yeah, I'm telling you man, the Bay Area birth, it's language. And everybody adopted it. That's cool, that's cool. We ain't mad, we share. Never cuz. Gangling though, y'all got it on the gangling. You know when I first moved down here and nobody would say birthday? Like cake day or like sea day. Happy birthday, happy B day. What? Happy B day?

speaker-0: It's me

speaker-1: ⁓ man, it's birthday, dawg. Like, why are we acting like this? That's crazy. I can't even have a birthday?

speaker-0: Be careful, ⁓ Why you can't have birthday, You can't have a cousin, that's your family member. relative. ⁓

speaker-1: No, HBD Happy birthday Y'all just make y'all take the fun out everything man Can't even wear cool hats out here. You gotta be careful get your block knocked off you wear the wrong hat

speaker-0: Hey, hey man hat man. That's crazy. Out here in the beautiful birds you wear whatever you want.

speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, yeah. In L.A. County, In L.A. city limits. You gots to be careful.

speaker-0: No Seattles, no, no Houston, no New York, no.

speaker-1: No Phillies. Yeah, nothing. No nothing.

speaker-0: No nothing, man. Just don't wear a hat, man.

speaker-1: Yeah, yeah, you just can't wear certain colors. And I even like the traditional colors like blues and reds, everybody. can't, purple might get you.

speaker-0: Yeah, purple might get you killed, orange might get you killed.

speaker-1: Dude, like, come on, man, these are just the colors.

speaker-0: That baby blue might get you killed, brown might get you killed. But ain't nothing happening to me, cuz you know why? Cuz I'm not in none of them areas where-

speaker-1: Can't do nothing, man.

speaker-0: I about what color I'm wearing. I remember, so we went to ⁓ a photo walk. It's just to put together this like really dope photo walk where you're walking down Crenshaw and you're in like Lamar Park. And my homegirl was like, ⁓ okay, Della. Della was like, okay, now y'all go on to the photo walk. Make sure you don't wear this, that, and the third. I said, it is not 1987, man. We straight, we good. We wore what we wore. Black folks everywhere. started at the Balling Hills Mall, walked around, hit Crenshaw, went to LeMur Park. Beautiful day, man. ⁓

speaker-1: It is. But man, just one street over the Lamar Park, you walk around and you won't come back. And it's crazy because you go to Lamar Park and it's like a nice little area and you have like the Hebrew Israelite to be on your head on one corner and then there'd be some some Crips on the other. I'm like, damn, let me just duck into this library real quick. I don't want to hear what neither one of y'all got to say.

speaker-0: Amen. ⁓ Yeah. See brother, what up God damn man. I didn't try to come and chill on a nice Sunday, man.

speaker-1: Nah, get back in the car. Yeah, went to see Misty When the girls were still doing ballet, we went and saw Misty Copeland at the bookstore, the black bookstore down there. And he literally, he was in one corner. The was on one corner with a bullhorn telling people they wasn't black or whatever they were saying. And on the other corner, was just some things hanging out. Like, god, Lee. You're just right in the middle of a rockin' hard place, huh? Get in this bookstore, get this autograph, and get the hell up outta here.

speaker-0: Listen, Hebrews are like, they're gonna take your head off. ⁓

speaker-1: No, they're not. That's what you feel bad about. Right. About being black. Black.

speaker-0: You ain't black. You ain't black. You one of the original people. You a Canaanite, brother. Yeah. Okay, man.

speaker-1: Love y'all, man. I appreciate the intensity. But I wonder, my aunt is now a Hebrew, is it like, I want to ask her, like, how did that happen? Like, how did you, how did you convert? Like, what was the aggressive thing that they said to you when you was walking past them that made you go, they're right. really, like, here's one thing that I will say, though, and I feel the same way about,

speaker-0: to be in his video.

speaker-1: a lot of people when they're really devout in their religion is the knowledge base that they have, not only about their religion, but others. That's not enviable, but that's an admirable thing to be able to have that kind of ⁓ extensive knowledge on any topic. So I always appreciate that. I feel like I'm cool anywhere. I have a conversation with someone about something and I'm like, just in awe and all the stuff that they know, but then I walk away and- On the grand scheme of things, like, all right, cool, you got me converted. Now I believe that I believe what you believe and now what we doing together. You got me. I'm all in. So now we're just going, now what is our goal? just, I guess it's missionary work technically, right? Like you're going and spreading the gospel or whatever your religion is. But sometimes it just be like, just bashing people for not knowing, not knowing what you know. It's like weird.

speaker-0: Mm-hmm. Fancy Crazy.

speaker-1: how you get me to sign up and join you and drink the Kool-Aid, when you tell me, man, they got you.

speaker-0: I ain't washed, brother! I ain't washed, brother! Sir, can I just get a fish sandwich please? That's all I came for. I never had beef- ⁓ man.

speaker-1: Yes, to a great. Bean pie. Have you had bean pie? So good. So good. So in Detroit, I used to work on the East side a lot. first of all, I forgot where we were, but somewhere on the East side, it's an intersection and it passes off, know, selling the final word or whatever and bean pie. Right in the middle of the intersection, you get like a little personal bean pie for like two bucks. It's obviously more now. This is 20 years ago.

speaker-0: speaks brother

speaker-1: but like two bucks, ⁓ man, perfect. ⁓ fire, fire. It kind of give you ⁓ a sweet potato pie vibe.

speaker-0: Yeah. Okay. But he talked to me more. Now we know we talking, you know what saying? Because you got this.

speaker-1: The pie is better than the sweet potato pie. I'm on record of saying it. This is why the... You need to eat more pie. Because your lights don't like me.

speaker-0: Or ⁓ get more bean pies in your system. You know what? Nah, pumpkin pie is trash.

speaker-1: I don't know what they got in the recipe, but the bean pie and the fish plate, don't know what they're doing to it, but it's always fire. I haven't had one bad bean pie or one bad fish plate.

speaker-0: It was made by the will of Allah.

speaker-1: They put the spirit in that. That's how you get me to convert.

speaker-0: Either Rod goes to the bean pie or the bean pie comes to Rod. Now y'all don't start boycotting me because I'm making jokes, all right?

speaker-1: That's it. Boycott him. It's all right. We're uncancelledable. Because we can just keep recording. You ain't gonna come in here and shut off the power.

speaker-0: I guess you can boycott me, it's fine. You gonna get these jokes. Yeah, man. So, what we getting into, man? What's on the plate?

speaker-1: I mean, we're getting to the group chat. I think we've got a couple of really pertinent topics as always, right? I think there's some things that kind of came up that we've seen or shared between us in regards to relationship and how we show up for each other. Talking about another podcast and kind of what happened there, I think is kind of popular right now, right? ⁓ Before we get into that, should we hit a congratulations?

speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, man, that's...

speaker-1: Let me say this. Congratulations, brother, on joining me on this another episode. I just got an email to our grown man game email the other day. And it was, or maybe it was today. ⁓ It's always somebody selling something. But one of the lines in the email was like, congratulations, you've recorded more episodes than most people. People typically fall off at this point. And we still rocking. man. ⁓

speaker-0: Right and like we beat God's Hey, we ain't in jail at 21 Podcast popping I feel like I Need to make another another goal man so I can keep pushing myself

speaker-1: Yeah, that's how it works, right? Create a goal, reach a goal, create another goal. Get back to work in the process. Yeah, but I feel like we got a good little system going. Episodes are coming out clean. Social media stuff is doing well. And I think we just stay consistent and keep trapping. Keep trapping.

speaker-0: Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Look at the call switch. The nigga came out. It came right up out of him.

speaker-1: It's ⁓ man, excuse me guys, I'm sorry. I misspoke. But yeah, man, congratulations on being the inspiration to getting this thing going and keeping it going.

speaker-0: He missed. Yes, really did. First of all, Shug, you were the inspiration. You held me over the table.

speaker-1: Nah, I just put it out there. Big red. It ⁓ took for you to actually commit though, right? And then we got into it. But I threw some breadcrumbs. I'm not gonna lie.

speaker-0: You know what, congratulations to you for having the idea. Yeah, getting me right. It takes a lot because I'm a very...

speaker-1: You ain't

speaker-0: So when I'm up, yeah, let me go left.

speaker-1: Okay, well you're here now, so yeah.

speaker-0: we hear I'm can't do nothing but just record and go home, you know, so. ⁓ This has been a blessing, you know what saying? It's been fun. I feel like our friendship has gotten deeper because of the podcast. Being more open with each other and, you know, knowing that you were not a robot or a serial killer is awesome.

speaker-1: That's it. I mean, if I was a serial killer, this would be a good way to get you to not believe it.

speaker-0: Alright y'all, so we made it to episode number 10. Signing off.

speaker-1: Yeah, right. That's the full episode. Yeah, that's it. Let's wrap it up, Get the wrap it up box. Now, but let's wait. Sorry. Did you have anything? No. Segue. Yeah, let's jump into the the group chat. Do you want to start with my good brother, good brother, Pinky Clifton Powell had a roundtable and I don't really understand. Like I didn't I only saw this. I'm be completely honest. I started to watch it.

speaker-0: Nah, go ahead man.

speaker-1: got sidetracked with something else, came back to it. I haven't seen the full thing all the way through. So let me say that context is key and I seen the full podcast to be like, ⁓ okay, this is where and why he said what he said. So I'm gonna start by saying like, I really didn't understand the panel. Like how did we select these people to be on the panel? Not that there's anything wrong with anyone, but I didn't see where like, we go, ⁓ let me bring him on because he got this perspective on it and bring him on and then can share. Like it was just like a kind of a random grouping of people. And maybe that was it, right? Like you take a random sample size of people, like, hey man, would you be interested in joining the panel? And he was like, ⁓ yeah, I'll do it. So maybe that was it. But I didn't see, like Clifton Powell is the, he's the sore thumb in the group. You know what I mean? Like, and maybe that was intentional, but like.

speaker-0: Thanks

speaker-1: he is generationally completely different than everybody in the group. I think even stylistically, he's different than everybody in the group. Because I don't know Clifton Powell, I've seen him before. I don't know him, but he is who he is. Every character that he's played has been very similar, and he is very similar to those characters. Like Pinky. Mine is like, obviously Pinky's a little over the top. But if you watch this podcast and you see when he gets frustrated, it looks like Pinky. You know what mean? it's so. Wait a minute, young man, let me tell you. Right.

speaker-0: Yeah Hey, hold on. Hold on, Cliff.

speaker-1: God damn it, hitting him turns made me spill this yak on this $200 suit. Like you get that from him, right? And so, and that's cool. And we talked about in previous episodes, the ability to be authentically who you are in all spaces. I like that. However, I don't think they did him any favors by having him be kind of the only one that is, cause you're like, all right, let's get a panel together and we can still talk about black women and talk about like black men and black women. All right, so we got the, ⁓ damn, we need an old guy. And let me just, you know, just throw him in there. Like, not that he isn't deserving. I think he deserved to be there. ⁓ I think he has some important things to say for himself and for his generation. ⁓ I just don't think it was, it was well matched. know, I think he was an outlier and that made it tough for him to make some of his points.

speaker-0: Check us out

speaker-1: You know, now that his points were valid, they were valid. I agreed with some of what he was saying, but I think just because he was the only one saying it, there was no echo. There's nobody to support him in what he was saying. Like, for example, we was talking about. He's about to be 70 and he just learned how to love. Now, if there was at least somebody who was 50, you know, or in their 40s, it looked like everybody in the panel was in their 20s. 30s, And so.

speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah, 20s and 30s.

speaker-1: It's gonna be hard for them to resonate with what he's talking about, but I, as a 40 year old man, I heard him say that, and he just learned how to love, and I was like, damn, that makes sense, right? Because he comes from a generation of men who were stoic, right? Or had to be kind of hard on the exterior, and depending on where you're from, maybe even hard on the interior. And men were like a man's man, and it was a period of time. during Clifton's life where you could smack a woman and it was okay. It wasn't okay, but people did it. Women were in a different place in terms of how they were treated by men and treated by society.

speaker-0: I don't ⁓

speaker-1: So you look at like how he and his formative adult years in a relationship, that ain't love if we look at it now, right? So now him as a seven year old man looking back at it, like, I really didn't know how to love. I loved the way that, you know, we were supposed to love in the seventies and eighties, which means I did what I was going to do and she was supposed to be understanding. And now that I'm older, I've talked to therapists, I've got a woman who's in a much better place emotionally and mentally. So she has shown me that I'm not. And he was like, I just, I wasn't aware. And then the argument kind of things kind of went off the rails. But again, I think with the group being so young, there's like this big gap between his generation and their generation. And there was no bridge in the middle to kind of be like, all right, young guys, we get it, right? You guys are completely aware and you're emotionally intelligent and you got all the things, right? And so you can't give him a pass for that. Got it. If he was your age. But at his age and where he lived through and came up through and all that stuff, like he was talking about his dad's parents were slaves. Like that's a very different life that he lived. Versus, know, the dudes who he was talking to live, you know. not necessarily two-parent households, but they look like good areas for the most part.

speaker-0: Maybe. Yeah, yeah, maybe. I don't want to, you know, jump out the window. Yeah, yeah.

speaker-1: Yeah, so like, they do now, right? Like they do now. So as men now, they live a very different life than he lived as an early young man when he was in their age. And so it was hard for them to give him a pass. And I don't think they should give him a pass, but I don't think they were as empathetic to what he was saying as maybe they should have been.

speaker-0: You know what, that's a good point because when I first saw it, I had sided with the other dude almost instantly. But I didn't notice, if y'all haven't seen the clip, basically Clifton Powell was what Rod is saying. It's just talking about how he just learned how to love at 69 and then experiencing love for the first real time in his purest form. And there was a younger dude that was just like, saying, know, my father, I haven't talked to my father in six years and I'm fine with that, I do not care. I'm not thinking about the past, I'm going forward through the future, right? And then he kind of jumps on Clifton Powell very quickly, like, here's some of the things that you're saying, but how come you old dudes get to that high age and now you're learning how to love?

speaker-1: Hmm.

speaker-0: And he's basically, his whole thought process was you're learning how to love now because you're gonna die soon. You're getting closer to death. Now you're like, I need to act right. I need to be more understanding. I need someone to be here to take care of me or I'm gonna be all alone and dying alone. That was his whole point, which I did find valid. But then, you know, just hearing you talk about like, dang, you know, yeah, you do gotta think about this dude being 69, which means what? It's 2026 now. Got me doing math on the show. So in 2000, was born He's born in 55? Yeah. OK, so let's say he's born in the 50s. 55, 56, probably 56, 57. But born in the 50s, being a, you know, coming, learning to be

speaker-1: You 55. It had to be. 56, 55, 56.

speaker-0: a young man, you know, his teenage years in the 60s. ⁓ And it doesn't even matter where he's from. If he was from the South is gonna be different. But even if he's from a major city like Chi town, LA or New York, it's still gonna be different. So depending on if he had the full extent of Jim Crow or the Jim Crow light in these bigger cities. brother still had to go through Jim Crow where, you know what saying? We just got out of, you know what saying? Black History Month. And I've been trying to, you know, just do more, more, you know, studying and researching about not just the items that we invented, but like, okay, what was going on?

speaker-1: Next episode, Mike gonna have on purple and gold.

speaker-0: That's it, Brothers and sisters, you need to wire heads up. Out there with them devils. But, ⁓ you know, there was like, if me and you got a car, we riding in our car in the Jim Crow South and the white man just runs into us and bow, hits us. It's our fault. No matter what. He ran into us and no matter, it's our fault. ⁓ There's something that our parents used to say to us, don't speak unless... spoken to, right? That was something that was happening in Jim Crow South, where if you spoke to a white man without a white man speaking to you first, that was an issue. Don't raise your mouth to a white man unless he's speaking to you first. So imagine growing up in that situation, having to navigate that. And then having to navigate love with that and never really learning, okay, I need to go talk to my therapist about these feelings that happened about what I went through during the Jim Crow in the 70s and you know, whatever. That's a lot, man.

speaker-1: Yeah, and there's nobody there to teach you, right? And I think one of his points too was like, in order for you to get to the level that they're saying he should be at in terms of like responsibility and ownership for love is you have to, if you aren't there yet, you have to be with or be around somebody who is. And so he wasn't or isn't or hasn't been until recently in the last few years, he hadn't gotten to a relationship with someone who was different than that. Which also makes sense, right? Because if you think about his age, the women he's dating are probably also his age, come from the same era, right? And they probably are accepting of that era's version of love, you know what mean? And so until you get with a woman who is like, hey, look, I know who I am and I know what I'm gonna accept and I know what love is and this is how you gonna treat me, you... treat her like, or you treat the other women like you've always treated them until somebody tells you, hey, this is not how, this is not how it's gonna be. And you learn from her that's how she needs to be loved. And so like I said, I think kind of being in the middle of age-wise of the two groups, I can see both sides of it. I definitely understand that there's an accountability piece that we all have to have. ⁓ I think there was like,

speaker-0: Your mind is not

speaker-1: there was some weird kind of like, in that particular interaction between Clifton and the younger gentlemen, where they kind of going back and forth about that. He had, it seemed like he had intention to kind of be like abrasive, you know what I mean? Like he came, he was a little hot coming into it. Like, cause when he was talking about his dad, like I didn't even know where that came, like where that connection was.

speaker-0: Yeah, ⁓ yeah

speaker-1: Like haven't talked to my father in six years or his family and I don't give a... I was like, I don't even know what that has to do with it. But like that was like his introduction to his part of the conversation and he was already aggressive. So I was like, man, I felt like he, not that he had an axe to grind, but it was already like ⁓ he had a feeling from, like I just, can't hear this from you. Right? Like I'm not going to be receptive hearing it from you because you remind me of my daddy kind of thing. You know what I mean?

speaker-0: Yeah

speaker-1: And so I kind of saw that right away. so I kind of knew. And then Clifton, you you're 60, 70 years old. Yes, they are going to be like, you don't know what you're talking about. those who older are not as willing to be accepting of being wrong because they've been around a long time. Right. Seen a lot, know a lot doesn't mean they're always right. But they've seen a lot and know a lot. And a situation where you come in and you just like,

speaker-0: No.

speaker-1: you just got into relationships. Like I've been married and in relationships for 60 years, young man. you can tell me about relationships now, but you can't tell me about my relationship. Right, yeah. Like, you can't tell me about where I'm living. You can't tell me about my life. And you can't. You can share a perspective. You can share ideas, but you can't say, in your situation, this is wrong and this is right. You can't really do that. I mean, you can try. but it's not gonna be received well. And so that the conversation kind of dies at that point, which it could have, right? Cause it would have just continued to go off the rails if they hadn't pulled my man out and like change gears. But I think it's good conversation to have, right? I think the dialogue between generations is important. I think we don't have it. I love talking to old dudes. Yeah, man. love like old men, old black men specifically and old black women.

speaker-0: Yeah. . and a lot of wisdom.

speaker-1: I love having a conversation with them, like just to sit underneath them and just let them talk and just tell me about stuff that happened or whatever. And that's not just exclusive to black men and women. I mean, I have an ⁓ obvious bias, right? But like I talk- No, I do. But like older, older anybody, anybody older for the most part, right? It's older people that don't think too highly of us that I don't necessarily want to hear their perspective, but I value their opinion. You know what I mean? In the sense that like,

speaker-0: No we don't.

speaker-1: Even, as I've talked about this before, I don't delete people off of social media. Like if we don't agree, we just don't agree and that's cool. But I get to hear your perspective. Like I'm not gonna openly walk up to a Klansman and be like, hey man, won't you tell me your side of the story. But you see some stuff or you might see something on Discovery Channel where they're kind of. they're talking about it or whatever. saw, man, I can't think of who it was. It was on Instagram, no, it was on TikTok. And it's a black dude, it's like mixed. And it's an older white dude. And they're somewhere in Georgia, but it's one of those, it used to be a sundown town, you know, back in the day. It still is though, but it's not openly a sundown town. But ultimately he knows the guy from somewhere, right? He knows the older guy and he goes to, visit him at his house and he was like, hey, you can't be here when it gets dark. He was like, you know, you my man, like I love you, you my guy and you hang out, we talk, we talk about everything that's going on. But he was like, you, we got to make sure you leave before it gets dark. And then, so they like cool with him, right? Like they sit down and have the interview. He invites some of his friends over from the little city, some other older white dudes, and they're all cool with him. But there's this very real fine line of like, Yeah, we cool with you right now, but when it get dark, we not gonna be cool with you. And they were just clear about it. your kind is not going to be accepted here. And if it wasn't for him, if we had seen you without him, we would have ran you out of the town or you wouldn't have made it. And it was like no joking. They were super. But again, like if you can be able to sit in that room and get it. their perspective on it, right? It gives you like a full perspective on what was going on and what was going on for them and why were they so threatened and why did they feel like they needed to, just to hear that side of the story. Not that you sympathize with it or like you agree with it, but like, okay, all right. So you had a, in your mind, valid reason. And now I know that it wasn't, it just wasn't a very good reason. Like you just didn't like it. You just really had no reason to, right? Maybe you were. You were lied to or you were led to believe something that isn't true and that's cool. And you stuck with it for 50, 60, 70, 80 years until your death. And okay, all right, cool. But at least I know, right? Like to have somebody hate me for no reason and I don't know why they hate me. Like at this point I don't care, but it'd be cool to be like, oh, that's why they didn't like me. All right, cool. I don't know.

speaker-0: I feel like burning that town down, Let me get back Zen right quick. I'm hearing this.

speaker-1: Yeah, yeah. back in.

speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's crazy, because I used to work with, when I was like, ⁓ how old was I? Maybe like 19? There was two dudes, they were for sure skinheads and one dude was for sure a Klansman. But when it came to talking about the Lakers, it was all, ⁓ we gotta get it this year, yada, yada, yada, yada, yada. And the one dude that was a Klansman, he was just so happy to be moving to Kentucky. And he moved to Kentucky, stayed there for about a year, came back. I said, Kentucky wasn't what you thought it was, was it? No, no, man. Ain't nothing like California. I don't know why I'm giving an accent now. He's like, ain't nothing like California, man. Ain't nothing like California. And I'm like, mm-hmm, mm-hmm. But yeah, no, I get it. is, because we do have to understand each other. We have to understand each other. ⁓ I remember I was telling, you know, a buddy at work, we were just talking about, you know, black and white and the different kind of issues. I was like, man, far, far be it from me. to have sympathy for a white man. But I was like, I can understand to an extent why some white people struggle with dealing with race. And I'm like, if you have white privilege, you've been living your life. And let's say I had a friend, you know her, I'm not gonna put her name out there so she's safe. But you know, like. As kids, would talk to each other all the time about whatever kind of relationship issues we're going through. And I'd be on the phone for hours with her, you know, just talking about all kinds of different things. And then when I would talk to her about the issues that I'm having, I'm like, yeah, I keep getting pulled over. freaking cops are racist. They pulled me over because of this. ⁓ my sister, my sister got pulled over because of that. It's not because the police are racist, Mike. I'm like, ⁓ okay, cool. Then I tell her again, I got pulled over last night, straight up harassing me. I mean, how fast were you going? Did you have a lot of people in the car? Like, no, I had no, it was just me. It was just me. Yeah, but you know, they're just not gonna pull you over. And literally, it took me years and years and years, because I had stopped telling her about, because I'm like, okay, I'm not gonna sit here and talk to you and try to prove my humanity to you. every time. Yeah. No, we're not going to do that. So I can't talk to you about these issues. We can just keep it over here. And literally years and years and years later, I understood it. And it's funny because she came to me and she apologized also because of all people, her gynecologist broke it down to her and she got it. And it was just like a woke white dude that just broke it down to her. She's like, ⁓ my God. But I had already, you know, we were cool. I had already come to the conclusion, okay, I have an understanding because she wasn't racist and she's been living this life as a white woman for so many years. And what's normal to her is why would a police officer want to hurt Mike? Why would a police officer ever think that you're a bad person? That doesn't make any sense. That's not what the police do. They're here to help. It's like, yeah, that's white privilege can be intoxicating and you don't even know you have it for some people. So was like, I can understand

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: that to a point to where you've been living this life and now you're dealing with not being able to find a job. you know, your lights get cut off and you don't have enough money in the grocery stores. The prices are super high. You've never had to struggle. You don't know what this is. I'm a white man and no one has it worse than me. It's like, oh, no, you're just here now. Welcome to the party. Welcome to the party that you do not.

speaker-1: That's finally treating you like it's been everybody else. Yeah.

speaker-0: Yeah, but I can understand if you've been, I've lived in the suburb my whole life and now my parents got divorced and now I'm in the hood. It doesn't make no sense why I can't wear a Seattle Mariners hat over here. You know what I'm saying? He's amazing. Why would you be mad at But yeah, man, far be it from me, like I said, but yeah, I get it. We do have to discuss. So there was another thing that we were.

speaker-1: of King Griffey Jr. Yeah.

speaker-0: checking out, there was a clip and we're going to stay on the topic of, I guess, love and communication. There's a clip with Nikki Giovanni and James Baldwin that it goes around social media all the time. It was actually these one hour shows they used to do back in the day. So it's like, I think they did two parts. So it's actually two hours.

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: of this conversation that's out there. And it's deep to even think like, ⁓ we used to have these kind of shows, hour long conversations about what we're dealing with as black people and what we're going through as black people. Yeah,

speaker-1: Hmm. podcast. It was like a podcast. sure. His and hers podcast. And it's actually like even to this day, the setup, right? Like if you look at typical podcast, it's two chairs, two mics, it's kind of sitting facing each other discussing the topic. Black people, man, we been in stuff. ⁓

speaker-0: You're right, They stole the podcast from us.

speaker-1: 50 years ago, 60 years ago, whatever was, making podcasts. sorry.

speaker-0: But it was dope. So if you haven't seen it, I don't know the rights or whatever, maybe we can put a clip on social media. You can go check out the clip on at Grow a Man Gain pod on IG. so basically, Nick Giovanni is basically saying like, listen. fake it till you make it, lie to me because you lie to everybody else and you come here telling me the truth and she's like, I'm catching hell from you because you're giving me the truth. But that white man at your job that you work for, you smile at him, he thinks everything is great. But as soon as you get home, you come and give me the truth and you give me all the hell. She's like, just lie to me for 10 years at least. So after we have these kids, kids can be like, hey, daddy always respected mommy, mommy always respected daddy, this is what it's supposed to look like in a relationship. And I was like, damn, that's deep. I wanted to your thoughts on that, brother.

speaker-1: Yeah, and you shared that with me and it's something that I have and still struggle with somewhat, right? Because I think there is this, when I come home to my wife, to my family, this is my safe space. And we talked about code switching on a previous episode and just like going out into the world and you got to move a certain way, right? And so when things aren't going your way or things go bad, you can't allow the outside world to know, right? So you wear a mask, right? or you swallow, not swallow your pride, because we don't really do that anymore, but there was times when you just swallow your pride, right? Or you had to act a certain way in order to move through society. Then you get home, it's the only place that you can be fully yourself, but you've been getting beat up all day. You've been getting beat over the head all day, right? So you come home, you're frustrated, you're upset, whatever happened at the job is affecting you, whatever happened in life is affecting you. And at that time, right, it was like during the 60s.

speaker-0: Yeah.

speaker-1: 60s and 70s, they were dealing with some heavier stuff than we were dealing with. So just being a black man in America at that time was difficult. And so you go through your day, and it still happens, right? Dudes have a terrible day at work, come home, cuss their wife out, don't want to play with the kids, frustrated, drink a couple beers, go to bed. ⁓ And her saying that was like, not lie to me in the sense that I want you to not tell me the truth, but like,

speaker-0: for

speaker-1: If you can muster up enough strength to like be happy or give off the happy vibe to everybody else, why do I gotta deal with, pissed off you, right? Like you're not nice to me, you're not nice to the kids, like you're not pleasant to be around. I'd rather you just lie to me and be that person than to come home and give me all that. to that I understand, right? Because to be the person that has to receive that is rough. It's rough. Like, my wife, even to this day, right, if something happens, right, like something happens at work, or, you know, she gets into an argument with like her sister or mom or dad or something like that, right? I'll catch a, I'll catch like a stray bullet every once in a while. Like, yo, wait a minute, I'm the good guy here. I know, come great, let me hug you, let me make you feel better. But like, she'll be, be upset about something and like, I'll just catch one. Like, damn, I didn't even do nothing. Or maybe I did, right? Like I did something, but it wasn't like,

speaker-0: Right.

speaker-1: was it's been amplified now because of what's going on. So I don't wanna act like I don't do anything. I do some stuff, but I feel like, that wasn't that bad. You were already pissed off kind of like, you just kind of throwing shots at me now. And so I understand her side of it. I also understand his side of it because you are or she is or this house is the only place I can really be my full self. Like this is the only place I can come and be like, Yeah, this happened to me today and people treated me like this and like, I don't feel like hanging out. Like I don't feel like fun time right now. Like I'm pissed off. I had a terrible day. Like I would rather, rather just be mad for the rest of the day, drink a beer and go to sleep kind of thing, right? And so I understand that, but what I think we've gotten to or what I've gotten to is one, yes, this is my safe space, but it's my safe space to communicate, right? when those things are happening, like I can't just come in wearing those emotions, have to come in and give some context to them. hey man, is, like let's sit down and talk about it, right? Like this is what happened today. You know, I'm not really feeling well. I'm upset about it. know, then they know how to move, right? Then they know, okay, all right, know, dad's a little upset today, so let's not, let's not tap dance on his last nerve, you know. And so I think that's really, really good conversation to have because I think all of us to some degree still do that, right? Like we still will give, not like give the world the best of us and give them what's left of us, but we give them that version of us where we feel like we can be vulnerable in that way, right? But then that's not, I don't get to see you all day. you're at work and then you come home, we got a few hours together and then the time that I get to see you is you upset. Like that's not a happy relationship to be in.

speaker-0: Yeah, that's tough. That's difficult and that's tough. I was telling Tiff, because when you have teenage daughters, preteen daughters, you start to see some things and you're like, Jesus. And she was just, her and Maddie were just going through it, going through it. And I'm like, well, one thing you have to understand is that you are the closest person to her where she can be her freest self. And we have made it in our household so that she can be free without fear of judgment or whatever may happen. She's not afraid that, okay, my parents aren't gonna love me anymore if I tell them this. And I'm like, it's double for you because I'm still daddy and I have to be daddy's princess to daddy. Like she still tells me all kinds of things and whatnot. But with mommy, it's just like. I get to tell you this, I get to be mad at you, I get to be, and it really reminded me of how sometimes it can be between her and Maddie and seeing this clip. It's like, yeah, as much as she wants to be able to fake and lie to you and be like, you know, I'm not, everything is fine, no issues at school, I'm gonna bring you everything. I'm mad at school, I'm mad at you because you did this and it's,

speaker-1: Yeah.

speaker-0: and I'm mad at dad, but I'm bringing it to you. You know what the Pox say, when things went wrong, we blame mama. So shout out to the moms out there, it's tough for y'all, it's a tough job. It's because you're the safest bet, you're the safest person. And that's tough, because now we have to teach this little girl, hey, this is how you communicate. This is how you express your frustrations. ⁓ you're super frustrated right now. All right, go into your room, let's cool off. We'll be back in a half hour and we can talk this through. But as men in that age, in those years, they weren't taught that.

speaker-1: Right. Yeah, no, no.

speaker-0: was difficult, super difficult. But it just reminds me of two John Witherspoon, or not John Witherspoon, John Singleton, two John Singleton movies. when Trey from Boys in the Hood, he gets pulled over from the police, he's hot, pissed off, he goes to see his girl. I'm sick of this shit. Yeah, he's sick of But it's like, ain't no joy coming from me at that moment. I'm not sitting down and I'm not having a great conversation with you letting you know like, hey, I'm afraid. Hey, I'm tired of this. Hey, I want better for this. I want better for myself. I want better for you. Nah, I'm sick of this shit. Punching the walls and she just, what's going on? What's wrong? What's wrong? And it's just.

speaker-1: And it might not even be that, right? Because that's a very vulnerable, visceral reaction from him, right? But it may not even be that because you may experience, let's say, take his example completely, right? Get pulled over, get racially profiled, jacked out the car. They talk to you, call you out your name, humiliate you. There may be some embarrassment around that, right? Like, so you don't want to go in and tell your wife, like, these dudes just like, they just stepped on my manhood, essentially. Right? So I go in the house, I'm pissed off about what happened, but I also don't want you to be looking at me like, less than, so I don't share that with you, but I do bring my emotion because I can't shake it. Right? So now you come in, something small happens and I just go off. Boom. And there's no explanation for me going off because I didn't tell you what happened to me. Or even if I did tell you what happened to me, I'm still in the emotion of it. And as men, we don't have great emotional processing. ⁓ I've said this before, we have only a couple of emotions that we really use. We're happy, we're afraid or we're sad. And typically fear makes anger and sadness makes anger. Or we're happy, right? And so... If I walk into the room and the world has just punched me in the face and I see you, you better not even look like you blink in the wrong way because I gotta go off on somebody and I can't go off on them. I gotta keep that job. I couldn't fight the police officer because I was gonna go to jail or they was gonna kill me. So I come home and I don't need you to tell me about anything I did wrong. I don't need you to ask me about that thing you told me to fix last week. None of that, because it's all going send me off the rails, right? But for her, it's like, hey, why don't you tuck that in for a little bit and give us some smiles? You smiled at his face, that cop pushed, he slammed your head against the car and you smiled at him, you can't smile at me. Yeah, right, like come on now. Yeah, give me that, some of that. So I get it, I get both sides of it and it's tough, but I think that, ⁓ again, communication,

speaker-0: Mafia mother- Kimmy?

speaker-1: some emotional intelligence. I think those two things make it easier, but it doesn't make it go away. I think you and your partner can have a better conversation around it. Maybe she can help you process it. Maybe they move a little differently. Hey, kids, we're gonna give daddy some space for a little bit so he can, like you said, 30 minutes, we'll come back and talk. But right now, let's give him a little time to gather himself. ⁓ I think that...

speaker-0: back yeah

speaker-1: That doesn't happen though, unless we are in tune with or understand how things are affecting us. And if we don't have the skills to communicate that. So young fella man, ⁓ listen, the world is not going to be nice to you. ⁓ It has no reason to, right? It's just not nice to anybody. Some of us have a little bit of a head start in certain situations. Some of us have a little bit more privilege in certain situations.

speaker-0: Yeah.

speaker-1: but nobody makes it out of this life alive. It is literally set up to get you to check out. So in the meantime, it is important that you start to learn to understand yourself because that gives you the platform to understand others and to treat them the way that they deserve to be treated and also set boundaries so you get treated the way you want to be treated.

speaker-0: Yes, sir. There's nothing wrong with self-preservation. Self-preservation gets you to where you can be that shoulder to talk to, I can call Rod now if I have some issues because he's solid in himself. He's dealing with whatever he's got going through, right? Now he can hear me if I need some help. know what saying? Self-preservation is just fine, man. and work on yourself, get to that place.

speaker-1: Yeah, and it doesn't have to be like, I think a lot of times we talk about like self-preservation or ⁓ self-improvement, personal development. It usually comes from something, right? Something was going wrong or we're trying to attain something, so now we go out and we try to seek help or whatever. I'm feeling depressed, so go to it. It doesn't have to be that way, right? It's not like a car, right? Like it doesn't have to break down for you to get it checked out. Matter fact, it might even be like a car, right? We'll get oil change, just regular maintenance. Yeah, just regular maintenance. Like we get it done so it doesn't break down. Right? It doesn't need to be done, but we're taking care of it because we don't want to get to a situation where we're stuck on the side of the road. Right? Or we get in situation where we can't get out of it. And so like you may not feel like you need any of it, but it doesn't mean that it can't help you. Right? Because you're learning these skills now so that when the opportunity presents itself, you're prepared. Right?

speaker-0: Yes, sir.

speaker-1: So I think it's important to lean into personal development. I think it's important to lean into self-care and creating ⁓ some tools that help you navigate difficult situations, right? Like don't wait until it happens, right? Work until it happens. And then when it happens, you have something to use to get through it because it is inevitable. Like I said, life is not designed for you to get through scot-free. There are going to be bumps and bruises and ups and downs and all of that. And it's all a part of the journey. It makes the finish line sweeter. Because if it was just a straight, know, straight and narrow and you just got through it like that, you wouldn't appreciate the end result. Right?

speaker-0: Yeah. All right, man, sounds good, man. Looks like we're bringing this thing on home to a close. Any last words?

speaker-1: ⁓ famous last words, What do you want in your tombstone? Pepperoni. Pepperoni and sausage.

speaker-0: Ha! Shout out to everybody that's old enough to know what we talking about.

speaker-1: No, man, think we kind of brought it home on this last little piece. I think that we will continue to preach self-care and getting firmer in your own foundation. Because I think once you have a solid foundation as a man, then you're better able to uplift and hold up those around you, not just your family. It could be friends, could be coworkers, it could be whatever. Like you become a pillar. And I think everybody's goal should be a pillar in their community, in their household, their job. Wherever you go, you should stand out as somebody that is reliable, that's trustworthy, that they can go to for advice. They feel protected around you, they feel safe. ⁓ And I think that should be a goal for every man, is to find a way to improve those qualities at all times.

speaker-0: Yeah, that's actually quite dope. All right, man. You know, y'all can catch us on the Insta's at grown man game pod. You can go ahead and email us at grown man. Not at but grown man game podcast at GMO dot com. And then I want to ask you all, you know, I'm saying show some love if you're enjoying the podcast. Show us some love, especially you Apple folks, Spotify, too. But Go ahead and drop us, you know what saying, five stars, man. Drop them five stars and drop us a comment, man. And then also, you know, just go ahead and shoot us a DM or shoot us an email. Let us know if there's anything that you're like, ⁓ man, I would love to hear your opinions on this or, you know, here's something I was thinking about tackling. What you think about this? Hit us up. We open to it, man. We open to it. We're trying to build a community, you know what saying?

speaker-1: Yeah. Yeah. One grown ass man at a time.

speaker-0: Alright y'all, we outta here. Deuce.