The Content Era: 2022 is the Year of Creatives and Entrepreneurs

     Charlemagne Tha God's recent interview with Chloe Bailey about why she deleted an Instagram video licking a lollipop is an indicator of how long his platform is going to last. Content about licking a lollipop?! Really? 😳 I have said this on numerous occasions; we are now in a Content Era. Streaming services are in global competition over it, Podcasters and Bloggers need it to survive every week and it's like that Frank Lucas blue magic to Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, TicTok and YouTube users. For THAT Economy to sustain itself Content must be consistently harvested from Creatives and Entrepreneurs who are sometimes trafficked through digital internet rings... We have to be able to control our Content. If some entity steals our Content then we can sue them; like Bev Standing did TikTok after she found out that they used her text-to-speech voice without permission. If we don't have that ability, we will be used as Content slaves.

     The obvious question is, "What can we do to control our Content?" The first thing that I would encourage people to do is to PROTECT THEIR BRAND. Even if you think that the Content that you share is for fun, PROTECT IT. If you have a Logo, Business Name, a unique Phrase or Hashtag that you use, trademark it! It is better to have it and not need it now than to need it after something you shared goes viral or some celebrity with 2.6 million followers uses it without giving any credit to you. Remember when it was announced that the Washington [Redskins] were going to change their team name? Well an Actuary [Risk Manager] named Martin McCaulay who had been stockpiling trademarks for years already owned many versions of the Washington team name such as Washington Red-Tailed Hawks, Redtails, Veterans and Warriors to name a few. If the Washington team wants to use any of his trademarks they would have to get licensed permission from him, which is not free. What about Durell Smylie? He successfully trademarked his viral phrase "Where The Money Reside" that entertainers like Saweetie, Meghan the Stallion and others were graciously using on their social media. Smylie also began to create merch bearing his trademark, lend his voice to advertisements and paid partnerships, appearing on television and showing up at celebrity parties. These are just some examples of how people have positioned themselves in this digital domain to PROTECT THEIR BRAND and how it works in our favor. 

     The next thing I would encourage people to do is stockpile Content before they officially put themselves out there. I have seen people with excellent ideas yet they failed to assess the time commitment necessary to create consistent Content. I have seen a person put out 3 or 4 great episodes or articles and the next thing you know it's damn near a year later and they disappear. What happened? They never really studied and prepared for the Content demand. They also did not make an honest assessment of their time and dedication to this work. If you want to start a Podcast you need to be clear on the amount of time you can unquestionably dedicate to it. If you are a family man with 3 children under ten-years-old, you probably should not tell everybody that you are going to have a Podcast Mon, Wed and Fri from 4pm to 7pm. If your office includes Starbucks Wi-Fi, you may not want to tweet to folks that you are dropping 1400-word articles 4 times a week while working on your first article during a morning rush. If we cannot honestly envision ourselves consistently maintaining that output of Content for at least three years, then we need to rethink the time we can dedicate to this. It is work! For the family man, maybe doing a Podcast from 8pm-9pm every Wednesday after your children are in bed is more realistic. For the Blogger, maybe writing a weekly article at your residence and only coming to Starbucks to upload it while you grab an oatmilk frappuccino is best. If you intend on starting something new in 2022, whether that is writing articles, Podcasting or Vlogging, stockpile at least six months of Content before you launch. Plan ahead! It is far better to have that Content available when you need it instead of scrambling to find something to write about, someone to interview or something to talk about. When you don't have anything to say people can see through it and your analytics will reflect it. That undermines our ability to build our readership and/or listening audience.

     If you are already out there then ask yourself, "Does my Content consistently represent my brand?" If someone were to click on your unique Hashtag do those posts accurately reflect the posts that you have made? Sometimes you may need to go back and meticulously update and/or link that Content to reflect your digital footprint. For example, I have well over eight hundred YouTube videos and I had to go back and add/change descriptions, keywords, create playlists and etc. on many of them to make sure that they were uniform with my brand. Again, this is work and a serious time commitment that we need to honestly assess. 

     For at least two decades I have consistently used this digital space as a medium to communicate my projects, programs and initiatives around education, youth advocacy and community outreach. I have been able to maintain this Content creation because it is based upon actual work that I do. I don't need to look for anything to write or talk about. That is the real key to consistent Content creation in this online space; to live a content life offline. When the shutdown happened and film/television production houses came to a grinding halt, entertainers were out of work and entertainment venues closed, this exposed the fact that we are in a Content Era. It also revealed that many people were/are online because they are not content offline. 

~SUPPORT HERE~

     As we closed out this Gregorian calendar year, I look forward to seeing more people controlling their destiny as Creatives and Entrepreneurs. Don't just talk about what you are going to do; prepare and plan to put your best foot forward with the goal of sustainability. Don't burn yourself out, pace yourself! If you are not a Creative or Entrepreneur then I encourage you to support those of us who are showing that we appreciate that support by investing in our communities, cities or online network. 

Peace,

Saladin

How To Invent Mini Sex Offenders

   Technology is moving at such a fast rate that state and federal laws are often years behind addressing some of the new problems that come up based upon new technological advances. One such problem are laws surrounding sex offender status, sext messaging and child pornography.

   According to statistics gathered by Impact Justice a national innovation and research center, in 75% of the states, there are laws that still exist that “require children as young as 8 years old to be placed on sex offender registries, often for life, when adjudicated of what the courts deem sexual crimes.” This pre-adolescent to sex registry pipeline began in the mid 90’s, corresponding to budding growth and development of the World Wide Wide, smart phone technology, text messaging and social media. Keep in mind that many of these children are not registrants because of a sexual crime they actually committed, many of them are registered sex offenders based upon doing something as silly as pulling student’s pants down at school, public urination, sending a nude photo or sext messaging someone who happened to be underage. Even more problematic is the fact that many of these children are disproportionately people of color from impoverished urban environments without the finances to fight legal cases like this.

   Consider the case of Bobby Garza who was registered as a sex offender when he was 11 years old for indecent exposure to a child. His crime? He and his brother were urinating outside, a girl saw them and reported that they exposed themselves to her. Bobby was placed in foster care and escaped until he was placed in a youth detention facility for the next 6 years. Upon his release when he was 17 he had to register as a sex offender until he was 27 years old. Feeling that this was unfair he refused to register and was sentenced to prison for 5 years. Another example is Cormega Copening who was charged with sexual exploitation of a minor and making child porn in 2014 for sharing nude photos with his girlfriend Brianna Benson when they were both 16 years old. They were arrested in 2015. A standout quarterback for his high school football team, Copening was benched by his team pending further investigation missing a critical time of his athletic career, facing nationwide public humiliation and the frightening possibility of becoming a registered sex offender. While awaiting trial, Copening was put on probation for a year when five felony charges of making and possessing child pornography were reduced to two misdemeanors in a plea bargain. It wasn’t until he competed his probation did County District Court Judge dismiss the two remaining charges, yet the damage was already done. According to North Carolina law, Copening and Benson were considered adults and children at the same time; when people 16 and older commit crimes they are prosecuted as adults, but if they are under age 18, and crime victims, they are considered minors. When Benson made and possessed nude photos of herself, North Carolina law treated her as if she were an adult pornographer who was victimizing her minor self. Thus charging her with two counts of felony sexual exploitation of a minor. Copening faced 4 charges for making and possessing nude photos of himself and 1 charge for possessing a nude photo that Benson sent to him. It’s outdated laws such as this in many states, which consider a teen both a victim and perpetrator, that are one of problematic reasons we see miscarriages of justice like this. These are just two cases involving young people of color who have found themselves punished for unreasonably defined so-called crimes. Another issue is the fact that while the identity of juveniles involved in a crime are kept private, a juvenile convicted as a sex offender is publicly registered.

   One of the other growing concerns are recent cases involving hundreds of students posting and sharing nude photos in Facebook groups, on other social media networks such as Twitter and Snapchat and on the file sharing site Dropbox. One such case is a child porn scandal involving an unnamed 17 year old student at Davidson Senior High School in Davidson, Michigan. Police learned that this student gathered over 100 nude photos of students posted to Snapchat, saved them to Dropbox and shared them around the school. Pending a full investigation, this student could be charged as an adult and according to Michigan law, nude photos of a person under the age of 18 is considered child sexual abusive material. The Prosecutor in this case can not only charge this student with the dissemination of child pornography but any student that posted these images to Snapchat in the first place. This is not even considering those youth who do not attend Davidson High School that may have downloaded those images from Dropbox and disseminated them.

   From the above examples I am sure you can see the magnitude of this issue surrounding sex offender registry status, sext messaging and child pornography and how there is usually no legal precedence of how cases like this should be handled. Historically speaking, as with most legal precedence's in this country, people of color from impoverished urban environments without the finances to fight these legal cases become the face of these often unfair judgments. Every quarter of the year technology advances to create and update tools we use that many state and federal laws are far behind. Advocacy groups such as Impact Justice and the Center on Youth Registration Reform are leading the charge to not only end youth sex offender registration but educate the public about its link to suicide, juvenile delinquency, homelessness, mental health issues, alcoholism and drug abuse. I encourage you to talk to the youth and look into workshops and information about internet and social media safety. Check out Impact Justice and the Center on Youth Registration Reform online to find our more about the legal cases and statistics involving youth sex registry. If we’re not on top of this and playing an active role to insure that we inform and protect our children, this system of creating mini sex offenders could be the next preschool to prison pipeline.

Peace,

Saladin

 Bridge Mix and Fakebook

I cannot stress enough the importance of properly examining people before allowing them into your social equality and allowing them to simply "claim" they're about the same thing as you. It's likewise important for us to allow ourselves to be examined before coming amongst others. I reside in the WNY/Southern Ontario Area where there isn't a high concentration of Gods and Earths like in NYC. This has been a gift yet I've also ceen the curse. The gift is the fact that since some of these areas are unchartered regions, this environment encourages Cultural development, self reliance and the propagation of our way of life. On the flip side, those people who really "ain't bout this life" find themselves slipping right back into a dead world or trying to be a cyclops in the land of the blind.

There are people, some who claim to have been around for years, that come in the names of Gods and Earths yet when you ask them what Lessons they actually know either they hopelessly stumble through reciting them like Leslie Nielson trying to sing the National Anthem in The Naked Gun or they reluctantly tell you they've been (stuck) on the same Lesson for a while now... It disapppointed me the most when I've heard this coming from those people who portray themselves as The God/The Earth and who always have the harshest criticisms about what somebody else ain't doing. The problem is not the fact that they don't know their Lessons or the lack of Knowledge itself. We all started out from a place of not knowing and there are many things I'm unaware of about life right now b.u.t. the bottom line is, "What are we (am I) doing about it?" The problem arises when people choose to not do anything about it, especially when it's brought to their attention.  The problem is their sense of apathy (or apathetic arrogance) and contentment with ignorance. "Apathetic arrogance" is when apathetic people, who obviously haven't invested the time to study/learn, arrogantly expect all the accreditation and accoutrements of someone who actually invested/invests the time to study/learn (know, articulate and understand the Lessons). My point in mentioning this is not for the sake of encouraging these people to get it together; it usually doesn't work that way. Encouragement usually works for people who honestly aren't aware of what they need to be doing and will strive to do better in their own good time when shown the way. The people I'm referring to already know what's up, stubbornly don't want to hear what anyone has to say and may go into a Rowdy Roddy Piper frenzy if you question them. The reason they're in this state is because over a period of time they simply made up a variety of excuses to stagnate -which YOU WILL HEAR when you have a conversation with them about their studies-, instead of healthy adjustments to elevate. Because of their pride, defensiveness and often arrogance they usually won't welcome your line of questioning and try to act like it's a personal attack against them instead of what's really taking place: a confirmation of the Knowledge they clearly aren't adding on to their Cipher. So I mention this not for these people. On their own, they have to make the choice to care enough about true growth & development, be concerned enough about the inadequate position it puts them in to assist others (especially their own families) and recognize that Knowledge is more valuable and a priority over the Ignorance they own. Our job is to simply make Knowledge Born, their job is to save themselves. 

I'm sharing this with those of you who may have encountered and will encounter these people who are coming in the Name. It's important to realize that regardless of how they dress, the lingo they can talk or names they can drop of people who aren't examining them, they are not you. You can be friendly or associate yet this relationship becomes a liability if you give them more credit than they deserve and expect them to uphold the same Cultural principles/values you adhere to. That is an unreasonable expectation you're unfairly placing on them and that relationship. How? Because these people never invested the time and aren't investing the time to learn or adhere to these principles/values you hold sacred. If you're in doubt about what I'm saying simply ask them to go through their Lessons and share their understanding and they'll show & prove it to you out of their own mouth. If they don't even know these Lessons, how can they possibly understand what they're unaware of or live that out as a consistent code of conduct? This is not to say that ALL PEOPLE who are coming in our Names b.u.t. have not fully committed themselves to learning/living our Culture are outright despicable, some may be. They may have some nice qualities about themselves and even demonstrate "some" (key word) of the principles/values we advocate as a Nation. In my experience with those people who are less likely to take responsibility for themselves and study their Lessons, one of their main arguments -in defense of their own ignorance of course-, is "So and so knows 120 frontwards and backwards yet they're doing A, B, C, D, and etc.!" Yes this may be a legitimate point because reciting Lessons doesn't automatically mean someone is learning these Lessons. Yet talking about somebody else does absolutely nothing to address or resolve the situation at hand: this person's choice to be ignorant and what they're actually doing about it. Even if a God/Earth who knows 120 is demonstrating questionable behavior, at least I and thousands of other Gods/Earths have an impartial, consistent, equitable standard between us (120 Lessons) to potentially check and balance our words/behavior. With someone who primarily dresses the part, uses our lingo and name drops you have no impartial, consistent, equitable standard or transparency between you. What you do have, Culturally speaking, is big box of Bridge Mix; a variety of nuts, fruit and cremes 'covered' with milk and dark chocolate -and you never know what you're going to get or where it comes from! Bottom line is it's important to hold fast to our Customary Tradition of "examining and being examined". Without this protocol we will continue to cee our Cultural Integrity being compromised. 

Speaking of compromisers, recently I had an online exchange, via Fakebook, with someone who claims this Culture that resides in my Area. Now as I've stated, there isn't a high concentration of Gods and Earths here so this creates an environment where either you're actually known, known of or completely unknown. If you're known then that's because you're out there doing community work, involved in publically recognized projects/programs and you're networking with various organizations and businesses. If you're known of then you're doing something that someone can/does vouch for. If you're unknown that's because you haven't made yourself (work) known for various reasons. Anyway, the person I had an exchange with is unknown in my area. Not because they don't know of me or have no way of getting in contact with me b.u.t. because they've chosen to be unknown for reasons known only to them. I guess today was their day to make contact.

The exchange started with her sending me a FB Message about how to figure out our Asiatic Calendar, inquiring about Parliaments here and saying that she's gotten together with "The Queens" a couple of times here before but wasn't sure what's up with the rest of the cipher. Keep in Mind that this person is unknown in this Area. Mentioning that I wasn't sure what Degrees she actually knew by heart, I briefly explained how she can figure out our chronology on her own. She responded by saying that she's on the 2/1-14, that's why she needs a cipher and that, "I know ppl say ur 7 suppose to teach u but we work so much we are like two ships passing." Knowing that she is unknown and that if there are some Queens she'd be building with in this Area I would know them or know of them, I responded, "What Queens have you got together with, who is their Educator and what Degrees do they knowledge? As far as Rallies/Parliaments in Bethlehem I'm not aware of anyone organizing any. I'm more actively involved with the Gods/Earths who're doing things in Steel City, Truth Cipher (Canada)"

She told me their names and both of them I'm aware of because they attended a few Civilization Classes and Rallies I organized in my and her City before. While one has been around the Lessons for years, because she was a student of a God I taught, the other started learning about who we are within the last five years. While the former has had a few different Educators, I'm not sure what she actually knows and the other one has decided not to learn. Anyway, at this point in time both of them don't have an Educator and it's unclear what Lessons they have. In addition to them she mentions another female who has a righteous name on Facebook that's not worth mentioning. So now here's the picture... Three females getting together sometimes. The main one who contacted me has a God (Educator) and she says she's on the 2/1-14. The other two don't have an Educator and it's unclear what Lessons they have. All of them have righteous names, many friends on Facebook yet are unknown in this Area.

At this point the female says she's trying to knowledge 120 by the Summer and not be around anybody that just don't care like that to which I respond, "I understand. We all invest time in what we cee as important and wharever we cee or don't cee going on in our Area reflects our Priorities. If that's your determined idea then you'll make it happen and put yourself in the position to be amongst those that care." At this point she said she mostly builds with one of the females who doesn't have an Educator and she's been giving her Lessons and "other Degrees that pertain to Earths". She also added, "We figured we would just say f*ck it & teach each other." Hearing that she's still just a Newborn herself and not an Educator, my response was, "What did your Educator say in regards to giving someone Lessons?" to which she responded, "I dont have one..never had one..I dont like to slow up somebody elses progress Cuz I maybe slow sometimes so I just gave it to her." This had me confused because she just said earlier that "I know ppl say ur 7 suppose to teach u but we work so much we are like two ships passing." Now this is where it really starts getting funny style...

Ceeing what this situation could potentially be and not judging what the circumstances were surrounding her Relationship/Education I said, "So ya'll freestyling. I wouldn't suggest coming amongst us Gods/Earths with a righteous name saying you have lessons, never had an Educator and you're just giving lessons to somebody else." Instead of ceeing the wisdom in my words as a warning that it's not welcoming to come amongst Gods/Earths calling yourself us when you clearly aren't, her response was, "Damn freestyling sounds like such a bad word for once. Hey im just being honest here." to which I responded, "That's definately not our Tradition and is completely irresponsible." She goes on to ask, "What are we suppose to do now? Wait for someone to care?" and states that she's "had most since 07". Do you cee how complicated this is? Here's a person who says she's on the 2/1-14, her God ain't teaching her because they're both working, she don't have and never had an Educator, she's teaching herself and giving some other female lessons and has had most for the last 5 years all in one FB Message conversation..! What was my response having years of experience of ceeing this type of phenomenon? "Well for the last 5 years I think your approach/decisions already demonstrates you have your mind made up about what you want and how you want to do it. Most Gods/Earths who learn about this won't trust your intentions or role you're striving to play within our Nation since you haven't directly consulted us and chose to do your own thing. And if you're not upfront about what you told me exactly, you're even more suspect. Take a moment to read the Post on my wall SciHonor Devotion tagged me in with the sword image. That will give you more insight into how that approach/decisions is perceived by many in our Nation." Not only did I share with her my wisdom and experience b.u.t. I referred her to a source from a reputable Earth I know who gives her more clarity on the subject from a Woman's perspective. So instead of being receptive, this is what this female had to say before terminating our conversation, "Hold on your doing to much. I ain't never been suspect about nothing. Who is us? Just because I dont consult u dont mean I dont consult anyone..so ppls dont b confused. U know what nevermind. I was asking for help. Forget it."

My question to those of you reading this is: Does that seem like someone who's actually receptive to learn, seeking actual guidance and interested in true Nation Building? This is not me disqualifying anyone, I am simply pointing out how people disqualify themselves from having access to certain areas of growth and development because of their mouth, attitude, arrogance and rugged individualism. Remember the phrase 'Many shall come, only a few will be chosen and those who are chosen choose themselves'? Well this female, who obviously has some attraction to what we're doing in our Nation, still hasn't chosen herself. Will she ever? That's not for me to say, it's her responsibility to get it together.

In the final analysis, it's all about our deeds. Even if people have had something to say negative about me I let time take care of them and eventually you've ceen their flames fade into some smoldering ashes of insignifigance -while I keep on doing what I've been doing; Building. It's not hard to recognize Who's Who within The NGE. Yeah some people may not be Nationally known yet they are many who are very active, involved and known within their respective Communities and Regions, Gods/Earths I'm grateful to have as Family fulfilling our vision! This isn't hard to verify or substantiate, especially with the expansion of our online presence that documents our offline activities. This the reasoning behind my documentation and time stamping of some of the various things I do. It's about showing people this is really where I am, what I actually do and how I do it! My Word or World ain't fake, staged, edited or surreal yet there's many people who's lives are fake, staged and edited to give others the appearance of something that doesn't exist. If I say I work out a certain amount of time I have the body to prove it. If I say I've published books I can refer you to a Bookstore to order them. If I say I work with youth then they can tell you in their own words what our relationship is. All of us who are actually doing something to assist others in their growth and development and make our contribution to civilization adhere to these standards of integrity.

So in closing I emphasize the importance of our examination process. A process of inquiring who somebody's Educator is, where they got their Information, how long they had it and how they understand and are living what they have. This Cultural Tradition has allowed us, Gods/Earths, to maintain a level of transparency and integrity within our Nation since we formally began in 1964. WITHOUT this system of checks/balances there would be no way of determining Who's Who or even what Who is! Even though we may not all agree with one another all the time, we cannot deny eachothers work and contributions to our Nation and Society as a whole. For example, if you cee somebody who says they're from my Area and you cee no interaction or actual contact between us then put two and two together. I'm out here; actively involved and have been available for years, months and days now. No these people don't have to be doing the exact same thing I'm doing b.u.t. there should be a level of social equality we have because we share the same common cultural cause right? A cause that I have taken the initiative to publically set and defend as an ever growing standard of our cultural integrity. If you're unsure about someone you're connected with on Facebook yet you cee they're in my Area, ask me about them. If I say anything like, "I don't know them", "I met them before/once", "They contacted me on Facebook before" or "They came to 'a' Civilization Class" then put two and two together. This doesn't mean that I'm The Don or something. Lol I'm simply saying that I have some experience and success in the field of Nation Building, have established many relationships/networks and learn from others who are doing this and can tell you will confidence and surety who's involved in this -based upon their actions or lack thereof. These people may not be directly in my City b.u.t. I'm connected to Gods/Earths within the surrounding Areas and other Regions who may/may not know them. I ran into an Older God out in Bethlehem one time who said he was from Pelon (The Bronx). As soon as I got the opportunity I reached out to another Older God (Freedom) in Pelon, who is his contemporary, to verify what this Brother was telling me. Freedom was able to confirm everything all the way down to Names/Occupations of this Gods siblings. Even though that all checked out it's still upon us to further examine a person's ways and actions! Sometimes people associate with others just to get a co-signer for their BS. Now imagine if these people aren't even connected to Gods/Earths within the surrounding Areas they live in, that also tells you something huh? Sometimes the cipher that's around them isn't progressive and they choose to not participate. That could be a legitimate reason for not coming around b.u.t. what are they doing about it? If all they're doing is going to work and claiming they're teaching their own babies, which isn't special because even animals are expected to perform this Parental duty, it should raise an eyebrow about their ideas about real Nation Building... They may be playing the 'Blame Somebody Else' Game as an excuse to do the exact same thing they're accusing the cipher of doing; NOTHING. They also may just be people with a "Me and Mines!"  mentality and they're using their child(ren) as a shield for their dirty, selfish religion. And if you do question them and hear the violins start to play as they give you this solicit for pity spiel about how they can't find nobody, maybe even for years and blah, blah, blah... even though myself and others are clearly right here, leave, them, alone. You've made Knowledge Born about your concerns and made yourself available to them if/when they're willing and able to "consistently" (key word!) add-on. They just need to work some things out first before they're ready to learn or finish what they started learning years ago.

Peace,
Saladin