"Black People Raised In the Suburbs Are Considered a White-Washed..." Why Black Culture Creates YNs

[00:00:00]So, why do a lot of young black suburban male teens kind of have thug adjacent tendencies? I've been seeing that this is a topic on Tik Tok, on Twitter, and people talk about in real life. So, here's my perspective on the matter. In the black community, you're really only allowed to have like three archetypes.

[00:00:16]Three archetypes are wellreceived. One is like the reformed like thug who started a business, so think of somebody from power. Two is like an athlete. And three is kind of like a thug. And if you don't fit into any of those categories, people will call you whitewashed even if your actions don't represent that. Like a lot of people call me whitewashed and they say that all this type of stuff.

[00:00:36]And if you actually look at my content and look at what I do and look at my dating history, that couldn't be further from the truth. So a lot of people in general, not just young black teens from suburban areas, they want to fit in with their group, that being black people.

[00:00:47]They want to feel like they belong to a group. So they act in a way which gives them uh some positive reinforcement. I will tell you this, whenever you don't act like one of those things and aren't one of those things, people will side eye you a lot. Even in more of a professional space, you're still expected to act a certain way. I've been told countless times that I don't act black or that I hate being black or whatever, just because of the way that I speak and the way that I I sometimes dress. So, that's why I think that a lot of young black teens act like this. It's because of the positive reinforcement they get and wanting to feel like they belong. Because a lot of black people, we we we don't like it whenever other people are like, "Oh, yeah, you know, black people are all a monolith. Black people are this that or the other." And then we do the exact same thing to like a black nerd that we see or to a black person who, you know, wears certain types of clothes or if a black girl doesn't have her edges laid properly.

[00:01:38]>> Yep. He's 100% right. And I will tell you, even as a person that is a content creator, doesn't matter where you from, don't matter that you're from the inner city of Detroit. None of that stuff matters to the community, which it takes a lot. And I'mma be honest, right? I went to um obviously raised in the inner city of Detroit and then I went to private school for two years in middle school because my father wanted to make sure that he had gave us the right impression and he wanted to expose me and my brothers to a different world outside of just the hood especially during that time because there was no social media uh in the 90s and in the mid '9s right and the first thing even back then right and this is the first time that I had ever experienced it the First time that people had started calling you a sellout even as a a kid as a 13 and 14 year old kid was when I was in middle school and it was because I was going to school and I learned how to speak proper English and I was going to school with people that didn't look like me and so it was always this expectation that you know you would be better than everybody else because of the opportunities that was afforded to you and I always thought that that was normal. is is supposed to be normal with you having a father and your household.

[00:02:59]When I see even today, right, before I even dig into it, let let's let's mind this out a little bit. Even today as a 40 plus year old man, people are still trying to force me, and I know that I'm visible, so you know, a lot comes with being visible. people are trying to force me to substantiate whether or not I was actually raised in the inner city of Detroit. Right now, in the context of certain conversations, I'll take people back and I'll show them where I lived and you know, I've done earlier content and all of this other stuff. And so, you know, me and maybe some family members or somebody will call me on the phone during the morning show, make sure y'all check out the Millionaire Morning Show and we'll have a conversation about where we grew up and all of that type of stuff. But in reality, I don't feel the need to have to prove anything to anybody. And maybe when I was 18, 19, 20, that would have flew, right? Because we are peer pressured. I think that everybody in society and in culture is peer pressured to justify your blackness or justify your whiteness or justify why you are Republican or why you are Democrat or all of that type of stuff.

[00:04:09]But I think that our cultural norms, and this is why I said that the culture is trash, our cultural norms is that this guy, for example, right here, because he speaks proper English, and he knows where to put a period in a sentence and a question mark and an exclamation mark and a comma, and every, you know, everything he says is not a run-on sentence, and he's not saying, and uh duh, and he's now looked at as a nerd.

[00:04:34]Nobody cares about where he grew up.

[00:04:36]Nobody cares about any of that, right? I know guys that grew up in the inner city in the worst conditions that wind up being some of the most successful guys and they were able to complete a sentence because their parents put more into them than where they were at at the at that particular time. And they were called, you know, lames, corny, and all of that stuff. And what I learned after going to middle school in private school where my parents actually made the sacrifice uh to expose us to a completely different lifestyle which I'm forever grateful for. Right? We had to learn how to tie a tie. We had to wear slacks. We had to wear a collared shirt.

[00:05:14]You were not getting into school unless you, you know, met those minimum expectations plus more. What I've learned is everything was the opposite of what the culture was, right? So the people that were the class clowns got laughed at, not laughed with, right? It wasn't, you know, the person that was dumb was considered cool. The person that wasn't smart was considered dumb.

[00:05:39]And everything was the opposite. Whereas when I went back to public schools, even though I went to a relatively good school, even the kids that kicked out, you know, they glorified that. It was like, yo, I'm not going to school. Yeah, man. School is bad. And stuff like that.

[00:05:54]And fast forward all the way up into my 40s. Now I see it happening even more with the peer pressure of social media because it was controlled. It was in a controlled environment where you know you could you could you would think that okay this is only happening in the inner city of Detroit when in reality this is happening all over the g globe. And I see grown men that are in their 40s, 30s, 40s, and 50s still calling people lames or saying this is what you didn't do in high school as though they know as though they know what you was getting and all of that stuff. And it's like on first glance, somebody that don't understand the culture would try to prove it to him. But then at the second on second glance, it's like, yo, why is it bad that I haven't went to prison?

[00:06:43]Why is it bad that I haven't been arrested? Why is it bad that I don't have a record? Why is it bad that I've never killed anybody? Why is it bad that I've never sold drugs? Why is it bad that I've never poisoned my community?

[00:06:53]Why is it bad that, you know, I'm in a relationship with no illegitimate kids? Why Why is that bad?

[00:07:02]But then you realize that it's all a part of the culture. It's a part of the music. It's a part of social media. Um it's a shaming tactic from the black community where they say that you're basically not black enough. Um, even if you are black enough, they'll try to figure out whether or not you're actually from America. If you're from America, which I am, and if your grandparents is from America, which they are, and if your great-grandparents is from America, which they are, they don't they don't care. They'll say you a nepo baby and all of this stuff as though it's bad for your parents to actually do something for you. But they're they're trying to figure out a way to discredit you from a negative way. And that's how toxic the cult culture is. So to speak to his particular point, the reason why suburban kids that were raised in a good environment then try to dumb themselves down to try to fit in is because the pressure is coming from all sides of the culture, especially for young people that may not have been raised in that environment.

[00:08:03]But at the same time, you got to prove your blackness by doing yin stuff, by by doing ghetto stuff. And if not, then all of a sudden, somehow someway, and again, you got to remember that these kids, most of them, their brain isn't fully developed. These young people, they feel the need to try to prove themselves to the culture to be accepted by the culture. Now, the the best one, obviously, the best ones have a parent or parents and a community that's telling them, "Hey, listen, you better than the than the environment that you're raised in or you're better than the culture." And so don't feel the need to have to dumb yourself down to be accepted by people that don't care anything about you and you're probably never going to see again, right? Focus on finding your your your tribe amongst the people that add value into your life. And that's why it's so it's so relieving and sometimes it's so cool to finally, you know, be around other people that may look like you. Even though I don't believe in separating ourselves based off of race. I believe in separating ourselves based off of the continent of our character. Sometimes it's a relief when you finally see other people that may stand up and say, "Listen, we not all alike and we may not all be a monolith and it doesn't make you any less of anything because you decide that you want to be able to speak proper English and you're educated or maybe you don't have debt or maybe you take care of your kids. It's okay to not have gone to prison and be a thug. And so we need more representation in my opinion of successful people without calling them a sellout just because they may think differently than you or talk differently than you or maybe they've even been raised differently than you.

[00:09:48]When I hear this guy speak, I don't see a person that is trash. I see somebody that's just naturally in their element.

[00:09:56]Uh, he seems like a regular black guy and I actually like his style and I think that he dresses well. Obviously, he's graduated from Duke, I'm assuming, but I don't know. Let me know what y'all think inside of the comments. Make sure y'all tap into the Patreon link is in the description. T Henley, 40% off your first order, 20% off a life. I love you.

[00:10:14]I appreciate you. I'mma holl at you guys later. Peace.