Yusef Salaam Of The 'Exonerated Five' Talks Keeping Strong During Difficult Times — Transcript

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1. 0:00welcome to the show he is a member of
2. 0:02the exonerated five and I don't want to
3. 0:04mess his name up because you and bring
4. 0:06all kind of hell on my head no we have
5. 0:11user salaam on the phone how are you
6. 0:12young man oh my goodness I am doing
7. 0:15extremely well trying to stay safe
8. 0:17trying to you know this is a sheltering
9. 0:19and clean site so to speak it is
10. 0:23something that I remember very very
11. 0:25clearly being a person who was locked up
12. 0:29in a place that I didn't deserve to be
13. 0:31locked in let me ask you something so
14. 0:40when you see what's happening now
15. 0:43because you're an example of a man who
16. 0:46was wrongly convicted ended up doing
17. 0:50time for something you clearly didn't do
18. 0:51and you you you an example of somebody
19. 0:55who leaned on their face your faith it's
20. 0:58really something that helped you and got
21. 1:00you through right absolutely and so now
22. 1:03we have a country that is fearful
23. 1:06basically they feel from all that things
24. 1:08are going on but it yet is the country
25. 1:09that talks about how much faith they
26. 1:11have right so Brooks
27. 1:13aren't things like this a crisis of
28. 1:15faith of challenge of faith a question
29. 1:17of faith you know when we say stuff like
30. 1:22this we definitely have a crisis of
31. 1:24faith in many instances we want to
32. 1:25question our faith but I want folks to
33. 1:28know also that this is perhaps the first
34. 1:30time that we've ever come in contact
35. 1:32with an epidemic like this ourselves
36. 1:34you know and this is definitely the time
37. 1:37that I think we should all turn towards
38. 1:40faith in a more powerful way because you
39. 1:42know we can't see the air right that's a
40. 1:45powerful powerful thing but you know I
41. 1:49think that when crises like this you can
42. 1:52tell how faithful people are by the way
43. 1:54do you know that there's never been I
44. 1:58don't know any wars that were started by
45. 2:0080s I don't
46. 2:01when things happen I don't I don't know
47. 2:04when things like this happen in in for
48. 2:07is is Japan you don't see the incidence
49. 2:09of price gouging and looting and you
50. 2:13usually then working together as a
51. 2:15community as a collective for the good
52. 2:17of each other here the very prescription
53. 2:20that they're telling us we need is to
54. 2:22stay away too - you're on your own -
55. 2:25like everything is the antithesis of
56. 2:27what we've always been taught exactly
57. 2:30and I mean you know that's the part
58. 2:32that's the most difficult I think to
59. 2:34swallow how do we be awake and still be
60. 2:38safe how do we be away in a place that
61. 2:40we've been taught that we need each
62. 2:42other to survive we do we lean on each
63. 2:44other I mean social media has been a big
64. 2:47barometer of how people have been moving
65. 2:48and operating in modern times where we
66. 2:51want the likes we want to be able to be
67. 2:53seen by others and be celebrated by
68. 2:55others and here we now have to do that
69. 2:57in ourselves by ourselves and try and
70. 3:00try to really find constructive ways to
71. 3:01spacing how do we maintain our mental
72. 3:04capacity in these spaces right and so
73. 3:07here we are locked so to speak in our
74. 3:09own homes by our own selves but we have
75. 3:11to figure out can we can we maintain a
76. 3:14fitness level can we maintain a mental
77. 3:16level by reading books
78. 3:17can we care for ourselves in a way that
79. 3:21we have to care for ourselves before
80. 3:22when most of what we are seeing causes
81. 3:24us to want to sometimes you know use
82. 3:27outside substances to make ourselves
83. 3:30let's not bring me in to tell you though
84. 3:47that even in the book that I read the
85. 3:49Quran it does say that there's utility
86. 3:50for men in substances you know then
87. 3:53there's definitely something that's
88. 3:55there but we just have to be mindful -
89. 3:57yeah we don't go overboard I think yeah
90. 3:58the other thing where you know there's a
91. 4:00balance in life that we have to maintain
92. 4:02them we can't make ourselves so afraid
93. 4:05of the unknown these records - in this
94. 4:09process we need to strengthen ourselves
95. 4:10because nothing is going to be the same
96. 4:12again
97. 4:13yeah now is the time for us to really
98. 4:15dig deep into ourselves reflect on
99. 4:18ourselves try to understand how can we
100. 4:21arise as new people out of this crisis
101. 4:25once enter once the doors are open who
102. 4:28are you going to step back out into the
103. 4:30world ask and I think that that's the
104. 4:31part that's important we have personal
105. 4:33power we have combat power we can be
106. 4:35better than we were and if we were great
107. 4:38than we can be even greater and help
108. 4:39others out - you're very dope man thank
109. 4:42you very much I'm gonna have it all back
110. 4:44thank you keep your head up man thank
111. 4:48you so much Yusef Salaam a big thank you
112. 4:54all right coming up we've got a special
113. 4:56cake giving us another Shortbus records
114. 4:59banger that's coming up in 20 minutes
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