Nostalgia and Nightmares: From Red Lobster to Diddy's Controversy

Bruce Anthony: Welcome. First of all, welcome. This is unsolicited perspectives. I'm your host, Bruce Anthony here to lead the conversation in important events and topics that are shaping today's society. Join the conversation and follow us wherever you get your audio podcasts. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch our video podcast.

Bruce Anthony: Rate, review, like, comment, share, share with your friends, share with your family, hell, even share with your enemies. On today's episode, I'm going to be talking about something about my childhood that's now been lost. My sister is going to join me for a special segment because we're going to talk about Diddy And then I'm going to talk about when planks go really really wrong.

Bruce Anthony: That's enough of the intro. Let's get to the show[00:01:00] 

Nostalgia Trip: The Importance of Red Lobster
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Bruce Anthony: You know, in the last episode, I talked about, you know, those casual dining restaurants, the Ruby Tuesdays, the Applebee's, the Chili's, um, that were really popular in the nineties and kind of part of my added adolescent years, uh, something that I grew up with. Another thing that is very, very, another restaurant, casual diner restaurant that is very, very important to me.

Bruce Anthony: Everybody that knows me will know this is red lobster. Now, why is red lobster so important to me? And why at the top did I say that I'm losing a piece of my childhood? Well, when I was growing up, me and my brother and sister, my mom and dad, My mom and dad were growing up as well, right? Like I'm older than my mom and dad was when I was 10 years old.

Bruce Anthony: Right. So when we were growing up and we live in, in this little town in Virginia called Lynchburg, Virginia, and my parents didn't have a whole lot of money, right? They were climbing that social economic ladder, but we were still on the [00:02:00] lower rung, but we, you know, made a good home and for special occasions, We would go to Red Lobster.

Bruce Anthony: It was always like a dinner thing. I mean, I was always like a birthday thing, right? Like birthdays, special celebrations. We're going to Red Lobster and I love. Red Lobster. Now, we live in DC. There are a million and one better seafood restaurants around here. But my number one choice still is Red Lobster for various reasons.

Bruce Anthony: One, first and foremost, those cheddar biscuits. Like, come on y'all. Seriously, let's talk about the cheddar biscuits and cheddar biscuits are absolutely delicious. Don't let me get, don't let me get to talking about my favorite meal that everyone's feast where you get clams and shrimp and, and all types of stuff, you know, you can add chicken tenders with it too.

Bruce Anthony: And then the lobster macaroni and cheese. Come on now. Sometimes in my adult life, I would go to Ruby Tuesday for happy hour and I would tell, and I [00:03:00] would sit at the bar and I would tell the bartender, Hey, look, man, go ahead and keep bringing me out red wine and the baskets, the baskets of the biscuits.

Bruce Anthony: Like keep on bringing them keep on bringing them because that's that's what I'm going to consume today I'm going to drink wine and eat these biscuits and and it's it's so much of a tradition That I still do red lobster for my birthday like every year I don't go there anymore But every year I will order and get red lobster delivered the Admiral feasts with all the red with all the cheddar biscuits that I can Consume and, uh, you know, the lobster macaroni and cheese.

Bruce Anthony: I mean the lobster mashed potatoes, excuse me, or is it macaroni and cheese? How do I forget my favorite dish? 

The Downfall of Red Lobster: Bankruptcy and Beyond
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Bruce Anthony: I don't know, but I got some disheartening news. Red lobsters filing for bankruptcy. So. Red lobsters filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy. The following was voluntary and followed the closure of a dozen of their [00:04:00] locations.

Bruce Anthony: This was the company's official statement. The company plans to use this bankruptcy proceedings to improve operations, simplify the business. Reduce locations and pursue a sale of most of it, of its assets. Despite the bankruptcy filing, Red Lobster intends to keep his restaurants open, open and operating as usual during the chapter 11 process.

Bruce Anthony: And the company is planning to sell his business to a new entity, uh, controlled by its lenders. So why is it filing for bankruptcy? Well, there were some financial challenges here. The company faced several financial challenges, including a high lease and labor costs. I'm going to get to the high lease later because I read something and there's conflicting reports.

Bruce Anthony: Even the conflicting reports are exactly how it happened, but the premise of this, the premise of this, I'm going to get to [00:05:00] later as far as that high lease is concerned. Another one of their financial challenges, the ultimate endless strip deal became more popular than expected, leading to significant loss in the third quarter.

Bruce Anthony: Okay. All right. It's not funny. People are going to be losing their jobs. This company is closing down restaurants. This is not funny, but it is. Everybody knew good and damn well that unlimited endless ultimate shrimp, whatever you want to call it, was going to be a detriment to this company. Look, let me tell you something.

Bruce Anthony: I know how many popcorn shrimp I can eat in one sitting. And it's a lot. And if you tell me it's endless, and if I stay away from the majority of what I'm going to eat, the cheddar biscuits, if I stay away from them, I just focus on the shrimp. Oh, I can kill about 60 to 90 of them. Popcorn shrimp with ease.

Bruce Anthony: Right? I stay [00:06:00] away from the, the fattening stuff, the, the filling stuff. If I stay away from the biscuits, I stay away from the french fries. I'm gonna kill them shrimp. I'm gonna kill them shrimp. And you gonna tell me therefore, whatever the price was, let's say it was 29.99, which I assume that they should have charged for that.

Bruce Anthony: 29.99. I get unlimited endless shrimp. No, eventually you're gonna have to cut some of those. Cut some of those people off. So clearly they didn't think this plan out. They wanted to bring people in, but didn't realize people weren't going to leave. So, so they ate, they didn't eat red lobster out of a shrimp at home.

Bruce Anthony: That's corny, but it's not funny, but it's so is. So the company considered filing for chapter 11 bankruptcy last month to restructure his debt. Uh, here's the CEO statement. The company CEO, Jonathan Tobias, stated that the restructuring is the best path forward for Red Lobster and allows the company to address several financial and operational challenges [00:07:00] and emerge stronger and refocus on growth.

Bruce Anthony: I mean, people are going to lose their jobs. Locations are going to be closed. They're going to be auctioning off equipment from these closed locations to try and keep some cash. Okay, I joked about the Ultimate endless shrimp. And they said they did have losses in the third quarter, but even that alone is not going to make a company that's been in existence for 30, 40 years, right?

Bruce Anthony: Uh, if I'm 40 plus, let's say 30, 40 years, that alone is not going to drive the company to bankruptcy. So what would it be that would lead a company? It's a bankruptcy. Does anybody know about Ray Kroc? He was, he's basically the man that's considered the founder for McDonald's. It was actually two other brothers that actually founded McDonald's and he stole the [00:08:00] company.

Bruce Anthony: He stole McDonald's from them because he went into a business deal with them. He partnered with them and he said, yo, y'all got this great idea for McDonald's. I want to expand this. And then it was like, all right, that's cool. As long as you don't take away from the integrity. Of our operations, meaning that our food is of good quality and our services of good quality.

Bruce Anthony: You can't ruin that. If you do that, you breached the agreement. Eventually Ray breached the agreement because he saw that he wasn't able to make money because he couldn't change the menu. He couldn't change the way that they were operating. So he didn't like it. He came up with the idea to buy the land, to buy the land and McDonald's actually sits on.

Bruce Anthony: So that's how he gained control of McDonald's. He said, Hey, y'all had the store. You had the operations, but I own the land. And now you have to do what I say, or you don't have a place to have McDonald's anymore. So how does that [00:09:00] pertain to red lobster? 

Exploring the Impact of Real Estate on Business Survival
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Bruce Anthony: Something very, very similar happened. And like I said, I've done some research, this conflicting reports.

Bruce Anthony: This is the Bay. I'm gonna give y'all the general basis of what happened to red lobster. So basically a company came in and bought the land that red lobster had. Okay. The red, all the red lobsters are sitting on plots of land, right? They bought the land, then they repackaged it and sold the land to an off suit.

Bruce Anthony: Oh, they basically took their company and put it into two divisions. There's the restaurant size of restaurant side of the company and then a real estate side of the company. And they, the restaurant side sold The land to this real estate side and a real estate side raised the rent of red lobsters. So when they were talking about operation [00:10:00] costs, that's what they were talking about.

Bruce Anthony: They raise rent and, and people out there in the world who are renting for housing. Right. Who are renting for housing? Like me seeing some of this, or not even if you're renting, if you tried to buy a house within the last three years, a condo, a townhouse, and try to buy property within the last couple of years, you will see that there's been a little bit of trouble because you'll put in a bid.

Bruce Anthony: Let's say there's a condo for 400, 000. And for those people who are listening in other parts of the world or other parts of the United States, and you say a condo is 400, 000. And the D the DMV, the Washington DC area. Yes. They are not even a great condo like a two bedroom, one bath, a two bedroom, two bath.

Bruce Anthony: That's going to run you close to four 50 and they can go upwards to 800, 000 real easy. So, uh, a lot of people were trying to buy properties. I know for a fact here in the DMV area and they were being outbid by 50, 000, 60, 000, 70, 000, [00:11:00] 100, 000 over asking price in cash. It's because there were companies that were buying property, turning around, renting them out, raising the rents.

Bruce Anthony: And you see this across the board where the cost of living is just really high. Uh, and here in the Washington area, there is a It's not landmark ish, but it's known if anybody's ever been in the Washington DC area, the Pentagon is actually in the state of Virginia is right across the DC line. And in this it's in, it's right there where the Arlington cemetery is.

Bruce Anthony: And Arlington is actually a city in Virginia, right? So when you go to the Arlington cemetery, it's in the city of Arlington, Virginia, and in the city of Arlington, Virginia, there's. Two Metro stops that a lot of people here in this area divide Arlington into is the Metro stop. So two Metro stops is Pentagon City Metro and Crystal City Metro and and it's gotten to the point now where people just say that they live in Pentagon City or Crystal [00:12:00] City if you're from this area.

Bruce Anthony: Okay. In crystal city, there's an underground that connects the Metro to the hotels and a bunch of the, in the underground, there were a bunch of restaurants and shops and yeah, you had to really either be working or living in the area. It wasn't like people were venturing out of town to come to this, to this underground shops area, but for people that are working and there's a large number of people that work at jobs.

Bruce Anthony: In Crystal City, Pentagon City, it was, uh, those businesses were thriving just because, you know, people go out to eat for lunch and dinner. And this area is very, really, really dense, uh, with people. So it was running things. The landlords. Of this crystal city underground have decided that they're no longer going to be in the retail and restaurant business and didn't even raise the rents.

Bruce Anthony: They just said, Hey, look, [00:13:00] we're closing up shop and we're going to do something else. And there are businesses down there just like, wait a minute. What? Like, You're just going to kick us out without any notice or anything like that. And it's a bit more complicated. There, there has been some notice and people have been getting information, but landlords have control.

Bruce Anthony: And so we're living in this country. Where Lex Luthor said it in the first Superman movie with Christopher Reeve land land is the most important thing, right? There have been wars literally fought over land and the control of this land are going to businesses and conglomerates that are pushing out Small business owners, but now multimillion, maybe billion, maybe billion dollar companies like red lobster.

Bruce Anthony: Now maybe they didn't hit billion cause people was killing, um, [00:14:00] killing red lobster with that ultimate endless shrimp. Y'all know I didn't even partake in that. I didn't even know that was a thing. I missed ultimate endless shrimp. But anyway, it's, it's just interesting to me that Thriving restaurants, despite that third quarter loss because of the ultimate endless shrimp companies that have been thriving for decades, right?

Bruce Anthony: I've been going to Red Lobster since I was eight or nine years old, right? That's decades. That's three decades of my life. Okay, that is now out of business and not solely out of business because people aren't going there anymore. And the business is failing. No, the business. Is losing money because of greed.

Bruce Anthony: Good old American greed. Y'all remember Gordon Gekko? Where he said greed is good? Yeah, that was a lie. And there's a whole generation of us that believe in that. [00:15:00] There isn't a thing called trickle down economics. That didn't really exist, right? But there is a thing called trickle down debt. And that's what we're experiencing now in this country more than ever.

Special Segment: Addressing the Diddy Controversy
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Bruce Anthony: All right, ladies and gentlemen, this is a special segment. We don't typically do this for the Tuesday show, but if you've been living under a rock and you don't know what's going on, a tape. That surrounds Diddy and all of his shenanigans was released Friday, just as we released the Friday episode. So what happened?

Bruce Anthony: CNN that great news organization obtained a surveillance video showing Sean Diddy combs, Puffy P Diddy, whatever you want to call them, allegedly I don't know how it was allegedly assaulting [00:16:00] his former romantic partner, Cassie, the video which was released last Friday, May 17th, 2024 shows Diddy violently grabbing, shoving, dragging and kicking and not a regular little kick like he kicked and his leg went up in the air.

Bruce Anthony: It was a follow through kick in a hotel in California back in 2016. This all happened in 2016 and it was released recently. The incident was reportedly part of some ongoing beef between Diddy and 50 cent. I don't even know why that's important or how that pertains to the case, but it blew up social media.

Bruce Anthony: There's a lot of questions that had to be asked and answered and my sister feels Oh, wait about it. And I want to give her the space and the opportunity to say what's on her mind and get everything off her chest. So Jay, welcome to the Tuesday episode [00:17:00] of unsolicited perspective. It's not the sibling happy hour, but you're my sibling and this ain't a happy hour, but we're going to try to give people another perspective.

Bruce Anthony: Of what's going on. So I'm going to give you the floor, the mic, whatever you want to call it. 

J. Aundrea: Yeah. So first I wanted to offer my sincerest and deepest apologies to Cassie Ventura for what she went through. I can't imagine from age 19 being preyed upon, abused, trafficked, and having really no hope for escape.

Bruce Anthony: Hmm. Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: Because it is not only an influential man, a powerful man, a famous man, but a billionaire. Yeah. Which, which carries a lot of significance in the United [00:18:00] States. I don't know how she eventually got away, but I am so glad she did because there are so many women who don't. I'm actually not going to discuss the video because at this point most people have seen it and there is a lot of discourse around it in recent days and from people who are much more articulate than me, but I do have a few points that I, I specifically wanted to address.

J. Aundrea: But before I start that, for me, and everybody can do whatever they want, but for me, he is Sean Combs forever. Nicknames are reserved for people we have an affinity for, and He is not that, so I will only be referring to him as Sean Combs or just Combs. [00:19:00] Like, I'm not, he's, he's not gonna be Diddy, Puff Daddy, Brother Love, any of that bull malarkey.

J. Aundrea: Since we're on the Tuesday show, so I can't. But, My first point, which I think a lot of people also feel this way is to hell with his apology. He can honestly take it and shove it up his ass. 

Bruce Anthony: Okay. So that's something I forgot to give the people out there. He did come out with an apology yesterday or Saturday.

J. Aundrea: Yeah. 

Bruce Anthony: In which it was 

J. Aundrea: Sunday. I believe it was Sunday, 

Bruce Anthony: Sunday. Okay. In which, you know, he tried to explain his actions. You brought this up to me and I had to rewatch it and he never actually apologizes to Cassie. 

J. Aundrea: He doesn't mention her name once and him shooting this and posting it. On Sunday is also intentional, right?

J. Aundrea: Because he has, [00:20:00] and he does in his apology, but he has in the past and he continues to weaponize religion. 

Bruce Anthony: Oh, 

J. Aundrea: I, I just, I'm going to pray to God and I'm going to, you know, seek, seek forgiveness for myself. I'm not asking for forgiveness, but I'm going to pray. And I'm a, I have another point about that. In a second.

J. Aundrea: But for me, it was a non apology directed at no one. It was, um, incredibly egotistical and narcissistic. If he was really contrite, he would have gone to rehab and sought therapy the first time he ever put his hands on anyone. This entire time up until CNN exposed this video, he has either directly or indirectly Call Cassie Ventura a [00:21:00] liar.

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. He has done that several times 

J. Aundrea: and someone who's just seeking a payday. 

Bruce Anthony: Yep. That's exactly what he said when the whole lawsuit originally came out. 

J. Aundrea: So I don't buy it. He does not appear contrite at all. He didn't even reference her. You were at a low point in your life. You hit rock bottom. No, you hit Cassie.

J. Aundrea: That's what you did. So your apology, keep it because what are you even sorry for that? The video came out. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah, that's what he's sorry for. 

J. Aundrea: You sorry that we saw it. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: That's what you're sorry about. The second thing, protect and believe black women, the statistics of intimate partner, violence, sexual abuse, and murder among black women in the United States.

J. Aundrea: [00:22:00] Absolutely staggering. Black women in the U. S. are six times more likely to be killed than white women with interpartner violence being the key contributor to homicide and black women. 

Bruce Anthony: And let's be clear. What we're saying is listen to all women. 

J. Aundrea: Yes, 

Bruce Anthony: but there is an overwhelming statistic that shows black women.

Bruce Anthony: Are not being heard and being hurt at a longer, not longer, more frequency than any other demographic 

J. Aundrea: black women also experienced significantly higher rates of psychological abuse. Things like humiliation, insults, name calling, these are prevalent in, in the music of the 90s and 2000s. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: All you had to do was read the lyrics to know how we were viewed by these kinds of [00:23:00] men at that time, and probably, and definitely still today.

J. Aundrea: And things like coercive control, which is what Cassie Ventura experienced and their experience, these rates of psychological abuse. At higher rates than women overall, not just not broken down by race. I mean, women overall, black women experience this in the U S black women who experienced interpartner violence or sexual violence are three times more likely to experience abuse or a neglectful response from law enforcement when they report it.

J. Aundrea: So a lot of times people are like, why didn't you go to the police? Well, the response isn't always, Helpful, right? Why didn't you leave? She tried. That's exactly what you were witnessing. Was a woman trying to escape a [00:24:00] situation and could not, 

Bruce Anthony: she literally waited until he fell asleep. And exited the room.

Bruce Anthony: He woke up chased after her and did that. That's what happened. 

J. Aundrea: Yes. So it's not, is it? And why don't, why are people just waiting till now to step forward? You don't know how much therapy she had to probably go through just to work up the courage to say it out loud. What happened to her? You don't know.

J. Aundrea: What she went through behind the scenes, none of us do. You make the report when you can, when you're able, you don't get to decide for the victim how and when they come forward and in what capacity. These, [00:25:00] most of the things that happened to her, the statute of limitations had expired. She had no choice but to file a civil suit.

J. Aundrea: Him settling it within 24 hours. in order to avoid the discovery period where she would enter in evidence. And then proceeding to go on this little social media tour about how it's just people looking for money, and they're lying, and he didn't do anything that she accused him of, which we all know, I mean, I feel like we knew at the time was a lie, and now we definitely know was a lie.

Bruce Anthony: Now we definitely know it was a lie. Now we have clear, concrete video evidence to prove that he was lying. 

J. Aundrea: Right. And anybody who thinks it was some sort of deep fake video, the man came out and said it was him. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah, he did. He said it was him. 

J. Aundrea: So, my third point is in response to [00:26:00] black people who engage in toxic Christianity.

Bruce Anthony: Mm, okay. I wasn't expecting this one. All right, here we go. 

J. Aundrea: They allow people in power to weaponize religion and weaponize God for protection and to be absolved.

J. Aundrea: There are, I am honestly disgusted by the number of black women supporting cones. You know, Kelly price made a post blaming the seductions of the industry and calling him a unique talent and imploring him to pray. He already started that, that rebirth or redemption tour before all of this even broke when he was making connections with people like T.

J. Aundrea: D. Jakes and he changed his name to Brother Love and things like that. Y'all in these comments [00:27:00] talking about I forgive him or we can't judge, only God can judge. First of all, it's not your apology to accept. It's Cassie Ventura's apology to accept. It's all of his victims, apology to accept or not accept.

J. Aundrea: You cannot absolve him. We need to start holding people in our community accountable regardless of their power, fame, influence, how many bops they got. Are y'all for real? You could be anything in the world and I'm asking you to be for real because that same mercy. Is never extended to black women. Y'all will judge a black woman publicly to the ends of the earth.

J. Aundrea: Oh, well, she shouldn't have been doing this, but she did that. Was she lying? She, this, she, that, that same mercy that you give him, you never [00:28:00] extended to black women.

J. Aundrea: God don't have, God ain't, God don't have nothing to do with the, with him. This, that, that's not this. I don't know what God y'all serve, but mine doesn't protect abusers. He heals. and cares for the victim. Our grace should go to them, should go to Cassie Ventura. That's where our grace should go. And the last thing I'm going to say on this is we need to start interrogating our support of anybody who has been in support of him, especially for any extended period of time, I'm talking about all your faves.

J. Aundrea: I'm talking about all of your faves, because what you need to ask yourself is, is my entertainment worth more? Then someone else's dignity and safety. It's not is the answer to that. [00:29:00] 

Bruce Anthony: Jay. I hear everything that you saying you are right. I agree with 99. 9 percent of it. However, Diddy is the soundtrack, excuse me.

Bruce Anthony: Sean Combs is the soundtrack to the nineties. You would have to almost eliminate all R& B and hip hop from the 90s because it's tentacles are on Everything. 

J. Aundrea: Yeah, you know what? You know what the great thing about music is? It's not going anywhere. The 90s was 30 years ago. When the last time you listened to bad boy anything?

Bruce Anthony: I listened to Biggie at least once a week. 

J. Aundrea: We got to wonder why he's gone. 

Bruce Anthony: Uh, look, don't, we not going to get into no Jaguar, Jaguar, right? Conspiracy. Let me tell 

J. Aundrea: you something about Jaguar, right? And her conspiracy theories. She's been saying this for years. And she [00:30:00] is being proven. Correct. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. But she also got some crazy conspiracy theories.

Bruce Anthony: Look, I have a friend, I have a friend educated professor educated. I asked him to come on the show and he said, nah, you ain't gonna get me canceled because I saw him today this morning and I was like, we still bad boy for life. And he was like, we're gonna have to do, we're gonna have to figure out something, maybe he could sell this whole catalog to a women's shelter so that he can't make any more money from it, but that all the money that is made from it is going to domestic abuse survivors or something like that.

Bruce Anthony: So that we can still listen to music. And I told him, I was like, yeah, I'm going to have a really hard time cutting. Anything bad boy out of my life, that's Jodeci, that's Mary J. Lablodge, that's Biggie, that's Craig Mack. That's, that's almost everything, right? Cause he's got remixes on everything. And I was like, what's next?

Bruce Anthony: What's next. 

J. Aundrea: Right. Whatever needs to be next. We need to start, I'm going to say it again, [00:31:00] interrogating our support of anybody who has been in support of him for any extended period of time. The reason he's been able to get away with this for so long is because of who he is. 

Bruce Anthony: Yes, this is true. 

J. Aundrea: Because of his reach, because of his influence, because of the people he knows who stay silent for him.

J. Aundrea: There are no innocent bystanders here. I can understand, you know, I tried to read some of Cassie Ventura's complaint. I could not get through all of it. I found it incredibly triggering, but. She was being abused in front of staff. Now I can understand being staff and it's your job. It's your livelihood.

J. Aundrea: And who are you to go up against a billionaire who, who hangs out, who's been [00:32:00] seen with literally everyone of any kind of importance, who has unlimited resources. I can understand that. I can't understand his peers not saying anything. 

Bruce Anthony: Well, how many peers does he really have? 

J. Aundrea: I can think of one in particular 

Bruce Anthony: who I 

J. Aundrea: have, who I've had a problem with since his dealings with R.

J. Aundrea: Kelly. 

Bruce Anthony: Okay. I knew you was going to go there. Look, we're not taking away his catalog. Bad boy is one thing. We're not taking away Jay Z because if you take away Jay Z, that means you got to take Beyonce away too. 

J. Aundrea: You might have to. 

Bruce Anthony: No, Jay, where does it end? Where does it end? It ends when 

J. Aundrea: people can live in safety and peace.

J. Aundrea: That's when it ends. And yes, you're going to have to be uncomfortable. Yes, you're going to have to give stuff up. But my [00:33:00] entertainment, my entertainment is not more important than somebody else's life. 

Bruce Anthony: You are absolutely right. Like, I'm not arguing that. I'm not even arguing your point. Selfishly and hypocritically because I'm often accusing other people of doing the same thing that I'm doing.

Bruce Anthony: I don't want to lose my fun. 

The Silence and Complicity in Celebrity Circles
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J. Aundrea: None of these people wanted to lose their fun. And so they allowed this to continue. You're right. People have been voluntarily silent in exchange for benefits, proximity to power and money and fame. People have been voluntarily silent. His peers who have been, who allegedly have engaged in a lot of this activity with him or who at least knew about it did absolutely nothing and continue.

J. Aundrea: Not only did they do nothing, at least you could distance yourself from him. 

Bruce Anthony: A lot of people did, a lot of people have distanced [00:34:00] themselves. 

J. Aundrea: No, 

Bruce Anthony: even before now, the person that you were going to talk about Jay Z has long since distanced himself from Puffy. I still see them. And he distanced himself from, uh, from, uh, from R Kelly as well.

Bruce Anthony: When all that stuff like dropped. 

J. Aundrea: No, because Dame was with Aaliyah before best of both worlds. He knew about 

Bruce Anthony: the videotape. Once the videotape hit, He was done with R Kelly. 

J. Aundrea: He are. Yeah, because now there's physical evidence out there that you can't refute. But as long as long as it remains rumor, even if he knows that it's the truth, because he's friends with the woman it happened to.

The Importance of Believing and Protecting Black Women
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Bruce Anthony: But that's about believing black women. That's originally it was one of your original points, right? Like maybe he just didn't believe what she was saying. 

J. Aundrea: Oh, he believed her. He didn't care. I said, protect and believe black women. There's two parts to it. 

Bruce Anthony: You 

J. Aundrea: [00:35:00] believe them and you protect them. That's what's not happening.

J. Aundrea: There are plenty of people who believe us. When you talk, when you, when you talk about predators in the community, in your family. All of these things. When you talk about that, there's people, oh, they believe you, but they're not protecting you. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. You're right. What is the thing that there's used to be said in the black community?

Bruce Anthony: When we were younger, we actually didn't live in any of these neighborhoods, but they would be like, stay away from Mr. Fred. Because you knew Mr. Fred wasn't cool, 

J. Aundrea: right? 

Bruce Anthony: And more than likely a pedophile instead of pressing and getting them charged and getting them sent to prison. We just like stay away from Mr.

Bruce Anthony: Fred and Mr. Fred would end up hurting kids 

J. Aundrea: or stay away from uncle. So and so 

Bruce Anthony: that's another one. So. I'm so glad that you touched on, and I hope they're [00:36:00] listening. Why? Like the, the, the questions that a lot of men had was like, why didn't you should you say some earlier, or she went for the money grabs.

Bruce Anthony: She should have just pushed some charges. 

The Power Dynamics and the Failure to Act
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Bruce Anthony: A whole bunch of people got hurt in between this. And when the first things happened with her. And I just didn't even want to entertain those conversations with those gentlemen, because I was like, wow, that's a really male perspective of looking at things, right?

Bruce Anthony: That's a really privileged way of looking at something, not understanding power dynamics and not understanding how much power, not, this isn't typical power dynamics. This is somebody who was known throughout the world who at that time was a multimillionaire who later became a billionaire and has power and influence.

Bruce Anthony: And also. How do you know that she didn't already do it and it didn't get quashed? Because what's funny is to me, this whole instance. This whole incident with the video happened eight years ago. 

J. Aundrea: Yes. 

Bruce Anthony: [00:37:00] Somebody's CNN, CNN doesn't pay for video. Somebody went to CNN and said, I have video of this incident. 

J. Aundrea: Yes.

Bruce Anthony: And they waited because everything with, with, uh, Sean Combs came out, what, last year, right? 

J. Aundrea: Yeah. So the speculation is that it, if it wasn't 

Bruce Anthony: speculating, speculating, 

J. Aundrea: yeah, the speculation is that it came out of the raid in his home. 

Bruce Anthony: Okay. 

The Role of Evidence in Belief and Action
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J. Aundrea: Because In Cassie Ventura's complaint, she state, she, first of all, described the incident exactly as it occurred in the video.

J. Aundrea: And she stated he paid 50, 000 to security to secure the tape. So if he kept it. Why would he keep 

Bruce Anthony: it? Why wouldn't he destroy it? 

J. Aundrea: So allegedly. He likes to [00:38:00] document these encounters. He likes to videotape these encounters. What you'll find a lot of times where predators, they keep trophies as souvenirs. 

Bruce Anthony: I mean, I've seen that, you know, cause I've watched a lot of criminal minds and, you know, they talk about that with serial killers, but I didn't think that, well, I don't know that he's not a serial killer, but I don't know that he is speculation.

Bruce Anthony: Ladies and gentlemen, uh, reckless. Reckless speculation, but I never thought of that as abusers keep trophies. 

J. Aundrea: Yeah. A lot of times the trophy is the abused. 

Bruce Anthony: Again, I guess when the abused is gone, you need something. 

J. Aundrea: You need something. 

Bruce Anthony: Wow. Hmm. 

J. Aundrea: Well, to remember. So again, if you were contrite. Why do you need this reminder?

J. Aundrea: Why didn't you destroy it? 

Bruce Anthony: Well, we know that he wasn't going to try it because this came up all of a sudden, because the video got released 

J. Aundrea: and 

Bruce Anthony: because he accused, he said that she was lying and it was a money grab. So he could have 

J. Aundrea: [00:39:00] said nothing. He could have settled that case and said nothing, but he made a point to directly.

J. Aundrea: And or indirectly accuse her of being a liar 

Bruce Anthony: because from most people in power, for most men in power before 2016, they got away with all this stuff. 

The Toxicity of Celebrity and Power
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Bruce Anthony: For those men out there who was saying, well, the me too movement has gone too far, shut up because this is another example of the me too movement helping expose somebody that needed to be exposed.

Bruce Anthony: But at this, on the same token, I'm not giving him my bad boy music. Now I stole most of the music anyway. So he ain't making no money off of me. 

J. Aundrea: That's, you know, that's between you and God, like that ain't got nothing to do with me, but I will, I'm just telling you what my position is. 

Addressing Toxic Christianity and Community Accountability
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J. Aundrea: And again, when I'm [00:40:00] talking about the response from the Black Christian community, I'm talking about toxic Christianity.

J. Aundrea: I'm not talking about the Christianity you and I practice, right, of, of love and respect. And helping your neighbor and things like that. I'm talking about this toxic stuff. 

Bruce Anthony: The same thing that we attacked white Christian nationalists of that toxic Christian Christianity. Guess what? We attack black people as well.

Bruce Anthony: We are not, we are not just attacking white folks out here. Us black folks just as toxic when it comes to Christianity. Just may in some cases, 

J. Aundrea: sometimes even worse. And y'all can be mad at me. I don't give a damn. Because this is the truth. You guys have been hiding behind your definition of God and your definition of what forgiveness is and who was entitled to it to [00:41:00] protect powerful men from doing God awful things.

J. Aundrea: How many times have people in a church been exposed for doing awful or illegal things? 

Bruce Anthony: The pastors, 

J. Aundrea: the top 

Bruce Anthony: of the church, the pastors, 

J. Aundrea: And y'all still, still are attempting to absolve this man as if you, A, have the power to do so you don't, and B, it's never, it's never across the board. Again, like I said, the same mercy is never extended to black women.

J. Aundrea: You'll never see them rallying around. And embattled black woman. You don't see it 

Bruce Anthony: unless it was Michelle Obama. 

J. Aundrea: I think black people in general rally around Michelle Obama, depending on what it is, I mean, 

Bruce Anthony: well, you, we 

J. Aundrea: all know w love him. So Michelle, Michelle, that [00:42:00] is true. 

Bruce Anthony: And Beyonce, everybody, everybody, 

J. Aundrea: there's, there's some, there's 

Bruce Anthony: a few, 

J. Aundrea: there's some stories out there about her being very upset, witnessing things and.

J. Aundrea: There is a story out there that she, I don't know if it was him being abusive towards Cassie. I believe it was this, of course, is speculation. I don't know if this is true, but she witnessed the abuse and demanded that he apologize. I mean, went up one side of him and down the other and the report is he got on his knees and apologized.

Bruce Anthony: No, well, 

J. Aundrea: but. Proceeded to then continue to abuse her for years. Not just her. And, and mind you hers, hers is not the only story out there. It's not just her. I believe there's four lawsuits. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. Yeah. Multiple lawsuits. Yeah. [00:43:00] 

J. Aundrea: Of men and women that he has victimized, that he has used his power and influence.

J. Aundrea: To coerce people into doing things they would not normally want to do. I don't care about that man's sexuality. I really don't. That has nothing to do. What happens between consenting adults don't have nothing to do with us. As long as he not hurting nobody or hurting himself that I, I don't care. I'm talking about him hurting people, using and abusing people.

J. Aundrea: And there are people who I want to hear from. I wonder what little Kim, what stories little Kim has or Mary J. Blige or Faith Evans. I would say I would love to know the story that Kim Porter has. She's been there since Uptown records, but she gone. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: Can't ask heavy D he's gone. Can't ask Andre Harrell.

J. Aundrea: He's gone. 

Bruce Anthony: I'll be 

J. Aundrea: sure. [00:44:00] Almost died. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: Make her that what you will. 

Bruce Anthony: All right. Jaguar. Right. Junior. Let's wrap this up. Cause now you starting to, real reckless speculation. But 

J. Aundrea: at the end of the day. You know, somebody said to me in the DMs, but it's not like people don't, you know, women don't be lying.

J. Aundrea: Okay. Let me, let me just say this. There are two possibilities, right? When you hear a woman tell her story of being abused, you can believe her or you cannot believe her. 

Bruce Anthony: Mm-Hmm. . 

J. Aundrea: If she is lying and I believed her, then I'm just wrong. But if she was telling the truth and I didn't believe her, that could be her life.

Bruce Anthony: Mm-Hmm. . 

J. Aundrea: There's more women dying than lying. Period. 99.9 times outta [00:45:00] 10. When a woman reports, and this is any woman, when a woman reports abuse, she's not lying. She just doesn't have the benefit of HD surveillance footage. 

Bruce Anthony: Yeah. 

J. Aundrea: All she has is her word. But that's the same on the other side. All they got is their word.

J. Aundrea: Believe people until you have a reason not to. But I would rather believe someone and be wrong than not believe them and they lose their life. That's all I have to say about that. 

Bruce Anthony: And all I got to say is message.

Bruce Anthony: All right. I want to thank my sister for coming on and talking about Diddy for this, for a special segment. We had to get that to you guys before. The sibling happy hour. It was just going to be too long of a wait to get that information out there. And [00:46:00] she had a lot to say, she had a lot to say, and I don't disagree with the majority of what she said.

Bruce Anthony: Uh, I really don't. And it's really something that we need to really look into ourselves and say, you know, I've, I've done this argument before. What is The cost of art and what are we willing to pay for to enjoy it? All right. And in that same vein art, right? 

The Dangers of Pranks and Emotional Harm
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Bruce Anthony: There have been prank shows like, uh, punked and, uh, I don't know.

Bruce Anthony: I can't think of any other prank shows on top of my top of my head. Cause punked was just so, so really good, but I'm sure like jackass did punk stuff or pranks. They did. They did do prank stuff. There's always been prank shows, right? And. Social media has given a platform for people to show planks that they would, not planks, [00:47:00] planks as an exercise, pranks that they would do to people and send it to us out in the internet, send it on the internet and give it to us for our own enjoyment.

Bruce Anthony: Some of the pranks are funny, you know, as long as nobody is getting hurt or if the person that's doing the prank gets hurt because it gets bodily harm, but that's part of the gag. Okay. That's fine. No, it's not. The main thing is whoever you're pranking, they shouldn't really, really get hurt. It's all supposed to be good fun and games and jokes.

Bruce Anthony: What happens when pranks go wrong? There is a growing trend on Instagram of A prank of one half of a couple pretending they're doing a sexual act with someone else. As the other half of the couple walks into the house. So let's give an example. The most recent one [00:48:00] I saw today that that makes me want to talk about this is a woman has her camera set up and she puts her head underneath the covers with like a dummy.

Bruce Anthony: It looks like a person. But it's not a person and she pretends that she's given fellatio as her boyfriend gets ready to walk into their house as he walks into the house and he sees this, his instant reaction is to throw the 48 pack water bottle at her and hits her in her back. Now, violence against women as we just talked about in the other segment is not funny.

Bruce Anthony: That is not fun. Okay. So I'm not making light to that. Okay. I'm kind of making light to his, his reaction afterwards when he found out it was a prank and he was like, yo back. All right. No, her back was not. All right. You just threw a 48 pack of water and it crashed on her back. But it got me to thinking [00:49:00] and you know, I love to be introspective and think about how I would respond to certain situations.

Bruce Anthony: And I've may or may not have told a story on this show of that evil girl that cheated on me and I caught her cheating. I mean, I'll say that for the after hours. If y'all haven't heard that story, y'all can hear it on the after hours of talking straight ish. I'm not going to tell that story right now, but, but I caught my girlfriend at the time I was in college cheating on me.

Bruce Anthony: My initial reaction was I fainted out of shock and hurt and pain. Then I immediately woke up. And proceeded to whoop that dude's ass. And the whole time that I'm beating him down, I'm saying to him, somebody has to feel my pain. I can't hit her. And that was a real situation. And I remember the initial reaction my [00:50:00] body gave was to faint because it's an overwhelming emotional thing to see a person that you care about.

Bruce Anthony: With somebody else. And so that made me think of these pranks and the initial feeling should have turned that off my bad, ladies and gentlemen. Uh, and the initial feeling that people get when they're cheated on. And that's, I, there are people out here that are listening to this episode, probably getting cheated on right now, probably found out today that they were cheated on, right?

Bruce Anthony: It it's heart wrenching. It, everybody, most people in the world have experienced that. Okay. It's not a, it's not a fun experience. It's not something I recommend to anybody. And to think that you would play a prank on somebody that you care about and give them that feeling, you know, [00:51:00] it's extra evil is if you play that type of prank on somebody, when you or yourself have been cheated on and you know what that feeling is like, it's not funny.

Bruce Anthony: It's not funny. It's an emotional experience that people really shouldn't have to go through. And I know, I know people are going to be like, Bruce is just a joke. It's not that serious. You always got to make a mountain out of a mole hill. And I'm like, yeah, okay. Y'all might be right. Sometimes I do make things bigger, but I like to look at the big picture.

Bruce Anthony: I'm not a, I am at times when it's important micro thinker by and large, I'm a macro. It means that I like to look at the bigger picture and see how. Everything is affected even if the initial instance is small. And, and that would be serious trust issues for me and I have serious trust issues anyway. Do they stem back from that girl that cheated on me?

Bruce Anthony: [00:52:00] Yes. Did I get over it? Oh yeah, I got up. That was like over 20 years ago. So I've absolutely gotten over it, but it broke my heart for a long time. And the girl that I dated afterwards, I'm sure she's not listening to the show, but if she is, you know who you are. I'm sorry. Cause you faced hell for three years.

Bruce Anthony: She was in hell now to defend myself just a tad bit. She was also toxic as hell too. It was just a toxic three year relationship. It was just bad. 

Reflecting on Personal Experiences and the Impact of Actions
---

Bruce Anthony: But anyway, like the pranks, sometimes these pranks are going too far. Right. So like there was a prank that I saw the guy was interviewing people in the street and he said, Hey, I'll give you a hundred dollars to call your parents right now and tell them that you're pregnant or that you got a baby on the way.

Bruce Anthony: And that in and of itself is not a bad thing. That could be a joyous thing, given the right circumstances. It can also be not so much of a joyous thing, given the wrong [00:53:00] circumstances and to call your parents. Look, our parents are old, right? Like if you're in college. Your parents are pretty, they're up there in age.

Bruce Anthony: And let me tell you, as a man that is. Slowly entering his mid forties, heart issues, blood pressure, all that stuff is important. And extra added stress is not needed, right? That is, that is not a thing that should be put on somebody, a man or woman as they get older. So calling your parents and saying, Hey mom, Hey dad, Sorry, I pregnant.

Bruce Anthony: So I might have to drop out of school and come home. I mean, your parents are going to ride for you, but also they're like, what the hell? Like I didn't send you to school, do something to make a careless mistake. I won't say mistake kids. You know, my parents did that, so I'm, I'm not a mistake, so I'm not gonna say mistake.

Bruce Anthony: Just say [00:54:00] accident, happy accident. Let's go with happy accident. So yeah, some of these pranks have gone too far. Yeah. And for these people that are pranking out there, pay attention to the prank, pay attention to what you're doing or what emotional harm you could cause to somebody for laughter. I remember playing the dozens of cracking jokes.

Bruce Anthony: Cracking, Jonan is what we call it in DC. Cracking is what we call it in Virginia. This is just joking on each other. You get at the lunch table and everybody's joking on each other. I'm not quick witted in that sense. I'm not quick at coming up with something. Funny to be derogatory to somebody else. I can be funny, but not when it's like joking on somebody else.

Bruce Anthony: Like I don't, I don't have that ability. So my dad always taught me to go for the jugular like to end, say the one thing that everybody is [00:55:00] avoiding saying, because it's just too me. And that'll stop the joking. And I, and I always did my, my one boy, that's still a friend to a friend of mine from high school said, you always said the thing that nobody else was willing to say that wasn't cool.

Bruce Anthony: And I was like, what wasn't cool is everybody having this quick wit to come up with all these jokes on me and me not being able to fight back because I didn't have that ability. So in order to get you guys to stop, I would say the most hurtful thing. And in retrospect, that was stupid. Like, why would I say the most?

Bruce Anthony: There's a reason why people don't say the most hurtful thing. There's a reason why, like, after a certain age, we stopped calling the stinky boy in school, stinky. Like at a certain age, like there's something going on and he don't have no control over that. It could be the bodily thing. It could be, maybe he's poor.

Bruce Anthony: He don't have the running water that, that, that they need. I, I didn't find out [00:56:00] until I was in my thirties of how people from lower income areas, women specifically will go to like donation places like food banks. You can also get like. Cleaning like things to clean your body, like soap, deodorant and things like that.

Bruce Anthony: Something that I never thought of is that a lot of these women that are in these poor economical situations, economic situations can't afford like pads. And tampons and things of that nature. And I remember in high school, there was this girl and she reeked of that smell, right? Like when taking care of herself down there.

Bruce Anthony: And she didn't like, she came, she lived in a poor area and it never, nobody ever joked on her about it. We talked about it behind her back because she was also a giant of a woman. And like most guys thought that they could probably beat her. But we didn't want [00:57:00] that fight because one, you don't fight a woman regardless.

Bruce Anthony: And two, she could probably kick your ass regardless if you was trying to fight her. So nobody said anything to her, but she would smell and. You know, people shouldn't, people shouldn't say that, that, that thing that, that people don't say to other people because it's so mean, there's a reason why, and as I got older and I, once again, this is looking at the macro, not micro looking at the macro as that example came to my attention of just not being able to afford feminine products.

Bruce Anthony: That's probably the reason why she smelled. It wasn't because she wanted to smell like that. Or maybe, you know, the water would get shut off sometimes, or, you know, maybe the electricity would get shut off and she wouldn't be able to take a hot shower or who wants to take a cold shower. And so. I learned [00:58:00] to be a little bit more sensitive to people and very much like the first segment where I started off at Red Lobster and I brought it around that it's such a bigger issue of, you know, America and capitalism.

Bruce Anthony: I'm going to bring it around to another bigger issue. And being considerate of others. You know, this is a running theme on this podcast of being considerate of others. And I'm no hypocrite. There are times where I am me and I try not to be me. I mean, to the commenters on YouTube and Instagram, I am, I call a lot of people dumb, but you know, don't, don't put yourself out there with ignorant statement.

Bruce Anthony: I won't call you dumb, but a lot of times people are not sympathetic and empathetic to another person's plight. And going back to the prank, somebody like me, [00:59:00] I would leave the woman if she did that to me. Because more than likely I told her the story of catching my ex girlfriend and how that affected me.

Bruce Anthony: And if she did that plank prank, I keep saying plank. It's a prank PR Bruce PR, not PL. And if she can still did that prank, knowing that how I felt when that happened to me in real life and how that affected me, then knowing that feeling is still doing that prank anyway. I mean, she really didn't give a damn about me.

Bruce Anthony: Cause ain't nothing funny, nothing at all funny, about another person's pain. I wish I had something, you know, punchier to make you laugh at this last little bit. Uh, but I already did my bit about the ultimate unlen ultimate endless trip. I already did my bit on uh, you know, me talking about [01:00:00] old funky girl.

Bruce Anthony: I didn't, I didn't, I never called her that though. She, y'all, it was, it was a bad smell. It was bad. And all my people that went to high school that might be listening and watching the show, everybody know who I'm talking about. Uh, I hope she don't know who we're talking about, but I bet things have changed.

Bruce Anthony: I hope things have changed. Anyway, on that note, I want to thank you for listening. I want to thank you for watching and until next time, as always, I'll holler. 

Closing Thoughts and Gratitude
---

Bruce Anthony: That was a hell of a show. Thank you for rocking with us here on Unsolicited Perspectives with Bruce Anthony. Now before you go, don't forget to follow, subscribe, like, comment, and share our podcast wherever you're listening or watching it to.

Bruce Anthony: Pass it along to your friends. If you enjoy it, it means the people that you rock with will enjoy it also. So share the wealth, share the knowledge, share the noise. And all those people that say, well, I don't have a YouTube. If you have a [01:01:00] Gmail account, you have a YouTube. Subscribe to our YouTube channel where you can actually watch our video.

Bruce Anthony: Podcast, but the real party is on our Patreon page after Hours Uncensored and Talking Straightish after hours. Uncensored is another show with my sister, and once again, the key word there is uncensored. Those are exclusively on our Patreon page. Jump onto our website@unsolicitedperspective.com for all things us.

Bruce Anthony: That's where you can get all of our audio video, our blogs. And if you really feel ingenuous and want to help us out, you can donate on our donations page. Donations go strictly to improving our software and hardware so we can keep giving you guys good content that you can clearly listen to. And as you can clearly see, so any donation would be appreciated.

Bruce Anthony: Most importantly, I want to say for listening, for watching, for supporting us. And I'll catch you next time. Audi 5000. [01:02:00] Peace.