Colette Barris's Open Letter To Detavio Samuels, 'The BlackPrint' Interview.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello, it's me, Colette Ferris, and I'm ready. Are you? Welcome! Thank you for joining me at the Urban Village, where the old school house party and community is alive and well. And that's saying a lot in 2026 with the precedent that we have and what's going on. But I'm gonna be truthful. Unlike what we see on media today, this is the source of truth. Would you join me? I got a lot to talk about.

unknown 0:32

Woo!

SPEAKER_03 0:32

Let's go.

SPEAKER_01 0:40

You know, it's very, very unfortunate, particularly what's going on in the mainstream press, the lies that are being told, and what um the non-mainstream media um is trying to share to tell the world no one's listening. I hope tonight you'll listen to me and hear our truths. I've been silent for a long time, and I've allowed lots to be said when I shouldn't have because of ongoing litigation. But, you know, it's hurtful to have the village meaning community, black media, in the forms of Mr. Samuels, um not do a better job. Journalists now, bloggers, uh podcasters have been labeled journalists. And you have a fiduciary responsibility to seek the truth, to investigate, to vet out, even when those people are employees or you collaborate. And this has been very hurtful to my family, and I want to address it now.

SPEAKER_00 2:02

This is the blackprint, a show that dives into the blueprint for black success. Every episode, I sit down with talented CEOs, entrepreneurs, and industry experts to explore their journeys to the top. This is the blackprint. I'm so glad to have you here. I think this is a conversation that I've been looking forward to. Um, I know who you are. Everybody tuning in is gonna know who you are. But at Revolt, we're really big around black people and black creators being able to control their own narrative. And so I never introduce my guests. I always kick it to them to own their narrative and let the world know who they are through their own lens and through their own mouth. So before we get started, can you please introduce yourself to the audience?

SPEAKER_04 2:47

My name is Kenya Barris. I am from England, California. Be a poor coin. I have to claim it sometime, but I'm from Ingle California, live in LA. I uh grew up um a poor black child, and I grew up. I grew up, you know what I'm saying, like like I think a lot of us.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

So if you start at the beginning where you said uh I grew up as a poor young black kid, to today, what is today? Can today can your marriage is prolific writer, Father? What is what is who are you today? Um I I'm still thinking of it out, you know what I'm saying? I grew up in Denver, Colorado. Um, a little bit, you know, uh a little bit younger than you, not much but a little bit younger. Uh no. No. But I know it was a lot of gangbanging and all of that was happening on the on the West. So, anyways, just kind of talk to me about what life was like for you growing up. Family dynamics, community realities.

SPEAKER_04 3:43

It was it was crazy when you grew up. You know, we were broke, but my dad my dad worked for Jean motors. My mom was, you know, kind of sit at home mom kind of punch. I'm working when she needs to. My mom, I remember my mom had the story like how my mom had a broken jaw from my dad when she was pregnant with me. And she had to have a wire mouthwire shit. Um, and so she was making like protein shakes in the 70s. I'm like, I don't know what they tasted like. But like, you know, like it was it weren't sure we were. I was like, let me get whatever, but they, you know, when I came up in the studio, he was, I think he was having his own demons and playing his own demons, and um eventually we they got divorced. Some things happened and he broke in the house. My mom stopped my dad, you know, sitting you know, in front of me, and and we and he was literally, we were afraid of what might happen. So we moved to uh New York to live with my West Indian relatives and um kind of like trying to stay away for a little bit, which was a culture shock, came back, um, and my brothers were in the streets, you know, saying really smart, really good athletes, but you know, kind of doing our own thing, sister was kind of doing her own thing. Um, but my mom, even with everything we went through, my we were the first generation of like um my brother and sister went to college, they went to the FC. Um, and we were like, they was, I think we were the first generation I said that like benefited from the civil rights movement. And my mom was like, we're gonna make sure that you guys have to go to school. So that was like a big thing for me. They went away to school. I was, you know, in the streets, running around England. It got real. It got very real. Um it got I went to, even though I was going to private school, it got very real, it turned, um A man turned um up in a different kind of way. The violence started changing. You know, and I remember, you know, right before.

SPEAKER_00 5:43

Uh forgive me for using like trauma, chaos, and I'm gonna be your your origin literally starts with um before you were even here on this earth, you were part of um a domestic violence uh issue. My question for you is um, how does young Kenya keep his head on straight, or didn't even have his head on straight growing up in a situation like that?

SPEAKER_04 6:07

Um it's crazy. My mom, my brother was getting into so much trouble. My mom was like, two things. She was like, you're not gonna go. The streets was crazy. Like, if she was like, um, my little brother had died asked for the kenya, and my mom was like, um, that made her really extra scared for me. I had to think I'm uh seriously like you know what I'm saying, like you do things like when I I could not I remember not being able to have shoes, you know what I'm saying? I mean I got like a crazy obsession of like how you seek or is it having like uh probably kind of up and coming back then.

SPEAKER_00 6:44

What was it like to go from life in California and all that it was to Atlanta to be surrounded by the black excellence that you experienced both here in the city and at the NHBC?

SPEAKER_04 6:57

Um, I remember the first my first few days on the campus, I was blown away. I didn't go with the class. I just was like, I wasn't used to seeing like you saw a new bag chick every day. That was one thing just to be around that many black women and black black people in general, and I didn't know about like and all that stuff when there was behind like nooses. Remember when I was young and like whenever my I got my young white friends and their spoons matched. And I was like, oh, I was like, you have spoons to match? Like we used to have links to match together, like spoons and match and shit. And I was like, oh my, there's a it's another version of this. Like once you start saying different things, it's hard, it is hard to go back. You know what I'm saying? You take to your point of my moment, like some one of the biggest things I've learned is this this thing called the impinent applause, the power of the pause.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

I mean, it is Victor Franco, but how does the family dynamic that you grew up in kind of play out in the story that we see you telling today?

SPEAKER_04 8:04

Um, I've talked about my mom and dad, you know what I'm saying, and Pops and Ruby. Um, because they're a lot different. You know, when I did, you know, blackish at least were Bowen Rainbow, they're not Bowen Rainbow. But like my family was so disjointed and fucked up. Like, and I when I got a chance to have my own family, I was like, I wanted to do the opposite. You know what I'm saying? Like, it's so crazy because like there's this whole myth that I have to stop you there, Mr.

SPEAKER_01 8:35

Samuels, because uh I was just um fascinated and saddened that you have a working relationship with my brother Kenya Barris. And at some point, there is research, there is vetting that had to be done. And not only did you make it trivial, really simplistic, primal, it's like you know, banter at the barbershop or lunch, or at the hamburger stand, and my family and I resent it. Um I'm just curious about things early on. I need to share with you that my father worked a gym motorcycle. My mother was not a homemaker, she didn't work part-time, she was an accomplished woman. She started out as a realtor. But if you're African American or black, they're called realtors because of discrimination that was file. There's a whole story about that, and sadly, it would have really been beneficial if someone would have taken the time to talk to her. She's 84 years old right now, and you could have learned something. In addition, she's been a real estate broker for more than 50 years. Also, I want to ask you where is the substance that makes this interview work? It's not just jokes and giggles. These are accomplished people stories that would be valuable. Not just say whatever for sensationalism and clicks and algorithms because that's sales, although I don't understand that. That's not a good interview. And I'm just deeply just disturbed. You're taking the narrative that's out there, and I would want to, as a business person, um, really did gotta know who I'm involved with. I'm just saying I don't want it to come off that I'm bitter or there's some sense of I didn't make it, and no, sir, no, Mr. Samuels, and to all the listening audience who may hear this, there's no bitterness, there's no joy. There was fundamental love and sacrifice for my brother. I, my parents, my mother in particular, gave everything. And I'll share that at the end. So much so that when Kenya went to go to Clark, Atlanta, and I need to say this, and this is why it's been so important just to have a conversation with his mother. She drove him across country. She drove her son to school. It's so unfortunate today that we as human beings, and particularly as black people, we have to gatekeep a certain way that unfortunately the white establishment says it was highly offensive because my mother so sacrificed to hear the statement about uh matching silverware that that was never the case and not true. And it hurt us, it hurt her deeply. Yet, in closing, I say this for my family, for myself, to my listening audience, and to your listening audience, Mr. Samuels, to make light of what obviously is a situation, and I say this in all truth and sincerity, and I have receipts, so we can go there. I've got receipts. It was hurtful, and my mother is 84 years old to have you know hear that her family was disjointed and fucked up and you just comment, oh yeah, we can overcome things. It was very weak and it just this really says where we are as a community and a village, that you as a late 40 or 50-year-old man with another man cannot have a really deep, sincere conversation and make light. And that's why I know this was just for clicks and the algorithms on to the next thing, which is to make money, and it's shameful. I have something to share with you. The black print interview of Kenya Barris, black humiliation for profit at all costs. My family was not dysfunctional. In response to my brother Kenya Barris's revolt interview with revolts with Jatavio Samuel's blackprint, I and our mother were left deeply offended and disgusted by the inaccuracy lies and outright slanderous portrayal of our family by my brother and co-signed by you. My question, Mr. Samuel, is in what way was investigative research done in preparing for your discussion with Kenya Barris? Can anyone deemed celebrity now just create myth and become factual or law? Moreover, does the truth even matter? America's comfortability with black humiliation trauma for profit is toxic. And as such, Mr. Samuels, were you two just adhering to other truly false narratives that exist for your own benefit? I believe so. For the record, Mr. Samuels, our 84-year-old mother has been a real estate broker for over 50 years in the greater Los Angeles area. In addition, she is a successful real estate owner who has contributed to creating several of Black Los Angeles' real estate millionaires, including herself. That's a storyline that would have truly been inspirational to our community. Our mother never raised my younger brother Kenya in poverty, and I will not stand for this narrative of I pulled myself up from humble beginnings and dysfunction lies anymore. Our mother and father worked hard and sacrificed to create an environment of achievement for their children. And this, Mr. Samuels, is a story the village desperately needs now. Mr. Samuels, you alone with journalists, writers, bloggers, and podcasts still must reside in the bounds of fact. As demonstrated in the Megan the Stallion case, with the blogger being ruled a journalist. And as such, it is a fiduciary to fact and not defamation or slander for clicks. Mr. Samuels to borrow from Cat Williams, it's time for truth. As such, it is time for you and others to seek truth and not algorithms. I and my family have had enough, and now I must stand up. It's long overdue. Oh boy, I've come to the end of another episode of the Urban Village. Again, I've been absent for a long time, I know, because there's not um it's just too much going on for me. And I had to step out of the shadows to respond to this because enough is enough. My family and I deserve better. I have been ridiculed, I have been harassed, my name has been tainted for far too many years, and I'm hoping that this will come to an end soon. But always remember this. Always remember this. The story is never told until the lion is a storyteller, and the hunter is not. God bless, be well. Bye-bye. And let me jump in one more thing. The village and Claretta Street are coming. We need it. This has been a brown bear production. Music by Patrick Bolton.

SPEAKER_03 18:47

I wanna have a debt. I won't have a forget.