00:00We're demonized. We're animals. They were called a wolf pack and didn't even know
00:06each other. Isn't that something? That's what happens when they see us.
00:13Hey guys it's Danielle Young here on the red carpet for Netflix's When They See
00:17Us and we asked everyone on the carpet to tell us about the idea of young black
00:21men and boys having freedom in America. The great pain that's deeply felt from
00:27so many of us when we watch freedoms taken from our boys and our girls around
00:33issues of criminality and assumed criminality before they do anything
00:36wrong. We are like discriminated against, marginalized, and penalized because we're
00:42black or we're brown so we don't get to have the same privileges as other people
00:47we don't get to move around the world as freely. There was a concerted effort to
00:53dim the light of the future by putting us in prison. 14, 15, and 16 year old
00:58children they tried to extinguish our life and somewhere in that darkness we got
01:03the message that we had to brighten our own lights to make change and to be able
01:09to thrive in the future. I'm so happy that Ava has put this on screen so people
01:14can see in real life what happens. Many people feel that we made it up 30 years ago
01:21and these guys did over a decade in jail on something they never did. Now you see
01:27the reality the pain the suffering that they had to go through so I'm glad this
01:31is happening but it continues to happen so I think that when you think of what
01:36Robert Smith did which is to take the debt off the back of young men in the
01:43case of Morehouse that did what we told them to do did the right thing. Being able to
01:47start your life debt free is a blessing. These men were given their education and
01:51to pay the amount that we have to pay for education I feel like it's a crime as
01:55well but someone gifted them the grant of freedom from student loans freedom of
02:00feeling the pressure of having to get a job right away or having to settle now
02:05this gives them more space for entrepreneurship gives them more space for
02:09freedom for creativity so I am completely floored by that action I hope
02:13one day I went to HBCU as well I hope one day I can do the same. What a
02:18generous man what a beautiful thing to do for those kids. Class of 2019 you're
02:22lucky. Hearing about things like that where this black billionaire paid off all of
02:26their debt that is that is insane and it really makes it makes me feel like
02:30we're not too far off from where we need to be. It's what supposedly the
02:34foundation of this country freedom. It's a tremendous gesture on his part I do
02:38have to say that I think it's unfortunate that it's necessary for him to make
02:43that gesture and I think it's an amazing thing for those young lives who were who
02:48will now enter into their lives their careers their world in a very different
02:53position but I wish we had the grace as a nation to provide all young people who
02:57had who had put in the time to do the thing that we as a society want them to
03:01do right you have educated your mind you have made yourself even more
03:05constructive citizen potentially and then it seems like not a good idea for us as a
03:11society to burden that that group of people every year with a crushing amount
03:15of debt that they're going to spend the next 15 years of their life working
03:17themselves out of so I nothing against him I'm very impressed like I think he's
03:22the first person that's ever done that and and at that volume and and like
03:27that's what you should be doing with all those billions of dollars but I wish I
03:31wish we lived in a place where it wasn't necessary for him to make that
03:33gesture I feel like for folks to be given up an opportunity to in a way be be
03:39immune from any kind of debt is a tremendous thing because some of these
03:45children don't know yet what that means instead of stepping out and say wow I'm
03:49debt-free that's great but they don't know that there are mothers and fathers
03:52and grandmothers and grandfathers and great-grandmothers and grandfathers who
03:56are still paying on these debts because they wanted to make sure that they got a
04:00better way and a better stature in society you know so I think that
04:06sometimes freedom isn't free but there's a lot that we can do at the end of
04:11the day we are the people
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