Charlamagne Tha God - Black Privilege Opportunity Comes to Those Who Create It

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Touchstone

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Copyright 2017 by Charlamagne Tha God

Jacket design by Antoine Johnson

Jacket photographs by Jonathan Mannion

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Touchstone Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

First Touchstone hardcover edition April 2017

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Tha God, Charlamagne, 1980

Title: Black privilege : opportunity comes to those who create it / by Charlamagne Tha God.

Description: New York : Touchstone, 2017.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016059721| ISBN 9781501145308 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781501145315 (pbk.)

Subjects: LCSH: Tha God, Charlamagne, 1980 | Tha God, Charlamagne, 1980 Humor. | Television personalitiesUnited StatesBiography. | Radio personalitiesUnited StatesBiography.

Classification: LCC PN2287.T337 A3 2017 | DDC 791.4502/8092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016059721

ISBN 978-1-5011-4530-8

ISBN 978-1-5011-4532-2 (ebook)

This book is dedicated to the state that made me great, South Carolina. The 843, the 803, and the 864. To every dreamer living on a dirt road somewhere, this book is for you. In my story, may you find the inspiration to create your own greatness.

This book is also dedicated to my mother, Julia; my father, Larry; and my late grandmother, Rosa Lee Ford. The foundation of who I am came from the three of you. I dont know if yall even want to take credit for my madness, but guess what? You have no other choice!!

Last, but certainly not least, this book is dedicated to my rib, my wife, Mook Mook, and our two beautiful daughters, A and Z. Yes, the name of one of my daughters starts with A and the other starts with a Z; we will fill in the rest of the alphabet at a later date. Please, when you two are old enough to read this book, dont judge your father for the sins of his past. I used to be a young savage, but Im grown now and I hope this book will remind you that life is about constant evolution.

Let me tell you about the first time I started living my truth.

I was fifteen years old and living in Moncks Corner, South Carolina. If youre not familiar with Moncks Corner, its a small town of less than eight thousand people about thirty miles north of Charleston.

For most of my teenage years, my family lived in a double-wide trailer on a dirt road on the edge of town. My mother was a high school English teacher and a Jehovahs Witness, a straitlaced woman who did everything by the book. My father was her polar opposite: a contractor who was an occasional drug and alcohol abuser and a full-time hustler.

One of my favorite activities back then was to talk on the phone. Not a cell phone either, but an old-fashioned landline. If you think sexting is better than talking, you dont know what youre missing. I can honestly say that 90 percent of the times I got pussy as a teenager was because of phone conversations, especially the late-night ones.

My trouble started one night when I was on the phone with my friend Imani; I dont think I ever wanted to fuck Imani (not that I would have turned it down if the opportunity presented itself) but we would just talk on the phone for hours for no reason. That night the conversation turned to a guy we knew named Darnell, who was Imanis cousin Dejas baby daddy.

Man, Darnell thinks hes hard, I offered.

Oh, you think he soft? drawled Imani.

Maybe he is, maybe he isnt, I continued. All I know is my father always tells me the dudes who act hard in this town all end up one of three ways: broke sitting under a tree, in jail, or dead.

After that the convo probably turned to something more pressing, like who was the best member of the Wu-Tang Clan. Neither of us gave my little rant about Darnell any more thought.

A few days later, after smoking weed I decided to go visit my neighbor Charles, who lived at the top of our dirt road. Charles wasnt home but as I was walking out of his yard, Darnell and his cousin came driving by. They spotted me and quickly pulled over, skidding to a stop in a cloud of dust and pebbles.

Yo, Larry, whats good? Darnell yelled menacingly as he hopped out of the car. Lenard is my government name, but people in Moncks Corner call me Larry, after my father.

I had zero idea what Darnell was yelling about. Number one, I was high. Number two, I talked SHIT about everyone in those days. I must have had a quizzical look on my face, because Darnell quickly filled me in.

You was talking that shit to Imani, he announced. So we gotta fight!

Id said what Id said, so there was no need to cop a plea.

Yeah, what about it? I answered back defiantly.

But Darnell was already done talking. He unleashed a wild roundhouse that would have knocked my head off but thankfully missed. I managed to land a quick jab in retaliation. It seemed like he barely felt it. Despite being basically the same size as me, in one quick move Darnell scooped me up, lifted me over his head, and viciously pile-drived me into a ditch. If someone had taped it, we could easily get twenty million views on Worldstar with that footage today.

I tried to get up, but Darnell was already beating me back down. Punch after punch after punch after punch. Then he moved on to a choke hold. Now, in my experience there are two kinds of choke holds: (1) the Im just letting you know things can get real so dont play with me again type, and (2) the This situation is so real that Im going to choke you until you die type. Im pretty sure option number two was being administered to me in that moment.

Thankfully his cousin stepped in before Darnell could finish the job.

Chill, man, thats enough, he said, pulling Darnell off me. Let the dude go.... Darnell relaxed his grip, and I could breathe again (though Im sure there are some folks todayBow Wow, Ciara, and Birdman to name but a fewwho would pay good money to go back in time and tell Darnell, Naw, choke him a little longer!).