Are we failing our children?
You know we are.
Now let's talk.
Because everybody loves the children.
Oh, we LOVE the children.
Put them on the campaign flyer.
Put their picture on the fundraiser.
Call them “our future.”
Then send them right back home to whatever food was cheapest, schools that aren't preparing them, neighborhoods stripped of opportunity, no life coaches, no capacity-building mentors—
and an algorithm raising them while the adults argue.
But we love the children.
I don't want to talk about the obvious anymore.
I want to talk about the disconnect.
Can we overcome our own self-inflicted biases long enough to build together what these children desperately need?
Because look at what we've built around them.
Can they learn something besides what an algorithm pushes at them?
Can they code?
Can they build?
Can they play sports without their parents needing a second job to afford it?
Can they find a mentor?
Can they get somewhere safely?
Can they eat well?
Can they see a world bigger than the six blocks around where they were born?
See, here's the trick we've been playing.
We hand children conditions we allowed to prevail—then blame them for failing to make cake out of mud.
That's a hell of a system.
We give them a phone.
TikTok.
Bad food.
Weak schools.
No transportation.
No safe place to go.
No real preparation for the economy they're about to enter.
Then at eighteen, we look around confused:
“What happened to these kids?”
What happened?
We happened.
And every time somebody starts talking about actually building something, here comes the favorite question:
“Where's the money coming from?”
Good question.
For a change—
let's look in our own pockets.
Black consumers spend roughly $16 billion a year on beauty products.
Beauty.
One category.
Hair.
Skin.
Cosmetics.
Fragrance.
Sixteen billion dollars.
Now don't get nervous.
I'm not telling anybody to stop buying beauty products.
Please don't.
I'm trying to strengthen families, not break them up.
Buy the hair.
Buy the skin cream.
Buy the perfume.
Look good.
But while you're looking good—
could the children get a laptop?
I'm serious.
Could they?
Because suppose we deliberately redirected just 10% of that $16 billion away from the usual retail path and through a Market built to produce something beyond the sale.
That's about $1.6 billion in purchases.
And suppose—for the example—the Market averaged a 10% commission.
That's roughly $160 million.
Now hold on.
That's not all our spending.
That's not half our spending.
That's not even all the beauty spending.
That's 10% of one category.
And now we're not talking bake sales.
We're talking computers.
Internet access.
Tutoring.
Sports.
Science programs.
Coding.
Transportation.
Equipment.
Mentors.
Community spaces.
Scholarships.
And whatever somebody smarter than me comes along and teaches us how to build next.
And remember—
we're still standing in the beauty aisle.
We haven't bought dinner.
We haven't bought furniture.
We haven't bought vitamins.
We haven't bought toys.
We haven't bought anything for the house.
We haven't even gotten through the rest of the shopping list.
So maybe the problem isn't that we don't have economic power.
Maybe the problem is—
we keep surrendering it one receipt at a time.
That's Radical Market Studio.
And no, I'm not interested in telling you what you can't buy.
We've done enough of that.
Every few months somebody says:
“Don't shop here.”
“Boycott them.”
“Stay out for five days.”
“Stay out for seven days.”
All right.
Then what happens on day eight?
Back through the door.
Same money.
Same company.
Same relationship.
Nothing owned.
Nothing organized.
Nothing built.
So I have a different question.
What if instead of temporarily withholding our spending, we learned to deliberately direct some of it?
Think about that.
You were already buying the product.
The company already wanted the customer.
The company already budgeted money to acquire that customer.
So come through the Market.
You get the product.
Take advantage of the many discounts the Market offers
The company gets the customer.
The Market earns a commission.
And some of the value created by a purchase you were already making stays attached to work that benefits us.
Especially our children.
Nobody asked you to spend an extra dollar.
We asked you to think before you click.
That's different.
I'm talking business.
Churches, community groups, youth alliances can have their own Market page.
Your members enter through that page.
They buy things they were already going to buy.
When those transactions generate commissions, the church can receive part of our portion.
Suppose the Market gets 10%.
Maybe the church gets 2.5% through its page.
Now what happened?
The customer got the product.
The merchant got the sale.
The church created a revenue stream to support its local work.
Radical Market Studio retained something to build the larger work.
And the children benefit from both.
Same money. More purpose.
Youth program?
Bring it.
Community organization?
Bring it.
Neighborhood project?
Bring it.
Sports team?
Bring it.
If you're doing useful work, why shouldn't the economic activity of the people who believe in that work help sustain it?
Now we've got a circle.
The family shops.
The business makes the sale.
The local organization receives something.
The larger network grows.
The children gain capacity.
And all of it started with money that was already leaving your pocket anyway.
Now watch what happens when the numbers grow.
Ten people?
Nobody cares.
A thousand?
Maybe somebody looks.
Ten thousand?
Now they're paying attention.
A hundred thousand people who can intentionally direct their spending?
Now the conversation changes.
Because businesses understand something we keep pretending not to understand.
Customers are power.
Manufacturers want customers.
Retailers want customers.
Brands fight over market share every single day.
So if we can demonstrate that we can reliably direct customers—
ask yourself:
What happens next?
Do you think companies offer an organized customer base worse terms?
Or do they compete for it?
Better commissions?
Maybe.
Better discounts?
Maybe.
Exclusive offers?
Maybe.
Special arrangements?
Maybe.
Partnerships we haven't even imagined?
Maybe.
I don't have to promise you any of that.
I'm asking you to use common sense.
If one group can move customers and another group can't, which one gets a seat at the negotiating table?
That's not magic.
That's leverage.
And every improvement in those arrangements gives us more value to circulate.
Back to families.
Back to churches.
Back to organizations.
Back to local projects.
Back into the larger work.
And ultimately—
back to our children.
That's why I'm finished being impressed by how well we can describe our problems.
We can describe them passionately.
We can make speeches about them.
Make documentaries about them.
Hold panels about them.
Create conferences about them.
Then have a meeting about the conference we had about the problem.
And while we're congratulating ourselves on understanding the problem—
the child is still sitting there in it.
So here's my question:
What will it finally take for us to use every reasonable tool available to protect our children from conditions we already know are failing them?
Because the money already exists.
The spending already exists.
The churches already exist.
The organizations already exist.
The teachers exist.
The coaches exist.
The programmers exist.
The business owners exist.
The parents exist.
The grandparents exist.
We don't need to manufacture a whole new people.
We need to organize the people and resources already standing here.
And give them a direction.
That direction is our children.
And now let me put some responsibility where it belongs.
Everybody says:
“I'd do anything for my child.”
Anything?
All right.
Here's something.
Not everything.
Not your life savings.
Not marching twenty miles.
Not quitting your job.
Not waiting on Congress.
Not asking you to stop feeding your family.
Something you already do almost casually:
spend money.
And right now, much of that spending helps protect somebody else's future—
people who may not need nearly as much protection as our children do.
So take a few minutes.
Look at the Market.
Understand the idea.
And when you need something that's available there—
participate intentionally.
That's it.
And no, I'm not telling you this is the only responsibility you have to your children.
Of course it isn't.
But once you understand what we're trying to do—
once you understand that it doesn't require you to buy something you don't need—
once you understand that it doesn't require you to spend extra money—
once you understand that you're simply redirecting a purchase you were already making—
then what exactly is the excuse?
Seriously.
What's the excuse?
Because don't keep telling me:
“I'd do anything for my children.”
Anything apparently has limits.
Apparently anything doesn't include taking five minutes to investigate.
Anything doesn't include changing where you click before you spend.
Anything doesn't include intentionally supporting something designed to create capacity for your own children.
Then stop saying anything.
Say what you mean.
“I'll do anything that's convenient.”
“I'll do anything somebody else organizes.”
“I'll do anything that doesn't require me to change one habit.”
That's different.
And while we play with words—
the children pay the bill.
Children are falling behind academically.
Children are moving through schools without skills they desperately need.
Teachers are sounding alarms.
Young people are entering adulthood unprepared for an economy that isn't going to slow down and wait for them.
So at some point—
caring has to become behavior.
If you know there's a problem—
and somebody puts a practical tool in front of you—
and you understand the tool—
and you still won't even investigate whether you can use it—
then quit pointing at everybody else.
You are in the picture.
I am in the picture.
We are in the picture.
We are part of the problem.
And that's actually good news.
Because if our behavior contributes to the problem—
our behavior can also contribute to the solution.
I'm not asking you to agree with every idea I have.
I don't need that.
I'm asking you to live up to what you already claim.
You care about the children?
Show me.
You say you'd do anything?
Here's something.
You say somebody needs to do something?
You're somebody.
Start there.
Not tomorrow.
Not once everybody else joins.
Not once it's perfect.
Not after another study.
Start with something you were already going to buy.
And make that purchase mean more than the product.
Because from here forward, that's the question we're bringing to everything.
What does it mean for the children?
Food.
Education.
Technology.
Housing.
Health.
Transportation.
Economics.
Community.
Every time—
what does this mean for our children?
And then we're going one step further:
What can we actually do about it?
Because loving children is easy.
Everybody loves the children.
That's why I'm not asking whether you love them.
I'm asking something harder.
What are you willing to change for them?
Because building for our children—
that's where the receipts start.
Radical Market Studio.
The Market is how we enter.
Our children are why we build.
Respect the process.