Rosie Perez rose quickly as a Soul Train dancer with her New York hip-hop style. When Don Cornelius tried to lock her into a contract and she asked to show it to her lawyer, he grabbed her. Her response: fried chicken, aimed directly at his face. That's how she tells it.
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Don Cornelius had an eye for talent that extended well beyond music booking. He spotted teenage dancer Jody Watley, paired her with Jeffrey Daniel, and effectively created Shalamar in 1977, launching what would become a major R&B act followed by Watley's even bigger solo career. Carmen Electra — born Tara Lee Patrick, a detail Josh finds deeply amusing — got her start here, as did Nick Cannon and Cheryl Song, notable as the first Asian dancer on Soul Train. The most colorful story belongs to Rosie Perez, who came up in the '80s with her New York hip-hop style and became a standout so fast that Cornelius wanted to lock her into a contract. When she responded by asking to show it to a lawyer, Cornelius grabbed her — a decision he likely came to regret almost immediately. Perez threw fried chicken at his face and that, apparently, ended the conversation. Chuck notes that Don Cornelius was later charged with domestic violence against his wife, adding nuance to the portrait of a complex man. [1] — Josh Clark "Rosie Perez rose quickly as a Soul Train dancer with her New York hip-hop style. When Don Cornelius tried to lock her into a contract and s…" 38:00
Don Cornelius spotted teenage dancer Jody Watley on Soul Train and paired her with Jeffrey Daniel; they formed the group Shalamar in 1977.
Dick Clark attempted to start a competing show called Soul Unlimited on ABC, which was widely seen as a direct ripoff of Soul Train and was quickly canceled after protests by Black leaders.
Dick Clark, already a TV mogul with American Bandstand, launched Soul Unlimited on ABC — a literal copy of Soul Train. Black leaders protested, calling it an inappropriate appropriation, and the show was quickly canceled. Soul Train was left to stand on its own, as it should have been.
Every mayor is bragging about record-low crime, and most of them have nothing to do with it. License plate surveillance is making crime harder to get away with, and the data shows it's working — from New York to California.
Sports betting is now a $17 billion industry in the US, and the data is alarming. Bankruptcies spike 30% when gambling is legalized in a state. Half of men under 25 bet on the Super Bowl. This is a crisis, even if that word is overused.
Young men are betting on crypto, sports, and social media flame wars instead of applying for jobs, approaching people, and starting businesses. That substitution is catastrophic. The fix is simple: take less risk online, more risk offline.
Most people confuse things they value instrumentally (because they get them other things) with things they value intrinsically (for their own sake). Greenberg's friend stayed in a miserable relationship for years because she was living by her parents' values, not her own — the values map made the mismatch instantly visible.
Jungian analyst James Hollis distills a good life to four things: shut up (have gratitude, stop whining), suit up (prepare yourself to fulfill a role), show up (do the actual work in service of others), and daily get out of stimulus-response to ask what your deeper wish actually is. The whole landscape of self-help slots into just these four bins.
Toward the end of their 20s, many men discover that all the strategies that earned them recognition and success have stopped working. It's a second adolescence — more important than the first — where the question shifts from 'how do I play the game?' to 'who do I actually want to become?' Most people going through it look fragile from the outside. They're actually building a foundation.
Boys are told from childhood not to cry, not to feel, not to be weak — but anger gets a pass. The result: a generation of men who reroute every emotion, including sadness and fear, through the only acceptable channel. Emotional avoidance isn't toughness, it's misdirected sensitivity.
Men need a 'bank account' of masculine status — muscle, money, success — before society grants them permission to express vulnerability. Chris Bumstead can cry at the Olympia and get celebrated. A struggling nobody doing the same thing gets contempt. This creates a tragic paradox where the men who most need emotional support get the least of it.
Emotional sensitivity isn't a defect — it's a high-resolution scanner for human experience. Highly sensitive people pick up body language, tone, and unspoken tension that others miss entirely. In the right environment, that's not a liability. It's a superpower.
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