0:00

Remember that hazing expert, Professor Ricky

0:02

Jones, from earlier episodes?

0:05

I don't think any hazers get up

0:07

in the morning and say, are we going

0:09

to go really injure or kill

0:12

somebody today?

0:14

Well, there's something I haven't

0:16

told you about him. The reason

0:18

he got interested in studying hazing, specifically

0:21

among black youth, is because of

0:23

his own experience, being hazed

0:26

and then hazing others. When I was

0:28

a plebe at the Naval Academy, I couldn't wait

0:30

to abuse other people and I

0:32

did it. I was notorious

0:35

for it. I hated the place, I was angry

0:37

and I took it out on the plebes who came behind me. Jones

0:40

entered the US Naval Academy at 19

0:43

as a plebe or first year and

0:45

the initiation process was intense.

0:48

You don't question that stuff. You

0:51

internalize it and then you become kind

0:53

of an automaton of abuse. I

0:55

didn't question it being done to me and

0:58

I didn't question doing it to anybody else. I

1:00

felt like I was doing them a service.

1:03

This is tougher than you are.

1:07

Later,

1:07

Jones enrolled in Morehouse College,

1:10

where he pledged Kappa Alpha Psi, historically

1:12

black paternity. He wouldn't tell me

1:15

much about the hazing rituals

1:16

there, but he did reveal this. I

1:19

prided myself on never beating

1:22

people, But I wasn't

1:25

willing to let go of the process

1:28

itself. But Jones'

1:30

perspective on Hazing changed after

1:32

a random encounter in the early 90s.

1:35

He was out with a friend who was wearing a Kappa Alpha

1:37

Psi T-shirt. And this older

1:40

black woman, she looks at

1:42

my guy and says, y'all

1:45

in that Kappa group. And

1:47

we say, yes, man, we know what was coming. You

1:49

know, damn sure didn't think what came

1:51

was coming. And she said, y'all

1:54

the ones who killed that boy

1:56

out in Missouri. She

1:58

was talking about 25-year-old... Michael Davis.

2:01

In 1994, Davis was killed

2:03

while pledging a different chapter of Jones's frat.

2:06

His brothers beat and kicked him until

2:08

he collapsed. He was found dead in

2:11

his bed the next morning. The autopsy

2:13

found fractured ribs, damage to his

2:15

internal organs, a bruised and bleeding

2:18

heart, and spinal hemorrhaging. And

2:21

that was like, you know, I was like, well,

2:23

we didn't kill him, But

2:26

we

2:26

were part of an organization

2:30

whose culture led to his

2:31

death. But according

2:34

to Jones, you couldn't find

2:36

a lot of remorseful people within the campus.

2:39

That's what made me start to think for the first time

2:41

in my life, why do we do what

2:43

we do? You know, what is this really

2:46

about? At that point, I hadn't thought about

2:48

it at all. I mean, I've been hazed, and, intermittently,

2:50

I had hazed people. But I didn't

2:52

think about why we did it what the consequences

2:55

could be.

2:59

Jones dedicated years of his academic

3:01

career to answering those questions.

3:05

But what were the consequences in his own

3:07

life? That's trickier.

3:10

Because people say to me, look how close you and your your

3:12

line brothers are. Look how close

3:15

you are to these dudes that you went through this hazing

3:17

experience with the U.S. Naval Academy back

3:19

in the 80s when

3:21

y'all were plebes and y'all are

3:23

still this close, I will wager that y'all

3:25

are that close because you suffer together. That's

3:27

a success.

3:29

And Jones says that he's mostly

3:31

unscathed by what he went through.

3:34

You know, I appreciate the experiences. They were great

3:36

for me. I went on, I got a PhD at 28 years old.

3:39

I've had a very successful career. I mean,

3:41

I'm good. Except

3:44

he still has dreams about being haste. And

3:47

they aren't good.

4:00

that knowing I'm not supposed to be

4:02

there, people are waking me

4:04

up, making me go to formations. One

4:06

dream, I had a conversation with

4:08

a platoon leader, where I'm like, look,

4:11

I'm not supposed to be here. And

4:13

he goes, oh, where are you supposed to be, Plee? I'm

4:16

like,

4:16

I'm a college professor. I'm not

4:18

supposed to be. He's like, yeah, you're a college professor. Get your

4:21

ass in formation. You know, so it's a terrifying

4:23

dream, even at 55 years old. Even

4:27

though I'm okay overall, there's still

4:29

certainly some deep area of

4:31

my psyche to scar. That's the

4:34

only explanation for that. That

4:36

was a traumatic time. And

4:38

moving on from that was a traumatic time.

4:41

You know, figuring out what I wanted to do with my life

4:44

and everything else. That's the only

4:46

way to explain that.

4:49

Hazing is usually short-lived.

4:52

It might happen in one day or maybe

4:54

throughout a semester, But eventually,

4:56

it's supposed to end. The

4:59

truth is, the

5:01

aftermath can linger for a very

5:03

long time. It can be complicated,

5:05

messy, and difficult. That

5:08

trauma's always there. You

5:10

can learn to live with it, but you never forget.

5:15

I'm Igy Manda. From Religion

5:17

of Sports and PRX, this

5:20

is Rough Housing, the final episode.

5:23

and it's time to talk about the future,

5:26

about how we move forward. Stay

5:29

tuned.

5:36

Each week, the 604 Pod

5:38

Network is talking all of the very latest

5:40

from around the NBA, with Canada

5:43

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5:45

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5:50

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5:56

Subscribe to NBA Sound System

5:59

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6:01

check out the show and so much more

6:03

at 604 pod network.com.

6:08

I wanted to show you something in Rodney's room myself.

6:11

That's Mary Kim, Rodney's mother. When

6:14

we first met, she brought me upstairs

6:16

to Rodney's bedroom to show me something. It

6:20

was a typical bedroom outside of the bed being

6:22

made with a couple dozen baseball bats, which

6:25

as a kid, I would have loved to have. But

6:28

that's not what Mary brought me here

6:30

to see.

6:31

She pointed at a fist-sized hole in

6:34

the closet door.

6:35

Maybe two weeks after his surgery,

6:38

I heard this loud pain noise

6:41

and I ran up here. And there it was.

6:43

Did you say anything? Tell

6:45

them about it. Yes, I did. We talked.

6:47

I asked him what was wrong and he just broke down. And

6:50

we sat in the middle of the floor and we

6:52

cried together. And I told him that

6:54

it's, I know it's hard, but

6:56

it's going to get better. And you never fix it?

6:58

No. A lot of people ask me, why won't

7:00

you get the door fixed? I

7:04

don't know. Each

7:07

time I come in here is going to remind me to fight harder

7:09

for my child.

7:13

To fix a wooden door, you'll probably need

7:15

some cardboard, insulating foam, filler,

7:18

sandpaper, and paint. To

7:20

fix a person's trauma, they'll take

7:23

more than visiting a hardware store. I

7:25

used to always ask myself, why me? Why

7:28

me? Why me?

7:31

That's Rodney again, when I first met him back

7:33

in 2021.

7:35

I've accepted that it was me. So

7:38

what it was me. And I try and use it as a

7:40

positive because I wouldn't

7:42

be who I am today if it wasn't for that situation.

7:45

But I'm not going to rule out the fact

7:47

that I could have been a better individual had

7:49

that not happened. I could have been in a better situation.

7:54

Rodney got jumped in 2018. And

7:57

when I spoke to him three years later, I

7:59

was. struck

8:00

then by how angry he was. Not

8:03

because he was angry, it was just

8:05

something in the way he communicated with

8:07

me. Once he opened up, there

8:10

was nothing stopping his pain and

8:12

his violent thoughts from pouring out.

8:15

I just don't feel like I could really get over

8:17

it until I beat the living

8:19

shit out of somebody that

8:22

was a part of the situation. don't

8:24

care because they didn't care

8:27

about

8:27

me.

8:31

Rodney told me about this one time he saw

8:33

an old Davidson teammate on his college

8:35

campus earlier that year.

8:38

When I seen him, I had to

8:40

double take just to make sure I knew who

8:42

it was. And at the time, I

8:44

had my baseball bats with me. But I've

8:47

just been thinking since then,

8:49

what could have happened? had

8:51

I just took that back, broke his legs. Because

8:54

I still to this day have that anger built

8:56

up in me, and I have yet to be able to let

8:58

it out. His violent

9:00

impulses weren't only for those who

9:03

hurt him though. His mother told

9:05

me he turned them towards himself too. She

9:08

didn't learn about it until Rodney was under oath

9:10

in court. We were in deposition

9:13

and Rodney was on the stand. I

9:16

can't remember the question, But I

9:18

remember him saying that

9:20

he tried to commit suicide when I was at work. And

9:24

I remember that day, I just, I

9:27

had that motherly intuition. I remember

9:29

coming home and his

9:31

best friend, JaMarcus, was here with him. I

9:34

remember walking in the den, asking

9:37

him how was his day. And then he was

9:39

very short tempered. He didn't want

9:41

me to ask him any questions. Come

9:44

to find out that was the particular day he

9:47

tried to hang himself with the

9:49

sheet from my stairs. And

9:51

Ja'Marcus talked him out of it. it.

10:00

These curses linger, these curses are big.

10:02

Like, they are big enough, they're

10:04

life changing. Now I have a darker

10:06

side to me. Now I'm depressed

10:09

a lot of times. I'm suicidal,

10:11

I'm homicidal. I'm gonna have to deal

10:13

with this shit for the rest of my life.

10:15

Now

10:15

I'm gonna need some kind of closure to really take

10:17

a deep breath and let it go.

10:23

Even though I've gone through hazing, a

10:25

much less abusive form

10:27

of it, I didn't come out of it with

10:29

scars. I feel the way Ricky

10:31

Jones does for the most part. I'm

10:34

good. But after I

10:36

first met Rodney that day and

10:38

learned about how much he was struggling, I

10:41

wanted to find someone who understands what he's going

10:43

through, someone who was violently hazed

10:45

and managed to work through the trauma. What

10:48

was their path? How did they

10:50

do it?

10:52

I reached out to a lot of people, adults

10:54

who were hazed 10, 20 years ago. No

10:58

one wanted to talk.

11:00

Some said they appreciated what I

11:02

was doing, but the answer

11:04

was still no. They

11:06

had put

11:06

their past behind them and didn't

11:09

want to revisit

11:09

it. But

11:12

then I

11:13

found Bob Meeker. Meeker

11:15

grew up in Goldsboro, North Carolina. Back

11:18

in 2000, during his freshman year,

11:20

he joined the wrestling team at Rosewood

11:23

High School. And my dad wrestled through

11:26

high school and college. And so that was a, I

11:28

was like, hey, I can do this. And

11:30

for the most part, I was able to kind of

11:32

hold my own. What does kind of hold my own

11:34

mean? Yeah, I won some, I lost some. But

11:37

Meeker was small even for lightweights.

11:40

But I mean, I'd always been the scrawny kid and

11:43

four foot, 10, 95 pounds. And

11:47

soon after he joined the team,

11:49

he became an easy target for the older

11:51

guys at practice.

11:53

The next thing you know, you're just pinned out flat,

11:55

shirt singlets ripped all up and pretty

11:59

much everybody around you.

12:00

just wailing on you. I call

12:02

them pink bellies. It's just, you know, their hands

12:04

open, slap in your belly until

12:06

it turns red. And

12:08

then, you know, time

12:10

goes on, time goes on, it gets worse. So then

12:13

stomach's purple, you know, a month later they roll

12:15

you over on your back because your stomach's still purple and your

12:17

chest purple, then they're just beating on your back and

12:20

your back's purple.

12:23

How did it make you feel in the moment?

12:26

Helpless. Can't get away from that.

12:29

Two, three kids holding you down, another kid

12:31

wailing on you. I mean, it's

12:34

either fight and make it worse, you submit.

12:36

And that's what it pretty much had to turn into

12:39

was whatever it started, you just give

12:41

up. How long did this go for? Like,

12:44

was this every day? Two,

12:46

three times a week. Jeez.

12:50

He

12:53

thought about quitting, but his 14 year

12:55

old self never let that be an option.

12:58

First year in high school, meeting all these people, I

13:00

didn't want to be that quitter. He

13:03

also didn't want to disappoint his father. Dad

13:06

was a bull. People

13:08

didn't mess with him. My

13:11

dad was a three-sport athlete, rugby

13:13

player, boxer, football. Went

13:15

to the Air Force Academy. His flight

13:17

name was Hulk. Let's put it that way. He

13:21

was never afraid to back down.

13:23

He was never really the person that people wanted

13:25

to pick on. It's in my head like I've

13:27

got to be tough. I gotta be tough for dad and You

13:31

feel it's your fault for being a victim

13:34

At some point you just just

13:36

break

13:41

The breaking point came in January 2001

13:44

He rode his bike to school went to class

13:47

and then took his place on the practice mat Meeker

13:50

says he doesn't really remember what happened

13:52

next as if he blacked out You

13:55

know, what I remember is the

13:58

stories I've been told. sparring

14:00

practice. I just I remember just getting just

14:03

viciously slammed into the mat. They

14:05

started on me and I said I

14:07

just freaked out and ran

14:10

in my gym bag and

14:11

they said I grabbed a Leatherman out of my bag.

14:14

A Leatherman is sort of like a Swiss

14:16

Army knife on steroids. They

14:18

said I pulled out the knife and just started

14:21

pointing at people. As soon as I had

14:24

that thing in my hands, I mean, I mean, that was tackled to the ground.

14:27

Meeker was taken to the principal's office.

14:29

That was when my parents found out. I kept it from

14:32

them the whole time. How did they

14:34

react? In the moment, I

14:36

just remember them saying, it's gonna be okay. It's

14:39

gonna be okay. I mean, that's what you tell your

14:41

kids. Doesn't matter what your kids have done. You tell them it's

14:43

gonna be okay. In every

14:45

story in this series, the Kims,

14:48

the Oscar Winkles, the Preveys, the

14:50

main victim had a difficult time opening

14:53

up and telling somebody what was going

14:55

on. And it makes sense. They're

14:59

teenagers. They don't wanna rock

15:01

the boat. They could be scared of retaliation

15:03

or being embarrassed even more than they already

15:06

were. But there's a whole other

15:08

thing that gets forgotten sometimes. People

15:11

like Bob Meeker and Rodney, they're

15:13

not the only victims from their hazing

15:15

incidents.

15:16

When it comes to the family,

15:18

everyone gets hit by a stray.

15:21

Parents might have trouble differentiating the signs

15:23

between teenage angst and actual

15:26

trauma. It's not something

15:28

anyone teaches parents how to spot and

15:31

they might blame themselves. Yeah,

15:33

I remember them feeling bad because I mean,

15:36

signs were there, coming home, just getting

15:38

ice packs, going upstairs, just isolating

15:41

away,

15:43

not wanting to talk about how practice was. I

15:46

think they felt bad because they didn't

15:48

pry. I didn't blame

15:50

anybody. I wasn't angry at anybody for not being

15:53

there because I know if I needed to talk to mom, dad, I could

15:55

have, that just didn't.

15:57

I didn't want to seem weak or seem like

15:59

I... I was quitting or be a disappointment.

16:03

Did you ever talk to him specifically about

16:05

the pressure of trying to be tough for him?

16:07

Pretty sure he told me I was being stupid because I didn't have

16:09

to be tough for him.

16:15

Rosewood High School expelled Meeker after

16:17

he pulled the knife on his teammates.

16:22

As he got older, Meeker took

16:24

it upon himself to make sure no one could

16:26

ever make him feel as helpless as he

16:28

did on that wrestling team.

16:30

He got stronger and as

16:32

nature would have it, he got taller. He

16:35

became a college cheerleader, a bodybuilder,

16:37

and a bouncer. And we just keep

16:39

on getting bigger and bigger and bigger. And it's like, am I a big

16:41

guy now? Like, people look at me and

16:43

they're like, oh, I'm not gonna mess with that guy. I

16:46

actually had a long talk with my other friend last week

16:48

about being in the bars and being the protector.

16:50

And you don't want this to happen

16:52

to other people because it happened to me.

16:55

And

16:55

in a weird way, it was me telling

16:58

myself I can be in control. Like

17:00

Rodney, Meeker has had

17:03

unexpected encounters with his past as

17:05

a hazing victim. And sometimes

17:08

he has seen red. Like

17:10

one time when he was working at a bar. This

17:12

kid walked in, I checked his ID and I froze.

17:16

He didn't recognize me, but it was one of the kids

17:18

from the wrestling team and my friend

17:20

came up and he was like, don't wanna go

17:22

beat him up? I'm like, no. He

17:25

goes, you want me to go beat him up? Like, no.

17:28

It's not gonna make me feel better. It's something

17:30

that you would think will make you feel

17:32

better, but life's too short to stay angry. To

17:35

stay in angry just, it's unhealthy.

17:38

The only time I ever, I guess

17:40

I'd say, lost my temper, blew a fuse

17:43

was that day.

17:45

I vowed never again. Walking

17:48

away is harder than fighting. I

17:50

think I was more upset with myself for letting

17:52

that happen, because I'd never been an aggressive

17:55

or violent person. I mean, and that was a does

17:59

not. good thing. Therapists

18:02

and psychologists

18:04

say if you pack a dog into a corner, at some point they

18:06

run out of somewhere to back up and then they're

18:08

gonna, you know, they're gonna fight to get out of the corner and

18:12

the more you hold in, the more you build up,

18:14

the more you keep to yourself and the more you just let

18:16

things happen without talking or finding

18:19

help.

18:19

You make your corner smaller, you know, the

18:22

more people you can talk

18:24

to, the corner gets better and you can eventually

18:26

walk away from a situation. Meeker

18:29

has now spent over two decades reflecting

18:31

and talking about the events and consequences

18:33

of being hazed.

18:35

He's a husband and a father. Time

18:38

and distance and maybe some of those new

18:40

muscles have given him more perspective on

18:42

his hazing. You have to eventually

18:45

forgive. You can't forget. You

18:47

can forgive somebody for doing something, but

18:50

you never forget it.

18:52

I've gone through Facebook and LinkedIn and stuff

18:54

and looked up everybody I can, just

18:56

go through that yearbook and be like, oh, that person, that person.

18:58

And most of them

19:00

seem like they work good jobs, responsible

19:02

jobs, have

19:04

beautiful families, and

19:06

seem like they're great parents. A

19:08

bad kid can still be a good adult if

19:10

they're

19:11

corrected and learn better. Things

19:17

can change. People can heal.

19:20

But Rodney hasn't had 20 years to

19:22

deal with what happened to him. He's

19:24

still coping with the injuries, and

19:27

unlike Meeker, Rodney's hazing

19:29

got immortalized on social media

19:31

for all to tweet about. When

19:33

I first talked to the Kims in 2021, it

19:36

was clear that for them, closure,

19:39

if that was even possible, was

19:41

a long way off. But

19:44

after spending more than a year on this podcast,

19:47

I wondered, how is Rodney

19:49

doing now? That's

19:51

after the break.

20:01

A little more than a year after I

20:03

visited Rodney and his family in Mobile, I

20:06

traveled back to Alabama. I

20:09

wanted to see if Rodney was progressing

20:11

since our first conversation.

20:13

I noticed a few things right away. Rodney

20:16

is now 19, threw a little bit of a mustache

20:19

and seemed to be an inch or two taller.

20:22

He also seemed more at ease,

20:25

like he was determined to get control over

20:27

his life.

20:29

just

20:30

becoming more focused on what

20:32

I can do with my future and

20:35

trying not to focus too much on the past, even

20:37

though a lot of things from the past

20:40

can weed its way up every

20:42

now and then. It's not like I

20:45

wake up every day and I see something on

20:47

the news about me like I used to. I

20:50

mean, it can come back up, but I've

20:52

gotten to that point. I'm either numb

20:54

to it or I'm more focused

20:56

on what I can do

20:57

now.

21:00

But some days are harder than others. Like

21:03

the day a federal judge dismissed his lawsuit.

21:05

I was

21:07

with my friends. We were supposed to go out

21:10

to the movies and skate and rink. That

21:13

ruined my whole night. Because I was at the point

21:15

I was ready to fight. So I went

21:17

home, let off some steam on the punching

21:19

bag, went upstairs, got on my

21:22

phone, you two

21:24

went to sleep.

21:31

Last time you spoke, you brought up this

21:33

idea of closure a

21:35

couple times. And I just wanted to know,

21:37

at this point, have you

21:40

made that progress towards closure?

21:42

Or is that

21:43

still one of your goals that you're working at?

21:45

To hell with closure. No need

21:48

for closure. Closure is killing

21:50

him. What do you mean by that? Closure is killing him.

21:52

That's it. That's

21:54

it. I mean, closure would be, you

21:56

know, getting the case done, would not,

21:59

with no amount of money.

22:00

is gonna make up for what

22:02

they did and what I was ready

22:04

to do.

22:05

Closure would be killing them, so fuck

22:07

closure.

22:09

Why do you connect closure with violence?

22:11

In this particular situation,

22:14

violence felt like it would have been the best answer.

22:17

But it wasn't. I'm

22:20

so diligent on putting that behind

22:22

me and moving forward because let's

22:24

be honest, as an emotional man, it's a very dangerous

22:27

one. I mean, that's not a threat that I'm making,

22:29

But I could have easily

22:31

just done it the old fashioned

22:33

way or done it the usual black man

22:36

way. I could have let my emotions get the best

22:38

of me. With time, I'm sure

22:40

it'll get better, but I'm still

22:42

young, I'm still dumb.

22:45

My brain isn't even done developing. So

22:47

I'm pretty sure as an older man, I'd be able

22:49

to look back on it and see the blessings

22:51

it gave me. But

22:54

as of right now, it's

22:57

just something I'm not really ready to focus

22:59

on. Oh my Lord,

23:02

that those were the words of a 19-year-old.

23:06

That's Ricky Jones again.

23:08

I asked him to listen to some of Rodney's

23:10

tape because as someone who has gone through hazing

23:12

himself and studied and written

23:14

about it, and as a black man in America,

23:17

I was hoping he could help me dissect Rodney's

23:19

words. He was very conscious

23:22

of options, conscious

23:25

of history, And he was conscious of race,

23:27

too. You know, how

23:30

Black men are looked at. Like,

23:33

you know, our first option is to

23:35

be violent. Or Black people overall, that

23:37

our first option is to be violent. And the reality

23:39

of it is, if you look at the overall historical

23:42

arc of this country, Black people have suffered a

23:45

hell of a lot more violence than we've inflicted.

23:48

And we have to figure out how to live with it. But he

23:50

was conscious of that. For this young

23:52

man to say, you know, 19 years old,

23:55

He's like, later for closure, I gotta move on. I can't

23:57

let this eat me up.

23:59

So he's making it. very conscious

24:01

choice

24:02

so he can get on with his life and allow other

24:04

people to live. That's pretty profound.

24:07

So good for that young brother 19 years old

24:09

understanding the situation that he's in and how he must

24:11

move forward if he's going to have a productive

24:13

life and not be buried in a prison cell somewhere.

24:20

I started this whole roughhousing journey

24:22

wanting to shed a light on a phenomenon that

24:24

we allow to to happen in our schools, to

24:27

our kids. I just wanted to understand

24:29

why. And through that journey,

24:32

a lot of people have shared their most painful

24:35

moments, their lowest points, their

24:37

scariest thoughts. As

24:40

a journalist, I'm just trying

24:42

to do my job.

24:43

But as the person who

24:46

asked them to revisit these memories, it's

24:48

made me feel guilty at times. It's

24:51

made me wish that I could give them something back,

24:54

At least some kind of answer or tip

24:56

from my research on how to find a path forward.

24:59

But it's not that easy.

25:02

I asked Jones,

25:04

can these people find closure?

25:08

Neat closure, I don't think that

25:10

exists. Being able to move

25:12

on and lead a decent and productive

25:15

life, yeah. You know, my

25:18

grandmother died in 2009, the woman who

25:20

raised me. My mother had me at 15 years

25:22

old. I had to meet my father till I was 35. My

25:24

grandmother was my everything. Talked to the woman

25:27

every day. She was the center of my universe. And

25:29

she died, I thought I would die.

25:31

But I kept living. Am I

25:33

still bothered by that loss? Yeah, but

25:36

it's much easier now. It's

25:38

something that I can handle. I remember the

25:40

good times, but there is no quick

25:42

fix to any traumatic situation. Hazen

25:45

included, you know, loss of a loved one,

25:47

loss of a relationship, psychological

25:50

damage, physical damage from a hazing

25:53

situation. So

25:55

do what you gotta do to keep

25:58

yourself alive. I say that very

26:00

seriously and very carefully.

26:04

Do what you gotta do for yourself or people

26:06

around you that have experienced something traumatic

26:09

to keep yourself and them

26:11

alive so that they can

26:13

kind of cross the Rubicon and

26:15

get to a happier space. So

26:18

I go Matthew McConaughey on that. Just

26:21

keep living, you

26:23

know, just keep living. Everything

26:26

gets better the farther

26:28

way you get from it.

26:35

My mom's favorite saying is live on. I'm

26:37

at the age now too, I understand. There's

26:40

nothing I can do about that. So

26:42

kick off that pond off the chessboard, keep

26:45

moving my king of head.

26:47

Not many people would ever be as

26:50

candid as Rodney has been with me.

26:52

And I think that means something.

26:55

Maybe there is something to talking.

26:58

Bob Meeker stressed several times throughout our conversation

27:00

that talking, being open and honest about

27:03

what he's going through, it's helped him heal

27:06

and avoid the sudden snaps of anger that got

27:08

him expelled more than 20 years ago.

27:10

I think part of opening yourself up

27:13

is telling people your worst, you

27:15

know, the lowest you've been. Because,

27:18

you know, if you feel like you can't let your

27:20

friends or your family know who

27:22

you are and what you've been through,

27:24

Sometimes you feel like you're guarded. And

27:27

then you're always looking over your shoulder. You're like, oh, I hope

27:29

nobody ever Googles my name. You

27:31

have to talk to people. You cast

27:33

a wide net. You can't get through

27:35

something with a small circle

27:37

because it's too much weight for one person.

27:40

Tracy Stoppard from the last episode

27:43

thinks so too. Since Jordan's

27:45

death, she's changed the way she

27:47

parents her youngest son. I

27:49

do a mental health check with him and

27:51

I call it that. So I've learned

27:54

my lesson not to be embarrassed as

27:56

a parent and ask the hard questions

27:58

and...

28:00

poke your kids, especially, you know,

28:02

I poke him all the time to tell me how he's doing and

28:05

not just to say fine. No,

28:07

fine won't do it for me. You

28:09

know better. And even

28:11

though it had to be hard to talk about the loss

28:14

of her son, Tracy

28:16

said she also found it helpful. Talking

28:19

to you helps me feel better that

28:22

I'm not not doing anything,

28:25

if that makes sense. Like I feel

28:27

purposeful, even though it's

28:30

a small thing. And it keeps him,

28:32

in my heart, more alive. It's

28:35

so important to talk about the hard

28:38

things.

28:39

["In My Heart,

28:41

You Are My Closure"] In

28:45

a funny way, I feel like

28:48

this interview is almost

28:50

my closure. That's

28:53

Sabrina Oshkar-Winkles from Episode 4.

28:56

There's closure in the sense where you can talk about it and you

28:58

can understand it and you can be

29:01

really comfortable with everything you did

29:03

and be proud of all the steps you take in. But

29:06

there's never going to be that closure in the sense where it's

29:08

just going to disappear from your life and you

29:10

know you're never going to

29:11

think about it or talk about it again.

29:16

We're living in a time where what's okay and

29:19

what isn't, at work and relationships

29:21

at school, is being questioned

29:24

and redefined. And

29:25

maybe finding the path forward requires

29:28

lots of brutal honesty and vulnerable

29:30

conversations about where we've been

29:33

and where we want to go.

29:35

Even when it's difficult.

29:37

Even when it's uncomfortable. You

29:40

know, maybe one kid in some school somewhere

29:43

is on a team, and maybe he's doing

29:45

this to other people. You

29:48

hope maybe he goes, this isn't good. And

29:50

he speaks up. And he stops it.

29:54

And that's worth it. You

29:56

always want to leave the world better than you found it.

30:06

In the first episode of this show, we

30:08

heard that the Kim family talks about

30:11

two Rodney's.

30:12

The fun light up a room Rodney

30:14

from before, and the quiet,

30:17

isolated Rodney after.

30:19

When I first spoke with him one on one,

30:22

I knew what that second Rodney looked

30:24

like. I knew what he sounded like.

30:26

As much as I didn't want

30:28

to define him by what happened in the Davidson

30:31

locker room, that was the only Rodney

30:33

I ever met. That

30:35

is, until the family moved us all

30:37

to the backyard later that same night. The

30:41

stars were out, a fire was lit,

30:43

Michael Jackson's Billie Jean was playing on some

30:46

speakers and Rodney, for the amusement

30:48

of his family, friends, and me,

30:50

put on a show. Yo,

30:53

I haven't seen this in a minute. It's

30:56

been a couple years since he did this. Be

30:58

careful what you do. Uh-huh, no, go round. Come

31:00

on. Yeah, I got it. Don't do it,

31:02

baby. Whoo! Come on, dog. He

31:07

can dance. He can dance. He can dance. He

31:10

can dance. He's

31:12

bad. He's the Usher and

31:14

the Michael Jackson all in one. James

31:16

Brown, all of that.

31:19

I can vouch for Dude. He can

31:21

dance. That night, seeing

31:24

him enjoy himself with his family

31:26

and friends, I felt like

31:28

I was catching a glimpse of that younger

31:31

Rodney before the hazing,

31:33

before the trauma. But

31:35

now, at the end of this journey,

31:38

what

31:38

I hope I was seeing was a new

31:40

Rodney altogether.

31:42

Someone who knows what it means to struggle, but

31:45

also can enjoy the moments in between.

31:48

Someone who knows that his past dreams and

31:50

past pain don't have to define

31:52

his future.

31:53

Someone who moonwalks, but

31:56

is trying to take steps forward.

31:59

That won't be easy. And he

32:01

may not get there anytime soon. But

32:04

he's on his way. This

32:14

episode was written and reported by me,

32:17

Iggy Manda. Jessica Pupovac

32:19

is our senior producer. Our lead producer

32:22

is Nina Earnest. Siona Petros

32:24

and Carly Perruccio are our associate producers,

32:27

with support from Megan Coyle. Michael

32:29

Garofalo was our editor. Tommy

32:32

Bazzarian from PRX Productions is our

32:34

engineer. Fact-checking

32:36

done by Jane Ackerman and Kim Frieda. Our

32:39

executive producers are Gotham Chopra, Amith

32:42

Sankaran, and Adam Schlossman.

32:44

Special thanks to Jacques-Nour Po,

32:46

Tim Rowan, Kevin Sullivan, Sarah

32:49

McRory, Chelsea Marotta, Joe

32:51

Levin, and all the families, victims,

32:53

coaches, experts, friends, who took

32:56

the time to tell me their story.

32:59

Rough Housing is a production of Religion of Sports

33:02

and PRX.

33:03

This is the last episode of the season, so

33:06

if you made it this far, just gotta

33:09

let you know how much we appreciate you. This

33:12

show took a lot of hours, a lot

33:14

of cups of coffee, and a lot of dedicated

33:16

care from the team. So genuinely,

33:19

from the bottom of my heart, thank you

33:22

for listening and supporting the show.

33:25

Hayley