The Game Is To Be Sold, Not Told

Tariq "King Flex” Nasheed could be a man's worst nightmare. The Los Angeles-based author/speaker could, quite simply, take your girl. But instead of using his powers to crush the competition, Nasheed chooses to bless brothers and sisters, with his gift of gab. His DVD (Mack Lessons)and books (The Art of Mackin', The Mack Within, Play or Be Played) have been top-sellers, and his Podcasts, The Mack Lessons Radio Show, have built on a cult-like following.

On February 1, Nasheed will be airing a special Podcasts, for, "Advanced macks only,” he says. "If you want to go to community college, that shit is free,” he explains. "But if you want to go to an Ivy League school, you have to pay some sort of tuition…this tution is only $10.” King-mag.com sat down with Nasheed to hear more about this special class, why he also caters to the females, and his thoughts on what's happening with today's man. Class is in session. - Jozen Cummings

KING-MAG.com: Besides the $10 I'm going to have to shell out for this special upcoming Podcasts, what is the difference between this one and the ones available for free?

Tariq Nasheed: The other Podcasts, I call that basic math. The one I'm doing February 1, I wanted to do an advance show. I need to do a show to really break this game down to not only get money but, have an even playing field in the game. A lot of brothers might not want to go out there and get no money, but I want to have brothers in a position where they can keep their own money in their pockets. And plus I wanted to charge because that's gonna screen out all the guys who don't really respect the game.

You say this class is for advanced macks only. For those squares out there, what's an advanced mack.

An advanced mack is someone who is about the purse first, and the ass last. The average guy is all about how many notches under his belt he can get. An advanced mack is all about bringing some paper to the table and finding females that he can get with and they can put their heads together and come up with creative ways to get more paper and the sex is secondary. You gotta have the mack bones in your body. Everyday, something happens in a man's life that's mack-ish, but the average guy it will go over his head.

Mack-ish? Give me an example so the next time that's happening, I can mack it to my advantage.

For example, you have two dudes they might have a girlfriend. And she might say some shit like, "I was at the grocery store and somebody offered to get me groceries.” Now a dude who has no mack bones in his body, a square dude will get offended, will be like, "Damn, don't be getting no groceries from some other nigga. I'm your provider.” But a nigga with mack bones in his body will be like, "Damn bitch, how many bags of groceries did you get?” It's all about perception and the way the cat will handle that situation.

But recently there's been a lot of studies showing more women can buy their own damn groceries. What do you make of the theory that because women are becoming more successful in the workplace, they're failing in marriage and relationships?

Just because a woman has the money, if she has a cool attitude and a cool disposition, most guys wouldn't have a problem with that. And actually a lot of guys out there are dating women who have more money than them, it's just the ones who act bitchy about it and the ones who throw it up in a brothas face. I'm going to touch on that on the show as well, I'm going to talk about the gigolo game because a lot of women out there do have paper, have their mind together, and they're ready to break bread. So I'm going to teach guys to step to women like that, where to find women like that, the age group to target. Who not to target, who not to spit at. I'm going to break down all that.

You also put ladies up on a lot of game. How is this supposed to work for men if women know all the secrets?

Good question. My audience is 50/50 anyway. My lectures are half women/half men. I'm working on a book for women right now called The Art of Gold Diggin'. And I don't have a problem with that because my thing is to put everyone up on game. The ones who don't want game, they're the ones who are going to lose out. When I do the book The Art of Gold Diggin' for women, my guys don't have anything to worry about, because women wouldn't target them, because their game is going to be crisp if they're reading and listening to my stuff. But all the square dudes who think they know everything, and they're too cool for books like that and they got game already, those are the ones women are going to break. And I have no problem with women breaking those guys.

I want to get your thoughts on this piece that ran in The New York Times. It says 30 percent of black women are married, and 70 percent are unmarried.

Unfortunately a lot of sisters are taught how not to keep a dude. All the instincts they have learned from like their single mothers, because a lot of girls grow up with single mothers, and a lot of black people in general grow up with single mothers. [Black women] have black men they love, but a lot of them didn't have a black man in their lives that they respected. And if you don't have respect for the brothers, there's not going to be any kind of relationship. That's the biggest problem, there's a collective lack of respect that a lot of black women have in this country for black men, and that's because of racism. Institutionalized racism. If you've seen black men castrated and lynched in front of you, subconsciously you lose respect for that. And that's a problem.

I'll tell you another problem. Four words: I Love New York.

What's funny is they wanted me on that show to help [New York] screen out some of the guys, but I turned them down. And also, New York, on her MySpace page, my book Play or Be Played is one of her favorite books.. But that show, it's exploitive, its exploitation at it's best. And I saw one episode where they had like Omarosa on there and they had New York's mom, it seems like they go out of their way to make the brothas look clownish and buffoonish. All of it is clownish and buffoonish.

Agreed. What does the show say about men today? What's your thoughts on today's man?

We live in a pussy-whooped society and it was strategic. The powers that be wanted it that way. You remember back in the 60's and 70's? Men were kind of rugged. Movies were kind of rugged – we had movies like The Godfather, we had westerns. Now westerns these days are like Brokeback-fuckin-Mountain. I don't have a problem with homosexuals [but] it's gotten to that point in the game. Back in the day, they were very rugged.

In our society they wanted men to be whooped because back in the day men were the decision makers, and a lot of businesses couldn't really capitalize off emotional sales and this is kind of deep, because men were the logical decision makers. They couldn't sell a house or they couldn't sell certain things without the husband and wife being present. If a woman made an emotional purchase or whatever, some salesman hustled the wife, the husband would come home and be like, "No. Hell no!” So they canceled it, they canceled the check. So they had to put the woman at the head of the household. They knew that women were emotional decision makers, and it's all about profit in this country. The government and big corporations are hand in hand. They're going to do whatever is going to make the most profit. So they had to create a society where women were the dominerring ones, and the men followed the women. You look at television now, it's completely catered to women. Everything is catered to women. There's nothing, besides sports, for men on television today.

That's word. Nothing but ESPN for me.

My thing is, read my books. A lot of stuff is common sense, I tell guys to have confidence. But I see these dudes fighting and belly-aching over females that are 5's at best. So I tell [them] to step it up and stop brown nosing and realize your value as a man.

For more information about the February 1 class, as well as other products by Tariq Nasheed, hit up macklessons.com.To subscribe to The Mack Lessons Radio Show, log on to http://myspace.com/tariq_nasheed.