Hip-Hop (In Cultural Evolution)

I was reflecting on my musical influences and just life in general as usual. I've been working on this "ode to Hip-Hop." In also reflecting on my past notes, I decided to break this into two pieces because it was getting kinda long. Please comment and tell me what you think...here goes:

Part I (Reminiscence)

Hip Hop Lives(I Come Back) by KRS-ONE

Hip means to know
It's a form of intelligence
To be hip is to be up-date and relevant
Hop is a form of movement
You can't just observe a hop
You got to hop up and do it
Hip and Hop is more than music
Hip is the knowledge
Hop is the movement
Hip and Hop is intelligent movement
All relevant movement
We selling the music
So write this down on your black books and journals
Hip Hop culture is eternal
Run and tell all your friends
An ancient civilization has bee born again
It's a fact

I come back
Every year I'm the Strongest
Krs-one, Marley Marl
Yup we last the longest
Let's go
I come back
Cause I'm not in the physical
I create myself man I live in the spiritual
I come back through the cycles of life
If you been here once you gone be here twice
So I tell you
I come back
Cause you must learn too
Hip Hop culture is eternal

Hip Hop (Shan!)

Her Infinite Power
Helping Oppressed People
We are unique and unequaled

I was reading an article on yahoo.com the other day about how hip hop has gone soft. The examples he listed were interesting. As someone who stays on the periphery of new music, I hadn’t heard most of these songs. However, after some reflection, I had to concur with his assessment there is definitely a “for the ladies’” feel to most of the music out today. As a late 80’s babies, I have only the vaguest of memories of the nascence of hip hop but what I do remember is that the early 90’s was a time in which the airwaves were taken over by “gangsta rap.” The most potent evidence of the exploding commercial value of “gangsta rap” is that of MC Hammer’s Star Warsian ("Luke, Come to the Dark Side") conversion from genie pants and a kid friendly attitude to the ultra-adult, baggy jeans and jersey approach he used while trying to relate to the “urban” audience by objectifying women with his ill-fated track, “Pumps and a Bump,” and his signing to the infamous and notorious Death Row Records. So even the most goodie of goodie two-shoes, MC Hammer who went from his own family-friendly cartoon show to this pseudo-“gangstaism,” was susceptible to the trap of fast money and trends. The fact that he was constantly in debt might also have spurred this change of heart as well.

As hip-hop pushed towards the new millennium(roughly '94-'98), we found ourselves in what I like to call the “Shiny Suit Era.” This period was all about immediate flash and ostentation. My favorite example of this is the Bad Boy label. My favorite being "Feels So Good" by Mase ft. Puff Daddy. If Diddy and Mase would’ve put on one more of those ridiculous outfits, I don’t know what I would’ve done. The bigger, the brighter, the more glitzy or glamorous, the better. But that what was the style of the time, it was pervasive throughout public fashion as well, an obsession with bright, loud and obnoxious colors in the largest sizes possible. That’s also the way that the music videos were shot as well. I remember the video for Missy Elliot’s debut song, “The Rain(Supa Dupa Fly).” The raw color of that video was enough to blind you. It was all bright and fast moving. Maybe this was also indicative of the perceived economic future of the time. (Ohh, the Clinton years.) And further on that color note, does anyone else remember the intro to the show, Smart Guy, shiny, right? Lol

The latter half of the Shiny Suit Era gave way to “Bling Bling” created by the Cash Money Millionaires(roughly '98-'03). The Bling Bling Era, in my opinion was really the point at which Hip Hop over-commercialized itself and distanced itself a great deal from its socio-politically revolutionary roots. Every song on the radio was talking about “blinging” or “shining” or some other non-creative, generic rap about egotistical materialism. I grew up lower-middle class, so that bling was truly beyond my reach. I just remember in junior high how everyone was obsessed with having some sort of shine and chains were the thing. Suddenly, it became not acceptable but necessary for a man to accessorize his outfit with jewelry. This only intensified the general teasing and immaturity of adolescence and served as a visual demarcation between the haves and have nots; however, this materialism drove a lot of haves to become hads and the have nots to become the have even lesses. The free money party of the Clinton era was drying up. I remember a distinct uptick in the number of evictions and the number of people once again living beyond their means. (But for some I suppose one eviction isn’t enough, see housing crisis 08). Anyway, I hit a tangent. “Bling” became so pervasive throughout the global culture Merriam-Webster added it to the dictionary; it grew beyond racial boundaries and found itself falling out of the mouths of Caucasian Americans throughout the land, even that of former presidential candidate Gov. Mitt Romney. So, as is the typical quality of African-Americans, whenever something that starts homegrown becomes transplanted into the national consciousness, it’s time to switch the style up. Andre 3000 says in the song, Hollywood Divorce, “Hollywood divorce. All the fresh styles always start off as a good little hood thing, look at blues, rock, jazz, rap. Not even talkin about music, everything else too. By the time it reach Hollywood it's over; but it's cool. We just keep it goin and make new shit.”

Right now though, it feels like hip hop is going through a phase I like to term the “Light (Low and Tight) Era.(roughly '05-current)” I think that’s best exhibited by today’s fashion. Yeah, the jeans still sag; but, now they’re skinny now. The shirts are still long but they are tucked tight and made in a size only known as “smedium.” For a man of my size, being “trendy” and “fashionable” nowadays is a scary proposition. So I wear what’s comfortable, as I would suggest for anyone; but, I don’t see the comfort in skinny jeans for men. Maybe I’m crazy. Moving back to the article I cited earlier from yahoo, in a blog by Billy Johnson, Jr. posted on Dec 23, 2008, he discussed how “basically, every rap artist who has released a song this year has borrowed LL Cool J's "I Need Love" hip-hop ballad formula to find their way on the charts,” and how even though,” The hip-hop ballad has been the hip-hop artist's no-brainer way to secure radio play for several years... things have recently intensified.” Some of the songs he cites from ’08 are “Love Lockdown” by Kanye West, “Sensual Seduction” by Snoop Dogg, “Whatever You Like” by T.I., “Put It On Ya” by Plies ft. Chris J, “Kiss Me Through the Phone” by Soulja Boy Tell’em ft. Sammie, “Camera Phone” by The Game ft. Ne-Yo, and “One and Only” by Nelly.

In listening to these songs and examining the top Billboard songs throughout the year, stuff like “Miss Independent”, “Green Light” and “Single Ladies”, lead me to believe that 2008 in the Hip-Hop/R&B community was really the year of the ladies, especially the rise of Jazmine Sullivan. Hip-Hop has definitely let its R&B side show in early 2009 continuing the 2008 push. Is this a bad thing? Not necessarily. I hope it’s a trend that leads to an upgrading of the citizenship status of women in Hip Hop culture. It seems like a complete 180, an about face from the early 90’s with groups like the Two Live Crew and pretty much all of hip-hop dogging women. It seems like hip-hop is constantly in this flux between its R&B side and its Rap side. Maybe this is an acknowledgement of the growing social influence of women or just an occasional spike on the meter.

One of the questions I am most frequently asked is, “What kind of music do you listen to?” My ear is extremely eclectic and diverse, we can move from Jazz to Opera to Gospel to Hip-Hop to Classic Soul to Classical to Blues to Rock to Reggae to Alternative to Pop to Funk to Go-Go to World to Bluegrass to Country and then back again. Right now, I’m listening to Reggaeton as I’m writing this. I think this is the first Reggaeton song I’ve listened to that hasn’t sucked to me. Maybe that’ll be the next thing I incorporate in my regular rotation.

But of all those differing styles, the one I love the most is definitely Hip-Hop because to me it is the most intriguing. Despite how derivative it can be at times, Hip-Hop has to be the most diverse, innovative, and linguistically challenging form of music out there. The art of sampling allows it to take the best of other forms and transform it to something uniquely Hip-Hop. Beyond that, linguistically, the phrasing, diction, and lexicon of Hip-Hop is constantly growing and evolving. Hip-Hop is also a self-edifying and updating work of art mainly because it depends on several different literary devices to get its point across, most notably:

• hyperbole- obvious, intentional exaggeration (e.g."Some say that I'm nasty. Plus, hookaz are mad because they can't outlast me. Girl, you ain't too small, cause I turn your crystal to one size fits all "- Kool G.Rap "Talk Like Sex"



• metaphor- A figure of speech in which a word or phrase that ordinarily designates one thing is used to designate another, thus making an implicit comparison (e.g. "I am the American dream, the rape of Africa, the undying machine, the overpriced medicine, the murderous regime, the tough guy's front,
  and the one behind the scenes"- Lupe Fiasco "Put You On Game")

• allusion- an indirect or casual reference to something not explicitly stated (e.g. "Me and the boy AI got more in common than just ballin and rhymin get it, more in Carmen . I came in your belly backseat, skeeted in your jeep. Left condoms on your baby seat"- Jay-Z "Superugly" [in which he alludes to the fact that both he and basketball player Allen Iverson had affairs with rapper Nas' first wife, Carmen Bryan. This is also a pun.])



• simile- a figure of speech in which two unlike things are explicitly compared, featuring the use of the words "like" or "as" (e.g."I'm standing on the roof of my building. I'm feeling the whirlwind of beef. I inhale it, just like an acrobat ready to hurl myself through the hoops of fire, sippin 80 proof, bulletproof under my attire." - Nas "Black Republicans" )

Also, one of the most unique things about Hip-Hop is the art of the sample. Sampling, for those who aren't familiar, is the usage of other previously recorded works as the beat or background music for new work. The art of the sample is what helps to keep the history of Hip-Hop and its predecessors alive. One of the most sampled musicians in Hip-Hop is definitely Isaac Hayes. Hayes' remake of the Burt Bacharach's classic, "The Look of Love," has been sampled by Ashanti (Rain on Me), Snoop Dogg (G'z Up,Ho's Down), and Jay-Z (Can I Live). Also, his remake of Walk On By has been sampled most notably by 2Pac (Me Against the World), the Wu Tang Clan (I Can't Go to Sleep), and Biggie Smalls(Warning). Hip-Hop transmits this music that was recorded decades prior to its reconstituted Hip-Hop forms to a new generation. I think that anyone who has a passion for Hip-Hop has to have a profound appreciation for other genres because of the interplay. When Kanye West sampled Daft Punk in Stronger, most people scratched their heads because they had/have no clue who Daft Punk is. Hip-Hop leaves a lot of lessons unlearned because it seems like this generation, in general, just consumes the product without a hunger to learn more about it. Anyone can tell you that a song features a sample but the question is do they know or even want to know anything about the original.

Hip-Hop is literally a catalog for pop culture references and historical documentation. For example, I’m a huge Biggie Smalls/Notorious B.I.G. fan. I noticed how in a good deal of his songs he often referred to himself as the Black Frank White. In my head I always wondered, “Who is this Frank White that Biggie is continually referencing?” I did a little research and found out that Frank White was a fictional drug lord, portrayed by Christopher Walken, in the movie, King of New York, released in 1990. Also, the name Biggie Smalls itself is taken from the role of actor Calvin Lockhart in the 1975 movie Let’s Do It Again, which featured a bevy of prominent Black actors and actresses of the time. Hip-Hop is built from esoteric references (e.g. Fabolous line- "Even with chicks beggin me for dick regularly. A nigga known for gettin rid of weight like Dick Gregory"; Jay-Z- "So tall and lanky, my suit it should thank me. I make it look good to be this hood Meyer Lansky. Mixed with Lucky Lefty, gangsta effortlessly. Papa was a rollin' stone it's in my ancestry.")

Also noteworthy is the proliferation of music made about and/or featuring the name Barack Obama in the Hip-Hop community. In an article in the Washington Post awhile back, there was a featured story I believe in the Style section that detailed the growing usage of Obama in lyricism. In my mind I go back to Young Jeezy’s intro to the “Love Your Girl” Remix with The Dream. The very first words out of his mouth are, “Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama.” The obvious question is “Why?” I still don’t know the answer but he felt it important enough to “big him up” in a song that was completely unrelated to anything political.

In a recent interview, rapper Common stated that "I really do believe we, as hip-hop artists, pick up what's going on in the world. I think hip-hop artists will have no choice but to talk about different things and more positive things. Try to bring a brighter side to that because, even before Barack, I think people had been tired of hearing the same thing." Hip-Hop is its own form of social commentary and political punditry. He collects data and analyzes events. I like to use the example of Biggie’s Juicy lyrics “Now I'm in the limelight 'cause I rhyme tight. Time to get paid, blow up like the World Trade.” This small nugget evokes memories of the collective conscious from the first World Trade Center bombing in New York and simultaneously points out the commercialization of hip-hop and its transformative ability to take situations of abject poverty and flip them into commercial capital.

Hip-Hop lyrically is Urban America's journal. It is our public discourse with the world which exhibits our particular brand of ingenue and intelligence. Hip-Hop has transformed the similes of Shakespeare, "Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world like a Colossus (from Julius Caesar)" expressing sentiments of dismay at the growing power of Caesar to "tell you dudes what I do to protect this, shoot at you actors like movie directors(PSA)" by Jay-Z which offers the inverse, almost the Caesarean point of view if he were truly the tyrant that Brutus saw him becoming. Personally, I just wonder what it takes to get the world to recognize the artistry of Hip-Hop for the intrinsic greatness. Hip-Hop is America; Hip-Hop is the world.

I'm not saying all of this to over-intellectualize Hip-Hop. However, there is definitely an intellectual element that is often overlooked, even by the rappers themselves. You may ask yourself in reading this as I did in writing it, "Do these dudes even do this stuff on purpose or is it just par for the course?" My answer is this: I believe that all the puns, allusions, metaphors, similes, hyperbola are definitely intentional. While the technical jargon of English used to describe these phenomena may escape the cognitive awareness of these men and women, they are no less adept in using it, which in many ways makes it all the more interesting. Hip-Hop is worth the intellectual investigation, if only out of sheer curiosity. Too many of us just accept the lyrics that we hear because "the beat is tight" without really analyzing the lyrics.

Most of Hip-Hop is birthed out of this Shakespearean sentiment from his play, As You Like It

Duke Senior:
Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.

What About The Children? Really, what about them?

There's something about the light of innocence that glimmers in the eyes of a child. I've wondered about how my life would end, what twists and turns would occur, what adventures would I have but one thing I've always wanted is children. It's always been non-negotiable. I love kids. Watching them succeed and fail, stand and fall, and just develop as the years go by just brings a tear to my eye. What I don't understand is how anyone could ever harm a child, under any circumstances. I'm not talking about the occasional whooping, which I feel is necessary but has to be dictated by the circumstances in which it becomes necessary, something you have to learn and observe in your child as you mature as a parent. Sometimes hard discipline is the best discipline; but, as with everything, there is a line.

Child Welfare

The rampant child abuse and neglect that goes on in the world and definitely in this country is utterly deplorable. From the rape, molestation, and incest to actual murder and assault, what could a child possibly have done so great to deserve that? Personally, I feel that rape and molestation are the most virulently revolting action that can be committed against another human being. They not only ravage the physical self, but the emotional, spiritual, and psychological self as well. Fortunately, no one in my family, that I know of, has been raped or molested- Thank God; but I have friends who have experienced that, for some of them, it has completely altered, in their opinion, the person they would've been.

Some of my male friends who have been either raped or molested by males are now in some way now attracted to men. I'm not saying that homosexuality is wrong; but what I am saying is that, how can you forcibly subject someone to that? You have taken choice away from them; and choice is the most fundamental part of life. You have killed a part of them that is difficult to resuscitate. But the part that makes me so upset- is that it's completely unnecessary. What sexual pleasure can a child give you that you can't either a.) Give yourself or b.) Receive from another consenting adult? The only way I can even begin to comprehend it is as some sort of power mechanism meaning that you, a rapist/molester, feel so powerless in your own life that you have to assert some sort of physical power over someone weaker than yourself so as to boost your own pathetic ego. How absolutely pathetic is that?

Generally, I'm of the belief that God will sort it all out and that no one deserves to die; but, when it comes to rape or child molestation or child abuse, my body seizes up with blind rage such Jesus better intercede quick or there will be no need for intercession, ya dig. The recent news story of the woman in Lusby, MD who had "unwittingly" been living in a house for months with frozen remains of her dead children in the refrigerator is testament to the type of mental illness, depravity, ignorance, disillusionment, or perversion that we have somehow allowed to seep into our social consciousness. How the hell do you not know that your "missing/dead" kids' remains are in your fucking freezer?

It turns my stomach when I think of the dastardly reprobate who would dare to do something like that. These two girls, who the police believe have been dead for a year or more, would be 11 and 9 years old now and supposing that it has been just a year, what the hell could a 10 and an 8 year old have to piss you off so badly that they deserved to die? The woman, Renee Bowman, has an adoptive daughter, 7 years old who was also being abused and was the key to discovering the other daughters. We all have only one life…JUST ONE LIFE…and who the hell are you to take it away from a child? I just don't get it. As I'm writing I'm holding back the tears, because this shit hurts to think about.

Another issue I have is this Safe Haven law, that most states have which allows you to drop your child off with a health care worker, if you are unable to take care of it. I don't have an issue with that in general. I'd rather you give it away and let it live than keep it and kill it. But, in Nebraska, the law intended to protect infants has taken an unexpected turn. The Nebraska statute, which in the infinite wisdom of the lawmakers strove not to piss people off, doesn't give a specific age limit for the decriminalized drop-off and utilizes the very broad, very ambiguous term "child." Last time I checked, we were all somebody's child. Parents and grandparents have been taken liberty with the law and construed it to mean anyone under the age of 18. So, in Nebraska, you have parents leaving teenagers to become wards of the state because after 16+ years of more than likely doing a poor parenting job you realize that you simply can't cut it. I understand that there are some kids who are horribly misbehaved; but, the last time I checked, it's your blood flowing through their veins. Take care of your kids. Bottom Line.

Darfur/Congo

I was listening to a 60 Minutes podcast the other day that really reminded me that there was still a crisis going on in that region. The Darfuri people have been mass-murdered to an extent that can only be described as genocide. Even President Bush recognizes that; but, yet again, we expend our military might in fighting a war in a country that at the time was not an immediate threat while we watch millions of people be savagely murdered, raped, and killed. The refugees, survivors of these atrocities are then herded up into villages where essentially they go to die, generally because they are left unprotected or have sustained wounds, injuries, or diseases that cannot be treated in time by the very limited medical staff on hand. Millions of children are left orphaned in all the violence. But hands down, the most disturbing part of it all is the rape.

The Human Rights Watch has a 44-page report out detailing the rape and sexual violence in Darfur. The rapes are systematic and are designed to instill fear into the hearts of the survivors and their families: "Soldiers, militia, rebels, and ex-rebels also rape women and girls outside displaced persons camps and in rural areas. A 12-year-old girl described how an armed Arab man in uniform lured her and her younger sister into a secluded area by pretending to help them find their lost donkey. He said if we went with him he would show us. He grabbed me and took off my clothes to do bad things to me. My younger sister ran back to the camp…In another case, an 11-year-old girl was raped by three armed men when she went to collect grass with her 7-year-old sister. The attack left her so badly injured she had to be evacuated by an African Union helicopter to the nearest hospital for treatment."

"'The victims of these horrific attacks have little or no hope of redress in Darfur's current climate of impunity,' said Georgette Gagnon, Africa director of the Human Rights Watch. 'By failing to prosecute the perpetrators, the government is giving them a license to rape.' Despite the presence of Sudanese police – at least in main towns of Darfur – and a somewhat functional judicial system, most attacks on women and girls go unpunished. Survivors are often too afraid to report their cases and lack confidence that authorities will assist them. Even when women do report incidents of sexual violence, police routinely fail to register and properly investigate reports. Some police exhibit a dismissive or antagonistic attitude toward the survivors. In addition, police and judicial authorities are unwilling or unable to prosecute most crimes committed by soldiers or militia. For example, during a large-scale attack on the village of Abu Sakin, North Darfur in late 2006, government soldiers and Janjaweed militia abducted eight women and girls, brutally raped at least three, and forced them to walk back to their village naked. The suspects were identified by the victims, but to date the military has refused to hand them over to the prosecutor. In other cases, police openly admit that they cannot take action if the case involves the military."

CBS also reported on a secret deadly war that was going on in the Congo in the last 10 years. The genocide in Rwanda spilled over into the Congo after the "end" of that genocide. The war over territory and resources is tearing the country apart. Each new battle has brought rape and pillaging. The fleeing people have run to U.N. refugee camps which are overcrowded. Women are still subject to daily rape. "Rape is the norm…this is not rape because soldiers got bored… it is a way to ensure that communities accept the power of that particular armed group," says Annika van Wootenburg, the top Africa researcher for the Human Rights Watch. In one story, a young 24 year old woman was living with her 2 kids and younger brother when militia men busted in, tied her up and raped her one by one. They forced her brother to hold the flashlight so he could clearly see them rape him. They asked him to join in the very savage and brutal rape but he refused. They turned to him and stabbed him to death. They took the young woman and dragged her to their camp and forced her to be their sex slave and she was raped daily. She escaped to find out that her children were. Her husband left as is common of husbands of rape victims. And to put the cherry on top of this shit pie, she had been impregnated by one of her rapists. Pregnant, single mother of 3 now, abandoned- Where is the justice? These women have been violated by bayonets, broken bottles and are even sometimes shot between the legs. One of the top surgeons in the region has seen female patients ranging from age 3 to 72. The efforts to repair the vaginal damage are largely successful but not always, living women often barren, unable to use the bathroom properly or to even control their bodily functions at all. I can only strain to imagine the type of psychological damage that goes into having the essence of both your womanhood and personhood violently destroyed. And for the young girls, even before you come to know what it means.

All of this simply begs the question: What kind of a world are we living in? The answer, and the only one, I can really come up with is a world of disinterest, a world that largely is completely disengaged with issues that do not profit itself. America, in your infinite nobility and valor and Christian piety, how can you overlook this? But I suppose I shouldn't be surprised because global issues only matter to America when we are either A.) Pretending to give a damn for the sake of public image or B.) subverting our main objectives of deeper global greed by continuing to rape the planet as the energy whores we are. For once, before I die, I would love to see the president be completely honest about where we are going and what we are doing.

Black Men

Now to everyone's favorite topic, Black men. This summer I had the pleasure to work with the Mayor's Green Summer Job Corps as a team leader. My job was to supervise groups of young men in various ecological and environmental efforts throughout the summer while also seeking to help improve their socialization skills and general livelihood and welfare. The youth range in age from 14-21. I worked primarily with the older young men who were all 17+ at the sites I worked. I personally supervised about 20 young men between the two sites I worked. Of these 20 young men, 3 were expectant fathers, one of a set of twins. And I asked myself, how does this happen nowadays? How do people have unplanned pregnancies? There a wide variety of prophylactics and contraceptives on the market now. We have the morning after pill, birth control pills, female and male condoms, most of which you can either get for cheap or free.

So I asked them, in as serious a manner as I knew how, "how did you get her pregnant?" All of them looked at me and laughed. And I repeated, "No, really, how did you get her pregnant? I know the physiological workings of reproduction, we all know that, but let's put that to the side for a minute. Did you just not use a condom, if so was it on purpose or accidentally? Was she not on the pill? Did she poke holes in the condom while you weren't looking? Did you bring your own? Did the condom break and just say was, "Ohh, it just happened man," and laugh. And instantly, I was paralyzed by fear for the children yet to be born to these young men, all of which are either engage or were engaged in some sort of illegal activity that could potentially put them behind bars and make them purely another statistic.

As a side note, despite the propaganda machine to the contrary, more Black men are in college than there are in jail, shocking, I know, particularly among college age inmates; but the statistics are kind of wonky, I'll get back to this. Funk it; I'll just explain it now. Based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau's 2000 Census, there were 816,000 Black men in college as opposed to 791,600 Black men in the total prison population at that time. But if you look at the National Center for Educational Statistics (NCES) analysis, their 1999 numbers show 603,032 Black men in college during that time. The discrepancy comes in with the fact that the NCES numbers are hand counted and total each and every student, it's "a mandatory institutional survey of all degree-granting institutions eligible to disburse federal financial aid funds (the overwhelming majority),"according to an op-ed piece in the Baltimore Sun. However, when you dissect the numbers into a college-age bracket of 18-24, there are more Black men in college than in prison by approximately a 4 to 1 ratio. So ladies, you can go ahead and let out a little sigh of relief, we're not all locked up! (lol)

Something else I found interesting and will mention only briefly. Dallas Mavericks Small Forward Josh Howard was caught on tape saying during a flag football game for Allen Iverson's charity, "The Star-Spangled Banner' is going on. I don't celebrate this [expletive]. I'm black," while the national anthem was playing. Josh Howard has admitted to being a marijuana user and has had a few skirmishes with the law. When PTI briefly covered this story, I didn't appreciate the way that I feel Michael Wilbon attacked Josh Howard for expressing himself. His sentiments there, in my opinion, are representative of what most people of color during a real moment of reflection as to what this country has really given to them and have thought quietly to themselves at one point or another. I feel like it was a sentiment that needed to be expressed publicly given his semi-celebrity status and media-accessibility but I think it was honest and not just the ramblings of an ignorant, immature young man. Media have decried his comments as simply unpatriotic without giving any real weight as to the possibility veracity of his comments.

Parenting/Role Modeling

Sometimes, I just sit back and think about all the advice that I've given to other people that I really should've given to myself; but, I guess that's how it always is, easy to say, hard to do. In life, when we really look back on all the things we did that damn near killed us but didn't, all the pearls of wisdom that have been passed down to us, and all the silent moments of unconditional love and unwavering support that we have been blessed to experience, there are generally a very small group of people responsible for that. These magical, wonderful people, who have given us all the tools to live beyond our imaginations, didn't just come out of nowhere. They were made. They were forged by the fires of indecision, discrimination, retaliation, ignorance and hatred; but, they were cooled by the waters of love, patience, and tolerance. I realized that the things that mother and father have told me, have said to me are the things I end up saying and telling others, and the things that were said and told to them.

My family didn't come together by happenstance; no one's family did. It is a series of defined decisions that brought us to this moment. Each and every one of us has millions of great grandparents; if any one of those people had made a different decision, we would not be here at this moment sharing this moment. To me that's the beauty of the chaos of the universe, the infinity of possibility that we have to play with, if we really think outside of ourselves. I believe it's one of the driving forces of man. But while we cannot choose our lineage, we can choose our legacy and in doing so redefine our lineage. So many of us who were born in poverty complain about, how about we decide not to carry that legacy to our progeny and make the money that our parents couldn't make because they were too busy sacrificing.

Too often in life people forget the simple things. The simplest being that you are the one you have been waiting for. You know that change you want to make? Go make it happen. We can't choose who births us but we can choose who influences us. If we allow ourselves to be taken in by the sheep, then we are simply sheep; but, if we sit at the feet of the shepherd, we will become shepherds. That's why to me role models are so important. While my father was never rich, he never quit and always did what he had to do to make things happen. While my mother hasn't always done things the way I like, she has never stopped loving me. If you have someone in your life that needs to be loved on, love on them. That's what I tried to do in all my attempts to really be a mentor. I didn't always succeed but I have gotten better and I am getting better.

Anyone can mentor but not everyone will. So that's why it's so important that we take each other seriously. That's kind of why my experiences with the AmeriCorps Heads Up and Manhood Training Rites of Passage programs are so important to me. It forced me to be the leader that I said I was. If I call you for help, will you answer me? Real mentors aren't there to give you the answers; but, merely serve as a conduit for unlocking the answers within yourself. I think of it this way: I can tell you all day that the stove is hot; but you won't know it's hot until you touch it. Information without experience isn't knowledge; it's simply retention.

Final Thoughts

There are too many parents who never should have been parents, in my opinion. All life is sacred and intended to live; but I suppose the question is, live how? My response would be according that person's own individual plan for their lives; but, I suppose, the overwhelming majority of us never get to that point in our lives because we are simply too busy reacting to our sociological and psychological conditioning of the illusion of life as opposed to living in the real reality which is solely based on our individual ability to forge ahead and press on with our personal virtues, aims, and goals. It is the belief of the individual that makes the individual an individual. We grow; we develop; we mature, and the day we stop doing that, is the day we start to die. Let the world see your passion. It does the world a disservice to hide your light under a bushel.

The Power of Language

Politics

As I sat on the bus, on my way home from another excursion into the land of Black Academia, I started reading this article in the Post that posed the question, “Is Obama too liberal?” In the article, the author discussed how both the Clinton camp and the Republican Party assailed Obama’s left-leaning politics and cast aspersions on his ability to lead and to distance himself from the “racist” values of his pastor Rev. Jeremiah Wright. But what is it that makes Obama too liberal? Will they tell you? No. On the subject of faith, how many people know where Hillary Clinton or John McCain worship? Nowhere as many as the number of people who now know the name, face, and probably address of Rev. Wright. By slapping the tag of “down-the-line liberal” on Obama, they hope to destroy his appeal to moderates. The Clinton campaign is truly confused as to how to really stop Obama and slow his momentum, which is apparent in their castigation of him as a liberal but also stating that Obama is too “fond” of Ronald Reagan’s ideology, the guiding principle of the neo-conservatives. It doesn’t make sense. The term “liberal” has brought the campaigns of Walter Mondale, John Kerry, and Michael Dukakis to a halt, when the issue of electability and nationwide appeal were raised. I think it’s up to the nation to determine whether they want politics of a more liberal and progressive bent, not the pundits and spin doctors behind these campaigns.

William Safire, in an interview of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, discussed how politicians utilize language to create associations or separations where there ordinarily wouldn’t be. The genius of the Bush Administration is the way in which they used language to create and perpetuate a state of panic and fear in America and punk us all into giving them much more power than they constitutionally should have had by painting everyone who opposed the war and by extension President Bush as being unpatriotic. What I find paradoxical is how we can extol virtues of liberty and democracy and improving conditions of our fellow man internationally but so openly fail to do so domestically. We speak so glowingly of liberating Iraq; but when it comes to liberating minorities and the rest of the dregs of society we openly lampoon and privately cripple efforts by anyone to do so. We are quick to castigate and denounce countries and powers who point out our blatant hypocrisy. France is a good example of that. I still am in shock that America tried to take the French off of everything and replace it with Freedom. Freedom Fries my ass. The French gave us the Statue of Liberty, ingrates.

Niggas/Bitches/Hos

How in the hell did we become this? Not too many generations ago calling any Black person any of these words was cause for an ass-whoopin’, plain and simple. How did we come to engage ourselves in this intraracial dialogue and accept these external limitations? When I think of the word “nigga/nigger/nucca/nicca/niggah/(however else you choose to spell it),” I immediately think of the shiftless, jobless, unproductive, uninterested, uneducated, irresponsible, negligent Black men out there who consistently don’t take care of their kids, don’t take care of their communities, don’t take care of their families, and don’t take care of themselves. And I’ll be damned if I allow someone to call me that and have me accept it. When your homeboi, is like “You my nigga,” my first thought is to some sort of reverse master philosophy. When I think of a nigga, I think of someone who is in bondage mentally, financially, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. But maybe I’m too old school, too orthodox in my thinking. I try to view the word “nigga” through the modern paradigm of being“a friend, a homie, compadre, road dog, etc.;” but, I just cannot shake loose the hurt associated with the word. I think of my ancestors who believed that they to be more than that literally having the black beaten off of them by whips and lashes, ripping their skin off of their bodies for merely attempting to have the type of freedom that is supposed to be associated with humanity. I just can’t get with it.

When did it become okay to be a bitch, ladies? When did it become okay to become a ho? When did we decide to disassociate ourselves from our dignity and allow ourselves to be denigrated by us. I see more Black men calling Black women “bitches” and “hos” than any other ethnic group. It disgusts me. I’m not here to argue or in any way to assert that “niggas,” “bitches,” and “hos” don’t exist because they do. They are real. They are interwoven into our everyday lives. What I am saying is that we don’t have to allow ourselves to be that. The first step to changing our perception of ourselves is by changing how we address ourselves and how others address us. It’s not what you are called, it’s what you answer to. Fellas, if you think the way you get at some of these females is cute, then you need to open your eyes forreal.

I guess it’s become cliché by now, but you have to realize that every woman is someone’s sister, someone’s aunt, someone’s cousin, someone’s mother or future mother, someone’s wife or future wife. If those women mean anything to you and you wouldn’t want to see them called “bitches” and “hos”, how can you dare to be so hypocritical as to call them out of their names and to address them in such a manner. Ladies, if you stop responding to it, a dude who is really and truly interested in you will eventually get the hint and address you the right way and in a more respectful way. We only do it because it works. I guess the same could be said of that “nigga” mentality. I assume it makes you sound more rugged, more tough, more “street,” more “hood,” more “thug,” if we speak in such an uneducated, inarticulate manner. And a lot of you ladies like and respond to that shit. Again, you do what works. A lot of dudes use the word “nigga” to get over as being tough. There’s no reason to do that. A punk is a punk. You can use the roughest, toughest, ‘thoroughest” language that there is, but at the end of the day, if you’re soft, then you’re soft. We have the potential to be far more than the nomenclatures of “niggas, bitches, and hos” will carry us; and until we shake that off, we will still be niggers at the beck and call of the social master, beating at our backs to keep us on the bottom rung of social stratification.

Homosexuality

“Queer”, ”Faggot”, “Homo”, “Dyke”, “Cunt”, “Sissy”, “Fairy”- some of the words we casually use to disparage homosexual people. Sexual preference is but a small part of who we are as people. Too often, society tries to make sexuality the determining factor in how we treat others. Openly homophobic sentiments are still part of the popular lexicon and culture. We like to compare racism and homophobia. While racial discrimination is for something that is plainly visible, open homophobia is much more accepted and pervasive. From the way in which we scold our children, “To stop being such a tomboy” or “to stop being such a sissy,” it is readily apart of conversation in which we teach our children that homosexuality or anything not standard is unacceptable.

It took me a long time to realize how offensive the term “faggot” or “faggie” is to homosexual men. Casual expressions like “that’s so gay” or “that’s some faggie shit” are definitely symptomatic of an unempathetic culture. The struggle for gay rights and gay visibility is inexorably linked to the over-arching goal of civil rights, which was freedom from the oppression of anyone for everyone. In a discussion with a friend of mine who happens to be homosexual about gay rights I told him, “I support it but I’m not the kind of guy who’s going to be out there on the front lines campaigning; but I wouldn’t be averse to signing a petition or waving a sign. I don’t feel passionately enough about it to be as enthusiastic in my defense of it as others would. I just don’t feel as connected to it, as say fighting racism but I understand the connection.”

What I found most interesting is the dilemma of race and sexuality. In reading J.L. King’s book, “Coming Up From the Down Low,” I really began to understand and connect with the variety of reasons men of color do not open up about their sexuality, primarily because we don’t present a space for them to be open. King articulates in his book that often Black men must choose between pursuing their interests and the very culture that has sustained them. If I knew that revealing one aspect about myself, namely who I kept in my bed, I would keep that a secret too. That’s a hell of a dilemma. Black women, especially, take issue with men who are on the DL and aren’t out, but as King presents, it comes to more so an inability to be honest as opposed to a lack of desire. Sexuality has been the basis for castigation and erasure of all other aspects of a person’s character. There’s got to be more. Black men on the DL must often decide which identification is most important to them, race or sexuality. And generally out of racial obligation, many men decide to hide, especially in hopes of creating and strengthening the Black family.

Psychological Disorders

Minority communities continue to see psychological disorders (i.e. anxiety, depression, schizophrenia, bi-polarity) as a White person’s disease that has nothing to do with us. Recently actress Jennifer Lewis (You may not know her name but you know her face) revealed that she was bi-polar and that she was receiving treatment. Bobby Brown also discussed being bi-polar. His admission was met with a lot of scoffs and disdain and accusations of dishonest. Black folks saying, “That boy just high and crazy- bi-polar my ass,” is merely a result of our lack of understanding of the issue. I feel a lot of that stems from the need of people of color to close ranks and to see ourselves as strong and self-sufficient and that any form of non-physical infirmity was merely personal weakness.

Many often sacrificed their personal well-being in their commitment to the larger goal of keeping the family strong, i.e. Mama taking her private pains to the bathroom as she cried all alone. The Black community in their devout religious belief has often moved away from established medicine. It was common for Blacks to say, “Doctor, I don’t need no doctor. I’m gonna pray and go get me some herbs.” That dogged commitment to the traditional didn’t allow many Blacks to really understand that science and medicine are gifts from God. Why would he put it here for us not to use? American ideology has always viewed the mental health profession with open skepticism, calling them “quacks” and “head shrinkers.” The kind of understanding that can come with a knowledge of the human psyche and how it relates to human physiology is key to repairing the human spirit which is crucial in promoting overall wellness. It is our skepticism that keeps us from healing.

Masculinity vs. Femininity

Society has always placed a premium on masculinity and maleness, part of the reason why male homosexuality is so openly vilified and female homosexuality is a bit more tolerated. In the back of pretty much every heterosexual male’s mind is the fantasy of seeing multiple women committing lesbian acts in front of them. Not every heterosexual man is overtly masculine, and for him, life must be very confusing, often being pushed in directions that he wouldn’t normally. In terms of language, we often portray our preference in the way in which we address people and objects. First off, the majority of job titles confer the masculine or feminine upon a position, i.e. stewardess, chairman, postman, seamstress. Often, when naming inanimate objects, e.g. cars, we choose feminine nicknames for them. Men are known to remark in reference to a car, “Ain’t she a beaut!” Even R. Kelly’s song, “You Remind Me,” features several references that equate a woman to something non-human.

Black society is giving into the growing trend of the more effeminate male and the more masculine female, which often complicates accepted household roles. The ideal of the late 80’s/90’s/early 2000’s was that of the thug male, who wore his masculinity on the outside and wore thug apparel, i.e. tims, wife beater, baggy jeans, chain; but as of late, Black males have traded in the loose and baggy for the tight and fitted and begun openly engaging in practices that not too long ago that would have labeled him as a “faggot” or a “sissy” or a “homo,” i.e. facials, having a stylist, wearing pastel colors, fitted shirts, manicures, pedicures, and using beauty cosmetics. Conversely, females have been stepping increasingly out of the home and into the workforce in greater numbers and holding higher level positions in male dominated fields, i.e. real estate, energy, and banking.

More and more men are becoming stay at home fathers as well. All of which often challenges commonly accepted gender roles. I know as a man I would have a problem, at least initially, with my wife making considerably more money than me. This issue is becoming more and more frequently faced by couples in which the man feels the need to assert himself as a man and take care of his family. The accepted standard was that the man brought home the bacon and the woman fried it up in a pan. What do you do when she comes home with steak and hands you a skillet? I think that all of these complications can be overcome if a basis for compromise is there. Men were once able to dominate women via finances; but now many women are able to turn the tables, increasing their freedom and simultaneously forcing us males to redefine our masculinity and our maleness. We can see by the overwhelming majority of males to females in college that they have put themselves in a position to increase their earning power despite the sexism and discrimination ion pay.

Issues of Race

Inter-racially there is great distrust. We don’t understand each other’s culture, attitudes and practices. Be they a “towel-head,” “chink”, “nigger,” “cracker”, “injun”, “kike”, “kaffir”, “jungle bunny”, “cholo”, “wetback”, “coonass”, “curry-muncher”, “gook”, “wop”, etc., we allow others to define what or who is acceptable in society. Something I’ve always made a note of is that I’ve never met a White person who is offended by the term, “cracker.” And that indifference is the luxury of dominance, the luxury of socially defined superiority. Reports estimate that in 2050 whites will be the largest minority group given the expansion of the Hispanic population and immigration. On the surface that sounds like something for minorities to root for; however, if the White community as the minority still dominates music and big business and basically the American economy, would the demographic difference really matter?

Beyond that, without minority solidarity to protect a collective agenda of increased representation, the aforementioned divisions will only continue to factionalize race and create an internal civil war for domination allowing Whites to continue to purport their domination. The privileges that come with Whiteness, while not always intended, are nonetheless prevalent and cannot be ignored. For White children growing up, no matter what you want to do, there are a variety of White faces that you can place with that goal, for minorities it is not always that readily available. The Native American population, which has almost been completely written off, probably has the worst of this particular situation. The agenda is solidarity, which comes through sacrifice.

In Randall Kennedy’s book, Sellout: The Politics of Racial Betrayal, he discusses the idea of “outing.” He speaks about how in terms of both sexuality and race “outing” people forces an often reluctant association, either as a form of punishment for the person for betraying the confidences of the membership or as a form of uplift for that community giving them an example of what they can achieve, a symbol of aspiration. People of mixed heritage by whatever name they are called are often caught between worlds and associations and are often “outed” when they achieve some sort of notoriety. I automatically think about Barack Obama, Colin Powell, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, and Tiger Woods. People went out of their way to dig through and often question their ethnic backgrounds to find out “what kind” of Black they were.

Final Thoughts

We often overlook the power of language and self-definition but it is pivotal to our understanding of self and our relationship to the global community. Beyond that, terms are up for re-evaluation and re-association. The growing assertiveness of the female is putting that forth for the male. A situation in which, he can either accept being the helpmate or work to create greater equity in the home from the beginning, because fellas, the ladies are getting theirs. Also in terms of race and sexuality, we have to begin to see race and sexuality as merely a portion of someone’s thought process and life experience and not the totality of what they are or who they could be. Religion is often a breeding ground for division, whereas spirituality is a common balm of healing. I think it would be beneficial for all of us to go back to the roots of why we believe what we believe and determine whether or not it’s worth continuing to believe. What I also find interesting is the discussion of diversity. Diversity is such a loose and vague term in my opinion. You can have diversity in any grouping. Often in education, we talk about creating diversity, but I ask, what kind of diversity? Ethnic diversity, economic diversity, linguistic diversity, religious faith diversity? Howard often touts its diversity and it is diverse; but diverse amongst young Black people. I never realized that kind of diversity could exist. If we can have it, then there’s diversity amongst Whites, Jews, Hispanics, Asians. Humans were born to differ; but difference shouldn’t end the conversation or the quest to create understanding.