There's something about the arts; something about creating worlds and people, shepherding visions into the atmosphere out of nothing, but God's words to your spirit. Nobody knows the words and you can't even explain them. It's a secret between you and the Lord. In its execution is the understanding.
Have you seen your local artist today? The singer on the nine train or the drummer standing in line for the band audition? How about the dancer stretching her legs while she sits over coffee watching the writer have run on sentences with himself in the out-of-the-way corner? The designer; the painter, a mad scientist of colors and chemicals. you might have missed them because sometimes they lead solitary existences where the hard work done to present their best work to you is done in secret places only they can inhabit.
Have you hugged you local artist today? The one who makes you smile when the show is over and you bask in the spectacle of lights and effects and talent. Talent that can be admired, but never duplicated because it's unique to that artist or that group of souls born to do what they do; to make you think, to make you feel, to relieve you, to push you, to connect with you.
Could you be these artists? The kind that stare rejection in the face and laugh with it like an old friend or cry about it in dark rooms until they can get the strength to climb between the ropes and take the ring for their next shot? The kind that only hear what they lack, what is missing, what might not exist? Do you sit on the fence with their duality that tells them that their truth won't make them the rent money or pay for health insurance or afford them the American dream? Do you hear their arguments with themselves to tell their truth or sell-out for the possibility of a dollar and fifteen minutes of whatever fame offers?
There's something in the soul of the artist, not the star, the artist that cannot let go of the truth. Even if it kills them. The authenticity of words and deeds that propel them to seek connection over popularity, even when that authenticity comes with a price of lonliness, uncertain futures or difficult presents. The artists is a warrior and daily these brave souls die on shields of passion that salute truth and connection and perseverance. Sun Tzu's, Art of War, is just half the story. The other half is the art in war. The artist is in a war against corporate structure, public indifference, lack of tast, and still the artist fights to tell their truth, through their verses, through their dances, in their canvases, within their spotlights to let the world know we are different and the same.
In an America that places less cultural value on the truth in art than on the earning potential of populrity, the truth, which is the birth name of "artist" is poetic, is stylish, is strategic, is magnificent and carries the weapon of art in a pop war that rages in intensity with each passing day.
Sunday, April 8, 2007
DIFFERENCE AND UNIFIED
Black people are not monolithic, homogenous in thought or deed. That being said, we cannot afford a separation between what racial classification denotes as “black” people and wickedness classifies as, “nigger.”
Chris Rock’s infamous observation was a profound one at the time he presented to the masses in one of his many successful and socially relevant cable television comedy specials. But there are certain elements of black professionals who seek to banish lower class, see poor, out of the black community. Issues of teen pregnancy, unwed mothers, sexually transmitted diseases, disbelief in education and false pride about the authority of a “boss” must be addressed, but by no means should be utilized as a tool to wedge a divide between the black lower class and their quickly descending compatriots in the shrinking black middle class.
I was six years old, in first grade, caught in the middle of an unruly line of children awaiting entrance into the classroom the first time I was called a nigger. He was dirty blonde, plump, disheveled white boy named Lee. At thirty-two years of age, two academic degrees and a job at a major Hollywood studio later, in a traffic dispute in a kitschy Los Angeles neighborhood, a white man, whose name I did not know and never found out, felt he could put me in my place with the same word that had slapped my ears more than twenty-five years earlier. This is the foolishness of a black people versus nigger mode of thinking. Accomplishment does not buy a black man or woman an out clause in the contract of ignorance. In the example I shared I was just a nigger with two degrees, one a Master’s degree, and a sexy job in show business. In the mind of a racist there is no delineation or bonus point for a status stamped upright citizen or doer of great deeds. In some backwoods Mississippi farm houses or skyscraper board rooms Oprah Winfrey would be nothing more than a nigger. Some would tell her that to her face while others would no doubt have the great courage to whisper it behind her back.
Volunteering, mentorship, public policy focusing on educational and economic development are some ways to repair some of the issues that have kept poverty-stricken black Americans an item that the black bourgeoisie would like to shove into the back of a dark closet. The means mentioned above must be implemented to stop the slide of that very same bourgeoisie into the nigghetto that many of them have risen from. Black America does not need to think alike, act or re-act alike, but the crucial and basic thing we must be about realizing is that we are all people imbued with a humanity that should be respected for its own value. Poor is a lack of wherewithal; specifically, cash and opportunity. It does not, inherently, mean ignorant or morally inferior, although immorality and ignorance exists in some project developments, apartments, and people in this economic bracket. However, those same immoralities and purposeless ignorance exists in the various tiers of government, the judiciary, the Christian right and the Christian left. None of these agencies would use a cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face mode of operation. Not only would this serve to weaken any nation or agency, but would rob any socio-political agenda of its life’s blood. The civil rights movement, the farm workers, and the unions of northern blue collar industries were all manned and led by people who were not economically dominant. Young, poor people are the foot soldiers in a war for change. When politically engaged and shown a proper path, these soldiers are priceless. Yet, it is this very group, a sub-section within a sub –division of class that is being cast adrift.
Dr. Bill Cosby went on a barnstorming tour of the United States highlighting problems of the black underclass. Dr. Michael Eric Dyson has defended the honor of these black people. I believe that both Dr. Cosby and Dr. Dyson have offered truths that must be acknowledged. The black underclass should be treated with respect and with an eye that takes in the societal barriers that cause the economic drought and opportunistic blight they find themselves in, while at the same time being held accountable for the bad choices or lack of making any choices, that serve to keep them stuck in a place of immobility and helplessness.
If one truly subscribes to W.E.B. DuBois concept of a talented tenth reality then black people have as many issues to answer for as our “niggers” do. The chief questions that have to be asked, in front of bathroom mirrors or car window reflections, is why has that tenth given up the promise and reach of their assumed power to help ninety percent in need? Are the ninety percent to blame for all or some of the problems of the lower class brothers and sisters or has the tenth sold them out of the black race into a nigghetto to banish faces they were not talented enough to help in the first place? The more horrific question looming on the horizon is if the house and field slave mentality been preserved within this very battle of black middle class versus black lower class. Have the tenth turned their backs on the field in an attempt to curry favor with the economic house that keeps them one step beyond the portal back into poverty? This scenario, allowing, in essence, a talented tenth disciple an ability to feel better in their accomplishment and have the basic capitalist need fulfilled that calls for one to feel better than another based on class and economic standing. This scenario must be spoken against and fought at every turn to ensure the black nation, not of homogeny, but of a mutual respect that allows counsel, acceptance and transformation.
Chris Rock’s infamous observation was a profound one at the time he presented to the masses in one of his many successful and socially relevant cable television comedy specials. But there are certain elements of black professionals who seek to banish lower class, see poor, out of the black community. Issues of teen pregnancy, unwed mothers, sexually transmitted diseases, disbelief in education and false pride about the authority of a “boss” must be addressed, but by no means should be utilized as a tool to wedge a divide between the black lower class and their quickly descending compatriots in the shrinking black middle class.
I was six years old, in first grade, caught in the middle of an unruly line of children awaiting entrance into the classroom the first time I was called a nigger. He was dirty blonde, plump, disheveled white boy named Lee. At thirty-two years of age, two academic degrees and a job at a major Hollywood studio later, in a traffic dispute in a kitschy Los Angeles neighborhood, a white man, whose name I did not know and never found out, felt he could put me in my place with the same word that had slapped my ears more than twenty-five years earlier. This is the foolishness of a black people versus nigger mode of thinking. Accomplishment does not buy a black man or woman an out clause in the contract of ignorance. In the example I shared I was just a nigger with two degrees, one a Master’s degree, and a sexy job in show business. In the mind of a racist there is no delineation or bonus point for a status stamped upright citizen or doer of great deeds. In some backwoods Mississippi farm houses or skyscraper board rooms Oprah Winfrey would be nothing more than a nigger. Some would tell her that to her face while others would no doubt have the great courage to whisper it behind her back.
Volunteering, mentorship, public policy focusing on educational and economic development are some ways to repair some of the issues that have kept poverty-stricken black Americans an item that the black bourgeoisie would like to shove into the back of a dark closet. The means mentioned above must be implemented to stop the slide of that very same bourgeoisie into the nigghetto that many of them have risen from. Black America does not need to think alike, act or re-act alike, but the crucial and basic thing we must be about realizing is that we are all people imbued with a humanity that should be respected for its own value. Poor is a lack of wherewithal; specifically, cash and opportunity. It does not, inherently, mean ignorant or morally inferior, although immorality and ignorance exists in some project developments, apartments, and people in this economic bracket. However, those same immoralities and purposeless ignorance exists in the various tiers of government, the judiciary, the Christian right and the Christian left. None of these agencies would use a cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face mode of operation. Not only would this serve to weaken any nation or agency, but would rob any socio-political agenda of its life’s blood. The civil rights movement, the farm workers, and the unions of northern blue collar industries were all manned and led by people who were not economically dominant. Young, poor people are the foot soldiers in a war for change. When politically engaged and shown a proper path, these soldiers are priceless. Yet, it is this very group, a sub-section within a sub –division of class that is being cast adrift.
Dr. Bill Cosby went on a barnstorming tour of the United States highlighting problems of the black underclass. Dr. Michael Eric Dyson has defended the honor of these black people. I believe that both Dr. Cosby and Dr. Dyson have offered truths that must be acknowledged. The black underclass should be treated with respect and with an eye that takes in the societal barriers that cause the economic drought and opportunistic blight they find themselves in, while at the same time being held accountable for the bad choices or lack of making any choices, that serve to keep them stuck in a place of immobility and helplessness.
If one truly subscribes to W.E.B. DuBois concept of a talented tenth reality then black people have as many issues to answer for as our “niggers” do. The chief questions that have to be asked, in front of bathroom mirrors or car window reflections, is why has that tenth given up the promise and reach of their assumed power to help ninety percent in need? Are the ninety percent to blame for all or some of the problems of the lower class brothers and sisters or has the tenth sold them out of the black race into a nigghetto to banish faces they were not talented enough to help in the first place? The more horrific question looming on the horizon is if the house and field slave mentality been preserved within this very battle of black middle class versus black lower class. Have the tenth turned their backs on the field in an attempt to curry favor with the economic house that keeps them one step beyond the portal back into poverty? This scenario, allowing, in essence, a talented tenth disciple an ability to feel better in their accomplishment and have the basic capitalist need fulfilled that calls for one to feel better than another based on class and economic standing. This scenario must be spoken against and fought at every turn to ensure the black nation, not of homogeny, but of a mutual respect that allows counsel, acceptance and transformation.
RESPECTFULLY, FOR RUSSIAN ANNA
A humanitarian with an undeniable need to assist those in need; to speak for the many whose voices have been seized by the status quo of fear and slight-of-hand violence. She was writer who dared tread in the lion’s den and the snake pit; through peril and pestilence. From my comfortable seat in a nation where Democracy is, at worst, allowed with the dissent democracy encourages, this journalist-soldier is a person I never heard of before her murder inside a Russian apartment building. I did not meet her nor read her work, and yet, I feel the weight of her attempts at inclusive humanity. Anna Politkovskya is no longer on the earth, in physical form, but her spirit remains. Her deeds cannot be boxed into the irrelevancy of the past tense. Even in death her life and efforts leave us, or specifically, those of us attempting to create lives filled with equality and freedom, with questions that would be better answered voluntarily, in the present, rather than at a forced crossroads in a fast approaching future of despair.
By appearance and report, Anna was cruelly murdered, shot twice, inside the elevator of her apartment building after years of investigative journalism that boldly pronounced alleged corruptions within the ranks of Russian government and military operations. Fellow journalists have spoken of their belief that her murder was nothing short of a political assassination, not an event to be laid at the feet of random violence. Her life had been threatened for many years, at one point, leading to relocation in Vienna. Not long after her murder a Russian spy, poisoned in London, accused Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of the lethal action that led to his eventual death. Reports have indicated that at least thirteen journalists have been killed in contract style killings since Putin took office. Of course, no crimes against Prime Minister Putin or any other governmental officials have been proven, but there has been a clear, chilling and covert war being perpetrated against journalists and others who speak out against the Russian political and military hierarchy. There is simply a tack of suppression misting the air in present day Russia.
At news of Politkovskya’s death, America, Britain and the European Council called for immediate investigation into the circumstances surrounding the killing; in other words the world called for justice. Prim Minister Putin agreed and has said all of the right things in terms of looking into the matter, but in a reality where dissent is silenced by murder how can one expect to find justice? These are troubling times for a country that has lived through oppression, poverty and resulting famine. And a raging war against Chechnya has recently raised red flags with Politkovskya being the chief flag waver. Her colleagues describe her as a person who could not suffer the suffering of others. Her journalistic travels; exile, escape in car trunk away from and to far flung villages due to death threats, attempts to negotiate the release of hostages with Chechnyan rebels, reads like the stuff making up one of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels. But she never ceased to writer for freedom. Politkovskya’s crime was the crime of believing in a fair and democratic society; a crime of vision in a world where possibility and vision is a valuable commodity that those in power seek to maneuver and control, playing keeps away, tossing it about while the common citizen reaches, at times futilely, for its hope. The probabilities of Poltikovskya’s killers being found are slight indeed. Ramzan Kadyrov, the Putin supported, Chechen Prime Minister has called her and other human rights activist’s liars who protect the interests of Russia’s enemies. Putin commented on the cruelty of the murder, while minimizing the impact of Politkovskya’s journalism on Russian politics.
There is a long history of discrediting and minimizing the effectiveness of those who organize, investigate, and therein, challenge political and social systems and agencies. In America, this is evidenced by the government sanctioned Cointelpro program that used mail fraud, violence, wire-tapping and other means to quell civil rights and other counter-culture movements in the 60’s and early 70’s. The evidence of Politkovskya’s effectiveness is her very murder, a crime that has yet to be solved. And her murder leaves our world with several uneasy questions: If her killers and those of other journalists killed during Putin’s reign are not found, what does this say for an honest concern about democracy in Russia’s leadership ranks? In this time of a wary peace between America and Russia, what would a continuing line of murdered journalists and other dissenters to Russia’s political operations say about America’s professed belief in protection for democracy around the world? Could a continued appearance of democratic suppression lead to a renewal of a cold war that had been thawed over? Or will America’s active protection of democratic ideals rest in the bosom of her hypocrisy that fed a non-aggressive stance on democratic abuses in places such as apartheid ravaged South Africa?
Whatever way the current situation plays out, we, as members of the international family, have been brutally reminded that the cost of democratic ideals and its fulfillment in progression or dissent, is often death, marginalization, loss of freedom and the forgetful anonymity inherent in a calendar that refuses to stop the world long enough to honor the brave souls consumed with a mission to make our world a more righteous place for every human being. May these people, these men and women; these leaders; these writers; these artists; these rabble-rousers, rest-in-peace. But more than that, let their courage and determination be an example of, not just the bluntly rude truth about the cost of individual courage, but of the hope that lives in the ability for one person to “change” themselves, others and systems. I respectfully remove my hat and smile a quiet celebration for these brave human beings, amongst them Russian Anna.
By appearance and report, Anna was cruelly murdered, shot twice, inside the elevator of her apartment building after years of investigative journalism that boldly pronounced alleged corruptions within the ranks of Russian government and military operations. Fellow journalists have spoken of their belief that her murder was nothing short of a political assassination, not an event to be laid at the feet of random violence. Her life had been threatened for many years, at one point, leading to relocation in Vienna. Not long after her murder a Russian spy, poisoned in London, accused Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of the lethal action that led to his eventual death. Reports have indicated that at least thirteen journalists have been killed in contract style killings since Putin took office. Of course, no crimes against Prime Minister Putin or any other governmental officials have been proven, but there has been a clear, chilling and covert war being perpetrated against journalists and others who speak out against the Russian political and military hierarchy. There is simply a tack of suppression misting the air in present day Russia.
At news of Politkovskya’s death, America, Britain and the European Council called for immediate investigation into the circumstances surrounding the killing; in other words the world called for justice. Prim Minister Putin agreed and has said all of the right things in terms of looking into the matter, but in a reality where dissent is silenced by murder how can one expect to find justice? These are troubling times for a country that has lived through oppression, poverty and resulting famine. And a raging war against Chechnya has recently raised red flags with Politkovskya being the chief flag waver. Her colleagues describe her as a person who could not suffer the suffering of others. Her journalistic travels; exile, escape in car trunk away from and to far flung villages due to death threats, attempts to negotiate the release of hostages with Chechnyan rebels, reads like the stuff making up one of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novels. But she never ceased to writer for freedom. Politkovskya’s crime was the crime of believing in a fair and democratic society; a crime of vision in a world where possibility and vision is a valuable commodity that those in power seek to maneuver and control, playing keeps away, tossing it about while the common citizen reaches, at times futilely, for its hope. The probabilities of Poltikovskya’s killers being found are slight indeed. Ramzan Kadyrov, the Putin supported, Chechen Prime Minister has called her and other human rights activist’s liars who protect the interests of Russia’s enemies. Putin commented on the cruelty of the murder, while minimizing the impact of Politkovskya’s journalism on Russian politics.
There is a long history of discrediting and minimizing the effectiveness of those who organize, investigate, and therein, challenge political and social systems and agencies. In America, this is evidenced by the government sanctioned Cointelpro program that used mail fraud, violence, wire-tapping and other means to quell civil rights and other counter-culture movements in the 60’s and early 70’s. The evidence of Politkovskya’s effectiveness is her very murder, a crime that has yet to be solved. And her murder leaves our world with several uneasy questions: If her killers and those of other journalists killed during Putin’s reign are not found, what does this say for an honest concern about democracy in Russia’s leadership ranks? In this time of a wary peace between America and Russia, what would a continuing line of murdered journalists and other dissenters to Russia’s political operations say about America’s professed belief in protection for democracy around the world? Could a continued appearance of democratic suppression lead to a renewal of a cold war that had been thawed over? Or will America’s active protection of democratic ideals rest in the bosom of her hypocrisy that fed a non-aggressive stance on democratic abuses in places such as apartheid ravaged South Africa?
Whatever way the current situation plays out, we, as members of the international family, have been brutally reminded that the cost of democratic ideals and its fulfillment in progression or dissent, is often death, marginalization, loss of freedom and the forgetful anonymity inherent in a calendar that refuses to stop the world long enough to honor the brave souls consumed with a mission to make our world a more righteous place for every human being. May these people, these men and women; these leaders; these writers; these artists; these rabble-rousers, rest-in-peace. But more than that, let their courage and determination be an example of, not just the bluntly rude truth about the cost of individual courage, but of the hope that lives in the ability for one person to “change” themselves, others and systems. I respectfully remove my hat and smile a quiet celebration for these brave human beings, amongst them Russian Anna.
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