Category: Uncategorized

In my opinion abolition is the only viable solution because legalism has harmed us tremendously and it continues to be weaponized against us. Incremental reforms won’t cut it considering that the business of prisons have so much money to lose. The same people that opposed the end of slavery are involved in the prison industrial complex and they are a brute and violent force to be reckoned with. For over 400 years the Americas have been a slave colony and the ones that profit from it don’t want it to end. Angela Davis has been through the black struggle in its entirety so she understands that we have to tear our current system down and rebuild it. She has lost all faith in our justice system and rightfully so because she once was a victim of it. The fact that 1 in 3 black people will go to jail or prison in comparison to 1 and 17 white males is mind boggling to me. These type of statistics are a justification for declaring a state of emergency. In the “13th” one of the speakers on behalf on of the prison system said that if he can keep crime out of our neighborhoods he should be able to ask us for a dollar. That is the problem right there, human decency shouldn’t be incentivized by monetary gain. You cannot serve both God and Mammon, you must love one and hate the other is what the scriptures say. Many of our heroes like Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr. and Marcus Garvey understood this and paid a high price with their lives. Marcus Garvey was a Pan Africanist that was trying to take black people back to Africa because of our horrible living conditions and he was charged with mail fraud and deported back to Jamaica. President Joe Biden just pardoned him posthumously but it’s 2025 so how does this help us as a people? We live in the legacy of social death, natal alienation and anti blackness and I believe that our liberation won’t be a bloodless one unfortunately because even when we want to leave in peace its still a problem and Garvey’s life is a testament of that truth. 

The critiques of Black excellence, individualism and capitalism in My Brothers’s Wedding are related to Black political ideologies in the sense that they both held a rebellious stance. In the film Pierce really wasn’t impressed or satisfied with the idea of black excellence. He really wanted to chart his own path because as a heavy machine operator he felt like his life was devalued when he learned that he was hauling explosives and other dangerous materials. I liked that he refused to walk to line and I saw a lot of myself in him. Black anarchism and Black radicalism are both rooted in the displeasure of the socio-economic conditions and violence against Black people. As I was watching this film I started to be reminded that in this world you’re either going to be a sheep or a wolf. If his friend Soldier’s energy could’ve been redirected towards our actual enemies instead of his own community then he would’ve been really effective in regard to making real change.  Pierce having to choose between his friends funeral and being his brothers best man was a really tough position to be put in and this movie was a great depiction of a lot of the different type of struggles that black people face in their communities. Black excellence came at the cost of losing your soul in this film and Pierce did a good job of making that known at the dinner table when both families met. Black excellence can also be viewed as an escape mechanism because as black folks we want to live in a world where everything is ok when the reality is that it’s really not.

The Palestinian liberation and the Black liberation intersect in many ways because culturally we are the same people and ethnically we are the same as well. The divide and rule military plan has taken a toll on us because of things like natal alienation. We built Jerusalem and the first king of Salem was Melchizedek an Ethiopian who later named the province Jeru of Salem after his son Jeru. King Solomon united Jerusalem and Ethiopia through the union he had with the Queen of Sheba. Colonialism has affected us both in Africa and Palestine which is located in the Middle of the East of what exactly? The only thing that separates Africa from this land mass is the Suez Canal and the truth is that the so called Middle East is a part of Africa just like Egypt is in Africa no matter how much they try to separate us from Egypts glory. It is Black glory that bothers the seed of Cain the vagabond so much. The word Vagabond is intricately linked with the term Colonialism because they both describe a person that moves from place to place and we cannot forget that Cain was a murderer from the beginning which is why he was banished to a distant land and marked by the creator for death. 

Within the film Claudine the welfare system functions as a mechanism that keeps black families in a state of prolonged poverty. It definitely reinforces racial and economic hierarchies because capitalism cannot thrive without second class citizens. Welfare is truly the legacy of slavery and this film did a great job of depicting the inequalities that it imposes on marginalized people. The fact that one of the state requirements is that a man not be present in the house in order to receive meager resources for survival is a shameful reality. Economic and social empowerment isn’t attainable under this system and the recipients are treated as burdens. This is the price many black people pay for freedom and it’s hard for anyone to function in a society being under constant surveillance. The welfare state is institutionally racist and it plays a major role in separating families by incentivizing mothers to remain unmarried. When they get married to the state they receive a mere pittance and when they get married in the traditional sense they are taxed excessively which is clearly a form of punishment.  I would say that I’m really shocked by the reality of the system but the truth is that nothing really surprises me when it comes to all the racist systems that are imposed on us by Europeans Americans. After learning about the fear that the ruling class have of minorities one day outnumbering them I can see how a system like this would be implemented. The Aryan ideology has been rebranded as capitalism and the view that black people are somehow less valuable than European Americans is still very prevalent today and its films like these that make Critical Race Theory undeniable.

It is true that violence begets more violence but we cannot all be lambs to the slaughter. Lions are necessary in a system that has been founded on colonial occupation and systemic racism. Fanon makes some great points in The Wretched of the Earth. The perspective of the native in contrast to the mindset of the settler  asserts that the settler is envious. I agree wholeheartedly because oftentimes if this spirit is out of control in a persons body it usually leads to violence. The natives being content was interpreted as laziness because they don’t know that after all the history of tribulation we were promised rest. One ethnic group having power over another ethnic group will always be problematic because of cultural differences, traditions, religion or the lack thereof as seen in The Battle of Algiers. Throughout the course of time lands have been given to one people and taken from another for various reasons. What place does France have in Africa is a question I asked myself while I watched this film. If the textbook definition of the word of the word “Civilized” was put into practice these two groups of people probably could have coexisted in peace. Meeting the Man was a powerful film, I’m always amazed at how introspective James Baldwin was, he was truly a visionary. I love his sense of conviction when he said “The world has to change.” He understood that a world rooted in a perpetual state of violence was not sustainable.

The “Invisible Man” and “Snow on Tha Bluff” highlight young black men who long to have a place in the world. Curtis was stick up kid and a trapper who took pride in sharing the spoils of all the missions he went on with his friends in his neighborhood. What’s sad is that every ghetto has a Curtis and that sort of pain goes unchecked by our society everyday. Deep down inside he just wanted to take care of his family and his neighborhood. He mentioned that he tried having a job and that it wasn’t for him at all. He was stuck in a destructive cycle of pain and death. Both these young men are extremely violent but the violence is really a cry for help based on the socioeconomic conditions of black people post slavery. Their stuck in an overdrive mode of survival and anyone can become food for them at any given time. “Snow on The Bluff” and Invisible Man themes of self definition and social recognition remind me a song by the Notorious BIG titled “You’re Nobody Till Somebody Kills You.” check it out down below and tell me what you think 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSdKuHvdPZ0Links to an external site.

As a Rastaman from the Caribbean the term Babylon takes on a lot of different meanings, but in the Rastafarian community it usually means confusion and we associate the term with police officers who are tasked with enforcing unjust laws of said Babylonian system or shitstem as Peter Tosh would say. oftentimes when I see the X president Donald Trump on the news and when he speaks he reminds me of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon who was very proud, godless and felt like he had an innate right to rule. With a godly fear I wonder to myself if Donald Trump knows how badly  King Nebuchadnezzar was punished. I remember reading about how he was turned into a beast of the field and had to chew the cud like an animal for 7 years, what a dreadful thing to encounter. All of this was to show him that God rules in the kingdom of humankind and  that he gives power to whomsoever he chooses. If he had exuded the spirit of humbleness, servitude, and kindness like that of Makeda the Queen of Sheba, Empress Zewditu, or Emperor Menelik things might have turned out different for him. If our politicians knew that their power derived from above and that they serve the people at the behest of God maybe the world might’ve been a better place, the money does say in god we trust but do they? I see all this homelessness, yet so much green pastures all over the state. I see more commercials for adopting and saving animals than I see for homeless people and then I hear the politicians talk about the budget and I say to myself what don’t they just print more money, they have the machine! In the book of Lamentations 5:4 a prayer for mercy and restoration is sent up to the heavens and it reads, “We pay for the water we drink and our wood comes at a price.” these were the conditions before the Christ, let’s compare that to a scene in a film called Black Girl made in 1966 that I watched in my African Film class, in which a parent sends her daughter a letter describing the hardships in Senegal and having to pay for water. I took macroeconomics and microeconomics and that’s just more confusion, so just give the have nots what they need. The earth freely gives us the trees to build the homes, the paper to print the money and the heavens open up and give us the water to mix the concrete so what’s the hold up. Is it greed or incompetence? In the scriptures Moses was taught the law by his father-in-law Jethro. He was an Ethiopian from the tribe of Judah who ruled Media and this tribe was tasked with being the Lawgivers and administering the law. So my question is are our politicians qualified for the royal office of taking care of human beings? 

Just a meditation from a Rastaman.

The Griselda imprint which houses Westside Gunn, Benny the Butcher and Conway the Machine are the true essence of Hip Hop. Rap royalty like Erik B and Rakim, Kool G Rap and Big Daddy Kane sported gold chains and designer clothing while their lyrics were filled with slick metaphors about coke dealing. All that being said Artist like Gunn and The Machine have made these rap pioneers proud for bringing back that authentic New York sound. The City had lost its authenticity when they adapted the Atlanta Trap Music sound and Chicago drill music as of late. The message has always been one of protest towards the music industry which is why many artist that come from hustling boldly state that they are not rappers. Artist like Westside Gunn achieved monetary success prior to rap deals which is why they have a disdain for record contracts because they are usually filled with the spirit of slavery. The luxury brands and violent imagery is geared towards the powers that be as a spit in the face while telling the system that they made it out of the trenches after being scorned with titles like Felons, Drug Dealers etc… Consider the brilliant artwork of one his most controversial album titled Hitler Wears Hermes with the reality of the who runs the music industry. The shock value and protest that this artwork recieved from the Jewish community who disseminate our music was something that Gunn had calculated. Was it his way of protesting the hierarchy within the music industry through his artwork? Or was it the sort of sophisticated ignorance that Kanye spoke about in the song titled Otis in regard to his reference about writing his curses in cursive? In one interview Kanye mentioned that he can’t be antisemitic because he is Semitic and the room suddenly went silent. In this world the truth is an offense and it’s just something that you have to learn to live with. Luxury rap is Hip Hop and a continuation of Jazz’s innovation when we consider the genesis of Hip Hop, Berry Gordy’s finishing school which was headed by Maxine Powell and Dapper Dans work in Harlem. Coming from deteriorated housing conditions post slavery we were told that we have to look presentable in front of white audiences to achieve “success”. Most of today’s artist are continuing this sort of conformity to appear on television screens. I think Westside Gunn is the rebel within the fashion industry that we need because he reduces European luxury ideals to the living conditions within the slums.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCQUl12VbBM&list=OLAK5uy_lcgQhEk3NwLzsh9s1qu_VdK_YYxMlml00&index=2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFrwm6oRYJg

The psycho-political forces that control the messages that we consume on the airwaves have chosen to broadcast rap artist whose music feed our lower self rather than our higher self. Rap groups like a Tribe called Quest could not survive the money driven climate of the music business today. Major markets like New York City and Los Angeles require massive sales for artist to continue to be employed by their record companies. Jay Z, Diddy, Kanye, and Dr. Dre all assimilated into capitalistic ideals based on the individualistic society that they grew up in. They did betray their origins and we saw that play out with downfall of Rocafella records but in the music business that is controlled by the authors of our destruction it is bound to happen. We need about 10 Kendrick Lamars to make conscious rap more mainstream. We couldn’t expect Jay Z to continue to rap about the hustle without being indicted at some point. In today’s climate rappers are being indicted for their rap lyrics so what will they rap about after they graduate from the streets, definitely something that we won’t be able to relate to like Jay Z’s 4:44 album which boasted about fine  European artwork that many of us will never be able to buy. What we can conclude is that none of these artist made timeless music that will serve generations to come. A Rapper like Nasir Jones was able to do that because he understood the importance of music that has substance even though he was often ridiculed for rapping about God and consciousness. His discography will live on because of his ability to eloquently tell us stories about the ghetto that were often laden with funk and soul samples from artist like James Brown, also engaging us with songs that quench our thirst for knowledge, and songs that inspire younger generations to be great.   

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvVfgvHucRY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWp2yY966BA

I do believe that the reasons for one’s drug use serves as a marker that places us in a particular class pertaining to identity. Wall Street bankers use drugs to knock the edge off after a long days work or at a conference party with their co-workers, but yet still you have the poorer class of white people who are strung out because of homelessness or some sort of Dis-ease.  Drug use among black urban communities are fundamentally different from the more privileged white collar class in terms of the social functions because most of the Rap artists that showcase drug use within their music are victims of generational trauma. The physical, emotional and mental scars of slavery have taken a tremendous toll on them. Consider a southern Artists like Future who raps about drinking lean as a coping mechanism regarding his upbringing. He oftens raps about the love for his grandparents who raised him after being abandoned by his mother and father due to drug use. He is a noteable artist who was groomed by the great Dungeon Family that consists of Andre 3000, and Ceelo Green. The dysfunction of his family life is being repeated today based on the amount of broken homes he has created. He celebrates the charge of toxic masculinity that the court of public opinion has convicted him of as he raps about Percocet, lean, molly and Xanax bars. Less than a month ago one of his best friends Young Scooter was killed in Atlanta, this is a broken man that will continue to sing his blues to us. Consider the life of Young Dolph who was a rap artist that was killed in 2017 and would often boast about being a rich crack baby because his mother was a crack user while she was pregnant with him. The chances of him surviving his birth was low according to the doctors but he beat the odds and celebrated becoming a millionaire after surviving the mean streets of Memphis. He survived 2 attempts on his life and would be often seen smoking marijuana in his rap videos to cope with his pain, anxiety and paranoia. In black culture the social functions of drug use is expressed as a coping mechanism and also as a flex in regard to having the means to afford designer drugs. We are dying and most of today’s rap songs are a cry for help if you listen closely. Who’s gonna declare a State of Emergency in our black communities?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXXZ3J_QIGw