Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Ferguson Burns
When this all happened, I expected to see Darren Wilson still on meds from the "reports" of his "fractured eye socket" after getting pummeled repeatedly by Mike Brown - a man who apparently had no second thoughts about placing his upper body into a police officers car and punching him in the face with so much force that Wilson feared for his life. Instead, this mugshot taken hours after Officer Wilson's confrontation with Mike Brown, is now available to the public.
Narratives are important here. Did Wilson spot Brown and his friend jay walking and say "Hey guys, what's wrong with the side walk?" as he testified? Or did he say, "get on the fucking sidewalk", as Brown's friend Dorian Johnson testified. More importantly, what is implied by Wilson's testimony if the verbal exchange is even slightly skewed? Legitimate questions when considering the rhetoric Wilson used during testimony to describe Brown as a superhuman, demonic possessed brute.
It's an image that looks far from a face pummeling, sun burned at the most. During testimony, Wilson descirbed Brown as a huge "demon" creature with "hulk hogan"-like strength. Incendiary footnotes that were clearly well coached talking points from his lawyer. Brown was an out of control monster, Wilson a timid 6 foot 4 inch child who had no choice but to fire at an unarmed suspect over 100 feet away who according to Wilson's testimony (and at least three others, one of which claims Brown was pointing a gun at the officer which is blatantly false), was charging at his car. Nine witness counter claim that Brown was standing still, or stumbling at the most. The video of two construction workers reacting to the shooting makes Wilson's claims just as specious and makes conservative pundits writhe in discomfort when spinning a "black neighborhood hoax" that two unrelated white men seem to contradict.
Without a more thorough investigation, many people are outraged. Ferguson is burning. And all Sean Hannity has to ask is "how does this reflect on Obama?"
There is looting and arson. Including a diner that has been feeding demonstrators in Ferguson for free up into the time of the grand jury decision. Her restaurant lays in ruins. It seems no one can escape the frenzy of indiscriminate anger.
As quick and easy as it is for anyone to condemn the destructive behavior of those incensed in Ferguson, a moment of reflection:
"It is not enough for me to stand before you tonight and condemn riots. It would be morally irresponsible for me to do that without, at the same time, condemning the contingent, intolerable conditions that exist in our society. These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard."
-Martin Luther Kiing, Jr. March 1968
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Jan Brewer is Not Your Hero
Do not confuse the veto in Arizona this week for anything other than a veto in Arizona this week.
There are still a dozen states with similar laws moving through legislatures.
There are still homophobes. Just goes to show, even homophobes aren't immune to the power of a dollar.
There are still a dozen states with similar laws moving through legislatures.
There are still homophobes. Just goes to show, even homophobes aren't immune to the power of a dollar.
Thursday, February 13, 2014
Showering Naked with Dudes...Not A Big Deal. Really.
I've served with many people in the Navy. Gay, straight, Muslim, Christian, Mormon, Buddhist, Yankee fans. So with the coming out of defensive back Michael Sam as gay my first thought isn't about locker room hazing. The fact is, if you've served in the military or showered in huge locker rooms with your teammates, you've more than likely unknowingly showed off your crowned jewels to a man who is attracted to your sex. Out of all the times you've peed in a public urinal, that guy next to you, yep he's gay...you're never safe, or at least you never are if you live you're life in homophobia. You going to start giving side eye to the guy next to you in the bathroom? Just to see if he's checking out your junk? Better not, because he probably is. But chances are he's probably not attracted to you. So many people seem very surprised by this. Don't take offense.
Paranoia and vanity seep into the crevices of their brain. Common concerns I've heard I'd like to address, as a straight man: "What if I get raped?" "This is a man's game!" "I'm not homophobic, I just don't want that shit around me!"
Rape? If 20 men happen to be around a gay man, I guarantee you the gay guy is most likely to be threatened. As irresistible as every man believes himself to be, gay guys aren't just waiting for you to fall on your head, lose consciousness, and wake up with a condom hanging out of your butt. A prevalent fear is that of sexual assault and aggression from gay men. Ironically, this is a manifestation of men who are afraid of being objectified. Objectification that was once (and still) is primarily reserved for women. The fears elicited by athletes and conservative culture reflect a concern that is normally placed exclusively on women. How's it feel, brothas? Better cover up before you become victims of your own male gaze!
A man's game? Michael Sam is an SEC defensive player of the year. The SEC. SEC. Known for their giant defensive linemen (and he's comparatively smaller) who have combine scores that would make your face flush with exhaustion before blacking out after the first event. If you don't think Michael Sam is a "man", I dare you to sit in for a practice and play a little one-on-one tackle football. We'll keep the ambulance on the field, but you have to do the sutures yourself. Like a man.
You're not gay, but you don't want gay people around you? I get it. Separate but equal. Kinda like the antebellum South. You'd be fine with a gay and straight only shower, but you're not homophobic at all. Of course not. An enabler of a homophobic culture at the least (but mostly a homophobe).
A piece I read on www.racialicious.com quoted sports commentator, Dale Hansen, who's probably stated it best since this whole fiasco took over ESPN talk points:
Discrimination is discrimination. It's that simple, gay or nay.
Paranoia and vanity seep into the crevices of their brain. Common concerns I've heard I'd like to address, as a straight man: "What if I get raped?" "This is a man's game!" "I'm not homophobic, I just don't want that shit around me!"
Rape? If 20 men happen to be around a gay man, I guarantee you the gay guy is most likely to be threatened. As irresistible as every man believes himself to be, gay guys aren't just waiting for you to fall on your head, lose consciousness, and wake up with a condom hanging out of your butt. A prevalent fear is that of sexual assault and aggression from gay men. Ironically, this is a manifestation of men who are afraid of being objectified. Objectification that was once (and still) is primarily reserved for women. The fears elicited by athletes and conservative culture reflect a concern that is normally placed exclusively on women. How's it feel, brothas? Better cover up before you become victims of your own male gaze!
A man's game? Michael Sam is an SEC defensive player of the year. The SEC. SEC. Known for their giant defensive linemen (and he's comparatively smaller) who have combine scores that would make your face flush with exhaustion before blacking out after the first event. If you don't think Michael Sam is a "man", I dare you to sit in for a practice and play a little one-on-one tackle football. We'll keep the ambulance on the field, but you have to do the sutures yourself. Like a man.
You're not gay, but you don't want gay people around you? I get it. Separate but equal. Kinda like the antebellum South. You'd be fine with a gay and straight only shower, but you're not homophobic at all. Of course not. An enabler of a homophobic culture at the least (but mostly a homophobe).
A piece I read on www.racialicious.com quoted sports commentator, Dale Hansen, who's probably stated it best since this whole fiasco took over ESPN talk points:
It wasn’t that long ago when we were being told that black players couldn’t play in “our” games because it would be “uncomfortable.” And even when they finally could, it took several more years before a black man played quarterback. Because we weren’t “comfortable” with that, either.Many are comparing Michael Sam to Jackie Robinson. I'm not making that leap. I believe the difficulties of visibility, legacies of oppression, and politics between the two eras aren't similar. However with gay children committing suicide and a heteronormative culture that disavows homophobia yet advocates "separate but equal" policies taken from the pages of archived antebellum handbooks, the impact of Sam's coming out cannot be denied. There is now an affirmation for those who are lost. Anonesty despite the critical back lash and possible sour career outcome. The freedom to be who you are in your home and in uniform.
Discrimination is discrimination. It's that simple, gay or nay.
Tuesday, February 4, 2014
Hip-Hop
Hip-hop is lost on untrained ears. If you don't understand it; if you won't understand it, it's not for you. I mean, you have to perform microsurgery on your English comprehension. Metaphors, alliteration, multi-syllables, double/triple entendres. Kendrick is not the savior of hip-hop, but right now he is a highly sacred prophet. A "rapper's rapper" never wins ceremonies that were not designed to celebrate hip-hop.
This is a disjointed rambling. Please, move on. No, really, if there's a diet pill pop-up ad to the side, check it out!
It's been over two days and hip-hop gods and music aficionados alike have not yet stopped chiming in on Macklemore's victory over his contemporaries for best rap album of 2013, namely Kendrick Lamar. Good Kid, Maad City has been heralded by many hip-hop fans as the greatest hip-hop album to come out in the last few years. Yes, even greater than the self-proclaimed kings of hip-hop, Jay-Z and Kanye, with their Watch the Throne album release.
Many hip-hop fans that follow the genre and the grammys see the awards ceremony as an irrelevant distraction. Nas, a rapper with a long enough track record and more than enough accolades to be regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time, has never won a grammy in a career that has spanned almost two decades. So tell me again, how are the Grammys relevant to the hip-hop fan base?
That one fact is enough to put to rest for an eternity the idea of the Grammy's as a legitimate ceremony for hip-hop heads. We are a sub-culture that is mostly neglected. Yet every year the community is rife with bitterness at the selected nominees and impending victors. Not to let the true colors of my hip-hop elitism spill on the page, but 2 Chainz was actually nominated for Rap Album of the year just a year ago. This alone is a solid indication that the panel determining what does and does not get a nomination are simply old men who wax poetic of the by-gone Paul McCartney era and rifle through their teenage kids crappy rap collection the moment they leave for equestrian lessons.
So lets say that the Grammys don't matter. Let's get that out of the way. Taylor Swift could win best rap single and lets imagine that would make a minor buzz at worst, a semi-nude magazine cover on XXL at best.
Assuming the prior paragraph is true, this is the break down over why the Macklemore/Kendrick saga is waning on.
Macklemore is an artist that has mass appeal. Not exactly transcendental hip-hop, but fun energetic beats with simple concepts and catchy tunes. His story from the bottom to the top serves as both literal emergence into stardom as well as a figurative struggle to remain sober; a theme that he is not afraid to speak on in his albums. Input an uplifting song in defense of homosexuals and gay marriage and you have an album that is very easy to digest. The liberal hippy vibe is so intoxicating that within weeks of Thrift Shop hitting the airwaves, wealthy kids from Madrona and Sand Point upset entire urban neighborhoods by buying all the good shit at your local thrift store. Seriously, that's how good it made people feel. Easy to digest and hard to hate, Macklemore found further success with the "bootstraps" hustle of making it on the top 100 Billboards list without having a major record deal. Impressive and inspirational to say the least. The momentum of the guy simply could not be stopped when coupled with a fairly solid debut album. This cannot be contested. Macklemore's rise in 2013 was meteoric.
There is no doubt that Same Love is a song that carried huge momentum in the rising of Macklemores famedom. The Grammy performance where dozens of couples who were gay, straight, trans, etc, getting married during a performance broadcasted in front of millions is a testament to how huge the song played in Macklemore's rise and how liberal everyone is currently dying to become. Washington has only recently allowed gay men and women to marry, and Macklemore patronizes christians, republicans, and the hip-hop community for rampant homophobia with his new queer anthem. This inspite of Cee-Lo and Andre 3000 performing in drag before Macklemore was even a teenager. The first rap song came out during the disco era, a genre known for being extremely open to the queer public before Macklemore or myself were even born. Afterall, hip-hop has been the force that has single handedly prevented queer tolerance and equality at the local, state, and national levels, right? The comments smack hip-hop in the face and erases Common's activism, Frank Ocean coming out as ambiguously gay, Angel Haze who raps openly about bisexuality, Nicki Minaj has a huge fanbase of gay supporters; she weaves in and out of pansexuality in her songs. When interviewed she has refused to identify as any particular sexuality because, frankly, it doesn't matter. Finale and Invincible, both amazing emcees from Detroit, who most likely will never receive popular spotlight, have performed as rap duo's numerous times. Invincible, a white rapper who is lesbian and would likely shame most rappers on the radio today, and Finale have prose that do wonders in compliment to each other. Tracks with the two of them on it are beautiful audio tapestries!
But oh, wait. He's talking about "youtube" comments sections. Because that's where legitimate hip-hop conversations happen. Because Brad Paisley and Ted Nugent comment sections aren't riddled with potty mouth, immature smack talking by a bunch of highschool teenagers using more than the f-bomb as slurs.
He continues with stating how "our culture [was] founded from oppression" to excoriate hip-hop on the irony of hating the queer. But whose oppression, Macklemore? Not yours. Hip-hop wasn't founded on the oppression of straight, white males. Although I understand he is making comparison between the black struggle and the gay struggle, framing the song around him and his co-opted identity as a gay black man becomes further problematic. Particularly at the end of the song when he tells the struggling gay community where a "damn good place to start" is. Because white heteronormative men have every right to tell any subculture what they should or shouldn't be satisfied with. Anyone involved in activism may be familiar with how co-opting struggles becomes problematic. But if you don't know, Racialicious has a pretty goo dentry about the difference between those who ally with a cause, and those who appropriate a cause.
He prefaces the hit song Same Love with how he questioned his own sexuality because at a young age because he could draw. First thing I have to say is...really? If you were really good at drawing dicks, sure, there might be some confusion. I guess I need a little more clarification on why drawing makes anyone gay. But with all that aside, ultimately, the Macklemore/Lamar debacle has a lot to do with who transparent it is that many Macklemore fans are precisely that, Macklemore fans. They're not hip-hop fans. And what has happened in the terms of his loving message in Same Love is a problematic consequence when the rising icon assumes the identity of a gay man and thinks that hip-hop hates him. It is offensive that the song that has catapulted him into widespread fame is the same song that started the momentum for him to sweep four Grammy awards and demonize hip-hop at the same time. Well, everyone in hip-hop except for himself. So yes, screw the Grammy's, but why does hip-hop have to be nationally screwed as well? Last I checked, Kelly Clarkson and Rosie O'Donnel were nationally scorned and figuratively assaulted by the media over whether they were gay or straight. Vin Diesel was subject to a litany of faux-news when a false rumor started spreading over whether he was gay or not. Hip hop personas generally take on masculine braggadocious identities (even female rappers set aside their femininity during songs to emulate a masculine bravado), but so does every action movie, drama, country and R&B song.
Liberals, particularly Macklemores major demographic (white liberals) get the opportunity to express how much they love Same Love and exalt Macklemore as the model rapper because he doesn't rap about guns and hos as if he's the first and only one. However, play songs and videos by actual gay rap artists like Mykkie Blanco or Le1f, and many progressives are quick to turn off the music and gape in shock at the music video. In effect, actual gay artists speaking about inequality remain silenced so that liberals can have a white guy make a song about gay love and tell them they're good people for being so liberal as to actually like the song. On Macklemore telling gays where a "damn good place to start" is, I'm reminded of white congregations sending letters to D.r. King in Birmingham jail telling him at what place the black community should accept to start the fight against racial discrimination. It's just not a good look...unless you're a Macklemore stan who believes hip-hop has a lot to learn from the crooning Seattlite.
But buried within this story is another concern. The disturbance among hip-hop heads over Macklemore acquiring the best rap album of the year doesn't sit well with many of them, myself included. Some freelance journalist crunch the adulation Macklemore has received into a very small box called "white privilege", which is almost as disturbing as Macklemore winning the best rap album award. It can't be that simple. It's not that simple. And one of the most difficult things to breakdown are consumers and music, but here it goes.
All of that is to say, more than his white skin, Macklemore dropped a hard to hate song at the height of gay rights activism that has rode out into the new year. Gayness is the newest big thing, even if those bumping Same Love don't want to see the shit in their face. It's privilege and irony at the same time. And while making everyone feel safe and cozy, it is mostly misleading. Check out articles and online comments about "Looking". A new HBO drama about men and their relationships...with each other. I've come to the conclusion, after being in the north west for a while, that people call themselves progressive because they don't challenge themselves. Ask a local if they're homophobic and, of course, they'll say "no". But invite them over to watch an episode and they'll stare at you in ghastly horror.
And while advocating for queer agendas definitely helped his stardom, a critical part of Macklemore's success, while not being the whole enchilada, is his whiteness, familiarity due to his whiteness, and the safety he assures listeners in his whiteness. This is an artists who portends to be very aware to this complicated social phenomenon. Eminem is not only talented, but white, and his appeal to the white audience was quickly realized when adolescent boys started dying their hair and imitating the infamous rapper. Macklemore has made on the record statements about his whiteness having easier access to the car radio during family road trips.
Perhaps the worst part about all of this is the self-promoting nice-guy image Macklemore feigns. The "aw, shucks, man. Kendrick, you should've won!" and "I wanted to say something on stage but they didn't let me" makes me want to wring my hands around something. A publicized text message that should most likely have stayed between the two of them doesn't hide the posturing. White-guilt or not, this is a guy who wrote a song about white-privilege and then pretends like he can't do anything about it when given national spotlight. What kind of ally is that? Simply one that will accept all awards and accolades, then let everyone know about his good intentions with a self-deprecating ironic text message he decided to instagram. This doesn't detract his fans. His fans use the instagramed text message as evidence of Macklemore's awareness and earnestness. Many others see the posturing as a futile defense of being complicit in his own privilege.
Again, Grammy's shmammy's. Blue Ivy will have a new sippy cup, and Lamar will have next year to look forward to you. But the foregone conclusion is that Hip-Hop is not being gentrified. That, too, is as much a distraction as the Grammy's. The awards show has never meant anything to hip-hop. You don't have to excavate any further than google to realize that once you discover that hip-hop legend and veteran Nas, with a career spanning two decades of god-like prose, has zero grammy's. Now Macklemore has four?
I know, maybe I'm being too hard on the Seattlite. But after reading for almost a week the articles that assault and defend Macklemore, this is the culmination of my final conclusion; that Macklemore's success has ridden on the momentum of a group that is not familiar or generally enjoys hip-hop. We've all met them. "Oh, nah, I'm not really into rap". Talib Kweli, another supreme lyricist, has made public statements about how hip-hop can't judge Macklemore based on his fan base...but how about based on his actions as an activist? Kweli, one of my top 5 favorite emcees of all time, actually opened for Macklemore. I won't go into how eternally offensive that is, but I will say that whiteness can definitely broaden the scope of your audience.
I look forward to what Macklemore will produce and how he will develop in the future. But right now, I'm stuck with an incomprehensible conundrum: Nas-0; Macklemore-4.
Many hip-hop fans that follow the genre and the grammys see the awards ceremony as an irrelevant distraction. Nas, a rapper with a long enough track record and more than enough accolades to be regarded as one of the greatest rappers of all time, has never won a grammy in a career that has spanned almost two decades. So tell me again, how are the Grammys relevant to the hip-hop fan base?
That one fact is enough to put to rest for an eternity the idea of the Grammy's as a legitimate ceremony for hip-hop heads. We are a sub-culture that is mostly neglected. Yet every year the community is rife with bitterness at the selected nominees and impending victors. Not to let the true colors of my hip-hop elitism spill on the page, but 2 Chainz was actually nominated for Rap Album of the year just a year ago. This alone is a solid indication that the panel determining what does and does not get a nomination are simply old men who wax poetic of the by-gone Paul McCartney era and rifle through their teenage kids crappy rap collection the moment they leave for equestrian lessons.
So lets say that the Grammys don't matter. Let's get that out of the way. Taylor Swift could win best rap single and lets imagine that would make a minor buzz at worst, a semi-nude magazine cover on XXL at best.
Assuming the prior paragraph is true, this is the break down over why the Macklemore/Kendrick saga is waning on.
Macklemore is an artist that has mass appeal. Not exactly transcendental hip-hop, but fun energetic beats with simple concepts and catchy tunes. His story from the bottom to the top serves as both literal emergence into stardom as well as a figurative struggle to remain sober; a theme that he is not afraid to speak on in his albums. Input an uplifting song in defense of homosexuals and gay marriage and you have an album that is very easy to digest. The liberal hippy vibe is so intoxicating that within weeks of Thrift Shop hitting the airwaves, wealthy kids from Madrona and Sand Point upset entire urban neighborhoods by buying all the good shit at your local thrift store. Seriously, that's how good it made people feel. Easy to digest and hard to hate, Macklemore found further success with the "bootstraps" hustle of making it on the top 100 Billboards list without having a major record deal. Impressive and inspirational to say the least. The momentum of the guy simply could not be stopped when coupled with a fairly solid debut album. This cannot be contested. Macklemore's rise in 2013 was meteoric.
There is no doubt that Same Love is a song that carried huge momentum in the rising of Macklemores famedom. The Grammy performance where dozens of couples who were gay, straight, trans, etc, getting married during a performance broadcasted in front of millions is a testament to how huge the song played in Macklemore's rise and how liberal everyone is currently dying to become. Washington has only recently allowed gay men and women to marry, and Macklemore patronizes christians, republicans, and the hip-hop community for rampant homophobia with his new queer anthem. This inspite of Cee-Lo and Andre 3000 performing in drag before Macklemore was even a teenager. The first rap song came out during the disco era, a genre known for being extremely open to the queer public before Macklemore or myself were even born. Afterall, hip-hop has been the force that has single handedly prevented queer tolerance and equality at the local, state, and national levels, right? The comments smack hip-hop in the face and erases Common's activism, Frank Ocean coming out as ambiguously gay, Angel Haze who raps openly about bisexuality, Nicki Minaj has a huge fanbase of gay supporters; she weaves in and out of pansexuality in her songs. When interviewed she has refused to identify as any particular sexuality because, frankly, it doesn't matter. Finale and Invincible, both amazing emcees from Detroit, who most likely will never receive popular spotlight, have performed as rap duo's numerous times. Invincible, a white rapper who is lesbian and would likely shame most rappers on the radio today, and Finale have prose that do wonders in compliment to each other. Tracks with the two of them on it are beautiful audio tapestries!
But oh, wait. He's talking about "youtube" comments sections. Because that's where legitimate hip-hop conversations happen. Because Brad Paisley and Ted Nugent comment sections aren't riddled with potty mouth, immature smack talking by a bunch of highschool teenagers using more than the f-bomb as slurs.
He continues with stating how "our culture [was] founded from oppression" to excoriate hip-hop on the irony of hating the queer. But whose oppression, Macklemore? Not yours. Hip-hop wasn't founded on the oppression of straight, white males. Although I understand he is making comparison between the black struggle and the gay struggle, framing the song around him and his co-opted identity as a gay black man becomes further problematic. Particularly at the end of the song when he tells the struggling gay community where a "damn good place to start" is. Because white heteronormative men have every right to tell any subculture what they should or shouldn't be satisfied with. Anyone involved in activism may be familiar with how co-opting struggles becomes problematic. But if you don't know, Racialicious has a pretty goo dentry about the difference between those who ally with a cause, and those who appropriate a cause.
He prefaces the hit song Same Love with how he questioned his own sexuality because at a young age because he could draw. First thing I have to say is...really? If you were really good at drawing dicks, sure, there might be some confusion. I guess I need a little more clarification on why drawing makes anyone gay. But with all that aside, ultimately, the Macklemore/Lamar debacle has a lot to do with who transparent it is that many Macklemore fans are precisely that, Macklemore fans. They're not hip-hop fans. And what has happened in the terms of his loving message in Same Love is a problematic consequence when the rising icon assumes the identity of a gay man and thinks that hip-hop hates him. It is offensive that the song that has catapulted him into widespread fame is the same song that started the momentum for him to sweep four Grammy awards and demonize hip-hop at the same time. Well, everyone in hip-hop except for himself. So yes, screw the Grammy's, but why does hip-hop have to be nationally screwed as well? Last I checked, Kelly Clarkson and Rosie O'Donnel were nationally scorned and figuratively assaulted by the media over whether they were gay or straight. Vin Diesel was subject to a litany of faux-news when a false rumor started spreading over whether he was gay or not. Hip hop personas generally take on masculine braggadocious identities (even female rappers set aside their femininity during songs to emulate a masculine bravado), but so does every action movie, drama, country and R&B song.
Liberals, particularly Macklemores major demographic (white liberals) get the opportunity to express how much they love Same Love and exalt Macklemore as the model rapper because he doesn't rap about guns and hos as if he's the first and only one. However, play songs and videos by actual gay rap artists like Mykkie Blanco or Le1f, and many progressives are quick to turn off the music and gape in shock at the music video. In effect, actual gay artists speaking about inequality remain silenced so that liberals can have a white guy make a song about gay love and tell them they're good people for being so liberal as to actually like the song. On Macklemore telling gays where a "damn good place to start" is, I'm reminded of white congregations sending letters to D.r. King in Birmingham jail telling him at what place the black community should accept to start the fight against racial discrimination. It's just not a good look...unless you're a Macklemore stan who believes hip-hop has a lot to learn from the crooning Seattlite.
But buried within this story is another concern. The disturbance among hip-hop heads over Macklemore acquiring the best rap album of the year doesn't sit well with many of them, myself included. Some freelance journalist crunch the adulation Macklemore has received into a very small box called "white privilege", which is almost as disturbing as Macklemore winning the best rap album award. It can't be that simple. It's not that simple. And one of the most difficult things to breakdown are consumers and music, but here it goes.
All of that is to say, more than his white skin, Macklemore dropped a hard to hate song at the height of gay rights activism that has rode out into the new year. Gayness is the newest big thing, even if those bumping Same Love don't want to see the shit in their face. It's privilege and irony at the same time. And while making everyone feel safe and cozy, it is mostly misleading. Check out articles and online comments about "Looking". A new HBO drama about men and their relationships...with each other. I've come to the conclusion, after being in the north west for a while, that people call themselves progressive because they don't challenge themselves. Ask a local if they're homophobic and, of course, they'll say "no". But invite them over to watch an episode and they'll stare at you in ghastly horror.
And while advocating for queer agendas definitely helped his stardom, a critical part of Macklemore's success, while not being the whole enchilada, is his whiteness, familiarity due to his whiteness, and the safety he assures listeners in his whiteness. This is an artists who portends to be very aware to this complicated social phenomenon. Eminem is not only talented, but white, and his appeal to the white audience was quickly realized when adolescent boys started dying their hair and imitating the infamous rapper. Macklemore has made on the record statements about his whiteness having easier access to the car radio during family road trips.
Perhaps the worst part about all of this is the self-promoting nice-guy image Macklemore feigns. The "aw, shucks, man. Kendrick, you should've won!" and "I wanted to say something on stage but they didn't let me" makes me want to wring my hands around something. A publicized text message that should most likely have stayed between the two of them doesn't hide the posturing. White-guilt or not, this is a guy who wrote a song about white-privilege and then pretends like he can't do anything about it when given national spotlight. What kind of ally is that? Simply one that will accept all awards and accolades, then let everyone know about his good intentions with a self-deprecating ironic text message he decided to instagram. This doesn't detract his fans. His fans use the instagramed text message as evidence of Macklemore's awareness and earnestness. Many others see the posturing as a futile defense of being complicit in his own privilege.
Again, Grammy's shmammy's. Blue Ivy will have a new sippy cup, and Lamar will have next year to look forward to you. But the foregone conclusion is that Hip-Hop is not being gentrified. That, too, is as much a distraction as the Grammy's. The awards show has never meant anything to hip-hop. You don't have to excavate any further than google to realize that once you discover that hip-hop legend and veteran Nas, with a career spanning two decades of god-like prose, has zero grammy's. Now Macklemore has four?
I know, maybe I'm being too hard on the Seattlite. But after reading for almost a week the articles that assault and defend Macklemore, this is the culmination of my final conclusion; that Macklemore's success has ridden on the momentum of a group that is not familiar or generally enjoys hip-hop. We've all met them. "Oh, nah, I'm not really into rap". Talib Kweli, another supreme lyricist, has made public statements about how hip-hop can't judge Macklemore based on his fan base...but how about based on his actions as an activist? Kweli, one of my top 5 favorite emcees of all time, actually opened for Macklemore. I won't go into how eternally offensive that is, but I will say that whiteness can definitely broaden the scope of your audience.
I look forward to what Macklemore will produce and how he will develop in the future. But right now, I'm stuck with an incomprehensible conundrum: Nas-0; Macklemore-4.
Thursday, January 23, 2014
"What did you do on MLK day?"
Honestly, I didn't do much.
But now I wish I could've spoken to Sarah Palin after she celebrated it by chiding Obama to stop "playing the race card" in honor of Martin Luther King on her facebook page.
...what was the name of that person playing the "woman card" during her VP run and now slowly dying political relevance?
A very sad example of how to politicize heroes and idols.
Using MLK as a prop is not an opportunity she alone is guilty of. But it sho 'nuff is ironic.
Leave it for today that MLK becomes a holy saccharine doll to be wielded and exploited with empty platitudes about who would be marching with the American hero and who wouldn't.
Quite tone deaf.
But now I wish I could've spoken to Sarah Palin after she celebrated it by chiding Obama to stop "playing the race card" in honor of Martin Luther King on her facebook page.
...what was the name of that person playing the "woman card" during her VP run and now slowly dying political relevance?
A very sad example of how to politicize heroes and idols.
Using MLK as a prop is not an opportunity she alone is guilty of. But it sho 'nuff is ironic.
Leave it for today that MLK becomes a holy saccharine doll to be wielded and exploited with empty platitudes about who would be marching with the American hero and who wouldn't.
Quite tone deaf.
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