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Rap and Spirituality
By
Marvin X
Rap poetry and spoken word originated
in Africa at the dawn of civilization, in the Nile
Valley and the classical West African cultures. The
poets were the priests, the magicians, the shamans, the
scholars, the prophets and warriors. These poets were
found in Moorish Spain, Arabia, Iraq and Persia,
geographical areas infused with African culture and
civilization.
In America, the African poetic mind
emerged during the 19th century, but more prominently
during the Black renaissance of the 1920s with Claude
McKay, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, Countee Cullen,
and during the 50s with the poets Bob Kaufman, LeRoi
Jones, Ted Joans, Margarete Walker, Gwen Brooks and
others.
Conscious rap is the direct
descendant of the 1960s Black Arts Movement: Sonia
Sanchez, Amiri Baraka, Askia Touré, Last Poets, Haki
Madhubuti, Nikki Giovanni, Marvin X, and others.
The Black Arts poetry was short lived
and conscious rap as well. Both were anathema to the US
sham democracy and were replaced by academic muddle and
street pussy and dick rap and pseudo gangsta rap. From a
cursory viewing of current rap videos, one would think
blacks are the world's greatest lovers, pimps and
gangsta, and black women are sexual freaks, whores and
gangsta bitches.
For revolutionary rap, one must check
out the Palestinians and Muslim fundamentalist poets.
They have the energy and message the blacks originated
but were forced to abandon by record company pimps and
low mentality black rappers. The BET music awards opened
with Waylans joking about deaf, dumb and blind
rappers—but it is no joke.
In the name of freedom of speech, we
shall not condemn any lyrics for we are absolutely
against censorship and abhor black bourgeoisie culture
police who espouse the moral high ground while they
wallow in conspicuous consumption and crass materialism
that is as morally decadent as that of the rappers and
hip hoppers they decry.
But for sure, the negative images in
rap videos and abrasive lyrics (and I am known to use
motherfucker, bitch and ho, on occasion) are a
desecration of our culture, actually an insult to our
ancestors who were paraded butt naked at slave marts
from New York's African village (Wall Street, still a
slave mart) to New Orleans and throughout the South,
throughout the Americas for that matter: Cuba, Jamaica,
Trinidad, Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, Columbia, and
elsewhere.
Of course language is a weapon in the
cultural revolution, it can assault the enemy and free
the slave from linguistic bondage. The oppressor and his
lackeys cannot determine the language of the oppressed,
that is our human right, part of our struggle for self
determination. Ultimately, we determine and define the
terms of our existence.
We determine what is profane and
obscene. But what is more profane and obscene than
poverty, ignorance and disease? Don't use language as a
scapegoat for the continued exploitation and blood
sucking of the poor.
But the rap videos are the modern
coon shows, minstrel shows and battle royals of the
antebellum South. What progress have we made from the
slave mart moans to rapping about it's hard out here for
a pimp? Think of all the brothers who were lynched for
looking at a white woman. Snoop Dog can pimp white women
on TV because she is the last weapon in the white man's
arsenal against the black nation, as Elijah taught.
While you fought for freedom,
suddenly the white woman jumped out of the box like jack
to claim minority status and win rights and privilege
rightfully deserved by black men and women. Keep pimpin,
hustle and flow with your trailer house trash white
girl, but you will never be anything until you embrace
your black woman and stand with her, no matter how sick
she is or how sick you are—go to the doctor together.
Don't disgrace your mother with alien women. Remember
Samson and Delilah.
Unconscious rap derives from the
animal plane and must advance to the divine or spiritual
plane if it is to be beneficial to our people. I must
admit that I appreciate Christian rap in spite of lyrics
based on juvenile mythology glorifying the after life
and suggesting Jesus is God. If Jesus is God who was God
before Jesus was born?
At least Christian rap is better than
raps on the pussy and dick theme, glorifying crass
materialism that reveals poverty consciousness—people
who have money don't flash. How can anyone in their
right mind glorify diamonds and gold that Africans died
to procure for De Beers and others, Africans who had
their arms and hands cut off in wars for filthy diamond
merchants in Europe, Israel and New York?
Yes, better to rap about Jesus and
pie in the sky than sista got a big ole butt. In the
words of ancestor Paul Robeson, rappers must become
artistic freedom fighters or give up the game, for
rather than pimps, they are whores for the record
industry, the filthy capitalist bloodsuckers of the
poor.
Muslim rappers know their duty is to
teach the uncivilized. They know they shall suffer a
severe chastisement if they fail to perform their duty.
As descendants of Nile Valley poets,
the poets of classical West African civilization, the
poets of Arabia, of Persia, of Moorish Spain, whose
poems and science brought Europe out of the Dark Ages
into the Renaissance, and the poets who inspired our
people with the sorrow songs and songs of inspiration to
endure and transcend the terror of slavery and pseudo
Reconstruction, segregation and civil rites opportunism,
we must continue our radical tradition or be cursed by
our ancestors and God Almighty.
posted 3 July 2004
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Sex at the Margins
Migration, Labour Markets and the Rescue Industry
By Laura María Agustín
This book explodes several myths: that selling sex is completely different from any other kind of work, that migrants who sell sex are passive victims and that the multitude of people out to save them are without self-interest. Laura Agustín makes a passionate case against these stereotypes, arguing that the label 'trafficked' does not accurately describe migrants' lives and that the 'rescue industry' serves to disempower them. Based on extensive research amongst both migrants who sell sex and social helpers, Sex at the Margins provides a radically different analysis. Frequently, says Agustin, migrants make rational choices to travel and work in the sex industry, and although they are treated like a marginalised group they form part of the dynamic global economy. Both powerful and controversial, this book is essential reading for all those who want to understand the increasingly important relationship between sex markets, migration and the desire for social justice. "Sex at the Margins rips apart distinctions between migrants, service work and sexual labour and reveals the utter complexity of the contemporary sex industry. This book is set to be a trailblazer in the study of sexuality."—Lisa Adkins, University of London |
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Greenback Planet: How the Dollar Conquered
the World and Threatened Civilization as We Know It
By H. W. Brands
In Greenback Planet, acclaimed historian H. W. Brands charts the dollar's astonishing rise to become the world's principal currency. Telling the story with the verve of a novelist, he recounts key episodes in U.S. monetary history, from the Civil War debate over fiat money (greenbacks) to the recent worldwide financial crisis. Brands explores the dollar's changing relations to gold and silver and to other currencies and cogently explains how America's economic might made the dollar the fundamental standard of value in world finance. He vividly describes the 1869 Black Friday attempt to corner the gold market, banker J. P. Morgan's bailout of the U.S. treasury, the creation of the Federal Reserve, and President Franklin Roosevelt's handling of the bank panic of 1933. Brands shows how lessons learned (and not learned) in the Great Depression have influenced subsequent U.S. monetary policy, and how the dollar's dominance helped transform economies in countries ranging from Germany and Japan after World War II to Russia and China today. He concludes with a sobering dissection of the 2008 world financial debacle, which exposed the power--and the enormous risks--of the dollar's worldwide reign. The Economy |
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The White Masters of the
World
From
The World and Africa, 1965
By W. E. B. Du Bois
W. E. B. Du Bois’
Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization
(Fletcher)
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Ancient African Nations
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The Death of Emmett Till by Bob Dylan
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Only a Pawn in Their Game
Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson Thanks America for
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George Jackson /
Hurricane Carter
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Haitian Declaration of Independence 1804
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January 1, 1804 -- The Founding of
Haiti
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