It’s Time for Jena 6 to Hold My Pocket

(caption:  Rev.  Al Sharpton marching with the motherof Mychael Bell of the Jena 6) 

The Jena 6 debacle is unfortunately one of the worst examples of our attempt to continue the work done during the Civil Rights Movement.  Here you have a classic case of wrong on both sides (racial abuse that leads to physical violence) and an honest to goodness chance to transform this instance into a vehicle of in-depth and necessary racial debate and discussion. 

Alas,  no.  First there was the youtube video of the Jena 6 tossing money in the air like a BET Uncut rap video.  And yes, I too initially defended the video as false, until the parents came out with a statement defending the actions taking place in the video.  The original video has been removed from youtube.  The closest I can find is a news report asking what happened to all the money.  Close enough:

Jena 6 video
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Now, a year later, we hear Mychael Bell accidentally shot himself while cleaning his gun. 
http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/12/30/jena.shooting/index.html

Technically nothing wrong with that.  I’m from Texas and we have guns everywhere.  Your friendly neighborhood hairdresser probably carries a gun just because. 

The problem here is image.   Tact.  Let’s take it to the extreme.  Were Rosa Parks’ civil rights as a human being as an American violated when they arrested her on that bus?  Yup.  Now would you support her if she was also out on the town every night, a heavy drinker, and loose?  No.  And that’s the point.  The Civil Rights Movement was about discipline.  The horrid truth is that you cannot effectively fight for your rights if you are not disciplined.

Black people were heavily uneasy about OJ’s infamous victory.  True, we wanted to see a Black person finally not get trumped by the system, but dammit… OJ????  And of course he continued to spiral even more out of control, but that’s a different story. 

Racism is difficult to fight if… well… it’s always difficult to fight.  It’s harder to fight if you can’t convince others that the delicate race-based issue at hand deserves  a close intraspection and carefully crafted analysis.  The desire to craft this analysis and engage in this discussion dissipates when you feature yourself in a youtube video and throw money in the air.  At that point you become a thug (right or wrong) and no one wants to hear you.  The courts don’t want to hear you.  I don’t want to hear you. 

Mychael Bell may have just been cleaning his gun, but damit why after all that drama does he have a gun?  That’s like OJ writing the If I Did It book.  Sure it’s your constitutional right, but what the heck man…

Put down the gun, hold a pocket.  Discipline.

“Obama’s Not BLACK”… Washington Post Holds The Pocket

First thing’s first, read the Washington Post article entitled Obama’s Not Black, where the first line reads “he is also half white.”

Ok look.  I love multiculturalism as much as the next person, but Obama is as Black as the ace of spades sitting at the bottom of a cup of coffee.

Black is not defined by “were my parents slaves…”  Black is a global definition to define not only those of African descent (not counting the way way back historic descent of everyone coming from Africa… or the Middle East, depending on who you ask), but Black in America is particularly defined by the shared and collective experience that such people have.  Sure not everyone experiences racism… directly.  But even if you are mixed and came out looking white or asian or hispanic, you know personally of Blackness in your life and at the very least you had to confront it on a personal level.

A close friend of mine summarizes the situation best:

Yeah, we’re all well aware of the fact that Barack Obama is of mixed ancestry but, so are a majority of so-called “African-Americans” in this country.  I am tired of people trying to steal our moment of pride and advancement with their semantics.  Being black is not about you’re genotypic make-up (because most of us are comprised of very different ones).   The binding force is the brown skin that gives us a certain outlook on society, and sometimes, to our detriment, a certain perspective of ourselves as we relate to it.  As DuBois said, it is a double-consciousness that I believe we have yet to escape, no matter how “diverse” our backgrounds are. 

So, Washington Post, I’m sorry, BUT, man oh man!!  You’re holding a pocket for this one. 

Club Etiquette: Learn the Rules Or Hold a Pocket

I’m back on the blog with a vengeance.  First item of business: the club.

Now, true enough clubs differ from region to region within the U.S., but I think grown & sexy or whatever the 2008 terminology for it is about the same across demographics, so we’re going to focus on that. 

Rule 1: No Simping
You may have read my earlier post on facebook simping.  Well simping in real life is even worse.  Chivalry’s not dead… it’s just been infected with spineless folk who do anything to get some digits.  Case in point…

Houston, TX.  Standing near the front of the line waiting for the club to open.  3 beautiful women walk up behind us wearing your pretty much standard tight-fitting short dresses (no complaints here).  One of the guys in front of us starts eyeing them… I mean HARD.  I’m thinking “take it easy buddy… the girls are cute but damn stalker…”  Turns out the girls are making comments about how cold it is.  No sooner had one of them said something along the lines of “yea I’m really starting to get cold out here” this dude damn near busts out of his skin with “here, you can have my jacket!”  And like magic, a chorus of “awwwww, that’s so sweet!” bursts out from the females. 

Now right here is where we have the problem.  The problem is not the nice deed.  It’s the different expectations.  The dude is thinking “GOTCHA!  I’m one jacket closer to getting in there.”  The females are thinking “free jacket.”  Note the difference.  

If you need an example of how simping ruins the dating economy, simply look at the stock market.  You keep giving out corporate bonuses to females who simply look good and next thing you know you’re in a damn deficit, begging for a corporate bailout.  And like they told em in Congress, it ain’t happening!  Those curious about how the story ended, that fella never saw those females again once they got inside the club.  But they sho nuff remembered me and my homeboy as the ones that did not give up the jacket/sweater/warm gear.  Hence, we had a valid conversation piece to go on.  Try it for yourself.

Rule 2: Dance
“What do you mean you don’t dance in the club?!”  That was the exact comment from another friend of mine when a certain female friend admitted she goes to the club not to dance, but to stand and talk about people.  Cut it out… You wanna do that go stand in a corner.  I came to the club to drink (in moderation) and dance (in excess). 

Now, true, sometimes fellas get TOO hyphy and try to dance with the wrong female.  Sometimes we try to pick up the female who clearly does not want to dance at that moment or is in the midst of dancing with her homegirls (another topic altogether) or just plain doesn’t want to dance with you.  That’s okay, let it go!  If you observe, you realize that these women did actually come to dance and you either just came at the wrong time or just aren’t the one they want to dance with.

BUT, for those who came to NOT DANCE, are you kidding me?  You should be shot.  Ladies, how brokeback would it look if you go up to a fella with some “i know you didn’t come here to just stand around…” and he hits you with “well actually, i just wanna stand here with my homeboys all night.  We just came to talk about people.”  WOW….  There’s no place for that at the club, male or female.  Dance, be a winner. 

 

Rule 3: Tip Your Bartender
Now I don’t believe in tipping shoddy service.  I had one experience (LA) where a bartender   straight up tried to tell me they didn’t have the type of rum I was looking for (though her co-worker had just served me that type of rum earlier).  Long story short, I gave her co-worker a $20 tip on GP.  Now that was actually excess and me just being on some revenge ish, BUT I digress: tip your bartender.  There’s nothing worse than having the appearance of being grown & sexy and then the ladies around you find out how cheap you are (let em find out later). 

Those are just my intro rules.  Following those will prevent you from holding someone’s pocket. 

What are YOUR rules for the club? 

Whopper Virgins… Burger King Hits a New Low

If you haven’t seen the commercials, Burger King is issuing a new global challenge to prove that the Whopper is better than the Big Mac.  To do this, they are going to indigenous communities around the world and flying them out to Burger Kings to have them do a Whopper/Big Mac taste test.  WTF?!

I don’t have much time online, but come on!  Is this the future of consumerism?  Get an Amazon tribe to endorse your product and all of a sudden you’re not only genuine, but also global friendly. But leave it to Burger King to let “these people” know what to think.  Thank you Burger King.  You’re winning just like McDonald R&B commercials.

As always, Burger King can hold my pocket. (Damn shame, I like those chicken fries too….)

Should “Arab Money” Hold My Pocket?

Once again we have another debate for the pocket universe (this time guys, seriously, debate).  If you haven’t heard Busta Rhymes’ semi-new track, Arab Money, I’ve got a youtube link below.  Essentially the song talks about how he has so much money, he’s on the same level as eccentric, Arab billionaires.  Aside from the fact that the Arabic portion of the song (in the hook) isn’t actual Arabic (it’s literally just a guy yodeling in a way that sounds Arabic), the potential controversy is that what if a white guy made a song saying “I’ve Got That Nigga Money!!” You also have to consider lyrics such as “I got oil well money in the desert playing golf” and if there were to be a similar song with lyrics like “I got rap lyrics money but I really call it bling” or something to that nature.

Racism isn’t just black and white, it’s a lot of different things.  And though we know Busta Rhymes would not intentially be racist towards Arabs (particularly since he practices 5% Islam… which… is another topic altogether), the fact remains that the song just might be offensive to Arabs.

What do you think?  Should Arab Money hold my pocket?