Business…this month’s joint for the BSN is on Pedro Martinez’ Jheri Curl. Yes, you read that right…nearly 1,000 words on a Jheri Curl. Thanks to DC for giving the folk a lil somethin called creative control.
And tonight I went and saw Angela Davis speak. Every year, I try to do something productive on the King Holiday, and this was what I did for the 0-cinco. The talk wasn’t bad, but I’m starting to get more out of hearing conservatives speak.
It gets old to hear someone say things that you already believe to be true. The trick for a leftist like me is to develop strategies to implement programs that reflect these views. I don’t know how to do that, so I go listen to these talks and hope to glean something on how to handle such business. Routinely, I’m disappointed.
See, I’m not romantic about the left of old. I appreciate the role that heroic figures like Davis played in different point in time, but their strategies are not working. What strategies will work? Hell if I know, to be honest. I’m working on it, but I have nothing but scattershot thoughts at this hour.
What I do know, though, is the utility of going to see heroes of the left speak is fading fast. There’s always lots of clapping–frequently for no good reason–and, if the speaker is black, usually a collection of good looking women. However, rarely do I hear something that makes me reevaluate my own thoughts. Perhaps that’s just something that happens when listening to my ideologues–I hold them in such high regard because I agree with them.
There’s no mental exercise in that, though. Nothing really great comes from that. I think I’m right about things, but I don’t know that I’m right. At this point, I need folks to force an expansion of how I see things, someone to take me to places my thought processes currently do not fly. While Luther and I found Alan Keyes to be nuts, we did find him to be sharp, and he did make us think some. In the end, we wound up thinking he was on some of that other other, but we did think.
Davis’ talk was cool, but it wasn’t enlightening. I won’t remember seeing her speak when I’m graying and talking to my grandchildren. I’ll put this in line with the litany of other speeches I’ve been to that had the same effect. Andre Benjamin once said that, “speeches only reaches those that already know about it,” and I’m starting to believe that’s an incomplete assessment. Speeches may reach those folks, but those people aren’t touched by those speeches. Those speeches don’t become moving experiences. To be moved, my mind must be riveted.
And hearing what I’ve heard before ain’t gonna do the trick.
7 thoughts on “To the curl…”
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Strong4u says:
It’s interesting Bomani that you say “…It gets old to hear someone say things that you already believe to be true. The trick for a leftist like me is to develop strategies to implement programs that reflect these views…” The difference between our generation and Angela Davis is that they did implement plans and strategies that got us to where we are today. Our job is to pick up the ball and run with it. There was no instructional school for MLK , Angela Davis and those before them, and there is no training for us. We simply have to get up off our collective behinds and stop waiting for the answer to fall out of the sky or from some older revolutionaries lips. They have served their time and their communities. It is now our time to stop being afraid and step up to the plate before it’s too late. (This would include my lazy tail).
peace always,
bj in philly
aka strong4u
‘The Glo of his Soul is the shine of a unique power…’, lol, come on bro! I will say this, I give that cat credit for rockin’ the greasy curl in the O-nickel…that means that he has the marbles to do it and not give a rat’s ass what anyone thinks.
I gave you too much credit. I just KNEW you were going to be able to get through that whole piece on Pedro Martinez without a single reference to Memphis. You never fail to disappoint. Since it has become increasingly obvious to me that you will forever refer to Memphis as the site of the famous Civil War battle “Jheri’s Last Stand,” I’ll take a moment to list things that breed and fester here in Houston that will probably remain in style here much longer than they should (assuming they should have EVER been trends to begin with):Already. This word being used as an explitive is truly mind-numbing. Already is an adverb and is used as such everywhere in the continental US. Catch up, by a dictionary, do something ALREADY.The box fade. I’ve counted six since I moved here seven months ago. Somebody down here has been telling these boys that the House Party hayday is coming back and they can be Kid. I don’t think so.Bush fanatics. I swear, if I see ONE MORE W sticker on the back of a muddy pick up truck (that, in all likelihood, recently had a negro body dragging behind it on the way to a Klan meeting) I’ll scream. Tell your people enough is enough. I want a president who not only KNOWS that S.A.T. is not the past tense of “sit” with a whole lotta periods in it.Yes, we may still drip more than average in Memphis, and we may have more than our share of the trend-challenged, but at least we come in second in the mouths-full-of-precious-metals category.But, admittedly, not by a whole lot…
well “hot teacher”..
spending a summer in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex was absolutely the most horrid experience in my life in terms of slang and ebonics.
It’s bad enough that they use the adverb “already” like us Louisianians use “fa sho” and “yes indeed”, but that damned twang they used with it had me about to go Ron Artest on some Texan.They turned “already” into AWWWWWWWWL-Rehhhhhhh-Dee …and that was horrible and I shuddered every time some gold-toofed wannabe Tupac or some kid on the radio said it giving shoutouts…
The worst part was the bastids had the NERVE to criticize how I talked. Houstonians and boppers, I can get with because they’re somewhat similar to Louisiana, but dem damn DFW folks, man I wanted to kick dem in the ass…
********I HUMBLY APOLOGIZE FOR THAT RANT. NOW ONTO MY REAL POST***********
Bo…The furthest east I saw a curl was a couple years ago on a flight from your beloved Atlanta to Ft. Lauderdale. Aww man, this old guy with the gold teefuses (TEEF-uhs-iz) had his fake Versace glasses and a maroon jump suit. Dude was blacker than the skid marks on the airport’s runways and the tarmac. I closed my eyes and immediately seen him as the old guy in the red suede suite (with matching gators and hat) dancing to Tyrone Davis records…I shuddered, shuddered like i never had before.
Most famous memphis curl had to go to Ball and MJG on the Coming Out Hard album cover…
Most times what I get out of conservatives speaking is that they’re out of touch with reality. Or maybe they know enough about the average American that they’re able to manipulate a topic the best.
At any rate, it is been a long realized fact that the 50s/60s methods aren’t working in our time. Marching around and making yourself visible was enough to get the attention of white America – both negative and positive – and the attention of the world to the issue of Blacks. But I don’t think its particularly fair to knock our heroic figures – from Davis to Cosby (yes I said Cosby) for expressing their ideas. They’re coming from a good place, they’re just from the old school. Many of us younger folk want to do something, but don’t know just what or how. At least they had ideas and were willing to sacrifice everything to follow through even for the hope of making a change.
Seems to me it’s a good thing if the folks you’re into get old. Otherwise, if it didn’t sink in yet, what the hell were they wastin all that time talkin for?
I can feel what you’re saying, Bo, as I’ve put some significant mental energy into the problem of finding real solutions to Black peoples’ problems from the ocean of opinions in the idea marketplace. The opinion I’ve come to over the past couple of years is that NO one ideology has all the answers nor asks all the right questions. The plain fact is that there are some “conservative” ideas that make common sense and deserve to be appropriated by a brother or sister interested in real solutions. Cases N Points: academic achievement and the importance of two parent households in reducing childhood poverty. It’s common sense academic achievement leads to better economic prospects as an adult. We all know this. Everybody reading this probably had this stressed to them by their parents growing up. If any of you are like me though you’ve also experienced Black people who were too accepting of lower achievement from Black students. An in-law of mine who is a preacher and the head of a private school recently told me that that his wife was wierd b/c growing up she used to go to science camps and the like during the summers adding “that’s what White kids do”!!! What the F***?!? Given, this comment was made in a casual setting, but still I think this attitude was a clear example of what the Black Chritian Nationalists (Shrine of the Black Madonna to you ATLiens, Houstonians and Detroitians out there) call ABI, Acceptance of Black Inferiority.
Additionally, the “conservatives” are probably right to stress strenghtening marriage and two parent households as a hedge against so many kids coming up po (or at least poorER than they might be with two parents in one house). Case N Point: A brother at my job recently told me that this “set out chick” he was hitting a few months back just had TRIPLETS that MAY be for him. She had the babies three months early, so their premies. She’s 19 and not too stacked on the common sense side (based on what he tells me). He’s 24 and already is having $500/ month taken out of his check for his other babys mama’s child. Now I don’t have illusions that preaching to these kids (I’m 37) about getting hitched will solve their individual problems but my opinion is that any serious race man (or woman) of the 21st century is going to have to deal with the importance of stable, commited relationships as a major pillar for furthure racial uplift.