Imagine: you are a 40 year old but the culture treats you like a “boy” or “girl.” That was the life of Blacks in the rural South the first half of my life. Looking back, I can now understand those who sought self-medication with liquor during Jim Crow.
“They treat me like a boy in front of my children…any work is really about keeping them rich…they don’t care about educating our children because strong back work is their lot in life and then they can show you in the Bible something about the descendants of Ham being cursed, African and us…that’s why slavery and Jim Crow is justified.”
But at the African Methodist Episcopal Church, Mrs. Nether and Mrs. Lumpkin taught us that being Black was noble and actually better. Elections are won and societies are shaped in church parking lots, in Barber/Beauty shops and on sports/band practice fields. The residual benefit of discussions and teaching explains that we can be better/should be better. A community is a tree that must have strong roots to grow and be fruitful but toxins can easily invade and ruin everything. Liquor, crack, illegal weed, heroin and now opioids often start poisoning people as a numbing agent for those who could understand the cards life dealt them.
Understand: Most people are their own worst enemies but the American dream is a nightmare for people of color. The best theoretical America is one in which every kid has a fair chance to learn and grow into being a productive, home owning member of society. Yes, Jesus knows that there will always be poor people and we should be compassionate with them. But, being poor should be based on your personal productivity; not the skin or gender of your birth.
In a recent blog post, I wrote about improving our community with P.E.C.S. (Politically, Economically, Culturally, Socially.) Yes, elections are part of the process every few years but we must grind smart daily. We must create a positive culture around our families. I think about the line in Gil Scott Heron’s “B-Movie” that said “the ultimate realization of the inmates taking over of the asylum.”
Heron wrote that after Reagan beat Carter for the White House but today I could easily apply that observation to the Black community’s embracing of Thug Culture in hip hop. Don’t get me wrong: artists should be free to express themselves. However, kids should experience art in a healthful context—N.W.A. introduced the nation to rogue elements inside the Los Angeles Police Department but maybe I am too old to understand the benefit of mumbling rap that glorifies crime on my street.
Gil Scott Heron and Muhammad Ali were the fathers of rap to me. My friends Darryl, Cassie, Rhonda and I saw him in the Blues Alley Club in Georgetown in the early 90s. Shaking his hand was painful for me because he was a skeleton. Heroin was eating Heron. We paid $35 each and he left the stage while the band played for 30 minutes—he wanted his poison in the dressing room. But, we understood that his genius was self-medicating the pain of being a man in country that saw him as a boy. It’s like Billie Holiday writing “Southern trees bear strange fruit” about lynching while likely high as a Georgia pine.
If you are rich and White in the South, you predictably are conservative because life is grand and design to subjugate others to keep you in tall cotton. But if you are the subjugated, you are liberal or radical because life isn’t fair…some change, any change would be welcomed. In the Hall of Fame of American poets, I put Gil Scott Heron and Tupac next to Poe, Dickinson and Hughes.
Heron’s B Movie’s lyrics are really an epic poem. President Reagan, an actor, was elected to play the role of hero on a white horse that saves the day by preserving a culture that keeps certain folks unfairly on top. To many Whites, conservatism seeks to go back to a time when life was wonderful without acknowledging that the economic system was based on the robbing of the red man and oppression of Blacks who were never supposed to be here in the first place. Africa without European colonization would be one of the best continents.
“Quick, we should find the Bible section about dark people working for the descendants of Noah’s other sons—Africans love working in blistering heat.” For the record, the death of Jesus cleaned the slate for all people before him but evidently the question for some Whites becomes “are Blacks actually people.”
I was hearing knowledge and wisdom in a barbershop yesterday and it made me realize that I learned from Mr. Nether in the chair, from Mrs. Nether in the classroom and both of them in the A.M.E. parking lot as a kid. Mrs. Lumpkin would encourage your growth every time she saw you. When Desert Storm broke out, Mrs. Lumpkin’s former students knew exactly where Iraq was. Unlike the Europeans who when there for oil, we knew that great civilizations of color existing in that region before Christ. Mrs. Lumpkin taught geography with a timeline and the Great Pyramid at Giza was erected 2400 years before Christ lived. And Napoleon wondered which Europeans came down to construct them—no, sir.
On a sly note, the Black church taught about the struggles of the Hebrew people AND the fact that some of those battles were with ancient Africans—us. Watch out now. Gil Scott Heron said “…Egypt and Libya have been moved to the Middle East…I will swear every time, this version ain’t mine…that’s why it is called “His” story.”
So, I have lived long enough that “conservative” too me is the Black culture of the 60s and 70s. Kids, we actually had Black business districts called Harlem in every town and city in America. A Black dollar touched five Black hands before it left the community. To break it down, the conservatism of my White classmates is different from the moderation/conservatism of Blue Dog Democrats and rural Black church folks. We are conserving two different periods of time or the culture they want to return is based on the oppression of us. You know what “make America great again” and “I want my country back” are really saying.
It’s woven into every issue and policy they support local, state and federal. Reasonable Blacks should all vote on the first day of advance voting if they remember the past those people want to be our future. On the other hand, the well-intended Progressive Movement might inadvertently hurt our community with wishes of giving too much from the government without acknowledging that someone must fund those programs with taxes and giving to much stymies personal responsibility, planning and growth. Yes, on some level, I am a conservative but I am trying to conserve the Black mindset from the 60s not the White oppressive mindset from the same time.
Gil Scott Heron’s B – Movie is poetry.
Because it seems as though we’ve been convinced that 26% of the registered voters, not even 26% of the American people, but 26% of the registered voters form a mandate ? or a landslide. 21% voted for Skippy and 3, 4% voted for somebody else who might have been running.But, oh yeah, I remember. In this year that we have now declared the year from Shogun to Reagan, I remember what I said about Reagan…meant it. Acted like an actor…Hollyweird. Acted like a liberal. Acted like General Franco when he acted like governor of California, then he acted like a republican. Then he acted like somebody was going to vote for him for president. And now we act like 26% of the registered voters is actually a mandate. We’re all actors in this I suppose.
What has happened is that in the last 20 years, America has changed from a producer to a consumer. And all consumers know that when the producer names the tune…the consumer has got to dance. That’s the way it is. We used to be a producer ? very inflexible at that, and now we are consumers and, finding it difficult to understand. Natural resources and minerals will change your world. The Arabs used to be in the 3rd World. They have bought the 2nd World and put a firm down payment on the 1st one. Controlling your resources will control your world. This country has been surprised by the way the world looks now. They don’t know if they want to be Matt Dillon or Bob Dylan. They don’t know if they want to be diplomats or continue the same policy – of nuclear nightmare diplomacy. John Foster Dulles ain’t nothing but the name of an airport now.
The idea concerns the fact that this country wants nostalgia. They want to go back as far as they can ? even if it’s only as far as last week. Not to face now or tomorrow, but to face backwards. And yesterday was the day of our cinema heroes riding to the rescue at the last possible moment. The day of the man in the white hat or the man on the white horse – or the man who always came to save America at the last moment ? someone always came to save America at the last moment ? especially in “B” movies. And when America found itself having a hard time facing the future, they looked for people like John Wayne. But since John Wayne was no longer available, they settled for Ronald Reagan ? and it has placed us in a situation that we can only look at ? like a “B” movie.
Come with us back to those inglorious days when heroes weren’t zeros. Before fair was square. When the cavalry came straight away and all-American men were like Hemingway to the days of the wondrous “B” movie. The producer underwritten by all the millionaires necessary will be Casper “The Defensive” Weinberger ? no more animated choice is available. The director will be Attila the Haig, running around frantically declaring himself in control and in charge. The ultimate realization of the inmates taking over at the asylum. The screenplay will be adapted from the book called “Voodoo Economics” by George “Papa Doc” Bush. Music by the “Village People” the very military “Macho Man.”
“Company!!!”
“Macho, macho man!”
“Two-three-four.”
“He likes to be ? well, you get the point.”
“Huuut! Your left! Your left! Your left…right, left, right, left, right…!”
A theme song for saber-rallying and selling wars door-to-door. Remember, we’re looking for the closest thing we can find to John Wayne. Cliches abound like kangaroos ? courtesy of some spaced out Marlin Perkins, a Reagan contemporary. Cliches like, “itchy trigger finger” and “tall in the saddle” and “riding off or on into the sunset.” Cliches like, “Get off of my planet by sundown!” More so than cliches like, “he died with his boots on.” Marine tough the man is. Bogart tough the man is. Cagney tough the man is. Hollywood tough the man is. Cheap steak tough. And Bonzo’s substantial. The ultimate in synthetic selling: A Madison Avenue masterpiece ? a miracle ? a cotton-candy politician…Presto! Macho!
“Macho, macho man!”
Put your orders in America. And quick as Kodak your leaders duplicate with the accent being on the dupe – cause all of a sudden we have fallen prey to selective amnesia – remembering what we want to remember and forgetting what we choose to forget. All of a sudden, the man who called for a blood bath on our college campuses is supposed to be Dudley “God-damn” Do-Right?
“You go give them liberals hell Ronnie.” That was the mandate. To the new “Captain Bly” on the new ship of fools. It was doubtlessly based on his chameleon performance of the past – as a liberal democrat ? as the head of the Studio Actor’s Guild. When other celluloid saviors were cringing in terror from McCarthy ? Ron stood tall. It goes all the way back from Hollywood to hillbilly. From liberal to libelous, from “Bonzo” to Birch idol…born again. Civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights…it’s all wrong. Call in the cavalry to disrupt this perception of freedom gone wild. God damn it…first one wants freedom, then the whole damn world wants freedom.
Nostalgia, that’s what we want…the good ol’ days…when we gave’em hell. When the buck stopped somewhere and you could still buy something with it. To a time when movies were in black and white ? and so was everything else. Even if we go back to the campaign trail, before six-gun Ron shot off his face and developed hoof-in-mouth. Before the free press went down before full-court press. And were reluctant to review the menu because they knew the only thing available was ? Crow.
Lon Chaney, our man of a thousand faces – no match for Ron. Doug Henning does the make-up – special effects from Grecian Formula 16 and Crazy Glue. Transportation furnished by the David Rockefeller of Remote Control Company. Their slogan is, “Why wait for 1984? You can panic now…and avoid the rush.”
So much for the good news…
As Wall Street goes, so goes the nation. And here’s a look at the closing numbers ? racism’s up, human rights are down, peace is shaky, war items are hot – the House claims all ties. Jobs are down, money is scarce ? and common sense is at an all-time low with heavy trading. Movies were looking better than ever and now no one is looking because, we’re starring in a “B” movie. And we would rather have John Wayne…we would rather have John Wayne.
“You don’t need to be in no hurry.
You ain’t never really got to worry.
And you don’t need to check on how you feel.
Just keep repeating that none of this is real.
And if you’re sensing, that something’s wrong,
Well just remember, that it won’t be too long
Before the director cuts the scene…yea.”
“This ain’t really your life,
Ain’t really your life,
Ain’t really ain’t nothing but a movie.”
[Refrain repeated about 25 times or more in an apocalyptic crescendo with a military cadence.]
“This ain’t really your life,
Ain’t really ain’t nothing but a movie.”
Project Logic Ga 
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