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mtlreviews2020 · 4 years ago

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A piece-piece nyana review to J Bob’s Kool Hip Hop Theatre. By Rethabile Headbush

Jeff Tshabalala, better known as J Bobs is the Standard Bank Young Artist Award winner for Theatre and Seen Pha is a fresh salad of poetry, hip-hop, comedy and traditional dramatic arts. There is Simphiwe Bonongo’s unreal beatboxing, a random hip-hop “holla” here and there, KWASHA in “communicating” hip hop combos and J Bobs at the centre of it. Seen Pha is fun, it’s flavourful and is an experiment of where J Bobs is taking sketch work next.

Chapter 6’s The Darkie Author is a reading, and discussion in response to Chapter’s 3’s The Money. The Whites. The Reviews. as Tshabalala puts it, “to talk about our problems on our terms”. The Darkie Author deals with issues in South Africa’s creative arts industry specifically the typecasting of black characters in White headed film, TV and theatre. It is also an insight into the direction he would like to take his work: taking the traditional theatre and “boom bap it – I’m gonna swag it up a little bit” as he puts it, make it interesting, cool and happening, evident in his hip hop inspired poetic pieces.

Chapter 10: Catchy Sing along 1 is an example of this. Tshabalala parodies your gold- chain-wearing, narcissistic wannabe rapper, aspiring for fame – J Bhoboza who is presented to us, arms flailing, shades wearing, guarded by his almost but not so quite two-man entourage/bodyguards in Chapter 10. The songs are truly catchy – so catchy his bodyguards can’t help but join. This piece is an intro to J Bhoboza, the woman loving (or stealing), artist vying for fame and not so concerned with the real issues of our reality. He makes this clear in a line where he raps “You won’t catch me reading and my subject matter’s weak. You’ll never hear me reading or in a scuffed sneak”.

Chapter 10 is as funny as it is catchy, poking fun at your rapper, more concerned with image and stardom than current affairs and we see it continue into J Bhoboza’s Chapter 13: La Khot del Swag. Chapter 11’s Catchy Sing Along 2 features Deevision (KWASHA’s Dinsthitile Mashile). Here, Deevision raps her own swaggerific interpretation of claim to fame, focusing on the dilemma of choosing between studying and stardom which often feel separate. She shares in her line “I don’t wanna train – I was born a star”. In it, we see continued the parodical theme established throughout J Bhoboza’s pieces and songs.

Chapter 15 is the Ubhoboza Podcast (towards Mzansi Hip Hop theatre) presented by J Bobs himself as a 50-minute podcast, breaking down the ideas and inspiration behind the varying skits and sketches. He introduces Location, Lekayshini, Lokasie, a game show exploring modern vernacular language in South African townships or Kasi taal. It is evident that it inspires much of his writing style, as he draws on contemporary South African issues in his work. The podcast also includes the story and inspiration behind the character and persona, J Bhoboza inspired by the rap cyphering culture and rap style of Black cyphers in suburban Johannesburg.

The J Bhoboza rap features the two UBDope Bursary recipients, Sydney Ndhlovu and Tshepo Matlala who play J Bhoboza’s body guards. We also see them in conversation with J Bobs, discussing his writings The darkie Author and To Wits or to Vurtz?. Tshabalala briefly breaks down the methods he uses in his sketches and the way he used rhymes to address real and pertinent social issues in a playful, engaging, and entertaining framework. Chapter 9: To Wits or to Vurtz does the same, by introducing his personal experiences which led him to the piece-piece nyana skits and songs we see in Seen Pha. Here, he also reflects on his personal experiences and finding Black voices that inspire his work.

Chapter 5, 7 and 8 are songs ranging between rap and poetry from the Market Theatre’s KWASHA who are either responding or adding their own twists – as seen in Chapter 4’s Side Chick Makhwapeni performed by J Bhoboza. The J Bhoboza rap skit parodies issues of infidelity “side chick” relationships in our society. The songs range between 1 and 4 minutes and are produced by Nkululeko “Muchacho” Nkosi. Chapter 14’s Bheja S’jole, featuring Moose Goose and All Hit Wonder, is a song illustrating relationships revolving around the exchange between sexual favours and money – a theme shared with the Side Chick/Dick Makhwapeni songs. Chapter 12: These broken feelings, sung again by Moose Goose and All Hit Wonder, also features the talents of Mosie Mamaregane and Wonder Ndlovu of KWASHA. It is a one minute melodic interlude responding to and closing the Makhwapeni raps and songs. The two KWASHA members flaunt their vocal range in this chapter. KWASHA transform into various roles in Chapter 17: Location. Lekeyshini. Lokasie., poets, rappers and collaborative artists in various versions and adaptations of Tshabalala’s works, contributing their own verses and perspectives in response to J Bhoboza’s Makhwapeni raps with just as much swagger, energy, and flair as Bhoboza himself.

The L.L.L game show is introduced with a musical mix of song and rap sung by KWASHA and vocal special effects by Beats eMlonyeni (Bonongo). A few of the songs like, “bheja s’jole” and “bimba for you” are familiar to the viewers by this chapter of Seen Pha. Just like the songs, the game show is led by J Bobs. Location. Lekeyshini. Lokasie. brings relatability, play and engagement into live performance. Tshabalala experiments with another kind of “play” to motivate his inquest into finding new ways of presenting and sharing theatre. The games played in the show create awareness and celebrate the uniqueness of township modern vernacular (demotic) languages or Kasi Taal, usually characterised by the adoption of numbers or words from colonial South African languages – like English or Afrikaans – and used with very different meaning and context, amongst other traits. The Translation and Decode English games illustrate this well with examples like “nine nine”, “nerves” and “tiger” which can be generally translated to “on point”, “stress” and “ten Rands” respectively, as illustrated in the show. Overall, this game ties in well with Chapter 18: Victor and the Vernacs to Mogodu or to Haggis that is the Conundrum, which uses modern vernacular language and politics around naming and renaming in South Africa.

Chapter 18 takes place at a Monday meeting between writers for the writing of The Darkie Author, a story written by J Bob. This pieces is read by the KWAHSA members and explores issues around the making of Black characters in White headed writing teams in South Africa. It highlights how White ignorance towards the Black South African experience influences problems such as typecasting- directly addressed in The Darkie Author. It poses the question of how problematic such structures can be in limiting the representation of Black characters in the industry and continues into another reading in Chapter 19: Victor and the Vernacs (Kale Tuesday). The reading is presented simply, we see KWASHA seated on high chair and Tshabalala at a desk between them introducing the piece, his signature pink suitcase in the background.

With Victor and the Vernacs, Tshabalala, the language and word-play wizard, uses his writing to bring colour to the members of this writing team especially seen through character, Victor. Victor’s expertise in his position as head writer is just as questionable as how he landed the job in the first place. Victor, played by KWASHA’s Joel Leonard, spends most of the brainstorming meeting being racially inappropriate and objectifying the women of the team. We see this in one line where Victor comments, “You okes like to think that everything is a mix-tape – my people say Pretoria, you lot tune Tshwane. My people say Grahamstown, your lot tune your khandas together and come up with Makhanda”, illustrating both Tshabalala’s strong and consistent theme in the political and social context of South Africa and his lovely play with words like “khanda” and “Makhanda”.

Seen Pha is an experimental mix masala of Tshabalala’s work made specifically for the vNAF stage. Tshabalala gave us a piece-piece nyana of everything, sharing his range as a creative, theatre maker and sketcher. Though numbered, the chapters do not follow an order and often jumps between different skits, songs, readings, and discussion. The way Seen Pha has been curated is to provide, what seems to be, musical breaks between text-heavy pieces, creating a satisfying and engaging rhythm for the audience. I thoroughly enjoyed the entertainment of the wordplay and relevance of both Victor and the Vernacs readings, the musicality and vocals of the Side Chick Makhwapeni 2 and 3 versions, the Ubhoboza podcast for its insight into Tshabalala’s process and The Darkie Author’s response to relevant questions around the structure and politics of South Africa’s creative industry. I am most interested to see all his experimentation and sketches establish themselves into physical pieces and see his idea of Hip-Hop Theatre come into a live stage realisation. You can find Seen Pha kwa J. Bobs anytime on the National Arts Festival website. Since the extension of certain vNAF programs, all 20 chapters are still open to watch at any time, on any day, for free until the 31st of August. Be sure to catch it when your data and Wi-fi bundles agree and pick your favorite piece-piece nyana combos.

#theatre jbobs review vnaf

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blackandbrownspoons · 6 years ago

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#BlackHistoryMonth: Disability History is Black History is American History

[Image Description: A graphic featuring a vintage brown photo of Harriet Tubman against a white background next to gray, black, and brown text that reads “disability history is black history is american history.” @blackbrownspoon]

Each year in February, America reflects on milestones and achievements in the Black community, as well as its role in shaping American history. Often left out of this discussion is the integral role that disability, healthcare, and the treatment of black bodies played in shaping Black history and American history as a whole. So please enjoy a timeline of #DisabledBlackHistory that shows some of the most well-known Black historical events-- and the influence of disabled POC and black bodies on those events.

(This post may contain affiliate links. See my disclaimer for more details.)

*TW/Note: These events may feature ableist/racist stereotypes or notably graphic/triggering depictions of abuse, mistreatment, or trauma of disabled POC. Feel free to read at your own risk.

1619-1808:

Slaves are legally transported from Africa to the Americas through the Middle Passage, the route slaves traders took across the Atlantic Ocean via slave ships. Captives were housed in tightly confined, unsanitary compartments in the ship, at times stacked onto each other. Physical and medical neglect and abuse were the norm, and as a rule captives were forced to release bodily fluids where they were seated, leading to the spread of infectious diseases. An estimated 15% of captives did not survive the journey, with a total of up to 2 million deaths as a result of the Middle Passage until the importing of slaves was outlawed in the US in 1808.

Read more: “Slavery at Sea: Terror, Sex, and Sickness in the Middle Passage” by Sowande M. Mustakeem

1600’s-1800’s:

“The Dozens” is a well-known, rich tradition within the African American community in which participants playfully (or not so much) drag not only each other, but often their moms with a series of incisive, targeted jokes. Less well known about the tradition is its roots during slavery, as it was often used by slaves to judge and devalue other slaves on the basis of their flaws-- frequently of their apparent disabilities. According to Krip Hop Nation, “The name itself [“The Dozens”] refers to the sale of slaves who had been overworked, were disabled, or beaten-down – their physical (and often mental) conditions affected their value and they were sold by the dozen, which was considered by slaves, the lowest position within the community.” The game was played as an “outlet of aggression” for slaves who could not yet fight or prevent their oppression or the discarding of slaves on an ableist basis, but could instead encourage each other to develop a thick skin emotionally in the meantime.

Read more: Yo Mama! New Raps, Toasts, Dozens, Jokes, and Children's Rhymes From Urban Black America by Onwuchekwa Jemie

Mid-1600’s:

Colonies develop “Slaves Codes” that, for the first time, codify that slavery will happen on the basis of skin color alone. Previously, indentured servants and slaves were of every race. Once Slave Codes limited slavery solely to African Americans, physicians and academics became instrumental in the medicalization of slavery and pathologization of blackness to justify continuing slavery.

Read more: Critical Race Theory: The Key Writings That Formed the Movement by Kimberle Crenshaw, N. Gotanda, G. Peller, and K. Thomas

Late-1700’s:

Physician Benjamin Rush, signer of the Declaration of Independence and Surgeon General of the Continental Army during the American Revolution, theorizes a disease known as “negritude”, which he considered a form of congenital leprosy, to explain dark skin tones, which could be treated with aggressive rubbing of the skin.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

Mid-1800’s:

Physician Samuel Cartwright theorizes diseases to explain disobedient or rebellious slaves. “Drapetomania” is a curable mental illness in which slaves develop the desire to run away from their masters and obtain freedom, which is treated by keeping slaves “well-fed and clothed” and “not overworked”. “Dysaethesia Aethiopica”, or “rascality” in layman’s terms, is another mental illness marked by a “difficult [...] mind and sensibility” that are “apt to do much mischief” and “slight their work” whose root cause is “negro liberty”, which is curable via whippings and abuse.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

Early-to-Mid-1800’s:

Slavery ends in the North, and continues in the South, sparking the Abolitionist Movement. The Underground Railroad, a network of safe houses owned by freed African Americans and White allies from the South leading into the Northern US and Canada, is established to allow slaves to escape often by foot. The most well-known “conductor” of the Railroad was Harriet Tubman, an escaped slave woman who developed a traumatic brain injury and consequently epilepsy and narcolepsy while enslaved and eventually facilitated the freedom of more than 70 slaves.

Read more: Harriet Tubman: Myth, Memory, and History by Milton C. Sernett

Mid-1800’s:

While growing medical literature distinguishes blackness as a syndrome and Black people as a separate species, physicians simultaneously primarily use slaves for experimentation of new procedures and treatments to generalize for use in mainstream white populations. J. Marion Sims, known as the father of modern gynecology, created the speculum and a procedure to repair post-childbirth vaginal fistulas by buying and experimenting on slaves. Despite being available in 1845, Sims did not use anesthesia on his black female subjects because Black people were believed to experience less pain from injury. This has long been debunked.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

Mid 1800’s-Early 1900’s:

Traveling vaudeville and circus acts are the leading form of entertainment in the US. Many vaudeville acts prominently feature minstrelsy or “blackface”, the act of White (and eventually some Black) actors painting their skin to take on a caricatured, deliberately mocking impression of African Americans. The first popular blackface act was “Jumping Jim Crow” in the 1820’s, said to be inspired by the dance of a physically disabled slave by the same name. Travelling circus acts prominently feature “freakshows” featuring performers displaying their rare conditions and disabilities, including dwarfism, albinism, and other conditions. African Americans were frequently used in these acts. Sarah Baartman, known as the “Hottentot Venus” was put on display due to having an exaggeratedly large bottom due to a condition called steatopygia.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

1861-1865:

The Civil War is fought, and won by the North following the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, which eventually led to the freedom of slaves starting on June 19th, 1865 (otherwise celebrated as Juneteenth). Black soldiers were an integral part of the Union’s victory, with more than 15 soldier earning a Medal of Honor after the war. Those who fought in the war are also the first African Americans to receive federal disability pensions for veterans.

Read more: Intensely Human: The Health of the Black Soldier in the American Civil War by Margaret Humphreys

Late 1800’s:

Following the abolishment of the 13th Amendment and of slavery, all Southern States eventually passed “Black Codes” and “Jim Crow Laws” to segregate and restrict the rights of former slaves and their descendants during Reconstruction. This leads to segregations of most major institutions and facilities, including hospitals, schools, and facilities for people with disabilities. Black physicians build their careers during this time via segregated hospitals, nursing and medical schools, medical journals and-- in response to the whites-only American Medical Association at the time-- establishing the National Medical Association specifically for African Americans.

Read more: Just Medicine: A Cure for Racial Inequality in American Health Care by Dayna Bowen Matthew

1880’s-1920’s:

Booker T. Washington establishes the Tuskegee institute, which initially teaches nursing and eventually established the first Veterans Hospital for African Americans. He also founded “National Negro Health Week” in the 1920’s to spotlight unaddressed health disparities in the African American community. It spotlights diseases prevalent in the Black community, particularly syphilis and tuberculosis. At the time, African Americans are believed to be predisposed to these diseases due to genetics. Germ Theory later emerges in the 1930’s that reveals that both diseases are infectious. Their prevalence in Black communities is later explained by segregation and poverty concentrating and restricting African Americans to living under unsanitary conditions in low-income communities.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

Early 1900’s:

The field of “Eugenics” is created and mainstreamed in the United States via the American Eugenics Society. The eugenics movement, which originally promoted selective breeding for exceptionally positive traits in affluent communities, eventually focused on eliminating negative traits across society. Eugenicists lobbied for legislation in many states to forcibly sterilize groups with high rates of “undesirable” traits, primarily in poor, disabled, and minority communities. The US Supreme Court upheld the practice in the case Buck vs. Bell in 1927. This resulted in the forced sterilization of over 64,000 people (a low estimate) in the United States alone. The rise of the Nazi movement in Germany and the Holocaust eventually led the movement to lose power by the 1940s, but the practice of involuntary sterilization continued until the mid-1970s, and laws are not codified explicitly banning it until as late as the 2000s.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

1930’s-1940’s:

Hitler assumes power, begins the Third Reich, and eventually begins the Holocaust by segregating, interning, and engaging in genocide of Jewish people, other ethnic minorities, and disabled people across Germany and Western Europe, triggering World War II. Hitler cites American eugenics and sterilization laws as his inspiration for ethnic cleansing and segregation. Over 100,000 African Americans fight in World War II, under segregated conditions. The victory of the US in World War II is thought to be one of the catalysts of the Civil Rights movement and ending of segregation in the US.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

Mid 1930-1970’s:

The “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male”, also known as the Tuskegee Experiments, is initiated by the United States Public Health Service in the 1930s. Contrary to the popular misconception, the study did not infect any African American participants with syphilis. However, a small, predominantly African American community in Alabama was targeted for its high rate of syphilis infections before treatment existed. The goal of the study was to gain an understanding of the long-term effects of syphilis and to discover a potential treatment. Very early into the study, penicillin was discovered as a treatment for syphilis and other bacterial infections and mainstreamed quickly into medical practice around the country. Up to 600 Black participants in the study, however, were left untreated for syphilis during the course of the decades-long study. Many participants were never offered treatment, not formally diagnosed with syphilis but told they had “bad blood”, enticed into continuing treatment in the participating hospital with free healthcare, and given placebos and experimental treatments in place of penicillin. The study was later stopped and abandoned due to these unethical practices, and revealed to the public in the 1970’s with led to lawsuits and congressional hearings. A number of medical studies followed a similar practice of withholding treatment during this era, which disproportionately targeted Black civilians and prisoners in the US.

Read more: Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present by Harriet A. Washington

1950′s:

A number of advances in the medical field and science emerge starting in the post-World War era, among them the discovery of the Polio Vaccine in the 1950′s, advances in cancer treatment, and by the end of the 20th century the study of the human genome. A little-known fact about each of these discoveries is that they are in part thanks to a black woman named Henrietta Lacks. Lacks died in 1951 of a rare form of cancer that produced the first known “immortal cells” that would reproduce outside of the human body indefinitely. Her cancerous tissue, now known as “HeLa cells”, have since been used by researchers to develop treatments and cures of many diseases. Her contribution to medicine is controversial, however, because her tissue was taken without her consent and her family initially was neither made aware of, nor as of today compensated for, the medical discoveries her tissue facilitated.

Read more: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

1950’s-1970’s:

The Supreme Court case Brown vs. Board of Education finds “separate, but equal” segregated facilities unconstitutional and inherently unequal, which slowly leads to the integration of schools, hospitals, and other public facilities. This win eventually sparks the Civil Rights Movement and victories such as the Voting Rights Act and Civil Rights Act in the 1960’s. Among prominent leaders in the movement is Fannie Lou Hamer, who helped organize the Freedom Summer in Mississippi to register Black residents to vote. Fannie Lou Hamer is a survivor of an involuntary hysterectomy, which occurred without her knowledge during a procedure for chronic kidney disease and was a result of forced sterilization laws that targeted Black women and were popular in the South. Another prominent group was the Black Panther Party who, while advocating for Black power, also provided for local Black communities with free healthcare clinics and food pantries. Bradley Lomax, a Black Panther with Multiple Sclerosis, helped to organize the occupation of regional offices of the US Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) for disability rights, knowns are the “504 Sit-ins” that led to the addition of Section 504 of the American Rehabilitation Act of 1973, a precursor to the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.

Read more: Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight against Medical Discrimination by Alondra Nelson

1980’s:

The HIV/AIDS epidemic begins in the early 1980s. It’s first clinically observed in gay communities and receives the name “gay-related immune deficiency” (GRID) until it’s observed in non-LGBTQ communities and receives the name AIDS in 1982. The disease eventually gets the reputation of affecting “the 4-H Club”-- primarily attacking 1) heroine and intravenous (IV/needle) drug users, 2) hemophiliacs and chronically ill patients who give and receive blood in medical settings, 3) homosexuals and the LGBTQ community, and 4) Haitians and poor Black communities in the US and, eventually, globally. The United States government was slow to fund research for AIDS through much of the 1980’s, and one of the Reagan Administration’s first references to the disease was to propose a travel ban on immigrants and tourists with the disease in 1987. While treatment and prevention methods eventually cut infection and mortality rates for HIV, both cisgender and transgender women of color are disproportionately infected and die from AIDS.

Read more: And the Band Played On: Politics, People, and the AIDS Epidemic by Randy Shilts

1990′s:

Disability rights advocacy leads to the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. The ADA ensures the right to “reasonable accommodation” for people with disabilities in public spaces in the US. The ADA is the basis on which Olmstead vs. L.C. and E.W. is decided, which allows people with disabilities to be able to live in their communities rather than be put in nursing homes and other institutions. One of the plaintiffs in the case is Louis Curtis (L.C.), a black woman with a developmental disability.

Read more: Americans with Disabilities: Exploring Implications of the Law for Individuals and Institutions by Leslie Francis and Anita Silva

2010’s:

A series of highly publicized, viral extra-judicial killings of unarmed African Americans by police and white civilians in the news and social media sparks the beginning of the Black Lives Matter movement, which advocates accountability for police brutality and discriminatory treatment of Black people by American institutions. Several of the most high-profile victims of the BLM movement, such as Eric Garner, Keith Lamont Scott, Freddie Gray, Sandra Bland, Deborah Banner, and Laquan McDonald had some form of disability, medical or mental condition. Disabled and deaf people are disproportionately targeted by police brutality due to police hyper-reliance on “compliance” by those facing arrest.

Read more: Disability Incarcerated: Imprisonment and Disability in the United States and Canada by L. Ben-Moshe, C. Chapman, A. Carey

You can find many of these milestones and more events in Black Disability History at the online Museum of Disability History.

Were they any major milestones in Black History that were missed? Please reach out to add it to the list!

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ujamaalive · 5 years ago

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Afro-Spaniards are Spanish nationals of West/Central African descent. They today mainly come from Cameroon, Gambia, Mali and Senegal. Additionally, many Afro-Spaniards born in Spain are from the former Spanish colony Equatorial Guinea. Spaniards of Sub-Saharan ancestry originating in Latin America are generally excluded from this definition.

Afro-Spaniard

Total population Spain 1,045,120 (2016) Regions with significant populations Andalusia, Catalonia, the Balearics, the Canaries, Madrid, Murcia, Valencia Languages Spanish; English, French, Portuguese, various languages of Africa Religion Predominantly Christian (mainly Roman Catholic), Sunni Islam, Traditional African religions, others, nonreligious Related ethnic groups African people, Spanish Equatoguinean, Cape Verdean Spanish, Afro-European

Notable people

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Activists

Antumi Toasijé, historian and Pan-African activist

Artists and writers

Juan Latino, poet and Renaissance humanist

Juan de Pareja, painter

Explorers and conquistadores

Juan Valiente

Juan Garrido

In entertainment and media

Francine Gálvez, journalist

Vicenta Ndongo, actress

Concha Buika, singer

Emilio Buale, actor

Virginia Buika, singer

Frank T, MC and rap producer

Dareysteel, rapper

Desirée Ndjambo, journalist

El Chojin, rapper

Santiago Zannou, film director

Jimmy Castro, actor

Hijas del Sol, music duo

Paloma Loribo, singer

Norberto de Noah, singer and writer

Andrés Montes, journalist

Philanthropists

Bisila Bokoko

Politicians

Dolores Johnson Sastre

Rita Bosaho

Juan Antonio de la Morena Doca, alcalde of Villamantilla

Pedro Oma Nkomi, alcalde of Pampliega

Guillem Balboa Buika, alcalde of Alaró

In sports

Miguel Jones, former football player

Vicente Engonga, football manager and former player

Benjamín Zarandona, retired football player

Venancio José, retired athlete

David Davis, retired handball player

Lauren, retired football player

Rodolfo Bodipo, football manager and former player

Glory Alozie, athlete

Yago Yao, retired football player

Souley Drame, basketball player

Iván Zarandona, football player

Valdo, football player

Rui, football player

Josephine Onyia, athlete

Marta Mangué, handball player

Alfi Conteh-Lacalle, football player

Javier Balboa, football player

Trihas Gebre, athlete

Alemayehu Bezabeh, athlete

Eva Ngui, athlete

Jade Boho, football player

María Bernabéu, judoka

Ruth Ndoumbe, athlete

Mark Ujakpor, athlete

Manuel Onwu, football player

Richard Nguema, basketball player

Godwin Antwi, football player

Jean Marie Okutu, athlete

Stephen Sunday, football player

Rubén Belima, football player

Aauri Bokesa, athlete and basketball player

Iván Bolado, retired football player

José Luis Collins, former basketball player

Serge Ibaka, basketball player

Emilio Nsue, football player

Pedro Obiang, football player

Eddy Silvestre, football player

Joel Johnson, football player

Omar Mascarell, football player

Derik Osede, football player

Jonás Ramalho, football player

Randy, football player

Astou Ndour, basketball player

Keita Baldé Diao, football player

Ilimane Diop, basketball player

Vanessa Blé, basketball player

Mamadou Diop, basketball player

Mamadou Tounkara, football player

Adama Traoré, football player

Iris Junio, basketball player

Larry Abia, basketball player

Sitapha Savane, basketball player

Iñaki Williams, football player

Marcelo Djaló, football player

Pape Cheikh Diop, football player

Nely Carla Alberto, handball player

Alexandrina Barbosa, handball player

Moussa Bandeh, football player

Mohamed Traoré, football player

Yankuba Sima, basketball player

Roberto Tobe, futsal player

Bacari Kambi, football player

Carlos Akapo, football player

Sergio Akieme, football player

Ismael Athuman, football player

Aitor Embela, football player

Igor Engonga, football player

Pablo Ganet, football player

José Kanté, football player

Niko Kata, football player

Josete Miranda, football player

Ana Peleteiro, athlete

Iván Salvador, football player

Boison Wynney, football player

Aridane Hernández, football player

Madger Gomes, football player

Juliet Itoya, athlete

Fátima Diame, athlete

Youba Sissokho, boxer

Gabriel Enguema, boxer

Jael Bestué, athlete

María Vicente, athlete

Joshua Tomaic, basketball player

Sebas Saiz, basketball player

Esteban Obiang, football player

Mujaid Sadick Aliu, football player

Jordi Mboula, football player

Cristopher Moisés, football player

Fátima Diame, athlete

Saúl Coco, football player

Jordan Gutiérrez, football player

Paolo Fernandes, football player

Sergio Hinestrosa, football player

Alberto Edjogo-Owono, former football player

Juvenal Edjogo-Owono, former football player

Juan Epitié, former football player

Rubén Epitié, former football player

James Davis, football player

Ruslan Elá, football player

Óscar Engonga, football manager and former player

Kily Álvarez, football player

Ruth Álvarez, football player

Sergio Barila, football agent and former player

Darwin Echeverry, athlete

Robert Sánchez, football player

Bambo Diaby, football player

Usman Garuba, basketball player

Aitor Ekobo, athlete

Ángel Mañana, basketball player

Óscar Ngomo, basketball player

Sebastián Bacale, basketball player

Riky Mendizábal, basketball player

Gorka Luariz, football player

Mamadou Gassama, handball player

Sekou Gassama, football player

Ángel Binyogba, futsal player

Luis Meseguer, football player

Acoydan McCarthy, basketball player

Adams Sola, basketball player

Federico Obama, football player

Salomón Obama, football player

Salma Paralluelo, athlete and football player

Mabel Okoye, football player

Fatoumata Kanteh, football player

Seth Airam Vega, football player

#AfroSpaniards are #Spanish nationals of West/Central #African descent. They today mainly come from #Cameroon, #Gambia, #Mali and #Senegal. Afro-Spaniards are Spanish nationals of West/Central African descent. They today mainly come from Cameroon, Gambia, Mali and Senegal.

#African immigration to Europe #Afro European

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music-billboard-blog · 6 years ago

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Make Defeats For Cool Jump and Reputation Online

Hip-hop audio is the automobile of hip-hop lifestyle and includes "rapping" (superimposed with vocals) by emcees. Owing to the, hip-hop music might be known as "reputation audio," Nevertheless, those that ignore hip-hop as rap audio do not understand its wealthy history and the influence this style of music is wearing youth culture.

Hip-hop music is a vehicle employed by the singers to deal with racism, oppression, and poverty issues. It narrates reports of internal city African-Americans residing the National desire (through hard work, courage and determination you can obtain prosperity) from underneath up, and bitterly details upon racial discrimination, broken houses, and overcoming adversity.

Created by Jamaican migrant DJ Kool Herc in early 70s in New York Town, it's ever since then distribute their tentacles throughout the world. Herc shifted from reggae files to funk, stone and disco. Owing to the small percussive pauses, he started increasing them utilizing an Music Billboard machine and two records. As the initial style of music turned popular, artists (emcees) started superimposing the music with lines; initially, they introduced themselves and the others in the audience. Later, the rapping became more varied, integrating quick songs, frequently with a sexual or violent concept, in an attempt to entertain the audience.

In the mid-1970s, hip-hop split into two groups. One dedicated to having the group dancing, still another outlined rapid-fire rhymes. The 1980s observed further diversification in hip-hop; extremely metaphoric lyrics rapping around multi-layered beats changed easy vocals. In the 90s, gangsta reputation (glorified outlaw lifestyle) turned mainstream. Hip-hop was shortly an important element of popular music, and the majority of the place songs highlighted an underlying part of hip-hop.

In the 90s and into these decade, elements of hip-hop were incorporated into diverse types of music: hip-hop soul mixed hip-hop and soul audio; in the Dominican Republic, a recording by Santi Y Sus Duendes and Lisa M was coined "Meren-rap," a synthesis of hip-hop and meringue. In Europe, Africa, and Asia, hip-hop has undergone a move from an undercover incidence to the mainstream market.

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abassi-okoro · 6 years ago

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THE SOCIALLY CONSCIOUS AND THE REVOLUTIONARY

by Abassi Okoro

Kwame Toure once spoke on the difference between mobilization and organization of African people in America. I would like to also speak on a difference.

There are two types of black people in America. There are those of us who are interested in "issues" and then there are those of us who are interested in much more. The overwhelming majority of our people believe that they are fighting for the right reasons and in some ways, they are. In the 1960's we fought for Civil Rights and desegregation. That was an issue that was important to us as a people. In the 60's we also fought for fair and equal treatment in the corporate world and in education, and what came out of that was a concept called, Affirmative Action. That was an issue that was important to us. We took it as a victory. The 1980's was a mixed bag. There were some good and some not so good things that took place. We had three black Miss Americas, we had an hour glass shape economic structure (big money in - a trickle down effect and big money out). It was a decade of corporate discrimination, a war on drugs that targeted inner urban black communities, and a new slogan "Afrocentric" which was more about fashion and culture than politics. But we fought the issues that were important to us.

The 90's brought in the crack epidemic, the Bloods and the Crips, the Rodney King beating, riots, the dragging death of James Byrd by white supremacist and, gangsta rap. It wasn't black people's best moment but we fought the issues that were important to us. We didn't win many battles but at least we fought our battles. I suppose there's pride in just playing the game. [It's not whether you win or lose but how you play the game. Well that old adage takes away our natural instinct and will to succeed.] The 2000's to now, Racism has gotten perpetually more brazen and in the past couple of years we have protested and boycotted more in the past two years than we did in the entire decade of 60's - proving that we have hardly taken a step towards real social progress. But, thanks to technology we can take our anger and outrage to social media and forge our dissatisfaction with our current government through Tweets and memes. Some even consider THIS "fighting."

Every time there's an act of injustice or a social issue, we (black folks) have no problem responding to that issue. There's no shortage of black people who are willing to boycott, protest or hold mass demonstrations. A clothing store is selling a racist sweater - let's rally and show them we mean business! We won't shop there any longer. No problem! The company will most likely pull the item from their shelves and we will most likely return to the store as happy patrons a couple of months later after it all blows over. We may even feel accomplished. A black man had the police called on him for doing nothing more than walking into his apartment building and a white woman took one look at him and decided that there's no way he could afford to live there and so she called the authorities. Let's rally and show them how upset we are at that sort of racism. No problem! The woman will probably lose her job at the bank as a result of the video of her harassing the young black gentleman gong viral. We may even feel accomplished. People will always come to rally and protest and scream and pump their fist. People will always come together to address "Issues." We will always gather around "Issues." It's predictable.

Those of us who are revolutionaries and progressive thinkers are not concerned with "Issues." We're concerned with the system. You must understand the difference. People who are concerned with issues are not concerned with reformation, they are concerned with equity. They are the people who pose the questions, "How come I can't have the same slice of pie? How come the white folks are entitled to certain privileges and I am not?" This is how they think. This is not how the revolutionary thinks. The protestors and equal opportunity folks don't want social reform; they just want what they think is "owed" to them and they want it with very little change or sacrifice. They want to be black without being African. Their concerns are always temporary. Once they are are satisfied, they move on to the next "issue" like a virus or forget all together about the previous issue. The two black men who were arrested in Starbucks last April, quick . . . what were their names? See? Because of this short-term memory, these people can easily be fooled around the issue and they often become so enamored by one issue that it seems that it's the only issue worth caring about. It's difficult to get these people to organize or to even organize their own thoughts. They lack continuity and consistency. They are simply not organized.

When you are organized, you don't need money, you don't need fame, fortune, popularity or allies. Why? Because you have power. Despite what some may believe, power does NOT come from money or opportunity. Power comes only from the organized masses (Kwame Toure). America is NOT the most powerful nation on the earth. China is the most powerful nation on the earth - not because they have money but because they are organized! Because they are not concerned with "Issues," they are concerned with systems! Capitalism is not a concept, it is an organized system of private enterprise. Europeans in the 1600's traveled to the west coast of Africa and captured in the excess of 10 million Africans for slavery and they accomplished this not because they had money but because they were organized. Only organization could account for several hundred men having the ability destabalize a country of millions.

Out of many of the issues that we love to rally over, we always fail to rally over the biggest issue, our disorganization. It is safe to say that we can not even organize to talk about our disorganization. Black people in America (displaced Africans) will never be able to fight an organized system while being disorganized. Money is not the answer, our national interest in destabalizing the system is the answer. We must understand our national interest and we cannot exercise so much stupidity to allow that system to convince us of what our interests SHOULD be (money.)

They will happily entertain our desire for money as long as we don't desire what we really need, organization (power). They understand that our lack of economic literacy will pretty much guarantee an hour glass result, (big money in - a trickle down down - big money out). Are you going to spend the rest of your life addressing "Issues" or are you going to stop putting your hand out and start addressing the system that gives birth to these issues? The difference between socially conscious folks and the revolutionaries is that the socially conscious are only conscious SOCIALLY and will only respond socially. They are the issue fighters. Revolutionaries on the other hand are globally conscious. GLOBALLY (hence the term: Revolve) and they see all sides of the sphere. We are the system fighters.

"Fighting the system IS fighting the issues. But fighting the issues is not fighting the system."

- Abassi Okoro

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nomaliqhwa · 6 years ago

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HERE'S WHY #HERSTORY IS ALSO OUR STORY

Nomaliqhwa Hadebe | Illustrations: Zinhle Sithebe

In our roles as rappers, radio hosts, executives, editors, DJs, VJs and patrons – it's women who are the custodians of the culture and who have helped hip hop in South Africa be more than just an imported passing fad.

Hip hop offers a space for reflection, ambition and comfort. It's competitive, raw, badass and nasty. And it can also be melancholic and emblematic, speaking to and for you. Simply put, hip hop belongs to women. And with Castle Lite bringing the first-ever all female line-up to Africa with the #HIPHOPHERSTORY concert, it's an opportune time to reflect on women's impact, starting with the trailblazers who will be on that stage.

Because for a genre that is shaped by many women's hands, the optics that currently represent hip hop still don't show the full picture. The way women are made to feel valueless within the scene, seen only as accessories to men's success is fraudulent. Women are the custodians of hip hop culture in South Africa right now, and it's about time we said it out loud.

"People generally think that with females sex sells and that's the only way you can get the message across. But that's not the case, that's what we are trying to eradicate in any industry that deals with entertainment and women. We are not here to sell ourselves, we are here to communicate with you. And in terms of transformation, that's happening more now." Ayanda MVP

There's a popular tag about Cape Town hip hop being excluded from the greater narrative, and you wouldn't be completely off if you bought into it. Similarly the women doing the work haven't fully received the props that they deserve, which has resulted in a massive oversight of the important conversations and themes that female MCs continue to bring to the forefront. Today, we are privy to rappers like Andy Mkosi and Dope Saint Jude using their narratives to make music that speaks to how race, gender, sexuality and class impact their lives. Legitimising their intersected identities within the bigger scope of the hip hop narrative and allowing that representation to cross over far and wide. Like with the project that was Andy Mksosi's intimate Bedroom Tour, it added an incredibly personal and immersive feel to the way we experience the genre. Demonstrating the different dimensions of what hip hop in South Africa is and can be – even to communities it's been previously known to subjugate.

As in the case of rap supergroup and South African Hip Hop Hall of Famers Godessa. In our narrow perspective we forget to pay homage to these true OGs: three women out of Cape Town who charged forward in their role as pioneers of a mainstream movement at a time when the genre needed a buy in from women and the nation as a whole. Kwaito was at its prime as the urban culture, and reverberated with the South African experience in a way that hip hop did not. Yet Godessa's impact cemented hip hop's place in South African popular culture and ensured that it was more than an imported passing fad. They did that.

Godessa's presence was especially important at a time when the types of conversations we had about marginalised groups weren't as mainstream and as nuanced as they are now. Even while faced with the expectation that's still prevalent to this day – that women must compete with one another for limited seats at the table – they came through as three women of colour from Cape Town. In love with how rap gave them the ability to shape and control, Shame, EJ and Burni disproved the myth that women are each other's opponents by design. They also gave us bop on bops while providing one of South African hip hop's biggest lessons: if this thing is going to survive the early days it's going to have to be through the power of collectives. A call that was heeded nationwide by groups like Skwatta Kamp, Jozi, Teargas and more.

A significant scene in the Roxanne Shante biopic comes at the end when a little boy named Nassir desperately seeks out Roxanne to help him with his rhymes – alluding to a whole Nas needing to know that Roxanne thought he had the ability to one day be a good rapper.

It's worth considering that the reluctance to include women in the conversation may be hinged on an aversion to "women's issues". Perhaps it's the disinclination to rhymes that centre experiences that are not tailored for male consumption that fuels the myth that the quality of rap suffers when women pick up the mic.

But have you noticed how many women's nods a track needs for it to truly take off? In South Africa, one of the greatest examples of the power of women's co-sign is Lee Kasumba. It is her love of hip hop that has led to a career as one of the most prolific personalities in entertainment on the continent, and who has launched rap careers locally and throughout Africa. As a DJ and producer at YFM she created a space for South African hip hop to go mainstream, and then working as the Head of Channel O she now ensures that some of our faves stand a chance at being play-listed. Alongside this her work at Big Brother allows hip hop to leverage a wider audience. Then it is her being part of judging panels for BET Awards, Hype Magazine Awards and the South African Music Awards that has made it so that there are legitimate dreams to chase within the sorority.

Lee Kasumba's flexibility as a creative and conviction that not only does her opinion matter, but that it is important, has helped propel the growth of hip hop across the continent. It's her identity as a Ugandan woman living in South Africa shapes what she envisions and it remains important that she see her visions through because of how far her reach extends to. It's important she makes the career leaps giving her access to more resources and connections, like with the UN projects she is a part of as well as her charity that links African youth together through hip hop, Harambe. In doing so she has created more opportunities for many, broadening the scope and widening the cannon.

Passing the baton on to artists like Moozlie, who as a MTV VJ gave the nod that affected how viewers perceived things, it was her interviews and reporting that made the rest of the country aware of happenings in spaces like Braamfontein and the rap stars and fashions that emerged from those scenes. Her face helped brands integrate themselves into the local scene on a much bigger scale, while her presence as an MC at events brought people to clubs so that DJs could play the songs that in turn made them an integral part of the culture. Not surprising then that as a rapper Moozlie has released material in relatively quick succession that's challenged her male adversaries. Another game-changing move has been starting her own label to ensure that the deals suit her best interest as the artist she wants to be. This is beyond the question of inclusivity, it's a challenge for the crown.

Sure, there's no denying how women are part of hip hop's aesthetics: the booty-shaking, the bottle girls, girls getting sprayed with Champagne, faces on the flyers, bodies doing on campus promotions... That's hip hop too, but so is consistency.

And since the 'Amantombazane' remix, released a good four years ago, Nadia Nakai has consistently delivered. Her rap persona has consistently been the unrelenting foul mouthed rapper, unafraid of courting the crass and challenging whomever for the number one spot. On features she's upfront about her intentions, she isn't there to sing a hook or twerk in the background; she's there to kill that sh*t. Improving her pen game so that each verse is better than the last, Nadia knows that she won't be afforded the opportunity to be lazy or that the predominantly-male industry is waiting for her to be.

If how good she looks is going to grab your attention first then so be it; Nadia uses the agency of her body as a part of her brand and has no qualms tapping into that. Having been featured on some of the biggest and most commercially viable songs Nadia has become an ambassador of the new school and proves how our female rappers may be the hardest working of any of the main players today.

It's this visibility that has created a space for women writers, DJs, rappers and fans to claim ownership in a hyper-masculine space. A power that has given women the room to decide how they want to enjoy what comes from it, as well as the power to out problematic figures from performances while making a point of promoting inclusivity. It's the female buying power that indicates the taste levels in hip hop: the images women aspire to – be it overt sex appeal or boss bitch looks – the fashion we find appealing, and that is empowering. Women need know that we have that power.

We see this online in spaces like Twitter, which has become the first real go-to when one wants to see how well a project is doing. It's the women with the many followers, often brought on by teams as conversation drivers, tweeting out their opinions because their influence is the deciding factor over whether or not a hit will bang. It's the influencers who get asked to promote the big shows and yes it's the mention of Nicole Nyaba and Sophie Ndaba that make a line memorable, downloadable and dare I say, bearable. It's the memes, gifs, Instagram captions, snapchat videos. It's the girls, girls, girls, girls...

At the intersection of hip hop and identity politics women have found that they can create their own spaces that hip hop can live and breathe in. Pussy Party, founded by Phatstoki and Rosie Parade at Kitcheners where women and femmes dominate the space, learn to be DJs and ultimately feel safe enough to enjoy hip hop in the way they want.

What is most inspiring is that we have a new generation of women working their way towards being Lee Kasumbas in their own right. That we can listen to Loot Love on a prime weekend slot on Metro FM and be reassured that our voices matter. Knowing that the idea of collaboration isn't discouraged, that there's room for all of us to eat and still have healthy competition. Knowing that women have the clout to achieve on the same scale as figures who previously took up all the space. It's about acknowledging that hip hop is ours enough for it to be something we feel entitled to enough to hand over.

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twylabain7220-blog · 6 years ago

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101 Points To Perform and see In Australia By John Morrad.

Frederick Douglass increased coming from restraint to become among the foremost abolitionist leaders and advocates who fought to end restraint within the USA in the decades prior to the Civil War. But it must be actually mentioned, that in those days it was actually a major task for a nation female to accomplish in addition to Donna performed. The cash which the federal government is actually to be made use of to make work for the masses is used in producing employment for the people of other nations through having money of Africans frozen in international financial institutions with political money theft. As for the writer of the item, he has actually not listened to or found any type of African nation that is actually referred officially as one of the established nations of the world. In 2005, White Americans balanced a combined math-verbal SAT of 1068, reviewed to 982 for United States Indians, 922 for Hispanics and also 864 for Blacks. Nonetheless, black R&B artist Jackie Wilson claimed, "A bunch of people have accused Elvis of stealing the dark guy's songs, when as a matter of fact, practically every black solo artist copied their stage mannerisms from Elvis." White cover models of smash hits through black musicians typically stilled outsell the originals; it seems to be that many Americans desired black popular music without the black people in it, as well as Elvis had actually most certainly derived his type coming from the black rhythm-and-blues entertainers of the overdue 1940s. Nigeria as a country positioned in the West Africa has endured a lot of political concerns coming from the moment of freedom till day. White rap artists (laughs in the songs field, essentially) have actually taken care of to carve out a niche through laying hold of, emulating, and also co-opting dark" lifestyle in their popular music". What I have actually overlooked is actually that in 2005, Asian-Americans balanced a mixed math-verbal SAT of 1091, so Eastern Americans covered the SAT game, a reality that white colored psycho therapists along with an ethnological plan possess challenge discussing.

Technological Danger: Lack of safety in electronic purchases, the expense of establishing brand-new technology, and the simple fact that these new innovation might stop working, and when each one of these are combined along with the outdated existing innovation, the outcome may develop a dangerous result in doing business in the international sector. It was an opportunity of brutality throughout the country: b3st-body-strenght.info those yearning for peace dealt with and picketed versus the war; those being afraid of the peace-loving "hippies" presented physical violence to reveal the opposite side they really did not want their kind." The action was strong on each edges and was the best scenery for this movie.Lots of Nigerians in the north aspect of the country have immigrated to the nearby nations because of the heat energy" from this team of unsympathetic creatures. Much of the musicians he played with had cross-over beauty; it was a time in America where a Country musician, including Ferlin Husky, might have a pop fined what the majority of might take into consideration a Country track.Currently, the pair seem to be to have everything that individuals need: great looks, amazing success, worldwide popularity, huge wide range as well as a full household with 3 little girls including Gracie, Maggie, and also Audrey. This appears towards indicate clinically that Blacks are much less intelligent than various other Americans, typically.Consult with all etiquettes of experts who are effectively versed in international organisation, finance and rule to prevent losses. I have actually visited to Switzerland however it was actually the summer opportunity still a charming nation as well as this told me of the go to as well.

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fakesam · 7 years ago

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Belated Black Panther Thoughts

Everything happening regarding Black Panther right now feels like a miracle. You can only congratulate a giant, increasingly powerful conglomerate so much for realizing black money runs the same as white money, but it is still a moment to be celebrated. Seeing a movie this proudly black in the limelight, with such a large budget and plenty of promotional backing, is delightfully paradoxical given the toxic whiteness infecting the national atmosphere from the top down. This movie dropped at the right time. The biggest individual piece of promo comes courtesy of Black Panther: The Album, curated by Kendrick Lamar and the rest of the Top Dawg Entertainment braintrust. Licensed movie soundtracks have experienced something like renaissance over the last couple years, a business maneuver congealing the interests of film studios looking for anything to boost social media traffic and musicians to get some extra exposure and a decent payday. The results of these partnerships has been mixed at best, even when the Best Rapper Alive is involved. Remember when Kendrick rapped over an overly macho remix of Tame Impala’s “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”? Most people don’t.

Even with this project, it was easy to develop some cynicism about the final results. Kendrick has become more and more intransigent about being the voice of the voiceless, but he’s hasn't been above easy mainstream pop dollars in the past. Man gave verses to Taylor Swift and Maroon 5, and performed with Imagine Dragons. “All The Stars”, the most successful single off The Album, is a pleasant enough pop-rap hit that struts perfectly over the end credits of a blockbuster, but it lacks the depth of feeling that has made Lamar the current Poet Laureate of Black America. There’s also “Pray For Me”, a Weeknd and Kendrick collab that sounds like it was salvaged off the Starboy cutting room floor. These songs are fine, but eminently forgettable. Thankfully, these tracks are clear outliers, the lone examples of mainstream genuflecting across the entire project. The uniqueness and specificity that makes Black Panther so appealing as a film is also apparent in the sprawling sonic odyssey of its soundtrack. It’s better than anyone could've hoped for.

The playlist era of album design, gives credence to the worst impulses of people just trying to get paid, narrative coherence be damned. Migos’ Culture II was ruined by an engorged tracklist that led to a runtime comparable to most of the nominees for Best Picture at the Oscars. Twenty-four songs was at least ten too many, but who needs an editor when the penalty for choosing quantity over quality is so minimal? But it’s the perfect format for a movie soundtrack.

Kendrick’s ability as a tastemaker has never really been a thing to consider until now. His albums are hermetically-sealed portraits of his psyche, exploring his personal tensions and how they’re informed by his personal history and the lineage of black strife in America. This intricate exploration of his inner self doesn’t leave much room for other voices - the featured artists welcomed into his world are brought in for a very specific purpose. Kendrick is also very selective about the songs of other artists he’s willing to jump on. Combine that with his social media reticence, and the lists of contemporaries that Kendrick listens to are tantalizingly vague. There’s an undeniable intrigue to learning who a near-consensus superstar genius deems worthy of the aux cord. Consciously leeching on to the burgeoning movements of younger rappers is a tactic that Drake has perfected over the years. The two current titans of hip-hop have been acting out a musical cold war for the last couple years, so it’s tempting in a sense to think of Black Panther: The Album as Kendrick running with Drake’s idea of a “playlist project” that he tried to make happen with the release of More Life.

But it’s much more tempting to talk about the sumptuous quality of this music on hand. The litany of artists brought together to assemble this album, a mix of established stars, burgeoning upstarts and total unknowns, bring disparate genres and musical approaches to the table, all cohesively strung together under the diasporic flag of black excellence.

It’s obvious in hindsight to see why Kendrick was so attracted to the project that he asked to oversee the entire soundtrack after watching snippets of the film during its production. The divide between T’Challa and Killmonger’s views on progress mirrors the internal strife that has Kendrick has been ruminating on his entire career. TDE took their role as gatekeepers seriously, drawing delineations between the conflicts of the movie and the endless struggle that is sadly inherent with the black experience. Black Panther could never have the intimate complexity of a solo Kendrick record, but it details the black experience with more nuance than many albums told from one perspective. The strokes are broad, but the completed painting is still worthy of admiration.

Most of TDE shows up in some form. SZA provides the hook on the aforementioned “All the Stars”, Schoolboy Q reminds us of his undeniable charisma on “X”. Ab-Soul puts together his first good verse since his 2012 album Control System on “Bloody Waters”. We even get a glimpse of the lesser seen, frivolous Kendrick on “Big Shot”, a bouncy, “New Freezer” interpolating Travis Scott collab that doubles as the latest entry in the “Dope Rap Songs built around a Flute Sample” pantheon. from rap to pop to heavily indebted house music from South Africa. But it’s the newer faces that making their formal introduction to larger audiences that makes this album genuinely exciting. SOB x RBE have received most of the acclaim for their scene-stealing performance on “Paramedic”, and that praise is warranted, but they’re not the only up and comers who killed it. Jorja Smith makes a war march sound like heaven on “I Am”, and South African artists Yugen Blakrok and Babes Wodumo make their case for international renown on “Opps” and the South African house jam “Redemption”. Kendrick is present on every song - his contributions ranging from being the best rapper alive to windy background vocalist - but he’s very much a secondary figure in the works of others.

It’s bears repeating how remarkable it is that this thing has been allowed to exist. That Future inhales a bunch of helium, interpolates Slick Rick, and asks for a blowjob with one absurdly entertaining turn of phrase. Someone at Marvel signed off on all of this. We should all be thankful for that man or woman or committee of persons. What could’ve been a simple cash grab for TDE becomes something much more stirring and exciting thanks to a commitment to take the source material seriously enough to use it as a launching point for work that is both evocative and entertaining. A perfect table setter for the main event.

As I sat in the chair of the theater waiting for the movie to start, I was slightly nervous about the quality of the movie. The hype cycle had spun into overdrive had built the movie to stratospheric heights. Black Panther stopped being a movie and became a religious communion. That’s a lot to live up to. Aside from the inescapable expectations created by fans, Marvel’s cinematic spell lost their power over me years ago, as the negative aspects of the “Movies as TV episodes” system became more glaring. Nothing of consequence ever happened and the action scenes were overwrought and anticlimactic, antiseptic, CGI-soaked action that put me to sleep. The last comic book movie I enjoyed without much reservation was the first Guardians of the Galaxy, way back in 2014, 87 years ago. Even Wonder Woman, one of the rare superhero films allowed to take some risks - as much as giving women the chance to be all-powerful warriors without the prompting of a man counts as a risk to some people - lost me during the third act when Gal Gadot fought a Bloodborne boss yelling corny “Give In To Evil and Join Me!!!!!!!” dialogue in the middle of a flaming airfield. When comic book movies go extremely comic book-y, I lose all interest. My expectations were middling despite the widespread adoration of the movie that compelled me to go see it in the first place. Not quite as cynical as I tend to be, but not wearing a T’Challa costume to the theater.

By the time the entire elite class of Wakanda was shimmying from on high while T’Challa fought for the throne of this Afro-futurist utopia (the first time this happens), I realized how wrong my assumptions were. I didn’t realize how much I needed this movie to exist. Just witnessing this much blackness - a proud, intelligent, secure version of blackness - actively enriched me while I was watching it. The power of representation isn’t lost on me, but I believed I was past the point where I would experience such gratification from a giant blockbuster. I underestimated how affirming it would be to see this much black prosperity on film. It’s amazing how impactful the casting of black actors in roles usually given to white people can be. I’m jealous of little kids who can look up to Shuri or T’Challa or Nakia and feel a little less ashamed of themselves at a young age. M’Baku’s capacity to be large and menacing and also capable of telling jokes about cannibalism is magical. I would watch all of these characters do anything for hours. Instant icons, all of them.

Black Panther also solves the eternal villain problem that’s been flummoxing superhero films since Heath Ledger died. Killmonger is incredible. He is still a villain, since his endgame of choice is to start a literal race war, but his motivations and reasoning up to that point are totally understandable. From an outsider’s perspective, Wakanda is this hovel of selfish conservatism that does nothing to stop systemic oppression and kills anyone who whispers about their existence too loudly. Sitting pretty in their Vibranium-powered towers above the struggle. It’d be easy to resent Wakanda if you’ve never seen Shuri pranking T’Challa in her lab. The most logical emotion for him is anger. He went out like a G, too. That last line was perfect. I would have liked to see more of a conversation between Killmonger and T’Challa before he took over, but you can only hope for so much civil rights philosophizing in a blockbuster. It was enough to feel like the obligatory third act battle was had actual stakes. Black Panther finally made the Game of Thrones fandom sensible to me. Political maneuvering can be way more engaging than I realized. Blame George Lucas for that train of thought.

I find it hard to think about this movie in any critical sense because I’m so happy that it was allowed to exist in this form. After sleeping on it, I will concede that the South Korea sequence didn’t need to be that long. The “Andy Serkis is a Soundcloud rapper” goof was an airball. But anyone who would rather complain about about the scene’s usefulness as a plot device more so than celebrate the badassery of Chadwick Boseman and Danai Gurira is not to be trusted. Same goes for the fact that this movie has a sense of humor that can’t be reduced to just Tony Stark saying something snarky or tryhard quirkiness, Guardians of the Galaxy 2 style. They really let Ryan Coogler do that shit. Black Panther is the first Marvel movie that was clearly in the hands of an auteur, with a vision uncompromised by studio notes or the compulsion to tie itself to the rest of Marvel Cinematic Universe. This movie never feigns interest in the machinations of the Avengers or whatever wold-destroying portal they need to destroy, and thank god for that. The narrowness of the story lends itself to much more in-depth character development and a sense of place. It rarely feels or looks like other Marvel movies. Wakanda is too good for reality, but the open designs of the shopping areas and the impeccable fashion of the citizens tied into the history of African culture in a way that's easy to intuit. Shoutout to the Codeine Crazy-esque skyline in T’Challa’s first herb-induced vision. Shoutout to the guy with the giant disc in his mouth. Man had fits for days.

Even my mom loved it. I saw the movie with her and Danai Gurira’s performance was so good that she thought about shaving her own head in her honor. She also said she wanted braids like Angela Bassett’s character, but quickly decided against it because of the time commitment to getting such a hairstyle. But getting that level of inspiration from a Marvel movie spells out how special Black Panther is. I rarely watch movies with her anymore. Our tastes have mostly split as I’ve grown up. I haven’t seen her that giddy walking out of the theater since… ever? Her love of the movie really made it clear how special this moment is for the culture. I kinda hate that I said for the culture, but I don’t know how to end this. Many thanks to Ryan Coogler and company for giving me that moment. Uhhhhhhhhhh bye.

#black panther #movies

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freelanews-blog · 5 years ago

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Six richest Nigerian kid-celebrities, net worth

As kids, we all fantasized about growing up and becoming rich and famous. Talent surely has no age barrier as long as you are willing to showcase such talent to the world. Such was the case of these 6 Nigerian children-celebrities who have created a niche for themselves in the entertainment industry. At a very tender age, these ones make impressive amounts through talents and fame that they have built over time. 1) Emmanuella Emmanuella Samuel, born July 22, 2010, is popularly known as Emmanuella. She is a YouTube child Comedian on Mark Angel YouTube channel. In 2017, Mark Angel Comedy YouTube channel became the first-ever Nigerian-owned YouTube channel to hit a million subscribers. Emmanuella started comedy when she was only five years old. She was on a family holiday and met with Mark Angel. He needed some kids for his comedy shoot, and called a few children he knew for the audition but they couldn’t memorize their lines. He then turned to Emmanuella and she excelled despite the eighteen-hour-long video shoot, a stunt he pulled to test the endurance of the kids. After her selection, Mark Angel had to convince her parents to let her become a part of the Mark Angel Comedy team and got their approval. Her fame started after the comedy skit “This is Not My Real Face Oh” in which she was making jokes about a teacher to her fellow student without knowing the student was the child of the teacher. This short skit was featured on CNN’s Facebook page. The Imo born comedian has won numerous awards such as the award for Top Subscribed Creator from YouTube at the inaugural edition of the Sub-Saharan African YouTube Awards. She also won the Best New Comedienne & Princess of Comedy awards at the Afro-Australia Music & Movie Awards (AAMMA) among other. In 2018, Emmanuella was invited to the National Assembly by former Senate President Bukola Saraki on account of her landing a role in a Disney film. She currently has a net worth of $90,000 that is over 20 million naira. 2) Ahmed Star Boy Before his encounter with popular musician Wizkid, Ahmed was just a young kid pushing to become a child star in the music Industry. In 2017, luck came on 13-yr-old Ahmed when Wizkid was simply performing at one of his concerts and noticed a boy in the crowd, singing along with so much energy.“Why you never sleep, come on stage,” Wizkid reached out to him. Young Ahmed, seized the window of opportunity, dropped some of the best bars of the night. Surprised by his rapping skills, Wizkid promised to sign him. He, however, gave Ahmed N10m and signed him into his star boy records. Prior to signing with Wizkid, Ahmed was always hanging around malls and pursuing his music by rapping for strangers. Ahmed is worth an estimated N10m 3) Destiny Boy Afeez Adesina Popularly known as Destiny Boy became famous after he covered the song IF (by Davido) and got noticed. His talents and hardworking character helped him to get promoted in the pop-music industry in Nigeria. The 15-yr-old Fuji pop artiste was born in Agege. According to him, his style of music was influenced by the area he grew up in where Fuji was is a societal soundtrack. He is worth an estimated N8m. 4) DJ Young Money This is one of the richest celebrity kids in Nigeria. The talented 12 years old DJ makes millions of Naira through different contracts and performances. In 2016, he signed a deal with K-Nation Entertainment, as the in-house DJ of the Label. The young DJ took over the disk jockey business from his father and is unarguably the richest child DJ in Nigeria. He is believed to be worth about N20m. 5) Egypt Ify Ufele Ify is a Nigerian-American designer who found joy in designing outfits for all occasions. She is the founder of Bully Chasers charity, she reportedly began her plus-size fashion line Chubiiline after being bullied in school. Despite starting to make clothes for herself, the 14-year-old girl also make clothes on mannequins and get them ready for fashion shows. The young designer was born on May 3, 2005, to Dr Reba Perry and Emeka Ufele. Her older sister Sade Perry is also a fashion designer. This got little Ify interested in owning her clothing line. According to her profile, she was diagnosed with critical asthmatic health condition because of her weight which made her go in and out of the hospital. After her heath got better, Ify returned to school but was bullied by some of her school mates. They said she was too chubby. Chubby or not, Ify makes a lot of money. At her age, she has an estimated net worth of N10m. 6) OzzyBosco Wonderkid OzzyBosco Wonderkid OzzyBosco Wonderkid is a Pop Singer. He was born on January 7, 2007, in Nigeria. During his first televised performances, he was already compared to the Nigerian superstars D’Banj and Naeto C. He hailed as the most successful child performer in Africa. After winning the Nigerian Kids Got Talent in 2011, he has worked steadily to make a name for himself and to become the biggest performer in Africa. According to Wikipedia, Forbes OzzyBosco Wonderkid’s estimated net worth is under review. However, he is believed to be worth nothing less than N20m Read the full article

#richestnigeriakid

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planetwalker · 8 years ago

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Reflections on 6 years of sobriety

Today, May 18th, I officially have not had a drop of alcohol in my system for six years. It has been a long road, and without the support of my family, my friends, and my therapist I would likely be dead or in prison. More that likely, dead. Also, I would like to thank a doctor I knew personally (she shall remain nameless) who risked her professional career by prescribing me medicine to keep me from going into seizures when I quit drinking the first time at twenty (for a year and a half), because of my refusal to go to rehab or do it any other way than in my house, alone. I woke myself up with an alarm every four hours for over ten days to manually check my own blood pressure and administer the medicine that would keep me alive and not convulsing, seizing, or having delirium tremens. It wasn't pretty.

My alcoholism had taken me to a depth of insanity that ended in me finally drinking nearly a 1.5 liter bottle of hard liquor a day, plus beer to wash it down. That's when your tolerance has beaten you so far into the ground that you pretty much just wake up and begin drinking again. There's just not enough time in the day to drink that much otherwise. That is no exaggeration. From about 10am until 5am the next morning, I would drink whiskey in a nearly constant way. There would often only be a half-inch of the largest bottles of liquor they sell left in my freezer by morning. A hair of the dog that bit me, which would get me to the liquor store for a fresh new dog. I think I spent about 25 dollars a day on booze for those 5 last (and worst) years after my initial relapse. That's about 45,000 dollars, more than triple what I have ever made in a year of my working life.

On this sixth anniversary of sobriety though, I'm not really reflecting on my accomplishments in the past, but I'm using it as an opportunity to talk about something far more deadly and much more hard for me to deal with, or speak about. I have to begin at the beginning, but every word of this is difficult to write, I will try my best to speak openly and honestly.

After many years of denial, after being psychologically tested at fourteen years old and severely misdiagnosed and mismedicated, put on lithium, and poisoned to a point of amnesia. After a week in a psychiatric hospital at twenty due to suicidal ideation, and after eleven more years of waiting (including these six sober years), I finally went to a psychiatrist to get a full mental health assessment, at the behest of my family. A multitude of tests, by the most progressive and up to date standards were administered by an expert clinician. I waited to hear the conclusion I pretty much have known my whole life was coming: I have Bipolar II, without a shadow of a doubt, and on the nose.

The good news: I have rote number memorization in the 99th percentile, as well as a smattering of other high-functioning brain abilities that I cannot take any real credit for. I just know how to memorize and remember things in a way that seems insane to most people. I can recite texts I read when I was ten forwards and backwards. I once made a rap out of the alphabet being recited backwards. I remember memorizing decks of randomized playing cards as a kid, just for fun, to see if I could name the last card in the deck. I found out many years later after requesting my transcripts that my IQ had been tested at fourteen as well during those psych exams and largely said the same thing, I was in the 99.975 percentile, something like 151. Unfortunately then, their only concern was me being able to "sit down and listen in school", which I found to be impossible, boring, and frustrating to the point that acting out was my only recourse. I remember refusing to say the pledge of allegiance in the 4th grade after reading a book on my own about the genocide of American Indians, and the horrors of slavery instituted by the very same people who wrote these documents. I was a little shit, too smart for my own good, and I needed to be controlled.

I was expelled from school in the 6th grade for printing out "The Devil's Cookbook" (essentially a bomb making guide, and anarchist literature), from the schools library, hundreds of pages. I went to a "democratic school" run by hippies for the rest of the year where I mostly skateboarded and flirted with girls. I spent 7th grade with my father living in South Africa, and was quickly shuffled out of middle school after arriving back halfway through 8th grade. They couldn't wait to get rid of me. My one saving grace was my music teacher named Ken Johnson, who always let me stay late after school and practice guitar, piano, singing. I don't think I could have finished that year without his support, he turned me on to great music I never would have heard. Mostly, he just got that was talented and interesting, and not just a little shit. That pretty much ended my formal education. I read manuals and textbooks in my spare time and proceeded to get my GED at 15 and tested again to receive a stamped and signed high school diploma (with honors!) from the Rockville Board of Education (the same document all my fellow graduating seniors would get at 18, after wandering the halls for four years of the hellhole I abandoned). I still think skipping high school was the smartest decision I ever made in my life. I have never met anyone who says they learned almost anything in high school except "I still have friends that I know on Facebook", which really says a lot. I was accepted into The Evergreen State College two days before my sixteenth birthday. I had not filled out the small line that asked for age on the application, and apparently nobody noticed. I flew across the country to Olympia, Washington that spring and began my studies in creative writing, ecology, and a self-created major with my friend Sky Cosby: "Liberating the voices of incarcerated youth", which we had a brilliant and very optimistic professor graciously sign off on. We called it "Celldom Heard". We threw a great hip-hop showcase in Red Square that year, as well as producing a DIY chapbook of prisoner literature. My drinking career also really took off at this time, as I was a seventeen year old on a college campus thousands of miles away from home. My gambling too, playing poker anywhere I could, often at seedy clubs and online with a pre-paid debit card, as well as hosting poker tournaments with everyone I knew and could convince to lose their money to me. I could do anything I wanted. I never lied about my age, but simply refused to tell anyone for quite a long time. Age is just a number, right? Says any self-righteous seventeen year old.

My grandiosity surely impressed people; I have been a performer since as long as I can remember (my mother always jokes that I was ready to go entertain people since I left the womb). A magician at five, playing piano and performing music by ten; writing, slamming poetry at the national championships at fifteen, it never stopped. I was in the center of the room, and I thought that meant something, not just that I was an egomaniac, sure to be on the cover of Rolling Stone by the time I was twenty-one. My parents couldn't understand why I could never get up for school, they didn't know till years later that I would put a towel under my door to block the light and stay up all night reading and writing, until about 5:30, where I would sleep for thirty minutes before my father came down the hall to wake me up for the bus. I don't know how I survived. Years pass; trying to drink my hypomania away, trying, jamming alcohol down my throat followed by NyQuil, Ambien, Benedryl, all to try to just get to sleep, that one unattainable goal I could never quite reach. At some point my dreams just disappeared into darkness. As the years progressed further, some of the darker sides of hypomania began to present themselves; impulsive spending, reckless gambling, strings of unhealthy sexual relationships, all of which were doomed to failure from the start. Anger, rage, darkness, depression, and finally, the scariest points of this last year of my life: Mixed-Episodes.

In the past year and a half, I have had to experiment with a regimen of drugs until finally finding the right dosage and medicine to help me live a functional life. And as much as people can be proud of you for conquering alcohol, it's a much harder beast to speak out about your mental illness. I remember once going on a date, and the first thing my date started talking about was her "crazy bipolar ex-boyfriend", he was an "alcoholic too, so I'm so glad you don't drink". What to even say? I'm a fucking mess, girl, you don't want to get anywhere near me, trust me. And what to do? Deny, deflect, and continue to function (sobriety will buy you a lot of time in doing this, as you can use it as an excuse that you've gotten help and are doing fine). Hypomania, actually also keeps you functioning at such a high level. I have been able to operate on about 4-5 hours of sleep for as long as I can remember. I produce music all night in my solitary zen wonderland, read about 3-4 non-fiction books a week, about topics from psychophysiology to economics to super-string theory. Memoirs about drug abuse to politics to mountain climbing. Anything I could get my hands on. People wondered at work out loud often to me "where do you find the time?!". My response was always the same: I am awake and doing things when you are asleep. My hours of extra work were from 10pm-5am. That's seven hours of intense, single-minded focus that hypomania can provide you with, and it is a very very hard thing to want to give up, especially if your depressive spells are severe, but not all that frequent.

This went on for years. I traveled the world, studied all manners of healing and spirituality, motorcycling through the dirty terrain of Cambodia at night, swerving around cattle barely visible until hitting the glint of my low-beams, yards ahead. Being chased by wild dogs on a night I was sure I was going to die and be ripped to pieces. Nothing could stop me. Ever. I was a star exploding at light speed through the galaxy, burning as bright as anything you had ever seen, but sure to collapse upon it's own weight and gravity eventually. I paid this no mind, as I had decided at about twelve that I was sure I would never make it to my 30th birthday alive. I didn't really want to. I wanted to live, hard, fast, intense, non-stop, now. I came pretty close to making that pact a reality. I'm only 31 now, but this year I finally made strides to comprehend and look deeply at who I am and what is happening to me, and what factors are chemical imbalances in my brain, rather that just my insane hyperactivity. I had never even thought to blame anyone but myself. Or thank anyone but myself. My choices were my fault. Everyone else's judgements about me were right, but fuck them, I didn't care, I'll move on to someone else who sees the good parts with the darkness hidden.

The mixed episodes began, and got worse quickly. This is where you have the intensity of the hypomania mixed with the self-hatred of the deepest and darkest depression you have ever felt. Suddenly all that energy I had to conquer the world was turned inwards into a pattern of suicidal ideation, agoraphobia, blowups with close friends, despising my family, hanging up on my father after screaming matches, all of it, more. So much more I can't even write it all down. It was the hardest time of my life, a thousand times harder than my worst days of drinking, without a doubt. At least then I had something to numb out the pain, something to try and quell the manic thoughts and get some sleep. I always used to say "drinking *is* a coping skill, it's just not a healthy one." It's true. Now, instead, I had hypersomnia, sleeping 14 hours a day, unable to get out of bed, whole weeks where I never left my house, fear of everything outside. I was so scared I bought a gun. Then I was scared that I had a gun in my house. Worried I might shoot myself, or worse, mistake some passerby as a burglar and shoot some innocent stranger. Afraid and anxious about the outside world, uncontrollable sobbing for hours at a time, the inability to pull myself out of it for more than 20 minutes before collapsing back into the despair and pain I can't describe as anything short of brutal psychological torture.

The first doctor I saw in New Orleans (who I later found out accepted thousands of dollars from big pharma, of course) told me outright that he didn't care about the tests, he was sure I had Bipolar I, which is much scarier and involves hallucinations, delusional thinking (I am Barack Obama, people are out to get me, etc.), psychosis, and far worse symptoms. He prescribed me tranquilizers that nearly killed me in the following three months. My depression worsened. He suggested I up my dosage. I declined. I am very fortunate and lucky that he was wrong about me having Bipolar I, and that I have the lesser of these two evils, and I never forget that.

That didn't matter though: my agoraphobia worsened to the point that I couldn't get into my car, could barely make it to my porch to check my mail. I didn't go grocery shopping for three months and ate chinese food ever night. Agoraphobia, means literally "fear of the public square", and comes from our (very smart) reptile brains that were afraid of the open savannah. This is because birds of prey could see us from above and pick us off while exposed without a tree to hide beneath. It is a very primal instinct, and hard to counteract. My anxiety attacks got worse and worse, the medication wasn't helping, it was making things worse, but I continued to swallow them down, convinced I was just adjusting. I was not.

My parents finally begged me to come home to Connecticut and see a doctor who was a specialist with Bipolar males of my age, and after months of fighting them off, I reluctantly agreed. And he likely saved my life. He took my off the tranquilizer immediately, and I began to experience emotions again. Not great ones, but at least something. And then I was put on Lamictal, the only Bipolar medication that has been approved for Bipolar II and come on the market since Lithium did in 1948. Lithium is the aforementioned drug that I refused to ever try again, after I was put on it at fourteen, and which cost me a year of my life I can barely recall but for hazy half-memories, lost in a sea of white noise. And to the gracious angels, goddesses, or simply to the smart psychiatrists diagnosing me correctly and providing me with a plan of action including proper medication and therapy, have saved my life.

I cook dinner every night. I went to the grocery store the other day, then the bank, then the post office. I didn't even mind. It felt kind of great. I always ask how people are doing, a habit I've always done. It's amazing how the little things can go such a long way. When I call Cox to complain that my internet has gone out again, I always start with "Hey, my name is Sam Dillon, how are you doing today?". The other night I was met with "No one has asked me that in a week". Try it, it's pretty fun. Sometimes a grocery store clerk will literally break down in tears and tell you about her bad day. That happened not to long ago too. I still go to sleep late still, up reading books, but when I'm ready to fall asleep, I drift off into the odd and vivid dreams I remember having since I was a child, the same ones that disappeared for more than a decade. I am on the path to recovery, not there yet, and as with my alcoholism, I take small steps and don't get ahead of myself.

I was born with a strange chemical imbalance, not much different that someone with diabetes or anemia or Crohn's disease or autism. The large difference is the stigma. When you are an impulsive, grandiose, gambling, alcoholic maniac, nobody gives you much slack that you can't just "get your life together", "fix your problems", or simply "stop acting this way". There is no discussion of treatment (other than AA, a religious doctrine started by holocaust-deniers, sorry AA folks), not much in the way of offering help, a lot of blame and a small amount of empathy. You can only burn so many bridges before people don't want to come near you. And I've burned a lot. Lost of a lot of good friends. Sometimes I'm amazed that most of my family still even talks to me. Some of them barely do. I understand. I empathize. I get it. I know why, even though I know they also just don't understand what I have been struggling with my whole life and simply blame me and say I "always play the victim".

I have not been easy to deal with for many, many years. Even in sobriety I have been a raging asshole to deal with at times. At the height of my hypomanic episodes I have been explosive, unpredictable, and stubborn beyond belief. Impossible to deal with. I have always been this way, in a sense, and for many years, it served me. I skipped high school completely, choosing to get my education through books, following politics and world affairs, listening to everything around me, absorbing knowledge and skills like a sponge, learning from the world and by trial and (a lot of) error. When I made a decision, there was no challenging me or changing my mind. I followed my gut to the ends of the earth and back. Nobody could have stopped me, though many tried.

So on this day I celebrate six years since I touched a drop of alcohol, I guess I would like to begin not by celebrating at all, but by admitting what I was actually trying to drink away, the hypomania, the depression. By admitting that getting to the root of a problem is often just the beginning of seeing a deeper one. That hitting rock bottom only happens when you stop digging, and try to find a way out. That stigmatizing people who are mentally ill is killing millions of people every year. That suicide recently surpassed homicide as the second-leading cause of death in teenagers each year, after car accidents. That our military veterans come home wounded in body and mind and have a suicide rate that is drastically high, with little to no mental health treatment available. Just "be a man and deal with it" leads to guns being put to heads, nooses being wrapped around throats. That we as a society must change the way we treat the mentally ill, simply as people who have an illness no more controllable or treatable alone than Parkinson's. What's the difference? There is no difference but our mind-state, that's the difference. I worked in a Psychiatric hospital for almost 7 years, and I am still amazed at the daily comments from doctors, nurses, staff in general: "Oh, she's just Borderline", "He's just an attention-seeking teenage brat", "He's just classic Bipolar, throw him on Seroquel". "She's just a Benzo-head", "He's just a fucking drunk", "If he even starts acting up, throw him into isolation and we'll put him down with a shot of B52", (this is what we called the injected cocktail of Benedryl 50 with 2mg of Ativan, the B50-2). "He's crazy as a loon". "Don't even try to talk to her". "He's just an old asshole". "Homeless grunt trying to get a free meal". "He's not nice enough, I don't think we should let his kids visit". "She's a classic cutter, let her find a paper clip and do her worst, just ignore her". Daily. During "Report", as they called it. On the floor of the hospital within earshot of other patients. Sometimes directly to a patients face. Adults, Adolescents, Children as young as four years old. I worked directly with them all. And every time I heard "YOU JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND", I remember distinctly thinking: "You're right, I don't understand your exact nature, your exact chemical imbalance or behavioral disorder, but I refuse to not try and help you in whatever way I can. I will show you as best I can that I am WILLING to try to understand, not just that I do", because most of the time, you just don't. But you can try. Empathize. Don't be scared of us. We're your mailmen, postal workers, neighbors, bartenders, waitresses, telemarketers, local business owners, bosses, employees, co-workers, friends, family, loved ones, heroes and heroines.

Which leads me to my last thought. Last night we lost another amazing musician and gentle soul to suicide, Chris Cornell. Add him to the list of amazing artists we have lost to suicide, drugs, and alcohol over the last few years, decades, and the list is too great to comprehend. And the biggest killer of us all is the inability to speak out without being judged, I can speak to that from experience. Saying (or writing) all of this is very hard, when I could be taking myself out to a steak dinner and saying "I used to spend 25 bucks a day on booze, time to treat myself to something nice". I could be getting a relaxing massage. I used to do that. I don't anymore. Now I reflect on what comes next, what the future looks like, what I can do about it personally and globally, and what is beyond my control. I urge other members of my community, and communities around the world to speak up and speak out for themselves and those they love when confronted with the silence that permeates mental illness and awareness of all kinds.

We can't afford another Robin Williams, Chris Cornell, Aaron Swartz, Kurt Cobain, Hemingway, Hunter S. Thompson, Van Gogh, Sylvia Plath, Virginia Woolf, David Foster Wallace, et al. The thousands of unnamed teenagers and unknown mothers and fathers who have to live every day knowing their child is gone. We as the mentally ill need to speak out, and we as a culture need to speak out against the stigma, which increases mortality rates more than any chemical in our brains, of that I am sure. So, help us. Stand up for us. Yes, ask us to get help for ourselves too, and be patient when we need time, or aren't sure, or don't want to talk about it, but keep on pressing. We need the reminder, even when we don't want to hear it. We need the reminder that someone needs us on this earth, and they refuse to let us go without fighting for our lives, and without us fighting for our own.

"Most of us are acutely aware of our own struggles and we are preoccupied with our own problems. We sympathize with ourselves because we see our own difficulties so clearly. But as Ian MacLaren noted wisely, “Let us be kind to one another, for most of us are fighting a hard battle.”

Good luck and godspeed.

May 18th, 2017

Sam Dillon

#suicide #suicide prevention #mental illness #bipolar #bipolar 2 #alcoholism #recovery #chris cornell #robin williams #van gogh #kurt cobain #david foster wallace #hemingway #sylvia plath

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blkrosebks · 8 years ago

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Franklin Jones #GitLitBookSocialClub Here's the true, and secret reason why they've socially engineered many Black people to call themselves n#ggers, thugs, hoes and bad bitches. Words become thoughts within our mind. Our thoughts are important part of our inner wisdom and they are powerful. A thought held long enough and repeated often enough becomes a belief. A belief becomes your biology. This happened without most people even realizing it. Certainly there are some of you that will doubt that disclosure--- especially those of you that frequently uses those terms and are therefore already under it's programming. However, this disclosure is verifiable. To do so all you have to do is conduct a mental review of your own circle of friends and family. Then critically think about the behavioral and life style differences between those of that frequently uses the terms of bitches, hoes, niggers and thugs, and those family and friends that do not. There are always some slight exceptions to every rule, however for the most part- if you're being totally honest with yourself then you'll admit to noticing that those people that do not use those terms, to describes themselves and others, tend to carry themselves within a higher degree of self respect. Words do have power. Furthermore, if you pay closer attention you'll even notice that most of our Blacks youths that wears their pants sagging from their asses are very often the same ones that habitually uses the word nigger to describes themselves. Moreover, men that frequently calls their women bitches, and hoes may also have a higher tendency to frequently mistreat their women-because disrespecting women naturally comes easier for a man that regards her as being a bitch,or a hoe. And women that proclaim themselves as being bitches tends to have no problem acting like a bitch. And a man the proclaims himself as a being a thug is more likely to engaged within a fight than he is to try and avoid one, etc... Again words do have power! Words become thoughts within the our mind, and these thought when held long enough and repeated often enough becomes a belief. A belief that eventually becomes our biology. This phenomenon happens without the persons using the words even realizing it. THE WHITE SOCIAL ENGINEERING SCIENTIST HAVE STUDIED THIS PHENOMENON SINCE THE 1930's Presently there are white social engineering scientists that manipulates the perceptions and opinions of the masses. These men govern our minds, molds our opinions of the world, and of ourselves through the societal information they present to us through the media. Because whites control the media that Black people routinely receives this allows these social engineering scientists to shrewdly indoctrinate self deprecating cultural norms among the Black population. Self deprecating cultural norms that gets us using terrible words to describe ourselves. Case and point: THE WORD BITCH: For years the term "Bitch" was deemed extremely offensive to millions of Black women. However, once they started putting the word in rap songs and repackaged it to sound empowering as being a "Bad Bitch"--behind a cool musical track, young Black girls then became desensitized to the term. Then before long many Black girls began using the term to describe themselves as being "Bad Bitches". Millions of Black women, young and not so young, were socially engineered to perceive themselves as bad bitches through popular music. Most of us believe that the media reflects our reality, but it is in fact rarely ever the case. The media most often forms our behaviors, beliefs, and perceptions of our collective selves through the images that it routinely shows us. The media's ability to effect the beliefs, control the behaviors, and form cultural norms among Black populations is immensely powerful. So much in fact, that if the white media social engineering scientist wanted blacks youths to start walking around daily with a Afro comb in their right back pockets, all they would have to do is routinely saturate the media ( rap videos and movies) with that image being depicted as being very cool. In doing so our Black youths would then adopt the image as being totally of their own making although it is fact not. It is an image created by white social engineers. Those Black people that do not think critically--and question the validity of all information being constantly fed into their minds from entirely white sources--never notices what is being done to them. This is all possible because people are like a computers, all you have to do is keep giving them certain information every so often and you can persuade an entire country or nation towards an implied objective. Because perceptions created by the media leads to non-deliberate thoughtful decision-making or decision below the level of consciousness. It has been called "thinking without thinking", and it ultimately leads to unconscious similar behaviors. It doesn't matter if the information is true or not most will agree because they too have been given the same information. This also means that they that controls the media that a population watches, also controls the collective brainstem of that population. THE WORD NIGGER Perhaps their greatest feat of negative media social engineering is seen in how white media controllers took the word of "nigger", a words once reviled and deemed deeply offensive by millions of African Americans, and not only desensitized them to the word, but also convinced millions to now favorably perceive the word as a term of endearment. Up until the mid 1960's the word nigger was viewed unfavorably by most African Americans. That era's generation of African Americans had experienced dehumanizing segregation, and many also had great grand parents that were born during slavery. Therefore, they knew intimately well the brutality and degradation that often accompanied the ugly taunts of the word nigger. Therefore, the usage of the word was most often forbidden within many African American homes. It was deemed as being a profoundly offensive word. The usage of the word nigger became more accepted among African Americans during the late 60's and early 70's as the popularity of Blaxploitation films grew. Blaxploitation is a term coined in the early 1970s to refer to black films that were aimed at black audiences. Featuring African-American actors in lead roles, the films were frequently condemned for stereotypical characterization and glorification of violence. Critics of the films saw them as morally bankrupt and as portraying black actors in the most negative way. Those Blaxploitation film were most often written, directed, and produced by Whites. It was that era's Black exploitation films that first taught African American youths on a national level that it was a cool and trendy term of endearment to call themselves niggers. In those films, most often written entirely by whites screenplay writers, black actors were hired to shuck and jive and to repeatedly called themselves niggers. The word was even made to appear as being funny at times. Such as in the contexts of "Nigger Please". This favorable nigger indoctrinating process was repeated in countless numbers of Blaxploitation films. Here's a list of just a few of those movies: The Black Klansman (1966), Black Like Me (1964) Black Lolita (1975), Black Mama White Mama (1973), Black Rage (1972), Scream Blacula Scream (1973), Shaft (1971), Shaft in Africa (1973), Shaft's Big Score (1972), Sheba, Baby (1975)etc... Within each of these films, financed by White owned movie studios, Black actors routinely called each other niggers. Some of these films also blatantly included the word nigger in its titles such as Boss Nigger (1975), Run Nigger Run (1974), and The Soul of Nigger Charley (1973) etc... Most people think that movies are made for nothing more than entertainment. That never was the case. The greatest social messages are promoted through movies. Social norms promoted through films can influence the way of thinking and the “cognitive map” of the populated audience. In a normal conversation when using logic and facts your guard is naturally up. But when your watching a movie there's no debate, your guard is down, the sensor part of your brain is not in action, it isn’t saying yes I agree with this, or I disagree with that like you would in a debate or a conversation. You’re actually in an alpha state being completely downloaded with ideas and images. Those Blacks exploitive films were well received by many African American audiences because they provided them with cinematic Black heroes on the silver screen in a portrayal unseen in most Hollywood pictures prior to that time. Therefore, African Americans flocked to the theaters in droves to see themselves being represented as heroes on the big screen. However, these films are the direct reason so many African Americans began using the self deprecating term of nigger to describe themselves. Many Black audiences, believing that those fictional movie characters were true, accurate representation of their group as a collective whole began imitating what they saw in the movies -this included calling themselves niggers. Here's why this negative social engineering of Black people is deemed necessary: "If Black people are to remain in slavery they must be kept in the lowest state of ignorance and degradation, and the nearer you bring them to the conditions of brutes the better chance they have to retain their apathy".- Dr. Carter G. Woodson TODAY IT'S THE WHITE CONTROLLED HIPHOP MUSIC INDUSTRY THATS TELLING BLACK YOUTHS THAT THEIR NIGGERS. Presently, many Black people that refers to themselves as Niggers have bought into the falsehood now being perpetuated through the hiphop music industry --that saying nigger is cool, and trendy. Moreover, that the word is now one of empowerment, and a form of privilege given that only we can say it. However, nothing could be further from the truth. When a Black person becomes convinced that he or she is a nigger this can have profoundly negative effect upon the individual. Our thoughts are important part of our inner wisdom and they are powerful. A thought held long enough and repeated often enough becomes a belief. A belief becomes your biology. THE WORD NEGUS NOWADAYS whenever an attempt to discourage the usage of the word nigger there are some African Americans that insist the we use the word Negus instead. There are literally thousands of languages and dialects in Africa; and each one of them has a word that means King. Given this fact, don't you find it suspicious that the ONLY word, among those many thousands, that's being circulated and propagated in the U.S, is the one that sounds like n#ggers? To believe that this is merely an amazing coincident is ridiculously absurd and naive! We're again being negative socially engineered by whites. WAKE UP BLACK PEOPLE THERE'S A DELIBERATE REASON WHY THE ONLY ONE BEING PROPAGATED IS THE ONE WORD THAT SOUNDS LIKE NIGGERS. There is deliberate reason why the word Negus was introduced, and is being so strongly propagated within the African American communities in spit of the fact that there are literally thousands of other African words that also means King. The introduction of the word Negus provides the white social scientists with a covert mean of getting millions of African Americans to hold on to the n#gger ideology and behavior that was indoctrinated into millions of African Americans during the 1970's. Millions of dollars and man hours were poured into into a campaign to socially engineering African Americans to believe that they're niggers. I know that this may sound crazy to some of you , but it's absolutely the truth. This is what mental slavery is. For many African Americans the word nigger is such a deeply engrained term of endearment that some will argue fiercely against anyone that suggest that they not use the word. Some literally ague that it is now a term of empowerment, and that it's their right to call themselves niggers. In fact some African Americans are so insistence on calling themselves niggers that they researched old African languages until they found a word that sounds close enough to it, but means something positive--because they can't bare to see calling themselves ANYTHING other than a nigger or soundalike derivative such as nigga, and negus. To the detriment of many Black people, this applied psychological conditioning has been an extremely successful. Some blacks have been so brainwashed to love this word that even when introduce to the truth about the word they will argue fiercely to keep using it. “Whoever controls media the images, controls your self-esteem, self-respect, and self-development." -- Dr. Leonard Jeffries Whoever controls the media also controls opinions and attitudes of the people. It's for all of these profound reasons, and more, why the media is a very effective weapon secretly used by the ruling elites against targeted populations. "The oppressed will always believe the worse about themselves" --Franz Fanon Until we break the monopoly the white oppressor has on our Black minds, liberation is not only impossible it is unthinkable". By Franklin Jones To learn more please visit www.theblackpeoplematrix.com Or Please visit and like the FB page entitled the Black Matrix perception management program designed to control we Black people. It is truly a real eye opener.

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artsvark · 7 years ago

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Market Theatre brings home the gold

The Market Theatre Foundation has once again proven its mettle when it scooped the Standard Bank Fringe Ovation Gold Awards at this year’s National Arts Festival.

Standard Bank Gold Ovation Award winner: Hani: The Legacy.

At a ceremony on Saturday night preceding the closing day of the annual Festival in Grahamstown, the Market Theatre Laboratory’s production, Hani: The Legacy was awarded the prestigious fringe festival accolade. Also, walking away with the Standard Bank Fringe Ovation Gold Award was Tau, a production developed and supported through the Market Theatre Foundation’s Zwakala Festival.

Standard Bank Gold Ovation Award winner: TAU

“The two Gold Standard Bank Ovation Fringe Awards highlight the Market Theatre’s pivotal role for being a hub for artistic excellence and social relevance. Both productions created and presented by a new generation of South African artists are a strong testimony that the Market Theatre Foundation, forty-one years into its existence, still is committed to its founding vision to excellently tell authentic South African stories that inform, educate and entertain,” said Ismail Mahomed CEO of the Market Theatre Foundation.

The accolades at the National Arts Festival follow the Market Theatre’s enormous success earlier this year at the Naledi Theatre Awards when the Market Theatre scooped a total of 51 nominations across various categories.

Hani, devised and directed by Leila Henriques is inspired by the hit American musical Hamilton. Amidst the current political challenges in South Africa, Hani is told through hip-hop, rap, ballad and high-powered energetic dances, the contemporary production is an inspiring story about the life and times of assassinated political leader, Chris Hani. Hani can be seen at the 969 Festival at Wits Theatre on 25 and 29 July 2017.

Tau deals with sensitive cultural issues that have remained unchanged for centuries and are difficult to question. It also deals with the taboo of homosexuality during a sacred “manly” ceremony. The play does not wish to shun the cultural beliefs of its audiences, but asks people to look to themselves and whether they are abusing the power rooted in customs on the grounds of ignorance or as a calculated choice…LEROTHODI!!

Tau will be staged at the Vryfees Festival in Bloemfontein from 19 – 20 July 2017.

The Market Theatre’s line-up for the second semester of 2017 consists of an equally exciting line up of productions which commences this week with the opening of Sue Pam-Grant’s production, Chasing Chairs and also Standard Bank Young Artist, Monageng Vice Motshabi’s production, Ankobia.

In Chasing Chairs, the husband and wife duo Sue-Pam Grant and DJ Grant merge their creative writing skills to produce a theatre piece that will navigate a couple’s journey in self-discovery and put them under a microscope. Chasing Chairs features Chi Mhende who is well known for her role as Wandi, a transgendered woman in Generations. She makes her Market Theatre debut alongside Theo Landey, who has won the hearts of South Africans in the series of television advertisements for Outsurance. Chasing Chairs will be staged at the Barney Simon @ The Market Theatre from 14 July to 6 August 2017.

Returning from its premiere at the National Arts Festival, the 2017 Standard Bank Young Artist Award winner, Monageng Motshabi’s play, Ankobia, will make its Gauteng premiere at the Market Theatre. Set in the futuristic land of Pelodikgadile where it is forbidden to remember anything that happened before the new state was formed, Ankobia traces the voices of those who used to fight for land and truth but have now been muted. Ankobia will be staged at the Mannie Manim @ The Market Theatre from 21 July – 13 August 2017.

For details about the above productions and for play dates visit the Market Theatre website www.markettheatre.co.za

Market Theatre brings home the gold was originally published on Artsvark

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gigslist · 3 years ago

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How Hollywood Killed the Oscars

Conceptual performance artists and the ethics of art and activism…

Foreword: I investigated and wrote this at the beginning of 2021, but had to wait until the pudding proof. I only sent it to those I knew personally who would think about it. I feared that rest of you would’ve castigated me.

Traveling and working in the arts I've lived and worked with different cultures for years at a time. Arts and trades friends and I lobbied Australia gov to save an Aboriginal sacred site as a natural open-air arts venue in Byron Bay. I’ve lived in Haight Ashbury for the past 20 years. One of the reasons I like San Francisco is that all races get along here. That is until BLM. Then everybody was deer in the headlights afraid of each other. Now people are trying to shake off the whole BLM and other acronyms and get back to being nice to each other.

But it was scary-ass sh.t. A white chick was trying to gather people for a riot on Haight Street. I wiped the slogan, in big letters, off her van. She came out of her van swinging her baseball bat. I let my Outback Ozzie Battler come out and a tai chi maneuver to fend her off. Then let out my inner Haight Ashbury freak and screamed like a crazy psycho at her.

Then I told the huge black armed security guards on Haight Street if they see anybody with riot and its slogans to nip it in the bud. Anybody who’s worked with big crowds at concerts knows about crowd psychosis. A frot man or front woman on stage has two jobs. To entertain and to keep a crowd under control.

Then I did some research to see what the fuss is about...

The Black Lives Mater movement reclaims slavery as a 1960's protest. It so wasn’t about that! I live in a loft in Haight Asbury, which was the speakeasy for the Black Panther’s fundraisers in the 1960s. The original bar is still here. So are some interesting hidden cupboards. We assume they were stash boxes, because cannabis was illegal in the 1960s. But I digress from why BLM and associated acronyms are blowing smoke up your ass. In the 1960s the Black Power Movement was not about slavery. Black Panthers and associates couldn’t claim black slavery as a protest. Because their ancestors were slave traders. White slavery has been around for thousands of years and is still going. I’m not an expert on the subject, but you can look it up in a real history book. Some Hasidic Jewish men still sell their wives and daughters into sex slavery. There are non-profits in New York about it. If researching black and white slavery, try the non-USA versions for perspective. Below is a nutshell. The American black slave trade was self-defense. After thousands of white settlers kidnapped and sold into slavery in Africa. Such as the town called Roanoke. The whole town of settlers taken twice. Roanoke sits on the African slave traders’ route from South America. From their fleets of ships on the sea, African slavers could see the smoke of the settlers’ cooking fires. There were no US navy and Coast Guard to defend the coasts back then. The problem with studying history is that ancient aliens aren’t interesting anymore. Art history is the most nit picking. Why art gets created and destroyed. What’s the motivation? Wha’s in the artist’s head? The origin of their inspiration? Is their work really a protest, or art dressed up as activism? Are they creating the art for art, ego, madness or money? The founders of Black Lives Matter. Patrice Collors, and AOC, real jobs are trained performance artists, from Hollywood. There are years of LA arts industry press about them. Their act is public group performance. Getting crowds to gather to do something, including public agitation.

That act didn't sell enough books to pay for multimillion$ houses and $25,000 restaurant tabs. So they called themselves Marxists and touted black rights spiced with fake history. To get uneducated students riled to cause riots. Now Patrice Collors does red carpet at the Oscars. For hyping up people to hate each other and hurt each other and destroy businesses and lives. To young men angry and attack defenseless elderly people and other races. That’s not art, that’s a nasty ego with greed and madness. Yes?

If you work in the arts or media for a few years in California you see psycholical patterns in artists seeking fame in Hollywood. Red carpet at the Oscars and multimillion$ houses are their ultimate goal. Else they wouldn’t be in Hollywood. New York or San Francisco is where top art for art’s sake is at in the USA.

Hollywood artists will do and say anything to get their time on the red carpet. A conceptual artist can tell themselves it is all art, no matter what it is, harmful or not. To them it is nothing but art and a form of madness, but the lure of money brings the ego, “fame”, into it.

I'm an art historian. I research why art gets and destroyed. Including marxism. That Patrice Collors actually trained in marxism I find doubtful. African Americans are staunch Baptists. God bless them and their amazing music. Marxism doesn’t mix with freedom of art or religion. Follow the money and do the math. The total is an artist doing her “art” for money and ego’s sake for the red carpet and multimillion dollar real estate. Not for art’s sake, nor the people’s sake, and not for her people's sake.

I’ve not looked into AOC, because what I found of Patrice Collors was blowing my mind enough. I actually thought AOC was an organization. What made me notice AOC is a selfie video rant that youtube autoplayed. To jaded cynical me who's seen it too many times... AOC looked like she’d had a “bump”, roadie slang for a dose of heavy drugs. Even the freaks in Haight Ashbury said “… she looks like she’s on crack.” Their words, from hardened rock and rap concert roadies. Seen a lot of people on many kinds of drugs in San Francisco and Hollywood.

“Interventionalist History” What AOC seems to be accusing those who don’t disagree with her.

“…a policy of interfering in another nation's affairs through coercion or threat of force. Intervention can be political, military, economic, cultural, or humanitarian, or often some combination of these...” study.com

“…an intervention is defined as a threatening act that is unwelcome by the target of one's intervention…” britannica.com

“… practice of intervening specifically : governmental interference in economic affairs at home or in political affairs…” merriam-webster.com

“…coercion or threat of force… unwelcome by the target of one's intervention… specifically: governmental interference in economic affairs at home…” What is BLM and AOC and associated acronyms doing to everybody who doesn’t agree with them in their home, the USA? How can anybody truthfully agree with anything based on fake history or fake news? The reason why so many people publicly agree with this cr.p is fear of being threatened, bullied and Black List. Even if they don’t understand what the cr.p is about.

The Hollywood Black List has turned USA screen offerings into unwatchable cr.p. Even on TV. It’s now rewriting history books into Ancient Aliens and winged beings with super powers. Instead of the truth. The truth that people from prehistory to the 21st century are smarter than Hollywood and media allows us to know. That’s the real reason why the Oscar ratings are at record lows.

Hollywood is writing for teenagers who want to know about sex and violence and ETs. They are not writing for jaded adults who want to relax with something think about. They watch the same English TV series over and over every night to avoid the Hollywood sex and violence. It’s also why youtube and social media are popular. Now I’m talking like an art historian.

I’m always surprised at how many USA citizens prefer English TV. Including hardened roadies and ICU nurses living in Haight Ashbury, San Francisco. They see violence and sex on the street and at work every day. They want to relax and think about something else on their time off. Once people are out of college, they are usually over the sex and violence. And kiddie lit is for baby bumps.

Pump sex and violence into kids’ heads whenever they can hack into it. Which is every night after the parents are asleep. And on their phones going to and from school. And accosted on social media by predators every 10 minutes. What will happen?

Remember that concentrated light, the screen, is the strongest hypnotic medium ever. Clinically tested and used by all the “secret agencies” and as medical therapy. Hypnotize sex and violence and UFO’s into impressionable minds for more than ten, 10, years on end. What will you get? Think about it.

Another thing that often surprises me is the politics of many people at the top of show biz. The producers behind the producers. They also don’t watch the sex and violence shows. They are progressive conservatives, not liberals, even in San Francisco. They feel safe talking to me, because I’m from Australia and an open minded neutral observer. And I'm too jaded to be bothered.

You could castigate me, but in show biz “The proof is in the ratings.” Hollywood created this big m…f… mess by indoctrinating hate and fear and greed! The Oscar ratings told you so. Hollywood is who can cleans the big m…f… mess up.

Make money from art yes, that’s why we are all here, we work in the arts industries. But don’t indoctrinate people to be hateful and fearful and greedy and call it art. Allow people to be adults. Allow people to be nice to each other.

In case you haven’t looked it up, all art and music originated out of spirituality and religion. Not out of politics.

The ancient Romans actually changed their laws to accommodate the Hebrew region. It was the Hebrews to wanted to fight anyway and destroyed all the art. Hollywood movies are not history.

Grow up and play nice and allow your children to be children and allow them grow up in a safe world that plays nice. A dripping tap fills a bucket of hate or a bucket of nice the exact same way. You are a public mirror, will you mirror hate and fear and greed? Will you mirror a community of all races and cultures living in harmony?

That is what the Black Panthers were really about. That is likely why their fundraising speakeasy was in Haight Ashbury. Nobody hated anybody in Haight Ashbury in the 1960s. They wanted the freedom to be and do what you want to.

And do no harm, because all lives fucking matter.

You all need a sense of something higher than yourselves to be humble to. It will enable you to stop being self-entitled assholes.

With Love

GigsList

#patrice collors resigns from blm

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