RIP Aaliyah: The Princess of "Street But Sweet"

In a world rife with bubble-gum cookie cutter pop stars, I have a hard time finding pop music that my artistic sensibilities respond to... I'm the type of girl who wants not only to dance, but to feel a connection to what I'm dancing to. I want to share a moment with the song, I want to be transported.

If there was one person who could make me feel that way it was Aaliyah. On this, the 10th anniversary of her passing so many bittersweet emotions arise. I love the outpouring of memories and support I have seen from all her fans, but I really wish she were still here.

People often ask, what was so special about Aaliyah? It's a difficult question to answer, because there were so many things. But one thing in particular stands out to me. It was her ability to be understated yet sexy, to exude this poised polished demeanor that was still so hood. She was sultry but subtle, fierce and smoldering in the coolest possible way. She was, as I have heard her describe it, "Street but sweet."

I wish so many of the over-sexualized objectified stars of today would take a moment to follow that example. Aaliyah proved that you didn't have to do what everyone expected to be successful. She stood on the merits of her talent and self-confidence and it was indeed enough. She was a trendsetter who was not afraid to try something new and to be herself, and I will always admire, respect, and miss that element in the music game.

RIP Aaliyah!!!

All Is Fair In War........ And War

A friend of mine who is a veteran recently expressed some anger and discontent with the celebration of the life of late Hip-Hop artist Nate Dogg saying in a facebook post "the majority of us on this site didn't know that dude so why care? He didn't care about you or me. Why don't all of us mourn our brothers and sisters that are dying for our country every other day? That seems more worth our time." I don't disagree that the lives of the soldiers who die everyday in the ongoing conflict in the Middle East should be remembered. But there are some fundamental problems that I have with the statement itself. Let me break it down.

1. Soldiers are not the only ones who have died in the war. Thousands of innocent women and children have been killed. Should we not also remember them? Are their lives not just as valuable as the lives of our soldiers?

2. Are our brothers and sisters really dying for us? Or is that the lie they have been told to get them to go to war in the first place? The more research you do, the more you see that this war really has nothing to do with terrorism, its all about one thing. Profit. There are powerful people who get rich off of the suffering of others, and these war profiteers don't give a damn about any of the people who die so that they can have 2 Bentleys in the garage instead of just one, or take their families and friends on lavish vacations providing them not only with a free trip to some of the world's playgrounds for the super rich but also such amenities as childcare. I'm not making this up, these are things that have been clearly documented. Who owns the construction companies that are "rebuilding" Iraq and Afganistan after we destroy it? Members of our own government. Who Owns the Oil companies that would benefit so greatly from control of the oil rich lands in the Middle East? Americans. We shouldn't mourn the soldiers who die, we should prevent further unnecessary loss of life in their memory.

3. Why is it that we are so quick to mourn soldiers, but not ask was it even necessary for them to die in the first place? To the best of my knowledge, diplomacy has not been used at all to try and solve any of the problems we have had post 9/11 with the Middle East. But no one questions that. And more and more soldiers and civilians keep dying everyday. What is the point?

To quote a phrase, nobody wins a war. Period. And I would just like it known that I don't want or need ANYONE to die on my behalf, especially not for oil and money and politics. I remember all those who have made sacrifices, but I do not ask it of them.

So we can say, the death of Nate Dogg is nothing compared to the deaths of soldiers, but we can also say the deaths of 4,326 soldiers who made the choice to serve a government that put them at unnecessary risk pales in comparison to the deaths of an estimated 151,000 people in Iraq. Where does it end? No one deserves to die, and all lives are valuable. Until we understand this, we are looking at an incomplete picture.

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Some links I found particularly interesting:


Iraq War Casualties: US Military Deaths and Civilian Deaths

The 25 Most Vicious Iraq War Profiteers

The Rip Off In Iraq: You Will Not Believe How Low The War Profiteers Have Gone


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And finally, a song that truly makes a statement about war:

Nobody Wins A War - Raheem Devaughn Featuring Jill Scott, Bilal, Anthony Hamilton, Chrisette Michelle, Algebra, Shelby Johnson, Ledsi, Citizen Cope, Dwele, Chico Debarge, and Rudy Currence

Nobody Wins A War Song Lyrics

Static Major "Bus Stop Breezy" feat. on "Frisco 2 The Ville" DVD

Static Major!!! One of the greats. RIP

The Problem With Nicki Minaj

I have been very outspoken about my feelings when it comes to rapper Nicki Minaj.I don’t care for her, plain and simple. It’s not that I think she’s completely talentless (although I do admit to probably saying so in the past), she’s obviously a beautiful woman, and I am happy to see a woman gaining success and notoriety in the Hip-Hop world…. But….. what good is it to gain all the success in the world if it comes at the expense of your self respect, your morality, or even worse your soul?

I guess I’ll start with her name—her REAL name—Nicki Maraj. Nicki Maraj would have been a perfectly acceptable name for a female MC. I actually think its very dope. Why change it to Minaj? Because you’re catering to what you think men want to hear? Because some record exec told you that’s what would sell? Because your confused about your own sexuality? I don’t have the answers to those questions, but whatever the answers may be, the point is this: You didn’t have to change your name to some sexual cliché in order to sell records… if you really are talented that is.

I think women dumb themselves down and over sexualize themselves so much. It sickens me. We are more than just T&A ladies, but how would anyone ever know that if that’s all we show to the world? Which brings me to my next point, Nicki at the BET Awards. When she accepted the award for best female Hip-Hop artists, she asked that women come together and support each other, which was understandable. I agree that women should support each other. Then she said she was doing music to open doors for other women in Hip-Hop and that she was standing up there representing us all. God forbid! I get what she is trying to say and do, but come on! Calling yourself Nicki Minaj alone has set women back 20 years!

It’s bad enough I have to listen to men objectify women all day long, but now I have to listen, accept, and support women who objectify themselves? I think not. I am sick and tired of hearing all this crap about money, cars, clothes, houses, and the female anatomy from men, but now I have to hear it from women too? I mean, it was a lot on it when Lil' Kim did it in the 90's, but she was such a good rapper we accepted it, because she brought a certain empowerment to it. And, because it was original! Kim was calling herself Barbie LONG before Nicki Minaj. I didn't necessarily like it, but I understood it to be her unique way of expression. When Nicki does it, it's like a knock-off gucci bag--it may fool everybody, but the trained eye knows it aint the real thing.

I think Nicki needs to be a little more objective and ask herself what kind of message is she really sending to young women everywhere? That being sexy is all about being like Barbie (the most unattainable standard of beauty ever created)? That being bisexual makes you sexier? That rapping about how good you are in bed is the way to get ahead? And this is what she wants us to support?

No.

Period.

Sorry Nicki.

Perhaps one day you’ll understand why some women have the reaction to you that they do. And then maybe we can start to see the real you instead of this bullshit bisexual Barbie image that you’ve constructed. At least the thought of that intrigues me.

Banking on a Reality Check

Statistics are dangerous. They can either show you the severity of a situation, or reduce it to mere digits and decimals. Once in a while though, you come across statistics that are too meaningful to be ignored. Such was the case when I began reading poverty statistics on www.afaceaface.org.

The disproportion of the world’s wealth is staggering. Before I go any further, I have to say that I am not a socialist, although I have been accused of being one. I am not a communist either. I do believe in the freedom to make your own way in life, and that your hard work and perseverance should be the only factors that determine how successful you are. I understand that not everyone can be rich, and not everyone wants to be. I understand that there is no utopia, no fool-proof plan, no magic that can fix it all. Still, I can’t help but to want to do something.

Less than one percent of what was spent on weapons worldwide could have provided basic education for all children by the year 2000, but that did not happen. Not to mention the world’s richest 20% consume 76% of its resources. So what does all this mean? It means that all around the world priorities are completely backwards. While that rich 20% are of consuming a bunch of crap they really don’t need, millions of children are dying around the world because they lack basic human needs like clean water and sanitation.

My brain feels like it’s swimming in my scull as I read these statistics. Americans and Europeans spend nearly three times as much money on pet food every year as the entire world spends on education. Europeans spend nearly ten times as much on alcoholic beverages as the entire world spends to make sure that all women have reproductive healthcare.

I think a big part of this problem is that people in the western world egotistically view themselves as the pinnacle of civilization. According to our behavior, we think our way of life is the best way, the lack of water and sanitation around the world has no effect on us, and our pets are more important than uneducated, third-world children dying. In truth, rampant consumerism is completely unsustainable and it’s destroying the very earth we live on. American children are being caught in the tide of anti-intellectualism and our education system is failing miserably.

Perhaps instead of a war on terror or a war on drugs (both of which have made almost no measurable progress) maybe we should be fighting a war on ignorance, or a war for government accountability, or a war on greedy fat cats who abuse not only the capitalist system, but the environment and the American people. Maybe those kind of wars would actually yield some successes.

The time has come for people to stand together and say, enough is enough. People lived on this earth for thousands of years without all the crap we think we need today. We cannot go backward, but it has become apparent that we aren’t moving forward either. If we don’t start making changes on our own terms, the universe will respond to our oblivious decadence with destruction, like it has already done with so many civilizations before ours. It’s our call.


Link to statistics: http://www.afaceaface.org/blog/?p=1223

M.I.A. in the Hood

I absolutely adore the music and style of Sri Lankan rapper/singer M.I.A. She is one of the most creative artists out there in my opinion. Her music blends all different styles seamlessly to create something entirely new. It seems that with the warm reception she received form the critics as well as the hip-hop community, that her music would be more popular among urban and inner city youth who like hip-hop.

At first, I thought maybe her music was just too weird for some people. It is very different, and in L.A. where I live the hip-hop community doesn’t really listen to much electronic music, unless it’s co-signed or performed by an acceptable hip-hop artist. Since M.I.A.’s music contains so many electronic elements, this seemed like a good reason.

Recently, I watched a short documentary on M.I.A. by acclaimed director Spike Jonze. In it, M.I.A. stated that she felt like hip-hop had always come from the perspective of urban and inner city youth in America and the UK, and her music spoke to a completely different kind of experience-the experience of a refugee from a third world country. She seemed to imply that their experience is nothing like that of people growing up in poor communities in developed countries.

This statement kind of blew my mind. There it is, I thought, that’s the reason she’s not as popular in the African-American community. She doesn’t seem to understand that the differences between living in poverty in the United States as a minority and being a refugee from a third world country are much fewer than the similarities. African Americans may not be refugees, but we were brought to this country against our will, enslaved for nearly 400 years, and then legally treated as second class citizens. We experienced an unprecedented level of racism, the remnants of which are still evident today.

The separation of families during slavery all but destroyed our concept of family structure, our African heritage and culture was forcefully stripped away from us. We have struggled, fought, and died for rights as simple as drinking from water fountains and riding on busses. Everyday in the black community there is genocide, and evidence of self-hatred. Many black people consider the definition of beautiful to be lighter-skinned with “good hair” and of course this description does not fit the majority of black people.

I don’t love M.I.A. any less, because much of what se said was true. I can’t imagine what it must be like to live in a third world country, and I’m glad to hear an intelligent, thought-provoking voice speaking out about the injustices the people there face, but in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” and we are experiencing severe-albeit different-injustice in the inner city communities of America.

To only focus on the differences is to marginalize the problem. Poverty, genocide, and racism are not third-world issues, they are world issues. We may not see the effects of the third world on America directly, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t any.

I want to walk down Crenshaw and hear somebody bumping M.I.A. I want to go to Hollywood to a popular night club and hear “World Town” blaring from the sound system and hear everyone singing along. I want everyone to have a little more substance to go with their style, and M.I.A. definitely has both. But until her music is a reflection of both experiences, hinged upon their similarities and not quite so hung up on the differences, I don’t think it will happen. I will, however, be listening and hoping.

Comfortable or Cracked Out?

In his novel The Celestine Prophecy, James Redfield speculated that mankind sent scientists into the world to explore its mysteries and come to some conclusions about the origins of the universe and our place in it. But, when the scientists went out to gather information, they found more than they were prepared to handle. The questions vastly outnumbered the answers, and after decades of searching mankind either lost interest or forgot why they sent them out in the first place. This “failure” on the part of science to explain the meaning of life was a pivotal point in the evolution of human values, because while mankind waited for answers they tackled an issue of their own: How to make life more comfortable.

When I look at the world around me, it seems that comfort is a top priority for the vast majority of Americans today. Whether it’s reclining in an easy chair watching TV and drinking a beer, or resting their asses on the plush leather seats of a luxury sports car while driving in traffic, comfort is like crack to Americans. We can’t get enough of the stuff. We need it all day everyday, even when we sleep. We want to be comfortable while we do even the most uncomfortable things. It got me to thinking, is being constantly comfortable a realistic expectation? And if so, what are some of the side effects of our obsession with comfort? Is it just making us weaker?

One of the most common definitions of comfort is: A state of ease and satisfaction of bodily wants, with freedom from pain and anxiety. Notice the word “bodily” in that definition. Somewhere along the line, we began to believe that being physically comfortable was equivalent to being mentally, spiritually, or emotionally comfortable in our own skin. Perhaps we thought, if I could just make my physical environment comfortable enough, everything else would follow suit. Perhaps being physically comfortable allowed us to dull our perception enough that we don’t perceive any discomfort within ourselves, much like taking an aspirin relieves pain but does not eliminate the problem.

And so here we all are, together, confined within the comfort zone we created. The question I can’t stop asking is, are we comfortable or cracked out on the most addictive, invasive drug mankind has ever known – luxury.