...::Taking Aim At The Black Male Cock...iness

If you have not heard of artist Fahamu Pecou, remember you read of him here first at "In The Mix". inthemixcomment.blogspot.com . Powerful, edgy, disturbing, aesthetically pleasing-- all the things good art should be. Stay tuned for a new body of work from the Fahamu Pecou Art Studio in Atlanta. The new show is called "cock.aim.shoot." The show examines the projection of sex and violence on and from black male bodies... More details coming soon...

...::Strip Her Down, Roy, Let The Gentlemen Look

Back in the day, I used to listen to this 2-minute song on record. It is the story of a woman being sold at auction. So glad to see that this is around on video today. It is still powerful. This is how modern media can be used to tell old stories in new and interesting ways. See what you think--


"Bid 'em In" by Oscar Brown Jr. Video by Neal Sopata.

...::Actor Mel Gibson Uses n-word In Rant To Mother Of His Child

For all you Mel Gibson fans, hear him here...
I even heard a sister suggest that the mom provoked him into using the n-word. Wow. Listen and decide for yourself.

...::Oscar Grant And Street Media

Oscar Grant poster in Oakland CA

Oscar Grant is the young unarmed father who was shot in the back and killed by a transit cop in Oakland CA on New Year's Day 2009. Most of you know about the case. Above is an Associated Press picture from Oakland. Here is the photo caption--

A beauty salon-- with a poster of Oscar Grant in the window-- is locked up in Oakland, California. Several shops put up photos of Grant in their windows in the hope that it would deter rioters [sic] from damaging the businesses.

Two lessons on media in the modern age here--

One, this poster is a good example of how street media can be used. Street media is where individuals or small groups go straight to the streets to influence public opinion. With street media, you don't send press releases to the Big Paper In Town. You don't buy an ad on a local radio station. You create strong images, words and/or sounds, and you take it to the streets.

Two, this is also an example of how street media can be mis-used-- The beauty salon owner is being very crafty-- "If I put this poster up, folks will not likely damage my business after the trial verdict." It is not being used for the purpose intended by the maker of the poster.

...::Whites Genetically Weaker Than Blacks, Study Finds

Conservative Fox News is the last place that I expected to find a report
on the genetic weakness of whites, but here it is

...::Black Woman Is Part Owner of "Black To The Future" Robot

OK, yall, follow me on this--

A company in Vermont has built a human-like robot that tries to hold a normal human conversation with you, and the company is using a Black woman as the model for the robot. Yes, a real living Black woman, Bena Rothblatt, is the model for the robot. The robot has hair and skin tone kinda like Ms. Rothblatt's. And the real living Black woman, Bena Rothblatt, is part owner of the robot. [Are you still with me?]

Is this Black To The Future or what?



Remember, you saw it at my blog, "In The Mix", first. inthemixcomment.blogspot.com.

...::When Beauty Trumps The News

Husan Thompson and Tanesha Terrell are getting ready to pool their talents.

Beautiful woman sunning herself by the pool… handsome dude looks up from newspaper at beautiful woman sunning herself. Not too unusual-- so why is this image in this blog?

We like images that are unexpected, that have an unusual twist, images that suprise us.

So what's the unusual twist here? Look closely at that newspaper… It's The Final Call, the newspaper of Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam! It's the last place on Earth where you will find an image of a sister getting her daily dose of Vitamin D from all that sunshine.

Reminds me of these lines from Julian Bond, former board chair of the NAACP--

"Looka that lady shake that thing.
We can't all be Martin Luther King."

So, thanks to all the beautiful people, and thanks to all the great leaders. The world I want must have both!

[Husan and Tanesha are engaged to be married 26.Jun.2010!]

Want more striking images? Click here.

...::Co-Founder Of BET Is "Ashamed" Of The Network

Sheila Johnson is crying all the way to the bank.

Sheila Johnson was right beside hubby Bob Johnson at the creation of Black Entertainment Television back in 1980. After decades of raking in money, after a nasty divorce and the selling of BET, Ms. Johnson looks back in shame.

“I don’t watch it. I suggest to my kids that they don’t watch it… I’m ashamed of it, if you want to know the truth.”

“When we started BET, it was going to be the Ebony magazine on television. We had public affairs programming. We had news… but the problem is that then the video revolution started up… And I remember during those days we would sit up and watch these videos and decide which ones were going on and which ones were not. We got a lot of backlash from recording artists… and we had to start showing them. I didn’t like the way women were being portrayed in these videos.”


More

...::You Think The Gulf Oil Spill Is Bad

The rupture of this oil pipeline in Nigeria in 2008 killed more than 100 people. In the Gulf of Mexico tragedy, 11 died.

In Nigeria, "oil companies have acted with such impunity and recklessness that much of the region has been devastated by leaks."

"In fact, more oil is spilled from the delta's network of terminals, pipes, pumping stations and oil platforms every year than has been lost in the Gulf of Mexico..."

The Gulf of Mexico disaster "has made headlines round the world. By contrast, little information has emerged about the damage inflicted on the Niger delta. Yet the destruction there provides us with a far more accurate picture of the price we have to pay for drilling oil today."

More >>> Guardian newspaper of London

“We don’t have an international media to cover us, so nobody cares about it,” said Emman Mbong, a Nigeria official. “Whatever cry we cry is not heard outside of here.”

More >>> New York Times

...::Precious Avatar...

Your reactions, please?

...::The Media Was A Catalyst In Death Of Detroit Girl

Aiyana Jones, age 7


Dominika Stanley and Charles Jones, the parents of Aiyana Jones

Kimora Lee Simmons, model, designer and businesswoman, comments on the media's role the 17.May.2010 killing by Detroit cops of Aiyana Jones...

Damn Detroit Police Department! You burned, shot and killed Aiyana Jones, a little seven year old girl.

You threw a stun grenade through the front window and lit the little girl’s blanket on fire! And then you shot off a bullet that [pierced] her neck! ...

First you said that the grandmother attacked the officer who pulled the trigger that pierced the neck of Aiyana, and now you have revised your story to say that the grandmother "may have simply collided" with the officer.

No matter what happened, you should never have used those tactics, because there were children in the house. And of course you knew that - since there were toys all over the front lawn!...

How, in this age of unfettered technology, did you get this so wrong?!! It’s my sincere hope that the cameras for A&E’s “The First 48” television series that trailed you and filmed the whole incident didn’t spur your heroics! I know reality shows, very well indeed. Please tell me that this wasn't a performance for the cameras!

And here is an important commentary on how the media and cops boost each other in deadly situations.

The wails and cries of Aiyana's grandmother, Mertilla Jones, are some of the most heartwrenching scenes you will ever see [toward the end of the video].

There is also a Facebook page on Aiyana's behalf.

...::Race Bias In The Babies

Children pick skin tones they like as CNN's Anderson Cooper watches

White children have an overwhelming white bias, and black children also have a bias toward white, according to a new study commissioned by CNN. Nearly 60 years after school "integration", and more than a year after the election of the first Black president, white children have a white bias, and Black children also have a white bias, says CNN.

...Jill Scott And The Roots Live Onstage... 'Nuff Said

I dare you to sit still through this. Notice Jill's wrists...

...::Death At A Movie Theater

Tracy Morgan is in "Death at a Funeral"

Tracy Morgan at the film premiere

Wherever you put Loretta Devine [right] on a scale of 1 to 10, your number would be lower after this film. Save yourself the disappointment.


Don't go see "Death at a Funeral". Sick. Sick in the bad sense, yall. Loretta Devine and Danny Glover should be ashamed. One character walked around with sh-t visible and smelling on his face and shirt for a great part of the film. What are the producers and director trying to say? "Black folks are so low down that they will tolerate smelling, visible feces on somebody at a funeral". Would you tolerate that?? I didn't think so. I almost walked out. The message stank to high heaven.

...::Calling For Obama's Death-- 1,100,000 Strong

We have talked before about the people who have made threats on the life of President Obama. Now a Facebook group has joined the herd. It is asking God for Obama's death. The group has a long, unusual name-- "Dear Lord, this year you took my favorite actor, Patrick Swayzie. You took my favorite actress, Farah Fawcett. You took my favorite singer, Michael Jackson. I just wanted to let you know, my favorite President is Barack Obama. Amen." The group has more than 1,100,000 members. No joke. For earlier items, just click the word "Assassination" right below here...

...::25 Joints To Get You Thru Black History Month

While you are going to all those talks and watching all those TV specials this month, don't forget the soundz, including Public Enemy and Queen Latifah. What would Black History Month be without music? From the one and only Davey D.

...::A Ton Of Pound

...::When A Tiger Turns Into A Cheatah

Read how the media helped turn Tiger Woods' image from Good Guy to Gangsta.


Did he just come off the prison yard??

Then read this insightful piece that puts Tiger in a larger media and cultural context. What’s striking about Tiger, the piece says, is the colossal gap "between this golfer’s public image as a paragon of businesslike discipline and focus and the maniacally reckless life we now know he led. What’s equally striking... is that the American establishment and news media... fell for the Woods myth as hard as any fan and actively helped sustain and enhance it."

...::Just One More Sign That This Is A "Post-Racial" World

As plain as the nose on her face: Shania Twain

An academic study, reported here, tries to describe female beauty, but it only looks at white women.

...::One Word, One Chant, One Great Musical-- "Fela!"

Outside the Eugene O'Neil Theater in NYC



Inside the theater, one wall caught the mood of Fela's shrine in Nigeria [photos by y.toure]


The taxi ride from New York's JFK airport to Brooklyn cost a huge $51.50. That was an awful re-introduction to the Big Apple after many years since my last visit, but hey, I was there from Atlanta to see the musical "Fela!", and no thieving taxi system was gonna ruin that.

The 11.Nov.2009 performance on Broadway got deep into the music and the meaning of Fela Anikulapo Kuti, the creator of Afrobeat music.

I came to the performance with doubts that a musical on Broadway in New York would do Fela justice. His music and his politics and his personal life were radical by Western standards, and I was cautious. But--

I was blown away. The show was an uninhibited, unapologetic, unashamed celebration of all of Fela, and I highly recommend it.

Fela was born in Nigeria, raised on the streets of struggle in his country and forged by the Black Power movement in the USA.

I have seen Fela and his band of musicians and dancers perform live, back in the day in Los Angeles. His shows were always a driving, sweating, loud, non-stop, hypnotic high, and it was fueled by drums, horns, bass, sex, politics, the gods, his mother's love and lots of ganja.

And it all came across in this show, directed and choreographed by Tony award winner, brother Bill T. Jones.

The Eugene O'Neil Theater was made over to simulate The Shrine, Fela's club, community center and refuge in Lagos, Nigeria. Images similar to those in The Shrine hung not only from the stage, but also from the balconies and walls of the theater.

This was not just a musical, with some music-and-dance pieces strung together with some talk in between. This was a bold exposition of Fela. We see his mother's radical politics... the influence of the USA Black Power movement on his thinking... images of Malcolm and Garvey... when is the last time you were in a musical where the dancers held books about Black radicals?

Production values were very high. In addition to the walls of the theater decorated like Fela's own Shrine, the show was a multi-media extravaganza, with live video, historical footage from Nigeria, supertitles, and an image of Fela's mother that moved every time he spoke to her.

You were not just surrounded. You were engulfed.

The stage was extended into the audience, troupe members danced through the audience, performers danced on two levels of the stage, and some audience members-- me included-- talked back to the performers.

"Fela!" exposed his ganja smoking, his polygamy, his attacks on Nigerian corruption and dictators, his help of the poor. The influence of one of his wives, a Black woman born in the US, herself a political radical, was well done.

There was little or nothing about Fela's father, about any other members of his family, or about how he died [of Aids-related causes].

This production was funny, passionate, revealing. The murder of Sean Bell and the corruption of the firm AIG were highlighted briefly and well, showing that Fela, though he transitioned in 1997, is still current and relevant.

These lessons from the stage still resonate with me-- "We must take our destiny into our own hands... The future is now!... Music is our weapon... We are going to be here forever!"

Do what you can to bring "Fela!" to your city.

Fela Lives!