Maybe it’s just me. But does it seem to you like everybody wants to be
a gangsta, a thug, or a pimp? Well, it does to me. And it makes me wonder if
the very people, both male and female, who want to be those things truly know
that those things are.
And just why do I feel that way? Oh, that’s
easy. All of my five senses seem to be bombarded daily by images
of people
with tough talk, street walks, and heartless deeds. Those images
burst forth full-blown from radio and television stations, from
the t. v. screen and the big screen, from newspapers and magazines
to billboards and ipods, from cd and dvd players to the world
wide web and beyond. They all seem to spout the same soul-sickening
message: that ruthlessness is next to godliness.
Tattooed from head to toe, often in alphabet-
block - size letters on their necks, legs, and arms—if not elsewhere--, all
too many of the world’s African (Black) youth sport messages
that it is almost impossible to believe that they themselves
even understand. In fact, it is nearly impossible to believe
that they truly know the history behind tattooing—that
at one time it was a badge of honor and distinction but, during
slavery, it was a way for European, if not Arab, enslavers to
brand enslaved Africans as their property and as possessing certain
desirable or undesirable traits or skills. In short, the tattoo,
as a whole, like all too many other things, has lost its true
meaning and all too many African youth don’t know what
it is. And, sadly, that probably includes all too many African
adults as well.
Yet, more often than not, many African youth
proudly display words like “thug”, which comes from a band of deadly
Asian assassins, the Thuggards, centuries ago; “dog”,
which, at one time, was one of the worse things that you could
call another human being and which, more often than not, justifiably,
was called “fighting words” because of the violence
it frequently produced; and “pimp”, which, technically,
is a “man who beats up and sells women”. Yet, even,
some African females, publicly, privately, and gleefully described
themselves as “a pimp”. And all too many African
youth the world over joyfully call themselves “thug”, “dog”, “pimp”,
and “soldier” or “soljah”, another word
for—guess what—“gangsta’”.
Oh, and let’s not forget the tattoo that says or strongly
implies that the wearer is a “gangsta’”. Whenever
I say or hear about something like that either being on someone’s
arm or having been spray-painted on some building, street sign,
and/or telephone phone, I truly shake my head in utter disgust.
Why? because it means that somewhere along the way someone in
the (1) billion-plus member African World Family has dropped
the proverbial ball, has chosen, by force or by choice, to look
the other way, and neglected his or her god-given duty to positively
direct the youth.
In short, someone has failed—and, typically it is less
the Church House and the School House—although they, too,
must shoulder their huge, thorny cross of blame in this matter,
too-- but your house and my house, brothers and sisters. In general,
we have failed to obey a divine directive—“train
up a child in the [positively justly, merciful, and humble] way
that he [or she] should go, and when he [or she] is old, he [or
she] will not depart from it.” And, as a result, all too
many of our neighborhoods, both far and near, rich and poor,
around the globe, have become either actual or potential war
zones where ever-ballooning private stress and unbridle public
unrest seem to be the order of the day. And, gently now but with
ever-increasing force, knocking at the door of this modern-day
nightmare is an ancient African proverb, which says, “The
ruin of a nation begins in the homes of its people.”
So, to stop this ruin, if we should choose
to do so, we, African people, must take back our homes. We
must take them back from
outside and inside forces that mean and do them no good. That
means the legal and illegal drugs and the hi-tech baby sitters,
like —television, video games, computers, ipods and such.
Those items, among others, serve mainly and historically to tear
down the very fabric that makes a family whole—listening
and learning from each other, loving and caring and sharing with
one another. We must take back our homes from wayward parents
and children, from divisive family members and untrue friends.
We must take them back from so-called child experts who never
raised nor had a child and from the very people who sold not
only ours but also their own children—white, yellow, and
brown supremacists and others. Ever hear of slavery and, today’s
version, child prostitution? Who runs it, can’t or won’t
stop it, and why?
And why can’t we, or so it seems, African World Family,
not only fully straighten out our house and the schoolhouse and
God’s house? We can if we want to. We can if we will to.
We can if we truly try. For, at one time, and it has not been
so long ago, within the African World Family as a whole, most
especially here in the United States, the home, the church, and
the school worked solidly together. They did not contradict each
other when it came to what was expected of all people, most especially
the youth. And that was for them to be respectful, responsible,
and dependable and to be the best people that they could possibly
be. And all three houses, if you will, celebrated the children
when they did so. Praise was reserved for those who consistently
tried hard and did well or tried hard and did average but strived
always to do better. No excuses for half-doing and not-doing
was the “golden rule”.
Whatever happened to that? And, though I
am well-aware that it has not fully disappeared, that tri-sided
relationship has
been greatly strained to the point of almost breaking fully apart.
The steel-booted foot of white supremacy has kicked down the
door of our houses and told us how to “raise” our
children or else; It’s twisted fingers have ripped off
the hinges the sacred doors of the Black Church, the only truly
Black-owned independent institution in the world, and has repeatedly
poured “30 pieces” of proverbial silver, with chains
attached, into the willing offering plates and greedy hands of
all too many “preachers” of the gospel with the hell-spawned
hope that it can “buy” and control the Black Church.
And, regrettably, all too many people in the pit, as I call the
pulpit—and mind you, I am an ordained Baptist minister—are
willingly and greedily selling their souls and the souls of African
people worldwide for what the Bible calls “filthy lucre” and
what an old Clint Eastwood movie calls “A Few Dollars More”.
And let’s not forget how white supremacy has virtually
padlocked the gates to a real, meaning educational system that
inspires students to use both their mental and physical—manual—skills.
(Remember, every one cannot be a doctor or a lawyer. For when
your’s car breaks down, usually neither is the first one
you call. Typically, it is what some folks used to call, with
no disrespect, “a grease monkey”--a blue-collar mechanic
not a white collar professional.) Instead, it has attempted--through
both the voucher program, No Child Left Behind, and even the
recent United States Supreme Court decision regarding school
desegregation—many believe, to shut down American public
education as a whole. Then where do the students go? Where do
the teachers, lunchroom staff, custodians and other staff members
go? Of, course, that includes administrators, too.
Before such socially deformed events fully take place, we can
stop them. We can do so, African World Family, by diligently
repairing the strong, positive, working relationship that the
home, church, and school once had. it, even it means, destroying
it in some ways and revising it in others in order to improve
it.
That, of course, will take time. So what
are we waiting for? And it, too, will take, as most historically
important things
do, blood, sweat, and tears and the working together of people
who are both willing and able to work to make it a reality. For
one of history’s stark realities is that everyone who is
able is not willing and everyone who is willing is not able.
So it will take people who are both willing and able to get the
job done.
Does that mean that it will take a “gang” of people?
No, not necessarily, it won’t. But it would not hurt to
inform African people, both young and old, the ageless truth
about gangs as mouthed by the writer and rapper Sistah Souljah
and as penned by the late scholar-activist Del Jones, “the
War Correspondent”. Said Souljah to an auditorium packed
with college students, “Real gangsters own land and businesses”.
Said Jones, “Real gangsters don’t wear Nikes”.
In short, real gangsters wear $1-2 thousand shoes, $5-10 thousand
suits, and $10-15 thousand watches.
Real gangsters also live well. In short,
unlike the wanna-bes, they don’t live with their mammas. Instead real gangsters
live in houses as big as hospitals or schools, travel, not on
their sisters worn-out bi- or tricycle like wanna-bes and with
their hats turned to the back, but in stylish, well-engineered
and –tuned cars that cost at least (6) figures. Furthermore,
real gangsters don’t dream about vacationing on islands
but actually go there and own them and employ those who work
on them.
Business-wise, real gangsters, surely are
cutthroats but they are also precise and concise. They don’t control corners
but countries and continents. They don’t wear colors; they
fly them. They don’t sing or shout “souljah”,
but control untold thousands, worldwide, of well-trained and
well-strapped ones—the real soldiers. They don’t
spray-paint walls, street signs, or telephone poles. But you
find their names flashed across television and internet screens,
stamped in huge letters on giant billboards and on and inside
clothing, and lighting up the night sky in neon-light-like fashion
and on skyscrapers, airplanes, multi-million dollar companies,
and often in the true halls of power.
Real gangsters are just that—gangsters. They are all apart
of the same gang, looking out for each other in every possible
way to make sure that the power they have gained “by any
means necessary” is never diminished, and, if so, never
for long. They take from the poor and give to the rich, which
is who they generally are. They keep the good for themselves
and cast the bad—the drugs (legal and illegal), the poisoned
food and the polluted air, the biased, nonsensical news and,
in the wise words of Marvin Gaye, the “inner-city blues” (poor
schools, poor jobs, poor housing, etc.) to everyone else. They
make the wrong right and the right wrong, hate seem like love,
and love seem like hate. They, directly or indirectly, commit
barbaric acts of violence against the bodies and souls and minds
and characters of others, then wave off such deeds with a wink
and a smile and an all-forgiving pardon. Real gangsters declare
their independence from other gangsters and freedom, justice,
and equality for themselves while using the most hard-core gangster
tactics to deny 500, 000 plus enslaved Africans all three. In
short, real gangsters protect their own.
And, without following in the mud- and blood-caked
footsteps of the real gangsters, the (1) billion-plus member
African World
Family, must take care of its own—making sure that all
of its members have, at least, the bare essentials that are due—decent
food, clothing, and shelter; a positive, powerful, and self-determining
form of education that benefits one and all; and true freedom,
justice, and equality in deeds more so than in words.
Speaking of words, probably the best ones
to quote at this time come from those of the God of Father
of Soul James Brown’s
1974 song “Funky President (People It’s Bad)”,
which gives the African World Family solid advice worth following
and talks clearly and honestly about the real gangsters, who
he calls “the Mob”. Sings Brother Brown, the Godfather
of rap:
People people, we gotta get over before we go under
Listen to me:
Let’s get together and get some
land
Raise our food like the man
Save our money like the Mob
Put up a fight down on the job
As some of the song’s background singers shout out, “Rap,
Godfather” and “Listen to the man”.
BlackCommentator.com Columnist
HAWK (J. D. Jackson) is a priest, poet, journalist, historian,
African-centered lecturer, middle school teacher and part-time
university history instructor. Click
here to contact HAWK. |