The Hip Hop Anthropologist

Rudy Ghouliani was a monster during his brutal tenure as Mayor of NYC, which was augured in by a riot that he incited with off-duty white cops shouting invectives with reckless abandon: hurling racial pejoratives like "nigger" and "washboy" at the incumbent Black NYC mayor, David Dinkins. The first Black man to hold the esteemed office. The riot grew rapidly with alarmed, risk-adverse, and highly-political, NYPD brass dispatching "white shirts" (NYPD line command staff to put it down by threatening the off-duty cops with arrest if they did not disperse). It was an insurrection before the J6 insurrection that one of his biggest fans during that infamous period reprised during his loss to Joe Biden in 2020. He promptly micromanaged all of his top aids most notably Education Commissioner Rudy Crews, who he initially praised to high heaven, right out of office instituting a "broken windows" approach to law enforcement to curb crime in the largest cit...

With the dearth of Black newsmagazines that flourished in the '70s, there are virtually none left standing. And the Black new space has become a hellscape with the current cast of characters tantamount to allowing the inmates to run the asylum. I grew up watching Tony Brown, John Johnson, Melba Tolliver, Gil Noble, and Bill McCreary; listening to Wayne Gillman and Gary Byrd on Black-owned radio; reading Sepia, Jet, and Ebony magazines, which were a mainstay on the cocktail tables of every Black household. I was filled with pride to see well-groomed, well-read, and well-prepared hosts, reporters, and producers deliver content in solemn, measured tones devoid of amateurishness that characterizes two particularly reprehensible hosts, which spanned the Black experience. Those days are long gone. Now we are left with a seventy-year-old guy who looks like a babble head that crucifies the English language day in and day out unscripted on a syndicated radio show that he allows his "fr...

A Black commentator made an interesting, provocative analysis about Black women in a recent podcast. He suggested that the hosts of another well-regarded podcast with two black female (neither of whom are married) and one black male (who is married) host "cryin" over Kamala Harris' loss, invective against the Democratic donor class, who are primarily wealthy, white Jewry out to also protect their whiteness, and sense of betrayal by white women is either misguided or born of naïveté or both. The commentator suggests the sisters along with their contemporaries are victims of their own choosing because they brought into [white] feminism hook, line, and sinker along with those $1,000, 8' long cadaver weaves they fling around unashamedly like vain, adolescent, white girls in a pathetic ode to white supremacy. They fucked around and found out that white feminism was just that exclusively "white."  The Women's Liberation Movement was fostered by young, white, l...

Comic-actor Katt Williams has the opportunity to assume the mantle of filmmaker in the vein of the first Black filmmaker Oscar Micheaux producing commercially viable, culturally relevant, historically accurate films that leave a lasting legacy that Tyler Perry and 50 Cents eschew - preferring coin over culture. "Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song" was produced on a shoestring budget by Black filmmaker Melvin Van Peebles in 1971 for around $150k. "Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song" was released to limited distribution. It grossed $15,000,000 or $116,912,592.59 in today's dollars, demonstrating to Hollywood that Black themed films have a commercially viable market.  Like Hip Hop music, however, the Hollywood elite, primarily wealthy, white Jewry, wrested creative control from artists with predatory contracts leaving a profane, polluted, cookie-cutter, follow-the-bouncing-ball bastard that denigrated Black women, glorified criminality, and promoted drug cult...

 Obviously, nothing is disqualifying any longer if mediocre why tees with marginal experiences in the departments they were imprudently nominated to run (into the ground) are allowed to skirt FBI national security background checks (an exhaustive process that normally takes upwards of six months) in chump the brain dead comic carnival barker aka klueless the klown's zeal wreak havoc on the administrative state: a vast, sprawling, and complex federal bureaucracy, poised to hinder his wacky schemes. Instead of pointing out the obvious hypocrisy, we must insist on criminal justice reform as it relates to criminal history reporting requirements. If undereducated Black men who have been trying to turn around their lives after a criminal conviction for a non-violent crime in their distant past cannot pass a criminal background (forget about a national security) check for an entry-level job paying roughly $50k/annum, activists need to affirmatively be demanding criminal background check r...

 While we're rightfully bemoaning tRump's triumphant reemergence as the first convicted criminal to become president, we have not seriously considered its lasting ramifications. The primary one is what happens when all of the lapdogs in the Executive and Legislature have to confront an unhinged, unmoored, and unrestrained tRump defying a Supreme Court order attempting to reign him... The very same Supreme Court that has granted conservatives a veritable wish list, a unilateral wet dream, of regressive decisions rolling back decades of precedent, losing its own identity in the process, along with any modicum of respect as a consequence. Don't think it could happen? I say 'when' not 'if' it happens, what will the country looks like after the final Grand Oaf Party controlled bulwarks fail🙄I guarantee MAGA will immediate repeal all of the Civil Rights Acts, the Social Security Act, AFDC, ACA, and then start dismantling the Reconstruction - i.e., 13th, 14th, and...

Sistas claiming to be conscious first need to lose 8' long cadaver or Brazilian wigs, which is a pathetic ode to Eurocentric standards of beauty that diminishes their advocacy, self-respect, and agency while affirming their subservience. Black women futilely trying to look like white women while playing lip service to liberation, espousing self-determination tongue-in-cheek, is the textbook definition of cognitive dissonance. It is jarring. They cannot be taken seriously because I cannot get past their $1,000 sewn-in, dead girl, weaves or synthetic wigs to actually hear what they have to say. The voluminous horse-like manes get in the way of any substantive conversation.

 Not to worry. The tattered remnants of the Grand Oaf Party will emerge like a specter from the ashes of our moribund democracy to push back against trumpty dumpty's authoritarian yearnings once chump the brain dead comic carnival barker aka klueless the klown starts the wholesale dismantling of the intelligence community (which has been eerily silent knowing tRump is a spy at best, a Manchurian candidate at worse), breaking long-standing treaties like NATO, the Abraham Accords, and the Paris Climate Treaty; green lights China's annexation of Taiwan, destabilizes the 27 resource-rich Sub-Saharan African [read that: "shithole"] countries on an industrial scale enabling his billionaire buddies to exploit these countries free of interference by popular, democratically elected leaders, while giving Israel free reign to totally decimate the Palestinians. The internal strife, the civil war, coupled by a House prayfully led by Hakeem Jeffries will render MAGA impotent after ...

 Gaza is a fait accompli. The world community has thrown in the towel allowing a scorched earth campaign by the Zionists to eradicate the hapless, helpless, and hungry Palestinians. Apparently the surrounding  Arab countries do not give af. Why should we (as Black folks care)? The tRump administration will pipeline the gasoline from Saudi Arabia to Nut N' Yahoo to fuel the total elimination of the remaining elderly, infirmed, women and children. North Africans and people from the Middle East immigrating to the United States - including the Palestinians - are classified as "white." More importantly, they realize that asperation like 80% in Dearborn (MI) did by casting their votes for stinky without the brain (who told these Muslims that he plans on reimplementing the infamous Muslim ban) on Tuesday, November 5, 2024. Black folks who are not well-off, well-heeled, or wealthy like 50 Cents or Kodac Black or Waka flocka or any other numbskull rapper supporting chump the brain...

I do not care about immigrants, period. I do not care about white women, period. I do not care about Latinos who identify as either "white" or white adjacent, period. No other progressive Black ought to either. And until the Democrats understand this fact, we will continue trying to court these ungrateful constituencies. Ones that showed their collective asses on Tuesday, November 5, 2024, by overwhelming voting for chump the brain dead comic carnival barker aka klueless the klown. I am more concerned about the federal merit system (civil service) where Blacks over index in GS-03 through GS-18 items; Article III court judge appointments (and centrist Democrat senators like Fetterman cross party lines to confirm radical, right wing ideologues because the "country must move forward" or some other rationalization), the Attorney General, DOJ, Department of Education and the social safety net. Those cabinet level appointments will directly and adversely impact our commun...

  We have been holding "space" in this country since before our forced immigration here over 400 hundred years ago. The generational trauma to our collective psyche has some of US identifying with our oppressor (Stockholme syndrome) in the vain hope that whitey will be less brutal, release some pressure from his size thirteen jackboot on our necks, while others take an opposite stance. I am personally done because my anger is not directed toward whitey for doing what they do to preserve their 200 year headstart. My angst is directed at deaf, dumb, and blind Black folk who refuse to rise up collectively to effectively push back against the oppression because they are "not all that racist," or "maybe tRump needs to come back," or "I had more money under tRump", or whatever other bizarre rationalizations they can conjure up in their pea brain for supporting a documented bigot. The fact of the matter is chump the brain dead comic carnival barker aka ...

  "Q" was in a class by himself. In addition to all the well-deserved accolades, he was also a talented pianist before taking up trumpet and becoming a respected trumpeter in his own right prior to writing, composing and producing, before finding his lane, arranging. His lush instrumentals were notable for their signature orchestration, which had a classical music flavor seeminglessly woven with jazz sensibilities. Like many "naturals," he got his start while still in high school. He went to the "woodshed" mastering his craft with some of the very best "Big Band" leaders in the business before carving out his own niche. Frank Sinatra said he had never seen an arranger score a song a quickly as "Q." Sinatra collaborations with "Q" stand the test of time as some of the best selling albums in the waning genre. His foray into pop with Michael Jackson are the stuff of legends propelling the star to superstardom. Little know fact is...

 The $2,100 ransom that the defendant has been coerced to pay under threat (aggravated by a bumbling, stumbling, and mumbling bedraggled, slovenly, indolent, disheveled lying court-appointed lawyer wearing shoes so worn out and, as such, rolled over, he must have had to lay down to put 'em on, unable or unwilling to provide effective assistance of counsel) of incarceration has been paid in full.  Do not contact or threaten this alleged defendant anymore, period. This jurisdiction has no further official business cognizable by common, state or federal law with the defendant. He is not seeking any further post-conviction relief. Leave him alone.  The defendant is resigned to take the "L" - the loss like a boss. He has paid the terms (dearly) for being held hostage in full  - imperiled by unprofessional threats to his life and his liberty, both. He will not tolerate any further officious, presumptuous, or unethical subordinate court clerical personnel or anyone else in ...

What defines NeoSoul? The question has not been clearly answered. But Neosoul is what the name implies: Neo meaning "new" plus soul music. If we start from that simple proposition instead of what some fans and aficionados and even industry insiders post, we have to define soul music, before we can even get to NeoSoul.  According to Wikipedia, "Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in the African-American community throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It has its roots in African-American gospel music and rhythm and blues." Now that we have that out of the way, we can begin to talk about the evolution of NeoSoul, or "new" soul music that started being produced and recorded in the mid-to-late sixties. Who were the top five major Black musical talents or influences in the mid-sixties: Ray Charles, Gladys Knight, Michael Jackson, Diana Ross, and  Marvin Gaye. All of these artists had careers that spanned decades and, mor...

 While the RNC chair is a regular fixture on Fox News, DNC Chair Jaime Harrison has been virtually missing in action. Suddenly he pops up like a weed in a flourishing garden. Too much posturing, gladhanding, backslapping, high fiving, self-congratulatory performative bs'ing; too many photo-ops; not nearly enough work down in the trenches meeting with grassroot organizers, building coalitions, relationships, and raising the capital necessary for a sustained effort to wrest this election out of the hands of scared-outta-their-wits yt Nationalists who plan to take US back to the Antebellum South. We have to keep it real. Harrison like Tom Perez his predecessor has not been an effective Chair😢Both Jamal Bowman and Cori Bush are a sad testament to Harrison's ineffectiveness, however.🥺

There was some lively, humorous discussion swirling about a Facebook group regarding some members desire to leave (for good reason - though many are victims of their own choosing). According to the group's administrator "over 60 and fab" was supposed to facilitate "love connections." But in practice is little more than a used car showroom for some attractive "involved" or married  women "kicking the tires" by posting self-congratulatory pictures of themselves soliciting complements like they were still the belle of the ball or, worse, back in high school (some in college) when all the handsome, buff jocks were chasing them (neither very hard nor very fast before they caught up, however). The remaining men and women are embittered, lonely, old folks desperately seeking love in a veritable sea of vanity that may have islands of unrealistic expectations upon which they can cling tenuously, resting briefly before washing back out to sea helplessl...

 Gen xers you failed us. You raised these Millennials. Some of whom can be our (Baby Boomer generation) kids but more likely they are our pathetically spoiled, bratty grandkids. Gen Xers kid's (Millennials) are a hot mess. Indolent, apathetic, disheveled, pampered, coddled, privileged, and wholly unconscious without a clear sense of legacy. The folks in the picture are who we (Baby boomers) were raised to emulate, not the tong wearing hoodrats twerking in the mall for impressions on social media or homo-thugs wearing sagging britches with soiled drawers in plain sight slinging dope and flinging shot on the corner of some dilapidated real estate he does not own. We were loathe to step out without being dressed to the nines; our hair cut, hat on, and shoes polished to a simmering gloss. And we now wonder why we get no respect and can be shot down like a rabid dog for sassing the police... We have lost our sense of style. If you look good, you feel good, and people around you will fee...

 Rittenhouse got away with murder. But the Spector of murderer clings to his dark spirit like a foul stench no decent human being can tolerate without gagging: an instinctual, primordial feeling  that they are in the presence of malevolence. To be continued.

 Prompted by weariness with the pedestrian fare found on social media, a group entitled "Black Intellectuals" seemed to be the ideal landing spot. However, unless I am missing something, it is also bereft of content. There is a lot of news directly impacting Black folks throughout the Diaspora. But "Black Intellectuals" are not discussing any of it either critically or in depth. In fact they seem to be "missing in action." I used to be in a group that will remain anonymous because a member there is also a member of Black Intellectuals. We used to have always lively, often raucous, sometimes bitter conversations about topics that engaged Black men of all races. It had over ten thousand members during its height of all political persuasions.  The group's owner was around my age in his mid-sixties but unlike me, retired. After a series of posts Meta's online reputation management (ORM) system and/or human censors found objectionable, the group had to ...

 Abortion is an issue that affects all women. But it is primarily designed to force young, child-bearing aged, yt women preferring the C-Suite to a hospital suite in some dusty, under-equipped, understaffed backwater clinic to produce more "Masters of the Universe." That's the real reason yt conservatives are pushing so hard for a nationwide ban on the controversial medical procedure. Black and brown women's concerns are only collateral to this fool's errand by the MAGA wing of the lunatic fringe. The analogy is yt feminism, which Blk women full-throatily but naively endorsed around the time the Black Liberation Movement was gaining a following in the early 1970s only to find out they were not welcomed at the all-white tea party. The fall out from their famously failed attempt to crash that party is still reverberating in our community as a wedge issue divided along gender lines that even the intrepid, "big-mouth" Reverend Al Sharpton only briefly touche...

 So, how do you strategically combat against an avaricious, aggressive, violent, warmongering tribe who projects its duplicity, hypocrisy, and criminality on to other tribes? By roundly denouncing the off-the-reservation tribe at every turn without fear of either reprisal or retaliation: its brazen theft of innate creativity, intellectual property, valuable mineral (and human) resources and real property of other tribes; by championing our own story: promoting excellence in our community where possible, agitating for it where not. By becoming the protagonist in our own stories. By becoming agents of change. The tribe in question is no longer in the mainstream of American political discourse replete as it is with ancient alabaster relics of a time long past. Its current worldview is a rusty artifact of that period fostered by a false sense of racial superiority naively employed to rationalize "manifest destiny," which is little more than an euphemism for conquest, plunder, mur...

  I never got how playing music at disco volumn or, more importantly, sitting in a car with music blaring so loud you can hear it a mile away was pleasurable. You have to know that you're damaging your hearing beyond disturbing the peace. A good stereo is like seasoning on food. It is supposed to accentuate the music enabling you to hear the highs, midrange, and lows with clarity. Allowing you to savor every note. Like a perfectly cooked steak seasoned with only clarified butter and a few grains of kosher salt. 'nuff said.