Showing posts with label videos. Show all posts

My friend Sarah forwarded this response to my last blog post. Really, Monty Python does say it best.

Once again, I steal any good thoughts from illdoctrine.com

Much love to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the flawed, real human beings that fought and struggled to increase justice and mercy in our world. Society does no favor to King's legacy by reducing it to one speech, or one issue and it does no favor to the rest of humanity to elevate King above his humanity. Dr. King worked to end poverty, bring about reparations for slavery, and an end to war.

Dr. King was a person who was a creature of his time. He may or may not have supported LGBT rights when he was alive, and he may or may not have supported LGBT rights if he were alive today. This is not to minimize the struggles and necessity of LGBT rights, but to emphasize that Dr. King may have had his vision limited by prejudices that are apparant to us today as racism was apparant to Dr. King in his day. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was and is a great man, a person to emulate. But let us not lose sight of the fact that he was also a man, and that what he did and who he became is achievable not just by a select few, but by all of us.

Dr. King was inspired in his own day by Jesus, Mahatma Ghandi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and many others. Today, Dr. King continues to exist as an inspiration for those of us alive today and those yet to come. Let us not "white wash" his legacy and our memories of him, thereby making him and what he did for us all unattainable by those who continue the struggle today. Let us see the full spectrum of his character and soul. Knowing that he had flaws, just as the rest of us do, should not be considered scandalous but a reminder that great things can come from any of us, despite of or maybe even as a result of our flaws or weaknesses.

There will always be those that will attempt character assassination of anyone they don't agree with. It is only by embracing the whole person of who Dr. King was will we be able to move beyond this increasing polarization. Just as it is patriotic to say when our country is wrong, so also is respecting the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. by remembering that no one is above sin or is perfect.

Alright, if you haven't picked up on it already, I'm infatuated with the video blog website illdoctrine.com. It's run by Jay Smooth, who has decades of cred in the hip hop community. His postings cover a wide range of topics and cover a lot of ground in the hip hop and Black community including culture, politics, and the issues of misogyny and homophobia. I find what he has to say to be persuasive, multi-layered, and spot on. Not to mention entertaining. So, don't be surprised if I keep posting his videos until I get this blogger crush out of my system.

I'm sure you are dying to know why I find this so interesting. I've been a fan of hip-hop since I started listening to music. Some of the first cassettes I had were called Raps Greatest Hits and had tracks from Kurtis Blow, Doug E. Fresh, Erik B. and Rakim. At the time, I was just one more white kid in the suburbs trying to be Black, or as we called it, a wigger. These were also the days of New Jack Swing, which influenced my sense of romance. Anyway, as time went on hip hop's lyrics and style influenced me, and I realized that if I liked this kind of music I also needed to pay more attention to the cultures and influences that shaped this music. This pushed me towards trying to understand racism and poverty in the United States, and started me thinking about cultural appropriation, the taking of elements of a usually minority culture by a more dominant culture.

To this day, cultural appropriation is one of the things that angers me the most, is rarely discussed, and is in reality a much more complex cultural interchange, as mainstream American culture is not totally seperated from the African American, inner-city cultures. So, I have tried to not be just a consumer, or a taker in Randian terms. As a member of dominant society, I must constantly check my priveldge and remember that I must instead work towards cultural exchange, where I give back as much as I take. I don't do this just in regards to hip hop and the Black community, but also in regards to interfaith dialogue, especially when it comes to Native American religions.

So, to bring it all back, illdoctrine has been a great reminder to me of the nuances of hip hop culture and the larger Black communities and I find Jay Smooth can help keep me on track. A good example of this is a piece he did on a church in Chicago putting up billboards telling people to not listen to some rappers. For all you ministers out there, what he has to say about this church's move is something to take to heart and mirrors much of what I learned in seminary about community dialogue.

So check it out. Don't believe the hype (even if it's my hype)

I really like New Years. Not so much as a festive occasion but as a new beginning.* It is one of the reasons why I am adamant about saying Happy Holidays through the month of December. For me, there is more than one "reason for the season," and I think the birth of Jesus and the birth of a new year are related. This blog entry will be some of my thoughts as I get ready to move into a new year as well as some texts that I'm finding useful this new year's season. There may be a follow up to this entry, or not, as the spirit moves.

New years is chance to pause, reflect, and assess where I'm at, how I am, and see who I am becoming. Maybe it's the Catholic in me, but a regular time for self reflection and confession does my soul good. I don't go in much for New Year's Resolutions but use the holiday as a time of reflection and a signpost in the path of my life. Even the weather cooperates with this mindset. The cold keeps me inside more often, and the snow and ice quiet the outside and require me to focus on walking, creating more space for reflection on my walks.

In thinking of the the past year and the year to come, I feel lucky to be able to use this time of year as a transition point. Within the coming year, there will be many new things in my life, a new job, a new degree program, and most likely a new city. In looking back, I look at the job that I left, and I see what I've taken from that experience, both good and not so good. In some ways, my self care skills have improved, but at the expense of others, I fear.

One thing that I've been reflecting on is how I view my overall mindset and sets of skills. I have noticed that I am shifting from the view of me being focused on organization and moving towards a focus of creation. I have also discovered that I've fallen away from something that energized me, teaching, and have found something else, making. Call it arts and crafts, DIY, tinkering, or living more self-sufficiently. I think of it as making. In the coming year, I want to continue making, and if an opportunity to teach presents itself, I will take that as well. The coming year will need to be a year of patience and preperation, as I realize that I am not in a place to have what I want, a clearly defined career path and a long term loving relationship.

So, with all of that in mind, here are four texts that I am finding useful to keep in the back of my mind.

Table by Edip Cansever, translated by Richard Tillinghast



A man filled with the gladness of living
Put his keys on the table,
Put flowers in a copper bowl there.
He put his eggs and milk on the table.
He put there the light that came in through the window,
Sound of a bicycle, sound of a spinning wheel.
The softness of bread and weather he put there.
On the table the man put
Things that happened in his mind.
What he wanted to do in life,
He put that there.
Those he loved, those he didn't love,
The man put them on the table too.
Three time three makes nine;
The man put nine on the table.

He was next to the window next to the sky;
He reached out and placed on the table endlessness.
So many days he had wanted to drink a beer!
He put on the table the pouring of that beer.
He placed there his sleep and his wakefulness;
His hunger and his fullness he placed there.

Now that's what I call a table!
It didn't complain at all about the load.
It wobbled once or twice, then stood firm.
The man kept piling things on.



An excerpt from Seventh Son, by Orson Scott Card. Page 129.

"It came together in Alvin's mind. The whole story that the Taleswapper was trying to tell. Alvin knew all kinds of opposites in the world: good and evil, light and dark, free and slave, love and hate. But deeper than all those opposites was making and unmaking. So deep that hardly anybody noticed that it was the most important opposite of all. But he noticed, and so that made the Unmaker his enemy. That's why the Unmaker came after him in his sleep. After all, Alvin had his knack. His knack for setting things in order, putting things in the shape they ought to be in."



Getting Back To Work, Part 1 from illdoctrine.com






Beating The Little Hater also from illdoctrine.com



That's all for now. I hope your new years is as transformative as I hope mine will be.

* as a party, New Years hasn't always treated me kindly. Rather, New Years has shown why I should stick to beer, because I have almost no ability to limit my alcoholic intake, as the toilets in the childhood house of a certain friend can attest.

Yes, you read that right. On mtvmusic.com, MTV has begun posting their entire music video library. This probably only means something to me because MTV seemed to get out of the music biz about 10 years ago. So, for nostalgia's sake, take a look.

I offer for your pleasure "Under Pressure" by Queen and David Bowie. It seems to be appropriate.

As you already know it's less than one month until the Presidential election. Given how polarized the country is, it does my heart good to see Senators Obama and McCain appear on the same stage and joke around in the interest of contributing to a good cause. Once again, showing that humor and compassion can bridge great divides. And, I have to admit, McCain delivers a joke better than Obama. So he's got that going for him.

If you have a few free minutes, watch this video:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/39636/msnbc-decision-08-mccain-and-obama-joke-around

Damn, do I find this funny.

And now, a break from the political commentary, for the religiously absurd. I wonder how this would preach?

To add to the political videos on here as of late, here is an awesome clip of Rage Against the Machine in St. Paul Minnesota. After the police shut down their public address system, they went out with a bullhorn, and performed acapella, to show that no one can silence free speech.

I'm sitting at home, having just watched the first part of Barack Obama's interview on Bill O'Reilly's show. Not surprisingly, I found the double standards and the hypocrisy of the show astounding. My temperature rising, I come to check my email, and find this gem of a video from the Daily Show. I intend to use this in many political debates to come. Again, how is it that the comedians can do what the politicians and the media cannot? Maybe it's true, the jester can say things to the king that no one else can.

I thought, no matter how much the world around us changed, I could rely on one thing.

Muppets.

I was wrong. Now, even cookie monster has gone on the wagon.

The youtube clip below is an interview of Father Mike Pfleger of St. Sabina's Church in Chicago Illinois by Fox News about his relationship with Rev. Jeremiah Wright. The clip, which had to be slightly edited to fit into 10 minutes, shows Father Pfleger take a Fox News reporter to task on his network's coverage of Rev. Wright, and on the larger issue of the condemnation of any who criticize America. The father's words are beautiful in their truth and direct in their focus.

Amazing.



Obama's ability to tap into popular culture to make a political statement is astounding. Yet, to take it one step further, I find myself wondering if "brushing the dirt off your shoulder," in this context isn't also tapping into a spiritual truth? Isn't it Buddhist non-attachment? Isn't it turning the other cheek? And, to take it one step further, isn't this the type of political leadership we need? The ability to let bygones be bygones? There are very few countries in the world that we have not offended by our policies, or that have offended our current political leadership for not following our policies?

January 20, 2009, we can all brush our shoulders off, and move towards a better future.

I got this video off of Neil Gaiman's blog:




...what do you mean, "I hope you aren't allergic to latex?"

Thanks to Rev. Johnny for bringing this to my attention:

Well, hello there.

New place for my blog, same ol' drivel. If you somehow have stumbled across this from somewhere else, I'm so sorry.

I've got some stuff brewing, but in honor of my old myspace blog, here are a couple of youtube videos to set the tone and get things off on the right foot:





Nothing like a couple of anti war videos to set the mood, right?






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