Blood Cells

For the roads paved in gold
Have stories told,

The truth on whose backs

Break from whacks

Of whips, forcing

Children to bring

Riches from mines,

Denying the education of minds.

Another poem on the wrongs,

But see we still throng

To that material saviour,

Rather than help a woman, save her

From the rape and torment,

Her body was not meant

To define a warlords control.

She's a queen, not a hole.

As coltan still surfaces

I pray mobile phone worshippers

See the red dripping from their wrists.

The twist?

It’s not your blood as you hold the cell,

It’s your phone trying to tell

The real cost…

In invaded bodies and lives lost.

Ask the manufacturer at point of sale,

What was the actual cost to child and female.

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Mother land

A revised version of my poem:

Mother land

Many years ago

My African ancestors strolled

From the mother land.

A band

Of men, women and children

Whose looks over time and descendents

Paled to cope with cold.

And as we weathered,

My people became coloured.

We settled many places

And became many shades of white races.

Our character carried this pioneer spirit that didn’t recognise

The rights of others. We named this trait “civilised”.

Our link to nature lost,

We invented religion at the cost

Of forgetting the earth

Is bound in spiritual worth

With She, our ancestral Queen, the Great Mystery.

Instead, we worshipped ourselves and called our faith His-story.

We proclaimed a God in our own image

And invented in Him our desire for rage.

Ignoring His son’s life of Peace. Without shame

We bestowed gifts upon ourselves in His name.

Gifts of green, but not of nature.

Instead the colour of ink on white-like-us-paper.

Our beliefs in God, ourselves and greed

Were able to justify that others should bleed.

Journeys began across land and sea.

Found old places and called it “discovery”.

Indigenous peoples viewed as a different class,

Yet we hadn’t recognised ourselves from our past.

What should have been a family reunion

Instead became butchery after Sunday communion.

Ships that should have united all in ancestry

Stole kin from lands and transported them to slavery.

Spread Christian beliefs across African nations,

A Caucasian Jesus inventing racial discrimination.

Beauty took form in what was white and European.

De-beautified Queens raped among sugar cane in the Caribbean.

Isolated a people that rose and beat us.

Haitian children adopted without a fuss.

No forethought to let their mother keep them,

Perish the thought we give her income.

To the West with this fashionable brown baby,

An accessory for the trendiest of white ladies.

We created empires that butchered a family,

Then called it a Commonwealth in the name of equality,

But to member states I’m humbly suggesting,

It’s like a child staying with the father who molested him.

Wind back our evolution to the start of the tree.

Truth of the matter would f*ck up the BNP.

From Africa our ancestors were born,

And now, as white, we pass scorn

Over brothers and sisters we don’t view as equal.

When we left our Mother, we were infested with evil.

Of the worlds 7 billion population only some 1 billion people are white (Wikianwers). The same article described the majority of the world's population (nearly 6 billlion people) as "people of colour". Now let me revisit this. Let’s take it back.. Humanity began in Africa and spread around the globe. Europeans turned white because they couldn’t absorb sufficient vitamin D from the lack of sun. So this 15% or so of the earths population changed colour…. So do we need to revisit who is termed "people of colour". If something is different to a norm, is that the basis for when we use adjectives?… something is small if its smaller than normal etc., so if we are applying adjectives to complexion, surely those that are different to the norm should get the adjective….europeans are coloured?

Enhancing the law in cases of racism and sexual offences

I’m no legal expert so my terminology may lack some expertise. One thing that’s struck me this week over John Terry, is that a court of law could not find him guilty due to the need to be beyond reasonable doubt. The FA could however rule him guilty on the mechanism of in all probability.

This got me thinking about the law of the land with regard to racism and sexual assault/rape cases. Very often, the nature of the evidence may mean there is insufficient conclusive evidence to remove reasonable doubt. So what if we flipped these to “in all probability”?

The issue is the defendant… it may never be considered appropriate to imprison based on probability. So perhaps courts need a two tier punishment system, and a jury can decide on both counts within the same court case.

If a conviction beyond reasonable doubt can be achieved, then go with the imprisonment option. If the evidence falls short of such a conviction, then at least an “in all probability” guilty verdict could be given. The penalty would be less (and in the scheme of things obviously still not sufficient for someone getting off committing such vile crimes), and could be in the realms of fines, sex offenders register, criminal record, even suspended sentences and probably other sanctions that my non-legal mind can’t think of.

At the very least this would give a criminal record and ensure someone who very likely perpetrated the crime, does not get a not-guilty verdict. I think however, it may be hard for the victim to support the case if they felt their assailant was likely to be out on the street after a probability ruling, but then that happens when they’re found not guilty too.

John Terry and Racism

The case of John Terry has highlighted the constant lack of burden of proof that seems to transpire whenever trying to prove racism exists. I’ve been no expert or close follower of this trial, nor as a white male, am I an expert on what racism is and the many forms it can take. But what strikes me, is invariably accusations come down to “interpretation”, or one word against another. So often then cases can avoid successful prosecution as in the eyes of the justice system, there is reasonable doubt.

But let’s not forget this is a white justice system. It was a white magistrate presiding over this case. Some may say the legality relates to evidence and not the colour of the magistrate/judge, but I am firmly of the conviction that a white person of the law cannot judge in cases of alleged racism. I, for example, may be a fighter of racism, but I can never see it all. My life experience does not allow me to comprehend the many ways this poison manifests. For that reason alone, judgement requires the perspective and experience of someone who is not white. Once I knew it was a white magistrate, I knew there would never be a conviction.

One positive out of this case is that it comes on the back of a couple of convictions based on YouTube clips on public transport, where racist rants…. No lets call them what they are, attacks/assaults… have been caught on camera. John Terry now adds to this “caught on camera” problem for many white people. And yes it is a problem for white people. Racism is endemic in way too many people in Britain, including the “white liberals” who claim they “don’t see colour.” And now suddenly the tools are there to catch them at it.

My own life experience has taught me that whenever I befriend white people, through work or socially, invariably the majority will come out at some point, in some situation, with a statement that stereotypes those that don’t look like them, based on a conscious or unconscious conditioned profiling that is inherent in European culture.  As bizarre as it may sound, I find myself uncomfortable in "all-white" situations, because I know sooner or later, someone will think that I think like them and say some thing. Even British comedy now thinks it's so liberal and passed the old days of racist comedians, that white people are "blacking up" again. I find this deeply offensive.

Another example is a popular white singer. I had seen him a couple of times on our London poetry circuit, performing one of his songs. Within the tune, he starts singing in what he terms “rastaman time” drawing on white stereotypes about a black male and smoking weed. I’ve always found this offensive, and once tried to make my way to him after a show and mention to him that it’s inappropriate for white people to be chatting like that… alas I couldn’t get through the adoring throng and since then he’s gone global (yes there goes another white singer making it). Many may find this song perfectly acceptable, but to me, it’s on the tip of the same pyramid of profiling.

The annual marches against deaths in custody serve as a reminder as to what’s further down the pyramid. Marches that bring to the fore the rawness of loss because of the colour of our justice system. Where a justice system that allows police to film our every move in the streets, can tolerate police losing film or not having cameras on their own kind. Now I’m not saying that those who speak racism are perpetrators in police cells, but the issue often comes down to who does or doesn’t say “Stop” when a situation escalates… a situation where stereotypes and profiling take over in an adrenalin rush and mob instincts overtake training. There we go again, the terms “profiling” and “stereotyping”. Let’s call it what it is… racism. It’s all wrong, and white people would do well to recognise, their own little versions of it do not constitute racism-lite verses what they can see as blatant racism-hardcore. There is much to be undone in European mindsets, before true equality can be done.

Western Souls

Defined as developed nations,

We sit astride our wealthy conquests.

Battles won with canon, musket,

Boats and plunder,

And economics backing dictators.

Under

Corrupted governments

Ownership transfers wealth

From starved bellies

And raped bodies.

An assassins bullet

Backing diplomacy,

And aid tagged to profit.

Our nations developed riches

But not of the mind.

It’s time

To understand the price of comfort

Or else our spirits choke

Under watchful eyes of the Great Mystery.

This inflicted misery

That we seek to resolve by charity,

Is not about us giving,

But deciding the lifestyles

We’re prepared to give up.

The Hip Hop Debate

A recent internet and audience based hip hop “on trial” debate can be replayed here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3-7Y0xG89Q&feature=player_embedded.

The motion debated - Hip Hop doesn’t enhance society, it degrades it.

I haven’t watched it yet. I may, I may not. I know of some peeps who went, or watched online and commented.

The reason I haven’t watched this, is so much really depends on what your basic definition of Hip Hop is. Anyone who saw hip hop grow from the start, is going to have a very different view, and some might say ownership, of hip hop. I can only give a perception of what it has meant to me as I grew up with it.

What hip hop means to me…

I first heard hip hop in 1981. I was at that time, extending parts of tunes I liked from old disco tunes, by recording instrumental breaks on cassette, and then keeping on the beat and re-recording them… so the instrumental break was longer. I loved the percussion or rhythm guitar and just wanted to hear more of them. I did it for myself. I didn’t know this was being done anywhere else.

Then I heard the Adventures of Grandmaster Flash on The Wheels of Steel, and parts of different tunes were being “extracted”, repeated, scratched, and rapped over. I didn’t know it was sampling then. I didn’t know it was break beats then. I knew it was like nothing I’d ever heard. I knew I fell in love with it straight away.

More hip hop came, and samples and break beats used from tunes that I had loved, gave honour to the original tune, but also the creation of an art form using essentially a live remix and yet more overlaid… the artistry, skill and ingenuity frankly just blew me away. So part one, hip hop to me was and is about the DJ.

Part 2 came from lyrics like in The Message, and later Public Enemy. Hip Hop actually stood for something to me. Revolution, change. Even if not for me, it was opening my eyes to something wrong in the world. So hip hop fundamentally by definition to me was a “constructive” art. It was positively about change. To me, my perception… it was a fight for equality.

So I’ll reiterate, this is my perception of hip hop from time. So when Biggie and 2Pac hit the scene. Me, personally, I didn’t feel them. I still don’t. I respect their legacy for the scene and what they mean for others, so I will never dis them. I can only say the first 2Pac track I bought was California Love… when I listened to the other tracks on the EP, I was shocked at 2Pac going off with some violent chat. It’s a shame, because it stopped me listening to much of his work… music and words that I know many people revere. Maybe if I’d heard more of his work first, then I would have a more rounded view of him. With Biggie, the talk of B’s as women, again, I couldn’t really get inspired to check much else out. Do I like some tunes by both 2Pac and Biggie. Of course. Am I a hater?… of course not. I simply never have got into hip hop that went down this route.

Hip hop, if it is hip hop, and that’s my point, left me for many years.

Only really Guru (Rest In Peace) and DJ Premier as Gangstarr kept my interest… trusted lyrics, DJ based. It was my kind of hip hop. But I’d really left “the scene”.

And it’s for this reason I wonder if I’m the hip hop lover that I’ve always claimed to be. I have a huge gap in hip hop knowledge because I left a scene I didn’t personally buy into. Either way, I look back at it now, and I think I love the ethos of what I thought hip hop was… this fight for truth, justice, equality, change and revolution. True hip hop was not sexist nor homophobic (and it should still be neither now).  Maybe I love that ethos more than I love hip hop, and my claim that hip hop has to have that ethos could be flawed. But that’s what it means to me.

What brought me back to Hip Hop, and discovering a lot of tunes that I had kept away from, was female MC’s. I got into Missy telling it from a woman’s angle. I just found it refreshing. I don’t really like male dominance in the world.

When I first got into the spoken word scene, about 2006, I saw this as an extension of hip hop. Not because it was like rapping…. Def not!!, but because the messages I heard from the likes of Mosaique, David J, Kat Francois, Zena Edwards etc., were talking to me in the same way hip hop did. But it’s now I’m starting to realise that maybe I love the “Constructive Arts” more than I love hip hop. I thought I loved hip hop, but I loved an ethos, which extends to constructive art from many forms, some hip hop, poetry, reggae, even calypso. And more recently for me Afrobeat.

Afrobeat has totally immersed me the last year, and I simply can’t get enough of it. It’s drawing me to explore much more music from other nations in Africa. You see like Hip Hop, I love a constructive message firing over a contagious beat. And as with a good DJ, I love a beat to be relentless (ps. and I love funk rhythm guitar).

One issue with hip hop… I have a radio show with a clean language policy on the station. How much hip hop do you think I can play (no I’m not re-buying my whole collection in “clean version”). The answer, too little. Does that say something? Does it say something about how we define hip hop? Does it confirm the premise, that we have to define what hip hop truly is and stands for, before we start debating its value to society. Because the version I thought I loved, (and still do), is life changing… and would kick every corrupt politician and banker off their asses… all over a beat to die for.

I’m just not sure if that’s the version of hip hop (real hip hop) that we’re debating.

Ethnic Minority

You see I am the minority.

I’m one of the 1 billion

That make up the ethnic minority

Of whiteness.

I confess,

My Eurocentric world brought me up

With expectations that we run this shit,

Correction, that we are the shit.

And yet a further 6 billion

Know truths about my kind

That schools and media keep Caucasians blind.

We used God as a way to remind

Ourselves of our self imposed superiority,

When His words of humbleness

Were spread by those first to the arms race,

You see sail and musket defined our morality

And our ability to impose our version of “civility”.

That invention of a white Son of God

Yet the reality, Jesus was not one of my 1 billion peoples.

He was darker, preaching all are equal.

This same love for all things white

Being right,

Creating creams

To make queens

Think their skin tones

Need to be light years from their actual beauty.

But this shit is only about vitamin D.

Out of Africa we all came, it’s just

The 1 billion of us had to turn white in cold climates

To absorb more of the sun.

Inside, look back, we’re all African.

These same queens being made to skin out

For dance floor hits,

Cloning a@@, pu@@y and t@ts,

All on show and calling it hip hop,

Forgetting where the truth of that music came from,

Before gangsta’d, bastardised and rapped wrong,

Into a format that saw Caucasians buy more than any other race,

Then called it “urban” to keep the sterotypes in place.

Dumbed down enough great voices of colour,

Then the media proclaims another Great White soul singer.

Don’t get me wrong, I can recognise talent when I see it.

But that doesn’t mean I have to like this shit,

When I know for every white MOBO act that wins

- I can’t be party to the sins

That keep the hundreds of voices that sweeten me

Daily on this art scene,

Pushed out by the contagion of Simons dream.

Black X’ess.

It’s more than a scent, it something to be kept down.

Just like the Holocaust that started in 1562.

John Hawkins beginning a trade of an ethnic majority

That roots every part of today’s inequalities.

Whiteness.

Let me breath in its righteousness.

So f@cked up that people want to be it.

Even Israel wants to be seen as European

And force Africans on trains to camps.

Damn, did they really forget what happened to them?

And the joke is, us of the 1 billion

Buy products to turn us brown

(well orange)

And photocrop swimsuit models to such dark tans

That in reality…

Shoulda just photographed a black girl in a bikini.

White laws govern the capitalist fantasy,

AKA “Free Trade”

That keeps raw materials in light ownership,

From the dark earth of a continent

That was scrambled into euro zones.

Let my cell phone pick at its bones

Of the dead, the raped and the limbless.

Congo dies while today’s big European news topic

Is 5p being charged on plastic bags for your shopping.

A nation that should be the richest on the planet

For the wealth that lies beneath the soil.

Instead ravaged by fear and turmoil.

Told we can’t do anything to stop it.

So reporting ceases.

The abuse increases.

Princesses who should grow to queens,

And choose who plants their future seed…

But the Coltan need decreed

That they, from violent intrusion, bleed,

As gun barrels, knifes and forced d@cks enter,

All to secure white riches and a euro future.

The only reason why the liberals among my 1 billion now shout,

That capitalism, after all, may not be what it’s all about…

Is because austerity came to bite their own asses.

In the past, they been raising glasses

To the toast of wealth.

You see, shits alright,…when shit happens to someone else.

Jubilee Spoyals

Lazy Saturday, in the quilt I hide.

It sounds like rain outside,

But it’s the sound of wind on bunting,

The Union Jacks flap patriotism of a nation fronting.

Kidding itself that all is grand

In Britain where “Great” names the land.

A weekend for celebrating the Royals

Yet under the praise, what of the spoils.

You want me to wave a flag,

Sing joyfully and forget the bad?

Perhaps you think I should look forward

Instead of back. For me, I look towards

The damage in legacies sowed.

The ones that deny people to grow.

See it’s hypocrisy

That spoils the day for me.

Don’t think so?

Ask the people of the Chagos Archipelago.

Stand under your red, white and blue and cheer

As justice is denied to Kenyan women who feared

Rape from British soldiers represented on parade,

The same uniforms that were displayed

In a Royal wedding in Westminster Abbey.

Check Anglican military memorabilia and ask me,

No, ask Jesus, if His words of peace

Would integrate armies in Faith and belief.

This same church in God’s name, in waves

Took Africans and forced them to be slaves.

The Codrington plantation owned by the C of E

Branded black chests with the word “Society”.

The smell of burning flesh and skin.

A church not questioned for its evil sins.

And who atop it’s head… the Queen

With the money to reparate for crimes seen.

This poem is the tip of the bunting triangle.

It’s base spreads wide and is tangled

In the structures that define our world today.

The suffering and inequalities of wealth play

Out as resources are stolen still from lands…

Think of that when you listen to army bands

Pomping and pimping to the National Anthem.

A nation that lives for us, and kills “them”.