Elfen’s NEOSOUL NEW ALBUM TUESDAY SOIA MOOD SWINGS
ATTENTION TO ALL MY NEWBIE NEOSOUL HEADS!!! LISTEN UP You got to ad Soia 2013 album Mood Swings to your Neosoul collection.
What’s old to you may be new to me. What’s new to you may be old to me. I’ll just let her Neosoul music sing for itself! See you next week!! Give Soia album a listen on Bandcamp or iTunes
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DC UNIVERSE Harley Quinn NY Comic Con First look
You’ll only find Harley Quinn on DC UNIVERSE. Subscribe NOW!
Goodbye British ‘Black History Month’? Cyber-Racism and Whitewashing Mar U.K. Celebration
For the past 20 years, October has marked the start of Black History Month in the U.K. (a whole 31 days! Imagine!) But this year, the event has been mired in controversy, with one prominent Black History Month site recently targeted by hackers and some local councils now opting to rebrand October as “Diversity Month.”
Let’s start with the hacking of Black History Month magazine’s website, which was attacked twice within 24 hours. As the Guardian reports, the entire site was brought down on Monday morning, restored, and then attacked again on Tuesday morning.
Patrick Vernon, the magazine’s editor, says the site is the country’s most popular one dedicated to black history, and that the timing of the attack was deliberate.
“What we are experiencing now is part of a wider context of cyber-racism,” he told the Guardian.
“We thought initially it was because Black History Month was trending because there has been a lot of interest on social media and in newspapers,” Vernon said. “It is very clear that it has been targeted by hackers in the UK. We don’t know who it is, but it’s clear whoever they are picked on us yesterday deliberately [on the first day of Black History Month].”
Vernon added that interest in Black History Month in the U.K. was higher this year because of the “Windrush Scandal,” which involves Caribbean immigrants who came to the U.K. between 1948 and 1971—the “Windrush generation”. Recently, some members of the Windrush generation were classified as illegal immigrants (despite being invited to move to the U.K.) and were threatened with deportation or turned away from jobs and public services, like health care.
Despite living and working in the UK for decades, many Windrush children are being told to leave.…
Part of the problem was that the British government had destroyed some immigrants’ landing cards, and didn’t keep track of the Caribbean immigrants allowed to stay in the U.K.
Prime Minister Theresa May recently apologized to Caribbean leaders for the debacle, reports the BBC.
The scandal also exemplifies why Black History Month is so important, especially as several London councils try to replace the month with a more generic “Diversity Month,” BHM supporters say.
According to News One, one conservative West London borough decided to focus more broadly on “multiculturalism,” rather than home in specifically on African and Caribbean culture and history. And another conservative South London neighborhood will rebrand BHM as “Diversity Month,” celebrating … well, everyone, it seems: Indian, Polish, Spanish, Chinese, and African and Caribbean cultures will be lumped together in a month that, in attempting to celebrate everyone, will ultimately mean nothing to anyone.
(*Taps mic* Y’all do know there are 11 whole other months, right?)
As Raifa Rafiq, a host on the Mostly Lit podcast, told BBC’s Newsbeat, taking the “black” out of “Black History Month” is unacceptable.
“Black people are at the bottom of that barrel and this month is supposed to be significant because we’re supposed to be celebrating those black lives,” she said.
“So it becomes really annoying to see that just black, and that word in itself, is not taken into consideration.”
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I Just Wanted Those Raggedy Shitstain To Loose
It so important to VOTE!! EVERY VOTE does count! If you don’t vote on a ballet or vote for an independent presidential or Senator candidate we all end up loosing very crucial bills and laws that need to pass, revised or vetoed!
In a Billboard cover story last week, knapsack enthusiast J. Cole admitted that he didn’t vote in the 2016 presidential election, claiming that while he would have voted for Bernie Sanders, Hillary Clinton just didn’t motivate him.
Naturally, he was roundly criticized for this—particularly since he’s considered to be (and shrewdly positioned himself as) an artist concerned with and invested in politics. How could someone so mindful of our history do something so disrespectful? How could someone who considers himself so smart do something so dumb? Did/does he not realize how dangerous and damaging the false equivalencies comparing Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are?
These (and other similar) questions are natural, damning and fair. They also might be the wrong ones.
Because if, for instance, my 18-year-old nephew watched the circus of the Judge Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings last week; and if he spent the last week watching CNN and MSNBC and Fox News; and if, after consuming all of this, he shared that he was deeply disillusioned with politics and not sure why he should even care, I’m not sure what I could say to sway him. Of course, I could remind him of the clear white supremacist bent of the Republican Party. I could teach him that as long as they’re in power, women’s rights and LGBTQ rights remain tenuous.
But then he could say, “If the Republicans are so bad and evil and the Democrats are so good, why did Barack Obama eulogize John McCain? And how did Michelle Obama and George W. Bush seem to become such good friends?”
And then I’d say, “Well, um, McCain and Bush were different. Republicans, sure. But they were decent people, and …”
And then he’d say “But if Bush is so different and so decent, why is he trying to get Brett Kavanaugh confirmed?”
And then I’d just take him to Chipotle.
Deciding to vote is, and will always be, the right answer. But considering this very real and very justified skepticism of politics and politicians —and also considering gerrymandering and voters’ rights restrictions and the rest of the obstacles put in place to make the act of voting a struggle—I just can’t begrudge someone whose response to this is “Fuck it.” I can be sanctimonious and self-righteous and attempt to shame them, perhaps. But when attempting to craft a compelling and honest counter to the voter apathy that 74 percent of 18-29-year-olds possess, I have nothing. Instead, I’ll just share what’s motivating me.
Of course, I recognize the danger of a right-leaning SCOTUS. Of course, I know the effect our elected officials have on the economy, our healthcare, our law enforcement, our education and criminal and environment justice. As theoretical and hypothetical and transparently performative as political arguments and campaigns tend to be, who we elect to office has a literal impact on the bodies we inhabit. For women, for people of color, for the LGBTQ community, for people who are not Christian, and for people who are not American-born Americans, this threat is critical. How America decides to vote can be the difference between life and death.
But the gravity-defying force that will lift me from my home on Nov. 6 and carry me to my polling station is schadenfreude. When I think of people like Donald Trump and Brett Kavanaugh—men who have never experienced any real disappointment or struggle or pain and are openly hostile towards and mocking of those who have—I just want those motherfuckers to lose. Same with all of the frothing MAGA motherfuckers who, as the Atlantic’s Adam Serwer articulated yesterday, mine glee from cruelty towards us. I want them to feel like shit, even if said shitty feeling only moderately interrupts the torrent of privilege, and I will derive more immediate pleasure from their defeat than our victory. Yes, the country will be a better and safer place if progressive politics win out, and this will make me happy. This will be a good thing. A great thing. But I also want them to be crushed, and this want for their political destruction and descent into self-doubt and irrelevance exists independent of the desire to win. And, also, it will bring my black ass joy.
I will tell my nephew this on the drive to Chipotle. And hopefully, by the time he finishes his chorizo and pinto bean burrito, he’ll agree.
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