Now, this little boy couldn’t have been more than three.  There’s no way that he could remember Michael the way that you and I remember Michael. Yet he shared such a pure enthusiasm for the MJJ, such a love that I couldn’t do anything but smile at him and think about the ways that Michael continues to live and touch lives.  Little boys rocking out at the sight of Michael Jackson on a magazine cover is exactly what legends are made of. 

I’m not sure why, but U.S. holidays don’t particularly care for the month of August.  Maybe the holiday gods think back to school shopping and Labor Day sales will tide the American public over until it’s time to buy afro wigs for Halloween costume parties.  I don’t know about you, dear reader, but I ain’t with it.  August needs a holiday, a three-day weekend we can all support.  Which is why I’m suggesting that we honor the life of Michael Joseph Jackson by making the last Monday in August a federal holiday.    He’s done a lot for us, for the world.  The fact that “Billie Jean” still bangs, that his jheri curl mullet (still?)  looked really good make MJJ worthy of a holiday.  Those facts combined with his philanthropic endeavors should make him a shoo-in for federal acknowledgment.  Lesser men have been honored with parades.  (Seriously, America, Columbus Day?  That’s just a incredibly arrogant way of dissing indigenous people and saying to the rest of the world, “Dude, we may not be a legitimate country, but we’re going to throw a party, anyway.”)
Yesterday was Michael Jackson’s birthday.  Many of us moonwalked our way into insobriety as we honored the gloved one all night at the club.  Others changed their Facebook profile photos to dancing Michael or Michael in a tux and afro or Michael in a fedora.  Many of us tweeted at least one shout out to the GREATEST ENTERTAINER OF ALL TIME on his birthday in some internet version of pouring out libations.  Still, I think there’s more we can do, more that Michael deserves.  Michael doesn’t need another mixtape; he’s needs a Monday off--which he can accomplish vicariously through us.

It’s prime time for another black person to have a holiday.  Instead of waiting for Barack Obama Day or for his face to appear on some money, I urge anyone reading this to contact their local Congressperson or whomever it is that helps federal holidays become federal holidays in an effort to commence the MJJ Day movement.  I’m sure there’s a wiki article about this floating around somewhere on the internet about how, exactly, to do this.  (Un)fortunately, my recently amplified nihilism precludes me from contacting the government about anything, otherwise it might appear as if I believe something other than nothing has meaning.  I’ve no idea how well my crusade to increase The Lovers and Friends Show following is going, but I hope this latest effort trumps that one.

In the meantime, I suggest the we continue informally celebrating Michael’s life until the government gets its act together and responds to the letter writing campaign that will undoubtedly commence after enough people read this blog.  Be sure to mention a day of service; BHO loves days of service.  We’ve already got the party part down, here are some other suggestions:

• Brush and gel down your baby hair.

• Try to toss a coin into a jukebox from fifty feet away.

• Put tape around a few of your fingertips.  I used to do this as a kid.  It’s so much fun.

• Everybody loves pink and red ribbons.  Screw that.  Honor Michael by pinning a little white glittery glove to your lapel.

• Tar and feather Joe Jackson.

• Add a “Shamone” to your statements.  For example, when asking your boss for a raise, say something like, “I’ve saved this company $2 million in the last two quarters alone.  I deserve a 4% raise.  Shamone!”

• Jazz it up on casual Fridays: wear some white socks with black dress shoes, preferably penny loafers.

• Two words: FLASH MOB!

• After your workout, you know when you’re all sweaty and gross looking, scream “Michael!” at the top of your lungs and pass out.

• Petition the city to get the sidewalks to light up when people step on them.  If they can turn the Chicago River green for St. Patrick’s Day, I know they can do some concrete magic once a year.  Can you imagine how awesome you’d feel about yourself if the sidewalk glowed as you walked on it?  Mental health benefits!

• Try to moonwalk.  Here’s a hint: don’t practice on carpet.

• Pick an MJJ song at random.  Then, try to decipher ALL of the lyrics without the help of Google.

• Watch this.  The greatest music video of all time:

Several eons have passed since that late summer night in West Lafayette, Indiana (Boiler up!).  I’ve registered and graduated and registered and graduated many times over.  In the interim, I imagine, there have been many, many more Jell-O wrestling matches featuring all too eager–and inebriated–co-eds gaining such learning on their parents’ dime.  (Seriously, how much Jell-O does one have to buy in order to properly coordinate a Jell-O wresting event?  Sounds like a math problem to me.)  Since the only thing I’ve ever been in my adult life is a student, I’ve picked my own brain to come up with a few tips.  Call it my effort to compile a list of unhackneyed advice that just might help you during your first year (and beyond) of college.  You’re welcome.

Pledging is not a major. I know, I know, there is just something about the way those Deltas stroll to “My Chick Bad” (Ludacris’ chick is so bad, she don’t need a verb.  That’s bad as hell.)  that makes you want to don crimson and creme.  And, should a black woman find a man to marry, her sorors will sing at her wedding.  But trust me, wannabe neo, your college education is not–and should not be– the spec script for the Stromp the Yard sequel or Drum Line 2 (Dr. Lee ain’t my daddy! – Oh, Nick Canon).  There are other ways of finding out the recipe for Kappa Kool-Aid.  Besides, you don’t want your life to peak too soon, Half Pint.

Be honest…because frankly, your late paper excuses suck.  So you didn’t listen to my first bit of advice, and now you’re totally buggin’ because you didn’t finish your mid-term paper because you were out all night pledging?  Ok, fine.  Don’t spend the morning fabricating some terrible excuse about why your work isn’t done.  Why?  Because you sound stupid.  Your late paper excuses only sound good to you and your hungover roommate.  Trust me.  If the work isn’t done, tell your professor it isn’t done; don’t lie.  You make it so much worse when you lie.  Just tell her that the paper isn’t finished.  Maybe she won’t penalize you.  Maybe you’ll have to take it on the chin, but you won’t look like an ass.  If you still insist on lying, there’s a blog post I wrote years ago floating around the internet about the most convincing ways to get a paper extension without really trying.  I’m not going to post the link, though.  You’ll have to work for that.

The staff are your friends. And by staff I mean all the folks who aren’t faculty: the janitors, the secretaries, the LOAN officers.  Here’s something really simple: Say hello–and mean it.  I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen staff just treated as if they were invisible cogs there to do the dirty work of the students and faculty.  If it wasn’t for them, the school would implode.  They’re people; treat them accordingly.  Clean up after yourself.  Act like you have some home training.  In a pinch, they may be the folks who can actually help you.  But that’s not why you should get to know them.  Just don’t be a bastard towards them, ok?

They’re not going to free Mumia, but sign the petition, anyway.

A few books you should (and will) read while in college: Zami, Blowback, Brave New World, Invisible Man, The Wretched of the Earth, The Leviathan, The Communist Manifesto, Letter from a Birmingham Jail, Beloved, Notes on the State of Virginia, Simulacra and Simulations, The Origin of the Species, Things Fall Apart, The Stranger, Crime and Punishment, One Hundred Years of Solitude, Democracy in America, and a host of others I can’t think of this Monday morning.

Go Veg (because that’s where the girls are).  You’re not going to get a date playing Sony Playstation all day, but you might get one if you become a vegetarian.  I’d say the same thing about a women’s studies course, but Fallon might smack me.

Speaking of, become a feminist. It’s now or never.  Also, it’s prime time to kiss a girl.  Be sure to pick up your free pass from the women’s studies department during orientation week.  They should also have condoms.

Protest something. (See Abu-Jamal, Mumia.)  Seriously, this might be the only time you’ll have time be an activist.  After graduation, you might have to get a real job.  (I kid, I kid.)

Open mic. I know.  There’s just something about that sing-songy cadence and/or an acoustic guitar that makes what’s being said sound profound.  It’s not.  Still, go.  Heckle.

Music(ians) you will inevitably–and probably should–listen to while in college (because blazing hip-hop and R&B has rotted your brain): Robert Johnson (duh!), Nina Simone, Joni Mitchell (she never lied), Billie Holiday, The Smiths (it happens to the best of us), The Roots, David Bowie, The Mamas and the Papas (don’t hate), Bob Marley (not just for frat boys), The Cranberries (because I said so), Fela Kuti (from the obvious files), Curtis Mayfield, Lucinda Williams, Donny Hathaway, some underground hip-hop courtesy of your campus backpacker, The Clash, The Cure, Carole King, Esthero, Fat Freddy’s Drop.  And, of course, a jazz musician.  Pick one.  If you need help, because getting into jazz can be daunting, go visit a black studies professor during office hours.  He has at least one poster of a jazz musician on his wall.

Love will tear us apart. Ten bucks says you and your high school honey are over by midterms.

Be kind to your T.A. They’re people, too.  They just made a very, very terrible mistake called graduate school.

Have a great first week of school!

P.S. I co-wrote a blog for the Crunk Feminist Collective.  Check it out.

The Lovers and Friends Show is something like Noah’s Arc meets The Golden Girls meets your grass roots A.V. Club.  In other words, The Lovers and Friends Show chronicles a group of lesbians of color living in south Florida, with no word from your local sponser.  It’s Sex and the City with melanin and a bus pass.  And it is so much more tolerable than The L Word.  The Lovers and Friends Show showcases the lives of women that Bravo and Logo and just about every other ostensibly gay entity fails to recognize.  And it is my latest goal to (further) inspire a cult following. (Jim Jones.)

Check out a clip:

So much goodness!

A few weeks ago, I spent at least 45 minutes talking with my friends Rosa and Sullivan about L&F.  @moyazb and I are going to figure out a way to MST3K the show.  It’s worthy of that much commentary--and a spot on your Netflix queue.  Each of the first two seasons is no more than 3 episodes, so it won’t take you too long to catch up.  (Heinz) According to my latest internet search, season three will be out soon.  For those of you thirsting for lesbians of color on your computer and/or television screen, or a show that not only compels but requires interactive watching, L&F is worth six hours of your time.  Seriously, if you don’t talk throughout the show, check your pulse. (EKG).  The Lovers and Friend Show following needs to grow exponentially.  Join us.  Tell a friend.  I know I have no real influence--and I’m rarely on the brink of cool-- but let’s start an even greater internet buzz.  Something worthy of a #blacktag on the Twitter.

(I’ll try to stop with the Drake lines, but I’ve recently started talking like that, and it’s hard to stop.  [Brakes]  See?!  It’s so much fun.)

Feel my body! gettin’ cooooold. As a friend said on Facebook, Wyclef can’t get The Fugees back together, but he thinks he can fix Haiti?  Well, if it means that ‘Clef will stop making records, then I shall feign Haitian citizenship and vote for him, and suggest you do the same.  I think hiring Cher of Clueless fame as a speechwriter would be a fantastic move for Wyclef.  It does not say R.S.V.P. on the Statue of Liberty!

How do you say “Yes We Can” in Haitian Creole?

We’re well into season 4 of Mad Men, and folks are still not happy with the treatment of black characters on the show.  I’ve written about this previously, but since the show delves further into the sixties with each season, perhaps what I--and others--have said bears repeating:  Mad Men is not explicitly concerned with black people.  Still, bloggers write letters on behalf of Carla, the Drapers’ maid:

I know you don’t know who you are and you’ve got a million identity issues, your dad was a real s— and… wait, wait, do you hear that? It’s the world’s tiniest violin playing just for you. Guess what? My family all lives in Mississippi. You know what’s going on there? Oh just the Ku Klux Klan, lynchings, murders, and an overall air of fear and violence. In fact in June of this year, three civil rights workers will be murdered during Freedom Summer. So cry me a river mystery man (the Klan will probably use it to dump bodies in but no big deal let me fix you a sandwich).

And yet another post equally unenthusiastic about the fact that Mad Men is knee-deep into the sixties, but has yet to use “We Shall Overcome” as a jingle for Lucky Strike cigarettes:

But no worries – through small references and slight of hand, the writers will allude hey, we know there were black people then. Unfortunately, that’s as far as it goes.  And where there is so much potential to develop plots that deal with race, the attitudes of the writers are eerily current.  It’s okay to remember the past, but it is verboten to apply historical events to our current realities.

Remembering the past is easy – it’s learning from our history (not erasing it, not sanitizing it) that’s hard.

I think this desire for anachronistic diversity misses the point on a few levels.  (Gosh, here I go defending white people again.)  First, I think the creators of the show purposely semi-ignore the civil rights movement in an attempt to compel viewers into thinking about the construction of whiteness, and the ways in which it insulates those who can access it from issues like racism.  It’s the sixties.  Practically every viewer is well aware of the overarching narrative of this decade, thanks to the work of Eyes on the Prize and The History Channel.  The question isn’t “Why don’t they give Carla a story line?”  but rather, “Why aren’t they giving Carla a story line?”  Because Don Draper is the original George Bush: he doesn’t are about black people.  And he doesn’t have to.  That is a rather telling story about race and what it means--aware or not--to be invested in whiteness.  Our collective memory of the 1960s tells us that the only place that was segregated was the South.  Mad Men reflects the lily white (seriously, Roger Sterling’s hair isn’t just awesome, it’s symbolic), self-segregated world of Madison Avenue--a street well north of the Mason-Dixon.  Perhaps we should ruminate on whiteness and its commoditification (it’s an advertising firm, after all) as the show invites us to instead of grumbling about the very accurate portrayal of blacks as elevator operators.  The world of advertising is (still incredibly) white; Mad Men reflects that.  Besides, it’s not like S.C.D.P. is selling Pepsi.

Second, the desire for a black storyline--and therefore access to said characters’ interiority--implies that Carla, for example, is actually thinking about racism and the South and the civil rights movement.  We love to wax nostalgic about brave blacks and liberal whites joining together to slay Bull Connor and the Klan.  We often deify them and make them members of Congress.  Yet, there were plenty of blacks who could not march through a Mississippi summer in church clothes because they had to work in the morning.  That’s not to say that they weren’t concerned with the issues of the day, but I think it’s important to remember that not every black adult living in the 1960s ran around boycotting buses.  There are degrees of activism--and inaction.  How accurate would it be, fifty years from now, for television watchers to critique a show about this decade for not showing enough folks concerned about the oil spill (as cars fill-up at BP stations daily), or immigration, or the war, or gay marriage?

Third, I think the desire for a more diverse story line reveals more about viewers than it does about the show.  The frustration with the handling of black characters on the show perhaps divulges the way that we have romanticized the 1960s, that decade when America bravely confronted its demons.  We have weaved a tale that presumes that (all the good) Americans were discussing and fighting racial inequality--in the same way that we all feel sad about Mexicans being deported during our lunch hours--and therefore negatively assess depictions that challenge those assumptions.  In our minds, the 1960s was quite literally a black and white, good and evil era.  So much so that we are alarmed when we are confronted with that gray area of indifference, and cry racist or racially insensitive and/or inadequate when we see it.  Frankly, I’m looking for a good story.  Those looking for a braver, more romantic storyline might need to put I’ll Fly Away on the Netflix queue.  Or turn to 80s sitcoms.   “The March” episode of The Cosby Show when Theo and Cockroach have to write an essay about the March on Washington might suffice.  There’s also an episode of Family Ties, where Rosalind Cash (yes, the same woman who played Denise’s professor at Hillman) and her family move into the Keaton’s neighborhood and all the white people bug out.  There’s pictures from Freedom Summer, a rendition of “Blowing in the Wind.”  Real multiculti stuff.  (By the way, if you’re playing 6 Degrees of Separation and you need to connect, say, Jimmy Walker to Keanu Reeves or George Clooney, Rosalind Cash is your key.)

Speaking of black people and illegal immigration, Great [Dred] Scott!  They want to remix the 14th Amendment?  I’m no historian, but my favorite sistorian, Elle and I briefly discussed how the Age of Obama occasionally looks like Reconstruction-lite.  Perhaps this latest political news provides more evidence for my ignorant observations.  To make up for defending white people earlier, I’d like to point out that white people were the original illegal immigrants.  If you don’t believe me, ask your local Native American--if you can find one.

When is it ok for me to say that I think Willow Smith is kind of funny looking?

Not to get all gossipy, but why were Queen Latifah and her [ahem] personal trainer on Alicia Keys and Swizz Beats’ honeymoon?  I know Just Wright made about five dollars at the box office, but damn, has the recession caused celebrities to go on group honeymoons?  I’m no conspiracy theorist, but is there something we should know about the father of Alicia’s baby?  Perhaps Queen Latifah just wanted to see how she looked on a boat.  Call it a dry run for the Olivia endorsement deal that has to be waiting for QL if and when she decides to come out.  I’m not saying she has to--no one has to.  What I am saying is there’s money when she’s ready.

I want to punch Jaden Smith in the face.

While I’m on Queen Latifah, Prop [H]8 got the judicial smack down last week.  Congratulations, California gays.  Can you say Alimony?  To echo what Alex mentioned last week, I wish the entire gay marriage debate had inspired us to question the institution of marriage and compulsory monogamy.  Instead, the decision simply reinvigorates the whole “gay people are just like everybody else” line of reasoning.  Which reminds me, maybe I should go see The Kids are All Right.

Oh well.  It does give us the opportunity to watch scenes from The Golden Girls, also known as the greatest sitcom of all time.  (By the way, the aforementioned Rosalind Cash guest starred on Golden Girls, too.  The subject?  Interracial marriage.):

On second thought, I probably should have just written about Mad Men.  I’ll do better next week.  Happy Monday.

Montana Fishburne, the 19-year-old daughter of Laurence Fishburne, has decided to release a sex tape.  According to reports, Ms. Fishburne intends to follow in the stiletto steps of women such as Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian:

“I’ve watched how successful Kim Kardashian became and I think a lot of it was due to the release of her sex tape by Vivid,” Fishburne said in the press release.” I’m hoping the same magic will work for me. I’m impatient about getting well-known and having more opportunities and this seemed like a great way to get started on it.”

If I may echo Cee-Lo, you don’t shock me anymore.  And though at some point in ancient history the idea of making a sex tape to get famous seemed illogical, in this lifetime Fishburne’s rationale is not immediately absurd.

I don’t intend to engage in some (Moynihan-esque,) this girl got Daddy issues type of conversation; I’ll let commenters on other blogs handle that.  I’m also not interested in a broader discussion on pornography.  I’m not against people getting paid for having sex.  That is another discussion, for another time.

What strikes me about Ms. Fishburne’s thinking is how classically post-race/colorblind it seems.  She sees no difference between Kim Kardashian and herself.  Fishburne is arguing that since she’s the daughter of a rich and famous man, then she might engage in the same kind of behavior that the daughters of other rich and famous men have and expect the same results.  Being a young black woman does not give her pause.  The discourse on black women’s sexuality, about their lasciviousness and their Jezebel nature does not apply.  Montana has no use for that history, because perhaps she was raised to think that little black girls are just like anybody else.

Is the logic behind Montana Fishburne’s sex tape not a post-race dream?

Tell you one thing, if Montana Fishburne gets a reality television show on E!, racism might be over, and I’ll have a non-sardonic reason to employ the term post-race.

Where in the world is Jaimee Foxworth when you need her?  (Smoked out.)

One thing I failed to mention in my LeBron James/plantation model discussion was his financial impact on Miami. I just read something about a restaurant in Miami offering a Lebron Burger,  and a spa offering “The LeBroyal Treatment.”  Thinking about this in conjunction with the how financially hurt Cleveland will be with James’ departure reminds me that the economic viability of these small institutions is directly affected by and reliant upon LeBron James’ body, his literal presence in the city. If LeBron doesn’t succeed in Miami, if he doesn’t play–and play well– or if he leaves, then not simply the Heat, but these other businesses are in some trouble.

They all have a financial stake in his brand, which is essentially his body, his physical performance. How are we not supposed to be reminded of the plantation model, slavery etc. when we discuss this?  Would it be acceptable to suggest that although athletes are not at all slaves, the economic structure–not condition–they operate under is reminiscent of the plantation model, because it is a situation where they’ve, until recently, exhibited comparably limited agency, and where their bodily labor greatly benefits the(ir) white owners?  And how might we connect the public’s general opinion that these athletes are greedy to the fact that the labor forces of the NFL (where contracts are not guaranteed and athletes are in the most danger) and NBA are overwhelmingly black?  And that, in generating opinions about LeBron’s (dis)loyalty to Cleveland we did, in effect, forget that he was an employee, and that our understanding of his decision to leave on some level must acknowledge that this was one of few times where we got to witness an athlete exercise all of his agency?  (And such agency is fleeting, and thoroughly dependent on those knees go.)

What would be a different, less sensitive discourse that would better help delineate and understand this narrative?

I’ve recently become fascinated by boxing, I have a book list and everything; it’s the most difficult and scariest sport I’ve ever tried.  A few years ago, a professor mine told his class that you could tell a society’s most subordinate group by watching boxing.  There have always been black boxers.  I think we can use sports to discuss larger social issues.  And I think the LeBron James case is an opportunity to talk about the ways in which the plantation model endures.  How can we begin with the caveat that athletes are not slaves, nor are they like slaves and still access this conversation?  Or is it completely impossible?

I refuse to go along with this week’s warm, feel-good celebrations of Harper Lee’s novel (published fifty years ago today), To Kill a Mockingbird. Simply put, I think that novel is racist, and so is its undying popularity. It’s also racist in a particularly insidious way, because the story and its characters instead seem to so many white people like the very model of good, heartwarming, white anti-racism.

Macon D. outlines several key issues he has with the novel: its reception, that the mockingbird symbolizes Negroes, Atticus Finch as the O.G. white savior, and the marginal presence of Negroes in the novel.  To put bluntly: I take issue with Macon D.’s issues.  Maybe this is also stuff black people do, because I embrace this novel, too.  Before I continue, however, I want to note that since the initial post takes up the novel, and not the Academy Award-winning film, which premiered in 1962, my response will exclusively center on the text and not the film.

Macon D. spends the first part of his post skewering the novel’s 2010 reception. He finds NPR’s story on the novel a prime, and perhaps common example of the kinds of anniversary stories media outlets produced.  He describes the NPR  piece as a “typically laudatory” one where racism is described as a historical ill and the novel is praised for its apparent universality.

Actually, that right there is the first reason I think this novel is, in effect, racist — it allows, indeed encourages, today’s well-meaning white people to think that “America is a very different place” than it was when Lee wrote her novel, and thus to think that widespread and deeply entrenched racism died a long time ago.

Here, Macon D. seems to be simultaneously conflating and confusing the book’s public reception--and its reception 50 years after its initial publication, mind you--with its intent.   I’m not sure what page and/or chapter TKAM encourages its readers to regard racism as a thing of the past, but I surely cannot recall that part.  In fact, how could Harper Lee, writing in the late 1950s, in the middle of the civil rights movement, when reality television starred black people and water hoses (no wonder 70% of black kids don’t know how to swim), be prescient enough to say to herself, “You know, this novel will be published many times over.  And a certain demographic, say half a century from now, will use this fiction to regard racism as a kind of fossil they only re-discover when they encounter items such as my novel.  I should write a different book.”?   How can one charge Harper Lee with not anticipating the reaction of today’s “well-meaning white people”?  How can one take issue with Lee for not being radical enough…for 2010?  In addition, what does it mean to privilege “well-meaning white people’s” positive response to the novel, and implicitly argue that their’s is the only kind of positive reaction?

Macon D. counters the NPR story by mentioning an effort in Nova Scotia to have the text removed from its school curriculum.  Macon D. appreciates  this story because it seems to represent the way the novel affects “different” (and by “different,” he means African-Canadian) readers.  According to the article Macon D. cites, these readers are negatively affected by TKAM because of, among other things, its use of the word “nigger.” According to that logic, then, the folks in Nova Scotia not only need to ban The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but practically all of Faulkner, Beloved, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Invisible Man, to name a few.  (Ralph Ellison, incidentally, called chapter 31 of Huck Finn one of the most moral moments in American literature.  Who cares?  That was over fifty years ago.)  How at all is it useful to remove texts from school curricula because we don’t like the words?  How can we accurately describe blacks’ present conditions if we refuse to engage with texts that help delineate the history of racism in America because the words are impolite?  Doing so seems as useful as changing the names of schools.  For example, not calling it Jefferson Davis High School does not magically make the curriculum taught in the school less racist or even better.  It’s best to learn why it was called Jefferson Davis High School in the first place. Perhaps that conversation inevitably reveals why students in the school are being under-educated.

Yet there are more reasons for this adverse reaction to TKAM, which Macon D. lists, and, I’m left to assume, agrees with.  First, the mockingbird symbolizes black people?  Granted, I read this book on my own and not in a middle or high school class, but I had never before heard this mockingbird is metaphor for black people line until I read this article.  TKAM is incredibly under-discussed in the place where it should be: college.  Which leads me to a (hopefully) pertinent aside.  One thing Macon D. and his complaints about the novel show is the way that the TKAM is often misread.  The first way we, as a reading public, misread it is assuming that TKAM is a novel for children.  This book is not for kids.  There are scenes in TKAM that, in my opinion, require assessments that are more complicated than we equip young students for in middle and high school and the teachers who lead them to handle, which is perhaps why we encounter these kinds of mockingbird = Negroes readings.  I don’t have a major problem with interpreting the mockingbird as a symbol of the death of innocence.  What I take issue with, however, is the literal association of that innocence with an innocent black man.  Tom Robinson isn’t the only person who dies.  The trial also marks the death of moral certainty in the minds of Jem and Scout Finch.  Jem and Scout have to come to terms with the fact they live in a world, a town, so consumed with racism that they will choose it over right; they are forced to learn that their world, the people they have longed loved and admired are willing to forsake morality in order to reify white supremacy.  That, I imagine, is indeed a trauma-inducing experience, requiring a new vision of the world that sees contradiction and the various shades of gray.

The second issue with TKAM is that Atticus Finch is Maycomb, Alabama’s resident white savior.  I wonder: Whom does Atticus save?  As my white savior primer informed you many months ago, a white savior has to save somebody, namely a downtrodden black person.  Atticus fails, and his failure results in the death of a black man.  Again, I think the idea of Atticus as hero lies in the reception of the novel.  Lawyers love to talk about how Atticus Finch/Gregory Peck made them want to become lawyers.  Yet (my interpretation of) the text shows otherwise.  Recalling the scene, Atticus takes the case for many reasons, “The main one is, if [he] didn’t [he] couldn’t hold [his] head up in town [...] [and he] couldn’t even tell [Scout] or Jem not to do something again.”  Atticus’ motives aren’t articulated as anti-racist, or even an effort to make a claim about Maycomb and the South’s ways or the criminal (in)justice system.  In fact, Atticus links his no-win situation to the Confederacy’s chances at winning the Civil War:  just because you can’t win doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try, which we all know is a troubling association, considering the effects of trying to win.  Atticus, who readily admits to Scout that he will lose this case, in effect intends to do his job because he has been charged to do it, not because he wants to make a proclamation about racism or shame his neighbors.  He quite likes his neighbors.   Atticus’ motives and his actions are complicated, not heroic.

Third, black people are marginal characters who exhibit no agency.  I think when making this claim it’s important to recall that the story is filtered through the eyes of a young white girl who associates with very few blacks outside of Calpurnia, the maid.  Furthermore, it’s 1930s Alabama.  I know we desire black people from the past to be noble and heroic and spit in Jim Crow’s face, but frankly, that’s not what happened all the time.  Not even most of the time.  I’m not sure how many of us can fully appreciate what it’s like to live a life where anywhere, at anytime you can be terrorized and your life can be threatened and/or taken.  Nor can many of us understand what it’s like to try to live as simply and quietly as possible under those conditions.    Where does one expect the black characters to voice protest in a novel about a little white girl and her big brother?  In the courtroom?  Furthermore, why is there no acknowledgment of Calpurnia, particularly the scene where Scout and Jem go to church with her?  To her credit, Lee created a scene where the Finch children actually witnessed Cal as something beyond a domestic.  To add, Jem, Scout, and Dill secretly watch the trial from the colored balcony, thereby (beginning to) understand the trial and justice from that perspective.  (My friend Rachel wrote a really good paper on this very scene.)  If one has issue with that narrative move, so be it.  Yet, I think it important to note that, however limited, the presence of blacks is pivotal nonetheless.

Should we denounce a novel because it does not convincingly utter all of the proper (2010) anti-racist politics?  Macon D. suggests that TKAM be replaced with texts such as the previously mentioned Invisible Man and Their Eyes Were Watching God; but what of the sexism in Ellison’s book and the uncriticized domestic violence in Hurston’s?  How many posts about warmly embracing a sexist book were there when 50 years of Invisible Man was celebrated?  What does it say about the politics of anti-racism when we cannot find the usefulness of a book like TKAM? How can we expand the anemic lexicon on race so that we can express fully the complicated subject matter of a book like TKAM?  As someone who not only holds this novel dear, but also thinks that we cannot properly address the history of race in literature and in the South without reading Faulkner, I hope to spend less time denouncing and more time exploring what these works tell us about ourselves--then and now.  In 2010, Tom Robinson is called Oscar Grant.  Perhaps the goal should not be to reduce the book to the level of racist, but rather populating a word bank that allows for us to hold the ambiguities of TKAM as we simultaneously embrace and discuss the successes and failures of it.

**As a bit of a coda, I’d like to say something about Mrs. DuBose, another marginal character whose very presence in the novel speaks more volumes than many of us recognize.  A subplot that, curiously, is not in the film, the episode between Jem and his curmudgeonly neighbor has always seemed to me (one of) the key(s) to the novel.  One afternoon not long after Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose said that Atticus should be in jail for defending Tom Robinson, or “niggers” as she puts it, an enraged Jem cuts off the heads of Mrs. Dubose’s camellias, the state flower of Alabama, in response.  Jem, of course, is caught, and as a punishment is required to read Ivanhoe to Mrs. Dubose on afternoons.  There he learns that Mrs. Dubose is addicted to morphine, and has been struggling to end her habit, wanting to die having conquered her dependence on the drug.

Several key points emerge in this scene.  First, Mrs. Dubose is an old, aristocratic southern belle, and is meant to symbolize the antebellum southern way of life.  With Ivanhoe and Sir Walter Scott, Lee seems to reference not simply Twain, who hated these kinds of novels and satirizes southerners love of them in Huck Finn, but also the hazy, romantic view of pre-Civil War southern culture and life, which by the 1930s had been idealized even more with Gone with the Wind.  More importantly though, I think Lee is also speaking to her generation of southerners who came of age during the Depression and were adults by 1960. Jem cuts off the heads of the camellias; he never bothers with the root.  The camellias, then, will grow back.  I suggest that Lee, here, speaks directly to the strategy of civil rights.  Desegregation, etc. may get to the head of racism, but it doesn’t access the core, the root.  Racism and white supremacy, as symbolized through the camellia, will simply grow back.  And I think the shortcomings of desegregation as a strategy are pretty evident to all of us by now.  Afterward, Mrs. Dubose gifts Jem a perfectly in tact camellia.  In other words, he has inherited her burden.  And that, partly, is how we have often viewed the civil rights movement: attempting to contend with the sins of the past, without really uprooting racism.   Since we teach this book to middle and high schoolers, I think this point is one often missed in our assessment of the novel.  (Seriously, how many of us have thought about integration in conjunction with the snowman scene?)  I think the sketch of an assessment I offer here perhaps proves 1. TKAM is not a book for young children and teenagers, and 2. that Lee is much more thought-provoking, complicated, and frankly, less warm than we all tend to think.  Enwrapped in this bildungsroman is a book that compels us to address societal ills and critically question our strategies for curing them.  Perhaps Lee has remained so elusive all these years because we all just didn’t get it.  Can we blame her for her quasi-silence?

And now, for some Noisettes:

Although the super homies, D-Wade, Chris Bosh, and King James have yet to adopt a nickname, I’m inclined to refer to them as Miami Thrice (kind of wack, I know, but you know you want to see those three dressed like Crockett and Tubbs.) or as The Triumvirate.  I don’t know if that makes the Lakers the senatorial elite or something, but Wade especially better watch his back.

A worthy sobriquet, of course, is only part of the post-Decision conversation.  There are many ways of looking at this blackbird, and sports writers and pundits have all thrown in their two cents.  Since I’m just a lowly blogger, I’ll just dip my toe into the water.  I’ve no desire to wade in a pool of sharks.

Here are some things I learned:

1. There are 50 ways to leave your lover.  Breaking up on television isn’t one of them.  This is what LeBron had to say about leaving Cleveland: “You know, you built a lot and you’ve done some things, you’ve done great things. You had the ups and downs. It’s almost like a relationship you may have with a lady where you’ve been with that person for seven years and you’ve seen it all. You’ve grown together. You’ve been through the ups and downs. And one day you guys just don’t see it the same way. You have to move on for the better. And that’s how I feel. It hurts. It definitely hurts. It hurts me to say that I’m moving on. But I have to do what’s best.”  Indeed, LeBron does have to do what’s best for him, but what’s best probably wasn’t dissing Cleveland on national television.  With the decision and everything thereafter, it was almost as if LBJ broke up with his girl, then showed up at her usual hang out with his younger, hotter new lady.  It was tacky–and we all watched it.  I’m not talking about image here; I’m talking about tact.  Anyone with a modicum of interest in sports knows that white Jesus seemingly hates Cleveland professional franchises.  Their favorite son not only dumped them, but did so in such a manner that, with the help of ESPN, the world could see their reaction.  NOT.  COOL.  AT.  ALL.  To add, James’ decision to leave not only hurt Cleveland’s pride, but the city’s bottom line.  With his departure, the restaurants and shops in and around Quicken Loans Arena will likely suffer.  There will–must?–be a casino in Cleveland soon.  All this makes me think that Cleveland sports are indeed cursed.  Not cursed like the Cubs, but cursed nonetheless.  I still root for y’all, though.
2. ACL does not spell loyalty.  Personally, I wanted to see LBJ stay with the Cavs or come to the Bulls to maintain some balance in the East, but I refuse to call his decision to leave disloyal or, as Cavs owner, Dan Gilbert put it, a “cowardly betrayal.”  Questions of loyalty only arise when players are involved, but not when owners expunge these players from their books if/when the injuries mount.  The NBA isn’t like the NFL, but still there’s no loyalty there. If LeBron James blows out both of his knees tomorrow, and recovers, but is no longer the explosive, freak of a basketball player that he once was, the Cavs, the Heat, any other team would get rid of James before Gilbert could have lowered James’ Fathead price.
3. Deion Sanders said it must be in the money, but in this case it isn’t.  In a culture where we go on and on about the greediness of professional athletes, but rarely if ever say anything about these billionaire team owners, LeBron James left Cleveland for Miami for what? Less money.  That’s right.  Less money.  As egotistical and selfish as he might have seemed by agreeing to participate in this television special, we must acknowledge that he joins the Heat for fewer dollars.   So, I suppose, his narcissism has its limits–or a price.  Take your pick.
4. There was a moment during the decision special when LeBron James said he didn’t want the “pressure” of having to be the guy every night.  Personally, that’s not the kind of thing I want to hear from the best player in the NBA.  As much as we’ve talked about LeBron’s ego, it sure is lacking at times.  What I loved about Jordan, Magic, and all the greats was that they thrived under the pressure.  They welcomed it.  They wanted to be the guy to make the shot, or pass, or steal, or rebound to win the game.  And the fact that LeBron enjoys the thought that somebody else on the team can be the man on any given night gives me pause.  But I guess making some scrubs and an aging Shaq look like all-stars takes its toll.
5. Ko-be!? Ko-be!?  I swore that if LBJ joined the Heat I’d root for the Lakers, because I just couldn’t stand that much talent on one team.  I might have to back away from that statement, because I’m just not sure that I can muster the courage to cheer for the Black Mamba.  I don’t know about you, but I felt kind of dirty about rooting for the Dream Team in ‘92.  I think rooting for the Heat might make me feel the same way.  Yet, while the King and Co. are partying it up in South Beach, KBB is up getting better.  Kobe Bryant is a basketball nerd, and The Triumvirate are coming off like the cool kids.  How can I not root for the guy?  Still, watching Kobe pout is one of life’s pleasures.  I might need to rethink my position.
6. G.Q. Pat Riley is the man.  And I would cheer for the Heat if he agreed to coach them this year, especially if he let LBJ play point guard.  It could be Showtime all over again, Pat. Think about it.
7. Dan Gilbert is rich, but he has no class.  Seriously, dude.  Comic Sans?  How professional.  It is not a “cowardly betrayal” if your best employee finds a better job, especially if you’ve spent years wasting his talent because you didn’t find better workers to join him.  Sure, LBJ didn’t officially give two weeks notice, but if everyone else saw the writing on the wall, Gilbert was just remaining willfully ignorant.  Get a grip, dude.  To add, I find it highly disturbing that this is the reaction we got when a young athlete actually used his leverage to his own benefit.  So sorry LBJ didn’t wait for you to trade him, Gilbert.  Who does he think he is?
8. Why Jesse Jackson is weighing in on Dan Gilbert’s rhetoric and not the Oscar Grant trial would be surprising and befuddling if the good reverend hadn’t been so ass backwards in the past.  Rev. Jesse was a trending topic on Twitter yesterday, so I knew he had said something crazy, and he ticked quite a few folks off by saying that Gilbert had a “slave master mentality.”  But is it really that crazy?  Are professional athletes slaves?  No.  They are legally free.  They make money.  If they are lucky, they can exploit their free agency in the way LeBron did.  Still, I think it’s important to acknowledge that the plantation model endures.  The fact is professional sports are constructed in a way where young men’s, especially black men’s, bodies are exploited until they can’t be used anymore.  And no matter how much money these athletes make while they do it, someone else makes more money off of them, and at the end of the day the latter still have their knees. LeBron James wants to be a billionaire.  Dan Gilbert is almost a billionaire.   How much money do we think Nike has made off of LeBron James?  Is professional sports like chattel slavery?  Absolutely not.  Yet the rhetoric survives. Listen to SportsCenter around draft time or during the next free agency period or near the trade deadline.  All the talk about trading players, the market and how much players are worth, or what their pre-draft numbers tell you about their bodies is alarming and will remind you of that horrible institution.  Pro sports may not be slavery, but the rhetorical and situational commonalities deserve conversation that doesn’t simply result in calling people who make such analogies morons.

That said, it seems appropriate to flesh out/expand upon the glib comment I made about Chris Brown’s performance during last week’s BET Awards.  After all, no one is looking.  Edward wrote a nice post about it the other week; Yolo took the opportunity to write a really timely and eye opening blog about domestic abuse in general.  I don’t want to retread that road here.  Rather, I want to say something more about why my response to Chris Brown’s tears (#wedontbelieveyouyouneedmorepeople) wasn’t unique, and perhaps divulge what I meant by it.

I’ve been Facebook messaging my cousin, Margot’ lately.  We have several threads going: my sister’s wedding, the re-emergence of Lauryn Hill, and of course, Chris Brown’s Michael Jackson tribute.  Margot’ is fantastically and wisely sweet–believes in forgiveness, second chances, and Chris Brown’s moonwalk.  I admire this about her, and I know she’s right but my cynicism won’t let my meter go anywhere beyond ambivalence when it comes to the Brown ordeal.  Our exchange has given me pause (not in the nohomo sense), because it has required me to explain why I’m so neutral on the resurrected Chris Brown debate.

Whatever BET intended to do by allowing Chris Brown to honor his idol by showcasing his mimicry skills is debatable.  Perhaps it was their effort to help revive Brown’s flatlining career.  (Before the Rihanna incident, Brown was Christopher Williams and Al B. Sure! remixed, bringing light-skinned dudes back into vogue as if Wesley Snipes and Tyson Beckford never existed.  It was almost as Brown’s popularity single-handedly avenged 1993.)  If you can’t go home to BET where can you go?  Of course, BET is not known to reflect critical thinking skills.  So if my conjecture is correct, how BET thought that letting Brown dance in tribute to Michael Jackson and giving him an award as a way of compelling people to love him again, is beyond me.  Dancing may cure many societal ills, but I don’t think domestic violence is one of them.  Besides, the whole thing seemed very deliberate.  BET could have simply left well enough alone.  Having already flubbed the Michael Jackson tribute last year, no one was really waiting for BET’s “do-over.”  The television station has made its share of soup sandwiches.  And, as was to be expected, BET and Chris Brown left us with that WTF? taste in our mouths.  The fact that Brown’s performance was the source of debate proved that having him on the show for the sake of rehabilitating his career was probably a bad idea.  Some of us were moved by the moonwalk while others scream that his tears were fake.

The fact that some of us, that the public feel that we have to decide whether or not to forgive Chris Brown is interesting.  After all, none of us were in the car that night.  We need not pretend that we are all Rihanna, in the sense that we are some caring community who is invested in making each other accountable,  reviles domestic violence, and protects its women.  (Some of us are respectable Negroes, but to be sure, we are not caring citizens of some mystical African village.)  So why are so many of us mad?  Why do we think that we’re in some position to grant or deny penance to Chris Brown?  Why are some of us just straight up confused?  Perhaps it’s because what Chris Brown did was a very real thing in a very inauthentic world.  Chris Brown jerked us out of the land of make-believe.  And we hate it when people do that.

Although many of us feigned appalled when the pictures of Rihanna were published on the internet, it wasn’t domestic violence that left our mouths agape.  It was the fact that we had been lied to.  False advertisement.  Chris Brown was not the clean cut kid who smiled as he sold tweens bubble gum.  He was just another young black man with anger management problems.  (Did we wonder why he wasn’t a rapper?)  We were forced to remember that celebrity–like race?–is a social construction.  We saw Oz.  And all the public relations stunts that followed: the Larry King interview, this latest Michael Jackson tribute, read like efforts to make us forget what we saw when the curtain got pulled back.

We have no problem with liars.  We just have a problem when the lies prove inconsistent.  It’s not that we’ll stop buying your albums once we realize you probably do horrible, horrible things.  R. Kelly still has a career, after all.  We just need you not to lure us into believing that you don’t do ostensibly horrible things.   And it’s incredibly difficult to reconstruct the house of cards once the falsities have been revealed.  Just ask Tiger Woods.  We need celebrities to appear better than we are to justify our admiration; why else are they richer, more beautiful, and famous than us?  We need empty shells of celebrities on which to project ourselves.  And that night, Chris Brown proved that he wasn’t some vacuous superstar, but rather an incredibly flawed person, full of issues that so many of us, and the people we know, have.  And forcing–deliberately or not–the product obsessed public to realize that we were buying a bill of goods all along is an unforgivable offense.

We all know exactly who Tyler Perry is, we just don’t want him to come out and tell us.  We like myths.  They’re comforting, and our country is built on some.  What happened between Chris Brown and Rihanna was, to reiterate, a very real thing that happened in a very inauthentic world; so it becomes quite the project to discern the authenticity of one’s apologies, etc. once one understands how constructed the whole thing is.  All the king’s horses and all the king’s men are simply making things worse, reminding us of the fabrication of it all.  Chris Brown exposed the myth of (his own) celebrity, and some of us just can’t deal.  So we act as if whether or not we’ll forgive him is important, when what we’re really saying is something much shallower:  I will buy your products–or I won’t.  Our forgiveness doesn’t matter; our money does.

I live blogged the Awards show.  I share it with you this morning.  May it momentarily assuage your case of the Mondays.

19:01 Is this Kanye as Moses?  He’s on a mountain.  Is the microphone stand his staff?

19:03 Still waiting for the 10 Commandments

19:05 Drinking game: Take a shot every time Queen Latifah overheteros [acts obnoxiously straight] during this telecast.

19:08 Drink up!

19:09 FREE LIL WAYNE!

19:10 Queen Latifah just called Trey Songz sexy, and asked him to take off his shirt. CHUG A LUG!

19:11 This BET Awards is the poor man’s version of, well, the BET Awards.

19:13 Queen Latifah raps!  Gee, I hope she’s freestyling.

19:15 Dear MC Lyte, there’s a microphone in front of your face.  Stop yelling.

19:22 Queen Latifah assumed the audience saw Chicago. #fail  I so thought she was about to imitate Tyler Perry.

19:24 Dear Usher, Kanye needs his smoke machine back after this performance.

19:30 Nicki Minaj’s wardrobe provided by David’s Bridal.

19:30 I hope Weezy can see this telecast in jail.

19:35 Who’s writing Queen Latifah’s jokes? Common?

19:37 This show has to be on a 45-minute delay. #TIperformance

19:39 For the record, I did not like Love Jones. In fact, I think I blame it for my aversion to spoken word. Love Nia Long, though.  LOVE HER.  (Call me.)

19:40 Has Larenz Tate been in a movie since Love Jones?

19:44 Drake just said his mom was a single mother. On stage.  At the BET awards.  As if he was saying something notable.

19:45 Two bucks says Drake plays a young Obama in the biopic.

19:50 Queen Latifah’s skits are like In Living Colour out takes. Or something.

19:52 Why does Alicia Keys sing like that? That whole screamy, breathy, whiny thing ain’t cool.

19:53 When I say I like an Alicia Keys song, I mean that I want someone else to sing it.

19:54 Kim Burrell.  Do not sing with her, Alicia. [...]  She should’ve listened to me.

20:04 BET, Dorothy Height hates you.

20:10 What does it mean that the most talented person to perform so far at the BET Awards is a white guy? [Eminem]

20:12 of course the white guy would be backed by a gospel choir. #likeaprayer #iwanttoknowwhatloveis

20:15 Why does Deniece Williams look like an extra from Beetlejuice?

20:19 Queen Latifah just came out…in character as Cleo.

20:21 The theme for the BET Awards: Smoke machines

20:25 Seriously, the smoke machinists’ union must’ve threatened BET.

20:31 Quick. Guess how much gel is in Jermaine Jackson’s hair.

20:31 Speaking of Jermaine Jackson’s hair, why hasn’t BP called him?

20:32 So BET rectifies last year’s hastily composed Michael Jackson  “tribute” by having Chris Brown perform?

20:35 The kid can moonwalk, though.

20:38 Chris Brown is crying to “Man in the Mirror.” #wedontbelieveyouyouneedmorepeople

20:39 All these MJ imitators remind us just how great he was. That’s my silver lining, I guess.

20:46 Drake’s pre-performance thought bubble: What would Weezy do?

20:50 Is it ok that I want Drake to tear his ACL right now?

20:50 Is Diggy Simmons performing tonight?  He should.

20:51 If Drake is the best rapper out right now, then rap sucks.

20:58 The Black Eyed Peas can go straight to corporate hell.  Oh wait.  Nevermind.

20:59 Trey Songz winzzzz an award. First Jesus shout out of the night.

20:01 God bless El DeBarge. Glad to see his hair is still good. #geneticconk

21:05 I still feel the beat of the rhythm of the night. #80sbaby

21:06 Can El sing that jam from Short Circuit–”Who’s johnny?”

21:11 This Teddy P. tribute isn’t that bad.  Still, I miss Coca-Cola commercial Tyrese.

21:15 Ok. We all now know why Kirk Franklin doesn’t sing.

21:17 I wish Kim Burrell’s presence would make the rest of these women stop singing.

21:19 I don’t care how many women were shaking their butts on stage before this moment.  We will have church.

21:24 John Legend is so lucky Stevie, Elton, Billy, etc. got famous years ago. #stepawayfromthepiano

21:25 John Legend, it’s a humanitarian award, but it’s from BET.

21:36 Prince is so mad at Trey Songz right now. #purplepain

21:37 Prince’s thought bubble: I could’ve been making pancakes.

21:49 Mad love to Janelle Monae for being fully clothed on stage.  Not a fan of this performance, though.

21:53 BET must have blindly picked from the “Alternative Negro” section of their rolodex for this Prince tribute.

21:53 If I were Prince, I’d walk out right now.

21:55 No one is ever going to use that piano again.  Thanks, Alicia Keys.

21:59 Patti freaking LaBelle

22:00 Prince will be wearing Patti’s shoes at some point in the future.  Trust.

22:10 Was Chris Brown supposed to win an award?  Is BET making an effort to rehabilitate his career?