…the baddest man on the planet…
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March 2010
It’s been over a year… and it’s still a beautiful thing…
What it is good folks of Do Better Nation?
Hope the days have gotten longer and little warmer wherever you are…
This weeks Do Better Thursday post will feature more “Doing It Right”, like the picture above, than “Doing It Wrong”… Blame the warm weather in the Nation’s Capital… I’m not in the mood to brood over the antics of a few… I did, however, contact Brother Ordale Allen to leave us with a Daley Dose of his opinion… Check that out down below… for the Thursday recap…
Let’s Get To It!
- Recently, Stussy and Stones Throw Records released a documentary on the later years of hip hop artist, producer and beat legend James “Jay Dee aka J Dilla” Yancey. The 3-part mini-documentary recounts the last years of his life through stories told by friends and fellow artists.
- Jimmy Kimmel’s Handsome Men’s Club…. just watch…
- Throwback clip from “Bloopers” of host laughing at a caller singing his heart out… just because…
- Throwback clip from “Soul Train”, James Brown brings out his daughter, Deanna… she promptly gets down on her good foot…
…moments before that performance… this occured… around the 2-minute mark… wait for it…
…his damn voice ain’t changed!?!
- White woman gets her Kanye on at the Oscars… the backstory on this is fuzzy… but apparently the woman and the director, who won for Best Documentary – Short Subject, were partners in the winning film, Music for Prudence… she left the project a year before completion… and used Sunday’s event as a time to voice her issues… Regardless of who was in the wrong for causing the split… the following is fact: that’s one cool brother because I’m not sure if I wouldn’t have wrestled her on stage for the mic back… (more evidence… she may be more than just “off”…)
…say what you want about Mr. West… at least he let Taylor finish…
- …oh yeah… this happened…
…do better…
please…
– dre’ of onustees.com
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“T-Pain, You’re the Game” by Ordale J. Allen
When I was about ten my father observed me as I “watched” my little sister. She was about two at the time. She was standing in her crib playing with a doll and kept dropping it on the floor. I’d picked it up, but it seemed like a minute later she’d drop it again. After watching this go on for about five minutes my father cynically remarked, “The funny thing about this is that you’re the game and you just don’t know it.” While watching the first fifteen minutes of “Freaknik: The Musical” took me back to that moment.
At first glance the show just seems like BET: The Animated Movie. Then I realized that somewhere in there T-Pain was trying to paint a satirical picture of Black people and Freaknik. AOL Keyword: “trying.” There was a scene about twelve minutes into it where the title character sings a song saying that women don’t have to watch their kids, instead they can go to Freaknik and it will solve all of their problems. There were various scenes of women getting their nails done and immediately transforming from a stripper into a lawyer.
Don’t get me wrong, I have a sense of humor. I know how to check my uppity ways at the door and just have a laugh. The problem is that while it may seem like he’s making fun of stereotypes, he’s only reinforcing them, hence the allusion to my babysitting days of yesteryear: T-Pain, you may think that you’re breaking down stereotypes in a clever way but guess what…you’re the game. You’re only reinforcing these stereotypes. After all, Black people aren’t a large enough demographic for Adult Swim to spend money on this show. Big brother is watching and all you’re doing is proving him right, especially considering what your day job is.
Someone who sings into a synthesizer over tracks generally promoting misogyny and being nigger-rich can hardly be viewed as an instrument of change and inspiration. So your message is lost on two levels. First, White people think that it’s real and younger (either in age or mentality) Blacks will relate to it because it’s in your videos.
Now perhaps the show will take a turn. Maybe some of you watched the whole thing and will say that I didn’t give it a chance. My only retort is this: I probably watched about as much of it (if not more) as a White person who happened to flip through the channels and landed on this tripe and who knew nothing about T-Pain, Big Boi or any of the other voice actors.
In this case, the show did for Blacks what those reports on the Prius malfunctions have done for Toyota. We’ve placed a magnifying glass over a few negative outliers and by doing so have painted an inaccurate portrayal of the whole. So the next time you wonder why racism still runs rampant despite having a Black president, you can add Freaknik: The Musical to your list of contributing factors. As for me, if there is such a thing as reincarnation, I’ve got dibs on Caucasian.
– Ordale J. Allen
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“Thought you could leave that easily?”
What it is good people?
Hope everything’s been everything… Also, hope you got a chance to follow the Black Music History “Group Session” Series… I attempted to get 28 groups in there… but uh… life happens?
Well, really Lost happened during the Snowathon and completely took all of my attention away from Do Better activity… I watched all 5 seasons in the span of 10 days… yes, this is the part where you shake your head… I’m currently shaking mine…
…and all for what? Have you seen this seasons mess? It’s like nothing from the past 5 years matters… I won’t get too deep into it… but I’ve completely given up trying to rationalize or tie this season to anything prior to episode 1 of season 6…
anyhoos… let’s get to it… getting back in the flow… so the “Doing It Rights” and “Doing It Wrongs”… will appear randomly…
- Just came across this moments before typing this blog… a trailer for a documentary on the Kinshasa Symphony… “Central Africa’s one and only symphony orchestra”… http://www.kinshasa-symphony.com/
- Like with most things in life… there’s a silver lining for events and situations we first view unfavorable… this can be applied to my Lost-Snowathon-Do-Nothing-But-Eat-Bad-and-Sleep February… once I came out of that fog… I looked down… looked at the mirror… then back down… and I realized I wasn’t on a horse… if I was on a horse… it would probably buck my outta shape ass off… Enter: Tony Horton and P90X… I’ve always considered myself pretty fit… but there was no denying… the absence of a regular workout and lack of exercise was becoming pretty obvious… with that… and the help of some friends taking up the challenge as well… I started the 90 day program… Granted I’m only on Day 5… my push-up / pull-up game is horrid… and my body has been in a constant state of soreness that only spans to new muscles each day… I fully intend to complete this program… and may even post pictures of before and after… 100% dependent on the outcome… 😉 …if you’ve been thinking about doing it… don’t think… just do it… or has they say… Bring It!
Don’t worry, he’s a lot nicer on the DVDs…
- For my people in need of a football fix… and a laugh… (keeping the health theme going…) Rich Eisen of the NFL Network runs the 40 yard dash… he didn’t do that bad either… well… considering he’s running in a suit…
- Ahh… the Doing It Wrong… and Doing It Right of the internet… much has been made of the Epic Beard Man fight… or beatdown of Brother Shoe Shine… ignorance in all it’s glory… fortunately, in the end… creativity (there’s that silver lining again…) has the last say… check out Epic Beard Punchout…
- J Smooth of the Nil Doctrine formerly Ill Doctrine addresses the Waka Flocka Flame issue… this isn’t an anti-Waka Flocka segment… but does shed some light on the misconceptions young rappers tend to have… by the way, the more I hear Mr. Flame speak off the mic… the more I respect him… although his raps are nonsense… he does appear to at least know what he’s doing (or not doing…) …and who to pay honor to… see: Method Man…
- Raheem DeVaughn releases “The Love and War MasterPeace”… I haven’t gotten a chance to listen to it… I did buy it from Amazon.com in time for the $3.99 MP3 download special… I may blog my thoughts on it next week… or perhaps tweet them… if you haven’t gotten your copy… GOOOO!!!
- Greivis Vasquez and the Maryland Terrapins defeat Duke on Senior Night… posting this mainly because it was on while I was typing this blog entry… and I Hate Duke… plus, Maryland gets local love… Congrats College Park, helluva game…
- I’m back on my t-shirt game… looking to revamp the site (www.onustees.com) and blog this Spring / Summer… also, going to reprint some tees and print new ones… here’s a candidate for the new… seems a little vague, i know… I’ll reveal the meaning and title closer to the launch date…
as always…
try to do better than you did yesterday…
peace,
– dre’ of onustees.com
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