Defending Kanye West

A friend recently dismissed this recent interview with Kanye West, mocking 'Ye's seeming obsession with "dopeness and awesomeness." The word most often used to describe Kanye: "ridiculous." Even Obama called him a "jackass" (which is worse than what he calls autocratic, repressive human rights-violating regimes). So "at least let me tell you why I'm this way, hold on." -December 4th. Or, rather, why it's not that way.

First, it's hard for people to get past the bombast. That's understandable. In just the above interview alone he calls himself the "Michael Jordan of music" and the "Steve [Jobs] of the internet." Yes, it's distracting when he talks about his legacy among the all-time greats while he's still alive. But that doesn't mean it isn't true. If Jordan had said while he was playing, "you know, I think I'm one of the greatest players of all time," people woulda hated on him, too. But now that he's retired people can all safely agree that that is undoubtedly true.

Second, I think Kanye has a point with all his award-show rants. Ye points out that neither Dark Twisted Fantasy nor Watch the Throne was nominated for album of the year, and he made those in the same year. RIDICULOUS, and not in the "word most often used to describe Kanye" way. He also points out that he has never won a Grammy when a White-person was nominated. From the interview: "I really appreciate that I was able to win rap album of the year. But after awhile it's like, 'wait a second. This is a setup'." Don't think that's wrong.

Third, he's incredibly self-reflective. That might be self-evident from someone who admits that they are "synonymous with vanity," but he realizes that he has a pulse on pop like few ever had. It's inspiring to hear him reminisce that he knew he was gonna be a star when we wrote "light-skinned friend look like Michael Jackson." He knows where the culture is, what will connect with them, and how to engage them ("we want pre-nup" x2). 

People think it's laughable that 'Ye said he's the "Bob Dylan of my generation," but what's laughable is our generation, not that Kanye represents the zeitgeist. Bob Dylan was the voice of the 60s, a time of intense cultural upheaval and social change. So far the 00s have been about the first Black President and Twitter. Which is cool. But you can be the voice of this generation without saying a lot. Most of what we will be known for is the eradication of privacy, both voluntarily (Facebook) and passively (NSA). 

People balked at his Katrina moment, too, when he said on a live TV telethon that "George Bush does not care about Black people." At the time, my reaction was mostly like Chris Tucker's ("I can't believe he said that."). Now I think that it's brave. In an era when President Obama's Secretary of Defense can laugh at an Indian-American Professor by asking him if he's a member of the Taliban, callin people out is both legitimate and necessary.

Maybe in the end the right analogy is not Michael Jordan or Steve Jobs, but Andy Warhol. With the release of Yeezus, Ye continues to own what the Times rightly calls "the most sui generis hip-hop career of the last decade." I would take out the qualifier "hip hop" and extend the time period. Warhol, the year before he died, painted "The Last Supper cycle," in which he made "almost 100 variations on the theme," which the Guggenheim felt "indicates an almost obsessive investment in the subject matter." Kanye is not ridiculous. He's obsessed.

Rap Laureate

A friend told me (unbelievably) that they still don't think 'Ye is a good rapper and is really mainly a producer. In case there are two other people in the world that hold this patently false and mistaken belief, I have taken the poetic liberty of translating 'Ye's verse on Clique into a Robert Frost poem. I don't really know how that relates but I've already spent several minutes doing it so here it is. All lyrics mine except the lines that are Mr. West's.

Break records at Louis, ate breakfast at Gucci
Her love is like the soft light of a familiar home.
Pleasantries are given, unpatriotic though they may seem.
The events of Paris are never far from mind.
George; a sight that brings a new memory, soon to linger.
A question; perhaps one asked like two weary travelers.
You know white people.
...
My neighbor T.C., though trials set upon him
Retains the sobriety of a man well kept.
On a summer's day, a drink recalls a winter's night
Everything I do need a news crew's presence
....
The sun beats upon my skin but cannot change it.
I am reminded of the arc of civilizations.
And confronted with our modern exuberance.
But I just wanna design hotels and nail it.
...
Shit is real. From one point on our globe to another
As that self-same as resides in two distinct but equally beautiful women.
...
A dark storm overtakes me; I shall not succumb, though it beckons my demise.
I doubt my own speech ("What kinda talk is that?")
Conversing with God, I turn my gaze inward.
And see that he has already answered me.
F*ckin with my clique.

Sources (like a good scholarly article):
http://rapgenius.com/Kanye-west-clique-lyrics
http://allpoetry.com/Robert_Frost

"Arent U Sharp as a Tac..."

wish the DS had let this EXCELLENT piece of political and cultural commentary go on longer. timely on two levels as the "Stop and Frisk" trial goes on in N.Y.:

1970 Somethin'

In honor of the end of the Knicks 2013 season, I watched Game 7 of the 1970 NBA Finals aka "The Willis Reed Game." I'd heard about it but never really appreciated its significance, until my Dad (shoutout Dad!) put me on to the game's historic, cultural, and heroic import. Here's the backdrop:

-the NBA finals are gonna be decided by one game, and "the #1 question is can the Feds can get us," no, actually, it's will Willis Reed play. Whachutalkinbout Willis was the Knicks big man and the only answer to the Lakers' Wilt Chamberlain. For those who don't know bout Wilt the Stilt, he is famous for two things: 1. scoring 100 points in a game (insane), and 2. claiming to have slept with like a million women or something ridiculous like that. Only the first is relevant here.

-Keep in mind that that Lakers team had three of the top 50greatest players of ALL TIME (I'ma let u finish): Wilt, Jerry West, and Elgin Baylor.

-Willis had gotten injured and no one knew if he was gonna play. Not even the other Knicks knew. Suddenly, as both teams are on the Court getting ready to start the game, Willis limps out of the locker room. At this point I'll turn the narration over to an eye-witness at the time, albeit as a youngin, Dad Esq. aka SuperDad:

"Although the run-up is discussed in the interviews, none of the clips really capture the emotion of watching Reed hobble on to join the team--an indescribable bit of drama. When is the last time you saw a pre-game analysis interrupted in mid-sentence to watch a single player limp on the court to a standing ovation that grows with every practice shot taken?"

What follows is one of the greatest basketball performances of all time. Willis incredibly hits his first two shots, sends the crowd into pandemonium, and then helps orchestrate one of the greatest displays of team basketball ever. This gets to the socio-cultural stuff. Again, Dad: "In an era of racial turmoil, the 70' Knicks were the first truly integrated (in every sense of that word) "dream team.""

The team really was diverse: Willis was from the segregated south (Louisiana) and went to an HBCU (Grambling), Bill Bradely was a Rhodes Scholar, future U.S. Senator, and Princetonian,  Dave DeBusschere was a white dude from Detroit, and Walt "Clyde" Frazier was "who everyone wanted to be" (footnote: Dad). 

I've heard about some of the "racial turmoil," too. Pops told me that when he was a teenager these dudes stormed the basketball court with sticks and bats and just started takin muahfckrs out, but when they came to him his Black friends he played ball with were like, "nah, he's cool, leave him alone." I'm sure that made him even more aware of the way basketball, a team, can unite people, a city.

When you hear Willis talk about it years later you can see the incredible selflessness of a man who took the floor when he could barely walk. This decent recap concludes with this from the Big Man (paraphrased): "people ask me how I explain to my son that the greatest game I ever played I only scored 4 points. I tell him it wasn't the best game I ever played, but it was the most important." #early Father's day

Shoa Mem'ries

Monday was Yom HaShoa, Holocaust Remembrance day, and my homey Young Hebrew Brother sent me this: "20 Photos that Change the Holocaust Narrative." The photos themselves and the stories behind them all really have a "wow" quality. it got me thinkin about the role of the Holocaust in my own narrative.

I remember Yom HaShoa Day at Jewish Day School. They took us to this assembly in the gym and a lot of the teachers were just crying. I think the only other time I've ever seen a teacher cry was when Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated. it's like when you realize your parents are real people, which for me happened about a week ago.

i was in the choir (i know, i know. shout out to Ravid) and at the assembly we sang this song that all my classmates will remember but that non-Jews probably have never heard. it's kinda JewPower'ed out. It goes: "think of the grandfather you never kissed / all of the relatives that you have missed / first raise your voice and then raise your fist / and tell the world 'never again.'" it goes harder: "memories as they grow older/ tend to grow colder, then disappear/ though you never met me, you must remember me/ now that I'm gone."

THAT'S SOME HEAVY SH*T MAN!

i mean for real. not just teaching the younger generation about the Holocaust, but teachin THE OBLIGATION TO REMEMBER the Holocaust. it reminds me of the Passover obligation to feel as if "you personally" were liberated from slavery in Egypt. My Saba always adds at the Seder, "as if you personally came out of Egypt, and out of Auschwitz." I think that's not uncommon.

recently, I visited my Saba and Savta ("grandfather" and "grandmother" btw) at the Jewish old age community (is their a better way to say that?) where they live. Saba introduced me to one of his friends, and told me he was a Holocaust survivor. one of Saba's other friends, a retired professor, took that as an opportunity to ask, "by the way, i've been meaning to ask you, how can you believe in God after the Holocaust?" cuz that's the kind of thing you can say when you're an ol' J. crazy. and peep this: the whole time the Holocaust survivor was wearing one of those "Life is Good" brand hats. I'm not making this up.

anyway. here's my favorite Holocaust-themed moment from Curb Your Enthusiasm to lighten things up.

Game Recognize Game

Today I watched a group of unaccompanied immigrant children--defined under Federal law as children under the age of 18, without lawful immigration status, and without a mom or dad able to provide for their care and custody--play floor hockey. On the bus the driver blasted the "All About the Benjamins Remix" and sang along, prompting me to wonder for the umpteenth time why they bleep-out "Hebrews" in the line, "you should do what we do/stack chips like Hebrews." (The only other two words bleeped out in that song are "pussy" and "chocha," which actually mean the same thing, and definitely are not in the same category as "Hebrews." no matter how the Supreme Court defines obscenity. #"the FCC won't let me be or let me be me so let me see.").

Watching these kids play floor hockey was fascinating, and not just because they diligently adhered to the rule about not raising their sticks higher than their waist. it was the spirit with which they played the game. Though (WARNING: culturally-based assumption) my guess is that this is one of the first few times that many of these indigenous children from Guatemala have played floor hockey, they possess a true love of the game. They play honestly; they have no animosity for the opposing team; they have fun when they play.

Though these may seem like simple things, to anyone who has ever played pick-up basketball anywhere in the United  States, they are not. I've seen 40-year old men at the JCC play sports with less humility, maturity, and respect than these kids without parents who have no idea what country they'll be living in six months from now. Now this could easily slide into a "noble savages"-type narrative or a "poverty is simplicity" rant or a #first world problems moment. But I won't presume to know what makes them play differently. I just know that they do.

Maybe it's the fact that they're all in this together; "strangers in a strange land." Maybe if they were back in their neighborhoods at home they'd be throwin elbows and talkin trash the way that Reuven, Zak, and I used to do (or at least I did--I'll let Zakface and Freight Train speak for themselves). But maybe there really is something wrong with our outsized American egos and, ironically, our machismo. Your manhood is not threatened just because someone else makes a lay-up. Get over it.

Every kid on a team is told to "go have fun out there," but I've rarely seen anyone able to do it. these kids seem to know how. I'm tryin to figure out why.

Freedom and its Discontents

"This Year we are slaves. Next year may we be Free Men." This quote has been part of every traditional Jewish Passover Seder I've ever been to (with the occasional language-adjustment for gender) and I always wonder what it means. Of course, we could take it literally and say "these were words uttered by former slaves, and we repeat them so as to honor them, as a matter of tradition." and that would still be cool and meaningful, since now we're goin on the chronological equivalent of 6 Stacks worth of Jewish muthahf*ckn history. #chea. #we still here.

But I think another perspective is to see it as a challenge to who we are as people TADAY. I think of the Buddha, and the idea of "liberation from suffering." Enlightenment is supposed to be freedom, so non-enlightenment must be slavery, albeit a form of slavery that is shared by nearly everybody. #"health consists in having the same diseases as one's neighbors" #the Matrix. in other words, we are still slaves in the Scarface sense: "you know why? bcuz you don't have the guts to be who you wanna be." #that's the bad guy.

so every Passover Seder, we acknowledge that we are less than free. but what is freedom? what is enlightenment? iono. but i think it's like the lyrics from the theme song from "Grease": "I solve my problems and i see the light...we start believing now that we can be who we are." (other deceptively deep lyrics from this underrated song include "only real is real...we got to be what we feel....this is the life of illusion.")

in conclu, at this time of year J-Crews everywhere gather to, at the very least, articulate that we aspire to something more. Or, at the very, very least, that we are aware that there is something more than our lives as we are currently living them.

there's another quote that's part of every traditional Seder: "In every Generation, each person is obligated to view themselves as if they personally had come out of Egypt [and from slavery]." why's that? bcuz only a former slave can understand the importance of being free.

Started From the Bottom

This song has been on my mind a lot lately, and not just bcuz Drake looks like a young Ben Stiller in the video. I went to White Plains Family Court last week to help a client file for a "Guardianship petition" to have his sister named his legal guardian (his moms either doesn't know how to / won't take him for doctor's appointments, haircuts, etc.). While we were filling out the paperwork a teenager walked by singin "started from the bottom now we up..."

the only reason I didn't finish the line was cuz I was like "Brett, you're at work, maintain professionality," but then we kinda caught caught eyes for a sec--I was checkin out this gray Phoenix Suns' hat he had on--and then he was like "what the f*ck you lookin at cracker"?!?!

that may be a first for me, but it also got me wonderin if I woulda been less of a cracker if I had said the line. Now, I can't make too much of it bcuz knowing a Drake song is not like hood credibility or anything, but maybe it would've made me more relateable, and less like a hostile, foreign whiteman.

Either way, I didn't take it personal. if he's wandering around White Plains Family Court by himself at 11 AM on a Friday, chances are he's goin thru some tough times right now. as I left the courthouse, I saw a gun tossed on the traintracks and told the conductor, who called it in to the po-lice. typical cracker.

the last thing I was kinda thinkin about was Drake's cross-class trajectory. as the video makes clear, his "momma's house" is not the same "everything in my momma's name" type situation that we usually see in rap. in fact, rap is one of the very few places where people cross class lines regularly. for all our terrible history it's still easier to cross racial lines in America than class ones (in my experience). and yet there is one section of our popular culture that does it regularly: rappers.

Ironically, Drake prolly isn't one of them. "started from the top, now at a totally different place but still also at the top." not as catchy. nobody gonna be singin that at White Plains Family Court.

Firsts

Idono y but I started blogging again.

I usually only blog in foreign countries, but I guess New York is like living in a bunch of foreign countries at once. Since this post is inaugural I want to start it off w/ this article from the NYT via my Momma (luv u momma!) about immigrants, particularly refugees and asylum seekers from Africa, who've been resettled in places like Maine and have to face New England winters as their first experiences with cold, snow, ice, etc. I kinda relate #UofR.

but for real this got me thinking about other "firsts" for new immigrants to the U.S., and just how new it really all can be. Dave Egger's "What Is the What" is good for this and I've also seen some firsts firsthand in my work with immigrants. Some highlights:

-immigrant kid gets in the elevator with me to come up to my office. Looks around nervously. Watches closely as I push the button for the floor. Takes my cue as we walk out. "Is this your first time in an elevator?" I ask. She nods.

-helping a client navigate the T in Boston. He is soooo interested in what lines go where and how you can get different places. "Did you know the Red Line goes to Ashmont?!?!" Yes i did, but i didn't find it so fascinating before.

-last summer in Kenya preparing a timeline of a client's life to help her apply for resettlement in the U.S. I ask, "did this happen in 2001 or 2002?" Her response: "which one is earlier?" Creating a timeline when you've never been taught time. I heard a colleague relate a similar story recently in which a client's life was constructed via world events. "Was this before or after the Americans came?"

I wonder how crazy hard a transition it must really be. Desert then blizzard. Vegetable markets then Wal-Mart. From feet to elevators. And no concept of the drastic nature of the change until you experience it. But I guess a lot of firsts are like that. It's like my Civil Procedure Professor said [and excuse me for paraphrasing shout out SECTION ONE]: "I could explain Civil Procedure to you, but it's like sex. You won't understand the words until you do it."