rootwork the rootsblog: a cyberhoodoo webspace

Benjamin Zephaniah Refuses OBE

HEROES by Benjamin Zephaniah

WANDERERS AND WORKERS SINNERS AND SAINTS,
FROM HERE THEY ALL LOOK HUMAN.
WE THAT ARE SET IN STONE KNOW THEIR GREATNESS,
WE MERE WORDS RECOGNISE THEIR POSSIBILITIES.
WE CAN SEE THAT THEY ARE ALL ROMANTICS,
FREEDOM FIGHTERS AND INTELLECTUALS.
THESE STREETS ARE FULL OF HEROES.

British Jamaican Rasta Poet, Benjamin Zephaniah, refused the Queens Invitation to be inducted into the Order of the British Empire. Hes a good writer, I will let him speak for himself. Excerpts from an article he wrote for the Guardian explaining his rejection.

"The truth is I think OBEs compromise writers and poets, and laureates suddenly go soft - in the past I've even written a poem, Bought and Sold, saying that. . .

There are many black writers who love OBEs, it makes them feel like they have made it. When it suits them, they embrace the struggle against the ruling class and the oppression they visit upon us, but then they join the oppressors' club. They are so easily seduced into the great house of Babylon known as the palace. For them, a wonderful time is meeting the Queen and bowing before her presence. . . .

I was shocked to see how many of my fellow writers jumped at the opportunity to go to Buckingham Palace when the Queen had her "meet the writers day" on July 9 2002, and I laughed at the pathetic excuses writers gave for going. "I did it for my mum"; "I did it for my kids"; "I did it for the school"; "I did it for the people", etc. I have even heard black writers who have collected OBEs saying that it is "symbolic of how far we have come". Oh yes, I say, we've struggled so hard just to get a minute with the Queen and we are so very grateful - not.

I've never heard of a holder of the OBE openly criticising the monarchy. They are officially friends, and that's what this cool Britannia project is about. . . . Then these rock stars, successful women, and ex-militants write to me with the OBE after their name as if I should be impressed. I'm not. Quite the opposite - you've been had. . .

Writers and artists who see themselves as working outside the establishment are constantly being accused of selling out as soon as they have any kind of success. I've been called a sell-out for selling too many books, for writing books for children, for performing at the Royal Albert Hall, for going on Desert Island Discs, and for appearing on the Parkinson show. But I want to reach as many people as possible without compromising the content of my work. . .

Me, OBE? Whoever is behind this offer can never have read any of my work. . .

Stick it, Mr Blair - and Mrs Queen, stop going on about the empire. Let's do something else."

Bought and Sold

Smart big awards and prize money
Is killing off black poetry
It's not censors or dictators that are cutting up our art.
The lure of meeting royalty
And touching high society
Is damping creativity and eating at our heart.

The ancestors would turn in graves
Those poor black folk that once were slaves would wonder
How our souls were sold
And check our strategies,
The empire strikes back and waves
Tamed warriors bow on parades
When they have done what they've been told
They get their OBEs.

Don't take my word, go check the verse . . .

· Taken from Too Black, Too Strong. Published by Bloodaxe Books (2001)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/features/story/0,11710,1094011,00.html

The Problem With Reparations

Reparations is pretty much the agreed upon primary empowerment strategy of Black America today. An effort to get the United States and various corporate entities to pay Reparations for historical damages done to African Americans.

First let me say that I support the Activists engaged in the Reparations Movement, which is most everybody. Mostly cause I don’t want folk jumping up and down on my head like they do whenever I bring this issue up.

But I do not think that Reparations are an effective 21st Century use of our Movement time and energies.

Those familiar with my position on the Longgame (11/17 Post) know that I think any Empowerment Strategy should have as its ultimate intent the shaping of future black generations into the kind of people we would our future generations be.

Otherwise its just Shortgame, Defense and the best you can hope for with a strictly Defense Strategy is status quo. And status quo don’t get it.

Let us not even deal with the problematic logistics of Reparations.

The problem with Reparations is what does it train our generations to be. Better Beggars. Because that’s all Reparations is. Begging Whitefolk To Save Us.

And yes, I have heard all the rationales. 'We not really asking for money.' 'Its not about getting a check, not really.' 'We are asking for Commitments.' 'Government this and Government that' 'Land' 'Policy Influence' 'Accountability' 'Acknowledgement' 'Investment in our Institutions' And so on and so forth.

All kinds of semantic wiggles to get around what it really and essentially is. Begging Whitefolk to Save Us. Period.

What happened to Self Determination. What happened to Kujichagulia. What happened to Black Power.

Whatever happened to Community Organizing. If all the energy and efforts we putting into Reparations was put into Institutionalizing Ourselves and Organizing our Community for Power we would be much stronger for it.

And I know that there are folk still doing other Organizing, but by far the bulk of our Hopes and Dreams have been laid on Reparations and everything else is considered supplemental.

Lord Legba, how did it ever get to this.

Previous highpoints of African American struggle trained us to be a stronger people. Abolition. The New Negro. Civil Rights. Black Power. What do Reparations train us to be. Better Beggars.

About the only real function Reparations has as a strategy is as an Organizing Tool. It seems to be great for inspiring folk to get involved and to maintain engagement. Getting Paid seems to work where Vision, Destiny, Commitment and the Survival of Our Generations just don’t get it.

But what we should be asking of our people is the kind of long term dedication to Empowerment and Achievement that will make our peoples a strong people, our generations strong generations. Not no external pie in the sky expectation of whitefolks saving us. Giving us what we need.

Even if we did get Reparations of Some Sort it would no more change the concrete conditions of Blackfolk than getting one of George Bush's taxcut checks.

And now we got folk falling out over who gon have control of these imminent goodies.

How did we get to the point of our primary Empowerment Strategy being dependent on what whitefolk did or did not do.

Instead we should be focused on Empowerment.

Empowerment.

Whatever our Strategy for the 21st Century is going to be it has to be some complex blend of Empowerment. Political Empowerment. Social, Economic and Cultural Empowerment. Personal Empowerment. International Empowerment. The Proper Use of Economic, Political and Social Resources.

You name it, Empowerment will cover it.

Surely raw survival is no longer sufficient. The real question is will we survive as a distinct culture and peoples. Will we grow and evolve or will we wither away and disappear. Times Hard for Blackfolk. Around the world Times are Hard. We got to make the strong moves Blackfolk or we going down.

Wherever you got Blackpeople in the world they are on the bottom of their respective societies. Everywhere. Cant blame Everywhere on nobody but ourselves. Somehow some way we must finesse the weaknesses that have crippled us in global competition.

And that wont happen standing on the corner with a tin cup in our hands.

We got to play for the Longgame, Blackpeople. The Survival, the Prosperity, the Empowerment of the Black Generations.

Any Empowerment Strategy we develop should both serve its immediate needs and also be designed to shape our generations into the people we would them be. Otherwise it will be finessed, co opted and counterfeited by our enemies and competitors.

There are alternative modes of mobilization. I say we consider the security and prosperity of our generations the Prime Directive. I say we calm, cool and coldblooded. We remain forever vigilant, we maintain an ever evolving, multifaceted strategic posture - some moves bold and strong, some hidden in shadows, some waiting silently in the wings - we grow in power.

Masters of the Longgame.

I saw we forge ourselves (and our generations) into a strong people capable of finessing any challenge. Be it human or natural. Be it KKK or AIDS.

I say we take the highroad, Blackpeople. I say we take responsibility not only for our own destiny but for the Destiny and Well Being of all peoples and all Jah creations great and small.

To Lead You Must Serve.

My Ultimate Game is that Blackfolk be so strong in spirit, so powerful a people that no matter what the governing system we find ourselves part of -

no matter where in the world/cosmos we find ourselves in the foreseeable and unforeseeable future -

that blackfolk not only survive and prosper as a race and culture but that they are illuminated and empowered, forces for justice and righteousness in whatever type of social system they find themselves part of.

Or Create.

And Reparations? Begging? Waiting on Whitefolk to Save us? Letting our Moves be Dependent on what Whitefolk Do or Don’t Do?

No. I Dont Think So.

As long as everybody else wants to do it I will go along with the Program. I dont want to rain on nobody's tactical parade and theres more than enough Struggle to go around. At our best we are a race of activists and we wont ever always agree on effective strategies.

But the old rootdoctor is not convinced that Reparations is an effective or even viable Primary Strategy. I wont waste my time with it and I will not be afraid to say what I think about it.

Yall can give me the Look if you wanna but its just Begging. And that’s all it is, Begging. I don’t care what you call it or how you justify it, its just Begging.

And I hate to be the one break it to you Blackfolk but Begging Whitefolk just don’t get it. It never did and it never will.

Is this the best Post Most-Favored-Minority Empowerment Strategy we can come up with for the 21st Century. If it is, God Help Us.

We got to do better than this Blackpeople. Work with me.

Weekly Grabbag 9/24: Iraq, Israel, Medicare, Energy, Vouchers, Etc

Weekly Grabbag of Interesting Tidbits

Interesting Current Events of the Week that I dont feel like using an entire post on. I will refine and update this Post throughout the Week. Then do one for next week and so on.

Nathan Bedford Forrest and Fort Pillow

Margaret Kimerbelys Freedom Rider has a November 25 Post on a Klan Initiation in which an Initiate was accidently shot. She mentions an Historical Incident, the Civil War Massacre of black soldiers at Fort Pillow by Nathan Bedford Forrest. This one is close to my heart.

As a black guy from Memphis, the Fort Pillow Massacre and Nathan Bedford Forrest are still open wounds. The Fort Pillow Massacre plays a large part in my new novel, Rest for the Weary.

Remember Fort Pillow became a battle cry of black soldiers for the rest of the war.

For the uninformed, Nathan Bedford Forrest, the Civil War General who conducted the massacre of black soldiers after they had surrendered at Fort Pillow, later founded the Ku Klux Klan. Nathan Bedford Forrest is such a hero to Southerners of a certain persuasion that there is a big statue of him on his horse in downtown Memphis and the fort itself has been rebuilt as a State Park. Kind of a Southern Shrine I guess.

Remember Fort Pillow.

A Mandate for the Naked Emperor

Sobering Time Magazine story about Bush as a polarizing force in American politics. Whats most sobering about it is the depiction of Rove and the Republican Party's effort to get Bush what he didnt get in the first disputed election. "A Mandate. They are already laying plans for the ambitious things they want to do in a second term—Social Security overhaul, tax reform, Medicare restructuring and even more tax cuts."

He already governs with a theocratic certitude thats frightening. Can you imagine how much of a loose canon he would be with a 2nd term mandate. Folk want to bemoan the influence of Islamic Fundamentalism and ignore the fact that we are being governed by Homegrown Fundamentalists just as bad if not worse.

God Help Us All.

On the Nature of Celebrity Child Abuse

One wonders why the entertainment industry (and the public too for that matter) is dropping M Jackson like a hot potato while R Kelly is still going strong. They have both been accused of basically the same thing. One wonders why RK has gotten a free pass? Guess MK has a higher profile. And wierder too.

Friend of mine explained that celebrities get a pass on young (not little) girls but nobody gets a pass on little boys. Be nice if nobody got a pass on either. Not that RK appreciates his good fortune. A little while back and apparently feeling himself somewhat abused RK said "Osama bin Laden is the only one who knows exactly what I'm going through." Well at least he didnt claim he was being subjected to a 'hightech lynching'. Bout tired of that one.

Israeli Containment Models

Apparently in their attempt to contain the Iraqi Intifada, the US has turned to that Paragon of Occupational Ethics, Israel. Apparently the American military has gone to Israel for advice on their techniques for fighting the Palestinians. I assume this means that we will see more assassinations, leveled homes and careless often questionable collateral damage.

To put pressure on some ex Iraqi general they believe is leading the resistance, the US arrested his wife and daughter. Little while back the US floated the idea of letting the so called "Governing Council" field a paramilitary force. Whatever happening over there in Iraq it dont sound like Democracy to me. Forget hearts and minds, they going for the cojones now.

Recent reports indicate this arbitrary war was implemented in spite of backchannel efforts and offers by Iraq to capitulate to all US Demands. But as everybody knows the Bush ideologues just had to go to Baghdad. And drag the rest of us along. Now they say they got a plan. But how can we trust them. Everything theyve told us has been either a Lie or they Just Didnt Know No Better. We need a new team up in here. This aint working.

Bush's Medicare and Energy Bills

Looks like the Medicare and Energy Bills are moving right along. The Democrats have stopped the Energy Bill for the moment, looks like they going down on Medicare, in large part thanks to the cooption of AARP.

Both Bills were conceived in private with primary input from their respective industries rather than the people to be effected. Energy has no redeeming features that I can see and the Medicare Bill gives just enough to camouflage its longrange goals of gutting Medicare. Hopefully when seniors realize how they’ve been buked and scorned they will turn on the Republicans. This might still work out for Progressive Forces.

But it doesnt sound like it will help my mother with her onerous prescription bill. (This one I take personal, they can find money for all kinds of corporate causes but they cant find any clean money to help seniors with a clear and imperative need.)

These bills seem more designed to provide energy corporations, HMOs and Providers with Billions of dollars in subsidies. But the Medicare Bill goes much further. The same principle used in the effort to privatize Social Security, which will raise its head again when the Repubs judge it timely, probably after the election.

If they win.

Okay, so the Medicare Bill is a Done Deal. The next step is to tidy it up. At the Industry's Insistence the Bill bans government price controls on drugs. Thats got to go. In 2006 I believe a trial run promoting competition with private sources. That needs to be scruntized too. As the parameters of the Bill become clearer we will have to see what can be done with it to make it a true benefit.

Death of a 1000 Cuts

Molly Ivins Mojo Article on Bush as Uncompassionate Conservative. His 'death of a 1000 cuts attitude toward social programs.

The Last Line of Defense

We are at the point now where filibusters in the Senate are the first, last and damn near only line of Defense against the Rightwing Ascendancy. It has stopped the judges and it has stopped the Energy Bill. This is a beleaguered moment for Progressive Forces.

We have a one party government thats using its lock to entrench itself even further. The Repubs have been trying to gut the filibuster tactic. I urge Senate Democrats to Resist. Use our last remaining weapon judiciously, but use it.

Stealth Vouchers

The Vouchers plan the Repubs are slipping into the 2004 DC Appropriations Bill looks like a go. Many blackfolk, concerned about their childrens problematic public education, have been coopted to support this blatant attempt to destroy public education and are, as is often the case when real people get caught up in Republican initiatives, working against our own interests.

Since when has the Rightwing cared about black kids being educated.

This is just part and parcel of their longterm goal of DeFunding the Government and returning us to a Darwinian age. It is hard sometimes to think of the community and the social good when your own needs are so great but it is part of what makes a strong and civil society, a strong and civil community. We cannot afford to give up on public education. Try to take the highroad on this one blackfolk.

The forces behind the voucher movement don’t want educated informed citizens, they want slaves.

Remember Fort Pillow

COINTELPRO II: FBI Gathering Data on Anti-War Protesters

Apparently the Bush Administration is using the FBI to gather information on protesters at antiwar rallys. They say that they are only monitoring them to forestall violence by marchers and terrorist acts targeting the rallys. Yeah right.

When you put this in context of an array of violations of basic American principles like putting that guy Padilla away without recourse to law, lawyers, judge or trial and their Total Information Awareness databases and other Ashcroftian excesses, their protestations of neutrality and concern for our safety are of questionable validity.

Basically they saying Trust me not to use this information unlawfully.

So, do you trust Ashcroft or dont you.

Testifying earlier this year before the House crime subcommittee, Louis Freeh, the head of the FBI said, "We are potentially the most dangerous agency in the country if we are not scruntinized carefully."

No kidding.

Feels like COINTELPRO is back in the house.

We have a constitutional right to protest what we consider an immoral and even counterproductive war without feeling like we are being put into some potentially punitive database by an Administration that has already proven itself ready to go to any length to smother domestic opposition to its imperial policies.

An Administration that has eagerly accused anybody who questions Bush's War as being unAmerican and even Traitors. This war had very little to do with Counterterrorism. If anything it has exacerbated Fundamentalism and Terrorism and diverted energies and monies best spent elsewhere. Folk in Iraq dying on a humbug and I have the right to say so.

The Bush Administration say they need $87 billion to build Democracy in Iraq while they crippling Democracy here in the States. Does belief in the Bill of Rights make me a Traitor. Personally I feel that I am being truer to the American ideal when I try to get America to live up to its higher principles.

Whatever else it is designed to do, this FBI policy is transparently an effort to intimidate folk from protesting against Administration Policies.

Local law enforcement agencies have eagerly climbed on board. The New York City Police Department was interrogating detainees arrested during antiwar marches about their political beliefs until public outrage caused them to rescind that policy and expunge the accompanying database.

Maybe we can restrain the FBI maybe we cant. No telling what repressive policies are flying underneath the public radar.

We can go ahead and protest this one (local representatives, op ed pages, etc, etc, you know the drill) but it will be more effective to concentrate on getting Bush and his Merry Band of Fundamentalists out of there.

They are making all kinds of very effective moves to set themselves up for reelection and their transgressions on Civil Rights, Environment, International Relations, Medicare, Social Security, the Great Society, etc etc etc, are so numerous that responding to them one by one just disperses our energies. Not only is it strictly Defense, its bad Defense. They cleaning our clocks.

Another four years of this is more than I care to contemplate.

Bush has got to go. We have to start yesterday organizing for the 2004 elections. So go ahead and sign me up for one of those FBI databases and get it over with.

a luta continua

Rickydoc's List: The Seven Critical Issues Facing Black America Today

This will be what an ongoing update regarding what I consider the 7 most critical issues facing Black America today. I will update them and replace them as necessitated by evolving events.

Every week (yeah right, more like once a month) I will update this list with links about these 7 issues. Occasionally one will be bumped by an evolving situation but for right now I think these are the 7 critical issues facing us today. Not in any particular order as of yet. Maybe later.

Let me know if you feel differently or if you think Ive left something out or missed a recent development. Whatever.

RDL#1: The 2004 Election

we got to get george bush and the rightwing ascendancy out of there - progressives of the world unite

RDL#2: The AIDS Epidemic

this is an immediate crises fate has dumped on us, we have lost almost a generation - around the world we must save the lives of blackfolk in need and make (v)ital health a black cultural trait

RDL#3: Diasporic Development

around the world wherever you got blackfolk they are on the bottom of their respective societies - everywhere, apparently without exception - somehow someway we must transform into strength the weaknesses that have crippled us in global competition

RDL#4: Cultural Wars and the Longgame

the longgame is about shaping our generations into the people we would them be - extracting the weaknesses from our culture and emphasizing its strengths - longgame on the Board of Destiny

cast your vision young hoodoo as far as you can see - determine the challenges the tribe will face - prepare the tribal soul to meet them

RDL#5: Islam, the West and the Rest of Us

islam and the west are both aggressive conquerors of the black soul
in this current battle between them we have to play them both

RDL#6: Empowerment Strategies

empowerment of the blackworld should be our 21st century goal - economic empowerment, political empowerment, personal, social and cultural empowerment, you name it, empowerment will cover it - the biggest issue of the moment seems to be whither reparations - is it the most viable post most-favored- minority strategy or is it

RDL#7: Male/Female Relationships

In many ways perhaps the most important issue of all - in this, the fundament of empowerment, we have been our own greatest weakness, our own worst enemy.

a luta continua

Hello Dear Reader

Introducing Rootsblog: Timely Observations on Politics, Literature, Culture, Struggle and the Hoodoo Way.

In case you are a New Reader and wondering why Im so prolific today, I am in process of moving the Posts that I want to keep from my old Blogspot. blog.

Blogspot started me off a couple of months ago and I hate leaving but I want that comment and feedback function. Really want MT but my host doesnt support it and I just dont feel like the hassle right now of changing hosts, I will see how this Typepad thing works and if feedback justifies it (assuming I get some).

Got to move my Lists over (which is going to be a hassle). Be putting up a New Post every couple of days.

Still a baby and finding my stride, seem to be leaning toward longer 'essay' posts over the shorter ones I started with. I will try to restrain myself, shorter works better on the Internet Ive found but I do like to cover the ground.

Old Readers Please Bookmark new site. New Readers, hope you hang around. Cause this is gon be Rickydocs Place: Willing To Go Where Other Folk Fear To Tread.

I will try to entertain you, make you frown, make you smile, and never waste your time with anything less than the significant.

be well &
a luta continua

Arthur Rickydoc Flowers

A Cautionary Note

Recently it seems, Howard Dean made a comment about wanting to appeal to guys with Confederate Flags on their trucks. The other Democratic contenders, smelling blood, have called him on it.

Dean has been the hope of quite a few black progressives (including Jessie Jackson Jr) as a candidate who can both be progressive and beat George Bush.

Much as I like and support them doing what they do best, I dont think Al, Carol and Kucinich are real contenders and I dont do symbolic politics. Im strictly a pragmatist when it comes to electoral politics. It doesnt do to bring your heart to electoral politics, you will surely get it broken.

I support their efforts to keep the Democratic Party honest and will consider maybe a primary vote if it does not constitute a throwaway.

Of the real contenders there isnt anybody that Im really excited about in this race, but in politics one holds ones nose and pulls the lever. Not voting is not an option. When I think of what we went through in the 60s to get the vote and then hear blackfolk talking about it doesnt make a difference if we vote or not it just breaks my little hoodoo heart.

Specially when we have the numbers and the organization to be a true force in American politics.

For those purists who swear there is no difference between candidates and parties, Bushs brutal domestic and international policies should really make you check yourself. This foolishness can conceivably be laid at the feet of Nader and the Green Party's revolutionary purity in the last election.

Like Fannie Lou Hamer of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, you do what you can when you can: "Sometimes is seems like to tell the truth today is to run the risk of being killed. But if I fall, I'll fall five feet four inches forward in the fight for freedom.'

Folk who sit out elections cause they cynical and feel like it dont make no difference betray the sacrifices of ancestors like Queenmother Hamer and are responsible for all the damage the Rightwing Ascendancy has inflicted on blackfolk.

So I am conditionally probably mostlikely voting for Dean.

But that comment about guys with confederate flags on their trucks sounds suspiciously like white southern code. Like “Don’t worry none about what I say campaigning, Im really one of yall and you wont have no problems with my policies once I win the election.” kind of code.

I understand where hes coming from, the need to reach out to that electorate too, that we need them to win and truth be told he has said it better elsewhere. Back in February a round of applause greeted him when he told the Democratic National Committee that "White folks in the South who drive pickups with Confederate flag decals on the back ought to be voting with us and not them because their kids don't have health insurance, and their kids need better schools too."

Last Tuesday Democrats lost two of their few if any remaining gubernatorial positions in the South, Mississippi and Kentucky. The Republican Southern Strategy of racebaiting the south has pretty much turned the South into a race divided electorate of black Democrats and white Republicans and the only winning Democratic president candidates since Kennedy have been progressive Southerners.

For the Democrats to try to win back some of the Southern vote is not only advisable its critical. The Republican Southern Strategy is part of what has American voters voting against their own self interest and it’s a good thing to put it on the table for discussion.

But the guys with the Confederate flags on their trucks are not the Southern electorate they are looking for. Or does he think that everybody in the South is a hick.

Folk from the South such as myself know that the potentially moderate Southern vote does not run around with Confederate flags on their trucks and if Dean wants to appeal to that vote he needs to come up with a new symbol.

Hes about done the same thing we jumped on Trent Lott for doing. He could have easily reached out to that electorate without bringing in the Confederate flag. Code is Code is Code.

But still he seems to be the only horse to ride. Bill Clinton ran code when he ran for President too. Perhaps whitefolk who speak in code may be the only ones capable of being elected in this day and age.

Its unfortunate that Al and the other candidates didnt use that opportunity to really open up that debate and instead used it for cheap points. Dean is still probably our best bet for getting rid of Bush and thats my main obsession of the electoral moment.

But I do run up the Caution Flag. We know the Code. Don’t do in politics to willfully ignore what you know to be the case. Best keep an eye on him.

The Longgame

I often refer in my posts to what I call the Longgame.

This concept originally comes from my mentor, John O Killens, who often complained that blacks were not longdistance runners (that was before the Kenyans dominated the marathons of course) and that we had to conduct ourselves in our lives in a manner that facilitated lifelong struggle and precluded burnout and in our political strategies to think in longterm effect.

I translated that as The Longgame. Because as a wouldbe hoodoo visionary and ideological orchestrator I have to think in generations when making my moves.

(Cast your vision young hoodoo as far as you can see. Determine the challenges the tribe will face. Prepare the tribal soul to meet them.)

In shaping the generations and in ideological conflict the longest and most comprehensive game wins. I try to take the games of other ideological orchestrators into mind when I construct mine so that their efforts feed mine. If your vision and your game is comprehensive enough everybody else's game becomes part of yours and their efforts empower yours. If you truly understand the Board of Destiny, young hoodoo, everybody on the planet works for you.

It behooves blackfolk to start thinking in generations, both in their personal lives and in their cultural strategies. It should always be about how many generations can we shape and how do we shape them.

Around the world, whereever you got blackfolk they are on the bottom of their respective societies. Everywhere. Apparently without exception. Cant blame Everywhere on nobody but ourselves. Somehow someway we must transform into strengths, the weaknesses that have crippled us in global competition.

My ultimate game is to ensure that blackfolk are never on the bottom ever again. My goal is that blackfolk be so strong in spirit, so powerful a people that no matter what the governing system we find ourselves part of - no matter where in the world/cosmos we find ourselves in the foreseeable and unforeseeable future - that blackfolk not only survive and prosper as a race and culture but that they are illuminated and empowered, forces for justice and righteousness in whatever type of social system they find themselves. Or create.

Politics is shortgame, basic defense, the longgame is always a spiritual one, trying to shape the initiation of the soul, trying to grow and evolve and be always greater than we are. This goes for cultures as well as people, (bear with me I will bring it back to earth in a minute) or in the case of African American culture, trying to shape our generations into what we would like them to be.

For instance AIDS. Once it became clear that AIDS had a special affinity for the souls of blackfolk, there should have been a way to communicate that to our people with the kind of cultural authority that enables timely adaptation to a cultural emergency. A cultural authority that would identify and finesse cultural crises in their infancy.

Immediate AIDS shortgame should have been to identify the cause and change community behavior accordingly and immediately. In this case - education, monogamous commitment, safesex, drug outreach, pharmaceutical research&pricing policies, etc.

But that’s just Shortgame. Defense. The corresponding longgame should be designed to harness the karmic power generated by a cultural crises of this magnitude to make health of primal importance in our culture. Once again we see the penalty of bad health. Both in the States and around the world blacks are sicker than other folk - we die earlier, we suffer longer, we have paid in stunted lives and stunted generations. We desperately need to use this cultural hammer to make nutrition, health, sanitation and healthcare a cultural imperative. We need to be a healthfreak culture.

AIDS has ravaged blackfolk throughout the Americas and Africa has damn near lost a generation. It is incumbent upon us to use the karma generated by a crises of this magnitude to make health an ongoing concern. Exercise, nutrition, lifestyle and compassionate healthcare policies are a must. The (v)ital lifestyle must become second nature to us. A cultural trait. Then we will have transformed adversity into strength. Worked the counterspell. Otherwise its just a tragedy. Just a tragedy.

(Please take care of yourself and your loved ones. Try to live a healthy and ital lifestyle in every way you can. This is both an individual and a cultural responsibility.)

It is in that vein that I express appreciation for the work of Kenny and Faatimah Gamble, who have used the monies theyve earned with The Philly Sound to support our community. Sister Faatimah founded The Wellness Of You Program, an innovatively comprehensive Health and Wellness Program based in Philly, while Brother Kennys Universal Companies has facilitated effective development of his South Philly neighborhood.

These efforts are commendable on so many levels. Rich black celebrities giving back to the community in a manner consistent with our greatest needs. I commend them both. I proclaim them both honorary Masters of the Longgame.

Us Bush Haters and the Longgame

I have been at a lost what to post these last couple of days. I so want to be a significant player. I so want all my posts to be serious and significant. To Change Things. To Make a Difference.

Probably an unreasonable expectation but nevertheless thats what I want. The Right Piece at the Right Time. Turning the Key in the Hoodoo Lock.

I think the most significant issue of the moment is the Bush Administration and I tend to spend an inordinate amount of time attacking them. I guess Ima Bush Hater.

Jonathon Chait in an article back in September "Mad About You" for The New Republic started a Rightwing feeding frenzy about Bush Hating.

Suddenly they are crying sensitive crocodile tears about the unfairness of Progressive charges against Bush and whining that its all about "Bush Hating" and how unfortunate it all is.

I don’t really hate Bush, I wouldn’t call it "hate" exactly but I sure do dislike what hes doing to America and the World. Im looking at the carnage in Iraq right now and Im wondering my God how are we going to get out of this.

And I look at what they are doing domestically. Defunding the government and trying to return us to a Darwinian age of every man (and possibly woman) for himself.

But I have to say that my last post on them, the Fundamentalist Post I thought got a little strident maybe. Thats frustration talking - watching this Howdy Doody President (wait, wait, I take that back, that was kinda snarly) this socalled President, so, I think the euphemism these days is ‘lacking in curiosity about the world’, the most powerful man in the world, got the nerve to boast about not reading newspapers and doesnt seem to have the slightest idea of what hes doing. He scares me.

And what frightens me even more is that I don’t see the American people being fully engaged with just how much of a danger Bush and his merry Band of Fundamentalists are. The storm of Jihad gathering in Iraq will fester for generations to come and domestically Bush has moved further on the rightwing agenda of defunding the government than anybody to date, blithly imperiling the American social contract.

And after using dirty politics to gain oneparty almost dictatorial control of all three branches of government the rightwing now wants us to ‘play fair’.

Yeah right.

You better beware the fury of a Pissed Off Progressive is what you better do.

But I don’t want to get strident. Mostly because I dont think thats an effective mode of advocacy. I want to be calm cool and collected. And when I hit them I want to hurt them.

So Im pondering my posts these days. I want each and every one to be serious and significant Forces of Change. To Make A Difference. Im pondering day and night the nature of effective advocacy. Im pondering day and night how to be an ever more effective progressive force in the world today.

Cool, Calm and Collected. A Master of the Longgame.

Shameless Self Promotion: I am a Conjureman, This is the Text.

Excerpt #1 from Mojo Rising: Confessions of a 21st Century Conjureman

I am Flowers of the Delta Clan Flowers and the Line of O Killens.

A Babagriot of the Hoodoo Way. A Lord of the Delta.

And I would you my people be
the great and glorious people you were
meant to be.

The Illuminated Children of the Sun.

Humanities Living Ancestors and
Gods True Chosen.

Lisen o ye Firstborn to the Geas of Rickydoc
and I will give you a mission greater
than your adversity.

I am a Conjureman. This is the Text.

Been most interesting trying to be true hoodoo in these contemporary times. Most folks arent certain hoodoo really exist. If they are conscious of the hoodoo tradition, they generally thinking slaverytime hoodoo - spells, hells and black cat bones. But as African Americans have evolved as a people so too has their indigenous spiritual tradition. Comparing contemporary hoodoo to slaverytime hoodoo is kinda like comparing the space shuttle to an oxdrawn cart.

My understanding is that the word Hoodoo is a linguistic riff on Voodoo, itself a riff on Vodou, a Fon word meaning spirit or deity. Hoodoo is often confused with Voodoo. They are, though, two different systems. Voodoo, like most afrospiritual systems in the Americas, is a conventional religious system (based in Haiti) whose primary concern, in spite of Western sensationalizement, is interface with the Divine, whereas Hoodoo has traditionally been a magical system based in the African American communities of the South.

My understanding is that the word Hoodoo came into being when the Vodou of Haiti was imported into French Louisiana by planters and slaves fleeing the Haitian revolution. When Voodoo was proscribed in New Orleans as "insurrectionary," it went underground and mythopoetic figures such as Dr. John and Marie Laveau shaped its American manifestation. It became Hoodoo when it dispersed out of New Orleans into the southern black experience and became the term for a variety of African magical/religious practices that had survived among assimilated slaves.

Around about the turn of the 20th century mystically inclined African American writers began to use Hoodoo as literary ground. It was Zora Neale Hurston facilitated Hoodoos transformation from the folkloric to the literary and Ishmael Reed its transformation from a magical to an afrospiritual ideological system.

Today Hoodoo is an eclectic system shaped to the personality of the practitioner from the classic rural magicworker to the sophisticated ideological orchestrators of literary hoodoo. Hoodoo today, as is the Afroamerican community for which it speaks, in a state of flux and transition. A blank slate to be shaped as we see fit. The cutting edge of Contemporary Hoodoo aspires to be a respected contribution to the Worldspirit - the global spiritual Work composed of the best of the national traditions. Where the essence of religions meet. The Holyground.

Concerning itself then not only with its classic tribal roles of afrospiritual guide and guard but with the wellbeing of all peoples and all Jah creatures great and small. Guide and Guardian still.

Consequently the human condition, evolutionary illumination, community empowerment, divine and destinic guidance have become prime hoodoo concerns. At least according to Rickydoc. Thats me.

I have tried in Mojo Rising to explore my evolution as a contemporary hoodooman and get further understanding of questions I have struggled with to get to where I am now - the Crossroad Decisions I have had to make. I hope with this work to contribute to the ongoing evolution of the hoodoo way and make it pertinent to the 21st Century mind and condition. I hope with this work to establish a claim for hoodoo as one of the world's respected spiritual traditions and to make of it an effective instrument of spiritual and political redemption.

Gon speculate then in Mojo Rising on two primary hoodoo skills - Conjuration and Consultation: Consultation as the classic hoodoo role of Individual Guidance - helping folk to address the challenges of life and be greater than they are.

Souleasery.

Conjuration as Destinic Guidance - destinic orchestrations conjuring reality into being and shaping the future of humanity. Making real that which was not. Turning the key in the hoodoo lock.

In my youth I was a sorceror.

I have struggled for some 25 years now to manifest as a contemporary hoodooman. I have for the last 10 or so struggled to understand just what it means to be a 21st Century conjureman. A true 21st Century afrospiritual force. A holyman if I may be so bold.

In spite of all evidence to the contrary, I like to think I got my mojo working and I plan to take the trick off black souls. This spell is then designed to define the hoodoo way as the prophetic tradition of the blackworld and shape the hoodoos of the future as spiritual and strategic advisors - masters of the longgame.

I have tried to approach this quest with the humility it demands and can only hope that in the journey I have found something worthwhile. My record is spotty and most of my understanding has come from failure. I hope in this work to find my own redemption.

I further hope with this work to influence the destinic dynamics of my times. To give my people a vision greater than their adversity. I hope with this Work to conjure.

Come then o traveler. I claim for hoodoo the prophets way.