day by day thoughts and ramblings... combining naivete, spur of the moment madness, beer, nfl and mlb, solipsism, photography, and adventures, with as little sarcasm as possible (I save that for real life)
Back in the day (early 90s, say between 1991 and 1994), I was fan of Boyz II Men.
I'm not sure how common that was, but whatever, I liked their sound and they were always singing about girls and making love and all that stuff that I dreamt about but was too scurred to actually do anything about. They did the "black-and-white and color in the same video" thing a bunch, which was awesome. But more than anything, I loved their clothes. Smooth, but not flaming like a lot of singers did. Sometimes they wore varied outfits with the same color scheme, sometimes the same outfits in different colors, and sometimes they just wore the same thing. But what the hell? If people tried to pull that crap off today, they'd be laughed at forever! I'm not sure if they'd be looking effeminate or just cheesy as hell, but it would never work.
I'm wondering... was it the 90s that made that ok? Or was it me being a kid (in other words, did older people/adults think it was ridiculous at the time, as i do now?) that made it ok in my head?
And then, on a related note... if I'm calling out Boyz II Men's outfits and overall appearance out, what can I say about these guys??
They even stole Boyz II Men's name scheme (word-number-word)? If nothing else, these 4 would totally get their asses kicked by the Boyz if they had some sort of smooth voice crooner cage match.
What a sick idea that turns into though... some sick battle royale with cross-generational boy bands...
four tops, temptations, the jackson 5, boyz II men, all-4-one, backstreet boyz, nsync...
Temptations have to be the favorites. Four tops and B2M probably fight it out for the numbers 2 and 3. All-4-One is the solid 4 (not intentional) spot. Then it gets tricky... I'd probably go with Backstreet @ 5 because Michael Jackson would either be a) too young to fight, or b) too busy thinking about his monkey and Justin Timberlake would be too busy with his celebri-girlfriend of the day to give two craps about the rest of *Sync to make them a force.
This leads to the bottom of the barrel being the Jackson 5 vs. *SYNC. Joe Jackson vs. Lance Bass and crew? I say Crazy Papa Joe comes in like a homophobic bat outta hell and pistol whips the crap out of JT's crew, leaving them in the cellar.
Where's your civilian rocketship ticket now, Lance?
The cadillac stood by the house And the yanks they were within And the tinker boys they hissed advice 'Hot-wire her with a pin' We turned and shook as we had a look In the room where the dead men lay So big Jim Dwyer made his last trip To the home where his father's laid
Fifteen minutes later We had our first taste of whiskey There was uncles giving lectures On ancient Irish history The men all started telling jokes And the women they got frisky At five o'clock in the evening Every bastard there was piskey
Fare thee well going away There's nothing left to say Farewell to New York City boys To Boston and PA He took them out With a well-aimed clout He was often heard to say I'm a free born man of the USA
--the drinking song sung at Kavanaugh's for every homocide police's wake.
Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet?
In recent weeks, I have discussed with friends and co-workers random topics on the current political climate in our country. I've been asked "Who do you plan on voting for?" Without going into a political debate here, one of the points that I inevitably give is "Well, voting for Barack is throwing your vote away", and I get crazy looks.
"HHHHHHHHHHWHAT?! Why would you say that?", with non-black people probably thinking "You can't say that! You're black! You agree with most of his political philosophies! You read his autobiography and loved it! You told me to read it! And now you say something like that?!!"
This is true. And in a perfect world, well, I still probably wouldn't vote for Barack just yet; I think I'd give him another 4-8 years in the Senate before I'd want him as Commander in Chief, just so he can get a little firmer handle on the political skillet in Washington. With a little more experience on committees, a few more alliances made on both sides of the aisle, and a few more significant legislation authorings/sponsorings under his belt, I think he'd be the best president since JFK. Which leads me to my next point...
Quick! Name the most significant assassinations in US History! Lincoln. Jack Kennedy. Bobby Kennedy. Martin. Malcolm. What's the connection? Yeah, pretty obvious. But think about that... the only successful assassination attempts in the history of this country have pretty much occurred against targets whose primary political, social, and moral goals were to help gain equality for black Americans.*
Now, if people (some readers might blindly assume that the people I'm describing were either white, racist, or both, but a good scientist never makes those inherently obvious assumptions in fear of stating a hypothesis with an initial bias) in the 1860s, and 1960s (jeez, what's with the 60s? I'm not leaving my house between new years 2060 and 2070...) were adamant enough about keeping black people from getting people to be treated as equal citizens in their country, what in the HELL is going to happen if one of these citizens now tries to take his liberties a step further, and attempts to because the most important citizen in the country! These people (I'll call them "haters" for simplicity) did everything possible to stop the country from allowing black people to rise from less-than-citizen to the citizen level. Once a black person tries to rise to the highest authority position in the land? Do people really believe that this is a safe undertaking? Really? The haters killed Lincoln, Martin, and JFK because they were trying to create a level playing field. If a black man is trying to leave the level playing field and jump to the top of the mountain, I'm supposed to believe that the haters, after40 years, have just learned their lesson and will sit idly by and watch a black man, the hatee**, appear on television and in the world's eye, as their leader?
I want to believe that this nation is ready for it. I know that my life is much easier (with regards to racial tolerance) than my parents' was, and infinitely easier than that of my grandparents. I mean, most of my friends are white. I went grew up in a middle class community, went to a private high school and attended a fairly good university. I am happy at least part of Dr. King's dream has been fulfilled: "We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one."
But even myself, ever the racial equality optimist, knows that the whole dream has not been realized. I know that there are many towns in this country where my family would probably not be welcome to visit for a trip. Does it make me sad? Sure. But unfortunately its a reality of life that I have to accept. Do I wish our United States could be like the United States on the hit show 24, where the greatest president of all time was elected? Of course. But that's not our reality. Our reality is that we live in a country that probably isn't ready for a black President. And that makes me sad... but not as sad as I would be if I was able to see a qualified candidate for President of the United States elected into office, and having his life taken not of the conduct of character, but because of the color of his skin.
...This all came to because I was watching this youtube clip. I was getting really excited, proud, and happy to be an American , and happy that one man was able to make such a significant difference in our world, and then I read some of the accompanying comments (click on the comments marked as "spam" or the ones with multiple thumbs down) listed below the video and saw that there are definitely many closed-minded haters among us even today.
*Yes, I know, Mr. Lincoln has been quoted with saying that his goal was just to keep America as one united country and the slavery topic was a secondary idea, but if that's all he really wanted, he could've done it with much less bloodshed if he continued to support legal slavery.
**hatee? hate-ee? recipient of the hate; yeah I make up words, wanna fight about it?
