music: Funkadelic- One Nation Under A Groove
(Disclaimer: This one is for the true Star Wars Dorque.)
Making prequels can be a tricky business in terms of internal consistency. Will everything that we know and love about the original Star Wars Trilogy hold up as the background information comes to light? Will glaring inconsistencies be found? Will some things need a bit of reframing? George Lucas had to have known that he was up against the most nitpicky, meticulous, obsessed group of movie fans this side of Mos Eisely when he set out to make Episodes I, II, and III. Let’s face it, some Star Wars fans know more about worlds and events that (alledgedly) never existed than they do about our own world and history. So what follows, on some level, is to be expected.
I can’t argue with it, actually; the logic is watertight. But it really changes how you think of almost everything that happens in Episode IV. Star Wars Dorque extraordinaire Keith Martin makes the case that the #1 and #2 masters of espionage for the rebel alliance, the ones who really are calling the shots are…R2D2 and Chewbacca??? The Force is strong in this one. Read on, fellow dorque, and be amazed.
music: Curtis Mayfield - Superfly (25th Anniversary Deluxe Addition)
My friend Jordan Carlos has become, by all measures, a successful comedian and actor. I remember seeing him in shows in college with the on-campus improv troupe. (There is, alledgedly, a very funny script floating around somewhere about Jordan, our friend Patrick, and I trying to move into our apartments before senior year of college…but I’ve yet to see product.) I remember seeing him perform in New York City a bunch of years back, some amateur night with a $10 cover and a two drink minimum, and I remember been pretty impressed with him then. I remember walking by a TV in a bar at one point and flipping out because Jordan was on TV, starring in a prime-time-major-network commercial. I remember people talking about Jordan being on The Daily Show (or so I heard; not watching TV leaves me high and dry in matters of popular culture). By most measures, Jordan made it as a comedian and actor, and on a nationally recognized level.
He is a funny guy and a great performer, has been for as long as I’ve known him. Most of his scripted humor is based around race, specifically his being a black man living and working in a white man’s world, and being the “preppiest black guy in the free world.” This sort of comedy depends on deep-set unspoken stereotypes. Because he would be the first to admit to crowds that he does not act black, he gains a certain leverage to be able to point out incongruities in stereotypes of black/white relations in America. The fact that mostly white audiences are perfectly aware of these oft-unspoken stereotypes, and the fact that they are spoken out loud, into a microphone, out loud, by a person of color, somehow has made it all safe to laugh at. To an extent, Jordan depends on those deep-set, unspoken stereotypes to be there, because without them his jokes are not funny. Having gone to a prestigious college with Jordan, one largely symbolic of the power of the dominant culture in America, and then having worked for teenagers in the inner city, gives me some understanding of the two cultures Jordan pits against each other and embodies simultaneously.
There is at least a grain of truth behind every joke. Even in college Jordan, one of the few black faces on campus, was refining the characterization of a black person living in a white world. Even then he was the first to voice the incongruity of it all, and even then it was done with humor and good intention. But I think it has taken its toll. Some time last November, around the same time of Michael Richards’s racist explosion, Jordan’s writing online got a little more serious. A couple weeks ago, I understand, Jordan published a piece in the Washington Post, revealing a more somber perspective on his perfession and alledged success. Here, now, is something new: being black in a white world is not as funny as Jordan has made it out to be for all us white folks in the audience. And moreover, the black song-and-dance that entertains mostly white audiences might just be subtle form of cultural oppression and inequality masqurerading as comedy. This is most assuredly not funny.
Jordan keeps a blog. Up until recently he’s posted about upcoming shows, tried out pieces of material, vented frustrations about being a young (black) entertainer. The last couple posts have taken a different tone, however; Jordan has seemingly reached a reckoning. In the last couple of posts, Jordan has positioned himself in opposition to those with whom he previously sought to join. Before, being a preppy black guy was funny. Now, being a preppy black guy is becoming a vehicle for social polemic. I suppose that one can publicly shame oneself for so long before one wears onself down. Jordan might have hit that point. Now that he is breaking into the spotlight proper, and the stakes are a bit higher, things are taking on more significance.
There has been a lot of popular self-deprecating comedy used as satire as of late (Chapelle and Borat come to mind). But in these cases, the self-deprecation has a higher purpose than just laughs, it’s meant to hold a mirror up to those that practice ignorance, racism, homophobia, xenophobia, and other sociological horrors. The problem is that much of the time the satire is too good, and the larger point is lost beneath the humor. Moreover, just because you know better doesn’t make it permissible. That Jordan has given himself a moment to pause and consider this, and then spoken about it on the national level, is commendable. Not just commendable, important. Not just important, vital. Vital. Someone has to say something, and if people are willing to listen to Jordan and laugh, I hope they are willing to listen to him tell them the tragedy of why it’s so funny.
Jordan’s January 10th post, the first following publication of his piece in the newspaper, takes the tone of social activist more than entertainer. As a teacher I have a job where people listen to me (well, most of the time anyway) and I feel an obligation to use that influence to further socially just causes. I think and hope that Jordan is positioning himself in similar ways now. It is, of course, is a big professional risk for a black man trying to be critical of and simultaneously break into a culture of power, one that I (and any other white person) can’t empathize with. But it is vital. Whites have no way of empathizing with this. Whites can not (read: are not allowed) to be critical of this, that is, if we want to actually see social justice being done. It’s inspiring to see a friend of mine grapple with quesitons of race, racial identity, and race relations, and assuring to see it being done with a degree of skill and poise that leaves people laughing instead of arguing. But at some point, if the message really is to stick, things have to stop being funny. That endeavour represents an enormous occupational hazard for Jordan, but one I support fully. There is at least a grain of truth behind every joke. My hope is that one day Jordan will get up and do his schtick and have nobody in the audience laugh. Not because he isn’t funny anymore, but because the underlying message in his jokes will have been, at last, successfully delivered.
music: Radiohead- OK Computer
Computers are ubiquitous. This much should be obvious to anyone reading these words. But for all their utility and application to all aspects of our lives, computers have become fairly transparent. Perhaps people who use computers on a daily basis don’t realize just how much they depend on them. I didn’t until my computer crashed on me three or so weeks ago. For the first time since I was eight or nine years old (minus extended travelling sans computer), I had no personal machine. I’d like to think that my life didn’t come to a screeching halt, but the day-to-day did change a great deal.
I realize how much I’ve started to do assuming use of my computer, how much data relevant to me as a human being is contained and processed by the machine in front of me. Never mind virtual reality; at every turn I was stuck with the realization that my computer is the most indespensible tool in navigating actual reality. My banking and bills are all handled on computer, as well as much of my shopping. I write, record, and document music as well as words on my computer. I commuincate professionally and with friends and family over my computer. I make social plans over the computer, maintain a schedule over the computer, transmit documents of all kinds over the computer, listen to my music collection through the computer, keep extensive photo galleries in my computer. I found a place to live on the computer, a job on the computer, band mates on the computer. I have bought and sold things using the computer. Short of going gargoyle and strapping a computer to my body or implanting wireless interface chips into my brain, I’m fully integrated.
And it’s not just me; as anyone reading these words knows computers have taken or are taking the place of technological and cultural artifacts left and right. The printing press, the calculator, the postal service, the post-it note, the bulletin board, the radio, the newspaper, the drafting table, the safe deposit box, and the home entertainment center are just the beginning. People’s computers have become the record store down the street, the video rental store next to it, the library, store fronts and office departments, and even serve social functions much like the high school lunch table or the watercooler at work. And all of it is on a staggering, ever-expanding scale. To this, then, it seems that the personal computer is indespensible.
When my computer bit the dust I was immediately concerned that I lost data of some kind. Old papers from college, content from the Live Live website, recordings from band practice, photos from some of my travels in realspace, binders upon binders upon binders of LPs. Luckily no data was lost (and I’m in the process of backing up my backups) but I’d need a new machine to host the hard drive that has become the crates that most people keep in their basement. The catch-22 was, of course, that I’d need a computer to find a new computer. So for three weeks I stopped by the library to use the internet there (and picked up some new books to read in the process), and visited friends down the block to jump on their computers (and spent some quality time with them in the process). I biked around town, popped in on some cool coffee shops, read some books, played some guitar, listened to a lot of NPR, and after getting over the initial loss felt pretty good. (The flip side is that I let my phone bill and credit card bill hang, missed out on some fun events that I never heard about in time, and couldn’t listen to nearly as much music.) By the end of the third week I could almost envision weaning myself off my computer, making do with friends and libraries and guitar and the radio. I spent more time cooking. I used my hands a lot more. I checked the weather by walking outside.
All that has subsided, taken a back seat to the task of getting my new computer up and running. It arrived last Tuesday in the mail (courtesy of computer transactions), and I skipped a friend’s concert that night to start getting things back to how they were before my computer fried itself. As I type, my 280 gb music collection is migrating to a 750 gb drive, my backups are being backed up, I’m answering emails that have been hanging, listening to music, monitoring the news, generally getting glazed over staring at this screen, getting lost in the bits and bytes, and I’m blogging about it all the while. i’m plugged in, fully integrated, and after a breath of what it must have been like 20 years ago, I don’t think I’m alone.
The computer in front of me allows me to think I’m not alone, at least.