To Be Like…

To be a lapdog of u.s. imperialism you have to be like mindless soldiers who voluntarily sign up to oppress other poor people. You have to be a mindless entertainer – while on BET you floss a street swag in an attempt to fool the youth into believing you are in the same position as them – then you run off to the whitest house to do a Motown revue or cut on the lights of a Christmas tree, where you rub elbows with other collaborators and oppressors smiling, soft shoeing and doing your best impression of ‘high culture’.

To be kept safe and alive, out of harm’s way and in front of cameras as a weapon of mass destruction, you have to act angry. As if you have a real issue, while promoting foreign cars, exotic jewelry, expensive liquor, outrageous fashions and naked women. You have to coat your body in a gaggle of meaningless tattoos, throw up a gang-less sign and frown menacingly through some obnoxious, face altering sunglasses. You have to mention guns, sexual prowess, hate, obsessions with the inane (absurd); you have to flail your arms wildly and do a two-step walk that resembles a war-dance from a street org you’re not a member of nor would ever be considered for. You’ll need to cover your natural teeth with metal and glass sold to you by the oppressors of your people.

You’ll have to do all this under the watchful eyes of a security firm that keeps those you’re trying to fool at a safe distance – lest they test your gangster and realize that it is not what it is. To prevent this occurrence you’ll be better off doing your video in the safe confines of a studio in front of a green screen where images can later be computer-generated onto it.

What you can’t do, however, is mention the following:

National Oppression
Patriarchy
Homophobia
Capitalism
Neo-Colonialism
Protracted Peoples War
Socialism
Communists
Revolutionary Nationalism
The Black Liberation Army
Imperialism
Liberation of Political Prisoners
Self-determination
Or that Obama is an Uncle Tom to the 10th power, and a Zionist.

In other words, you can floss in Tom Foolery all day on 106 and Park. You do know that BET is owned by CBS? That CBS is one of the major propaganda pillars of the settler government and thus the bourgeoisie?

As long as you employ the meaningless formula of fluff, pomp, posture and posing, you can stay 106 and Park count down for 19, 20 weeks. As long as you promote collaboration, parasitism, black-american-ism, a willingness to be angry within the established boundaries of colonial legality, you’re touted as a star. You know the business: anger, undirected rage – pseudo-struggle.

From your infantry work at distracting New Afrikan youth – once you’ve proven worthy in this regard – you’ll be promoted up the chain (literally) as a small bit actor in hood movies; then independent films and maybe even a major motion picture. And, if your show/act is that believable, you could get a position on a tv drama as – of course – a pig. And let’s be clear, whether you portray a detective, a navy investigator, or a medical examiner –that’s all pig. You are an entertainer in a business that promotes, supports and contains national oppression.

In your pursuit of the money (which you’ve been led to believe is freedom – which you are now trying to make others believe), you’ve been played all the way out of pocket. Now they got you singing and dancing at memorials for imperialist troops killed in colonialist actions. They’ll move you onto the country music circuit, a New Year’s celebration in N.Y., a tour of duty in the hoods and barrios to promote participation in bourgeois elections; in defense of charter schools that promote nothing but dependency and white supremacy. They’ll parade you on Extra, Entertainment Tonight and Good Morning Amerika. They’ll have you begging your nation for money to support the victims of the earthquake, tsumani, and radiation leak in one city of rich ass Japan while down the street Mrs. Johnson can’t afford to eat and also pay for her medication. Support one city in Japan while you whole nation is under a genocidal tsunami. Good work, idiot.

Another video, another tattoo, another chain, another car, another half-naked dance – another stitch in this satin lining of the national coffin. You’re not significant enough to be a nail in the coffin – don’t fool yourself. You’re only a small thread, a mere stitch, in the lining. That is all. The thing is however, there’s no shortage of you bastards. But trust and believe – the revolutionaries are coming!

Rebuild!
Sanyika Shakur
PBSP–SHU