ALICIA BANKS

Public Intellectual, Scholar, Radio Producer & Host, Columnist, Singer

ELOQUENT FURY



REVOLUTIONARY AFRICAN TRUTH

EXPRESSLY FOR RADICAL INTELLECTUALS WHO SEEK KNOWLEDGE
   (*******WARNING: HAZARDOUS TO NEOCON DELUSION*******)


AMANDLA!
A REVOLUTION
IN
FOUR PART HARMONY
 

“Black people are natural, they possess the secret of joy, which is why they can survive the suffering and humiliation inflicted upon them...”
                           
-Mirella Ricciardi, author of “African Saga”; from the foreword
    of “Possessing the Secret of Joy” by Alice Walker
 

“Everything you drop is so tired
Music is supposed to inspire
How come we ain't gettin no higher?”

                           
-Lauryn Hill,“Superstar”; from the CD "The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill"
 

“And even after all my logic and my theory
I add a muthafu**ka so you ignint niggas hear me..."

                           
-Lauryn Hill/The Fugees,“How Many Mics”; from the CD "The Score"
 

Some films are merely entertaining. Others are massive experiences. Amandla! is
both. Music is my anti-drug. Music is my greatest joy. It soothes me. It cheers me.
It energizes me. It helps me endure all of the pain I survive daily in this racist,
sexist, elitist, and homo-hating world. It is cathartic and inspirational to see that
music similarly saved the pained, rebel South African souls tortured by apartheid
from 1948-1990.

This film allows you to re-live the apartheid struggle through rare footage and a
hypnotic soundtrack. Multi-racial South African political activists, celebrity singers,
legendary musicians, powerful poets, and a host of revolutionaries from every
generation share their memories of madness, music, and mayhem. They act as griots
while the ancestors simultaneously speak through their warrior voices and the
protest songs that fueled their rage and rebellion against apartheid.

Since 1999, my life has been a blur of sheer toil in graduate school and exhaustion
due to constant corporate travel...This is why I have just seen this film released in
2002. My review is belated. Yet, the subject of this film is timeless and timely in
the context of the global terror being meted out by president select George W.
Bush/King Shrub and his fascist royal court. Oppression and music are both
universal.

Apartheid and Jim Crow are toxic cousins in a global family of racist dysfunctions.
King Shrub, his brother, and other Republikkkan allies revived Jim Crow brilliantly
at national voting booths in 2000. He and his ruthless royal court are gearing up to
usher Jim Crow in yet again in 2004.

So much in this film is applicable to the civil rights struggles and the Black Power
movements in America. In this film, world music legend Miriam Makeba speaks
about an anti-apartheid slogan “Free in ‘63!”. She said many rebels believed
apartheid would end in 1963. Ironically, 1963 is the year of my birth. And,
apartheid was still rabid and secure within South Africa’s regime when I was a 12
year old college student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, actively
engaged in campus protests against apartheid from 1976-1984.

Racist whites stole South Africa from its black residents, just like the United States
officials stole California/Aztlan from Mexicans. In South Africa, officials forced
pass books upon the Africans they robbed. In California,  green cards are still being
forced upon Mexicans dubbed “illegal aliens” by their legalized robbers. The war
for oil and construction windfalls in Iraq has proven that land theft is still a lucrative
bounty. And, historical amnesia is still a political weapon of choice.
 
Nelson Mandela was released from decades of political imprisonment in 1990. He
triumphantly and even surreally became president in 1994. And, this film displays
that entire tragic and glorious legacy. From bloody massacres to joyous celebrations,
from brave missions to heart crushing executions, from tearful wailings of pains to
thunderous cries of victorious joys, this is a film that must be seen!

It is euphoric to watch rebels, who survived government sanctioned beatings,
tortures, and incarcerated births delivered solo, speak with defiance and lingering
warrior spirits, even through tear filled eyes. They are living proof that oppressors
can only kill revolutionaries. But, they can never kill revolution. It is crucially
important to remember this in a new millennium defined by old madness. We are
living in a time for new rebels and martyrs now...

The gifted legendary musician Hugh Masakela speaks passionately and poetically
about being exiled. He says he began to dream in english and counteracted this
disturbing sign of cultural distance by speaking to himself in his native languages
when awake. He laments how dreaming of home only deepens depression when
exiles awake elsewhere.

This wonderful film celebrates how rebellious human spirits refuse to die. Music
spiritually fortifies that refusal. We are living in a time when president select
George W. Bush/ King Shrub and his ruthless royal court are killing the spirits of
soldiers and their families, homosexuals and their families, and voters who are
stripped of democracy. Every person who sees beyond the official lies regarding
Iraq and everthing else that King Shrub utters truly must see this film. It breeds hope and healing.

I am severely allergic to all metals. I rarely wear any jewelry. When I do, it is
usually wooden or shell. This film reminded me that I hate gold and diamonds for
more than genetic reasons. It exposes the brutal processing of diamond and gold.
We see and hear the pain of black miners abused by global lusts for jeweled
trinkets.

Masakela also speaks of trains as “South Africa’s first tragedy” . The trains carry
gold and diamond miners to their dark and dank toil. Trains carried Jews to the
genocide of the Holocaust. Aquatic trains/slave ships carried African slaves to
Amerikkka and beyond. Legal trains carry a generation of African-Americans to the
newest plantations of the prison industrial complex. Trains represent demonic
departures and oppressive evils for many....

This film reminds me that music is supposed to be meaningful. So much of what
we call music in Amerikkka today is truly meaningless. South African music lifted
spirits and renewed souls. Most music today is literally degrading to the spirit and
soulless.

South African composers appreciate the magic of music. And, they perfected its
most potent potions. One of the anti-apartheid rebels’ songs asks: “What have we
done?” It moved masses of organized and productive rebels who destroyed
apartheid.

It motivated me to reflect upon the “Bling Bling” obsessions of Amerikkka’s rap
music lyricists, who typically only ask: “What have we bought?” or brag about their
own bloody purchases. This contrast with superior South African lyrical
content is truly a dejecting one...

In South Africa, music literally fashioned a revolution. Songs always reflect the
future of a nation. Gil Scott Heron told us: “The Revolution will not be televised.”
So much of today’s music leads one to question if Amerikkka’s revolution will ever
even happen at all. [See “Pimping Past The Revolution” herein.]

South Africa’s musical slogans include: “An injury to one is an injury to all.”
Students recall how they were too angry to study. Soldiers describe how they sang
to avoid crying at the burials of their fallen military peers. Rare footage is featured to
visually document all.

I thank God daily for all of my gifts. A singer in this film speaks about how her
voice helped her make a living and rebel. My voice has always done the same for
me. As a rebel radio host, a vocal production talent, a singer, a lecturer, a corporate
trainer, and a teacher, I strive to honor God by using my voice and all of my gifts within righteous
endeavors. Nothing is ever more righteous than rebellion against oppression.

It is physically painful to watch retired, white South African police officers
display no iota of remorse about the beatings, tortures, and executions that they
inflicted for decades. Some are visibly still very proud of their bloody roles in
apartheid’s atrocities. Some openly admit how much they enjoyed their violent
work. Some confess that their power to execute blacks at will became addictive.
Their lingering evil is as visible and palpable as their brazen apathy and arrogant ignorance.
Watching these bigoted bastards reminded me of a quotation from an old slave
narrative in another classic film entitled “Unchained Memories”: “Some white
folks got gizzards where their hearts should be...”

Defiance is eternal. I was thrilled by the tales of rebels who literally sang protest
songs until the actual moments of their lynchings. Their death marches from
political cells to martyrs’ graves were not merely somber earthly walks but
supernatural victory marches. Many legendary South African revolutionaries chose
death rather than be denied freedom. That is an honorable way to die. That is a
death that breeds eternal life as a legendary rebel. These rebels chose to make even
their gallows revolutionary gifts.

We African-Americans have subconsciously retained so much of our native African
culture within our rebel spirits and practices. This film makes this evident in all of
the references to the masked smiles and coded lyrics. Just as rebel African slaves
spoke in code in the lyrics of American Negro spirituals, so did South African
rebels code the lyrics of their anti-apartheid protest songs.

This film proves that music is stronger than pain. It also demonstrates that black
love is stronger than white hatred. And, it shows us that white fear is stronger than
white guns. It documents that black joy is stronger than all of the aforementioned.

Our joy is indeed our strongest spiritual weapon globally. Our music is our most
natural and divine expression of that joy which we possess. As long as we posses
the secret of joy, we will overcome anyone and anything anywhere!....AMANDLA!



For more information on rebel music, racism, revolution, Nelson Mandela, and
Winnie Mandela see:
The Eloquent Fury Index
at:
www.oocities.org/ambwww/index.html


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