The legendary soul singer Aretha Franklin, a woman of power and talent, died on August 16, 2018, from a long battle with pancreatic cancer. The architects of modern music were in that church to pay homage. That alone was beyond fascinating. And, the remnants of the COINTELPRO-ravaged and thus failed 1960s Civil Rights Movement were also in the house, represented most prominently by its "voting-is-revolution" adherents such as Michael Eric Dyson, who's preacher shouting reflections were as mundane, conflicted and confused as his politics.
Dyson's the guy who campaigned for Barack Obama while his wife (a la James Carville and Mary Matalin), supported Hillary Clinton. Each supported a different Democratic plantation candidate. During the homegoing service, Dyson called Hillary Clinton his president. Criticized Obama, his former candidate for not attending Aretha's homegoing. And palpably deepened the confusion when he declared not evil Hillary whom he had just called his president, but his former candidate's attorney general as the next U.S. presidential candidate to win the big White House.
But if that phony is speaking for the W.E.B. Du Bois, dual-consciousness, Black intellectuals of today, seems like they've finally let go of Hillary-for-president and replaced her with former Obomba Attorney General, Eric Holder. These Black opportunist, don't even know how nauseating and out of touch Eric Dyson's white ass-kissing coonery, disguised as radical Black thought, is to the Black international human rights freedom movement! Ask Haiti about the Clintons' role in rigging elections to put in an ultra-right wing puppet president after the earthquake? Ask a devastated Africa about the Clinton-Obama murder of Muammar Gaddafi, arming ISIS extremists in Libya for private capital and the oil hucksters and the aftermath? Ask Haiti about these Clintonite coons, in love with assimilated Beltway Negroes like Eric Holder,Susan Rice, Cheryl Mills and we'll tell you a truth or two about the Dysons, the Ron Daniels, most of the CBC Demon rats, and the rigged media doing the Woodrow Wilson and F.D.R. butchery-dance in Haiti since before 2004!
Dyson's speech solidified the assimilated Negroes' pathological love for the Clintons, who along with the Bush/Dick-Cheney-on-steroid-Obama Administration, have hurt Black America and the Black world probably more than any other president since FDR. Most, still revere them. Are seduced by the Black symbols they co-opt. The collaborators still grin wide like a lit Jack-o'-Lantern at Slick-"blow job"-Bill, putting on dark glasses and playing the saxophone and cackling Hillary attempting to parrot Beyonce's "hot sauce in a bag" swag. Dyson's speech epitomizes what's wrong with the Black church and the Black society's mis-leadership. A group of men and women who continue to confuse symbols with substance. He and the other preachers normalizing sexism up there continue to elevate voting on the plantation as our only "civilized" choice for Black liberation, justice, and economic equity.
It's plain offensive, too distasteful, for too long and unendurable for critical thinking Black people, free from such schooled, Ph.D. academia groupthink.
Aretha's father, the famous Reverend C. L. Franklin, led the New Bethel Baptist Church from 1946 until 1979 and was at the center of the Civil Rights Movement in Detroit. Jesse Jackson, he is now an old, sick man. So, I shouldn't talk disparagingly about a sick ol' Jesse except to say he deserved to be up there. He had a long association with the Franklins and Aretha's music was the soundtrack for the civil rights movement. But that aspect of the history alone serves no truth in need of telling for the present day. For, Reverend Jesse Jackson and Reverend Al Sharpton on that stage just made me think of the glaring failures of the corporatized, token Black collaborators and dare I say it, dare I desire it -- the end of the integration-with-injustice era for Black America, across the Americas? (See photo below and story of how Aretha had Jesse Jackson on speed dial and once pushed him to do the right thing and support Farrakhan.)
"White America Still Tell Us Who to Love, How to Love, How to Not Listen to the Voice of Liberty that Sings Within All Our Hearts."
I was moved by the service, the shining power of the Queen ever present, the Black cultural icons in attendance -- Mavis Staples, Shirley Ceasar, Valerie Simpson, Cicely Tyson, and simultaneously nauseated with the political push to vote for the poverty pimping Demon rats, who've had over 50 years post Brown vs Board of Education to help destroy Black community solidarity with their structural racism and fringed hedonism put on the same scale as immutable characteristics and sold as "multiculturalism" or "diversity."
Judging by who was allowed a slot to speak and what they said overall, it's clear that most in that room weren't taught to be appalled by the Obama bipartisan-"Washington consensus"-John-McCain-trajectory, glorified by both the white liberals and the Neocons. No matter that neither the Republican nor the Democratic party -- especially not the Demonrats' colluding with imposing colonialist neoliberal economic policies abroad -- have done diddly squat positive locally for the poor Black masses in Detroit for over 50-years. In fact, there's no clean water just like Haiti in Flint Michigan. So, go sock it to 'em, Judge Greg Mathis!
A Homegoing Musical Celebration Fit for the Queen of Soul
I enjoyed Smokey Robinson, the greatest songwriter ever, who gave the most personal and authentic farewell, speaking directly from the podium to his long, long time friend.
The great musical icon, Ronald Isley, cried softly and beautifully sung "His Eye Is on the Sparrow" for his dearly departed, beloved friend. His famous brother, Charles Neville, died just this year in April of the same cancer as Aretha, pancreatic cancer. You felt the grief and tenderness in his soft rendition. I am going to be looking it up on YouTube to savor, again and again. It was uniquely memorable.
93-year old Cicely Tyson looked more youthful than all the dignitaries on the stage put together. Ms. Tyson wore a conversation piece, wide-brimmed black hat, designed by B Michael, that was as quirky and bold as her passionate delivery of the Paul Laurence Dunbar poem, "When (Aretha) Malindy Sings." The legendary Hollywood actress reworked the poem to pay tribute, queen to queen, to Aretha Franklin. She fabulously paid homage to the world's greatest singer in any style, her good works, incomparable music, her deep love of God, Blackness and Black people.
Fantasia took her shoes off while singing from a well of grief.
Chaka Khan, Jennifer Hudson, Jennifer Holiday, the Clark Sister, Pastor Shirley Caesar, Yolanda Adams -- all, were pure Black woman soldiers for justice, belting out their presence from gut-wrenching stomach power, raw pain, and talent.
Gladys Knight's iconic voice soothes us still. Lovely to see her sing and Valerie Simpson there too, in the audience.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
2
2
2
