SUMMER OF LOVE
My first port of call when writing this blog is to apologise for such a long break in between posts. My intention when taking on the responsibility of being a blogger on this amazing site was to keep it entertaining and to keep it regular. Some, I’m sure, would say I’ve failed on both fronts! But to anybody that actually does read these posts, I offer my sincere apologies and assure you that I’m officially back …
So … where has the one like Jameson Davison been? Having a busy and brilliant summer is the answer. Things are beginning to gather momentum and gain pace in terms of my music and after forming my band ‘The Barefoot Apostles’ it’s been a period of focus and musical graft. Gigs have included Glastonbury & Croissant Neuf Summer Party as well as various performances around Birmingham. I’ve also completely given myself to this thing called a routine. The routine is generous, caring, rewarding and fulfilling. But disrespect the routine and it will only be forgiving for so long. Winning back its trust can then be a struggle and you have to work twice as hard, so if I do happen to go missing again, you know what to blame!
As somebody that works with young people and given recent events, I felt there was really only one thing I could base this post around. Yes you guessed it, the UK riots. It’s time for me to throw my Brummie two pence into the forum and give my perspective. It may all have died down now and the criminal justice system may be well on its way to making a ridiculous example of those involved, but the feelings of disillusionment and disconnectedness amongst young people are still raging strong. These feelings will continue to simmer under the radar until something happens to provoke another public explosion of anger and frustration, and the country is again thrown into chaos. That is unless we begin to fully understand, comprehend, and begin to heal what led to the anarchy that affected so many people during that week.
I had a very interesting and heated debate with my mother on the way to a festival that we played in Wales. The conversation remained constructive throughout, yet I found myself increasingly frustrated by her ‘mindless violence and criminality’ viewpoint. I feel that blaming what happened purely on 'yobbish' behaviour, lack of discipline, and lack of respect to be missing the point completely. Yes I would agree that there is an element of all of these things to be potentially highlighted as ‘contributing factors’, but this is just a tiny piece of the puzzle that forms part of the overall jigsaw.
So where do we start? We are still awaiting completion of the full investigation into Mark Duggan’s death at the hands of the police, but it was this that sparked protests outside the local police station in Tottenham, which then led to a further incident and eventually to the riots breaking out. This eyewitness account of what happened during the initial protests sheds some light on the beginnings of the disorder:
So we then had what in my lifetime is the most incredible outbreak of public disorder in my own country. I was shocked at some of the things that I saw but not really surprised. I am part of a music project called ‘Positive about Music’ which runs out of Hawkesley, Birmingham - the UK’s second city. We have a number of talented Grime emcees at the project who all write and recite amazing lyrics and have incredible ‘flows’. But one thing that I have noticed about Grime, and indeed Hip Hop music, is that there is an incredible amount of aggressive, negative, criminally orientated lyrics that abound these genres of music. We recently had an interesting issue raised at the project, whereby the emcees who were participating in the sessions were reciting very aggressive and negative lyrics with explicit references to drugs, sex and street culture. This put me in a difficult position and I found myself unable to support either what the young people were doing or indeed what my employers were proposing we implement. As soon as the management team became aware of the lyrical content being recorded they banned all lyrics that promoted negative activity and demanded that all profanities be censored in any song. Now I can see the logic in this entirely, after all it would be hypocritical of me to encourage young people to engage in this kind of lyricism when I try and promote positivity through my own music. However, I also felt that the intention behind this regulation being introduced was for much more than just to satisfy any personal crusades that the management may have had. It was mainly due to the fact that funders would not be happy if they heard this sort of material being produced in a project that they had contributed towards. The problem with this is that we are then glossing over the real issues in these areas and presenting a false, ‘rosy’ picture through the music they make, rather than allowing these young people to express things exactly as they see them. So I embarked on a mission to try and help the young people to understand that there is a clear difference between social commentary and the glamorization of a criminal life. This however was easier said than done. They already viewed me as a player for the opposing team and simply felt that their liberty was being taken away from them. As one of them said to us “you can’t tell people how to make their music, especially if you don’t understand it.”
In my experience it is Grime more so than Hip Hop that contains large amounts of this kind of content, but both do their fair share of promoting what could be considered to be a negative message. One recent example that has always stuck with me is from a very popular song by Professor Green called ‘Jungle’, and is in fact the first 2 lines of the song:
“I see no point in living life right, so I just take what I can find”
Now I’m not saying that this is right or wrong, it may well be what Professor Green is feeling and he is just conveying that through the medium of music. But where the imbalance lies is that never with the same level of promotion or pushed into the marketplace on the same scale do we hear the likes of Akala saying:
“Kids in Iraq, yours and my children, kids in Iran, yours and my children,
Afghanistan, yours and my children, even Sudan, yours and my children”
If we choose to believe that we don’t hear this sort of material on a mass scale simply because it’s not popular then, I feel we are being slightly short sighted. There is a whole other topic of discussion that surrounds the benefits of promoting negativity and how certain people benefit from criminality, but that’s for another time.
Music isn’t the only medium that needs to be scrutinised when considering what may have contributed to the uproar and subsequent actions, indeed films and television have a massive role to play in all of this; as does advertising. The glamorization of a materialistic lifestyle is encouraged by almost every sector of the corporate world, because it means one thing, more consumption. Materialism blights our society and it only becomes worse with every generation. More consumption means more money generated and more money spent. But when the primary goal of a human being becomes their income and how much ‘stuff’ they can own, we lose connection with whatever our ‘purpose’ is here on this great planet. Now this may be getting a bit deep for some of you but I can only offer what I feel. I guess the question we have to pose ourselves is this, ‘are we really here just to earn, consume and reproduce?’ I believe we are far greater than that. This interview from author, writer and independent scholar Alastair Mcintosh gives a very concise summary of where these issues stem from:
What Alastair touches on in that interview I’d like to pick up on. We have a widening gap between rich and poor in this country and there is no denying that relative poverty leads to alcohol and substance abuse, crime, and gang culture. But what I also feel fuelled the growing feeling among young people that led to these riots, is what Alastair referred to as the ‘fat cat culture’. It began with the MP’s expenses scandal. Highly paid professionals and representatives of constituencies up and down the country scamming a system funded by the taxpayer. Yes many were punished but these are people in trusted positions of power, and it always begs the question, for how long was this happening before we became aware? Next came the bank bail outs, many of whose reckless decisions in their ‘casino banking’ ventures cost the entire country. And to rub salt in the wound, we then saw countless reports of bankers being handed massive bonuses in the face of this crisis. Some of these banks are now called ‘our bank’, a certain percentage owned by the taxpayer. But how does this benefit us? Dividends, shares? Following this the News of the World / Murdoch Empire story; police taking bribes and knowingly allowing voicemails to be hacked. The young people of this country are not stupid. They see all of this happening, and I would imagine feel slightly aggrieved, only adding to their sense of disconnectedness and feelings of inequality and injustice.
Writer and broadcaster Darcus Howe appeared on BBC news speaking of police treatment of young, particularly black males making suggestions as to why there is a great feeling of animosity towards them. I had to laugh at the presenter getting his name wrong constantly but then gasped as she began to insult him. However I feel that he makes an important point relating to the fact that the police and government are so far removed from the feelings amongst the disaffected in society that they didn’t sense this coming.
One man that spoke some real sense during the week’s events was Nii Sackey. He runs a national youth project called bigger fish that work with disaffected young people in poor communities. Here’s what he had to say:
And the gap between rich and poor isn’t helped by the huge tax breaks given to corporations and tax havens for the rich:
There’s an inexplicable link between the cuts introduced by this government and the riots, simply because the poorest of this country have been hit hardest. As a youth worker I can say first hand that the government cuts will have a serious knock on effect, and expecting the voluntary sector to pick up the slack is a ridiculous notion.
So what are the challenges we face following this episode? Understanding young people and their culture? Listening to them more? Is it to start coming down on them with more force and discipline, stamping out this kind of behavior? I feel that the answer to our problems goes way beyond just focusing on young people. There is fundamental change needed at every level in our society, from community cohesion to the function of the corporate world, from politics to the porn industry and its damaging effects on young minds, from the deep rooted injustice all across the developing world to the huge gap between rich and poor even in the most developed countries. As Nii Sackey pointed out, when our young people begin to feel like they belong to something, we see them shine like never before. And we also have to take some collective responsibility over the fact that this is all just a reflection of what society has become. It seems perfectly reasonable for British and American armed forces to invade a country causing carnage and mass destruction illegally, all for purposes that were never justified. And when Iraq’s natural history museum, which contained some of the worlds most precious and coveted artifacts, was looted and robbed, and soldiers stood by and allowed it to happen, there was no uproar. I suggest that before people are quick to point the finger of blame and label the actions of some they should look a little deeper at what is being done in the name of their country and with their money.
Something that was posted on twitter around the time of the riots stuck with me. It said this –
‘The police said Mark Duggan had a gun, Smiley had a knife, Jean Charles de Menezes had a bomb, and Ian Tomlinson died of natural causes.’
We need to see great investment in our young people. We need more community projects like the Galgael Trust, whose work allows people to “begin waking up from the soul outwards” (www.galgael.org). We need more ways of tapping into the amazing potential that all of our young people possess without keeping them trapped within the confines of the education system. We need to improve the relationship and reputation of the police. The list goes on and on. And this is just my opinion, I’m sure there are many more experts in this field that have greater knowledge and understanding of the key issues involved. The government needs to start listening to more people like Nii Sackey.
We are on the brink of huge change and we have an opportunity like no other to really grasp this moment and change the course of human existence for the next millennia. I sense that many are tired of the system we’ve built, the injustice it promotes, and the way we treat the planet as an inexhaustible resource pool. Something has to give. We’ve done enough taking; perhaps it’s time for us to give. Like Sam Cooke said ‘I know change gone come’, but will it be too late???
