Public Enemy - Fight the Power

My First Black History Teacher

1. Public Enemy’s megaton bomb exploded on me in 1989. The force it exerted chemically altered my brain and reshaped the trajectory of my education forever. Public Enemy was my first Black history teacher. They sparked a fire in me to know more, and my father fed that fire at every opportunity. Every single album was a new book that demanded research and careful study. I got started early. I devoured Public Enemy’s lyrics and used them to learn a history of America deliberately kept from me. I wasn’t gonna have it. For example:

   Elvis was a hero to most, but he
   Never meant shit to me, you see, straight out
   Racist—that sucker was simple and plain

   Motherfuck him and John Wayne!

   Do you mean Elvis appropriated and profited off Black music? *GASP* And what is this beef with John Wayne, the cowboy/war hero who taught Americans how to be men? A quick little dig into the thought behind that lyric was this quote from John Wayne in Playboy magazine from May 1971, “I believe in white supremacy until the blacks are educated to a point of responsibility. I don’t believe in giving authority and positions of leadership and judgment to irresponsible people.” It remains morally and ethically irresponsible to teach a white-washed version of American history. If learning an accurate history of America that includes correct information about indigenous cultures, Brown cultures, and Black cultures makes you uncomfortable, you are precisely the reason it needs to be taught, because if you’re an American your heritage is either native, immigrant, refugee, or slave. We are blurred past truth and 20/20 hindsight. I demand a reckless verisimilitude to correct the record.

   I walk the corner to the rubble that used to be a library
   Line up to the mind cemetery now
   What we don't know keeps the contracts alive and movin'
   They don't gotta burn the books they just remove 'em

   -Rage Against the Machine, Bulls on Parade

2. I’m not Black. I’m not mixed. I’m ethnically Jewish sure, but I’m a white man in America. I won the genetic lottery, and I use my winnings to stand proudly for a comprehensive education that expels the myth of traditional American values. I can’t make any claim to understanding the Black experience in America, but what I can do is shut my mouth and listen. I can ask questions. I can read. I can fight the power by demanding a deeper, broader picture of these United States. Professor Chuck D of Long Island, New York taught me that. This country was never innocent. Every 20 years or so, our government releases documents that say “Yeah, we did this horrible shit, but you won’t do a thing about it. Ain’t democracy great!” Then we wave party banners at cute conventions and smile as people play with balloons while nostalgic songs blare over loudspeakers. Advertising and marketing executives employed by think tanks deliver talking points to talking heads to get you hyped (Don’t believe the hype) for an America that never existed. The real Golden Rule has always been “He Who Has the Gold Makes the Rules,” because America isn’t an idea anymore. America is a corporation. The same companies hired to design casinos were hired to design cable news. This should not surprise you.

   I like Nike, but wait a minute
   The neighborhood supports, so put some money in it
   All corporations owe, they gotta give up the dough
   To my town or else we gotta shut 'em down

   -Public Enemy, Shut ‘Em Down

3. American Exceptionalism was sold to us. Founding mythology was sold to people who never read the Constitution. The idea of Vanishing Indians was sold to the people, though not to natives, who wholly understood there was no magic act involved unless gunpowder and subjugation constituted magic. America First is a recently popular item, sold on Donald Trump’s shelves recently. Marginalized people have always understood the dominant culture. They have no choice. This is survival instinct on overdrive. The dominant culture incorporates and appropriates what they can market and sell from those groups. Black culture is fucking cool. In America, cool is currency. Jazz, Blues, early Rock and Roll, Funk, Soul, Hip-Hop, the NBA, the NFL, vernacular, and slang… coooooool (a piece of Black vernacular) as the other side of the pillow. Let’s get paid. Here’s some inside baseball: in Black communities, if Miles learned to cut hair in the service, then everyone in his neighborhood is gonna have a crispy fade. If John got a job as an Internet/cable technician, then every one of his neighbors is going to have the fastest Internet around. If Tisha is about to sign with a D1 basketball program then I promise you, NO ONE will let her smoke weed. This is how marginalized cultures adapt, but that’s not the story sold on streaming television services and cinemas. As the dominant musical culture around the globe has become Hip-Hop, in the 50th year of the art form, I found myself reaching back to the late spring/early summer of 1989, and the bombastic sonic collage called Fight the Power concocted by Professors Chuck D, Flavor Flav, and the Bomb Squad. The real value of a real education cannot possibly be quantified because it’s constantly expanding, like the universe itself. Public Enemy was a Big Bang.

   I got a right to be hostile, man, my people are being persecuted!

   -Richard Pryor

4. Lastly, long live Radio Raheem.