Journalist Selwyn Seyfu Hinds Examines The Mashup, part 2

Journalist Selwyn Seyfu Hinds Examines The Mashup, part 2
Friday, June 18, 2010

 

Another great one passed on last year, though the word resistance was hardly bandied about in his obits. Michael Joseph Jackson was called a lot of things over the course of his career and in the wake of his death. Resistance fighter was not one of them. But as with all things Jackson, the equation is not as clear-cut as it first appears. For many folk, there are two Michael Jacksons—pre-and post-Thriller. And both incarnations fit into our narrative of struggle and success. Pre-Thriller Mike sits in the memory as unabashedly black, he of the full lips and nose, and Motown lineage. And while that Mike certainly wasn’t Marvin Gaye wondering what’s going on, much less lobbing the cries for justice of a Marley or a Kuti, his artistic heights in a society inimical to the very notion of black excellence, and his success in crafting a musical common-denominator in factionalized America can’t be said to have had no place in the struggle. Post-Thriller Mike, he of the thinner features, lighter skin, and tabloid attention, sits more uneasily in the memory. For this Mike, energy for resistance/struggle was often directed in the global/humanist realm, with a particular emphasis on children. He damn near created the mode of concerned international celebrity now exhibited by the Bonos, Jolies, and Madonnas of the world.  But Mike certainly had his black-fist-in- the-sky moment, too.

Recall 2002: Jackson banded with Al Sharpton to lobby against exploitative practices of the music industry and the way it impacted black artists. Yes, it may have been personally motivated by his own frustrations with his label Sony. Yes, the cynical would say it was easy for him to rage against the machine then, when he’d stopped selling records and had already been caricatured by the strange behavior and scandal that ruled his later years. But there was something in the face, eyes, and voice of a Mike Jackson, standing outside of Virgin Music, shaking his proverbial and literal fist at the one he’d named tormentor that Fela Kuti would understand. Besides, anyone who helped masterminded “We Are The World,”—that celebrity anthem which raised $63M to combat famine in Africa—has earned the right to petition for a perpetual seat at the table for heroes of the struggle—at least the artistic ones.

Selwyn Seyfu Hinds