Faith and Biggie : A Review of Keep the Faith

I read Faith's memoir, Keep the Faith, by Faith Evans
with Aliya S. King, this weekend. I was surprised by the tone,
it was honest, readable and ultimately made you want to like her.

She starts off the book giving the first couple chapters to her childhood
and familial background and then goes into her relationship with
Biggie and her musical career.

Perhaps what was most refreshing was her honesty about how,
when she was a teenager, she dated a dude who hit her, was verbally
abusive and how she finally decided to leave that relationship.

It was interesting to learn that she graduated high school at the top
of her class and subsequently attended Fordham University in The Bronx.

There are a few things that I was surprised to learn. For example,
early on before they were all famous Biggie asked Faith to take Kim
shopping and to the gym. I was also surprised to learn how honest
Biggie was about sleeping with other women. She would ask him,
he told the truth, yes. They would go on being husband and wife,
in the way that you do when you have that kind of information.
It was as simple as that.

Perhaps what is most beneficial about the book is that it provides a behind
the scenes to young women who are interested in getting involved in
the music industry. She talks about gaining the courage to ask
Puffy to pay her for her song writing contributions. She walks the reader
through what it was like to learn how publishing credits are allocated.
She talks about her managing the relationships professional and
private with Puffy, Missy, Mary and 112, in a way that I don't recall anyone
from our generation doing so.

I must admit that I was drawn to finishing the book because I was
interested in seeing how honest she talked about Biggie hitting her.
Given the fact that Pepa just published a book Lets Talk About Pep,
where she mentions being abused by Treach and Kim Osorio, former
editor The Source discusses in her Straight from the Source
how she endured sexism galore while at the helm
of that magazine, I wondered to myself if we were beginning
to be honest about the violence against women in our neighborhoods
and in our music.

I am trying to connect the dots between our attitudes towards the
violence that women suffer in hip hop to the violence that we see
against women in our communities. While reading Keep the Faith
I was looking for how she framed Biggie hitting her. What is interesting
is that the only incident that she mentions is him shaking her and
pushing her down after he found out that she recorded a song with
Tupac. However, they both committed act's of violence against people
that they thought were, or actually were the other persons lover.

Ultimatly the book will resonate with you if you interested in Hip Hop,
stories about women in the music industry or a story about
a stormy relationship between two lovers who came of age in
the eyes of the public. If you find yourself or Barnes and Noble or
Amazon, pick it up, its a great weekend read.

In My Oakland Gristle

Man listen. There is an article in the Chronicle today
about Oakland and murders. It had me livid, inspired,
depressed AND heated all at once. You can read it here.

In the last five years, 557 people were slain on the city's streets, making Oakland the state's second-most murderous city, behind Compton.

Most victims are young, black men who are dying in forgotten neighborhoods of East and West Oakland.

A handful of their killers, speaking from prison, describe an environment where violence is so woven into the culture that murder has become a symbol of manhood.

The inmates say the only difference between these neighborhoods and prison is the absence of walls. The same hierarchies apply - the meanest rise to the top. It's a survival skill that ensures ownership of drug corners, a sense of self-worth, female attention and protection from attack.

See. Here is the context.

Yesterday, I was speaking to Birkhold about how difficult it is to
write fiction. My problem is that I am attempting to write about
real things I have seen AND I am cautious, perhaps, too cautious
about perpetuating sterotypes about Black people, specifically,
Black teenage mommas.

His response was gone head and write about it, because if you do,
and your readers feel you,
THEN YOU CAN take them to another place. And I had nothing
to say to that. He was right.

So this morning. I woke up energized. And started on my stories.

Then this article comes up. And it had me and never really quite let go.

I must have spoke to 5 people today about it, including my father.

Now, if a resonable person reads this article, it serves as evidence that
East Oakland just needs to be bombed a la Philadelphia "MOVE" and
because there is no redeeming it.

And the comments (all 486 of them), which I normally enjoy reading as a
sort of journalism anthropology experiment, I couldn't bring myself to read
them.
I can't take what those folks have to say on this topic. They have no
"skin in the game" so what room do they have to talk?

The more I thought about it the more I realized why the article about
why it was egregious.

The article offers NO historical context for why East Oakland, and Philly,
Detroit, D.C., Newark, Pittsburgh and most of the RUST BELT
have evolved to be the way that they are.

For example, there are NO MORE factory jobs in East Oakland. Cats who
had factory jobs now operate in the underground economy.

Second welfare to workfare was egregious WITHOUT an educational component.
You and I both know that education is what gives people options in this country.
Straight up and down.

And if you disagree with me, then why was it ILLEGAL to teach
an enslaved African's to read. Right? Right.

Thirdly, prisons are the new steel mills. White rural counties LOBBY to get jails
built in their counties because of the jobs that they create.

Fourth, if a Black child encounters a babysitter for a teacher in two years,
in either first, second or third grade, they will likely NEVER recover.
Those years are so precious that the harm done academically takes and act
of congress to recover from.

So yeah.

Im vexed.

Oh. And on the bus home tonight I witnessed an E.S.O dude
going back on forth with two women. The women were obviously a couple
and he disprected one of them and THEY WERE not having it.

Street dude + lesbian couple + BUS = BAD combo.

And I am thinking to myself, please don't provoke her.

I can feel the situation escalate. He starts talking another DUDE about
BROADS that mess with OTHER BROADS and all I am thinking is
NOTHING good will come of this.

Just then, a cat walks back and says,

"Yo, I hear yall, and I just want you to know that my daughter here
seen 3 murders and she is only 5. She is five."

He pointed at the ladies and said, " You have your point" and points to him
saying "He has his point, but it ain't nothing worth getting smoked over".

Things were smoothed over between the two parties.

And the gentleman took his daughter and sat down.

At that very moment I thought to myself. This is what the article missed.

The perspective of someone who has their "skin in the game".

======
======

What was the last article you read that had you livid?

How did you respond?

When was the last time you had to deescalate a situation?

Why so much violence? ( For the record, I get violence, I understand it
I had to in order to survive. I am asking YOU, why so much?)

======
======

You Notice How People Hate Mothers?

Typically the venom I witness in the media towards parents is directed at those that are low income and the working poor. Imagine my surprise when I see the homies at the Washington Post talking sh*t about people who hire folks to HELP with raising their children.

But no more! It turns out that other parents who are either too busy or too inept will pay dearly for our child-rearing talents. And I'm not talking about the drudgery of working twelve hour days as a nanny or baby nurse. I mean becoming highly compensated Child Life Specialists who are taking over the intimate, mundane responsibilities that are no longer the sacred purview of parents. Who needs law school? Now we all can bill by the hour.

Take this:

Professional Potty Trainer. You too can charge $185 an hour to toilet train someone else's child, like the talented folks at the Soho Parenting center in New York. This tidbit was reported in the October issue of Vanity Fair, which also told of a company called High 5 which will teach your kid to ride a bike (for $60 an hour) and the Los Angeles trend of paying attractive young men to come to your house to horse around -- with your kids. "There's nothing more emasculating than watching a stranger being paid to play with your kids," one (apparently sane) father complained.

On one level I can see how it seems trivial to be hiring out someone to play with your kid. On the other hand, who is suppose to do it IF you are working 80 hours a week be it ONE JOB outside of the house or TWO.

But then again the upper middle class and the wealthy pay for assistance
with other child raising matters such as kindergarten consultants, college
consultants, SAT tutoring, running coaches etc. Why should this been
seen as being any different?

The article would have made a MUCH better point if it
discussed the HUMAN CAPITAL that is invested in
raising children and how our culture has moved
from a one parent needing to work to support a
working middle class life style
to two parents working 60 odd hours per week
with a grandmomma/cousin/auntie/ stepmom-dad
living in the home OR nearby as well.

What all of these articles LACK are a critique of the system itself.

The next time you read something criticizing parents or
mothers who have and ADDITIONAL job outside of the
home, look for an analysis of the employee system itself.

Don't hold your breath. You see y'all that Britney sh*t,
that Lauryn sh*t and this is all tied
together in that it reflects a GRAVE lack of understanding of how
much MONEY and TIME and HUMAN CAPITAL in general goes
into raising babies.

========
========

Looks like the colleges have caught the Bigotry Flu.
I guess I am content with the fact that someone is writing about it.

A couple of weeks into classes at the University of Maryland, a rope tied into what looked like a noose was found hanging outside the campus's African American cultural center. Campus police reports this month included two incidents of racially disparaging remarks, one written on a workstation and one on a bathroom stall in the student union.

This weekend, a swastika was spray-painted onto the car of a member of the Kappa Alpha fraternity, which one member described as a Christian fraternity.

A couple of weeks into classes at the University of Maryland, a rope tied into what looked like a noose was found hanging outside the campus's African American cultural center. Campus police reports this month included two incidents of racially disparaging remarks, one written on a workstation and one on a bathroom stall in the student union.

This weekend, a swastika was spray-painted onto the car of a member of the Kappa Alpha fraternity, which one member described as a Christian fraternity.

Oh. Its SO MUCH FUN being a model minority.

If this shit didn't happen, what would I talk about?

Oh. Hip Hop, fancy Italian shoes and Sweet Jesus
trynna mack me into moving to Dallas. LOl.

=========
=========

Birds is chirpin' about Biggie.

A prison inmate who had implicated a former Los Angeles Police Department officer in the shooting death of rap star Biggie Smalls has renounced his story, tying a new knot in the tangle of intrigue that surrounds the still-unsolved killing.

Waymond Anderson, who was briefly a top-selling R&B artist and is serving a life term for murder, said in a recent deposition that he lied about LAPD involvement in the Smalls slaying as part of a "scam" concocted by two other convicts to squeeze a large monetary settlement out of the city.

A prison inmate who had implicated a former Los Angeles Police Department officer in the shooting death of rap star Biggie Smalls has renounced his story, tying a new knot in the tangle of intrigue that surrounds the still-unsolved killing.

Waymond Anderson, who was briefly a top-selling R&B artist and is serving a life term for murder, said in a recent deposition that he lied about LAPD involvement in the Smalls slaying as part of a "scam" concocted by two other convicts to squeeze a large monetary settlement out of the city.

=========
=========

Now, here is a voter issue that can affect a whole lotta Negroes and Mexicano's.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to decide whether states can require voters to show government-issued photo identification before they cast a ballot.

The justices' ruling, due by the end of June, could have a major effect on the 2008 presidential election and on congressional races in several states.

New photo ID laws in Indiana, Georgia and Arizona have been upheld in the last year, while a Missouri law was blocked from taking effect. By agreeing to hear an appeal from Indiana Democrats, the justices signaled that they wanted this legal dispute resolved before voters go to the polls next fall.

Since 2002, Republicans have championed photo IDs as a means to prevent fraudulent voting. Under the laws, a voter must show government-issued identification -- such as a driver's license or a passport -- to prove to poll workers that he or she is indeed the person registered to vote.

=========
=========

OH. THE KKK is angry about the Jena 6 protests.

First a neo-Nazi website posted the names, addresses and phone numbers of some of the six black teenagers and their families at the center of the Jena Six case, as it has come to be known, and urged followers to find them and "drag them out of the house," prompting an investigation by the FBI.

Then the leader of a white supremacist group in Mississippi published interviews that he conducted with the mayor of Jena and the white teenager who was attacked and beaten, allegedly by the six black youths. In those interviews, the mayor, Murphy McMillin, praised efforts by pro-white groups to organize counterdemonstrations; the teenager, Justin Barker, urged white readers to "realize what is going on, speak up and speak their mind." `

Over the weekend, white extremist websites and blogs filled with invective about the Jena Six case, which has drawn scrutiny from civil rights leaders, three leading Democratic presidential candidates and hundreds of African American bloggers. They are concerned about allegations that blacks have been treated more harshly than whites in the criminal justice system of the town of 3,000, which is 85% white.

Ummp. I wonder what the middle class liberals who make my @ss itch
to say about this new development

=======
=======

How do you deal with the soft bigotry that you encounter?

How did you deal with your last "racial" incident?

I honestly don't know why their is MORE Public Violence? For trill.

========
========

The Bridge Haunts Me: My Biggie Wars

Its been a month since I have been out of BK.

It hurts.

But not in the obvious ways.

See I was walking in 'Frisco on Wednesday, and right there
in a plain sight was a 2 by 4 poster of the BK bridge
and it was like I saw a ghost.

See. For a long time I had issues with living in my old neighborhood.

Class mobility hurts.

Fitting into new environs.

Being mistaken for a cleaning lady or a nanny. You know.

Typical model minority bullsh*t.

Well.

When I got into running the bridge, I finally began to accept that
I would always have a foot in my past in East Oakland
and a foot in my future whether it be on the bridge, the SEC,
the NBA's players union or Goldmans.

I began to claim mines!
I began to accept the uncomfortable as a part of the process.
I began to feel that I had earned it and would earn more.


So seeing it.
Reminds me of how I have succeded.
Where I have come short. Where I haven't met my expectations
and trust, you don't expect to be walking down the street
minding your own business and have
a f*cking photographs trigger all that.

But.

Last August, my father told me I was a soul looker, and I should be
careful about telling
people about what I saw. He is right. And I listened.

But peep, if I can look into others, I shouldn't be so surprised when
the mirror is on me. Right?

With regard to running, there is some deliciousness in the Bay.

There are some mind altering trails near Stanford in the Redwoods and some
others in the Berkeley Hills w/ fly Bay views.

However, it wasn't until I saw that flick of The Bridge in the Crate and Barrel
window did I realize how much I missed those concrete slabs, the sound of the cars,
motorcycles and tourists, and just the majestic sight of it.

I ran it in the pouring ran.

I ran it at night.

I yelled at tourists to move they sh*t.
Pedestrians and Walkers on the left, bikes skates on the right.

I ran that b*tch in bikini's when it got hot.

In many ways the bridge became a sign of my both my strength
my weaknesses, and ultimately my endurance.

I remember the first time I ran it from end to end, w/o stopping.

What I will never forget about that sh*t is that I wasn't trying.

I was listening to 50.

Listen to Memph.

Listening to Freeway.

And it happened.

Before I knew it, I made it to the other end, non stop.

******************

So. I think I have blogged away my wiggles, and ghosts.

Off to kick it on my first Bay Labor Day w/ fam in ages.

Will get at 'chall tomorrow night.

yours,

~m.dot

=========
=========

When was the last time something startled you?

Made you feel like you saw a ghost?

Took you back to the past when you weren't ready?

========
========

Don't Just Act Grown, Be Grown.

I don't read movie reviews or book reviews. I simply go to movies based on the actor, director or the buzz from homies.

Easy.

Granted, some reviews slip through the cracks from the village voice or the news, but them sh*ts aren't a deciding factor for me.

Critics are haters.

LOL.

I go Barnes and Nobles to browse books, one of my FAV-O-RITE dates conmigo, I pick up a book, turn to a random page and read.

Or I check the t.o.c. and pick a chapter based on the title and read. This has had interesting affects.

I recently did this w/ the Art of Loving by Eric Fromm.

During spring break I re-read, The Art of War and I Read the Art of Loving.<<<**Tells you a lot about baby gurl hunh!?!??!?!?

Chapter 3
Theory of Love
page 41
"Eventually the mature person has to come to the point where he is his own mother and father. He has, as it were, a motherly and fatherly conscious. Motherly conscious says: "There is no misdeed, no crime which could deprive you of my love, of my wish for your life and happiness." Fatherly conscious says" You did wrong, you cannot avoid accepting certain consequences of your wrong doing, and most of all you must change your ways if I am to like you."

The mature person has become free from the outside mother and father figures, and has built them up inside.

=========
=========

Ummm. Biggie War Management.

=========
=========

You Don't Know About My Biggie Wars...

I been running the streets since that last post
yall.

Bouncing around the city.

I started counting, and I realized that I changed my life substantially in '07.

1.) I missed 6 birthday parties.

2.) I missed A Clipse concert (I had free tix).

3.) I missed A wedding.

4.) I missed all of the recent Sopranos episodes.

5.) Had no brunch in the last 9 weeks.

6.) Had no Sunday Times in the last 9 weeks.



7.) AND. NO new boyfriends. <<greasy!

========
========

I kicked it with some White classmates yesterday.

Got into a fight. Dude gon' try and tell me that
it was a COOK OUT and not a Bar b que.

I was like.

They got a pit?

They got coals?

Then its a bar b q.

He. Gon' say it's a cook out cuz there ain't no bb q sauce.

^^Silly non-negro.

Speaking of non negros, I noticed something about white men.

The normal defense mechanism that I see that some Black men have isn't present in white men, to the same extent. [I will conceed that Black men can and do say the same thing about White women in comparison to Black women].

Its almost as if they would cap on each other, but they ain't get hostile or annoyed by it.

It was like, they just weren't pressed by the 'lil snide comments
that they made towards one another.

Based on behavior I saw in school, I thought there would be more
antagonistic towards each other.

But it was more like just, gentle clowning of one another.


Texas Truth posited that white men, especially professional jawns,
know that there is very little that they can do to "ruin" their lives. In turn
this gives them the privilage, a sense the world is waiting for 'em.

Interesting right?

Have yall seen this before?

And.

I had a good time. <<<*** turns over a new leaf.

========
========

Happy MUMS day.

I miss my MOOOOMMMMMMAAAAA.

She in Oakland, SMOKING a ham, LOL.

========
========