Strange Fruit

Some months ago, I blogged about the Michael Richards "nigger" incident. And then a couple of days ago, I read a fascinating blog by one of my Yahoo 360 friends (well, sorta. she dumped me but I still adore her and her writing...) Nita.

You can click on the link to THIS blog to read her insightful thoughts and provoking question.

The topic was the appropriateness of offensive humor, and what the rules are and should be for a performer on stage.

I contended in comments to her blog that funny is the most important thing for a comic.

Those comments and this topic have stayed with me for a few days now, and they deserve more context.

I'd like to try to talk a bit about it here.

First, a moment of historical relevance. I invite you to watch the following youtube clip in its entirety.




The singer is Billie Holiday. The song is her (in)famous Strange Fruit.

Here are the lyrics, as written by Abel Meeropol (a.k.a. Lewis Allan)

"

Southern trees bear strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.

"

The question on my buddy Nita's table at the time was:

Should we support racist comments from a comedian, JUST because they are doing comedy? Isn't racism racism, no matter where it shows up?

Being the radical, race-conscious man that I am, it could easily surprise you to hear me say that in some cases ... Yes, we should.

I didn't see the particular clip she was referring to at the time, but I've watched enough comedy to know that it absolutely DRIPS with content that would be considered inappropriate at any other time or place.

I won't defend the comedian SHE was watching, because I don't know if, among other things, the bit was even funny or thought-provoking.

But there's an important distinction between a conversation involving two random people on the street, and a person performing on a stage.

Namely, audience.

In society, art is always the vanguard of social change. Artists use their various crafts to say things that society isn't ready to say or hear yet. It's true of comedians, painters, playwrights, comics, dancers, filmmakers, authors, cartoonists, preachers ... and singers.

And it is their access to an audience that makes the difference.

Which brings us back to Billie Holiday, 1939.

She was 24 when she stood on stage at New York's Cafe Society; the Big Apple's only integrated club outside Harlem. She was afraid, and rightly so, because America was still in the part of our shared history where lynching was as American as football is today.

Afraid, she sang the song anyway.

And over time, the song changed the conversation years before the Congress was ready to put legislative pen to paper.

And it WAS a real problem.

Between 1882 and 1968, there were 4,742 reports of lynchings in the United States. More were undocumented.

Billie wasn't just "whistling Dixie."

It is literally impossible today to tell an honest history of the practice without mentioning the impact of the song "Strange Fruit."

The song was both protest, and ART ... at its very finest.

Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor, DaVinci, Michaelangelo, Billie Holiday, Alvin Hailey ... there is an IMPRESSIVE list of artists whose controversial works changed the game.

Which ISN'T to say that every political piece of art is worth the time you spend experiencing it. Some, perhaps even most ... is absolute garbage.

But the first amendment is unique not for the obviously useful and agreeable "speech" it protects. It is special for the tightrope walking, offensive, questionable, maddening, over-the-line, pornographic, religion-bashing, homophobic, racist, sexist, outright STUPID ideas it allows the moron to SLAM down on the table to be confronted by the group as a whole.

America at its best, ridicules these ideas off the front page and banishes their Creators to the corner of obscurity.

This is the beauty of free-market capitalism. If there's no market for your ideas, or our higher passions win the day, you AND your dumb-assed idea will disappear from thought, view, and consciousness.

We need to hear Richard Pryor say "nigger," and put it in a place where the power of the word can be challenged, and debated, and properly addressed.

And if we have to put up with dumbass Michael Richards saying it too, so be it.

We need the Boondocks, and South Park, and if having comedians who don't "get" it" is the price ... we should pay it.

We need The March on Washington, and if protecting the Klan's rally to keep it gives us indigestion, we should swallow our Pepto, turn our backs, and do our very best to protect those idiots, too.

In my humble opinion, OUR obligation when confronted with material we find useless or not worth discussion ... is to BOO!! HISS!!! HECKLE!!! RIDICULE!!! DEMAND OUR MONEY BACK!!!

Artists don't like that.

But it allows them to space WE need to protect the occasional genius who has a message and a megaphone we need to hear.

I am grateful that the first person applauded "Strange Fruit."

Peace,

--Stew.

References used for this blog:

http://obama.senate.gov/news/050614-us_senate_apologizes_for_not_e/
http://www.ladyday.net/stuf/vfsept98.html


Photo:
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/aap/photo06.jpg