Food for Thought: Ever discover something new in songs you’ve listened to a thousand times?

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Well, I was listening to Talib Kweli’s song, ‘Get By’. The mystery line goes, “I paint a picture with the pen like Norman Mailer”. Sounds pretty savvy, huh? But then I asked who the hell is Norman Mailer? Come to find out he’s not the respected male literary author Talib thought him to be. In fact he was a sexist, deep routed in misogyny, and homophobia. Mailer said to an audience at the University of California at Berkeley in 1972, “A little bit of rape is good for a man’s soul.” Naturally, I’m disturbed because it took me so long to discover who Norman Mailer was. Also, makes me question the intent of Kweli for crediting Mailer in the first place? Why not someone respectable like James Baldwin? I can’t conceive that Talib knowingly wrote lyrics in reference to a man, so deeply routed in hate against women and homosexuals. Pay attention. -Gracie
Here is the source of the quote: http://flavorwire.com/417099/7-breathtakingly-sexist-quotes-by-famous-and-respected-male-authors/7/ImageImage

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Black Film Noir

If during the 1940s and 1950s Hollywood was not actively racist, it still largely ignored race. Some academics have gone so far as saying that film noir was essentially a manifestation of a transference of a fear of blackness, the other, to a noir nether world of ambivalence and sublimation. But my view is to the contrary. If you look at noir movies over the classic period from the early 40s to the late 50s, a significant number of progressive writers and directors made noirs that deal sympathetically with race as important elements of the story. This is more than can be said of the body of Hollywood output for the period.

Here I would like to cover some of these noirs from 1941 through to 1956. The Harry Belafonte produced Odds Against Tomorrow (1959) is not included in this discussion, as we are dealing here with white Hollywood’s portrayal of blacks. -Tony D’Ambra

Read more: http://filmsnoir.net/film_noir/race-and-film-noir-black-and-noir.html#ixzz2kqtTvpFm
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