I’m sure many of you are familiar with the Baracka Flacka parody that’s been floating on the Internets. If not, here it is. It’s really not safe for work.
Now, what many of you may not know is that James Davis — or, if you will, Baracka Flacka — is my little brother. Not by blood, per se, but I met him my first year of grad school, when he was a freshman in college. I’ve been calling him my little brother since I met him in 2002, and that’s what it is.
Couldn’t have been prouder of him for this. It’s pitch-perfect satire, and I say that as someone that works hard often trying to master that art. It is very, very difficult to find a joke so absurd and do it so absurdly while maintaining a natural quality, and you need all of those things to really, really drive a satire home. That whole, “this can’t be real, can it?” quality. No, it’s not real, but I’ll be damned if it doesn’t look as such. Seriously, it’s SO much harder than it looks, and the little brother pulled it off. I’ll stop beaming and instead send you to a story Jon Caramanica did on him in the New York Times.
(And if you’re wondering if I’m jealous that one of my all-time favorite writers did a profile of my little brother before me, you’re more correct than you could possibly imagine. But it’s cool, though…)
Now, pride notwithstanding, I’ve been surprised the staying power the video had. I expected my man could milk a good week from this, then would need to furiously grind to figure out what to do next (because it’s harder to keep it warm than it is to heat it up at first). Instead, this thing is still getting miles. Great for him. He got the million views on YouTube he wanted, and it’s a chance for him to really sit and figure out the next move. Rumble, young man.
But, this means it hung around long enough for Stanley Crouch to get on the case. You can read his commentary for The Root here.
Now, I think I’ve spelled out whatever biases I may have for you. That said, you can ask the little brother if I’d tell a lie to make him feel good. See what he tells you.
Now, the first thing I have to say about Crouch is that I haven’t recently reduced him to being “out of touch” as a lot of other people do. When I was 21, I thought that about him. At 30, I think he’s got his eyes on many of the right issues and his heart in the right place. He is, unfortunately, ill-equipped to package his message for those he most needs to hear it, assuming he wants to have an impact, and those are the folks that create the art that he finds so distasteful.
However, the truth is that, for better or worse, the mass media is America’s only introduction to black people. And as mainstream hip hop has become close to homogenous in terms of content — a lotta stuff that has no business on the radio, I might add — how black people are represented on screen and record is very, very important. And, well…let’s just say I’m not so comfortable seeing white folks dressed as Lil Wayne for Halloween. The big media companies are, without question, playing black folks for fools.
His voice could be a valuable one, if he’d get in key with the song that’s being played. Instead, his indignation comes across without a hint of love, which makes him sound a lot like the folks that dog young black men just to do it.
Now, after reading that column, I have to wonder if Crouch just found a young black man and dogged him out of reflex. How friggin ironic is that that, in doing so, Stanley Crouch is standing on the same side of an argument as Waka Flocka Flame?
THIS is the rapper that most folks that have despised Crouch would have loved him to eviscerate. He is the guy that Crouch has demonized forever, the one that is truly selling out his people for nothing other than profit. And now, when he’s given the opportunity to open season on him, he instead chooses to slam the young man that satirized him? Hmmm…let’s think about this one, shall we?
Here’s the video for “Hard in the Paint,” which is the basis for “Head of State.”
Now, I want to take you to what Crouch wrote about “Head of State.”
It is disturbing to see the petty power of meaningless violence and impotent threat boosted up by endless partying, as if tomorrow is a fantasy. It is not. For the majority of the uneducated young black men depicted in “Head of State,” little more than deep discomfort and endless frustration are guaranteed them.
That’s what he wrote about the parody? And he managed to get through the entire commentary without one single time offering even a cursory critique of the original “Hard in the Paint” video and the man behind it?
Does that sound like Stanley Crouch to you? C’mon now…Waka’s been a big deal in the game for quite a while now. Go check how many views on YouTube “Hard in the Paint” has gotten. Yet, as far as I know, Crouch hasn’t written a word about him.
Ummm, I could be wrong, but does anyone else have doubts as to whether Crouch had ever heard of Waka before last week? It’s the only thing that makes a single bit of sense.
I mean, Waka is right in Crouch’s wheelhouse. I can’t think of a single rapper before him that so transparently didn’t give a damn about music. Say what you want about all these cats before, but it never took long to tell that these cats cared about and loved the music they were making. They were fans of hip hop. They grew up in it and had the emotional attachment that we have to it. So even though cats like Fiddy and Jeezy would tell you they were in it for the money, it took no time at all to listen to their records and tell they were just talking that jazz.
The Waka kid’s in it for the dough. He doesn’t care if what he makes is good. He doesn’t care if it’s respected. I don’t even think he’s in a position to tell if it’s good. He’s just a dude whose mama works in the biz, saw the raw essentials of a rap star, and basically created a Chia rapper. He is a modern minstrel, and I don’t say that judgmentally. He is a hyper-ridiculous caricature of a rapper, and he’s that way by design.
The height of his faking, doing an impression of a rapper is the video for “Hard in the Paint.” Yes, Waka. You’re hood, I guess. And yes, you’re in the Jungle. That’s definitely hood. But uhhh, what does that mean? Now, check what is, for my money, the greatest hip-hop video ever made. And, well, the one that it looks like Waka shamelessly bit for his own.
See the depth to the Juve video, layered perspectives on poverty? Now, go back to Waka “being” hood and standing in “the hood.” You cannot tell me that he’s not a minstrel. He has, in fact, taken the worst stereotypes of young black men, amplified them, and made a fortune from it. Do you realize the dude did some performance for a party for the ESPYs or something? That’s soft shoe stuff, folks.
Now, along comes the little brother, Baraka Flaka Flame. He drops Obama in the middle of this contrived minstreal show Flaka created, and it’s gold. Never mind how well it ties in to what Obama has written about his wilder younger days. Just focus on the sheer absurdity of all the video’s visuals (including the uncanny damn near Michelle). How can you look at that and not see just how ridiculous Waka Flocka looks.
Yet Crouch ignored how absurd James made Waka look — which used to be Crouch’s favorite note to play — and somehow came to the defense of Obama. Perhaps he’s sensitive to how such an image can be manipulated by Obama’s enemies, but let’s not pretend as if what determines whether or not they put the screws to the President is available material. They’re gonna do that anyway.
However, it’s hard to think that’s what’s going on here. After all, it’s a columnist’s dream to be given an issue that lets him take down both sides on a point. If Crouch feels as he does about Baracka Flacka, then he could change the name from one of his previous columns, replace if with “Waka,” add the stuff about James and have himself a banger.
But he didn’t. Instead, I think he saw a young black man dressed like the President, sitting in front of a house smoking blunts, and jumped to a conclusion. Rather than considering what Waka does to make Obama “look like” the dudes in front of the house, he dogged the cat dressed as Obama. It’s so superficial that I don’t know why The Root wasted the money it costs to pay Stanley Crouch for a column that someone could have — and would have — written for free. I wouldn’t even be surprised in the least to find out he filed his commentary and an editor added the paragraph on “Hard in the Paint” (and if you read that paragraph, see if the voice matches the rest of the piece…editors throw grafs like those in all the time).
I hope I’m wrong. I really do. But the only thing I feel wrong about now is ever saying Crouch wasn’t “out of touch” in the first place.
