Hey people i'll be on Channel 4 tonight debating the EU referendum with Paxman and all the rest... here are my basic thoughts ahead of time... 

Some thoughts on the EU

Before I get into my own opinions on the subject I would first like to note the astoundingly banal and generally poor standard of debate from both sides in this campaign. Ranging from complete lies and scaremongering to disregard for experts and their pesky little ‘facts’ to half truths and outright racism and in the past few days some from both sides attempting to marshal the murder of Jo Cox by a right wing terrorist (of course our ‘free’ - read Murdoch - press refuses to call him that) to support their respective positions before her body is even cold in the ground. Really generally gutter stuff. When did we become this anti-intellectual, this unconcerned with knowing actual facts and this easily duped by a political class who will almost certainly still be rich a powerful on June the 24^th either way? Or were we always made of such stuff?

I also think the public should be deeply suspicious as to why we are being asked our opinions on this particular issue when we were not asked regarding austerity, the bankers bailout or Iraq, Libya, Syria in fact clear and massive public opposition was actually actively ignored as with countless other issues.

So whilst I am pro-remain, just about and with great reservations and no illusions about what that actually means; it’s a vote for the current neo-liberal status quo –I admit that this is a coke and pepsi style choice, organic non-gmo orange juice is not an option. The British Nation State is not some anti neo-liberal social alternative to the EU; in fact the UK was the pioneer of neo-liberal economics in Europe and the city of London remains the center of European finance.

There is of course a progressive people led anti-austerity, anti corporatist, anti-imperialist case for leaving the EU and if that strain of argument were even close to an audible voice in the campaign and if our current political trajectory was not one of the most regressive in the Union I may have well been swayed to join the leavers. But as it has played out the leave lot have appealed to good old fashion fear of the ‘other’ to rile up support for their cause at a time when the ‘others’ are being left to drown in the sea in droves, sensitive humane stuff.

Some of the people of this island do have a great tradition of pro people radical internationalist politics (anti apartheid struggle, the suffragettes, chartists abolitionist movement etc.) but this tradition has always been marginalized and oft persecuted by the state and it’s certainly not that tradition that has been empowered in this ‘debate’.

And whilst I can recognize the political achievement in bringing a continent that had constantly been at war with itself to relative peace and stability the EU is indeed a corporatist, neo-colonial entity, a subject to which we will return later. However legitimate criticisms do not legitimise lies…

We have been told constantly by the leave lot that the EU is undemocratic and that poor little bullied Britain is subject to the random whims of Brussels. This is simply bullshit and anyone who can be bothered to do an internet search on the structure of and relationship between the European Council, The European Commission and the European Parliament would realize that the EU is probably as ‘democratic’ in its decision making process as the UK, with our House of Lords, our Monarchy and our City Of London Corporation – to say nothing of the oil/arms industry lobbies - arguably more so. In addition there are whole sectors of the EU arrangement that the British Nation state has opted out of in a way no other member nation has been able to such as the single currency, the Schengen no border zone and EU law on migration and asylum. The British government has also repeatedly shown its frustration with the EU rights for workers.

Which brings us on to one of the elephants in the room that no one in this mess of a debate seems to have brought up. Iraq. The Brexiters keep telling us that Britain’s ‘sovereignty’ is compromised by being in the EU (this is just legally untrue by the way) and that Britain is not free to make its own decisions blah, blah, blah. Perhaps these people were in a coma during 2003 when several EU member states, much of the UN and of course British public opinion (there was also that small matter of lack of evidence for the very thing that the war was justified upon) were all against invasion and yet the British elite and their US cronies went ahead anyway and more recently the UK Government decided to drop bombs in Syria without so much as parliamentary approval.

Does any of this sound like a small bullied little victim of the dictates of Brussels?

Not really, it sounds more like one of the most regressive states in the EU (yes us, the UK) by many factual indicators (arms exports, prison population, child poverty, basic educational attainment etc.) want to be ‘free’ to be even more regressive. ‘We’ – a certain section of Britain - want our country back. I can almost hear them singing Britannia rules the waves, bless them they think it’s 1851, when in the real world India has just put a rocket on Mars for 10% of the cost NASA can with a whole bunch of women scientists and while still technically a ‘third world’ country. The world is complex and for people brought up to believe they are great simply because they came out of their mothers womb on a particular patch of the earth it can be hard to adjust to the reality that ‘greatness’ takes actual work.

Back to the EU it is not the liberal, harmless, beacon of human rights that its most ardent supporters purport it to be. It is an imperialist behemoth that collectively imposes grossly asymmetrical trade relationships on Europe’s former colonies and it has immense collective amnesia about how it came to be so wealthy. This neo-colonial economic relationship with the Global South massively contributes to the poverty, instability, conflict (and of course resultant migration) of large parts of the globe, whilst the EU poses as the worlds shining light for spreading democratic ideals. Interestingly I have not seen any of the main voices for Brexit raise this continued economic exploitation of the South as an issue, much less as a reason for leaving. It does not seem to even be on their radar.

Back to how it seems Brexit under the current circumstances would affect everyday people. Lets just deal with the facts; most economists of many school of economic thought are against Brexit. Legal experts, (I am being told that UK law firms are already re-registering as Irish in case of Brexit) the majority of scientists all seem to think it a bad idea and I would agree with Mr. Gove that we should ignore the well paid experts if we had a great national moral conviction that we were leaving for moral, humane reasons that would genuinely better the planet, but that’s not what we have.

Even far from the political mainstream prominent activist/lawyer/reparationists like Esther Stanford-Xosei are clear that the EU for all its imperialist unity and actually partly because of that unity (Berlin 1884 anyone?) is a better structure within which national minority groups can wage their respective human and peoples (group) rights struggles than an isolated British nation state at this point in time.

So where does this leave us? With the big I world, immigration, immigration, immigration. We can try and deconstruct all of the other arguments as intellectually as we like but this debate has been so visibly dominated by this omnipotent fear of the other coming over here ‘stealing our jobs and taking our women’ that we must address it. People are to be heard claiming that 500 million people now have a British passport as if the red book was inherently superior to its Swedish, Italian and German counterparts which we as British Citizens also - by the same logic - have.

The Brexit lot is so desperate they are even claiming that being free of the EU will leave ‘us’ to look toward parts of the world Britain has long neglected like the Commonwealth! I mean really. This is post empire melancholia at its finest. Can you imagine a group of people so intellectually bereft of ideas that they expect us to believe that British multinationals are suddenly going to start dealing with the non white parts of the Commonwealth as business partners rather than as pools of cheap labor and un-processed resources the moment we leave the EU? You’ll pardon me while I laugh…

Britain and or private ‘British’ entities like the East India Company ruled most of the Commonwealth for a couple centuries before the EU existed and decided not to build any significant infrastructure and or industrial development other than in those parts of the empire where they thought white people would settle and live - under apartheid - forever more. So when I hear members of the same class, who have never show any signs of global south solidarity before invoke the well being of our homelands as a reason for leaving the EU, I am very suspicious. No in fact I just plain don’t trust a word they say.

The experts are telling us that there will be at least a decade of re-negotiating trade deals, very serious economic downturn and loss of business, the potential for the UK to adopt regressive human rights legislation (many of the right have made it clear they’d like to bring back the death penalty for instance) loss of our own free movement across Europe and all of the retired gangsters from the ends having to return from Spain but this is all worth it to regain some outdated imperial notion of sovereignty (a sovereignty which Britain still legally has) and just in case the Turks join the EU in 20 years, essentially. Of course its highly unlikely that Turkey will ever join, given that all EU member states get a veto on new members but the mere threat is enough for some people.

I can imagine some of the critics ‘from the left’ reading this thus far screaming but but but. I hear you and whilst rallying against TTIP or for workers rights or any of the other left leaning reasons that have been stated (and I acknowledge in principle) for leaving the EU sounds really cool, I think this position is naïve. Britain is already by many indices as pointed out above one of and in some cases the most Neo-Liberal state in Europe - we imprison our population at roughly double the rate the Germans do, despite them taking a much more politically progressive approach to migrants and refuges, for example. The City of London after all is the center of European finance, to think Westminster will stop governing in favor of big banks post Brexit just because the big banks are in favor of remain seems an odd conclusion to me but happy to hear more about how that would actually work?

I am going to make a very crude, imperfect but philosophically interesting (in my opinion at least) historical parallel. America. I think nobody will doubt (at least I hope) that the US is ‘the’ imperial power in the world today and that it was founded on racist exploitation, slavery and genocide. Would the south leaving America after the civil war have been positive for history? We’ll never know and whilst America is 10,000 miles south of perfect I am still glad the North won and that the racist imperial union was preserved, why? Because the realistic alternative at the time was far worse; a Southern US where race based slavery and terrorism, eugenics and serfdom for poor whites would in all likelihood have continued until today. And whilst 2016 Britain is obviously not 1850’s Alabama I think the principle remains the same, sometimes a shit version of power is better than a shittier one. I am glad the allies won World War II despite their mass murdering colonial rampages around the globe, because the Nazi’s were obviously a worse alternative at the time for example. Any how I digress 

I am not mystic meg I do not have a crystal ball but I think if we leave the EU it’s the ‘hard right’ that have dominated the narrative that will be empowered and the narrow nationalism (that both leave and remain have invoked when it suits them) will again come to the fore and push us further right. This is of course conjecture, but in a land where a few million people do not think the current status quo is far right enough and with a little knowledge of British history I’d like to think its an educated guess.

I must stress though I could be wrong and we genuinely might transform into Norway on the 24^th June 2016 except I am not convinced that shape shifting is real.

But hey you might save your great grandkids from having a Turk for a neighbor, but you’ll still have Bangladeshi and Ghanaian born nurses cleaning your dying grandmothers shit and all in all it is they, the poor and the ones not in power and definitely not the political class that are the cause of all Britain’s problems isn’t it? It’s they who ushered in austerity and bailed out the banks and it is they that used to hang poor people at Tyburn too; it’s always (on this ISLAND) been the fault of the immigrants.

One of the last things Shakespeare ever wrote was a soliloquy he put into the mouth of Thomas Moore telling the English people to be kinder to those fleeing persecution and poverty in other lands (in this case from northern Italy) apart from the archaic language it could have been written last week. Sad really.

Which brings us onto Scotland. The SNP despite all their many shortcomings and blind spots are easily the most progressive of Britain’s mainstream parties on big issues like austerity, war and immigration. They have also made it clear that if the UK leaves the EU that would trigger a second referendum that the SNP would almost certainly win. Where would this leave us in England, Wales and Northern Ireland? With a far right Tory government, a few million UKIP supporters and the most politically progressive part of the nation gone forever. To think that the Labor and Tory warmongers will have any real opposition in an SNP-less Westminster seems fanciful to me. But hey maybe Corbyn will be the next PM and large sections of the English working class will rediscover that Polish plasterers are not their enemy, who knows? I doubt it though.

So, strangely I find myself telling you that I think a vote for the status quo – understanding what they actually means - in this instance is actually the more sensible option because the realistic alternative does, to me at least, seem that bleak.

Social justice groups will still have to fight, things will still be shit, austerity will continue, the banks will still run the world and be able to steal 500bn from the national economy after fucking it up, the EU Plutocracy will still do its best to keep poor countries of the south underdeveloped, all of that is true. But I honestly think that a post Brexit Britain will be even more neo-liberal and nationalist than today and for that reason with no illusions about what the status quo is, if you feel to vote I would vote remain, just. 

References

Professor Michael Dougan on the EU

Brexit as nostalgia for empire

http://criticallegalthinking.com/2016/06/19/brexit-nostalgia-empire/

What would Brexit mean for Human rights

http://rightsinfo.org/brexit-mean-human-rights/

Employment rights

http://www.solicitorsjournal.com/comment/employment-rights-unseen-iceberg-brexit-debate

The EU is exporting UK Neo-Liberalism to the rest of Europe

http://www.ier.org.uk/blog/eu-exporting-uk-neoliberalism-rest-europe

The EU and other Neo-Liberal nightmares

https://www.opendemocracy.net/uk/enrico-tortolano/eu-and-other-neoliberal-nightmares

Goves appeals to Anti-Intellectualism

http://anotherangryvoice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/michael-goves-appeals-to-anti.html

MBC EU Debate

Why African Caribbean’s should vote for a left exit from the EU

http://www.counterfire.org/articles/opinion/18383-why-african-caribbeans-should-vote-for-a-left-exit-from-the-eu

How the EU works – a video guide

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-23488006

Blog about Shakespeare and Medieval migration

http://theshakespeareblog.com/2015/09/shakespeare-sir-thomas-more-and-the-immigrants/

MBC EU position  

https://momentumblackconnexions.wordpress.com/2016/06/12/the-mbc-discussion-brief-on-the-eu-debate-from-a-politically-black-perspective/

TTIP is a very bad excuse to vote for Brexit

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/25/ttip-vote-brexit-barack-obama-leave-eu-trade-deal

Institute for criminal policy research

http://www.prisonstudies.org/highest-to-lowest/prison_population_rate?field_region_taxonomy_tid=14

The UK Is Exporting Neo-Liberalism to Europe

http://www.ier.org.uk/blog/eu-exporting-uk-neoliberalism-rest-europe

Gove appeals to anti-intellectualism

http://anotherangryvoice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/06/michael-goves-appeals-to-anti.html

Some books for wider context

The Shock Doctrine By Naomi Klein

Captive State by George Monbiot

From The Ruins Of Empire by Pankaj Mishra

Black People In The British Empire by Peter Fryer

Bad Samaritans or Kicking Away the Ladder by Ha Joon Chang

Hey people I recently addressed the Oxford Union regarding African history as the 'lost' (distorted may be a more appropriate term) pages of human history. Unfortunately the slides are not ver clear in the video but you can view most them in my teacher Robin Walker's book 'Before The Slave Trade'. 

Please also see below an extended bibliography regarding this talk and the subject in general. 

Unesco General Histories Of Africa Vol 1-15 - Multiple authors 

When We Ruled - Robin Walker 

Before The Slave Trade - Robin Walker 

The African Origin Of Civilsation: Myth or Reality - Cheikh Anta Diop 

The Came Before Columbus - Ivan Van Sertima 

Early America Revisited - Ivan Van Sertima 

Black Athena - Martin Bernal 

Black Genesis - Bauval & Brophy 

Imhotep The African - Bauval & Brophy 

African Towns & Cities Before European Conquest - Richard Hull 

The Ruins Of Empires - C.F Volney 

Ancient Egypt The Light Of The World - Gerald Massey 

The Signs and Symbols Of Primordial Man - Albert Churchward 

Africa and Africans As Seen By The Classical writers - William Leo Hansberry 

Life In Ancient Egypt - Adolf Erman 

Ancient Egyptian Literature Vol 1-3 - Mariam Lichtheim 

African Philosophy: The Pharaonic Period - Theophile Obenga 

Timbuctoo The Mysterious - Felix Dubois 

The Black Jacobins - C.L.R James 

The Irritated Genie - Jacob Carruthers 

Africa In History - Basil Davidson 

Ta'rikh al Fattash - Al Hajj Mahmud Kati 

The Pale Fox - Griaule & Dierterlen 

A Tropical Dependency - Flora S Lugard 

Big Ups 

Akala 

KNOWLEDGE SEEKER:                                                                                           

These ancient ruins, do you have the authority?                                                                       

To teach plainly freedom and equality                                                                              

You show us ancient states, let us peer at their mistakes                                         

Through the windows of these crumbling bricks, that once were palace gates                                                             

Where once were grand galleries, now just silent death                                                       

kings and slaves alike both are buried flesh.                                                                 

Gold and spices were traded here, for the finest silks known to man                                                                      

And learned men traded ideas through books written hand                                           

Here, grand galleries and sculptures used to stand                                                        

All easily washed away, like footprints in the sand.                                                  

This is ugly to my eyes, but stimulating to my meditation                                                  

I wonder, is this the fate of our Nation?                                                        

I wonder what is wrong with us? Why do we blame creation?                                                                               

How could a god that only creates be the source of devastation?                                                                      

The stars have not changed their course, nor the earth its motion                                                                                  

And pride always predates a fall and the worst commotion                                                                             

The universe was governed by laws, before the pens of men                                                                                       

These crumbling ruins stand as testimony defending them                                                

Does fate author destruction? Or that our law is corruption?                                           

That causes the cities of men, to be turned to nothing                                                    

As I sit in these crumbling bricks, pondering crumbling wits                                                                                       

Filled with a sudden mix of questions, needing another fix                                         

Here appears the genius that I’ve seen in my mind                                                      

Like a guiding spirit or intuition personified                                                                   

Oh dear genius, please tell me the source                                                                   

What is the wellspring from which fortune and misfortune are born?                                                                            

Why is it that war famine and death visit people in turns?                                                    

But still we never learn. It seems we’ll forever burn.                                                 

Then the genius spoke to me and said

GENIUS:                                                                                                                      

Dear disciple of truth. Wisdom is the fruit                                                                      

You can only know what's true if you examine the root                                                

Peace and happiness visit the home built from the bricks of justice                                                                              

And the throne that is built from the same, is never ever rusted                                                                                      

So rise above your senses young one it’s a must

KNOWLEDGE SEEKER:                                                                                             

Then the genius reached out and the top of my head, touched                                                                                    

In an instant my perception changed, no longer imprisoned                                        

Within my flesh, I had some kind of out of body experience                                                  

A bright red flame severed the ties holding me to the ground                

I floated up above the earth and I was looking down 

But to me earth appeared to me a barren object, grey and smooth 

If I did not know better, I would have thought it was the moon                                       

The genius touched my head once more and transformed my vision                                                                                      

I could see as clear as a hawk now, with the same precision                                                                                      

 I could see the great mass that we call the ocean                                                            

So strange that we call I the earth, when it is water mostly.

 To forget, to lose

Origin is map

Compass and guide

Excise the root

The fruit will comply

For, the branch that is blind to the source of the soil

Dances with death and begets nothing less

At the behest of story

Memory attends

A tale told by a tyrant

In the tone of a friend

In the war between nations

Between women and men

The wickedest of weapons

Of course, is the pen

It depends on nothing more

Than the flick of a wrist

But the damage it inflicts

Breaks generations

Yet we don’t condemn

As the bomb or the bullet

Though the pen does kill

Way more than the regiment

What is the death of mere skeletons

To the death of intelligence?

The death of the body

To the death of the mind?

We can find more soldiers

But murdered memory

Must be re-membered

By a people

Blind

Osiris is scattered

Isis must come

But Horus the young

Rejects his own mother

As we reject darkness

Especially when feminine

If you wish to see sickness

Then this is your evidence

Memory, memory

Where for art thou memory

To our shame, our dead

Mere stones in the cemetery

But the dead are the living

And the yet to be born

So it’s not death that we mourn but the changing of form

And we scorn our past it’s the mask that we wear

On our masters behalf, and we ask in our prayers

To be made over, by Jehovah

White as the cliffs down in Dover

Cos you know you believe what they told ya

And the truth that we hold is a boulder

So you beg to forget your exposure

Bury your head in the sand to the shoulders

And hope someone else is gonna solve it, but

You are Peter Jackson

They wont fight you squarely

Those that claim they’re superior

Believe the contrary

Forgetting is begetting

A self

Amputated

And the part you’ve negated can’t be replaced with

All of the stars and the stripes they emblazon

On blazers and faces and races inferior

The narrative the story that causes hysteria

The savage, the baggage, the marriage to myth

We must divorce from the source of the sick

Severed from centuries

Cut from continents

Hidden in view

Who is responsible?

What is this omen?

That sings of a time

When stories of mine

Have the gall not to hide

But to scream their solution

In picture, in rhyme

Remember

Remember

Remember

Re-member

A young knowledge seeker walks toward the pyramids at Giza. Facing south, with the thoughtful Nile to his east and the vast, angry, Sahara to his west he is engulfed by the desolate surroundings. Not another living thing in sight. Squinting is the best defence he can muster against relentless seas of sand, driven by a reckless wind, irritated at a life condemned to the desert. He stares into the face of the Sphinx, instantly taken aback by the uncanny resemblance it bears to his grandfather, a man whom he had seen countless times in old family photographs; that wise but tormented face that had visited his dreams so often, yet he had never actually seen in the flesh.

 His grandfather - like so many of the worlds brighter souls - was killed early in life, fighting against the forces of unjust power, but his example and sacrifice continued to provide inspiration and insight for all those interested in freedom who heard his story or read his ideas. Arriving at the foot of the great Pyramid the young knowledge seeker looks up, almost breaking his neck to see the top of this millennia old structure. Placing his weathered palm on the sandstone, he elevates his tired body onto the first enormous step and begins climbing this human made Everest. 

 Eventually he arrives, sweating profusely, at the summit. Looking southward he can see the four thousand mile Nile valley pulsing like a giants vein way down into the heart of Africa, lined by pyramids and temples, decayed, destroyed, silent. Terrified by the sight before him and all it has to tell, his enquiring mind craves to know what weakness in the soul of humanity brings about the ruin of such opulence. Sitting atop the great pyramid he envisions countless similarly destroyed epochs, sacrificed at the altar of history. Deeply absorbed by the question, in a state akin to meditation, he pleads with the crumbled stone for answers.

‘The Ruins Of Empires’ -- an epic poem. This graphic novel features illustrations by Tokio Aoyama (who also produced artwork for my latest album "The Thieves Banquet"). A story that follows 'The Knowledge Seeker' through the course of human history, via astral travel and multiple re-incarnations, in an attempt to discover the causes of the rise and fall of empires. Inspired by the French author C.F. Volney's book of the same name. Pre-order the signed limited edition NOW for £25.00 (shipping: 15/12/14) http://akala.tmstor.es/ 

‘The Ruins Of Empires’ -- an epic poem. This graphic novel features illustrations by Tokio Aoyama (who also produced artwork for my latest album "The Thieves Banquet"). A story that follows 'The Knowledge Seeker' through the course of human history, via astral travel and multiple re-incarnations, in an attempt to discover the causes of the rise and fall of empires. Inspired by the French author C.F. Volney's book of the same name. Pre-order the signed limited edition NOW for £25.00 (shipping: 15/12/14) http://akala.tmstor.es/

The last time I did a book list was 2011 people been getting on to me for a new one!

So here are some other great bits that will keep you busy for at least a year. What you lot been reading? 

The New Jim Crow - Michelle Alexander

Damning The Flood - Peter Hallward

Death by Black hole - Neil De Grasse Tyson

Millennium - Felipe Fernandez Armesto

When China Rules The World - Martin Jacques

Assata - Assata Shakur

Revolutionary Suicide - Huey Newton

Ready For Revolution - Kwame Ture

Moses and Monotheism - Sigmund Freud

Black People In The British Empire - Peter Fryer

KMT - Ayi Kwei Armah

The Devil On The Cross - Ngugi Wa Thiongo 

The London Hanged - Peter Linbaugh 

From The Ruins Of Empires - Pankaj Mishra 

An Ordinary Person Guide To Empire - Arundhati Roy 

Black Genesis - Buaval and Brophy 

World Poetry (anthology) - Cliffton Fadiman (general editor)

Taoist Secrets Of Love - Mantak Chia

The Eastern Origins Of Western Civilisation - M. Hobson

Breath Eyes Memory - Edwidge Danticat 

The Sea And Civilisation - Lincoln Paine  

African Philosophy Of The Pharaonic Period - Theophile Obenga 

So as you have probably heard. An ‘artist’ named Brett Bailey thinks it is creative and innovative to showcase black humans in a mock zoo for the entertainment of white ‘liberals’ at the Barbican centre. Some people, including the poet Lemn Sissay, have mustered all kinds of defenses for the forthcoming exhibition: free speech, artistic expression, promotion of dialogue about serious subjects, blah blah blah. Some of these reasonings may even appear sound at first glance, until we examine them in the context of the actual world we live in, not the fairy world of a certain kind of white liberal - and their black and brown servants - the same world inhabited by humanitarian imperialisms and post racial posturing.

 For those who are unaware, black humans were indeed literally exhibited in zoos, yes zoos, next to chimpanzees and other primates in Europe and America in the late 19^th and early 20^th centuries. This is partly the origin of the monkey chants and banana skins that are still all to often aimed at black sport figures today. These zoos formed part of the western propaganda that justified bringing civilization to Africa - that is, killing 10 million plus in the Congo, practically exterminating the Herero and Nama peoples and installing apartheid regimes in much of southern Africa, which is to say nothing of the countless millions shipped across the Atlantic, or the induced Irish and Indian famines.  

 This 21^st century recreation of the very real human zoos is disgusting, deplorable and aims to do none of the things its supporters claim it does. I’ll explain why.

 This exhibition, is of course, aimed at the Barbicans primary audience: a certain kind of white people with disposable income. If its aim is to promote dialogue, with whom are these people going to be dialoging in the privileged space of the Barbican so rarely accessed by the wider community? More importantly, what is the psychological profile of the kind of person that would pay £20 a pop to see black humans exhibited in cages?

 What is the make-up and behaviour of such individuals? If you are a person of color who is remotely aware of yourself, you have encountered them before and will know their kind well. The kind of ‘liberal’ that likes to tell us how we should feel about our history, like the woman who arrogantly messaged me on twitter - not to ask my reasons - but to let me know that she (the important person) was ‘disappointed’ that I was supporting the petition (below), the kind of person like my year 4 primary school teacher who informed me that William Wilberforce ‘stopped slavery all by himself’ (white men are that omnipotent you know). The kind of mind that will leave this exhibition (presuming it still goes ahead) congratulating themselves on ‘how far we’ve come’. The question is who is their ‘we’?

 Do the proponents of this kind of ‘art’ have a history of making common cause with the very real struggles against racist Euro-American imperialism that the south is still fighting (not least of all in Baileys native South Africa) or would they prefer to engage in masturbating their guilt by seeing black bodies tied, bondaged, broken, powerless? It is that last word, Power that brings us squarely to crux of the matter. Many will actually get a sadistic kick from inert black bodies so pornographically disempowered. This is a common theme; I can’t help but be reminded of the Swedish minister of culture eating the clitoris of a coon cake made by another ‘artist’, this too was meant to provoke discussion, or so our liberal friends told us.

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/video/2012/apr/17/swedish-minister-racism-cake-video

Mr. Bailey’s piece of racist propaganda is cut from that same shitty cloth. As for the minds of the black people allowing their bodies to be used in this way, we could write whole a book and many indeed have, try Fanon for starters.

 Yes art is supposed to be about free expression, but in reality that free expression is always bounded by the political realities of the day. To offer an analogy, would a German artist ever be given a platform as large as the Barbican to make money from displaying real live Jewish bodies piled on one another in a mock gas chamber, would this be considered art? Those who think that comparison is an exaggerated one are either ignorant of historical facts or think African lives are worth less. If this is about promoting a discussion of colonial history why not include ‘strung out on opium’ Chinese people? Why? Because contemporary Chinese power would render any attempt to display Chinese people as lifeless victims quite laughable and thus would not offer the same cheap kicks.

 Just to confirm his complete lack of understanding of the issues at hand Mr. Bailey offered the following liberal hodgepodge to explain his thinking

 ‘Exhibit B is not apiece about black histories made for white audiences. It is a piece about humanity; about a system of dehumanisation that affects everybody within society, regardless of skin colour, ethnic or cultural background, that scours the humanity from the 'looker' and the 'looked at' "

 You see, it’s not about black/white relations at all its about the looker and the looked at. Please, ever so kindly, fuck off.

If ‘artists’ like Mr. Bailey really want to be provocative and create discussion around the subjects of European colonialism and genocidal white supremacy I can think of a million more interesting places they could choose to start. Perhaps the Barbican would consider an exhibition with live white people used as dummies to pose as the many thousands of slave masters and overseers our ancestors majestically hacked to death during the Haitian Revolution? Or perhaps they would consider revising the myth of Gandhi’s uncontested pre-eminence in the Indian independence struggle and instead erect monuments to Bhagat Singh, Queen Rani and others who used the coloniser’s favorite tool -violence of course - against him in their search for freedom? Or to bring the point back to Mr. Bailey - a white South African - directly, why not make art of the dead and mutilated white bodies that Africans killed in the anti-colonial struggles that gained the limited modicums of independence that former ‘settler colonial’ African states have today?

How liberating would it be (especially for white people) to be forced to so viscerally engage with the reality that the freedoms black and brown people enjoy today did not come as a result of Abraham Lincoln, William Wilberforce, or World War 2 but rather from the blood that our own ancestors courageously shed, fighting Europeans with significantly greater military might, as well as their own domestic oppressors and collaborators. We did not, contrary to Hollywood, sit around waiting for white saviors.

 Or perhaps, images that do not re-enforce white power do not float the boat of the aforementioned ‘liberal’ types. Perhaps they are not content with the still dominant, international image of Africa; as a disease-ridden, war torn wasteland inhabited by lifeless black skins? Perhaps they are not content with the mass incarceration that serves to privilege them or the black bodies being gunned down by police on a weekly basis in the US and elsewhere? They just need to take it one step further and have niggers back where they really belong, in cages and chains?

The bottom line is this.

The Barbican like almost all other major arts institutions in this country receives public money and thus has a remit to serve the ‘public good’. So if you agree that this proposed exhibition oversteps that remit of ‘public good’ and delves into the realm of orientalist white guilt/power masturbation that will have absolutely no useful outcomes and will certainly not empower the millions of descendants of victims of European colonization living here in London, then please sign this petition and let Mr. Bailey take his foolishness back to where he came from.

https://www.change.org/p/withdraw-the-racist-exhibition-exhibition-b-the-human-zoo

Thanks for all the support yesterday, you all made it a great event. See below for all those interested. 

Due to unforeseen circumstances, The Hip-hop Shakespeare Company have been forced to postpone their forthcoming Richard II Live tour until the Autumn. New dates have been announced & all tickets for the original dates will be valid for the new dates, with a new date for the Newcastle show to be announced in due course. Those ticket holders who wish to obtain refunds, should seek a refund from point of purchase by 5th June 2013.

Part 1 

Narrator:

Once upon a time in an obscure part of the Milky Way galaxy there was a spinning ball of water and rock ruled by the forces of evil. The devil himself, proud of the magnificent achievements of his children decided to call a special banquet for the greatest thieves in all the land. He sent invites to thousands of the greatest murderers, rapists, pimps and general assorted scum and let them know to attend his palace at the dawn of the new moon. Each thief would be given a chance to stake his claim as the greatest messenger of murder upon the planet and the devil himself would decide who should be crowned king. After many days of deliberating all the petty thieves such as street criminals had been found far short of the required level of wickedness and there were just four sets of thieves left in the competition. They were, the Monarchs of the Empire, A Cartel Of Bankers, The heads of religious orders and the ‘third world’ Dictators. Each set of thieves appointed a spokesman to give his case to the devil; we have recorded these events for posterity.

Narrator:

First up was the thief with the worst reputation

The Dictator of the third world nation

He looked the devil in the eye as he spoke in an oh so serious tone

‘THIRD WORLD’ DICTATOR:

Dear Mr. Devil I am the greatest thief

There has ever been on the earth

Please tell me who else more than me personifies your work?

I came to power in a military coup

I murdered the elected president

He wanted to use the resources of our country for our own peoples benefit

I proved to masters in the west I could kill my own people

Just was well as the best

So I took over the so-called independent country

When the foreigners left

Sent squads of death for those that suggest

In power should be the one they elect

Erected a statue of the great man

That raped our mothers and stole our lands

That’s how little self-respect that I have

Don't fight slavery it makes me glad

Account in Switzerland, Rolls Royce

Murder and rape cos I want new toys

Don't want a portion but a whole fortune

With that kind of profit what’s a little bit of torture?

Even outlawed my indigenous culture and language and history

And taught our people to only worship colonizers and of course

Me

CHORUS:

Thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Come and dine with me

It’s the banquet of the thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Narrator:

The devil was impressed with this wonderful man

He almost ejaculated on his own hands

But the monarch of the empire said

Monarch of Empire:

Excuse me Mr. Devil

I would like to speak if I may?

But who do you think trained this amateur

Dictator to behave this way?

Yeah I am sure before I came along

His country was far from heaven

But look at the carnage I caused all over the earth its gotta be the work of a devil

Countless deaths mass enslavement

Deliberate starvation of whole nations

The dictator tries his best but looking at me he is just an imitation

Who do you think pays his wages?

He would love to be trading places

I’ve been doing this ting on the roads way back, way back, way back

Since the Middle Ages

Everybody knows he's a criminal element

They think I’m democratic and benevolent

And that shows I’m really devilish

Cos people think I’m heaven sent

I could not care about democracy

You all know no one elected me

But the citizens love me despite my crimes

Sucker emcees wana bite my shine

So blinging so out of control you would vomit

Don't even touch dough but my face is still on it

CHORUS:

Thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Come and dine with me

It’s the banquet of the thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Part 2

Religious leader:

I’m a pervert using the cloak of the clergy. I’m a pervert using the cloak, I’m a despicable character. I use my position of authority and spiritual reverence. I’m a despicable character.

Mr. devil allow me to speak

For all the religious leaders that leech

In the world of creeps I’m initiated

I take the peoples faith and I dissipate it

With false promises, hollow oratory

Don’t need a gun it’s daylight robbery

Dear Mr. devil I thought you would like it

I use their faith in god to keep them blinded

Put on a nice voice, read them a book

Some how they think that I'm not a crook

I tell them go will repay them in the next

They give me their life savings so I can buy jets

All the reports about child sex

None of us have ever gone to jail yet

A system of stealing so appealing

Convinces its victims their lives have meaning

Monarchs boast about conquest

But needed my blessings to could get it done

And all of the dictators they use me my books therefore they are just my sons

Narrator:

The devil was sure that this was the winner 

And was just about to put an end to the dinner

But then the man from the banking cartels stepped up said

The Man From The Banking Cartel:

 I think I’m the biggest sinner

All of those three depend on me

All they ever do is defending me

Cos I pad for all of the things that they have of course

And all of the lives that they lead

I paid for guns, bombs and the tanks

That's why you'll see there is always more

I turned sciences basic appliance into a client of weapons of war

I paid for monarchies

Armed robberies

I make monopolies of property

I never shot a gun or killed anyone myself but billions dies cos of me

Who needs a threat?

I make a debt out of thin air

Just sit back collect

And whatever they say every single day, the people need me just to connect

But not one of them knows what I look like

But all of them spend my money to look nice

They all want more not one of them is pure

I hold the keys to every single door

I sell sex and drugs and profit and lies

Earth and skies I even sell life

I even sell freedom for the right price

But no one is smart enough to ask me nice

So give me the medal Mr. devil don't be biased

If you don't give it to me

I’ll just buy it

CHORUS:

Thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Come and dine with me

It’s the banquet of the thieves

It’s the banquet of the thieves

Whoever's more human must have the right to do the abusing

Or are you men just as clueless?

Foolish fools, thoughts of a tortured soul

Bought for a quarter of gold

One little sand nigger slaughter it whole 

Why not? They don't have souls

They love their children less than we do so they are less than equal

They abuse women so we kill them cos they are bloody villains

That's right, we are the feminists

For the women of the world, kill terrorists

Liberate them from their burqas 

They feel more free with their children murdered

I know that it sounds absurd but, lemme explain it a little bit further

We're so superior our missiles whistle until they tickle

Little itty bitty grandchildren and make them giggle

But their laughter sounds like screaming.

I told you that they were demons

They pretend to be dead to make us feel sad

Put bullets in their head to make us look bad

But we're never anything other than glad

When those that look funny end up in a body bag

But if a hair is harmed on Sally or Brad or

Even a dog, we cry like mad

A dog is a man's best friend, not a girl

Women are abused all over the world 

And children are raped

Every place, every religion or creed or race

Even fathers with daughters, uncles with nieces, sweep it under the carpet

Rape is a weapon used by power, and we don't wanna look like bastards

So manufacture hero complex, a reaction to nuttin' more complex

Than organised mass rape of the state, don't wanna hear about mass graves

Cos I hate to relate to a shade that's darker than you

One that prays under a different roof

Has less dollars or pounds, crowns or gowns or grounds 

Fill 'em up with rounds

If they mess with the way that things are constructed

Obstructing lines of production

You can buy anything, liposuction, seduction, just buy it from us, men

Buy lies, can't buy truth

No-one's selling it there is no use

There is no customer base for the product

We'd rather buy some celebrity trollop

Cos our life is about getting one-up

On everybody else that we pass on the come up

We don't care what force bring the sun up

But lie in the sun every day gettin' bun up

Lie to the point that it's part of the culture

Tell the truth it's only the result of 

A double lie

Cancelling itself, their pride cancer in itself

Cos virus is normality, living in a world that is built on vanity

More salaries, more calories, more thieving, more charities

Picture a Moor on a horse with a chariot speaking some kind of African Arabic

Teaching mathematics to a Spaniard when maths had not got to Britannia

Can you picture mind scripture 

That’s designed for the mind to enrich ya?

Are you blind can't you find the riddim pratt?

Cause your timing alignment is on crack

It's hard to be as far off the rhythm as you are 

It's like art

Hard to have so little charisma,

I swear that you try to be shit?

To make me look even better than

Everybody knows that I am already

I'm a pedigree that can't be touched like leprosy

Have a rapper like The Beatles begging me to let it be

And I don't need no referee

I play the game on my own, it's my own sport

And you can't take a king to his own court

You can't take a king to his own court

You ain't the throne sort

You're the type to rap for five minutes

And complain your throat's sore

While I'm so sure that my stone jaw

Is the coldest on road since '04

But these silly little boys think they’re so raw

Make a bigger bit a noise but we know you're

You ain't up the game, you ain't match fit

You ain't even got the brain for the tactics

You ain't even on the bench you're a ballboy

One lickle send out yout so just sit down

I am the Big Mic man with the crown

Super cat de pon sting with the sound

Who are these silly little wolleys?

Think they erupt with enough of the guts to be on it

They’re the version of me that I didn't wanna be

I'm the coldest  on road since Admiral Zheng He

I'm the fire in the booth, you a wet rag

You ain't the real ting like a step-dad

I'm the best so rest where the rest have

Don't big up your chest, let your breasts sag

I'm the best dad look, I don't even beat my sons

I let them shine

Even when they got no talent to rhyme

Insist on doing it all of the time

All of my spine is re-enforced with a kind 

Of carbon that hardens the thoughts in my mind

Of course you will find that I torture a line

I'm born with bars, no-one ever taught me to rhyme

The portion that's mine, don't touch it

Furthermore, don't even discuss it

I know that you heard

Britain's biggest export is weapons of death

That ain't a theory or a guess

Take another breath and your country is next

Unless you remind 'em whenever you're rhyming

You're a beast on the mic with impeccable timing

They will think they’re in the league that I'm in

But that is most absurd

I Turn a Stanza to a cancer with banter

For those between the gangster and a panther

I know you seen me these man dem with their tantrums

Like kids when I'm off on a tandem

Cos they don't know what a tandem means

So rather than use a dictionary they talk shit and badmouth me

When I'm only tryina elevate your mind, G

But I don't watch that the love is more than a grands worth

You should see when I roll through Handsworth

Elders see me, cross the road, talk to me and it usually goes

We love how you bus up da ting, spread knowledge

Bunfire pon them Babylon college

We salute ya, you a da future

All the bigger man have time for them yout deh

What I'm saying it that the respect's worth 

More than the chain on your neck

When it's not that it's somebody's mum

Saying that she feed me to her son

Cos she wanna come get his mind out of the slums

Akala is smarter than Arthur you dumb?

Regardless the bars are retardedly dumb

What the rass and the raated a  part of my lung

Take out a whole clique that chat's do do

Pic up a mic, we can see who's who

I'm fire in the booth, you're dry wood

Chew your flesh it best taste quite good

So smart but he still move quite hood

See him on the road but don't think that I try should

That's a wise assessment, kind of like land is a wise investment

Especially land that's recently blessed with 

In excess of one million deaths in

And the castle you rest in, that's a next ting

Built on the bones and the flesh of the wretched

Throne that you pose in, only protected

Cos we regret that only deceptive 

Things that we like, and only reject it

When it feels like it's truth were digesting

So

Get in with a blessed king

Whose crown is the rounds that he fought

Therefore you ain't gotta deal with the fraud

Of all these picanees of whom I'm bored

My worst, stronger than their best

Aura alone stronger than their flesh

All that they known can't compare to his guess

Usually don't ever dare to spit next

It's clear the reason is fear

Even the worst MC has ears

Though they can't hear where the beat is

The time their flow with the kick and the snare

When they hear me they know life ain't fair

God bless some and some get air

Like these conscious heads that cry

That I get big headed and I don't know why

Cos I, I have always been this guy

Ever since mum said aim for the sky

I decided that that was too low

So I'm astral travelling to another zone

You won't ever get on the dog and the bone

Cos I don't ever really wanna answer my phone

Zone that I'm in is high vibration

See the future with mind meditation

Your peeps, poor libation

For all the creeps that get above their station

I place them in the right placement

That is to say I erase them

Ain't no-one above nor adjacent

Still these mugs they want to get feisty

But face it they don't really wanna face me

I don't run so you can't ever chase me

And I been through tings on the pavement

But don't beg road fame cos I never made it

My uncles, cousins and friends 

Have done everything that yours have, mate

But I don't tell their story I tell mine

That means I'm real and you're fake

With that said, I don't mind a bit of fiction

If you did tell your story well

But your raps are dryer than a dead man's top lip

After six years of living in hell

You meet a nice girl, you just might gel

Might be wifey, you can't quite tell

You know why? Cos the only bitch in the world

Is a man and this ego we have as a shell

Mine is harder than my uncles foot back

Who don't even need to wear shoes

Who only eats pounded yam and stew

With hands like a can on a man, I refuse

Who said mum never raised no fools?

Your mum raised you

You're a plonker, a plank, a donut, a tool

You make me think that mother nature's cruel

Then I get back and remember

Life is a gift even when it don't look like it is

And everybody thinks that they're cold in a booth

Got no friends to show them the truth

Put the pen down, become a spectator

Go get a day job, there is no shame in it

We need doctors and architects

Not more crap rappers that are passed their best

And if the cap fits you wear it

If it fits your friend too share it

I know it ain't the role of a parent

To take my child's confidence and tear it

But it is my role as a father

To show my son about life and it's harder

When you got a dad named Akala

Those are big shoes to fill, be your own man

Have you own plan, your own destiny

Just don't ever mess with me

Preferably bun these fools for their treachery

Definitely those that put us in jeopardy

Especially foes that wanna pose next to me

Nobody ain't testing me

It's the versatility that is killing them

So road but I teach kids William

Listen to my albums I actually write songs

And of course the bars are brilliant

We can do politics, spirituality

Or real life road reality

Or do this ting here with straight up vanity

Either way, nobody can't battle me

Much less shackle me, the maroon

One man army, an entire platoon

They're like "won't he run out of breath soon?"

"How does he do that? Is he human?"

Look man, it's the spirit of Boukman

Back in the flesh in a terrible crook man

The law won't like me, ain't it obvious

I ain't a paedophile, nor a colonist

I'm the MC that you don't wanna bother with

To gauntlet is thrown down, who's crossing it

Hmm, that's what I thought

You can have your whole life to retort

Still won't think up the things that I thought

When I was age four

Scratch that before I was born

In the womb when I was yet to be formed

Before that in a past incarnation

When I set fire to a thieves plantation

Me and Sam Sharpe hid in the cane fields

Two weeks straight totally stayed still

With nothing but a blade of great steel

Jumped on our enemies what a great kill

Self defence is not violence it's common sense

The first rule of nature, self preservation

To let people kill and abuse you is just self hatred

Turn the other cheek, why?

No-one ever got their freedom that way, lies

When the oppressed say an eye for an eye

They talk this crap about the world goes blind

Just don't attack us in the first place

And everything will be just fine

In the mean time train hard

Read nuff, stay sharp

And don't diss the sisters, are you barmy?

You are putting down half your army

Any evolution without the women in the middle is no revolution at all

Trust me you could read back through them all

Women were there ready to pop tools

But we have become so cowardly that

Rather than fight back we attack

The only ones that ever had our back

And that is a actual fact

And I ain't saying that I ain't ever done that

I'm just saying that it's time that we bun that

So don't put my name in the same sentence

As real revolutionaries, I'm offended

Real revolutionaries spend their life engaged in revolutionary acts

And as cold as I am on the mic

Thus far, I just rap

That said there is no comparison

To cold for the  way that I carry on

These vultures feed off carrion

Come along now, carry on, carry on

Roll up roll up, two for a pound

Bun down MC's bun whole sound

Bun your whole clique I bun the whole town

Take a stroll at the speed of sound

Who said the speed of light was the fastest thing

Never knew the speed of darkness

A black hole absorbs all light that there is

So how could light ever get past it?

I studied the masters and sages

Secret teachings of all of the ages

I don't know, I can't explain it

The knowledge ain't mine yet I radiate it

It's why they write sixteen lines

And I write an essay that rhymes

And I never went uni neither

But my mind works just fine

In fact no need to be modest

My mind's a fine instrument If I'm honest

And I promise that I'll show you where the bodies at

Burying MC's my lickle hobby that

And MC's don't bite me

They ain't got the technique to even copy that

I think I made my point

In a manner that is more than adequate

Let's put all the boasting aside

I do know that I'm just channelling

This thing, what is it?

Inspiration, the source of the spirit?

Not a man in the sky

But a force that animates all things that are living

Dali's brush, Akala's lyrics all things

Ain't explained by the laws of physics

Cos you've been down on your life

Don't mean you'll ever be on top of it

Cos for this force right here

There ain't one that is equal and opposite

Get Tickets here http://xoyo.co.uk/2013/03/13/dhp-concerts-presents-akala-album-launch/

IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER – ENJOY. 

 
Desmond Dekker - Shanty Town
Max Romeo – War Inna Babylon
Capleton – Tour
Bounty Killer – Fed Up
Bounty Killer – Down In a the ghetto
Dennis Brown – Stick By Me
Garnett Silk – Lord Watch Over Our Shoulders
Garnett Silk – Fill Us Up With Your Mercy
Beres Hammond - Rockaway
The Wailers – Pass It On
John Holt – My Number One
Barrington Levy – Here I come
The Maytals – Monkey Man
Garnett Silk – Mama Africa
Jimmy Cliff – Many Rivers To Cross
Burning Spear – Marcus Garvey
The Gladiators – Marcus Garvey Time
Dennis Brown – Just My Imagination
Bob Marley – Forever Loving Jah
Morgan Heritage - Down By The River
Garnett Silk – Cry Of My People
Peter Tosh – African
Alton Ellis – True Born African
Jacob Miller – Tenement Yard
Junior Murvin – Police and Thieves
Dennis Brown – Stop The Fussing And The Fighting
Danny Livingstone – Rudy, A Message To You
The Ethiopians – Train To Skaville
Desmond Dekker & The Aces – Isrealistes
Harry J Allstars – Liquidator
Bob & Marcia – Young Gifted and Black
The Melodians – Rivers Of Babylon
The Maytals - 54-46 That’s My Number
Desmond Dekker – You Can Get It Of You Really Want
The Pioneers – Let Yeah Be Yeah
John Holt – Help Me Make It Through The Night
Ken Boothe - Everything I own
Althea & Donna – Uptown Top Ranking
Peter Tosh – Brand New Second Hand
Dennis Brown – Money In My Pocket
Janet Kay – Silly Games
Gregory Isaacs – Soon Forward
Black Uhuru – Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner
The Mighty Diamonds – Right Time
Supercat – Ghetto Red Hot
Freddie Mcgregor – Just Don’t wanna be lonely
Gregory Isaacs – Rumours
Tenor Saw – Ring The Alarm
Frankie Paul – Pass The Tu Shen Peng
Byron Lee & Dragonaires -  Cherry Oh Baby
Eek A Mouse – Wa Do Dem
Ken Boothe – Crying Over You
Gregory Isaacs – Night Nurse
Michigan & Smiley – Diseases
Buju BaNton – Untold Stories
Capleton – Jah Jah City
Bow Marley & The Wailers – War
Sugar Minott – River Jordan
U-Roy – Wake The Town
Niney The Observer – Blood & Fire
Augustos Pablo – Cassava Piece
Dennis Brown – Slavedriver
Sugar Minott – Herbman Hustling
Bob Marley and The Wailers – Redemption Song
Bob Marley and The Wailers – One Drop
Yellowman – Mad Over Me
Johnny Osbourne – Water Pumping
Half Pint – Greetings
Admiral Bailey – Punanny
Red Dragon – Hol A Fresh
Pinchers – Bandolero
Neville Marcano – Yuh Dead Now
Buju Banton – Boogle Dance
The Wailers – Simmer Down
Don Drummond – Man in The Street
Delroy Wilson – Dancing Mood
Derrick Morgan – Tougher Than Tough
I-Roy – Welding
Roman Stewart – Natty Sing Hit Songs
Leroy Smart – Ballistic Affair
Culture – Two Sevens Clash
Gregory Isaacs – Number One
The Wailing Souls – Breda Gravalicious
Dennis Brown – Sitting And Watching
Dave & Ansell Collins – Double Barrel
Delroy Wilson – Better Must come
Junior Byles – Curly locks
Peter Tosh – Skanky Dog
Peter Tosh – Arise Black man
John Holt  - Time Is The Master
Sizzla – Thank You Mama
Taruus Riley – Shaka Zulu Pickney
Bounty Killer – Look
Ziggy Marley – Tomorrow People
Aswad – Dub Fire
Aswad Warrior Charge
Buju Banton – Murderer
Steel Pulse – Your House

The Sunjata Story (published by penguin)
Oral Tradition As History by Jan Vansina
Emperor Shaka The Great (A Zulu Epic) By Mazisi Kuene
The African epic controversy by Mugyabuso M. Mulokozi
Before The Slave Trade by Robin Walker (For Images)
Langston Hughes Collected poems
Rap Attack by David Toop
Can¹t Stop Wont Stop By Jeff Chang

                                        DOUBLETHINK
                                         Diary entry 13
                             The discovery of my disease

I was thirteen when it happened, it is clear now. We were at the secondary
indoctrination centre, we were learning about the Œflea bitten inhuman
savages¹ that we had to remove from this land before we could found this
great nation of ours. I am not sure what it was, something in the
indoctrinators speech or manner or just the smell of the air that day but I
could taste a rage building in me with every word she spoke. In my mind I
kept getting images of these¹ savages¹ and their children being killed, and
their books and buildings being destroyed, and the few of them still alive
being whipped into submission. Somehow those savages seemed regal and wise
and of course not perfect, but human to me, and for a brief moment that was
a characteristic that I found endearing. And I just lost it. I leapt out of
my chair and screamed at the indoctrinator that what she was saying was
nonsense and that the massacre of human beings could never be justified, I
screamed that they were humanoids just like us and actually we could have
perhaps learned a thing or two from them.
At that last comment my whole class paused, frozen in indignation, I could
see a few faces grimacing as if bitten by a slight truth they felt in what I
was saying but their bodies disobeyed this bite and as the indoctrinator
rang the bell for the enforcers of ignorance to come and collect me and the
rest of the class held me pinned to a desk to await their arrival, those few
conflicted souls sat in their seats and just watched. They just watched, as
I was beaten by the enforcer¹s electro-metallic sticks and my bloody body
dragged by its feet leaving a viscous red smear on the floor. They just
watched.
They just watched as something they knew to be wrong unfolded and happened
before their very eyes. The elders tell me that all that needs to happen for
humanity to sink into barbarism is for people to just watch.

Made You Look Freestyle War Mixtape Vol2
Don¹t believe in heaven cos were livin in hell
You wana know WHATS BEEF? I GOT A STORY TO TELL
He had SUICIDAL THOUGHTS he was READY TO DIE
KICK IN THE DOOR waving the 44 to HYPNOTIZE
No WARNING NOTORIOUS THUGS gave him long clips
YOUR NOBODY TIL.. somebody give you the LONG KISS
NO MORE CHANCE THE WORLD'S FILLED with greed
And NASTY BOYS that Love The Dough and make N****S BLEED
EVERYDAY STRUGGLE MACHINE GUN FUNK Soundtrack
THE SKY IS NOT THE LIMIT when your TEN COMMANDMENTS ARE CRACK
Infact it¹s a countdown to your LAST DAY
MO MONEY MO PROBLEMS when you get it the fast way
Sky mask way will turn your song to an INTERLUDE
You Can scream GIMME DA LOOT and even get it to
JUICY you can F*** HER TONIGHT and then another one
But it never will be enough if you need another gun
Haters plot your DOWNFALL and now they MISS U
And SOMEBODY GOTTA DIE for what they did to you
And that¹s THE WHAT? The hood the street the life
UNBELIEVABLE its just an INTRO before you see the knife
You could be show stoppa or top shotta
For respect enemies and Friends Of Mine meet BIG POPPA

This is a picture of Loango capital city of Congo as seen by Dutch observer
Olfert Dapper in 1668 ....