Two weeks ago in this column, in response to some complaints that popular music performers were leading people astray, I made the point that “majority popular music trends” – those were the words I used – were almost always a reflection of popular culture and that the popular performers were, in fact, not leading but simply reflecting their societies.
The column arose principally because I had been hearing for months now, from adults here and overseas, that they saw no value in modern music such as dancehall, soca, rum chutney, and rap – they could not understand how people could gravitate to such things – and I was making the case that as we rail against these musical forms, we should understand that they were reflecting the culture of the surrounding society, our own society, which is why they were so widely popular.
Subsequently a newspaper editorial argued that the fact that something was a reflection of a culture did not necessarily mean we should endorse it, and used the example that a group proposing torture, for instance, is not something we should be sanctioning. I must point out that the column I wrote was merely an explanation of how these music genres come about; nowhere did I endorse them. There are also more differentiations involved.
In the first place, I was dealing with popular culture which is a mass movement, not the deranged behaviour of a few, such as torture, slaughtering turtles, public nudity, etc. I specifically made the point that I was dealing with majority positions in the popular culture. I was talking about what most of the entertainment followers indicate they want in their popular music, which, in the Caribbean today, means dancehall, soca, and, in Guyana and Trinidad, hybrid chutney. I was not dealing with whether the music was beneficial to the society or not; I was simply dealing with how it came to be – its genesis; its propulsion – and most readers, judging from the feedback, clearly understood the distinction.
Of course, the trigger for this discussion is the recent Mavado issue, when protests were made against that popular Jamaican dancehall performer appearing here. Notice that the popularity of the music is a social phenomenon, while the banning or curtailing of it is a political act, and those two creatures do not often coexist in the same house, never mind the same country. Having said that, however, every society is free to express concerns about what is happening in its territory, and I’m not dismissing those concerns at all. In fact, my view is that some of Mavado’s material is indeed revolting, and the same is true of some gangsta rap artistes as well as some on the hybrid chutney charts.
The response to the concerns however, as my friend Gordon Forte would put it, “gat teet”.
You can certainly urge performance bans in your country by singers you find objectionable, but what are you achieving by that? The music continues popular, it’s relayed by internet, transported on Ipod, and emailed among devotees. Furthermore, think about it: the objectionable song sung by Buju or Mavado is drawing thousands – that means it is already popular. I understand the concern “to do something” but from a practical standpoint, your ban is too late. That musical horse is long gone from the stable, and is in a powerful gallop.
And here’s another reality: it is common knowledge that a ban imposed on something only generates widened interest in that subject. At one point or another, concerning one ban or another, we’ve all said: “I never heard about this. What is it they don’t want us to hear?” In effect, it increases the popular fever surrounding the song, or film, or performance. I recall, during the ‘70s and 80’s, calypsonians in Trinidad being delighted when a carnival song of theirs was banned on the radio. “Hear, na, padna. Dey ban it? Den it hot.”
And by the way, why is there such an uproar about Mavado, and general silence about the rum chutney songs? The degradation caused in families by excessive rum drinking across Guyana is horrendous. It leads to abuse, mutilation and murder. Examples abound in the daily press, but the “rum till I die” mantra doesn’t get banned; those shows are here every couple of months.
These matters of cultural expression impacts are extremely complex, and I sympathise with the people agitating against the current popular music – some of it is indeed vile and degrading – but I ask you to consider the following: If the contention is that these forms of expression – lewd dancing; revolting lyrics; rum songs – could be potentially harmful to our society, wouldn’t our time be better spent on researching how we got to the stage where there is widespread embrace of these things?
Shouldn’t we be concerning ourselves with what we see as wrong in our societies, rather than excoriating the singers or performers the societies have generated?
Shouldn’t we be putting all our efforts into finding out why so many of our men find something admirable in getting drunk, or why so many of our women are comfortable being sexual toys, or why so many of our neighbourhoods extol guns? Those things are rampant around us. We see them every day, not just when a performer comes to the stadium. For four days before a wedding in our neighbourhoods, music with those messages is pumping, loud and clear, from a distance. Should we ban those manifestations, too?
I can see the argument that the performer singing about the horror should condemn it, as Pete Seeger did; as Bob Dylan did; as Black Stalin did; as Bob Marley did. But not every artiste is going to do that. Some will simply bring the message – “watch wha’ happenin’ inna de yard, sah.” – because they make money in the process.
If you’re worried about the message, and I’m with you on that one, perhaps you should do what some community groups here are doing and turn your attention to what’s going on in your culture; that’s what you should be worked up about. The songs – pardon my repeating it – are based on what exists in the culture; they are reflecting, not inventing.
Banning the messenger may give you the satisfaction that you have at least protested, and that does have some symbolic value, but in the end when you ban, all you really ban is the messenger; the message remains. If you doubt me, check your neighbourhood bar, or the wedding celebration across the road.
