"Folks find it easier to win arguments when they demonize the opposition."
Yeah, too true. Next thing you know someone will be calling me a fascist.
Talk about shooting the messenger...though KDJ doesn't need me to defend
his views. Glad I pushed a few buttons. Though I've seen some thoughtful,
valid responses to my quoting of Moodymann, it's amazing how defensive
people become over the issue of techno & race, myself not excepted...Only
a handful of people have actually addressed the substance of what
Moodymann--the real Detroit deal, no less--was saying about sampling &
respect on those liner-notes.
After more than 5 years, I guess I'm starting to get a little sick of the
so-called 'regular programming' on this list. There's so much idle
chatter; don't some of you get enough mindless entertainment during your
everyday lives? Do people still believe that Detroit techno can function
as a militant, all-embracing force for change in the whole world, not
merely a safely-insulated musical one? Does anyone still believe in the
revolution, rather than the raveolution? Is it all just a pipedream, a
pathetic imitation of what someone like Marcos has the potential to
achieve in Mexico? Maybe AO was right, Detroit techno is dead.
I'll leave you with another incendiary quote from someone whose name I
know a few of you will recognize, & whose views may even accord with what
many of you have been saying about techno being intrinsically 'raceless'
in its ideal form:
"Ultimately, class is the only way to measure advantage and disadvantage
in the world--there's nothing intrinsically good about being black,
nothing good about being white. Nothing intrinsically evil about either
one either. What I'm saying is we're all niggers--all the people that can
see that, all the people that can feel that. All the slave masters are
gonna die and the people who can see that they're niggers are the only
ones that will survive. People who feel that they're being abused in the
world are the ones that are going to fight. No matter who they are, what
they look like, they're gonna fight." Amiri Baraka
And before the flames start, he's the communist, not me ;-)
Thanks for reading,
Wes
(Agent Provocateur)
