We’ve made mention of this recently on the podcast and on the blog but the time has finally come: the PB massive is taking its snarky ruminations over to the Huffington Post BlackVoices.

It’s exciting. It’s terrifying. And we need you to come along with us. What makes PB so much fun for us is the [...]]]>

We’ve made mention of this recently on the podcast and on the blog but the time has finally come: the PB massive is taking its snarky ruminations over to the Huffington Post BlackVoices.

It’s exciting. It’s terrifying. And we need you to come along with us. What makes PB so much fun for us is the commenters, the value-adding asides, and the smart-ass pushback.

So update your RSS feed! Like us at the FB page! And follow us on Twitter! Ain’t nothin’ changing but the URL.

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? — Matthew 7:3

Last night, a woman cradled her abdomen and revealed the life growing there, as vibrant and as certain as the crimson of her Lanvin gown. You [...]]]> (cross-posted from slb’s blog)

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? — Matthew 7:3

Last night, a woman cradled her abdomen and revealed the life growing there, as vibrant and as certain as the crimson of her Lanvin gown. You are too young to know her, but she is an icon for my generation, in much the same way that the triumvirate of divas–Aretha, Diana, and Tina*–are for your grandmother’s. Her husband is similarly eminent and, as they took to yet another of what, for them, must be an endless strait of red carpets, the radiant woman basked in the rarefied air that only exists under an arc of flashbulbs.

It was a seminal moment, not at all spontaneous but with just the right amount of coyness, delight, and pride. Responses were immediate–and as polar as they were predictable. Opinions were divided along moral lines. The couple was applauded for being married before deciding to procreate: “They did it the way God intended.” and “They did it the ‘right way.’” Many offered up their hope that this would “start a trend” in the black community, of valuing marriage (as though the reason black women and men remain unwed is because they thumb their nose at nuptials). By extension, unmarried mothers were inundated with presumptuous gloating: “This is what you should’ve done.” and “Never have a child with a man who doesn’t even offer to marry you.” and “You’ll never have this moment.”

But even the couple, so lauded for their pristine ordering of life events, did not escape the critical gaze of their public. They were blasted for releasing their news in as public a way as possible; some detractors went as far as suggesting the news was meant to boost their respective album sales. Others still wanted it known that they would not be engaging in any excited, celebratory antics “over a couple they didn’t know” and wondered aloud if they were the only ones who “didn’t care” about this announcement.

Darling, there is something I should tell you.

Every decision carries with it a value judgment; every action is first magnified then dissected. This is true of the famed and the civilian, of the leader as well as the follower. There is always someone watching, always someone desperate to compare, and to come away from that comparison looking superior. As much as I will teach you that the language of “better than” is dangerous, this language is unavoidable.

There is no sense in defending yourself against people who are certain they are better than you are. That is the worst kind of futility; it not only leaves you spent, but also unnerved and inadequate. But it is no better to seek solace in your own “better” circumstances. This renders you dispassionate and smug in ways that never fail to mortify you during life’s inevitable reversals of fortune. These are slopes that descend into hells; it would behoove you not to slide down them.

I spent much of your first year of life, and the nine months before your birth building an immunity to Better Than. I am still susceptible to the lesser of its side effects, but there are some nerves I have protected from its paralysis. There are some criticisms that I will just not allow to bring me low.

I am a third generation single mother. In high school, I was lauded for escaping teen pregnancy. In college, the voices grew louder, the compliments more flowery. By grad school, I’d “escaped a generational curse” and “broken a cycle.” I was half of an “upstanding couple”–a fine Christian man and a wholesome, Proverbs 31 woman; it was only a matter of time before we married, before someone suggested that we become youth leaders, before we were asked to educate others on purity. I didn’t protest; that wouldn’t have done much good. There was no baby then, to confirm what we weren’t. But I didn’t chime in, singing solo in a chorus of my own praises, either. I knew who your father and I were to each other, and it wasn’t husband and wife. And there were few days we would’ve described ourselves as “wholesome.”

You will find that people love their narratives. They need for your life to have meaning; it must provide them a teachable moment, whether cautionary or aspirational.

But you will never be who they think you are. The more you allow their expectations to dictate to you what you should be, the more unfamiliar you’ll become with your own reflection in a mirror. You must know, even as a grade school girl—and perhaps particularly then, as children can be cruel—that you are not pitiable because your parents are not married. You shouldn’t feel excess pressure to excel because “the odds are against you,” nor does my marital status require you to defend me or yourself against the assumptions of your peers. But it also does not give you license to exalt yourself over other children whose circumstances are different than your own. You will find soon enough that all homes, whether married or single-parent, are not created equal. There is no greater example of this than this red carpet couple whose little one will be swaddled in cashmere receiving blankets, with diamond pins fastening its handwoven diapers.

We are ourselves. That is all that we are, and that is enough.

There will be days—like this one—where I will feel like I am everything others assume I am: jilted, irresponsible, and unworthy of a man’s unerring commitment. And then I will remember that I am the woman who writes to you. I am wise and intuitive; artful and accomplished; nurturing and nourishing; strong enough to tear apart and reassemble myself for you; and beautiful in ways the naked eye cannot observe—particularly if its gaze is obstructed with beams.

Hey Fam.

Earthquakes, breezy-for-August nights, and a rainy day in DC is more than enough to make me yearn for my borough of Brooklyn. Since I can’t uproot myself from DC just yet, I guess music will have to suffice, so I thought I’d break you off too.

This ain’t new, but it ain’t too old either [...]]]>

Hey Fam.

Earthquakes, breezy-for-August nights, and a rainy day in DC is more than enough to make me yearn for my borough of Brooklyn. Since I can’t uproot myself from DC just yet, I guess music will have to suffice, so I thought I’d break you off too.

This ain’t new, but it ain’t too old either (definitely said that before, it was rainy too); The Stuyvesants “Stoops Parks and Rooftops.”

Enjoy, even if you aren’t from Brooklyn.

Cop the track fo’ free, (with or without third member Naturel’s BK summer inspired rhymes) on the The Stuy’s site

Well, if we have to provide an answer, I suppose he’d look like Brian Austin Green and play like a slightly less effective but more dynamic blend of Steve Young and Fran Tarkenton.

But that’s not really the question worth asking. What I really want to know is what is a “deeply [...]]]> … Michael Vick was white?

Well, if we have to provide an answer, I suppose he’d look like Brian Austin Green and play like a slightly less effective but more dynamic blend of Steve Young and Fran Tarkenton.

But that’s not really the question worth asking. What I really want to know is what is a “deeply African-American approach to the game”?

The foreclosure crisis in Prince George’s County, a wealthy suburb of DC.

Welfare reform turns 15.

The gospel of healthy eating in the Mississippi delta.

For those who know Ashford & Simpson mostly for their ’80s hit “Solid As A Rock,” Jay Smooth dug up 12 other classic songs that they wrote over the course of their nearly 50-year music career.

1. In more serious news, the Libyan civil war isn’t nearly over yet. And even with Muammar al-Qaddafi close to be removed from power, Kurt Volker at Foreign Policy cautions against chalking this up as a victory for NATO. And The Guardian has a list of the chaotic final moments of [...]]]> Share with us your tales of carnage:

1. In more serious news, the Libyan civil war isn’t nearly over yet. And even with Muammar al-Qaddafi close to be removed from power, Kurt Volker at Foreign Policy cautions against chalking this up as a victory for NATO. And The Guardian has a list of the chaotic final moments of other overthrown regimes. (Blackink)

2. An incredible series of photos from Libya. (Blackink)

3. In comparison to his more famous predecessor, Texas Gov. Rick Perry comes off as a real cowboy. Paul Waldman at TAP asks if “American can stomach the real thing”? Also, Perry believes creationism should be taught in schools and he apparently wants to continue his quixotic fight with the EPA. And Paul Krugman has more on the Texas unmiracle. (Blackink)

4. WSJ: “We are a nation of homeowners and home-speculators because of Uncle Sam.” (Blackink)

5. NPR remembers a time when there were actual mom and pop grocery stores threatened by a big chain, and the government stepped in to protect local markets. (Monica)

6. The Department of Agriculture has rejected New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s proposal to ban the purchase of soda with food stamps. (Nicole)

7. Rice Krispies Treats cereal still exists. (Nicole)

8. Toxicology results show that no illegal drugs were found in Amy Winehouse’s system, according to her family. (Blackink)

9. Even as a pair of black scholars claim the panic over single black women is unfounded, Jada Pinkett reportedly goes back on the market. There’s nothing to believe in anymore. (Blackink)

10. And terrible news: University of Tennessee women’s basketball coach Pat Summitt, the all-time winningest coach in NCAA history, has been diagnosed with early onset dementia. (Blackink)

And if you have any good news to share with the class, now would be a great time to do it.

Jane Black wrote a piece recently for the Atlantic discussing the price of eggs at her local farmers market (emphasis mine):

My first instinct was that the egg guy was gouging people, like me, who have enthusiastically embraced efforts to build an alternative to our industrial food system. But it turns out that’s what it [...]]]>

Flickr: boughtbooks

Jane Black wrote a piece recently for the Atlantic discussing the price of eggs at her local farmers market (emphasis mine):

My first instinct was that the egg guy was gouging people, like me, who have enthusiastically embraced efforts to build an alternative to our industrial food system. But it turns out that’s what it costs him to produce his eggs. The farm, Grazin’ Angus Acres, follows the gold standard of environmental practices: each morning, the chickens are fed organic grain, then moved to fresh pasture in a specially made chicken mobile. Owner Dan Gibson says the process is so labor-intensive that bringing down the price would be near impossible—and he’s not interested in trying. “At eight dollars a dozen, you pay 67 cents an egg,” he told me. “If your priorities are in the right place, that’s a bargain.”

The food blogosphere exploded, and I’d like to pull out one response in particular, from Michele Simon at Food Safety News:

That’s exactly why instead of fretting over the high cost of organic eggs we should focus on changing this bigger picture, which also involves many complex and challenging policy changes. Then maybe we would make some progress toward shifting the American diet to health-promoting, disease-preventing plant-based foods. Just like things used to be.

I think Simon misses the point entirely. Yes, we should encourage people to eat less meat, and make the meat they do eat of a higher quality. But that is a massively long term project, much like dismantling the subsidies that make industrially produced meat so cheap in the first place (something Black points out in her piece). It took time for the American diet to shift from meat-as-a-treat to meat-and-three, and I don’t think it’s unreasonable to think it will take time to shift back (arguably, that time might be a luxury we don’t have, but that’s for another day)

In the interim, there is an immediate problem- there are lots of people who want to eat better, but are priced out of doing so. How do we fix that?  The answer is not “buy $8 eggs or don’t eat them at all,” as some would have you think- that’s exactly the kind of thing that allows people to marginalize the movement towards better food by calling it elitist.  In his response, Tom Philpott pointed out that there are ways to raise food that aren’t as disgusting and dangerous as our current system.  Black took to her personal blog to defend her piece (emphasis mine):

Any suggestion that good food could be convenient ruffles feathers. The message: Anyone who doesn’t get that food should be a top priority — in terms of money and time — just doesn’t get it. Well, a lot of people don’t get it. And I still want them to support farmers that are good stewards of the land and eat healthfully.  The goal of food reform should be to make it easy and affordable for everyone to eat well.

There are many, many people out there, of varying socioeconomic levels, who are worried about what goes into their food.  A one size fits all prescription (“eat less meat” or “go vegan“) removes any incentive to bring more people into the movement (the food movement big tent: we have catering, and it is tasty!)- you either care about it and don’t complain, or you don’t care enough, and can go back to your wasteland of McDonalds and Chinese takeout.  To put it bluntly, “it’s not that we don’t care or understand, it’s that we’re poor.”

Between Anderson Cooper, Bono, and the New York Times deigning to (at least briefly) put a story about famine on the front page, it seems the world has finally taken notice of the unfolding disaster in the Horn of Africa.

It is about DAMN time.  The US Agency for [...]]]>

entrance to Dadaab refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya

Between Anderson Cooper, Bono, and the New York Times deigning to (at least briefly) put a story about famine on the front page, it seems the world has finally taken notice of the unfolding disaster in the Horn of Africa.

It is about DAMN time.  The US Agency for International Development (USAID) created the Famine Early Warning System (FEWS) in the wake of famines in Ethiopia in 1984-85, in an attempt to predict future famines and mitigate their impact.  Unfortunately, all the alarms in the world do no good if no one is paying attention when they go off.  Since January, aid agencies on the ground have cautioned that failing rains could mean drought and famine for a huge swath of people in East Africa.

Which brings us to today.  The rains did fail, and the current drought is the worst since 1950.

Famine is not a word thrown around lightly in the humanitarian sphere.  Much like “genocide,” there are  specific metrics that have to be met for an incident to qualify.  In the case of famine, the UN has three concurrent conditions that must be met:

First, 20 per cent of the population must have fewer than 2100 [calories] of food available per day. Secondly, more than 30 per cent of children must be acutely malnourished. And finally, two deaths per day in every 10,000 people – or four deaths per day in every 10,000 children – must be being caused by lack of food.

In some areas of Somalia, including parts of Mogadishu, the death rate for kids under 5 is 13 per 10,000- roughly the equivalent of ten percent of kids under five dying every three months.

Estimated food security conditions, August-September 2011. The darker the color, the higher the hunger level

Somalia is far and away in the worst shape, particularly southern Somalia — the area not-so-coincidentally controlled by the Shabab, an al-Qaueda affiliated group the U.S. classifies as a terrorist organization.  Thankfully, the Obama administration relaxed its sanctions against the Shabab. Humanitarian organizations often have to bribe the militias to gain access to the areas they control, and without relaxing the rules, those same organizations could be prosecuted for giving material support to terrorists.  This is not unilaterally good news though.  In an effort to eliminate all Western influences, the Shabab have gone so far as to kill aid workers and refuse Western food humanitarian assistance.

Right now, there are roughly 12 million people in need of immediate assistance.  Some have made it to refugee camps in Kenya (Dadaab) and Ethiopia (Dollo Ado).  Many others have not been so lucky.  With their own levels of hunger rising, Kenya and Ethiopia are not necessarily in the best position to provide food, medical care, and shelter for the refugees that do make it over the border.

Meanwhile, back in the US, the Republican-controlled congress is still trying to severely cut, if not outright eliminate, funds for emergency food aid.

This week, G.D. and Joel are joined by the always-insightful Jay Smooth of IllDoctrine, Donwill of the critically acclaimed hip-hop group Tanya Morgan, and Wyatt Cenac of “The Daily Show,” to talk about Michael Rapaport’s documentary on A Tribe Called Quest, “Beats Rhymes and Life.” You’ll also learn about Wyatt’s secret crooner past and Bushwick Bill’s gospel [...]]]>

This week, G.D. and Joel are joined by the always-insightful Jay Smooth of IllDoctrine, Donwill of the critically acclaimed hip-hop group Tanya Morgan, and Wyatt Cenac of “The Daily Show,” to talk about Michael Rapaport’s documentary on A Tribe Called Quest, “Beats Rhymes and Life.” You’ll also learn about Wyatt’s secret crooner past and Bushwick Bill’s gospel rap career. Some salty language.

Listen to the podcast here on the blog (and subscribe on iTunes). Click once to play, click again to download. (Some salty language.)

PostBourgie: The Podcast – #19: Beats, Rhymes & Life.

Key Links:

Oh look, another article about who black women should be dating.  Great.

Our own jbouie on last night’s debate.

A new poll finds that only 34 percent of Americans would be able to find $1,000 in their savings account if they needed to.

And lastly, your Friday cute.

Have a good weekend [...]]]> Without further ado, “Otis”:

Oh look, another article about who black women should be dating.  Great.

Our own jbouie on last night’s debate.

A new poll finds that only 34 percent of Americans would be able to find $1,000 in their savings account if they needed to.

And lastly, your Friday cute.

Have a good weekend y’all.

I’m also not going to mention that this is (at least) the second time she’s been on a soundtrack with a song that is possibly better than the movie.  On to the leftovers:

Black women bike too.

Derailing [...]]]> I’m not going to venture an opinion on The Help other than to say Mary J. is at it again:

I’m also not going to mention that this is (at least) the second time she’s been on a soundtrack with a song that is possibly better than the movie.  On to the leftovers:

Black women bike too.

Derailing for dummies: how to converse with marginalized people.

Speaking of dummies, those bottled water ads aren’t fooling anyone.

Why Rick Perry is going to the White House.

When I say I hate you… this is what I mean.

Well, first, let me clarify:  I hate bad spoken word.  The “I’m deep by sound and headwrap and ankh tattoo alone” spoken word.  The “as long as I say something about Africa, this is a good poem” spoken word.  The affected cadence.  The [...]]]>

Image via Nerdsatthecooltable.com

When I say I hate you… this is what I mean.

Well, first, let me clarify:  I hate bad spoken word.  The “I’m deep by sound and headwrap and ankh tattoo alone” spoken word.  The “as long as I say something about Africa, this is a good poem” spoken word.  The affected cadence.  The wildly unnecessary rap hands.  The circle jerking crowd that thinks itself cultured because it goes to open mics.  I hate it.  I abhor it.

That said, not ALL spoken word is bad spoken word.

But that said, like 98% of spoken word is completely horrible.  That includes what you’re about to listen to.

Some backstory:  So my life is kind of amazing.  There is some phenomenon at work here recently that finds my decidedly non-religious self in the midst of Christian functions.  It’s amazing!  I don’t know how it happens!  Not that I mind.  Me & Jesus are cool.   I just think it’s interesting that it happens so much lately.

Last Friday, I went to see my good buddy at a local open mic that included comedy, music, and poetry.  This particular performer—let’s simply refer to her as Bee—went last.  It was surreal.. she started off with a weird comedy set that included her squatting down in the middle of the room to demonstrate how babies are made (NOTE:  THIS IS AT A CHRISTIAN FUNCTION), then went into this bizarre spoken word piece about sex, cereal and candy bars (REMINDER:  STILL A CHRISTIAN SHOW) in which she randomly sings old R&B songs throughout.

My favorite part?  When the band gives her the “Wrap It Up, B” music at the end (I had to cut it off because she says her name at the end, but make no mistake—that band was NOT giving her backup.  They played gradually louder as she talked for another minute and a half at the end).  Listen below.

Bee Does Freaky Cereal Christian Spoken Word.