Wisdom to the Child

“Issa” Clip de Dobet Gnahoré�
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This song, “Issa,” is from the 2007 album Na Afriki by Dobet Gnahoré, from Côte d’Ivoire. I do not know Malinke, the language this song is sung in, though I certainly wish I did. Perhaps I will learn that language one day. Meanwhile, I found the imagery in this video so striking that I was moved to comment on it. Those who have the liner notes to this album, or who know malinke, feel free to correct my interpretations.

It seems that the child is approached both lovingly and anxiously by Dobet and the other woman in this video. I assume the boy’s name is Issa. He is the focal point of affection and what I perceive to be wisdom-teaching from the mother(s). Yet his future – particularly as a young Afrikan – will surely be uncertain. Will he even heed the advice of his elders? Is he even listening to them in the first place?

The Afrikan woman loves her child so. But here, the mother and her sister/ friend shake their heads in quiet dread. They want the best for him, but the world is not the best. And it will not be up to them to get Issa to want the best of and for himself.

What does this mean? One generation can’t easily prevent the suffering of the next, despite their best wishes. It will take more than one mother imparting wisdom onto one child for the next generation to make more progress, on a human scale, for a more beneficent existence in their lives.

Generations of Afrikans being born today and recently have been offered a worse world, and worse prospects and opportunities, by the preceding generations, so they won’t rise easily. Fathers and mothers have to be wiser, so young ones are more confident in themselves. The mass of doubt the elders share between themselves, outside the presence of Issa, won’t do the boy any good. Issa must know that trouble is everywhere, and not be shielded or sheltered from the suffering of the world and of his own peers, nor from the fact that all that suffering is in part due to the actions of his parents’ generation. Issa didn’t ask to be born, so tell him all the truth. That way he will be a stronger Afrikan and will know what the precedents of current conditions are so as to affect means to create conditions which promise a better future today and tomorrow.

To the young black Afrikan youth all over the world! Take heed and get smart!

Domestic Violence – Folly of Man

Girl: You ain’t shit your daddy ain’t shit
your brother ain’t shit your money ain’t shit
your lab ain’t shit your rings ain’t shit
your gear ain’t shit your jewels ain’t shit
your kicks ain’t shit nigga your whips ain’t shit
Bobby you ain’t shit nigga I’m the shit
you ain’t shit your daddy ain’t shit
your brother ain’t shit your money ain’t shit
your lab ain’t shit your rings ain’t shit
your gear ain’t shit, your jewels ain’t shit
your kicks ain’t shit, your whips ain’t shit
Bobby, you ain’t shit, nigga I’m the shit
you ain’t shit, your daddy ain’t shit
your brother ain’t shit, your money ain’t shit
your lab ain’t shit, Bobby you ain’t shit
your rings ain’t shit, your gear ain’t shit
your jewels ain’t shit, your kicks ain’t shit
your whips ain’t shit, nigga, I’m the shit
You ain’t shit, your daddy ain’t shit
your brother ain’t shit, your money ain’t shit
your lab ain’t shit, your rings ain’t shit
your gear ain’t shit, your jewels ain’t shit
your kicks ain’t shit, your whips ain’t shit
nigga, I’m the shit…

Comment: The culmination of interpersonal hatred and the disparaging of human worth. Human beings don’t ask to be born. Much less do we ask to be told, “we ain’t shit.” Of course, we ain’t shit. We’ll all pass on down the hill before long, many of us not even having realized our full potential, many of us far too soon. This existence – so ephemeral, like snow just before spring. And as First Sergeant Welsh told Private Witt in the 1998 film The Thin Red Line, “in this world, a man, himself, is nothing. And there ain’t no world, but this one.”

In the Dhammapada, the Buddha says that there is no person in this world who is universally praised or universally chastised. We ain’t all that, no matter what we think. To get rid of ego is very healthy, to get rid of vanity leads to clarity, to get rid of narcissism dispels delusion, to eliminate self-importance is the road to health. We ain’t shit. All we are is what we are.

One still must deal, though, with the biting words up above. “You ain’t shit, nigga I’m the shit.” What if I don’t want to be “the shit?” What if I just want to be a human being? Fame, glory, riches, none of those things move me. I only want to give my life for the betterment of humanity, especially Afrikans. All I know is the world mostly sucks, that I’m a part of it, and therefore I can play some roll in overturning the suckiness of this world. This is something like the Bodhisattva’s vow (to unselfishly enlighten sentient beings). But I don’t consider myself enlightened either. I’m just the world’s student, a work in progress, humble and trying.

“You ain’t shit.” Human beings, in pairing up, may come to hate each other such that their hatred is of a magnitude many times more intense than the heat of the sun. Is such an outcome necessary? I think not. It is total misfortune when it occurs; it brings down families, children, communities, nations, and civilizations.

As humans, we mostly seek affection; we seek validation. The patriarchy of men, which leads to the oppression of women, all too often messes up our chances of seeing each other as human beings, as potential bearers of greatness. The arrogance of men – it says to women that they “ain’t shit” every day of the week. It’s wrong, it’s pompous, and it leads to the destruction of relationships on up.

We should thus recognize correctly, “we ain’t shit.” When we wake up to the reality that we ain’t shit, we become everything. Then we can embrace one another in an atmosphere of openness, honesty and sincere motives. Yeah, I ain’t shit. I hope not to be doing stupid ugly crap that makes you have to remind me, your voice full of hatred, shaking with pain.