A neo-Jacobin

Cameron, stop picking on black music! You get me?

Here we go again, yet another white man having-a-go at black music, and, this seems to be the obvious main problem with David Camerons latest utterings. Cameron went out of his way to single out Radio 1's hip-hop dj Tim Westwood, and accused him of playing the kind of music that 'encourages people to carry guns and knives'

Reggae artist Doctah X, the co-founder of the Black Music Council, put it best while defending reggae music against Peter Tachell censorious interference "We've had enough, you get me?", I agree. For years I've been told that reggae dancehall music, jungle music, hip-hop music (black music in general) has some imaginary power that turns it's audience into some sort of pogrom. Apparently, no sooner than we hear the lyrics of Beenie Man, or the Wu-Tang Clan, we have this unstoppable urge to put a knife in our pockets and cause the most amount of trouble.

The underlying assumption of Cameron's notion seems to be that the people who do listen to dancehall reggae, or hard core hip-hop are so ignorant that just might go out and get themselves a gun or a knife. Firstly, I'd like to know what business is it of Cameron to dictate to Radio 1 about what they should or shouldn't play - and, secondly, why is he picking on black music alone? Would he prefer if black music artists dressed up in monster outfits and sang about Satanism instead? Cameron would like to be percieved as some sort of 'radical', but he reminds me more of the Mary Whitehouse blue-rinse school of politics - just like that the old-fashioned censor, who tried to get Frankie Goes to Hollywood banned all because she thought the lyrical content could turn nice striaght boys into raving queers.

Cameron doesn't seem to care very much about the notion of freedom either - he needs reminding that real freedom is supposed to means putting up with music that we don't even particularly like.

posted by Courtney Hamilton @ 12:38 PM