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Guest Posts
Guest Post: The Left’s Answer to the Tea Party
Oct 7th
The Occupy Wall Street Movement that began in mid-September has now caught fire around the nation. This is truly a grassroots movement unlike the Tea-Baggers Party who is funded by the Koch brothers, and other Super PACs whose idea of progress continues to marginalize people of color, working class individuals and others who have not been privileged to become trained to be hedge fund managers, investment bankers or republican politicians. More >
Guest Opinion Post: Questioning the Death Penalty
Sep 23rd
Unfortunately last night the state of Georgia executed an innocent man, unfortunately for me this wasn’t the first time that I’ve seen or heard of an innocent man being put to death for a crime they didn’t commit by a “Criminal Justice System”. Living in Texas we have had a few innocent individuals be put to death by Mr. Bush, and Mr. Perry. I want to focus on Gary Graham. Mr. Graham was innocent of the crime he was put to death for like Mr. Troy Davis. Like Mr. Davis, there was no EVIDENCE to link Mr. Graham to the crime of murder, witnesses couldn’t credibly verify that Mr. Graham ”murdered” his “alleged victim” and unfortunately like Mr. Davis, Mr. Graham was not given a stay of execution. More >
[Guest Post] The BET Awards: What happened to good music?
Jun 28th
Sunday night brought around the annual showing of the BET Awards. I can appreciate the show for its historical context considering June is Black Music Month. I don’t support BET often as it has strayed far from the channel that it used to be in its golden age. However, my friend Bell made an interesting point that made me “glance” at it. He said that this awards show is one of the few times that this new generation can see truly great musical artists. I agree halfway with my dear brother on this point.
There seems to be a generational divide within the millennial group. Seems as if anyone born in the 90′s (possibly 1989) and later do not have the ability to appreciate good music. I make this statement based off of comments posted on various social networking platforms at the time the show was on. The most consistent thing I’ve said this year is that mediocrity is the new excellence and last night was evident of it. Commercialism, greed, and mainstream appeal are destroying our art forms. For example, I saw a few tweets that said Wayne should perform his single “How To Love”, a song where he’s “singing” but sounds more so like an auto-tuned cat being strangled. It also seems that people would rather hear sub-par lyrics from Rick Ross and nagging yelling from DJ Khaled, than to hear the whiskey soul infused voice of Jill Scott. How can this be? This is far from a genre preference argument, but rather quality vs. quantity. Just because Ross, Wayne, DJ Khaled, Trey Songz, Beyonce, etc are all you hear on the radio, is no indication that they are the best artists or even great artists. They are excellent at selling gimmicks and images and that’s it.
I cannot blame BET completely because they cater to what the masses are listening to. However, if a 15-year-old teenager by the name of Janita Patrick can write a letter in 2009 asking BET to step its quality up, I’m pretty sure some of you “grown” folks can do
the same. When are we going to return to a time when we supported ARTISTS who loved music and not jokes looking to get paid from one-hit magic? Artists such as Van Hunt, Ledisi, Jill Scott, Rahsaan Patterson, Aloe Blacc, Raheem Devaughn, Maxwell, Musiq, Mar, Mint Condition, Nas, the LOX, AZ, Common, Lupe Fiasco, Damien Marley, OutKast, Joe Budden, Clipse, Beanie Sigel, Slaughterhouse, various members of Wu Tang, and countless others are perfect examples of artists who truly love their craft and continue to make quality music. I beg all of you 90′s children (and quite a few 80′s babies) to please research musical roots before you start giving away crowns and titles so easily.
Guest Post: March Madness
Mar 16th
One of the goals over the next few weeks is to get some of my friends to get up and share their ideas with the world. One of my closest friends, sports-head and graduate student at Murray State, Francis “Aj” Niles hopefully will be sharing more of his insight here on the blog. This post was supposed to go up on Wednesday, but due to my travel schedule, birthday and the inaugural HBCU Awards it got pushed back. However, like everyone else since last Sunday we have been discussing the insanity of the current NCAA Mens Basketball tourney, something just isn’t right…. So, friends enjoy this blog and we’ll be rolling again soon!
March Madness. Two words in the English language that used to describe the annual NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament that begins every mid-March. It’s an annual right of spring. Bracketologists from all over the world proclaim to have an exact scientific way to predict who will win the tournament. The average sports fan will look to cheer for this year’s “Cinderella” to unexpectedly win games in the tournament and make it to the Final Four, which will take place this year in Houston, TX in April. In particular the first 3 rounds are the most exciting and bring in the most casual fans hoping to win those office pools. But the selection of the 68 teams who will participate in March Madness is never with out controversy.
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Guest Post: Pursuit of Elitism vs. Social Responsibility
Jan 26th
From time to time, I think we can all benefit from the varied perspectives of our close friends, family and associates. Today, I invited my friend Malcolm Jamal Lumpkins (“Capo”) to bring today’s entry. He is a student at North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. Presently he is very active in the Greensboro community, especially through Ignite Greensboro. Malcolm’s views on education, social responsibility and life are very much needed today and I thank him for agreeing to stop by today.
Look out for more posts from him here on BrandonBellamy.com and on his soon to be established blog.
Enjoy!
Pursuit of Elitism vs. Social Responsibility
My generation is growing up in a unique time in history. We are witnessing the very first minority President of the United States who identifies himself as an African American. We know the struggles that our people have dealt with since the 16th century and it is finally refreshing to see one of us on the largest stage of them all: the leader of the supposed free world.
With the rise of the President Obama, there seems to be an emerging selfish elitist attitude in our current generation. Before he was elected, I was already disgusted with this generation’s thoughts of money, power, and self. Now that disdain grows significantly with each passing day. When I originally came to college I assumed that everyone, especially at an HBCU, would have this sense of pride in the community, & be willing to help those less fortunate rise to the same opportunities that we have been blessed to receive. Boy was I wrong.
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