#truthhour

[hkbfinn]

Its only when you have been disconnected for a while do you begin to recognise Media is a powerful narcotic & trap designed to socially condition us into active dormancy & promote virtual activism. Even this quote falls into the same trap within a trap...❁

HKB FiNN (justjazzjazzvisuals.com)

[hkbfinn]

Mainstream vs Underground in 2017

When I was a teen, we only had temporary spaces to call our own. These were called ‘underground’ spaces. We knew you can have fun or find deep pleasures following a style or sound or look or feel of something in the ‘underground’ scene of your choice but we also knew the boogie man of mainstreaming was always on the hunt & ready to come & ruin whatever you’re doing. We didn’t know why, we just knew thats how it was.

Back then I didn’t understand that we lived inside the confines of a cultural hegemony that had us & our parents as its prisoners. I didn’t fully understand how it used economics, racism, gerrymandering & cultural appropriation to keep us trapped & fixated on our oppression & never on the practicality of becoming free.

Despite being trapped by it, I didn’t quite know how to articulate our situation except to describe it as underground (Us) & mainstream (Them).

Mainstream was always a hostile place. It treated our history with contempt, portrayed only dehumanised versions of us & actively sought to disregard & delegitimise our humanity.

Underground was always a friendly space. It was a place to be free, to breathe, to laugh, to love, to cry, to dance, to chill, to be with kindred, to find solace & to find peace.

Those of us in the creative vein poured ourselves into Arts & Culture only to have our temporary spaces, our fragmented spaces: hijacked, misrepresented & diluted by the very powers we were resisting. They always came led by their fascination & always left with our creativity in their pockets. So we on the ‘underground’ always had to keep moving from one temporary space to another & keep reinventing our expressions because our freedom-to-be depended on the one thing the mainstream hated: separation on our terms.

Overtime, the internet came & everything seemed to change. We finally had a universal space to call our own & for once we could build something at a higher standard & reach all our kindred because there was something inherent in the neutrality of the world wide web.

But it was a false hope because as with all previous safe spaces we dared to call our own, cultural hegemony soon encroached on our expressions & since the moment we went online, many of us never invested in any other form of independence & so we found ourselves either surrounded by mainstreamers or feeling adrift once again, battling against the raging sea of conformity, disrespect & indifference. Ironically, those who could afford to run soon reverted to tradition & ran for cover.

For everyone who cannot afford to run or swim away or live a life outside of the new mainstream curated spaces like social media, they had to tolerate having no spaces to freely express our inherent humanity. We had to find solace in the mainstream. We had the most difficult task of all because for the first time in years, the children of those who cannot run are seeing young people with no concept of anything that isn’t mainstream.

Some of these young people do not understand the traditions of underground economics, underground expressions or any underground art movements. Most troubling is how difficult it is for some young people born in this internet era to find who they are because the mainstream barely acknowledges them. For some, if it isn’t on google, it does not exist? Right?

But like all previous generations, I am confident these young people will eventually find or create or curate new safe spaces & find time to enjoy what it feels like to have something for yourself away from the blandness of a society that wants you to work & die for it & not live & love for yourself. I call that society: mainstreaming.

I believe young people will find ways to detach themselves from mainstream curated virtuality, if only as a way to find temporary freedom.

I believe in you young people. As a veteran of many underground scenes, I know in my heart, you’ve got this…❁

HKB FiNN (www.justjazzvisuals.com)

[hkbfinn]

Fight the power or get crushed by it...❁

HKB FiNN

(www.justjazzvisuals.com)

[hkbfinn]

You will never prosper building your business in someone else’s platform. The odds against you are too great. Start investing in you. Literally…❁

HKB FiNN

(www.justjazzvisuals.com)

[hkbfinn]

How many relationships do you have to break before realising it’s you?

When you go beyond just being broken both conceptually & emotionally to embrace a new form of cognitive dissonance that allows you to formulate relationships that ultimately are pre-destined to failure (because you refuse to acknowledge being broken in the first place), you’re very much a broken soul.

That way, anyone you’re with will have to navigate your bullshit while deluding themselves its actually them, only to realise it was you all along. Just hanging around good people with your delusional mindset (Thinking; there’s nothing wrong with me, yet I am a mess that is somehow perfect in every relationship), is simply you waiting to make good people toxic like you.

You lie to yourself about how destructive your brokenness actually is, just so you can lure someone else into your pit of doom & slowly consume them.

So yes, you’ve upgraded being broken into a sadistic, corrosive & poisonous life style. All while pretending its not you, it’s them. So how many relationships do you have to break before accepting it’s you? Huh? Hmmm...❁

HKB FiNN

(www.justjazzvisuals.com)

[sheedbert]

#TruthHour #HigherQuestion https://www.instagram.com/p/Bocvr83HKiQ/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=hpsrljeacpqk

[poeticnubia]

Las Vegas!!! Come out and spend some time with me Wednesday, May 16th. I’ll be featuring at the Truth Hour. It’s going to be a fabulous and inspiring experience. #TruthHour #Poetry #SpokenWord #Poets #PoeticNubia #Feature #LasVegas @relldatruth @nailahmm @dj_nowlater (at The Truth Spot LV Social Club)

[sheedbert]

#TruthHour