Ego Trippin’

 •  Bloggers  •  by XXL Staff  •  14 Comments

I, for lack of a better description, am a prick. Asshole, douchebag and whatever else Kanye crooned off-key on his ode to decadent opulence. In my weird, quasi-narcissistic world however, I oddly believe that’s what Malcolm, Rosa, Emmett and everybody else who took either a bullet to the chest, high-pressure water hose blast to the face, canine fangs in the ass and/or a Paddy wacker to the skull would have wanted me to be: an individual possessing a free, uninhibited form of thought that remains unfettered due to the abolishment of Jim Crow laws, able to do, think and feel what I want within the legal boundaries.

So I can take amusement at the idea that, on a day meant to celebrate the life and times of one Martin Luther King, Jr. was seemingly created not only to honor the legacy of a man instrumental in the cultural blending of the country, corporations also use it to offer mediocre products at marked-down prices, or as an excuse for the friendly neighborhood strip club to offer two-for-$20 lap dance specials.

I’m enthralled with, if not entirely in grasp of, the ideal of capitalism. Shit, I’ve thought about buying the cheapest swap meet kufi, loading up on 24-packs of Costco water bottles and jetting down to Crenshaw and Slauson to sling the shits for a dollar to passersby. So seeing “MLK-inspired” specials at K-Mart and the local African bootlegger offering a deal for the products that line his quilt is just… amazing. It shows to me that, despite our cultural differences, people will still come together when and trample the ever-loving shit out of each other to grab that last Wii on the shelf.

Martin had a dream that his children would live in a color-blind nation. The reality is, we live in a society where we’re judged by the contents of our wallets. Who would have thought that capitalism would be the tie that binds?

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  • http://rockthedub.com khal

    “The reality is, we live in a society where we’re judged by the contents of our wallets.”

    true indeed.

  • Colton

    yeah mek you tell em… even if everybody was the same color and practiced the same religion, people would still discriminate over wealth and the resulting social status… human race and peace can never coexist, were natural born haters.

  • abdulnasir

    For once you actually wrote something in a long while.

  • http://harlemworld.wordpress.com New HarlemWorld Order

    “waaa waaa- america is so bad – people with more money have more privileges than myself :(”

    its called social stratification & it’s been around since the fucking dawn of days

    stop feeling sorry for yourself nigga – you could be a crack baby or a fuckin child soldier in another world – you make a living from sitting on a fuckin chair and typing into a computer.

    malcolm & rosa had heart – something this country is losing because of pussies od’ing to kid cudi & mac miller

  • http://harlemworld.wordpress.com New HarlemWorld Order

    So seeing “MLK-inspired” specials at K-Mart and the local African bootlegger offering a deal for the products that line his quilt is just… amazing. It shows to me that, despite our cultural differences, people will still come together when and trample the ever-loving shit out of each other to grab that last Wii on the shelf.

    ^^^^

    THIS IS WHAT BUSINESSES DO

    ITS BUSINESS – ITS NOT ABOUT PEOPLES FEELINGS OR EMOTIONS

    You didn’t wait until Columbus Day to do this post – you deliberately waited till around MLK Day to post it

    Should you be called out for exploiting MLK Day to increase page impressions and to appear fakely deep?

    And for an African man, to shit on another African – even if he is a bootlegger – who is just trying make a dollar to feed his family shows you know nothing about struggle or capitalism for that matter.

    Rant over – you can continue your self righteous diatribe.

  • Don mcCaine

    meka is the oregano in a kush world…u know this dude is gonna hand u a bag of dirt when u see him

  • dunk

    people just can’t take the truth, hurts me to see these comments empathizing. capitalization off of once a symbol of struggle isn’t right. yes it happens but i won’t take “it’s something people do” for justification. ever.

    • http://harlemworld.wordpress.com New HarlemWorld Order

      I agree its wrong – but not everyone is like Meka who can afford to be self righteous and live life as a blogger due to their middle class roots. He singled out the immigrant bootlegger who is working hard and not Walmarts & Targets.

      And what about Christmas – the most corporate day/holiday in the calendar. Most people don’t care about what it’s supposed to symbolize. It’s exploited because a group of highly paid marketing executives come together to trade ideas on promotional pricing – loss leadership – discount pricing etc.

      He’s making it out into something it’s not.

  • http://teamwerk.tumblr.com thirstin more

    “So I can take amusement at the idea that, on a day meant to celebrate the life and times of one Martin Luther King, Jr. was seemingly created not only to honor the legacy of a man instrumental in the cultural blending of the country, corporations also use it to offer mediocre products at marked-down prices, or as an excuse for the friendly neighborhood strip club to offer two-for-$20 lap dance specials”

    ^ is this ongoing dribble of S.A.T. words supposed to be a sentence? get an editor, dunny.

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