The "Black" National Anthem

Mame wrote:

No, Drewdad - it's just been used so much lately, like a buzz word... made me wonder how out of touch I am.

Are you feeling uneasy about it? Do you fear being out of touch? Because if you do, you're feeling creepy about the word creepy, which I find incredibly philosophical of you.

As to Bear's question, my opinion is that rituals aren't about being creative and expressing oneself. Their purpose is to provide rigidity, not creativity. They exist to give an enduring formal framework to the event they're part of. Of course, flexibility and creativity do have their place. And if the city had decided to abolish the ritual from their proceedings, I would have sympathized with them. But to have a ritual, to agree to take part in it, and then improvise it ad hoc into something else -- that, I have little patience with.

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thank you Thomas...

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I agree with you Thomas. I actually love the song she chose, but not there and not in that setting for the reasons you stated.

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so BBB and ebrown are okay with it.

thomas and jpb feel it was inappropriate.

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Mayor John Hickenlooper? What kinda name is that for a mayor of Denver? Probably a democrat. I hope everyone understands that Dr. James Dobson lives just 65 miles south of Denver and has to tolerate a democrat mayor named Hickenlooper.

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I also have an issue with what is clearly a hymn being sung as the opening of the State of the City address. I'm seldom one to harp on minor separation of church and state concerns, but her choice was closer to an invocation than an opening for a secular event.

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I understand the point Thomas is making. I think it is understandable that people get upset when a ritual (especially a "sacred" one) is violated.

However, I tend to think sometimes people need to be upset (especially when it involves a "sacred" ritual).

Society has often benefited from people rocking the boat. That being said, I don't think this particular instance was either that important, or that scandalous.

The important point here is that making the the singing of the national anthem into a religious ritual that shalt not be violated is silly.

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Thomas wrote:

But to have a ritual, to agree to take part in it, and then improvise it ad hoc into something else -- that, I have little patience with.

agreed...it has nothing to do with whether the song was right or wrong. She accepted to sing the national anthem. She should have asked those that requested the honor of her singing there before she took that liberty of changing it. The Black National Anthem is a beautiful and meaningful song. The problem is not shaking things up, or the song itself.

If I was asked to do a specific job and went in and changed what I did without asking first...I would expect to be criticized.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK8z8oWERMk

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dyslexia wrote:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK8z8oWERMk

They thought they were hiring a singer when they approached her?

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mismi wrote:

Thomas wrote:
But to have a ritual, to agree to take part in it, and then improvise it ad hoc into something else -- that, I have little patience with.

agreed...it has nothing to do with whether the song was right or wrong. She accepted to sing the national anthem. She should have asked those that requested the honor of her singing there before she took that liberty of changing it. The Black National Anthem is a beautiful and meaningful song. The problem is not shaking things up, or the song itself.

If I was asked to do a specific job and went in and changed what I did without asking first...I would expect to be criticized.

Not by me. You could sing the star spangled banner off-key, naked and covered in chocolate and whipped cream and I would still not criticize you for it. In fact, why don't you do that, so I can prove myself?

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ebrown_p wrote:

Society has often benefited from people rocking the boat.

But in all these cases people have been rocking the boat openly. This is not Rosa Parks sitting in front of a segregated bus. This is like an alternative history in which Rosa Parks says "okay, I agree to sit in the back of the bus", and then sneaks her way to the front. Such sneakiness would have doomed the positive change that the actual Rosa Parks affected by her boat-rocking.

Rocking the boat may move society forward sometimes. Making engagements and then breaking them for no good reason doesn't.

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You say the sweetest things Kicky...you wait right here...going to get the chocolate and whipped cream.

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I'm feeling patriotic already...

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JPB wrote:

I also have an issue with what is clearly a hymn being sung as the opening of the State of the City address. I'm seldom one to harp on minor separation of church and state concerns, but her choice was closer to an invocation than an opening for a secular event.

I suppose, then, that you would feel pretty uncomfortable if anybody sang all four stanzas of the Star Spangled Banner. The fourth stanza is particularly iffy:

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation, Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the Heav'n - rescued land Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserved us a nation. Then conquer we must, for our cause is just, And this be our motto--"In God is our trust." And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave. This doesn't just glorify your neoconservative foreign policy that's currently freaking out the world, it also comes awfully close to hymn territory.

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Quite honestly, I never knew there was more than just the first verse. No one sings past the first...would get a little tedious I would think...but that's just me....

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mismi wrote:

Quite honestly, I never knew there was more than just the first verse. No one sings past the first...would get a little tedious I would think...but that's just me....

That's what I get from all native-born Americans I meet. To me personally, the lyrics of the first stanza didn't make sense as a standalone text. After all, it ends with an unanswered question. It seemed obvious to me, then, that there had to be further stanzas that answered the question posed in the first.

But this way of thinking -- that the words in a national anthem actually mean something, and that this meaning is worth understanding, appears to be a specialty of immigrants. Seen this way, it comes as no surprise that it was an immigrant who wrote the best text interpretation of your national anthem I have read so far.

So in the spirit of the Fourth of July, here is Isaac Asimov's All Four Stanzas. It's only four pages, and it's well worth the five minutes it takes to read it.

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Thank you Thomas...

you know...it must just be one of those things you just don't even think about anymore because it is heard so often. Before every game ever played etc...

Nice to stop and actually look and comprehend what it means every once in a while.

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Thomas wrote:

JPB wrote:
I also have an issue with what is clearly a hymn being sung as the opening of the State of the City address. I'm seldom one to harp on minor separation of church and state concerns, but her choice was closer to an invocation than an opening for a secular event.

I suppose, then, that you would feel pretty uncomfortable if anybody sang all four stanzas of the Star Spangled Banner. The fourth stanza is particularly iffy:
Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand Between their loved homes and the war's desolation, Blest with vict'ry and peace, may the Heav'n - rescued land Praise the Pow'r that hath made and preserved us a nation. Then conquer we must, for our cause is just, And this be our motto--"In God is our trust." And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.
This doesn't just glorify your neoconservative foreign policy that's currently freaking out the world, it also comes awfully close to hymn territory.

My neoconservative foreign policy?

And, yes, I would be equally uncomfortable with the last verse.

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It is sad that patriotism and bigotry are so often linked (although I doubt Asimov had anything to do with the all-caps rant tacked on at the end).

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The "Black" National Anthem

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