November 06, 2008 | Tags: none

I know I haven’t been around much lately. I also know that I say that a lot. But in the past month or so, despite being busy with the usual school and work, I’ve been making it a point to get out and take some trips and catch up with people. And although it was nice to see some friends and some new scenery, there’s one constant theme that has presented itself at essentially every event or place I’ve gone to in the past month or two: unity.

I know that recently the internet has been filled with a bunch of twinkie-soft rambling about the election from usually-cynical bloggers and writers, and I hate to add to that (I am not a fan of sappiness), but this goes far beyond the election. Take, for instance, the radio show that went down on election night that I gave you a heads up about in my last post. An incredible amount of people showed up, and yet there was no bickering, arguing, etc. This is the DMV, people. The same region where I’m sure at one point in time most of us from here have complained about a lack of unity. Hell, I think Wale even drops lines about it in some of his tracks, but I just woke up and my quoting game hasn’t had its daily caffeine jumpstart yet. Forgive me.

The point is that various rappers and producers who are all trying their best to make a name for themselves in the music industry and live out their dreams put their personal goals to the side for a minute, took the spotlight off of themselves as individuals, and placed it on the group as a whole. It felt amazing to see artists from the District, Maryland, and Virginia all supporting one another for once. So props are due to everyone that came out, and to jben.ok and his Funkadelic Freestyles show for organizing everything and sharing his time and resources with so many people.

But it doesn’t stop there. Word that Obama had won the election came while everyone was in the studio. And while all of us were jumping around, screaming, and celebrating, I didn’t realize what was going on in the streets. And at this point I’ve learned that it wasn’t just in the streets of D.C. (where Obama won with 97% of the votes!), but it was happening all over the country. All over the world. Now, I haven’t been alive long enough to see a huge number of elections go down, but from the ones I can remember, the reaction to this one has been tremendously different than the ones that came before it. Of course this is significant because we have our first black (well, half?) President. But look at all the people that took to the streets. They were all ages, all walks of life, all colors, all religions. Everybody ran outside not to fight and riot, but to celebrate. To share the joy they were feeling. People took to the same streets of D.C. to celebrate where 40 years ago people were rioting and burning buildings to the ground after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Incredible.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying America is perfect yet. We all know there’s a lot to be improved upon around here and that the “unity” mind state still hasn’t gotten to everyone, but for at least one evening it felt like that was all put to the side and positivity prevailed. Even the news channels didn’t feel so depressing, for once.

I won’t bombard you with the detailed itinerary of the trips I’ve been taking recently, but I’ve been seeing people come together prior to this election, and not even for political reasons, from VA all the way up to New England, and everywhere in between. Whether it was to come together to make positive change, to learn from one another and attain knowledge, or to simply have a good time and celebrate, it’s nice to see people from so many different backgrounds come together and peacefully make themselves heard. Although I have dismal hopes for the immediate future of the economy, along with other political issues, I remain hopeful that as President for the next four (or eight?) years, Obama will be able to successfully change some people’s outlooks on races and cultures that differ from their own. That he can prove to all the people that called him a Muslim (which I still can’t understand how people believed) as if it was a bad thing, or didn’t vote for him simply because he has a little more melanin than they do, that thinking that way is doing nothing but holding us back. If nothing else but that gets accomplished in the next four years, I might be a very happy woman.

The views and opinions expressed in this blog are those of the writer and not necessarily those of HipHopDX.com or Cheri Media Group.

Loading Comments…

	November 2008
S	M	T	W	T	F	S
						1
2	3	4	5	6	7	8
9	10	11	12	13	14	15
16	17	18	19	20	21	22
23	24	25	26	27	28	29
30
« Oct					Dec »

Use these links on your blogs, messageboard posts, etc.
URL
HTML
BBCode

Your Name: (Required)
Friends Email Addresses: (Comma Seperated)
Message:
Verification Code:

© CHERI MEDIA GROUP All Rights Reserved
	Hip Hop Hip Hop News C & E Features Hitlist Release Dates Album Reviews Lyrics
	Community Blogs Message Board Chat Room DXNext Contests
	Media Audio Videos Mixtapes
	Lifestyle Features Parties & Pics Beauty & Brains Movies The Boondocks Video Games
	Fashion Features Men Women Toys
	Contact Us Intership Advertising Search Plugin Site Map Terms of Use Privacy Policy

Blogs

The Undisputed Truth

The Beauty of Unification

Share Blog Link

Loading Comments…

Enter verification code:

Note: Registered members are not required to verify posts. Click Here to register. Some BBcode and HTML may be stripped.