Childish Gambino - This is America (Official Video)

[Json]

The symbols he decided to use were purposely black. Can't ignore the symbolism he chose or the lyrics he decided to use. As you said it's a package.

Right a package. Containing multiple things to make a whole. Pulling something out would look weird or odd without the rest of it.

You gonna put a table together with three legs and say it doesn't look like a table when there's a fourth leg still in the box?

The absence of a "white person" doesn't negate racism symbolism. A movie about the effects of Nazi Germany without a Hitler figure doesn't negate Nazism.

Y'all wanna add a bunch of shyt to try to make it deep or to fit what you want it to be.

Or you can admit your interpretation isn't what other people see and that's fine. That's what art is.

You seem butthurt your opinion is a vast minority.

 

[GoldenGlove]

The song isn’t a bad song. It is not a good song.

This is black-struggle porn

Grasping for white acceptance.

I like Donald, but this isn’t it.

Don’t y’all get tired of trying to show to others what we face? Who is this video for?

What are we learning from this?

There’s not even any white people doing these acts of violence

 

[MeachTheMonster]

Right a package. Containing multiple things to make a whole. Pulling something out would look weird or odd without the rest of it.

You gonna put a table together with three legs and say it doesn't look like a table when there's a fourth leg still in the box?

The absence of a "white person" doesn't negate racism symbolism. A movie about the effects of Nazi Germany without a Hitler figure doesn't negate Nazism.

It's not just the lack of white people. It's his purposeful depiction of the protagonist/villain being a shucking and jiving black person. The lyrics of the song being aimed at "black man"

This tells me where he wants to direct the conversation.

Or you can admit your interpretation isn't what other people see and that's fine. That's what art is.

You seem butthurt your opinion is a vast minority.

Twitter consensus is nothing to hang your hat on.

You sound like a 12 year old

 

[Json]

It's not just the lack of white people. It's his purposeful depiction of the protagonist/villain being a shucking and jiving black person. The lyrics of the song being aimed at "black man"

This tells me where he wants to direct the conversation.

That fact you're describing traditional African dance moves a shucking and jiving tells me we aren't going anywhere with this.

Twitter consensus is nothing to hang your hat on.

You sound like a 12 year old

You sound like you don't understand how to express actual artistic constructive criticism that isn't "I don't like because I only care about what I literally see"


Bye.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

That fact you're describing traditional African dance moves a shucking and jiving tells me we aren't going anywhere with this.

That shyt wasn't traditional African dance. It was the current popular dances black kids are doing and literal shuckin and Jiving.

The fact that you don't even know what the fukk you are looking at tells me you are just jumping on the "that's so deep/great" bandwagon without taking the time to understand what the hell is going on.

You sound like you don't understand how to express actual artistic constructive criticism that isn't "I don't like because I only care about what I literally see"


Bye.

The hell are you even saying here? You critique art about what's there. Not what you want to be there.

 

[Black Bolt]

That shyt wasn't traditional African dance. It was the current popular dances black kids are doing and literal shuckin and Jiving.

.

I have no horse in this race so get me involved with your back and forth but he quite clearly hits the gwara gwara multiple occasions. It's a SA dance.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

I have no horse in this race so get me involved with your back and forth but he quite clearly hits the gwara gwara multiple occasions. It's a SA dance.

It's not a "traditional African dance" it's a modern popular dance just like the Stanky leg or something like that

 

[brownsugah]

“This Is America” by Childish Gambino Review | Pitchfork

Dunno if it's been posted but Pitchfork awarded it 'Best New Track'.

 

[JahBuhLun]

That shyt wasn't traditional African dance. It was the current popular dances black kids are doing and literal shuckin and Jiving.

The fact that you don't even know what the fukk you are looking at tells me you are just jumping on the "that's so deep/great" bandwagon without taking the time to understand what the hell is going on.


The hell are you even saying here? You critique art about what's there. Not what you want to be there.

There's different ways to critique art; you can critique the technical aspect, basically what you see. You can look at it from a metaphorical viewpoint; as in what is the representation of what we are seeing, or not seeing.

If I paint a picture of a rose, you can critique it on if you liked the way I painted it, my technique, does it look enough like a rose to you. Or you can ask the question, Why did he paint the rose? what does it represent? why did he paint the rose that color? Does the rose represent beauty?, life, death,?

Sometimes it's just a rose, sometimes it's more. A lot of good artists leave their art to interpretation, making it more inclusive.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

There's different ways to critique art; you can critique the technical aspect, basically what you see. You can look at it from a metaphorical viewpoint; as in what is the representation of what we are seeing, or not seeing.

If I paint a picture of a rose, you can critique it on if you liked the way I painted it, my technique, does it look enough like a rose to you. Or you can ask the question, Why did he paint the rose? what does it represent? why did he paint the rose that color? Does the rose represent beauty?, life, death,?

Sometimes it's just a rose, sometimes it's more. A lot of good artists leave their art to interpretation, making it more inclusive.

Obviously I get that.

But your interpretation should be based on the material at hand. We acknowledge all the other symbolism in the video, but people in this thread want to pretend the killer wasn't deliberately black.

 

[trillanova]

It was enough to make me think and run it back a few times. I don't know about genius but it's definitely something to ponder on. There are many ways you can take it but this is good artistic vision at work.

 

[JahBuhLun]

Obviously I get that.

But your interpretation should be based on the material at hand. We acknowledge all the other symbolism in the video, but people in this thread want to pretend the killer wasn't deliberately black.

I see what you're saying, the deeper question is, what was he killing, a part of himself, or a part of Black culture as whole. I thought it was dope how after he shot the people, the beat would change.

 

[Pegasus Jackson]

I gotta give it to this corny nikka. He got talent..

HOWEVER.. excised from the video, the song is half-baked and not nearly as deep as people are making it to be.

BLACK FOLKS GOT GUNS!

BLACK FOLKS KILL OTHER BLACK FOLKS!

DA WHITE MAN RACIST!

wash and repeat.

 

[MeachTheMonster]

I see what you're saying, the deeper question is, what was he killing, a part of himself, or a part of Black culture as whole. I thought it was dope how after he shot the people, the beat would change.

To me it seems he was placing some of the blame of the recent popular(for lack of a better word)killings on black peoples disinterest and propensity to dance/party/get money.

Which to me is parroting a stereotype oft used by Fox News type cacs.

 

[trillanova]

I gotta give it to this corny nikka. He got talent..

HOWEVER.. excised from the video, the song is half-baked and not nearly as deep as people are making it to be.

BLACK FOLKS GOT GUNS!

BLACK FOLKS KILL OTHER BLACK FOLKS!

DA WHITE MAN RACIST!

wash and repeat.

That wasn't really how I interpreted it. I got that he was saying America is out of control period and being a black man at the center of it is an everyday thing. He put himself in the midst of the chaos. Like everything is spiraling out of control but for black folk we've been dealing with this shyt.

The cool part of this piece is that depending on where you're sitting, you get something different from it, which is why it's real art..