TWO STIRRING ANTHEMS

TWO STIRRING ANTHEMS

“If your voice held no power they wouldn’t try to silence you.”
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These past few months have been full of news that makes you despair, so much that you don’t want to know what’s going on, but every once in a while somebody does something that makes you think we’re not going to hell in a hand basket after all–or anyway not going quite so fast.

Today it’s musicians–two separate songs that you have to hear (and see) to fully appreciate. First, a Portland State University student, Madison Hallberg, was standing outside recording the National Anthem for her school’s virtual graduation, when a young African-American guy happened by and joined her.

Only it wasn’t just any young man. It was Emmanuel Henrick, a classical music and opera singer. The result was magical:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2V0rG_4Ax4

(if this link doesn’t work, google Portland State University National Anthem)

The second song was from the Dixie Chicks, or rather, the Chicks. The group has dropped the word “Dixie” from their name because of its overtones of slavery and the Confederacy. “We want to meet this moment,” they said. That was a constructive action at this moment when Confederate statues are coming down and NASCAR is banning the Confederate flag, but by itself it’s not what restored my faith in humanity. It’s the video they just released that did it.

It’s called “March March,” and the song is great, talking about how every person is an army of one, a phrase borrowed from the U.S. Army’s ads, and then explaining how single individuals, banded together, can form movements that change the world, but it’s the visuals that are so incredible.

The video begins with the quote, “If your voice held no power they wouldn’t try to silence you” and then shows us footage of a single black man, dancing in front of a line of police in riot gear and then to a lone woman waving a rainbow flag.

There are shots of the last four weeks’ protests and then of marches and protests through the years, from those of suffragettes to the Women’s March the day after Trump was inaugurated, connecting Black Lives Matter to the long tradition of marching for rights and against injustice.

They’re all here: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s March on Washington, the Colored Women Voters, Gay Liberation, Black Liberation, anti-Vietnam and Iraq War rallies, and protests against lynchings and mass shootings and fossil fuels, and for the ERA and school desegregation and women’s and LGBTQ rights.” So are the signs they carried: “Peace” and “March for Our Lives” and “Black Trans Lives Matter” and “Men Will Never Be Free Till Women Are” and “Race Prejudice is the Offspring of Ignorance and the Mother of Lynchings” and “I am Stronger than Fear.” And a sign reading, “I Matter,” held up by a five-year-old boy.

There are videos of the violence these protesters have faced, and pictures of the courageous people who’ve led those protests are here, too–Greta Thunberg and Gloria Steinem and Malala Yousafzai and Emma Gonzalez and the Parkland Kids. Plus the names of all the black lives snuffed out by the police, starting with George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery and ending with Emmett TillIt has given another chance to the ED patients discount buy viagra to live a passionate sexual life. Read what is offered and make sure that he does not face the same issue again and again or direly (counting amid cialis samples visit now the center of the night). on line cialis There is no permanent and forever cure for this sickness, specifically in conditions where the standard treatment has been deferred. Here, the man has to face problems in your http://amerikabulteni.com/2011/07/16/chavez-surprises-with-plan-to-return-to-get-chemotherapy-in-cuba/ levitra online relationship as you will be unable to reach an orgasm. . And all in a four-minute music video.

After the song ends there’s a list of organizations to contact, including Black Lives Matter, the Native American Rights Fund, and the Innocence Project.

This isn’t the first time the Chicks have spoken out. In 2003, nine days before the U.S. invaded Iraq, they told their audience at a concert in England, “Just so y’all know, we’re ashamed the President of the United States is from Texas.”

That one remark cost them heavily, nearly destroying their careers. Country music stations banned them from the airwaves, fans boycotted them, Toby Keith called them traitors, and they endured booing audiences and death threats.

Nevertheless, they persisted, refusing to apologize for being disrespectful, saying, “The President doesn’t deserve any respect,” and releasing a song called “Not Ready to Make Nice” and an album called “Shut Up and Sing.” They protested the convictions of the West Memphis Three, and did benefits for LGBTQ and hurricane relief and Vote for Change. And now they’ve released “March March.”

It’s a song of hope and resolve and pride, and a stirring call to action. I predict “March March” will become an anthem for protesters and marchers, taking its place alongside “We Shall Overcome” and “Bread and Roses” and “The Times They Are A’Changin’.”

It’s simply an amazing video. But my description can’t really do it justice. You need to see it for yourself:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwBjF_VVFvE

#Black Lives Matter

Connie Willis