Essay 232

Cotton-picking Nonsense with MultiCultClassics Minutes…

• A Detroit middle school concert was revised after a Black parent complained over a featured song glorifying slavery. The tune was about picking cotton, with lyrics that included, “Jump down, turn around, pick a bale of cotton. Gotta jump down, turn around, Oh, Lordie, pick a bale a day.” Maybe the concert director will replace the number with a Stepin Fetchit routine.

• Derrick Mosley was convicted of attempting to extort $20,000 from gospel singer Deleon Richards (aka wife of NY Yankee slugger Gary Sheffield). Mosley allegedly had a videotape showing Richards having sex with R. Kelly and his wife. Holy shit! R. Kelly had sex with adult women?!

• 50 Cent is launching a line of hip-hop literature starring his former G-Unit crew. Bookstores across America are already beefing up security.

• Ice-T was slapped with a lawsuit for failing to pay Brother Marquis for co-writing “99 Problems” back in 1993. Brother Marquis must have a lot more than 99 problems if he’s suing the rapper-turned-actor for work produced over a decade ago.

• Three White female detectives in New York are suing over discrimination by a Black superior officer. The women claim they were denied choice assignments and promotions, which were ultimately given to minority counterparts. But then they went to work for Charlie, and the Angels leveraged it all into lucrative television and movie series.