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Comment by hutzlibu | Hacker News Reader

I love reggae and most of the vibes rasta people bring. But I really cannot listen closely to most of the common lyrics.

Praising Haile Selassi sounds only good, when you don't know much about his actually reign.

I recommend Ryszard Kapuściński's book about him:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor_(book)

(And then there are Ragga hits like Chi Chi mon from TOK, which translates to burn the gays)

So in my conclusion, most of the theoretical theological ideology/religion is wishful thinking of a oppressed minority/ex slaves in poverty who dream of a better future.

And some of them turned to fanatic bigoted racists themself. And some just want to live the good life, avoiding conflict wherever possible. With those you can get along very fine..

(And my favourite reggae band alive - groundation - is mostly white and not from Jamaica, but I really don't care about that)

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As someone from the region Haile is one of the worst leaders of Ethiopia, even the Omnicidal DERG was better on some points than him. He was an insane racist slaveowner usurper who was put in power by British arms, fed his dogs steak while millions starved, broke every promise he made etc.

He’s so toxic in modern Ethiopia both Amhara and Oromo nationalists say that he’s from the other ethnicity, he’s mostly worshipped by Caribbean and west Africans who don’t know anything about Ethiopia or Abyssinia.

Also that book is wonderful. The Shadow of the Sun is an amazing book about his travels in Africa in the 90’s.

I'm sure you are correct. But as with any religion it's the general abstract idea, not the specifics (which in an objective view, are mostly myth and fable) that is important.

In this case the idea of a downtrodden oppressed people who seek righteous living and a liberator and protector and a possible better future ahead.

I'm a big reggae fan and recall during certain periods of life how much it spoke to me when I felt oppressed and was trying to do right in life, but was abused by systems of greed and evil materialism but I had to keep on trudging ahead.

I think it's a somewhat common theme of humanity. Well, that, plus the beat is awesome lol.

Reggae is so deeply & necessarily intertwined with the religion. It's like saying you like gospel or byzantine chant except for the christian lyrics. The forms simply don't make sense when you separate them from their religious context.

Anyway you've got ska, rocksteady, dub, dancehall, and a legion of white californian groups that should fit your sensibilities more easily. Religions are allowed to have their own thing even/especially when it makes outsiders uncomfortable.

This is the best copy I could find.

Eddie Murphy SNL kill the white people

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vc5igOAJ7k&ab_channel=takan...

It's an old dynamic.

"It's like saying you like gospel or byzantine chant except for the christian lyrics."

I do actually (some of it, sometimes). Also yes, there is lots of reggae without Haile Selassi.

Also I can make a difference between what other people mean with some words and what I understand by them. Meaning to Rastafari Haile Selassi stands for a great and just ruler. So I can go with those vibes while listening, even though for me the historical Haile Selassi was just another corrupt monarch.

> Reggae is so deeply & necessarily intertwined with the religion.

> The forms simply don't make sense when you separate them from their religious context.

As a big reggae fan I totally disagree.

Although there's indeed a lot of roots reggae talking about Selassie and religion, there's also a huge lot of reggae that's not about that. There's even, to me, lots of actual roots reggae that is not about religion but about poor people's struggle.

Lots of reggae is also purely about ganga / smoking (Peter Tosh "Legalize it").

Stuff I listen to... Max Romeo's "Chase the Devil" (and many other Max Romeo songs), Ranking Dread "Superstar" (where he sings about... famous reggae singers), many reggae love songs (Marcia Griffiths "Hold me tight"), John Holt "Police in Helicopter", Horace Andy "Skylarking".

One of my all time favorite: Zap Pow "This is Reggae music". No religion. No poor people's struggle. Just pure reggae sound, with lyrics about... Reggae itself (it's an amazing one, check it out).

There's also more recent anti-consumerist reggae, like Mike Love "Permanent Holidays" (link because this is sooo good):

https://youtu.be/fU7hZ3smj0g

So yeah big disagree. Not all reggae is about religion, far from it.

I didn't say all reggae is about religion. I'm pointing out that it's a form that is historically connected to a specific religious practice, and rooted in a particular religious worldview.

That doesn't mean you can't enjoy it from outside that religion or worldview. But it means if you find fault in the point of view it takes, you should find another music to listen to not wish this one was different for you.

For me, I practice an abrahamic religion though not rastafari and a lot of the religious sentiment and imagery resonates with me. Again it's not that all reggae songs are religious. But it's there you know. I find it pretty grim how quick & comfortable people are trying to ignore it, or downplay its significance.

I don’t think this is how music works. The people who make music might have a certain worldview, and they might express that worldview in their lyrics, but it’s totally possible to enjoy that music without agreeing with or even understanding the lyrics or worldview. Just ask the millions of teenagers around the world who spend the second half of the 20th century enjoying English language rock music without even knowing English.

> It's like saying you like gospel or byzantine chant except for the christian lyrics.

People do that. People also like John Lennon or Rage Against The Machine without turning into communists (much to the artists’ disappointment, I think). Music can sound good to you without you having to agree with the lyrical content.

"People also like John Lennon or Rage Against The Machine without turning into communists (much to the artists’ disappointment, I think). "

Or The Refused. They added a (simple) manifest to their LP and literally expected that wherever they were touring, uprising would follow.

>Reggae is so deeply & necessarily intertwined with the religion. It's like saying you like gospel or byzantine chant except for the christian lyrics.

This hasn't been true for a very long time. Just look at Lover's Rock and the really big guys there

- Beres Hammond - Gregory Isaacs - Dennis Brown - Sugar Minott - Ken Boothe - Alton and Hortense Ellis

This certainly is not a religious song

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=lJEQnmDnIq8

> Anyway you've got ska, rocksteady, dub, dancehall, and a legion of white californian groups that should fit your sensibilities more easily.

Why did Ras Trent immediately come to mind? https://youtu.be/TcK0MYgnHjo

After reading his bio in Wikipedia he does seem like a martyr to me.

Ryszard Kapuściński, jugding by his first and last name, seems to be disqualified to be writing about ethiopian rules on account of heavy conflict of interests.

If that is your take, ok.

But maybe you should read more about Kapuściński than his name, because I do think he was qualified to write about power and oppression. No matter the skin color.

I would very much like to hear from him his detailed opinion on notorious communists Dzerzhinsky, Menzhinsky and Vyshinsky (not sure what is the correct Polish spelling) before anything else.

He is not alive anymore, so he cannot tell you. And regarding about what he thought about those people, you can really find in any of his books.

But like other people already hinted at you: the book about Haile Selassi was mainly a attack on his corrupt system back at home. By examining the power mechanisms and corruption of King Selassis court(and publishing it step by step) he managed to publish a antiauthorian criticism on corrupted buerocracy in general, in such a corrupted system. But he could do so, because when critizized from above he said: "Do you want to imply, that this corrupt monarchist court is comparable to our democratic peoples republic elected comitees?"

Which they could not admit, even though they understood how it was meant, because yes, they were just as corrupt. Unchecked power works the same in a monarchy, than it does in socialism or anywhere else.

He simply hated corruption and opression and he lived voluntarily among the poorest of the planet, to write about their lives and their struggles.

This sounds like a load of bullshit. We are talking about sub-Sakharan Africa. "Corruption" is a very underwhelming accusation in the land of racial segregation, endless wars, genocides and hyperinflation on wheelbarrows-of-banknotes scale.

I also do not care about all that signalling nonsense.

Dude. You are free to keep your knowledge about things without reading about them, if you like. I don't actually know what your point here is at all, except that you want to continue worship or admire Selassi because he happened to be black?

> We are talking about sub-Sakharan Africa [...] the land of racial segregation, endless wars, genocides and hyperinflation on wheelbarrows-of-banknotes scale.

Citation needed.

What does being Polish have to do with writing a book about Haile Selassie? It's sort of written on the tin that the book is used a sort of a mirror to reflect the absurdity of communist rule on Poland, but where is the "conflict of interests"? The book is drawn from interviews and primary sources.

Polish are firebrand catholic christians, whereas Ethiopia is a notable orthdox christian country.

So unless you are going to fact check every single claim in the book, I'd skip it.

Do you know anything at all about Ryszard Kapuściński? The guy reported on 27 coups and rebellions on the ground and there are some criticisms of his work but none based on religion. It's not even clear that Kapuściński was catholic, he was born in Belarus.

This sort of blanket dismissal based on ethnicity or presumed religious affiliation is just stupid and doesn't belong here.

Almost everything you get to read about history ranges from heavy spin to bullshit.

A good example of that is how English (mainland and colonist) got to badmouth Spanish handling of natives whereas their own deeds were an order of magnitude worse, until very recently.

Disregard the message and examine the messenger.

this is just nonsense.

groundation is really great and among my favorite reaggae band alive as well with israel vibrations and 10 ft ganja plant

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