Miss Fidget.com

caption id=”attachment_3472″ align=”alignnone” width=”316″ caption=”Larry Platt performs his rap "Pants on the Ground" outside his home in Atlanta, Thursday,, Jan. 14, 2010 in Atlanta. Platt performed the song during an audition for American Idol. John Bazemore / AP Photo “][/caption]

Larry Platt is the first pop sensation of 2010. The 63 (or 62) year old’s American Idol audition got aired and his performance of his original song “Pants on the Ground,” was a huge sensation.

Now he’s got a record deal, and Brett Favre and his team The Vikings did a “Pants on the Ground” chant after the Minnesota Vikings’ victory over the Dallas Cowboys and even famous people are spoofing the catchy tune.

“Pants on the Ground” is a scathing criticism of youth fashion. On ABC’s The View he explained the inspiration, “I was walking one day…I see a guy with a baby bottle in his mouth, pacifier, with his pants on the ground. That’s what gave me an inspiration.”

Even before his Idol audition, Mr. Platt has had a full and interesting life. At 16 Larry Platt became active in the Civil Rights movement. He worked with the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in Georgia, organizing sit-ins in the South. During the Bloody Sunday march from Selma, Ala., to Montgomery he was beaten. The Rev. Hosea Williams gave him his nickname, “General,” because of his heroic efforts on behalf of the civil-rights movement.

Because of “his great energy and commitment to equality and the protection of the innocent and for his outstanding service to the Atlanta community and the citizens of Georgia.” The Georgia General Assembly proclaimed Sept. 4, 2001, Larry Platt Day in Atlanta.

Sources for this:
Pants on the Ground’ Keeps Dropping Hits, Jan. 20, 2010, www.cbsnews.com
Arts in Brief, Compiled by DAVE ITZKOFF, January 18, 2010, www.nytimes.com
General Larry Platt: A closer look, Jan 13, 2010, www.usatoday.com

PANTS ON THE GROUND LYRICS
Pants on the ground
Pants on the ground
Lookin’ like a fool with your pants on the ground
With the gold in your mouth
Hat turned sideways

Pants hit the ground
Call yourself a cool cat
Lookin’ like a fool
Walkin’ downtown with your pants on the ground

Get it up, hey!
Get your pants off the ground
Lookin’ like a fool
Walkin’ talkin’ with your pants on the ground.

Get it up, hey!
Get your pants off the ground
Lookin’ like a fool with your pants on the ground

(Repeat second verse)

Personally, I think this is no more offensive than serving “pizza pies” on Columbus Day. Considering this was Denver, Colorado this soul food lunch could have helped educate kids about American and Southern culture by showing them fried chicken and biscuits in context, that is, with collard greens.

I would like to point out to Mother Holladay, “who originally complained about the menu, e-mailed … a statement that said: “I’m confident we’ll see stereotype-free menus in the future” that soul food is not a stereotype. Soul food is a recognized regional American cuisine with restaurants, cookbooks and tv shows enjoyed by black and white people.

To say Soul food is a stereotype is like saying Chinese food is a stereotype. The more I think about this, the wackier it is. Some of kids’ favorite foods are Soul Foods like fried chicken, macaroni and cheese and apple cobbler.

Yes, more black folks than white folks eat Soul Food, especially North of the Mason Dixon Line. The best Soul Food restaurants are often owned and run by black people, the same way the best Chinese Restaurants are often run by (gasp) Chinese people.

BUT if Mother Holladay feels like a racist when she sees collard greens she should deal with her problem alone and not deny Denver’s children the pleasure of the gray green greasy greens with no Tabasco.  She’d have made a better argument by pointing out that Soul Food’s are often high in fat and sodium and unhealthy. But she didn’t. She called the lunch without watermelon, flaming crosses or grape soda racist.

__________

Legal experts in the area of Schools have contacted me and told me the menu was probably changed to avoid the cost of even a potential legal fracas. The change of menu shouldn’t be viewed as an endorsement of the idea the meal was “racist” but a tactic to avoid even potential legal expense.

Random Soul Food lunch offered up at an Atlanta restaurant.

Proud Soul Food chef. The result of a web image search.

School Sorry For ‘Insensitive’ MLK Jr. Lunch
January 15, 2010 | www.wapt.com

Denver Public Schools Lunch Would Have Included Chicken, Collard Greens

Denver Public School officials are apologizing after a parent complained that a school lunch meant to honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was stereotypical and offensive, reported KMGH-TV.

The lunch, planned for Friday, was to include southern-style chicken, collard greens and a biscuit in honor of King.

Denver Public Schools spokesman Michael Vaughn released a statement that said: “The plan to serve a Southern-style meal in recognition of Martin Luther King Day was well intentioned but highly insensitive in light of certain hurtful cultural stereotypes still harbored in parts of our society.”

Organizers of Denver’s annual Martin Luther King Jr. Marade, a combination march and parade that honors King every January, did not consider the menu inappropriate, considering that King came from a southern background, but said there are other, more meaningful ways of honoring him.

“When you reduce it to the ‘I have a dream’ speech and a fried chicken and collard green lunch, you have just destroyed everything that Dr. King stood for,” said Vern Howard, chairman of the Martin Luther King Jr. Colorado Holiday Commission.

But in barber shops and soul food restaurants in Denver’s historic Five Points district, the tone was decidedly more relaxed.

“To me, I don’t see that much wrong with this,” said Franklin Stigal, owner of the Afro-Styling Barber Shop. “A lot of people are just griping to be griping.”

Chereka Dickerson, who helps run the soul food restaurant Welton Street Café, said the criticisms were over-the-top.

“If that’s the food that’s really associated with black people in America, why not celebrate it instead of trying to make everything negative?” she said.

Denver Public Schools changed the Friday meal to the manager’s choice for Friday. Jennifer Holladay, the parent who originally complained about the menu, e-mailed KMGH a statement that said: “I’m confident we’ll see stereotype-free menus in the future.”

(more…)

Some deft interweb searching reveals that DJ Penk is known for his “wind up calls.” What a cheeky naughty DJ.

DJ played ‘Jump’ as woman threatened suicide leap
19/01/2010  |  www.rochdaleonline.co.uk

TV and radio personality Steve Penk has defended his decision to play a song called “Jump” while police were attempting to talk a suicidal woman down from a motorway bridge.

Mr Penk said he played the Van Halen classic “Jump” following a request from a frustrated driver stuck in traffic on the M60.

A 30-year-old woman had been threatening to jump from the Nut Bank bridge near junction 19, Middleton.

The incident closed all three lanes of the M60 anti-clockwise and two lanes of the clockwise carriageway between junction 19 and 21 Chadderton, with hundreds of drivers affected.

Despite police spending nearly nine hours trying to talk her down, the woman jumped shattering her heels.

Mental health charity Mind said Penk’s decision to play the song was “in very poor taste” while the Samaritans said it showed a “lack of compassion”.

Listener Lorna Guinn slammed the move as “irresponsible” because the woman could have overheard the song on a car radio. However Mr Penk, who bought 96.2 The Revolution, which is based at the Sarah Moor Studios, Henshaw Street, in September, 2008, said he did not regret playing the song.

He said: “The entire area had been thrown into total chaos by the inexplicable actions of a single, troubled woman.

“A listener texted me to request the classic rock track ‘Jump’ by Van Halen and, after careful consideration, I decided to play it because I knew it would send out a clear signal of empathy to all those gridlocked drivers who were going to be late for work, school, a hospital appointment, etc through no fault of their own.

“I was, of course, very sorry to hear that the woman had subsequently jumped from the bridge but relieved that her injuries were minor.

“If, as has been suggested, the woman jumped because she heard the song from a passing car radio that’s unfortunate but I don’t regret playing it for a minute.”

Its eerie how much this great vintage foreign tv music video clip DOES sound like English. It is not.

Sorry its a link one must click… reckon youtube has not taken over the planet…yet!