every little step

the weekly run-down of being bobby brown

Thursday, August 25, 2005

What the Fuck Happened?


Bobby and Whitney yell, "Where the hell has your black ass been, girl?!?!?"

Okay okay. So I dropped the ball. But if you've checked my homesite lately, you know a nig has been busy. John Lennon said life is what happens when you're making other plans.

Anyway, the season finale is tonite. In honor of that, there will be a new post up reflecting on the Browns sometime next week. Promise.


Summer M.

Sunday, July 17, 2005

"'Cause I'm Nasty for You": Being Bobby Brown Episode 4

Niggerdom 301: "Work me Over", Or, I Know I Own Your Penis, but I'd Really Like it if You Would Use it on Me










When we last left our nig, Mr. Brown, his mate, niggerous ghettois diva had completely and thoroughly "dephallused" him during their trip to England. Like a female praying mantis murdering her partner after copulation, our diva struck quickly; some would regard her actions as "feminist," but that's neither here nor there.

As we returned to our observations, the primary question was, "How will our nig recover from the embarrassment of last week's episode?" In other words, where can he locate his penis? Our nig did not make us wait for his answer. How does any male prove his worth when his masculinity has been brought into question? Why hunting, of course.

"I got a few misdemeanors."
As the episode begins, one thing becomes apparent: our nig, an urban boy from Roxbury, Boston, MA has never been camping. He gathers his pack--father, brother, nephew, son--and heads to a locale that will assuredly prepare him to hunt his prey.

If we have learned anything from our nig, it's that he likes to spend his (mate's) money. When he enters the store-- a cornucopia of sports gear at every turn--our nig warns his young son and namesake, Bobby Beresford Brown, Jr., "Don't steal anything." (Did we not predict that black male criminality would be the focal point of each episode?) Our nig tells store clerks he needs everything for this 24-hour excursion in the Georgia woods; from snowboards to tents to a deep fryer, in our nig's eyes, nearly every item in the store becomes a necessity. Especially guns.

Now who knows if it's hunting season, or what exactly our nig and his pack plan to hunt. Whatever the case, our nig must observe, shoot, point, cock every gun in the store. From rifles to berettas, our nig tries several on for size. He decides to buy a few, and the clerk informs him that he needs to fill out some paperwork and do a background check. "Uh oh," says our nig. "I got a few misdemeanors." Check the score: Team Criminality 2; Our Nig 0.


"Ohhhhh the Lord is good to me/and so I thank the Lord/For giving me the things I need/the sun, the rain, and the appleseed..."
Clad in army fatigues and boots, our nig, his father, underling Tommy, son, and nephew embark on what we shall call a "male bonding excursion," for a night in the woods away from their noveau riche, extravagant lifestyle. Spending the afternoon pitching tents--seemingly without directions--the younger members of the pack (son and nephew) struggle with the equipment while their grandfather, affectionately known as Pops, entertains and taunts them simultaneously by passing gas and speaking about things of insignificance--we believe our nig's species would call this "talking shit." Whatever the case, the day ends rather uneventfully, and the pack winds down by the campfire singing a medley of our nig's greatests hits, including Pops' favorite, "Tenderoni...roni."

"Fiiiiiiiyah"
The next morning, the pack continues with their male bonding with a variety of activities around the campsite (riding bikes, blowing up plastic boats with air, etc.), until they are interrupted by several phone calls by our nig's wife, the seemingly omnipresent ghettois diva. Though it is a bright and beautiful day, ghettois diva sounds belligerent and upset on the line, claiming to have missed our nig dearly though he and the pack have only been out hunting for less than 24 hours. She misses him so much that she threatens to interrupt our nig's male bonding session by coming to the campsite. Though our nig circumvents giving his mate his specific location, his underling succumbs to the pressure, and soon after ghettois diva arrives with her two cubs.

Dressed in a "wife beater," jeans, and the usual Star Jones' line wig and visor, ghettois diva and her young invade the all-male campsite, immediately making their presence known. Our diva and our nig share an amorous reunion, kissing sloppily in between phrases that intimate our diva's desire for coitus behind a tree.

The behavior we've grown to expect to see between our nig and our diva continues throughout the day. They kiss and talk in the plastic boat out on the lake until our diva gets tired of their aquatic adventure, and demands that our nig "dock that shit"--for her unsuccessful and erratic effort to bring the small boat back to shore is humorous at best. Their duet of the Ohio Players song "Fire"as our diva takes over the feminine domestic duty of cooking our nig's "kill" on a grill is absolutely priceless and a great asset to our research. (Mmmmmm...I smell hamburgers!) They even show teamwork and loyalty when threatened by a predator. Gazing out upon the lake, a white male approaches our nig and our diva in his aquatic vehicle. Albeit delayed, he recognizes our nig as someone he has perhaps seen on television, and reprimands him for his arrest for driving under the influence of alcohol. Undaunted, our nig offers to buy the white male's aquatic vehicle. But the white male scoffs at the offer, claiming that our nig couldn't write a big enough check. Immediately our diva chimes in, defending her mate by telling the white male he "doesn't know who the hell [he's] talking to." As expected, the white male regards such words as empty, and immediately solicits our diva, as if we have somehow been transferred back to an antebellum moment:

there our nig stands in the field next to his mate. the white male, atop his aquatic horse if you will, gazes upon the couple and disciplines the male. powerless in the presence of another male, our nig "chooses" to ignore the reprimand, and his mate tries to cover for his tenuous masculinity. this goes unnoticed, however, and the white male immediately relegates our diva to a sexual object, and offers to take her for a ride...

Whatever the case, the couple walks away from the racially-loaded situtation, and returns to their favorite pastime: eating. This time, our nig tries his hand at cooking. and even when armed with Lawry's Seasoned Salt and gallons of K.C. Masterpiece (two flavors innate to the species' palate), it seems that this racialized body rejects all chicken that is not fried. Though cookouts are common to his kind (the white species often refer to this activity as "grilling out"), our nig proves himself a novice, and becomes ill after partaking of some of his half-cooked food. His sickness calls for an immediate evacuation of the campsite. And, as always, ghettois diva is there to drive him home.

TO REVIEW
  1. "3 generations of Browns" take 1: Despite the desire to carve out male spaces, it seems that black masculinity is necessarily contingent upon the presence of (a version of) black femininity.
  2. "3 generations of Browns" take 2: When Bobby Brown comments that his father, his son and he all make three generations of Browns together, and that this moment is therefore special, we believe he's referring to the past, present, and future of alcoholism.
  3. Just when the black female gives the male his dick back, a white dude is there to take it away.
  4. Even in the woods, with no one of significance around for miles, Bobbi Kris still hates and is embarrassed by her parents.
  5. Crack, when taken by Whitney Houston, is an aphrodisiac. Alcohol, when drunk in scores by Bobby Brown however, isn't.
By Summer M. (Fort Wayne's Own Fecundmellow)

The International Perspective (Der Deutsch dieser Arsch!)

Der Neger ist ubergeschnappt (The nigger is crazy). Seine Ehefrau ist geile (His wife is horny). Seine Tochter ist dicke (His daughter is fat). Und sein sohn ist hasslich (And his son is ugly). Verdammt (Damn)! Kann die Kacke werden jeder schlecter (Can the shit get any worse)?

Bei Des International Hassers (the interstate hater)



Sunday, July 10, 2005

"Bobby Brown, Whitney Houston's Husband": Being Bobby Brown Episode 3

Niggerdom 201: 'Dude, where's my rumored extremely large penis?', Or, 13 Ways of Emasculating a Black Man**

(2 points if you got the '13 ways...' literary reference without googling it.)

Though it wasn't abundantly clear if Mr. Brown--our nig--was still on probation, he and the rest of the crew jumped the pond and headed to London, England for episode three. (Our guess is hitting up jolly old England for a spot of tea, and some shopping at Harrods had to be some sort of probation violation. If you recall: just like a party ain't a party unless it's ran all through, a nig ain't a nig unless he's breaking the law...with his crew. Please forgive that wack ass rhyme, but it seemed appropriate at the time. Oops, I did it again!!) Anyway, as we observe our nig and co. during their London vacation, one quickly realizes that the word for the day will be emasculation. Can you say that, kids? EEEEE-MASK-YOU-LAY-SHUN. Very good!

"What time is it? Ice!"
In the first part of Observation 007, our nig heads to the jewelry store for some bling. Perhaps due to the swelling crowd outside of the building, and/or perhaps, the presence of his mate, niggerous ghettois diva (also waiting outside of the store; similar to a mother parked in front of the movie theater in the mini-van waiting for her too-young-to-drive child to emerge from the 8:00 flick), the jewelers seemingly recognize our nig as a subject that must sing or dance or play ball. They allow our nig to place an extremely decadent and expensive watch just above his left paw. I believe our nig's species would describe the timepiece as "iced" and/or "blinged out". We don't suppose it a stretch to argue that our nig's wrist was "frozen" as the hippity hoppers like to say. Immediately, as if our nig had just buried his teeth into a chicken leg with gobs and gobs of hot sauce, his eyes light up, clearly impressed with how the watch looks strapped around his arm. His speech seems even more grammatically incorrect than usual, "Must...have...watch...now." Excitedly, our nig walks out of the store to show his waiting mate.

Now technically, that's theft. But what's important in this particular instance are two things. First, our nig must persuade his wife to give him the money for the watch. She, however, looks unimpressed, giving our nig that "Put it back now. I thought I told you not to touch anything," look one often sees when this female species is maneuvering through department and grocery stores with her young. But the rejection doesn't end there--absolutely not. With the quickness of a cheetah surreptitiously waiting to get her paws and fangs around an unsuspecting wildebeest at the watering hole, our nig's mate told him not once, but twice, "That looks like a female's watch."

Ouch. Something just went flaccid.


"She's a Brown!"
After the jewelry store disappointment, our nig and his family visit a department store to do some garment shopping. As they stroll through the store--the female, as always, steps ahead of our nig--Mr. Brown tells retail representatives to wrap up extra large shirts in every color. Though smiling, the employees don't budge. Also ignoring our nig's antics, the female concentrates on buying the young female some new clothes. If it wasn't evident by the picture in last week's post, it should be formally noted that our nig's child with ghettois diva is a bit on the pudgy side. Make that chunky. As our nig waits, ghettois diva tosses jeans and such over the dressing room door, instructing (yeah, like parenting) young female nig to "try these on." While they wait, our nig and his mate discuss young female nig's plumpness. Our nig, mistaking his offspring's size for that highly desired "thickness" males of his species enjoy in a potential mate, concludes that the "junk in her trunk" must come from his genetic material. She is, as our nig puts it, "a Brown." Yet his female mate, quite feisty and seemingly more intelligent mumbles, "Well, if she was a Houston..." the youngin' might not have such issues when trying to find garments to fit her frame.

Ouch. Kids, our second word of the day is matrilineage. Can you say matrilineage? MAT-TRI-LIN-EE-AJ. Very good.

Now what does ghettois diva's loaded statement imply in a much more general sense? Well let's see. 1) Slavery. Oh yes, friends. There was a time when the nig's species were what we like to call slaves. As slaves, they were the property of the aforementioned white man--the species that often still misrecognizes nigs as individuals. All slaves and their offspring "took" said white man's surname, even if he hadn't (in certain cases) impregnated the female species with his own sperm, he still got to name the offspring (affectionately known as pickaninnies), leaving the male nig out in the cotton fields.

Now what else? Ahh, yes: the baby daddy factor. This is a colloquial term for having young nig children out of wedlock. See, along with being a criminal, the nig is often considered an absent father. As a result, his children often take the female's last name, because hey, if he's not going to pay for the diapers, why would one give him the glory of having children with his last name? In some places, this might not be such a problem. Yet, as our friend Mr. Moynihan pointed out so many years ago, to pass on the mother's name in a white [racist] patriarchal society is antithetical to America (or American-ness) as we know it, thus putting all nigs on the bottom of the social totem pole.

So when our ghettois
diva literarily challenges the pedigree of our nig's genetic material?

Well, let's just say, we wouldn't have been surprised if there was a little puddle in between our nig's legs.

"Mr. Lama! Mr. Lama!"


While in England, our nig had the fortune of running into the Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of the Tibetan people. And, well, after our nig maneuvers through the crowd, he and an anonymous underling are able to stop the Dalai Lama and introduce themselves:

"Mr. Lama! Mr. Lama!" our nig screams. "I'm Bobby Brown."

Uh...


Mr. Lama stares back at our nig, but not in that, "I'm old and didn't hear half of what you said" type-way. But rather in a "Who is this nig? Usher? P. Diddy?" type-way.

Our nig's underling steps in, yelling in Mr. Lama's ear to ensure he's heard. "Mr. Lama! This is Bobby Brown."

Nothing.

"Bobby Brown! Whitney Houston's husband."

What's that? An acknowledgement by Mr. Lama?

Shrinkage.

"I do act like I got kids!"


After a long day, our inebriated nig, returns to his mate already winding down in their hotel room. It seems that the "Ike and Tina-like" banter is for more than just dinner time. In fact, the tete-a-tete in which they engage, which probably rouses (not arouses, but rouses) not only their offspring but neighboring guests of their upscale hotel, seems to be the prelude to some fiery pillow talk. Whatever the case, our drunken nig is told by his mate that he acts as if he has no children.

Wow. Now whatever could our phallis-slayer mean by this? Is she suggesting that our nig is a baby boy?

I don't know, but maybe someone's been shooting blanks during those "festivities was on" sessions.

Until next time...

TO REVIEW


  1. "Nick Cannon got your school clothes money.": Will Bobby Brown get his penis back? Our magic 8-ball says, "As soon as he gets another hit. Hit song, that is."
  2. Bobby Kris walks around with a teddy bear. I think she's about 12. This would be a problem, but the bear seems to be more of a parent than Bobby and/or Whitney.
  3. If you ever meet Bobby Brown and want to get money from him, your best bet is to throw a couple tracks (that's a weave, y'all) in your hair, and feed him some line about having kids and no rent money. After he breaks you off a bill or two, tell him some shit about showing your gratitude in a motel room. Since the cameras are rolling, odds are he won't bite.
  4. Somehow Francis Cress Welsing lurks in this post. That makes me shitty.
  5. Bobby Brown is an alcoholic. Whitney Houston, however, isn't.
By Summer M. (Fort Wayne's Own Fecundmellow)

N.B.: All inquiries submitted by commenters (such as: What type of adult will Bobby Kris become?) Will be addressed at the end of the season. Keep those questions coming. We're not experts, but we play them on tv.


Monday, July 04, 2005

"Hell to the Naw": Being Bobby Brown Episodes 1 & 2

Niggerdom 101: A Primer, Or, WWMS (What Would Moynihan Say)?


Here is the hotel room. It is expensive-looking and messy. It is very pretty. Here is the family. Whitney, Bobby, Bobbi Kris, (and Bobby's kids by other women). They are very ghetto. See Bobby Kris. She has a big forehead. She hates her parents. Who will adopt Bobbi Kris? See Whitney. She goes hell to the naw. See Bobby. He is loud and drunk. He goes jack be nimble, jack be quick, jack jump over the candlestick, bring dat ass here quick. See Bobby and Whitney. They are very embarrassing. Dance, Bobby and Whitney, Dance. Bobbi Kris eats food to make the pain go away. See white people. White people are staring. Will Bobby and Whitney let white people take their picture? Will white people adopt Bobbi Kris? Runaway, Bobby Kris, runaway.

"If there is any diffuculty in establishing a paradigm for a reality television show starring a black male, one should simply pick up the bat-phone and give the justice system a call. For it is the justice system that gives the black male structure; and the black male structures the justice system. That made no sense, but I still believe it's true." --Summer M.

After viewing episodes 1 & 2 of Being Bobby Brown, it seems that the Bravo network took the sage, Summer M.'s words to heart. If you're gonna show nigs doing nig shit, you're gonna have to have a moment or two involving jail or court so that people can orient themselves. Thus, as one views the beginning of the first two Being Bobby Brown episodes, it is not suprising to see Mr. Brown getting out of jail (after failing to pay child support) in the first, and appearing in court (for a domestic violence charge) in the second. Now let's see, what else would one need to make Bobby Brown's famous Niggaroni (nutritious and tastes great, too!)?

Once the obligatory "just got outta jail...gotta go to court" shots were out of the way, the viewer was allowed to see Bobby and crew in their natural habitat. As we approach the nig (scientific name niggerous ghettois), we see the male prowling the territory looking for his mate. All of a sudden, she appears almost without a sound, dressed in her crackwhore uniform-- visor, headwrap, concert t-shirt. Both the female and her cub seem to look a bit haggard and worn; the rainy season was long this year, and the seeming lack of money for a touch-up** is evident by observing both females' hair. Despite this, the male seems quite happy to see his mate; he has just been released back into the wild after 30 days in captivity.

As we observe the pack, we are fortunate enough to see the male and female engage in a sort of traditional dance. Although seemingly impromptu, the male and female are quite coordinated in their moves, almost as if they'd choreographed this jam session. We know that improvised coordination is native to their kind, so impromptu displays of rhythm is not uncommon. Their violently funny mealtime banter, which scientists have deemed, "Ike and Tina-like" is also inherent in the species. Thus when the female says to the male, "Bobby, I will knock your ass at this table," the male responds with a simple, "And I will sue you," and both discussants and observers can have a hearty laugh.

As the male and female travel through hotel lobbies and gift shops, several things become certain: First, when away from his native land, the black male species is often mistaken for others of his kind by those not of (or entirely familiar with) his racial makeup. Thus, when the white man--who has been hunting the black man for generations--encounters our subject outside of his urban menagerie (commonly known as the ghetto), he and his kind will often misrecognize the subject Brown for other black males such as Usher and Puff Daddy. Second, the female species--in this case the nearly extinct niggerous ghettois diva-- is not a "friend of the people"; she especially does not like being gazed upon while she is grazing or feeding her young, asking those observing her to, "be me for a minute." Third, when left for long periods without supervision from his female mate, the nig will often regress to his most animalistic behavior. In this particular case, we observed the subject Mr. Brown breaking into the hotel minibar with a screwdriver. Though he is successful in getting the door open without paying, he is immediately disappointed when he realizes he has broken into the wrong refrigeration device.

One thing above all is most certain: both male and female do seem to enjoy making themselves spectacle for anyone with time and popcorn enough to watch.

TO REVIEW:

  1. In the first two episodes of BBB, Bobby Brown fucked with crime on three levels: 1) Getting out of jail; 2) Going to court and having charges dropped; 3) Committing a crime (breaking into the hotel minibar) that did not--in this particular instance--pay.
  2. Will future episodes of BBB continue to begin with Da Kang being in/getting released from jail, and/or showing up in court? Our magic 8 ball says, "Hell to the yes."
  3. Pre-rehab Whitney Houston everyday attire makes her look like a crack addict. Pre-rehab Whitney Houston formal attire makes her look like a Muslim. Not that looking like a Muslim is bad; it's just that in this case the burqa, er, headwrap is not covering the Star Jones' wig for religious purposes. Well, she does take drugs religiously, so...
  4. Bobbi Kris hates her parents. Going as far as screaming "No, please don't!" when her parents enter the bedroom in an effort to perhaps "impregnate" Whitney (though, according to the diva, Bobby had been "impregnating her all week"). Bobbi Kris does, however, rejoice whenever Daddy has a court day; she doesn't have to go to school on "court days." (If this practice continues, we assume she will either be repeating several grades, or having Beyonce-like intelligence.)
  5. "Loving a black man" includes putting lotion on his ashy feet.
  6. Bobby Brown is not a drug addict. Whitney Houston, however, is.
By: Summer M. (Fort Wayne's Own Fecundmellow)

**a touch-up is the reapplication of a relaxer (hair straightener) approx. every 6-8 weeks.

ROCK WIT'CHA: BOBBY, WHITNEY, AND THE TRIUMPH OF BLACK LOVE

After Fecundmellow's anthropological exploration of the first couple of episodes of BBB, which should be published in somebody's academic journal if you ask Saf, or at least in an issue of Source or XXL, I thought that you - the readers - would appreciate some straight talk about a subject that I think is very real when discussing Bobby Brown and Whitney Houston's union. And that's love. Yeah, I said love...and I wasn't joking, either.

Since Bobby and Whitney jumped the broom over ten years ago, people have been speculating on what brought and holds them together. The answer that everyone settles on is their twin substance addictions. People that watch the E! Network and know that Whitney's "urban" upbringing in Jersey rivaled Bobby's in Boston, despite the fact that Cissy was a "successful" singer, chalk it up to ghetto kinship. But no one ever gives these two credit for loving each other. They cast Bobby as the greasy, ghetto-fied gigolo, and Whitney as the rebellious good girl, looking to gain some street cred by hooking up with the craziest R&B nigga since Rick James in his heyday. They regard their union as a tragedy, the end of Whitney's career and the beginning of her decline into...what did Fecundmellow label it?...crack whore-dom. But I think that they, that we've all, been selling Bobby and Whitney short. Crazy as they are, and crazy as it sounds, I think these two dysfunktional mutha fuckas really love each other. Whatever the hell that means.

Throughout Episodes 1 and 2, Bobby gives mad commentary on being a husband to Whitney. Makes sense, since it is his job nowadays, singing career being defunct and all. He talks of loving Whitney, of wanting to make her happy, impregnate (God help us) her, of the support and care she gives him. He calls her by pet names, makes excuses for her outlandish behavior, comforts her as she weeps for her dead father. He joins in her crazy singing and dancing, doesn't flick an eyelash when she talks of rectal parasites over their Chinese food meal at Chopstix. He takes her out to a fancy gourmet dinner, does not crack on her wig or her burqa, shooes fans away from her table at the resort in the Bahamas. Laughs off her threats to beat his ass. I mean, he could be giving her tough love, forcing her into an institution, confronting her left and right about her "condition" or "problem." That's what we, the public, have done, in a sense. But not Bobby. He's stood by her. And even if it's illogical or unreasonable, it seems to me like he loves her. And she loves him. Or at least she's in too much of a stupor to work up a serious attitude toward his crazy ass, which is, in essence, love, you know, with the dopamine and shit. It's a semi-beautiful thing, Bobby and Whitney, rocking with each other across the hemisphere.

Anyway, the words for Episode 1 and 2, for me, are black love. Like Whitney said as she greased Bobby's ashy feet at the day spa. This is what it is to love a black man. This is what it is, I guess, for a black man to love a black woman. It's crazy as hell, but oddly sweet. Manic, depressing, but also uplifting. It's comical. It's shameful and shameless. It's not quite sweeping romance, panty-moistening passion, or tear-jerking tenderness, but it makes for a helluva an hour of reality television.

Rock on Bobby and Whitney, in life, love, and the pursuit of your respective career come-backs!

By: Saf (Cleveland's Beloved Black Beyotch)

Sunday, June 26, 2005

All Hail "Da Kang": An Introduction to the Critical Companion to Being Bobby Brown



Everybody wants to know what's going down, with not the James, not the Jim, but Bobby Brown... Let's face it: Bobby Brown is the king of R&B, a musical genius, and soon-to-be reality television show star with the debut of his upcoming Bravo series, Being Bobby Brown.

As dedicated "old school" fans, we thought it more than aposite to create a web log dedicated to "Da Kang." Such an exercise shall undoubtedly contribute to the critical discourse on Bobby Brown and his undeniable importance to popular culture, music, and the elevation of black people in the United States.

With that in mind, we seek to participate in a tripartite conversation between the personality chix©, experienced critics of popular culture, and budding African American public intellectuals, in which we critically engage and analyze Mr. Brown's life as it is articulated on his Bravo series.

This project has several aims:

- To show our unflagging support of the entertainment entity that is Bobby Brown & Whitney Houston

- To provide an in-depth analysis of the niggafication of the Bravo channel by one Bobby Brown

- To consider how the aforemetioned niggafication subsumes and/or consumes the seemingly homo-centrified core of the Bravo network's programming

- To analyze how the divafied spouse of "Da Kang," namely Whitney Houston, complicates and/or nuances the locus of the show (read: Do we get to see her in rehab?).

We encourage you to tease out, problematize, and put pressure on any and all aspects of our analyses. Mostly, we urge you to critically observe the show. You'll laugh. You'll cry. But (what's) most important(ly): you'll grow!

Sincerely,
personality chix©
(Fecundmellow, Nahmix, and Safire)