Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

What The Video Shows
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
01 Dec 2015
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR's poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Video, as police and military malefactors frequently remind us, is two dimensional.

What The Video Shows

by BAR's poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

The officer drove 6 min.
Like Mario Andretti impersonating
Evel Knivel on Chicago streets
The officer alighted from his vehicle
Firing and fearing for his safety and
The safety of his fellow officers…

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

After being struck by several rounds 
Fired by the responding officer, the 
Suspect assumed a combative prone
Position and began resisting the officer’s
Fire…

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

Notice the suspect’s body refusing to
Stay still; notice the suspect’s body 
bouncing, twisting—that’s resisting
Notice the suspect’s body refusing to
Just die—that’s resisting—he’s resisting!

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes
The officer feared for his safety and
The safety of his fellow officers whose
Guns were holstered
The officer feared for his safety and
The safety of his fellow officers and
The safety of the suspect, so they let
Him ‘bleed out’—a split–second decision
this work’s hard enough without second-guessing 

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

Well, on second viewing, the officer may
Have used poor judgment, may have over-
Reacted; the officer may need more training

Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

Video’s two dimensional—what you think you
See is not what you really see—take that hospital 
Bombed
In Afghanistan—it wasn’t really bombed—it only
Looked bombed. It only looks like splattered blood
on ICU walls. That head only looks like it’s detached 
from its torso. It only looks like 32 people were killed…
Video’s two dimensional—what you think you
See is not what you really see—so repeat after me:
Baby, don’t do it
Baby, don’t you do it
Baby, don’t dare do it
Don’t trust your lying eyes

Raymond Nat Turner Š 2015 All Rights Reserved

subscribe to our free weekly email notifying you of new content published at Black Agenda Report

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • I had a nightmare (For friend/fellow Poet Genny Lim)
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    I had a nightmare (For friend/fellow Poet Genny Lim)
    22 Apr 2020
    I had a nightmare that down in Mississippi, its governor having his lips  dripping with words of Social Darwinism, Herd immunity and Mengele Medicine,
  • The Black Plague
    Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
    The Black Plague
    22 Apr 2020
    The rapidity with which the pandemic has consumed black communities provides an unvarnished look into the dynamics of race and class that existed long before it emerged
  • Antiblackness of the Pandemic in the US and Brazil
    JoĂŁo Costa Vargas and Ana Flauzina
    Antiblackness of the Pandemic in the US and Brazil
    22 Apr 2020
    At the heart of health disparities is antiblackness, a social code that renders Black people disposable.
  • BAR Abolition & Mutual Aid Spotlight: La Resistencia
    Dean Spade and Roberto Sirvent, BAR Contributors
    BAR Abolition & Mutual Aid Spotlight: La Resistencia
    22 Apr 2020
    Public pressure works. Some local entities are not willing to work with ICE anymore.
  • BAR Book Forum: Joshua Bennett’s “Being Property Once Myself”
    Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
    BAR Book Forum: Joshua Bennett’s “Being Property Once Myself”
    22 Apr 2020
    Black thought is environmental thought and Black Studies is, at its core, an ecological critique. 
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us