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


  • Black Agenda Radio, Week of March 18, 2018
    Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    Black Agenda Radio, Week of March 18, 2018
    19 Mar 2019
    US Mercenaries Arrested in Haiti; Chris Hedges: Israeli Apartheid Utterly Indefensible; Laura Henley: Class distinctions among US blacks have always been with us; Vilissa Thompson on the struggles
  • The Particularities of Black Disability
    Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    The Particularities of Black Disability
    18 Mar 2019
    Vilissa Thompson fights to make sure that Black disabled people’s lives matter, too.  A social worker and disabilities activist, Thompson is the creator of “Ramp You
  • A Failed Black Upper Class Project to “Reform” Poor Black Girls
    Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    A Failed Black Upper Class Project to “Reform” Poor Black Girls
    18 Mar 2019
    Between 1919 and 1939, the National Federation of Colored Women’s Clubs attempted to run a school for “wayward” Black girls called the Efland Home, in North Carolina.
  • The Indefensible Israeli Aparteid State
    Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    The Indefensible Israeli Apartheid State
    18 Mar 2019
    “We’re seeing a crumbling of Israel’s ability to defend and promote the apartheid state,” said political analyst Chris Hedges. Rep.
  • Who Were US Mercenaries Targeting in Haiti?
    Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
    Who Were US Mercenaries Targeting in Haiti?
    18 Mar 2019
    Haitians have all kinds of theories on what seven heavily armed American mercenaries were up to when they were arrested outside the country’s Central Bank at the height of civil disturbances, last
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us