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


  • Pentagon Orders All Installations to Stop Reporting COVID-19 Infections and Deaths 
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Pentagon Orders All Installations to Stop Reporting COVID-19 Infections and Deaths 
    01 Apr 2020
    This is going to become a problem for the Pentagon, whether it's on Navy destroyers, submarines, and aircraft carriers or the 800+ bases.
  • Flattening the curve on Capitalism?
    BAR Poet-in-Residence Raymond Nat Turner
    Flattening the curve on Capitalism?
    01 Apr 2020
    CEO from Boeing to CEO from Wells Fargo,  heard by the flies on walls at Mar-a-Lago: “It’s their health or our economy— we get to choose…”
  • COVID-19: The Capitalist Emperor Has no Clothes
    Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor
    COVID-19: The Capitalist Emperor Has no Clothes
    01 Apr 2020
    The systemic failure of the capitalist order triggered by the coronavirus has reinforced the growing awareness that extreme wealth inequality is a fundamental characteristic of the system.
  • Racial Profiling Disorder: the All-American Pandemic 
    John G. Russell
    Racial Profiling Disorder: the All-American Pandemic 
    01 Apr 2020
    RAPROD carriers are convinced that blacks disproportionately carry guns and other contraband.
  • Letters from Our Readers 
    Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor
    Letters from Our Readers 
    01 Apr 2020
    This week readers discussed the coronavirus’s relationship to NATO, sanctions, and the duopoly.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us