About that #LooseTalkPodcast

So, online media has had a field day analysing MI’s recent appearance on Osagie Alonge’s podcast series. To be honest, I avoided it; I kept on telling myself I would stay away from it, and I was successful, up till today.

A colleague played the #LooseTalkPodcast in the office this afternoon, I listened, and I thought I’d share my thoughts on the bits I listened to. Tweeted a bit, even made a Facebook post on it, but the matter didn’t leave me so I thought I’d provide some more context here.

For starters, here’s the video. Make sure you have approximately three hours to set on fire, and note that it’s not suitable for work because of all the cursing.

Again, I’m not a ‘hip-hop head’; this is to preempt the ones whose only basis for disagreement with this will be “you do not understand hip hop, you’re not a hip-hop head. I agree in advance.

Fact: Osagie Alonge was rude; there are no ifs, ands, or buts about that. Also fact: MI’s calmness is #goals. Either that or he has a liking for masochism. If my memory serves Osagie has taken quite a few swipes at him in the past, almost, as it were, building (or attempting to build) notoriety off ‘critiquing’ Jude.

I thought I would take a few minutes to look up the word ‘critique’, because Osagie went on and on about people saying he was negative when he was only ‘critiquing’ their work. Here goes.

Critique – to evaluate (a theory or practice) in a detailed and analytical way. It refers more to literary, theoretical or philosophical bodies of work, but stretches to other forms of artistic expression. It is from the Greek word kritikē, from kritikos meaning ‘able to discern.’

Where was the analysis? Where was the careful, structured presentation of fact backing the many wild allegations he made? Nothing. Zilch. Nada. Even law has it that “he who alleges/asserts must prove.” At some point he was yelling, “we have the receipts, we have the facts.” Where were they? The reference to his colleague as his data back up?

Yet, there was no desire to brook any facts countering his opinions. MI came back with a few statistics on album ranking, money he’s made off the album in question, etc., Osagie disputed them, citing the difference in demographics. So let’s get this straight – you make a claim (without facts), it is countered with facts, you reject the counter (without facts), but somehow we’re all supposed to take your opinion as law?

Speaking of opinions, Isaac Asimov said, “Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won’t come in.” Emphasis on ‘your’ – no one is under any obligation to agree with you, even if you’re their fan.

I do not know that I would ever be able to sit through that amount of swearing & disrespect in the name of critique or fandom. I know quite a few Nigerian artistes who would have walked out, who might have even thrown a few punches.

Call me old-fashioned, but there are still standards for public-facing conversations, even private ones. Some might say interviews for podcasts cannot be viewed through the lens of textbook journalism, but do you want to be taken seriously or not? Hiding behind ‘my opinion’ or ‘I said what I said’ or ‘I can say this because I’m a long time fan’ to put down your guest is unprofessional. It was worse because both guest and the lead interviewer kept referring to being friends. Friendship? Who needs enemies?

It’s not even about my respect for Jude Abaga (which has quadrupled since listening to this); it’s about the decency of engagement that was missing. Talking over the guest, interrupting him the entire time, downright rubbishing his work, this was painful to watch/listen to.

In my short time facilitating learning around strategic communication and advocacy I always warn against inadvertently drowning out the message because of the language, the messenger, or even the design. In engineering it’s referred to as the signal-to-noise ratio; where the background noise adversely affects the strength and utility of an electrical signal. This was quite messy, overflowing with emotion, and lacking the coherence to justify doing it in the first place.

Finally, I probably won’t ever endure listen to #LooseTalkPodcast again; I cringed for all of the 90 minutes I got through. I probably don’t like music this much, or maybe my expectations for 2 hours 47 minutes are just too high.

An evening with Fela Durotoye

Early in October 2016 I spent the day with my day one girl, Francesca. It’s always a pleasure to hang out with someone who not only gets it, she gets me completely. She’s gorgeous in and out, and is one of the realest people I know. But this post is not about her, it was about a ‘meeting’ we went to.

We went as a group to see Fela Durotoye and it was one of the best evenings out I’ve had in a long time! Anyone who knows or has interacted closely with Fela Durotoye knows that he’s such a profound and prolific speaker. And when you add that to the fact that he’s a Christian and has the wisdom of God flowing through him, any/every interaction is one that’s sure to be a blessing.

And so it was, that we spent the evening with his beautiful family. One of the first things I said to myself after spending a few minutes was I would work very hard to raise children that would bring God, us, and their societies joy. Pure joy.

When we eventually got to chatting with Mr Durotoye, I started taking notes, and I’ve reproduced them as is, simply because I stumbled on them recently and I was so blessed all over again I wanted to share. Most of the talk was centred around relationships, marriage (in the 21st century), and pleasing God.

Ready?

• Love (in addition to the many definitions that exist) – genuine desire and pursuit of the best well-being for another person. How do you measure love? Sacrifice
• Honour – Recognition of the glory of God in another (to the maximum). How do you measure honour? Adoration

The onus of admiration doesn’t lie on the woman but in the man… he must be admirable.

You can decide to love a person, even in spite of themselves. But you cannot honour them in spite of themselves.

How do we build a generation of admirable men? How do we prepare men that women will honour?

Proverbs 12: 4 – A prudent wife is the crown of her husband. It is the man who bejewels his crown.

There are stats to show that the economic, social, and psychological values of a nation are tied to the family unit.

And then we moved away from family, love, and relationships into nation-building.

Any generation must leave three things for the next’

1. Values
2. Environment (that allows the values to thrive)
3. A good name  (that opens doors of opportunity for the values to thrive)

If we’re going to build Nigeria into a desirable place to be and live in, we must fix the next generation of marriages.

The following are very key to passing on our values to the next generation

A. Transcend bias (religious, cultural, etc)

B. Show personal benefit

C. Be communicable (Messaging must be consistent)

D. Demonstrable

How could the devil who was described as perfect have pride in him? He discovered he was perfect, and his focus became in himself. That’s when he decided to ascend to the place where God was. It became about ‘self’, about ‘me’.

The mentality of ‘other centric’ – leadership… ‘self-centric’ – rulership

If you don’t frame and know your values, ou will acquire values as you go, and they could be positive or negative.

Every generation will have to explain why they ‘didn’t’ or ‘how they ‘did’ – which of them will we be?

Finally, Mr Fela talked about the tripartite, triangular relationship between vision/values, a road map, and people/projects, and how a mastery of all three will ensure you never have unfinished projects.

And then it was time to go home, because good things come to an end. Like this post. 🙂

 

 

 

Got to drum (an amazing short clip you should see)

I love street performances. Always have loved them. I’m like a little child whenever I watch them, and I never want to know how the tricks are done. Just keep doing them!

When I saw the caption for the video, an attack on social media junkies who “won’t carry this video”, I almost didn’t look at it.

But before I shut the page, I saw the Peak milk tins, and that held my attention. So I clicked play. Say hello to lovely music, reminiscent of my years living in Aba, Abia State. The little boy went from high-life, to calypso, and then to ‘Ariaria’ and I nearly got up from my bed to dance! Blame my duvet for strapping me to the bed and refusing to let go! Lol…

I don’t know what excited me more, the passion and concentration I could see on the boy’s face, the creativity and ingenuity that manifested as his drum set, the hours he had to have put into rehearsing, the fact that he was getting some attention (and some money as well), or the simple truth about the music being really good!

I don’t know who the boy is, and there were about 12, 000 shares of this video on Facebook so I don’t even want to think of finding him that way, but I knew I had to share!

Did you like it? Of course you did! Say thank you….

I’M BACK, and SORRY!

Good morning world!!

*now singing, in Bryan Adams voice* Please forgive me, I don’t know what to do, please forgive me, I can’t stop loving you! Followers, subscribers, and friends of the Fairy GodSister, forgive me! I’ve been away for far too long! I know, and I’m sorry! It’s not like I didn’t write o, it was translating the blurb to an actual post that was a bit of a challenge; not because I’ve forgotten how to use a computer (lol) but because stuff has been happening a tad too fast these past couple weeks and I’m only just getting my rhythm back. Bottom line, I apologise. E ma bi nu o!!!! Forgive me! I’m back now, and guess what, I’m going back to where I stopped, and you’ll get my thoughts on just about everything that has happened/is happening, however stale or fresh. K?

This is one of best pictures ever! And no, I'm not blaming anyone for not being available, it's all me!

To start us on good, smooth path, I woke up this beautiful Thursday morning (totally ignoring the fog and blistering cold outside), and after speaking to my Dad and Sister, started playing over and over again a song by my best Nigerian artist. Forget the fact that music is food for the soul, bla the bla, I doubt that listening to Terry G, DMX, or Cabo Snoop early in the morning will be the right diet for ANY soul. Agreed? Of course you agree.

First time I heard the song, late March this year, I cried like a baby! Not only is the artist brilliant, she is socially responsible, and the song came at the right time. Just as we were prepping for the April elections, we needed the boost that this song brought, the hope, and that ‘ginger’ (especially for young people) to go out and perform their civic duties. Funny, but these days I can easily equate the song to our national anthem, because they both give me goose bumps, and an intense sense of pride to be Nigerian whenever I hear them.

Did I mention she now follows me on Twitter too? I can remember how excited I was the night she did! I had just finished blogging (and the song is an excellent blogging companion), and then I tweeted, saying that she, and Eldee The Don were my best socially conscious Nigerian artists, and they are. She followed me that night, and I’m looking forward to meeting her (or working together on a project, whichever comes first), but you’ll be the first to know ok!

I’ll send you on your way to a beautiful start to the weekend (since Thursday is the new Friday) with ‘The Future is Here’ by TY BELLO. Have a fabulous, super productive day, and know this, the Fairy GodSister is back! She loves you, and thanks you for always being there!

Related articles

• The Fairy Godsister Is Home (fairygodsister.wordpress.com)
• It’s Your Size!!! (fairygodsister.wordpress.com)