Gone in Sixty Seconds: A Review of “This Is America” by Childish Gambino

The first time I saw a clip of This Is America, it had no sound.  I was given no backstory, the phone was just placed in my face with a question from my roommate asking me to explain it to her.  I watched Donald Glover (Childish Gambino) dance around in tattered pants with the latest “dance” craze and gingerly take a gun and point it to the back of the sack covered head of a man.  The same man that moments ago had sat down to play guitar.

He pulls the trigger.  Blood projectiles from the skull.  The body slumps over.  The video ends.  Well, not really… it was an Instagram feed I was watching and those were the sixty seconds I was fed.

[embedyt] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VYOjWnS4cMY[/embedyt]

Again she asked me, “What does this mean?  What do you think of this?”  I told her I didn’t know what it meant yet, because I’d have to hear the lyrics to have a full summation.  Yet, I’m sure it has a deeper meaning.  I sat back to take in what I’d just seen and based on what I saw in those first sixty seconds, I noticed came up with this:

00:00-00:25  The man comes and sits to play on the guitar and has our attention in the seemingly empty room.  I notice that both he and Childish Gambino are dressed in clothing similar to what early slaves wore.  SLAVERY.  Is this an inference to common day slavery?  If you’re the least bit woke, you know that we haven’t escaped slavery per se.  It has morphed into a facade to placate us into believing that the “American Dream” is for us or includes us.  Yes, that’s what I get immediately.

00:26-00:50  The camera swiftly moves away from the guitarist to Gambino.  His dance is hypnotic and strong, almost tribal… Again, I can’t help but think of our ancestors who were fresh off the boat.  How their movements reflected our African roots, a longing for a home they would never see again.  And that spiritual body movement morphs into a common jig.  Similar to that of what we were forced to do for Massa’s entertainment.  See, it’s not just about dancing.  We are a dancing, rhythmic people.  Our dancing has meaning, is our expression, our release.  But when we arrived here in America, our dancing became a tool of exploitation.  See, Massa thought it [our dancing] quite peculiar.  Thought it barbaric even. it was something he (white people) couldn’t do.  So as with anything they don’t understand, they make a spectacle of it.  For their enjoyment.  They’d round us up and tell their friends from neighboring plantations, “My nigger Jim dances something fierce!  Their nigger legs move so fast, I’ve never seen anything like it!”  So when friends would visit or business deals needed to be made, we’d be put on display to dance a jig for Massa.  Again, what we were once FORCED to do.  This to imply we now do it for free (after hearing the sound, I see that he even says “dance a jig for free” in the song).

[ctt template=”4″ link=”mGb3j” via=”yes” ]There is a fine line between entertainment and exploitation. – Kimberly “Isis” Thomas[/ctt]

00:51-00:53  The way he gingerly poses to point the weapon at the skull of our brethren closely resembles the Jim Crow minstrels.  Minstrels were entertainers with blackened faces who performed songs and music ostensibly of black American origin.  And many black men had to play minstrel sideshows in ordered to find any “career” in entertainment.  Minstrels are just an evolution and appropriation of the “jigging” slaves.  This is Gambino’s way of showing that our entertainment has become a modern day minstrel show.  There is a fine line between entertainment and exploitation.  For many of our entertainers, they tow this line and step over it without even recognizing they’re being used as a weapon tucked away in the back pocket of those that wish to eliminate us.

00:54-00:60  The brother he shoots has his head covered with a sack.  This is the same brother that at the beginning of the video entertained us with a guitar.  I believe this to represent that he doesn’t see it coming.  We are blindly allowing our gift to be used against us (appropriation).  And to show you just how much they care, someone rushes out to carefully grab the gun, while the dead black body gets no attention.  And the minstrel show continues.

In just sixty seconds, I see what he is saying.  Modern-day slavery has us jigging around for free in a pursuit of the “American Dream” while what is killing us goes unnoticed.  We can continue to play minstrels in the name of celebrity, or open our eyes to what is truly happening to us.  They shoot us down, appropriate, and abuse our culture and we move on to the next trending topic. Guns hold more value than black bodies.  We have become slaves to celebrity, pop culture, social media, and everything that blinds us from seeing what is actually happening all around us.

I did finally see the video in its entirety and I will be discussing it with you all on FB Live tonight, May 8th at 9 pm ET.  I can’t wait to hear your thoughts on this beautiful piece of visual art.  Donald Glover has been giving us so much to think about in his series, Atlanta, and this is just another contribution to think pieces.  Comment your thoughts on our Facebook Page and click here to join us in the live tonight!