ReGeneration Page #5

And, why do you feel that

you need to judge

the most intimate relationship

between two human beings

on the basis of how much money

has been spent on this?

I've seen a kid with

a CD player be ostracized

because he has a CD player.

It just creates this wall in between

you and someone who can't have that.

We have to create wants.

We have to direct people to what were

called the more superficial things of life,

like fashionable consumption.

And if we can do this,

then we can control them.

The government has tried to respond to

our demands for more.

That's why, as soon as 9/11 happened,

they said, "Hey, go out and buy stuff".

You know, because that's

what it's based on.

That's what is really going to make

this society go round.

Too many people have the wrong idea

of Americans as shallow,

materialistic consumerists.

And I encourage you all

to go shopping more.

And that's what we did.

We followed orders.

The ads that I see everyday

are trying to make an effort,

so it's really easy to just buy

the green Samsung Razor that

donates fifty cents to global warming.

Like, "Oh, I did my job.

I feel morally ok with myself now."

Now, the consumer culture

or consumer message

doesn't talk about the world.

The consumer message talks about me.

In that sense, the movement

of advertising into every nook

and cranny of culture

shouldn't surprise anyone.

And over the course of the 20th century,

and now into the 21st century,

advertising has colonized more and more

of the spaces within which we live.

With an age group ranging from 18 to 29

as their key demographic,

advertisers feed on the lust of our

generation's desire for material goods,

resulting in more products to be made

and the necessity for more products

to be advertised,

consumed and disposed of.

Never mind the effects

this may have on our planet.

But with this excess of consumerism,

how too can this affect

the identity of our generation?

I think what we are all

subconsciously deciding is

the 'Me' Generation,

is the stuff that's readily

available and out there.

The homogeny.

Homogeny is defined as a correspondence

in form or structure

owing to a common origin.

And in the case of today's generation,

this means a world where

everything looks the same.

The homogeny that happens in America

creates a cultural ignorance.

"I want it now, I want it fast."

You know, the convenience store

is where I spend all my time.

It destroys the beauty of the country.

When I was in college, I knew

I wanted to do music for a living.

So I knew that I had to get a job

that was going to allow me

the freedom creatively and

physically to do music.

Working in a bookstore or a record store

was the only thing that made sense,

so I went to every bookstore and

every record store in my neighborhood

until I got a job.

And then I moved on to a black-owned

bookstore Nkiru Books.

Mos Def helped me out with a lot of

different events we were doing there.

Me and him ended up purchasing the store,

running it for a couple of years.

We made it more of a community thing

and we developed a program

in the high schools that was based

on poetry readings we used to do.

But we weren't prepared

to handle skyrocketing rents

of Flatbush Ave, Brooklyn.

You know, independent bookstores

have the same problems.

You have a major company like a

Barnes & Noble that will come up.

The only thing the independent

bookstores had was

this home feel where you could come in

and you would know the person

who'd worked at the counter,

you could come and see

your favorite author.

At some point the majors started

to figure out how to do that.

Put in cafes, start bringing authors in,

putting couches in and making them

feel more like an independent store.

Brand new hardcover

you can get it at

Barnes & Noble for ten dollars,

fifteen dollars.

At an independent bookstore,

you got to pay the thirty,

or else the guy ain't gonna make

no money and they'll go bankrupt.

So the consumer is just going to keep on

to the bigger bookstore all the time.

We saw our community go from

two-lane dirt roads,

trees and forests and lakes,

to Lowe's and Kroger's and miles

and miles and miles of shops.

And that's something that

we just were always

so surrounded with and just

couldn't understand.

What is destroying the beauty

of our community?

And when we started the band that was

something that just really influenced us.

We drive all night

coming back from Alabama

or North Carolina or Florida,

in my dad's Mercury Villager van.

We'd literally play three or four places

in each town.

We'd go to this place and then work

and play that two or three times,

and then you finally sold it out so

now we're gonna put you in this place.

People were catching on.

We had a particularly

hard decision to make

of how were we going to release

the record that we're working on.

We were working on it

for a very long time.

So we wanted to just

really make sure that

we looked at all of our options.

And on the outside, the perception

of going with the label

looks really cool because

they're giving you money

and what they say that

they're going to do

is they're going to put it

in all the music stores

you're going to be in Best Buy,

you're going to do it all.

That's what they claim that

they're going to do.

We flirted around with different

companies for a little bit

and I tried to make something happen.

But it always came down to just

our gut feeling telling us

that we could...

We'd be better off in the long run

if we just did it ourselves.

So we just kept at it.

It meant more to us to know

that we had the freedom,

to know that we still could do

what we wanted even though

we had to work a little harder to do it

and didn't make as much money,

and didn't have as

much attention out there.

Because that's not what

we were going for.

Eventually, what became important to us

was this do-it-yourself culture,

without having to sell our souls,

if you will.

Or join the corporate system or get into

these things that we were kind of...

trying to escape from.

Because we grew up

in this suburban structure

everything looked the same.

And when we started touring, it was,

"Wow, everywhere looks the same!"

It's not just the South,

it's not just Georgia,

it's not just Stone Mountain,

it's really everywhere.

From advertising to consumerism,

the media has played a dominant role

in shaping today's culture.

Add to that the education

of our generation

what we are taught and who's teaching us

and the media has all but overshadowed

another vital institution.

How did I know what

I wanted out of my life?

It may sound weird, it is not necessarily

about the experience

but talking about what you learn.

And I knew what I wanted out of life

by watching TV, not by going to school.

It's sad to say, I think a lot of them

are learning more from the media.

They're more excited about it,

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