LA I’ll see you next week! Deck Yes & HoneyFest have started an incredible program / meetup / event series based on making Dj education, gear and connections more accessible to the communities who have been denied these opportunities as Dj culture became more commercialized.
I almost said historically excluded but that betrays the truth that these are the same communities that invented DJing and pushed the culture forward! DJing and dance music as we know it comes from Black communities, Gay & Queer communities, Trans communities, Latine communities.
The phenomenon of all cis white male headliner festivals came from The racist, homophobic and specifically anti Black music industry/pop culture machinery getting ahold of Dj culture and outputting what their white supremacist board rooms would call “marketable”.
It’s incredibly important to me to (when invited) offer what I can to people intentionally trying to upend that system. As white djs, we have to confront the fact that we have been given opportunities by these racist systems specifically because we are white. We’ve been viewed as the “marketable” way to co-opt Black / Queer / Global south cultures by a white supremacist system.
It’s not comfortable, and we’re programmed as artists confident enough to put ourselves out there to believe all these opportunities came from our talent, but it just ain’t true no matter how badly you want it to be. SO what do we do from there?
An IG post when there is pressure on isn’t enough, memes about how our record shelves would be empty without black artists isn’t enough. We need to DO things that will hopefully shift opportunities away from ourselves and people who look like us in order to move towards a more egalitarian culture. This is all part of why I’m looking to 1) Examine my own actions and history in the industry to hold myself accountable and be ever more aware moving forward, and 2) Be of service for projects working towards the social / cultural / economic fairness that is core to my beliefs.
Of course none of this means I’m doing everything right! I’m just trying to do better and leverage some of the experience I do have. Love to you all!