Careful marketing is responsible for presenting Marley’s image to a new generation that was bound to find him because the struggle for equality and the search for songs of freedom are still relevant and pressing globally. In North America and Europe where Marley’s music is sold the most, his image is synonymous with weed (marijuana) smoking and being high – why is that?
The Grammy Awards have come under criticism over the past years for focusing solely on reggae artist with mass cross-over appeal. The name Marley undoubtedly has such an appeal – both Marley and his children have won the award several times; in 1999 Bob Marley & The Wailers were first inducted to the Grammy Awards Hall of Fame
he African should be able to do that; Live as an African, and if there is something he wants to experience which is Asian or Europe, then he can do that. But he cannot remain there. Because if he remains there then the crisis begin, and that is what Fanon was dealing with, the alienation of the black man.
Marley’s music made plain the intricacies of poverty, ‘mental slavery’, colonialism, oppressive civil society, relationships and Rastafari – themes that are alive and well in the Caribbean and in need of much discourse. Yet, from Port-of-Spain to Montego Bay, his image is relegated to t-shirts, mugs and assorted trinkets. The only value Marley seem to present to his homeland is his ability to draw tourists to the island in search of things the government have been slow to celebrate – marijuana and a Rastafarian lifestyle still marginalized on the island today.
In her book, Rita Marley’s rag to riches story tracks the couple’s tumultuous relationship fraught with marital infidelity and emotional hard times. Although many credit his widow’s current fame and fortune to the legacy of Bob Marley, her book attributes her success to her resourcefulness, independence, talent and faith.
Whether it has an African name or a “Babylonian” name or it is wearing a dashiki, agbada or suit and tie, injustice is injustice and it deserves a fierce fight from the oppressed until it is eliminated. Sexism within Rastafarian spirituality is an injustice to our collective struggle as a people.
How [could] the Europeans construct the Americas without African labor? It’s just not true… we are led to believe that the trans-Atlantic slave trade was an involuntary migration of unskilled labor, well that’s not true either. If you are about to build a whole continent-I mean “rebuild” because somebody had already built it, you are not going to recruit people based on their lack of knowledge, you want people who have the kinds of skill and expertise you need to create this new society.
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