St. Louis CofCC Blog

MSNBC:

A video in which rapper-actor Mos Def asked students around the country to walk out Oct. 1 to support the “Jena Six” escaped comment by this town’s mayor. But when John Mellencamp sang, “Jena, take your nooses down,” he took issue.

“The town of Jena has for months been mischaracterized in the media and portrayed as the epicenter of hatred, racism and a place where justice is denied,” Jena Mayor Murphy R. McMillin wrote in a statement on town letterhead faxed on Friday to The Associated Press.

(snip)

Mellencamp could not comment immediately because he was on a plane from California to Indiana and had not heard about McMillin’s comments, publicist Bob Merlis said late Friday.

A brief note from Mellencamp posted Thursday on his Web site says he is telling a story, not reporting. “The song is not written as an indictment of the people of Jena but, rather, as a condemnation of racism,” it says.

(snip)

Mellencamp’s song opens, “An all-white jury hides the executioner’s face; See how we are, me and you?” As he sings, images of Jena, the high school and the tree are followed by video from the 1960s, including civil rights marchers, police beatings, and President John F. Kennedy and the Rev. Martin Luther King speaking. Still images include one of a protest sign reading, “God demands segregation,” a stylized drawing of people in Ku Klux Klan robes and an older image of a black man in shackles, begging.

He may not think he’s reporting, but that will be the disparate impact of this screed song. If he doesn’t think it’s an “indictment of the people of Jena,” then why mention Jena or allude to the Jena One saga at all? And yes, I do think that the Jena city government has grounds for, and should sue for libel and slander, against anyone or any institution that had anything to do with writing, recording, producing, distributing and marketing this song.