Talk:Rastafari/Archive 1

message: An anonymous user added:
[More information is requested regarding the history of homophobia and misogyny within this group, and efforts both current and past to progress.]
I second it. Tokerboy
Well, only dancehall music is homophobic. Rastas don`t like homosexuals
but do not condemn it so openly and homophobic.
Police seek Jamaican singer after armed attack on gay men
Sports Giant Threatens Antigay Reggae Singers
Puma threatens sponsorship withdrawal over anti-gay reggae row
Police Begin Criminal Probe Of Beenie Man, Three Other Anti-Gay Singers
please sign your postings using "~~~~"
thanks for these links. to quote from the first (article from The Guardian):
:Few can agree on the source of such homophobia. But most agree the church plays a crucial role. "Evangelical Christianity is very strong, and there is a prudishness and hypocrisy that comes with that," said a representative of J-FLAG. "They ignore the part that says don't have sex out of wedlock and focus on gays."
:Others claim the sheer geographical size of islands in the Caribbean makes them more socially conservative. "So long as you are stuck living close to your family then you never really get the space to make the kind of choices about your life that will challenge the values and practices you've been brought up with," said Erin Greene, a member of the Rainbow Alliance of the nearby Bahamas.
Rastafarianism is not mentioned as a possible source.
also, please explain how the sentence Homosexuality is seen as sinful and decadent, and so homophobia is found in a lot of Reggae songs matches the fact that homophobic lyrics are far more frequent in Dancehall than in Roots reggae, while the latter is more dominated by Rastafari imagery and ideology. 
I'm all for exposing the downsides of the Rasta ideology in this article, too, but I would prefer to have a reliable source establishing such a causal connection before we state it in the article. regards, High on a tree 21:56, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Homophobia 

message: I looked through the 5 most recent theses and dissertations avaiable through UMI (University Microfilms - they have all theses and dissertations done in the US) and I looked for anything with the keyword Rastafari, Rastafarian or Rastfarianism.  These were the five most recent (that's as far as I had time to get).
*  Christensen, Jeanne. 2003. The philosophy of reasoning: The Rastafari of Jamaica.  PhD dissertation, University of Colorado at Boulder
:The author discusses Rastafari, and calls, the people, the philosophy and the and the faith by that name.  This is the usage the Rastafari themselves employ because they are suspicious of the western 'isms': Rastafarian or Rastafarianism (p.9)
* Stanley, Cathy S. 2002. Expanding the small space: Rastafarians as knowledge producers (Jamaica). Ed.D dissertation, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois.
: The author alternates between usage of Rastafarians (for the people, culture and movement) and Rastafari (for the philosophy/religion)
* Raphasha, Makgompi Hamilton. 2002. Misrecognition and nonrecognition of Rastafarian identity in South Africa: A critique of 'Prince'. LLM thesis, University of Toronto
:Author uses the terms Rastafarian and Rastafarian religion
* Sterling, Marvin Dale. 2002. In the shadow of the universal other: Performative identifications with Jamaican culture in Japan. PhD dissertation, UCLA
:The author uses Rastafari for the religion and culture, with Rastafarian as an adjective, and Rasta for the person.
* Price, Charles Reavis. 2001. No cross, no crown: Identity formation, nigrescence, and social change among Jamaica's first- and second-generation Rastafarians. Ph.D. dissertation, CUNY.
:The author used the term Rastafarians for the people and Rastafari for the movement and the culture (although he quotes Rex Nettleford (from (1967) using the term Rastafarianism).
Among the dissertations and theses available with one of the names in their title, Rastafari appeared 17 times, Rastafarian(s) 8 times and Rastafarianism appeared 1 time.
In Google (English) Rastafari - 138,000 hits, Rastafarian 169,000 hits (95,100 hits for Rastafarians), Rastafarianism 77,300 hits.  As shown in usage above, Rastafari is more often used for the culture/religion while Rastafarian(s) for the people or as an adjective.  So, all hits for Rastafari is for the noun, the culture, while Rastafarian(s) is a mixture of noun (the people) and the culture.
I think there is a pretty good case for using Rastafari.  Guettarda 01:24, 19 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Looking at the data

message: There are quite a few terms from rasta-oriented reggae that aren't listed here or at Roots rock reggae and Rastafarian music. I'm thinking in particular of Natty Dread, Dread and Dreadlocks for Rastafarian and Baldhead for non-believer. Also ganja-related terms like lambsbread, chalice and many more that I haven't been able to decipher from records. Plus usages like I-man. Don't know if this is the place for it, but it would be useful if reggae newbies had somewhere they could find this out. It took me forever to work out that Natty Dread wasn't an actual person. I thought he was some religious teacher or something. Perhaps a reggae glossary is needed. 
Also, I thought this page might benefit from a clearer explanation of where the name Jah for God derives from. Isn't is Psalm 68? It's the one with 'Ethiopia shall stretch out her hands to the LORD' in it as well I think. I was under the impression that it was pretty important. 
I won't make any changes myself because I'm not knowledgeable enough to risk offending someone's sensibilities, but thought I'd offer a few suggestions. While i'm here, where does the oft-repeated lyric 'Jah is I light and I salvation, I shall not fear...of whom shall I be afraid' derive from? And what is Johnny Clarke singing in Top Ranking that sounds like 'All friars under manners'?
Cheers Mattley 13:47, 10 Nov 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  some suggestions and queries 

message: I would like to make radical changes to this section. While the Holy Piby was one of many sources for the development of Rastafarian doctrine in the early thirties the book deserves no more than a small mention. I would use Joseph Owen's book Dread, The Rastafarians of Jamaica as a primary source. Unlike this section as it is the book expounds ideas that match the rastafarian beliefs as expressed in reggae music. I think reggae music must be seen as the richest source of information about rasta doctrine that we have. The Owens unlocks many of the keys to Rasta doctrine, whereas the currenty article does not even penetrate the surface, and appears to have been written by people who do not know what rastafarian doctrine is.--Squiquifox 01:00, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changing doctrine section 

message: I removed the speculative sentences in the history section about marijuana smoking originating at Pinnacle and that Haile Selassie rejected Rastafari. There is no evidence to support the former, only that marijuana use did already exist. There is controversy around what Selassie thought of the rastas, and various contradictory reports, which the sentence ignored, thus being NPOV. how come obscure Walter Rodney gets a paragraph and immensely important Bob Marley gets nothing. This is plain bad, i.e. doesn't reflect the reality of the history of Rastafari. The problem with this article is it is mostly a rewrite from one particular source, and not a good one, I think --Squiquifox 20:42, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  removals 

message: I have included songs of Lincoln Thompson to explain how the reastas see immortality. I think we should not only rely on secondary sources (academic studies) in this article. There is a vast quantity of available primary source material in rastafarian reggae songs to help us understand this religion, and I definitely see it as legitimate to use the lyrics in helping to explain difficult or poorly understand beliefs such as physical immortality. --Squiquifox 21:58, 14 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Primary sources 

message: Hey, I removed the use of the term Babylon and did some other cleanups on the article. While I feel that it is in some circumstances ok to use custom terms in an article (e.g. kosher in articles on food), it shouldn't be done without good reason, especially when there's a decent way of saying what it is to be said without said custom words. The article actually needs some work to keep it from feeling like a propoganda piece for Rastafari.. --Improv 17:48, 15 Feb 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Avoiding codespeak 

message: Irie Ites!
I have added a major improvements to the discussion
on the houses
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Mansions_of_Rastafari
Please check it and see what`s good to go.
Blessed,
Rastavox
user:Rastavox
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Rastavox (talk • contribs) 22:10, 1 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Houses 

message: Hey, would you people care to give your opinion about Earth changes? The article is about to be deleted: Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Earth_changes   Subramanian talk
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Subramanian (talk • contribs) 15:53, 11 October 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Earth Changes delete 

message: I'm sure some of those pictures appear twice.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.217.64.118 (talk • contribs) 08:26, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Repetition 

message: It is a testament to the ultra-liberal bias of Wikipedia that this goes ignored. The whole ideology is overtly anti-white, even violently so. There is no hesiation to mention racism elsewhere...double standard? -- Ari
"Even violently so"? What do you mean? There are Rastafari practitioners in almost every (if not all) races. True, the "original" or rather, the early rastafari have been pro-black and anti-white, but who could blame them? The movement was borne in the early 1900's; the time of racial segregation=legal racism, apartheid and whatnot, even the holocaust was still to come... So, if I knew that my family and my ancestry had been slaves for 600 years, I might be little pissed,wouldn't you? But, a few things changed that racial aspect;
First of all, when Haile Selassie spoke in the UN, he spoke VERY strictly against racism.
Secondly, we've come a long way from the racism of the 1930's, the whole worlds changed. And all rastafari are not anti-white, quite the opposite nowadays, but they are very much against "Babylon", which is the modern global corporate-ruled, corrupt world, which happens to be mainly ruled by whites...
Peace,
Oliver--Oliver Filo 11:04, 9 November 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It is already mentioned, that some of the beginnings were violently anti-white, but this can no longer be said today.  I find that Rastafari today is multi-racial and much more a force *against* racism. In fact, the movement has become a much closer reflection of Haile Selassie's views, by becoming far more educated than it was in the beginning. ፈቃደ (ውይይት) 06:56, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

text: I remember in the 80s the USA network used to show a interview with the band 3rd World where Bunny Rugs says "The way InI see it, JAH is the Faada of all people - whether them realize it or not".  Don't assume it to be a religion designed only for black Africans, it claims to be the Truth from the beginning of time, not designed for only certain people.  If "the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes" to JAH, then that caste-classification based on flesh is exactly the kind of thinking Rastas try to reject from their minds. ፈቃደ (ውይይት) 23:53, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

text: Garvey was never a Rastafarian. It is Haile Selassie's well-known views on race that hold precedence for most Rastas.  However, there is one small sect known as 'Bobo Shanti', that holds Garvey to be equal to Haile Selassie, as part of a trinity (this is not the view of most other Rastas) ፈቃደ (ውይይት) 21:02, 15 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rastafari as a racist movement