Last night I attended the Jimmy Eat World concert at Mem Aud. It was a good show overall, but did not carry any special significance that is worth my time in this space here. You can read the Insider tomorrow if you really want to know how the show was.
The part of the night that did carry significance occurred as I walked through the doors of Mem Aud. As I strode through the entrance, a digital camera packed in my chest pocket and a notebook in my back jeans pocket, two security officials stood waiting for me. I've been to plenty of high-profile concerts in my day, and understood this to mean they were quickly searching or patting down everyone that attended the show.
But the two security officials just smiled at me and waved me on. They didn't ask me to empty my pockets or raise my arms - they simply let me go. I could have been packing heat and they would never have known.
And as I walked right by those officials, I remembered a concert I attended at Mem Aud last year. It was a David Banner show; Banner is a southern rapper, and I was attending the show to cover it for the Insider as well. Turned out to be a pretty good show, even though I really don't care for rap.
When I entered the doors of Mem Aud for the David Banner show, the scene was much different than last night; first we had to walk through metal detectors, then we were patted down by security officials. It was intense - I felt like I was visiting a prison or something.
And this stark difference between the two shows' security really startled me. Mind you, Banner is black, and the majority of the audience that night was also black. Jimmy Eat World is very white, and thus the crowd was too.
This reflects the still-very-prevalent racial divide in our society. Racial tension has always been in our rear-view mirrors, but when you experience such obvious discrimination as I did with these shows, it saddens you to think how slowly we've progressed. Did they expect guns and weed at the David Banner show? Was Red Bull the most dangerous substance that a Jimmy Eat World fan could have possibly carried in?
They knew what audience to expect for both shows, and acted accordingly.
And this - this is our world.
1 comment:
Great post. Yea that whole racial divide is amazing to me... and yet... it is very real. I wonder how much of the security alert was requested by the artists? Could that have been the difference? But it's sad in any case.
Post a Comment