Head Tax Hip Hop for Redress in Saltwater City: No Luck Club to play atVancouver's Carnegie Centre on Sept 10
Here's an announcement for a fun and politically charged event for Sept 10th, at Carnegie Community Centre in Vancouver. The
No Luck Club will play an event attended by the CCNC national president Collen Hua.
It's time that the Head Tax Redress movement took it to the streets to engage the youth, the people who have benefitted the most from growing up in a less-racist era, post-head tax, post-exclusion act, and post-systemic racism.
So far, most of the head tax redress events have been meetings, forums and protest marches that brought out the surviving people who were most affected the head tax and the exclusion act – the sons and daughters of the head tax payers, along with some grandchildren. But Prime Minister Stephen Harper failed to include them in the redress package, because it was limited to “surviving head tax payers and spouses” – even though almost all of such people have died in the past 10 years, if not the previous 20 years when head tax redress first became an issue on parliament hill in 1984.
No Luck Club earlier this year created a riveting musical hip hop track titled “Our Story” Trevor Chan, the laptop samplist, of created a “mash-up” called “Our Story.”
It address the head tax issue and 62 years or legislated
racism. It is an amazing aural soundscape that splices
together historical and documentary sound bites including quotes from
Martin Luther King Jr. The juxtaposition of positive and negative
statements for racial equlality is striking. Click here to listen to it: http://newmusiccanada.com/genres/artist.cfm?Band_Id=5120
Listen to such quotes as:
“The people of Canada do not wish to make a fundamental alteration to the character of our population”
“Large scale immigration from the Orient would change the fundamental composition of the population the of Canada”
“He's telling us what he wants us to know. That's his story not our story.”
“The government passed a special
legisalation which places a tax of $50 on every Chinese entering the
country. The Head tax was raised to $100 and eventually in 1903
to $500.”
“We have suffered political
oppression, economic exploitation and social degradation. The
government has failed us. You can't deny that.”
Vancouver seethed with racial hatred. An Anti-Asiatic league was formed.”
Media
Advisory – August 25, 2006
Head
Tax Hip Hop for Redress in Saltwater City:
no
luck club (NLC) and Funk In Da Attic at Carnegie
Hall!
Vancouver,
BC – BC
Coalition of Head Tax Payers, Spouses and Descendants invites citizens to a
petition signing and letter writing dance party with music by no luck club
(NLC) and performance by Funk in Da Attic. Colleen
Hua, president of the Chinese Canadian National Council, will also be in
attendance.
Date: Sunday, September 10, 2006
Time: 10:00am call time –
program to begin shortly after
Place:
Carnegie Community Centre Main Hall
401 Main Street
at Hastings, Vancouver
The
Conservative government's unilaterally imposed redress
package ignored and rejected repeated calls from head tax families for a just
and honourable redress.
no
luck club (NLC) is an instrumental hip hop group combining turntable improv with sample-based rhythms. Founded by the Chan
Brothers (Matt & Trevor), Vancouver DMC DJ champion Paul Belen (Pluskratch) joined the group in 2004.
Funk
In Da Attic is a local
recreational dance troupe with steps to put “move” into the redress
movement. They are Nicole Chubb, Gary Quon, Cathy Jupista, Julie Miller, Ikue Ueno,
Megan Hui and Hersie Init.
The
BC Coalition of Head Tax Payers, Spouses and Descendants are today's Canadians
on a two decade plus quest for justice and honour for
Chinese adventurers and pioneers and their families.
– 30 –
CBC TV Special “Gung Haggis Fat Choy”