Here & there
What if Ebrahim Nabavi was born in Detroit and Eminem in
Tehran?
March 1, 2001
The Iranian
Last week marked a seminal moment for American art. The National Academy
of Recording Arts and Sciences, the organization responsible for Grammy
Awards, welcomed Eminem, a controversial artist who has thrived on verbalizing
his anger (and some say his hate) through music.
Ever since Eminem's Grammy nominations were announced, not a day passed
without some group or clique voicing disgust. Strange bedfellows -- groups
as diverse as gay rights advocates, women's rights organizations and parents
groups -- all banded together to denounce the Grammy's endorsement of Eminem's
music.
These groups have declared his music nothing more than foul, hateful
and subversive language disguised as entertainment.
To add to the controversy, music critics across the U.S. have applauded
the academy's embrace of Eminem. Throughout the year, almost every major
music critic has called Eminem's "Marshall Mathers LP" a breakthrough
artistic work deserving of highest awards.
Eminem won three Grammys last week, and each time, as he rose to accept
his award, what prevailed was not the specter of hatred, but the ascension
of art over censorship, an endorsement of free expression in lieu of containment
of art for the sake of public appeal.
And while I was watching Eminem accept award after award, the gesture
took me back to a few months ago when Ebrahim Nabavi, an Iranian satirist,
stood in front of a judge in a court room in Tehran and apologized for
having written "subversive" and "foul" prose.
Akin to a criminal, Nabavi stood in prison uniforms and tried to use
his only asset, his humor, to appeal for lesser punishment. He even promised
to abstain from writing. HIS award was his life spared.
This made me wonder what would have happened if Nabavi was born in Detroit
and Eminem in Tehran? What if god decided to stop this carousel of absurdity
for a moment and make it run the other way around?
