M.d.c. Shades Of Brown

They say the darkest hour is just before the dawn

In chess, without exception, white moves the first pawn

They called it "Black Tuesday" when the stock market crashed

A fix in 1919 turned the White Sox to Black

Black balled, black magic, executioner's hood

White hatted, white horsed, champion of good

Black knight of Dark Ages on the darkest night

The Pope walks in truth, head to toe in white

[Chorus:]

Who started all this bullshit - were they looking for a fight?

You didn't have to be there to know that they were white

But when you're talking skin tone, let's not fuck around

Cause no one's really black or white, we're all just shades of brown

Black hearted, black beard on the briney deep

Or the family outcast you call the black sheep

Days of black plague - draw your final breath

Heading for heaven white dying of Black Death

Mankind is preoccupied to keep each other down

Some use superstition, a Bible or a crown

At best it's fear and ignorance, at worst, it's a sin

Not God and country, king or crown, it's the pigment of our skin

Used to reinforce what's wrong or right

It's really just the presence or absence of light

In the blackest hour of the blackest day

It isn't mighty white of us, but we gotta say

[Chorus]

White when your marry, black when you die

A racial hierarchy, a festering white lie

White stands for ignorance, pure and sincere

But if you're talking bigotry it should be crystal clear

The new world becond, the immigrants came

Homogenized their culture, anglicized their names

Then they painted Jesus, blonde with eyes of blue

Not a Nazarene, more a nazi than a Jew

In the black revolution with their Black Power found

Till their leaders were all jailed or stomped into the ground

And the final step ironic - to nail that coffin tight

The powder of enslavement in their glassine bags of white

[repeat chorus until this white male power structure falls]