Barking Justice Music
Welcome to Barking Justice Music, where music and politics collide to fuel change. This podcast dives into the power of protest anthems, political storytelling, and the role of music in shaping movements. From historic resistance songs to modern-day battle cries, we explore how artists turn activism into sound and how music amplifies the fight for justice.
Join us as we break down lyrics, interview changemakers, and discuss the issues that demand a voice. This isn’t just music—this is a movement.
🎙️ Tune in. Stand up. Speak out.
Barking Justice Music
Still Not Gone: An Anthem for America's Betrayed Promise
Some wounds never heal—they ignite.
"Still Not Gone," our new anthem, traces America's recurring nightmares from Kent State to January 6th, connecting atrocities that many would prefer we forget. This episode reveals why we created this musical indictment of those who betrayed America's promise.
Now available: https://on.soundcloud.com/f6wx5R6Elk45c8DLCL
The song begins with the 1970 Kent State massacre, where Nixon's National Guard killed four students for opposing the Vietnam War. We journey through the 40-year Tuskegee experiment, where government doctors watched Black men die from untreated syphilis; through Hurricane Katrina, where families drowned while officials watched from television screens; through Flint, where children drank poisoned water for years while officials denied responsibility. We name those accountable: Thomas Parran, Michael Brown, Rick Snyder, Colin Powell, Dick Cheney, Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, and the 147 members of Congress who voted to overturn an election hours after blood dried on the Capitol steps.
These aren't isolated incidents but a pattern of betrayal. When power faces accountability, it responds first with denial, then with distraction, finally with attempts to erase history itself. Our anthem refuses this erasure. We name names because memory is resistance.
"You can jail the voice, but not the fight. Burn the truth, but it won't die," we sing, because while they can break individuals, they cannot break us all when we stand together. These wounds don't heal naturally—they require justice, truth, and collective action.
Listen to our full performance of "Still Not Gone" and join us in refusing to look away from America's darkest chapters. Share this anthem with those who need to hear that they're not alone in their outrage, their grief, or their determination to build something better from the ashes of what's been betrayed.
I'm Mika Douglas and this is the Firing Line a voice for those who don't just shout at the fire but walk through it. This week I want to introduce a new anthem we produced, called Still Not Gone. Let me give you the backstory. I wrote an obituary for America a few months ago because I could no longer pretend the America I grew up in, imperfect but striving, has been betrayed. I wrote an obituary for America a few months ago because I could no longer pretend the America I grew up in, imperfect but striving, has been betrayed. We buried the truth beneath slogans. We replaced justice with power. We allowed cruelty to become policy. But grief isn't the end of the story.
Mika:In talking with my husband, robert, we remembered what we lost and lived through the civil rights era, the protests, the pushback, the pain, and in that moment one song kept echoing Kent State 1970. The National Guard shot four students for protesting. The Vietnam War, the man whose words turned protest into bloodshed, president Richard Nixon, his war, his lies, his soldiers. Ohio, by Crosby, stills, nash, young Captured this event and was an indictment of those atrocities. And now it's happening again, and so we wrote the anthem for our time still not gone, the stories of our past that recount the hatred, greed and ignorance. Let this inform our future and fuel our resolve. Our anthem begins. Four young lives fell in Ohio's dirt, kent State. These were students, not rioters. They were kids holding peace signs and Nixon calling anti-war protesters. The enemy sent the message that dissent equals danger. Four dead, nine more wounded and no one was held accountable. But we remember.
Mika:And then there was the Tuskegee experiment. For 40 years, the US Public Health Service and the CDC, under the authority of presidents from FDR to Nixon to Ford, let hundreds of black men in Alabama die on purpose. Dr John Cutler, surgeon General Thomas Perrin and others knew. They watched and they lied. Their names were reduced to files, their bodies, statistics. And we remember.
Mika:And Hurricane Katrina, President George W Bush, fema Director Michael Brown. The warnings came and they ignored them. They watched from television screens while black families drowned. Heck of a job. Brownie, referring to Michael Brown, that was the eulogy W Bush gave to the Gulf states, flint, michigan Governor Rick Snyder. Snyder's administration switched the water supply to save money, then lied about the lead For two years. They let families drink poison At the border.
Mika:Donald Trump, stephen Miller, jeff Sessions and Kirstjen Nielsen signed the orders that separated families. They built the cages and then denied they existed. Don't tell us this was about the law. It was about fear and power and cruelty. And we remember. And of course there are the lies for war, silence, for profit. President George W Bush, vice President Dick Cheney, defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, secretary of State Colin Powell they invented weapons of mass destruction, they doctored Intel. Dot Powell stood before the UN and sold a lie the world would bleed for, and we did. Thousands dead, millions displaced, halliburton enriched. Then came COVID. Donald Trump mocked the masks. He pushed bleach and conspiracy theories. 400,000 Americans died on his watch before vaccines arrived and he went golfing.
Mika:And perhaps most egregious was Trump's insurrection and cowardice. January 6th wasn't spontaneous. It was incited by Trump with his rallying cry, and Steve Bannon, roger Stone and Mark Meadows who fueled it, by Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz who legitimized it. 147 members of Congress voted to overturn the election hours after the blood had dried on the Capitol steps. Hours after the blood had dried on the Capitol steps. And now they claim to wave the flag. That flag doesn't wave for democracy. It waves for grievance and for power.
Mika:But we are not afraid. We've heard the call. You can break one, but not us all. Now we name it. I see your cowardice in cages and silence in poisoned pipes and dying breath. In Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, rewriting justice for donors and dogma. In Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg, the truth is turned into algorithms of rage. In Leonard Leo, the architect of the Supreme Court takeover. In Charles Koch funding the dismantling of democracy from the shadows. In Governor Ron DeSantis, who bans books instead of guns. In Greg Abbott, who ships migrants like cargo. You jail mothers who beg for light. You gas youth who march for right. You buy the courts. You poison the well. But now we name you, and we say enough. These wounds don't heal, they ignite. Listen to our anthem and be resolved to stop this terror. We are the only ones who can.
Barking Justice Music:with fire and we won't erase Barking justice music. I will not sit back and be afraid, thank you.
