The goat, the goat, the goat is on fire
Dec. 4th, 2005 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
likethebeerWe don't need no water let the motherf*cker burn.1
"The goat is on fire. I repeat: the goat is on fire."
A history of the burning goat of Sweden, which is highly entertainging.
Alas, the list only goes to 2004. Here's 2005.
These links due to, as wi_c & jujupees will not be surprised to hear, from our goat-loving friend, ND.
1This is the only large scale cultural phenomenon that I have ever been remotely connected to. The following is my understanding of the event.
In 1985, the "Move" compound, a naturalist, anti-government group, was occupying a row house on Pine St. & Osage Ave. in Philly (near where I hail from). This group had been involved in a shoot out with Philly Police in '79, leaving one officer dead. A stand-off in 1985 concluded with the Philly police dropping some sort of device onto the group's row house. They dropped an incendiary device on the roof, but whether they knew what they were dropping it on, has never really been determined. The cops said the group had been collecting weapons and that they dropped it on an incendiary device (I'm going on hearsay right now, so please forgive me). The group's members said it was gasoline used for the generators.
Regardless, every member of Move was killed except for 2: a woman about 36 and an 11 year old boy. What actually happened that day has never been resolved, as I said earlier. There was some contention that MOVE members were shot as they tried to exit the building.
Being a row house (which is a town house connected on either wall to the house/apartment next to it), the fire burned down an entire block. This was a huge source of contention, as you can imagine.
Anyway--the subject line of this post: by my Senior year, there was a dance song with a certain break-point, in which all of us would scream, "The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire. We don't need no water let the motherfuckers burn. Burn, motherfucker, burn."
I don't know the song off hand, but if I heard it again, I would know it immediately. It's an early rap tune I think.
I have to say for my own defense that at the time, it never occurred to me what the line was about; I thought it was just associated with the song. It was only much later that I learned that (a) it was regional and (b) it was specifically tied to this event.
Such is Philly.
Oh, and yes, when I was a Senior ('85-'86), there was a video of the past year's events shown on our school tv. The burning of the MOVE compound in Philly was on there. There were kids in my class who clapped uproriously. yeah. And we were in a suburb of Philly. Gotta love that place.
http://www.library.temple.edu/collections/urbana/psic-01.htm
http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/MOVE-Phihladelphia-BombNYT14may85.htm
"The goat is on fire. I repeat: the goat is on fire."
A history of the burning goat of Sweden, which is highly entertainging.
Alas, the list only goes to 2004. Here's 2005.
These links due to, as wi_c & jujupees will not be surprised to hear, from our goat-loving friend, ND.
1This is the only large scale cultural phenomenon that I have ever been remotely connected to. The following is my understanding of the event.
In 1985, the "Move" compound, a naturalist, anti-government group, was occupying a row house on Pine St. & Osage Ave. in Philly (near where I hail from). This group had been involved in a shoot out with Philly Police in '79, leaving one officer dead. A stand-off in 1985 concluded with the Philly police dropping some sort of device onto the group's row house. They dropped an incendiary device on the roof, but whether they knew what they were dropping it on, has never really been determined. The cops said the group had been collecting weapons and that they dropped it on an incendiary device (I'm going on hearsay right now, so please forgive me). The group's members said it was gasoline used for the generators.
Regardless, every member of Move was killed except for 2: a woman about 36 and an 11 year old boy. What actually happened that day has never been resolved, as I said earlier. There was some contention that MOVE members were shot as they tried to exit the building.
Being a row house (which is a town house connected on either wall to the house/apartment next to it), the fire burned down an entire block. This was a huge source of contention, as you can imagine.
Anyway--the subject line of this post: by my Senior year, there was a dance song with a certain break-point, in which all of us would scream, "The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire. We don't need no water let the motherfuckers burn. Burn, motherfucker, burn."
I don't know the song off hand, but if I heard it again, I would know it immediately. It's an early rap tune I think.
I have to say for my own defense that at the time, it never occurred to me what the line was about; I thought it was just associated with the song. It was only much later that I learned that (a) it was regional and (b) it was specifically tied to this event.
Such is Philly.
Oh, and yes, when I was a Senior ('85-'86), there was a video of the past year's events shown on our school tv. The burning of the MOVE compound in Philly was on there. There were kids in my class who clapped uproriously. yeah. And we were in a suburb of Philly. Gotta love that place.
http://www.library.temple.edu/collections/urbana/psic-01.htm
http://www.mindfully.org/Reform/MOVE-Phihladelphia-BombNYT14may85.htm
