Chicken & Why You Don’t Matter
PBS’s news magazine Frontline did a report on dangerous pathogens found in chicken sold by one specific company. The chicken made a lot of people sick and some even died. The shocking part of this story is the company knew their chicken was tainted and even knew it was making people sick but did nothing to address the problem and continued to sell the tainted chicken to consumers. The federal entity who’s supposed to enforce strict regulations to protect consumers from hazards like this also knew about the company’s tainted chicken but did nothing to protect consumers, and did not push for a recall. It’s a very interesting piece that I think holds meaning that goes way beyond just chicken.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/trouble-with-chicken/
To me this is just another reminder that corporations run our government now. It’s totally mind-boggling to me that American’s were scared out of their minds about Ebola and right before the midterm election a majority of voters listed Ebola as one of the most important issues that concerned them enough to come out and vote. If I recall the poll correctly, voters said the second most important issue was Benghazi. People are getting sick and dying because of tainted chicken and the company selling this chicken continued to sell it even though they knew there was a problem. I guess they figured it was much cheaper to buy politicians and political influence than it was to recall the chicken to protect the consumer. Adding insult to injury the government agency who are supposed to regulate and protect the citizens against this kind of malfeasance were also aware that a potentially deadly pathogen was in a consumer product yet they did almost nothing to hold the company responsible and did nothing to alert or protect the citizens who pay their salaries.
Situations like this reinforce my belief that Citizens United was one of the worst Supreme Court decisions in my lifetime. That law pretty much guarantees that the citizens of this country and the politicians we put in office are completely powerless against the will of the 1% and the corporations they own. The media both progressive leaning and conservative tells the country what issues they should care about, and how to think about the issues they chose to report. Ebola got wall-to-wall 24 hour news coverage on every cable news network for 3 weeks straight. There were only 2 deaths from Ebola in the US, and neither of the people who died contracted the disease here in America. There have been 6 or 7 investigations into Benghazi so far and all of them concluded the same thing. There was no conspiracy in which the president and the secretary of state colluded to make sure American’s in the consulate died. But somehow voters named both of those issues (Benghazi and Ebola) as the two issues that were most important to them.
I place a lot of blame for this on the media. I find it very curious that campaign finance reform and overturning the Supreme Court’s decision on Citizens United almost never gets discussed on network news. I’m sure it has nothing to do with the enormous spike in ad buys that brought them unprecedented profits and revenue during the last presidential election where candidates on both sides spent over a billion dollars each to fund their bid for president. It’s very plain to see that Citizens United worked out very well for all of the news networks. Why would they want to stop the gravy train? This kind of thing breeds voter apathy and political cynicism. Unfortunately the voter apathy they cultivate works in their favor as well. The less engaged you are and the less you believe in the system they know people like that are less likely to vote. The lower voter participation gets, the more power they have.
I wish I had a simple solution to fix all of this but I don’t, but something has to change. We can’t claim to be the land of the free and the home of the brave when public opinion shows that an overwhelming majority of citizens wants to raise the minimum wage and overturn Citizens United, but corporations and the 1% are against both of these things so it will never even get a vote despite the will of the people. After Benghazi and Bridgegate fizzles out, they’ll throw us another meaningless distraction and a large majority of us will eat it up just like we’ve been conditioned to. Now isn’t that sad?
Freddie Gray May Get Justice
In a shocking turn-of-events Maryland State Attorney Marilyn Mosby announced Friday that six Baltimore police officers involved in the arrest and death of Freddie Gray, due to a severed spinal cord, will be charged criminally. Attorney Mosby stood on the steps of the War Memorial Building in Baltimore before a crowd of reporters and local citizens and delivered a well thought confident and resolute statement explaining some of the details she gathered from her independent investigation. During that investigation she found evidence that lead her to believe the initial arrest of Freddie Gray was not warranted. The officers who arrested him lied in their statements and said he had an illegal switchblade but Mosby said Freddie had a legal pocket knife. Marilyn Mosby is new to the office of State Attorney only being there for 3 months now, which I believed played a part in her decision to charge and prosecute. She has no obligations or improper relationships with the police department, and she hasn’t been there long enough to owe anyone any favors yet.
Warrants were issued for the arrest of all six officers, and here are the names and charges:
Officer Caesar Goodson Jr., 45, who was the driver of a police van that carried Gray through the streets of Baltimore, was charged with second-degree murder, manslaughter, second-degree assault, two vehicular manslaughter charges and misconduct in office.
Officer William Porter, 25, was charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault and misconduct in office.
Lt. Brian Rice, 41, was charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault and misconduct in office.
Sgt. Alicia White, 30, was charged with involuntary manslaughter, second-degree assault and misconduct in office.
Officer Edward Nero, 29, was charged with second-degree assault and misconduct in office.
Officer Garrett Miller, 26, was charged with second-degree assault, misconduct in office and false imprisonment.
If convicted of all charges, Goodson would face up to 63 years in prison. Rice would face up to 30 years and Porter, Nero, Miller and White would face up to 20 years.
Protesters in Baltimore protesting against police brutality
It’s important to remember that this is just the beginning. It feels very vindicating to make it this far because we’ve seen prosecutor after prosecutor look the other way and decline to charge officers with anything when the life of an unarmed black man is taken. It’s ok to enjoy the relief we feel by crossing this first hurtle, but we have a long way to go before we can see true just justice. So don’t let this lure you into complacency or dampen the urgency and determination that has fueled protest and the #BlackLivesMatter movement. We’ve worked so hard to get the attention of our leaders and the world and as long as we keep the pressure on we’ll continue to make progress towards our ultimate goal of a total reconstruction of our entire criminal justice system and the removal of all institutionalized racism within the system.
Cultural Theft or Respectful Homage
This blog post started off as a comment I left on a youtube video. I realized halfway through writing my comment that it was way too long to post as a comment so I “appropriated” (lol) my words and took them to my blog. I’m explaining all this because my writing style for this one is more conversational because it was never meant to be a full blog post. Anyway, here it is: It’s amazing to see African American culture influencing the entire world. Especially in music, dance, art, fashion, and sports. Descendants of slaves created almost every new musical genre of the 20th century. Rock, blues, jazz, R&B, soul, doo wap, pop, swing, big band, etc. all came from a very concentrated number of blacks crammed into a handful of southern states in the US. Now the world has taken this gift and created some of the best most innovative music the originators probably couldn’t even fathom. Living on cotton plantations our ancestors used song, dance, and rhythm as a way to feel connected to their homeland, and as a way to communicate important information to each other that only they could understand. Living through the hell of slavery and being treated like cattle is enough to kill the spirit of most men, but they created and sang songs to inspire one another which became just as important as bread or water. I’ve heard people say that the most creative and honest art comes from pain and struggle. If that saying is true then it makes perfect sense that these extraordinary gifts were possessed by slaves and passed on to each subsequent generation as a birthright.
I could argue a pretty convincing case for artistic purity while highlighting the unavoidable negatives that come with any appropriation of culture such as compensation, recognition, and commercialization, but to do that justice I’d have to ignore how much music has become a uniter reaching across borders and oceans like a war averse cultural diplomat. Thinking about the history of my country and the deep dark oppressive history of my people both still dealing with the effects of slavery and only 50 years removed from the horrors of segregation and Jim Crow, I feel such immense pride at the things we have accomplished and created in spite of the adversity. My parents grew up in the south during segregation and Jim Crow. Those weren’t foreign concepts I just read about in textbooks. They had to sit in a back corner of the movie theater where the “colored” section was if they wanted to see a film. While shopping downtown all the bathrooms had “white only” signs on them. Just trying to register to vote could get you fired if your white boss found out, and in some cases you could end up losing your life. Coming from that history feelings of proprietorship are understandable. Our slave ancestors didn’t have wealth to pass on to us, but what they did have was culture. Not being protective of that inheritance would be a gross disrespect to the pain they endured to pass it on.
When I see a Russian hip hop artist, or a Chinese break dance crew, or a French Jazz band, respecting the art and doing it justice, it warms my heart. I think it’s pretty easy to discern the artist who are deferential to the culture from those who mimic the culture primarily for financial gain. I think we should let the universe sort them out and while that process is happening, go buy a concert ticket to see a P-Funk or Earth Wind and Fire concert. Go to itunes and download Biggie’s “Read To Die” and “Life After Death” albums. Find some old clips on youtube of the men who invented Rock & Roll (Arthur Crudup, Goree Carter, and T-Bone Walker). Go to your grandmother’s church and sing along to some old negro spirituals and watch the oldest woman on the mother’s board add 2 more verses to the song that nobody else seems to know. I’m suggesting these things because we can’t be protective and selective of parts of our culture and take it for granted at the same time. If you don’t know who Goree Carter is, then I don’t want to hear your complaint about Iggy, Lorde, or Adele appropriating our culture even if I agree that two of 3 named are doing just that.
More Info & Poll Question
Black Lives Matter Unity
After the murder of unarmed black teenager Mike Brown by a white Ferguson Missouri police officer, a protest movement began to emerge. The most visible and well organized movement was started by 3 women of color who were fed up with the injustice and wanted to do whatever they could to unite everyone around the idea that black lives have just as much value as any other and highlight the very apparent fact that a lot of police and other people in positions of power do not value black lives. This ugly truth has been verified by extensive studies and backed-up by police arrest/encounter statistics in every police department all over the country. I’ve written a number of blogs about the data and provided source information in every one of them, so if that’s what you’re looking for feel free to look through Socially Urban’s archives. This blog is about the 3 founders of the “Black Lives Matter” movement, and how some well-meaning misguided men are questioning the movement because the founders are gay women. Alicia Garza, Patrisse Cullors, and Opal Tometi jumped right in from the very beginning in Ferguson even before the media arrived. They organized, they protested, they marched, they kept everyone up to date on twitter, and dedicated themselves to this movement. Black Lives Matter gave the movement a tangible legitimacy that it seemed to be lacking from the outside looking in.
When the movement went national they added another integral piece to the protest movement’s leadership and his name was Darnell L Moore who also happens to be gay. Keep in mind that none of these people are getting paid or doing any of this for money. Black Lives Matter is a nonprofit protest movement that started very small but quickly
Black Lives Matter Protest
became the catalyzing force behind a well oiled tech-savvy social media explosion that allowed the protesters on the streets in different cities to pool resources and push for specific political changes in the cities where police brutality surfaced and gained national attention. Here’s how Alicia Garza puts it “We were humbled when cultural workers, artists, designers and techies offered their labor and love to expand #BlackLivesMatter beyond a social media hashtag. Opal, Patrisse, and I created the infrastructure for this movement project—moving the hashtag from social media to the streets. Our team grew through a very successful Black Lives Matter ride in Ferguson, led and designed by Patrisse Cullors and Darnell L. Moore.”
Other protest movements and community activist began to use the “Black Lives Matter” slogan and infrastructure in other protest related activities and events. But when they would call for permission they never wanted the input of the founders. They would write articles and stories and completely omit the 3 lesbian founders and Darnell L Moore. Now that all of them are speaking out about it and wanting to bring attention to the work the black lgbt community is doing in the anti-police violence movement. Some are trying to inject their personal homophobia into this situation by questioning the motives of the Black Lives Matters movement strictly based on the sexuality of the BLM founders. altogether. If you’re a black person gay or straight this attempt to divide and conquer should sicken you. Police brutality and how they devalue the lives of black people needs EVERYONE who’s willing and able to fight. Gay activist bring so much knowledge and know-how to the movement because we’ve been relentlessly fighting and protesting for the right to marry for the past decade. They patterned their “right to marry” movement after MLK’s civil rights movement in the late 60’s
Protest in Baltimore
and because of that we now have legal gay marriage in 37 states with a case before the Supreme Court right now that will lead to gay marriage rights in all 50 states. You have to question the motivation of someone who’s willing to destroy an entire movement because gay people make them uncomfortable. The gay people protesting right beside you for the same cause is not the enemy. If we start thinking like that, we’ve already lost before we’ve even began. People like Tariq Nasheed who’s been one of the most vocal critics against lgbt people of color, has a history of misogynistic homophobic divisive hate-speech and if anyone cares about the movement against police brutality specifically against black men, they’ll see him for what he really is. A pseudo-intellectual idiot who should’t be taken seriously on any level. His message is outdated and counter-productive, and if listened to will divide and weaken the collective force the “Black Lives Matter” campaign has amassed. But no matter how hard they try to bury the 3 lesbian founders, we will continue to protest, speak-up, and march for what’s right. Whether we get the recognition or not.
Very relevant side note about a civil rights icon who most Americans haven’t heard of:
Martin Luther King’s most trusted adviser was a black gay man named Bayard Rustin. MLK knew Rustin was gay but saw the value he brought to the movement. Without Rustin there wouldn’t
Martin Luther King and Bayard Rustin 1956
have been a March on Washington, and MLK’s I Have A Dream speech wouldn’t have had the same grandeur and resonance without the image of 250,000 people of all colors uniting on the national mall all the way to the steps of the capital just to hear this extraordinary black leader speak. Whether there in person or watching on tv at home, the entire nation was captivated. That whole event was created and planned by Bayard Rustin. An out gay proud black civil rights hero who deserves to be recognized for his work within the movement.
I Support You
Legal gay marriage in all 50 states has been the law of the land for 96 hours now and the sky isn’t falling, straight married couples aren’t getting divorced due to the change, the black plague didn’t reemerge, we didn’t have to sacrifice a virgin to stop volcano’s from erupting, no one turned into a pillar of salt, there was no rioting, no looting, no anarchy, no national guard, no EMS alert on tv, nope, none of that happened at all. Barack Obama is still the president, Fox News is still racist, wall street continues to screw everyone out of their retirements, the sun still rises in the east and sets in the west, and Socially Urban Blog is still the most amazing source for progressive commentary :-). Yep, all of that is still as it was before. People woke up and went to work, or to school, or did nothing just like every day prior to gay marriage being legal. Other than the whining from republicans and a few silly angry posts predicting the end of the world from a few misguided (but well-meaning) panic-prone people on social media, life went on as usual and this Monday seemed no different from the Monday of last week. But for gay people like me I can’t tell you how amazing it feels to know that my government, who I pay taxes to, will no longer tell me I deserve less rights just because I’m gay. I wish I could describe that feeling but words will not do it justice.
Tonya R Isom
After getting her message I decided to take a little social media sabbatical Saturday and Sunday. I had to remind myself that I’m not here to make people happy or to convince people that they should accept me. I’m in charge of my happiness and it’s going to take a whole lot more than a few facebook posts to get me down, or to take away the joy I felt after hearing the court’s decision. I’m not deleting anyone, I’m through trying to convince people that I deserve the same rights they have, and I’m through showing respect to those who show me disrespect. At the end of the day, gay marriage is legal, it’s a done deal, settled once and for all by the highest court in our judicial system. Those who oppose it or those who think it’s wrong, their opinions became completely irrelevant on Friday June 26 2015 at approximately 10 am eastern standard time. But fret not; it’s never too late to educate and evolve. Just know that love and justice will always be triumphant over negativity and fear. ‪#‎MarriageEquality‬ ‪#‎DamnTheHaters‬
Mr Insecurity Dame Dash
Dame Dash interview on The Breakfast Club Morning Show
Dame Dash is the former business partner of hip hop mogul Jay Z. Their partnership ended on bad terms and left Dame in serious debt while Jay Z walked away with roughly $250 million. Although I love what Dame brought to hip hop and he deserves credit for advancing the culture as well as the music, his confrontational bully-ish personality is hard to overlook. This interview isn’t an anomaly, he’s always presented himself in this manner. Watch the video and read my thoughts after.
Before watching this interview I still had a little respect for Dame. I knew he had an abrasive personality but now I see him as a joke. I use to think he was your typical “type A” personality. Extremely confident in himself driven by a need to dominate and that made him seem conceited and self-centered. After this interview I realized I had him all wrong. He’s not confident and filled with high self-esteem, he’s the exact opposite of that. Extremely insecure, filled with self-doubt, and deathly afraid someone will figure this out. This interview with DJ Envy and Charlemagne revealed how intimidated Dame was right from the beginning. You can hear it in his voice at the start of the interview. He’s terrified. The odd way he tries to challenge Envy’s manhood is a textbook example of a psychological coping mechanism called overcompensation. It’s defined as an attempt to make up for a character trait or flaw by overexaggerating its opposite. For example; if you feel your masculinity doesn’t measure up to the masculinity of the other men you’re dealing with, you’ll try to project an image of hyper masculinity. You’ll start talking about testosterone and how much of a “real man” you are. No one who’s confident and secure in their manhood would have to engage in this type of boasting.
Jay Z & Dame Dash Reasonable Doubt Album
Another thing that bothered me was the things he said about social media. He says “real men” don’t use social media. This is absolutely ridiculous because anyone who considers themselves a business man would realize the importance of social media in promoting your brand. There’s not one successful business or successful music artist who does not use social media. If you’re not promoting your brand on social media then you’re leaving a lot of money on the table that could easily be scooped up with little effort. Utilizing social media as part of a marketing strategy is pretty ubiquitous now… especially in entertainment. Dame should know that.
Another thing that bothered me was Dame’s obsession with being “a real man”. Maybe he feels inadequate in his manhood. Who knows, but that’s definitely not normal. Who the hell goes around constantly thinking “what would a real man do”? If you are a man of honor and living up to what you believe a real man is, you wouldn’t have to constantly define it while trying to convince other people you have those qualities. It would be self-evident. Dame trying to convince Envy that he’s not a real man because he works for the radio station is one of the saddest parts of this train-wreck. I don’t see how Jay hung in there as long as he did. If I found out that Dame was a part of any business deal that I was considering, there’s no way I’d go through with it. No matter how much money I stood to gain. Life is too short to bring this kind of hyper insecurity into any kind of business dealing.
Jay Z and Dame Dash in 2001
Of course I do not know Mr Insecurity Dame Dash personally so all of this is just my opinion. But after observing him in this interview and others, I think my armchair psychology hits pretty close to home. Some of the points he made about entrepreneurship are 100% valid and I also believe more African American’s should look into starting their own businesses. I started my first business when I was 13 years old. I purchased 200 t-shirts wholesale and sold them all within a week. I did that through Junior High and decided to start a totally different business in high school. I sold custom business cards to almost every student at my school, and then hired students from other schools in the area to sell my product to their classmates as well. I then branched out and started designing advertisements for local churches. I’ve only worked for a boss maybe 2 years out of my entire life. But not everyone is suited to become an entrepreneur, and there’s nothing wrong with that. If you’re happy working a 9 to 5 don’t let idiots like Dame Dash make you feel less of a person for it. Please don’t adopt his insecurities because no one who lives like that are happy and content with their lives.
Fox News Racist Views
If anyone is curious why I despise Fox News and everything they represent, the video clip below is a perfect example that explains why. You have 4 people pretending to have an intelligent debate on terrorism and policing in the wake of the recent terrorist attack in France, but if you listen to the overall theme of this phony debate you’ll see that it’s really another opportunity for Fox to make their viewers afraid of black and brown people. They try to make racism sound reasonable, to desensitize us all from that sick feeling we get when we realize we’re taking part in or doing something or saying something that we know is wrong. When we lock our car doors when we see a young black man approaching thinking he’s a criminal who might rob me. When we see a black mother and her kids in the grocery store with a cart full of food and think she’s probably paying with food stamps. When we see a Muslim man boarding our flight and hope that he was stopped for extra screening. Fox News and their guests are constantly telling their viewers that it’s not only ok to make racist assumptions, but those racist assumptions are most likely true. This ignorant moronic woman suggest that skin tone is an indicator of criminal behavior, or as she put it an indicator of who’s a “bad guy”. The man beside her takes this even further and connects the terrorist attack in France to the way policing is done in New York. He suggest that targeting black and Latino men, ignoring their rights as Americans, and policing ethnic neighborhoods with military style police armed with military style weapons will somehow prevent terrorism and make us all safer. Then another ignorant panelist adds something very telling. She says people like her will not be targeted so in her mind it makes it all ok. This was the only truthful utterance in this pathetic racist discussion. Everyone on that panel knows that their race would exclude them from the dangers and dehumanization of racial stereotyping and racial profiling. Even the African American female panelist would be excluded due to her gender.
This video encapsulates everything that’s wrong with Fox in 4 short minutes. After watching it a few times, I feel it’s necessary to challenge or break down some of the ridiculousness and speak directly to each problematic statement:
1. Militarizing the police or making them carry larger or more powerful weapons would not have prevented 9/11. Making police in France carry larger weapons would not have prevented the attack there. The police officer who died in France had a gun. Giving him 10 more guns wouldn’t have changed a damn thing.
2. Stop and Frisk in New York had absolutely nothing to do with the decrease in crime there. Every study that has been conducted to answer that question has shown that targeting people based on race is a waste of police time and resources and it has a negative effect on the relationship between minority communities and police. Stop and Frisk was an unconstitutional failure that should never be repeated anywhere.
3. The male panelist said he never felt like police looked at him as “the enemy”. Of course they didn’t because his race wasn’t targeted. That’s why it’s called racial profiling. Stop and Frisk made NYPD look at blacks and Latino’s as “the enemy”. NYPD officers were told that if they assume everyone they stopped potentially had a concealed weapon, that would make the encounter legal. So black and latino men weren’t looked at as law abiding citizens anymore, under Stop and Frisk they were all looked at as potential criminals.
4. NO ONE IN THE UNITED STATES IS BEING HUNTED BY ISIS. That ludicrous assertion needs no debunking or rebuttal from me.
5. The best way to be safe is arming everyone with guns. This is probably the most irresponsible piece of the Fox News ideology. First they convince their viewers that young black and brown males are dangerous, deserves to be targeted by police, and are most likely criminals; then after they are convinced of this they tell them all to go out and buy guns to protect themselves from the black and brown men who are out to get them. This is the kind of reporting that leads to unarmed men of color being shot and killed because the shooter perceived them as a threat, only later realizing that they posed no threat at all. Crime continues to drop in this country but when polled most Americans believe crime is at an all time high. That misconception is mostly due to media who use fear to sell products. Unfortunately that misconception is also costing lives.
6. If a terrorist sees a heavily armed police officer they might decide to call off their planned attack. This kind of thinking is almost laughable. The truth is if a terrorist is determined to attack Americans and take lives, there really isn’t a lot we can do to prevent this. Human’s aren’t perfect and neither is our government and law enforcement. For every 10 attacks that they prevent, there’s always going to be 1 or 2 that gets by them. That’s why I believe looking at the reasons that lead someone to become a terrorist and trying to address those issues in a realistic rational way would be much more effective than waging wars and stockpiling weapons and passing concealed carry laws that encourages citizens to be suspicious of those who do not look like them, and adopt the role of a vigil anti justice crusader.
7. The NYPD being exemplary in blending in with the citizenry and becoming part of the population without being the enemy? This statement is only true if you’re a white New Yorker which makes up about 33% of the city’s population. For the rest of the non white citizens this statement is not true, and even more so for the black citizens who make up 25% of the population. Choking an unarmed man to death on a sidewalk, forcing a man to strip naked while people on the street watch, or anally raping a man with a plunger is not what I would call an exemplary police force. But this panel at Fox if fine with all of that just as long as their white privilege protects them from it.
At the end of this video clip the panel talks about the bravery of those who worked for the French satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo. I’m in total agreement with them on that, but “brave” is a word that becomes meaningless when it comes out of a Fox News anchor’s mouth. There is no bravery in ignoring the suffering of those who aren’t a part of your perceived “good guy” skin tone or race, and there’s certainly nothing brave about profiting from manufactured fear. Fox News and those who subscribe to their ideology are cowards. Racist predictable cowards. Charlie Hebdo’s cutting edge commentary that spared no one’s sacred cow is the antithesis of Fox News and their crusade against African American culture and the minority community.
Here’s a link to an older post that also points out Fox for their racist ideology. ttp://sociallyurban.com/video/how-fox-news-views-race/.
Tamir Rice New Video
More video of the events that took place after the murder of 12Â year old Tamir Rice finally got released today (1/9/15) and it’s even worse than I expected. After watching the behavior of the officers in the video I thought to myself, this is what happens when life is devalued because of race. To people like me this video is sickening and hard to comprehend how children could be treated this way. A little boy murdered by police while playing on a playground. His older sister tackled and wrestled to the ground, forced in handcuffs then tossed in the backseat of a police car while watching her little brother bleed to death only a few feet away while police officers offer the dying kid no medical help at all. No one calls an ambulance, no one tries cpr, no one tries to stop the bleeding for a full 8 minutes. You can see them walk very casually around the bleeding dying kid with no sense of urgency. It was like Tamir’s life didn’t matter at all to them. It was more important to tackle and arrest his 14 year old sister who only wanted to help her dying brother.
If you read the account given by the officer before he knew this tragic incident was all caught on video, you’ll notice some disturbing similarities to the statements given by other officers who were also involved in shooting an unarmed African American. In the cases where there is no video, most officials and non minorities tend to believe the account given by police. But in every case where there is video of the event, the video directly contradicts the story given by police. What’s even sadder is even when there is a video that proves the officer lied or misrepresented the events that took place, the officer still does not get charged. Apparently murder, conspiracy, reckless endangerment, and giving false statements aren’t crimes when the victim is African American and the perpetrator carries a badge.
By watching the initial video of the shooting we’ve been able to confirm 5 lies that the Cleveland police department and Officer Timothy Loehmann have told:
1. Police said that Tamir Rice was seated at a table with other people.
TRUTH: Â Tamir Rice was not seated at a table with other people.
2. Police said that as they pulled up, they saw Tamir Rice grab the gun and put it in his waistband.
TRUTH: Â Tamir Rice does not appear to grab the gun and put it in his waistband.
3. Police said they got out of the car and told Tamir Rice three times to put his hands up but he refused.
TRUTH: Â Police shot and killed Tamir in less than two seconds and could not have told him to put his hands up three times.
4. Police said that Tamir Rice then reached into his waistband and pulled out the gun, and was then shot and killed by Officer Timothy Loehmann.
TRUTH:  Tamir Rice absolutely does not pull the toy gun out of his waistband and brandish it in any way. This fact is crucial.
5. The officer who shot and murdered Tamir Rice (Timothy Loehmann) was described as a rookie.
TRUTH: Â Timothy Loehmann was not a rookie, but had been an officer for over two years.
Conspiracy Nuts Common
I received one the dumbest comments left on my blog, which I will not post because I have a strict policy about hate-speech. But there was one part of the comment I will address because it’s something I’ve heard over and over again. Below is a small excerpt of the comment I’m talking about:
“Your lawless president hates America and you’re too dumb to see it.”
– Anonymous Moron
The elegance of the commenters ignorance is astounding but I’ll attempt to respond anyway. It’s one thing to disagree with the policies set by the president or to criticize his effectiveness as a leader. That kind of critique is totally valid and understandable because opinions are very subjective. Especially when you have two sides with very different views about what needs to be done to make our country a more perfect union. I get that, but what I don’t get is the way a lot of conservatives frame their disagreements with the president. Most of the time they are incredibly condescending calling into question the president’s understanding or intelligence, or their attacks become very conspiratorial (like the one above). It’s the crazy insane conspiracies that bother me the most. This gentleman is suggesting that the president is purposely on a mission to destroy the country because the president secretly hates America. This kind of thinking has become very common among conservatives. For example, the fake Benghazi scandal (created by Fox News). Conservatives actually believe that President Obama ordered our military not to rescue the Americans in our consulate when they were under attack. Never mind this has been debunked by all 8 investigations into Benghazi and by every official account given after the attack. How can seemingly intelligent individuals believe that Barack Obama became president to destroy America and watch Americans die as a part of some nefarious plan? They weren’t saying he just dropped the ball due to incompetence, they were saying he made a conscience decision to let the American Ambassador and his staff die. A significant portion of American conservatives believes this wholeheartedly. It’s very important to understand the distinction here because it can explain why republicans refuse to compromise or work with the president on anything. A definite “no”, merits be damned has been the raison d’être of the republican party for the past 6 years. So Before we complain about the partisanship of Washington politics, I think we have to examine the flaws within our own views and throw away the divisive insulting conspiracies. I believe anyone who makes it to the white house has already proven their commitment to the country. That position isn’t easy to come by, and it’s even harder to win two terms (especially for our first black president). So their patriotism and love for their country as president should not be a part of any serious discussion. If you do not respect the man, at least have some respect the office he holds.
Money Hoarding
The CEO of a very successful hip hop record label just finished building himself the biggest house in South Florida. His name is Ronald Slim Williams and he’s worth an estimated 300 million. I read an article where he talks about his success and at the end of that article he says hard work does pay off and if people are willing to work hard they can have the same kind of wealth and success he has. I understand the need to inspire people, especially young African-Americans, but I take issue with the idea that his wealth (and anyone else at his level) is a result of hard work. The super wealthy are always dangling this proverbial carrot in front of the less fortunate even though they know it’s a lie. That kind of wealth has absolutely nothing to do with hard work. More than anything it’s a result of pure luck, being in the right place at the right time, or being born into a family with wealth. I’m sure he works hard and he seems to have a very good mind for business and I know he’s very well versed in the workings of the music industry. All of that is a talent and I recognize that, so I’m not saying this to take anything away from him. All I’m saying is there are a million other people with those same talents who has worked just as hard but all of that didn’t produce hundreds of millions of dollars for them.
Baby & Slim Williams owners of Cash Money
The chances of someone becoming that wealthy is 1 in a billion. Less than 1% of this country holds this kind of wealth and over the last two decades the super wealthy have actively pushed legislation that makes sure no one else has opportunities to build wealth, and are currently blocking avenues for the poor to lift themselves out of poverty. I’m not saying that Slim is doing this but I look at it like this, if someone with his power, influence, and political access stays silent while benefiting from the system that creates wealth inequality, they are just as responsible as the people who are marshaling their resources to rig the system in their favor (Koch Brothers, Art Pope, Sheldon Adelson etc are money hoarding pros).
Here’s something that a lot of people don’t understand. For every person who’s worth 9 figures and up (100,000,000+), they aren’t doing anything with their money. 99% of what they spend is money from tax breaks, capital investments, and bank interest. They don’t have to touch a dime of their money because that’s the way the system they created works. Essentially they are hoarders of wealth. It sits in a bank making them richer with interest. Our financial system creates a finite amount of money. In order for mega millionaires and billionaires to exist, there has to be extreme poverty. Children have to starve. Families have to be homeless. To put it in simpler terms lets say I created my own world and named it “Socurb”. In Socurb I print out 100 dollars and that’s all the money in my fictitious world. Socurb has a population of 11 people (including myself). I can distribute that 100 dollars anyway I’d like. So let’s say I decide to keep 99 dollars for myself and let the other 10 inhabitants divide the rest among themselves.
Slim Williams House
As long I sit on my 99 dollars no one else has an opportunity to get anywhere close to my kind of wealth, and in order for me to keep my wealth I know some of the inhabitants will starve, some will decide to use force or violence to steal money from other inhabitants, and every other negative outcome that poverty produces will occur. My wealth will protect me because I can afford security and my house will be very far away from the poor people. So any crimes committed will most likely be poor people stealing from other poor people. If I see all of this going on as a result of my wealth hording and continue to hoard my wealth, what kind of person does that make me?
I believe we should look at wealth inequality as a moral issue because that’s exactly what it is. It’s completely amoral for anyone to aspire to be a billionaire. Every single person who obtains great wealth and parks it in a bank or somewhere offshore is without question amoral and is personally responsible for every child who goes to bed hungry every night, for every homeless person they pass on the street, for every death that occurs as a result of a treatable disease, every inner-city neighborhood where crime flourishes and hopelessness abounds, for every dehumanizing hoop we make the poor jump through to receive any kind of assistance. That is the cost of their wealth. So this blog is not about envy.
I do not envy billionaires and I have no interest in obtaining that kind of wealth. I could not enjoy the perks of that lifestyle knowing that my money is drenched in blood. I couldn’t live with that on my conscience. Of course I’d love to be rich and I’m not knocking rich people at all. There’s a huge difference between rich and wealthy. 7 or 8 figures is rich and is a sign of a healthy meritorious financial system. Those who are creating new technology, or finding cures for disease deserve a bigger piece of the financial pie. But when a system creates consolidated wealth and distributes it to a few, that is the sign of a very unhealthy system. The larger that gap grows, the more instability and restlessness you’ll see among the 99%.
Proud supporter of Kay Hagan for North Carolina Senate. She represents the constituents of North Carolina with integrity and I believe she has earned another term in office.
D5 Creation