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Donald Trump GOP Fools Gold
There’s no doubt in my mind that Donald Trump is the least qualified presidential candidate we’ve ever seen in our nation’s history. His high poll numbers continue to astound me because his campaign so far has no substance to it whatsoever. He hasn’t made any policy speeches. He has no policy papers available on his website. He promises things that aren’t a part of presidential powers (like imposing a penalty tax on a company who does something he doesn’t like). He says he wants to build up our military forces but hasn’t said how much he plans to spend on this or where he’s going to get the money for this. He thinks diplomacy is making demands under threat of war. He says he wants to get rid of Obamacare and replace it with “something terrific”, but hasn’t let anyone know what “something terrific” means yet. He says he has a plan to defeat Isis but it’s a secret he can’t reveal. His only reassurance when pressed on this issue is “I’m going to be so good at the military that it will make your head spin” (direct quote, I kid you not). He says he’s going to deport 11 million people even those who are currently legal citizens
Donald Trump Press Conference
I can understand republicans frustration with the establishment politicians because I feel that way about Hillary sometimes, but Trump isn’t the answer. He is not someone who has the mental capacity, thoughtful diligence, personal temperament or the selfless dedication needed to be the leader of the free world. He’s a thin-skinned attention addict who tries to mask his many insecurities by telling everyone how rich, successful, amazing, and smart he is. He’s shallow, vapid, and only wants to be president to add one more thing to his list of accomplishments. Running for president as a way to validate your greatness should be a disqualifier in the eyes of the American people. Again, Trump is not the answer… he’s entertaining at times, but still not the answer. Politics is a serious business. The job of president is a serious thing. Running for office is a serious commitment… not a role to play on a reality show.
Who Is Offended By History
While listening to some very early blues players music on youtube a while ago I had an inspirational thought that made me feel even more connected to the music because of the rough history my people have had in this country. I thought about the vileness of slavery, the hell of Jim Crow, the rough journey we’ve taken from being sold as slaves to where we are now… a free people with full constitutional rights. While listening to Arthur Crudup literally inventing a new genre of music it makes that journey seem even more remarkable to me. A very small number of oppressed black people 1 generation removed from slavery creating new art-forms that have become wildly popular all over the world. Blues, rock, jazz, R&B, etc all created in a country that officially amended our constitution counting black people as 1/5th of a person. Just that thought alone inspired me. If musical pioneers like Arthur Crudup could achieve so much with so little, it makes me feel that anything is possible regardless of your current circumstances. Unfortunately someone read my inspirational comment and got offended by it. This person read it and thought what I wrote was racist. It literally makes no sense so I decided to do a print-screen and share the exchange with everyone. Here’s the full conversation so you can decide for yourself. I didn’t edit anything out or add anything in. I did blur his name and picture because I thought it was the right thing to do.
Interesting right? I’ve never had anyone tell me I should be thankful for slavery. That is definitely a first. After the last comment above, I informed him that I would love to share our conversation on my blog which lead him to quickly delete his side of the conversation. I figured something like that might happen so I made sure I copied everything just in case. It’s weird how he saw my comment as being racist against whites. History is history. Slavery happened, Jim Crow happened, lynchings happened, the kkk happened. Using those very hard times as a marker for progress shouldn’t upset anyone and it certainly doesn’t make someone a racist for talking about it. Especially when someone talks about it in an inspirational way like I did. Americans shouldn’t be ashamed of the progress we’ve made. We should talk about it more in my opinion. That’s a pretty stark contrast from then to now. That should be celebrated. Even-though we still have inequality within our institutions we can overcome that as well. Just like the abolishment of slavery, just like ending Jim Crow, just like gaining amendments to protect our right to vote. There’s always progress to be made. In my opinion, I think he knew what he was saying wasn’t right. He probably had some time to think about it and that may have lead him to come back, read it again, and delete it. Misunderstandings happen all the time and we’re all imperfect human beings, so I don’t think any of this makes him a bad person. But that’s just my opinion.
***UPDATE***
After I posted this blog I got another comment from the same person. Apparently I have angered him. He wanted to call me a racial slur but he stopped himself and left hints about the slur he had in mind instead. So here’s the latest:
***UPDATE #2***
Here’s the latest developments (2/2/2016). This guy came back and deleted his comment about calling me a racial slur (the one from the 1st update), then tried to pretend he never said anything about a racial slur, and somehow I hallucinated the entire thing. He should have known I was going to screenshot the comment as soon as he posted it. It was only up for 20 seconds but I was quick enough to grab it. Here’s how it went:
After this last comment he decided he had enough and deleted everything again. People don’t know how to react when they are angry and lashing out but you are cool, calm, and rational. They end up looking like the irrational crazy person, which is what they are usually. When you’re smart, confident in your message, and honest about your point of view, there’s no need for anything extra like insults, slurs, and put-downs. Whenever I engage with people who try to attack me personally instead of debating the merits of my ideas, I try to keep that in mind. It’s hard not to call people like him assholes, but I know measured restraint is always the better option.
Marriage Equality Bittersweet
After news broke that the US Supreme Court upheld marriage equality making gay marriage legal in all 50 states I posted a tweet expressing how happy I was about the court’s decision. From this short tweet I ended up having a very interesting exchange with someone who comments a lot on my blog. We disagree on almost every political issue imaginable but I love to hear his point of view. He said he was unhappy about the Supreme Court’s decision to make marriage equality a nationwide thing. Then I asked him a very simple question that he had no answer to. I asked him how this decision to legalize gay marriage would change his life or change the way he practices his religion. He couldn’t answer because the truth is it will have no effect whatsoever on his life or how he chooses to live it.
If you are one of those people who are disappointed or sadden about someone gaining rights that you already enjoy, please ask yourself how this changes anything about your life or wellbeing as a citizen of a free country. If you are one of those people who oppose this for religious reasons, please ask yourself how this will change your Sunday morning church service, or the way you read your bible, or the way you pray to God. If you’re truly being honest with yourself, you’ll see how insignificant this is in your life. But for gay people like me, this gives us a chance to better our lives. It says to us that we deserve to be treated like equals. We pay the same taxes, we abide by the same laws, we work in and contribute to the same economy, so what gives you the right to tell me how to live my life? What gives you the right to exclude me from the same opportunities you have? No one is forcing you to agree with gay marriage, no one is saying your religious beliefs are wrong or not valid. No one is forcing you to like lgbt people. But in a free democracy you can’t force me to live my life by your religious beliefs or by your interpretation of your religious text.
Marriage Equality Upheld
you may purchase male or female slaves from among the foreigners who live among you. You may also purchase the children of such resident foreigners, including those who have been born in your land. You may treat them as your property, passing them on to your children as a permanent inheritance. Leviticus 25:44-46
Laws were created to uphold a system that treated human beings as cattle primarily for financial gain but the aide of Biblical scripture allowed it to last 200+ years while supporters struck down every moral challenge to this barbaric system with (what they thought was) written approval from god. I’m using this example not to bash Christianity or anyone’s beliefs, but to show how problematic it can be when government makes legislative decisions based on a personal religious belief.
Clementa Pickney’s casket in Charleston SC
RIP Senator Reverend Clementa Pickney.
Rev Clementa Pickney
Creators Of A Racist Killer
This year mainstream America have been forced to witness something that black America has known and tried to sound the alarm on for decades. RACISM EXISTS AND IT EFFECTS EVERY PART OF AMERICAN LIFE. Amazingly we have social media to thank for exposing this simple truth. Network news and print media’s failure to properly address and report the truth about systemic racism gave enterprising bloggers an opportunity to correct this using the power of social media. Mainstream media’s reporting on race issues were all one dimensional only focusing on overt racism (white people using racial slurs, KKK, refusal of service based on race etc).
After the Civil Rights movement our government put in place laws that ended segregation, ended refusal of service based on race, and protected the voting rights of African Americans. All of these changes were huge steps toward racial equality, but none of them addressed systemic and institutional racism. Those outside of the minority community assumed racism was over and turned their attention elsewhere. Mainstream media did the same. In instances where institutionalized racism appeared (such as incarceration stats, or public school funding) those who didn’t want to see it or acknowledge it would come up with 50 different explanations besides race to explain it. Those who objected were labeled “race baiters” or “race pimps” and African Americans who wanted to discuss this were accused of playing the “race card”.
Bill O’Reilly on Fox News Addressing Race
Fox News and the network’s show hosts became pros at dismissing racism with condescending editorials full of misinformation. They explain every symptom of institutionalized racism as a moral failure of African American culture. We’ve all heard this before; having children out of wedlock and one parent homes explains why kids join gangs and end up in prison. Dependence on welfare explains why the unemployment rate is higher among African Americans. Laziness and a poor work ethic explains the large income gap between whites and African Americans, and hip hop music explains an elevated crime rate in African American inner city neighborhoods. What most people fail to realize is, the moral failure argument is the same argument that slave owners and segregationist used to justify their racist views on African Americans. In other words, if you buy into the “moral failure” argument, you’re also buying into the white supremacist African Americans are inferior argument. That’s exactly what Fox News and conservative media have relentlessly pushed for decades. The election of Barack Obama seemed to accelerate their appetite for this kind of reporting even more.
Dylann Storm Roof taken to Cleveland County Courthouse in Shelby, N.C., Thursday, June 18, 2015.
Bottom line is this: if you look at the high incarceration rates, the wealth gap, the crime rate, the drop-out rate, and the high unemployment rate of African Americans as a moral failure that you have no obligation to help or correct, then you are RACIST. I use that word with great caution when I write because it requires some personal knowledge of how a person thinks and reacts to the world around him. But I feel extremely comfortable with labeling people who adhere to the Fox News and conservative media school of thought as a racist. Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh are leaders in the conservative media entertainment complex who have made millions by supporting white supremacist ideology hidden under the cover of political debate and commentary.
The rise of police brutality against African Americans, police killing unarmed African Americans, white people who fear physical violence at the hands of African Americans, the growing divide between the races, the rise in organized hate groups, and the rise in hate crimes are the result of conservative media’s white supremacist ideology that continues to inch closer and closer towards the mainstream. The depravity of those who make a living by misinforming their audience needs to be exposed, and those who consume this misinformation needs to open their eyes to the consequences of their consumption.
9 shooting victims that lost their lives due to Dylann Roof
The most recent consequence is named Dylann Storm Roof. On June 11, 2015 a 21 year old named Dylann Storm Roof walked into a friendly, kind, loving Christian church who welcomed him (a stranger) with open arms. He sat with them for the hour long Bible study service they were having. He listened to them pray, he listened to them sing, he watched them engage in Christ-like fellowship. After watching all of this for an hour he stands up pulls out a gun and began shooting. He killed 9 goodhearted Christian people just because they were black. He listened as one of the church members who welcomed him like family a few minutes prior, begged him not to do it and responded saying “you rape our women, you’re destroying our country, you’re taking over our country, so I have to kill you”, then reloaded and continued putting multiple bullets into the church-goers to make sure they were dead.
This terrorist may have grown up in a household where racist thoughts and beliefs were very common. But he could have shed those beliefs while entering adulthood and gaining a more realistic look at race and the world around him. Instead, that early predisposition for racist thought found a place to feed and grow in conservative media. Dylann told his African American victims that he had to kill them because they were criminals and rapist, and he wanted to take his country back. This horrendously racist way of thinking isn’t far from the kind commentary you can find in conservative media on any given day. Political commentator Chris Hayes pointed this out on his MSNBC show “All In” (see video below).
Dylann Storm Roof is responsible for his actions and he should be punished accordingly, but we can’t ignore the atmosphere that created this deranged racist killer. We can’t ignore the steady diet of racist propaganda and misinformation from Fox News and conservative media that gave him the justifiable motivation needed to commit this heinous atrocity without a shred of remorse. So Fox News and the conservative media entertainment complex bares just as much blame for the 9 deaths in Charleston as Dylann Storm Roof. If our justice system really was fair, Fox News would be facing 9 murder charges while sitting in a cell right next to Dylann.
Resources and thought provoking links
Welfare Queen 2015
Bill O’Reilly Calls Protesters Race Agitators
20 Things To Know About Race
How Fox News Views Race
Proof Of Racial Profiling
Racist Rancher Becomes GOP Hero
Revised Jim Crow
No Justice For Trayvon
Illuminati Conspiracy
SNL Skit About Race
10 Issuesless Topics To Distract
Freddie Gray May Get Justice
The Death of Mike Brown
Pointergate Exposes Racial Divide
http://graphs.net/police-brutality-statistics.html
Twice a week white officers shoot black suspects
http://mic.com/articles/96452/one-troubling-statistic-shows-just-how-racist-america-s-police-brutality-problem-is
Blacks suffering under stop and frisk:
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/05/where-blacks-suffer-under-stop-and-frisk-on-steroids/371869/
Race and the drug war:
http://www.drugpolicy.org/race-and-drug-war
Stats on African American’s disproportionate contact with police:
http://sentencingproject.org/doc/publications/jj_Disproportionate%20Minority%20Contact.pdf
Mass incarceration of minorities:
http://www.prisonpolicy.org/reports/pie.html
Racism in the prison industrial complex:
http://www.colorlines.com/articles/masked-racism-reflections-prison-industrial-complex
Prison became the new Jim Crow:
http://www.uua.org/multiculturalism/ga/200393.shtml
Racial Bias in hiring:
http://www.chicagobooth.edu/capideas/spring03/racialbias.html
Whiter jobs, higher wages – EPI Report
http://www.epi.org/publication/whiter_jobs_higher_wages/
The Racist Housing Policy that Made Your Neighborhood:
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/05/the-racist-housing-policy-that-made-your-neighborhood/371439/
The Case for Reparations:
http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/
Take Down The Confederate Flag:
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2015/06/take-down-the-confederate-flag-now/396290/
Race Forward important research about racism:
http://www.raceforward.org/research/reports/moving-race-conversation-forward
Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum thinks government funded social programs are the government giving lazy black people hard-working white people’s money: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdfZmcuomcE
Special thanks to Laci Green for the reference material and links. Follow her on facebook
http://www.facebook.com/officiallacigreen and twitter http://www.twitter.com/gogreen18
Welfare Queen 2015
Republican representative Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin said at a town hall in his district last week that constituents should monitor purchases made with debit cards from Food Share, which is Wisconsin’s name for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.  Grothman told the people in attendance to “keep an eye on the types of things people on Food Share buy at the grocery store,” because you know those people who are poor aren’t really poor. They are just lazy and we’re gonna catch’em in the act.  Ok, I added that last part about catching them in the act but that’s exactly what he was inferring and it adheres to his political party’s current attitude on this issue.
The less fortunate and the working poor are constantly getting demonized by conservatives.  There’s been all kinds of false narratives and urban legends passed around as truth for a long time.  Everyone has heard the one about the welfare queen in a long fur coat wearing expensive jewelry with a grocery cart full of steak and lobster reaching her freshly manicured hand into her Gucci handbag and pulling out her food stamp card to pay at the register and then walks to her Mercedes to load up all of her government handout ill-gotten groceries.  THIS IS THE STORY THEY USE TO JUSTIFY CUTTING PROGRAMS THAT HELP THE POOR AND NEEDY WHILE GIVING MORE TAX CUTS AND FINANCIAL INCENTIVES TO GREEDY CORPORATIONS.  Of course there are people who game the system but it’s a very very small percentage out of those who honestly need help.  If the program helps 100,000 legitimately poor down on their luck people and is gamed by 1 out of that 100,000, what kind of sense does it make to cut the funding of the 100,000 because of the actions of 1?  Don’t be fooled by this people.  And drug testing those who receive government assistance is just one more way to demonize the poor.  If you look at the stats for government food assistance programs you’ll see that a large majority of recipients only uses the food assistance for less than 1 year.  That means most of them were between jobs and fell on hard times, which is very common among the working poor.  They aren’t strangers, they are your friends, your neighbors, your parents, your siblings who are just trying to feed their children and make it through one more day.  They are not drug addicts, welfare queens, or freeloaders.  Anyone could end up in that position, and if those who turned their noses up at those who needed help end up needing government assistance themselves, I hope and pray that government program is still there to help them in their time of need even though they had no sympathy when the shoe was on the other foot.  Why? Because that’s the country I live in.  That’s the country I’m proud of.  That’s the America that the entire world population looks at as a model of what a great nation can achieve.  Sounds like Congressman Glenn Grothman needs his constituents in Wisconsin to remind him of that.
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.
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.
D5 Creation