Plausible Separation

Plausible Separation

 

The Art of Causing Racism by Pretending to Defeat It

 

Last night, after a long day at the office, I picked up my son from the sitter, fed him and let him play, cooked spaghetti with meat sauce and waited for my wife to come home from work. Once she arrived and settled herself we turned on the television to entertain us as we ate. Soon, time came around to put the baby down for the night. After that, my wife turned to me and asked “What time is it?”

“Nine o’clock” I replied and she went on to tell me that Black in America was coming on CNN and she wanted to watch it. I looked at her like she was crazy but I turned the channel anyway.

Fifteen minutes into the program I was livid…well, actually I was livid when she asked me to tune in but I decided to give it a chance anyway. Bad move. As we viewed this “enlightening” program, I realized something. Why do we need an after school special to highlight just exactly what is WRONG in our community.

Are We There Yet?

Last night, Senator Barack H. Obama won the Democratic Nomination for President of the United States of America. This is the first time in Black American History that one of our brothers have been *this* close to leading the country.

In thinking of this great achievement and milestone, it begs me to wonder. I wonder if (whether he wins or loses the race) we as a people will continue to cut each other from the knees, will we continue to let pettiness keep us short-sighted or will we as a community become one again.

Back in the late 1960s and early 1970s, our younger generation galvanized itself as a community. We had leaders, both political and religious. Societies were created (Nation of Islam, Nation of Gods and Earths, Black Panther Party, The National Black Caucus, The NAACP etc) in which we as a people could feel some sort of comfort in knowing WE HAD A VOICE, AND WE WERE GOING TO HAVE OUR SAY.

Since the 70s however, our culture as Black Americans was whitewashed (for lack of a better term). Somewhere along our way, we changed our focus from setting up our culture and our societies within the American infrastructure to melding with the infrastructure all together. Thus attaining a sense of equality unheard of just a decade or so prior.

So, if we successfully assimilated into the American system, why has it taken so long to be recognized that we have the ability to make some of the most important decisions ever?

That being said, we also lost a lot of ourselves and who we were in this country because of the conforming issue. The things that made Black beautiful are the very things our culture is missing right now.

So I ask you, Are we ready to reclaim who we were and our Black American culture? Are we ready for Black to be beautiful again? IS this the second renaissance? Or will we continue to assimilate so much that we lose our Black culture all together?

Are we there yet? Or are we still in a fight?

They hate our black skin.

Amadou Bailo Diallo (September 2, 1975 – February 4, 1999) was a 23-year-old immigrant to the United States from Guinea, who was shot and killed on February 4, 1999, by four New York City Police Department plain-clothed officers: Sean Carroll, Richard Murphy, Edward McMellon and Kenneth Boss. The four men fired a total of 41 rounds. Diallo was unarmed at the time of the shooting, and a firestorm of controversy erupted subsequent to the event as the circumstances of the shooting prompted outrage both within and outside New York City. Issues such as police brutality, racial profiling, and contagious shooting were central to the ensuing controversy.

The shooting took place at 1157 Wheeler Avenue in the Soundview section of The Bronx. The four officers involved were part of the now-defunct Street Crimes Unit. All of the officers were exonerated by jury trial of any wrongdoing.

 

Phillip Pannell was an African American teenager killed by Police Officer Gary Spath in Teaneck, New Jersey on April 10, 1990. Pannell was fleeing police when he was shot; Spath was later charged and acquitted on charges of manslaughter[1]. The case created controversy over the issues racial profiling and police brutality.

 

Rodney Glen King (born April 2, 1965 in Sacramento, California) is an African-American motorist driver who, in 1991 was stopped and then beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers (Laurence Powell, Timothy Wind, Theodore Briseno and Sergeant Stacey Koon) after being chased for speeding. A bystander, George Holliday, videotaped much of the event from a distance. Part of the video was broadcast around the world and shows four LA police officers restraining and repeatedly striking a black man, while four to six other officers stand by.^[1] There is no part of the tape that shows Mr. King attacking the officers, as some have claimed.^[2]

The resulting public outrage raised tensions between the black community and the LAPD, and increased anger over police brutality and issues such as unemployment, racial tension, and poverty in the black community of South Central Los Angeles. The four officers were tried in a state court for using excessive force, but were acquitted. The annoucement of the acquittals sparked the 1992 Los Angeles riots

 

(from Wikipedia.com)

Woman Studying to Become one of the First Black Woman Rabbis…

While Hillary is fighting to become the first woman president, Tamar Manasseh is fighting just as hard to break another barrier for her race and her sex. She is studying to become one of the nations first black female Rabbis.

America The Tainted

Ladies and Gentlemen of America… please stop allowing yourselves to be fooled. There is an immediate and dangerous terrorist plot unfolding before your very eyes. America is being set up to be destroyed. All that you hold true and dear is about to be taken away in a flash of fire and agony.

There’s a half-negro attempting to take over the White House.

He will bring terrorists from all Muslim countries onto our shores for the sole purpose of destroying the America our forefathers built, toiled and died for. Don’t be fooled. He is no Martin Luther King. He will not follow what we prescribe him to do. He’s dangerous and needs to be stopped. If you believe in America… stop Barack Obama.

As strange as it seems for this to be written, this is exactly what Anderson Cooper, Bill and Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Lou Dobbs and just about every reporter, media correspondent, political pundit, shoot, just about every person in control of our airwaves want you to believe.

If that weren’t true, why are we attacking Sen. Obama for telling the truth? As shown in CNN’s recent programming, though Sen. Obama clearly and confidently answered all of the questions put forth to him his orator continued to SHOW her frustration at the fact he would not crack under her belligerent questions.

Why are they still reporting that he “lost” Texas? Why are they still talking about a retired pastors statements? Why America? Why are we allowing the media to sway our feelings toward fear? What are they truly afraid of?

Sen. Hillary Clinton had the absolute audacity to call Sen. Obama elitist for stating the truth about small town America, where poverty is ever-increasing. Where jobs are being lost at alarming rates; where health care is impossible, wages are shrinking but food, gas and all other amenities are becoming increasingly more expensive? In a world that is watching all of its medical and educational funding being cut to kill our children in a war WE SHOULD NOT BE IN.

Are main concern is that the “Tiger Woods of Politics” is trying to blackface the White House.

Of course this is just a ploy to take our hearts and minds away from the important facts of this election, and America’s future. The status quo is not working. Period. The presidency is supposed to be of the people, by the people. Sen. Clinton, ex-President Clinton, Sen. McCain, FOX news, and all other media outlets want us to realize one fact. The people mean rich white people. Not US people, not the United States of American People, their kind of people. The big business, oil-producing, Yale and Princeton affording, 2.5 million-dollar home purchasing people, where excellent health care and excellent education affordability is of no concern.

Why else do they continue to raise the color flag every time Sen. Obama is addressed. The media believes they are being fair and impartial, but to whom? It has been highlighted and documented the inaccuracies of Sen. Clintons claims of experience. The down-right exaggerations of seeing battle, the omissions of just how intricate she was in democratic processes overseas have been shown, and yet we continue to allow her to control our airwaves with her nonsense. During the course of her campaign the great respect this writer once had for her has been thoroughly obliterated.

There is something bigger happening here. Race issues that have not been spoken of in 20 years are now all we hear. Even hip hop music message boards are splitting into race wars based on the fear and misunderstanding that we NEVER TRULY HEALED AS A COUNTRY. And for Pat Buchanan to say Black Americans should be grateful for slavery is like saying Jewish Americans should be praising Hitler for the holocaust. To us it IS that serious.

And yet, there is nothing spoken about that madness, but Rev. Wright is all over the news for his comments. Right or wrong, he is allowed free speech and though some may not like his comments because they truly don’t know that the other side understands his words, whether they are mad because his truths hit too close to home and allow for dialogue America truly isn’t ready for, or if they just don’t like him, matters not,. If Buchanan can say what he says, why can’t Wright?

Fear campaigning my people, fear mongering, and fear tactics are what’s separating us from seeing the truth.

What is the truth, simple. Whether we like it or not, America is changing. Americans are not the reflection of what they were 20-30 years ago. To elect a person to lead us who cannot see the change is to say we don’t respect the change. We are archaic in our decision-making and we do not want to truly come together as a united country, all of its people together.

I am not an “Obamaite” or any nifty colloquialism you can ascertain to dismiss these writings. I am a husband, a father and a person struggling within this economic system that is crippling my loved ones. I am an ex Army Sergeant with friends and family still caught up in a war we should not be in. I am black, and I am America.

Are you America? If so, tell these people controlling our airwaves to STICK TO THE TRUTH. WE ARE NOT IN A COMMUNIST DICTATORSHIP WHERE WE ARE TOLD HOW TO THINK. ALLOW US TO VOTE CLEARLY FOR OUR COUNTRY’S FUTURE.

If not, we will have 100 years of more of the same. That is not what I want for my children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Do you?

 

Wake Up my Family…

My Brothers and Sisters,

The “editorial opinion” below was taken from the below link on craigslist.org. Apparently, though skewed opinion is floating around the internet and it is truly appalling to me. Being a black man married to a beautiful Nigerian woman of dark complexion and one who has been raised by a beautiful black American single mother and he who has 2 beautiful sisters find this testimonial to be false and extremely crass.

Unfortunately, due to the immense proportion of our sistren in the adult industry, the amount of single mothers in our culture and the amount of our brethren who date “outside” our culture, could there be any truth to this madness?

Here is the link and the quote. Please let me know what you think.

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/nva/rnr/642308315.html

“There are very few attractive black women to begin with. I am talking about truly black, not red bone or Dalmatians. I mean 90% of the women are bald, have skin issues, have chicken legs with cottage cheese thighs. Very few black women actually look good with a fat ass. The average black woman has to work 10 times harder to look presentable. Otherwise they look like they got dipped into Crisco and just woke up. There is nothing special about a black woman, unless you have a fetish for them.
It may sound racist but even their own males don’t find them attractive. The common answer to that is well black woman are strong and don’t put up with shit. No the real answer is that black women are just not attractive to males, of any race.”

 

We the Neglected Children of American Politics

Leon A. Walker- leonwalker@cox.net

April 12, 2008

“We the neglected children of American politics, in the sincere hope, that we will someday be embraced by this Union”. 

I made that up following an inexplicable urge to scan some of this nation’s founding documents yesterday.  In doing so, I again read the following from our Declaration of Independence, the document that is the cornerstone of American freedom. 

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”. .

There is no escaping the beauty, passion and eloquence of Thomas Jefferson’s words.  My man Jefferson could run it down now… but apparently he was not talking about everybody.  There were, and amazingly still are, Americans who are better described by my far less eloquent opening statement.
The exclusively White representatives that shaped the original thirteen United States were incredible visionaries.  I believe that they understood that the fledgling nation they had laid the foundation for would flourish and grow.  I also believe that they imagined that Blacks (then primarily but not exclusively a population of slaves) and women, would someday be granted the power of the vote.  These rights were not provided for in our original founding documents or laws.  It must be pointed out then, that even from the very beginning the influential few, orchestrated governmental inequities counter to their claims.  And thus, were born of this wonderful document, the first “neglected children of American politics” to be victimized by the privileged.  Women, for social reasons and slaves for economic and political reasons.

The Clintons: “Sixty Is the New Seventy”

Leon A. Walker-leonwalker@cox.net

April 11, 2008

Former President Clinton’s recent remark about his wife being sixty and suggesting that those of that age can be expected to sometimes forget things leaves me in uncomfortable hysterics. I am only laughing about this most recent Clinton gaff because the content and context of the comments are really of no consequence. The reason I am somewhat uncomfortable is because the only plausible explanation for such a ridiculous statement is that the former President has actually started inhaling this time.

How is it possible for a surrogate (who happens to be your husband and a former President) to call his wife (a candidate for President) old, senile and then to again breathe life in the biggest lie she has told in her campaign (hopefully in her life). Never mind who is going to answer the phone. It already is beginning to look like the inmates have taken over at the asylum! I had no idea how old Senator Clinton was nor did I care prior to yesterday and I doubt that anyone in America really cares. Although I am not a supporter of Senator Clinton and whatever else I think of her and her politics, I would have to characterize her as an amazingly, bright, accomplished and vibrant woman. That said, I’m not seeing much in the way of leadership and experience from Senator Clinton in managing her campaign. Additionally and perhaps most importantly, she is faced with a political and personal problem in her husband that may have consequences beyond any she might have ever imagined. He is now a “prime time” political nightmare!

In consideration of the aforementioned I have to begin to ask some questions that have begun to haunt me. Exactly what does Bill Clinton fail to understand about the terms: “World Wide Web” and “Mass Media”? Exactly why does he continue to stand before crowds and reporters and wag his finger (oh god, the finger) and embellish and lie as if we will all consider that it is coming from the burning bush? How in the world will Senator Clinton’s Campaign remain credible in light of his continuing smorgasbord of embarrassments? Has anyone on their staff realized that he has now become a walking, talking reminder of every deception and scandal that were the hallmarks of the first Clinton Administration? Does anyone else see that right before our eyes, “Slick Willy”

has become “Silly Willy”?

I am convinced that former President Clinton has made and can continue to make a significant contribution to the Senator’s campaign behind the scenes. But as a front man, he has definitely lost his touch. The sad thing is Senator Clinton may not have figured it out yet. I can tell you this; she is going to have a good many people on her staff pointing it out to her in the very near future. That is when things will get interesting. Hillary is going to have to fire Bill and when that happens, many Democrats will be reminded to ask themselves this more serious question. Are we really comfortable with the idea of another Clinton Administration? Particularly one with the former President, a man of influence and connections wandering around making statements and working deals that may well run counter to administration policy. Ok, alright, let’s try another question. Does anyone really believe that Hillary can keep him on a short leash politically, ethically or otherwise? Go ahead, you can say it. Absolutely not!

Thankfully, I do not believe that we will be faced with another dysfunctional Clinton White House. I feel confident that as the primary process continues to unfold she will lose herself this contest due to unsavory tactics and the embarrassing baggage that she has to tote along with her. This is to say nothing of the earnings and business dealings that are beginning to surface and face severe scrutiny. I predict it is all far worse than it may currently appear.

Unfortunately, the impacts of this campaign fiasco may impact her political future beyond what I believe will be a failed run for the Presidency. This could get so messy that after her term I the U. S. Senate, Senator Clinton may just have to put a robe on Bill and shrink from public life.

I like to think that history will record that she had a storied life through age sixty. Even if she is a well… “old” sixty.

L. A. Walker

Young Black and Hispanic Couple fight over toddler’s gang affiliation….

Here’s a sad commentary on the state of today’s family…Denver’s Channel 7 News reports the story of a young hispanic man and black woman who had a fight over what gang their 4 year old son should belong to. Maybe they should have just had a shootout to decide…

Victim Takes Mugger To Dinner

I saw this on NPR’s website and thought I should share. Sometimes *especially in this day and age* it’s nice to see GOOD NEWS for a change.

Julio Diaz has a daily routine. Every night, the 31-year-old social worker ends his hour-long subway commute to the Bronx one stop early, just so he can eat at his favorite diner.

But one night last month, as Diaz stepped off the No. 6 train and onto a nearly empty platform, his evening took an unexpected turn.

He was walking toward the stairs when a teenage boy approached and pulled out a knife.

“He wants my money, so I just gave him my wallet and told him, ‘Here you go,’” Diaz says.

As the teen began to walk away, Diaz told him, “Hey, wait a minute. You forgot something. If you’re going to be robbing people for the rest of the night, you might as well take my coat to keep you warm.”

The would-be robber looked at his would-be victim, “like what’s going on here?” Diaz says. “He asked me, ‘Why are you doing this?’”

Diaz replied: “If you’re willing to risk your freedom for a few dollars, then I guess you must really need the money. I mean, all I wanted to do was get dinner and if you really want to join me … hey, you’re more than welcome.

“You know, I just felt maybe he really needs help,” Diaz says.

Diaz says he and the teen went into the diner and sat in a booth.

“The manager comes by, the dishwashers come by, the waiters come by to say hi,” Diaz says. “The kid was like, ‘You know everybody here. Do you own this place?’”

“No, I just eat here a lot,” Diaz says he told the teen. “He says, ‘But you’re even nice to the dishwasher.’”

Diaz replied, “Well, haven’t you been taught you should be nice to everybody?”

“Yea, but I didn’t think people actually behaved that way,” the teen said.

Diaz asked him what he wanted out of life. “He just had almost a sad face,” Diaz says.

The teen couldn’t answer Diaz — or he didn’t want to.

When the bill arrived, Diaz told the teen, “Look, I guess you’re going to have to pay for this bill ’cause you have my money and I can’t pay for this. So if you give me my wallet back, I’ll gladly treat you.”

The teen “didn’t even think about it” and returned the wallet, Diaz says. “I gave him $20 … I figure maybe it’ll help him. I don’t know.”

Diaz says he asked for something in return — the teen’s knife — “and he gave it to me.”

Afterward, when Diaz told his mother what happened, she said, “You’re the type of kid that if someone asked you for the time, you gave them your watch.”

“I figure, you know, if you treat people right, you can only hope that they treat you right. It’s as simple as it gets in this complicated world.”

Produced for Morning Edition by Michael Garofalo.