Last night in Trump’s campaign rally speech (now think about that for a second—a campaign rally in the eighth month of his term; the event was paid for with campaign funds. And you think Christmas merchandise on shelves in September is premature!) we heard the code words “culture” and “heritage”. These are normally venerable words, now being pressed into service for ignoble purposes. When used to lament the loss of Confederate monuments, the culture and heritage being referenced is White Supremacy and slavery.
[Read more…]
Learning To Hate – the Brown Eyes / Blue Eyes Exercise | Video Worth Watching
A recent tweet from Barack Obama’s Twitter account featured a quote from Nelson Mandela: “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin or his background or his religion … People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love … For love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.” It now holds the record for the most “Liked” tweet of all time with 2.723 million times as of Tuesday evening (8/15/17).
For insight into how one might learn how to hate, here is a video that features highlights of the PBS documentary “A Class Divided” which describes an exercise conducted by Jane Elliott in 1968 after the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. [Read more…]
Who Are These Defenders of Confederate Statues? – Charlottesville: Race and Terror | Video Worth Watching
“VICE News Tonight” correspondent Elle Reeve went behind the scenes with white nationalist leaders, including Christopher Cantwell, Robert Ray, David Duke, and Matthew Heimbach — as well as counter-protesters. VICE News Tonight also spoke with residents of Charlottesville, members of the Black Lives Matter movement, and the Charlottesville Police.
From the neo-Nazi protests at Emancipation Park to Cantwell’s hideaway outside of Virginia, “VICE News Tonight” provides viewers with exclusive, up close and personal access inside the unrest. [Read more…]
Confederate Monuments – Grind the Stone Into Dust | Video Worth Watching
What is to be done with the monuments to Southern white supremacy? New Orleans has already begun the process of removing these symbols of white supremacy and New Orleans mayor, Mitch Landrieu, revealed to the Atlantic, some of the issues raised by this project.
Then there’s Daily Kos blogger, Hunter, who weighed in recently with a post titled “Tear Them Down”. Pointing out that nearly all of the monuments nationwide were erected long after the end of the Civil War, most were less an attempt to honor the exploits of those fighting to preserve slavery than a demonstration of the continued dominance of white power and privilege. Putting them in historical context he says: [Read more…]
I’m Not the Angry Racist You See In That Photo | Video Worth Watching
The Twitter image of Peter Cvjetanovic somehow belies his claim, as reported in a Raw Story post, that “I’m not the angry racist you see in that photo”.
What comes to mind for me is the “Cabaret” sequence ‘Tomorow belongs to me …’ and the question that the protagonist poses to his companion near the end of the sequence: “You still think you can control them?” [Read more…]
NAACP Issues Travel Advisory For Missouri | Video Worth Watching
We’ve all heard about travel advisories issued by our State Department for U.S. citizens planning to travel abroad, but this NAACP advisory is truly a first. To be clear, this is not a directive that tells folks not to go to Missouri. This is a warning that if you are a minority and for some reason you find that you will be traveling through Missouri, there are safety concerns and risks that you need to be aware of. Check out this coverage by Charles P. Pierce at Esquire and Nancy Coleman at CNN for more details on the trajectory of the issuing of this advisory. A clue to the nature of the situation can be found in the the state attorney general’s annual report where it is documented that black drivers were stopped by police at a rate 75% higher than white drivers. Got bail? [Read more…]
Congressional Black Caucus Says No to Trump Photo Op
With one senior aide telling Politico “No one wants to be a co-star on the reality show,” the Congressional Black Caucus rejected an invitation from the President Donald Trump to meet at the White House.
Members of the 49 member caucus were put off by the invitation signed by “the Honorable Omarosa Manigault,” noting the-reality-TV-star-turned-White-House-aide had in no way earned such a title.
The CBC’s letter in response to the invitation pointed out the failure of the administration on numerous occasions to respond to entreaties from the group and the policy proposals coming from the White House were, in fact, harmful to their interests. [Read more…]
California Has an Opportunity to Stop Predatory Lending with AB 784
By Liana Molina
People should not be punished financially for the color of their skin or for the neighborhood they live in. And yet, that is exactly what has been happening in our state when it comes to high-cost lenders who disproportionately peddle payday loans in black, brown, and poor communities. While we know that payday loans and the “debt traps” they create are bad, there’s been recent, and troubling growth in even larger and more problematic loans known as installment loans.
It’s hard to believe, but under existing state law, there are no restrictions on the interest rates that lenders can charge for installment loans of over $2,500. Not surprisingly, high-cost lenders are pushing people to take the loans for more than $2,500. According to state data, in 2015, more than half the loans to Californians for $2,500 to $4,999 came with interest rates of over 100%. [Read more…]
New Orleans Mayor Landrieu’s Address on Removal of Confederate Monuments
By New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu
History cannot be changed. It cannot be moved like a statue. What is done is done. The Civil War is over, and the Confederacy lost and we are better for it. Surely we are far enough removed from this dark time to acknowledge that the cause of the Confederacy was wrong.
And in the second decade of the 21st century, asking African Americans — or anyone else — to drive by property that they own; occupied by reverential statues of men who fought to destroy the country and deny that person’s humanity seems perverse and absurd.
Centuries-old wounds are still raw because they never healed right in the first place. [Read more…]
Need for Police Accountability and Transparency After La Jolla Shooting
“It is possible to be in debt, to be lovelorn, and to be racist. They are not mutually exclusive.”
The recent shooting rampage at the La Jolla Crossroads apartment complex in University City left one person dead and seven persons wounded. This is indisputable.
We also know that the dead victim and wounded were all African Americans and the shooter, who was subsequently shot by the police, was white.
Local news coverage of the event has unsurprisingly focused on the possible motives for San Diego’s scene of American Carnage. While shooter Peter Selis’ troubled financial history and recent break up with his girl friend appear to provide reasonable motivations, the possibility of racial animus has become a contentious issue.
[Read more…]
Beyond the ‘Golden Gulag’: Film Screening and Panel Discussion at SDSU to Focus on Prison Abolition
By Lydia P. Wood and James K. Anderson
Author and prison abolitionist Ruth Wilson Gilmore coined the term “Golden Gulag” in her 2007 book by the same name to label and critique what, despite destroying lives, has become a disturbingly normal way of life in the “Golden State” of California.
“I called my book ‘Golden Gulag,’” Gilmore says in the documentary film, “Visions of Abolition: From Critical Resistance to a New Way of Life,” “in order to resonate with the images of totalitarian state incarceration … to emphasize that the ‘gulag’ is not simply a building with cages in it, but it is an entire way of life, an entire way of political and social and economic life. It extends from the places where prisoners come from to the places where prisons are built. [Read more…]
The Man Who Skipped Breakfast and Found a World of Love
Charlie Chatman woke up one morning saying to himself, as he had for so many mornings, for eternities: “Lord, give me the strength to put up with these damn peckerwoods one more day.”
The only thing he cared about in his godforsaken life, on a Hawkinsville, Georgia sharecropping plantation, was breakfast, whatever it happened to be, cornbread and scraps of pork, a potato or two, a cup of milk (maybe) – or some stolen boiled corn that the pigs were fed.
Anything to sustain his body and spirit to stand up against the insults to his humanity he had to put up with each day. What kept him alive each day were his daydreams, simple imaginings: sleeping in a nice bed, walking leisurely down a country road, meeting Gabriel on Judgment Day. [Read more…]
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