компютриoffice furniture in BulgariaWhat would it be like to be a Black president?

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преносими компютри преносими компютри преносими компютри преносими компютри преносими компютриoptical communicationscar hire bulgariafurniture ElhovoFor many black people it would be a sign of progress to see a black president grace the podium and address the nation. However, as he stands there what will he really face?

One thing that I’ve pondered is the fact that unlike some of his white predecessors he won’t be able to get away with turning a blind eye to race issues. He would be held to a higher standard by many blacks to take sides which would probably make it seem unfair to other races.
I’m sure that many white supremacists would try to assassinate him, but would his own people turn on him and assassinate his character if he had the slightest slip up? We are a sensitive race and in order to make Barrack Obama’s time in the White House a lot more effective and help create change in our country we would need to grow up as a race and do our part so that every race fight we take on can be fought fairly.

A person in his position would need us to stand behind him and be understanding that things will be twice as hard for him. Are we willing to give that to him? Are we willing to consider taking a step back before coming down on him and ask,
“What is it like to be a Black president?”

Originally published in The Michigan Citizen

For the last 40 years, the city of Detroit, the state of Michigan and the United States as a whole have struggled to come to grips with the week of anger and violence that ravaged the city on those hot summer days and nights in July 1967. Was it riot or rebellion? Why did it happen? Who is to blame? What has changed and what hasn’t?

These questions and many others have been asked and answered for decades now, but somehow the questions remain. The answers begat more questions. The frustration and fury of that time linger for many, mostly lying dormant, but rearing their ugly heads from time to time.

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I’ve written about it… time and time again… I’ve beaten it into the ground.

Hip Hop and Don Imus… the ruiners of the Black Community…

Yet, EVERYONE is still talking about it… The Hip Hop Summit Action Network (HSAN) held a meeting and released what I hate to admit is a meaningless statement… Bleep the words “b***h”, “h*e” and “N****r” on radio edits of songs…

Um, don’t they already bleep those words?

They don’t bleep “Brain”, “Dome”, “Crack”, “Coke”, “Dope”, “Drugs” or “Guns” - all words that, while they are not considered curse words, are indicative of problems in our community. And don’t think that just because you tell these rappers that they can’t say certain words that you are affecting change.

These are rappers we are talking about here. They got a made up phrase, “Bling-Bling”, into the Oxford Dictionary. They will just make up a new word that means the same as the old word. Before you know it, your four year-old will be running around with a new phrase that perplexes you.

MC Lyte says that hip hop owes women an apology. So does my friend Chuck, the Co-Founder of Allhiphop.com. I agree. If someone was always talking bad about me, and people like me, I would start feeling a little bad about myself. In some ways, I guess I do.

And yet, I’m not blameless. I can’t express how many times my best friends and I have called each other “B***h” and “H*e”. I mean, I am pretty sure that I have called someone that I love a “nappy headed ho” because I thought it was funny.

I don’t anymore.

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Billed as the biggest sit down dinner in the world, the 52nd Annual NAACP Fight for Freedom Fund Dinner attracted 10,000 to Detroit’s Cobo Hall on April 29. Dinner itself was unremarkable. (Reports confirm that each entree - cajun beef, some unidentified fish or a mushroom pasta - was equally mediocre.)

What was most important about this dinner though was the guest list. The governor, both of Michigan’s US senators, several congress members, the mayor and other public officials, business and union leaders, entrepreneurs and preachers all joined grassroots activists to honor and support the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights organization.

During the three and a half hour event Lifetime Achievement awards were given to Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, attorney and politician Joel Ferguson and former NAACP head Ernest Lofton. But the main attraction was the keynote address from the man described by several of the night’s speakers as “our president”, William Jefferson Clinton.
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The Don Imus Incident brought out a lot of anger toward Hip Hop. In reality hip hop culture plays a very small role in the Imus controversy - Don Imus probably isn’t a fan of Snoop Dogg, and most Black folks didn’t know who he was until the controversy erupted - but his remarks inflamed the long standing debate that similar language has gotten out of hand in popular music.

Oprah even got into the act by devoting two shows to a town hall meeting where Russell Simmons and Ben Chavis (representing The Hip Hop Summit Action Network), joined by Common and Warner Music exec Kevin Lyle, were confronted by a host of detractors including longtime hip hop-hater columnist Stanley Crouch and a group of Spellman college students who appeared via satellite. The hip hop panel promised to convene a summit with the corporate music industry to discuss the problem and develop concrete solutions. That summit, held at the home of Warner Music’s Lyor Cohen, ended with no press conference and no statement about what was or was not accomplished. And no one is surprised.

The corporate media and the major labels who market the small percentage of music that is heard on most radio and video outlets should be held responsible for the content that they push on the public. Bay-area emcee Paris put it best in a post on GuerrillaFunk.com when he said:

The argument is often made by Russell Simmons and others that rappers are poets who simply report on what they feel and their surroundings, and that they shouldn’t be censored. As an emcee, on that point we partially agree — we shouldn’t be censored. But balance between the negative and positive needs to be provided, and it currently isn’t.

Most artistic integrity is questionable at best. My understanding is that artists are supposed to express what they believe in at all costs (if not, there’s work at the post office). But most don’t, and they mold their approaches to making music based on what they perceive major labels wanting. If Def Jam or Interscope or any of these other large culture-defining companies issued a blanket decree that they would only support material and artists with positive messages then 99% of those making music now would switch up to accommodate. That’s real talk.

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The Imus/Rutgers insult and the furor that followed illustrate both the power of words, and the volatility of race as an issue in America and the world.

The remarks that he made have struck nerves on so many levels. The term “nappy headed” invokes Black hair politics; the reference to women as “hoes” is degradation; darker skinned Blacks are pitted against fairer skinned Blacks with the “jiggaboos vs. wannabes” comment; and all of it raises questions like Who has the right to call people names? Why is it okay that Blacks can use certain language while others can’t? How responsibile are Black people for the words that are used against us when we perpetuate the issue by continuing the use of those words?

On April 10 after the Rutgers Women’s Basketball team’s press conference, I submited a post titled, “Not a Nappy Head in the Bunch” on Last Chocolate City. The post pointed out that those beautiful women had responded to Don Imus’s comments with poise and grace. The title implied, though the article did not clarify, that none of the women had what most Black folks would consider, “nappy” hair. Unfortunately, some people were offended by my reference to the women’s hair.

I didn’t mean to offend anyone with that statement. I apologize personally, and on behalf of LastChocolateCity.com and The Michigan Citizen, Inc., I apologize as well.

Imus and his team had attacked the women for their physical appearance, and the women of Rutgers obviously did not fit the description of “nappy headed hoes” by any stretch of the imagination. My intention with my post was to emphasize the fact that Imus’s comments were not only hateful, but inaccurate. However, by stating that there wasn’t a nappy head in the bunch, I stirred up some deep seated animosities within the Black community.

For the record, I am a brother with waist length locs. My hair is nothing if not nappy. The comment I made was intended to be a humorous remark directed with love for my sisters on that team and for my people. But by making comments that were offensive to someone else, my intentions (and my hair) were not scrutinized. What mattered was the perception and that another human being was hurt by my words.
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The Rutgers Women’s Basketball team responded with class and poise to racist comments from Don Imus’s “Imus in the Morning” show at a press conference on Tuesday.

The radio/television host and his producer, Bernard McGuirk, referred to the Big East champions as “nappy-headed hoes” and “jiggaboos” last week after their loss to Tennessee in the NCAA Women’s National Championship game. Imus will serve a two-week suspension beginning on Monday, April 16.

Rutgers team members refused to comment on the severity of the punishment or on whether they thought it was just. The university used the opportunity to highlight the accomplishments of the group this season and to focus on their intellectual prowess. Rutgers has tough academic standards, and according to Coach C. Vivian Stringer

“These young ladies before you are valedictorians, future doctors, musical prodigies… these young ladies are the best this nation has to offer and we are so very fortunate to have them at Rutgers. They are young ladies of class, distinction. They are articulate. They are gifted.”

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As I walked through Capitol Park on Griswold in downtown Detroit I heard a voice call out,
“Hey you”
“Hey you”

I turned and a finger was pointed at me and I pointed to myself and she said,
“Yes, you”
I made a u turn and walked towards the bus stop that I had passed only a few seconds before.
In my mind I was sure that she wanted to know why I was asking people questions and taking their photos. It’s not uncommon for me to hear those questions. However, once I made it inside the bus stop area I wasn’t prepared for what I would encounter.

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Sisters are doin’ it, y’all!

Canada’s Governor General Michaelle Jean, the commander-in-chief of our northern neighbor’s military, visits war-ravaged Afghanistan, discusses policy with President Hamid Karzai and meets with Afghan women on International Women’s Day.

The question of whether women could be effective world leaders was answered long ago. But despite Jean’s powerful position, it seems there are still political (chauvanist? racial?) barriers for the African-Canadian leader to overcome.

Last year sources told The Canadian Press that Jean, who is commander-in-chief of Canada’s armed forces, had asked and was twice denied permission to visit Afghanistan because of security concerns.

That was despite visits by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay and Defence Minister Gordon O’Connor.

Former governor general Adrienne Clarkson visited Canadian troops in Kabul on New Year’s Day 2005.

Canada.com

It has been ten years since The Notorious B.I.G. was murdered after a party at The Petersen Automobile Museum in Los Angeles. A decade, and no one has been convicted of his murder. In fact, no one has ever been arrested.

Now, before you say “Aw, here goes that ‘hip-hop girl’ talking about rappers again.” Give me a chance to explain. See, the unsolved ten-year old murders of Biggie and 2 Pac are relevant to all Black folks. I mean, look at how often the slaying of our men goes unpunished. Emmett Till’s case was recently closed again, with no indictment. Medgar Evers, Martin Luther King, their killers were not in court until they were senior citizens. Jam Master Jay’s killer has not been arrested, either.

Then, there are all the Black men who are leaders of their families and their communities who are murdered every day. Some of their assailants are other Black men, which is tragic. But then, why should one Black man value the life of another when society doesn’t? (more…)

I found a piece of art
It was alive
It was on the corner of Mack and Third within a famished corridor.
It was she
Somebody’s mother
Somebody’s daughter
Somebody’s granddaughter
What lured her to this corner? Standing in the cold begging for a nickel, a dime, a dollar or whatever you can provide. What story does she have to tell? (more…)

 ”My Mic Sounds Nice”

It is the longest relationship I have ever been in. There is no one and no thing that I have ever loved longer than hip-hop. The best memories of my youth have bass and the sound of a DJ scratching in the background. In fact, the sound of a needle on a record is one of the most soothing sounds I have ever heard.

I grew up with crushes on D-Nice and LL Cool J. I sent LL a letter to his fan club and a picture of my cousin, Mychele. She was older and I thought prettier, and I figured if L was going to call anyone, he would call her. He never did.

I wanted to be like Salt ‘n Pepa. Wait, that’s not right. I wanted to BE Salt ‘n Pepa. Leggings, asymetrical haircuts, and all. I had an African medallion and Kwame’s first album the day it came out. I wished I was from New York, names like Brooklyn, Queens and the South Bronx sounded as exotic as Madagascar.

Yes, I was in love.  

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New York Daily News columnist Stanley Crouch weighs in on crime…especially crimes perpetrated by Black people. And he has some harsh criticism for the bleeding heart-types who excuse Black criminal behavior.

“Before the victories of the civil rights movement, the murders of black people during the most intense redneck reigns throughout the South were committed by those once called “poor white trash.” These were the people who became homicidally enraged at the idea of a black man acting as if he was a free person. What is now so appalling is that while the street gangs that presently terrorize black communities across the nation do so with astonishing levels of murder and mayhem, they are so often defined by supposedly empathetic liberals as victims of race and class.”

NY Daily News

Let me start by saying that I am not sipping the Barack Obama Kool-Aid. I agree with Glen Ford of Black Agenda Report who calls the junior Senator from Illinois “…an imperialist at heart who offers George Bush at least another year or two to wage war in Iraq, while warning Iraqis that they can expect no more American ‘coddling’”.

But when people like Debra Dickerson say “Obama isn’t Black”, it just confuses the issue.

According to Dickerson’s Jan. 22 article on Salon.com:

“Black,” in our political and social reality, means those descended from West African slaves. Voluntary immigrants of African descent (even those descended from West Indian slaves) are just that, voluntary immigrants of African descent with markedly different outlooks on the role of race in their lives and in politics. At a minimum, it can’t be assumed that a Nigerian cabdriver and a third-generation Harlemite have more in common than the fact a cop won’t bother to make the distinction. They’re both “black” as a matter of skin color and DNA, but only the Harlemite, for better or worse, is politically and culturally Black, as we use the term.

Hogwash. (more…)

SUPER BOWL SUNDAY IS HERE!!!

Black folks everywhere are thrilled that for the first time we’ve got not one, but TWO African American head coaches leading their teams to the big dance. Tony Dungy and Lovie Smith make us all proud.

But as any Black high school or Black college football fan will tell you, the games may be great, but the real show is at halftime. This year we’ve got a Black band taking the field during intermission.

Prince is performing at the big dance!

No disrespect to U2, Paul McCartney, Detroiter Kid Rock or Janet Jackson’s nipple medallion, but it’s about time we had some soul at the Super Bowl!