This student’s message about white privilege is NOT the most important thing you’ll read today

This student’s message about white privilege is the most important thing you’ll read today | indy100

 

The most important words in this were not written by Jenny Lundt but by Sahil Gadhavi:

“[W]here is this response when you see black men being incarcerated everyday while white men walk free for the same crimes or more? Where is this overpouring of attention when black children are being shot by the police everyday, while your own white children are being raised in the ignorance afforded by their skin? Where is this praise when black activists march up and down the city squares all over the country screaming “Black lives matter” and all they hear back is All lives matter.”

Until that question is answered, this reads too much like Trump’s coining of the phrase, “prime the pump”. He believes he coined the phrase because he has never come across it before because of his willful intellectual ignorance. Ms. Lundt is correct that this is about privilege. The privilege to ignore a subject until you decide to address it and then to treat it as if it sprang full blown from your forehead like Athena bursting out of Zeus’ dome. Your creation. Your insight.

And that insight has been analyzed and passed around and added to. All because a nice, upper class White woman decided it was worth her notice. Just notice. No action beyond her admission. Just notice. Meanwhile, marginalized people EVERYWHERE continue to suffer due to inaction of the privileged. The privileged who are the only people that can solve these issues.

Excuse me, if I don’t join the parade. If you can’t answer Mr. Gadhavi’s questions with a “Right here”, you, like Ms. Lundt, are the real problem.

(Hat tip to John Belt)

– Eliot

Back To The Future…Again?

I don’t get the hate and fixation on undocumented immigrants.I assume that we must need the room or something because otherwise immigrants, documented or undocumented, don’t bother me, at all. They do the work no one else wants to do. For a wage no one else will take. Working hours no one else will work.

 

I think a large part of the obsession with undocumented immigrants is the neverending American need to have a Nigger of some sort. The Founding Fathers thought they had that covered forever but they never thought that one day folks would consider Blacks actual people OR women were included in the word “men”. Imprecise language opened a door that minorities and the marginalized barged right through.

New Niggers had to be found

The old Niggers were still there but some of them refused to play the part. Replacements had to be found. The Chinese, Irish, Italians, Vietnamese and a few others all spent time in the box. Being abused and laboring under horrible conditions to support the US economy. Each in turn were Niggers. Abused by their employers. Abused by the police. Abused by governmental authorities. Each until they gained enough political power and the goodwill of good people to ascend from Niggerdom and into personhood. Of course, the ur-Niggers remained.

To this day, we remain

 

Central and South Americans are today’s Niggers. Our economy rides on their backs. Abused by their employers. Abused by the police. Abused by governmental authorities. Political power is slowly coming but it won’t get there until the new Niggers are found.

 

My prediction? I’ll give you a hint:

Michael J. Fox, Christopher Lloyd and a DeLorean.

– Eliot

I AM A MAN!

February 12, 1968, Memphis sanitation workers went on strike to protest, among other things, the death of two of their fellow workers due to unsafe working conditions. The Memphis mayor refused to negotiate. He saw no reason for concern over the condition under which “Negroes” worked and, besides, the strikers would be back as soon as the money ran out.

His cavalier and uncaring attitude raised a simple question in the men’s minds: Am I not a man? This same question had been used by abolitionists in an attempt to shame “Christian” men and women into realizing that Slaves were humans. Just as they were. And beholding to the same God and due the same rights. Eventually, a war was fought to settle that question from a legal standpoint. Blacks were men UNDER THE LAW.

 

 

Now, we find ourselves suddenly realizing that UNDER THE LAW means nothing if it isn’t recognized by the people. Virtually all Americans pay lip service to the truth that Black men are indeed men but many through their actions and the law demonstrate that it is, indeed, only lip service. It is time once again to let them now that we are men. Let them know that “I AM A MAN”That is the simple fact. And as a man in this country I have certain rights which I will insist are recognized and honored. All because I AM A MAN.

There was a time when Black men who wanted to be recognized as men had to stand up and declare it. And they did. Loudly and proudly.

They let the world know they were men by simply carrying a sign that declared “I AM A MAN” and not letting anyone forget it. Today, we find ourselves in the same situation. Black men are no longer seen as men. They are seen as criminals and thugs. They are, to quote the Governor of Maine, “the enemy” as far as much of America is concerned.

To fight back, we’ve designed a shirt to tell the world you have had enough. That you are a descendant of those men that carried a sign declaring their manhood. They were beaten, attacked by dogs, jailed, and even killed for taking this stand. Take your own stand and help others at the same time.

Purchase one of our I AM A MAN (Say it again) t-shirts. You don’t have to be Black or White or Brown or Red or Yellow to wear it. You don’t have to be Straight or Gay or Bi or Trans. You don’t have to be Anglo or Latino. You don’t have to be Native-born or Immigrant.

You don’t even have to be a man.

You simply have to be willing to say “I will have my rights AND YOU WILL NOT STOP ME!” They come in the original red letters on white background and a more impactful and modern white letters on black background.

 

Our shirts pay homage to those brave souls who carried that simple sign. Those men that said “I AM A MAN”. By wearing this shirt you’ll continue the message. You’ll be doing your part to fight the prejudice and bigotry so many face every day. You’ll be saying that without a doubt that now and forever “I AM A MAN”.

Get one for yourself and some for the men in your life. Just Click on the shirt you want and follow directions.

50% of all profits will be going directly to the ACLU. I’m pretty sure they’ll need the money over the next few years. The other 50% will go to keeping The RiverHouse Chronicles on-line.  Thanks loads and if you feel like sharing this EVERYWHERE…it couldn’t hurt.

– Eliot

Ladies and Gentlemen. The President of the United States.

I’ve been following the normalization of Donald Trump by the media. Much of recent history is being bent, mangled and mutilated as his supporters try to wash the taint of racism, xenophobia and White supremacy out of Trumpism. We are told that it’s economic populism and not active and benign White supremacy that gave us our new Overlord –

 

(Don’t kid yourself. That is what Trump calls himself in the wee hours of the morning when he’s tweeting out his outrage at the Constitution.)

 

– and we better accept it. This is just the end result of the bizarre philosophy that being called a “racist” is as bad as being the object of “racism”. A lie that only people who have never been the object of “racism” would even entertain.

 

(Having been called a “racist” AND been the victim of “racism”, I can assure you that there is no contest)

 

The spectacle of a man who’s Campaign Chairman and Senior Policy Adviser declared his business as the “platform” for White Supremacy AND who’s Father marched with the KKK AND who’s business model has, at times, included discriminating against Black Americans AND who has spoken of his belief in eugenics AND who has said he will ban entire religions from entering this country EVEN IF THEY ARE AMERICAN CITIZENS SERVING IN THE UNITED STATES MILITARY arguing that he is not racist would be laughable if it didn’t bring the very real possibility that we are watching the end of America as an experiment in social equality and democracy.

 

A man that has spoken of his belief in eugenics. A man that has declared his belief that wealth and fame entitle men to fondle your daughters genitals. A man who enjoys having his daughter called a “piece of ass” by other rich men. A man who believes that Black Americans all live in some dystopian nightmare called the “inner city” where a simple trip to the grocery store is a death sentence. And Jews acumen with money is so self-evident that he laments having Blacks “counting his money”.

 

Ladies and Gentlemen. The President of the United States.

Where there’s smoke…

The United States exists in a special place among all nations every created. We are the only nation specifically  created with the ideal that a person is more than what they look like OR who they worship OR what they believe OR who they love OR how much they have OR who they are related to. We insist that each person is the same at the moment of birth. That there is no built-in advantage or disadvantage within each person.

All of our words say that. Even if our actions don’t. But it is those words that have made America that Shining City On A Hill that Reagan dreamt dewy-eyed about. It is those words and the moral weight that goes with them which left us as the only remaining superpower. Coupled with our wealth, we wield that moral authority to tell others what is expected of them AND to keep our enemies in check.

Once lost, so are we.

If 117 countries see us as human rights violators, we are on our way to the dustbin of history that is reserved for all empires. If those countries include some that are our allies or that are not actively our opponents, we look even worse.

“Contemporary police killings and the trauma that they create are reminiscent of the past racial terror of lynching.”

We have joined some of the worst actors in the world as a country of concern to the United Nations Human Rights Council. China, Syria, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and, now, the United States. For something that is easily remedied by requiring the government at all levels to act as if Black Lives Matter. To stop treating Black Americans like an afterthought as a matter of official (albeit de facto) policy.

We must recognize that the closer the level of government is to the citizen, the worse it is at discriminating against the disenfranchised. Local rule was fine when this country was first created but it is useless in today’s world. In fact, it is counterproductive and just adds to our problem.

This is a job for the Federal government. Now.

 

Justice For All

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We all need to take a knee and talk this out. We caused it. We can fix it.

– Eliot

Danger, Will Robinson

“Them thug niggas up there need to find that bitch! And thats all it is to it!!!

– Facebook User in response to the killing of unarmed Terrence Crutcher by Officer Betty Shelby in Tulsa, OK

Those are the words we should have all been dreading.  The wish by Blacks that the element that preys on them will turn their wrath onto the other element that preys on them. Doing what all marginalized people do. Turn to the strong within their tribe to protect them from the enemy outside. The enemy, which is slowly moving from the police to the government in general.

Just leave us alone and fight it out with each other

The police should be thrilled to hear this. They’ve used as justification for all of the unjustified killing of Black men that they were confused/worried/concerned about the threat that Black men pose. They are bigger than they are. They are older than they are. They are more impervious to pain than they are. They are so much more than they are.

And that’s why the need for assault rifles, armored personnel carriers, sound cannons, body armor, all of the baubles of war that today’s police force in America deploys to keep their charges subdued safe. That’s why the continual need to turn the other way, to wink at a bit of the old ultra-violence when dealing with the jigs.Gotta let them know who’s boss or nice White folks will be in danger. They are already coming after our women. Next, will be our money. Our jobs. Our neighborhoods.

Our power.

Secret interrogation facilities in Chicago? No problem. Rough riding in Baltimore? Sure. Stop-and-frisk? Absolutely. All part of keeping the animals in the jungle. And keeping the jungle from coming to the suburbs.

But even animals get tired. You kick a dog enough and, eventually, it will bite. Blacks are tired of getting kicked.

Seems like time for some biting has come.

 

 

Exponential Depression

“We are sick and tired of being sick and tired of being killed.”

Corinne Mack

Charlotte-Mecklenburg, NC NAACP

Candid Camera

“Shelby claimed the victim was reaching into a passenger-side window of her car and that she, an armed officer of the law surrounded by three others and backed up by a police chopper, felt threatened.”

– Goldie Taylor, The Daily Beast

And then the video showed up. Again.

Seize the Deification

In The Huffington Post’s The Racial Wage Gap Between Black And White Workers Is Getting Worse, Pay for black workers lags behind that of white peers more than it did in 1979 by Daniel Marans, Marans does a fine job of dealing with the issue in the title. As I was reading it, I kept thinking about something I had recently seen on TV. Something to do with the President.

Then it hit me

In the middle of all this data (as depressing as it is) lurks another strange truth. That could be the ascendancy to the top of the pile of Black American heroes. Leaping over all others, even the sainted Martin Luther King, Jr. Barack Hussein Obama. The first Black President.

Barack Hussein Obama

He is able to preside over a nation in which murder of innocent and unarmed Black men by the police is widely believed (mistakenly) to be at EPIDEMIC LEVELS. Most Americans (Black, White, Red, Yellow & Brown) believe that Chicago, his home town, is a killing zone in which gangs of Black youth indiscriminately kill anyone on the street. And now this news that the wage gap between Blacks and Whites is not only not getting better, it has actually gotten worse.

While he was President

His reaction to this? To get up behind his pulpit and let Black folks know that he will be personally offended if they did not get out there and vote for Hillary Clinton. WE would be offending HIM by not voting.

For all that he did for them while he was President

Unfortunately, I’m having a hard time figuring out just what that was. What did the President do that was specifically designed to help the group of Black folks he was demanding fealty from? Nothing. And he knows it. He wasn’t really making the argument that was coming out of his mouth.

I think he was making the same assumption his opposition makes: Blacks vote as one.

In this case, you vote for Hillary Clinton because I, Barack Obama, am Black and I, Barack Obama, am the determiner when it comes to political goals of all Black Americans.

Hubris? Not really. He is just taking advantage of all peoples instinctual desire to take the easy way out. Nothing easier than letting someone else do your thinking for you. Eh, Democrats? Republicans?

Don’t get me wrong. I believe Barack Obama was the President we needed for the last 8 years. Did I agree with everything he did? Nope. But much of what he did that I didn’t agree with worked. So, there’s that.

Would I vote for him again given the current choices? In a heartbeat but not because I’m Black. It would have to be in spite of the fact I’m Black. Barack Obama has been a nightmare for Black folks. We’ve had virtually no participation in the economic comeback. Much of the improved profits were on the backs of working folks squarely n the socioeconomic classes Blacks routinely inhabit. Once again, Blacks gave a bit of the gains we had made so that the country can bounce back. But there’s been a net gain. As there always is as we continue our journey to truly realizing that “All men are created equal” meant exactly that.

Our young and our children have embraced the lesson of Dr. King. They come on bended knee before the country of their birth. The country that promises them equal treatment under the law. The country that reveres those that fought for those children’s rights. They ask that country recognize that they are afraid. That they are in danger. That they just want their country to say their life matters.

On bended knee.

And on we go.

• Eliot