“Though this nation has proudly thought of itself as an ethnic melting pot,” Holder said in a speech given during Black History Month in 2009, “in things racial we have always been and I believe continue to be, in too many ways, essentially a nation of cowards.”An no, ignoring the subject won't make it go away, old racist aren't dying, they are multiplying. And therein lies the problem.
White people do not think in terms of we. White people have the privilege to interact with the social and political structures of our society as individuals. You are “you,” I am “one of them.” Whites are often not directly affected by racial oppression even in their own community, so what does not affect them locally has little chance of affecting them regionally or nationally. They have no need, nor often any real desire, to think in terms of a group. They are supported by the system, and so are mostly unaffected by it.EYE recently read blog by an African American mother who wrote a powerful, provocative, and persuasive post entitled It's time for parents to talk to their children about race. She also provided valuable tools and resources to facilitate an honest and open discussion, but it's not just black parents who need to talk to their children about race/racism, it's white parents.
Given the dominant conceptualization of racism as individual acts of cruelty, it follows that only terrible people who don’t like people of color can commit it. While this conceptualization is misinformed, it functions beautifully to protect racism by making it impossible to engage in the necessary dialogue and self-reflection that can lead to change.EYE have to ask, what are white parents are teaching their children about race/racism?
It appears there is a confluence of events and circumstances, with the first Black president, and a nation that is becoming increasingly Black and Brown, particularly because Black and Brown people are soon to be a majority. Things were not supposed to be this way, as the idealized, homogeneous America of the 1950s when Black folks were invisible, except when cleaning white folks’ homes or hanging from a tree, is gone.Parents are the first teachers.
Huntsville is now fair game for all protesters, anywhere and anytime... Let's call it the Dale Jackson Precedent. #ShutItDownHSV
— Dale Jackson (@TheDaleJackson) December 9, 2014
“There is a right way to protest and a wrong way to protest. Laying down in the middle of the road is the wrong way and shame on the politicians who are afraid to stand up and tell them ‘no.'”Let's backup. Their plan was to start in the parking lot of the Oakwood University Church and march up University Drive, “blocking all traffic in protest.” When Dale Jackson got wind of this, he and his posse cranked up a they don't have a permit whine on social media.
That is the point Huntsville conservative talk radio personality Dale Jackson says he wanted to get across on Monday when he staged a one-man protest, lying down in the middle of the street blocking traffic on one of Huntsville’s busiest thoroughfares as local residents tried to make their way home from work.
The genesis of Jackson’s idea came when word started to spread on social media that several Huntsville residents were planning a demonstration they had dubbed “Shut it Down Huntsville.” Their plan to was to start in the parking lot of the Oakwood University Church and march up University Drive, “blocking all traffic in protest.”
The protest mirrored many others taking place around the country in the wake of the Michael Brown and Eric Garner deaths and subsequent grand jury decisions.
RT @61Webhead: @TheDaleJackson @RedEyesPage did these protesters obtain a permit to block off University Dr? // DJ: Af 4PM? On Friday? No.
— Dale Jackson (@TheDaleJackson) December 5, 2014
Huntsville City Councilman Will Culver said Huntsville police hope to prevent a planned Friday afternoon protest march from spilling into busy University Drive.Did you get that last sentence? An area was identified where people can stand alongside (not to be confused with in the middle of) University Drive.
Culver, whose council district includes University Drive as well as Oakwood University where the 4:30 p.m. march is starting, said Huntsville Police Chief Lewis Morris has identified "a few areas where people can stand alongside University Drive and peacefully protest."
The police had hoped the protestors would be satisfied staging their "die in" - four and a half minutes laying in the road to simulate the four and a half hours Michael Brown's body lay in the street in Ferguson, Mo. - on less busy Wynn Drive.There's just one hitch, no one could see the die-in on "less busy Wynn Drive" which kind of defeats the purpose of the protest.
But when protestors asked if they could have four and a half minutes to lie down on University, Police Chief Lewis Morris said yes. Police had the people and equipment in place to stop traffic, it would only take a few minutes, and it would avoid unnecessary confrontation.
Some have made an issue of the protestors not having a permit to do what they did. Morris pointed out that he signs the permits, he was on the scene, and he decided to grant the protestors' request. It wasn't on paper, but it was within his authority to make a spot decision.
Morris could have refused. He could have been indignant and stuck to the letter of the law.Which goes to show no good deed goes unpunished. Under the guise of concern for law enforcement, Dale Jackson forced HPD to provide him with a seven police car escort and block off busy streets during rush hour for a tax payer funded PR stunt.
Instead, he was smart, thoughtful and tolerant.
While #ShutItDownHSV was performed to draw attention to Ferguson and similar issues, Dale Jackson's stunt is just to draw attention to Dale Jackson.
I'm glad Mr Jackson got his 120 seconds in the lime light, but it's absurd for him to equate laying alone on a public road stroking his ego with a social protest and demonstration involving over a hundred people..
#ICantBreathe In Black & White -->
(Cartoon by @AnnTelnaes) #EricGarner #p2 pic.twitter.com/mn9n7Iu75r
— Eric Wolfson (@EricWolfson) December 6, 2014
I've long felt that, since the days of Reagan, conservatives have
thrived by modifying the "Southern strategy" demonization of blacks --
the demons now include Democrats, liberals, college professors,
Hollywood stars, feminists, gay people, immigrants, and other groups.
The rhetoric frequently circles back to race, of course -- especially,
needless to say, while we have a black president -- but the same basic
anger is stoked when the top Democrat is Bill Clinton or Nancy Pelosi.
So, now we're at the point where beginning to see signs that openlyThe information age is actually a media age. We have war by media; censorship by media; demonology by media.
racist messaging is on the verge of becoming respectable again. When
right-wing politicians start justifying the murder of black citizens by
white police officers regardless of the specifics of the case, we're one
step below the level of just calling for a system that acknowledges
white supremacy as the natural and "correct" order of things. We're just
one step away from openly saying that equality before the law is not
the goal, and never should be. Recent remarks by Rep. Peter King and Rudy Giuliani, plus the openly-expressed sentiments of countless white citizens, indicates that
we're dangerously close to a situation where white supremacy is just one
side of the political argument...again. And we have the Conservative Movement to thank for that.
In 2003, I filmed an interview in Washington withIt's the Media. They think we are stupid.
Charles Lewis, the distinguished American investigative journalist. We
discussed the invasion of Iraq a few months earlier. I asked him, “What
if the freest media in the world had seriously challenged George Bush
and Donald Rumsfeld and investigated their claims, instead of channeling
what turned out to be crude propaganda?”
He replied that if we journalists had done our job “there is a very, very good chance we would have not gone to war in Iraq.”
I have a feeling @Morning_Joe would have called these freedom riders THUGS! #morningjoe pic.twitter.com/2YorH0Ib5Q
— Political Nerd (@Sttbs73) December 2, 2014
"If I've offended anybody, offended anybody, by saying what I've said, trust me, 95% of America thinks just like me. Just because there are cowards that won't say that on TV — that's your problem, it's not mine," he said.
I think this, more than anything, is the source of our trouble when it comes to racial division in this country. The inability of white people to hear black reality—to not even know that there is one and that it differs from our own—makes it nearly impossible to move forward. But how can we expect black folks to trust law enforcement or to view it in the same heroic and selfless terms that so many of us apparently do? The law has been a weapon used against black bodies, not a shield intended to defend them, and for a very long time.We Shall Overcome.......
"White police wouldn't be there if you (Black's) weren't killing each other."- #AmericasMayor #RudyGiuliani #Racist💥 pic.twitter.com/GeCUl1EPGk
— F.Corey (@cfgodwell) November 24, 2014
We owe a debt of gratitude to Rudy Giuliani, who the main stream media dubbed America's Mayor because he happened to be the mayor of New York on 9/11, for decoding the code words behind Governor Nixon's decision to declare a pre-emptive state of emergency in #Ferguson.The decision by Governor Jay Nixon (D-MO) to declare a state of emergency in his state ahead of the grand jury decision in the killing of Michael Brown has been a hot topic this week, and resulted in a very clarifying moment on NBC’s Meet The Press Sunday morning. In discussing cities with disproportionately white police forces, giuliani decided to change the subject to, what else, so-called “black-on-black crime,” a favorite hobby horse of police apologists, but one which is usually played for concern-trolling effect. Not this time.Yeah, let's talk about black on black crime every time a white police officers kills unarmed black people so we won't have to talk about why white police officers kill unarmed black people!
Giuliani brought up the statistic that 93% of black homicide victims are killed by black people, and wondered why this doesn’t sufficiently distract people from caring when cops kill unarmed black people. “I would like to see the attention paid to that that you are paying to this, and the solutions so to that,” Giuliani said.
To Giuliani and his ilk, black people aren’t being killed by criminals, they are killing each other, so the cops aren’t there to protect black people, they are there to pacify a population that is killing each other.There's just one little problem with this ahem theory, according to statistics, white people are killing each other too, and most mass murders are privileged white males.
Well, what do you know. So, do white people also need to “stop killing each other,” too? For Whatever Reason™, people like Giuliani look at those stats and see black people as the threat, but not white people. The unfortunate thing is that it is becoming ever more acceptable to share this view in polite company.Thank you Rudy Giuliani for decoding the code words, and for illustrating the absurdity of the police mindset that has them “reasonably suspecting” nine innocent black men out of every ten, for example, or gunning them down for holding toys.
There are many people in the world who believe that “social justice” equates to being anti-white, anti-wealth, and anti-male. (I’m not saying who those people are, but you can take a guess.) And if you dare try to have critical conversations about racism—especially the impact race plays in nearly every aspect of daily life in the U.S.—then you are just “trying to make white folks feel guilty for being white.”#nojusticenopeace
Being Republican means you get to have your white privilege and tell yourself you are victimized too.
— Jesse LaGreca (@JesseLaGreca) August 6, 2014
Two hundred fifty years of slavery. Ninety years of Jim Crow. Sixty years of separate but equal. Thirty-five years of racist housing policy. Until we reckon with our compounding moral debts, America will never be whole.Groups want NFL Players to join battle over Washington Redskins team name.
 |
| Columnist Mark McCarter |
White privilege refers to any advantage, opportunity, benefit, head start, or general protection from negative societal mistreatment, which persons deemed white will typically enjoy, but which others will generally not enjoy. These benefits can be material (such as greater opportunity in the labor market, or greater net worth, due to a history in which whites had the ability to accumulate wealth to a greater extent than persons of color), social (such as presumptions of competence, creditworthiness, law-abidingness, intelligence, etc.) or psychological (such as not having to worry about triggering negative stereotypes, rarely having to feel out of place, not having to worry about racial profiling, etc.).Mark McCarter missed the mark (pun intended) again with his latest attempt to defend the indefensible actions of HCS Superintendent Casey Wardynski, the Board of (mis) Education, and their ongoing assault on north Huntsville's J.O. Johnson High School community.
This story shouldn't be all about the coach, either. But it's impossible to tell it without him as the central figure.The most disappointing and disturbing fact in all of this is McCarters' attempt to use the words of the chief protesters son to undermine the initial concerns, which remain unanswered. Why was Maurice Ford demoted? Was it so that "The Great White Hope" could come out of retirement and lead this predominately black team(who had already proven themselves) to victory and enhance his profile ?
Doss came out of a short-lived retirement, having left Butler, where he won five titles between 2004-2011. The key, Doss said, was "Dr. Wardynski had the confidence in me to be able to do this."
Senior guard Lionel Love, who had those team-high 18 points, confessed that "we were upset (at the change). But at the same time, we knew we had to keep pushing forward and accomplish our goals. And we knew Coach Doss had a great record."
The bitter irony in this defeat is that it comes the morning after still another protest.No, it is disingenuous to suggest those with questions and concerns have been heard Mr. Mark McCarter, Sir. As a matter of fact, those who make the rules are breaking the rules right under your nose. If you've been reading this blog, or The Geek Pavaler's blog, you would know that in their haste to treat the taxpayers of District 1 like second class citizens, the HCS BOE violated it's own naming policy.
Groundbreaking was held Friday for the new Jemison High that will replace Johnson in August 2016. Many Johnson alums and supporters have been irate that the Johnson name will not be carried over to the new campus, and several protesters gathered to claim they were "not included" in the decision process. But it's disingenuous to suggest they haven't been heard.
It is also about the BOE purchasing land to build a new $65 million dollar school in an area where people aren't building $65,000 dollar homes because of it's proximity to an active rock quarry.New Rules, hand pick a committee giving the appearance of diverse viewpoints, while stacking the deck with people in favor of your point of view, hope the people won't notice because after all, they are Johnson grads nod nod wink wink.
this is the fox panel discussing a campaign on white privilege #withoutcomment pic.twitter.com/DgOZlQKV
— Oliver Willis (@owillis) February 20, 2013
What has the GOP done for blacks?
Voter suppression
Cutting food stamps
Cutting Pell Grants
Denying health care
Bankrupting Detroit, Governor cut back block grants to Detroit
Gutting Head Start
Cutting education
Enriching charter school administrators
Spending more on prisons than education
GOP achievement that they are so proud of.
As the American Society of Newspaper Editors has reported, racial and ethnic minorities make up less than 13 percent of newsroom employees. Minority ownership of television stations hovers around 3 percent, while radio station ownership is at 7 percent, despite the fact that the minority population of the U.S. is roughly 28 percent.RedEye tiptoeing away from the computer to go play cards....
Ok, here goes: If you are wise, you will not ever put your finger–or your whole hand– in a Black person’s face, unless you know you want to immediately engage in a knock down, drag out, fight-to-the-concrete physical brawl. It’s actually a well-known signal for “let’s fight right this moment” in the Black community. When I say “ever” I mean not in this present lifetime, or even after death, if you encounter another Black angel in Heaven. Because that angel is still liable to get into it with you and risk being de-winged.Be careful what you ask for....
I don’t know when the finger point in the face became such a grave insult to Black folks, but it has been for at least fifty years. And what does the gesture mean anyway? It means derision. It means disrespect. And above all, it means power to the pointer.
" Loose (sic) Joe Reed and double...triple the support of the Democratic Party in Alabama."I'm back!
The word these days basically is equal to "guy", "man", or "dude." At least that's how *I* think of it. For example, rarely will you see girls referred to as n**gas. Only males are called this. Then there's a broader use of the word where it simply means "a black person." I think this use of the word was common during slavery, it wasn't considered offensive. Even after slavery ended, blacks still referred to each other as n*** because they were used to the word. Of course, since this word was common during slavery, some racists began to use to word to mean "slave" or "inferior person." Anyway, it's generally assumed that when a white person says it, they are trying to be rude or insult the person. That's why some people get offended. I don't buy into the whole "trying to take a bad word and make it good" idea. If that were the case, then why don't they call themselves other racist names? After all, there are numerous insulting names for people of African descent, yet n*** is the only word used. It's hard to get a group of people to stop using a word that they've been using it for so long. That would be like trying to get Australians to stop saying "mate."Here is a list of acceptable nouns you can use as code for the N word.
"Well, there's a certain mean spiritness that's out there, not only in Alabama but it's in America. And that makes this election extremely important."~ Alabama State Senator Hank Sanders (D)
Cooper asked Sanders what evidence he had that the Republican opponents would take Alabama back to Jim Crow days. Sanders said, "Well, there's a certain mean spiritness that's out there, not only in Alabama but it's in America. And that makes this election extremely important." Which is true, but not at all what the robocall said. Following the interview with Sanders, Cooper continued to discuss "race in the race" with a panel of pundits.There is a certain mean spiritness that's out there, not only in Alabama but it's in America, and it's being enabled by the predominately white male dominated mainstream media. Which is why I find the lack of diversity in the mainstream media appalling because they promote racist stereotypes like this;
It not a way to feel it's to show you and others what is really going on!!!! You like to write these stories of how blacks are done wrong etc. it's not as bad as it was. There have been improvements and yes we could do a bit better but with that said look at situations were whites are treated unfair in order to get the so called ratio up etc.The more important story is black on black crime, absent fathers, the uneducated blacks, when there is free money and programs everywhere for the black man or woman but most do not take advantage because we as a society have gotten them use to a handout (whites too) like welfare etc. Why work when the government will pay the bills? It's an entitlement society!!! If all you know is to apply for free money health care etc when will anyone better themselves? It's called FREE WILL but most do not have it.
Gerrymandering. It's ugly and it's unhealthy, no matter which party does it.
Following the 1964 election, a variety of civil rights organizations banded together to push for the passage of legislation that would ensure black voting rights once and for all. The campaign to bring about federal intervention to prevent discrimination in voting culminated in the voting rights protests in Selma, Alabama, and the famous Selma to Montgomery marches. Demonstrations also brought out white violence, and Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, and Viola Liuzzo were murdered. President Lyndon B. Johnson, in a dramatic joint-session address, called upon Congress to enact a strong voting rights bill. Johnson's administration drafted a bill intended to enforce the 14th and 15th Amendments, aiming to eliminate various previously legal strategies to prevent blacks and other minorities from voting.There are some who want to believe the Richard Showers incident is not about racism, but about an ethics violations. It's just a coincidence the violations were filed the day after Showers protested a wrecker service contract award accusing the company owner of unethical conduct. They want us to believe Richard Showers is unethical in an attempt to destroy his credibility.
HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- Huntsville City Councilman Richard Showers may have violated state ethics law by allowing his daughter to get gas at a government fuel terminal on the day after the tornado.Well, well, well
City Attorney Peter Joffrion reported the April 28 incident to the Alabama Ethics Commission on Friday. The Times obtained a copy of the two-page letter through an open records request.
According to the letter, Showers and his daughter drove in separate vehicles to a generator-powered city fueling station on Governors Drive -- one of the few places in town that had gas in the immediate aftermath of the storm. Two Huntsville police officers were posted there to ensure that only city employees providing "essential public services" got fuel.
The letter says Showers called City Administrator Rex Reynolds after being told he could not refuel both vehicles. Reynolds told Showers he could pump 10 gallons into his daughter's vehicle if he planned to use that car for city business.
Want some irony? In Thursday night’s city council meeting, the city was poised to award a contract for wrecker services to a local company. Showers objected, accused the company owner of unethical conduct, and tried to get the council to award the contract to a company in his district that had submitted a higher bid.See what I mean? We know more about Shower's ethics than we know about the wrecker contract and the owners ethics. Instead of the policeman and the City Administrator showing some compassion they decided to exercise their authority.
So given Showers’ infamous sensitivity to all matters racial, I just have to ask: Would it be racist here to invoke the old saying about the pot and the kettle?
racism -nounNow let's define racist:
The belief that some races are inherently superior (physically, intellectually, or culturally) to others and therefore have a right to dominate them. In the United States, racism, particularly by whites against blacks, has created profound racial tension and conflict in virtually all aspects of American society. Until the breakthroughs achieved by the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, white domination over blacks was institutionalized and supported in all branches and levels of government, by denying blacks their civil rights and opportunities to participate in political, economic, and social communities.
A person with a prejudiced belief that one race is superior to othersNote, both words are nouns, but one describes an act(racism) and one describes a person (racist). This is very important
A hostile opinion about some person or class of persons. Prejudice is socially learned and is usually grounded in misconception, misunderstanding, and inflexible generalizations. In particular, African-Americans have been victims of prejudice on a variety of social, economic, and political levels.Racism is an action. It's that thing you did not that thing you said.
But I'm NOT A RACIST / HOW DARE YOU."The things that divide us are rooted in sin (greed, pride). We need to be wall breakers instead of wall builders and tear down the wall that divide us. The white privilege mindset is the way of thinking that grows out of having white privilege, from the advantages of being white in America.
Thing is they're ALWAYS going to come at it from that point of view, because being called a racist has become more taboo than actually being one. People get more upset about the possibility they might have been called racist than the fact that their actions are racist as hell. They'll harp and linger on all their deeds in the past and what clubs they belong to and who their friends are. They'll START any rebuttal to your first words with that. And in the end you end up talking to yourself or talking to the wind, because they've drawn a crowd to chant the "I AM NOT A RACIST" mantra to the point where any on lookers without reading/listening to the whole thing, think that's what it's all about. Then people start picking sides and - boom- it's all over.
A liberal democrat is just as capable of being a racist as a conservative wingnut. I suppose the difference is that the liberal doesn't really think he is a racist and doesn't want to be painted as such. The wingnut, on the other hand, embraces his racism, and indeed wears it like a badge of honor.Please watch, listen and learn as Tim Wise confronts the stupid racism in this 9 minute video.
10,000 Pound Elephant (4.00 / 1)
The all danced around a very pertinent issue, Joe Reed. He has got to go and will be used as the poster boy to beat Dems going forward for many years. Good lord, how badly do we have todo in elections before stupid people at the top get it.
There is no such thing as white privilege.
Blacks like to complain.
Blacks are their own worst enemy, not white people or their supposed racism.
Blacks need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps just like everyone else.
I made it on my own, I did not get any special favours. Why should blacks?
If anything, blacks have it easier than whites, what with affirmative action and all.
Affirmative action is unfair to whites.
Whites are a better judge of whether something is racist than blacks are. Blacks are oversensitive.
It is unfair to have a Black History Month when there is no White History Month.
Blacks are just as racist as whites.
Republicans and Tea Partiers have no compunction when it comes to lowering the hammer on the lives and welfare of taxpayers (the "low-hanging fruit"), while the rich and the powerful are advocated for with full press--the extension of the Bush tax cuts which will increase this nation's deficit hole, although economists are mostly in agreement that such an extension will do little to stimulate our lethargic economy.
Every time I hear the phrase "it's gonna be painful", what comes to mind is that the only ones that are feeling the pain are the downtrodden and poor. However, our government officials always seem to glide through the pain as untouchables.
To be fair, two callers on a talk show does not make the republican party racist. I mean these guys sounded as old as Methuselah, so I can understand their disdain for not only hope and change. But also the addition of the bumbling-incompetent-bald headed-wide nosed having RNC Chairman, that is Michael Steele. Yep, those guys were the exception to the rule because we all know that the republican party isn't racist. I mean if they were, they would have never elected Steele, right?
Things seem to intensify during the holiday season. People's emotions tend to get the better of them, and their true feelings always comes out. It's why my man racism works in overdrive around this time. But I have no problem with chasing his ass around the room and shining a light on him when he stops.
Every single day, prisoners face the same deplorable and unnecessarily punitive conditions that you have courageously decided to stand up against. For too long, this nation has chosen silence in the face of the gross injustices that our brothers and sisters in prison are subjected to. Your fight against these injustices is a necessary and righteous struggle that must be carried out to victory.
A Sheltered White Man is a white man whose experience rarely goes beyond that of well-to-do White Americans. The power of his class, race, sex and country shelters him from much of the bad done in the world.
True, most people’s experiences are limited by class, race, sex and country. And most people understandably avoid experiencing the bad in the world as much as they can.
What makes Sheltered White Men different is their power:
It would be particularly bad for the Alabama economy. According to a report by The Heritage Foundation, if Congress fails to extend the Bush tax cuts, Alabama would lose an average of 9,873 jobs per year, peaking at almost 12,500 jobs by 2016. The average household income in Alabama would go down by $3,498 per year and overall, individual income taxes would go up by $5.3 billion, according to The Heritage Foundation report.
While there are many opinions for the cause of this phenomenon the one that is the most fraudulent is that America is a conservative nation. This false premise has been propagated by those who want to maintain some fictitious sense of America’s past and a desire to reverse the progress we have achieved. Over the course of the last 50 years they have steadily and persistently chipped away at those ideas which defined liberalism (shared sacrifice, equality, and shared responsibility) and replaced them with greed, selfishness, and special interests while simultaneously demonizing liberalism as socialism.