Tanya’s Comment: Very good news. The tide seems to be finally turning against the display of the Confederate flag. The flag is not just a symbol of the history of the American Civil War, but has come to be used as a symbol of racism and all its violent manifestations. It has been used to terrify Black people with its promise of lynchings, torture, and murder, and to whip up racist hysteria. Finally, it’s reign is nearly over.
Tag Archives: Black Community
Important Victory in Push to Demilitarize Police
Courtesy of FreeFoto.com
“President Obama just banned the federal government’s transfer of certain military vehicles and weaponry to local and state police departments across America.”
The absent black father myth—debunked by CDC
Tanya’s comment: I admit that I also bought into the black father myth. Unfortunately, many black women have bought into it, too, and often blame black men when family problems arise. I have even heard black women say they hate dating black men for these reasons. I’m pleasantly surprised that the CDC took interest in this issue.
We’ve been told, quite frequently and repeatedly that the problems in the black community that we’ve seen in Ferguson and Baltimore recently are not the fault of biased, paramilitary, paranoid and violent policing (even if the Bureau of Justice Statistics indicates that black people are three times more likely to be subject to law enforcement uses of force). They are not the fault of racist red-lining that created these impoverished neighborhoods in the first place. They are not the fault of bigoted lending and hiring practices that create roadblocks for those attempting to escape those neighborhoods. And the fact that black students are disciplined, suspended and expelled far more easily and quickly for the same or lesser offenses, isn’t the problem.
None of that is the problem. Nope. All of that is just too bad. Life is tough all over. Lots of people have…
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Race Relations with Police worsening in U.S., AP votes it Top Story of 2014
By Robert A. Vella
Relations between minority communities and local law enforcement are rapidly deteriorating across the U.S. in the wake of two grand jury decisions not to indict police officers for the killing of unarmed black men (Michael Brown, Eric Garner), and the subsequent murder of two NYPD cops. The most prominent flashpoints have occurred in Ferguson, Missouri and now New York City, but worsening race relations are a national problem which has shaken America to its moral foundations.
At the heart of the matter is the dangerous increase in economic inequality that has plagued the U.S. and other western countries since the Great Recession. As societies become more stratified and segregated along class and ethnic lines, civil unrest intensifies as a natural result. This pits a stubborn – and predominantly white – administrative establishment against an angrily disaffected – and racially diverse – population with law enforcement…
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Senate OKs First Openly Gay Black Federal Judge
Black Teen Breaks Academic Records
Photo courtesy of chosenfamilies.org
This story is a perfect example of what a young Black person can achieve when given the opportunity.
According to NewsOne.com, a Black teenage girl named Gabrielle Turnquest became the youngest person to pass the Bar exam of England and Wales at age 18, allowing her to practice law there. A native of Florida, Turnquest previously broke the record for the youngest person to graduate from Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., at age 16.
And she’s not stopping there- she plans to return home to the States to tackle the American Bar exam, as well as the Bar of The Bahamas, where her parents were born.
Conversation Between a Black Man & a White Man About Racial Profiling
This exchange took place on CNN between CNN anchor Don Lemon, who is black, and conservative commentator Ben Ferguson, who is white.
The Raw Story (online news) titled their article about the video, “CNN’s Don Lemon schools white conservative: ‘Your privilege does not allow you to see… certain circumstances in society.’
I applaud The Raw Story for posting this frank, and at times heated, exchange. This is an issue than many feel uncomfortable talking about, but it is absolutely worth talking about. I hope you watch it.
GUNS: The Cold Hard Facts
Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com
The debate about guns in the U.S. has reached fever pitch. Recent massacres, especially that which took place at Sandy Hook Elementary School, are some of the worst in American history. These events have spurred a new round of debate on how to prevent future gun violence.
Black Republican Candidate Speaks Against Planned Parenthood and Gay Rights Movement
Bishop E.W. Jackson- courtesy of NYDailyNews.com
Watch YouTube video of his speech– http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oi_KaZ53eDg&feature=youtu.be
A Virginia Republican who on Saturday secured the nomination to run for Lt. Governor said in an online video published last year that he believes “black civil rights leaders” are responsible for a “genocide” of African-American children by supporting Democrats and reproductive choice.
E.W. Jackson, a pastor and Harvard graduate who previous sought Virginia’s senate seat, is the party’s first African-American candidate for statewide office since the 1980s. He’s also part of a trio of fringe conservatives leading the Virginia Republican Party’s statewide ticket, joined by state Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli running for governor and state Sen. Mark Obenshain running for attorney general.
“The Democrat Party has created an unholy alliance between certain so-called civil rights leaders and Planned Parenthood, which has killed unborn black babies by the tens of millions,” he said in a video published to his official YouTube page. “Planned Parenthood has been far more lethal to black lives than the KKK ever was.”
During his last run for public office, Jackson insisted that the so-called 3/5ths clause in the Constitution, which counted slaves as 3/5ths of a man, was “an anti-slavery amendment” designed to reduce the voting power of slave-owning states. That woefully wrong theory was originally floated by Republican conspiracy theorist Glenn Beck and apparently repeated by Jackson without examination.
In the video published last year, Jackson adds that Democrats “and their black civil rights allies are partners in this genocide,” going on to insist the persecution of LGBT people is nothing like the persecution of African-Americans throughout U.S. history.
“They can keep their homosexuality private,” he said. “You and I cannot hide being black. I need not recount to you the painful history of slavery, Jim Crow, lynchings and sterilizations, all because of skin color. Anyone who dares equate the so-called gay rights movement to the history of black Americans is exploiting the black community.”
Interestingly, as he made these comments, a photo of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. hung on a wall just over his right shoulder. Dr. King’s wife Coretta, before her death, spoke out passionately in favor of LGBT marriage equality despite a coalition of black pastors who urged that she recognize the civil rights movement and the LGBT movement are fundamentally different.
“I still hear people say that I should not be talking about the rights of lesbian and gay people and I should stick to the issue of racial justice,” King said in 1998. “But I hasten to remind them that Martin Luther King Jr. said, ‘Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.’”
Illuminate 