Title: Hidden Mechanisms of Prejudice: Implicit Bias & Interpersonal Fluency Part 1
Post by: AGelbert on November 15, 2013, 07:19:37 pm
The Hidden Mechanisms of Prejudice: Implicit Bias & Interpersonal Fluency by Alex Madva (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=6&cad=rja&ved=0CEsQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Facademiccommons.columbia.edu%2Fdownload%2Ffedora_content%2Fdownload%2Fac%3A153251%2FCONTENT%2FMadva_columbia_0054D_10998.pdf&ei=-syFUpaXIebKsASKxoHYBA&usg=AFQjCNEB7cZy9tpiDlSfzissuJWAplqJDQ&sig2=bNpPah17h7yvwoxP6cRMOg&bvm=bv.56643336,d.cWc)
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This dissertation is about prejudice. In particular, it examines the theoretical and ethical questions raised by research on implicit social biases. Social biases are termed “implicit” when they are not reported, though they lie just beneath the surface of consciousness. Such biases are easy to adopt but very difficult to introspect and control.
Despite this difficulty, I argue that we are personally responsible for our biases and obligated(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) to overcome them if they can bring harm to ourselves or to others. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
My dissertation addresses the terms of their removal. It is grounded in a comprehensive examination of empirical research and, as such, is a contribution to social psychology. Although implicit social biases significantly influence our judgment and action, they are not reducible to beliefs or desires.Rather, they constitute a class of their own.
Understanding their particular character is vital to determining how to replace them with more preferable habits of mind. I argue for a model of interpersonal fluency, a kind of ethical expertise that requires transforming our underlying dispositions of thought, feeling, and action (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F128fs318181.gif&hash=eff6d5f3831782966c2ff2081f07bf7fc5b22a6b) .
The associations in our heads belong to us… The selves that we are and the selves we intend tobe are both us, and sometimes they do not agree. One might say that humans are large, containing multitudes. Full recognition of this fact raises serious questions for important issues of responsibility, culpability, and intentionality. ~ Brian Nosek and Robert Hansen (2008, 553, 591)
A 2004 study found that, after attending an all-women’s college for one year, female undergraduates’ implicit attitudes regarding gender and leadership qualities were completely overhauled.1
Beforehand, participants were quicker to associate female names like “Emily” with attributes stereotypical of female leaders, like “nurturing,” whereas they were quicker to associate male names like “Greg” with attributes stereotypical of male leaders, like “assertive.”
After one year, these implicit biases vanished; they were no more likely to associate “Emily” with nurturance than with assertiveness. The same study also found that attending a coed university had the opposite effect on female undergraduates.
After one year, they were even more likely to associate “Greg” with assertiveness. What accounts for the difference? The mediating factor was not, the evidence suggests, a supportive or encouraging atmosphere. The difference evidently boiled down to the total number of classes that students had taken with female math and science professors, that is, with female professors in historically maledominated fields.
In fact, a closer look at the data showed that this was true regardless of which institution they attended. What’s just as striking is the fact that neither group showed any changes in their reflective, self-reported beliefs about women, nurturance, and leadership.
Before as well as after, at both schools, participants consistently claimed that women possess more supportive qualities than leadership ones. :( ???
This first part is about gender roles. Wait until we get to judging (i.e. "pre" ;)) the level of threat in the behavior of same or other races (hint: the behavior, look, stance, clothing, etc. doesn't have BEANS to do with it and RACE has EVERYTHING to do with it.).
Those "parent tapes" are hard to MODIFY, aren't they? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.imgion.com%2Fimages%2F01%2FAngry-animated-smiley.jpg&hash=84657bd1a63cad676e3551587daeb4b39411a289)
Title: Hidden Mechanisms of Prejudice: Implicit Bias & Interpersonal Fluency Part 2
Post by: AGelbert on November 15, 2013, 07:21:15 pm
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Implicit attitudes are studied indirectly, most commonly by measures like the Implicit Association Test (IAT), which tests how quickly individuals associate pairs of items, such as male and female names with leadership traits.2 Implicit attitudes contrast with explicit attitudes, which are paradigmatically expressed in individuals’ reflective judgments and self-reported commitments.
How are we to understand cases such as these in which our automatic, intuitive responses come apart from our considered commitments?
The 2004 study is particularly striking in that the automatic, virtually unconscious tendencies of students in the women’s college seem to have been in some sense getting it right while their reflective judgments persisted in getting it wrong. :o
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Implicit attitudes shape a wide range of pivotal decisions and actions without our ever realizing it. They influence our judgments about whom to trust and whom to ignore, whom to promote and whom to imprison. While it would be a mistake to think that implicit attitudes are intrinsically bad or regrettable features of human psychology, our failure to appreciate what they are and how they affect us can cause serious and pervasive harm.
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In the paradigmatic cases I consider in this dissertation, the challenge is what to do about the implicit attitudes that get it wrong.
For example, while fewer and fewer Americans openly avow racist and sexist beliefs, subtle but pervasive forms of disparate treatment on the basis of race and gender persist. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113183729.png&hash=d898195c8ae0a55e2e6d84fc47b9d06f8ba13f03)
Some researchers have suggested that part of the explanation for this state of affairs is that many Americans have egalitarian explicit attitudes—in that they sincerely embrace anti-racist and antisexist commitments—but nevertheless harbor a range of biased implicit attitudes.
In one study, participants evaluated two hypothetical candidates for a job as chief of police.3 One candidate had extensive “street” experience but little formal education; the other had extensive formal education but little street experience. When the street-smart candidate was male and the book smart candidate was female, participants said that street smarts were the most important criteria for being an effective police chief, and recommended promoting the man.
However, when the street-smart candidate was female and the book-smart candidate was male, participants said book smarts were more important, and, once again, recommended the man.
They unwittingly tailored their judgments about the tools necessary to be a successful police chief to match their gut feeling that the man was better suited than the woman for the job. :P :o ???
The Hidden Mechanisms of Prejudice: Implicit Bias & Interpersonal Fluency by Alex Madva (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=6&cad=rja&ved=0CEsQFjAF&url=http%3A%2F%2Facademiccommons.columbia.edu%2Fdownload%2Ffedora_content%2Fdownload%2Fac%3A153251%2FCONTENT%2FMadva_columbia_0054D_10998.pdf&ei=-syFUpaXIebKsASKxoHYBA&usg=AFQjCNEB7cZy9tpiDlSfzissuJWAplqJDQ&sig2=bNpPah17h7yvwoxP6cRMOg&bvm=bv.56643336,d.cWc)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 18, 2013, 08:35:28 pm
Peter Z. Scheer: A question is “how should people of color respond to the dying of a civilization that has not been civil to them?”
[audience laughter and applause]
Chris Hedges: Well, I teach every Thursday night at a maximum security prison and I spent significant amounts of time with this book “Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt” in statistically the poorest pockets of the country and the creation of omnipotent police forces, especially in urban areas has set a template. As anyone who knows has spent time in depressed urban areas, police on pretext stops can seize and incarcerate—you only get a few minutes with a public defender—anyone they want. And I find often in the prisons the people with the longest sentences are the people who refused to plea out because they were not guilty. But if you don’t plea out you’re finished; and they know it, the whole system’s rigged.
And one of the reasons that I would hope that those who were in many cities the engine of the Occupy movement, which were primarily underemployed or unemployed college educated kids, would begin to reach out to marginal communities not so much because I think these communities now are so broken and of course such a high dis-proportion of especially African-American men are within the system. Not just in prison but on parole; I mean they have all sorts of ways to cripple your life. I think that we have to make amends to these communities because we …
[audience applause]
… by supporting the Democratic Party, and in particular figures like Clinton, which rammed through the Omnibus bill and created a massive prison industrial complex, destroyed welfare—which as Bob points out 70 percent of the recipients in the old welfare system were children—passed NAFTA. We busied ourselves with a kind of boutique activism, multiculturalism, all of which I support, but at the expense of justice. We forgot about justice. And our poor and our working class were decimated. And what has happened now, there has been a Weimarization of the American working class. What’s happened to the working class is now being visited on the middle class; I mean this is how history works.
So, I think there’s a, for those of us who care about social change, one of the reasons we have to reach out to these communities—and one of the reasons I teach in the prison system—is because we have to make atonement for, in essence, turning our back on these people, while in the name of a kind of faux liberalism a war was made against their very beings.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 18, 2013, 08:55:30 pm
Agelbert NOTE: DeBlasio changed his name from Warren Wilhelm to win an election. He comes from a family with some members in the CIA. He is a bought and paid for Clinton Clone. I don't like him for that reason. However the incredibly racist piece of crap by Cohen that Colbert exposed is worthy of PRAISE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
A Famous Columnist Has Trouble Defining Racism. Colbert Eats Him For Dinner.
Here’s the quote:
“Today’s GOP is not racist, as Harry Belafonte alleged about the tea party, but it is deeply troubled — about the expansion of government, about immigration, about secularism, about the mainstreaming of what used to be the avant-garde. People with conventional views must repress a gag reflex when considering the mayor-elect of New York — a white man married to a black woman and with two biracial children. (Should I mention that Bill de Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, used to be a lesbian?)”
Wait, what?!
Alvin Melathe
Video Here: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fus.cdn2.123rf.com%2F168nwm%2Flenm%2Flenm1201%2Flenm120100200%2F12107060-illustration-of-a-smiley-giving-a-thumbs-up.jpg&hash=2046bc6d662e09d3014a2c404a2af6ba17f8217c)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 18, 2013, 11:50:19 pm
Rumplestiltskin must have been quite a happy fellow! ;D
Does a Person’s Name Impact Happiness?
A person’s name might affect his or her happiness, because people who have rare names report higher levels of happiness than those with more common names, research shows. Researchers believe this could be the result of humans’ subconscious desire to be considered unique from others. Research also reveals that people who have common names are likely to rate their names as being more rare than they actually are, a psychology term referred to as the false uniqueness effect. ;D
More about the impact of names:
•About 20% of parents reported regretting their children’s names, according to one 2013 British study. Common reasons were the difficulty other people had spelling the name or that it was too unusual.
•Boys who have been given names that are traditionally associated with girls have been found to be at a higher risk of disciplinary problems during adolescence, :o which is thought to be because of self-consciousness from being teased about their names.
•A person who has high self-esteem is more likely to prefer words that contain the same letters as his or her name, especially words that include the first letter of the name. ;)
Agelbert NOTE: Why is this posted in the "Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden" Board? Because arrogant individuals often have very high (and totally unjustified) self esteem. These people are NOT trustworthy. Their main prejudice is that they lack humility and honestly believe they are more valuable to society than anyone around them. consequently, if the situation is them or you for survival, they will ALWAYS decide for THEM.
Altruism does not exist in these people but they can put on quite a show. The last tidbit from Wisegeek will help you pick up on whether a person has gone overboard in the self esteem department if they happen to be good at disguising their arrogance.
As always, this is just one factor and you need to weigh carefully many other behavioral characteristics of your acquaintances to determine if they are trustworthy or not.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: William Hunter Duncan on November 19, 2013, 09:28:23 pm
Rumplestiltskin must have been quite a happy fellow! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Femoticon-animal-042.gif&hash=948c6a3290ff23118007cc45e013732f8fe92370)
Does a Person’s Name Impact Happiness?
A person’s name might affect his or her happiness, because people who have rare names report higher levels of happiness than those with more common names, research shows. Researchers believe this could be the result of humans’ subconscious desire to be considered unique from others. Research also reveals that people who have common names are likely to rate their names as being more rare than they actually are, a psychology term referred to as the false uniqueness effect. ;D
More about the impact of names:
•About 20% of parents reported regretting their children’s names, according to one 2013 British study. Common reasons were the difficulty other people had spelling the name or that it was too unusual.
•Boys who have been given names that are traditionally associated with girls have been found to be at a higher risk of disciplinary problems during adolescence, :o which is thought to be because of self-consciousness from being teased about their names.
•A person who has high self-esteem is more likely to prefer words that contain the same letters as his or her name, especially words that include the first letter of the name. ;)
Agelbert NOTE: Why is this here? Because arrogant individuals often have very high (and totally unjustified) self esteem. These people are NOT trustworthy. Their main prejudice is that they lack humility and honestly believe they are more valuable to society than anyone around them. consequently, if the situation is them or you for survival, they will ALWAYS decide for THEM.
Altruism does not exist in these people but they can put on quite a show. The last tidbit from Wisegeek will help you pick up on whether a person has gone overboard in the self esteem department if they happen to be good at disguising their arrogance.
As always, this is just one factor and you need to weigh carefully many other behavioral characteristics of your aquiantances to determine if they are trustworthy or not.
agelbert,
Mehopes you weigh behavioral characteristics before you make judgements. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sherv.net%2Fcm%2Femoticons%2Fconfused%2Fpuzzled-smiley-emoticon.gif&hash=58d9c2f95eab81ff691df5d7367e46faeb6d695c) (http://www.sherv.net/emoticons.html)
William Hunter Duncan
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 20, 2013, 11:55:06 pm
Absolutely! ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 05, 2014, 08:42:14 pm
The role of rationalization in justifying criminal behavior as "okay"
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on February 15, 2014, 04:26:52 pm
SATIRE
Conservative Libertarian Senator Prudentius Windy is all in a lather over the horrendous waste of taxpayer dollars in gated communities:
"How is it possible that these PEOPLE that live in these gated communities at taxpayer expense are allowed to live there free?". Our country needs to be responsible and have a balanced budget when military expenses are not the issue! These freeloaders need to be sent out to work on environmental cleanups and other worthy projects for the good of the gated communities and America!. They will learn discipline and responsibility that they don't seem capable of obtaining in their family units due to the lack of values central to REAL Americans. We may never be able to get them to talk English properly but we CAN make them stop mooching from the good people of the USA!".
Stop these FREELOADERS! Make them work for their privileged gate community life even if we can't EVER expect them to talk like REAL Americans!
Note: Photo of evil FREELOADER was picked at random without regard to race, color, creed, nationality, sex, pimples, ugliness or general appearance. We pick photos in a totally impartial fashion. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)
This news is brought to you by the lobby for private corporate for profit security facilities and the KKK Libertarians. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978)
Title: Cops Busted for Conspiracy to Steal Cars from Poor Hispanics
Post by: AGelbert on March 01, 2014, 05:58:21 pm
California town shaken as police officers arrested
The misgivings had been building for some time. Investigators heard people — many unable to speak English — complain that police were taking their cars and money, and there was nothing they could do about it.
"I'm not at all surprised by the arrests, I'm just surprised there weren't more charges," restaurateur Vivian Villa said Wednesday in Spanish while sizzling a pan of beef in preparation for the lunch rush. "Now maybe some of them are going to feel what we feel when they target us."
Later in the day, Villa held a meeting in her little restaurant where about a dozen community members spoke out against police abuse and corruption.
Latinos account for nearly 90 percent of the community of 13,000 people tucked among fields of tomatoes, strawberries and lettuce along the Salinas River, 150 miles southeast of San Francisco.
Farm mechanics Francisco Mendez and Alfonso Perez, stopping at a taco stand before heading into work, both described being stopped frequently by police for having tinted windows or broken tail lights.
"It seems like they just want a reason to pull you over," Mendez said.
Tuesday's arrests, which also included a former police chief, came after a six-month probe of the police department launched in September when a visiting investigator — there to check out a homicide — heard from numerous sources that the community didn't trust its police department.
By this week, authorities said they had enough evidence to arrest a total of six people linked to the department for a variety of crimes ranging from bribery to making criminal threats. They were all quickly released on bail.
"Ordinary citizens, again and again, told us they didn't trust the police," said acting chief assistant Monterey County District Attorney Terry Spitz. "There are more investigations underway."
Tow shop owner Brian Miller, his brother acting police chief Bruce Miller and Sgt. Bobby Carillo were scheduled to be arraigned Monday on bribery charges after authorities said vehicles impounded from Hispanic immigrants were funneled to the tow yard then sold or given away.
Prosecutors said an undetermined number of vehicles were sold or given away for free when the owners couldn't pay fees to reclaim them. Two people at Miller's Towing in King City refused comment.
Former Chief Dominic David Baldiviez and Mario Alonso Mottu Sr. were set to be arraigned March 6 for embezzlement of a city-owned Crown Victoria. Officer Jaime Andrade, accused of possession of an assault weapon and illegal storage of a firearm, and officer Mark Allen Baker, accused of making criminal threats, are also slated for a March 6 arraignment.
Bruce Miller said the charges were baseless, and his family had received death threats since prosecutors disclosed details of the case. Messages for Baldiviez and Brian Miller were not immediately returned. A man who answered the phone at a listing for Baker hung up when asked about the case.
Andrade said he had not obtained an attorney. He said hopefully, the truth would come out soon and "things will be cleared up."
City Manager Michael Powers said all but Mottu had been placed on paid leave during the investigation prior to their arrests, and that he hopes to announce a new, interim police chief on Thursday.
Fixing King City's sense of well-being is a bigger challenge.
"Obviously no one should be targeted because of race, but recent immigrants are at something of a disadvantage," Powers said. "They already fear the police. It makes them easy prey."
Powers said a community meeting would be held in two weeks to try to resolve concerns of angry citizens and those worried about the depleted police force, where 10 of the 17 sworn positions were held by Latinos.
State Sen. Bill Monning, whose district includes King City, said he was "incensed and outraged," and thanked the FBI and local authorities for their ongoing pressure.
"While I hope this is an isolated incident, I fear it is not," he said. "There continues to be situations throughout the state where the immigrant workforce is subjugated to tyranny of those abusing their authority."
County Supervisor Simon Salinas said it's going to take community oriented policing to get the town to trust authorities again.
"It's certainly going to be a black eye for King City," Salinas said.
Complaints of misconduct have been raised during the past few years in this historic, agricultural city where John Steinbeck's father settled in 1890s and met his wife. With wide streets, historic buildings and old oaks, parts of the city haven't changed much since Steinbeck wrote of King City in parts of Mice and Men and To a God Unknown.
But some said they are now afraid in the city.
"I'm not sure who is taking care of the town," said San Lorenzo Liquors store owner Myukng Hong who reopened Wednesday after closing early the night before after learning of the arrests.
At Leyva's Tow Yard, which police often bypassed with impounded cars, George Oliveros said many people in the community were aware of the investigation for months.
"In King City, a lot of people really try to stay away from the police," he said. "Cops aren't really helping the people, they focus on helping themselves."
Title: How Conservation Efforts are Gamed bv the Rich to Fool Everyone Else.
Post by: AGelbert on March 02, 2014, 05:09:36 pm
The following thread was taken from this article (http://grist.org/politics/obama-has-a-good-transportation-plan-now-we-just-need-to-raise-the-gas-tax-so-he-can-pay-for-it/#comment-1267522241). I disagree with the premise of the article on how to generate funds to improve our infrastructure in order to make us a sustainable society.
agelbert I think the solution is to eliminate the gas tax altogether and slap a 0.1% transaction tax on all Wall Street stock sales. Billions would be generated continuously, gaming the stocks with thousands of computer generated buys and sells would stop and, without the price manipulation, assets would be priced in a realistic manner. THEN we could get serious about overhauling ALL of our infrastructure.
We need fossil fuels or the taxes they generate like a hole in the head.
Don't Believe the Dirty Lie (http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/climate-change/pollution/msg703/#msg703) SticksInMyCraw > agelbert The financial transactions tax is such a sensible idea, I don't know why it doesn't get any traction here in the United States. Didn't the UK just adopt a stock-transactions tax?
In any case, I know it is attracting serious attention throughout Europe. A modest transactions tax would have minimal impact on regular folks like you and me and our 401k's. But -- as you point out -- it would slow down and/or shift some tax burden onto the computerized high frequency stock trading that adds absolutely no value to the U.S. economy.
agelbert > SticksInMyCraw Our Senators, Congressmen, the White House AND the Supreme Court get hard of hearing when someone mentions taxing Wall Street. Of course we know who they work for (It is definitely NOT we-the-people).
Even my Senators and my Rep in Vermont (who favored this tax about 5 years ago) have gone silent on it.
On the plus side, more people are talking about it and a tax Wall Street party actually exists now and made the ballot (but lost the election) in New York recently.
It's the only logical solution to our fiscal problems. But the 1% get the heeby jeebies just thinking about it!
Thanks for talking it up; the more people know about this no-brainer, the better chance we have of making our government enact it.
SticksInMyCraw > agelbert Here you have it: The European Parliament approved such a tax last summer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E...
agelbert > SticksInMyCraw The Europeans have more sense than we do.
dreamweaverdory Taxes should be based on use, why the per gallon tax is workable the more you use the road the more you pay, and if you want to save taxes you pay, get a fuel efficient car you pay less and pollute less. In a small town, unless you live in a food desert, you will drive less to find a supermarket than in most cities, and you should have a farmers market near by ,so why would you drive to the city for anything but the night life.If you live farther than that out in the country you are probably raising at least some of your own food. Also , yes purple people should pay less in taxes and blue people should pay more.
agelbert > dreamweaverdory Taxes based on use is regressive taxation and fosters inequality and strife. Taxes should be progressive and based on net worth and income from all sources (including capital gains).
The present structure polarizes the population. That is wrong.
We want a tax structure that benefits the country as a whole, not just the richest.
dreamweaverdory > agelbert if we all paid one tax, not a bunch of different ones, i would agree with you. The idea that if you tax the user for polluting resources by the amount they use will help control use and maybe help undo/clean up said pollution. The poor are not the ones gobbling up resources, but they should be responsible for what they use.
agelbert > dreamweaverdory "The poor are not the ones gobbling up resources, but they should be responsible for what they use."
Well, that is exactly my point. The poor are, not only responsible for what they use but are being forced to shoulder the cost and responsibility of what they don't use (i.e. the top 20% piggies!).
And you want to level the piggy playing field by pounding on the victims of massive pollution and resource explotation first?
That is, not just illogical (because it doesn't address the heart of the problem), it's immoral, vindictive, buck passing and irrational too.
I don't mean to sound so harsh but you really need to understand how this works in human power structures. Watch this, somewhat slow at first (jump ahead to the 28 minute mark to) where the Survival International Director explains where our so-called "Conservation of Nature" concept came from. No, it has nothing to do with conserving the biosphere and everything to do with throwing natives off their land (first, the poor come later) and then using said lands for resource explotation while setting aside a small portion as "nature preserves" that the resource raping goons use as pristine "natural" areas they can hunt wild animals in to their corrupt hearts' content.
These very same bastards will turn around and defend conservation efforts and wail and moan about how the people of the world are despoiling nature and more areas need to be "conserved" (for the rich to hunt and play in, of course).
It's a long and sordid story. Can you handle it? We liberals have been manipulated big time by the rich for their benefit and the detriment of the rest of humanity.
Date: Friday, February 28 Time: 5pm Pacific Standard Time (1am GMT on Saturday, March 1)
Survival Director Stephen Corry is giving a hard-hitting talk on the impact of conservation on tribes worldwide at the University of Oregon's Public Interest Environmental Law Conference.
Explaining the role of ‘conservation’ in the ongoing destruction of tribal peoples, he will explore how conservation theories grew with ‘scientific’ racism, which underpinned colonial genocides and the Holocaust.
He will demonstrate that contemporary claims that tribal and indigenous peoples are ‘like our ancestors’, and ‘more violent’ than us, are no less spurious, and that they too damage the people they purport to describe.
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'First we were dispossessed in the name of kings and emperors, later in the name of state development, and now in the name of conservation.'
Indigenous Peoples' Forum
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 28, 2014, 04:15:35 pm
So where is the outrage against affirmative action for white people? ??? >:(
by Laurence Lewis
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Flcweb2.loc.gov%2Fservice%2Fpnp%2Fppmsca%2F05500%2F05542r.jpg&hash=c95f8892764221cdc3e3cec5a32163c8cd2fe35b) Vivian Malone registers at the University of Alabama, accompanied by U.S. Deputy Attorney General Nicholas Katzenbach and federal marshals
Affirmative Action continues to be under attack, and the Supreme Court's Schuette decision was no surprise. But if it is a moral and perhaps legal outrage for colleges and universities to give admissions preference to specific demographic groups, why aren't the ostensibly principled warriors against Affirmative Action also fighting against legacy admissions? (Agelbert NOTE: Whitey Bigot REACTION ---> (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F237.gif&hash=13b71d2444f84b15c53fb1c0272c080f48a165f1) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fnocomment.gif&hash=e2062ee03ac013cc64a2d5285ec05dd9510c141b) Paul Waldman explains:
Quote
Meanwhile, the preferences whites enjoy remain firmly in place. There have yet to be any successful laws or ballot initiatives to ban “legacy admissions,” in which applicants who had a relative who attended the university are given special preference. No one can come up with rational grounds for retaining this affirmative action for wealthy white people, yet universities all across the country do. And there are other only slightly less blatant forms of favoritism; for instance, the reliance on standardized test scores provides a boost for wealthy students, most of them white, whose parents can afford expensive test prep courses and tutoring. Again, no serious person contends that SATs or ACTs are a pure measure of “merit,” yet they continue to play a huge role in college admissions.
Legacy admissions are blatantly racist, because at many American colleges and universities, minority admissions were prohibited or restricted until at least the latter half of the 20th century. Generations of white families established legacies at those colleges and universities, while minority families couldn't. The continued favoritism granted those often growing legacy families necessarily perpetuates the legacy of racism from the era of explicit minority exclusion. But about this form of affirmative action, those white supposed champions of equal opportunity are curiously silent. Perhaps they're not really concerned with fairness, perhaps they're really most concerned with protecting their historical privileges. Perhaps they fear that if admissions standards were truly fair and unbiased, they wouldn't be able to compete. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.giphy.com%2Fmedia%2FHjPbLbmep2aJO%2Fgiphy.gif&hash=3c7f7703f00cb341d3e9bdba607208d4204a294c)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 27, 2014, 03:10:18 pm
Before repairing the climate, we’ll have to repair the impacts of racism
By Brentin Mock
Protesters rallied in December to oppose the construction of a garbage incinerator in one of the most polluted parts of Baltimore. :P >:(
Ta-Nehisi Coates’ 18-page cover story for The Atlantic making a case for reparations for African Americans is a must-read, even if you’re not into all that hopey, changey racial justice stuff. Even if you believe that the only thing we need to repair right now are the practices that are leading to surplus greenhouse gas emissions and resultant climate change, you need to read it — in fact, you are the ideal audience for it. Coates makes the case that after two-and-a-half centuries of slavery, and another century-plus of Jim Crow, segregation, and racial terror, African Americans deserve redress. Financial redress? Yes.
To celebrate freedom and democracy while forgetting America’s origins in a slavery economy is patriotism à la carte. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039) Perhaps no statistic better illustrates the enduring legacy of our country’s shameful history of treating black people as sub-citizens, sub-Americans, and sub-humans than the wealth gap. Reparations would seek to close this chasm. But as surely as the creation of the wealth gap required the cooperation of every aspect of the society, bridging it will require the same.
If you wonder why more black people aren’t so quick to fight against the Keystone XL pipeline, it’s because we’re too busy fighting the school-to-prison pipeline — or in places like California, the pollution-to-school-to-prison pipeline. Not to mention all of the other racial ills making our lives hectic, before we can even think about something like climate. As Anthony Giancatarino of the Center for Social Inclusion recently wrote, “to truly address climate change, we need to understand how our past and current policies have reinforced climate change and inequity and the implications for our work.”
Bold and italics are mine, to show this is not an either-or nor zero-sum equation. And it’s gonna take more than some green jobs programs to insert equity in the equation. For years, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan has been trying to pass House Resolution 40 to get Congress to just study the reparations issue so we can have a greater understanding of how U.S. policies have reinforced inequities. Writes Coates:
Perhaps after a serious discussion and debate—the kind that HR 40 proposes—we may find that the country can never fully repay African Americans. But we stand to discover much about ourselves in such a discussion—and that is perhaps what scares us. The idea of reparations is frightening not simply because we might lack the ability to pay. The idea of reparations threatens something much deeper—America’s heritage, history, and standing in the world.
I’d submit that what scares us in the reparations conversation is similar to what most scares us in the climate change conversation: Taking either subject seriously would mean considerable discomfort in our lives and radical changes in our behavior. I would also submit that what has led us to these points — alarming levels of inequality along with alarming levels of greenhouse gas emissions — are also virtually the same in nature: The urge to criminally devalue both people and nature in the quest to live as comfortably as possible.
To get to the bottom of these things, we’re going to have to pay for the women and men and land and air that have been devalued for far too long. There is no way around it.
Allow me to highlight a few passages from Coates’ article to illustrate what I mean:
1. “In 2001, the Associated Press published a three-part investigation into the theft of black-owned land stretching back to the antebellum period. The series documented some 406 victims and 24,000 acres of land valued at tens of millions of dollars. The land was taken through means ranging from legal chicanery to terrorism. ‘Some of the land taken from black families has become a country club in Virginia,’ the AP reported, as well as ‘oil fields in Mississippi’ and ‘a baseball spring training facility in Florida.’” >:(
Here is the AP article Coates is referencing. The oil fields are a reference to Jasper County, Miss., where according to AP’s investigation, the Ku Klux Klan drove black farmers off of the land they owned in the 1930s and burned the courthouses where the land records were stored. The lumber and paper company Masonite later came in and claimed ownership of some 9,851 acres in that same area, even though at least 204 of those acres belong to black farmers, according to the land records that survived the fires. Since claiming that land, Masonite “has since yielded millions of dollars in natural gas, timber, and oil, according to state records.”
Not only that, Masonite’s deforestation for paper and wood products made its Mississippi operations the lumber commerce center of the nation, if not the world. It also helped Masonite destroy basically all of the healthy forests in Mississippi. Pretty much everyone in America — and our parents and grandparents — have bought or used Masonite paper products produced on land that was stolen from African Americans.
Talk about ‘there will be blood’: “ At least 850,000 barrels of oil have been pumped from this property, according to state records,” reported AP. But last year, a pipeline leak led to over 100 gallons of crude oil spilled into the county’s wetlands costing some $5 million to clean up. The black landowners driven out of Jasper by the Klan, I’m sure, reaped none of Masonite’s profits. Meanwhile, the African Americans who live in the area now will likely have to pay for the oil cleanup through their tax dollars.
2. “Scholars have long discussed methods by which America might make reparations to those on whose labor and exclusion the country was built. … Perhaps no number can fully capture the multi-century plunder of black people in America. Perhaps the number is so large that it can’t be imagined, let alone calculated and dispensed. But I believe that wrestling publicly with these questions matters as much as—if not more than—the specific answers that might be produced. An America that asks what it owes its most vulnerable citizens is improved and humane.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
Right, and let’s not forget that America knows how to do these formulas. We’ve not only done them for Japanese Americans and for Native Americans, but we’ve also done them for plants and animals. Case in point: The Natural Resource Damage Assessment, which is a process where, after a disaster like an oil spill, scientists study all of the non-human victims affected — trees, wetlands, waters, fish, fauna, coral reefs, beach sands — to place a financial value on each thing, the costs of the damage, and how much it would cost to restore them whole. It happened after the Exxon Valdez oil spill, and there is one happening right now for the BP Oil Disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. When the total is tallied, a bill is given to the company that created the disaster and it is expected to pay up.
America has not developed a similar process for African Americans. This means right now a patch of wetlands is more entitled to reparations than a black human being is.
3. “The past two decades have witnessed a rollback of the progressive legislation of the 1960s.”
This can’t be emphasized enough. Whatever gains this country made to begin approximate compensation and reconciliation for past wrongs against African Americans, began getting dialed back almost immediately after they were passed. The Civil Rights Act? I just wrote about this in my last post. It used to be that African Americans could file lawsuits against companies under Title VI of that Act if it was found that companies were dumping waste and pollution on their neighborhoods discriminately. But that private right to sue was curtailed in 2001 and now people of color must rely on the EPA to make such findings :( >:(— their record for which has been wanting. Financial redress for toxic exposures is even less unlikely under current terms. Combine that with the gutting of the Voting Rights Act last year, the recent depleting of affirmative action policies, a near-knifing of fair housing protections, and energy apartheid in the former slave-holding states, and any argument that America is already paying its dues goes out the window.
Again, to reconcile all of this, it’s gonna require some discomfort. If that’s not something we can live with, then I don’t expect people will change much to deal with climate change adequately, either. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
Brentin Mock is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist who writes regularly for Grist about environmental justice issues and the connections between environmental policy, race, and politics. Follow him on Twitter at @brentinmock.
A young Brazilian Indian leader was assaulted on Monday by four armed men, despite being under the care of a government protection program since he witnessed the murder of his father-in-law. Valmir Guarani Kaiowá, of the Guarani tribe, was kidnapped, tied to a tree in a forest, blindfolded, and tortured. He managed to escape and said, ‘They tied me up and told me that I was going to die and that no one would ever find me. They put a bitter liquid in my mouth and told me to swallow it. Then, they fired several shots by my ears and I couldn’t hear any more… >:( then they left in their car.’ Valmir’s late father-in-law, Nísio Gomes, was killed by masked gunmen in 2011, having led his community back to part of their ancestral land which had been stolen from the Indians and occupied by a cattle ranch.
In 2012, 18 men were arrested in connection with the murder, including the owner of a ‘private militia’ security firm which has since been closed down. Some of the men are believed to have been released.
Valmir is a key witness, and continues to push for the murder investigation to be completed and for the land to be returned to his tribe.
He told a Survival researcher last year, ‘Nísio told me to be strong and fight for our land. All we need is for it to be protected for us.’
In the run up to the FIFA World Cup, Survival is highlighting ‘The dark side of Brazil’. :( Click here to find out more about the situation of Brazilian Indians and the government’s attacks on their rights to their land.
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10267
Title: How black land became white sand: The racial erosion of the U.S. coasts
Post by: AGelbert on June 05, 2014, 09:36:40 pm
How black land became white sand: The racial erosion of the U.S. coasts >:(
In 1910, less than 50 years after Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, African Americans owned over 15 million acres in the former slave-holding states. Much of that black-owned property was on the coasts, the geographic margins of the nation, which at the time were some of the most undesirable areas for living or leisure.
That was before the Army Corps of Engineers came along to convert those coastline areas into “flood protection” zones, and beaches. The Corps dumped over 7 million cubic yards of sand in Mississippi to create “the longest manmade beach in the world,” but not for all to enjoy. When the federal government brought the sand to the beach, and a highway system for city folk to access it, in came droves of white folks, who then effectively drove black landowners out of their homes.
What the lauded black scholar W. E. B. Dubois called “the color problem of summer,” the National Park Service called the “spectacular acceleration [of] private and commercial development” of America’s coasts. What DuBois was referencing, and what the Park Service was ignoring, was the violent pushing out of former black landowners into segregated, polluted nooks of the shoreline, if not off the land altogether.
Andrew Kahrl Harvard University Press
Andrew Kahrl.
University of Virginia history professor Andrew Kahrl calls it “coastal capitalism” in his book The Land Was Ours: African American Beaches from Jim Crow to the Sunbelt South, released somewhat quietly in late 2012. If you’ve been following my blog, you’ll note that I referenced the book a couple of times, including in my last post on how black people have been historically excluded from safe swimming spaces in the U.S.
Kahrl not only details the deleterious impacts of racial segregation in his book, but also how the white overthrow of black landholdings — from Maryland shores to Texas — was closely linked to the pursuit of reckless environmental policies in the name of profits. Many of the same properties stolen from African Americans are today threatened by climate-change-fueled sea-level rise and coastal erosion. Writes Kahrl: The shores that African Americans steadily lost over the course of the second half of the twentieth century … demonstrate the inextricability of environmental and human exploitation — power over lands and power over persons — and force us to reassess the familiar story of America’s triumph over segregation, its achievement of civil rights, and its slow, painful but nevertheless inexorable progress toward a more just and equitable future.
I caught up with Kahrl by phone to further unpack his research around racial segregation, “coastal capitalism,” and how these might be reconciled under the wrath of climate change.
Q. The stories in your book are mostly about social “soft” sciences like race discrimination, but you write quite a bit about problems like coastal erosion and climate change. Did you anticipate exploring those harder sciences going in?
A. That wasn’t initially part of the story, but it became an essential feature of that history the more I worked on it. I ended up trying to rethink or at least expand the way we understand environmental racism. We often think of it strictly as cases of African Americans being disproportionately affected by the damage done to the environment, from the siting of polluting industries or what have you. But here we have cases where whites are doing damage to their own environment while in the process of carrying out racist policies.
African Americans are victims of being pushed off the land, and at the same time those same policies are destroying land itself, and sometimes those two worked hand-in-hand. Like in New Hanover County, N.C., where you had the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers carrying out policies that are literally eroding the foundation of black coastal landowners, which then ensured that it would be very difficult to continue to sustain a livelihood there and results in their eventual displacement.
the land was ours
Q. And this continues today, right?
A. We have, over the last half-century, this steady process of restricting public access to beach areas in the Northeast. A lot of it is driven by fears of the civil rights movement spilling over into what had previously been white enclaves. You started to see this push towards restricting public access to beaches oftentimes out of an ostensibly race-neutral policy like resident-only policies or even by building physical barriers that restrict the public’s ability to access areas that had long been upper-class white coastal communities. Well, in the process of trying to armor themselves against the prospect of hordes of urban masses flocking to their shores, they were also destroying the very environment that they were seeking to protect.
Q. Maybe this is unfair, but given what climate change is poised to do to these coastal communities I couldn’t help but read a certain sense of karma in these stories.
A. It would be poetic justice if it only affected those persons carrying this [racism] out, but instead it affects all of us, because it’s our planet. It also affects us in other ways, like by shifting our priorities as a country, it’s shifting tax dollars toward the rebuilding of playgrounds for the rich, and just having a really corrosive effect on the body politic as a whole. It absolutely reveals the multifaceted damage that racism does to us as a society and to the planet.
Q. Ta-Nehisi Coates’ recent Atlantic article laying a case for reparations for African Americans is told through the lens of a working class black family from really humble beginnings. But your book centers a lot on stories of African Americans who actually had some measures of wealth and land ownership, only to have it stolen from them. Do you think your book bolsters the case for reparations for African Americans?
A. Well, I think we need to shift the focus from cash payments to people of color, which is the stereotypical argument of what reparations constitutes, and more toward structural reforms that will address and eliminate the sort of instruments of racism that have been carried out for generations and continue to operate and are really in many ways intrinsic to our system of capitalism — and that’s a conversation that most Americans don’t want to have.
With regards to these characters (in the book), these are folks whose wealth was never realized. The one thing about the African American experience under Jim Crow, when talking about wealth and the inability to accumulate wealth, the landowners who I discuss, these are folks who emerged out of a century of Jim Crow with one asset, which was land. They never got a chance to realize that wealth. Those lands instead became a source of wealth for others.
The perfect example is Hilton Head, S.C. That land was once owned by African Americans, but is now worth hundreds of millions of dollars and the people who [previously] owned it never got a cent. It’s the same thing we’re seeing today in these gentrifying neighborhoods where the land is highly valuable, but the people who lived on it didn’t get a chance to enjoy the riches that came from it. Coates uses the word “kleptocracy” to describe this and it’s very powerful and very accurate in the sense that the state is operating in ways to facilitate the dispossession of African American assets.
Q. So given all of this, do you see a way for the nation to reconcile its debt to African Americans while also reconciling a sustainable future under climate change’s threats? A. It’s hard to imagine when you have states like North Carolina, which just passed a law that forbids coastal engineers and state agencies from even acknowledging the existence of climate change. But yeah, it’s a tricky issue of how do we begin to right these past wrongs in ways that are actually meaningful for people who actually suffered that damage and their descendents — the people who are living in trailer homes while the land that their parents owned has now been turned into golf courses and multimillion dollar mansions. There’s no real easy answer that doesn’t involve a transfer of assets and wealth in a way that does compensate those people who had their land stolen from them by legal means.
Going forward, if there is a realization that [the current] model of development in these areas is unsustainable, then one of the ways to address this is to look back to previous models of living here, when [African Americans] were much more in tune with living in volatile environments, and ones that are much more well adapted to living in an age of rising sea level.
So, for instance, I was out in the Sea Islands [off the coast of South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida] in April, and you drive through these areas like John’s Island, Wadlamaw and Kiawah Island, these are areas that used to have large numbers of independent, self-sufficient black farm families. Today, the African Americans are still living on these islands but in these Habitat for Humanity villages. They have no means for actually living off the land, they have no place in the island economy other than as low-wage service workers. Their very way of life was destroyed.
At the same time the islands themselves are being destroyed in ways that will really become apparent in the future. So what do we do for these people who are living in these trailer homes, where their ancestors were living as proud independent farming families? One way is to look at those older models of living — not that return to the Earth in any kind of nostalgic way — but begin to recognize how we can adopt a new model. So learning from the past and also compensating for past injustices, and finding a way that those two can be brought together.
Brentin Mock is a Washington, D.C.-based journalist who writes regularly for Grist about environmental justice issues and the connections between environmental policy, race, and politics. Follow him on Twitter at @brentinmock.
A joyous ceremony was held in a Yanomami community in northern Brazil on 31 May to mark the withdrawal of the last rancher to occupy the tribe’s land along the notorious ‘Northern Perimeter Highway’.
The celebrations held in the community of Ajarani were attended by Yanomami, public prosecutors, NGOs and representatives of the government’s indigenous affairs department, FUNAI.
In 2013, public prosecutors drew up an agreement with the last 12 ranchers who had occupied the south-eastern tip of Yanomami land for decades, even though the territory was officially recognized as belonging to the Yanomami in 1992.
The Yanomami of Ajarani suffered a catastrophic loss of life when hundreds died from measles and other diseases brought in by construction workers building the highway in the early 1970s.
Carlo Zacquini, a Catholic missionary who has worked with the Yanomami since the 1960s treated those he could and recalled, “We knew that along the Ajarani River alone, there were 15 villages before the road. When the road was completed, not one of these 15 villages remained. The survivors then formed one new village along the road. It was really shocking and FUNAI was totally absent.”
Later the state government gave colonists plots on Yanomami land along the highway which also gave goldminers easy access to the Indians’ territory.
In 2007 Hutukara, the Yanomami association, wrote to the President of Brazil demanding action and stating that, “We, the Yanomami people, are very angry and worried about the borders of our land. The region of Ajarani is the point of entry for invaders, problems and diseases. They continue cutting down our forest to increase their lands and fatten their cattle, and they bring in illegal fishermen.”
According to João Catalano, coordinator of FUNAI’s ‘Yanomami Protection Front’, “The challenge now is to promote the self-sustainability of the community” in a region where much forest has been destroyed and degraded by cattle pasture.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Femoticon-object-106.gif&hash=f996659d18df7f3b445e6135e884397ac91f25b1) Last month, Yanomami shaman and spokesman Davi Kopenawa made a unique visit to the USA and told the American people that, “We must fight together to save the Earth.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia.giphy.com%2Fmedia%2FHjPbLbmep2aJO%2Fgiphy.gif&hash=3c7f7703f00cb341d3e9bdba607208d4204a294c)
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10276
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 15, 2014, 08:48:19 pm
Land at last for Indians evicted by fraudster(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fza4.gif&hash=2db0a6001703f4089cb64dc38159bb3d467e1bff)
Paraguay’s President Horacio Cartes has today signed an historic bill for the expropriation of 14,400 hectares of land on behalf of a group of Enxet Indians of northern Paraguay.
The Enxet community of Sawhoyamaxa has been living in squalid conditions on the side of a highway for two decades after their land was bought by German conman Heribert Roedel, owner of cattle company Liebig.
Roedel made his fortune after conning members of the public in Germany, who believed they were investing in land purchases in Paraguay.
With the funds he defrauded from German investors, Roedel himself bought large areas of land in the Paraguayan Chaco, and evicted the Enxet Indians who had been living there since time immemorial.
The Enxet have been claiming title to their ancestral territory since 1991. At least 19 members of the community died while they waited. Survival International repeatedly lobbied the Paraguayan government for the Enxet to be allowed to return.
With the help of local organization Tierraviva, the Enxet took their case to the Inter-American Court on Human Rights in 2001.
The Court found the Paraguayan government guilty of violating the Enxet’s right to their land in 2006, and ordered that 14,400 hectares of it be returned to the Sawhoyamaxa community within three years.
Eight years later, in June 2014, 150 Enxet Indians arrived in Paraguay’s capital Asunción to demand the government sign a bill that would legally enforce the Inter-American Court’s ruling.
Today their wait is over. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
Enxet leader Leonardo González told journalists, “We have recovered our Mother Earth. Without her, we could not exist, we could not be free, we could not walk, we could not be happy.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fdl2.glitter-graphics.net%2Fpub%2F780%2F780562lvhmtn5nuw.gif&hash=e458dfee9bd1894b58b2d027e7e64c88820fa956)
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10283
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 15, 2014, 09:08:01 pm
Hundreds of thousands of travelers urged to boycott Botswana
A worldwide advertising campaign calling for a boycott of tourism to Botswana, launched by Survival International – the global movement for tribal peoples’ rights – has reached hundreds of thousands of travelers.
The ad has been published in international travel and lifestyle magazines including Wired, Escapism, Departures and Centurion magazines in France, Italy, Austria, Germany, Japan, and the U.K.
The ad, titled “Discover…the hidden secrets of Botswana” exposes the Botswana government’s intention to drive the last hunting Bushmen off their land in the Central Kalahari Game Reserve, while promoting the reserve as a tourist destination.
Botswana’s Tourism Organization uses images of hunting Bushmen in their efforts to attract tourists to the country, while the Bushmen are literally starved off their land by not being allowed to hunt for subsistence, and harassed, arrested and beaten by wildlife scouts if they do.
The ad reads, “The government use glossy and contrived images of Bushmen to attract tourists – but they are using violence, torture and intimidation to deport the Bushmen from their ancestral lands in the country’s largest game reserve… This could mean the end for the last hunting Bushmen in Africa.” Botswana’s President Ian Khama sits on the board of U.S. organization Conservation International and has been widely praised for his conservation work. But a diamond mine is operating in the Bushman’s reserve, and the government has issued permits for diamond and fracking exploration. >:( (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets.survivalinternational.org%2Fpictures%2F7668%2Fdegraaff-san-hunting-3_screen.jpg&hash=fde127b2d3def3afd118915b007e4ead4beb489a) The Botswana Tourism Organization uses images like this one of the Bushmen hunting, while in reality they are banned from hunting and arrested if they do.
Over 8,000 people have so far pledged not to visit Botswana until the Bushmen are allowed to live on their land in peace, including celebrities Gillian Anderson, Sir Quentin Blake, Joanna Lumley, Sophie Okonedo, and Mark Rylance.
Survival supporters have protested at travel fairs in New York, London, Berlin, Madrid, and Milan and several tourism companies have also joined the boycott.
Bushman Jumanda Gakelebone recently visited the U.K. to call on the support of Prince Charles. In a letter delivered to the Prince, the Bushmen said, “We have survived alongside the animals of the Central Kalahari Game Reserve since the beginning of time. We know how to look after them and we hunt them for our survival, not for entertainment like many tourists from your country do.”
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said, “The Botswana conservation industry promotes tours to supposedly protected zones. The Bushmen there are persecuted. Anyone thinking of going on safari should ask themselves whether they really want to play a part in the destruction of the last hunting Bushmen of Africa.” >:(
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10280
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 20, 2014, 09:55:55 pm
Peru’s largest mass grave reveals hundreds of murdered Asháninka Indians
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets.survivalinternational.org%2Fpictures%2F7943%2F784x2048_screen.jpg&hash=d60213085176c6619eeff7e187eb254605e6b04c) Bones and Asháninka Indian robes have been uncovered in several mass graves in Peru.
The largest mass grave in Peru has been uncovered by a team of government investigators, in the ancestral land of Asháninka Indians in the jungle in central Peru.
The grave contains the remains of around 800 people, the majority believed to be Asháninka and Matsigenka Indians.
The Indians were decimated in a violent conflict between Maoist guerrillas known as ‘The Shining Path’, and counter-insurgency forces in the 1980s.
Around 70,000 people are estimated to have died or disappeared during the insurgency. Bodies from several other mass graves in Asháninka territory are currently being exhumed.
The Asháninka have survived centuries of intense conflict since their land was first invaded by the Spanish in the 16th century.
In 1742, the Indians successfully defeated the Spanish, in a revolt which closed off a large part of the Amazon for a century.
Today, their land is under threat from oil and gas projects, hydroelectric dams, drug trafficking and deforestation.
A few small groups of Shining Path rebels remain active, mostly confined to the Ene and Apurimac rivers (which form part of the Asháninka’s homeland).
Asháninka leader Ruth Buendía was this year presented with the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize for her work against the Pakitzapango Dam.
The dam was one of six hydroelectric projects planned under an energy agreement between Brazil and Peru, and would have forced thousands of Asháninka from their homes.
In 2011, Buendía and her organization CARE succeeded in getting the dam suspended through legal action.
See Survival’s picture gallery of the Asháninka tribe here.
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10302
Title: "Violent attacks" caused uncontacted Indians to emerge
Post by: AGelbert on July 21, 2014, 04:27:51 pm
"Violent attacks" caused uncontacted Indians to emerge(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
Seven uncontacted Indians made contact with a settled Ashaninka community near the Brazil-Peru border in June. Authorities have treated them after an outbreak of flu.
Highly vulnerable uncontacted Indians who recently emerged in the Brazil-Peru border region have said that they were fleeing violent attacks in Peru.
FUNAI, Brazil’s Indian Affairs Department, has announced that the group of uncontacted Indians has returned once more to their forest home. Seven Indians made peaceful contact with a settled indigenous Ashaninka community near the Envira River in the western Acre state, Brazil, three weeks ago.
A government health team was dispatched and has treated seven Indians for flu. FUNAI has announced it will reopen a monitoring post on the Envira River which it closed in 2011 when it was overrun by drug traffickers.
The emerging news has been condemned as “extremely worrying” by Survival International, the global movement for tribal peoples’ rights, as epidemics of flu, to which uncontacted Indians lack immunity, have wiped out entire tribes in the past.
Brazilian experts believe that the Indians, who belong to the Panoan linguistic group, crossed over the border from Peru into Brazil due to pressures from illegal loggers and drug traffickers on their land.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets.survivalinternational.org%2Fpictures%2F7551%2Fbraz-unc-gm-funai-2010-22_screen.jpg&hash=ca8713f7de766581a097f8ec600acb3888f09963) Uncontacted Indians face pressures on their land due to illegal logging, drug trafficking and oil and gas exploration (picture taken in 2010).
Nixiwaka Yawanawá, an Indian from Acre state, said, “This news proves that my uncontacted relatives are threatened by violence and infectious diseases. We already know what can happen if the authorities don’t take action to protect them, they will simply disappear. They need time and space to decide when they want to make contact and their choices must be respected. They are heroes!”
Uncontacted Indians in Peru suffer multiple threats to their survival as the government has carved up 70 percent of the Amazon rainforest for oil and gas exploration, including the lands of uncontacted tribes.
Plans to expand the notorious Camisea gas project, located in the heart of the Nahua-Nanti reserve for uncontacted Indians, recently received the government’s go-ahead, and Canadian-Colombian oil giant Pacific Rubiales is carrying out exploration on land inhabited by the Matsés tribe and their uncontacted neighbors.
Both projects will bring hundreds of oil and gas workers into the lands of uncontacted tribes, introducing the risk of deadly diseases and violent encounters, and scaring away the animals the Indians hunt for their survival.
Survival has launched an urgent petition to the Brazilian and Peruvian governments to protect the land of uncontacted Indians, and called on the authorities to honor their commitments of cross-border cooperation.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said, “This news could hardly be more worrying – not only have these people confirmed they suffered violent attacks from outsiders in Peru, but they have apparently already caught flu. The nightmare scenario is that they return to their former villages carrying flu with them. It’s a real test of Brazil’s ability to protect these vulnerable groups. Unless a proper and sustained medical program is immediately put in place, the result could be a humanitarian catastrophe.”
http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10361
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 30, 2014, 11:11:50 pm
Davi Kopenawa, shaman and internationally renowned spokesman for the Yanomami tribe in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, has demanded urgent police protection following a series of death threats by armed thugs reportedly hired by goldminers operating illegally on Yanomami land.
In June 2014, armed men on motorbikes raided the Boa Vista office of Brazilian organization ISA, which works closely with the Yanomami, asking for Davi. The men threatened ISA’s staff with guns and stole computers and other equipment. After the assault, one of the men was arrested and reported that he had been hired by goldminers.
In May, Yanomami Association Hutukara – headed by Davi – received a message from goldminers that Davi would not be alive by the end of the year.
Davi said, “They want to kill me. I don’t do what the white people do, who go after someone to kill them. I don’t get in the way of their work. But they are getting in the way of our work and our fight. I’ll continue to fight and to work for my people. Because defending the Yanomami people and their land is my work.” Since the attack, a climate of fear has surrounded the offices of Hutukara and ISA, as men on motorbikes intimidate the staff and repeatedly ask for Davi’s whereabouts.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets.survivalinternational.org%2Fpictures%2F7001%2Fbraz-gold-var-04_screen.jpg%3Futm_source%3DSurvival%2BInternational%26amp%3Butm_campaign%3D47dcfac861-News_as_it_happens%26amp%3Butm_medium%3Demail%26amp%3Butm_term%3D0_241e47c256-47dcfac861-87773793&hash=5b8a62931f5c064ce366181ecbf0608fea594b09) Illegal goldminers >:( operating on Yanomami land pollute the environment on which the Yanomami depend for their survival. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
In collaboration with Hutukara, Brazil’s government launched a major operation to evict hundreds of illegal miners and to destroy mining infrastructure in February 2014.
Davi, who has been called the “Dalai Lama of the Rainforest”, has been at the forefront of the struggle for the protection of Yanomami land for over 30 years. Survival International, the global movement for tribal peoples’ rights, supported the Yanomami’s successful fight for the demarcation of the Yanomami territory in Brazil, after an invasion of thousands of illegal goldminers in the 1980s decimated the tribe.
Davi has traveled abroad on many occasions to raise awareness of the urgent need to protect the Amazon rainforest from destruction. He has spoken at the United Nations and received the Global 500 award, among others, for his contribution to the battle of environmental preservation.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said today, “The rule of law means nothing on the Amazon frontier, which is as wild and violent as the American West used to be. Anyone standing in the way of this aggressive colonization risks being killed in cold blood. These are not empty threats – indigenous activists are frequently assassinated for resisting the destruction of their land. Davi Yanomami’s life is in danger. Those behind the threats and this latest attack must be brought to justice – the authorities need to act now to prevent the murder of another innocent man.”
Notes to editors: - Brazilian NGO CIMI reported in July 2014 that over 600 indigenous people have been assassinated in Brazil over the last 11 years, and Global Witness reported that nearly half of all assassinations of environmental defenders in 36 countries recorded between 2002-2013 occurred in Brazil.
- Contact Survival for pictures and video material of Davi Kopenawa Yanomami, who visited Survival’s San Francisco office in April 2014.
- Davi is scheduled to speak about his new book “The Falling Sky” at a Literary Festival in Brazil on Friday, and in London in September 2014. Please get in touch for interview requests in London.
http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/10367
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 04, 2014, 08:27:08 pm
See a Cocoa Bean Farmer Try His First Bite of Chocolate (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b)
by Kevin Mathews
Even if you resist the temptation to eat chocolate every day, it’s probably rare for you to go more than a week without consuming some of that sweet goodness, right? We take chocolate for granted as a common dessert in America, but it turns out that in other parts of the world, many aren’t even familiar with chocolate. Specifically, that includes the Ivory Coast, a West African country responsible for producing a full third of the world’s cocoa beans.
How is it that the people most responsible for chocolate haven’t tried chocolate before? Fascinated by this bizarre scenario, Selay Kouassi, an international journalist, visited cocoa bean farmers in the Ivory Coast to give them their first bite of chocolate. The video shows that touching moment:
The first man Kouassi meets with, N’Da Alphonse, admits that he doesn’t know why people pay him for this crop in the first place. “Frankly, I do not know what one makes from cocoa beans. I’m just trying to earn a living with growing cocoa.” Upon discovering the sweet taste for the first time, he declares, “I did not know that cocoa was so yummy.” Considering that cocoa beans are bitter until blended with butter and sugar, Alphonse’s reaction is understandable.
Afterwards, Alphonse takes Kouassi to meet fellow farmers who are also unaware of what happens to the beans they harvest. One of the growers is under the mistaken impression that cocoa beans are primarily cultivated to make wine. “We complain because growing cocoa is hard work,” said one farmer upon trying chocolate for the first time. “Now we enjoy the result. What a privilege to taste it.”
Not having tasted chocolate is possibly the least of these exploited workers’ worries. The cocoa bean industry is flooded with claims of human trafficking and child slave labor.
In truth, there is a limited amount of chocolate available in parts of the Ivory Coast, but it retails for an unattainable $2.69. Considering that Alphonse makes just $9.40 per day and uses it to support 19 people, chocolate is a luxury that he could never realistically afford.
The video serves as a good reminder of the privileges American society has access to that people in other parts of the world can’t even comprehend – despite being a part of the labor force that creates these products. Can you imagine working day in and day out to produce something that you don’t even understand? ??? Americans typically at least have a sense of what the end goal is at their jobs, but these cocoa bean farmers aren’t even in a position to ask what people in other parts of the world do with their products. >:(
Cocoa bean workers aren’t alone in being clueless toward the end result of their labor. CNN has a video of an anonymous teenage Foxconn employee who spends extended hours each day constructing screens for iPads but had never seen the finished product before. After trying it out, she said she liked the gadget and hoped she could afford one one day — something that wouldn’t be possible on her current sweatshop wages. :(
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 14, 2014, 05:59:09 pm
'Stand Your Ground' Laws Linked to Rise in Homicides, Extreme Racial Bias: Study (http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/08/14/stand-your-ground-laws-linked-rise-homicides-extreme-racial-bias-study) Published on Thursday, August 14, 2014 by Common Dreams Task force co-chair: "][T]he more you look at them, the more problems you find." by Nadia Prupis, staff writer
Title: Reagan Began the Exponential Growth of the Prison Industrial Complex
Post by: AGelbert on August 19, 2014, 02:37:55 pm
The Imprisoning of MOSTLY minorities for NON-violent drug offenses for Corporate Profit (PIC- Prison Industrial Complex)
It was planned. It's not a "conspiracy'" theory. The plan was hatched in the Reagan Administration (although the ideology is as old as Jim Crow, this new plan had a neo-con fascist profit scam 'spin') to obtain some very specific objectives:
1) Provide a publicly funded profit stream (Prison Industrial Complex).
2) Keep minorities, especially blacks, from better job opportunities due to tainted 'history' (arrest and prison record) while claiming it's "their own fault" when it is the direct consequence of police frequent stops and harassment from preteen school age on.
3) Set up a channel from the Pentagon to the police disguised as "war on drugs" that we-the-people pay for to increasingly militarize and alienate the police from the public while using code speech to convince the white population it is just happening in 'bad' neighborhoods (the old "good German" trick!) until it is too late for the poor and middle class to avoid a police state that protects the rich and is FUNDED by the poor and middle class. SUCH A DEAL! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Most average Americans do not want to go there but THIS WAS PLANNED!
White Americans' Support for Prison-Industrial Complex Grows With Knowledge That It's Harder on Blacks
Elizabeth Nolan Brown Aug. 7, 2014 12:15 pm
One of the rallying cries of the criminal justice reform crowd, including us here at Reason, is that American policing policies disproportionately harm blacks and other minorities. These days even mainstream politicians like Rand Paul have been sounding this alarm—he recently told a Rotary Club crowd in Shelbyville, Kentucky, that "the war on drugs has had a disproportionate racial outcome." The ostensible purpose of pointing to these disparities is to showcase how unfair and subjective our law enforcement can be. But according to a new study published in Psychological Science, this may not be what the average white person takes away.
Being made aware of the racial composition of America's prisons actually bolsters white Americans' support for intrusive policing and harsh sentencing policies, according to Stanford University researchers Rebecca Hetey and Jennifer Eberhardt.
In one of their experiments, 62 white Californians watched a video showing mug shots of male prison inmates. Some saw a video in which only a quarter of the men were black; in another video, 45 percent were. Afterward, participants were given the opportunity to sign a real petition to amend California's severe three-strike sentencing statute, which currently mandates 25-years to life in prison upon a third felony offense with no exceptions.
The results: More than half of participants who saw the video with less black men signed the petition. But only 27 percent of those who saw the video with more black inmates signed.
In a second experiment, 164 white New Yorkers were given statistics about prison populations. Some heard about how blacks—who make up 12 percent of the U.S. population total—account for 40 percent of those in American prisons, with white Americans accounting for 32 percent. Others heard the New York City incarceration stats, where blacks make up 60 percent of those incarcerated and whites just under 12 percent.
Participants were then asked if they wanted to sign a petition to end New York City's stop-and-frisk policy. About a third (33 percent) of participants who heard the national statistic were willing to sign the petition, while only 12 percent of those who heard the New York City stat would do so. The second group was more likely to say concern over crime made them hesitant to support ending stop-and-frisk policies.
"Many legal advocates and social activists seem to assume that bombarding the public with images, statistics, and other evidence of racial disparities will motivate people to join the cause and fight inequality," said Hetey. "But we found that, ironically, exposure to extreme racial disparities may make the public less, and not more, responsive to attempts to lessen the severity of policies that help maintain those disparities."
A good reminder to heed the work of British sociologist Stuart Hall and similar communication scholars: Never assume your audience will take away what you intend for them to take away. Between the producing ("encoding" in Hall-speak) and the receiving ("decoding") of a message, there's a lot of space for conscious or unconscious fears and prejudices to meander in. Elizabeth Nolan Brown is a staff editor at Reason.com.
http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/07/othering-the-prison-population (http://reason.com/blog/2014/08/07/othering-the-prison-population) White Americans are BEING SUCKERED into being the MILK COW by having their PREJUDICE AGAINST MINORITIES used against them by the corporatocracy! It's also what the astroturf Tea Party IS ALL ABOUT!
Quote
A significant influx of women prisoners were reported in the 1980s and 1990s. It is argued that this was due to three related factors: 1) The change in the role of the state due to neo-liberalization 2) The PIC is made up of an interweaving of penal institutions, profit-driven companies, and politicians 3) The war on drugs. These factors lead to the “super exploitation” of black men AND women. That is to say, black men and women provide the industry with a means to grow. The prison industrial complex is seen as mechanism of rehabilitation; however, it has also been viewed as a means of repression. Racism and poverty largely determines who is repressed. Placing these people behind bars (many of which are non-violent offenders) means that there will be more jobs available in certain regions and huge gains for private companies invested in the PIC. It seems that the role of race and gender within the PIC is intimately linked with an economically driven and politically charged system.
Here's the book that explains, with references, laws, rigged plea bargain (minorities=prison whites=optional prison and clean record tool for the D.A. - Federal versus State applied selectively to shaft minorities and/or help mostly whites), regs and Congressional ducks lined up for this cruel gravy train that goosed the police militarization STEP by STEP.
Capitalist Punishment
Christian Parenti (Contributor); Rodney Neufeld (Editor); Alison Campbell (Editor); Andrew Coyle (Editor);Elizabeth Alexander (Author)
Quote
Over 100,000 people in the U.S. are incarcerated in prisons owned and operated by private corporations--a booming business. But how are the human rights of prisoners and prison employees affected when prisons are run for profit? This anthology of leading experts examines the historical, political and economic context of private prisons, and how privatization is connected to the war on drugs, the criminalization of poverty and 'tough on crime' politics. It offers a glimpse into the transnational spread of privatized incarceration, creating important links between neo-liberal policies locally and their effects globally.
Your local library has this book. Read it and any other writings from Elizabeth Alexander (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020). This lady lawyer crosses ALL the "T"s and dots ALL the "I"s. It was PLANNED as a TWO-FER - make MONEY from the white suckers by scaring the **** out of them that there is a 'war' on drugs and the blackies and brownies can be 'taken care of' by winken, blinken and nod police that's just helping keep the streets safe for white America (while they turn the USA into a police state for EVERYBODY that isn't in the elite).
And the 1% laugh all the way to the bank! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 22, 2014, 02:54:09 pm
I had to come back! This is HUGE! This is the same as the Buddhist priests in Viet Nam that used to light themselves on fire to protest the war! And it's on VIDEO!
This next video is a compilation of store cameras which captured the apparent act of taking the two cans of soda:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyjMXk00gMk&feature=player_embedded Another police killing of an African American has occurred. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3) Caught on camera by a bystander (see video below the fold), apparently the man, identified as Kajieme Powell, a 25-year-old, had gone into a convenience market, deliberately took two cans of soda, walked out without paying for them, proceeded to set the two cans symbolically down on the sidewalk, and waited for police to come, as if having planned and predicted the entire sequence of events.
The police soon arrived, and Powell approached them, telling them to shoot him. And without the slightest hesitation, they did, firing nine shots in rapid succession into Powell at close range, several of the shots occurring after he had already fallen to the ground. Then they had the audacity to cuff him (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fgaah.gif&hash=e43fa6be4258ba495007b2bbb3e7dd2f60288fcd), ridiculously acting as if a man with nine bullets in him, who for all the world looked dead or unconscious on the ground, was still a threat. It was all over within seconds of their arrival on the scene. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.zaazu.com%2Fimg%2FIncredible-Hulk-animated-animation-male-smiley-emoticon-000342-large.gif&hash=db736c8c06568f1aa878171ad53d1f0301cfdff2)
Powell's actions looked to me to be a deliberate, symbolic protest of police, (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e) clearly intended to induce a replay similar to the events which had recently occurred with Michael Brown, who had been shot while surrendering with arms raised, allegedly minutes after taking cigarillos from a nearby store. And the police behaved exactly as Powell expected they would.
Powell allegedly had a knife, although one is not visible in the video, and his arms were not raised in aggression, and he was not brandishing any weapon in a threatening manner. They could have easily backed away 30 paces, deescalated the situation, talked him down. They could have tasered him (or maybe not), or any other number of nonlethal methods. No, in my mind this was murder. We expect more from police. We expect professionalism. We expect them to think before acting.
The police, in an earlier press conference, before the revealing video had been released, had clearly lied about Powell having allegedly threatened the shooting officers with a knife in an "overhand grip". In the video, Powell's hands are at his side, with no overhand motion. No object is visible in his hands. Powell seemed to be expecting to be shot with minimal effort, and his motions were slow and non-threatening, simply moving toward the police, reflecting what he thought would be sufficient to provoke an overreaction by the police.
The striking implications of the new police killing seems to be that cops in the St. Louis area are so reliably prone to shoot Black people with the slightest provocation, that anyone can elicit a reenactment of the Brown incident by simply arranging the same pieces on the chessboard all over again. And the police obligingly cooperated by willingly playing their part, firing nine lead bullets into Powell, completing the events as if a planned theatrical drama, as if performance art. But sadly, this is not art, but tragically real, and now another man is dead from the eagerness of police to kill anyone who presents even the slightest opportunity.
I've read that a tweet apparently claims Powell's mother recently died. Others say he was acting erratically, and assume he was disturbed. Ezra Klein remarked that he might be mentally ill. Perhaps all this is true. But why is he cast this way before this is known as a fact? Why wouldn't Blacks be understandably driven to extreme levels of distress over what has occurred, over how they have been treated over the many decades which have led to these recent atrocities? Why isn't it immediately perceived as a statement of protest of the peril that Blacks live with on a daily basis? Was he mentally ill, or was he understandably distraught over how Blacks are treated in his community? Or was it, perhaps, a combination of these possibilities?
Whatever else this is, it is obviously a protest against the police. He didn't have to end his life using this particular avenue. He could have chosen any one of other methods to commit suicide, if that was his intent. Powell meant this to be a statement. Let's not allow his act to be in vain. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
In my mind, regardless of the aggregate of motivations that were in Powell's mind, it is a potent commentary on how easy any black youth can be murdered in cold blood, on any street corner, and so reliably predictable that it was easily orchestrated by a person who was willing to end his life to make the point.
Is this any different, really, than Buddhist monks setting themselves on fire to protest war? Few would debase their noble sacrifice as mental illness. Powell's act, whatever else it may prove to be, is powerful symbolism of Black experience, of a police force gone wild, and the deeply systemic racism that exists in institutions of authority in the United States.
I fear for the safety of people in the St. Louis area tonight and in the days to come. I really don't know what else to say. This has left me speechless. I have no words.
Missouri state senator Maria Chappelle-Nadal, during an interview with Amy Goodman on today's Democracy Now, commented about Black young men, and how outraged they are about the shooting of Brown:
"A lot of young men, they're willing to die for justice". {...} "On Sunday night, right after the killing of Michael Brown, I was between police officers and people who were willing to die."
St. Louis Police Release Video Of Kajieme Powell Killing That Appears At Odds With Their Story [N]ewly released cell phone footage undermines the statement, showing Powell approaching the cops, but not coming as close as was reported, with his hands at his side. The officers began shooting within 15 seconds of their arrival, hitting Powell with a barrage of bullets.
The St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department released the video and 911 calls, telling St. Louis Public Radio that it plans to act transparently.
The shooting death occurred less than four miles from where Michael Brown was fatally shot by a police officer in the suburb of Ferguson on Aug. 9.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 23, 2014, 02:50:28 pm
Oakland Protesters Hold Up Mirrors To Police Officers In Ferguson (http://www.popularresistance.org/oakland-protesters-hold-up-mirrors-to-police-officers-in-ferguson/) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.popularresistance.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2014%2F08%2FScreen-Shot-2014-08-23-at-10.13.19-AM.png&hash=403d79e900250b22c17dbf737a38367c2ae836c5)
US Top Brass: Striking Syria Back On The Table (http://www.mintpressnews.com/us-top-brass-striking-syria-back-table/195723/?utm_source=feedly&utm_reader=feedly&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=us-top-brass-striking-syria-back-table)
How the Ultra-Rich .01% Have Sucked Up Even More of America's Wealth Than You Think (http://www.alternet.org/economy/how-ultra-rich-01-have-sucked-even-more-americas-wealth-you-think) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.doomsteaddiner.net%2Fblog%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2014%2F04%2FJoseph-Goebbels-and-Dick-Cheney.jpg&hash=0435cc4887a2f70d737b4b584efbe5176ce60fd2)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 23, 2014, 03:25:35 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 24, 2014, 05:49:35 pm
Hands Up, Don't Shoot: Ferguson on Center Stage by Malik Miah
August 19, 2014
Two Americas. Two realities. Race matters. Us against them.
The mass media have swarmed all over Ferguson, Missouri for one reason: The Black community went into the streets after the police murder of Michael Brown, and refused orders to leave. They have inspired solidarity actions taking place all over the United States and internationally, including Latino, Asian and white young people along with African Americans.
“Hands Up, Don't Shoot” spread across the country. It reflects a reality for African American boys and men when in contact with the police. There is genuine fear that any wrong move could lead to your death. Racial profiling is commonplace in cities small and big. Accountability for cop violence is not. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-240814172718.jpeg&hash=d4af10668761a634ddccd0da8667b2215cb68a0f) Howard University students show solidarity with Ferguson.
A majority of white people, on the other hand, especially in middle or upper class communities, rarely experience cop brutality. Police serve and protect them. So they believe African Americans must be at fault, not the police. Whites in Ferguson, Missouri, a six-square mile town of 21,000 people, don’t see discrimination or racism; they see Black people rioting in their neighborhoods. Popular culture propagates fear of African American men. Guns are flying off the shelves at gun shops as whites armed themselves in the St Louis area. Yet whites, 30 percent of the population, control the power structures and police. Black people have no political power.
Ferguson joins a long list of places where the lives of African Americans have been taken away by police violence. The dehumanization and disrespect that Black men suffer by society reflects a broad culture of institutional racism. It is not an accident that a white cop feels threatened by an unarmed 18 year old teenager.
The 28-year-old cop, Darren Wilson, was hidden away as the community erupted for five days. The 53-person militarized police force (only three are Black in a city with a 69 percent African American population) used armored vehicles and weapons more appropriate in Iraq and Afghanistan. All wore camouflage fatigues.
The police sought to control the truth by presenting “Big Mike” Brown and the community as violent and out of control to gain white support and to justify massive military type force. The occupied community is presented as subhumans who are throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at cops. Police in Ferguson and St. Louis County were indoctrinated with this dehumanizing and disrespectful view of the Black community.
The Murder and Aftermath (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-240814172756.jpeg&hash=affdbfa04d6efae8b357e96b574a6950b5771a08) Michael Brown
On August 10, the cop instructed Brown and his friend to move from the street to the sidewalk. They didn’t do so and a struggle ensured, the specifics of which are contested. Brown was then shot and killed with hands turned up some 35 feet away from the patrol car. His body was left on the street for four hours.
Between August 12 and 13, police officers fired tear gas and rubber bullets at lines of angry but peaceful protesters, many of whom were in their own front yards when attacked. Reporters were detained and attacked including from the Huffington Post and Washington Post.
Aljazeera America reporters fa2miliar with war zones in the Middle East were hit by tear gas and shot at with rubber bullets by police SWAT Team. CNN cameras filmed an officer addressing a group of protesters by saying "Bring it, you **** animals, bring it.” Weapons for war are now common among many police departments. This militarization is not to fight terrorists but to control the common citizens of these communities — to put down civil unrest.
The structural racism of U.S. society means that police departments meet their quotas of arrests by going after the “others” who are African Americans, Latinos, and Arabs and all Muslims. Young Black men are profiled by cops, arrested and prosecuted by a justice system that is far from color blind. A common comment heard in Ferguson’s Black neighborhoods: “we demand respect and justice.”
Once the cop’s name was released on August 15, the police spun a new reason why Michael Brown was murdered. The story changed to a shoplifting incident a few blocks away, allegedly by Brown, at a convenience store--yet the police chief admitted that Wilson did not know that Brown was a suspect when he shot him. Blame the Victim
The alleged robbery was a classic tactic of misdirect (a “smokescreen”) of blaming the victim for his own death, said Brown’s family. Many whites had already assumed Brown was a criminal. What torpedoed the planned coverup were the eyewitness accounts. It put politicians on the spot, including the Democratic Governor Nixon.
The cops had to retreat. Nixon appointed an African American captain, Ron Johnson of the Missouri Highway Patrol, a native of Ferguson, to be the public face of the police force.
Later the Governor imposed a curfew after some protesters started looting stores August 15. Community leaders condemned the action of a few who did not reflect the majority support for defiant but peaceful protests. The provocative actions, many by unknown people coming into Ferguson, played into the cop’s assertion that they had to use heavy force to keep order.
The insensitive response by the police and white politicians exposes what every African Americans knows all too well: Black people live in a racially divided country where different rules apply. It recalls the 1960s when African Americans were treated as less than human, cops were seen as an occupying force, and demands for “community control of the police” became popular.
Militarization of Police Forces
Glenn Greenwald, the investigative journalist who reported to the world on whistle blower Edward Snowden’s disclosures of massive U.S. spying, discussed in an August 14 article for the internet-based Intercept news service the origins of the militarization of city police forces:
The intensive militarization of America’s police forces is a serious menace about which a small number of people have been loudly warning for years, with little attention or traction. In a 2007 paper on “the blurring distinctions between the police and military institutions and between war and law enforcement,” the criminal justice professor Peter Kraska defined “police militarization” as ‘the process whereby civilian police increasingly draw from, and pattern themselves around, the tenets of militarism and the military model...
As is true for most issues of excessive and abusive policing, police militarization is overwhelmingly and disproportionately directed at minorities and poor communities, ensuring that the problem largely festers in the dark. Americans are now so accustomed to seeing police officers decked in camouflage and Robocop-style costumes, riding in armored vehicles and carrying automatic weapons first introduced during the U.S. occupation of Baghdad, that it has become normalized. But those who bear the brunt of this transformation are those who lack loud megaphones; their complaints of the inevitable and severe abuse that results.
If anything positive can come from the Ferguson travesties, it is that the completely out-of-control **** of domestic police militarization receives long-overdue attention and reining in. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-240814172824.jpeg&hash=275b3c86070a514618b45fb47115a33f6c28a2a0) Militarized police in Ferguson, MO.
New York Times reporters Julie Bosman and Matt Apuzzo in an August 14 article explained, ”Department of Homeland Security grant money paid for the $360,000 Bearcat armored truck on patrol in Ferguson,” said Nick Gragnani, executive director of St. Louis Area Regional Response System, which administers such grants for the St. Louis area.
Since 2003, the group has spent $9.4 million on equipment for the police in St. Louis County. That includes $3.6 million for two helicopters, plus the Bearcat, other vehicles and night vision equipment. Most of the body armor worn by officers responding to the Ferguson protests was paid for with federal money, Mr. Gragnani said.
“The focus is terrorism, but it’s allowed to do a crossover for other types of responses,” he said. “It’s for any type of civil unrest. We went by the grant guidance. There was no restriction put on that by the federal government.”
While the major Homeland Security grants do not pay for weapons, Justice Department grants do. That includes rubber bullets and tear gas, which the police use to disperse crowds. A Justice Department report last year said nearly 400 local police departments and more than 100 state agencies had bought such less-lethal weapons using Justice Department grant money.
The militarization of police is also related to the “war on drugs” that has brought havoc and death to U.S. cities and to Mexico and Central American nations where youth are fleeing for their lives to the southern U.S. border, and contributed to mass African American incarceration.
The important point here is that the social composition of the police force isn’t what causes militarization. While it’s a factor as seen in Ferguson where few cops are African American, the bigger problems are policies and training. Racial profiling and targeting of minority communities are taught to all cops--white, Black, Latino, or Asian-American. New York City, for example, has a police force that is majority people of color, yet where a Black man was choked to death on Staten Island, and stop-and-frisk remains a major issue for people of color.
Mass Public Action
What happens next depends on public protests and pressure on the county, state, and federal governments. President Obama and Attorney General Holder have instructed the FBI to investigate the Brown killing. Obama failed as usual to mention the underlying racial divisions and tensions in Ferguson. He implied both the community and cops need to do better! It’s up to the district prosecutor and closed-door grand jury to decide if the cop who killed Brown is even arrested and prosecuted. So far he’s on paid desk duty. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-240814172855.jpeg&hash=6f74661b5a0a14e9530ea6cf14b2535ceaba4b33) Demonstrators in Ferguson, MO, on August 17, 2014.
The country remains divided by race even as some progress has been made for educated African Americans. Ferguson shows that we don’t live in “post-racial’ society as many hoped with the election of the first African American president. Obama’s refusal to take on institutional racism head-on is a reason why whites opposed to full racial equality have been on the offensive since his election in 2008. If anything, Barack Obama’s election told whites (at least a sizable minority) to circle the wagons and make sure power is not taken from them.
That’s why the hard core of rightwingers and racists in the Tea Party rally around white nationalists who hate Obama and civil rights. It is why voting rights laws are being limited in the Old South and Republican controlled states. The events in Ferguson, Los Angeles, Staten Island, and many other cities show that racially targeted police violence is widespread.
The history of Black people being shot and killed by cops (an average of at least two per week) gets little notice unless video phones are present. Only when African Americans are treated as people and human beings will they respond in kind. Working class and poor African Americans are still waiting for that to happen.
“Hands Up, Don’t Shoot” is a demand for fairness and dignity. It is matter of life or death for Black boys and men. It is a universal slogan for all victims of state-sanctioned violence and the oppressed from Ferguson to Gaza.
Malik Miah is an editor of Against The Current and lived in Detroit, Michigan, during the 1967 rebellion after a police raid. The National Guard was called in and some 43 people died in five days in one of the most destructive riots in U.S. history. The surge of “white fear” and “white flight” from Detroit to the suburbs can be dated to these events, and subsequently the election of the city’s first Black mayor Coleman Young in 1973. http://www.solidarity-us.org/site/node/4227
Title: Judge rules for the People!
Post by: AGelbert on August 24, 2014, 06:13:07 pm
Judge rules for the People! Clerk files lawsuit AGAINST herself! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Fviolent%2Fsterb029.gif&hash=7a43a0c106eab798f7ba6133dc5cc550647a03d2)
A Berrien County Judge ruled the Benton Harbor recall election can be held. This is a major victory for the people against fascist county and city governments, directed by the Whirlpool Corporation.
County elections administrator Carolyn Toliver removed more than 100 good petition signatures to attempt to prevent the mayoral recall election organized by Benton Harbor and Benton Township residents.
What you're about to read is absolutely true. :o
County clerk Sharon Tyler filed a lawsuit against herself in order to prevent the recall election. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) Whirlpool most likely directed her to take this action, probably a first in US election history. Whirlpool was desperate because their man Hightower was losing by a large margin in the absentee ballots. (Those were sent out before the powers-that-be called off the election.)
The Benton Harbor mayoral recall election will now be held on Nov. 4, 2014. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
The order was issued Tuesday, August 12 by Judge John Dewane after the Aug. 7 civil trial.
The decision to schedule the election hinged on Judge DeWane's decision that the practice of the Berrien County Clerk's office to disqualify both signatures, if a person signed a recall petition twice, violates First Amendment free speech rights.
This is a tremendous victory for people all around the country, with all the corruption not just in Benton Harbor.
Rev. Edward Pinkney (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) Burn Baby Burn
Title: White Guy talks about Stuff White People Do
Post by: AGelbert on August 24, 2014, 07:24:48 pm
Mistake non-white people for service workers More and more frequently these days, white people are claiming that they don't see race -- that they're "colorblind."
"You know something?" they might say to a black person, "I never even notice that you're black!" ::)
Which actually says a lot about black people, or rather, the supposedly white person's denigrating conceptions about black people. And on top of that nonsense, this black person is often someone whom the white person otherwise holds up proudly as a "black friend."
When white people claim that they're colorblind, what they're actually demonstrating is that they're delusional. What they fail to recognize is something about themselves, which is that they do notice the color of non-white people, and that it's often the very first thing they notice.
One way white people sometimes demonstrate that they're the opposite of colorblind is by mistaking non-white people for service workers. I've been in department stores, for instance, and seen white shoppers ask black shoppers where to find something.
Being mistaken by white people for a service worker also happens to other non-white people. I've also seen apparently Hispanic customers stopped as they're walking through restaurants by a white person, who wants to know where the restrooms are. Chinese American journalist Thomas Lee recently wrote about his experience with this form of racism, when he went to interview a company president: I arrived a few minutes before noon and told the receptionist at the front desk I was looking for the president's executive assistant. "Oh. Are you delivering food?" she asked.
Oh, no, she didn't!
It wasn't the first time I was mistaken for a Chinese food delivery guy. In college, I had arrived at my girlfriend's dorm with dinner and the front desk dude assumed just that. I was embarrassed, to be sure, but let it go. That's the burden of being a Chinese-American with a penchant for baseball caps, jeans and takeout food.
Yet the receptionist's inquiry stunned me. I was wearing a dress shirt, black slacks and black dress shoes. True, I was sporting a backpack and sunglasses, but how many food delivery guys whip out kung pao chicken from a Gap bag?
After realizing her error, the receptionist offered a rather clumsy explanation. "I only asked because [the executive assistant] always orders food," she said.
Nice try, lady. . . . At least she didn't speak extra slowly and offer a tip.
Derald Wing Sue, a psychologist, labels such incidents "racial microaggressions" (he adopted the term from an earlier psychiatrist, Chester M. Pierce). Sue defines these behaviors as "everyday insults, indignities and demeaning messages sent to people of color by well-intentioned white people who are unaware of the hidden messages being sent."
Ordinary, well-intentioned white people almost never want the word "racism" associated with themselves. In this post, I just labeled a common white tendency -- to mistake non-white people for service workers -- a form of racism, and I'm committed to that description.
White people usually think that "racists" are the ones who harbor racist thoughts and feelings, and thus the ones who commit "racist" acts. However, as Derald Wing Sue suggests, there are many, many ways in which white people can act with unwarranted and unconscious aggression toward people of color, and thus, act in "racist" ways. Mistaking non-white people for service workers is but one common example.
Another common example is something that sometimes happens after such incidents, when the non-white victims explain what just happened to another white person. After describing his racist encounter with a white receptionist, Thomas Lee writes about his subsequent encounters with, I assume, other white people:
I told the story to friends and colleagues. I expected them to laugh and sympathize. Instead they offered several explanations, everything except what seemed obvious to me. It was my backpack. It was my sunglasses. It was my age. It was Elvis. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffc06.deviantart.net%2Ffs71%2Ff%2F2009%2F347%2F2%2F6%2FWTF_Smiley_face_by_IveWasHere.jpg&hash=8ca673f8cf785d9dac626f9fd91e37a1a318c7ac)
The backpack defense seemed particularly popular so I considered it. OK, maybe -- maybe -- I could buy that. But the receptionist didn't ask if I was delivering just anything. She asked if I was delivering food. Not documents, not packages, not flowers, but food.
Worse yet, people offered me tips on how I could avoid this problem in the future, as if I was somehow to blame. :evil4: Wear a jacket. Carry a briefcase. Walk differently.
Walk differently? I wasn't aware that I walked like a deliveryman. I'm not even sure how a deliveryman walks. Just to be safe, maybe I should don a tuxedo, speak in a faux British accent and goose-step my way to the front desk.
As I've noted before, white people often feel a need to explain away racist incidents, to argue that they're not racist. This common denial of a non-white person's point of view -- which tends to be an informed and experienced point of view -- is itself another racial microaggression.
According to an article on Derald Sue Winger's work in Monitor on Psychology, he and his colleagues have been developing a taxonomy of racial microaggressions, in order "to help people of color understand what is going on and perhaps to educate white people as well" (other examples are listed in this PDF table and graph based on Sue's work):
"It's a monumental task to get white people to realize that they are delivering microaggressions, because it's scary to them," he contends. "It assails their self-image of being good, moral, decent human beings to realize that maybe at an unconscious level they have biased thoughts, attitudes and feelings that harm people of color."
I find it interesting (as well as saddening -- and thus inspiring) that white people are commonly reluctant to recognize not only their own actions as racist, but even those of other white people. This second reluctance is what they're displaying when, after hearing that someone white mistook a non-white person for a service worker, they struggle to come up with other explanations for what happened. Even though it wasn't they themselves who made the mistake, but instead someone they don't even know!
I can only conclude here with something that I've said before. Although white people commonly think that their racial status has little to do with who they are and how they act, they are nevertheless trained to be, and act, "white." If they don't understand that about themselves, and then work to counteract it, they will sometimes commit acts of racism.
Actually, even if they do come to understand that about themselves, they'll still commit racist acts at times. But, at least they'll inflict their common and largely unconscious white tendencies on fewer non-white people, and they'll better understand themselves, and the power that they often unconsciously wield. And if they then interact and work with non-white people and treat them more equally, but also as people with differing perspectives and understandings, they'll be countering racism at both individual and systemic, institutional levels.
THE BODY IN THE STREET (http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/The_Body_In_The_Street) By Charles P. Pierce on August 22, 2014
..they have built the electric chair and hired the executioner to throw the switch all right we are two nations America our nation has been beaten by strangers who have bought the laws and fenced off the meadows and cut down the woods for pulp and turned our pleasant cities into slums and sweated the wealth out of our people... -- John Dos Passos, "The Big Money," USA
I keep coming back to what seems to me to be the most inhumane thing of all, the inhumane thing that happened before the rage began to rise, and before the backlash began to build, and before the cameras and television lights, and before the tear gas and the stun grenades and the chants and the prayers. I keep coming back to the one image that was there before the international event began, before it became a television show and a symbol in flames and something beyond what it was in the first place. I keep coming back to one simple moment, one ghastly fact. One image, from which all the other images have flowed.
They left the body in the street.
Dictators leave bodies in the street.
Petty local satraps leave bodies in the street.
Warlords leave bodies in the street.
A police officer shot Michael Brown to death. And they left his body in the street. For four hours. Bodies do not lie in the street for four hours. Not in an advanced society. Bodies lie in the street for four hours in small countries where they have perpetual civil war. Bodies lie in the street for four hours on back roads where people fight over the bare necessities of simple living, where they fight over food and water and small, useless parcels of land. Bodies lie in the street for four hours in places in which poor people fight as proxies for rich people in distant places, where they fight as proxies for the men who dig out the diamonds, or who drill out the oil, or who set ancient tribal grudges aflame for modern imperial purposes that are as far from the original grudges as bullets are from bows. Those are the places where they leave bodies in the street, as object lessons, or to make a point, or because there isn't the money to take the bodies away and bury them, or because nobody gives a damn whether they are there or not. Those are the places where they leave bodies in the street.
Bodies are not left in the streets of the leafy suburbs. The bodies of dogs and cats, or squirrels and raccoons, let alone the bodies of children, are not left in the streets of the leafy suburbs. No bodies are left in the streets of the financial districts. Freeze to death on a bench in the financial districts and you are whisked away before your inconvenient body can disturb the folks in line at the Starbucks across the street. But the body of a boy can be left in the street for four hours in a place like Ferguson, Missouri, and who knows whether it was because people wanted to make a point, or because nobody gave a damn whether he was there or not. Ferguson, Missouri was a place where they left a body in the street. For four hours. And the rage rose, and the backlash built, and the cameras arrived, and so did the cops, and the thing became something beyond what it was in the first place. And, in a very real way, in the streets of Ferguson, the body was still in the street.
***
The rage rises.
The very last march in which Martin Luther King, Jr. participated ended violently. He had come to Memphis to lend support to a strike by the city's sanitation workers. On March 28, 1968, King led a march in support of the striking workers. It did not end well.
King arrived late and found a massive crowd on the brink of chaos. Lawson and King led the march together but quickly called off the demonstration as violence began to erupt. King was whisked away to a nearby hotel, and Lawson told the mass of people to turn around and go back to the church. In the chaos that followed, downtown shops were looted, and a 16-year-old was shot and killed by a policeman. Police followed demonstrators back to the Clayborn Temple, entered the church, released tear gas inside the sanctuary, and clubbed people as they lay on the floor to get fresh air. Loeb called for martial law and brought in 4,000 National Guard troops. The following day, over 200 striking workers continued their daily march, carrying signs that read, "I Am a Man"... At a news conference held before he returned to Atlanta, King said that he had been unaware of the divisions within the community, particularly of the presence of a black youth group committed to "Black Power" called the Invaders, who were accused of starting the violence. The backlash builds.
Whites, angered by the property damage to businesses during the aborted march, blamed blacks. The President of the Memphis Chamber of Commerce told the New York Times: "You can't take these Negro people and make the kind of citizens out of them you'd like."(sic). Rev. Lawson would later note that the nonviolence of thousands of black citizens who moved back to the church and their homes was lost in press accounts of the story. A week or two later, Dr. King stepped out onto the balcony of his motel room in Memphis. A white man shot him through the neck and he died. They covered his body with a sheet. They did not leave it there on the balcony, blood pooling around it, for four hours.
***
In 1965, the editors of the National Review traced the violence of the Watts riots back to the baleful influence of Dr. King's various campaigns throughout the South.
For years now, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and his associates have been deliberately undermining the foundations of internal order in this country. With their rabble-rousing demagoguery, they have been cracking the "cake of custom" that holds us together. With their doctrine of "civil disobedience," they have been teaching hundreds of thousands of Negroes - particularly the adolescents and the children - that it is perfectly all right to break the law and defy constituted authority if you are a Negro-with-a-grievance; in protest against injustice. And they have done more than talk. They have on occasion after occasion, in almost every part of the country, called out their mobs on the streets, promoted "school strikes," sit-ins, lie-ins, in explicit violation of the law and in explicit defiance of the public authority. They have taught anarchy and chaos by word and deed - and, no doubt, with the best intentions - and they have found apt pupils everywhere, with intentions not of the best. Sow the wind, and reap the whirlwind. But it is not they alone who reap it, but we as well; the entire nation. In 2014, the editor of the National Review traced the violence of the disturbances in Ferguson to the baleful influence of MSNBC.
You get the feeling that the enormous emotional investment in Ferguson from the left-from Eric Holder to MSNBC on down-reflects a nostalgia for the truly heroic phase of the civil rights movement. They (most of them, at least) can never be Freedom Riders, but they can write blog posts complaining that the police gear in Ferguson looks scary. They can never register voters in the Jim Crow South, but they can tweet dramatic pictures of tear-gas canisters going off. They can never march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge circa 1965, but they can do some cable hits. Ferguson is all they've got, so it must be spun up into a national crisis-our Gaza, our apartheid-to increase the moral drama. They do not leave bodies in the street in Arlington County in Virginia, where the editor of the National Review grew up.
***
The story now seems to be about the "healing process" going on in Ferguson. The nights are quieter. The National Guard has pulled out. Some of the reporters have moved on to other things. There will be a funeral on Monday for the boy whose body was left in the street. It will be a dignified spectacle and it will be terrific television and it will be said to be "healing" the wounded place. Meanwhile, there are other people finding their healing in many different ways.
I support officer Wilson and he did a great job removing an unnecessary thing from the public. An unnecessary thing.
The body they left in the street.
The body that, in so many ways, is still in the street.
An unnecessary thing.
The body they left in the street. For four hours. Ferguson, Missouri was a place where they left a body in the street. For four hours. And the rage rose, and the backlash built, and the cameras arrived, and so did the cops, and the thing became something beyond what it was in the first place. And, in a very real way, in the streets of Ferguson, the body was still in the street. What kind of place leaves the body of a boy in the street? What kind of country does that?
Dos Passos was correct.
All right.
We are two nations.
All right?
Almost. We are one wishful thinking nation of white privilege that cultivates self worship and bling praise while constantly inventing new excuses for our unfailing dislike for the unlike.
The unlike is not, now or ever was, another nation. The unlike are an oppressed minority that has to learn to "act white" to make a living and survive in this depraved, self loving and barbaric society. And the kicker is the 24/7 PROJECTION of EVERYTHING white society REALLY STANDS FOR on to the minorities in general and African Americans in particular.
Here's the cognitive "impediment" problem for MR. LOGICAL REASONING Whitey: Imagine you walk into a bar that has the best and the worst people in the world in it. Whitey NEVER thinks that the biggest bully troglodyte **** in that bar is going to zero in on that BULLSEYE painted on him while the "nice people" go about their business of socializing. To whitey, it's a matter of odds if you have to deal with an **** or not. To the Minority that CAN'T PASS, it's a 99% probability.
And all the above is REALLY (although they refuse to accept it or admit it) a problem for whitey (the non-racist whitey) because, by his own "math", the African American/minority is just a MAGNET for TROUBLE.
IOW, the MAIN reason that bigoted behavior targeting African Americans 24/7 CONTINUES is BECAUSE the non-racist whites REFUSE to get MILITANT with the **** among them. There will ALWAYS be **** among Homo SAPS of all colors, sizes and shapes.
But the RESPONSIBILITY of keeping them in check falls squarely on the non-racist portion of the GROUP IN POWER that oppresses the "unlike".
The group of Homo SAPs NOT IN POWER is NOT another "nation"; it's a whipping boy of a sick society.
It can be argued that, if African Americans were in whitey's shoes and the situation was reversed, they would be just as much in denial about their willful blindness as whitey is today.
SO WHAT? African Americans are just as human as any other Homo SAP! The ISSUE is justice, not how much depraved behavior mankind is capable of.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 25, 2014, 10:09:27 pm
The Police, the Military, and Ferguson (http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/08/the-police-the-military-and-ferguson/)
Retired Cop Ray Lewis Blames Corporate America for the Situation in Ferguson (http://www.vice.com/read/retired-cop-ray-lewis-blames-corporate-america-for-the-situation-in-ferguson-825) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fassets.vice.com%2Fcontent-images%2Fcontentimage%2F178737%2Fcops-chillin.jpg&hash=89aa8f4e676da9460c24c7032a52e486bb8aeb15)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 25, 2014, 10:57:04 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 25, 2014, 11:20:25 pm
How Often are Unarmed Black Men Shot Down By Police?
Snippet 1
o The most common reason for contact with police in 2008 was being a driver in a traffic stop (44.1%) o Black drivers were about three times as likely as white drivers and about two times as likely as Hispanic drivers to be searched during a traffic stop. Yet as we all should know, even though Blacks get searched more often during stops - police don't find more drugs or guns on them.
White New Yorkers make up a small minority of stop-and-frisks, which were 84 percent black and Latino residents. Despite this much higher number of minorities deemed suspicious by police, the likelihood that stopping an African American would find a weapon was half the likelihood of finding one on a white person.
So why then, exactly, are they doing it? If stopping twice the Black people only generates half the guns or drugs, why does this happen?
Snippet 2
You can see that consistently from 2002 through 2008 that Black citizens encountering police received threats of force, or use of force at least Three Times More Often than White citizens. Latinos citizens were threatened with force, or had force used on them about Twice as Often.
If we are to use the example provided by Chicago as a rough guide, about 95% of these instances are being deemed "Justified" by the Police but that's not how the citizens feel about it.
Snippet 3
If the use of kicking, punching, tasering and pointing guns at citizens is felt to be excessive an average of 74% of the time - and is Three Times Higher for Black People - just what would the percentages of unjustified, excessive uses of deadly force really be like if we had those numbers?
Could it be as high as 80%, 90%?
Could it be so bad that the obviousness of it all would be plain for all to see? Just how bad is it? Maybe that's why, with all this number crunching already being provided by the BJS and Police Departments and the FBI - we still don't have that. one. strategic. figure.
Somehow I don't think that's a coincidence.
That's why we have people marching in the Streets in Ferguson, and Los Angeles, and New York this week. People are marching for the truth. For Justice. What we all used to not cynically laugh and call "the American Way..."
Maybe we should start to solve the problem by defining and quantifying the problem. Then we can measure if things are getting better, or if they're getting worse, if we're going the right direction or we're going the wrong way. Body cams or not, if we don't have raw data - we don't really know what's going on, do we? None of us.
But I think we now have a clue, and it doesn't look good. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
This is in St. Paul, Minnesota, NOT the DEEP SOUTH! If I read JUST ONE **** REMARK ABOUT this man being in trouble because of something he did or did not do, I will call you a RACIST MOTHER FUCKER because THAT IS WHAT YOU ARE.
If you believe the "racial divide" in this country is caused by people of color, you are FULL OF ****! This is WHITEY's fault. ALL OF IT! Yeah, YOU non-racist whites that keep your tongue where the sun doesn't shine when this kind of **** GOES DOWN. You should be REQUIRED to shoe polish your FACE for a year so you learned HOW IT WORKS in this country. A few days ago one of you panicked pinkies called the cops on a black kid handling a TOY gun in a WALMART. They KILLED HIM! **** YOU!
Agelbert, Those video's you posted on white's vs. black's are disinformation posts. Over $1,000,000,000.00 a year is spent on this kind of nonsense. Your being sucker punched bubba.
AZ, Bull s h i t. Being part minority, and having several black friends in the course of my past life, I have LIVED this stuff. I live in Vermont. pal. I KNOW the score. I was raised in Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. I was a racist. Next to the base was "jig" town. I thought, "why do those black people live next to the post?" like any ignorant racist whitey would that doesn't know his ass from a hole in the ground. The INSTANT you study Kansas history you LEARN why the FEW blacks that were allowed to leave the south after the civil war that weren't ghettoized instantly or run out of town or hung for the fun of it ALWAYS survived because of the Federal Government (and that was iffy a lot of the time too!). Do you know why they were called the JIGS? Right, because they could be USED to make a product CHEAPLY and easily. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Whitey is the culprit. the fact that I look white has helped learn about all the vile stuff whitey has come up with to BLAME THE VICTIM.
Don't F U C K with me on this, Az. I can give you chapter and verse on how minorities are targeted, cornered and manipulated into violent responses ONLY to have whitey ask, "what's wrong with those people? Why aren't they civilized and well behaved like whitey?".
Have you ever had a cop that stopped you ram his arm inside your car inches from your face, grab your seat belt and pull back quickly and connect it while saying, IN _______ WE WEAR SEAT BELTS!!? Do you KNOW why he did that or are you going to dance around with some baloney along the lines of another Doomstead Diner that always manages to blame the minority for whatever problem they are in?
I'm not in the mood for this game of whitey plays dumb. The cop WANTED and excuse. A normal person reacts and grabs the person's arm inches from his face. Then you get charged and jailed and a nice record stays to ruin your future (if you are lucky and don't get the stuffing beat out of you, your car confiscated and possibly shot!). I'm NOT the normal run of the mill chump. I KNOW how it works. So I did not move a muscle. The cop was visibly angry and frustrated. All he could give me was a ticket. Go ahead, AZ, just say it was a "bad day" for the cop or it was just anecdotal or I am exaggerating. I'm not given to hyperbole.
WHY TF do you think most minorities live in ghettos, HUH? Do you think it's because they LIKE it there!!? Learn the history of this country, especially AFTER the Civil War and then you will get the proper perspective on how much of this "bemusement" about how minorities, especially those of color, "never seem to get ahead" is BECAUSE, since the Homestead act (that EXCLUDED AMERICAN FREE BLACKS but let your great grand daddy go steal Arizona from the Native Americans and Mexicans), which is one of GREATEST SOURCES of American middle class wealth in the USA, at EVERY STEP of the way, minorities are hog tied to keep them from getting ahead (OWNING PROPERTY) while affirmative action for whitey has ALWAYS been PAR FOR THE COURSE while whitey screams about all those "welfare queens" in the minorities out there. BS, BS and more bull s h I t!
I watched a Southerner (nicknamed "Flash" LOL!) in my Enroute air traffic control center mess up continually and his pals cover for him. They guy was DUMBER than a wedge. But there he was, making over $22,000 a year in 1974 while minorities with twice his intelligence and ability were kept down.
That same crew had another moron that told a joke we were all supposed to laugh at. Why do blacks have chickens on their farms? So they can teach their kids to WALK!! Funny, funny, funny. Why do (insert Agelbert's minority group here - just before he has to start a shift to see if they can mess him up well enough to make a mistake, have a "deal" and get FIRED) have pointed shoes? So they can kill the roaches in the corners of their house rooms. FUN-N-NY Southern CRACKERS!
Don't get mad, Agelbert! You need a thick skin for this job! We are just trying to see if you can take it before so get to dish it out! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)(Never mind that Flash and the run of the mill whitey DUMB forks were babied 24/7!). Hey Agelbert, I'm H O R N Y, does your wife have a sister I can F U C K? THAT too delivered right before going on position IN FRONT of the crew chief who acted like he had heard nothing.
Hey Az, do you know what a radar screen looked like before digitized data blocks? We had little plastic markers we would push along a flat horizontal display. We called them "shrimp boats". Do you know what one of my trainers from Proud Bigots 'R 'US even WORSE than Southerners (from Indiana (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)) did when I was ready to check out (get certified) on a radar position? He took his hand and scrambled 14 shrimp boats on the screen and said, FIX IT. I had to re-identify fourteen aircraft in less than 3 minutes. I was pretty good. I didn't flinch and just did it. They NEVER did that to anyone who WASN'T a minority.
Another sadistic racist on that crew took over 40 flight progress strips I had set up in all their appropriate bays while working the "manual" air traffic position next to the radar and he threw them ALL on the floor! The crew chief said NOTHING. I almost lost it but I controlled myself, picked up all the flight progress strips and sequenced them accordingly in a couple of minutes. They NEVER did that to anyone who WASN'T a minority. They picked the wrong guy to fork up. Having spent 8 months at the USMA helped me get through the sadistic racisism from Southerners and that pack of super racists from Indianapolis center.
But that's not the POINT, Az! They POINT is that minorities have a BULLSEYE painted on them and people like you PRETEND it ain't so and you ain't favored for opportunites from jobs to purchases to simple human compassion 24/7. You IGNORE the FACT that there are a plethora of DUMB fork whiteys out there that should not have the job that a smarter, more qualified HUMAN that happens to be a minority SHOULD HAVE but doesn't because whitey is covering for it's low IQ members. And it is HELL ON WHEELS to get WHITEY to admit that! He's too busy claiming minorities are Da ones dat do dat! LOL!
Blaming the victim and planning 24/7 to hurt minorities even more is part of this racist country's DNA. It's how DUMB fork from the low IQ portion of whitey manage to make a decent living while minorities of average to above average intelligence struggle.
Sure, superior intelligences and high IQ people of ANY Homo SAP group will make it despite all the S H I T thrown at them. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191258.bmp&hash=e4ed21caaca822f7445ccafd39f49a9f84be90ca)
The USA is RACIST TO THE CORE. PART of that racism is claiming the soft peddling of bigotry (like in the above videos where barely ANY part of the HORRORS that go on daily are touched!) get the old KNEW JERK REACTION from whitey saying it's PROPERGANDER aginst us sweet innocent, upstandin' Merikans. I know better. Since I can "pass" I have observed the "game" incognito.
I even play the racist every now and then to listen to the FILTH that comes from whitey's mouth like the old "JOKE" about the black with 12 bullets in him tied in chains with his feet in concrete found at the bottom of a river (Worse case of suicide we ever haid around here! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
And the one about the black guy that was hit by whitey's car and was charged with breaking and entering because he went through the windshield...
Isn't that just HILAREOUS, Az!!!? Don't tell me YOU have nevah heard such things because I will call you a LIAR to your face!
http://www.youtube.com/watchv=j-P54MZVxMU&feature=player_embedded But..., uh, Um, the black man stole two cokes! And, and he had KNIFE! He would have done horrible things if they hadn't DEFENDED themselves, RIGHT!!? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Keep dreamin' you have logic and reasonableness on your side, whitey! Anyone with a lick of sense knows racism is ENDEMIC and UBIQUITOUS in the USA. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113183729.png&hash=d898195c8ae0a55e2e6d84fc47b9d06f8ba13f03)
Yeah, I know. The fallacious argument comes next... ::)
Quote
Argument By Dismissal:
an idea is rejected without saying why.
Dismissals usually have overtones. For example, "If you don't like it, leave the country" implies that your cause is hopeless, or that you are unpatriotic, or that your ideas are foreign, or maybe all three. "If you don't like it, live in a Communist country" adds an emotive element.
I AIN'T LEAVIN' (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.imgion.com%2Fimages%2F01%2FAngry-animated-smiley.jpg&hash=84657bd1a63cad676e3551587daeb4b39411a289)
Title: Video Captures EXACTLY How Cops Feel About Black People
Post by: AGelbert on September 02, 2014, 09:08:15 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 04, 2014, 06:26:39 pm
How ABOUT THAT! Whitey's "reasonable, logical and civilized" (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe) Modus Operandi EXPOSED! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailykos.com%2Fimages%2F103414%2Flightbox%2F1203ckCOMIC-attention-african-americans.png%3F1409667863&hash=4ff8c6be3912d6d024ac7749409fa9b18eaa727b)
Added instructions To that FINE and PRUDENT and SENSIBLE advice given above to HELP YOU PEOPLE TO BEHAVE so you don't CAUSE TROUBLE by YOUR behavior.
1) When stopped by a police officer for any reason whatsoever, even if it happens on a regular basis without a ticketing offense, ALWAYS be RESPECTFUL and the POLICE OFFICER will be RESPECTFUL TOO! Remember if the police officer does NOT act RESPECTFULLY, it's YOUR FAULT! ;D
2) If a sales person follows you around in a store or you are mistaken for a service person or/and asked to clean up some mess or take out the garbage or "Where's that pizza we ordered?", be THANKFUL that you can get such QUICK SERVICE and ATTENTION. ;D What's wrong with you? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6656.gif&hash=2038f9b45636a93e5c0f4ee508ce29778fe9e9b4) Don't be so paranoid and overly sensitive! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fsnapoutofit.gif&hash=911b14b142101df534f739771fb2d3836a807d19) Stop playing the RACE CARD! Quit your whining! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457) This just shows what a RACIAL DIVIDE (Whites are reasonable and non-combative - we aren't looking for silly excuses to feel dumped on!) in this country. We whites are happy (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) when we are followed around or mistaken for a service person. That we get quicker service!... ;D
3) Racism ENDED in the USA when the Civil Rights act was passed a long time ago. Stop living in the past. Get that silly chip off your shoulder. If you don't want to be called a welfare queen, whining trouble maker, BEHAVE and you won't have any TROUBLE. USA! USA! USA! ;D
Signed, Some NON-racist ;) REAL (white) Americans (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) that made the above SUGGESTIONS for the GOOD of you over excitable minorities. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Ffly.gif&hash=b0526635e8b47d751b0e429925d73d78f9d79fc6)
Agelbert NOTE: If that's how the NON-racists think, I don't think it would be a good idea to ask what the RACISTS think! :P
Title: It Seems that, in INDIA, the WHITER YOU ARE THE RIGHTER YOU ARE!
Post by: AGelbert on September 05, 2014, 10:03:12 pm
Ad council says telling people they won’t be loved or successful because of the color of their skin is no way to sell beauty products. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
September 04, 2014 By Melissa Rayworth Melissa Rayworth is a regular contributor to TakePart. She has also written for the Associated Press, Salon and Babble.
A few semesters ago, one of Jayanthi Rajan’s marketing students had her mind blown while working on a senior project at Albright College. As this American student compared the cultural messages in advertising from different countries, she was stunned to see a demeaning commercial for “skin whitening” creams sold in South Asia. “Professor, you have to see this ad,” the student told Rajan. “It’s about a guy who breaks up with a girl because she’s dark. And then she uses the cream and they get back together!” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)
After working for nearly a decade in India’s advertising industry (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b) before teaching in the U.S., Rajan wasn’t surprised. Ads for skin-whitening creams are ubiquitous in India and many Asian countries, and many promote that same before-and-after story line: Make your skin fair, and you’ll be beautiful and successful, but stay as dark as you really are and you’ll get nowhere in life or love. “The so-called ‘fairness cream’ market is huge in India,” Rajan says, and many ads depict “before-after scenarios of dark-to-fair transitions resulting in success.” >:(
So she sees an important victory in the new guidelines announced by the Advertising Standards Council of India on Aug. 14. The guidelines state that ads in India can no longer depict people with darker shades of skin as less successful, less happy, less appealing to potential mates, or otherwise in worse situations than fairer-skinned people.
India’s standards council is an ad industry organization, not a government agency that can legally enforce its guidelines. But in the past, it’s had high rates of compliance when calling for ads it has deemed false or offensive to be removed from TV airwaves or not to be printed. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38)
The council announced that it hopes these new rules will “go a long way in ensuring that advertisements of products in this category do not depict people with dark skin as somehow inferior to those who are fairer.” Rajan hopes the council is right, but she’s realistic: You can’t sell “fairness creams” like India’s popular Fair & Lovely without promoting the idea that lighter skin is better than darker skin. Beauty advertising is only the beginning of India’s deeply divided class divisions and the entrenched cultural beliefs regarding light skin. At best, this ruling will force advertisers to step back from blatantly stating that lighter skin is the only road to success and happiness.(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
That implicit connection can still have an impact on the lives of darker-skinned people, says Harlan Spotts, a professor of marketing at Western New England University. “Even subtle cues can be quite powerfully transmitted through repeated exposure,” he says.
But Spotts points out that just as American tobacco companies were forced to stop touting the supposed health benefits of cigarettes a half century ago, these companies are finally being told to stop drawing an explicit connection between fair skin and success.
They’re also beginning to face pressure because of globalization and social media. Decades ago, multinational companies could hide from their Western customers that they sold products with blatantly bigoted messages in Asian countries. Today people are hearing about these products, seeing the way they’re sold, and sharing these offensive ads online.
At the Facebook page for Dark Is Beautiful, a campaign launched five years ago by the India-based organization Women of Worth, ads for “fairness creams” are posted, discussed, and shared. Supporters can also see ads created by Dark Is Beautiful, including some featuring Bollywood actor Nandita Das.
“Look anywhere and everywhere,” reads the tagline in an ad featuring Das. “There are blatant and subtle reinforcements that only fair is lovely. So much pressure and so little public debate around it!” >:( Whether or not advertisers like it, that public debate has begun. Fueled by social media and shaped by rules that call out discrimination, it’s likely to grow.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 06, 2014, 06:44:30 pm
In Detroit, so many workers are blocking the streets that the police chief is worried they might run out of handcuffs. (https://twitter.com/OccupyWallStNYC/status/507513672877752320) :o
Title: Another Black Man Murdered By Police
Post by: AGelbert on September 10, 2014, 10:03:17 pm
Quote
Justice for Disabled Man Killed by LAPD During a Traffic Stop author: SUE LEE target: LAPD Officials signatures: 10,887
we've got 10,887 signatures, help us get to 11,000
overview petition
Please sign and share this petition in an effort to get LAPD officers held accountable for killing a disabled man during a routine traffic stop. The officers should be suspended until an investigation is completed into the incident and why this man ended up deceased. These officers need to be held responsible; wearing a badge does not entitle people to kill unarmed innocent people.
Ezell Ford, a 25-year-old disabled man, was on his way home in South Los Angeles when two police officers stopped him for "investigation." The police claim that Ezell reached for their gun and a struggle ensued --but the only eyewitness account so far tells a different story. According to the witness, Ezell was lying on the ground, complying to the officers' demands. They shot him three times with intent to kill.
Ezell's cousin stated "They shot him in the back, knowing mentally, he has complications. Every officer in this area, from the Newton Division, knows that -- that this child has mental problems... The excessive force... there was no purpose for it. The multiple shootings in the back while he's laying down? No. Then when the mom comes, they don't try to console her... they pull the Billy clubs out."
No officers were injured during the incident. In fact, one of the officers involved has a history of complaints lodged against him. In 2011, the officer allegedly trespassed on private property and then nearly drowned a man to death in front of his family when they asked to see a search warrant.
These officers need to be held accountable for their actions and realize are in these positions to serve and protect their communities and residents, not overpower, bully and kill them! Please sign and share this petition in an effort to get LAPD officers held accountable for killing Ezell Ford. At the very least, they should not be allowed on the streets with weapons while eyewitnesses report they have needlessly murdered an innocent man!
Don't worry _______, this guy must have REALLY REACHED HARD for the gun and must have REALLY given the police a REASON to shoot him in the back! Of the course the suspect was UNARMED so the FACT that the POLICE ARE ALWAYS ARMED provides and EXCELLENT REASON for blowing away a blackie, DON'T IT? Now you can GIT EM' even if they HAVE NO WEAPON! Besides, He might've given these poor police an orbital fracture! ;D
And after all, let us not forget DUE PROCESS OF LAW! There has been no GRAND JURY! What are, ya, uncivilized or sumptin'? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fbc3.gif&hash=e80a574cef1f1cd31dc58d76fe36b5ffb7fe7d5b) Where's the evidence!!? ;) We must be objective about all this... Let's not get carried away... The police must be trusted. Besides this doesn't happen to white people so there is NOTHING TO "CRY" about, eh? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi1.wp.com%2Fgas2.org%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F05%2Fstupid.png&hash=03f34f8c94a314e127f3ee8c4872e721e1b04063)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-100914200618.png&hash=f479fee18195cc607a4997814e7ba285a735fc5f) Thomas Jefferson's BIG PLAN continues to experience MISSION CREEP... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
Title: VIDEO by Ferguson Kids: Hey White People: A Kinda Awkward Note To America
Post by: AGelbert on September 11, 2014, 01:38:23 am
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 13, 2014, 02:03:11 pm
September 12, 2014 By Nicole Pasulka
Staff Writer Nicole Pasulka has written for Mother Jones, BuzzFeed, The Believer, and New York Observer. She lives in New York City.
New witnesses to the Aug. 9 police shooting of unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., have come forward. Brown, who was black, was shot by white police officer Darren Wilson. St. Louis County Police have said that Brown ran toward Wilson and made a grab for the officer’s gun.
But statements to the police, FBI, and media this week by witnesses contradict Wilson’s version of the shooting. Two construction workers, who have not been named but who were near the scene, said that they "starting hearing pops." They saw Brown “staggering and running,” according to KSDK. "And when he finally caught himself he threw his hands up and started screaming, 'OK, OK, OK, OK, OK, OK."
"The cop didn't say, 'Get on the ground.' He just kept shooting,” one of the construction workers, who said he heard a gunshot and then another one 30 seconds later, told CNN. Brown "had his f---in' hands up." The other man "got about 8 to 10 feet away from him...I heard six, seven shots...it seemed like seven. Then he put his gun down. That's when Michael stumbled forward. I'd say about 25 feet or so and then fell right on his face."
A witness named Phillip Walker told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch he saw Brown walking with his hands up, not running toward Wilson.
The shooting has sparked weeks of protests in Ferguson, where the population is around 70 percent black and the police force and City Council are overwhelmingly white. Locals are demanding Darren Wilson be charged in Brown’s death. On Wednesday 10 people were arrested during a demonstration that blocked traffic on I-70.
Dashcam video captured the moment a South Carolina state trooper shot an unarmed man during a traffic stop earlier this month.
The trooper, Sean Groubert, was arrested Wednesday and charged with assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature.
The video shows Groubert stopping Levar Jones for a seat belt violation (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffc06.deviantart.net%2Ffs71%2Ff%2F2009%2F347%2F2%2F6%2FWTF_Smiley_face_by_IveWasHere.jpg&hash=8ca673f8cf785d9dac626f9fd91e37a1a318c7ac)at a convenience store in Richland County, South Carolina, on Sept. 4, according to South Carolina Department of Public Safety.
After Groubert asked for his license, Jones, 35, turned back toward his car and reached inside. Groubert then began shooting and yelling at Jones to "get out of the car."
Jones, who was unarmed, was hit in the hip with a bullet, police said. He can be heard saying "I just got my license. You said get my license."
Groubert was fired last week. He faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.
Agelbert NOTE:20 years!!!? That's it!!? I know it's REAL HARD for some here to do the "appropriate punishment" math, but TRY to imagine what a Black man would get for SHOOTING at an unarmed BUILDING, let alone another human being....
Still don't get it? Look at the charges. It's a SET UP to keep the punishment low. When they want to SCREW SOMEONE (i.e. a Black man), the charges involve a grievous felony (i.e. Manslaughter or attempted murder). The charge of Assault and battery of a high and aggravated nature is a way to MINIMIZE the maximum sentence!
Never mind.
Title: Navajo Nation gets some PAYBACK!
Post by: AGelbert on September 29, 2014, 02:01:06 am
Wed Sep 24, 2014 at 05:19 PM PDT.
U.S. To Pay Navajo Nation $554 Million in Largest Single Tribe Settlement in History
In the largest settlement with a single American Indian tribe, the Obama administration will pay the Navajo Nation $554 million to settle claims that the U.S. government has mismanaged funds and natural resources on the Navajo reservation for decades. The settlement, to be signed in Window Rock, Ariz., on Friday, resolves a long-standing dispute between the Navajo Nation and the U.S. government, with some of the claims dating back more than 50 years.
...
“This landmark resolution ends protracted and burdensome litigation,” Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said in a statement provided to The Washington Post on Wednesday. “This demonstrates the Justice Department’s firm commitment to strengthening our partnerships with tribal nations.”
...
“The Navajo Nation has worked tirelessly for many years to bring this issue to a close,” said Ben Shelly, president of the Navajo Nation. “After a long, hard-won process, I am pleased that we have finally come to a resolution on this matter to receive fair and just compensation for the Navajo Nation.” ...
Agelbert NOTE: Never forget the Navajo Uranium miners compensation PITTANCE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
SNIPPET 1:
Quote
Thirty years after mining began, an increasing number of deaths from lung cancer made evident the fact that Kerr-McGee had held miners' lives as cheaply as their labor. As Navajo miners continued to die, children who played in water that had flowed over or through abandoned mines and tailing piles came home with burning sores.
Even if the tailings were to be buried -- a staggering task -- radioactive pollution could leak into the surrounding water table.
SNIPPET 2:
Quote
Miller's committee was investigating not only the Navajo death toll from radiation poisoning, but many other reports that indigenous peoples were willfully and recklessly exposed to radiation during the Cold War.
The geographic range of purported radiation poisonings spans half the globe -- from the Navajos in the United States Southwest, to Alaskan Natives whose lives were endangered when atomic waste products from Nevada were secretly buried near their villages :o >:(, to residents of the Marshall Islands in the South Pacific, an area in which the United States tested atomic and hydrogen bombs in the atmosphere between 1946 and 1958. As investigations deepened, it appeared that the treatment of Navajos was not the exception, but one example of a deadly pattern of reckless disregard for indigenous life in colonized places, human and otherwise. >:(
Grand jury considering the Ferguson shooting is being investigated for misconduct
The St. Louis County prosecutor’s office is investigating an accusation of misconduct on the grand jury that is hearing the case against the Ferguson Police Officer who shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown.
Ed Magee, the spokesman for county prosecutor, Robert McCulloch (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16), said they received the information from a “Twitter user” Wednesday morning.
“We are looking into the matter,” ::) he said.
An account of possible jury misconduct surfaced Wednesday morning on Twitter, when several users sent messages about one juror who may have discussed evidence in the case with a friend.
In one of those messages, a person tweeted that they are friends with a member of the jury who doesn’t believe there is enough evidence (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) to warrant an arrest of the officer, Darren Wilson.
The same person who tweeted about being friends with a member of the jury has also tweeted messages of support for Wilson.
Magee confirmed that the Twitter user and feed came from an activist, Shaun King.
Within seconds of posting this, her friends told her to delete it and she did. It was screenshotted first. pic.twitter.com/b6kTf9p40h :emthup: :icon_mrgreen:
The jury has been weighing evidence on the case since Aug. 20, within days of the Aug. 9 shooting. McCulloch told The Washington Post last week that both the FBI and county police’s investigations into the shooting are “pretty much done.” He also said that jurors should be done hearing all the evidence by later this month, but they could meet through mid-November.
Grand jury proceedings are confidential and if there has been a breach, the prosecutor’s office may have to start over with a newly empaneled group.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 02, 2014, 11:07:31 pm
Thu Oct 02, 2014 at 09:56 AM PDT.
Arizona Teacher Fired for Breaking up Racist Bullying of 4th Grader (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffc06.deviantart.net%2Ffs71%2Ff%2F2009%2F347%2F2%2F6%2FWTF_Smiley_face_by_IveWasHere.jpg&hash=8ca673f8cf785d9dac626f9fd91e37a1a318c7ac)
attribution: Arizona teacher fired after defending student from bullying [KNXV-TV] 25 year veteran Elementary Teacher Pam Aister was fired this week by the Fountain Hills Arizona School District after breaking up an incident of Racial Bullying by Four Students against one other.
“He was called the n-word, ‘monkey’, and ‘coon,’ Aister told KNXV.
Ainster told KTAR-FM that she also said to the group, “If you’re picking on him, you’re picking on me. It’s not five against one, it’s five against two, and there will be no more taunting, teasing or racial names.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020)
But parents of the alleged offenders claim that Ainster used abusive language telling them to "shut up" ::) and that one had an "ugly face", an allegation that Ainster denies. In the end the School Board, following the recommendation of their attorney, voted to terminate Ainster on the basis of reports from the parents.
Isn't it an interesting world, assuming Ainster's claims are essentially true and even that the counter claims against her are valid, where a pack of bigoted bullies can rely on their parents to protect and escalate their bullying in order to remove a teacher whose primary crime was to stand up against their racist taunting - even if somewhat vehemently - in order to protect and defend a vulnerable child?
How would you hope the teacher of your children would react in this situation?
Follow the link below to read more and to watch a Video Report from KNXV.
http://www.rawstory.com/... .
12:26 PM PT: Change.org has a Petition Up to Support Ms Ainster: https://www.change.org/...
12:34 PM PT: Additional Links on this story: Racially Bullied Student Talks about Teacher who Stood Up for Him http://www.kpho.com/...
Veteran Teacher fired for Defending Bullied Student http://www.kpho.com/...
http://ktar.com/...
12:35 PM PT: What I'm hearing vis Kosmessage is that this area is on top of being predominantly white, is also dominated by Hard Core Tea Party Politiics.
David Schweikert is the congressman in this district. He beat former congressman Ben Quayle in the republican primary in 2012 largely due to overwhelming support from his hometown of Fountain Hills, where there is a very active tea party group. Schweikert is so right wing, he was one of a handful of republican reps (along with Huelskamp and Amish) removed from key committees by Boehner as punishment for being a pain in the a$$ to house leadership. That gives you an idea of how reactionary and right wing a lot of the people are there. So that's something. 12:55 PM PT: CBS 5 - KPHO
2:13 PM PT: The School Board Report claims this wasn't the first incident where Ms Ainster was "rude" to some of the white children, ::) and even casts doubt that the initial incident was "racial" http://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/... (Although it should be noted that the bullied student, in one of the above reports, completely verifies Ms. Ainster's account, could this report itself be biased? Hard to tell.) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.imgion.com%2Fimages%2F01%2FAngry-animated-smiley.jpg&hash=84657bd1a63cad676e3551587daeb4b39411a289) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
. Originally posted to Vyan on Thu Oct 02, 2014 at 09:56 AM PDT.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 03, 2014, 11:48:28 pm
Daily Kos KNOCKS IT OUT OF THE PARK with this one! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) 'Dear White Racists' is One of the Best Explanations of White Privilege You Will Likely Ever Read
Dear white racists and your fragile fee-fees:
Relax, I'm white, too. Look, I can do the secret handshake and nudge-nudge, wink-wink. Lemme whitesplain something to you, fellow white men: no one buys your bullshit. That's because your bullshit runs like this: For historically- and presently-oppressed black people to be treated decently, they must carefully avoid doing anything that could be remotely twisted into behaving like a white racist, even if you're squinting and looking at it from five hundred meters away in a thick fog. Because that would be racist, and therefore hypocritical, and if that's the case, they deserve to continue to be oppressed.
Here's the thing you thick-headed **** totally fail to get: NO ONE DESERVES TO BE OPPRESSED, PERIOD. You can talk all you want about how it's okay for black people to be mistreated if--- but get this, there is no "if". It's not okay, ever. That's why we call it mistreatment. Your error is to think that it's ever justified, and your active misdeed is to constantly search for a justification. Black people, collectively, are not guilty of anything. In fact, a basic principle of civil society is that we reject the notion of collective guilt.
Some individual black people, like individual white people, have done bad things, and in those cases, may deserve judicial punishments. But even those people don't deserve mistreatment from some random white guy on the street. And black people in general don't owe anyone anything as a prerequisite for being treated decently. No one does.
Now I know there are a bunch of you in the back of the room waving your hand and getting ready to launch the argument that it's racist to complain about white privilege. No, it is not. Complaining about white privilege is not the same as assigning collective guilt to white people. White privilege is a pervasive feature of our society and our legal system. It's hard to see if you're white (and you're not looking or actively trying not to look), but it is real, it is powerfully destructive, and if global warming had the kind of statistical support that evidence of white privilege has, Bill O'Reilly would be haranguing FOX News viewers to install solar panels.
And here's the subtle point that you folks either can't or won't grasp. White privilege is especially the responsibility of white people to fix, not because we're all racist schlubs like you are, but because white privilege itself means that we're the ones who have the power to change it. Black people don't have that power, again because of white privilege, and not because they aren't sufficiently careful in the way they phrase their complaints about being mistreated. It's our problem and our responsibility as white people to fix not because whites are collectively guilty, but because it is the responsibility of ALL PEOPLE to fight for decent treatment for ALL PEOPLE. It just happens that, because of our shithead ancestors and a helping handful of historical accident, we white people are the ones who can do something about it. When the finger on the trigger is white, it's pointless to ask a black guy to lower the gun.
And quite frankly, given all the **** that our black fellow citizens have put up with, and all the **** they have to deal with every. ****. day., if some of them lose their tempers and say things that aren't carefully calibrated to kiss your privileged, hypersensitive asses, well, is that actually surprising? You lose your minds when black people just complain verbally about being kicked. Imagine how tough it would be for you to keep your cool if someone was actually doing something to you instead of just talking.
Finally, yes, I know this is pointless. You want to be offended to fluff your fragile egos, and you want black people to please shut the **** up and stop harshing your mellow. ;D I hate to break it to you, but as long as people are being murdered by the state, given draconian sentences for crimes that in many cases they haven't even committed, and being held in poverty and privation and a constant state of fear, those of us who actually give a **** about our fellow citizens are going, at the very least, to make some noise about it. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
In the meantime, if you can't be bothered to do your duty as an American to protect your fellow Americans with the considerable power at your disposal, at least shut the **** up and stop making an ass of yourself. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 04, 2014, 10:14:14 pm
Ashvin (since you just pointed out that you are technically under arrest if the police are detaining you and must charge you or release you if not - hence the fact that a law savvy person asks, "Am I free to do?" - No arrest means you ARE free to go, period),
Watch this video of an educated, law savvy African American Woman get fired on by the New Mexico Highway Patrol. White racists will say it was her fault (as usual ::)). But the point is that ALL the cop had to do was NOTE the fact that she would not sign, take her license plate number and let her go. She KEPT asking if she was free to go. The cop kept saying NO. This was a civil, not a criminal law area. the cop was SUPPOSED to let her go when she would not sign.
Eventually she just took off. The cop that fired on her and her kids was eventually fired BUT he was NOT charged with attempted manslaughter, attempted murder, aggravated assault, etc. Imagine if this had been a WHITE person fired on by a Black officer!!!
And by the way, this woman is a FANTASTIC driver! She handled that van like a PRO! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714194256.bmp&hash=1c2795e25df0dc7d9be4879b7bba6f1632f715e1) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714194256.bmp&hash=1c2795e25df0dc7d9be4879b7bba6f1632f715e1) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714194256.bmp&hash=1c2795e25df0dc7d9be4879b7bba6f1632f715e1) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191258.bmp&hash=e4ed21caaca822f7445ccafd39f49a9f84be90ca)
White Racist prudent, measured, logical, free thinking defense of his inability to see a "problem" with the way the New Mexico racist, murdering cops handled that traffic stop. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Ffam%2Ffam12.gif&hash=8dbdc056fce063c27eaf513ccecb9366574f6193)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 05, 2014, 09:19:41 pm
Ashvin, Watch this video of an educated, law savvy African American Woman get fired on by the New Mexico Highway Patrol.
Bro, she definitely was not "law savvy" LOL. The passenger (her son?) was not either.
Quote
Mking will say it was her fault (as usual ::)). But the point is that ALL the cop had to do was NOTE the fact that she would not sign, take her license plate number and let her go. She KEPT asking if she was free to go. The cop kept saying NO. This was a civil, not a criminal law area. the cop was SUPPOSED to let her go when she would not sign.
Technically, traffic violations are criminal. And when she drove off the first time, she gave the officer more than enough probable cause to make an arrest, and probably enough for a search of her vehicle.
And obviously when the son came out and assaulted the officer, that made it a very serious criminal matter.
Basically, driving away after the officer pulls you over and before he lets you go is not lawful and will rarely end well...
Quote
Eventually she just took off. The cop that fired on her and her kids was eventually fired BUT he was NOT charged with attempted manslaughter, attempted murder, aggravated assault, etc. Imagine if this had been a WHITE person fired on by a Black officer!!!
You're 100% right about this. The cop firing his gun should have been fired AND charged with at least agg assault. This was a clearly a situation in which deadly force was not needed for any legitimate reason. Cops are not held to the same legal standard most citizens are, especially white cops dealing with minority suspects, which can make them very dangerous. [/quote]
Ahsvin,
Notice that MKing did not say WORD ONE about this statement from you
Quote
You're 100% right about this. The cop firing his gun should have been fired AND charged with at least agg assault. This was a clearly a situation in which deadly force was not needed for any legitimate reason. Cops are not held to the same legal standard most citizens are, especially white cops dealing with minority suspects, which can make them very dangerous
He just did his best to ridicule my position as some "Anthony's world" never-neverland. :evil4:
A traffic stop may be technically part of "criminal" law BECAUSE it's not a law suit in the CIVIL law area but speeding is STILL a misdemeanor offense so low on the legal totem pole that it doesn't STAY on your rap sheet after a period of time. THAT was the SITUATION when the COP stopped her. The COP created the negative situation by IGNORING the LAW. You CAN claim that when she drove off she gave probable cause to use force (open her door and pull her out of the vehicle - assaulting her in the process) and you would be WRONG again.
Take a deep breath, counselor. Who is in charge of exacerbating the situation here, the driver, her son or the cop? WHY did the cop INSIST that she sign the ticket when she had NO LEGAL OBLIGATION to sign it, OVER and OVER again.
Sure, if I had been her, I would have said that I will not sign the ticket and, rather than asking if I was free to go (although that WAS a law savvy question, regardless of what you said), I would ask, OVER and OVER, if I was under arrest until I was released or jailed with some trumped up charge of "creating a disturbance" or whatever.
MKing's playing a game here (and you've fallen for it (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113183729.png&hash=d898195c8ae0a55e2e6d84fc47b9d06f8ba13f03) with his "Anthony's world" BULLSHIT. Notice he uses my first name when he has NEVER used his. That's his "friendly" way of saying that HE KNOWS WHO I AM AND WHERE I LIVE. I've gotten that from a few "friendly" Vermonters too. They look at you, smile, then say, "I know where you live". :evil4: Bring it on MKing. Boo! 8)
I'll dig up the trial proceedings if you want. Her son? Are you kidding me? He's a MINOR! I never said anything about him being law savvy. Did you watch the video? The driver CLEARLY stated she DID NOT want to sign the ticket OVER and OVER. She was WITHIN HER RIGHTS to say that. She was doing 70 in a 50 mph zone! Are you going to tell me the cop could DEMAND that she sign if she refused to sign the ticket? BULL S H I T !
Did you see the cop's body language when he got out of the car the second time? Are you BLIND? He KNEW they were unarmed. He had INTENT to use FORCE because somebody drives off without SIGNING A TICKET!!!? Are you all right, Ashvin?
These people were UNARMED and the cop pulls a GUN on a teenaged boy when the cop is assaulting his mother! Are you all right, Ashvin!!? The mother was screaming at her son to get in the car. He was just a kid trying to defend his UNARMED mom!
And she was supposed to just SIT there while the cops are smashing the side door? Are you all right, Ashvin?
I cannot believe you came up with this analysis. We will have to agree to disagree. The point neither you or Mking want to see which IS considered in ALL Criminal Court proceedings is INTENT (as in MENS REA).
That cop KNOWS exactly where the line is. The INSTANT an uncooperative citizen began to argue about signing a speeding ticket, he HAD to let her GO. He DELIBERATELY used his power, authority and WEAPON to attempt to force a signature. The fact that you believe he was in his rights is sad. He wasn't.
At THAT POINT, he was NO LONGER acting as a police officer but as a DICTATOR. The LAW was on HER side from then on.
But with encroaching fascism, what those cops did to that lady WILL become "normal" whenever they want to do it without even the uncooperative driver excuse. And I'm sad to say, with all the hair splitting you came up with, all I can say is Corruptissima re publica plurimae leges (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113183729.png&hash=d898195c8ae0a55e2e6d84fc47b9d06f8ba13f03)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 06, 2014, 03:35:41 pm
And obviously when the son came out and assaulted the officer, that made it a very serious criminal matter.
Ashvin, you are missing the point. In Anthony's world, there is nothing that a police office can do to a civilian of color that isn't racist. Can't wink at them, can't bust them for speeding, nothing, and ANYTHING that the poor oppressed minority does is just all good clean normal activity, like in the example provided, OBVIOUSLY the cops were just to supposed to not do their job, not notice being assaulted (after all, it was whiteys fault for slavery 100 years ago and therefore the rules are different because of what the great-great grandparents of those people suffered).
Of course it is a serious matter. Just like when Brown reached in through that cop car window and did...something. Or Trayvon Martin decided to bash someone's head against the sidewalk. Or Sharpton claimed that this young lady had been **** by a bunch of white guys...except...she hadn't...but to Anthony, FACTS don't matter...if it involves a white person (or Peruvian), and some African American person, the white person is racist and the minority person is oppressed and all laws should be suspended because...just because...
It doesn't have to make sense in his world. It doesn't make sense in your world, or mine. Or anyone else's. Only Anthony.
The son did not assault the officer, he had a gun pointed at him as soon as he got out of the car, although what else to expect where anyone could be armed any time. The officer never acted as though the driver may have been armed talking and struggling with the woman. Typically the officer was very very patient and willing to cut a break with a tall slim MILF, but zero patience with the male. Before she went to drive off the second time he decided to go to the rear passenger side and work on smashing the sons window rather than the drivers side front to stop her driving off.
The officer while very patient seemed to have a problem with stating clearly she was under arrest. Saying "that means what youre saying to me is you want to see a judge right away, and I can arrange that, wait there", is not the same as "YOu are under arrest", neither is "just come out here.......no, no tricks....just turn around" .
You see the son get out and stand close to the officer struggling with the woman on the busy road for a second before backing off, with his back to the camera. Good enough to call assault for Ashvin and MKing.
Zimmerman was seen under arrest straight after the incident on camera from the front, side and back all clearly unmarked, and the coroner stated there was no sign of struggle on martins body. That's the evidence, however the claim by Zimmerman that he was having his head bashed on the ground without losing consciousness or leaving an injury trumped that.
MKing previously said he wanted to wait and see before coming to any conclusions about Brown in Ferguson now he's reached a conclusion that he reached into the car for some reason. It seems to me it doesn't matter what the evidence is ever, since Ruben Hurricane Carter and Rodney King and the slaves were freed, fearful folks needed to be reassured.
Thank you, UB.
The instant the cop refused to release the woman without a charge (conditio iuris) to justify said arrest, he stopped being a law enforcement officer and started being a dictator. The LAW was technically on HER side at that point. The fact that she drove off the first time means she knew that. THEN when the DICTATOR assaulted HER (you saw his body language when he got out of the car at the second stop), the cop was using force outside the law. THAT is assault AND battery. THEN, a minor who obviously doesn't know **** about the law and is just trying to protect his mom (I NEVER said the minor was "law savvy!" - I don't know what caused Ashvin to assume incorrectly that I said that.) tries to STOP the assault and THAT is considered an assault!!!? Then the cop pulls a GUN on an unarmed MINOR because said MINOR was interfering with the cop's illegal assault and battery. The mom screams at her son to get in the car because she KNOWS that cop is itching to pull the trigger on her son. THEN the cop proceeds to vandalized the vehicle, recklessly endangering the MINOR occupants in the process based on WHAT? That the minor backed AWAY from a GUN pointed at him and got in the vehicle!!!?
I am sure the court proceedings will reveal all the above as an objective analysis. The cops may be given a lot of latitude under our **** up system, but they are under the SAME laws as we are. Yes, in a fascist state where some citizens have greater protection under the winken, blinken and nod racist modus operandi than others, that "latitude" CAN turn into looking the other way while a cop goes berserk. But that does not mean, by any stretch of hair splitting legalese, that the cop was NOT acting unlawfully LONG before a bullet was fired at the vehicle!
Ashvin, if you still insist on your position, we will have to agree to disagree. If this cop's behavior is "lawful" when he refused to let that uncooperative driver who refused to sign the ticket go (saying she was NOT FREE TO GO), then all I can say what Tacitus said long ago:Corruptissima re publica plurimae leges. The greater the degeneration of the republic, the more of its laws.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 06, 2014, 03:55:59 pm
Quote
but to Anthony, FACTS don't matter...if it involves a white person (or Peruvian), and some African American person, the white person is racist and the minority person is oppressed and all laws should be suspended because...just because...
I KNOW all about YOUR world, pal! I had a friend from Indiana (as white as they come with blue eyes who's last name is Robeson) that worked as an electrician on ocean oil platform rigs in the Gulf of Mexico and one off of Brazil for years. You are full of ****, MKing, and you know it. That's why you use the above fallacious debating technique of extrapolating the extreme example without DARING to discuss the merits of the example I presented. HELLO? It was Ashvin that tried to EDUCATE you about what being TECHNICALLY UNDER ARREST is and what isn't. Those cops DID NOT do their job and you **** know it. But it's rather entertaining to watch you bob and weave. HELLO? When you are NOT under arrest, you are free to go. Play your **** word games with someone else, pal.
Tell me, have you ever heard the expression "Jungle bunny"? Oh, of course not. LOL!
Ken told me ALL ABOUT "how it works" for pay (the COLOR pecking order of pay) on those rigs. Go ahead and deny it. That's your thing. That's your predatory, dog eat dog, **** world where the mark is NEVER supposed to know he is being suckered, abused or whatever and you go around pretending you have a shred of ethics.
Ken lived in Texas. He explained "how it works" with blacks and Hispanics there too...
You talk a good game. And you play a rough game. I've got your number and so do many here.
Back to the ocean oil rig platform, the only cool thing about it was that he was once several miles off the coast of Brazil over a promising salt dome and several thousand HUGE moths parked on the rig for a couple of days before moving on. Ken wondered where the **** those moths came from so far out to see. IT seems they can fly a lot better than it says in the biology books. But I'm certain they were pleased to see that ugly thing sticking out of the ocean that they could rest on. So thank you, fossil fueler, for giving the moths a place to rest while your pals "did what you do". That's another propaganda point that you can throw at people along with the "oil rigs provide habitat for fish" BULLSHIT. :evil4:
So have fun trying to flip the racist meme on me. That's an old and rather tired RACIST trick. LOL!
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fnews.7msport.com%2Fnews%2Fupload_img%2F20121223%2F21_2012122310024291.jpg&hash=713328bb6d0d4a1c9007bbc5deddfa34d8c386de) Hey MKing, the above are two Homo SAPS, that, scientifically speaking, are the same species with slightly different melanin concentrations. No big deal, right? So why does it **** you off to see those two breeding? Say WHAT? It doesn't bother you? LIAR!!! :icon_mrgreen:
I know ALL ABOUT "your world", MKing. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) If you had your way, there would be NO PLACE on earth where your kind did not abuse fellow Homo SAPS.
I'll give you one thing though. I don't think you are particularly racist, per se. You'd screw ANYONE. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F5yjbztv.gif&hash=d3dc6c69f3fc5ad39c44fb5466265476f34e5a76)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 06, 2014, 06:45:31 pm
I think the same thing would have happened if it was a white family in the car.
You can speculate that might be true, but evidence doesn't bear that out.
While there are numerous video examples of White on Black egregious Police behavior out there on You Tube, there are none I know of of egregious White on White or Black on White egregious behaviors. Given the White population is much larger, statistically speaking there should be more examples of this.
RE
Well said. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714194256.bmp&hash=1c2795e25df0dc7d9be4879b7bba6f1632f715e1)
Ashvin, if the "law" is on the side of your assumptions, then you need to go back and review Mens Rea in regard to INTENT in criminal law as well as Tacitus:
Corruptisima Republica Plurimae Leges. The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws. —Tacitus, Anals III 27
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 09, 2014, 12:52:47 am
Fresh from New York City comes the lawful, obedient and wonderful experience of a BLACK youth brutalized for the hell of it by police hoodlums!(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Fviolent%2Fsterb050.gif&hash=7ab92003788aa87a5cec0e350c97a7bd23eb8b44) >:(
Watch the video. enjoy the show. Don't forget to be a "GOOD GERMAN" and obey the laws because, uh, they are LAWFUL! And, um, ah, uh, as long as you ain't black, it will NEVER BITE YA IN THE ASS. LOL! The Fourth Reich is HERE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
While NYPD Police Commissioner William Bratton has taken the rather rare step of suspending David Afandor WITHOUT pay, Tyrane Isaac, who started the brutality and clearly demonstrated excessive and unnecessary force with the repeated punches to the face and body of Tribble, is just on modified duty WITH pay as is the other officer who did nothing to intervene or support this young victim of police violence.
Read more about this breaking story here and write Commissioner Bratton a tweet here to let him know how you feel and that you want him to keep his recent promise of firing the officers who are "poisoning the well—the brutal, the corrupt, the racist, the incompetent."[/size][/color][/quote]
Quote
In the video below you are witnessing 16-year-old Kahreem Tribble of Brooklyn, New York, fully non-violent and surrendered, being brutally beaten with the fists of New York City Police Department Officer Tyrane Isaac, then smashed in the face with the loaded gun of NYPD Officer David Afanador.
Caught on hidden camera, NYPD officers beat surrendered, unarmed teenager with gun and fists
Agelbert NOTE: And yeah!, SURE! If the kid had been white this would have happened EXACTLY the way it happened, RIGHT? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe) And I would have ignored it because it was a white kid, RIGHT!!!? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe)
Quote
Leges Sine Moribus Vanae, means "Laws without morals are useless". Even so faith, if it has not works, is dead, being alone. James 2:17
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 09, 2014, 02:04:41 am
A proud Representative of the Ferguson Police Department appears satisfied with the Grand Jury deliberations. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg4.wikia.nocookie.net%2F__cb20080719200951%2Funcyclopedia%2Fimages%2Fe%2Fe0%2FDownarrow.PNG&hash=4fd64e7b48c1d4f60b87dae1dff6ab5ace9a6e3d) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.doomsteaddiner.net%2Fforum%2FMGalleryItem.php%3Fid%3D1666&hash=95de48731f619b60b9358dfd53e89b3788ed5cbb) Yeah, I'm blonde. Ya got a problem wid dat!!? We hire African Americans too (as long as they have blonde hair ;). Hey, don't look at me! I don't make the rules; I just enforce the LAW. ;D )
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.doomsteaddiner.net%2Fforum%2FMGalleryItem.php%3Fid%3D402&hash=098d0e95bf9220921faa9add0fedb284a095d6a4) Check out the NEW, APPROVED HANG OUT for our LAW ABIDING (whatever they **** DO, IS the LAW! - so there! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)) "honorable" police officers:
The Grand Jury has, in their profound wisdom, and to preserve the domestic tranquility of the whitey citizens of Fergut-them-blackies, MO., issued guidelines for all citizens with more than a drop of black blood more than the "average" MeriKan (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) melanin concentration in order to avoid charges of assaulting police officers and gratuitous free, high speed bullets when driving anything other than a pizza delivery vehicle. ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 09, 2014, 08:18:12 pm
GO said,
Quote
May I make a remark with regards to our mutual friend Ashvin? I really think you are going a bit rough on him in regards to this issue.
You are probably right. I can be a royal pain in ass at times. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
But here's the deal, GO. God has given Ashvin a mind, a fabulous talent for logic and a loquacious vocabulary for a purpose that goes way beyond a little pro bono work for the poor here and there. This man is brilliant. there is no question about that. That brilliance was given to him by God. Ashvin has a responsibility to go to bat against a fascist regime's brutality that is above ours BECAUSE he is a lawyer and BECAUSE he risks disbarment by fighting corruption.
Christ said we would have TRIBULATION in the world His statement that we should not despair because He has defeated the world has nothing to do with THIS life until His return. It's PAR FOR THE COURSE for a Christian to get shafted six ways from sunday defending truth and justice in a corrupt world. I've been there (often! :( (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183312.bmp&hash=02dafef2fe739676600fdc9bd56271f0f5ab3723)).
Christianity is not now, or ever was, a walk in the park; it's HARD! The superb mind, talents and law degree Ashvin has are God given for a purpose in these dark times. With great talents come great responsibilities. Getting the big house, the car and the fat portfolio is nice, but not the sine qua non of a Lawyer in the Service of Christ; attacking injustice IS.
And we Christians are called to exhort each other to work as best we can for Christ. That's why I give you a hahd time every now and then. :evil4: God put me here for many reasons, most of which I probably don't know. But it is quite possible that one my purposes is to remind you every now and then that gold ain't the only thing with REAL glitter for your soul. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
Just sayin'
As to MKing's baseless conclusions, the calm demeanor of a police officer is NOT the result of training, as MKing mistakenly assumes. As a pilot, I could do an engine out procedure in my sleep. This is what proper training for high stress situations enable you to do. But the cop here broke the law, period. There was no danger of assault. The cop acted, not passionately (which would HAVE made his behavior more appropriate) but CALMLY. That is EVIDENCE of malice and aforethought, regardless of what a lawyer for the cop might argue. I understand human nature quite well. When I trained pilots, I had to slap the white knuckled hands of students that had a death grip on the controls and tunnel vision from being overstressed. I KNOW how people behave when they are stressed and losing control versus when they are bastards doing the preplanned thing. I had a narcissistic student that wanted to solo in 7 hours so he would be the "best" in his Air Force ROTC group. This **** social climbing **** wasn't ready yet. I told him so. He kept pushing. So, having passed his ground reference maneuvers in the practice area (but still bothered about his cockiness - as a danger to himself) I had him start landing practice. He was quite good but still cocky as hell. MKing would, WRONGLY, say that's a-****-okay. It's not. But MKing doesn't do introspection so he would not understand. In brief, cockiness in inexperienced pilots, no matter how much natural skill at piloting, is often, at best, a dinged airplane or, at worst, a death sentence.
Anyway, he did his touch and goes fine for an hour. The next lesson wast the 8th hour and he wanted to solo. He even brought his girlfriend to witness it from the ground. I said, we'll see. We did touch and goes and a few landings to a full stop and he was doing fine so, despite my misgivings with this c o c k y Air Force ROTC f u c k, I soloed him. He had to do three landings to a full stop and three takeoffs. While in the traffic pattern, several aircraft started showing up (all light planes at this airport). I began to worry. Radio chatter can make new pilots nervous. C o c k y bastards are NOT used to being nervous (they are naturally quite gifted so they think they can handle "whatever". When they get surprised, the nerves **** them up worse than those used to spotting their own deficiencies and acting accordingly). On the third landing the tower delayed landing clearance and he remained too high while on final approach (He was rather close to the plane landing in front). The tower offered for him to "Go Around" (overfly the runway, fly the traffic pattern in a square and line up more comfortably. OF COURSE, our "super ace" said, NO PROBLEM! So there he came, diving with full flaps, eating up half the runway (and getting REAL NERVOUS but trying not to show it). He made a fine landing despite the high, fast approach...
But he was in a hurry. There was only a third of the runway left and he was making a touch and go...
So, he FORGOT to raise the flaps (he left them in the full flap position - this means the aircraft is much lighter over the runway and will respond to propeller torque and P-factor changes more quickly). He applied full power and the plane swung to the left. He panicked, cut the power and braked and the plane swung HARDER in the OTHER direction. Pulling the power exacerbated the opposite torque effect which was amplified by the brakes. He applied power AGAIN while letting off the brakes and hitting left rudder and the plane swung HARD to the left. In his final, OH **** moment of defeat (not enough runway to take off), he pulls the power off and slams on the brakes. AGAIN the plane swings HARD to the right and ground loops with his left wing scraping the ground and the entire aircraft (wheels and all!) off the ground in a severe right turn. I thought the plane was going to flip over. It had executed a complete turn facing the opposite direction, with an ever increasing bank angle, off the runway and on to the taxiway.
The plane sort of hovered there on its left wing for a second, then slammed down on the tricycle gear.
The s h i t eating grin on that c o c k y bastard's face instead of a repentant, 'I f u c k e d up' look, ended my training with him right there. He eventually soloed with another flight instructor LATER than his entire class of eight ROTC pilots.
Humility is required, not just for those of us average plodders, but for the MKings of this world. Not that it does any good to tell THEM that.
If that driver in the video above had been black, he would be dead. MKing is full of c o c k y S3 Baloney. Then again, that driver is an execellent example of white privilege in action. If you think a black guy would get out of his car, argue with a cop there and ask, "What's wrong with you?" when a cop is pointing a weapon at him, then you must be in MKing's la-la land. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8)
Title: A hummingbird’s brain: Largest proportion per body weight in the bird kingdom!
Post by: AGelbert on October 09, 2014, 09:19:14 pm
MKing, As President Reagan used to say, "There you go again. ;D". Hyperbole and extreme examples of irrational behavior are simply fallacious debating techniques. I'm surprised you have not called me a hypocrite for not asking everyone to "turn the other cheek", so to speak. ;) But then, since you are a chief advocate of separation of "church" (i.e. morality, the golden rule, etc. ;D) and state, I guess you wouldn't look too good counseling me to play dead and TAKE IT for Christ's sake.
Sigh.... ::) Mens rea, MKing, invoives malice and aforethought. It is the essence of the criminal mind and mindset. It involves premeditation, something that is regarded very seriously in, what used to be, our justice system.
WHY is that, MKing? Aren't you the guy always talking about "doing the math?". Isn't the illegal ACT (actus reus - action or conduct that is a constituent element of a crime, as opposed to the mental state of the accused.) the main issue in your DO THE MATH world? For YOU it is, maybe. And I know why. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
You have a modus operandi and modus vivendi that evidences mens rea in almost every statement you make about the fossil fuel industry, global warming, human rights, appropriate behavior for police, white privilege and abuse of minorities.
It's all about where YOU are sitting, isn't it? You have money and benefit from the status quo. So, you "prudently" and ACTIVELY have set out to undermine anything that could "rock that boat".
You ponder and, with malice and aforethought, set out to use your keen intelligence, scientific knowledge, training and vocabulary to undermine the truth and deny the daily crimes being committed by the corrupt fascist, racist and fossil fuel oligarchic status quo. You are AIDING AND ABETTING criminality. You are a willing accessory to injustice and global crime. That means you have a GUILTY MIND.
You claim you are amoral. Of course! That way, you can justify absolutely any behavior, no matter how morally repugnant, because you have gotten away with it. How **** convenient! How Machiavellian.
My personal policy is to turn the other cheek and TAKE IT when dealing with EVERYBODY, not just the police. That said, I do not, and never will, find fault with a person who, if assaulted physically by a police officer, responds passionately (NO MENS REA THERE AT ALL - the natural human propensity to dislike being beaten and engage in instinctive defensive action is NOT a premeditated act and should NEVER be considered assault) by physically defending himself. It is a travesty of the law to call THAT an assault on a police officer. You know that. You just don't give a damn because it hasn't rung your personal bell yet.
All that said, I am in agreement with you and Ashvin that we'll never solve this problem by attempting to respond in kind if a police officer brutalizes us. I froze in position while a cop tried to entrap me into defending myself so he could assault me (see what an emperor penguin does when a leopard seal tries to take a bite out of it ;D).
Nevertheless, it is our duty to defend any citizen that does so and to do everything we can to rein in this police brutality. It's NOT lawful, no matter what some "law" claims in regard to "latitude" for the police. It's another step in the march to the Fourth Reich. When they came for the Blacks, you said nothing. When they come for YOU, you will remember me. Have a nice day.
NOW for some interesting information to brighten the day of decent people: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183632.bmp&hash=6511806c9d22bb52be6eac78997c7c3f99a59277)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.curiositiesbydickens.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fcolorful-hummingbird.jpg&hash=ec7fa5a4f91fc5d6b694ee83120f3ac15725fdcc) Hummingbirds are NATIVE AMERICANS! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Ftreeswing.gif&hash=03d29d18183a2924176defc1df7861676abb0960)
They are only found in the Western Hemisphere — from southeastern Alaska down to southern Chile — with most living in the tropics. There are more than 325 species of hummingbirds!
Here are some interesting facts on these beautiful creatures:
The bright radiant color on hummingbirds comes from iridescent coloring like on a soap bubble or prism, and are used to attract mates.
A hummingbird’s brain is 4.2% of its body weight, the largest proportion in the bird kingdom.
Hummingbirds are very smart and they can remember every flower they have been to and how long it will take a flower to refill.
Hummingbirds can hear better than humans, but have little to no sense of smell.
Hummingbirds can see farther than humans and can even see ultraviolet light!
Their heart beats up to 1,260 times per minute and their metabolism is roughly 100 times that of an elephant. :o
A hummingbird’s heart is 2.5% of the total body weight.
Their body temperature is around 107 degrees Fahrenheit.
Only eight species regularly breed in the United States, though up to two dozen species may visit the country or be reported as regular visitors.
Their maximum forward flight speed is 30 miles per hour, though they can reach up to 60 miles per hour in a dive.
Despite their small size, hummingbirds are one of the most aggressive bird species and will regularly attack jays, crows and hawks that enter their territory. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38)
Historically, they were hunted for their vibrant, colorful feathers. At present, habitat loss/destruction are the hummingbirds main threat to survival. Every specie of hummingbirds are currently listed as vulnerable or endangered on the IUCN red list. Up Close and Personal with the Hummingbird *videos (http://knowbefore.weatherbug.com/2014/10/09/close-personal-hummingbird/)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 09, 2014, 11:23:07 pm
Wed Oct 08, 2014 at 09:42 AM PDT. Police pepper spray black teen because he couldn't possibly be part of white family
by I give in to sin
Fuquay-Varina, North Carolina
Foster parents Ricky and Stacy Tyler left the side entrance door unlocked for 18 year old DeShawn Currie, on Monday afternoon - aware DeShawn was coming home early that day to an empty house. A neighbor spotted the teen entering the home and called 911 to report a break in. Three officers responded in pavlovian fashion, handling the teen as a suspect rather than putting aside racial bias and giving the black kid the benefit of the doubt. After ordering DeShawn to put his hands on the door,
said DeShawn. "I was like, 'For what? This is my house.' I was like, 'Why are y'all in here?'" the cops pointed to photos of the Tyler's three white children and decided he didn't belong there. DeShawn, justly upset, objected to being treated like a criminal in his own home. Of course, in Copworld, that translates to being threatening and belligerent so that's a pepper spraying to the face. Stacy Tyler arrived home to find E.M.S workers tending to DeShawn. Cops didn't pepper spray her.
"My 5-year-old last night, she looked at me and said, 'Mama I don't understand why they hated our brother, and they had to come in and hurt him.'"
In addition to DeShawn still being alive, the best part of this story is being reminded that yes, wonderful people still exist.
"He's my baby boy just as much as my other three children are," said Stacy.
But, uh, naturally, this is just an "isolated incident", of course. I mean, if this had been a BLACK neighborhood and a BLACK person called 911 that a WHITE prowler was seen....(You get the idea... ;D ;)), I am CERTAIN the police would have pepper sprayed the WHITE kid after seeing pictures of BLACK kids on the wall... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Ftuzki-bunnys%2Ftuzki-bunny-emoticon-026.gif&hash=cea0c85d87fadfcde1f4ffdeb123185070f6de75)
Racism? What racism? Quit tryin' to play the racist card! Gott mit uns! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fpullzone1.atlas.netdna-cdn.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2014%2F04%2FScreen-Shot-2014-04-17-at-2.36.23-PM.png&hash=eb437b194d7229341c34731d78d69ca28970d1ac) Whoops, wrong picture. :-[ But the past is sometimes prologue. Have a nice day, GOOD GERMANS!
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 11, 2014, 06:27:11 pm
Protests Continue in St. Louis Over Police Shooting of Another Black Teen
By Press TV Global Research, October 10, 2014 Region: USA
Theme: Law and Justice, Police State & Civil Rights
Hundreds of angry protesters have clashed with police in the US city of St. Louis for a second consecutive night after a white police officer fatally shot another black teenager.
As many as 400 demonstrators chanted and marched through St. Louis in the state of Missouri on Thursday night following loud protests the night before over the shooting death of 18-year-old Vonderrit Myers Jr. by an off-duty white policeman on Wednesday.
The latest police shooting took place two months after Darren Wilson, a white police officer shot and killed 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, a predominantly black suburb of St. Louis, sparking weeks of violent protests.
Thursday’s demonstration over Myers’ death grew increasingly chaotic overnight with police arresting several protesters and one officer getting slightly injured. Several American flags were also burned and stomped on by the protesters. “It’s not our flag,” said Elizabeth Vega, an artist who said she had been protesting since Brown’s death. “Our children are being killed in the street. This flag doesn’t cover black or brown people.”
Gina Gowdy, 46, stood for hours waving an upside-down American flag. “I have three grandsons,” she said. “This has to stop. They are assassinating our black young men. People are fed up.”
The St. Louis police department has refused to identify the 32-year-old off-duty officer who was working for a private security firm when he killed Myers.
St. Louis Police Chief Sam Dotson told reporters that the black teen got into “physical alteration” ;D with the policeman before he was fatally wounded. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) He said (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) the suspect allegedly turned and “pointed a gun at the officer and fired at least (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) ;D three rounds at the officer.”
The victim’s family, however, contend that the police are lying. “The police are lying,” Joseph Cotton, Myers’s grandfather, said outside the family home on Thursday.
The victim’s mother told The Associated Press by phone Thursday that her son wasn’t carrying a gun, as police claim. Syreeta Myers said her son was holding a sandwich when he was killed. “Police lie. They lied about Michael Brown, too,” she said.
Several civil rights organizations and protest groups have planned marches during the weekend over the killing of Michael Brown with Myers’ death on Wednesday expected to add fuel to the fire.
Police brutality and the unnecessary use of heavy-handed tactics have become a major concern across the US in recent years. US police shoot and kill an average of 1,000 people a year >:( , 1 in 4 of whom are unarmed, according to a report by the Police Policy Studies Council.
Agelbert NOTE: SURE, the GRAND JURY is going to sort out this ISOLATED INCIDENT. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251) Have a nice LEGAL AND LAWFUL day.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 12, 2014, 07:26:56 pm
One can see a distinct change for the worse after 1859, with a marked increase in callousness, ill-treatment and brutality towards Aboriginal people
Agelbert NOTE: I've split this article into two. What follows is the first part. All jacked up fonts and smileys for accent and highlighting are my doing. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113185047.png&hash=384024358ff8d5e7133d19b6e6638da4584a8154) By the way, the LAW profession was INSTRUMENTAL in making all that you will now read about, LEGISLATED into being LAWFUL AND LEGAL. They did not lift a FINGER to stop this despite the fact that most of them were professing "Christians". In fact, they were the HANDMAIDENS of the pseudo scientific Social Darwinism true believers in Government by making BUTCHERY legal. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Faliens%2Fhae51.gif&hash=8f03fbaf5bcbd8c47a5fc16e8cd148ffc66dda73) Admittedly, SOME laws EVENTUALLY curtailed OPEN SEASON on Aborigines for Darwinian "Science" (and good "specimen" prices!). Some scientists are complaining, to this day, about lawful laws that got rid of many UNLAWFUL LAWS. ;D
But, of course, to the average Australian White back then, Christian or not, it was JUST PRACTICAL CFS to go with the effluent flow. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Faliens%2Fhae51.gif&hash=8f03fbaf5bcbd8c47a5fc16e8cd148ffc66dda73) Korah Wills, a mayor and a fine upstanding citizen (just GOOGLE him - no mention is made of his LEGAL Aborigine hunting for science and profit), made a little money, for the good of science, of course by killing and dismembering an Aborigine. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Faliens%2Fhae51.gif&hash=8f03fbaf5bcbd8c47a5fc16e8cd148ffc66dda73)
Contrary to what many modern folks may claim, some rather erudite and well reasoned arguments in favor of this "policy" were made by intelligent, scholarly, educated, logical, prudent, practical, etc. keen legal minds and luminaries of that era. I am not being sarcastic. They really WERE being practical. As many modern jurists will patiently explain to those people like myself (that don't know nuttin' about LAW (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fshame.gif&hash=88b5b0c8644862ef4930e3c7e3556db6c3bf600f) ), being based on morality is not only NOT sine qua none for a LAW to be LAWFUL, it's irrelevant. They managed to cleverly undermine and discredit any accusations of iniquity as "sentimentality" (i.e. MORAL considerations must be IGNORED as being UNLAWFUL according to their Darwinian Definition of "natural" LAW). Past can be prologue. Enjoy...
Missing the link between Darwin and racism Part 1 of 2 by Warren Nunn Published: 12 October 2014 (GMT+10)
In an article titled Sorry, atheists, but you’re wrong: The death of Love your neighbour (http://creation.com/sorry-atheists-but-youre-wrong), CMI highlighted how much Australian society had changed for the worse and linked that to the increasing acceptance of evolutionary ideas.
Anthony B., from France, in a comment on the article, said evolution should not be blamed and suggested the ‘religious’ had a part to play in the poor treatment of Aboriginal Australians in the 19th century. He wrote:
Quote
The rise in gratuitous violence is a disgrace, but as to whether the theory of evolution is to blame is somewhat controversial. In the 19C in your country the violence meted out to aborigenes [sic] was carried out when people were far more religious than today.
Violence is indeed ‘a disgrace’; but it’s a pity that the perpetrators of the gratuitous violence don’t seem to see it as such. And how is teaching them an evolutionary view of their origins going to change their minds?
But in any case, Anthony B. clearly did not think through his comment and/or chose to ignore the historical record which shows that it was evolutionary thinking that convinced society that indigenous Australians were ‘living missing links’. From that flowed countless heinous acts of murder, etc, many of which were done for the ‘benefit’ of allegedly ‘scientific’ knowledge.
In his book One Human Family, CMI’s Managing Director Dr Carl Wieland reveals the depth of the problem. The following extract shows clearly, with documentation, that it was the rush to adopt Charles Darwin’s ideas that fuelled a dramatic upsurge in shameful actions:
Aboriginals bearing the brunt
An unusual book was published in 1974, called Aborigines in White Australia: A Documentary History of the Attitudes Affecting Official Policy and the Australian Aborigine 1697–1973.1 Apart from a few introductory/editorial comments, it consists almost entirely of substantial excerpts from documents. These are parliamentary transcripts, court records, (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)letters to editors, anthropological reports, and so forth. Far from showing a progressive enlightenment in the attitudes of the colonists as time goes on, one can see a distinct change for the worse after 1859, with a marked increase in callousness, ill-treatment and brutality towards Aboriginal people being evident in official attitudes. This is not lost on the editor of the above book, who writes:
“In 1859 Charles Darwin’s book On the Origin of Species popularized the notion of biological (and therefore social) evolution. Scholars began to discuss civilization as a unilinear process with races able to ascend or descend a graduated scale. The European was … the ‘fittest to survive’ … [The Aboriginal] was doomed to die out according to a ‘natural law’, like the dodo and the dinosaur. This theory, supported by the facts at hand [i.e. that Aboriginal folk were dying out from ill-treatment and disease—CW] continued to be quoted until well into the twentieth century when it was noticed that the dark-skinned race was multiplying. Until that time it could be used to justify neglect and murder.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F126fs2277341.gif&hash=1a8375f11d76a653bcb48e30eaa7b652175f029d)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-121014144740.jpeg&hash=6d202d38d9d090d3804397efccecf61ffdb4e131) From the book’s transcript of an interrogation of a policeman during a Royal Commission of Inquiry in 1861 (p. 83), we read concerning the use of force against tribal Aboriginals: “‘And if we did not punish the blacks they would look upon it as a confession of weakness?’ ‘Yes, that is exactly my opinion.’ ‘It is a question as to which is the strongest race—if we submit to them they would despise us for it?’ ‘Yes …’” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Faliens%2Fhae51.gif&hash=8f03fbaf5bcbd8c47a5fc16e8cd148ffc66dda73)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-121014153442.png&hash=fafa672d64a3c90bfcad85c1577e6d4f4cc5a236) The lowly state in which some Australians viewed the indigenous population was evident before Darwin’s ideas began to take hold.
The influence of evolutionary thinking can also be seen in another excerpt from Aborigines in White Australia, on p. 100. The writer quoted, also author of an 1888 book, is justifying the killing of the native population in the State of Victoria. He writes: “As to the ethics of the question, there can be drawn no final conclusion.”
He says that this is because it is “a question of temperament; to the sentimental it is undoubtedly an iniquity; to the practical it represents a distinct step in human progress, involving the sacrifice of a few thousands of an inferior race. … But the fact is that mankind, as a race, cannot choose to act solely as moral beings. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f) They are governed by animal laws which urge them blindly forward upon tracks they scarce can choose for themselves.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-300714025456.bmp&hash=f4e4a260bd60d3f34ca86fed93c47d5fb4117cfd)
In other words, he is justifying ‘iniquity’ (another word for sin) by appealing to the ‘animal laws’ of the evolutionary struggle for survival. Opposition can be dismissed as ‘sentimental’—lacking understanding of such ‘natural laws’ . There were isolated voices of protest. On p. 93, we read of a letter writer to an Australian newspaper in 1880, who, incensed by the treatment of his fellow man, stated:
“This, in plain language, is how we deal with the aborigines: On occupying new territory the aboriginal inhabitants are treated exactly in the same way as the wild beasts or birds the settlers may find there. Their lives and their property, the nets, canoes, and weapons which represent as much labor to them as the stock and buildings of the white settler, are held by the Europeans as being at their absolute disposal. Their goods are taken, their children forcibly stolen, their women carried away, entirely at the caprice of white men. The least show of resistance is answered by a rifle bullet … [those] who fancied the amusement have murdered, ravished, and robbed the blacks without let or hindrance. Not only have they been unchecked, but the Government of the colony has been always at hand to save them from the consequences of their crime.”2 (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-121014155219.jpeg&hash=4e37ac11b87c897497c2a1dcc68b07d24e623336)
But such voices were readily drowned out by the fashionable science of the day. Three pages further on, we read of someone else, also writing in an 1880 newspaper, who said:
“Nothing that we can do will alter the inscrutable and withal immutable laws which direct our progress on this globe. By these laws the native races of Australia were doomed on the advent of the white man, and the only thing left for us to do is to assist in carrying them out [i.e. helping the ‘laws’ of evolution by hastening the Aborigines’ doom—CW] with as little cruelty as possible … We must rule the blacks by fear … .”3 (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fdl0.creation.com%2Farticles%2Fp096%2Fc09662%2FBlacks_slain_racism.jpg&hash=8d941e70e139fae362d1992dec12d5ef071bd431) This Australian newspaper article highlights how Aboriginals were butchered in the name of science. The article mentions 19th century politician Korah Wills who admitted to killing and dismembering the body of an Aboriginal.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fupload.wikimedia.org%2Fwikipedia%2Fcommons%2Fc%2Fcb%2FStateLibQld_1_53460_Korah_Holcombe_Wills_%281828_-_1896%29.jpg&hash=e20f1aabbb980df77380dac24bffe967e316a5f9) Korah Wills: Politician, Gentleman, Good Family Man and a Man of Letters! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2rzukw3.gif&hash=f0487b8f0d488ab1126ce5e031b11ea3d74b1cc2)
Australian secular historian Joanna Cruickshank acknowledges, if somewhat reluctantly, not only the baneful effects of the Darwin-inspired ‘scientific racism’ on Australian Aboriginals, but the way in which belief in our common descent from Adam and Eve operated to temper such thinking. In a recent article4 on the topic, she writes:
“Supporters of Darwin have understandably often been reluctant to acknowledge how closely entangled Darwinism and social Darwinism were, preferring to distance Darwin from his theory’s evil twin." ;)
Yet those who debated the theory of evolution in the late nineteenth century were keenly aware of this connection … . Nowhere was this more obvious than in Australia.”
She writes how by 1876, the library of a typical squatter (pastoralist) consisted of books by Shakespeare, John Stuart Mill, and Darwin. The pattern, widespread today, of church leaders anxious to compromise with this new ‘scientific’ ideology, was already evident. She writes how in 1869, a Reverend Bromby gave a public lecture defending Darwin’s book, in which he “followed Darwin’s logic in using the apparent dying out of Aboriginal people as evidence for evolution. “In response, the Anglican Bishop of Melbourne, Charles Perry, attacked both Bromby’s evidence and his conclusions. Perry critiqued what he saw as the scientific inadequacies of Darwin’s book. “In particular, however, Perry attacked the view that human beings could be divided by race—or any other category—into ‘savage’ and ‘civilised’ … .” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
Cruickshank explains that Bromby represented the ‘progressive’ wing of the Church of England. Betraying her pro-evolution bias, she calls him “open to scientific evidence” and “dismissive of biblical literalism.” ;D She continues:
“Perry, by contrast, was a staunch evangelical, uncomfortable with the theological implications of Darwin’s theory and horrified at what he saw as a threat to the biblical claim that all humanity was formed of ‘one blood.’”
Cruickshank goes on to say that when legislation (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) was passed “enshrining the ‘White Australia’ policy and effectively denying Aboriginal people the vote, few voices were raised in protest. Progressives and conservatives alike saw the preservation of the more evolved white race as central to national identity. ;D
Following Darwin and his contemporaries, they [Aboriginals] were regarded by scientists and other evolutionary enthusiasts as ‘living missing links’ >:(
“Those few protests against the policy came from unlikely quarters. The fledgling New South Wales Aborigines Mission, a small evangelical organization, pointed out that while most politicians claimed ‘to be ultrademocratic, they are sadly conservative in democratic practice, and unChristian both in theory and in practice when they say that a native born Australian is not a man and a brother because his skin happens to be a few shades darker than their own.’ (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
Finally, and very significantly for our purposes here, this secular historian states: “In earlier periods, one of the few persistent barriers to social Darwinist theory in Australia was the Christian doctrine that all human beings were of ‘one blood.’” Agelbert NOTE: We ALL KNOW what SCIENCE and GOVERNMENT DOES about persistent barriers to "proper modern, progressive, Gott mit uns, scientific" thinking, now don't we? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.imgion.com%2Fimages%2F01%2FAngry-animated-smiley.jpg&hash=84657bd1a63cad676e3551587daeb4b39411a289)
A gruesome trade; Darwin's Bodysnatchers for "Science" Continued in part 2:
Missing the link between Darwin and racism Part 2 of 2 (http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/who-can-you-trust/mechanisms-of-prejudice-hidden-and-not-hidden/msg2025/#msg2025)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 12, 2014, 08:47:21 pm
Missing the link between Darwin and racism Part 2 of 2
Quote
Pickled Aboriginal brains were also in demand, to try to demonstrate that they were inferior to those of whites. >:(
A gruesome trade; Darwin's Bodysnatchers for "Science"
The body parts of Australian Aboriginal folk were keenly sought after. Following Darwin and his contemporaries, they were regarded by scientists and other evolutionary enthusiasts as ‘living missing links’. The remains of some 10,000 dead Aboriginal people in all were shipped to British museums over the course of this frenzy to provide specimens for this ‘new science’.5
David Monaghan, an Australian journalist, extensively documented these—and far worse—effects of evolutionary belief. He spent 18 months researching his subject in London, culminating in an article in Australia’s Bulletin magazine6 and a TV documentary called Darwin’s Body-Snatchers. This aired in Britain on October 8, 1990.
Along with museum curators from around the world, Monaghan says, some of the top names in British science were involved in this large-scale grave-robbing trade. These included anatomist Sir Richard Owen, anthropologist Sir Arthur Keith, and Charles Darwin himself. Darwin wrote asking for Tasmanian skulls when only four full-blooded native Tasmanians were left alive. (Ever the Victorian gentleman, his request came with a caveat; provided, that is, that it would not upset their feelings.) American evolutionists, too, were strongly involved in this flourishing ‘industry’ of gathering specimens of ‘sub-humans’, according to Monaghan. The Smithsonian Institution in Washington holds the remains of 15,000 individuals of various groups of people. Museums were not only interested in bones, but in fresh skins as well. These would provide interesting evolutionary displays when stuffed. Pickled Aboriginal brains were also in demand, to try to demonstrate that they were inferior to those of whites.
Good prices were being offered for such specimens. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.smilies.4-user.de%2Finclude%2FSpiele%2Fsmilie_game_017.gif&hash=e8548890f80af23241a1d43a1ab1ca8031301f20) Monaghan shows, on the basis of written evidence from the time, that there is little doubt that many of the ‘fresh’ specimens were obtained by simply going out and killing the Aboriginal people. The way in which the requests for specimens were announced was often a poorly disguised invitation to do just that. A death-bed memoir from Korah Wills, who became mayor of Bowen, Queensland, in 1866, graphically described how he killed and dismembered a local tribesman in 1865 to provide a scientific specimen. Monaghan’s research indicated that Edward Ramsay, curator of the Australian Museum in Sydney for 20 years from 1874, was particularly heavily involved. He published a museum booklet which appeared to include his, my and your Aboriginal relatives under the designation of ‘Australian animals’. It also gave instructions not only on how to rob graves, but also on how to plug up bullet wounds in freshly killed ‘specimens’.
Many freelance collectors worked under Ramsay’s guidance. Four weeks after he had requested skulls of Bungee (Russell River) blacks, a keen young science student sent him two, announcing that they, the last of their tribe, had just been shot. In the 1880s, Monaghan writes, Ramsay complained that laws recently passed in Queensland to stop the slaughter of Aboriginals were affecting his supply.
The Angel of Black Death
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fgutenberg.spiegel.de%2Fgutenb%2Fberend%2Faltezeit%2Fbilder%2F0224.jpg&hash=72aff51b66b1a9e9be56a32e7ab699cdaad76f10) The 19th century German naturalist Amalie Dietrich was part of the gruesome trade for Australian Aboriginals—one of Darwin’s bodysnatchers.
According to Monaghan’s Bulletin article, that was the nickname given to a German evolutionist, Amalie Dietrich. She came to Australia asking station7 owners for their Aboriginal workers to be shot for specimens. 'She was particularly interested in skin for stuffing and mounting for her museum employers. Although evicted from at least one property, she shortly returned home with her specimens.
Monaghan also recounts how a New South Wales missionary was a horrified witness to the slaughter by mounted police of a group of dozens of Aboriginal men, women and children. Forty-five heads were then boiled down and the ten best skulls were packed off for overseas.
Still in recent times
As much as one would like to think that such attitudes are long gone, remnants still linger, including in the scientific community itself. This is shown by a telling extract from a secular writer in 2004 (emphasis added):
“It has been estimated that the remains of some 50,000 Aborigines are housed in medical and scientific institutions abroad. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fswear1.gif&hash=87347674f9297191f3f8a447208170617da4caf6) >:( The Tasmanian Aboriginal remains in particular are there for two reasons. First, at the time of collection they were considered to be the most primitive link in the evolutionary chain, and therefore worthy of scientific consideration. Second, each skull fetched between five and ten shillings. … in anthropological terms, while the remains maintain currency as a museum item, the notion that they are a scientific curiosity remains. Put simply, if it is now accepted that Tasmanian Aborigines are not the weakest evolutionary link,that they are simply another group of people with attendant rights to dignity and respect, there is no longer any reason to keep their remains for study. Institutions should acknowledge that by returning the remains. There are two reasons why this is not as straightforward as it appears. First, the British Museum Act of 1962 did not allow British government institutions to deaccess stored material. Second, a number of scientists haven’t accepted that Tasmanian Aborigines are not on the bottom of Social Darwinist scales, and until they do, feet are being dragged.”8
Darwinist views about the racial inferiority of Aboriginal Australians drastically influenced their treatment in other ways too. These views were backed up by alleged biological evidences, which were only much later seen for what they were—distortions based on bias. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df) In 1908 an inspector from the Department of Aborigines in the West Kimberley region wrote that he was glad to have received an order to transport all half-castes away from their tribe to the mission. He said it was “the duty of the State” to give these children (who, by their evolutionary reasoning, were going to be intellectually superior to full-blooded Aboriginal ones) a “chance to lead a better life than their mothers”. He wrote: “I would not hesitate for one moment to separate a half-caste from an Aboriginal mother, no matter how frantic her momentary grief”.9 Notice the use of the word ‘momentary’ to qualify ‘grief’; such lesser-evolved beings, sub-human as they were, were to him clearly not capable of feeling real grief.
Many genuine Australian Christians and church institutions, though patronizing on occasion, seem to have tried to protect Aboriginal people from the full brunt of the many inhumanities sanctioned by evolutionary thinking. However, like today, most church leaders and institutions compromised in some form or another with this new Darwinian ‘science’. Virtually no Christian voice in Australia did what was required—to affirm boldly the real history of mankind as given in the Bible. For the church to have stressed regarding Aboriginal people that we all go back only a few thousand years, to Noah’s family, would have helped strongly refute both pre-Darwinian racism and the maxi-spurt it received from Darwin, It would also have anticipated the findings of modern genetics, that biologically we are all extremely closely related.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dw.de%2Fimage%2F0%2C%2C2362526_4%2C00.jpg&hash=bbf3453659602f14e0bc67221d8ee908885b247b) Aborigine Bob Weatherall protested in London against the Museum of Natural History's decision to test indigenous bones. Australia calls for German museums to give back human bones (http://www.dw.de/australia-calls-for-german-museums-to-give-back-human-bones/a-2426639)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dw.de%2Fimage%2F0%2C%2C2426771_4%2C00.jpg&hash=80480dc45fad514ef8cebf9323ed09ab7f71c8dd) Whoopie! Great Grandma is doing her part for SCIENCE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251)
Related Articles
The scars of a nation
Genetics and the human family - Chapter 3 of "One Blood"by Ken Ham, Dr Don Batten and Dr Carl Wieland (http://creation.com/one-blood-chapter-3-genetics-and-the-human-familyOne Blood)
Sorry, atheists, but you’re wrong: The death of Love your neighbour (http://creation.com/sorry-atheists-but-youre-wrong)
Darwin’s bodysnatchers: new horrors
The Australian Aboriginal
Further Reading
Blood brothers
Aboriginal cannibalism?—and our
Pre-Adamic man: were there human beings on Earth before Adam?
‘Race mixing’ and animal hybrids—condemned by God?
Australian Aboriginal Flood Stories
References and notes
Edited by Sharman Stone, Heinemann Educational Books, Melbourne, 1974.
The full text (which makes interesting reading) can be found at trove.nla.gov.au. .
Full text at trove.nla.gov.au.
Cruickshank, J., Darwin, race and religion in Australia, ABC Religion and Ethics, abc.net.au, 11 Apr 2011, accessed 13 April 2011. .
Darwin’s bodysnatchers, Sydney Morning Herald, March 3, 1990, cited in Creation 12(3):21, 1990.
The original apparently stated that only 3,000 sets of remains were left after the bombing raids of World War II.
Monaghan, D., The body-snatchers, The Bulletin, 12 November 1991, pp. 30–38. Return to text. ‘Station’ (e.g. cattle station, sheep station) is the Australian designation for what would be termed ‘ranch’ in the US. Many Aboriginal people worked on stations, often as stockmen (the equivalent of ‘cowboys’ or ‘cowhands’).
Onsman, A., Truganini’s funeral, Island, No. 96, 2004. Truganini was the last surviving female full-blood Tasmanian. .
Agelbert NOTE: If you are an Aborigine, FORGET damages awards of portions of the estates from, or RETROACTIVE MURDER CHARGES AND posthumous trials for, all these serial murderers. ???
Lawyers will calmly state that the murder wasn't murder when it was committed because it was, uhm, LEGAL and LAWFUL then. ;D Water under bridge, old boy. But our law firm will be happy to sue a British, German or American Museum (Hello, Smithsonian! ;D) to get the bones of your great grand pappy for a reasonable fee. No, we can't get them to stop displaying the bones for science until we win the lawsuit. No, sorry, we can't get all the pictures taken of your deceased relatives in the museum files collected and given to you. Science must, after all, be considered. Just consider that your relatives "donated" their bodies to science like people do today when they sign that part of their driver's license. Remember, our legal system is JUST! Trust us. We are lawyers. We know the LAW and we are the ONLY defense you have and bulwark you can rely on to protect you from injustice, abusive government and anarchy!
Would you like to engage our firm to get justice for you and your family from this heinous act done to your relatives? I would be incensed if this outrage had been perpetrated on my ancestors! Justice must be done! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-300614160245.gif&hash=26cf0af4ea082bdb608bb7b2656d54ec7199969b)
Excuse me? No, we are unable to take the case on contingency or pro bono. Sorry. Now, if you will excuse me, I have an appointment with a paying client. Best of luck to you, and God Bless you. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 01, 2014, 06:42:38 pm
Fri Oct 31, 2014 at 04:01 PM EDT.
The complete guide to every public eyewitness interview in the shooting death of Mike Brown
by Shaun King
Mike Brown was shot and killed by Officer Darren Wilson in broad daylight on a hot Saturday afternoon in Ferguson, Missouri.Consequently, eyewitnesses were standing at virtually every angle to observe exactly what happened that day. Seven have come forward publicly. Many gave interviews in the immediate aftermath of the shooting on Canfield Drive. Below is an annotated list of every public interview and video given by each eyewitness. Dorian Johnson
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQeni0qt8Vo&feature=player_embedded Dorian Johnson is an essential eyewitness. He was walking with Mike Brown when they were first confronted by Officer Wilson and has given the only public account of what was said and done throughout the early stages of that confrontation.
Agelbert NOTE: Go link at bottom for links to all interviews.
• Here is the video interview with Johnson still on the scene soon after Brown was killed in which he describes everything he saw.
• Here is the same video from Johnson, but from a different camera angle.
• A very detailed 12-minute interview with Johnson by Al Sharpton in which he recounts every detail he could remember.
• Here Johnson does a video interview with the local press in which he recounts the story, the same as he said when he was on the scene. But he adds that it felt as if Brown was gunned down "like an animal."
• Here is an interview Johnson did with Chris Hayes just days after Brown was killed.
• Here Johnson does an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer.
• Here Johnson does an interview with CNN's Don Lemon after Brown's funeral.
• Here Johnson gives an interview more two months later, on Oct. 30, again with CNN's Lemon, and stands by every aspect of his previous account.
Additional ALL links to interviews can be found below the fold at the link below. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
“We as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values… when machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” -- Martin Luther King, Jr. April 4, 1967
Quote
"It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones." Gandhi
It's time to listen to Martin Luther King, Jr., Gandhi, Kajieme Powell, Chris Hedges and Will Allen. If we don't, mankind is doomed. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2955.gif&hash=ddc12d8bdb1bc63b7998a6b086b79a71b7bda755)
The Concept of Race. (http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/geopolitics/power-structures-in-human-society-pros-and-cons-part-1/msg767/#msg767)
Title: The Mike Brown Shooting: What You're Not Being Told
Post by: AGelbert on November 01, 2014, 07:10:41 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_icVWKO4_o&feature=player_embedded The Mike Brown Shooting What You're Not Being Told Mike Brown was MURDERED in cold blood, PERIOD. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
(https://secure2.convio.net/pep/images/content/pagebuilder/darrenwilson.jpg) So why does DARREN the RACIST MURDERER look unconcerned? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-291014182422.png&hash=f5178cb31c0bf9067fb3cf408d7047840a10e3f4)
DARREN "understands" Our Court System and the Constitution QUITE WELL... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-241013183046.jpeg&hash=51c9c4f17e747698c76c65c7c1814eff4f32c400)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 01, 2014, 08:09:00 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wYLHfcmK1Q&feature=player_embedded Two White Construction worker eye witnesses agree Mike Brown DID NOT attack the COP DARREN WILSON.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 01, 2014, 08:33:43 pm
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmedia-cache-ec0.pinimg.com%2F236x%2F78%2Fba%2F9b%2F78ba9b4c7cf7f8ce6c73ddd152223955.jpg&hash=5d50e114d92df132bc8330e1b173f8ebdefd5d37) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPQzFF0tYKE&feature=player_embedded Dick Gregory once ran for President of the United States. He is a wise man. He says, "white" is not a color, it's an ATTITUDE. He is right.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aD9wJoEfHvE&feature=player_embedded Dick Gregory is a Comedian as well as being a Historian and Top Tier Civil Rights Activist.
Dick Gregory, from the bottom of my heart — THANK YOU.
Quote
Peter Barry Chowka summed it up perfectly when he said, “Gregory’s name, is synonymous with progressive social and political causes. He is that rare combination (like Gandhi) of activist and healer, one whose own life illustrates how real change first must come from within oneself.”
On September 10, 22-year-old Darrien Hunt was shot six times in the back and killed by two police officers in Saratoga Springs, Utah. New evidence proves that police have told at least two huge lies (and maybe another) in their attempt to justify the shooting. What follows is an account of those lies. Lie #1: As the first officer exited his vehicle, Darrien Hunt lunged at him with his sword.
Detectives and medical examiners are consistently among the first officials on the scene of a police-involved shooting death. Their initial reports are particularly valuable because they regularly have the earliest documented statements from the officers involved in the shooting. As late as six days after the shooting death of Darrien Hunt, the police admitted that they had not even interviewed the officers involved yet, giving them ample time to prepare their stories. Similarly, the earliest known statement we have about the shooting death of Missouri teenager Mike Brown on August 9 in Ferguson came from a detective and was included in the autopsy report. It is inconsistent with later stories purported to be from Officer Darren Wilson.
In the newly released autopsy report in the shooting death of Darrien Hunt, it states the earliest known account of the police perspective as follows:
The first officer exited his vehicle and the subject charged him swinging the sword. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) Three shots were fired (at Hunt) upon the initial contact.
Darrien Hunt, smiling while talking to officers outside of their car. (at link) This photo alone (at link), taken by bystander Jocelyn Hansen, contradicts that story and proves that both officers had exited their vehicle and were talking to Hunt.
Lie #2. Police claimed Hunt took acid and was on drugs (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) but his toxicology report came back negative for all drugs and alcohol. In apparent attempt to smear Hunt, police made a strange and absurd claim in their report, which states the following:
"(Hunt) apparently liked hallucinogens and had taken acid approximately three weeks (prior to the shooting)." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03)
However, when the state toxicology report came back, it proved that Hunt was not under the influence of any drugs whatsoever—making the police statement about Hunt being on drugs seem like an absurd attempt to justify the shooting.
Potential Lie #3. Witness Leonard Zogg says police have deliberately misrepresented what he said he saw on September 10.
In the earliest police report from the day Hunt was killed, Leonard Zogg is quoted as saying he saw Hunt lunge at the officers and swing his sword at them (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03). Zogg emphatically denies ever seeing any such thing and states that he never stated anything of the sort. Zogg also states that he told detectives that the police began shooting at Hunt after he started running away, but that the report states Zogg told them Hunt ran away after he was fired upon. While it is nearly impossible to confirm what Zogg did or did not tell the police originally, his public avowal that he has been misrepresented, when considered alongside these two other lies, is highly concerning.
These cases of police inconsistencies are troubling at best and must be investigated. ::) http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/11/04/1341612/-Proof-the-police-have-told-two-huge-lies-in-the-shooting-death-of-Darrien-Hunt
Agelbert Comment: The last statement is the UNDERSTATEMENT of the YEAR. >:(
Fascism is NOW OFFICIALLY the NEW NORMAL. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) Have a nice day.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 06, 2014, 04:11:14 pm
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailykos.com%2Fimages%2F114305%2Flightbox%2Fcrueljoke.png%3F1415000161&hash=cb72320303c2561c0dc6d1168d465461921bfb7b) But don't worry! According to "Christian" Lawyer Ashvin, the above is hyperbole, madness and irrationality. ;D The jogger will, AFTER ALL, get his "DAY IN COURT", WON'T HE? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe)
The only thing worse than a prejudiced, racist moron is a prejudiced, racist LAWYER moron. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
The Court System is irreparable and must be totally scrapped.
The Exxon Valdez PITTANCE of a settlement: PROOF we have a Fascist Fossil Fuel Government AND the irreparably DYSFUNCTIONAL Court System is its HANDMAIDEN (http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/fossil-fuel-folly/fossil-fuels-degraded-democracy-and-profit-over-planet-pollution/msg2122/#msg2122")
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 10, 2014, 02:47:02 pm
Snippet 1:
Quote
KELLER: Well, we have a criminal justice system that incarcerates more people than any other nation on earth. One possible exception is North Korea where we don’t really know. We have 5% of the world’s population and 25% of the world’s prison inmates. The system fails badly at, at the fundamental obligation to protect public safety, because we put people in prison and then, when they’re finally finished their terms we let them out with no skills, no preparation for the real world. :(
SNIPPET 2:
Quote
You know, the, the … one of the issues I would like to look at is pre-trial detention. I mean large numbers of people who are accused of crime can’t afford the high price of the …and rising cost of bail. So they end up languishing in jail before they’ve had a trial. They lose their jobs, their families often fall apart. This is before they’ve been convicted of anything.
We’d like to look at the, the prevalence of plea bargains. And most people I think would be surprised to know that upwards of 95% of the people who are in prison never had a trial. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df) They were … they all cut deals with the prosecution because there is a huge pressure in the system not to slow things down. You can take your chances on, you know, a ten year sentence or you can take a year, plead guilty and, and avoid that, that risk. ;) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) :P
SNIPPET 3:
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HEFFNER: How do you get at whether or not prosecutions and inadequate counsel and all these negative aspects of the criminal justice system are racially motivated? How are you going to try to get at that question? Because that’s on people’s minds today.
KELLER: Well, you know, one book that has, has been … become a kind of bible for the more liberal reformists is Michelle Alexander’s book called The New Jim Crow, which … where, in which she writes eloquently and passionately about the racialization of the American justice system. And it’s, it’s an undeniable truth … just from looking at the, at the data.
"Day in Court", MY ARSE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Femoticon-looney-toons-008.gif&hash=04158afe2649cfc41ac34d90ac720bf253ae6892)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 13, 2014, 10:06:07 pm
How the Amish AVOID >:( paying into or collecting Social Security.
Quote
And so it came to pass that in 1965, the Medicare bill was passed by Congress. As Wayne Fisher writes in The Amish in Court, "Tucked into the 138 page bill was a clause exempting the Old Order Amish, and any other religious sect who conscientiously objected to insurance, from paying Social Security payments, providing that sect had been in existence since December 31, 1950. After Senate approval in July, the signing of the bill by President Lyndon B. Johnson on August 13, 1965, made it official and canceled tax accounts of some 15,000 Amish people amounting to nearly $250,000."
Agelbert NOTE: Had they not been the RIGHT COLOR, I am certain this outpouring of support for their "Constitutional Rights" would NEVER have happened. The Amish think it was due to their Religion. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251) That was the political fig leaf, nothing more. ;)
Full article at link:
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Valentine Byler vs. the IRS "Pay Unto Caesar - The Amish & Social Security"
Many people think the Amish do not pay taxes. They do. But they have been exempted from paying Social Security. This story is little known to the general public today. It is full of drama, clashes with the government, issues of religious freedom, politics, and much more. For writing this 5-part series, I was privileged to have access to many original materials and personal letters.
(To read each section of the series individually, click on the following bookmarks, or read on for the entire series.)
Part One: The Dispute Begins Part Four: The Public Reaction Part Two: The Amish vs. the IRS Part Five: The Amish "Fight Back" Part Three: The Media Gets Involved Part Four: The Public Reaction Part Five: The Amish "Fight Back"
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 13, 2014, 10:34:49 pm
J. Edgar Hoover’s ‘Suicide Letter’ to Martin Luther King Jr. Is Even Worse Than We Knew (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Posted on Nov 12, 2014
Half a century ago, FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover had what he clearly considered to be a big problem in the form of civil rights galvanizer Martin Luther King Jr. In late November 1964, one of Hoover’s underlings typed out a letter, posing as a disillusioned African-American excoriating King for his moral failings and calling for a reckoning, as Beverly Gage details in a report for The New York Times Magazine.
By that time, King had become a renowned leader occupying a very visible stance on the global stage; as Gage notes, he was months shy of receiving the Nobel Peace Prize, and Congress had passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 a few months prior. So Hoover and his deputy William Sullivan produced another indirect plan (attempts to stage a smear campaign in the press hadn’t been so productive) to tear King down.
“King, look into your heart,” the letter says. “You know you are a complete fraud and a great liability to all of us Negroes.” Gage, an American history professor at Yale, sums up the letter thusly in her write-up:
The word “evil” makes six appearances in the text, beginning with an accusation: “You are a colossal fraud and an evil, vicious one at that.” In the paragraphs that follow, the recipient’s alleged lovers get the worst of it. They are described as “filthy dirty evil companions” and “evil playmates,” all engaged in “dirt, filth, evil and moronic talk.” The effect is at once grotesque and hypnotic, an obsessive’s account of carnal rage and personal betrayal. “What incredible evilness,” the letter proclaims, listing off “sexual orgies,” “adulterous acts” and “immoral conduct.” Near the end, it circles back to its initial target, denouncing him as an “evil, abnormal beast.”
The unnamed author suggests intimate knowledge of his correspondent’s sex life, identifying one possible lover by name and claiming to have specific evidence about others. Another passage hints of an audiotape accompanying the letter, apparently a recording of “immoral conduct” in action. “Lend your sexually psychotic ear to the enclosure,” the letter demands. It concludes with a deadline of 34 days “before your filthy, abnormal fraudulent self is bared to the nation.” “There is only one thing left for you to do,” the author warns vaguely in the final paragraph. “You know what it is.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Although more general information about Hoover’s “suicide letter,” as it has come to be called, was made public for decades, sizable portions of it were redacted—until Gage made the kind of discovery that those in her field dream of: “This summer, while researching a biography of Hoover,” she says in her Times story, “I was surprised to find a full, uncensored version of the letter tucked away in a reprocessed set of his official and confidential files at the National Archives.”
Gage draws a timely link across five decades by pointing out that “the letter offers a potent warning for readers today about the danger of domestic surveillance in an age with less reserved mass media.”
Scary and true. Now, if only we could find out about more of these incidents closer to the time when they actually happen.
—Posted by Kasia Anderson http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/j_edgar_hoovers_fake_threat_letter_to_martin_luther_king_jr_20141112
Agelbert NOTE: The letter OFFERS something else as well; it offers PROOF of the incredibly RACIST double standard in this country. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
During EXACTLY the same time period that Martin Luther King Jr. is being hounded, demonized and destroyed by Hoover and his TU TU wearing friends, the FBI has its finger up its ass while the Amish are being exempted from Social Security through SPECIAL legislation. ;) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
A NOBEL Peace prize winner is treated like an immoral criminal because he is black while an Amish farmer is raised up as the "ideal" of a REAL American striving to defend his "Constitutional Rights". ;)
The people like Hoover have NOT gone away. American Hypocrites for a Better (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) Tomorrow never rest... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280914173045.png&hash=f2929cf7cb77bffdadbba746822ec6a60a002dd6)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 15, 2014, 07:16:52 pm
Fri Nov 14, 2014 at 09:32 AM EST. How To Get Away With Murder...in Ferguson
by attytood
Cross-posted at Attytood:
The shorter version of this week's news out of Ferguson is basically this: Tin soldiers and Nixon coming. The grand jury investigation of the shooting of teenager Mike Brown, by the Ferguson, Mo., police officer Darren Wilson has dragged on for weeks, from the hot summer afternoon when Brown's corpse was left to rot on the street for four long hours, to this week's polar vortex. This cold snap makes it even more likely that authorities will finally announce the decision they've been carefully grooming for weeks, that Officer Wilson (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) will not be charged with murdering an unarmed 18-year-old. For NON-Racists only: Full Story at link ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 15, 2014, 08:31:50 pm
Aglbert NOTE: On behalf of the We-The-People. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
Let's Do Some Legislatin': The Michael Brown Over-Policed Rights Act of 2015 (Draft 2) Why do we need a law to police the police, you may ask. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fgen152.gif&hash=d5b10968fe56c4cb95fae17cee3cb420a5f4e2da) Consider this: As reported by USA Today, police are involved in 400 killings per year.
Section 1
(a) UNIVERSAL REPORTING REQUIREMENTS. All policing jurisdictions shall report the following information every twelve months to the Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI") in the manner that agency shall prescribe by rule:
(1) The name, address, race and occupation (if known) of any person injured or killed by a firearm, taser, or other weapon designed to cause physical injury to, or which is used to subdue or control, persons, and which was fired by an officer of that policing jurisdiction. (2) The name, address, race and rank of any officer who has shot or tazed a person during the preceding twelve months. (3) Whether the police action described in subsection (1) of this section resulted in death, injury or medical treatment, specifying which, if any. (4) The filing and disposition of any criminal or civil matters related to the use of force. (5) The result of any internal investigation, including punishment, if any, meted out. (6) The language minority status of any persons involved. (7) Whether that officer has shot another person during his or her career as a police officer. (i) If so, provide each instance, including, (ii) Date, policing jurisdiction, reason for use of force, disposition of person targeted (legally and medically), and the disposition of any related criminal or civil matters. ( 8 ) The number of shots fired at any person by any weapon during the course of police activities in the policing jurisdiction, including the type of weapon. (9) The number of target or practice shots taken by the policing jurisdiction for training purposes during the preceding 12 months. (10) The number of full-time and part-time employees of the policing jurisdiction. (11) The number of times a police officer in the policing jurisdiction complained of physical injury requiring medical treatment because of interaction with the public in the course of police activities during the preceding twelve months. (12) The number of times a person in the policing jurisdiction complained of physical injury requiring medical treatment because of interaction with officers in that policing jurisdiction in the course of police activities during the preceding twelve months.
(b) To encourage accurate and prompt reporting, it is expressly provided that the report of any policing jurisdiction prepared pursuant to this Act may not be used as evidence against any individual police officer or officers in any civil, or administrative proceeding. Provided, however, that any information contained in the report that can be obtained elsewhere shall not be subject to this restriction.
(c) ONE-TIME UNIVERSAL REPORTING REQUIREMENT. All policing jurisdictions shall report the items described above in (a)(1)-(12) for each of the preceding five years to the Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI") in the manner that agency shall prescribe by rule:
(d) Each Section 1 report will be signed by the police unit's commanding officer and, based upon information and belief, sworn to be true and correct. Failure to comply with the universal reporting requirements described above shall subject that policing jurisdiction to designation as a Federal Over-Policed Rights Act Jurisdiction and subject it to forfeiture of any or all federal funding or equipment. The Department of Justice shall have the authority to enforce Section 1 of this Act.
(e) The Federal Bureau of Investigation shall report the information provided pursuant to subsections (a)(1)-(12) each year to the public.
(f) DEFINITIONS. "Policing jurisdiction" shall include all state and local law enforcement entities of any size. "Weapon" or "other weapon" shall include any weapon used to subdue or inflict damage to a person.
Section 2
(a) A Citizen or Resident Alien of the United States shall have the right to file in federal court in his or her political subdivision of residence an Official Complaint against any policing jurisdiction with law enforcement responsibilities in that person's area of residence that has shown a long-standing pattern of abuse, brutality or racial or language minority animus of at least eighteen month's duration even if that Citizen or Resident Alien has not been directly affected by police or state actions.
(b) STANDING AND WAIVER OF FEES. By virtue of a person's residence in a jurisdiction, he or she is deemed to have standing to sue. Every person in a jurisdiction is affected in one way or another by the policing carried out there. Filing fees and any trial or witness fees for this action are waived. Complainant will be responsible for any fees necessary to effectuate Service of Process on the policing jurisdiction. The Complaint and all subsequent pleadings will be prepared and argued by an attorney in good standing in that federal district and follow current federal rules of civil procedure except as described herein or amended for good cause by the federal district court.
(c) JURISDICTION; EXHAUSTION OF ADMINISTRATIVE OR OTHER REMEDIES. The district courts of the United States shall have jurisdiction of proceedings instituted pursuant to this Act and shall exercise the same without regard to whether a person asserting rights under the provisions herein shall have exhausted any administrative or other remedies that may be provided by law. Trial will proceed before the judge without a jury.
(d) SPEEDY TRIAL PROVISION. A hearing and disposition of this matter shall occur within six months after the policing jurisdiction has filed its Answer. The parties shall provide expedited discovery. No later than one month after the policing jurisdiction has filed its Answer, the court shall convene the parties to discuss discovery and case management. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11 sanctions shall apply to all proceedings herein, as will the inherent contempt powers of the court. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12 shall not, except that a policing jurisdiction may file a Motion to Dismiss if the complainant is not a resident of the jurisdiction.
(e) CONSOLIDATION OF CASES. The court may consolidate multiple independent complaints for hearing. One continuance of no more than one month's duration may be granted by the court for good cause shown.
(f) At the election of the Attorney General, the Department of Justice may enter the suit on behalf of the Complainant; however, if the Complainant voices an objection, he or she will be allowed to proceed with the Department of Justice appearing as a friend of the court, or the Department of Justice may withdraw, if it elects to do so. At any time during the proceedings and after adjudication, the Attorney General may appoint a local or state government authority as its designee to appear at hearings and receive reports and take all actions available to the Attorney General and Department of Justice under this Act. The designee will be reimbursed for all out-of-pocket expenditures.
(g) If the court, after hearing, finds by a preponderance of the evidence that the police unit has had a long-standing pattern of abuse, brutality or racial or language minority animus, which may be proved statistically and without direct evidence of intentional malice, then the court shall designate that policing jurisdiction as a Federal Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction. The policing jurisdiction may appeal, but there shall be no stay of this Act pending appeal. The complainant shall also have the right to appeal.
Section 3
(a) PENALTIES, CONDITIONS AND PROBATION. This Act is not intended to limit the authority of a federal district court judge to tailor his or her order to a given situation. However, a designation as an Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction shall, at a minimum, result in the following, unless good cause is shown:
(1) The court shall appoint volunteer observers of good moral character who reside in the jurisdiction to monitor the policing jurisdiction as described herein. (2) The specific reporting requirements for an Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction, as described below, shall be enforced. (3) The Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction shall forfeit all federal "militarized" hardware, including only vehicles and weapons. (4) The policing jurisdiction shall be subject to audits at any time by the Department of Justice or the Federal Bureau of Investigation. (5) The policing jurisdiction shall designate a person to act as liaison between the unit and the federal court system, the Department of Justice and any volunteer observer organizations. (6) If the court found a long-standing pattern of abuse, brutality or racial or language minority animus regarding the police unit's temporary detention of arrestees, then the court will order all police personnel in the holding facility to wear body cameras and shall consider ordering (i) twenty-four hour video monitoring in cell areas, (ii) the employment of additional officers, including those trained in first aid, (iii) specific changes to detention protocols, (iv) the employment of Spanish-speaking (or other language of need) officers, (v) physical changes or additions to the facilities, and (vi) the use of volunteer observers in or around the cell area. (7) The court should consider the effectiveness of body cameras for all officers on patrol and their supervisors. If certain geographic areas have presented particular problems and others have not, the court shall order that police officers use body cameras in the problem areas. ( 8 ) The court shall order that any officer in the policing jurisdiction involved in using his or her weapon against a person shall have a blood screen as soon as possible after the event.
(b) Volunteer observers shall be authorized to—
(1) enter and attend at any place in which officers of the policing jurisdiction are conducting official business for the purpose of observing and documenting; provided, however, that the court may order that certain investigations involving organized crime or other matters shall not be subject to volunteer observation; and (2) ride along in any police cruiser or other police conveyance. (3) Volunteer observers are specifically permitted to carry and use video cameras or any other reasonable recording device. (4) Investigate and report. Volunteer observers shall investigate and report to the Attorney General or the appropriate designee, and if requested, to the court. Observers are directed to observe only, and if any problems occur, either the observer or the police unit may report same to the court. (5) Video or other recordings, including written reports made by volunteer observers shall be maintained by the Department of Justice or its designee.
(c) The Federal Bureau of Investigation shall make available training materials for use by the Volunteer Observers.
(d) REPORTING REQUIREMENTS. In addition to the Universal Reporting Requirements described above, an Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction shall also meet the following reporting requirements and provide to the DOJ or its designee—
(1) a description of every instance in which an officer during the performance of his or her professional duties unholsters a weapon of any kind in preparation for its use on any person; (2) a description of any assault or battery committed by any officer of the policing jurisdiction during his or her professional duties; (3) a list of all incidents in which a police encounter escalates. This would include an officer making a traffic stop but ending up citing the person for a misdemeanor, or if the officer took a call for a misdemeanor and ended up filing felony charges; (4) a list of all injuries suffered by arrestees or detainees or persons released, including those observable injuries that were not caused by, or occurred during, the arrest or detainment; (5) any lists or reports required by the court tailored to the court's findings or any reasonable requests of the DOJ or designee. The final arbiter of reasonableness for the purposes of this Act will be the court; (6) a list of any significant changes to department or unit procedures or protocols; and (7) a copy of all blood screens conducted pursuant to subsection (a) ( 8 ).
(e) ENFORCEMENT AND PENALTIES. An officer of an Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction who fails to report an action as described in Section 3(c)(1)-(4) commits a felony. An Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction that fails to report as provided for in Section 3(c)(5)-(7) is subject to contempt and the contempt powers of the federal court. The Department of Justice or its designee may investigate any instance involving an unholstered weapon, an assault or a battery, and it or its designee shall investigate every instance in which shots were fired, a taser employed or other weapon used at a person.
Section 4
(a) PETITION FOR TERMINATION. After the expiration of one year or any longer term set by the court, the policing jurisdiction may petition the court for relief from the designation as a Federal Over-Policed Rights Act jurisdiction.
(b) If by a preponderance of the evidence the court finds that the policing jurisdiction has followed the terms of its order and the strictures of this provision, has implemented any and all reasonable and narrowly-tailored recommendations made by the Department of Justice, and if the court finds that the police unit has been positively changed and is now focused on proper policing techniques, then the court shall lift the Federal OPRA designation. In the alternative, the court may designate a reasonable term of probation if certain requirements have yet to be met.
Section 5
(a) MISCELLANEOUS. Appropriations for this act will come from the General Fund every year without vote. This Act may be cited as "The Michael Brown Federal Over-Policed Rights Act of 2015."
(b) If any provision of this Act or the application of it to any person or circumstances is held invalid, the remainder of this Act and the application of its provisions to other persons not similarly situated or to other circumstances shall not be affected thereby.
Agelbert NOTE: Yes, I know. You want me to also consider snowball's chances in hell. ::)
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ftftppull.freethoughtllc.netdna-cdn.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2014%2F04%2Fa1.jpg&hash=500d8f54ee44755a13a8601fa23e9782a87287cc) DEMOCRACY, MY ASS! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 19, 2014, 06:54:08 pm
Ferguson: Missouri Governor Declares State of Emergency, Mobilizes National Guard ahead of Protests (http://www.globalresearch.ca/ferguson-missouri-governor-declares-state-of-emergency-mobilizes-national-guard-ahead-of-protests/5414751)
Add Ferguson. We've seen these very techniques used both against local Occupy groups and especially OWS:
Ten Illegal Police Actions to Watch for in Ferguson (http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/11/18/ten-illegal-police-actions-to-watch-for-in-ferguson) by BILL QUIGLEY
When the Michael Brown verdict is announced, people can expect the police to take at least ten different illegal actions to prevent people from exercising their constitutional rights. The Ferguson police have been on TV more than others so people can see how awful they have been acting. But their illegal police tactics are unfortunately quite commonly used by other law enforcement in big protests across the US.
The First Amendment to the US Constitution promises the government will not abridge freedom of speech or to prevent the right of the people to peaceably assemble or to petition to the government for the redress of grievances. Here is what they :evil4: are going to do, watch for each of these illegal actions when the crowds start to grow.
One. Try to stop people from protesting. The police all say they know they have to let people protest. So they usually will allow protests for a while. Then the police will get tired and impatient and try to stop people from continuing to protest. The government will say people can only protest until a certain time, or on a certain street, or only if they keep moving, or not there, not here, not now, no longer. Such police action is not authorized by the US Constitution. People have a right to protest, the government should leave them alone.
Two. Provocateurs. Police have likely already planted dozens of officers, black and white, male and female, inside the various protests groups. These officers will illegally spy on peaceful protesters and often take illegal actions themselves and encourage other people to take illegal action. They will even be arrested with others but magically not end up in jail. Others inside the groups will be paid to inform on the group to the government. Comically, when undercover police are uncovered they often claim they have a constitutional right to be there and try to use the constitution they are violating as a shield!
Three. Snatch Squads. Police will decide who they do not like or who they think are leaders. Then they will use small heavily armed groups to knife into peaceful crowds and grab people, pull them out and arrest them.
Four. False Arrests. The police will arrest whoever they choose whenever they choose and will make up stories to justify the arrests. If people are breaking glass or hurting others, those arrests are legal. However, the police will arrest first and sort out who they arrested later. Police in Ferguson have already wrongfully arrested legal observers, a law professor, and church leaders.
Five. Intimidation. As they have shown many times in Ferguson and all over the country, once the protests heat up, police will show up in full riot gear, dressed like ninja turtles (big flashy guns, plastic shields, big batons, shin guards, gas masks, flex cuffs) and act like they are military warriors protecting people from ISIS invasion.
Six. Kettling or Encircling. The police will surround a group and pen them in and not let them move. They will either arrest all or force them to leave in one direction. This, as the police know fully well, always sweeps up innocent bystanders as well as protestors. NYPD did this with hundreds on Brooklyn Bridge and at many other protests. Sometimes they deploy orange plastic nets or snow fencing, sometimes just lots of police.
Seven. Raids on supportive churches, organizations or homes. Often the police make illegal pre-emptive raids on places where volunteers are sleeping, cooking or parking their cars. They lie to locals and accuse the protesters of links to violent organizations.
Eight. Pain Noise Trucks. Police will also use LRAD noise trucks (Long Range Acoustic Device). First used in Iraq now used against peaceful protesters in the US. The trucks blast bursts of sound powerful enough to cause pain. Never approved by any court, this intentional infliction of pain is another sign of the militarization of the police. Police also use MRAPs Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles – heavily armored trucks which look like tanks but roll on wheels not treads. This is part of the intimidation.
Nine. Arresting reporters. When the police are feeling the heat of public view, they will force journalists away from the protesters. Those who insist on engaging in constitutionally protected activity and returning to the scene will be arrested.
Ten. Chemical and other weapons. When the police get really desperate and afraid, they will try to disperse the entire crowd with pepper spray, tear gas, and other chemical weapons, rubber or wooden bullets. If this happens the police have just about lost control and are at their most dangerous.
Dozens and dozens of different police forces which will be surrounding the protesters in Ferguson when the Michael Brown verdict is announced. There will be federal FBI agents, Homeland Security, US Marshalls, State Police troopers, County Sheriffs, and local city cops from the dozens of little towns in and around St. Louis. Perhaps this will be the time when the peoples’ constitutional rights to protest are actually protected. We can only hope. But in the meantime, look for these common police tactics.
Surly, Right you are! Thanks for the Quigley article. 8)
Agelbert NOTE: BILL QUIGLEY knows the score.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 20, 2014, 06:32:07 pm
Wed Nov 19, 2014 at 09:24 PM EST.
A lie (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) in the Darren Wilson defense in the shooting death of Mike Brown that just won't go away
Where the Lie Began On August 10, 2014, St. Louis County Police Chief John Belmar held his first press conference on the shooting of Mike Brown by Officer Darren Wilson of the nearby Ferguson Police Department. His force had been called in to take over the investigation for the much smaller local department. The shooting had occurred less than 24 hours earlier, and the tensions on the ground in Ferguson were already red hot and boiling over.
Six different witnesses on the scene claimed that Mike Brown was shot at repeatedly from behind before he turned around, faced Darren Wilson, verbally surrendered, and put his hands in the air. Wilson, having already shot at Mike Brown at least six times while he fled, then fired off a barrage of four quick shots at the surrendered Brown he was looking at face to face, killing him on the spot. With his lifeless body face down on the road, Mike Brown’s blood literally flowed down Canfield Drive for more than four hours. The shooting and the aftermath that evening, which included bringing police dogs to the scene, infuriated residents as never before, and the anger was spreading rapidly across St. Louis and into the nation.
When Chief Belmar sat down the next day to brief the press on his summary of the facts, he stated at 1:13 (and then even more emphatically at 6:01) in the video below, "The entire scene, from approximately the car door (of Officer Wilson) to the shooting, is, uh, about 35 feet."
Title: GOTT MIT UNS!
Post by: AGelbert on November 25, 2014, 02:21:01 pm
It's really hard to avoid indictment — unless you're a police officer
Following the Ferguson grand jury's decision to decline to indict Officer Darren Wilson for the shooting of Michael Brown, statistics blog FiveThirtyEight has shared numbers that indicate just how unusual that outcome is:
Former New York state Chief Judge Sol Wachtler famously remarked that a prosecutor could persuade a grand jury to "indict a ham sandwich." The data suggests he was barely exaggerating: According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. attorneys prosecuted 162,000 federal cases in 2010, the most recent year for which we have data. Grand juries declined to return an indictment in 11 of them.
There are some differences to note: That ratio is for federal grand juries, and the Michael Brown case was heard in a state court. But the most important difference is the job of the accused.While regular citizens are almost always indicted, police officers who have shot civilians are almost never are. In Houston, for example, not a single officer has been indicted
http://theweek.com/article/index/272608/speedreads-its-really-hard-to-avoid-indictment--unless-youre-a-police-officer Agelbert NOTE: If you still have the magical thinking stupidity to believe the USA is not a Fascist Police State, I feel sorry for you. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.websmileys.com%2Fsm%2Ffam%2Ffam12.gif&hash=8dbdc056fce063c27eaf513ccecb9366574f6193)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 25, 2014, 02:45:04 pm
Read Officer Darren Wilson’s Testimony (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) to Ferguson Grand Jury (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605)
by Josh Feldman | 12:40 am, November 25th, 2014
The St. Louis County Prosecutor’s (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-241013183046.jpeg&hash=51c9c4f17e747698c76c65c7c1814eff4f32c400) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) Office has put out all the evidence and testimony tonight in the Ferguson grand jury case, including testimony from Officer Darren Wilson himself.
Wilson explained that he first saw Brown and Dorian Johnson when they were walking down the middle of the road. He said, “As he [Brown] came around to the mirror I said, ‘Well, what’s wrong with the sidewalk?’ Brown then replied… ‘**** what you have to say.’” ::)
Wilson then reportedly saw the Cigarillos, realized he must have been the suspect who stole from a convenience store he heard about in his police car, and angled the vehicle to cut him off. He opened his car door and beckoned Brown over. This is what Wilson said happened next:
“As I’m opening the door he turns, faces me, looks at me and says, ‘What the f uck are you going to do about it”, and shuts my door, slammed it shut. I haven’t even got it open enough to get my leg out, it was only a few inches.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251)
Wilson said Brown was attempting to overpower him, and after telling him to “get the f uck back,” that’s when they had their physical altercation inside his car. When he reached for the gun, Wilson told the grand jury, “I said, ‘Get back or I’m going to shoot you.’ He immediately grabs my gun and says, ‘You are too much of a p ussy to shoot me.’” ::)
He grabbed his gun back and it went off twice in the car. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8) When Brown started running, Wilson chased him. And this is what Wilson (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil19.gif&hash=6eeb0dbc471743691793f5130640fdcbd1f77b5c) said he was facing when Brown stopped:
“I tell him to get on the ground… He turns, and when he looked at me, he made like a grunting, like aggravated sound and he starts, he turns and he’s coming back towards me.(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe) His first step is coming towards me, he kind of does like a stutter step to start running. When he does that, his left hand goes in a fist (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F126fs3187425.gif&hash=698371058827d6a11faaaa56c2531639421f9477) and goes to his side, his right one goes under his shirt (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F126fs3187425.gif&hash=698371058827d6a11faaaa56c2531639421f9477) in his waistband and he starts running at me.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251)
Wilson fired at Brown multiple times, but as he said, “it looked like he was almost bulking up to run through the shots, like it was making him mad that I’m shooting at him.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffc06.deviantart.net%2Ffs71%2Ff%2F2009%2F347%2F2%2F6%2FWTF_Smiley_face_by_IveWasHere.jpg&hash=8ca673f8cf785d9dac626f9fd91e37a1a318c7ac)
He said he didn’t remember (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) how many times he shot, but once he saw “the aggression was gone” in Brown’s face, he knew “the threat was stopped.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-070814193155.png&hash=144ce9330e49ee84060db8753a8db69c39a14913)
Wilson was asked why he didn’t wait for backup. He said, “I thought I would be able to just stall until someone got there… I wanted to be out of the car, that way if I need to run I can run.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03)
You can read Wilson’s full testimony (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) below, starting at page 195:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04kJtp6pVXI&feature=player_embedded CNN is a Fascist Police State Racist TOOL of EVIL. >:( The "interview" is a typical hit piece designed to ridicule or humiliate a citizen so the Police State BALONEY is pushed ("justice" is being served and everyone should "calm down" - while the VIOLENCE and MURDEROUS BEHAVIOR of the POLICE is IGNORED) in typical cognitive dissonant fashion (see Orwell and 1984) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b).
In this case the citizen (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) made a fool of the CNN (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil19.gif&hash=6eeb0dbc471743691793f5130640fdcbd1f77b5c) propagandist. Good! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 25, 2014, 04:08:44 pm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEl5YnEVtEY&feature=player_embedded A reasonable analysis of how police violence comes about. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 26, 2014, 10:13:50 pm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWuvF2n4kz4&feature=player_embedded The racist hatred is getting so bad in the USA that a racist had the psychopathic insanity to DRIVE THROUGH people :o >:( protesting peacefully about the Ferguson Grand Jury TRAVESTY of justice (failure to indict police officer Darrell Wilson for the MURDER of Michael Brown). (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfWjgAK-VsQ&feature=player_embedded One of two videos in the following truth filled article: But I don’t need to go that far back in history. Just a few months ago, in downtown Seattle, 25-year-old Raymond Wilford, was maced and apprehended by a security guard and then taken into custody by police for pump-faking a swing at a white man who got in his face while heckling protestors.
Dozens of photos and videos show that the white heckler was the chief aggressor. He had been acting obnoxiously throughout an otherwise peaceful protest, and yet he was never a person of interest for the security and police.Wilford, meanwhile, was on the scene for just minutes, and not even as a protestor — he was just passing through — and yet he was the one who was pepper-sprayed, handcuffed, and led off by police. This happened while multiple witnesses tried to explain to the officers that it was the white heckler, not Wilford, who was the clear threat. “You have the wrong guy,” witnesses shouted at the police.
It’s for these reasons that negotiating peace when police are involved will always be a tenuous thing for many African Americans, because history does not support the idea that black people will come out of it unscathed or unassailed.
If your are a black male in the USA, you are 21 TIMES more likely to be shot dead by a police officer than if you are a white male.
In the video you will hear many truths. One that stood out for me is the PROOF that has emerged recently, as told by Thom Hartmann, that the Reagan Administration was pumping drugs into black neighborhoods.
Gary Webb was RIGHT! The TARGET of the Reagan Administration was African Americans.In typical Predatory Crapitalist fashion, Reagan and his war profiteering pals wanted to make money off of blacks even as they got them to kill each other for drugs. >:(
SNIPPET:
Quote
The Nicaraguan Contra civilian leadership chose their base in Miami in the 1980's, where the co caine cowboys were already established and renowned during the 1970's for the violence that is associated with the illegal co caine trade. Southern Air Transport (S.A.T.), a ClA-affiliated freight airline operating out of Miami has been implicated in drug-running, evidence of which comes from many sources. Notably, in Congressional testimony Wanda Palacio, an FBI informant, has stated that she witnessed drugs being exchanged for guns on an S.A.T. plane in Barranquila, Colombia.
Corroborating this testimony is an Associated Press story of Jan. 21, 1987, which states the October 1986 S.A.T. plane crash in Nicaragua revealed flight logs indicating that the pilot, Wallace Sawyer Jr., had been flying from Barranquila, Colombia to Miami, Florida in early October 1985. Eugene Hasenfus, an Air America veteran and sole survivor of that crash, filed suit against White House National Security Council (NSC) aide Richard Secord and S.A.T. for expenses and damages, claiming S.A.T. and Secord were his employers. Secord in turn contends that Mr. Hasenfus' real employer was Ronald Reagan and the actual chain of command was Reagan-Poindexter-North-Secord. :o >:(
Then there were the allegations coming from Costa Rica regarding White House involvement in the drug trade. The Central American country of Costa Rica lies on Nicaragua's Southern border, which made Costa Rica strategically important during the Contra insurgency in Nicaragua. In that time, the Northern region of Costa Rica bordering with Nicaragua was the site of extensive CIA and Contra activity. In the wake of the Iran-Contra affair, White House NSC staff members Lt. Col. Oliver North, John Poindexter, and Richard Secord were banned-for-life from entering Costa Rica in 1989, after the Costa Rican legislature implicated the NSC staff members in guns and drug smuggling. Former Contra leader Eden Pastora has said "I knew that much of what went through (CIA operative John Hull's northern Costa Rica ranch's) airstrips was related to narcotics trafficking" as part of a "Colombia-Costa Rica, Costa Rica-Miami connection." (Co ckburn, p. 177) These White-House NSC members, along with John Hull, were indicted in a Costa Rican court as accessories to murder in the La Penca bombing and assassination attempt on Eden Pastora, which resulted in the death of an American journalist. North, Poindexter and Secord were never extradicted or arraigned in Costa Rica.
Evidence of White House premeditated involvement in drug trafficking is provided by examining the unusual covert action background of key Iran-Contra players, dating back to American involvement in Laos. Air America - the CIA's Thailand-based Vietnam-era airline - was notorious for its participation in heroin trafficking as a part of funding and supporting the CIA's secret war in Laos during the Vietnam war. This profound bit of history has been the focus of much commentary by historians, and has been confirmed by many sources. (Regarding the recent controversial August 1990 comic movie, "Air America", former Air America pilot Jack Smith spoke out on Entertainment Tonight, substantiating the movie's essential truths.)
Since controlling the Laotian opium fields determined who would control Laos, the CIA put all of its support behind their chosen drug lord, Vang Pao, and the amount of opiates that came out of Laos tripled. As it turns out, Richard Secord (CIA Special Operations Group Deputy Wing Commander in Laos), Lt. Col. Oliver North, Richard Armitage, and John Singlaub were all veterans of the secret war in Laos (Co ckburn). The presence of several Laos secret-war veterans who emerged as key NSC players in Iran-Contra exceeds the realm of mere coincidence. In the October 1986 S.A.T. plane crash which yielded Eugene Hasenfus and the U.S. Government embarrassment, an old Air America operations manual was found. (Co ckburn p. 221)
Public record documents that General Manuel Noriega was on the CIA payroll in the early to mid 1970's, as well as the 1980's. An important point mostly ignored in the mainstream press, however, is the Congressional testimony by George Bush's own NSC advisor, Donald Gregg, that George Bush (then Pres. Gerald Ford's CIA Director) met with Noriega and other Panamanian officials sometime in 1976. This meeting with Noriega took place well after Noriega had been implicated in the intelligence community as a drug trafficker in the DEA's June 1975 DeFeo report. Meeting with a foreign official, CIA Director George Bush would have been fully briefed on Noriega's dossier. Later, Jimmy Carter's CIA director, Adm. Stansfield Turner, ended payments to Noriega; however, Noriega's CIA pay checks resumed when Reagan/Bush took office in l980. (1990 PBS Frontline on Noriega)
It is interesting to note at this point that George Bush was the Drug Czar during his tenure as Vice President under Pres. Ronald Reagan. In NSC memos discovered in the-Iran-Contra investigation, it has been revealed that George Bush's NSC advisor Donald Gregg was aware early on of Contra involvement in the drug trade.
Could ex-CIA chief George Bush, at that point Vice President and Drug Czar, be unaware of such goings-on when his reporting subordinate was quite aware of Contra involvement in the drug trade?
And the pattern continues: During the first two years of the Bush presidency, William Bennett, Bush's first Drug Czar, was criticized by members of Congress for his apparent indifference to Federal judicial and legal loopholes which permitted U.S. companies to export unusual volumes of co caine processing chemicals to Latin American countries harboring co caine production laboratories. Mr. Bennett had been an outspoken proponent of escalating the war on drugs, and yet on this important front of anti-drug policy, Mr. Bennett was apparently negligent. (Rolling Stone, "Between the Lines", October - November 1990)
It's doubtful that the concurrence of the Contra war in Nicaragua with the emergence of crack co caine were mere coincidences. It has been long aknowledged that heroin's prominence and availability during the Vietnam war was contributed by the trafficking of opiates in Laos and Southeast Asia. Sadly, covert wars and drug trafficking go hand in hand.
Ex-CIA field officer John Stockwell has commented, "We cannot forget the Senate Kerry Committee findings of co caine smuggling on ClA/Contra aircraft, the DEA reports on the number of prosecutions in which the CIA has intervened to block prosecution of drug smugglers, the note that escaped Lt. Col. Oliver North's shredder that $14 million of drug money had gone to the Contras, or the CIA's 20-odd-year relationship with Manuel Noriega." (Austin American Statesman, op-ed editorial) Nor has this escaped the comment of ex-DEA agent Michael Levine: "God knows how many secret elements are out there working under the guise of the drug war. Oliver North was the latest example. His operation was hip-deep in Contra drug smuggling. He was banned from Costa Rica for his involvement with drug runners. The DEA documented fifty tons of Contra coke that was being routed into the U.S. by a Honduran connection. An agent bought two kilos in Lubbock, Texas, and made the arrest. The CIA comes quickly to the rescue. A closed hearing is held. Case dismissed." (Esquire, March 1991, p 136)
Leslie Co ckburn has documented that since drug trafficking was facilitated via an unhindered CIA-Contra network unencumbered by increased U.S. border interdiction efforts, the effect was "... involvement of the CIA and the related White House covert operations network in drenching America in co caine and other narcotics ..." (Co ckburn, p.187) And since overall co caine use declined in the '80's, it was the cheaper and more-addictive Crack co caine that came into prominence. As the shipments of South American marijuana declined as a result of increased interdiction efforts, cheap co caine came to the fore to replace marijuana as the drug of choice for drug users and drug smugglers alike.
Fill article at link:
The Duplicity (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03) of the War on Drugs
http://www.lycaeum.org/drugwar/dupe.html
Title: Hand Out Machine Guns to the Poor in the Projects and watch them Kill Each Other
Post by: AGelbert on December 03, 2014, 09:24:41 pm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v5KnmVNURo&feature=player_embedded Watch it all. It starts a bit slow but gets quite informative towards the end. ;D
But just like it happened in Germany, Fascism in the USA did NOT stop with the targeting of a small minority. YOU and I are not quite as much in the fascist police state crosshairs as the blacks, but EVIL is always a growth industry... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_1593.gif&hash=628238f2fc26695937f6e97b91b050976065743b) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fsnapoutofit.gif&hash=911b14b142101df534f739771fb2d3836a807d19)
If you do nothing to address the murderous brutality against the African Americans, it will be TOO LATE to COMPLAIN when the POLICE STATE reaches YOU! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2194.gif&hash=5a6b9202f44f22d5ce751c5414683a0944e92e0c) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 03, 2014, 09:42:44 pm
Dallas Activists File Complaint Against Dallas Police For Systemic Abuse
Organize! Dallas, Law, police brutality, Texas By Candice Bernd, www.truth-out.org December 3rd, 2014
Dallas resident Collette Flanagan holds up a photo of her son (at link below), Clinton Allen, who was unarmed when he was shot by Dallas Officer Clark Staller in March 2013, during a public hearing on the impacts of police violence in Dallas, November 7, 2014. (Photo: Candice Bernd)
Dallas Communities Organizing for Change (DCOC), a grassroots, Dallas-based police accountability group, has filed an administrative complaint with the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Civil Rights Division alleging that the Dallas Police Department (DPD) has participated in a pattern and practice of excessive use of force against African-Americans and Hispanics, echoing a national trend. According to the complaint, between July 2002 and July 2013, there were 185 police shootings reported by the DPD, with 58 resulting in a fatality. African-American and Hispanic fatalities accounted for 43, or 74 percent, of all lethal police shootings. Thirty-six of the 185 police shooting victims were unarmed.
ANIMATED (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e) Cartoon: Who killed Michael Brown?
It seems that everyone but Darren Wilson is responsible for the death of Michael Brown. It’s Michael Brown’s fault, black-on-black violence is at fault, it’s a culture of disrespect and lawbreaking that’s at fault, take your pick. Perhaps the best spew of logic came from Rudy Giuliani, who essentially said, if you black people didn’t kill yourselves so much we wouldn’t have to send so many white cops down there to kill you as well.
Yes, crime in black communities is bad. Yes, white police officers killing unarmed black people is bad. Are we not capable of holding two thoughts in our collective head at the same time? It sure seems that many people only talk of “black-on-black” crime when they are defending a white police officer.
Now that another tragedy has happened in the blink of an eye and the police officer who choked Eric Garner to death on camera was not indicted (who you gonna’ believe, your lyin’ eyes or the police union?), let’s hope the growing outrage continues to spotlight police brutality and brings an end to these all-too-frequent killings. Be sure to like, comment and share this cartoon far and wide, or check out links behind the cartoon on my site.
Now that the Missouri non-prosecutor has issued a sweeping non-indictment of Darren Wilson, we can finally find Michael Brown’s real killer!
Who Killed Michael Brown? It’s a real whodunit!
Was it the black-on-black crime in his neighborhood that forced Brown to tackle a police officer’s bullet with his head?
No? Well it must’ve been the Cigarillos that pushed him into a competent and level-headed police officer’s line of fire.
And if not the Cigarillos, it must’ve been his sheer size that killed him!
Weighing in at six-foot-four, two-hundred and ninety-two pounds, Brown terrified Officer Wilson, who was only six-foot-four, two-hundred and ten pounds, (plus the additional weight of the club, gun and police vehicle.)
Was the real killer . . . Hulk Hogan?
Had Officer Wilson not been so scared of the wrestling superstar, he would not have confused an unarmed teen with a world heavyweight wrestling champ in tights and a boa.
The real killer was most surely . . . a culture of violent rap music, broken homes, sagging pants, marijuana socks, social media, divorce, demonic weight gain, disrespect, hip hop, happy meals, Obama and, sunspots.
And thanks to the innocent bystander with the gun, we have plenty of leads into Who Killed Michael Brown! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil19.gif&hash=6eeb0dbc471743691793f5130640fdcbd1f77b5c)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 07, 2014, 03:25:30 pm
"Seeing Ferguson Clearly: 12 Double Standards That Expose White Supremacy" -- The doublethink of domination and victimhood is central to the pathology of white supremacy in the U.S. It is used to dupe and confuse us into believing that there is nuance in brutality and justice in murder. >:(
SNIPPET 1:
Quote
“Black people are feared, and lies are told about our propensity for violence, that we want to burn everything down, we want to tear everything up, we want to shoot everybody but we don’t do it. But historically, who are the ones that do it? Groups like the Klan, groups like the Oath Keepers.”
SNIPPET 2:
Quote
The word “Ferguson” has become synonymous with racism and police brutality in the U.S. today, in the same way that the name “Rodney King” did in 1992.
And yet there remains a persistent and reactionary response from some white Americans who vehemently view themselves as the victims and black Americans as “violent thugs” who deserve the treatment they receive from police and the criminal justice system.
The doublethink of domination and victimhood is central to the pathology of white supremacy in the U.S. It is used to dupe and confuse us into believing that there is nuance in brutality and justice in murder.
But what we really need is to see things in black and white. Literally.
Here are 12 double standards that prove white supremacy is alive and well and hard at work in Ferguson:
It's a three page, must read article ESPECIALLY if you have ANY doubts about how it REALLY works in our racist, police state country and have a SHRED of decency and honesty left in you:
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 09, 2014, 07:51:44 pm
Agelbert Observation in regard to Libertarian hypocrisy:
The racist motive is the only explanation for why some libertarians suddenly start defending the state, big-time, in cases where black guys get killed by police, when in almost all other contexts they are quite suspicious of state power. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-291014182422.png&hash=f5178cb31c0bf9067fb3cf408d7047840a10e3f4)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 13, 2014, 05:08:55 pm
Louisiana Plantation Opens as the First Museum Dedicated to the History of American Slavery
by Crystal Shepeard December 12, 2014 2:30 pm
Martha was one of 16 children. She didn’t grow up with her siblings. Her mother was a slave whose children, fathered by 15 different men, were sold away, including Martha. She is one of thousands of slave children to be memorialized at the Whitney Plantation Museum in Louisiana.
The Whitney Plantation’s history began in 1752 when the land located 35 miles outside of New Orleans, Louisiana was purchased by a German immigrant. Ambroise Heidel made his fortune by turning the property into an indigo plantation. His youngest son, who had changed the spelling of the family name, would switch the Habitation Haydel plantation cash crop to sugar in the early 1800s. It would remain in the family until the late 1800s, when the property was sold after the Civil War. It would later be renamed to the Whitney Plantation, after the new wealthy owner’s youngest grandson.
This week, the Whitney Plantation opened its doors as the first museum dedicated to the history of the slavery in America.
The numerous plantations in Louisiana and across the south are a reminder of a dark time. Many have been restored and also been turned into museums. The history told focuses on the white owners that were part of the economic fabric of the region. The architecture of the buildings represents the influence of the countries they came from, modified to a uniquely American experience. What is missing in all of these stories is one important element: None of it would have happened without the free labor of black slaves that built those houses and worked the lands.
John Cummings is determined not to make the same mistake.
A retired lawyer and wealthy real estate owner, the Whitney Plantation is one of Cummings’ 9,000 acres of real estate holdings in the New Orleans area. His purchase of the antebellum property was personal, wanting to preserve an important part of Louisiana history. It was due to be razed by a petrochemical company when he purchased it from them in 1998. The main house is an architectural gem, a testament to the region’s history. Cummings, however, has no intention of making the house the center of the museum.
He wants everyone to remember who built that house.
The Haydel family was one of the largest slaveholders in the region. On a household inventory from 1860, they noted 101 slaves, listed by name, gender and country of origin. Their ages, skills and even their skin tone were detailed on the report, which also noted two runaways that were presumed hiding. For the past 15 years, Cummings has spent $7 million of his own money trying to recreate the world those slaves lived in and, most importantly, who they were.
The plantation is considered the most complete in the south. In addition to the Greek and Spanish Creole styled house, the property has the overseer’s house, a blacksmith’s shop, as well as the oldest kitchen in Louisiana – all of which has been restored. The murals, believed to be painted by Italian artist Domenico Canova, also remain. Still, Cummings had to take some latitude to achieve his mission. He has purchased mahogany furniture, silver and other items from auction houses to recreate the style of the original owners. However, it’s not the owners Cummings wishes to memorialize.
Cummings admits that he, as a wealthy white man, may be looked at suspiciously for trying to create this monument. However, he insists that his intentions are sincere. He relied heavily on the expertise of Ibrahima Seck, who is the academic director of the Whitney Plantation Museum. His book, “Bouki Fait Gombo: A History of the Slave Community of Habitation Haydel (Whitney Plantation) Louisiana, 1750-1860,” details the history of the slaves of the plantation. Originally from Senegal, he documents the routes of the slaves from the countries of origin, as well as many of the culinary and musical traditions that were part of how they coped with the brutal life of the plantation slaves.
Cummings has purchased original slave houses from other properties, as well as a shingled church used by the slaves. Visitors can see a steel jail from 1868 used to hold slaves, as well as 9 ½ feet wide sugar kettles, and rusted metal crosses that are used as grave markers on the property. After a brief tour of the main house, visitors are met with the sound of large antique bells ringing, reminding them of who they are there to remember. It promises to be emotional and even uncomfortable. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e) One memorial was done by Ohio artist Woodrow Nash. Sixty-three ceramic heads of slaves killed rest on rods near a lagoon. The German Coast uprising happened on January 8-10, 1811 in what is now St. John and St. Charles parishes in Louisiana. It was the largest uprising in American history, in which 66 slaves died and another 33 were executed, escaped, or presumed dead.
Visitors are constantly reminded of the harsh world of the slaves as they walk through the hot and humid grounds, complete with the sounds of freight trains rumbling in the distance. Transcribed oral histories are etched on the walls, just some of the 4,000 stories of Louisiana slaves the staff has obtained. Some of these stories have been recorded and are played throughout the tour.
The Field of Fallen Angels is in an incongruously quiet courtyard that contains a centerpiece of a bronze angel breastfeeding a baby. The angel, bare breasted and surrounded by rusty chains, sits in the center of a memorial with 2,200 hundred names etched in stone. They are the slave babies born in St. John Parish that died before their third birthday. The slave children are a central theme throughout the plantation, with scores of life-sized ceramic sculptures of children sitting on the steps of the slave quarters, standing in fields, or sitting in the pews at church.
One of those children is Martha.
When recounting her story, Cummings notes how clergy (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) at the time justified slavery through scripture. They said that their purpose here on earth was to be good slaves to their masters. In return, God would reward them by reuniting their families in the afterlife. He pauses as he remembers Martha’s mother dying brokenhearted at the loss of her 16 children.(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2955.gif&hash=ddc12d8bdb1bc63b7998a6b086b79a71b7bda755) >:( “I just hope those pastors kept their promises,” he says.
Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/louisiana-plantation-opens-as-the-first-museum-dedicated-to-the-history-of-american-slavery.html#ixzz3LogF0fix Agelbert note: Slavery is NOT over in the USA. It's good to remember the history but it's also important to recognize that slavery in the world AND the USA HAS NOT gone away. It just has better PR. :(
Cheap, Disposable People •An average slave in the American South in 1850 cost the equivalent of $40,000 in today’s money; today a slave costs an average of $90.
•In 1850 it was difficult to capture a slave and then transport them to the US. Today, millions of economically and socially vulnerable people around the world are potential slaves.
This “supply” makes slaves today cheaper than they have ever been. Since they are so cheap, slaves are today are not considered a major investment worth maintaining. If slaves get sick, are injured, outlive their usefulness, or become troublesome to the slaveholder, they are dumped or killed. For most slave holders, actually legally ‘owning’ the slave is an inconvenience since they already exert total control over the individuals labor and profits. Who needs a legal document that could at some point be used against the slave holder?
Today the slave holder cares more about these high profits than whether the holder and slave are of different ethnic backgrounds; in New Slavery, profit trumps skin color. Finally, new slavery is directly connected to the global economy. As in the past, most slaves are forced to work in agriculture, mining, and ****. From these sectors, their exploited labor flows into the global economy, and into our lives.
In addition, there may be people held in slavery in your community. Slavery happens in nearly every country in the world, and the US and Europe are not immune. Research that Free the Slaves conducted with the University of California, Berkeley found documented cases of slavery and human trafficking in more than 90 cities across the United States. To learn about the warning signs of slavery and what you can do to combat slavery in your community, click here (https://www.freetheslaves.net/NETCOMMUNITY/Document.Doc?id=69).
https://www.freetheslaves.net/page.aspx?pid=301
Why is there slavery in the United States?
Trafficking victims are often tricked into slavery through promises of work. Human traffickers tend to prey on impoverished people who live in countries with little access to education, health care or jobs. When traffickers disguise themselves as legitimate recruiters or employment brokers and promise paying work, many people are willing to sign on.
Parents desperately want to work so they can feed their hungry families. Young people want to work so they can pay for their schooling or that of their younger brothers and sisters.
They are tricked into believing they will be paid for their work.
The basic rule of this global traffic in slaves is that victims flow from poorer countries to richer countries. While it is true that most slaves in the US are trafficked in from other countries, US citizens are also forced into slavery around the country. A recent study found the citizens of more than 35 countries enslaved in the US, with the greatest numbers coming from China, Mexico, and Viet Nam.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 21, 2014, 09:52:19 pm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0g73A-QHvao&feature=player_embedded The Australian Government has gone back to treating the natives horribly. Other very important issues in regard to of the corruption in the media and the government are also discussed by John Pilger. >:(
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 25, 2014, 07:12:40 pm
Agelbert NOTE: The article points at the solution.
What it fails to point out is that every single time ACTUAL solutions like these are brought up, those very same people pretending to be NON-racist scream and holler that "affirmative" action is "reverse prejudice".
IOW, the privileged whites, regardless of their pretense of being "color blind", are, in fact, QUITE MILITANT about making sure their privileged status is not altered one bit! :(
So it goes. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2955.gif&hash=ddc12d8bdb1bc63b7998a6b086b79a71b7bda755)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 27, 2014, 03:56:41 pm
Thomas Locke, CA (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)
Dec 27, 12:19
Signature number 24,481 (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e)
Quote
Dear Mr. President, While I have to admit that no single one of the recent incidents of police using deadly force against minorities could be cited in and of itself as wrongful, the recent rash of such incidents shows there is still a predisposition by police to use more force against African-Americans and Latino Americans than they use against White Americans.
I have read accounts of Whites engaging in criminal mischief without being met with force, or in some cases without their even being arrested, while when minorities engage in similar behavior they are subjected to harsh enforcement. Profiling has no place in this century.
Thomas E. Locke
PETITION: Invite the Brown and Garner families to the State of the Union Address! (http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/859/834/788/)
I wrote to Nathan Empsall, the originator of the Petition:
Thank you Nathan, for this noble effort. With efforts like these, REAL, not cosmetic, structural reforms can be put in place to stop this brutality and provide justice and equal opportunity for people of color on a par with the people of privilege.
Our society is upside down. Empathy gets almost no press and Empire almost all of it. That is exactly backwards from the way it should be in an intelligent society concerned with the welfare of present and future generations.
Nathan, You give me hope for the future because you are truly a person of GOOD WILL! God bless you and your family.
Here are some graphics that underline the importance of what you are doing:
An article I that defines the problem of our racist/fascist police force:
Who Will Police the UNCONSTITUTIONAL Standing Army Brutal Behavior of the Police? http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/geopolitics/power-structures-in-human-society-pros-and-cons-part-1/msg2300/#msg2300
A. G. Gelbert
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 30, 2014, 10:05:38 pm
RACE TALK and the CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE Published on Feb 2, 2015
Quote
Thom's guest for tonight's Conversations with Great Minds is one of America's most influential thinkers on muliticulturalism and race - Professor Derald Wing Sue. Currently a Professor of Psychology and Education at the Teacher's College at Columbia University - Professor Sue has been at the forefront of some the most forward-thinking scholarship on race relations in America.
His book "Microaggressions in Everyday Life" is now considered a classic of its kind - and it won the inaugural UnityFirst dot com National Diversity and Inclusion Book Prize .Professor Sue is also the co-founder and first President of the Asian American Psychological Association. His new book - "Race Talk and the Conspiracy of Silence: Understanding and Facilitating Difficult Dialogues on Race" - is a fascinating look into how we talk about race and racism.
Agelbert NOTE: More proof that the meritocracy is a myth; The reality is a white male privilege pecking order (white females suffer white male prejudice 24/7) with some token diversity for looks. The pecking order includes less advantages for poor and middle class with equal or greater potential (intelligence and ability) than the upper middle class on up. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-291014182422.png&hash=f5178cb31c0bf9067fb3cf408d7047840a10e3f4) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
Columbia University Professor Derald Wing Sue discusses the incorrect academic view that emotion is antagonistic to reason, the (white privilege based) color blind "protocol" (strategic colorblindness), rhetorical incoherence and other techniques used 24/7.
He also says that the ultimate "White Privilege" is to admit there is racism and demonstrate no plans to attempt to change that unfair status quo. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fshame.gif&hash=88b5b0c8644862ef4930e3c7e3556db6c3bf600f) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6961.gif&hash=df13f27d25fd180bcc904f19809e2b35dc3309cf)
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The big problem with meritocracy is that if we allow talented poor children good educations and the ability to rise to the level their talents will allow, then the dull, conventional, blinkered spawn of the affluent will have to fall to the level indicated by their (lack of) ability.
- Vanessa Vitiello Urquhart Slate Writer
The Meritocracy Myth in the USA is a clever, ongoing elite PR stunt called TOKEN opportunities for people of the WRONG color who are poor and/or foreign. Of course the poor and lower middle class whites are NOT given equal opportunities the upper middle class on up have. But they are definitely more advantaged than people of color.
This is NOT about the "most motivated" making it. That's a Social Darwinist (erroneous) view of intelligence that is contradicted by science and human politics on a daily basis. It's also part of the "you can, if you are smart AND aggressive AND determined enough" psychobabble pushed by our society to make people think they have a chance if they really, really are "smart enough". (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03)
That's just another part of the clever con. It serves another purpose besides fooling outsiders into thinking they have a chance to make it; it makes that blinkered spawn, babied into prosperity without any effort (or talent) on their part to merit it, really believe they are special. LOL!
The door is FIRMLY shut to those who would undermine, in any significant numbers, the comfort level of the blinkered spawn of the affluent (and the middle class TOO!).
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 07, 2015, 01:51:43 pm
Michelle Alexander: Ferguson Shows Why Criminal Justice System of "Racial Control" Should Be Undone
SNIPPET 1:
Quote
The U.S. Justice Department has concluded that the police and city courts in Ferguson, Missouri, routinely engaged in a pattern and practice of discrimination against African Americans.
Agelbert NOTE: See water is wet in the USA. OR, just correct the above statement by appropriate word replacement - SEE BELOW:
1) engagedengage 2) Ferguson, Missourithe USA 3) African Americans Primarily African Americans, but including, in decreasing levels of frequency by percentage, ALL minorities AND targeted activist white folks that have issues with fascist police fun and games.
Objective law enforcement? SURE ...(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil12.gif&hash=d1822754cefdd0f77369dacd157d00f5f8d3fff9)
SNIPPET 2:
AMY GOODMAN: Investigators also found that African Americans constituted 96 percent of people arrested in traffic stops solely for an outstanding warrant, 95 percent of jaywalking charges, 94 percent of failure-to-comply charges, 92 percent of all disturbing-the-peace charges. With traffic stops, African-American motorists are twice as likely to be searched when pulled over, even though searches of white drivers are more likely to turn up drugs or other contraband.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 07, 2015, 10:26:18 pm
Why there's no such thing as "Reverse Racism"
by hepshiba
Tim Wise just wrote a great diary on right wing racism. As usual, though, in the comments some folks started claiming that white folks could be the victims of "racism" too. Even though I thought, from Tim's article, that the impossibility of that was clear, it's a point that's very hard to get across.
Coincidentally, an ex-student of mine wrote to me last night and asked me to remind her of my explanation of the impossibility of "Reverse Racism" -- she's in an M.A. program and found herself in a heated argument with some of her peers. So I wrote it down for her and sent it off. I thought, though, that it might be a useful document to post on DailyKos, so here it is...
Tim Wise just wrote a great diary on right wing racism. As usual, though, in the comments some folks started claiming that white folks could be the victims of "racism" too. Even though I thought, from Tim's article, that the impossibility of that was clear, it's a point that's very hard to get across.
Coincidentally, an ex-student of mine wrote to me last night and asked me to remind her of my explanation of the impossibility of "Reverse Racism" -- she's in an M.A. program and found herself in a heated argument with some of her peers. So I wrote it down for her and sent it off. I thought, though, that it might be a useful document to post on DailyKos, so here it is...
In any discussion of racism and it's alleged "Reverse," it's crucial to start with the definitions of prejudice and discrimination, to lay the foundation for understanding racism in context. There's a reason these three terms exist, and a very good reason not to conflate them, as I'll demonstrate below.
Prejudice is an irrational feeling of dislike for a person or group of persons, usually based on stereotype. Virtually everyone feels some sort of prejudice, whether it's for an ethnic group, or for a religious group, or for a type of person like blondes or fat people or tall people. The important thing is they just don't like them -- in short, prejudice is a feeling, a belief. You can be prejudiced, but still be a fair person if you're careful not to act on your irrational dislike.
Discrimination takes place the moment a person acts on prejudice. This describes those moments when one individual decides not to give another individual a job because of, say, their race or their religious orientation. Or even because of their looks (there's a lot of hiring discrimination against "unattractive" women, for example). You can discriminate, individually, against any person or group, if you're in a position of power over the person you want to discriminate against. White people can discriminate against black people, and black people can discriminate against white people if, for example, one is the interviewer and the other is the person being interviewed.
Racism, however, describes patterns of discrimination that are institutionalized as "normal" throughout an entire culture. It's based on an ideological belief that one "race" is somehow better than another "race". It's not one person discriminating at this point, but a whole population operating in a social structure that actually makes it difficult for a person not to discriminate.
A clear cut example is a slave-holding culture: people are born into a society where one sort of person is "naturally" a master, and another sort of person is "naturally" a slave (and sometimes not considered a person at all, but a beast of burden). In a culture like that, discrimination is built into the social, economic and political fabric, and individuals -- even "free" individuals -- don't really have a choice about whether they discriminate or not because even if they don't believe in slavery, they interact every day with slaves and the laws and rules that keep slaves bound. In a racist society, it takes a special act of courage and willingness to subject oneself to scandal or danger to step outside that system and become an abolitionist. It's not the "fault" of every member of the master class that slavery exists, and some might wish it was gone. But the fact is that every single member of the master class benefits from the unpaid labor of slaves at every level of society because they simply can't avoid consuming the products that slavery produces, or benefiting from the exploitation of slave labor. So unless members of the master class rise up and oppose the system and try to overthrow it (abolitionists, for example), they're going to be complicit in the slave system: even abolitionists will profit -- against their will -- in the slave system because they still have to wear clothes or use other things the system produced.
The above is an extreme, clear example, which I use to make it easier to see the fuzzier, more complex situations in which we operate today. Despite the fact that slaves were freed by the Emancipation Proclamation, and that the 14th Amendment gave African Americans voting rights, the institutional structures of racism were not overturned. Even after the 14th was passed, white people still had the power to prevent black people from voting by instituting the poll tax, the grandfather clause, and the "understanding" clause which required blacks to recite any segment of the Constitution the registrar wanted them to recite. In the Sixties, the Civil Rights Voting Acts were passed, which knocked down those obstacles to voting. But black Americans still do not have political power in proportion to their presence in the population (even though there's a black President).
If you look at important voting bodies like the Federal and the State senates and congresses, or at the Federal and State supreme courts, or at the CEO list of major corporations, or at any other body that wields substantial power in the U.S., you will count only a few black faces (and in some cases, none). Out of the number of black faces you count, most of them will not be representing the views of the majority of black people in this country, but the views of the white majority. On the other hand, if you count the number of black people in poverty, and in prisons, or the number of people who are unemployed or lack health care, there are far more black people in these categories than is proportionate to their numbers in the larger society.
Unless you are going to argue that blacks are "naturally" inferior to whites (which is an outright racist position), you have to admit that there is some mechanism that is limiting black opportunity. That's the mechanism we call "racism" -- the interacting social, political, and economic rule systems that all discriminate, either overtly (racial profiling, for example) or covertly (i.e., white majority governments redrawing district voting lines so that black majority areas are politically split up and don't have the electoral power to vote in black candidates; or, white-run banks using zip codes as a criteria for excluding people who apply for loans, and just "happening" to exclude all the majority black neighborhoods in a city, a practice called "red-lining"). One could go on for hours about these various mechanisms, and I'm sure you can think of plenty on your own which discriminate against blacks, Hispanics, "Arab-looking" people, Native Americans, & so on.
Now to "Reverse Racism." It's crucial to maintain the distinction between the above three terms, because otherwise white people tend to redefine "Discrimination" as "Racism". Their main argument is that because both blacks and white can discriminate against each other, that "Reverse Racism" is possible. But the truth of the matter is that black people: 1) have far less opportunity to discriminate against whites than whites have to discriminate against blacks, overall; and 2) black people lack a system of institutionalized support that protect them when they discriminate against whites.
It took black and white people working together for one hundred years to get programs like Affirmative Action installed in the U.S., but it took one white man (Alan Bakke) only a single Supreme Court case to get those programs dismantled because he felt he didn't gain entry into medical school based on his white race.
"Reverse Racism" would only describe a society in which all the rules and roles were turned upside down. That has not happened in the U.S., however much white right wing ideologues want to complain that they're being victimized by the few points of equality that minorities and women have managed to claim. White people who complain about "Reverse Racism" are actually complaining about being denied their privileges, rather than being denied their rights. They feel entitled to be hired and not to be discriminated against, even though the norm is white people discriminating against blacks. If, in a rare instance, a black employer discriminates against a white job applicant, that's not "reverse" anything -- it's simple discrimination. It's to be condemned on principle, but it's not evidence of some systematic program by which whites are being deprived of their rights.
The right wing popularized the term "Reverse Racism" because they were really angry at having their white privileges challenged. Anyone who uses that phrase, whether they are right wing or not, furthers the right wing's cause. This is what I tell Democrats and progressives who I hear using the term -- not only are they being inaccurate, but they're helping out their opponents.
The above arguments can be applied to any institutionalized structure of oppression, affecting any race, ethnic or religious group, and can be used to to oppose claims of "Reverse Sexism" too.
I hope that clarifies things a bit. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e) ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2015, 05:42:44 pm
Tue Apr 07, 2015 at 09:52 PM PDT.
Ferguson, MO City Council Becomes Diverse as Two African Americans Win Office (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.runemasterstudios.com%2Fgraemlins%2Fimages%2F2thumbs.gif&hash=98130be1edf2bed4a80ac8f134b0126673bd469e)
Tue Apr 07, 2015 at 06:31 AM PDT. Three black men, convicted as teens, exonerated in Ohio after serving 20 years in prison (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
by Shaun King
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/07/1376122/-Three-black-men-convicted-as-teens-exonerated-released-in-Ohio-after-serving-20-years-in-prison Tue Apr 07, 2015 at 02:51 PM PDT. Police officer to face murder charges for shooting man in back 8 times
by Walter Einenkel
PICTURE OF THE MURDER (Yeah, it was a WHITE cop KILLING a BLACK man >:() at link. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/07/1376242/-Police-officer-to-face-murder-charges-for-shooting-man-in-back-8-times
If you have not read "The Unsteady March", then you do not know what has actually been DONE to African Americans in this country since over a century BEFORE 1776. They were promised property and equality when they were needed (USED (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183312.bmp&hash=02dafef2fe739676600fdc9bd56271f0f5ab3723)) for a war and subsequently denied everything promised and systematically ABUSED through denial of "white" rights under the law.
The next war comes and the same empty promises are given, only to have the POLICE and the COURTS "put them in their place again" after the war. :(
And don't think it is an equal up and down thing. It is not. The duration of the war(s), along with the empty promises (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.u.arizona.edu%2F%7Epatricia%2Fcute-collection%2Fsmileys%2Flying-smiley.gif&hash=a34c2f7344d5f54f7009a4e684bb6c7310cdda03), is short in comparison with the LENGTHY periods of abuse, murder, crushing poverty and demonization (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fshrk.gif&hash=96ffb60cb25efb2a5b789ad51b531420ed1c1b36). ]Like the Native Americans, African Americans have ALWAYS been a people under a clever and ruthless RACIST siege by MOST (not just the powerful) Americans of white European descent.
And the BLACK president? ::) Obama knows he is a token that had better tow the line in the unending gaming of minorities in this fascist paradise. Being a "house ****" is the ONLY real path to a certain amount of prosperity and tranquility that African Americans have EVER HAD in the USA. The Constitution WAS NOT written for African Americans.
"The Unsteady March: The Rise and Decline of Racial Equality in America" by Philip A. Klinkner and Rogers M. Smith is reviewed.
Quote
In spite of the history of enslavement, hostility, and continued discrimination experienced by African Americans, it is possible to put together an optimistic portrait of racial progress in the United States. In a series of constitutional amendments following the Civil War, former slaves were recognized as American citizens and promised constitutional rights, including full political participation. And in spite of many setbacks along the way, there have been significant improvements in the social, political, and economic conditions for most black Americans over the last fifty years. However, it is also possible to assemble a very pessimistic account of the historical and contemporary status of African Americans. The promise of racial freedom and progress of the Reconstruction Era ended in little more than a decade after the Civil War. The rise of Jim Crow, sanctioned by state law throughout the South, and the system of de facto segregation and semi-official discrimination in the rest of the country were only ended by the power of the Civil Rights movement and the threat of a second civil war.
In spite of significant economic improvements and the creation of a sizable black middle class, there has been only modest progress in the racial integration of neighborhoods, schools, churches, and other social institutions. Playing the race card to mobilize white voters based on their fears of blacks has been a perennial feature of American politics.
Social science has not had an easy time providing a plausible theoretical explanation of this complex and often contradictory history of race relations in the United States. Any theory of continuity, whether of unremitting white racism or of gradual enlightenment, is inconsistent with the zigs and zags of history. Historians tend to eschew broad theoretical accounts in favor of interpretations of trends and events in specific periods. Most social scientists focus on the contemporary period that usually allows for an assumption of stability or only one major historical change that requires an explanation.
In a very bold volume, political scientists Philip Klinkner and Rogers Smith take on the task of explaining the entire fabric of American race relations, from seventeenth century Virginia to the political dynamics of the Reagan and Clinton administrations of the late twentieth century. Even though the authors fall short of their ambitions. The Unsteady March: The Rise and Decline of Racial Equality in America is a book with a novel interpretation that deserves serious discussion and debate.
In a nutshell, Klinkner and Smith argue that African Americans have only made progress when black soldiers were essential for winning a war. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039) During the Revolutionary War, somewhere between five and eight thousand blacks served as soldiers; and perhaps one-hundred thousand slaves, about one-fifth of the total slave population, gained their freedom through one means or another during this period.
Agelbert NOTE:The book was written by academic scholars. It is just over 417 pages long. It has a bibliography that references absolutely every quote and historical activity provided as evidence for the way it REALLY WORKS (past AND PRESENT) in this country. Bring a sandwich if you want to challenge these scholars. 8)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2015, 07:02:07 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2015, 07:42:58 pm
Sugary Drinks in Communities of Color: Recent Research and Policy Options for Reducing Consumption
2015-03-17 at 11.07.03 AM
This policy brief investigates sugary drink consumption in communities of color, focusing on the public health impact and marketing of such products, and policy options to facilitate healthy beverage consumption. It also discusses how decision makers can work to prevent childhood obesity and related illnesses by advancing policies to reduce the marketing and appeal of sugary drinks—and increase the availability of healthy alternatives—in communities of color.
Facts at a Glance:
•Consumption of sugary drinks is associated with poor health outcomes,including excessive weight gain, childhood and adult obesity, type 2 diabetes, and tooth decay.
•Children who drink a 12-ounce soda every day are 60 percent more likely to become obese than those who do not.
•People of color are more likely to have limited access to healthy beverages, more inclined to consume sugary beverages, and more affected by preventable chronic diseases.
•Food and beverage companies disproportionately target marketing efforts promoting sugary drinks toward people of color.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 11, 2015, 02:01:36 am
“Being A Cop Showed Me Just How Racist And Violent Police Are. There’s Only One Fix.” By Redditt Hudson / Washington Post April 8th, 2015 Redditt Hudson, a former cop, works for the NAACP and chairs the board of the Ethics Project. The views expressed here are his own.
As a kid, I got used to being stopped by the police. I grew up in an inner-ring suburb of St. Louis. It was the kind of place where officers routinely roughed up my friends and family for no good reason. I hated the way cops treated me.
But I knew police weren’t all bad. One of my father’s closest friends was a cop. He became a mentor to me and encouraged me to join the force. He told me that I could use the police’s power and resources to help my community.
So in 1994, I joined the St. Louis Police Department. I quickly realized how naive I’d been. I was floored by the dysfunctional culture I encountered.
I won’t say all, but many of my peers were deeply racist.
One example: A couple of officers ran a Web site called St. Louis Coptalk, where officers could post about their experience and opinions. At some point during my career, it became so full of racist rants that the site administrator temporarily shut it down. Cops routinely called anyone of color a “thug,” whether they were the victim or just a bystander.
This attitude corrodes the way policing is done.
As a cop, it shouldn’t surprise you that people will curse at you, or be disappointed by your arrival. That’s part of the job. But too many times, officers saw young black and brown men as targets. They would respond with force to even minor offenses. And because cops are rarely held accountable for their actions, they didn’t think too hard about the consequences.
Once, I accompanied an officer on a call. At one home, a teenage boy answered the door. That officer accused him of harboring a robbery suspect, and demanded that he let her inside. When he refused, the officer yanked him onto the porch by his throat and began punching him.
Another officer met us and told the boy to stand. He replied that he couldn’t. So the officer slammed him against the house and cuffed him. When the boy again said he couldn’t walk, the officer grabbed him by his ankles and dragged him to the car. It turned out the boy had been on crutches when he answered the door, and couldn’t walk.
Back at the department, I complained to the sergeant. I wanted to report the misconduct. But my manager squashed the whole thing and told me to get back to work.
I, too, have faced mortal danger. I’ve been shot at and attacked. But I know it’s almost always possible to defuse a situation.
Once, a sergeant and I got a call about someone wielding a weapon in an apartment. When we showed up, we found someone sitting on the bed with a very large butcher knife. Rather than storming him and screaming “put the knife down” like my colleagues would have done, we kept our distance. We talked to him, tried to calm him down.
It became clear to us that he was dealing with mental illness. So eventually, we convinced him to come to the hospital with us.
I’m certain many other officers in the department would have escalated the situation fast. They would have screamed at him, gotten close to him, threatened him. And then, any movement from him, even an effort to drop the knife, would have been treated as an excuse to shoot until their clips were empty. * * *
I liked my job, and I was good at it.
But more and more, I felt like I couldn’t do the work I set out to do. I was participating in a profoundly corrupt criminal justice system. I could not, in good conscience, participate in a system that was so intentionally unfair and racist. So after five years on the job, I quit.
Since I left, I’ve thought a lot about how to change the system. I’ve worked on police abuse, racial justice and criminal justice reform at the Missouri ACLU and other organizations.
Unfortunately, I don’t think better training alone will reduce police brutality. My fellow officers and I took plenty of classes on racial sensitivity and on limiting the use of force. The problem is that cops aren’t held accountable for their actions, and they know it. These officers violate rights with impunity.They know there’s a different criminal justice system for civilians and police.
Even when officers get caught, they know they’ll be investigated by their friends, and put on paid leave. My colleagues would laughingly refer to this as a free vacation. It isn’t a punishment. And excessive force is almost always deemed acceptable in our courts and among our grand juries. Prosecutors are tight with law enforcement, and share the same values and ideas.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 12, 2015, 09:16:28 pm
UB, I wish the "Mom and Pop" MYTH would JUST GO AWAY!
I have been subjected to SEVERE prejudice and treatment at those "beloved bastions of free enterprise" you worship enough times to AVOID THEM LIKE THE PLAGUE (which was their intention, of course). ALL those big box stores all over this country HELPED minority NON-WHITES to get fair treatment and reasonable prices. All the evils of those giant efficient store systems made a few people horribly rich and have shafted many WHITE small town employees and store owners along the way. That was, and is, WRONG. But moaning and groaning about the "saintly" Mom and Pop stores scares the **** out of minorities. WHY? Because it is CODE SPEECH for nostalgia for the "good old" RACIST days!
MOM AND POP STORES were the bigotry and price gouging FRONT LINE against people like me in this country before the big box stores came along. THEY STILL ARE in Vermont and other places not totally Walmartized. I KNOW what Mon and Pop restaurants and bed and breakfasts I WANT TO AVOID (ALL of them) if I know what is good for me.
I STOPPED going even to chain restaurants AND fast food outlets several years ago, not for health reasons (although now that is the main reason I don't eat out ANYWHERE). BECAUSE of the dirty looks and delayed service. I was even treated to a caterpillar in my lettuce at a Friendlies Restaurant. I said nothing. My wife had her leg in a cast and I didn't want to ruin the meal for her. So I casually covered the little fellow with my napkin. At first, since the waitress was friendly, I thought it was just one of those things. However, I noticed somebody from the kitchen walked by and looked at me out of the corner of his eye TWICE. I was NOT attracting any attention.
And Friendlies isn't even "Mom and Pop"! You DON'T want to know about the looks I have received at other chain restaurants from rather large, white and menacing looking Vermonters.
Forget venturing into one of those "Mom and Pop" places they have here. At a "Mom and Pop" hardware store I waited a full 10 minutes while THREE attendants studiously avoided eye contact with me while talking in a group. There were NO OTHER COSTUMERS IN THE STORE. I never went back there (which was their plan, of course).
I DO NOT BELIEVE in the "FREEDOM" of people to treat other people like ****, GET IT!!? If you open a business for HUMAN BEINGS TO EAT AT or SLEEP AT, you DO NOT have the "right" to treat people poorly because you think they are LESS THAN YOU.
THAT is what those MOM AND POP **** ACTUALLY BELIEVED WAS (and IS) their "right". BUL LS HIT!
I'm GLAD Walmart, Lowes, Home Depot and so on DESTROYED the racist based profits of those Mom and Pop stores! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Ftuzki-bunnys%2Ftuzki-bunny-emoticon-022.gif&hash=3b60da70b71b7109fe66036056cb1dedc1affb43)
And millions upon millions of blacks/Hispanics/orientals/brown people FEEL EXACTLY THE SAME WAY!
FU CK the Mom and Pop ASS HOLES who nurtured, protected and profited from a RACIST SYSTEM. Put that in your Libertarian pipe and SMOKE IT! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Femoticons%2Ftuzki-bunnys%2Ftuzki-bunny-emoticon-005.gif&hash=c0f70cc821100c434469eae24e0fa6131745ab51)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 13, 2015, 02:16:18 pm
I live right on the path of a marathon. A few weeks ago, my neighbors and I were gathered in our courtyard, enjoying sun and the runners whizzing past. We are a multi-culti group of residents, Latinos, Asians, Whites and African-Americans. One of the residents had friends over to watch the marathon, and as we all chatted, one of the White male guests casually commented to two others about what was happening in his old neighborhood, yada yada, "wetbacks", yada yada. I froze for a second. There were at least 4 Latinos standing in our midst, and my White neighbors have always been extremely friendly. No one said anything. The men kept discussing "ghetto people," crime, guarding their cars, etc.
It was like being in college again. I knew I would say something, I knew the "Seven Steps of Denial" would come up, I knew my neighbor, who'd invited this man, would never speak to me again, etc. I let that all go, stepped over to the men, and said, I'd heard what they said, that this was my home, and that his language was not okay.
The Seven Steps of Denial that next unfolded took less than 20 minutes (this sometimes happened over the course of days in college): 1) "I didn't do it." Wide-eyed stare and shrug from one of the listeners. 2) "It's not my problem." The other listener walks away.
3) "It was a fluke/out of character." The man I addressed said, "I'm sorry, I never say things like that." (I reply, "It's not my business if you say it, but you can't say it here where I live.")
4) "I'm not guilty by association/One of my best friends is___." The man I addressed said, "I'm sorry. My uncle is Hispanic, I mean not one of THOSE Hispanics, he didn't come over on a boat--" I cut him off, admittedly. I said, "You are sorry you were overheard. And I'm guessing your uncle does not know you call Latinos w***." I turn to the wide-eyed guy, who is muscular, covered in tattoos and has short-cropped hair. "Can you relate to this a little? I'm guessing people see you and think you're an ex-con or just cross the street." The tattooed man says, "Why are you making this about me?" I reply that "it's everyone's responsibility to say something."
5) "You're overreacting/hyper-sensitive." The tattooed man says, "People are too hyper-sensitive to this stuff." I reply, "No, people are under-sensitive." He walks away.
6) "I'll just assert my inherent entitlement/dominance/superiority over you." The man I addressed steps up and firmly says, "I said I'm sorry. You want to call the police?" I say just as firmly, "Are you kidding? You're in my home. You can go." Another resident comes over and asks who invited him and whose fault he is (literally). I walk back to watch the race. 6) "Your thinking I'm a racist, based on an actual thing I've just said or done, cannot be allowed to stand." The man I addressed does not leave. He keeps coming over to apologize, to say he isn't a racist, to mention his Hispanic uncle again, etc. Another resident, who is White and married to a Latina, tells him he'd have punched him in the face if his wife had been outside. I ignore the man I'd originally addressed and watch the marathon.
7) "Your mentioning race is an affront to our sensibilities." No one at the gathering speaks to me for the rest of the marathon, and the resident who'd invited the man I addressed stops speaking to me in passing.
So decades after shaking my head about this with 20 year olds, it was interesting to hear Dixon D. White, a half-White/half-Cuban, self-identified Southern redneck and former racist, sit in his Ford F-150 and talk so deeply about something so few have tools to think about. I like that he said it was everyone's responsibility (and agree). I like that he said that the African-Americans who have reached out to him have experienced "truth deprivation" from a world that denies and reframes racism.
Dixon D. White: "I challenge all of you to post a video with your smart phones about race and post it on social media! Let's do the damn thing!"
But I really like his call to action. I asked many times when I used to engage regularly here for someone to explain what happens when racism is mentioned, what is the chain of thoughts that triggers such consistent and passionate resistance/denial? I wanted to understand it then; I realized today, I still do.
Maybe it's not the world - maybe it's just my life that will change, one selfie-stick video at a time.
P.S. it's been so long since I posted, I'm not sure what tags to add.
2:15 PM PT: No selfie-stick, but here's another testimonial from Dallas newscaster Dale Hansen:
Read more and watch videos from honest white people who get it at link: :coffee:
"Redneck's" viral video calls for "white racial responsibility" videos (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/10/1376881/--Redneck-s-viral-video-calls-for-other-whites-to-post-their-own-white-racial-responsility-videos)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 13, 2015, 02:32:02 pm
TDOS, The problem most humans have with reality is that they lack the ability to put themselves in the shoes of other people due to ingrained prejudices about "taking care of their own" against whoever is out there that might try to bang their daughter or take their stuff.
This egocentric attitude based on the primitive society "wisdom" of taking care of number one and his or her offspring/tribe worked okay when there weren't that many people around.
But now that there are many of us, the HYPOCRISY of documents like the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights are in plain view. Yet people claim that everybody "gets what the deserve". (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe)
No, since Thomas Jefferson and George Washington calmly planned to starve, demonize, ostracize, marginalize ETC. the Native Americans in order to steal their land while the African Americans were "kept in their place", NOTHING HAS CHANGED in this country.
Do you know what minorities think about all those "rights" we supposedly have? They think it is all bul ls hit. Do you know what many of them think of Socialism? They think it's a con game to enslave them in a slightly different way that Capitalism shafts them by being a "property rights" front for bigotry and prejudice.
You might say that minorities EXPECT to be lied to and double talked to from here to the moon because THAT is the way it has ALWAYS been.
There has been a CONCERTED effort in this country since the end of the Civil War to PREVENT minorities from owning property and businesses. When a leader of said minorities appears, he or she is either bought or bopped. THAT is how you can get GROSSLY duplicitous, mendacious and perfidious crap spewed from the mouth of bigots about those "rich" blacks taking the jobs away from "Mom and Pop".
The hell of all this that whitey does not get is that by gaming the minorities to fu ck them over per secula seculorum, the INSTANT minorities are given a tiny bit of relief from being under a 24/7 siege, they go for it, even if it is going to be deleterious to their own well being eventually. They DON'T CARE. All they see is that what they had was SH IT. All, they see is their leaders getting bought off and then raised up by whitey as examples of the rest of the minorities. They CANNOT catch a break with whitey.
SO, they actually will embrace fascism and dictatorship if they get more freedom in that society than they had in the "Mom and Pop", small town friendly police (to whites), democratic towns (for whites) era.
Justice really does require affirmative action and massive reverse taxation reparations to minorities. That AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN because whitey STILL thinks minorities are "free loaders", thanks to centuries of demonization of said minorities.
WHY do you think the big political parties in the US are going after the latino vote? Because its EASY to sucker people that are desperate for a break.
Thomas Jefferson and George Washington et al planted a twisted racist seed. It is now almost full grown. The fruit of that tree is not freedom; it is fascism.
Treating minorities like sh it has consequences. Everybody loses because the bastards behind this racist system deliberately fomented denigration, hatred, marginalization, cruelty and suspicion of the other since long before 1776.
Now most of the minorities are every bit as "racist" as the those who visited them with racism. THAT IS THE FAULT OF THE DOMINANT GROUP, no matter what disingenuous claim to innocence the dominant group (European descended land owning white males) pis ses and moans about.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 13, 2015, 11:47:38 pm
GO said,
Quote
Facts like the millions of immigrants coming to America with hopes and dreams from another country and making it through hard work in their own small business have no place here Unc.
It's all about victim weeping Leftist BS here.
MORE offensive, deliberate distortion of reality, in the service of private property and racist privilege, by the sneering mocker of all minorities and poor. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00) Next you will show us another picture of some rich guy enjoying some veal.
YOU HAVE NO SHAME, GO.
HERE are some FACTS to stick up your perspective challenged, Libertarian ****:
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May 12, 2014 - Minority businesses make up almost 15 percent of the 28 million small businesses and employ 5.9 million workers in the United States. Minorities include people in any category other than non-Hispanic white, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
THAT MEANS EIGHTY FIVE PERCENT PLUS IS OWNED by WHITES, MR. BULL****!!! And most OF THE TINY percentage of minority owned business ARE IN MAJOR METROPOLITAN AREAS because they will NOT get community support (or get trashed) in pretty suburban places like YOU like to live in. THEY ARE FORCED to limit WHERE they open a business thanks to WHITE GREEDY BIGOTS. SPARE me the "Chinese restaurants are everywhere", PAL! And that is after 400 ****ing YEARS, you ignorant, bigoted buffon!Take your double talk to your pals at TBP where they think JUST LIKE YOU.
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In 2007, Asians owned 1.6 million businesses, African-Americans owned 1.9 million, Hispanics owned 2.3 million, and Native American/Pacific Islander owned 0.3 million, according to the most recent data from the Small Business Administration.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101639528
NO Surly, I AM NOT going to apologize. Delete this post if you want. I am SICK AND TIRED of this bloated ****ANT GO playing the part of the injured party. **** HIM, HIS GOLD, HIS GREED and HIS DELIBERATE, PREJUDICED and MENDACIOUS DISTORTIONS OF REALITY!
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 21, 2015, 07:43:02 pm
Person steals property, resists arrest and insults police. WATCH what happens. ;)
The officers attempting to detain her also declined to press charges for resisting.
Instead, Manhart was given a criminal trespass warning which effectively bans her from any university activity, including graduation and football games, said Andy Clark, vice president for enrollment, marketing and communications.
IOW she gave the authorities the finger and got off with a restraining order. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) Remember folks, in this country the REAL religion is THIS: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fd2.gif&hash=98d536bf1047a88ef91e9c45e08b725347c9fe13) FLAG=God=M.I.C. USA! USA! USA!
This is the PRIESTHOOD: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978)
DETAILS HERE (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/20/1378893/-White-Woman-Steals-Flag-Resists-Arrest-Watch-What-Happens)
Quote
"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored." -- Aldous Huxley
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 07, 2015, 07:54:50 pm
Sat May 02, 2015 at 05:23 AM PDT. Shocking Facts for Anti-Blacks by TheLovingThinkingFighter
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Has anyone visited the comment section of an MSN news story, which involved police brutality of blacks, or just blacks? If you have, you probably noticed an ill feeling in your gut as you read the horrendous comments posted by anti-black racists. If it was against all other races except for their own, they would just be racists; but no, their particular gripe is against the people with the darkest of dark skin tones. The article I visited that had this latest batch of typed fecal was, "TIME magazine asks how much has really changed in America since the '60s". The cringe-worthy diatribes against blacks outnumbered any commenters with brains... I know, because I posted a reply myself. I know, it was a waste of time - but it felt to me as if just leaving the comments section vacant of any reason and logic, would've drawn in some poor young person to fall for whatever terrible trash was posted without some rebuttal. I was going to post another, but said post was longer than first intended, and I felt it would have been wasted on a short-lived news story's comments section. So instead, I decided to post it here, so if you ever run into a poo-flinging mouth breather, you can redirect them here or copy and paste parts to use as a quick response to stupid comments. (If they learned how to read that is.) [I'm mixed, (Hispanic & black,) but I wrote this in a way so to make sound less like I'm being the representative of all black people.].
Here are a few things you might find a bit of a shock: 1.) Blacks don't want your pity and sympathy, they want your respect, empathy, and equal opportunity. No matter how hard blacks try, this country never gives all three. They are said to be available, but it rarely is, if ever. Many blacks are held responsible for the actions of the few, blamed for the breakdown of society, and seen as the most inferior in many aspects compared to other skin colors. As a result, blacks are excluded from the inclusive, beaten without question, and killed without remorse. The most peaceful are labeled cowards, the bravest are labeled violent, adults are patronized like children, and children are treated like adults. This is all while being exploited for profit, have their successes ignored, failures paraded, and berated for just existing. Blacks take such mistreatment for years, and whenever they want to have a dialogue about this, they are accused of being "race-baiters" or "uppity troublemakers". Then when they finally react to their mistreatment, it is somehow assumed that there is no reason to act that way, so that must be just the way they are. All of this makes it near impossible to achieve any cordial interracial relationship, even with those considered as the "few good ones" who "pull themselves up and become great citizens." 2.) Black culture IS American culture. Everything racists despise blacks for, you see every other U.S. citizen do: Blacks glorify crime? The Sopranos was a top-rated show across the U.S., and pirates are beloved fantastical characters. Blacks are always asking for handouts? Last I checked, so does the other 61.2% of recipients, with the majority of those being whites. Blacks are so violent? In Walmart, you have the choice of getting a copy of Dirty Harry or GTA, before heading for your next NRA meeting. Am I saying blacks don’t have their own culture? Yes and no; but hey, that happens when your ancestors are kidnapped and stripped of much of their old ways. Over time however, blacks adapted to their new home and contributed with their own innovations, but they were only well incorporated into America’s culture after racism tried to remove any black identity. 3.) Other minorities did go through hard times, and they did react violently to injustice too, despite how passive you thought they were to get to where they are now. Remember all of the Indian Wars and AIM during the 1960's and 70's? Remember the Jewish uprisings in Europe, and the people like Meyer Lansky in the States during WWII? I doubt many remember the Manzanar Riot. Yeah, people without black skin managed to fair better in American society than those with, in spite of being just as qualified for the same treatment. Why? Here are two major reasons: a.) lighter skin meant an easier time blending in with whites, than someone with darker skin, (especially if they could pass themselves off as white,) and b.) except for Native Americans, many minorities made the choice to come to America. They may not have had a lot of money or familiar faces with them, but they came and kept much of what they brought with them. Blacks…not so much. 4.) When a community is stricken with poverty and abuse, it’s much less likely anybody living there will feel as if they are a part of it. If when you move into a neighborhood, and the area’s residents are prejudice against you, they will intentionally make things hard for you. When the wealthier residents let their prejudice get the best of them and move away, taking their personal funds and investments with them, there is going to be poverty. When corrupt elected officials, (both left and right,) defund education and social services, there is going to be a lack of education and fewer avenues to receive aid. If you work long hours at multiple minimum-wage jobs just to make a living, and still not able to afford certain needs and amenities, you are going to hate those establishments.
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Poverty + Inadequate Education and Services + High Effort, Low Paying Jobs = Desperation, Depression, Frustration.
This leads to more crime, more drug usage, and less stable families. Anyone in a situation like this would feel trapped in a community where they feel unappreciated, unsafe, and unlikely to move up the social ladder; it feels more like a penal colony than something worth living in. You feel like the community is not your own. Yet despite that, you try to make the best out of this situation, and then here come the cops. The ones who are supposed to protect and serve you, instead victimize you. If you run, you die! If you startle the officer, you die! If you give up, dead! If you even sneeze, dead! Is it racism? Classism? Both? Whichever the case, only so much can be piled on any human being before they break. It doesn't matter if the next individual was innocent or a small-time crook, if they die unarmed while complying, surrendering, in custody, running away in fear, or just minding their own business, it all will boil over. When that break finally happens, don't be surprised that you find yourself targeting police cars, minimum-wage work places, stores with unaffordable needs and wants, and homes with shoddy upkeep. Is this a good idea? To anyone not living there, of course not…but if you look under the surface, it becomes a little more understandable.
5.) “Black Lives Matter”, means black lives matter AS MUCH as everyone else’s. People with brains get the message, which is why you see people of many colors march together against police brutality and racism. Meanwhile, racists somehow see the term “Black Lives Matter” as a challenge; as blacks are worth more than everyone else, or that blacks are the only victims to brutality. With that, racists are offended by the term, and accuse blacks of being bigots with victim complexes.
Blacks have been in America since the Spanish. Blacks are not going anywhere and are not going to stop demanding a fair shake. If you still have some humility left, stop ignoring and demonizing an entire people for the sake of secretly making yourself feel better than others. We are all human; we are all more complex than just good and evil, and skin certainly doesn't dictate who a person is. Don't like that truth? Get used to it! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 02, 2015, 11:57:27 pm
Addressing environmental racism to ensure rights for everyone in Canada (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
May 20, 2015 | By Katie Perfitt, Blue Dot Community Organizer
By Katie Perfitt, Blue Dot Community Organizer 5/20/2015
In April, the conversation about environmental rights took a significant step forward with a private member’s bill introduced in the Nova Scotia legislature. Bill 111 is called An Act to Address Environmental Racism. Although it wasn’t passed before the legislature adjourned for the summer, it shines a light on a fundamental concept in our work.
We cannot talk about environmental rights unless we also acknowledge historical and continuing injustice. Unfortunately, we have plenty in Canada. Environmental racism and the broader concept of environmental injustice and inequity describe situations in which disadvantaged and vulnerable communities bear a disproportionate burden of preventable environmental health hazards, such as pollution, environmental degradation and the effects of climate change.
In Nova Scotia and elsewhere, many serious issues that come up when we’re talking about environmental rights — lack of fresh air and clean water, lack of access to unspoiled nature, health impacts — are disproportionately experienced by people who have been historically marginalized.
The disproportionate location of polluting industry sites and other environmental hazards close to racially marginalized communities is just one reason the connection between environmental rights and environmental racism cannot be understated.
That’s why we consistently say we want to ensure fresh air, clean water and healthy food for all. We’re not just talking about a majority of people who live in Canada; we’re talking about every person who lives here. No matter where you live, how much money you earn or what colour your skin is, you shouldn’t have to live in an area where dumping or industrial processes put your health at risk.
Many of us are fortunate to live in a healthy environment. But in Nova Scotia — similar to many parts of Canada — when you see pulp mill or a dump, you’ll often see a First Nations band, or an Acadian or African Nova Scotian community nearby. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2955.gif&hash=ddc12d8bdb1bc63b7998a6b086b79a71b7bda755)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mrwallpaper.com%2Fwallpapers%2FSad-Sunflower.jpg&hash=ac9f33a23da8f73b88a002b6f4421f8c42327406)
These are serious issues that challenge us to confront who we are and who we want to be as a people. As Martin Luther King Jr. stated,
Quote
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
People in communities that experience the worst impacts must be given a chance to tell their stories and to be involved in creating solutions for problems they did not create. Until that happens, we can’t as a collective be healthy. By confronting environmental racism we can begin to look for solutions so we can find environmental justice for all people in Canada.
Just a few months ago, the Nova Scotia government passed Bill 89, to clean up Boat Harbour (a pulp mill effluent site on First Nations’ land). While this is an important step for the province, and long overdue for the community, Boat Harbour is only one Nova Scotia community that has experienced environmental racism. Other notable examples include Africville, East Preston and Lincolnville. Bill 111, also known as the Environmental Racism Prevention Act, is the first step in acknowledging and accepting responsibility for widespread environmental racism in the province.
Although the bill is profound in its intent, it’s modest in its aims. Introduced by NDP MLA Lenore Zann, Bill 111 proposes to establish an independent panel to consult the public on environmental racism in Nova Scotia and make recommendations to government. The legislature adjourned for the summer before a vote could be held, but we hope the issue will be back on the political agenda during the fall sitting.
It’s a conversation that’s long overdue, and this bill starts us down a path of seeing the environment, social justice, racism and our shared future in a new light: holistic, with integrity and improved health for everyone.
Read more about Bill 111
Bill 111 – Legislative text
David Suzuki Foundation proposal for an environmental health equity agenda for Canada (page 44 in the Green Budget Coalition Recommendations for Budget 2015)
Canadian Centre for Environmental Health Equity http://bluedot.ca/stories/addressing-environmental-racism-to-ensure-rights-for-everyone-in-canada/
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 06, 2015, 03:15:31 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 06, 2015, 03:45:39 pm
Repetitive Motion Disorder: Black Reality and White Denial in America by Tim Wise
I suppose there is no longer much point in debating the facts surrounding the shooting of Michael Brown. First, because Officer Darren Wilson has been cleared by a grand jury, and even the collective brilliance of a thousand bloggers pointing out the glaring inconsistencies in his version of events that August day won’t result in a different outcome. And second, because Wilson's guilt or innocence was always somewhat secondary to the larger issue: namely, the issue of this gigantic national inkblot staring us in the face, and what we see when we look at it---and more to the point, why?
Because it is a kind of racial Rorschach (is it not?) into which each of these cases---not just Brown but all the others, from Trayvon Martin to Sean Bell to Patrick Dorismond to Aswan Watson and beyond---inevitably and without fail morph. That we see such different things when we look upon them must mean something. That so much of white America cannot see the shapes made out so clearly by most of black America cannot be a mere coincidence, nor is it likely an inherent defect in our vision. Rather, it is a socially-constructed astigmatism that blinds so many to the way in which black folks often experience law enforcement.
(More below...) . Not to overdo the medical metaphors, but as with those other cases noted above, so too in this one did a disturbing number of whites manifest something of a repetitive motion disorder---a reflex nearly as automatic as the one that leads so many police (or wanna-be police) to fire their weapons at black men in the first place. It is a reflex to rationalize the event, defend the shooter, trash the dead with blatantly racist rhetoric and imagery, and then deny that the incident or one's own response to it had anything to do with race.
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about sending around those phony pictures claimed to be of Mike Brown posing with a gun, or the one passed off as Darren Wilson in a hospital bed with his orbital socket blown out.
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about how quickly those pictures were believed to be genuine by so many who distributed them on social media, even when they weren’t, and how difficult it is for some to discern the difference between one black man and another.
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about how rapidly many bought the story that Wilson had been attacked and bloodied, even as video showed him calmly standing at the scene of the shooting without injury, and even as the preliminary report on the incident made no mention of any injuries to Officer Wilson, and even as Wilson apparently has a history of power-tripping belligerence towards those with whom he interacts, and a propensity to distort the details of those encounters as well. .
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about Cardinals fans taunting peaceful protesters who gathered outside a playoff game to raise the issue of Brown’s death, by calling them crackheads or telling them that it was only because of whites that blacks have any freedoms at all, or that they should “get jobs” or “pull up their pants,” or go back to Africa.
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about sending money to Darren Wilson’s defense fund and then explaining one's donation by saying what a service the officer had performed by removing a “savage” like Brown from the community, or by referring to Wilson’s actions as “animal control.”
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial about reaction to evidence of weed in Brown’s lifeless body, as with Trayvon’s before him, even though whites use drugs at the same rate as blacks, but rarely have that fact offered up as a reason for why we might deserve to be shot by police.
Reflex: To deny that there was anything racial behind the belief that the head of the Missouri Highway Patrol, brought in to calm tensions in Ferguson, was throwing up gang signs on camera, when actually, it was a hand sign for the black fraternity of which that officer is a member; and to deny that there is anything racial about one's stunning ignorance as to the difference between those two things.
Reflex: To deny that there's anything at all racial about the way that even black victims of violence---like Brown, like Trayvon Martin, and dozens of others---are often spoken of more judgmentally than even the most horrific of white perpetrators, the latter of whom are regularly referred to as having been nice, and quiet, and smart, and hardly the type to kill a dozen people, or cut them into little pieces, or eat their flesh after storing it in the freezer for several weeks.
And most of all, the reflex to deny that there is anything racial about the lens through which we typically view law enforcement; to deny that being white has shaped our understanding of policing and their actions in places like Ferguson, even as being white has had everything to do with those matters. Racial identity shapes the way we are treated by cops, and as such, shapes the way we are likely to view them. As a general rule, nothing we do will get us shot by law enforcement: not walking around in a big box store with semi-automatic weapons (though standing in one with an air rifle gets you killed if you're black); not assaulting two officers, even in the St. Louis area, a mere five days after Mike Brown was killed; not pointing a loaded weapon at three officers and demanding that they---the police---"drop their ****ing guns;" not committing mass murder in a movie theatre before finally being taken alive; not proceeding in the wake of that event to walk around the same town in which it happened carrying a shotgun; and not killing a cop so as to spark a "revolution," and then leading others on a two month chase through the woods before being arrested with only a few scratches.
To white America, in the main, police are the folks who help get our cats out of the tree, or who take us on ride-arounds to show us how gosh-darned exciting it is to be a cop. We experience police most often as helpful, as protectors of our lives and property. But that is not the black experience by and large; and black people know this, however much we don't. The history of law enforcement in America, with regard to black folks, has been one of unremitting oppression. That is neither hyperbole nor opinion, but incontrovertible fact. From slave patrols to overseers to the Black Codes to lynching, it is a fact. From dozens of white-on-black riots that marked the first half of the twentieth century (in which cops participated actively) to Watts to Rodney King to Abner Louima to Amadou Diallo to the railroading of the Central Park 5, it is a fact. From the New Orleans Police Department's killings of Adolph Archie to Henry Glover to the Danziger Bridge shootings there in the wake of Katrina to stop-and-frisk in places like New York, it's a fact. And the fact that white people don't know this history, have never been required to learn it, and can be considered even remotely informed citizens without knowing it, explains a lot about what's wrong with America. Black people have to learn everything about white people just to stay alive. They especially and quite obviously have to know what scares us, what triggers the reptilian part of our brains and convinces us that they intend to do us harm. Meanwhile, we need know nothing whatsoever about them. We don't have to know their history, their experiences, their hopes and dreams, or their fears. And we can go right on being oblivious to all that without consequence. It won't be on the test, so to speak.
We can remain ignorant to the ubiquity of police misconduct, thinking it the paranoid fever dream of irrational “race-card” playing peoples of color, just like we did after the O.J. Simpson verdict. When most of black America responded to that verdict with cathartic relief---not because they necessarily thought Simpson innocent but because they felt there were enough questions raised about police in the case to sow reasonable doubt---most white folks concluded that black America had lost its collective mind. How could they possibly believe that the LAPD would plant evidence in an attempt to frame or sweeten the case against a criminal defendant? A few years later, had we been paying attention (but of course, we were not), we would have had our answer. It was then that the scandal in the city's Ramparts division broke, implicating dozens of police in over a hundred cases of misconduct, including, in one incident, shooting a gang member at point blank range and then planting a weapon on him to make the incident appear as self-defense. So putting aside the guilt or innocence of O.J,, clearly it was not irrational for black Angelenos (and Americans) to give one the likes of Mark Fuhrman side-eye after his own racism was revealed in that case.
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.
In his contribution to Jill Nelson’s 2000 anthology on police brutality, scholar Robin D.G Kelley reminds us of the bill of particulars.* As Kelley notes, in colonial Virginia, slave owners were allowed to beat, burn, and even mutilate slaves without fear of punishment; and throughout the colonial period, police not only looked the other way at the commission of brutality against black folks, but were actively engaged in the forcible suppression of slave uprisings and insurrections. Later, after abolition, law enforcement regularly and repeatedly released black prisoners into the hands of lynch mobs and stood by as their bodies were hanged from trees, burned with blowtorches, body parts amputated and given out as souvenirs. In city after city, north and south, police either stood by or actively participated in pogroms against African American communities: in Wilmington, North Carolina, Atlanta, New Orleans, New York City, Akron and Birmingham, just to name a few. In one particularly egregious anti-black rampage in East St. Louis, Illinois, in 1917, police shot blacks dead in the street as part of an **** of violence aimed at African Americans who had moved from the Deep South in search of jobs. One hundred and fifty were killed, including thirty-nine children whose skulls were crushed and whose bodies were thrown into bonfires set by white mobs. In the 1920s, it is estimated that half of all black people who were killed by whites, were killed by white police officers.
But Kelley continues: In 1943 white police in Detroit joined with others of their racial compatriots, attacking blacks who had dared to move into previously all-white public housing, killing seventeen. In the 1960s and early '70s police killed over two dozen members of the Black Panther Party, including those like Mark Clark and Fred Hampton in Chicago, asleep in their beds at the time their apartment was raided. In 1985, Philadelphia law enforcement perpetrated an all-out assault on members of the MOVE organization, bombing their row houses from state police helicopters, killing eleven, including five children, destroying sixty-one homes and leaving hundreds homeless.
These are but a few of the stories one could tell, and which Kelley does in his extraordinary recitation of the history---and for most whites, we are without real knowledge of any of them. But they and others like them are incidents burned into the cell memory of black America. They haven’t the luxury of forgetting, even as we apparently cannot be bothered to remember, or to learn of these things in the first place. Bull Connor, Sheriff Jim Clark, Deputy Cecil Price: these are not far-away characters for most black folks. How could they be? After all, more than a few still carry the scars inflicted by men such as they. And while few of us would think to ridicule Jews for still harboring less than warm feelings for Germans some seventy years later---we would understand the lack of trust, the wariness, even the anger---we apparently find it hard to understand the same historically-embedded logic of black trepidation and contempt for law enforcement in this country. And this is so, even as black folks' negative experiences with police have extended well beyond the time frame of Hitler’s twelve year Reich, and even as those experiences did not stop seventy years ago, or even seventy days ago, or seventy minutes.
Can we perhaps, just this once, admit our collective blind spot? Admit that there are things going on, and that have been going on a very long time, about which we know nothing? Might we suspend our disbelief, just long enough to gain some much needed insights about the society we share? One wonders what it will take for us to not merely listen but actually to hear the voices of black parents, fearful that the next time their child walks out the door may be the last, and all because someone---an officer or a self-appointed vigilante---sees them as dangerous, as disrespectful, as reaching for their gun? Might we be able to hear that without deftly pivoting to the much more comfortable (for us) topic of black crime or single-parent homes? Without deflecting the real and understandable fear of police abuse with lectures about the danger of having a victim mentality---especially ironic given that such lectures come from a people who apparently see ourselves as the always imminent victims of big black men?
Can we just put aside all we think we know about black communities (most of which could fit in a thimble, truth be told) and imagine what it must feel like to walk through life as the embodiment of other people's fear, as a monster that haunts their dreams the way Freddie Kreuger does in the movies? To be the physical representation of what marks a neighborhood as bad, a school as bad, not because of anything you have actually done, but simply because of the color of your skin? Surely that is not an inconsequential weight to bear. To go through life, every day, having to think about how to behave so as not to scare white people, or so as not to trigger our contempt---thinking about how to dress, and how to walk and how to talk and how to respond to a cop (not because you're wanting to be polite, but because you'd like to see your mother again)---is work; and it's harder than any job that any white person has ever had in this country. To be seen as a font of cultural contagion is tantamount to being a modern day leper.
And then perhaps we might spend a few minutes considering what this does to the young black child, and how it differs from the way that white children grow up. Think about how you would respond to the world if that world told you every day and in a million ways before lunch how awful you were, how horrible your community was, and how pathological your family. Because that's what we're telling black folks on the daily. Every time police call the people they are sworn to protect animals, as at least one Ferguson officer was willing to do on camera---no doubt speaking for many more in the process---we tell them this. Every time we shrug at the way police routinely stop and frisk young black men, even though in almost all cases they are found to have done nothing wrong, we tell them this. Every time we turn away from the clear disparities in our nation's schools, which relegate the black and brown to classrooms led by the least experienced teachers, and where they will be treated like inmates more than children hoping to learn, we tell them this. Every time Bill O'Reilly pontificates about "black culture" and every time Barack Obama tells black men---but only black men---to be better fathers, we tell them this: that they are uniquely flawed, uniquely pathological, a cancerous mass of moral decrepitude to be feared, scorned, surveilled, incarcerated and discarded. The constant drumbeat of negativity is so normalized by now that it forms the backdrop of every conversation about black people held in white spaces when black folks themselves are not around. It is like the way your knee jumps when the doctor taps it with that little hammer thing during a check-up: a reflex by now instinctual, automatic, unthinking.
And still we pretend that one can think these things---that vast numbers of us can---and yet be capable of treating black folks fairly in the workforce, housing market, schools or in the streets; that we can, on the one hand, view the larger black community as a chaotic maelstrom of iniquity, while still managing, on the other, to treat black loan applicants, job applicants, students or random strangers as mere individuals. That we can somehow thread the needle between our grand aspirations to equanimity as Americans and our deeply internalized biases regarding broad swaths of our nation's people.
But we can't; and it is in these moments---moments like those provided by events in Ferguson---that the limits of our commitment to that aspirational America are laid bare. It is in moments like these when the chasm between our respective understandings of the world---itself opened up by the equally cavernous differences in the way we've experienced it---seems almost impossible to bridge. But bridge them we must, before the strain of our repetitive motion disorder does permanent and untreatable damage to our collective national body. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
*Robin D.G. Kelley, “Slangin’ Rocks…Palestinian Style,” in Police Brutality: An Anthology, Jill Nelson, ed., (New York, W. W. Norton, 2000), 21-59.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 11, 2015, 06:30:04 pm
Agelbert NOTE: Sean Toon is an excellent example of a Homo SAP with Empathy Deficit Disorder.
Gratuitous cruelty to animals and people are part and parcel of the egocentric attitudes that undervalue fellow earthlings of the same and other species. Sean Toon cares ONLY about himself. He is egocentric, selfish, bigoted, racist and cruel to animals. I am certain he is a narcissist too. He successfully lied to the police in order to hurt innocent African American children. This means he is an excellent liar too.
Along with all other Homo SAPS that suffer from Empathy Deficit Disorder he has the following meter reading:
Unless his behavior pattern can be weeded out of human society, there is little hope for us. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.mrwallpaper.com%2Fwallpapers%2FSad-Sunflower.jpg&hash=ac9f33a23da8f73b88a002b6f4421f8c42327406)
Wed Jun 10, 2015 at 05:18 PM EDT.
Someone took a look at the guy who called 911 because black people were in the pool
by SantaFeMarie.
Someone took a look at the guy in McKinney who called 911 because black people were in the pool. Guess what they found? He's hideous:
911 caller in Texas pool party incident was convicted of torturing animals
Sean Toon, who called police to complain about group of black teenagers trying to enter a party on Friday, was jailed for violent behavior and animal torture.
The man who called 911 to complain about a group of black teenagers at a pool party in Texas, and defended the controversial police response as a “good amount of aggression”, is a convicted felon who spent time in jail for violent behavior and torturing animals. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi1.wp.com%2Fgas2.org%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F05%2Fstupid.png&hash=03f34f8c94a314e127f3ee8c4872e721e1b04063)
Sean Toon was sentenced to more than nine months in jail after pleading guilty to killing and maiming prize farm animals and covering them in paint, according to court records in Texas. He was separately sentenced to two and a half months for an assault.
Toon, 33, called police on Friday to allege that a group of predominantly African American young people were climbing over fences (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251) to get into a party and cookout at a community pool in his neighborhood of Craig Ranch in McKinney, a suburb of Dallas.
...
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In November 1999, aged 18, Toon and three high school friends were arrested and expelled from school after vandalizing the agricultural center of a rival high school district and attacking animals housed there, many of which were owned and cared for by school children.
“Cows and pigs were cut and bruised, apparently beaten with wooden boards. And baby turkeys were slain, their limbs torn apart,” the Dallas Morning News reported at the time. Dale Gardner, a teacher in the school district’s agri-science and technology program, told the newspaper: “It was brutal. There’s no way to describe it. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
About a dozen prize turkeys, which were reportedly being bred by a student aiming to win money for his scholarship fund, were feared killed.
Animals and buildings were covered in green and gold paint, according to reports. These were the colors of Toon’s high school, Newman Smith, whose football team rivaled that of RL Turner High, whose students used the agricultural center.
We can all agree that Sean Toon is a SICK FU CK. But that is not the real problem. The problem is the refusal by our society to accept that OUR CULTURE REWARDS PEOPLE LIKE HIM and demonizes people that conscience free greed balls like him victimize. George W. Bush, whose childhood "fun" blowing up frogs aligns quite well with the Sean Toon behavior pattern, probably applauds Sean Toon's "school spirit". (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605)
Empathy Deficit is destroying everything good about humanity.
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Technical knowledge of Carrying Capacity will not save us; only a massive increase in Caring Capacity will. -- A. G. Gelbert
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 13, 2015, 05:39:09 pm
The Lie About When Slavery Ended by Denise Oliver Velez
SNIPPETS:
I hate lies. History books are still full of them.
Lies about the founding of this country. Lies about the treatment of Native Americans. Lies about the Civil War and slavery.
One of the most important things that takes place each year in Black History Month is the outing of lies and attempts to correct the distorted history we have been taught.
Slavery in the US did not end with the emancipation proclamation.
Slavery did not end in 1865. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
Thanks to PBS, we have an accessible documentary to address the truth. Too many textbooks distributed to schoolchildren are as yet unrevised. So we have to take it upon ourselves to spread some truth.
Quote
Directed by Sam Pollard, produced by Catherine Allan and Douglas Blackmon, written by Sheila Curran Bernard, the tpt National Productions project is based on the 2009 Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Blackmon.
Slavery by Another Name challenges one of our country’s most cherished assumptions: the belief that slavery ended with Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. The documentary recounts how in the years following the Civil War, insidious new forms of forced labor emerged in the American South, keeping hundreds of thousands of African Americans in bondage, trapping them in a brutal system that would persist until the onset of World War II.
Based on Blackmon’s research, Slavery by Another Name spans eight decades, from 1865 to 1945, revealing the interlocking forces in both the South and the North that enabled this “neoslavery” to begin and persist. Using archival photographs and dramatic re-enactments filmed on location in Alabama and Georgia, it tells the forgotten stories of both victims and perpetrators of neoslavery and includes interviews with their descendants living today
If you have not yet seen it, Slavery By Another Name (http://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/watch/), is available in its entirety online. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
The first book to expose this travesty in our history was written as a novel, by James John L Spivak and serialized in several newspapers in the 1930's. Agelbert NOTE: I corrected the name error in the article. It's John, not James.
John Louis Spivak (June 13, 1897 – September 30, 1981)
Quote
Spivak was a firebrand leftist journalist. Many of the photos Blackmon has used are from his groundbreaking book. His papers are housed at Syracuse University.
He was an investigative reporter and author whom fellow muckraker Lincoln Steffens described as "the best of us," was most concerned with the problems of the working class and the spread of fascism and anti-Semitism in Europe and the United States from the 1920s through the 1940s...
Spivak traveled throughout the South in the early 1930s interviewing prison camp officials and photographing camp atrocities and their corresponding punishment records. His novel, Georgia Nig ger, depicting the brutality of prison camp chain gangs was serialized in the Daily Worker. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.albany.edu%2Fnews%2Fimages%2Fslaverybyanothername.jpg&hash=339d34d1807da82f5a890b4312facae02cf2da40)
His 1935 exposé in the New Masses charged a congressional committee with deliberately suppressing evidence of an offer made to Maj. Gen. Smedley D. Butler by Wall Street financiers to lead a military coup against the U.S. government and replace it with a fascist regime. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130615173717.png&hash=d29b476c769c91ce22bed44fe1f654d1d35e0e54)
He also investigated the anti-Semitic and financial activities of Charles E. Coughlin, the Catholic radio priest who founded the Shrine of the Little Flower in Royal Oak, Michigan.
Agelbert NOTE: Empathy Deficit Disorder has a LONG HISTORY in American culture, along with the vigorous denial of GUILT and RESPONSIBLILITY for BENEFITING from the exploitation of people, animals and nimby profit over planet. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
I, for one, was not as aware as I should have been, about the particulars of the long, sad history of race relations in this country. This series of postings is more or less just a sharing of my current reading. I wanted to go all the way back to the Civil War, and then carefully try to see and understand how it all really happened. How we got from there to here.
I grew up watching MLK march on Selma. I remember the Watts riots, I remember Rodney King.
I did not know that these events are just the most recent events in a very long chain of ugly confrontations that spans more than a hundred years, with many, now mostly forgotten, episodes.
There were race riots in Detroit in 1863...and again in 1943. Three separate cases where martial law was declared in Texas during the Reconstruction period around 1870. Houston, in 1917. Chicago in 1919. Beaumont, Texas in 1943.
It's quite a long list, and the more I read the more I find. It isn't particularly encouraging.
Well done, Eddie. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) We all need to face the unvarnished truth about, not only our history, but how it is systematically massaged for the specific purpose (see mens rea) of perpetuating inequality and injustice for the benefit of TPTB.
One of the most insidious examples of this 24/7 in-your-face attack on the "wrong" people is the siting of pollution spewing industrial activity like coal fired power plants, city dumps, oil refineries, chemical plants, ETC. Through ruthlessly ethics free consistent planning in industrial board rooms, said industrial centers have been sited to undermine the health of the poorest Americans in general and minorities in particular.
The engineers that plan these factories and power plants know EXACTLY what kind of toxins they spew long before they are built. The claim that they "aren't profitable" if they are pollution free is baloney. In fact, when they MUST site them near the "right" people, they DO have adequate safeguards.
That's the dead giveaway that dumping industrial toxins on the "wrong" people has ALWAYS been part of a sadistic "profit equation" that most Capitalists willingly embrace while claiming that the "market" will "force" clean factories and power plants because the "customer base" will force them to. Baloney!
Tell me, how much did ANY OF US learn in history classes in high school or college about the deliberate poisoning of certain neighborhoods in our country for the purpose of providing profitable energy for, and profitable products from, industrialization? NADA! ZIP!
And it was PLANNED CAREFULLY. No, I'm not talking about chemical spills or three mile island or refinery fires. Sure, those were/are accidents. I'm talking about the 24/7 downwind and downstream toxins steadily entering the biochemistry of the poor. But since nobody wants to talk about it, then it allegedly didn't happen and the alleged victims are just being hysterical. ::)
And mind you, Eddie, that is BEFORE the poor and/or minority kid is born! His or her genes and IQ are under attack before exiting the womb. THEN comes the unhealthy nutrition, toxic air, water, inadequate schools and the police brutality. And then people wonder why those poor white trash and/or the minority kids can't seem to "get ahead" more...
Our culture REFUSES to accept the FACT that there has been a conspiracy by TPTB, willingly supported by the white majority that knows better, regardless of what they read in the happy talk history books propaganda, to achieve the heinous ends that protect the profit over people and planet status quo. But THAT is the reality. :emthdown:
https://youtu.be/J_dkEgNGpzY Chris Hedges paraphrased:
Quote
From the START, our country was NOT set up as a popular democracy.
Agelbert Comment: Most people in the USA do not understand what is meant by the type of economic model that is defined by asset stripping.
This was the economic model used in the Southern US before the Civil War. It's an extractive process that commodifies everything and everybody except the owners of the corporate/company/elite extractive force. Anybody that can add and subtract can see that this process is unsustainable.
But two hundred years ago, the bounty of slaves, animals and soil products looked endless.
When industrialization really got going in the USA after the Civil War, there was a battle that raged for several decades between a sustainable, seed corn saving type economic model that had the upper hand in the Northern Sates and the conscience free extractive one.
Taylor's Theory of Management even postulated that a CEO MUST take good care of his employees and look after their health and well being in order to ensure that a quality product was produced. The so-called "Good Will" accounting entry in balance sheets that gives added value to a corporation included LOW employee turn over.
But the unsustainable, brutally extractive "model" that increased short term profits gained the upper hand as the power of the vote in this country got more and more watered down and the power of big money in government increased.
This Fascist, Empire loving, greed based and unsustainable economic "model" predatory world view is now widespread. It is the reason things just get worse.
The book discussed in the video goes a long way towards explaining how STUPID this greed ball thinking is and how much horrific damage and death it brings.
The Lie About When Slavery Ended by Denise Oliver Velez
SNIPPETS:
I hate lies. History books are still full of them.
Lies about the founding of this country. Lies about the treatment of Native Americans. Lies about the Civil War and slavery.
One of the most important things that takes place each year in Black History Month is the outing of lies and attempts to correct the distorted history we have been taught.
Slavery in the US did not end with the emancipation proclamation.
Slavery did not end in 1865. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
Thanks to PBS, we have an accessible documentary to address the truth. Too many textbooks distributed to schoolchildren are as yet unrevised. So we have to take it upon ourselves to spread some truth.
Quote
Directed by Sam Pollard, produced by Catherine Allan and Douglas Blackmon, written by Sheila Curran Bernard, the tpt National Productions project is based on the 2009 Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Blackmon.
Slavery by Another Name challenges one of our country’s most cherished assumptions: the belief that slavery ended with Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation of 1863. The documentary recounts how in the years following the Civil War, insidious new forms of forced labor emerged in the American South, keeping hundreds of thousands of African Americans in bondage, trapping them in a brutal system that would persist until the onset of World War II.
Based on Blackmon’s research, Slavery by Another Name spans eight decades, from 1865 to 1945, revealing the interlocking forces in both the South and the North that enabled this “neoslavery” to begin and persist. Using archival photographs and dramatic re-enactments filmed on location in Alabama and Georgia, it tells the forgotten stories of both victims and perpetrators of neoslavery and includes interviews with their descendants living today
If you have not yet seen it, Slavery By Another Name (http://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/watch/), is available in its entirety online. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
The first book to expose this travesty in our history was written as a novel, by James John L Spivak and serialized in several newspapers in the 1930's. Agelbert NOTE: I corrected the name error in the article. It's John, not James.
John Louis Spivak (June 13, 1897 – September 30, 1981)
Quote
Spivak was a firebrand leftist journalist. Many of the photos Blackmon has used are from his groundbreaking book. His papers are housed at Syracuse University.
He was an investigative reporter and author whom fellow muckraker Lincoln Steffens described as "the best of us," was most concerned with the problems of the working class and the spread of fascism and anti-Semitism in Europe and the United States from the 1920s through the 1940s...
Spivak traveled throughout the South in the early 1930s interviewing prison camp officials and photographing camp atrocities and their corresponding punishment records. His novel, Georgia Nig ger, depicting the brutality of prison camp chain gangs was serialized in the Daily Worker. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.albany.edu%2Fnews%2Fimages%2Fslaverybyanothername.jpg&hash=339d34d1807da82f5a890b4312facae02cf2da40)
His 1935 exposé in the New Masses charged a congressional committee with deliberately suppressing evidence of an offer made to Maj. Gen. Smedley D. Butler by Wall Street financiers to lead a military coup against the U.S. government and replace it with a fascist regime. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130615173717.png&hash=d29b476c769c91ce22bed44fe1f654d1d35e0e54)
He also investigated the anti-Semitic and financial activities of Charles E. Coughlin, the Catholic radio priest who founded the Shrine of the Little Flower in Royal Oak, Michigan.
Agelbert NOTE: Empathy Deficit Disorder has a LONG HISTORY in American culture, along with the vigorous denial of GUILT and RESPONSIBLILITY for BENEFITING from the exploitation of people, animals and nimby profit over planet. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
Objectively u could say the cross is a far more offensive symbol ans should also be banned. It doesnt matter if it symbolizes jesus death and resurrection to some If it also means the white mans colonization of all indiginous people and the kkk to the expat blacks.
Good point! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Apple Pulls All Civil War Games From The App Store
"Monkey See Monkey Do."
The dim have their new cause for the week.
Next are all history books, movies, confederate money, the song Dixie, southern accents etc.
The enlightened wonderful citizens of our democracy, doing good and feeling good as their freedoms, privacy, press are taken from them by their wonderful loving war mongering spying government. :-\
TPTB must be roaring; rolling around the floors in wild uncontrollable belly laughter, guffawing with tears of joy at not being so afflicted.
Of course. The swastika was stolen by the NAZIs and made into a symbol that got equated to all the evil the NAZIs visited on the world in general and European Jews in particular. The swastika wasn't the problem; Empathy Deficit Disorder was (and still is) the problem. TPTB don't want to go there, of course. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Nevertheless, we cannot forget the giant finger to the civil rights movement that South Carolina making their state flag be the stars and bars, NOT in 1861, but in 1961, symbolized.
Like the NAZI flag, the stars and bars is a symbol of bigotry and the Empathy Deficit Disorder evil that afflicts human societies.
I agree with you that demonizing a symbol won't do much to reduce Empathy Deficit Disorder in humans. I disagree with you that it will do nothing. It is not a meaningless gesture. Just as South Carolina making their flag the stars and bars in 1961 was NOT a meaningless gesture, demonizing that flag also has meaning.
The ASS HOLES that voted to make the stars and bars the flag of South Carolina didn't do it to be nice. You KNOW THAT! Don't pretend you don't. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)
Several months ago I ranted and raved about how the cops were racist, bigoted and so on. Ashvin and "others" here challenged that with all sorts of amazingly convoluted bits of hair splitting logic that has subsequently been proven false.
The bottom line is that our society has a SICK (EDD) pecking order. This is wrong. This is destroying us. Your points about TPTB getting off on divide and conquer tactics are valid. But TPTB DID NOTHING to address the destructive EDD status quo the stars and bars stands for until they HAD TOO! Yes, they are trying to get out in front of this and look good (see murdering MLK Jr. and then making a statue for him a half century later (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) ) but it needed to be done. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
"Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored." -- Aldous Huxley
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"Technical knowledge of Carrying Capacity will not save us; only a massive increase in Caring Capacity will." -- A. G. Gelbert
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 27, 2015, 08:44:45 pm
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theblaze.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2012%2F12%2Fshutterstock_101803237.jpg&hash=3b6f4d849b6a550605066313b0aaeb4e79e4eb43) Second Confederate Flag
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According to "William T. Thompson of Savannah, the creator of the second Confederate flag, the emblem he devised would be "hailed by the civilized world as the white man's flag." As rediscovered by Jonathan Wilson, history professor at Syracuse University, Thompson declared in explaining his design, "As a people, we are fighting to maintain the heaven ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil12.gif&hash=d1822754cefdd0f77369dacd157d00f5f8d3fff9)
The Confederate Flag Stars and Bars Deconstructed (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81) SNIPPETS: Flags first emerged in human history as banners of war. They would convey allegiances of battle combatants and provide a standard under which wavering or scattered troops could rally.
The earliest flags were simple colors, until the introduction of commonly understood icons to convey meaning. The flag of Denmark, for example, one of the oldest national flags in Europe, prominently features a cross in white on a red background, a Christian symbol.
Given how many Europeans nations share a common Christian heritage, Dannebrog, meaning "the flag of the Danes" or "the red flag," isn't the only national banner to incorporate the cross. Switzerland, Norway, Finland and others European countries include it as well into their own designs.
The Saltire
The Confederate flag incorporates a variation on the cross in its design. Known as the saltire, the diagonal cross represents the crucifixion of St. Andrew, who insisted to his Roman executioners he was unworthy of the same death as Jesus Christ. The apostle is the patron saint of Scotland, which is why the cross is used on the Scottish national flag.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimg13.deviantart.net%2F1acc%2Fi%2F2009%2F011%2F2%2Fe%2Fscotland_grungy_flag_by_think0.jpg&hash=bb0563dfb297257bdf0ec895d8a781eee80860a0) Scottish Flag
The Confederate flag deliberately takes its cue from the Scottish flag, owing to the Scottish background of many Southerners in 19th-century America. In this one regard, the flag does carry echoes of a religious and cultural heritage, but there's more to the story.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270615195255.jpeg&hash=09a195cdf383c525bbcdaff87199fc14ac9a8a73) Original Confederate Flag
Stars
In addition to the saltire, the Confederate battle flag also contains 13 stars in its modern incarnation.
The original Confederate national flag, seen here, similarly incorporated stars into its design. It began with seven, each one representing the original Confederate states: South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Texas. As new states joined the Confederacy, more stars were added. The stars in other words are a token of membership to a rebel nation that no longer exists.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270615195336.jpeg&hash=9bc29b7efcfd21126b8e07f1a844cbc712847459) Did the Klu Klux Klan employ the Stars and Bars as a symbol of Southern pride, history and heritage? I DON'T THINK SO.
The Real Meaning
Stars and Bars boosters typically claim the flag is a symbol of Southern pride, history and heritage. Nothing contained within the flag itself necessarily discounts that argument.
However, flags don't just appear out of nowhere (except for maybe the Danish flag). These banners have designers. According to William T. Thompson of Savannah, the creator of the second Confederate flag seen here, the emblem he devised would be "hailed by the civilized world as the white man's flag." As rediscovered by Jonathan Wilson, history professor at Syracuse University, Thompson declared in explaining his design, "As a people, we are fighting to maintain the heaven ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race."
Those words reveal the flag's racist origins -- and why the Ku Klux Klan employed it as a symbol, and why Dylann Roof posted pictures of himself with the banner to identify with the white supremacy movement.
Full article here: http://news.discovery.com/history/us-history/confederate-flag-stars-and-bars-deconstructed-150626.htm
Agelbert NOTE: Despite the OVERWHELMING EVIDENCE of what the confederate flag is REALLY ALL ABOUT, you will continue to have folks that claim that Germans who want to fly the swastika Southerners who want to fly the Stars and Bars are just doing it for pride, history and heritage...
UH HUH, SURE.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 28, 2015, 04:30:21 pm
Guns Don’t Kill People: Confederate Flags Kill People
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We have just seen another massive, and masterly, prestidigitation by the people who love guns and dislike poor people, and who understand that large majorities of Americans dislike gun violence and are poor. The continued existence of free and open elections in this country — albeit less free and less open every year — constrain these people from talking too openly about their vision for America, i.e. one nation, under God, armed to the teeth with people dying in the streets. So they obfuscate, and misdirect, and bloviate and lay down smoke.
And when confronted with a truly obscene massacre of innocent black people by a white whack job with a racist manifesto and a gun, right wingnuts have to work overtime to come up with a diversion to keep the chattering class from talking about their manifesto. This time, after nine people at prayer were gunned down in a church in Charleston, South Carolina, they knew they were going to have to be really good to get this off TV and out of the minds of Americans before any damage was done to their Second Amendment Rights.
They were better than good. They were awesome. They tried a few honkers first, including one actually voiced by a state representative: that if only those elderly folk who went to that Bible study class had been packing heat, they would still be alive. And in any case, they should have fought back instead of waiting their turn to be shot. Honest to God. He said that.
Now, I don’t know who came up with the Confederate-flag meme. I doubt that it was one of the right wingnuts because, really, they are not that subtle. But when someone juxtaposed the fact that there had been a racist massacre and, just a few blocks away, a Confederate flag was flying, the right knew at once that this was the right thing. Pundits were puzzled that pols who had been declaring for decades that you could have their Confederate flag when you pried it from their cold dead hands were practically burning it in public. Why? the pundits wondered. Was this a historic paradigm shift, a nation suddenly discovering its conscience?
Old rule: when you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras. Another old rule: the proof is in the pudding. And the pudding, in this case, was that within 48 hours of the atrocity, all the websites and the cable news channels had room for was pictures of the Confederate flag flying over a memorial near the state capitol. The chattering class, in full stampede, trampled each other to vilify the Stars and Bars, along with any state, county or grocery store that would tolerate its display.
Their syllogism was as simple as it was silly: Dylann Roof displayed the Confederate flag; subsequently, Dylann Roof killed a lot of people; therefore we have to get rid of the Confederate flag. I guess the headline they envision, coming soon to Fox News, would be: “Last Confederate flag comes down, mass shootings stop.” Yeah, I know, they don’t really think that. What they think is, by the time everybody finally runs out of things to shout about the Confederate flag, another shooting massacre will be old news, forgotten by everybody but the husbands and the wives and the children and the parents and the relatives and the friends.
The sound and the fury have been magnificent, from revisionist and simplistic history lessons about the Civil War to the discovery of Confederate symbols and colors lurking in other flags.
Meanwhile, cold hard facts lie disused in the basement of our culture, ignored by the party going on upstairs. Fact: the militants who have slaughtered more Americans since 9/11/2001 than any other group are white, right-wing Christian extremists (as none other than the New York Times has just pointed out — again). The violent extremists about whom police are most worried, as surveys by the Times and others have confirmed, are “militias, neo-Nazis and sovereign citizens” (by which they mean people who recognize the authority of no government). As The Daily Impact pointed out three months ago.
Wait, what? Not the Muslim “lone wolf” popularized by frequent FBI news conferences, the crazed ISIS recruit who, if we don’t stay alert and buy more tanks, is going to kill us all in our beds (as presidential candidate Lindsey Graham put it)? No indeed. Loosely defined, presumptive, dumb-as-a-stump Islamic terrorists have killed three people in America so far this year. A far more dangerous group, that racked up five fatalities so far — toddlers. It’s a fact.
So spare me, pundits, your comic-book versions of Civil War history that explain, neatly and without nuance, the motivations behind a conflict that over four bitter years inflicted a million casualties on our young nation. Spare me your tortured logic that says, among other things, that since most of the people who display the Confederate flag today are racists, the flag itself is racist. Using that construct, what could we say about the flag of the United States?
There is too much violence, and too much racism, in our country right now. Could we talk about that? Could you folks please stop changing the subject?
Thomas Lewis is a nationally recognized and reviewed author of six books, a broadcaster, public speaker and advocate of sustainable living. He also is Editor of The Daily Impact website, and former artist-in-residence at Frostburg State University. He has written several books about collapse issues, including Brace for Impact and Tribulation. Learn more about them here.
Great Article. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
But the problem is much worse than closet racists just changing the subject. Racists ENJOY inflicting pain on people who care about injustices. Racisms has a huge SADISTIC element not limited to just shafting African Americans. What these sadists DO to "have some fun" (and get those touchy feely librels to walk away in a huff, of course (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)) is get snarky and begin to BRAG about how deep their roots are in the South.
It's called code speech. I've seen it over and over since my days in the Federal Aviation Administration surrounded by world class racist ass holes from ALL OVER the USA (but mostly from Indiana and Georgia).
It's linked to Empathy Deficit disorder. It's the crux of the problem with humanity. Many people are comfortable, well off and GRATEFUL for the social conditions that ENABLED THEM to prosper, even while they claim they weren't "given any advantages in life and deserve every penny of their prosperity".
History makes a mockery of their claims, but these folks HATE to admit they benefited from other people's misery (though they secretly relish in it - apex predator and all that).
SO, they change the subject (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0). HOWEVER, when you push a few of their buttons and force them to stay on topic, their sarcastic, sardonic and sadistic PRIDE in being a racist comes out. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.freesmileys.org%2Fsmileys%2Fsmiley-devil19.gif&hash=6eeb0dbc471743691793f5130640fdcbd1f77b5c)
These people do not DO shame, remorse or restitution; it might cost them some money and would wound their precious pride.
Webster Tarpley, an EXPERT in US history in general, and the civil war in particular, clearly quotes the Constitution of the Confederacy for any nostalgic person that thinks the Confederacy, AND THE STARS AND BARS, was not about, AND ALL ABOUT (No law shall be passed, and no new state shall be added, that harms the property rights of negro slave owners!) PROFIT FROM SLAVERY OF AFRICAN AMERICANS.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 09, 2015, 12:42:34 pm
Thank you Rep. Jenny Horne (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185038-16442135.gif&hash=52927992b43007fa5c5eb6ffcb453ae29948c356), for telling those foot dragging, bigoted, double taking racist sadistic apologists for murder, mayhem and slavery why that God Damned flag has to be taken down AND live in INFAMY.
South Carolina Approves Bill to Remove Confederate Flag (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcliparts.co%2Fcliparts%2FBig%2FEgq%2FBigEgqBMT.png&hash=e7eec62f009cdd686ce795fad0a53c6befe748e9)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 14, 2015, 05:59:20 pm
"Lies My Country Told Me"
https://youtu.be/AIAMpMa8_Uw
Sun Jul 12, 2015 at 06:00 AM PDT.
Mount Rushmore, the KKK, and sanitized American history
by Denise Oliver Velez.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.howitworksdaily.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2015%2F01%2Fmount_rushmore_south_dakota-wide.jpg&hash=9daa69e4c79ed09578e1afa27fd8072c232a77a3) Sculptures of (left to right) George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln, at Mount Rushmore, South Dakota. (Lakota Sioux name for the mountain: Six Grandfathers)
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"And yet where in your history books is the tale, of the genocide basic to this country's birth..." Buffy Sainte-Marie
Monuments tell a tale of history. The question is, whose history, and who is the teller?
Two of the largest monuments in the U.S. are graven images carved into the stone of mountainsides. There are few people who have never seen the iconic presidential images on Mount Rushmore.
Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. proclaimed "Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia..." in his "I have a Dream" speech. His reference was deliberate, since he was speaking of the monument to white supremacy carved into the rock at the Stone Mountain Confederate Memorial in Stone Mountain, Georgia. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailykos.com%2Fimages%2F152935%2Flarge%2FStone_Mountain_carving.jpg%3F1436382315&hash=50021a648f1e6f0d3acc42a2f88ffabc7772d527) Granite carving of Confederate leaders Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, Stone Mountain, GA.
No one ever taught me in school how Mount Rushmore and Stone Mountain are related.
No one taught me that the original sculptor at Stone Mountain, Gutzon Borglum, who went on to carve Mt. Rushmore, was associated with the Ku Klux Klan, which used Stone Mountain and an altar designed by Borglum to stage their revival in 1915. No one taught me in school the history of violation of the Black Hills sacred spaces to carve out a monument to U.S. presidents who participated in the extermination of Native peoples and appropriation of their lands.
While the nation is having a conversation about Confederate flags, with mixed results (according to a recent poll), and that conversation has extended to monuments, I'd like to take it one step further and talk about the racist history that still isn't taught or memorialized in many schools, and about the sanitizing and whitenizing of history books to ensure our children remain ignorant of our collective his- and her-stories.
Gutzon Borglum was, at one time in his life, a powerful member of the Ku Klux Klan, the nationalist, white supremacist organization created after the fall of the South in the American Civil War. He held a lifetime membership, was on their payroll for the Stone Mountain project, and he was also known to be a member of the Imperial Koncilium, a council of high ranking Klansmen who oversaw the transfer of power from one Imperial Wizard to another.
He also later repudiated his involvement with the Klan. Whether the repudiation was sincere or not depends upon who is being asked, as some modern critics as well as some modern Klansmen alike prefer to think that the repudiation was political rather than sincere.
When we talk of Confederate flags today, revived in order to combat the movement for civil rights, we should remember also other periods of history when the flames were fanned to heighten hate. Stone Mountain is a monument to such a revival.
The Revival of the KKK:
The popularity of The Birth of a Nation, and specifically its appearance in Atlanta in December 1915, proved the major impetus for the reemergence of the Klan. Equally significant was the Leo Frank case, which culminated in his August 1915 lynching in Marietta by a group of armed men who had organized themselves as the Knights of Mary Phagan,named for the young murder victim in the case. The anti-Semitic sentiments aroused by that case (Frank was Jewish), along with the ongoing racism fueled by Griffith's film, led William J. Simmons, a local recruiter for men's fraternal societies, to establish a new KKK.
Restricting the group's membership to white American-born Protestant men, Simmons designed the notorious hooded uniform, composed an elaborate ritual for the secret order, and secured an official charter from the state of Georgia. On Thanksgiving evening in 1915, Simmons and sixteen other members of the new order, several of whom also belonged to the Knights of Mary Phagan, ascended Stone Mountain, ignited a flaming cross, and proclaimed the rebirth of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan. This is not the first time that protest has swirled around symbols of hate. The Olympic Games in Atlanta was another such occasion.
Full, hard hitting and historically accurate article at link: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 20, 2015, 07:53:29 pm
State notifies Reach Up recipients of $125 a month reduction in benefits >:(
Elizabeth Hewitt Jul. 19 2015, 4:18 pm 23 Comments
Agelbert NOTE: The article gives the surface facts but the comments tell the real story. A few Empathy Deficit Disordered dissemblers try to make a case that the "poor get too much". Vermonters with a conscience then proceed to methodically make mincemeat of said fallacious arguments. ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 29, 2015, 07:15:51 pm
VIDEO: You Can Watch Jose Antonio Vargas’ Documentary ‘White People’ Here
Posted on Jul 28, 2015
Those of you who have been looking for somewhere to watch Jose Antonio Vargas’ “White People,” look no further. MTV has released the entire documentary online, and here it is for your viewing pleasure.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 31, 2015, 07:49:44 pm
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Here are Reed’s five recommendations for Sanders:
1. Stop saying you are from a white state. “Acknowledge there are people of color living in Vermont,” instead of “reinforcing a narrative that people of color simply do not count” here.
2. Meet with groups of Vermonters of color across the state “to learn of the micro-aggressions, micro-invalidations, and micro-injustices we experience.”
3. Meet with organizations governed and managed by people of color who are “engaged in the struggle to dismantle structural racism in Vermont” and learn from them.
4. Meet with white Vermonters who are operating at a consciously skillful level to learn the “challenges they face while helping their well-intentioned white colleagues.”
5. Stop talking about your experience in the civil rights movement “like an Eagle Scout showing off his merit badges” and instead focus on actions to deal with racial injustices today.
Agelbert NOTE: The comments are a real eye opener for any racist reading them. But since I am of color and live in Vermont, I am gratified to see more and more Vermonters get it AND do not remain silent when fellow Vermonters spew racist code speech comments. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)
Rich Lachapelle (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) July 30, 2015 at 5:25 pm Bernie would be wise to completely ignore the advice of these local “race hustlers”. With his long track record of promoting social justice in general he has nothing to apologize for, especially for his own lack of skin melanin. Race relations in Vermont and in the US will only improve when we all stop our long, tireless obsession with the “race issue” and with the liberal culture of victimology in general. The incessant focusing on race by the lamestream media and by our current President has set race relations back 100 years. The criticisms of Bernie by these charlatans for his supposed lack of empathy in this area are in themselves a “micro-aggression”.
John Davy July 31, 2015 at 8:31 am Unfortunately there’s a long history of “social justice in general” not being shared with black Americans and other people of color (not that that’s likely to bother anyone who thinks Obama is responsible for setting back race relations. Sheesh.) By the way, literally zero people have criticized Sen. Sanders for his “lack of skin melanin.” I love Bernie but his pointing to his actions 50 years ago as evidence that he’s invested in racial justice here and now is a little embarrassing.
Mari Cordes July 31, 2015 at 1:29 pm These are hardly “race hustlers” and “charlatans”. These are our friends, neighbors, community members and leaders calling on all of us, and in this case Bernie Sanders, to stop the ignorance, stop the defensiveness, and stop the denial that race IS, actually, still an issue. The fact that you call this critical work for our community health “incessant focusing” just shines the light on your own ignorance. I’m very grateful that Curtiss wrote these recommendations, and am very grateful for the brave many that are speaking out. And I wish that President Obama had spoken more publicly and earlier on the race issue – he actually has said quite little until the media finally picked up on how many black people are being killed for nothing other than their race. Oh, and I’m white, and not a charlatan.
Vicki Garrison July 31, 2015 at 7:24 am I agree with the sentiments of this article. Sanders has historically spoken about economic inequality without consideration for how this is impacted by race, racism, privilege, and power in American politics. This is because he approaches the issue of economics from his privileged lens without ability to connect with or regard for other equally valid perspectives, impacted by race. Bernie’s one-size-fits-all approach to economic inequity fails to acknowledge and address the historical and current reality and impact of racism on the lives of people of color. In essence, Bernie’s approach is offensive and endorses colorblind racism ideology.
As a native black Vermonter, I was familiar with Bernie Sanders as a child, as he frequented and collaborated (in some capacity) with The King Street Youth Center, an organization my mother co-founded. Because of this young real life connection with Bernie, I maintained interest in and followed his political career with the desire to support his political agenda (as I knew my mother had in the early 80’s). This, however, posed an internal conflict for me, that has increased throughout the years, because Bernie’s agenda and messages have remained consistent AND these have been consistently void of me, void of people of color, which is extremely problematic/privileged/racist.
What is equally problematic/privileged/racist is that after not mentioning or responding to resounding nationwide concerns related to racial inequality during the launching of his presidential campaign, Bernie, three months in, added some superficial, safe, and, potentially, minimizing sentiments about the “tragic history of racism” in this country and progress obtained through civil rights activism. As a person of color, this is too little too late and not enough, as Bernie continues to fail to meaningfully consider and address how people of color are included in and impacted by his vision, his agenda, as a presidential candidate.
Why? Because he can’t. The fact that Bernie marched with Martin Luther King means little to nothing because his ally-ship is perceived to have ended there. He has consistently demonstrated a lack of care for, engagement with, and understanding of people of color throughout his political career that manifested into the continuation of us being rendered invisible and our needs mute as evidenced by his political voice, vision, and accomplishments.
In essence, Bernie’s political conduct to date serves as a metaphor for racism in this country where complacency is the norm to meet the needs of the dominate culture (privilege), engagement in “race talk” is self-serving, and where black lives don’t matter. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53)
Bernie Sanders needs to unpack his white privilege and learn how to deconstruct and reconstruct his own vision to include voices and needs of people of color before he can be a presidential candidate that has the ability to serve ALL people and impact racial progress in America. As a child, I looked up to Bernie Sanders and viewed him with hope. As a young adult, I maintained hope that I would one day be reflected in his vision. As a mature adult, Bernie has proven to me there is no hope for people of color in his politics.
Jill Michaels July 31, 2015 at 7:44 am I would also suggest that all Vermonters watch this compelling video by a young woman of color who recently relocated to Vermont and entered high school in Chittenden County. The video was shown this spring at the WRJ White River Indy Festival: https://youtu.be/oe7rVgGzOFU Agelbert NOTE: Did you know that Mike Brown "deserved to be killed because he was black"? Did you know that "black people can't afford shoes like those"? Did you know that ONLY white people can get away (i.e. NOT feel like they are insulting you are acting like an ass hole) with saying things like that to a person of color or in their presence? THAT FEELING OF ENTITLEMENT IS INTRINSIC to WHITE PRIVILEGE! But, if you are white, you just never noticed that, did you? SURE... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
Justin Boland July 31, 2015 at 12:13 pm This is excellent and fascinating – thank you so much for bringing it to my attention.
Agellbert NOTE: Judith McLaughlin's comment below is an excellent example of buck passing double talk presented as an "everybody does it" excuse OFTEN USED by YOU KNOW WHO to avoid the very selective and cruel prejudice applied to children (and adults) of color in the USA in general (and Vermont in particular). Judith's world is egocentric based. She is unconcerned about anybody but herself and her offspring. She tries to cover her egocentrism with a cheap empathy deficit disordered generalization. Closed minded types like her will always tell you to "move somewhere else" when confronted with the truth that they are dissembling in order to avoid facing their bigotry. So it goes. :(
Judith McLaughlin July 31, 2015 at 12:45 pm The same thing happened to my stepdaughter when she had to locate to a new school. The kids in her new school were horrible to her – they made fun of her, laughed behind her back, told lies about her, ignored her, etc..etc.. This went on for an entire year. It didn’t matter that she was white and from a well to do family. Kids can and will be cruel to anyone. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)
Jess Wisloski July 31, 2015 at 2:07 pm Thanks for sharing Jill!
Ann Raynolds (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) July 31, 2015 at 7:59 am Dear Rich, I reach out to you from the vantage point of a white American who lived & worked years in the predominantly black neighborhood of Boston (Roxbury). You know not of what you are speaking. We are privileged as white people and some do not even recognize this. It is ONLY through open discussion, engagement with the realities almost daily confronting our fellow Americans of color that we can resolve injustices and fears.
Their concerns are real and should be ours as well. People of color face danger just living anywhere in America, and I would be glad to meet with anyone to discuss the pain I have experienced firsthand from experiences of friends of color. Mr. Reed’s advice to Bernie is right on target, and, being a Sanders supporter, I do believe Bernie is looking honestly at his lack of knowledge of how it has been to live with dark skin color for over 400 years in this country.
I am old, I returned to my home country of Vermont when I thought I was dying (and I’m still kicking 15 years later), but I am always activated to speak out when I read such things as your comment. I continue my visceral sorrow and upset when I read comments such as yours — all too prevalent I fear.
I reach to you not with anger but with compassion to ask that you open your mind, because you are probably writing from the vantage point of a well-intentioned person who simply does not know or understand that these issues are not going away if we white people ignore them (most black people live with them and so cannot ignore them.). If you are not, as apparently you are not, following the tragedies to African-Americans at the hands of the police this year, then please consider reading online about the work of the Southern Poverty Law Center on the threats to anyone of color by groups of white supremacists and worse.
Nate Orshan (@Winooski) July 31, 2015 at 1:15 pm Ann, thanks so much for working compassion into your response. I truly believe that working from an attempt to be compassionate, especially to people at whom I’d rather just yell, is the only lasting way to effect change. May I also add Michelle Alexander’s “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness” to the list? http://newjimcrow.com/
Jess Wisloski July 31, 2015 at 2:11 pm Thanks for that share Nate – I can add this for some context.
Janice Prindle (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) July 31, 2015 at 8:22 am Well, Mr. Lachapelle, you’ve just proved Mr. Reed’s point. Racism is indeed alive and well in Vermont, as in our nation.
I am appalled at your characterization of Curtiss Reed and his organization as “hustlers,” not to mention your bizarre view that focusing on the problem of racism in America is due to a “liberal culture of victimology” and has “set race relations back 100 years.”
Do you know what was happening to blacks in this country 100 years ago, Mr. L. ? Lynchings, Jim Crow laws, extreme segregation and every trick in the book to prevent blacks from voting — not just in the South, either. No indeed, liberals and other decent Americans of every color, concerned about racial equality, have not “set us back,” they have been the ones to move us forward. But not far enough.
When people of color can be denounced as “charlatans” for speaking up about the racism that they experience daily, even in “liberal” Vermont, it’s pretty clear racism continues to be alive and well. The national statistics on employment, wages, and police shootings support Reed’s statement that a progressive candidate like Bernie needs to speak to all Americans, honestly, acknowledging that America has a racism problem — not a race, but a racism problem.
I know that being white and of the same generation as Bernie, it is easier to see the progress made in our lifetime than it is to truly experience what it’s like to be a person of color in America today. Mr. Reed is right, we can’t expect “brownie points” for righteous actions 50 years ago.
I think Bernie is smart enough and cares enough to take this advice, in fact, I understand he already has, in a more recent speech, begun to “connect the dots” between the economic issues and racism.
Wanda Hines July 31, 2015 at 9:46 am Thank you Mr. Reed….clear and concise. As a Vermont African-American woman, it is a shared perspective I’ve witnessed all to often first hand over the last few decades. With this in mind, I especially concur with your following recommendations: 1. Stop saying you are from a white state. “Acknowledge there are people of color living in Vermont,” instead of “reinforcing a narrative that people of color simply do not count” here. 2. Meet with groups of Vermonters of color across the state “to learn of the micro-aggressions, micro-invalidations, and micro-injustices we experience.”
John Greenberg July 31, 2015 at 12:32 pm Bravo Curtiss Reed!
Lindsay Wenkouni July 31, 2015 at 2:33 pm As a Vermonter of color I also agree with the sentiments of this article. Thank you Curtiss Reed.
Michael T Heath July 31, 2015 at 2:37 pm Wislowski delivers a first-rate examination of the erstwhile presidential candidate and his better-late-than-never conversion to broaching the touchy subject. Like a true socialist, Mr Sanders has tunnel vision around class struggle – perhaps believing that ALL issues spring from economic ones. Certainly if everybody made the same wages and lived in the same neighborhoods we’d have fewer problems, but we don’t and don’t, with enough egregious violence still lurking as if the KKK controlled police and politicians and armed citizens cost to coast. Sanders is intelligent, but wisdom comes from experience. He hasn’t gone through the same hell black folks face daily, nor does he sincerely empathize with them yet. Grow a bit, Mr Senator. We will notice for sure.
Ron Pulcer July 31, 2015 at 3:30 pm Regarding: “Sanders was caught off guard, and it has been reported that he shouted at the protesters, …” I actually watched a video of Sen. Sanders at NetRoots, the day after the event. Yes, he was caught off guard by the protesters interrupting the event. But he was NOT “shouting” back at them. He raised his voice to try to be heard. He even stated that he did not want to shout at the audience. So much for “it has been reported that”.
Also, Sen. Sanders has acknowledged that these protesters are bringing up a very valid issue and concern on several subsequent interview programs, and stated his willingness to listen and work with them.”
I do agree with Mr. Reed’s first 4 points. On the fifth point about Bernie Sanders history during the 1960s, from the perspective of Mr. Reed and other commenters, Bernie’s work during Civil Rights era of 1960s might be old history, old news, or not as meaningful today to them. However, it does point out Sanders differences with other Presidential candidates, both Democratic and Republican. Voters in other states might be interested or surprised to learn about this. So to go completely silent on that aspect of Mr. Sanders life is probably not the way to go. Yes, he could tone it down or drop it from some speeches. There’s got to be a happy medium to reach voters in other states who don’t know much about Bernie Sanders.
From Pinterest: http://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/0d/01/8b/0d018bd8898e322cb32b0593a481528d.jpg BTW, Hillary Clinton did not attend NetRoots, because she was at a “fundraiser”. So she has not gotten the same scrutiny as Sanders and Martin O’Malley.
Any discussion of race or ethnicity is always a challenging subject. Anyone can be easily misunderstood and then civil discussions can suddenly become uncivil.
Dialogue is a two-way street. Has Mr. Reed and others considered Bernie Sander’s family background? Bernie’s parents were Jewish. His father came to America from Poland at a young age, after other family members were killed in the Holocaust. The Jewish people also have a history of discrimination and were (and still are) targets of ethnic hatred.
I am not Jewish. But as a Christian, I say everyone is a “child of God”. So Jewish lives also matter, and so do Muslim lives as well. Believers as well as non-believers. All races, all ethnic groups. To think that Bernie is “tone-deaf” to how people are suffering in this country and around the world is a bit crazy. Yes, he probably does need to address the concerns of African Americans more directly… However, Bernie is well aware of the “divide and conquer” strategy of the elites in power. We are also witnessing the divides within both political parties, within both the so-called right and left. United we stand, divided we fail. We are already very fragmented and divided within this country.
If Bernie goes around from state to state, city to city, and tries to tailor his message for specific interest groups, he could end up sounding just like a lot of other politicians, and sound less “authentic”. Other politicians are always changing their statements to appease different groups on different days. The fact that Bernie has been consistently concerned about economic just for “all” resonates with me.
When I attended Bernie’s kickoff event in Burlington, I thought he had a good strategy in that he addressed ALL people across the spectrum of our country. He just happens to go about it differently. He is not trying to appease a certain group or groups of voters in terms of race or ethnicity. But his platform has something for everyone, but from more of an age or life cycle basis: Free / lower college tuition for young people, strengthen Social Security and Medicare for senior citizens, higher wages and paid leave time for workers, parents, families of all ages (which just so “happens” to include all races and ethnic backgrounds, including African Americans).
Bernie’s approach seems to be more implicit then explicit. He covers the spectrum of our society, but from a different angle than race and ethnicity. If Bernie talks about skyrocketing college tuition and high interest rates, he is talking to young people, that that does include young African Americans, young Hispanics, and young people from every background. When he is talking to seniors, that includes African American seniors, Hispanic seniors and senior citizens from every background. I can understand what Mr. Reed is suggesting and I agree with his first 4 out of 5 suggestions.
But I also can understand the approach that I think that Sen. Sanders is taking. He knows how “Divide and Conquer” works (against us), and I think he is trying to avoid “dividing” the electorate of this country. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
I hope that Sen. Sanders will dialogue with Mr. Reed. But I also hope that non-white population in Vermont will also work to better understand Sen. Sanders as well. His approach is different than what you might want or expect, but maybe there are reasons for his approach, right or wrong.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 01, 2015, 04:44:41 pm
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 04, 2015, 08:29:09 pm
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailykos.com%2Fimages%2F156613%2Flightbox%2Frebecca-hendin-cartoon-illustration-see-no-hear-no-speak-no-republicans-2-700pix.jpg%3F1438206007&hash=f8d57bc6601384774ebc9ff2e64ed3d22fdf2f6e) If only it was just the Republicans... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
"When I go to the grocery store and see a choice between cr ap cereal and sh it cereal, I'm not buying cereal. It's not my problem, it's the cereal makers' problem." -- Puddytat on low voter turnout
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 06, 2015, 05:40:45 pm
https://youtu.be/6Mct8UB4XhY
Kids who die
Quote
A Movement Grows #Ferguson
In 1938 civil rights activist and poet Langston Hughes wrote his chilling poem “Kids Who Die” which illuminates the horrors of lynchings during the Jim Crow era. Now, Hughes’ vivid poetry is being featured in a three minute video created by Frank Chi and Terrance Green. It is a startling reminder that the assault on Black lives did not end with the Jim Crow era.
As we approach the one year mark of the Ferguson uprising that has sparked a movement of resistance against state violence, we are reminded of our ability to secure real change. This is a matter of life or death and we need collective power to win. Join the movement and text JUSTICE to 225568.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 27, 2015, 08:28:30 pm
Agelbert NOTE: This is a rush job so I didn't format the pictures and graphs. They are VERY good and VERY descriptive, if you know what I mean. See them HERE (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/08/25/1414925/-The-hate-next-door-Unexpected-faces-of-the-Neo-Confederacy).
Tue Aug 25, 2015 at 09:30 AM EDT.
The hate next door: Unexpected faces of the Neo-Confederacy
by DocDawg
228 Comments
attribution: DocDawg
It is far too easy - and all too human - to make sweeping judgements about people based solely on limited experience and unlimited assumptions. But it is important to work past that genetically encoded human defect for any number of reasons, not the least of which are that: (1) knowledge is power, and (2) stereotyping is not. Please join me below the fold for an exclusive and detailed look at the surprising demographics of the fast-rising Neo-Confederate movement of North Carolina. .
There's nothing new about loose talk extolling the virtues of a second secession in America's south. In Texas, of course, such talk is all but an article of the state constitution, and long has been. And in the Deep South - states like Mississippi and Alabama - Confederate flags hanging limp in the withering heat are as much a part of the quotidian scenery as are magnolia blossoms and Moon Pies. But North Carolina is different...or so, at least, many of our sons and daughters would like to think. The last of the states to secede, on May 20th, 1861 (and even then only with great ambivalence), and the first and foremost to raise a sustained, home-grown, and devastating Unionist guerrilla movement behind the lines during the War Between the States (see, for instance, William T. Auman's Civil War in the North Carolina Quaker Belt: The Confederate Campaign Against Peace Agitators, Deserters and Draft Dodgers), North Carolina was then, and is now, on balance more Northern in its sympathies and temperament than even more northerly rebel states such as Virginia. And with our state's top-ten rank in population growth (fueled largely by northern immigrants bearing northern dollars), North Carolina becomes more 'Northern' every day.
Still, old habits die hard, and waves of new immigrants do not overnight sweep away the Old Guard before them. Just how true this is here in the Tar Heel State has been starkly revealed by the paroxysm of Neo-Confederate sympathy suddenly and shockingly witnessed in the wake of the recent Charleston massacre and the ensuing lowering of the rebel battle flag in neighboring South Carolina. The Southern Poverty Law Center's Mapping Hate project has cataloged some 13 Confederate flag rallies across the state since Charleston, with a combined attendance earning the Tar Heel State second place in the U.S. for total attendance (just behind the much more populous Florida). SPLC's attendance estimates are sometimes greatly at odds with those of most reliable local observers, but on the other hand some recent North Carolina rallies are missing from its database.
I recently attended one such 'Southern Heritage' rally, in nearby and highly progressive Hillsborough, NC, and covered it (as well as the locals' resistance to it) in this recent diary. In its aftermath I found myself succumbing to the human urge to stereotype, referring to the assembly's denizens as looking "like they were fresh from a cardiologist's waiting room: unhealthy, obese, aging smokers." I was, thankfully, called on this by one of the opposing Red Strings I had interviewed for that diary, who pointed out that it is important to understand who these people really are, instead of being blinded by misguided images of whom we would like them to be.
Moved by that wisdom, my colleagues and I have just completed an unique demographic analysis of self-identified North Carolina Neo-Confederates, the findings from which I report here exclusively. We were aided in this effort by Facebook, where North Carolina-specific Neo-Confederate pages make it easy to identify the movement's leading sympathizers. Those pages include (but are not limited to):
Alamance County Taking Back Alamance County Orange County Taking Back Orange County Guilford County Taking Back Guilford County Person County Taking Person County Back Rockingham County North Carolina Taking Back Rockingham County Caswell County Taking Back Caswell County North Carolina Taking Back North Carolina North Carolina Sons of Confederate Veterans and the page of the North Carolina chapter of the notorious secessionist White Power group, the League of the South
Using largely automated scripts to simplify the task, we tagged the most explicit post-Charleston Neo-Confederate posts from these and similar pages, extracted approximately 1,000 of the user profiles of readers who liked, shared, and/or commented favorably upon those posts, and cross-indexed those names with North Carolina's remarkably forthcoming downloadable database of registered voters' demographic information and voting behavior (the latter totaling about 24 million records). To minimize the chance of mis-identifying these individuals in that database we employed a three-point test: a Facebook user was associated with an individual voter record only if his name matched that of a registered voter, his Facebook profile's 'lives in' descriptor matched the voter's town or county of residence, and the preceding two criteria matched one and only one voter record in the database. This process produced a list totaling 367 Neo-Confederates plus their detailed demographics: age, gender, race, residence, political affiliation, complete histories of all their voter registration transactions - such as address updates and changes of party affiliation - and voting behaviors (which elections they did or did not vote in and, for "Unaffiliated" voters, which party's ballot they chose in each primary election in which they voted). The results outlined below are based on these data, supplemented with U.S. Census data where indicated. The analysis presented here supersedes a preliminary effort which I offered in my earlier Hillsborough diary, which was based upon a much more limited sample of only 50 registered voters.
Summary Demographics of North Carolina Neo-Confederate Sympathizers
Race: Unsurprisingly, 99.5% of our collection of Neo-Confederates self-identified in voter registration records as being 'White.' The remainder specified 'Other.' None are 'Black.' Compare this with the racial distribution of currently-registered North Carolina voters overall, among whom 71% self-describe as 'White' and 22% as 'Black.'
Gender: A decent respect for the presumably more refined sensibilities of women-folk, coupled with casual observation of rally participants, had initially led us to expect that men must surely outnumber women among Neo-Confederate sympathizers (hereafter, NCS) by a wide margin. But nothing could be further from the truth: among our 367 NCS, 56% are men and 44% are women, precisely matching the gender breakdown of white North Carolina voters overall. Neo-Confederate sympathy is a gender-neutral phenomenon in The Tar Heel State.
Party Affiliation: While registered Republicans predominate among NCS (50% overall, and 73% of all those who are not 'Unaffiliated"), Democrats nonetheless manage a surprisingly strong showing (18% overall, or 26% of all NCS who are not 'Unaffiliated').
Understanding this perhaps surprising finding requires some historical perspective. In the North, the anti-slavery movement and the Civil War itself were largely championed by the Republican "Party of Lincoln," and the vast majority of Union-appointed Reconstruction officials were Republicans as well, whereas Northern Democrats of that era were inclined to tolerate slavery in the South, and many were sympathetic to the Confederates' motivation, if not their cause. As a result, a legacy of distrust of Republicans and affinity for Democrats (reversed only as late as the Nixon administration, with its Southern Strategy) was long common among vanquished Confederates - a legacy which lives on today in North Carolina's high frequency of DINOs (Democrats in name only), who are Democrats only by virtue of family history, not by political beliefs or voting behavior.
Reinforcing this explanation is our survey's observation that, among registered NCS who claim no party affiliation (32% of all NCS), nearly twice as many vote exclusively Republican ballots in primaries (45%) as do those who vote exclusively Democratic ballots (26%); the remaining 28% have voted a mix of the two parties' ballots over the years.
Still, it is difficult to explain how today's NCS voters with documented Democratic sympathies (those 26% of Unaffiliateds who vote exclusively Democratic primary ballots) can harbor both Democratic and Neo-Confederate sympathies at the same time, without being forced to conclude that the Democratic Party in North Carolina itself still harbors its own fair share of bigots. But, in fairness, the reader should note that these Democratic-voting Unaffiliateds are a very small fraction of our sample (just 4% of all NCS) - the majority of Unaffiliated NCS voters (59%) have never voted any partisan ballot, Republican or Democratic.
In short, Republicans-in-fact plus Republicans-by-sentiment comprise the lion's share - but by no means all - of our NCS sample.
Age Distribution: Contrary to what we had hoped (namely, that Neo-Confederate sympathizers, at this 150 year remove from the War, are a dying breed), today's NCS are a remarkably youthful group, as the graph below illustrates.
Age distribution of North Carolina Neo-Confederate sympathizer voters, versus all white North Carolina voters
Age distribution of Neo-Confederate sympathizer (NCS) voters (red) versus all white North Carolina voters (grey) While it is good to bear in mind that our sample of NCS voters was derived from social media - and thus may be somewhat skewed toward its users' overall age distribution - nonetheless a comparison of the NCS age distribution in the figure above with that of Facebook users overall illustrates that the abundance of young NCS voters in our sample cannot be accounted for by the demographics of Facebook users overall. Younger voters (ages 18-32) account for one-third of all NCS in our sample, suggesting a movement whose sympathies are likely to live on for decades to come. It should perhaps not be surprising that a movement featuring shiny objects, in-your-face rebelliousness, and a style calculated to offend, might well prove attractive to a certain segment of youth. Discouraging, certainly...but not surprising.
Socio-Economic Status: Looking out over the clutches of Neo-Confederate sympathizer who actually attend public rallies, one might well be forgiven for arriving at the conclusion the the NCS movement as a whole is comprised primarily of lower-income citizens. Indeed, as the NC-NAACP's Laurel Ashton so eloquently said at an NAACP Historical Accuracy press conference in Hillsborough just days before the flag-waver rally there:
The tragedy is that these very people, those who will drive through the Piedmont waving Confederate flags, converging here in this courtyard, these very people, many of whom are poor and face a system of economic oppression daily, are hurting and sometimes even dying because of the policies passed by our elected officials. It is these poor white southerners who are so often without healthcare, who are underpaid and need a raise in the minimum wage, who have children struggling in under-resourced public schools, who live alongside black folks in rural communities where they can’t drink the water because of lack of environmental protections. It is these poor white folks who need access to affordable women’s healthcare, who need an end to the death penalty, who need emergency unemployment and earned income tax credits. Yet, here again, the data indicate that the stereotype is an over-simplification of the reality. For, as the graph below illustrates, while activist flag-wavers with nothing better to do of an afternoon may indeed be primarily low-income folks (a question which our data cannot speak to), clearly the greater Neo-Confederate sympathizer movement is primarily a middle-class phenomenon. Percent of residents below the poverty level (U.S. census data) in Neo-Confederate sympathizers' zip codes, versus all white North Carolina voters Percent of residents below the poverty level in Neo-Confederate sympathizers' zip codes (red), versus all white North Carolina voters (grey). Poverty data from the 2013 American Community Survey of the U.S. Census Bureau. Judging by U.S. Census data regarding the poverty levels in the zip codes in which they reside, NCS voters are remarkably middle-class - indeed, more so than North Carolina white voters overall. Political Engagement: In America, clouds of brightly colored fluttering scraps of cloth may attract outsized attention, but they do not win battles; votes do. And here we find some good news, for - as the graph below illustrates - NCS voters are comparatively disengaged when it comes to actually turning out to vote.
Registered voter turnout at the polls for the 2000 through 2014 elections, comparing Neo-Confederate sympathizers (red) and all white North Carolina voters (grey) Registered voter turnout at the polls for the 2000 through 2014 elections, comparing Neo-Confederate sympathizers (red) and all white North Carolina voters (grey) North Carolina's NCS voters routinely post election turnout figures which are 10 to 20 percentage points below those of all white voters, reflecting their relatively low degree of meaningful political engagement. It is also worth noting that the two election years which witnessed their highest turnouts - 2008 and 2012 - are the two years in which an African American stood for the office of president, in keeping with the notion that racial politics can be a motivating factor for NCS voters. Our survey's methods do not enable us to calculate the percentage of all NCS commenters who are registered to vote, but our distinct impression has been that it is likely to be much lower than 50%.
Geographical Distribution: As the map below illustrates, NCS voters in our sample are largely concentrated in three hot-spots throughout North Carolina. The largest of these, by far, is the old "Quaker Belt" region of the north-central Piedmont - which, ironically, William Ausman's book (cited at the beginning of this diary) identifies as the nexus of the anti-Confederate unionist guerrilla movement of the Civil War era. Equally unionist-dominated back then was another of the state's current NCS hot-spots, in the extreme west's Blue Ridge Mountain region (specifically, just south of Asheville). As Ausman discusses at length, both of these regions of North Carolina had extremely low numbers of persons held in slavery during the antebellum period (because the regions' poor soils made large plantations unfeasible), rendering these the homes of poor subsistence farmers and 'mechanics,' who neither needed nor could afford slaves and, as a result, had no dog in the fight that was the Civil War, and no sympathy for it.
Our NCS voters reside in at least 55 of North Carolina's 100 counties. The top ten - those which are home to 2% or more of the NCS in our survey - include Alamance (26%), Orange (13%), Henderson (8%), Rockingham (6%), Gaston (4%), Guilford (4%), Person (3%), Cleveland (3%), Wake (3%) and Granville (2%).
Geographic distribution of North Carolina Neo-Confederate sympathizers, from voter registration home address data
Geographic distribution of North Carolina Neo-Confederate sympathizers in our sample, from voter registration home address data Connections to Racist/Secessionist Groups: Throughout the research underlying this report we noted repeated connections between some of the most active NCS commenters and old-school racist/secessionist organizations including the League of the South and the Sons of Confederate Veterans. Evidence of such links includes: Eight very active NCS commenters on Facebook "Taking Back" pages are also members of the restricted North Carolina League of the South (LOS) Facebook page (including the individual who, according to numerous press accounts, was the organizer of the single largest North Carolina rally to date) Comments posted on "Taking Back" pages by LOS's North Carolina chapter chairman, Harold Crews, eagerly inquiring about turnout numbers shortly following recent rallies. Crews has also blogged on the NC-LOS web site regarding his participation in NCS rallies featuring "a good number of League members and supporters" Facebook profile and avatar photos, belonging to dozens of NCS commenters, which incorporate the "Black Cross" flag of the LOS - including this avatar for the organizer of one of the state's largest rallies to date, symbolizing the melding of the Confederate battle flag and the LOS Black Cross:
Regarding the symbolism of its Black Cross flag, LOS states: The white field stands for our Folk and for purity. The black cross stands for no surrender. Sentiments: Neo-Confederate sympathizers seldom miss an opportunity to repeat their "heritage, not hate!" mantra - a tag-line so smart that it is tempting to suspect the hand of a professional wordsmith in its creation. But the more unguarded comments of North Carolina NCS Facebook users belie that assurance of reverence for history free of racial hatred: Truly sad. But, when you crawl out of that blighted, cesspool portion of society who works for nothing and demands that everything be handed to them....senseless destruction of other people's property means nothing to you.
So when will they start taking down all the MLK statutes and dig him up and move him???
And when they remove the MLK statues they need to remove his name from the public roads all buildings and HISTORY books
To many ass kissing spineless people bowing down to the naacp and other racist groups and letting them destroy Americas history. Im getting more and more closer to not being an american flag on the front of my house. Its getting ready to be just my confederate nc flag and southern cross. I guess i will just consider myself a southern confederate instead of an american. If American politicians want to hate on my history and what i believe in then i will hate on them and just follow what i believe in.
All lives matter and time has come for the Blacks to stop their racist ways.
Maybe a black person had a white do it. The spelling is really good. Very few can write that well if they are the caliber to do that at all. Just saying
stand guard and shoot if anyone comes close with paint in hand
Shoot all them basterds
The real meaning of NAACP is National Association for the Advancement of Crazy Peopl
I hope people plan on bringing firearms for protection.
they are the ones committing the crimes, not us, and they need punished for it
I don't see any of them protesting in front of abortion clinics or in gang banger neighborhoods where most black lives are lost.
Just talk about rioting. That's what they threaten (or do) to get what they want.
Put the Haters and Yankees in Libby Prison, Ric. Virginia
sooo tired of this B.S. Let's just fight this war over again.. I got everything i need..
they keep ordering the murder of white ppl & have been successful in a lot of cases & act as tho black ppl do not commit mass murders Welcome to the Neo-Confederates' dystopian vision of a new New South - the same as the Old South: a heritage of hate. These are folks some of whom you may even know: pest control technicians, used car salesmen, cashiers at Walmart, mechanics, truck drivers, stay-at-home mommies, beauticians, burger-flippers, community college students, office workers, bikers, veterans, the unemployed, retired folks and (Jesus wept) even little children. They are mostly young to middle-aged. They are white. They are men and women alike, mostly (but not exclusively) Republicans. They are largely middle class. They are white supremacist secessionists. They are angry and armed and politically ineffectual. And, ironically, many of their 'Confederate' ancestors were actually Unionists at heart. They are the faces of the Neo-Confederacy.
Questions or comments? Reach me at docdawg666 [at] gmail [dot] com
When it's said and done, I just prefer to own arms, just in case I might need them. They are only good for one thing though, and that's killing something or somebody. Obviously' owning a gun and using a gun is something that requires really good judgment, which seems to be in ever shorter supply. Meanwhile, guns are cranked out by the millions, and anybody who wants one can get one.
We have a real problem with stupid people killing innocent people with guns. I wish there were a test for good judgment that one had to pass to own a gun, but we don't seem to be able to do that in any way that can't be rigged.
I expect more and more of these racially driven shootings. But it's more of an excuse for powerless, angry ****s to use to justify their inability to control their own violent emotional outbursts. It's not so much to do with race as it does being cornered like rats in a world with poor prospects and no frontiers.
Too many people.
Eddie, Race has nothing to do with it in places where everybody is more or less the same color (see Puerto Rico). Yet claiming the violence is because people are "Stupid" is incorrect. Humans are emotional creatures. Your claim to being able to blow somebody away in self defense is as "valid" for you as for anyone else out there. Keeping guns out of human hands is the only way deaths from angry confrontations or revengeful vendettas will be reduced.
In the USA, RACE has EVERYTHING to do with it, no matter how much you want to dance around this by claiming it is an issue of intelligence level. LOOK at these comments, Eddie! I have read similar comments HERE from some rather intelligent people. Don't tell me you have to be "stupid" to agree with them. All you have to be is BIGOTED! And lots of BIGOTS have college degrees and make a lot of money, pal!
Quote
Neo-Confederate sympathizers seldom miss an opportunity to repeat their "heritage, not hate!" mantra - a tag-line so smart that it is tempting to suspect the hand of a professional wordsmith in its creation.
But the more unguarded comments of North Carolina NCS Facebook users belie that assurance of reverence for history free of racial hatred:
Truly sad. But, when you crawl out of that blighted, cesspool portion of society who works for nothing and demands that everything be handed to them....senseless destruction of other people's property means nothing to you.
So when will they start taking down all the MLK statutes and dig him up and move him???
And when they remove the MLK statues they need to remove his name from the public roads all buildings and HISTORY books
To many ass kissing spineless people bowing down to the naacp and other racist groups and letting them destroy Americas history. Im getting more and more closer to not being an american flag on the front of my house. Its getting ready to be just my confederate nc flag and southern cross. I guess i will just consider myself a southern confederate instead of an american. If American politicians want to hate on my history and what i believe in then i will hate on them and just follow what i believe in.
All lives matter and time has come for the Blacks to stop their racist ways.
Maybe a black person had a white do it. The spelling is really good. Very few can write that well if they are the caliber to do that at all. Just saying
stand guard and shoot if anyone comes close with paint in hand
Shoot all them basterds
The real meaning of NAACP is National Association for the Advancement of Crazy Peopl
I hope people plan on bringing firearms for protection.
they are the ones committing the crimes, not us, and they need punished for it
I don't see any of them protesting in front of abortion clinics or in gang banger neighborhoods where most black lives are lost.
Just talk about rioting. That's what they threaten (or do) to get what they want.
Put the Haters and Yankees in Libby Prison, Ric. Virginia
sooo tired of this B.S. Let's just fight this war over again.. I got everything i need..
they keep ordering the murder of white ppl & have been successful in a lot of cases & act as tho black ppl do not commit mass murders (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
And then UB has the BRASS BALLS to claim putting people like that in prison is "hate".
And then UB, because I left out a bunch DETAILS on the STRICT gun control laws in Puerto Rico, tries to make a case for what "works" and what "doesn't work" with his personal experiences and a list of fines that allegedly equal "stricter" gun control laws. ::)
Whatever...
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 27, 2015, 09:12:14 pm
Quote
A well regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed; but no person religiously scrupulous shall be compelled to bear arms. In late August 1789, the House debated and modified the Second Amendment.
I make no attempt to rationalize my position. I just refuse to be disarmed. I don't consider it a God-given right. Just a choice.
TPTB are considering every excuse to outlaw ammunition, if not firearms themselves. They have had some success there already.
I predict greater repression. It is the logical expectation.
You are a smart man. Me too. Your pea shooters don't stand a chance against TPTB the instant they decide to take them away from you.
Back when I was taking military tactics at West Point, we had to learn to do all kinds of neat stuff with weapons. We had to disassemble and assemble 45 caliber automatics in a certain number of seconds. But the real bear was loading, firing and reloading a continental Army musket from the Revolutionary War. They had bayonets (LONG BAYONETS) on them because that durn thing was used way more often than not.
It was quite a dance to get the wick ready (and it had to be kept DRY along with the powder during combat too!), jam the powder and then a cloth and then a round ball and then aim and then hope your flint hadn't crapped out and then shoot. At that point, it was rinse and repeat unless the red coat was charging you close by. Some people got really good at it and could reload in less than 30 seconds. Most could not.
I bring all this irrelevant babble to the fore because THAT weapon is the basis of all the rhetoric in the Second Amendment. The RIGHT to shoot ONCE IF your powder, wick and flint are dry within a minute or so was the mindset of the folks who wrote that piece of paper.
But things have changed. I can take an AR-15 and file something on it and turn it into a machine gun. The Army knows all this. And yet they have not moved against the dudes out there that have enough clips and "hunting" rifles/machine guns to start a little war. The reason is that they are ALL pea shooters compared with what TPTB can bring to bear.
Yes, I know you aren't claiming you own weapons because of this or that Constitutional rhetoric. But you ARE claiming that you are somehow more capable of deciding when to use lethal force than most of the rest of the population. Yes, I know you don't give a rat's patutty if that doesn't sit well with some folks.
But your claim that being locked and loaded will keep TPTB at bay is wishful thinking. TPTB won the arms race with the population over a century ago.
You can kill your neighbor (by accident or because of strife) or some local thief with your hardware, Eddie. That's it.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 27, 2015, 09:42:17 pm
Wed Aug 26, 2015 at 10:22 AM EDT. Two Seattle police officers fired after body camera worn by bus driver catches them in a huge lie
On November 14, 2014, Kelvin Kirkpatrick, an African-American Metro bus driver with over 20 years of experience in Seattle, requested that sheriff's officers remove sleeping homeless men from his bus, per company policy. The officers weren't helpful and even lied to Kirkpatrick about why they weren't being helpful. He got back on his bus and got back to work.
Little did he know that two of the officers involved would flat out lie about the entire encounter in a report that they completed, stating that he dropped f-bombs and berated them. The thing is, that never happened—and a body camera, worn by the bus driver himself, captured the entire ordeal as you can see below the fold.
The firings resulted from an investigation into a complaint filed by King County Sheriff’s Office Sergeant Lou Caballero after an early morning argument on Nov. 14 between him and driver Kelvin Kirkpatrick in downtown Seattle, internal Sheriff’s Office documents showed.
During the argument, Kirkpatrick, a 20-year transit veteran, criticized Caballero and his deputies for not removing non-paying “sleepers” from his bus.
Caballero said Kirkpatrick yelled at him: “You got three fu cking deputies out here that don’t do nothing.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe) Another deputy, Amy Shoblom, attested to that in a witness statement. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-030815183114.gif&hash=2bf1553e87e8605311feb874231953d5fb88ee9c)
Both officers have now been fired (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf), but it shows you the frightening ease with which officers will not only make sh it up, but back each other up on the fiction. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Rejoice, the world has been made safe for political correctness and racial diversity.
At least the U. got something for the money they spent on Dr. Gregory Vincent's 315K salary this year, their house nig ger VP for Diversity and Community Relations.
You apparently missed the part about the PC Police also deciding to remove the statue of Woodrow Wilson today too, because, somehow, by some convoluted logic, his bronze likeness was also some kind of throw-back to Jim Crow. It'd be hilariously funny to me if it weren't such a tired sack of pure sh it. Who will they go after next, Davy Crockett?
Why doesn't your mocking, dismissive tone not surprise me? ::)
I seem to have read similar, though less erudite, comments along exactly the same lines recently...
Quote
Truly sad. But, when you crawl out of that blighted, cesspool portion of society who works for nothing and demands that everything be handed to them....senseless destruction of other people's property means nothing to you.
So when will they start taking down all the MLK statutes and dig him up and move him???
And when they remove the MLK statues they need to remove his name from the public roads all buildings and HISTORY books
To many ass kissing spineless people bowing down to the naacp and other racist groups and letting them destroy Americas history. Im getting more and more closer to not being an american flag on the front of my house. Its getting ready to be just my confederate nc flag and southern cross. I guess i will just consider myself a southern confederate instead of an american. If American politicians want to hate on my history and what i believe in then i will hate on them and just follow what i believe in.
All lives matter and time has come for the Blacks to stop their racist ways.
Maybe a black person had a white do it. The spelling is really good. Very few can write that well if they are the caliber to do that at all. Just saying
stand guard and shoot if anyone comes close with paint in hand
Shoot all them basterds
The real meaning of NAACP is National Association for the Advancement of Crazy Peopl
I hope people plan on bringing firearms for protection.
they are the ones committing the crimes, not us, and they need punished for it
I don't see any of them protesting in front of abortion clinics or in gang banger neighborhoods where most black lives are lost.
Just talk about rioting. That's what they threaten (or do) to get what they want.
Put the Haters and Yankees in Libby Prison, Ric. Virginia
sooo tired of this B.S. Let's just fight this war over again.. I got everything i need..
they keep ordering the murder of white ppl & have been successful in a lot of cases & act as tho black ppl do not commit mass murders
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.dailykos.com%2Fimages%2F156613%2Flightbox%2Frebecca-hendin-cartoon-illustration-see-no-hear-no-speak-no-republicans-2-700pix.jpg%3F1438206007&hash=f8d57bc6601384774ebc9ff2e64ed3d22fdf2f6e) If only it was just the Republicans... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.sodahead.com%2Fpolls%2F000370273%2Fpolls_Smiley_Angry_256x256_3451_356175_answer_4_xlarge.png&hash=15577651daa4c35ff4d6b26217f99db6ebfde0b3)
Quote
"When I go to the grocery store and see a choice between crap cereal and sh it cereal, I'm not buying cereal. It's not my problem, it's the cereal makers' problem."
-- Puddytat on low voter turnout
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 02, 2015, 10:28:51 pm
Special Report: Pepperspray, Por nography, And Two Bad Apples
Quote
Under an ugly shadow: The path to redemption for the Rutland City Police Department
by Elizabeth Hewitt
Andy Todd had been at the Rutland City Police Department for six years when he filed a formal written complaint with his command staff.
It was not spur-of-the-moment.
It came: Six years after he first heard coworkers use racial slurs.
Four years from the time he saw an officer pocketing items during illegal vehicle stops.
Nine months after Todd heard officers laughing about African American Jamek Hart, who was pepperballed in his cell more than 20 times.
Four months since Todd witnessed a coworker slam a teenage African American face-first into the wall of a cell.
Finally, on Sept. 21, 2010, Todd filed a written complaint to his supervisors documenting his concerns about the alleged misconduct of fellow officers.
Five years later, Todd’s allegations of racial discrimination in the Rutland City Police Department are headed to court in January.
His lawsuit exposed a police culture that was rife with misconduct and aggressive racial bias during the time when Todd, who is black, served as an officer with the department from 2004 to 2011.
That culture, in which police openly discriminated against blacks, used excessive force, threatened other officers and had sex with informants on the job, has been kept a secret until now. Todd’s lawsuit brings to light internal reports, affidavits and depositions that detail alleged misconduct and a hostile work environment at the Rutland City Police Department.
The court case has sparked questions about whether the department has done enough to address racial bias and alleged officer misconduct.
Rutland City officials say the department has been fully reformed. Two officers who are fingered in Todd’s lawsuit have left, and the internal culture of the Rutland City Police Department has changed dramatically since the lawsuit was filed, they say.
But former officers and local residents say they are not so certain all that much has changed.
The Epicenter Of An Epidemic
Gov. Peter Shumlin’s state of the state address in January 2014 drew attention to the opiate addiction crisis in Vermont, and shortly afterward, a front-page story in the New York Times identified Rutland as the unofficial epicenter of Vermont’s heroin epidemic.
The publicity drew attention to an issue that wasn’t new to residents of this central Vermont city of 16,000. For more than a decade, the local newspaper, the Rutland Herald, has reported on drive-by shootings, drug possession charges, arrests of dealers and drug-related burglaries.
Local law enforcement has struggled with how best to apprehend drug dealers, many of whom are black and hail from the New York City area and Springfield, Massachusetts. Vermont enacted a bias-free policing law that required a few years ago, but studies show that racial profiling remains prevalent.
Fernando Furtado (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00), Survival's Racist of the Year 2015, addresses the Maranhao state assembly
Survival International today announced the winner of the Racist of the Year Award 2015 as Fernando Furtado, a deputy in the Brazilian state of Maranhao.
Furtado, of the Communist Party of Brazil, was given the award for comments he made in a speech in July, in which he said that Amazonian Indians should be left to starve. He also called them “a bunch of little gays.” After having caused outrage in Brazil, Mr. Furtado was forced to issue a formal retraction.
Addressing a meeting of loggers and ranchers, Mr. Furtado said of indigenous Brazilians: “They don’t know how to plant rice (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-030815183114.gif&hash=2bf1553e87e8605311feb874231953d5fb88ee9c) ,so let them die of hunger in poverty, that’s the best thing, because they don’t know how to work.”
The speech was delivered to a settler community in São João do Caru, close to the border of the Awá indigenous territory. Multiple fires started by the loggers are still raging in this area, threatening the lives of several hundred Awá tribespeople. This includes a group of uncontacted people, who are one of the most vulnerable societies on the planet.
Considering the extremity of Mr. Furtado’s remarks and the context in which they were delivered, Survival is calling for them to be considered as incitement to racial hatred. There is widespread resentment towards tribes in the region after a government operation to expel loggers from the Awá’s reserve following a high profile campaign by Survival. It is highly probable that these sentiments were part of the motive behind the arson attacks on the local Awá people.
This is the second year running that a Brazilian has received Survival International’s notorious award. Fellow Brazilian politician Luis Carlos Heinze (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi1.wp.com%2Fgas2.org%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F05%2Fstupid.png&hash=03f34f8c94a314e127f3ee8c4872e721e1b04063) was named Racist of the Year 2014 for saying: “the government … is in bed with the blacks, the Indians, the gays, the lesbians, all the losers.”
Survival director Stephen Corry said: “These loathsome remarks indicate the extent of racism against tribal peoples among some of the most powerful people in Brazilian society. It’s important that people both within and outside of Brazil are aware of the prevalence of these attitudes because they underpin the genocidal onslaught of violence that Brazilian tribes face today. That’s why we’ve decided to make Furtado Racist of the Year 2015.”
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/11058
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 21, 2015, 07:58:07 pm
There is nothing creeping about American politics. It barges through the door and blows your brains out when and where it wants to- which not coincidentally happens to be where the precious resources are positioned that the savage capitalists wish to appropriate.
ISIS is largely a fiction that serves the needs of the US National Security State. These various bogeymen have morphed through the years- anyone who does not understand how this works and can't see through it is trapped in a manufactured reality.
List them through the years- the innumerable threats that were and are coming to get us and that needed our full attention (and taxpayer dollar)- Commies, Al Qaeda, Chavez, Mossadegh, Arbenz, SARS, Russians, Hussein, Black Panthers, FARC, Reefer, Rock N Roll, Zapatistas, Pan Africa, Mujahideen, the list goes on and on and on and on- any and all threats all the time. Pimpin' fear to keep us believing that any and all of these cretins that are peddling the fear are actually interested in our welfare.
Meanwhile what's really going on, the very real threats that are coming at us every moment of every day- Wall St., the MIC, Republicans, Chamber of Commerce, NED, CIA, NSA, the School Board, the police, gated communities, Democrats, mortgage, rent, food insecurity, no health care, grinding debt, poverty, repossessions, drug war, soil erosion, pollution, car trouble, water turned off and on and on and on and on- are all kept hidden from view even as they bash us over the head- all kept hidden by the distractions of the LATEST MANUFACTURED TERROR- AND THAT'S WHY THEY DO IT FOLKS- which has no bearing on the reality of virtually every single individual that exists in this country.
66 △ ▽
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on February 29, 2016, 10:33:35 pm
Mark Hughes, with the group Justice for All, urged activists to take a broader view of institutional racism in Vermont. It extends well beyond the schools and plays an insidious role in housing and the criminal justice system, he said.
Institutions rely on the discretion of individuals whose perception is invariably colored by personal bias, he said. That leads to racial disparities, whether it’s suspensions in schools or sentencing in court.
see pictures at article link 8) race Vanessa Sanchez, 49, of Brattleboro, is visibly emotional during a rally for racial justice Saturday in St. Albans. Photo by Morgan True/VTDigger
ST. ALBANS — Advocates for racial justice marched through the city Saturday calling for an end to the mistreatment that people of color say their children are experiencing in Vermont’s schools.
“The time has come in Vermont when systemic racism just won’t do,” said Ebony Nyoni, an organizer with Black Lives Matter Vermont, during a rally before the march.
The march drew close to 75 people from across the state. It was not met with the same angry response as a rally here in December.
Some passers-by honked or gave thumbs up. A few appeared frustrated with marchers who momentarily blocked traffic on Main Street. No police were present.
Nadine Morales, a 23-year-old biracial mother of three from St. Albans with Puerto Rican heritage, told the crowd of marchers that she spent years being ostracized by her peers and ridiculed with racial slurs at Missisquoi Valley Union High School.
Her daughter, a fourth-grader in St. Albans public schools, has already been teased for taking pride in her Puerto Rican heritage, Morales said, and she declared it’s time for that to change.
Nadine Morales, 23, a mother of three who is of Puerto Rican heritage, advocates for racial justice in Vermont schools during a march Saturday in St. Albans. Photo by Morgan True / VTDigger
Morales described feeling bullied and alone, forced to constantly defend her identity, simply because she was the only Puerto Rican at her school and the other students had negative associations about her people. “I was the only one fighting this fight,” Morales said.
Morales said the bullying pushed her in the wrong direction, leading to fights with other students, skipping class and drinking. She didn’t stop getting in trouble until a counselor saw potential in her and asked her to lead group counseling sessions, she said.
Now she’s a student at Champlain College and making a life for herself that she never imagined in high school when she felt completely isolated, she said.
Morales and the other organizers of Saturday’s march are calling on teachers and administrators in Vermont’s schools to work with people of color in their communities to develop cultural competencies they say are lacking, leaving schools unprepared to deal with racial bullying.
They also want public schools to end the use of suspension and expulsion as a disciplinary measure, because it disproportionately affects students of color and students with disabilities.
A Vermont Legal Aid report released in January found that African-American and Native American students were two to three times more likely to be suspended than white students. Students with disabilities were three times more likely to be suspended.
Mohamadou Ndione, a foreign language teacher who has worked in central Vermont public schools for more than a decade, said white children in Vermont have very little cultural awareness.
When students say things that are racially insensitive to Ndione, who is African-American, he said he tries to use it as a teachable moment, but he and others said there isn’t formal curriculum that teaches about race from a nonwhite perspective.
“Schools should create curriculum to teach about other cultures because the kids really want to know,” he said. Many of the hurtful things students say are simply parroted from what they hear at home, he said.
“Our children should read books by slaves, not books about slaves,” Morales said. She wants her children to learn about race and ethnicity before they’re checking a box on a job application declaring it.
Brigham Young, 31, of Essex, said he came to the rally to support Morales, who is a friend. Young, who is white, said he appreciates the work she is doing to bring about a dialogue about race in Vermont schools.
“They don’t teach any of this in school,” said Young. His oldest child is 11 and learns more about race from television than in school, Young added.
Part of the problem is that Vermont is so overwhelmingly white that the experiences of people of color are not visible, said many activists. Mark Hughes, with the group Justice for All, leads marchers in song in St. Albans on Saturday. Photo by Morgan True / VTDigger
Stina Booth, 38, was in Taylor Park enjoying the city’s annual winter carnival, which was happening at the same time as the march. Her young children were drawn to the protest songs and accompanying band as they went by on Main Street.
Booth said her kids are too young to have raised questions about race, having not started elementary school, but she seemed unsure what she would tell her children when the time comes.
Booth, who grew up in St. Albans, said she was always more aware of economic inequality in her community and hadn’t given much thought to racial inequality.
There was only one black student in her class growing up, she said. “I didn’t realize he was black until an embarrassingly late age,” she confessed.
Charles Rainey, 18, is an African-American freshman at Middlebury College who grew up in Atlanta. He said he joined the march because he’s felt discriminated against a number of times on the campus of the elite educational institution.
It happens most frequently when white progressives won’t acknowledge that race still affects the lives of nonwhites, Rainey said. They want to believe Vermont is post-racial, he said, and that has not been his experience. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132401-16881856.gif&hash=ef5bd30cec7a50a81f3507f9bd328189dead7aa2) “We need to dismantle the white liberal power structure that isn’t hearing our voices,” Rainey said while addressing marchers.
Mark Hughes, with the group Justice for All, urged activists to take a broader view of institutional racism in Vermont. It extends well beyond the schools and plays an insidious role in housing and the criminal justice system, he said. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-060518153110.png&hash=39d587c31b7f7e66b30d7e59bb560e2ad0662eee)
Institutions rely on the discretion of individuals whose perception is invariably colored by personal bias, he said. That leads to racial disparities, whether it’s suspensions in schools or sentencing in court. “We need to shine a light on those decision points and demand accountability,”(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) he said.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 19, 2016, 05:47:22 pm
The TRUTH that empathy deficit disordered people that DEFEND the polluting, racist, profit over people and planet CORRUPT, BLOOD THIRSTY, CRUEL and SADISTIC STATUS QUO (they have BENEFITED FROM (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978)) work 24/7 to deride, disdain, ridicule and LIE about.
They do this BECAUSE they LIKE the TRUTH about the total absence of ethics in their beloved "real world" and don't want anybody to change it. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f)
https://youtu.be/_tVJNvQzK8M
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 20, 2016, 05:09:15 pm
Brilliant brilliant David Stockman, still a patriot in this desperate time. I am certainly going to vote for Mr. Trump, not only as the "lesser evil" as compared to the Deathshead female impersonator Harpy Shrillary but as a possible if imperfect Hercules to begin cleaning the Nasty Augean Stables that this impaired Republic has become under its card carrying Oligarcic Usurious Overlords. Since most continual jawboners prefer doing nothing while vicariously licking their chops at the flames and demise of our Motherland, some Patriots would appreciate a still living hope that something could be tried to avert this catastrophe. I would rather have honest hope than continual fat chewing cynicism any day. I am glad and proud that millions agree. Karpatok
Still off your meds, K? You referring to anyone else as a "harpy" is truly risible. The gods of irony laugh. You and the other American Nazis here need to be resisted by any means necessary.
Oh thank you so much Surly . Not a surprise coming from all negative you. Bet your meds in number far surpass mine. I don't take any so I guess it's just that clean living and thinking positive and becoming a bit more spiritual. I truly wish the best for you considering your physical state. Like letting go of some of the anger and bitterness and thinking of how to be a bit more constructive and helpful. Check out what they tell you about enlarging your heart space instead of contracting it constantly. That would help you know, if you really want to stick around. I'm doing well,thank you, I now see a lot more hope and possibilities for all. What a difference a season makes,eh? Cheers, Karpatok
Here's some of that K-style "spirituality" and "enlarged heart space:"
But there is quite a bit more to this story of 'screw the little guy for profit'. Some the best dividend yield stocks over the last thirty years, loved by all state (and FEDERAL) pension funds (i.e. just about anybody with a 401K may own some of these profit over minorities stocks), are Prison Industry stocks. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 04, 2016, 03:26:12 pm
The problem of course is getting the group in the 2 standard deviation above the mean to realize that they belong with the average people and those below average, and not with the group 3 standard deviations above the mean.
RE
An observation: The self-evident truth of this accounts for the class division and racism as a tool of social control that has obtained in the FSoA ever since Nathaniel Bacon rose up against the British Governor Berkeley, leading an armed rabble of malcontent whites and black freedmen.
A litlte googleization of Bacon's rebellion will reward the curious on this theme. What people often fail to realize is that institutionalized racism is not meant to only control blacks (and other peoples of color) but also to control white people.
Why white people need to be controlled and how the system of institutionalized racism does just that is found in the annals of colonial court houses. Some scholars have traced the origins of institutionalized racism back to colonial days, before the actual construction of black slavery was finalized, to a time when black and white bond-servants worked and slept together – and ran away together. Sounds pretty remarkable, but records indicate this was so. Not surprisingly, Howard Zinn's remarkable, People’s History of the United States thoroughly documents how a a system of racial slavery was created to address the needs of the colonial elite for a system of control.
It is hard to imagine such a time, when colonial elite had to fear not only nearby hostile Indian population, but also in the southern colonies a fear of slave revolt which seems to have been a permanent facet of plantation life. Plus they had to contend with the class anger of poor whites: indentured servants, tenants, the propertyless, the soldier and sailor. Scholars have documented that there were about 250 instances where at least 10 slaves joined in revolt or in a conspiracy to rebel. And time to time, whites were involved in the slave resistance. Generally, when apprehended, all were duly convicted and executed.
A well defined class system arose from North to south, which sought to preserve social arrangements of Mother country. They controlled trade and commerce, dominated the politics of the residents through church and town meetings, through intermarriage alliances, and formed a reasonably inpenetrable oligarchy.
In Virginia, the House of Burgesses declared that white servants were loathsome, as since many were from past wars, if given arms “we have just reason to fears that they may rise upon us.” So class fear among the elites was explicit. This was at a time when “hopes of leveling” – equalizing the wealth, was the cause of countless actions in colonies of poor whites against the rich in all the colonies in the century and half before the Revolution.
To elides many years of history and jurisprudence, eventually the elite passed the slavery codes, forcing all blacks to be slaves and all whites to be non-slaves. The elite had discovered that if they constructed a racially-based system of slavery, and gave the white servants just a bit more than the black servants received, they could effectively “buy-off” the Europeans. But they had to create a “white race” in order to achieve this. That lilt in Jamaican patios is a remnant of poor Irish overseers... or so I am told.
Historian Edmund Morgan nailed it when he said:
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Only one fear was greater than the fear of black rebellion in the new American colonies. That was the fear that discontented whites would join black slaves to overthrow the existing order.
Of course, divide and conquer has worked since before Roman times, and maybe since the Cro-Magnon walked into Neanderthaler lands, for all I know. But as we can see from our current day, it's alive and well in the FSoA.
So good luck getting people to identify with those they perceive as "their lessers." Class division has a long and ignoble pedigree.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 09, 2016, 06:52:15 pm
Immokalee: A Story Of Slavery And Freedom
https://youtu.be/zBc4cOg9-ks
Blood on the Tomatoes
Brutal exploitation of farm workers, including slavery and indentured servitude, continues to plague thousands in the fields and groves of south Florida. This is the story behind America's cheap domestic produce. Immokalee is the name of one of the largest agricultural worker centers.
Workers toil in the sun for 10-12 hours a day, and hope to scrape together $50. The amount paid per bucket of tomatoes has barely crept up about 15 cents in as many years. That wasn't even the worst of it: physical violence and abuse of workers was systemic.
This documentary shows the how the workers organized, forming CIW, the Coalition of Immokalee Worker and have succeeded in raising wages and ending the violence. Among other things, they organized a 3 year long campaign to boycott Taco Bell, the biggest purchaser of these tomatoes, resulting in a real breakthrough: in 2005 Taco Bell agreed to work with CIW to address the wages and working conditions of farm workers in the Florida tomato industry.
With this agreement, they were the first in the fast food industry to directly help improve farm workers wages. "Yes, Immokalee is still poor... but now we've raised the voice of the worker and from here we have affected the whole country" one resident says.
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"We are going to be here until this industry becomes democratized and respects us." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
--Bibi Farber This documentary was produced by Jeff Imig
Agelbert SIDE NOTE: Although somewhat less violent than Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela or the African Congo, the Orangetree, Florida area, where Immokalee is located, has the highest rate of lightning strikes per square kilometer in the United States.
THAT ALONE should be enough for OSHA (Occupational Safety & Health Administration) to step in and force those who contract farm workers to pay them a premium for the added lightning occupational hazard (on top of the pesticides and selective herbicides these workers are subjected to every time they go out to pick tomatoes or other crops).
These workers are GROSSLY underpaid! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 31, 2016, 11:22:46 pm
South American tribes have denounced the call from American academics Kim Hill and Robert Walker for forced contact with uncontacted tribal peoples in the Amazon, warning of the catastrophic consequences such contact would bring.
Speaking in a video as part of Survival’s Tribal Voice project, Guajajara Indians rejected the idea entirely. Several members of the tribe, known as the “Guajajara Guardians,” have acted to protect nearby uncontacted Awá people in the absence of greater government support.
The leader of the Guardians, Olimpio Guajajara, said: “We are here… Monitoring the land and defending the uncontacted Indians and the Guajajara who live here. Why? Because there are some people, some anthropologists in other countries who want, once again, to violate the rights of the uncontacted Indians in the country.”
He added: “We are aware that some anthropologists have been calling for ‘controlled contact’ with the uncontacted Indians… We will not allow this to happen because it will be another genocide of a people… of an indigenous group which doesn’t want contact.”
Video: Olimpio Guajajara criticizes proposals for ‘controlled contact’ with tribes
The Guajajara are the latest of many indigenous peoples in South America to reject the idea. Davi Kopenawa Yanomami, known as the “Dalai Lama of the rainforest,” has long campaigned for the rights of uncontacted tribes to determine their own futures after witnessing the devastating impacts of contact on his people, the Yanomami, in the 20th century.
Under the Brazilian constitution, all indigenous peoples have the right to their land, including uncontacted tribes. In 1987 FUNAI, the indigenous affairs department, adopted a policy of not making contact with uncontacted tribes and continuing to demarcate their territories and enforcing protection of them.
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All uncontacted tribal peoples face catastrophe unless their land is protected.
The policy of not forcing contact with uncontacted tribes is supported by Brazilian NGOs like CIMI, ISA and CTI, as well as Survival International.
Uncontacted tribes are the most vulnerable peoples on the planet. Whole populations are being wiped out by violence from outsiders who steal their land and resources, and by diseases like flu and measles to which they have no resistance.
Last month, Survival’s global campaign for the Kawahiva, an uncontacted tribe in Mato Grosso state, succeeded in securing a protected territory for the tribe.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said: “When are people going to start listening to tribal peoples about what they want, rather then presuming to know what’s best?
The attitude of some academics like Hill and Walker is dangerous and neocolonial. This so-called ‘controlled contact’ could be devastating for uncontacted peoples and would only play into the hands of South America’s logging and ranching mafias, who want to steal the tribes’ land and don’t care about human rights. It is for tribes to determine their relationship to the wider world, not academics.”
Read this online: http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/11257
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 19, 2016, 08:08:20 pm
To mark Father’s Day (June 19) Survival International is celebrating the extraordinarily close parenting of rainforest tribes in central Africa, including some “Pygmy” tribes where fathers spend more time with their children than most parents in industrialized societies – and some have even been known to suckle infants.
A study has suggested that fathers from the Bayaka “Pygmy” tribe in the northern Congo hold their children for up to 20% of the day, and are far more likely to kiss or cuddle their children than the women.
The same study also found that Bayaka fathers were far less likely to engage in “rough and tumble” style play to create bonds with their children than their farming neighbors, instead preferring to communicate gently. This was shown to produce extremely nuanced understanding and communication between parent and child, even with children under 18 months old.
Hunter gatherers have developed ways of life which are largely self-sufficient and extraordinarily diverse. They are also widely known to foster close ties within families and communities and to afford more leisure time than pastoral, farming, or industrial working patterns.
Statistics like these suggest that rather than being considered backward or primitive, tribal peoples should be respected as contemporary societies who enjoy high qualities of life, especially if their right to determine their own futures is respected.
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Despite this, many tribal peoples in central Africa are under threat. Their lands and resources are being stolen in the name of “progress” and “conservation.”
Tribal peoples like the closely related Baka people have been dependent on and managed their environment for generations. But big conservation organizations like WWF are instead partnering with industry and destroying the environment’s best allies in the name of conservation.
Ngoko Madeleine, a Baka parent said: “Before when a woman gave birth we took her to the forest to help her regain her strength and weight, now we can’t do this. We would take our children to the forest to avoid epidemics. Now we know illnesses we never knew before, like malaria, tetanus.”
Another Baka, Ango, said: “We don’t understand, they told us not to go into the forest. But we don’t know how to live otherwise. They beat us and they kill us. They force us to flee to Congo. We want our children to know about the leaves and barks and rites and everything. But now they don’t know.”
Survival’s Director, Stephen Corry, said: “This study is further confirmation that those who think tribal peoples ignorant and backward are simply wrong.
They are of course highly developed and sophisticated societies with a lot to teach us, not just about the natural world, but also about living in human society. We know that many of the world’s staple crops and drugs used in Western medicine originate with tribespeople, perhaps the world could also draw inspiration from the Baka and Bayaka’s approach to parenting, especially now, a time when the West still hasn’t evolved much clarity on the issue and childhood depression and bullying are on the increase.
Rather than stealing these people’s land or forcing our ideas of “progress” onto them simply because their communal ways are different, we should be respecting them as contemporary societies and protecting their rights.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcliparts.co%2Fcliparts%2FBig%2FEgq%2FBigEgqBMT.png&hash=e7eec62f009cdd686ce795fad0a53c6befe748e9)
Some names have been changed to protect tribal peoples’ identity
Note: "Pygmy” is an umbrella term commonly used to refer to the hunter-gatherer peoples of the Congo Basin and elsewhere in Central Africa. The word is considered pejorative and avoided by some tribespeople, but used by others as a convenient and easily recognized way of describing themselves.
The Brazilian government’s Indigenous Affairs Department (FUNAI) has severely criticized the authors of a controversial editorial in Science magazine who called for forced contact with uncontacted tribes.
In an open letter criticizing controversial anthropologists Kim Hill and Robert Walker, uncontacted tribes experts at FUNAI stress the threats facing uncontacted peoples. These include violence from outsiders who steal their land and resources, and diseases like flu and measles to which they have no resistance. They reject what Hill and Walker (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fgen152.gif&hash=d5b10968fe56c4cb95fae17cee3cb420a5f4e2da) call “controlled contact” as “a severe violation of these peoples’ right to determine their own lives."
They added: ”We feel compelled to express our disagreement with the ideas of some anthropologists… that ‘controlled contact’ is the only possible strategy for protecting these peoples.
“There is never absolute control in contact situations, even in cases when the teams have all the resources they need to operate efficiently.”
Quote
In the editorial Hill and Walker acknowledged the devastating impact first contact can have, but claimed that “controlled contact” is “a better option than a no-contact policy” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251) and should be initiated after “conceiving a well-organized plan.”
FUNAI has joined the international call, led by tribal peoples, to protect uncontacted tribes’ land rights and to give them the chance to determine their own futures. Several Brazilian NGOs, including CIMI, ISA and CTI, as well as Survival International, are campaigning for this right to be upheld.
Speaking as part of Survival’s Tribal Voice project, Olimpio Guajajara, an indigenous man from the eastern Amazon, rejected forced contact, saying: “We are aware that some anthropologists have been calling for ‘controlled contact’ with the uncontacted Indians… We will not allow this to happen because it will be another genocide of a people… of an indigenous group which doesn’t want contact.”
Earlier this year, Survival’s global campaign for the Kawahiva, an uncontacted tribe in Mato Grosso state, helped secure a protected territory for the tribe. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)
Campaigners are now hoping that this statement from FUNAI will keep pressure on the interim Brazilian government to effectively protect uncontacted peoples. Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said: "Claiming that missions to forcibly contact uncontacted tribes, even when “well-planned”, can save lives is naive, and flies in the face of history:
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first contacts across South America have almost always resulted in death, disease or destruction for the tribe involved.
Why should it be any different in the future?
The short answer is that it won’t be.
Let’s be clear, forced contact is likely to be a death sentence for uncontacted tribes. Uncontacted tribal peoples face catastrophe unless their land is protected and we’re doing everything we can to secure it for them."
Namaya: As a white guy, does racism affect my life? ;)
Jul. 21, 2016, 7:05 pm Editor’s note: This commentary is by Namaya (who goes by one name only), a poet and writer from Brattleboro. He was a member of the board of Restorative Justice and one of the leaders in the founding of a Civilian Police Review Board in Brattleboro.
I’m a white, middle-class, middle-aged man with more than a few dollars in the bank. I see the police and can wave at them and drive safely on by. If I reach into my coat pocket for my wallet and identification I will probably not get shot with 40 bullets. I can shout out my magic protective words, “Don’t shoot me, I’m white. Put on some James Brown, see I can’t dance!” Oops, did I just fall into a stereotype? So, as a white guy, does racism affect my life?
Being white and of European descent I don’t worry that I’ll be mistaken for a brown Muslim named Mohammed, strip searched, and undergo a rectal probe at the airport. However, given Timothy McVeigh’s role in blowing up the federal buildings in Oklahoma it would seem reasonable that white guys should equally be suspect and the U.S. should have launched an invasion on Scotland. (Though it is still puzzling to me why 15 Saudis attacked the World Trade Center towers and the U.S. invaded Iraq and not Saudi Arabia: a case of the U.S. being geographically challenged?)
When I apply for work and they look at my credentials or college education, employers will not wonder if I was successful because of affirmative action. The employer may assume I did it on my own merit or, at the least, perhaps if I did attend an Ivy League school, it was because I was smart or, in the case of GW, from a wealthy and well connected family. If I was from that well-connected family a gentleman’s C grades will do.
When I go into a grocery store and decide not to use a shopping cart and stuff a few things in my pockets, generally, it is assumed that I was in a rush and the management doesn’t call the police. Because I am a white, middle aged man who is not walking around in raggedy clothes mumbling to myself (most times) it’s assumed that I’m harmless, a little careless in not using a cart, but not a significant problem. If I was black or Hispanic, how long would it take before the police are called?
I can walk into a local bank and cash a check without an ID. They will not ask me for four pieces of ID, even though I might have had a bank account there for years. I will not have the bank guard calling for backup because I get in an argument with a teller over an error in my bank account. As a white, middle-aged, middle-class professional, I know she will defer to her manager, and we will resolve this.
If I move, I can be sure of renting or purchasing housing in an area which I can afford and in which I would want to live. I don’t need to ask my friend to find an apartment. I can let the grass grow on my front lawn, have the hedges a bit shabby and the neighbors will think, “He’s still a bit of a hippy.” But if my name was Gonzales would the neighbors think, “Those damn Hispanics – one moves into the neighborhood and look what happens.” It is the hundreds of small clues during the course of day that says, “You’re different. You’re not quite like us.” If there is a fistfight at the school do they assume the black or Hispanic youngster is the aggressor?
When an African-American friend of mine comes to town, do I need to give them a heads-up about our local police department’s history of racial profiling or bias. If he is stopped does he need to do his black thing?
“Yes, sir, officer. I know it looks suspicious being a 6-foot tall black man wearing a suit and tie waiting on the street corner for my wife. No, I wasn’t casing the store for a robber. Yes, officer I have identification. Yes, officer, observe my hands as they are going into my pocket. No, I don’t have a gun or a shiv.”
Do people of color and various ethnicities feel safe and welcome coming into town? Will they spend their money for shopping? Will they buy second homes here? Will they invest their talents as lawyer, carpenter, artist or poet? Will the richness of many diverse cultures that have strengthened our collective national cultures be welcomed and become an asset to our community? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F126fs3187425.gif&hash=698371058827d6a11faaaa56c2531639421f9477)
Does racism affect me in my life? On the surface it doesn’t. As a white, middle-aged man, living in a predominantly white community, racism can be a ghosted shadow drifting invisibly by. However, racism/ bias/discrimination, is the sure and slow corrosive acid that that eats away at the fabric of a community. It says there is an “us and them.” It is another wall in the community that divides neighbors, differenced solely based on ethnicity or color.
In the past month, police shootings of black men and the subsequent shooting of police officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge have revived conversations about police brutality and racism in the US. From NYC to LA, protesters are carrying signs and chanting “black lives matter” and in many instances, especially on social media, they have been met with the controversial response “all lives matter.”
The fact is, all lives do matter. So why is responding to “black lives matter” with “all lives matter” problematic? Because the purpose of the Black Lives Matter movement is to highlight the way in which black lives are not currently being treated as though they matter. Black Lives Matter aims to draw attention to a specific problem — the discrimination and social injustice that black Americans have suffered and endured for hundreds of years.
Former NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani said that Black Lives Matter is “inherently racist” because it narrowly focuses on problems that affect one group of people; however, Black Lives Matter aims to spark social change and remedy a larger systemic problem. To do that, it necessarily singles out black Americans and their plight.
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6:57 PM - 7 Jul 2016 Obama: All lives matter, but "the data shows black folks are more vulnerable to these incidents."
Read more: Why Black Lives Matter Is a Global Issue (https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/black-lives-matter-movement-uk-europe/)
In doing that, Black Lives Matter’s approach to creating social change is not unlike that of the UN’s Global Goals.
These goals aim to tackle the world’s biggest problems — poverty, hunger, education, gender inequality — by focusing on specific problems that impact specific populations. The ultimate aim of the Global Goals (the UN’s 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development) is to eradicate “poverty in all its forms and dimensions” and to “realize the human rights of all.” Yet the Agenda specifically mentions “extreme poverty” when talking about freeing the human race “from the tyranny of poverty.” It emphasizes the “empowerment of all women and girls” when mentioning “the human rights of all.”
Does that mean girls and women and those in extreme poverty deserve special treatment? Perhaps. Does that mean boys and men and those who live on more than $1.25 a day are excluded from the agenda? Not at all.
Put it this way: you go to the doctor because you have a pain in one particular organ — let’s say, your heart — aside from this heart problem, you are relatively healthy.
In terms of keeping you healthy as a whole, all of your organs matter. But the doctor treats your heart because that is where the present problem is. Once your heart problem has been solved, she may mention that your body needs some TLC overall, but she likely didn’t extol the benefits of sunscreen while you were clenching your chest in pain.
https://youtu.be/oW8piEF9Lhc
Saying “black lives matter” is like telling the doctor “the pain is in my chest.” The goal is to draw her attention to a particular problem that urgently needs to be addressed so that your whole body will feel better. But just because you tell her you’re having heart troubles doesn’t mean there aren’t other things happening in your body. Saying “all lives matter” is akin to telling the doctor “my chest hurts, but all of my organs are important — so go ahead and give me something for each of my organs on top of those heart meds.”
Read more: Global Barriers to Girls Education (https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/global-barriers-to-girls-education/)
Well why not just treat all your organs while you’re at it? Because equal treatment does not lead to equal outcomes.
Image: Interaction Institute for Social Change | Artist: Angus Maguire
If we don’t address the most urgent problems first, then the larger system is likely to deteriorate. Neglecting to address the social injustices that black Americans experience hinders the progress of the US as a whole. If the agenda didn’t specifically target extreme poverty and challenges faced by girls and women, it would be extremely difficult to fulfill the broader Global Goals.
That’s why it is important, in this moment, to focus on black lives and not all lives, and why the Global Goals focus on ending extreme poverty and not making the whole world a little richer. Saying “all lives matter” is optimistic at best. It presumes that everyone has been, up to this point, treated equally. In the image above it would mean that everyone started out the same height and needed to be equally elevated above the fence to see. But that’s not the case.
Read more: You Are Not Allowed to Read This (https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/you-are-not-allowed-to-read-this/)
In theory, all people have equal claim to all human rights. But in actuality, there are groups of people who experience systemic discrimination, which disadvantages them from the outset.
When we talk about female genital mutilation (FGM) is it not to the exclusion of other harmful bodily practices. When we talk about equal access to education for girls, it does not inherently mean that we’re taking education opportunities away from boys. When we say “black lives matter,” we in no way negate the value of other lives.
Read more: 14 Million Reasons to Care About Education for Refugees (https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/14-million-reasons-to-care-about-education-for-ref/)
Approximately 10.7% of the world’s population lives below the extreme poverty line ($1.25 a day), that’s a relatively small minority. So why do they deserve special mention if the goal is to eradicate poverty overall?
People living in extreme poverty — like girls and women, and black men in the US — have been discriminated against and excluded by societies and institutions that sought to treat everyone equally without recognizing pre-existing inequalities. They are, through no fault of their own, starting life at the “bottom.” The discrimination and unequal access to opportunities these groups face mean they not only start at the bottom, but if there’s no conscious effort to change the systems that reinforce these inequalities, they are likely stuck there.
By singling out certain sets of people like those who live in extreme poverty, we’re simply drawing attention to problems within our society that need to be addressed to raise society up as a whole. We’re talking about treating heart problems to restore health to whole bodies.
The solution to the problems pointed out by Black Lives Matter and recognized by the Global Goals is not necessarily equal treatment — but rather treatment that makes us all equal.
To say “all lives matter” to people who are starting at the bottom does not help them “move up” or improve their situation. It merely shifts the whole system — relative inequalities and all — up (recall the illustration from above).
The Global Goals are presented in broad terms, but the accompanying written Agenda specifically mentions the “needs of the most vulnerable” when it talks about making the world a better place for all. Because some of the world’s biggest and most pressing challenges affect the most vulnerable — that’s where the “pain” is. The Global Goals aim to elevate those who have been systematically kept down — starting the most disadvantaged, those who have been pushed to the very bottom — to the top. Not to create a new upper echelon, but to equalize circumstances so that everyone has the same initial opportunities.
Watch: 14-Year-Old 'White Boy' Poem Is a Searing Critique of Privilege (https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/royce-mann-slam-poetry-video/)
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The ultimate global goal is equality, but in order to achieve that some problems will require more attention and resources than others in the present. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
The Black Lives Matter movement is highlighting a problem that requires special attention and resources today, so that we can not only boldly proclaim that “all lives matter,” but we can also proudly practice it tomorrow.
We focus on ending FGM and other barriers to girls education because girls are disproportionately denied their rights. We do that today, so we can talk about providing equal access to quality education for all — and know that everyone will be starting at the same point — tomorrow.
We talk about the particular needs of refugees today, so that tomorrow we won’t call them refugees — just people. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
“All lives matter,” that goes without saying. Fundamentally, we know that all people are equal and equally deserving of human rights. Unfortunately, many people are still prohibited from exercising their human rights.
In order to get to a point where we are all truly equals who are free to exercise our rights, we sometimes need to put the spotlight on one particular issue — but that does not automatically negate the importance of other issues.
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“Black lives matter” is not a step away from “all lives matter,” but a step toward it, and a step toward fulfilling the Global Goals. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcliparts.co%2Fcliparts%2FBig%2FEgq%2FBigEgqBMT.png&hash=e7eec62f009cdd686ce795fad0a53c6befe748e9)
Agelbert NOTE: Daniele Selby is absolutely right about every single issue she brought up.
The problem with all of this is the FACT that this systemic inequality and inequity is CAUSED by an insidious MENS REA modus operandi.
A patriarchal and bigoted power structure is behind all of these injustices that perpetuate unearned privilege under the color of Law. IOW, things are not the way they ARE by ACCIDENT or INATTENTION; they are QUITE (see: Mens Rea (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f)) DELIBERATE.
The "all Lives Matter' PROPAGANDA campaign to discredit the Black Lives Matter movement is a clever departure from outright ridicule for the purpose of making the Black Lives Matter supporters appear to be 'uncaring, unrealistic, and wasting everybody's time'. IOW, it's a SLICK form of RIDICULE by the empathy deficit disordered ASS HOLES that want to PERPETUATE the current injustices for privilege and profit.
The power structure pecking order is designed so that those on a higher rung, even if they are poor Whites only a rung or two from the bottom (but still more privileged than the brown/blacks) getting shafted day in and day out by their 'betters' far above them, will always resort to ridicule and accusations of "wild eyed conspiracy theorist paranoia" that they were/are methodically taught through FREQUENT REPETITION by the power structure propaganda machine.
But the conspiracy by White European Elite Males to keep the brown/black people down (who certainly ARE NOT the "minority" on this planet), and women everywhere with less pay for the same work a man does, is an irrefutable fact of life that perpetuates the misery of many (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fshrk.gif&hash=96ffb60cb25efb2a5b789ad51b531420ed1c1b36) and the privilege and comfort of the empathy deficit disordered few. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 11, 2016, 02:59:24 pm
On UN Indigenous Peoples’ Day, Survival International is calling for the full demarcation and protection of the land of the Kawahiva people, an uncontacted tribe in the Amazon that is at extremely high risk of extinction.
With the eyes of the world on Brazil during the Rio Olympics, campaigners are hoping that more will be done to secure their land for them, and to give them the chance to determine their own futures.
Many powerful people in the region, including José Riva – dubbed “the most corrupt politician in Brazil” – are targeting the tribe’s land. The Indians are acutely vulnerable to the threat of forced contact from these loggers and ranchers.
In April 2016, pressure from Survival International supporters helped push the Brazilian Minister of Justice to sign a decree ordering the full mapping out and protection of the tribe’s land.
But despite this, the Minister’s demand has not been carried out. Until the Brazilian indigenous affairs department enacts the demarcation, the tribe faces annihilation.
First contact has been catastrophic for many Brazilian tribes. Jirusihú, from the Zo’é people in the northern Amazon, who were forcibly contacted by evangelical missionaries in the 1980s, said: “After the outsiders came, Zo’é became sick and some died. Back then… there was diarrhea and there was pain. Fever killed many, many Zo’é.”
Many tribes have been wiped out as a direct result of land theft and forced contact. Konibu, the last shaman of the Akuntsu people, died in May 2016. He left behind just four members of his tribe.
Uncontacted tribes are the most vulnerable peoples on the planet. Whole populations are being wiped out by genocidal violence from outsiders who steal their land and resources and by diseases like flu and measles to which they have no resistance.
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We know very little about uncontacted tribes, but we do know there are more than a hundred around the world. Brazil is home to more of these peoples than any other country on Earth.
All uncontacted tribal peoples face catastrophe unless their land is protected, but, in areas where their rights are respected, they continue to thrive.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said: “It’s time for Brazil finally to end centuries of genocide by respecting the rights of its tribal peoples and protecting their land. Uncontacted tribes are not backward and primitive relics of a remote past. They are our contemporaries and a vitally important part of humankind’s diversity.”
http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/11377 Agelbert NOTE: For those wishful thinkers who believe the fairy tale that hunter gatherers have a greater chance for survival than the rest of homo sapdom, perhaps you need to wrap your head around the scientific consensus that the biodiversity in the tropics (that all those hunter gatherer tribes living there REQUIRE to survive and thrive) is more degraded by climate change than the biodiversity in any other part of the planet.
Climate Change: Why the Tropical Poor Will Suffer Most https://www.technologyreview.com/s/538586/climate-change-why-the-tropical-poor-will-suffer-most/
Tropical ecosystems appear to be more sensitive to climate change and less able to store carbon http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/tropics-feel-the-heat-of-climate-change/
Forest fires are raging in an indigenous territory on the edge of the Brazilian Amazon, threatening to wipe out uncontacted members of the Awá tribe.
Small groups of neighboring Guajajara Indians were forced to spend days attempting to contain the blaze in the absence of government agents, until an Environment Ministry-led fire-fighting operation began last week.
Forest fires started by loggers destroyed over 50% of the forest cover in the territory in late 2015. The Environment Ministry has stated that the situation is “even worse this year.”
Zezico Guajajara warned the NGO CIMI that the flames are approaching the uncontacted Awá, and said: “We’re in a real battle here and we need help.”
Campaigners are concerned that the current wave of fires could wipe out the tribe and are calling for urgent action.
Uncontacted tribes are the most vulnerable peoples on the planet. Tribes like the Awá are being wiped out by violence from outsiders, and by diseases like flu and measles to which they have no resistance. Unless their land is protected, they face catastrophe.
Among those fighting the fires are members of the “Guajajara Guardians,” who live in and frequently patrol the area in an attempt to crack down on illegal logging, and protect their uncontacted neighbors who are living on the run.
Olimpio Guajajara, the leader of the group, said: “We are defending our territory, so that the uncontacted Awá can survive. We have managed to reduce the number of loggers on our land and we hope to force all of them out. Otherwise, the Awá could be wiped out. We just want them to be able to live in peace.”
The Guajajara Guardians are receiving very little support from the Brazilian government, despite promises of assistance. Unless they have the resources they require to conduct their expeditions, the territory remains open to invasion.
Tribal peoples like the Guajajara and Awá have been dependent on and managed their environment for millennia. Evidence proves that tribal peoples are better at looking after their environment than anyone else. They are the best conservationists and guardians of the natural world.
If properly protected, tribal territories are the best barrier against deforestation.
Survival’s Director Stephen Corry said:
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“This is an urgent and horrific humanitarian crisis. The Brazilian authorities know that fires are going to break out in the dry season, and that they could decimate uncontacted peoples.
Brazil needs to take its eyes off the Olympics and focus proper attention on stopping the annihilation of its tribal peoples.”
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 16, 2016, 05:55:44 pm
09/16/2016 01:18 PM
International Criminal Court Turns Attention To Environmental Destruction, Protecting Indigenous People From Land-Grabs
SustainableBusiness.com News
In a world where rapacious growth moves profits and stock markets, deadly conflicts are becoming commonplace as what's left of the world's undeveloped land is gobbled up for exploitation. When people stand against this destruction, and being kicked off their land, they too often are murdered.
That's why the International Criminal Court (ICC) announced a new policy. Their mission of investigating "crimes against humanity" is expanding beyond war crimes and genocide to environmental destruction and illegal land grabs from indigenous people.
Corporations and corrupt politicians can now be held criminally responsible under international law.
This is a landmark shift in international criminal justice and could reshape how business is done in developing countries, says Global Witness, a non-profit that's been urging and tracking this for years.
Based in The Hague, the Court prosecutes the world's worst crimes where domestic courts are unwilling or unable to act. Other new priorities are: crimes against children; gender-based violence; cultural destruction; arms and human trafficking, terrorism and financial crimes.
Monsanto will face the ICC October 12-16 for crimes against nature and humanity, and ecocide. It faces a trial for its steady stream of toxic products, which have permanently damaged the environment and caused illness or death for thousands of people: PCBs; 2,4,5 T (dioxin component of Agent Orange); Roundup; and bovine growth hormones.
Millions Evicted From Their Land
Millions of people have been evicted from their land - illegally and often violently - by the global rush by big agriculture (ie, palm plantations), mining, enormous hydroelectric dams, logging, drilling, toxic dumping etc. Colluding governments have allowed corporations to take over tens of millions of hectares of land in the past 10 years, reports The Guardian.
Last year was the deadliest yet. Three people were murdered every week as they defended their land from theft and destructive industries, says Global Witness.
"Chasing communities off their land and trashing the environment has become an accepted way of doing business in many resource-rich yet cash-poor countries," notes Gillian Caldwell, Executive Director. "Today's decision by the ICC shows the age of impunity is coming to an end. Company bosses and politicians complicit in violently seizing land, razing tropical forests or poisoning water sources could soon find themselves standing trial in the Hague alongside war criminals and dictators. The ICC's interest could help improve the lives of millions of people and protect critical ecosystems."
"National governments and legislators should now follow suit. Land rights must be strengthened in countries that sell land, and respected by the companies that invest in it. A far stronger legal architecture is required internationally to bring an end to the human suffering and environmental cost of the global trade in land."
In Latin America and South Asia, a surge in investments on undeveloped land has led to murders by hired assassins or by police as people defend their rights to the land.
"Tackling land-grabbing will also help address some of the causes of climate change, since deforestation is very often a result," says Richard Rogers at Global Diligence, an international criminal law firm.
Honduras, The Most Dangerous Country
Global Citizen ranks Honduras as the most dangerous country for environmental activism right now.
This year, Berta Cáceres won the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize for leading a successful grassroots effort that forced the world's largest dam builder (China's state-owned Sinohydro), to pull out of building the 17-dam Agua Zarca complex. Months later, she was murdered when two anonymous shooters forced themselves into her home at 1AM.
As co-founder of the Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH), she worked for decades to protect lands from megaprojects like dams, mines and logging, drawing the ire of loggers, palm oil interests, and dam-builders. She and her colleagues faced ongoing harassment and threats for their peaceful protests.
Two weeks after Berta's death, her colleague, Nelson Garcia, was murdered outside his house, trying to prevent the eviction of 150 families from their land for the dam. "They started to tear down the houses, they destroyed the maize, the banana trees, and the yuca plantations," exclaimed Tomas Gomez, another activist with COPINH.
That prompted the Netherlands Development Finance Company to withdraw from the dam project. But because there are always other financial interests waiting in the wings, the dam remains under construction.
In Brazil, indigenous people are in a "war" against megadams and agriculture moving deeper into the Amazon.
While financial institutions across the world are implicated in land deals and ensuing destructive projects, China's tentacles are easily felt in Latin America. Since 2005, China has invested $119 billion to finance mines, dams and even a transcontinental railroad. It's a major player in the bigger-than-Panama Canal project in Nicaragua.
The railway, for example, would require cutting and fragmenting forests in one of Peru's most biodiverse areas and where indigenous people still live.
We've written extensively on renaissance of mega-dams, which are displacing tens of thousands of people and destroying pristine ecosystems across Latin America, and soon Africa. In 2014 alone, 829 new dams got the go-ahead in South America, according to Hydroworld.com. Many of the projects have the sole purpose of supplying cheap energy to corporations building mines and other extractive activities. All this stokes climate change.
Read our article, The Dark Side of Peru and Elsewhere .. For Environmental Activists. (http://www.sustainablebusiness.com/index.cfm/go/news.feature/id/1927)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 17, 2016, 01:09:42 pm
Wall Street Is Prepared to Destroy Sacred Burial Grounds of the Sioux
Posted on Sep 16, 2016
By Jerome Irwin
Water protectors at Sacred Stone Camp in Cannon Ball, N.D., with a replica of the flag that Gen. Custer’s force (at article link) carried into battle. (Rob Willson / Bold Alliance)
Major kudos go out to the Texas-based crude oil company Energy Transfer Partners and its multitude of Wall Street financiers. The lineup reads like a Who’s Who of banksters in the world: Sunoco, Bank of America, HSBC, UBS, Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, U.S. Bank, Barclays, Wells Fargo, Bank of Nova Scotia, Citibank, Credit Suisse, Royal Bank of Canada, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Morgan Stanley, Royal Bank of Scotland, Bank of Tokyo, Société Générale, Intesa Sanpaolo, BBVA Compass, Phillips 66, Enbridge and Marathon, to name a few of the 30-plus international funders of over $10 billion dollars. Their collective contributions to the Dakota Access pipeline are in keeping with the time-honored, ruthless American tradition of racism, fascism and corporatism toward people of color and the sacredness of land and life.
The moguls of the petroleum industry and reckless abusers of the earth’s finite resources are now intent upon creating an underground pipeline wall 1,172 miles long that winds back and forth across the Missouri River, through North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois, with pipeline connections to the Gulf of Mexico and many international destinations beyond. The penchant among politicians and corporatists alike to constantly build walls—whether above or below ground—of various kinds between nations makes this current pipeline controversy especially poignant on the eve of the 2016 U.S. presidential election, as voters struggle to decide who is the lesser evil regarding the support of Wall Street, the Pentagon and the establishment’s environmental destruction and warmongers in the world. One wonders what relevant, pithy commentary will be forthcoming from presidential candidates Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Jill Stein and Gary Johnson?
Energy Transfer Partners and its coterie of fat cats recently sent in a fleet of Caterpillar tractors to destroy the culturally sensitive, sacred burial grounds of the Standing Rock Sioux people before their legal representatives could address relevant state and federal protocols in a court of law, or North Dakota’s State Historic Preservation Office could do a proper survey of the area. One could either call it a stroke of genius or stupidity, matched only, perhaps, by the diabolical craftiness of North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple, who called in the National Guard and stirred tribal memories of muzzling dissent.
Meanwhile, the brutality and ruthlessness continues at the hands of those like the Frost Kennels of Ohio and their ex-police and military dog handlers who’ve been hired to sic their trained German shepherd guard dogs on peacefully protesting men, women, elders and children from all races and nations who have begun to gather in ever-greater numbers to protest what is going on.
This confrontation in the distant, isolated northern plains and prairie lands of the Lakota and Dakota Sioux people has all the earmarks of a potentially brewing, historic Wounded Knee. Will it end up becoming yet another massacre of 1890 or siege of 1973?
Will America and the fat cat corporatists and politicians ever learn to live in peace and harmony with those so different from themselves, who live on ancestral lands they consider forever sacred?
A hopeful answer to that question has been put forth by recent dramatic, stunning interventions. The Obama administration’s departments of the Interior, Justice and Army stepped in to provide a temporary halt of construction. This action is meant to ensure meaningful Sioux tribal input to the dispute and show respect for its treaty laws and natural laws of life, suggesting that some sanity has begun to prevail and a window of higher spiritual consciousness and awakening has been **** ajar.
The world holds its breath as it waits to see if this window can be thrown wide open.
Jerome Irwin is a Canadian author. During the 1960s and early ’70s, he lived with the Dakota and Lakota peoples on the Crow Creek Sioux and Oglala Sioux reservations in South Dakota. He later published “The Wild Gentle Ones: A Turtle island Odyssey,” a book that documents these tribes’ historical plight and those of other indigenous peoples on Turtle Island.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 24, 2016, 02:27:13 pm
From the Civil War to Today: Centuries of Institutional Racism, Explained in Less Than 20 Minutes
Posted on Sep 23, 2016
The history of racism in the United States is not a simple topic, but actor Romany Malco successfully delves into the topic in less than 20 minutes in a new video posted to Facebook. In “The Racket of Racism,” Malco explains how we can trace the current prison-industrial complex and reliance on the convict-lease system back to Civil War-era politics.
After that war, he explains, “the Southern economy was hurting,” but politicians found a solution in the 13th Amendment. “While common folk were fighting against one another over the abolition of slavery, or celebrating the abolition of slavery, political officials and wealthy slave owners were crafting a loophole,” Malco states. “Like I said, some things never change.”
So-called “black code” laws were passed to bring African-Americans into civil society and when they broke a law, to punish them in the judicial system. Black code laws were eventually replaced by “pig laws.”
“Basic misdemeanors came with extremely harsh sentences and fines,” Malco says. All these legal punishments ushered in the beginning of America’s reliance on a convict-lease system, essentially allowing white Americans to profit from cheap labor, “aka free slaves,” according to Malco.
“Pig law and the 13th Amendment pretty much reversed everything the abolitionists had accomplished,” he explains. “And that drama sustained well into the Jim Crow era.”
Malco zeroes in on the history of Tulsa, Okla., currently a focus of racial inequality in the wake of the police shooting of Terence Crutcher. In the early 1900s, Malco says, a prominent black community established itself in Tulsa. It didn’t last, though, because the Ku Klux Klan began to destroy the community in the 1920s.
After the Jim Crow era, Malco explains, sneakier methods were used to attack African-American communities and the civil rights movement. Nixon’s war on drugs, for example, was a direct assault on black people and black movements, as Nixon aide John Ehrlichman explained in an interview decades later. These efforts continued throughout the 1980s and into the ’90s, thanks to Bill Clinton’s crime bill (the 1994 Violent Crime Control Act) and Hillary Clinton’s coinage of the term “super predator,” referring to at-risk youth.
“Black is beautiful, but black is also highly abused and highly incarcerated—has been since 1865,” Malco sums up. He argues that the country is in dire need of “modern abolitionists” to combat the prison-industrial complex and the convict-lease system, both of which are designed to target African-American communities.
In fact, Malco explains, it’s affecting the U.S. economy as a whole—nonviolent prisoners are forced to work for 16 cents to 26 cents an hour at jobs that could go to general citizens. “The more you buy into the concept [that] putting nonviolent people in jail for extreme amounts of time is a good idea, the more jobs you lose to the convict-lease system,” he states.
Unfortunately, big prisons still hold enormous sway on Capitol Hill, and only by examining centuries of historical context can Americans understand the powerful, greedy forces destroying the economy and creating widespread racial injustice. Watch the full video below: (at article link)
The corporate state, no matter how many protests take place in American cities over the murder of unarmed citizens, will put no restraints on the police or the organs of security and surveillance. It will not protect the victims of state violence. It will continue to grant broader powers and greater resources to militarized police departments and internal security forces such as Homeland Security. Force, along with the systems of indoctrination and propaganda, is the last prop that keeps the corporate elites in power. These elites will do nothing to diminish the mechanisms necessary for their control.
The corporate state, by pillaging the nation, has destroyed capitalism’s traditional forms of social control. The population is integrated into a capitalist democracy by decent wages and employment opportunities, labor unions, mass-produced consumer products, a modest say in governance, mechanisms for marginal reform, pensions, affordable health care, a judiciary that is not utterly subservient to the elites and corporate power, the possibility for social, political and economic advancement, good public education, arts funding and a public broadcasting system that gives a platform to those who are not in service to the elites. These elements make possible the common good, or at least the perception of the common good.
Global capitalism, however, is not concerned with the cohesion of the nation-state. The relentless quest for profit trumps internal stability. Everything and everyone is pillaged and harvested for profit. Democracy is a mirage, a useful fiction to keep the population passive and compliant. Propaganda, including entertainment and spectacle, and coercion through state-administered surveillance and violence are the primary tools of governance. This is why, despite years of egregious police violence, there is no effective reform.
Propaganda is not solely about instilling an opinion. It is also about appropriating the aspirations of the citizenry into the vocabulary of the power elite. The Clintons and Barack Obama built their careers mastering this duplicity. They speak in words that reflect the concerns of the citizenry, while pushing through programs and legislation that mock those concerns. This has been especially true in the long campaign to curb excessive police force. The liberal elites preach “tolerance” and “professionalism” and promote “diversity.” But they do not challenge the structural racism and economic exploitation that are the causes of our crisis. They treat the abuses of corporate oppression as if they were minor administrative defects rather than essential components of corporate power.
Naomi Murakawa in her book “The First Civil Right: How Liberals Built Prison America” documents how the series of “reforms” enacted to professionalize police departments resulted in placing more money and resources into the hands of the police, giving them greater power to act with impunity and expanding legally sanctioned violence. All penal reform, from President Harry Truman’s 1947 Committee on Civil Rights report to the Safe Streets Act of 1968 to the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 to contemporary calls for more professionalization, have, she notes, only made things worse.
The fiction used to justify expanded police powers, a fiction perpetrated by Democratic politicians such as Bill Clinton and Obama, is that a modernized police will make possible a just and post-racial America. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe)White supremacy, racism and corporate exploitation, however, are built into the economic model of neoliberalism and our system of “inverted totalitarianism.” A discussion about police violence has to include a discussion of corporate power. Police violence is one of the primary pillars that allow the corporate elites to retain power. That violence will end only when the rule of these elites ends.
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The calls for more training and professionalization, the hiring of minority police officers, the use of body and dash cameras, improving procedures for due process, creating citizen review boards, even the reading of Miranda rights, have done nothing to halt the indiscriminate use of lethal violence and abuse of constitutional rights by the police and courts. Reforms have served only to bureaucratize, professionalize and legalize state abuse and murder. Innocent men and women may no longer be lynched on a tree, but they are lynched on death row and in the streets of New York, Baltimore, Ferguson, Charlotte and dozens of other cities. They are lynched for the reasons poor black people have always been lynched—to create a reign of terror that serves as an effective form of social control.
The wreckage left behind by deindustrialization created a dilemma for the corporate state. The vast pools of “surplus” or “redundant” labor in our former manufacturing centers meant the old forms of social control had disappeared. The corporate state needed harsher mechanisms to subjugate a population it condemned as human refuse. Those on probation and parole or in jails or prisons grew from 780,000 in 1965 to 7 million in 2010. The kinds of federal crimes punishable by death leaped from one in 1974 to 66 in 1994, thanks to the Clinton administration. The lengths of prison sentences tripled and quadrupled. Laws were passed to turn inner-city communities into miniature police states. This had nothing to do with crime.
Since policing is a problem, the police should be removed from communities altogether, according to Black Lives Matter founder Alicia Garza.
Garza argued that the United States gives too much respect to police officers, explaining that when police do wrong, a few bad cops are blamed, rather than a “corroded and corrupt system.”
“Quite frankly, many of our [Black Lives Matter] members are continuing to investigate what it would mean to have police-free communities. I think what we'’ve continued to see over time is that no moral appeal is actually stopping the deaths of black people, whether they be armed or unarmed.” Garza told Complex.
Garza also claimed that the Charlotte riots are a natural reaction; they occurred because people had been denied housing and good schools.
“How do we stop violence, looting, and riots? The way that we stop that is by making sure that people have the things that they need to thrive,” Garza said. “When people are systematically denied their right to adequate housing, adequate schools, to adequate food, to dignity —this is a response and a reaction that we should absolutely expect.”
People also should pay attention to the black women killed by police, Garza said.
“This is a perfect moment for us to have each other'’s backs, to call out the names of people who have been killed like the brother who was killed in Charlotte and the brother who was killed in Tulsa, but to also remember that this isn'’t just a problem impacting black men, but it’'s a problem that is impacting black people. For us to advance on this front, we have to bring everyone along with us,” Garza said to Complex.
Agelbert NOTE: It is good to know that there are many people in this country who do not blame the victim AND in addition, recognize the systemic problem of racism and brutality in the police.
Sep. 26, 2016, Hundreds gather at UVM on Monday to show support for the Black Lives Matter movement. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)
Photo by Elizabeth Hewitt/VTDigger
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 15, 2016, 01:58:05 pm
Ten activists were arrested on Tuesday for shutting down tar-sands oil pipelines. Among them was Deia Schlosberg, producer of the documentary How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can’t Change.
Schlosberg reportedly faces three felony conspiracy charges. If convicted, she could be sentenced to 45 years in prison. To put that in perspective:
Neil Young, Mark Ruffalo, and other celebrities called for the charges to be dropped on Thursday, arguing that Schlosberg was not participating in the protest but documenting the event as a filmmaker. That’s right, folks: In the eyes of the legal system, spilling the NSA’s secrets is less reprehensible than doing a journalist’s job.
In February 1979, John Trudell (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) led a march in Washington, D.C. to draw attention to Indian difficulties.
He had been warned against speaking out but John was and activist and the FBI hated him. The FBI does not have a red man's soul in any way. On the steps of the FBI building John spoke out on the agency's harassment of Indians. Less than 12 hours later John's wife, Tina and his three children, were burned alive in their family home in Duck Valley, Nevada along with Tina's mother.
The hatred in Washington for the Indians goes long and deep. The hatred was institutionalized long ago and for most people monkey see monkey do explains everything that they do; so the hatred festers as it is imitated by new occupants of the bureaucracy as generations pass.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 30, 2016, 04:08:49 pm
U.S. Police Are Shooting Natives Americans At A Higher Rate Than They Are Even Killing Black People
October 3, 2016 2:04 pm by Ivan Stamenkovic
Quote
Current statistics also show that US police kill citizens at a rate over 70 times higher than other “developed”, “democratic” nations.
Ever since the government’s official numbers regarding fatal police shootings were shown to be inaccurate, alternative means of tracking police killings have been necessary in order to fully understand what can only be described as an epidemic of police violence. The most notable of these efforts is the Guardian’s “The Counted” project, which seeks to offer an interactive, comprehensive database of killings carried out by US police. The database allows users to see the breakdown of US police killings based on the victim’s race, gender, age, and whether they were armed as well as filters for geographical location. The statistics themselves offer a harrowing picture of police violence in the US, but it’s not the picture that many expected.
As of today, 801 people have been killed by US police in the first 9 months of 2016, averaging about 22 people every week. In comparison, 878 people had been killed by US police by this time last year, marking a slight decrease in police-related homicides since 2015. The states with the most killings so far have been California, Texas, and Florida, which together accounted for 237 of 2016 police homicides. However, New Mexico, Alaska, and the District of Columbia topped counts of police killings per capita. 126 of the victims this year have been unarmed and 35 of them were Black men.
Yet, in 2016, it is Native Americans who have been the most likely to die at the hands of police with African-Americans ranking only slightly less as potential police victims. Native American deaths, at the hands of US police, is often forgotten as most well-publicized protests and movements against racially targeted police killings focus chiefly on African-American deaths. However, though African-Americans are undeniably dying at an unjustifiably higher rate than most other ethnic groups, Native Americans make up three of the top five ethnic/age-groups most likely to be killed by law enforcement. Both Native Americans and Blacks have been twice as likely to be killed by police this year than Whites. This is actually down from last year, when Blacks were killed by police at 3 times the rate of Whites. However, the incidence of Native American police violence has shown no such decrease. Though Native Americans represent only 0.8% of the US population, they now account for nearly 2% of all fatal police shootings.
Though police violence and fatal shootings have become all but normalized within the US, there is a startling divide between police killings in the US and other “developed”, democratic nations. It turns out that US police kill more people in a few days than other countries have in years or even decades. For example, Australia recorded a total of 94 fatal police shootings in the 19 years between 1992 and 2011. To compare, 93 people were killed by US police just last month. England and Wales even had less in the last 24 years, with 55 fatal police shootings in more than two decades. US police have killed that same number of people in just the last three weeks.
Germany and Canada, which use more lethal force than either Australia or England, also trail far behind US statistics. German police fatally shot a grand total of 15 people between 2010 and 2011. That’s also how many unarmed women have been killed by US police this year. Canada’s police force, for its part, is estimated to kill 25 people a year. US police have killed claimed the lives of 25 people just in the last 12 days. Ultimately, police in the US are killing citizens at a rate more than 70 times higher than police in other “similar” nations. This proves that the US police violence is indeed a major outlier compared to other nations. This is what a crisis looks like.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 09, 2016, 08:48:16 pm
November 9, 2016
The Urgency of Now - A Message from Paul Jay
Paul Jay concludes our election night coverage with a promise to our viewers to be a platform for movements trying to organize.
https://youtu.be/JAilK8WV-lY
TRANSCRIPT of above Video: PAUL JAY, TRNN: As I said earlier, I don't think there's a party more responsible, assuming you're not happy about Trump's victory, if you are then I'm surprised you're watching us. But for other people who are not so happy and we've talked about the policies of the Clinton administration, of course Bush and the continuation of the economic policies of the Obama administration.
I think it’'s primarily the economic policies that are responsible for this. She asked Trump's language of noninterventionism in foreign affairs certainly appealed to people. But it was fundamentally the shifting of even more vast amounts of wealth into fewer and fewer hands that created this condition and the promises of Donald Trump I think by any objective measure will not alleviate those problems for people but as one of our guests said earlier, this is like, giving the finger, excuse me. This is just 'we don't believe any of you and we kind of don't believe Trump either but we're going to just give you the finger up because we don't know what else to do here'.
The xenophobia, the racism, all of this we've seen before in history. There's nothing new about blaming the other, blaming minorities. There's certainly nothing new in American history about this. We're going to be opening up a restaurant in the Real News building called Ida B.’s table and it's named after Ida B. Wells who was a very courageous journalist, investigative journalist, African American woman who exposed systemic lynching. One of the things in her investigation she exposed was that when unemployment went up amongst white workers, lynchings went up.And that it wasn’t just anger from white workers, that it was being deliberately organized by employers to let white workers vent by going out and lynching black workers. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978)
So there's nothing new in what we're seeing here. But as dismal as this all might look for progressive people and I personally do think this is not the best of scenarios that could have happened tonight. There is also something here which is that the economic situation is smoke and mirrors. The economic recovery is false as far as any serious economist I've talked to. The federal bank threw tons of money at banks to make them look solvent. But the real bottom line of the economy is that demand low wages have hardly moved at all. Real demand is extremely low and it's going to get lower. Trump's policies are far from what he promised, are not going to increase jobs.
Certainly, not going to increase worker’s' wages which means the recession is likely to deepen here. The geopolitical threat in spite of Trump's talk, I don't personally believe it. I said personally in the broadcast I think it's going to be more of a Cheney situation with very aggressive foreign policy by Pence. Pence's critique of Clinton is she was weak on Russia. Pence and Trump have talked about we're going to put an end to ISIS. They've talked about bombings at a great scale. But Pence is as provocative with Russia as Clinton is. We'll see.
The number one problem we're all facing here, the really deep crisis and perhaps the most dangerous thing about what happened tonight is that we are now going to have a congress and a president that don't believe human caused climate change is real. If there was ever a time for all of these movements, whether it's black lives matter, whether it's climate change and whether it's workers fighting for rights. If it was ever a time for all of these movements to converge, merge, and not just take to the streets but work on various kind of electoral strategies and mass organizing, clearly it's now.
At the Real News we hope to be a platform for discussing and debating what comes next and we've done some of that tonight. We're going to continue. And let me once again stress the importance of the climate change issue which got almost no discussion whatsoever in this presidential election. We have a new film out called the Koch Brothers war on climate science. Well, Koch Brothers are going to get their way for the next two years until 2018 and maybe beyond.
It’s a very dangerous time. Very dangerous moment. But we humans have seen very dangerous times before. Whether it'’s before leading into the first world war before leading into the second world war. I say that with some meaning because we discussed a little bit earlier that there's going to be an I think disillusionment here of Trump supporters where their lives just don't get better. It doesn't matter that we know what is really coming down the pike here. Given this Trump-Pence alliance and Pence's connection with Karl Rove and the global agenda of these people, and it's not just these people because certainly democrats do the same thing. But the answer they have in these situations is war. And we need to be very aware of this and on guard for this.
So, we hope on the Real News that we will obviously be following all of this and we hope you will join us. So, thanks for sticking with us tonight and we'’ll be back tomorrow to talk about the post-election fall out and as I said we will be a platform in terms of everyone discussing what needs to be done and what needs to be done next. Thanks for joining us on the Real News Network.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 11, 2016, 07:05:38 pm
The North Carolina Ku Klux Klan announces they will hold a Trump victory parade in December (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi1.wp.com%2Fgas2.org%2Ffiles%2F2013%2F05%2Fstupid.png&hash=03f34f8c94a314e127f3ee8c4872e721e1b04063)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 11, 2016, 07:26:21 pm
California Legislature (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38) Fires a Shot Across The Racist Fascist's Bow.
California Does The Right Thing - in the Face of Trump...
By Dewstino
Wednesday Nov 09, 2016 · 10:30 PM EST 602 Comments California stands strong... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F47b20s0.gif&hash=cc48c9af9d29b8836023c7db21103e52d1ed439e)
Joint Statement from California Legislative Leaders on Result of Presidential Election
Wednesday, November 09, 2016
SACRAMENTO – California Senate President pro Tempore Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles) and California Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon (D-Paramount) released the following statement on the results of the President election:
Today, we woke up feeling like strangers in a foreign land, because yesterday Americans expressed their views on a pluralistic and democratic society that are clearly inconsistent with the values of the people of California.
We have never been more proud to be Californians.
By a margin in the millions, Californians overwhelmingly rejected politics fueled by resentment, bigotry, and misogyny.
The largest state of the union and the strongest driver of our nation’s economy has shown it has its surest conscience as well.
California is – and must always be – a refuge of justice and opportunity for people of all walks, talks, ages and aspirations – regardless of how you look, where you live, what language you speak, or who you love.
California has long set an example for other states to follow. And California will defend its people and our progress. We are not going to allow one election to reverse generations of progress at the height of our historic diversity, scientific advancement, economic output, and sense of global responsibility.
We will be reaching out to federal, state and local officials to evaluate how a Trump Presidency will potentially impact federal funding of ongoing state programs, job-creating investments reliant on foreign trade, and federal enforcement of laws affecting the rights of people living in our state. We will maximize the time during the presidential transition to defend our accomplishments using every tool at our disposal.
While Donald Trump may have won the presidency, he hasn’t changed our values. America is greater than any one man or party. We will not be dragged back into the past. We will lead the resistance to any effort that would shred our social fabric or our Constitution.
California was not a part of this nation when its history began, but we are clearly now the keeper of its future.
Potential Trump Homeland Security head says anti-Trump protests must be 'quelled'
By Hunter
Thursday Nov 10, 2016 · 12:53 PM EST http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/11/10/1595788/-Potential-Trump-Homeland-Security-head-says-anti-Trump-protests-must-be-quelled (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/11/10/1595788/-Potential-Trump-Homeland-Security-head-says-anti-Trump-protests-must-be-quelled)
I'm sure California is paying close attention. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 12, 2016, 03:08:12 pm
Some people are talking about California exiting the Union. Here's my take on that.
I think educated and elite Californians. not just the common populace, are quite serious about NOT enforcing any fascist unconstitutional overreach by Trailer Trash Trump.
As to attempting to become the United States of California, that's code speech for stating they aren't gonna play fascist ball.
Is Honduras a state? No, but guess who runs EVERYTHING down there? There are many other examples but the point is that Empire fascist enforcement and Empire playing nice is a game of force and resources.
Fascists have a track record of believing their koolaid, which ultimately leads them to ruin after much murder and mayhem. The scapegoating works only briefly. As soon as the prosperity promises are proven to be false, it gets harder and harder to enforce respect for the Gestapo.
The people that will bring Trailer Trash Trump and his pseudo-Christian cabal to ruin are not in any particular area. In fact, many of them probably work within the national security deep state right now.
And another thing is that the fossil fuelers celebrating their new water boy in the fossil fuel government are totally clueless to the velocity with which Europe, China and Asia (excluding Russia which is still big on fossil fuels), now that they see the US has decided to champion polluters against all economic and environmental sense, will accelerate their transition to Renewable for their own survival.
WHAT THAT MEANS is that all fracked gas, tar sands crap and coal that the IDIOTS in the fossil fuel industry are planning to open the export spigots for are going to run into DEMAND DESTRUCTION. IOW, the total denial of climate reality by this new administration is the ONE THING the rest of the WORLD needed to unite against pollution. ;D
Trump will ultimately be for the fossil fuel industry, so smitten with their new water boy, what Fukushima was for the Nuclear Industry. MKing and his friend Hamm will scoff. But already the IEA has said the "glut" is going to run through 2017 unless the Saudis turn production way down. I don't see them doing that any time soon.
The USA's "leadership" is nuts. Fascist overreach always results in a massive backlash. The Renewable Energy Big Push in the rest of the world that you will now see is a DIRECT consequence of the announced plan by the new crazies in power to smash all the rules and laws for the protecting the environment in the USA on behalf of fossil fuel industry profits.
The Schadenfreude will be quite entertaining. But unfortunately, all the efforts of the rest of the world to bring the USA into the reality based community will not be enough to prevent increasingly frequent climate change catastrophe events. :(
The Tardigrades are happy.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 12, 2016, 04:38:41 pm
Trump sign marked with swastika found near Hillel Center
Nov. 11, 2016, 6:46 am by VTD Editor 10 Comments
Editor’s note: This story reported by Lindsay Freed and Lauren Schnepf was first published in the Vermont Cynic.
The day after the election, a student intern found a campaign sign lawn spray painted with a swastika near the Hillel Center, a Jewish organization on campus.
Sophomore Isabelle Schechter who works as an intern at the center discovered the sign three doors down from Hillel.
It is unknown whether the sign was meant to be directed at the Jewish group. The sign has since been removed; UVM police did not comment.
Quote
“[The sign] made me feel terrified and nauseous,” Schechter said. “It was like a punch in the stomach about this reality … that we’re facing.”
“For Jewish students,” Matt Vogel, executive director of Hillel said, “no matter what the intent is, seeing a swastika holds a very deep and painful association with [the Holocaust]; a deeply tragic part of our history.” Trump sign, swastika UVM students found this sign three doors from the Hillel Center, a Jewish organization.
Sophomore Arielle Cheifetz said she was disturbed by discovery of the sign because of the swastika’s historical context.
“The part [about this] that is the most disturbing,” Cheifetz said, “is that this occurred on the anniversary of Kristallnacht, a night [in 1938] where almost 200 synagogues [in Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia] were destroyed, over 8,000 Jewish shops were sacked and looted and tens of thousands of Jews were removed to concentration camps.”
Cheifetz said she has concerns over the implications of the swastika being found on a sign supporting President-elect Donald Trump, and that she believes minority groups are preparing for hateful speech or actions to be committed against them. This unease is echoed by other members of the community.
“I’m worried there’s going to be much more of this since the election went in favor of Trump,” senior Connor Clark said. “ [He is] someone who is openly hateful toward minority groups.”
The sign was brought to Hillel because students feel it is a place where they can feel comfortable and bring up these types of incidents, Vogel said.
“I’ve seen the importance of the Hillel Center as a space where students feel safe,” Hillel Assistant Director Sharon Silverman said. “I know people are getting what they need for nourishment, whether that’s a bagel, a conversation, a hug or an ‘I see you.’”
Both Silverman and Vogel said students have been coming into the Hillel center for support following Trump’s election.
“This day hasn’t compromised our values,” Silverman said. “We are here for students more than ever, and that’s something that’s going to continue on as we go through some changes for all of us.
Agelbert NOTE: View picture of sign at article link. The Trump supporters quickly dived in to claim "it was the unhappy democrats" that did this. Scapegoating the other and covering for racism and hate crimes is a Vermont Tradition, so I am not surprised at the lack of objectivity. The sane comments were, of course, thoroughly down voted. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2955.gif&hash=ddc12d8bdb1bc63b7998a6b086b79a71b7bda755)
Quote
Rama Schneider
Neo-nazis and the KKK were publicly and vocally supporting Trump from the get go. These groups understood quite well that Trump built the base of his primary campaign on their issues. These groups were NOT supporting Hillary Clinton.
I agree that we should inform ourselves with the facts.
22 | -52
Anders Aughey
I don’t equate anyone who supports Trump as hating nonwhites, women, the disabled, and everyone else. I do see supporters as not caring in the slightest for the well-being or rights of those marginalized groups. Also there has been a remarkable uptick in hate crimes around the country since Tuesday. (Or, if not that, they’re happening as they always have but just being reported on more and brought into polarizing the election.)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 14, 2016, 07:22:36 pm
https://youtu.be/Ajt2d7oQLtE
Big Picture Interview: Josh Fox, Gasland/Gasland II & How to Let Go of the World and Love All the Things Climate Can't Change. So - is this the end of the road for the Standing Rock water protectors? Or has the real fight just begun?
For more information on the stories we've covered visit our websites at thomhartmann.com - freespeech.org - and RT.com. You can also watch tonight's show on Hulu - at Hulu.com/THE BIG PICTURE and over at The Big Picture YouTube page. And - be sure to check us out on Facebook and Twitter!
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 26, 2016, 05:53:38 pm
Roland Martin just ended white supremacist Richard Spencer's 15 minutes of fame
By Walter Einenkel
Wednesday Nov 23, 2016 · 1:21 PM EST
Roland Martin had “White Nationalist” Richard Spencer on his NewsOne Now program for a little debate and discussion. Spencer’s Nazi-friendly revisionist narrative is that America has a white European culture and that white Europeans made this country great and can do great things without people of color. Spencer’s family-friendly angle is that slavery was a terrible mistake both morally and culturally, so you see, he’s not a racist. Except, he’s a racist and his ideas are dumb and based on a racist and factually incorrect reading of the history of our country.
The interview begins with them discussing the ‘Hail’ Hitler Trump gestures seen during Spencer’s speech in D.C. a few days ago. From there Spencer and Martin talk about Christianity and the politics of Christianity. It’s early in the discussion and things are a bit over-talking and messy, but you begin to see very clearly that Spencer has a few rhetorical asides that probably work on children and Trump supporters, but don’t really pass muster with someone who knows exactly what they are talking about.
Martin and Spencer move onto how the alt-right isn’t white supremacist because they are separatists who don’t want to rule over anybody, they just don’t want to be around anybody. Martin decides to do away with the formality of letting Spencer bullshit anymore by destroying Spencer’s conceit that America was built by white Europeans. He takes Spencer to task by asking him about the cheap labor of slavery and the free labor that blacks in America provided after slavery. Spencer tries to goose step around this but Martin is relentless.
That’s when it gets good as Martin and Spencer segue into the classic racist’s chant of “affirmative action” being the root of all evils. Unfortunately for Spencer, Martin knows the history of affirmative action in our country, things like the Homestead Act and the G.I. Bill, and the fact that white women seem to have been able to benefit the most from Affirmative Action policies int he past couple of decades—compared to other groups.
Please watch the clip below. Give it a little time—it gets really great somewhere in the middle. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F128fs318181.gif&hash=eff6d5f3831782966c2ff2081f07bf7fc5b22a6b)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 07, 2016, 05:30:04 pm
Counter Protests Swamp KKK Celebration in North Carolina (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Barry Yeoman December 5, 2016
A Ku Klux Klan gathering this weekend both recalled North Carolina’s racially troubled history, and demonstrated the strength and diversity of the state’s civil rights movement today.
Excellent article with a picture worth a thousand words: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F128fs318181.gif&hash=eff6d5f3831782966c2ff2081f07bf7fc5b22a6b)
Trump Win Propels White Nationalism and Chauvinism to Center of US Politics (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
Historian Gerald Horne (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) says social movements will need to adopt an international strategy in order to push back against the coming reign of terror for communities of color.
The Counter Revolution of 1776 and the Construction of Whiteness (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) – Gerald Horne, (3/6)
Published on Aug 20, 2014
On Reality Asserts Itself Professor Horne says that the defense of massive profits from the slave trade and fear of slave rebellions was an important impetus for the American Revolution.
https://youtu.be/2Snzl41lX54
White Unity and American Propaganda History
Gerald Horne on Reality Asserts Itself (4/6)
Published on Aug 21, 2014
Professor Horne says American slave owning settlers needed to create a bond between all white immigrants to create a force to suppress slave rebellions.
https://youtu.be/wevifsvKUG0
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 22, 2016, 01:51:21 pm
Democrats can learn from the Rev. William Barber and the Moral Mondays fusion movement
Will President Obama Grant Clemency to Leonard Peltier (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) Before He Leaves Office? ??? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_1730.gif&hash=cdaf50326d98ff7b051a9c49e83d51c7bb687407)
TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway examines the political motivations behind mass imprisonment in the US and why so many people incarcerated can be considered "political prisoners."
Agelbert NOTE: SLAVERY is alive and well in the U.S. Prison Industrial Complex. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
September 5, 2016
Rattling the Bars: US Prison Labor
On this Episode of Rattling the Bars, TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway interviews Asatar Bair Assistant Professor of Economics at Riverside City College about prisons and the ownership of a person's labor power vs. the ownership of a person
https://youtu.be/_SJbQF2rS3c
September 20, 2016
Work Stoppage Prison Strike Continues in 11 US States
This is a revolt against inhuman conditions of incarceration and the use of free prison labor by many major US corporations, says Pastor Kenneth Glasgow
Under George W. Bush, Republicans set about undermining the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department. Expect a more devastating assault on the division under Trump.
By Samuel R. Bagenstos
December 12, 2016
This article will appear in the Winter 2017 issue of The American Prospect magazine. Subscribe here. (https://ssl.palmcoastd.com/21402/apps/ORDOPTION1LANDING?ikey=I**EF1)
SNIPPET:
In my first job as a practicing lawyer, I served from 1994 to 1997 as a career attorney in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. The division, staffed by hundreds of committed lawyers and other professionals, has long played a key role in making good on our nation’s promise of equality under the law. Established in 1957, it was at the center of the civil-rights struggle of the 1960s. Its attorneys had a major hand in drafting, defending, and enforcing the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act, and its cases successfully desegregated schools and neighborhoods throughout the United States. The Civil Rights Division has always represented the best of what government can do.
At the beginning of the Obama administration, I returned to the division as part of the leadership team assembled by Tom Perez, who was assistant attorney general at the time. George W. Bush’s administration had taken its toll on the division’s staff. Although some great lawyers and other professionals had continued to work there, the department’s top leadership under Bush had abused and demoralized them. During the first six months of my job, much of the work was best described as trauma counseling. At staff meetings and discussions of pending cases, lawyers would break down, suddenly remembering horrible things that the Bush folks had said or done.
Of course, not all the longtime staff had stuck it out through the Bush years. A large proportion of the attorneys in the division, including about two-thirds of those in the Voting Section, had departed. The departing lawyers were disproportionately those who had between 7 and 15 years of experience, just the people the division counts on most to lead trial teams and handle the most complex and sensitive issues.
When career lawyers left during the Bush administration, three sorts of people replaced them. One group consisted of good lawyers who cared about civil rights. These were the kind of attorneys whom the division might have hired at any time—and there might have been more of them if the Bush appointees had not tried to avoid hiring lawyers who worked with civil-rights groups. A second group was made up of undistinguished lawyers from partisan Republican networks, who had shown no commitment to civil rights but sought a steady job in the career civil service. The third group was the most threatening: right-wing true believers with an agenda to subvert the historic work of the division—an agenda many of them continued to pursue after Barack Obama took office. Some of these attorneys, such as Hans von Spakovsky and J. Christian Adams, eventually left the division and became outspoken critics of Obama’s civil-rights policies from perches in conservative media.
By the time Perez and his team were done, the Civil Rights Division was the most aggressive and effective civil-rights law firm in the country—and perhaps the government’s most aggressive and effective enforcement agency. The Democratic Congress played a central role. It gave the division money to hire new career lawyers, enabling us to recruit truly outstanding, experienced, and committed people. We also insisted that front-line supervisors apply rigorous standards to all their employees, which helped to get the best performance from everyone and encouraged poor performers to find something else to do. We brought in several new section chiefs who took on both longstanding and newly developing civil-rights issues.
Under Perez, the division pushed forward on as many issues as possible as quickly as possible. When he moved on to head the Department of Labor, his successors Jocelyn Samuels and Vanita Gupta—neither of whom served with Senate confirmation—built on his achievements.
Trump’s announcement that Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions is his choice for attorney general sends an especially strong signal about the new administration’s intentions.
The election of Donald Trump, I fear, will wipe out all those achievements. Trump’s announcement that Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions is his choice for attorney general sends an especially strong signal about the new administration’s intentions. Sessions first came to public notice in the 1980s as a young Reagan-appointed U.S. attorney in Alabama, when he criminally prosecuted three prominent local voting-rights activists for voter fraud—only to see a jury acquit the activists in a matter of hours. Although Reagan nominated Sessions for a federal judgeship, the Republican-controlled Senate voted down his nomination after a number of Department of Justice lawyers—including one from the Civil Rights Division—testified about his use of racist language with his coworkers. Sessions has attracted national attention in recent years for his extreme anti-immigration positions.
Here are the areas in which civil-rights advocates should have the most concern about a Trump/Sessions Justice Department: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Freading.gif&hash=63e3e644b39258d4c4eedbcdaf322315b1856723)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 28, 2016, 06:46:29 pm
December 28, 2016
Researchers Fault Mass Incarceration for Black-White Wage Gap Returning to 1950's Levels >:(
Black labor has become superfluous in the US economy, and the ruling class (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605)is responding with more incarceration and police oppression, says Glen Ford.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 30, 2016, 08:36:58 pm
December 30, 2016
The Real Baltimore - Police Accountability in Age of Trump
In the first of many discussions on the implications of a Trump presidency, we analyze how the city should respond to what many believe will be a Justice Department openly hostile to police reform under proposed Attorney General Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 11, 2017, 06:29:23 pm
Coretta Scott King's letter that helped sink Sessions in 1986 is finally public
By Mark Sumner
Tuesday Jan 10, 2017 · 6:47 PM EST
WASHINGTON, DC - JANUARY 10: Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee during his confirmation hearing to be the U.S. Attorney General January 10, 2017 in Washington, DC. Sessions was one of the first members of Congress to endorse and support President-elect Donald Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978), who nominated him for Attorney General. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) (at article link)
The letter that Coretta Scott King wrote to the Senate in 1986 when Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III was up for a federal judgeship was never entered into the record. So, until now it hasn't been available to the public.
According to Buzzfeed, Democrats cannot get the letter released as they are beholden to committee rules that give only Sen. Chuck Grassley the power to do that. The question is, can a Democratic senator just read it out loud as a part of their time?
But now the Washington Post has obtained the letter. ;D
Quote
“Mr. Sessions has used the awesome powers of his office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters. For this reprehensible conduct, he should not be rewarded with a federal judgeship.”
”The irony of Mr. Sessions’ nomination is that, if confirmed, he will be given a life tenure for doing with a federal prosecution what the local sheriffs accomplished twenty years ago with clubs and cattle prods,” she wrote, later adding: “I believe his confirmation would have a devastating effect on not only the judicial system in Alabama, but also on the progress we have made toward fulfilling my husband’s dream.”
This letter was buried in 1986 by then committee chairman Strom Thurmond (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0) . It’s easy to see that he and Sessions would have gotten along famously.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 11, 2017, 07:20:32 pm
January 10, 2017
Democrats Go Soft (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183312.bmp&hash=02dafef2fe739676600fdc9bd56271f0f5ab3723) on Jeff Sessions and Why That Should Concern Us All
Historian Gerald Horne says Jeff Sessions as Trump's Attorney General signals a frontal assault against the gains of the Civil Rights Movement
Dr. Gerald Horne holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston. His research has addressed issues of racism in a variety of relations involving labor, politics, civil rights, international relations and war. Dr. Horne has also written extensively about the film industry. His latest book is The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America. Dr. Horne received his Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and his J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and his B.A. from Princeton University.
https://youtu.be/Z9EQhBv8qDg
VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:
JAISAL NOOR: Welcome to the Real News Network. We're coming to you live on Facebook, as we cover the Senate Confirmation hearings underway for Donald Trump's cabinet picks. First up is Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, who Trump has tapped for Attorney General. He was Trump's earliest, and one of his most vocal supporters in the Senate. He's expected to be confirmed, but that hasn't stopped what seemed like an endless stream of protestors from disrupting the hearing.
(video clip) MAN: This is a... (heckling - inaudible) ...the whole (inaudible) ...redeemed (inaudible). People just wanted you to speak to these things, (inaudible) poor people... (inaudible - heckling) ... (shouting) (end video clip)
JAISAL NOOR: Well, now joining us to discuss this is Gerald Horne. He's the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History in African-American Studies, at the University of Houston. Author of many books, most recently, "The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America". Thanks so much for joining us again.
GERALD HORNE: Thank you for inviting me.
JAISAL NOOR: So, Jeff Sessions spent a good deal of time today defending his history, and his record on civil rights. Which is significant, because in 1986, Republicans joined with Democrats to block him from becoming a federal judge, after allegations of racism surfaced from his colleagues.
To counter these claims today, he cited his prosecution of civil rights activists when he was U.S. Attorney to Alabama in the 1980s. They were registering elderly black voters. We're going to play the clip, and then we'll play news coverage from 1986 that discusses that case. Here's that clip.
(video clip)
JEFF SESSIONS: Let me address another issue straight on. I was accused in 1986 of failing to protect the voting rights of African-Americans, by representing the Perry County case, the voter fraud case, and of condemning civil rights advocates and organizations, and even harboring, amazingly, sympathies for the KKK. These are damnably false charges.
The voter fraud case my office prosecuted was in response to pleas from African-American incumbent elected officials, who claimed that the absentee ballot process involved a situation in which ballots cast for them were stolen, altered, and cast for their opponents. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-030815183114.gif&hash=2bf1553e87e8605311feb874231953d5fb88ee9c)
REPORTER: His biggest problem came in a case he prosecuted and lost, a vote fraud case involving black civil rights leaders in Perry County, Alabama.
Defendants in the Perry County case were Albert and Evelyn Turner, political and civil rights leaders for more than 20 years. Albert was an aide to Martin Luther King. Their scrapbook has all the marches.
EVENLYN TURNER: This is Bloody Sunday. Albert can see... that's him right there.
REPORTER: Albert Turner guided the mules at Dr. King's funeral. The federal government charged the Turners with doctoring absentee ballots, vote fraud and mail fraud.
ALBERT TURNER: My own opinion is that the case was ... I actually don't think Jeff Sessions ever came in with an ounce of evidence. (end of video clip)
JAISAL NOOR: Okay, so to recap, Jeff Sessions says he is a defender of civil rights and voting rights (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16), because he prosecuted the Turners who were registering elderly black voters (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Ffc06.deviantart.net%2Ffs71%2Ff%2F2009%2F347%2F2%2F6%2FWTF_Smiley_face_by_IveWasHere.jpg&hash=8ca673f8cf785d9dac626f9fd91e37a1a318c7ac)in Alabama in the '80s. Gerald Horne, give us your response to this.
GERALD HORNE: Well, obviously, Jeff Sessions' response is a case of opportunism. It reminds me of the vice presidential debate with Mike Pence and the Democratic candidate, Tim Kaine, where Mike Pence basically denied reality and denied truths -- and apparently that worked, since now he's the Vice President-elect of the United States of America.
Jeff Sessions has copied that playbook, and feels that this will lead to his confirmation as the U.S. Attorney General. It's rather disconcerting to look at the New York Times headline and see that according to their reporter, the Democrats did not land a glove on Jeff Sessions -- which is quite unfortunate, becausethat voting rights case is enough to sink this nomination. Keep in mind--
JAISAL NOOR: And... It actually was part of why he wasn't a federal judge in '86, why Republicans joined with Democrats. It was a Republican-controlled committee that blocked him from being a federal judge.
GERALD HORNE: Yeah, basically what happened, was that Albert Turner was helping some voters fill out an absentee ballot -- some of these voters reputedly had problems in terms of reading these ballots. And to prosecute Mr. Turner, and try to put him in jail for such assistance is beyond the pale.
In the New York Times this morning, in fact, the wife of Mr. Turner –- Mr. Turner has now passed away –- she said that Jeff Sessions came up to her recently and tried to explain, and tried to hug her, and she basically chased him away. And I think that the Democrats and other senators of good will should chase him away from that hearing room, and make sure he is not confirmed as the next Attorney General of the United States.
JAISAL NOOR: Well, he's certainly been facing what seems like an endless barrage of protests. There is a moment where protestors with Code Pink actually dressed up in KKK hoods, to confront him about his past. And, you know, I was watching the hearings on CSPAN, and the president of the NAACP also expressed his frustration that Sessions, who was a Senator, member of the same committee, was treated with such deference. He wasn't really challenged very often on his record. There was a moment where he was challenged, though, by Senator Al Franken. He questioned Sessions about several civil rights cases that Sessions claims to have worked on as, again, U.S. Attorney to Alabama.
I want to play a clip of that questioning, and actually was able to track down one of the lawyers that did work on those cases. Mr. Gerald Hebert, who was a Department of Justice lawyer at the time, and he actually testified in Sessions' hearing in 1986. And he says Sessions wasn't being truthful. And that's why he and several of his Department of Justice colleagues wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post last week, which went viral. Here's that exchange.
(video clip) AL FRANKEN: Last week, I should note three attorneys who worked at DOJ, and who actually brought three of the four cases, who wrote an op-ed piece in which they say, "We can state categorically that Sessions had no substantive involvement in any of them."
Now, you originally said that you personally handled three of these cases, but these lawyers say that you had no substantive involvement. Chairman Grassley, I would ask that that op-ed from last Tuesday's Washington Post be entered into the record.
CHAIRMAN GRASSLEY: Without objection it will be entered.
AL FRANKEN: Are they distorting your record here?
JEFF SESSIONS: Yes. In fact, one of the writers there, Mr. Hebert, spent a good bit of time in my office. He said I supported him in all the cases he brought, that I was more supportive than almost any other U.S. Attorney, and that I provided office space. I signed the complaints that he brought, and as you know... may know, Senator Franken, when a lawyer signs a complaint, he's required to affirm that he believes in that complaint, and supports that complaint, and supports that legal action.
GERALD HEBERT: We looked at that list, and three or four of those cases were ones that we handled personally when we were at the Justice Department. And we knew he didn't really have any involvement, substantively, in any of those cases. So, we felt that the senate colleagues that he has, who are on the Judiciary Committee, as well as members of the public, ought to know that he really can't be taking credit for other people's work. (end video clip)
JAISAL NOOR: So, that was that exchange with Senator Franken, questioning Jeff Sessions about his claims that he worked on those cases, and Sessions saying, "No, Mr. Hebert, he thinks highly of me, I supported his work." And then my interview with Gerald Hebert saying, "Absolutely not, that is not the case."
This is a clear example of Sessions fabricating history to change his track record on civil rights, to make it more appealing and to make it easier, I guess, for his confirmation. Your response, Professor Horne?
GERALD HORNE: Well, it reminds me of heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis, who more than seven decades ago was fighting Billy Conn, and Joe Louis's message to Billy Conn is, "You can run, but you can't hide." Jeff Sessions may be able to run from his record temporarily, but he cannot hide from his record, which is a human rights and civil rights debacle. Keep in mind that Jeff Sessions is on record as denying the notion of birthright citizenship, which is embedded in the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution.
In other words, the 14th Amendment says if you're born in the United States, you're a citizen of the United States. Because Jeff Sessions is so anti-immigrant and because, like his boss, Donald J. Trump, he accepts the fallacious notion of so-called Anchor Babies -- that is to say women and other women coming into the United States in order to have a baby, so that somehow then they can get a leg up into getting rights as U.S. nationals, or at least mothers of U.S. nationals. Because he accepts such fallacies, he's willing to mangle, and do violence, to the Constitution of the United States of America, and the 14th Amendment, more specifically.
He's also very hostile to LBGT rights. He's anti-immigrant, as noted. He's anti-working class, in terms of the denial of the right of workers to get a living wage. He should be rejected by the U.S. Senate.
JAISAL NOOR: Another stance he's taken, is he has come out on record and opposed the Voting Rights Act, which the Supreme Court gutted just a few years ago. And we've seen the reports of massive voter disenfranchisement across the country, hundreds of thousands of people not being able to vote. We've seen more than a dozen states limit voting, the ability to vote, which disproportionately target African-American and people of color.
And now you're going to have Jeff Sessions, who actually prosecuted people for registering people to vote, as the Attorney General defending the right to vote. What is that going to mean for the ability for this country to have the semblance of a fair election in the future?
GERALD HORNE: Well, it makes the possibility of a fair election in the United States of America basically a nullity: null and void, a joke, a travesty. It would be as if you were appointing the wolf to guard the henhouse. If Jeff Sessions, as Attorney General, has the authority to supervise Voting Rights Act regulation, and in fact, to make sure that the Voting Rights Act, even as gutted, is still not removed from the books altogether, once again, it's very disappointing to see that many of the Democratic Senators are treating him as if he were a valued colleague, as opposed to treating him as the civil rights and constitutional rights outlaw that he actually is.
JAISAL NOOR: And so, another thing that's of concern to people around the country and, for example, in Baltimore, is that Jeff Sessions has... he supports "law and order", and he's come out specifically against Consent Decrees. That's when the federal government, Department of Justice, intervenes with local police departments.
Like we saw in Ferguson, and again right here in Baltimore, when the actions of the local police are so egregious that, as in the Baltimore case, that DOJ lawyers found a pattern in practice of routine constitutional violation of civil and human rights by the police force, especially on the African-American population -- and that's something Baltimore's tackled for a long time -- the local authorities can't seem to get a grip on it, so the feds have intervened. And in Baltimore's case, if that Consent Decree is not that... to a federal judge, by the time Trump takes office, it's likely going to mean that there will be no Consent Decree here, that things will go back to the way they were.
Talk about what a Donald Trump presidency, and a Jeff Sessions Attorney General, could mean for law enforcement across the country.
GERALD HORNE: Well, not only is what you're saying relevant to Baltimore -- recall a few years ago that Tamir Rice, a young black boy, was killed on tape by Cleveland police officers -- there was no viable prosecution of those police officers. The Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department intervened, just like the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department intervened with regard to Ferguson, Missouri, in the aftermath a few years ago of the slaying of Michael Brown.
If Jeff Sessions becomes the U.S. Attorney General, you can kiss good bye the idea of the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department intervening in cases where young black boys and men have been killed by the police. This could lead to a further epidemic of such police slayings, and obviously this is too ghastly to contemplate.
JAISAL NOOR: And, Professor Horne, you've studied and documented U.S. history since its inception, done some of the leading work on those issues. How do you place the moment we're in, in an historical context with a Trump presidency, and someone like Jeff Sessions, who is deemed too racially insensitive to be a federal judge 30 years ago, to now be our next Attorney General?
GERALD HORNE: Well, what's interesting is that Reverend William Barber, of Moral Mondays fame, in North Carolina, the head of the NAACP in that state, has suggested that we're going through the Third Reconstruction, and the birth pangs of the Third Reconstruction. He's referring to the First Reconstruction after the abolishing of slavery post-1865, the Second Reconstruction in the 1960s culminating, as you noted, with the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
He says that we're now on the verge of a Third Reconstruction. But in fact, with all due respect to Reverend Barber, what seems to be unfolding with this pending appointment of Jeff Sessions, is the overthrow of the Second Reconstruction of the 1960s. Just like the First Reconstruction, post-1865, was overthrown in 1877.
Now, in 2017, we see, 140 year later, that we're on the verge of the overthrow of the Second Reconstruction, but it's not too late to prevent that result from taking place.
I salute the protesters, I salute Code Pink, but obviously, we will need much more if Jeff Sessions is to be denied the appointment to be the next Attorney General of the United States of America.
JAISAL NOOR: All right, Gerald Horne, thank you so much for joining us.
We want to thank you all for joining us on Facebook. We will continue our ongoing coverage of the confirmation hearings of Jeff Sessions' cabinet appointees, and the Trump administration, including on Inauguration Day and beyond. Thank you so much for joining us.
It is all theater and now there are two kinds of people. Those who know it is theater and those who don't. That article about the protesters would have you believe that the author can be in three places at once so as to count the number of people in the crowds he claims.
Quote
In Chicago, more than 1,000 people poured into a teachers' union hall to support immigrant rights. In Los Angeles, several hundred people rallied at a downtown Mexican-American cultural center and plaza. The line to enter Metropolitan AME Church in Washington stretched nearly a city block.
This author can fly like a drone. Can a drone fly that fast? Smearing Trump is fine if it is done honestly, but this author lacks honesty. This ABC 'fake news'.
Of those 'who don't' the ones who are manipulated to become pawns against their own interests are the most disgusting.
I agree with K-dog that Trump will have great difficulty besting Obama, the reining champion among presidents in the deportation numbers. There is NO immigration problem. The REAL stats show that they have STOPPED coming here because the jobs have evaporated, not just because of the deportations.
That said, it is absolutely impossible to "defame" Trump, the champion POS of all US Presidents. If K-Dog wanted to be honest about Trump, he would say that Trump just used the immigration issue as a 'vote for me' sucker play on the bigots and xenophobic cretins in the USA.
Maybe someday K-Dog will be open minded about the horrendous bigotry and prejudice endemic to most white Americans. But, until that day comes, he will go out of his way to deny there is a problem and to downplay any news that evidences racism in the Police, the Courts and the Streets.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 16, 2017, 08:19:12 pm
DOJ Report About Chicago Police Department (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-241013183046.jpeg&hash=51c9c4f17e747698c76c65c7c1814eff4f32c400) Echoes What Residents Have Long Known
Posted on Jan 15, 2017
By Sarah Lazare / AlterNet
SNIPPET:
In a September 2014 report prepared for the United Nations Committee Against Torture, a grassroots effort called We Charge Genocide documented that, “Young people of color in communities across Chicago are consistently profiled, targeted, harassed, and subjected to excessive force by the (predominantly white) [Chicago Police Department]—leaving far too many physically injured, killed, and emotionally scarred.”
The investigation, led by directly impacted Chicago residents, determined that between 2009 and 2011, 92 percent of all CPD Taser uses targeted blacks or Latinos. Black residents are 10 times more likely to be shot by the CPD than their white counterparts, the probe found, and thousands of misconduct complaints are going systematically disregarded. The CPD’s “endemic” use of excessive force is racially discriminatory in nature, fuels a climate of fear and trauma and “constitutes torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,” concluded the report, which was presented in November 2014 to the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland by a team of eight young Chicago residents of color.
That detailed investigation followed in the footsteps of the We Charge Genocide petition brought to the United Nations in 1951 under the Genocide Convention. Written by the Civil Rights Congress, the paper determined that, “oppressed Negro citizens of the United States, segregated, discriminated against and long the target of violence, suffer from genocide as the result of the consistent, conscious, unified policies of every branch of government.” It concluded that, “Once the classic method of lynching was the rope. Now it is the policeman’s bullet.”
Since the 2014 investigation alone, black, brown and poor residents of Chicago have consistently warned that there is an ongoing epidemic of police killings, racism and violence in their city. They have done so in step with the nationwide Black Lives Matter movement. Were it not for the sustained resistance of these communities, including members of Black Lives Matter-Chicago, Black Youth Project 100 and Assata’s Daughters, the world might never know the names of black Chicago residents killed by police over the past five years, among them Rekia Boyd, Joshua Beal, Ronald Johnson, Pierre Loury, Kajuan Raye, Bettie Jones, Quintonio Legrier and Roshad McIntosh. And were it not for continued mobilizations and outrage, the Rahm Emanuel administration might have gotten away with its coverup of the police killing of Laquan McDonald, a 17-year-old African American who died after being shot by white officer Jason Van Dyke 16 times.
When the Department of Justice released a 164-page report last Friday confirming that the Chicago police department is perpetrating harassment, “unreasonable” killings and systematic civil rights violations against the people of Chicago, bereaved family members and racial justice campaigners said they were neither surprised nor satisfied. Many expressed concern that the findings will almost certainly be used to justify funneling more funding into the police department that continues to unleash atrocities on the city’s residents, on the watch of Mayor Emanuel.
“The statement that the DOJ made today, I said it a long time ago. The system is corrupt,” said Dorothy Holmes, the mother of Ronald Johnson, a 25-year-old black man who was shot to death by Officer George Hernandez in October 2014. Gathered with other bereaved family members and members of Black Lives Matter-Chicago, for a press conference outside the outside the Central District police station on the day the DOJ’s findings were released, Holmes declared, “We want accountability… My son should have been here. I should not be standing here.” “We know these cops are killing our families”
Echoing the findings of We Charge Genocide’s 2014 report, the DOJ report found that the CPD systematically uses force nearly 10 times more often against black residents than whites, and that “officers engage in a pattern or practice of using force, including deadly force, that is unreasonable. The report notes, “Among the most egregious uses of deadly force we reviewed were incidents in which CPD officers shot at suspects who presented no immediate threat.” In just one example, the report states:
RE, The topic on this thread, as far as I can tell, is TRUMP, not Obama. So, when K-Dog DERAILED the thread with the Leonard Peltier post, why didn't you split it off? THAT was a violation thread topic, was it not?
Splitting threads is a rather tedious task, and I don't usually do it unless you get numerous posts running on a tangent. Besides that, to be honest I don't read every thread or post made to the Diner Forum, so often enough I am completely unaware of all sorts of **** going down.
Then when I finally do find out about it, cleaning up the **** spread all over the walls of the Diner can be quite a chore. ::)
RE
But the fact remains that K-Dog ATTACKED me as well, though he doesn't want to admit it.
Obama leaving office and Trump entering office are two sides of the same coin. Obama pardons are therefore an appropriate topic in this thread. The title of the thread is the:
Trumpty-Dumpty POTUS Thread.
That does not define things well enough so that discussing our old POTUS and what he does at the end of his term as a consequence of Trumpty-Dumpties entry into the White House is inappropriate.
Forty years in prison for firing a gun but not killing anyone is a bit much. If I did have a habit of derailing threads like some other diners I'm sure RE would assign me my own news channel as he has done for others.
Discussing POT-US however would be more appropriate in the potfolio thread.
Baloney! THREE posts on Sessions, which IS applicable to Trump BECAUSE Sessions was the FIRST RACIST ASS HOLE to support the RACIST ASS HOLE TRUMP and you ARE NOT ONLY quiet as DEATH, you CHANGE THE SUBJECT!
The issue here is TRMUPTY-DUMPTY, NOT whether you voted for him or not, pal! The DISCUSSION of RACISM AND RACISTS in the US power structure is GERMANE to this thread, PERIOD!
Here's ONE MORE CHANCE for you admit that Trump and his pals are a RACIST THREAT TO PEOPLE OF COLOR (AND the planet). (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191258.bmp&hash=e4ed21caaca822f7445ccafd39f49a9f84be90ca) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191456.bmp&hash=a239c2fd76d20d142f1c54b961e22ebd0d2a4808)
Sessions is a looming threat to people of color and the planet
Posted Jan. 13, 2017 / Posted by: Judith Browne Dianis, executive director of national office of Advancement Project and Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth U.S.
At few points in our generation does Congress seem poised to vote on something so colossally consequential for the wellbeing of people of color. The nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) as United States attorney general presents U.S. senators with one such decision. The question is, will they step forward on climate priorities and racial equity, or will they dangerously turn their back on the progress our country has made?
With Sessions as attorney general, communities of color stand to lose significantly. Charged with enforcing civil rights laws, the Department of Justice has historically played an important role in bringing us closer to an inclusive democracy.
Whether it was filing lawsuits to end segregation, protecting organizers during the civil rights movement, fighting housing and voting discrimination or challenging discriminatory policing policies, the Department of Justice has responded to the racial justice movement over decades, helping secure protections. Under Sessions’ leadership, immigrant families will be criminalized and police reform efforts will stop dead in their tracks, among other things. Even worse, a Sessions’ Department of Justice will probably do affirmative damage on civil rights. Further, Sessions will hurt communities of color, who are hard hit by environmental racism by eviscerating enforcement of fundamental environmental laws.
Wrapped in racial injustice, environmental abuses have harmed people of color across the country — in communities ranging from Flint, Michigan to Mossville, Louisiana. The climate change-induced flooding and oil spill pollution in the Gulf Coast have disproportionately harmed people of color and low-income communities.
Legal enforcement of governmental responsibility is often the last and only recourse in these cases. Weakening enforcement tools would be disastrous to the progress communities of color have made.
As a senator for the state of Alabama, Sessions voted against environmental protection 93 percent of the time. In 2015, Sessions said that carbon dioxide is only “a plant food and it doesn’t harm anybody.” This shows a pattern of refusing to connect scientific cause-and-effect, which makes him unfit to set polluter prosecution priorities.
Sessions would also choose a next head of the Environment and Natural Resources Division at the Department of Justice, who will have the power to weaken consequences against those who violate the nation's civil and criminal pollution control laws. They could refuse to defend EPA and other agencies against corporations. That puts environmental programs at risk to fossil fuel interests who are pursuing ongoing legal fights over public lands and waters for Native American sovereignty. This will embolden polluters to be even more litigious to undermine environmental justice.
A look at Sessions’ record on voting rights, immigration, racial justice and civil liberties reveals not just a disregard for communities of color but he is an enemy of progress. As an attorney in Alabama, Sessions went on a witch hunt to persecute civil servants who were registering voters in historically Black counties under allegations of voter fraud that were quickly rejected by a jury. Sessions has called the Voting Rights Act, an anti-discrimination law that guarantees free and fair elections, “a piece of intrusive legislation,” a view held by supporters of Jim Crow.
Voting is the most fundamental way that communities empower themselves against polluters and the politicians that support them.
When Sessions was vetted in 1986, during a confirmation hearing to be appointed a federal judge, his history on race led to a rejection of his ways by a Republican-controlled Senate. Yet time has not improved the senator’s record, and now the 2017 Republican-controlled Congress is positioning itself to overlook it.
As recently as last summer, the courts forcefully went on record decrying rampant attempts to make it harder for people of color to vote. As the attorney general in charge of setting guidelines for which cases can and cannot be brought to court, Sessions poses a danger to voters of color as well as every American who is not white, male, straight and citizen-born. Sessions’ clear prejudices and racism make him willfully blind to some of the most pressing civil rights abuses and environmental injustices in our country.
With the stakes too high to let Sessions run unchecked with the Trump administration’s racist agenda, the choice before the Senate is clear. We cannot trust Jefferson Beauregard Sessions to serve as the top enforcer of our constitution and our laws. Senators must stand definitively on the right side of history. Our people and our planet depend on it.
AND BY THE WAY, K-Dog, Mark Blyth is the Scottish economist that has stats that PROVE there is NO IMMIGRATION PROBLEM IN THE USA, who claims Trump dog whistled his racist followers to support him with racist and xenophobic CRAP about immigration "taking jobs" from Americans.
Have a nice day.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 19, 2017, 05:14:43 pm
I find Jeff Sessions to be a strange choice, even for Trump. I suppose he was chosen because of his anti-immigration views, and because he was the first (and for a while, the only) Senator to endorse Trump the candidate. But it seems like Trump might have been just as happy to have a rabid supporter there in the Senate, as to pull him out and make him AG. It never has quite added up to me, and I strongly suspect he was chosen to make some fat cat happy, like maybe one of the Koch brothers, or Sheldon Adelson, the casino magnate who spends millions fighting pot legalization.
On the contrary, picking the Racist Ass hole Sessions for Attorney General is quite consistent with Trump's "Comedy" in regard to all the other Cabinet posts (SEE: Orwellian Mindfork). (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
Center for Biological Diversity: 100-day Trump Action Plan
Rather than waiting to see Donald Trump’s plan for his first 100 days in office, the Center for Biological Diversity has drawn up our own plan to resist Trump during the earliest days of his term. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-210614221847.gif&hash=54129e3b65760aaddc6f2d7f42b34a7d839d2f27) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcliparts.co%2Fcliparts%2FBig%2FEgq%2FBigEgqBMT.png&hash=e7eec62f009cdd686ce795fad0a53c6befe748e9)
1.Rally Americans from coast to coast under the banner of #Earth2Trump to resist Trump's extremist, authoritarian agenda.
2.Strengthen alliances with groups fighting for gender and racial equality, American Indian sovereignty, LGBTQ rights, freedom of speech, press and religion, workers’ rights and other civil rights and values.
3.Hire 10 new attorneys, investigators and activists to aggressively hold the Trump administration accountable when it violates America's federal environmental laws.
4.Fight the confirmation of Trump's extremist, financially conflicted, unqualified cabinet nominations, including Rex Tillerson for secretary of State, Rick Perry for secretary of Energy, Scott Pruitt for Environmental Protection Agency director, Ryan Zinke as secretary of the Interior and Sonny Perdue as secretary of Agriculture.
5.Stop the repeal or weakening of the Endangered Species Act.
6.Block efforts to rescind, radically shrink or defund America's national monuments.
7.Stop the weakening of the Clean Air Act and revocation of the EPA's responsibility to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.
8.Stop Trump from revoking the Clean Power Plan.
9.Stop Trump from weakening protection for wetlands and streams.
10.Maintain the moratorium on new federal coal leases and ensure a national assessment is completed of the environmental, human-health and financial costs of the federal coal-mining program.
11.Stop new offshore oil drilling in the Arctic, Atlantic and eastern Gulf of Mexico by defending the Five-year Offshore Leasing Program and preventing the repeal of permanent protections against oil and gas leasing in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans.
12.Fight in the courts, along with the state of California, environmental and indigenous groups, to stop ocean fracking along the California coast.
13.File suit to stop intensive pollution of our oceans by industrial plastics.
14.Defend the State Department's refusal to approve the KXL pipeline and the Army Corps of Engineers' decision not to allow the Dakota Access Pipeline to threaten the water supply and cultural values of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe.
15.Defeat proposals to weaken trophy-hunting regulations and expand U.S. imports of endangered species including elephants, lions and polar bears.
16.Defeat efforts to give away federal public lands or turn their management over to states and corporations.
17.Prevent the stripping of federal protection from grizzly bears and wolves.
18.Prevent rollback of protections for imperiled greater sage grouse and more than 300 other species dependent on healthy Sagebrush Sea habitat.
19.Stand with reproductive-rights organizations defending the Affordable Care Act, abortion rights, access to birth control, and international funding for family-planning programs.
20.Mobilize college students across the country around clean energy, sustainable food and population issues.
21.Stop the construction of a massive new wall on the U.S.-Mexico border that would destroy wildlife habitat, pollute rivers, violate national parks, wildlife refuges, forests and rivers, and cause massive social and economic disruption of border towns and cities.
22.Petition the Department of Agriculture to cease the use of dangerous, unnecessary predator-killing poisons.
23.Ensure the Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Department of Agriculture are not stripped of their authority and responsibility to protect people and wildlife from dangerous pesticides.
Brought to you by the Brooklyn Bridge Realtors for Trump. ;D
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 20, 2017, 06:44:49 pm
The prevalence of lies by police gives new meaning to 'protect and serve'
By Kelly Macias
Wednesday Jan 18, 2017 · 4:16 PM EST
Hardly anything seems to draw more conservative ire than badmouthing the police. When progressive activists demand police accountability and cite the plethora of police violence against unarmed citizens, they are called disrespectful, unpatriotic, and in the case of Black Lives Matter activists, actual terrorists.
Of course, it’s a message that you learned since childhood, right? Cops are there to serve and protect the citizenry and deserve to be supported. And if you can’t trust the police, who can you trust?
It turns out that while it’s questionable if they are actually protecting the citizens they serve, they are doing a whole lot of protecting and serving—themselves. And (in case you needed actual proof) demands for accountability and reform are well founded. Buzzfeed News reviewed 62 examples of video footage in which a cop’s statement in a police record or testimony directly contradicted the video evidence. They found definitive proof that cops lie. Often.
Lying is “something that has been endemic in the history of the American police system for the last three or four generations,” said Peter Keane, a former San Francisco police commissioner who now teaches law at Golden Gate University. “And why do they do it? The main reason they do it, historically and now, is they can get away with it.”
Of the 62 incidents BuzzFeed News reviewed, only 22 led to charges being filed against an officer, and of those, only nine have resulted in convictions.
So now we know that not only is lying a serious problem in the profession, it is a well-used tactic in a corrupt system that rewards those who do so.
And the rabbit hole goes even deeper. While we might have guessed that cops lie when they kill people, apparently, lying isn’t limited to one specific type of incident.
They lie when they think no cameras are watching, like Reading, Pennsylvania, officer Jesus Santiago-DeJesus did when he smashed Marcelina Cintron-Garcia’s cell phone and arrested her on a false charge of assault after she filmed him during a traffic stop. They lie when they should know for certain that cameras are watching, like officers in Seabrook, New Hampshire, in Skokie, Illinois, and in Sweetwater, Florida, did when they slammed and injured suspects getting booked into their police stations, then falsely claimed the suspects had acted aggressively. [...]
They lie in groups, like the six cops in San Francisco, four in Chicago, and three in Kissimmee, Florida, who lied about having probable cause to arrest a suspect for drug possession.
They lie when no other cops are on the scene. Bullitt County, Kentucky, sheriff’s deputy Matthew Corder arrested Deric Baize for disorderly conduct and resisting arrest, claiming that he “caused alarm to neighbors,” but video showed that Corder entered Baize’s house and tased him only after Baize had cursed at him for blocking his driveway. “Next time you tell a police officer to f u c k off,” Corder said, “you might want to think about it.”
These are just a handful of incidents that have been caught on camera. Imagine how many more are out there, never seeing the light of day.
Our justice system, under the guise of impartiality, privileges the word of police officers over anyone else. Some police are free to lie all day without consequence while countless innocent people end up in prison. And as we already know, these lies disproportionately impact people of color.
A cop’s word is often the difference between a person’s freedom and imprisonment. In many cases, an officer and a defendant tell diametrically opposed versions of the same incident — a “swearing contest,” lawyers call it — and a judge or jury is left to decide whom to believe: the professional law enforcement agent who has testified in dozens of trials or the undereducated, underemployed, probably black or Latino guy from an “area known for narcotics trafficking” accused of breaking the law? The scale is even more unbalanced when the word of the defendant is lined up against the words of not one but two, three, four, five professional law enforcement agents. “The words of the police officers would always prevail over the words of poor black and brown folks,” said Craig Futterman, a professor at the University of Chicago law school.
So the next time you think about who you can trust, think twice before trusting the police. As it turns out, your neighbor, butcher, mail carrier, or bus driver may be more trustworthy.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 21, 2017, 09:01:54 pm
January 20, 2017
As Trump Takes Office Baltimore Remains Defiant
City residents remain wary of Trump's commitment to address the city's long neglected problems.
https://youtu.be/wWLStGWlk1g
Agelbert NOTE: The people of Baltimore understand Trump perfectly. The sad fact is that the US Government is now fully fascist and will proceed to ignore every clean air, soil and water regulation on behalf of the fossil fuel industry and other polluters from the pharmaceutical and chemical industries.
Also, the entire social contract that has been laboriously built up by people of good will since the time of FDR up to and including civil rights gains for people of color and healthcare for all Americans during the LBJ Administration will be deliberately and methodically destroyed piece by piece.
Every step in the dismembering of the social contract that will cause the unnecessary misery and the death of millions of Americans will be given an Orwellian label. For example, the Ryan plan to DEFUND the Affordable Care Act (i.e. Obamacare) is cynically called a "rescue", when in fact it is a death sentence. This nihilistic cynicism is part and parcel of the fascist regressive modus operandi now only slightly less prevalent in the Democratic Party wing of the duopoly as in the Republican in-your-face fascist wing.
More wealth transfer from the poor and middle class of all colors to the rich is what the Trump Administration is all about, as well as more pollution, more sickness, and more rampant racist brutality.
The defunding of the ACA immediately hands out an average of 7 million dollars in tax cuts (EACH!) to the 400 most wealthy families in America. The only reason the ACA was bad mouthed and demonized as "Obamacare" for the past seven years by the internet noise machine and the bought and paid for news media is because all those families that make over $250,000 a year did not like funding this program, even though it was a poor substitute for what every other industrialized country in the west has for their own citizens.
Plutocratic greed is destroying America. This will end VERY badly.
Quote
"A people that values its privileges above its principles soon loses both." — Dwight D. Eisenhower
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 23, 2017, 07:48:03 pm
Well folks, TRUMP is DOUBLING down on THE BIG PLAN to crush anybody, including the Standing Rock water protectors, that wants to keep Big Oil from Profit over Planet. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714191329.bmp&hash=4764bfbe6bb0e11ca61102efa97a932a824f47e0)
First, Trump picked arch civil rights foe Jeff Sessions as his nominee for attorney general.
Then, it was reported last week that Trump’s budget blueprint slashes funding for the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division.
Now, Trump has tapped anti-civil rights, right-wing lawyer John Gore, to head the Civil Rights Division!
These headlines tell the story:
Trump's Pick to Enforce Civil Rights Is an Expert at Defending GOP Voting Laws (New York Magazine - Jan 21, 2017)
Donald Trump's Pick to Enforce Civil Rights Is a Civil Rights Disaster (Slate - Jan 20, 2017)
Quote
Petition
US Senators:
John Gore is an unacceptable pick to head the DOJ's Civil Rights Division. Someone with his record of extreme hostility to civil rights and voting rights should not be the one tasked with protecting those rights.
I ask that you do all in your power to OPPOSE Gore's confirmation.
Let your Senators know that the nomination of John Gore to enforce our nation’s civil rights laws is UNACCEPTABLE!>> (https://secure.pfaw.org/site/SPageNavigator/action.html?survey_id=11742&autologin=true&utm_medium=email&utm_source=aa&utm_campaign=johngore)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 23, 2017, 08:00:56 pm
Quote
Wenonah Hauter Executive Director Food & Water Watch wenonah(at)fwwatch(dot)org
On inauguration day, the Trump Administration took all references to climate change off of the White House website.1 Now, they're beginning a months-long rollout of budget cuts and roll backs of key regulations designed to protect our air, water and climate from corporate polluters.
The leaked to-do list makes it clear that Trump will follow through on promises to gut the agency.2
•The document identifies opportunities to cut programs, including $513 million from "state and tribal assistance grants (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f)," $193 million from ending climate programs and $109 million from "environmental programs and management."
•The administration outlines initiatives they want to stop, including "Clean Air Act greenhouse gas regulations," clean car standards and clean water protections.
•The to-do list also includes a plan to permanently change how the EPA uses science (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) to prevent the agency from returning to "its bad old ways as soon as an establishment administration takes office."
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 26, 2017, 12:58:14 pm
Agelbert Note: The Fossil Fuel Industry Fascist POS POTUS STRIKES AGAIN!
Trump puts EPA's ethanol program on ice
By John Siciliano • 1/24/17 2:15 PM
SNIPPET:
The Environmental Protection Agency's renewable fuel program faces a temporary freeze as President Trump's regulatory chill kicks in this week.
The Trump administration will use that time to review the regulations and decide if any further action is warranted based on an executive order Trump signed after being sworn in as the 45th president on Friday, according to a notice that the EPA's acting administrator, Catherine McCabe, issued late Monday.
McCabe lists the fuel program among 30 regulations, issued from Oct. 28 to Jan. 17, that Trump has ordered the agency to freeze temporarily by delaying them all by one month. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
"The temporary delay in effective dates until March 21, 2017, is necessary to give agency officials the opportunity for further review and consideration of new regulations," a pre-publication copy of the notice reads. The notice will be published in Thursday's Federal Register as a final rule.
Ethanol was always a bad idea. My guess is Trump decides to let the conduit scheme continue, just because it makes sense to end it.
You are quite wrong about ethanol, Eddie. The only BAD idea, whitch was cleverly FOSTERED by the fossil fuel industry in cahoots with Big Ag, was making ethanol from CORN. I can give you chapter and verse on that (as I have done so in the past here) but it would probably do zip to convince you since you have swallowed the "food or fuel" propaganda from the fossil fuel industry.
Ethanol was always a bad idea. My guess is Trump decides to let the conduit scheme continue, just because it makes sense to end it.
Feed people or feed carz? Hmmmmm....
Every acre of land producing ethanol used in carz is one less acre of corn or sugar cane or beets to feed people. It is a Zero Sum Game.
RE
At any rate, THAT is not the issue here; the ISSUE is the Trump Fascist Anti-science CRUSADE that you just avoided mentioning.
There is a LOT of Hidden History in this country that you refuse to acknowledge. Some of it comes out from time to time. I think it is time that you stop pretending what is in the history books is reality. And please spare me the ridicule of what people like me have lived with all their lives as a "conspiracy" theory. For you to ignore all this stuff because you are an, as you put it, "Old White Guy", is unprincipled. I urge you to be more open to facts which challenge your world view.
Here's an example of the TIP OF THE ROTTEN HISTORICAL ICEBERG you should pay more attention to:
AP/ January 26, 2017, 9:35 AM
Georgia police chief apologizing for agency's role in 1940 lynching
SNIPPET: The unprecedented ceremony comes as the police profession across America wrestles with its tense relationship with the black community.
In 2015 the U.S. Department of Justice launched a program to build community trust with minorities. The program, which includes a reconciliation component, is in a pilot stage in six communities across the country, including Minneapolis and Birmingham.
And last fall the head of one of the largest police groups in the country, the International Association of Chiefs of Police, acknowledged and apologized for his profession’s historical mistreatment of minority communities. That came three years after a police chief in Montgomery apologized to Rep. John Lewis for his agency’s failure to protect Freedom Riders in 1961.
Dekmar is believed to be the first police chief in the South to apologize for his department’s role in the legacy of lynchings that claimed more than 4,000 black lives across the region between 1877 and 1950.
“It’s important for those agencies, those institutions that have been responsible for some very bad things that have never been acknowledged,” said David Harris, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law who has studied racial profiling by police.
Police often played a role in lynchings across the region, even if they weren’t directly involved in carrying out the violence, said E.M. Beck, a University of Georgia sociology professor who is an expert in the history of lynching in America. Law enforcement routinely let lynch mobs take a person from their custody and after the person was killed there was often little effort to investigate or determine who carried out the violence.
He said he’s not familiar with another instance of a law enforcement chief going back into this history to admit the role their own agency played.
“It’s very significant,” said Beck. “There’s an acknowledgement that justice was not done.”
In Callaway’s case, little was known in LaGrange about the incident.
“A lot of this history of Austin was hidden,” said Ernest Ward, a local educator and president of the Troup County NAACP. “People didn’t want it to be told.”
Agelbert NOTE: The lynchings total is WAY OFF! Many lynchings were NOT even classified as "lynchings" (i.e. worse case of suicide ah ever did see (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)), never mind the number of beatings and deaths where a rope wasn't used in the cities. The total EASILY exceeds 20,000 racist murders. The convict lease program resulted in thousands of black deaths too. Carnegie got RICH from it! And YEAH, it was MOSTLY blacks that were worked to death. But, of course, they weren't 'lynched", eh? Too many white people in the USA WANT the TRUE RACIST HISTORY to REMAIN HIDDEN in Austin and EVERYWHERE ELSE! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
THEY ALSO want to PRETEND the POLICE are no longer "racist". (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Ffly.gif&hash=b0526635e8b47d751b0e429925d73d78f9d79fc6)
THAT is a VERY CONVENIENT DENIAL OF THE PRESENT REALITY. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
NOW JUST WTF DO YOU THINK SESSIONS IS GOING TO DO ABOUT THAT U.S. Department of Justice program to build community trust with minorities? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)
Yeah, I know; I'm just "too sensitive". (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8)
Vermont Refugee Resettlement Program Director Amila Merdzanovic, left, and Stacie Blake, director of government and community relations at the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, speak at a meeting in Rutland. File photo by Elizabeth Hewitt/VTDigger
SNIPPET:
For members of Rutland Welcomes — a group that has organized to support Syrian refugee resettlement — the news of the president’s order was devastating.
“We’re really disappointed,” said Hunter Berryhill, a spokesperson for the group. Berryhill described the suspension of the program as “unjust, inhumane, shortsighted and heartless.”
Trump derives his power to unilaterally freeze immigration for broad blocs of people from section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952. That law allows the president to curtail immigration of certain groups on various grounds, including national security and terrorism concerns.
The one word solution to this federal/imperial overreach? NULLIFICATION. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) The Vermont legislature can declare the Trump administration’s executive order to be “null and void” within the borders of our Green Mountains, and bring the Syrian refugees here as we have been planning to do for months. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Both constitutional and historical precedent are on our side (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039) – see Vermont’s 1858 nullification of the Fugitive Slave Act as one example.
I hope our elected legislators will have the foresight and courage to consider this option.
Free Vermont, and long live the UNtied States! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fcliparts.co%2Fcliparts%2FBig%2FEgq%2FBigEgqBMT.png&hash=e7eec62f009cdd686ce795fad0a53c6befe748e9)
Agelbert NOTE: Please, spare me any babbling about Federal Law "pre-emption" and a Republican Supine Supreme Court. In the case of Executive Orders, State Rights CAN override them LEGALLY (NO, the Civil War WAS NOT about State's Rights!).
Here's another powerfully truthful comment:
Quote
Patty Smith
The military industrial complex dictates US foreign policy for profit. US foreign policy creates terrorists through regime change and illegal covert activities. Then US immigration policy bans victims of US aggression from seeking asylum. It’s no wonder the US is considered the greatest threat to world peace.
Yet the American people continue to be blind to the connection between our “strong military” and global instability.
Both major parties are to blame and so are the majority of the American people who continue to march blindly to the drumbeat of war.
Sadly, the bigots also commented with their typical doubletalk and closet racist comments disguised as, "We gotta take care of our own first" crocodile tears. Selfish, racist people always use duplicity to disguise their lack of compassion for fellow humans and other life forms in the biosphere. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183312.bmp&hash=02dafef2fe739676600fdc9bd56271f0f5ab3723)
I will post just one of these comments, which was countered by a Vermonter of good will.
Quote
michael olcott
a good person doesnt take food from their own to feed their neighbor when both are starving. im so glad that all who feel as you do and Mayor Chris Louras have managed to eliminate the homeless and all other poverty related issues down there,oh wait we need to take care of our own people first before we bring others that would consume our resources. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)
Richard M Roderick (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)
I don’t think resources are being diverted. The United States, Vermont and Rutland have the ability to take care of the number of refugees that are coming and take care of our own citizens. It often just lacks the political will. We are a country of immigrants. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 26, 2017, 06:07:26 pm
Burlington police use of force data shows racial disparities
by Morgan True
SNIPPET:
BURLINGTON — Seven years of data released this week by the Burlington Police Department shows persistent racial disparities in the use of force by its officers.
Overall, the data shows that use of force incidents, which police define as everything from verbal commands to firing their gun at someone, have decreased in the last seven years, despite an increase in police responses and arrests.
People of color account for 23 percent of police interactions where force was used but they are only 13 percent of the population — based on 2010 U.S. Census figures — according to presentation by Eric Fowler, a crime analyst for the department.
When the sample is limited to just people who were arrested, and not the population as a whole, people of color are still overrepresented, Fowler said, but only by a margin of 2 percent instead of 10 percent.
People of color are also37 percent more likely to have a gun pointed at them than a white person, even though they are less likely to actively resist an officer, the data shows.
Agelbert NOTE: All the above progress for equal treatment will come to a screetching halt under a Racist Bigot Sessions DOJ AND go in the OTHER DIRECTION. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 27, 2017, 11:49:39 pm
Statue of Liberty Weeps: President Targets Mexicans, Muslims
Thursday, 26 January 2017, 1:20 pm Press Release: Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect
THE STATUE OF LIBERTY WEEPS AS PRESIDENT TRUMP TARGETS MEXICANS AND MUSLIMS
Statement of Steven Goldstein, Executive Director of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect, the U.S. civil and human rights organization among Anne Frank organizations worldwide:
As President Trump prepares orders to wall out Mexicans and shut out refugees from America, today marks one of the most hateful days in our nation's history. Donald Trump is retracting the promise of American freedom to an extent we have not seen from a President since Franklin Roosevelt forced Japanese Americans into internment camps during World War II. Today the Statue of Liberty weeps over President Trump's discrimination.
President Trump is beyond the wrong side of history. He is driving our nation off a moral cliff.
When President Trump uses national security as a guise for racism, he doesn't strengthen our national security. He compromises our national security by engendering disrespect for America by people around the world.
Make no mistake, suspending visas for citizens of Middle Eastern and African countries is not called national security. It's called prejudice. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
President Trump is now exacerbating the largest global refugee crisis in history. His slamming America's doors on the starving, the wounded and the abused is a grotesque blot on our nation's history of freedom. The President's actions are an embarrassment to the timeless vision of America as inscribed by Emma Lazarus to "give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
Demonizing refugees and immigrants, and spending billions of taxpayer dollars to keep them out of our nation, will go down in American history as one of the most tragic deviations from our national conscience.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 28, 2017, 10:32:11 pm
The woman responsible for Emmett Till's death admitted he did nothing to her
By wagatwe
Friday Jan 27, 2017 · 12:02 PM EST
SNIPPET:
If you have problems with high blood pressure, you might want to do a few deep breaths before reading this. In a new book by Timothy Dyson titled The Blood of Emmett Till, the author reveals a bombshell fact about the case surrounding the 14-year-old boy’s murder in Mississippi: the woman made up the most damning parts of her testimony.
With Executive Order on Policing, Trump Declares Racialized War on Dissent
Flint Taylor, Truthout:
SNIPPET:
President Trump's recent executive order on policing can be read as an official authorization from one white supremacist (Steve Bannon) to another (Jeff Sessions) to pursue the most racist and reactionary criminal legal policies in recent memory.
Aside from the rise of Andrew Anglin’s Daily Stormer site and its real-world “clubs” — new chapters that profited directly from the Trump phenomenon — the year on the neo-Nazi scene was marked by a number of attempts to build new coalitions among groups. Several of them, like the Coalition of Aryan Organizations and the United Aryan Front, collapsed almost as quickly as they appeared.
That left what was first called the Aryan Nationalist Alliance and then was rebranded as simply the Nationalist Front. The unity effort was spearheaded by Jeff Schoep, leader of the National Socialist Movement, Josh Steever of the Aryan Strikeforce, and Matthew Heimbach of the Traditionalist Worker Party.
The coalition peaked at 26 mostly tiny groups, but that had fallen by year’s end to 16, reflecting the perennial infighting that characterizes the neo-Nazi scene.
The “Unity Statement” of the Nationalist Front, which describes Schoep and Heimbach as its leaders, is a fairly typical neo-Nazi screed emphasizing hatred of “the globalists and the Jewish banking elites” and calling for the creation of an all-white homeland within the current United States. What is most interesting about it is that it essentially adopts the so-called “third position,” meaning that it opposes both communism and capitalism. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85) Using anti-imperialist and pro-worker language that sounds almost as if it came from the left, it describes its goal as an ethno-state based on “economic Social Nationalism” (national socialism, or Nazism, in reverse).
The document is reminiscent of the early days of the German Nazis, when the so-called Strasserites emphasized the “socialism” in national socialism. Later, the German Nazi Party completely changed course, allying with major capitalists. One Strasser brother was murdered, another fled, and the Strasserites were purged. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
The US Has Always Had Black Inventors -- Even When the Patent System Explicitly Excluded Them
Shontavia Johnson, The Conversation: One group of prolific innovators has been largely ignored by history: Black inventors born or forced into American slavery.
Though US patent law was created with colorblind language to foster innovation, the patent system consistently excluded these inventors from recognition.
Brazilian Indians paraded and protested at the renowned Rio Carnival, to raise global awareness of their land struggle and the serious threats they face.
17 indigenous leaders, including Kayapó leader Raoni Metuktire, paraded with the Imperatriz Leopoldinense samba school in its ensemble which focussed on the destruction of tribal territories in the Amazon rainforest.
The lyrics of the school’s songs expose the destruction Indians have faced since the colonization of Brazil, and criticize the ongoing theft of tribes’ land for the Belo Monte mega-dam and other projects.
The music has provoked outrage and anger among anti-indigenous politicians, and has led to racist comments by a TV presenter who said that Indians will “have to die of malaria.”
Indigenous leader Sonia Guajajara said at Carnival: “Thanks to the samba school for giving us another tool in our struggle, as we face powerful economic and political interests. Carnival can strengthen our fight.”
Attacks on indigenous peoples in Brazil are intensifying: Violence against their communities has increased, and Congress is debating several proposals which would drastically weaken indigenous peoples’ control of their lands. Tribal people and their allies, including Survival supporters around the world, are fighting the proposals.
Babau Tupinambá, an indigenous leader, said: “Indigenous peoples will not stop fighting for our rights. We will not stop fighting to exist.” (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Around the world, industrialized societies subject tribal peoples to genocidal violence, slavery and racism so they can steal their lands, resources and labor in the name of “progress” and “civilization.” The theft of tribal land destroys self-sufficient peoples and their diverse ways of life. It causes disease, destitution and suicide. The evidence is indisputable.
http://www.survivalinternational.org/news/11597
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 01, 2017, 06:10:58 pm
"A Sermon to White America" (w/Guest Michael Eric Dyson)
https://youtu.be/uowTnSuDzoo
Thom talks with Michael Eric Dyson (Professor of Sociology at Georgetown, Contributing Opinion Writer - The New York Times, and Author - Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America) about race relations in America, white privilege, and more. (Part 1)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 17, 2017, 01:37:52 pm
Quote
... the Republican anti-information crusadeis not limited to big ticket items that capture national attention, such as gun violence orclimate change. A little-known bill introduced last month by Sens. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Mike Lee (R-UT) — called the “Local Zoning Decisions Protection Act of 2017” —would prohibit the use of federal funds “to design, build, maintain, utilize, or provide access to a Federal database of geospatial information on community racial disparities or disparities in access to affordable housing.”
We don’t know what such a database would show but we also see no reason why there shouldn’t be one. Republicans obviously feel differently.
THIS LANDFILL IS YOUR (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f) LANDFILL (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978)
Written by Zoë Schlanger
March 22, 2017
Go looking for the local landfill or toxic waste treatment facility in any US county with a mostly white population, and you’ll likely find it in the black or Latino neighborhoods. That’s because in the US, your race is the single biggest factor that determines whether you live near a hazardous waste facility.
In 2016, a study published in Environmental Research Letters found “a consistent pattern over a 30-year period of placing hazardous waste facilities in neighborhoods where poor people and people of color live.”
“In fact, places that are already disproportionately populated by minorities, and where their numbers are growing, have the best chances of being selected (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fmocantina.gif&hash=d013c741bcf9a78776eec19c2c3aac449c35d75c),” Paul Mohai, a professor and the founder of the environmental justice program at the University of Michigan who coauthored the paper, wrote in an email.
The paper followed decades of reports finding much the same: As reported by The Nation, in 1983 the Government Accountability Office found that black people made up the majority of communities near landfills, and a 2007 report, authored by a group of university-affiliated experts in environmental policy and published by the United Church of Christ, found that things had actually gotten worse since the 80s: “[M]any of our communities not only face the same problems they did back then, but now they face new ones because of government cutbacks in enforcement, weakening health protection, and dismantling the environmental justice regulatory apparatus.”
Any remaining environmental justice regulation in the US is likely to be further dismantled in the near future. The Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270117175421.png&hash=cf39e823dd9156833bfa885808a876bf518bd0d6) administration’s proposed budget for the US Environmental Protection Agency would gut the agency’s environmental justice work by 78%, and likely cut into the EPA’s civil rights office‘s resources, which was set up to handle disparities in geographical distribution of pollution. Mustafa Ali, the head of the environmental justice program at the EPA, has already resigned.
It’s worth pointing out that the EPA’s civil rights office(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-241013183046.jpeg&hash=51c9c4f17e747698c76c65c7c1814eff4f32c400) doesn’t exactly have a robust history of reform; the EPA denied 95% of civil rights claims they received since the mid-1990s. When the agency made a formal finding of discrimination on the day before Trump’s inauguration, it was just the second such finding in the office’s history—the first was a preliminary finding in 2011.
Now it appears the federal government will completely take itself out of the business of addressing environmental discrimination.
Living near a hazardous-waste landfill is not just a gross nuisance; it makes you sicker. Air pollution from these sites can lead to a range of health problems. People of color in the US are also exposed to a 38% higher level of nitrogen dioxide, on average, than white people. Nitrogen dioxide is pumped out of power plants and exhaust pipes on cars and trucks, and is linked to asthma, bronchitis, and a host of other respiratory problems. And when a power plant emits nitrogen dioxide, it likely also emits sulfur dioxide, another respiratory irritant. Chronic respiratory diseases make daily life harder and shorten life spans. Children are especially susceptible; air pollution exposure has been shown to cause cognitive delays in children, and when expecting mothers are subjected to air pollution, it increases their child’s risk for early birth and low birth weight, both of which risk for impaired brain development down the road. Detroit is a good example for how the racial disparities in pollution exposure play out in America. Much of Detroit’s heavy industry—steel making, oil refining, and coal-fired power plants—is clustered in the majority-black neighborhoods in the southwest part of the city. In 2011, Mohai mapped Detroit’s public schools over air pollution data. He found 82% of black students went to schools in the most polluted parts of the city, while 44% of white students did. And the children in those pollution-exposed schools scored lower on standardized tests.
Agelbert NOTE: Only a racist, privileged, clueless moron (e.g. a Trumper) would be surprised at the above, ESPECIALLY the irrefutableMens Rea involved in selecting the LOCATION of past (and future) hazardous waste dumps and toxic industry infrastructure by BIGOTED Town council zoning boards ALL OVER THE USA. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F237.gif&hash=13b71d2444f84b15c53fb1c0272c080f48a165f1) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F290.gif&hash=38949e35cf58eaa4218b5a8176767c806d2f8537)
The Trumpers would then immediately react, OF COURSE, by calling it "Soros backed fake news". ::)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 23, 2017, 03:40:56 pm
Holy Bleeding S h I t! That is magnificent, AG. Deeply moving.
Most here won't watch it. I consider myself fortunate that I did.
This spoken word poetry slam stuff can sometimes catch you with a swift uppercut for a knockout, like this. I refer you to the work of Agnes Torok.
https://youtu.be/kiaxHUFAWew
Agnes gets it. Such an eloquent and brave exposure of the reality of the cruelty of capitalism needs to be shouted from the rooftops!
Thank you. I just chanced on it. I can never stop admiring Blacks for all the S H I T they go through. Sure, I've been dealing with that prejudice crap all my life. BUT, at least in public I have been able to "pass". I have never had to deal with the fecal effluent of sardonic and cruel hate mocking most Blacks have to deal with. I don't think I could have handled it without going postal. But, who knows? God often provides strength when we feel we have none.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 26, 2017, 01:00:41 pm
Idaho company defends using blatantly racist imagery on its trucks
By wagatwe
Tuesday Apr 25, 2017 · 1:36 PM EDT
SNIPPET:
It’s common knowledge that depicting Black people with watermelon—or even just insinuating that we love to eat it—is racially insensitive at best. If you’re unfamiliar with the reasons why watermelon became such an awful symbol of hatred and oppression, I recommend this piece from the Atlantic (emphasis mine):
Quote
But the stereotype that African Americans are excessively fond of watermelon emerged for a specific historical reason and served a specific political purpose. The trope came into full force when slaves won their emancipation during the Civil War. Free black people grew, ate, and sold watermelons, and in doing so made the fruit a symbol of their freedom. Southern whites, threatened by blacks’ newfound freedom, responded by making the fruit a symbol of black people’s perceived uncleanliness, laziness, childishness, and unwanted public presence. This racist trope then exploded in American popular culture, becoming so pervasive that its historical origin became obscure. Few Americans in 1900 would’ve guessed the stereotype was less than half a century old.
But like any good, ol’ racist, Dixie Services owner Valentine wouldn’t let something like history or facts to ruin his racist fun. ABC affiliate KXLY reports reveals that he’s just as clueless as you’d expect (or perhaps he’s just pretending to be):
The U.S. government has prosecuted 796 people for terrorism since the 9/11 attacks. Most of them never even got close to committing an act of violence. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
Data last updated on April 20, 2017
SNIPPET:
The U.S. government segregates terrorism cases into two categories — domestic and international. This database contains cases classified as international terrorism, though many of the people charged never left the United States or communicated with anyone outside the country.
Since the 9/11 attacks, most of the 796 terrorism defendants prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice have been charged with material support for terrorism, criminal conspiracy, immigration violations, or making false statements — vague, nonviolent offenses that give prosecutors wide latitude for scoring quick convictions or plea bargains. 523 defendants have pleaded guilty to charges, while the courts found 175 guilty at trial. Just 2 have been acquitted and 3 have seen their charges dropped or dismissed, giving the Justice Department a near-perfect record of conviction in terrorism cases.
Today, 345 people charged with terrorism-related offenses are in custody in the United States, including 58 defendants who are awaiting trial and remain innocent until proven guilty.
Very few terrorism defendants had the means or opportunity to commit an act of violence. The majority had no direct connection to terrorist organizations. Many were caught up in FBI stings, in which an informant or undercover agent posed as a member of a terrorist organization. The U.S. government nevertheless defines such cases as international terrorism.
415 terrorism defendants have been released from custody, often with no provision for supervision or ongoing surveillance, suggesting that the government does not regard them as imminent threats to the homeland.
A large proportion of the defendants who did have direct connections to terrorist groups were recruited as informants or cooperating witnesses and served little or no time in prison. At present, there have been 32 such cooperators. By contrast, many of the 296 defendants caught up in FBI stings have received decades in prison because they had no information or testimony to trade. They simply didn’t know any terrorists.
Whatever services Dixie offers I'd take my business elsewhere. The customers are the problem, not the idiot businessman. In a just world he would have his free speech but no income.
The very LEAST a person must do is not take their business to that racist scum. If you think this is just about business behavior and free speech, you do not want to deal with the harm that sardonic, cruel, mocking and demeaning racist bullshit does to degrade the fabric of human society.
Racism, like unregulated Capitalism, IS CRIMINAL! And it is NOT a victimless crime!
Holy Bleeding S h I t! That is magnificent, AG. Deeply moving.
Most here won't watch it. I consider myself fortunate that I did.
This spoken word poetry slam stuff can sometimes catch you with a swift uppercut for a knockout, like this. I refer you to the work of Agnes Torok.
https://youtu.be/kiaxHUFAWew
Agnes gets it. Such an eloquent and brave exposure of the reality of the cruelty of capitalism needs to be shouted from the rooftops!
Thank you. I just chanced on it. I can never stop admiring Blacks for all the S H I T they go through. Sure, I've been dealing with that prejudice crap all my life. BUT, at least in public I have been able to "pass". I have never had to deal with the fecal effluent of sardonic and cruel hate mocking most Blacks have to deal with. I don't think I could have handled it without going postal. But, who knows? God often provides strength when we feel we have none.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 28, 2017, 10:59:35 pm
TRUMP, WHAT are you and Sessions DOING to DECENT, HARD WORKING, TAX PAYING PEOPLE!?? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
100 years ago the US President, who had campaigned on keeping the US OUT of the war, was actively planning to get the US INTO WWI. But they needed cannon fodder for that "war to end all wars".
By an amazing coincidence, the Jones–Shafroth Act made the people of Puerto Rico into "US Citizens" (who could NOT elect their own governor or vote in presidential elections - but COULD "serve in the military" LOL!). And almost immediately after that, the US entered WWI.
"On March 2, 1917, the Jones–Shafroth Act was signed, collectively making Puerto Ricans United States citizens without rescinding their Puerto Rican citizenship."
"On April 6, 1917, the U.S. joined its allies--Britain, France, and Russia--to fight in World War I. Under the command of Major General John J. Pershing, more than 2 million U.S. soldiers fought on battlefields in France. Many Americans were not in favor of the U.S. entering the war and wanted to remain neutral."
The IRONY of all this is that recently Trump's ICE tried to DEPORT a Puerto Rican to Mexico! It's BIGOTRY and RACISM, pure and simple, that most Americans do not want to admit is behind all this "property rights" and "border control" BULLSHIT, never mind the hypocrisy of sucking up cannon fodder hither and yon, only to double cross them later.
Jeff Sessions is no Confederate General, even though he might be named for one.
Conflating the likes of him with real dead war heroes is the kind of senseless re-organization of facts, feelings and bullshit that has resulted in the false narrative that passes for Civil War history.
No one who didn't live in the South during Reconstruction can really understand why all those monuments were built. The people who built them are all dead, and the people who have a problem with them are completely clueless as to why they exist. Certainly, some unemployed Hollywood writer with a Twitter account like Tom Ceraulo, has no standing when it comes to weighing in on the subject.
Like you do? You lived through reconstruction?
Part of the perpetuation of the mystique with all things Confederate is the endless romanticization of the "Lost Cause" by generations of writers who have lobbied in the courts of public opinion for what they could not win on the battlefield. Not having it.
Let us be **** clear. Allow me to acquaint you with VP of the Confederacy Alexander Stephens and his Cornerstone Speech, which became so known for Stephens's declaration that the perpetuation of slavery was the principal goal and purpose of the secession and the Confederacy:
"Our new government is founded upon exactly [this] idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
Here’s what William Thompson said about the Confederate flag, and we should listen, since he was the one who created not only its design but its symbolism and purpose. Here he is quoted in the book Our Flag, by George Preble:
As a people we are fighting to maintain the heavenly ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race; a white flag would thus be emblematical of our cause. Confederate monuments should be relocated to museums or memorial parks. They, like the battle flag, offend the living f u c k out of me.
This turned up in my Twitter feed, then I went to the photojournalist's blog.
ANTI FASCIST PROTEST OF WHITE SUPREMACIST RALLY IN PIKEVILLE, KENTUCKY (https://danielshular.com/2017/04/30/anti-fascist-protest-of-white-supremacist-rally-in-pikeville-kentucky/)
There is a writer named Elizabeth Mika who has come closest I have found to nailing this phenomenon:
It is no accident that the most enthusiastic Trumpists can be found among the manospherians, alt-righters and neo-Nazis: white men (usually) with a deficient conscience and a permanent sense of hurt and their own, so far unrecognized (but that’s gonna change soon!), specialness. They feel victimized by their own fears, at least some of which come from having to share the planet and human rights with the groups that were previously denied them, something they consider both a personal insult and grave threat to their existence. These are the men who live with the specter of white genocide taking place under the feminazi totalitarianism, in their minds already in progress in America. They come from among the spite voters, a large and largely unrecognized voting bloc brilliantly described by Mark Ames — in 2004 — as affected with the Middle American malice:
Spite voting is mostly a white male phenomenon, which is why a majority of white males vote Republican. It comes from a toxic mix of thwarted expectations, cowardice, shame, and a particular strain of anomie that is unique to the white American male experience.
More here: https://medium.com/@Elamika/trumpian-victory-or-the-avengers-fractured-song-6ebe51aa0cc9 (https://medium.com/@Elamika/trumpian-victory-or-the-avengers-fractured-song-6ebe51aa0cc9)
Thank you for this article. The issue of the REALITY of racism that NEVER WENT AWAY in the South is something most white Southerners just cannot accept as anything other than "liberal" or "leftist" propaganda.
Here is a snippet of a scientific study that confirms the worse fears about the continuing systemic nature of the racist culture in the South (of course we have it in the north too, but NOT to the same level of entrenchment).
Other People’s Racism: Race, Rednecks, and Riots in a Southern High School
Jessica Halliday Hardie1 and Karolyn Tyson2
Abstract
This article uses data drawn from nine months of fieldwork and student, teacher, and administrator interviews at a southern high school to analyze school racial conflict and the construction of racism. We find that institutional inequalities that stratify students by race and class are routinely ignored by school actors who, we argue, use the presence of so-called redneck students to plausibly deny racism while furthering the standard definition of racism as blatant prejudice and an individual trait. The historical prominence of rednecks as a southern cultural identity augments these claims, leading to an implicit division of school actors into friendly/nonracist and unfriendly/racist and allowing school actors to set boundaries on the meaning of racism. Yet these rhetorical practices and the institutional structures they mask contributed to racial tensions, culminating in a race riot during our time at the school. Keywords: race, high schools, tracking, qualitative, racism
The week of February 5, 2007, may have been like any other at North Carolina’s Cordington High School had it not been for the race riot. According to student and teacher accounts, it began early in the week when a black student overheard a white “redneck” student say, “Let’s go lynch some ‘n*****s.”’1 Subsequently, rumors spread, first that the redneck students were planning to jump a black student in the hallway and then that a black male was going to bring a gun to school. Sheriff’s deputies were called in, and teachers were put on high alert. As stories of a major fight between rednecks and blacks and plans to “shoot up the school” circulated, tensions mounted. School officials attempted to quell fears by identifying and punishing the students involved in the incident (both redneck and black students) and using the automated telephone messaging system to inform parents that the incident had been resolved and everything was “under control.” Still, three days after the initial incident, on the Friday on which the rumored confrontation between blacks and whites was to occur, more than half the students skipped school or were kept home by their parents. Although there was no evidence that any physical fights or violence actually occurred on or away from school grounds as a result of the incident, it was nonetheless variously referred to by students and faculty during informal conversations and interviews as a “riot,” “race riot,” “redneck riot,” and “brawl.”
This incident, which occurred while we were conducting a study examining how law and authority affect school actors at more than 20 schools, brought into stark relief the unfinished business of racial reconciliation in the South.The southern United States is an important region in which to study race relations among youth and school racial conflict. Racial confrontations occur regularly in schools across the country, but the one that occurred in North Carolina involved symbols of racism and racial violence and intimidation tied to the Old South. Nor was it the only incident of racial unrest we heard about during our research. At another North Carolina high school, we learned from students and administrators about a race riot (this one with actual fighting) triggered by tensions about Confederate clothing worn by rednecks (as they were called by other students and faculty alike) and counter-Confederate clothing (declaring that the South will never rise again) worn by blacks in response.2 School officials also reported a dispute about a Confederate flag at Cordington a few years prior to our study. Similar to the incident in Jena, Louisiana, in 2007, in which a vicious fight broke out between black and white students after nooses were found hanging from a tree in the schoolyard,3 these incidents highlight the endurance of racist symbols and racial hostility between blacks and whites in the South. Yet unlike the Jena case, most racial incidents receive little attention outside of the communities in which they take place, leaving few opportunities for systematic analysis of the underlying factors and meaning making surrounding these conflicts.
Furthermore, most recent studies documenting racial tensions and fights among students were conducted in ethnically and racially diverse schools in the West and Northeast (e.g., Bettie 2003; Lee 1996; Morrill and Musheno 2009; Perry 2002; Staiger 2006). In those accounts, the group conflicts were usually between two or more nonwhite groups, reflecting the changing demographics of those regions. The South presents a different landscape. Despite large-scale demographic shifts introducing Hispanic migrants (Lippard and Gallagher 2011; Wahl and Gunkel 2007), blacks and whites still make up the vast majority of the population in North Carolina, at 22 and 65 percent, respectively (U.S. Census 2011).4 Moreover, cultural symbols and images (e.g., nooses, lynching, Confederate flags) of the old slave-holding and segregated South dot the landscape of North Carolina.Schools are no exception. Indeed, some of these symbols, particularly the Confederate flag, were ever present at Cordington and the cause of much tension. This context is important because it presents a unique opportunity to examine racial dynamics in an environment of blatant, overt racism, which is less common today than in the past. Few contemporary studies have assessed how these dynamics play out in schools in the South. Thus, we heed Morris and Monroe’s (2009) call for more attention to place in social science research, particularly as it relates to the educational experience.
In this article, we examine the social and institutional factors that make race meaningful for youth in schools and how they contribute to racial hostility and conflict. We are particularly interested in how school actors construct and respond to racism. At Cordington, issues of race and racism were apparent throughout the school in observations and formal and informal interviews before and after the riot; thus, the incident is just a touchstone for examining these issues. We find that as in other parts of the country, institutional practices (e.g., tracking) and the social organization of students (i.e., cliques) strengthen racial and class identities within schools. However, the presence of southern rednecks, a group historically defined as synonymous with racism, serves an important ideological function. While redneck students clearly contributed to racial hostilities at Cordington, this population of students was frequently cast as the only culprit of racism at the school. This communicated a shared understanding of racism as an individual trait and overt action. However, as conceptualized by Bonilla-Silva (1997; 2003) and others (Chesler, Lewis, and Crowfoot 2005; Wellman 1994), racism is an ideology that supports a racialized social system that rewards racial groups unequally across a number of domains. Such a system was evident at Cordingtonin tracking and, according to students of color, disciplinary practices, yet school actors ignored the symptoms of racism and the racialized social structure in favor of placing the blame for racism on the rednecks. Thus, not only could others point to rednecks to deny any racism on their own part (e.g., “I’m not like that”), but the group’s behavior also drew attention away from and helped mask racist structures within the school. In total, both the blatant aggression of the rednecks and the more passive, but powerful, institutionalized racial structure contributed to racial inequality at Cordington.
We argue that similar to test scores and other evaluative criteria to which Americans often point to deny structural components of racial inequality, Cordington’s rednecks were a means to “plausibly deny” racism (Liu and Mills 2006; van Dijk 1992). Our findings show that “plausible deniability of racism” is achieved not only through discourse, as in “the rhetorical moves” speakers use to defend their words as not racist, as European and Oceanic scholars have found (Liu and Mills 2006:83; Simmons and Lecouter 2008), but through objects as well, things or people to which one can point to provide a plausible alternative explanation to institutional racism or to deflect charges of individual racism. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
Continue reading a truly objective analysis of Southern systemic racism at link: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Freading.gif&hash=63e3e644b39258d4c4eedbcdaf322315b1856723)
Agelbert NOTE: IOW, it's NOT "just the rednecks". It's the SYSTEMIC INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM! The rednecks are just the EXCUSE the educated BIGOTS use to disingenuously make the following claim over and over:
Quote
"Only ignorant and low IQ rednecks AND blacks engage in racism".
100 years ago the US President, who had campaigned on keeping the US OUT of the war, was actively planning to get the US INTO WWI. But they needed cannon fodder for that "war to end all wars".
By an amazing coincidence, the Jones–Shafroth Act made the people of Puerto Rico into "US Citizens" (who could NOT elect their own governor or vote in presidential elections - but COULD "serve in the military" LOL!). And almost immediately after that, the US entered WWI.
"On March 2, 1917, the Jones–Shafroth Act was signed, collectively making Puerto Ricans United States citizens without rescinding their Puerto Rican citizenship."
"On April 6, 1917, the U.S. joined its allies--Britain, France, and Russia--to fight in World War I. Under the command of Major General John J. Pershing, more than 2 million U.S. soldiers fought on battlefields in France. Many Americans were not in favor of the U.S. entering the war and wanted to remain neutral."
The IRONY of all this is that recently Trump's ICE tried to DEPORT a Puerto Rican to Mexico! It's BIGOTRY and RACISM, pure and simple, that most Americans do not want to admit is behind all this "property rights" and "border control" BULLSHIT, never mind the hypocrisy of sucking up cannon fodder hither and yon, only to double cross them later.
Jeff Sessions is no Confederate General, even though he might be named for one.
Conflating the likes of him with real dead war heroes is the kind of senseless re-organization of facts, feelings and bullshit that has resulted in the false narrative that passes for Civil War history.
No one who didn't live in the South during Reconstruction can really understand why all those monuments were built. The people who built them are all dead, and the people who have a problem with them are completely clueless as to why they exist. Certainly, some unemployed Hollywood writer with a Twitter account like Tom Ceraulo, has no standing when it comes to weighing in on the subject.
Like you do? You lived through reconstruction?
Part of the perpetuation of the mystique with all things Confederate is the endless romanticization of the "Lost Cause" by generations of writers who have lobbied in the courts of public opinion for what they could not win on the battlefield. Not having it.
Let us be **** clear. Allow me to acquaint you with VP of the Confederacy Alexander Stephens and his Cornerstone Speech, which became so known for Stephens's declaration that the perpetuation of slavery was the principal goal and purpose of the secession and the Confederacy:
"Our new government is founded upon exactly [this] idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
Here’s what William Thompson said about the Confederate flag, and we should listen, since he was the one who created not only its design but its symbolism and purpose. Here he is quoted in the book Our Flag, by George Preble:
As a people we are fighting to maintain the heavenly ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race; a white flag would thus be emblematical of our cause. Confederate monuments should be relocated to museums or memorial parks. They, like the battle flag, offend the living fu ck out of me.
My great great grandfather fought for the 22nd South Carolina volunteers. In my recent research into his story, I discovered that the 22nd, which was mustered in 1861 in Columbia SC, started out with 1100 men. At Appomattox,where they were present when Lee surrendered, there remained 77. By my math, that's 93% killed in battle.
I don't think that there is anything particularly unusual that the families of those men, who died everywhere from Antietam to Vicksburg and all points in between, thought it was appropriate to build monuments to their ultimate sacrifice. It had little to do, imho, with **** like Alexander Stephens, who was one of about fifty or so wealthy slave owners who agitated aggressively and successfully to push the South into war. Those who died were mostly pioneer farm boys like my ancestor, led mostly by men a few years older who had served the country honorably in the Mexican War.
We live in a different time, and what you two (and many others) find offensive about Confederate monuments, has more to do with your own experience around civil rights, the 1960's, and the modern concepts of what is and isn't politically correct, than it does about why those monuments were built, which was all about expressing grief, loss and paying homage to brave men and boys who died young (my gg grandfather was in his early 30's and left four war orphans and a widow). Do I give a flying **** how you feel about the Civil War? Not much. It has affected my family directly for four generations. Neither of you has a clue. I was not there, but I have some insight, I believe, based on what really went down, as opposed to the rhetoric.
Does any of this matter anymore? Not so much. It's just more ancient history to re-write, to distort, and to use to push whatever your personal and political agendas are with regards to racial equality and ethnic diversity, and fairness. Others use it to rationalize the gutting of states rights that changed this country forever, and made it into what it is now, a top-down federal plutocracy run by the rich for the benefit of the rich.
Don't worry. The PC Police are going to tear down all the statues of Confederate Generals, wherever they exist. Your ignorant asses will be completely vindicated. We can change the world into a brave new place where racial equality reigns supreme, and all God's children can sit down together in harmony, and the Lion will lie down with the Lamb.
And monkeys will fly out of my ass.
Sorry Eddie, but this is NOT about your grandfather; this is about your claim that a Confederate General was somehow NOT a raging bigoted racist like Sessions. Yes, Sessions is an evil SON OF A B I T C H, but so was AT LEAST ONE former Confederate General that I KNOW OF.
In the year 1600, the island of Puerto Rico had cobblestone roads and a city called San Juan. That was before Jamestown, as you know.
Three hundred years later, in the year 1900, a former confederate General, who had become an influential politician in the U.S., said (when congress discussed whether or not to give Puerto Ricans a Democratic Government rather than a non-elected Governor assigned by the POTUS - which is what was dictated from 1898 to 1948) that people from the Philippines, Cuba and Puerto Rico were (paraphrased- I'll get you the exact quote if you like) TOO SAVAGE TO BE CIVILIZED AND DID NOT HAVE THE ABILITY TO GOVERN THEMSELVES.
One of those "savages" was my grandfather. He could read and right, was a Spanish soldier for the very brief "war" and owned and ran a laundry. His father was a shoemaker from Majorca, Spain. He worked hard all his life and never killed anybody.
At the time the literacy rate in Puerto Rico was FAR above that of the average American. We were peaceful and minded our own business. We were invaded for EMPIRE.
Now we could say that that bigoted ass hole who was a former Confederate General was a "product of his times".
But to that I would say that monkeys fly out of my ass too.
I don't honor all the cruelty of the Spanish Empire. I disdain and despise it and take every opportunity to wish they would destroy every statue of Cristofero Columbo and Juan Ponce De Leon that still stands in Puerto Rico.
Just because you have confederate ancestors does not mean the Generals in the Confederacy were not raging racists. They were. We should NOT honor them.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 01, 2017, 01:22:20 pm
Jeff Sessions is no Confederate General, even though he might be named for one.
Conflating the likes of him with real dead war heroes is the kind of senseless re-organization of facts, feelings and bullshit that has resulted in the false narrative that passes for Civil War history.
No one who didn't live in the South during Reconstruction can really understand why all those monuments were built. The people who built them are all dead, and the people who have a problem with them are completely clueless as to why they exist. Certainly, some unemployed Hollywood writer with a Twitter account like Tom Ceraulo, has no standing when it comes to weighing in on the subject.
Like you do? You lived through reconstruction?
Part of the perpetuation of the mystique with all things Confederate is the endless romanticization of the "Lost Cause" by generations of writers who have lobbied in the courts of public opinion for what they could not win on the battlefield. Not having it.
Let us be **** clear. Allow me to acquaint you with VP of the Confederacy Alexander Stephens and his Cornerstone Speech, which became so known for Stephens's declaration that the perpetuation of slavery was the principal goal and purpose of the secession and the Confederacy:
"Our new government is founded upon exactly [this] idea; its foundations are laid, its corner-stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery subordination to the superior race, is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth."
Here’s what William Thompson said about the Confederate flag, and we should listen, since he was the one who created not only its design but its symbolism and purpose. Here he is quoted in the book Our Flag, by George Preble:
As a people we are fighting to maintain the heavenly ordained supremacy of the white man over the inferior or colored race; a white flag would thus be emblematical of our cause. Confederate monuments should be relocated to museums or memorial parks. They, like the battle flag, offend the living **** out of me.
My great great grandfather fought for the 22nd South Carolina volunteers. In my recent research into his story, I discovered that the 22nd, which was mustered in 1861 in Columbia SC, started out with 1100 men. At Appomattox,where they were present when Lee surrendered, there remained 77. By my math, that's 93% killed in battle.
I don't think that there is anything particularly unusual that the families of those men, who died everywhere from Antietam to Vicksburg and all points in between, thought it was appropriate to build monuments to their ultimate sacrifice. It had little to do, imho, with **** like Alexander Stephens, who was one of about fifty or so wealthy slave owners who agitated aggressively and successfully to push the South into war. Those who died were mostly pioneer farm boys like my ancestor, led mostly by men a few years older who had served the country honorably in the Mexican War.
We live in a different time, and what you two (and many others) find offensive about Confederate monuments, has more to do with your own experience around civil rights, the 1960's, and the modern concepts of what is and isn't politically correct, than it does about why those monuments were built, which was all about expressing grief, loss and paying homage to brave men and boys who died young (my gg grandfather was in his early 30's and left four war orphans and a widow). Do I give a flying **** how you feel about the Civil War? Not much. It has affected my family directly for four generations. Neither of you has a clue. I was not there, but I have some insight, I believe, based on what really went down, as opposed to the rhetoric.
Does any of this matter anymore? Not so much. It's just more ancient history to re-write, to distort, and to use to push whatever your personal and political agendas are with regards to racial equality and ethnic diversity, and fairness. Others use it to rationalize the gutting of states rights that changed this country forever, and made it into what it is now, a top-down federal plutocracy run by the rich for the benefit of the rich.
Don't worry. The PC Police are going to tear down all the statues of Confederate Generals, wherever they exist. Your ignorant asses will be completely vindicated. We can change the world into a brave new place where racial equality reigns supreme, and all God's children can sit down together in harmony, and the Lion will lie down with the Lamb.
And monkeys will fly out of my ass.
Thanks for another rousing chorus of "heritage, not hate." That puts you squarely in Corey Stewart territory. And the end of the day, it's what they ALL say. http://www.mediaite.com/online/nothing-is-worse-virginia-gop-gubernatorial-candidate-defends-white-supremacist-monuments/ (http://www.mediaite.com/online/nothing-is-worse-virginia-gop-gubernatorial-candidate-defends-white-supremacist-monuments/)
The latest version of cracker ass hole we have to deal with in Virginia.
And cue the **** monkeys to start flying out of your ass. After they leave, perhaps you can pound your lion/lamb straw man into the available space.
No one but you fully appreciates the Civil War?
And, I remind you again, the monument that was removed was a memorial to a white insurrection that happened 11 years after the conclusion of the Civil War. A monument to treason. Of course, treason is back in good fashion in the FSoA.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 01, 2017, 02:36:18 pm
Agelbert said:
Quote
Sorry Eddie, but this is NOT about your grandfather; this is about your claim that a Confederate General was somehow NOT a raging bigoted racist like Sessions. Yes, Sessions is an evil SON OF A B I T C H, but so was AT LEAST ONE former Confederate General that I KNOW OF.
In the year 1600, the island of Puerto Rico had cobblestone roads and a city called San Juan. That was before Jamestown, as you know.
Three hundred years later, in the year 1900, a former confederate General, who had become an influential politician in the U.S., said (when congress discussed whether or not to give Puerto Ricans a Democratic Government rather than a non-elected Governor assigned by the POTUS - which is what was dictated from 1898 to 1948) that people from the Philippines, Cuba and Puerto Rico were (paraphrased- I'll get you the exact quote if you like) TOO SAVAGE TO BE CIVILIZED AND DID NOT HAVE THE ABILITY TO GOVERN THEMSELVES.
One of those "savages" was my grandfather. He could read and right, was a Spanish soldier for the very brief "war" and owned and ran a laundry. His father was a shoemaker from Majorca, Spain. He worked hard all his life and never killed anybody.
At the time the literacy rate in Puerto Rico was FAR above that of the average American. We were peaceful and minded our own business. We were invaded for EMPIRE.
Now we could say that that bigoted ass hole who was a former Confederate General was a "product of his times".
But to that I would say that monkeys fly out of my ass too.
I don't honor all the cruelty of the Spanish Empire. I disdain and despise it and take every opportunity to wish they would destroy every statue of Cristofero Columbo and Juan Ponce De Leon that still stands in Puerto Rico.
Just because you have confederate ancestors does not mean the Generals in the Confederacy were not raging racists. They were. We should NOT honor them.
I made no claim about whether any particular Confederate general was a racist or not a racist.
There were certainly racist Southern generals. In fact there were a good many racist Union generals too. Ever hear of Custer? He fought for the Union. Would you like to hear about his adventures in racial diversity?
However, the vast majority of Southern officers were recruited from the ranks of Mexican War veterans who had served in the US Army 1846-48. Like my ancestor's commanding officer (and brother-in-law) who was Major Milam Hilton. Mile made it back from the war and lived until 1906, and I believe, led what was left of the family here. He is buried in East Texas.
I made no claim about whether any particular Confederate general was a racist or not a racist.
There were certainly racist Southern generals.
My friend, I read the following and apparently misinterpreted it as your belief that Confederate Generals (along with monuments in the South honoring their persons and war deeds) were honorable people, unlike Sessions, who you admit IS a racist.
Jeff Sessions is no Confederate General, even though he might be named for one.
Conflating the likes of him with real dead war heroes ... ... has resulted in the false narrative that passes for Civil War history.
I am not mocking Confederate Generals as some sort of Jubilation T. Cornpone character that Northerners, every bit as racist in word, if not in deed, as Confederate Generals, go out of their way to lampoon just to push Southerner buttons.
Of course Confederate Generals fought like loyal soldiers to their cause. Their valor in battle is, according to your opinion, the only reason those monuments for them are out there. And, you will be damned if you will ever willingly consent to them being taken down unless every Union monument is destroyed too.
I get it. But those monuments, as is discussed in the scientific study I pointed out to Surly, are a source of symbolic fodder for the continued nonsensical view that any one human race is somehow superior or inferior to another. Any scientist will tell us that is total ass backwards bullshit. Any scientist will tell us that what is disdained as a "mongrel" type human (i.e. Heinz 57 great joke by Northerners AND Southerners about "mixed race" people) is actually genetically more likely to perpetuate his genes than a "pure bred" human whose family has inbred with those of like appearance for centuries, even if they aren't directly related.
The entire concept of racism is total BULLSHIT. But, to this day, this unscientific baloney pollutes our schools and our culture throughout the world, not just in the USA.
Also, the very concept of Political Correctness is abhorrent to me because it was invented precisely to mask the bigotry of those who go through the non-racist motions but remain as bigoted and racist as ever.
So, yeah, all war monuments should be destroyed. But the Confederate ones have a race thing associated with them that is USED to push racist bullshit, whereas the Northern monuments don't. Around here in Vermont, a war monument is a place for pigeons to decorate with dainty droppings ;D, except maybe in Veterans Day. ::)
Sure, this country WORSHIPS WAR. That is stupid and wrong. But there is a white supremacist EVIL distinction with a difference that accompanies Southern Civil War monuments. Tearing them down would not desecrate the graves of your Confederate ancestors; it would further the cause of scientific CommonFuckingSense race relations here and abroad.
https://youtu.be/3GDmhVD5GMs
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 01, 2017, 02:53:43 pm
I am not mocking Confederate Generals as some sort of Jubilation T. Cornpone character that Northerners, every bit as racist in word, if not in deed, as Confederate Generals, go out of their way to lampoon just to push Southerner buttons.
Of course Confederate Generals fought like loyal soldiers to their cause. Their valor in battle is, according to your opinion, the only reason those monuments for them are out there. And, you will be damned if you will ever willingly consent to them being taken down unless every Union monument is destroyed too.
I get it. But those monuments, as is discussed in the scientific study I pointed out to Surly, are a source of symbolic fodder for the continued nonsensical view that any one human race is somehow superior or inferior to another. Any scientist will tell us that is total ass backwards bullshit. Any scientist will tell us that what is disdained as a "mongrel" type human (i.e. Heinz 57 great joke by Northerners AND Southerners about "mixed race" people) is actually genetically more likely to perpetuate his genes than a "pure bred" human whose family has inbred with those of like appearance for centuries, even if they aren't directly related.
The entire concept of racism is total BULLSHIT. But, to this day, this unscientific baloney pollutes our schools and our culture throughout the world, not just in the USA.
Also, the very concept of Political Correctness is abhorrent to me because it was invented precisely to mask the bigotry of those who go through the non-racist motions but remain as bigoted and racist as ever.
So, yeah, all war monuments should be destroyed. But the Confederate ones have a race thing associated with them that is USED to push racist bullshit, whereas the Northern monuments don't. Around here in Vermont, a war monument is a place for pigeons to decorate with dainty droppings ;D, except maybe in Veterans Day. ::)
Sure, this country WORSHIPS WAR. That is stupid and wrong. But there is a white supremacist EVIL distinction with a difference that accompanies Southern Civil War monuments. Tearing them down would not desecrate the graves of your Confederate ancestors; it would further the cause of scientific CommonFuckingSense race relations here and abroad.
Thank you for your very civil and polite response. I respect your opinion, AG, although I cannot completely agree. Enough said on the subject, as far as I'm concerned.
You are welcome. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Agreed, this dog subject has been sufficiently severely beat about the head and shoulders for a while. 8)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 04, 2017, 01:06:14 pm
Agelbert NOTE: Attorney GENERAL SESSIONS (Forget? Haill!) just ain't got no sense of humor AT ALL. Ah just cain't figure it out. Ah mean, if he's such a non-RACIST 'noble feller' and all, what's he makin' such a fuss about? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6656.gif&hash=2038f9b45636a93e5c0f4ee508ce29778fe9e9b4) ;) It seems to me that fine lady hit a raw racist nerve or two... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
woman (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) arrested for laughing during Jeff Sessions' confirmation hearing heads to trial
Desiree Fairooz, a woman who laughed when Republican Senator Richard Shelby (AL) (https://beprepared.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/f/m/fm_c140_mre_cracker_1500x1500__1_1.jpg) introduced now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions by saying his record of “treating all Americans equally under the law is clear and well-documented,(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8)” is now on trial for laughing at such a blatant lie. Huffington Post reports:
Fairooz was seated in the back of the room, and her laugh did not interrupt Shelby’s introductory speech. But, according to the government, the laugh amounted to willful “disorderly and disruptive conduct” intended to “impede, disrupt, and disturb the orderly conduct” of congressional proceedings. The government also charged her with a separate misdemeanor for allegedly parading, demonstrating or picketing within a Capitol, evidently for her actions after she was being escorted from the room.
The hypocrisy of the U.S. Capitol Police officer who arrested Fairooz and the prosecutors trying her case is easy to find. Fairooz’s lawyer has footage of other times folks laughed during Sessions’ hearingand didn’t get arrested.
Samuel Bogash, a lawyer representing Fairooz, showed a video of the audience laughing at another part of the hearing, when Sessions joked about disagreements with his wife. But [assistant U.S. attorney Jason] Covert argued that it was appropriate for the audience to laugh when Sessions made a joke about his marriage but not when Shelby claimed Sessions had a long record of “treating all Americans equally.”
If it’s truly about Fairooz’s laughing, then this is completely ridiculous. Where are conservative “free speech” advocates now? Conservatives like to mock liberals for being “special snowflakes” yet they’re throwing down the hammer on someone who wouldn’t politely laugh at the Racist Keebler Elf’s jokes. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
Agelbert NOTE: Attorney GENERAL SESSIONS (Forget? Haill!) just ain't got no sense of humor AT ALL. Ah just cain't figure it out. Ah mean, if he's such a non-RACIST 'noble feller' and all, what's he makin' such a fuss about? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6656.gif&hash=2038f9b45636a93e5c0f4ee508ce29778fe9e9b4) ;) It seems to me that fine lady hit a raw racist nerve or two... (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85)
woman (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3) arrested for laughing during Jeff Sessions' confirmation hearing heads to trial
Desiree Fairooz, a woman who laughed when Republican Senator Richard Shelby (AL) (https://beprepared.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/f/m/fm_c140_mre_cracker_1500x1500__1_1.jpg) introduced now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions by saying his record of “treating all Americans equally under the law is clear and well-documented,(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8)” is now on trial for laughing at such a blatant lie. Huffington Post reports:
Fairooz was seated in the back of the room, and her laugh did not interrupt Shelby’s introductory speech. But, according to the government, the laugh amounted to willful “disorderly and disruptive conduct” intended to “impede, disrupt, and disturb the orderly conduct” of congressional proceedings. The government also charged her with a separate misdemeanor for allegedly parading, demonstrating or picketing within a Capitol, evidently for her actions after she was being escorted from the room.
The hypocrisy of the U.S. Capitol Police officer who arrested Fairooz and the prosecutors trying her case is easy to find. Fairooz’s lawyer has footage of other times folks laughed during Sessions’ hearingand didn’t get arrested.
Samuel Bogash, a lawyer representing Fairooz, showed a video of the audience laughing at another part of the hearing, when Sessions joked about disagreements with his wife. But [assistant U.S. attorney Jason] Covert argued that it was appropriate for the audience to laugh when Sessions made a joke about his marriage but not when Shelby claimed Sessions had a long record of “treating all Americans equally.”
If it’s truly about Fairooz’s laughing, then this is completely ridiculous. Where are conservative “free speech” advocates now? Conservatives like to mock liberals for being “special snowflakes” yet they’re throwing down the hammer on someone who wouldn’t politely laugh at the Racist Keebler Elf’s jokes. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fwww_MyEmoticons_com__burp.gif&hash=8ff3ef6c016d8baf5f61ed5e8db58f069b64da00)
Almost unbelievable that she was charged....and now, convicted as well. She certainly got a speedy trial. I'm not sure it's Sessions who was responsible for this miscarriage of justice however, or whether credit should go to his fellow Alabama ass hole Senator Richard Shelby, who was speaking when Ms. Farooz busted out laughing. He doesn't have much of a sense of humor either. Both Sessions and Shelby need a pie in the face.
Well, I AM SURE! And you are being willfully BLIND by even questioning whether or not the Attorney General of the U.S. is not BEHIND THIS UP TO HIS thin skinned, bigoted RACIST EYEBALLS.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 07, 2017, 05:40:31 pm
Almost unbelievable that she was charged....and now, convicted as well. She certainly got a speedy trial. I'm not sure it's Sessions who was responsible for this miscarriage of justice however, or whether credit should go to his fellow Alabama ass hole Senator Richard Shelby, who was speaking when Ms. Farooz busted out laughing. He doesn't have much of a sense of humor either. Both Sessions and Shelby need a pie in the face.
Well, I AM SURE! And you are being willfully BLIND by even questioning whether or not the Attorney General of the U.S. is not BEHIND THIS UP TO HIS thin skinned, bigoted RACIST EYEBALLS.
Well, I AM SURE! And you are being willfully BLIND by even questioning whether or not the Attorney General of the U.S. is not BEHIND THIS UP TO HIS thin skinned, bigoted RACIST EYEBALLS.
People who are always very SURE about everything are frequently completely wrong. I'm the last person to stick up for Sessions, but I'd bet five bucks Shelby pushed for the arrest. At the time she was arrested, Sessions wasn't even sworn in as AG.
Agelbert NOTE: I see. Sessions was just sitting around fat, dumb and happy, blissfully unaware of who was laughing at his own swearing in ceremony. And after he was sworn in, they had to twist the General's arm to authorize criminal chargers against those "disrespectful mockers". ;D Speaking of people who are SURE of things (I.E. your CERTAINTY about the "true cause" of the Civil War and the "irrelevance" of slavery to it):
Contemporary Confederate sympathizers who are SURE that the civil War was "not about slavery" are obscuring Civil War history in hollow romance. They are entitled to their opinion of the cause of the Civil War, regardless of how erroneous it is, but documented history by BOTH Southern and Northern historian scholars correctly brands hollow romance as magical thinking. April 08, 2015 AMERICAN TALL TALES (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6869.gif&hash=f94938471d343a09155d1f60eefacdb2ceab2457)
For the last time, the American Civil War was not about states’ rights
SNIPPET:
Northern racists, Southern racists
In a last-ditch effort to deny the integrality of slavery to Southern secession, a contemporary Confederate sympathizer will inevitably raise the issue of the Corwin amendment. Proposed in the US Senate by William H. Seward of New York and in the House by Thomas Corwin of Ohio in 1861, it was intended to lure seceded states back into the Union (and convince border states to remain) by promising to protect slaveholders from federal interference. Its reference is meant to convey a fallacious argument: that the impetus for secession could not have been the preservation of slavery because a few Northern politicians were willing to forgo abolition to keep the Union intact.
The Corwin amendment was never actually implemented. Only three states—Ohio, Illinois, and Maryland—ratified it. But its mere proposal indicates that the North, like the South, was no ideological monolith. There were men who fought for the Union that believed in the institution of slavery, who believed blacks to be inherently inferior to whites. Likewise, there were men who fought for the Confederacy that never owned slaves (the vast majority, in fact), who didn’t wish to, and who believed in the inherent equality of all men.
But while the Civil War was fought, on the ground, by these ordinary men of diverse opinions, it was not a conflict of their own engineering. Southern secession was not a guerrilla insurgency nor a populist rebellion as the neo-Confederate romantics prefer to believe.It was a conflict between two well-heeled establishments: one that depended—economically and spiritually—on the continued enslavement of black people, and another that did not. Extant racism among Northerners does not extinguish this fact.
Ultimately, the debate over motives for Southern secession trivializes the true shame of antebellum America: the existence of an institution of slavery all together. Which is why the effort to debunk Civil War myths must avoid becoming an exercise in elevating the morality of white Northerners. That too is beside the point. As history inarguably demonstrates, life for free African Americans in the postbellum North was subject to just as many miseries and injustices as in the South. And although one region outpaced the other in the formal abolition of slavery, neither was immune to the informal perpetuation of inequities established by slave-trade.
Obscuring Civil War history in hollow romance, refusing to recognize the true heritage of the Confederacy—these are just two of its many manifestations.
Code Pink Activists Convicted for Disrupting Jeff Sessions Hearing
Desiree Fairooz & Lenny Bianchi of the activist group Code Pink tell about their protest and the verdict, which they say was unjustified. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
https://youtu.be/LGJl0p_UXMg
Kim Brown: Welcome to The Real News Network in Baltimore, I'm Kim Brown. One of the early hallmarks of this Trump administration has been the crack down on some for targeted actions as well as a harsh reaction from law enforcement on protestors. Do you remember the confirmation hearings for then Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions to become Attorney General? ...
Speaker: The nomination is approved by the committee and will be reported to the floor. Meeting over
Protestor: Shame. Shame. Shame. You have furthered the nomination of a man who will not protect the vulnerable. That is why we have an attorney general. Shame
Kim Brown: As you just saw they were dragged from the gallery in the Senate office there on Capitol Hill. On Wednesday a demonstrator with the activist organization Code Pink was found guilty of disorderly conduct. Other people were also convicted of various charges related to that Sessions disruptions and today we are joined with two of the members of Code Pink who were involved in that action, Desiree Fairooz and Lenny Bianchi. We want to thank you both for joining us here on The Real News.
Lenny Bianchi: Hello.
Desiree Fairooz: Hi.
Kim Brown: So Desiree, obviously we have seen a lot of coverage of not only the demonstration right there in Jeff Sessions' confirmation hearing, but your conviction on Wednesday is receiving a lot of coverage as well. So talk to us about what happened in court on Wednesday.
Desiree Fairooz: On Wednesday surprisingly we were found guilty. I was found guilty for disrupting Congress, and for raiding.
Kim Brown: What were prosecutors saying about your conduct and what type of penalties were they seeking as it related to your conviction?
Lenny Bianchi: The prosecutors haven't indicated to us what they're going to ask for with regard to sentencing. Each of the charges carries a maximum of six months in prison, and each of us are convinced on two charges. I believe there's also a possible fine associated but I'm not sure what the amount of the fine is.
Kim Brown: So what were your thoughts as you heard what the verdicts were connected to the both of your charges that you were facing? What was your immediate reaction, and what were you thinking about how not only your rights have been impacted here, but the rights of other people planning actions to resist this administration, and what their consequences could be?
Desiree Fairooz: Well I was definitely disappointed in the verdict. We were hoping for a sympathetic jury. We were hoping that they too would be concerned as we are about a Jeffrey Sessions Department of Justice, and we were surprised.
Kim Brown: So Desiree, take us back to that day. Take us back to that moment inside the Senate chamber where you stood up and begin to shout. What were you saying specifically and who were you saying it to?
Desiree Fairooz: Well my action happened after my codefendant Lenny and Ty Berry were removed from the room, so it was moments later, minutes later after they were removed that Senator Shelby made a comment in his introduction to Jeff Sessions, that is why he was worthy of the position of Attorney General because he believed he would be unbiased and he would treat all Americans equally. I found that comment laughable. Involuntarily I let out a giggle. A few moments passed and then a young Capitol Police officer approached me as I was seated in my seat at that time, and said something to the effect of "Ma'am, please come with me." I couldn't understand why I was being removed. We had followed the instructions of Capitol Police up and to that point as the members of Code Pink were all dressed in pink garb to look like Lady Liberty, and we sat down when we instructed to sit down, and put our signs down when we were instructed to put our signs down, and were cooperating and behaving as decorum required after the gavel was struck. So I was surprised that I was being removed for giggling.
Kim Brown: So Lenny if I have this correct, you were on Capitol Hill dressed in a Ku Klux Clan outfit, full with the pointed hat and the white robes, et cetera. Obviously this was a coordinated planned action on behalf of you and the other protestors, and on behalf of Code Pink, so what were you hoping to accomplish?
Lenny Bianchi: Well with regard to the action that I was involved in, it was myself and one other person. Our purpose was to have a little political theater, to have a parody, in which there would be members of the Ku Klux Clan that would welcome Mr. Sessions into the hearing room as he entered the room. It wasn't really coordinated with any other actions of Code Pink, it was just an action that stood by itself. What we did was, as soon as Mr. Sessions entered the room, this was before the hearing had begun, the gavel hadn't struck, there were according to the prosecutor about 500 people in this very large hearing room, so it was very noisy. Lots of people talking, and shouting and laughing and so forth. As soon as he entered the room we stood up on our chairs with our outfits on, and began waving to him and calling out to him as if we were welcoming him as Ku Klux Clan. It lasted for about 13 seconds before the police hauled us out of the room.
Protestor: Thank you so much for being here for the people. What do we have to do? Wait a minute. You cant arrest me. I'm white. White people don't get arrested. Wait a minute. What do we have to? Wait for the inauguration?
Lenny Bianchi: But we certainly didn't expect to be arrested because we hadn't disrupted anything, the hearing hadn't begun yet. The room was already very noisy.
Kim Brown: Had either of you been involved with protest actions prior to Donald Trump becoming President, and if so have you noticed a difference in how law enforcement treated you then verses how you were handled in January?
Desiree Fairooz: Well I would like to say that we have participated in several hearings, and the reaction to the Capitol Police is never one that you can count on for sure, but normally they wouldn't eject us for laughing. We participated in hearings where we held signs or banners, and then were removed if they didn't want us to stay, and not arrest us, or we've been ignored totally and were allowed to stay at the back of the room where we were for the entire hearing. It's not predictable. We did not expect that we would be arrested for what occurred that day.
Kim Brown: Do either of you feel as if your actions were commiserate with the charges that you faced and potential consequences from those charges that you both were convicted on in DC court this past Wednesday? Were you prepared to deal with the possibility of arrest and facing charges, or do you feel as if your First Amendment rights, your freedom of speech, your freedom to assemble have been violated in any way?
Lenny Bianchi: As Desiree mentioned, we have participated in other political actions, and at times we realize that there may be risk of arrest, and so we have to make a decision whether or not we want to risk arrest or not. In this case, we did not anticipate arrest. And so like in my case I was simply exercising First Amendment right as a private citizen does not leave their First Amendment rights on the hallway when they enter into a hearing. It doesn't mean that they're allowed to interrupt, that's not what we did. In Desiree's case, all she did was sound for about two seconds, laughter. That's all she did. It's just absurd that she would have been hauled out of the room and arrested, and be facing two charges totalling twelve months in prison. That's extremely harsh and just absurd. The cost of this to the government, to the people whose taxes pay for all of these things is just unbelievable. All the court appearances that we have to make, the jurors that came in, I'm sure it adds up to quite a hefty sum of money for something so small, so trivial. We didn't harm anyone, we didn't use any threatening or obscene speech or any hate speech, nothing like that at all. We simply used our First Amendment rights to express ourselves which in regard to Desiree's laughing, later on in the hearing there was other laughter as senators and others joked about Mr. Sessions and his relationship with his wife, and the audience would laugh. Someone even when he was questioned as part of a joke. Someone called out from the audience "Don't forget you're under oath." So apparently at that time it was okay to speak out even during the hearing, it was okay to laugh even during the hearing. But I guess it depends on who's laughing or what they're laughing at as to whether it's an arrestable offense.
Kim Brown: Last question for the both of you. Do you have any intentions to participate in any protests or resistance actions against the Trump administration going forward, even despite what you have gone through in regards to the consequences of this incident from January?
Desiree Fairooz: I certainly plan to. There are so many issues about this administration that we take issue with. We participated at the airport against the ban and in support of refugees and immigrants. We would appear at Department of Justice when issues around Black Lives Matter and police brutality. We marched on issues of health, climate, so yeah we're not going to stop.
Lenny Bianchi: To give you an idea, within an hour after we left the courtroom having been convicted, we were in front of the White House participating in a Palestinian riots demonstration in front of the White House with many other people. Whether they end up putting us in prison or not, we're not going to be silent. We're going to continue speaking up for those who suffer injustice because of policies of this government.
Desiree Fairooz: And we must continue speaking up because if we don't use it, we will lose our right to do so. This administration seems bent on squashing the set, and I think the more people see that there are citizens willing to step out of their box, step out of their daily lives to speak out and stand up for our rights, I think more will be inspired to do likewise.
Kim Brown: Indeed. Well we have been speaking with Desiree Fairooz and Lenny Bianchi, members of the activist organization Code Pink who were arrested during Jeff Sessions' confirmation hearings to become Attorney General back in January. On Wednesday they were convicted on a variety of charges including disorderly conduct. We want to thank you both for taking the time to speak with us and we wish you both the best of luck going forward.
Desiree Fairooz: Thank you for having us.
Lenny Bianchi: Thank you very much.
Desiree Fairooz: Bye.
Kim Brown: Thank you and thank you very much for watching and supporting The Real News Network.
END -----------------------------------------------
White Supremacist Richard Spencer leads a KKK-style mob of torch-wielding protesters chanting 'you will not replace us' in fight to keep a statue of Robert E. Lee in Virginia park (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4503906/Richard-Spencer-leads-mob-Robert-Lee-statue.html#ixzz4h3dSV5mJ)
Alt-right leader Richard Spencer, 39, led the protests held in Virginia The marchers were protesting against the removal of a Robert Lee monument Demonstration only lasted ten minutes before police were called Mayor has denounced the gathering, saying it echoes practices of the KKK
RE said: I don't think you can really claim Spencer's movement is a backlash to the modern civil rights movement and social experiments with welfare. White Supremacists movements have been around a lot longer than that, see the Nazis, the Eugenics Movement and the Ku Klux Klan.
Eddie said: Sure it is.
No one alive now is directly connected to the real Nazis or the eugenics movement, and KKKer's have been considered a bunch of knuckle-dragging idiots by educated Southerners for most of my adult life. They have had very little support outside certain very racist enclaves. Even with my southern heritage, I never met or knew of anyone personally who was in the Klan.
If you study the real history of the Klan, you will find that it died out as a political force in the early 1870's, was almost extinct, only to be brought back around 1910, by a group of racist joiners out of Atlanta. It had a second, very nasty wave, but then faded again with the Depression. Throughout most of my adult life, most Klan rallies in the South were met with large protests, including plenty of white people who opposed their agenda.
Spencer's followers are very different from the Klan. They have a base of intellectual thinkers who can muster rational explanations for their gripes, and lumping Spencer and the alt-right with the Klan is fallacious. Spencer is smart and appealing to a lot of working class whites who deeply resent Affirmative Action. And they see that it's perfectly okay to be a proud black man, but that claiming to be a proud white man is to be labeled a racist.
That's crap, my brother. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b)
RE said: Sure, each of these movements "died out" to one extent or another under their original names, but the overall tradition of White Supremacist thinking and philosophy never did. It keeps popping back up in a new incarnation under a new Brand Name, like a corporation that goes outta biz but then all the managers form up a new company and sell the same product over again.
Far as Spencer's movement having an intellectual underpinning and "respectable" thinkers it could muster up to justify their positions, so did the Eugenics movement.
Quote
The American eugenics movement was rooted in the biological determinist ideas of Sir Francis Galton, which originated in the 1880s. Galton studied the upper classes of Britain, and arrived at the conclusion that their social positions were due to a superior genetic makeup.[11] Early proponents of eugenics believed that, through selective breeding, the human species should direct its own evolution. They tended to believe in the genetic superiority of Nordic, Germanic and Anglo-Saxon peoples; supported strict immigration and anti-miscegenation laws; and supported the forcible sterilization of the poor, disabled and "immoral".[12] Eugenics was also supported by African Americans intellectuals such as W. E. B. Du Bois, Thomas Wyatt Turner, and many academics at Tuskegee University, Howard University, and Hampton University; however, they believed the best blacks were as good as the best whites and "The Talented Tenth" of all races should mix.[13] W. E. B. Du Bois believed "only fit blacks should procreate to eradicate the race's heritage of moral iniquity."[13][14] ::)
The American eugenics movement received extensive funding from various corporate foundations including the Carnegie Institution, Rockefeller Foundation, and the Harriman railroad fortune.[7] In 1906 J.H. Kellogg provided funding to help found the Race Betterment Foundation in Battle Creek, Michigan.[11] The Eugenics Record Office (ERO) was founded in Cold Spring Harbor, New York in 1911 by the renowned biologist Charles B. Davenport, using money from both the Harriman railroad fortune and the Carnegie Institution. As late as the 1920s, the ERO was one of the leading organizations in the American eugenics movement.[11][15] In years to come, the ERO collected a mass of family pedigrees and concluded that those who were unfit came from economically and socially poor backgrounds. Eugenicists such as Davenport, the psychologist Henry H. Goddard, Harry H. Laughlin, and the conservationist Madison Grant (all well respected in their time) began to lobby for various solutions to the problem of the "unfit". Davenport favored immigration restriction and sterilization as primary methods; Goddard favored segregation in his The Kallikak Family; Grant favored all of the above and more, even entertaining the idea of extermination.[16] The Eugenics Record Office later became the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory.
There were many others, including as I recall Teddy Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, H.G. Wells and Margaret Sanger among others. The Nazis of course had the same intellectual underpinning, since Hitler glommed the s h i t from the Eugenics crowd. So I don't think my argument is crap here. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039)
Regardless of whether you want to consider this something brand new or part of a long tradition though, the fact remains that a large portion of the world is seeking retribution for the past crimes of White people and their industrial war machine and economic oppression. Consider yourself lucky down in Texas if all the Mexicans demand is removal of statues of Davey Crockett and Jame Bowie at the Alamo.
You'll be a lot safer up here in Alaska. There aren't enough First Nations People left here to take much retribution.
RE
[/quote]
Well said. I hasten to add the Eugenics cheap racist excuse movement grabbed Darwin's Theory of Evolution to justify absolutely every form of prejudice, defamatory mendacity and assorted self serving white supremacy BULLSHIT on behalf of empathy deficit disordered CAPITALIST profit over people and planet (plus black genocide by Germany in Africa around the time of WWI - which DIRECTLY influenced Hitler's racist genocidal policies later on).
But BELOW PLEASE FIND, the way most Southerners of reasonably good will, such as Eddie, view this whole racism thing ALWAYS in the light of the alleged "false" version of the cause of the Civil War:
Quote
Aglebert NOTE: There is a gif of a Confederate flag waving prior to the title below.
The Civil War was NOT over slavery by Amy M. Wrobel
amy_wrobel@att.net
I am a devout Southerner who is proud of my heritage. I am, however, tired of hearing such things as: "Southerners are ignorant," "Southerners are trash," "Southerners are racists," "The Civil war was over slavery," "whites treated the blacks horribly," "Southerners are uneducated." But so far the worst is that the "South was wrong." and "the Union was correct."
As I said before, I am a PROUD Southern woman and anyone who knows me can attest to the fact that I am a loud, proud, outspoken person when it comes to my heritage. They can also, however, attest to the fact that I am not, in any way, shape or form, a prejudiced person.
This is not written to offend anyone who doesn't share my same beliefs, but I can assure you that if you were taught and believe the "Northern ways of life" that this will, for lack of better terms, **** you off. I will warn you now I am a very intellectual individual and if you try to contradict me I can throw a book of solid facts at you. I am going to speak about the black Confederates. Yes, they existed and there were over 65,000 of them, both slave and free. What the war was really about, and both the point of view of Confederate Generals and Union Generals on the act of slavery. I will also touch on how blacks were treated both before and after the war and how the white population is being treated now as a minority.
First things first, the 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln; Lincoln was NOT an abolitionist. William Lloyd Garrison, the most prominent of all abolitionists, concluded that Lincoln "had not a drop of anti-slavery blood in his veins." Lincoln was against social and political equality of the races, he opposed inter-racial marriages, supported the Illinois Constitution's prohibition of immigration of blacks into the state, defended a slave owner who was seeking to retrieve his runaway slaves but never defended slaves or runaways themselves, and he was a lifelong advocate of colonization - of sending every last black person in the U.S. to Africa, Haiti, or central America - anywhere but in the United States. In August of 1852 Lincoln said "If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it… what I do about slavery and the colored race, I do because I believe it helps to save the Union." Lincoln also said on September 18th, 1858, "I will say, then, that I am not, nor have I ever been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races." In 1861 Lincoln was asked "why not let the South go in peace?" He replied by saying "I can't let them go. Who would pay for the government?" I have found no proof that Lincoln was a slave owner, but I can tell you without a doubt in my mind that he was not seeking to abolish slavery.
Two acts of Congress were passed during the Civil War, One in 1864 (13 Stat. 11) and one in 1866 (14 Stat. 321) which allowed slave owners whose slaves enlisted or were drafted into the Union military to file a claim against the Federal Government for loss of the slave's services. The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 freed slaves in the Southern or 'rebellious' states but in border-states that were loyal to the Union, slavery continued to be legal. If a slave ran away to join the military and the owner knew where and when he joined, the owner could file a compensation claim as long as he or she was loyal to the Union. There were also free blacks who owned slaves. And something else you might not know, it was the Africans who sold their own people into slavery. Union Generals Grant and Sherman were slave owners as well. Confederate Generals Jackson and Lee were not.
Confederate President Jefferson Davis not only envisioned black confederate veterans but also envisioned them receiving bounty lands for their service. There would have been no future for slavery once the armed black CSA veterans came home after the war.
John Parker, a former slave, recorded that many colored Confederate soldiers were killed in action. The "Richmond Howitzers" were partially manned by black militiamen who saw action at the 1st Battle of Bull Run. There were also two black regiments, one free and one slave, who participated in the same battle on behalf of the South. One black Confederate was a non-commissioned officer by the name of James Washington. One was in Company D, 35th Texas Cavalry, Confederate States Army and became 3rd Sergeant. There were also higher ranking commissioned black Confederates. James Russell was a free 'man of color' and the cook for Company C, 24th South Carolina Volunteer Infantry. Unfortunately, he was killed in action at Missionary Ridge on November 25th, 1863. Private Louis Napoleon Nelson was also a free man of color and served time in the 7th Tennessee Cavalry under General Nathan Bedford Forrest. He fought at Shiloh, Lookout Mountain, Brice's Crossing, and Vicksburg and survived the war.
General Grant made the comment that, "The sole object of this war is to restore the Union. Should I be convinced it has any other object, or that the government designs using its soldiers to execute the wishes of the abolitionists, I pledge to you my honor as a man and a soldier I would resign my commission and carry my sword to the other side" in a letter to the Chicago Tribune 1862. Union General William T. Sherman said in 1864 "I am honest in my belief that it is not fair to my men to count negros as equals. Let us capture negros, of course, and use them to the best advantage." As I said before, these two men both owned slaves, and did not want to free them. I honestly do not see how so many "politically correct" people can stand there and say the "North was right."
Confederate General Robert E. Lee, however, saw the world of slavery from a different view. He said "There are few, I believe, in this enlightened age, who will not acknowledge that slavery is an institution of a moral and political evil" In 1858. In 1866 he also made a statement that "All the south ever desired was that the union, as established by our forefathers, be preserved; and that the Government, as originally organized, should be administered in purity and truth." It wasn't a far fetched idea yet the people in this country then and still today are yet to grasp hold of something like morals, purity, or truth. But I guess that's where Confederate States President Jefferson Davis comes in with "Truth crushed to the earth is truth still and like a seed will rise again."
I will not deny that most slaves were treated poorly. I feel pity for those who had to endure lashes for not doing their "masters bidding". But as I said before, Africans sold their OWN people into slavery and there is still slavery going on in other parts of the world. And do not think that blacks were the only ones in this country who were slaves. During the 17th century Native Americans (My Ancestors) were enslaved by colonists on a common basis. But just because Southern whites owned slaves it is now taken out on the white population today. My family never once owned a slave and a select few of my ancestors fought beside them in the Civil War. My Aunt Evelynn is a Southern black woman whom I love dearly. As well as friends of both my husband and myself who are colored. I do not agree with slavery on any point. There were free blacks whom owned slaves and a large majority of northerners owned slaves.
Now because of slavery over 150 years ago, whites are being treated like dirt. It is almost like the mentality of a kid I knew in school who told me once that since I'm white that my family owned slaves and I should owe him everything I own. That's not the mentality of a country that should be living together in harmony. You never see the ones who are pissed at the white population for crimes committed 150 plus years ago ever leaving to go live in Africa. If you are going to hold every white person accountable for the acts of whites AND blacks more than a lifetime ago, then go to Africa and hold them accountable as well. Until then, learn the facts before you speak. If you speak intellectually I will gladly listen to and respect you, otherwise I will blow you off as another ignorant individual who couldn't pay attention to true history to save your life.
If you would like the sources from which I found all this information, message me and I will gladly send it to you. I applaud those who actually will look up the correct history on their own.
"Surrender means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written off by the enemy, that our youths will be taught by Northern school teachers; learn from Northern school books THEIR version of the war." Confederate General Patrick R. Cleburne 1864. http://www.confederateamericanpride.com/notslavery.html (http://www.confederateamericanpride.com/notslavery.html)
So, what is wrong with this fine lady's analysis? ???
It is based, NOT on the reality of the two elite groups fighting for economic gain, but on the way the people on the ground in the South, WHO DID NOT START THE WAR, felt then and now.
She is right about how many Southerners felt and feel now. SO WHAT? THAT doesn't have any bearing on the fact that slavery was the economic raison d'être for the wealth of the Southern elite BECAUSE they went FULL COTTON after the God Damned cotton gin was invented.
Hollow romance about what motivated the LEADERS of the Confederacy is NOT HISTORY.
The article below explains why the Confederate flag and all monuments associated with the confederacy should be remembered as racist memorials, PERIOD. Southern nostalgia for the pre-Civil War South is based on hollow romance. And any claim that the South was fighting for "states rights" is a cheap, and historically inaccurate racist dodge.
HERE ARE THE FACTS:
AMERICAN TALL TALES
For the last time, the American Civil War was not about states’ rights
Written by Jake Flanagin
April 08, 2015
This week marks the 150th anniversary of Robert E. Lee’s surrender to the Union—an occasion for celebration, or mourning, depending on which side of the Mason-Dixon line you fall on.
In this way, the historiography of the Civil War is somewhat unique. Rarely in human history has a conflict’s losing side been lent such considerable say in how the textbooks remember it. As such, American social studies curricula have long been hobbled by one of the most pervasive myths in US history: that the Civil War was fought to preserve (or undermine) the spectral concept of “states’ rights.”
It’s a self-delusion some use to justify neo-Confederate pride: stars-and-bars bumper stickers, or remnants of Confederate iconography woven into some of today’s state flags. “It’s about Southern pride,” they insist. “It’s about heritage”—forgetting, intentionally perhaps, that slavery and its decade-spanning echoes are very much a part of the collective American heritage. Confederate denialism, in the form of states’ rights advocacy, permits sentimentalists to keep their questionable imagery without having to address its unsavory associations.
Just how pervasive are these Confederate mythologies? An informal survey conducted in 2011 by James W. Loewen, published by the Southern Poverty Law Center, found that 55% to 75% of American teachers—“regardless of region or race”—cite states’ rights as the chief reason for Southern secession. This attitude is also reflected in a Pew Research Center poll from that same year, which found that nearly half (48%) of all Americans agreed: the Civil War was fought over states’ rights. Only 38% of those surveyed attribute the conflict to slavery.
So-called states’ rights
No one seems to be able to agree on which specific Southern rights were in danger, but that’s really beside the point. The fact is, Southern states seceded in spite of states’ rights, and the Confederacy’s founding documents offer plenty of proof. In its constitution, Confederate leaders explicitly provided for the federal protection of slaveholding:
“In all such territory the institution of negro slavery, as it now exists in the Confederate States, shall be recognized and protected by Congress and by the Territorial government; and the inhabitants of the several Confederate States and Territories shall have the right to take to such Territory any slaves lawfully held by them in any of the States or Territories of the Confederate States.”
It’s a provision that clashes jarringly with neo-Confederate mythos—how could the South secede to preserve states’ rights if its own constitution mandated legal, federally protected slavery across state borders?
South Carolina was the first state to secede from the Union. On Dec. 24, 1860, its government issued a “Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union.” In it, South Carolinian leaders aired objections to laws in Northern states—specifically, those that sprung from the case of Prigg v. Pennsylvania (1842), in which the US Supreme Court ruled that state authorities could not be forced to help return fugitive slaves to the South. Ensuing individual state legislation in New England would double down on that very ruling, expressly forbidding state officials from enforcing the federal Fugitive Slave Acts, or the use of state jails to detain fugitive slaves.
In effect, South Carolina seceded because the federal government would not overturn abolitionist policies in Northern states. South Carolina seceded because the federal government would not violate a state’s right to abstain from slavery and its concomitant policies.
Taxes and tariffs
Another strain of Confederate apologia asserts secession inspired by high taxes, in the form of heavy tariffs. Once again, the neo-Confederates are wrong, and South Carolinian history proves it. The state first raised the threat of secession in 1831 and 1833, events known collectively as the Nullification Crisis. South Carolina declared the federal tariffs of 1828 and 1832 unconstitutional, and therefore null within state borders. No other state government backed the move, president Jackson threatened force, and South Carolina abandoned the idea.
No matter! A Virginian slaveholder wrote a new tariff in 1857, which was passed and generally well-received by Southern members of Congress as it stipulated a record-low rate. Thus, at the time of war, Southerners had no real reason to complain (with regards to tariffs): a plantation owner in Louisiana could export his cotton to Europe at the lowest tariff rate instituted since 1816. Counting states, taking sides
It isn’t entirely inaccurate, however, to say that the war was fought over money. Most human conflicts are, in some way. In this case, the money issue centered around potential losses Southern titans of agribusiness would experience if slavery was abolished at the federal level. Federally mandated emancipation would require a majority of free states in the US Senate—something Southern lawmakers fought tooth-and-nail to impede.
As a result, the number of free and slave-states was kept equal until 1846, when the count reached 15 and 14, respectively. This imbalance exacerbated tensions between North and South significantly, reducing Southern leaders to a culture of extreme paranoia. Secession, in this sense, was very much a preemptive move.
The Southern aristocracy feared the impending election of Abraham Lincoln would ultimately bring about nationwide emancipation. He and his supporters were known, after all, as “black Republicans,” a term purposefully designed to conjure an image of radical abolitionism. Lincoln’s famous “House Divided” speech of 1858 only aggravated tensions, clarifying the divide between an abolitionist North and a slave-dependent South:
“A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently, half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved—I do not expect the house to fall—but I do expect it will cease to be divided. It will become all one thing or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or its advocates will push it forward, till it shall become lawful in all the States, old as well as new—North as well as South.”
Neo-Confederates regard the material of this speech as “proof” of Lincoln’s priority of concerns: preservation of the Union above abolition of slavery. They may be correct. But at the time of its delivery, Southern leaders heard these words and thought one thing: Lincoln aims to abolish slavery at the federal level. Lincoln aims to destroy our way of life.
Declaring a Confederacy
So, as this preemptive secession commenced, Southern state governments issued declarations of secession that placed the preservation of slavery front and center. Mississippi’s is perhaps the most infamous—though also among the most pragmatic. It generally concerns the preservation of the South’s slave-dependent export-economy. “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery—the greatest material interest of the world,” it reads. “Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth.”
The declaration of secession for Texas is perhaps the most dogmatic. On Feb. 2, 1861, state leaders published a defense of slavery that amounted to little more than a bizarre, quasi-eugenic treatise for white supremacy. “Texas abandoned her separate national existence and consented to become one of the Confederated States to promote her welfare, insure domestic tranquility [sic] and secure more substantially the blessings of peace and liberty to her people,” it begins, before taking a wildly offensive turn, even by the standards of the day:
“We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial or tolerable.”
Of all the state governments that published “declarations of the causes of secession” like these (some published shorter “ordinances of secession”), none mentioned the ostensible injustices of America’s tariff system. None complained of high taxes, or even states’ rights in a general sense. All, however, passionately pontificated on the necessity of preserving an institution of slavery; and that no such preservation could be maintained within the Union as it was then organized. Ironically, secession, and the creation of a Confederacy was the only conceivable way of maintaining the status quo.
Northern racists, Southern racists
In a last-ditch effort to deny the integrality of slavery to Southern secession, a contemporary Confederate sympathizer will inevitably raise the issue of the Corwin amendment. Proposed in the US Senate by William H. Seward of New York and in the House by Thomas Corwin of Ohio in 1861, it was intended to lure seceded states back into the Union (and convince border states to remain) by promising to protect slaveholders from federal interference. Its reference is meant to convey a fallacious argument: that the impetus for secession could not have been the preservation of slavery because a few Northern politicians were willing to forgo abolition to keep the Union intact.
The Corwin amendment was never actually implemented. Only three states—Ohio, Illinois, and Maryland—ratified it. But its mere proposal indicates that the North, like the South, was no ideological monolith. There were men who fought for the Union that believed in the institution of slavery, who believed blacks to be inherently inferior to whites. Likewise, there were men who fought for the Confederacy that never owned slaves (the vast majority, in fact), who didn’t wish to, and who believed in the inherent equality of all men.
But while the Civil War was fought, on the ground, by these ordinary men of diverse opinions, it was not a conflict of their own engineering. Southern secession was not a guerrilla insurgency nor a populist rebellion as the neo-Confederate romantics prefer to believe. It was a conflict between two well-heeled establishments: one that depended—economically and spiritually—on the continued enslavement of black people, and another that did not. Extant racism among Northerners does not extinguish this fact.
Ultimately, the debate over motives for Southern secession trivializes the true shame of antebellum America: the existence of an institution of slavery all together. Which is why the effort to debunk Civil War myths must avoid becoming an exercise in elevating the morality of white Northerners. That too is beside the point. As history inarguably demonstrates, life for free African Americans in the postbellum North was subject to just as many miseries and injustices as in the South. And although one region outpaced the other in the formal abolition of slavery, neither was immune to the informal perpetuation of inequities established by slave-trade.
Obscuring Civil War history in hollow romance, refusing to recognize the true heritage of the Confederacy—these are just two of its many manifestations.
We welcome your comments at ideas@qz.com. https://qz.com/378533/for-the-last-time-the-american-civil-war-was-not-about-states-rights/ (https://qz.com/378533/for-the-last-time-the-american-civil-war-was-not-about-states-rights/)
Agelbert NOTE: For anyone that believes states rights had BEANS to do with the Civil War, dinner is served:
Far as Spencer's movement having an intellectual underpinning and "respectable" thinkers it could muster up to justify their positions, so did the Eugenics movement.
And, in the same exact way, there was (and still is) a small kernel of baby in the eugenics bathwater that got thrown out. Instead of eugenics, we have chosen what could be described quite logically as "anti-eugenics". We keep every defective baby alive and give support to every person incapable of carrying his/her own weight, and allow everyone to perpetuate whatever genetic defects they might have, with impunity.
I believe you are capable of seeing the problems with that approach.
The problem with Eugenics is that it disproportionately is applied to poor people. Rather than selectively breeding by actual ability, what it does is selectively breed by economic circumstance.
So for instance, a certifiable IDIOT like Dubya or Trump is not aborted or Euthanized after birth as would make CFS with real Eugenics, but rather lots of poor people are sent to gas chambers.
If you read my 12 Step Plan for a Better Tomorrow (http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/blog/2017/04/18/12-step-plan-for-a-better-tomorrow-on-planet-earth/), you will see it has a Eugenics Component in it. There is a Leadership Test and a Test for Survival at puberty. Acolytes who do not pass this test are not given permission by the tribe to marry or reproduce, although they can live out their lives as contributors to the tribe. I have also come out in favor of Euthanasia for infants born with extreme defects like Spina Bifida or severe retardation. Also in favor of Euthanasia of the Elderly and Infirm (such as myself) to rid the society of that burden too. I am extremely Darwinian in all these areas.
HOWEVER, my Eugenics has nothing whatsoever to do with Race or Economic Circumstances, it is applied across the board to all equally in the society. No 7 Heart Transplants for Rich **** like David Rockefeller. No reproduction from dimwits like the Bushes, who have now given us at least 3 generations of IDIOTS in charge of our Goobermint. With my system, Prescott Bush would never have reproduced at all! His line would have been snuffed out by the Test for Ecological & Economic Wisdom.
I am all for Eugenics done correctly. I am totally against Eugenics as it has been defined and applied by White people with the biggest and best guns.
RE
I think God has done a fairly decent job of taking care of Eugenics, than you very much. It's called "natural selection", I believe.
The issue here is RACISM, is it not? Eugenics, a product of DO NOT PASS GO, DO NOT COLLECT "GOOD" OFFSPRING DARWIN's THEORY, if applied intelligently in today's world, where we KNOW about DNA and cellular machinery that Darwin and his RACIST PALS and their racist scientist community (who had Australian natives shot to collect their skeletons along with those "scientists" from Germany in Africa that collected African skulls for the "study" of primate evolution) who didn't have a CLUE how genetic traits are passed on to offspring, would ADMIT that racism is one of the stupidest and unscientific concepts that has EVER afflicted mankind.
WHY DON'T THEY ADMIT THAT there is ZERO evolutionary difference between ANY human, even the "genius" ones that have helped make weapons that will probably destroy mankind? HELLO? WHAT is "genius", RE? Is that your ability to read 5000 words a minute or to build stuff with tools or to outsmart another human in some sort of competition? HOW do you KNOW that is an "evolutionary advantage" that you could then quantify, classify and gene snip to make what YOU believe is a "super" human?
The FACT IS, you DON'T have those skills. The FACT IS, humans are cursed with the DISLIKE OF THE UNLIKE in appearance for ABSOLUTELY NO SCIENTIFICALLY VALID REASON.
And the scientific community, which SHOULD HAMMER THAT FACT into children in schools from the time they are knee high to a grasshopper until they get ready to retire, REFUSE to TALK ABOUT IT.
The imbecilic cognitive dissonance of people who claim to be scientifically literate, but still hold onto prejudices about people of different "races" (a TOTALLY unscientific artificial cultural construct) is, to quote Trump, SAD!
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 14, 2017, 05:07:07 pm
Kid: Southerners are sayin' that evil and totally unjustified affirmative action of the 1960s on is what made the poor downtrodden Southern Whites angry at those uppity you-know-whats.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 14, 2017, 05:08:28 pm
I think God has done a fairly decent job of taking care of Eugenics, than you very much. It's called "natural selection, I believe.
Given the fact we have bred up so many empathy deficit disorder folks like Dubya & Trump, Natural Selection hasn't been working so good lately.
RE
I beg to differ. You are Exhibit A in that regard because you, and people like you (and most diners) have recognized that we are heading balls out to extinction if we don't get rid of the parasites pronto.
So, YOU KNOW that NATURAL SELECTION might just be SELECTING HOMO SAPS OUT of the biosphere. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F128fs318181.gif&hash=eff6d5f3831782966c2ff2081f07bf7fc5b22a6b)
Not only do we NOT have the CFS to get along with nature, we make up bullshit about different "races" being superior or inferior to the "more evolved" among us (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fgen152.gif&hash=d5b10968fe56c4cb95fae17cee3cb420a5f4e2da) when SCIENCE says we humans are ALL GENETICALLY about as "diverse" as Cheetahs.
Compared to many other species, humans have much lower genetic variation. An oft-quoted statistic for human genetic diversity is that we differ on average by about one in a thousand base pairs, which amounts to 0.1% average pairwise variation. [1]
This is not much. It's lower than it is in chimpanzees [2][3]. It's certainly lower than it is in many plants and most bacterial species, although in the case of the latter, the word "species" is often used much more loosely. Wen-Hsiung Li and Lori Sadler write that the nucleotide diversity of humans is about an order of magnitude less than in the fly Drosophila pseudoobscura (although oddly enough, their amino acid diversity is similar). [4] My own experience indicates that human nucleotide diversity is also lower than in the plant model organism Arabidopsis thaliana.
Hell, at least almost all of us have the same number of chromosomes. In many other species, that's not the case at all. Plants go through genome duplication and fractionation often, to the point where nearly every sequenced plant species has had a detected genome duplication at some point in its evolutionary history. And variation in chromosome number is pretty widespread among even vertebrate animals; to pick an arbitrary example, populations of garden dormice throughout Europe and Northern Africa vary between 46 and 54 chromosomes.
Of course, there are many species that have less genetic diversity than humans. Many of these, however, are either limited in range (like species endemic to a certain area), or have had their population and genetic diversity reduced by humans. For example, cheetahs have critically low genetic diversity, but this is largely a result of human intervention.
It's not entirely clear why humans have such low genetic diversity. Perhaps someone with a better knowledge of human ancestry can explain this, but in general, I think its fair to say that the processes through which some species come to have more diversity than others are often somewhat obscure. Li and Sadler suggest that "The low diversity is probably due to a relatively small long-term effective population size rather than any severe bottleneck during human evolution."
And now for a somewhat off-topic but important aside. ;D ;) Discussions about human genetic diversity are often racially charged, and I'd like to do my part to clear some of that up. Once we've established that humans are relatively homogeneous, the next question is to consider how human diversity is distributed.
Even excluding recent immigration, most diversity is within populations, not between populations. Between population diversity is often clinal, lacking in sharply defined boundaries. These patterns of distribution mean that it is unlikely that such things as "races" exist - or, depending on how you define a race, they may exist, but they almost certainly will not correspond to the races we often imagine. This is still a contentious issue, but there is a growing recognition that "race" is an inaccurate way of conceptualizing human diversity. Humans certainly do not have subspecies.
As David Serre and Svaante Paabo wrote: "When individuals are sampled homogeneously from around the globe, the pattern seen is one of gradients of allele frequencies that extend over the entire world, rather than discrete clusters. Therefore, there is no reason to assume that major genetic discontinuities exist between different continents or 'races.'" [5]
(Thank you to Hillel Gray for alerting me to this question.)
[1] Lynn Jorde. "Genetic Variation and Human Variation." From the American Society of Human Genetics.
[2] Becquet et al. "Genetic Structure of Chimpanzee Populations." PLoS Genetics, 2007.
[3] R. Bowden et al. "Genomic Tools for Evolution and Conservation in the Chimpanzee: Pan troglodytes ellioti Is a Genetically Distinct Population." PLoS Genetics, 2012.
[4] Li and Sadler. "Low Nucleotide Diversity in Man." Genetics, 1991.
[5] Serre and Paabo. "Evidence for Gradients of Human Genetic Diversity Within and Among Continents." Genome Research, 2004.
Agelbert NOTE: Racism is unscientific. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) Nuff said.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 23, 2017, 10:18:14 pm
Crania Americana: the most influential book on scientific racism
SNIPPET:
EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK
Europeans
“The Caucasian Race is characterized by a naturally fair skin, susceptible of every tint; hair fine, long and curling, and of various colors. The skull is large and oval, and its anterior portion full and elevated. The face is small in proportion to the head, of an oval form, with well-proportioned features. . . . This race is distinguished for the facility with which it attains the highest intellectual endowments. . . . The spontaneous fertility of [the Caucasus] has rendered it the hive of many nations, which extending their migrations in every direc-tion, have peopled the finest portions of the earth, and given birth to its fairest inhabitants. . . .”
Today, these sort of claims would be labeled as politically incorrect, to say the least, but his book stirred quite a few leading figures in the scientific community and earned him a solid following. Only 500 copies were ever printed with no more than 60 being sent outside of the United States, but even so a couple of these precious few made their way on the shelves of the most distinguished libraries in the world.
A book that gave people what they wanted to hear, not the truth
Quote
In this day and age, you might find his findings nothing more than crackpot gibberish, but back in the day Crania Americana was endorsed by the likes of Charles Darwin(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) who considered Morton(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) an “authority” on the subject of race. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fugly004.gif&hash=c56db4280057389afd154a1cb4057410151579c8)
EXCERPT FROM THE BOOK
Africans
“Characterized by a black complexion, and black, woolly hair; the eyes are large and prominent, the nose broad and flat, the lips thick, and the mouth wide; the head is long and narrow, the forehead low, the cheekbones prominent, the jaws protruding, and the chin small. In disposition the Negro is joyous, flexible, and indolent; while the many nations which compose this race present a singular diversity of intellectual character, of which the far extreme is the lowest grade of humanity. . . . The moral and intellectual character of the Africans is widely different in different nations. . . . The Negroes are proverbially fond of their amusements, in which they engage with great exuberance of spirit; and a day of toil is with them no bar to a night of revelry. Like most other barbarous nations their institutions are not infrequently characterized by superstition and cruelty. They appear to be fond of warlike enterprises, and are not deficient in personal courage; but, once overcome, they yield to their destiny, and accommodate themselves with amazing facility to every change of circumstance. The Negroes have little invention, but strong powers of imitation, so that they readily acquire mechanic arts. They have a great talent for music, and all their external senses are remarkably acute.”
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 28, 2017, 01:22:05 pm
35-year-old Cory Godbolt is the RIGHT COLOR for General Sessions to USE (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)
BROOKHAVEN (US): Eight people, including a deputy sheriff, were killed in a shooting in Lincoln County in the US state of Mississippi on Sunday.
Police said the suspect, 35-year-old Cory Godbolt, has been arrested and charges are being filed against him.
Mississippi Bureau of Investigation spokesman Warren Strain said the shootings occurred at three separate homes Saturday night in the state's rural Lincoln County.
The sheriff's deputy was responding to a distress call when he was shot and killed by the suspect, media reports said. The identities of the victims have not been released.
While authorities said it was too early to speculate about the shooter's motive, Godbolt himself revealed in a video filmed by a local newspaper that his intention was to evade arrest and commit "suicide by cop".
The suspect had reportedly been talking with his wife and members of her family about the custody of their children when somebody called authorities. The arrival of the police apparently sent Godbolt on the shooting spree, during which he also shot and killed the sheriff's deputy.
Mississippi governor Phil Bryant issued a statement calling the incident a "senseless tragedy" and noted the "sacrifice" made by law enforcement officers to protect and serve their communities.
"Every day, the men and women who wear the badge make some measure of sacrifice to protect and serve their communities. Too often, we lose one of our finest. I thank the law enforcement agencies involved for their hard work," Bryant wrote in a Facebook post.
He also asked people to pray for those who lost their lives in the shooting.
Racists, REJOICE! You have still another example of the those "people" that "don't respect law and order, like to dance, and uh, have low IQs and jes naturally are trouble makers"....
Expect a statement from your HERO shortly about he is going to help our communities be cleansed of these "animals" who threaten our police and or white women too. ;) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)
Down in Mississippi there seems to be, as I am fond o' sayin', a FAILURE TO COMMUNICATE. I will now do my duty to good, law abidin' citizens everywhair and make sure our peace officers COMMUNICATE more effectively with those no-account animals.
Be calm, friends of liberty, those jigs jes' need to be put back in their place, and I'm jes the man to do that for God and Cuntry. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 30, 2017, 06:13:19 pm
Was a Georgia Congressional Candidate (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) Responsible for Kicking Voters off Rolls? (w/Greg Palast)
https://youtu.be/4Ik4-nMnGsg
Published on May 30, 2017
Thom talks with guest Greg Palast (Investigative Reporter and Contributor - Rolling Stone, Author & Filmmaker - The Best Democracy Money Can Buy) about the current special election race happening in Georgia's 6th District where the republican candidate is the former Secretary of State.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 15, 2017, 01:30:32 pm
The Big, Beautiful Fetish Object Is Back (http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a56282/mexico-wall-funding/)
The big, beautiful Wall with the big, beautiful Door is now one of those fetish objects—like the Keystone XL pipeline and the imaginary Ronald Reagan—to which good Republican politicians must pay fealty. This will be true even if it never gets built, or only partly gets built, or even if it gets built and doesn't work the way it's supposed to work, or even if it turns out that Mexico shockingly won't pay for it. These fetish objects carry substantial political salience even when they don't exist.
My first exposure to a journalist named Chris Hayes came in 2007 when he wrote The Nation on the "NAFTA superhighway", (https://www.thenation.com/article/nafta-superhighway/) a rightwing fever dream that never existed, but that still helped decide local races all over the middle of the country through which the mythical highway was said to run. They surely want the big, beautiful Wall with the big, beautiful Door but, in its absence, they will protect the idea of it. That's often enough.
It's very telling (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_0293.gif&hash=b1af4868ed8f18c30e637f8cbcb79002f6f71039) that this is one of the issues which Dump's supporters care most about. "Day took eeer jobsss." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F165fs373950.gif&hash=ad797fcc08a061d3ae50ee49ccd9f3d517fb7496) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-030815183114.gif&hash=2bf1553e87e8605311feb874231953d5fb88ee9c)
https://youtu.be/WgGlbnfeClc
So true, that depiction of the dumb ass conservative redneck. They are a very real phenomenon. I was pumping gas the other day and there was a Mexican there pumping gas as well along with one of these dumb ass conservative rednecks. The Mexican had on t-shirt which he had cut the sleeves off of and he had also cut slits all over the shirt to allow for better air flow. It looked ridiculous, but it was obviously not something he had done as a fashion statement. I understood, it's fuckin' hot as **** here, and humid, and if you work outside it's more about staying cool then what you look like.
The dumb ass conservative redneck was staring at the Mexican. His facial expression was one of utter contempt and hatred. He was looking at that Mexican like the Mexican was the cause of all that creates unhappiness in his life. It was all over his face. I was embarrassed to be the same color as this fool. I saw the Mexican and just saw another person pumping gas. A person that likely works very hard for **** pay in a climate that's miserable just being outside in while doing no work. Working in it is down right torturous. I know, I work in it.
Anyways, they haven't taken any of our jobs. The **** neo-con's offshored them all, and the ones that couldn't be offshored just about no Merikan citizen will work. I'd say probably 60% of the landscapers around here are Mexican, if not more. The house building crews are probably at least 80% Mexican, and the siding and roofers are probably 95% Mexican. Why?
They didn't take any **** jobs. The dumb ass conservative redneck had his job offshored. The same motherfuckers offshoring those jobs illegally bring Mexicans into this country to pick the damn fruit. I'd say a good percentage of the illegals are here with the help of Merican corporations.
Build a **** wall? Jesus **** Christ these motherfuckers are retarded. Dump took your **** jobs your morons.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 15, 2017, 01:58:32 pm
July 10, 2017
A Brief History of the KKK (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605) with Gerald Horne (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020)
As the KKK rallies in Charlottesville, VA, author and historian Gerald Horne charts its history from Reconstruction to the rise of Donald Trump
Dr. Gerald Horne holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston. His research has addressed issues of racism in a variety of relations involving labor, politics, civil rights, international relations and war. Dr. Horne has also written extensively about the film industry. His latest book is The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America. Dr. Horne received his Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and his J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and his B.A. from Princeton University.
transcript
A Brief History of the KKK with Gerald Horne
Jaisal Noor: Welcome to the Real News, I'm Jaisal Noor in Baltimore.
A few dozen members of the KKK one of America's most infamous and oldest hate groups, held a rally in Charlottesville, Virginia on Saturday, where they protested a city council decision to remove a statue honoring Confederate General Robert E. Lee. The group was guarded by scores of police and outnumbered by hundreds of counter protestors, who waved signs denouncing racism. The anti-KKK protestors raised their voices in chants and shouts, drowning out speeches from the white supremacists. The Klan group that brandished Confederate flags and signs with anti-Semitic messages, was separated by crowds by a ring of fencing and a heavy police presence. After the rally, police dispersed the protestors with tear gas, after they said they refused to let the KKK members leave.
In February, the Charlottesville City Council voted three to two, to remove the statue from the park once named for Lee, and made plans for a new memorial to remember the Southern cities and slave population. That's according to the Daily Progress, the local newspaper there. Now joining us to discuss all of this is Gerald Horne. Dr. Horne holds the John Jay and Rebecca Moore's Chair of History in African American Studies at the University of Houston, he's the author of many books, most recently The Counter Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America.
Thanks so much for joining us again.
Gerald Horne: Thank you for inviting me.
Jaisal Noor: I wanted to get your reaction, your response to this latest rally that happened over the weekend, it made national headlines, the KKK, about a few dozen members, were greatly outnumbered by the anti-KKK protestors, the anti-racist protestors. The KKK was drowned out, they had a heavy police presence and the police ended up using tear gas to disperse the protests against the KKK after the Klan rally had ended. Give us your reaction to this, because Charlottesville has been a flash point in recent months, ever since the city council voted to take down the statue of Robert E. Lee. Richard Spencer held a torch light rally there in the spring, which has been followed by a counter protest in the subsequent days. Give us your thoughts.
Gerald Horne: Well you need to realize that Charlottesville, Virginia, is a particularly sensitive site. On the one hand, it houses a college campus, the University of Virginia, and college campuses tend to have many people who lean to the left. In fact, I had a fellowship at the University of Virginia, some years ago and I remember that statue very well, being offended by it. On the other hand, Charlottesville, Virginia, and more particularly, the University of Virginia, is known as a site founded by a Founding Father, Thomas Jefferson. A Founding Father, who many considered to be a sociopath, not least because of the intimate relationship he had for years, with a slave teenager, speaking of Sally Hemmings, while denying it during his lifetime.
He's considered to be the Sociopath in Chief, and of course there is a saying in United States history, that if Thomas Jefferson is wrong, then the United States is wrong. Thomas Jefferson is certainly wrong, and many in the Ku Klux Klan and the ultra-right, find that a very difficult pill to swallow. Keep in mind, that this is the fourth iteration of the Ku Klux Klan. Recall, that it had its origins in the early post-Civil War era, circa 1865, when the Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest organized a clan to terrorize the newly freed enslaved population, and particularly to deprive them of voting rights.
Then it had another iteration in the World War I era, when it broadened its remit to include anti-Catholicism and antisemitism, and in fact, controlled a number of state houses and marched into thousands, if not into 10s of thousands, through the streets of Washington DC. Then in the 1960s with the rise of the Black Power and Civil Rights Movement, the Ku Klux Klan came creeping back, and of course was known for executing civil rights protestors and demonstrators, and now, with the rise of Donald J. Trump, and the so-called Alt Right or White Nationalist movement, the Ku Klux Klan has been given a new lease on life, and we see it rearing its ugly head once more.
Jaisal Noor: What you're describing in many of your examples here, about the history of the Klan, is these two versions of history that are sort of in the fabric of the history of the United States. You mentioned Sally Hemmings. Just before the Fourth of July holiday, NBC, the Washington Post, a number of other news outlets came under fire for describing Sally Hemmings as Thomas Jefferson's mistress. This is just one example, they got lots of criticism of it, the Washington Post ran an op-ed rebutting the portrayal of Sally Hemmings as Thomas Jefferson's mistress, and at the same time, the KKK now is defending Robert E. Lee as a hero, as a defender of the South.
Can you just comment a little bit about both of these topics as well?
Gerald Horne: First of all, with regard to Sally Hemmings, it is beyond belief that one could imagine that an enslaved teenage girl could give voluntary consent to an adult powerful man, indeed a Founding Father like Thomas Jefferson. It's beyond belief that the Washington Post and other news outlets would describe her as a mistress, that's part of the sanitizing and deodorizing of US history that I would have thought had gone the way of the dodo bird, that in fact it was now extinct.
With regard to Robert E. Lee, he was a traitor to the United States government, that is to say he was trained by the United States government to be a military officer, but in 1861, when the so called Confederate States of America rebelled against the United States government, in order to overthrow the United States government, and perpetuate the enslavement of Africans for evermore, he joined that inglorious cause and in fact, was responsible for the deaths of numerous US nationals, not least black US nationals.
So to imagine that a statue would be built in his honor is blowing my mind. I think it should have come down years ago, and I'm happy to see that protestors are now trying to ensure that it comes down for evermore.
Jaisal Noor: You talked about the different periods of the KKK, of their resurgence. Many of these Confederate statues you see built across the United States, including in Maryland, in Washington DC, in the South as well. They were built in, what may surprise people, they were built in the earlier 20th century, during the rise of Jim Crow. It wasn't right after the Civil War. Can you talk a little bit about the history of these Confederate statues and what they really represent?
Gerald Horne: The construction of these Confederate statues was part and parcel of a revision of history. Instead of seeing the Confederate States of America as a counter-revolutionary force, a treasonous force, it was re-fashioned and revised, to appear to be a kind of cause, that was somehow glorious, and that was somehow defeated, that had something to do with States Rights, not slavery, that had something to do with tariffs not slavery. They are all over the place. At the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where I formally taught and still have a residence, the centerpiece of that campus, is a Confederate soldier with his gun pointing North.
This is not unusual, in my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri, in the neighborhood in which I grew up, there is a Confederate statue that the city authorities are now trying to remove. In Richmond, Virginia, just down the road from where you are in Baltimore, there are enormous Confederate statues reaching to the sky, honoring these traitors, and certainly, those statues too need to be removed.
Jaisal Noor: Can you comment a little bit more about the relationship of the KKK and the state? You mentioned that there's members of KKK that took state houses that had lots of political power, but especially during the Civil Rights Movement, at the time, when they attacked and killed members of the Civil Rights Movement, were they held accountable? And to this day, have they been held to account for their actions?
Gerald Horne: Generally speaking the answer is no. They literally have been able to get away with murder, and that is one of the many reasons why you find these folks coming out to protest the removal of these Confederate statues, because they recognize more than most, that if you can successfully remove these Confederate statues, you might be able to bring successful prosecutions, even against KKK killers, who enjoyed and executed a reign of terror in the 1960s, so this is a very important struggle that's unfolding as we speak, in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Jaisal Noor: And finally, do you think that the vastly outnumbered KKK protestors, they were drowned out by this massive crowd of anti-racist demonstrators. Do you think that, that's a sign of where the popular opinion and feeling is right now, about the KKK? Do you think this era is waning, or do you think we're just seeing the beginning of a new resurgence? We know that for example, the KKK newspaper, their largest paper endorsed Donald Trump, we know White Nationalists have been empowered by Donald Trump, but do you think that they're on the decline or do you think we're just seeing their rise?
Gerald Horne: I would like to think that they are on the decline. I would like to think that their influence is waning, but since they have a comrade in the Oval Office, since you have had racist killings in New York City, in College Park, Maryland, in Portland, Oregon, that bear the earmarks, if not the design of those sympathetic to the KKK, I think it would be naïve to imagine that the KKK is going away anytime soon in these United States of America.
Jaisal Noor: All right Gerald Horne, thank you so much for joining us.
Gerald Horne: Goodbye and thank you for inviting me.
Jaisal Noor: Thank you for joining us at the Real News Network.
Charlottesville Was Not a "Protest Turned Violent," It Was a Planned Race Riot (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605)
Tuesday, August 15, 2017
By Zenobia Jeffries, YES! Magazine | Op-Ed
SNIPPET:
Quote
On Saturday, NBC said, "Charlottesville rally turned deadly." CNN said, "1 dead, 19 injured after crash near Unite the Right rally." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b)
What took placewas not a rally. Who wears paramilitary gear and carries automatic weapons to a rally? Who takes shields and helmets and pepper spray and bats and sticks to a rally? The car didn’t "crash" -- it was driven at full speed into a crowd of counter-protesters.
What happened in Charlottesville was White nationalist extremists inciting a riot.
We cannot unite, come together, overcome, Kumbaya, or whatever else, until we get some truth-telling. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F301.gif&hash=0291ed4abf2d80e420d1aa00d4eb3c5dd6bbfb53) Media professionals need to get it right this time.
Jesse Owens with guess who ;) after Beating the "unbeatable" representatives of the "Master (i.e. white (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)) Aryan Race" at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin ;D
Tell me, dear readers, do you honestly believe the ultimate fate of Jesse Owens would have been the same if he had not been Black? I don't. Jesse Owens was a man of stern discipline and a level of strong willed determination that few humans have.
Yet the the racist society he lived in, which normally goes out of its way to care for great athletes, eroded his self confidence and consistently undermined his economic opportunities. Learn about the sad story of Jesse Owens below.
Four months after winning an unprecedented four gold medals at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Jesse Owens found himself in Havana, Cuba, for a race that promoters were calling the "Race of the Century." This time, though, the heroic 23-year-old American sprinter was lined up against a horse as halftime entertainment at a Cuban soccer match.
Owens was given a 40-yard (37 m) head start in the 100-yard (91 m) sprint, and when the gun went off to start the race, Julio McCaw hesitated before galloping toward the finishing line. Owens exploded from the blocks and ran a 9.9-second race, edging out his hard-charging, four-legged challenger. A talented athlete, down on his luck: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_2932.gif&hash=0eaec4791a5825821998245e7fcd7744b56557fe)
Soon after the 1936 Olympics, Owens lost his amateur status after accepting some lucrative endorsement deals. He would contend with economic uncertainty for the rest of his life.
In the years following the "man vs. horse" stunt, Owens raced trains, cars, motorbikes, baseball players -- even a dog. “Those races made me sick,” Owens later said. “I felt like a freak.”
Jesse Owens visiting the Berlin Stadum in 1965 fifteen years before his death
Owens later ran a dry cleaning business and worked as a gas station attendant just to earn a living. He was a pack-a-day cigarette smoker for 35 years and died in 1980 at age 66, succumbing to an aggressive type of lung cancer. . http://www.wisegeek.com/can-humans-outrun-many-animals.htm
Throughout the turbulent social changes of the civil rights era, Owens was invoked by the white establishment as the one of the movement's trailblazers. Owens espoused the message of his longtime hero, Booker T. Washington, promoting gradualism and individualism as the path toward racial equality.
Regarded by a new generation of civil rights activists as racially naïve, Owens continued to endorse the promise of American egalitarianism, even leading the charge against advocates of black power who protested racism in the United States at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City. During the 1960s Owens remained a conservative Republican, rejecting the Democrats' "Great Society" programs.
While he admired Martin Luther King Jr.'s principles, he opposed King's tactics of confrontation in the civil rights struggle. Owens had no patience with more radical elements of the struggle, condemning Muhammad Ali for refusing induction into the military and only referring to the boxer by his Christian name, Cassius Clay.
He vociferously condemned the Black Power movement as out-of-touch with the "silent black majority" in a 1970 book entitled Blackthink, which was praised by the Nixon Administration and much of the white press.
Now you know why the propagandists pushing the clever cold war pretense of 'liberty, justice and equal economic opportunities for all' had this nice stamp made:
A few supporters in the African American community lauded Owens for his position but the vast majority, even his fellow moderates, condemned his claim that racism no longer kept blacks from achieving success in American society.
Responding to the criticisms that African Americans heaped on Blackthink, in 1972 Owens offered a mild retraction in I Have Changed.
He belatedly gave credit to the civil rights movement for changing the American racial landscape, reluctantly recanted his claim that all forms of activism were inherently flawed, and briefly admitted that racism fundamentally hampered access to equal opportunities.
Long after the marches and protests in Selma, Birmingham, and Montgomery had remade the Alabama of his birth, Owens finally expressed admiration for the courage of those who took on segregation directly.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 27, 2017, 05:57:28 pm
Have you ever spoken with Trump one on one behind closed doors?
Diane Huff, Assistant Vice President, IT, Networking, Data (1993-present)
Answered Apr 15 · Upvoted by Carter Moore, Degree in Political Science, former Congressional aide and Federal employee
I had a completely different experience with him than the men who responded. I worked for a consulting company that upgraded the network infrastructure in Trump Tower. He spoke directly to the men, even though I was the system architect. When speaking to me, he was condescending, and called me a “pretty little thing.” I was a little taken aback but let it slide. When he did it again, I asked him nicely to not to do it again. From that point on, he never spoke to me again and later asked that I be removed from the project. My employer put me on another project in order to keep the business, but later regretted it when he was stiffed on the final payment.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 07, 2017, 05:16:49 pm
Deporting the Dreamers Would Be a Betrayal of Our American Values
Pramila Jayapa (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)l September 6, 2017
Graciela Nuñez Pargas doesn't know Venezuela. She can't tell you the geography of its cities or how many presidents the country has seen, but she got a five in AP U.S. history. When her parents fled the Chávez regime to settle in Miami and, eventually, Seattle, they told 7-year-old Graciela that the family was headed to Disney World for vacation. Only after she got off the plane did Graciela learn she was in the U.S. to stay.
Graciela is a Dreamer -- someone who came to this country as an undocumented child, but has legal status to live and work here under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. She's now a 22-year-old University of Washington graduate, working at a humanitarian law firm. Graciela is as American as they come, doing all she can to contribute back to the only country she knows as home.
Her story is compelling but not unique. Across the country, nearly 800,000 young people have benefited from President Barack Obama's DACA program since 2012. Now, President Donald Trump is terminating that program and throwing Dreamers' lives into limbo.
As an organizer, I spent the last 16 years working to pass comprehensive immigration reform and protect undocumented people. From the outside, I fought for the DREAM Act in the House and, when it failed under Republican leadership, worked with the Obama administration to push for DACA. I founded the largest immigrant advocacy group in Washington state and helped pass a statewide DREAM Act. I believe so strongly in the fight for immigration reform that I've been arrested for peaceful civil disobedience ... twice.
Coming to the U.S. as a young person, settling into adolescence while adjusting to a new country and culture, is a dizzying mix of anxiety and promise. It's a steep drop-off into unknown territory and a chance to grasp the American dream.
I know because I've done it.
I came to the U.S., alone, at the age of 16 to go to college. My parents sent me with the last $5,000 in their bank account because they knew this is where I would have the best education and the brightest future. Since then, I've spent 35 years building a life here, the last 18 of which have been as a citizen. I know this country more intimately than I know India, the place I was born. Like Graciela, I consider this my home.
DACA recipients come here at an average age of 6 1/2. Many don't speak the language of their birth country. The first time they learned to ride a bike, had their first crush, got their first job, faced their first rejection, and celebrated their first big success all happened here. Some only learned they had no legal status when they needed documents to join field trips or apply for college. Imagine feeling as American as anyone but suddenly finding out a simple piece of paper precludes your participation in society.
DACA gave people like Graciela a chance to be fully human again and it allowed America to benefit from their talents. It created space for skilled young people to participate in our economy and recognized that Dreamers are so tightly woven into the fabric of our communities that deporting them would rip our nation apart. Ending DACA would strike a $460.3 billion blow to our GDP over the next decade and the moral cost is immeasurable.
On Tuesday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the immediate end of DACA application acceptance and a six-month window to close the program in totality, stripping Dreamers of their future. Sessions claimed this move will "[strengthen] the constitutional order and rule of law" in our country but that is false. Immigrants make us stronger.
Trump's administration wants us to believe that being American is defined by the walls we build, the place we started, or the whiteness of our skin. Do not believe it.
Being American is about pursuing the promise of a better future, of contribution and generosity, of compassion and commitment.
Dreamers had no choice in Trump's decision but we in Congress have a choice in our next move. We can stamp on long-held American values and dole out poverty, confusion, and death sentences to hundreds of thousands of young people. Or we can strive for the more perfect union in which our founders believed. We can enact comprehensive immigration reform, protect Dreamers, and provide a roadmap to citizenship for all.
On the Statue of Liberty that welcomed newcomers as they arrived at Ellis Island, it says:
"Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free."
We know what it means to be American: to come with nothing and become something; to help your neighbors and build a community; to show up, every day, against hardship and persist until your dreams are achieved.
In their stories, determination, and the lives they build, DACA recipients are as American as it gets.
Dreamers have done their part. My Democratic colleagues and I are ready to do ours. All that remains is for President Trump and congressional Republicans to bring forth a bill, so we can finally create a permanent fix for our broken immigration system.
Agelbert NOTE: I am not going to hold my breath waiting for Trump or any of the other racist reprobates in Congress to do the right thing. But I am convinced that this incredibly cruel, as well as amazingly stupid, action by Trump will accelerate his ejection from the the White house.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 14, 2017, 10:31:52 pm
Trump’s DACA Decision is a Grim Turning Point | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
https://youtu.be/i7NvF42MhCA
GQ
Published on Sep 5, 2017
The opportunists in the GOP who enable these racist moves will face a reckoning.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 08, 2017, 08:54:59 pm
Trump is Not Planning to Rebuild Puerto Rico | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
https://youtu.be/7FEYMlF3LkU
GQ
254,035 views
Published on Oct 3, 2017
The dead, the dying, the displaced—they are now, to quote Trump, “politically motivated ingrates”.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 08, 2017, 09:01:42 pm
The Roots of Trump’s Prejudice | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
https://youtu.be/r9j7T8TTdDw
158,953 views
GQ
Published on Oct 6, 2017
A man without empathy, Trump was—as a boy—surrounded by an intense regional bigotry.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 08, 2017, 09:14:12 pm
Robert Reich: The Resistance Report 10/04/2017
https://youtu.be/2toaal3KqJ8
Inequality Media Civic Action
Published on Oct 4, 2017
Tonight I talk about the anxiety, despair, and stress that so many Americans are feeling. This comes in the wake of what happened in Las Vegas, and Trump and Congressional Republicans' unwillingness to do anything to control gun violence and mass killings.
But it has also been compounding over the last few months of Trump's assaults on social justice and our nation's ideals. It may feel like Trump is an abusive father hurting our nation, but do not underestimate your collective power to oppose him. You are the leader you are waiting for.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 16, 2017, 06:09:10 pm
The PTSD of Class War Veterans (w/Guest Greg Palast)
Oct. 13, 2017 4:00 pm
https://youtu.be/G8XwsTzkI7c
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 16, 2017, 07:31:40 pm
The latest revelations of the link between playing pro football and brain injuries put the NFL in the same league with those other classic civic criminals, the tobacco companies and the Big Oil promoters of climate change denial, not to mention a sycophantic media that offered years of cover for all the deniers (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) by creating a false balance in its reporting and claiming a lack of definitive scientific evidence.
After that one, please read, and pass on to your friends and family, this one:
Trump and Pence's War on Black Athletes Has Nothing to Do With Sports Saturday, October 14, 2017 (http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/42260-trump-and-pence-s-war-on-black-athletes-has-nothing-to-do-with-sports)
SNIPPET:
Quote
Like his boss Donald Trump, Vice President Mike Pence is a lazy racist. Trump's public demands nothing more because they are easily satisfied by the thought of humiliating black and brown people. Last Sunday, Pence spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money to fly from Las Vegas to an NFL game in Indiana. His plan? To stage a political stunt where he showed his displeasure towards "uppity" black football players who are protesting police brutality and social injustice in America.
Agelbert NOTE: Getting Americans, particularly WHITE Americans, to realize they are being suckered BIG time (as were their bigoted ancestors since they got off the boat from Europe) with racist divide and conquer tactics/"wedge" issues and reject that manipulation by uniting with people of all colors to stop the pillage of our planet by ANTI-free market/competition, PRO-monopoly Capitalist Cruelty Elite ENEMIES OF HUMANITY, is like herding cats.
I think it's time for this fellow to "take care of business": (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fcowboypistol.gif&hash=2dc97f743dffca22404e6e4e0822765e60b33f38)
The double talking LIARS and SELECTED BRAIN DEAD BULLSHIT ARTISTS that curse this benighted forum will, OF COURSE, claim they do not have a racist bone in their body... S-U-U-U-U-R-E. Here is a photo of one them below:
AND, to those who will, NO DOUBT, claim the above photo fits me far better than you innocent, logical, prudent, practical, high IQ (and so on) gifts of evolution to this planet (and to ungrateful "whiners" like myself (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)), my friends below describe my view of that claim:
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 23, 2017, 02:58:54 pm
Quote
President Lyndon Baines Johnson (LBJ), a son of TX, understood how Southern politicians played the race card to get white voters to cast ballots against their own interests. After seeing vicious racial epithets on TN billboards, LBJ made this statement to his then aide Bill Moyers, “I’ll tell you what’s at the bottom of it. If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you (snopes.com, 8/2016).” Exactly. LBJ correctly saw the politics of racism as an effort to divide and conquer. Pundits would call playing the race card a wedge issue or correctly describe it as the politics of resentment and divisiveness.
Demagogue Donald used such politics to get into the White House. He played the race, ethnicity, and religious cards against blacks, Hispanics, and Muslims to add rural and blue-collar Rust Belt voters to his base of white Southerners who had been going GOP since the time of Nixon’s Southern Strategy.
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-191017143841.jpeg&hash=21f142befe4ed82f10ef0bdba11c22bbd3051289)Full article By Came In On Saturdays | October 20, 2017:
Our Ever-Deadlier (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-070814193155.png&hash=144ce9330e49ee84060db8753a8db69c39a14913) Police State
SNIPPET:
Police forces, as Vitale writes in his book, were not formed to ensure public safety or prevent crime. They were created by the property classes to maintain economic and political dominance and exert control over slaves, the poor, dissidents and labor unions that challenged the wealthy’s hold on power and ability to amass personal fortunes. Many of America’s policing techniques, including widespread surveillance, were pioneered and perfected in colonies of the U.S. and then brought back to police departments in the homeland. Blacks in the South had to be controlled, and labor unions and radical socialists in the industrial Northeast and Midwest had to be broken.
The fundamental role of the police has never changed.
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Freading.gif&hash=63e3e644b39258d4c4eedbcdaf322315b1856723)
In defending Gen. Kelly's praise for Robert E. Lee (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) and his view that the Civil War arose from "the lack of an ability to compromise,"(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817122018.gif&hash=74d86c1f35e2f61ea38c9bfa392f84a92631b96e) the White House's white supremacist (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) sympathies are again on display. We speak to historian Gerald Horne.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 07, 2017, 09:10:32 pm
The Persistence(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4)Of White Supremacy (w/Guest Rev. David Billings)
https://youtu.be/500TXauMiP8
Rev. David Billings joins the studio today to discuss white supremacy
Thom Hartmann Nov. 7, 2017 4:00 am
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 11, 2017, 02:01:37 pm
Empire Files: The Sacrifice Zones (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-070814193155.png&hash=144ce9330e49ee84060db8753a8db69c39a14913) of Hurricane Harvey
In this second installment of special coverage Hurricane Harvey's aftermath, Abby Martin explores how the petrochemical industry dominates the city and why its low-income, Black and Latino areas are in the highest-risk areas for flooding and pollution, earning them the name "sacrifice zones." Watch more on teleSUR
Turkey Day usually represents a late-season reset for pro football, but myriad controversies portend a more serious tone this year.
//The top storyline in the NFL this season has not been Tom Brady’s continued excellence or Carson Wentz’s timely emergence or the surprising Rams and Jaguars. It has instead been the dozens of players across the league who have knelt, sat, or raised their fists during the national anthem in protest of police brutality and racial injustice. //
The former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick will not be anywhere near Thursday’s action, as he remains unsigned after initiating the wave of protests last fall, but his name will echo through living rooms every time, say, the Vikings quarterback Case Keenum throws an incomplete pass. Why, Kaepernick’s defenders will wonder, do retreads like Keenum continue to receive opportunities while a former NFC-champion quarterback sits at home?
//
Meanwhile, no one will loom over the NFL’s Thanksgiving more than the Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, who has spent this fall sowing chaos on numerous fronts. //
As the protest issue simmers, Jones has feuded with the NFL commissioner Roger Goodell over Ezekiel Elliott’s suspension, which the running back began serving last week after months of injunction requests and appeals. ESPN reported that a furious Jones told Goodell he would “come after [him] with everything I have,” then later threatened to sue the league to hold up the commissioner’s contract negotiations.
On Thursday afternoon, Jones’s Cowboys will play the Los Angeles Chargers, who face a crisis of the existential variety. The franchise relocated this past summer from San Diego, a year after the Rams arrived in L.A. from St. Louis.
Meanwhile, since this article was published, Dolt 45 has rage-tweeted repeatedly, attempting to redefine the players' BLM-inspired protests into dishonoring the flag, or the troops, or some other manifestation of stolen valor. The point has always been about social injustice on African Americans and police brutality, to say nothing of open season/no bag limit on black Americans.
Case Keenum is inexplicably having an all star season. In the only football I watched yesterday, he led the Vikings to a convincing victory and played far better than a "game manager." Pretty good for a comparatively "old guy." Who knew?
jerry Jones' threatened lawsuits have folded like a tent, much like popular support for this Potempkin President... or the Cowboys, for that matter. They were beaten convincingly by the near-orphaned, aforementioned Chargers, as karma had a holiday. Even though I wasn't paying attention, I was pleased with the result.
And in other news, John Schplatter still makes shitty pizza. May worms take up residence in his head.
Trailer Trash Trump just does what he does.
Recent photo of Trailer Trash Trump having his morning Joe:
CNN Crusades Against Slave Trade in Libya, but Knew About It for Years (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
U.S. corporate media "does not report on the slaughter and the persecution of people by these U.S.-backed governments until most of them are dead," says Black Agenda Report's Glen Ford
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 05, 2017, 09:44:34 pm
December 5, 2017
Trump's Friends Get Tax Cuts, His Base Gets Bigotry
As President Trump re-tweets an anti-Muslim British group, historian and professor Gerald Horne of the University of Houston says Trump is following through on the bigotry he campaigned on
As Alabama votes in the special Senate election, historian Gerald Horne and TRNN senior editor Paul Jay discuss why an alleged sexual predator and slavery apologist is even in the running.
Fellow White Men, Listen to the Voices You Have Ignored for So Long
Sunday, December 17, 2017
By Bill Ayers, Truthout | Op-Ed
SNIPPET:
Quote
"White Americans finding easy comfort in nonviolence and the radical love of the civil rights movement must reckon with the unsettling fact that black people in this country achieved the rudiments of their freedom through the killing of whites."
-- Ta-Nehisi Coates, We Were Eight Years in Power
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Freading.gif&hash=63e3e644b39258d4c4eedbcdaf322315b1856723)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 10, 2018, 05:22:08 pm
Why Are So Many White Male Republicans Afraid of Weed?
Hint: It's not really about marijuana, itself.
SNIPPET:
Quote
What both of these white guys are making clear is that, for some Americans, being called a racist is worse than doing or saying racist things. (Or, you know, being discriminated against.) Almost no one in America today would consider themselves racist, even the self-described "white nationalists" feeling somewhat empowered by this political era. They take great offense when anyone suggests they are, even when they offer up a textbook example of racist rhetoric, as Alford did. He claimed that another race is genetically inferior, and prone to antisocial behavior on that basis. It means exactly nothing that Alford doesn't consider himself a racist, or that his (white) colleague doesn't think he's a racist.
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F19.gif&hash=3f9f2fc2285bc756137e21463bc2a4c420b15ac3)
The net effect of 40 years of relentless class war.
"Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?"
Social media fury follows video of dazed woman put out in cold by Baltimore hospital (http://www.doomsteaddiner.net/forum/index.php/topic,10522.msg144306.html#msg144306)
By John Woodrow Cox, Theresa Vargas and Justin Wm. Moyer January 11 at 7:40 PM
The man hurried up the Baltimore sidewalk with a camera in his hand as four black-clad hospital security guards walked toward him, then past him. One of them was pushing an empty wheelchair.
“So wait, y’all just going to leave this lady out here with no clothes on?” said Imamu Baraka, referring to a dazed woman wearing only a thin hospital gown who they had left alone at a bus stop Tuesday night in mid-30s temperatures. Her face appeared bloody, her eyes empty.
It was the latest incident of “patient dumping” that has sparked outrage around the country — one that, according to an expert, probably violated a 1986 federal law that mandates hospitals release those in their care into a safe environment.
“This kind of behavior is, I think, both illegal and I’m sure immoral,” said Arthur L. Caplan, founding head of the division of medical ethics at the New York University School of Medicine. “You don’t just throw someone out into the street who is impaired and may have injuries. You try to get them to the best place possible, and that’s not the bench in front of the hospital.”
The phenomenon was pervasive two decades ago, when the law was largely unenforced, Caplan said, but remains a problem from California to Virginia. [Video shows apparently incapacitated, half-naked woman put out in cold]
On Tuesday, the woman left outside the University of Maryland Medical Center Midtown Campus could barely walk and seemed unable to speak.
Still filming, Baraka turned and followed the guards back to an entrance.
“That is not okay,” he shouted.
“Due to the circumstances of what it was,” one of them said.
“Then you all need to call the police,” replied Baraka, a licensed counselor.
At the doorway, Baraka asked for a supervisor, demanding to know why they were leaving her outside.
“She was . . . medically discharged,” one of the guards (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) said, before the camera captured them walking into the hospital, their backs turned.
What Baraka filmed next — the woman, staggering and screaming into a night so cold that the sidewalk remained speckled with salt and bits of unmelted snow — has been viewed more than 1.4 million times on Facebook, triggering a cascade of online fury and an apology from the hospital.
At a news conference Thursday afternoon, the hospital’s chief pledged to investigate what he described as “a failure of basic compassion and empathy.” He said it represented a wrenching departure for a widely respected medical institution — one that has embarked on a major expansion in Prince George’s County and southern Maryland.
“We firmly believe what occurred Tuesday night does not reflect who we are,” said Mohan Suntha, the hospital’s president and chief executive. “We are trying to understand the points of failure that led to what we witnessed on that video.”
Suntha would not provide details on the personnel involved, saying the review of the woman’s experience from arrival to discharge had just begun. Nor would he speak to her condition or treatment because of patient confidentiality, but he asserted that her care before being led into the cold was adequate and complete.
Suntha, who cited the hospital’s 136-year history of providing indigent care in Baltimore, said the woman’s insurance coverage or ability to pay played no role in the decision to discharge her.
“I share the community’s shock and anger at what occurred,” he said, although shock and anger haven’t ended patient dumping in the past.
Last year, court records show, a man sued Inova Fairfax Hospital in Virginia for $100 million after alleging that he had been prematurely discharged on a cold winter night — and was subsequently hit by car.
The suit, filed in Fairfax County Circuit Court, alleged that Donald Paul Ryberg came to Inova just after noon on Jan. 29, 2015, a day when temperatures barely edged above freezing.
Ryberg, then a 46-year-old diabetic, had a history of alcohol abuse that had led him to the emergency room before.
The complaint alleges that Ryberg was so weak that he couldn’t stand or walk. When hospital staff discharged him around 7 p.m. — without a diagnosis and over his daughter’s objections — Ryberg was alone and confused, the complaint said, but had been given bus tokens and directions home. He then stumbled into the street, where a car smashed into him.
An Inova spokesman (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4) declined to comment.
His daughter, Tabatha Ryberg, said she spent the final years of her high school career caring for her father, who fractured his skull and remained in a coma for weeks after the accident. He continues to have mobility and memory problems, she said, and he lost his job as a laborer at an engineering firm.
“My dad has just lost everything,” she said. “I want to bring some attention to this because this is ridiculous. . . . They didn’t contact us. If they had, we would have had a ride for him. This has ruined so many people’s lives.”
In California, a 78-year-old man, disoriented and suffering from arthritis, was discharged from a Sacramento hospital and sent in a taxi to a homeless shelter that had no room for him, the Sacramento Bee reported. A year ago, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, former patients at a state-run hospital in Nevada filed a federal lawsuit after they and others were allegedly placed on Greyhound buses and sent out of state.
In the Baltimore case that went viral this week, much remains unknown: Who the woman is, why she was hospitalized, what led staff to discharge her when she appeared to be incoherent and where she is now.
Baraka has not responded to multiple requests for comment or posted an update on his Facebook page, but he gave a short interview to CBS Baltimore, saying he had just left his office across the street when he came upon the scene and began filming.
The video’s release was just the latest in a string of painful moments for Baltimore, still reeling from the 2015 death of Freddie Gray and the riots that followed. The city endured 343 homicides last year, making it the bloodiest year, per capita, in its history.
Last week, amid a stretch of frigid weather, images spread of Baltimore students bundled in coats in unheated schools. One teacher described students shivering and able to see their own breath.
“Things are so broken here, so broken,” said Bronwyn Mayden, a Baltimore native and executive director of Promise Heights, an initiative established by the University of Maryland School of Social Work. “It’s like dominoes — one just knocks down the other. Can it get any worse, y’all?”
The city’s struggles have reached a point where there’s no outrage, she said. Instead, there’s simply acceptance.
“I think,” Mayden concluded, “people are numb in Baltimore.”
Steve Hendrix and Jennifer Jenkins contributed to this report.
Agelbert Observation: You need to take your meds if you think this grotesque fascist/classist/racist behavior is limited to any single area of the United States of Trump.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 12, 2018, 02:16:26 pm
Re: Home of the Brave, Land of the Free™
This classist/fascist/racist grotesque behavior is not limited to any area or city in the United Fascist States of Trump, otherwise known as the Fourth Reich. Of course all the elements of this empathy deficit modus vivendi were present long before Trump, who is merely the true face of mostly bigoted ugly America.
All my life I have been subjected to micro-aggressions by racists. The only reason they have not become dangerous enough to get me hit with trumped up charges against me for the purpose of getting me thrown in jail is because I think ahead and have NEVER bought the BULLSHIT espoused by certain closet bigots here that when you get in trouble, it's your own fault. Yeah, if you are white enough, that's true to a certain extent. But if you aren't, the odds are ALWAYS stacked against you. I have seen white people in Vermont yelling and bad mouthing a police officer at the top of their lungs, with no negative repercussions. In fact, often the cop simply tries to get the person to calm down. The exact reverse is true for minorites. If you begin to argue, they get really hard faced and begin interrupting you and cutting your words off. White people just do not WANT to understand how privileged they are in the Fourth Reich.
Are whites being "astute" in playing the game of feigning innocence? Maybe. Are they secretly glad that continuous emotional harm is visited on minorities so whites can get a leg up on brownie and blackie (while pretending they just want a "fair shake")? Of course.
All this is as old as human nature. But, that does not make it right. For those white bigots here who yawn and said, "Tough luck, pal, that's life.", I wish to remind you that your turn in the barrel is coming. It may not manifest itself as racism, but it will definitly manifest itself as classism. How so? Police States have a pecking order fetish that is aLWAYS working to get greater numbers way down in the pecking order (i.e. move YOU sufficently 'unimportant' whites from your current level of being tolerated to punching bag status) and fewer fine fascist cruelty for profit bastards on the top. YOU will reap what you have sown with your bigotry. Have a nice day.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 12, 2018, 02:58:24 pm
After his comment about “shithole countries,” the arguments for being reticent about applying the R-word to President Trump seem absurd.Photograph by Mark Peterson / Redux
Donald Trump grew up in a wealthy white enclave in Queens, and he first came to public attention in 1973, when the Justice Department sued his father’s real-estate company for refusing to rent apartments to people “because of race and color.” (Trump strongly denied the charges, which eventually led to a consent decree.) In the nineteen-eighties, when Trump owned casinos in Atlantic City, some of his managers got the strong impression that he didn’t like black employees. In a 2015 story about the faded resort town, my colleague Nick Paumgarten quoted a former busboy at the Trump Castle, who said, “When Donald and Ivana came to the casino, the bosses would order all the black people off the floor.”
In a 1991 book about his experiences running Trump Plaza, in Atlantic City, “Trumped! The Inside Story of the Real Donald Trump—His Cunning Rise and Spectacular Fall,” John R. O’Donnell, a veteran casino executive, recalled a conversation that he had with his boss about an employee in the Plaza’s finance department who happened to be African-American. I cited the passage last fall, after Trump attacked Myeshia Johnson, the widow of a black soldier in the U.S. Special Forces who was killed in Niger, but it is worth reproducing it now. (The quote below begins with Trump speaking about the black employee. The “I” at the start of the second paragraph is O’Donnell.)
Quote
“Yeah, I never liked the guy. I don’t think he knows what the fu ck he’s doing. My accountants in New York are always complaining about him. He’s not responsive. And it isn’t funny. I’ve got black accountants at Trump Castle and at Trump Plaza. Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day. Those are the kind of people I want counting my money. Nobody else.”
I couldn’t believe I was hearing this. But Donald went on, “Besides that, I’ve got to tell you something else. I think that the guy is lazy. And it’s probably not his fault because laziness is a trait in blacks. It really is. I believe that.It’s not anything they can control. . . . Don’t you agree?” He looked at me straight in the eye and waited for my reply.
“Donald, you really shouldn’t say things like that to me or anybody else,” I said. “That is not the kind of image you want to project. We shouldn’t even be having this conversation, even if it’s the way you feel.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” he said. “If anybody ever heard me say that . . . holy sh it . . . I’d be in a lot of trouble. But I have to tell you, that’s the way I feel.”
Is there any doubt that Trump still holds these kinds of views? Even before his latest racial slur—it was reported on Thursday that he referred to Haiti, El Salvador, and certain nations in Africa as “shithole countries” during a meeting with lawmakers in the Oval Office—the answer was clear. During the 2016 Presidential campaign, Trump described Mexican immigrants as “in many cases criminals, rapists, drug dealers, etc.”; questioned the fitness of a U.S.-born federal judge by referring to him as “Mexican”; mocked the mother of a Pakistani-American war hero; and, for a time, refused to condemn David Duke, the former Klansman.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 12, 2018, 08:33:10 pm
Paul Krugman: Republicans Simply Want to Hurt People
Quote
"Making lower-income Americans worse off has become a goal in itself for the modern GOP."
By Jacob Sugarman / AlterNet
January 12, 2018, 6:52 AM GMT
SNIPPET:
In his Friday column, he examines three policy positions that seem to confirm sadism has become part of the Republican platform. The first is the party's refusal to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act, which should have been a "no-brainer" for every state. But eight years after the legislation's passage, 18 have refused, "all of them with Republican-controlled legislatures, governors or both."
"For a while you could argue that it was about cynical political strategy: Medicaid expansion was a policy of Barack Obama, and Republicans didn’t want to give a Democratic president any policy successes," he writes. "But that story can’t explain states’ continuing resistance to the idea of providing health coverage to thousands of their own citizens at minimal cost. No, at this point it’s clear that G.O.P. politicians simply don’t want lower-income families to have access to health care and are actually willing to hurt their own states’ economies to deny them that access."
Then there's the Republican cry to impose aforementioned work requirements on Medicaid recipients, which has only grown more shrill since Trump assumed office. As Krugman explains, 10 of the states exploring such measures have accepted Medicaid expansions, so they gain nothing by booting people off their rolls. Ultimately, their motivations are as simple as they are vicious.
"It’s about stigmatizing those who receive government aid, forcing them to jump through hoops to prove their neediness," he notes. "Again, the pain is the point." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-120716190938.png&hash=01feab1c7345a4e98764e0f9d24b2d69171b93c2)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 13, 2018, 04:14:51 pm
GLOBAL NEWS HOME
CONFRONTING THE ROOT CAUSES OF FORCED LABOR IN GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAINS
Wednesday January 10, 2018
Where does forced labor come from? What are the root causes? Often this is traced back to two explanations: poverty and globalization, but how exactly do they perpetuate “endemic labor exploitation” in global supply chains?
This week Beyond Trafficking and Slavery, part of Open Democracy, launched a 12-part report that breaks down the root causes of forced labor and what we can do about them. The report aims to “provide policymakers, journalists, scholars and activists with a road map for understanding the political economy of forced labour in today’s “global value chain (GVC) world.”
This report is organised around a metaphor – the classical economic metaphor of ‘supply and demand’. Within mainstream economic theory, the price of any particular good is not determined by the individuals who buy and sell it. Instead, the price results from a system-wide balance between how much of it is available in the world (supply), how many people want it, and how badly (demand). The price goes up as supply decreases or as demand increases, and down if the opposite applies.
This is a useful way of thinking about forced labour. Rather than a simple consequence of greed or the moral shortcomings of individuals (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.coh2.org%2Fimages%2FSmileys%2Fhuhsign.gif&hash=3732d0427be65896527fc3805c5be54a33cffd3b), forced labour in global supply chains is a structural phenomenon that results when predictable, system-wide dynamics intersect to create a supply of highly exploitable workers and a business demand for their labour.
On the “supply side,” researchers identify four key factors that contribute to vulnerability among workers: Poverty, Identity and Discrimination, Limited Labor Protections, and Restrictive Mobility Regimes. On the “demand side,” or factors that “create pressure within the market for highly exploitable forms of labor,” are Concentrated Corporate Power and Ownership (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fpirates5B15D_th.gif&hash=32438e1ed2c4d1823d4ed2a193286525c840a605) , Outsourcing (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013200859.png&hash=a7aaaa9f04c1e3e2c948723b5f8c13fe814dacd4), Irresponsible Sourcing Practices (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978) , and Governance Gaps (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fmocantina.gif&hash=d013c741bcf9a78776eec19c2c3aac449c35d75c).
The research is grounded in several academic disciplines and draws on industry-specific cases, ethnographic investigations, and statistical studies from around the world. In sum, they paint a picture of how the global capitalist economy produces an “unjust status quo” and point out what is and what is not working to fix it.
To read the entire article, click here https://www.opendemocracy.net/beyondslavery/genevieve-lebaron-neil-howard-cameron-thibos-penelope-kyritsis/confronting-root-causes
Agelbert NOTE: Okay, foced labor may not be the simple consequence of greed or the moral shortcomings of individuals, but that does NOT rule out the FACT, especially if we are going to address ROOT causes, not a causal chain of downstream effects (see: moral hazard), that ALL abuse of humans for profit is the somewhat complicated consequence of greed and the moral shortcomings of individuals.
The artists are going to do in Trumpofsky. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F4fvfcja.gif&hash=34a9a570347d39a0a892bc1f376c5e8b88add6b5)
If you took a look at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., on Saturday night, you might think it was a real shithole.
An artist with a video projector gave the Trump family’s D.C. hotel a makeover using President Donald Trump’s very own and very racist words.
“This place is a shithole” was projected onto the front steps of the hotel, in an apparent nod to reports that Trump called Haiti and African nations “shithole countries.”
The projection also displayed the word “shithole” and a stream of poop smiley-face emojis (💩).
As seen in a Periscope livestream, a longer message mocked Trump and his supporters and called for others to stand against white supremacy.
“This is not normal,” a segment of the display read, along with messages to “stay vigilant” and “#resist.”
“The president distracts us from politics that are harming us,” the projection read later in the video.
The display was the work of artist Robin Bell, the founder of video projection company Bell Visuals.
Bell has made news headlines in the past for projecting various messages on buildings with political ties. In May, Bell projected on the same D.C. hotel “emoluments welcome” and “pay Trump bribes here.” (Both of those messages also appear in the most recent projection.) That same month, Bell projected “#SessionsMustGo” and “I thought the KKK was OK until I learned that they smoked pot” on the Department of Justice building, in reference to Attorney General Jeff Sessions.
Trump incited outrage this week over his reported remark, “Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?” ― which he asked after lawmakers suggested granting visas to individuals from Haiti, El Salvador and multiple African nations during a meeting about immigration reform.
Democrats and some Republican lawmakers criticized the president’s choice of words and called for him to apologize.
Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.), the chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said in a statement that Trump’s alleged remarks were another “confirmation of his racially insensitive and ignorant views.”
“It also reinforces the concerns that we hear every day, that the President’s slogan Make America Great Again is really code for Make America White Again,” Richmond added.
The United Nations human rights office rejected the president’s remark, which they labeled as “racist.”
“There is no other word one can use but ‘racist,’” U.N. human rights spokesman Rupert Colville said, according to Reuters. “You cannot dismiss entire countries and continents as ‘shitholes’ whose entire populations, who are not white, are therefore not welcome.”
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 14, 2018, 05:22:58 pm
GOOD ONE! : (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 15, 2018, 01:52:44 pm
Donald Trump’s Racism: The Definitive List
By DAVID LEONHARDT and IAN PRASAD PHILBRICK
JAN. 15, 2018
SNIPPET:
Donald Trump has been obsessed with race for the entire time he has been a public figure. He had a history of making racist comments as a New York real-estate developer in the 1970s and ‘80s. More recently, his political rise was built on promulgating the lie that the nation’s first black president was born in Kenya. He then launched his campaign with a speech describing Mexicans as rapists.
The media often falls back on euphemisms when describing Trump’s comments about race: racially loaded, racially charged, racially tinged, racially sensitive. And Trump himself has claimed that he is “the least racist person.” But here’s the truth: Donald Trump is a racist. He talks about and treats people differently based on their race. He has done so for years, and he is still doing so.
Here, we have attempted to compile a definitive list of his racist comments – or at least the publicly known ones.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 15, 2018, 09:06:27 pm
15 Reasons African Countries Aren't 'Shitholes'
The African continent boasts several of the world's fastest growing economies.
By Zoe Kelland
JAN. 12, 2018
On Thursday, US President Donald Trump reportedly referred to Haiti, El Salvador, and several African countries as “shithole” countries in a meeting with politicians, the Washington Post reported.
The president had been discussing immigration policy with the lawmakers and suggested that the US focus on bringing in people from countries like Norway over those from African countries.
“Why are we having all these people from shithole countries come here?” Trump reportedly said, comments which the UN condemned as racist on Friday.
This is not the first time the president has allegedly made such comments. In a meeting with cabinet members and administration aides last year, Trump reportedly advocated against more open immigration policies, saying that all Haitians have AIDS and that people from Nigeria would refuse to go back to their “huts” if allowed into the US, according to the New York Times.
But the idea that the entire continent of Africa is a disease-ridden land of “huts” is a myth, and a dangerous one at that.
Here are 15 other debunked myths about African countries.
1. Africa is poor, and always will be. DJ Paco (Papis), a DJ and rap artist from Mauritania. Photo by Philippe Sibelly, The Other Africa.
Yes, 47% of people in Sub-Saharan Africa live on less than $1.25 a day, and this is a scandal. However, this number is falling, and things are getting better. One in three Africans are defined as ‘middle class’, and whilst many Western economies are in crisis, Africa’s economy continues to grow. Did you know that 6 of the 10 fastest growing economies in the world are African?
2. Africa is all savannah and wild animals. Image credit: BBC
In 2014, Delta airline, a major US carrier, made a huge mistake on social media. Whilst congratulating the US World Cup team on a victory over Ghana, they used a photo of a giraffe to represent the African nation. Unfortunately for Delta there are in fact no wild giraffes in Ghana, and the Twitter community was quick to alert them to this.
Oh dear, @delta. There isn't even a single wild giraffes in Ghana. pic.twitter.com/oDsA1mA2RJ
— Messi Minutes (@MessiMinutes) June 17, 2014 That Delta giraffe pic is from Getty Images and it's from the Masai Mara National Reserve. In KENYA http://t.co/XV9t8Ig8mk via @YAppelbaum
— Solange U (@dcGisenyi) June 17, 2014 If you're gonna talk about something at least take 10 seconds to study it a little. @Delta Africa is not a big bush full of wild Animals.
— InnÖcent ÖkÖye (@CentyClaus) June 17, 2014 This is the boolsheet us Africans gotta deal with. There are no giraffes in Ghana, you narrow-minded nincompoops! @Delta FAIL!
— Awesomely Luvvie (@Luvvie) June 17, 2014
Slammed by accusations of racism and stereotyping, Delta have since apologised for the image used. However, this highlights how widely such stereotypes are still accepted and perpetuated in Western media. Yes, there are a whole host of exciting wild animals, and gorgeous savannahs, in some regions of Africa. However, there are also huge cities, rolling beaches, historic ancient monuments and more. One region of Africa is not identical to another, and we shouldn’t stereotype a whole continent in this way.
3. It’s hot, dry and sunny all the time Photo credit: Kyle Taylor (Flickr)
Band Aid may be a classic festive hit, but next time you find yourself singing ‘there won’t be snow in Africa this Christmas time’ remember that Africa is a diverse continent with a huge variety of landscapes and temperatures. Take a look, for example, at this stunning snowy landscape on Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania!
4. Africans have no access to modern technology.
Technology in Africa is actually an incredibly fast growing market, with many global technology giants making big investments in the continent. Did you know that people in Kenya are 4 times more likely to own a mobile phone than to have access to a toilet or latrine? As of 2013, 80% of African people had access to a mobile.
Mobile technology is also being used in very innovative and exciting ways to help end extreme poverty across Africa. Check out this story of mobile insurance creating financial stability for people in Ghana!
5. In order to develop, Africa should become like the West Tana River, in Kenya, is one source of the country’s hydroelectric power. Image credit: Bedford Biofuels
There are so many arguments against this presumption. Let me focus on one - many African countries are far ahead of Western countries in terms of sustainable energy use. Both the UK and the US source only 11% of their energy from renewable sources, less than Kenya sources from geothermal activities alone (13% of Kenya’s energy consumption). Meanwhile, a staggering 50% of Kenya’s energy comes from hydroelectricity. In terms of long-term sustainability, shouldn’t we be looking to Kenya for some answers?
6. There’s no arts industry in Africa Nigerian actress Taiwo Ajayi-Lycette gets makeup applied before performing a scene. Photo by Akintunde Akinleye/Reuters
Every year, more films are made in Nigeria’s Nollywood than in the US’s Hollywood. FACT.
7. Africans do nothing to help themselves Dr. Hawa Abdi and her daughters. Together they have helped over 90,000 women & children in Somalia. Photo from the Dr Hawa Abdi Foundation.
The stereotype of African people as helpless and dependent on Western help is one that has been built by decades of well meaning but arguably dangerous charity advertisements in the West. Bombarded by images of sad, dirty children with eyes that call you to urgently donate money, it’s no surprise that this is a common belief. The debate around how development charities should advertise is a complex one, but these photos often ignore the fact that African people can and do help themselves.
In 2010, Africans who lived outside the continent sent $51.8 billion back to Africa. Meanwhile, $43 billion was sent in aid from Western countries, known as Official Development Assistance (ODA). Yes, you read that right - African people who now live outside the continent send more money back to their families than the whole Western world sends in aid.
There are also countless examples of grassroot projects established by African people, for African people. One is Hawa Abdi, an incredible Somalian woman who established a health clinic in the 1980s. It’s now grown to encompass a school, refugee camp and hospital for over 90,000 women and children made homeless in the war. Incredible, huh?
8. ‘African’ is a language (and African people don’t speak English) A student at Cambridge University challenges African stereotypes. Photo from Tumblr (We Too Are Cambridge)
There are over 2000 languages spoken across the African continent, and ‘African’ is not one of them. This is the equivalent of presuming that people who live in Europe speak ‘European’. English is also an official language in 24 African nations and taught to a high level in schools across the continent.
9. Africa’s not that big This is the real size of Africa. Pretty big, right? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817121424.gif&hash=384c17a4d2be4831084933b91808f8a60f73f7f5)
This brilliant video by Mama Hope is made by African men, dispelling myths about themselves. Pretty cool, huh?
https://youtu.be/qSElmEmEjb4
11. Everyone in Africa has AIDS
At the end of 2013, Justine Sacco, a PR director from InterActiveCorp, posted this tweet just before boarding a flight to South Africa. Understandably, the world’s reaction escalated quickly from disbelief...
Yes, but you're also clearly stupid. “@JustineSacco: Going to Africa. Hope I don't get AIDS. Just kidding. I'm white!”
— Whydya Tweetthat (@TwitOvershare) December 20, 2013 ...to strong accusations of racism.
Oh. Hell. No. Did this Justine Sacco person just say that? Did she really fix her keyboard to type that mess? Whyyyyyyyy? You racist bit ch!
— Amish Donut (@Lilikins8) December 21, 2013
After a worldwide twitter storm hit Justine, she did apologise for her remark. However, this appallingly insensitive tweet represents a terrible stereotype that is all too common. Not everybody in Africa is sick. Furthermore, we should treat those who do suffer from HIV, or any other illness, the way we would want to be treated - with dignity and respect.
12. All governance in Africa is bad. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf speaking at the opening of Libera’s first tuition-free girls’ school, the More Than Me Academy. Photo from More Than Me.
Let me dispel this myth with an example of one leader who is making incredible progress for her country. The current President of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, is an inspirational woman who is leading Liberia out of the devastating damage caused by civil war, and kicking ass at it. President Sirleaf was awarded the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize for her “non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women’s rights”, and listed by Time as one of the top 10 female leaders in the world.
13. Everyone in Africa lives in a mud house in the middle of nowhere. Embed from Getty Images
Where would you guess this city is? The US? Europe? Asia? Nope - this is Lagos, in Nigeria, and it has a population of 21 million - more than double that of urban London! In 2008, 39% of the African population lived in urban areas, and this is rapidly increasing.
14. There’s no partying in Africa
Before I first visited the continent, I never thought about Africa having parties, bars or clubs. I presumed they just didn’t exist, but boy was I wrong! Having spent nine years of my life working with Nakuru Children's Project in Kenya, let me tell you that most of my Kenyan friends know how to party hard. And by partying I don’t just mean pubs and clubs - I mean finding a reason to sing, dance and celebrate at any time of day!
15. It’s all doom and gloom
This satirical meme reminds us of the common humanity that we all share, no matter where we’re born. Every 60 seconds bad things happen all over the world, not just in Africa. But an awful lot of good things happen too!
Above article with graphics at link below: https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/africans-are-all-poor-and-15-other-myths/
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 21, 2018, 07:07:31 pm
Haitians gather outside the US embassy in Port-au-Prince to protest against reported comments made by Donald Trump against the countries of the Caribbean and Africa
For most immigrants in the United States, the year that has passed since President Donald Trump's inauguration has been one in which their new country has become an increasingly frightening place to live.
Those of us who are visible as an "other" - having black or brown skin, bearing names that show we are Muslim or Hispanic, wearing clothing that mark us as somehow "different" - are repetitively evoked (in both veiled and vulgar language) in the president's public speeches, private policy meetings, and barrages of tweets.
Trump tweeted earlier this month that he plans to make immigration more "merit-based" to attract "highly skilled" workers and followed these plans up by calling potential and existing immigrants from Haiti and all of Africa, in particular, people from "shithole countries" during a policy meeting.
Part of why Americans are susceptible to this violent, xenophobic, and nativist rhetoric is not because they are exceptionally thick, but because of how the national mythology of the US - one constructed on Puritan ideals of egalitarianism, "hard work" and perseverance against adversity - is constructed.
Americans are told, since childhood, that hard work and perseverance not only build character, but allow them to overcome obstacles, and achieve their goals and dreams. Because this powerful myth is repetitively drummed into their heads - be it through apocryphal narratives of kids who came from impoverished backgrounds who went on to become multimillion-dollar earning athletes, or women who beat the odds and attained positions of leadership in fields dominated by men - they learn to believe that their country is a meritocracy.
These experiences of failure and not-making-it are true, unexceptional, and the norm; yet, they are unincorporated into America's popular narrative.
Anyone who has gone thorough the immigration process here knows that US immigration is not only class-based, but underhandedly racist, too: after all, Trump himself remarked, in that same infamous policy meeting, that immigrants from Asia should be favoured over those from Haiti and Africa.
So it baffles me why legislators and pundits are suddenly calling on immigration reforms to reflect the desire for skilled workers, when it is clear, from even a cursory glance at H1B and Greencard application documents, that it is already so.
As an immigrant who was born in a small island in South Asia (Sri Lanka) and grew up in a Southern African country (Zambia), and who now lives and teaches in the US, I make a point of incorporating my own narrative of immigration - the cost, the paperwork, the lawyers' fees, the networks of fellow immigrants who helped me, and the (often difficult to identify) factors and existing privileges in my personal history that allowed me to be a "successful" immigrant - into how I teach my global literature classes.
"It's about money and existing privilege," I laugh. "America sure didn't want any tired and poor immigrants." Most of my American students are surprised - unless they, too, have come from recent-immigrant families.
We all know this to be true, if we are recent immigrants to the US. But we become defensive against racism, and prefer to align ourselves with American rhetoric of being exceptional. And because US immigration policy already selects immigrants who come from privileged social class, caste, and educational backgrounds, this group is used to being seen as elite; certainly, these immigrants do not want to align themselves with workers in the service industries or the undocumented.
I was dismayed, but not surprised, therefore, by the defensive rhetoric used by my fellow immigrants when "Shithole-gate" hit the national and international fans. On Twitter and Facebook, immigrants brought out the weaponry of respectability to prove that racists were wrong about them. Since Haiti and Africa were on the "shithole" list this time, they listed the exceptional African and Haitian immigrants who invented amazing things and discovered incredible surgical techniques that no doubt saved the lives of countless American racists who hated immigrants.
Others touted how so few immigrants, statistically, are involved in any crimes. Articles, like this one in the LA Times, rushed to assure frightened Americans that while many are refugees, and "beneficiaries of the 'diversity visa programme' aimed at boosting immigration from underrepresented nations…African immigrants are better educated than people born in the US or the immigrant population as a whole".
The African Studies Association's Board of Directors released the following statement:
"[In the] US Census Bureau report, Africans account for only 4 percent of the total foreign-born population in the United States, but the educational attainment of that 4 percent far exceeds the average of all of those born outside of the US. Indeed, 41 percent of African residents in the US hold bachelor's degrees or higher. Nigerians, who have been singled out by the president on previous occasions, are among the most educated group in the US, with some 61 percent holding bachelor's degrees and 17 percent masters degrees."
All this is true. But this rhetoric only serves to boost the myth of merit, and further the erroneous belief that only the "deserving" and exceptional - who are mostly exceptional because of existing class, family, political, and educational privileges - should be in the US.
As critic Steven Salaita explained in a Facebook post, cases like that of 57-year-old Palestinian-American business owner, Amer Othman Adi - who has been unjustly held by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement and is currently on hunger strike, "gives lie to the conservative (and often liberal) narrative that 'good' immigrants are welcome … By all accounts, including those of a mayor, a business community, and a congressman, Adi was the ideal arrivant. So, even by the insidious standards of model minority discourse (fuelled by anti-Black racism and Native dispossession), Adi isn't worthy of freedom and dignity. What is left to conclude? That people from certain countries - shitholes - are never acceptable no matter how much they conform to the state's chauvinistic mythologies."
It is time that Asian immigrants in particular ... also stop imagining themselves as more special and deserving than US minorities of non-recent immigrant backgrounds.
In my university classes, I make sure that I stress that all but the most privileged had to almost bend God's will to be here, and stay here. I make sure that I include immigrants who are both documented and undocumented in this narrative.
We are nearly all exceptional in many ways, but not because we have class privilege and exceptional jobs - but because of the inventiveness of our hustle, the "I can't go on/I'll go on" ideology, evocative of Irish playwright Samuel Beckett's beautiful, painful writing.
We internalise that struggle, steel, and vulnerability in the face of immigration officials at airports, border checkpoints, local immigration offices, and the everyday racism we encounter. When I read French existentialists, I actually laugh: if they actually wanted to know what it is like to face insurmountable obstacles, they should have first spoken to a black or brown immigrant in the US (or France) first.
It is true that many of the first friends I made in the US were in college because they did have something exceptional about them that parents and teachers recognised; a slew of people - school administrators, guidance counsellors, a friend in the neighbourhood who had an aunt who went to college - helped get them into university by helping them fill out paperwork, write entrance essays, and generally navigate the difficult US tertiary education system and immigrate into the lower rungs of the US middle class.
But I also pose this question: what happens if you are exceptional, but a queue of terrible and overworked educators dismiss or simply do not see your ability? What happens if you are not exceptional, but simply ordinary, and poor, and immigrant?
While the ordinary middle and upper-middle class kid will often have parents and educators advocating for them - protecting the young person from learning difficult lessons even at the cost of their character and skills development - the poor and the immigrant in the US rarely have the benefits of that invisible, protective shield. These experiences of failure and not-making-it are true, unexceptional, and the norm; yet, they are unincorporated into the US's popular narrative.
Those who have gone through this expensive and Faustian processes of an H1-B application, Permanent Residency or "Greencard" process, and eventually, US citizenship, know how ludicrously and nakedly class-based, racist, and violent it is towards immigrants. It is especially so for women of colour.
This system clearly favours those with existing economic, class, gender, and privileges that pipeline them into college educations. Those of us from urban centres, rather than rural areas, from nations with thriving education systems, from families with existing wealth and political power, and those from ethnic groups that are in ascendancy get ahead.
US visas and immigration processes favour those with money in hand, to pay for those exorbitant application fees, a requirement at every step of the immigration and naturalisation process. Yet, if I suggest that the US is not a meritocracy, my students react in disbelief, and many sweetly try to convince me otherwise, using the examples of the miraculous achievements of the authors we read in class.
When I point out that the problem with a meritocracy is that only those who are truly exceptional - like the authors we read - who will "make it" out of dire circumstances, there is silence. When I point out that none of us would have a chance, should we have been born in more dire circumstances, since no one in class (including me) is truly as exceptional as any of the authors we read, there is more silence.
These are some of the few moments in which I have felt that I have communicated something of importance about how structures in the US work - creating at least some doubt about powerful and pervasive mythologies that serve only to blame those who cannot claw their way out of circumstances meant to make them fail.
The truth is, anyone who plots, schemes, saves, and works to the point of exhaustion - sometimes only with the hope that the next or even the third generation will benefit - in an economically and politically powerful nation like the US has to be exceptional, in some way.
It is obvious that (white) Americans need to be disabused of the notion that the US's white population is special, and deserving, somehow, of privilege; it is time to get over the belief that they only received their privileges from having worked for it.
But just as importantly, those immigrants of more privileged backgrounds - those who are currently touting the percentage of people from their national group who have college and post-graduate degrees, as if waving these statistics and their material possessions are ways of proving that they are not, in fact, deserving of Trump's racism - also need an antidote for their misplaced smugness.
It is time that Asian immigrants in particular - who benefit from the Civil Rights Movement and the efforts of African Americans towards changing and challenging racist immigration laws that excluded Asians, and who have, as a group, been favoured since American immigration began moving towards a merit-based system - also stop imagining themselves as more special and deserving than US minorities of non-recent immigrant backgrounds.
Our class snobbery, carried over from our old countries, and defensive superiority, developed against the racism of our new country, has only aided white supremacists who couldn't care less about how exceptional we are.
The drivers of xenophobia and racism are more perceptions than reality. Mistaken assumptions,like:
There would be plenty of good-paying jobs for all native born Americans who managed to get a high school diploma if it just weren't for all the illegals. Wrong.
Native born Americans could get health insurance if the government wasn't giving it away free to illegal aliens. Wrong.
Spanish speaking children should just figure out how to speak English instead of us spending millions on bilingual education. Wrong.
But every misapprehension has a grain of truth. For many years, some illegals from Mexico and Central America and pretty much all of their American born offspring did get free Medicaid. I know that's true, because the government paid me to provide the care. I saw it. No illegals now, but still plenty of second and third and fourth generations manage to be poor enough to qualify. There are definitely ways to game the system. I have people arriving for their kid's free dental treatment in Hummers and brand spanking new pick-up trucks. Not all of them, but enough to know something is fishy.
And....there is a fairly large contingent of Spanish speaking adults in this country who were born here who still can't (or just won't)speak English, which is an unfortunate unintended consequence of bilingual education. I deal with these people very day too.
As for jobs, technology is an equal opportunity job destroyer. All low skill, low education jobs suck, pretty much. And high skilled jobs are something for skilled Americans to fight over with smart, educated H1-B immigrants. It is the corporations who want the H1-B workers. They cost less. Why blame the immigrants...but they're convenient.
There is a definite drain on social services when large numbers of very poor, uneducated refugees are allowed to immigrate into 1st world countries, either legally or illegally. Anybody who can't see that is willfully blind.
And, when such people accumulate to form ethnic enclaves in ghettos, and their children can't get jobs, it leads to crimes of various kinds, against property and against innocent people, and it leads to social unrest.
We have shithole places in the world now. I don't blame anybody for wanting to get out of Syria or sub-Saharan Africa, or even El Salvador. All those shitholes were made into sh itholes by the colonial system of disenfranchisement, corporate take-over of assets, and resource stripping. Now they're getting worse because of climate change and extreme population overshoot.
These problems appear intractable to me. The sh it is literally hitting the fan. No one is going to fix these problems. We could certainly be doing a better, more fair job of taking care of those who need help. But solve the underlying problems? Nah.
“There are no innocents. There are, however, different degrees of responsibility.”
― Stieg Larsson, The Girl Who Played with Fire
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 22, 2018, 10:26:39 pm
🌩 The Power of Fear 🌪
https://youtu.be/29Fotznf9lc
The United States imprisons more people than any other nation, including China and Russia. Over 2.3 million adults are currently in American prisons and jails. Locking up more and more people for longer and longer doesn’t make us safer, yet still the incarceration rate has shot up 500% over the past four decades.
We explore the scope and source of mass incarceration in, Sentencing Reform: Part I – The Power of Fear. It's the first in a forthcoming series that will highlight the symptoms and ultimate solutions to the ongoing mass incarceration epidemic.
To understand the historical roots and ideological underpinnings of Trump’s white supremacist beliefs, Taney’s opinion in the Dred Scott case is a good place to start. Contrary to what most of us are taught in high school civics classes, the case is by no means a relic of the past pertinent only to the institution of slavery. It is also a conduit to the bigotry of the present.
As law professors Jack Balkin of Yale University and Sanford Levinson of the University of Texas wrote in a 2007 article for the Chicago-Kent Law Review, the Dred Scott case remains “relevant to almost every important question of contemporary constitutional theory.” In particular, Balkin and Levinson argue, “The twin questions that Dred Scott posed and answered in 1857—who is an American and to whom does America truly belong—are still with us today.” Trump’s “Make America Great Again” and “America First” slogans and his white-nationalist agenda are the latest iterations of the perennial debate.
SNIPPET 2:
Although Taney’s opinion dealt with slavery, its reasoning is far broader, and directly applicable to the policies and rhetoric of President Trump because of the linkages it draws among race, status, citizenship and community. Echoes of these linkages, as Balkin and Levinson argue, “are still with us whenever we assume that one race is more centrally ‘American’ than others and more clearly and obviously a part of the American people and the American political community.”
For Taney and also, unfortunately, for Trump, America was and remains principally a white nation descended from European immigrants. Substitute “illegal aliens” or DACA “Dreamers” or prospective immigrants from “shithole” countries for the “Negroes” reviled by Taney and you have today’s “others”—the perpetual and dangerous outsiders stigmatized by Trump and his enablers, who should never be admitted to the country or welcomed and embraced as citizens.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 24, 2018, 07:11:56 pm
January 24, 2018
Gerald Horne 🕊 on Trump's 🦀 Racist 🦖, Nativist 1st Year
University of Houston professor and eminent historian Gerald Horne joins us to discuss Donald Trump's first year in office, which has been defined by the same racism and nativism that launched Trump's political career
Gerald Horne 🕊 on Trump's 🦀 Racist 🦖, Nativist 1st Year
University of Houston professor and eminent historian Gerald Horne joins us to discuss Donald Trump's first year in office, which has been defined by the same racism and nativism that launched Trump's political career
https://youtu.be/UVVdl0BnOCo
Quote
Dr. Gerald Horne holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston. His research has addressed issues of racism in a variety of relations involving labor, politics, civil rights, international relations and war. Dr. Horne has also written extensively about the film industry. His latest book is The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America. Dr. Horne received his Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and his J.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and his B.A. from Princeton University.
After New Trump 🦀 Demand for $25 Billion Wall, Lawmaker Fires Back
Sunday, January 28, 2018
By Jon Queally, Common Dreams | Report
SNIPPET:
Following an immigration deal🦖 (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2F2z6in9g.gif&hash=771b084a0f186d9cc14f31defd98a6c90b69b84f) put forth by the Trump administration 🦀 late Thursday -- one which demands $25 billion for a wall and another $5 billion for increased militarization of the border -- progressives said the proposal was "dead on arrival," nothing but a "racist ransom note," and Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) suggested it would be "far cheaper to erect a 50-foot concrete statue of a middle finger and point it towards Latin America."
The Reality Oprah Helped Us Create: Disempowering People From Changing an Unjust Society
Thursday, February 01, 2018
By Alison Rose Levy, Truthout | Op-Ed
SNIPPET:
Despite being an important role model for women in general and women of color, it's ironic that far from modeling effective ways to protect democracy, for years prior to the current rise of the #MeToo movement, Winfrey encouraged her audience to ignore mounting inequity, and instead to buy into the three most famous self-help truisms, promoted by her and many of her guests:
1. "You create your own reality." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fmemecrunch.com%2Fmeme%2F5L3XX%2Fspiderman-bullshit-detector%2Fimage.jpg%3Fw%3D544%26amp%3Bc%3D1&hash=4825835b92337d62f61a3d37d282105e97ac3ee3)
2. "You can't change anything outside of yourself."(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-191017140758.jpeg&hash=8c0a35a928dcda3c1a8714ab03f4924a1a775851)
3. "The only thing you can control is your response to it."(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817121829.png&hash=035f25ddb6d065f1533ce03c1c07f5fddcbbc83c)
Winfrey was certainly not alone in promoting these beliefs. Jane Roberts, Wayne Dyer, Rhonda Byrne, who authored The Secret (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.desismileys.com%2Fsmileys%2Fdesismileys_6961.gif&hash=df13f27d25fd180bcc904f19809e2b35dc3309cf) , and Tony Robbins were other proponents. In the US, many middle-class women have internalizedthese beliefs (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Fgen152.gif&hash=d5b10968fe56c4cb95fae17cee3cb420a5f4e2da)-- without ever questioning whom (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pic4ever.com%2Fimages%2Facigar.gif&hash=dc9dccf92c6c88c99611b06c86d92629d69f2978) the beliefs serve, where they come from or whether they bear re-examination given our current political situation.
Rather than modeling how to get out the vote or keep fossil fuels in the ground, Winfrey, et al. encouraged people to focus on intentions for success, love, confidence and weight loss. Once women adopted the belief that we could never hope to change outer reality, then protecting democracy was deemed outside of our control and unworthy of our attention.
Instead, these beliefs urge civic disengagement -- retreat, withdrawal and work on oneself, along with individual entrepreneurship. In a feature story in O Magazine, cited in the book, Age of Oprah: Cultural Icon for the Neoliberal Era, Winfrey told students that, "you cannot blame apartheid, your parents, your circumstances, you are not your circumstances."(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-111214174727.png&hash=a0ea65f844542e4709bd444bd2f70496c434c56b)
Obviously, blame on its own is not that helpful. But teaching people to regard all outer life circumstances as insubstantial discounts socio-economic factors 🦀 🐉🦕 🦖 and replaces them with individualistic bootstrap philosophies (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-280515145049.png&hash=84e87515e750391c1f1bca6d6ae06485972bfa81)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-051113192052.png&hash=93c42ef9f18fc5d9da50fd91fc19f70009f95f85). When self-help author Tony Robbins declares that, "People who succeed at the highest level are not lucky; they're doing something differently than everyone else (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-251117175700.png&hash=00439d30db6e35817ea0d1fbcba614f1f971448e)," he omits education, economic opportunity, health status, debt burden, family responsibilities, social connections, gender, race, and yes, even voting rights, as contributors to (or detractors from) an individual's access to "success." Look into the self-help literature (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-241013183046.jpeg&hash=51c9c4f17e747698c76c65c7c1814eff4f32c400), as I have been doing for a book I am writing, and you will never find these factors acknowledged.
As psychologist James Hillman posited in his book, We've Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy -- And the World is Getting Worse, psychologically based beliefs that emphasize individualism over the societal and the environmental directly contribute to social devolution. His book, which shocked many when it was first published nearly 25 years ago, seems more prescient and accurate today.
Guns Are Just the Tip of the Iceberg When It Comes to US 🦍 Violence
MARK KARLIN, EDITOR OF BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT
SNIPPET:
The cliché for television news is true: "If it bleeds, it leads." That phrase says a lot about our nation's grim fascination with carnage.
Perhaps it is understandable when you consider the premise of Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment. As she establishes in an interview with Truthout, the Second Amendment represents a United States 🐉🦕🦖🦀 built on stolen land and chattel slavery.The means of enforcing these goals, in relation to Indigenous people, were largely through the use of militias armed with guns and the government military:
I would call "massacres and oppression of Indigenous Americans" a government policy of genocide, total war, total ethnic cleansing. The citizens' militias [were] one aspect of that policy; the other was the formal US Army and Marine Corps, which spent the first century of US independence carrying out this project. The role of settler-colonial landowners as voluntary militias in initiating massacres to drive Native communities out and seize their land was acted out as "individual rights (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6)".
As for Black chattel slavery, Dunbar-Ortiz asserts:
By the mid-1700s, the plantation agricultural system was agribusiness and made up the primary source of wealth in the new republic. There was no debate about including the individual right to bear arms and form militias in inscribing the Second Amendment among the first 10 amendments to the constitution, as these features already existed in the colonies. Colonial citizens' militias already existed, and by time of independence, the slave-owning colonial militias had been transformed into slave patrols.
In short, many of those who worship guns do so as a legacy of how firearms were used to enact violence on two oppressed groups essential to the growth of the United States. Guns were and are a representation of a nation built upon the violence of white supremacy, as land was bloodily seized from Indigenous people, and as enslaved people were kept in bondage by militias with guns.
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.clker.com%2Fcliparts%2Fc%2F8%2Ff%2F8%2F11949865511933397169thumbs_up_nathan_eady_01.svg.hi.png&hash=599691109af22b33f1d59dd61eb97448a9427020)
Learn about NRA Hypocrisy and also the REAL HISTORY of How and Why the Second Amendment was Added to the Constitution
Feb. 20, 2018 3:30 pm
By Thom Hartmann
https://youtu.be/5cYHu36NFj8
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on February 27, 2018, 04:02:55 pm
FEB 25, 2018 TD ORIGINALS
Guns and Liberty
Quote
Gun ownership in the United States, largely criminalized for poor people of color, is a potent tool of oppression. It does not protect us from tyranny. It is an instrument of tyranny.
By Chris Hedges (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
SNIPPET 1:
American violence 🦀 has always been primarilyvigilante 🐉🦕🦖 violence. It is a product of the colonial militias; the U.S. Army, which carried out campaigns of genocide against Native Americans; slave patrols; hired mercenaries and gunslingers; the Pinkerton and Baldwin-Felts detective agencies; gangs of strikebreakers; the Iron and Coal Police; company militias; the American Legion veterans of World War I who attacked union agitators; the White Citizens’ Council; the White League, the Knights of the White Camellia; and the Ku Klux Klan, which controlled some states. These vigilante groups carried out atrocities, mostly against people of color and radicals, within our borders that later characterized our savage subjugation of the Philippines, interventions in Latin America, the wars in Korea and Vietnam and our current debacles in the Middle East. Gen. Jacob H. Smith summed up American attitudes about wholesale violence in the Philippines when he ordered his troops to turn the island of Samar, defended by Filipino insurgents, into “a howling wilderness.”
Mass culture and most historians do not acknowledge the patterns of violence that have played out over and over since the founding of the nation. This historical amnesia blinds us to the endemic violence that defines our culture and is encoded in our national myth. As historian Richard Slotkin writes in “Regeneration Through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier 1600-1860,” the first of his three magisterial works on violence in American society, our Jacksonian form of democracy was defined by “the western man-on-the-make, the speculator, and the wildcat banker; [in a time] when racist irrationalism and a falsely conceived economics prolonged and intensified slavery in the teeth of American democratic idealism; and when men like Davy Crockett became national heroes by defining national aspirations in terms of so many bears destroyed, so much land preempted, so many trees hacked down, so many Indians and Mexicans dead in the dust.”
SNIPPET 2:
The Second Amendment, as Dunbar-Ortiz 🕊 makes clear in her book, was never about protecting individual freedom. It was about codifying white vigilante violence (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) into law (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6).
“The elephant in the room in these debates has long been what the armed militias of the Second Amendment were to be used for,” Dunbar-Ortiz writes. “The kind of militias and gun rights of the Second Amendment had long existed in the colonies and were expected to continue fulfilling two primary roles in the United States: destroying Native communities in the armed march to possess the continent, and brutally subjugating the enslaved African population. …”
Clashes Erupt as White Supremacist Richard Spencer Speaks at Michigan State University
The white supremacist Richard Spencer (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) spoke at Michigan State University after defeating a campaign against his appearance. The Rev. David Alexander Bullock 🕊 of Change Agent Consortium says that Spencer shouldn't be given a platform to recruit for a violent, racist movement
"The Alt-Right 👹 Is Killing People," SPLC Report Documents😠
Thursday, 05 April 2018 06:31
BILL BERKOWITZ FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT
SNIPPET:
Over the past several months, news about the white nationalist/alt-right, no longer seems to draw the attention of the mainstream media. Nevertheless, as the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Keegan Hankes and Alex Amend pointed out in its recent report titled "The Alt-Right Is Killing People" there have been over 100 people killed or injured by alleged perpetrators influenced by the so-called alt-right.
"[T]here have been at least 13 alt-right related fatal episodes, leaving 43 dead and more than 60 injured," the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) reported. "Nine of the 12 incidents counted here occurred in 2017 alone, making last year the most violent year for the movement."
Original caption: "Memphis, Tennessee. An unidentified woman has difficulty holding back her tears as she watches the casket of slain civil-rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., put aboard a plane for transport to his home in Atlanta, Georgia." Bettmann / Getty
One of the last pictures to be taken of Martin Luther King Jr., as he spoke to a mass rally in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 3, 1968, saying he would not halt his plans for a massive demonstration scheduled for April 8 in spite of a federal injunction. Bettmann / Getty
People stand near a destroyed and burned-out building on 14th Street and Kenyon Street in northwest Washington on April 6, 1968. Darrell C. Crain / D.C. Public Library Specials Collections / AP
More than 2,000 paratroopers of the 82nd Airborne Division were flown into Washington, D.C., on April 6, 1968, to augment the federal and national guard units already on duty in riot-torn sections of the city. # Bettmann / Getty
Coretta Scott King, the widow of Martin Luther King Jr., walks on the arm of Dr. Ralph Abernathy, her husband's successor as head of the Southern Christian Leadership conference, leading about 10,000 people in a memorial march in King's honor. The King children—Yolanda, Martin III, and Dexter—are at left with Harry Belafonte. Reverend Andrew Young marches next to Dr. Abernathy. Bettmann / Getty
Rows of Pennsylvania national guardsmen march down the street and sidewalks clearing the area in Pittsburgh's Hill District on April 8, 1968. Residents lean from windows watching the show of force. The guardsmen were called out to restore order following three days of arson and looting in the district. AP
Firemen gather around a fire engine near the intersection of 14th and Irving Streets in Washington, D.C., on April 6, 1968, following rioting after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. # Darrell C. Crain / D.C. Public Library Specials Collections / AP
A soldier and civilians walk near a destroyed newsstand at 14th and Kenyon Streets in northwest Washington, D.C., on April 6, 1968, following rioting after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. # Darrell C. Crain / D.C. Public Library Specials Collections / AP
President Johnson called federal troops into the nation's capital to restore peace after a day of arson, looting, and violence on April 5, 1968. Here, a trooper stands guard in the street as another (left) patrols a completely demolished building. # Bettmann / Getty
When it comes time for Trump to call in Federal Troops to restore order he will probably authorize the use of tactical nuclear weapons.
Hyperbole. President Trump is an American citizen with a family and desires like the rest of us.
Hate or dislike him all you wish, he certainly is a controversial person but he is one of us, a fellow citizen elected our president by fellow citizens who rejected the status quo of career politicians and their never ending lies bull s h i t and lining of their own pockets.
Golden Oxen, Your "history in photographs" is, to put it as charitably as I can, rather selective. If you had been objective, you would have shown pictures of Hoover smirking about MLK Jr.'s death. FBI Hoover had him assasinated. THAT is the correct perspective to the history you portray.
No, I do not expect you to respond respectfully. But I wish that, rather than hurl some sarcasm at me or lash out in your typical ad hominem fashion, you would accept this post as constructive criticism.
It really bothers me that you shot yourself in the foot, and probably your family's heart, by voting for an unrepentant enemy of the environment.
We all require a viable biosphere to survive in this valley of tears. I just do not get it, GO. You are smarter than that. Can you hate so much that you are willing to see everyhing you hold dear in this biosphere be increasingly insulted just so Trump remains in power? That does not make any sense at all.
Your Trump🦍 hero (By the way,how does it feel to see Trump🐵depicted the SAME WAY 🦍 you often depicted Obama? My depiction is ACCURATE, unlike yours, because it applies to his polices, not his race.) makes Lyndon B. Johnson look like a saint.
Shame on you for voting for that profit over people and planet TOOL of the Fossil Fuel Fascists.
Here is some recent history that you, due to your blind pro-Trump prejudice, REFUSE to pay any attention to whatsover. It's a simple fact that you cannot handle the truth of the irrefutable damage Trump and his wrecking crew are doing to our environment, never mind our politics.
RE is correct to call you out on your consistent lack of objectivity. Yet, you refuse to acknowledge how you went out of your way to trash Obama, including many derogatory comments aimed squarely at his race.
Yeah, Obama is man I will agree was, and still is, a tool of the oligarchs. Obama's policies were the fascist war-up; Trump is the MAIN EVENT!
As far as policies that endanger the health and welfare of you and yours, Obama was a piker compared to Trump (see the evidence below).
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2018, 06:24:09 pm
APR 05, 2018 ARTICLES
The Truth About Martin Luther King's Assassination
Snippet:
The last step is to invert the legacies of these once prophets into the polar opposite of who they actually were. The rich kill first, then they own narratives. They do so through propaganda and institutional disinformation. It goes back to money and power, professors pass along lies because they don’t want to lose their jobs, politicians dare not speak against deception if they want to keep their seats and media personalities swallow their tongues or else risk getting blackballed. An implicit agreement is thus arrived at. It is better to pass along lies than to challenge accepted untruths. Those who find the courage to say “the emperor has no clothes on” and speak against the lies of the system are immediately labeled kooks and marginalized. If they speak up too loudly and garner a bit too much of a following, they might end up getting the Lumumba treatment.
There are two ways the legacies of murdered prophets are inverted. One is to lionize them as I noted above and turn them into mythical legends.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2018, 06:42:06 pm
Golden Oxen, Your "history in photographs" is, to put it as charitably as I can, rather selective. If you had been objective, you would have shown pictures of Hoover smirking about MLK Jr.'s death. FBI Hoover had him assasinated. THAT is the correct perspective to the history you portray.
No, I do not expect you to respond respectfully. But I wish that, rather than hurl some sarcasm at me or lash out in your typical ad hominem fashion, you would accept this post as constructive criticism.
It really bothers me that you shot yourself in the foot, and probably your family's heart, by voting for an unrepentant enemy of the environment.
We all require a viable biosphere to survive in this valley of tears. I just do not get it, GO. You are smarter than that. Can you hate so much that you are willing to see everyhing you hold dear in this biosphere be increasingly insulted just so Trump remains in power? That does not make any sense at all.
Your Trump 🦍 hero (By the way,how does it feel to see Trump 🐵 depicted the SAME WAY 🦍 you often depicted Obama? My depiction is ACCURATE, unlike yours, because it applies to his polices, not his race.) makes Lyndon B. Johnson look like a saint.
Shame on you for voting for that profit over people and planet TOOL of the Fossil Fuel Fascists.
Here is some recent history that you, due to your blind pro-Trump prejudice, REFUSE to pay any attention to whatsover. It's a simple fact that you cannot handle the truth of the irrefutable damage Trump and his wrecking crew are doing to our environment, never mind our politics.
RE is correct to call you out on your consistent lack of objectivity. Yet, you refuse to acknowledge how you went out of your way to trash Obama, including many derogatory comments aimed squarely at his race.
Yeah, Obama is man I will agree was, and still is, a tool of the oligarchs. Obama's policies were the fascist war-up; Trump is the MAIN EVENT!
You Kind Sir, and your pal RE are the ones who cannot handle the truth.
Palloy has made that point abundantly clear, as has Ashvin. Both your pseudo science and lack of objectivity in all maters has been made abundantly clear. You are merely another hater with your leftist agenda, and god forbid anything or anyone get in it's way, no matter what the accuracy.
I have told you repeatedly that I did note vote for Trump and am a supporter of the Paul family. Yet you continue to pursue your hate, me hate Trump agenda. Lie about my vote as well.
So be it. Continue weeping and moaning and crying about Trump and fossil fuels destroying life on the planet as you drive away to the supermarket in your Camry Anthony, full of hate for others and love of yourself because you are so wonderful and good and planet loving.
I shall continue to laugh and smirk to myself at your absurd lies, falsehoods, and hate filled attacks against people who do not agree with you as well as your lack of knowledge and ability to deal with facts, shown for all to see, who can see, by your banning of Palloy. He does make a complete fool of you with his every objective analysis of your pseudo science postings that are in error, so at least I understand your shame. Ashvin exposed you falsehoods as well.
Remember to Antoine, it was millions upon millions of our fellow citizens that put our President in the White House, not GO. Have a pleasant Sunday afternoon Anthony, spring has arrived. GO (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-141113185701.png&hash=615e3c1aa9c374cb1eab5bfc1e9494f2cb05e9f7)
Your post is a blatant Ad hominem attack on my person and a groundless attack on much of the material I have posted on. I have reported it and request that the above post be deleted. Have a nice day.
Quote
Proverbs 29 New King James Version (NKJV) 29:1 He who is often rebuked, and hardens his neck, Will suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.
Agelbert NOTE: The above is a repost from the Doomstead Diner. I place it here to give readers an idea of how thoroughly propagandized and intractable these Trumpers are. As you can see, the repsonse is as much abuse and vitriol as they can come up with until they finish off with some nauseating swaggering saccharin sarcasm at the end.
Oh play nice. It's the Lord's Day, you Christians behave.
GO, I'd rather look at XXXX than have to see so many grinning visages of the President that Twitter and Reality TV gave us.
GO knows pictures of Trumpovetsky make the Diners puke, so he puts them up just to be annoying. He's been doing that since before he got elected, when he was stumping for him.
RE
Yep. GO got tired of trying to get my goat with Nicole Foss grinning pictures after a few years. But, he has picked up with Trump pictures where he left off.
As Da Presidente would say, SAD! (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-220216203149.gif&hash=bd184b6edccce4045e246847a0c84e89bd5a18b6)
As a courtesy to AG, RE, and Eddie I am removing the posting you gents find so offensive.
Understand please from my point of view Eddie and company, I would rather look at and listen to a camel taking a good healthy **** at the local zoo than listening to and reading your hate filled disrespectful fallacious diatribes against our President and contempt towards our citizens who elected him.
May I please request you afford me the same consideration and STFU! Thanks GO
Posting removed by GO as a courtesy to certain fellow Diners.
hate filled disrespectful fallacious diatribes against our my President
Fixed that for you.
Your POTUS, not ours. You never acknowledged Obama-sama as your President. You just spit hatred at him. At Hillary & Bill too. So now we get to return the favor. Payback is a B I T C H.
White Supremacy and Capitalism Are Deeply Entangled With the Colonial Slave Trade
Gerald Horne, Monthly Review Press: The United States may have declared its independence from Britain in 1776, but it was from England and other European powers that the breakaway colonies inherited an evil that was of fundamental significance to its future: slavery. This excerpt of The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism describes how the US is still experiencing that ruinous legacy today.
Read the Book Excerpt (http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/44287-white-supremacy-and-capitalism-are-deeply-entangled-with-the-colonial-slave-trade)
“Two centuries ago, a former European colony decided to catch up with Europe. It succeeded so well that the United States of America became a monster, in which the taints, the sickness and the inhumanity of Europe have grown to appalling dimensions”
Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 28, 2018, 09:41:33 pm
From Starbucks to Waffle House: American Society Devalues Black Lives
By Sonali Kolhatkar
SNIPPET:
Had the Waffle House shooting suspect been Muslim or black or both, we would likely have seen the word “terrorism” bandied about from the very start in both major media outlets and on President Trump’s Twitter feed. From Trump’s refusal to address the incident and considering how little speculation has occurred in the media questioning the motives of this white anti-government perpetrator in his targeting of black and brown folk, we can only conclude that there are racial double standards permeating our society, making necessary the assertion that Black Lives need to Matter. Reinking 👹 would have slaughtered many more people had he not been stopped by James Shaw Jr. 🕊, an African-American. Were Shaw an armed white man who used his gun to stop Reinking, there might have been no end to the political hay that Trump and the National Rifle Association would have made of the scenario. Instead, there has been a deafening silence from the outspoken president on Shaw, whose life-risking actions contradict the NRA’s favorite fantasy scenario of a “good guy with a gun.” But none of this should surprise us, as neither Trump nor the NRA have demonstrated any real respect for Black Lives.
The other Waffle House incident, which took place in the neighboring state of Alabama on the same day as the Antioch shooting, offered up yet more evidence of anti-black racism with the incredibly disturbing arrest of Chikesia Clemons by multiple male police officers 🦍🦍🦍🦍 late at night. 😠
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 30, 2018, 08:43:04 pm
Truthdig
APR 29, 2018TD ORIGINALS
The Crime of Being Poor and Black >:(
By Chris Hedges
SNIPPET:
Mervilus is 6 feet tall and broad-shouldered and has long, thick dreads. He was never in a gang. He was not a drug dealer. He had a job. He came from a good and loving family. But he was cursed with being black and poor and living in a city, Elizabeth, N.J., where if you are black and poor you are always one step away from being arbitrarily shot or arrested or tossed into jail. This is true in nearly every city in America.
There are cops in poor communities who hunt black boys and men as if they are prey. To them it is a sport. These cops are not always white, although they are often white. But they are always sadists. Intoxicated by the power to instill fear, use lethal force indiscriminately and destroy lives—and allowed to do so by a judicial system that no longer protects the most basic rights of the poor, including due process, adequate legal representation and the right to a jury trial—they circle around their victims like human vultures. If we were to use the strict dictionary definition, these police officers are criminals.
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418200416.png&hash=15d789b29124aa5a1f1ea397ce630913734b20a4)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 21, 2018, 07:31:22 pm
Agelbert NOTE: This article should be required reading EVERY YEAR from the third grade on up to the senior year in high school. Students should be tested on this knowledge yearly as well.
NO student should be allowed to have a high scool degree unless they accept the scientific truth that race is a social construct with no purpose except to maliciously marginalize some for the express purpose of elevating others based on lies and fables.
Truthdig
MAY 20, 2018
The Royal Wedding and the End of Whiteness
By Juan Cole
SNIPPET 1:
Benjamin Franklin was extremely worried about whites being overwhelmed. He said in
“Observations Concerning the Increase of Mankind, Peopling of Countries, etc.” (1751):
Quote
“Which leads me to add one Remark: That the Number of purely white People in the World is proportionably very small. All Africa is black or tawny. Asia chiefly tawny. America (exclusive of the new Comers) wholly so. And in Europe, the Spaniards, Italians, French, Russians and Swedes, are generally of what we call a swarthy Complexion; as are the Germans also, the Saxons only excepted, who with the English, make the principal Body of White People on the Face of the Earth. I could wish their Numbers were increased.”
So get this.Some of the eighteenth century founding fathers only thought English and Danish people were white. Even Swedes and Germans were “swarthy.” French certainly were. So Franklin would not have considered me white, since my family is French and German. We’re swarthy. We do have some Scottish, but if the Swedish are swarthy I suspect he thought the Scottish were, too. Since Coulter🐍 is in part Irish and German, Ben Franklin wouldn’t have accepted her as white, either, and was worried about the German part of her family acting like barbarians and interfering in elections. You can only imagine what he would have thought of German grifters like Donald Trump’s🦀grandfather 😈.
SNIPPET 2:
But “whiteness” is an illusion. Because the crowned heads of Europe intermarried over centuries and because Spanish nobility was in the mix, and because in turn Spaniards and other southwestern Europeans are up to 20% North African in heritage as well as having substantial genetic endowments from Jews and various other Muslim peoples, not to mention Phoenicians and sub-saharan Africans– actually all European royal families have been mixed-race for a very long time. In fact, some genealogists allege that Prince Harry is descended from the Prophet Muhammad the residual category of “white”. . . was used [in the early 20th century) by working class Catholics in a desperate bid to distinguish themselves from Latinos and African-Americans. But really. Why are Italian-Americans from Sicily “white” in America, but people from Latin America whose ancestors lived in Catalonia are “brown”? In the medieval era, for a while, both Catalonia and Sicily were in the same country, ruled by the crown of Aragon!
The popular press in America is confused about such issues because many writers do not realize that there is no such thing as race in the 19th century biological sense. You have 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 16 great-grandparents, and by the time you get back to 1400 you have a million ancestors. For someone who hails from Europe, how likely is it that none of them were Arabs and Berbers from southern Spain who had been forced to convert and then married Catholics?
Europe’s population in 1400 was only 78 million or so and [each modern is] descended from a million of them. And Arabs in southern Spain were in turn intermarried with Berbers and Africans. After 50 generations (a generation is 24 years), most of the world’s genes get shared around. Everyone in the Mediterranean basin shares common ancestors from only a few thousand years ago, including Tunisians and Egyptians and Spanish and Italians. The claim about Prince Harry and Muhammad is a little bit of a trick, since most contemporary Europeans are probably descended from Muhammad.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on May 30, 2018, 09:38:39 pm
Agelbert NOTE:Great discussion of the history of policing. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
The Limits of Police Reform: The Origins and Ends of the Police
May 30, 2018
Alex Vitale talks about his new book “The End of Policing,” which casts a skeptical eye on the liberal calls for police reform, and calls for us to stop asking police to solve a wide variety of social problems
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 05, 2018, 07:45:37 pm
Truthdig
JUN 03, 2018TD ORIGINALS
The Second Sight of W.E.B. Du Bois
By Chris Hedges
SNIPPET:
Quote
“But what on earth is whiteness that one should so desire it?” Du Bois asked. “Then always, somehow, some way, silently but clearly, I am given to understand that whiteness is the ownership of the earth forever and ever, Amen!”
“It is curious to see America, the United States, looking on herself, first, as a sort of natural peacemaker, then as a moral protagonist in this terrible time,” he wrote. “No nation is less fitted for this role. For two or more centuries America has marched proudly in the van of human hatred—making bonfires of human flesh and laughing at them hideously, and making the insulting of millions more than a matter of dislike—rather a great religion, a world-war cry: Up white, down black; to your tents, O white folk, and world war with black and parti-colored mongrel beasts.”
Hi David, Have always been fascinated by the Amish.
While knowing nothing about the mechanics you are posting about, all my instincts tell me that the Amish are probably very well equipped to deal with the kind of Doom I expect, mainly a financial event that causes much hardship.
They will manage with empty supermarket shelves, no gas or rationed gas, no autos and Uber, as well as a dark boob tube and it's endless sporting events for the dim Colosseum crowd.
... You could split hairs that they can function in their way only because they are cocooned in a functional society that has the money to purchase from them but is rich enough to demand very little from them. ...
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) You took the words right out of my mouth. And no, I do not think that is simply spliting hairs. There is another group (pacifist German immigrants) in the USA that has the same priviliged existence. I don't remember the name of the group but they were always exempted from the military draft, along with the Amish and the Mennonites. The Mennonites are similar, but not exactly the same as the Amish.
Quote
The original difference in opinion came in 1693, when Jacob Ammann, a Swiss Anabaptist leader, felt that the church leaders were not holding to strict separation from the world and that spiritual renewal was needed. Ammann did not believe that the ban, or shunning, was being practiced as it should be. He separated from the Swiss Brethren segment of the Anabaptists over this issue and his followers were nicknamed “Amish.”
Ammann enforced more separatist ways upon his followers, and today some practices among the Amish include: untrimmed beards and hooks and eyes in place of buttons on outer garments of the men; horse and buggy transportation; horse-drawn implements for farming; plain and distinctive dress patterns; no electricity in homes.
However, most contemporary Mennonites are not outwardly that different from any person you meet on the street, and in fact live in countries around the world with a wide variety of ethnic backgrounds. Mennonites believe in simple living, but express that simplicity in a spirit of stewardship and awareness of the needs of others rather than completely separating from society as the Amish continue to do.
These religious communities also have another privilege that few Americans know about. They have a legal justification for not paying into Social Security. They are not required to have Social Security taxes withheld from their wages. Long ago, they established in Civil Court that, because their religion requires that all be cared for, no matter the age, and no matter whether employed or not, their society group does not require a government sponsored pension system. They are technically right, but the Social Security System has other functions that these pacifists should not be exempt from paying into.
To destroy the cohesion of any one of these communites, including the Amish, all you have to do is engage in corrupt US Government style eminent domain land grabs, as was done to the Native Americans long ago.
The Cherokees had an excellent, fully functional and independent community in Georgia, far exceeding anything the Amish, Mennonites or the other groups mentioned have ever accomplished, yet the government deliberately did not prosecute white poachers and criminals of all sorts that attacked them routinely. The "Trail of Tears" we all know about from the bastard Andrew Jackson was just the end of a LONG series of land grabs and other assorted clever attacks by Georgia whites.
The problem I have with these Amish good people, who I admire greatly, is that they will not go to bat for poor people outside their community or victims of racism either. The Amish (and the other groups mentioned) will not allow outsiders of color to become part of their communities.
Perhaps they are smart enough to know that this country would eliminate all their privileges in a hearbeat if they weren't 100% white. If that is so, then they are being realistic and practical, not religious or even worthy of praise for their "independent" life style.
Maybe God is protecting them, but I think it is their skin color that is protecting them, not God.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 13, 2018, 06:18:08 pm
Incarceration Nation: How US Political Prisoners Live in Hellish Conditions 😨
June 13, 2018
The US has 5% of the world’s population but 25% of its prisoners. TRNN’s Ben Norton speaks with Nino Brown, of the Jericho Movement and ANSWER Coalition, who says American political prisoners are ignored, while they try to survive on dirty water
Story Transcript
BEN NORTON: It’s The Real News. I’m Ben Norton.
I’m here with the organizer Nino Brown. He organizes in the Boston area with a few different groups, including the ANSWER Coalition and Jericho. Jericho is a movement to free political prisoners in the U.S. And here we’re going to talk about the state of political prisoners in the United States. Frequently when we hear about political prisoners, media outlets talk about them as if they only exist in other countries, and as if the U.S., which has 25 percent of the world’s prisoners but 5 percent of the world’s population, we-, the impression is that we don’t have political prisoners. Of course, that’s not true. There are political prisoners from the Black Power movement who are still incarcerated after decades, from the Native American movement, and from other movements. So we’re going to talk today with Nino about some of the organizing around freeing political prisoners. Thanks for joining us, Nino.
NINO BROWN: Glad to be here.
BEN NORTON: So can you just talk about the state of political prisoners in the United States?
NINO BROWN: Well, currently I think, as you said, the United States has dozens of political prisoners that are, they’ve been incarcerated primarily because of their beliefs. They go against American capitalism, white supremacy, patriarcy, what have you. And they’re really soldiers from a past era movement. The Black Power movement, American Indian movement, Chicano movement, and so on and so forth. So today we have movements like Jericho that are trying to rekindle the general movement, consciousness around political prisoners, because we still have to deal with the fact that we have only 5 percent of the world’s population but 25 percent of the world’s incarcerated.
And those who are incarcerated from the past large social upheaval, we have just gems of knowledge, you know, important people to the movements and communities just rotting behind cages all because they chose to challenge American power, capitalism, racism, patriarchy, such as Mumia Abu-Jamal, Leonard Peltier. Most recently Red Fawn. She was an indigenous woman who was entrapped by the FBI during the Standing Rock movement. So we have not only political prisoners who are, you know, older, elders, but we have new political prisoners entering the United States prison system every year.
BEN NORTON: Yeah. And The Real News, in fact, we work with Eddie Conway. He frequently, you know, produces shows and hosts for us here at The Real News. He was himself an incarcerated political prisoner for decades. Can you also talk about some of, some of the recently released prisoners like Herman Bell, and others who are still incarcerated, specifically from the black liberation movement?
NINO BROWN: So, we still have-. Well, recently, Herman Bell came out and was being harangued around the conditions of his release. About two, three years ago Sekou Odinga came out, was released. But we still have Jalil Muntaqim, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and many others from the Black Power movements that are still incarcerated.
And there are others in the broader social movements that we don’t hear about, like the past, Weather Underground, like David Gilbert. However, the list of new political prisoners, that’s yet to be, not explicated, but just itemized, you know. So I consider folks who were involved in the anti-Trump protests, who are facing charges, some of whom are incarcerated, as political prisoners. I may not know all their names, but the conditions of why they were incarcerated is inherently political because they chose to take a stand against what they see to be a rising fascist government movement. So-.
BEN NORTON: This is a reference to the J20 protest on January 20 of last year, 2017. There were more than 200 protesters who were all just rounded up, kettled by cops, and all charged with a variety of charges. Some of, some of, some major felonies that could have led to decades in prison. Some of the prisoners have had their, some of the detainees have had their charges thrown out. But there are still dozens more, and the trials are ongoing, with almost no media coverage. I think what’s fascinating as a journalist is we have all these corporate media outlets that have rebranded in the age of Trump as part of the Resistance, as anti-Trump. The Washington Post has “Democracy Dies in Darkness” on the top of its newspaper. But they have no interest in these activists who put their bodies on the line to protest Trump at the inauguration, and in some cases faced decades in prison.
NINO BROWN: Exactly right. So we’re trying to do with Jericho is really expand what do we mean by political prisoners, in addition to highlight the fact that the United States is not an exceptional nation, where it can point and wag its finger at other countries for having political prisoners, when they have prisoners right here in the United States. I know in Massachusetts we have several friends who are friends of Jericho who are facing repression inside prisons just for speaking up around their basic basic human rights and conditions of life.
BEN NORTON: Let’s talk more about this, because what’s interesting is there are two narratives, I think, that need to be debunked. One, that the U.S. doesn’t have political prisoners. But two, also that the conditions that these people are under are somehow humane. I mean, we’re talking about absolutely horrific, inhumane conditions that violate international law in every single way. Can you talk about some of the conditions that some of these prisoners in Massachusetts are forced to live under?
NINO BROWN: So an example that Jericho is really focusing on now is the prison in Norfolk. MCI Norfolk. So this is the same prison that Malcolm X went to when he was Detroit Red, a criminal, gangster, et cetera, and transformed his life, became Malcolm X. And fast forward to today. In 2011, all the state environmental agencies said that the water filtration system in Norfolk was defunct. And you know, the president said we’re going to fix it, we’re going to change it. 2017. Nothing has happened. The Boston Globe put out an exposé of what was going on in the prison after the prisoners began to agitate, organize around their own conditions, and expose the system, expose the prison system, for its inhumane treatment of them.
So what the prisoners are being subjected to is being, they’re drinking black-, are forced to drink and bathe in black and brown water, sometimes gray, that has high levels of [magnes], iron, and other harmful chemicals. [/b]All the while while these prisons are forced to labor, to work, otherwise they face the hole, solitary confinement. Another medieval form of torture, I would say. All the while they train these guard dogs, who are drinking clean, bottled water.
So here we have a clear example of just a gross violation of human rights where prisoners who are, you know, workers, a part of the working class, predominantly black or brown, agitating around their own conditions just to get clean water, and are being thrown into the hole, are being repressed. Some of our friends have written letters to them and had our letters intercepted.
BEN NORTON: That says everything. You-, it’s the symbol of that. You have human beings who are incarcerated, who can’t get clean water, but dogs, dogs that are being trained, get better quality water. Get water bottles. It just shows the priority.
NINO BROWN: Yeah, I mean, the United States doesn’t have, really, a priority over human life, period. Particularly when it comes to political prisoners, just because their, I think their existence and their fight pokes holes at the narrative of U.S. exceptionalism, or the fact that we have, or the idea that we have some sort of democratic system. I would say it’s more oligarchical. It’s more of an oligarchy with democratic trappings. But I think you’re exactly right. This is why we’re out here demanding that the prisons have clean, potable drinking water. Moreover, they have their visitation rights returned to them. There has been a shift to lower the number of visitors you can have and create more loopholes for prisoners to interact with their families, in addition to higher charges for calling in.
This is all on top of the fact that the prisons are outside of Boston, outside of the city. So not too many families have the resources to travel all the way to MCI Norfolk on a weekly basis just to engage in basic human interaction with their families.
BEN NORTON: Yeah, and let’s talk more about this. This is a huge racket. It doesn’t get much media coverage. You’re talking about how private corporations are profiting from providing, you know, food and other resources that should be provided but are not adequately provided to incarcerated people. So you know, you have companies that, where you can buy chips and other kinds of food, and they’re charging astronomical prices. We also have calls that are charged ridiculous rates per minute, and these incarcerated folks, their families and loved ones, have to raise large sums of money so that their incarcerated loved ones can try to get access to some food and some calls while corporations make a lot of money off of this.
NINO BROWN: Yeah. I mean, recently we tried to, we helped to start a campaign called the Deeper the Water campaign. One of our friends, Tim, he’s formerly incarcerated in MCI Norfolk. And once he got out, hit the ground running to organize to get clean water to his friends in prison in MCI Norfolk. So we organized a campaign to flood the canteen, to raise money so that the prisoners can buy the water in prison directly themselves. And you know, it seems a basic, you know, basic measure. However, once we started to do that, the prisoners who were buying the water inside with the money that we were able to send to them, they were being targeted for repression, you know, because the guards see a threat. And you know, when they see that people care about you on the outside, in that, you know, you still have some of your humanity left, and are still going to struggle, that’s a threat to them. It’s a threat to their profits, because they’ll be exposed in all sorts of lawsuits.
But I think exactly right, you hit the nail on the head in terms of how do they maintain the system. It’s a system of super exploitation and super profits. So you have the prisoners working for a dollar, two dollars, maybe, on top of being charged for purchasing things inside of the prison with their own money. And the recreational activities are not subsidized by the state, but they’re subsidized by the taxes that they levy off of these prisoners. So you have prisoners carrying the burden of their own incarceration financially, on top of families already being strained by this downward spiral of capitalism to provide resources to their loved ones in prison.
BEN NORTON: And then finally, I want to come to a conclusion here, but I want to take a step back and just talk about the prison-industrial complex in this country. And we both stress this, but again, the U.S. has 5 percent of the world’s population, and 25 percent of incarcerated people on this planet. It’s just, just baffling to think of that parallel. And this is, this problem you’re talking about is not isolated to just Massachusetts. This is a problem everywhere, and it’s not just for incarcerated citizens. This is equally true for undocumented folks who are being forced into these facilities. They’re increasingly privatized.
So there’s a lot we can talk about, but I’m wondering if you can just wrap up here just reflecting on how the, how we should think about the American prison-industrial complex, American exceptionalism, and maybe you can even throw in, like, the war on drugs. Because many of these folks who are incarcerated, it’s not even necessarily for violent crimes. It’s for folks who were involved in trading drugs, or buying or using drugs. And we have this war on drugs that has led to a massive influx in this problem.
NINO BROWN: Yeah. I mean, I’ll start there with the, with the war on drugs. You know, it’s not a war on drugs. Drugs have continued to proliferate in our society to such a degree that we have, you know, such things as the opioid crisis. Drugs are still being used in prisons themselves, being used as weapons of war for these prison guards. So that whole veneer of a war on drugs is just that. An illusion. It’s really a war on, undeclared war, on black, indigenous, poor working class people, Chicano people, Latino people. And the way that they frame it as being around crime, it just distracts from the, from the focus, from the content of this being about social control. You know, that there was a counter-revolution following the radical ’60s and ’70s that saw, saw the need to suppress this radical, this radical uprising from the black population, from Latino populations, oppressed people generally. And prisons provide the perfect mechanism to maintain that social control in working class communities, but moreover to bolster capitalism, right.
So as we see globalization in the 1980s, and the really, the birth of neoliberalism, where production goes global, right, there’s this false notion that production has just disappeared. And it actually hasn’t. It’s shifted into prisons where prisoners are making anything from Nintendo 64 cartridges, to furniture, to things for Starbucks. You know, belt buckles. So it’s a way for them, for the capitalists 🦀 💵 🎩 😈 👹 to super exploit prison labor while at the same time maintaining social control and pacification over the oppressed communities, whether it be through recidivism, militarized policing in the communities that these incarcerated folks come from. It’s really just a way to control labor, but also to make super profits, all the while claiming to be fighting drugs, claim to be fighting crime, and so on and so forth.
BEN NORTON: We’re going to take a pause here for our conversation. I’m here with Nino Brown. Nino’s an organizer with the ANSWER Coalition and Jericho. In the second part we’re going to continue our discussion on the prison-industrial complex in the United States.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on June 17, 2018, 09:05:25 pm
Rattling the Bars: More Arrests (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df) And Jail Time (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183337.bmp&hash=fd5a6df63c32bd65dda7b6d93e788647ca3829df)
June 17, 2018
Executive Producer Eddie Conway uncovers why more arrests are not resulting in safer making communities. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
https://youtu.be/jFQoXXmPAxo
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 04, 2018, 01:58:41 pm
Militarizing US Schools and Society Only Creates More Gun Violence and Police Brutality
July 4, 2018
TRNN’s Ben Norton continues his discussion with Boston teacher Nino Brown, of the ANSWER Coalition, on the links between US militarism, gun violence, and police brutality. Nino Brown argues militarizing schools and more heavily arming cops will only make the problem worse
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 09, 2018, 08:18:45 pm
Agelbert NOTE: Scholar Judy Klass tells it like it is. My hat is off to her for this expert accurate analysis of the inexcusable actions by Trump 🦀 and his wrecking crew (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c).
Quote
How do you think history will look at the Trump administration's policy of separating families at the border and putting children in what could be called concentration camps? Judy Klass (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf), Truman Scholar, D.Phil Political Science/Latin American Studies, bookish wonk
Answered Jun 26, 2018
Hyperbole is dangerous. It’s true that even Godwin has said that thoughtful, well-informed people might compare Trump ‘s rhetoric with Hitler’s without looking ridiculous via Godwin’s Law — and after all, Trump’s rhetoric since he launched his campaign has been all about scapegoating the Other, and may well be modeled on the rhetoric that brought Hitler to power.
Donald Trump 'kept book of Adolf Hitler's speeches in his bedside cabinet and may have read it for inspiration'
But it’s tricky to talk about concentration camps. It bothers me when the internment camps in which Japanese Americans were held during World War II, as awful and unjust and un-American as they were, are called concentration camps — because for most people, concentration camp = death camp. It means Auschwitz. (Or “Holocaust Centers,” as Sean Spicer might say.) There are rotten, dehumanizing prisons for civilians in many places, but not many where huge numbers of people of all ages are gassed to death, their bodies then burned in crematoria. That was unusual. I’d only compare a few things to that: the Killing Fields of Pol Pot in Cambodia, what the Serbian Christians did to Bosnian Muslims at Srebenica over the course of a few days in the 1990s — the ugliest and most genocidal impulses that people have.
The internment camps that Japanese Americans were forced to live in may be a better analogy for the camps that the Trump administration now plans for parents and children who come here seeking asylum. (Those internment camps are the one thing that a lot of people condemn FDR for — and the only thing about FDR that Trump has talked about admiringly.) And there are crummy facilities for refugees all over the world.
The policy of separating children at the border that’s been in place for months — that’s kind of its own thing. Abusing refugee children to penalize their parents … I hadn’t quite heard of that one before. That’s something kind of distinctive and new that will be remembered about this administration. History will view it as being of a piece with numerous Trump era policies: framing various vulnerable minority groups as the dangerous “invading,” “infesting” Other; casually lying as smoothly as Hitler did and with the same gusto; appealing to people’s lizard brains and basest impulses; incompetent and incoherent policies that do as much harm accidentally as the few well-organized policies do intentionally … it’s of a piece with allowing 4,600 Americans to die in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria and lying wildly about the numbers. It’s of a piece with mocking a Gold Star family because they are Muslim. It’s as ugly and incoherent and unjustifiable as the travel ban that the Supreme Court has now upheld. And so on.
Sessions and Trump and Nielsen and Huckabee Sanders — they can prevaricate and say oh, blame Democrats, blame the courts, this has been the policy all along, but it’s a policy John Kelly and Stephen Miller and Jefferson Beauregard Sessions came up with and put in place, and Miller and Sessions have acknowledged as much in the past. Under Obama, if a family turned themselves in at the border, the parent would be given a court date for the misdemeanor — and there was often someone they knew that they all could stay with until then, and most of the time they’d show up for their hearing, and if they were considered a flight risk, the parent could wear an ankle bracelet. That cost a little money, but not the thousands we’re now paying every day for each parent and child housed separately — and, soon, possibly housed together, indefinitely. It’s a waste of tax-payer dollars on an unnecessary policy because the system was working before and there were few crimes committed by those released on their own recognizance.
The Trump administration implemented this jarringly cruel policy of separating children from parents with no good system for keeping track of both, no long-term plan for how to reunite them, and now they have no clear plan for the changed policy they’ve announced … it’s wasteful, mean-spirited incompetence tinged with racism, all the way down the line.
That’s what history will remember about this policy and about this administration in general: no thought, no care, just the petulant, impulsive wrecking of long-standing policies and treaties that have been painstakingly assembled and were working well, casual violations of human rights, and cruelty for its own sake — again and again.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on July 20, 2018, 12:35:31 pm
Bodies of 95 black forced-labor prisoners from Jim Crow era unearthed in Sugar Land after one man's quest
By Meagan Flynn / The Washington Post Jul 18, 2018
Today the city of Sugar Land is a sprawling suburb southwest of Houston, home to Imperial Sugar Co., shopping malls and endless cul-de-sacs. ... But, more than a century ago, it was a sprawling network of sugar cane plantations and prison camps. Sugar Land was better known then as the Hellhole on the Brazos. From sun up to sun down, convicts who were leased by the state to plantation owners toiled in the fields chopping sugar cane sometimes until they "dropped dead in their tracks," as the State Convention of Colored Men of Texas complained in 1883.
In modern-day Sugar Land it was all easy to forget - but not for one man named Reggie Moore, who couldn't stop thinking about it. ... Moore started researching Sugar Land's slavery and convict-leasing history after spending time working as a prison guard at one of Texas's oldest prisons, but his curiosity evolved into obsession. He had a hunch. Based on what he learned, he believed that the bodies of former slaves and black prisoners were still buried in Sugar Land's backyard. He focused his attention on a site called the Imperial State Prison Farm, the one that bore the name of the country's premier sugar company.
For 19 years he searched for their bodies, stopping just short of sticking a shovel in the dirt himself. ... "I felt like I had to be a voice for the voiceless," said Moore, who is African American. ... This week, his quest produced results. ... At the former Imperial State Prison Farm site, archaeologists have unearthed an entire plot of precise rectangular graves for 95 souls, each buried 2 to 5 feet beneath the soil in nearly disintegrated pinewood caskets. The 19th century cemetery was unmarked, with no vestige of its existence visible from the surface.
And it was almost "truly lost to history," archaeologist Reign Clark of Goshawk Environmental Consulting told The Washington Post. ... The graves were found, really, by accident. The local Fort Bend Independent School District began construction on a new school at the former prison site in October. Then in February, a backhoe operator happened to see something jutting out of the dirt. He thought it was a human bone. ....
Just about the best book I've read in the last few years was "Slavery by Another Name." It was written by Douglas Blackmon, who at the time was the Atlanta bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal. He is now at the University of Virginia.
-- -- -- --
https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB120674340028272915
BOOKS EXCERPT
A Different Kind of Slavery
After Abolition, Forced Labor Thrived in South; Helping Rebuild Atlanta
By Douglas A. Blackmon
Updated March 29, 2008 12:01 a.m. ET
A Different Kind of Slavery
At the center of a massive new real-estate development in Atlanta, an $18 million monument designed to honor 2,000 years of human achievement is nearing completion. When it opens this summer, a museum inside the Millennium Gate also will pay special tribute to the accomplishments and philanthropy of some of the founding families of modern Atlanta. Organizers say plans for the exhibit don't include one overlooked aspect of two of the city's post-Civil War leaders: the extensive use of thousands of forced black laborers. The builders of the 73-foot archway say the museum is too small to convey every aspect of the city's founders and that it's appropriate to focus on the positive aspects of these men. In this adaptation from his new book, "Slavery by Another Name," Douglas A. Blackmon, Atlanta bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal, chronicles how companies owned by these two men used forced labor to help rebuild Atlanta -- a practice that was widespread through the South.
Millions of bricks used to make the sidewalks and streets of Atlanta's oldest neighborhoods -- many of them still in use today -- came from a factory owned by James W. English, the city's former mayor, and operated almost entirely with black forced laborers. Many had been convicted of frivolous or manufactured crimes and then leased by the city to Mr. English's company, Chattahoochee Brick Co.
Between the Emancipation Proclamation and the beginning of World War II, millions of African-Americans were compelled into or lived under the shadow of the South's new forms of coerced labor. Under laws enacted specifically to intimidate blacks, tens of thousands were arbitrarily detained, hit with high fines and charged with the costs of their arrests. With no means to pay such debts, prisoners were sold into coal mines, lumber camps, brickyards, railroad construction crews and plantations. Others were simply seized by southern landowners and pressed into years of involuntary servitude.
At the turn of the 20th century, at least 3,464 African-American men and 130 women lived in forced labor camps in Georgia, according to a 1905 report by the federal Commissioner of Labor.
-- -- -- --
https://millercenter.org/experts/douglas-blackmon
DOUGLAS BLACKMON Director of Public Programs, Executive Producer of American Forum
Douglas A. Blackmon is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II , and co-executive producer of the acclaimed PBS documentary of the same name. He is also executive producer and host of American Forum, a public affairs program produced by the University of Virginia’s Miller Center and aired on more than 200 public television affiliates across the U.S.
His book, a searing examination of how the enslavement of African-Americans persisted deep into the 20th Century, was awarded the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction. The Slavery by Another Name documentary was broadcast in February 2012 and attracted an audience of 4.8 million viewers. Slavery by Another Name grew out of his 2001 article on slave labor in The Wall Street Journal. It revealed the use of forced labor by dozens of U.S. corporations and commercial interests in coal mines, timber camps, factories, and farms in cities and states across the South, beginning after the Civil War and continuing until the beginning of World War II.
Blackmon was the longtime chief of The Wall Street Journal’s Atlanta bureau and the paper’s Senior National Correspondent, and was a contributing editor at the Washington Post. He has written about or directed coverage of some of the most pivotal stories in American life, including the election of President Barack Obama, the rise of the tea party movement, and the BP oil spill. Overseeing coverage of 11 southeastern states for the Journal, he and his team of reporters were responsible for the Journal’s acclaimed coverage of Hurricane Katrina and the failed federal response after that disaster; the Journal’s investigation into the training and preparations of the 9/11 hijackers in Florida; immigration; poverty; politics; and daily reporting on more than 2,500 corporations based in the region.
As a writer and editor at large, Blackmon led the Journal’s coverage of the tea party and the final hours before the BP oil spill—for which he and a team of other Journal writers were finalists for the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Investigative Reporting. Those stories received a Gerald Loeb Award in June 2011.
https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142112480
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 09, 2018, 11:33:14 am
Brett Kavanaugh (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) is a Threat to Racial Justice and Voting Rights
BY Marjorie Cohn Truthout
PUBLISHED September 8, 2018
SNIPPET:
Quote
Hirono quoted an email in which Kavanaugh wrote, “I think the testimony needs to make clear that any program targeting Native Hawaiians as a group is subject to strict scrutiny and of questionable validity under the Constitution.”
That email was one of tens of thousands of documents the GOP-led Senate Judiciary Committee had marked “committee confidential” in an unprecedented attempt to hide them from the public. By releasing that email, Hirono risked censure, discipline or removal from the Senate.
Hirono, who said Kavanaugh’s (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) views on Native Hawaiians are “factually wrong” and incredibly offensive, told the nominee:
full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418200416.png&hash=15d789b29124aa5a1f1ea397ce630913734b20a4)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 27, 2018, 10:48:03 pm
Blasey Ford/Kavanaugh Testimony Exposes Deep Misogyny and Political Divides
September 27, 2018
An emotional day of testimony by Dr. Christine Blasey Ford and Judge Brett Kavanaugh displayed our political partisanship while exposing the raw nerve of sexual assault
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on September 29, 2018, 07:16:56 pm
Quote
🦍 👹 😈 Does anyone actually believe the allegations against Kavanaugh? Isn't it a little fishy that all of a sudden every Republican politician is under fire for things that no one can prove?
MG Berge 👍👍👍, Consultant
Answered Friday, September 28, 2018
Yesterday was a watershed moment for me as a Fat old privileged white man. My suggestion is that you listen carefully and digest before reveling in your partisan thoughts.
First off, I do believe the allegations against Kavanaugh, in part due to Ford’s testimony, in part due to his, but even more so due to my personal realizations. His anger and tears were the emotions of a man caught in a lie. Have patience with me as I tell you a relevant story. It was just over 18 years ago that I met my lovely wife. During our short courtship period, she revealed her traumatic story to me. As a single young mother, several years before we met, she was assaulted in much the same manner as Ford claims. Having just started a new job one month prior, she was encouraged to attend a dinner with a good many co-workers as well as very senior executives in the conference room at a local hotel/convention center. People were laughing and showing off pictures of their families. It seemed to be a good team building moment. At the end of the two-hour event, she has a foggy recollection of being carried upstairs by two of the senior execs, unable to move. Now if you assume she had consumed too much, you would be wrong as she was a competitive bodybuilder/fitness athlete. She did not drink and was obsessive about her diet. Something was put into her water.
Those two senior execs, that had spent a great deal of time showing her pictures of their families and winning her trust, R A P E D HER. She recalls it very clearly. Having two kids to feed, she was worried about her job and struggled to go to work the next day, but she went. Noticing she was distraught, two female co-workers asked and she relayed the incident, whereby she was encouraged to go to the hospital. She did so only after finishing the day's work as she was afraid of losing her job. The police came, she was photographed (there were many marks) and in the end, she did not press charges. WHY? Again, she was afraid of losing her job and she knew that she would be condemned, not the senior execs. There were kids to feed.
I was certainly compassionate when I heard the story, but it just did not really register on me. Then we have yesterday. I had the TV on to the news (mostly for noise) while I worked in my home office. I had not one inkling that this hearing should have an effect on my wife. Oh, but did it have an effect. Ms. Ford’s testimony had my wife transfixed, it brought everything back for her as if the event in question was yesterday. How in the sam hell could I be so blind, so inconsiderate and stupid?
The answer to the how is that I am one of the guilty, that being a privileged old white man. No, I have never assaulted or **** anyone, far from it, but I certainly have been callous to women's rights. I laughed at the life-sized Wile E Coyote doll in the trophy case of the team house. One arm cut off and a name tape across the chest and a spare silly looking hat on its head. It was a trophy that some worked hard to win, though I will let you all imagine how. I have told jokes at women's expense and unconsciously looked at women in the workplace as playing only a supporting role. I have bought into the sexual objectification of women as promoted by TV/print advertising as well as Hollywood and the conservative culture I grew up in. I was taught that us men were proper and conservative when in reality we were selfish p r i c k s.
Last night I realized my gross stupidity but it took the suffering of my wife watching this entire sordid affair to do so. I feel horrible.
The whole confirmation/Republican/Democrat thing is nothing but bullshit. I was sickened by both Republicans and Democrats yesterday as both used Dr. Ford as nothing but an expendable tool in order to get their way. I often think we have fallen so far, but then again, maybe we have never climbed out of the stinking hole filled with s h i t that we have always been in.
My concept is “when in doubt, throw it out”. 👍 This is a job interview and the Judge is owed nothing. The response should be “Thank you Mr. Kavanaugh, you are impressive but we need to look elsewhere”. There is no shortage of candidates that have no baggage. I am happy that all of this is coming out, painful though it may be. Change is needed and the privileged white guy needs to be taken down a notch or 50.
It is time we start acting like dignified people pulling in a unified direction. This selfishness and tribal mentality will quickly destroy a great nation. We can be better than this!!!!!!!
Edit:
While I am trying to keep up with comments and clarify where I can, it is getting a bit out of my hands, so I thought I would add a couple points here. In regards to women's, rights, I am heartened to see the groundswell of activity and attitude that has occurred over the last several years. Writing the words “women's rights” seems odd to me as those rights should be expected, taken for granted. But they have not been and we are now seeing the results. I say it is about time.
As to Judge Kavanaugh, I have said enough about him already. There are enough words floating around out there professing his guilt or innocence, how this is right or wrong so that I do not need to add any more insight. What I see this being about is full disclosure. Not by Kavanaugh but by all women. There has been so much abuse specifically because us men have not been held accountable. Understandably. most women HAVE BEEN afraid to come forward after an assault.
Even today, my wife does not want anyone to know about her assault. In fact, I am feeling bad about this written story right now and it may have to come down. She is afraid of how it could affect her in the workplace, how it could affect the opinions of friends and family. Embarrassed, ashamed, scared or maybe just fearful of having to continually face the memories are all reasons for staying silent. Then we have the knowledge that for so long, the victim will be held to blame and the assaulter will face no repercussions.
Us men have gotten away with our poor behavior for so long, comfortable in the knowledge that no one will say anything, and if they do we can just deny it. This confirmation process is stoking the fires of anger in many, many women. They are sharing their story, opening the floodgates. Doing this by many will change the calculation. When aggressors realize it will be much harder to get away with poor behavior, there will be less poor behavior to try and get away with.
To be sure, there will be collateral damage, impacts to undeserving men, it is inevitable. Maybe that collateral damage will be to Kavanaugh, maybe to me. If so, that's fine as everything good in life comes at a cost.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 16, 2018, 06:46:06 pm
As Far Right 🦍👹 Marches in London, UK Teachers Organize Against Racism (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132422-1693180.gif&hash=8bc43ce7ebff6fb3a70224434834524068d3583c)
October 15, 2018
Educators gathered in Leeds to share strategies on how to combat growing racism, xenophobia and and Islamophobia across the UK
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on October 31, 2018, 08:28:21 pm
After White Supremacist Terror, Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F809_84688966.jpeg&hash=7f3e84eea23fef901b7df618784dc2005290f591) Doubles Down from Birthright to the Border
October 30, 2018
In the aftermath of a spate of white supremacist violence from Florida to Kentucky to Pittsburgh, President Trump is ramping up nativism and xenophobia. The U.S. is deploying up to 14,000 troops to the U.S.-Mexico border, purportedly in response to a caravan of Central American asylum seekers. Trump also says he might revoke birthright citizenship for the babies of non-citizens. We are joined by historian Gerald Horne of the University of Houston
https://youtu.be/zN6NgDLSno0
Story Transcript
AARON MATE: It’s The Real News. I’m Aaron Mate.
From pipe bombs in the mail, to the killing of two black shoppers in Kentucky, to the synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh, the U.S. is grappling with yet a new round of white supremacist terror. But in the aftermath of this incident, and just days before the midterms, President Trump is ramping up the nativism and xenophobia that has stoked white supremacists. First, on Monday, federal officials announced plans to send 5,200 active duty troops to the U.S.-Mexico border in response to a caravan of Central American asylum seekers fleeing violence in dire conditions at home.
SPEAKER: Our message to the organizers and participants of this caravan is simple: As the President and Secretary Nielsen have made clear, we will not allow a large group to enter the United States in an unsafe and unlawful manner. For those that seek to cross the border illegally. We will apprehend them and fully enforce the laws of the United States. For those that seek to make an asylum claim safely and lawfully in a port of entry, the governor of Mexico has already offered you protection and employment authorization. If you are fleeing alleged persecution at home, you have arrived at a safe place to make your claim.
AARON MATE: According to Newsweek, the size of the U.S. force on the border could top 14,000. This comes amid reports that Trump is mulling executive actions to shut down border entry entirely, and even suspend habeas corpus, which grants detainees the right to appear before a judge.
Then on Tuesday, Trump announced yet another potential executive action. Speaking to AXIOS, Trump said he might revoke birthright citizenship for babies of noncitizens and undocumented immigrants.
DONALD TRUMP: Now they’re saying I can do it just with an executive order. Now, how ridiculous- we’re the only country in the world where a person comes in, has a baby, and the baby is essentially a citizen of the United States for 85 years with all of those benefits. It’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And it has to end.
REPORTER: Have you talked about that with counsel?
DONALD TRUMP: Yeah, I have.
REPORTER: So where in the process is-
DONALD TRUMP: It’s in the process. It’ll happen. With an executive order. That’s what you’re talking about, right?
Yeah, that’s exactly what I was talking about.
That’s very interesting. I didn’t think anybody knew that but me. I thought I was the only one.
AARON MATE: Joining me to discuss Trump’s latest anti-immigrant actions is Gerald Horne, historian and professor of history and African-American studies at the University of Houston. Welcome, Dr. Horne. Let me ask you first about this latest announcement from Trump today about birthright citizenship. Do you think that he even has the constitutional authority to end birthright citizenship for noncitizens? And if he doesn’t, then as a historian, what do you make of what he’s doing here?
GERALD HORNE: Apparently he does not have the authority to end birthright citizenship via an executive order. That is the impression I got from the words not only of Speaker Paul Ryan, but also from a survey of a number of leading constitutional scholars.
Having said that, we all know that the Republicans have packed the courts, the federal courts, in recent months and years. And many of these federal judges owe a debt of gratitude to the Republicans and Mr. Trump personally for him placing them on the court. And so it’s possible that there could be a wildcard federal judge, and certainly a wildcard Supreme Court, that could pass on that. I doubt it. But we’re in a different age right now. It’s obvious that many of our liberal friends have miscalculated when they overestimated the democratic potential nature of the United States of America, and the Bill of Rights, particularly. And I’m afraid to say that many of us are going to pay the price for that miscalculation.
AARON MATE: As a historian, when you hear Trump speak like this, what historical parallels come up for you? I’ll just say for myself that my thought today was I was recalling how the Nazis, back when they were formulating their own so-called racial purification laws, that they looked to the United States for inspiration.
GERALD HORNE: That’s true. There’s been a good deal of scholarship with regard to that, particularly how the Nazis looked the United States for so-called antimiscegenation laws. That is to say, laws in the United States that basically made it verboten for those defined as white to marry those defined as black. Obviously in Germany that was transferred to the German non-Jewish population and the Jewish population.
That is one striking parallel, but of course there are striking parallels from U.S. history itself. We should not forget the fact that when the Ku Klux Klan arose post-1865 in the wake of the U.S. Civil War, in many ways they were the armed wing of the Democratic Party. That is to say, the Democratic Party then being the party of Jim Crow, the party of Dixie. And that kind of terrorism that was inflicted, not least on black people post-1865, we hear echoes at least of that kind of policy in 2018 as enunciated by the present occupant of the White House.
AARON MATE: OK. So you mentioned 1865. So just 13 years later, in 1878, you have the signing of the Posse Comitatus Act, which bars military forces from playing a role in domestic law enforcement. Now there is talk of that being suspended, along with the suspension of habeas corpus, as I mentioned earlier, giving people the right to appear before a judge in this crackdown on the border, with Trump sending thousands of troops there, possibly over 14,000, which is about as many as are in Afghanistan right now.
And yesterday at the White House, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was asked about this, and whether these drastic steps, these suspensions of constitutional protections, is on the table.
REPORTER: Now those are options on the table?
SARAH HUCKABEE SANDERS: Look, I’m not going to get into specific policies that we’re considering. There’s a number of actions that we’re looking at taking. When we’re ready to make an announcement on that front, we’ll let you know.
AARON MATE: That’s Sarah Huckabee Sanders. So Dr. Horne, if Trump is sending thousands of troops to the border, is he violating Posse Comitatus? And would there be a historical parallel for such an infringement, as he’s apparently doing that?
GERALD HORNE: Well, once again I’d have to give a similar response as I gave to the previous question; that is to say, that there is an argument that he is in violation of the law, but there is a counter argument that if he goes before the so-called right judge, that will not matter. It reminds me of what Trump’s lawyer Roy Cohn, the late Roy Cohn, the anticommunist fixer and colleague of Senator Joe McCarthy, once said. When he went into court he didn’t want to know what the law is, he wanted to know who the judge is. And I think that that’s the kind of philosophy that you see taking place with regard to Mr. Trump’s actions.
Secondly, this removal or threat to remove habeas corpus is particularly dangerous. That is a long-standing writ that goes back to England hundreds of years ago which allows a prisoner improperly detained to go before a judge and be released. That suggests that there will be a mass roundup of some sort where people will not be able to go to a federal judge to be released.
And then thirdly, I think you have to look at the fact or the possibility that what Mr. Trump is saying is a desperate electoral gambit. That is to say, the midterm elections are taking place on Tuesday. There are polls that suggest that the Republicans will lose the House. More to the point, the Houston papers in particular are talking about a Beto bump; that is to say, senatorial candidate Beto O’Rourke, who’s running against incumbent Ted Cruz. He’s behind in the polls. But the so-called Beto bump might wipe out Republican Congressman Will Hurd, a former CIA analyst who is now in the Congress. He’s running against a very strong Democratic candidate who is expected to benefit from the Beto bump. And it’s possible that Mr. Trump is trying to prevent other Beto bumps by ginning up the right-wing base, particularly in southern Texas.
AARON MATE: So in terms of these threats to all these basic rights, now, there is a growing fear that this is not just being done to target undocumented people, but this is also part of a process that wants to gin up fear in order to justify cracking down on dissent on progressives at home, working people, to crush strikes. And I’m wondering, in this context, to what extent is the historical crackdown on working people, the crushing of unions- a huge theme especially in the 20th century- how has that contributed to what we’re seeing today, and actually to the appeal and the power of white supremacy across the country?
GERALD HORNE: Well, I couldn’t have asked a better question myself. One of the things I’ve been stressing in recent days, months, and indeed, years, is that you cannot underestimate the potency of the Red Scare, which not least routed progressive labor. I oftentimes cite the case of Harry Bridges, the leader of West Coast Longshore, who led the San Francisco General Strike of 1934. Happened to be born in Melbourne, Australia. And therefore it led to repeated efforts not only to deport him, but to weaken his progressive leadership. The Union, the International Longshore and Warehouseman’s Union, had to spent a pretty penny out of its treasury in order to keep their leader from being deported. I could also cite the case of Ferdinand Smith, a black Jamaican who was number two in the National Maritime Union, who actually was deported in the early 1950s, which led to the demolishing, virtually, of the National Maritime Union, which he led, turning ships into floating slums.
That also led to a devastation of political education which has been particularly harmful to the working class. Particularly, I would say, those working-class voters who were seduced and [traduced] into voting for Mr. Trump in places like Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, et cetera. And it created an overall atmosphere of backwardness whereby the class question was downgraded, which inevitably lead like a seesaw to the rising of ultra right-wing white nationalism, which you just saw manifested in Pittsburgh, not least.
AARON MATE: I want to go to a clip of some of the xenophobia and chauvinism that has stoked by the media. Because it’s not just Trump, it’s also his allies on Fox News, especially. So I want to go to Lou Dobbs speaking recently on his show on the Fox Business Network.
LOU DOBBS: The fear is, to be clear, the fear is that some of them are radical Islamist terrorists that have intermingled with this group of Central Americans. A further fear is that many of the, you know, so many of these, these migrants from Central America, frankly, are radical left-wingers. Their leaders are left-wing party members, for crying out loud, out of Honduras. This is- and no one other than the President at this point, we- you know, I keep expecting to hear Chuck Schumer Nancy Pelosi express their concern for America. But with a caravan that seems to be doubling every few days in size, they have said nothing.
AARON MATE: So that’s Lou Dobbs speaking on the Fox Business Channel about the migrant caravan comprised of hundreds of people fleeing violence and persecution in Central America. Dr. Horne, As we wrap, where do you rate this moment right now in history, in terms of the level of white supremacy and chauvinism we’re seeing being mainstreamed across the country? And if you have any comments on what Lou Dobbs said there, and especially about the role that that’s stoking fear of immigrants has played in a historical context.
GERALD HORNE: Well, obviously Lou Dobbs is introducing a canard when he’s speaking about so-called Middle Easterners who are part of this caravan of hope, which is making its way through Mexico as we speak. I find it also striking that the speaker in waiting, Kevin McCarthy, has demonized Jewish billionaires such as George Soros, Michael Bloomberg, Tom Steyer, who’s leading the struggle to impeach Mr. Trump; and deleted his tweet demonizing them, but the stain still remains. Note as well that the New York Times just reported this morning that a leading executive of Campbell’s Soup Company was recently ousted because he singled out George Soros as financing this caravan that’s heading North. That is to say, like Kevin McCarthy, helping to whip up the kind of anti-Semitism that you saw recently manifested in Pittsburgh.
I would say this is a particularly dangerous moment, because unlike previous dangerous moments we don’t have the necessary kind of international solidarity that the black liberation movement, for example, enjoyed for decades, but does not necessarily enjoy today. That means that the ultra right-wing white nationalists have wind in their sails as a result, and our climb as a result will be uphill, I’m afraid. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185038-1647640.gif&hash=2ef54cdc4f328b2b5315f424b6c41978252e8e49)
AARON MATE: We’ll leave it there. Gerald Horne, historian, professor of history and African-American studies at the University of Houston, thanks very much.
GERALD HORNE: Thank you.
AARON MATE: And thank you for joining us on The Real News.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 13, 2018, 09:38:38 pm
Vote Recount in Georgia and Florida Defined by Racism and Voter Suppression (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418201722.png&hash=5299cc10ee42beae76e4d3b7c79dbf5f4c0addac)
November 13, 2018
A new political movement is born in the South in the wake of Trump and Republicans’ efforts to stop vote recounts. Democracy is on trial
https://youtu.be/h5Q-7cJzPY4
Story Transcript
MARC STEINER: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Marc Steiner.
This election is not really over, especially in places like Georgia and Florida. And given the history of this nation that’s not surprising Georgia House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, the Democratic candidate for governor, is facing off with Republican Brian Kemp, who is- or was, until the other day- Secretary of State in the state of Georgia. Part of the responsibility of that office is to oversee voter registration and elections. Kemp, whose ads while running against Abrams show him wielding a shotgun next to his pickup truck, has a political history, penchant, and strategy of voter suppression. He purged more than 1.5 million- that’s 10.6 percent of all registered voters- between 2016 and 2018. He carries on the grand old tradition in Georgia that dates back from the end of the Civil War to ensure that black people do not get to vote. As an example, Kemp put on hold the voter registration of 53,000 people, 70 percent of them African Americans.
The race between Abrams and Kemp is razor thin. If he falls below 50.1 percent of the vote, there has to be a special election. Kemp declared victory and is trying to get Abrams to concede, saying there’s a liberal conspiracy to deny him victory. And in Florida, the home of the hanging chad, made famous in the 2000 Gore v. Bush battle for the U.S. presidency, a recount has been ordered in both the race for the United States Senate between Governor Rick Scott and sitting Senator Bill Nelson, and in the race for governor between Congressman Ron DeSantis and Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum. The courts ordered the recount of eight million ballots by this Thursday. The larger metropolitan areas and communities like Broward County say they cannot possibly make that deadline of Thursday for the recount. It’s impossible; too many people. However, if they don’t, then all those votes- the majority of which might go to Andrew Gillum- for one, may not be counted at all.
And to top it all off, Trump has weighed in, saying and tweeting, quote, the Florida election should be called in favor of Rick Scott and Ron DeSantis, because large numbers of new ballots showed up out of nowhere- which, by the way, is a bald-faced lie. And then went on to tweet and say many ballots are missing or forged; another lie. And it goes on to say, tweet, an honest vote count is no longer possible. Ballots massively infected; must go on with election night results.
So the battle is on between the legacy of the Confederacy, slavery, and violence, and the forces of a new progressive South which could possibly be on the verge of electing the first black governors since Reconstruction, and the first black woman governor in the history of this country; and all this is coming now as no surprise.
Gerald Horne holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston; a frequent guest and contributor here on The Real News. And Gerald, welcome. Good to have you with us.
GERALD HORNE: Thank you for inviting me.
MARC STEINER: So, Gerald, let’s just take this from the top, here. The state of Georgia and Florida, and these recounts that are taking place at the moment. Now, what we’re seeing here- I want to start with this. I mean, how deeply do we understand how voter suppression, especially in Georgia, may have played in what’s going on between Kemp and Abrams at this moment?
GERALD HORNE: Well, the Abrams camp- quite correctly, in my opinion- has charged that Brian Kemp, who up until a few days ago was secretary of state of Georgia, and thereby, therefore helping to supervise and administer these elections, was involved in a rather crass and blatant attempt to purge from the voter roles particularly those who were considered to be African American, which would thereby tip the scales in his favor.
As we speak, the struggle consists of this: Stacey Abrams is trying to make sure that if Brian Kemp wins, he wins 50 percent-plus, as opposed to, as it now stands, where he may be below 50 percent. And if that is the case, that he is below 50 percent, that means that there should be a runoff. That is what is at stake as we speak.
Florida is a different kettle of fish. As of now, Rick Scott, the governor, and who you could see as being the agent in charge of these elections as governor, is now in a battle for the U.S. Senate with the 75-year old incumbent Bill Nelson. He has a 0.15 margin of victory as we speak, which automatically means that there will be a recount of some sort. It is apparent, as a judge has suggested, that the Republicans are trying to intimidate the recount process, going after local officials, particularly in Broward County. This campaign has been joined by Senator Marco Rubio, and also by the 45th president of the United States of America, who as you know has a second home in Florida, is very close to the man who is running for governor, and also has a slight lead, that is subject to a runoff- I’m speaking of Ron DeSantis. And according to press reports, Mr. Trump will consider it to be a personal affront and a personal rebuke if Ron DeSantis, in particular, is not dragged across the finish line.
MARC STEINER: I’m going to go- think of the race had happened 2000, when Al Gore, for most people’s consideration, won that race in Florida, but clearly didn’t fight it in the Supreme Court. If, for argument’s sake, Abrams and Gillum lose-and Nelson- lose in these recounts, and they take it to the courts, we have a very different situation in the courts than we did in 2000 in 2018. The courts have shifted right in America. The Supreme Court has shifted right and very conservative in America. If it goes that far, I mean, I’m wondering what you think politically it could set up.
GERALD HORNE: Well, you are correct to suggest that Mr. Trump has appointed a number of Supreme Court justices; Mr. Kavanaugh most recently. He’s appointed a record number of federal district court judges and federal appellate judges. That is true. However, I do feel that Ms. Abrams has attained some victories in the courts, and we should not rule out the possibility that she can attain further victories.
I agree with your supposition that Al Gore did the Democratic party no favors when he failed to challenge aggressively the recount in Florida in the year 2000 that led to George W. Bush being president. And I would say the same thing for John Kerry in 2004, where he could have challenged the result aggressively in the state of Ohio. We are now paying a very stiff penalty and price for their lack of aggressiveness.
MARC STEINER: To Florida for a moment, as we work our back up to Georgia. One of the things that I have been reading this morning in the papers is that Broward County, other counties that probably would lean for Gillum and lean for Nelson, most likely, are saying we need more time. We have too many voters here. We have too many ballots to count. It cannot be done by Thursday. So it’s clear that they’re being set up for failure, it seems to me, and being set up to ensure a Republican win.
GERALD HORNE: I do not disagree with what you say. Not only that, but consider what happened on election day approximately a week ago. If you went to voting precincts and voting sites in the center of Georgia, for example the area around Morehouse College, Spelman College, the historically black campuses, you would have found long lines, you would have found voting machines that did not work precisely, not to mention not perfectly. However, if you had gone to some of the more conservative areas in the state of Georgia, such as Macon, or heading southward towards the Florida state line, you would not have encountered such a problem. Obviously that tips the scales in favor of the Republicans, just like the fact that the courts have been impacted by Mr. Trump also tips the scales in favor of Republicans.
MARC STEINER: Now, this race is very tight, and Kemp has been- Brian Kemp has been after Abrams and her work since the beginning with the new Georgia Voters Project that he took to court, tried to stop them from registering voters. He has banned people, one estimate is 1.5 million voters over a four year period; 35,000 more before this election started. And so I’m curious, I mean, this is- you know, Georgia has a history here. Georgia has a history of voter suppression, from the end of the Confederacy on. And it just seems to rear its head in whatever fashion or form it takes given the historical moment. So the battle in Georgia, to me, is indicative of a much larger battle that we’re facing. But it really is very intense in Georgia.
GERALD HORNE: I think you’re on to something. There’s a battle for small ‘d’ democracy. The battle was tipped in the favor of the right wing when a few years ago the U.S. Supreme Court, led by Supreme Court Justice John Roberts, the chief justice, ripped the heart out of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Fundamentally, as per the Voting Rights Act of 1965, until the Shelby decision that the Roberts Court helped to ram through, if a state like Georgia, which had a long-demonstrated record of racism and white supremacy in terms of keeping people away from the polls, if they made changes in terms of how many voting machines would be cited in a particular precinct, this had to be pre-cleared, so to speak, by the U.S. Justice Department. After the Roberts-engineered decision, preclearance went out of the window. And in its wake you saw a number of states move to have voter ID laws. For example, in the state of Texas, from where I’m speaking now, the legislature tried to have a voter ID law where a college ID was deemed not to be acceptable as a voter ID, but a hunting license was deemed to be acceptable, with the premise being that students might be prone to vote for the opponents of the Republicans, and hunters might be prone to vote for the Republicans.
This is the dire state of affairs that we’re encountering, not only in the state of Georgia, but I’m afraid to say all across Dixie.
GERALD HORNE: [Inaudible] said in the Atlantic, if the Georgia race had taken place in another country, say the Republic of Georgia, U.S. media and the U.S. State Department would not have hesitated to question its legitimacy. I mean, and even Jimmy Carter has said similar things, having monitored elections across the globe.
So no matter who ends up winning this in these cases right now in Georgia or Florida, let’s take Georgia again, what does it set up politically if Abrams wins? But what does it set up politically if Abrams is denied the win because of voter suppression? Because it interrupts a whole new political struggle that is also based on the reality that this Georgia race is so close. I mean, we’re talking about Georgia, where a black woman could win- can almost win, or win the governorship. So I’m curious what you think this sets up politically in terms of the struggle in this country.
GERALD HORNE: Well, an Abrams victory would be highly significant. I would even go so far as to say that the Abrams race to this point has been very significant. Recall that in recent elections in the state of Georgia the Democrats have sought to appeal to the mythical suburban swing voters. They have tipped to the right. They ran a relative of President Jimmy Carter; they ran a relative of former conservative Democratic hawk Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia. Both lost spectacularly.
And now you have Stacey Abrams, along with Andrew Gillum in Florida, who are running as true blue progressives. Andrew Gillum has even gone so far as to come out for Medicare for All. He campaigned alongside Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who endorsed him. So they basically helped to blazed a new trail for the Democratic Party in Dixie. So win or lose, it seems to me that the Democrats now have a recipe and a prescription for getting closer to the finish line than they have gotten to this point. Let us hope that they follow the logic of what I’m saying.
MARC STEINER: If you look at the history of this country and the power that the South has played politically in this country from the very founding of this nation, from three fifths of a vote so they can count the people who they had enslaved to ensure that they had political power, to what happened in the civil rights movement of the ’60s, to what this struggle is about now and the form it’s taking at this moment in the South, the fact that you have this progressive mass of people who are who are at least half the population in both states, if not a majority, this is a really different political dynamic for the future. It’s built also around the black struggle in the south via a Gillum and Abrams personifying it in their races. So I just want to take a step further, what this might say for the inside of the Democratic Party, what this says for the continuing struggle in America, for a progressive America, in the face of this kind of real right-wing nationalist pushback embodied in Trump, but actually started much earlier.
GERALD HORNE: Well there is also a message for the GOP, for the Republican Party. I’m not saying that demographics is destiny, but it’s apparent that the Trump recipe of ginning up a white right base, which he did successfully in November 2016, is basically reaching a point of expiration. That is one of the major messages that one can glean not only from the Abrams and Gillum races, but I would say from the results last Tuesday more generally.
I think that there’s a lesson for the progressive movement, as well. That is to say, that oftentimes our friends in the progressive movement have a rather dewy-eyed, overly idealized analysis of the history of this country. They tend to point to the Bill of Rights as being this great leap forward for humanity. Whereas if you look at the Bill of Rights with more careful scrutiny, you’ll find that it was devised without the black population in mind, or it was devised to target the black population, and I would also say the Native American population. That is the import of the ballyhooed Second Amendment, which basically authorized the use of militias to suppress revolts of the enslaved, and uprising by the indigenous population. Therefore I think that the races that we’re talking about in Florida and Texas not only have significance in import for the GOP and for the Democratic Party; it has significance and import as well. For those to the left of the Democratic Party.
MARC STEINER: So I don’t know whether you are or not; my guess is you may not be a betting man. But I’m curious what you think the outcome might be of all this in the next week.
GERALD HORNE: Well, it’s hard to say. If you look closely at the numbers, I think that there is a distinct possibility that a recount a count of absentee ballots and provisional ballots, can drive Brian Kemp’s numbers below 50 percent, causing a runoff which would then allow Stacey Abrams to do a major mobilization and win the gubernatorial race in the state of Georgia. Things in Florida seemingly are different, but I’m rather reluctant to make a prediction and stare into my crystal ball, because we all know about the hanky panky and shenanigans that the Republicans are notorious for in the state of Florida, and they can upset and destabilize the most accurate of prognosticators.
MARC STEINER: It is always a pleasure to have you with us here on The Real News. I really enjoy your thoughts and hearing what you had to say about all this. I appreciate your time.
GERALD HORNE: Thank you.
MARC STEINER: And I’m Marc Steiner here for The Real News Network. Clearly we’re going to stay on top of this one. Take care.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 16, 2018, 02:19:35 pm
Agelbert NOTE: Eddie is a closte racist that pretends to be objective. He loves to post propaganda while claiming he "isn't racist or right wing". He is BOTH. He is a also a very clever LIAR. Peoplel ike Eddie are stalking horses for Fascism and the worst aspects of human greed and racism while presenting themselves as "objective, caring" individuals. Learn to spot their BULLSHIT.
I ran across this excellent piece in the Washington Post. It isn't new, but it's timely.It helped me understand how a moron like Trump can come to be President, and be hugely popular among large numbers of people, even though almost everything he does is either ignorant, stupid, or downright mean.
The Post goes to great lengths to make sure people like me have trouble reading them for free or re-posting their stuff on forums, so it would be much easier to read the images, which are huge, if you just follow this link.
If you’ve ever described people as ‘white working class,’ read this
By Max Ehrenfreund and Jeff Guo November 23, 2016 .
The white working class has received enormous attention since Election Day thanks to its critical role in electing Donald Trump the next president. Exit polls show he won this group — defined as white adults over 25 without a four-year degree — by an overwhelming margin of 39 percentage points.
Census data show that 42 percent of American are part of the white working class, bigger than any other single group.
Yet although this demographic acted with surprising uniformity on Election Day — few other groups swung so far toward a particular party's direction since 2012 — it is far from monolithic. And it is certainly doesn't match the stereotype of the rural, blue-collar worker that has often been cited as a typical member of the white working class.
Here are seven key facts about this group that capture how socioeconomically diverse it actually is.
1. The majority of white Americans are working-class, and nearly half have more than a high-school education
The 90 million white adults without a college degree far exceeds the 51 million white adults who have at least a bachelor's degree. Of those without a college degree—the white working class—about 39 million, or 43 percent, have some college or an associate's degree. Another 41 million have only a high-school diploma, and the remaining 9 million do not have a diploma.
White workers without a degree earn more than workers of other races and ethnicities with similar levels of education, according to the bureau.
For instance, the median white worker with only a high-school diploma makes $706 in an ordinary week (compared to a worker with a bachelor's degree, who earns $1,154 a week). Among Latinos, the median worker with only a high-school diploma makes $611 — the same as the median Asian worker in this category. For black workers with only a high-school education, the figure is $578.
A significant number of people in the white working class are either unemployed or not looking for work. Among men between the ages of 25 and 54 — prime working age — only about 79 percent are working; another 5 percent are unemployed, and 16 percent are not working or looking for a job, according to an analysis by The Washington Post.
In contrast, 93 percent of white men with a four-year college degree are working. The pattern is similar for women.
2. They live in cities and suburbs, not primarily in rural America
While it is true that the white working class outnumbers white graduates in rural America — and the election did highlight a huge urban-versus-rural divide — many of them also live in and around cities.
A Post analysis of Census data shows that there are 62 million working-class white adults living in the metropolitan footprint of a large city with a population of over 250,000. There are just 37 million white adults with bachelor's degrees living in these metropolitan areas.
Many working-class whites might live in outlying counties, but their neighborhoods are still intimately connected with the economic and social life of the nearby city. Metropolitan areas are defined as regions in which at least a quarter of a county's population commutes to the city or elsewhere in the metropolitan area for work.
Trump campaigned on promises to restore employment in factories and the manufacturing sector through aggressive negotiation on international trade. Yet not that many members of the white working class work traditional manufacturing jobs. Most of them are employed in white-collar or service occupations, according to the Brookings Institution.
According to a Post analysis of Census data, white workers with less than a four-year degree most commonly hold jobs as store managers, cashiers, salespeople and administrative assistants. Many work in food service as servers or cooks. Some are nurses. There are a number of blue-collar workers in trades outside of manufacturing, such as trucking and construction.
White workers who do have bachelor's degrees are more likely to be teachers, accountants and lawyers.
A study published last year by economists Anne Case and Angus Deaton focused national attention on opioid abuse among the white working class. The study showed that the number of white Americans with no more than a high-school diploma dying from poisonings, including drug overdoses, increased five-fold from 1999 to 2013.
These numbers are troubling, but opioid use remains relatively rare among the white working class despite the increase.
Only about 2 percent of white respondents between the ages of 25 and 54 without a bachelor's degree use heroin or prescription painkillers not for medical purposes, according to a Post analysis of a Department of Health and Human Services survey. About half as many whites with a degree used these drugs.
Marijuana is more popular, especially among the white working class. About 11 percent of respondents without a bachelor's degree reported getting high at least once in the past month. The figure was 7 percent among white respondents with a degree.
Alcoholism is also a greater danger among the white working class. Those with no more than a high-school diploma are nearly six times more likely to die of chronic cirrhosis of the liver than those with at least a bachelor's degree, Case and Deaton report.
Again, however, these figures might be more representative of the few who seriously abuse alcohol than of the white-working class as a whole. The Post's analysis also shows that those both with and without a bachelor's degree report drinking about nine or 10 days out of the month. Respondents without a bachelor's degree are somewhat more likely to binge on booze, but the difference is small in the context of the overall population.
While Donald Trump's marital history and crude language were prominent features of the campaign, the white working class doesn't tend to be especially sensitive to these cultural issues as much as traditional conservatives are. On the whole, the white working class attends church about as frequently as the general population, according to the Public Religion Research Institute.
Over the last few decades, members of the white working class have also become less likely to be married. As this chart from economists Shelly Lundberg and Robert A. Pollak shows, marriage rates have fallen for whites without a college degree. About 55 percent of white men and 60 percent of women with no more than a high school diploma are married, compared to about 70 percent of men and women with four-year college degrees.
6. Being white matters to many of them
Members of the white working class identify more strongly with their race. About 40 percent of the white working class said that being white was "very" or "extremely" important to their identity, compared to about 29 percent of whites with four-year college degrees, according to a Post analysis of a January poll from the American National Election Studies project.
The two groups are equally patriotic, however. The same poll showed that, regardless of their educational background, about 70 percent of whites say that being American is "very" or "extremely" important to their identity.
7. They don't believe education will make them better off
Even though data shows that whites without a bachelor's degree earn less, on average, than their more-educated counterparts, many members of the white working class are not hopeful about the power of education to improve their lives.
About 51 percent say that their lives would be no different if they had a four-year college degree, according to a Kaiser Family Foundation/CNN poll. Only 45 percent believed that a bachelor's degree would benefit them. In contrast, 73 percent of the black working class and 74 percent of Hispanic working class said they thought having a four-year college degree would make their lives better.
Overall, members of the white working class say that they're doing okay. When asked if they felt "happy" about their lives, about 79 percent said yes, compared to 87 percent of college-educated whites. There's a happiness gap there, but the majority of the working class — no matter their race or ethnicity — are staying on the sunny side.
Sort of an artificial demographic, doesn't mean much. So artificial it is contrived. Perhaps it is meant to awaken a sleeping giant, a collective consciousness which screams "IF YOU'RE WHITE, YOU'RE ALL RIGHT! ANY OTHER HUE, I DON'T TRUST YOU.
What seems warm an fuzzy with fancy picture and graphs which size themselves to the WAPO column width, fuzzy and full of fun tasty facts that white people love, I'm one of them, I got my fix, may be a very sophisticated chunk of propaganda. It's us against the rest of the world. Our masters want us defined as a glass teat watching 'us' while they play nuclear ping pong to get every last drop of oil they can. To do that they want everybody hating brown people, not with actual racism but with something very close to it. Brown people defined as the rest of the world regardless of color.
Sit back and enjoy the show.
True. I might add that Trump is not now, or ever has been, popular with the anything but a SMALL minority of Americans. The unending mendacity about Trump as a "successful business man" (yeah, as long as he had a salary of $200,000 a year from the time he was 4 years old) and how "clever" he has been to file bankruptcy all those times (stiffing creditors is SO "successful" (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-250718210558.gif&hash=9234ac544277d3924347404eb52489dfe64e3ca4)) in addition to the "brown ain't good" vile propaganda you pointed out, constitutes a constant s h i t storm of mindfuck trying to manipulate people to vote against their economic interests.
EVERY ASS HOLE at the Fed and the banks and the Congress and the Senate and the White House and the Pentagon AND having a CEO position in the top profit over people and planet Corporations in the S&P 500 HAVE COLLEGE PLUS degrees. THESE EDUCATED **** ARE F U C K I N G UP THE PLANET.
To claim that voting goes the way it does in the USA becasue of "education levels" ignores a rather BLATANT FASCIST, RACIST ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM (quite deliberately, I might add) called RIGHT WING ELECTION RIGGING. If elections were not RIGGED to SILENCE the vote of WE-THE-PEOPLE, most who DO NOT have COLLEGE DEGREES, this country would not be in the RIGHT WING FASCIST MESS it is in now.
LDF (Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.), Defend. Educate. Empower.
The midterm election proved that voter suppression is alive and well. Here's a quick overview of what voters encountered in key states where LDF staff and volunteers were on the ground as part of our Prepared to Vote initiative:
Georgia—Voter Registrations Blocked: Before the election, the state attempted to block 53,000 voter registration applications, most of which were from African Americans. On Election Day, voters encountered long lines and malfunctioning voting machines. Some polling places were even changed without notice. Now, over a week after the election, votes for Georgia's next governor are still being recounted.
Alabama—Black Students Denied the Vote: LDF filed a complaint on behalf of four Black college students who were denied the right to vote in Madison County. Across the state, voters encountered barriers to the ballot because of “inactive voter” lists, inaccurate voter registration lists, mismatches between addresses on photo ID and registered addresses, and poorly trained poll workers.
South Carolina—Machines Changing Votes:In Richland County, voters reported that machines were changing their votes. There was only one technician assigned to recalibrate malfunctioning machines for every five polling places, resulting in long wait times during the morning hours.
Texas—Early Voting Cut for Students: Last month, LDF filed a lawsuit on behalf of students at Prairie A&M University who are being disenfranchised by attempts to curtail early voting on campus. On Election Day, Texas voters encountered challenges with malfunctioning or broken machines, polling place changes, and long wait times for public transportation for voters with disabilities.
Barriers to the ballot in these states and others revealed renewed efforts to restrict voters' rights. Our report on the obstacles we encountered (https://www.naacpldf.org/wp-content/uploads/Prepared-to-Vote_2018_VOTE_BULLETIN_PREVIEW_FINAL.pdf) underscores the ongoing impact of voter suppression on racial minorities and the need for greater protections and election reform.
LDF has fought diligently over the past year to defend civil rights, and we will continue to ensure that all voters can exercise their fundamental right to vote. Watch this video to learn more and help us keep fighting with a donation in support of equality.
WATCH NOW (https://vimeo.com/298699385)
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. 40 Rector Street, 5th floor • New York, NY 10006
A brief snapshot of a few of the voting issues the LDF team observed on the ground and learned about on Election Day
SNIPPET:
Quote
TEXAS
In Tarrant and Dallas counties, Texas voters encountered challenges with malfunctioning or broken machines, polling place changes, and long wait times for public transportation for voters with disabilities.
At the Lakeside Recreation Center precinct, voters—most of whom were people of color—were turned away for attempting to vote at the wrong location. The precinct lines changed 😈 from the previous election, but the voters did not receive notice.
In Harris County, long delays in the morning hours at polling sites around the county resulted in a judicial order to extend polling place evening hours at nine locations
READ MORE about ELECTION RIGGING in Alabama, Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, South Carolina AND Missouri: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418201112.png&hash=679f4583d6861313c256e8762c40929af1ac667e)
Our report on the obstacles we encountered (https://www.naacpldf.org/wp-content/uploads/Prepared-to-Vote_2018_VOTE_BULLETIN_PREVIEW_FINAL.pdf)
Quote
Democracy Defended, our full report on the 2018 midterm elections, which will also include an analysis of pre-Election Day voter suppression activities, is forthcoming.
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. 40 Rector Street, 5th floor • New York, NY 10006
Agelbert NOTE: A more appropriate title for the forthcoming LDF full report would be "Democracy Destroyed" or "Democracy Attacked".
Response to the above irrefutable evidence of REPUBLICAN FASCIST ELECTION RIGGING by Right Wing BIGOTS (see below):
ANOTHER Agelbert NOTE: It is no coincidence that the very same racist PIGS who rig elections in the USA are in total alignment with the Hydrocarbon Hellspawn destroying our environment for profit over planet. They are ALL "Birds" of the VERY SAME empathy deficit disordered, hate filled, vile, despicable, rampant greed driven "feather".
Alan Watts saw all this coming and warned us about it way back in 1970.
https://youtu.be/_LXiSPpfM54
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on December 03, 2018, 09:27:36 pm
An Off-Duty Cop Pulled a Gun on Teen Waiting for a Bus, How Will the City Respond?
December 3, 2018
The nearly deadly encounter between an unarmed teen and an off-duty Baltimore police officer still haunts the family, but the recent controversy involving the city’s civilian review board may leave them with nowhere to turn
Moyers Talks To Author Ben Fountain About Trump’s Triumph
Quote
This is the boldest, bravest and most bracing book about politics that I have read this year.
BY BILL MOYERS | OCTOBER 9, 2018
SNIPPET 1:
BEN FOUNTAIN: So much of the news coverage portrayed his campaign as a challenge to the establishment of the Republican Party, the way the Republican Party had conducted itself the last 50 years. But, come on, he (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F809_84688966.jpeg&hash=7f3e84eea23fef901b7df618784dc2005290f591) was simply doing the same thing, talking the same game Republicans have been doing for years, but he did it better. He’s absolutely a virtuoso of the politics of paranoia and racism, cultural resentment, xenophobia, misogyny and all the rest that the GOP has prospered on for the past 50 years.
What IS a New Democrat 😈?
BILL MOYERS: Yet he would have lost, I’ll wager, if the Democrats had kept their house in order and their priorities straight. Your take on how both parties paved the way for Trump is tough and true, but your account of how the Democrats piled on the people they once represented is one for the ages, in no small part because of your eye for details. Your chapter “Hillary Doesn’t Live Here Anymore” is wicked in its particulars. You might have painted a big mural on the wall — and there is an impressive scope to your story — but it’s the pimples of guilt that are most revealing. Like how establishment Democrats, seeing Republicans raise so much money from the oligarchs, set out to tap into the loot by developing close relationships with big donors and big business. For one thing, they organized an outfit called the Democratic Leadership Council [DLC] with an “executive council” that included corporate behemoths such as ARCO, Chevron, Merck, DuPont, Microsoft, Philip Morris, Koch Industries. Among the trustees would eventually be the longtime chief political operative for Charles 🦕 and David Koch 🦖. His nickname was “the Pirate (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-250718205137.gif&hash=7a79df8ecf1b29d8599c26fe550e664c6c5e24bd).” I might think you had made that up if I hadn’t seen note 11, page 255.
BEN FOUNTAIN: Thank you. But let me make this point: In one sense the so-called New Democrats of the Clinton years were traditional Democrats in that they were still strong for civil rights, for cultural diversity, sensitive to sexual orientation and ethnicity. But in terms of rock-bottom economics, of all those people really hurt, even ruined, under globalization and the reckless financialization of the American economy, establishment Democrats became more and more like Republicans: They stopped making the case for government. Republicans were perfectly happy to wage class war against the constituencies Democrats nominally represent. Democrats didn’t exactly become pacifists, but — well, let me put it this way: Those eight years of Bill Clinton’s New Democrats served the party’s traditional constituency of the working class, the middle class, minorities, the poor and immigrants about as well as the second coming of Herbert Hoover.
BILL MOYERS: One might say Democrats pulled up their roots on Main Street and repotted them on Wall Street, where Hillary Clinton plucked plenty of posies before and during the 2016 campaign.
SNIPPET 2: BILL MOYERS: We’re finally scraping the whitewash off our mythologies, and that’s painful for those whose lives were framed by those mythologies.
BEN FOUNTAIN: Yes, the paradigm of what it means to be an American is changing, and it needs to change if we’re going to have a realistic idea of ourselves and our history. There’s the old paradigm of mythic whiteness — John Wayne, on his horse: the big white guy who tames the frontier. Well, the reality was — is — much more complex and problematic than that. But a lot of white folks have felt demeaned and put-upon, especially by so-called “elites” — educated opinion, the intellectuals, the scholars and writers who are bringing historical truths to light and insisting that they be reckoned with. Not only do a lot of white people feel threatened by this, they feel insulted, condemned. That’s a fraught psychological state to live in.
BILL MOYERS: People want their John Wayne back.
BEN FOUNTAIN: Oh man, do they. I saw it everywhere on the campaign trail: Trump gave a huge swath of white America back to itself. Gave them psychological, emotional affirmation as an antidote for all the anxiety, all the resentment they’d been feeling. He told them: “You aren’t bad; you’re good. Actually, you are the real America.” That kind of affirmation is powerful medicine in politics.
The Ghost (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270117175421.png&hash=cf39e823dd9156833bfa885808a876bf518bd0d6) of George Wallace
BILL MOYERS: Backlash thrives on it. Think of the backlash after the emancipation of the slaves. Demagogic politicians rallied a defeated and sullen South to put the chains back on black people — all those segregationist laws of Jim Crow. Lynching that continued into the 20th century. Statues erected to Confederate warriors to preserve the memory of the “Lost Cause.(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F2.bp.blogspot.com%2F_9HT4xZyDmh4%2FTOHhxzA0wLI%2FAAAAAAAAEUk%2FoeHDS2cfxWQ%2Fs200%2FSmiley_Angel_Wings_Halo.jpg&hash=13281f1944b60773bf12b29387b70be77cc1fe16)”And then the backlash in our time against the Supreme Court’s order to desegregate the schools, againstpassage by Congress of civil rights and voting rights legislation, against the struggle and victories of the civil rights movement. Whites fled to the suburbs, opened private religious schools, created federal housing policies that institutionalized segregation on economic grounds.
SNIPPET 3:
BILL MOYERS: Yeats got it right: “We had fed the heart on fantasies / The heart’s grown brutal from the fare.”
SNIPPET 4:
J.R. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270117175421.png&hash=cf39e823dd9156833bfa885808a876bf518bd0d6) Comes Home
BILL MOYERS: So he’s (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270117175421.png&hash=cf39e823dd9156833bfa885808a876bf518bd0d6) less an aberration than a culmination —
BEN FOUNTAIN: — Of a certain strand of American life, yes. Well, several strands. We can’t discount the con man strand, for one. I found myself wondering how many tricks Trump poached from J.R. Ewing [the star of the TV series Dallas in the ’70s, played by Larry Hagman]. The creators of that hit saga had intended for J.R.’s “good” brother Bobby to be the star, but J.R. — a snake and bastard who cheated on his wife — stole the show. The man truly did not give a s h i t about anyone else. Yet the audience took to the villain — loved him. You can imagine Donald Trump watching J.R. and thinking, I can work with this. Just be myself (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) . People loved J.R. not in spite of his nastiness and greed but because of it.
Bill Moyers Talks To Author Ben Fountain About Trump’s Triumph (https://billmoyers.com/story/bill-moyers-talks-to-ben-fountain-about-trumps-triumph/)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 10, 2019, 08:20:38 pm
Rattling the Bars
With Eddie Conway (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf)
Black Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal 🌟 Granted Right Of Appeal (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185037-16412296.gif&hash=c8a4038d309a0f49ca4a7a464f30f9a340049cac)
January 8, 2019
The world’s most renowned death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal has been granted the right of appeal after 30 years. Eddie Conway, former Black Panther wrongfully convicted and Imprisoned for 44 years himself, now released, discusses Mumia’s case with Scholar Anthony Monteiro
https://youtu.be/shO6tAjAawg
Story Transcript
EDDIE CONWAY: Welcome to this episode of Rattling the Bars. I’m Eddie Conway.
Former Black Panther, journalist, activist, and political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal may still have a chance to regain his freedom one day. Last week, a Philadelphia commons plea court judge ruled that Mumia Abu-Jamal can re-argue and appeal before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court. Judge Leon Tucker cited that then-Chief Justice Ronald D. Castille did not recuse himself due to his prior role as Philadelphia’s district attorney when Abu-Jamal initially appealed his case. Tucker wrote in his 36-page opinion that if a judge serves as prosecutor and then the judge, there’s no separate analysis or determination required by the court. There is a finding of automatic bias and due process violation.
Abu-Jamal was convicted and sentenced to death in 1982 for the 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner. For 37 years, activists have protested his conviction and imprisonment on grounds that insufficient evidence was provided at the time, and that the charges and eventual conviction was politically motivated.
Joining me to talk about Mumia Abu-Jamal’s case is Dr. Tony Monteiro, activist and scholar from Philadelphia. Tony, thanks for joining me.
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: It’s our pleasure to be with you.
EDDIE CONWAY: OK. A lot’s been going on up in Philadelphia lately around the Mumia Abu-Jamal case. What I’m curious about right now is what kind of impact this case had on the black community, and what’s happening in the community in reference to the case.
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: Well, I think this is a very important moment in the struggle for justice for Mumia, and ultimately for his freedom. And I think, from what I’ve heard and from what I’ve seen around the community, that this is considered a victory. And there’s a certain amount of celebration, although not unbridled, because we know that there’s still some way to go. But for the first time, Mumia’s case was heard before a judge who was not on the pay, was not politically obligated, to the Fraternal Order of Police or the corrupt elements in the criminal justice system. On the other side, the law was on his side because of the Williams v. Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision. And a judge, Leon Tucker, a fair judge, a black man from the black community, who grew up and, I am certain, went to law school and practiced law in the time of Mumia. And he had been aware of Mumia’s case probably for most of his life, for most of his professional life. So that was to our advantage and to Mumia’s advantage.
His lawyers made a brilliant presentation and argued on behalf of Mumia in a very competent way. And on the other side, the political geography has changed somewhat in the city of Philadelphia. In the last year we elected a DA for the first time who was not, again, obligated politically or financially to the Fraternal Order of Police. And so the situation is different in a positive way than it has been for Mumia for now going on for 39 years.
EDDIE CONWAY: One of the things that I’ve noticed, and I’ve kind of watched this case over the years, is that the black community have always remained involved in Mumia’s case, and they have always organized around it. Did that organizing have something to do with the election of–the support for the election of the new district attorney? Did that organizing have something to do with constantly bringing his case forward to challenge the injustice?
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: I’m certain it did. I’m certain it did. Along with, you know, the history of police murder and violence against black people, the corruption of the court system, and that history–you know, the almost 100-year history of the District Attorney’s Office as being a center of racism and of violence, and the covering up of violence against the black community. I think all of this played a huge role. And we cannot ever forget that it was the black community that elected Larry Krasner, that broke the–again, certainly the most, the 65-year history of the Democratic Party machine up literally deciding who would be the DA. And this corrupt political machine, along with the FOP, along with the corrupt and reactionary elements of the business establishment, and others, held on for dear life to the DA’s office, even as we elected black mayors and heads of city council, and other high elected offices.
The white establishment held onto the DA’s office. And it was with the election of Larry Krasner–and he was elected, we cannot say this enough, by the votes of the black community. Because they were at least two other candidates running who were backed by the FOP. And the black community put Larry Krasner in office. And for that reason, for the first time in maybe the history of the DA’s office, certainly for the last 65 years if not 100 years, the DA’s office was taken out of the hands of the of the police and of the corrupt judicial system itself.
EDDIE CONWAY: Well, do you think that the DA’s office–obviously Mumia has won the right to another appeal. It’s not the DA’s decision to deny him that right. But is it the DA’s decision not to contest his illegal sentence now?
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: Not to contest his right to appeal. That’s where we are now. And DA Krasner and his office will have to decide whether they will move to contest his right to appeal, or not to contest it. And I would suggest that Larry Krasner’s future, political future, will in large measure be decided by what he does at this time with the Mumia case. And again, I want to emphasize that it was the black community in particular–I like to make this point very, very clear–in particular, Eddie, the black working class who have suffered the most under police violence and the injustice of the criminal justice system. And it was they who elected Krasner. And it is upon their shoulders that not only Mumia’s future rests, in large measure, but Larry Krasner’s political future rests.
EDDIE CONWAY: OK. Because one of the things that I do know, I mean, with the MOVE bombing, with a number of attacks that has been taking place over the decades against MOVE, one of the things I notice is that MOVE continues to kind of organize in the community in a way that apparently then help empower the community. The only other situation I’ve kind of seen like this is with the Puerto Rican political prisoners in Chicago and in New York, in which they actually put forth their political power from down the grassroots level in the community. Is this a way forward for political prisoners in terms of getting out, organizing on that grassroots level?
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: Well, I think that’s what the future is. Organizing on the grassroots level means, in the end, the political education of the people. Because there are hundreds, if not thousands, of people across this country who are in prison because of their politics. Some would argue that most people who are locked up are in one another way political prisoners. I don’t know that I go that far. However, once we say, as in the case of Mumia, in the case of the MOVE 9, and many others, once we say they are political prisoners, the battle becomes a political battle. The legal struggle is only ancillary, or secondary, to the political struggle. And once we say it is a political struggle, then we’re talking about the role of the people, the role of the masses in deciding the outcomes of these things.
And you know, I want to underline once again, Eddie, because it’s not often recognized, certainly it’s not said enough, that ultimately, Mumia’s fate would be decided in Philadelphia by the progressive forces, and in particular black working people, who would have to change, as we have done, significant areas of the political landscape of Philadelphia. That has happened, to a large degree. And so it is the political struggle, the political education of the people of Philadelphia. And it is they who will decide this question on all sides. And that’s the message that I take from this. It elevates my confidence in the people, in ordinary people, to understand and to do the right thing. I think this message must be heard throughout this country and throughout the world, that it is the grassroots. That a political prisoner, for example, in the case of Mumia or the MOVE 9, who come from a certain community. It is that community which must be educated, which must be mobilized to ultimately free them. What happens nationwide and worldwide is only supportive of what the people in Philadelphia did and would do.
EDDIE CONWAY: OK. On that note, I’m going to keep an eye on this. And if things change and new developments come up I want to try to get back with you and talk about it and look at it a little more. So thanks for joining me.
ANTHONY MONTEIRO: I really appreciate it. I hope I was clear in my view of this situation.
EDDIE CONWAY: Very clear. Very clear. OK. Thank you, and thank you for joining me at The Real News.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 10, 2019, 09:04:01 pm
How Nixon's Southern Strategy 😈 Lead us Straight to Donald Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F809_84688966.jpeg&hash=7f3e84eea23fef901b7df618784dc2005290f591)
1,837 views
https://youtu.be/Rx0BzLTLZ7Q
Thom Hartmann Program
Published on Jan 9, 2019
How Nixon's Southern Strategy Lead us Straight to Donald Trump
Nixon's political strategy helped Republicans get elected by appealing to racist and xenophobic elements within the white vote. More than just dog whistle racism, Nixon created a lot of policies that hurt communities of color.
The Southern Strategy has been adopted and utilized by Republican politicians to varying degrees ever since, George H.W. Bush's Willy Horton ad and now from Donald Trump.
Is Donald Trump the result of Nixon's Southern Strategy?
SUPPORT THE PROGRAM ► Join us on Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/thomhartmann where you can also watch a re-run of the three hour program at any time
ABOUT THE PROGRAM The Thom Hartmann Program is the leading progressive political talk radio show for political news and comment about Government politics, be it Liberal or Conservative, plus special guests and callers
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on January 10, 2019, 09:32:59 pm
Thousands without Pay: The Consequences of an Indifferent President (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-270117175421.png&hash=cf39e823dd9156833bfa885808a876bf518bd0d6)(2019)
https://youtu.be/06nDZcEdpqs
Thom Hartmann Program
Published on Jan 9, 2019
The Government Shutdown over Donald Trump's (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) wall is leaving thousands without paychecks, and the president and the republican Party, simply don't care.
Are we seeing the consequences of an Indifferent President?
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 04, 2019, 06:29:48 pm
Could a National Legal Pot Law Finally Happen? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-221017161839.png&hash=7d34712243960aa20883775dad728bc2115ed6fe)
March 4, 2019
With Cory Booker’s proposal to legalize marijuana on a federal level, TRNN looks at the current politics surrounding legalization in the nation’s capital and statehouses across the country to see if the time has finally come for a federal law to decriminalize pot
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 06, 2019, 06:22:33 pm
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 2019
In Condemning Ilhan Omar, Democrats 👹 Have Proved Her Right
SHILPA JINDIA, TRUTHOUT
At a time of heightened anti-Muslim discrimination and hatred, the Democratic establishment has singled out a Muslim representative for her criticisms of the outsized influence of the Israel lobby in the U.S. government. The rush to reprimand Rep. Ilhan Omar ✨ further exposes Democrats' close ties to pro-Israel groups 🦍 and, more alarmingly, gives tacit approval to the Islamophobia and racism of the Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F809_84688966.jpeg&hash=7f3e84eea23fef901b7df618784dc2005290f591) administration and its 😈 supporters. >:(
Read the Article → (https://truthout.org/articles/in-condemning-ilhan-omar-democrats-have-proved-her-right/)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 08, 2019, 07:00:13 pm
Ilhan Omar (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185038-16442135.gif&hash=52927992b43007fa5c5eb6ffcb453ae29948c356) in Her Own Words: I Know What Hate Feels Like
AMY GOODMAN, DEMOCRACY NOW!
PUBLISHED March 8, 2019
In her speech last week, Rep. Ilan Omar said, "When people 😈 say, 'You are bringing hate,' I know what their intention is. Their intention is to make sure that our lights ✨ are dimmed (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-040718162656-14241872.gif&hash=6c39a3206e2b2a3d652adee626b5eee8ab5b15bf), that we walk around with our heads bowed, that we lower our face and our voice.But ... we're here to stay and represent the voices of people who have been silenced for many decades and generations." (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-210818180844.png&hash=d74cfbba22967e53f7eb6202dffdd50b3e520fe2)(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-060518153110.png&hash=39d587c31b7f7e66b30d7e59bb560e2ad0662eee)
Watch the Video and Read the Transcript → (https://truthout.org/video/ilhan-omar-in-her-own-words-i-know-what-hate-feels-like/)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 08, 2019, 08:02:26 pm
Sorry, John Kelly, nice try
Robert Harrington 👍 | 4:00 pm EST March 7, 2019
Palmer Report » Analysis
“The least enjoyable job I’ve ever had,” is how former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly described his time working for Donald Trump. The now ousted Marine General has used his first public comments since his inglorious dismissal January 2nd to distance himself from Trump’s positions on immigration and the border wall, and claims he would also have worked for Hillary Clinton, if asked.
John Kelly, in short, has been born again, a la Michael Cohen. The prodigal son has seen the error of his ways and returned to the embrace of the human family for redemption and forgiveness.
Not so fast, General. We have the right to remember certain things. For example, we have the right to recall your disgraceful treatment of Congresswoman Frederica Wilson, who was present in the car when your idiot, hamfisted boss phoned the grieving widow of a slain US soldier and made hideously inappropriate remarks of misfired “condolences.”
We have the right to recall the lie you invented about a perfectly innocent speech made by the Congresswoman – an African American woman whom you characterized as “the empty barrel that makes the most noise” – in which you lied and said she inappropriately claimed credit for securing federal funding for an FBI building in her district, a lie that is directly and immediately contradicted by a video of that event.
We have the right to remember when you said the American Civil War was caused by “the lack of ability to compromise,” and when you described Robert E Lee as an “honorable man.” We have the right to remember when you disparaged potential DACA signatories, some of whom were too frightened to sign up, as “too lazy to get off their asses.”
We have the right to remember when you promoted serial wife abuser Rob Porter despite knowing full well Porter had a protection orders from both ex-wives for domestic abuse. We have the right to remember when you illegally used the Situation Room to fire White House staffer Omarosa Manigault, and that you threatened her with reprisals both legal and reputational should she make trouble.
As to the idea that you could have worked for Hillary Clinton? What makes you think you qualify, you arrogant son of a B I T C H? No, General John Kelly, you chose to work for Donald Trump, and you permitted him to corrupt your soul. It’s time to accept the consequences – like a Marine.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 22, 2019, 10:05:46 pm
Eddie Conway: 5-Year Anniversary of His Release From Prison - RAI (11/12)
March 22, 2019
We continue our Reality Asserts Itself series with TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway, who spent 44 years as a political prisoner and is now in the leadership of TRNN
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 26, 2019, 10:09:22 pm
Homicide ☠️ and Baltimore’s Black Butterfly – RAI with Eddie Conway (12/12)
March 26, 2019
Murders take place in Baltimore at a rate that compares with New York, thirteen times the size; Eddie Conway says deep poverty, unemployment, and brutal 🦍 policing are contributing factors to the murder epidemic – on Reality Asserts Itself with Paul Jay
In Condemning Ilhan Omar, Democrats 👹 Have Proved Her Right
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185037-16401634.png&hash=64d3e1b1de88caf3dd27821752a0500439778c05) Someone smarter than me once said, "if you want to know who REALLY holds the power, figure out who you're not allowed to criticize."
True.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 28, 2019, 08:36:43 pm
Eddie Conway (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf): ‘It’s Not Mass Incarceration, It’s Targeted’ >:(
March 1, 2018
Prisons aren’t “correctional” facilities, because they 🦍have no interest in correcting anything; the multibillion-dollar prison industry is interested in profits 😈, and institutional racism (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201314.png&hash=0715eb72631014310634eb56176ff860c6d542f6) keeps the money flowing, says TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway
https://youtu.be/yQx0GYVHwPQ
Excellent series of Eddie Conway videos ✨ from THE REAL NEWS NETWORK:
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 28, 2019, 08:52:30 pm
Rattling the Bars: The Strange Case of Merle Unger
December 26, 2017
TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway examines the landmark case of Unger v. State of Maryland, which was responsible for the release of over 200 prisoners in 2014. However, Merle Unger, who won the case, remains locked up after 42 years of incarceration
https://youtu.be/6mJ6MkEuZ3A
Story Transcript
JENNY PIPER: Our brother, Merle Unger, was convicted of felony murder in Washington County, Maryland in 1976 and was given life and 15 years. During this incident, an off-duty police officer was shot and killed. In 2012, Merle has his case overturned, which opened the door for anyone convicted by a jury before 1980. Merle was quickly retried, found guilty, and given the same life sentence. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
EDDIE CONWAY: There has been a strange case in the State of Maryland in which almost 230 some prisoners have gained their eligibility for freedom. 160 some have actually been released. The person that fought the longest and the hardest for the release of these prisoners is a prisoner named Merle Unger. And the strangeness of that case is that Merle Unger is one of the few people that is not being released. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F2%2F3-310119164317.gif&hash=870c66e6ad21133a740ba1583280577f05ccb4ac)
JENNY PIPER: Since 2012, over 160 lifers has been released off of our brother’s case. Our brother is 68 years old and has spent almost 42 years in prison. He hasn’t been involved in any violence while in prison. He has learned many skills, gets along very with staff, and helps others. Washington County has reduced the sentences of others convicted of felony murder and/or r a p e, which led to their release. So they are obviously biased against our brother.
The question we asked is: Is it fair that close to 200 have been released because of our brother’s issue, while he can’t get equal justice? Mr. Charles Strong, the head District Attorney in Hagerstown, Maryland refuses to treat our brother the same as anyone else, perhaps for a personal or political reason. In over four years, not a single one of those released have went back to prison, which is proof that people change as they get older. It costs taxpayers billions each year to keep people 50 and older in prison, while studies shows they are very low risk to commit another crime.
ROBERTA UNGER: The key thing was, we didn’t have TV when we were a child growing up, and we didn’t know anything different than just the things that our parents taught us and stuff. But today it’s out there. But we lived very poorly. We came from a family of 12, and he went through so much verbal and mental abuse and physical abuse. And we all had low self-esteem, and it took us years to go out. You know, the people in prison amaze me. The people that I know here, every one of these lifers it’s left out. There all like brothers to me and stuff, and sisters, and they’re the most loving and giving back to the community people that I ever heard. So we all make mistakes, and when you’re young and don’t know any better, and if people out here that grow up with the low self-esteem and the abuse that he and a lot of these other people, and that’s why they pick on the people, because they’re so poor. Most of your people in prison are poor and can’t fight the justice. But there’s wrong justice done to everyone in the prison system today. And if I can do anything to help anybody out, no one deserves to die in prison.
EDDIE CONWAY: What can people do to maybe help support the effort to win his release? Because obviously there’s hundreds of people that has a vested interest in him gaining his freedom since they gained theirs. So what can people do? Not just those people, but the people’s families and so on, so what can people do?
JENNY PIPER: They can write letters to help him.
EDDIE CONWAY: To who?
JENNY PIPER: I don’t know who you would write them to, probably the governor, or I don’t know who you would write them to.
ROBERTA UNGER: You mean petitions?
EDDIE CONWAY: Well, if he has a lawyer, I would assume that if some kind of way y’all could make that known people could write letters to the lawyer.
JENNY PIPER: To the lawyer.
EDDIE CONWAY: And for the governor. In other words, so that there will always be a copy. The lawyer will have a copy, but then it can be a letter to the governor. I think. I don’t know. Is there anything else you think?
ROBERTA UNGER: Yes. This is for off duty or police officers and things like that, that get killed in the line of duty or lose their life trying to help others, and it’s called Duty Calls, is the poem, and from your family in blue. And he’s doing this from prison too, so he sent these cards to me, and then I make copies. He sends these for free out to people to try to ease their pain from what they’re going through. And then this one, he made up that’s for … It’s called The Life of Roses, another poem that he made. And this is for battered women, r a p e victims and stuff like that, so when we see anything going on like that, we try to Google it and get to where someone could send these.
JENNY PIPER: An organization, a support group.
EDDIE CONWAY: Does anybody in the family have a website or anything for him?
ROBERTA UNGER: We’re working on that. We’re trying to get that set up, but I don’t know nothing about computers, and I was paying a girl to do it. But she went back to college and I don’t know how far she is on it, but I’m trying to work on that to get a website to put this artwork out. He does a lot of artwork. This is a painting he did. We’ve got lots of them. Yeah. And so we’re trying to get a website set up for him and a podcast as well to try to get out to help reach more people.
Puerto Rico Climate Change caused Infrastructure damage
April 4, 2019
Trump's 🦀 Disdain for Puerto Rico Should Be His Undoing (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-221017161839.png&hash=7d34712243960aa20883775dad728bc2115ed6fe)
By Sonali Kolhatkar — His “otherizing” of the U.S. colony should not obscure the fact he has failed Americans suffering through the aftermath of hurricanes.
Read more (https://www.truthdig.com/articles/trumps-disdain-for-puerto-rico-should-be-his-undoing/)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 06, 2019, 02:03:10 pm
In 1992, Stevens was sentenced to 15-years-to-life for a nonviolent drug offense. He served 10 years before receiving clemency from former New York Governor George Pataki in 2001.
Quote
“To incarcerate someone in my condition, who poses absolutely no physical threat to society and is unable even to wipe his own behind, shows the complete and utter failure of the criminal justice system." - Terrence Stevens (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
Read more:
Terrence Stevens 🕊 is on a mission to save children whose parents are incarcerated. (http://www.drugpolicy.org/blog/terrence-stevens-keeping-families-connected)
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 08, 2019, 09:10:53 pm
Should Reparations Pay Convicts Who Endured Prison Slavery? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-060518153110.png&hash=39d587c31b7f7e66b30d7e59bb560e2ad0662eee)
589 views
https://youtu.be/crhyQoRthiM
Thom Hartmann Program
Published on Apr 5, 2019
The 13th Amendment was ratified to end slavery in the United States but actually codified it into law though the use of prison slavery.
Organizers fighting for the rights of prisoners today are now asking that prisoners forced to endure prison slavery receive reparations for the mistreatment.
➡️Please Subscribe to Our Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/thomhart...
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ABOUT THE PROGRAM The Thom Hartmann Program is the leading progressive political talk radio show for political news and comments about Government politics, be it Liberal or Conservative, plus special guests and callers
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Category News & Politics
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 19, 2019, 07:24:50 pm
Make Nexus Hot News part of your morning: click here (http://climatenexus.us4.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=d1f5797e59060083034310930&id=7c84c08aaa) to subscribe.
Racism Rampant in Denierland, But Enviro Community (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418201722.png&hash=5299cc10ee42beae76e4d3b7c79dbf5f4c0addac)Has Work To Do, Too
Yesterday, we talked about how WUWT seems to be finding some new life by exemplifying how denial can operate across issue areas. And that wasn’t the first time we’ve explored the sexist and racist dimensions of organized denial.
It’s important to understand, though, that there’s a larger cultural aspect to the warm welcome climate denial has received among the political right. In Megan Mayhew’s latest column at the Guardian, she travels to Natchez, Mississippi to see how the small town full of racist history is faring in the era of climate change. The piece opens, as you might expect, with Mayhew being told climate change is not “polite” conversation, a nod to how the concept of “civility” is used selectively to protect the status quo.
While some Natchez residents may be slowly coming around on climate change, it’s all too easy to look down at them and see the climate action community as the opposite: a shining beacon of diversity, tolerance and goodness. But that, too, would be denial.
The green world still has plenty of work to do when it comes to welcoming non-white communities. The growth of the environmental justice movement is encouraging, but the fact that it was ever divorced from the rest of the environmental community in the first place is a problem. Because that didn’t happen accidentally, and the community has yet to heal the damage it caused.
As Mary Annaïse Heglar wrote in Dame this week, despite the movement’s best efforts, black faces are all too rare in public venues like climate marches. Stories from black voices who were made uncomfortable by both micro- and macro-aggressions from their fellow marchers, meanwhile, are all too common. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201604.png&hash=3793102f2f335b7a8fe106d54eac4db31f2674eb)
Framed around the exclusive nature of Woody Guthrie’s protest song “This land is your land,” Heglar exposes not only the current shortcomings of the community, but also its past, which is sadly, she writes, “steeped in oh-sh-it racism.”
That tragic history is the focus of another piece this week by Matt Mildenberger. Writing in Scientific American, Mildenberger explores the racist past of environmental thought and the hate behind the Tragedy of the Commons. The famous 1968 piece has become something of a cornerstone of environmental thought: if left unregulated, everyone exploits natural resources to their own benefit, leading to overconsumption.
The problem, Mildenberger explains, is not just that the author, Garrett Hardin, was a white nationalist who espoused virulent racist, islamophobic and eugenic ideology, but more importantly, that he’s wrong. Historians have shown that early common areas were informally regulated by local customs and institutions--turns out people aren’t quite as stupid or greedy as Hardin suggested. And so environmental concerns should not, as Hardin 😈 proposed, be used to justify eugenics or xenophobia or whatever other racist nonsense arises out of the perception of scarce resources.
So if Hardin’s overpopulation and overconsumption claims aren’t the root of the climate challenge, what is? Decades ago, Mildenberger argues, we had the chance to start taking the slow and steady steps necessary to transition to clean energy, and had we done so, the “costs to most Americans would have been imperceptible.”
“But that future was stolen from us,” Mildenberger continues, “by powerful, carbon-polluting interests who blocked policy reforms at every turn to preserve their short-term profits.” To overcome that well-funded political power, we need to drop Hardin’s idea that individual consumption is to blame, and instead turn our attention toward bringing more people into the fold, “a commitment at the heart of proposals like the Green New Deal.”
So while it's important to acknowledge the racist roots in the environmental tree, as the climate community knows well, simply recognizing a problem without taking action to remedy it, isn’t enough. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
"Technical knowledge of Carrying Capacity will not save us; only a massive increase in Caring Capacity will." -- A. G. Gelbert
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 23, 2019, 07:58:18 pm
How Many 😈 Americans Agree with Trump's Worst Goals?
1,026 views
https://youtu.be/W0otDtcUGGo
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Apr 23, 2019
Donald Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F809_84688966.jpeg&hash=7f3e84eea23fef901b7df618784dc2005290f591) opened his campaign with hatred and has continued to use his role as president to spread and inflame hatred.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on April 29, 2019, 07:06:01 pm
Bernie Sanders Supports Voting Rights for the Imprisoned👍
April 29, 2019
Corporate media’s twisted narrative frames voting rights as "letting terrorists and rapists vote."; Anoa Changa and Norman Solomon join host Jacqueline Luqman to discuss the battle over voting rights for people in jail
https://youtu.be/-0fyUZKsAiY
Story Transcript
JAKE TAPPER [CNN] Senator Sanders earlier this evening said he’s in favor of felons being able to vote even while serving their prison terms. He was asked specifically about people like the Boston Marathon bomber, people convicted of sexual assault, ra pe, and other things, ****. What do you think? Should people convicted of sexual assault, the Boston Marathon bomber— should they be able to vote?
PETE BUTTIGIEG While incarcerated? No, I don’t think so. [applause] I do believe that when you are out, when you have served your sentence, then part of being restored to society is that you are part of the political life of this nation again. And one of the things that needs to be restored, is your right to vote. But part of the punishment when you are convicted of a crime and you are incarcerated, is you lose certain rights. You lose your freedom. And I think during that period, it does not make sense to have an exception for the right to vote.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN Hi. I’m Jacqueline Luqman with The Real News Network. This is our weekly segment on trending topics where we discuss some of the significant news items from the past week. One of those big issues was the CNN town hall and the question of voting rights for the incarcerated. And of course, Senator Joe Biden has finally announced that he is running for the Democratic nomination for president. Here to talk about these issues with me this week are Norman Solomon. Norman is the National Coordinator for RootsAction.org. Hi, Norman. And, Anoa Changa. Anoa is an attorney and a Director of Political Advocacy for Progressive Army. She’s also the host of the highly recommended podcast The Way with Anoa. Hi, Anoa.
ANOA CHANGA Hi, Jackie.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN Thank you both for joining me today.
ANOA CHANGA Thank you for having us.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN Alright. Let’s start. Let’s jump right in with the CNN town hall this week because a lot of talk is centered around Bernie Sanders wanting the Boston bomber and rapists to vote. Like this subhead in The New York Times recap of the town hall says, it reads that Sanders backs voting rights for the Boston bomber and rapists. But what Sanders really said was this. I think we have the clip from what Sanders said at the town hall.
BERNIE SANDERS I think the right to vote is inherent to our democracy. Yes, even for terrible people because once you start chipping away and you say, “well that guy committed a terrible crime– not going to let him vote.” Or, “that person did that– not going to let that person vote.” You’re running down a slippery slope. So I believe that people commit crimes, they pay the price. When they got out of jail, I believe they certainly should have the right to vote. But I do believe that even if they are in jail, they’re paying their price to society, but that should not take away their inherent American right to participate in our democracy. [applause]
CHRIS CUOMO [CNN] Applause for the answer. My follow up question goes to this being like, you’re writing an opposition ad against you by saying you think the Boston Marathon bombers should vote not after he pays his debt to society, but while he’s in jail. You sure about that? [crowd laughs]
BERNIE SANDERS Look. You know, this is what I believe. Do you believe in democracy? Do you believe that every single American 18 years of age or older, who is an American citizen, has the right to vote? Once you start chipping away at that, believe me, that’s what our Republican governors all over this country are doing. They come up with all kinds of excuses why people of color, young people, poor people can’t vote, and I will do everything I can to resist it.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN You gotta love Sanders’s enthusiasm when he responds to this question and I want to start with you, Anoa, and ask you specifically about the role the media played in the way this question was framed. What’s your take on how CNN framed this question and how it played out for Sanders and Pete Buttigieg?
ANOA CHANGA Well I will say, if the question is like other questions for other town halls, the student who asked it more than likely wrote it. They may have helped tweak it some, but that came from that person. But I think your question about how the media has helped frame it— before this town hall, Bernie Sanders did actually come out and say he did believe that incarcerated persons should vote, which I believe is probably what prompted the question to begin with. But part of the problem with the spin has been, they stuck with the problematic framing in the actual question, as very extreme examples provided. Even you see Lindsey Graham like, oh my God. That means he thinks Dylann Roof who murdered x, y, z people in x, y, z occurrence should get to vote— trying to inflame rhetoric and we know that this is an industry that’s heavily driven by clicks, by headlines. Most, 60 percent of Americans do not read past the headline in most instances, so it is driving a particular narrative. But when you really dig deep and you start looking at it, and you see most of the major civil rights organizations, legal organizations, pushing back and also saying, “duh. This is a no brainer. Bernie Sanders is right because voter suppression of any form should not be tolerated.” We should not be writing caveats into really what is one of the most fundamental rights that we should be protecting. And as in many states, we see that the right to vote has actually been severely eroded in many occurrences. Now when we’re talking about incarcerated persons, incarcerated persons are good enough to go fight fires for pennies on the dollar. They’re good enough to be counted for when you draw congressional districts. They are counted as part of that population, but they’re denied the opportunity to vote and participate. One thing that I always thought was really great from last cycle was, Rachel Rollins, who’s now D.A. of Suffolk County which is around Boston— in their D.A. primary race, there was actually a forum that was held with incarcerated persons in the county asking questions of the D.A. candidates and what they would do on criminal justice reforms, etc. I think being able to have those people participating in the process and not being shut out because we see just what the re-enfranchisement of voters in Florida, how Republicans— but it’s not only just Republicans in Florida. Instances predominately Republican-led to just create an extra hurdle to the amendment that overwhelmingly passed with support of Floridians and we see now they’re trying to put these other barriers in, but what basically amounts to a poll tax. So there are all these very nuanced aspects to this very basic idea that Bernie Sanders is discussing, which the lack of nuance sometimes with him is one of my major critiques of the way he communicates ideas and issues. And I just felt that instead of accepting her problematic, extreme framing which is what everyone ran with in headlines, it could have been flipped on his head. But I thought overall, he’s absolutely right-on about this whole premise that when we start eroding, deciding, and picking and choosing who is valuable, who can vote, and who cannot— we start to create a slippery slope. We already see that happening in many states across the country.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN You raised a lot of great issues, but I think the one that stuck out to me the most was that the statistic that 60 percent of Americans don’t read past the headline. So what we get from the media is driven by clicks, is driven by sensationalism, and there is this nuance that is very, very important in this discussion that Sanders seems to have done a good job with. He also seems to have had a better reception at the Fox News town hall with explaining Medicare for All than he did here. And even some on the Left have come out against him on this issue from this town hall. But there’s also been pushback against CNN for this framing, like this tweet from Alexandria Ocasio Cortez and her response. But Norman, I want to ask you, when we’re talking about the framing of this discussion and the fact that incarcerated people were not included in this discussion in the town hall, that this was an audience of students from a local college, I believe— is this really an issue of, as The New York Times framed it, “giving terrorists and rapists the right to vote,” or is this a bigger problem with corporate influence in the media that we need to pay attention to?
NORMAN SOLOMON A lot of the problem with corporate media is continuing to depict some people as the other, prisoners among them but more generally and more subtly often, just people of color or those who don’t have a lot of power in this society. And if we’re going to look at this particular instance, it’s not just CNN and cable news. As you noted, The New York Times took the most retrograde, opportunistic, and slanderous way to frame Bernie Sanders’s response. And what I think we need to look at very strongly and very clearly, is that this issue is the Willie Horton issue so far of this presidential campaign. As in 1988, the racist ad against Michael Dukakis by the George Herbert Walker Bush forces, were also playing on racism and the fear of prisoners and trying to exploit some of the most racist tropes that have been in place for centuries in this country. And frankly, I’m outraged that The New York Times and other media outlets would take a principled position by Bernie Sanders against perverse oppression and turn it around and try to exploit the most extreme interpretations of what he said, to make this Willie Horton-2019. And so, I just think we have to push back on this and recognize that this is part of a propaganda assault.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN This is some really great comparisons. These are some great comparisons you made Norman about the similarities to the Willie Horton campaign and the Dukakis campaign. This is journalistic history, or campaign and political history, that we need to be reminded of when we’re looking at the role of corporate media in our politics today. Anoa, let me give you the last word on this. What role does independent media play in this campaign cycle? Is it a bigger role than last time? What role does independent media play in these types of issues?
ANOA CHANGA Well I appreciate that. This is how we first crossed paths, right? I think that in this cycle, just as we saw the past cycle, there is a really high burden whether it’s right or wrong. It’s the value proposition that we often say that we have as progressive, independent media folks, that we’re trying to parse through the b.s. and really get good commentary, get straight to the issues, and inform people of what’s going on. So I do think that we do have this standard to really, actually, effectively discuss these issues to help raise the voices of people who are doing directly the work and get people actual information. I don’t remember who shared it, but someone shared a report from The Sentencing Project. The Sentencing Project has been talking about incarcerated persons voting while incarcerated for probably almost two decades. I think I saw something that was actually dated 1999, so this is not a new thing that Bernie Sanders just thought of. This is something that’s been well-thought and often discussed by a lot of people. When you look at the containing conditions of those who are incarcerated here— and we focus so much on the federal prison system or private prisons— but the majority of people who are in prison in this country, are in state and local holding. And the conditions that people are in— just recent accounts from Fulton County and DeKalb County jails down here in Georgia are appalling. We’re seeing issues of strikes, of starvation, people having issues with being exposed to mold, all types of stuff. I remember, real quickly, during the 2014 West Virginia water crisis in Charleston, West Virginia, incarcerated persons were being given the equivalent of I think it was one bottle of water per day. And this was a time where as a community, as a county-wide area, we were on a 10-day water ban, so no water for anything. They were being given one bottle. So when we’re saying that we’re not allowing people to participate civically in what is happening, we’re saying that they don’t— we, as in the people who are saying— saying that these people are not people. They’re second class citizens. They don’t count as much as we do and that’s a problem. And again, like Bernie Sanders just said, when we start creating special classes of people as we’ve already seen, he was talking about going back to a different era, that’s exactly the type of rhetoric we’re hearing from people is actually enforcing and supporting. And we already have a steep climb to getting people re-enfranchised who’ve already been disenfranchised from the system. So these barriers that are there, are kept up, are problematic. I think independent media has a real, serious burden on us. And really, it should be our welcomed burden to make sure that were upholding good conversations as truthful commentary as possible, and really digging deep and doing critical analysis, even if it means calling our faves on the carpet.
JACQUELINE LUQMAN And you know, we’ve certainly done plenty of that. [laughter] Thank you guys so much for joining me today on this segment. Unfortunately, we are out of time on this segment. But Norman, Anoa— stick around for the next segment where we will talk about Joe Biden’s announcement. Thank you all for watching this segment of trending news on The Real News Network. I am Jacqueline Luqman.
Yup, the old, "Go back where you came from." trick. If you are a minority and/or of the "wrong" color in the USA, this is par for the course. From being a plebe at West Point, to ATC work at Syracuse Tower in New York, to the parking lot booth I worked at the airport in Burlington, to 🕷Eddie, 🐉 Karpatok, et alat the Doomstead Diner, I know all about it.
There are variations to that 'You don't belong here' theme (You are a guest in this country - You should be more grateful - Why did you come here? - How come you people breed so much? - How long have you been gaming the system?, etc., Ad nauseum) that, of course, always avoid mentioning the fact that the one delivering the 'witty snark' comes from a long line of (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418203402.gif&hash=b2691028ba683a0039a5811f5775c68d7ccae01c) European invaders to Turtle Island. As 'good old 🕷 Eddie', the proud WHITE Dentist from Texas, would say, "White guilt, I do not DO. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F2%2F3-200419205214.png&hash=4c5b9ca97c84607da003becdf6282716bcdf1800)".
Anyone with critical thinking skills recognizes that Mr. Trump is dispensing with the dog whistle and going full in-your-face "Southern Strategy" NOW because he feels cornered by some "setbacks on the census issue" and needs to start earlier than planned to get his base fired up against 'libruls'.
But, there is more going on here than racist button pushing to get bigots all emotional so they stop looking at their empty wallets under Trump. Yeah, there is that, sure, but Trump is trying to hide something far more damaging to him.
A key part of the Trump volume raising is the fact that he does not want his history with 🐍 Epstein to get discussed by too many people.
One other bit of skullduggery going on TODAY is the methodical disempowering of comment period access by we-the-people in regard to EPA proposals :o >:(. If a Democratic Adminstration was engaging in that bit of fascist skullduggery, it would be all over the news.
The Trump noise level is always part of a strategy to distract from some skullduggery his wrecking crew is engaging in.
Yesterday, before I learned Trump🦀 did his 'go back where you blackies came from' thing, I made the following comment after reading an excellent article. I believe it is appropriate to post it here. I hope it triggered some critical thinking among Trumpers, but I'm not holding my breath waiting for that to happen. It's not that I am jaded; it's that I am an experienced observer of my fellow Americans, particularly those who fancy themseves as 'better/superior/smarter/cleaner/civilized' because they are WHITE.
Annie Easley, The Rocket Scientist Who Worked At NASA Before It Was Even Called NASA (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818184310-1635923.gif&hash=5e2530db4748ed6c7163e1d478fdfa3cd1108668) (https://cleantechnica.com/2019/07/14/annie-easley-the-rocket-scientist-who-worked-at-nasa-before-it-was-even-called-nasa/)
👍👍👍 This is an excellent, truth filled article. Though most people do not possess the impressive intelligence of Annie Easley, her tenacity and grit is an inspiration to all objective humans.
The 😈 privilege hogging bigots that have cursed this country from the start lack any objectivity whatsoever. They go out of their way to hide the accomplishments and brilliance of scientists like Annie Easley.
For example, the scientist who invented "bean soup", the Navy term for a chemical that quickly put out fires on U.S. ships during WWII, thus saving thousands of lives in the process, is NOT mentioned in WWII history documentaries (the exception was a 2007 PBS documentary, but the name of that documentary, "Forgotten Genius", neglects to point out the FACT that he was DELIBERATELY "forgotten" by those who write "sanitized" history in the USA). Percy Julian's name does not even appear in most history books of this period.
Percy Julian was one of the best Organic Chemists of the 20th century.
SNIPPET:
During WWII the Navy used a foam to put out fires of oil and gasoline. This foam was called Aer-O-Foam, and is still made today by Kidde Fire Fighting. The foam is made from soy protein and water, mixed and then aerated in a nozzle. The foam smothers the fire, coating the oil and preventing oxygen from getting to it. Seamen called the mixture ‘bean soup,’ since it was made from soybeans.
National Foam System (today owned by Kidde) got a sample of the soy protein from the Glidden Company in 1941. Glidden employed an organic chemist named Percy Julian, who had devised a way to separate soy protein from soybean meal. Glidden hired Julian in 1936 because of his resume, and because he was fluent in German, having done his dissertation work in Austria. Glidden had just purchased a modern solvent extraction plant from Germany, and needed someone to supervise the extraction of oil from soybeans, and the production of coatings, solvents, and glues from soy products. Percy Julian was very happy to have the job, having been refused work at DuPont (because when he arrived they realized he was black), and at the Institute of Paper Chemistry (because the town where it was located didn’t allow black residents). ...
... When Glidden gave up pharmaceutical work in 1953, Julian left the company and started his own. At the time he was being paid $50,000 a year (about $440,000 in today’s dollars).
Percy Julian’s later life was a mixture of success and obstacles. His company was fairly successful, and he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences (in 1973, on the second African American in the Academy).
On the other hand, he faced continued discrimination. For example, in 1950, when he moved his family into a ‘nice’ neighborhood in Oak Park, a suburb of Chicago, someone fire-bombed the house on Thanksgiving Day.
Later that year someone tossed dynamite into their house.
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818184310-1635923.gif&hash=5e2530db4748ed6c7163e1d478fdfa3cd1108668)
SciTech Tuesday: Percy Julian and ‘Bean Soup’ (http://www.nww2m.com/2016/12/scitech-tuesday-percy-julian-and-bean-soup/)
If you think this heinous racist violence has "gone away", you do not understand Trump, his Cabinet's 🐍 "Plans and ☠️ Programs", and his Racists 'R' US enthusiastic base.
You see, there are way too many Americans that long for their privileged 'abuse of the other' past. Trump and his supporters have read the Constitution. They know that when the founders wrote "We the people", they meant "We the WHITE People".
Yes, they also excluded non-propertied white men and all women along with all other humans. Anyone that tries to bring that bit of nuanced BALONEY up is deliberately attempting to get readers to ignore how destructive to modern society the version of Gestapo Racism that Trump Champions IS. You are a FOOL if you think Trump is going to save your white bigoted arse. Your "enjoyment" of the increased violent racism under Trump and his wrecking crew will not feed your family or educate your children. Living on HATE and ABUSE of the "other" is the only "job" Trump wants you to have.
The following was written January 21, 2017. The prediction that the entire social contract that has been laboriously built up by people of good will since the time of FDR up to and including civil rights gains for people of color and healthcare for all Americans during the LBJ Administration would be deliberately and methodically destroyed piece by piece, is coming to pass.
Anything at All Can Happen in the Age of (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-250718205137.gif&hash=7a79df8ecf1b29d8599c26fe550e664c6c5e24bd) Trump (http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/who-can-you-trust/corruption-in-government/msg6321/#msg6321)
Title: Our national nightmare will end when white Americans decide they can no longer tolerate Trump's raci
Post by: AGelbert on July 18, 2019, 09:26:47 pm
Quote
Our national nightmare will end when white Americans decide they can no longer tolerate Trump's racist behavior
Trump outdoes himself with latest display of rank hatred and rancid bigotry (https://thinkprogress.org/the-stench-of-racism-envelops-trump-and-the-gop-45113a1f61c2/)
Associated video (Trump has ALWAYS been a Racist POS):
Title: Can Trump Go Too Far or Will Racism Get Him Reelected
Post by: AGelbert on July 18, 2019, 10:37:33 pm
Can (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-301216165623.jpeg&hash=1ccfee6aaf9d939cca294a849774cff11e462e59) Trump Go Too Far or Will Racism Get Him Reelected
https://youtu.be/YwKsf2f65gU
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Jul 15, 2019
Will Donald Trump's Racism get him elected again? Is there anythingTrump 🦀 could do that would be too far for (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418203402.gif&hash=b2691028ba683a0039a5811f5775c68d7ccae01c) Republicans and the (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/1/3-221218213129.png) American voter to support? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132332-16812332.gif&hash=ca61f76f711b4ad81f3e665376f43c8076f05b1d) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-311013201604.png&hash=3793102f2f335b7a8fe106d54eac4db31f2674eb)
Is America a "Melting Pot" or a Racist Nation?
https://youtu.be/RUCjVB791Qs
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Category News & Politics
Quote
“This matter is by the decree of the watchers, and the demand by the word of the holy ones: to the intent that the living may know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will, and setteth up over it the basest of men.” -- Daniel 4:17 KJV
Title: Donald 🦀 Trump staged one of his most overtly racist and patently offensive Twitter tirades to date
Post by: AGelbert on July 29, 2019, 01:16:53 pm
Better to have a few rats than to be (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-301216165623.jpeg&hash=1ccfee6aaf9d939cca294a849774cff11e462e59) one
By BALTIMORE SUN EDITORIAL BOARD BALTIMORE SUN | JUL 27, 2019 | 6:36 PM
SNIPPET 1:
Quote
This is a president who will happily debase himself at the slightest provocation. And given Mr. Cummings’ criticisms of U.S. border policy, the various investigations he has launched as chairman of the House Oversight Committee, his willingness to call Mr. Trump a racist for his recent attacks on the freshmen congresswomen, and the fact that “Fox & Friends” had recently aired a segment critical of the city, slamming Baltimore must have been irresistible in a Pavlovian way. Fox News rang the bell, the president salivated and his thumbs moved across his cell phone into action.
SNIPPET 2:
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... — we would tell the most dishonest man to ever occupy the Oval Office, the mocker of war heroes, the gleeful grabber of women’s private parts, the serial bankrupter of businesses, the useful idiot of Vladimir Putin and the guy who insisted there are “good people” among murderous neo-Nazis that he’s still not fooling most Americans into believing he’s even slightly competent in his current post.
Baltimore Sun sets (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-301216165623.jpeg&hash=1ccfee6aaf9d939cca294a849774cff11e462e59) Donald Trump (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418201722.png&hash=5299cc10ee42beae76e4d3b7c79dbf5f4c0addac) on fire (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185039-1655102.gif&hash=1a13ffad2c8451cba6f45b04a1249447d50c3e73)
Bill Palmer | 11:30 pm EDT July 27, 2019 Palmer Report » Analysis
On Saturday morning, Donald Trump staged one of his most overtly racist and patently offensive Twitter tirades to date, lambasting Congressman Elijah Cummings and his hometown of Baltimore. Trump was clearly trying to distract from the fact that House Democrats initiated an impeachment inquiry against him the day before, but – as has increasingly been the case of late – Trump took things to a level beyond the pale.
Donald Trump insisted that Baltimore was a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” and a “very dangerous & filthy place.” Trump immediately faced widespread pushback on the matter, but instead of checking himself or simply moving on, he doubled down by continuing to rant about Cummings and Baltimore as the day went on. By the time it was over, the Editorial Board of the Baltimore Sun newspaper had finally had enough, and decided to figuratively set Trump on fire.
Here’s the most salient paragraph from the op-ed: “It’s not hard to see what’s going on here. [Elijah Cummings] has been a thorn in this president’s side, and Mr. Trump sees attacking African American members of Congress as good politics, as it both warms the cockles of the white supremacists who love him and causes so many of the thoughtful people who don’t to scream. President Trump bad-mouthed Baltimore in order to make a point that the border camps are “clean, efficient & well run,” which, of course, they are not — unless you are fine with all the overcrowding, squalor, cages and deprivation to be found in what the Department of Homeland Security’s own inspector-general recently called ‘a ticking time bomb.'”
Meanwhile, Donald Trump has continued to spend the night digging himself a deeper hole. Trump was still attacking Elijah Cummings as late as 10pm, even as he thanked one of his deranged sycophants after another for defending his racist tirade. You can read the entire Baltimore Sun takedown of Trump here (https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-0728-trump-baltimore-20190727-k6ac4yvnpvcczlaexdfglifada-story.html).
Sign up for the Palmer Report mailing list and never miss an article!
Title: Rick 🐍 Scott RACES to Rescue fellow RACIST TRUMP
Post by: AGelbert on July 29, 2019, 05:14:47 pm
Donald 🦀 Trump’s pal 😈 Rick Scott goes off the deep end on live national television
Bill Palmer | 7:45 pm EDT July 28, 2019 Palmer Report » Analysis
Donald Trump spent all day Saturday trying to use his racist tirade about Elijah Cummings and Baltimore to distract from the fact that the House Judiciary Committee has opened an impeachment inquiry. The trouble: Trump took his racist ranting so far over the top, even by his horrid standards, he ended up needing someone to clean up his mess.
For reasons known only to Donald Trump, and perhaps because no one else was willing to do it, Rick Scott went on television on Sunday to try to defend Trump’s antics. Rick Scott’s history includes using his position as CEO of a hospital to steal from Medicare, using his time as Governor of Florida to steal from the pensions of teachers and police officers, and using his position as Donald Trump’s ally to steal a U.S. Senate seat in an election that was clearly rigged by pro-Trump hackers. In other words, Scott is precisely the kind of piece of (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fstyles%2Frenewablerevolution%2Ffiles%2F3104_shit%2520bitmap.png&hash=13c3368bd73680b8cbcbaaa8e306e42cb17d4d41) who would go on television and defendDonald (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-301216165623.jpeg&hash=1ccfee6aaf9d939cca294a849774cff11e462e59) Trump’sracism.
Voldemort is on the left. Rick the RACIST Scott is on the right.
Sure enough, Rick Scott – who looks like Voldemort on crack(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132401-16872027.gif&hash=bba6aaee2cf1cdc8a213cd8f2d2c6a9bcd8c3f3a) – appeared on NBC’s Meet The Press. Scott was apparently attempting to take advantage of Todd’s legendary eagerness to give softball questions to the most corrupt and inept of Republicans, in the hope of making the Republicans and Democrats look equal to each other. But even that couldn’t save Rick Scott. When Todd asked him about the tweets, Scott said “I, uh, I, look, I, uh look, I didn’t do the tweets.” That’s a glowing defense if ever there was one.
But don’t worry, because Rick Scott turned right around and blessed Donald Trump’s racism by dishonestly attacking Elijah Cummings for the same things that Donald Trump had dishonestly attacked Elijah Cummings over. The whole thing was the kind of train wreck that Scott has been known for his entire career – yet the dumbest of most gullible conservative suckers and idiots keep voting for the bag of (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/2/thumb_3-290719170837.png) anyway.
Title: A National Call for Moral Revival
Post by: AGelbert on July 30, 2019, 01:34:54 pm
Agelbert NOTE: I signed. 🌞
July 30 2019
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-210818163123-1664600.png&hash=d609f7e4847e25e034ca7c7b11e75234ba2a0afd) A National Call for Moral Revival (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
Hi,
On July 17, the Trump 2020 campaign held a rally in Greenville, North Carolina, where President Trump used racist tropes to demonize Representative Ilhan Omar before pausing to let the crowd chant, “Send her back!” Along with the vast majority of Americans, you and all the other presidential candidates condemned Trump’s appeals to racism. We are writing to invite you to come together for a mass rally in Greenville to demonstrate what an alternative for America’s future looks like.
While you are not enemies, we understand you are competitors. You have real policy differences between you, and you are on the campaign trail to make the case for why you should be the next person to lead the United States of America. But just as the global community of nation-states has at times put aside competitive differences in order to face an existential threat, we believe this is a time for candidates to unite and demonstrate what an America committed to moving forward tog ether looks like.
Trump and his enablers have decided to push racist words to cover their racist works in policy. He continues to tweet the racism and sow false fear, because he has no answers to unite people who need health care, living wages, and a clean environment. He knows he cannot win, even in the South, without a divided electorate and low turnout.
It is important to return to the scene of Trump’s crime in North Carolina’s Pitt County, because while the whole world has seen images of a nearly all-white crowd chanting in racist unison there, we know this does not actually represent Pitt County or the vast majority of rural America that Trump 2020 wants to cast as “red counties.” Pitt County is not, in fact, a red county. Hillary Clinton won Pitt County in 2016, as did almost every Democrat down ticket. Pitt County is in North Carolina’s Black Belt. Poor and low-income Black, white, and Latino people there have voted in a fusion coaliti on that demonstrates our capacity to come together and reject the divide-and-conquer politics of racism.
America desperately needs to see this possibility now. Because such coalitions are possible all across the South and the Midwest. These fusion coalitions offer the only hope of reclaiming democracy from a movement of extremism.
North Carolina’s Forward Together Moral Movement organized in response to extremism that took over the state legislature and the governor’s office in 2013. The policy agenda that the Trump administration and its enablers in Congress are pushing today was front and center in North Carolina in 2013. Leaning into a long history of moral fusion organizing in the South, we learned to fight reactionary extremism by highlighting how racism hurts Black, white, and brown people regardless of their party affiliation. We came together in mass Moral Monday rallies that showed the people of North Carolina what uniting to move forward t ogether could look like. We beat voter suppression in the courts, and we beat extremism at the ballot box in 2016’s statewide races. We know fusion coalition can win in the South—even in places that have been misidentified as “Trump country.”
The vast majority of Americans do not want to capitulate to racist demagoguery. They do not want to be pitted against one another in a zero-sum competition. Most people are desperate for leadership that can chart a path forward together to the multi-ethnic democracy of equal opportunity that this nation has long aspired to become but has never yet been.
Now is the time to unite for a mass unity and voter registration rally focused not on any individual’s campaign, but on the coalition building that is needed to dispel the myth of a solid South and show the nation what a better future looks like.
The world is asking how you will respond to the open racism of Trump’s Greenville rally. We believ e the answer is, “If Americans don’t like what they see in the White House, they can go door to door registering and educating a powerful new fusion coalition to chart a new course beyond 2020.”
Whoever emerges to lead the challenge to Trump in 2020, this must be clear: The future of democracy and the well-being of our common home on this planet depend upon a fusion coalition that can reclaim American democracy from the extremism that now holds power in our public life. We believe this crisis demands that you unite to make this single message clear.
Sincerely,
Liz Theoharis, Co-Director of Kairos Center and Co-Chair of the Poor People's Campaign: 🕯️ A National Call for Moral Revival
Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Director of the School for Conversion and member of National Steer ing Committee, Poor People's Campaign: 🕯️ A National Call for Moral Revival
That's why I signed a petition to All Presidential Candidates, which says:
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185037-16401634.png&hash=64d3e1b1de88caf3dd27821752a0500439778c05) "All presidential candidates should unite for a massive, pro-voter, anti-racism rally in Greenville, NC—the city in which attendees at a Trump rally chanted "Send her back!"—to reject racism and regression, register voters, and demonstrate what an America committed to moving forward together looks like."
Will you sign the petition, too? Click here to add your name:
https://petitions.moveon.org/p/e_epl_CW4Y0
Thanks!
Title: The Lines Between Us: The Modern History of Baltimore 👹 Apartheid (1/2)
Post by: AGelbert on July 30, 2019, 05:14:24 pm
The Lines Between Us: The Modern History of Baltimore 👹 Apartheid (1/2)
July 30, 2019
As (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-301216165623.jpeg&hash=1ccfee6aaf9d939cca294a849774cff11e462e59) Trump unloads a racist attack on Baltimore, we speak with author Lawrence Lanahan, who charts the history of segregation from redlining to the civil rights movement
https://youtu.be/nv0J6wP-D2s
Story Transcript
JAISAL NOOR Welcome to The Real News. I’m Jaisal Noor in Baltimore.
A raucous crowd packed the July meeting of the commission overseeing Baltimore’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund. The fund— the result of nearly a decade of successful community organizing— mandates authorities subsidize affordable housing in a city that’s faced a huge shortage for decades. Local resident and activist, Destiny Watford, the winner of the 2016 Goldman Prize, one of the most prestigious international environmental awards, said the community is prepared to continue the fight for housing that’s affordable to working people.
DESTINY WATFORD, ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE ORGANIZER I just want to remind the commissioners that as [inaudible], we fought for two years canvassing in the blazing hot sun during summer to not only create the fund, but to make sure that the money goes into the fund. We know how to fight and I just want to remind you guys of that. That if the money, for whatever reason it seems like it’s not going to go where it needs to go— to permanently affordable housing— we will fight you. Not physically. [audience laughs and cheers]
JAISAL NOOR For generations, housing policy has been used as a weapon against Baltimore’s poor black residents. Redlined government maps from the 1930s serve as stark predictors for today’s disparities in violence, lead poisoning, and even life expectancy. But what often gets less attention are the stories of those who have not only been directly impacted by those policies, but are on the forefront of fighting back against them. Well, a new book offers what can be described as a people’s history of the fight for fair housing in the entire region. It’s called The Lines Between Us: Two Families and a Quest to Cross Baltimore’s Racial Divide. It’s by author and journalist Lawrence Lanahan, who’s joining us now in the studio.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Thank you so much, Jaisal. I really appreciate you bringing me in.
JAISAL NOOR So let’s start with this news. You know, we have for years now community groups fighting and winning demands for affordable housing in Baltimore City, the city that pioneered racial segregation. What’s the significance of these recent victories and this ongoing activism to ensure that the promise that, you know, the voters approved on the ballot box to create this fund actually does what it’s intended to do?
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Well, I guess I could illustrate it with a story. In the book, I talk about a meeting. It feels like ancient history, but it was in the year 2000. They wanted to put ten—They wanted to renovate ten houses for use as public housing in northeast Baltimore. And probably 800-900 people showed up to this school auditorium and—No, that’s how many got in. Like 1,200 people showed up, lots of people in the auditorium waving signs like “No Section 8,” you know, “We don’t want public housing.” And outside there are a couple hundred people going, “let us in, let us in,” to keep affordable housing out. Sixteen years later, I was outside the War Memorial Building when there was a city council hearing on the application by Sagamore Development. That’s part of the real estate group co-founded by the owner of Under Armour.
They wanted to do all this development in South Baltimore on the waterfront and they wanted a tax increment financing package. And the community said we want a community benefits agreement, and so there was a city council hearing. Well, I would say there were 6-700 or 800 people there and they closed the door because they couldn’t fit everybody. And you had all these people— not just white people this time— people of all backgrounds saying, “let us in, let us in,” because they wanted to make sure that if there was going to be a new neighborhood, that it would be accessible to everybody. That there would be affordable housing and that they would reserve a certain percentage of the housing for certain income levels. So I see just the people showing up to that as a victory. You can quibble about what they got out of it. There was a $100 million community benefits agreement, which did a lot in, you know, gives a lot to black communities.
But in what’s probably going to be a mostly white community at Port Covington, they have loopholes where they don’t really have to build any affordable housing at all. They can put money into affordable housing elsewhere. So I feel like you had this string— and I try to follow this narrative throughout the book— of the initial organizing for region-wide fair housing through the Thompson v. HUD suit in the 90s and 2000s up to Port Covington and up to just the other night in Curtis Bay this meeting about the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. So when lots of people show up from the community, and they know what’s going on in City Hall and they know what the policies can do, when you go from the bottom and you start tugging on the top, you do start to see some victories. There’s a long way to go housing-wise in this region, but I don’t know. I wasn’t able to make it to that meeting, but I suspect it must have been pretty inspiring to see the people fighting for permanent— not just give us a little bit now, but permanent— institutionalized, you know, affordable housing.
JAISAL NOOR Yeah. It’s really—The land trusts are really a new vision and they’ve been successful in many places and successful in Baltimore as well. But it’s a new vision of what you can do when housing isn’t commodified. It becomes the right, sort of, in the commons where it’s collective ownership. And so, I wanted to really get into your book, but start off by why you chose the title, The Lines Between Us, and what you’re trying to tell us there.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN That’s sort of a trick because once I say “us,” anybody who hears me say it is implicated, right? That’s—Any us includes me if we’re in this conversation. So I wanted it to be—I wanted people to see Baltimore not as like a city with city problems, but as an entire region that is connected and is beset by harmful policies and personal prejudices that get institutionalized into policy. So The Lines Between Us, it says there is an us. We’re together in this region, you know. And then the lines, you know, tell you that something is wrong. So we are being pushed apart. Even the most well-meaning person if they just kind of sit back, you know, and let our economy and government go on autopilot, it will always generate inequality and segregation.
So the lines are—There are some real clinical lines, you know, that are like if you do a data map of where there’s more opportunity and less opportunity, you can see clinical lines. And you can have some policy that tries to create more racial equity and that’s great, but there are also lines that personally many of us tend not to cross. And once you do cross them, I wanted people to feel that. What are your obligations? What happens with the dynamics when people try to cross these lines? So it’s, I mean, it’s about policy and data maps and stuff, but it’s also about— this might sound corny— but souls. I mean, what happens when you cross these lines and you are bound to a soul that a policy is trying to keep you away from?
JAISAL NOOR Yeah. And I think you do a masterful job tying in the history and the policy with the stories. So I wanted you to talk a little bit about Nicole Smith and she plays a central role in this book. Talk about who she is, and how these policies affected her, and what she did to try to escape essentially.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Yeah. She’s the first person you see on the first page of the book, and the last person you see on the last page of the book, and I really wanted to center her. I mean, it’s about us, but these policies play out in black Baltimore. So she is a black mom who grew up all over West Baltimore. Her mom bought a house when she was in eighth grade in Penn North, which we all know what happened in 2015 in Penn North. That’s when everything came down from Mondawmin. That was ground zero for all the unrest in April 2015. So. But she’s there 20 years earlier, right? And it’s just—It is her life and when she has her son, their life. And you see her grow up in West Baltimore, and then you see her cross paths with a federal public housing desegregation lawsuit, Thompson v. HUD.
And because Nicole had lived in Murphy Homes for a little while, a high-rise public housing project when she was younger, she qualified for a special housing voucher that came out of the remedy for that lawsuit. It was a Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher. You could only use it in areas that were less than 26% minority population and a poverty rate of no more than 10%. All the places that had traditionally fought assisted or public or, you know, low-income housing, this lawsuit created thousands of opportunities for people like Nicole to move out there. So she eventually moves with her son to Columbia, a planned community, planned for diversity and inclusion. And she, you know, by the end of the book, you’re just out in Columbia with her and you see how her life and her son’s life change as a result of individual decisions and preferences, but also shaped by policy and the history of the region.
JAISAL NOOR And you also have Mark and Betty Lange who also play significant roles and, sort of, in their trajectories go in an opposite direction than Nicole’s. Talk a little bit about them, and why you decided to include these two white figures in the story, and their significance.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Well, to the degree that we live in separate worlds and there are lines between us, that’s who the lines are between. Not because anybody is opposed to anybody in particular; that is how the region places us. And so, I wanted to write about a white family too. And Mark and Betty I thought were really interesting because— I guess I’ll just give this away— they live in Bel Air, which is where I grew up. Like, a very white, at that point, middle to upper-income suburb, exurb out in Harford County. It can be a 40 minutes outside of Baltimore— living out there, living the American dream. But they were very religious and they had friends who had started a multiracial church in Sandtown. They had moved from Howard County to Sandtown to start this church and do community development and started this Habitat for Humanity office down there. And eventually, they kind of feel compelled to do the same thing.
They leave their life in Bel Air behind and they move to Sandtown in 2005 to live in solidarity with the black poor. I thought that was a pretty unusual story for this region. And what I didn’t want to do is just like try to find the perfect black family to represent everything I wanted to explore, and the perfect white family to represent everything I wanted to explore. There’s no way I was going to land on that. I was not going to find that. I picked Nicole because I had already reported on her. I picked Mark because I had already reported on him. What I discovered after that reporting is I had sort of found a real sort of central tension that could serve a story about our region, which is when it comes to policymaking, when we bother to deal with residential segregation, racial inequality, deconcentrating poverty, there are kind of two ways we typically go about it.
One, which has gone on for a long time, is community development. Or if they pour like hundreds of millions of dollars in, you know, they call them Comprehensive Community Initiatives-Neighborhood Transformation. They did that in Sandtown in the 90s. Jim Rouse who had built Columbia teamed up with Mayor Kurt Schmoke and— what does “BUILD” stand for— Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development. They were like, we’re going to change every aspect of life in Sandtown. We’re going to pour in all this money. We’re going to empower people who live here. And they spent anywhere from $60 to $130 million, depending on who you ask, in the 90s and the early 2000s to transform Sandtown. So that’s one way of doing it, right? Take the place where there’s not opportunity, and try to bring the opportunity there.
And then I chronicled the growing movement of housing mobility, which says fair housing law compels us to create choices all throughout the region for people of any racial background, disability, family size, and, you know, socioeconomic status tracks so closely with that. So like, let’s get people out of those neighborhoods, out to where the opportunity already is. So instead of bringing the opportunity to where the people poor people are, you take the poor people out to where there’s opportunity— which is the places that have always resisted low-income housing. And I realize that you have this white family moving from Bel Air to Sandtown crossing the lines. You have this black family moving from Penn North to Columbia crossing the lines.
I thought the lines would come out in very sharp relief if you saw the stories of them crossing those lines. And it would illustrate, like through Mark and Betty’s story, you’d see what happened in Sandtown with the massive community development. With Nicole, you’d see housing mobility. And it’s not like you have to pick one or the other. Sometimes when there are limited resources, people pit those huge strategies against one another. But, you know, that is a lot of what we do, is try to build up these neighborhoods and try to provide people opportunities in places where they’ve been resisted.
Title: The Lines Between Us: The Modern History of Baltimore Apartheid (2/2)
Post by: AGelbert on August 02, 2019, 09:13:35 pm
The Lines Between Us: The Modern History of Baltimore Apartheid (2/2)
August 2, 2019
In part two, Lawrence Lanahan says the fight for fair housing did not end after the civil rights movement.
https://youtu.be/luaz1VgwdGQ
Story Transcript
JAISAL NOOR Talk about—And so, you mention one of the hearings that took place in the city about affordable housing, but there’s, sort of, these different moments throughout your book where you see these different groups of people clashing over this fundamental issue about who gets to live where.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN That is the question.
JAISAL NOOR And people on the other end, on the wealthier end, they see this as an attack on what they have earned or their privilege. And they will do anything to fight it and to oppose it.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Yeah, yeah. I mean, that—You do. You see scene after scene after scene of people opposing any kind of change in the residential patterns in this region. I suppose they will put it in terms of protecting their property values or the character of the community. There are all these ways of talking about it that give them plausible deniability that has anything to do with discrimination. And they may absolutely believe that, oh, this is I just don’t want my roads to be crowded, I don’t want my school to be overcrowded. But another theme that the book gets into is disparate impact, which is you’re not looking for the racist person and the racist thing they said or did, you are finding the outcomes of our policies. And if they have a disparate impact on groups that are protected under civil rights law, like I said, you know, race, color, family structure, disability. And so, you know, maybe nobody said anything discriminatory, but there are tools in American law and regulation that allow you to take action when there are disparate impacts.
If this policy is creating this segregation, this inequality, there are things that you can do about it. And what you see through the book is some of those tools start to get used. And I’ll give you an example. I just had a talk about the book with Noliwe Rooks, who I know you talked to Dr. Rooks. She wrote a book about segregation in education and she talked about how after Brown v. Board, you know, in the South they launched this campaign of massive resistance. You know, we’ll use white and black taxpayer money to create private white segregation academies. You know, we’ll shut the public schools down, and just put the white kids up in here. But when the 1964 Civil Rights Act came along, it said you can’t discriminate in the use of federal funding.
And the federal government under Johnson actually said, you know, if you don’t desegregate, we’re going to stop funding you. And all of a sudden, they were like, oh, oh, all deliberate speed. [snaps fingers] Let’s go. And they desegregated the schools pretty quickly to the degree that I’m pretty sure that Southern schools are less segregated than Northern schools. And so, that was kind of undercut in the 70s when there’s a Supreme Court decision saying you can’t deal with school segregation at a metropolitan level. Like once people, families get across the city line, you can’t force them to go to the school with city kids. This is the Milliken decision in ’74. So you had this judicial ruling saying, no, no, not the region.
Well, fast forward 20 years later and the ACLU of Maryland and some public housing tenants filed Thompson v. HUD here in this region saying, you all segregated public housing by law when you built it. Now you want to tear down the public housing high rises and just rebuild all their replacements in the same—Like you have an opportunity to right a historic wrong, to put public housing around the region. If you resegregate literally brick-by-brick what you built in the 40s and 50s, like, that’s not okay. That’s not legal. And eventually, a federal judge—You know, they sued the city and HUD. They didn’t find against the city, but they found on one count against HUD. They did not affirmatively further fair housing and the judge said you failed to consider regionalization. You failed to even try to put assisted housing in the suburbs. So it’s like the opposite of Milliken, right? It’s like you should have dealt with this regionally.
And so, you know, eventually housing mobility becomes less and less controversial. Barbara Samuels, the lawyer for the ACLU of Maryland, her lesson is just do it. That people will go bonkers before you put low-income housing in the suburbs, but once it’s there they don’t have much to say. They don’t notice much difference. So her thing is just get it out there, do it. And now Governor Hogan’s putting it out there. I mean, it took a federal housing complaint and a settlement, but you know, they’re building low-income housing in Bel Air and Fallston and Eldersburg and Towson and all these mostly white places that had resisted it forever.
JAISAL NOOR And you know, I think your book is especially important because these stories, this history are just not taught in public schools. They’re not part of the discourse or really get the justice, the attention they deserve in the mainstream media. So I think this serves as an important contribution to telling this story. And I guess, I want to end on asking you, sort of, what impact this had on you.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Doing this book?
JAISAL NOOR Yeah.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Well, it just made me a whole lot more reflective. I mean, one thing I ended up doing because I’m kind of a data nerd—You know, I grew up in Bel Air, so a white suburb, right? And until I was 18. Then I went off to college, you know. And now I’ve lived in Baltimore for most of the last 18 years, right? It’s been this, like, slow-motion whiplash of just going from utter opportunity to a city that block-by-block things change so drastically. You just see the inequality. And so, I went back and looked at the data and I found a census report from 1990, you know. And my census tract in Bel Air was 95% percent white and I just thought that was utterly normal. We never went anywhere else. That just, you know—
And so, I went to college at St. Mary’s College of Maryland down in southern Maryland. It’s a public school, you know, and it just—I came out of that college wanting to just smash that culture that had made me think that white was normal and that we deserved wealth and all the policies that pushed it our way. And I looked in the factbook for my freshman year in college and it said that the college was 80% white. That’s too white for a state school, right? But just that 15% difference turned my head around. And it just made me value every interaction and every experience I have in this city where people are drawn together and forced to cooperate. It makes me appreciate density. It makes me appreciate my bus driver saying “good morning” when I get on the bus. I mean, it’s just—It also makes me mad.
I always end up very upset at the end of these interviews because I know I’m going to walk out and I’m not quite sure what’s going to change despite laying out this history of quiet, covert, you know, discrimination and policies that drive us apart. So it has motivated me, it has made me come to understand my own narrative differently, and it makes me appreciate the, you know, grassroots organizing. And it makes me appreciate the structural drivers of all this. That if you can connect the grassroots organizing to the structure—I mean, you can get transactional change. You can get that like Sagamore, like a hundred million bucks in the black neighborhoods. They’ll do that. That’s transactional.
That will help as many people as it helps for as long as the money’s there, but once that money’s gone, what is the incentive toward equality and toward integration after that money’s gone? You know, if they had been forced to say, we will always have 20% affordable housing in this neighborhood, that would’ve been structural. That would’ve been transformative and more inclusive. And every time you look at one of these things, you see that people will give up a little of what they got— the powerful people— but they won’t change the structure to keep generating that. You know, so—
JAISAL NOOR So the question of who gets to decide, who has the agency—
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Who has the agency? Who benefits? You know, I took a picture from the Port Covington hearing, which was just people holding up signs that say, “Who benefits?” And that is just—That is my frame now. That’s the way I see everything.
JAISAL NOOR Lawrence Lanahan, thank you so much for coming in and for writing this book, The Lines Between Us. It’s available now. I strongly recommend it. It’s an incredible history. It gives you the policy and it gives you the background, but it also gives you the stories which are really powerful and impactful. And I definitely appreciate it.
LAWRENCE LANAHAN Thank you and thank you for your work. You’re doing the same thing every day covering things that nobody else seems to find deserving of coverage, so I appreciate that. You and everybody here.
JAISAL NOOR Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you for joining us at The Real News Network.
Title: El Paso Blood Is on the Hands of EVERYONE WHO HAS SCAPEGOATED Migrants
Post by: AGelbert on August 05, 2019, 06:59:31 pm
MONDAY, AUGUST 5, 2019
El Paso Blood Is on the Hands of Everyone Who Has Scapegoated Migrants
SPENCER SUNSHINE, TRUTHOUT
The slaughter of more than 20 people in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday was a horrifyingly predictable outcome of right-wing scapegoating that has seen both active and tacit encouragement from Trump and the GOP. We all need to take a role in the fight against the far right and its violence. It's abundantly clear that the government is not going to do this for us, especially given recent attempts to outlaw the grassroots antifascist movement that has helped keep white nationalists in check. >:(
El Paso Blood Is on the Hands of Everyone Who Has Scapegoated Migrants
SPENCER SUNSHINE, TRUTHOUT
The slaughter of more than 20 people in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday was a horrifyingly predictable outcome of right-wing scapegoating that has seen both active and tacit encouragement from Trump and the GOP. We all need to take a role in the fight against the far right and its violence. It's abundantly clear that the government is not going to do this for us, especially given recent attempts to outlaw the grassroots antifascist movement that has helped keep white nationalists in check. >:(
It amazes me (although it shouldn't) that the drooling right (e.g. Ashvin on the Diner Forum) whines loud and long about antifa "violence" while casting a blind eye to events like those of these weekend. Much in the same way that Pud changes the subject froimn guns to "mental illness."
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 05, 2019, 09:39:00 pm
El Paso Blood Is on the Hands of Everyone Who Has Scapegoated Migrants
SPENCER SUNSHINE, TRUTHOUT
The slaughter of more than 20 people in El Paso, Texas, on Saturday was a horrifyingly predictable outcome of right-wing scapegoating that has seen both active and tacit encouragement from Trump and the GOP. We all need to take a role in the fight against the far right and its violence. It's abundantly clear that the government is not going to do this for us, especially given recent attempts to outlaw the grassroots antifascist movement that has helped keep white nationalists in check. >:(
It amazes me (although it shouldn't) that the drooling right (e.g. Ashvin on the Diner Forum) whines loud and long about antifa "violence" while casting a blind eye to events like those of these weekend. Much in the same way that Pud changes the subject from guns to "mental illness."
I hear ya. If I ever needed an emetic, I could just go read some of 👹 Ashvin's serial stomach turning sophistry (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.sherv.net%2Fcm%2Femoticons%2Fsick%2Fbarfing-smiley-emoticon.gif&hash=36f6791510582d9f9f48af1d4d1a006a5681103b). Trump is the hero Liar in chief of all these double-talking, selfish, arrogant bastards.
When Happens When Inequality Meets Hate... (w/ Greg Palast)
https://youtu.be/MIMeZD9z3SE
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Aug 5, 2019
Greg Palast examines what the shooters have in common and whether white supremacy is the main cause. He asks if it is the economy and lack of jobs in Dayton that is partly to blame.
Greg Palast suggests there are other causes and discusses his views with Thom.
Is Trump’s History Contributing to the Destruction of America? (w/ Dr Justin A. Frank)
918 views
https://youtu.be/dTT8qdDsdrw
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Aug 5, 2019
The pattern of Trump in the past is a useful study to understand where he is today.
Dr Justin A. Franks M.D., examines Trump’s history and previous destructive streak and how it affects Americans today.
The moral tone he sets today says that being aggressive, hurting others and his race views are fine with him, so why not with you? His lack of responsibility running the country is going to damage America, not improve it. Trump doesn’t care about the rules and this destructiveness rubs off on many people.
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Category News & Politics
Title: White Nationalist Terror Attack in El Paso Was Not an Isolated Incident
Post by: AGelbert on August 07, 2019, 02:53:35 pm
White Nationalist Terror Attack in El Paso Was Not an Isolated Incident
August 5, 2019
Gerald Horne and Arun Gupta outline the history of white terror in America and what its modern manifestation means for our future.
https://youtu.be/AT9-Qkbai4Y
Story Transcript
MARC STEINER: Welcome to The Real News Network. I’m Marc Steiner. Great to have you all with us.
We just experienced a terrorist attack in El Paso with at least 22 people murdered, and now it’s being reported that the killer in Dayton might’ve been incensed that his sister was dating a black man, and killed the next five black people that he saw after he killed his sister. I think back to 1995, Timothy McVeigh, who committed the largest mass murder since Pearl Harbor; Ruby Ridge; Waco; and of course Charlottesville, the Confederate and Nazi flags flying together, and the murder took place there. Now, the killings in El Paso and Dayton. These are not mere isolated incidents, but part of a right-wing identity movement in this modern era born of the Vietnam War, whose roots go back to the end of the Civil War and the birth of the Klan and the end of Reconstruction. What we are facing is the potential of mass violence and the growth of an armed right-wing movement in this country.
Am I being hyperbolic? Alarmist? Well, let’s see what our guests think. We’re joined today by Gerald Horne. Dr. Gerald Horne holds the John J. and Rebecca Moores Chair of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston. He’s the author of numerous books, most recently Storming the Heavens and The Apocalypse of Settler Colonialism.
And Arun Gupta is a writer and contributor to numerous journals, The Washington Post, YES! Magazine, In these Times, The Progressive, TeleSUR, The Nation and many more. Graduate of the French Culinary Institute of New York and author of a book coming out, Bacon as a Weapon of Mass Destruction: A Junk-Food Loving Chef’s Inquiry into Taste. Gentlemen, welcome. Good to have you with us.
ARUN GUPTA: Good to be with you today.
MARC STEINER: I don’t want just to focus on Donald Trump in all this, but let me play this brief clip though that we put together so you can watch and our viewers can watch, and you can comment on just what this means, and the dangers that may lurk beneath.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We are outraged and sickened by this monstrous evil. In one voice, our nation must condemn racism, bigotry, and white supremacy. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-250718202127.gif&hash=acc63221521ebaf3f238088fd92d1ae3a08b6e48)
🐵=AUDIENCE: Send her back! Send her back! Send her back! Send her back! Send her back! Send her back!
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Today we also send the condolences of our nation to President Obrador of Mexico and all the people of Mexico for the loss of their citizens in the El Paso shooting. Terrible, terrible thing. (https://stickershop.line-scdn.net/stickershop/v1/product/1451400/LINEStorePC/main.png)
At this very moment, large, well-organized caravans of migrants are marching toward our southern border. Some people call it an invasion. It’s like an invasion. …Rushing their border. That’s what’s happening.
And remember my opening remarks at Trump Tower when I opened, everybody said, “Oh, he was so tough.” And I used the word (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/styles/renewablerevolution/files/5482_label%20for%20the%20word%20rape.png). This journey coming up, women are **** at levels that nobody’s ever seen before. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-030815183114.gif&hash=2bf1553e87e8605311feb874231953d5fb88ee9c)
But each of us can choose to build a culture that celebrates the inherent worth and dignity of every human life, that’s what we have to do.
Two or three border security people that are brave, and great. … And don’t forget, we don’t let them and we can’t let them use weapons. We can’t. Other countries do. We can’t. I would never do that. But how do you stop these people?
🐵=AUDIENCE: Shoot them.
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP : You can’t. That’s only in the panhandle, you can get away with that stuff.(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818180835-16181943.gif&hash=0b93e71ee5e24bbe02555e0d648a1283e0e9651d)
MARC STEINER: Gerald, let me start with you. When you see these kind of contradictory things that he says, and what they’re saying to the American public, the danger that may lurk under this, so talk a little bit about your analysis of what you just saw.
GERALD HORNE: Certainly, the 45th US President bears responsibility and complicity for his rhetoric and his actions with regard to these terrorist slayings in Texas and Ohio, but I dare say that the entire Republican Party is also guilty. What I mean is, is that if you look at the recent history of the Republican Party with Ronald Wilson Reagan talking about “welfare queens”— by which he was meant to suggest that black women in particular were defrauding the US government so that hardworking, so-called white taxpayers would not have as big a paycheck—or a George H. W. Bush using the Willie Horton ads to demonize black men as criminals. It seems that the 63 million-strong Republican Party base needed a more intense injection of the drug of racism, and so therefore we now have Donald J. Trump, who has ripped off the mask and has spoken much more vigorously with regard to racism, which has obviously inspired some within his base to take matters into their own hands.
But I would make another point as well. That is to say, that if you look at the troubled history of United States of America, what you will quickly find is that white nationalism and white terrorism helped to build the United States of America. We in North America are sitting on stolen land. How did that happen? Did the Native Americans willingly and voluntarily give up their land? No, they gave up their land at the point of a gun.
MARC STEINER: Right.
GERALD HORNE: Were the enslaved Africans—my ancestors— did they work willingly and voluntarily for free? No, they were forced to work by debt of terrorism, and this continues after the US Civil War, post 1865 with the spade of lynchings. And so I think we all, if we really want to understand what has transpired in this country over the past 24 to 36 hours, we may have to make a deeper dive into the ugliness of US history.
MARC STEINER: Arun?
ARUN GUPTA: So the terms I use for what happened in El Paso and now it appears Dayton is “pograms.” That’s what we’re seeing. Racialized terror, ethnic cleansing, mass murder based on people’s racial, ethnic, religious identity. Let’s not forget that almost a year ago, less than a year ago, Robert Bowers went into the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh because he was—this is a neo-Nazi—he was so enraged by the invasion, and that’s what all Trump was talking about last October in the run up to the midterm elections. The invasion, the caravan invasion, over and over again. And Bowers specifically targeted the Tree of Life synagogue because of this a Jewish aid called HIAS that helps resettle refugees. He said that himself.
Then we also saw the MAGA bomber, Cesar Sayoc, last fall who is going after Trump opponents, sending them mail bombs. Trump embraced the neo-Nazis in Charlottesville saying “They’re very fine people” among them, among murderous neo-Nazis. And we know his whole history on and on and on, but the way to understand Donald Trump, he engages in what’s called stochastic terrorism. And what that means is that there’s a general increase in the level of terrorism, but any one event is unpredictable.
Now, I looked at Patrick Crusius’s manifesto. This is the El Paso shooter— and I’m writing a piece about this for the Raw Story—and the words come straight out of Donald Trump’s mouth. He starts off with the Hispanic invasion of Texas. He starts talking about the Great Replacement. The Great Replacement is just this viciously racist manifesto from France that claims that whites in Europe are going to be replaced by Muslims. It’s basically all this lurid Nazi thought fantasy about the untermenge , the under people, the subhumans replacing the noble white, Christian civilization.
And Donald Trump has promoted this. The Great Replacement is synonymous with white genocide. Tucker Carlson, who’s show is— the real name of his show should be the Tucker Carlson White Power Hour— has promoted white genocide, claiming this is going on in South Africa against farmers even though any killings of farmers are at a 20-year low in South Africa. And then Donald Trump promoted Tucker Carlson.
And so, Gerald is right. It’s the Republican Party, but there’s this whole ecosystem, especially of right-wing media and these right-wing figures. One of them, one of the biggest right-wing figures, Ben Shapiro—This is also what makes it hard for, I think, a lot of people to grasp. There’s not much that’s hard to grasp. Ben Shapiro, who is Jewish, has been one of the most vicious supporters and promoters of white supremacism. And he, in fact, was admired greatly by Alexander Bissonnette, who was the guy who shot up a mosque in Quebec City in January of 2017. That was in response to Trump’s Muslim ban because he was afraid that Canada was going to take in all these refugees. And then Tarrant, the guy in New Zealand, was an admirer of Bissonnette, and Crusius is an admirer of Tarrant, the New Zealand shooter. So you see this whole entire chain, and it starts with these right-wing media figures who then Trump promotes. And so what we have is really a terrorist-in-chief.
MARC STEINER: I want to ask Gerald and also bring this home in a sense into our history and what we might be watching here. I think this is really important for us to focus on, at least from my perspective. We’ve seen in the history of this country, after the Civil War, both the Klan was created and as were the black veterans who led the movement during Reconstruction in many ways. The same thing with the Civil Rights movement – World War II and Korean [War] black veterans doing the same thing. We also saw the beginning of the Klan kind of moving up. And after the Vietnam War it exploded again.
So people look at this sometimes as like isolated incidents. This is one mad bomber. This is one crazy guy who is blowing up a building, another person who’s gone in and shot up people, but they’re all these isolated incidents. There’s a mental illness here. But it seems to me that what we’re facing is something a great deal more dangerous and sinister, if we look at our history and our present, which is the rise of an armed right-wing movement in this country. I was looking at a poll just the other day that showed that a plurality of police officers and a number of people in the armed forces also support Trump and this whole idea. So am I making too much of this, Gerald? It seems to me that we are facing something we’re maybe not taking quite as seriously as we should.
GERALD HORNE: Well, I tend to agree with you, and just to inject a bit of good news amidst all the gloom is that the government of Mexico, at least certain officials from Mexico City, have suggested that they’re going to be moving aggressively to protect their nationals who go across the border, for example, into El Paso, a number of whom were killed in the last 24 or 36 hours by this terrorism. This is good news because we know that the way that we have been able to fight back effectively against right-wing nationalism and terrorism historically has been through international solidarity.
I would hope and trust that Mexico would then take this not only into Mexican courts and try to indict this killer and get him extradited to Mexico along with those who might’ve conspired with him, perhaps even those who sold him his weapons as well, but also take an initiative at the Organization of American States headquartered conveniently in Washington, DC, and try to pass resolutions that I would imagine would be supported by countries like Jamaica and Barbados who are pressing reparations claims against the North Atlantic powers for enslavement. And then perhaps even co-op nations like Uruguay, which as you know, unlike many other nations in this hemisphere, have not broken relations with Venezuela. And the same could be said for Mexico.
So I think that hopefully this can lead to an entire international campaign against the 63-million strong Trump base, which I’m afraid to say also contains about 60% to 67% of the entire Euro-American electorate, rising to 90% in states like Mississippi and Alabama. It’s apparent that that’s the kind of initiative that we need because if you look at the Trump base, what you’ll quickly detect is that these terrorists remind me of what was said about the New Deal in the 1930s. Recall that the Communist Party, they were referred to as New Dealers in a hurry, and the Democrats were New Dealers. Well, these terrorists are fascist in a hurry, whereas a good deal of the Trump base are willing to take the step by step approach to fascism, packing the courts, cutting taxes, shredding the safety net, et cetera.
And if you look at the manifesto of the accused terrorist in El Paso, it’s apparent that he would like to speed up the route to fascism, whereas Mr. Trump and his routine and routinely Republican supporters are willing to take the step by step approach. I think our approach should be to go against each and every one of them. The most effective way to do that is not only through domestic solidarity, but through global solidarity as well.
MARC STEINER: There is real danger here as well, I think, that the violence could increase. As people have said here, we had discussions internally here, and I remember Eddie Conway saying to me “We’re not going to get out of this without a fight” because of what is being confronted. And again, I’m asking this because some people might hear what I say and think this is hyperbole and I’m getting just overwrought about this. But, Arun, let me start with you and then I want to go back to Gerald before we have to conclude. It seems to me that this also calls for, as Gerald was alluding to at the end of his comments, that this calls for some kind of strategy on the part of others in this country to confront this before it does take hold in a major way.
ARUN GUPTA: Oh yeah, most certainly. Look, we are in a moment where we have concentration camps and pogroms, and what does that sound like? This is fascism. A few weeks ago the mainstream media were patting themselves on the back for calling Trump’s comments about Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the other Congresswomen racist. They were congratulating themselves for being so bold, whereas it’s been evidenced since June of 2015 when he came down the gold escalator in Trump Towers that this guy is a full metal racist. When he begins his campaign first on birtherism and then calling Mexicans rapists, drug dealers and criminals, and then starts talking about a Muslim ban, “very fine people” among neo-Nazis, and on and on, there’s no question he is a racist.
But the question we should be talking now is, are we seeing the development of a fascist state and society? And I think we really are. This is really classical fascism. MAGA, Make America Great Again, is a call for national birth, national renewal against degeneracy. Donald Trump is an authoritarian demagogue who wants to create an ethno-state through ethnic cleansing, talking about removing the millions of undocumented people, talking about “shithole countries,” and that we need people from Norway instead. This is classical fascism.
And so the terrorism we see, we need to link it directly to what is going on with the state. The same people who are torturing thousands of innocent children whose only crime is to legally seek asylum, are the ones who are inspiring and provoking these white nationalist terrorists around the country. And so it’s that combination of extra state violence with the state repression, and it’s against the exact same groups, right? Who can ignore the fact that Trump had been ranting about invaders for the last couple of months, and all this “send her back” stuff, and then you have a guy who drives apparently 600 miles to mass murder Hispanic people. Then Trump is going after African Americans, and talking about infested cities, and then you have some guy who then starts murdering African American people.
These are intimately connected. One is not separate from the other. And the paramilitary force, of course, is a hallmark of fascism. We can have this debate, and I think honest people can disagree, but we need to be debating the rise of fascism because that is what we are seeing.
MARC STEINER: And, Gerald, whether it’s the Native community or a black community, this rise is nothing new. So what should be the conversation we’re having? What should be the response collectively?
GERALD HORNE: Well, first of all, I think we need to begin to connect the dots. Part of the problem, speaking as a historian, is the way history is written. You have a number of historians, for example, who will write about genocide against Native Americans, or you have historians who write about enslavement of Africans, but few of them connect that to the origins of the United States of America because, I dare say, they’re either ideologically weak or frightened to say the truth. And so we need venues like The Real News to get the truth out. And certainly with regard to fascism, once again instead of some illusionists and those who are delusional are stressing what they consider to be the triumph of the Bill of Rights, which by the way did not apply to most of the denizens of North America, not least Native Americans and Africans, not to mention women of various ancestries.
We need more stress on the point that any country that was born at a moment of mass enslavement of Africans and genocide against Native Americans, is certainly capable of fascism. That’s the implication of the recent book by Madeleine Albright, former Secretary of State, Fascism: A Warning. That’s the implication of the recent remarks by Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez when she toured what she saw as concentration camps along the border, and spoke rather movingly and eloquently about the seeds of fascism being planted along the border. So certainly we need a more honest discourse as a first step towards building domestic antifascist solidarity that within stretches arms across the border and the first instance to Mexico.
MARC STEINER: I think it’d be good for us, at The Real News here, to actually do something you’ve just suggested in a way, Gerald, which is to create something that actually tells that history and ties it to the present so people can see the continuity of what’s going on here with our country, which I think in a very popular way, really hasn’t been done.
Well, Arun Gupta and Dr. Gerald Horne, thank you both so much for being here today. I deeply appreciate your thoughts. I look forward to many more conversations. Thank you so much.
ARUN GUPTA: Thank you.
GERALD HORNE: Thank you.
MARC STEINER: And I’m Marc Steiner here for The Real News Network. You know we’re going to stay on top of all of this for all of you and ourselves. Take care.
Title: Donald Trump has put a target on the back of millions. ...
Post by: AGelbert on August 07, 2019, 10:01:27 pm
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-210614221847.gif&hash=54129e3b65760aaddc6f2d7f42b34a7d839d2f27) Joaquin Castro slam dunks the Republicans after they attack him for doing the right thing
Bill Palmer | 1:59 am EDT August 7, 2019 Palmer Report » Analysis
Yesterday, Democratic Congressman Joaquin Castro posted the names and occupations of some of the biggest donors to the Donald Trump campaign, thus calling them out for funding Trump’s deadly white supremacist rhetoric. Castro was merely reposting publicly available information that anyone can find in FEC filings, but the Republicans nonetheless tried to turn it into a scandal for him.
Republican Senator 😈 Ted Cruz falsely accused Joaquin Castro of “doxxing” the Trump donors. In response, Twitter commenters promptly taught Cruz that “doxxing” doesn’t mean what he thinks it means. But it was House Minority Leader 😈 Kevin McCarthy who went after Castro the most viciously and dishonestly, claiming that Castro was “targeting and harassing Americans because of their political beliefs.” Joaquin Castro fired back at McCarthy:
No one was targeted or harassed in my post. You know that. All that info is routinely published. You’re trying to distract from the racism that has overtaken the GOP and the fact that President Trump spends donor money on thousands of ads about Hispanics “invading” America.” Donald Trump has put a target on the back of millions. And you’re too cowardly or agreeable to say anything about it. How about I stop mentioning Trump’s public campaign donors and he stops using their money for ads that fuel hate?
That seemed to silence Kevin McCarthy, who is best known for having landed his current gig as House Minority Leader by bribing Donald Trump with red and pink Starbursts. No really, this happened.
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Title: 4Chan’s and 8Chan’s Internet-Brewed Racism Informs Trump’s Rhetoric
Post by: AGelbert on August 08, 2019, 08:15:48 pm
4Chan’s and 8Chan’s Internet-Brewed Racism Informs Trump’s Rhetoric
August 7, 2019
The BBC's Mike Wendling explains the history of a message board subculture and discusses his book, "Alt-Right: From 4Chan to the White House"
https://youtu.be/wBIpa3tLnlA
Story Transcript
MARC STEINER: Welcome to The Real News Network, I’m Marc Steiner. Great to have you all with us.
What is 4chan and 8chan? Why does so many of the right-wing terrorists post their treatises on their sites? Is this an organized national and international movement or is it really just decentralized and we don’t know what it is? How much do Trump’s tweets, his language, exhortations and presence galvanize this movement? Or how much was he created by it, in essence? When did this modern formation, a right-wing supremacist presence, come about to life and why? How dangerous is it really?
We talk with Mike Wendling. Mike Wendling is the Editor of “BBC Trending,” a podcast, and author of Alt-Right: From 4chan to the White House. And Mike, welcome. Good to have you with us here on The Real News.
MIKE WENDLING: Thanks. Thank you.
MARC STEINER: I’m glad you’re here. I really enjoyed your book. It was really well done and sorry I didn’t get a chance to interview for that when it came out, but we can make amends to that later. So let’s just begin. Talk to us a bit first about 4chan and 8chan. They’re not the same thing. They’re separate. So just describe a bit who they are and where they came from.
MIKE WENDLING: Yeah, sure. So I mean it’s a very unusual story in that they were not meant to be breeding grounds for white nationalism. Let’s put that out there to begin with. Really they come from online culture. Specifically, Japanese anime culture was the inspiration for 4chan and it’s basically a freewheeling message board. Pretty much anything goes. Crucially, all users are anonymous. All threads, all discussion topics have to start with an image and that means people have to produce a lot of images and make them very popular because another rule on the site is that the threads, the discussions go away very quickly, in a matter of hours sometimes if they’re not popular. So really, the premium is on getting lots of people to respond and react to your really grabby images really, really quickly.
4chan began in the early 2000s and it got popular. It was associated with other online movements, most notably Anonymous who did raids against Scientology. And then in the past few years it has basically been, I suppose, overtaken or dominated to a large part, particularly one very specific discussion board devoted to politics called the Pol, or Politically Incorrect board. And that has become sort of synonymous with what we think of it as today— as a white nationalist rallying point.
8chan, pretty similar in the way it functions, but a lot newer, was conceived as a spin off or rather a sort of rival because the founder, a guy named Fredrick Brennan thought that 4chan was becoming too centralized, too restrictive. He wanted individual users to be able to come up with their own topics and come up with their own boards and moderate themselves. And to that end, he created something that fulfilled that need. It also meant that it was a lot more extreme. It was a lot more, sort of—It had a lot more calls to violence, doxing. This sort of stuff was really rife, still is on 8chan. And it has led to what we see today in terms of it, again, being a very crucial rallying point for extremists and white nationalists.
MARC STEINER: And 8chan works out of the Philippines, we should say as well, and Congress is trying to get him to come to DC, but I doubt he’ll do that. Of course, just as a disclaimer he said, “This has nothing to do with me. We had nothing to do with any of these things.” So the question is, these aren’t necessarily right-wing sites, they’re sites used by the right-wing because of how they were created, is that what you’re saying?
MIKE WENDLING: Essentially, yes. I mean, and Fredrick Brennan and also the creator of 4chan, the original creator of 4chan, they no longer have anything to do with those websites now. Fredrick Brennan sold it to an American named Jim Watkins— who also lives in the Philippines— a few years ago. And Fredrick Brennan has been very vocal about how he abhors what’s going on and how he just wishes that his creation should be killed. But yeah, I mean what you say is essentially true. It’s not that these sites were created for the far-right or with any real far-right intentions. It’s just the mechanisms that were put in place and made them very popular and very useful for political movements, became very useful for the far-right.
MARC STEINER: So I think in some ways, I mean this is where people post their ideas, but even more important in some ways is something I’m about to show everyone and you. This was put together by Brendan Friedman, who is a columnist for The Daily News in New York. It shows the man who committed the mass murders in El Paso, what he wrote originally on the chan sites, but also how they’re tied to these various tweets and messages sent out by different people, including Donald Trump. So let me just read a couple and let’s talk about what this synergy might mean and why it exists.
All right. Let’s start with this. So Donald Trump tweets, “The US is ill-prepared for this invasion and will not stand for it.” And the killer put into his piece, “The attack is in response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.” Trump to The Sun says, “Allowing the immigration to take place in Europe is a shame. I think that it changed the fabric of Europe. And unless you act very quickly, it’s never going to be what it was. And I don’t mean that in a positive way.” The killer writes, “The natives didn’t take the invasion of Europeans seriously, and now what’s left is just a shadow of what it was.”
And finally, Republican Senator John Cronin tweeted, “Texas gained almost nine Hispanic residents for every additional white resident last year. The man who did the murders said, “The heavy Hispanic population in Texas will make us a Democratic stronghold.” Now, I could go on and read dozens and dozens more of these, but I didn’t want to do that. I just want to kind of jump into what this means. What does this synergy mean? What does it tell us? How do you analyze it? I think it’s too simplistic to say, “Well, Trump did this.” Do you know what I’m saying? But there’s a synergy here, and describe how you would describe what that means.
MIKE WENDLING: Yeah. I think that would be very simplistic to say that, overly simplistic. Throughout his campaign in 2016, Donald Trump consistently showed a – he didn’t show in most cases an outward or a blatant courting of these types of people. I mean, there were a few incidents; for instance he blamed faulty microphone for him not being able to hear about a question whether he would condemn a KKK leader or reject his support, this kind of stuff. But in some ways what is really happening here is that there is a common language, I suppose, that results in all sorts of beliefs. And some of them are not necessarily violent. Some of them are fairly mainstream in American society. And this is where the commonality is coming out.
Now, I mean, I think if you look at Trump and you look at his record, what you have is a series of really inconsistent sorts of, I guess, moves and strikes. You know what I mean? Everything from, I guess, Syria to taxes and the economy. He kind of vacillates between being a new, more extreme right president and an establishment Republican who for instance wants to cut the taxes of businesses, right? That’s a pretty mainstream and notably one of the few legislative achievements that he has actually managed in his term.
It’s clear though that at times he has veered towards this type of language. It was clear that when he appointed Steve Bannon who has links in this kind of world that was a different style of Donald Trump. And then it’s also clear, I think that at least now, he is pushing these identity issues as a key plank in his campaign. So of course, whether he does that next year, we don’t know. But that kind of explains what’s going on here in terms of where these ideas are coming from.
MARC STEINER: I’m curious though, talk a bit about here just for a moment before we look at some of the things from the real conservative media and how they play into this. There’s Donald Trump and you have this growth of this kind of alt-right, the white supremacist right, people call it by many names or describe it many ways, but the modern history of this in the 21st century – where it came from. And I think what an interesting analysis to explore would be how Trump played into that, why they support Trump, what they see in him, how he feeds into that, and just where it came from? In post 9/11, Obama’s election, the growth of this movement and how it exploded through 4chan and 8chan and other places. This, to me, that history is really important to figure out where the future might be going.
MIKE WENDLING: Yeah. And so I think that the history is complicated, but it kind of boils down to fringes that have always been there on the right in America. Pat Buchanan for instance, has a lot of these same ideas. A few really fringe academics, bloggers, radicals kind of kept that flame going throughout the early part, the Bush years, the Obama years. It kind of exploded with Trump. And Trump’s success was to hang on to enough establishment or mainstream Republicans and then tap into this well of discontent that was underneath the surface, that was not afraid of some of these ideas, including the white nationalist ideas of the alt-right. Now, let’s remember that the alt-right and people like Richard Spencer who’s probably shot to prominence— he’s probably the biggest, most well-known white nationalists in America today— really welcomed Trump, but then quickly became disillusioned with him as he didn’t 100% tow their line, right?
Now, it’s interesting to see whether he might come back in their favor and what that means. And now that, I guess this movement, there’s been coverage about it. My book is one of a few books that are on the shelf under the alt-right label these days. Whether that will make any difference, not only in the governance that Donald Trump does, but his reelection prospects.
MARC STEINER: Well, I have a question about that, a push a bit on that, but let’s show these clips first because I think they’re connected. These are clips – the first is a montage we put together from Fox News that I think is important to watch. And then what happened last night, we’re going to watch right after that, is Tucker Carlson and what he said. Let’s watch this.
MARK STEYN, FOX NEWS GUEST: The white supremacists are American citizens. The illegal immigrants are people who shouldn’t be here.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: Your views on immigration will have zero impact and zero influence on a House dominated by Democrats who want to replace you, the American voters, with newly amnestied citizens.
STEVE CORTES, FOX & FRIENDS GUEST: Illegal immigrants are burglars, are thieves who are there to harm your security and steal your prosperity.
BRIAN KILMEADE, FOX & FRIENDS CO-HOST: What’s happening at the border is a flat-out invasion. We are being overwhelmed every day.
JESSE WATTERS: As the illegal invasion at our southern border intensifies. … It is an invasion.
STUART VARNEY, FOX NEWS HOST: And I’m going to call it an invasion, like it or not.
LAWRENCE JONES, FOX NEWS CONTRIBUTOR: You have a group of people that are invading the US border, right? And they’re being held in facilities.
TUCKER CARLSON, FOX NEWS HOST: Their political success does not depend on good policies, but on demographic replacement.
RET. COL. DOUGLAS MACGREGOR, FOX NEWS GUEST: The more of these people that can be brought in illegally as well as legally, the better it is for the Democratic Party because their goal is to transform the United States.
LAURA INGRAHAM, FOX NEWS HOST: And I think calling it anything but an invasion at this point is just not being honest with people.
TOMI LAHREN, FOX NATION HOST: Any citizen of any nation should be upset and outraged when there is an invasion by foreigners into their country.
MARC STEINER: So that’s just one piece and let’s play this other piece. This is just from last night with Tucker Carlson.
TUCKER CARLSON: But the whole thing is a lie. If you were to assemble a list, a hierarchy of concerns or problems this country faces, where would white supremacy be on the list? Right up there with Russia probably. It’s actually not a real problem in America. The combined membership of every white supremacist organization in this country would be able to fit inside a college football stadium? I mean, seriously, this is a country where the average person is getting poorer, where the suicide rate is spiking. White supremacy, that’s the problem. This is a hoax, just like the Russia hoax. It’s a conspiracy theory used to divide the country and keep a hold on power. That’s exactly what’s going on.
MARC STEINER: So if I combine this, and you can tell me if you think we’re making too much of this Mike Wendling, but if I combine what I see on Fox News, which is a major news outlet that has tens of millions of viewers. Watching this, coupled with the tweets that we’ve seen and statements by the President of the United States because he loves to do things that are extreme. That’s part of – always been his raison d’être for his entire existence most of his life and has been doing that and throwing these things out.
And then you have this alt-right movement and just this right-wing movement. We know in our country here in United States that almost all the terrorist acts that have been committed to internally, have been committed by people who identify with this movement. And then whenever you see these things, whatever movement’s on top, there are many, many more people beneath that and around that who support it even if they don’t act the way these men and women act. So the question is, to me—I’m just pushing that a little bit because I think it’s more complex and perhaps even more insidious than we’re talking about here.
MIKE WENDLING: Look, I mean, this is not an issue of— as terrible as it is— the number of people who are dead. You know what I mean? This is not a matter of people, “Oh well they only killed X dozen people thus; car crashes kill more.” That’s just crazy talk to be frank. It’s not a matter—After the Orlando shooting or the San Bernardino shooting, it wasn’t just the number of people who are dead, but the fear. That’s why we call it terrorism. The terror that is meant to create, the way it’s supposed to divide society and make individuals fearful. That is the point of these attacks.
So to say that, oh well it’s small-scale or to play it down is just not really a credible position take. Clearly, the authorities and not only in the US, in New Zealand for instance, here in the UK, around Europe are taking this as a serious and growing threat. Counter-terrorism officers who’ve spoken in this country say the same thing. The FBI looks at conspiracy theories and comes out with reports about how they’re growing and how they’re dangerous. So the real conspiracy theory is actually shown by some of the clips that you played before that clip, which is this idea. It goes by the name of the “great replacement” or the white genocide conspiracy theory, an idea that there was somehow a grand plot by the government, the elite, if you get to the extreme— anti-Semitic, it’s the Jews, to somehow replace the white race with a combination of immigration, interbreeding, depressed fertility, abortion, whatever, you can throw whatever that goes in there. This is a conspiracy theory. This is a far-right conspiracy theory. It has its origins in a book called The Great Replacement—
MARC STEINER: Renaud Camus.
MIKE WENDLING: … And the alt-right groups in Europe and it’s based upon the racist idea that a child of a mixed-race couple is non-white. And it is a fear-mongering tactic that has been used by white supremacists long before the alt-right was ever a thing.
MARC STEINER: So, but we have to conclude here, I mean, because I was thinking about the book, I was thinking about Renaud Camus and many Americans don’t even know who that is or the author’s name. But he is the philosophical founding father in many ways of this whole idea of replacement, right?
The question I have though is that even if you can look at these movements as something smaller than an entire society, they’re fueling an entire populous movement across Europe, across India, across the Philippines, in Brazil, in the United States, in the UK. This is, to me, we’re looking at this, is looking at the alt-right like they’re some kind of fringe maniacs, but more of what they say about a larger trend of the fears in this planet and how they fit into that.
MIKE WENDLING: I mean there is if you like international-nationalist movement. These ideas, and given it’s fueled by social media, it’s fueled by sites like 8chan and 4chan, it’s easy for these ideas to spread. It’s not the case anymore that somebody who is a demagogue in one place will have no influence in another. You can bet that the people in Oregon are really aware of the people in Manchester, in England and are really aware of the people in places like Germany and France who are advancing these ideas. It’s coming together. I mean, I don’t want to sort of overstates the, I guess, a meeting of minds here because there are definitely some differences—
MARC STEINER: Oh absolutely, right.
MIKE WENDLING: … In philosophy and approach and how they play out in national politics, right? Which is very different still. But it’s very clear that there is a greater coalescing of these, you mentioned, there are a whole bunch of nationalist movements and far-right movements around the globe. They’re increasingly coming together.
MARC STEINER: Well, Mike Wendling, A, I appreciate your work at “BBC Trending.” Thank you so much for joining us here at The Real News today. I look forward to continuing our communications and conversations. Thank you so much.
MIKE WENDLING: Thanks for having me.
MARC STEINER: I’m Marc Steiner here for The Real News Network. Thank you all for joining us. Please let us know what you think. Take care.
Title: Former White Nationalist Reveals Surprising Way to End Extremism
Post by: AGelbert on August 09, 2019, 07:33:07 pm
Former White Nationalist Reveals Surprising Way to End Extremism
5,631 views
https://youtu.be/KYVfaBSBtHI
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Aug 8, 2019
Former white nationalist, Christian Picciolini reveals surprising way to to put an end to the movement of extremism and how Donald Trump fits right into white nationalists' goals.
Being brought into a white nationalist skinhead organization in his early teens, Christian fought his way out of the movement and now spends time trying to radicals others like him.
Could he have a way to put an end to white nationalist organizations once and for all?
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Category News & Politics
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on August 12, 2019, 11:05:01 pm
Nixon Southern Strategy Rises Again
2,328 views
https://youtu.be/PvO0LEvPdzI
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Aug 12, 2019
Are we seeing the return of Nixon's southern strategy with Donald Trump?
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ABOUT THE PROGRAM The Thom Hartmann Program is the leading progressive political talk radio show for political news and comments about Government politics, be it Liberal or Conservative, plus special guests and callers
Title: Donald Trump has even found a way to ruin the Statue of Liberty
Post by: AGelbert on August 15, 2019, 03:33:06 pm
Donald 🦀 Trump has even found a way to ruin the Statue of Liberty
Robert Harrington | 12:01 pm EDT August 15, 2019 Palmer Report » Analysis
I recall a time when white nationalist talking points inserted into any discussion about the Statue of Liberty would have been politically dangerous, even for a Republican. Lest we forget, a mere seven years ago a Republican candidate for president of the United States was castigated endlessly (and, let’s face it, fatuously) for referring to “binders full of women.” We knew what he meant, and, what he meant was clumsily put, albeit innocently intended, and the backlash was a simple case of taking cynicism too far. The truth was then much easier to come by than it is now. Mitt Romney shouldn’t have become president of the United States, not because he kept actual women locked up in actual binders, but because he was a weak-minded fool and a coward, and Americans understood that.
But if one could add another verse to the Book of Ecclesiastes (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Ecclesiastes+3&version=KJV), one would be forgiven for wishing to include “a time to be cynical,” because that time is certainly now. These days there are fewer and fewer instances where extreme reactions to mildly and (ostensibly) innocently-phrased pronouncements are not warranted – barring irresponsible accusations of murder without evidence, of course.
When the concluding lines of the sonnet “The New Colossus,” by Emma Lazarus, was first cast in bronze in 1903, and added to the plinth of the Statue of Liberty 17 years after Lady Liberty first lifted her lamp beside the golden door of New York Harbor, I doubt any realized then how pregnant with dangerous meaning those 17 years “too late” would become, in the hard and humorless eyes of white nationalists a century later. That 17 year gap in time subverted, in their view, “what the statute originally meant,” and hastily, they insist, tacked on this popular nonsense about letting brown people come flooding in, for goodness’ sake.
Never mind that the poem was actually written in 1883, three years before the statue was dedicated. Never mind it was written precisely to raise money for the very plinth upon which Lady Liberty was to rest and to which the poem was ultimately affixed. Just don’t confuse a white nationalist with the facts. Besides, if we destroy this precious little talking point of theirs they’ll jolly well go in search of another.For those of you who don’t know or have forgotten what the plaque says, here is the entire text:
Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
All of which brings me to 🐍Ken Cuccinelli. Cuccinelli is the Trump administration’s acting head of Citizenship and Immigration Services. It was he who in a recent PBS interview changed the words of the poem. “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” Cuccinelli began, then he added the words, “who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge.”
All of which is to distract Americans into believing that immigrants are an undue strain on the system, despite the fact that they pay billions in taxes, billions into social security, and, for those who are undocumented, are not allowed to vote, collect benefits or qualify for Medicare. It was immigrants who helped build Trump Tower at the below-minimum-wage rate of $4 an hour. And, no, it was not millions of undocumented immigrants who voted for Hillary Clinton. No matter how much Trump would love to blame them for that, Hillary legitimately won the popular vote in 2016.
Donald Trump’s recent disavowal of white supremacy rings hollow in the shadow of Cuccinelli’s rewrite of the Statue of Liberty poem. Insisting that however duck-like the appearance, the walk and the quack may be, that this administration is not a duck is laughable. We know what the poem on Lady Liberty says, we know what it means and we know when it was written. All Americans ought to understand this, particularly a man named “Cuccilini.”
All of which puts me in mind of another poem written by another woman, Marya Mannes ✨:
Borders are scratched across the hearts of men By strangers with a calm, judicial pen, And when the borders bleed we watch with dread The lines of ink across the map turn red.
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Title: Was Universal Healthcare Stopped by Racism?
Post by: AGelbert on August 19, 2019, 09:13:14 pm
Was Universal Healthcare Stopped by Racism? 1,284 views
https://youtu.be/x64u92GXFrg
Thom Hartmann Program Published on Aug 19, 2019
Did Universal Healthcare end because of racism?
Thom Hartmann exposes how Universal Healthcare was stopped at every corner by racist policies that didn't want to see healthcare and other benefits applied to the African Americans.
Title: How Elites Crush Black Dissent
Post by: AGelbert on September 05, 2019, 12:41:25 pm
How (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817135149.gif&hash=b4a8748d7cf56a31dd0a6aae5828ed2c1ac2815c) Elites Crush Black Dissent
34,017 views
https://youtu.be/dtDm9eFO5Gg
The Real News Network Published on Sep 2, 2019
What does it mean for the people living under systemic oppression when society frames their rebellion as a riot?
Subscribe to our page and support our work at https://therealnews.com/donate.
Category News & Politics
Title: Key Witness Against Dallas Cop Amber Guyger murdered!
Post by: AGelbert on October 15, 2019, 10:08:01 pm
What Really Happened ☠️ To Key Witness Against Dallas Cop Amber Guyger?
29,669 views•Oct 11, 2019
https://youtu.be/fRv8HBEcvH8
Thom Hartmann Program 184K subscribers
Hours after a guilty verdict was given to Dallas Police Officer Amber Guyger, a key witness, Joshua Brown was shot and killed.
Police are saying that Joshua Brown's death was the result of a drug deal gone wrong but the African American community, doesn't buy it.
Thom Hartmann answers a call from friend of the show Kenyatta, who finds something rotten with the whole situation.
Should we really believe the same police department that just murdered Bothom Jean had nothing to do with the death of a Joshua Brown, a witness whose testimony lead to a police officer serving a ten year sentence? (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185040-16582181.gif&hash=0d99dd3e7a01101b8b7d5d1d810050efa1fc13df) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2F1.bp.blogspot.com%2F-TzWpwHzCvCI%2FT_sBEnhCCpI%2FAAAAAAAAME8%2FIsLpuU8HYxc%2Fs1600%2Fnooo-way-smiley.gif&hash=b8545bd420b1e2f2c7b9f665d2093523e4ad2251)
Leave your thoughts in the comments! What do you think really happened?
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Title: Why Do Police Get Away With Shooting the Mentally Ill?
Post by: AGelbert on October 15, 2019, 10:10:05 pm
Why Do Police Get Away With Shooting the Mentally Ill?
5,299 views•Premiered Oct 10, 2019
https://youtu.be/eDJ3ycJyZds
The Real News Network 362K subscribers
On this episode of the Police Accountability Report we analyze an investigative report on controversial police shootings in Greenville, South Carolina that points to a troubling trend of police using deadly force against people suffering mental distress.
Send your tips to par@therealnews.com
Subscribe to our page and support our work at https://therealnews.com/donate. Category News & Politics
Title: A Native Perspective on the Buried History ☠️ of America
Post by: AGelbert on November 08, 2019, 07:55:06 pm
A Native Perspective on the Buried History ☠️ of America
Franklin & Marshall College 1.35K subscribers Most people are unaware that the Declaration of Independence, 30 lines below the statement "all men are created equal" refers to the Native Americans as "merciless Indian savages."
Mark Charles is a dynamic and thought-provoking public speaker, writer, and consultant. The son of an American woman (of Dutch heritage) and a Navajo man, he speaks with insight into the complexities of American history regarding race, culture, and religion in order to help forge a path of healing and conciliation for the nation. Mark is currently working to bring about a national dialogue on race, specifically regarding the Doctrine of Discovery and its influence on the very foundations of our nation; including the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the United States Supreme Court.
Recorded Oct. 13, 2016, in Mayser Gymnasium. Category Education
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on November 09, 2019, 06:21:53 pm
Houston Elects 19 Black Women Judges, so 😈 Texas Gov. and Legislature Move to End Judicial Elections. (https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/11/9/1898244/-Houston-Elects-19-Black-Women-Judges-so-Texas-Gov-and-Legislature-Move-to-End-Judicial-Elections)
Joe Madison ✨ Battles Bridge Named After Civil War 👹 Traitor!
1,010 views•Feb 1, 2020
https://youtu.be/T3vS9VUI53A
Thom Hartmann Program 205K subscribers
Joe Madison has been hard at work, fighting to remove a name honoring a traitor to the United States, from a bridge.
🔴 Subscribe for more clips like this: https://www.youtube.com/user/thomhartmann
Title: How to Fix the Criminal (In)Justice System
Post by: AGelbert on February 14, 2020, 06:26:03 pm
Quote
"Whatever the 🦍 Police Unions are FOR, BE AGAINST!" (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-210818180844.png&hash=d74cfbba22967e53f7eb6202dffdd50b3e520fe2)
John Legend and Patrisse Cullors on How to Fix the Criminal (In)Justice System
1,265 views•Premiered 8 hours ago
https://youtu.be/j0HWAKpfpko
The Intercept 146K subscribers
THE UNITED STATES has the biggest prison population of any country on the planet. The crime rate is down, but the incarceration rate continues to soar. Black men are six times as likely to be locked up as white men. With the 2020 presidential election around the corner, what hope is there for fixing the criminal justice system? For reforming or even abolishing prison? For tackling the mental health crisis behind bars?
Those were the topics of discussion at a live taping of the Deconstructed podcast on Monday night at the Writer’s Guild Theater in Los Angeles. Host Mehdi Hasan was joined by John Legend, musician, activist, philanthropist, and founder of FREEAMERICA, and Patrisse Cullors, artist, organizer, author, and co-founder of the Black Lives Matter Global Network.
Subscribe to our channel: https://interc.pt/subscribe Category News & Politics
Title: X: Malcolm's Final Years
Post by: AGelbert on February 22, 2020, 11:58:23 am
X: Malcolm's Final Years
2,586 views•Feb 21, 2020
https://youtu.be/BxWe8ohW_Cs
The Real News Network 387K subscribers
On Malcolm X's 92nd birthday, TRNN revisits this documentary, which commemorated the 50th anniversary of his death. Interviews include Angela Davis and Danny Glover. (Executive Producer Paul Jay, co-production with Telesur and support from the Bertha Foundation)
Subscribe to our page and support our work at https://therealnews.com/donate. Category News & Politics
Title: Malcolm X’s Daughter Ilyasah Shabazz on Her Father’s Legacy & the New Series “Who Killed Malcolm X?”
Post by: AGelbert on February 22, 2020, 12:37:21 pm
Malcolm X’s Daughter Ilyasah Shabazz on Her Father’s Legacy & the New Series “Who Killed Malcolm X?”
25,005 views•Feb 21, 2020
https://youtu.be/IyzEv7XM2bY
Democracy Now! 635K subscribers
Fifty-five years ago today, Malcolm X was assassinated. The civil rights leader was shot to death on February 21, 1965, at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City. He was only 39 years old. Details of his assassination remain disputed to this day. Earlier this month, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance said he was considering reopening the investigation, just days after a new documentary series about the assassination was released on Netflix called “Who Killed Malcolm X?” It makes the case that two of the three men who were convicted for Malcolm X’s murder are actually innocent and that his uncaught killers were four members of a Nation of Islam mosque in Newark, New Jersey. We are joined by Ilyasah Shabazz, one of six daughters of Malcolm X, who was just 2 years old when her father was assassinated in front of her, her siblings and her mother. We also speak with award-winning author Abdur-Rahman Muhammad, independent scholar, historian, journalist, writer and activist, who is widely regarded as one of the most respected authorities on the life and legacy of Malcolm X and is featured in the new documentary series, and Shayla Harris, a producer for the series and an award-winning filmmaker and journalist.
#DemocracyNow
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Title: 🦀 Trump Inspires a New Generation of Bullies
Post by: AGelbert on February 23, 2020, 12:51:38 pm
🦀 Trump Inspires a New Generation of 🦍Bullies (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/2/3-300919160017-22191429.png)
2,032 views•Feb 23, 2020
https://youtu.be/uiA5Z5VYirI
Thom Hartmann Program 209K subscribers
🦀 Donald Trump is a classic bully and he is now inspiring a whole generation of new little Trumps around the country.
🔴 Subscribe for more clips like this: https://www.youtube.com/user/thomhartmann
🔥 WATCH NEXT: Does 😈 Grover Norquist Have the 🦀 President He Always Dreamed Of?
https://youtu.be/QYfjIQJQrBE
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Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on February 23, 2020, 07:31:49 pm
Anti-Native Sentiment Increasing Amid Protests Against Canadian 🦕🦖 Pipeline (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818180835-16271224.gif&hash=c2a9bfbff23e2414975829eb4b3655af12eb02cc)
7,960 views•Feb 23, 2020
https://youtu.be/oywkhuGMVZg
NowThis News 514K subscribers
This Indigenous woman says she was verbally and racially abused during her daily bus commute amid growing tensions over Native protests against a Canadian pipeline. » Subscribe to NowThis: http://go.nowth.is/News_Subscribe » Sign up for our newsletter KnowThis to get the biggest stories of the day delivered straight to your inbox: https://go.nowth.is/KnowThis
In US news and current events today, this Indigenous woman says she was verbally and racially abused as she rode the bus on her daily commute as Native protests against a Canadian pipeline gain momentum.
For years, First Nations communities in Canada and their supporters, including members of the Wet’suwet’an nation, have fought the construction of TransCanada’s Coastal GasLink pipeline. The proposed pipeline would cross over traditional lands in British Columbia in order to ship oil to Asia.
Several elected Indigenous councils along the route have approved the construction of the pipeline, but Wet’suwet’an hereditary chiefs say they actually have the final say over the control of these traditional lands, and the elected Indigenous councils have no jurisdiction over them.
Protesters initially set up camps blockading access to the pipeline’s construction sites, but those camps have been removed cleared by law enforcement. In recent weeks, Indigenous people and their allies have held demonstrations across Canada, reaching as far away as NYC in support of the anti-pipeline demonstrators.
Canada’s railways, highways, & ports have been occupied by demonstrators, with the aim of causing travel & economic disruption. However, an anti-Native sentiment is reportedly increasing as the acts of civil disobedience continue.
For Violet Baptiste, she was on the receiving end of it while riding the bus. Baptiste hopes non-Native allies will speak up when they see someone being harassed. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has called for a peaceful end of the blockades.
For more stories relating to Indigenous rights and world news, subscribe to NowThis News.
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NowThis is your premier news outlet providing you with all the videos you need to stay up to date on all the latest in trending news. From entertainment to politics, to viral videos and breaking news stories, we’re delivering all you need to know straight to your social feeds. We live where you live.
Title: Re: Mechanisms of Prejudice: Hidden and Not Hidden
Post by: AGelbert on March 01, 2020, 12:51:44 pm
February 27, 2020/102 Comments/in emptywheel /by Jim White
SNIPPET:
But what really seared into my memory were the multiple collections of jars of soil from lynching sites. Here’s my photo of one such wall in the building housing the meeting room and gift shop at the National Memorial:
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🐘 TED YOHO SAYS LYNCHING IS NOT A HATE CRIME (https://www.emptywheel.net/2020/02/27/ted-yoho-says-lynching-is-not-a-hate-crime/)
Title: Fired Amazon Worker Chris Smalls Responds To Leaked Smear Campaign Plans
Post by: AGelbert on April 06, 2020, 12:14:27 am
Fired Amazon Worker Chris Smalls (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185038-16442135.gif&hash=52927992b43007fa5c5eb6ffcb453ae29948c356) Responds To Leaked 👹 Smear Campaign Plans
7,666 views•Apr 3, 2020
https://youtu.be/jTQiTliRxig
The Real News Network 394K subscribers
Amazon executives described Smalls as “not smart or articulate." Smalls was fired after organizing a walkout over employee safety at Amazon's Staten Island warehouse.
Subscribe to our page and support our work at https://therealnews.com/donate. Category News & Politics
Title: UnCommon Law Helps Inmates Serving Life Sentences Earn Back Their Freedom
Post by: AGelbert on April 26, 2020, 02:45:55 pm
UnCommon Law Helps Inmates Serving Life Sentences Earn Back Their Freedom | NowThis
5,260 views•Apr 26, 2020
https://youtu.be/TeUIMhGDtHo
NowThis News 677K subscribers
This lawyer helps people serving life sentences earn parole and win back their freedom. » Subscribe to NowThis: http://go.nowth.is/News_Subscribe » Sign up for our newsletter KnowThis to get the biggest stories of the day delivered straight to your inbox: https://go.nowth.is/KnowThis
In US news and current events today, every year, thousands of people serving life sentences have a chance to get out of prison. This lawyer helps them win back their freedom.
For more stories on prison reform and social justice, subscribe to NowThis News.
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NowThis is your premier news outlet providing you with all the videos you need to stay up to date on all the latest in trending news. From entertainment to politics, to viral videos and breaking news stories, we’re delivering all you need to know straight to your social feeds. We live where you live.
Title: Rahm Emanuel's brother argues life after 75 is not worth living
Post by: Surly1 on April 27, 2020, 07:05:08 am
It frosts my balls that this article calls him an "ethicist." No surprise that he is Rahmbo's brother. Proof that not just Rs are members of the Death Cult. If you're not helping to raise stock prices, you're a useless eater.
A doctor and medical ethicist argues life after 75 is not worth living (https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/08/21/238642/a-doctor-and-medical-ethicist-argues-life-after-75-is-not-worth-living/?fbclid=IwAR3WvZ0CX2_WjV5g9u6guO9M-eva_kjQj6AwBz1TftK6gG3JKXoICwx0JfQ) Ezekiel Emanuel questions “whether our consumption is worth our contribution” in old age.
In October 2014, Ezekiel Emanuel published an essay in the Atlantic called “Why I Hope to Die at 75.” Because Emanuel is a medical doctor and chair of the University of Pennsylvania’s department of medical ethics and health policy, as well as a chief architect of Obamacare, the article stirred enormous controversy.
Emanuel vowed to refuse not only heroic medical interventions once he turned 75, but also antibiotics and vaccinations. His argument: older Americans live too long in a diminished state, raising the question of, as he put it, “whether our consumption is worth our contribution.”
Emanuel was born into a combative clan. One brother, Rahm, recently completed two terms as the controversial mayor of Chicago; another brother, Ari, is a high-profile Hollywood agent. But even given his DNA, Emanuel’s death wish was a provocative argument from a medical ethicist and health-care expert.
Emanuel, now 62, talked with me about the social implications of longevity research and why he isn’t a fan of extending life spans. I was particularly curious to get his reaction to several promising new anti-aging drugs.
Q: It’s five years since you published the essay. Any second thoughts as you near the deadline?
A: Not really! [Laughing]
Q: You announced that you wouldn’t take any measures to prolong your life after 75. Isn’t that an extreme position?
A: First of all, it’s not an extreme position. I’m not going to die at 75. I’m not committing suicide. I’m not asking for euthanasia. I’m going to stop taking medications with the sole justification that the medication or intervention is to prolong my life.
Q. But it’s called “Why I hope to die …”
"The world will exist fine if you happen to die. Great people, maybe even people greater than you, like Newton and Shakespeare and Euler—they died."
A. As you probably know better than everyone else, it’s editors that choose titles and not authors.
I often get, from the people who want to dismiss me, “You know, my Aunt Nellie, she was clear as a bell at 94, and blah-blah-blah …” But as I said in the article, there are outliers. There are not that many people who continue to be active and engaged and actually creative past 75. It’s a very small number.
Q: You suggest that one effect of our obsession with longevity is that it diverts attention from the health and well-being of children.
A: Lots of presidents and lots of politicians say, “Children are our most valuable resource.” But we as a country don’t behave like that. We don’t invest in children the way we invest in adults, especially older adults. One of the statistics I like to point out is if you look at the federal budget, $7 goes to people over 65 for every dollar for people under 18.
Q: The buzzword in longevity research is “health span”—living a maximum life with a minimal amount of disability or ill health. Isn’t that a worthwhile goal?
A: If you ask anyone, “All right, design out the life you want,” I think people initially say, “Oh, I want to keep going as fast as I can, and then just fall off a cliff.” And then they reconsider: “Well, maybe I don’t want to die of a heart attack or a stroke in the middle of the night. I want to say goodbye to my family. So I want some gentle decline, but a very short amount of time. You know, months, not years.”
It makes perfect sense. I’m no different. I would like to maintain my vigor, my intellectual capacity, my productivity, all the way through to the end. But I think we also need to be realistic—that’s not the way most of us are going to live.
Q: Does that mean you’re skeptical about the health-span idea?
A: In the early 1980s, we had a theory that as we live longer, we’re going to stay in better health. You know, at 70, we’re going to be like our parents were when they were 50. Well, if you look at the data, maybe not. We’re having more disabilities. We have people with more problems. And even more important, for most people, is the biological decline in cognitive function. If you look at really smart people, there aren’t that many writing brand-new books after 75, and really developing new areas where they are leading thinkers. They tend to be re-tilling familiar areas that they’ve worked on for a long time.
Q: What’s wrong with simply enjoying an extended life?
A: These people who live a vigorous life to 70, 80, 90 years of age—when I look at what those people “do,” almost all of it is what I classify as play. It’s not meaningful work. They’re riding motorcycles; they’re hiking. Which can all have value—don’t get me wrong. But if it’s the main thing in your life? Ummm, that’s not probably a meaningful life.
Q: Are the anti-aging drugs in development just a bid for immortality by the back door?
A: Certainly. You listen to these people and their lingo is not “We’re just trying to get rid of problems.” Right? It’s “We want to live longer.” I notice that almost all of these things—not all of them, but many of them—are based out in California, because God forbid the world should continue to exist and I’m not part of it!
The world will exist fine if you happen to die. Great people, maybe even people greater than you, like Newton and Shakespeare and Euler—they died. And guess what? The world’s still there.
Q: What message do you think it sends when iconic innovators in Silicon Valley—people like Peter Thiel and Larry Ellison—are clearly fascinated by life extension and …
A: No, no—they’re fascinated by their life extension! This idea that they’re fascinated with life extension [in general]? Naw, they’re fascinated by their life extension. They find it hard to even contemplate the idea that they are going to die and the world is going to be fine without them.
Q: You have described the “American immortal”—people interested in life extension and immortality.
A: There is this view that longevity, living forever—and if not forever, 250 or 1,000 years—is really what we ought to be aiming at. And once you’ve got cultural leaders, or opinion leaders, saying this, people glom onto it. And it feeds into a whole situation of “Yes, dying is a bad thing.”
I do fear death. But I think I fear being sort of decrepit and falling apart more.
Q: Is it really a problem if one of these drugs like metformin shows a modest life-extending effect?
A: I think it would be, especially if what ends up happening is it adds a few years of life. Then the question is: What are the downsides of that? There may be a cognitive downside, maybe a little more mental confusion.
It’s very funny—every time I talk to people, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, definitely quality of life over quantity of life.” But when push comes to shove, it’s really quantity of life. “I might be a little more confused, but I’ll take that extra year!”
Title: 1984 speak is the Neoliberal Normal
Post by: AGelbert on April 27, 2020, 01:14:51 pm
It frosts my balls that this article calls him an "ethicist." No surprise that he is Rahmbo's brother. Proof that not just Rs are members of the Death Cult. If you're not helping to raise stock prices, you're a useless eater.
A doctor and medical ethicist (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-250718202127.gif&hash=acc63221521ebaf3f238088fd92d1ae3a08b6e48) argues life after 75 is not worth living (https://www.technologyreview.com/2019/08/21/238642/a-doctor-and-medical-ethicist-argues-life-after-75-is-not-worth-living/?fbclid=IwAR3WvZ0CX2_WjV5g9u6guO9M-eva_kjQj6AwBz1TftK6gG3JKXoICwx0JfQ) 😈 Ezekiel Emanuel questions “whether our consumption is worth our contribution” in old age.
In October 2014, Ezekiel Emanuel published an essay in the Atlantic called “Why I Hope to Die at 75.” Because Emanuel is a medical doctor and chair of the University of Pennsylvania’s department of medical ethics and health policy, as well as a chief architect of Obamacare, the article stirred enormous controversy.
Emanuel vowed to refuse not only heroic medical interventions once he turned 75, but also antibiotics and vaccinations. His argument: older Americans live too long in a diminished state, raising the question of, as he put it, “whether our consumption is worth our contribution.”
Emanuel was born into a combative clan. One brother, Rahm, recently completed two terms as the controversial mayor of Chicago; another brother, Ari, is a high-profile Hollywood agent. But even given his DNA, Emanuel’s death wish was a provocative argument from a medical ethicist and health-care expert.
Emanuel, now 62, talked with me about the social implications of longevity research and why he isn’t a fan of extending life spans. I was particularly curious to get his reaction to several promising new anti-aging drugs.
Q: It’s five years since you published the essay. Any second thoughts as you near the deadline?
A: Not really! [Laughing]
Q: You announced that you wouldn’t take any measures to prolong your life after 75. Isn’t that an extreme position?
A: First of all, it’s not an extreme position. I’m not going to die at 75. I’m not committing suicide. I’m not asking for euthanasia. I’m going to stop taking medications with the sole justification that the medication or intervention is to prolong my life.
Q. But it’s called “Why I hope to die …”
"The world will exist fine if you happen to die. Great people, maybe even people greater than you, like Newton and Shakespeare and Euler—they died."
A. As you probably know better than everyone else, it’s editors that choose titles and not authors.
I often get, from the people who want to dismiss me, “You know, my Aunt Nellie, she was clear as a bell at 94, and blah-blah-blah …” But as I said in the article, there are outliers. There are not that many people who continue to be active and engaged and actually creative past 75. It’s a very small number.
Q: You suggest that one effect of our obsession with longevity is that it diverts attention from the health and well-being of children.
A: Lots of presidents and lots of politicians say, “Children are our most valuable resource.” But we as a country don’t behave like that. We don’t invest in children the way we invest in adults, especially older adults. One of the statistics I like to point out is if you look at the federal budget, $7 goes to people over 65 for every dollar for people under 18.
Q: The buzzword in longevity research is “health span”—living a maximum life with a minimal amount of disability or ill health. Isn’t that a worthwhile goal?
A: If you ask anyone, “All right, design out the life you want,” I think people initially say, “Oh, I want to keep going as fast as I can, and then just fall off a cliff.” And then they reconsider: “Well, maybe I don’t want to die of a heart attack or a stroke in the middle of the night. I want to say goodbye to my family. So I want some gentle decline, but a very short amount of time. You know, months, not years.”
It makes perfect sense. I’m no different. I would like to maintain my vigor, my intellectual capacity, my productivity, all the way through to the end. But I think we also need to be realistic—that’s not the way most of us are going to live.
Q: Does that mean you’re skeptical about the health-span idea?
A: In the early 1980s, we had a theory that as we live longer, we’re going to stay in better health. You know, at 70, we’re going to be like our parents were when they were 50. Well, if you look at the data, maybe not. We’re having more disabilities. We have people with more problems. And even more important, for most people, is the biological decline in cognitive function. If you look at really smart people, there aren’t that many writing brand-new books after 75, and really developing new areas where they are leading thinkers. They tend to be re-tilling familiar areas that they’ve worked on for a long time.
Q: What’s wrong with simply enjoying an extended life?
A: These people who live a vigorous life to 70, 80, 90 years of age—when I look at what those people “do,” almost all of it is what I classify as play. It’s not meaningful work. They’re riding motorcycles; they’re hiking. Which can all have value—don’t get me wrong. But if it’s the main thing in your life? Ummm, that’s not probably a meaningful life.
Q: Are the anti-aging drugs in development just a bid for immortality by the back door?
A: Certainly. You listen to these people and their lingo is not “We’re just trying to get rid of problems.” Right? It’s “We want to live longer.” I notice that almost all of these things—not all of them, but many of them—are based out in California, because God forbid the world should continue to exist and I’m not part of it!
The world will exist fine if you happen to die. Great people, maybe even people greater than you, like Newton and Shakespeare and Euler—they died. And guess what? The world’s still there.
Q: What message do you think it sends when iconic innovators in Silicon Valley—people like Peter Thiel and Larry Ellison—are clearly fascinated by life extension and …
A: No, no—they’re fascinated by their life extension! This idea that they’re fascinated with life extension [in general]? Naw, they’re fascinated by their life extension. They find it hard to even contemplate the idea that they are going to die and the world is going to be fine without them.
Q: You have described the “American immortal”—people interested in life extension and immortality.
A: There is this view that longevity, living forever—and if not forever, 250 or 1,000 years—is really what we ought to be aiming at. And once you’ve got cultural leaders, or opinion leaders, saying this, people glom onto it. And it feeds into a whole situation of “Yes, dying is a bad thing.”
I do fear death. But I think I fear being sort of decrepit and falling apart more.
Q: Is it really a problem if one of these drugs like metformin shows a modest life-extending effect?
A: I think it would be, especially if what ends up happening is it adds a few years of life. Then the question is: What are the downsides of that? There may be a cognitive downside, maybe a little more mental confusion.
It’s very funny—every time I talk to people, it’s like, “Oh, yeah, definitely quality of life over quantity of life.” But when push comes to shove, it’s really quantity of life. “I might be a little more confused, but I’ll take that extra year!”
This is the problem with materialists. This is the problem with the ideology of Social Darwinists. This is the problem with humans who deliberately choose to lack empathy. This is the problem with people who reject the most elementary concept of right versus wrong in a "random" universe where the only "right" is selfish caloric intake "might".
Quote
"if God doesn't exist, then everything is permitted" Fyodor Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov
People of color make up about 40 percent of the population of the United States. And yet, when you look at the judges who make up each state’s supreme court, the amount of diversity is sorely lacking. According to analysis conducted earlier this year by the Brennan Center for Justice, 23 states have an all-white state supreme court bench, including 12 states in which people of color make up at least 20 percent of the population. Nationwide, only 15.5 percent of state supreme court seats are held by people of color.
And justice for all:🗽
► Conversely, there are six U.S. states with a supreme court bench where the percentage of non-white judges is higher than the proportion of the state’s non-white population. Those states are California, Connecticut, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oregon and Washington.
► Gender diversity is also somewhat lacking on these courts. Nationally, women hold 37 percent of state supreme court seats, although 15 states have one or fewer female justices. Currently, in April 2020, Florida does not have any female supreme court justices, although there are two vacancies to fill on the bench.
► The Brennan Center says that ”a diverse bench is crucial to achieving a fair system of justice and promoting public trust in our courts.” The report added that sate supreme courts do not reflect an increasingly diverse U.S. population.
Title: Americans were TAUGHT this as "SCIENCE" to BELIEVE IN or you FAILED in SCIENCE STUDIES
Post by: AGelbert on May 07, 2020, 08:58:22 pm
To whom it may concern: It was the SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY that PUSHED ALL THIS BULLSHIT to JUSTIFY THEIR CRUEL AND STUPID BLIND PREJUDICE! A significant percentage of Americans, many of them scientists, STILL cling to this "White Evolutionary Superiority" CRAP. If you think that IRRATIONAL SELF-SERVING PSEUDO-SCIENTIFIC LEGERDEMAIN was "just about blacks", and did not spill over into other areas of "scientific" inquiry, but has "all gone away" and our "science" is really, honestly "completely objective" now, you are willfully ignorant of reality, guilty of bowing like a gutless herd following coward at the atheist altar of the scientific priesthood which is still pushing all sorts of UNSCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE FREE CONJECTURE as "Science" you must believe in or fail your studies, as well as an instrument of pseudo-scientific LIES.
Human Zoos: America's Forgotten History of Scientific Racism
669,962 views•Feb 17, 2019
https://youtu.be/nY6Zrol5QEk
Discovery Science 63.7K subscribers
Human Zoos tells the shocking story of how thousands of indigenous peoples were put on public display in America in the early decades of the twentieth century.
"A racially charged story that will mesmerize you...." —Oregon Documentary Film Festival.
👉 Subscribe to our channel: https://www.youtube.com/discoveryscie...
Often touted as "missing links" between man and apes, these native peoples were harassed and demeaned. Their public display was arranged with the enthusiastic support of the most elite members of the scientific community, and it was promoted uncritically by American's leading newspapers. This award-winning documentary explores the heartbreaking story of what happened, shows how African-American ministers and other people of faith tried to push back, and reveals how some people today are still drawing on Social Darwinism in order to dehumanize others. The film also explores the tragic story of eugenics in America, the effort to breed human beings based on Darwinian principles.
Human Zoos was an official selection of the African World Documentary Film Festival and has won awards for Best Editing (Oregon Documentary Film Festival), Best in Show (Cinema WorldFest Awards) and Awards of Excellence from the Impact Docs Awards and the Hollywood Independent Documentary Awards.
Be sure to check out these other videos about Social Darwinism.
The Biology of the Second Reich: Social Darwinism and the Origins of World War 1
https://youtu.be/9n900e80R30
Darwin Day in America
https://youtu.be/cm4WuWOatjs
The War on Humans
https://youtu.be/RWcEYYj_-rg
============================ The Discovery Science News Channel is the official Youtube channel of Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture. The CSC is the institutional hub for scientists, educators, and inquiring minds who think that nature supplies compelling evidence of intelligent design. The CSC supports research, sponsors educational programs, defends free speech, and produce articles, books, and multimedia content. For more information visit https://www.discovery.org/id/ http://www.evolutionnews.org/ http://www.intelligentdesign.org/
Title: Troopers gave benefit of doubt to 😈 Barreda while their behind-the-scenes attitude toward Clemmons was “hostile.”
Post by: AGelbert on June 24, 2021, 12:07:21 pm
Agelbert NOTE: If you are a person of color, REMEMBER the Vermont State 😈 POLICEMENS REA MODUS OPERANDI detailed in this story if you are ever anywhere near Williston, Vermont.
Panel: 👿 Troopers discriminated against Clemmons Family Farm director
By Anne Galloway and Alan J. Keays
Jun 23 2021
SNIPPETS:
“This case illustrates why people of color and women fear turning to the police, and distrust government agencies of all kinds,” Campbell wrote in her conclusion. “The power that law enforcement has to manipulate the facts through its exercise of 😈 discretion in the delivery of services is significant.
“The Vermont State 🦍 Police allowed Gregory Barreda to prey on Dr. Clemmons and terrorize her and her family and destroy a building on one of the few African American farms left in Vermont.” ... ...
Physical damages to the Barn House building, unpaid leave, legal fees, moving fees and private security totaled in excess of $100,000, according to Clemmons. As a result of the harassment and damage, the family business was forced to close from October 2017 to May 2018.
In the report, Clemmons said it would be “impossible to attach a financial value” to her family’s experience, and she found the state police’s conduct to be “far more painful, more humiliating and more haunting to us than anything Barreda ever did to us.”
Barreda did not swear a duty to protect her family, she said, but the state police did.
“I cannot begin to describe to you how it felt for our family to be treated the way we were treated by the VSP. As if our lives, our property, our business, and our longstanding position in this state and in our local community meant less than nothing,” Clemmons said in the report. “We will never forget this, and we will never, ever get over this.”
Read the full story evidencing rampant racial prejudice by Vermont State Police against people of color:🤦♂️ https://vtdigger.org/2021/06/23/panel-troopers-discriminated-against-clemmons-family-farm-director/
Title: LDF issues statement on the sentencing of Derek Chauvin
Post by: AGelbert on June 26, 2021, 12:43:03 pm
LDF issues statement on the sentencing of Derek 👿 Chauvin
Fri, Jun 25, 5:53 PM
Former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was sentenced today to 22.5 years in prison for second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter for killing George Floyd in May 2020. In response, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) President and Director-Counsel Sherrilyn Ifill issued the following statement:
“While the sentencing of Derek Chauvin brings a measure of accountability for the murder of George Floyd, our hearts go out to the Floyd family and the friends of Mr. Floyd who will continue to grieve his loss long after today, and for whom justice would mean George Floyd would still be alive today.
“The circumstances in this case are extremely rare. For a measure of accountability, it took a courageous teenager putting herself at risk to record the slow torture of an unarmed Black man; harrowing and traumatic eyewitness testimony; the rare instance of a police chief and officers willing to testify against Chauvin; and so much more.
“Even now, we await the three upcoming trials for former police officers J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane, and Tou Thao — all of whom have been charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter for their role in failing to intervene as Chauvin murdered Mr. Floyd. Across the country, police brutality and the violent deaths of Black and Brown people at the hands of law enforcement have persisted in spite of last summer’s unified call from protestors and communities across the country for true accountability and an overhaul of our public safety system.
“Much more must be done to bring about the transformational change required to end police violence against communities of color and establish accountability and justice in public safety. To that end, the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act must be passed with the provisions that would end qualified immunity for law enforcement officers, which has too often been used by officers to evade accountability for egregious misconduct. (https://click.everyaction.com/k/31402615/292556829/-1968099459) True justice for George Floyd — and the many more killed at the hands of law enforcement — calls for a public safety system that invests in its communities and holds those who do them harm truly accountable in every instance.”
Bob Stannard ✨: Why all those 👿 parents hated Ruby Bridges
Jul 25 2021
This commentary is by Bob Stannard (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-080515182559.png&hash=d4dfa952fa0f817bf30a8059a4c88d6fb05ee1bf) of Manchester , an author, musician and former state legislator and lobbyist.
The year was 1960. The school was the William Frantz elementary school in New Orleans, an all-white school. The little girl, Ruby Bridges, only 6 years old (the same age as my granddaughter), was Black. Thanks to the elimination of segregation, this little girl was able to go to a presumably better school.
When I was 6 years old, I attended the school at the foot of Danby Mountain Road. It had a potbelly stove for heat and a boys and girls “in-house” for bathrooms (and in-house is an outhouse, only indoors. You get the picture). I did not need an armed escort to allow me into my humble little school. Ruby did.
In 1960, I was 9 years old and living in the whitest state in the country. Had it not been for the Equinox Hotel bringing in Black help from Mississippi, I may never have seen a Black person until I went off to college. By 1960, we were wrapping up the age of innocence. Racial tensions in the South were heating up. Kids in Vermont had no clue what was happening down South.
Did Ruby Bridges’ parents decide to send their child to this all-white school to make a point or so their child would get a better education? Who knows, but there’s no argument that this little girl who suffered racial verbal attacks every day she attended this school must have received quite an education. The parents of the white kids relentlessly shouted and taunted this poor little girl for one and only one reason: the color of her skin.
By the time I entered Burr and Burton high school, other kids of color were being brought into our community to attend then-BBS along with me through what was known as the “Links Program.” BBS reached out to schools that were predominantly Black or Hispanic and chose a handful of kids to come to Vermont.
I don’t recall ever experiencing any racial problems with these kids, but there may very well have been some isolated episodes. What I can say is that there never was a time when the parents of students at my all-white school stood on the sidewalk with placards bearing hateful, racist words or small, handmade coffins with a Black doll inside. Yet, that is what the 6-year-old Ruby Bridges had to endure each and every day she went to school.
For the kids of today who may be reading this, 1960 may feel like a long time ago, but for me it doesn’t. Although I lived through the civil rights era in America, it didn’t have a huge impact on me, primarily because I was living in a nearly all-white state. We didn’t have any race issues, because we only had one race.
By the time non-white kids began arriving at BBS. our community didn’t seem to care all that much about the color of their skin. Maybe it’s a Vermont thing. Who knows. Perhaps if my parents had sent the 6-year-old me to an all-Black school in Harlem, things would have been very different for me.
How would I have reacted if an angry mob of Black people were shouting racial slurs at me just because I was white? I’ll never know, but the Ruby Bridges of today sure does.
Now 66 years old and a grandmother, she’s had a lifetime to reflect on her school days of 1960. She could not imagine putting her kids or her grandchildren in the same position as she had been placed. It was terrifying for her and her family. Both of her parents lost their jobs. Their commitment to having their little girl get a better education cost Ruby’s parents their marriage. We could only try to imagine how hard this decision must have been, but never having been in those tiny shoes, we’ll never truly know.
What was Ruby’s response to those people with hate in their hearts and horrible words spewing from their mouths? She prayed for them. The more empathy this child showed, the more vile hatred was thrust upon her.
Today we hear white politicians from red states try to tell us that there is no systemic racism in America. They want us to believe that the hatred exhibited by their grandparents was never handed down from generation to generation. They want us to believe that everything is just fine, while simultaneously working overtime to disenfranchise Blacks and other minorities from their constitutional right to vote.
Babies are not born hating or loving anything. Hating, loving, narcissism, empathy are all things that are learned from their parents. Parents who have 👿 hate and rage in their hearts will undoubtedly hand that hate and rage down to their kids. Sometimes the kids will ignore what’s being fed to them. Other times they lick the spoon.
America has been a racist nation since its inception and we’ve never come to grips with that reality. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-120716190938.png)
Congress has a voting rights bill ready to be voted on. Passing it would be another step forward to counter our racism. Will it pass? I doubt it. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-041115022304.png&hash=cd8cb8e28ab8f7fc78c1ea00d30a661bd937aed5) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132421-16911675.gif&hash=b337cdc73ae0e451ca134d064ea3363d3de56665) https://vtdigger.org/2021/07/25/bob-stannard-why-all-those-parents-hated-ruby-bridges/
Victim of racist road-rage incident in Winooski questions low-level charges
By Grace Elletson
SNIPPETS:
The man, Michael Gosselin, 50, has been charged with four misdemeanors: aggravated disorderly conduct, stalking, negligent driving and disorderly conduct with a hate crime attached, according to court documents obtained by VTDigger through records requests.
But Gibbs and others are questioning why Gosselin hasn’t been charged with felony aggravated assault — a crime with a steeper jail sentence and one that was recommended by the first police officer to arrive at the scene of the incident. ... ...
While $15,000 bail was initially set by Judge Thomas Devine, the request was not imposed by the court, and 👿 Gosselinwas released on condition that he not be allowed to drive, contact Gibbs or come within 300 feet of her home. Gosselin pleaded not guilty to all charges. ... ...
“As far as I’m concerned, he tried to kill me,” Gibbs told VTDigger about the encounter with Gosselin.
“It feels like there’s this really shitty trend where white people do really horrible, racist things, and then the 😈 state’s attorneys just kind of give them a slap on the wrist, and nothing really happens, and there’s not really any consequences,” she said. “And it doesn’t make me feel safe in the community. At all.”
Shank 👍 writes that white extremists have “bullied countless people of color in Vermont, who had to flee their communities because it became increasingly hostile and unsafe for them. And now it’s pushing me out, too.”
Shank tells The Vermont Conversation, “Not only are people unsafe in our communities … but they are unsafe in terms of who they turn to for protection…. The very people who are supposed to protect them aren’t protecting them.” He cites recent reports about racial disparities in policing in Vermont that show that Black and Hispanic drivers are three to four times more likely to be searched by police during traffic stops — despite having a lower “hit rate” for contraband.
The bias that pervades policing has created a permissive environment for racial harassment and white extremism to flourish, says Shank. “Vermont has a leadership problem on this issue,” he asserts. “We are allowing the racism to metastasize.”
🔊 Podcast and article:🤦♂️ https://vtdigger.org/2021/08/18/vermont-conversation-is-vermont-fertile-ground-for-white-extremists/
Title: Vermont drivers stopped by police at far above the national average
Post by: AGelbert on August 24, 2021, 07:36:50 pm
Vermont and its leaders have made historic progress in reimaging public safety (https://www.acluvt.org/en/plan-reimagine-policing-vermont) and creating a smarter criminal legal system (https://www.acluvt.org/en/news/our-solutions-smarter-criminal-legal-system). But if you listen to some law enforcement leaders, you'd think the sky was falling.
Recently, Vermont's top federal prosecutor, acting U.S. Attorney 😈 Jonathan Ophardt, claimed that violent crime is increasing, echoing a false narrative that's been cropping up in places like Burlington in recent weeks. Ophardt claims that the data "backs up these concerns." It doesn't. (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418202709.png&hash=7503265ec59e4c28d735afb762bc39f4674bd838)
Read our blog to learn why. (https://www.acluvt.org/en/news/getting-facts-straight-public-safety-and-policing) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418200416.png&hash=15d789b29124aa5a1f1ea397ce630913734b20a4)
Here are the facts: Vermont continues to be one of the safest places in the country, and Vermont's Judiciary reported fewer criminal charges in 2020 than the year before, with felony charges down 12 percent and misdemeanors down 21 percent.
Meanwhile, Vermont drivers are stopped by police at a rate far above the national average, and Black and Brown Vermonters are still disproportionately targeted by police, year after year. In Burlington, for example, police last year used force against Black residents at a record rate. 😠
That's why Vermonters are still calling for change, and overwhelmingly support prioritizing people and communities over prisons and policing. Instead of fearmongering, law enforcement leaders should be working with the communities they serve to reimagine public safety, reduce the footprint of law enforcement, and combatsystemic racism in our state.
Learn more by reading our blog. (https://www.acluvt.org/en/news/getting-facts-straight-public-safety-and-policing?initms_aff=vt&initms_chan=eml&utm_medium=eml&initms=210824_affcampaign_safety-and-policing_gradead_sail&utm_source=sail&utm_campaign=affcampaign&utm_content=210824_racialjustice_safety-and-policing_gradead&ms_aff=vt&ms_chan=eml&ms=210824_affcampaign_safety-and-policing_gradead_sail) (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-060914180936.jpeg&hash=5e39d70fafe4e7190a6eebce34b740c58721de3f)
We have so much more work to do, and we can't afford to be distracted or dissuaded by false narratives. If we can learn from the mistakes of the past, we can win transformative change, creating more just and inclusive communities statewide.
James Lyall Pronouns: He, him, his Executive Director, ACLU of Vermont
Agelbert (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-210818163123-16652282.gif&hash=3e78c6c5447f417c0b376d2ae21803e908a959d0)NOTE: It is very, very difficult to get rid of systemic racism in Vermont because systemic racism is the reason for the material wealth of most Vermonters. Closet racists like acting U.S. Attorney 😈 Jonathan Ophardt (SEE: Fox in the Henhouse) will never admit that they are doing absolutely everything they can to perpetuate the cruel and unjust systemic racism that has, for CENTURIES, materially benefited white Vermonters who lack a consciense.
Captain Mulzac (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-120818185037-16412296.gif&hash=c8a4038d309a0f49ca4a7a464f30f9a340049cac) and his crew in England after the maiden voyage of the SS Booker T. Washington.
Pioneering Black Ship Captain Honored Alongside Merchant Marine Veterans Of WWII
SNIPPET:
The featured honoree at this year’s AMMV event was civil rights leader and US Merchant Marine World War II hero Captain Hugh Mulzac, master of the SS Booker T Washington.
Born in the British West Indies in 1886, Mulzac went to sea after high school, sailing on British vessels. He later attended the Nautical School in Swansea, in the United Kingdom, earning a mate’s license. He sailed as a ship’s officer in World War I, and came to the United States, becoming a citizen in 1918.
By 1920, Mulzac passed the examination as a U.S. shipmaster, but there were no shipboard berths available to a black captain. Although he held a master’s license, which qualified him to be a ship’s captain, he worked for the next 20 years mostly in the steward’s department of various shipping lines. This was the only shipboard work he could find, and he became an expert in foodservice management.
With the outbreak of World War II, Mulzac recognized an opportunity to use his license and command a vessel. At age 56, he was named master of the new Liberty 🗽 ship Booker T. Washington, christened by legendary opera singer Marian Anderson. Mulzac insisted on having an integrated crew, not the all-black crew that had been planned. The U.S. Maritime Commission relented, and the Booker T. Washington made 22 round-trip voyages with Mulzac at the helm.
Also Read: Captain Mulzac WW2 Hero and America’s First Black Master Mariner (https://gcaptain.com/mulzac-first-black-master-mariner/)
“There were many other black ship captains throughout history before him. Many of the great abolitionists in this country were seafarers but they were stripped of their human rights by the Negro Seaman’s (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-040718162656-14241872.gif&hash=6c39a3206e2b2a3d652adee626b5eee8ab5b15bf)😈 Act of 1822 (https://www.scencyclopedia.org/sce/entries/negro-seaman-acts/). By World War II much of the history of proud black seafarers had been long forgotten.” said Captain Robert Cook President of the Organization of Black Maritime Graduates. “Honoring Captain Mulzac is important so that every American understands how far we have come.”
A Union Apology
After World War II ended Captain Mulzac never sailed as master again because of prejudice enforced by the Master, Mates, and Pilots Union (MM&P).
“In looking back I discovered ours was a history of discrimination based on race, gender, and religion from the founding of MM&P until we were forced to integrate, to open our ranks to all qualified people in the 1960’s.” said MM&P representative Jeremy Hope at the event. “for this we apologize to Captain Mulzacs family and every mariner our policies hurt.”
Congressional Gold Medal
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-130418200416.png&hash=15d789b29124aa5a1f1ea397ce630913734b20a4) https://gcaptain.com/captain-hugh-mulzac-awards-diner/
Title: Wrongful imprisonment and deteriorating health of Indigenous political prisoner Leonard Peltier.
Post by: AGelbert on October 11, 2021, 01:48:08 pm
Oct 11, 2021
(https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F1%2F3-111018132401-16881856.gif&hash=ef5bd30cec7a50a81f3507f9bd328189dead7aa2) Free Indigenous political prisoner Leonard Peltier
https://youtu.be/HyFBMkCLRzE
The Real News Network 463K subscribers
In this special Indigenous Peoples' Day episode of Rattling the Bars, TRNN Executive Producer Eddie Conway speaks with author and activist Ward Churchill about the wrongful imprisonment and deteriorating health of Indigenous political prisoner Leonard Peltier. A member of the American Indian Movement who was sent to prison in 1977 after a dubious trial sentenced him to two consecutive life sentences, Peltier’s continued imprisonment remains a stain on our “criminal justice” system.
Help us continue producing radically independent news and in-depth analysis by following us and making a small donation:
Donate: https://therealnews.com/donate-yt Sign up for our newsletter: https://therealnews.com/nl-yt
Title: Vermont student-athletes often targeted with hate speech and other verbal abuse during games
Post by: AGelbert on October 12, 2021, 03:42:46 pm
Athletic directors say Vermont student-athletes often targeted with hate speech and other verbal abuse during games (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-200714183404.bmp&hash=dc40a133c761f80036b08ef0f6c0427aaa7e9f4b)
By Shaun Robinson
Oct 10 2021
SNIPPET:
They’re just trying to play sports.
But Vermont student-athletes are often jeered and shouted down by fans in the stands, officials say, including with targeted hate speech.
“I’ve been an athletic director for eight years now,” said Michael Jabour, who oversees sports at South Burlington High School. “And verbal abuse that student-athletes face has been very consistent.”
Full article: (https://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Frenewablerevolution.createaforum.com%2Fgallery%2Frenewablerevolution%2F3-250817134648.gif&hash=d24c66a26329a19150a175d576b631d10f631ee8) https://vtdigger.org/2021/10/10/athletic-directors-say-vermont-student-athletes-often-targeted-with-hate-speech-and-other-verbal-abuse-during-games/
Title: Abusive corporate power, a concerted assault on civil rights, and the destruction of the Earth's sustainability.
Post by: AGelbert on October 27, 2021, 04:08:51 pm
Oct 14, 2021
Public Justice 🗽 | Mass Torts Made Perfect 2021: Hall of Fame Luncheon
https://youtu.be/9g2mfmBM7SA
Public Justice 🗽
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