I love those moments in all the Rush Hour films when Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker burst into "War: What is it good for? Absolutely NOTHING!" The same can be said for prejudice. Recent events in the Sunshine State of Florida have brought home the message that the ugly, smelly, nasty underbelly of white power and/or free-flowing racism is alive and well in Fort Lauderdale. It's had a long nap and now is flexing its muscles, savoring a romp in the park or Fort, as it were. Like this kind of crap:
"We have to see these billboards flourish in 2010 and leading up to the 2012 election when Obama will seek re-election," said Farah. "If he can't answer that simple question by then, he's toast. Help me make it so Obama can't go anywhere in the United States without seeing this sign." Since Jesus was an immigrant, I guess these are Christian values in action!
Last Saturday there was demonstration requesting amnesty for aliens which turned into a street fight between ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) and ALIPAC (Tea Parties Against Amnesty. Actually, it's Americans for Legal Immigration PAC).
A video posted by ALIPAC was so bizarre with it's pop-up comments that I felt compelled to deconstruct it, lest someone less compulsive than I sit through it and be misled and deluded.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ekW3HmlnYS4
It's easier to watch if you turn off the sound and keep your finger on the pause button. Ignore the pop ups, (very strategically placed) because reading them will obscure what your eyes see.
Shot from the perspective of someone across the street (let's call this person "Deep Wad"), we see a group of demonstrators organized around a corner while a man (call him "Jacko") stands in the street shooting a video directly into the face of an ANSWER demonstrator (good morning!). Words are seemingly exchanged and Jacko walks behind, then into the middle of the group. The ANSWER group turns to Jacko as a man in a black shirt (so ironic we could call him "Benito") leaps into the action (#8) with another video camera hoisted, already "shooting." Benito joins Jacko as side-by-side they continue to endure (heroically or arrogantly?) more verbal confrontration from the ANSWER demonstrators who clearly had claimed that corner to express their First Amendment right.
Only now notice there's a guy in a brown hat ("Goose") to the far left (# 12) who ALSO has a video camera and has been taping (from yet a different perspective) Jack and Benito's great adventure of provoking a riot at a peaceful demonstration.
Things happen quickly now. As Jacko seem to leave by walking behind and past Goose, a black van cuts across Deep Wad's angle. Although Goose is nearly obscured by a HUGE cartoony balloon directing us elsewhere, we can see Goose is clearly making gestures towards Jacko or Deep Wad, or maybe both. Goose turns towards Deep Wad and from here to #34 we can watch Goose cross the street and past Deep Wad's camera. Goose avoids a direct look but smiles into said camera while using his brown hat to shield his face as he gets closer to Deep Wad. Mission accomplis[h]ed?
Except provoking a riot is a felony, or so I thought based upon all the Black Panthers and Yippies and pacifists and progressives who've been busted for less. And in the case of the Panthers, outright hounded and murdered.
I don't get paid to do this and need some sleep but I hope someone will use what I've noticed, continue the deconstruction and get it to the right places.
Back in the day there were plenty of slug fests started by hardhats and Nazis and yes, cops out of uniform against anti-war protestors, only this time THEY GOT THE SHIT BEAT OUT OF THEM!!!
What a surprise!
Here is ANSWER's response, appropriately titled:
Racism, Lies and Videotape
A statement from ANSWER Florida
Nov. 17, 2009
http://answer.pephost.org/site/News2/1667236835?abbr=ANS_&page=NewsArticle&id=9225&news_iv_ctrl=1621
At least the majority of American people understand the stupidity of the birthers, Birchers, Tea Baggers and repuglicans. There will be scuffling in the streets but we will continue to love and live as free Americans, despite their hatred.
November 18, 2009
Prejudice: What is it good for?
October 10, 2008
October Surprise? Palin’s out!
Back to Alaska!
The smartest move the McCain campaign could make right now would be 
to cut Sarah Palin out of the race. I’d even bet Mitt Romney would be ready to step up, and it would bring relief to the repuglicans as predictably as a titty to a hungry baby.
Watching white, working class Americans act like reptilian humanoids salivating over the bait being thrown by both Ms. Palin and, with more finesse by Mr. McCain was an awful, horrific experience for this privileged white person. It would have been so easy for these ignorant people to be pushed over the edge to the next step and have themselves a lynchin’.
This McCain campaign phenomenon of making Americans insane with anger and fear by false associations of an American Senator as a "terrorist," "Muslim" or, perish the thought, an "ARAB" must not be allowed to grow outside the rallys and spill over into our communities.
Tonight’s surprise release of the Troopergate Report is the icing on Palin’s retirement cake. It stated clearly and completely without equivocation that Ms. Palin abused her power. She acted exactly like a greedy, self-inflated politician who used her office for personal vengeance. She is more of the same, not change. Combine her eagerness to fan the flames of racism with the concrete evidence of Palins lying and manipulating the trust of her constituents, Palin has become major damaged goods.
While questioning Newsweek’s Michael Issicoff about the Troopergate news, Rachel Maddow asked: “Is this an impeachable charge?” Seems to me this opens the door for McCain to dump Palin, pronto. Who could argue with the maverick standing up for values and country first, even if it costs his career? Of course, it won’t. Good republicans will see it as redeeming McCain from any association with corruption and hate speech. The reptilian humanoids will just turn in the direction their pointed towards.
I'd like to believe most Americans have a good spirit and know it is better to respect your neighbors. That way they'll be there for you just as you'd be there for them in times of trouble. And we've got plenty of trouble here in America.
The third act will commence after a brief intermission.
October 9, 2008
The Continuing Devestation of Agent Orange
We still have unfinished business with the people of Vietnam who continue to suffer the effects of Agent Orange. Children born to children of the war have birth defects and no one knows how long the chemicals will infect future generations. THIS WAS/IS GENOCIDE. Helping Americans to understand their problems will also shed light on our Vietnam Veterans, also burdened by the sickness of the deadly dioxins and other chemicals they inhaled while strafing the country. The only redemption is our determination to help the victims. Please visit this site to learn more from Vietnamese Women who are touring the USA to educate us:
Agent Orange Victims Visit
10 US Cities, Sept 28–Oct 31, 2008
Organizing groups for the delegation have formed & are planning events in
9/28 - 10/5: New York City, New Jersey & New Haven, see below 10/6 - 10/8: Washington DC, press conference at the Supreme Court, meetings with Congress representatives, contact us 10/9 - 10/12: Birmingham AL, meetings with lawyers, contact us 10/12 - 10/14: Pittsburgh PA, Reconciliation & Healing: Remembering Vietnam, La Roche College, contact us 10/15 - 10/18: Detroit MI, National Lawyers Guild, Law for the People Convention, Friday 10/17 10/19 - 10/21: Chicago IL, NPR Worldview, Roosevelt University, Hull House, U of Illinois at Chicago 10/22 - 10/25: Portland & Eugene OR, 10/22 Knight Law School, 7pm (Eugene). contact us 10/26 - 10/28: Los Angeles CA, Reception by CHEER, UCLA Labor Center, Strategy Center & SoCA for Youth, contact us 10/28 - 10/31: Bay Area CA, events in Laney College (10/28, 4pm, Oakland), Eastside Arts Alliance (10/28, 7pm 2277 International Blvd at 23d Ave, Oakland), Glaser Center (10/29, 7pm 547 Mendocino Ave. at 10th St, Santa Rosa), and at Veterans Bldg (10/30, 7pm, Rm 223, 401 Van Ness at Golden Gate, San Francisco), contact ushttp://www.vn-agentorange.org/
July 22, 2008
Exceptionalism, Here, There, Everywhere
The town is called Torregavetta. Torre is an ivory tower, and gavetta means to rise from the ranks. Can it be possible to rise so high above fellow human beings that your senses become immune to their suffering? How can anyone be so assured of their place in this world that they cannot identify with the vision of death before them? Is it really possible to "enjoy" the rest of the afternoon with two bodies a few feet away? What do you think you would you do?
Tuesday, 22 July 2008
It's another balmy weekend on the beach in Naples. By the rocks, a couple soak up the southern Italian sun. A few metres away, their feet poking from under beach towels that cover their faces and bodies, lie two drowned Roma children. [my bold] The girls, Cristina, aged 16, and Violetta, 14, were buried last night as the fallout from the circumstances of their death reverberated throughout Italy.It is an image that has crystallised the mounting disquiet in the country over the treatment of Roma, coming after camps have been burnt and the government has embarked on a bid to fingerprint every member of the minority. Two young Roma sisters had drowned at Torregaveta beach after taking a dip in treacherous waters. Their corpses were recovered from the sea – then left on the beach for hours while holidaymakers continued to sunbathe and picnic around them.
They had come to the beach on the outskirts of Naples on Saturday with another sister, Diana, nine, and a 16-year-old cousin, Manuela, to make a little money selling coloured magnets and other trinkets to sunbathers. But it was fiercely hot all day and, about 2pm, the girls surrendered to the temptation of a cooling dip – even though they apparently did not know how to swim.
"The sea was rough on Saturday," said Enzo Esposito, the national treasurer of Opera Nomadi, Italy's biggest Roma organisation. "Christina and Violetta went farther out than the other two, and a big wave came out of nowhere and dashed them on to the rocks. For a few moments, they disappeared; Manuela, who was in shallow water with Diana, came to the shore, helped out by people on the beach, and ran to try and get help."
Other reports said that lifeguards from nearby private beaches also tried to help, without success. "When Manuela and Diana came back," Esposito went on, "the bodies of her cousins had reappeared, and they were already dead."
It was the sort of tragedy that could happen on any beach. But what happened next has stunned Italy. The bodies of the two girls were laid on the sand; their sister and cousin were taken away by the police to identify and contact the parents. Some pious soul donated a couple of towels to preserve the most basic decencies. Then beach life resumed.
The indifference was taken as shocking proof that many Italians no longer have human feelings for the Roma, even though the communities have lived side by side for generations.
[...] The attitudes of ordinary Italians towards the Roma, never warm, have been chilling for years, aggravated by sensational news coverage of crimes allegedly committed by Gypsies, and a widespread confusion of Roma with ordinary, non-Roma Romanians, who continue to arrive. The Berlusconi government has launched a high-profile campaign against the community, spearheaded by the programme announced by the Interior Minister, Roberto Marroni, to fingerprint the entire Roma population. The move has been condemned inside Italy and beyond as a return to the racial registers introduced by the Fascist regime in the 1930s. The fingerprinting of Roma in Naples began on 19 June. [my bold]
[...] In a speech yesterday, Mr Maroni proposed, "for humanitarian reasons", granting Italian citizenship to all Roma children in Italy abandoned by their parents.
The Italians and the Roma
Roma have been living in Italy for seven centuries [my bold] and the country is home to about 150,000, who live mainly in squalid conditions in one of around 700 encampments on the outskirts of major cities such as Rome, Milan and Naples. They amount to less than 0.3 per cent of the population, one of the lowest proportions in Europe. But their poverty and resistance to integration have made them far more conspicuous than other communities. And the influx of thousands more migrants from Romania in the past year has confirmed the view of many Italians that the Gypsies and their eyesore camps are the source of all their problems. The ethnic group is often blamed for petty theft and burglaries. According to a recent newspaper survey, more that two thirds of Italians want Gypsies expelled, whether they hold Italian passports or not. [How many centuries does a community have to live in a place before they "belong?"]
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/the-picture-that-shames-italy-873743.html
May 6, 2008
Racial Bias in Drug War Verified
Reports Find Racial Gap in Drug Arrests
By ERIK ECKHOLM
More than two decades after President Ronald Reagan escalated the war on drugs, arrests for drug sales or, more often, drug possession are still rising. And despite public debate and limited efforts to reduce them, large disparities persist in the rate at which blacks and whites are arrested and imprisoned for drug offenses, even though the two races use illegal drugs at roughly equal rates
Two new reports, issued Monday by the Sentencing Project in Washington and by Human Rights Watch in New York, both say the racial disparities reflect, in large part, an overwhelming focus of law enforcement on drug use in low-income urban areas, with arrests and incarceration the main weapon.
But they note that the murderous crack-related urban violence of the 1980s, which spawned the war on drugs, has largely subsided, reducing the rationale for a strategy that has sowed mistrust in the justice system among many blacks.
In 2006, according to federal data, drug-related arrests climbed to 1.89 million, up from 1.85 million in 2005 and 581,000 in 1980.
More than four in five of the arrests were for possession of banned substances, rather than for their sale or manufacture. [my bold] Four in 10 of all drug arrests were for marijuana possession, according to the latest F.B.I. data.
Apart from crowding prisons, one result is a devastating impact on the lives of black men: they are nearly 12 times as likely to be imprisoned for drug convictions as adult white men, [my bold] according to the Human Rights Watch report.
[...] Some crime experts say that the disparities exist for sound reasons. Heather Mac Donald, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute in New York, said it made sense for police to focus more on fighting visible drug dealing in low-income urban areas, largely involving members of minorities, than on hidden use in suburban homes, more often by whites, because the urban street trade is more associated with violence and other crimes and impairs the quality of life.
“The disparities reflect policing decisions to use drug laws to try and reduce violence and to respond to the demand by law-abiding residents in poor neighborhoods to clean up the drug trade,” Ms. Mac Donald said. [What about the violence created in homes where mothers, fathers, brothers and sisters are incarcerated for possession, not making a profit over someone else's misery!? Ms. Mac Donald doesn’t care about the quiet violence of families being torn apart! She is a racist and a class criminal!]
[...] Police in a few cities including Denver, Seattle and Oakland, Calif., have said they are spending fewer resources on arrests for lower-lever offenses like marijuana possession.
In December, the United States Sentencing Commission amended the federal sentencing guidelines for convictions involving crack cocaine, which is more often used by blacks, somewhat reducing the length of sentences compared with those for convictions involving powder cocaine. But mandatory and longer sentences for crack violations remain embedded in federal and state laws.
April 27, 2008
Fightin' Man, Melvin
Black Waxx Multimedia says:
Defy Containment ... Destroy the Illusion ... Crush the Machine!
I agree and add: Welcome back, Melvin!
"Go ahead, stick it in! That's your fightin' man!"
I know it's short notice, but if you can get to Pace College tonight, it'll be a trip!
From BLACK WAXX MULTIMEDIA: http://www.blackwaxx.com
Thousands took to the streets to protest the government sanctioned murder of Sean Bell and got little to no press. This illustrates the importance of developing an independent media structure. We are in a battle for the hearts and minds of the masses of people because America has a long history of controlling ideas through the conglomerates. But Black Waxx Multimedia has a long history of creating places and spaces for new ideas, defying containment, destroying the illusion and crushing the machine….
NOW WITH THE GUIDANCE OF AND IN COLLABORATION WITH
REVOLUTIONARY FILM ICON MELVIN VAN PEEBLES
REVOLUTIONARY MULTIMEDIA COMPANY
BLACK WAXX MULTIMEDIA
INVITES YOU TO THE PREMIERE SCREENING
OF THEIR LATEST PRODUCTION:
EX-DOOFUS-ITCHY FOOTED MUTHA
DEBUTING AT THE TRIBECA FILM FESTIVAL
SUNDAY APRIL 27TH AT 7:30PM
PACE UNIVERSITY’S SCHIMMEL CENTER FOR THE ARTS
November 9, 2007
Columbia Hunger Strikers
Hope grows on the Upper West Side. Columbia students have taken radical steps to move the university towards a true pluralistic society. Check out their web site, think about their ideas, sign the petition (
if you agree) and pass it on!
The question is not “why do you have so many demands?” but “why has the university left so much to be demanded?” We ask those who see our demands as not specific enough, or too broad, or too many, to take a look again at the detailed version (core, expansion, ethnic studies, admin reform - we know it may appear verbose, apologies are expected from the bureaucracy making it complicated) and not try to weigh each individual demand on its own but instead look behind these demands. Look to what they stand for, a beginning of the end of repeated marginalization, exclusion and silencing of students within this community.
So once again, tonight there is a vigil at 9pm as there will be every night the strike lasts. We ask people to also take the time to sign our petition, come by the tents, and talk to a friend about what’s going on. Saturday look forward to a community rally, with Harlem residents and people from throughout New York.
VIGIL EVERY NIGHT! 9PM ~ Sundial @ Low Plaza
http://cu-strike.blogspot.com
Here's their petition: http://www.petitiononline.com/kwzchen/petition.html
October 27, 2007
Short People Got No Future
This future, predicted by evolutionary theorist Oliver Curry from the London School of Economics presents evolution will be determined through sexual selection. 
The human race will one day split into two separate species, an attractive, intelligent ruling elite and an underclass of dim-witted, ugly goblin-like creatures, according to a top scientist.
…While science and technology have the potential to create an ideal habitat for humanity over the next millennium, there is the possibility of a monumental genetic hangover over the subsequent millennia due to an over-reliance on technology reducing our natural capacity to resist disease, or our evolved ability to get along with each other.
"After that, things could get ugly, with the possible emergence of genetic 'haves' and 'have-nots'."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=489653
October 11, 2007
Racists Get OUT of Town!
EMERGENCY DEMO THURSDAY, 2 PM, TEACHERS' COLLEGE, COLUMBIA:
Noose hung on office door of African American prof at Teachers' College
Yesterday, a noose was hung on the door of an African-American professor at Teachers' College, Columbia University. In light of recent events at Columbia (not to mention Jena...), we cannot let this stand.
…the racist graffiti left in the bathroom of the School of International and Public Affairs shortly thereafter: "Attention you pinko Commie motherfuckers and Arab Towelheads: America will wake up one day and nuke Mecca, Medina, Tehran, Baghdad, Jakarta, and all the savages in Africa. You will all be fucked! America is for White Europeans!" I am not exaggerating here; this is the graffiti, verbatim.
A rally has been called: mobilize at 2 PM tomorrow at the gates of Teachers' College, on 120th Street between Broadway and Amsterdam. 1 train to 116th Street or 125 Street.
October 7, 2007
Go to the Top of the Charts!
With a bullet! Mellencamp may not be your musical cup of tea, but his song reveals he is still a white farm boy who can smell horse shit before he steps in it, and is warning us to take a higher path.
I say BRAVO and ENCORE!
JOHN MELLENCAMP WRITES SONG ABOUT JENA 6
Folksy rocker sings about injustice as part of recording session for new album.
http://relative-way.com/jenastream/
Props o
ut to Mos Def for his passionate leadership in the hip hop community:
What’s different about this moment in terms of hip-hop and political activism is that ... we’re to the point where grassroots activists and hip-hop artists are talking with each other about political change,” said [Bakari] Kitwana.http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21137111/