Police Brutality

Just as I am researching the movement for the abolition of prison (please look it up), I find that in march a man from my hometown was beaten to death by police after a car accident!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A car accident! Interestingly enough, the example I was given for reducing the dependency on police was from a woman who fought her instinct to call the police after a car accident. Rodney Wilson is dead, and I hadn't even heard about it. I researched it and most of the news came from a blog. This system is a mess. It's time to be done with it.
Research people research..... Critical Resistance 10, Rodney Wilson, 3 men beat by cops n Pennsylvania...
Now that our media is failing us, we have to educate ourselves. Thank god for the word of mouth. Rodney Wilson,you have made up my mind, I dedicate what I do for this movement from now on to you!!!!!

Kristin Butler's Suma Cum Loony

http://media.www.dukechronicle.com/media/storage/paper884/news/2008/05/15/Columns/Summa.Cum.Loony-3371900.shtml
I have tried to blast this article on the Chronicle's comment page, but that wasn't enough. And as a poster said, the writer is deteriorating strides made to connect the two schools. Any disdain students at NCCC and residents of Durham held for us before, has just been increased. Though I am sure that the writer and most of her supporters could care less. Here are JUST A FEW of the issues I see bursting in between the lines
1. Can you say hypocrite? As if our students hold perfect behavior everyday outside of class. With the massive consumption of alcohol by under age drinkers, the drug use, the unreported, on-campus rapes, the racism that's bubbling beneath several surfaces... The cheating!!!!!!!! Come on
2. I am still amazed at how many people gloss over the wrongs admitted to: the racial slurs, that hateful email...(Not to mention I am curious why this mostly white party ordered up two black strippers)
3. These issues mentioned are not that simplistic. I wasn't planning on going there but as one poster added in response to the semen, how likely is it that there were only team members at that party? Is it possible that she just confused who was on the team? The evidence found, the main one I remember, the broken nail (what did she break it taking her clothes off)
4. Generalizations. Not trying to separate the two individuals from the rest of the school (because I don't think they are bad people at all and do feel that they have earned their degrees), but if you feel that you must, this is a good example of a small group having to represent an entire institution- including all of the people who work there, attend there, and hold degrees. And now you have added to our generalization. Sad enough I have heard rumors that your editors only publish articles that fit their dominant opinions (I hope that isn't true). This article wouldn't make me so angry if I had at least once seen one from the other side of the fence. The views of Kristin and students who share them are ever present. Where are my views? Here on this blog I guess.

To Be Or Not To Be... A Problem

Lately, I have been expressing my views more and more, and the result ,lol, hasn't been too pleasant. I've been accused of being a racist, the result of someone not liking what I said on the school newspaper blog and googling me to find out about my intent to participate in a reparation demonstration. I have lost a friend, her choice not mine. I have been called a republican, that one kind of got to me lol(yet their senseless explanation- that I don't really want change because I want to change this completely around???? made me feel better). With the reactions I have been getting and the words that pop up when you google my name, sometimes I wonder how it will affect me later. Will I lose the opportunity to work with a great employer. Coupled with my new "political statement" growing out of my head (Glamour Magazine told a room full of lawyers to leave the political hairstyles, aka the afros and dreads, outside of the courtroom. I can admit I was a little shaken, BUT ONLY FOR A SECOND! Yeah for two seconds I allowed my mind to slip back into colonization, then I woke back up. If a work place won't allow me to express myself completely, I DO NOT WANNA BE THERE! It will be their loss. Especially as a layer, I plan to put my heart into my cases, I will not sugar coat or dim down anything. No more suffocation. No more hiding the covers of my books (Yes I did so for bell hooks Black Masculinity) for fear of someone stereotyping me as a crazy radical or crazy feminist. I am radical and I am a feminist, still learning but still one. And if that makes people nervous then I am sorry for them.

My Air

Every time I bite my tongue I feel like
That thing I was trying to birth
that drops hard in my stomach
Something heavier than me
It hits bottom and begins to expand
Bursting throughout my small body
I feel it creeping to my throat
It hits my mouth, where oddly it all started
But its already been surpressed so it grows
Taking air from me
Blocking all hopes of breathing
Now I know how Qua’daisha’s mother felt
As she stumbled hopelessly in search of her daughter
but was overcome by the loss of air
Passed out before she could make it
No matter how hard her heart pulled
Outside forces caused her body to fail
Her Qua’daisha lied there as her singed soul,
Only ten years old was carried away by angels
Or maybe she did wake to search for her mother
Cried in a corner as her mother laid air-less
Far away
My Qua’daisha is in danger but not yet carried away
And what am I doing
I’m suffocating myself

King Kong?

Had I not heard about this photo in its current context (with all this King Kong discussion, I wonder if I would have realized. Taking a class on black popular culture (a name somewhat misleading considering it seems to be about black masculinity in the media) I am struggling with deciding how consciously these decisions are made. It's obvious that it looks like the huge black beast was about to run away with the poor damsel. At least she's still smiling. Especially since there is a stereotype that black athletes move on up and date white women. I find it hard to believe that the directer of the shoot planned to fit the black male stereotype, but if I was the director I would have considered the possibility. When Lebron walked on that photo shoot that director should have been fully conscious of the black male's type cast in the media. Especially since that was the black male to ever appear on Vogue! Come on, not only is it long overdue but could you at least do it right. There is no excuse. With the damage that these images create, there is no room for "I didn't know"'s.

To some members of the gangs at home

Sweet brown baby probably played in the streets the day before
Made her mom a mother's day card
Looked hopefully toward the summer
When school would be out and her days would belong to her
Probably knew to duck when bullets flew
Or maybe her mother kept her indoors most of the time
Like my mother did
Safe in the refuge of home
On walnut ave where I used to skip track practice
Around the corner where my cousins lived
Lil Qua'Daisha, ten years old asleep in her bed
Didn't wake up when the smoke covered her head
Mother passed out before she could save her love
The product of her womb
On mother's day, a mother lost her motherhood

Second time you burned a house, complete with children, to prove a point...
I am not talking to all of you, just the ones responsible. No one loves you more than I. I always give you the benefit of the doubt. I don't stereotype you. But what the fuck did she do to you?
Part of the reason why I didn't come home is because I feel helpless. When I told one of you that, all he said was I would be safe, no one would bother me. It's not about fear. It's the fact that I do not want to pick up another news paper and hear about another child who's face was blown halfway off by a stray bullet, or another execution, another father hit with a bat, another classmate murdered, another high school valedictorian who can't deliver his speech because there is a target on his head... I am running from the feeling of responsibility. I do not know what else to do yet. Thank you for bringing out my cowardice.

Tupac, Juice, and "I ain't shit"

Watched this movie many times, but it wasn't until today that this quote deeply saddened me. Previously, I saw a young black murder discussing how low he was. Now, I see a young black man and a strong symbol of hiphop, telling the world that he ain't shit, and ain't never gonna be shit... Telling the world that he doesn't give a fuck. Telling the world that he will decide whether or not his friend is ever gonna be shit. How many times have I told the world that I ain't shit and that niggas ain't shit... I did it just the other day as I changed my away message to "Fuck niggas, get money." Yes I said it. Mad at one black man and condemned them all... Guess I still have some growing to do.

Plastic Surgery

Bullshit!!!!! I have heard the best excuses...that it makes you feel better about yourself, that it saves you from the cruelty of others...WHATEVER! Instead of spending all of this money to make people "beautiful", instead of making plastic surgery into a humanitarian effort, how about we spend that money on changing the world's obsession with superficial characteristics. Stop falling for this bullshit. And now people have the nerve to write a book for children to help them cope with their mother's plastic surgery. It's called "My Beautiful Mommy". Please don't put our children through that. What in the world is happening to ourselves?