“USA Radical Black invites readers to enjoy another very popular media outlet, MXyMAG.com. MXyMAG.com features news and information that is Sexy and Business while providing relevant Entertainment news.”
Toronto…A model came up to me a while back, dejected because she was just told that she is too dark to be a “successful” model. As a person who understand the business very well I was thinking to myself “welcome to the new world my friend”. As a black man I was thinking you should have kicked him in his nuts. But in the end what the person had said carries a truth to it and here is why.
People want to relate to the person they interact with. Most people who aren’t black don’t know how to relate to black and in most cases it’s out of fear or intimidation. Most black people I have seen or talked to don’t know how to relate to black neither. Read More »
Resistance may be especially high among the homeless
Historically, African Americans have led the way when it comes to disparities in many categories. African Americans were the largest ethnic group under-counted in the 2000 Census. At the same time, Whites were over-counted by an estimated 2.2 million people. This is according to facts and data collected by groups like the National Urban League, the NAACP, the Coalition on Black Civic Participation and the Prison Policy Initiative.
In the 2010 Census, African Americans could possibly experience even higher undercounts due to the national foreclosure crisis, displacement from the Gulf Coast hurricanes, and the miscounting of prison populations reported by the Prison Policy Initiative. While many Americans are shocked at these disturbing reports, others are angry about what they see as the government’s blatant disrespect of Black people.
This anger reinforces Black Americans’ lack of trust for the U.S. government, so much so that many have vowed not to participate in this year’s Census. In search of answers from those African Americans about their reluctance to talk with Census enumerators, MSR visited the Salvation Army Harbor Light Worship and Service Center, located next to a homeless shelter downtown where about 60 or 70 people had gathered.
The first person we spoke with was the tallest man in the crowd who gave his name as Tony Mayo. Mayo was very articulate on the subject of Census participation and clearly let us know that he understands the importance of participating in the Census and plans to do so. However, he also understands the resentment, mistrust and anger by some of the homeless. Read More »
By Donald W.R. Allen,II – Minister of Information-USA Radical Black
“Never let a good crisis go to waste.”-Rahm Immanuel, Chief of Staff, President Obama
On Sunday, January 17 the BBC reported from Port-au-Prince: “We have been hearing the constant roar of high-powered engines for days as transport planes take off and land. But like the people of Haiti, we have wondered why the cargo has not been getting to its final destination.
The incidents of unrest over food and water have been few and far between, but many people still want answers.
At one of the makeshift camps in the capital, hundreds of people made homeless by the earthquake shelter from the intense heat under a patchwork quilt of tarpaulin, zinc sheet, and blankets.
There are hundreds of men, women and children on the rough ground surviving without the basics.”
While we watch the Democratic machine go in to over-drive to raise funds for Haiti – the country has just become another photo opportunity for President Obama and his cabinet. Our hearts go out to the brothers and sisters and their families who have lost loved ones.
President Obama, who has not addressed the state of Black America, or for that matter stated his position on Africa, might have to finally take a strong stance in regards to the people of Haiti.
Haiti was a human disaster long before the earthquake. Haiti is a by-product of the United States’ gross neglect. The problems with Haiti’s infrastructure could have been addressed decades ago– but we have to keep in mind, this is a Black-led nation. What is most sad is that Haitians were living a nightmare even before this horrible situation (their unemployment rate is 65%), and we need to see the nightmare come to an end.
Long after the fanfare is over, Haiti will continue to be a “human disaster area” much like New Orleans.
Haiti’s regional, historical and cultural position is unique for several reasons. It was the first independent nation in the Americas, the first post-colonial independent Black-led nation in the world. The independence of Haiti was gained in 1791 via a successful revolt of enslaved Africans and free people of color who overthrew the slave regime and the colonial system at the same time.
Why does this become an issue for the Obama administration?
When US President Barack Obama announced that one of the biggest relief efforts in US history would be heading for Haiti, he highlighted the close ties between the two nations. President Obama said, “With just a few hundred miles of ocean between us and a long history that binds us together, Haitians are our neighbors in the Americas and here at home.”
Hundreds of thousands of Haitians have indeed become neighbors of Americans.
Some 420,000 live in the US legally, according to census figures. Estimates of the number of Haitians in the country illegally vary from some 30,000 to 125,000.
The history that ‘binds us (Blacks) together” is Slavery and our Blackness.
Haiti has been a poor country past, present and will be in the future. The so-called “curse” of Haiti is its perpetual poverty and the United States’ continuous interference with Haiti’s government, while overlooking the needs of its people. The basics, “food, water and shelter” have never been the top priority- shaping the government to the desires of the U.S. has. The people of Haiti have been starving for too long.
Why does it take a disaster to address an on-going disaster?
American administrations from President Nixon to Obama have well known the true state of Haiti. They knew that the Haitian people mixed dirt with sugar to make “cookies” to have something to eat. A significant part of the population of Port-au-Prince eats dinner out the garbage cans of tourists from the First World.
The catastrophic disaster in Haiti has gained worldwide attention. Nations like Haiti deserve the assistance of the United Nations in a humanitarian way, without the politics of government interference.
Haitian native, Wyclef Jean’s Yele Haiti at www.yele.org, has come under-fire by larger charities for his fund raising that have gone on long before all eyes where on Haiti. This blog endorses Wyclef and his ongoing efforts to assist his homeland.
Americans give over $100 billion dollars per year to churches, so if we simply gave one month of tithes to genuine Haitian charities, this would be nearly 8 times the Haitian government’s annual budget. Sure, there might be some corruption in charitable fund-raising, but there is corruption everywhere, including the US government.
Executive Director and President of Rainbow Writing, Inc., Karen Cole Peralta writes
A long time ago in the fabled southlands of America, the authorities told black people they had to use the “colored” restrooms – not the “white” people ones. It was thought at the time that “mixing the races” would lead to rape, diseases or other unfortunate circumstances. One public restroom each in a building’s common area was supplied for colored men, colored women, white men and white women; pretty idiotic, don’t you think?
It did make four “water closets” available, two apiece for each sex, which admittedly allowed for somewhat easier restroom availability. But it also undermined the dignity of the American Deep South, which was thus stuck moving from the lack of fair human rights to the promotion of greater civil rights, and eventually to manifesting independent living rights. After all, the involved country was America, and being a democracy, it couldn’t long maintain such hostile acts of racial segregation – or discrimination against the physically disabled, challenged, or handicapped.
You could say the 1950s and 60s were a time of incredible transition when it came to the full legal rights of American citizens. What was the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s role in this so-called “incredible transition?” For one thing, changing racially segregated public restrooms back to the usual men’s and women’s ones was considered to be politically important. This sort of thing, along with the Deep South’s municipal bus boycotts, was to enable “colored” people to get away from such underhanded referencing to their darker and harmless black, brown or mulatto skin color.
Uniting the public restrooms enabled people to continue their normal way of life, unhampered by racism or any presumed “need” for such segregated facilities. Plus, there was the further needed transition of the municipal city buses, where black people had been forced to sit in the far backs of the buses. As with the public restrooms, there was no need for such isolation, which at the time was being corrected by the acting Civil Rights Movement, headed by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., so that people could use most public facilities without suffering from further racial segregation. Read More »
The closer we get to the beginning of 2010, and the possibility of Corporate America getting closer to “Blackness” in anticipation of Martin Luther King’s birthday and Black History Month, there are important questions that we must ask ourselves. Why has Black America let the commemoration of our history and achievements slip into the hands of White commercialization?
Minneapolis, MN (IBNN)…In 1961, my birth certificate said I was born a Negro. In 2009, given the existence of a playing field that is only semi-level—and even that, only for certain blacks- black Americans as a whole are still in the “Realm of Negroism.”
On January 18 2010, General Mills Foundation and the United Negro College Fund will present the 20th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Holiday Breakfast.
The Breakfast “is an opportunity to celebrate the legacy of service of Dr. King and create an imperative to live out his legacy today in our homes, our communities and our world,” according to the MLK Breakfast website.
But wait. Next question.
Just what is Dr. King’s legacy? And how can we claim to honor this legacy, with no real engagement with the urgent issues that affect people of color every day?
Dr. King’s legacy cannot be lived and made real today over breakfast and tea, but requires grassroots organizing, protest, and activism. To fully understand this fact, we must look at the history of the Civil Rights Movement.
The Civil Rights Movement was at a peak from 1955-1965. Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, guaranteeing basic civil rights for all Americans, regardless of race, after nearly a decade of nonviolent protests and marches, ranging from the 1955-1956 Montgomery bus boycotts to the student-led sit-ins of the 1960s to the huge March on Washington in 1963.
We must realize that Dr. Martin Luther King’s words and actions were considered radical at the time. They gained popularity because he spoke Truth to the People of the United States. Dr. King said, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”
Today, Black America has become mute and non-confrontational. Read More »
Minneapolis, MN (Source IBNN.org) – The purpose of the Minneapolis Urban League Glover-Sudduth Center for Economic Development is to do just that. Grow economic development among the Black Minnesotan population. Not to be the DFL political plantation in a cold Jim Crow. The irony is that the top voter turn-outs in Minnesota are cast in the highest populated Black districts. What a way to thank the Black voters!
How can the Minneapolis Urban League reach out to the African American population when the main focus has been to pimp the African American vote for the DFL? African Americans hold the right to vote sacred and the historical importance has been manipulated by those who promise and deliver not much more than a cup of Free Trade Coffee at EJAM’s Founders Day among hippies “slumming it” on the Northside for the day, with their Obama buttons. Community members are only treehuggerinvited when there is a photo opportunity, and when the image of mobilization is needed for organizations such as Institute for Agricultural and Trade Policy, which although does work on the policy side does little to help the day to day with the trickle down hopes promised. Only deliver a hot mess of benign neglect. Pimped for grants, and yet nothing ever gets done but then again there is always next year. Another example that poverty pimps have a vested interest keeping the Northside oppressed and earn, a nice notation on their resumes. Read More »
“This generation will have to learn from damn near scratch what a real social movement looks like.” ~Black Agenda Report 2009
Reports of racism have increased. Black unemployment is sky-high. The foreclosure crisis has devastated black neighborhoods across the country. Yet no official stance on race relations in the United States has been taken by our Black President, Barack Obama.
“Is racism only prevalent if you’re a professor at an Ivy League school who is arrested in your upscale neighborhood?”
White America allegedly demonstrated their goodness and racial tolerance in 2008 by voting for a Black man to be president of the United States. We have learned that a large and decisive number of whites can be persuaded to vote for a certain kind of Black man: one who never speaks about racism, and in no way, resembles Al Shartpon, Jesse Jackson, or Louis Farrakhan. Read More »
“USA Radical Black invites readers to enjoy another very popular media outlet, MXyMAG.com. MXyMAG.com features news and information that is Sexy and Business while providing relevant Entertainment news.”
A long time ago in the fabled southlands of America, the authorities told black people they had to use the “colored” restrooms – not the “white” people ones. It was thought at the time that “mixing the races” would lead to rape, diseases or other unfortunate circumstances. One public restroom each in a building’s common area was supplied for colored men, colored women, white men and white women; pretty idiotic, don’t you think?
Black Agenda Report
Your Black World