South Carolina To Remove The Confederate Flag on Friday 7 10 2015

The House of Representatives in South Carolina has voted to take down the Confederate flag from capitol grounds after a long and fractious debate.

After a final procedural vote, the bill was then signed by Republican Governor Nikki Haley later on Thursday.

The flag will be removed at 10:00 ET (14:00 GMT) on Friday, according to Ms Haley's office.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-33457169

VIOLA DAVIS CALLS OUT HOLLYWOOD ON PAPER BAG TEST

Davis says that Keating (the Shonda Rhimes character she plays)  has no predecessors when it comes to portraying a chocolate-complexioned woman with all of the different layers that make women, well, women. Instead, dark-brown actresses are usually typecast as demeaning characters in society.

"But I encourage you to search your memory and think of anyone who's done this," she said. "It just hasn't happened. I hear these stories from friends of mine who are dark-skin actresses who are always being seen as crack addicts and prostitutes."

BRAVE WOMAN, Viola Davis. She risks being called divisive by those dedicated to being colorism blind.  READ MORE/VIDEO
http://www.theroot.com/blogs/the_grapevine/2015/06/viola_davis_says_that_the_paperbag_test_and_colorism_are_alive_and_well.html

Interesting exercise?

I wish it was interactive. But in the three side-by-side, black actress graphics below,  I have

1) the NETWORTH Ladder
2) COLORISM LADDER (defined by skin tone AND facial features, here)
3)The COLOR Ladder
 

KEY
 BLACK ACTRESSES on Left of Each Ladder
COSBYs on Right of Each Ladder.

EXCEPTIONS HIGHLIGHTED RED AND GREEN
new actresses in center in yellow

The BLACK ACTRESS NETWORTH LADDER and the COLORISM LADDER
They are virtually the same, with Angela Bassett being way out of place on both (which is why she is high-lighted in red) Except for Angela Bassett, it's clear that light skin and white features are the key to success in Hollywood and beyond.

COLOR LADDER: When I adjusted positions of the actresses from dark to light, strictly by skin tone, the arrangement of actresses doesn't change much.  Success depends a little less heavily on skin lightness. If skin color alone determined your success in Hollywood, Angela Basset and Gabrielle Union would be making less money while Taraji P Henson would be making more. On the Cosby side of the ladder, all things being equal, Lisa Bonet should be making the most money.

RUNNING ON INSTINCT

Yesterday two NYPD officers in uniform came to my house. They did that knock that ONLY cops do. My almost 4 year old was asleep in my bedroom which is in the front of the house. Her father was out at the store.

When I say that I FREAKED out it is not an understatement.




I was in my own home in my bra and panties (it's hot and I don't have ac), innocent as the Virgin Mary and terrified. I yelled who is it through the door, even though I already knew. I moved my sleeping child to her room and closed her door and put a chair in front of it. I grabbed a robe from the bathroom and a knife from my kitchen. I sent a text to my man telling him the cops were here and he should NOT rush home. Because in reality I was more afraid of him being there than not being there.

Aiyana Stanley-Jones, killed by police in 2010

My primary thought was "protect my child and survive this interaction."


As I opened the door to the cops (and YES I know I didn't have to but in that moment I was not thinking clearly) I was shaking and fingering the knife in the pocket of my robe. I was trying to remember the things I learned in self defense if they tried me. The cops were talking as it occurred to me that that knife in my pocket would be all the reason they needed to "be afraid for their lives"

I wanted to smack myself. How stupid could I be?

The cop on my front step is showing me a picture and repeatedly saying, "Miss. Miss. Miss." I look at
the photo and tell him I have never seen that teenager before. He asks me who lives here.

I always thought I would be bad ass. I did trainings on safe police interactions for God's sake! I mean I actually taught fucking classes on this when I was in college. But no. I was too fucking scared. Too aware that my child was asleep in the other room. Too aware that I have no rights they have to respect.

I sang like a canary.

"It's just me and my child here now officer. My man is at the store. There are two other units in the back. This is a 3 family house."

I would have snitched on the whole world to get them away from my door and my child. I was terrified and the knife in my pocket no longer felt like protection. It felt like a death sentence.

As I write this I am still shaking.

Old Rich Man In Tulsa Playing Cop Shoots Black Man.
Real White Cop Puts Knee On Head

The cops realize they are at the right house but wrong door so they start to leave. My man comes running down the block and I'm shaking my head at him. Trying to let him know everything is okay. The cops walk out of my front gate as he makes it to the gate.

He looks at me and says, "everything okay?" I say, yes please come inside. He gives the cops the evil eye and I pull his Black ass in the house and slam the door shut.

------------------------
Ya'll this can't be life. This can not be the new normal. This is wrong.

Skip Gates Arrest after breaking into his own home

I honestly knew I was traumatized but I didn't realize how much until last night. I knew I didn't do anything illegal. I knew that they couldn't be at the right house. I mean I knew these things on some logical level that was behind a wall of fear. I was literally in self preservation mode.

Sighs We can't accept this ya'll. We can't live like this. This is so f*cking wrong.

There's this small incident I had with a police officer in the late 90s. It's boring. I won't relate it here. But this incredibly minor traffic stop comes my mind every single time someone tells a story about a scary encounter with police.

For a long time I couldn't figure out why.

I thought I was reviewing it in my head because I was trying to figure out if the white police officer in a very white town stopped me for driving while black. And I certainly did talk it over with friends and family for that reason. But a driving while black incident doesn't warrant the kind of mental attention I'd been giving it.

I've had other encounters with other policemen, most of them white males. And I haven't even given the one in Oklahoma, where I thought the guy was a little crazy, very much thought. I've also had encounters non-verbal incidents with white racists, while being a yankee down south, that I haven't given much thought.

A whole slew of incidents, that appear more serious on the surface, have not created hair-trigger memories like that minor traffic stop in 1990s .

It must have taken me more than a decade to admit that I wasn't just a little more nervous as usual during that traffic stop. It took a while because I used to decide what emotion I was allowed to have based on an analysis of what happened. But now I know that I was terrified even though all that happened was a cheap fix it ticket.

Once I admitted terror, I understood that I was replaying the film in my head trying in order to see what terrified me in the moment.

Unlike other traffic stops, I had no idea why he'd stopped me. I hadn't been speeding. I hadn't done a California Stop (rolling stop). My registration and insurance was up to date. I wound up being pulled over in a place less than a 1/4 mile from a main street. 

Instead of telling me what I did, he said, "Can you get out of the car please."

That ratcheted the tension up a little. I obeyed like a robot. I don't think I asked a single question. But I had a bunch of unspoken questions once I got out of the car.

- Why are his hands resting on or hovering near his weapon?

- When he made me get out of the car, did he back up in a wide circle away from me? Did that I really see him do that?

- Why is he still standing so far back when he as he shows me some problem with my license plate?

- Why won't he just tell me what was wrong with it, now that I am at the back of the car?

- Why is he making me ask him what's wrong with it over and over?

- Why is he staring at me so hard?

- Why couldn't he tell me this kind of license plate cover isn't allowed in California while I was still in the car?

- Why is he so obviously frightened?

It took me more than a decade to realize that something other than a fix it ticket, did happen. At some point during the encounter I went from being annoyed at being stopped for driving while black to being terrified that he was going to shoot me.

Like Angela, I knew I hadn't done anything. I knew that I didn't have anything. I knew all my car stuff was up to date. But I felt this officer's terror over nothing but my skin color.

I can't know if my memory of his movements are accurate after all this time. But I do remember mine. I have a body memory of mine. I moved very, very slowly the entire time he was there. I made sure my hands never left his field of vision. I remember trying not to get shot.

As soon as he gave me the ticket and let me be on my way, I shut the terror down because "nothing happened." Nothing happened but a fix it ticket.

Don't these two stories describe Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder? I'm not a psychologist. But these stories seem like symptoms of PTSD or something very similar to it.

Do many of us, as black people, have some level of PTSD when it comes to white police officers? I know I've always felt this way about white police officers. Almost always. I remember how dismayed I was in elementary school when I was told a police officer would be coming for show-and-tell. When teacher said, "The policeman is your friend" my little 5 to 7 year old brain said, "Not MY friend." Up to that point, every image I'd seen on the news involving police officers and blacks involved civil rights workers, fire hoses, and german shepards with teeth sharp enough to rip my arm off.

I'm sure we've transmitted this fear down to our children. And that would be a bad thing if all the things black people are afraid of when it comes to white police officers weren't true so often. Then again, the fear makes you run.

We think we know why Walter Scott ran; He ran because he was poor and behind on child support payments. But we don't know why Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell ran. We don't know why Freddie Gray ran. And I'm pretty sure Mike Brown knew he couldn't run fast enough from the jump.

We can't out run bullets. Therefore, we have to stop running. We have to fix the PTSD independent of fixing a white supremacy policing. A black PTSD reaction in front of a white police officer, can get us killed today.

It could be a while before white culture fixes covert forms of white racism (covert even from the executor), so what do we do in the meantime?  Training? Education? Knowing the law might help some of us to not panic if we practice too.

But what about people who feel the need to run because they are poor?

He looks like he was too big to have taken a chance on running, but we have to assume Eric Garner was selling loose cigarettes because he was poor. Walter Scott ran because he couldn't afford child support. Homeless, Malissa and Timothy probably didn't have registration and/or insurance.

Natasha McKenna
Tasers banned at Virginia jail
as a result of her death

And why are the police the ones called when a somebody that is mentally ill starts wilding out a little? If hospital personnel take care of this in the hospital, why don't the paramedics take care of that on the street if the person is sans weapon? And why aren't the black mentally ill being taken to Burger King  after acting out then a mental hospital instead of jail? Why are terrorists being treated better on the way to jail than the mentally ill? Tanisha Anderson, Shereese Francis, and Natasha McKenna would probably still be here if the people with guns who see force as the answer to everything hadn't been called.

We have to do a few things at one time, while white culture gets a handle on white supremacy in the general population and police departments - not running; race specific police response training; basic law education; addressing jail and poverty issues; and mental hospital type treatment instead of law enforcement treatment for the mentally ill are just a few of these things.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/04/25/virginia-jail-bans-tasers-natasha-mckenna_n_7143930.html

UPCROWN FUNK - Naptural 85

HILARIOUS

Love on your curls gurls!!!

DON'T BELIEVE ME JUST WATCH!

I didn't really get the mask thing, but I'm totally into the original video. I wanna say I saw I knew it was a hit first! Before anybody on the planet. Go BRUNO MARS!

If you haven't heard of Natural85, you're missing something. She does tons of natural hair care videos. I can't totally do every single thing she does, but I wouldn't have been gotten as far as I have on hair journey. My hair likes damp styling and a little heat from an overhead dryer. (The flax seed gel isn't working for me so far.)

Twist out instructions:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkjM-bNPbN4

A CALL TO MEN - TONY PORTER

FROM TONY PORTER'S TED TALK:

"...Jay (5 years old)  could come to me, come to me crying. It didn't matter what she was crying about, she could get on my knee, she could snot my sleeve up, just cry, cry it out. Daddy's got you. That's all that's important.

Now Kendall on the other hand -- and like I said, he's only 15 months older than her -- he'd come to me crying, it's like as soon as I would hear him cry, a clock would go off. I would give the boy probably about 30 seconds, which means, by the time he got to me, I was already saying things like, "Why are you crying? Hold your head up. Look at me. Explain to me what's wrong. Tell me what's wrong. I can't understand you. Why are you crying?"

Was Jim Crow Born On July 4, 1876?

feeling rebloggy

On July 4, 1876 a Black militia gathered in Hamburg, South Carolina, a center of Reconstruction and Black power, to celebrate the nation's centennial. A white farmer arrived on the scene and ordered the militia to move aside for their carriage. 

Although the militia eventually opened ranks, the next day the farmer demanded to a state justice that the leader of the militia, Dock Adams, be arrested for obstructing “my road." 

Meanwhile, the Black militia again gathered in Hamburg, but this time there was also a large group of white men. The outnumbered Blacks attempted to flee, but 25 men were captured and five were murdered in cold blood. African American shops and homes were also ransacked. The Hamburg Massacre launched the 1876 Democratic campaign for South Carolina's “Redemption,” inaugurating single-party white supremacist rule, and leading to nearly a century of "Jim Crow" denial of civil rights. 

-Zinn Education Project
 

Hmmm...Maybe not so much born as conceived on that July 4th?



Read more about the Hamburg massacre and other July 4 people's history stories from throughout U.S. history here: http://bit.ly/1JDtrkk

2014 UNARMED & KILLED BY POLICE ALL IN 60 SECONDS

VIDEO FROM NOW THIS




Not sure of the demographics or all ethnicities, but


VICTIM COUNT


1 WHITE WOMAN

3 BLACK WOMEN (Mariam Carey Missing)

4 LATINO MEN

7 WHITE MEN

17 BLACK MEN





POLICE

5 INDICTED


8 NOT CHARGED OR INDICTED

 

17 UNDER INVESTIGATION

BLACK ON NETFLIX

BEYOND THE LIGHTS from Gina Prince-Bythewood director of
LOVE AND BASKETBALL
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rieoWn9BdrQ

Documentary: LITTLE WHITE LIE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qxHLpgYwcVY
Incredible story of a girl who didn't know she was
NOT WHITE until she was 18 years old

FRUITVILLE STATION
Based On Story Of Oscar Grant
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crMTGCCui5c

Documentary: WHAT HAPPENED MISS SIMONE?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=moOQXZxriKY

Ava DuVernay's MIDDLE OF NOWHERE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1vOw9ykpQk

BLACK POWER MIXTAPE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFWHNpfjByQ

BBC SERIES - LUTHER
3 SEASONS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEwrOnrlERY

TAKEN FROM ME
Based on true story of Tiffany Rubin
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRgyVCZ5MFs

ALSO ON NETFLIX
______________

THE WOOD
PULP FICTION
DJANGO

THE REASON FOR "ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT" BASHING SEASON

Macy's (amongst others) Dumps Trump

"Macy’s has severed ties with Donald Trump after a petition calling on the company to do so gathered more than 700,000 signatures. The retailer will also phase out its Trump menswear collection. The news comes days after NBC ditched Trump’s show The Apprentice, citing his comments about Mexican immigrants. “We are disappointed and distressed by recent remarks about immigrants from Mexico,” Macy’s said in a statement. “We do not believe the disparaging characterizations portray an accurate picture of the many Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and Latinos who have made so many valuable contributions to the success of our nation.” "



http://www.thedailybeast.com/cheats/2015/07/01/macy-s-dumps-trump-for-racism.html

- - - - - - - -


Trump is smiling anyway. But this is temporary. His poll numbers have gotten another little bump as a result of yet another company, Macy's, disassociating themselves. But there aren't any real worries that Trump will actually get anywhere near the presidency. Some are saying he'll never disclose his finances as required. Therefore he's nothing, politically speaking. And he's probably too dumb anyway. Yet, I've thought that before and been wrong before- twice in a row.

The *Dump Trump* idea moving United States companies like a stadium fan wave gives me some satisfaction all by itself after all the bigoted crap that's come out of his mouth over the decades. But I'm also quite satisfied with the idea that people who work for him are losing jobs and being hurt by his (ethno)racism.

Sorry to be callous about it, but I know that most people won't care about racism until it impacts them negatively in a real and personal way. And nothing is more real and personal to some folk than money. That's why NBC and Macy's have made the decisions they have. 

Racism is ultra unpopular in the main stream media right this second, with the shootings of unarmed black people, confederate flag outrage, and the resulting church burnings that are just making it to the mainstream media. NBC and Macy's cannot afford the kind of losses Donald's big mouth might bring down on them.

As a result of these business break-ups, some people will become more aware of racism due to Trump's  losing their jobs for them. Some, dedicated to ignorance, won't see what's happened as anything more than political correctness with people of color at fault yet again. But a small percentage of those who lose work or money because of Donald's big mouth might give a little more thought as to who they are willing to work for in the future. And if we can tag a few more public figures in the same way that we've tagged big mouth, we might able to make racism real to yet a few more people.

More importantly, TV networks other than NBC (who also dumped Trump) are on guard as to what their representatives are allowed to spout about racial-others. That's good news too.

So the fallout from Donald Trump's ethnoracist tirade seems like win-win-win on the anti-racism front. Only a small step? Yes. But a bunch of small steps eventually turns into miles on the anti-racism path.

I'll take it.

But do not think that I am naive. I know that illegal immigration is more than an abstract problem for the black community.

As sorry as I feel for illegal immigrants who are fleeing various situations, as sure as I am that I would likely be one of them given the same set of circumstances, I also know that non-white illegal immigrants are deliberately allowed into this country as a source of cheap labor.  And this illegal and therefore permanently cheap labor is used, via competition, to maintain a permanent underclass where black people are heavily over-represented.

This is why "illegal immigrants," code for "Mexicans," are only verbally --and only verbally-- attacked during voting season. They serve as scapegoats that solidify the poor, white racist vote for the conservative party during voting season.


Not only is illegal immigration practically a non-issue during the voting off-season, politician Arnold Schwarzenegger even went so far as to have a special election in order to get driving licenses for illegal immigrants. "The Terminator" wasn't successful in getting Miss Anne's mammy-- excuse me--Miss Anne's nanny a driver's license.  But he tried his hardest to get illegal immigrants what passes for legal identification most everywhere. And for what? So the nanny can get up and go to Beverly Hills at 3AM on a moments notice if need be?   


Clearly, being silent in the face of someone like Donald Trump screaming about "those people" will not fix our end of the immigration problem. The only thing that will do that is overhauling the our immigration policy so that it favors people coming in at the bottom instead of at the top.

That is, I'm thinking that people who have advanced degrees in other countries should stay in those other countries or go elsewhere for the most part. If our immigration policies are reformed so that legal immigrants coming in at the bottom are given preferential treatment while eliminating a lot of those coming in at the top, then U.S. born citizens at the bottom will be needed at the top. And that means our public school system will become important again. Affordable college tuition will also become important.  If the demand for workers with advanced degrees is great enough, which makes college more affordable for more people, then school loan debt will also be managed.

In an immigration system where new legal people are mostly sliding in at the socioeconomic bottom, the U.S. born poor will be both pushed upward by immigrants and sucked upward by the vacancies left by degree-ed people no longer being imported at the top.  When the next set of legal Mexican and African immigrants slide in at the bottom arrive they will push both the previous set of legal immigrants upward AND U.S. citizens in the layers above upward.

And when a higher percentage of the inner city poor are legal, they will collectively be able to be more demanding. They will Unionize. They will demand better conditions at school and at work and they will vote. They will expect bang for their tax bucks.  And people with more hope, collectively speaking, will demand better behavior from police departments. 

You may notice that my immigration idea is not a new idea. "Give us your tired, your poor, your hungry" is how America worked for white immigrants for decades and decades according to what I learned in elementary school. That means it can work again.

And, I'm thinking immigration probably needs to be gradually slowed down to a trickle at the top first.

White racist voters
are always the reason
for illegal immigrant bashing season

-  not immigration reform,

- not spread of disease

- not tax drain

- not safety

The top one-percent has created a no-win competition at the bottom, between the U.S. born poor and illegal immigrant poor. And they are trying to use racism to maintain the status quo. But racism is a doubled edged sword that always manages to swing back and cut us all. Some people, the especially the poor white variety, do not seem to realize that they are bleeding too. The white poor needs immigration policy humanely overhauled as badly as anybody else. But they've been tricked into looking at those-people as the source of problems instead of looking at the top one-percent, mostly comprised of their-own-people as the source of problems.

We truly have to decide to whether we are going to hang together or hang separately.

Isn't it funny that having empathy and compassion for those that have the least, for illegal immigrants, is the path forward for us all? I wonder if that's not always the answer to most problems.

Prayers. Pray em if you got em. Humanity doesn't seem built to share in this way. But I really think that a lot more empathy is what it's going to take to move forward on racism and classism, both.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/01/politics/donald-trump-macys/index.html?sr=fb070115macytrump11aVODtopLink

FRAGILE - Esperanza Spalding

If blood will flow when flesh and steel are one

Drying in the colour of the evening sun

Tomorrow's rain will wash the stains away

But something in our minds will always stay

Perhaps this final act was meant

To clinch a lifetime's argument

That nothing comes from violence and nothing ever could

For all those born beneath an angry star

Lest we forget how fragile we are

music

On and on the rain will fall

Like tears from a star like tears from a star

On and on the rain will say

How fragile we are how fragile we are

On and on the rain will fall

Like tears from a star like tears from a star

On and on the rain will say

How fragile we are how fragile we are

How fragile we are how fragile we are

If “esperanza” is the Spanish word for hope, then bassist, vocalist and composer Esperanza Spalding could not have been given a more fitting name at birth. Blessed with uncanny instrumental chops, a multi-lingual voice that is part angel and part siren, and a natural beauty that borders on the hypnotic, the prodigy-turned-pro might well be the hope for the future of jazz and instrumental music. FUN FACT:  She snatched Best New Artist from cutesy child sensation Justin Beiber in 2011