Welcome back to the Front Porch.
We had visitors here last week–some who have never been here before. Just in case they happen to drop back in, thought it would be a good time for us to explain again just what a front porch is all about, and why we gather here.
There's an old tradition in our community of gathering on the front porch, sometimes to just "set a spell" and talk with kin folk or neighbors. Sometimes just to watch the world pass by. Or read the newspaper. Other times it’s a good place to get some work done–shelling peas, or plucking chickens, mending or sitting one of the kids down to braid their hair. We gossip, talk about the news of the day, recite poetry–hum, or sing or even pray. Some folks bring instruments, and impromptu music sessions occur.
We love music cause it feeds the soul.
Now it isn't always a porch–in the city it might be a stoop, or a fire-escape.
In cyberspace it’s a string of letters–but never forget that there are real people behind the fonts.
Sometimes that slips our minds.
Whether country, or city or cyber–the front porch is a place where we can gather together. In harmony.
Doesn't mean we always agree–we have had many a heated discussion on porches, but they should always be rooted in love and respect.
Folks bring food, in the spirit of sharing.
Folks bring their problems–in the spirit of caring.
We call today's porch Tuesday's Chile 'cause Tuesday's child is full of grace. On Friday's we gather to review the week and celebrate the weekend to come.
We know a lot about grace. It gets us through the day.
We welcome everyone to the porch–somehow some folks have gotten the impression that only black folks are gathered here. That's far from the truth. We are a bit like gumbo–a heady mix of ingredients goes into the pot and we wind up with a savory stew.
We ask newcomers to introduce themselves when they drop by. Most of us have known each other for quite a while, but we are always open to expanding the family. And we are a family. We tend to call each other brother or sister. It's not a church thing–it's a kinship thing. It helps strengthen the bonds of friendship and community.
We have comfy chairs, a rocker in the corner and a glider. There's a hammock slung from the beams–but it is usually occupied. We figger if you find a comfortable place to sit–you'll stay awhile and make some new friends.
It's been a long week here since last Tuesday. Filled with pain, anger, and heated discussion.
Some folks are now in other neighborhoods, some folks took a hiatus for a week, some new folks have moved in, and some folks stayed here. Conversations continue and there are hopeful new beginnings.
The porch isn't going anywhere.
We will keep on building bridges.
So if you are new–glad you have joined us. Welcome back to everybody else. Prayers and blessings for those who are no longer with us. Hope some of them wend their way back.
Don't have anything more to say. I'm tired and just want to put my feet up and listen to some front porch music.
Love you all.
Dee
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Prominent African Americans recall painful and life-altering brushes with discrimination. The Atlantic: The Most Racist Thing That Ever Happened to Me
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There's a Chris Rock joke that is emblematic of modern racism. It's from his 2008 standup routine "Kill the Messenger," and it's about Alpine, New Jersey, the posh town where he lives in a multi-million dollar home. His neighbors include Mary J. Blige, Patrick Ewing, and Eddie Murphy. Rock says Blige, Ewing, Murphy, and he are (or were) among the best in the world at their professions, legends in their line of work. They're also the only four black homeowners in town.
Then he says his next-door neighbor is a white dentist. "He ain't the best dentist in the world," Rock says. "He ain't going to the dental hall of fame. He's just a yank-your-tooth-out dentist." Rock spells out the point with a devastating punchline: "The black man gotta fly to get to somethin' the white man can walk to."
He's saying that in modern America blacks can ascend to the upper class, it's possible, but they have to fight so much more to get there because white supremacy remains a tall barrier to entry. The fact that a few slip through the infinitesimal cracks is a way of advancing the idea that white supremacy does not exist, an attempt to mask its awesome power, because the Matrix doesn't want you to know it's there. How can someone argue that Alpine, New Jersey, is racist when four black families live there, welcomed by the community and unharassed by police?
Of course this is a fake argument--these extraordinary blacks would be welcome anywhere and Alpine itself is not racist because it doesn't need to be. There are institutional systems in place that keep the number of blacks in Alpine and Beverly Hills and other exclusive communities very low, but not so low that Jesse Jackson can come and raise a ruckus. It's like releasing a tiny bit of air so the bottle doesn't explode.
Modern racism is a much more subtle, nuanced, slippery beast than its father or grandfather were. It has ways of making itself seem to not exist, which can drive you crazy trying to prove its existence sometimes. You're in Target. Is the security guard following you? You're not sure. You think he is but you can't be certain. Maybe the guard is black, so if you tried to explain it to a white friend they might not understand it as racist, but the guard's boss isn't black. Or maybe he is. Maybe what you're feeling are his ashamed vibes as if he's sending you a silent signal of apology for following you. Or maybe . . . now you're looking for the Tylenol for migraines when you all you needed was toothpaste.
And that's one of the basest examples of racism. That says nothing of the constellation of anxieties that could flash through you when the stakes are high--when you're applying for a job or competing for a promotion, or applying to a school, buying a house, or asking for a loan. When you're wondering if the white person who appears less qualified got the promotion because they were actually better than you or because they were better at networking upper management, or someone wrongly assumed you're not as good because you're black or . .
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Why marriage equality matters. ColorLines: James Anderson’s Partner Can’t Join Family’s Wrongful Death Suit in Mississippi
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Earlier this week the family of James C. Anderson, the black man who was killed in an alleged hate crime in Mississippi, filed a lawsuit agaisnt the seven white teens who participated in the murder. But the state of Mississippi will not allow Anderson’s male partner of 17-years to be part of the family’s civil suit, the New York Times reported.
As the Andersson family lawyer explained to the Times, James Bradfield, Anderson’s partner, is not a plaintiff in the family’s suit because same-sex partners have no claim in civil actions like the one the family is putting forward in the state of Mississippi. (There is no indication that Anderson’s sexual orientation was a factor in the crime.)
Anderson was violently attacked and then run over by a group of white teens on June 26, 2011. Deryl Dedmon 19, of Brandon, Mississippi is accused of intentionally running over Anderson with his green Ford-250 and is now facing capital murder charges because of evidence that he assaulted and robbed Anderson, according to Hinds County District Attorney
The civil suit accuses the seven white teenagers of deliberately setting out in the early morning hours of June 26 to go to Jackson to “go f*ck with some niggers.”
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Why Police Are So Bad At Racial Profiling. Someone who is definately not one of my favorite writers hits the nail on the head with this one. TNR: Driving While Dreadlocked
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Last Monday in Brooklyn at a West Indian Day parade, two black people walking through a blocked-off area were stopped by the police, wrestled to the ground, and detained for a half hour. In most instances, this would have been a lamentably unextraordinary event. But in this case, the two detainees were Councilman Jumaane Williams and his public advocate aide Kirsten John Foy, both of whom had received permission from the police to be in the area where they were arrested. This is the sort of police harassment that, rather than disappearing into anonymity, finds its way into national newspapers: Indeed, Williams made sure of it by calling a press conference the next day.
Which is not to say that the subsequent debate has proven particularly enlightening. For every rote charge of racial profiling, there has been a voice eager to dismiss the arrest as a mere misunderstanding. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, for instance, blithely suggested that everybody “get a beer,” in the vein of the “beer summit” that President Obama hosted in 2008 with Harvard’s Henry Louis Gates and James Crowley, the officer who had famously arrested Gates on his own front porch.
But Jumaane Williams’ arrest is instructive precisely because it’s not analogous to Gatesgate. It shows us, namely, that pernicious racial profiling is not a situational problem, but a structural one. Jumaane Williams’s arrest was not just the product of a single interaction gone wrong, but a reflection of the fact that police procedures have yet to catch up with broader changes in American culture in general, and black culture in particular.
IT IS ALMOST IMPOSSIBLE to suppose race wasn’t part of the problem, of course. It is technically possible that two white men walking through that area and showing their badges would have wound up handcuffed with their faces in the dirt, but only that. Still, the NYPD officers in Brooklyn that day were operating upon a stereotype more subtle than a simple racial one. Not all black men would have been as likely to suffer the treatment Williams faced. I sincerely suspect, for example, that I would have been rather less likely to suffer what Williams did.
Williams directly addressed this point in his press conference. He noted that his treatment was due to his being, certainly, young and black, but also to his wearing dreadlocks and an earring. That is, the cops read Williams as “street,” despite that he is a municipal lawmaker, not to mention college graduate with a Master’s Degree.
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The lack of a push of a sustained effort at institution building is really one of the modern failures of black leadership. NewsOne: Why Don’t HBCU Alumni Give Back?
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For my first Easter Sunday in New York, I drove to Queens with my significant other to spend the holiday with a fellow alum from Tennessee State University. She and I met through our alma mater’s local chapter. After eating, laughing and chatting, the women headed to the kitchen to help clean up while the men sat in the other room discussing sports and politics. Ms. Betty graduated from TSU in the ‘60s, and I four decades later. Somehow while washing dishes and scooping out ice cream for dessert the conversation led to HBCUs and alumni giving.
Hearing Ms. Betty and I passionately discuss our beloved HBCU apparently struck a nerve in one of the women. She was a mid-twenty something native New Yorker who attended Stony Brook University. Although she’d never gone to an HBCU, hadn’t done any extensive reading on HBCUs, she had quite a few criticisms not only about HBCUs, but also the students it produced. In an attempt to validate her inaccurate point about HBCU education not being up to par with that of traditionally white institutions, she offered up as evidence that she had seen HBCUs recruit and accept high school students on the spot without them having to take any SATs or ACTs. She babbled on and on about how HBCUs ethnic makeup is not representative of the real world. After she finished I assured her that state schools are state schools regardless if they are HBCUs or TWIs. SAT or ACT scores are a requirement for admission into an accredited college. Further, I reassured her as a graduate of both an HBCU and TWI that I received a top-notch, quality education at my HBCU. Not something I would say about my experience at the TWI I attended.
Ms. Betty interrupted. “Well all I know is I can’t give my money to a school that continuously admits white students and gives them free rides just for being the minority,” she said bluntly. “If they want me to give back they need to find a way to earmark my money only for Black students.”
The woman who I had been debating with earlier took this as her opportunity to keep throwing shade at HBCUs. “Tell me this. Since HBCU graduates are always so passionate about HBCUs being such wonderful institutions, why don’t graduates give back?” she queried. “The bottom line is HBCUs are sinking due to financial strains and the alumni are nowhere to be found.”
People who are typically uninformed about HBCUs, but have righteous and wrong opinions about them and use anecdotal evidence to back up their points, grind my gears. But Miss Stony Brook had a point. One of the toughest problems HBCUs face is getting alumni to give back.
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Just when we thought we had a few "conscious" rap artists in he United States. New York Times: Rappers Lead Opposition in Senegal
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In Senegal, rappers are demonstrating what it really means to make music with a purpose. They're not just participating in but are also leading a movement against the country's aging president, who does not want to leave office, the New York Times reports.
In the former French colony in Northern Africa, there were riots this summer with tear gas and tire burnings, as well as several large demonstrations. One of them forced President Abdoulaye Wade to back away from constitutional changes that would almost ensure his third term in office.
At the forefront of the movement has been a surprising group: rappers like Fou Malade (real name: Malal Talla) and Thiat (Cheikh Oumar Cyrille Touré).
"In politics, nothin' but hypocrites, robbers of cash. Government, why do you always lie, always?" says rap Fou Malade in the song "We're Going to Tell Everything." They continue, comparing the state to a small, traditional fishing boat: "The pirogue is sinking, and whoever dares say it spends the night at the D.I.C.," referring to the Criminal Investigations Division.
The movement's objective is simple, Fadel Barro, a friend of the rappers', told the New York Times. "That they stop making futilities priorities, like the Monument de la Renaissance" -- a giant statue -- "or buying new planes. We're fighting so that the preoccupations of the Senegalese return to the center of politics."
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Voices and Soul
by Justice Putnam
Black Kos Poetry Editor
It is so good to be back at The Porch. I missed you all, though some of us bumped into each other, Out There.
It looks like some of us are missing, hopefully they'll call and let us know they are ok. Though, to be honest, I think they'll be just fine; but I still wish they would stop by and say hello sometime.
Because everyone is welcome here on The Porch, whether you're an old, or a new...
Visitor
I am dreaming of a house just like this one
but larger and opener to the trees, nighter
than day and higher than noon, and you,
visiting, knocking to get in, hoping for icy
milk or hot tea or whatever it is you like.
For each night is a long drink in a short glass.
A drink of blacksound water, such a rush
and fall of lonesome no form can contain it.
And if it isn’t night yet, though I seem to
recall that it is, then it is not for everyone.
Did you receive my invitation? It is not
for everyone. Please come to my house
lit by leaf light. It’s like a book with bright
pages filled with flocks and glens and groves
and overlooked by Pan, that seductive satyr
in whom the fish is also cooked. A book that
took too long to read but minutes to unread—
that is—to forget. Strange are the pages
thus. Nothing but the hope of company.
I made too much pie in expectation. I was
hoping to sit with you in a tree house in a
nightgown in a real way. Did you receive
my invitation? Written in haste, before
leaf blinked out, before the idea fully formed.
An idea like a storm cloud that does not spill
or arrive but moves silently in a direction.
Like a dark book in a long life with a vague
hope in a wood house with an open door.
-- Brenda Shaughnessy
You can listen to On The Porch with Black Kos on Monday's 6pm to 8pm pacific, the players and Podcasts on The Go! are at the Blue Skies Netroots Radio Network website.
For this inaugural edition, Dopper and Seeta sat down with me, On The Porch and discussed the issues of the day.
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