This is real.
A Talk with Mom
by Chitown Kev
I think that my Mom gave me a version of The Talk recently.
Let me digress a bit.
When The Talk emerged from behind The Veil and filtered into national (aka white folks) consciousness, I had heard of it. Of course.
But I could not recall ever having received The Talk from Mom or my stepdad.
Given the way that people talked of The Talk in the MSM and even here at Daily Kos, it felt, at times, as if I‘d missed out on some sort of initiation rite into black adult male hood.
I did consider that maybe, just maybe, my inability to recall The Talk was yet another manifestation of a slowly fading memory.
So at some point after the George Zimmerman acquittal, I asked my Mom about it.
Mom said that my memory wasn’t faulty and that she had not given me or my brother The Talk because she never felt that it was necessary.
She said that in spite of the fact that her two sons were (and are) “knuckleheads,” that we were "good kids" who didn’t need that kind of “talking-to.”
[And before anyone accuses my Mom of insufficient black parenting skills there is this: When I was around 10 years old, my younger brother and I wandered into a drug store as it was Mom’s bowling night and she decided that we didn’t have to stay at home. My brother was caught stealing baseball cards in the drug store. Both of us were taken to the store basement until the cops arrived. The security on duty (both white men) handcuffed me and my brother; once security ascertained that I had no knowledge of my brother’s actions, that we were no dynamic duo of preteen boosters, they un-handcuffed me and tried to avoid my questions about the porn magazines that they were reading (one of which I distinctly remember was Oui). The cops arrived, dropped me off at the bowling alley and took my brother to the police station.
About 30 minutes or so later, Mom arrived at the police station. My brother was standing in a corner. I have not seen a sadder look on a child’s face before or since that time; a look that quickly turned into sheer terror once he took a good look at Mom.
I will not describe in any sort of detail what happened to my brother after we arrived home (though you can well imagine). And while this story does seem more than a bit anecdotal and peripheral to the topic at hand, it does suggest a primary reason that any version of The Talk may have seemed unnecessary: simply put, my brother and I feared Mom more than we feared law enforcement.]
I have wondered, in recent weeks, exactly how not receiving The Talk from my Mom and stepdad has impacted my black (and gay) consciousness while living in 20th and 21st century urban America.
[I will note here that are versions of The Talk that take place among some gay men (especially, though not exclusively,among black gay men) talks which I did receive...but that’s a story for another time.]
Yes, I’ve had “encounters” with law enforcement for a variety of reasons. And those encounters have pretty much gone the way I think they’re supposed to go, regardless of the ethnicity of the officer.
Maybe that has something to do with having not received The Talk. Maybe not.
I do know that when I talked to Mom a few weeks ago, she told me to be careful walking out on these streets; that it seemed as if some cops were out to kill and/or humiliate black men.
And that it (generally) didn’t matter whether the cops was black or white.
She discussed some of the reasons behind those beliefs. Among those reasons was misplaced anger at the current occupant of the Oval Office, changes in policing techniques, and issues eloquently covered in Shaun King's essay(s) on the hiring of Timothy Loehmann.
I have never heard that type of fear in my mother’s voice and I am 47 years old.
This woman has raised two sons, was instrumental in the raising of two grandsons and while she would say that all four of us (me, my brother, my two adult nephews) are pretty much knuckleheads (which is TOTALLY not her fault; of course!), she also knows that all four of us are good, responsible citizens. Or at least we try to be.
I can't forget the fear in Mom's voice when we discussed the non-indictment of the cops that killed Eric Garner.
I had never heard that fear in her voice before. Not on that subject.
Granted, it’s natural for a parent to be concerned and, perhaps, to even fear for the health and safety for their children for all sorts of reasons.
It seems unnatural, however, that any parent would be concerned that those entrusted to “serve and protect” would do the opposite and look to search and destroy, at least when they can get away with it.
And it’s difficult to shake my anger at a system that, of all things, would inculcate that type of fear in a woman that should simply be enjoying her retirement and being a grandmother and a great-grandmother.
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News by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
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The answer to the next headline's question is; because they aren’t trying hard enough. Slate: Why "can’t" the RNC rid itself of a racist?
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Agema, formerly an Air Force fighter pilot, served three terms in the Michigan House of Representatives—the maximum allowed by the state’s term limits—and then challenged Saul Anuzis for his spot as RNC committeeman at the 2012 Republican state convention. MLive reported that consultant John Yob, now the national political director of Sen. Rand Paul’s RANDPAC, “engineered Agema’s victory,” a win that capitalized on the state delegates’ Tea Party fervor. Paul Welday, the chairman of the Michigan GOP 14th district committee, said that contest was a proxy war between Yob and Anuzis, who have feuded in the past.
“Dave Agema proved to be the beneficiary as the result of that fight,” Welday said.
Before becoming committeeman, Agema had a controversial tenure in the Michigan statehouse. He has said that Muslims intend to implement Sharia in the state, energetically opposed same-sex marriage, and was known as one of the most far right members of the chamber. “He’s not a shrinking violet,” said Susan Demas, the editor and publisher of Inside Michigan Politics. “He’s been very vocal about his opinions about Muslims and the gay community for a long time.”
After becoming committeeman, Agema got a lot more vocal. In March 2013, according to MLive, he linked to a blog post on Facebook saying that “the homosexual agenda” is looking to “get the public to affirm their filthy lifestyle” and “turn people from Christianity.” Then, in January 2014, also per MLive, he posted an anti-Muslim rant on Facebook that asked, “Have you ever seen a Muslim do anything that contributes positively to the American way of life?"
Two weeks ago, on Dec. 31, 2014, he was at it again, posting the text of an article that ran in the white supremacist magazine American Renaissance. “Very interesting article by a public defender,” Agema wrote. “We are in a cultural battle. Very enlightening for anyone who is concerned about crime in America …” Nearly every line of the piece is astonishingly racist. For instance:
[B]lacks are different by almost any measure to all other people. They cannot reason as well. They cannot communicate as well. They cannot control their impulses as well. They are a threat to all who cross their paths, black and non-black alike.
“This guy is essentially the RNC’s David Duke, and they refuse to give him the boot,” said Dennis Lennox, a Michigan Republican consultant and 2008 delegate to the Republican National Convention.
Former Michigan state Rep. Dave Agema (R), appearing on Off the Record with Tim Skubick.
Photo courtesy WKAR/MSU
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The Republican governor of New York and the civil rights leader shared a close political and financial alliance that is revealed in a new book. The Root: MLK and Nelson Rockefeller Revealed.
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While much is being made about the new movie Selma’s depiction of the complicated relationship between the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and President Lyndon B. Johnson at the summit of the civil rights movement, it was actually King’s friendship with a larger-than-life Republican governor that speaks to our more complicated political past. Looking past it, we not only miss a host of intriguing historical surprises but also underestimate King’s deft leveraging of power on either side of the aisle.
Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller (1908-1979), scion of a mighty oil dynasty, was the four-term governor of New York who also served as vice president under President Gerald Ford and did his best to outdo LBJ’s Great Society by way of his own blended liberal-conservative style, which he described as having “a Democrat heart with a Republican head.” Before being shouted down by his own party at the 1964 Republican National Convention in favor of Barry Goldwater’s conservative forces, Rockefeller thought that energetic governance, to save capitalism by softening its sharpest edges and to advance civil rights in the Lincoln tradition, would be his ticket to the White House. Had he been right, we wouldn’t be talking about LBJ and the Voting Rights Act today.
Before it was fashionable, Rockefeller, more than any other white political executive in his party and far more than most Democrats, recognized King’s potential to lead the march for justice that would redefine American greatness in a Cold War world. Now, for the first time, we get a more complete sense of his support for King in an impressive new biography by noted presidential historian Richard Norton Smith: On His Own Terms: A Life of Nelson Rockefeller, reflecting 14 years of research that tracks this remarkable man through his flawed but ebullient life.
Here are the surprises that caught my eye:
In 1961, when King was still largely unknown outside the South, Rockefeller overruled advisers who were worried about how it would look if he shared the same stage with King and instead hired a film crew to capture King’s oratorical gifts. “If it’s morally the right thing ... it’s the politically right thing,” Rockefeller told his team.
Cardinal Francis Joseph Spellman, archbishop of New York; the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.; and New York Gov. Nelson Rockefeller at the Sheraton Hotel in New York City in 1962 for the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation.
1962 NEW YORK STATE ARCHIVES
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Nigeria says the number of people who lost their lives in an assault by Boko Haram militants on the town of Baga last week was about 150. BBC:Boko Haram crisis: Nigeria estimates Baga deaths.
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The defence ministry said this figure included "many of the terrorists" who had attacked the town in Borno state and faced resistance by troops.
Local officials earlier estimated the number of deaths at as many as 2,000. Nigeria has often been accused of underestimating casualty figures to downplay the threat of Boko Haram.
The ministry dismissed higher estimates for deaths at Baga, in north-east Nigeria, as "speculation and conjecture" and "exaggerated".
It said the army was taking "necessary actions" to restore law and order there, but gave few details about the operation to recapture the town from the Islamist insurgents.
Potiskum in the north-east was among the towns hit by explosions at the weekend
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Voices and Soul
by Justice Putnam
Black Kos Poetry Editor
I knew long before my grandkids were born, that to invoke they were black as a means to convey I get what it is to be black, would be a fool's errand. I think it was Shanikka who said to someone who had, "well, I've been black my whole life." That statement pretty much corroborated what I had deduced so long ago.
I took notice when New York Mayor, Bill de Blasio, stated he and his wife had the talk with Dante; and the subsequent reprisals by the usual bigots and the hand wringing by the usual stenographers for corporate media as they fulminated on the issue. Another thing was corroborated of what I had deduced so long ago.
We have tremendous shortcomings as a nation, society and even as individuals. So tremendous, that desperate measures are required.
My grandson turns 15 this week. I had the talk with him the best I could. While I was at it, I also spoke of rape, consent and that use of the B word might not be such a good idea.
It was important to me that he knows of these systemic problems in our society.
"But GrandPop," he assured, "that's the reason I want to study Law."
He's a good kid.
Enlightenment
In the portrait of Jefferson that hangs
at Monticello, he is rendered two-toned:
his forehead white with illumination —
a lit bulb — the rest of his face in shadow,
darkened as if the artist meant to contrast
his bright knowledge, its dark subtext.
By 1805, when Jefferson sat for the portrait,
he was already linked to an affair
with his slave. Against a backdrop, blue
and ethereal, a wash of paint that seems
to hold him in relief, Jefferson gazes out
across the centuries, his lips fixed as if
he's just uttered some final word.
The first time I saw the painting, I listened
as my father explained the contradictions:
how Jefferson hated slavery, though — out
of necessity, my father said — had to own
slaves; that his moral philosophy meant
he could not have fathered those children:
would have been impossible, my father said.
For years we debated the distance between
word and deed. I'd follow my father from book
to book, gathering citations, listening
as he named — like a field guide to Virginia —
each flower and tree and bird as if to prove
a man's pursuit of knowledge is greater
than his shortcomings, the limits of his vision.
I did not know then the subtext
of our story, that my father could imagine
Jefferson's words made flesh in my flesh —
the improvement of the blacks in body
and mind, in the first instance of their mixture
with the whites — or that my father could believe
he'd made me better. When I think of this now,
I see how the past holds us captive,
its beautiful ruin etched on the mind's eye:
my young father, a rough outline of the old man
he's become, needing to show me
the better measure of his heart, an equation
writ large at Monticello. That was years ago.
Now, we take in how much has changed:
talk of Sally Hemings, someone asking,
How white was she? — parsing the fractions
as if to name what made her worthy
of Jefferson's attentions: a near-white,
quadroon mistress, not a plain black slave.
Imagine stepping back into the past,
our guide tells us then — and I can't resist
whispering to my father: This is where
we split up. I'll head around to the back.
When he laughs, I know he's grateful
I've made a joke of it, this history
that links us — white father, black daughter —
even as it renders us other to each other.
-- Natasha Trethewey
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Pull up a chair and sit down a while and enjoy the company.