By Henry Louis Gates

Cambridge, Mass.

LAST week, the Pew Research Center published the astonishing finding that 37 percent of African-Americans polled felt that “blacks today can no longer be thought of as a single race” because of a widening class divide. From Frederick Douglass to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., perhaps the most fundamental assumption in the history of the black community has been that Americans of African descent, the descendants of the slaves, either because of shared culture or shared oppression, constitute “a mighty race,” as Marcus Garvey often put it.

“By a ratio of 2 to 1,” the report says, “blacks say that the values of poor and middle-class blacks have grown more dissimilar over the past decade. In contrast, most blacks say that the values of blacks and whites have grown more alike.”

The message here is that it is time to examine the differences between black families on either side of the divide for clues about how to address an increasingly entrenched inequality. We can’t afford to wait any longer to address the causes of persistent poverty among most black families.

This class divide was predicted long ago, and nobody wanted to listen. At a conference marking the 40th anniversary of Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s infamous report on the problems of the black family, I asked the conservative scholar James Q. Wilson and the liberal scholar William Julius Wilson if ours was the generation presiding over an irreversible, self-perpetuating class divide within the African-American community.

“I have to believe that this is not the case,” the liberal Wilson responded with willed optimism. “Why go on with this work otherwise?” The conservative Wilson nodded. Yet, no one could imagine how to close the gap.

In 1965, when Moynihan published his report, suggesting that the out-of-wedlock birthrate and the number of families headed by single mothers, both about 24 percent, pointed to dissolution of the social fabric of the black community, black scholars and liberals dismissed it. They attacked its author as a right-wing bigot. Now we’d give just about anything to have those statistics back. Today, 69 percent of black babies are born out of wedlock, while 45 percent of black households with children are headed by women.

How did this happen? As many theories flourish as pundits — from slavery and segregation to the decline of factory jobs, crack cocaine, draconian drug laws and outsourcing. But nobody knows for sure.

I have been studying the family trees of 20 successful African-Americans, people in fields ranging from entertainment and sports (Oprah Winfrey, the track star Jackie Joyner-Kersee) to space travel and medicine (the astronaut Mae Jemison and Ben Carson, a pediatric neurosurgeon). And I’ve seen an astonishing pattern: 15 of the 20 descend from at least one line of former slaves who managed to obtain property by 1920 — a time when only 25 percent of all African-American families owned property.

Ten years after slavery ended, Constantine Winfrey, Oprah’s great-grandfather, bartered eight bales of cleaned cotton (4,000 pounds) that he picked on his own time for 80 acres of prime bottomland in Mississippi. (He also learned to read and write while picking all that cotton.)

Sometimes the government helped: Whoopi Goldberg’s great-great-grandparents received their land through the Southern Homestead Act. “So my family got its 40 acres and a mule,” she exclaimed when I showed her the deed, referring to the rumor that freed slaves would receive land that had been owned by their masters.

Well, perhaps not the mule, but 104 acres in Florida. If there is a meaningful correlation between the success of accomplished African-Americans today and their ancestors’ property ownership, we can only imagine how different black-white relations would be had “40 acres and a mule” really been official government policy in the Reconstruction South.

The historical basis for the gap between the black middle class and underclass shows that ending discrimination, by itself, would not eradicate black poverty and dysfunction. We also need intervention to promulgate a middle-class ethic of success among the poor, while expanding opportunities for economic betterment.

Perhaps Margaret Thatcher, of all people, suggested a program that might help. In the 1980s, she turned 1.5 million residents of public housing projects in Britain into homeowners. It was certainly the most liberal thing Mrs. Thatcher did, and perhaps progressives should borrow a leaf from her playbook.

The telltale fact is that the biggest gap in black prosperity isn’t in income, but in wealth. According to a study by the economist Edward N. Wolff, the median net worth of non-Hispanic black households in 2004 was only $11,800 — less than 10 percent that of non-Hispanic white households, $118,300. Perhaps a bold and innovative approach to the problem of black poverty — one floated during the Civil War but never fully put into practice — would be to look at ways to turn tenants into homeowners. Sadly, in the wake of the subprime mortgage debacle, an enormous number of houses are being repossessed. But for the black poor, real progress may come only once they have an ownership stake in American society.

People who own property feel a sense of ownership in their future and their society. They study, save, work, strive and vote. And people trapped in a culture of tenancy do not.

The sad truth is that the civil rights movement cannot be reborn until we identify the causes of black suffering, some of them self-inflicted. Why can’t black leaders organize rallies around responsible sexuality, birth within marriage, parents reading to their children and students staying in school and doing homework? Imagine Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson distributing free copies of Virginia Hamilton’s collection of folktales “The People Could Fly” or Dr. Seuss, and demanding that black parents sign pledges to read to their children. What would it take to make inner-city schools havens of learning?

John Kenneth Galbraith once told me that the first step in reversing the economic inequalities that blacks face is greater voter participation, and I think he was right. Politicians will not put forth programs aimed at the problems of poor blacks while their turnout remains so low.

If the correlation between land ownership and success of African-Americans argues that the chasm between classes in the black community is partly the result of social forces set in motion by the dismal failure of 40 acres and a mule, then we must act decisively. If we do not, ours will be remembered as the generation that presided over a permanent class divide, a slow but inevitable process that began with the failure to give property to the people who had once been defined as property.

Henry Louis Gates Jr., a professor at Harvard, is the author of the forthcoming “In Search of Our Roots.” Read more!

We here at Op-Ed Central have been calling for a pro team in Harlem for the longest time. Not on this blog of course but elsewhere. I have always felt that Rucker Basketball should have been the catalyst for a NBA team in Harlem, a long time ago. As a Harlemite, or rather a brother from Uptown, I lived for summer Basketball in Bradhurst park, Rucker, 145th, etc. Suffice to say I was shocked when I perused the New York Times this morning and found this....

courtesy of the New York Times by William C. Rhoden

Commissioner David Stern wants to put an N.B.A. Development League team in Harlem, U.S.A. The idea was jolting at first. Now it’s intriguing.

Harlem, Stern said Saturday, represents a caldron of basketball tradition that would give much-needed weight to the N.B.A.’s seven-year-old D-League, a place teams can send young talent to mature. “Harlem represents a basketball tradition that for decades and decades and decades has given the N.B.A. so many players,” Stern said in a telephone interview.

The most intriguing aspect of a team in Harlem is finding a place to play. Some have said the armory at 142nd Street and Fifth Avenue. But the only place to play is in the old Renaissance Casino and Ballroom on 138th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard. Some see the building as an eyesore. I see it as a bridge between Harlem’s past and future.

Every day, often twice a day, I pass the old Renaissance. The building, boarded up and worn down, gives no hint of its glorious past. I always stare. I can practically hear happy voices, bands blaring. I can see Pop Gates and John Isaacs playing on a slippery hardwood court with the Rens, and winning. Again.

Today I can see a new Renaissance team playing in Harlem.

Harlem is changing before our eyes: babies pushed by their nannies; swank health clubs; high rises blotting out the sun; Starbucks.

There would be many, many layers of red tape as well as community resistance to overcome. The Renaissance has been boarded up for nearly 30 years. The place needs work, lots of work. Seating capacity might be an issue, although the old Rens accommodated crowds of 3,000 in the halcyon days of the 1920s and 1930s, when they were the physical face of Harlem. Dan Reed, president of the D-League, said there were some franchises with 3,000-seat arenas.

The development league badly needs a presence in the Northeast. New York would be the hub. Harlem would become the D-League capital.

In fact, the Knicks have expressed an interest. “The Knicks are all over the idea,” Stern said. “It’s a great cultural tie-in.”

A renaissance is taking place in Harlem (that’s a generous description; accelerated gentrification is more to the point). Some shattered dreams are being forced out, new dreamers are moving in. The renovated ballroom and a developmental basketball team could be bridges between Harlem’s present and future.

•

Harlem is home to the Rucker League and the Entertainers League, although the leagues are just that — entertainment. From what I gather from Stern and Reed, the league’s teams — and the team that would eventually come to Harlem — will not simply develop players but train a workforce for placement in the N.B.A. or a franchise in another sport.

“I don’t want this to just be about basketball,” Stern said.

This month marks the 84th anniversary of the Harlem Renaissance Big Five playing its first game inside the Renaissance.

The game was played Nov. 3, 1923. For the next 16 years, the Rens were one of the best basketball teams in the country. They won the first world professional championship in 1939.

Dr. Calvin O. Butts III is the pastor of the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem and president of SUNY College at Old Westbury. He is one of the founders of the Abyssinian Development Corporation, which owns the Renaissance, among other properties. During an interview Saturday, Butts outlined his vision for a renovated Renaissance Casino and Ballroom, saying it would be a cultural space, a repository for the arts, music, the spoken word, dance.

But home to an N.B.A. minor league team?

“It’s an interesting thought,” he said. “This is something I can consider. We haven’t really thought about this at all.”

A few years ago, Butts created a wide-ranging sports program at Abyssinian. He acknowledged that including a basketball component in the Renaissance renovation — in this case an N.B.A. Development League team — was “in keeping with what the space was originally used for.”

The Renaissance Casino and Ballroom was a hub of black culture in Harlem.

The Renaissance opened in 1923. The casino was built by the black-owned Sarco Realty Company. Bob Douglas, who founded the Rens basketball team and is known as the father of black basketball, made a deal with Sarco to play games and practice in the ballroom. In return, Douglas agreed to pay a percentage of the gate receipts. He also agreed to call the team the Renaissance Big Five. The team became famous as the Rens, and between 1924 and 1940, they were among the best teams — black or white — in the United States.

Once the N.B.A. hurdles the substantial bureaucratic and community barriers, the final challenge will be naming the D-League franchise.

On second thought, that’s easy. They’ll be the New Harlem Rens.

THANK YOU MR. RHODEN! Read more!

Posted by Tanvir Ahmad Khan


Every war is shrouded in fog. Since the regime is fighting several battles, the fog of war is commensurately thicker but not thick enough to persuade the people that holding the Constitution in abeyance would in any way help retrieve the lost ground

“There is no atonement. Every action in life is final and produces its inevitable consequences despite all the tears and gnashing of teeth.” — Joseph Conrad, in a letter dated September, 1891

While justifying the proclamation of emergency, President Musharraf portrayed Pakistan as a state collapsing under the weight of Islamist insurgencies and a Supreme Court wantonly unaware of the dangerous consequences of its decisions. Since the Baloch struggle for an honourable place in the federation would not have preyed on the already fraught nerves of Western governments grappling with Afghanistan, he did not dwell on it. But precisely with that objective in mind, he risked self-indictment when it came to the tribal badlands and Swat. Pakistan’s chief of army staff suddenly conceded that ungoverned spaces in a highly sensitive region of the country were proliferating. The people knew it to be true and waited patiently for their president to explain why the regime was losing even territory after losing the battle for hearts and minds, and what it proposed to do to turn the tide. What they got was a fuzzy view of the putative complicity of the higher judiciary and the media in preventing a winning deployment of our legions against the terrorists stalking the land.

Every war is shrouded in fog. Since the regime is fighting several battles, the fog of war is commensurately thicker but not thick enough to persuade the people that holding the Constitution in abeyance would in any way help retrieve the lost ground. On the face of it, the barbarians at the gate stand to gain as the project for national reconciliation crumbles. The implicit message that this project would be advanced by sending tens of highly respected judges home and by pulling out the plug of every independent news channel has been interpreted across the globe to mean that the army chief was not thinking of the barbarians at all but of an impending threat to his own absolute power. From the Roman generals packing off Senates to present day military rulers dissolving parliaments and abrogating constitutions, the ploy has acquired a pathetic banality.

Perhaps there wasn’t much of a fog hanging over the real battle. For weeks, rumours of a stern response to a negative verdict by the Supreme Court had swirled around with as much abundance as the leaves shed by trees in the deepening Islamabad winter. But that was the kind of intimidation that Pakistan’s judiciary has always faced; intimidation that sent an elected prime minister to the gallows and inscribed the Doctrine of Necessity as the dominant principle in the legal repertoire of the ruling elite. But there were reasons to hope that this time around, it would not be allowed to become an existential threat to the country. The threats came mostly from inconsequential agents of the regime — shrimps pretending to be whales — retained almost exclusively for unsavoury tasks. The expectation was that at the apex of the political, judicial and legislative systems, there were men who would not strain the body politic to a breaking point.

Even the international context of the unfolding political drama pointed to restraint. Global powers embroiled in the Afghan conflict had worked tirelessly to convince Pakistan’s political class that President Musharraf would not countenance giving up power, while persuading Musharraf that he would be better off with a civilian make-over. He had not been able to construct a polity where he could rule with popular assent. All through the summer of 2007, the powers — often in the person of Condoleezza Rice — had promoted a coalition with Benazir Bhutto that would obviate Musharraf’s dependence on the office of the army chief. This factor alone militated against turning the world upside down.

Musharraf had all the time in which he could remove the constitutional anomaly of combining the august office of the president of the republic with that of the army chief. All that he needed was to overcome a fear of some loss of power as a necessary condition for the restoration of democracy. But he has ended up casting aside all constitutional restraint and virtually re-imposing Martial Law on the country. It has created legal and political complications that by definition are far graver than those arising from the Supreme Court declaring him ineligible for the presidential election already held.

The armed forces do not have a single factor left from the cluster that facilitated the coup d’état of October 12, 1999. Any attempt to re-impose direct military rule will almost certainly lead to fragmentation of the national polity and possibly the state. Musharraf may find it extremely difficult to sustain the present version of emergency. Bhutto returned from exile in the midst of misgivings about her secret understanding with him and was then confronted with the death of nearly 140 of her ardent supporters. She still made only modest demands. The present assault on fundamental rights and civil liberties almost entitles her to demand better terms of engagement for her party.

She is still in the twilight zone so far as resistance to the regime’s latest lurch towards authoritarianism is concerned, but very soon there would be a new demand that Musharraf must step down to enable the people to have a fair and free election. If circumstances push Bhutto into the role of a determined opposition leader, the situation would change radically. A few more weeks of turbulence in the Pakistani street would further reduce the already waning international backing that Musharraf has enjoyed in the past. Governments in the West have to contend with a sense of outrage that grows with every passing day. The Provisional Constitutional Order is a formidable obstacle but Pakistan needs the ingenuity of its legal wizards to enable him to revoke the proclamation of emergency, restore fundamental rights and hold a fair and free election this winter. Pakistan’s survival depends on this ingenuity. It is time to live up to the slogan of Pakistan First.

Tanvir Ahmad Khan is a former foreign secretary Read more!

Posted by Epiphany Blog

I guess I didn’t get the memo, but when did the “noose” become the modern day symbol of racism? It seems as though every time I turn on the news or pull up my internet browser there is a new noose sighting. What’s really going on? Are “they” so threatened by “our” potential and our achieved successes that they have resorted to sending nooses? Are we getting too big for our britches and thus need to be brought back to reality???

News flash, we didn’t need a noose to know how they really felt about us! Anyone that has ever had even the most minor confrontation at work knows when someone is giving you the who does she think she is stare. Most of us will stare right back and take the I double dog dare you to call me out of my name so that I can kick your behind all up and through this camp, and then drag you to Human Resources to tell them what I did stance. I guess our refusal to cower and shuck and jive has made some of us targets. Read More

There are still a few people cooning it up at our jobs (you know the type, always making jokes at the wrong time and doing something to embarrass the rest of “us”). There are the “Renegades” (the ones that buck the system…come in when they want, leave when they want, and dare someone to say something). Then there are the “Rabble-rouser”, we ain’t goin for this crap no more types. I am going to guess that the renegades and the rabble rousers have somebody shaking in their boots. These crazy fools are really sending nooses in the mail. *shaking head*

Historically the noose was a tool used to kill us. We could see our people swinging from trees so that there would be no mistaking the fact that the powers that be meant business. The empty noose hanging from a tree was a reminder of what would be done to us if we “got out of line” or disobeyed. Now that it is 2007, does the noose hold the same meaning? If, God forbid, someone sent a noose to your inter-office mailbox, would you be afraid? Do you think the dude in the cube across from you might try to hang you up from a light fixture? Chances are he wouldn’t, but the people sending these nooses are trying to send some type of message.

If we look at the Jena 6, they lived in a racist town, and decided to sit under a whites only tree. Subsequently a noose was hung to send them a message. At first glance you might think, Jena is in the south, and there is still a huge racial divide, but this noose nonsense is much more widespread. A black professor of a racial justice class in New York had a noose hung on her door. Someone was trying to send her a message. A principal in Brooklyn received a noose in her mail, accompanied by a letter full of racial slurs. New York City is one of the most diverse places in the world, yet people are still hiding behind nooses. Someone hung a noose at the Nyumburu Cultural Center at the University of Maryland last month. What is that all about?

The reality is this: Racism is real. While we are some of the richest black people on the planet, and most of us will achieve successes our grandparents only dreamed of, we are still thought of by some as second class citizens. We can march all day and all night, they can pass legislation up the yin yang, but you can not take hate out of someone’s heart. There will always be a segment of the population that will despise us, and while they know they can’t destroy us, they will try to “beat” us into submission with scare tactics like this noose nonsense.

As offensive as the noose is, we need to seize the opportunity to turn it right back around on them. I do not know your personal stance on the “N” word, but many in my generation believe that by changing the spelling and using it as a term of endearment we took the sting out of the word. They could no longer “own” it as a means to degrade us, because we flipped it into what we wanted it to be. While I support the notion of legislation against the noose, I’m not holding my breath. I’d rather look at the noose as a reminder of what all we as a people survived. They hung us from trees, but at the end of the day, America would not be what it is today if not for the blood, sweat, and tears of those same people that the nooses were used to kill.

I am not condoning fighting, but the Jena 6 were determined not to go out like Emmett Till. I think it was a simple case of you wanna hang a noose, we got a trick for you! (Only my opinion, I was not there.) I am not saying we go beat up everyone that we think is responsible for sending the noose, but the fact of the matter is, only a coward sends a noose in the mail. Only a coward hangs a noose when no one is looking. A noose couldn’t break us then, and it won’t break us now. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but a noose in the mail makes me LAUGH AT YOU!

Read more!

Posted by DJ Black Adam

Black Gay Christians, Don’t Blame JESUS for the Social Clubs / Churches that won’t accept you!!

I guess this is for “gays” in general, but since the whole Donnie McClurken / Obama thing, I thought I addressed Black Gays who are Christian.

Let me submit two points before I go on:

One: I am not gay, so I will not pretend to know what a gay person goes through when a family, church or part of a community you have been part of REJECTS you based on who you love.

Two: Understand that theologically, the argument can be made that homosexual sex is sin; as well the argument could be made exegetically that homosexual sex is not sin but fornication is. Either way, the Christian church is supposed to reflect the LOVE OF CHRIST if you see people in what you believe sin or not.

I listened to Gina’s Thursday night podcast, and heard a brother named Terrence (Republic of T) talk about many of his horrible experiences as a gay man in the “Black Church”, I was truly mortified. Read More

He expressed why he left the Church and became a Buddhist, a choice I respect even if I do not agree with it. My point is this to gay Black Christians, if a church is rejecting you, it is not the same as JESUS rejecting you, there are gay and mixed congregations that will accept you, be with people who at least know how to give you love and support you need as a human being.

Listening to Terrance I began to understand something I had not before. You see, I did not grow up in the “Church”, I converted as an adult. I have no ties to any denomination or sect, I am a follower of JESUS. So I had a bit to learn about why gay Blacks in the church don’t simply leave, Terrance explained it to me pretty well.

THE CHURCH AS A SOCIAL / POLITICAL INSTITUTION:

The Black church from what I have found has been somewhat political since the days of slavery. The Black Church was where slaves had the smallest bit of peace they could find in their lives, the AME Church was instrumental in fighting the institution of slavery, the AME Church, the Missionary Baptist Church, the Church of God in Christ, etc. were instrumental in the Civil rights movement, so the church is political and social in a way that is unique to the African American community.

There were homosexuals that worked with Dr. King, so obviously they have been part of the Black church for sometime, lately, due to the evangelical right trying to sway the black Christian vote by focusing on so-called “family values” issues, there has been an upsurge of this homosexual persecution in the church. Here it is folks, even in a church where homosexuality is seen as sin, the fact is, it is a sin between consenting adults, sort of like the fornication and adultery if that is your theological take.

But I have heard the stupid and inane comparisons with “pedophilia”? Good Lord people, what the heck is that about? The fact the people could compare the two is scary.

My theory is that pastors who preach hard against homosexuality, are generally gay themselves and trying to come to terms with their sexuality in contrast to their theology. That’s fine, but don’t bash and hurt people because of your issues, how about PREACH ON THE GOSPEL and let the Holy Ghost do the rest?

PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP WITH CHRIST:

Gay Christians, bottom line, it is between YOU and JESUS. You are supposed to be a Christian, that means FOLLOW JESUS. Show Him in Your Life, and teach others how to do the same. Don’t leave JESUS because of ANY GROUP that rejects you, your relationship should be PERSONAL and with JESUS above anything else.

O.K., I rant, I hope ya’ll got my point, I'm JUS' Saying...

Read more!

Posted By Lord Hannibal

I spoke to one of my best friends tonight for the first time in a while. One of the things I enjoy about our friendship is that we can go for weeks or months without speaking and pick up where we left off when we do.

He asked why he hadn’t heard from me in a while. I knew that I could be honest and tell him that I’ve been depressed. It turns out that he, too, has been depressed as of late, something I’m going to get into in a second.

In the meantime, I wish that more people understood that except in extreme cases, depression is intermittent. This allows people who are battling depression to do the same things that people who aren’t do, like go to group dinners, hang out at get-togethers, party, and talk to people.

The irony is that kickin’ it often exacerbates my depression, because I rarely feel any real sense of connection to the people I’m with when I am. That isn’t to say that I dislike them, nor am I suggesting that I’m better, smarter or more live than them necessarily. But even people who don’t know me all that well can tell that I’m not really enjoying myself. I can stay at home and feel alienated.

But alienation isn’t at the root of my depression. Believe it or not, I didn’t intend to discuss my depression in this entry.

Posted By Undercover Black Man
Black nationalism is an irrational ideology because it depends upon the gross exaggeration of white people’s wickedness... and black people’s nobility.

Consider a recent comment left on this blog by Michael Fisher. Regarding the two Nigerian newspaper columnists who have proclaimed that blacks are intellectually inferior to whites, Fisher presents this rhetorical either-or:

“If the [Global System of White Supremacy] doesn't exist and black people have not been able to make a go of it in half a century all around the globe, clearly something must be wrong with them. ... [A]bsent an outside retarding influence it must be a problem of genetic inferiority.”

Fisher’s assertion that black Africans are either innately dumb or else victims of a sinister global conspiracy to keep them down... first of all, it’s shoddy reasoning. Couldn’t blacks be innately dumb and victims of a white-supremacist conspiracy? Read More

In other words, accepting Fisher’s premise that there is an effective Global System of White Supremacy [GSWS] does nothing to prove or disprove the proposition that blacks collectively are less intelligent as whites.

Indeed, if Fisher is correct when he declares – as in his current online debate with Cobb – that white supremacy is “the sole and overwhelming paradigm in humanity’s existence. [It] knows no borders, it knows no bounds, it rules directly and indirectly”... well, that raises a couple of questions:

What is necessary for a group of people to conceive, implement and maintain for centuries an effective system of world domination? Intelligence perhaps? Hello!

And what’s lacking in another group of people – those identified as “black,” who were architects of great ancient civilizations – that they now find themselves, everywhere on earth, utterly controlled by whites and their “supremacy system”? How’d they fall for the okey-doke?

This element of black-nationalist thought – ceaselessly overstating the impact of white racism – runs the risk of calling attention back to the old superior/inferior dialectic. This is a rhetorical problem. How can you say that Whitey rules everything around you... without giving Whitey the credit for being smarter?

The solution: White people must be evil.

The Nation of Islam, for example, constructed a full-blown demonology (complete with creation myth) to explain why the “white blue-eyed devil” is on top.

Afrocentric professor Leonard Jeffries popularized the notion of whites as “ice people,” evolutionarily inclined towards violence and cruelty, compared with melanin-endowed “sun people” who are warm and empathetic.

Michael Fisher, on his blog recently, wrote: “[W]hite racism/supremacy is nothing but a death cult. They worship death.

“... A dead white man nailed to an ancient torture/execution instrument hanging everywhere, the spending of hundreds of billions of dollars on wars.... The whole society is permeated with the stench of death and decay.”

Poet Haki Madhubuti, in the audio track I uploaded earlier today, makes his own reference to “the faces white with death.” White men as “the enemies of the world.”

Cruel, devilish, death-worshipping white folks, dominating the world and keeping the black man down. Don’t you hate that? Don’t you hate them?

But now, see... having constructed this monstrous white enemy and exaggerated its power and influence... damn, how can you fight that? How could you possibly defeat a system so vast, an enemy people so effective in their designs, so ruthless in their ambitions?

Shit, you know they invented AIDS and turned it loose on the world, right? What won’t the white supremacist do? What couldn’t he do? And you’re going to fight him with what... a poem? A blog? A guerrilla army? Whitey got nukes, bitch! Think he don’t?

In the end, black nationalists, for all the mental energy they’ve invested in researching and comprehending the Global System of White Supremacy, are left with one intangible asset: their hatred of white people. And a cheap asset it is.

Click here and listen to a 1970 poem titled “Kill” by Anthony Hamilton of the Watts Prophets.

(By the way, the Watts Prophets grew out of Watts Writers Workshop, which was founded by a white man, Hollywood screenwriter Budd Schulberg, after the ’65 riots.) Read more!

By Siditty
I just saw this trailer for Silence: In Search of Black Female Sexuality in America on youtube and made me think about black women, how we are portrayed in the media. The stereotypes, and what we have been told growing up about sex and sexuality. Of my black female friends, when sex is discussed, it is basically very limiting. To hear these women tell it, the only sexual position they do is missionary, no oral sex, no foreplay, it is often seen as a chore to keep a man happy. Oral sex is seen as unclean, gross, and something white women do to "take our men from us". The idea of IR sex is even more disturbing to them. Even though I am married to a white man, many times I hear my friend say, they could never sleep with a white man, the concept of sex with them is something as odd or alien. I have heard the disgust of looking at a "pink penis". Read More
Usually I say nothing, knowing that they have no idea or concept of what a white man looks like unclothed. I think many times it has to do with the fact that these women are very religious, and like me grew up with the mentality of keep your legs closed tight, and don't let boys touch you. Growing up my mother actually talked about sex, but again very limiting. I would ask a question, and she would answer, using the most clinical terms possible to ensure it went over my head and I wouldn't think of it as anything to do with pleasure. I remember when I got my period, I told me mother, and the talk went as follows, "don't have sex and get pregnant, or I will kill you." Thank you mother for that female bonding moment. That is truly what she said, nothing like the Huxtables on TV, getting excited that their daughters had become women, Claire took them out for a day at the spa and lunch. My mother gave me pads, and told me not to use tampons, as they were dirty and unsanitary because you had to stick them "up there". I also got the fear of getting pregnant put into me by my mother. Per her everything caused pregnancy, from getting groped, to kissing a boy. I was out of high school before I even entertained the idea of sex, and when I did entertain it, I was so sexually repressed, I viewed sex as something to get rid of my virginity, which was an albatross around my neck in my mind. My first time wasn't romantic, loving, or even with someone I was dating. It was very random, and very mechanical, just an act to get to the goal of not being a "virgin" anymore. To add to my confusion about sex, from ages 5 to 10, I was sexually molested by multiple family members (two cousins and an uncle). This is also something not discussed in the black community. I have just realized in the last five years it was sexual molestation. I always took it as "kids experimenting" even though I was five the first time my then high school aged uncle kissed me a bit too intimately and groped me inappropriately. Or when my cousins who are only a few years older would grope me and take off my clothes while sleeping, and in turn ask for the same. I never even realized what it was. I knew sex as something dirty, and I didn't dare tell. Even if I had told, I would fear myself, not my uncle and cousins as getting into trouble. Then I felt that my family would be shamed if I ever told. So I never did. In the black community we see child exploitation and molestation as a "white people's problem". Pedophiles are typically white males, and when there is a case of a black girl or teen coming forward with tales of rape or molestation, even if her family stands behind her, the black community will always question her intentions, her involvement, and lay some of the blame on the victim, especially if her assailant is a black male with money. The R. Kelly debacle is a perfect example of this. He tried to marry a 15 year old (Aaliyah), videotaped himself having sex with a high school girl, they have found pictures on his computer, and he has been infamously known for cruising high schools for girls. To this day, his victim has been seen as a fast girl who know what she was doing, who was trying to bring him down, and people are still quick to buy his albums and go to his concerts. So the lesson black girls learn is that it doesn't pay to tell, stay quiet and it will go away. In terms of relationships or dating, there has always been the stigma of black women being so loose and easy, that they are willing to do whatever, whenever. I have been approached very boldly by men of all races to "perform" for them. I never have, but it shocks me how open these men are. I remember on my last cruise, me and my friend did an excursion on a boat where shots of tequila were flowing freely. I being the outspoken, intoxicated person I was, was the first in the mambo line, actively participating with the host when he asked questions or asked for volunteers. Mind you I was intoxicated, but not beyond feeling tipsy, the tequila was basically very watered down. In no time a middle aged white man came up to me asking if I was willing to show my chest to him. I quickly went to the other side of the boat, freaked out he was ask such as thing, as there was no nudity on this boat. It was an excursion on a cruise ship, adults only, but not XXX. It was about drinking and riding to the beach, not sex. I have been in clubs or other places where men have asked me to just dance for them, I was not in a strip club, but for some reason I apparently am such a great dancer, they just want to watch me perform. It is like I was just there for their amusement. Nothing but an object or museum oddity to gawk at. The objectification of women is not helped by music videos, mainly hip hop videos in which women are happily suggestively dancing on poles, on cars, and in the club, with barely a strip of cloth to cover up their "assets". This has gone on for decades if not centuries, black women seen as oddities and for the sole purpose of sex. The Jezebel stereotype, Hottentot Venus, Superhead. Then we have the other extreme with the mammy stereotype. Overweight, mother like, and asexual. She is there for the purpose of taking care of everyone else. She covers herself so not to expose anything that might excite anyone. Her job is to have empathy and emotions for others, but not herself, almost like she is a saint, but not quite, as she is black and still considered subhuman. She must be strong, and she cannot show emotion. White women fall for this stereotype the most I think. I can't count how many white women are shocked by my marriage. It is as if to them how was I able to get a white man, much less get married to a white man. White women are the ideal, not black women. What shocks them even more is how often white men, especially now are more open to dating black women, as if they are scratching their heads and wondering. It doesn't help that as more and more relationships between white women and black men are on the rise, there is an outcry from black women, and there are negative stereotypes of black women being told to some white women by their black partners. Black woman are full of drama, argumentative, not attractive, overweight, have too many kids, and whatever else they have been told by their partners. Overall, I think black women straddle the line of the extremes. I know many women who on Saturday night will be at the club dancing suggestively, but on Sunday morning in the church. They will be active in the church, and active in the bedroom, evidenced by the multiple children they have with multiple partners. Or they will be praying one minute, but due to the black male shortage laying with a married man in the next. Or we have the black woman still praying and hoping their black prince will come, while they are home every weekend wondering when if ever, they will get married and start their families. Read more!

By Jimi Izrael

I was on the B-Shop not long ago with Keith Boykin, the gay Al Sharpton, speaking on Obama and his affiliation with ex-gay Donnie McClurkin,which apparently offends the sensibilities of some in the gay community. I’ve been saying it since last election: the gay community has to stop making people show their Gay Card. Why does anyone have to check in, and with whom? I was gonna put Boykin on blast, but I didn’t want to put him on the spot by pointing something out. Namely, the most troubling thing about McClurkin/Obama crosstalk, for me, isn’t his “ex-gay”-ness. But apparently, he turned his back on homosexual activity having been exposed to it unnaturally e.g. a pervert uncle and cousin who raped him repeatedly in the formative years of his life. Before we go there, the fact that the relative touches little kids, and not their sexuality, is the thing that makes them perverted. Now, the gay community doesn’t think he has a right to heal from that trauma on his own terms, some instead suggesting that, well, you know, he was probably going turn gay at some point anyway and even as a child, probably enjoyed it. Some have said that explicitly and others, by scrutinizing his current stance, imply it. Obviously, these idiots don’t have kids. I don’t know anything about the ex-gay movement, but I’m willing to bet that a sizable percentage of ex-gays are the victims of some brand of sexual abuse, looking to reconcile that in some way that will let hem live their lives without conflict. How is the gay community, beyond ridiculing them, prepared to handle these people? (>crickets chirping<) Right. Read More
That’s what I thought. I think bowing to societal pressure to change your orientation is wrong, however, victims of abuse should have a safe-space to find their true self, whoever that ultimately turns out to be, without putting a run in anyone’s stocking. And of course, anyone sexualizing little kids should be shot in the head. That said, I don’t read McClurkin as anti-gay: I read him as a victim of sexual abuse coming to terms with it in a way not all of us agree with. I don’t agree with his message or his means, necessarily, and I don’t have to. None of us do. But I also don’t fault Obama for getting down with him. You can’t be held accountable for your people’s politics, certainly not over an issue like this. Read more!

Originally posted by Glory-I-Am


Let me just say this about hip hop.The problem is not the music, or the images, the industry, greed, capitalism - none of that.The problem is culture. The problem is family values. There will always be something that turns a mirror back on society, reflecting the culture in that society. Misogyny, greed, violence, hedonism, materialism - all these things are in mainstream commercial hip hop and other media because all these things are in society. No one recording artist, video model, producer, or record label has the patent on these things. If there was no appetite for these morally questionable displays of vanity set to simple beats, then these opportunists would be out of business.I don't excuse these opportunists for what they're doing. The problems with today's mainstream commercial hip hop are inexcusable. In fact, that's exactly where things start to go awry - people are excusing the inexcusable. People know some songs say things that don't reconcile with their values, but they like the beat, so they turn it up... with their three year old listening in the back seat of the car. They wouldn't like if their three year old grew up to have a credit card swiped through the crack of her behind, but they'll watch some other man's daughter in that very position late at night while their little girls are sleeping (or up way too late, watching TV too). Read More They would rather their son get a good job when he grows up, but they allow him to hang pictures of admitted drug dealers - street thugs - on his bedroom walls. Not affirming our values - not honoring the values of our grandparents, is excusing the inexcusable, and as long as we let this and that continue to slide under the radar of what we should know is worthy of our time and attention, that which is considered "entertainment" will continue to degenerate. It's not just the music, it's the movies, it's celebrity "news" and gossip, it's fashion - it's culture at large, not just hip hop.The stuff I hear on the hip hop station as I turn by it disappoints me - not just because it's bad to me, but because I know people are listening and are entertained by it. Not very long ago, stuff like Chicken Noodle Soup and Laffy Taffy wouldn't have gotten airplay, because people would have said, "This song is stupid," and turned off the radio. Rappers who rhyme a word with the very same word in the next verse were once clowned. But as people allow music to dumb down by excusing mediocrity and ignorance, this is the future of radio hip hop. We have arrived. Maybe this isn't where we want to be, but until we change our appetites, we will be spoonfed whatever we tolerate.If we, as a group, rose to the level of the people we have the potential to be - people hungry for creativity, ingenuity, integrity, and variety, the problems we have with hip hop would ebb away like a bad dream after you wake up. We have to raise, not just feed and clothe, but guide, instruct, encourage, and believe in our children. We have to teach them their worth and about the opportunities available to them in this age where the ancestors have cried, bled, marched, and achieved so much so that we wouldn't have to shake our behinds or shuck and jive, grinning ear to ear, celebrating ignorance just to make a buck. We have to expose them to a variety of music, so they can appreciate a good hip hop sample when they hear it. We have to give our kids the tools to see hip hop and evaluate it for themselves - to separate fantasy from reality, and be able to tell walking, rapping stereotypes from genuine men and women.In short, we don't need hip hop to go away. If we know who we are and what we're capable of and we give our kids the right tools in life, they'll see the negative things about commercial mainstream hip hop, or other media images and preoccupations for themselves, and respond in kind by rejecting that which is abhorrent, embracing that which doesn't appeal to the basest levels of our existence, and changing the game. Read more!

Posted By Tyrone Rock

By Mad Poetic


My parents divorced when I was 13 and eventually my Dad went on to another relationship and ultimately getting remarried. I was cool with that even though dude kept it a secret until I found out 10 years later…”What! You mean to tell me that broad you’ve been living with all this time is your wife??? When the hell did that happen?” After the divorce shit was strained as you can imagine and my mom’s response to everything was “call your father”. If I need a pair of draws, “call your father”, if I need some new shoes, “call your father”, if I need a pack of condoms…y’all get the drift. But I wasn’t calling him for shit…I didn’t make this mess so why I got to hustle phone calls and whatnot….so basically I went without draws, shoes and I ended up boosting the condoms from the Venture’s out in River Oaks. There were many a heated phone call between my mother and father….I made the mistake off picking up the phone one night only to encounter a slew of “F U pay me’s” and a handful of “I ain’t got no money” but what surprised me was the response of my fathers new lady. I could hear in the background shouting directions to my Dad like “you ain’t got to do that” and my favorite “you paying child support so let them figure it out”. Read More Let “THEM” figure it out? Oh really?!?! Who the fuck is “THEM”! I wanted to scream in the phone so bad and say “Dad, you ain’t smack her yet? I know you ain’t gon’ take that” but to no avail dude just hung up and went on with his life. It was at the moment that I vowed to a) have my chirrun in a family setting by hook or crook and b) if shit don’t work out and I got to bounce I will never let some random ass hussy shit on the remnants of my family….
I have no respect for cats who let the new broads infiltrate and agitate their situations especially when it comes to the children. That shit I can not honor. Your main focus is to the seeds you left behind…you still hold the position of cultivator and father and you can never allow anyone to push you off your square. And you can’t blame the sistas you move on with from trying to look out for themselves and their chirrun by piecing together families as best they can which you are now a part of. That’s the nature of a mother…trying to carve a world out of the disappointments they may have faced in the past. Trying to give there chirrun the family, that in some cases, they never had. It’s easy to put the blame on them but this is a cross you need to bear. But be wary, there are some sista that really and truly don’t give a shit about what you stand for and could care less whether you spend time with your offspring or not….as long as you are doing for her and her baggage. As soon as you get a phone call talkin’ ‘bout “Lil Tyrone needs this or that” they all in your ass pulling out all the tricks…guilt, the “what about me?”or the always reliable “I’m yo woman now!”….but what they fail to realize is that it ain’t about them. So if you get the call you needs to get yo ass up, put yo shit on and hightail it to the nearest “Babies R Us” and get them wipes, diapers, bottle warmers, breast milk pumps or what the fuck ever is needed. You can deal with the bullshit later but you take care of your responsibility before anything else. If you got a woman that can’t relate to that then in the words of Wesley Snipes from New Jack City “cancel that bird and get you a new one”.
Women just want to be a part of something beautiful, real, and sustaining. They want to feel safe, be pampered and loved. They want to find a place to put down all the baggage they’ve been carrying and not have to worry about being judge but a place to find infinite acceptance. So if you’re the brotha who has chosen to give her this Utopia at least do her the solid and reveal her place, her role, and your expectations. Sometimes in our quest to put her first we do more of a disservice in our attempt to forge a healthy relationship. “Second” relationships have a great number of obstacles to conqueror so it’s best to put all the cards on the table then to have a wait and see outlook. And be firm and open about how you deal with your situation. If you’re going to pick up your shorty from the babies’ momma’s why the hell is the new broad riding shotgun? Does she let you hang out at the flat when the baby daddy comes by to pick up his kid…I didn’t think so. And why is the new broad all in your pocket when it comes to things you purchase for your child? Does she sweat you or question you when your paying tuition and shit for her child?…I didn’t think so. And why is the new broad coming to your child’s football game?…you know, the one where your child’s mother will be in attendance?…tell her ass to fall back…this is not her place. Don’t allow her need to be “seen” to fuck up an already fragile situation. And if the babies daddy comes to the crib to get his shorty don’t be all in the front door trying to intimidate somebody, you might get your ass kicked…sit yo ass back down in the lazy boy and finish watching the game…ain’t yo place even if you do live there.
Dudes, if you got baggage and responsibilities and getting ready to jump into the pool of “second chance at love” then first gather your senses and priorities. Remain steadfast in what you believe in and never compromise when it comes too your children because believe me the women you get with ain’t gon’ compromise either and she shouldn’t have too. Give her the “real” situation so that she can make her decision based on fact and not fantasy. Ladies, you can’t dethrone the babies momma…not happening. Try being an ally and not an antagonist. Read more!

Op-ed Central was formed by a husband and wife team of writers who are genuinely interested in what other people have to say. Opinions form public policy as well as public opinion. The common man often does not have an outlet for his voice, so we decided to provide one. As well as provide a central hub for pieces written by other bloggers. We accept all submissions regardless of content or subject, but you have refrain from personal or derogatory attacks.

We look forward to reading what's on your mind! Read more!