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Greetings:
I'm amazed at how slowly the veil is lifting from black folks eyes. I'm living in Oakland, California. The Bay Area is one of the MOST diverse places on earth. Racism doesn't dance in sheets here, but economic racism is HUGE ... and getting bigger. Here are just a few points that I'd love for 'yall to just ponder on:
1. Quote: "A business should remake itself when it is at the peak of its success. Failure to do so means that it's competition will adjust come up with new ideas before it can adjust."
2. Quote: "The only constant is change." Change is the only thing we KNOW will happen ... yet, black folks (esp. black men) continue to hold their heads in the sand ... denial ... a doomed ostrich hiding from the upcoming storm.
3. China and India cannot get enough educated, Sharp minds to fuel their growth. Still, they are standing on the runway, ready to fly. Soon they will become the world's biggest economic powers. Multinationals are just waiting. When that happens, they will pull money out of the U.S. economy like mad. (Remember Bush and his gang trying to get Social Security money to prop up our economy?)
4. It's far too late to be angrily mumbling that "Mexicans need to go back where they came from." The Jinni is out of the bottle. They are eating our lunch and soon, many more white folks lunch too. They are showing us where our game is weak.
5. "My enemy - my friend" say the Buddhist. God told gave us two main instructions ... Love God and love your neighbor ... even when he doesn’t love you back. We have some powerful lessons to RE-learn. Chief amongst those lessons is the fact that all these once poor Asians and Mexicans are now driving the cars we used to drive, living in the houses our homeless asses used to live in, and working in the jobs we used to complain about and would die to have back. How'd they do it? Yeah ... they built a better mouse trap. Provided a better service, and pooled their money. They lived together when they needed to. Supported each other economically, physically, emotionally, intellectually and CULTURALLY.
6. WHY are we taking up the Prince's (as in "Prince Machiavelli's") agenda and turning ourselves into "Thugs" that destroy any and ALL business hopes in our own community, kill and terrorize our own people (esp. the nerds we need to hold close to our bosom) and create hatred between the sexes? WHY? WHY are we doing the Klan's work for them??
7. An East Indian engineer who runs a computer chip manufacturing company recently told me that "America needs creativity. There will increasingly be more jobs out-sourced over seas. If you're going to start a company, it needs to hire at least 10,000 people to make change." He has been trained to look at the high end ... but have you looked into the world's new micro loan industry? There are POWERFUL ways to make change happen on the small end too. [SEE: Kiva Microfinance at kiva.org/
and www.blacksolutions.blogspot.com ]
8. Disaffected youth ALL OVER THE WORLD look at disaffected people here in the U.S. and many emulate our actions. We can help engineer POWERFUL changes for ourselves and others. At the very least, we can stop being "Niggas" to the world and position ourselves better than we are currently doing! "He or she who doesn’t engineer his or her own destiny, will have his destiny engineered for him." What do you think the plans of the super rich are for you?
9. WE NEED TO STOP BEING BLACK-WHITE MEN !!! AHHaaHHHaaahh!! God wants every one to be his or her AUTHINTIC selves. We do NOT need to:
a.) Huck-a-buck to the world. Speaking all phony and laughing all silly
b.) Go 'round the back door for a piece of chicken and a biscuit after stabbing yet one more brother in the back. STOP THIS SHIT!
c.) Embrace our own spiritual, psychological, moral and ethical destruction by thinking that crime is our only hope. What the hell is this "No Snitch" crap?? If Spooky up the street breaks my car window and steals my face plate for a $5 rock and you don't tell ... guess who's window he's going to break when you park YOUR new ride at the curb?
10. Why do we keep embracing the WRONG people? What's with all this anti-Semitism rising up about? That ain't our fight. Okay, who cares if the guy at the deli is rude? His cousin marched with us .... before many of you got here. But that's besides the point ... what the hell do you think growing up is all about?
The list goes on and on. Include the fact that "those foreigners" dollars now mean more than ours ...and the best we can do is continue to yell about Reparations and apply for SSI?? C'mon folks ... we betta than THIS!!
I assert that the biggest obstacles to change for the black man and woman today is:
a.) The inability to work together. We have to become "brothers" and "sisters" again and cease being "niggas."
b.) Denial or the Fear of Change
c.) The inability to see what our true demons are. We're so busy trying to be *special* and defending Snoop Dawg that we can't even SEE that the things we've come to value most are killing us. Going to the night club tonight? What you going to look for??? What do you most hope to do ... and with whom??? Yeah....
I'm amazed at how slowly the veil is lifting from black folks eyes. I'm living in Oakland, California. The Bay Area is one of the MOST diverse places on earth. Racism doesn't dance in sheets here, but economic racism is HUGE ... and getting bigger. Here are just a few points that I'd love for 'yall to just ponder on:
1. Quote: "A business should remake itself when it is at the peak of its success. Failure to do so means that it's competition will adjust come up with new ideas before it can adjust."
2. Quote: "The only constant is change." Change is the only thing we KNOW will happen ... yet, black folks (esp. black men) continue to hold their heads in the sand ... denial ... a doomed ostrich hiding from the upcoming storm.
3. China and India cannot get enough educated, Sharp minds to fuel their growth. Still, they are standing on the runway, ready to fly. Soon they will become the world's biggest economic powers. Multinationals are just waiting. When that happens, they will pull money out of the U.S. economy like mad. (Remember Bush and his gang trying to get Social Security money to prop up our economy?)
4. It's far too late to be angrily mumbling that "Mexicans need to go back where they came from." The Jinni is out of the bottle. They are eating our lunch and soon, many more white folks lunch too. They are showing us where our game is weak.
5. "My enemy - my friend" say the Buddhist. God told gave us two main instructions ... Love God and love your neighbor ... even when he doesn’t love you back. We have some powerful lessons to RE-learn. Chief amongst those lessons is the fact that all these once poor Asians and Mexicans are now driving the cars we used to drive, living in the houses our homeless asses used to live in, and working in the jobs we used to complain about and would die to have back. How'd they do it? Yeah ... they built a better mouse trap. Provided a better service, and pooled their money. They lived together when they needed to. Supported each other economically, physically, emotionally, intellectually and CULTURALLY.
6. WHY are we taking up the Prince's (as in "Prince Machiavelli's") agenda and turning ourselves into "Thugs" that destroy any and ALL business hopes in our own community, kill and terrorize our own people (esp. the nerds we need to hold close to our bosom) and create hatred between the sexes? WHY? WHY are we doing the Klan's work for them??
7. An East Indian engineer who runs a computer chip manufacturing company recently told me that "America needs creativity. There will increasingly be more jobs out-sourced over seas. If you're going to start a company, it needs to hire at least 10,000 people to make change." He has been trained to look at the high end ... but have you looked into the world's new micro loan industry? There are POWERFUL ways to make change happen on the small end too. [SEE: Kiva Microfinance at kiva.org/
and www.blacksolutions.blogspot.com ]
8. Disaffected youth ALL OVER THE WORLD look at disaffected people here in the U.S. and many emulate our actions. We can help engineer POWERFUL changes for ourselves and others. At the very least, we can stop being "Niggas" to the world and position ourselves better than we are currently doing! "He or she who doesn’t engineer his or her own destiny, will have his destiny engineered for him." What do you think the plans of the super rich are for you?
9. WE NEED TO STOP BEING BLACK-WHITE MEN !!! AHHaaHHHaaahh!! God wants every one to be his or her AUTHINTIC selves. We do NOT need to:
a.) Huck-a-buck to the world. Speaking all phony and laughing all silly
b.) Go 'round the back door for a piece of chicken and a biscuit after stabbing yet one more brother in the back. STOP THIS SHIT!
c.) Embrace our own spiritual, psychological, moral and ethical destruction by thinking that crime is our only hope. What the hell is this "No Snitch" crap?? If Spooky up the street breaks my car window and steals my face plate for a $5 rock and you don't tell ... guess who's window he's going to break when you park YOUR new ride at the curb?
10. Why do we keep embracing the WRONG people? What's with all this anti-Semitism rising up about? That ain't our fight. Okay, who cares if the guy at the deli is rude? His cousin marched with us .... before many of you got here. But that's besides the point ... what the hell do you think growing up is all about?
The list goes on and on. Include the fact that "those foreigners" dollars now mean more than ours ...and the best we can do is continue to yell about Reparations and apply for SSI?? C'mon folks ... we betta than THIS!!
I assert that the biggest obstacles to change for the black man and woman today is:
a.) The inability to work together. We have to become "brothers" and "sisters" again and cease being "niggas."
b.) Denial or the Fear of Change
c.) The inability to see what our true demons are. We're so busy trying to be *special* and defending Snoop Dawg that we can't even SEE that the things we've come to value most are killing us. Going to the night club tonight? What you going to look for??? What do you most hope to do ... and with whom??? Yeah....
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It has to start with the individual. Each and everyone of us has to embrace the Code of Personal Responsibility. This means Personal Responsibility for not only our actions as individuals, but; PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY FOR OUR ACTIONS AS A GROUP!!! Until each and everyone of us OWNS responsibility for the lack of initiative, complacency, bling bling mentality, anti snitch ideology, sloth, indolence, lack of motivation to become educated and empowered; we are just as guilty as those who are the examples of the personality deficits.
I had a conversation just yesterday with a well educated Sister about the lack of an ethical or spiritual ideal in the generation of Black young men in her care as a Public School Teacher. I asked her, "why is it that since Black Women are raising the next generation of Black Men, you don't collectivize and establish a minimum standard of behavior for them and require them as a group to pursue higher purpose and goals in their lives?" She responded, "I used to spend time trying to do that, and I couldn't stand the attitude of the other Sisters involved. Some sisters are still doing that, but I don't roll with them." I love her as my sister and value her as my friend. However, I am saddened by the fact that her lack of vision is translated into the environment she sets in the classroom with Black children 9 months out of the year.
Yet I am guilty too. I spend some time working toward ameliorating the on-going crisis; but not enough. I write and speak and mentor and teach; but not enough. I have some impact on my contemporaries and our youth; but not enough. I am actively pursuing a land based new economic paradigm; within which we parley the accumulated wealth and retirement income of the Baby Boom generation, who are retiring now and create new communities that are both sustainable and oriented towar growth and an interdependent economic paradigm.
Some times I get angry, sometimes I despair. But those moment pass and I return to the struggle for our progeny and destiny. I think, from time to time, that we need to start an "Ice pick" squad (modelled after the "Drop Squad" idea of the 80s) and go around to every athletic field and playground and destroy every basketball and football in the hands of our children. I'd also like to jam the signal of every cable and broadcast station beaming professional sports and the underlying illusion of sports prowess as a way out of poverty. You don't see any Jewish, Asian, or other up-coming ethnic groups exchanging the opportunities of education and economic growth for a MVP trophy or Bowl Ring. What do they know that we don't.
Finally I'd like to replace every single Rap, and Hip Hop Video showing rampant consumerism and riotous waste of resources with a video reportage of the ATTAINABLE lifestyle of those of us who have studied, become educated, worked and achieved economic self-determination and security.
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Hey Brother Al ... how are you this beautiful Sunday?
May I add something to what you said? But first ... Kudos to you for continuing to shine your lamp in what sometimes feels like darkness. Just last night I echoed your feelings. Remember that song ... "The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald?" True story...
"At the time it was launched in 1958, the 729-foot long, 75-foot wide freighter S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald was the largest ship to ply the Great Lakes. On November 10, 1975 the Fitzgerald left Superior, Wisconsin carrying 26,000 tons of iron ore pellets, bound for Detroit." (Click here for full story and lyrics: www.corfid.com/gl/wreck.htm)
(song cont.)
“The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called 'Gitche Gumee'
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy…”
That's how us old brothers can feels sometimes Al ... like the "skys of November turned gloomy ..." Well, the song goes on … and while I’m not a big Gordon Lightfoot fan, dude did that song up right. Great narrative. Anyway, he sets the tone and chronicles the demise of the big ship.
Bare with me on this …’cause last night I felt like that big ship was a metaphor for black people. “African-Americans.” Once great and full of pride …
(song cont.)
“The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound_
And a wave broke over the railing_
And every man knew, as the captain did too,_
T'was the witch of November come stealin'…”
But now we (all these black “individuals”) are out to sea in perilous waters … “individuals” all together on the same ship… The wind has whipped up … started in the 80’s. "The witch of November done come stealing Al. Asking for her due. How long has it been that we "once and almost great people gave up on spiritual virtues Al? Everything is cause and effect they say ... but I'm getting ahead of myself...
(song cont.)
“When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin'._
Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya._
At Seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in, he said_
Fellas, it's been good t'know ya_
The captain wired in he had water comin' in_
And the good ship and crew was in peril._
And later that night when his lights went outta sight_
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald….”
That's who I identified with Al ... me and you. We're cooks on this big ship. Trouble is, the crew don't know they're crew. They all think they're captains sailing their own individual ships. In-di-viduals. (Ha-ha)
Love that song. Has a kinda Irish sailor infrastructure of steel, salt, "mud and blood" it hangs on. You know it's real when you hear it 'cause truth rings from it. Them white boys really did sail that ship. Built it good and strong. Brave men. Brilliant men. But 'twasnt' worth a damn when nature came calling. (We don't even want to build our own ship these days Al ... this crew just want to ride...)
But there are many times like these in life... when all of man's brilliance and pride come to nothing ... twisted twigs washed up on a beach ...
The last two lines of the ballad are telling...
(song cont.)
"Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early!"
Who is "Superior" Al? On National Propaganda Radio, I heard a story about how *special* this "Millennium Generation" thinks they are. "Instead of 'worker of the month, we have to have 'worker of the day' for these people." *Special People."
God hates Pride. The spirit of Pride is running amuck these days. "Pride cometh just before a fall."
After feeling that wiff of November's gloomy skies last night, I almost feel into depression ... like it was all over ... that it's been good to know 'yall ... but it's over now. Then the thought hit me that we're over 22 million peoples ... and SOME of us got money. So, they'll never be able to kill us ALL off ... but I do think a storm's a'coming. I think we as a people are headed for a good ass whippin'. America is heading for one ... and when Big Brother gets spanked, you know how bad it's going to be for the canaries in the cave.
And you know why we're going to get an ass whipping Al? Cause and effect on all the materialism and other false gods like violence, crime, sexual depravity that we've embraced over the last 25-27 years? Yeah ... but more than that ... we're headed for deep waters in a storm because of our pride.
Brothers who think the best goal is to become black-white men ... instead of the beautiful birthright God bequeath to them
Sisters who think they can raise black sons without fathers
Boys pimping their sisters
Girls allowing themselves to become whores ... and pimping those fools who think they're the pimp
This list would go on and on. But what should be "individual" is each of us taking responsibility for the pit of crimes we've become. You can't heal a problem you don't admit you have. I think we're headed for homelessness and food lines that'll make the 80's look like Christmas. Disease and prison work camps.
Don't despair though Al. There's too many of us ... and those of us who see it ... who know the signs ... won't be able to stop the avalanche. But all we need is a few. Not the hundreds of thousands who'll suffer. (Millions?) We old cooks have to keep on cooking up seeds and planting them ... letting the aroma float out over the wind ... calling out the name: "Gideon!" GEDION !! All Gideon needed was a few. God kept telling him to send some home ... he had too many. Just a few.
We need those farms and urban communities we've been talking about Al. We're a pluralistic people right now ... individuals. So were the Israelites when they built that golden fatted calf and started worshiping him.
Pride.
Ass Whippin' a coming Al.
Find high ground or a mountain ... or a storm shelter.
Me?
I'm looking too. 'Cept 53 years of this crap has taught me that I'm taking the Good Book with me ... and as many of the flock as I can. -
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i'm so tired of the christian thing in the african american community,remember it was this book that was used to qualify african's in servitude in the first place,i actually love the teaching's of jesus,but his follower's scare the hell out of me,they're mostly a bunch of judgemental hypocrit's.i'm all for taking responsibility for one's action's,but unfortunately i don't and probably in this life-time see that from the general black public.we live in a consumer driven society which is crazy,to value who you are by what you possess is nut's,who came up with that brilliant idea,as a group we must have love for self first.i feel rather cynical about much change happening,we already have a retarded nut for president now what?black people need to turn the television off,stop buying copious amount's of stuff they don't really need,read a damm book for a change and hopefully stop supporting artist who denegrate women,encourage homophobia,and the love of money.real change happen's through out history when a people have to change when something catastrophic happen's.my parent's are children of the depression, and a segragated america,only time will tell.black people in this country are spoiled brat's,and thoughtless to each other,i see the shit we dish out each other every day pathetic.the civil right's movement wasn't that long ago.yes i see a change but it's not what we would like to think.
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