Ok first, this is a message to all the young black males and females in America who struggle when their class mates say that they are talking white because they choose to speak proper English.

This fallacy has gone too far, in fact there is nothing “white” about being an articulate and intelligent individual. And now we have to hear these same type of attacks from Presidential hopefuls who know they have no chance in hel of ever becomig the President of these United States.

I am sad that Cornell West once endorsed your run Mr. Nader for you are the epitome of ignorance and you have taken upon yourself to promote discension and misunderstanding throughout the land with your careless remarks.

Recently Nader said, “”There’s only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He’s half African-American,” Nader told the paper in comments published Tuesday. “Whether that will make any difference, I don’t know. I haven’t heard him have a strong crackdown on economic exploitation in the ghettos. Payday loans, predatory lending, asbestos, lead. What’s keeping him from doing that? Is it because he wants to talk white? He doesn’t want to appear like Jesse Jackson? We’ll see all that play out in the next few months and if he gets elected afterwards.”

So to speak to blacks or about black issues is only to speak about what is going on in the ghettos. Are both whites, blacks and latinos alike not the victims of predatory lending, payday loans, asbestos and lead.

And what is this “talking white” you speak of. Barack Obama often speaks of changing politics, changing America and creating a better world for people of all ethnicities to live in. Is that talking white Mr. Nader. Deep down Nader has the same white supremacist attitude that others before him have had and will inject race into this equation or election whichever you want to call it whenever he can.

I just wonder how does it feel to go down in history as the quintiessential loser. As the man who helped put George Bush in office, who has destroyed the reputation of America and kept us in a bloody war with Iraq where Iraqi officials kill U.S. troops.

Beat it Ralph Nader!

If the Negro in the ghetto must eternally be fed by the hand that pushes him into the ghetto, he will never become strong enough to get out of the ghetto. - Carter G. Woodson

If I know about drug dealing in the ghetto, the police have to know. One has to wonder why very little is ever done about it. - Elaine Brown

R.I.P JOSHUA SIMMS

Words can’t express a mother’s pain when her child is lost. Lost to the senseless violence and killings that are frequent amongst young black men today in America. Today I asked myself, why, and if not why how. How can we help, how can I help, is it worth the energy, will people listen? I am sure that it is worth the energy, to save what many are calling an endangered species; the young black male in America. A close friend asked me yesterday, why do you write, what is at your core? I didn’t know how soon I would be able to show her my answer rather than tell her. Why you ask, because that picture above us, that young man’s soul prayerfully resting in heaven could have been me. It can be any one of us who walk this earth searching for a better way. And because it could be us, might be us, this is even more reason why we must stand against the death of our people.

Living in Philadelphia from 2002 to 2007, I watched the neighborhood which surrounded Temple University transform. Blacks were moved out and whites were moved in; we had many town hall and discussions about this topic as concerned students. Depending on who the speaker was we would hear different terms used to describe this process. If white property owners were speaking ,we learned that what was happening to the community was a “beautification program”. If Black community members were speaking, this displacement was called “negro removal”.

No matter how you frame the situation, gentrification was happening in a community that was historically black and becoming increasingly white. I have many thoughts on this topic that I will save for now but I want to share with you something I recently read. This piece is an honest reflection of what it’s like for a caucasian man who moves into one of these neighborhoods that is not quite gentrified yet. I bring to you the words of famed author Marty Beckerman and his well written piece “Gentrify This”.

Here is an excerpt from the article:

When I moved to New York, I only had two days to find an apartment. Rents in “affluent” neighborhoods with numerous “young professionals” are considerably higher than in “up-and-coming” neighborhoods. Whereas I lived in a luxury building in D.C. with a gym, pool, doorman, deck, chandeliered lobby and (most lavish of all) dishwasher, I was suddenly—thanks to my desperate rush and journalist’s budget—in a neighborhood where the only appetizing-looking restaurant is a McDonald’s, save for a Mexican eatery that gave me a gastrointestinal holocaust.

To read more of this article go to:

http://www.jewcy.com/index.php?q=post/gentrify

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJusbALMMKI&hl=en]

Just My Thoughts

As the days turn and the clock spins I wonder what’s the struggle

What’s the plight for black men?

Are we to to fade off, lost in the abyss?

Or rise strong like our ancestors did

Kings or Pharaohs

On TV sometimes we act like the emperor with no clothes

Ashamed

Never

More like excited

Cause damn are we clever

I walk into a classroom

Black as ever

My skin I can’t hide from

My struggles … CAN Rise from

I read the papers

See the news

It looks like I’m on the losing team

5 blacks shot last night

Over shoes that we use for hoop dreams

I want to be like Malcolm

No dead that I am Malcolm

The Resurrection of such

He was just a man and I refuse to give up

So I travel this earth ready for our rebirth

Black men the sleeping giant

At times we are both David and Goliath

So turn the TV off, turn the radio down

Black Men …. The Kings of this Nation

OUR TIME IS NOW!

The following post is reflective of the views of a young woman who made a video and posted it on youtube about other women of color. Her youtube profile and views can be found at http://www.youtube.com/user/melosidad1

I think she creates an interesting dialogue and I am curious to see what your reaction will be to this video.  Please feel free to comment and check out an earlier post that I wrote expressing my own views on women of color titled  “Letter to a Young Black Female”. Peace and Love!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4tdNxTV9i2c&hl=en]