AM I GETTING PUNK’D:

By far Plies has the most stupid, shallow, ignoramus fans who say and do the most idiotic things. I watched this video, hoping that the girl would come to her senses but she never did, in fact she jumped 40 feet off of a bridge into disgusting water. She is now a CERTIFIED GOON, or in my opinion a CERTIFIED IDIOT. Once again I have to post a letter to young black females because this ish is ridiculous. And what’s really crazy is I have heard Plies speak and he can be pretty articulate. How it is that he inspires such idiots to do such stupid things is beyond me!

Letter to a young black female

What’s up young lady. You may not know who I am but I know who you
are. You see, I see your potential, I envision you accomplishing all
of your dreams and goals. Anything that you set your mind to can and
will be yours if you just Believe!

Believe in what you may ask? Yourself! Believe that you are the
intellect which has governed civilizations for century upon century.
Believe that you are the standard of beauty and not whatever images
the media shells out at you. Believe that there is no task too big
or too small that you can not reach for and achieve.

Realize young lady that women have always been at the helm of
everything great. James Brown said it best, “this is a man’s world but
it wouldn’t be nothing without a woman or a girl”. You have so many big
sisters to look up to, so many sources of inspiration that have
provided the framework of the strong work ethic known as womanhood.

Notice I call you young lady for these terms that I hear you referred
to are not your names. You are a Queen who must demand respect, your
mere presence should command respect. You must first respect yourself
however, and respect your fellow sisters as well. Together you young
ladies make up the future table of leadership.

God made you to be special, he made you to stand apart from the crowd.
So fear not if you feel isolated or alone, look back to your big
sisters who have changed the landscape of history, they once felt
alone too. I write you this letter to show my admiration for you, to
pay homage to the beautiful gift that the creator is bestowing upon
us. Follow your dreams and believe in your path young lady, for the
very thought of you reaching a tenth of your potential is an
inspiration to us all!

Truly yours,
Cedric D. Shine (your #1 fan)

Am I getting Punk’d:

Did she say a real nigga need a real bitch?

It smells like water…. WTF….. I’m sorry ladies I must post Letter to a Young black Female AGAIN. CLEARLY SOME OF YOU OLDER WOMEN CAN READ IT AS WELL!

Letter to a young black female

What’s up young lady. You may not know who I am but I know who you
are. You see, I see your potential, I envision you accomplishing all
of your dreams and goals. Anything that you set your mind to can and
will be yours if you just Believe!

Believe in what you may ask? Yourself! Believe that you are the
intellect which has governed civilizations for century upon century.
Believe that you are the standard of beauty and not whatever images
the media shells out at you. Believe that there is no task too big
or too small that you can not reach for and achieve.

Realize young lady that women have always been at the helm of
everything great. James Brown said it best, “this is a man’s world but
it wouldn’t be nothing without a woman or a girl”. You have so many big
sisters to look up to, so many sources of inspiration that have
provided the framework of the strong work ethic known as womanhood.

Notice I call you young lady for these terms that I hear you referred
to are not your names. You are a Queen who must demand respect, your
mere presence should command respect. You must first respect yourself
however, and respect your fellow sisters as well. Together you young
ladies make up the future table of leadership.

God made you to be special, he made you to stand apart from the crowd.
So fear not if you feel isolated or alone, look back to your big
sisters who have changed the landscape of history, they once felt
alone too. I write you this letter to show my admiration for you, to
pay homage to the beautiful gift that the creator is bestowing upon
us. Follow your dreams and believe in your path young lady, for the
very thought of you reaching a tenth of your potential is an
inspiration to us all!

Truly yours,
Cedric D. Shine (your #1 fan)

Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path. Psalm 119:105

Today’s piece is not written by myself. I came across this piece via a very inspiring young woman who is committed to bridging truth and words to make profound statements that speak to communities of color. I hope you enjoy, I know I did!

Where black people meet the law?
by Ma’at

Where black people meet the law?
Where a single mother gets evicted from her apartment…
Because Bill, Bob and Dick moved in upstairs
Mary, Jane, and Sue moved in downstairs
And now her property value rises too high for her meager earning

Where the long are of the law shoves a hollow gun against the temple of a black man while shouting
“YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT”
Right?

Where basketball player signs a contract that gives his lawyer 40% when Mr. Esq. knows he should only get 10%
Where a 6 year old boy watches his mother sue his father for child support
He stares into a strangers brown eyes and wonders how that face could look just like his
Where a PO meets the guilty till proven innocent…..
Until innocent become guilty
Filthy
Right-less
Less than
Three fifths of a person
3/5ths of the men in prison
Yall though when slavery ended we became more than 3/5ths?

I’ll tell you where we don’t meet
We don’t meet in Law School
In a world where knowledge of the law provide the tools through the confines of this so called “JUSTICE SYSTEM”
SYSTEM yes
JUSTICE…it depends
Depends on who defends the rights you though you had
You don’t have shit…
Pause
You have what your lawyer knows (minus) your ignorance (minus) his ignorance (times) each previous charge
(Equals)… it depends

I walk into class my first day of class
The room filled with pink faces
Folks who see the world in black and white without the black
Issues in black and white, without the black
My blood pressure rises as a privileged woman raises her hand and implies that all black men who are not in suits are thugs
My brother is a thug…
My nephew is a thug……..
Where black people meet the law………

Where do black people meet the law?
In Us.. Law Students
Us… the privileged few with the knowledge to change
Educate
Inform
Inspire to rebuild that which has been done

As a member of a Black Greek Lettered Organization, I found the following article “interesting” to say the least. I will allow you the pleasure of reading these words and encourage you to engage in lofty discourse over the tone of this article. Please check back tomorrow where I will then post my response to this article. Enjoy!

My “Fascination” With Greeks By Hananie Albert

By Hananie Albert, on 22-03-2008 20:39

Did they starve the consciousness out of you during hazing?

I have always been wary of those within the black community who pay a superficial homage to black history, only to turn and defecate on the legacies they pretend to uphold. Unfortunately this trait seems inherent to the black Greek system at this university—a cluster of complacent organizations who meander around issues of social justice and command respect because of the actions of their predecessors rather than their own commitments to equality, justice and progress. These groups only seem interested in the performative aspects of black culture and fail to reckon with the significance of their complacency, given their immense influence in the black community.

My time here at UF has been marked by crises that challenged the strength of the black community—from the bitingly ignorant Alligator cartoon, to the lack of funding for the African-American Studies Program to the controversy with the Jena 6. In these instances, individuals from Black Greek Letter Organizations (BGLOs) offered their support—but the Greek community at large stood idly by, seemingly ignorant of their power to galvanize the students and the administration to action. Oddly enough, they put this power to great use when it was time to raise awareness for a party or a step show. I began to wonder if these organizations felt at all ashamed to claim great Civil Rights leaders and political figures as alumnus, given the insignificance of their records of local social activism.

A recent forum titled “What’s your fascination with black Greeks?” promised to facilitate a dialogue between the Greek and non-Greek community, and I attended on my editor’s insistence. I was curious to see how the black Greek community would address the stark hypocrisies in their records—the fact that they had stopped earning the respect they demanded, the fact that “brotherhood” came to be marked by well documented instances of hazing and male on male sexual harassment, and the fact that they seemed to privilege mindless assimilation and social mobility over social justice.

The responses at the forum were as contrived and hollow as I had assumed BGLOs to be. When questioned about their failure to live up to their founding tenets, one Greek panelist responded that the public underestimated the efforts put into step shows; others insisted that Greeks were normal people and were unfairly put on a pedestal. Finally, one Greek responded with what seemed to be the default answer whenever a particularly tough question was posed: there was just so much that the public did not know. This implies that the public does not have the right to judge BGLOs because they are not privy to the same information. I doubt that adequate justification for black Greek complacency is somehow written into the founding principles that are beaten into them– or that one acquires intellectual infallibility by “crossing the burning sands.”

If the BGLOs at the University of Florida want to take the cowardly route favored by organizations such as the Black Student Union and respond to accusations of complacency by claiming that they are a “social” organization rather than a “political” one, they have every right. However, black Greeks must understand that they invoke a higher standard every time they mention alumnus like Huey P. Newton, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Jr. and other prominent figures in black history who might very well be ashamed to have their names associated with the uninspired, unengaged morass that is black Greekdom at this university.

This is not an assault on individuals within the organization—I know several exceptional individuals that join these organizations and strive towards social equality and consciousness—unfortunately the overall character of these groups is impermeable to the progressive intentions of the individuals. BGLOs, like other university organizations, will be judged as a whole, not just the sum of its more progressive parts.

I must note, however, that if black Greek existence on this campus seems shallow and self-serving, it is because black Greek organizations are composed of and cater to a shallow and unengaged black community who love to point out the evils of discrimination but fail to meet these evils with intellectual resistance and social activism. So, critiquing black Greeks for thinking that uplifting the black community entials nothing more than wearing letters on Wednesdays, the occasional self-gratifying forum on Fridays and a routinized and thus hollow commitment to “community service” on Saturdays, is ultimately a critique of the black community as a whole. Assuming that new members have had the consciousness and social awareness beaten and starved from them during the hazing ignores the fact that that many of these new members may not have cared about these issues to begin with.

As an immigrant to this country, I was ignorant of the significance of black Greeks until I stepped foot onto Turlington Plaza. There, I was ushered out of the way in order to make room for the strolling Greeks; a friend even jokingly suggested that looking them in the eye was disrespectful. I didn’t understand how a group could command this amount of unquestioned respect.

After conducting some research, I began to believe that these students were respected because the letters stitched onto their jackets were a sacred covenant—a reminder of the great contributions of past members and a promise to continue while improving upon their auspicious legacies. I believed that the initiation process was well-reasoned and commendable for its commitment to restoring rites of passage, similar to those in tribal Africa.

After several years on this campus, I am starting to realize just how wrong I was.

http://www.blacklistedmagazine.org/