Monday, July 29, 2013

The Blanks Slate: Living While Black: Anecdotes about Dealing with Police

Most countries have foundational myths that underlie the ethos of the national character. Much of our national myth involves freedom and Enlightenment liberalism: property rights, religious freedom, and the dignity of the individual are among the core values which under-gird our national identity. This narrative leads to national cliches like "If you work hard enough, you can do anything" and 'pulling oneself up by the bootstraps' is the key to success.  The accompanying narrative overlooks what that actually looked like for much of our history including, inter alia, discriminatory legal regimes. This is important not, as many think, to enable a "victimhood" mentality among descendants. This is important to reaffirm that this country has only recently recognized that the "inalienable rights" explicitly assigned to all of mankind in our founding document apply to women and many people of color. This recognition is to understand that, since our country's inception, there have been parallel sets of rules and laws for  marginalized people that are distinct from and harsher than those for the majority. It also means "dignity of the individual" doesn't apply equally.

dream hampton • 20 African Novels That Grew Me

I have read a number of thee novels and they will expand your mind as well as your world.

DARING ACTION AT THE BORDER BY UNDOCUMENTED YOUTH - NEED YOUR HELP! - THE REDESIGN

After a daring act of bravery and civil disobedience, six undocumented youth, now in Arizona's Ely Detention Center, have begun a hunger strike demanding their release. They need your help in pressuring the Department of Homeland Security and the Obama administration to release these immigrants to be reunited with their families.

Crackdown in Egypt Kills Islamists as They Protest

CAIRO — The Egyptian authorities unleashed a ferocious attack on Islamist protesters early Saturday, killing at least 72 people in the second mass killing of demonstrators in three weeks and the deadliest attack by the security services since Egypt’s uprising in early 2011.

Crackdown in Egypt Kills Islamists as They Protest

Monday, July 22, 2013

FISA court renews authority to collect phone records | Politics and Law - CNET News

A top-secret federal court has renewed the authority of the U.S. government to collect telephone records as part of its surveillance program. In other words: Let the federal spying keep on rolling.

The Court & the Right to Vote: A Dissent by John Paul Stevens | The New York Review of Books

The Court’s heavy reliance on the importance of a “fundamental principle of equal sovereignty among the States,” while supported by language in an earlier opinion by Chief Justice Roberts, ignored the fact that Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution created a serious inequality among the states. That clause counted “three fifths” of a state’s slaves for the purpose of measuring the size of its congressional delegation and its representation in the Electoral College. That provision was offensive because it treated African-Americans as though each of them was equal to only three fifths of a white person, but it was even more offensive because it increased the power of the southern states by counting three fifths of their slaves even though those slaves were not allowed to vote. The northern states would have been politically better off if the slave population had been simply omitted from the number used to measure the voting power of the slave states.

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Saturday, July 20, 2013

Court Tells Reporter to Testify in Case of Leaked C.I.A. Data - NYTimes.com

WASHINGTON — In a major ruling on press freedoms, a divided federal appeals court on Friday ruled that James Risen, an author and a reporter for The New York Times, must testify in the criminal trial of a former Central Intelligence Agency official charged with providing him with classified information.

Court Tells Reporter to Testify in Case of Leaked C.I.A. Data - NYTimes.com

The Trayvon Martin Killing and the Myth of Black-on-Black Crime - The Daily Beast

But there’s a huge problem with attempt to shift the conversation: There’s no suchthing as “black-on-black” crime. Yes, from 1976 to 2005, 94 percent of black victims were killed by black offenders, but that racial exclusivity was also true for white victims of violent crime—86 percent were killed by white offenders. Indeed, for the large majority of crimes, you’ll find that victims and offenders share a racial identity, or have some prior relationship to each other.

The Trayvon Martin Killing and the Myth of Black-on-Black Crime - The Daily Beast

Obama Takes Over White House Press Briefing To Speak On Trayvon Martin - It Was Far To Weak And Timid

It is about time President Obama something even though it was somewhat weak. The state's have never respected the human rights of African Americans. He needed to speak more to the racial bigotry that caused this to happen. I am sick and tired of being sick and tired of Black folks speaking straight with other Black folks and meekly to White folks. Until we confront, combat and defeat racism. The problem is the attitude of supremacy felt by to many White folks. There are plenty of fair minded White folks but attitudes of far to many are unacceptable and must change. We cannot wait.

Approximately the same percentage of White folks kill White folks as Black folks kill Black folks. White folks are far more likely to own guns than Black folks. White folks are the problem. White folks need to deal with the bigotry among themselves. We, as Black folks need to find ways to raise the decision costs when White folks act out on racism. There must be a price for this behavior. Unless their is a price there is no incentive to change.

Obama Takes Over White House Press Briefing To Speak On Trayvon Martin (VIDEO)

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Disembodied Racism and the Search for Racist Intent: The Trayvon Martin Case » Sociology Lens

The Trayvon Martin case has become a national media event complete with competing individual evaluations, competing definitions of racism and competing blame narratives.  In these “racial events,” Americans propensity for individualistic analysis coalesces with America’s racialized culture in order to produce a mix of individual evaluations and sweeping claims about racial groups and the institutional privileges and disadvantages of different racial groups.  In my experience, this process reinforces many of the flawed ideas about race that sociologists regularly debunk and challenge.

Disembodied Racism and the Search for Racist Intent: The Trayvon Martin Case » Sociology Lens

Thursday, July 11, 2013

When A Teen's 'Sarcastic' Facebook Message Goes Terribly Wrong


On February 14, just two months after the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting, an 18-year-old in Texas named Justin Carter was arrested.
Carter, an avid gamer, got into a spat with a fellow League of Legends player on Facebook. After being provoked and told he was "messed up in the head," Carter fired back with a startling comment:
I think Ima shoot up a kindergarten / And watch the blood of the innocent rain down/ And eat the beating heart of one of them.


When A Teen's 'Sarcastic' Facebook Message Goes Terribly Wrong

Poll: Americans say Snowden isn’t a traitor — MSNBC

Approximately 55% of American voters view Snowden as a “whistle-blower,” according to new Quinnipiac University poll. Only 34% consider him a “traitor” for revealing details on two of the nation’s top secret surveillance programs.

Tuesday, July 09, 2013

Fugitive tweets 'catch me if you can'; caught | Technically Incorrect - CNET News

A woman flees to Mexico, perhaps in the belief that she won't be caught there. Her confidence reportedly spills over into a tweet. It is misplaced.

Whose Term Was It? A Look Back At The Supreme Court

In the voting rights case, the South, which for decades had to clear any voting changes with federal officials, saw itself liberated, while African-American and Latino voters saw the decision as once again allowing historically hostile states to suppress the right to vote for minorities.

Whose Term Was It? A Look Back At The Supreme Court

In the voting rights case, the South, which for decades had to clear any voting changes with federal officials, saw itself liberated, while African-American and Latino voters saw the decision as once again allowing historically hostile states to suppress the right to vote for minorities.

Friday, July 05, 2013

Tuesday, July 02, 2013

Race-based policing ‘from California to the New York island’ — MSNBC

Today is the 49th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act. Signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson, the 1964 Act was a seminal piece of anti-discrimination legislation and paved the way for the 1965 Voting Rights Act. But much of the institutional racism quelled by the Civil Rights Act some 50 years ago has resurfaced in a different form.
Race-based policing ‘from California to the New York island’ — MSNBC