knowledge equals black power

nativeamericannews: Victim of Racial Discrimination Awarded...

Fri, 17 May 2013 20:07:38 -0400

Victim of Racial Discrimination Awarded $123K in Zales Lawsuit

A woman from Portland, Maine who claimed she was discriminated against at Zales Delaware, Inc. because of her race has been awarded more than $120,000, the Portland Press Herald reported.

The end of the article was perfect (and so relevant).

“Those who discriminate need to learn the impact their actions have on victims and society, not only for the sake of justice, but also because doing so will result in more tolerance in the future,” Hoffman said in a written statement. “I’m so impressed by individuals like Ms. Morris who find the courage to speak up when subjected to this type of behavior.”

thepoliticalfreakshow: quickhits: Member of white power...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:52:00 -0400

thepoliticalfreakshow:

quickhits:

Member of white power structure claims to identify with call to overthrow the white power structure.

Is he serious?

Are they still trying to “get more Black votes”?

Election time is gonna be more hilarious than usual in 2014.

raw-r-evolution: ikenbot: Star Trek: Into Whiteness If...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:45:42 -0400

raw-r-evolution:

ikenbot:

Star Trek: Into Whiteness

If there’s one thing that most fans of Star Trek will agree on, it’s the fact that Gene Roddenberry’s vision for the show — and, more optimistically, for human society — was predicated on the idea that all life is valuable, and that the worth of a person should not be judged by their appearance. Much of this was done through the old sci-fi trope of using aliens to stand in for oppressed groups, but Star Trek didn’t rely on the metaphor; it had characters who were part of the ensemble, important and beloved members of the Enterprise crew, who were people of colour. It had background characters who were people of colour. And, here and there, it had anti-heroes and villains who were people of colour … one of whom, Khan Noonian Singh, became well-nigh iconic.

Image 1: “Who is your favorite villain?” ; Actor John Cho (Lt Sulu) answers.

Image 2: TOS Khan looking at a watercolor of himself. Yes, he’s wearing a dastar (Sikh turban)

Image 3: Cumberbatch and Montalbán (as Khan)

And who is now being played by white actor Benedict Cumberbatch in the new JJ Abrams reboot movie, Star Trek: Into Darkness.

We’re all cynical and jaded enough to know the standard dismissal when it comes to matters of media representation: Paramount Pictures and most film studios are not interested in diversity or visibility, they only care about the bottom dollar. Star Trek as a franchise is too much of a juggernaut to affect with boycotts. There are too many people who love it, who love those characters and that world, and will go to see the movie. And for some of these people, this devotion to the idea of a future where even South and East Asian men get to pilot a starship and love swashbuckling, where Black women make Lieutenant on the Enterprise and actually get the boy, will be trivialized and eroded and whitewashed when the most formidable and complex Star Trek baddie becomes a white man named Khan.

It wasn’t perfect in the 60s when Ricardo Montalbán was cast to play Khan (a character explicitly described in the episode script of Space Seed as being Sikh, from the Northern regions of India). But considering all of the barriers to representation that Roddenberry faced from the television networks, having a brown-skinned man play a brown character was a hard-won victory. It’s disappointing and demoralizing that with the commercial power of Star Trek in his hands, JJ Abrams chose not to honour the original spirit of the show, or the symbolic heft of the Khan character, but to wield the whitewash brush for … what? The hopes that casting Benedict Cumberbatch would draw in a few more box office returns? It’s doubly disappointing when you consider that Abrams was a creator of the television show Lost, which had so many well-rounded and beloved characters of colour in it.

Add to this the secrecy prior to release around Cumberbatch’s role in the film, and what seems like a casting move that would typically be defended by cries of “best actor for the job, not racism” becomes something more cunning, more malicious. Yes, the obfuscation creates intrigue around and interest in the role, but it also prevents advocacy groups like Racebending.com from building campaigns to protest the whitewashing. This happened with the character of the Mandarin in Iron Man 3, as well as ‘Miranda Tate’ in The Dark Knight Rises, who ended up being Talia al Ghul but played by French actress Marion Cotillard. This practice is well in effect in Hollywood; and after the negative press that was generated by angry anti-oppression activists and fans when Paramount had The Last Airbender in the works, studios are wising up. They don’t want their racist practices to be called out, pointed at, and exposed before their movies are released — Airbender proved that these protests create enough bad feeling to affect their bottom line.

So the studio has now found a way to keep it secret and underhanded. Racebending.com was there for most of the production of The Last Airbender, and were even able to correspond with Paramount Pictures about it. This time, for Star Trek: Into Darkness, their hiding and opaque practices has managed to silence media watchdogs until the movie’s premiere.

As I said, this racist whitewashing of the character of Khan won’t affect how much money this Trek movie makes. And I’m happy that the franchise is popular, still popular enough to warrant not only a big-budget reboot with fantastic actors but also a sequel with that cast. I’m happy that actors I enjoy like Zoë Saldaña and John Cho are playing characters who mean so much to me, and that they, in respect for the groundbreaking contributions by Nichelle Nichols and George Takei in these roles, have paid homage to that past.

But all of that will be marred by having my own skin edited out, rendered worthless and silent and invisible when a South Asian man is portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch up on that screen. In the original Trek, Khan, with his brown skin, was an Übermensch, intellectually and physically perfect, possessed of such charisma and drive that despite his efforts to gain control of the Enterprise, Captain Kirk (and many of the other officers) felt admiration for him.

And that’s why the role has been taken away from actors of colour and given to a white man. Racebending.com has always pointed out that villains are generally played by people with darker skin, and that’s true … unless the villain is one with intelligence, depth, complexity. One who garners sympathy from the audience, or if not sympathy, then — as from Kirk — grudging admiration. What this new Trek movie tells us, what JJ Abrams is telling us, is that no brown-skinned man can accomplish all that. That only by having Khan played by a white actor can the audience engage with and feel for him, believe that he’s smart and capable and a match for our Enterprise crew.

What an enormous and horribly ironic step backwards. For Star Trek, for media representation, and for the vision of a future where we have transcended systemic, racist erasure.

(via RaceBending)

THIS IS PISSING ME OFF

sheilkuroi: Went to the 42nd Annual Powwow at Stanford...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:38:34 -0400

sheilkuroi:

Went to the 42nd Annual Powwow at Stanford University today. Pictures of the dancers. I grew up with the Flat Head and Black Foot tribes, I really missed going to the Powwows. The dancers are really inspiring.

"That the Obama administration is now repeatedly declaring that the ‘war on terror’ will last at..."

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:36:28 -0400

“That the Obama administration is now repeatedly declaring that the ‘war on terror’ will last at least another decade (or two) is vastly more significant than all three of this week’s big media controversies (Benghazi, IRS, and AP/DOJ) combined. The military historian Andrew Bacevich has spent years warning that US policy planners have adopted an explicit doctrine of ‘endless war’. Obama officials, despite repeatedly boasting that they have delivered permanently crippling blows to al-Qaida, are now, as clearly as the English language permits, openly declaring this to be so. It is hard to resist the conclusion that this war has no purpose other than its own eternal perpetuation. This war is not a means to any end but rather is the end in itself. Not only is it the end itself, but it is also its own fuel: it is precisely this endless war - justified in the name of stopping the threat of terrorism - that is the single greatest cause of that threat.”

- Washington gets explicit: its ‘war on terror’ is permanent | Glenn Greenwald (via theamericanbear)

thepeoplesrecord: Outraged against austerity, students &...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:35:19 -0400

thepeoplesrecord:

Outraged against austerity, students & teachers in Philadelphia resist the machine of capitalism
May 17, 2013

Dozens to hundreds of Philadelphia students, teachers and school staff protested outside one of the city’s premiere high schools in an effort to fight proposed budget cuts to the district.

Wearing signs and handing out pamphlets to drivers, members of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers lined the sidewalk outside the Philadelphia High School for the Creative and Performing Arts along South Broad Street Friday morning. The teachers are fighting a series of severe budget cuts proposed by the district to close a more than $300 million funding gap. The proposed cuts include ending arts and music programs, sports and cutting auxiliary staff like secretaries, librarians and counselors.

“With the austere budgets schools have received, schools will not be able to provide a high-quality education for Philadelphia’s children,” said Jerry Jordan, president of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers. Jordan says the teacher’s union has been discussing labor concessions with the district. However, he says a concession that results teachers taking a pay cut is a non-starter.

“The school district is asking for salary cuts for all PFT members of anywhere between 5, 10 and 13-percent,” he said. “I don’t think that you’ll find employee in the school district and the PFT…who are going to tell you that they can afford to take that kind of pay cut.”

The teacher protest is just the first of many demonstrations planned Friday over the funding flap.

Students from Philadelphia public schools around the city have also walked out of class and are marching on the School District of Philadelphia and Philadelphia City Hall. Similar walkouts were organized last week by students, who also marched on the same spots.

District spokesman Fernando Gallard says staff will not stop students from walking out, but says officials have asked principals remind students that leaving early will results in being marked as cutting. “Schools will follow the district’s attendance policy and will take the appropriate action which triggers at least a phone call to parents to notify them of the student’s absence, a request for a parent conference at the school, or after school detention,” he said.

Students are using Twitter to organize and document their protests. The group Philly Student Union is promoting the hashtag #walkout215 as a digital rally point during the event.

Source

Gina Calaya, arrested for Tucson murder at 14, released at 34

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:23:08 -0400

Gina Calaya, arrested for Tucson murder at 14, released at 34:

thisisrapeculture:

socialismartnature:

When then-14-year-old Gina Celaya killed the man who tried to rape her, the state of Arizona sentenced her to life in prison.

Today — after twenty years in prison, and almost as many years of legal battles fought from state courts up to the federal court of appeals — Gina is finally free.

That’s the American “justice system” for you. Serving up injustice to poor people, people of color, and women, since 1776 … She has served more years in jail than the number of years she had been on this Earth at the time of her supposed “crime.”

Meanwhile, actual murderers and rapists walk around freely if they wear a police badge or serve in the U.S. military.

There are no words for how much I fucking hate this country.

There is no justice system.

I hope no one ever interferes with her life again.

thepeoplesrecord: Two radioactive goldfish were found swimming...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:20:00 -0400

thepeoplesrecord:

Two radioactive goldfish were found swimming in a juice pitcher of nuclear reactor water in an underground steam tunnel at an Ohio power plant. Investigators are baffled as to how the radioactive fish remained unnoticed in the ‘secure’ facility.
May 16, 2013

Investigators from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and officials of the plant, which is operated by FirstEnergy Corp., have been looking through surveillance tapes to try to identify who was responsible for leaving the radioactive goldfish in the tunnel on May 2.

They believe one of the 700 employees and contractors who work at the plant smuggled the fish into the facility, Jennifer Young, spokeswoman for FirstEnergy Corp., told AP. The fishy tale has served as an embarrassment for the plant, which has already come under scrutiny for a case in which four contractors were exposed to life-threatening hard radiation in 2011. The plant has also been scutinized for a serious lack of security.

“Last year, Perry got into trouble with the NRC about weaknesses preventing unauthorized access to the plant,” David Lochbaum, a spokesman at the Union of Concerned Scientists, told The Plain Dealer. “Goldfish are not authorized to be inside the tunnel, yet they were there. And Perry cannot determine how they got there or who put them there.”

Officials believe the goldfish were taken through the front door and likely hidden in a plastic bag in a worker’s pocket. All workers are required to pass through security, which detects metal and bombs but not fish and water. Investigators believe the fish were left unnoticed in the tunnel for several days before scaffolding crews discovered them and filed a report.

But despite looking through surveillance tapes for more than a week, little progress has been made in identifying the perpetrator(s). “While we continue to look at the video for evidence, identifying folks in the video has been challenging,” Young told AP.

Both of the 1 ½-inch-long fish died shortly after their discovery, but officials at the plant claim that neglect and starvation may have been the cause – not radiation. Chemists found that the fish were admitting small amounts of radiation, but not enough to put anyone at risk, including the fish. “They did not have exposure to enough radioactivity to hurt them,” Young told The Plain Dealer. “It was probably due to lack of care before they got to the plant. The radiation could not have killed them.”

Lochbaum said the story might sound funny to some, but that smuggling live animals into the plant shows a serious lack of security. The story has caused some to recall an episode of the “Simpsons” in which Blinky, an orange fish, has a third eye due to his exposure to radiation.

“What might be an amusing account of misplaced goldfish today could become tomorrow’s nightmare story if someone with an axe to grind, another Timothy McVeigh type, places a bomb instead of two goldfish in Perry,” Lochbaum told The Plain Dealer, referring to the 1995 bombing of the Oklahoma City federal building.

Source

patrickandmarcus: studies show some shit black people been saying for 200 goddamn years

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:14:01 -0400

patrickandmarcus:

studies show some shit black people been saying for 200 goddamn years

Photo

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:13:20 -0400

Harper government withheld documents in indigenous human-rights case

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:12:54 -0400

Harper government withheld documents in indigenous human-rights case:

jakke:

The Harper government withheld tens of thousands of documents that it was obligated to disclose as part of a human-rights case in which it is accused of discriminating against indigenous children. Now, it is using its failure to hand over the files to try to get the proceedings put on hold.

The First Nations Child and Family Caring Society filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal in 2007 saying it is wrong for the federal government to pay 22 per cent less for child welfare on reserves than the provinces pay for non-aboriginal welfare services.

Despite many attempts by the government to have the case dismissed, the hearings before the tribunal finally began in February of this year.

But, next Tuesday, Justice Department lawyers will ask for an adjournment of many months while they gather more than 50,000 documents that were required to have already been handed over to the Caring Society’s lawyers under the human-rights commission rules.

Hey so when the federal government got caught illegally hiding 50,000 documents which it was required to turn over for what could potentially be a very large and expensive human rights case, they responded by insisting that they needed the whole proceeding adjourned for months while they collected all those documents.

That’s it. That’s exactly what happened. That’s just how things are now.

girljanitor: indica-tor: POC who live here in America: I realize you’re hurt by the ignorant words...

Fri, 17 May 2013 19:10:58 -0400

girljanitor:

indica-tor:

POC who live here in America:

I realize you’re hurt by the ignorant words of “white people” who don’t know what they’re talking about, and I’m sorry.

But I have a question for you. In this “land of the free”…aren’t you free? What are their words doing to you, unless you LET them affect you? I thought this was a free country, where people were allowed to speak their minds, and other people were allowed not to listen.

But maybe I was wrong. Maybe the words of people are so strong that it’s impossible to stand up against them. Which is sad, and basically means our country is full of weak people.

No matter what race or gender I am, I would never let people’s words affect me. Don’t you realize they’re just words? Words are not physical, they will not capture and torture you. They won’t keep you from getting a job (and if your race is keeping you from getting a job, that’s the owners problem, not every white person), and they won’t kill you.

Unless you let them.

So take pride in who you are and stop listening to stupid people. It’s that easy. Once you let go of worrying about what other people think, your life will be a hell of a lot easier. And a lot less stressful.

Empower yourself. Empower your own life.

“once you let go of ‘worrying what people think and say’, then magically all this will disappear! “

“RACISM CAN’T AFFECT YOU UNLESS YOU LET IT!!!”

This is what they want you to do people of color. They want you to ignore what they do to you. They want you to take the verbal abuse. They want you to live in the worst housing with the worst environment. They want you to go to the worst schools. They want you to eat the food that isn’t fresh and has less nutrition. They want you to work your life away so that they can live in safe fenced in White neighborhoods while you risk your life on the streets. And they want to shoot you down in those same streets…. and tell you that you let it happen. They say, “Hey, Kimani Gray… why did you let the police kill you?”

They want you to believe that if you don’t accept all their abuse with a smile, then you are weak.

But it has always been them who has been weak. It is them who hide behind guns. Them, who almost died at Plymouth Rock. Them who needed us to build America. … not the other way around. It is THEM who is the minority in this world… not us people of color. We are many… and we are strong!

And the time will come when they will understand just how strong we are and just how weak they have always been.

But that time won’t come until we believe in our own strength and the strength of our voices.

Until that time, for the love of God, do not let a White person trick you into thinking that ignoring the problems of this world is the solution. Not when you have Assata… not when you have MLK… not when you have Moses in the Bible.. not when you have so many revolutionaries who did not ignore their world… who stood up defiantly in the face of their oppressors and said “NO!”

And I thank God for our ancestors who said “No!” and the future generations will thank God that you said “No!”

Study Finds People Of Color Nearly Invisible On Evening Cable News

Fri, 17 May 2013 18:18:59 -0400

Study Finds People Of Color Nearly Invisible On Evening Cable News:

sinidentidades:

A new analysis released yesterday by the media monitoring group Media Matters found that evening cable news guests are overwhelmingly white and male. According to the report, titled “Diversity on Evening Cable News in 13 Charts,” women and other people of color are underrepresented as guests on evening cable news programs at MSNBC, CNN and Fox News.

Media Matters examined the guests of thirteen evening cable news shows on CNN, MSNBC and Fox News during the month of April 2013. During that time period, only 33% of MSNBC guests, 29% Fox News guests and 24% CNN guests were female. Latinos fared much worse. Only 3% of Fox News guests and 2% of CNN and MSNBC guests were Latino.

An excerpt of some of the findings are below:

White Guests Were Hosted Most Often On Cable News. Fox News had the largest proportion of white guests — 83 percent. African-Americans were the largest non-white group on all networks, representing 19 percent, 10 percent, and 5 percent of guests on MSNBC, Fox, and CNN, respectively.

The Rachel Maddow Show Was Least Ethnically Diverse. Although The Rachel Maddow Show hosted fewer guests than other shows on MSNBC, those who were invited were most likely to be white. Out of 65 total guests, only 7 were non-white.

All In With Chris Hayes Was The Most Diverse Show In Evening Cable News. All In had both the largest proportion of women and the largest proportion of non-white guests — both 41 percent. All In also had the lowest proportion of white men — again 41 percent. Hayes’ show was the only evening cable news program to obtain such diversity.

Piers Morgan Live Guest Lineup Was 91 Percent White. CNN’s most ethnically diverse show was Outfront, which still hosted white guests 71 percent of the time. Similar to The Situation Room, the higher proportion of non-white guests on Outfront can be attributed in part to a couple of regular commentators: CNN correspondents Christiane Amanpour and Fareed Zakaria on The Situation Room and conservative political commentator Reihan Salam and political comedian Dean Obeidallah on Outfront.

White Men Were Vastly Overrepresented On Cable News. While white men enjoyed representation on cable that was nearly double that of their representation in the U.S. population, white women, who represent 32 percent of the population, were only 21 percent of guests on cable. Non-white women fared even worse. While they make up 19 percent of the population, they were only 8 percent of all guests on cable. Non-white men were also underrepresented; only 13 percent of guests on cable were non-white men while they make up 18 percent of the population.

The president of the National Hispanic Media Coalition released a statement on how he believes these findings may have real real world consequences.

“At a time when Latinos are over 16% of the country, a growing bloc of the electorate, and with over $1 trillion per year of buying power, it is unimaginable that we be excluded from cable news at such rates. This has a real affect on our community - the way we are perceived is how we are treated, and when our experts are absent from these programs it gives the perception that Latinos are not making meaningful contributions to this country, which couldn’t be further from the truth,” said NHMC president Alex Nogales in a statement sent to Colorlines.com.

White Men Were Vastly Overrepresented on Cable News

I’m tired of these basic ass studies! Like, how much grant money did you just waste?

bygoneamericana: University of California students at the...

Fri, 17 May 2013 18:08:57 -0400

bygoneamericana:

University of California students at the Assembly Center in Sacramento awaiting transfer, 1942.

By Dorothea Lange

One of the strategies employed by the federal government to sell the forced removal and confinement of Japanese American from the West Coast during World War II was the use of euphemistic terms that masked the true nature of what was being done. Japanese American were “evacuated” — as if from a natural disaster or for their own protection — from their homes and sent to “assembly centers” and “relocation centers,” names that gloss over the fact that these were concentration, prison, or detention camps.

“Assembly centers” were temporary housing where Japanese Americans were detained until the concentration camps were completed. Like all other prisoners at the Sacramento center, these students were transferred to Tule Lake (which was eventually and infamously turned into a “segregation center”).

nostalgerie: quae-non-apta: antanlontan: Young girl,...

Fri, 17 May 2013 16:56:53 -0400

nostalgerie:

quae-non-apta:

antanlontan:

Young girl, Morocco

What a sad and intriguing picture. “Young girl, Morocco, wasn’t added by the OP and I would love someone to confirm or deny it as it doesn’t ring true to me.

I forgot to put info on there, sorry. It is indeed a Moroccan girl.

I found a smaller version of the same photo here:

“Maroc. Portrait d’une fillette dans la vallée du Ziz. Photographe: Jean Besancenot”

dynamicafrica: discoversomalia: French-Somaliland (Djibouti)...

Fri, 17 May 2013 16:52:34 -0400

dynamicafrica:

discoversomalia:

French-Somaliland (Djibouti) colonial portraits, with names, age & tribe.

Follow us on twitter: @DiscoverSomalia

can we say ‘ethnic group’ instead of tribe?

thedorseyshawexperience: The Cola Road (2013)

Fri, 17 May 2013 11:02:16 -0400

thedorseyshawexperience:

The Cola Road (2013)

Before you say there are no good men, make sure you're a good woman. And before you say there are no good women, make sure you're a good man.

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:55:06 -0400

Before you say there are no good men, make sure you're a good woman. And before you say there are no good women, make sure you're a good man.

or - you could not generalize genders and their behavior. you could stop the dichotomy of good and bad when in reality you know like I know there's no measure of either. if you fuck someone over or love someone more than they love you - it doesnt make you good or bad absolutely so please stop putting yourself and your partners through unnecessary greif.

soulbrotherv2: The Iceman + Magic = Magic Ice Does that make...

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:54:28 -0400

soulbrotherv2:

The Iceman + Magic = Magic Ice Does that make sense? Did I add that up correctly?

"It’s just like when you’ve got some coffee that’s too black, which means it’s too strong. What do..."

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:53:57 -0400

“It’s just like when you’ve got some coffee that’s too black, which means it’s too strong. What do you do? You integrate it with cream, you make it weak. But if you pour too much cream in it, you won’t even know you ever had coffee. It used to be hot, it becomes cool. It used to be strong, it becomes weak. It used to wake you up, now it puts you to sleep.”

- Malcolm X, on the ‘infiltration’ of the African-American Civil Rights movement (via indizombie)