Reminder: City Council meeting tomorrow (Tuesday) at 5pm. There will also be a study session at 12noon. The topic is special use housing and land use. Voices in support of Tacoma's homeless are needed at one or both meetings. On that note, here is some info that Mona would like to pass on regarding the state homeless plan. http://qa.cted.wa.gov/_CTED/documents/ID_3356_Publications.doc
Major food for thought. I highly recommend this article. It's lengthy but worth the time. http://counterpunch.org/santos07292006.html It would be interesting to discuss this at The Conversation sometime.
I was listening nostalgically to an old David Rudder (Trinidadian singer/songwritier/Calypsonian) song and thought I'd share the chorus with you as it kind of expresses my feeling about "The Conversation" I'm also including a link to an mp3 recording of the actual song. We'll see if that part works.
Day of the Warlord
David Rudder
(Chorus)
Ina these times of the warlord
They say it is the day of the warlord
They want you put your hands in the air
These people want you surrender
Ina this day of the warlord
They say it is the day of the warlord
Understand where you are
They say now he is the new superstar (no no no no no no no no no NO!)
But even in this loud desperation and raging despair
We got to let them know we ain’t takin’ it so
We got to survive, keep our living alive
We got to tell them no, tell them no, no, no, no, no
A song in the heart of good people
Tell them the voice of good people
Tell them good people say so
Get the song here http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=494085C821B064E3
This program was billed like this: In “Tom Brokaw Reports: Separate and Unequal,” Brokaw traveled to Jackson, Miss., for an in-depth report on race and poverty. Jackson struggles everyday with the issues of race and America.
Want to know what I learned from it? That the problems in the black community of Jackson, Mississippi (and by extension, the rest of the U.S.) are caused by:
Now, I admit--I didn't have high hopes for a Tom Brokaw special on race and poverty, but I did expect that such a special would at least touch on the roots and causes of the whole, separate and unequal problem. But guess what, after an hour, all I got was the same old, tired pathological "analysis". Brokaw mentions that during integration, blacks were able to move into formerly all-white suburbs and attend formerly all-white schools, but that now, 50 years later, the suburbs and schools are all black. Does he give us one iota of explanation for this? NO! Instead of helping the viewer see how white flight, (oh no--our property values are going to go down, and oh no--our children are going to have to sit next to "them") resegregated everything, he spends all his time getting his subjects to tell us earnestly that it really comes down to personal responsibility. I was sickened.
Once again I was reminded of Tim Wise's statistic--that 80% of white America lives in communities where there are no people of color. It's no wonder that we have so far to go when programs like this not only do not give an accurate analysis of the causes of the problems, but basically give those white people every justification for the racial isolation they seek.
I'm thinking of writing to Tom Brokaw and suggesting that he watch "Ku Klux Klan: A Secret History", which does an excellent job of tracing the history of white supremacy and it's political, legal and extra-legal manifestations right up to the present day. Believe me, it has a lot more explanatory power than the nonsense put out in his "report".
The exhibit is on. Click on the image and it will appear larger in a new window
Friends,
Please visit this link that Mona has passed along and take action now at http://www.democracyinaction.org/jvfp/campaign.jsp?campaign_KEY=4678&t. This is a very one-sided bill.
Folks, I'm telling you, just go here http://www.ups.edu/documents/RPCAgenda.pdf and browse the schedule. This is an incredible opportunity, right here in Tacoma. Nearly 60 different panels and 100 workshops presented by people from all over the country and even internationally, on an impressive range of topics. This is BIG! Once you've looked over the schedule, then go here http://www.ups.edu/x9988.xml and get registered. And take what Rosalind says to heart--the Cornell West lecture and reception at the Glass Museum is going to sell fast. I've seen Cornell West at both UPS' Fieldhouse and Evergreen's College Rec Center Gynmasium, both of which hold around 3,000 and both of which were standing room only.
I'll see YOU there!
Laurie
Dear Conversation Family,
This is a gentle nudge to get you to drop what you're doing right now, right this second and log on to UPS Race & Pedagogy Conference and register. You may think there's a lot of time left for you to register between now and the conference's start date of 9/14, but you'd think wrong. Why? Well, for one thing, there are only 300 tickets available for the Cornell West Opening/Welcoming/ event (this $50 ticket includes both his UPS campus address and the reception at The Glass Museum) and they are going fast. Also, don't we want to be the first in line to support this cause? Yes! Yes! I hear you saying. Okay then, let's get going with our registration and show we're standing with Dexter and his vision in this groundbreaking endeavor.
If any Conversation Family member would like help with the financial aspect of the registration, please call or write. We want as many of us there as we can possibly get. No barriers exist to your getting there. Transportation from the campus to events downtown is also being provided.
Love, Laughter, Peace,
Rosalind
Dear Conversation Family,
This is a gentle nudge to get you to drop what you're doing right now, right this second and log on to UPS Race & Pedagogy Conference and register. You may think there's a lot of time left for you to register between now and the conference's start date of 9/14, but you'd think wrong. Why? Well, for one thing, there are only 300 tickets available for the Cornell West Opening/Welcoming/ event (this $50 ticket includes both his UPS campus address and the reception at The Glass Museum) and they are going fast. Also, don't we want to be the first in line to support this cause? Yes! Yes! I hear you saying. Okay then, let's get going with our registration and show we're standing with Dexter and his vision in this groundbreaking endeavor.
If any Conversation Family member would like help with the financial aspect of the registration, please call or write. We want as many of us there as we can possibly get. No barriers exist to your getting there. Transportation from the campus to events downtown is also being provided.
Love, Laughter, Peace,
Rosalind
We will begin with chapter 3 (Racism & the White Backlash) but Dexter hopes to get to chapter 4 (The Dilemma of Negro Americans). So read both, everyone! See you tomorrow.
P.S. The Native Arts Festival today was great--I recommend you show up tomorrow. It starts at 12 noon outside the History Museum.
Check it out! Today and tomorrow--art, music, dance & storytelling. FREE.
http://www.wshs.org/wshm/arts-festival.htm
National Action Network
Contact Information
Alton McDonald 253-255-2619
For Immediate Release
PRESS RELEASE:
Rev. Al Sharpton, Founder and CEO of the National Action Network, will be in Tacoma to address the community. Open invitation, cordially inviting all citizens to attend.
Time: 7:00p.m.
Date: Saturday, July 15, 2006
Place: Shiloh Baptist Church
Address: 1211 South “I” Street
Tacoma, WA 98405
Dear Conversation Family,
Dick called on Saturday to check in with us again. He was in the desert. He sends his love to us, wants us to know he's thinking of us and can't say when he will return. He is very happy to be spending this precious time with his daughter, his first daughter/child. And although it appears he gets to email rarely, I encourage Conversation members to email him your good thoughts. You can imagine how filled with Joy he'd be.
Love and Laughter and All That Jazz,
Rosalind
Here's the article.
Black men quietly combating stereotypes
By ERIN TEXEIRA, Associated Press Writer
Keith Borders tries hard not to scare people.
He's 6-foot-7, a garrulous lawyer who talks with his hands.
And he's black.
Many people find him threatening. He works hard to prove otherwise."
I have a very keen sense of my size and how I communicate," says Borders ofMason, Ohio. "I end up putting my hands in my pockets or behind me. I stand with my feet closer together. With my feet spread out, it looks like I'm taking a stance. And I use a softer voice."
Every day, African-American men consciously work to offset stereotypes about them - that they are dangerous, aggressive, angry. Some smile a lot, dress conservatively and speak with deference: "Yes, sir," or "No, ma'am." They are mindful of their bodies, careful not to dart into closing elevators or stand too close in grocery stores.
It's all about surviving, and trying to thrive, in a nation where biased views of black men stubbornly hang on decades after segregation and where statistics show a yawning gap between the lives of white men and black men. Black men's median wages are barely three-fourths those of whites; nearly 1 in 3 black men will spend time behind bars during his life; and, on average, black men die six years earlier than whites.
Sure, everyone has ways of coping with other people's perceptions: Who acts the same at work as they do with their kids, or their high school friends?
But for black men, there's more at stake. If they don't carefully calculate how to handle everyday situations - in ways that usually go unnoticed - they can end up out of a job, in jail or dead."
It's a stressful process," Borders says.
Melissa Harris Lacewell, a political scientist at the University of Chicago, says learning to adapt is at the heart of being an American black male.
"Black mothers and fathers socialize their sons to not make waves, to notcome up against the authorities, to speak even more politely not only when there are whites present but particularly if there are whites who have power," she said."
Most black men are able to shift from a sort of relaxed, authentically black pose into a respectable black man pose. Either they develop the dexterity to move back and forth or ultimately they flounder.
"It's a lot like a game of chess, says 43-year-old Chester Williams, who owns Chester Electric in New Orleans. He has taught his three sons, ages 16, 14 and 11, to play.
"The rules of the game are universal: White moves first, then black moves,"he said. "Black has to respond to the moves that the whites make. You take the advantage when it's available.
"Twenty-year-old Chauncy Medder of Brooklyn says his baggy jeans and oversized T-shirts make him seem like "another one of those thuggish black kids." He offsets that with "Southern charm" he learned attending high school in Virginia - "a lot of 'Yes, ma'ams,' and as little slang as possible. When I speak to them (whites), they're like, 'Hey, you're different.'"
Such skillful little changes in style aren't talked about much, especially not outside of black households - there's no reason to tip your hand. As Walter White, a black sales executive from Cincinnati, puts it: "Not talking is a way to get what you want.
"He recalled that, "as a child, we all sat down with my mother and father and watched the movie 'Roots,'" the groundbreaking 1970s television miniseries tracing a black family from Africa through slavery and into modern times.
The slaves were quietly obedient around whites. "But as soon as the master was gone," he said, "they did what they really wanted to do. That's what we were taught.
"Historians agree that black stereotypes and coping strategies are rooted in America's history of slavery and segregation.
Jay Carrington Chunn's mother taught him "how to read 'Whites Only' and 'Negro Only' before she taught me anything else," said the 63-year-old, who grew up in Atlanta. "Black parents taught you how to react when police stopped you, how to respond to certain problems, how to act in school to get the best grade.
"School is still a challenge, even from an early age.
Last year, Yale University research on public school pre-kindergarten programs in 40 states found that blacks were expelled twice as often as whites - and nine out of 10 blacks expelled were boys. The report did not analyze the patterns, but some trace it to negative views about black boys.
Black male children are often "labeled in public schools as being out of control," said Lacewell, who studies black political culture and wrote "Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought."
"If you're a black boy who is smart and energetic and always has the answer and throws his hand up in the air," she said, "you might as a parent say, 'Even if you know the answer you might not want to make a spectacle of yourself. You don't want to call attention to yourself.'
"Bill Fletcher still has nightmares about his third-grade teacher, a whitewoman who "treated me and other black students as if we were idiots," he said. "She destroyed my confidence."
But his parents were strong advocates, and taught him to cope by having little contact with teachers who didn't take an interest in him, said Fletcher, former president of TransAfrica Forum, a group that builds ties between African-Americans and Africa.
As black boys become adolescents, the dangers escalate. Like most teenagers, they battle raging hormones and identity crises. Many rebel, trying to fit in by mimicking - and sometimes becoming - criminals.
"They are basically seen as public menaces," Lacewell said.
Rasheed Smith, 22, a soft-spoken, aspiring hip-hop lyricist from the Bedford Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, recently tapped his long fingers, morosely counting his friends killed in neighborhood violence in the last five years - 11 in all. Few spent much time beyond their blocks, let alone their neighborhood. Some sold drugs or got in other trouble and had near-constant contact with police.
Smith has survived by staying close to his family. He advised: "With police, you talk to them the way they talk to you. You get treated how you act.
"Twenty years ago, Carol Taylor's teenage son - now a lawyer - was mugged twice near their Brooklyn home, but police officers "treated him like he had done the mugging," she said. She wrote and self-published "The Little Black Book: Survival Commandments for Black Men" filled with tips on how to deal with police: keep your hands visible, carry a camera, don't say much but be polite.
"Don't take this as a time to prove your manhood," wrote Taylor, a retired nurse and community activist who said she's sold thousands of the pocket-sized, $2 books.
And more general advice: "Learn to read, write and type, and to speakEnglish correctly. This is survival, not wishful thinking. If you are going to survive in America, go to college!"
One selective business program at historically black Hampton University in Virginia directs black men to wear dark, conservative suits to class. Earrings and dreadlocked hairstyles are forbidden. Their appearance is"communicating a signal that says you can go into more places," said business school dean Sid Credle. "There's more universal acceptance if you're conservative in your image and dress style.
"One graphic artist says he wears a suit when traveling, "even if it's on aweekend. I think it helps. It requests respect.
"But in the corporate world, clothing can only help so much, said Janet B. Reid of Global Lead Management Consulting, who advises companies on managing ethnic diversity.
Black men, especially those who look physically imposing, often have a tough time."
Someone who is tall and muscular will learn to come into a meeting and sit down quickly," she said. "They're trying to lower the big barrier of resistance, one that's fear-based and born of stereotypes."
Having darker brown skin can erect another barrier. Mark Ferguson has workedon Wall Street for 20 years. He has an easy smile and firm, confident handshake."
I think I clean up pretty well - I dress well, I speak well - but all that goes out the window when I show up at a meeting full of white men," says Ferguson of New Jersey, who is 6-foot-4 and dark-skinned. "It's because they're afraid of me."
"Race always matters," said Ferguson, whose Day in the Life Foundation connects minority teenagers with professionals. "It's always in play."
Fletcher knows his light brown skin gives him an advantage - except that he's "unsmiling."
"If you're a black man who doesn't smile a lot, they (whites) get really nervous," he said. "There are black people I run across all the time and they're always smiling particularly when they're around white people. A lot of white people find that very comforting."
All this takes a toll.
Many black men say the daily maneuvering leaves them enraged and exhausted. For decades, they continuously self-analyze and shift, subtly dampening their personalities. In the end, even the best strategies don't always work.
"I've seen it play out many times" in corporations, said Reid of Global Lead. "They go from depression to corporate suicide. Marital problems can come up. He loses all self confidence and the ability to feel manly and in control of his own fate.
"Sherman James, a social psychologist at Duke University, studies how the stress of coping for black men can damage the circulatory system and lead to chronic poor health. Black men are 20 percent more likely to die of heart disease than whites, and they have the highest rates of hypertension in the world, according to the National Medical Association.
The flip side, black men say, is that many learn to be resilient.
Ferguson recalls when a new Wall Street colleague, minutes after meeting him and hearing he grew up in a housing project in Newark, N.J., asked if he had been involved in "any illicit activities" there. He shrugged it off.
Over the years, as he has earned promotions and built client relationships over the phone, he has learned to steel himself for face-to-face meetings -for clients' raised eyebrows and stuttered greetings when they see he is black.
"It just rolls off our backs - we grin and bear it. You can't quit," he said, sighing heavily. He vents his frustrations to mentors and relaxes with his wife and young children.
"Then you go back," he said, "and fight the good fight."
Copyright C 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewrittenor redistributed without the prior written authority of The AssociatedPress.
Here's a link to an article Dexter recommends.
Black men quietly combating stereotypes.doc
My hubby was doing a little demographic digging*. For your amusement, here are a couple of multiple choice questions. The answers may surprise you. They will surely be thought provoking:
1. Which is the most ethnically diverse city in the Pacific Northwest?
a. Vancouver, B.C.
b. Seattle, WA
c. Tacoma, WA
d. Portland, OR
2. Which city is whitest?
a. Vancouver, B.C.
b. Seattle, WA
c. Tacoma, WA
d. Portland, OR
3. Which city is least white?
a. Vancouver, B.C.
b. Seattle, WA
c. Tacoma, WA
d. Portland, OR
4. Which city has the most African Americans?
a. Vancouver, B.C.
b. Seattle, WA
c. Tacoma, WA
d. Portland, OR
Answers:
1. Tacoma, 2. Portland, 3. Vancouver, 4. Tacoma
Here are some interesting stats on the ethnic makeup of some of our NW cities:
Af Am Asian Latino Native Pac Isl White
Vancouver 0.9% 45% # 1.9% # 51%
Seattle 6.6% 13.1% 5.28% 1.0% 0.5% 73%
Tacoma 11.24% 7.5% 6.85% 1.96% 0.93% 69.08%
Portland 6.69% 6.33% 6.81% 1.06% 0.38% 77.9%
Tri-Cities-
Pasco 3.2% 2.9% 56.6% 1.8% 0.14% 52.76%
Kennewick 1.1% 0.11% 15.6% 2.12% 0.11% 82.9%
Richland 1.4% 4.06% 4.72% 0.8% 0.11% 89.6%
Only Vancouver is less white than Tacoma, but much of their non white population is Asian, so Tacoma is more racially "balanced".
Perhaps not surprisingly, Portland is whitest, but somewhat surprising to me was that Seattle is not far behind.
For some reason, I was surprised to see that Tacoma has almost twice as many the African Americans as Seattle has.
# = unknown (Canada doesn't have a census like ours and apparently it was harder to figure out how they calculate some groups. Further investigation needed).
I think this is interesting stuff. What do you all think?
*from wikipedia.org
