Saturday, July 31, 2010

Hip Candy: New Music: Lauryn Hill's "Repercussions"

Hip Candy: New Music: Lauryn Hill's "Repercussions": "New Music! From Lauryn Hill, still unreleased, will it be a new, long awaited single from her? Guess we'll have to wait and see..."


This is new music from the Great Lauryn Hill!!!

Monday, July 26, 2010

Mad Men: 5 Black Ads That Drive Us Nuts

Mad Men: 5 Black Ads That Drive Us Nuts

This is a post from a website I came across in my daily investigations. The website is the bvx.com. What do you think about the commercials???

Sunday, July 25, 2010

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Jessica Care Moore "Warriors Walk Alone" (S01 E04)




Listen up!!!

Chris Abani muses on humanity | Video on TED.com

Chris Abani muses on humanity | Video on TED.com


This is Chris Albani speaking about humanity. He uses the South African word "Ubuntu" which means " The only way for me to be human is for you to reflect my humanity back to me." He also speaks about being entangled in the Biafran war with his brothers and sisters and his mother. He said that he never once saw his mother cry through out their ordeal of living in several refugee camps. It was not until the family arrived at an airport in Lisbon when a woman, after hearing their story, emptied her suite case giving them all of the clothes and toys that his mother cried. Later he asked her about her tears and she said, "You can steal the heart against all kinds of cruelty, but one act of kindness will unstitch it." This is a powerful!

Friday, July 23, 2010

Rachel Maddow: Fox News To White People: Be Very Afraid! Black People Ar...

Rachel Maddow - Fox Assissination (1) Kills Again - Shirley Sherrod

Rachel Maddow: Fox News Advancing Age-Old ‘Scare White People’ Political Strategy
» 153 comments
by Glynnis MacNicol | 9:39 am, July 22nd, 2010
VIDEO
While President Obama may be trying to avoid diving into the racial fray Rachel Maddow jumped right in last night.

In a fairly devastating segment Maddow tied this week’s Shirley Sherrod debacle to previous cases, dating back to the Sixties, of politicians and the media using “scare white people” tactics to generate support.

At and after the Civil Rights era the political strategy of terrifying white people by the threat posed by black people, black people coming to get them, coming to take what’s rightfully theirs, that strategy got a new name, the Southern Strategy…it about making white people feel like they are the victims of black people. Black people are the racists…it’s good politics, it always has been in this country. It still is.

Maddow then aired a series of, it should be noted, rather selective soundbites of conservative personalities including Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and a variety of Fox News clips — “crusades” including Van Jones, ACORN, and the new Black Panthers — all of which touched on the same theme: white people are the victims.

Maddow is certainly not the first to draw this conclusion, though there are signs that, justified or not — you’d be hard-pressed to paint the entire network in this light — this is going to be a new theme for critics of Fox. Dave Weigel also briefly touched on a similar point in his excoriation of Megyn Kelly the other day, pointing our her fear mongering of the DOJ with the Black Panthers story was reminiscent of the 1966 rumor that flew around “that black gang members on motorcycles were going to head from Chicago to ransack Des Moines.”

However, Maddow sees the trend as being network-wide.

What do the four major Fox News only stories of the Obama era have in common? The four major stories, pressed and pushed relentlessly on Fox, over and above the facts, as their own make up the news cycle you wish you had narrative that they want to pin on the Obama administration?…Van Jones, ACORN, the New Black Panthers, and Shirley Sherrod….This isn’t about racism, this isn’t a story about picking on black people. This is a story about political outcomes…a strategy to feel afraid of black people. To feel afraid of African American people as if they are not fellow Americans, rather a threat to what white people have…This is a political strategy, advanced not by a news organization, but by political activists who use a cable channel as a political outlet and they are pros at this, there is no reason to expect them to stop doing stuff like this. Unless it stops working some day.

Watch below.


Tuesday, July 20, 2010

3 - The Space Traders - Dir. Reginald Hudlin

2 - The Space Traders - Dir. Reginald Hudlin

1 - The Space Traders - Dir. Reginald Hudlin

1 - The Space Traders - Dir. Reginald Hudlin

This a movie entitled Space Traders. It is based on a short story written by Derrick Bell.

In sum, America is at its wits end. The economy is busted. Suddenly Space Traders appear and offer the American Government the money to make the country rich again if they will give up all of the African-Americans. Well, you can predict the end... Whites who have longed believed that African-Americans are a drain on "their" country give up the goods. Blacks are marched off American soil like slaves at gunpoint into space ships.


See for yourself!!!

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Mothers Raising Girls to be Single

I found this on Black Voices. I thought It was worth posting. Maybe some black mothers should examine this question? What do you think


Her mother very rarely talked about the good qualities of her late father, Audrey Irvine says.








STORY HIGHLIGHTS



Audrey Irvine's father died when she was 3, leaving her mom to raise three kids
Mom struggled and made sure her daughters knew how to support themselves
Columnist rarely heard much about her dad because mom was so busy
Irvine wonders whether single moms unwittingly raise their daughters to be single



Atlanta, Georgia (CNN) -- As a single black woman, I am tired of people and the media moaning about why black women can't find successful black men willing to marry them.
"Nightline" dedicated a show recently to this situation, offering the explanation that the available pool of successful black men is rather slim. The 2000 U.S. Census also found 1.8 million more African-American women than black men. A recent Yale study found that 42 percent of African-American women are unmarried, compared with 23 percent of white women.
I know the numbers don't lie, but after talking with friends, I realized there is another factor that has nothing to do with race. As the daughter of a single parent, I wonder whether are we raising our daughters to be single as well.
My father died when I was 3, leaving my mother to raise three kids on her own. My mother was adamant about raising her kids to be independent, self-sufficient members of society. I remember while growing up always hearing "find a way to take care of yourself and have your own."
My mother would punctuate each comment with the reminder that she had to figure it out after my father died. She did not want to see her children face the same fate.
Parents instill their unrealized hopes and dreams into their children's future. But it is also possible to fill us with their fears. I didn't realize that I was the byproduct of my mother's obvious fear that her kids would somehow be unprepared for the struggles and heartache that she had faced.
Years later, I recall having a great conversation with my mother on how she met my father. I always cherished those moments when she would share any detail about him. While telling this story, my mother's face lit up and she was laughing, then she started to cry. I realized that 30 years later, she still missed him.
She felt cheated because he had left so soon. I knew at that moment that my mother had filled me with her anger and sadness over losing my father. I realized I had never been told by my mother what to expect from a man, so all this time I had been flying blind.
What about those women who had to grow up hearing complaints that their father was never around. What about those mothers who have faced a bitter divorce? Are they projecting all their drama on their kids as well? Has this created a generation of hurt, angry women who only know how to be single?
One of my girlfriends is the product of divorce. She lived with mother, who took every opportunity to talk badly about her father. When her father remarried, her mother became bitter.
She would make disparaging comments about the new wife, calling their marriage a sham. At no point did my girlfriend receive any positive feedback about her father. She has since spent the longest time avoiding any man that reminds her of her father.
I won't say that my childhood experience is the sole reason for all the other unmarried successful women. However, it does provide some potential insight as to what may be holding women back from finding that potential mate.
Before my mother died three years ago, we were able to have the conversation I wished I had had as a teenager. I got to hear that my father was a humble, hardworking man with an incredible sense of humor.

She was finally able to hang up her fears and let me know that the man I am looking for is still out there. Despite the statistics that are thrown our faces daily, I remain hopeful knowing that my parents will be proud when that choice is made.

Wednesday, July 7, 2010

Education Secretary: More Black Male Teachers Needed - Essence.com

Education Secretary: More Black Male Teachers Needed - Essence.com

Serena & Venus Williams: Fashion Match

Serena & Venus Williams: Fashion Match

Black Writers/Black Literature

I thought this article written by Bernice McFadden regarding the ghettoizing of black writers and black literature was an interesting and thought provoking read. She says that white writers who write about African-Americans are lauded and receive more accolades for their work than do African-Americans who write about the same subjects. Moreover, the writings of whites are viewed as universal and marked as such. Similar works by African-Americans are marginalized and receive little to no marketing as universal works. She argues that this difference is related to one thing only-RACISM! It seems that whites who write about blacks do an excellent job of maintaining White Supremacy and Black Inferiority which is always the goal in America. The article is published in the Washington Post and entitled Why Can't Black Writers Escape the Literary Ghetto.

Read it for yourself. A link is provided. What do you think??

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 3

Part #3

Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 2

Please take the time to learn something about real American HIstory! This truth is always left out! Black had developed their own economic power and hateful white people destroyed that! The did not want African-Americans to have anything in America. From what I have seen in politics, the sentiment from them is the same. They don't want health care for all. They don't want the banking system saved which is best for all of America. They don't want tax breaks for the middle class. They don't want! they don't want! They don't want. The only thing they do want is to save and protect their way of life!

Black Wall Street in Tulsa, Oklahoma - Pt. 1

Friday, July 2, 2010

LOVE

LOVE! LOVE! LOVE!

Everybody is looking for LOVE these days!

What is LOVE?

This is an age old question, and it still remains.

For the Bible thumpers.... 1 Corinthians 13 is the LOVE book of the Bible. I will relay the meaning of LOVE from that book for those who are unfamiliar. "Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. it is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in with truth. It always protects, always trust, always hope, always perseveres."

I like what bell hooks lays out as her definition of love in her trilogy on black LOVE. In sum, she says that caring for people-feeding them, clothing them or meeting other needs is not a real indication of LOVE. Shocking huh! I tend to agree with her assessment since there are many parents who abuse or kill children they have housed and clothed etc... Also, there are several husbands who care for families whom they turn around and murder. She says, instead, that real LOVE is LOVE that does what is spiritually right for the other person involved.

Think about. Real love is love that does what is spiritually right for the other person.

My take on LOVE after much of my own life experience, observations and courses of study has certainly evolved.

Today the world is full of evil people who would do harm to those who are isolated, those who are vulnerable and those who are looking for relationship and LOVE.

I have learned not to be deceived by the media's, all forms, ideas/images of LOVE and have surmised that LOVE coming from another human is broken at best. Yes! that is what I said. Any LOVE that you will get from another human will be broken, and that will be the best that they can give you. They will hurt you accidently! They will lie to you! They will surely disappoint you! The LOVE will be broken because every human is broken and born into sin-saved or not-there is still the existence of brokeness. You will never get perfect love from another human being.

Martian Luther, the church reformer, discussed two types of love in his theology on grace. He referred to one type of LOVE as common. This common Love is a love given to all. It allows humans to love and care for their families. This common love that Luther refers to is that broken love that I am discussing. The common LOVE that you will get from another human being, no matter how great it may be, will be broken at best!


The only perfect LOVE comes from the only perfect person-JESUS!

Knowing this allows me to keep the expectations I have for people whom I am in relationship with in perspective to their humanity and my humanity!

Think about it!

Selah.