Thursday, March 31, 2011

So....I'm still wondering.....

Yes....I saw the speech.
Yes....I heard his words.

But I'm still very haunted.


Why Libya

Why not Sudan and Darfur?
 
Why not the Ivory Coast?

Why not the Congo?

Why not Tunisia?

Why not Egypt?

Why not Syria?



Is it because of that 3 letter word that rhymes with "royal"??










Wednesday, March 30, 2011

The Kill Team

 The horrors of war and the evils of men cross so many generations and centuries.  Over and over and over.  I keep thinking of how U.S. army soldiers cut the breasts off of dead Indian women at the Wounded Knee massacre and tossed them to each other, laughing and playing games of "catch". 

I first heard of Morlock and his "team" last year when his trial began.  It's just unreal to see these horrors happening again and again and again. Even with his sentencing and the pentagon apologizing for their actions it's not enough.  It wasn't the first time...and I wish I could believe it will be the last.

Link to feature on his trial and the Kill Team in a segment by Amy Goodman last September on  Democracy, Now:

Link to recent article and photographs in Der Spiegel that have given way to the new Rolling Stone article by Mark Boal focusing on the actions and horrors of the Kill Team:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,752310,00.html

Link to Samantha Henig's post about the Rolling Stone article on the New Yorker's blog:
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/newsdesk/2011/03/rolling-stones-extremely-graphic-and-disturbing-images.html


Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Got plans for Monday, April 4??????

 Many people forget that Dr. King was assassinated in Memphis while trying to speak out and take a stand for striking African-American sanitation workers who were fighting hard for equal pay, safer working conditions and paid days off for severe weather.  If you haven't heard the rumblings yet, there are some demos and actions being planned for this anniversary of Dr. King's death to make a bold, loud stand in solidarity with working people and union members across the country who are facing the union-busting insanity currently being felt from coast to coast.  There's a lot of info in the link below which can help you get connected to some of the actions that are being planned -- and you're even welcome to create and spread the word about your own, too.

No effort for change is ever too little or too small.  We must remember the gains of the past and the origins of the labor movement and unions because too many politicians and corporate businesses are turning their back on the truth and trying to revise the history of the past to suit the needs of the new "Ownership Class".  Connect with your elder family members who may have been in unions or are now facing losses of pensions, etc.  Record their stories for your families' posterity and post them on YouTube or your social networks to help educate and inspire others -- especially the young generations out there.  Remember the recent 100th anniversary of the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire in NYC and the hellish deaths faced by those young girls and women who were just trying to make a living and a new life for themselves and their families and found themselves locked inside a raging inferno because their bosses thought they were thieves and didn't want to lose merchandise.  Remember them.  Remember what it was like when children worked in factories and there was no such thing as an 8 hour workday or 40 hour workweek.  Remember what it was like when workers (particularly children) lost fingers and limbs inside machinery and didn't receive any sort of adequate compensation for their injury.  Remember them.  Remember what it was like when there was no oversight or organizations -- like OSHA -- in charge of workplace safety and ensuring healthy working conditions.  

Regardless of how hell-bent many of these politicians and corporate heads are trying keep everyone divided and ignorant of each others' struggles, it's not working.  We are one.

click for info on the April 4 Day of Action:
http://local.we-r-1.org/

Monday, March 28, 2011

An update about Recy Taylor and the effect of the Change.org petition....

She deserves so much more than an apology, but this is a little acknowledgment and light for the darkness. I'm heartened to hear the progress, but I'm a bit perplexed by the title of this article on AllGov.com. It's an awkward way to revise the era in which this horrific crime occurred.  It was Jim Crow.  It was segregation.  It happened in the early breaths of the civil rights movement.  It was a brutal and shameful time. 

True enough when I think of WW2, on the surface, I think of the evil perpetrated by the nazis, Pearl Harbor and the horrors of war....but I also think of the picture of the sailor kissing the nurse in Times Square, Pin-up girls, The Andrews Sisters, Rosie the Riveter, Bebop and Swing dancers tossing their partners in the air and all kinds of warm-fuzzy caricatures.  Calling this a "WW2-era rape" really blunts the reality too muchAllGov - News - Alabama Town Apologizes to 91-Year-Old for World War II-Era Rape

Recy Taylor (photo: Phelan M. Ebenhack, AP)

Saturday, March 26, 2011

Strength and peace to you, dear Poly

I heard an update yesterday that Poly is struggling hard. She's now in hospice and the doctors aren't giving her much time. Let's keep sending her mega day-glo vibes of strength and peace.

Here's a recent interview she did with John Robb of the Membranes and Goldblade about her new album, Generation Indigo. She talks about each track of the album here. It's due out on March 28th.

Friday, March 25, 2011

The Triangle Shirtwaist Fire: 100 years later.....

Remember yesterday....fight for today.

UNION is not a dirty word.
The horrific deaths of these girls and women
helped reinforce the need for a comprehensive labor movement.
I still can't fathom that we're living in a time where union-busting is
becoming an accepted idea.

Never forget:

Facebook = Narcissism?

I was done with it after the recurring privacy violations (heehee -- ooops! Sorry, we're sharing your preference info so you can shill for advertisers...heehee -- OOPS! We're releasing your personal contact info -- like your phone and address).  Being contacted by so many drama-loving parasitic assholes from my teen years and the racist skin whitening app they supported that was aimed at dark-skinned Asian Indians were also major issues for me, as well. [And anyone who thinks that skin whitening among people of color is on the same innocuous par as tanning is for whites like Snooki and her fist-pumping Jersey spectacle, it's seriously time for you to learn about the brutal impact that colonialism and imperialism has had on those of us from brown, red and darker-skinned persuasions...what did my hapokni (grandma) used to say??? If it's yellow or white, it's beautiful and right...if it's red, black or brown -- put it down]  

I can't speak for everyone out in the blogsphere, but creating this blog is definitely about expression, art, politics, social issues, music, sharing a point of view and healing, more so than creating a cult of followers and attacking people in my personal life.  I post once for the day (or maybe twice, sometimes) and then I go about the business of the rest of my day.  I don't constantly check back-and-forth all day, glued to the computer -- if visitors out there like it, fine...but even if they don't get it, that's okay, too.  I've mentioned this to some of my friends, but I really do feel like I'm sending messages in bottles and setting them out into the sea of the internet.  It's been a very troubling double-edge to watch the rise of social networks over these years --  while it's been absolutely awesome to connect with like minds in faraway places like New Zealand, France, Africa, Jamaica and The Netherlands, there's definitely a disconnect that is happening with people's abilities to directly communicate with each other.  It's a bit insulting when you make the time to talk with a friend and all you get is their back facing you and a distracted voice while they feverishly check the walls and status updates of their online friends.  Even excessive texting is too much.  I understand it when you're in situations where you can't speak verbally, but how hard is it to pick up a phone to communicate directly?  Or set time aside to have coffee for an hour or so??  Direct communication is becoming a dying art.  This kind of goes back to a recent post I wrote about remembering to "taking a break" from all the gadgets and the internet universe.  Doesn't mean you have to throw everything out the window and go back to a tin can with a piece of string.  Just be mindful of moderation....dare to pause and go smell the roses in a park.  Dare to make time to catch up with a friend, face-to-face.  Hand-write a letter or card to a loved one.  Take the time to connect (and reconnect).  A sincere loving hug and a smile from a friend is worth more than every Apple gadget and smartphone known to man.

Click to read article:





































Thursday, March 24, 2011

What the fuck were they thinking???

 "Curing" those evil gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people?  Yeah...there was an app for that.  And thanks to the massive action of Truth Wins Out on Change.org and the searing heat people blasted Apple with, they got rid of it.  But I can't quite shake this whole insanity out of my head.  What the hell was Apple thinking??  Did Steve Jobs really sign-off on this bigoted piece of homophobia and xenophobia?  True enough, Apple has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to defeat the "Prop 8" ban on gay marriage out here in California and several months ago they took down another anti-gay app from iTunes that called same-sex couples "immoral".  Thankfully that effort was also powered by Change.org.  It just knocks me on my ass that Apple would actually give Exodus International a platform to spew their hate in the first place.  For those out there who haven't heard of them, they're a group which supports the idea of "conversion therapy" -- remember that loving technique??  Somehow, it always reminds me of A Clockwork Orange and the traumatic conversion Alex went through with his eyes pinned open.  It's supposed to be great for de-gaying queer folk into shiny, happy heteros...not to mention cheerleading concepts they throw around like "freedom from homosexuality", "spiritual warfare" and the beliefs that LGBTQ folks are evil and "satanic" and in need of a cure.  And as if it couldn't get any stranger, Apple actually labeled the app as "non-offensive".

So...yes, Apple took them down.  But I'm beyond bothered that they even approved such hateful things in the first place.  And this recent spectacle of Apple and Jobs getting in bed with Rupert Murdoch and Fox for the daily iPad-only newspaper absolutely makes my skin crawl.  I'm done.  I'm done with the "Apple-opoly".  I'm in the process of looking into new mp3 options -- I haven't been a digital junkie anyway when it comes to buying albums online.  I actually like holding the album/cd/cassette in my hand, looking at the artwork, reading the lyrics, names of session musicians, instruments, "thank you's" and dedications.  Yes, I like the convenience of having a way to load my cds and old LP's into the computer and being able to listen to my own personal jukebox, but there are increasingly more and more options out there other than iTunes (and, no, I'm not going the other way with Gates and Microsoft).  Thankfully I've held on to my sanity and refused to jump on-board the iPad/iPhone crazy trains.   There have to be other options out there for conscious consumers to choose from, and if there aren't I want to find a way to support the people trying to create them.  The older I get, the more I still want to walk my talk and put my money in the right places.  I'm feeling the same way about this new merger happening between AT&T and T-Mobile and the choices out there for cell carriers.  It's beyond disturbing that both AT&T and Verizon have supported right wing causes and politicians (like anti-unionist Scott Walker in Wisconsin) -- and the bat-shit-crazy Tea Party insanity.   In the words of my dear friend Sue, a passionate Texas spit-fire and proud, elder lesbian who died last November...."There has to be another way".  Happy Birthday, Sue.  I miss you dearly, chica x0x0x

 http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/03/23/Gay_Cure_App_Pulled_by_Apple/

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Thought for eternity....

Banksy x0x

Just the icy, brutal tip of a massive, massive iceberg....

1 in 5 Women in the Air Force Report Being Sexually Assaulted....

And the army
navy
and marines 
aren't too far behind.

I've personally known women (and men)
in each arm of the armed forces who were sexually 
assaulted going as far back as Gulf War One. 

None of them reported what happened 
for fear of retribution and losing their military careers.

http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2011/03/17/1-in-5-women-in-the-air-force-report-being-sexually-assaulted/

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

A breath of mindfulness...

A dear friend just passed this on to me. It's absolutely amazing.
The instrument he's playing is a begena and it has a rich history
in Africa with origins in Ethiopia and Eritrea. I hope you take
a break from the chaos of your day to pause and listen to his voice
and the feel the vibration of this beautiful instrument. Enjoy.
(Thanks again, sweet Duke x0x)


Monday, March 21, 2011

Thought for the day....

Even if it's a slight, sly one, like the Mona Lisa.....SMILE

Ethiopian children seen on estoperpetua-.tumblr.com
These cuties really click with the mommy fantasies I have sometimes.  So adorable.  So cute.  So happy.  Yeah, I know they'd probably have tantrums and meltdowns in the middle of the Safeway when I wouldn't let them eat 5 pounds of chocolate-covered pretzels, but I still have my daydreams.  And the little sweetie in the pretty dress and headwrap would be spoiled BEYOND belief.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Thought for the day...

Remember when this song first came out?? It's been almost 20 years
and it's as relevant as ever. True story: I've lost count of the number of
young kids and teens (all races, all socio-economic classes) I've met
who seriously think Central America is another name for the midwest. 
And don't get me started on the adults who think Africa is a country made 
up entirely of jungles and wild animals.

Friday, March 18, 2011

Happy Birthday, Mom x0x0x


You really were my guiding light

Here are some of your faves...plus a new one by Buffy I think you would've loved:

A little Shirley...
A Little Floyd Red Crow....
A little Sledgehammer...
A little Etta...
A little Joya...
A little Chahta...
A little Nina...
and here's a newer one by Buffy...


Miss you. Chi Hullo Li Na Billia Chih x0x0x0x




Blaming the victim

My career background is in psychology, counseling and social services.  I worked for a number of years counseling rape survivors, many who were prostitutes and other women and girls who found themselves in situations where they were attacked while drunk or under the influence of drugs.  Time and time again I heard the same questions "was I raped because of what I was wearing?" and "it's all my fault because I was drunk, high, etc."   It was such a challenge to help them understand that rape is a crime of power and that, regardless of the negative messages and criticisms they received from the police and/or their families, they were not responsible for what happened to them based on the clothes they were wearing or how inebriated they were.  Making poor choices does not cancel-out or excuse the horrific crime of rape.  When I first heard about the case of the young 11 year old girl who was gang-raped by over 15 men in Cleveland, Texas it hit me like brick to my head.  It's a disgusting fact that there are so many cases like hers happening all around us in every corner of this country.  Some are reported.  Many others are not.  What disgusts me even more is to see the way many of these young girls are being blamed for causing their own rapes as a result of the so-called provocative clothing and promiscuous behavior they allegedly displayed to their abusers and rapists.  So many people are missing the truth about these little girls.  That they are, in fact, still little girls, regardless of whatever hip-hugger jeans, cropped-top shirts, high-heeled shoes, makeup and mature hairstyles they may be wearing.  I wish I could shout this from every rooftop....a promiscuous, sexually active 11 year old girl is NOT a normal, healthy phenomenon, and just because a young girl OR a grown woman, for that matter, dresses in so-called provocative clothing, etc. does NOT mean they "were asking for it" and they have every right to report that they were raped and receive justice.

I can't help but think back to my own youth and the kinds of things that were happening to my peers and I.  Back in the 70's, I grew up in a very chaotic, abusive environment.  Physical, emotional and sexual abuse was happening to me.   I had a great friend back then who was my age and she, too, was being abused physically and sexually.  We were bound together by our experiences and our attempts to make sense of the horrors that were happening to us.  In many ways it was the blind-leading-the-blind, but we were doing our best to survive and live in difficult realities.  Besides the abuse, we both had a lot of other things going on that pushed us out of childhood a lot faster than our peers. We were precocious kids, concerned more about things like politics, reading high school level books and becoming a part of the early waves of punk rock, no-wave, post-punk, etc. than watching tons of cartoons, playing with dolls and squealing over teen mags like Tiger Beat or Right-On.  But we were still kids.  

There is a difference between precocious and promiscuous.  I took a more precocious route and became more emotionally closed with my interactions as a result of the abuse and all the other things I was trying to cope with, but, unfortunately, my dear friend fell into a pattern of behavior that often happens to young girls who are sexually abused -- a very promiscuous sort of acting-out for attention.  Make no mistake, children who act-out in such ways are truly not aware of what they are doing, and as a result are at the whim of abusers and rapists who seek to manipulate and take advantage of them. There are so many complex layers to understanding this behavior.  Consider how much more murky things become if you don't have connected/involved parents or guardians keeping an eye on a child's behavior.  And it's not easy to point the finger and say that kids like this only come from households with drug abusers, etc.  Many come from homes with parent(s) who are so distracted and over-stressed from working 2 or 3 jobs to make ends meet and support the family, they've lost touch with having control over their children.  It's easy to understand if the child in question is outwardly displaying a kind of "mature" behavior they've adopted as a result of being left to take care of themselves.  An over-stressed parent could very easily fall into a belief that just because the kid knows how to cook, do laundry, go to the store for groceries, stay at home on their own, do their homework without being nagged, etc. they are doing great and able to care for themselves.  My friend came from such a family situation.  Divorced parents, her dad was a dead-beat barely giving any consistent support...her mom was a loving, over-worked nurse working insane hours plus another job to keep up with the needs of the family.  My friend presented a very mature, calm, knowledgeable facade, but barely anyone really knew the truth of what was going on behind her 11 year old facade with the tight Jordache jeans, clog heels, frosted blue eyeshadow and Farrah Fawcett hair.   
 
If you know any young girls who are acting-out in sexually promiscuous behavior that is entirely inappropriate for their age group it's time for a wake up call. Don't just stand back in the chorus of adults shaking their heads and criticizing the child.   Dare to take a stand and be an advocate for the child -- especially if none of the adults in her life are doing anything constructive about her behavior.  Remember, it takes a village.  Thankfully I survived the trauma and horrors of my childhood abuse and lived to grow into an adult.  I still have scars, some physical....many mental and, yes, I'm still dealing with my demons and ghosts....but I survived.    My dear friend didn't.  She became so lost and continued to spiral more and more out-of-control.  She took her own life while we were just beginning to step into our early 20's.  Don't be afraid to take a stand and do something for a child in trouble.  You may end up saving their life.
  
Click for articles on the case of the young girl in Texas (particularly 
the NY Times article that seemed to be more concerned with the 
rapists than with the victim):


Thursday, March 17, 2011

Thought for the day....

"I tried to drown my sorrows, but the bastards learned how to swim, and now I am overwhelmed by this decent and good feeling" 
-- Frida Kahlo

The Broken Column -- 1944





























Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Monday, March 14, 2011

Thought for eternity...

No Nukes.....PERIOD.

Here's an idea.  All the business people and rabid tycoons of corporate industry who 
believe nuclear is the greatest and safest energy option for the world and think the
rest of us are nuts for believing otherwise?? Let's relocate them and their beloved families 
within a couple blocks of the Fukushima nuclear power plant in Japan that is currently exploding and rapidly melting down as a result of the horrific recent earthquake and tsunami. Let's see how they feel after a few years -- especially as their children reach child-bearing age.  Anyone remember Chernobyl?


Sunday, March 13, 2011

Thought for the day....

Take a deep, cleansing breath...and dare to switch off the endless gadgets, "smart" devices,
uber-fab laptops and monitors, and the idiot box chock full of reality shows and tabloid culture bits about celebrities having mental meltdowns and girls and women behaving badly towards each other. Go outside for a long walk. Take a book and read in the park. Go explore an art gallery and spend a couple hours looking at the art. Hop the bus or subway and explore the city. Take your skateboard and try some tricks you haven't done in a while -- or have never, ever tried. Call a friend, a real friend, and catch up....even dare to meet them face-to-face and have a direct conversation for an hour or more over coffee or a meal -- and no checking the computer for Assbook status updates from other "friends". Remember, you already have a friend sitting in front of you who took out the time to be with you. Give him/her your attention and eye contact....not your back and a flat, distracted voice. I'm sure kids raised in other eras and areas may have heard it...but back in the 70's growing up in Chicago we often heard the phrase: "play outside until the streetlights come on". Looking at the modern, mega detached and distracted times we're living in that phrase is a piece of timeless, golden advice. Dare to take a break and give yourself permission to do it...OFTEN.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Have you been watching the anti-Muslim xenophobia in our "Homeland Security" committee hearings this week??

Beyond heartbreaking and infuriating. Congressman King really is wearing old Joe McCarthy's shoes. His explanation for why supporting the IRA isn't the same as supporting "real terrorists" makes my stomach turn. Bet he's one of those guys who likes to drink green beer on St. Patrick's day and wear shamrock antennae on his head (or maybe a green derby) and romanticize life in the Emerald Isle. Hypocrite.

If you haven't seen Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison's powerful testimony at the witchhunt hearing this week you need to watch this. Do you remember Mohammed Salman Hamdani? He was a young "first responder" emergency services worker who died while trying to save lives on 9/11....but his name was smeared for quite a while in the NY press by those who tried to whip up the story that he was part of the terrorist plot that day and that he was "on the run" trying to escape being caught. His detractors only backed down after his body was later found in the rubble. Barely an apology or retraction was heard. It's a disgrace.

Friday, March 11, 2011

HAPPY FRIDAY......

We're almost there....
 Hope your week is winding down in a great way -- especially if you had a lot of crap to tackle and you finally got the energy to start taking care of it.  


I'm feeling...


.....a little Tura Satana

















.....a little Nina Simone















....a little Angela Davis

















....a little Winona LaDuke



















So much change, chaos and struggles going on in our world...near and far.   There's so much work to do.  Never underestimate the power you have as just one person to take a stand and affect change.  It only takes ONE.

Now...just need a little of Sister Rosetta's sweet voice and rocking guitar.....
and I think I can make it through the day. 
 [ Love this classic footage.  Some of the guys in the choir look so tepid and pissed -- you can just hear them grumbling, "Secular devil music!!!! MAKE HER STOP!!  It's not FAIR -- she's better than me, my brother AND Chuck Berry!!!!  Electric guitars are NOT for girls!!!"]




Thursday, March 10, 2011

Fascism anyone?? Anyone???? Bueller......?????

 Does anyone remember the secular humanist Lawrence Britt??  He closely studied the fascist regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, Suharto, Franco and Pinochet and during the Bush administration he created a list he called the 14 Signs of Fascism highlighting similar, troubling elements found in current era politics .  In light of what the republican legislators did in Wisconsin yesterday by shattering and pissing on union rights, it's especially dead-on.
 
http://www.secularhumanism.org/library/fi/britt_23_2.htm

Where THE HELL do we go from here??  Idaho?  New Jersey? Michigan? Ohio? Indiana?  Pick a state...any state.  What's next on the menu for these power-crazed, corporate-loving bunch of plutocrats??  I mean, oligarchs....er, I mean kleptocrats...no, I mean theocrats....Aw, fuck it -- you know what I'm trying to say.   And you know what I've been wishing, over all of these long days and nights that people have been raising their voices and demonstrating for their rights??  Wouldn't it have been so effin' awesome if president Obama snuck in a visit to Madison to the activists in the capitol building -- like all the times he and other presidents have suddenly appeared in "surprise" visits to Iraq and Afghanistan festooned with giant plastic turkeys and american flags waving from every possible orifice??  Didn't have to bring in coffee and donuts....or even movies to project against a large sheet on the wall (that would've been super rad though, huh?).  Just showing up and being there with the people he promised to represent and fight for would have been priceless.  Please, Mr. President.  We need you.  Do something.  SAY something.  Please keep your promises.

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

No...No...No....and No.

No.........they are not extensions. 

No.........you may not touch them (unless we say it's okay).

No.........I don't smoke marijuana (so stop the hassle about a dealer).
 
No.........they are not braids.

It's kind of like having tattoos...and meeting random people who walk up to you and feel empowered to grab your arm and stroke/touch the tattoo as you stand there with your jaw on the ground. Or any women who have been pregnant and had strangers walk up and stroke/touch their bellies. Seriously, people...respect and personal space shouldn't be such foreign concepts. It never hurts to ask before you act.

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

Thoughts For The Day...


EVERY Day is International Women's Day.


"We learn the rope of life by untying its knots"
                  Jean Toomer -- brilliant Harlem Renaissance poet and novelist

Monday, March 7, 2011

What does the word "ghetto" mean to you?

  
Dictionary.com defines the word as:


1. a section of a city, especially a thickly populated slum area, inhabited predominantly by members of an ethnic or other minority group, often as a result of social or economic restrictions, pressures, or hardships.
 

2. (formerly, in most European countries) a section of a city in which all Jews were required to live.

3. a section predominantly inhabited by Jews.

4. any mode of living, working, etc., that results from stereotyping or biased treatment: 
    job ghettos for women; ghettos for the elderly.
 
Who do you think of when you hear or say the word "ghetto"??

Do you automatically think of uncultured, poorly educated, loud, black people from low-income neighborhoods??

Do you automatically think of the ghettos where Jews were forced to live in European countries?

Do you automatically think of the ghettos Irish and European immigrants lived in when they first arrived in the US?

When you think of poor whites in this country do you automatically label them as "trashy"??

What's the difference between ghetto and trashy? 

It has been beyond bizarre to watch the way the word ghetto has morphed into an acceptable tag to label a certain class of black people.  It's troubling to see how it has exploded into a favored pop culture term in light of its self-hating, negative racial overtones.  I can't help but also think of how some blacks -- particularly among the young who idolize their rapper heroes -- boast that they've "reclaimed" the hateful word "nigger", as well.   

Every time I hear a black person call another black person the n-word a part of me feels like the world has been turned upon its head. EVERY TIME I hear that word I can’t help but remember the disturbing reality that when my father was about 8 yrs old he accompanied his older cousins and uncles to cut down the body of a cousin from a tree in the woods where he had been hung by the klan. “NIGGERS DIE” had been carved deep into his chest with a knife and his body had been mutilated. That experience combined with all the other racism he endured during jim crow and segregation had a profound effect him. He grew into a very angry, bitter, abusive man. That word will NEVER be ok with me. EVER. So many people are forgetting history. It’s troubling that we’re living in a time where people — especially the young — are losing sight of what our elders went through during the furnace of jim crow and the civil rights movement and whose shoulders we're standing upon right now. I think the last straw for me was when I was riding a bus to work here in San Francisco and a large group of Asian kids got on going to school, dressed in their finest rap/hip-hop attire, and began rapidly spitting out the n-word at each other and an urban patois of  poor speech and grammar. I don’t think that’s quite the “dream” of equality civil rights fighters like Dr. King, Odetta, Malcolm X and Dr. Dorothy Height hoped for.

I have a number of white friends all over the country who have kids in city/urban schools where some of their peers are from low-income and poor households.  It's been extremely sobering and painful to listen to some of them throw around the word ghetto as they negatively refer to the more "troubled" students (many who happen to be black and/or Latino), families and neighborhoods some of these kids are from (often in front of their own kids' ever-listening ears).   A number of them are blissfully ignorant with the way they only use "ghetto" to label lower income, uneducated, uncultured blacks and "trashy" to label lower income, uneducated, uncultured whites.  Some are very uncomfortable when they're called on it.  Others displayed a kind of hubris and quiet bigotry that knocked me on my ass (and damaged the friendship).  Whenever I hear them or anyone else, for that matter, using these words I always strive to remind them that poor EQUALS poor, no matter what race/ethnicity, etc. 

Some people may think this is such a petty issue, but it's not.  That old "sticks and stones" adage doesn't hold a lot of water for many people in the times we're living in.  Children are sponges and they soak up so much of what they hear and model from the behavior of the elders and peers around them.  There are still so many hidden Americas of color, within the US, and the majority of white people still have no clue about them (and many, unfortunately, just don't care to learn) --  black America...American Indian America...Latino America, Korean American, Asian Indian America, etc.  There is still a major battle for equality, dignity and civil rights going on, and there a lot of folks who have given up on the "dream". 

If you don't quite get what I'm trying to say, consider the fact that there are still scores of low-income communities of color where children and teens don't receive the same kinds of encouragement and support, even as their poor white counterparts. There are damaging messages that continue to be thrown around that plant the wrong seeds in young black, Latino and American Indian minds and so much of it is steeped in negative self-esteem and the fact that misery often loves company, such as: 

-- If you speak proper English and good grammar you're trying to "talk white" and be 
     something you're not.

-- If you actually like to go to school everyday, look forward to reading/studying/learning   
    new things and give a damn about your GPA you're trying to be "stuck up" and better than
    the people in your family or neighborhood peer group who look down upon and actively 
    discourage these aspirations.

-- Striving to be middle class/working class is a negative, "bougie" idea
    (pronounced boo-gee as in bourgeois) and, again,  means you're striving to be something 
     you shouldn't and, of course, means you're ashamed of being black.

True enough, we live in an age where the shifting sands of semantics and linguistics turn and evolve quicker than we can all keep up with.  "Bad" no longer means bad, as a negative connotation.  "Sick" no longer only means sick, as a term of ill health or even maladaptive behavior.  But there are some words which hold such hate and weighty dysfunction, we should all be careful and mindful about how they are used.  If you're a parent of any color, across all socio-economic groups, etc. teach your kids about the true origins and meanings of words like nigger, ghetto and other racist/sexist/xenophobic epithets.  Help plant the seeds of how dangerous it is to judge an entire class of people based on the actions of a troubled number among the many -- especially who/what is depicted in the mainstream media. Are there poor whites who speak in extremely poor English and broken grammar, speak loudly in public, flunked out of their schools, got knocked-up at 14, have children by 4 different fathers, got addicted to crack and meth, fathered 7 kids by 7 different mothers, have a deep love for malt liquor and hot sauce...and live on welfare??  Absolutely.  Are American whites judged as an entire race based on these variables??  Absolutely NOTThere is so much work that still needs to be done towards equality and understanding.  Each and every one of us have a part to play.