Sunday, August 31, 2008

Survival

Have we moved into a period in our existence as human beings where our survival as individuals has come into conflict with the survival of our species? 6.7 Billion People are estimated to inhabit the earth at this time in our history. We're projected to reach 8-10 Billion people sometime this century. We use faster than nature can produce and reproduce; exhausting our resources and leaving nothing for future generations. We appear to be killing ourselves as a species to survive and thrive as individuals. Research shows that at the rate in which we reproduce, it would only take 2.9 days to replace the 652,000 Americans killed in battle in all U.S wars and only about 1.4 years to replace the 111 million soldiers and civilians killed in all wars fought in the twentieth century. Though we may miss our loved ones when they pass on, one can assume that the earth doesn't, and our society essentially needs people to die. Technological advances are allowing people to live longer. People are living into their hundreds more and more frequently. When the old won't make way for the new, we're presented with the dilemma of finding more space to accommodate both or eliminating one of the two.
This brings me to the point of this essay, which is population control. Wars cause deaths, Aids cause deaths, poor healthcare causes deaths, homosexuality slows population growth, and Aids does as well. Since the inception of Aids, condoms have become essential to our sexual encounters. Condoms not only protect us from diseases but they also prevent us from conceiving.

If I found my room to be clotted and needed to create more space I would, in all likeliness, look at what I could do without and that would be the first to go. In regards to the governments view on population, this would be the old, poor, and undesirable (minorities). This causes me to ponder this question, how dangerous is it for a species to be at war with itself?

The catch 22; let's say we win our battle with healthcare, we find a cure for cancer and all other diseases, we find a way to exist peacefully on Earth and eliminate the need for wars, and keep reproducing at our current rate; we then put ourselves at risk of extinction from a lack of resources to sustain the population. So what do we do? Do we illuminate these ills that plague our society and subject ourselves to the immanent extinction we'd face as a result of the consumption of resources that would take place as a result of our population growth, or do we accept these ills as evils necessary for the longevity and ultimate survival of our species? You be the judge!

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Nigger Not a Derogatory Term

When I looked up the definition of the word nigger online at Dictionary.com I found the results peculiar to say the least. Nigger is noted as a derivative of the Portuguese word Negro, meaning black. It also notes the sound shifts in the pronunciation of the word in varying regions. In the south Negro switched to Nigra, in the north Nigra shifted to Nigger.

The word nigger became derogatory not because of what it was defined as being, but because of what we were defined as being. In the eyes of most whites during the periods of slavery, to be black was to be ignorant and inferior. Their superiority was in the chains that kept us in bondage. The superior conquers the inferior and we were a conquered people. Whatever definitive term we were labeled would have meant to be ignorant and inferior because in their eyes we were that. To be black meant that, to be African meant that, to be Negro meant that, to be colored meant that. It was not a sentiment that was confined to the term nigger.

Words do not define themselves; people define the meanings of words. It is my belief that our refusal to define our own reality is indicative of our powerlessness as Americans. A word can be defined as one thing, White Americans use it in such a manner that it then becomes defined by their usage, but when we do the same thing the same rules don't apply; why?

Could it be that we've chosen to suppress the spirit of black independence in exchange for integration into white America and the word nigger makes us feel so inferior that it becomes abundantly clear that we are not, and may never be viewed as equals, which in turn threatens the survival of the idea of integration? I do not believe that you can take 400 years of oppression, many more of segregation, more of discrimination, fuse it into one word, burry it and march on to racial harmony.

Today we proudly boast about being black without acknowledging its negative aspects or the insidious ways in which it was used to demonize us as a people. Black; a term that among other things is defined as being: deliberately harmful, inexcusable, sullen or hostile, threatening, without any moral quality or goodness, evil and wicked, we boast as proud of being. In American media outlets, black has always been associated with being "bad" and doing "wrong" why is it okay for us to allow ourselves to be defined by that?

Black Power, "say it loud, I'm Black and I'm proud" we disassociated the word from what they defined it as being, and redefined it as representation of what we saw ourselves as, which was: beautiful, powerful, soulful, and ancient. Black Power was the power to define our own reality, but that was a concept thought up by those who were seeking black independence, people like Stokely Charmichal, who was an integrationist until he came to the realization that there would be no equality for blacks in integration until there were first black independence and solidarity, which we still haven't achieved. Black power wasn't about what black meant to America as much as it was about what it meant to us Black people.

Now we're being asked to sacrifice our ability to define our own reality in the spirit of integration because when it comes to integration, it's not about what concerns you, it's about what concerns everybody. So we have to sacrifice some of the independence we never really had, in order to be accepted into a society we're not really sure wants us there in the first place.

Christianity condoned slavery, aspects of it, such as the curse of Ham Genesis 9:25) alleged that Ham after looking at his father Noah drunken and naked in an unclean manner, was cursed to have all of his decedents be the slaves of all nations and casted us as the decedents of Ham designated to be, "the lowest of slaves to his brothers", using that as a means of justifying our enslavement. For generations they've instilled in our children the idea of whites being associated with the divine by embedding images of a white Jesus in their minds. One would assume that if the son of God is white, then God must be white with these seeds in our brains we were taught to fear God, but blacks proudly boast about being Christian. These blacks have disassociated Christianity with what it was used for and redefined it by what they deem its intent to have been.

With the word Black and the religion Christianity transformed, why such resistance to the word nigger? I assume it to be the idea of what is deemed to be a low class society having the intellectual capacity to do such a thing. I assume this because the rampant use of the word is often attributed to the lack of knowledge of its history which I find to be untrue. I and many of my friends use the term and are very aware of its history. We use the term because to us, it is not defined by what they've defined it to be, it is defined as what we defined it to be. We have chosen to define our reality as those before us had chosen to define theirs, and we are unwilling to accept the idea of us being unintelligible enough to do so.

It is considered ignorant to consider yourself a nigger because a nigger was defined as being ignorant and inferior. But Nigger wasn't defined as being ignorant and inferior, black people were defined as being ignorant and inferior and nigger came to represent that because nigger was another word for black. In my opinion, it's ignorance that leads individuals to perceive the word nigger as a representation of ignorance.

Now, I'm not saying that it's wrong to say it, and I'm not saying it's right. What I'm saying is it's neither and its use shouldn't really be an issue. People often try to make claims of the word being a term of endearment. I find that to be untrue as it's not always used in endearing terms. Among me and my friends it's used more so as a pronoun. Words, like people, change. The only thing consistent in life is change, "Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything" – George Bernard Shaw

Negro, Nigra, Nigger, Nigga

Check this post for even more on this "Can I Call You Nigga Now"

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Saturday, August 30, 2008

Obama; Realism vs. Idealism

The Republicans try to paint Barack Obama like he's one of those evangelists. You know the guys that go to those hick towns, erect tents, and put on these spectacles of passionate speeches where they make claims of being able to heal the sick and handicapped. The logical thinking person knows better than to believe that. The logical thinking person knows that in all likeliness they are going to suffer for the rest of their life from their disease or sickness and eventually die from it. They know there's no way to fix their handicap and mind as well embrace living that way. They want them to put their faith in medications that fail them time and time again, or technology that continues to make handicapped individuals feel dependent, despite the things it can allow them to do.

They think Barack is too inexperienced and naive because he believes you can solve America's problems as oppressed to just coming up with more ways of dealing and coping with them. Fantasy vs. reality, idealism vs. realism is the way the Republican Party would like for the American people to view the election. The question is if we as American people, are too intellectual competent, too rational, too logical to have hope.


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Friday, August 29, 2008

Does Barack Obama Deserve All The Praise?

Do remember how after Easter, you'd go back to school laced in your new gear to show off what you rocked on that day? Remember how the kids that either couldn't afford new clothes or just bought ugly ones, would try to say you were acting different because you had new gear? Maybe you were and maybe you weren't, regardless they would have felt the same way because it wasn't about you. It was about their insecurity.

How about the cool kids, you know, the ones that dressed fly all the time so getting fresh was nothing new to them; the popular ones that got all the girls. You might have been the kid that wasn't ugly but wasn't dip so chicks would front on you and the cool kids that were cool with you, would hang with you but use you as sort of a whipping boy, snapping on your gear and stuff. You came back to school after Easter fresh so your confidence got a boost, you started talking to girls, they were giving you play, when the cool kids snapped on you, you snapped back. The cool kids think, "This dude gets dressed up for one day and forget his place." They're quick to remind you of how bumy you used to be and imply that your Easter outfit was all the fly gear you had.

That whole Easter thing reminds me of Republicans view of Barrack Obama. There are those among them who are jealous of his aura and speaking ability, jealous of his appeal and affect on voters, and jealous of his impact because they lack the ingredients to do what he does. 48 Laws of Power said anything you can't posses show disdain for. Since they don't have it, they try to underplay its importance and act as if it's unconnected to his ability to do the job.

There are the others among them, who, in my opinion, are being a bit racist. Not, "I hate niggers" racist, but that institutionalized, racial hierarchy type of racism. Many whites still view blacks as intellectual inferior. They still feel blacks have a place in America, and that place is a step, or a few steps beneath a white man. They are like the cops who stop innocent black men on highways who drive fancy cars feeling them to be undeserving of such luxuries because of the color of their skin.

I think America has gotten too used to the image of the humble black man with his hat in his hand begging for a handout. You know how Black folks do something great, then they come on T.V to talk about it and start attributing their success to all these white folks; white teachers, white coaches, etc. Barack Obama's mother is white, but I haven't seen any white politician be brought up as taking Barack under his wing, or teachers as being responsible for challenging him mentally, I've seen Jeremiah Wright though. Which I think makes it clear to many white folks that Barack isn't their "boy". He hasn't been in Washington long enough to be brainwashed by the old white men who run it. He doesn't speak through his nasal passages to suppress the depth of his voice so he can sound less black and consequently less threatening. As many Black Americans sit around questioning whether barrack is Black enough. They've made it somewhat clear that he's too black for them.

There have been many politicians who won the node to run for president, so the idea of winning a primary for the right to run for the presidency doesn't seem that spectacular, but up until this point, they've all been white. The political pundits look at the praise Barack Obama receives and think, " what he has done to deserve this?". They realize what it means to win the opportunity to run for president but they don't realize what it means to accomplish that if you're black. There were many Major League Baseball players before Jackie Robinson, and many Tennis players before Arthur Ash. They don't believe Barack should receive the same praise that we bestowed upon these individuals after they achieved these things and broke down barriers for those that would come behind them, while he has achieved this, the feat of becoming the first black presidential nominee. Maybe we should wait 20 years, or till he gets…I won't say that. They don't believe that Barrack deserves praise because; they feel he hasn't done enough for America as a candidate. They don't understand that he receives praise for what he's done for America as a man. Who's really the celebrity, Barrack or McCain? Check this article > http://newsone.com/article/why-making-history-is-considered-celebrity

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Monday, August 25, 2008

Invisible!

"Invisible" - Gif (Free Download) I was riding the train on my way home from school when I came across this article in the Village Voice. The article was about a young black girl by the name of Ramona Moore. This young girl had been kidnapped, repeatedly raped, tortured, and murdered. Her mother called the police hours after she hadn't returned home but was told she hadn't been missing long enough to be reported missing. The officer, against policy, told the woman he would open up a missing persons case if she called back in a few hours, which would have made her missing for the sufficient amount of time. Mrs. Moore called back the exact time he had specified attempting to file a missing persons report on her daughter. To her surprise, this time she had got the Captain on the phone who told her they wouldn't look for her daughter and that he didn't know why the officer she had spoken to previously would tell her such a thing. They refused to launch an investigation and long story short, Ramona Moore was found dead. It was reported that she had been murdered on the same day that the police department buckled and decided to launch an investigation into her absence. Her mother felt particularly insulted because around that same time there was an older white women. The wife of a doctor, who had went missing along with her dog. This women had been missing less than 24 hours but the morning following her husbands call to the police an all out investigation was launched, checking bank records, phone records, and etc. I decided to do this joint just to no allow this girls memory to be lost. The news never reported the incident because the police told them she was a runaway. The mother of Ramona Moore was made to feel as if her daughter didn't matter, she was made to feel as if her daughter was invisible. That's what I felt like had happened, so that's what I named the song. "Invisible" - Gif (Free Download) All I ask is that you google the name Ramona Moore and don't let her death be in vain. Read the full VillageVoice article Digg!