Today's StoryCorps episode, as aired on NPR's NPR Morning Edition, a woman of grandmotherly age described learning from her great-grandmother, Sylvia, about Sylvia's experiences gaining literacy after attaining freedom subsequent to the Civil War.
That is to say, there are Black People ALIVE TODAY who PERSONAL KNEW formerly enslaved people.
Don't let anyone say anything to you about how the chattel enslavement of Black People in the States is all in the past. It isn't. It is directly part of the stories of people who are alive today.
Freedom to Be Me: The meanderings of a freed mind.
Friday, 6 November 2020
Michigan Republicans Have No Integrity
Do you know which party the KKK took over here in Michigan as it swept county party to county party to county party? Republican. This was before even the 1948 walkout of the Dixiecrats. It was all the way back to 1924, when we whites issuing history revisionist apologia like to claim that It WaS dEmOcRaTs WhO sTaRtED tHe KkK!
Now, we have a party that actively colludes with white supremacist militias which take part in terrorist activities. They go to protests held by those militias. They get their photos taken when them. They support their political agendas. Nothing has changed in this state. White supremacist violence continues to control our politics.
Michigan's history of Republican collusion with white supremacists stretches back for nearly a century. There is no way that anyone here can convince me that they have had any integrity.
Now, we have a party that actively colludes with white supremacist militias which take part in terrorist activities. They go to protests held by those militias. They get their photos taken when them. They support their political agendas. Nothing has changed in this state. White supremacist violence continues to control our politics.
Michigan's history of Republican collusion with white supremacists stretches back for nearly a century. There is no way that anyone here can convince me that they have had any integrity.
Monday, 20 April 2020
Stop (Mis)Diagnosing Trump
Hi. I am mentally ill. Here are some things that I am not:
* capricious
* greedy
* self-centred
* wilfully racist
* a proponent of libertarianism
* unfair, save to the wealthy and powerful
* inspired by autocrats
trump Is not guided by any mental illness. Racism is not a mental illness. Neither is greed. Nor is obsession with autocracy. None of these things or other behavioural problems present in That Man can be found in the DSM.
Please. Stop equating his disgusting ideology with mental illness. There is a canyon of a difference between the two.
He makes choices. We live with monsters in our heads.
* capricious
* greedy
* self-centred
* wilfully racist
* a proponent of libertarianism
* unfair, save to the wealthy and powerful
* inspired by autocrats
trump Is not guided by any mental illness. Racism is not a mental illness. Neither is greed. Nor is obsession with autocracy. None of these things or other behavioural problems present in That Man can be found in the DSM.
Please. Stop equating his disgusting ideology with mental illness. There is a canyon of a difference between the two.
He makes choices. We live with monsters in our heads.
Thursday, 26 March 2020
Tuesday, 31 December 2019
On White Gayness in the 2010s
One of the ways that I remember the 2010s is how we white gays ignored Black People. We won a victory at SCOTUS whilst Black People's voting rights were decimated. None of us noticed. None of us cared.
Mass incarceration continued to spiral out of control. Black Children were killed by cops and lay-folk alike. More power has been added to the police state. Yet whilst Black People's have been struggling for their very lives, we have been trumpeting laws and court cases that would improve our own lot in life.
Black transgender women are slaughtered in this country. We white gays react after the fact, but we do nothing to ensure that Black Transgender people are stably housed, gainfully employed, given access to nutritious foods, or provided healthcare - all of which are necessary to remain more out of the reach of bigoted murderers.
May we begin to care - to really and truly care - in the 2020s and beyond.
Mass incarceration continued to spiral out of control. Black Children were killed by cops and lay-folk alike. More power has been added to the police state. Yet whilst Black People's have been struggling for their very lives, we have been trumpeting laws and court cases that would improve our own lot in life.
Black transgender women are slaughtered in this country. We white gays react after the fact, but we do nothing to ensure that Black Transgender people are stably housed, gainfully employed, given access to nutritious foods, or provided healthcare - all of which are necessary to remain more out of the reach of bigoted murderers.
May we begin to care - to really and truly care - in the 2020s and beyond.
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