(Source: blau-rosa)
“It is white power that makes the laws, and it is violent white power in the form of armed white cops that enforces those laws with guns and nightsticks. The vast majority of Negroes in this country live in these captive communities and must endure these conditions of oppression because, and only because, they are black and powerless. I do not suppose that at any point the men who control the power and resources of this country ever sat down and designed these black enclaves, and formally articulated the terms of their colonial and dependent status, as was done, for example, by the apartheid government of South Africa. Yet, one cannot distinguish between one ghetto and another. As one moves from city to city, it is as though some malignant racist planning-unit had done precisely this—designed each one from the same master blueprint. And indeed, if the ghetto had been formally and deliberately planned, instead of growing spontaneously and inevitably from the racist functioning of the various institutions that combine to make the society, it would be somehow less frightening. The situation would be less frightening because, if these ghettoes were the result of design and conspiracy, one could understand their similarity as being artificial and consciously imposed, rather than the results of identical patterns of white racism which repeat themselves in cities far apart as Boston and Birmingham. Without bothering to list historic factors which contribute to this pattern—economic exploitation, political impotence, discrimination in employment and education—one can see that to correct this pattern will require far-reaching changes in the basic power-relationships and the ingrained social patterns with the society. The question is, of course, what kind of changes are necessary, and how is it possible to bring them about?
In recent years, the answer to these questions which has been given by most articulate groups of Negroes and their white allies—the “liberals” of all stripes—has been in terms of something called “integration.” According to the advocates of integration, social justice will be accomplished by “integrating the Negro into mainstream institutions of the society from which he has been traditionally excluded.” It is very significant that each time I have heard this formulation is has been in terms of “the Negro,” the individual Negro, rather that in terms of the community.
This concept of integration has to be based on the assumption that there was nothing of value in the Negro community and that little of value could be created among Negroes, so the thing to do was to siphon off the “acceptable” Negroes into the surrounding middle-class white community. Thus the goal of the movement for integration was simply to loosen up restrictions barring the entry of Negroes into the white community. Goals around which the struggle took place, such as public accommodation, open housing, job opportunity on the executive level (which is easier to deal with than the problem of semi-skilled and blue-collar jobs which involve more far-reaching economic adjustments), are quite simply middle-class goals, articulated by a tiny group of Negroes who had middle-class aspirations. It is true that the student demonstrations in the South during the early Sixties, out of which SNCC came, had a similar orientation. But while it is hardly a concern of a black sharecropper, dish-washer, or welfare recipient whether a certain fifteen-dollar-a-day motel offers accommodations to Negroes, the overt symbols of white superiority and the imposed limitations on the Negro community had to be destroyed. Now, black people must look beyond these goals, to the issue of collective power.”
| Stokely Carmichael
- There are more African American adults under correctional control today — in prison or jail, on probation or parole — than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began.
- As of 2004, more African American men were disenfranchised (due to felon disenfranchisement laws) than in 1870, the year the Fifteenth Amendment was ratified, prohibiting laws that explicitly deny the right to vote on the basis of race.
- A black child born today is less likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born during slavery. The recent disintegration of the African American family is due in large part to the mass imprisonment of black fathers.
- If you take into account prisoners, a large majority of African American men in some urban areas have been labeled felons for life. (In the Chicago area, the figure is nearly 80%.) These men are part of a growing undercaste — not class, caste — permanently relegated, by law, to a second-class status. They can be denied the right to vote, automatically excluded from juries, and legally discriminated against in employment, housing, access to education, and public benefits, much as their grandparents and great-grandparents were during the Jim Crow era.
for people who want to read more accessible writing about the raced and economic contours of the prison industrial complex, check out Are Prisons Obsolete? By Angela Davis
![hejjmobejjmo:
thedailywhat:
Ted Nugent Drama of the Day: Ted Nugent, at the NRA convention Saturday:
“If Barack Obama becomes the president in November, again, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year.”
A Secret Service spokesman, responding accordingly:
“We are aware of the incident, and we are conducting appropriate follow-up.”
DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, going on the offensive today:
“Mitt Romney must condemn Nugent’s violent and hateful rhetoric immediately, as it has no place in our political discourse or this campaign.”
Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul, forced to play defense:
“Divisive language is offensive no matter what side of the political aisle it comes from. Mitt Romney believes everyone needs to be civil.”
Sigh.
[ww]
I’m now putting Ted Nugen at the top of the list of reasons I left Michigan.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2ncoqYIna1qzpwi0o1_500.jpg)
Ted Nugent Drama of the Day: Ted Nugent, at the NRA convention Saturday:
“If Barack Obama becomes the president in November, again, I will either be dead or in jail by this time next year.”
A Secret Service spokesman, responding accordingly:
“We are aware of the incident, and we are conducting appropriate follow-up.”
DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, going on the offensive today:
“Mitt Romney must condemn Nugent’s violent and hateful rhetoric immediately, as it has no place in our political discourse or this campaign.”
Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul, forced to play defense:
“Divisive language is offensive no matter what side of the political aisle it comes from. Mitt Romney believes everyone needs to be civil.”
Sigh.
[ww]
I’m now putting Ted Nugen at the top of the list of reasons I left Michigan.
He said this man was watching him, so he put his hoodie on. He said he lost the man. I asked Trayvon to run, and he said he was going to walk fast. I told him to run but he said he was not going to run.
…Trayvon said, ‘What, are you following me for?’ and the man said, ‘What are you doing here?’ Next thing I hear is somebody pushing, and somebody pushed Trayvon because the (phone) headset just fell. I called him again and he didn’t answer the phone.
”| — | From an ABC News interview with a friend of Trayvon Martin; she recounted her last phone call with Trayvon before he was murdered by George Zimmerman with a gunshot to the chest. (via lepetitmortpourmoi) (Source: inothernews) |
| — | - Michael Skolnik. (via surruhmac) Teenage Black americans don’t make good postcards / it was never about justice (via readnfight) (Source: goodgood) |
Everything hurts.
I’m sorry. I do not find this racist AT ALL. It is the truth. I am not racist AT ALL. I was not raised that way. But this is so true. I think all this stuff is just as racist. When Obama was elected the first time, black kids walked around chanting “Black power!” and if that had been me and my friends, we would have been expelled, so why weren’t these kids punished for their equally as racist commments? If you do anything based on RACE alone, or excludes a certain race, it is racism. It doesn’t matter which race, it doesn’t matter what it is. It is racism.
^agreed.
I hate being black sometimes….
Why..?
…
…
…
White folks never stop and think “Hey, maybe if my people hadn’t oppressed, segregated, and dehumanized POC so much, it wouldn’t have led to them hiding away and creating their own safe spaces to be themselves where my presence wouldn’t stifle them.”
And maybe we create these spaces and communities for ourselves because we’ve never been welcomed in yours.
History. How does it work?
