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Until Death Do Us Part: 8 Reasons For Marital Failure Amongst African Americans By Dr. Umar Abdullah-Johnson, Psy.D., NCSP, M.Ed. Nationwide (November 6, 2011) -- Discussions about the epidemic are everywhere, from the latest best-selling novels to academic discussions on college campuses, to passionate discussions between Frat brothers & Sister circles. The question everyone wants answered is "WHY?" Unfortunately, many of the traditional reasons you have been given for the premature romantic meltdowns amongst Blacks are inaccurate and insufficient. These very same factors were present when successful Black marriages, created 30 or 40 years ago, were forged but yet many a couple managed to stay together. As a child therapist, who spends much of my time navigating the parental relationship in order to create an atmosphere of normalcy in which our children can function, and as a doctor of clinical psychology, who studies the emotional and psychological conditions that give rise to relationship difficulties that are unique to African-Americans, I have discovered that there are several themes running through failed families that if brought to your consciousness may help you escape a dead end relationship, or be able to help resuscitate a dying one back into new life. With nearly most Black children being reared in single parent households it shouldn't come as a surprise that the ADHD diagnosis has been on the rise, which in most cases has nothing to do with any neurologically-based brain dysfunction, but rather a family-based emotional dysfunction that I refer to sarcastically but truthfully as "Absence of Daddy from Home Disorder," which is the real ADHD. If we want to save the Black community, we have to save the Black family, for if the most essential of institutions is destroyed then almost no other can function effectively. 1) SEARCHING FOR SECURITY: UNMET EMOTIONAL NEEDS FROM CHILDHOOD - Because so many of us either come from families that were dysfunctional, or had relationships with parents that were dysfunctional, it's not difficult to understand how one's unconscious conflicts may lead you on a search to find what you never had (i.e., SECURE ATTACHMENT TO A CAREGIVER, ATTENTION, ACCEPTANCE, LOVE/INTIMACY, APPROVAL, TRUST, RECIPROCITY). Because one's relationship behavior, under such circumstances, is largely under the control of unconscious impulses it should come as no surprise to you that selfishness ranks at the top of the list of reasons for relationship dissatisfaction. When your dating or mating behavior is largely driven by an unmet childhood need, your partner simply becomes a means to an end, but NOT the end itself. Thusly, you end up using and exploiting them, for what they can give to you, without offering anything in return. You must become conscious of how your poor relationships with parents, or siblings, is continuing to play out in your romantic behavior, transforming you into an exploiter or victim of emotional exploitation. Before settling down, you'd being doing yourself a huge favor by having an in-depth discussion with your bride or groom to be, to ensure their reasons for marriage are not based upon attempting to overcome childhood insecurities that have plagued them for most of their lives. 2) SELF-HATRED: LOOKING FOR SOMEONE TO LOVE YOU - Many people are their own worse enemy but are totally unconscious of this fact. When something goes wrong in your life do you chalk it up to a learning experience, or human error, or are you one of many Blacks who begins to replay old abusive audiotapes from memory, with your parents' voices (or older siblings) disguised as your own. Do you beat yourself up without mercy, or are you able to comfort yourself when you make mistakes. If your inner voice is that of an abusive and overly punitive parent, chances are you suffer from self-hatred, and it is this self-hatred that is driving you to find a mate who can put out your self-inflicted emotional arson with their cool waters of love and compassion. You can spend a significant portion of your life trying to find love until you come to the realization that you will not be able to reciprocate the love you find if you do not ALREADY love yourself. No matter how much another person loves you, until you love yourself, you will never be able to love them in return appropriately or effectively. In fact, they may choose to walk away from the arrangement after having their emotional forces sucked dry without reciprocity. You don't need a lover, you need a therapist. 3) MATERIALISM MELTDOWN: BUYING HAPPINESS - Needless to say that in a capitalistic society the corporate-owned media will actually be able to convince some African-Americans that marrying someone with economic potential, and the education to go along with it (i.e., MBA, JD, MD, PhD, PsyD, etc) may actually brainwash you into thinking that to find a person who appears able to help your purchase an upper middle class lifestyle may lead to lasting happiness. Nothing could be further from the truth. Listen to me carefully, "money buys pleasure, it can never buy happiness." In fact, the pleasures that money buy often lead to addictions that destroy relationships. This is not an invitation to a life of poverty often so well propagated by the religious sector, that many Blacks erroneously find poverty to be a blessings, but rather this is just a dosage of psychological realism that peace of mind cannot be purchased. Many Black marriages simply dissolve when one superficial partner is no longer content with the "financial ceiling" their partner has hit. A high maintenance partner, man or woman, spells disaster. These individuals are self-centered and emotionally distant. They never get the last laugh as sooner or later old age creeps upon them, and the wisdom of contentment begins to haunt them, but not before then with they give up their self-centered capitalistic mindset to begin the search for an intimacy and love that cannot be purchased with a credit card. 4) ESCAPING MISERY: LOOKING FOR A WAY OUT OF YOUR PAIN - Many of us look for relationships not to satisfy our unmet needs, or our economic desires, but rather as a life jacket to save us from dealing with personal challenges that we don't care to address. All of us have things about ourselves that cause us great discomfort (i.e, problems with relatives, health concerns, dietary issues, professional barriers, unfinished goals, problems on the job, unearned degrees, poor relations with our children, emotional concerns, etc), but yet we don't have the resolve or discipline to face them. Just as an alcoholic or drug user reaches for substances in times of inner pain and turmoil, you simply reach for a new relationship. As all drugs must ultimately reach a point of tolerance, where more is required to retain the desired effect, as soon as one relationship is no longer sufficient to distract us from our personal emotional issues, we discard it and reach for another. RELATIONSHIP ADDICTS, Blacks who cannot be without a romantic partner, is a very real and prevalent concern in our community. Being addicted to relationships is certain to land one in an ongoing, yet unfulfilling, cycle of relationships that are devoid of true reciprocity and intimacy. The problem with relationship addiction is that the relationship cannot save you from yourself, nor can it ever serve as an effective band-aid for your inner conflicts. It's better to fix yourself than destroy someone else's life. Anyone who cannot be alone long enough to develop a relationship with themselves can never build a happy one with another person. 5) POST-TRAUMATIC RELATIONSHIP DISORDER: THE GHOST OF RELATIONSHIPS PAST - In an attempt to acquire happiness, which cannot be obtained from any outside source, including people, many of us do not allow ourselves sufficient time to heal from long-term relationships, or short-term exhausting relationships, that have sapped our emotional, spiritual and psychological energies. Between relationships we all need a period of fasting, where we give our minds and souls the opportunity to heal and rest, before we attempt to "get it right the next time." We always hear talk about the need for dietary fasting and spiritual fasting, but now is the time for me to introduce the concept of relationship fasting. Yes, a period of NON-DATING, that should last at least a season (3 months) before you infect some innocent person's life with the negative energy of a past relationship. Just as with all traumas, you need time to re-stabilize your inner self and regain a sense of reality. When you don't give yourself TIME OFF from forging new romantic attachments you risk spoiling what otherwise would have been a perfectly good relationship with your psychic baggage from your previous love(s). You are not able to trust, love, commit, reciprocate and be emotionally available for fear that he or she may be a rendition of the previous failed partnership. If you are still afraid, that means you are still suffering the aftershocks of post-traumatic relationship disorder, and should not be dating. This is one of the biggest problems with relationships in our community, as too many of us are spiritually infected with the unhealthy energies of past encounters, not to mention still in love with previous partners, thusly wasting the time of an innocent person who has healthy relationship needs that you are not able to fulfill since you are still preoccupied with someone who is no longer in your life, or shouldn't be. You have to get over your past in order to get on with your life. There is a season for everything, including a time to heal. 6) TYRANNY OF YOUR INNER CHILD: THE PAIN BODY EXPERIENCE - Everyone, regardless of Race, has a pain body. An inner child who has never really grown up, and has been wounded in some way during our earlier years. This inner child usually sleeps and never bothers us until something happens, usually something that causes an intense insecurity, embarrassment or fear, sufficient enough to awake the sleeping inner kid and causes him/her to have a temper tantrum. When we date we are usually selling our conscious better selves to our partner, like a good salesperson we tend to hide, consciously or unconsciously, the negative aspects of our character, which tend to reveal themselves until an experience occurs that lessens our ego's desire to hide its TRUE SELF. So you've been dating for 3 years and now she's pregnant, or the two of you decide to co-habitate, or get engaged, or get married. Now, finally, the real you will begin to reveal itself. That's right, not just the positive side of your personality that has been on display the past 3 years, but the negative side of your personality is about to show itself for the very first time, and in full effect. Once your partner's pain body has been awaken, that tyrannical inner child, you are face-to-face with a person that you never really knew. You have never seen him/her under real stress until now, and you realize you have been sold a false personality picture, and you thusly decide it's time to end a situation that has been 3 years in the making but only 3 months in duration. This is why most Black divorcees do so within 2 years of jumping the broom - they never saw their partner's pain body until it's too late. That is why, as a therapist, I am in full support, despite opposition of religious circles, that pre-marital co-habitation is a must. Only when you actually share 24 hrs a day with your mate-to-be will you truly be able to assess who they really are. It is so very easy to hide one's negative traits behind a false façade of being the "perfect catch." Until you have seen his/her pain body, regardless of how many years into the relationship, you are still dating a stranger. 7) WE DON'T HAVE ANYTHING IN COMMON: THE CLASH OF VALUES - One of the biggest misconceptions regarding Black marriage is the need to have things in common. This is so not true, you don't need to have anything in common (i.e, careers, hobbies, interests, etc) EXCEPT VALUES. Two people may appears to be twins on the outside, coming from the same types of homes, same religious backgrounds, same careers, same hobbies and interests but yet be total opposites INTERNALLY. Non-identical values are destroying Black families faster than fire consumes wood. At the top of the list is finances. You may love to spend money, and live paycheck to paycheck, but your mate values saving over the long term, and not being a spendthrift. Such a clash of values is likely to erode the foundation upon which the marriage stands. Another is GOD. You love going to worship service, and it's a regular part of your weekly routine. However, your mate, who is of the same religion and claims to value God as much as you do, doesn't see the need to attend bible study or Friday/Sunday worship at the Masjid/Church. This is going to cause a major conflict because it heightens the true values gap that exists between the two of you. Some of the others include intimacy, in-laws & friends. You may like to spend more time with your friends that your family, or you mother may like to play a bigger role in your marriage than she should, or you think that physical intimacy one night a week should be sufficient while your partner values regular intimacy as a foundational aspect to his/her marriage. Clashes over values can be easily avoided by making sure they are discussed during the dating/courting process. When you clash over values it's because you really didn't take sufficient time to get to know your mate. You were so busy focusing on your own values that you didn't bother to study his/hers. 8) BLENDING THE UNBLENDABLE FAMILY: YOUR CHILDREN OR OUR CHILDREN - Co-Raising children, even if the children are biologically your own, can be a very difficult issue to tackle in marriage. However, when you have children and your mate has children of his/her own, brining all of those personalities under the same family governmental system can be quite a challenge. Sometimes, we never prepare ourselves for the fact that marriage truly means "what is yours is also mine." Thusly, it becomes difficult for us to allow someone else to chastise our children. When partners feel that you don't want them raising your children they begin to question the commitment your have for them overall. Think about it, what better way to show trust and true reciprocity than to allow him/her the opportunity to share in the decision-making duties of their non-biological children. When you are not able to do this it creates a trust gap in the relationship that can only widen with time. Still further, when you differ over how the children should be raised and discipline techniques, or even just the need for discipline itself, things can begin to get really rocky in that once peaceful household. As a therapist, I have seen the Black mothers' traditional over-protection of her son lead to standoffs with her new husband, who refuses to share power, nor should he, with a spoiled teenage boy. I have also seen where a biological father's love for his daughter has prevented him from making it clear that his wife is not one of her girlfriends. When these small fires are not stamped out of existence, they threaten to burn down the entire marriage. Before settling down, spend some time with your mate's children, get to know them, and ask yourself if you can tolerate those particular personalities for the rest of YOUR life. Study how different your discipline approaches are, and whether or not you can find common ground, especially when you don't share the role of biological parent. Most importantly, check your own possessiveness, and readiness for having another person treat your children like their own. If you are not ready for this, then you are not ready for marriage. These are just a few major issues that can threaten, add oftentimes destroy, what could have otherwise been a happy marriage in the Black community. Certainly, a book can be written about each of the above-mentioned issues, and I plan to follow-up by doing just that. Nonetheless, we should want what's best for our children, and that is a safe and happy home with their biological parents. None of us are perfect, and there is nothing wrong with moving past a terrible situation, as staying in an emotionally unfulfilling relationship, just for the sake of the kids, can end up hurting the children more than you. Let's face it, we live in a psychologically unhealthy society, where the pursuit of material, economic & professional accomplishment has reduced the importance of family and children to being nothing more than social assets we use to given the impression that we are psychologically healthy, when in all actuality we are rotting from the stench of American Capitalism. Just take a look at the suicide and homicide rates in the Black community, and you will see that we are a people in crisis. Still further, just take a look at the rates of depression, bipolar & borderline personality disorders in our community, and you will see that our people, a historically faithful people, are now dying from spiritual hunger. Domestic violence and child molestation are two taboo topics that neither the Black Masjid or Black Church is willing to discuss openly and honestly, which leaves it to crusading Black behavioral specialists, like myself, to set the record straight as to why so many of us are living as "functional depressives." The Black family is facing extinction because the spiritually-grounded non-materialistic African-American personality is facing extinction. Two spiritually unhealthy individuals cannot build a healthy family. The point of intervention should not be the family, but the individuals who created it. Stop putting the cart before the horse, career before family, and money before GOD. Umar Abdullah-Johnson is a Doctor of Clinical Psychology, Nationally Certified School Psychologist, Certified K-12 School Principal, and political scientist. He is an expert independent special education evaluator. He trains educators, principals and mental health technicians on various psycho-educational topics, including ADHD & disruptive behavior disorders. He is an outspoken opponent against the mass psychiatric drugging of Black boys in public schools, and the mass diagnosing of Black children as mildly mentally retarded and learning disabled. He has appeared on the Tom Joyner Morning Show, the Bev Smith Show, and countless radio and talk shows across the country, in Africa and in the Caribbean. He will be speaking at Arcadia University's Black Male Development Symposium in Philadelphia on May 12th, 2012, HBCU Charles Drew University, Keck Lecture Hall, in Los Angeles on December 2nd 2012 & the 12th Annual Central Texas African-American Family Conference in Austin on February 16th 2012, discussing the topic of his highly anticipated upcoming debut book, "The Psycho-Academic War Against Black Boys: From Grade School to the Grave Yard." He is Founder/President of the National Movement to Save Black Boys (NMSBB), and a blood relative of Frederick Douglass, the 19th century Abolitionist & Orator. He can be reached for consultation or lecture scheduling at DrUmarJohnson@yahoo.com or (215) 989-9858. http://www.blacknews.com/news/marital_failure_african_americans101.shtml

I don't know. But i had a set of twins comment on my sexual persona. The lesbian though I was gay. And the heterosexual one thought i was straight. Some Gay men think I am gay because I dont judge them or don't overcompensate. I just treat them as people. Lesbians it can either go well badly or strangely.

Perhaps Intuition is one of my greatest psychic strengths. I believe God has blessed me with a gift of strong insight and being able to discern and see patterns in human thought and behavior. Despite dreams, visions, and precognitions......all of which offer some validity. I'm still convinced that no one can really KNOW the future except God.

I absolutely would use my extrasensory perception for financial gain. From time to time I feel like I have extra sensory experiences. For example, when I was a kid, if I was in the lobby of my apartment building I knew what my mother was preparing for dinner --especially if it was something I liked. I could "smell" the meal. Years later I realized it was physically impossible for me to smell a meal that was being prepared in an apartment 3 stories away, but if happened so frequently it could not be chalked up to coincidence. I even experienced this in within the last few years. Now I can't do it on demand it just comes to me. I've also had the persistent thought that the Earth as we know it will not persist. Interestingly, it is not a negative feeling, more of a feeling of pending transition. It is not a situation that only I experience, like my own death, but one many people will experience or transition that many people will experience simultaneously. Again I'd know what it means or even if I could understand it, but it feels like something that will occur in my natural life time.

This picture is nether wrong nor right to me. The imputedmeanung is not in the picture it is in your mind. If enough people share a hallucination we call it reality. Hey twin you may be nicer but you aren't a welcome mat.

@Mel Hopkins LinkedIn allows you to search for a specific company and send a message to that person. There isn't any political banter and if your profile is solid, people will connect to you. It's a great place to seek employment and because of that it is the most efficient form of social media next to blogging. Twitter actually comes in second for me because of the same ability to tag, retweet and connect to a person you are looking to align yourself with. With all of that said, the biggest driver of traffic to my website is search. Our job is to literally create so much content that Google includes our content in their search listings. Even with over 3000 social media followers combined I only get about 4% of my overall traffic from social. The majority of my traffic, which has seen a +600% increase since October 2016, is from direct links and search. AALBC is almost = in directing traffic to my sneaker website as both Twitter and Facebook.

Cynique there are signs everywhere if you pay attention. My phone deletes posts and calls people. Yeah Mel and I may have been related. Shes the nicer nore diolomatic twin.

I'm glad y'all weren't bored by my self-indulgence in posting my akashic stream of consciousness, - a whole post about ME. . @DelanoI'd be very interested in your doing a reading on me. And i'd have no problem with you posting it here for all to see. Mel and Del; maybe you 2 were twins in another life. In addition to you all, i also have a kinship with, as well as a curiosity about my computer. Could it be like a psychic medium , a channel to the consciousness of others since it involves waves that traverse cyber space and pick up vibrations and transmit thoughts?? Sometimes, with me, keying replicates an automatic writing experience where words just flow from my brain to my fingers. Other times my computer seems to have a mind of its own and other times it's like it's an extension of me. I talk to it all the time, and swear at it when it messes up. it's like a husband. Good thing i avoid the porn sites. On 3 occasion, i have been pissed about something and have written an e-mail cursing out or telling someone off, only to have the completed letter suddenly disappear from the screen before i can send it. These occurrences spooked me so i had a change of heart about re-writing and sending the e-mail, which proved to be a good thing in hindsight. One of the emails had to do with my late 22-year-old grandson who was killed in a drive-by, and the church where the funeral was held, After the letter vanished, i wondered if my grandson had something to do with it, and I could just hear him saying, ."just forget it, Nana, What you wrote might upset my Momma cuz you known how much she likes that church she goes to." So i let it go.. Which was probably a good thing...

Troy I am thinker. I will thoroughly explain racism from my perspective. Although I had done so in a previous post. I forgot the Trump question. Trump is not a racist he is an opportunist and misanthrope. His biographer says Trump has no philosophy. Its just grab as much ___ as you can. He did a photo op with Kanye West and Black Educators. With a rather large smile. Donald Trump is for Donald Trump. Why does Melania choose not to stay in one of the most prestigious pieces of real estate. She would rather be in New York. Your TV comment seems to mirror my statement about racism not being seen. In this case you acknowledge and vote with your dollars. However this is a personal choice not part of a larger boycott. I am hesitant to point this out. Since you spend your life promoting books. However Mel point is valid. Your argument is a weak counter. However you spend a Herculean amount of effort to educate the Folks. There are two streams to racism. Economic and Social. For owners its a way to keep Everyone in place. Just like every other ism. There's an intersting article that looks at Slavery as work place harrasment. Using rape of Women and Men as a control technique. Apparently Alpha Black Men were anally raped publicly. The overseer is meant to feel superior to the slaves.Poor Whites were made overseers. Translation your better than them but not as good as us. Pioneer believes his world is the world. You are starting to sound more like Pioneer. I have a neutral position. Which allows me more freedom of thought. Or freer thinking. It's impossible to have an open mind unless you can see your beliefs and assumptions. I am also observing the style of discussion. I saw Leslie Jones do stand up before? SNL. You can say whatever you want in comedy. If it's not funny then it's offensive.

Interview with Assata Shakur Paul Davidson Assata Shakur in politcal exile in Cuba Paul Davidson is a veteran Cuba solidarity activist from Britain who has visited Cuba many times with IFCO/Pastors for Peace and with British solidarity brigades. He was recently in Cuba with the 11th Friendshipment Caravan. Friends, This valuable interview was granted to 60 participants of the 11th US-Cuba Friendshipment Caravan (Pastors for Peace) in Havana on Nov 6th last. Assata is one of those unique human beings who is able to articulate, through her own experience in a lifetime of struggle, profound truths about the world we live in. Assata is one of the 80 or so ex- Black Panthers being persecuted by US authorities and given sanctuary by Cuba. As a result of Cuba's noble stand the island has been named a 'terrorist nation' by the US regime, a categorisation they repeatedly use in legislation to entrench the blockade. Thanks to Karen Lee Wald for recording the event and forwarding her transcription. Paul Davidson Assata Shakur addresses Pastors for Peace caravan Instituto Cubano de Amistad a los Pueblos (ICAP) - in Havana on 6th November 2000 (the first few questions are missing due to bad tape). In this first part Assata spoke about how she became a Black Panther in the 1960s and was targeted by the FBI. She spoke of the role of the press in collaborating with this campaign until she and other companeros were finally forced underground. She told how she was captured in 1970 and accused of killing a New Jersey policeman, although medical testimony showed that she had been shot twice -- once with her arms up in the air -- and so could not possibly have shot anyone after that. Nevertheless, she was convicted by an all- white racist jury to a sentence of life +. She spent 6 1/2 years in prison, 2 of them in solitary confinement. Karen Lee Wald Assata: In 1979 I was liberated by some friends, and in 1984 I came to Cuba, where I was united with my daughter and was able to bond with her for the first time. And to begin healing the wounds. Here, I worked, studied, mothered and continued to be an activist. I found that Cuba was much different from the US; its government was genuinely trying to erase racism. But racism had grown out of slavery and exploitation and was very hard to eradicate quickly and completely. Cuba has been undergoing a process to eliminate racism) .. Cuba like every other place has got to struggle against the whole racist ideology that it inherited, the culture, the eurocentric way of viewing the world where Europe is this big (shows with her hands) and Africa and Asia and Latin America are these little microscopic dots on the map. That's a process that has to be helped and contributed to by everybody, because the whole way the world is viewed now, the way that science, literature and history are used, is totally distorted and Eurocentric. In order for the world to be free of racism that is a struggle that has to be waged on all fronts by all people. I think that more than anything, the whole cultural imperialism that is going on today where people, whether they're in Senegal, South Africa, Indonesia, are looking at this USA vision of the world that is totally distorted, totally unreal, that really diminishes and minimalizes the cultural values and wisdom of people all over the world, and sells this kind of McDonald-ized vision of the world that everybody is supposed to aspire to. Cuba is very important in that struggle, because Cuba is not only talking about racism in abstract terms, but connecting it with imperialism, which is the underlying motor of racism today. The underlying reason that racism keeps on being promoted in all of its various forms today. I think anybody who is honestly struggling against racism must struggle against imperialism and vice versa. Q. You could have gone to many countries for asylum. Why did you choose Cuba? A. I decided to come to Cuba for a variety of reasons. One, because it was close to the United States, and I considered it to be a very principled country. It has a long history of supporting victims of political repression, not only of people in the United States, like Huey Newton, Robert Williams, Eldridge Cleaver (a long list of people), but also people who were victims of political repression in other places, like Chile, the apartheid government of South Africa, Namibia, etc. I felt this was a place that held the principle of international very close to heart, so I felt comfortable coming here. It was close, so I wouldn't be separated from my family and friends. And I really wanted to know what happens in a place that is trying to build socialism, that's trying to construct some form of social justice. That's trying to feed people, to make health care and education a right. When I came I had some very silly ideas, to be honest. My fantasy of Cuba was that everybody was going to be going around looking like Fidel, with green uniforms -- and it was very different from my vision of how Cuba was going to be. I found that people had all kinds of levels of consciousness, all kinds of levels of education, but that Cubans in general were very educated politically. I could go sit in a bus and get into a conversation with someone and that person had a wealth of knowledge. And energy! What most impressed me about Cuba was the optimism. There are 11 million people on this island who have an incredibly optimistic vision of the world. My mother put it into words most clearly when she said: "If these people had not won, had not taken power, everybody would think they were insane!" (Laughs). People would think the whole revolutionary process was totally insane. How DARE these 11 million people on this little island think they can change the way that this planet is going? How dare they think they can stand up against the United States? That they can have their own system....But that is the kind of magic of Cuba that people have this optimism, this pride, this belief -- not only in themselves but in other people. That to me has been one of the psychic vitamins that has fed me since I've been here and that has taught me the power of people. I was a member of the Black Panther Party, and we used to say "Power to the People", but here in Cuba is where I've seen that put into practise, where I've seen that internalized by people in such a way that people feel empowered to build this planet and to change it. And to contribute and feel privileged to do that. Feel that when they go to sleep at night that all is not in vain. There is some sense in living on this planet. That there is some beauty in constructing something better and giving to other people. And work is a source of pride, not "Oh, I've gotta go to work in the morning". It's another way of looking at the world and another way of living on this planet. Q. Describe experience of being in Cuba, being exiled here. To what extent have you been able to continue being the political person you were in the United States? A. Well, exile is difficult. Anyone who says it's nothing, that it's easy, is simplifying things. Exile for me was hard. When I came here I spoke very little Spanish. Like two words. I couldn't communicate, and people would talk to me like I was a blooming idiot. Like, how did they know? They'd say, "Hello, how are you?" -- simple things. There was no way I could express my personality in Spanish, tell jokes, be specific, describe anything...It was a hard adaptation process. But I went through it and in some ways I guess continue to go through it. For me personally Cuba has been a healing state. When I first got here I had no sense that I had to heal or anything. When you're struggling for your life and you're in the midst of things, you don't feel all the blows. But after awhile I began to understand that oppressed people --just by being oppressed -- suffer serious wounds. You might go into a store, and somebody might follow you around the store, and you would have a choice of how to react: you could confront them and say "Why are you following me around the store?" or you could say to yourself: "Well, I came here to buy some socks, so let me just concentrate on buying the socks." But you still feel the pain. The obvious racism before had affected me, the prisons, torture...my whole life had created wounds, scars in me that in Cuba I was able to find a space to begin to heal. To begin to think, "Yeah, this happened, and I can look at it and see it for what it was but not be there, not be destroyed by it, not be turned into something bitter and evil by it. And not be like my enemies. Because I think that the greatest betrayal that a revolutionary can participate in is to become like the people you are struggling against. To become like your persecutors. I think that is a betrayal and a sin. I think that people who want to change this planet have to seriously understand that as human beings we have to work to be good. I'm saying that in many ways: good at what we do, better people, better in the way we related to people, that we treat other people. Better in our ability to outreach to people. Better in so many ways. And the wounds that are inflicted on our families, on ourselves, we have to heal. We have to work within our families, within our communities, within our neighborhoods, to make it livable. My experience in the United States was living in a society that was very much at war with itself, that was very alienated. People felt not part of a community, but like isolated units that were afraid of interaction, of contact, that were lonely. People didn't build that sense of community that I found is so rich here. One of the things that I was able to take from this experience was just how lovely it is to live with a sense of community. To live where you can drop in the street and a million people will come and help you. That is to me a wealth that you can't find, you can't buy, you have to build. You have to build it within yourself to be capable of having that attitude about your neighbors, about how you want to live on this planet. Q. Some people have voiced concern that the end of the blockade will bring many negative things from the United States to Cuba. What do you think about the blockade ending? A. I think that it's all positive. I think that any time anybody gets rid of oppression, intervention, exploitation, cruelty -- that's positive. I think that the effects of lifting the blockade are all positive. Now that's another question from the effects of exposure to US consumerism, violence, militaristic culture, greed, institutionalized sexual exploitation, Barby-doll vision of women -- those are different things. One is lifting the blockade; the other is cultural imperialism, materialism, etc. Tourism, for example, has affected Cuba, because tourists come and they bring racist, sexist ideas. They bring a whole vision that there are rich people all over the world and that's the way it should be -- you know? The only way to struggle against that is ideological struggle in terms of values. And also improving the economy. People here being able to say, "You have your vision of the world but we have ours, and we are committed to ours." That's a struggle of ideas, of values. And hopefully not only in Cuba, but all over the world, people are saying that this kind of McDonald's, Barby-doll culture that is being pushed by the United States and other big powers is a very empty, sad, alienating kind of culture, and there are much richer values on this earth. Q. How did you get involved in the struggle (become an activist)? A. Well, basically, it was hard not to. I was fortunate enough to grow up in the 60s -- not to idealize the 60s, but there was a lot of political activism going on. I had dropped out of school and was working at this terrible 9-to-5 drudge clerk-type job. I was miserable and not going anywhere. So I decided to go to school. I was in school like two weeks or something and my whole world changed! First of all I met all of these wonderful people who were doing things and were active and positive. Then I started to learn about myself. I grew up in the United States totally ignorant of the history of African people in the United States. Of the literature. I knew about the music and parts of the culture, but in terms of the history of African people I knew nothing. So all of a sudden I was exposed to these people who were talking about Malcolm X, Marcus Garvey, DuBoise -- so many people -- and it was like waking up from a semi-sleep. It was like saying, "Oh, wow! We were there; we struggled, we resisted!" For me as a Black person, it was like coming into touch with the reality of my ancestors, my history. I had grown up at a time when people were being lynched, being attacked with water hoses. Becoming active and learning a different way of viewing my life was a healthy reaction to what I was seeing every day. I actually believed then and still believe that activism is fun! I think that the movement has done more for me as a human being than I will ever be able to do for the movement. Because there's something nice about being able to go to sleep at night saying "You know, tomorrow I'm gonna get up and I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna do that...." I think that being an activist on this planet is a privilege and a pleasure. Q. Could you talk about the Black Panther program? I know that it influenced other activist groups like the American Indian Movement. How could we use some of those ideas? And could you also tell us about the methodology the FBI used to try to infiltrate and destroy these movements? A. The Black Panther Party had a Ten Point Program and Platform. We talked about the right to control our communities, (inaudible -- a summary from notes follows) to be free from induction into the military, the right to food, housing, clothing, jobs and freedom. The BPP was an anti-imperialist, pro-people party, not a racist party. It participated in all progressive organizations and coalitions, with Puerto Ricans, Asian and other liberation movements all over the world. Because of this the BPP came under siege by the police. The FBI framed people on false charges, murdered people, including murdering them in their beds as they did with Fred Hampton... Q. What advise would you have for activists in the US? A. (Summary) First of all we need to put real democracy on the agency in the US, because there is no real democracy there now. I think we need to treat activism as FUN -- because it is fun. We need to develop a political style that's interesting and fun and personal. To celebrate together. Q. I'd like to sort of pull this back to Cuba....The reasoning behind the debate about whether or not to pass a law allowing the sale of food and medicine to Cuba is because the United States has laws imposing unilateral sanctions against trade with what are defined [by the US government] as "terrorist nations". Cuba is on the list of "terrorist nations", not because it has put bombs on civilian airlines that exploded in mid-air -- that's what has been done TO Cuba; there was the one incident of shooting down the airplane of the Cuban-American terrorist organization that was flying over Cuba. But the most important reason that has been given for a number of years now about why Cuba is on that list, why the US calls it a "terrorist" nation, is because Cuba gives political asylum to individuals who the US calls "terrorists". And the US government has demanded that Assata and others like herself who have been given political asylum be returned to the United States. The question that has been raised often is, Are you worried that Cuba will turn you back over to the US government in order to resolve this problem? And if you don't think that Cuba will do that, what does that mean to you? A. I think first of all, I trust Cuba as a principled country. Cuba's strength is that it has been steadfast in its commitment to the principles of liberation, freedom, of resistance to the kind of institutionalized terrorism that the United States government does every day. The US has attacked countries like Grenada, Panama, Libya....the list of victims of US terrorism is almost infinite. And the US government's participation in torture, whether in El Salvador, Guatemala, Chile....is well-documented and widely known. I believe Cuba's strength has been its denouncing that kind of terrorism, torture. It does this politically not only by [providing asylum for] exiles [from terrorist regimes] but also fighting in the context of the United Nations Organization, in world organizations, in denouncing all kinds of terrorist torture in governmental policies. All of the maneuvers by the US government to keep the blockade alive is a manipulation by the US government because "Cuba poses a threat". The real reason Cuba poses a threat has nothing to do with my being here or anyone else being here. It's because Cuba is an example of a country that is actively fighting against imperialist domination and insists on its own right to self-determination and sovereignty. The US government's most acute fear is that other countries are going to follow the Cuban example. They want everybody to know that if you follow this example we will attack you in every way that we can. That is the reality as I see it about the blockade and why it is being continued. The Miami Mafia (as everybody here calls them) has some input into that, but I believe it is not the money the Miami Mafia contributes to both parties that is making US policy what it is. It is the United States' government's insistence on being able to control the world, to tell all the people how to live, to export their version of "dollarocracy" to everybody else and to make every country in the world subservient to the interests of big business. I think that as long as Cuba continued to be strong, I have nothing whatsoever to fear from the Cuban people. In fact I think I have much, much, much to gain in understanding how a people can unite, how people can be strong, and how people can take a little piece of earth and try to mold that piece of art into a work of art and a work of love. Q. Can you comment on the importance of religion and spirituality? A. I think that spirituality is important for all people to develop. I don't mean there necessarily has to be a religious aspect to spirituality. Some people are spiritual in a religious way, other people are spiritual in their work and in their art and in their treatment of other people. In my case, spirituality has been important to me because at periods in my life there's been very little else that I've had going. I've actually needed to call on, to feel the forces of good in this universe to be able to survive. I've always been a student of different ways of looking at the world, different religions. That's been part of my survival mechanism, and also part of my curiosity as a person, because I believe that some people spell "good" with two o's and some people spell it with one....and there shouldn't be a contradiction between that. In Cuba I was able to broaden my vision of spirituality. Here for the first time I became aware of the African and African-Cuban religions and began to study them and see how people interacted and made very common things -- rocks and leaves and shells -- into things that were very precious. I saw how people respected history, not only in terms of the revolutionary government preserving history--because I think that one of the great things that the Cuban revolution has done is preserve history. I came here and there's a museum called the Museum of the Revolution. I got to one little case and there were these shoes of one of the revolutionary heroes who died before the victory. And as I looked at those shoes, tears began to come out of my eyes, because -- this was someone who gave his life for the Revolution. So the Revolution didn't have a person, but made sure that the person was remembered. And in the African religions, one of the things that was very important to me was that somehow the struggle of so many slaves is remembered. The ancestors remembered. All of my experience of studying religion, studying spirituality, studying natural healing, traditional medicine, has kind of enriched my vision of the world. Not only seeing reality as this moment, but as a culmination of all of the history behind us, and all of the fruit that hopefully we will be able to grow from the seeds that we are trying to plant now, of goodness and peace and beauty and equality. Q. In the movement to free Mumia Abu Jamal, in the US we've seen increasingly repressive tactics against the protestors, jailings and fines against protestors. One of the caravanistas who is usually with us had her passport taken away from her, she cannot be here in Cuba this week because she participated in a protest in support of Mumia last summer. What can you say about where the movement in support of Mumia stands right now? A. Looking at the repression from Cuba is like looking at Martians. Whether it was in Seattle or Washington or at the Conventions, the visual image looks like these space monsters that are attacking people. Because you don't see that here! Nobody here lives that reality. And people in the United States take that reality as normal. The survival of the movement around Mumia is absolutely one of the most important struggles that needs to be waged, that must be waged right now. And it is more and more obvious that the US government is willing to ...I don't know, to set extraordinary bail for acts of civil disobedience. Some of the fines and bails have been out of this world in a so-called "free country". But in spite of that I think that what the government can't do is squash everybody. So what the main thrust needs to be right now is to incorporate as many people as possible into the struggle to save Mumia, and to do whatever is needed to save that man's life. Because Mumia is not just one person. Mumia represents, at this particular time in history, opposition to the United States government. He represents opposition to the prison-industrial complex. The death penalty is used in such a blatantly racist way in the United States. There is no way that can be defended under any kind of definition of justice by anybody. I think that struggling to save Mumia's life will save many other people's lives and in that struggle, we need to have a new definition of what justice is. A new definition of how people are treated in the society. And how people are not some kind of disposable item that you throw away, you destroy. You have a government that is sentencing 20-year-olds to life in prison without parole, for drug offenses. When you're 20 years old and you sell, not even a huge quantity of drugs -- we're not talking about the dons or the godfathers or anybody else -- we're talking about small quantities of drugs. And they write in the newspapers "This is a drug kingpin" and they sentence this person to life without parole. What kind of reality is that creating? What kind of future for the United States is that creating? If these people ever get out, who will they be? After years of watching beatings, tortures, suffering, you know what I'm saying? So I think the struggle around Mumia is important, to defend all of those people who are struggling against this system. I think that the more that people feel they can WIN that struggle, that they can go to their neighbors, that they can have signs on their blocks, that they can do things where they live, and not make it so abstract. Bring it home, take it to work, put a sign where you work. Take it to your church, to make it more and more a people's struggle. I think people's struggles are the only ones that in the long run cannot be defeated. Q. (Inaudible. Probably about media manipulation...) A. (Talking about how absurd it was that the US could convince people Grenada was a danger to its security)....Grenada has about 100,000 people. I remember Ronald Reagan holding up this map, an aerial map of an airport, and saying this was gonna be a military airport that was gonna threaten the people of the United States. And actually they convinced a huge amount of people that Grenada, a LITTLE, TINY ISLAND, that wasn't even the size of Brooklyn, was a threat to the United States government!!! And people really believed it. It was like convincing people to believe in the tooth fairy. (Laughter). So people have to be aware of how the media manipulates the way we think. Because they have really created a situation where all the US government has to do is say that such-and-such a government is terrorist, and they can wipe people off the map! The language that is being used in the media today is incredible. I must have been about 14 years old when I read "1984". It never occurred to me that anyone would name a nuclear missile "Peacekeeper". It never occurred to me that thousands of people would be killed in the name of "peace-keeping". But that is what is happening today. Or that the deaths of 200,000 people is called "collateral damage". How can you justify that? They are making a language that is a callous language of imperialism and we are using it. That doesn't mean we are going along with their language, but that we have not developed our own. The average person living in the US may not even be aware that those are 200,000 women, children, babies that are dead, and they are not even called human beings, they are called "collateral damage". "Friendly fire" -- what the hell is that? It is sickening when you listen to it, but you are inundated by it. Because they've developed these code words, they have been incorporated into the language of politics, and people see that as normal. Just as they see the police dressed up as Martians beating people up as "normal". So the abnormal, the sick, the vicious have become more and more interwoven into the violent culture of the United States. Into the way news is seen, into the way movies are seen. I watched this movie, they had it on tv here, called "Instinct". Black actor Cuba Gooding, very good actor, is playing the psychologist, and his patient is this white anthropologist who has been extradited from some African country for killing three people. And Cuba Gooding is trying to get at the roots of what has made this man "mad". The man has a relationship with gorillas that he's been studying and is beginning to bond with gorillas; he finds that the gorillas have this good gorilla way of living. And this anthropologist becomes like a hero in this movie. And he's talking about what liberation is, how gorillas have achieved a stage of liberation, although you are never clear what he means by that. And because this guy stands up to this system in prison in which the roughest prisoner gets a turn to go out on the exercise yard; they deal out a deck of cards and the one who gets the ace gets to go out. And the one who is the strongest and the most evil takes the ace and always goes out into the yard. So this anthropologist stands up against this strong guy -- who also happens to be black -- and he becomes the hero of the prison. In the end he escapes. And he's like this great white hero who escapes. And nowhere in the whole movie, there is not one word about these three people he killed. All three of them were Africans, and they were poaching on the animals, capturing the gorillas. And this guy kills them because of the gorillas. In the way that this whole history is told, we feel so much for this guy. We begin to love him; he becomes the hero, the symbol of liberty and justice. He and his relationship to the gorillas become principal, and the three Africans that he killed are totally irrelevant. And from the beginning to the end of the movie, that's the way it goes. And I'm looking at this and thinking, "This is incredible! When Malcolm X created 'tricknology' as a word to describe how the mind can be twisted and distorted and manipulated into believing that the enemy is the victim and the victim is the enemy -- the United States is a MASTER of it! You have a bill: "Feed Cuba! Food for Cuba!" that not only tightens the blockade, makes things harder for the Cuban people, and they say "Oh, this is a wonderful thing to open trade with Cuba". And they have people believing it. We're living in a very tricky world, and unless we become analytical and expose the tricknology, people will become sucked into that. It is very easy, it is very, very easy. Q. Cuba has been fighting against [neoliberal] globalization. What do you think the potential for the anti-globalization movement is? A. I think that the movement against the policies of the World Bank, of the IMF, is very important. People are really beginning to see the mechanisms of imperialism. When colonialism existed people could see colonialism. When racial segregation existed in its apartheid form, people could see the "whites only" signs. But it's much more difficult to see the structures of neo-imperialism, neo-colonialism, neo-slavery. I think that the movement against the World Bank, against the globalization process that is happening, is very positive. We need a globalization, a globalization of people who are committed to social justice, to economic justice. We need a globalization of people who are committed to saving this earth, to making sure that the water is drinkable, that the air is breathable. When I was a child, if someone had talked to me about buying water, I would have thought it was a joke. If we are not committed to saving this earth we will be buying designer air filters and gas masks with little Nike swishes on them. (Laughter, applause) The people who are running this planet are insane -- they are literally destroying it. I don't know where they think they're gonna drink water, breathe air....This planet is a wonderful place, but a vulnerable place. And they are making and implementing policies that are destroying the earth in all kinds of ways. The movement against the kind of global assassination that is going on, in terms of whole countries -- because every African country is facing an ecological disaster in terms of becoming deserts, in terms of fuel -- Africa is one of the richest countries in the world and the people are the poorest in the world. A lot of that poverty is directly related to the policies of the IMF and the World Bank. Those policies are very important not only to Cuba but to people all over the world who want to see their children grow up and have access to health care, to live somewhere that is not a desert, where they can drink water, where they can breathe air. So I think that movement is one of the most important, most optimistic struggles that is going on at this moment. Q. In 1965 US President Dwight D. Eisenhower said the Pentagon was planning for 100 years into the future. Most of us don't even plan for 5 years ahead. I don't know how Cuba is coming along with it's planning. But most of us are always REACTING to what the world powers do. What is our pro-active plan for 5 or 10 years from now? A. I wish (laughs) I had those answers. I believe that we have to...the first part of planning is to believe that you can put that plan into practise. And I think that one of the problems that exists in the United States and in many places in the world is that people don't believe that they can make a difference. So a lot of times we're defeated before we even start. We've become consumers of a world vision, of Kentucky Fried Chicken, of McDonalds, and we're convinced that Kentucky Fried Chicken tastes better than any other thing, or that a hamburger made by McDonalds is something special. Other than a piece of greasy meat and some bread. McDonald's are things we've been sold. And we've also consumed the idea of powerlessness, of the idea that "you can't fight City Hall" [you can't win against a powerful establishment -ed. note], of "you can't change things, the government is strong, that's just the way things are". And as long as we continue to have that vision of the world, the planning of a better world is going to be a hard nut to crack. So I think that one of the things as a step towards the phase that WE plan years and years ahead is to actually believe that this world is redeemable, changeable; that we can eradicate poverty, that we can eradicate alienation, that we can eradicate this tremendous consumerism, this disease that we have to buy everything that exists, everything that the television says we have to have. We have to have a vision of the world we want to make in 100 years. And maybe when we have that vision, when we convince enough people that that is a realistic vision, and that the opposite vision is basically that if we don't do something in this 100 years, a hundred years from now this world is gonna be so destroyed, so raped and ravished that we won't HAVE much of a world to save. Internalizing the importance of this century, and how much work we have to do, will give us at least some ways to invent a system of planning. I think it's really hard to plan if you don't believe you can implement those plans.