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Tempus is fugiting. And before we know it, election day will be here and that bad ol Donald Trump will be ousted and Democracy will be restored and gas prices and grocery bills will plummet and the Economy will skyrocket and everybody will be able to afford to be sick. Black folks? They can all come out of hiding .God will be in his heaven and all will be right in the world... Or - maybe not. Hope all you optimists have a Plan B.

Back in my teens and 20s, I wouldn't have believed that I would feel so obliged or dedicated to people I wasn't related to or something I wasn't getting paid to do. But as we know, things and often attitudes and mentalities change with time. Now if I spend an extended amount of time away from AALBC whether it's a few days, a few weeks, or a couple months.....I feel OBLIGATED to go back and as best I can respond to all posts directed at me or about me. And also, if time permits....address posts that grab my interest even if they weren't directed at me. And it appears that most of you seem to feel the same way. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ And by the way let me thank @Troy for providing this space for us to do so. It's been a while since I sent a token of my appreciation because I've had new personal obligations to focus my resources on these past few years, but your treasures are building up. Trust me _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I suppose it's just human nature; however knowing this makes me feel good, proud, and hopeful. Why? It shows me that there are certain feelings, emotions, and drives that are just innate in human nature that guarantees that no human society will degrade down past a certain level. We will never get so selfish and individualistic AS A COMMUNITY where we simply ignore eachother and focus on our own issues and promotions. Some will, but the vast majority will not. There are certain ways we relate to other human beings that seem to be "in" us; ingrained in our psyche. These are the traits a progressive well functioning society should be built on and modeled after. Characteristics that agree with basic human nature.

As part of the AALBC upgrade, I have to move to a dedicated server. The shared environment I current run on is not allowing to add the features I'd like to add and to make aalbc.com a truly world class website. This discussion forum may experience a brief outage (hours not days). It is also possible some posts may be lost depending upon when you make them. So please do not share anything you do not want to lose until I give the all-clear. Finally, I will probably migrate to newer discussion forum software (...ugh, I know). The problem with this software is that they are pushing upgrades to a cloud-based solution which is much more expensive. I'm basically broke; so, I (1) can't afford the software and (2) I don't think it is worth it. There are better solutions that I can more easily integrate with aalbc.com and I will pursue one of those. I'm open to suggestions. This software will remain in place, but I will probably lock down the discussion forums and encourage people to begin using whatever new platform I launch. I believe this is the best chance for increasing the number of engaged active users of the site and ultimately building something that someone else or another team and actually maintain after I'm gone. (Sidebar: in the longer term I doubt websites will continue to be a thing, but there will always be a need for to Black-operated and owned platforms we Black people communicate and curate out culture we can't leave this up to Elon and Mark).

UN backs resolution calling slave trade ‘gravest crime against humanity’ RFI Thu, March 26, 2026 at 4:08 AM EDT 2 min read A memorial sculpture by Sandrine Plante-Rougeol in Bordeaux, a historic slave-trading port, where the legacy of the transatlantic slave trade remains central to debates on recognition and reparations. (AFP - GEORGES GOBET)More The resolution – proposed by Ghana – was adopted to applause by a vote of 123 in favour. The United States, Israel and Argentina opposed the measure. There were 52 abstentions, including the UK and all 27 members of the EU. Ghana's President John Mahama, one of the African Union's most vocal supporters of slavery reparations, was at the UN headquarters in New York to support the vote. "Today, we come together in solemn solidarity to affirm truth and pursue a route to healing and reparative justice," said Mahama. "The adoption of this resolution serves as a safeguard against forgetting." Transatlantic cruise to turn spotlight on Brazil-Angola slavery past Despite being non-binding, the resolution goes beyond simple acknowledgment and asks nations involved in the slave trade to engage in restorative justice. It also highlights the legacy of slavery via "the persistence of racial discrimination and neo-colonialism" in today's society. "The transatlantic slave trade was a crime against humanity that struck at the core of personhood, broke up families, and devastated communities," UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said. "To justify the unjustifiable, slavery's proponents and beneficiaries constructed a racist ideology -- turning prejudice into a pseudoscience." During discussions over the resolution, US ambassador Dan Negrea said the text was highly problematic. "The US also does not recognise a legal right to reparations for historical wrongs that were not illegal under international law at the time they occurred." He added: "The US also strongly objects to the resolution's attempt to rank crimes against humanity in any type of hierarchy." The UK and EU countries put forth similar arguments while acknowledging the wrongs of slavery. "The resolution risks pitting historical tragedies against each other that should not be compared, except at the expense of the memory of the victims," said French representative Sylvain Fournel. Heroes who fought to abolish slavery honoured in Paris Pantheon expo For African Union officials, the language of the resolution is central to its purpose. Amma Adomaa Twum-Amoah, the AU’s Commissioner for Health, Humanitarian Affairs and Development, said clearly naming these events removes any lingering ambiguity about their nature. “It is to say that what was done to Africans was not a tragic accident of history, but the result of deliberate policies whose legacies structure today’s inequalities,” she said. “Justice begins with calling things by their proper names.” Beyond recognition, the resolution encourages countries historically involved in the slave trade to engage in processes of restorative justice. Ghana’s Foreign Minister, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa, has been explicit about what that could entail. “The perpetrators of the transatlantic slave trade are known – the Europeans, the United States of America,” he told reporters. “We expect all of them to formally apologise to Africa and to all people of African descent.” He pointed to the return of looted cultural artefacts as one possible step, alongside continued efforts to dismantle structural racism and, potentially, financial compensation for affected communities.

@Troy....thanks again for everything you're doing to maintain this site.

Abolish the need for Visas to cross International Borders.....Advocate for the Right To freely Travel the Globe as a Basic and Foundamental Human Right. Travel is Education

The great experiment that is the United States of America (USA) even in its relative youth as a 250-year old nation has studied the history of empires...their rise & fall. The *smartest* thing the USA did was allowing people from all of the planet to come & live in this country. Though its institutions, the USA has tapped into the best & brightest minds from around the world. Through its power of money & influence & military strength, the USA has become the leading super power in the world. There is no other country on the planet to which more people immigrate. I don't believe the USA will implode or self-destruct under the weight of its own largesse. Nor will disputes & bickering among disparate groups of people (tribes) derail the USA either. I believe it will take an act of of the universe i.e. series of natural disasters to dismantle &/or destroy the USA. There's always the remote possibility that white people will get fed up with each other & start firing off those nuclear bombs. Of course, going nuclear means game over for humanity as we know.

Impressive word usage there. Let me know how much you'd charge to write my posts.

We are going toward the "light" aka the longest day of the year. Wouldn't it be reaffirming if America reversed its course and the current powers-that-be dissipated and were blown away by solar winds! What say you, Delano and Chevdov?? 🗯

In the mean time, silky-voiced Nat Cole, a Chicago product, enjoyed tremendous popularity among his own people. He put out a lot of single 78 vinyl records in the '50s as I recall, and they were all hits! We loved us some Nat "King" Cole. Back in the day, a lot of - perish the thought - colorist negro women used to pay him the left-handed compliment by declaring that "the only thing they liked black were Cadillacs and Nat Cole". To this day, like one of his best sellers, he remains "Unforgettable".

The Best way to destroy colorism is through Education Create systems that promote celebrate and reward all skin tones hues and shades... Accentuate the positive and ignore or confront the negative..... Saturate Mass Media with the Spectrum of all shades ....as equally as possible. Demonstrate the necessity of variety.. etc

I wrote that slave films aren't going to be very popular. Surely, some people will watch the films & enjoy them in one way or another. Otherwise, films, music, books & other forms of visual & literary art provides entertainment in different ways. Entertainment as escapism doesn't have to be negative in the form of self-hate or low self-esteem. Many people can watch a movie or listen to music & allow it to take them away from their reality for a few minutes up to a couple hours.

Well, if you dont want the 3 Presidents to talk politics at the funeral of a political figure, then don't invite them, just to show how important the deceased was. And Al Sharpton certainly didn't mince any words about what's happening in the country in his remarks. If you want a dignified funeral, don't invite a bunch of dignitaries to speak, and hold the services at a huge hall to accommodate all the public mourners you opened the doors to. You're just asking for confusion and resentment and that's what the Jackson family got. You can't have it both ways.

Jesse Jr, has his bi-polar panties in a bunch because the 3 US Presidents invited to the funeral of his father (a political figure in his own right who never missed a chance to speak about political issues) injected politics into their tributes to Jesse,Sr. at his funeral. Jesse, Jr.'s complaints have garnered very little support, with most people cynically speculating that he's probably trying to get on the good side of Trump in hopes of Trump pardoning him for his crime of misusing his campaign funds to finance a luxurious lifestyle and served time in jail for doing this. tsk-tsk. Also rumors floating around about Jesse having conned Trump into contributing to his presidential campaigns back when he ran for president twice. Whatever. As has previously been established, nobody's perfect.

Common ground achieved, arguably my most positively responsed post. I am very happy:) thank you again @aka Contrarian @Chevdove @Pioneer1 beautiful memories from you all:) thank you for sharing.

Interesting. Can't help but wonder if any of this astrological activity coincides with Israel and America's violent assault on Iran and what it portends for the future of the great American Empire and the orange tyrant who has crowned himself king of it.

I have to disagree. Some Africans were reported to be sold because they were imprisoned or had debts. But the Portuguese literally built a fort at what is now Ghana's shoreline because they had already invaded West Africa and had to fight other invading Europeans who headed to the continent to get goodies. But we are talking about the 1400s. This was just the beginning of what historians call the Atlantic Slave trade. Elmina Castle "In 1482, Portuguese traders built Elmina Castle (also called São Jorge da Mina, or Saint George’s of the Mine) in present-day Ghana, on the west coast of Africa. (Mack 1.1 Portuguese Exploration..") But the millions of enslaved Africans wasn't sold by Africans, that was the British, French, and Spain until they finally got out of the human trafficking business. Then the newly minted Amerricans started a second middle passage - and imported a few million more. By the time of the Civil war there were four million Africans in the southern states (also why they lost) ...Africans selling Africans is white propaganda to deflect from the truth of the slave trade that harmed so many lives. The reason why historians know they trafficked all those Africans to various Carribbean islands and the Americas is because of the hubris of the white man who kept-effing records. Like Thomas Jefferson who had a list of his 600 slaves, they kept records everything!

I haven't. Thank you for sharing! I probably won't. I am working on my first screenplay but it's historical fiction.

Some celebrities will do &/or say the most ridiculous to include revealing their ignorance in order to maintain relevance. As the late Honorable Malcolm X said back in the 1960s, if entertainers are leaders, we have a bigger problem. Congrats to your alma mater in making it to the Final Four. The bots are convenient when calling up a few friends isn't in the cards. The invention of computer games allowing humans to play with themselves was the precursor to social isolation. As humans become more silo'd, AI will become the perfect companion to some. AI won't do dishes or give out hugs & kisses but it won't require anything of humans either. Zero sum fun.

Awesome gesture introduced to UN by the West African nation of Ghana. There should be no confusion among FBA/AfroAmericans about where our birthplace stands as it relates to the original sin of slavery & acknowledging it through a series of actions including recognition, apology & reparations to name a few.

Which is crazy because back in the 50s and 60s not only did every Black community have it's own paper but nearly every Black highschool had it's own Black newspaper. You didn't need a Scripts Howard back then. Black students were learning journalism (among other skills and trades) BEFORE they graduated from Highschool.

See, and that's another issue. I know the internet is the largest form of media currently, however it's not wise to put too many of your eggs in one basket. Where I go at work, I walk into different departments and depending on which race/ethnic group dominates the environment....depends what you may hear, lol. But the thing I notice about departments dominated by Whites and Latinos....whether it's the office or the warehouse....they don't need the internet to listen to their music or programs. White people can still listen to their music or talk shows on the radio and so can Latinos! Racist conservative White men still can tune into AM RADIO stations from coast to coast and listen to politics and have their voices heard. They don't need a computer, phone, or wi-fi to communicate with eachother OR be communicated to. Again, all Latinos have to do if they want to listen to a Latino program is just turn on the radio and you'll have 3 or 4 stations they can listen to in Spanish Most Black folks have to use their phones to get online to pick up THEIR programs or listen to fresh music not downloaded on their phones My greater point is......... We can EXPAND our options without CANCELLING some of them out. We should be on the internet and social media...no doubt. But we should STILL keep and have our news papers, radio shows, and broadcast television stations to reach that older or less tech savy audience.

ProfD Funny thing it's illegal for us to buy cartons of cigarettes & break them down to sell loosies. Well see, I didn't know that. I don't smoke or deal in cigarettes so I didn't know it was illegal for citizens TO do that. I guess that's why they have an ATF bureau. Easily. Same mentality that bums a ride & doesn't offer gas money or *borrows* household sh8t (sugar, cooking oil, flour, a few pieces of bread, etc.). That caused flashbacks from childhood. We had a woman who lived next door who would constantly ask for shit like that and we KNEW when she wanted something because she'd always first greet you buy saying, "hey neighbor"....lol. Any other time she'd either ignore you or give you a "Hey" or stale "How you doin'". But when she wanted some sugar or milk or eggs or wanted to use the vacuum cleaner..... "Hey Neighbor!"

Liquor and White women.....his two vices, lol.

That is about as likely as the rising cost of cigarettes making smokers reconsider their habit, quit, and live healthier life styles...lol.

Chaka not only still has those amazing pipes but, at 74, she looks great! Stephanie is still hangin in there too, her mellow voice retaining its smooth quality. Didn't she recently go on tour with Gladys Knight, Patti LaBelle, and Chaka,- the Grand Dames of R&B?

Chaka Khan will always be my personal favorite vocalist of all time. However, there is no denying that Stephanie Mills has always been an incredible vocalist too. My favorite Stephanie Mills song is "What You Gonna Do with my Lovin".

Thank you. I'm struggling with fixing bugs on the website so I did not read the rest of the conversation but just for kicks I ask Gemini to summarize it for me and this is what I got. Let me know if you think the summaries of you positions are accurate: This discussion forum conversation, initiated by Pioneer1, explores the psychological impact of colorism within the Black community and debates strategies for reversing centuries of “anti-Black programming” regarding beauty standards. Core Arguments and Perspectives Pioneer1 (The Proponent of Radical Counter-Programming): Argues that Black women dyeing their hair blonde is a symptom of psychological damage from White-centric media that associates dark skin and kinky hair with being “ugly.” Proposes “reversing the hypnosis” by aggressively promoting dark skin and African features as the primary standard of beauty. Contends that in 2026, the community should see people in tanning booths trying to get darker and dyeing their hair black rather than blonde. Believes that “medium to dark” skin must be given priority over light skin to “balance the scale” after 500 years of lopsided preference for whiteness. ProfD (The Historical and Social Realist): Notes that movements for Black pride (James Brown, 70s Soul, 90s Hip-Hop) have existed but were often short-lived. Identifies colorism as a deep-seated issue rooted in the “slave plantations” that requires extensive time to undo. Suggests that interpersonal love—specifically Black men actively loving and choosing dark-skinned women—is a primary solution to the self-esteem crisis. Chevdove (The Moderate and Nuanced Critic): Expresses indifference toward Pioneer1’s proposal, arguing that while dark skin should be highlighted, light-skinned individuals should not be “suppressed” or “downplayed.” Raises concerns about the systematic exploitation of the term “Pride,” suggesting the “Black Pride” movement has been merged with or co-opted by the global LGBT movement. Believes education is key to understanding that traits like blonde hair are not exclusively “White.” Frankster (The Advocate for Education and Equality): Argues that education is the most effective way to destroy colorism. Advocates for a “spectrum” approach: saturating media with all shades as equally as possible rather than creating a new discriminatory hierarchy. Maintains that beauty standards should be viewed as universal (based on symmetry and balance) rather than political or racial competitions. Major Themes of Debate Theme Pioneer1’s View Frankster/Chevdove’s View Strategy Aggressive Counter-Programming: Preferencing dark/medium skin specifically. Equality: Celebrating the full spectrum of all hues and shades. Logic The “Reparations” Model: You don’t add weight to both sides of a lopsided scale to balance it; you add only to the lighter side. The “Universal” Model: Teach that all people are beautiful to avoid shifting the problem to a different group. Education Intellectual reasoning is insufficient for psychological wounds; entertainment and religion are needed. Systematic education in psychology and history is the primary tool for healing.

Nat King Cole born 1919 enjoy music and lyrics from the legend

It is a sad state of affairs that the only hope of getting out of a man-made quagmire is some type of celestial intervention.

Sure. Entrenched blue states do not make as much of a difference in the POTUS election. Same goes for red states. Swing states flip-flopping play a huge role in determining POTUS election outcome. Those are the states that Democrats need to pour the most time & energy convincing folks to "vote blue no matter who".

Understood. At some point in your lifetime, I hope that you are able to relocate to Haiti or some other country that is less dysfunctional than the USA. No need to quote yourself. I understand the context. Hoping that my family members have the misfortune of medical malpractice or bad law enforcement or cheaters is not going to change me and/or cause any type of pain or suffering on my behalf. Again, such is life. I always have and will roll with the punches.

I would still teach the basics of computing. No different from teaching alphabets & words to children. They'll figure out soon if/when they need to use a dictionary or library or internet. AI (Artificial Intelligence) is another tool in the box. Folks wil use it to get things done faster &/or more cost effectively. Surely, some folks will use AI to enrich themselves & put others out of work. Such is life especially when it comes to technology.

The Universe does Not come in Alphabetical Order! I started reading science fiction in 4th grade. This was before Star Trek. My mother had a World Book Encyclopedia sitting right outside my bedroom door. I used that Encyclopedia looking up stuff I encountered in science fiction books at least 10 times as much as I did for school. I would not have a problem with a kid using an AI to research stuff found from reading SF. There is a YouTube video made from 1988 footage of Harvard graduates unable to explain summer and winter. I saw that in 1988 and laughed my ass off. I knew the answer but not because of school. Read enough science fiction and you will encounter Orbital Mechanics. .

Exactly. That is why I created Huria Search I literarily brought it back yesterday. It was down for several years, but as I'm revamping the site I'm bringing back features that I abandoned -- even if a few people will use and benefit from it. It took me all of 5 minutes to bring it back. AI made this possible. AI is reminiscent of the early days of the web. This time around fewer people will take advantage of it and the benefit to individuals will not be very long.

Sly Stone was very important to music. He gave R&B an edge & inspired Jazz musicians to embrace electronic instruments. Sly was a huge influence on Miles Davis & by extension, the list of musicians who came through Davis' finishing school.

That last for a few minutes relatively speaking. Just long enough for me and many others to get excited about the potential only to have it usurped by the folks maniacally fixed on money. The same thing will happen with AI; money will be the only motivator in how it is used and criminals will have unfettered access to use it to fuck over the world. Today I resurrected a Search Engine, Huria Search, which only queries Black-owned websites. There are hundreds on Black owned sites that are indexed. It uses Google's tech in the way it was originally designed -- just to direct you to websites. It used to sit on it's own domain huria.org, but I allowed the domain to lapse. I have pulled the search engine it back into AALBC.com. I naively thought Black folks, especially the website owners themselves would support the search engine -- maybe embed it into their own sites. That never happened website owners actually stopped linking out to other websites as Google told them it would potentially hurt them in search -- as a result it became virtually impossible for people to discover another website from a website. I have NEVER stopped linking to other website because, despite what Google says that was the beauty of the web. I sure you will not find ANY Black site that links to more Black sites than AALBC.com.

To get the nation out of the Great Depression, one of my favorite Presidents.....Franklin D. Roosevelt......implemented community service projects and conservation and agricultural project to employ low skilled and unskilled people by the millions and used government funds to pay them decent wages and raise them out of poverty. My Father remembered some of these projects. There were "work camps" all around the nation, including down south....employing a lot of Black folks.

@Pioneer1 what if the influencer is the freedom of a woman to do whatever she wants with out having to worry about any penalty ? who is going to deny them their freedom to do what they want? what can deny them the freedom to do what they want?

One of the reasons I wanted to share this video was because of a couple of recent events that happened over the past week or two. The incident down in Austin Texas where the Senegalese man started shooting people. And now I'm hearing that the man who shot up the ROTC class down in Virginia was also an African. They aren't sure but it appears they did this in response to Americas actions in Iran. People....especially Black folks...shouldn't be so quick to defend people who don't even recognize them as human beings. How many Arabs or Iranians have retaliated against the West when America sent missiles to Nigeria a few months ago or routinely targets Somalia over the decades? You don't even hear of AFRICANS being outraged over it...let alone Arabs and Iranians. Yet you got Africans who want to strap up and seek revenge for something that barely concerns their well being. ProfD One has to wonder 1) what the African countries are doing about their citizens being sold into slavery & 2) how complicit are the leaders in those countries in allowing it to happen Exactly. I'll tell you what they're doing about it.....SENDING THEM. Instead of making the economy better and more stable so that their people wouldn't want to leave the nation and migrate to these racist Arab societies or risk drowning at sea to make their way to Europe......some of these African leaders are actually ENCOURAGING their own citizens to leave the nation! Why? Because they figure if they leave: 1. There will be less mouths to feed, which means more resources in the country for the few who remain. 2. They're hoping these refugees can find jobs in Europe or the Middle East and send money back home so they can steal get some of it.

@aka Contrarian Lovely thoughts, thank you for sharing them:) Well use of the word personifications, in that true persons change are not pantomime. Sylvia a true mulatto, definitely goes through trials or tribulations but she isn't tragic cause she wins in the end. She isn't clotel. Mattie is motherly, in the same way Mammy's are, but Mattie is a black woman married to a black man raising a black child... when a black maid is motherly to a white child that is the mammy figure, it isn't a black woman being motherly to a black child, that is expected? right? The landrys are both hanged and burned alive for a crime they didn't commit. hahaha LArry is the trickster, I admit he doesn't change. If anything he is the one true caricature. and Micheaux being like Pioneer:) one of these law abiding blacks, criminalizes black street people. All of larry's crimes are financial, none are violent. but yeah, larry is the pantomime black trickster, but knowing what I know of micheaux that makes sense. I as a writer don't view black hustlers negatively so... Efram wasn't the coon for one reason, in the film, he recants his actions in a confession to the audience so to speak. yes, he is the prototypical coon figure gestures, talk and all, BUT unlike most coon figures, he gets killed by whites, which is a very rare touch. even among black writers, they rarely give "black traitors" aka coons the death that micheax gave efram. People remember samuel l jackson's characters death in django, but he is murdered by a black man, django, Oscar micheaux murders his coon, efram through the true subjects whites, displaying the simple truth that whites are the enemy of blacks folks, whether the honorable, loving, law abiding Landry's or the lying, self hating scheming eframs. But the key is that efram confesses he hates himself, confesses he is wrong which is very rare in film, even black written films. And your correct, the Rev is the "righteous reverend" and Dr.."good hero" But at least with the rev. he is actually challenged. when sylvia rebukes his offer of marriage, that is a real test that again, so few righteous reverends have in many stories. to be challenged is key to testing the identity. but the doctor is an evergood hero:) which ok:) I wish I could see a complete version of symbol fo the unconquered. The partial I placed below. I think it is a response to birth of a nation, not within our gates. Why do I say this? In a general sense, because all of Micheaux's work involve the south plus black people and they are not like in griffith's film, they are all partially a response to birth of a nation, on a mere stylistic point. But in terms of agrarian fantasies, i argue, symbol of the unconquered is more of an agrarian fantasy which is what birth of a nation is, than within our gates. Birth of the nation is dismissive of the usa outside of the south, in birth of a nation the usa outside of the south, doesn't functionally exist. In that way, within our gates isn't a reply. Within our gates is very much holistic. It is showing black unity between blacks outside the south and to the south. Sylvia makes it where the black school in the south will thrive/survive/live but she lives in the north, has found love in the north, fled the south because of white terror, but doesn't ask other black people to leave the south. Within our gates i argue is more holistic to the usa. that complete nature is absent in birth of a nation. But symbol of the unconquered is all about black homesteaders. It is focused on a specific area in the usa like birth of a nation. And like birth of a nation has straight messages about certain persons or groups. Whereas the KKK is heroic supporting the traditions of the south in birth of a nation, the kkk is a terrorist illegal operating organization in symbol of the unconquered. whereas "birth's" female lead is so negatively biased she can jump off of a cliff to her death rather than be violated. the female lead in "symbol"fights through wind and rain and storms, to get her land. can be frightened but will never go to her death from fear. yeah, well , even though I don't prefer comedy usually, i think comedy is the art form most in need in the usa at all times, this countries history doesn't yield to seriousness well. lovely thought, thank you for sharing them

@richardmurrayI watched "Within Our Gates" and fully appreciated it for what it was. In fact, it inspired me to do some research on Oscar Micheaux because I was both curious and confused about him, even misspelling his name. I was, however, vaguely familiar with him which was why I was of the opinion that it must've been his movies that I was seeing quite a while back on a local TV channel that did not run them in prime time but instead put them on during the early afternoon, almost as if to fill in empty air space like the wrestling matches and The Liberace Show did back during the early days of TV. This would mean that my seeing these old films must've been back in the 1950s. Anyway, I learned, to my surprise, that Oscar Micheaux was born in 1884 in Metropolis, Illinois, a town I know of because I had friends from there, and that he died in 1951, so he was alive during my life time. I watched a couple of short YouTube videos about him and have concluded that at least some of those sound movies I was watching back then were ones produced by him later in his career. Finally, imo, some of the stereotypes I previously mentioned did appear in Micheaux's "Beyond the Gates". Certainly Sylvia Landry, the lovelorn heroine of "Within Our Gates, was a "tragic mulatto" whose real father was white and whose black adoptive parents were lynched, her adoptive and nurturing mother, Mattie, being a "Mammy" figure, and the wicked Larry, brother-in-law of Sylvia's cousin, being a villainous "Trickster", while the tattle tale Ephraim, was the "Coon" figure. The minister Jacobs, who ran a school for black children, represented the "Righteous Reverend"and Dr. Vivian, who falls in love with Sylvia, represented the "romantic hero". These personifications, rather than being pantomimed degrading figures, were transformed in "Within Our Gates", and I suspect the improved versions, like the film itself, were used to counteract the negative caricatures that "The Birth of a Nation" depicted. My introduction to Micheaux was probably about 70 years ago and I'm curious if those films I remember seeing were lost and no longer exist since the claim is being made that this movie is the last of its kind in existence. Also, imo, minstrel shows were not totally without merit. They show cased sly humor, buck dancing and banjo artistry among other things. I mention this because there was a time when black Masons would stage their own minstrel shows and, having seen one put on by my father's lodge when I was a young girl in the 1940s, I remember being rather proud that my dad, was a member of a barbershop quartet that performed in a show his Masonic lodge staged. Just some thoughts...

Films depicting slavery aren't going to be very popular. Mainly because it does not make people feel better about themselves. Entertainment is a form of escapism not intended to cause depression.

I was deliberating whether or not to put a 'laughing emoji' or a 'heart emoji' because this post evoked two simultaneous emotions for me. Yeah. Me too. The clouds blocked it completely where I am. On this same wise though, there is supposed to be an upcoming celestial event that might be spectacular. A comet is suppose to come close to the sun in a few weeks and because of it being 'a sun grazer' though, it is difficult to know what will happen. Scientist say that it might explode or if it makes it past the sun, it might become bright enough to see.

Clearly you are not "stuck"

Lol..... Yeah, I did do a somewhat informal thread about it where I mentioned how much of a surprise it was. They got hit on an early Saturday mawnin'.....when a nigga still yawnin'....lol. But I took it down.

I recently watched the Oscar-nominated movie, "SINNERS" starring Michael B. Jordan, and it was certainly a different take on vampire horror movies with a black theme. The producers did a very good job of creating the film's dark, eerie atmosphere, as well as recreating the rural zeitgeist of black America back during the 1930s. The authentic characterizations of the cast members also contributed to the over all effect. I had to watch it 3 times to get the full complexity of the plot, but it was well worth it, and when it comes to horror movies, I would certainly recommend "SINNERS" as an intense, gripping example of this genre. The blues-themed musical sound track was also noteworthy.

I see that I have mellowed a bit, which is a a good IMHO.