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Cynique

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Posts posted by Cynique

  1. I can't believe these big city mayors currently making news! :huh:

    Not just content to limit how large a soft drink fast food customers can order in public places, NY mayor, Michael Bloomberg, is advocating that hospitals charge new mothers for the infant formula required should they choose not to breast feed. Puleeze. All of these LaLeche busybodies can't protest enough about bans placed on mothers nursing in public, claiming these mama cats have a right to do so. If this makes onlookers uncomfortable then, tut-tut - or tit-tit in this case. :P But if a woman decides she doesn't want to fulfill the second step of the ritual/fad that follows showing off her baby bump for a disinterested world to admire, by suffering through 3 months pretending she enjoys shutting up a bawling brat by poking her gnawed nipple in its mouth, she should be able to do this without being intimidated or penalized. There are a lot of extenuating circumstances when it comes to breast-feeding and its benefits ain't all they're cracked up to be because of things that a mother can inadvertantly pass on to her baby. But this doesn't impact on people who want to dictate how others should live their lives. :(

    Not to be out done in overstepping his bounds when it comes to public policy Chcago's mayor Rahm Emanuel has sided with the city alderman who doesn't want a Chick-fil-A business opened in his ward because the CEO of this organization doesn't support same sex marriage, preferring the biblical definition of this "holy state" as being a union between a man and a woman. Mayor Emanuel voiced approval of the alderman's objection saying Chick-fil-A's values do not reflect those of the city of Chicago. Get outta here, Rahm. When's the last time you walked through the hazardous homophobic streets of Chicago's black neighborhood? Far be it from me to defend reigious caveats, but I think a merchant has the right to believe what he wants to believe as long as he doesn't discriminate against customers. Jeeze! :o

    I went out and looked at the full moon last night, because at my age I won't be witnessing many more of these celestial wonders that have always appealed to my werewolf tendencies. :wacko: I feel the same way about this unusually hot summer, glad that I have lived long enough to experience what I,as a Leo, have always thought the weather should be like this time of the year. Hot and Sunny; relief supplied by an occasional balmy breeze. I love nature, but the world's inhabitants pollute it. If, all of a sudden, my posts stop, consider that me and Morgan Freeman have slipped "through the worm hole" and have become one with the universe! :)

    • Like 2
  2. I always wondered why you chose suicide as your method when making jokes. Another form of despair would've been less methodical and more dramatic. I never took you seriously because I somehow have the perception that you think the world wouldn't have anything to revolve around upon your demise. ;)

    And at this point, I would be remiss if I didn't give a thumbs up to good ol boitumelo for being succinct and timely. :unsure:

  3. Yes, I did read "The Coldest Winter" - and hated this poorly-constructed book and its shallow characters. Sistah Souljah may impress you, but I've never found anything extraordinary about her.

    Tell me something, Waterstar. What about you and me being on different wave lengths, don't you understand ?? All of these people and videos you dig up do not resonate with me. I don't find them relative to my outlook because, to me, they are not saying anything new. I am a cynic and you are an optimist. I"ve suggested that we have an age gap, even a geographic one, - that you and I have a yin and yang dynamic, that my black experience is different from yours Yet, you prefer to dismiss these explanations for our polarization. I don't.

    Your perception is that I am mis-perceiving you, rebutting things you've never said, yet you never clarify or get specific. In spite of my "IMO" tag lines, you imply that I am trying to invalidate your arguments, seemingly unaware that you are judgmental yourself, exuding an air of being ennobled in your grand mission as you turn this board into your personal blog, promoting your agenda. That's all well and good because my interest in the black dilemma is waning and jaded, so knock yourself out. But sitting back taking pot shots suits me just fine, so you know what to expect. Sistah Souljah? Screw her. IMO, she shares a lot of the blame for establising the street genre that lowered standards in black literature and made white publishers rich. :P

    Hummm. Whoever thought, I'd find a new Kola Boof to bounce off. I even suspect that 'trolls" are on the loose. :lol:

  4. Who besides you and Troy and me and sometimes WriterGirl and Milton are expressing any viewpoints here? Those who follow these discussions are loud in their silence, most apparently preferring to lurk. Who other than someone that is deaf and blind and illiterate doesn't know that things haven't changed much?? But carry on. ^_^

  5. What is Sistah Souljah doing nowadays? Still living off the royalties from "The Coldest Winter Ever"?, the much-overrated self-aggrandizing book, glorifying the "redeeming" qualities of materialism and drug profits and murder that she wrote waaaay back when? Still living off the notoriety she gained from being deflated by Bill Clinton's dismissal of her politics - an anachroism who hasn't made an impact on Black progress, considering that post racial America is in dire shape??? Still wearing that bad weave??? :P

  6. You are typical of too many people today, Authorctl, who do not act on their curiosity about something. Upon seeing the statue and reading(?) the plaque, a desire to be enlightened should've motivated you to find out more on your own about Tommie Smith and John Carlos instead of just happening to come across an article about them on an internet discussion board. This is the lesson that each one needs to teach one. Seek knowledge!

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  7. What do you think Tommie Smith and John Carlos overcame when they raised their fists at the 1968 Olymphics. WaterStar? Constantly carping about how the "more things change, the more they become the same" neutralizes the very people whose accomplishments you supposedly want to revere.

    How do all of these panelists reflect the the points of view on this site?? Of the few people who comment on the subject, none are deluded about how things are today. Actually, Cousin Souljah, you and your much-vaunted optimism are the one who is out of step. :lol:

  8. Well, looks like Obama is one of us, after all. Just in time for the election we learn he's a slave descendant. I knew that pimp walk was authentic. :lol:

    President Obama Related to First Documented Slave in America

    Research Connects First African-American President to First African Slave in the American Colonies

    PROVO, UTAH – July 30, 2012 – A research team from Ancestry.com (NASDAQ:ACOM), the world’s largest online family history resource, has concluded that President Barack Obama is the 11

    th great-grandson of John Punch, the first documented African enslaved for life in American history. Remarkably, the connection was made through President Obama’s Caucasian mother’s side of the family.

    The discovery is the result of years of research by Ancestry.com genealogists who, through early Virginia records and DNA analysis, linked Obama to John Punch. An indentured servant in Colonial Virginia, Punch was punished for trying to escape his servitude in 1640 by being enslaved for life. This marked the first actual documented case of slavery for life in the colonies, occurring decades before initial slavery laws were enacted in Virginia.

    In the 372 years since, many significant records have been lost – a common problem for early Virginia (and the South in general) – destroyed over time by floods, fires and war. While this reality greatly challenged the research project, Ancestry.com genealogists were able to make the connection, starting with Obama’s family tree.

    President Obama is traditionally viewed as an African-American because of his father’s heritage in Kenya. However, while researching his Caucasian mother, Stanley Ann Dunham’s lineage, Ancestry.com genealogists found her to have African heritage as well, which piqued the researchers’ interest and inspired further digging into Obama’s African-American roots. In tracing the family back from Obama’s mother, Ancestry.com used DNA analysis to learn that her ancestors, known as white landowners in Colonial Virginia, actually descended from an African man. Existing records suggest that this man, John Punch, had children with a white woman who then passed her free status on to their offspring. Punch’s descendants went on to be free, successful land owners in a Virginia entrenched in slavery.

    An expert in Southern research and past president of the Board for Certification of Genealogists, Elizabeth Shown Mills, performed a third-party review of the research and documentation to verify the findings.

    "In reviewing Ancestry.com’s conclusions, I weighed not only the actual findings but also Virginia’s laws and social attitudes when John Punch was living," said Mills. "A careful consideration of the evidence convinces me that the Y-DNA evidence of African origin is indisputable, and the surviving paper trail points solely to John Punch as the logical candidate. Genealogical research on individuals who lived hundreds of years ago can never definitively prove that one man fathered another, but this research meets the highest standards and can be offered with confidence."

    "Two of the most historically significant African Americans in the history of our country are amazingly directly related," said Ancestry.com genealogist Joseph Shumway. "John Punch was more than likely the

    genesis of legalized slavery in America. But after centuries of suffering, the Civil War, and decades of civil rights efforts, his 11th great-grandson became the leader of the free world and the ultimate realization of the American Dream."

  9. Surprised Carlos would have a picture of The Pledge of Allegiance hanging in his office, - the anti-thesis of what he raised his fist for! :angry: Seems like a nice guy, tho; his lack of bitterness is admirable.

    I remember the raised fist incident well, watching as it actually happened on TV. The Olympic committee was apoplectic. At least in one area Carlos followed in Jesse Ownes' track shoes. Owens was also reduced to racing against horses after his spectacular performance in the 1936 Olympics. Such is life. :huh:

    • Like 1
  10. Me, I'm one of the ones who don't care one way another. bell hooks must've figured a sure way to sell an article was by elevating a plastic icon to the status of a social phenomenon . Harsh on Madonna? To me, she attributes much too much importance to Madonna's impact on black pop culture. During the peak of her popularity Madonna never garnered a large black following. Caught up in the giddiness of the 1980s, we might've hummed her catchy tunes, but Prince and MIchael Jackson and Lionel Richie and Marvin Gaye, Janet Jackson and Whitney Houston and The Time and Rick James and Luther Vandross and Chaka Kahn and Natalie Cole and Aretha and I could go on and on naming the artists Blacks were into back during the 80s. You never saw any young black girls dressed up like Madonna screaming at her concerts; only white ones. Even the black gay community was more into divas like Donna Summer and Patti LaBelle. I don't think I ever heard any young black artist when asked who influenced them coming up, mention Madonna.

    Madonna and Cyndi Lauper were considered outrageous for their thrift-store garb and enjoyed a lot of publicity because of their kookiness. But Madonna's attempts at edginess were contrived and she worked at being controversial; hence her black Jesus video. As for her feminism, it was focused on sexual liberation designed more to shock than to educate. Granted, because she was an object of curiosity she was in a class by herself; but I question whether she made an impact or was a paragon in the black community. Dennis Rodman even passed up her request to father a baby with her.

    Today she's a caricature of herself, still around because people can't resist a freak show. In spite of all of this, I like her. Because she is unflappable. But as to whether she's a plantation mistress or a soul sister. I don't think she's either. Nobody took her as seriously as she took herself; except maybe bell hooks. Madonna was the daughter of an auto company executive who grew up in an affluent Detroit suburb, an ambitious, semi-talented white girl who parlayed her bazarre uniqueness into fame. IMO. B)

  11. A child being accidently killed during the course of gunfire exchange is nothing extraordinary on the streets of Chicago. This has been the case in at least 4 incidents thus far this year.

    Banning guns would have no effect on the underground traffic of illegally selling guns to whomever has the asking price. The situation has gotten so bad that black leaders are calling for Obama to show the same concern he showed for the Aurora, Colorado, killings by coming to his hometown and speaking out against the senseless gun violence whose weekly toll is in double figures, exceeding deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq. Others are demanding the Mayor ask the Governor to call out the National Guard to patrol the sreets. But the murders go on. And in enough cases to show a pattern, the deaths have been the results of personal slights. Uninvited guests show up and disrupt a private gathering and when asked to leave, they go get their guns, then return and shoot up the place. Disputes between acquaintances wherein the losers settle the argument by killing the person who bested them, or a scorned lover replaced by a girlfriend's latest companion who becomes the target of revenge. Of course the drive-bys are always cases of mistaken indentities.

    In one of the latest Chicago tragedies, yet another promising basketball player bound for college on a scholarship, tried to break up a neighborhood brawl and was riddled with bullets by someone he'd known all his life. When the brother of this victim was asked to name names he refused, because he didn't want to snitch on his "homies".

    Another common scenario involves the interviews with families of victims, - tearful mothers and grandmothers and siblings and girlfriends, quivering into the microphones thrust before them by TV reporters, all declaring how innocent Pookie was, not affiliated with a gang and who had gotten, or was getting his life together. The follow-up stories show the makeshift memorials erected at the scene of the crime, as neigbors stand around shaking their heads asking when it's all going to end, and Preachers lead straggly marches against violence. Such episodes are reported almost daily in the 6 o'clock news segments.

    Gun violence has taken root in the culture of inner cities and unless minds can be re-programmed, it will continue to thin the ranks of young black people. Things are out of control and a superhero needs to emerge and save the day. Bat Man where are you when we need you??

  12. The fact that we see things differently is not so much an indication of disunity as it is diversity, WaterStar. People of color who fall under the black umbrella run the gamut of types. In your subliminal goal of controlling their minds, you like to refer to them as "we" or "us" but they don't all choose to be on your team or share your passion. If your cause was more compelling perhaps they would. You want them to congeal into a mass who, lumped together, can rise. But others are not encouraged by this overweight aspiration, skeptical perhaps about the tribulations of Barack Obama, the paragon that unity created, but who fares better as an individual that ignores his own kind. He is the result of the solidarity that you advocate, even as you chose not to support him with your vote and approve of the idea that Blacks divide their political loyalities by infiltrating the Republican party. It's complicated.

    But that's how it goes. You are an idealist and I am a pragmatist. And the future is gonna do what it does. -_-

  13. Yes, there are groups who are united in bringing down a historical enemy in revenge for the past. That's the motivation of the Islamic Jehad against Christianity, and variations of this theme permeated the mindset of militants who considered "whitey" their foe.

    And. one person's truth can be another person's falsehood. You call for greater "autonomy" and "solidarity", words which bring "automatons" with a "sheep mentality" to my mind. Leaders never want dissidents in their ranks because they dilute the power that eventually corrupts those in charge.

  14. Or is what unites us necessarily good for the collective. It all depends. Life is too full of variables to totally embrace a philosophy that is the mantra of those who are seeking revenge for the past.

    Determining what's good for the common collective is a slippery slope when defined by paternalistic, self-serving leaders, as illustrated by the German people during HItler's era.

    Many roads lead to a goal; those who prefer a lock-step cookie-cutter approach have tunnel vision and are lacking in flexibility. :rolleyes:

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