Troy

Hey Former LSAer. I can't speak to what the site is like relative to a few years ago. I only just discovered it last year. Eddie George is clearly Black so I'm confused by your statement.

@harry brown, I stepped away from social media and watch virtually no broadcast TV or radio. Most of the media I consume I seek out, It is "pulled" in by me rather than "pushed:" to me. Now I admit this will not be a complete picture of our world, but it is better than have my news feed to me by those solely motivated by profit. I say this to suggest that you may be are getting a very biased and distorted picture of preachers. The media focus mostly on the preachers who behave badly, simply because we show more interest in the thieving whoring preachers than the ones who are actually doing good in the community. I would be willing to bet you money that the majority, perhaps the vast majority, of ministers are righteous and trying to have a positive impact on their communities. This is not to suggest that they are perfect, no one is, but I think they are doing more good that bad. Would you be willing to try this for a while. Forget the bad preachers, share stories about ministers that are doing good work. Now again, you might have to dig deep given the current state of our media, but I'm sure you can find folks who are doing the right thing. You might also wanna read a bit more about Winnie Mandela... As always thanks for you contributions to out forum.

OK thanks, I get it. Seems the divine plan, whatever it may be, is not working out so well for many folks.

Del, I don't know what that means on the surface it is oxymoronic. How does it apply to your prodigious faith in our political process?

@Pioneer1 (anyone) you should read this issue. I just got it in the mail myself, but I'm sure you can find it on Newsstands, or the Library. It is the April 2018 Issue. I think it will help you think differently about race. The two girls picture on the cover below are biological sisters, twins actually. Hey which one do you think is cuter

Done.

Shoot, Pence could be worse. 45 is your garden variety greedy ego manic. Pence is on a mission from God which could be far more dangerous Del you clearly have far more faith in this whole process than I. The source of your faith remains a mystery to me. Cynique The American empire has already entered it's decline. 45's presidency is the most stark indication. Even American life expectancy is going down.

Yeah it looks like an interesting book. How did you discover it? The Un-Civil War: BLACKS vs NIGGERS: Confronting the Subculture Within the African-American Community (May 4, 2013) by Taleeb Starkes

Del step put the liberal bubble and check out some right wing media. You'll gain a different perspective and see, as Cynique described 45 has a lot of support. Maybe not the majority, but certainly enough to keep him in office. Besides there are those who believe our current vice president, would be worse for the county. 45 ain't going anywhere before the end of his term.

Del you could have saved all of the copying and pasting and just asked. I can't speak for the others, and I think I was the only one who made the suggestion. I wrote it based upon your latest statement: As far as I can recall, you are the first person to start taking about a 2nd term -- I thought we talking about whether he would finish this term. OK, I get based upon your reaction that you are not backing off the belief (or is it also a prediction) that Trump will not finish his term. Again, I believe he will. The author of the latest article you shared did not draw the conclusion that Trump will not serve out his term.

I've just created a page where I will compile lists of Top 10 Book Categories. I'm really looking for overlooked, unusual, and creative categories for which to creates lists and the books to go with them. I put a started a category for "Black Girl Hair" and "Steampunk," but am looking for many more along with titles to go with them. I have not shared this project with anyone yet, hopefully some of you out there who read these forums but don't contribute will be moved to share some ideas. Really trying to raise awareness of breather of out literature beyond the regular run of the mill categories. I'll happily include those but I want to make it much broader.

@DelanoI did not think he would have a first term. I would not put giving Trump a second term past the American population. You see how easily we were manipulated by Facebook. Facebook dominance, and control, will only get stronger giving spinmeisters with deep enough pockets to brainwash us into doing anything. Besides, I thought you were predicting that he would not finish his current term. Have you now conceded that he will complete his first term and are now changing the speculation to whether he will win a 2nd term?

This is very useful information that you shared @D.E. Eliot I'm actually compiling a similar list of expenses an author should expect if they are self publishing their book. This is in conjunction with a workshop I gave this past week on self publishing. You can review what I've started here: https://aalbc.com/nbwc/ Now every manuscript it different, so the production costs will be different as well. For example I would also caution writers against editors that price based upon a manuscript's length. Again every book is different; some books need a less work than others -- the pricing should be a function of the effort involved not the simply the length. Is #10 and #12 for promotional copies for booksellers, reviewers, etc? Yeah 50% of ones budget allocated to marketing sounds about right. Though the cost of this over time if you hire a publicist and purchase advertising regularly and crun into integer multiples of the production costs. It is interesting that you were a late reader and are now a published author -- congrats. I know a Brother who was functionally illiterate, in college (a football player). He is now a successful novelist published by a major house.

One of my favorite cities. I have not been there in about 15 years. I have 3 suits that I purchased there thst I still wear to this day :-) How long will you be there? Enjoy!

@Pioneer1 there is no harm in going to see a film. I do it from time to time myself. The problem is went we begin to elevate this fiction into something we worship. Don't you see this is the exact same strategy that put 45 into office. Some slick marketers created the fiction of 45 being a savvy businessman for the purpose of bolstering his profile for the Apprentice "reality" TV program. The nation brought into the fiction and we made him POTUS. The facts of his business failures did not matter, what mattered was compelling fiction that was created. White folks are needy too. They needed someone who spoke to their pain and promised to make things better and on paper 45 is doing just that. 45 will serve out his term and do not be surprised if he wins a second term -- unless Oprah runs and she'll win in a landslide.

@Pioneer1 I never meant to completely discount anecdotes. They can be interesting and, when backed by actual data, quite powerful. However, absence such data, I would just not use my personal anecdote as proof of anything dealing with all Black people or a more general audience. This is something you quite often, with reckless abandon. Do you see the difference? So while I may tend to agree with you on the issue of the disappearing straight-Afro-America male in general I just don't have any proof -- other than my own anecdotes -- even as it relates to our representation in literature. Even if you and I combined all of our anecdotes, on the subject, this would not be proof, no matter how good it made us feel or how right we feel we are.

Sure a good argument can be made that by ony exposing yourself to view points that mirror your own, your ideas are never challenged and you never learn. This is a classic filter bubble. But man we already saw this movie we know how it the game works, there is nothing new here except for the fact that our reaction is much more exaggerated that I can recall in recent memory. Besides I'm sure you can think of a great many things that you don't have to experience to understand are bad. I was never enslaved but I read about it. I don't need to have my children taken away from me, see my woman raped, or feel the pain of the whip. I can read about it and imagine. Is that the same thing is being enslaved -- of course not, but it is better than not knowing about it or seeing some sugar coated version of negroes happily singing in he fields.

Please share the link to your youtube channel or post a video.

Yes Del, but payment still has not been adjudicated in court yet. Explain how a divorce can impact 45's presidency before the first term is over?

I agree. Unless this effort is coupled with strategies to hurt gun makers financially through boycotts and legislation nothing will change Which is why nothing has changed.

@Pioneer1, sure I'd accept the notion that heterosexual American Black men maybe be excluded as well. This parallels a period where our incarceration rate climbed and our rates of college graduation related to Black women plummeted. You'll also notice a precipitous drop on the number of Black American-nonbiracial-straight-male novelists who promoted to a wide audience. I don't have firm numbers, but you don't hear names like Travis Hunter, Victor Mcglothin, Eric Jerome Dickey, and Carl Weber nearly as much as you would have 15 years ago-- and they are all still writing... Maybe it is me, with my outside-the-social-media-filter-bubble perspective, but i doubt it, because my book sales tell the same story.

I see the point you are trying to make, but your analogy fails to make the point. There are issues of discretion and judgment that come into play when dudes (and the ladies) start having sex with coworkers, subordinates. So yeah there probably is something "wrong" with the folks on the job screwing each other, when there are so many other ways to find sex partners.

Maybe, but you friend has a point @Pioneer1; sometimes not exposing yourself to propaganda is the best defense. Y'all might recall that during the run up to that last election, I'd decided I was not going to vote, once Hillary became the Democratic candidate. I had been bombarded by so much anti-Hillary "news." I had no interest in supporting her candidacy. Obviously 45 was not a viable alternative. During conversations here, @Cynique convinced me that I really needed to vote, and I ultimately did. Today, we know that social media targeted people with messages psychometrically designed to get you to support 45 or to not vote at all. This is a fact. I feel I was was manipulated, through my use of social media, to loose interest in voting for Clinton. Today to protect myself, I don't read anything on social media unless it is directly related to something I've posted -- and that is always AALBC.com related stuff. I simply refuse to subject myself to Facebook's manipulation. So I get it when some people actively avoid seeing the film and refuse to expose themselves to Disney's propaganda. There is a part of me that wished I had not paid to see the film. But I'm not going to beat myself up over it, because I'm not nearly as susceptible to the hype as most seem to be. So it is not always best to see things for yourself. There are other ways to acquire knowledge, reading is one.

No crime in son getting divorced. The payment to silence "lover" is still an allegation. These are the facts. Does not matter what I think, 'cause niether will get him booted.

Probably.