Troy

MrsMommy, I think you are pouring it on a bit. Colin was not the first athlete, nor will he be the last, to protest the National Anthem. It was a purely symbolic effort amplified by the media and social media for ratings and engagement--otherwise, it would have been a completely inconsequential action. Colin did not risk a thing. Muhammad Ali actually risked his career, money, and body by refusing to fight in Vietnam. Colin risked very little if anything Colin didn't even bother to vote in the last presidential election... So while I agree with your statement that, "There are no black women or men willing to stand out like those Civil Rights leaders of old." Colin is a FAR cry from exhibiting any of the traits of the civil rights activists before the early 70's.

This along the same of as the articles like "The Case for Reparations" by Ta-Nehisi Coates and "The Decline of Black Business And what it means for American democracy" by Brian S. Feldman. Of course art of the reason is structural, but the largest impact is mental. “... [we are taught to be] docile and compliant with being taught to be a mule and a burden bearer whose only goal in life is to seek approval and acceptance and to qualify to work for white people.”

Another great pick Harry. Raising Black Boys by Jawanza Kunjufu has been a top-selling book on AALBC.com for years. There is obvious a desire to obtain information on raising Black boys into men, but everything in our culture undermines this process. If you let the culture raise your boy they have nothing to look forward to but a world of hurt. I can't even blame the parents at this stage. They were not raised themselves, and there is very little in the society them. Indeed, 45 seems hell bent on yanking what little support remains.

45 is uncategorically an alpha male. The term has nothing to do with virtue or morals. He might be an evil Alpha male but he is an alpha male nonetheless.

Well I was drinking 40s long before Ice Cube glamorized the behavior. I do agree with you about the very negative impact of gangta rap music had on Black youth. Anyone one with eyes could see this. This the reasons I loss respect for many of these cats, because they swore up and down there was no impact and they were just telling their stories. They were lying and in it for the money. Back to Aires; I'm not sure why you'd put Aries in the same category as a gangsta rapper and call him "dangeous." That is a tremendous and unsupportable leap. Pioneer you and MrsMommy apparently associate being from the 'hood as all negative. Everyone is the 'hood is not creating the slum conditions their, doing crack, on welfare, or from single family households. Aires did not say anything about that. You are saying this and THAT is the danger Bruh. You are applying your own stereotypes onto the 'hood, associating them unfairly to Aires and vilifying hm for it. It does not sound like you heard a word he said? Del and I came from the hood, but neither of us present 'hood. Del and I both graduated a top business school. You can be in the 'hood and not be ghetto. The point Aires is essentially making @Pioneer1 is that Key and Peele are not as culturally Black as you or I and this informs their comedy. Do you agree with this assessment?

Hey Drew thanks for sharing this here. I'm not into the social media hash-tagging thing, but I'm into uplifting Black dads. Do you have a website or is the HuffPost the main platform for Black Dad TV

@CDBurns thanks for popping in. I'm predicting Twitter is on the way out. They have never made a penny in profit even Trump's tweets isn't making them profitable. Every semester I poll my students, asking them to name their favorite websites. This semester I asked them to give me two social media websites. Our out of 53 students only 1, named Twitter This is a dramatic decrease from previous semesters. The students did say they used Twitter for breaking news, mainly for the memes. Snapchat and Instagram are far more popular with my group of college juniors and seniors. Good to read your website traffic is up!

MrsMommy, are you equating Colin Kapernick with a civil rights leader of old (or new for that matter)?

Bereavement Announcement On the Passing of Sir Derek A. Walcott On Friday, March 17, 2017, at Gros Islet, St. Lucia, Nobel Laureate Sir Derek Alton Walcott passed away at his home. With his passage, the world of arts and letters has lost a poet, dramatist, and essayist who shaped prevailing definitions of twentieth and twenty-first century figurative language in poetry, drama, and prose. Born January 23, 1930, a twin to his brother Roderick in Castries, St. Lucia, Derek A. Walcott's commitment to forging the English language into an instrument of revelation is of the fiercest variety, equal only to his commitment to the Caribbean as a site and source of artistic and cultural wealth brought forth in the word; if language is the metal at hand, Walcott is our modern-day Hephaestus. His life's work, the monumental and monumentalizing consideration of history in poetry and drama, is captured in each of the following collections of poetry and plays: In a Green Night: Poems 1948-1960; The Castaway and Other Poems; The Gulf and Other Poems; Another Life; Sea Grapes; The Star-Apple Kingdom; The Fortunate Traveller; Midsummer; Collected Poems: 1948-1984; The Arkansas Testament; Omeros; the Bounty; Tiepolo's Hound; The Prodigal: A Poem; Selected Poems; White Egrets; Dream on Monkey Mountain and Other Plays; The Joker of Seville and O Babylon!; Remembrance and Pantomime; The Odyssey; The Haitian Trilogy;and Walker and the Ghost Dance. His collection of essays titled What the Twilight Says: An Overture remains one of the richest and most intriguing ruminations on Caribbean artistic creation's inheritance of colonialism and its hybrid cultures; Walcott theorizes the Caribbean artist as both "Adamic," a "first man," and Caliban, colonial slave. Walcott remains the lyrical and elegiac beating heart of the Caribbean, and it is toward the specificity of Caribbean linguistic and cultural hybridity that his work turns in each formal declaration: throughout lyric, elegy, epic, and drama, Walcott confirms the truths of the universal through the particular rhythms of Caribbean language and culture. In that regard, Walcott also confirms throughout his work the messages of the particular in the universal; as such, he is also our modern-day Hermes, messenger to the gods. To quote Russian poet Joseph Brodsky, who was a dear friend of Walcott's: "He gives us more than himself or 'a world'; he gives us a sense of infinity in the language." That "sense of infinity" is foregrounded in Walcott's profound respect for the English language, and his calling to the craft of poetry and drama. It is perhaps fitting that Walcott made his departure on St. Patrick's Day, as his other great friend in life and poetry was Seamus Heaney. Yet the material of his work is always already revolutionary, in that Walcott envisions an infinity in which all of the narrative requirements of heroism are imagined from the position of the black Caribbean world, and remain at the fingertips of the black Caribbean subject, most apparent in his epic Omeros, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992. This fidelity throughout his work to fashion his Caribbean through the eyes and ears of its rhythms will continue to enthrall audiences throughout the world, and across time. Walcott's commitment to poetry extended to all of the arts, most notably to his passion for theater and painting. He is an accomplished playwright who founded the Trinidadian Theater Workshop with his brother, Roderick, in 1950, and he also painted for most of his life. Tiepolo's Hound boasts twenty-six reproductions of Walcott's own paintings throughout its interweaving narrative that reimagines St. Thomatian nineteenth-century impressionist-painter Camille Pissarro's journeys to Europe with Walcott's own. He was also a terrifically conscientious reader, critic, mentor, and friend to younger poets and writers who sent him their work; generous with his time, Walcott was also a sharp critic carefully maintaining his integrity and his honesty in responding to people's work. His sense of humor was robust, and sometimes silly; he observed the everyday world and people in it with a voracious curiosity. In social settings, he would speak to strangers-from child to ancient, and in any context-who he found interesting. His delight in the world was complete-as could be his impatience with that same world, and the people in it. Walcott taught at several institutions over the years including Boston University, Columbia, Yale, and Rutgers. Among numerous awards and commendations, Walcott was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II as KCSL (Knight Commander of the Order of St. Lucia) in 2016. In addition, he won an Obie Award for his play Dream on Monkey Mountain (1971) and a MacArthur "Genius" Fellowship in 1981.The T.S. Eliot Prize was awarded to him for his last collection of poetry White Egrets (2010), which includes a series of poems on President Barack Hussein Obama. The Center for Black Literature and the English Department were fortunate to have honored Sir Derek Walcott with the W. E. B. Du Bois Award at Medgar Evers College (CUNY) during the 2014 National Black Writers Conference. This last trip, he and his wife, Sigrid, made included visits throughout the Americas, from Canada to Mexico; after this visit, Walcott remained in St. Lucia with Sigrid, writing, painting, entertaining friends, and enjoying the view from his aerie on Rodney Bay. Victoria A. Chevalier, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Englis Medgar Evers College (CUNY) The Center for Black Literature at Medgar Evers College, CUN Phone: 718-804-8883 E-mail: writers@mec.cuny.edu www.CENTERFORBLACKLITERATURE.org

@Pioneer1, to your point about leaders. Leaders, by definition, have followers. If the so-called followers don't do what the leader says, then that person is not much of a leader. Are they? Obama, for example, is not a leader, but Minister Farrakhan is definitely one. But the impact of the NOI was greatly diminished after government intervention fostered division within the organization, as with the Pathers and an organization responsible for making material changes within and for the Black community. Brother Umar is a leader too but he is too obscure to have the kind of impact Matin or Malcolm had. I hate to let you guys in on something, but feudalism has already returned. Once white folks started complaining about a lack of opportunity that should have told you it was a wrap for us spooks. But we are happy to be serfs, so long as we have cable TV, social media, sugary food, porn/sex, and some way to get high. We don't mind being bound to the land--most of us don't even have passports. We are happy to give away our labor for free (ala HuffPosty Bloggers) Here is a related article worth reading: The Decline of Black Business And what it means for American democracy by Brian S. Feldman Last June, Black Enterprise magazine marked the forty-fourth anniversary of the BE 100s, the magazine’s annual ranking of the nation’s top 100 black-owned businesses. At the top of the list stood World Wide Technology, which, since its founding in 1990, has grown into a global firm with more than $7 billion in revenue and 3,000 employees. Then came companies like Radio One, whose fifty-five radio stations fan out among sixteen national markets. The combined revenues of the BE 100s, which also includes Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Productions, now totals more than $24 billion, a ninefold increase since 1973, adjusting for inflation. A closer look at the numbers, however, reveals that these pioneering companies are the exception to a far more alarming trend. The last thirty years also have brought the wholesale collapse of black-owned independent businesses and financial institutions that once anchored black communities across the country. In 1985, sixty black-owned banks were providing financial services to their communities; today, just twenty-three remain. In eleven states that headquartered black-owned banks in 1994, not a single one is still in business. Of the fifty black-owned insurance companies that operated during the 1980s, today just two remain. Read the full article in the Washington Monthly. Of course there a great number of parallels to Black bookstores. This photo of the Black grocery struck a cord, because I remember when Black people owned grocery stores in Harlem. Today I'm not aware of a single grocery store owned by a Black person.

That short little speech was so deep. Yeah, there are no leaders speaking this way. All of our leaders are quite safe and at no risk being assassinated today. Forget about Black people for a second, image if the masses boycotted Walmart, Amazon or Facebook for a day, a week or even a month. This shouldn't even be a sacrifice for anyone, but image the immediate impact of throwing our collective, financial, weight around? We should be boycotting Coca-Cola simply because the product is complete garbage and only good for fostering obesity and related illnesses. Of course, we will never boycott anything because all of us slaves (whites folks, you are slaves too) are still fighting amongst ourselves. --------------- Is Black History Month still a thing? From my perspective, Black History is celebrated every day, but thinking about this last February I don't recall much buzz about Black History Month. In fact, I usually see a doubling of traffic the site February, this year the increase was much more muted. The graph below supports my observations, should that the number of search for the term Black History Month is way down compared going back to 2004 (the earliest year Google supplies data). Remember Black Solidarity Day? maybe that explains the small spike prior to the one in February

“When the slaves get together, that’s the beginning of getting out of slavery.”—Martin Luther King, Jr. I'd be surprised if many people would recognize that quote coming from MLK. If they knew it was Dr, King, they probably would not recognize that it came from the famous speech he gave, the evening before he was murdered in Memphis, TN almost 49 years ago to the day, the "Mountaintop" speech. The most quoted line is, "We, as a people, will get to the promised land! I'm glad I reread this speech as I was migrating Dr. King's web page. We are misdirected with the focus nonviolent aspect of King's message. But King was keen on using economic power to win justice for Black folks. “And so, as a result of this, we are asking you tonight, to go out and tell your neighbors not to buy Coca-Cola in Memphis.” It was pretty clear from the speech that King knew his life was in serious danger but he did not let up. Calling for a boycott of Coke in the south probably signed his death warrant. Coke does not have to worry about Negros boycotting them today, or anything else for that matter because we are not prepared to give up anything--even if it would advance our cause. Read or listen to the entire speech--especially if you have heard it before.

In the first 27 days of not using social media at all. My traffic from social media has actually gone up when compared to the prior 27 days. It is also higher than the traffic from the same 27 days in 2016. After about 6 months or so I'll write about the impact of not using social media on my business. My initial conclusion is the increase this just reflects how the impact of my personal activity on social media has been on my websites traffic. I have to admit I have sometimes I found it hard to ignore the desire to share something on social media that I just posted on this site. I feel like people will not learn about the interesting book or author I just posted. Intellectually, know this is just the result of 10 years of conditioning to use social media. I know of course over time this urge will diminish. From an online social perspective, I have y'all :-) From my family and friends perspective, most are not active on social and those that are, are the ones sharing the minutia from their daily lives--either way I don't feel like I'm missing anything, From news and information perspective, I know I'm better off ignoring social media. It has been interesting to see traditional news outlets start to sell themselves on the virtues of providing true journalism and not the fake news you find on social media. The subscriber base for the NY Times has increased. It appears the pendulum may be swinging the other way. Last night (March 26th), 60 Minutes aired a segment which spoke about Fake News. They demonstrated how websites can buy fake likes and shares, which not only gives people the false impression that articles are important but "tricks" social media into sharing these articles as trending--which greatly increases the organic reach of the entity buying the fake likes. I put "tricks" in quotes, because I know social media sites can identify the artificially amped up articles, but they have little incentive to remove this fake engagement because it helps the social media platforms too. I watch and enjoy the Showtime program Homeland. One of the threads in the season's series deals with social media and how is used to influence public opinion. This is straight out of the article @Mel Hopkins shared about how social media was used to influence the trump campaign. This is actually not the first time I stopped using Facebook. About 2.5 years ago I stopped as part of a much larger campaign called, 99 Days without Facebook, which asked the question would you be happier with Facebook. I hoped to use the campaign to encourage others to join the effort. I don't think I convinced a single to leave Facebook. I boycotted Facebook for 37 days. This boycott is different. I don't care if any joins me. I'm not even trying to convince anyone to. I'm relating my experience here for my own benefit as much as anyone else's

Yes "building a progressive Black community in Michigan," is a vision in my book. The individual steps you taken to accomplish that a vision is not. Perhaps my vision can be stated as "developing an independent Black community on the web." I don't mean independent in terms of being exclusive of anyone else, but independent as in self-sufficient. Where Black folks reap not just the cultural but the financial benefits. The problem with my vision is that it is exceedingly difficult.one to accomplish. Overtime, I've learned limiting this vision to the web is short sighted. It is not like we have independent Black communities in the physical world, and they simply need to be extended to the web. I think the web reflects or amplifies the physical world and that our independence needs to start in the real world... If the weather were not so jacked up in Michigan I would consider moving there--seriously.

I was in the Mcdonalds is white neighborhood near the college I teach. A young Black woman, told a Hispanic male, "If I was a nigger I would fuck you up," There were a wide variety of people standing around. No one batted an eye. Just another day in New York City. Pioneer, perhaps you live in a more civilized environment, but if I went around checking everyone one who said the word nigger in public, I would not have time to do anytime else. It is 7:10 a.m. and I've already heard the word used by someone walking down the street. Besides I would probably risk a physical altercations--and for what?

Since I posted this Vlad video I watched several more. I noticed he stays off camera, but he constantly names drops. I'm not surprised that he is white. Vlad, clearly brokers in Black controversy in the music business and is profiting a great deal. I'm surprised he can get so many interviews and have Brother talk about controversial issues on camera...then again he is white. Addressing your issues as you have enumerated them; I'm not gonna dis Aries because of his relative attractiveness. His personal affect is the 'hood negro. I don't think it is schtick it is who he is. As discussed this is what differentiates him from Key and Peele. You obviously misunderstood Aries. In fact Aires used himself as an example of a real nigga who can navigate the white world. Pioneer it is obvious Aries was using a metaphor--come on man! I did not know that. I did not see a single video where he had white people talking about white dysfunction. He raised so much trash about Black folks I was completely unaware of. I agree and I'm not going to watch any more of his videos. I don't think Aries is "jealous." but he does recognize that he is a white man's world and the Key and Peel's will always be more successful than and Aires Spears. Think Barack Obama versus Jessie Jackson.

Yes it is true we are never in the same point in space at any given instant in time. Does the zodiac change to accommodate these changes to our relative position in the heavens? I forgot what you wrote (if anything) about the additional constellation in the zodaic.

True, what I think of Jordan can not possibly matter to him in how he perceives himself. However, if Jordan has any interest in appealing to the great masses of Black people on a more than superficial manner, then my opinion does matter. But again, I'm sure this was not a goal of the film. Appealing to Black people on a profound level has never been a goal of Hollywood. Indeed, as you probably know Key and Peele appeal more to white folks more than they do to Black folks. for these very reasons. This is of course the primary reason for they terrific success. Of course, profit, as you implied is the measure of success and this makes it necessary for films to appeal to white folks. Appealing to Black folks is nice but certainly not necessary or a driving factor.

Del, since will soon be twice and many people on earth as the 4.2B number you posted above, does that mean some of us will have the same natal chart. Now I know, of course all of these people were not born the same year, but do natal charts repeat in cycles year to year? In other words, would someone born January 1, 2017 at 11:00 a.m. in room 124 at Lennox hill hospital have the same chart as someone else born in the same room, at the same time, on January 1, 2016?

Yes, I remember that video. Langston Hughes lived down the street from where I live today.

See this is why I do not like the term bi-racial. Saying Jordan is bi-racial, in isolation, means nothing. Jordan being bi-racial does not explain or justify behavior. Now if Jordan was raised by white people, lived in a white neighborhood, went to school with white people, and married a white woman. It goes with our saying that Jordan is culturally white. Again this would have nothing to do with his race. Basically was Aries is saying is that Jordan does not pass the sniff test of being culturally Black. Of course what it means to be culturally Black is subjective as well, but it is a lot more meaningful than the term bi-racial. Jordan looks as Black as I do, But I'd guess Jordan did not grow up in the racially and economically segregated projects and attend racially segregated schools like I did. I would probably pass muster with Aries for so-called Blackness, but there other Black people who grew up middle class and had a completely different but no less valid Black experience. Because Black people don't own anything in Hollywood, the movies we see often fail to relate an authentic Black experience--at least one that resonates with me. Even with the film Get Out!, which I enjoyed, as a Black man there are still many things I had to overlook from a cultural perspective. This is easy because I have to do it with virtually every movie I watch. For example, dating the white woman or staying in the house more than 5 minutes are just a couple of things I had to let slide because it does not speak to my experience, but again I'm accustomed to this. You could have replaced the Brother with actor of any race and it would not have changed the film one iota. It was a white film that happened to have a Black actor.

This is just another free what to expand your blog's reach. https://aalbc.com/blogs/addnewblogform.html

One of the Bloggers who recently added their Blog to AALBC.com had a very humorous take on this film: Get Out Movie Review from a black dude's perspective... Below is a quite from the review: "...These MOFOs been dating for four months. They ain't married. Since when did parents let they kids sleep in the same room, in the same bed in their house after four months of dating? Bruh you better sleep in the car. He shoulda already been uncomfortable when they allowed that shxt to go down. But again, the brotha is still there!" Now I immediately noticed myself and just chalked it up to things white families "white people do," and did not give it another thought. But it raised and interesting thought about culture and humor. The comedian Aries Spears clearly articulated the differences between a culturally Black comedian (like himself) and a culturally white one like Jordan Peel, the man behind Get Out!

Yes @Delano, that last message was in reference to Trump. And yes I realize when I wrote it that it was inconsistent with my previous statement about Trump, but I'm using a different definition of the phrase, "Alpha-Male." Twitter is optimized to spread gossip and to encourage the piling on to abuse others (as in the Leslie Jones case). Real men don't gossip or join groups to bully someone, and as a result, have little use for Twitter. @Pioneer1, of course to you and I that Koren kid's concept of "dating" is laughable, maybe even a bit sad. but it is reflective of the world we live in today. Alpha males have usually had intercourse with someone they describe as dating. Pioneer your word choice in describing social media is different that what I would use, but we seem to have arrived at the same conclusions. The WWW facilitated freedom and independence which enhances creativity; while social media limits freedom, fosters dependence and crushes creativity by defining a very narrow band of what is possible (eg use of memes. 140 characters, etc). To an Alpha male being told what to do and how to do it is entirely unacceptable. Followers are happy in this predicament--indeed they need it. Cynique original definition of Alpha Male makes this plain. I've changed my position and proudly accept the designation of Alpha Male

@Pioneer1 when I write here it is for public consumption with the idea that anyone can read and comment on what I write. If I want to communicate with anyone directly I would email them or message them directly. In my case, at least, you should read everything I write in a conversation, because I'm assuming you have. I guess that explains some miscommunication in the past I'm surprised you felt I was snapping at you. That was not my intent. Sorry about that. To explain my mission "in detail" to someone unfamiliar with me and the nature of the web would take a minute. It is like responding to a common question I get, "I just wrote a book, what do I do next?" What seems like a simple question really is not very simple it depends so much on what the person already knows, what their goals are, etc. Probing to get the detail to provide an adequate response would take more time than I have. I tell myself I need to craft a genetic response so that when I get that question, I can direct writers to the canned response, rather than ignoring the email. Pioneer your question deserves a response, but I'd like to take some time to craft it properly, because I know I'll have occasion to use it often. I won't have it done tomorrow or next month, but when it is done I will be sure to share it with you. But I will tell you this much; selling books or opening a chain of Black-owned bookstores are activities, not a vision in my opinion. The underlying reason for those activities can reveal one's motivations and shed some clue to their vision.