Troy

Sara the idea that you would pass on going to the library does not surprise me. Sara why hurls barbs at Harry? He said he mistyped--which is something we all do and he answered the question. Similarly why all the machinations over conceding that you were incorrect about the quoting of a single paragraph. You would not be the first person you was wrong about something. We all have been wrong. -------------------- Finally @Sara, and this is important: if you (or anyone else who makes a habit of it) persist on quoting full comments from other posters, I will simply delete them--unread. If I have to spend time deleting these too often, I will prevent the offending poster from post. Please stop doing it. Sorry for taking such extreme measures If I could stop people from doing this in software I would, but I can't so I have to resort to a brute force tactic which I'm not a fan of. For example, there is absolutely no reason for you to fully quote Harry's post when you are entering the very next post. When you do this you clutter the board and make is harder for others to read it.

@Xeon, of course the question "Better than what?" makes sense to the statement, "I know a lot of Black men and women who did and most of them came out better." In fact, that question ALWAYS makes that most sense when someone say that something is better or worse. If you want to describe something as not making sense, lets look at your statement; "...people who generally serve in the military are better after they leave the military than when were prior to entering the service for the most obvious reasons." What is obvious about that? We have already discussed that people in the military suffer from PTSD, homelessness, suicide, all at rates higher than people who did not go into the military. Your statement makes no sense in light of these facts. Also how can you be so confident that if people did something else with their time, like go to college, learn a trade, or just get a job, that they would be worse off than if they went into the military? As Chris mentioned the negative outcomes of military service has to do with the job you are in and other factors. And as already stated there are of course people who come out better as a result of Military service, Chris is an example. However Chris' alternative was JAIL! I'd recommend anyone go into the military, every day of the week, if the option was jail. I have one simple question for you Xeon: Do you think that all young men and women should serve in the military? @Cynique, I'm not sure why you are accusing me of lecturing, and not anyone else, including yourself.. We are debating the issues and making arguments . But I think I get why you are so defensive of my critique of the military. I think you are receiving it as if I'm personally attacking all the men in your life who have served, I'm not doing that. Again, I'm not focusing on Individuals. I like Chris, and am glad he had a great experience, but I'm not going to judge the entire armed forces on his experience, any more than I would judge it on the experience of my father's, who was able to show his premature death was related to his military service. I'm also not sure why you use adjectives like "revolted" and "despised" in describing my feeling about the armed services. I did not use these words, nor do I feel this way. Indeed, I wrote that we NEED the military, because we do. I'm only advocating that we treat the people better than we currently do. But improving how we treat our military personnel will never improve if we all bury our heads in the sand and act like there aren't any problems that need correcting. I also believe that Black men, in particular, are presented with so few options that the military is often their only decent choice. I don't feel this should be the case either. So sure Cynique, that is the "world as it exists," but that does not mean we can't try to change it. @CDBurns, interestingly I went to a high school that had a class that taught us little life skills, like writing a checks, banks account, even how to buy a used car.

@CDBurns, when talking about the military, or anything for that matter, we have to separate individual experiences from that of the whole group. I don't doubt that you and many others have wonderful experiences in the military, but again those are just your opinions from your relatively narrow experience within the entire US Armed forces. Like the proverbial blind men describing an elephant your experience doesn't make you wrong or right they are your experiences, I'm not judging you on that. How can I? I'm not you. Even if I shared your identical experience in the military I would have come away with a completely different impression, because I'm not you. What I'm talking about is the US military in general, looking across the entire service. Now when you examine something with at such a high level, this has little to do with individual experiences. It is like taking the average height of 100 people: it is possible to calculate an average height that none of people actually have. That does not make the average height value useless because no one is that height. So while there homelessness is higher for ex military personnel, than the general population, that does not mean you will be homeless if you join the military. But the fact there is a higher propensity toward homelessness for the group is not a good thing, but you've suggested some causes that might be perfectly plausible At the end of the day we need a military, but my problem is that I think we use it recklessly and spend too much money on it. I also know the military industry complex is driving the spend because it is lucrative. I seem to remember reading we spend more than the next 20 countries -- why? I also don't like the fact that too many Black kids find the military is their only option. I do know other Brothers my age that were given the choice between jail and the Military (one came out the Military and ended up in jail). I don't think they give Brother that option anymore; cause locking Blackmen up is now lucrative too. . Finally I mentioned indoctrination, because since you've gone through it, it is harder for you to see things the way someone who has not gone through it. Do you see my point? You are naturally less likely to be critical of the Military because you are part of it even was only 8 years. As for Cynique, her motivation for being so uncyniquely defensive of the military and roping you into this conversation is less obvious. I suspect it is a generational thing you know the folks old enough to remember WWII. Knew what it was like to come together as a nation and fight Hitler, the Japanese c=and communism. Rationing food and metal, women working the jobs men left behind, all that stuff the greatest generation is know for--I dunno Cynique what is it?

Sara, I see you have trouble understanding the nature of the web and hyper links. I cited the publication, which means if you want to read the article you have to go to the library or something (again everything is not on the web), the hyperlink was to Herb Boyd page so that you would know who he is. I wrote I was done, I slipped up LOL I removed the quote you pasted from instagram, which was broken was i the process and needlessly copied. I will continue to delete unnecessarily quoted content you past from your posts as I discovered them. If you don't like it sorry. I watched the episode too. Of course it was much better produced than the original and did a much better job of depicting the humanity of the Africans, while in Africa. The people were beautiful.

@Pioneer1 (I like the new avatar), man I can drink dairy and eat ice all day long and I'm in my 50's now what? Also people from other parts of African are also able to digest lactose. Again skin color is genetically determined (ignoring environmental factors), but as we've written numerous times; skin color is insufficient to to determine what you understand as race. I'd bet most of the genetic variation we observe in human is due more to environment (geography, available food supply, climate, etc). Cultures come and go too quickly to have much of an influence on our genetics.

If Snoop did not do a lot of cussing it probably would not have been shared a bazillion times. I was doing a search to trying to find the start time for Roots and the video popped up. Honestly, I'm a little disappointed in myself for contributing the the echo chamber that has become the social media fueled internet. Snoops video was almost 9,000 times and hour over the last 10 hours! If Snoop was really a "real Nigga," he'd stop enriching Mark and his boys at Facebook and help uplift some Black owned websites. Humm... I think I'll add this comment to the 12 hundred other ones.

Apparently Snoop D O double G agrees. It looks like I missed the first episode, it started an hour ago here...

"Courlander's 1978 suit was successful and proved that eighty-one passages from Roots were copied from Courlander's 1967 book, The African, which subsequently led to decreased scholarly interest in Haley." --Herb Boyd, "Plagiarism and the Roots Suits," First World 2, no. 3 (1979): 31–33, 31–32. Seems I'm not the only one less interested in Haley's work. If white people selling the book and making another miniseries if is enough to validate Haley's literary merit for you great and if that put me in the minority even better. Half a million dollars, in 1978, is cheap to you?! My God woman... I'm done here.

Monday, June 13, 8:30 AM–5:00 PM FROM THE BLACK ARTS MOVEMENT TO CAVE CANEM To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Black Arts Movement and the 20th anniversary of Cave Canem, a day-long symposium featuring two panels and a Master Class in children’s literature. This event is co-sponsored by the Folger Shakespeare Library’s O.B. Hardison Poetry Series, PEN/Faulkner Foundation, We Need Diverse Books, and Cave Canem Foundation. 8:30AM – 12:30PM: Master Class featuring Kwame Alexander, Jacqueline Woodson, and other faculty members, Jason Low, publisher at Lee & Low Books; Jennifer Brown, publisher at Knopf Books for Young Readers, a Penguin Random House imprint; and Cassandra Pelham, senior editor at Graphix, a Scholastic imprint. *Master Class open only to accepted applicants. 2:00PM – 3:30PM: Panel One: “Writing Across Genre,” featuring Tony Medina and Marilyn Nelson, moderated by Marita Golden 3:30PM – 5:00PM: Panel Two: “Organizing Founders,” featuring Michael Datcher, Toi Derricotte, and, Sharan Strange, moderated by Joanne Gabbin Evening events to follow at the Folger Shakespeare Theater. Location: LJ-119, First floor, Thomas Jefferson Building Contact: (202) 707-5394 from Kwame Alexander Author of The Crossover, awarded the 2015 Newbery Medal for Most Distinguished Contribution to American Literature for Children

Chris you appreciate the fact that the purpose of boot camp is indoctrination right? It is no different than pledging a frat, you are broken down to be built back up again. This is a necessary part of the process otherwise you'd have too much insubordination and a lack of unity. Anytime you go through a challenging experience with anyone bonds are formed and this of course is well understood by the military. But if you assert and believe the argument, that you have to serve in order to speak on the issue. i guess there is nothing a non military person can say to you that would influence you. But you must appreciate that "you can't understand until you've done it" argument is flawed for several reasons. i guess the biggest one is that people in the military disagree with each other. My father served in the Navy, much longer than you served, 20 years. One of the few things he ever said to me was "don't go into the military." He died at age 44. But that is just an anecdote as is all of your experience and the experiences of everyone else you know. You can get much better insight by looking at the information you found: "...veterans continue to remain overrepresented in the homeless population in America." basically that says if you go into the military your chances of being homeless increase over that of the general population. You don;t need to have served in the military to understand this. Cynique wrote that enlisted men go into to become officers citing it as a benefit. I knew that to be inaccurate, but I know her belief is part of what informs her opinion. At the end of the day Chris, you spent 8 years in and had a great experience and that is terrific. All I'm saying is not everyone has your experience, some even end up dead. I'm also suggesting that many of the young people that sign up don't feel they have many other options, and I'd argue that is a problem of our culture. In fact it sounds like you are one of those people. @CDBurns, what path were you headed down that made you join the military?

Sara it would be a less cluttered and easier to follow your points if you did not quote everything others wrote in your responsest. Your response to me is more difficult to parse than necessary because me quoted text and your response is formatted exactly the same. If you are reply to a question I posted a few hours ago it is not necessary to quote me, I'll remember what I wrote. I did post the link to the Times article. Sorry if I come across snippy, but you know you never move from a position once you've asserted it. You wrote only one paragraph was plagiarized, emphasising only one. Because it was absurd on it's face I challenged on on it. But once it became clear that there was obviously more than one paragraph copied you called into question the journalism of the paper of record and shifted the argument to focus on whether Haley intended the book to be pure fiction versus an account of his family's story. Unfortunately I don't really care enough to hunt down a link to determine when/if haley flipped flopped on his description of roots. Besides, despite popular belief, not everything can be found in a Google search. To properly establish the chronology of statement would require some good old fashion research to establish a timeline. We do know Haley's genealogy as presented in Roots can't be substantiated. Is the book worthless--compared to what? Compared to a well written historical fiction novel--yes. What made Roots so very compelling (at least for me) was that is was presented as truth. Once it was revealed for what it is, the novel is was down on my list, and is only interesting as far a fraudulent literature is concerned. But again you assert that the book was always presented a fiction, but that is not my recollection and you apparently have no memory of the period and are relying on the echo chamber of lies bouncing around the web. In fact, all of Haley work is suspect as far as I'm concerned including the biography of Malcolm X.

Are you suggesting that the New York Times simply made up the figure and that you don't believe it? You don't find it odd that the editors of the Norton Anthology of African American Literature failed to include the book? Haley said Roots was faction only after he got busted. The judge presiding over the case said Haley "perpetrated a fraud." Are you old enough to remember when the miniseries broadcast? If so, you'll also remember that it was not presented as fiction but a family history, a lot of effort was put into making it appear factual including a trip to Gambia. I guess you also believe Haley is a direct descendant of Kunta Kinte too. But that is fine Sara, I know from experience with you that new information and facts don't inform your opinions once you have your mind set. I gave it a shot, but I give up.

Cynique, if you had to guess, what percentage of enlistees, ultimately go on to become commissioned officers? If I had to guess I would bet is is less than the number who have been killed in action, mained, and suffer from PTSD. What percentage of vets do you think actually go on to complete college for free? I would be willing to bet that it is less than the number of homeless vets and vets whose families struggle to survive while they are deployed over seas. Finally, you don't need to risk your life to get a mortgage. Again middle class people with options get mortgages without difficulty. Look, I'm not saying the military, does not offer "benefits," I get that. This is why so many thousands of poor people enlist. My problem is that these benefits are only beneficial to those with limited options. Who wants a life that is not your own? You are told when to get up, what to do, and precisely how to do it -- up to and including getting into the line of fire--and for what? I hope the answer is more than just the "benefits" you've described.

“Actor-director-producer Nate Parker made history by inking a landmark $17.5 million Sundance deal to sell his slavery drama The Birth of A Nation to Fox Searchlight, starting his 2017 Oscar campaign a full year early. The vibrant and lyrical portrait of the divisive African American hero is an incendiary inquiry into themes of racism and faith that still echo today.”—Daily Beast Set against the antebellum South, The Birth of a Nation follows Nat Turner (Nate Parker), a literate slave and preacher, whose financially strained owner, Samuel Turner (Armie Hammer), accepts an offer to use Nat's preaching to subdue unruly slaves. As he witnesses countless atrocities - against himself and his fellow slaves - Nat orchestrates an uprising in the hopes of leading his people to freedom. (In Theaters: Oct 7, 2016 Limited) It seems Park's film is not a reboot of 1915 film Birth of a Nation (which dealt with the Civil War and the rise of the Klan in it's aftermath). Nate's story is about the Nat Turner. I'm looking forward to this one!

This is picking up on the Roots conversation started by Harry which segued into a conversation about Race. I still don't think remaking Roots was necessary given, as we've discussed the great many other stories which have yet to make it to the screen. It is curious The Atlantic failed to mention the fact the Alex's story was largely fictional, as if this does not matter. When Roots broadcast it was presented as truth. (@Sara, do you think Haley would have paid over $500,000, in an out of court settlement, for plagiarizing a single paragraph?) The Atlantic did mention Nate Parker’s record-breaking Birth of a Nation. I heard something about a film being made sometime ago, but I have heard nothing about a finished film until now. I own the original Roots novel and DVD. Over the years I've tried to get my own 20 something daughters the watch the Roots miniseries, but they have no interest in seeing it. I have not spoken to them at all about this new version. I will watch it. i will try to keep an open mind and manage my expectations. Why the Roots Remake Is So Important by STEPHANE DUNN The Atlantic, May 29, 2016 In an age of remakes and reboots, it’s no surprise that A&E announced that it was “reimagining” the epic drama in an effort to appeal to a new generation of viewers. The four-part miniseries, which begins airing Monday, is executive produced by Mark Wolper, whose father David Wolper helped create the original Roots with Haley. While it may be easy to question the worth of a remake given the original’s masterpiece status, A&E’s Roots has the kind of high production values that can better translate the visual power of its predecessor to younger audiences. But more importantly, the new series brings new light to the misperception that popular culture has done a good job telling stories about slavery and black history in the decades since Roots first gripped the U.S. To date, America’s most defining chapter, slavery—with all of its complexity, contradictions, and endless fictional and true narrative possibilities—has been under-treated by Hollywood. The recent visibility of films such as the Oscar-winning 12 Years a Slave, Nate Parker’s record-breaking Birth of a Nation, the intriguing, savvy WGN series Underground, and Django Unchained, Tarantino’s fantastical slave era-cowboy hero flick—might make it appear otherwise. (BET’s unusual but laudable 2015 effort, The Book of Negroes miniseries, failed to widely engage American viewers.) read the full article Why America Forgot About ‘Roots’ By MATTHEW F. DELMONT The New York Times, May 27, 2016 But “Roots” fell out of favor almost as quickly as it rose, in part because Haley’s story started to unravel as soon as it was in print. He relied heavily on an editor to finish the book and later paid over half a million dollars to settle a plagiarism suit. Other people were upset with the way ABC, Haley and Doubleday, his publisher, seemed to be wringing money from the history of slavery. It was also hard for people to pin down “Roots.” Was it fact or fiction? Haley, who died in 1992, said it was a bit of both, a mix of archives, oral traditions and imagination in a composite narrative he called “faction.” The television version complicated matters further, insisting that the production was based on a true story while billing the series as an “ABC novel for television.” If “Roots” was too fictional for most historians, its version of historical fiction was not literary enough for English departments. “Roots” is notably absent from The Norton Anthology of African American Literature, which runs to nearly 3,000 pages. The literary critic Arnold Rampersad described “Roots” as being “so innocent of fictive ingenuity that it seldom surpasses the standards of the most popular of historical romances.” read the full article

Well it would not just be rich people, it would also be middle class folks who would complain too. I think much of the aversion to Vietnam had more to do with the draft than the senseless killing of southeast asians. Do you think Ali would have spoken out against the war so vigorously if he weren't forced to go himself? Don't you think there would be at least a little more outrage against the protracted wars in the middle east if our sons and daughters were legally obligated to go? You'd hardly know there is a war going on today, because people with options are not affected by the wars and people without options have no voice. Meanwhile the rich get richer, for wars mean money for the oligarchy, and if Black people believe going in the military is a good thing--it is better for the rich.

Pioneer sure anyone would take free land, but the idea these same folks will also go work this land, build the necessary infrastructure, to live there is naive and short sighted--we hardly support our own businesses now. That said, there are groups of people who are building their own communities on the own land, we don't need reparations to do this we, just the the desire, and it is simply not there.

Of course one would also have to hypothetically assume that race also exists in order for this thought experiment to even make sense. Despite that @Pioneer1 you don't have to consider this hypothetically, we live in a world that believed Black people are intellectually inferior--this is the reality. To answer your question just look around. There have been many books written over the last century that promulgated the concept of Black inferiority or white superiority. Of course all of these books are garbage and have no basis in science. But again these ideas persist because people can not let go of the concept of race, and understand we are all part of the same race, Human.

@Pioneer1 of course phenotype is defined in one's genetics but "race" is not (and I wrote I wouldn't debate this fact). Again, there is no Black gene or genes. You can't look at someone genes a say this person is Black and this one is white. In other words one can not come up with DNA test for whiteness. Man you can't even look at someone's phenotype and determine definitively that they are Black or white--that should tell you something right?

Man homesteaders could live off the land. Nobody wants to live off the land today. Man, in places like NYC folks don't even cook any more--let alone raise crops and livestock

No it is not boredom... shoot I can't remember the last time I was bored. Maybe by challenging your ideas I'm really challenged my own. Yes I've heard Chris and others who have been in the military extols the virtues of discipline that the military enforces, but I wonder how many of these folks were trigger pullers whose lives were actually on the line. You know the young men who come back only to commit suicide in numbers way out of proportion compared to the general population, or who suffer a lifetime of PTSD, or who were tragically maimed or killed... Unfortunately, when we say a Brother is better off going into the military we are usually comparing it to a civilian experience in some ghetto, underemployed and struggling to survive. You and I both know people with options, bright futures, financial resources, don't just enlist. Honestly, if it because of this fact I wish they would bring back the draft. Perhaps some of these legislators might make different decisions about wars knowing their rich kids would be the ones doging bullets in some dessert or jungle on the other side of the planet.

Pioneer race is ONLY about phenotype and has nothing to do with genetics. There is no Black gene. If you got to African today you could easily find a "black person" who is genetically more different from you than you are a typical white boy. I read all of the articles, but they I'm at a loss to understand why you think they support you believe in a genetic basis for race. So if both Black and white people can be super tasters, have dry ear wax and be color blind, these facts serve to weaken your argument for a genetic basis for race, not strengthen it. You see why don't you? As far as the sex stuff you sound pretty open minded on paper in reality I'm not so convinced. We happen to live in a culture where women with multiple partners are looked down upon and men with multiple partners are revered. A women is not likely to freely admit to her lover, that she wants all of her holes plugged by three other dudes--fantasy's like this are typically frowned upon. _____ It is gonna be raining in NY tomorrow, I'll probably catch the Roots special just so I can talk about it. Still, I'm not in the mood to see Black people getting whipped, raped and worked to death.

So you disagree with Muhammad Ali's position on serving in Vietnam? If there were another military draft, do you think Black boys should be compelled to go? Do you think America has been completely justified in all of the military campaigns (killing) that has taken place in your life time? If not do you think Black people are better off participating in these campaigns? When you write: "I know a lot of Black men and women who did and most of them came out better for it." I'm forced to ask better than what? Better than what they were before they went in, or better than what they would have been if they, say, went to college, gotten a decent job, or learned a trade. @Pioneer1 I know I spend the day challenging everything you wrote today, but I know you welcome your ideas being challenged and are not treated by it or take it personally. @harry brown, did Sara and I read you correctly are you a Trump supporter>

Pioneer, to be clear, it is not possible to give out as much money as I described in my initial examine. But I now understand giving away money is not what you propose. We should be getting business opportunities, medical care, and education anyway. This is not reparations this is just a consequence of being an American What land do you propose that America giveaway, Detroit? You obviously can't displace people from prime real estate to accommodate descendants of Black slaves. You might recall this was done before (Liberia). Humm now that I think about it should be include descendant of white slaves too? I can get with you in the exceptions route. Maybe making descendants of enslaved African's exempt from Federal income tax. But again this will never happen especially given your idea of including anyone who is directly descendant from an enslaved African. I would be willing to bet that would a majority of Americans, if you exclude recent immigrants would fall into this category. Also you wrote: "There are a dozen websites out there where a person can trace their ancestry back to determine whether or not they descended (in whole or in part) from slavery." I did not know that data was available, would you mind posting a link to one of them, I'd like to check it out.

I don't think anyone is arguing that Black folks have and continue to suffer from the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow laws in the U.S.. However, the question of who deserves what, and how much, is simply unanswerable 150 years after the end of slavery and 50 years after the end of Jim Crow. But even when a question is unanswerable, that does not mean if should not be asked, becuase reasonable estimates can be made. The number of stars in are universe is unanswerable, but we can come up with reasonable estimate. My point however is even if we could answer the question what can we possibly dowith the information? Lets, for argument sake, say the we've determined that every descendant of an enslaved African in the US is entitled to damages of 50 million dollars, based upon generations of wealth lost as the result of generations of enslavement and lost opportunities because of Jim Crow. Of course some would argue that sum to too small given the damages, but I'm just throwing a reasonable number out there. The are roughly 45 million Black folks in the US. of course one could argue not all of these folks, like Barack Obama, deserve compensation for a wide variety of reasons. But for the sake of simplicity we are going to consider any of this. We would just give 45,000,000 people $50,000,000 for a total spend of 2.25 Quadrillion dollars. This sum easily exceeds the wealth of the entire planet. Even if we scaled the number back 3 orders of magnitude, and give everyone $50K it would equal the entire federal budget--and ultimately not change a thing in anyone's life. Given the country is about 18 Trillion in debt, I don't know where even $50K a person would come from. Maybe it would be best for you @Pioneer1, to describe what reparations would look like. Does every so called "Black" person get a check? If so how big would it be? Are all so called Black people compensated equally? Will there be a "brown bag test" of sorts to determine relative level of compensation?