Troy

@Delano you have a good memory. I saw Nona Hendrix a couple of times. The last was Summer Stage a Central Park and Black Rock Coalition event, but I don't recall if you or Jasper was at that event. Speaking of Jasper, I'm not sure you are aware of his transition. Dyson and West are always informative and entertaining. I liked Dr. John Henrik Clarke. I saw him speak once. I thought Minister Farrakhan, in his prime, was one of the most powerful speakers I ever heard. I hear him give a lecture on Cornel's Campus back in the early 80s eye opening. Our course Malcolm X. The Nation trains their ministers well. There are many others. One of the things I miss able NY City was the abundance of lectures one could attend--often for free.

@Mel Hopkins I’m glad you were serving him drinks and not the other way around. @Pioneer1 welcome back!

What?! If I gave you the impression that you of all people her tail your post in anyway please forgive me! Plus God knows we can use some Bookreviews around here. Please do share shoot. I’d love to post it on the website proper! All I was doing was voice in my perspective on your comment. It would be interesting, however, to take a pole and find out if black women took that story about white chicks, snatching up the wealthy black men. I would be willing to bet a substantial portion, if not, a majority aren’t pleased with the “news.” What?! 😳 please check out the rest of the website occasionally if you visit the homepage once a week, you’ll discover a bunch of new books by Black Writers and you definitely would’ve seen his book: https://aalbc.com/books/arsenio-9781982191368

..., he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket." No, he will just blame some whomever he is told to blame. Mexicans, The Blacks, Gay People. Muslims, Jews, etc. I was reminded of the quote in a review I just published: Book Review: Weathering the Storm: Navigating the Anti-Social Justice Wave by Tiffany G. Townsend

"Every time you quote-tweet something that infuriates you, somebody's getting paid. And it's not you." This video showed up in my inbox. I was actually surprised to see a Blavity cover this topic, as it is not the type of content that will not feed the algorithm. As y'all all know I have been gripping about this subject for the past decade. I'm beginning to sense that publishers are getting tired of producing content to feed the beast (social media algorithms). As the thumbnail for the video suggests Steven A. Smith is called out for brokering in the rage-bait economy--basically taking the successful formula used in sports and transferring it to more lucrative cultural issues; celebrity politics, race. I have some minor issues with the video, but overall, I think it is a net positive and I was pleased to see it. We need more like it.

In this case, it is just fringe without discernable merit that I can see. How do you square that statement with the belief in a flat Earth? I presume you do not believe the Earth is flat. I did not know the was a religious component to the flat earther belief. It makes sense... poor word choice... I mean I can see how that would be the case.

Probably ☹️

Yes, i was agreeing with you :-) I think we are fundamentally on the same page, I'm just trying to emphasize the fact China is much more than a source of low wage labor.

@frankster below I have embedded the video you shared. There are several tells which gives me pause when consuming content online. I would have normally stopped watching 5 seconds into the video, but since you shared it and it was only 5 minutes long, I watched the thing twice (once when you first posted it and again just now). I would have immediately skipped it after 5 seconds because the voice over said Professor Gates Proves the voice over said we live in a virtual reality simulation. This is simply false on it's face. Dr. Tyson was respectful but clearly was not buying into Gates' theory -- again, Gates himself never said he had "proof." Sure, it is a provocative notion and sure to garner some views (34K in 7 years), but you also have to consider the source: Who is "Simulation Secrets" and what is their motivation? Their YouTube presence is marginal, small even when compared to mine only 164K total views on the channel. It is used to promote a self-published book, Simulation Secrets: Don't Be Afraid by Casper Stith. Now the question becomes, who is Casper Stith. and why should we believe him? Again, when an unknown and uncredentialled person makes hyperbolic claims, I am very wary of what they have to say and generally don't invest my time into what they are sharing. There are simply too many vetted and reputable sources generating fascinating content to be dealing with fringe lunacy. @frankster you seem like a reasonable person why do you trust anything Stith is sharing? Did you know that he is also a Flat Earther? Stith also wrote a book entitled, The Earth is Flat: Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid. Does this give you pause? I eagerly await your response.

@frankster so you’re going to defend that video as scientific evidence. I wasn’t just slamming the caption which was clearly misleading. I was slamming the content of the video, but I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on that one.

I think American propaganda is causing you to underestimate or marginalized China’s accomplishments. Again, this is the result of propaganda when you’re colonial power, and an empire everyone is an adversary. America needs to be able to flip the switch and turn any adversary into an enemy. We are really very good at doing this history tells us indeed we’ve been on the business end of that type of propaganda for centuries.

No, it’s not just the words is government officials, military personnel, coming with videos that helped change my position. That’s some crack pot on YouTube.

In terms of competition for the world's resources China is way ahead of America. As you know China has always been more willing to go into Black nations and "partner" with the people there. Whether it is Central America, the Caribbean of even the Motherland, China has a global footprint. As a result, China controls and processes 90% the planet's rare earth metals which are used to make all the tech gadgets American's want today. Most telling is that China gives us TicTok, but don't subject their own people to that trash... We all know their students outperform Anerican's in math and reading. I'd be willing to bet Chinese kids perform on par with Americans on reading English. Their EVs are far superior to what Elon has us driving around in here in the US... Viewing China as a cheap labor force is short sighted. We are becoming increasing dependent upon them not just for labor.

I would not have posted that photo of Trump. Obama sanctioned the killing of others including innocent people (by accident or acceptable collateral damage). People would be understandably outraged in that situation... I'm sure the post got a lot of views and I'm sure getting attention was at least part of Mark's motivation -- a motivation fueled by social media.

Over the course of the last year, I have changed my opinion in this matter; while there is no proof of the existence of aliens is this plenty of evidence provided by the federal government. I could understand why government is unwilling to say these UAPs are alien -- maybe they don't know. Maybe they are of Earth origin. I never rejected the possibility of advanced alien civilizations. I was just never willing to take the unsubstantiated statements of some guy in a crop field with a tin hat as evidence -- let alone proof.

Your statements were riddled with examples: Of course not; otherwise there would be nothing to dispute. What I find curious is that conspiracy theorist will believe some random anonymous guy on YouTube over the scientific community. Conspiracy theorists love to spread misinformation as you have done. The professor, a Brother, NEVER made this assertion. Even if he did, proof actually means something. "Proof" is not based upon what someone says. Conspiracy theorist often claim they have proof when they don't. Another typical conspiracy theorist talking point. This is why we have organizations doing the research. Where do you find the time, intellect, skill, tools, funding, and resources to do your own research on covid, WTC collapse, contrails, veracity of the moon landing, etc?

@frankster "Alien" Like Mexicans, the original inhabitants, but not recognized as such 😉 At the end of the day there is so much we don't know, and are unable to comprehend, about the universe. I find it all fascinating. On my bucket list is getting some DMT... seriously.

Did anyone actually hear what Trump said? The website you shared @ProfD won't let you listen to the clip unless you subscribe. I don't know if they are a reputable news source given their use of this tactic... Report the "news" or don't, but don't bait me with scandalous content and fail to deliver. At any rate. they use terms like "appears" and "apparently" when it comes to his use of the word. So I can only assume it was not blatant - still he has to play to his base.. approval rating are down. I guess he'll be hurling the N-bomb soon--that will really rally his supporters. He'll probably hold that card until right before the midterms 😉

Perhaps. My position not new; in the 1950 C.L.R. James wrote a book entitled American Civilization. It is based upon the premise that America is indeed a civilization and he describes why. Since neither one of us will read the entire book; we can only speculate how successful he was in the effort.

Aliens are apparently real. My money is on them being Earth based and not "alien" at all.

No one is asserting that they are interchangeable--at least I'm not. However, they are also not mutually exclusive as I wrote American is both. The point I was simply making s that many empires (and civilizations has lasted longer the 250 years and to assert this as a paradigm is a function of a myopic western European perspective. The fact that you are seeing references to this perspective making the rounds is not surprising. I presume you saw most of these references online and we know who controls the online space (newsflash it ain't us 😉).

Wow! I need to know what woman can pull not one but TWO of the Jackson Five! The kids' father is also their uncle...

WT Hillbilly F! Where did you learn that piece of gossip so their kids are both siblings and cousins huh?

No, the two are different but, America is both a civilization and empire.

Kindred spirits?