I've helped black families…to guide them in the right direction

[RedSand]

Not sure if you guys have had a chance to view the following......

The last link from Yahoo is a beauty.....

 

BBC News - Public fury over 'racist' Trayvon Martin killing

 

Public fury over 'racist' Trayvon Martin killing

Comments (156)

 

Trayvon Martin was carrying only sweets when he was killed

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There's mounting outrage at the shooting dead of an unarmed black teenager in Florida - it is online and it is on the streets.

 

The reason for the fury is the belief that 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was a victim of racism. Not what is now called a "hate crime" - not that he was targeted for random violence because of his colour. Not that sort of racism, but the racism of assumption: that a black teenager in a hoodie in smart neighbourhood must be up to no good.

 

It is the assumption by police that the man who shot him was telling the truth, that it was self defence, even though Trayvon was near his own home, armed only with a bag of sweets and a soft drink.

 

The anger is all the stronger because a series of emergency calls to the police are very revealing and disturbingly graphic.

 

In the first, the neighbourhood watch captain, George Zimmerman, shows his suspicion of the teenager: his anger that could be summed up as "they" keep getting away with "it" and his refusal to listen to police advice to not go after Trayvon Martin.

 

There are disturbing 911 calls from neighbours where you can hear prolonged screaming in the back ground. And then a single shot.

 

Then there is the testimony of a friend who Trayvon called moments before his death, when he asks why he is being followed. Then there are sounds of a struggle.

 

The police did not arrest the man who shot the teenager, even though he, unlike Trayvon Martin, had been arrested in the past.

 

Florida, though, has a law - often known as the "stand your ground" that makes it far from certain that those defending themselves can be arrested for a crime.

 

A very few see the outrage as orchestrated by a liberal media. There has been a bit of an odd argument that Mr Zimmerman was not white but Hispanic.

 

But it is pretty obvious a lot of black people think it self-evident that this is about race.

 

Chauncy De Vega has some profound reflections on this which are well worth reading.

 

It is only 72 years since Congress would not pass a law making lynching illegal.

 

The US has travelled a long way since then, but it is not surprising that cases like this stir up fears that some lessons have not been learnt well enough.

 

Trayvon Martin and Life Lessons for Young Black Boys - Chauncey DeVega - Open Salon

 

Scholars have long maintained that race is merely a social construct, not something fixed into our nature, yet this insight hasn’t made it any less of a factor in our lives. If we no longer participate in a society in which the presence of black blood renders a person black, then racial self-identification becomes a matter of individual will.

 

And where the will is involved, the question of ethics arises. At a moment when prominent, upwardly mobile African-Americans are experimenting with terms like “post-black,” and outwardly mobile ones peel off at the margins and disappear into the multiracial ether, what happens to that core of black people who cannot or do not want to do either?

Trayvon Martin was killed for the crime of being black, young, and "suspicious." Like many other young black boys and grown men throughout United States history, he was shot dead for the crime of possessing an innocuous object (and likely daring to be insufficiently compliant to someone who imagined that they had the State's permission to kill people of color without consequence or condemnation).

 

The facts are still playing themselves out. From all appearances,the police have failed to investigate the incident properly. Trayvon Martin's family has been denied the reasonable care, respect, and response due to them by the local authorities. Observers and activists have gravitated towards racism as the prime motive for the shooting and murder of a young black boy by a grown man and self-styled mall cop, Charles Bronson, Dirty Harry wannabe vigilante.

 

Common sense renders a clear judgement here: if a black man shot and killed a white kid for holding a bag of Skittles he would already be under the jail; in this instance, the police are operating from a position where a young African American is presumed "guilty," and his murderer is assumed innocent.

 

Yes, race matters in the killing of Trayvon Martin. However, and I will explore this in a later post, it is significant in a manner that is much more pernicious than the simple calculus of whether to shoot a young black boy for some imagined grievance or offense--as opposed to being asked a question, or perhaps sternly talked to. The latter is also problematic: it assumes that black people's citizenship and humanity are forever questionable, and subject to evaluation, by any person who happens to not be African American.

 

Cornel West famously suggested that all black children are "niggerized" at some point in their upbringing. Moreover, black children learn to live in a state of existential dread because they are always subject to wanton and unjust violence. Trayvon Martin's murder reminds me of a parallel and complementary observation. Black people live a paradox. We are simultaneously both children and adults in the white racial imagination regardless of our age.

 

Black people are treated as adults even when they are minors. In the courts, black young people are disproportionately subjected to punishments which are typically meted out to adults. As research has repeatedly demonstrated, to be young and black is to be an adult for purposes of arrest, the gas chamber, or imprisonment.

 

Historically, black people have been treated by whites as though they are children in regards to political matters. Thus, the contemporary rhetoric from conservatives that African Americans are childlike, zombies, on a plantation, or somehow hoodwinked or tricked into supporting the Democratic Party. Despite all of the available evidence, grown folks who were either heirs to, or participants in, a Black Freedom Struggle that salvaged and saved American democracy from its own weaknesses, lies, and hypocrisies, are depicted as naive infants, unable to be full and equal political actors.

 

The sociological imagination draws many connections. To point, Trayvon Martin's murder is also a surprising (and for many, counter-intuitive) complement to The New York Times' excellent series of essays on race, interracial marriage, and identity.

 

As someone who has loved across the colorline, and also believes that there are many ways to create a family, I have always held fast to a simple rule.

 

In this society, in this moment, and given what we know about how race impacts life chances, if a white person is going to have a child with a person of color (especially one who is African American or "black"), a parent is committing malpractice if they do not give their progeny the spiritual, emotional, philosophical, and personal armor to deal with the realities of white supremacy.

 

By implication, young black and brown children must be made to understand that they are not "special," "biracial," or part of a racial buffer group that is going to be given "special" privileges because one of their parents is white. These "multiracial" children are some of the most vulnerable and tragic when they are finally forced to confront the particular challenges which come with being a young black boy or girl in American society. In post civil rights America, this notion is politically incorrect. Nonetheless, it remains true.

 

Here, Thomas Chatterton Williams offers a great comment on blackness and the dilemma of "post-black" identity:

Still, as I envision rearing my own kids with my blond-haired, blue-eyed wife, I’m afraid that when my future children — who may very well look white — contemplate themselves in the mirror, this same society, for the first time in its history, will encourage them not to recognize their grandfather’s face. For this fear and many others, science and sociology are powerless to console me — nor can they delineate a clear line in the sand beyond which identifying as black becomes absurd.

Question: what happens for those young people who do not see themselves as "black" or "brown," yet run into the deadly fists of white racism? Do they have the skill sets necessary to survive such encounters whole of life and limb?

 

Because we are both part of a diaspora, the wisdom of our Jewish brothers and sisters is also instructive here. Continuing from The New York Times piece:

For Judt, it was his debt to the past alone that established his identity.Or as Ralph Ellison explained — and I hope my children will read him carefully because they will have to make up their own minds: “Being a Negro American involves a willed (who wills to be a Negro? I do!) affirmation of self as against all outside pressures.” And even “those white Negroes,” as he called them, “are Negroes too — if they wish to be.”And so I will teach my children that they, too, are black — regardless of what anyone else may say — so long as they remember and wish to be.

Trayvon Martin was likely taught the life lessons necessary to survive an encounter with the police (or their posse cousins) by his parents and other elders. Because black life is cheap, a young person of color can do everything "right" and still end up dead. What does this mean for blackness, when a century or more after the end of slavery, and decades after the end of lynch law, that your guilt is still assumed?

 

Whiteness and White privilege involve the luxury of being able to decide how, in what ways, and under what conditions, you will be allow yourself to be uncomfortable. White privilege also involves the luxury of not having to have a conversation with your kids about how to avoid being murdered by the cops because of your skin color. In many matters of life and death, white supremacy remains, in many ways, unchallenged. Black and brown folks, if they are responsible parents, cannot avoid such conversations with their children. The foot-dragging by the police in regards to the murder of Trayvon Martin reveals this ugly truth.

 

Dr. King is gone. A black man is President. Yet, life remains unfair...does it not?

 

Don't Re-Nig purveyor Paula Smith says bumper sticker isn't racist | The Sideshow - Yahoo! News

 

Last Friday, I wrote about the racist, anti-Obama "Don't Re-Nig in 2012" bumper sticker that has been making the rounds across social media circles. While people were questioning the authenticity of the photograph showing the bumper sticker on someone's car, we were able to track down a website selling the sticker along with several other controversial items.

 

Writing for Forbes, Roger Friedman interviews the site's owner, Paula Smith. Ms. Smith, who hails from Hinesville, Georgia, insists that neither she nor the sticker are racist. Who knows what Smith really believes, but her logic is a stretch, to put it gently.

 

"I do find it amazing and entertaining that one of our stickers has become a racist thing," Ms. Smith told Forbes.

 

She even tried arguing that the dictionary does not define the "N-Word" as racist. Wisely, Friedman posted the actual definition from dictionary.com, which says the word, "is now probably the most offensive word in English. Its degree of offensiveness has increased markedly in recent years, although it has been used in a derogatory manner since at least the Revolutionary War. Definitions 1a, 1b, and 2 represent meanings that are deeply disparaging and are used when the speaker deliberately wishes to cause great offense."

 

Her protestations aside, Ms. Smith appears to have removed the bumper sticker from her site. Under the "Anti-Obama" section of the site (advertised as her No. 3 bestseller), you'll now only find a sticker reading, "I was Anti-Obama Before It Was Cool."

 

In what may be a reference to the controversy her other bumper sticker has caused, the description below reads, "Show the world how you feel! (but be careful, you may hurt someone's feelings)."

 

Ms. Smith then goes on to argue that President Obama is "not even black," but rather, "a mixture of race." When Friedman asks Smith if she thinks the N-Word is offensive or derogatory, she says no, but then claims that she herself does not even use the word.

 

"I have kids here around me that are black kids. I call them my own kids. I've helped black families…to guide them in the right direction," Smith told Forbes. "We like to laugh and have a good time. That's our way of life."

[Pony Princess]

Three cheers for the Zimmerman! My new hero. Justice is done. He's free and that little rat Trayvon is still dead.

 

Oh god, I've been drinking these liberal tears and they taste amazing. I just can't get enough of them and believe me the supply isn't going to run out anytime soon.

 

[Section_31]

[Pony Princess]

 

You are on brain duty

[Gym Beglin]

You know what, I wrote out a good page of race-related commentary that I'd love to discuss with people but I just deleted it for fear of being called a racist.

 

And that's the problem. Fuck you.

[setreal]

You know what, I wrote out a good page of race-related commentary that I'd love to discuss with people but I just deleted it for fear of being called a racist.

 

And that's the problem. Fuck you.

 

Racist.

[Gym Beglin]

Racist.

 

I laughed. :)

 

Still, my point remains. If a white person doesnt agree with a black person about any aspect of race then the white person is immediately wrong and almost definitely a racist. Fair?

 

As a snippet of my racism, I believe that young white men just consider themselves as 'a young man', whereas a young black man considers himself to be 'a young BLACK man'. The difference is self-referred and even a sense of pride. If a bloke told you he was proud to be 'a young WHITE man' then you'd think he was a racist twat to differentiate himself from all other races.

[ZonkoVille77]

I agree with the above because it's actually true sadly.

[Bjornebye]

I agree fully. A young black lad used to work for me, he was only a part-time worker as he was at Uni. The lad thought he fucking walked on water, used to piss about and stuff all the time and the rest of the team couldn't stand him.

One day I caught him being blatantly rude to a client on the phone and pulled him up on it, the cheeky cunt pulled the race card saying he felt victimised.

I never use HR but thought I better had for this one so he sat in a disciplinary meeting and basically acted like i was bullying him for being black and that he had done nothing wrong. Our HR lady at the time was asian so he must have thought he was fine.

He actually started talking about making an official complaint and had told a few on the team he was going to get me fired.

His face was brilliant when I played the recording of the call which had him bang to rights acting the cunt on the phone.

That was probably my most satisfying sacking to date. not because he was black, but because he was a cunt.

 

Fucking prick though saying he will get me fired just so he kept his 16 hours a week temp job that he didn't give a fuck about even though he knew he was chatting shit and was in the wrong.

 

He is lucky i left it at sacking him. I should have kicked his fucking head in as well but couldn't be arsed getting sent down for racially motivated assault.

 

Its scary what they can get away with though.

[Rex Banner]

The way the media treated this in the US was disgraceful, blatantly race baiting and just plain right lying. The best though is constantly showing a picture of Treyvon when he was about 12 and making all the stupid fucks who don't actually look into things think this was a sweet little kid instead of a 6 foot+ guy with a history of fighting and text messages about buying and selling illegal guns.

Oh and the people protesting and rioting are a bunch of absolute fools, wheres the outrage over the tens of "black" people killed EVERY weekend in places like Chicago including innocent bystanders and actual children. No that's nothing to get up in arms about because the white man (actually Hispanic but close enough to white apparently) didn't do that so that's alright just boys being boys.

[FrenchEyeGlass]

I agree fully. A young black lad used to work for me, he was only a part-time worker as he was at Uni. The lad thought he fucking walked on water, used to piss about and stuff all the time and the rest of the team couldn't stand him.

One day I caught him being blatantly rude to a client on the phone and pulled him up on it, the cheeky cunt pulled the race card saying he felt victimised.

I never use HR but thought I better had for this one so he sat in a disciplinary meeting and basically acted like i was bullying him for being black and that he had done nothing wrong. Our HR lady at the time was asian so he must have thought he was fine.

He actually started talking about making an official complaint and had told a few on the team he was going to get me fired.

His face was brilliant when I played the recording of the call which had him bang to rights acting the cunt on the phone.

That was probably my most satisfying sacking to date. not because he was black, but because he was a cunt.

 

Fucking prick though saying he will get me fired just so he kept his 16 hours a week temp job that he didn't give a fuck about even though he knew he was chatting shit and was in the wrong.

 

He is lucky i left it at sacking him. I should have kicked his fucking head in as well but couldn't be arsed getting sent down for racially motivated assault.

 

Its scary what they can get away with though.

 

Like what Stig?

 

You had one unpleasant encounter with a cunt (who happened to be black), it doesn't mean anything other than that. To suggest that all black people get off easy or try leverage their race is rubbish mate.

 

Of course you weren't a racist and that guy was obviously a tosser (I hate people who play the race card *cough*evra*cough*) but it was one guy.

 

Positive discrimination is a fucker and very real - when I was applying for Banking jobs I was getting through with an institution called SEO, which only allowed applications from ethnic minorities and had lower grade requisites. It was bollocks and I purposely fucked it off out of misplaced morality. So I know where you're coming from.

 

But, despite what the Daily Mail might purport, british ethnic minorities are still subject to more racism or prejudice (whether on the street or institutional) than british white people. I don't particularly give a fuck, but thats the reality. The also have to overcome social stereotypes like Funneee's rather ridiculous assertion that all black men consider themselves part of some brotherhood and are out to push black power.

 

Funneee, despite what you wrote being total conjecture, you're missing the point of denotation. If you're angry at people's ears standing up when they hear "I'm proud to be young and white!", blame the EDL, NF and likewise. There is nothing racist about it all but it doesn't sound great because it stereotypically followed by "...and we need to reclaim Britain from Sharia law!". In an extreme sense, its why people don't walk around with Swastika tattoos and a taught right arm propelled into the air. Neither of those things are individually racist but run analogue to racism itself.

[FrenchEyeGlass]

The way the media treated this in the US was disgraceful, blatantly race baiting and just plain right lying. The best though is constantly showing a picture of Treyvon when he was about 12 and making all the stupid fucks who don't actually look into things think this was a sweet little kid instead of a 6 foot+ guy with a history of fighting and text messages about buying and selling illegal guns.

Oh and the people protesting and rioting are a bunch of absolute fools, wheres the outrage over the tens of "black" people killed EVERY weekend in places like Chicago including innocent bystanders and actual children. No that's nothing to get up in arms about because the white man (actually Hispanic but close enough to white apparently) didn't do that so that's alright just boys being boys.

 

The US media can be defined by the word 'baiting'. Its all they ever fucking do. I don't think much of the media here but when I was over there for a couple of months I came home a lot more appreciative.

[Gym Beglin]

I think the saying "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" is especially true of a lot of young AA's when it comes to how all the wrongs done to black people over the centuries have any relevance today. They seem to learn history in an odd way, like they've had it preached to them as opposed to having it teached to them.

 

They may or may not have noticed that we openly trade and generally enjoy the culture of the German people in this day and age, despite them being right horrible bastards a few years back.

[Pureblood]

 

Its scary what they can get away with though.

 

Oh dear.

[Bjornebye]

woah hang about , im not saying all of them do it im just saying they have leverage to use the race card and sometimes it is hard to dis-count it.

 

had I not had a recording of that call, i could have been in the shit if it was my word against his as he could potentially have taken it further meaning the company gets brought into disrepute if they hadn't acted against me. at the very least my name would have been tarnished with a racial allegation despite me not doing anything wrong at all.

[PestiRed]

This thread is a train wreck and I can't see it going anything other than downhill

[Pureblood]

Dear oh dear.

[FrenchEyeGlass]

I think the saying "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" is especially true of a lot of young AA's when it comes to how all the wrongs done to black people over the centuries have any relevance today. They seem to learn history in an odd way, like they've had it preached to them as opposed to having it teached to them.

 

They may or may not have noticed that we openly trade and generally enjoy the culture of the German people in this day and age, despite them being right horrible bastards a few years back.

 

What a pitiful, insulting post.

 

"A little knowledge is a dangerous thing" ironically seems very apt for you.

 

And I'm not sure who taught you but 'teached' isn't a word.

[Bjornebye]

Oh dear.

 

what do you mean 'oh dear' ?

 

It is a valid point. Same applies for a woman. As red banjo said on the sexual proposition thread about the reaction if a man walked up to a woman unbuttoning his clothes and saying he was horny.... he would have been in the shit but its deemed more acceptable for a female to do it to a man?

 

I have 1 nobhead who regardless of his colour had broke the rules, i acted on it and then he tried to get out of it by using the race card. its happened loads of times and like ive said, had i not had evidence that he had broken the rules, I could have been in the shit for nothing.

[Lee909]

*cough*evra*cough*)

 

Some outrageous shit will be said on this thread, but nothung will be worse than f**tb*** on the GF.

 

NEGGED

[Bjornebye]

Like what Stig?

 

You had one unpleasant encounter with a cunt (who happened to be black), it doesn't mean anything other than that. To suggest that all black people get off easy or try leverage their race is rubbish mate.

 

Of course you weren't a racist and that guy was obviously a tosser (I hate people who play the race card *cough*evra*cough*) but it was one guy.

 

Positive discrimination is a fucker and very real - when I was applying for Banking jobs I was getting through with an institution called SEO, which only allowed applications from ethnic minorities and had lower grade requisites. It was bollocks and I purposely fucked it off out of misplaced morality. So I know where you're coming from.

 

But, despite what the Daily Mail might purport, british ethnic minorities are still subject to more racism or prejudice (whether on the street or institutional) than british white people. I don't particularly give a fuck, but thats the reality. The also have to overcome social stereotypes like Funneee's rather ridiculous assertion that all black men consider themselves part of some brotherhood and are out to push black power.

 

Funneee, despite what you wrote being total conjecture, you're missing the point of denotation. If you're angry at people's ears standing up when they hear "I'm proud to be young and white!", blame the EDL, NF and likewise. There is nothing racist about it all but it doesn't sound great because it stereotypically followed by "...and we need to reclaim Britain from Sharia law!". In an extreme sense, its why people don't walk around with Swastika tattoos and a taught right arm propelled into the air. Neither of those things are individually racist but run analogue to racism itself.

 

I quite clearly didn't say this nor was I implying it. I was implying they are capable of it as in they have the ability to use this to try and get out of something.

Of course the majority wouldn't dream of doing it but unfortunately some do and if anyone tries to suggest anything i wrote was racist then you are a fucking prick.

[FrenchEyeGlass]

Some outrageous shit will be said on this thread, but nothung will be worse than f**tb*** on the GF.

 

NEGGED

 

Im a bad cunt when it comes to this but I'm going to defend myself here.

 

No way that is F..tb..l related! It was completely to do with racism.

 

I even coughed, too! Have mercy on me, i'm an ethnic minority for gods sake.

[FrenchEyeGlass]

I quite clearly didn't say this nor was I implying it. I was implying they are capable of it as in they have the ability to use this to try and get out of something.

Of course the majority wouldn't dream of doing it but unfortunately some do and if anyone tries to suggest anything i wrote was racist then you are a fucking prick.

 

I wasn't saying you were a racist - in fact, I explicitly said you weren't! Calm down! I was asked because I didn't know what you meant. I misinterpreted what you said, to be fair, so apologies for that.

 

I agree, though. It probably is scary because, as recent racism debacles have shown (not to mention any names, Kal) you're pretty much guilty until proven innocent.

[Gym Beglin]

But, despite what the Daily Mail might purport, british ethnic minorities are still subject to more racism or prejudice (whether on the street or institutional) than british white people. I don't particularly give a fuck, but thats the reality. The also have to overcome social stereotypes like Funneee's rather ridiculous assertion that all black men consider themselves part of some brotherhood and are out to push black power.

.

 

Without this getting into a slanging match, what evidence do you have to back up your claim?

 

Of course there is still racism around, we're at the tail-end of a period where it was perfectly acceptable to call someone a 'blackie' and for the bloke to solemnly lower his head and accept what was being meted out to him. But 50 years from now there will be a different concept of racism.

Until recently, the concept was borne of nationalism, a lack of legislative help and ignorance. But that has died, you can't legally or morally discriminate anymore. So 50 years from now there should be no racism at all, in theory. But in actuality that won't be the case. Why? Because some black people are perpetuating the cycle and refusing to let the past remain in the past, for one. But also more societal factors are coming to the fore, there will be overcrowding in the cities and the strain this puts on housing and benefits. Racism won't go away, we're tribal, it's innate. But in terms of it being the sort of racism that means that you cannot get a job over a white person in Britain ,I don't subscribe to that, it's almost impossible for you to survive in this day and age and operate like that.

 

In terms of it affecting your social groups, yes, of course it can and does still exist. Older and even middle aged black and white people have very different frames of reference even in this country, you can't just change your spots, I don't expect many of them to be in the same pool team at the local pub.

 

However, the younger lads are different though still affected by history and how it is taught to them, and especially how that knowledge should inform their actions in the here and now. It's one thing to be proud, or even fiercely proud, of your roots and your heritage. It's another thing to shove those roots into people's faces or using it as an excuse for acting like a prick, or masking your deficiencies as a willing and capable student.

[Stu Monty]

Amazing how many people still don't get how deep and complex the issue of race is, especially in the US.

 

The idea that the Germans are in any way a decent example to use just shows a massive error of judgement. As does having comfortable white males telling other minorities to stop being so narky about things because "everything's cool now", oblivious to how not cool things are.

 

You'd think this case might point that out a little more; that things aren't cool for a people who are stalked and shot on racial presumptions and then have their murderers released back into society to continue their lives.

 

Bjornebye - If you don't want people questioning your motives then maybe pull away from using "they" too often and talking about blacks or women as huge blocks of opposing people. Just a suggestion. I'd also point out that you suggest "the shit they get away with" about a story proving that the bloke got away with nothing.