Thursday, November 06, 2014

Savant's Commentaries

W.E.B. Du Bois was 95 when he died in 1963 (one day before the March on Washington). Angela Davis is 70, probably still at least a few years older than you. There's an old Black cat named Nelson Peery, author of BLACK FIRE, who was in his 70s when I met him back in the 1990s (when I was still under 40!). He's still out there! Unless we become senile or invalid, there's no necessity to abandon the Struggle. NEITHER of us are in our 80s or 90s. So, the struggle CONTINUES. This summer an elderly Jewish lady--a HOLOCAUST survivor---marched with my people (and got arrested) in Ferguson. She must be at least in her 80s, maybe older. Perhaps those militarized police evoked some ugly and familiar images in her mind. A colleague jokingly asked me whether King would be in Egypt in solidarity with the Egyptian arab Spring. I said "No, he's bein solidarity with the struggling peoples over there. But he would now be in Wisconsin fighting with workers there against their despotic governor, as he once marched with Memphis workers in defiance of their dictatorial Mayor Loeb." Yes, King would be marching today even if he needed crutches or a wheelchair. Justice was more important than middle class respectability.

-Savant

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Trolls Max are one big joke, and a joke in poor taste. At any rate, you may be on to something. Sometimes the newly arrived among the middle and upper classes are more reactionary than are members of the privileged classes who were into the lap of privilege. Dr. King and Angela Davis were both born into middle class families of COLLEGE EDUCATED parents. They saw poverty around them but they never had to live it. Their indignation began in childhood when they discovered the deprivation and insecurity of their playmates.....But they're no worried about their own economic security. Many newly arrived middle class Blacks do not feel security. They can't forget their childhood in poverty. And many fear that if they become too defiant or rebellious they may get pushed back down into poverty. I happen to be a first generation university graduate, and on of poor parents who came to Baltimore from the Jim Crow South. I know a few other brothers and sisters from the hood, and even a couple of folk who grew up with me in the same projects in East Baltimore. They may not like what's happening but they are VERY cautious (Some ask "So, why are you different?" Answer: Partly because of my revolutionary Black mother who was always attentive to what was happening in the Struggle. She remembers Rosa Parks, the sit-ins, and even stuff like the Algerian Revolution and the trials and tribulations of Lumumba. To this day, you could go to mama's home and find old copies of the Black Panther Newspaper. How we rear the youth is important). Some newly arrived middle class persons from the lower depths are outright reactionaries. Uncle Clarence Thomas on the Supine Court would be an example of that. Also, with regard to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., he came from a middle class family that was socially active. His dad (possible first generation educated and middle class) was involved in struggle in Atlanta when Martin, the son, was a child. Angela Davis mother, Sallye Davis, was involved in activism--left activism-- while Angela and her siblings were growing up. Angela mentions that in her book ANGELA DAVIS: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY. Martin and Angela were not only born into middle class comfort, but born into families where at least one of their parents were activists. Coincidence?


 -Savant 
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Interestingly enough, WHITE MEN are more likely than Black men to MURDER their wives. I suspect (though I'm not sure) that they beat the crap out of their wives and girlfriends more often, or at least as much. I imagine they should be able to help themselves. But when an already twisted sense of WHTE privilege is compounded by a sick MALE privilege we have a very toxic psychological mixture. A significant fraction---I won't say A MAJORITY, but a significant fraction--of white America (especially white American men), are simply maniacal.

-Savant
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 As you know, I wrote on the issue of le racisme Francais a number of years ago, and for an American readership. Having no scholarly expertise I tried to write more in the tradition of James Baldwin, or perhaps your compatriot Emile Zola. I'm studying more now. There are now quite a few peuples Afro-Francais a l'Amerique. Ils parlent a l'universite concernant le situation des Noirs en France. Aussi, la recherché sur la vie de L'Europe noir is increasing. I would like to begin a dialogue between our two countries about these an other matters. Unfortunately, I've not made much contact with les Noirs francais throught this thread. And even less with les Nord Africains.

 -Savant

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I think that the fact of racial discrimination and inequities in law enforcement and in judicial practices are so well established that people who deny it are somewhat like people who deny the Holocaust. The results of a ton of research showing that even TODAY rampant anti-Black racism exists in the judicial system, the police, employment and most other areas means that this is more a matter subjective perception. American racism has been denounced by the UN, by Amnesty International, and by America's own ACLU. There are even works by philosophers and psychologists which reinforce those findings. So, it's more than mere anecdotal testimony. And while it may be debatable whether there is a war on the Black man or, in my estimation a war on BLACK PEOPLE, the results of history and continuing research means that claims or even suspicions of such a war in grounded in EVIDENCE, and is not "paranoia " as many whites (and white racist negroes like Capree) may believe. INDEED, what was discovered about COINTELPRO back in the 1970s can be taken as an indication of a longstanding war on Black America.


-Savant

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