Motley Moose – Archive

I haven’t forgotten Spike Lee’s School Daze, made in 1988, which took a look at the doings of black students on an HBCU campus during homecoming weekend. Coming to a theater near you on October 17, is a new film, also looking at black college students, but this time on a white campus.

Dear White People, “a satire about being a black face in a white place,” is a film offering from Justin Simien, who is making his directorial debut.  

Winner of the 2014 Sundance Film Festival’s Special Jury Award for Breakthrough Talent, Dear White People is a sly, provocative satire of race relations in the age of Obama. Writer/director Justin Simien follows a group of African American students as they navigate campus life and racial politics at a predominantly white college in a sharp and funny feature film debut that earned him a spot on Variety’s annual “10 Directors to Watch.” When Dear White People screened at MOMA’s prestigious New Directors/New Films, the New York Times’ A.O. Scott wrote, “Seeming to draw equal measures of inspiration from Whit Stillman and Spike Lee, but with his own tart, elegant sensibility very much in control, Mr. Simien evokes familiar campus stereotypes only to smash them and rearrange the pieces.”

Thank you for your service to the cause of justice and civil rights for Americans.

Thank you for the courage of your convictions and for simply doing what a good lawyer for the defense is charged to do.

I am deeply saddened that on the anniversary of Birmingham Sunday, one of the most egregious acts of terror against us, that I had to read of your withdrawal.

Thank you for standing on principle:

“What I have come to focus on is that in life and as a professional, the principles for which you stand are more important than the office that you hold. I’m very proud to have worked to vindicate the principles of the constitution, and I hope to continue to have those opportunities in the future.”

By now most of us should recognize the photos of Marina Silva, currently the Socialist Party candidate for President of Brazil, who may possibly defeat Workers’ Party President Dilma Rousseff, in the upcoming elections. She’s been attracting a lot of press attention here, with two recent features in the Wall Street Journal.

I’ve written about Ms. Silva on Black Kos before, in “Through a glass darkly: A United States lens on Brazilian Politics and Race.” If she wins, she would become Brazil’s first black female President. Several US news outlets have incorrectly stated she would be Brazil’s first black president – but that is not exactly correct. It depends on whose racial lens one is looking through, and Silva, is “afro-descendente” (African descended) but so have been other Brazilian Presidents (see my previous article). Silva does fill out the census as “black”.  

While searching for news pieces from Brazil, on Silva, and Brazilian perspectives I happened upon a Brazilian website with a major feature on Silva. The article emphasized her Afro-Brazilian heritage, which is not surprising since the site is called Black Women of Brazil.  

Fascinated, I spent the next 6 or 7 hours reading the features there, which ran the gamut from politics, culture, health, Afro-Brazilian religion and more.  

Just because Ferguson isn’t dominating the headlines at the moment, doesn’t mean nothing is going on. In fact, plenty is happening…most importantly the activities of #HealSTL.

Buy tee-shirts to support the movement

The shirt is free if you volunteer one hour or you can pay $9 for it and we will use that to pay a Ferguson youth for one hour of work organizing his/her community.

#HealSTL – The struggle continues in Ferguson

(clip from Pre-Moral Week of Action LiveStream Broadcast)

Unrest in Ferguson, Mo., prompts vigil and rally in Charlotte

Moral Mondays, the familiar North Carolina protests, are being expanded to Moral Week of Action, a seven-day protest of the state legislature in Raleigh starting Friday.

The Rev. William Barber, president of the state NAACP and a leader of Moral Mondays, said in a video posted Monday that the peaceful protests have attracted attention from people in Missouri.

“We’ve been asked about coming down to Ferguson and having some conversations with people,” Barber said. “They’ve said that the Moral Monday movement is a model that they need in that community.”

North Carolinians frustrated with what has happened in Ferguson should turn to local elections, he said.

“You’ve got a lot of young people that say they’re angry about what they saw in Ferguson, so let them know this,” he said. “Mayors and city councils hire police chiefs. People elect mayors and city councils. So if you’re concerned about who the police chief is, you need to be organized and registered to vote.”

Today was the first day of the seven days of protest, culminating in a major rally on the anniversary of the March on Washington on Aug 28.

‘Moral Mondays’ Movement Expands to 12 States for ‘Moral Week of Action’

A broad coalition of faith, labor, and social justice organizations will hold events in 12 mostly Southern states-Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Mississippi, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Wisconsin-with a different social justice theme every day. Friday kicked off with discussions of labor rights, fair and living wages, and economic justice. The weekend will feature actions on education and criminal justice, then equal protection under the law. A “Youth Moral Monday” will start the work week, then women’s rights will take the stage on Women’s Equality Day (August 26), followed by health care and environmental justice actions, and finally voting rights.

Get involved – support the Moral Week of Action.

(see full transcript of Rev. Barber’s remarks below )

Another night has passed in Ferguson MO. The press were kept from covering a lot of what happened. More tear gas, more arrests. Peaceful nighttime protests are stymied.

But my “quote of the day” came from Attorney General Eric Holder:

“I realize there is tremendous interest in the facts of the incident that led to Michael Brown’s death, but I ask for the public’s patience as we conduct this investigation. The selective release of sensitive information that we have seen in this case so far is troubling to me. No matter how others pursue their own separate inquiries, the Justice Department is resolved to preserve the integrity of its investigation. This is a critical step in restoring trust between law enforcement and the community, not just in Ferguson, but beyond.

Yes.

We should all be troubled by the bs we see leaking out of Ferguson. Efforts to smear Michael Brown and divert the focus from the pursuit of justice continue.

I kept reading this sentence from the autopsy report of Dr. Michael M. Baden, reported in the New York Times:

One of the bullets shattered Mr. Brown’s right eye, traveled through his face, exited his jaw and re-entered his collarbone. The last two shots in the head would have stopped him in his tracks and were likely the last fired.

Across the nation today, people who believe in and demand justice will be gathering.

Groups on the ground in St. Louis are calling for nationwide solidarity actions in support of Justice for Mike Brown and the end of police and extrajudicial killings everywhere. On Saturday at 1pm — one week after the murder of Mike Brown by a Ferguson police officer–we in St. Louis will gather at the location that Mike was shot in the Canfield Apartment buildings. We ask that you gather at the places in your community on Saturday where police and extrajudicial killings have occurred to memorialize lives that have been lost and demand justice by ending systemic violence upon communities of color.

Look for one in your area HERE.

Please share this video.

Hands in the air, Howard University students show solidarity with the people of Ferguson and the family of Michael Brown.

A few weeks ago I had planned to write a piece about the upcoming anniversary of a case of police brutality that had a slightly different end to it than we have come to expect from the criminal injustice system in America. The unarmed black man assaulted by police didn’t die. Not only did he not die, he went on to sue the NYC and the NYPD and won “the largest police brutality settlement in New York City history”. His primary police assailants were put on trial, and the officer responsible for the sodomizing, Justin Volpe is still incarcerated. Sadly, the others involved are not.

That man was Abner Louima, and the anniversary of his brutal attack, beating and sodomizing while in NYPD custody was on August the 9th, 1997.

But August the 9th is now the anniversary of yet another attack, this time ending in death, of an unarmed young black teenager, at the hands of police. Michael Brown.