American Samoans are the only people born on US soil but denied birthright citizenship.
Source: www.motherjones.com
Learning something new every day.
#SystemicRacism
Racial Justice
Black Prophetic Fire: Cornel West on the Revolutionary Legacy of Leading African-American Voices [VIDEO]
“The renowned scholar, author and activist Dr. Cornel West, joins us to discuss his latest book, “Black Prophetic Fire.” West engages in conversation with the German scholar and thinker Christa Buschendorf about six revolutionary African-American leaders: Frederick Douglass, W. E. B. Du Bois, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Ella Baker, Malcolm X and Ida B. Wells. Even as the United States is led by its first black president, West says he is fearful that we may be “witnessing the death of black prophetic fire in our time.”
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Source: www.democracynow.org
My favorite role model here.
Dr. Cornel West.
He is the closest living person that I know of to the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his passion for social justice and oratory eloquence.
Michelle Alexander talks about the future of race
Lawyer and advocate, Michelle Alexander talks about her concern for criminals and the prison system at a Tedx talk in Columbus. She argues that the criminal justice system functions like “a system of social control (“race control”) instead of crime control.” She argues that these prisons serve to create casts and manage “caste control.” And she dispels myths or commonly held beliefs as to the mass incarceration of African Americans one fact at a time. Let’s keep the conversation going as we have so much to talk about.
Source: racelessgospel.com
Thank you to Starlette McNeill @racelessgospel for sharing.
We need to talk about racism: Gillian Schutte at TEDxJohannesburgWomen 2013
Writer and filmmaker Gillian Schutte fearlessly and creatively tackles issues of race, identity, sexuality and social justice. She is founding member of Media for Justice and co-owner of handHeld Films and online reality TV show ‘The Schutte Singiswas – A South African Love Story’.
Twitter: @GillianSchutte, Web: mediaforjustice.net
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)
Source: www.youtube.com
Gillian Schutte (white) explains learning about racism through the eyes of her mixed race child.
‘Selma’s Missing Epilogue: The Recent Dissolution Of The Voting Rights Act
The final scenes of the 2014 film Selma, which depicts Martin Luther King Jr.’s struggle for federal voting rights legislation to protect African Americans in the South, leave viewers applauding, content with our nation’s civil rights progress after witnessing a concrete example of how a protest effected meaningful national change. But what the movie doesn’t provide is an update — a scene that flashes forward almost 50 years to show how the exact rights granted to blacks who marched across Alabama in demonstration have recently been eroded by our highest court and then by states across the country.
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Source: kstreet607.com
Do you think we will every be able to vote from home to avoid all this voter ID mess and votes getting thrown out because someone has the same name?
Jury awards $8M to family of black man who died after being choked by police
The Los Angeles Times reports that a civil court jury has awarded $8 million to the family of a man who died while struggling with L.A. Sheriff’s deputies.
Source: thegrio.com
HT @TheObamaCrat2
#BlackLivesMatter
Rev. Al Sharpton calls for national police brutality protests on Dec. 13th
Rev. Al Sharpton calls for national police brutality protests on Dec. 13th http://t.co/zibanmGcXu – #EricGarner pic.twitter.com/VT18BlrVha
— RT America (@RT_America) December 4, 2014
Meet the woman spearheading the federal probe of Ferguson
Vanita Gupta was only weeks out of law school in 2001 when she began looking into a strange series of drug busts in a tiny West Texas ranch town named Tulia.
In 1999, a third of the town’s black population had been ensnared in the biggest drug bust the Texas Panhandle had ever seen. Forty-six people, almost all of them poor African-Americans who had prior run-ins with the law, were convicted on charges of cocaine dealing and sentenced to years in prison based solely on the testimony of a former rodeo clown turned undercover cop who had little experience investigating narcotics.
Gupta, then 26, had just joined the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund, and she began assembling a team of attorneys and civil rights groups to look into the drug arrests, which didn’t smell right to her. It was her first case as an attorney. Two years later, a Texas judge overturned many of the convictions, calling the cop’s testimony not credible. After the officer was found guilty of perjury, Gov. Rick Perry pardoned most of the defendants whose convictions had not been previously overturned.
It was one of the highest-profile cases of racial injustice in recent memory, and it branded Gupta, so young she still resembled a college student, a rising star in the legal world. “Don’t be surprised if she ends up on the Supreme Court someday,” the Houston Chronicle mused in 2003. And Hollywood took notice too, optioning a book about the Tulia case.
In the decade since, Gupta has gone on to become one of the best-known civil rights attorneys in the country — leading the charge on prison reform, immigration law, police overreach and other issues.
Source: news.yahoo.com
Denver and 911 Dispatchers Sued
Denver, Colorado On November 18, 2012, it took more than an hour for dispatchers to send the police to the home of 44-year old Loretta Barela. One of Loretta’s neighbors called 911 reporting that s…
Source: blackbutterfly7.wordpress.com
What If The Killing In Ferguson Was Reversed
Modified a little from original post:
The Ferguson shooting in reverse:
A young white kid is walking down the street. A black policeman approaches him and tells him to get the F**K out of the street. The cop pulls off, then backs up, almost hitting the white kid. A confrontation occurs, shots are fired with several white neighbors witnessing it. The black cop exits the vehicle and begins to fire on the unarmed white kid who is running away. The white kid turns around and puts his hands in the air. The black police officer continues to shot at the white kid, shooting him in the eye and top of the head as he is slumping down from the previous shots.