Huffington Post: Avatar and What it Takes To Be a Real "Race Traitor"
Posted: January 25, 2010 08:53 AM
Being slow to embrace some pop culture, I finally saw Avatar in all of its IMAX 3-D glory. I did enjoy the film and look forward toAvatar II (there is no way the greedy imperialist will give up after losing one battle).
Have been waiting for some discussion linking the not so subtle politics of the film with the serious political critique of whiteness. Haven't seen much of it so I thought I would quote in great length someone who could answer Colonel Miles Quaritch's question "How does it feel to betray your race?" The following is from Noel Ignatiev's The Point Is Not To Interpret Whiteness But to Abolish It. Remember, you don't have to be linked to an avatar to fight racial supremacy and imperialism.
Abolitionism is first of all a political project: the abolitionists study whiteness in order to abolish it...
Abolitionists deny the existence of a positive white identity...we will take our stand with David Roediger, who has insisted that whiteness is not merely oppressive and false, it is nothing but oppressive and false. As James Baldwin said, "So long as you think you are white, there is no hope for you."...Whiteness is not a culture. There is Irish culture and Italian culture and American culture -- the latter, as Albert Murray pointed out, a mixture of the Yankee, the Indian, and the Negro (with a pinch of ethnic salt); there is youth culture and drug culture and queer culture; but there is no such thing as white culture. Whiteness has nothing to do with culture and everything to do with social position. It is nothing but a reflection of privilege, and exists for no reason other than to defend it. Without the privileges attached to it, the white race would not exist, and the white skin would have no more social significance than big feet....However exploited the poor whites of this country, they are not direct victims of racial oppression...We are anti-white, but we are not in general against the people who are called white...We hold that so-called whites must cease to exist as whites in order to realize themselves as something else...The white race is neither a biological nor a cultural formation; it is a strategy for securing to some an advantage in a competitive society. It has held down more whites than blacks. Abolitionism is also a strategy: its aim is not racial harmony but class war....any "anti-racist" work that does not entail opposition to the state reinforces the authority of the state, which is the most important agency in maintaining racial oppression...racial oppression is not the work of "racists." It is maintained by the principal institutions of society, including the schools (which define "excellence"), the labor market (which defines "employment"), the legal system (which defines "crime"), the welfare system (which defines "poverty"), the medical industry (which defines "health"), and the family (which defines "kinship"). Many of these institutions are administered by people who would be offended if accused of complicity with racial oppression. It is reinforced by reform programs that address problems traditionally of concern to the "left" - for example, federal housing loan guarantees. The simple fact is that the public schools and the welfare departments are doing more harm to black children than all the "racist" groups combined....The white race is a club. Certain people are enrolled in it at birth, without their consent, and brought up according to its rules. For the most part they go through life accepting the privileges of membership, without reflecting on the costs. Others, usually new arrivals in the country, pass through a probationary period before "earning" membership; they are necessarily more conscious of their racial standing....The white club does not require that all members be strong advocates of white supremacy, merely that they defer to the prejudices of others. It is based on one huge assumption: that all those who look white are, whatever their reservations, fundamentally loyal to it....When it comes to abolishing the white race, the task is not to win over more whites to oppose "racism"; there are "anti- racists" enough already to do the job. The task is to gather together a minority determined to make it impossible for anyone to be white....A traitor to the white race is someone who is nominally classified as white but who defies white rules so strenuously as to jeopardize his or her ability to draw upon the privileges of whiteness. The abolitionists recognize that no "white" can individually escape from the privileges of whiteness. The white club does not like to surrender a single member, so that even those who step out of it in one situation can hardly avoid stepping back in later, if for no other reason than the assumptions of others - unless, like John Brown, they have the good fortune to be hanged before that can happen. But they also understand that when there comes into being a critical mass of people who look white but do not act white - people who might be called "reverse oreos" - the white race will undergo fission, and former whites, born again, will be able to take part, together with others, in building a new human community....
FRIDAY, JANUARY 22, 2010
Augusta Chroncile: Basketball league for white Americans targets Augusta
A new professional basketball league boasting rosters made up exclusively of white Americans has its eyes set on Augusta, but the team isn't receiving a warm welcome.
"Only players that are natural born United States citizens with both parents of Caucasian race are eligible to play in the league," the statement said.The All-American Basketball Alliance announced in a news release Sunday evening that it intends to start its inaugural season in June and hopes Augusta will be one of 12 cities with a team.
Augusta Mayor Deke Copenhaver, who has publicly expressed his support for minor league teams in the past, said he would not do the same for this team.
"As a sports enthusiast, I have always supported bringing more sporting activities to Augusta," he said. "However, in this instance I could not support in good conscience bringing in a team that did not fit with the spirit of inclusiveness that I, along with many others, have worked so hard to foster in our city."
Clint Bryant, athletic director at Augusta State University, laughed when he heard the news.
"It's so absurd, it's funny, but it gives you an idea of the sickness of our society" he said. "It shows you what lengths people will go to just to be mean-spirited. I think at any basketball level, no matter if it's all black, all white, all Hispanic, all Asian or anyone else, the players should just be a basketball team."
Don "Moose" Lewis, the commissioner of the AABA, said the reasoning behind the league's roster restrictions is not racism.
"There's nothing hatred about what we're doing," he said. "I don't hate anyone of color. But people of white, American-born citizens are in the minority now. Here's a league for white players to play fundamental basketball, which they like."
Lewis said he wants to emphasize fundamental basketball instead of "street-ball" played by "people of color." He pointed out recent incidents in the NBA, including Gilbert Arenas' indefinite suspension after bringing guns into the Washington Wizards locker room, as examples of fans' dissatisfaction with the way current professional sports are run.
"Would you want to go to the game and worry about a player flipping you off or attacking you in the stands or grabbing their crotch?" he said. "That's the culture today, and in a free country we should have the right to move ourselves in a better direction."
The Atlanta-based league, which will operate as a single-entity owning all of its teams, is looking for local contacts to pay $10,000 to become a "licensee" in one of 12 cities throughout the Southeast. Lewis said he has already received threats from people opposed to the roster restrictions and several cities have told him to stay out of town. Lewis said he has yet to hear from any one in Augusta.
"We need a local person ingrained into the community to make this successful," he said.
Lewis said he expects to eventually find support in every town with a team.
"People will come out and support a product they can identify with. I'm the spoken minority right now, but if people will give us a chance, it'll work... The white game of basketball, which is essentially a fundamental game, works."
Lewis said he wasn't sure where the team will play.
Augusta has had problems with minor league basketball teams in the past, but the issues never centered around race. The Augusta Drive lasted less than a month before folding in 1995, citing financial reasons. The Augusta Groove made it through a full, 20-game schedule in 2009, but accusations from players and local businesses that the team wasn't paying its bills surrounded the team during the second half of the season. The team later shut down in the offseason.
SUNDAY, JANUARY 17, 2010
Pat Robertson Blames Earthquake on Pact Haitians Made with Satan
Below is a short article about recent comments made by Pat Robertson about the disaster in Haiti, and I'm sure that most people find these comments disgusting. Robertson has been called out in the past for espousing racist ideas and here we have another prime example. He talks about a myth that Haitians made a pact with the devil in order to overthrow slavery in their nation in the early 1800s. He attributes the casting off of white enslavers of black people to evil, and implies that without the help of the devil, black Haitian would not have been able to overthrow the white French colonists. The myth is also rooted in deep beliefs about the savagery of the Haitians and their religion- their prayers to their own deity were re-written as the forging of a satanic alliance. The extreme poverty of Haiti that Robertson speaks of with such condescending paternalism is not connected to the history of colonialism, slavery or exploitation, but to their "pact with the devil".
It is disturbing that this man is able to mobilize so much money for his causes, but I sincerely hope that the aid money his organization is sending to Haiti can be put to good use and relieve some of suffering of the people there.
.
From ABC News Blogs
Pat Robertson Blames Earthquake on Pact Haitians Made with Satan
January 13, 2010 3:29 PM
On the Christian Broadcasting Network’s “700 Club” today, after a lengthy interview with a missionary who talked about helping the victims earthquake in Haiti, Rev. Pat Robertson had some interesting thoughtsas to why the earthquake struck the impoverished nation:
"And you know, Kristi, something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it.
“They were under the heel of the French, uh, you know Napoleon the 3rd and whatever, and they got together and swore a pact to the Devil.
“They said, 'We will serve you if you'll get us free from the French.'
“True story.
“And so the Devil said, 'Okay, it's a deal.’
“And, uh, they kicked the French out, you know, with Haitians revolted and got themselves free.
“But ever since they have been cursed by, by one thing after another, desperately poor.
“That island of Hispaniola is one island. It’s cut down the middle. On the one side is Haiti on the other side is the Dominican Republican.
“Dominican Republic is, is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etcetera.
“Haiti is in desperate poverty.
“Same island.
“They need to have and we need to pray for them a great turning to God and out of this tragedy I’m optimistic something good may come. But right now we’re helping the suffering people and the suffering is unimaginable.”
Robertson’s tale stems from a legend that Jean Jacques Dessalines, who led the Haitian revolution against the French Army, entered into a pact with Satan disguised as a voodoo deity in exchange for a military victory, which finally happened in 1803.
One minister of a Haitian-American church -- who does not believe this legend -- recently wrote about the frequent references in Haiti “to a spiritual pact that the fathers of the nation supposedly made with the devil to help them win their freedom from France. As a result of that satanic alliance, as they put it, God has placed a curse on the country sometime around its birth, and that divine burden has made it virtually impossible for the vast majority of Haitians to live in peace and prosperity in their land…The satanic pact allegedly took place at Bois-Caïman near Cap-Haïtien on August 14, 1791 during a meeting organized by several slave leaders, under [Dutty] Boukman’s leadership, before launching what would become Haiti’s Independence War.”
UPDATE: CBN spokesman Chris Roslan issued a statement Regarding Pat Robertson's Comments on Haiti, saying “On today’s The 700 Club, during a segment about the devastation, suffering and humanitarian effort that is needed in Haiti, Dr. Robertson also spoke about Haiti’s history. His comments were based on the widely-discussed 1791 slave rebellion led by Boukman Dutty at Bois Caiman, where the slaves allegedly made a famous pact with the devil in exchange for victory over the French. This history, combined with the horrible state of the country, has led countless scholars and religious figures over the centuries to believe the country is cursed. Dr. Robertson never stated that the earthquake was God’s wrath. If you watch the entire video segment, Dr. Robertson’s compassion for the people of Haiti is clear. He called for prayer for them. His humanitarian arm has been working to help thousands of people in Haiti over the last year, and they are currently launching a major relief and recovery effort to help the victims of this disaster. They have sent a shipment of millions of dollars worth of medications that is now in Haiti, and their disaster team leaders are expected to arrive tomorrow and begin operations to ease the suffering.”
-jpt
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 13, 2010
Huffington Post: The State of Martin Luther King Jr.'s Dream in 2010
By DEDRICK MUHAMMAD
Posted: January 13, 2010 07:42 AM
Over 40 years after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s assassination, his words still speak to the social conditions that so many Americans face. Our unemployment rate is hovering at 10 percent, and the wealthiest 10 percent of us control over 70 percent of the nation's wealth. Economic inequality remains a barrier to greater racial equality. The national commemoration of King's birthday, therefore, is more for reflection than celebration.
During one of the worst economic crises seen in this country, black/white economic inequality is still a vast and greatly under-recognized challenge for this country. Two generations past the 1960s civil rights movement, African Americans make less than 60 cents on every dollar of income for whites. Their unemployment rate stands at 150 percent of the national average.
As King fought to end this country's racial divisions, he recognized that economic inequality was as great a barrier to his vision of a more racially inclusive America as Jim Crow segregation laws. Many forget that the March on Washington, where King delivered his famed "I Have a Dream" speech, was actually called the "March on Washington for Freedom and Jobs." When one of the last great symbols of political hope, President John F. Kennedy, was in the White House, King called hundreds of thousands to come to the nation's capital to fight for an America that would reflect its best values rather than its greatest fears. "We called our demonstration a campaign for jobs and income because we felt that the economic question was the most crucial that black people, and poor people generally, were confronting," he told Look Magazine in 1968.
In 2010, after the first challenging year of the presidency of another man who came into office riding a wave of hope, Americans can honor King's legacy by advancing a contemporary agenda of jobs, wealth building, and peace.
King and other civil rights leaders advocated progressive economic reforms with such proposals as the Bill of Rights for the Disadvantaged and the Freedom Budget of 1966. A new report from United for a Fair Economy that I co-authored builds on that work by advocating bold and progressive economic reforms to meet today's challenges. Reforms proposed in this report, titled "State of the Dream 2010: Drained," include a major jobs creation program, strong investment in job training, an equity assessment of federal spending, and returning the tax system to one where those with the most concentrated wealth provide greater investment in the public good.
A rededication to King's vision can redirect the United States back to the path of greater equality, and a stronger economy for the middle and working classes. Martin Luther King, Jr. didn't believe in the trickle-down philosophy that has run our economy for the past three decades. Instead, his "liberation theology" analysis called for siding with and addressing specifically the challenges of the most disenfranchised to advance society as a whole.
History witnessed this strategy's success with the results of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. All Americans--women, immigrants, the disabled, the elderly, the young and the poor--benefited from the vast social programs and protections that resulted from that struggle. As the nation continues to heal from an economic and financial crisis caused by unregulated greed, we'll find racial inequality unchanged and overall economic inequality at unprecedented heights. It's time to finally make a unified thrust to bridge racial and economic inequality.
TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 2010
New York Times: Race Assumes Central Role in New Orleans Vote
Cheryl Gerber/Associated Press
State Sen. Ed Murray dropped out of the race.
The balance of power between blacks and whites in New Orleans has been an issue for decades, a back-and-forth that has only intensified since Hurricane Katrina, now that every election is a referendum on the future of the city. But a recent decision by a black candidate to drop out of the 2010 mayor’s race has made the possibility of a white man in the city’s most powerful office startlingly real.
For most of 2009, the mayor’s race was a lackluster affairthat attracted far less interest than Saints’ football.
The relatively low wattage of the candidates left an opening for Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu, who, despite months of denials, announced his entry at the last minute in early December. Mr. Landrieu has run unsuccessfully for mayor twice before, in 1994 and 2006. Since losing to the current mayor, C. Ray Nagin, four years ago, Mr. Landrieu has kept a moderate profile, using his position to promote Louisiana’s tourism industry and cultural economy. (Mr. Nagin cannot run again because of term limits.)
But many of those who preferred Mr. Nagin to Mr. Landrieu in 2006 have had a case of buyer’s remorse, expressing disappointment at the current mayor’s halting leadership in the years since Hurricane Katrina and an unending series of scandals at City Hall. And Mr. Landrieu has nearly universal name recognition: his sister Mary is a United States senator, and his father, Moon Landrieu, was mayor in the 1970s, the last white man to hold the job.
In the weeks after Mr. Landrieu’s announcement, the wisdom among political experts around town had generally been that the Feb. 6 primary would result in two candidates who would go on to compete in the March runoff: a white candidate, most likely Mr. Landrieu, and a black one. The black candidate was widely expected to be Ed Murray, a state senator who is well respected if a little reserved for the rough and tumble of New Orleans politics.
He was among the most prolific fund-raisers and better known than the other black candidates: Nadine Ramsey, a former Civil District Court judge; James Perry, director of a fair housing group; and Troy Henry, owner of a consulting firm. While few thought it was possible to beat Mr. Landrieu in the primary, the idea was that minds would concentrate in the run-off, and black voters might rally to Mr. Murray’s side.
All of this arithmetic became irrelevant on Jan. 2, when Mr. Murray announced, to the shock of even some of his closest aides, that he was leaving the race.
“Ed was going to be the guy to beat,” said Robert Berning, Mr. Murray’s media adviser.
Mr. Murray’s decision to drop out, several of his campaign aides said, was based on recent polls showing Mr. Landrieu with a huge lead, buttressed by considerable support among black voters, many of whom remember the racial barriers torn down by Mr. Landrieu’s father. That lead was not insurmountable, but overcoming it would have required a large outlay of campaign money that just wasn’t there.
Mr. Murray also said in a statement that he dropped out to avoid a racially divisive campaign. But the fact that his announcement left Mr. Landrieu and John Georges, a white businessman and former candidate for governor of Louisiana, as two of the front-runners, may have fueled just that.
The New Orleans Tribune, an African-American newsmagazine, called Mr. Murray’s decision “a betrayal of the black community.” At a news conference, Mr. Henry castigated the news media for having “prematurely crowned the next mayor as a white mayor.”
Even though Mr. Georges has some prominent black supporters and Mr. Landrieu’s own father helped bring African-Americans into City Hall, influential blacks around the city are already anxious about the possible effects of electing the first white mayor in 32 years.
“The mayor has always been the citadel of strength for the black community in this town,” said Bernard L. Charbonnet Jr., a lawyer who is active in black political circles. “It has always been the prize.”
Black professionals refer to the office as “the franchise,” the counterweight to the economic power of New Orleans’ white elite. For the past three decades, the black private sector — the lawyers, businessmen and architects — has relied on the franchise: they may not always be able to become board members at the city’s white-owned firms, but black professionals could always depend on city government for contracts and job opportunities.
But after Hurricane Katrina, Mr. Charbonnet said, the importance of keeping the franchise often paled next to immediate crises, like the city’s shortage of health care facilities, the slow recovery of the black middle-class neighborhoods of Gentilly and New Orleans East, and the widespread scattering of the city’s population. Some members of the city’s black middle class found Atlanta, St. Louis or Chicago to be more welcoming; though blacks are still in the majority here, their numbers have shrunk.
“We’re not attuned to politics as we once were,” Mr. Charbonnet said. But that is unfortunate, he added. The prospect of a white mayor, he said, is “an earth-shaking event.”
For this reason, black voters have been urged to rally around one of the remaining black candidates, and Mr. Henry seems to be gaining ground quickly. After all, Mr. Landrieu seemed poised to beat Mr. Nagin around this time in 2006, but Mr. Nagin won in a 52-to-48 percent vote. (Mr. Landrieu’s defeat may have owed more to his unpopularity amongconservative whites, some of whom vow never to vote for a Landrieu.)
Still, some black power players are making calculations they never thought they would.
Bill Rouselle, owner of a public relations and consulting firm called Bright Moments, helped engineer Mr. Nagin’s re-election in 2006 and had been working for Mr. Murray’s campaign. Now Mr. Rouselle he has agreed to join the Landrieu campaign.
“The critical thing for the African American community is to be much more focused on a clear agenda,” he said. In recent years, he said, “the agenda being followed became a secondary concern to getting a black person elected.”Mr. Rouselle said his daughter is even thinking of voting for Mr. Landrieu.
“For her to even consider voting for a white candidate is something totally different,” he said. “It’s almost as big a deal as the prospect two years ago that we would have an African-American president of the United States.”
No comments:
Post a Comment