It’s Day 17 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

At the intersection of patriarchy and anti-Black racism stands the Black woman. There’s even a word for it: misogynoir. And it’s a necessary word, too, because multiple axes of oppression (like misogyny and anti-Black racism) do not compound each other by simple addition. Instead, they contort and magnify each other in a way that is distinct, and it works a lot more like multiplication.

Can Black women experience anti-Black racism in the same way Black men do? YES.

Can Black women experience misogyny in the same way white women do? OF COURSE.

Can Black women experience bigotry and oppression that is unique to the wholeness of their identities as “Black women”? YESSSSS.

And add LGBTQ+, disabled, or any other axes of privilege/oppression and the harm and marginalization multiply. Again.

There are white feminist women being racists toward Black women in the feminist movement (a well-documented phenomenon since the earliest feminist organizing that unfortunately continues to this very day). And Black men being misogynistic and patriarchal toward Black women (also a well-documented phenomenon).

Misogynoir manifests in too many ways to enumerate here, but one example that comes readily to mind is when police assume a Black woman who is dressed appropriately for warm weather is a sex worker, and they then proceed to degrade, harass, arrest or assault her. (Not that mistreating sex workers is EVER okay, in any context.) The misogynoir lies in the initial assumption: the stereotyping and overt sexualizing of Black women, because they are Black women. The consequence of that assumption is harm to Black women.

I have been privileged and honored to know and to work with Black women over the course of my time living in New York, and even more fortunate to count some Black women as my friends.* While they face not only sexism and anti-Black racism but their twisted cousin, misogynoir, in everyday life, my respect, empathy and anger on their behalf only continues to grow, as I do.

WAIT. Now I owe you all an apology! All of that^ was a way-too-wordy prelude (from the white woman who is supposed to be S-ing TFU and listening!) to introducing perhaps my favorite historical figure ever, a Black woman. It just felt necessary to emphasize this context in which she lived her life, because it makes her all the more extraordinary for being who she was, and doing what she did.

Her name is Florynce Rae Kennedy. A.k.a. Flo.

Florynce Rae (“Flo”) Kennedy
1916-2000

[Read more…]

It’s Day 16 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

I’ve written, quoted and shared petitions from Color of Change many times here. Today we’ll listen to their statements about anti-protest laws being passed all over the country. Apparently criminalizing Black voting just doesn’t go far enough; obviously Black voices need to be criminalized, too.

Criminalizing protest was always going to be the next step on the fascist/conservative agenda. First, members of the Bush-Cheney war criminal cabal avoided exposure to protests at their public appearances by designating “First Amendment zones.” People could protest there – and only there – safely away from the possibility of crossing into any executive branch criminal’s line of sight or earshot.

Bu that just didn’t go far enough for the fascists and conservatives. Why would they stop there? It’s not like there was a concerted media push to expose “First Amendment zones” for the (very likely unconstitutional) sham that they were, much less any appetite to sue the administration and consequently lose precious access to Big Willies in the government and military throwing glamorous parties and running exciting wars. Since no one stopped them at the point of “First Amendment zones,” OF COURSE they’re going farther and outlawing protest outright.

This should teach us all something important about what really scares powerful public officials and America’s owners, whom they so ably serve. Which, in turn, illustrates why we so badly need more, bigger and louder protest movements.

Nationwide general strike, anyone?

__________

Iris, our right to protest is under threat.

It’s been nearly two years since millions of people around the world took to the streets in historic numbers for what became the longest, largest, and most sustained movement to stand up for Black lives.¹Our persistent, loud, and clear voices, as well as organizing efforts were instrumental in obtaining a modicum of accountability for George Floyd.

Since then there have been over 100 anti-protest bills proposed across the country! Thirteen of those bills have been passed,² and in 2022 already, several bills have been newly introduced or re-introduced.³

Some of the anti-protest laws proposed and passed actually grant immunity to drivers who run into protesters with their cars or use force against a protester like how Kyle Rittenhouse did!

But Iris, we cannot be stopped and we cannot be silenced. From the March on Washington to the Black Lives Matter movement, protest is an essential tool for our freedom and we will fight to protect it.

Join us in demanding the Department of Justice defends our Constitutional right to protest.

Iris, these laws, often backed by organizations affiliated with police unions, are an attempt to criminalize free speech, punish those who speak up for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities, and offer specific protections for counter-protesters who harm us.⁴ In fact, police unions have advocated for anti-protest bills in 14 states, and bills proposed in at least 9 states include sponsorship from current or former law enforcement officers.⁵

Here’s just a sampling of some of what we’re up against:

Several laws include provisions that would strip people of public benefits, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and unemployment benefits, if they are convicted.⁶ These laws are trying to punish people by taking away their ability to feed and house their families!

A Tennessee law would make it a felony for demonstrators to camp at the state Capitol. The result? People would lose their right to vote.⁷

In Florida, Oklahoma, and Iowa, laws grant immunity to drivers who run into protesters with their cars.⁸

A proposed bill in Indiana would ban anyone who was convicted from getting a state job or running for elected office.⁹

And laws in states like Georgia include provisions that would create civil immunity for a “volunteer” who uses or threatens to use force against a protester.

Iris, the Department of Justice has the power to make an impact by condemning these laws and supporting legal and advocacy efforts to fight them.

As history has shown us, where racial justice protests flourish, anti-protest laws follow.¹⁰

It’s time we break the cycle of silencing and criminalization by demanding the Department of Justice fight for our right to protest.

Until Justice is Real,

Scott, Rashad, Arisha, Malachi, Megan, Ernie, Palika, Ariel, Madison, Trevor, Erick, Ana, Kristiana, McKayla and the Color Of Change team

REFERENCES:

1. Black Lives Matter May Be the Largest Movement in US History (PAYWALLED): https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/07/03/us/george-floyd-protests-crowd-size.html

2. US Protest Law Tracker https://www.icnl.org/usprotestlawtracker/?location=&status=&issue=&date=custom&date_from=2020-05-01&date_to=2022-02-02&type=

3. US Protest Law Tracker: https://www.icnl.org/usprotestlawtracker/

4. It’s not just voting: Legislators have introduced 100 state bills targeting protesting (PAYWALLED): https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/05/13/its-not-just-voting-legislators-have-introduced-100-state-bills-targeting-protesting/

5. New anti-protest laws cast a long shadow on First Amendment rights: https://publicintegrity.org/politics/new-anti-protest-laws-cast-a-long-shadow-on-first-amendment-rights/

6. Minn. lawmaker proposes revoking convicted protesters’ student loans, food stamps: https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/minn-lawmaker-proposes-revoking-convicted-protesters-student-loans-food-stamps-n1264549

7. Tennessee legislature cracks down on protesters, making it a felony to camp overnight outside Capitol: https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2020/08/12/tennessee-passes-law-targeting-protesters-makes-capitol-camping-felony/3354879001/

8. G.O.P. Bills Target Protesters (and Absolve Motorists Who Hit Them (PAYWALLED): https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/21/us/politics/republican-anti-protest-laws.html

9. G.O.P. Bills Target Protesters (and Absolve Motorists Who Hit Them (PAYWALLED): https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/21/us/politics/republican-anti-protest-laws.html

10. Arresting Dissent: Legislative Restrictions on the Right to Protest: https://pen.org/arresting-dissent/

__________

Just FYI, here are some other stories I could have written about today:

Washington Post, Breaking News email alert:

Home buyers in Black neighborhoods were disproportionately squeezed as investors bought record share of homes in metro areas in 2021

Last year investors bought nearly 1 in 7 homes sold in America’s top metropolitan areas, the most in at least two decades. An analysis of 40 major metro areas reveals unequal levels of investor activity, with Southern cities and Black neighborhoods disproportionately affected.

__________

New York Times: New York Today email newsletter:

Ignored by the media and pushed aside by the police, families and supporters of Black women are building their own missing persons operations online.

__________

New York Daily News online edition:

Proposed elementary school merger stirs debate over race, education in East Village

A proposed merger of two Manhattan elementary schools with sharply differing student demographics and enrollment numbers is stirring up debate over race, gentrification and education in the East Village.

__________
Day 1 of Black History Month 2022 (Lori Teresa Yearwood) is here.
Day 2 (Mallence Bart-Williams) is here.
Day 3 (Emmett Till) is here.
Day 4 (A Tale of Two Citizens) is here.
Day 5 (Trayvon Martin) is here.
Day 6 (Franchesca Ramsey) is here.
Day 7 (National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day and the Black Aids Institute) is here.
Day 8 (extreme racial disparities in marijuana arrests) is here.
Day 9 (Summer of Soul/1969 Harlem Cultural Festival) is here.
Day 10 (current and historic racist domestic terrorism, Steve Phillips/Democracy in Color) is here.
Day 11 (Gee’s Bend Quilters) is here.
Day 12 (egregious anti-Black (& anti LGBTQ+) behavior at a NY State high school is here.
Day 13 (Erin Jackson, 1st Black woman to win Olympic gold medal in speedskating) is here.
Day 14 (Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions) is here.
Day 15 (racial inequities in spiking vehicle death rates during the pandemic compound and are compounded by other racial inequities, and The New York Times buries the lede) is here.

It’s Day 14 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

Today, we get to listen to recording artist Stevie Wonder from back in 1973.

Stevie Wonder Innervisions
album cover art

As I’ve immersed myself in this Black History Month project, I’ve had some memories surface from long ago. I now view those experiences through a very different lens than I did at the time.

I was was a young child when Innervisions came out in 1973. As I got a little older and gained a musical awareness, singles from Innervisions were still in occasional rotation on the radio. They weren’t current top 40 hits by any stretch, but still, I knew these songs.

I remember one day finding Stevie Wonder’s Innervisions album in the stacks of my father’s records. I was not allowed to touch them – nor his turntable or tuner – but he was rarely ever around. All I had to do was wait until my mother was scarce, and I could pretty much have at it.

I played that record, both sides, straight through. And played it again. And again. I even dug out daddy’s 100% off-limits headphones so I could listen to it louder and with more clarity, alone inside my own head. Sure I was just a kid, but I got lost in that record. Musically and lyrically, Innervisions transported me to another world, one very different from my own. A Black world.

The music was positively bursting, full of struggle and pain, of power and pride, of musical exuberance and originality, of yearning and hope, of politics and poverty, and of characters and stories unlike anyone or anything I had known. And that was by design, by the way: I knew only a very insular, sheltered, and blindingly white world.

Innervisions gave me my first glimpse into Blackness. Now, looking back, I can see that was where my Black history lessons first began.

Of all the tracks on the album, Living for the City hit me the hardest, touched me the deepest. Here are two versions of it, plus a link to the album in its entirety. It changed me. I think it’s worth honoring and celebrating what is arguably Stevie Wonder’s finest work this Black History Month.

This is the radio edit (3:39):

Full-length version (7:22) from the album:

The whole album (nine tracks) can be played on YouTube here.

It’s Day 12 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

[CONTENT NOTE: descriptions of racist taunts and anti-LGBTQ+ vandalism; no anti-Black or anti-LGBTQi+ images]

You know, I never have to look far for content to post for Black History Month. Hell, I don’t even have to look at all: it’s in my news feeds, social media and email inbox every single day. And this is just as true when it’s not Black History Month. Sometimes the content is indescribably beautiful, deeply moving and inspiring (like yesterday), even within the context of the unfathomable Black struggle and pain surrounding it.

This is not one of those posts.

via lohud.com (bold emphasis mine, except headings and photo captions):

Racist taunts at Pearl River basketball game shock community, bring calls for action

Probe called for by Nyack superintendent into fan behavior Wednesday night. Legislator calls for disciplinary action against involved Pearl River students.

Nancy Cutler
Rockland/Westchester Journal News

Published 2:40pm ET Feb. 11, 2022 / Updated 5:03pm Feb. 11, 2022

Nyack’s varsity basketball team captain Harrison Jordan and teammate Kameron Kukielczak were on the court Wednesday night when they heard noises from the crowd. Fans in the Pearl River gym were making noises – monkey and ape noises – as a Black player readied to take a free-throw shot from the foul line.

“It happened three different times,” said Jordan, a senior. “You hear it but you don’t believe it.”

Kukielczak, a sophomore, said he anticipated a lively home crowd for Pearl River. But not that.

School superintendents in both Pearl River and Nyack have expressed outrage at the fans’ behavior at a varsity basketball Pirates home game.

Kameron Kukielczak [left] and Harrison Jordan at Nyack High School, Feb. 11, 2022
(image: Peter Carr/The Journal News)

Outrage alone, though, is not enough, school leaders in both districts have said.

No, it’s not. It’s a good place to start, though.

[Read more…]

It’s Day 10 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

I’ve been noodling around with an idea for a post about the infamous 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963 (and all the other Klan bombings of homes and churches in that city that garnered it the name “Bombingham”), in light of the recent spate of bomb threats against Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs). No bombs have been found on these campuses (yet). But the history of 1960s Birmingham can teach us something important, and highly relevant today. Because we know what happens after bomb threats: bombs happen.

But then I got this email today from author, political leader and civil rights lawyer Steve Phillips, the founder of Democracy In Color:

Democracy in Color is a political media organization focused on political strategy and analysis at the intersection of race and politics.

We create and elevate content that influences public opinion and steers political behavior towards a more progressive and inclusive country. Using research and data-driven analysis, our multimedia content lifts up the voices and issues of the multiracial, progressive New American Majority and includes a podcast, articles, reports, and social campaigns.

I recommend signing up for their email newsletter, which is always informative and provides links to additional great content. Today’s newsletter is no exception, as you can see for yourself below. I’ve posted it in its entirety not just because it’s exceptional content – though it is that – but because Steve Phillips wrote that post I wanted to write, only far, far much better than I ever could:

[Read more…]

It’s Day 9 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

Today we are going to STFU and listen to black voices speaking to us from 1969. Not just any black voices, either: these are some of the most groundbreaking, hit-making, genre-breaking, unfathomably influential musical artists of the time – and for some, perhaps, of all time

Last evening, a film popped up in our streaming suggestions: Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised). The blurb said the documentary was about the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, a multi-weekend concert series that took place in the summer of ’69 in what is now Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem. Directed by Ahmir Khalib (“Questlove/?uestlove”) Thompson, perhaps best known as the drummer and co-frontman for the band The Roots, his debut film was put together from reels of raw footage that sat in a basement, virtually untouched, for fifty years.

Summer of Soul premiered at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, where it took both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award for a documentary.

Playing the trailer (which you can view below), I first heard then saw Nina Simone (*squeee4EVAH*) sing-saying to an enormous sea of black bodies and faces,

“Are you ready, black people? Are you really ready? Are you ready to listen to all the beautiful black voices, the beautiful black feelings, the beautiful black waves, moving in beautiful air? Are you ready black people? Are you ready?”

The Harlem crowd erupts in response to her callouts with spine-tingling, goose-bumping enthusiasm. Meanwhile, written words are interspersed, appearing in bright, colorful lettering against a black background:

In 1969
the same summer as Woodstock

Another festival took place

It was filmed but never seen

Until now

And with that, we were only 21 seconds into a 2-minute trailer.

The concert lineup promised nothing less than a pantheon of Black musical gods: Nina Simone, 19-year old Stevie Wonder, Sly & the Family Stone, Gladys Knight & the Pips, Mahalia Jackson, B.B. King, The Fifth Dimension and more.

Ms. Simone had me at “Are you ready?” We paid $5.99 for the rental.*

[Read more…]

It’s Day 8 of Black History Month and We Whites Are All Going to STFU and Listen.

Any rational observer (which excludes conservatives, by definition) would conclude that the so-called “War on Drugs” is misleadingly named. Not the “war” part of the construct; that part’s accurate. From the extra-constitutional surveillance, “stop-&-frisk” policing, coercive consent searches and no-knock warrants to the military equipment provided to local law enforcement by the Department of Defense (including tanks… tanks!), the tactics and weapons deployed against U.S. citizens in the drug war are indistinguishable from those deployed by the U.S. on foreign battlefields in actual wars.

Likewise, our rational (non-conservative) observer would be dead-on accurate were he/she/they to rename the entire endeavor the “War on Black (and brown, and other, but mostly Black) People Who Use Drugs.”

That this is so cannot be disputed (in reality). For the facts of the matter, see the ACLU report A Tale of Two Countries: Racially Targeted Arrests in the Era of Marijuana Reform. In it, you will learn such facts as these:

Analysis conducted by the ACLU shows that due to racial profiling and bias in marijuana enforcement, Black people are 3.6 times more likely than white people to be arrested for marijuana possession, despite similar usage rates. This disparity has not improved over the last decade, and in fact, disparities have actually worsened in most states.

“3.6 times more likely” is a national average. On a state level, the Black/white racial disparities can get much worse: in Montana it’s 9.6 times more likely, Illinois 7.5, and in no state is it equal or less than even. Hell, it’s 1.5 times in Colorado, where weed has been legalized since 2012. At the county level, the disparities can get much, much worse. And this is before racialized sentencing disparities factor in.

Even so, a marijuana arrest is much more than an arrest. The ACLU report also addresses what it calls the “collateral damage” that often comes along with it, including:

Denial of public benefits based on use, arrests, or convictions for marijuana

Drug tests for benefit eligibility

Separation of families in the child welfare system

Loss of driver’s licenses

Deportation

Loss of federal financial aid

Bans on participation in the marijuana industry for those with drug arrests

Felony disenfranchisement [i.e. loss of voting rights]

Taken together, the “collateral damage” accrues to the individual, families and entire communities. And we’re not talking about violent traffickers and cartel kingpins here:

Nine out of 10 of marijuana arrests are for possession. While arrests for possession have decreased nationally since 2010, the rate of decline has stagnated and, in recent years, has even reversed upward despite popular reform movements.

For the whys, the hows and the history of the matter, see the The Last Prisoner Project’s extraordinarily comprehensive and beautifully written report Criminal Injustice: Cannabis & The Rise Of The Carceral State. It tracks the intertwined threads of politics, ideology and the perverse incentives that perpetuate the racist injustices of the weed war, and is worth a read for the highlighted quotations alone.

There are many who agree that the “War on Drugs” has been an abysmal failure by virtually every measure. (To hear the ACLU tell it, a majority of Americans agree.) The cost in blood and money lost in waging it is likely incalculable at this point, to say nothing of all that “collateral damage.”

But I disagree. By certain measures, the “War on Black (and brown, and other, but mostly Black) People Who Use Drugs” has been a spectacular success. It’s not exactly a secret that there are powerful factions in the country who are going to great lengths to disenfranchise Black voters. Take a look again at the ACLU’s list of “collateral damage,” and you’ll notice that for those same powerful factions, many of the harms listed are quite openly and enthusiastically touted as features, not bugs.

I’d say this war is working out very well indeed – for conservatives.

__________

It so happens that today, there’s something you can do about this, at least at the federal level. I received an email from RootsAction as I was writing this:

Here’s candidate Joe Biden: “I think we should decriminalize marijuana, period. And I think everyone – anyone who has a record – should be let out of jail, their records expunged, be completely zeroed out.”

We couldn’t have said it any better. In fact, it was our public pressure that compelled him to say it.

Here’s what President Joe Biden has done: ______________. Nothing! He has not pardoned a single cannabis conviction.

Join a big coalition petition by signing your name here! Let’s make this happen.

Text of Petition:

While running for President, you committed to the American people that you would expunge marijuana convictions.

Yet more than one year into office, you have not taken a single action to provide relief to those still held back by a criminal conviction.

Millions of Americans have been subjected to a marijuana-related arrest and criminal conviction. Branding these individuals as lifelong criminals serves no legitimate society purpose and results in a litany of lost opportunities including the potential loss of employment, housing, voting rights, professional licensing, and student aid.

Further delay is completely unwarranted. The time for action is now.

In November of 2019, you said “I think we should decriminalize marijuana, period. And I think everyone – anyone who has a record – should be let out of jail, their records expunged, be completely zeroed out.”

This action would be a meaningful step in moving our nation beyond the harms of the senseless and cruel policy of marijuana criminalization and prohibition. Furthermore, this would set a tremendous precedent for state and local leaders to follow in your footsteps and facilitate the expungement of millions of cannabis records that were assigned under state and local criminal codes.

Please, honor your promise and take action to pardon marijuana offenses now.

ADD YOUR NAME.

After signing the petition, please use the tools on the next webpage to share it with your friends.

________

Please sign and share if you are able and inclined.

__________
Day 1 of Black History Month 2022 (Lori Teresa Yearwood) is here.
Day 2 of Black History Month 2022 (Mallence Bart-Williams) is here.
Day 3 of Black History Month 2022 (Emmett Till) is here.
Day 4 of Black History Month 2022 (A Tale of Two Citizens) is here.
Day 5 of Black History Month 2022 (Trayvon Martin) is here.
Day 6 of Black History Month 2022 (Franchesca Ramsey) is here.
Day 7 of Black History Month 2022 (National Black HIV/AIDS Awareness Day and the Black Aids Institute) is here.

Death to Squirrels

by Iris Vander Pluym

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The Greater Gardening of 2026 - Part 22 - Still Sowing

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