Buying Your Freedom

Too often we tell our children that their bodies are the most precious things they have and that they shouldn't just give them to anyone, but that advice is wrong. The most precious things we have are our integrity, values and character (ie, our soul), and once we sell those things we can never truly get them back.

Yet too many people wilingly trade their soul to gain things like status, popularity and wealth. In the process, they wind up selling off—little by little—the essence of who they are, eventually becoming people they don't even recognize.

Maximum:

You can buy your freedom or sell your soul, but you"ll sell for brass and pay with gold.

Suspects, First and Citizens, Second.

Whether or not people want to admit it, there is a DOUBLE-STANDARD with regard to how law enforcement officers (LEOs) generally treat "perceived" threats when the person is white versus black. From Oscar Grant to Tamir Rice to my old acquaintance Casper Banjo, a disabled septuagenarian who was gunned down in 2008 by a police rifleman who claimed he was pointing a "replica gun", black men and women—from adolescence through their senior years—are initially viewed by LEOs as threats and not citizens. On the contrary, white people, regardless of the situation or circumstance, are first treated like citizens—with all the associated rights, including the presumption of innocence—and only labeled suspects when it is either obvious or necessary to do so.

Why I No Longer Talk About Race With White People

After following the media coverage associated with a grand jury's decision not to indict Darren Wilson for shooting Michael Brown, as well as the divergent responses from white and black Americans, I decided that I was no longer going to discuss any issues involving race in a mixed race setting—in particular, one that includes white people.

This is because no matter what a black person says about racism, discrimination or racial profiling, most white people always seem to believe that they are the final arbiters on black people's experiences in America; on whether our claims of racism and discrimination are valid; on whether we are entitled to feel aggrieved by the injustices we THINK we have faced; on whether we are competent; and on whether we are deserving of the same rights, protections and opportunities that they feel are their birthright as Americans.

After years of conversations—in college classes and cocktail parties—I have realized that white people subconsciously believe that their opinion on the black experience trumps my actual experience  as a black woman, and that no amount anecdotal or actual evidence will change what they have decided is the truth about black people's lives and experiences in this country.

More important, I am refusing to discuss racism with white people because they're generally uninvested in ending it, so these conversations are at best, feel good opportunities for those that think it's wrong and blame game sessions for those who believe it either doesn't exist or that what blacks perceive as racial bias against all of us is justified by the actions of some of us.

As I get older, I can no longer afford to frustrate myself by discussing issues that impact MY life with people who believe that they know more about me and my experiences than I know about myself; especially, when I know that my perspective only matters if it validates theirs. Moreover, I'm at a point in my life where I cannot afford to invest my limited free time in unproductive discourse that will lead to neither understanding nor resolution of a particular problem.

So instead of wasting my time on fruitless attempts to influence white America's opinions and attitudes regarding race and racial injustice, I plan to avoid such conversations, opting instead to talk about the Saints' dismal record, the merits of okra versus filé gumbo or any other topic about which I know my opinion will be accepted.

Why I Wasn't With Mary

When people ask why I refused to vote to re-elect Sen. Mary Landrieu and supported her GOP opponent, Rep. Bill Cassidy, I point to a meeting I attended in 2006 with her and a recently elected senator from Illinois, where she promised to provide resources for recovering minority and small businesses.

This promise was delivered in the form of  a $1 Billion in special GO Zone New Markets Tax Credits that were supposed to be used to finance business and real estate investment opportunities in "severely  distressed" neighborhoods like parts of the Ninth and Seventh Wards, but were primarily used to finance her brother's Broadway South fantasies (maybe he thought he'd get a chance to use his undergraduate drama training), "mixed-use" downtown buildings offering high-rent apartments that 80+% of the city's residents can't afford or hotels offering wages so low that most employees have to work two jobs just to afford rent in those STILL underserved neighborhoods. 

This was was delivered in the form of BILLIONS of dollars of Disaster Recovery Community Block Grant funds she lobbied for that were supposed to create thousands of "quality" construction and permanent jobs for local residents, along with sustainable business opportunities for local disadvantaged businesses, but came with a waiver of the local hiring and prevailing wage provisions typical for such funds, allowing contractors to hire out-state and even undocumented foreign workers, leaving blacks even more under- & unemployed than they were before Katrina.

On the other hand, made an effort to research and meet Bill Cassidy, and wound up impressed by his work creating community clinics, his commitment to providing educational opportunities and resources for children with learning challenges, and his belief in empowering people to help themselves through entrepreneurship versus empowering established businesses to maintain the economic status quo—it should be noted that the Small Business & Entrepreneurship gave him a 100% rating on supporting favorable legislation, while Mary Landrieu only received a 58% rating.

While Cassidy may not deliver anything to help the people Mary promised to help during that meeting, I already know that Mary hasn't done it so I'm willing to take my chances on someone else and vote against him, if he fails to deliver over the next six  years.

Racism is NOT A Black Problem

For centuries, the wealthy white male power structure (WWMPS) has used racism (and all of the other isms) to justify treating people as less than so they can take more of. 

Like dealers who need to get high on their own supply, the WWMPS has wholesaled racism to the rest of the white community to pay for its habit. By creating institutions and systems that extend the benefits of racism to all whites, the WWMPS has turned white people into paid racism stakeholders who are willing to maintain it, or at very least, unwilling to fight it.

These wages of whiteness—paid through preferential access to resources and opportunities, as well as insulation from the injustices and negative outcomes faced by non-whites in similar circumstances—are paid to all white people, regardless of whether they have a hand in creating or maintaining it. As a consequence, the wages of whiteness are often too attractive to refuse, and too easy to disavow.

Unfortunately, the wages of whiteness are like an addiction for which the "antidote is also the poison", because only white people can fix the problem they've created. With every addiction, there are addicts who try to assuage their guilt by blaming others for their habit. With racism, this group typically justifies it as merely a by-product or consequence of the actions or behaviors of non-whites.

In general, white people are too 

addicted to the wages of whiteness to simply give them up. This is why almost two centuries of economic, moral and political efforts have done little to end racism. 

When the only person who has the ability to fix a problem benefits from its existence, any resolution is improbable. So until white people collectively admit that racism is a problem that needs to be fixed and that it is their problem to fix, racism will exist until the concept of race is no longer valid or relevant.

How The Media's Mirror Reflects The Black Community

One of the most popular recent stories in the Times-Picayune (T-P), the paper of record in New Orleans, has been recent release of Lil Boosie, from the Louisiana State Penitentiary after serving three years of an eight year sentence for drug possession and intent to distribute.   While Lil Boosie's release has been a prominent story, the recent death of Chokwe Lumumba, a man who was an advocate for the poor and disenfranchised, as well as the mayor of the largest city in Mississippi has been completely ignored.  In addition to posting at least a half dozen articles in the five days since his release, the paper's website recently participated in and live-streamed a press conference with the Baton Rouge rapper and parolee, who was acquitted of one murder-for-hire charge while he was in prison but remains a suspect in two more, who recently posted a video on Instagram of his seven year old daughter cursing like an irate sailor and whose total CD sales wouldn't even earn him a gold record.

There are those in the Black community who will undoubtedly call me a "hater" for criticizing the T-P's love fest with Lil Boosie, but there is no justification for celebrating someone who not only promotes thuggish behavior in his music, but embodies it in his lifestyle.  Moreover, covering the prison release of a quasi-celebrity rapper, while ignoring the death of a world-renown activist and politician, is not much different than putting stories about Black criminals on the front page while burying ones about Black achievement in the lifestyle section..

It is an accepted notion that—through their reporting—journalists are merely "holding up a mirror to society," and that their stories are accurate reflections of the people and events they chose to cover.  Unfortunately, it is also an accepted notion that journalists tell us everything we need to know about our society.  So if the only stories about Black people they chose to tell are ones that portray us as thugs, addicts, criminals and poor parents, the implication is that the personal characteristics and behaviors of this group are the sum of our reality and existence.

When the worst of us is celebrated while the best of us isn't even worth mentioning, the message to our children is that the values and social norms of the former are to be embraced while those of the latter can be ignored.  Through their in-depth coverage of Lil Boosie and virtual news blackout on the life and death of Mayor Lumumba, the T-P's mirror is one that reflects the lowest common denominator in the Black community and promotes thug life as our ideal life.

We Ain't Alright

Depending on whom you talk to and which neighborhood that person lives in, New Orleans is either thriving under Mayor Mitch Landrieu, or we’re still suffering eight years after Chuck D penned these lyrics in response to seeing Black New Orleanians struggle after Katrina:

Urgency

State of emergency

Shows somebody’s government

Is far from reality….

New Orleans in the morning, afternoon, and night

Hell no, we ain’t alright.[1]

Mayor Landrieu claims that under his administration, we are improving and moving forward as “One City,” but if you drive through and talk to people in various neighborhoods, you will hear a tale of two cities—one that has thrived and benefitted from his term in office, and one that has been neglected.

In THEIR New Orleans, the CBD and French Quarter have been spruced up with freshly paved streets and sidewalks, along with new palm trees that are regularly strung with Christmas lights to celebrate the holidays and major tourism events like the Super Bowl, NBA All-Star Weekend and Mardi Gras. In MY New Orleans, people in predominantly Black neighborhoods like the Seventh Ward and Gentilly are living with broken street lights and sidewalks.

In THEIR New Orleans, money from the DOT's Submerged Roads Program is available for fixing Uptown streets like Magazine and Jefferson that never saw a drop of water during Katrina. In MY New Orleans, streets in Katrina-flooded neighbors like Broadmoor and Gert Town remain cracked and caving in almost nine years after the waters subsided.

In THEIR New Orleans, the city and school board have spent BILLIONS on new schools and public facilities. In MY New Orleans, the unemployment rate for the city's Black residents is one of the highest in the country.

In THEIR New Orleans, three police cars arrive within 15 minutes, in response to a security alarm at a Garden District residence.  In MY New Orleans, the police take over 30 minutes to respond to a 911 call from a homeowner in New Orleans East who's just been in a shootout during an attempted home invasion.

While people who in Uptown neighborhoods, the French Quarter or the CBD enjoy newly paved streets, reliable police services, a responsive City Hall and an overall improved quality of life that makes them feel the city is doing well, the people in MY New Orleans are living with broken street lights, pot-holed streets, high crime and higher unemployment rates.  So when people tell me New Orleans is doing great under Mayor Landrieu, I just tell them that while certain parts of New Orleans may be doing well, the people in my part of town "ain't alright."

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[1] Lyrics from the song “Hell No, We Ain’t Alright” on the album Rebirth of a Nation by Public Enemy, 2005