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Volume 6 Issue 49…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…December 12, 2003
By John Burl Smith
If blacks enjoy equality in the US, then what explains socioeconomic and political differences between blacks relative to whites? In 1953 when J. D. Watson and F. H. C. Crick described the double helical shape of DNA, only a select few could imagine its implications and possibilities. Most could not cognize explaining the behavior of "God’s" greatest creation "man," as the actions and reactions of four chemicals.
Ironically, proving human history began in Africa, which is the opposite of the original intention, DNA evidence substantiated that there is only one race, Africans and their descendants. Today, elementary students accept the idea that DNA is responsible for most of human development, not divine intervention. This acknowledgment wipes out any possible pretense for racism and discrimination based on racial inferiority.
A psychologist, I believe physical laws act on behavior as they do other objects. Accordingly, forces like gravity and electromagnetism must be considered when envisioning what is possible in the physical world. The analogy of balls rolling down an incline addresses assumptions of equality. If one ball falls behind, it is not due to the will of God, or because something is inherently wrong with the ball. The laws of proportionality establish that the balls are equal and immutable characteristics, like color, do not impact speed.
Complex interactions like DNA and electromagnetism are based on true equality. Unless physical laws are manipulated to aid one and disadvantage the other, their forces act uniformly on movement. For example, electromagnets can counteract gravity to lift tons or propel objects forward. Reversing polarity can hold an object fixed or repulse it backwards. Such arbitrarily imposed conditions destroy the assumption of equality by slowing one ball, while speeding up the other.
Proportionally, DNA produces anatomically equal but distinguishable human beings. Disparate environmental conditions, such as those imposed on African slaves, not mental deficiencies, explain why blacks lag behind whites. Symbolizing an electromagnetic brake, slavery and colonialism, coupled with institutionalized racism, held blacks in place. Denied socioeconomic mobility and choice, blacks were drained of their energy to drive America's socioeconomic dynamo. No longer able to justify inequality based on genetic inferiority, DNA has laid white racism bare.
Emblematic of the double helix discovery, few minds are sufficiently receptive to Dot M. Smith's chasm analysis' implications for assumptions about US equality. Bulls-eyeing the 3/5 Compromise of Article 1 Section 2 of the US Constitution, Smith showed the government systematically disadvantaged blacks by limiting choice and creating resistance to black's socioeconomic and political mobility. This propelled whites and repelled blacks. Smith debunked the notion that gaps between blacks relative to whites in the US are the natural reflection of democracy and freedom. She proved that the US government used court mandates to segregate blacks and maintain discriminatory laws and policies that deny equality today. A dynamo for whites, while reversing the socioeconomic polarity for blacks, the US government, under George Bush, has transformed blacks' dynamism into backward motion.
The Dark Knight-Batman/White Ninja/Zorro is learning to arithmetically manipulate those pesky fractions, which can boggle the imagination and become a source of frustration. As the light of understanding slowly brightens, his confidence in handling quantities less than one grows. After a challenging assignment, the Dark One/Ninja/Zorro groused, "Fractions break my nerves!"
Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana (1863-1952)
"Democracy has many faults, but it has the great virtue of providing a more equal opportunity than other forms of government to talent and genius of whatever origin and rank. Perhaps in the distant future men will be sufficiently intelligent to combine aristocracy and democracy, giving the franchise to all, but limiting office to the fit. Till then we must suffer fools gladly." (Santayana's philosophy of government and the unfortunate reality of having to put up with second best.)
Poet, philosopher, critic and novelist, Jorge Agustín Nicolás Ruiz de Santayana, known as George Santayana, was born December 16, 1863 in Madrid, Spain. With a heritage rooted in the Spanish diplomatic society, which stressed education and global familiarity, Santayana was truly an international citizen. He traveled extensively before making his home in Rome. While he wrote in English and is a major figure in Classical American Philosophy, he retained his Spanish citizenship.
Santayana's father brought him to Boston in 1872. On finding it inhospitable, Puritanical and cold, his father returned to Spain. His parents permanently separated. Santayana completed his B.A. and Ph.D. at Harvard College (1882-1889), including eighteen months of study in Germany on a Walker Fellowship. A respected and popular Harvard faculty member (1889-1912), Santayana cherished academic life, but found his professorship limited his intellectual pursuits.
As early as 1893, with his father's death, his mother's illness with Alzheimer's disease and his older sister's marriage, Santayana planned to leave Harvard. In May 1911, he announced his retirement. Initially, he agreed to alternate years in Europe and the U.S. However, in 1912, he escaped the "thistles of trivial and narrow scholarship" to write full-time and travel. After numerous trips to Europe, he decided to live in Paris. Unable to return to the mainland with the outbreak of WWI, Santayana lived in London. He traveled after the war, before settling in Rome in the 1920s.
Based on allusions in Santayana's early poetry and his association with known homosexuals and bisexuals, some scholars conclude Santayana was a homosexual, even though he provided no clear indication of his sexual preferences. He never married.
Considered well ahead of his time, Santayana's essay The Sense of Beauty (1896) was critically acclaimed as the best American contribution to aesthetics. His philosophy, richly expressed in his five volume magnum opus The Life of Reason (1905-06), emphasized the importance of reason in understanding the world, while retaining a healthy dose of skepticism about what one can really know. Skepticism and Animal Faith (1923) suggested a relationship between faith and knowledge. His, "Scepticism is the chastity of the intellect, and it is shameful to surrender it too soon or to the first comer, " is often quoted. In his four books The Realms of Being (1927, 1930, 1938, 1940), Santayana placed idealism in context as he proclaimed the only reality is experience. While reared as a Catholic, Santayana was a non-believer, yet critics of his work found his treatment of religion strikingly sensitive. For Santayana, "Religion in its humility restores man to his only dignity, the courage to live by grace."
At the outbreak of WWII, when his efforts to leave Rome proved unsuccessful, Santayana entered the Clinica della Piccola Compagna di Maria, a hospital-clinic run by Catholic nuns. He lived there until his death. Santayana died of cancer on September 26, 1952. He is buried in the "Panteon de la Obra Pia espanola" in Rome's Campo Verano Cemetery. (Sources: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/santayana/ and www.iupui.edu/~santedit/)
Gay Rights vs. Civil Rights
On December 8, 2003, the National Black Justice Coalition, an ad hoc consortium of black lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community leaders, announced a national campaign against the proposed constitutional amendment to limit the definition of marriage to a union between a man and woman. The group announced a major fund-raising drive and targeted ad campaign to generate black support for marriage equality.
It is evident that gay marriage and gay rights are the new wedge issues. Some contend the gay rights movement is tantamount to the black civil rights struggle. Most blacks reject the comparison. Sexual orientation is a choice, whereas skin color is immutable, even though some of us try to bleach the black away.
Wedge issues are nothing new to the black human rights struggle. When blacks begin to mobilize around issues that empower us, such as the civil rights movement, issues that divide us invariable show arise.
Genome Blues
By Shabaka Tecumseh
Dress rehearsal almost over
players sit in place
three hundred years
straightening hair
cultural remake
Blue-eyed contacts
blonde wigs galore
they have mapped the genome
Blacks won't need the store
Finally able to satisfy
implanted cerebral desire
relieving the 20 per cent
becoming their multiplier...
Will melanin be archived?
This time will nature survive?
Tell you what my friend
genome blues is what I cry.
About Me: I am a seeker of truth for the psychological liberation of African and Indigenous Peoples. In cooperation with Ms. Tureeda Mikell, I've co-authored a book of "succinct," and we hope, culturally relevant poems entitled: "Sum mo Nommo: Words and Rhymes from the Ghetto." We hope we were on target. For your copy, email shabaka@cox.net.
By John Burl Smith
After his first date, heart gazing and smooching in the Rose Garden with President Vladimir V. Putin, George Bush has apparently scrapped future dinner plans. Popping off like fat in a fire about Russian election results, administration talking heads screamed as if Bush had been date raped. Shrill as a Texan served a steak left on the grill too long, sources stopped short of accusing Putin of a shotgun wedding without a kiss. Surprised by his "choke hold" on the government, Bush attack dogs chawed down on Putin's rear, like it was an entree on the menu. Regurgitated a surrealistically sour litany on what Putin dishes at his totalitarian hash house, no one found democracy on his menu.
Americans chewing on Bush's hard sell found it tougher than a $2 steak and three times harder to swallow. A very heavy serving of hypocrisy that left a fetid fowl smell, Bush point men wagged their tail feathers at Putin's claims of fairness. Like a rotten egg in a campfire, Putin cleared the air with quick election results. Equally malodorous, in 2000, the world's greatest democracy, America, stank up the world as its Supreme Court stopped the counting of legally cast ballots to award Bush the presidency. Resembling thieves stealing pies from kitchen windows, international election observers greeted Bush's coup d'état with silence. Choking on a bite of American pie that is going down like $2 steak, Democrats must give the US a Heimlich maneuver in 2004, because Bush can neither be spat up nor swallowed. Peering into that Russian's dark heart, Bush may have gleamed his own future!
Disgruntled wants to know: Recently, addressing some 400 Brown University students, filmmaker Spike Lee called some gangsta rap "dangerous." Considering violence, pimping and 'ho' freaking, one can agree gangsta rap and other negative endeavors that push uncomplimentary stereotypes, including movies, make progress difficult. However, rather than criticize, there are hip-hop artists throwing down conscious vibes that Lee and other icons should be supporting. A recipient of help from successful blacks himself, is there a conscious hip-hop viber Lee has allowed to stand on his shoulders?
Disgruntled feels: Skeptical! It's the season for Scrooge to dole out a few pennies to the poor to qualify for his charitable tax deduction. Everywhere Christian deeds are done. Along with Thanksgiving, it is the time of the year we remember to feed the poor and homeless. Cold hearts magically warm with good cheer at X-Mas. Good Christians stuff stockings with cheap trinkets for poor children, then religiously dismiss their need for food, clothing and shelter the remainder of the year.
Disgruntled says: According to government reports, the US economy grew at a robust 8.2% over the third quarter. Other economic indicators suggest the US economy is red hot; even stocks are rising. With such favorable economic activity, the unemployment rate should be falling, yet it continues to hover around six percent. Cynics say, the economic numbers are bogus.
Liars and Tail Chasers!
By Dot
George Santayana must have had Americans and their lying chief executives in mind when he wrote "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it," and "Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim."
The gullible US public, especially its poor white and black components, acts like a dog chasing its tail; we keep going faster and faster within this tight circle even though there is nothing to indicate we are getting any closer to actually achieving the desired end.
The US has a rich history of presidential prevarication, yet the US public keeps falling for fallacies and sending young people to die in wars that accomplish little save cull "undesirable" populations, which means poor whites and people of color, and beef up the profits of certain industries. In the end, the motive for war is lost in the blood and guts spilled on foreign soil.
A fabrication, the Tonkin Gulf incident led to congressional passage of a resolution authorizing the use of force in Vietnam under Lyndon B. Johnson. Richard Nixon, whose Southern strategy won the hearts and minds of whites, escalated what a lying Johnson started. More US soldiers were sent to Vietnam to make the world safer for democracy by stopping Communism.
Under pressure of growing war protests, Nixon turned to Vietnamization, wherein Vietnamese would lead the fight against Communism and North Vietnamese aggression. Rather than pull out US troops, the killing continued; the US government concealed atrocities in which scores of innocent men, women and children were massacred and downplayed the number of dead and wounded US soldiers, while inflating the number Vietnam freedom fighters killed in combat.
Like his predecessor Richard Nixon, Bush campaigned on a states' right platform. He promised to cut taxes, reduce the size of government and appoint judges that strictly construct the Constitution. All told, Bush boldly telegraphed his plan to rollback gains made by blacks since the 1960s. Some have ventured to say his intent is to reverse New Deal programs of the 1930s.
Bush claimed to be a uniter, but he ran the most divisive campaign in US history, surpassing the 1876 debacle and the questionable selection of Rutherford B. Hayes. Fulfilling his promise to white Democrats, Hayes withdrew federal troops from the South and ushered in conditions for black Americans akin to slavery. Under Bush, the state of black America has worsened.
Some analysts have suggested the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks saved Bush's presidency. The attacks ushered in a litany of lies to justify wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Bush deflected attention from his fraudulent selection and divisive domestic agenda to warfare around which Americans traditionally rally.
Recently, the US redoubled its efforts to beat back Iraqi freedom fighters. As election 2004 draws near, Iraqification of the war has been floated as a course of action to reduce US troop strength. The lies that were told about weapons of mass destruction, threats to US security, enforcing UN Security Council Resolutions, etc. that got us into this conflict are pushed under the tattered rug of democracy. Rather than Santayana's skepticism, "the chastity of the intellect" that "is shameful to surrender too soon or to the first comer," the US public, like a dog chasing its tail, has embraced fanaticism and is oblivious to the deadly repetition.
Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and Telephone Calls
Email trueblackness@yahoogroups.com Here we go again! It is obvious these white cops are descendants of barbarians. They know no other course of action when confronted by African people except violence. Confronted by a wild animal, they would not have pulled out nightsticks. Whatever happened to stun guns for people who are obviously distraught and have not committed a crime against another person? These barbarians will not face any punishment for this beating. Merry Christmas black people.
Email Mwananchi@yahoogroups.com Can someone please explain this in English? "There are known knowns - there are things that we know that we know. There are known unknowns - that is to say - there are things that we now know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns ... things we do not know we don't know. And each year we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns." Donald Rumsfeld
Email www.washingtontimes.com Former Sen. Max Cleland has been nominated by George W. Bush to serve on the board of the Export-Import Bank. Cleland has been one of the more outspoken members of the 9-11 commission, accusing the administration of delaying access to vital documents in an effort to run out the clock on its investigation. The panel, which started work at the beginning of the year, must submit its report by a congressionally mandated deadline of May 27, 2004.
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