Urban Horror

Moving On

2008-09-16T06:57:00.000-07:00

As of 8/30/2008 I have move to my new site urbanhorror.wordpress.com

On 10/1/2008 I will elimnate this blog to reduce confusion

I look forward to hearing from you :)

Obama the Comedy Central Version

2008-08-29T09:57:00.000-07:00

Princess & the Frog Sneak Peek

2008-08-20T07:03:00.000-07:00

Black & Blue Print

2008-08-19T06:17:00.001-07:00

The Black Male Handbook is a collection of essays for Black males on surviving, living, and winning. Kevin Powell taps into the social and political climate rising in the Black community, particularly as it relates to Black males. This is a must-have book, not only for Black male readers, but the women who befriend, parent, partner, and love them.

The Black Male Handbook answers a collective hunger for new direction, fresh solutions to old problems, and a different kind of conversation -- man-to-man and with Black male voices, all of the hiphop generation. The book tackles issues related to political, practical, cultural, and spiritual matters, and ending violence against women and girls.

The book also features an appendix filled with useful readings, advice, and resources. The Black Male Handbook is a blueprint for those aspiring to thrive against the odds in America today.

Click here for more

Skip a Flick Read a Book

2008-08-18T07:31:00.000-07:00

3 Quick Questions

2008-08-15T06:21:00.000-07:00

When will this drop?

What were they thinking?

Was this the coolest series or what?

Sheer Genius

2008-08-13T06:51:00.000-07:00

Preview Pilot Season Genius #1

Pilot Season: Genius #1 (W) Marc Bernardin, Adam Freeman (A)Afua Richardson (COV) Afua Richardson Alexander, Hannibal, Napoleon, Patton. What if the greatest military mind of OUR generation was born in strife, surrounded by violence and combat since birth? When the gauntlet is dropped, the question isn’t “How did 17-year-old Destiny Ajaye unite the gangs of South Central into a killer army and declare war on the LAPD?” No, the question is, “Can anyone stop her?” From the minds of writers Marc Bernardin & Adam Freeman (The Highwaymen, Monster Attack Network) and innovative illustrator Afua Richardson (Half Dead), Genius is a book that will have readers talking for months to come. Full Color 32 pages $3.99 pilot issue

Click here for interview

Click here for preview

video trailer

2008-08-10T20:03:00.000-07:00

ICONIC Return

2008-08-08T05:48:00.001-07:00

Two opinions on the return of Milestone Comics after a decade

"I specifically stayed away from saying that,(minority characters) because that’s not what it’s about. There is a depth to these characters, there is an awareness to these characters, there’s a strength in personality, and there’s great development in these characters. When you have characters like ICON, Static, Hardware, the Shadow Cabinet...these are great characters and great concepts in their own right. This isn’t about a diversity issue – this is about bringing great material into the DC Universe, and being able to add value to everything that we do. "
Dan Dio DC Comics interview

"I believe this is a huge mistake that will, over time, work to the detriment of these characters instead of their benefit. By losing the uniqueness that made them stand apart from the crowd, the Milestone heroes will, sooner or later, become as far removed from their roots as the Marvel family is now."
The Glyphs article

LeSean Thomas

2008-08-05T07:15:00.001-07:00

Lesean Thomas is the Co-Director & Supervising Character Designer of "The Boondocks" on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim. Season 2 AIRING NOW! StoryBoard Artist on BEN10:ALIEN FORCE and artist extradonaire'

His Space
Deviant Art
Blog

The Event Designer

2008-08-04T05:56:00.000-07:00

There are event designers and then there is Preston Brailey, whose style transcend the term

Above the worlds largest wedding bouquet

Check out his books here

Check out his web here and his blog here

Chop Shop

2008-08-01T06:32:00.001-07:00

Alejandro, a tough and ambitious Latino street orphan on the verge of adolescence, lives and works in an auto-body repair shop in a sprawling junkyard on the outskirts of Queens, New York. In this chaotic world of adults, young Alejandro struggles to make a better life for himself and his 16-year-old sister, Isamar.

The Return of Milestone

2008-07-30T05:45:00.000-07:00

Static - co-created by Dwayne McDuffie, the fan favorite writer of DC's top-selling "Justice League of America" - will be joining "Teen Titans" as an active team member.

The supercharged hero is arguably the former DC imprint's most recognizable character thanks in large part to the animated series, "Static Shock," that ran for four seasons from 2000 to 2004.

Late Saturday night, McDuffie, one of Milestone's co-founders, also confirmed for CBR News that two of his most popular creations will appear in his next arc of "Justice League of America," beginning in #27.

"You will definitely see Icon and you'll definitely see Hardware," revealed McDuffie. "And the Justice League will be going up against Milestone's Shadow Cabinet too."

Icon is an ageless alien stranded on Earth, who possesses the abilities of superstrength, superspeed and flight while Hardware, is an alias for Curt Metcalf, an inventor who battles crime with his high-tech gadgets.

Along with "Static" and "Blood Syndicate," "Icon" and "Hardware," were amongst Milestone's first launch of titles in 1993.

Shadow Cabinet has been dubbed "the JLA as run by the CIA."

As for Static, McDuffie said, "He's a 15-year old fanboy, who has ended up with superpowers. And he has decided to be a superhero because that's what you do when you get superpowers. He's just like any of us if we got superpowers."

"And despite everybody asking him all the time," quipped McDuffie, "he's not related to Black Lightning."

Most of Milestone's heroes are based in the fictional Midwestern city of Dakota.

A city, according to McDuffie, that has always been planted firmly in DCU.

That being said, McDuffie couldn't say how the two worlds eventually collide in terms of DCU continuity, but did say that question would be answered in the months ahead.

"There is something a lot more complicated going on from the point of view of all the characters in the DC Universe," said McDuffie. "The city of Dakota has always been there. There's something else going on but that won't play out for quite sometime."

He did confirm the 'complicated something' has nothing to do with Grant Morrison's "Final Crisis."

McDuffie said he is thrilled the two companies were able to make this announcement today.

"We're really excited to see it happening. These are great characters. I think we found a way to make them a good fit in the DC Universe. It's a good fit for both companies and for both sets of characters and I think the fans are going to be really pleased."

He also confirmed DC and Milestone had been talking about this deal for 'about a year.'

"Both sides hoped we could pull it off," said McDuffie. "There is a lot of complicated stuff both contractually and creatively. We had to come up with stuff that made sense to both sides but we finally did.

"And it really is going to be great for us to have our characters be in books that are so well known and alongside Superman, Batman, etc. And we are going to add a bunch of exciting, new, young characters to the DCU. So everybody wins."

Black Panther on BET

2008-07-28T06:24:00.000-07:00

The Black Panther is coming to BET, I'm not that fond of the art (couldn't you guys have talked with the folks over at the Boondocks) But its a success because BP is coming to the screen

Here the creators discuss the project

200, 000 Germans Can't Be Wrong

2008-07-24T12:39:00.000-07:00

I Guess Sistah's Don't Watch Block Buster Movies

2008-07-24T11:02:00.000-07:00

I was planning on doing a blog on this but Margeaux Watson nailed it

It's Time to Put Black Actresses in Hollywood Blockbusters Margeaux Watson

I like Will Smith as much as any other black woman — as much, for that matter, as any person, given that he has once again proved that he is the most bankable star in the universe. But I did not like Hancock. (Spoiler alert!) Smith's relationship with Charlize Theron was just plain bizarre: She's secretly superhuman! They've been married for eons! She's also married to Jason Bateman! What gives?
But the duo bothered me on a deeper level, too. Why is it that once an actor like Smith reaches A-list status, Hollywood never seems to pair him with a black actress in a potential blockbuster? From Denzel Washington (Training Day) to Dwayne ''The Rock'' Johnson (The Game Plan), leading African-American actors have been increasingly matched with non-black love interests. The sci-fi comedy Meet Dave (out now) finds Eddie Murphy romancing Elizabeth Banks, while Smith is paired with Latina actress Rosario Dawson in his next film, Seven Pounds (out in December). It's obviously a strategy to make these films as accessible as possible to all audiences, but I think it also expresses an implicit fear: A film featuring the coupling of a black actor and actress is too ''urban'' for the masses.
Just imagine how refreshing Hancock would have been if Theron's heroine had been played by a black actress like Tracee Ellis Ross (TV's Girlfriends), Paula Patton (Déjà Vu), or even Smith's real-life wife, Jada. Would the movie have tanked? Will Smith's last seven films have opened at No. 1, and Charlize Theron didn't star in any of those.
I don't have a thing against Theron — I loved her in Monster. And I don't have anything against Will Smith, either — he's done an enormous amount for African-Americans in Hollywood by proving to studios that actors of color can open movies here and overseas. I don't even have anything against interracial couples on screen — in fact, that's a nice sign of progress. My beef is that Hollywood opts for these couples again and again. The result? Black actresses are getting the shaft, and reality as I know it is not getting portrayed on the big screen. (And please don't mention Tyler Perry's name to me — Madea doesn't represent me either.)
Right now, with the exception of Halle Berry, Queen Latifah, and occasionally, Beyoncé Knowles, African-American women rarely get above-the-title billing in mainstream movies that pull in big numbers. Even when they do end up in supposedly plum roles as the love interest of a white male, most of their screen time is spent talking about and dealing with the fallout of that relationship. Just look at Sanaa Lathan, who freaked out when Simon Baker discovered she wears a weave in Something New. Or Zoe Saldana, who struggled to get her father (Bernie Mac) to accept her relationship with Ashton Kutcher in Guess Who.
And Lord knows I can't wait to see Lakeview Terrace, due out Sept. 19. This thriller, which is produced by Smith, finds Kerry Washington and Patrick Wilson playing an interracial couple living in L.A., suffering the wrath of their disapproving neighbor: an angry black cop played by Samuel L. Jackson.
C'mon, Hollywood, this is tired territory. Haven't you redone Guess Who's Coming to Dinner enough? Why can't black actresses play lead roles in benign romantic comedies like 27 Dresses and Made of Honor — or Hitch? Here's the real hitch: Until women like Nia Long and Gabrielle Union are cast opposite big guns like Smith and Washington, they'll never gain the recognition they need to open their own films. And until that happens, well, I'll always have Dreamgirls. nailed it

Memin in Context?

2008-07-23T07:23:00.000-07:00

I made the same comment in yesterdays blog over at Glyphs, this was the response from Journalist Adalisa

Sorry it took me so long to come and comment here. First of all Rich, thank you for linking to my blog. I never expected so many people to read my post, but now that it has happened, I have a much better idea of what is going on, and what can be done to reach a better understanding on this tricky business.

@urbanhorror: I am afraid that we’re probably passing each other by with our mutual points. I’m aware,as I say in my post (Although I clarified it in an ETA after reading yours and other comments like this) that the image of Memin is offensive, and it draws from very racist stereotypes. I’m currently organizing with a friend a group of mexican artist to redesign Memin to take him away from those stereotypes. What I was trying to explain is why Mexicans say the story is not racist. because there are a couple of things that were completely distorted in the news report because of the language and cultural difference.

In Fairness Adalisa deserves the opportunity to put Memin in contest below is a snippet from her blog

This is not the first time that Memin has caused controversy on the states, but last time I held on hopes that someone from my country would step up and explain what Memin is about, but no one did. Most of the posts in México were about how hystericals americans were at some stuff, not delving in the fact that there's a huge cultural difference between the States and México, and that most of the problem American's have with Memin is due to those cultural differences click here for the whole article

Crash Course in Cultural Sensitivity

2008-07-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

Its always an amazing thing when a group tries to explain to the offended party that their actions are not racist and that the offended party, just dosen't understand

The character spurred debate in 2005 when the Mexican government issued a stamp commemorating Memin. At the time, many U.S. activists and political figures called the character racist.

The Mexican government protested the characterizations, asserting that Americans simply do not understand Memin’s cultural significance in Mexico.

That debate spurred the publisher to re-issue the old comics in a collector’s series that are available for purchase in the United States as, well as Mexico.

Diversity in Entertainment: Why Is TV So White?

2008-07-21T06:43:00.000-07:00

Cleveland Brown -- a cartoon voiced by a white guy -- is the only minority character to anchor a new series in 2008-09. What gives? As the broadcast networks prepare a predominantly white fall schedule, we examine where all the color has gone

CLEVELAND BROWN How did it fall to him to become TV's great black hope?

Fox
Cleveland Brown favors gentle words, and few words at that. He likes yellow T-shirts and baths. He is also fiercely proud of his African-American heritage, as evidenced by his ''Two Decades of Dignity'' board game and that nice talk he had with a racist cop about how a black bowling ball might feel when surrounded by white pins. It's a good thing, too, because Cleveland Brown is shaping up as network television's great black hope for the 2008-09 season — he's the only minority character anchoring a new series on the Big Five networks. Granted, his Family Guy spin-off, The Cleveland Show, didn't even make it onto the fall schedule (it's slated for midseason). Yes, Cleveland himself is merely a figment of animation. And true, the person who provides his voice, Mike Henry, is actually white. But hey, it's a start, right? click to continue

Man-ning Up

2008-07-16T08:59:00.000-07:00

Barack Obama told the NAACP that he’s not going to stop calling on African-Americans to take more personal responsibility even if it angers people like the Rev. Jesse Jackson. A Hardball panel debates: Has the torch been passed to a new generation of African-American leaders?

Baseless, Tasteless, & True

2008-07-15T07:04:00.001-07:00

The New Yorker, a liberal magazine accurately depicted how many narrow minded, Fox News watching (because what other news organization has fanned fears more than Fox) Americans see Obama and his wife. A couple that depicts that the American dream is possible but who's color the racist underbelly of this nation can't swallow.

Mandela on Leadership

2008-07-11T06:02:00.000-07:00

By RICHARD STENGEL. TIME .Thu Jul 10, 5:30 PM ET

Even at 90, the world has never needed Mandela's gifts - as a tactician, as an activist and, yes, as a politician - more, as he showed again in London on June 25, when he rose to condemn the savagery of Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe. As we enter the main stretch of a historic presidential campaign in America, there is much that he can teach the two candidates. I've always thought of what you are about to read as Madiba's Rules (Madiba, his clan name, is what everyone close to him calls him), and they are cobbled together from our conversations old and new and from observing him up close and from afar. They are mostly practical. Many of them stem directly from his personal experience. All of them are calibrated to cause the best kind of trouble: the trouble that forces us to ask how we can make the world a better place.

No. 1
Courage is not the absence of fear - it's inspiring others to move beyond it
In 1994, during the presidential-election campaign, Mandela got on a tiny propeller plane to fly down to the killing fields of Natal and give a speech to his Zulu supporters. I agreed to meet him at the airport, where we would continue our work after his speech. When the plane was 20 minutes from landing, one of its engines failed. Some on the plane began to panic. The only thing that calmed them was looking at Mandela, who quietly read his newspaper as if he were a commuter on his morning train to the office. The airport prepared for an emergency landing, and the pilot managed to land the plane safely. When Mandela and I got in the backseat of his bulletproof BMW that would take us to the rally, he turned to me and said, "Man, I was terrified up there!"

Mandela was often afraid during his time underground, during the Rivonia trial that led to his imprisonment, during his time on Robben Island. "Of course I was afraid!" he would tell me later. It would have been irrational, he suggested, not to be. "I can't pretend that I'm brave and that I can beat the whole world." But as a leader, you cannot let people know. "You must put up a front."

And that's precisely what he learned to do: pretend and, through the act of appearing fearless, inspire others. It was a pantomime Mandela perfected on Robben Island, where there was much to fear. Prisoners who were with him said watching Mandela walk across the courtyard, upright and proud, was enough to keep them going for days. He knew that he was a model for others, and that gave him the strength to triumph over his own fear.

No. 2
Lead from the front - but don't leave your base behind
Mandela is cagey. in 1985 he was operated on for an enlarged prostate. When he was returned to prison, he was separated from his colleagues and friends for the first time in 21 years. They protested. But as his longtime friend Ahmed Kathrada recalls, he said to them, "Wait a minute, chaps. Some good may come of this."

The good that came of it was that Mandela on his own launched negotiations with the apartheid government. This was anathema to the African National Congress (ANC). After decades of saying "prisoners cannot negotiate" and after advocating an armed struggle that would bring the government to its knees, he decided that the time was right to begin to talk to his oppressors.

When he initiated his negotiations with the government in 1985, there were many who thought he had lost it. "We thought he was selling out," says Cyril Ramaphosa, then the powerful and fiery leader of the National Union of Mineworkers. "I went to see him to tell him, What are you doing? It was an unbelievable initiative. He took a massive risk."

Mandela launched a campaign to persuade the ANC that his was the correct course. His reputation was on the line. He went to each of his comrades in prison, Kathrada remembers, and explained what he was doing. Slowly and deliberately, he brought them along. "You take your support base along with you," says Ramaphosa, who was secretary-general of the ANC and is now a business mogul. "Once you arrive at the beachhead, then you allow the people to move on. He's not a bubble-gum leader - chew it now and throw it away."

For Mandela, refusing to negotiate was about tactics, not principles. Throughout his life, he has always made that distinction. His unwavering principle - the overthrow of apartheid and the achievement of one man, one vote - was immutable, but almost anything that helped him get to that goal he regarded as a tactic. He is the most pragmatic of idealists.

"He's a historical man," says Ramaphosa. "He was thinking way ahead of us. He has posterity in mind: How will they view what we've done?" Prison gave him the ability to take the long view. It had to; there was no other view possible. He was thinking in terms of not days and weeks but decades. He knew history was on his side, that the result was inevitable; it was just a question of how soon and how it would be achieved. "Things will be better in the long run," he sometimes said. He always played for the long run.

No. 3
Lead from the back - and let others believe they are in front
Mandela loved to reminisce about his boyhood and his lazy afternoons herding cattle. "You know," he would say, "you can only lead them from behind." He would then raise his eyebrows to make sure I got the analogy.

As a boy, Mandela was greatly influenced by Jongintaba, the tribal king who raised him. When Jongintaba had meetings of his court, the men gathered in a circle, and only after all had spoken did the king begin to speak. The chief's job, Mandela said, was not to tell people what to do but to form a consensus. "Don't enter the debate too early," he used to say.

During the time I worked with Mandela, he often called meetings of his kitchen cabinet at his home in Houghton, a lovely old suburb of Johannesburg. He would gather half a dozen men, Ramaphosa, Thabo Mbeki (who is now the South African President) and others around the dining-room table or sometimes in a circle in his driveway. Some of his colleagues would shout at him - to move faster, to be more radical - and Mandela would simply listen. When he finally did speak at those meetings, he slowly and methodically summarized everyone's points of view and then unfurled his own thoughts, subtly steering the decision in the direction he wanted without imposing it. The trick of leadership is allowing yourself to be led too. "It is wise," he said, "to persuade people to do things and make them think it was their own idea."

No. 4
Know your enemy - and learn about his favorite sport
As far back as the 1960s, mandela began studying Afrikaans, the language of the white South Africans who created apartheid. His comrades in the ANC teased him about it, but he wanted to understand the Afrikaner's worldview; he knew that one day he would be fighting them or negotiating with them, and either way, his destiny was tied to theirs.

This was strategic in two senses: by speaking his opponents' language, he might understand their strengths and weaknesses and formulate tactics accordingly. But he would also be ingratiating himself with his enemy. Everyone from ordinary jailers to P.W. Botha was impressed by Mandela's willingness to speak Afrikaans and his knowledge of Afrikaner history. He even brushed up on his knowledge of rugby, the Afrikaners' beloved sport, so he would be able to compare notes on teams and players.

Mandela understood that blacks and Afrikaners had something fundamental in common: Afrikaners believed themselves to be Africans as deeply as blacks did. He knew, too, that Afrikaners had been the victims of prejudice themselves: the British government and the white English settlers looked down on them. Afrikaners suffered from a cultural inferiority complex almost as much as blacks did.

Mandela was a lawyer, and in prison he helped the warders with their legal problems. They were far less educated and worldly than he, and it was extraordinary to them that a black man was willing and able to help them. These were "the most ruthless and brutal of the apartheid regime's characters," says Allister Sparks, the great South African historian, and he "realized that even the worst and crudest could be negotiated with."

No. 5
Keep your friends close - and your rivals even closer
Many of the guests mandela invited to the house he built in Qunu were people whom, he intimated to me, he did not wholly trust. He had them to dinner; he called to consult with them; he flattered them and gave them gifts. Mandela is a man of invincible charm - and he has often used that charm to even greater effect on his rivals than on his allies.

On Robben Island, Mandela would always include in his brain trust men he neither liked nor relied on. One person he became close to was Chris Hani, the fiery chief of staff of the ANC's military wing. There were some who thought Hani was conspiring against Mandela, but Mandela cozied up to him. "It wasn't just Hani," says Ramaphosa. "It was also the big industrialists, the mining families, the opposition. He would pick up the phone and call them on their birthdays. He would go to family funerals. He saw it as an opportunity." When Mandela emerged from prison, he famously included his jailers among his friends and put leaders who had kept him in prison in his first Cabinet. Yet I well knew that he despised some of these men.

There were times he washed his hands of people - and times when, like so many people of great charm, he allowed himself to be charmed. Mandela initially developed a quick rapport with South African President F.W. de Klerk, which is why he later felt so betrayed when De Klerk attacked him in public.

Mandela believed that embracing his rivals was a way of controlling them: they were more dangerous on their own than within his circle of influence. He cherished loyalty, but he was never obsessed by it. After all, he used to say, "people act in their own interest." It was simply a fact of human nature, not a flaw or a defect. The flip side of being an optimist - and he is one - is trusting people too much. But Mandela recognized that the way to deal with those he didn't trust was to neutralize them with charm.

No. 6
Appearances matter - and remember to smile
When Mandela was a poor law student in Johannesburg wearing his one threadbare suit, he was taken to see Walter Sisulu. Sisulu was a real estate agent and a young leader of the ANC. Mandela saw a sophisticated and successful black man whom he could emulate. Sisulu saw the future.

Sisulu once told me that his great quest in the 1950s was to turn the ANC into a mass movement; and then one day, he recalled with a smile, "a mass leader walked into my office." Mandela was tall and handsome, an amateur boxer who carried himself with the regal air of a chief's son. And he had a smile that was like the sun coming out on a cloudy day.

We sometimes forget the historical correlation between leadership and physicality. George Washington was the tallest and probably the strongest man in every room he entered. Size and strength have more to do with DNA than with leadership manuals, but Mandela understood how his appearance could advance his cause. As leader of the ANC's underground military wing, he insisted that he be photographed in the proper fatigues and with a beard, and throughout his career he has been concerned about dressing appropriately for his position. George Bizos, his lawyer, remembers that he first met Mandela at an Indian tailor's shop in the 1950s and that Mandela was the first black South African he had ever seen being fitted for a suit. Now Mandela's uniform is a series of exuberant-print shirts that declare him the joyous grandfather of modern Africa.

When Mandela was running for the presidency in 1994, he knew that symbols mattered as much as substance. He was never a great public speaker, and people often tuned out what he was saying after the first few minutes. But it was the iconography that people understood. When he was on a platform, he would always do the toyi-toyi, the township dance that was an emblem of the struggle. But more important was that dazzling, beatific, all-inclusive smile. For white South Africans, the smile symbolized Mandela's lack of bitterness and suggested that he was sympathetic to them. To black voters, it said, I am the happy warrior, and we will triumph. The ubiquitous ANC election poster was simply his smiling face. "The smile," says Ramaphosa, "was the message."

After he emerged from prison, people would say, over and over, It is amazing that he is not bitter. There are a thousand things Nelson Mandela was bitter about, but he knew that more than anything else, he had to project the exact opposite emotion. He always said, "Forget the past" - but I knew he never did.

No. 7
Nothing is black or white
When we began our series of interviews, I would often ask Mandela questions like this one: When you decided to suspend the armed struggle, was it because you realized you did not have the strength to overthrow the government or because you knew you could win over international opinion by choosing nonviolence? He would then give me a curious glance and say, "Why not both?"

I did start asking smarter questions, but the message was clear: Life is never either/or. Decisions are complex, and there are always competing factors. To look for simple explanations is the bias of the human brain, but it doesn't correspond to reality. Nothing is ever as straightforward as it appears.

Mandela is comfortable with contradiction. As a politician, he was a pragmatist who saw the world as infinitely nuanced. Much of this, I believe, came from living as a black man under an apartheid system that offered a daily regimen of excruciating and debilitating moral choices: Do I defer to the white boss to get the job I want and avoid a punishment? Do I carry my pass?

As a statesman, Mandela was uncommonly loyal to Muammar Gaddafi and Fidel Castro. They had helped the ANC when the U.S. still branded Mandela as a terrorist. When I asked him about Gaddafi and Castro, he suggested that Americans tend to see things in black and white, and he would upbraid me for my lack of nuance. Every problem has many causes. While he was indisputably and clearly against apartheid, the causes of apartheid were complex. They were historical, sociological and psychological. Mandela's calculus was always, What is the end that I seek, and what is the most practical way to get there?

No. 8
Quitting is leading too
In 1993, Mandela asked me if I knew of any countries where the minimum voting age was under 18. I did some research and presented him with a rather undistinguished list: Indonesia, Cuba, Nicaragua, North Korea and Iran. He nodded and uttered his highest praise: "Very good, very good." Two weeks later, Mandela went on South African television and proposed that the voting age be lowered to 14. "He tried to sell us the idea," recalls Ramaphosa, "but he was the only [supporter]. And he had to face the reality that it would not win the day. He accepted it with great humility. He doesn't sulk. That was also a lesson in leadership."

Knowing how to abandon a failed idea, task or relationship is often the most difficult kind of decision a leader has to make. In many ways, Mandela's greatest legacy as President of South Africa is the way he chose to leave it. When he was elected in 1994, Mandela probably could have pressed to be President for life - and there were many who felt that in return for his years in prison, that was the least South Africa could do.

In the history of Africa, there have been only a handful of democratically elected leaders who willingly stood down from office. Mandela was determined to set a precedent for all who followed him - not only in South Africa but across the rest of the continent. He would be the anti-Mugabe, the man who gave birth to his country and refused to hold it hostage. "His job was to set the course," says Ramaphosa, "not to steer the ship." He knows that leaders lead as much by what they choose not to do as what they do.

Ultimately, the key to understanding Mandela is those 27 years in prison. The man who walked onto Robben Island in 1964 was emotional, headstrong, easily stung. The man who emerged was balanced and disciplined. He is not and never has been introspective. I often asked him how the man who emerged from prison differed from the willful young man who had entered it. He hated this question. Finally, in exasperation one day, he said, "I came out mature." There is nothing so rare - or so valuable - as a mature man. Happy birthday, Madiba. View this article on Mandela: His 8 Lessons of Leadership

The Cost of Sounding Black

2008-07-09T06:03:00.000-07:00

In light of the remarks Ralph Nader made about Obama trying to sound white in order to get white voter Steven D. Levitt has posted this article on the cost of sounding black like dat.

Fascinating new research by my University of Chicago colleague, Jeffrey Grogger, compares the wages of people who “sound black” when they talk to those who do not.

His main finding: blacks who “sound black” earn salaries that are 10 percent lower than blacks who do not “sound black,” even after controlling for measures of intelligence, experience in the work force, and other factors that influence how much people earn. (For what it is worth, whites who “sound black” earn 6 percent lower than other whites.)

How does Grogger know who “sounds black?” As part of a large longitudinal study called the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, follow-up validation interviews were conducted over the phone and recorded.

Grogger was able to take these phone interviews, purge them of any identifying information, and then ask people to try to identify the voices as to whether the speaker was black or white. The listeners were pretty good at distinguishing race through voices: 98 percent of the time they got the gender of the speaker right, 84 percent of white speakers were correctly identified as white, and 77 percent of black speakers were correctly identified as black.

Grogger asked multiple listeners to rate each voice and assigned the voice either to a distinctly white or black category (if the listeners all tended to agree on the race), or an indistinct category if there was disagreement.

Then he put this measure of whether a voice sounded black into a regression (the standard statistical tool that economists use for estimating things), and came up with the finding that blacks who “sound black” earn almost 10 percent less, even after taking into account other factors that could influence earnings. One piece of interesting good news is that blacks who do not “sound black” earn essentially the same as whites.

(It turns out you don’t want to sound southern, either. Although pretty imprecisely estimated, it is almost as bad for your wages to sound southern as it is to sound black, even controlling for whether you live in the south.)

So what does this all mean?

The first question to ask is whether the impact of speech on wages is a causal one. It is possible that there are many other characteristics that differ between blacks who do or do not “sound black” that Grogger cannot control for in his regressions. It does seem likely that the biases at work would make his estimate an upper bound. (Although it should also be noted that his estimates are for young people, and the importance of speech may become important with age, in which case his results might underestimate the long-run effects.)

If one believes Grogger’s effects are causal, then investing in the ability to not “sound black” looks to have a huge return — roughly of the same magnitude as getting one more year of schooling.

Of course, there is the issue of one’s identity. There may be personal costs associated with being black and not sounding black. But these costs would have to be pretty large. (When I have Asian Ph.D. students go on the job market in the United States, I tell them that I think there is rampant discrimination against non-English speakers and encourage them to adopt Americanized first names for the job market. Very few of my students choose to do so — either a testimony to the identity cost of pretending to be someone you aren’t, or possibly their lack of faith in my assessment of the amount of discrimination.)

I was talking with one of my colleagues about this study. He thinks it will be a very important and influential one.

My response, “Tru dat.”

Origin of Break Dance

2008-07-08T04:29:00.000-07:00

Alright B-Boys take note

8 Destructive thinking patterns and how to change them

2008-07-07T06:06:00.000-07:00

It can be extremely difficult to focus on the good when, seemingly, bad things are happening in your life. However you can train your mind to focus on the good things in your life rather than dwelling on the bad. No it’s not one of those positive thinking articles that you’ve read all over the web and are sick and tired of. This is about changing the way you think, changing your thinking pattern. Do you use any of these thinking patterns in your day to day life?
8 limiting patterns of thinking click here