REV-elution

My Chat With Author of Duke Study

2012-01-26T12:06:00.003-05:00

Photo: Herald-Sun/Christine Nguyen

He’s not a racist. He simply didn’t know any better. That’s the impression I left with after my chat with Peter Arcidiacono, one of the authors of a controversial study that has damaged race relations at Duke University. Last week the Rev-elution shredded the study for making assertions that make one wonder about the underlying motives of the authors.

In that blog (The Ghetto Side at Duke) I questioned why the authors would use the decision to shift academic major to gauge performance. “By arguing against the merits of black academic performance by using academic major as a variable, the authors of this study have created an academic caste system that the university may have difficulty in unraveling,” I wrote.

My primary contention with the study is it being attached to a case on affirmative action before the U.S. Supreme Court. Arcidiacono reached out to me due to the public perception that he is aligned with the people arguing against affirmative action. He wanted to set the record straight that his agenda is not to dismantle affirmative action. I met with him to discuss his concerns.

I began with my issues related to the study as an unpublished work. Given it has not been published and hasn’t been reviewed by his peers, how did it land in the hands of those connected to the Supreme Court case?

Arcidiacono informed me that it was pulled from the website that presents his unpublished work. “It’s the way we do things in the field of economics,” he informed me. Given the time between completion of work, and the publication of that work, it is posted on the internet to give peers a chance to review before it is published. “People in the field of economics don’t have problems with the research.”

I discussed with him my personal concerns that his work is being discussed prior to publication which gives the impression that it is endorsed by his peers. He informed me that it has been rejected once due to what was called a lack of relevancy.

“This is the most talked about work I have ever done,” he says. Maybe the people at that journal were afraid to step into that can of worms.

Despite the local talk about the study, it has failed to receive the official endorsement as a credible study among those within his field. I informed Arcidiacono that having a conversation involving a study that hasn’t been peer reviewed assumes credibility of his research. The truth is that hasn’t happened yet.

I moved from a discussion involving the significance of the work given a lack of peer review to the matter of motivation. What is it that stirred his interest in this subject matter? He indicated that the decision is rooted in what he considered to be a lack of credible research on either side of the affirmative action issue. He felt it critical to delve into how the gap between white and black achievement is impacted after students enroll in elite universities.

It is his contention that the findings of his study expose the limits of the university in supporting students once enrolled opposed to a deficiency among the black students enrolled at Duke. Students enrolled with the intent of pursuing certain academic disciplines are set up to fail due to a failure of support from the university.

“Are you saying those students don’t deserve to be at Duke,” I asked.

“No, I’m saying the university needs to support them in achieving the interest they had when they enrolled.”

We discussed the implication within the program he teaches. There are few black students and no black professors. By failing to support black students who enroll with an interest to pursue a degree in economics, the university creates a culture that fails to offset the disparity between black and white students within that field.

Arcidiacono pressed to convince me that the findings of his study are more of a critique of the failures within the Duke system versus a question of the intelligence of the students enrolled. If they enroll with an interest to pursue certain fields of study after being accepted with academic credentials below white students; it is the responsibility of the university to establish systems of support to assure that they will achieve their goal.

“Do, you understand why the study is painful for black students to read,” I asked. Arcidiacono’s response made it clear that he was clueless. I had to help him understand.

Black students on campuses like Duke have to contend with the perception that they don’t belong. The judgment that they aren’t as smart as white kids is rooted in a history a race and racism that we have not yet overcome. The study exposes the gap between white and black achievement in a way that feeds the hunger among those who contend a white person was robbed a seat due to an unworthy black kid who took their place.

Arcidiacono, and the other authors of this study, failed to ponder how it feels to walk in the shadow of the Duke legacy while many feel you have no right to be there. They need to be there – he responded. We simply need to help them be successful.

How do you do that without drawing attention to the disparity? I had to ask that question after he informed me the university doesn’t want to deal with the conclusions of the study. How do you establish a system of support for black student without bringing attention to the need for the support? Do we want to give those searching for evidence to prove the unworthiness of black presence the ammunition to shoot them down?

What does that do to the self-esteem of those who enroll with pride related to their acceptance? Do you want to tell them they lack the intelligence? Should we establish a remedial program that brings further attention to that disparity?

We then discussed the social implications related to this type of research. The role of research is to measure and expose the validity of our assumptions. Some of that research is rendered within a context of historical anguish that both compromises and hinders the way the public engages with the study. As viable as some research may be, some things can’t be heard because it is too painful to hear.

Why is it painful? Because no matter how you state it, the conclusion asserts the limits of the subject of the study. You may argue the university needs to do more, or you can suggest that black students lack the same level of preparation. It all feels the same. Black folks don’t deserve to be here.

So, I’m willing to concede that Arcidiacono is not a racist. With that being said, the findings of the study have racial implications, and they hurt deep.

Any thoughts?

Mitch Daniels Republican Response Proves He Doesn't Read

2012-01-25T15:02:00.004-05:00

I enjoyed the opening of Mitch Daniels GOP response to President Obama’s State of the Union address. He commended Obama for being a good father, husband and leading the charge to rid the world of Osama Bin Laden. I was beginning to think the Governor from Indiana was willing to depart from the antics that has hindered the progress of our nation. Then it happened.

Daniels conjured the memory of Steve Jobs. He made a comment about that last name – Jobs - and how it was fitting to have that name given how many jobs he has created to support the American economy. He talked about how government needs to encourage businesses like Apple by not loading them down with high taxes. Shame on Obama for fueling a class war. Shame on Obama for blaming the deficient on the rich and forcing them to pay as much in taxes as million and billionaires.

The problem with Daniels comments is it followed an article in Sunday’s New York Times. It told of an exchange between Obama and Jobs last year. Obama was at a dinner in Silicon Valley last February when he asked Jobs what it would take for iPhones to be made in the United States.

“Those jobs aren’t coming back,” was Jobs response, according to the NY Times. Not long ago all Apple products were made in America, but now all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products sold last year were made overseas.

In using Jobs as an example of how low taxes and incentives foster an environment that encourages businesses to create jobs, Daniels proved he didn’t do his homework before making his speech. One would think that someone would have slowed his roll before making a statement that could be used later to bite him in the ass.

Or maybe his pro business position isn’t as much about creating work for those in our own back yard. Maybe, in the minds of those stuck on reducing the deficient at all cost, the loss of jobs in America isn’t as important as allowing companies like Apple to make as much money as they can, even if at the expense of the American worker.

The NY Times article makes a good argument for why Apple decided to take their show on the road. “Last year, it earned $400,000 in profit per employee, more than Goldman Sach, Exxon Mobile or Google.” It simply isn’t financially viable for Apple to move those jobs back home.

“Apple’s an example of why it’s so hard to create middle-class jobs in the U.S. now,” the article quoted Jared Bernstein, who until last year was an economic adviser to the White House. “If it’s the pinnacle of capitalism, we should be worried.”

“A foreman immediately roused 8,000 workers inside the company’s dormitories, according to the executive. Each employee was given a biscuit and a cup of tea, guided to a workstation and within half an hour started a 12-hour shift fitting glass screens into beveled frames. Within 96 hours, the plant was producing over 10,000 iPhones a day,” the NY Times reported.

“The speed and flexibility is breathtaking,” an executive said. “There’s no American plant that can match that.”

The Foxconn City plant in China employs 230,000 people, many working six days a week and 12 hours a day at the plant. Foxconn Technology has facilities in Asia and Eastern Europe, and in Mexico and Brazil and is responsible for assembling 40 percent of the world consumer electronics for companies like Amazon, Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Motorola, Nintendo, Nokia, Samsung and Sony. An official at Apple says they can employ 3,000 people in one night.

“We shouldn’t be criticized for using Chinese workers,” a current Apple executive said. “The U.S. has stopped producing people with the skills we need.”

Republicans have argued that business opt to leave American soil due to regulations and taxes. The NY Times article paints a different picture. Companies are manufacturing services abroad because doing so increase profit. One could argue that this is a variable of extreme regulations. That may be true if you’re willing to have workers function in sweat shops.

What Daniels failed to concede are the numerous implications related to the article in the NY Times. His comments showed a lack of sensitivity to how jobs in America are being lost as companies take advantage of the benefits of using factories on foreign soil. Obama addressed this issue in his State of the Union address.

The least that Daniels and other Republicans could do is face the elephant in the room.

Last I checked, the elephant is a Republican mascot.

Joe Paterno Dead: Sad is the Only Word

2012-01-23T08:33:00.006-05:00

Photo from ABC News

Those who knew him best say he died of a broken heart. In 2010, when asked why he wouldn’t retire, he said he was afraid he might die if he walked away from the work he loved so much. There is only one word to describe the death of Joe Paterno-sad.

What makes the death of Paterno so heartbreaking is the way it all ended. After coaching 46 seasons, becoming the winningest coach in major college football, he was handed a package via a carrier with a phone number. He called the number and was told the trustees at Penn State had decided to fire him. His wife called back to give her thoughts on how they handled her husband’s termination.

The sadness of Paterno’s death is impacted by the bitterness caused by one lapse in judgment. He lived by what he called “Success with Honor” and carried that torch for 46 years. The tarnishing of his character was due to mistakes made by others. It was the mistake of one of his coaches that forced him out. It was the mistakes of those he trusted to investigate allegations of child sex abuse that did him in.

Recently, Paterno admitted he didn’t know what to do. As they say, hindsight is 20/20. It is easy for those standing on the outside of it all to claim they would have contacted the police. Certainly I hope that I would if placed in that situation, but it is possible that I, like Paterno, would have trusted those who know what to do to do the right thing. “I wish I had done more,” he said.

What makes this all so sad is how Penn State handled the last days of Joe Pa’s life. From all accounts, no one from the administration reached out to Paterno after he received his pink slip over the phone. There was no tribute in his honor before he took his last breath. The university he loved so much never thanked him for giving so much back.

And he gave a lot back. He was told over the phone despite contributing over 4 million dollars to Penn State. Yes, he should have contacted the police. There is no doubting that. The sadness in his death is in how the mistakes made by others can tarnish the legacy of one who has given so much.

It’s sad that Jerry Sandusky released a statement. “This is a sad day! Our family, Dottie and I would like to convey our deepest sympathy to Sue and her family. Nobody did more for the academic reputation of Penn State than Joe Paterno," Sandusky said in an email through his attorney. "He maintained a high standard in a very difficult profession. Joe preached toughness, hard work and clean competition."

"Most importantly, he had the courage to practice what he preached. Nobody will be able to take away the memories we all shared of a great man, his family, and all the wonderful people who were a part of his life."

It’s sad that Sandusky failed to understand that his release of a statement harms the family and reminds us of how his actions led to the tarnishing of Paterno’s reputation. It’s sad that people get punished for failing to police those they trust. It’s sad that all the good one has done is forgotten due to the bad someone else has done.

Those close to him say he died of a broken heart. Given all he stood for, that’s enough to kill a person with a heart like the one he shared.

It’s sad that we get judged not only for what we do, but for what we do related to the people we trust.

Sad is the only word.

The Ghetto Side at Duke University

2012-01-19T08:45:00.004-05:00

Photo from BET.com

Just when I was prepared to throw away all those race cards, I find reason to keep a few in my back pocket. After years of grappling to get past the notion that I’m only in the room because I’m black, a study conducted by faculty at Duke University argues black students aren’t able to deal with the rigor of those tough academic majors. In other words, they take classes in the ghetto at Duke.

One is left questioning the motivation behind the study. Why would a group of professors go about the task of researching the merits of black folks being in the room? The answer is simple. The paper is part of a brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court by opponents of affirmative action. The report, “What Happens After Enrollment? An Analysis of the Time Path of Racial Difference in GPA and Major Choice,” found that among students who enrolled with an interest in majoring in economics, engineering and the natural sciences, 54 percent of black men and 51 percent of black women changed their major to the humanities or another social science.

That’s compared to the 33 percent of white women and 8 percent of white men who switched majors. The study assumes the switch is made because they are less rigorous, require less study and have easier grading standards.

Professors Peter Arcidiacono, Kenneth Spenner and graduate student Esteban Aucejo argue that “attempts to increase representation [of minorities] at elite universities through the use of affirmative action may come at a cost of perpetuating underrepresentation of blacks in the natural sciences and engineering.”

In other words, it’s not enough to consider the GPA of black students. According to the study, the success of black students at Duke must be evaluated based on their academic major. The authors of the paper suggest that the switch to easier majors is the reason the GPA of black undergraduates is similar to the GPA of white students. Black folks can’t compete in a world where they have to take the tough classes. Time to pull out one of my cards.

The measuring of the black intellect is an old game. In 1994, Harvard psychologist Richard J. Hermstein and political scientist Charles Murray, published The Bell Curve. The controversy of the book involved sections in the book in which the authors wrote about racial differences in intelligence. They write in chapter 13: "It seems highly likely to us that both genes and the environment have something to do with racial differences." The book fueled a national debate on the issue of race and intelligence.

By arguing against the merits of black academic performance by using academic major as a variable, the authors of this study have created an academic caste system that the university may have difficulty in unraveling. There are real programs, and there are easy programs. Are the big wigs at Duke willing to accept that the findings of the study ultimately call into question the academic strength of the programs on the other side of the tracks?

The study also implies that black students make changes due to struggles in those tough programs. Their GPA should be cast aside because they failed to compete in those real programs. Is it possible that a few of those students changed their major because they found a true passion in the humanities? How many of those students went on to pursue a PhD?

It’s dangerous whenever a person delves into the matter of race and intelligence. It is even more harmful when the motivation for the research is to invalidate intelligence due to a political agenda. This research is not about the decisions of black students at Duke. It is a ploy to nullify their right to be in the room.

I say no to placing merit on a few academic programs over others. I say no to measures of black student achievement based on an assumption that they can’t handle the heat. I say no to Duke University for failing to stand by programs in the humanities that this study attacks for being less than the rest.

I want to throw these cards away. But if it smells like a bigot and sounds like a bigot, well, you know the rest

Journey Back to the Heart: DCIA Anuual Meeting

2012-01-13T10:16:00.004-05:00

I will never forget my last thought before passing the torch as President of Durham Congregations in Action. I spoke about the organizations role in moving the city past the issues that divide us. It was the day after I made a similar speech at the Martin Luther King Triangle Interfaith Prayer Breakfast. There, I spoke about dreams deferred.

“Where is Carl,” I thought as I made my speech at the DCIA Annual Meeting. Something didn’t feel right. Carl Washington, my best friend, wasn’t there. Washington, the former director of the Department of Parks & Recreation, stood with me during a season of struggle. He, along with Steve Chalmers, former Chief of Police, had tutored me in the work of community organizing. We worked together in helping to build the North East Central Partners Against Crime project. More than any of that, Carl was the one who carried me through a combination of personal troubles.

When I returned home I received a call from his wife. “Carl is dead,” she told me. “He died while jogging…” My head was filled with silence as the tears consumed me. I carried that pain through the night. I didn’t want to move. I didn’t want to preach. I couldn’t even think.

I made my way to the office the next morning. The first order of business was handling a phone call from one of the deacons. They wanted to meet with me about the jar of condoms placed on my desk by an employee at the Health Department. It was enough to fuel their interest of ridding the church of my leadership. It was too much for me to bear. Carl wasn’t there to listen. The pain consumed me. A part of me was lost, little by little.

The following week I gave Carl’s eulogy. I used a line from Og Mandino’s book The Greatest Miracle in the World. Mandino told the story of a ragpicker. I told them Carl was a ragpicker. He had a way of finding rags and refining them. I was one of those rags.

What followed was a retreat. Pain can do that. I retreated from DCIA. The memory of that night was too much for me to take. I retreated from the NECD project. In many ways, I retreated from the work of the Church. I walked in that space like a zombie in search of a place to die. My intellect and charisma were enough to keep me entrenched in the work, but I knew the truth. It wasn’t the same.

I returned to DCIA last year after Spencer Bradford, the executive director, met with me to discuss my getting involved again. The climb back into my calling has stirred so many memories – some good, mostly painful. The faces in the room have changed over the years. What hasn’t changed is the significance of that message I gave when I stepped down as President.

It’s a message about the bonds we create beyond race, class, faith claims, gender differences, age gaps or sexual orientation. It’s a message about the power of authentic unity and the claiming of the worth of every life. That message hasn’t changed.

What has changed are the people in the room. Some have moved away. Some have died. Some are getting older yet continue to serve the best they can despite the limits caused by age. And, others have lost passion for the vision.

Those who lost passion due to personal pain, like me, need to come back. Where are they now? Have they given up or are they too tired to keep trying?

No more excuses. It’s time to serve again. Back to the heart

DCIA’s Annual Meeting takes place on Tuesday, January 24 at 6:00 pm. It will be held at the St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church (82 Kimberly Drive). The keynote speaker will be William J. Barber, president of the North Carolina NAACP and pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), in Goldsboro, NC. Barber will be speaking on the role of faith communities in fighting racism in 2012. The dinner is $14 per plate, and reservations need to be made by January 19, by calling (919) 688-2036, emailing dcia@dcia.org, or in person or by postal mail to the DCIA office, 504 W. Chapel Hill St., Durham, NC 27701. Payment may be sent in advance or made at the door (checks should be payable to “DCIA” and noted for the 2012 banquet).

Ar-Rahmaan installed as Pastor:The Journey of a Female Minister to Find her Way

2012-01-09T17:31:00.006-05:00

Willeta J. Ar-Rahmaan (left) and Richele James with Carl W. Kenney II (The Rev-elution) at the celebration of Compassion Ministries of Durham 8th Anniversary)

She would sit in the back of the church each Sunday. Unlike many of the others who gathered for worship, she failed to reflect the spirituality of those enamored with visible praise. She didn’t stand during one of those electrifying songs that triggered memories of how God carried us through many dangers, toils and snares. She didn’t shout in the middle of a line in my sermon to denote a connection with the thought uttered. She just sat in the pews. Unnoticed. She just listened.

My first thought when she came to my office was her name - Willetta J. Ar-Rahmaan. She told me her story. “I’m Muslim,” she said. She was there, listening to my words. I watched as she made her progression from the balcony, to the back row on the first floor, to closer to the front, and then, she made that last step.

“I’m called to the work of ministry,” she told me. Her announcement came as no surprise. I recognized something different after that first encounter. Yet, a still cried. There was something about the message of love and compassion that compelled her to move from the safety of the pews into the work of ordained ministry.

I continued to watch her grow. She would call me and share being caught between her life as computer geek employed by IBM and the work in ministry. “I want to walk away from my job, but how can I when I have to eat.” I listened as I felt the pain of her struggle to walk within her calling. I listened and watched as she completed her Masters of Divinity while maintaining her job at IBM. She commuted from her home in Charlotte to attend classes on Saturday’s at Virginia Union in Richmond, Virginia.

I listened as she endured the deep-seeded sex discrimination within the African American Baptist church. She watched as men were promoted to the work of ministry while she was passed by despite her theological training and willingness to serve. I could hear the frustration within her voice as she prayed for a place, any place, to use her enormous gifts and graces.

“Leave the Baptist,” I instructed her. “Why remain in a place that fails to affirm you.” I was then and am saddened now by that admission.

I watched as she made the move I suggested. She contacted the District Superintendent to begin the process. She enrolled at the Hood Theological Seminary to take courses on Methodism. It seemed like the perfect union, although she would take a cut in pay.

Fast forward to Sunday, January 8, 2012. On yesterday, she was installed as Pastor of the St. Paul United Methodist Church in Newton, North Carolina. Sadly, I couldn’t make the trip due to my need to be in Durham for worship service. If there, I would have made comments to her congregation. I would have spoken about how proud I am of her for pressing on despite the barriers in her way.

I think of other women who have fought to find their way within structures unwilling to share space. I pray for all of my daughters in ministry who remain faithful while men and women refuse to concede the power of their voices. When I consider the women who have moved on to obtain their Maters of Divinity from congregations I led, I’m amazed by the numbers. Willetta, Richele James, Chanequa Walker-Barnes, Vanessa Enoch. Karen Thompson, Edna Stephens, Teddra Bynes, Denise Bland-Jones, Ivy Hooper, Katia Wilson, Prinn Deavens and Connie Pope. That’s twelve out of the thirty-six women who have entered ministry under my leadership.

Willeta is the third to be called to lead a congregation. Both Teddra Bynes and Karen Thompson, like Willetta, had to leave the Baptist to make it happen. Karen, who was ordained under my leadership, has led congregations with the United Church of Christ. Teddra is an Episcopal priest. Four other women planted new churches – Arlene Chavis, Daryl Bowick, Pat Lee and Shamiele Alston– all are Pastors of churches they started in Durham. Three others, Chanequa Walker-Barnes, Vanessa Enoch and Katia Wilson, hold PhD’s and serve in the academy.

There are 65 men and women who have entered ministry from the work I have done in Durham, NC. Many of the men have been appointed to lead congregations within the Baptist church family. Others have gone on to organize new churches. Sadly, not one woman has been called to serve within a Baptist Church. Each has been forced to either organize a new church, change affiliation or teach religion at a seminary or divinity school.

This is of concern when it comes to the promotion of theological training within mainline faith traditions. It is saddening that so many have opted not to pursue the benefits of theological training. I’m burdened at the numbers of people being led by pastors who have not taken time to ponder the truths they teach week after week. Shouldn’t we demand of our leadership a level of training consistent to what we expect from other vocations? Or, should we assume that the Holy Ghost feeds truth to those empowered with spiritual gifts?

Women have been forced to prove their worth in ways beyond the men who share that sacred space. Some give up and do it their own way. Others keep pressing, waiting and praying for a chance to use those gifts God has given. So many female clergy become battered along the journey of self-discovery and affirmation. Don’t give up Richele. Hold on Cheryl, Sandra, Joyce, Regina, Connie, Valerie and the other women waiting to find a place.

As you wait, thank God for Willetta. She made it! Beyond her past. Beyond her gender. Beyond all that stood in the way – well done Pastor Lettie. Well done.

Durham Arts Council Under Attack for Not Supporting Artists

2012-01-06T13:34:00.006-05:00

Baltimore Blues is the work of King Kenney

I’ve been spending a lot of time talking to artist lately. My passion to know more about how they feel is rooted, in part, to my son taking the leap of depending on people to buy his work. It also has to do with my being an artist. It reminds me of a line from “Hustle and Flow”- “It’s hard out here for a pimp.” Well, it’s hard out here for an artist.

It’s always been hard out here, but things have become increasingly more difficult since the economy took a turn for the worse. My second novel hasn’t sold like the first one, and I’m clear it has a lot to do with people pinching those pennies the best they can. Those artists are telling me about how they scuffle to stick with their passion. They have to decide between creating masterpieces and paying the rent.

The worst part is a lack of resources to inspire them to keep on keeping on. Each person I’ve talked to has the same complaint. They want to know more about the purpose of the Durham Arts Council. They are disenchanted with the lack of support coming from the organization established to promote and support the artists in our community.

I’m told the council is set up to support its own infrastructure while leaving very little for the artists. Other than the Emerging Artist grant, they say they are left with no more than a few chances to showcase their work, and that comes with a price. They have to pay to participate in Art Walk and Centerfest.

“I paid to be in the last Art Walk,” one of the artists told me. “I lost money because no one brought my work.”

I’ve heard that from King, my son, and others who have chosen not to participate in Art Walk for that reason. The point isn’t to throw darts at the Art Council, but to bring attention to the perceptions of those who create the work. These views are reflected among both visual and performing artists. Many base their opinion on a comparison of what is done in other communities.

A good example is the New York City Artist Homestead. I first heard about the program after Sima Flower, former owner of Peacefire Gallery in downtown Durham, moved to New York City. The Homestead offers a variety of incentives to those who make a living with their art. Check out their website at:
http://www.artisthomestead.com/

Here’s the list of incentives on that website.

1. Inexpensive Historic Structures And Raw Space Available - as well as vacant lots and other structures owned by the City of York Redevelopment Authority.

2. Zero Interest, Forgivable Loan Of $5,000 Per Artist - a panel will jury five visual artists homesteading in City of York in 2006, judged on quality of work and/or business plan. Once homesteader lives in home for five years, loan is 100 percent forgivable.

3. Architectural fees up to $3,000 - for services of York City architects per artist/homeowner for best five visual artists homesteading in 2006-2007.

4. Residential Tax Abatement (ReTAP) - on value of improvements of new construction and/or new residential construction.

5. Waiver of Permit Fees. - as well as vacant lots and other structures owned by the City of York Redevelopment Authority.

6. Free Promotions: - Art reception with local artists at local galleries, free website listings, listing in the Downtown York visitors guide, and feature on White Rose Cable Television.

7. Free One-year Memberships - to the Strand-Capitol Performing Arts Center, YorkArts, York County Heritage Trust and YMCA.

8. Free Gym Membership with unlimited fitness and aquatic classes - for one for one year courtesy of YWCA. Annual value of $453.

9. Sparky and Clarks Roasting Company - Welcome Basket of Coffee and Promotion Products.

10. Starving Artist Stipends Restaurant Discount Cards courtesy of - York's Downtown Restaurant Coalition.

I couldn’t fight the urge to list all the incentives. Shouldn’t artist in our own city have access to some form of support? They need more than a building they don’t use, with an infrastructure paid for by the city and other grants. The money needs to feed those who need it the most rather than a staff committed to giving the illusion of supporting the arts.

That’s the word coming from the artists. Don’t shoot the messenger, deal with the perception.

DSS Dispute Requires More Than a Re-Vote to Fix

2012-01-04T14:02:00.001-05:00

I’m confused by the recent decision to set Gayle Perry’s salary at $129,000. Perry, interim Social Services director in Durham, was hired by the Board of Social Services on July 27 after board members axed Gerri Robinson during the same meeting. On Monday, board members decided to approve Perry’s salary after hearing a report that concluded the board may have violated a state law.

After what can best be described as an old fashioned shouting match between the two black male board members (as the young folk say, SMH) members of the Board of County Commissioners decided to hire an attorney to evaluate the way Perry was hired. Perry was a member of the DSS board the night Robinson was fired and she was hired. Jimmie Hicks, Jr., the attorney hired to review the matter, says the hiring of Perry is a conflict-of-interest due to her being a member of the board that appointed her to serve.

Board members decided to approve Perry’s salary at Monday’s meeting due to the conflict regarding the way she was hired. The recommendation passed 5-0, leaving an unresolved issue on the table. What has been established now that an attorney hired by the county has substantiated the claims of concerned citizens? Hicks stated that it is his judgment that the action lacked criminal intent; however, the lack of intent doesn’t settle the concern that it was wrong.

Hicks‘ findings have been passed on to the District Attorney. By violating a state statue those involved face criminal charges. The breach is punishable as a misdemeanor. The board’s conduct related to this matter sends a clear message that they want to clean their hands and keep it moving. The re-vote on the salary was designed to repair the lousy handling connected to the hiring of Perry. Since it wasn’t legal, they had to vote again to make it right.

Obscured in all of this is how Perry reaped the benefit of a salary that was disbursed after an illegal vote. By stating there was no malcontent intended, the attorney for the county and members of the board expect this to go away after Tracey Cline, Durham’s district attorney, decides not to press it any further. We’re expected to treat the handling of that July meeting as no more than a hiccup.

Sorry folks, it’s not that simple. This is a complicated matter that needs to be placed within a context that allows us space to view this beyond the emotions that strip people of good judgment. The war, and I call it that for a reason, among members of the Board of County Commissioners led to the appointing of an attorney and an internal audit. Now that both reports have been released, it’s critical that actions be taken to bring credibility to the way the board functions.

If the law was broken, albeit unintentional, what can be done to right that wrong? Keep in mind that Robinson lost her job at that meeting, and she has filed a lawsuit against the county. The internal audit undermined the allegation that fueled the movement to remove her. Commissioner Joe Bowser has cited poor morale and high staff turnover as reasons for Robinson’s termination. The audit found that staff turnover is no higher than with previous directors.

Does this mean Robinson lost her job based on hearsay? Can we conclude there was a lack of documented evidence to substantiate the board’s decision? If that is true, combined with the illegality of the meeting, it will take more than a vote to approve a salary and a hand slap from the DA to make this one go away.

I’m incensed that no one on the board had the insight to suggest that maybe Perry should not be maintained given the way the vote was conducted. If her initial appointment is undermined due to a conflict-of-interest, her continuing to serve is clouded by that first vote. As sad at that may be given the great work she is doing, someone has to pay for the misdeed of July 27.

The vote to hire Perry was illegal. I suppose it’s acceptable when those involved don’t know any better.

The bad news is that doesn’t work in the court of law. I tried that the last time I got a traffic ticket. It cost me 300 bucks.

Marry Durham is 2011 Top Story

2011-12-30T08:56:00.002-05:00

Over the next few days you will read and see broadcast reports of the top news stories of 2011. It’s an annual ritual that bestows a top ten list in a way common to one of those made for television award shows. It proves our fascination with the best of the best.

I have wrestled over putting my own list up. It just seems wrong to play God with the news by minimizing it to a best of list. How does one come up with the list in the first place? Is it the most read or talked about? Or, is it the most horrific? Should we look for examples of people who screwed things up so badly that it left us saying “Come on man!”

After pulling the leaves from a daisy, “yes I should, no I shouldn’t…” I have decided to reveal my top story of 2011. I’m doing so because, more than likely, it won’t appear on any of the other list. No one was killed in my story. No one lost their job for exposing their rear end. No one embezzled money from taxpayers or had a baby by some cheap stank while his wife was home fighting for her life. Nope. Not going there today.

My top story took place on March 9th in a parking lot on Rigsbee Avenue. Thousands of folks showed up. Some wore wedding dressing. A dude came on stilts. It was a wedding service. Citizens of Durham married the city we all love so much.

It’s my story of the year because of what it represented. It, more than any other event last year, brought us together to celebrate living in this amazing place. It came after years of hostility among members of the Board of Education and racial clashes between members of both the city council and Board of County Commissioners. It followed the embarrassment of being skull drug by the national press for that Duke Lacrosse situation.

It followed being called the state black sheep by journalist from across the state. We stood together, all types of people, and did a serious whopping on that old reputation as a city that simply refuses to get along. It’s the top story of the year because citizens came together to say Hell to tha naw to all that Durham bashing.

That day shifted the culture involving the way we think about ourselves as a community. It was our way of throwing a rock at the bullies from the other side of the track. We ain’t taking it no more! That’s right. Take you bad talk and inferiority complex and go back to that dungeon you call a home. We love it over here.

The Marry Durham celebration allowed us a chance to say what we all had been thinking. They say we can’t get along due to racial tension. We say we love our diversity. We love our local shops and take care of this world we love so much. We vow to do better at celebrating the arts. We hold our leaderships accountable. We’re not a community that throws stone at people for being different. We throw them at people who throw the stones. Back off my little brother and sister you jerk.

That day was like no other. It helps that I performed the ceremony and was able to stick a ring in Frank Stasio’s nose. Yeah, it gave me goose bumps gazing out in the crowd to view all those smiling faces. It also helps that I was able to work with a group of amazing people to pull it off. We worked through our differences. Shucks, there were times when I wanted to tell them to kiss my backside.

That’s what family does you know. We yell at each other. We walk away sometimes to deal with the anger. Then we come back to say, “you know I love ya baby.”

That’s the city I love. In good times and bad. In sunny days and snow storms. This is the city I love so much.

And that’s why Marry Durham is the top story of 2011.

Celebrating Chuck Davis

2011-12-28T12:44:00.006-05:00

Chuck Davis is an icon. His reputation extends beyond the boundaries of North Carolina. He is known internationally for his contribution in educating the world about African dance and culture.

Who in Durham hasn’t seen the African American Dance Ensemble? They’re everywhere performing that heart throbbing movement of body blended with the stimulating beat of those drums. For decades now, students within the Durham Public School system have learned to embrace and celebrate the culture of those connected to the African Diaspora.

Davis, along with his dancers, has taught us to smile when we dance. His work has helped us transcend the discomfort related to the cruelty of slavery. There is more to the story then people robbed of their culture and forced to endure the burden of enslavement. Although the past is laced with memories of whippings, lynchings and rapes – from all of that emerged the gift of dance.

Many have been mesmerized by the towering figure packed with charisma that forces you to love and smile. Davis has taken us back to empathize with the intent of our ancestors dance. Each movement awakens the dimming spark needy of reason to skip again. Beyond the dread fostered by an attack of things hoped for, beyond thoughts that bind love and make us evil due to the lie that we are made different – we can all dance together.

For a brief period, I served as the Executive Director of the African American Dance Ensemble. I did so as a volunteer. I took hold of the task due to the anger that was robbing me of the serenity I pray for everyday. “God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” I was tired of not doing what I could to change things.

What needed to be changed was the lack of stability. I was left devastated and embarrassed by the lack of support that would secure the organization beyond the charisma of its founder. I wanted more for the African American Dance Ensemble. It miffed me whenever I thought of why a community like Durham has been unable to find a way to formulate a strategy to do just that.

Maybe I’m an idealist, but I can’t help but wonder about a lack of village love in Durham. All that talk about it takes a whole village leaves me thinking that none of us live in the same village or have grown so weary by our own quest for comfort that we care less about passing on the culture that makes us dance.

As always, Chuck and the gang will lead us in the celebration of Kwanzaa on Sunday. He will call the village to gather at the Durham Armory at 220 Foster St as we reflect on the meaning of Imani – faith. It’s fitting that it begins on the day many of us will go to church to contemplate the lessons learned over the previous year. Someone will sing “We’ve come this far by faith…” Things at the Armory start at noon, but we will be there most of the day.

I will stand before the crowd clad in my agbada gown. I will pour libations along with leaders of other faith traditions. I will challenge those present to take hold of the messages of Kwanzaa – unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith – and abide in them beyond the day.

Hopefully, prayerfully, it will be enough to inspire a community to support Chuck Davis and the African American Dance Ensemble. It’s the best way to be a community that echoes the message of Kwanzaa. Our failure to do just that could have grave implications regarding our ability to dance in the future.

Beat the djembe drum. I have reason to dance. Say it loud, I’m black and I’m proud. There’s no hatred in my spirit because I know where my people come from.

Usiache mbachao kwa msala upitao (Don’t abandon your old rug for a passing mat)

Contributions to the African American Dance Ensemble can be mailed to: 120 Morris Street, Durham, NC. 27701

The University of Missouri vs. UNC: My Past Duels My Present Life

2011-12-26T15:26:00.008-05:00

Photo from the Columbia Daily Tribune

It’s official. I’m homesick. It’s more than the usual angst that comes during the holiday season. Yes, I miss my mom and pops, my sister, niece and nephew and members of the Kenney, Warrick, Bush and Crum clan in Columbia, Missouri. Yes, I miss Doodle Bug, Mert, Ed, Darren, Gerrod and Rodney. I miss life on the block that made us more than an old school posse – we were best friends and family. I miss playing ball in the park within walking distance from the block. I miss all of that.

Today, I miss what football meant back home. From those days when we played gang games with the boys over in Miles Manor to winning state High School championships, and watching our friends go off to make it big in the NFL. I miss watching Leo Lewis prove everyone wrong when he rose to fame at Mizzou and then made it big with the Minnesota Vikings. I remember watching Gary Anderson as he made that move with the San Diego Chargers that caught attention across the nation. I still smile when I think about playing ball with Geri Ellis who went on to be inducted into the Green Bay Packers Hall of Fame.

There were so many local stars. Many left Hickman High to play ball at Mizzou, the school I attended. I remember when Hickman and Rockbridge, a school just opened, won state championships in their divisions the same year. We dominated. We took pride in the game. We played it as much as we could.

I’m not saying things were better in the goods ole days. I just miss those days. There’s no place like home. Home sweet home – football, barbeque that isn’t chopped and the university known for those columns behind Jesse Hall – is the stuff that made me into the man I am today.

The old me and the new me will clash in less than two hours. The old home, Missouri, will go to battle with the new home – The University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill- in the Independence Bowl. It helps that I’m protected by my affiliation with Duke University and the deep-seeded hatred between those Tar Heels and Blue Devils. I’ve found comfort in pretending that I care about the war on tobacco road. My heart is back home where football is king and the smell of the trees in autumn awakens thoughts of big dudes fighting to cross the goal line, rather than the sound of a swish with a three point shot.

Life down here in Dixie has been lonely at times. All that talk about color options – Carolina Blue versus the darker version – leaves me on the outside of the civil war. I crave the black & gold and the sound of the crowd coming from Fauort Field. I miss the chat of “M-I-Z-Z-O-U, T-I-G-E-R-S,” in anticipation of another six points.

I’m surrounded by all these blue folks as I crave black and gold. You see, Mizzou is more than a place that educated me in the field of journalism. It’s where this boy grew up. I love life in Durham, NC, but there is no place like home.

The University of Missouri versus The University of North Carolina. The past versus the present. The best of the past versus the best of, well some of the best of, what is in my life today. There is no winner in this game. It’s just another reminder that life is full of decisions, and you can’t have it both ways. In choosing between the past and the present you have to live with what it means to decide.

I wish I could live in the middle, but today I will root for the past. Tomorrow will be a new day, and I will go back to life in the present.

Until the game begins, I deal with life in the middle.

All I Want for Christmas is My Hope Back

2011-12-23T11:26:00.002-05:00

All I want for Christmas is hope restored. You know the type of hope that had us all yelling “Yes We Can!”

As we approach my favorite time of year, the celebration of Hanukkah and Christmas followed by the singing of Auld Lang Syne, it may be fitting to ask what happened to all that hope. Did it get kicked off a cliff after the Republicans got a hold of it and choked it back into reality? Was it stomped on by corporate kingpins who refused to let go of their bonuses and incentive packages. Or, was it all just a dream that came after we drank the Kool Aid with the toast to celebrate a black dude in the White House?

Something happened to that hope, and, once we woke up to yell, “No you didn’t”, the gush that came with hope seemed like a fantasy coming from a page of “Chronicles of Naira”. C.S. Lewis couldn’t have written a better script for how the international community felt when a soul brother and his chocolate fine wife moved in at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW. There’s a bad feeling in the air now. It feels like hope has taken a vacation.

The demise of hope in the United States was enough to compel people to Occupy Wall Street and other communities around the country. It happened in Oakland, Baltimore and Atlanta, and in smaller pockets of pain like Chapel Hill and Durham, North Carolina. Some called it young folks smelling themselves. They minimized the Occupy movements to a generations angst related to not being able to get their way. They were called a bunch of spoiled brats unable to fit into the boxes society requires to make a real contribution.

A deeper reflection exposes a feeling of dread that has permeated the international community. Everywhere we looked, people protested. It started in London with a group of young people fed up with the way they have been treated. Things exploded in Egypt, Syria, Libya and Morocco. It would be effortless to play it down as divergence caused within a culture unlike our own. But, hold on before you throw those stones over there.

2011 was, to put it frankly, the year of deep frustration among common folks dealing with people in power. Be it a dictator like Muammar Gaddafi, Hosni Mubarak or King Mohammed of Morocco, or U.S. lawmakers and business leaders, folks refused to take it anymore. They are fed up from the head up and did what it took to bring attention to their being pissed off.

On a personal note, I stopped singing that song in July. You know the one that was played on the radio after Obama won the election – “A Change Gonna Come,” by Sam Cooke. The last few lines kept me inspired in my wait for hope.

There been times that I thought I couldn't last for long
But now I think I'm able to carry on
It's been a long, a long time coming
But I know a change gonna come, oh yes it will

Then it happened! It felt like hope got shot coming out of a liquor house on Dowd Street. It felt like a gang of white dudes wearing whites sheets took hope and strung him up in a hangman’s noose dangling from an oak tree. Felt like hope got fired because it’s still true-the last one hired is the first one fired. I started crying, No We Can’t!

Now I listen as people chastise all of that hope. They say hope was a punk who didn’t have guts enough to tell the Republicans to kiss his ass and take a seat while he finished his business. I listen now as they beat hope down with all that talk about his lack of insight regarding life among those privileged hope haters who make a living on people’s pain. They treat hope like an afterthought while snubbing any attempt forcing them to step down from that seat of privilege long enough to give other folks a chance to see how it feels to look at opportunity.

I listen as they tell the hopeless to get in the back of the line and mind your own business. Those with the hope that comes with having more than enough, lash out at the hopeless with “pull yourself up from your bootstraps”. How do you do that when you don’t have any bootstraps?

It leaves one feeling like a lab rat running through a maze as a dude in a white coat takes notes about how foolish you look while trying to escape. Maybe, just maybe, people are fed up with that ‘I got mine you get your own’ approach to the handling of our lives. After decades of buying into the notion that my condition is the result of a lack of effort or a failure to take advantage of what is offered in the good ole U.S.A, that bubble has exploded in my face. The hope in that dream is fading away.

It hurts accepting someone with more money and power is pulling the strings. It goes against everything I have been taught to believe to articulate the passing of hope. What else should I think after witnessing the nation held hostage due to the overly rich refusing to lend a hand by paying more taxes? What should I say after hearing a crowd roar in approval when candidates say let a patient die if they lack medical insurance?

There was hope and a bunch of Yes We Can prior to the unraveling of the truth. There was hope in the sanctioning of the voices of poor and middle class people. There was hope a movement away from systems that minimize and divide. Heck, there was hope that this nation would finally live up to the mushy messages that we so proudly sing about and die to maintain.

The international community was depending on us to lead the way. If America can’t do it, who can? Yes they can, and yes we will. Fueled by the hope we promised, many went and fought for their own piece of the dream. All while our own government remained stuck in stupid and refused to give in to the promises of hope – healthcare for all who need it, a livable wage for all and a quality education for all our children. There was hope in protecting our fragile world. There was hope in the singing of a new song.

Maybe we can resurrect that hope. It will take more than an election. We need hope in the strength we share.

All I want for Christmas is my hope back. It was a long, long time coming, and now, a change done gone. Oh, yes it did.

Michael Peterson case: a low down dirty shame

2011-12-15T14:18:00.004-05:00

Photograph from the website: Jword.com

How should we feel about Michael Peterson getting a new trial? Sadness? Anger? Frustration? Regret? Or, is it shame that we should feel?

On Wednesday, Superior Court Judge Orlando Hudson ruled that Peterson deserves a new trial after he heard new evidence revealing shenanigans on the part of a former agent at the SBI lab. The recent hearing to consider a retrial focused on the expert testimony of Duane Deaver during Peterson’s 2003 trial. Peterson, a Durham novelist, former columnist for the Herald-Sun and candidate for Mayor, was sentenced to life in prison for killing his wife, Kathleen Peterson, in 2001.

Deaver’s handling of the evidence was so loathsome that Hudson asked David Rudolf, Peterson’s attorney, to research the possibility of appointing an investigator to consider other cases handled by Deaver. Peterson will be freed after posting a $300,000 secured bond while he waits for a new trial.

Tracey Cline, Durham’s District Attorney, says she’ll ask Roy Cooper, the State Attorney General, to prosecute the new trial. Hudson, who was the judge in the first trial, has indicated that he will ask the N.C Administrative Office of the Courts to appoint a new judge. Rudolf isn’t sure if he will lead the defense in the new trial. After a trial that lasted close to six months, drew national attention and a made for TV movie, one has to wonder what the heck was all of that about.

It all leaves me sad due to how a life was played with like a checker on a game board. Hudson’s ruling hit me like “whoops, sorry fellow. We’ll try it again.” I’m ashamed to have been a part of a community that rooted for the prosecution like fans for the home team. “Go get ‘em Jimmy!” Jim Hardin was the DA who prosecuted the case.

I’m ashamed that people held contempt for Peterson due to his columns and run for the Mayor seat. I wonder if the case against Peterson was prejudiced from the onset due to the public opinion based on his role in the community. Was the prosecution out to get him? Were members of that team incapable of seeing past their assumption of guilt? Did they look past the questionable evidence? Was the jury tainted by those columns in the Herald-Sun?

It all makes you question what makes a person guilty. Is it the evidence or is it the perceptions we hold regarding what smells a little funky. Think about those discussions at the coffee house or dinner table. “Hmm, I knew something was up wit him in tha first place,” simply insert the slang relevant to your kitchen table crowd.

I have to ask the question due to the obvious lesson learned from this trial. The prosecution of cases is a judgment call. We would like to think that the decision to move forward is grounded in a preponderance of evidence that proves guilt beyond all reasonable doubt. The thing that is tugging at my freaking spirit is the frequency of cases that go before a jury with evidence that belongs in the button of a dumpster.

I can’t help but wonder about the lack of a sleaze bag monitor to detect the mounds of bull crap before it ends up in court. Something stinks like cow manure whenever there’s a case certain to transform someone into an instant superstar. I’m not suggesting that the DA used the Peterson case to launch a career. Well, maybe I am. More than that submission, there’s something to be said about placing limits on how we view high profile cases.

None of that implies that Peterson is innocent. Given what happened on Wednesday, it will be more difficult for the next prosecutor to prove guilt. So much of the evidence will not be allowed in the next trial. What is more instructive related to this case is the impact of public perception in both moving the case forward and finding the dirty sucker guilty.

It hurts me to think that Peterson may be innocent. If that is true, he will find it difficult to reclaim what he had prior to being found guilty in 2003. He can’t get his home back. He has lost loads of money and a lucrative writing gig. He has lost a reputation as one of those community movers and shakers. More than any of that, he has lost his wife.

Duane Deaver lost his job for the way he mishandled this case. Sorry to say it, but that’s not enough. Maybe he should be put in prison to pay for the years Peterson lost. Sadly, there’s no way to make this right.

There’s one way to describe it all. It’s a damn shame. A low down dirty shame.

The Business of Public Educaton

2011-12-13T18:49:00.001-05:00

The plan to overhaul Durham Public School’s magnet program has been stalled by Superintendent Eric Becoats. The decision came after a groundswell of criticism at public meetings. The attack exposes a deeper issue that members of the school board may find hard to hear. People simply want more emphasis on improving all the schools.

“Don’t roll the dice, make all our schools nice,” was the message on balloons distributed at the meeting held on December 5. More than 70 people signed up to speak. The tension in the room exposed angst among students and parents regarding the state of Durham’s system of education. Many fear that administrators have given up on educating students at low performing schools.

The controversy began with the proposal to close Chewning and W.G Pearson Middle Schools due to the operating expenses connected to the opening of the Lucas Middle School next year. Becoats responded with a new proposal that involved the opening of the Lucas school. That proposal calls for the school to house an International Baccalaureate program with 70 percent of its students coming from the enrollment area and 30 percent coming from a lottery; or to open the school without an International Baccalaureate program, with all of its students coming from the enrollment area.

Becoats had called for developing a magnet to magnet feeder system with an overhauled transportation scheme with just four to six bus stops for students attending magnet schools. The revised proposal continues to phase out both Chewning and W.G. Pearson. The closure of those schools has people wondering about the underlying motivation.

One of those parents spoke at the forum held at Southern High School. “The underlying message from their statement was ‘we don’t want these poor black/brown kids either’,” Steve Bumgardner wrote in an email sent to members of the school board and key administrators following the community forum.

Bumgardner’s response opened the proverbial can of worms that many refuse to face. The Durham Public School system is facing a dangerous season. Like many school systems across the country, leaders are grappling to break free from the stranglehold of a tarnished reputation. While leaders do their best to convince parents there is reason to keep their children enrolled in Durham Public Schools, they face the stiff competition of private and charter schools.

Those argumentative parents and baffled students, who showed up to express their opinion, sense a dedication to offer alternative academic options to weary parents while pushing the need to improve academic performance of low performing schools on the back burner. This is a troubling matter due to how, if true, it leads to the re-segregation of the school system.

According to the Herald-Sun report of the December 5 public meeting, Jasmine Grace, a Hillside High School senior, complained that the focus on building up magnet programs, while ignoring programs at neighborhood schools, left schools like Hillside underserved. “Hillside isn’t considered a ‘good school,” she was quoted as saying in the Herald-Sun. “At Hillside, students who are enrolled in standard courses, who aren’t enrolled in [specialized programs], we find it hard to access resources or find that we don’t have the same benefits or opportunities as students at ‘good schools’”

Grace’s usage of the phrase “good schools” places this conversation within a context that speaks to the burden of those troubled parents. As administrators discuss school closings, changes in the transportation system and the provision of more academic options, it’s vital that all of us pause to consider how all of it sounds. The language involving the education of our children sounds more like a business model.

Rather than talk about improved academic performance, we discuss repositioning the system to compete with existing threats to our growth. Schools like Voyager Academy compete for the best minds within the system. The magnet approach becomes a marketing strategy designed to convince white and middle class African Americans to enroll their students in the new improved school option.

Schools are downsized to maximize the return on investment. It all appears as a way of placating those parents ready to pull the plug on public education. All in an effort to counterbalance the fear among parents unwilling to cast their children to those unruly wolves attending those “bad schools”. All in an effort to offer an option that convinces them not to join ranks with those who have given up on the dream of integration.

It’s all about the business. I sure would like to hear more about how to improve the quality of education for all our children. The spirit of competition doesn’t allow space for that type of conversation. Not when each parent is vying to provide the best option for their own child.

It all makes sense. It’s life in a world where the fit survive. There’s no time to worry about “those” kids when the only thing that matters is your own.

Cousin Replaces Allison as Chair of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People: Now What?

2011-12-09T10:59:00.006-05:00

Philip Cousin has been chosen to lead the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. During a brief speech prior to the vote, Cousin emphasized his service as a member of the Board of County Commissioners, the Durham Public School Board and twenty years as Pastor of the St. Joseph AME Church.

The pews at the Community Baptist Church were filled with Black residents of Durham County hoping to cast a vote to begin a new saga for the once powerful organization. This was their chance to voice an opinion related to who should replace Lavonia Allison, who stepped down after 14 years as Chairwoman. A few voiced the opinion that everyone should be granted a chance to vote. Only 24 people were allowed to vote due to the constitutions definition of active membership.

The constitution may have helped Cousin’s win the election. Allison voiced her support for Cousin, but it’s possible that many present showed up to cast a vote for Hester. The issue of contention with those who supported Hester was his commitment to the Durham Committee. Cousin has not attended meetings which didn’t set well among those who have been present over the years. Allison’s support of Cousin served as the passing of the torch to one capable of restoring integrity and galvanizing support among those who have walked away.

Many who backed Hester fear the connection between Allison and Cousin. Could this be her way of maintaining control by using Cousin as a puppet dangling from her strings? Hester is perceived as one who can effectively create distance from Allison. The perceptions that Cousin will be used by Allison both underestimate the character of Cousin and overestimate the influence of Allison. The endorsement of Allison should be construed as a sign of good things coming for the Durham Committee.

Among those interested in participating in the work of the Durham Committee, serving with Hester was never an option. Despite the good he has done, the need was for a complete break from the way business has been handled over the past 14 years. The Durham Committee has become depicted as a divisive body incapable of moving toward any form of compromise. It has been fractured by a leadership style and organizational culture that pits all things black against all thing that aren’t black. As a result, the Durham Committee has failed to generate interest among those fed up with a lack of productivity.

What the Durham Committee needed wasn’t within the organization. Cousin talked about formulating a plan, following through and holding leadership accountable. That’s what has been missing, a lack of clarity of vision and purpose that get’s people excited about participating. The Durham Committee was suffering due to an assumption among those who held on the best they could. The strength of the Durham Committee is not its historical bearings. It’s not the command of blackness. The Durham Committee is not significant due to the solidarity among those who share the same hue. Its vision and purpose that makes the difference. That has been missing.

Allison and Hester represent an antiquated methodology when it comes to activism. The Durham Committee has failed to solidify collaborative efforts among other groups with similar visions. They have failed to energize a collective body around a vision beyond who gets elected for public office. More is needed than black folks serving on the school board.

The black community has been strangleheld by an old assimilation agenda that needs serious revision. The Durham Committee needs to fast forward to a world that has evolved and adapted beyond the old protest songs of the movement. It’s time to recognize those weeping in the valley. They have no clue regarding the battles for leadership of the Durham Committee. To all that I say, shame on all of us. Shame on us for fighting over who has the right to vote to lead the organization. Shame on all of us for getting stuck on maintaining what was needed long ago while failing to see what is required today.

Hester represents an outdated assimilation model for community engagement. Fight the white man, fight for black owned businesses, and keep the enemy away from what belongs to our people. There is a time and place for that form of conversation, but wait a minute. Do you see your Latino brothers and sisters who are suffering to maintain life? Have you noticed the poor not benefitting after you get your candidate into public office?

It’s time for massive change in the way black people function in leadership. It’s time for communities of faith to change. It’s time for leaders to change, and, yes, it’s time for the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People to change the way black leadership is viewed in Durham.

Do your thang Rev. Cousin. The foot soldiers are coming home.

Cline Vs. Hudson: Better than CSI

2011-12-08T10:50:00.008-05:00

Sorry folks, this is not CSI Durham. So don’t expect cases being solved after examining a bug under a microscope to determine the time of death or decoding DNA from a flake of dandruff. We simply lack the technology used to solve crimes like those popular television shows.

We do have a system that forces local law enforcement to send evidence to a state lab to get stacked on the bottom of evidence coming from departments across the state. It’s a system bond to blunder. Evidence gets lost, it takes far too long to process and local law enforcement has no control over how the evidence is handled.

The SBI forensic lab is in the center of discussions involving the handling of a number of high profile cases in Durham County. Tracey Cline, Durham’s district attorney, was slammed in a two part series in the News & Observer for the way she handles evidence. J. Andrew Curliss, staff writer for the N&O, made a compelling case of prosecutor misconduct in a number of cases handled by Cline. http://www.newsobserver.com/2011/09/05/1462653/misstatements-in-court-questions.html#storylink=misearch#ixzz1fx5wNIib)

In the case of David Yearwood, SBI forensic test showed no fluid, no finger prints and no DNA that connected Yearwood to the rape of his 12-year-old neighbor. Cline claimed those tests were inconclusive or that he failed to ejaculate. The case is under review, but, according to the N&O article, officials have not been able to find the evidence.

On yesterday, an SBI agent was questioned in connection to his testimony in the Michael Peterson murder case. Peterson, a Durham novelist, former columnist for the Herald-Sun and candidate for Mayor, was found guilty of the murder of his wife, Kathleen Peterson, in 2001. Duane Deaver, an SBI agent, was labeled as having a strong pro-prosecution bias at yesterday’s hearing.

Deaver testified in Peterson’s 2003 trial. He had analyzed bloodstains and testified that it was his judgment that Kathleen Peterson was murdered by her husband. The former director of Connecticut’s Forensic lab testified that he was troubled by documents in Deaver’s personnel file indicating a pro prosecution leaning.

"If an individual has a strong prosecution bias, they can't be objective, they have a horse in the race," said Timothy Palmbach. "The expert coming into a courtroom shouldn't care about the results, whether it's guilt or innocence."

Palmbach also testified that Deaver’s work in the case failed to apply the basic rules governing high school science. He said Deaver’s didn’t document his work, failed to explain his methodology and didn’t test every possible and competing hypothesis. He noted that Deaver failed to conduct an experiment to test the possibility that the bloodstream pattern could have come from an accidental fall.

Earlier in the week, Carl Fox, Superior Court Judge, ruled that Orlando Hudson could preside over the hearing. Cline has claimed that Hudson, who is Durham’s top judge, has directed a conspiracy to punish her for failing to dismiss a murder case.

“Judge Hudson has been a judge for 20 years and these two cases aren’t a blip on the screen,” Fox said in court. “He’s handled thousands and thousands of cases…this is dismissed.”

Cline had filed three motions in the cases of Peterson, Yearwood and Michael Dorman. Dorman’s murder charge was thrown out by Hudson earlier this year. Cline withdrew her motion on the Dorman case after Fox noted it is currently in the NC Court of Appeals.

Now Hudson, who allowed the testimony of Deaver’s in the original trial, has to determine if he would have allowed him to serve as an expert witness if he had the information presented at the recent hearing.

Isn’t this better than TV? The spat between Hudson and Cline exposes the intriguing management of the judicial process. For one, the evidence isn’t always evidence. For another, the SBI Lab can’t be trusted as a tool to uncover the truth “beyond reasonable doubt.” Then there’s that sticky question of personal bull shit

This lunacy between Cline and Hudson goes deeper, at least it seems that way, than what is happening in that court of law. Cline’s attempt to remove Hudson from those three cases appears to be about a personal beef between two powerful people who hold the lives of others in their hands. She claims he is out to punish her. Fox ruled a lack of evidence to substantiate her claim. Can someone say stick up for your brother?

There is a missing piece to this puzzle. Who sent the tip to the News & Observer? Who leaked the information that landed Cline on the front page in a series of articles that revealed her management of the DA office? Could it be that Cline thinks Hudson is behind this hack job? If he is, and I’m not saying he’s guilty, doesn’t that give credence to her claim that ole dude is out to get her?

No, this is not CSI Durham. This is better than prime time TV.

Tune in for the next episode.

Black Folks Need Justice Too

2011-12-06T11:36:00.003-05:00

Let’s face it. The criminal justice system sucks. It’s full of corruption, set up to assist those with the resources to pay their way out of trouble and embedded in a long history of racial inequity.

Yes, I said it. The criminal justice system is compromised due to the degree race and racial discrimination plays in the way people are filtered through the system. The disproportion of black and brown people who end up serving time in prison is not solely the result of the crimes they commit. Many are handed severe sentences despite the preponderance of evidence that proves innocence.

It was a series of cases proven foul that led to the passage of the North Carolina Racial Justice Act. Floyd McKissick, State Senator from Durham, and others pushed the law to limit the death penalty. It came after considerable evidence to support the claim that race seriously impedes the judicial process.

Recently, the North Carolina Senate rewrote the Racial Justice Act by approving a bill titled No Discriminatory Purpose in the Death Penalty. Republicans claim the action is not a repeal, but, Josh Stein, a Democrat from Raleigh, told the News & Observer “it is an utter and total repeal.”

“The Racial Justice Act has very little to do with race of justice,” Thom Goolsby, a Republican from Wilmington, argued on the Senate floor. “Instead, it’s turned out to be a Trojan horse, a back-door attempt to end the death penalty in North Carolina.”

The new bill removes language that contends race is a “significant factor” in the handing down death penalty decisions. It’s yet another example of what happens when perspective is hindered by the smothering grip of politics swayed by pigeonholes.

Those who backed the change failed to concede mounds of corroboration of how race, in North Carolina, undermined numerous cases. The murder case of Daryl Hunt is an example of how the judicial system failed to guard the rights of a man later proven to be innocent. If you’re not familiar with that case, I suggest a pause to view this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=16miEJ-tKjM

The Racial Justice Act hoped to shield others from the pain caused by a system unable to see past the race of the person accused. It called for a moratorium until the state fixed the untidiness. Far too many were assumed guilty when the evidence failed to prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt.

Critics of the Racial Justice Act will point to the disparity between blacks and whites arrested for violent crimes. Their contention is that the gap is the primary consequence of more blacks being arrested. They claim that the Racial Justice Act is no more than an attack on the death penalty.

What those critics are unable to concede are the myriad of cases that uncover a system that unfairly prosecutes blacks. The case of Daryl Hunt isn’t the only example of prosecutorial misconduct in North Carolina. The cases of James Johnson, Terrance Garner and Erick Daniels expose how district attorney’s have moved to convict when there was evidence to prove someone else committed the crime.

This combined with recent rulings related to evidence submitted to the State Bureau of Investigation is enough to place the breaks on the death penalty in North Carolina. What is happening in the state, and across the country, is cases were men and women are proven to be innocent after years of time in prison. Some have been proven innocent after being executed.

Despite the evidence to the contrary, those too blind to see are incapable of implementing legislation to protect the most vulnerable in our society. Black and brown people are unguarded due to the deep-seeded stereotypes that classify them guilty before they set foot in a courtroom.

Laws are constructed to protect people from the assumptions made by those incapable of moving past their preconceived notions. It’s the potential of human error that forces the implementation of statutes designed to prevent the force of human error. They are imposed to correct systematic slip-ups.

What Republican legislators failed to confess in reversing the Racial Justice Act is the pervasiveness of evidence that speaks to the necessity of an adjustment due to human error within the criminal justice system. Beyond the question of race is the matter of protecting the rights of those accused of crimes. The system is to offer a fair trial. Those arraigned are assumed innocent until proven guilty and they are to be proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt.

There is no adjustment based on race. The preponderance of evidence shouldn’t take on a different meaning when the person on trial is black or brown. The prosecution team isn’t empowered to treat the evidence differently when the person isn’t white.

The system is for all the people. When it doesn’t work, fix it! We did just that, but the good ole boys decided to do it another way.

I can’t wait for next year’s election. Let’s get ready to send their ass to the back woods where they belong. Until then, call them and tell them we took down the sign long time ago.

You know, the one that says “White Only”.

Youth Deserve Our Support of the Arts

2011-11-30T15:13:00.004-05:00

I’m thankful for being the son of artistic parents. My pops introduced me to sketching at a young age. I can’t remember not drawing. It safe to say it’s in my bones. My mom’s flare for the artistic is reflected in her skill as a seamstress. She’s known for designing and making clergy robes.

It’s my contention that there is a deep correlation between the arts and stimulating the mind to learn. Be it playing an instrument, writing a poem, choreographing a dance or painting a landscape - the arts unlocks the imagination to a world hidden by a lack of clarity. Young people learn more when the arts are used to penetrate those places not tapped by science and math.

So, forgive me for being a bit unbalanced when I attend a high school football game to witness a band with fewer than 50 members. Forgive me for shouting out loud when the middle and high school doesn’t have a jazz band. Go ahead and yell back at me when I argue that we shouldn’t have a school of the arts in Durham. I simply have no patience for minimizing something as important as the arts to a few schools within the district. Every school should be a school of the arts.

Bringing further insult to my rapidly rising blood pressure is the lack of support for nonprofits dedicated to teaching the arts. Many Durham gems are grappling to survive due to a declining resources coming from corporations, foundations and citizens. One of those gems has faded into that place where organizations become the subject of discussions of what used to be in the good ole days.

SeeSaw Studio recently announced that it will end its independent status as a nonprofit organization at the end of this year. Founded by Steven Wainwright in 1998, the program teaches youth to become designers. They are taught print, craft, textile and industrial design skills with the assistance of an entrepreneurship coach who helps them turn their skills into a business.

Despite the great work at SeeSaw Studio, they have been forced to terminate their nonprofit status due to the cost to survive. The decision comes after Michelle Gonzales-Green, executive director, was named an Afterschool Ambassador by the Afterschool Alliance. The Washington D.C. based organization was established in 2000 by the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, J.C. Penney Company, Inc., the Open Society Institute/The After-School Corporation, the Entertainment Industry Foundation and the Creative Artists Agency Foundation to ensure that all children have access to affordable, quality afterschool programs. Gonzales-Green is one of only 20 named an ambassador nationwide.

The distinction positions Gonzales-Green to facilitate afterschool efforts nationally. It also exposes a sad truth related to Durham’s inability to embrace and support those numerous gems in our own backyard. Rather than utilizing the gifts of those in Durham, we tend to look for models in other places-like Harlem. It just proves that old adage to be true-a prophet is of no honor at home.

The good news is that the work at SeeSaw will continue through the efforts of Spirit House, another local nonprofit dedicated to nurturing the gifts of youth. Nia Wilson, executive director at Spirit House, has a long track record of reaching those often forgotten by the grant writing pimps. That’s the moniker I use to describe those who stampede poor, black and brown communities with their new improved version of yesterday’s promise for change. They bring a few bucks, a staff with degrees and past accomplishments and a sales pitch about how things will be different after we take a bite. I’ve already eaten that sandwich.

All while people like Gonzales-Green and programs like SeeSaw are doing the work that transforms lives. They lack the proper connections that lead to the level of support necessary to continue the work. A difference is made, but its old news in an environment more prone to embrace an unproven entity. The community engages in deep dialogue regarding what needs to be done to motivate youth while the answer is there waving at those with the deep pockets.

People simply don’t get it! You inspire youth with the arts. They become motivated upon discovering their ability to create. That is the unspoken truth that the leadership at Durham Public Schools, those who support the East Durham Children’s Zone and those grant writing pimps are too blind to see. Stop reducing funding for the arts. Find ways to support efforts that inspire youth to create. While you’re at it, find a way to make the arts a priority in all our schools-not just a few designed to convince white parents not to send their children to the charter school du jour.

It’s a shame that SeeSaw, as we have known it in the past, is gone. If we’re not careful the Walltown Children’s Theater will be next. After that it may be the Collage Dance Company. Three amazing programs that are recognized nationally for the work they do.

Too bad folks in Durham seemly don’t care. It’s too close to home to be appreciated. Oh, it’s the arts.

Is it just me?

Compassion Ministries & Calvary United Methodist Church presents a Neighborhood Christmas

2011-11-28T10:30:00.006-05:00

The work of being the Church has become amazingly difficult. I’m reminded of the comments made by J. Randall Nichols on my first day of studies at the Princeton Theological Seminary. A group of 20 students gathered to discuss our work since completing our Masters of Divinity degrees. “The work you will do to complete your doctorate my lead to your exit from the Church,” Nichols said.

Those words haunted me as I began to grapple with the vast contradictions exploding in my head. Nichols was right. My work at Princeton forced me to rethink and evaluate the way I had functioned in ministry for over 20 years. That work, combined with personal shifts, stirred a change in the way I functioned both within private and faith space. The journey has been complicated and at times confusing. Those changes have confronted the way I view God, the globe and everyone I encounter.

The Church I lead, Compassion Ministries of Durham, reminds me of the wandering Hebrews. We have pitched our tent numerous times-beginning our work at the Northgate Mall, moving to a warehouse Space in RTP before the city of Durham challenged our right to be there, took up space at a middle school before moving back to the Northgate Mall. We have lost both people and resources along the way. We keep pressing, like that faithful clan headed toward the Promised Land.

We currently worship in the home of the Calvary United Methodist Church. This too has been a humbling experience. Our ability to function is limited by the needs of the owners of the space. We gather at 8am, too early for most interested in coming, but I come prepared to share despite the small crowd.

Each week we gather in a sanctuary that reminds us of the historical bearings of this sacred space. The names of the matriarchs and patriarchs of the church are on the walls. They tell the story of people born shortly after slavery. The building represents a community’s grapple with the tension between our faith claims and race.

Since May, I have stood in that space intentional about recasting the way we envision the room dedicated to sharing the truths of our faith. I pray, each week, for the strength to prophesy to the bones within the shadow of the building. Each week, I pray that our presence will challenge the larger community to cuddle the message of our presence in a space once inhabited by those who, more than likely, regarded people like me as less than themselves.

My prayer has been for a movement beyond the sharing of space. I have prayed that our humbling journey will be used, by God, as a way to facilitate a deeper conversation regarding the nature and power of privilege and our need to move beyond the assumptions that come with operating in that place of power. I have prayed that we, those who attend Calvary United Methodist Church and Compassion Ministries of Durham, will lead the way in helping others embrace a movement that forces each of us to move past the assumptions that come with doing things in a way that endorse the vicious divides caused by that privilege.

What do I mean by all of that? My prayer is to lead a community of worship that operates beyond the particularity of the way we have been classified. This is the beauty of the relationship between Calvary, Compassion and Imani. Imani also rents space from Calvary. Imagine that-three congregations functioning every Sunday. Each of us brings a unique perspective to the work we do, but we have so much in common.

Calvary is a welcoming Church. They have paved the way among United Methodist Churches in North Carolina by fighting for the rights of gay and lesbian Christians. Imani is an African American congregation committed to providing ministry to gay and lesbian Christians. Compassion is a Church dedicated to the code of love and compassion. Hatred, of any form, has no place among those who worship at Compassion.

We have more in common. We are all small in number. Our numbers reflect, in part, the emphasis of our work. Calvary has the unique challenge of being positioned in a community of black and brown residents. Each congregation is praying to survive as the world of faith has shifted from a progressive agenda to a name it claim it prosperity bent that has captured the interest of those seeking a place to worship.

Our challenge is to live from the inside out. As we weep over struggling to make it another day, the faith that keeps us is the work we do. It’s what our being represents-love and compassion, spreading the Good News of hope to those left out and abandoned by systems of evil. Compassion, Imani and Calvary survive due to the message that guides the work we do. It is the reason we continue to move.

Being community takes work. Sometimes you have to sing together to feel the power of divine presence. That’s what we will do on Saturday and Sunday. Calvary and Compassion will come together to present a musical. Neighborhood Christmas is written by Billy Kluttz, minister of music at Calvary. It’s the story of Alex, a young female pastor who comes to the church prepared to get the people involved in social action.

I play the role of Rev. Berger, head of the NAACP. My character is based on William Barber of the state NAACP. Rev. Berger is fighting for the Racial Justice Act and Alex wants to get the church involved. Her brother, Bryan, who is her roommate, is an attorney representing the opponents of the Racial Justice Act.

We will perform the play twice-On Saturday, December 3rd at 6:30 pm and on Sunday, December 4th at 11:00 am. It will take place in that space where I preach every Sunday. Calvary is located at 304 East Trinity Avenue.

The real message involves our sharing space. We will sing and dance and act-together. More than a play, this is a movement. It is a movement toward change. These bones will live.

Just talk to the bones and be present. And, let the Spirit of change captivate your imagination.

Is Big Brother Keeping House at Bank of America?

2011-11-18T13:04:00.003-05:00

The agency has a whopping budget of $41 Billion for fiscal year 2012 and employees 230,000 people across the country. The Department of Homeland Security combines the functions of 187 federal agencies and departments. Many consider it the realization of George Orwell’s novel 1984. Orwell describes a nation where everyone is under complete surveillance. They are constantly reminded that they are under constant examination by the phrase “Big Brother is watching you.”

Has Orwell’s fictitious vision for the future come to pass with the formation of Homeland Security, or is that just another conversation for those bent on following conspiracy theories?

I must admit that I was taken aback when I learned security officers at Bank of America are employed through Homeland Security. It’s yet another twist that adds fuel to the consuming flame called Occupy the city nearest you. Why would the bank whose very name is, in the minds of many, synonymous to corruption engage in hiring people to work for Bank of America?

The Homeland Security website links jobs available through Bank of America (http://jobs.homelandsecuritynews.info/a/jobs/find-jobs/q-Bank+of+America). More significant to those living in the Raleigh/Durham/Chapel Hill community is the presence of Homeland Security employee’s currently working security at Bank of America local branches. They are stationed across the country and keeping an eye on people in our own backyard. Many are serving in a temporary capacity after being sent to our area from other states.

Homeland Security’s partnership with the nations largest bank has intensified since Bank of America appointed a Homeland Security executive to head the office of business continuity. Donna Bucella, who headed the U.S. Terrorist Screening Center for the FBI, joined the bank in October. Prior to her work with the FBI, she served in the Department of Homeland Security as Director of the Southeast region.

The hiring of Bucella follows a serious threat of exposure from Wiki Leaks. Julian Assange, director of Wiki Leaks, had said that he intended to take down a major American bank and uncover an “ecosystem of corruption” with data coming from an executive’s hard drive.

The New York Times reported on January 2, 2011 that a team of 15 to 20 officials were involved in an internal investigation. On August 29, 2011, Daniel Domscheit-Berg, a break-away member of Wiki Leaks, informed Spiegel Online that he destroyed data he took from the organization, including 5 gigabytes of information from Bank of America-more than 200,000 pages of text.

The battle between Bank of America and Assange intensified in December of last year when the bank said it would join other companies like MasterCard and PayPal in halting payments intended for Wiki Leaks. The banks shares dropped 3 percent the day after Assange’s threat. He never named the bank he would expose; however, in an interview the year before the threat Assange claimed to have the hard drive.

The threat of another security breach may be enough to justify the connection between Bank of America and Homeland Security. The unholy union has led to even more speculation. Part urban legend, part conspiracy theory and part the kind of drama that has one shaking their head (SMH), what is behind this marriage between state and big business?

In April, three Homeland Security Black helicopters dropped soldiers on top of a Bank of America building in Miami. (http://highboldtage.wordpress.com/2011/04/20/homeland-security-black-helicopters-protect-bank-of-america-in-miami/). A police spokesperson says it was a training exercise by the Southeast region of Homeland Security, the same region formerly headed by Bucella, now with Bank of America. Interesting connection.

Then there’s the urban legend dating back to 2006. The rumor circulated that Bank of America and Compass Bank managers had received a memo informing them Homeland Security had access to safe deposit boxes with no need of a warrant. It’s a conspiracy theory that is hard to rebuff because people are highly suspicious that ‘big brother” is watching our every move.

So what is the reason behind this union? Maybe it’s to beef up security after the debacle of 2006. There is evidence that points to Brazilian money launderers moving $3 billion through a Bank of America office in New York. In February, I Watch News reported that there were problems with the banks efforts to develop a computer program that would red-flag questionable movements of money. Boris Galinsky, a former senior vice president, said he was being asked “to develop crap.”

In August 2006, the U.S. Senate Homeland Security Subcommittee on Investigations reported that Bank of America had allowed Samuel and Charles Wyly to avoid IRS scrutiny by allowing the wealthy businessmen to funnel money into the bank through offshore entities. They were charged with a $550 million securities fraud. Maybe security has been placed at banks to monitor potential money laundered to support terrorist activities. I'm just saying.

Or maybe, just maybe, they are placed in our own backyard to keep an eye on illegal immigrants. The National Illegal Immigration Boycott Coalition (NIBC) targeted Bank of America for issuing credit cards, establishing bank accounts and offering loans to illegal immigrants. The boycott began in 2007 after Bank of America introduced the pilot program in Los Angeles as a way of offering service to a rapidly growing population.

Given Homeland Securities role in protecting the boarder, maybe the presence of security officers stationed at local banks is to detect and report those illegal immigrants with accounts. I give up! I can’t figure out the connection between Bank of America and Homeland Security. I do know that it feels like a precursor to Orwell’s community controlled by “big brother.”

Or maybe I’m too much of a pessimist. Maybe I shouldn’t be concerned. Certainly we can trust Bank of America to have our best interest at heart. Surely we have the government on our side.

Or maybe it’s something behind door number 2.

A Call to Occupy the Church

2011-11-16T10:10:00.002-05:00

My phone, inbox on Facebook and email has been buzzing about the concept I placed on my Facebook wall-Occupy the Church. It’s intriguing that most agree that the Church, for the most part, has morphed into a monster that we would rather refrain from being a part. The truth is, if not for my role as a pastor, it would be difficult for me to find a place that fits my spiritual needs.

My evangelical, conservative friends will tell me that the Church can’t be defined by those who claim faith, but rather is rooted in that big book we call the Bible. They also remind me that the Word, as they put it, is the same yesterday, today and forever. In other words, there is no place for the consideration of context or culture.

I find myself incredibly frustrated due to the absence of critically thinking, progressive minded folks who have made a decision to use their gifts of time, talent and money to press an agenda that connects each of us to the maladies of others. I have come to the Church due to a past filled with anguish and irritation caused by my own actions.

The Church became my healing station. I found comfort in the words of a compassionate Christ. I was inspired by words like “if you are without sin, throw the first stone.” I needed forgiveness in my life. I found in those words the solace needed to overcome being abused, using and dealing drugs and using women and sex to cover pain.

I was moved by the movement toward the liberation of those devalued by systems of evil. The words of Martin Luther King, Jr. stirred me to walk within my dream. I discovered the teachings of Howard Thurman, a great mystic, theologian and visionary, who taught me to be a disciple of Spirit. The Church helped shape the man I have become. With that being said, something left the Church as I made my way toward rediscovery.

I’m not alone. Others feel the same. They say they don’t want to go back. There’s too much entertainment there. All of that talk about the streets paved with gold keeps them disgusted due to a lack of gold to pay their bills. They’re asked to pay more, to bring a seed offering, a tithe and more and more, to assure their blessings on this earth. They are reminded that their lacks are correlated to their lack of faith and failures of participation in the work of the kingdom.

Love walked out the back door. Hate walked in to take its place. Judgment took the seat once occupied by love. Those in search of unconditional love and acceptance are left hungry and depressed by constant reminders about why they feel the void.

I stand before the people every Sunday. I’m mad because those who need the message of love are not there. Why? Because they are fed up with the Church and refuse to give it another chance. They desire a place to ponder the voice of their inner spirit, but can’t in the Church. They have been told that everything they need is relegated to words in the book. The canon is closed. God has spoken; thus, our responsibility, as advocates of truth, is to live the words as written. Is that all!

They say no to that claim. There is more to the tug at their spirit than the simplistic messages laced with cute phraseology and a loud shout at the end. They have questions. Pray harder, pay more, come every week and trust the Lord in all things, they are told. It’s a formula to emptiness and people want more.

I have committed myself to stand with those who walked out when love left. I have made the shift toward being present with those who want to form a relationship with themselves, their neighbors and the Spirit they seek to discover. They want to hear Spirit in nature. They want to listen to the journeys of others devoid of judgment.

My message to those committed to the Occupy the Church movement is to shut up long enough to listen. God is speaking. You can’t listen because you are trapped in the assumptions of your claims. If you are willing to go back, to OCCUPY what rightfully belongs to us, then let’s move in that direction. Find a place to explore the movement of Spirit. You can come to OCCUPY at Compassion. You may seek another Church or another spiritual tradition. It doesn’t matter where you go, just go.

Why is it important that we go? Because we have stories in common begging to be shared in a way that moves us past our divides. I am more than a Christian. I am more than a man. I am more than an African American. I have waded through the water of discovery and re-discovery. I seek places to share my own journey. I need - I must have a place to listen to how those same waters cleansed the agony in your life away.

Now, the ten guiding principles of the Occupy the Church movement. They are for those prepared to go back intentional about reclaiming our rightful place as people bond by Spirit. I will be at Compassion Ministries on Sunday. I will occupy at 8am the space shared with Calvary Ministries (304 E. Trinity Avenue). If not with me, find a Church, a mosque a synagogue or a temple.

I will be calling the disciples of the Occupy movement to join me in group discussions down the road. I will be asking each of you to share the stories of your spiritual voyage. Will you please join me?

My mama used to sing, “I will not, I will not be moved…”

1. We promote an authentic embrace of different spiritual views.
2. We are willing to hear the spiritual stories of those who have encountered faith from a cultural perspective different from our own.
3. We are open to encountering God by listening to and responding to voices uncommon to the presuppositions of our own.
4. We seek to find the humanity in those who respond to life and faith different from the common views of our faith traditions.
5. We denounce all efforts to deny the spiritual claims of those rejected due to the common claims of our faith traditions.
6. We seek to respond to and seek to defeat all systems that deny the humanity of those created in the image of God.
7. We will celebrate the face of God in all we meet.
8. We will not be defined by the strapping of our institutions. We will seek spirit beyond our buildings, our liturgy and the particularity of our congregational norms.
9. We will be molded and defined by a love greater than our differences
10. We will ponder the assumptions of our privilege and seeks ways to transcend how we define our value based on those assumptions

My Own Story of Abuse

2011-11-14T11:14:00.005-05:00

“As Simon rubbed the ugly black thing, the family friend moaned,” harder boy, rub it harder. Faster, um, ah, um, yeh, that’s right. Simon did as he said. Soon it got easier. But then it got worse,” it’s a line from Preacha’ Man, my first novel.

“Put it in your mouth, Simon stopped rubbing. He couldn’t believe what he heard. No, Simon cried. Why would he ask me to do that? Simon whispered. He slapped Simon across the face.”

Those lines from my novel rekindle memories from my sore past. It’s a story like so many others - a 10-year-old boy stripped of innocence in the truck of a family friend. The pain of that moment couldn’t be explained. The hurt caused was too deep to share with mother and father. It remained locked within the dark chambers of my subconscious. That’s was until the flashbacks came to haunt me more.

I wrote Preacha’ Man as a way to free the countless others from the brutal condition of having to keep secrets like these. I was afraid to share my story. The power of decision was taken away from me when the memories became stronger than my resolve to keep my thoughts to myself. I was too broken by the past to remain silent. I had to be set free.

Breaking that silence came with a price. Being broken and sharing that in public space can rock the world of a minister trapped in the expectations of those who drop dollars in the collection plate. Sharing a past of dysfunction radically hinders the work of ministry. Telling my truth was the beginning of the end of the work that meant so much to me.

The comments that followed the release of my first book reminded me of why I fought the urge to place those words on paper. “He must have wanted it,” I heard people say. “It proves he is gay,” others said. The backlash that came with paving the way for my own liberation made me wonder if freedom is worth the cost.

I personally grieve whenever I hear a story about boys being abused. It took me weeks to recover from the Catholic Church scandal. I’m still aching due to the lack of justice in the Eddie Long case in Atlanta. The Church seems to miss the mark whenever boys cry foul play by one called to lead the way. The image of the institution seems to mean more than exposing and ending the cycle of pain felt by boys too young to understand what was happening when they were being touched.

Those cover ups and cash settlements may be rooted in a deeper issue. Could it be that our notions of masculinity, even among those not yet men, make it difficult for those engrossed in the merits of gender identity to conceptualize the torment of boys molested by men? Are cover ups and passing the buck a result of a failure to conceive of a way to think about the abuse of boys?

Blaming the victim is a systemic evil that obstructs the pursuit of justice in cases involving sexual abuse. Women tolerate the laundry list of labels attached with being violated: they asked for it or it’s because of their alluring attire. Women have been answerable to how their ways entice those who lack the ability to control the heat.

Added to the complexity of abuse of boys are notions of masculinity. What heartrending assertion comes from institutional decisions to pretend it never happened? What does it say concerning a moral obligation to protect the innocence of those too young to protect themselves? What is said when we close our eyes and make believe it’s not our responsibility to point a finger in the direction of cruelty?

Conversations related to institutional responsibility (be it Penn State, the Catholic Church or Greater New Birth Baptist Church) should not preclude critique of affirmations of identity that minimize the masculinity of boys caught in the web of sexual abuse. Just as a woman raped does not make her a whore; a boy abused does not strip him of legitimate masculinity.

Being raped doesn’t make a person gay. Supplementary in this discussion is the need to affirm the masculinity of those who are gay. Being gay doesn’t surrender legitimate masculine identity. It may define it by different constructs, but it is masculinity all the same.

Pain wrenching discourse is necessary to help both institutions and individuals contend with their feelings related to notions of masculinity after one voices a history of abuse. Needed are ways to affirm those hiding out of fear of being labeled a fraction of a man. Every time an institution covers it up or pays for it to go away, boys like me, still aching from past memories, suffer even more.

They can’t deal with our pain. Maybe I should have never told the truth.

But, it wasn’t my decision.

Beyond the Colors of Hate

2011-11-11T14:16:00.004-05:00

It’s a story that tugs at that tender spot of most who hear about it. Something magical happened at Occupy Atlanta. Something bigger than the causes that moved people to camp out in tents-the movement inspired rival gang members to become friends.

Occupy Atlanta participant Tim Franzen wrote the story of two young men who found a common bound while attending one of the meetings in Atlanta. “I stayed for the common cause, speaking for the people. I feel strongly that we have the right to jobs, health care, and affordable higher education," says Sherrod Britton, a 29-year-old member of the Bloods.

Shabaka Addae Guillory, a 20-year-old member of the Crips, was also moved by the Occupy movement. "I knew this kind of movement was coming I just didn't know it would come so soon," Guillory stated in the story that appeared in the Huffington Post.

Franzen tells the story of two African American males who traveled similar paths. Guillory, who became a Crip when he was 14 years old, noticed folks doing freestyle rap. Britton was in the group. "I saw him in the park, saw his colors. There was no mean mug or rivalry because we realized that what's happening here is so much bigger then gang rivalry", says Guillory.

"Now we're the best of friends," Britton replies. There was something deeper than their rival colors.

"I let him sleep in my tent because he didn't have one. We are connected through music, faith, and Occupy Atlanta", stated Britton.

Could it be there is more to the Occupy Movement than we have heard about in the news? “It's important to acknowledge that one of the beautiful byproducts of this new movement is the transformative experiences that arisen as a result of so many different people from different walks of life occupying a space together for a common cause,” Franzen writes.

It’s not the first time that music has broken the barricade between blue and red. In 1993, Ronnie Phillips and rapper Tweedy Bird Loc, who is a Kelly Park Compton Crip, produced an album featuring actual Crips from Compton and Long Beach Bloods from Inglewood and Los Angeles.

Bangin' on Wax was the debut album of the Bloods & Crips. One year later, Bangin’ on Wax 2: The Saga Continues was released as their final studio album. After Bangin’ on Wax 2, the Bloods & Crips parted ways, with the Bloods becoming the Damu Ridas and the Crips recording as the Nationwide Rip Ridaz.

The concept behind the projects was to get gang members to bang on wax rather than in the streets. Each record consisted of a “B” side and a “C” side. You got it! The “B” side featured Bloods and the “C” side was for Crips. The single Bangin’ on Wax was the only song that combined the forces of the Bloods and Crips. Most of the songs were recorded during the same studio sessions.

Something is happening in Atlanta, but what? A connection was made that allowed rival gang members to put their colors away long enough to become friends. What is behind that change?

For answers I had to revisit an important movie. If you haven’t seen it, watch Crips & Bloods: Made in America (2008). Directed by Stacy Peraltz, the movie features Forest Whitaker. Jim Brown appears in the movie. Check out my blog from November 20, 2007 (Time to Handoff to Jim Brown). There I report on a conversation with the NFL great that changed my life forever.

The movie reflects on the change that came after the death of vocal black leaders. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X are killed. Others are thrown in jail. In a blink of an eye all the icons are gone. There is no hope left. That hope is replaced with two gangs divided by territories, red and blue bandanas and beefs.

Peraltz weaves a story of young African American men without fathers, mentors or leadership. Bravado takes center stage among those devoid of hope. Acting cool becomes a survival tool in a culture where police use their force to keep thugs in their place. They grow up questioning authority. The oppressed respond in the only way they know-with violence.

Then there’s a quote from Jim Brown in the movie. "If the police have not resolved the problem in 40 years, they never will resolve the problem," he says. “

They can’t solve it because it is bigger than the police. It’s not about improved police strategies. Something is missing. What? A lack of role models, a lack of alternatives, but, more than any of that, a lack of hope.

David Patterson, former Governor of New York said it best on Real Time with Bill Maher. He argued, on this week’s show, that the lack of organization within the Occupy Movement is because people haven’t protested in 30 years. We have forgotten how to fight for our rights.

So, hope was found for gang members in Atlanta. Maybe, just maybe, it’s what they have been waiting for. They know how to speak through their music. They know they are hurt, in part, due to the way they are perceived. What has been missing is a form to verbalize all of that pain in a way that frees them enough to see the humanity in one they have been taught to hate.

They have been waiting for a message. Someone, something to give them reason to change. Be it a rap album or a movement that tells ones truth.

It’s the small victories that make a difference.

Election is instructive on the state of Durham's political future

2011-11-09T13:12:00.003-05:00

There were no surprises coming from yesterday’s election. As expected, Mayor Bill Bell pounded challenger Sylvester Williams with 81.9 percent of the vote. Incumbents Diane Catoti and Eugene Brown and former school board member Steve Schewel firmly outpaced the competition.

The lack of stun factor serves as the underpinning for a deeper conversation involving the state of Durham’s local political scene. The three challengers, all African American, showed poorly in this election. The support of Victoria Peterson with 11 percent, Donald Hughes with 8.6 and Solomon Burnette with 6.2 percent of the votes is highly instructive for a variety of reasons.

Most significant in critiquing the results is the state of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. This election speaks to the inability, on the part of the Durham Committee, to locate and groom candidates that the public can take seriously. This year’s slate of candidates came from the remnant of the once powerful organization. They were embraced by the few who continue to fight to reclaim the dignity and respect the Committee once held in Durham.

Each candidate suffered image flows that hindered success at the polls.

Victoria Peterson has been a polarizing force for years. A former Republican, she alienated African Americans with her staunch support of Jesse Helms. Her political views shifted after she discovered unwillingness on the part of her former party to support her previous bids for office. Others find it difficult to concede her conservative Christian views. Her pro-life and anti-gay agenda has pitted her against a city council seeking to support the rights of all its citizens-despite sexual orientation.

She has clashed with many voters due to her support of Michael Peterson during his murder case, Crystal Mangum in the Duke Lacrosse mess and Mike Nifong when he faced being disbarred as Durham’s District Attorney. Her antics at his hearing were enough to get her kicked out. Peterson has developed a reputation as a conspiracy theorist. She is one of the many serial office seekers in Durham. Despite all of that, she received the most votes among those who lost.

Donald Hughes endures the task of overcoming something beyond his control-his mother. Voters disqualify him because his mother is Jackie Wagstaff, former member of both the City Council and School Board. Wagstaff’s name conjures memories of heated discord on the school board. Meetings became the source of shame throughout the region and resulted in a commentary in the Greensboro News & Record that labeled Durham North Carolina’s black sheep.

Like Peterson, Hughes has run for office before. Unlike Peterson, Hughes is, in my opinion, one of the youth to watch in Durham. Sadly, his problem with voters has nothing to do with his strengths, but with his mother. If Hughes could discover a way to distance himself from his mother he could go far as a politician. How does a person break from the ways of mom, and is it reasonable for us to expect that distancing? It is distressing that Hughes has lost again, making it difficult for him to be regarded as a credible candidate in future elections.

Hughes is faced with a dilemma that is informative in dialogue involving the impact parental ways have on their progeny. The same could be said about Solomon Burnette who placed last in the election. He is the son of Brenda Burnette who served four years on the city council and ran against Bill Bell and former Mayor Nick Tennyson for mayor in 2001.

The younger Burnette’s problems were not connected to the issues with his mother, but had more to do with his overcoming the concerns from his past. When he was 17, Burnette was arrested for an armed robbery of two Duke University students. He was later accused of domestic violence and was later connected with a friend suspected of an East Duke Campus robbery in 1999.

Burnette became the center of controversy for an editorial he wrote in the Campus Echo, the student newspaper at North Carolina Central University. “White people still murder us with impunity. White people still beat us with impunity,” he wrote in response to the Duke Lacrosse fiasco. “White people still rape us and get away with it. The only deterrent to these legally, socially and economically validated supremacist actions is the fear of physical retribution. Black men, stand up. Black women, stand up. Black children, stand up. We have been at war here with these same white people for 500 years. The time to fight, whether intellectually, artistically or physically, has always been now.”

James Ammons, former Chancellor at NCCU, publicly distanced the university from Burnette’s comments. “We are aware of the fact that Mr. Burnette has a right to express his opinion, but we also know that the freedom of speech comes with the responsibility to be fair and accountable,” Ammons said in a statement.

Kristin Butler, a Duke University graduate, later wrote a guest column for the Duke Chronicle where she criticized NCCU for awarding Crystal Mangum and Solomon Burnette a diploma. "Because of the university's blatant refusal to enforce its own rules, I will never again take an NCCU degree seriously," she writes in the May 15, 2008 piece “Summa cum loony”. “Because it no longer guarantees good character, and it's just too hard to tell the thugs and liars apart from the high-performing majority."

The Chronicle, unlike Ammons at NCCU, stood by the decision to run the column. "At The Chronicle, we value the right to free speech, and I don't think that whether I agree with the views in a column is necessarily relevant to making editorial decisions," said Chelsea Allison, editor at the Chronicle. "'Summa cum loony' has sparked a very passionate dialogue, and we have published and plan to continue to publish responses from NCCU alums and others with interest in the issue."

To his credit, Burnette is an example of what it means to transcend the mistakes of youth. He has a Bachelor’s degree in European History from North Carolina Central University and has studied the Arabic language at Duke. In addition, he has worked with Latino immigrants, students, gang members, people incarcerated and the homeless. He is also a performing artist.

Peterson, Hughes and Burnette prove the burden of the past in pursuing political office. Sometimes that past belongs to someone else. Sometimes it’s the past that one has created for themselves. Durham is an unforgiving city. It is hard to rise above the blunders of the past when people hold in their hand the vote that determines your future.

Two questions emerge from a discussion regarding those who lost. Is this the best the Durham Committee could offer? Where are those devoid of the skeletons waiting to be exposed? And, what does it take for a person to overcome those missteps from the past? That’s three questions. Heck, I’m sure there are more.

Lesson learned.

OMG: He Called Me a House Nigger

2011-11-07T11:26:00.002-05:00

“That’s because you’re a house Nigger,” a distraught poll worker yelled at me for refusing to vote for his candidate. I had declined to take the sheet of paper promoting the virtues of the man he supported. I knew who I was voting for and had no need to waste the paper. I’m a green friendly kind of dude.

“That’s okay,” I responded when asked. “I’m not voting for him.” I then made my way to vote for the man he opposed Bill Bell for Mayor.

“I really appreciated your saying that,” a woman passing out the slate for the People’s Alliance told me when I returned. We chatted a bit about the significance of the two tax measures on the ballot. She expressed concern that teachers and assistant teachers would be terminated if it didn’t pass. I talked about the need for a rail system connecting the three counties. That’s when the man yelled at me-“You a house Nigger.”

“And that’s why I’m not voting for Sylvester Williams,” I roared back. “It’s because of people like you that I will never support him.”

I left disgusted with myself for allowing the idiocy of that man to get under my typically thick skin. I’m accustomed to being called names. It comes with the territory of putting your neck out to be chopped by those incapable of reading between and around the lines of what I write and say.

What he called me speaks to the politics of race and pronouncements of legitimate blackness. The expression house Negro comes from Malcolm X’s speech “Grassroots.” He spoke about two ranks of enslaved Africans: the “house Negro” and the “field Negro”. The house Negro lived in the owner’s house, dressed well and ate well, Malcolm X argued.

“He loved his owner as much as the owner loved himself, and he identified with his owner,” Malcolm said. “If the owner got sick, the house Negro would ask, ‘are we sick?’ If somebody suggested to the house Negro that he escape he would refuse to go, asking where he could possibly have a better life than the one he had.”

“The field Negro lived in a shack, wore raggedy clothes, and ate chittlins,” Malcolm argued. “He hated his owner. If the owner's house caught fire, the field Negro prayed for wind. If the owner got sick, the field Negro prayed for him to die. If somebody suggested to the field Negro that he escape, he would leave in an instant.”

Malcolm X claimed there are still house Negroes and field Negroes. His comments were a direct criticism of the nonviolent resistance movement led by Martin Luther King, Jr. It was a consistent theme of Malcolm X while he served as the primary voice of the Nation of Islam. His commentary continues to manipulate and influence the way blackness is affirmed or censured based on the judgment of a few.

What Malcolm X’s speech did within its historical context was to place the power of assimilation at the forefront of public discourse involving the rights of people of color. It revealed the thrust of the persuasion regarding the desire to live within the comforts of being accepted by those with power. Malcolm X unveiled the scandal involving a strategy, planned or not, to pit black folks against one another, and the benefits that come with compromising racial solidarity.

It’s a rhetoric that continues to resonate within sectors of the African American community. It’s the cousin to being called an Uncle Tom. It assumes that a person maintains a position of prominence due to succumbing to the interest of white people. It demands a level of hatred that denies the possibility for moving past the wounds caused by those long ago.

There are a number of assumptions correlated with the contemporary interpretation of Malcolm X’s analysis. To cling to his argument demands the embrace of the submission that all white people are blue eyed devils. One must conclude that white people are created with incapacity to transcend the hatred they have toward black people. One must adopt a logic that refuses to concede the possibility of any good within an entire race of people. To that end, anyone who embarks on developing any form of relationship with the blue eyed devil is, by nature, given into the psychosis of a house Negro.

This is a mindset that continues to fragment advancement toward the celebration of a diverse community. Progressive minded black people are constantly engaged in proving and protecting their status as a legitimate member of the black community. If you write for the white press, you are a house Negro. If you vote Republican, you are a house Negro. If you are highly educated, send your children off to college at a school that isn’t a historically black college or University, you are a house Negro.

The term is often used as a way to demoralize those living with the rewards of hard work. It elevates those on the bottom of the economic threshold by belittling those reaping the advantages normally reserved for white people. The field Negro disputation assumes that those in the house are there because of deep love for the white people in the house.

History suggests that Malcolm X’s analysis of the house Negro is laced with suppositions that we are forced to question. It denies the evidence that indicates many of the houses Negros were placed in the house to serve as the sex toy of the master. It refuses to acknowledge the evidence that points to boys lying at the foot of the bed to warm the master’s feet. It denies the myriad of cases that indicate that boys and girls were raped by the master. The house was a place of torture, not privilege.

What Malcolm attempted to do was bring meaning to the consequences of class division within the African American community. It assumed a position of privilege among those in the house that requires deep critical scrutiny. It also requires an examination of a view of history that fails to considers the particularity of humanity. In other words, not all white people are the same. Not all African Americans are the same. To suggest that everyone in the house felt the same gives far too much power to the influence of living in a given place.

I looked at my critic with rage filled eyes. How dare he make an assumption based on one vote. How dare he make that statement in the presence of white people. How dare he discredit me as a person due to my unwillingness to do things his way.

It only confirmed my vote. Birds of a feather flock together. That bird needs to be locked in a cage to sing alone. That bird sings because he refuses to fly after the doors of the cage have been open.

And for the record, I move between the house and the field. That’s what freedom brings