Black vs. black

by Malcolm G. Turner

black is the color of night;
the darkness escaping the reach of light.
black is the pit from pole to pole,
but Black, my brother, is in the soul.

black is the earth's rich soil
from Gaia springs life and endless toil.
black is the pigment that sets us apart,
but Black, my sister, is in the heart.

black is the shade of Original Man,
Adam, eve, and the Creator of man.
black is the color of infinity and time before time.
but Black, my people, is a state of mind.

MLK Was a Revolutionary

Equality in a society based on one group dominating all others is a revolutionary concept. MLK was a revolutionary.

Don't get it twisted, despite the watered-down, docile version of the man they show you on TV and in tributes around this time of year MLK was really a revolutionary. The reason he's not with us today is because those revolutionary tendencies were showing through with more force with regard to the war in Vietnam and the economic empowerment of poor people in this nation. He was truly a dangerous Negro, a Black man that defied that status quo and couldn't be controlled like some of his contemporaries that are still with us today.
The media likes to portray this religious-based, non-violent movement lead by the Civil Rights leaders of the day, but they don't tell you the true ramifications of MLK's movement and how dangerous it really was to the white businessmen that controlled (and still control) this country. Why was this non-violent movement so powerful? Why were sit-ins so effective? Non-violence may have been justified with scriptures from the Bible, but there were actually very practical reasons for this strategy:

1) We were in no position to go up against the government's military might. Don't fight a battle you can't win. Not resorting to violence gave us the moral advantage which is effective in getting PR and support from possible domestic and international allies. In a supposedly Christian nation "under God," it's hard not to see something wrong with armed men physically abusing unarmed women and children. It also showed how dishonorable and cowardly the police were, which is an embarrassment to national pride.

2) Sit-ins were more than just a mere annoyance for white business owners. It messed with their cash flow, and we know how these people get when you mess with their money. The reason these tactics don't work anymore is because they're old and played out and the leaders that use them either don't know the purpose behind them or don't really care. You have to find new and more disruptive ways to make a negative financial impact against these racist companies that are alive and well today in 2009. For example, go into a bank and fill up the lines with people opening up and closing bank account with the minimum deposit. Open an account with $25 at 9:00, make small deposits/withdrawals at the counter every 30 minutes or so, and repeat step 2 every day for as long as the protest lasts. Then at the end, close the account. Or send a ton of people to a store to buy the cheapest thing they have and return it. Anything to prevent real customers from patronizing the business for long periods of time is effective.

See Dr. King was only getting started with achieving political/civil rights. When they killed him he was starting to focus more on economic empowerment and building international alliances with other poor brown countries (because that's what Black America is in essence, having never really been accepted into the general population). The American intelligence agencies know how powerful a unified Black population is especially when they flex their economic muscles and they believe this could pose a national security risk (i.e. COINTELPRO). Any Black man that was capable leading this unified population was bought, coerced into submission, or killed. Like Nas said, "No revolutionary gets old, or so I'm told. You're left full of bullet holes when you tell the people go free."

On this day of remembrance for Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., let us honor his name by remembering the man depicted by the mainstream media, but also the man they don't show you; the one you have to read about on your own. Honor him by reading and learning why he was so dangerous that they decided to prematurely end his life. Learn, and teach the children, about the life of a revolutionary; not some socially acceptable, passive shadow of the man he really was.

Black Professionals Aren't Recession Proof

by Malcolm G. Turner
blackgelcap.blogspot.com

There's a dark side of affirmative action that rears its ugly head during a recession. Despite being more educated than our peers, well-spoken, non-threatening, generally good Negroes, Black folks tend to take the brunt of the damage during recessions all the way from the janitors to the managers. The companies that are forced to comply with these equal opportunity standards are presented with the perfect opportunity to get a little vengeance during recessions when its easier to provide justification for firing large amounts of Black folk. How can they get away with this you ask? A Wall Street Journal quote from the 1990-91 recession sums it up nicely, "Affirmative action has gotten so diluted that companies can trade one minority against the other." During that recession Blacks were laid off at rates disproportionately higher than their white, Asian, and Hispanic counterparts. By allowing ourselves to be grouped in with all minorities we have essentially forfeited our unique status as unwilling immigrants and senior claim to the debt owed to us from our free labor, military service, American apartheid, and taxation without representation.

Let's put it this way. Black people for the past couple decades have been individually selfish and collectively generous. It's time to switch that around and start thinking as a nation within a nation. We fight four our collective rights and claims on the government and immediately share them with all so-called minorities (even white women). While quite noble, this is economic suicide. I'm not saying there are deliberate, high-level conspiracies to fire more Afrikan Americans during a recession, but there are micro-level decisions influenced consciously or sub-consciously by racism specifically against Blacks more than other minorities that add up to large numbers of us being "right sized." But we'll see what the numbers say a couple years after this recession is over.

Meanwhile we're so busy celebrating one Afrikan American man that broke the ultimate barrier we have yet to discuss the inevitable backlash from white racists that have the ability significantly affect our employment numbers (not mention our physical safety). You're Black professionals right? So you know about re-orgs. It's time to re-organize the YBP ranks and come up with a new corporate strategy. Some of us can remain as emissaries in these white corporations so they are reminded of our humanity on a daily basis and to make sure they don't get too crazy with the discrimination and whatnot. But a gang of us need to get off the plantation. Why not just buy these companies that we complain about being racist all the time? Why not focus on ownership instead of employment; wealth instead of income? The car companies need money...well, Black folks in America spend a trillion dollars a year, mostly on stuff we don't need that benefits other racial groups. We can afford a few billion to buy up some of these distressed companies.

I have a proposition. To make it easier, I'll split YBP's up into two categories: Toby and Kunta. Both are slaves obviously since they both work for white masters, but there are subtle differences. When Toby talks about his company he says "we" because he truly believes that his fate is that of his master and when his master is sick, he's sick. On the other hand, Kunta says "they" or the name of the company because he's just using the company for a paycheck until he can find the opportunity to run away. The higher your salary the more likely you are to be a Toby almost by definition. Kunta just can't spend every day for 10 years around these MF's he can't stand.

So my proposition is for the Kuntas out there. I have two tasks for you. 1) By yourself or with a group of trusted, business-minded colleagues, write a business plan or two. One of them can be a business you'd start from scratch, but the other, more important one, should focus on buying an existing business. You don't have to actually start the business(es) yet, just get yourself in the mindset of thinking about other options. 2) Research Black-owned companies you wouldn't mind working for that actually make it a point to have a majority Black employment base.

At the end of they day capitalism is characterized by a competition for assets and resources in the pursuit of profits. Unfortunately, mankind has not evolved to the state where we do not separate ourselves based on ethnicity. Every other ethnicity operates as an economic cooperative with preference given to fellow ethnic members. Whereas we're still stuck in this mode of trying to crash everyone else's party instead of getting together and controlling our own economic destiny. If there has ever been a time for an agenda of self-determination within the Afrikan community it's now while assets are cheap and governments are too weak to fight back with full force. Ethnocentricity is not necessarily a bad thing; it's time we start practicing it in economically productive ways.

Finally, I'm currently enslaved on the plantation with a side hustle for extra income, but if anyone is thinking about starting a Black-owned and operated private equity company to take advantage of these low asset prices while providing jobs and building wealth in the Black community holler at me. I might have a few good recruits for you.

Hotep

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