tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-208001432024-03-13T01:37:20.488-07:00National Reparations CongressCreating a National Repartions United Front for Education, Mobilization and Action to realize Reparations for African Descendants.Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-90185249255010058912014-05-26T08:34:00.001-07:002014-05-27T06:39:37.470-07:00<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><span style="color: red;">Reparations2014</span>- A Renewed Discussion/<span style="color: #38761d;">A Revitalized Mobilization</span></b></span><br />
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May 21, 2014- http://billmoyers.com<br />
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Signs
of overt racism still are all around us, be it a New Hampshire police
commissioner’s use of an ethnic slur to describe President Obama or an
NBA team owner’s disturbing remarks about black athletes and fans. By
now, we all know the drill, the media calls these people out for their
ugly words and we play our parts, shaking our heads in sad disbelief —
then return to our daily lives.<br />
<br />
Ta-Nehisi Coates, a senior editor at <i>The Atlantic</i>
magazine, thinks it’s time for a bold step to change the way we talk
and think about race in America. This week, Bill speaks to Coates about
his June cover story for the magazine, provocatively titled “<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/" target="_blank">The Case for Reparations.</a>”
In it, Coates argues that we have to dig deeper into our past and the
original sin of slavery, confronting the institutional racism that
continues to pervade society. From the lynching tree to today’s mass
incarceration of young African-Americans, he says we need to examine our
motives more intently and reconcile the moral debt and economic damage
inflicted upon generations of black Americans.<br />
<br />
For one, Coates
points to a century of racist and exploitive housing policies that made
it hard for African-Americans to own homes and forced them to live in
poorer neighborhoods with unequal access to a good education, resulting
in a major wealth gap between black and white. In fact, the median
wealth of white households is 20 times that of black households,
according to a <a href="http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2011/07/26/wealth-gaps-rise-to-record-highs-between-whites-blacks-hispanics/" target="_blank">Pew Research Center study</a>.<br />
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“There
are plenty of African-Americans in this country — and I would say this
goes right up to the White House — who are not by any means poor, but
are very much afflicted by white supremacy,” Coates says. By white
supremacy Coates says he refers to an age-old system in America which
holds that whites “should always be ensured that they will not sink to a
certain level. And that level is the level occupied by black people.”<br />
<br />
Coates
explains to Moyers: “I am not asking you as a white person to see
yourself as an enslaver. I’m asking you as an American to see all of the
freedoms that you enjoy and see how they are rooted in things that the
country you belong to condoned or actively participated in the past.”<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><span style="background-color: #660000;"><span style="color: magenta;"><i>More From Ta-Nehisi Coates on Our Racist Heritage</i></span></span></b></span><br />
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May 23, 2014</div>
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Ta-Nehisi Coates, a senior editor for <i>The Atlantic</i>, recently spoke with Bill about his new cover article for the magazine “<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/" target="_blank">The Case for Reparations</a>.” You can view the <a href="http://billmoyers.com/episode/facing-the-truth-the-case-for-reparations/" target="_blank">full interview here</a>, but we’ve also cut extra clips from their conversation, which were just too good to leave on the cutting room floor.<br />
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<b>The Elementary School Experience That Changed Him</b><br />
Coates recounts an after-school fight that he witnessed as a child in
which another child pulled out a gun in a 7-Eleven parking lot and
brandished it. “When you think about the moment that your world is
different, that was the moment,” Coates tells Moyers.<br />
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<b>On Black vs. White Neighborhoods</b><br />
Coates says to understand African-American communities today, you need to look at the legacy of our <a href="http://billmoyers.com/2014/05/21/living-apart-how-the-government-betrayed-a-landmark-civil-rights-law/">discriminatory housing policies</a>.
“We didn’t want integration … It’s not just white people being bigoted.
It’s not a disease of the heart. It is that we had certain policies
that guaranteed that that was going to be the result. And here we have
it.” Coates points to sociologist Patrick Sharkey’s research that finds
an African-American family earning $100,000 a year on average will live
in a neighborhood that is comparable to a white family that makes
$30,000 a year.<br />
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<b>On Chicago’s Scam Housing Loans</b><br />
The practice of redlining made it nearly impossible for most
African-Americans in Chicago to secure mortgages in the 1960s. “Contract
sellers” jumped in to fill the void giving eager first-time buyers an
opportunity to “purchase” a home under miserable terms, which led almost
all black families at the time to be evicted from their homes. Coates
explains that the “rinse and repeat” process of contract lending relied
on fear tactics to get white homeowners to sell.<br />
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<b>The Messages America Sends to Black Children </b><br />
Coates tells Moyers that African-American kids get messages from our
society — through television and community policing practices, for
example — that equates young black children to second-class citizens.
“You take a message if you’re living in New York and you’re walking down
the block and you’re regularly stopped and frisked,” Coates says.<br />
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<b>On America’s Heritage and Reparations</b><br />
Coates says that when Americans reflect on their collective history
they in effect, cherry pick, by only recognizing the past when it
flatters us. “We’re deluding ourselves. We are trying not to open our
bills. We only want to open our paychecks that come from the past. But
the bill is accumulating. And it’s all around us.”<br />
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<i>Featured
images: 1) Ta-Nehisi Coates 2) White homeowners in 1969 Chicago formed
block clubs, designed to keep the neighborhood white. Credit: AP
Photo/JLP 3) Civil rights marchers enter west-of-Chicago suburb in
Cicero, Ill., on September 4, 1966. Credit: AP Photo 4) Justin Williams,
6, center, waits with his grandmother Denise Robinson, left, before the
start of a silent march to end the “stop-and-frisk” program in New
York, Sunday, June 17, 2012. Credit: AP Photo/Seth Wenig 5)The Freedom
Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution, march with the colors
during the annual 4th of July Parade in The Woodlands, Texas. Credit: AP
Photo/Houston Chronicle, Brett Coomer </i><br />
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<span style="color: #783f04;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Eight Charts That Help Explain US Structural Racism</b></span></span> <i><span style="color: #660000;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>and Why Racial Equality Is a Myth in America</b></span></span></i><br />
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May 22, 2014</div>
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by <b><a href="http://billmoyers.com/author/lightj/" title="Posts by John Light">John Light</a></b></div>
<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Cover of The Case for Reparations" class="alignright size-medium wp-image-77661" data-lazy-loaded="true" src="http://cdn.billmoyers.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Atlantic-Cover-226x300.jpg" height="400" style="display: block;" title="Atlantic Cover" width="301" /></a>Ta-Nehisi Coates’ cover story at <i>The Atlantic</i>, “<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/" target="_blank">The Case for Reparations</a>,” published last night — and the subject of <a href="http://billmoyers.com/episode/facing-the-truth-the-case-for-reparations/" target="_blank">this week’s <i>Moyers & Company</i> interview</a>
— shows how dramatically the legacy of slavery and centuries of
legalized and institutionalized racism have held back our country’s
African-American population. In 2014, there still very much exists what
in 1967 Martin Luther King described as “<a href="http://billmoyers.com/2013/04/10/dr-king%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%9Ctwo-americas%E2%80%9D-truer-now-than-ever/" target="_blank">two Americas</a>,”
one “overflowing with the milk of prosperity and the honey of
opportunity,” the other tainted by “a daily ugliness … that constantly
transforms the buoyancy of hope into the fatigue of despair.”<br />
<br />
Last summer, America celebrated the 50th anniversary of the March on Washington, and this week marks the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2014/05/17/the-great-society-at-50/" target="_blank">50th anniversary</a>
of the beginning of President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society programs.
But in 2014, just as in the mid-1960s, which one of Dr. King’s two
Americas you live in likely depends on the color of your skin.<br />
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These charts show what those two Americas look like. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA_HqDKC60MFMH0SHLWnxsp3V3_GLcKvleFGHjHG1DMzrssrVWWokXuXD15c8RUPwmBX98_ZS4MDcp3GFsWZ0BPQvlS8DCdEdn1hXpWRbc7rT8LYRX87KYMFw_kk1Kb9ZhMskA/s1600/real-median-income.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjA_HqDKC60MFMH0SHLWnxsp3V3_GLcKvleFGHjHG1DMzrssrVWWokXuXD15c8RUPwmBX98_ZS4MDcp3GFsWZ0BPQvlS8DCdEdn1hXpWRbc7rT8LYRX87KYMFw_kk1Kb9ZhMskA/s1600/real-median-income.png" /></a></div>
For the last few decades, the median household income for
African-Americans has done little to catch up to that of whites. The
comparatively low incomes of Hispanic and black households is made
worse by the fact that across races, Americans are making less today
than they were in the year 2000.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNItVyoLKEgnRdNNi00nCy379s1urXM8WK8BjDqPqNoB_43Da-ZGnwTLQuGZtU0XfbXn90XtDw6rsijvp0CfZz00WMXAbETRIbttelXgN_HK7KYCkEA9bIltJmt78lDSgRi2kb/s1600/urbanInstitute_RacialWealthGap_FamilyWorthByRace_1983-2010.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNItVyoLKEgnRdNNi00nCy379s1urXM8WK8BjDqPqNoB_43Da-ZGnwTLQuGZtU0XfbXn90XtDw6rsijvp0CfZz00WMXAbETRIbttelXgN_HK7KYCkEA9bIltJmt78lDSgRi2kb/s1600/urbanInstitute_RacialWealthGap_FamilyWorthByRace_1983-2010.jpg" /></a></div>
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Median household income is just one measure of a given demographic’s economic wellbeing: as the <a href="http://www.urban.org/changing-wealth-americans/lost-generations-interactive-race.cfm" target="_blank">Urban Institute</a>
notes, the racial wealth gap is three times greater than the racial
income gap. Wealth is a measure of all the money a family has, as well
as assets — such as a house. In 1983, for every dollar held by the
average black or Hispanic family, the average white family had five.
Rather than shrinking, that gap has increased from the 1980s through
today; white families now have nearly six times as much as black
families.<br />
(<a href="http://www.demos.org/blog/5/22/14/ta-nehisi-reparations" target="_blank">Matt Bruenig does a good job delving further into this gap at Demos’ <i>Policy Shop</i> blog »</a>)<br />
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These divides put a far greater proportion of racial minorities below
the poverty line than whites. Today, about one in 10 white Americans
lives in poverty; compare that with roughly one in four
Hispanic-Americans and African-Americans. The Great Recession hit
minorities particularly hard, with poverty rising from 24.2 percent to
27.5 percent among African-Americans and 20.6 percent to 25.3 percent
among Hispanic-Americans between 2006 and 2011.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYxw2aSMt1Ks0JKGpSbE2r-9DPiKklafpW4O5jLQUmGk8PHK-LmJID-oGmysm2-tV_T6w7LGcKyz-N6Rv3n94Y41BoEKnsFNfij_sS-RRdi6F8VzFT8HLezSpgEwMgLQrAvmny/s1600/tumblr_m7p767Co2s1rvk3kyo1_500.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYxw2aSMt1Ks0JKGpSbE2r-9DPiKklafpW4O5jLQUmGk8PHK-LmJID-oGmysm2-tV_T6w7LGcKyz-N6Rv3n94Y41BoEKnsFNfij_sS-RRdi6F8VzFT8HLezSpgEwMgLQrAvmny/s1600/tumblr_m7p767Co2s1rvk3kyo1_500.jpg" height="640" width="539" /> </a></div>
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Racial poverty figures are even more stark when you look at child
poverty. Across racial demographics, children are more likely to live in
poverty than adults. But with racial minorities, the numbers are
striking: In 2011, 37.4 percent of black children and 34.1 percent of
Latino children lived in poverty. That’s more than a third of children
in both groups. (In 2011, a family of three was in “<a href="http://aspe.hhs.gov/poverty/11poverty.shtml" target="_blank">poverty</a>”
if it made less than $18,530 a year.) Compare that with 12.5 percent of
white children living in poverty — which is, of course, still a
depressingly high figure.</div>
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Research by the <a href="http://www.epi.org/publication/unfinished-march-overview/" target="_blank">Economic Policy Institute</a>,
a labor-oriented think tank, shows one of the drivers of the yawning
inequalities in the charts above: The unemployment rate among black
Americans has remained at least twice as high as that of white Americans
for 50 years. Back in 1963, the unemployment rate was 5 percent for
whites and 10.9 percent for blacks — or 2.2 times as high for blacks as
for whites. In 2012, it was 2.1 times as high (6.6 percent for whites,
14 percent for African-Americans) after 50 years of fluctuating more or
less between 2 and 2.5 times as high. <br />
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<br />
The structural racism behind these economic disparities takes many
forms; some can be quantified, and some cannot. One that can is the rate
of incarceration.<br />
<br />
Across races, a greater share of Americans are
imprisoned today than 50 years ago. But the increase has been more
dramatic among African-Americans. For every one white man out of 100,000
imprisoned in 1960, 2.6 are imprisoned today. For every one black man
out of 100,000 imprisoned in 1960, 3.3 are imprisoned today. Even
though, in 1960, there were still US states maintaining “separate but
equal” schools, disenfranchising African-Americans and barring
interracial marriage, a larger share of the black population is behind
bars today. According to the <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/09/06/incarceration-gap-between-whites-and-blacks-widens/" target="_blank">Pew Research Center</a>, for every white man in prison in 2010, 6.4 black men were in prison.<br />
<br />
(This,
argue many, is the legacy of the War on Drugs. “We have not ended
racial caste in America; we have merely redesigned it,” writes Michelle
Alexander in her book on the topic, <i><a href="http://billmoyers.com/content/book-excerpt-understanding-the-new-jim-crow/" target="_blank">The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness</a></i>.)<br />
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It’s been 60 years since the Supreme Court struck down the concept of “separate but equal” schools in <i>Brown v. Board of Education</i>,
but today, the majority of black students attend schools that are
majority non-white. The share of black students attending a
majority-non-white school today — 74.1 percent — is little changed from
figures from the 1960s. Nearly 40 percent of black children attend
schools that are almost entirely (more than 90 percent) non-white.<br />
-------------------------------------------------------------<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhohizjlb7rD5TGm4SlFj5q2uvb0Wqw-r2V3pW9lnaYhkeXPtfctzKmRywuHkdzUNs6FCQCkZnxgprbPrV9O3d3dhxzRGoUAp1etE9FqE_hFBvEnm0QrrdOaMqtkwZVkQrv0rLa/s1600/3f17196797c92a043652744b9b175e0a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhohizjlb7rD5TGm4SlFj5q2uvb0Wqw-r2V3pW9lnaYhkeXPtfctzKmRywuHkdzUNs6FCQCkZnxgprbPrV9O3d3dhxzRGoUAp1etE9FqE_hFBvEnm0QrrdOaMqtkwZVkQrv0rLa/s1600/3f17196797c92a043652744b9b175e0a.jpg" height="640" width="312" /></a></div>
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Housing
is another form of segregation with centuries of history in America.
Today, it is not always so overt as in the past — such as what Ta-Nehisi
Coates documents in mid-century Chicago in “<a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/05/the-case-for-reparations/361631/" target="_blank">The Case for Reparations</a>” — though, of course, housing-related racism is still ugly and overt often enough (see: <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/next-america/perspectives/donald-sterling-and-other-landlords-openly-discriminate-against-low-income-renters-20140522" target="_blank">Donald Sterling</a>).<br />
<br />
But
it takes insidious, harder-to-document forms too. The chart above shows
one of them: Latinos and African-Americans with good credit receive
high interest rate mortgages far more often than whites. These mortgages
are supposed to go to risky borrowers; because of their higher rates,
houses purchased with these mortgages are harder to pay off, and are
more likely to be foreclosed on. This phenomenon — giving <a href="http://www.epi.org/publication/latino-black-borrowers-high-rate-subprime-mortgages/" target="_blank">higher-rate, or subprime, mortgages to families of color</a>
who qualified for more traditional mortgages — was one of the reasons
why the housing bubble burst, which, in turn, helped set off the global
financial crisis.<br />
<br />
This phenomenon also helps explain why
minorities were hit harder by the Great Recession, and illuminates the
modern-day racism that keeps the wealth gap so strikingly wide.<br />
<br />
<div class="author-box clearfix">
<div class="pic">
<a href="http://billmoyers.com/author/lightj/"><img alt="" src="http://cdn.billmoyers.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/John-Light2_8438crop-150x150.jpg" height="81" width="81" /></a></div>
<div class="dek ">
<span style="color: #073763;"><span style="font-size: x-small;"><b>John Light</b> blogs and works on multimedia projects for <i>Moyers & Company</i>.
Before joining the Moyers team, he worked as a public radio producer
and a freelance writer and filmmaker. His work has been supported by
grants from The Nation Institute Investigative Fund and the Alfred I.
duPont-Columbia Awards, among others. A New Jersey native, John studied
history and film at Oberlin College and holds a master's degree in
journalism from Columbia University. Follow John on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/LightTweeting">@lighttweeting</a>.</span></span></div>
</div>
-------------------------------------------------<br />
<span style="background-color: #ffd966;"><br /></span>
<span style="background-color: #ffd966;"><b><span style="color: #0b5394; font-size: x-large;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-large;">Sister Callie House Led Early Push for Reparations</span></b></span><br />
<h6>
<div class="ody-arttime">
<span style="font-size: small;">Feb. 19, 2014- tennessean.com</span></div>
</h6>
<div class="ody-article">
<div class="ody-article-bodytext" id="article-bodytext">
<div class="ody-photo-port ody-photo" id="ody-mainphoto" style="position: relative; width: 300px;">
<div class="ody-bottomdiv" style="position: relative;">
<img alt="Callie House" src="http://cmsimg.tennessean.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?Site=DN&Date=20140219&Category=NEWS01&ArtNo=302190143&Ref=AR&MaxW=300&Border=0&Black-History-Month-Callie-House-led-early-push-reparations" />
</div>
<h6>
Callie House / New York Public Library</h6>
</div>
<div class="ody-bo-sm ody-port">
<div class="ody-byline">
<div id="ody-byline-written-by">
<h6>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Written by</span> Quint Qualls</span> <i><span style="font-size: small;">for The Tennessean</span></i></h6>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="ody-asset-breakout" id="ody-asset-breakout">
<div class="ody-facts-wrapper">
<div class="ody-bo-lg">
<h3>
<span style="color: purple;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">Callie House</span></span></h3>
<h3>
<span style="color: purple;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">• 1861-June 6, 1928 </span></span></h3>
<h3>
<span style="color: purple;"><span style="font-family: Verdana,sans-serif;">• Helped lead the movement for slave reparations</span></span> </h3>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div id="artpagination">
<div class="content-wrap" style="float: none;">
<div class="gel-content">
<div class="gel-pane gpagediv">
Callie House, born a slave in 1861, spearheaded the beginnings of
the reparations movements in Nashville 70 years before the civil rights
movement of the 1960s.<br />
<br />
At the end of the 19th century, House
joined with the Rev. Isaiah Dickerson to create the National Ex-Slave
Mutual Relief, Bounty and Pension Association. She resided in Nashville
in the area known as the Gulch and had five children with her husband,
Charlie House.<br />
<br />
The Jim Crow culture then prevalent in the South
didn’t stop House from demanding that money gained from seized rebel
cotton, which amounted to $68 million (more than $1.7 billion in 2012
dollars), be distributed to former slaves as repayment for centuries of
forced labor.<br />
<br />
Many black leaders during the pre-civil rights era
focused on education and quality, not the reparations movement.
Regardless, local association chapters sprung up across the country.
Monthly dues provided burial expenses for members and cared for those
who were sick and disabled. The group also worked on a national level to
lobby Congress for reparations legislation.<br />
<br />
Early in the 20th
century, Justice Department officials indicted House and other members
of the organization on charges of mail fraud after the reparations
movement began to lose momentum.<br />
She was convicted by an all-male,
all-white jury and sentenced to a year in prison. After her release,
she went back to work as a washerwoman.<br />
<br />
After her death in 1928, she was buried in an unmarked grave in Mount Ararat Cemetery in Nashville.<br />
======================================================<br />
<div class="sectionHeader width4 hasStrapline hasByLine">
<h1 style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d;">
Kara Walker interview:</span> </h1>
<h1 style="text-align: center;">
<i><span style="background-color: black;"><span style="color: white;">“The whole reason for refining sugar is to make it white” </span></span> </i></h1>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyKFrYC5r7BwV0q65XRXLGDIQgf_OY9hlDbTnKFJCmMvIM7U6JIsoLABTzs_fLeSgAWpFqZcdtxbCIeq2gs-5Svvok8sMPc6CSVKbt9JPsAzBsJCPLN1CrEkyI57bnNo8f2h0/s1600/20140517-145510.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyKFrYC5r7BwV0q65XRXLGDIQgf_OY9hlDbTnKFJCmMvIM7U6JIsoLABTzs_fLeSgAWpFqZcdtxbCIeq2gs-5Svvok8sMPc6CSVKbt9JPsAzBsJCPLN1CrEkyI57bnNo8f2h0/s1600/20140517-145510.jpg" /></a></div>
<h2 class="strapline" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #783f04;">The artist’s first public work evokes the not-so-sweet history of sugar and slavery--</span></h2>
<h2 class="strapline" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #783f04;"><span style="color: blue;">The Work: </span></span></h2>
<h3>
<span style="background-color: yellow;"><span style="color: red;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><b><i>Homage
to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes
from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion
of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant.</i></b></span> </span></span></span></h3>
<h2 class="strapline" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #783f04;"> </span></h2>
<div class="byLine">
<span class="author">
By <b>Paul Laster </b></span><b>
<span class="date"> </span></b></div>
<div class="byLine">
<span class="date">Tue May 6 2014- timeout.com</span>
</div>
</div>
<div class="imageAndText module imageAbove">
<div class="picture" style="width: 660px;">
<img alt="Karen Walker in front of her installation in progress at the Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn" class="photo lazy" src="http://media.timeout.com/images/101570929/660/370/image.jpg" data-src="http://media.timeout.com/images/101570929/660/370/image.jpg" height="370" style="display: inline;" width="660" />
<br />
<div class="overviewPictureCaption">
<span style="color: #274e13;"><i><b><span class="caption">Kara Walker in front of her installation in progress at the Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn</span></b></i></span>
<cite class="credit">Photograph: Alex Strada</cite> </div>
</div>
<br />
Since her graduate-school days at the Rhode Island School of
Design, Kara Walker has courted controversy with her provocative
exploration of slavery in America and its connection to present-day
issues involving race and gender. Her most notable efforts have been
cut-paper <a href="http://www.timeout.com/newyork/art/street-art-top-ten-spots-to-see-street-art-and-graffiti-in-nyc" target="_self">murals</a>,
done in the style of old portrait silhouettes, depicting antebellum
plantation life as a hellscape of violence and sexual abjection. Now
Walker is about to unveil her first <a href="http://www.timeout.com/newyork/art/public-art-the-ten-most-iconic-new-york-attractions" target="_self">public artwork</a>, commissioned for the former Domino Sugar Factory in <a href="http://www.timeout.com/newyork/brooklyn/williamsburg-brooklyn-neighborhood-guide" target="_self">Williamsburg</a>,
Brooklyn. The centerpiece of the project, which references the history
of slavery in the 19th-century sugar trade, is a mammoth female sphinx
created out of sugar. <i>Time Out New York</i> visited the artist on-site to get her take on the very bitter story behind the sweet stuff.<br />
<br />
<b>How did the antebellum South become such a major theme in your work?</b><br />
I
grew up partially around Stone Mountain, Georgia, and in that part of
the country, there was always this aura of mythology and palpable sense
of otherness about being a Southerner. I mean, <i>Gone with the Wind</i>
was playing 24/7 at Ted Turner’s Omni Center in Atlanta. So it’s only
natural that I found myself wanting to address the subject once I moved
north for school. <br />
<br />
<b>How did the Domino Sugar Factory project happen?</b><br />
[Presenting
organization] Creative Time called to say that they had this great site
for me, and Nato Thompson, the curator, mentioned in particular the
molasses-covered surfaces left in the factory. The image of the tar baby
popped into my head, and also this idea of a stickiness or residue that
doesn’t go away. I wanted to draw a bridge between themes—not just
between slavery and the sugar trade, but between industry and
waste—spawned by the fact that molasses is a by-product of processing
sugar. And for me, that represents a metaphor for identity formation.<br />
<br />
<b>You mean because the factory was originally built to refine brown sugar into white?</b><br />
Absolutely.
The whole reason for refining sugar is to make it white. Even the idea
of becoming “refined” seems to dovetail with the Western way of dealing
with the world.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTFk0COKGL5QtWvGnObCHVh1u12E3vPrc0yIdjdRbNi9Ly-VSj1bp2xsEHCLfwZgz-sVw4tzWCM7DF2JipiMkQGp78Jer3b78m2FPFGDSCovaPBKqyadpA8x7U-jpjUm9emHQ/s1600/panorama1_lowsmall_custom-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-s6-c30.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTFk0COKGL5QtWvGnObCHVh1u12E3vPrc0yIdjdRbNi9Ly-VSj1bp2xsEHCLfwZgz-sVw4tzWCM7DF2JipiMkQGp78Jer3b78m2FPFGDSCovaPBKqyadpA8x7U-jpjUm9emHQ/s1600/panorama1_lowsmall_custom-00c30c22c6f0e07d23f3799914f4e689c40f6201-s6-c30.jpg" height="244" width="640" /></a><br />
<b>How did you settle on using the symbol of a sphinx?</b><br />
In
Greek mythology the sphinx is a guardian of the city, a devourer of
heroes and the possessor of a riddle that maybe can’t be answered. The
factory is a modern-day ruin, and I think the sphinx contains the
various readings of history that the place represents. But she also
creates this aesthetic contrast of a white sugar object inside a dark,
molasses-encrusted space.<br />
<br />
<b>You’ve depicted her in a highly eroticized manner, with huge breasts and an exposed vagina.</b><br />
Well,
yes, she’s a woman, a bootylicious figure with something paradoxical
about her pose. She’s both a supplicant and an emblem of power. From the
front, she seems to hold her ground. But what you see from behind is
what happens when a nude woman bends over, raising a question of whether
it’s a gesture of sexual passivity or not. <br />
<br />
<b>You’ve also given her a very stern expression.</b><br />
One
of the things I discovered while researching the history of sugar is
that the packaging for molasses tended to relate back to slave lore.
There was Brer Rabbit Molasses, for instance, and also an Aunt Dinah
Molasses picturing a woman in a kerchief. But she wasn’t a smiling,
cookie-jar mammy. She had a severe look with a furrowed brow and smirk
on her face, so I guess I was thinking of that. <br />
<br />
<b>The title for the piece includes the phrase <i>A Subtlety</i>. What does that refer to?</b><br />
It’s
the name for sugar sculptures that were originally made for the tables
of Middle Eastern sultans before being adopted by European nobility. A
subtlety was a display of power and wealth to impress dinner guests. <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsLu2LHK6xxcshLEbroRdnlz0AzVbEGmFQtUkiP68gajrW4IsmJ3Hzu47s4Oe3bJQT0R0iFn5hyphenhyphen663XTwTkSX8dGH-V2qA1i0030TFeqclNY9nWn-m0QwhKsiAKgy6MgrppOI/s1600/10326447_1392982337653252_404686641_n.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsLu2LHK6xxcshLEbroRdnlz0AzVbEGmFQtUkiP68gajrW4IsmJ3Hzu47s4Oe3bJQT0R0iFn5hyphenhyphen663XTwTkSX8dGH-V2qA1i0030TFeqclNY9nWn-m0QwhKsiAKgy6MgrppOI/s1600/10326447_1392982337653252_404686641_n.jpg" height="640" width="640" /></a></div>
<br />
<b>So your sphinx is a giant subtlety.</b><br />
Yes,
but by being sexually overt, she’s not very subtle at all. She’s
discomfiting. And as far as the riddle she poses, it’s maybe answered in
her figure, though as I mentioned before, that only begets other
questions. <br />
<br />
<b>The sphinx is actually part of an ensemble
that includes a group of boys cast in molasses. What do they represent,
and what’s their overall function within the installation as a whole? </b><br />
They’re
her attendants, her children. They’re laborers and supplicants, and yet
also endearing portraits. They were based on contemporary gift items
made in China. <br />
<br />
<b>How does this project relate to the rest of your work?</b><br />
It’s
a departure for sure. Not the end of the other work, just an expansion
of my horizons. It still deals with the themes that interest me: race,
gender, sex and slavery.<br />
<br />
<b>The same real-estate developer
who will transform the site into condos is also a sponsor of your
project. Do you worry that your work is being used as part of the
gentrification process?</b><br />
I don’t see how that could succeed. I
have this fantasy that once the installation comes down, the sphinx’s
presence will somehow remain. That people will remember something
legendary happened here, and that the legend contained histories of
sugar and of slavery, and representations of femaleness and sweetness.
Sugar is so much a part of our world. It’s this kind of goddess who we
give ourselves over to.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6KbcDVMvW1U4RUff7hhp-648u-p-oCG2bjJcvCDviGQ29ixdYtJa3JUy3knJEF8Ly39Ew1Q-iE3IezvGHrU7D90HqP4iHCWXepw7E26D4O7QpHsJtk6k0wmxZq7xzwnIw5lg/s1600/kw5-8-14_082-0dbe6c3e6d28479a2f6c0b6e3c4e06cb82b6489e.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi6KbcDVMvW1U4RUff7hhp-648u-p-oCG2bjJcvCDviGQ29ixdYtJa3JUy3knJEF8Ly39Ew1Q-iE3IezvGHrU7D90HqP4iHCWXepw7E26D4O7QpHsJtk6k0wmxZq7xzwnIw5lg/s1600/kw5-8-14_082-0dbe6c3e6d28479a2f6c0b6e3c4e06cb82b6489e.jpg" height="478" width="640" /></a></div>
</div>
<h2>
<span style="color: #783f04;">See the exhibition- </span></h2>
<ol class="inner">
<li class="address">
<address>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b><a href="http://www.timeout.com/newyork/art/galleries/domino-sugar-factory">Domino Sugar Factory</a> </b></span></address>
<address>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>316 Kent Ave, at South 2nd St</b></span></address>
<span style="font-size: large;"><b>
</b></span></li>
<li class="date"><span style="font-size: large;"><b>
<span style="color: red;">Sat May 10 - Sun Jul 6</span></b></span>
</li>
</ol>
<h3>
<a href="http://www.timeout.com/newyork/art/kara-walker-a-subtlety-or-the-marvelous-sugar-baby">Kara Walker, "A Subtlety or The Marvelous Sugar Baby"</a></h3>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEils70iDPVIDH33siZlgQsHHWuvvf_L_IrIjnU2Po6KPMRftLcMulHuq3JTHn8KIFL6R9Jn6dru7a4viDNdseYQUDJrzYYCfV328P2sF8Lt1e1ME7Ykg7qXDXWWhfrBviJ9Fec/s1600/kara-walker-a-subtlety_16-1024x683.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEils70iDPVIDH33siZlgQsHHWuvvf_L_IrIjnU2Po6KPMRftLcMulHuq3JTHn8KIFL6R9Jn6dru7a4viDNdseYQUDJrzYYCfV328P2sF8Lt1e1ME7Ykg7qXDXWWhfrBviJ9Fec/s1600/kara-walker-a-subtlety_16-1024x683.jpg" /></a></div>
<h3>
<span style="font-weight: normal;">The very long subtitle of Walker's first ever public-art project reads an <b><i>Homage
to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined our Sweet tastes
from the cane fields to the Kitchens of the New World on the Occasion
of the demolition of the Domino Sugar Refining Plant.</i></b></span> </h3>
<h3>
<span style="font-weight: normal;">While the
word artisan is a bit vague, the subject of sugar is certainly in
keeping with the artist's career-long investigation of the historical
wages of slavery and racism. Sugar was a key leg of the so-called
triangle trade that traversed the Atlantic between the 16th and 19th
centuries, as European slavers brought their human cargo to the
Caribbean in exchange for molasses, which was then transported back to
the Continent to be made into rum. Meanwhile, the subtlety of the title
refers to sugar sculptures that once adorned the tables of the rich and
powerful in Medieval Europe—which, given the rarity and expense of the
substance at the time, were meant as displays of wealth. Accordingly,
Walker's project for the old Domino Sugar factory in Williamsburg,
Brooklyn centers on a giant female sphinx made of the sweet stuff.
Although the installation relates to the site's past, it retains a
sphinxlike silence about the location's future as a complex of office
and residential towers along the Williamsburg waterfront. </span> </h3>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-1145988407163515752006-04-25T11:05:00.000-07:002006-04-25T11:06:47.316-07:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/slavechain%20N%20Map.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 235px; height: 235px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/slavechain%20N%20Map.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">A NATIONAL</span> STRATEGIC </span></span><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">PLAN</span></span></span> <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">2006-2010<br />======================<br /><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">WE WELCOME COMMENTS</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">GREETINGS,</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">ADVOCATES</span></span><br /></div><br />This is a blog set up to discuss the Reparations Movement. It will begin with the National Strategic Reparations Plan that was the follow-up consequence of the National Reparations Congress gathering held in Compton, California, 2004, involving over 50 reparations organizations from over 36 American cities.<br /><br />We expect participants on this blog to read the NSRP, and comment on it/critique it, and talk about how we can implement it. In order to win reparations in the USA, we must have a strategic, unified and unifying plan.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">D</span>L<span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">H</span><br />=============================================<br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">A NATIONAL</span> STRATEGIC </span></span><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">PLAN</span></span></span> <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">2006-2010</span></span><br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">The Documentary Result of<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">THE <span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">NATIONAL</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">CONGRESS</span></span><br />Held in Compton/Los Angeles, California<br />MAY 28-31, 2004<br /><br />PRESENTED AND COMPILED BY<br />THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT OF<br />SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">==============</span><br /></div> <div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA</span><br />REPRESENTING THE PLANNING COMMITTEE FOR THE<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">NATIONAL</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">CONGRESS</span></span><br />PRESENTS<br />A NATIONAL STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN<br />2005-2010<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">www.reparationunitedfront.org </span><br />(310) 967-5871<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">----------------------------------</span> </div><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">In order to be effective and credible, any action plan---a battle plan, architectural plan, educational growth and development plan, etc.--- must have, at minimum, the five components immediately listed below:</span><br /><br />A. A clear view of the relevant issue/problem to be dealt with or corrected.<br />B. A fairly accurate depiction of what has been attempted before, if anything,<br />to deal with this issue/problem.<br />C. Why dealing with this issue/problem is necessary.<br />D. An operational definition of the issue at hand.<br />E. Specific steps to take to handle/correct the issue or problem.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">CONTENTS OF A NATIONAL</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN (NSRP)</span><br /></div><br />I. Rationale For the Plan<br />II. Five Principle Goals For The National Reparations Effort<br />III. The Operational Definition Of Reparations for African Americans<br />IV. Broad Tactics For Short-Term Goals<br />1. Youth/Students<br />2. Churches/Mosques<br />3. Black Fraternal and Social Organizations<br />4. Education<br />(a) Public/Charter<br />(b) Higher Education<br />5. Community-based Organizations<br />6. Entertainment Industry<br />(a) Record Industry<br />(b) Movies/T-V/Cable<br />(c) Pro Athletes<br />7. Business Community<br />8. Legal Community (Including the Black Political Prisoners Issue)<br />9. Legislative/Governmental Community<br />10. Mass Media<br /><br />V. Broad Tactics For Long-Term Goals<br />VI. Needs And Resources To Achieve Effective Implementation And<br />Success Of This Plan<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" > <span style="font-weight: bold;">I. RATIONALE FOR THE PLAN</span></span><br /><br />At this historical time towards the end of 2004, the <span style="font-weight: bold;">Reparations Movement</span><br />needs to move to the level of regional and national strategic reparations plans. Why?<br /><br />As long as the primary aim of the<span style="font-weight: bold;"> Reparations Movement</span> is actually to achieve reparations, the momentum forward towards that goal will either be through divine intervention (usually called accidents, miracles, or dumb luck) or through carefully thought-out strategic steps by Reparations Movement organizers and planners.<br /><br />Spiritual intervention will occur, whenever it does, in its own timing and is not in<br />our control. The strategic implementation of group tactics is.<br /><br />For the past five years or so, we have had hundreds of meetings, Town Halls,<br />gatherings, sit-downs, conferences, and one congress to engage reparationists in<br />discussions of what needs to be done, who needs to do it, and how it needs to be<br />done. We have had over fifteen mass market books, more than five hundred printed<br />articles, and at least twenty websites publicly distributed that deal specifically with<br />aspects of the <span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">African American Reparations Movement</span>, and, frequently, with the<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">International Reparations Movement.</span><br /><br />During this time, we have filed over twenty-five new reparations cases nationwide and have not yet achieved a single legal victory, including the flagship Tulsa (Greenwood), Oklahoma case. The nine cases brought to the Chicago federal district court in a consolidated package, including a California state case, were dismissed early in 2004. Eight of the cases were amended and re-considered, but as of December of the same year, the attorneys for the cases fully expected them to be rejected again by the same judge. The California case, brought on the basis of slavery and its legacy being an unfair business practice, sought to be remanded and will probably be adjudicated separately in 2005. Hopes for success are very dim since in November, 2004, California voters substantially weakened the unfair practices law. Additionally, according to a recent <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span> study by Wautella and Kibibi, we have gotten more than twenty-eight city councils and at least three state legislatures to pass public resolutions which support U.S. Congressman John Conyers’ H.R. 40 bill to study the reparations issue. Still the bill languishes in obscurity, continually left off the agenda of the House Judiciary Committee on which Mr. Conyers sits as the senior member. The bill is barely alive and is essentially on life support with less than fifty congressional sponsors and no companion bill pending in the Senate.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span>, the most recognizable reparations group in the USA, has had at least five annual conferences during the period, and several special gatherings, including two important leadership roundtables . The <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span> series of reparations leadership meetings, called the “Great Sit-downs,” were created by Dr. Conrad Worrill of the National Black United Front, in association with Minister Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, and has been held at least four times, twice in 2003, and twice in 2004. Chicago Alderwoman Dorothy Tillman’s National Reparations Convention has also met annually since 2000, and the Reparations United Front of Southern California, in association with the Compton College BSU and the NRC National Planning Group, produced and held the first National Reparations Congress, which was a gathering of reparations activists from across the U.S., in the early summer of 2004. The Millions for Reparations committee, spearheaded by Viola Plummer of the December 12th Movement and Conrad Worrill of NBUF, held a national reparations rally in Washington, D.C. in August, 2002, and numerous other organizations have held panel discussions, Town Halls, Teach-ins, Black History Month lectures, etc., to spread the Reparations Movement word.<br /><br />But with notable exceptions, the Black Church remains uninterested and<br />uninvolved in the Movement. The traditional civil rights groups, with the exception<br />of the local Political Action Committees of the NAACP, have eschewed any real<br />commitment to or involvement in the Movement. Similarly, American youth and<br />students, except on scattered occasions, have thus far not been motivated by or interested in the Reparations Movement to any significant degree. The Masons, Shriners, Elks,<br />Eastern Stars, Black fraternities and sororities, and most Hollywood celebrities,<br />except Transafrica Chairman Danny Glover, have shown little knowledge and given virtually no attention to the Movement, save the snide jokes of Cedric the Entertainer<br />in “Barber Shop,” and Chris Rock in his monologues.<br /><br />A Black political movement, once achieved, cannot be sustained with the continued absence of the above components. Some advocates say that the Movement currently needs a charismatic, M.L. King-like leader; some say there must be a single, credible reparations organization that can be depended on to take us forward. These ideas, while critically important, are for another document. Here, the point is made that one of the central components necessary for this stage of the Reparations Movement is a set of regional strategic plans with common principles and goals, and a single, unifying national strategic reparations plan. There have been great and profound speeches made, some brilliant ideas and projects offered and discussed by well-meaning reparationists, and a few activities actually carried through to completion, like the <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span>’s grass roots petition campaign to Congress, and <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span>’s Black Fridays, and the Year of Black Presence, among others.<br /><br />But what is crystal clear when contemplating all that has been said and done in the last five years of this Movement is that while there has certainly been a great deal of talk accompanied by a number of important visions of things to come, there has been very little evidence of organized, strategic follow through.<br /><br />The Reparations Movement currently hovers at another of its many crossroads. An increasing number of committed and dedicated Western States’ activists who have invested a lot of time, money, energy and thought to the Movement are now constantly in high frustration mode and they cannot see any light at the end of the tunnel. Many of them are thinking of moving on to other things and issues. To help us re-invigorate them and provide an impetus for choosing the right path forward and to avoid the road to perdition, it is clear that the Movement must now have many more reparations chess players and less folk who merely talk a good game. At this critical time, there must be the coming to the fore of the strategic planners and organizers.<br /><br />The following document, which is unequivocally a product both of the National<br />Reparations Congress held in Los Angeles/Compton, California in May, 2004, and the<br />flow of ideas discussed at the <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA </span><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Leadership Roundtable</span> in June, 2004, in<br />Washington, D.C., and the two <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span>s held in Houston, Texas and Baltimore,<br />Maryland in 2004, is the <span style="font-weight: bold;">NRC National Strategic Reparations Plan</span>. It is a five year roadmap to be implemented regionally to accomplish the reparations goals of the African American population. We expect each region of the country to do its part, and the accumulated total should be the overall reparations victory that Black folk in this country, and in the world, deserve.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/Set%20Free-%20Ed%20Lam.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 509px; height: 226px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/Set%20Free-%20Ed%20Lam.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >II. FIVE PRINCIPAL GOALS FOR</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >THE NATIONAL REPARATIONS PLAN</span><br /></div><br />All activity, projects, tasks and efforts identified in this reparations plan are to ensure<br />the accomplishment of the following principal goals:<br /><br />• The raising of the level of consciousness concerning reparations to<br />a critical mass of African Americans in each region of the USA---to wit, each reparations group in various parts of the country should dedicate itself to ensuring that reparations will be on the lips and in the conversations of all Black folk in the<br />organizing realm of that group.<br /><br />• The organization, coordination and implementation of selective economic<br />boycotts to gain bargaining leverage concerning reparations.<br /><br />• The planning, coordination and implementation of a national legal strategy.<br /><br />• The planning, coordination and implementation of a broader political/<br />legislative strategy than H.R. 40 alone.<br /><br />• The establishment, coordination and implementation of regional Slave<br />Remembrance and Restitution Funds that will eventually merge into a national<br />SRR Fund..<br /><br />III. THE OPERATIONAL DEFINITION FOR BLACK AFRICAN AMERICAN<br />REPARATIONS AS THE BASIS FOR A NATIONAL STRATEGIC<br />REPARATONS PLAN PUT FORTH IN THIS DOCUMENT 1<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">EXTERNAL REPARATIONS</span><br /><br />(A) GOVERNMENTAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT, APOLOGY, ATONEMENT, AND COMPENSATION FOR ITS PARTICIPATION IN THE SEIZURE AND MISUSE OF VALUABLE PROPERTY --LABOR PROPERTY--TAKEN FROM BLACK AFRICAN AMERICANS WHO WORKED AS SLAVES BETWEEN 1775-18652 IN THIS COUNTRY, USING THAT ILL-GOTTEN PROPERTY TO UNJUSTLY ENRICH THIS COUNTRY AND HELP IT BECOME THE GREAT NATION IT IS TODAY, ALL WITHOUT FAIRLY COMPENSATING THOSE AFRICAN AMERICANS OR THEIR DESCENDANTS FOR THE DELIBERATE LOSS OF SAID LABOR PROPERTY;<br /><br />(B) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING THE ATONEMENT) FOR THE 140-YEAR SET OF GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ACTIVITIES CALLED JIM CROWISM AND BLACK SEGREGATION (INCLUDING THE LYNCHING, MURDERING AND RAPING OF BLACK PEOPLE, AND THE RAZING OF BLACK TOWNSHIPS) ALL OF WHICH RELEGATED AFRICAN AMERICANS TO THE BOTTOM RUNGS OF SOCIETY;<br /><br />(C) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING ATONEMENT) AT FAIR MARKET VALUE FOR CONTINUING GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ANTI-BLACK SOCIO-POLITICAL-ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES THAT HAVE DEPRIVED AFRICAN AMERICANS OF RESPECT AND THEIR RIGHTFUL HONORED PLACE IN USA SOCIETY.<br />INTERNAL REPARATIONS<br />(NOTE: <span style="font-style: italic;">Internal Reparations does not absolve, excuse or dilute the responsibility of the various U.S. governmental components nor American corporations viz-a-viz Black Americans and what is owed us. However, our redemption is both</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">external and internal and will not occur without our taking responsibility for</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">part of our own healing.</span>)<br /><br />(D) BLACK ASSESSMENT AND IDENTIFICATION OF THOSE NEGATIVE AND DEBILITATING ASPECTS OF OUR COMMUNITIES THAT WE CAN MOBILIZE AND ORGANIZE OUR EFFORTS TO REPAIR, REFORM AND CORRECT FOR OUR OWN BENEFIT.<br /><br />(E) THE FORMULATION OF ACTION PLANS—BOTH SHORT-TERM AND LONG-TERM---TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEMS AND NEGATIVE ASPECTS ASSESSED AND IDENTIFIED, AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THOSE PLANS.<br /><span style="font-size:130%;"> <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">A STRAIGHTFORWARD BREAKDOWN</span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">WHAT REPARATIONS IS: </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">(Based on our continuing veneration of and connection to our African and African descendent ancestors)</span><br /><br />1. It is our race-based quest for justice in America.<br /><br />2. It is our race-based quest for the restoration and redemption of our<br />dignity and positive worth as a people in this country and on this<br />planet.<br /><br />3. It is our relentless quest to achieve respect for simply being Black<br />people in this country and in this world. The single collective<br />existence of Black people in America and on this planet is one<br />of common, habitual and omnipresent disrespect. From that core<br />(a nurtured product of white supremacy) all else that ails us comes.<br /><br />4. It is the race-based quest for an Apology (to our Ancestors)--An<br />Atonement (to demonstrate the sincerity or at least the seriousness<br />of the Apology)--and Compensation (in some form decided by Black<br />people in the USA).<br /><br />5. It is the race-based quest to heal this country of its racist past and<br />present, and to provide a viable, non-racist alternative for this<br />country's future.<br /><br />6. It is the accumulation of overwhelming bushels of evidence,<br />including personal testimony, property records and deeds, financial<br />profits and transactions, historical documentation and a clear<br />sense of righteous indignation together balled up into tight, steel-<br />trap arguments that will compel victory in the foreseeable future.<br /><br />7. It is a national/regional struggle in the USA that is closely<br />intertwined with a global reparations struggle against vestiges of<br />colonialism and capitalist exploitation. A reparations victory<br />anywhere will show the way for reparations victories everywhere!!<br /><br />8. It is both an Internal struggle for us to redeem and rescue<br />ourselves, and an External struggle to exact acknowledgement,<br />apology and atonement for this country's long-term abuse and<br />exploitation of Black people.<br /><br />9. It is a demand for the release and return of our Black political<br />prisoners.<br /><br />10. It is logical, it is correct, and it is winnable.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">WHAT REPARATIONS IS NOT:</span><br />1. It is not a plea for a hand-out, another welfare program, nor an extortion plot to fleece White folk. Reparations is not solely an economics issue—we cannot buy the respect that is due us.<br /><br />2. It is not a substitute for regular and ordinary social programming done by the USA government.<br /><br />3. It is not a far-out fantasy of the lunatic fringe.<br /><br />4. It is not an issue that Black folk will simply forget and "get over it."<br /><br />5. It is not going to be won by trying to solve all our problems at once.<br />We must focus our efforts.<br /><br />6. It is not the panacea for all Black problems, but it is the beginning of our being able to end those ills that have kept us down for so long.<br /><br />7. It will not cause more racial friction; it will finally allow racial healing in America.<br /><br />8. It is not a struggle that can be won by one segment of the Black population in the USA. To win, we need a coming together of virtually all segments of the Black population.<br /><br />9. It is not a struggle for the lazy and one-time participant. To win this struggle we must be relentless for reparations.<br /><br />10. It is not a struggle that will be won by emotion, zeal, righteousness and passion alone. We must have continuous strategic planning, common sense, mother wit and mutual respect to get this done.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/slavegrafix.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 322px; height: 409px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/slavegrafix.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>_________________________________________________________<br />1 The Operational Definition of reparations, which is the basis of this NSR Plan, was developed and submitted by The Reparations Research & Advocacy Group, Los Angeles, California and enhanced by suggestions from participants and Planning Group members for the National Reparations Congress, Los Angeles/Compton, California, 2004); approved and adopted by the RUF membership, September, 2004.<br /><br />This Operational Definition is a complement to the current conceptual definitions of reparations regularly referred to in the Reparations Movement. Conceptual definitions, while very important for envisioning the “big picture” of a process, are essentially generalized notions or ideas about an issue, thing or activity. It is rare for conceptual definitions<br />to be adequate or very useful when it’s time for real work.<br /><br />The most accepted concept of reparations in the Movement, for example, is that it is equivalent to repairing the Black community. Whether it is ‘repairing a wrong or an injury, or repairing the community back to wholeness,’ the idea of repair presupposes an original condition of non-injury, non-wrong, non-damaged when we were whole and healthy, or when we existed in efficient, harmonious operation or normal relations.<br /><br />But exactly when was that in the African American Experience? Was it back in various West African villages that we are still trying to find our DNA connections to? Was it during the Maafa/Transatlantic Slave Trade? Was it during the heyday of several successful Black towns in America before their Rosewood and Greenwood-like devastation by enraged white citizens and surrounding governments? Was it during the bullwhip days of chattel slavery in America? During Jim Crow days after the Civil War?<br /><br />During the era of Emmit Till and the Civil Rights Movement? In reality, there exists no clarity in the Reparations Movement about what historical period we are referring to when demanding repair. That makes it amorphous and virtually impossible to focus on and achieve. That is characteristic of conceptual definitions.<br /><br />Operational definitions are more specific, pragmatic, clarifying articulations of a process, thing or activity and can be more readily put into tangible action.<br /><br />The NRC NSRPlan respectfully recognizes and acknowledges the following two aspects of the current conceptual definitions of Reparations, one international, the other national:<br /><br />(a) The Van Boven Report, 1989, representing the U.N. Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, stated that, “Reparations includes restitution, compensation, rehabilitation and, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition. Restitution refers to measures such as restoration of liberty, family life, citizenship, return to one’s place of residence and, return of property. These measures seek to re-establish the situation that existed prior to the violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Compensation refers to monetary compensation for any economically assessable damage resulting from violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Rehabilitation includes medical and psychological care as well as legal and social services. Satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition includes, inter alia, an apology (including public acknowledgement of the facts and acceptance of responsibility) and, measures to prevent recurrence of the violations.” This quote is from “International Law Obligations to Provide Reparations for Human Rights Abuses,” by Antonio Buti, Murdoch University School of Law, as provided by The Afrikan American Institute For Policy Studies and Planning, Greenville, South Carolina.<br /><br />(b) N’COBRA’s conceptual definition of reparations is, “Payment of a debt owed; the act of repairing a wrong or injury; to atone for wrongdoings; to make amends; to make one whole again; the payment of damages; to repair a nation; compensation in money, land, or materials for damages.”<br /><br />2Although it is more regularly asserted that American slavery began for Black folk either in 1619 with the landing of the Dutch slave ship in Jamestown, or 1661-1664, when Maryland, and then Virginia, made slavery a specifically color-coded thing, the dates here refer to the birth and legal establishment of America (the USA) as an independent and “sovereign” country in 1775-77, with the Second Continental Congress’ declaration of the United States of America, the writing of America’s first Constitution (the Articles of Confederation), and the Declaration of Independence. Colonial America—1607-1775-- was “owned” and<br />regulated by England and English companies..<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/scars%20of%20slavery.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 305px; height: 401px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/scars%20of%20slavery.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">_________________________________________________________<br /></div><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">IV. BROAD TACTICS FOR SHORT-TERM REPARATIONS GOALS IN THE</span> <span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">REGION</span></span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> (NOTE: These are activities that can and should be completed within one year or less)</span><br /><br />Youth/Students should<br />(1) Disseminate the word to all college/university campuses, public and<br />charter schools, that for Black History Month Activities, Feb. 2005, for<br />Black graduation dinners and seminars, periodic campus guest speaker<br />events, graduation speakers, etc., bring in reparations speakers. (See<br />www.reparationunitedfront.org for a list of solid reparations speakers)<br /><br />(2) Make sure that for all upcoming student conferences, 2004-2005, where<br />there will be Black attendance, reparations – in its international and/or national dimensions— will be discussed somewhere on the agenda.<br /><br />(3) Make sure that in all regional areas that have Black-Africana-Pan African-<br />African American Studies programs or departments, students should try to<br />get professors to set up reparations classes, colloquia or seminars to discuss<br />the issue, or else incorporate the topic into their current course syllabi. BSU<br />and ASU-type meetings should initiate dialogue on the issue, do student<br />debates regarding the issue, and/or coordinate student-faculty retreats to<br />discuss reparations, among other ideas.<br /><br />(4) Set up book clubs on reparations to keep current with the increasing literature<br />on the topic<br /><br />(5) Buy and support rap/hip-hop artists and other talents who push the reparations<br />issue, and request reparations songs to be played on the radio, including<br />campus radio shows.<br /><br />(6) Make sure that in all church, mosque, community group, and campus cultural<br />activities (e.g. theater, poetry, dance, singing, step shows, etc.) that students<br />and youth are involved in, they push for the reparations issue to be included<br />in the activities in some way.<br /><br />(7) Find out whether your campus—high school or college/university—was<br />built by slaves or founded by investors who made money from slavery or<br />the slave trade. If your research shows either to be the case, demand a campus<br />memorial or other kind of recognition of that fact.<br /><br />(8) Find a distinctive tactic that appeals to youth and students and spread it<br />(e.g., Rap-ins, where students consistently stand in front of classroom<br />buildings, on the campus lawns, or in the campus Quads, and do short rap/<br />spoken word pieces on reparations); Challenge-ins, where students select<br />certain social science or humanities classes and, with the professor’s<br />permission, challenge the particular class to a reparations debate, etc.).<br /><br />(9) Set up a student reparations response team on every campus to immediately<br />produce a written rebuttal to any Horowitz-type campus or community<br />newspaper article/opinion piece on reparations.<br /><br />(10) Put out flyers and leaflets promoting the various pro-reparations arguments.<br />Take out ads in the campus and community newspapers supporting and advocating reparations.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Churches, Mosques</span><br /><br />(1) Investigate the scheduling of all upcoming church conventions and<br />conferences where policy resolutions and substantial discussion will be<br />allowed. Get on the agenda (contact whatever ministers, program<br />coordinators, or planning committees that are in charge and negotiate<br />participation) and get reparations resolutions written and passed in all<br />available regional denominations of the Black Church.<br /><br />(2) Try to get church and mosque ministers to let your best reparations<br />speakers do a Black History Month sermon during February, 2005.<br /><br />(3) During Sunday School, use Bible verses and stories that promote<br />reparations (See www.reparationunitedfront.org for relevant Bible verses.)<br /><br />(4) For churches and community groups that have Kwanzaa celebrations in the<br />region, get the reparations issue into the discussion topics.<br /><br />(5) Whenever churches have youth choirs, theater/drama activities, teen<br />development/rites of passage activities, get the reparations issue discussed<br />in those venues through skits, songs, and other techniques.<br /><br />(6) Get the adult choirs—particularly on Men’s Day, Women’s Day or other<br />special activities—to do something on reparations. Find a reparations-oriented song, write one, or have one written for the choirs. Be creative and get this done.<br /><br />(7) Work with any and all NOI mosques in the area to push the reparations issue. Have panel discussions at the mosques, when allowed, and find other ways of helping all mosque members to become highly knowledgeable about the reparations issue.<br /><br />(8) If a Second Million Man March is organized, reparations groups should work<br />closely with mosques and other interested groups to ensure the success of that effort, and to ensure a prominent role is made on the agenda for discussion of the National and International Reparations Movement.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Black Fraternal Organizations and Related Activities</span><br /><br />(1) If you are or you know a member of the Masons (three or four letter),<br />Shriners, Eastern Stars, Elks, Moose Lodge, or any other similar<br />organization, find a way of getting the reparations issue put into the<br />organization’s newsletter, get it on the agenda of lodge and temple<br />meetings, annual conferences, etc. Get the Masons and other similar<br />groups to endorse the Reparations Movement.<br /><br />(2) If you are or you know a member of a Black Greek organization, get<br />the issue of reparations on the group’s agenda at any and all meetings<br />that are available for such public discussion. Get the organization to<br />sponsor reparations projects. Discuss the issue in the organization’s<br />newsletter or bulletin.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Education</span><br /></div><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">PUBLIC SCHOOLS/CHARTER SCHOOLS</span><br />(1) Engage PTAs in discussions about the reparations issue and how it can<br />be incorporated into regional school work.<br /><br />(2) Get a small group of concerned individuals together and offer $100-<br />500 rewards for the best student essays on the reparations issue during<br />Black History Month, MLK festivities, and any other time the issue can<br />be pushed.<br /><br />(3) Get reparations storytellers, dramatic skits, singing groups/rap groups,<br />etc., to bring the issue of reparations to as many schools as possible<br />during Black History Month, graduation ceremonies, and any other<br />available times. There will always be current and retired teachers who<br />are resident in our communities. Converse with them about how best<br />to achieve these ends; use their expertise.<br /><br />(4) Pass out, whenever it’s allowable, the reparations one-sheets to kinder-<br />garteners, 1-6 graders, middle school students and high school students.<br />There are one-sheets specifically designed for each broad grade level<br />in the Appendix to this plan. For example: (Intended for Kindergarteners<br />and First Graders—Can Be Recited or Sung)<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">=======================</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);"><br />KNOW WHAT?</span><br /><br />There was a man<br />Who worked real hard<br />He got no pay<br />But his back got scarred<br /><br />There was a young girl<br />With dreams and things<br />Did what she was told<br />But sold for string<br /><br />There was a woman<br />They worked her to death<br />She fed their children<br />Hers got hung for theft<br /><br />There was an owner<br />Had lots of farm hands<br />Took away our freedom<br />Still owes us some land<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">========================</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">HIGHER EDCATION</span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">(See Youth/Students, Section A in the Plan)</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Community-based Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) Whatever group you are a member of, get the reparations issue on the<br />agenda as many times as possible. Try to get guest speakers to come<br />in and talk about the relevance of the reparations issue and the mission<br />of your group. Get the group to sponsor at least one reparations Town<br />Hall or to fully participate in one put on by another community group.<br />Pass out reparations one-sheets and other literature as often as possible.<br /><br />(2) Choose a reparations project—Internal or External—that is appropriate<br />and relevant to your group, and drum up support within your group for<br />the project to be done. (For example, sponsor or sell a reparations<br />calendar, reparations pins, stickers, do a community debate on reparations,<br />coordinate a candidates’ forum that deals with the issue, etc.)<br /><br />(3) We must help to complete and disseminate the results of the regional and<br />national survey of Black folk on what form of reparations they want.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Entertainment Industry</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(1) Record Industry</span><br />a. Locate and support any conscious rappers, hip hop or r&b<br />artists who are willing to make reparations-oriented records. That<br />means buying the cds/dvds, attending any concerts given by them,<br />and helping to arrange engagements at schools, community outlets, etc.<br />b. Do a letter-writing campaign to Russell Simmons, Puff Daddy, and<br />other record moguls, requesting reparations tracks and albums from<br />some of their artists.<br />c. If talented enough, start your own reparations singing/rap group and<br />make the rounds of community shows, university programs, etc,<br />spreading the word.<br />d. Secure copies of Prince’s “When Will We Be Paid” (a re-make of the<br />Staples Singers’ 1970’s song), and any other dance-ready reparations<br />jam. There are several out there. Take them with you when you go<br />to parties and ask the DJ to play one or two of them. At any parties or<br />social gatherings that you host that include music, play one or more<br />reparations tunes.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(2.) Movies/T-V/Cable</span><br />a. Locate and secure any previously produced movies, t-v shows or cable shows that deal with reparations. Get copies of them and prepare them to be shown at free public gatherings on reparations.<br /><br />For any such shows that will be broadcast in the future or made into films, have someone in your organization designated to scour the entertainment trades for this information and have a mailing list/ telephone tree already prepared for quick dissemination of broadcast times, theater bills, etc.<br /><br />b .Seek out one or more Hollywood celebrities who will support<br />the Reparations Movement and negotiate with them on how they<br />can best help move us forward.<br />c. Produce and find ways to air as many times as possible Public<br />Service announcements on the Reparations Movement. Do this<br />on radio and t-v.<br />d. Find a way to produce and regularly broadcast a cable t-v program<br />on the Reparations Movement in your local area.<br />e. Do as many t-v/radio/cable interviews on the Reparations Movement<br />as possible. Try to get on the Steve Harvey Morning Show, Tavis<br />Smiley, etc. Be prepared and have something cogent to say.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(3). Pro Athletes</span><br />a. Locate either the agents of conscious pro athletes, or other accessible contacts and set up meetings with them to discuss the significance of the Reparations Movement. Give them tangible ways to help--- financial support, making a public service comment, underwriting<br />a reparations gathering, talking to their friends about the Reparations Movement, etc.---rather than have an informal chat that meanders nowhere.<br />b. Once a particular area or region has done an assessment of what projects can be successfully accomplished by ourselves in terms of Internal Reparations, ask for specific help from the conscious pro athlete(s) you have successfully contacted.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Business Community</span><br /><br />(1) Articles have to be written and published making the case for the<br />African American business community to embrace the Reparations<br />Movement. One-sheets have to be prepared. The articles must<br />demonstrate how the achievement of African American reparations<br />will benefit all of us, including Black businesses. The articles must<br />get into the local newspapers, and businesses should be asked to allow<br />the reparations one-sheets to be left on their counters for clients<br />coming in.<br /><br />(2) Reparations exhibits, including brochures, videos, one-sheets, etc.,<br />should be prepared and displayed at any annual Black Business<br />Expositions, as regularly occurs in Los Angeles and other regional cities.<br /><br />(3) Lectures should be prepared on ‘Reparations and the Black Business<br />Community,’ for presentations at conferences, Business Roundtables,<br />Black Business Student Association meetings, etc.<br /><br />(4) Within the next 12 months, the Black Business community should<br />get prepared for a series of rolling economic boycotts by Black<br />customers of predominately White-owned businesses in the Black<br />community.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Legal Community</span><br /><br />(1) The national and regional Black attorneys interested in reparations should meet and agree on a common legal strategy for achieving reparations. Filing scattered, individual lawsuits is not working. One or more of these attorneys should take the initiative and set up the series of meetings necessary to accomplish this legal strategy goal. There law students<br />(BALSA students, for example) who are very interested in working along with those who pursue this approach.<br /><br />(2) The regional reparations attorneys should help set up and run the Slave Reparations Remembrance and Restitution Fund. This may have to begin as a California state fund first to provide a positive model for how it can work regionally, then nationally.<br /><br />(3) There should be an historical search, state-wide and regionally, for fully-supportable legal reasons to file briefs for reparations. For example, the investigation of the illegal slave trade and slave ownership in California after 1850 and its impact on unfair business practices in the state is a current issue needing focused attention in order to be completed.<br /><br />(4) Conduct legal research on whether states have violated their own public education laws and their duty to educate Black citizens. That may be another grounds for legal redress. Also address the tobacco industry and its unpaid Black labor issue.<br /><br />(5) Those who are expert on the issue of Black Political Prisoners should get that issue on the national legal strategies agenda for reparations so that we can continue progressive work on that issue.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Legislative/Governmental Community</span><br /><br />(1) Work towards getting H.R. 40 passed, including passing out information sheets, and trying to get more municipal resolutions approved should be continued.<br /><br />(2) We must explore the full range of governmental opportunity to get reparations more broadly on the public agenda. The local representatives on the Congressional Black Caucus should be asked to set a meeting with President Bush or one of his top advisers and request a Presidential Commission to Study the Viability of Reparations for African Americans. Presidents regularly set up such commissions. A coherent essay advocating that approach and its significance must be prepared and delivered to each such representative. These representatives will also be asked to seek federal funding for a special three-day conference on the viability of the slave reparations, inviting up to 25 Black scholars who will deliver papers on specific aspects of this large issue, e.g., the Legal Argument for Reparations, the Moral Argument for Reparations, etc. The papers presented will all be published in a booklet as a special congressional representative field study/report.<br /><br />(3) The Slave Business Ordinance passed in Chicago and Los Angeles must be carefully studied as a possible model for other cities in the region. A summary of how the Chicago/Los Angeles laws were accomplished must be written, including an assessment of what each has accomplished thus far for the Reparations Movement.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Mass Media</span><br /><br />(1) In each locale within the region, we must train at least one group of writers and researchers to keep up with all news coverage of the Reparations Movement, and to quickly respond to any negative newspaper editorials or articles anywhere in their geographical area.<br /><br />(2) In each city within the region, raise the necessary funds and put up at least one, possibly two, large billboards saying REPARATIONS NOW! IN MEMORY OF OUR ANCESTORS AND FOR THE FUTURE OF OUR CHILDREN!! that can be seen by a large number of Black folk traveling through the community daily.<br /><br />(3) We must write and keep current one-sheets, flyers and brochures on the Reparations Movement.<br /><br />(4) We must write and get printed in the local media articles that will help prepare the community to participate in an economic boycott in 2005 to establish negotiating leverage in this struggle.<br /><br />(5) We must adopt a particular newspaper or mass media outlet (radio or t-v) and focus a weekly letter writing campaign to that newspaper or radio/t-v station giving them a steady stream of requests to publish pro-reparations articles and commentary.<br /><br />(6) We must make a list of each church bulletin, Black Greek newsletter, Masonic bulletin, publications of the Association of Black Social Workers, newsletters of predominately Black employee unions, etc. Make contact with whoever edits and produces these news sources, and consistently try and get reparations pieces in those documents.<br /><br />(7) We must publish a well-edited and well-presented Reparations Newsletter at least bi-monthly for public distribution.<br /><br />(8) We must produce and distribute a reparations DVD, and a reparations Power Point presentation that can be distributed throughout the region.<br /><br />(9) We must produce a bevy of Reparations Now pins, caps, shirts, stickers, and other such paraphernalia and get them out to the public at every opportunity.<br /><br />(10) As stated above, get on any and every radio, t-v, cable show possible and spread the reparations word.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">V. BROAD TACTICS FOR LONG-TERM GOALS</span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">(To be accomplished within the 2005-2010 time period)</span><br />A. Youth/Students<br /><br />(1) We must study the issue of American universities possibly being responsible for some portion of reparations because in their early years, slaves built their facilities, and/or the university faculty/staff owned slaves, as in Brown University and the University of Alabama.<br /><br />(2) We must identify Black youth and students with talent, and help to teach and to train them to become articulate, well-informed, responsible and ethical spokespeople for Black reparations, redemption and respect. We cannot allow these youth to grow up like weeds.<br /><br />(3) We must master the computer technology that is currently available and utilize it to help us accomplish reparations. All Black youth and students should become computer experts and we all should do every thing we can to facilitate that.<br /><br />(4) We must get a "We Are The World"-type song and album recorded, distributed and promoted by some conscious rappers/hip-hop and R&B artists.<br /><br />(5) We must finance and establish a Black Leadership Institute somewhere in the region or in the USA in which we can train our youth on how to lead us into the future, and where we can hold seminars, working sessions and meetings to keep our current Black leadership engaged with each other and on a positive, ethical and responsible path.<br /><br />(6) We must encourage our youth and students to support THE MATAH DISTRIBUTION NETWORK. Expanding, defending, and building this network to its full capacity will help the Reparations Movement tremendously.<br /><br />(7) We must educate our youth and students on who Black political prisoners are, how we can network to keep each other informed about the progress or lack of progress in their situations, and the various ways we can help to support these sisters and brothers incarcerated for trying to help the Black community. Our youth and students must become more knowledgeable about using DNA sampling to force new looks at old cases and to help get some of those incarcerated out.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">B. Churches /Mosques</span><br /><br />(1) We must convince from 15-25 ministers with significant congregations in the region to take on the reparations issue and to push their congregations to understand it and to get involved in it.<br /><br />(2) We must construct a massive mailing list (e-mail and snail mail) and telephone tree of church and mosque members that we can regularly contact with reparations information.<br /><br />(3) We must continually cultivate the reparations relationship with the Nation of Islam, to steadily improve the sharing of vital information on the progress of the Reparations Movement. There should be joint rallies, panel discussions, strategy sessions, etc., as often as possible on this issue.<br /><br />(4) Eventually, we must sit down with White church allies and inform them how they can help us in this struggle.<br /><br />(5) We must set up a church-by-church visitation schedule in each locale in the region to either be on the podium delivering the reparations message, or passing out leaflets and flyers to church and mosque goers (on cars, hand-to-hand, etc.). We should be able to visit every Black Church and Muslim Mosque in the entire region at least once every two years, with some visited more than once.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">C. Black Fraternal and Social Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) There must be a consistent network of contacts established and maintained of Black Greek organizations and their members, the Elks, Moose Lodge, and especially the Masons and Eastern Stars. We must attend their rallies, conferences and meetings. We must make sure we are members ourselves, and we must continually push the reparations issue.<br /><br />(2) There must be a regional and national petition/support drive to get as many Black organizations as possible to sign up to promote and support the Reparations Movement, including as many Black Greeks, Masons, etc.,as possible. The drive should culminate in 2006-2007.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">D. Education</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Public/Charter</span><br /><br />(1) There are both informal and formal educational organizations that we need to impact in terms of the reparations struggle. In the mass-based, grass roots educational activities, we must implement specific reparations educational programs in our particular geographical areas. In the formal educational process (public school), we must have a reparations educational curriculum<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">a. That tells the truth about the world </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">b. That corrects the currently taught historical record </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">c. That will have at its center the birth of African civilization and the birth of capitalist exploitation </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">d. That re-claims our rightful place in the history and development of science and technology e. That re-invigorates African/Africana Studies in the schools and colleges to re-claim their original purpose to empower the Black community. </span><br /><br />(2) We must infiltrate the current educational system in terms of not only curriculum content, but book purchase decisions, methods of preparing and teaching culturally relevant information, etc.<br /><br />(3) We must identify currently existing programs and activities that allow us to model and share successes from other parts of the country, including: a. The L.A. Learning to Learn initiative b. The schools storytelling programs c. The Ella Baker Training Institute d. The consistent discussion of the 13th and 14th amendments regarding the need for reparations e. Providing training and extra credit through public school and college programs (African American Studies, etc.) for working with the community and pushing reparations.<br /><br />(4) We must establish a Working Group on video production for Reparations Education. Through that we will prepare reparations infomercials, audio spots, 60-second public service announcements, etc.<br /><br />(5) We must get testimonials from Black doctors, faculty members, star athletes, and others as spokespeople for reparations education.<br /><br />(6) We must study programs like the Model U.N. in public schools and colleges as vehicles to immerse youth and students into learning about and representing African societies. That kind of training sharpens the mind and intellect to defend African contributions.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Higher Education</span><br /><br />(1) A listing of all Black-oriented academic/scholastic organizations must be compiled, including contact names. All such organizations will receive information urging them to add the reparations issue to their discussion and decision agendas. All of these organizations will be asked to sign the support letter which will come to them urging continued, written support of the Reparations Movement. A specific committee of people within each of our organizations should be assigned to focus on this project.<br /><br />(2) A list of all Black Studies/Africana Studies/Pan African Studies/African and African American Studies Programs and Departments in the region and in the country must be compiled, including relevant contacts, and reparations data, including the Reparations Newsletter mentioned above, should regularly be sent to each of them. The Black Studies entities should be urged to join in and participate in the Reparations Movement in whatever ways they can.<br /><br />(3) All Black Studies organizations---NCBS, Black Heritage Association, National Association for the Study of Black Life and History, etc.--- must be listed and contacted. Members of those organizations who are reparationists should get the issue on the conference and meeting agendas of those organizations on a regular basis.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">E. Community-Based Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) We must get as many grass roots and community-based organizations as possible to implement this plan. Set up meetings, attend rallies, discuss the plan with organizational representatives, answer any questions participants have, etc. Pass out one-sheets and brochures to card club meetings, auto club rallies, Senior Citizens rallies and conferences, etc.<br /><br />(2) It is especially important that we must explain Internal Reparations to any and all CBO and grass roots groups. Dealing with every new or continuing problem in the Black Community is not IR, but dealing with any and all of them that are about regaining the respect that is due to Black folk, and redeeming the dignity of Black people, is what Internal Reparations is about. So anything and everything that CBO members and grass roots folk are doing towards that end must be supported and encouraged as helping to move us forward towards achieving the reparations goal.<br /><br />(3) We must establish and maintain book clubs and reparations discussion groups in the community to engage each other on new literature in the Movement, and to keep up with all new writing and new issues regarding the Reparations Movement. To stay informed is to stay alert.<br /><br />F. Entertainment Industry (Continue the Work Described in the Short-Term<br />Tactics Section of this Category Above)<br /><br />G. Business Community (Continue the Work Described Above for this<br />Category)<br /><br />H. Legal Community (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br />I. Legislative Community (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br />J. The Mass Media (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">VII. NEEDS AND RESOURCES TO ACHIEVE EFFECTIVE<br />IMPLEMENTATION AND SUCCESS OF THIS PLAN</span><br /><br />A. Essentially, this plan is founded on creative volunteerism. There will be no paid positions for getting the required work done, and, unfortunately, much of the printing costs for flyers, brochures, newsletters, one-sheets, etc., will be borne by the activists themselves unless their local organizations are adept at fundraising.<br /><br />B. There are already on-going reparations activities and organizations in the region with their own body of resources. A networking list of organizations and regular reparations activities should be produced and maintained.<br /><br />C. Financial sponsorship of reparations activities should be explored from Blacks who have the monetary wherewithal and the political consciousness to help. Accepting financial donations from anyone who offers is not a good idea and can bring discredit from the Black community if the funds are from a suspicious source. Whatever activists can pay for themselves, they should do.<br /><br />D. The biggest asset we will have in the implementation of this plan is talented Black folk: lawyers, teachers, business men and women, politicians, regular grass roots workers, writers, students, clergy, musicians and artists, etc. Actually, that may be enough.<br />-----------------------------------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);font-size:130%;" ><br />APPENDIX</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">I. ONE-SHEETS/FLYERS</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">(Suitable for the General Public, High School and College Students)</span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">A. REPARATIONS STRAIGHT TALK</span><br />by David L. Horne for <span style="font-weight: bold;">The Reparations United Front of Southern California</span><br />Reparations is an issue that African Americans must deal with in this country. Either we deal seriously with it, or others will deal with it for us, and impose their results on us. In memory of our ancestors and the totality of the Black Experience in this country, we simply cannot allow that to happen. So, we must educate ourselves about this issue, discuss it among ourselves, decide what we want to do about it, and decide what shape or form reparations for African Americans should take when it is ultimately achieved.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Don't waste time asking whether it will or won't be accomplished. Take the high road--affirm that it will be and move assertively and progressively regarding that decision. </span><br /><br />To help clear your mind about reparations for African Americans, here is some straightforward information on the What, Why and How of the concept.<br /><br />WHAT THERE IS A SERIOUS DEBT OWED BY AMERICA TO THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION. THAT DEBT IS CALLED REPARATIONS (APOLOGY-COMPENSATION- ATONEMENT FOR INJURY CAUSED).<br /><br />WHY 1. UP TO 78% OF THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION WAS UNJUSTLY ENSLAVED FROM 1661-1865 IN THE U.S. (Some argue that the inclusive dates were 1619-1865, but slavery was not exclusively a Black thing in America until first Maryland, then Virginia passed legal stipulations to that effect.) EVEN IF ONE WANTS TO START WITH THE FIRST AMERICAN GOVERNMENT--AS OPPOSED TO ENGLISH COLONIAL GOVERNMENT--DECLARED IN 1775-1776 BY THE FIRST OFFICIAL AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION (THE SECOND CONTINENTAL CONGRESS) UNTIL 1865 (90 YEARS OF AMERICAN SLAVERY), THE PERCENTAGE OF BLACKS ENSLAVED ONLY INCREASES TO 88%.<br /><br />2. BLACK AMERICANS WERE NOT PAID FOR THEIR LABOR, YET THAT SLAVE LABOR HELPED SUBSTANTIALLY TO BUILD AND TO ENRICH THIS COUNTRY. THIS IS NOT MYTH OR HYPERBOLE, BUT PROVABLE FACT. THIS PROCESS IS LEGALLY CALLED "UNJUST ENRICHMENT."<br /><br />3. EVEN "FREE" BLACK AMERICANS WERE ENSLAVED THROUGH THE 1850 FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT <span style="font-style: italic;">(Through which Any White person could accuse Any Black person of being a slave, and the accusation alone could get one arrested and sent up river, since Blacks were prohibited from testifying in court even on their own behalf), AND THE 1857 DRED SCOTT CASE (the infamous Roger Taney ruling, that Blacks were not citizens of America, and thus "...there are no rights that the colored man has in America that the white man is bound to respect...")</span>.<br /><br />4. AFTER THE CIVIL WAR, BLACK AMERICANS WERE LEGALLY FREED (The 13TH AMENDMENT, ratified in December, 1865 ) BUT ECONOMICALLY RE-SHACKLED AND IMPOVERISHED BY LAWS OF THE FEDERAL AND SOUTHERN STATE GOVERNMENTS, INCLUDING TENANT FARMING, SHARE CROPPING AND THE CHAIN GANG SYSTEM. THIS IS LEGALLY CALLED "RELENTLESS" OR "CONTINUING HARM."<br /><br />5. THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CONVINCED THE MAJORITY OF THE SOUTHERN BLACK POPULATION (WHERE 89% OF THE BLACK POPULATION LIVED) TO INVEST ALL OF THEIR MEAGER SAVINGS AND ASSETS IN THE FREEDMEN'S SAVINGS BANK, THEN ALLOWED CORRUPT BANK OFFICIALS THAT THE U.S. GOVERNMENT HAD APPOINTED TO STEAL THE MONEY AND TO CLOSE THE BANK WITH OVER $4 MILLION( valued at approximately $35 million today) OF THAT MONEY UNACCOUNTED FOR. THOSE OFFICIALS WERE NOT PROSECUTED NOR THE MONEY RECOVERED.<br /><br />6. AFTER GIVING AMERICA ITS LOYALTY, ITS HARD WORK, AND ITS TRUST, THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION WAS PUNISHED BY THE FEDERAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS SIMPLY FOR BEING BLACK AND POOR. THIS PUNISHMENT WAS THROUGH THE BLACK CODES, LYNCHING, JIM CROWISM, DEFICIENT EDUCATION, RESTRICTIVE COVENANTS, BLACK DISENFRANCHISEMENT, AND COVERT AND OVERT PATTERNS OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION. AND THIS PERSISTENT PUNISHMENT CONTINUES TODAY THROUGH 21ST CENTURY RACISM AND UNREMITTING DISRESPECT! THIS IS ALSO KNOWN AS MORE "RELENTLESS HARM."<br /><br />7. SINCE 1865, MORE THAN 50 COURT CASES HAVE BEEN FILED AGAINST THE U.S. GOVERNMENT IN U.S. DISTRICT OR U.S. CIRCUIT COURT FOR AFRICAN AMERICAN REPARATIONS. THEY WERE ALL UNSUCCESSFUL BECAUSE OF THE "SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY" ISSUE ( PLAINTIFFS' LACK OF STANDING TO FILE THE CASE). TODAY, THERE ARE AT LEAST THREE DIFFERENT GROUPS WORKING ON FILING NEW COURT CASES WHICH CAN OVERCOME THAT GREAT OBSTACLE. THE CATO VS. U.S. CASE, 1995, IS INSTRUCTIVE READING.<br /><br />HOW YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS ISSUE BY SPREADING THE WORD AND TAKING UP THIS CAUSE! THEY OWE US!! TALK ABOUT REPARATIONS AT YOUR CHURCH, IN YOUR SCHOOLS, AT YOUR JOB, IN THE NEWSPAPERS !! DISCUSS IT! DEBATE IT! WRITE SONGS ABOUT REPARATIONS !! (As Pop Staples of the Staples Singers did in the 1970's, and Prince re-recorded and re-issued in January, 2001, "When Will We Be Paid?" ). <span style="font-weight: bold;">JOIN A REPARATIONS GROUP! GET IN THIS MOVEMENT AND LET'S GET THIS DONE !!!</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">THEY RIGHTEOUSLY OWE US !!!</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">REMEMBER REPARATIONS = RESPECT OUR FREEDOM IS MEANINGLESS WITHOUT RESPECT !!!</span><br />==============================<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >B. SOME FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS<br />CONCERNING REPARATIONS FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">1. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">What does Reparations for African Americans really mean? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> It means getting the American government (federal, state, county and city) which supported the institution of slavery, lynching, institutional racism and other such things, to admit that it did a great injury to black people in this country, that that injury still continues, that the government apologizes for that injury, and that the government is willing to demonstrate its good faith in that apology by compensating African Americans in some relevant form determined by African Americans.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">2. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Is Reparations only about Black folk getting money from White folk? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>No. The forms that Reparations will take will be decided by Black people talking together about that issue. It may be a 50-year trust fund accessible to any African American who wants to start a business. It may be a guaranteed scholarship to and through college for every African American high school graduate. It may be any of those and any of various other forms that we can generally agree on. Yes, some individual money will probably be involved but that will be only a small part of a much larger equation. Reparations will come from the American government, and private corporations that profited from slavery and the domestic slave trade, not individual White people.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">3. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Won't this Reparations issue just divide America into racial camps by opening up old wounds?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>No, it won't. America is already divided into racial antagonism that simply won't die. Why? In great part, it is because those "old wounds" never healed. America essentially does not respect Black Americans. Slavery in America left a legacy of White privilege and entitlement, and Black deficiency and disrespect. It will take Reparations to seriously begin the process of racial Healing and interracial Respect in this country.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">4. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Isn't Welfare a kind of Reparations for African Americans? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> No. Welfare comes from the taxes all Americans pay. Most of the people on Welfare in America are White, not Black, and the Welfare System was designed to be that way. Welfare has nothing to do with Reparations.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">5. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Can we really win this? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>Yes, we can and we will. We will win with mother wit, a lot of research and hard work, and a great deal of strategizing and persistence. We cannot give up. We owe it to our ancestors. We owe it to our history and to ourselves. It is time. It is right. It is inevitable. Our best and brightest minds are on this as we speak, and we will not be denied. Come on, people! Get on the train!! All Abooard the Reparations Express !! They owe us!!!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">6. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Is there a prominent role for the Black Church? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> Absolutely. The Black Church has been part and parcel of every serious movement for our racial betterment in our history in America. The Reparations Movement is a culmination of much of what our ancestors fought and died for. The Black Church must be involved in the leadership and energy of this mighty movement to restore the dignity of being Black in America, and to re-capture the respect that is due to Black folk in this country and in the world. Those in congregations should urge your particular church to get involved right now!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">7. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">What was the role of Arabs Spaniards and Africans in the enslavement of Black people around the world? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> There has been an Arab slave trade from East Africa and from West Africa northwards since at least 200 a.d. In fact, there was an Arab enslavement and trade of Africans well before and all through the time of Muhammad's founding and establishment of Islam, and both of these activities were perpetuated after Muhammad by many of those who professed to be Muslims. From modern reports out of the African countries of Sudan, Mauritania and Morocco, vestiges of that Arab slave trade still exist in the year 2003.<br /><br />Will there be a reparations reckoning with the Arabs over this issue? Yes, but not now. That issue is on the reparations agenda, but it is way down on the list.<br /><br />The Portuguese and the Spanish were the first two European nations "legally" approved by the Catholic Church to capture, transport and trade Africans. Both the Spanish and the Portuguese not only took African captives to parts of Europe for sale and exhibition, the two countries brought hundreds of thousands, even millions, of African slaves into South America, the Caribbean and North America.<br /><br />Thus, there were African slaves in Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba, Jamaica, Bermuda, Barbados, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Puerto Rico, etc., as a direct result of Portuguese and Spanish slave trading. Some African tribal groups participated heavily in raiding, capturing and selling other Africans; some African groups initially participated in this practice, then stopped and became opponents of the process; and some African tribal groups ferociously fought the process from the outset and continued to resist it no matter what. Examples of the first group include the Kanem-Bornu "kingdom" in West Central Africa; examples of the second group include the Ashanti and portions of the Congolese; and examples of the third include segments of the Mende-Malinke, the Mossi,and the Coromantians. Read From Chains to Bonds, Doudou Diene,ed., UNESCO, 2001, for more information on this African participation and resistance to the slave trade.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">8. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Is there a deadline period for achieving reparations? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> No, there is no deadline period for achieving reparations, either in America or elsewhere in the world. We will just keep at it until the task is accomplished, no matter how long it takes. Patience must be practiced, since strategic planning and implementation take time. Also, the reparations struggle is too deep, too wide, and too fundamentally at the core of what the U.S. really is about for there to be a fixed date set. That being said, there are various hoped- for target dates--2007-8, 2010, 2020--that several activists have mentioned, but those are just that, mobile target dates.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">9. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">How does the Reparations Movement connect to the effort to save our Black colleges and Black hospitals from closing/disaccreditation ? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> There is both an Internal Reparations Movement and an External Reparations Movement going on simultaneously. For the former, there are community strengthening, community control, and community institution building and consolidation activities that must occur. While we cannot allow ourselves to get misdirected to the point of dealing only with the everyday problems of racism, discrimination and Black disrespect, we also cannot ignore immediate and debilitating problems ongoing in our communities. Rescuing the Black colleges that are threatened with closure is one of those problems, and so is stopping the closure and disqualification of hospitals and trauma centers in the Black community. There are many other immediacies like these wherever we live. Those who have the expertise, contacts and skills should deal with those situations, including making sure there are future plans drawn up to stop this constant cycle of fiscal crisis and even fiscal mismanagement and/or constant understaffing and underfunding.. But the rest of us must keep working on the External Reparations struggle. Remember: all of our major problems as a people--the HIV-AIDS epidemic, the Black prison overpopulation, persistent school failure, etc.— are symptoms of the larger issue of persistent, pernicious Black disrespect and the relentless promotion in the U.S. of the negative value of being Black. If we spend all of our time dealing with all of the brush fires, we'll never attack and overwhelm the core forest fire from which they all emanate.<br /><br />Again, good strategic planning requires a proper and timely allocation of our talents and resources to both the immediate and the long-term issues, i.e., the small picture and the big picture.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" ><br />D. ONE SHEETS/FLYERS (Suitable for Middle School )</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">R</span> is the Respect that’s due when you worked hard rather than play<br />E is for the Equality you’ve earned by contributing in every way<br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">P</span> is for being Poor and Landless because they wouldn’t pay<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">A</span> is for the Anger you felt when they chained you to make you stay<br />R is for Reclaiming what’s yours no matter what they say<br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">A</span> is for our Ancestors for whom we’ll win this come what may<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">T</span> is for the Trees they used to make us swing and sway<br />I is for the I Won’t forget that burns in me as I lay<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">O</span> is for our Origins and the story that we must convey<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">N</span> is for the Never Again will we allow them to hold us at bay<br />S is for the Struggle we’ll wage and win for a brighter day<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Inspired By Two Young Brothers</span><br />(<span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Nigel and Kiawe</span>)<br />May ‘04<br />==================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">A Little Rap(hasody)</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">Reparations is the name</span><br />Respect and Freedom is our claim<br />In this democratic game<br />That stole from us but take no blame<br />For what they did should be ashamed<br />But whaddaya know, they take no blame<br />For what they did, should be ashamed<br />But in their eyes ain’t nuthin ta change.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">Reparations is the name</span><br />Freedom and justice is our claim<br />And we learned to take dead aim<br />Since Willie Lynch done snitched their game<br />They tryin to play us all the same<br />But Willie Lynch done snitched their game<br />Yeah, we ran before when they came<br />But now it’s time for a rearrange<br /><br />dlh ‘04<br />=========================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">E. ONE SHEETS (Kindergarten—3rd Grade)</span> </span><span style="color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-family:arial;font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">KNOW WHAT?</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">There was a man</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Who worked real hard</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">He got no pay</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">But his back got scarred</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was a young girl</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">With dreams and things</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Did what she was told</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">But sold for string</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was a woman</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">They worked her to death</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">She fed their children</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Hers got hung for theft</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was an owner</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Had lots of farm hands</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Took away our freedom</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Still owes us some land</span><br />=================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">A Little Song (Umph Umph Umph Umph)</span></span><br /><br />Gonna do what’s right<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Fair wins this fight<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gonna do what’s right<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Fair’s outta sight<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Gonna tell the truth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Want a Baby Ruth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gonna tell the truth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Else I’ll be uncouth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Gotta be for real<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />What I did revealed<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gotta be for real<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />No lock and seal<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />When you work a man<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Tyin him tight as you can<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />When you work a man<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />You can’t steal his land<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Here’s how it will go<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gotta pay what you owe<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Here’s the way it’ll go<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />You’ll reap what you sow<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">======================<br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/Black%20Unity%20Arms.gif"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 129px; height: 173px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/Black%20Unity%20Arms.gif" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-1141569143880058392006-03-05T06:12:00.000-08:002006-03-05T06:41:51.123-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/nigga%20target.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/320/nigga%20target.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span id="obmessage" style="font-family:georgia;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:85%;" ><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><span style=";font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:180%;" ><br /><span style="font-family: lucida grande;">THE</span></span><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-family: lucida grande;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:180%;" > 'N' </span><span style="font-family: lucida grande;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:180%;" >WORD &<br />THE </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0); font-family: lucida grande;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:180%;" >'R' </span><span style="font-family: lucida grande;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:180%;" >WORD</span></span></span></span></span><br /><span id="obmessage" style="font-family:georgia;"></span></div><span id="obmessage" style=";font-family:georgia;font-size:130%;" ><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br /></span></span><div style="text-align: center; font-family: georgia;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span id="obmessage" style="font-size:130%;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">An Open Letter To All Hip Hop & Rap Artists--<br />And Their</span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span id="obmessage" style="font-size:130%;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Future Supporters</span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"><br /></span></div><div style="text-align: center;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-family: georgia;font-size:130%;" id="obmessage" ><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-style: italic;">from</span> </span></span><span style="font-family: georgia;font-size:130%;" id="obmessage" ><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">MIKE RAMEY </span></span></span><br /></div><span id="obmessage" style="font-family:georgia;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:85%;" ><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br />Greetings.<br /><br />My column today concerns the 'N' word.<br /><br />The first part of my plea: USE IT. But SPELL it<br />right!<br /><br />It is </span><span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >N-I-G-G-E-R</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >.<br /><br />Not 'Nigga', nor 'Niggaz', nor 'Ni**as', or even<br />'Nicca'.<br /><br />Just plain N-I-G-G-E-R. As used on the cover of Dick<br />Gregory's autobiographical book. Also, as used by Dr.<br />Rosie Milligan's thought-provoking 1996 book: "Nigger,<br />Please." Dick Gregory wrote the forward to that<br />dynamic piece of work.<br /><br />While some of you reading this are gasping for air,<br />grabbing your smelling salts, or wondering if the<br />columnist has lost his mind, I have a second half of<br />my plea: Use the word N-I-G-G-E-R, with its correct<br />spelling as often as you please--ONLY if you mention<br />the 'R' word somewhere within earshot.<br /><br />Oh.... the 'R' word? <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-family: georgia;">R-E-P-A-R-A-T-I-O-N-S</span>!<br /><br /></span></span></span><div style="text-align: center; font-family: trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/nigga%20flag.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/nigga%20flag.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: georgia;font-family:georgia;font-size:100%;" id="obmessage" ><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153); font-family: trebuchet ms;">A LITTLE HISTORY LESSON:</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">What was that 'R' word again? </span><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold; font-family: trebuchet ms;"> R-E-P-A-R-A-T-I-O-N-S!</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Have you not heard of the 'R' word? THAT word will</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">do more to get people upset than all the variations of</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">the 'N' word COMBINED! Of course, to understand the</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">subject of Reparations, you have to go back into</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">history when Black folk first arrived in the USA</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">around 1619 as 'Indentured Servants'. This was an</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">'old school' term for 'slave'. Well, young Hip Hop</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">warrior, our numbers grew--and grew rapidly. Then</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">came slavery--the 'legal' device to get newly arrived</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Africans to continue to work for nothing to build this</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">country. Then, a few decades go by and slavery became</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">the 'in' thing. Next, we have the Civil War from 1861</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">to 1865. Abraham Lincoln used the Emancipation</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Proclamation as the 'nuclear option' to 'free' Black</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">folk during the war.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Somewhere between the Civil War and the Emancipation</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Proclamation, Black folk were promised 'forty acres</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">and a mule' by the FEDERAL government.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Uncle Sam had a chance to get it right.but failed</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">miserably.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Still, we did have a few years of Reconstruction--until folk in Washington and the South</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">developed amnesia. Then, we had an impressive round</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">of segregation, Jim Crow, 'Separate but Equal', Civil</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">Rights, and finally the mainstream, depending upon</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">where you get and how you order your historical</span><br /><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;">research and timeline.</span><br /><br /></span></span><div style="text-align: center; font-family: georgia;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/reparations%20chart.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/reparations%20chart.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /></span></div><span id="obmessage" style="font-family:georgia;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:85%;" ><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >OTHER FOLKS HAVE BEEN REIMBURSED:</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >The acres disappeared, the mule never arrived and</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >history was 'whitewashed'.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >I may be a little simplistic in my example, but hear</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >me out young person. Along the highway of U.S.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >History, various other segments of Americans were</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >compensated for wrongs--real or perceived--done to</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >them by society. The American Indian was given</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >various tracts of land called 'Reservations'. No, my</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >young friend, there were no casinos on these early</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >gifts from the government. This was a weak attempt at</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >the government allowing restitution for the various</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >lands many of the Caucasian forefathers stole after</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >arriving on these shores many, many, many years ago.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >The forefathers not only found that the American</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Indian existed, but lived rather well off the land</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >with an abundance of game and a respect for nature.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Over the course of a few dozen decades, the American</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Indian was 'dispossessed' of their land. A handful of</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >beads here, a massacre there, and germ warfare down</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >the block (a.k.a. smallpox-infested blankets), and the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >USA was under new management.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >As you young folk like to say: "I'm not hating.I'm</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >just stating!"</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Let's go down the historic route a little further.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Over on your right, because of a threat during World</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >War II from the alliance of Nazi Germany, Italy, and</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Japan, many Japanese-American citizens were 'scooped</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >up' by the powers-that-be and shipped off to</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >'Relocation Centers'. Many of these folks lost jobs,</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >businesses, and homes in which they had invested, in</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >search of the American dream. However, a few decades</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >passed. A bill circulated Capitol Hill. It</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >eventually became law. The result: restitution, or</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >R-E-P-A-R-A-T-I-O-N-S</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" > were paid to the surviving</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >family members of those Japanese-Americans who were</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >physically and economically wronged by Uncle Sam.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Overseas, various methods were found to compensate</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >families of Jewish victims of the Holocaust. Dollar</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >values were assigned, and checks mailed out to the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >survivors of those crimes. In fact, an international</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >fund was created in order to make sure those companies</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >who profited from the slave labor supplied by the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Nazis properly compensate the survivors to the dollar.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >It took DECADES to get this arrangement approved,</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >implemented, and put into effect. It will take</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >DECADES for the survivors to get their fair share.but</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >their checks are coming regularly.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Question: Who has been left out of the restitution</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >equation?</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >DON'T BE SWAYED--OR SIDETRACKED:</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Until the U.S. 'settles up' with her African American</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >citizens, America will be a 'good' country.but never a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >great country. We, in the USA have plenty of</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >opportunity and freedom to allow anyone who wants to</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >succeed to do so. African American income and</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >earnings exceed expectations every YEAR!</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Next generation.do not be fooled, nor sidetracked.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >You are the best trained, best educated and</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >technically-savvy Black folk on the planet. Do not</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >worry about the 'bling'; demand the 'cha-ching' that</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >is owed you--and our community--from the years of</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >uncompensated labor, mistreatment, and deaths of your</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >ancestors in building this nation.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Don't be swayed over the debate over the 'N' word.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >The debate is meant to distract you from the main task</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >at hand. The 'N' word was originally 'aimed' at Black</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >folk back in the day, like the words 'boy', 'girl',</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >'spear chucker' and 'jungle bunny'. Unfortunately for</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >the 'haters' who coined these terms, Black folk</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >removed the venom from them and reversed their curse.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >You see, the American Indian, the Chinese, the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Japanese and the Korean have derogatory terms for each</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >other, and derogatory terms that those of the 'lighter</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >hue' use as to 'insult' them. The Chinese, Japanese,</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >and Korean Americans merely withdraw to their own</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >'cities within cities', talk their own language, pass</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >down their traditions to their children and shut out</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >the offender. African Americans may not have a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >section of a city to call home, but we are learning</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >that wisdom from a past day: "It is NOT what you CALL</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >me, but WHAT I ANSWER to!" Once we master THAT</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >lesson, insults lose their sting, and the truth</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >develops a rather sharp point.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Yes, I've heard the catcalls. Yes, I understand the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >'mock' rage that some 'folk' feel about the use of the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >'N' word. Yes, I have visited this issue before in</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >column form, and coined the phrase: "America, CHECK</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Please"! You too, my young entertainer, will</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >experience the same outrage. Nevertheless, it is up</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >to you to carry on. It is up to you to keep the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >debate active and alive so that WE get our</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >restitution, just like every other race of people who</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >have taken part of building America have gotten some</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >of their wrongs settled out of court.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >When young people study the big picture of history</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >and realize that the 'R' word is far more powerful</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >than the 'N' word, they will be truly transformed.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >They will realize that they no longer need to fear the</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >sting of being hit by the N word when someone hurls</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >it. They will have accomplished their 'reasonable</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >service' for the community, and entered the dangerous</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >world of truth.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Use the 'N' word if you want to make a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >statement: that's free speech.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Use the 'R' word if you want to make history: that's</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >also free speech.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Make sure America doesn't 'duck' this past due</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >account for another generation.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >R-E-P-A-R-A-T-I-O-N-S NOW!</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Remember one other thing as I close.develop an</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >ECONOMIC plan to use what you get.when it eventually</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >arrives.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >-----------------------------------------</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153); font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >MIKE RAMEY </span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >is the author of </span><span style="font-weight: bold; font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >THE MANHOOD LINE</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >. A</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >syndicated, monthly column written for men from a</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >biblical, business, and common-sense perspective.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >Emails always welcomed to manhoodline@yahoo.com.</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >©2006 Mike Ramey/Barnstorm Communications</span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" ><br /></span><span style="font-family: trebuchet ms;font-family:trebuchet ms;font-size:100%;" >International.</span><br /><br /></span></span></span><div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/No-Nigger.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/No-Nigger.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a></div><span id="obmessage" style="font-family:georgia;"><span id="role_document" style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);font-size:85%;" ><span style="font-size:100%;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-family:georgia;"> </span></span>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-1138031438586170142006-01-23T06:55:00.000-08:002006-01-23T07:50:38.656-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/slavechain%20N%20Map.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 235px; height: 235px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/slavechain%20N%20Map.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">A NATIONAL</span> STRATEGIC </span></span><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">PLAN</span></span></span> <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">2006-2010<br />======================<br /><br /></span></span></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">WE WELCOME COMMENTS</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" ><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">GREETINGS,</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">ADVOCATES</span></span><br /></div><br />This is a blog set up to discuss the Reparations Movement. It will begin with the National Strategic Reparations Plan that was the follow-up consequence of the National Reparations Congress gathering held in Compton, California, 2004, involving over 50 reparations organizations from over 36 American cities.<br /><br />We expect participants on this blog to read the NSRP, and comment on it/critique it, and talk about how we can implement it. In order to win reparations in the USA, we must have a strategic, unified and unifying plan.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">D</span>L<span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">H</span><br />=============================================<br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><br /></span><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">A NATIONAL</span> STRATEGIC </span></span><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">PLAN</span></span></span> <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">2006-2010</span></span><br /></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;">The Documentary Result of<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">THE <span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">NATIONAL</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">CONGRESS</span></span><br />Held in Compton/Los Angeles, California<br />MAY 28-31, 2004<br /><br />PRESENTED AND COMPILED BY<br />THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT OF<br />SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">==============</span><br /></div> <div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA</span><br />REPRESENTING THE PLANNING COMMITTEE FOR THE<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">NATIONAL</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">CONGRESS</span></span><br />PRESENTS<br />A NATIONAL STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN<br />2005-2010<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">www.reparationunitedfront.org </span><br />(310) 967-5871<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">----------------------------------</span> </div><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">In order to be effective and credible, any action plan---a battle plan, architectural plan, educational growth and development plan, etc.--- must have, at minimum, the five components immediately listed below:</span><br /><br />A. A clear view of the relevant issue/problem to be dealt with or corrected.<br />B. A fairly accurate depiction of what has been attempted before, if anything,<br />to deal with this issue/problem.<br />C. Why dealing with this issue/problem is necessary.<br />D. An operational definition of the issue at hand.<br />E. Specific steps to take to handle/correct the issue or problem.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">CONTENTS OF A NATIONAL</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN (NSRP)</span><br /></div><br />I. Rationale For the Plan<br />II. Five Principle Goals For The National Reparations Effort<br />III. The Operational Definition Of Reparations for African Americans<br />IV. Broad Tactics For Short-Term Goals<br />1. Youth/Students<br />2. Churches/Mosques<br />3. Black Fraternal and Social Organizations<br />4. Education<br />(a) Public/Charter<br />(b) Higher Education<br />5. Community-based Organizations<br />6. Entertainment Industry<br />(a) Record Industry<br />(b) Movies/T-V/Cable<br />(c) Pro Athletes<br />7. Business Community<br />8. Legal Community (Including the Black Political Prisoners Issue)<br />9. Legislative/Governmental Community<br />10. Mass Media<br /><br />V. Broad Tactics For Long-Term Goals<br />VI. Needs And Resources To Achieve Effective Implementation And<br />Success Of This Plan<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" > <span style="font-weight: bold;">I. RATIONALE FOR THE PLAN</span></span><br /><br />At this historical time towards the end of 2004, the <span style="font-weight: bold;">Reparations Movement</span><br />needs to move to the level of regional and national strategic reparations plans. Why?<br /><br />As long as the primary aim of the<span style="font-weight: bold;"> Reparations Movement</span> is actually to achieve reparations, the momentum forward towards that goal will either be through divine intervention (usually called accidents, miracles, or dumb luck) or through carefully thought-out strategic steps by Reparations Movement organizers and planners.<br /><br />Spiritual intervention will occur, whenever it does, in its own timing and is not in<br />our control. The strategic implementation of group tactics is.<br /><br />For the past five years or so, we have had hundreds of meetings, Town Halls,<br />gatherings, sit-downs, conferences, and one congress to engage reparationists in<br />discussions of what needs to be done, who needs to do it, and how it needs to be<br />done. We have had over fifteen mass market books, more than five hundred printed<br />articles, and at least twenty websites publicly distributed that deal specifically with<br />aspects of the <span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">African American Reparations Movement</span>, and, frequently, with the<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic;">International Reparations Movement.</span><br /><br />During this time, we have filed over twenty-five new reparations cases nationwide and have not yet achieved a single legal victory, including the flagship Tulsa (Greenwood), Oklahoma case. The nine cases brought to the Chicago federal district court in a consolidated package, including a California state case, were dismissed early in 2004. Eight of the cases were amended and re-considered, but as of December of the same year, the attorneys for the cases fully expected them to be rejected again by the same judge. The California case, brought on the basis of slavery and its legacy being an unfair business practice, sought to be remanded and will probably be adjudicated separately in 2005. Hopes for success are very dim since in November, 2004, California voters substantially weakened the unfair practices law. Additionally, according to a recent <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span> study by Wautella and Kibibi, we have gotten more than twenty-eight city councils and at least three state legislatures to pass public resolutions which support U.S. Congressman John Conyers’ H.R. 40 bill to study the reparations issue. Still the bill languishes in obscurity, continually left off the agenda of the House Judiciary Committee on which Mr. Conyers sits as the senior member. The bill is barely alive and is essentially on life support with less than fifty congressional sponsors and no companion bill pending in the Senate.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span>, the most recognizable reparations group in the USA, has had at least five annual conferences during the period, and several special gatherings, including two important leadership roundtables . The <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span> series of reparations leadership meetings, called the “Great Sit-downs,” were created by Dr. Conrad Worrill of the National Black United Front, in association with Minister Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, and has been held at least four times, twice in 2003, and twice in 2004. Chicago Alderwoman Dorothy Tillman’s National Reparations Convention has also met annually since 2000, and the Reparations United Front of Southern California, in association with the Compton College BSU and the NRC National Planning Group, produced and held the first National Reparations Congress, which was a gathering of reparations activists from across the U.S., in the early summer of 2004. The Millions for Reparations committee, spearheaded by Viola Plummer of the December 12th Movement and Conrad Worrill of NBUF, held a national reparations rally in Washington, D.C. in August, 2002, and numerous other organizations have held panel discussions, Town Halls, Teach-ins, Black History Month lectures, etc., to spread the Reparations Movement word.<br /><br />But with notable exceptions, the Black Church remains uninterested and<br />uninvolved in the Movement. The traditional civil rights groups, with the exception<br />of the local Political Action Committees of the NAACP, have eschewed any real<br />commitment to or involvement in the Movement. Similarly, American youth and<br />students, except on scattered occasions, have thus far not been motivated by or interested in the Reparations Movement to any significant degree. The Masons, Shriners, Elks,<br />Eastern Stars, Black fraternities and sororities, and most Hollywood celebrities,<br />except Transafrica Chairman Danny Glover, have shown little knowledge and given virtually no attention to the Movement, save the snide jokes of Cedric the Entertainer<br />in “Barber Shop,” and Chris Rock in his monologues.<br /><br />A Black political movement, once achieved, cannot be sustained with the continued absence of the above components. Some advocates say that the Movement currently needs a charismatic, M.L. King-like leader; some say there must be a single, credible reparations organization that can be depended on to take us forward. These ideas, while critically important, are for another document. Here, the point is made that one of the central components necessary for this stage of the Reparations Movement is a set of regional strategic plans with common principles and goals, and a single, unifying national strategic reparations plan. There have been great and profound speeches made, some brilliant ideas and projects offered and discussed by well-meaning reparationists, and a few activities actually carried through to completion, like the <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span>’s grass roots petition campaign to Congress, and <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA</span>’s Black Fridays, and the Year of Black Presence, among others.<br /><br />But what is crystal clear when contemplating all that has been said and done in the last five years of this Movement is that while there has certainly been a great deal of talk accompanied by a number of important visions of things to come, there has been very little evidence of organized, strategic follow through.<br /><br />The Reparations Movement currently hovers at another of its many crossroads. An increasing number of committed and dedicated Western States’ activists who have invested a lot of time, money, energy and thought to the Movement are now constantly in high frustration mode and they cannot see any light at the end of the tunnel. Many of them are thinking of moving on to other things and issues. To help us re-invigorate them and provide an impetus for choosing the right path forward and to avoid the road to perdition, it is clear that the Movement must now have many more reparations chess players and less folk who merely talk a good game. At this critical time, there must be the coming to the fore of the strategic planners and organizers.<br /><br />The following document, which is unequivocally a product both of the National<br />Reparations Congress held in Los Angeles/Compton, California in May, 2004, and the<br />flow of ideas discussed at the <span style="font-weight: bold;">N’COBRA </span><span style="font-style: italic; font-weight: bold;">Leadership Roundtable</span> in June, 2004, in<br />Washington, D.C., and the two <span style="font-weight: bold;">NDABA</span>s held in Houston, Texas and Baltimore,<br />Maryland in 2004, is the <span style="font-weight: bold;">NRC National Strategic Reparations Plan</span>. It is a five year roadmap to be implemented regionally to accomplish the reparations goals of the African American population. We expect each region of the country to do its part, and the accumulated total should be the overall reparations victory that Black folk in this country, and in the world, deserve.<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/Set%20Free-%20Ed%20Lam.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 509px; height: 226px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/Set%20Free-%20Ed%20Lam.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >II. FIVE PRINCIPAL GOALS FOR</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >THE NATIONAL REPARATIONS PLAN</span><br /></div><br />All activity, projects, tasks and efforts identified in this reparations plan are to ensure<br />the accomplishment of the following principal goals:<br /><br />• The raising of the level of consciousness concerning reparations to<br />a critical mass of African Americans in each region of the USA---to wit, each reparations group in various parts of the country should dedicate itself to ensuring that reparations will be on the lips and in the conversations of all Black folk in the<br />organizing realm of that group.<br /><br />• The organization, coordination and implementation of selective economic<br />boycotts to gain bargaining leverage concerning reparations.<br /><br />• The planning, coordination and implementation of a national legal strategy.<br /><br />• The planning, coordination and implementation of a broader political/<br />legislative strategy than H.R. 40 alone.<br /><br />• The establishment, coordination and implementation of regional Slave<br />Remembrance and Restitution Funds that will eventually merge into a national<br />SRR Fund..<br /><br />III. THE OPERATIONAL DEFINITION FOR BLACK AFRICAN AMERICAN<br />REPARATIONS AS THE BASIS FOR A NATIONAL STRATEGIC<br />REPARATONS PLAN PUT FORTH IN THIS DOCUMENT 1<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">EXTERNAL REPARATIONS</span><br /><br />(A) GOVERNMENTAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT, APOLOGY, ATONEMENT, AND COMPENSATION FOR ITS PARTICIPATION IN THE SEIZURE AND MISUSE OF VALUABLE PROPERTY --LABOR PROPERTY--TAKEN FROM BLACK AFRICAN AMERICANS WHO WORKED AS SLAVES BETWEEN 1775-18652 IN THIS COUNTRY, USING THAT ILL-GOTTEN PROPERTY TO UNJUSTLY ENRICH THIS COUNTRY AND HELP IT BECOME THE GREAT NATION IT IS TODAY, ALL WITHOUT FAIRLY COMPENSATING THOSE AFRICAN AMERICANS OR THEIR DESCENDANTS FOR THE DELIBERATE LOSS OF SAID LABOR PROPERTY;<br /><br />(B) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING THE ATONEMENT) FOR THE 140-YEAR SET OF GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ACTIVITIES CALLED JIM CROWISM AND BLACK SEGREGATION (INCLUDING THE LYNCHING, MURDERING AND RAPING OF BLACK PEOPLE, AND THE RAZING OF BLACK TOWNSHIPS) ALL OF WHICH RELEGATED AFRICAN AMERICANS TO THE BOTTOM RUNGS OF SOCIETY;<br /><br />(C) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING ATONEMENT) AT FAIR MARKET VALUE FOR CONTINUING GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ANTI-BLACK SOCIO-POLITICAL-ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES THAT HAVE DEPRIVED AFRICAN AMERICANS OF RESPECT AND THEIR RIGHTFUL HONORED PLACE IN USA SOCIETY.<br />INTERNAL REPARATIONS<br />(NOTE: <span style="font-style: italic;">Internal Reparations does not absolve, excuse or dilute the responsibility of the various U.S. governmental components nor American corporations viz-a-viz Black Americans and what is owed us. However, our redemption is both</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">external and internal and will not occur without our taking responsibility for</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">part of our own healing.</span>)<br /><br />(D) BLACK ASSESSMENT AND IDENTIFICATION OF THOSE NEGATIVE AND DEBILITATING ASPECTS OF OUR COMMUNITIES THAT WE CAN MOBILIZE AND ORGANIZE OUR EFFORTS TO REPAIR, REFORM AND CORRECT FOR OUR OWN BENEFIT.<br /><br />(E) THE FORMULATION OF ACTION PLANS—BOTH SHORT-TERM AND LONG-TERM---TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEMS AND NEGATIVE ASPECTS ASSESSED AND IDENTIFIED, AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THOSE PLANS.<br /><span style="font-size:130%;"> <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">A STRAIGHTFORWARD BREAKDOWN</span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">WHAT REPARATIONS IS: </span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">(Based on our continuing veneration of and connection to our African and African descendent ancestors)</span><br /><br />1. It is our race-based quest for justice in America.<br /><br />2. It is our race-based quest for the restoration and redemption of our<br />dignity and positive worth as a people in this country and on this<br />planet.<br /><br />3. It is our relentless quest to achieve respect for simply being Black<br />people in this country and in this world. The single collective<br />existence of Black people in America and on this planet is one<br />of common, habitual and omnipresent disrespect. From that core<br />(a nurtured product of white supremacy) all else that ails us comes.<br /><br />4. It is the race-based quest for an Apology (to our Ancestors)--An<br />Atonement (to demonstrate the sincerity or at least the seriousness<br />of the Apology)--and Compensation (in some form decided by Black<br />people in the USA).<br /><br />5. It is the race-based quest to heal this country of its racist past and<br />present, and to provide a viable, non-racist alternative for this<br />country's future.<br /><br />6. It is the accumulation of overwhelming bushels of evidence,<br />including personal testimony, property records and deeds, financial<br />profits and transactions, historical documentation and a clear<br />sense of righteous indignation together balled up into tight, steel-<br />trap arguments that will compel victory in the foreseeable future.<br /><br />7. It is a national/regional struggle in the USA that is closely<br />intertwined with a global reparations struggle against vestiges of<br />colonialism and capitalist exploitation. A reparations victory<br />anywhere will show the way for reparations victories everywhere!!<br /><br />8. It is both an Internal struggle for us to redeem and rescue<br />ourselves, and an External struggle to exact acknowledgement,<br />apology and atonement for this country's long-term abuse and<br />exploitation of Black people.<br /><br />9. It is a demand for the release and return of our Black political<br />prisoners.<br /><br />10. It is logical, it is correct, and it is winnable.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">WHAT REPARATIONS IS NOT:</span><br />1. It is not a plea for a hand-out, another welfare program, nor an extortion plot to fleece White folk. Reparations is not solely an economics issue—we cannot buy the respect that is due us.<br /><br />2. It is not a substitute for regular and ordinary social programming done by the USA government.<br /><br />3. It is not a far-out fantasy of the lunatic fringe.<br /><br />4. It is not an issue that Black folk will simply forget and "get over it."<br /><br />5. It is not going to be won by trying to solve all our problems at once.<br />We must focus our efforts.<br /><br />6. It is not the panacea for all Black problems, but it is the beginning of our being able to end those ills that have kept us down for so long.<br /><br />7. It will not cause more racial friction; it will finally allow racial healing in America.<br /><br />8. It is not a struggle that can be won by one segment of the Black population in the USA. To win, we need a coming together of virtually all segments of the Black population.<br /><br />9. It is not a struggle for the lazy and one-time participant. To win this struggle we must be relentless for reparations.<br /><br />10. It is not a struggle that will be won by emotion, zeal, righteousness and passion alone. We must have continuous strategic planning, common sense, mother wit and mutual respect to get this done.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/slavegrafix.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 322px; height: 409px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/slavegrafix.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>_________________________________________________________<br />1 The Operational Definition of reparations, which is the basis of this NSR Plan, was developed and submitted by The Reparations Research & Advocacy Group, Los Angeles, California and enhanced by suggestions from participants and Planning Group members for the National Reparations Congress, Los Angeles/Compton, California, 2004); approved and adopted by the RUF membership, September, 2004.<br /><br />This Operational Definition is a complement to the current conceptual definitions of reparations regularly referred to in the Reparations Movement. Conceptual definitions, while very important for envisioning the “big picture” of a process, are essentially generalized notions or ideas about an issue, thing or activity. It is rare for conceptual definitions<br />to be adequate or very useful when it’s time for real work.<br /><br />The most accepted concept of reparations in the Movement, for example, is that it is equivalent to repairing the Black community. Whether it is ‘repairing a wrong or an injury, or repairing the community back to wholeness,’ the idea of repair presupposes an original condition of non-injury, non-wrong, non-damaged when we were whole and healthy, or when we existed in efficient, harmonious operation or normal relations.<br /><br />But exactly when was that in the African American Experience? Was it back in various West African villages that we are still trying to find our DNA connections to? Was it during the Maafa/Transatlantic Slave Trade? Was it during the heyday of several successful Black towns in America before their Rosewood and Greenwood-like devastation by enraged white citizens and surrounding governments? Was it during the bullwhip days of chattel slavery in America? During Jim Crow days after the Civil War?<br /><br />During the era of Emmit Till and the Civil Rights Movement? In reality, there exists no clarity in the Reparations Movement about what historical period we are referring to when demanding repair. That makes it amorphous and virtually impossible to focus on and achieve. That is characteristic of conceptual definitions.<br /><br />Operational definitions are more specific, pragmatic, clarifying articulations of a process, thing or activity and can be more readily put into tangible action.<br /><br />The NRC NSRPlan respectfully recognizes and acknowledges the following two aspects of the current conceptual definitions of Reparations, one international, the other national:<br /><br />(a) The Van Boven Report, 1989, representing the U.N. Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, stated that, “Reparations includes restitution, compensation, rehabilitation and, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition. Restitution refers to measures such as restoration of liberty, family life, citizenship, return to one’s place of residence and, return of property. These measures seek to re-establish the situation that existed prior to the violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Compensation refers to monetary compensation for any economically assessable damage resulting from violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Rehabilitation includes medical and psychological care as well as legal and social services. Satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition includes, inter alia, an apology (including public acknowledgement of the facts and acceptance of responsibility) and, measures to prevent recurrence of the violations.” This quote is from “International Law Obligations to Provide Reparations for Human Rights Abuses,” by Antonio Buti, Murdoch University School of Law, as provided by The Afrikan American Institute For Policy Studies and Planning, Greenville, South Carolina.<br /><br />(b) N’COBRA’s conceptual definition of reparations is, “Payment of a debt owed; the act of repairing a wrong or injury; to atone for wrongdoings; to make amends; to make one whole again; the payment of damages; to repair a nation; compensation in money, land, or materials for damages.”<br /><br />2Although it is more regularly asserted that American slavery began for Black folk either in 1619 with the landing of the Dutch slave ship in Jamestown, or 1661-1664, when Maryland, and then Virginia, made slavery a specifically color-coded thing, the dates here refer to the birth and legal establishment of America (the USA) as an independent and “sovereign” country in 1775-77, with the Second Continental Congress’ declaration of the United States of America, the writing of America’s first Constitution (the Articles of Confederation), and the Declaration of Independence. Colonial America—1607-1775-- was “owned” and<br />regulated by England and English companies..<br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/scars%20of%20slavery.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 305px; height: 401px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/scars%20of%20slavery.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">_________________________________________________________<br /></div><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">IV. BROAD TACTICS FOR SHORT-TERM REPARATIONS GOALS IN THE</span> <span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">REGION</span></span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> (NOTE: These are activities that can and should be completed within one year or less)</span><br /><br />Youth/Students should<br />(1) Disseminate the word to all college/university campuses, public and<br />charter schools, that for Black History Month Activities, Feb. 2005, for<br />Black graduation dinners and seminars, periodic campus guest speaker<br />events, graduation speakers, etc., bring in reparations speakers. (See<br />www.reparationunitedfront.org for a list of solid reparations speakers)<br /><br />(2) Make sure that for all upcoming student conferences, 2004-2005, where<br />there will be Black attendance, reparations – in its international and/or national dimensions— will be discussed somewhere on the agenda.<br /><br />(3) Make sure that in all regional areas that have Black-Africana-Pan African-<br />African American Studies programs or departments, students should try to<br />get professors to set up reparations classes, colloquia or seminars to discuss<br />the issue, or else incorporate the topic into their current course syllabi. BSU<br />and ASU-type meetings should initiate dialogue on the issue, do student<br />debates regarding the issue, and/or coordinate student-faculty retreats to<br />discuss reparations, among other ideas.<br /><br />(4) Set up book clubs on reparations to keep current with the increasing literature<br />on the topic<br /><br />(5) Buy and support rap/hip-hop artists and other talents who push the reparations<br />issue, and request reparations songs to be played on the radio, including<br />campus radio shows.<br /><br />(6) Make sure that in all church, mosque, community group, and campus cultural<br />activities (e.g. theater, poetry, dance, singing, step shows, etc.) that students<br />and youth are involved in, they push for the reparations issue to be included<br />in the activities in some way.<br /><br />(7) Find out whether your campus—high school or college/university—was<br />built by slaves or founded by investors who made money from slavery or<br />the slave trade. If your research shows either to be the case, demand a campus<br />memorial or other kind of recognition of that fact.<br /><br />(8) Find a distinctive tactic that appeals to youth and students and spread it<br />(e.g., Rap-ins, where students consistently stand in front of classroom<br />buildings, on the campus lawns, or in the campus Quads, and do short rap/<br />spoken word pieces on reparations); Challenge-ins, where students select<br />certain social science or humanities classes and, with the professor’s<br />permission, challenge the particular class to a reparations debate, etc.).<br /><br />(9) Set up a student reparations response team on every campus to immediately<br />produce a written rebuttal to any Horowitz-type campus or community<br />newspaper article/opinion piece on reparations.<br /><br />(10) Put out flyers and leaflets promoting the various pro-reparations arguments.<br />Take out ads in the campus and community newspapers supporting and advocating reparations.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Churches, Mosques</span><br /><br />(1) Investigate the scheduling of all upcoming church conventions and<br />conferences where policy resolutions and substantial discussion will be<br />allowed. Get on the agenda (contact whatever ministers, program<br />coordinators, or planning committees that are in charge and negotiate<br />participation) and get reparations resolutions written and passed in all<br />available regional denominations of the Black Church.<br /><br />(2) Try to get church and mosque ministers to let your best reparations<br />speakers do a Black History Month sermon during February, 2005.<br /><br />(3) During Sunday School, use Bible verses and stories that promote<br />reparations (See www.reparationunitedfront.org for relevant Bible verses.)<br /><br />(4) For churches and community groups that have Kwanzaa celebrations in the<br />region, get the reparations issue into the discussion topics.<br /><br />(5) Whenever churches have youth choirs, theater/drama activities, teen<br />development/rites of passage activities, get the reparations issue discussed<br />in those venues through skits, songs, and other techniques.<br /><br />(6) Get the adult choirs—particularly on Men’s Day, Women’s Day or other<br />special activities—to do something on reparations. Find a reparations-oriented song, write one, or have one written for the choirs. Be creative and get this done.<br /><br />(7) Work with any and all NOI mosques in the area to push the reparations issue. Have panel discussions at the mosques, when allowed, and find other ways of helping all mosque members to become highly knowledgeable about the reparations issue.<br /><br />(8) If a Second Million Man March is organized, reparations groups should work<br />closely with mosques and other interested groups to ensure the success of that effort, and to ensure a prominent role is made on the agenda for discussion of the National and International Reparations Movement.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Black Fraternal Organizations and Related Activities</span><br /><br />(1) If you are or you know a member of the Masons (three or four letter),<br />Shriners, Eastern Stars, Elks, Moose Lodge, or any other similar<br />organization, find a way of getting the reparations issue put into the<br />organization’s newsletter, get it on the agenda of lodge and temple<br />meetings, annual conferences, etc. Get the Masons and other similar<br />groups to endorse the Reparations Movement.<br /><br />(2) If you are or you know a member of a Black Greek organization, get<br />the issue of reparations on the group’s agenda at any and all meetings<br />that are available for such public discussion. Get the organization to<br />sponsor reparations projects. Discuss the issue in the organization’s<br />newsletter or bulletin.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >Education</span><br /></div><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">PUBLIC SCHOOLS/CHARTER SCHOOLS</span><br />(1) Engage PTAs in discussions about the reparations issue and how it can<br />be incorporated into regional school work.<br /><br />(2) Get a small group of concerned individuals together and offer $100-<br />500 rewards for the best student essays on the reparations issue during<br />Black History Month, MLK festivities, and any other time the issue can<br />be pushed.<br /><br />(3) Get reparations storytellers, dramatic skits, singing groups/rap groups,<br />etc., to bring the issue of reparations to as many schools as possible<br />during Black History Month, graduation ceremonies, and any other<br />available times. There will always be current and retired teachers who<br />are resident in our communities. Converse with them about how best<br />to achieve these ends; use their expertise.<br /><br />(4) Pass out, whenever it’s allowable, the reparations one-sheets to kinder-<br />garteners, 1-6 graders, middle school students and high school students.<br />There are one-sheets specifically designed for each broad grade level<br />in the Appendix to this plan. For example: (Intended for Kindergarteners<br />and First Graders—Can Be Recited or Sung)<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">=======================</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);"><br />KNOW WHAT?</span><br /><br />There was a man<br />Who worked real hard<br />He got no pay<br />But his back got scarred<br /><br />There was a young girl<br />With dreams and things<br />Did what she was told<br />But sold for string<br /><br />There was a woman<br />They worked her to death<br />She fed their children<br />Hers got hung for theft<br /><br />There was an owner<br />Had lots of farm hands<br />Took away our freedom<br />Still owes us some land<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">========================</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">HIGHER EDCATION</span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">(See Youth/Students, Section A in the Plan)</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Community-based Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) Whatever group you are a member of, get the reparations issue on the<br />agenda as many times as possible. Try to get guest speakers to come<br />in and talk about the relevance of the reparations issue and the mission<br />of your group. Get the group to sponsor at least one reparations Town<br />Hall or to fully participate in one put on by another community group.<br />Pass out reparations one-sheets and other literature as often as possible.<br /><br />(2) Choose a reparations project—Internal or External—that is appropriate<br />and relevant to your group, and drum up support within your group for<br />the project to be done. (For example, sponsor or sell a reparations<br />calendar, reparations pins, stickers, do a community debate on reparations,<br />coordinate a candidates’ forum that deals with the issue, etc.)<br /><br />(3) We must help to complete and disseminate the results of the regional and<br />national survey of Black folk on what form of reparations they want.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Entertainment Industry</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(1) Record Industry</span><br />a. Locate and support any conscious rappers, hip hop or r&b<br />artists who are willing to make reparations-oriented records. That<br />means buying the cds/dvds, attending any concerts given by them,<br />and helping to arrange engagements at schools, community outlets, etc.<br />b. Do a letter-writing campaign to Russell Simmons, Puff Daddy, and<br />other record moguls, requesting reparations tracks and albums from<br />some of their artists.<br />c. If talented enough, start your own reparations singing/rap group and<br />make the rounds of community shows, university programs, etc,<br />spreading the word.<br />d. Secure copies of Prince’s “When Will We Be Paid” (a re-make of the<br />Staples Singers’ 1970’s song), and any other dance-ready reparations<br />jam. There are several out there. Take them with you when you go<br />to parties and ask the DJ to play one or two of them. At any parties or<br />social gatherings that you host that include music, play one or more<br />reparations tunes.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(2.) Movies/T-V/Cable</span><br />a. Locate and secure any previously produced movies, t-v shows or cable shows that deal with reparations. Get copies of them and prepare them to be shown at free public gatherings on reparations.<br /><br />For any such shows that will be broadcast in the future or made into films, have someone in your organization designated to scour the entertainment trades for this information and have a mailing list/ telephone tree already prepared for quick dissemination of broadcast times, theater bills, etc.<br /><br />b .Seek out one or more Hollywood celebrities who will support<br />the Reparations Movement and negotiate with them on how they<br />can best help move us forward.<br />c. Produce and find ways to air as many times as possible Public<br />Service announcements on the Reparations Movement. Do this<br />on radio and t-v.<br />d. Find a way to produce and regularly broadcast a cable t-v program<br />on the Reparations Movement in your local area.<br />e. Do as many t-v/radio/cable interviews on the Reparations Movement<br />as possible. Try to get on the Steve Harvey Morning Show, Tavis<br />Smiley, etc. Be prepared and have something cogent to say.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">(3). Pro Athletes</span><br />a. Locate either the agents of conscious pro athletes, or other accessible contacts and set up meetings with them to discuss the significance of the Reparations Movement. Give them tangible ways to help--- financial support, making a public service comment, underwriting<br />a reparations gathering, talking to their friends about the Reparations Movement, etc.---rather than have an informal chat that meanders nowhere.<br />b. Once a particular area or region has done an assessment of what projects can be successfully accomplished by ourselves in terms of Internal Reparations, ask for specific help from the conscious pro athlete(s) you have successfully contacted.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Business Community</span><br /><br />(1) Articles have to be written and published making the case for the<br />African American business community to embrace the Reparations<br />Movement. One-sheets have to be prepared. The articles must<br />demonstrate how the achievement of African American reparations<br />will benefit all of us, including Black businesses. The articles must<br />get into the local newspapers, and businesses should be asked to allow<br />the reparations one-sheets to be left on their counters for clients<br />coming in.<br /><br />(2) Reparations exhibits, including brochures, videos, one-sheets, etc.,<br />should be prepared and displayed at any annual Black Business<br />Expositions, as regularly occurs in Los Angeles and other regional cities.<br /><br />(3) Lectures should be prepared on ‘Reparations and the Black Business<br />Community,’ for presentations at conferences, Business Roundtables,<br />Black Business Student Association meetings, etc.<br /><br />(4) Within the next 12 months, the Black Business community should<br />get prepared for a series of rolling economic boycotts by Black<br />customers of predominately White-owned businesses in the Black<br />community.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);"></span> <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Legal Community</span><br /><br />(1) The national and regional Black attorneys interested in reparations should meet and agree on a common legal strategy for achieving reparations. Filing scattered, individual lawsuits is not working. One or more of these attorneys should take the initiative and set up the series of meetings necessary to accomplish this legal strategy goal. There law students<br />(BALSA students, for example) who are very interested in working along with those who pursue this approach.<br /><br />(2) The regional reparations attorneys should help set up and run the Slave Reparations Remembrance and Restitution Fund. This may have to begin as a California state fund first to provide a positive model for how it can work regionally, then nationally.<br /><br />(3) There should be an historical search, state-wide and regionally, for fully-supportable legal reasons to file briefs for reparations. For example, the investigation of the illegal slave trade and slave ownership in California after 1850 and its impact on unfair business practices in the state is a current issue needing focused attention in order to be completed.<br /><br />(4) Conduct legal research on whether states have violated their own public education laws and their duty to educate Black citizens. That may be another grounds for legal redress. Also address the tobacco industry and its unpaid Black labor issue.<br /><br />(5) Those who are expert on the issue of Black Political Prisoners should get that issue on the national legal strategies agenda for reparations so that we can continue progressive work on that issue.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Legislative/Governmental Community</span><br /><br />(1) Work towards getting H.R. 40 passed, including passing out information sheets, and trying to get more municipal resolutions approved should be continued.<br /><br />(2) We must explore the full range of governmental opportunity to get reparations more broadly on the public agenda. The local representatives on the Congressional Black Caucus should be asked to set a meeting with President Bush or one of his top advisers and request a Presidential Commission to Study the Viability of Reparations for African Americans. Presidents regularly set up such commissions. A coherent essay advocating that approach and its significance must be prepared and delivered to each such representative. These representatives will also be asked to seek federal funding for a special three-day conference on the viability of the slave reparations, inviting up to 25 Black scholars who will deliver papers on specific aspects of this large issue, e.g., the Legal Argument for Reparations, the Moral Argument for Reparations, etc. The papers presented will all be published in a booklet as a special congressional representative field study/report.<br /><br />(3) The Slave Business Ordinance passed in Chicago and Los Angeles must be carefully studied as a possible model for other cities in the region. A summary of how the Chicago/Los Angeles laws were accomplished must be written, including an assessment of what each has accomplished thus far for the Reparations Movement.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">The Mass Media</span><br /><br />(1) In each locale within the region, we must train at least one group of writers and researchers to keep up with all news coverage of the Reparations Movement, and to quickly respond to any negative newspaper editorials or articles anywhere in their geographical area.<br /><br />(2) In each city within the region, raise the necessary funds and put up at least one, possibly two, large billboards saying REPARATIONS NOW! IN MEMORY OF OUR ANCESTORS AND FOR THE FUTURE OF OUR CHILDREN!! that can be seen by a large number of Black folk traveling through the community daily.<br /><br />(3) We must write and keep current one-sheets, flyers and brochures on the Reparations Movement.<br /><br />(4) We must write and get printed in the local media articles that will help prepare the community to participate in an economic boycott in 2005 to establish negotiating leverage in this struggle.<br /><br />(5) We must adopt a particular newspaper or mass media outlet (radio or t-v) and focus a weekly letter writing campaign to that newspaper or radio/t-v station giving them a steady stream of requests to publish pro-reparations articles and commentary.<br /><br />(6) We must make a list of each church bulletin, Black Greek newsletter, Masonic bulletin, publications of the Association of Black Social Workers, newsletters of predominately Black employee unions, etc. Make contact with whoever edits and produces these news sources, and consistently try and get reparations pieces in those documents.<br /><br />(7) We must publish a well-edited and well-presented Reparations Newsletter at least bi-monthly for public distribution.<br /><br />(8) We must produce and distribute a reparations DVD, and a reparations Power Point presentation that can be distributed throughout the region.<br /><br />(9) We must produce a bevy of Reparations Now pins, caps, shirts, stickers, and other such paraphernalia and get them out to the public at every opportunity.<br /><br />(10) As stated above, get on any and every radio, t-v, cable show possible and spread the reparations word.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">V. BROAD TACTICS FOR LONG-TERM GOALS</span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">(To be accomplished within the 2005-2010 time period)</span><br />A. Youth/Students<br /><br />(1) We must study the issue of American universities possibly being responsible for some portion of reparations because in their early years, slaves built their facilities, and/or the university faculty/staff owned slaves, as in Brown University and the University of Alabama.<br /><br />(2) We must identify Black youth and students with talent, and help to teach and to train them to become articulate, well-informed, responsible and ethical spokespeople for Black reparations, redemption and respect. We cannot allow these youth to grow up like weeds.<br /><br />(3) We must master the computer technology that is currently available and utilize it to help us accomplish reparations. All Black youth and students should become computer experts and we all should do every thing we can to facilitate that.<br /><br />(4) We must get a "We Are The World"-type song and album recorded, distributed and promoted by some conscious rappers/hip-hop and R&B artists.<br /><br />(5) We must finance and establish a Black Leadership Institute somewhere in the region or in the USA in which we can train our youth on how to lead us into the future, and where we can hold seminars, working sessions and meetings to keep our current Black leadership engaged with each other and on a positive, ethical and responsible path.<br /><br />(6) We must encourage our youth and students to support THE MATAH DISTRIBUTION NETWORK. Expanding, defending, and building this network to its full capacity will help the Reparations Movement tremendously.<br /><br />(7) We must educate our youth and students on who Black political prisoners are, how we can network to keep each other informed about the progress or lack of progress in their situations, and the various ways we can help to support these sisters and brothers incarcerated for trying to help the Black community. Our youth and students must become more knowledgeable about using DNA sampling to force new looks at old cases and to help get some of those incarcerated out.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">B. Churches /Mosques</span><br /><br />(1) We must convince from 15-25 ministers with significant congregations in the region to take on the reparations issue and to push their congregations to understand it and to get involved in it.<br /><br />(2) We must construct a massive mailing list (e-mail and snail mail) and telephone tree of church and mosque members that we can regularly contact with reparations information.<br /><br />(3) We must continually cultivate the reparations relationship with the Nation of Islam, to steadily improve the sharing of vital information on the progress of the Reparations Movement. There should be joint rallies, panel discussions, strategy sessions, etc., as often as possible on this issue.<br /><br />(4) Eventually, we must sit down with White church allies and inform them how they can help us in this struggle.<br /><br />(5) We must set up a church-by-church visitation schedule in each locale in the region to either be on the podium delivering the reparations message, or passing out leaflets and flyers to church and mosque goers (on cars, hand-to-hand, etc.). We should be able to visit every Black Church and Muslim Mosque in the entire region at least once every two years, with some visited more than once.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">C. Black Fraternal and Social Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) There must be a consistent network of contacts established and maintained of Black Greek organizations and their members, the Elks, Moose Lodge, and especially the Masons and Eastern Stars. We must attend their rallies, conferences and meetings. We must make sure we are members ourselves, and we must continually push the reparations issue.<br /><br />(2) There must be a regional and national petition/support drive to get as many Black organizations as possible to sign up to promote and support the Reparations Movement, including as many Black Greeks, Masons, etc.,as possible. The drive should culminate in 2006-2007.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">D. Education</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Public/Charter</span><br /><br />(1) There are both informal and formal educational organizations that we need to impact in terms of the reparations struggle. In the mass-based, grass roots educational activities, we must implement specific reparations educational programs in our particular geographical areas. In the formal educational process (public school), we must have a reparations educational curriculum<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">a. That tells the truth about the world </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">b. That corrects the currently taught historical record </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">c. That will have at its center the birth of African civilization and the birth of capitalist exploitation </span> <span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255); font-weight: bold;">d. That re-claims our rightful place in the history and development of science and technology e. That re-invigorates African/Africana Studies in the schools and colleges to re-claim their original purpose to empower the Black community. </span><br /><br />(2) We must infiltrate the current educational system in terms of not only curriculum content, but book purchase decisions, methods of preparing and teaching culturally relevant information, etc.<br /><br />(3) We must identify currently existing programs and activities that allow us to model and share successes from other parts of the country, including: a. The L.A. Learning to Learn initiative b. The schools storytelling programs c. The Ella Baker Training Institute d. The consistent discussion of the 13th and 14th amendments regarding the need for reparations e. Providing training and extra credit through public school and college programs (African American Studies, etc.) for working with the community and pushing reparations.<br /><br />(4) We must establish a Working Group on video production for Reparations Education. Through that we will prepare reparations infomercials, audio spots, 60-second public service announcements, etc.<br /><br />(5) We must get testimonials from Black doctors, faculty members, star athletes, and others as spokespeople for reparations education.<br /><br />(6) We must study programs like the Model U.N. in public schools and colleges as vehicles to immerse youth and students into learning about and representing African societies. That kind of training sharpens the mind and intellect to defend African contributions.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Higher Education</span><br /><br />(1) A listing of all Black-oriented academic/scholastic organizations must be compiled, including contact names. All such organizations will receive information urging them to add the reparations issue to their discussion and decision agendas. All of these organizations will be asked to sign the support letter which will come to them urging continued, written support of the Reparations Movement. A specific committee of people within each of our organizations should be assigned to focus on this project.<br /><br />(2) A list of all Black Studies/Africana Studies/Pan African Studies/African and African American Studies Programs and Departments in the region and in the country must be compiled, including relevant contacts, and reparations data, including the Reparations Newsletter mentioned above, should regularly be sent to each of them. The Black Studies entities should be urged to join in and participate in the Reparations Movement in whatever ways they can.<br /><br />(3) All Black Studies organizations---NCBS, Black Heritage Association, National Association for the Study of Black Life and History, etc.--- must be listed and contacted. Members of those organizations who are reparationists should get the issue on the conference and meeting agendas of those organizations on a regular basis.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">E. Community-Based Organizations</span><br /><br />(1) We must get as many grass roots and community-based organizations as possible to implement this plan. Set up meetings, attend rallies, discuss the plan with organizational representatives, answer any questions participants have, etc. Pass out one-sheets and brochures to card club meetings, auto club rallies, Senior Citizens rallies and conferences, etc.<br /><br />(2) It is especially important that we must explain Internal Reparations to any and all CBO and grass roots groups. Dealing with every new or continuing problem in the Black Community is not IR, but dealing with any and all of them that are about regaining the respect that is due to Black folk, and redeeming the dignity of Black people, is what Internal Reparations is about. So anything and everything that CBO members and grass roots folk are doing towards that end must be supported and encouraged as helping to move us forward towards achieving the reparations goal.<br /><br />(3) We must establish and maintain book clubs and reparations discussion groups in the community to engage each other on new literature in the Movement, and to keep up with all new writing and new issues regarding the Reparations Movement. To stay informed is to stay alert.<br /><br />F. Entertainment Industry (Continue the Work Described in the Short-Term<br />Tactics Section of this Category Above)<br /><br />G. Business Community (Continue the Work Described Above for this<br />Category)<br /><br />H. Legal Community (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br />I. Legislative Community (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br />J. The Mass Media (Continue the Work Above)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">VII. NEEDS AND RESOURCES TO ACHIEVE EFFECTIVE<br />IMPLEMENTATION AND SUCCESS OF THIS PLAN</span><br /><br />A. Essentially, this plan is founded on creative volunteerism. There will be no paid positions for getting the required work done, and, unfortunately, much of the printing costs for flyers, brochures, newsletters, one-sheets, etc., will be borne by the activists themselves unless their local organizations are adept at fundraising.<br /><br />B. There are already on-going reparations activities and organizations in the region with their own body of resources. A networking list of organizations and regular reparations activities should be produced and maintained.<br /><br />C. Financial sponsorship of reparations activities should be explored from Blacks who have the monetary wherewithal and the political consciousness to help. Accepting financial donations from anyone who offers is not a good idea and can bring discredit from the Black community if the funds are from a suspicious source. Whatever activists can pay for themselves, they should do.<br /><br />D. The biggest asset we will have in the implementation of this plan is talented Black folk: lawyers, teachers, business men and women, politicians, regular grass roots workers, writers, students, clergy, musicians and artists, etc. Actually, that may be enough.<br />-----------------------------------------------------<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);font-size:130%;" ><br />APPENDIX</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">I. ONE-SHEETS/FLYERS</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">(Suitable for the General Public, High School and College Students)</span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">A. REPARATIONS STRAIGHT TALK</span><br />by David L. Horne for <span style="font-weight: bold;">The Reparations United Front of Southern California</span><br />Reparations is an issue that African Americans must deal with in this country. Either we deal seriously with it, or others will deal with it for us, and impose their results on us. In memory of our ancestors and the totality of the Black Experience in this country, we simply cannot allow that to happen. So, we must educate ourselves about this issue, discuss it among ourselves, decide what we want to do about it, and decide what shape or form reparations for African Americans should take when it is ultimately achieved.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">Don't waste time asking whether it will or won't be accomplished. Take the high road--affirm that it will be and move assertively and progressively regarding that decision. </span><br /><br />To help clear your mind about reparations for African Americans, here is some straightforward information on the What, Why and How of the concept.<br /><br />WHAT THERE IS A SERIOUS DEBT OWED BY AMERICA TO THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION. THAT DEBT IS CALLED REPARATIONS (APOLOGY-COMPENSATION- ATONEMENT FOR INJURY CAUSED).<br /><br />WHY 1. UP TO 78% OF THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION WAS UNJUSTLY ENSLAVED FROM 1661-1865 IN THE U.S. (Some argue that the inclusive dates were 1619-1865, but slavery was not exclusively a Black thing in America until first Maryland, then Virginia passed legal stipulations to that effect.) EVEN IF ONE WANTS TO START WITH THE FIRST AMERICAN GOVERNMENT--AS OPPOSED TO ENGLISH COLONIAL GOVERNMENT--DECLARED IN 1775-1776 BY THE FIRST OFFICIAL AMERICAN ADMINISTRATION (THE SECOND CONTINENTAL CONGRESS) UNTIL 1865 (90 YEARS OF AMERICAN SLAVERY), THE PERCENTAGE OF BLACKS ENSLAVED ONLY INCREASES TO 88%.<br /><br />2. BLACK AMERICANS WERE NOT PAID FOR THEIR LABOR, YET THAT SLAVE LABOR HELPED SUBSTANTIALLY TO BUILD AND TO ENRICH THIS COUNTRY. THIS IS NOT MYTH OR HYPERBOLE, BUT PROVABLE FACT. THIS PROCESS IS LEGALLY CALLED "UNJUST ENRICHMENT."<br /><br />3. EVEN "FREE" BLACK AMERICANS WERE ENSLAVED THROUGH THE 1850 FUGITIVE SLAVE ACT <span style="font-style: italic;">(Through which Any White person could accuse Any Black person of being a slave, and the accusation alone could get one arrested and sent up river, since Blacks were prohibited from testifying in court even on their own behalf), AND THE 1857 DRED SCOTT CASE (the infamous Roger Taney ruling, that Blacks were not citizens of America, and thus "...there are no rights that the colored man has in America that the white man is bound to respect...")</span>.<br /><br />4. AFTER THE CIVIL WAR, BLACK AMERICANS WERE LEGALLY FREED (The 13TH AMENDMENT, ratified in December, 1865 ) BUT ECONOMICALLY RE-SHACKLED AND IMPOVERISHED BY LAWS OF THE FEDERAL AND SOUTHERN STATE GOVERNMENTS, INCLUDING TENANT FARMING, SHARE CROPPING AND THE CHAIN GANG SYSTEM. THIS IS LEGALLY CALLED "RELENTLESS" OR "CONTINUING HARM."<br /><br />5. THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CONVINCED THE MAJORITY OF THE SOUTHERN BLACK POPULATION (WHERE 89% OF THE BLACK POPULATION LIVED) TO INVEST ALL OF THEIR MEAGER SAVINGS AND ASSETS IN THE FREEDMEN'S SAVINGS BANK, THEN ALLOWED CORRUPT BANK OFFICIALS THAT THE U.S. GOVERNMENT HAD APPOINTED TO STEAL THE MONEY AND TO CLOSE THE BANK WITH OVER $4 MILLION( valued at approximately $35 million today) OF THAT MONEY UNACCOUNTED FOR. THOSE OFFICIALS WERE NOT PROSECUTED NOR THE MONEY RECOVERED.<br /><br />6. AFTER GIVING AMERICA ITS LOYALTY, ITS HARD WORK, AND ITS TRUST, THE BLACK AMERICAN POPULATION WAS PUNISHED BY THE FEDERAL AND STATE GOVERNMENTS SIMPLY FOR BEING BLACK AND POOR. THIS PUNISHMENT WAS THROUGH THE BLACK CODES, LYNCHING, JIM CROWISM, DEFICIENT EDUCATION, RESTRICTIVE COVENANTS, BLACK DISENFRANCHISEMENT, AND COVERT AND OVERT PATTERNS OF RACIAL DISCRIMINATION. AND THIS PERSISTENT PUNISHMENT CONTINUES TODAY THROUGH 21ST CENTURY RACISM AND UNREMITTING DISRESPECT! THIS IS ALSO KNOWN AS MORE "RELENTLESS HARM."<br /><br />7. SINCE 1865, MORE THAN 50 COURT CASES HAVE BEEN FILED AGAINST THE U.S. GOVERNMENT IN U.S. DISTRICT OR U.S. CIRCUIT COURT FOR AFRICAN AMERICAN REPARATIONS. THEY WERE ALL UNSUCCESSFUL BECAUSE OF THE "SOVEREIGN IMMUNITY" ISSUE ( PLAINTIFFS' LACK OF STANDING TO FILE THE CASE). TODAY, THERE ARE AT LEAST THREE DIFFERENT GROUPS WORKING ON FILING NEW COURT CASES WHICH CAN OVERCOME THAT GREAT OBSTACLE. THE CATO VS. U.S. CASE, 1995, IS INSTRUCTIVE READING.<br /><br />HOW YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS ISSUE BY SPREADING THE WORD AND TAKING UP THIS CAUSE! THEY OWE US!! TALK ABOUT REPARATIONS AT YOUR CHURCH, IN YOUR SCHOOLS, AT YOUR JOB, IN THE NEWSPAPERS !! DISCUSS IT! DEBATE IT! WRITE SONGS ABOUT REPARATIONS !! (As Pop Staples of the Staples Singers did in the 1970's, and Prince re-recorded and re-issued in January, 2001, "When Will We Be Paid?" ). <span style="font-weight: bold;">JOIN A REPARATIONS GROUP! GET IN THIS MOVEMENT AND LET'S GET THIS DONE !!!</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">THEY RIGHTEOUSLY OWE US !!!</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">REMEMBER REPARATIONS = RESPECT OUR FREEDOM IS MEANINGLESS WITHOUT RESPECT !!!</span><br />==============================<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" >B. SOME FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS<br />CONCERNING REPARATIONS FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">1. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">What does Reparations for African Americans really mean? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> It means getting the American government (federal, state, county and city) which supported the institution of slavery, lynching, institutional racism and other such things, to admit that it did a great injury to black people in this country, that that injury still continues, that the government apologizes for that injury, and that the government is willing to demonstrate its good faith in that apology by compensating African Americans in some relevant form determined by African Americans.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">2. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Is Reparations only about Black folk getting money from White folk? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>No. The forms that Reparations will take will be decided by Black people talking together about that issue. It may be a 50-year trust fund accessible to any African American who wants to start a business. It may be a guaranteed scholarship to and through college for every African American high school graduate. It may be any of those and any of various other forms that we can generally agree on. Yes, some individual money will probably be involved but that will be only a small part of a much larger equation. Reparations will come from the American government, and private corporations that profited from slavery and the domestic slave trade, not individual White people.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">3. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Won't this Reparations issue just divide America into racial camps by opening up old wounds?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>No, it won't. America is already divided into racial antagonism that simply won't die. Why? In great part, it is because those "old wounds" never healed. America essentially does not respect Black Americans. Slavery in America left a legacy of White privilege and entitlement, and Black deficiency and disrespect. It will take Reparations to seriously begin the process of racial Healing and interracial Respect in this country.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">4. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Isn't Welfare a kind of Reparations for African Americans? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> No. Welfare comes from the taxes all Americans pay. Most of the people on Welfare in America are White, not Black, and the Welfare System was designed to be that way. Welfare has nothing to do with Reparations.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">5. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Can we really win this? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A. </span>Yes, we can and we will. We will win with mother wit, a lot of research and hard work, and a great deal of strategizing and persistence. We cannot give up. We owe it to our ancestors. We owe it to our history and to ourselves. It is time. It is right. It is inevitable. Our best and brightest minds are on this as we speak, and we will not be denied. Come on, people! Get on the train!! All Abooard the Reparations Express !! They owe us!!!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">6. Q. </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Is there a prominent role for the Black Church? </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> Absolutely. The Black Church has been part and parcel of every serious movement for our racial betterment in our history in America. The Reparations Movement is a culmination of much of what our ancestors fought and died for. The Black Church must be involved in the leadership and energy of this mighty movement to restore the dignity of being Black in America, and to re-capture the respect that is due to Black folk in this country and in the world. Those in congregations should urge your particular church to get involved right now!!<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">7. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">What was the role of Arabs Spaniards and Africans in the enslavement of Black people around the world? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> There has been an Arab slave trade from East Africa and from West Africa northwards since at least 200 a.d. In fact, there was an Arab enslavement and trade of Africans well before and all through the time of Muhammad's founding and establishment of Islam, and both of these activities were perpetuated after Muhammad by many of those who professed to be Muslims. From modern reports out of the African countries of Sudan, Mauritania and Morocco, vestiges of that Arab slave trade still exist in the year 2003.<br /><br />Will there be a reparations reckoning with the Arabs over this issue? Yes, but not now. That issue is on the reparations agenda, but it is way down on the list.<br /><br />The Portuguese and the Spanish were the first two European nations "legally" approved by the Catholic Church to capture, transport and trade Africans. Both the Spanish and the Portuguese not only took African captives to parts of Europe for sale and exhibition, the two countries brought hundreds of thousands, even millions, of African slaves into South America, the Caribbean and North America.<br /><br />Thus, there were African slaves in Mexico, Columbia, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba, Jamaica, Bermuda, Barbados, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), Puerto Rico, etc., as a direct result of Portuguese and Spanish slave trading. Some African tribal groups participated heavily in raiding, capturing and selling other Africans; some African groups initially participated in this practice, then stopped and became opponents of the process; and some African tribal groups ferociously fought the process from the outset and continued to resist it no matter what. Examples of the first group include the Kanem-Bornu "kingdom" in West Central Africa; examples of the second group include the Ashanti and portions of the Congolese; and examples of the third include segments of the Mende-Malinke, the Mossi,and the Coromantians. Read From Chains to Bonds, Doudou Diene,ed., UNESCO, 2001, for more information on this African participation and resistance to the slave trade.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">8. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">Is there a deadline period for achieving reparations? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> No, there is no deadline period for achieving reparations, either in America or elsewhere in the world. We will just keep at it until the task is accomplished, no matter how long it takes. Patience must be practiced, since strategic planning and implementation take time. Also, the reparations struggle is too deep, too wide, and too fundamentally at the core of what the U.S. really is about for there to be a fixed date set. That being said, there are various hoped- for target dates--2007-8, 2010, 2020--that several activists have mentioned, but those are just that, mobile target dates.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">9. Q.</span> <span style="font-style: italic;">How does the Reparations Movement connect to the effort to save our Black colleges and Black hospitals from closing/disaccreditation ? </span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">A.</span> There is both an Internal Reparations Movement and an External Reparations Movement going on simultaneously. For the former, there are community strengthening, community control, and community institution building and consolidation activities that must occur. While we cannot allow ourselves to get misdirected to the point of dealing only with the everyday problems of racism, discrimination and Black disrespect, we also cannot ignore immediate and debilitating problems ongoing in our communities. Rescuing the Black colleges that are threatened with closure is one of those problems, and so is stopping the closure and disqualification of hospitals and trauma centers in the Black community. There are many other immediacies like these wherever we live. Those who have the expertise, contacts and skills should deal with those situations, including making sure there are future plans drawn up to stop this constant cycle of fiscal crisis and even fiscal mismanagement and/or constant understaffing and underfunding.. But the rest of us must keep working on the External Reparations struggle. Remember: all of our major problems as a people--the HIV-AIDS epidemic, the Black prison overpopulation, persistent school failure, etc.— are symptoms of the larger issue of persistent, pernicious Black disrespect and the relentless promotion in the U.S. of the negative value of being Black. If we spend all of our time dealing with all of the brush fires, we'll never attack and overwhelm the core forest fire from which they all emanate.<br /><br />Again, good strategic planning requires a proper and timely allocation of our talents and resources to both the immediate and the long-term issues, i.e., the small picture and the big picture.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" ><br />D. ONE SHEETS/FLYERS (Suitable for Middle School )</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">R</span> is the Respect that’s due when you worked hard rather than play<br />E is for the Equality you’ve earned by contributing in every way<br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">P</span> is for being Poor and Landless because they wouldn’t pay<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">A</span> is for the Anger you felt when they chained you to make you stay<br />R is for Reclaiming what’s yours no matter what they say<br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">A</span> is for our Ancestors for whom we’ll win this come what may<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">T</span> is for the Trees they used to make us swing and sway<br />I is for the I Won’t forget that burns in me as I lay<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">O</span> is for our Origins and the story that we must convey<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">N</span> is for the Never Again will we allow them to hold us at bay<br />S is for the Struggle we’ll wage and win for a brighter day<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Inspired By Two Young Brothers</span><br />(<span style="font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; color: rgb(102, 0, 204);">Nigel and Kiawe</span>)<br />May ‘04<br />==================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">A Little Rap(hasody)</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">Reparations is the name</span><br />Respect and Freedom is our claim<br />In this democratic game<br />That stole from us but take no blame<br />For what they did should be ashamed<br />But whaddaya know, they take no blame<br />For what they did, should be ashamed<br />But in their eyes ain’t nuthin ta change.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">Reparations is the name</span><br />Freedom and justice is our claim<br />And we learned to take dead aim<br />Since Willie Lynch done snitched their game<br />They tryin to play us all the same<br />But Willie Lynch done snitched their game<br />Yeah, we ran before when they came<br />But now it’s time for a rearrange<br /><br />dlh ‘04<br />=========================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">E. ONE SHEETS (Kindergarten—3rd Grade)</span> </span><span style="color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-family:arial;font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">KNOW WHAT?</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">There was a man</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Who worked real hard</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">He got no pay</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">But his back got scarred</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was a young girl</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">With dreams and things</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Did what she was told</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">But sold for string</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was a woman</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">They worked her to death</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">She fed their children</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Hers got hung for theft</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">There was an owner</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Had lots of farm hands</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Took away our freedom</span> <span style="font-family:arial;">Still owes us some land</span><br />=================================<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(102, 0, 204);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">A Little Song (Umph Umph Umph Umph)</span></span><br /><br />Gonna do what’s right<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Fair wins this fight<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gonna do what’s right<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Fair’s outta sight<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Gonna tell the truth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Want a Baby Ruth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gonna tell the truth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Else I’ll be uncouth<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Gotta be for real<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />What I did revealed<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gotta be for real<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />No lock and seal<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />When you work a man<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Tyin him tight as you can<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />When you work a man<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />You can’t steal his land<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br /><br />Here’s how it will go<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Gotta pay what you owe<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />Here’s the way it’ll go<br />Umph Umph Umph Umph<br />You’ll reap what you sow<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">======================<br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/Black%20Unity%20Arms.gif"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 129px; height: 173px;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/Black%20Unity%20Arms.gif" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-1137013673688169042006-01-11T12:51:00.000-08:002006-01-11T13:07:53.716-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/reparations_slavery.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/reparations_slavery.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: lucida grande;font-size:180%;" class="ft" ><br /><br />National Strategic Reparations Plan: Part II</span><br /></div><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 255);">III. THE OPERATIONAL DEFINITION FOR BLACK AFRICAN AMERICAN REPARATIONS AS THE BASIS FOR A NATIONAL STRATEGIC REPARATONS PLAN PUT FORTH IN THIS DOCUMENT 1</span><br /><br /><br /> <span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> EXTERNAL REPARATIONS</span><br /><br /> <span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);"> (A) GOVERNMENTAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT, APOLOGY, ATONEMENT, AND COMPENSATION FOR ITS PARTICIPATION IN THE SEIZURE AND MISUSE OF VALUABLE PROPERTY --LABOR PROPERTY--TAKEN FROM BLACK AFRICAN AMERICANS WHO WORKED AS SLAVES BETWEEN 1775-18652 IN THIS COUNTRY, USING THAT ILL-GOTTEN PROPERTY TO UNJUSTLY ENRICH THIS COUNTRY AND HELP IT BECOME THE GREAT NATION IT IS TODAY, ALL WITHOUT FAIRLY COMPENSATING THOSE AFRICAN AMERICANS OR THEIR DESCENDANTS FOR THE DELIBERATE LOSS OF SAID LABOR PROPERTY;</span> <span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">(B) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING THE ATONEMENT) FOR THE 140-YEAR SET OF GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ACTIVITIES CALLED JIM CROWISM AND BLACK SEGREGATION (INCLUDING THE LYNCHING, MURDERING AND RAPING OF BLACK PEOPLE, AND THE RAZING OF BLACK TOWNSHIPS) ALL OF WHICH RELEGATED AFRICAN AMERICANS TO THE BOTTOM RUNGS OF SOCIETY;</span> <span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">(C) COMPENSATION (DEMONSTRATING ATONEMENT) AT FAIR MARKET VALUE FOR CONTINUING GOVERNMENT-SUPPORTED ANTI-BLACK SOCIO-POLITICAL-ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES AND THEIR CONSEQUENCES THAT HAVE DEPRIVED AFRICAN AMERICANS OF RESPECT AND THEIR RIGHTFUL HONORED PLACE IN USA SOCIETY.<br /><br /></span> <span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> INTERNAL REPARATIONS</span><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">(NOTE: Internal Reparations does not absolve, excuse or dilute the responsibility of the various U.S. governmental components nor American corporations viz-a-viz Black Americans and what is owed us. However, our redemption is both external and internal and will not occur without our taking responsibility for part of our own healing.) </span><br /><br /><br /><br />(D) BLACK ASSESSMENT AND IDENTIFICATION OF THOSE NEGATIVE AND DEBILITATING ASPECTS OF OUR COMMUNITIES THAT WE CAN MOBILIZE AND ORGANIZE OUR EFFORTS TO REPAIR, REFORM AND CORRECT FOR OUR OWN BENEFIT.<br /><br />(E) THE FORMULATION OF ACTION PLANS—BOTH SHORT-TERM AND LONG-TERM---TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEMS AND NEGATIVE ASPECTS ASSESSED AND IDENTIFIED, AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THOSE PLANS.<br /><br /><br /> <span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);"> A STRAIGHTFORWARD BREAKDOWN</span><br /><br />WHAT REPARATIONS IS: (Based on our continuing veneration of and connection to our African and African descendent ancestors)<br /><br />1. It is our race-based quest for justice in America.<br /><br />2. It is our race-based quest for the restoration and redemption of our dignity and positive worth as a people in this country and on this planet.<br /><br />3. It is our relentless quest to achieve respect for simply being Black<br />people in this country and in this world. The single collective existence of Black people in America and on this planet is one of common, habitual and omnipresent disrespect. From that core (a nurtured product of white supremacy) all else that ails us comes.<br /><br />4. It is the race-based quest for an Apology (to our Ancestors)—An Atonement (to demonstrate the sincerity or at least the seriousness of the Apology)--and Compensation (in some form decided by Black people in the USA).<br /><br />5. It is the race-based quest to heal this country of its racist past and<br />present, and to provide a viable, non-racist alternative for this country’s future.<br /><br />6. It is the accumulation of overwhelming bushels of evidence, including personal testimony, property records and deeds, financial profits and transactions, historical documentation and a clear sense of righteous indignation together balled up into tight, steel-trap arguments that will compel victory in the foreseeable future.<br /><br />7. It is a national/regional struggle in the USA that is closely intertwined with a global reparations struggle against vestiges of colonialism and capitalist exploitation. A reparations victory anywhere will show the way for reparations victories everywhere!!<br /><br />8. It is both an Internal struggle for us to redeem and rescue ourselves, and an External struggle to exact acknowledgement, apology and atonement for this country’s long-term abuse and exploitation of Black people.<br /><br />9. It is a demand for the release and return of our Black political prisoners.<br /><br />10. It is logical, it is correct, and it is winnable.<br /><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">WHAT REPARATIONS IS NOT:</span><br /><br />1. It is not a plea for a hand-out, another welfare program, nor an extortion plot to fleece White folk. Reparations is not solely an economics issue—we cannot buy the respect that is due us.<br /><br />2. It is not a substitute for regular and ordinary social programming done by the USA government.<br /><br />3. It is not a far-out fantasy of the lunatic fringe.<br /><br />4. It is not an issue that Black folk will simply forget and “get over it.”<br /><br />5. It is not going to be won by trying to solve all our problems at once.<br /><br /> <span style="font-style: italic;"> We must focus our efforts.</span><br /><br />6. It is not the panacea for all Black problems, but it is the beginning of our being able to end those ills that have kept us down for so long. <br /><br />7. It will not cause more racial friction; it will finally allow racial healing in America.<br /><br />8. It is not a struggle that can be won by one segment of the Black population in the USA. To win, we need a coming together of virtually all segments of the Black population.<br /><br />9. It is not a struggle for the lazy and one-time participant. To win this struggle we must be relentless for reparations.<br /><br />10. It is not a struggle that will be won by emotion, zeal, righteousness and passion alone. We must have continuous strategic planning, common sense, mother wit and mutual respect to get this done.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">_________________________________________________________</span><br /><br />1 The Operational Definition of reparations, which is the basis of this NSR Plan, was developed and submitted by The Reparations Research & Advocacy Group, Los Angeles, California and enhanced<br /><br />by suggestions from participants and Planning Group members for the National Reparations Congress, Los Angeles/Compton, California, 2004); approved and adopted by the RUF membership, September, 2004.<br /><br />This Operational Definition is a complement to the current conceptual definitions of reparations regularly referred to in the Reparations<br /><br />Movement. Conceptual definitions, while very important for envisioning the “big picture” of a process, are essentially generalized notions or ideas about an issue, thing or activity. It is rare for conceptual definitions to be adequate or very useful when it’s time for real work. The most accepted concept of reparations in the Movement, for example, is that it is equivalent to repairing the Black community. Whether it is ‘repairing a wrong or an injury, or repairing the community back to wholeness,’ the idea of repair presupposes an original condition of non-injury, non-wrong, non-damaged when we were whole and healthy, or when we existed in efficient, harmonious operation or normal relations.<br /><br />But exactly when was that in the African American Experience? Was it back in various West African villages that we are still trying to find our DNA connections to? Was it during the Maafa/Transatlantic Slave Trade? Was it during the heyday of several successful Black towns in America before their Rosewood and Greenwood-like devastation by enraged white citizens and surrounding governments? Was it during the bullwhip days of chattel slavery in America? During Jim Crow days after the Civil War? During the era of Emmit Till and the Civil Rights Movement?<br /><br />In reality, there exists no clarity in the Reparations Movement about what historical period we are referring to when demanding repair. That makes it amorphous and virtually impossible to focus on and achieve. That is characteristic of conceptual definitions.<br /><br />Operational definitions are more specific, pragmatic, clarifying articulations of a process, thing or activity and can be more readily put into tangible action.<br /><br />The NRC NSRPlan respectfully recognizes and acknowledges the following two aspects of the current conceptual definitions of<br /><br />Reparations, one international, the other national:<br /><br />(a) The Van Boven Report, 1989, representing the U.N. Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, stated that, “Reparations includes restitution, compensation, rehabilitation and, satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition. Restitution refers to measures such as restoration of liberty, family life, citizenship, return to one’s place of residence and, return of property.<br /><br />These measures seek to re-establish the situation that existed prior to the violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Compensation refers to monetary compensation for any economically assessable damage resulting from violations of human rights and humanitarian law. Rehabilitation includes medical and psychological care as well as legal and social services. Satisfaction and guarantees of non-repetition includes, inter alia, an apology (including public acknowledgement of the facts and acceptance of responsibility) and, measures to prevent recurrence of the violations.” This quote is from “International Law Obligations to Provide Reparations for Human Rights Abuses,” by Antonio Buti, Murdoch University School of Law, as provided by The Afrikan American Institute For Policy Studies and Planning, Greenville, South Carolina.<br /><br />(b) N’COBRA’s conceptual definition of reparations is, “Payment of a debt owed; the act of repairing a wrong or injury; to atone for wrongdoings; to make amends; to make one whole again; the payment of damages; to repair a nation; compensation in money, land, or materials for damages.”<br /><br />2 Although it is more regularly asserted that American slavery began for Black folk either in 1619 with the landing of the Dutch slave ship in Jamestown, or 1661-1664, when Maryland, and then Virginia, made slavery a specifically color-coded thing, the dates here refer to the birth and legal establishment of America (the USA) as an independent and “sovereign” country in 1775-77, with the Second Continental Congress’ declaration of the United States of America, the writing of America’s first Constitution (the Articles of Confederation), and the Declaration of Independence. Colonial America—1607-1775-- was “owned” and regulated by England and English companies..Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20800143.post-1136946372691283232006-01-10T17:53:00.000-08:002006-01-10T18:26:12.706-08:00<div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/gr1_reparations1b.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/gr1_reparations1b.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);font-family:georgia;" >PART ONE</span><br /></div><div style="text-align: center; font-weight: bold;font-family:trebuchet ms;"><span style="font-size:130%;">A NATIONAL STRATEGIC<br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">REPARATIONS PLAN</span></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);font-size:130%;" ><br />2006-2010</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);font-size:130%;" > </span><br />The Documentary Result of<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">THE NATIONAL</span> REPARATIONS <span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">CONGRESS</span><br />Held in Compton/Los Angeles, California<br />MAY 28-31, 2004<br /><br />PRESENTED AND COMPILED BY<br />THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA WWW.REPARATIONUNITEDFRONT.ORG<br /><br />(310) 967-5871<br />www.reparationunitedfront.org<br /><br /></div><div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(102, 51, 255);"> <span style="font-weight: bold;">THE REPARATIONS UNITED FRONT </span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA</span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">REPRESENTING THE PLANNING COMMITTEE FOR THE NATIONAL REPARATIONS CONGRESS</span> <span style="font-weight: bold;">PRESENTS<br /></span><span style="font-weight: bold;">A NATIONAL STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN<br />2006-2010<br /></span></div><br /><br />I. RUF '04: In order to be effective and credible, any action plan---a battle plan, architectural plan, educational growth and development plan, etc.--- must have, at minimum, the five components immediately listed below:<br /><br />A. A clear view of the relevant issue/problem to be dealt with or corrected.<br /><br />B. A fairly accurate depiction of what has been attempted before, if anything, to deal with this issue/problem.<br /><br />C. Why dealing with this issue/problem is necessary.<br /><br />D. An operational definition of the issue at hand.<br /><br />E. Specific steps to take to handle/correct the issue or problem.<br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">CONTENTS OF A NATIONAL STRATEGIC REPARATIONS PLAN (NSRP)</span><br /></span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">I. Rationale For the Plan</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><br />II. Five Principle Goals For The National Reparations Effort</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><br />III. The Operational Definition Of Reparations for African Americans</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><br />IV. Broad Tactics For Short-Term Goals</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span><br /> 1. Youth/Students<br /><br /> 2. Churches/Mosques<br /><br /> 3. Black Fraternal and Social Organizations<br /><br /> 4. Education<br /><br /> (a) Public/Charter<br /><br /> (b) Higher Education<br /><br /> 5. Community-based Organizations<br /><br /> 6. Entertainment Industry<br /><br /> (a) Record Industry<br /><br /> (b) Movies/T-V/Cable<br /><br /> (c) Pro Athletes<br /><br /> 7. Business Community<br /><br /> 8. Legal Community (Including the Black Political Prisoners Issue)<br /><br /> 9. Legislative/Governmental Community<br /><br /> 10. Mass Media V. Broad Tactics For Long-Term Goals<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">VI. Needs And Resources To Achieve Effective Implementation And Success Of This Plan</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">I.</span> RATIONALE FOR THE PLAN</span> At this historical time towards the end of 2004, the Reparations Movement needs to move to the level of regional and national strategic reparations plans.<br /><br />Why?<br /><br />As long as the primary aim of the Reparations Movement is actually to achieve reparations, the momentum forward towards that goal will either be through divine intervention (usually called accidents, miracles, or dumb luck) or through carefully thought-out strategic steps by Reparations Movement organizers and planners.<br /><br />Spiritual intervention will occur, whenever it does, in its own timing and is not in our control. The strategic implementation of group tactics is.<br /><br />For the past five years or so, we have had hundreds of meetings, Town Halls, gatherings, sit-downs, conferences, and one congress to engage reparationists in discussions of what needs to be done, who needs to do it, and how it needs to be done. We have had over fifteen mass market books, more than five hundred printed articles, and at least twenty websites publicly distributed that deal specifically with aspects of the African American Reparations Movement, and, frequently, with the International Reparations Movement.<br /><br />During this time, we have filed over twenty-five new reparations cases nationwide and have not yet achieved a single legal victory, including the flagship Tulsa (Greenwood), Oklahoma case. The nine cases brought to the Chicago federal district court in a consolidated package, including a California state case, were dismissed early in 2004. Eight of the cases were amended and re-considered, but as of December of the same year, the attorneys for the cases fully expected them to be rejected again by the same judge. The California case, brought on the basis of slavery and its legacy being an unfair business practice, sought to be remanded and will probably be adjudicated separately in 2005. Hopes for success are very dim since in November, 2004, California voters substantially weakened the unfair practices law. Additionally, according to a recent N'COBRA study by Wautella and Kibibi, we have gotten more than twenty-eight city councils and at least three state legislatures to pass public resolutions which support U.S. Congressman John Conyers' H.R. 40 bill to study the reparations issue. Still the bill languishes in obscurity, continually left off the agenda of the House Judiciary Committee on which Mr. Conyers sits as the senior member. The bill is barely alive and is essentially on life support with less than fifty congressional sponsors and no companion bill pending in the Senate.<br /><br />N'COBRA, the most recognizable reparations group in the USA, has had at least five annual conferences during the period, and several special gatherings, including two important leadership roundtables . The NDABA series of reparations leadership meetings, called the "Great Sit-downs," were created by Dr. Conrad Worrill of the National Black United Front, in association with Minister Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam, and has been held at least four times, twice in 2003, and twice in 2004. Chicago Alderwoman Dorothy Tillman's National Reparations Convention has also met annually since 2000, and the Reparations United Front of Southern California, in association with the Compton College BSU and the NRC National Planning Group, produced and held the first National Reparations Congress, which was a gathering of reparations activists from across the U.S., in the early summer of 2004. The Millions for Reparations committee, spearheaded by Viola Plummer of the December 12th Movement and Conrad Worrill of NBUF, held a national reparations rally in Washington, D.C. in August, 2002, and numerous other organizations have held panel discussions, Town Halls, Teach-ins, Black History Month lectures, etc., to spread the Reparations Movement word.<br /><br />But with notable exceptions, the Black Church remains uninterested and uninvolved in the Movement. The traditional civil rights groups, with the exception of the local Political Action Committees of the NAACP, have eschewed any real commitment to or involvement in the Movement. Similarly, American youth and students, except on scattered occasions, have thus far not been motivated by or interested in the Reparations Movement to any significant degree. The Masons, Shriners, Elks, Eastern Stars, Black fraternities and sororities, and most Hollywood celebrities, except Transafrica Chairman Danny Glover, have shown little knowledge and given virtually no attention to the Movement, save the snide jokes of Cedric the Entertainer in "Barber Shop," and Chris Rock in his monologues.<br /><br />A Black political movement, once achieved, cannot be sustained with the continued absence of the above components. Some advocates say that the Movement currently needs a charismatic, M.L. King-like leader; some say there must be a single, credible reparations organization that can be depended on to take us forward. These ideas, while critically important, are for another document.<br /><br />Here, the point is made that one of the central components necessary for this stage of the Reparations Movement is a set of regional strategic plans with common principles and goals, and a single, unifying national strategic reparations plan. There have been great and profound speeches made, some brilliant ideas and projects offered and discussed by well-meaning reparationists, and a few activities actually carried through to completion, like the NDABA's grass roots petition campaign to Congress, and N'COBRAS's Black Fridays, and the Year of Black Presence, among others. But what is crystal clear when contemplating all that has been said and done in the last five years of this Movement is that while there has certainly been a great deal of talk accompanied by a number of important visions of things to come, there has been very little evidence of organized, strategic follow through.<br /><br />The Reparations Movement currently hovers at another of its many crossroads. An increasing number of committed and dedicated Western States' activists who have invested a lot of time, money, energy and thought to the Movement are now constantly in high frustration mode and they cannot see any light at the end of the tunnel. Many of them are thinking of moving on to other things and issues.<br /><br />To help us re-invigorate them and provide an impetus for choosing the right path forward and to avoid the road to perdition, it is clear that the Movement must now have many more reparations chess players and less folk who merely talk a good game. At this critical time, there must be the coming to the fore of the strategic planners and organizers.<br /><br />The following document, which is unequivocally a product both of the National Reparations Congress held in Los Angeles/Compton, California in May, 2004, and the flow of ideas discussed at the N'COBRA Leadership Roundtable in June, 2004, in Washington, D.C., and the two NDABAs held in Houston, Texas and Baltimore, Maryland in 2004, is the NRC National Strategic Reparations Plan. It is a five–year roadmap to be implemented regionally to accomplish the reparations goals of the African American population. We expect each region of the country to do its part, and the accumulated total should be the overall reparations victory that Black folk in this country, and in the world, deserve.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 51, 255);">II. FIVE PRINCIPAL GOALS FOR THE NATIONAL REPARATIONS PLAN</span><span style="color: rgb(102, 51, 255);"> </span><br />All activity, projects, tasks and efforts identified in this reparations plan are to ensure the accomplishment of the following principal goals:<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">1. The raising of the level of consciousness concerning reparations to a critical mass of African Americans in each region of the USA---to wit, each reparations group in various parts of the country should dedicate itself to ensuring that reparations will be on the lips and in the conversations of all Black folk in the organizing realm of that group.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> <br /><br /></span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">2. The organization, coordination and implementation of selective economic boycotts to gain bargaining leverage concerning reparations.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><br /><br />3. The planning, coordination and implementation of a national legal strategy.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> </span> <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><br /><br />4. The planning, coordination and implementation of a broader political/legislative strategy than H.R. 40 alone.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"> <span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><br /></span></span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">5. The establishment, coordination and implementation of regional Slave Remembrance and Restitution Funds that will eventually merge into a national SRR Fund.<br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/1600/march_reparations.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://photos1.blogger.com/blogger/3173/2095/400/march_reparations.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0