Prosecutor Marty Stroud came forward with his apology for putting Glenn Ford on death row after the state refused to compensate Ford for wrongly imprisoning him for 30 years. Stroud said, “I was arrogant, judgmental, narcissistic and very full of myself... I was not as interested in justice as I was in winning.” Early in his career, ambitious no doubt, he met his colleagues for drinks to celebrate. “That’s sick,” Stroud wrote. Ford who served 30 years for a murder he didn’t commit, rejected the apology from prosecutor who unjustly put him in a jail. That would be the same prosecutor who didn't have a significant attack of conscience independent of being proved wrong nearly30 years later. “It happened,” Glenn Ford said in an emotional meeting arranged by ABC’s Nightline. “I’m sorry I can’t forgive you. I really am.” http://kulturekritic.com/2015/04/news/im-sorry-i-cant-forgive-you-exonerated-murder-convict-who-served-30-years-for-a-crime-he-didnt-commit-rejects-apology-from-prosecutor/
"Glenn Ford, who
spent nearly 30 years on Angola's death row before his murder conviction
was vacated last year, has filed separate federal lawsuits claiming he
was wrongfully imprisoned and was also denied medical care following a
cancer diagnosis that later became terminal." - NOLA
Glenn Ford has months to live. Maybe he find a way to make peace with what happened in the little time he has to live. May the prosecutor do the same for so long as he finds a way to make amends to somebody, somewhere, somehow. We should all pray there's a way for the prosecutor to do this because I wouldn't wish his conscience on my worst enemy on the day that Ford dies.
I had a nasty reaction to a similar image 20 years back. It might have been during after the Rodney King Verdict. I can't remember if I was living in Modesto at that time or not.
We were watching a riot on the news. And I said, "Can you believe these people stealing!"
She said, "I don't know I've never needed toilet paper when I couldn't go out and buy more."
I was speechless. The thought hadn't even occurred to me. Talk about being unaware of your privilege.
*************************
People don't loot in middle class and rich neighborhoods because they've never had to knock on the bathroom door while their child is peeing to remind them not to use too much toilet paper because there's not going to be money to buy more until the first of the month.
And long before that riot on TV, on the younger side of teenager-dom, I'd actually seen a refrigerator with a metal strap around it with a hole for a pad lock attached.
I was visiting a friend's house for the first time. I stared at the refrigerator out of the corner of my eye for a while. I didn't want to ask and be rude. That probably lasted all of two minutes.
When I asked my friend's mother what the pad lock was for, she said she'd bought the refrigerator used and that she didn't know. But then she came clean and added that she'd seen other refrigerators with the locks actually on them. She told me that people locked up their food to make sure that nobody in the family eats too much on any given day.
..so they don't run out of food before the first of the month.
But I'd forgotten. Elia Martin(ez) called me on my crap, blunt but gentle, and helped me see outside of my normal. And I'll always be grateful.
Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy.” Captain G. M. Gilbert, the Army psychologist , Nuremberg trails
“In my work with the defendants (at the Nuremberg Trails 1945-1949) I
was searching for the nature of evil and I now think I have come close
to defining it. A lack of empathy. It’s the one characteristic that
connects all the defendants, a genuine incapacity to feel with their fellow men. Evil, I think, is the absence of empathy.”
Quotation: Captain G. M. Gilbert, the Army psychologist assigned to watching the defendants at the Nuremberg trails
"Cut the sh*t. You can get rid of this social conditioning. Read some books, actually LISTEN to the people you're helping oppress, I mean f*** Google will teach you all you need to know if you're really interested. Within this movement you have options, you have freedom, you have the comfort of those who value you so what the f*** is wrong with returning the favor just because it's the right thing to do?So what brought me to this tirade? Well for one it was WELL overdue because we've been doing this sh** for too long but the straw(s) that broke the camel's back for me were two things that happened this past weekend. The first was something that happened in the St. Louis area. Activist & Blogger Angel Carter so eloquently put it like this:
"Sunday, April 26th there was a rally held in downtown Saint Louis to amplify the names of black women who have been killed and/or raped by police officers. The desire to incorporate black women into the conversation about police brutality, is not an act of division, it’s an act of inclusion. This was the first rally held to centralize black women here in Saint Louis. It has been long overdue. In comparison to past events, the turn out was typical. White allies were in attendance, kids, signs, banners, blow horns, chants, cops, etc. Every thing was as it always is, minus one thing…. There were only six black men present. I wish I was exaggerating this number, but someone even walked around and counted to be sure. Six black men supporting black women. Even the police exceeded the amount of black men, there were approximately eight of them [policemen] standing behind us."
Add caption
Hardly
anybody showed up for Rekia Boyd protest either. Her killer walked
away in April 2015 and there were crickets, half the people I've spoken
to on Rekia Boyd hadn't even heard her name before.
I might start calling Ricky Hinds a BLACK FEMINIST whether he wants to be one or not...just for a week or two. Those who cannot bear the weight of being identified as and binding together with black women that identify as BLACK FEMINIST or BLACK WOMANIST do not deserve the title. Black folk like this only show up for black women sometimes, much like the white anti-racist that disappears once the bullets and beatings aimed at the unarmed disappear...as if institutionalized racism isn't real.
Her murder trial lasted just a day, without a single witness called by her court-appointed lawyer. She was convicted and sentenced to death.
John Cole Vodicka, director of an Americus-based inmate advocacy program known as the Prison and Jail Project, said Knight had kept Ms. Baker as his “virtual sex slave.” She was his paramour, she was his mistress, and, among other things, his drinking partner. If you read the transcript and have any understanding of black-white relations, Black women were often subjected to the sexual whims of their white masters, their white bosses, or some white man who had control over their lives or the lives of their families.
“Here is one who resisted and paid the price.”
- From Black Then (see link below)
Lena Baker Innocent of Killing White Man, E B Knight
I don't want her to think 2015 looks just like the 1968 MLK Assassination Riots.
She probably won't. She's more optimistic and stronger in faith than I am. But, I don't want her to go home while Baltimore is burning. I want her to go home after something stronger emerges. I want her to hang on until the Phoenix rises from the ashes.
A Church Pastor's Photo of 2015 Uprising In Baltimore
There was a recent-ish article about the white kids at Huntington Beach getting a little rowdy after Surf Competition (I know...I don't get it either) Extra police patrols were called for and gotten after they knocked over porta potties, broke store front windows, and just generally wreaked havoc. By the way? It's damn near impossible to get past Huntington Beach on Pacific Coast Highway EVERY summer weekend.
But don't worry. Nobody is ever called by the n-word substitute there. (whispering: "thug")
Don't worry. Nobody's spine will accidentally or mysteriously snapped during arrest
Don't worry. Nobody will be shot in the back of the head over a noise complaint by an off duty cop using an unregistered weapon who like to shoot over his shoulder. He'll be set free by a judge anyway. (Rekia Boyd) Don't Worry. Everybody knows white riots are harmless. CLICK HERE TO SEE A DOZEN OR MORE PHOTOS AT STORIFY by Betakateenin
"Over the past four years, more than 100 people have won[CIVIL] court judgments or settlements related to allegations of brutality and civil rights violations. Victims include a 15-year-old boy riding a dirt bike, a 26-year-old pregnant accountant who had witnessed a beating, a 50-year-old woman selling church raffle tickets, a 65-year-old church deacon rolling a cigarette and an 87-year-old grandmother aiding her wounded grandson ....
And in almost every [CRIMINAL] case, prosecutors or judges dismissed the charges against the victims—if charges were filed at all. In an incident that drew headlines recently, charges against a South Baltimore man were dropped after a video showed an officer repeatedly punching him—a beating that led the police commissioner to say he was 'shocked.' "
Sounds a lot like the directed verdict that set Dante Servin free in theRekia Boyd case.
Most of us with more than a tinge of color in our skin had already guessed, but was some people had one question on their mind after the Department of Justice disclosed the fact that Ferguson's police department was targeting black for arrests and fines:
How many other Ferguson's are there?
Well this "week New York City announced plans to reform its approach to summonses, creating a system designed to make it easier for people facing
fines to show up for their court dates and defend themselves.
One of the most important features of the reform package, however—and one that has been discussed less than it deserves to be—is the introduction of a “race box” that will appear on every single ticket that police officers in New York write.
Even more striking: The racial identity of every individual who receives a summons will be aggregated in a central database and made public, so that anyone can download it and analyze it for patterns."
Monitoring the police so we can police the police. Transparency is one of the keys to stop adding to list of the people who died at the hand of white police officers while black and unarmed. I can't figure out whether to say "Hallelujah" or "It's about time"
I think I'll got with "It's about time" and ask "When is the federal government will make this mandatory nationwide?"
Apparently they need to work out the categories. Maybe they should use the census racial categories or the FBI UCR data categories. Another story for another time---like when this becomes a federal requirement. CLICK HERE TO READ MORE AT SLATE
"If I hear one more poem
written by a man telling women
how to live their lives
by policing their clothes,
bodies,
sexuality,
make up use,
reading habits,
exercise regimes
and cooking skills,
I’m going to slap somebody…
Take a look at this 20 second video of the end of police chase.
It looks like the guy on the motorcycle was white. And it doesn't really matter if the cop was white or a pale Hispanic person. You don't get to treat criminals like slaves, okay? You don't get to treat criminals like you own them, like it's your right to beat them when they disobey you.
Doesn't that cop kicking the man and motorcycle over just scream "How dare you defy me?"
By the way, I've seen a practically still motorcycle fall over on a man. It look like it HURT pretty bad. He was limping afterward. So there's no doubt the white man, this human being, in this video was hurt. There's also no doubt in my mind this cop meant to hurt him in order to punish him
News Flash: In this country, policemen are not in the punishing business. They are in the arresting business. That means keep your hands to yourself outside of defending yourself and making the arrest.
And I get that cops are human. They get mad. If I were a cop and I got flipped out and afraid for my own safety, I just might take out my gun and shoot everybody in a circle around me, accidentally hit my partner and grandma just taking a stroll a little further down the block. And that's why I didn't sign up to be one.
Criminals break the law. That's what "criminal" means - a person that broke the law. You don't get to act like massa's overseer, slave catcher/ paddy roller just because someone defied you.
And you don't get to stupidly arrest someone in their own house ala Skip Gates and pretend you thought this little ole man on a cane, on the phone with the door open was robbing his own house because he didn't obey your demand to step out on the porch....as if you own him
You don't get to treat criminals like slaves, as if they are yours to beat because they broke a rule. You don't What is it some officers are not understanding about this?
Some might say that only a few officers are doing this. And I would respond that 1% is too many because that could (and has?) resulted in a few beatings per day nationwide, and some of those beatings have ended in murder for those of the darker persuasion.
Flying kick officer is a likely precursor to officers like Dante Servin (Rekia Boyd's murderer - set free because his actions were murder (in the judges view) while the prosecutor only charged him with manslaughter and reckless....The charges didn't match the actual accusations= get out of death penalty free card) And I think the difference between Flying Kick Officer and the white-Dante-Servin-type officers of this country is the cheering section
The people who originally posted this video probably enjoyed flying kick officer and felt nothing for the white guy that went down. The bullying attitude wrapped in racism that is part and parcel of massa-attitude (see "Roots"), overseer attitude (see Cumberbatch's in "12 Years A Slave"), paddy-roller/runaway-slave-catcher-attitude (see "Django" lynch scene) is not isolated to cops. The predominantly white part of the country who watches predominantly white police officers beat down anybody who ticks them off are feeding the violence inside those able to move from beating (Flying Kick Officer) to murder (Dante Servin). And black and brown cops are perfectly capable of catching this character-based disease (You did notice that there was a black cop present, who didn't appear to see or report anything when Walter Scott was gunned down.)
All of the above is why I think the movie "The Accused" should be required watching
in school. Not only does this movie address rape culture, but it
addresses just how influential the people who don't actually do anything
but run their mouths are.
Understanding this fact would go a long way to making people understand that the racial rhetoric and straight up racism that has risen in quantity and quality since the election of President Obama has had a nationwide effect on the beaters (Flying Kick Officer) and changed them into murderers (Dante Servin)
Or maybe not. It could be the murderers have been this frequent all along, pre and post President Obama, and that the thing that's changed is having a black male president address the death of Trayvon Martin has made the deaths of black men (and only black men judging by turn out for Rekia Boyd) truly matter.
"Our lives, our cultures, are composed of many overlapping stories.
Novelist Chimamanda Adichie tells the story of how she found her
authentic cultural voice -- and warns that if we hear only a single
story about another person or country, we risk a critical
misunderstanding."
A born story teller, this Woman. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, author of
"Americanah" She explains the danger that all of us of face by only
knowing the details of our own tribe --whether the commonality of our
tribe is based on race, class, or nationality-- how that makes everybody
else in every other tribe seem flat, lesser, and easier to stereotype.
I like these two, Olivia and Rachel. The first episode cracked me up. This is getting to be my Saturday Morning thing--Just seeing what they are up to for five minutes. This episode felt so familiar. Made me feel like the silly-free version of black people are the same everywhere
In this episode, Olivia and Rachel escape the rain by
ducking into a carpet store. Then they proceed to make themselves a
little too much at home.
"This Is What Happened When Maine Forced Welfare Recipients To Work For Their Benefits" along with the required image of black and brown people standing on line, obviously poor. But this time it was a picture of black and brown men...in MAINE.
File this post under *AN IMAGE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS*
Problem 4? I haven't bothered to find out what percentage of welfare recipients in freaking Maine are black or brown because I already know the image was chosen to create a certain impression. And anybody with a high school diploma worth the paper it was written on should know most welfare recipients are women and children -- not men as pictured.
Something you may not have bothered to think about? The white population's average poverty rate is 9% (in good years) And the black population's poverty rate is 28% (in good years) HOWEVER, black people are only 13% of the population while the white population is 77%* according 2013 info on Census This would tend to mean it's likely that are 2x as many white people as black nationwide. Now think about what 94% white Maine's welfare rolls look like.
ANTI-RACISM TIP 1: Did you know that you can right click most images, save
it, then go to go WWW.GOOGLE.COM or WWW.BING.COM to the search "IMAGES"
section to search an actual image? All you have to do is find the word
"image" on either search engine, then click on the camera icon and
upload the picture you want to search for. You'll get results like the
photo here. Dozens. Sometimes, if the photo is not TOO over-used all
over the net, you can find out where a photo was purchased.
IMAGE USED TO DEPICT LAZY WELFARE RECIPIENTS IN MAINE
- AFTER SUBMITTED TO GOOGLE SEARCH
ANTI-RACISM TIP 2: I used 95% of the above to place a comment on the article itself...which they'll have to approve in order for it to show up. But I also sent 95% of this message to two advertisers I saw within the online article --Goedeckers and Consumer Reports.
My final comments in the e-mails I sent were as follows:
The article you are advertising within should be called RACISM CREATION 101. It's a teachable moment for sure.
I hope you choose your advertising spaces more carefully in the future
I hope you find these anti-racism tips useful, but not too often. * I've heard much lower numbers for white
population, but this is likely could be due to census corrections, white
paranoia or purity desires. We'll use the 77% link to the census)
Apparently, two white teenage girls at Grapevine High School in Texas sang a song about how sexy they are, as white females and how they wanted to lynch and kill non-white males that inevitably want them, stare at them...because as white females they are the sexiest of all women.
Clearly, the main stream media and everything around us tells white girls the same thing it tells our black and brown girls: White girls rule. And the audio recording below is proof positive that these white girls are hearing and embracing the message and even going so far as to count their white female supremacist blessings.
Apparently this white supremacist song was passed around between the white students at this schoolfor 2 years before word got to the media.
Apology #100,817,004
"While my intentions were never to offend anyone, I wasn’t thinking at
the time about how awful this recording is or that it would get spread
so widely. That was almost two years ago and we were just getting into
social media at that time. Being new to social media then, I did not
fully understand the swift and large impact that one posting can have.
That does not excuse my behavior and I realize I made a huge mistake. I
am so sorry to all the people who heard it and who I hurt by my actions.
The song does not portray in any way how I actually feel about
people. I am a very open-minded person and I enjoy being part of a
diverse family and diverse community. I am being raised to be respectful
of all people, cultures and differences"
Translation: Racism is supposed to be secret, especially when it involves murder. You're not supposed to say it in a place where the people in the "diverse community" can hear it. And what a person says has nothing to do with what that person means and what you were raised to believe. Nothing. This is all about what I SAID, the words I used. My parents didn't teach me to be this way.
Ummm, sure they did. If my upbringing didn't allow me to sing such things about people of other races before I was 5 years of age, then your parents are doing a piss-poor job of making sure you did not learn white supremacy -- because you've got the lingo down pat.
But at least this one knows it's not all about her.
Check out the next apology
Apology #100,817,005 "The moment I
heard that someone had heard and reported the rap to the principals
office, I was fully aware that my life was about to change forever. I
have gone over this day after day, thinking about what I was going to
say to the people hurt, and utterly disgusted at the content of the
recording. I understand that there are many unanswered questions and
multiple versions of rumors regarding when, where, and why the rap was
made. I have never been so utterly humiliated and ashamed in my entire
life, because if you know me, you know you will never meet a human being
with as much unconditional love and kindness in their heart as me...."
Translation: 'The words didn't mean anything. I didn't mean anything. I am the most loving, non-racist individual you will ever meet. I love everybody equally. Attitudes, words, and actions are not linked....the bible says so....um...whoops...wait...I mean..."
When
she wrote this, did she remember that she was writing an apology
for using the n-word in a song that jokes about murdering people for
being black, mexican, and asian?
And I don't care how young she is: How stupid is she?
How stupid is she,
her parents, and everyone around her. Who let her write "you will never
meet a human being with as much unconditional love and kindness in their
heart as me..." at such a time as this? Who is this ridiculously
unconscious about singing about murdering people for not being white? Who?
Once again, we see the white racial apologies are about the offensive words used in mixed race company. It's all just words and getting caught. It's nothing.
When these two girls are 10 years into their futures 26 years old(?), I wonder how small this will seem. I'm sure all the white students that have been passing this recording around between themselves for 2 years are telling them to get over it already.
Note To Self: White female racists might be too delicate to have their names disclosed to the media.Check future white racial apologies for pattern
