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SAT., MAY 16, 1881
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Affirmative Action
I Racism And Violence
Gerald C. Horne,Esquire
"A Little Knowledge Is A
Dangerous Thing
Twice the renowned jazz rnusi
cian, Dexter Gordon, has played
in the St. Joseph's Performing
Arts Center in Durham, and at
both performances, the audience
has consisted mostly of white
university students, some from as
far away as Greensboro and High
Point.
Similarly, when a "Salute to
Black Cultural Arts" was held in
the McDougald Gymnasium at
North Carolina Central Universi
ty, April 28, only a few black
students who did not participate
on the program chose to attend.
Many students complained that
the $10 admission price was too
high. Yet, if one has had the occa
sion to attend a Kool and The
Gang, Prince or Larry Graham
concert at the Dorton Arena in
Raleigh, where the door price is
58, one has witnessed some ten to
black music. What a tragedy!
The philosophers and
psychologists have been scream
ing at us for centuries that the
first step to learning is to learn
one's self. One innovative
graduate student in a Texas
university has developed a suc
cessful reading program using
music as a point of interest. He is
to be commended, and, until and
unless the majority of teachers
who teach black students truly
learn how and what they should
be taught, there will continue to
be difficulties in an attempt to
teach them to appreciate other
fine cultures. The first step then is
to teach black students to ap
preciate the brilliance in their own
culture.
In their professional training,
many teachers were overly expos-
culture, ana
ed to European
Racism has become unfortunately
such a common facet of life in the USA that
even the most outrageous excesses barely
receive attention or merit note, x 7
It is all well and good that national atten
tion has been focused on the Atlanta child
slayings, the Mobile lynching, the New York
City slashings, the murders in Buffalo and
' Salt Lake CityV etc., ;
Nevertheless, the attention focused on;
, these incidents should not blind us to the fact
: that such racist inspirdmayoem is no longer1 :
' an aberration or freak occurrence but has
become part of an overall pattern and prac
tice that has few parallels outside of Nazi
: Germany in the 1930's. Let a few more ex
amples suffice to illustrate this trend:
The Jackson (Miss.) Advocate reported
recently the lynching of 32-year-old Roy
Washington in rural Holmes County, near
Pickens, Mississippi. The young black
: worker had been shot in the head, his hands
bound behind him. He had been weighted
down by a scissor jack attached to his body
by barbed wire wrapped around his waist
and had been beaten badly about the head
, and face. .
The Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI), which worked zealously in infiltrating
and disrupting civil rights groups in .
Mississippi in the 10's has been a virtual
Rip Van. Winkle on this case, investigating
briefly and inadequately. Local residents
who recall the bad old days when lynchings
were as prevalent as' blooming magnolias
have been paralyzed with fear and have re
mained raither tight-lipped about the entire
situation.
The slaying of Roy Washington -r a slay
ing that cries out for a full-scale, comprehen
sive investigation - was more bizarre
perhaps but not dissimilar from the lot that
has befallen other black males of his era. In
deed, homicide is the leading cause of death
among black males between the ages of 25 to
44 years, according to the National Center
for Health Statistics. The average life expec
tancy of black males, unlike other groups, is
declining. The leading cause of death in this
country is heart disease but the black
population is at about one-fourth greater
risk than whites; for stroke (cerebrovascular
diseases), the second leading cause, blacks
are at twice the risk of whites; for the third
leading cause of death, cancer, the black
population is at one-third greater risk than
whites.
But homicide presents the most striking
statistics. Blacks are six times more likely to
die of homicide. During the Vietnam War, a
war where blacks were put "at the point;"
leading the charge, almost 6.000 were killed.
Today the war is over but the traumatizing
WtfiAHr&Vforti;vfm?''ir? 'ruts mYtfo-mt
TTfects remain. In fact the Multi-Service'
Veteran's Center in Philadelphia says that;
more Vietnam vets have been claimed by
suicide than by the actual war. Thus far,
over 50,000 Vietnam veterans have taken
their own lives, a high percentage of them
black. The reasons cited for the suicides
range from psychological stress to despair
over the inability to obtain and retain jobs.
Yet with all of its problems, the scarred
rice paddies of Vietnam may have been safer,
than the urban areas of the United States.
The number of police killings of blacks has
'shot up so dramatically that black males
especially are in danger of becoming an
-'endangered species " As a matter of fact,
those ecologists compaigning on behalf of
saving the sperm whale or baby seals would
do well to devote time and energy to saving
"homo sapiens-male-Negroid-United
States;" their probable extinction is obvious
ly on the agenda of some.
Things have gotton so bad that one would
think that "open season" has been declared
on black males. Though this may seem likea
bit of morbid humor to some, the fact is that
the deputy sheriff of Okaloosa County fn
Florida a stone's throw from rebellion
torn Miami circulated a letter within the
department recently declaring "open hun
ting season" on blacks. This racist outrage
has brought forth angry demands, for his im
mediate sacking but thus far the only
response from the police department has
been to dismiss- the whole episode as a
"joke," This is no "joke" for Florida
blacks nor to the late Larry Williams, a
16-year-old. black student recently found
dead in the Dade County jail with "several
bumps on his head, his bottom lip was
busted and two front teeth were missing."
Dismissing signs of this 1980 Holocaust as
a "joke," not to be taken seriously, is also
part of a national trend. Apparently, they
feel that blacks will be so busy laughing that
they won't know what hit them, at least not
until the gas jets of the ovens have been turn
ed on. However, the black community has
failed to see any wit in racism and has
responnded accordingly. Note the latest,
abomination in Portland, Oregon where'
policemen, as a "joke", tossed four dead
opossums in front of a restaurant in a black
neighborhood recently (dead "coons" get ;
it?). As many as eight white officers were in
volved in this incident, Norman Monroe,
deputy director of the Portland Urban
League, has lent support to a number of
demonstrations calling for the swift firing of
the culprits. Rev. John Jackson, co
chairman of Portland's Black United Front
has expressed himself similarly.
. But with the Ku Klux Klan and Nazi Party
--"7 - :. : ,wv- V
. 4lUu;At J miitin0 nmnnffst notice forces na- F
tionally, it is little wonder that Portland .
blacks and Miami blacks or the Afro- j
'American community generally see anything y
! funny about genocide. Unfortunately, there I
are those in the white community who sen-
sibilities havebeen so numbed by cascading ;
racism lhat they have lost touch with any :
glimmer of humanity. Because of com
.i:..t 'h;ArSat ncwhrtlnoical aaM other
reasons, their overt violence is dispropor
tionately directed at black males.
But "in-house" it is well not ta unduly
emphasize this aspect, as some would like to j
do. Certain males wind up alleging that the
treason they can't get jobs is because "the
white man" (sic) can "fill two quotas" by.,
'hiring a black woman rather than a black .
male. Yet the fact is that violence in its j
myriad forms is directed against the Afro-;
'American community generally. The reality
of black women heading households being at v
the bottom of the per capita income ladder
engenders and reflects a violence that
: murder rates cannot subsume.
. The powerful Educational Testing Service
t (ETS) which administers the Scholastic Ap
titude Tests for entrance into colleges and
'medical and law schools (the effect it has on
our youth's future is tremendous) has been
charged with selling lists containing the
names of white students to certain schools
requesting them. So avers the journal Equal 1
Opportunity Forum. Their Student Search
"Service (SSS) supplies schools and scholar-:
- - ship agencies with overall intormation aoout
students; for "U cents a name" SSS breaks .
down lists of students by race, as well as by
income brackets.
The schools that use this "service" to ig-.
nore and pass over qualified, eager black
youth for admission into the hallowed halls,
are doing untold violence to black males and "
females deprived of education and in
evitably, jobs.
Tommy Quin, head of the International .
Woodworkers Union, has stated that in his
industry, black workers a dying of lung
; cancer due to the dust and splinters that they
breathe, and that they are going deaf
because of the noise level. Black furniture
workers in North Carolina inhale lacquer
fumes on the job and often collapse.
Black women, who comprise a high percen-t
tage of these workers, when pregnant, have
i to deal with the effects of chemicals and dust .
on their unborn children.
In sum, the racism and violence that keeps
. ; Atlanta awake is something that touches
each and every one of us and each of us
will have to push harder if this wave is to be
beaten bck. .
T7
fits, who have found the money
to attend. -
The problem, then, is a reflec
tion of the type of cultural
breadth that our youngsters get
during their formative years. Too
many teachers are simply not
teaching our black students to ap
preciate what is fine and brilliant
in their own culture because these
teachers, too, are unaware of
what is considered to be
aesthetically superior to black
, culture. V &
One point of focus would be
the coming music program,
"Blow Out," to be held next
. week at Durham High School.
What a fine way to expose
students to some of the brilliant
music created by blacks on this i
continent. The program instead,
will include one spiritual and
another selection by a black ar
tist. In what will possibly be a one
and one-half hour program, there
will be less than five minutes of
vinced themselves since that time
that Bach, Chopin, Liszt,
Beethoven and Rachmaniof f (and
the like) are the raison d'etre6i
the musical experience. But how
can such a brief encounter with
world music render one
knowledgeable of all of the
brilliant music black Americans
have created?
Until all teachers, then, learn to
appreciate a breadth of good
music, and unless these teachers
find the vehicles by which to .
teach black students to appreciate
their music, our black students
will continue to carry portable,
sterep systems down what are .
reputed to be "our halls of
knowedge' popping their fingers
and literally blowing their, brains
out on the top ten tunes of the
week. For too many teachers have,
acquired only a small amount of
knowledge on the subject of art,
vis-a-vis black music, and a "little
knowledge is a dangerous thing.'
To Be Equal
Budget Victims Are The Poor
By Vernon E. Jordan, Jr.
Things You Shoul d Knitijf
1 tz.jjy -rmz'. j
ANTAR
The FATHER OF HEROES"...
about 600 AD
flat-nosed & black, born a slave, he
ecame the greatest soldier and poet the the Orient.
Revered by 335,000,000 Mohammedans of whom
Mohammed said, "He ii the only Bedouin I ever
admired." He became a soldier at age 15, so
distinguishing himself In bttle that he was set free.
8 -.'.''.'." .',;'' ''.: ...-:'.x ''''''r:,::' Jy'.:
Experts find his poetry equal to that of Homer,
y VirgW snd Taiso.
r( j - ' ., . . . "
. CmivfAi Turns' y
The Administration's budget proposals,
loaded with cuts in social programs, have
been roundly condemned as harming poor
people. Those charges have been denied by
officials pointing to the "safety net" pro
grams left intact, primarily benefiting the
' non-poor, programs like social security,
Medicare, veterans benefits and others. .
' Now, the Conngressional Budget Office,
: in an analysis of the budget cuts, concludes
that the poor will indeed lose out in this
- budget; and in the most direct possible way
through real reductions in income. ,
The CBO estimates a minimum of 20 to 25
million people, most of them below the
poverty line and he rest barely above it,
would have their incomes cut by losing
welfare benefits, food stamps, school lun
ches, and public service jobs. ; ,
Those were the only program areas
covered by the CBO study. But Medicaid is
slated to be capped, and the people knocked
off, the eligibility list will come from the
, raniks of the poor; The same holds for cuts in
x' housing aid. V
x ' Energy assistance to help poor people
cope with escalating home heating costs will
be combined in a block grant with other
assistance programs. That step too, would
deprive many low-income families of impor-
. tant income assistance. ' -
So the CBO figure of 20 to 25 million vic
tims of the budget cuts has to be taken as a
rock bottom, minimal estimate. The real
body count is far higher.
Agaih, destroying the myth of that sup
posed safety net, the study says that the
worst hit would be the worst-off children
in families headed by nonwhite women. Also
hit hard would be the working poor, people
whose earnings are so low they need some
welfare of food stamp aid to get by.
The CBO report also says that the majori
ty of the poorest families in the nation would
lose some income. Their definition of
"poorest" is income fifty per cent of the
poverty line, At about $4,000 a year for a
family of four that's not poverty, it's
destitution.
Partisans of the Administration's plan like
to say that its proposed tax cut will help
balance things out. But the tax cut won't af
fect poor people at all. And most working
families will find that the rise in their social
security taxes more than offsets any tax cut
they get.
Only at the upper levels of income groups
will the tax cuts amount to much, part of
that strange philosophy that assumes well
off people need incentives to work harder
while low arid moderate income people do ,
not.
Spectacles: A Closer Look
Atlanta Mourns
By Ada M. Fisher, Fvf.D.
3
" ,.r.
The number of black children murdered
or found dead now exceeds two dozen for'
Atlanta, Georgia with no end or leading
clues in sight. Monthly, Atlanta uncovers the
bodies of young pre-teen black children,
' usually male, found dead over the previous
months. Atlanta mourns as the black com
munity suffers in horrifying silence.
Initially a rage seemed to emanate as the
bodies were discovered in an atmosphere of
racial distrust prompted by the September
1980 killing of four black men within a
36-hour period in Buffalo, N.Y. In October,
the deaths of two more black men followed
r this time with their hearts cut out. Sniper
fire in Oklahoma City, Indianapolis, Cincin
nati, Salt Lake City, and Johnstown, Pa.,
has felled 28 black men several of whom,
were in the presence of white female compaf '
nions. Vernon Jordan, executive director of
.the National Urban League, survived an am
bush attack. In Greensboro, a "Death to the
Klan" rally left black death as well.
Newspapers and magazine frequently speak
of the military training being undertaken by
Ku Klux Klan and Nazi groups in Alabama,
Connecticut, .Illinois, North Carolina and .
Texas. The hostilities continue to mount as
our survivaUs constantly threatened. "
Though convinced that racism is at the
heart of all of these deaths, , Atlanta's
children may be somehow different.
Everyone has his or her theories about the
murders and silently the black community
must sense that the murders are by the hands
of someone the children knew or trusted
someone who also is most likely black. A
neighbor, a public service officer of one pos-.
ing as such, a man or a woman are all
possibilities, however, the real problem is
. the violence in our society at whose core lies
the issue of black-on-black crimp,.
When it is our neighborhood j the crimes
seem to pile up, the criminals weasel their
way back on to the streets, and the assault on .
the black citizenry by blacks continues .
(Continued On Page'ffif
The underlying assumption behind the
budget cuts in social programs and the tax
cuts that favor the better-off is that lower
federal spending and incentives to save and
invest will stimulate the economy and result
in non-inflationary growth. The payoff
would be jobs in the private sector for to
day's jobless.
That's a neat theory, simple and direct.
As an example of wishful thinking it is
peerless, but in the real world I fear the out
come will be somewhat different.
By tilting tax breaks to the affluent,
leisure rather than more investing would be
encouraged. By cutting federal spending,
still greater pressures will be placed on state
and local governments who will either raise
taxes , or cut services. By vastly increasing
military purchases, inflation will be sparked.
And, most serious of all, by cutting the in
comes of the poorest citizens, the policy en
courages alienation and bitterness that an
likely, in the long run, to prove mow
dangerous and more expensive than a. budget
in deficit.
This budget represents the almost pcrfec
matching of bad economic policy with bat
social policy.
LE. AUSTIN
Editor-Publisher 1927-1971
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