Newspapers / Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.) / April 12, 1984, edition 1 / Page 4
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1 Page A4 The Chronicle, Thursday, April 12, 1984 Winston-Salem Chronicle . Founded 1974 IRNKST M. PITT, NDUBISI EOIMONYK ALLEN JOHNSON Co founder f ieiu/1 >e tdnor ELAINE L. PITT MICHAEL PITT JOHN SLADE Olhir Manager Circulation Manager AuiMani tdiior Twenty-three questions If you can answer the following questions, please write our executive editor and put his curiosity to rest: - Why does it always rain when they launch space shuttles? ? Why are people still wondering if Jesse Jackson can win? (He already has won by getting so many black people _ A | 1 A A - A l _ H * rcgisicrcu anu uui 10 me pons ana putting Diack issues on the agenda of his adversaries as well as the agenda of the Democratic National Convention.) -- Why are the only streets in residential areas with numbers as names in the black community? - How in the world did they come up with a name like Pond Giants for a semi-pro baseball team? -- Why do some firms apparently spend time and money searching for new ways to make it hard to unroll toilet paper in public restrooms? - Why do those "Aerobicise" features on cable TV look so much more X-rated than the ones on "The Good Morning Show?" -- How, even when it was brand new, could somebody admit he built something as ugly as the Winston-Salem Coliseum and sleep at night? - Why do some people delight in reading obituaries? -- Why are there no statues^ of famous black folk in Winston-Salem? - Why do some people become journalists when they could open a K&W Cafeteria here and get rich off of broccoli, string beans, fried chicken and veal parmesan? -- What's the difference between a parkway and a regular highway? - Does anybody pay attention to the flashing warning sign on the Hawthorne Curve? -- Why don't they build shelters over burger restaurant drive-throughs so you can order your super-deluxe tripledecker with tomato and lettuce and cheese and onions and mayo and a morsel of beef in there somewhere too without taking a shower when it rains? - Who designed those weird-looking red emblems on the city's Fire Department vehicles? - Is Jimmy Walker still alive? - Is Jimmy Walker still unable to act? - What's the significance of a dream that's in color and has credits? - How did someone come up with the term "gay" to refer to homosexuals? - Why are there no movie theaters in East Winston? --.What is the meaning of life? -- Where do you stand, Jim? -- Why won't somebody pray for Jesse Helms? -- Where is the beef? Crosswinds The press and Big John (Editor's note: John Thompson's Georgetown Hoyas won the NCAA basketball championship April 2.) From The Philadelphia Tribune. It is becoming increasingly obvious that regardless of how successful a black person is, he or she is most likely to take brutal swipes from the mainstream media. An excellent case in point is the recent beating John Thompson, the black basketball coach of predominantly white Georgetown University, has been taking from the national media. "Sports Illustrated" devoted an entire cover story to criticizing. edict to his players not to discuss _.."5SytSig^QtfiefjMaBasJc typ^Many other white sports journalists have had a field day with Thompson in recent years. One of Thompson's former stars, Eric Floyd of the National Basketball Association's Golden State Warriors, felt he had to speak out. Floyd called the attacks on Thompson "unfair." Floyd described Thompson as "a great person" and "a great motivator." America's black community already knew that. What Thompson has done with his championship caliber team is no different frotp what John Wooden, the Wizard of Westwood, did with all of his title teams at UCLA. Yet, Wooden was hailed by the same bunch of sports journalists as the greatest basketball mind ever to grace the earth. Thompson comes along and applies the same kind of formula, and the same white*Sports reporters are demanding his scalp. Some of the on- and off-court antics the same reporters allow Indiana's Coach Bobby Knight to get away with are unbelieveable. Knight's behavior in Puerto Rico was a national disgrace. Yet, he has been assigned to coach the U.S. Olympic team. Compared to Knight's behavior, Big John (Thompson's edict to his team is but a minute step in the right direction. What it all boils down to is that despite the fact that Thompson is such a success, white America is not prepared to fully accept him or his standards. \N?r30ST CtLEAS D "W6 W&Y' "TH& N\0et*?S ot im U.S. U6C THeV AIR9ADV K*K>W, WD T1 6 TTtVI& ?&N>y TO SE^D US MOR? \KJ ^lUTACV AID StSll Marvin and CLIFTON GRAVES Chronicle Columnist In recent weeks, African Americans -- and, no doubt, Americans of other hues -- have been shocked and saddened by the sudden deaths of Clarence E. Mitchell Jr., Ahmed Sekou Toure, Benjamin Elijah Mays and, of course, Marvin Gaye. (I note here that within the same time span our local community lost outstanding and caring leadership in the persons of Mrs. Sarah Marsh, longtime NAACP secretary and community activist; Dr. Royal Puryear, noted educator and minister; and Mrs. Joyce Caldwell Williams, one of the sweetest ladies God ever put on this earth. They all will be sorely missed). For the record, Clarence Mitchell Jr., NAACP leader and member of the politically active and influential Mitchell clan of Maryland, was unquestionably one of the most effoctive lobbyists ever to grace the halls of the U.S. Congress. Known as the " lOI ct Qanaf Ar" fAr Utr J vuv uviiOkV/l IUI I11S 9MU9 CU1U omnipresence, Mitchell was a prime mover and negotiator of nearly every major civil rights bill now the law of the land. To be sure, Brother Mitchell's contributions to black (and white) progress is well-documented and his place in history secure. Farewell, Brother Clarence. Ahmed Sekou Toure, president of Hart: The G By MANNING MARABLE Guest Columnist Americans have always been fascinated by fads. When I was a child, the hula hoop emerged to take the nation's hips by storm. Over 30 million Americans bought hula hoops in 1958 - but within a couple years, they had disappeared from the stores. The culturally vacuous '70s provided fertile terrain for the growth of even more absurd fads. How many mi *+ ? ?-- - minions or Americans will now admit that they once purchased "Pet - Rwks"? Ttfc blattffflfy' suxist ictetfr-? sion show "Charley's Angels" produced a live version of the Barbie Doll in the form of "actress" Farrah Fawcett.. In 1977, five million Americans purchased her famous swimsuit poster. Five years later, Fawcett was virtually forgotten. The '80s have also generated a number of juvenile-oriented fads. An enterprising Belgian artist created the Smurfs back in the 1950s, but it was only in 1981 that the little blue dwarfs oecame a nit in tne U.S. Coieco Ind.'s Cabbage Patch Kids^ were the hot item last Christmas, as thousands of parents slept in mall parking lots overnight in order to be the first in line to buy the dolls. The Cabbage Patch Kids, viewed objectively, are homely, overpriced trolls. Few who clammered for the gnomes could provide a logical explanation for their popularity. Some psychologists sugMOW Yte ONTGOL A SMALL OTlH-*R*W VtHM WILLI! witness IN c mm sees rtEv'CG ISN'T *&1 MILLION V w f Tammi --to? Guinea and revoluntionary African leader, once told the imperialist French that Guineans would rather be free and poor than colonized and rich. Sekou Toure was a man whose leadership tactics in the latter years were questionable, but whose name will go down in African-history alongside those of Patrice Lumumba, Kwame NKrumah, Gamel Nasser, Amilear Cabral and Julius Benjamin Elijah Mays i, am#B ^ known as a revered educator, scholar, humanitarian, president of Morehouse College and mentor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Mays' first remembrance as a child was fearfully observing a "white mob looking for a Negro to lynch." "Bennie" May*, a man of God, a man of and for his people, a man for all time. May God bless you and rest your soul, "Bennie" Mays. And finally, the "Marvelous One," the "Prince of Motown," the brother whose sensuous sounds left the ladies shrieking and the men's abbage Pate gested that the media was responsible for the mass, cult-like devotion to the dolls: If a number of influential "others" state that a product is in hot demand, then nearly everyone will want it, even if the fad in question has absolutely no inherent value. The same principles apply to American political behavior. The media, bored with a series of all-toofamiliar Democratic candidates, searches for something unique. Suddenly an aloof, obscure candidate emerges from the pack, winning several elecstate-i-. His picture., vaguely similar, to-. "... Sen. Gary Hart, the latest A political cabbage patch to captu culturally comatose white uppe*; that of an assassinated president, is portrayed on millions of magazine covers and on every television news i *t*i n * t _ ? snow, i nus sen. oary narx, mc laiest American fad, rises up from the political cabbage patch to capture the hearts and minds of the culturally comatose white upper middle class. Popularity in American electoral politics is largely a matter of style. If Walter Mondale is campaigning as the late liberal leader Hubert Humphrey, and if John Glenn evokes an Eisenhower style,Gary Hart has managed to project himself as tody's version of The Great Gatsby. OH,WO- IMAHOW IS of- powee / 0MERICW5 S*Y NNttfcN/ "THEY FIND OUT? Irilla "THERE ANYONE ELSE iic M*n Dei ewe? l w wvwi/ Nwwwrgu "i <yf ;ether again heads shaking -- the man who put the "Do" in duets with sisters like Mary Wells, Diana Ross, Kim Weston, and, yes, the imcomparable Tammi Terrell. Yes. Marvin Gaye Jr.. legendary musical genius, tormented but - talented. Who will ever forget "Stubborn Kind of Fellow," "Hitchhike," "It Takes Two," "Heaven Must Have Sent You from Above," "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" or "Ain't That Peculiar"? How can we forget "If I Could Build My Whole World Around You," "If This World Were Mine," "What's Going On?," "Mercy, Mercy Me" or "Too Busy Thinking About My Baby"? And we most certainly won't ever forget "Gotto Give it Up," "Distant Lover," "Sexual Healing," or Marvin's historic and memorable rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at the 1983 National Basketball Association All-Star Game. Yes, we'll miss you dearly, Marvin, but we can rest better knowing that somewhere in a corner of heaven you and Tammi are reunited, harmonizing as beautifully as ever, making the angels weep and clap, just as you made us ween and rlan Farewell. Clifton Graves is affirmative action officer at Winston-Salem State University. h Candidate Until this month, few knew (or cared) that Hart had legally changed his name, or that he inexplicably lies about his age. Even his Senate collegues are perplexed by the new Hart mystique. Arrogant and secretive, he nevertheless projects the public image of a boyish, passionate fighter -- the fourth Kennedy brother. But nobody seems to know exactly for whom he's Fighting. Overnight, Hart has become the champion of the oppressed Yuppies - Young Urban Professionals while he blasts Mondale as the vicious. --underpaid -school teachers, laid-off imerican fad, rises up from the ire the hearts and minds of the r middle class." e*% factory workers, the unemployed and minorities. What exactly are Hart's "new ideas"? On war spending, Hart advocates a "cost-effective" arsenal just like conservative Sen. Sam Nunn, a leading hawk. Hart advocates an annual expansion of 4 to 5 percent in Pentagon spending - just like the majority of Senate Republicans. Hart opposed the federal bailout of the nearly-bankrupt 'Chrysler Corp. several years ago ? just like Ronald Reagan. And the Colorado senator tends to concentrate more on budget Please see page A5 A NATION (* cemCAL, SyMDUC ! Chronicle Letters YMCA issue oversimplified To TW Editor: It has been said that 4'silence gives consent** and 44if you are not part of the problem, then you are part of the solution.*' Because I believe these doctrines, I feel compelled to respond in part to the editorial titled "Why-MCA" that appeared a couple of weeks ago (March 22). As an actively involved and concerned member of the Patterson Avenue Board of Management, it concerns me that^an oversimplification of the actions surrounding the building of the new Winston Lake facility would lead readers of the Chronicle to believe that C.P. Booker has not acted in the best interest of the black community and that "he" is solely responsible for what we "almost" didn't get. I know better and others who have been involved from the beginning and kept abreast of the many various developments know better, too, even if they are not willing to state so publicly. We do one another a grave disservice when we refuse to look at the total picture and therefore .take things out of their proper perspective. Everything is. not cul and dried; everything is not always about "black and white." There are other elements, oftentimes even more important, that must be considered. The building of a new YMCA facility is something new to all of us, and to that extent, there was not a "tried and true" path to follow. Mistakes, oversights, lack of communication, unanticipated rtKct a/.) At rl a! r? irr vvjiHVlVJi UVIOJ 3) WUII911 UW11U1I costs estimates - all have played a role in complicating the common goal: the building of the Winston Lake YMCA. I sincerely believe that all who have been involved from the outset have worked diligently in their negotiations to deliver what was promised months ago without causing unnecessary liabilities and disappointments in the future. There are those of us who are flexible enough to bend for the realization of the "Big Picture" without selling out. Unless a witness to the goings on, it would behoove us all not to be so quick to pass judgment, especially negative judgments. Ask questions if you must, but until you have investigated or the case has been proven, let us give our fellowman the benefit of the doubt. Thanks, C. P. Booker, for the Hnnatinn r*f vnnr tima w?aw%ivi? VI J V LA A lllUVy lAICUl ttUU energies in causes you deem worthwhile and just at the risk of ridicule from those who stand to gain the most. Mutter D. Evans, Member Patterson Avenue Board of Management Extending Thanks To The Editor: On behalf of Bfwmgirrr nistrihutinft Urn., thank you for helping us make the community aware fo the avialability of the Health Mobile last month. This was its sixth site since beginning its U.S. tour and by far the most successful. Four hundred twenty-eight Triad residents were 4 A I /?! J - icsicu in nvc aays, ai a High of 32 people per hour. The efforts of Anheuser-Busch, the NAACP and over 25 local volunteer health professionals to provide these free tests would have been in vain without your help through public service coverage. Again, R.H. Barringer Distributing Co. and 1 say thank you. Clayton J. Henry Budwelser Brand Mananger R.H. Barringer Distributing Co. Winston-Salem KCADtt QPXHD gttdW y*
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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April 12, 1984, edition 1
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