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5A OPINIONS/tEte Cfiatlont $o«t Thursday June 30, 2005 Ada M. Fisher m.d. An American exit strategy for Iraq No mattei' the politics, the USA can’t turncoat and run from Iraq. Tb leave before that nation is able to defend itself is to set up another rogue nation for teii’orist. The USAmust stay the coui'se with a different mind-set, which respects Islamic principles and virtues and focuses on rapid deploy ment of change agents, which will brii^ about the economic i-ehef necessary to add stability to that nation. First, though, the president states no weapons of mass destruction were found, we must talk about the fact that we did find and remove a major weapon of mass destruction-Sadam Hussein who inflicted genocide on hundi'eds of thou sands of his own. people. It is this action of genocide, which is probably one of two inter nationally acceptable indications for a pre emptive strike or unilateral involvement in the affaii’s of a sovereign nation. The other being the proven potential to annihilate a substantial portion of the world. Second, we must acknowledge and accept that not every one is Christian in his or her orientation nor do we have a ri^t to make it so. In all the praying and fi’etting over the foimding of this nation, forgotten is the fact that it was the concept of refigious fiieedom (First Amendment), the need for individual rights and the concept of property rights which are the stiung reasons for this coimtry’s defection fium Euiupe. As President Bush acknowledged, no one enjoys being occupied and neither do men and women of faith appreciate being told who is their God and how that God is to be worshipped. Thirdly prisoner abuse must be exorcized. Islam to be understood must first be respected for it surpasses Christianity in its members and converts. Islam is a patri lineal rehgion with much authority placed in the hands of men who exercise authoritaiian control over women in the eyes of some. The humiliation of fraqi prisoners by showing men naked, reportedly attacked by dogs, posed in sexually degi'ading postures, is bad enoi^h but to have them splayed before an American woman in their minds is the insult of insults. If civihan fraqi women have been raped arid chfl- di'en molested by those acting on this nation’s behalf, under no conditions will this be tolerated or foigiven by many in the Middle East, nor should it be tolerated by this nation. Heads will and must roll for om* national security is being fuither threatened. lb not undei'stand this means looking over your shoulder constantly for we can nevei* be secure against people who ai'e known to carry on wars for ages. We must support our tixx)ps but be mindful that privates, coipo- rals and the like who are underlings ai*e responsible throu^ a chain of command which must be cleansed of this foohshT ness as well. Fourth, this nation must undei’stand what the VFW notes, the price of freedom is not fi^. Fifth, the use of private contractors not accountable to the U.S. government and US Congress for its actions is some thing that must be seriously examined. We need a military where all dtizens share in the responsibifrty for the protec tion and security of the nation against enemies domestic and foreign. We maybe at that jun9ture where volunteers alone may not be sufficient to meet our nation’s needs and com mitments. If we required national service of our citizens, we would have moi’e accountability for our involvements and our foreign poHcies. Had Oakwood International fix)m Richland, N.C. been given the housing contract instead of non-competitive bids by Halliburton or political cronies, we could have had sub stantial concrete housing up in 16 days, which can be adapt ed by the cultures involved as well as finished with the labor and contributory pioducts fiom citizens of that country This housing would have employed and stfll can employ hundreds in Iraq as well as N.C. where so many of our jobs have been removed. This housing would give Iraq the economic devel opment needed to quiet the disaffected. Six, Iraq’s oil isn’t the spoil of the victors nor will it be suf ficient to pay debts. It’s past time that this nation had a rea sonable energy pohcy, which looks at new sources of fuel and energy as well as conservation of resources. If 10-15 mile per gallon cars is to be continually used, oil wars will be in the foreseeable flitm'e. Ex-Secretary of State Colin Powell’s pubhc voice has never wavered in his support of the president, nor has his compas sion for the people and estimate of the natui’e of the prob lems of the troubled Middle East been more on target. Maybe it’s time to let Seaetary Powell do what he has done well, be a top military man for this nation or a United Nations envoy to the Middle Eeist. ADA M. FISHER mA. is a licensed teacher for secondary educa tion, former Rowan County school board member, physician and for mer Republican candidate for the US. Senate andUS. House of Representatives. Contact her at P. O. Box 777; Salisbury, NC^28145, telephone (704) 637-6134 or DrAdaMFishererg. Connect with Send letters to The Charlotte Post, P.O. Box 30144 Charlotte, NC 28230 or e-mail editorial^ithecharlot- tepost.com. Angela Lindsay Understanding why we have so many ‘Crash’ moments In the star*-studded, quietly released movie, Crash, the causes and effects of om* society’s most conmion racial stereotypes are relentlessly splashed acress the screen with vivid, unapologetic ferocity Frem a Persian family being mistaken as Ar'ab and berated for terTorism to a white LAPD officer bogusly pulling over a black couple and violating the wife as her husband helplessly watched. These images are seared into the minds of the audience long after the movie is over, no doubt because of their umepentant natme and the fact that many of them were probably already embedded in. our* psyches long before the opening credits began. Last year, a restaurant owner in Miami was sued by a black couple for adding gratuity to their* bill without doing the same to a white couple dining near’by As justifi cation, the lestauT'ant owner allegedly stated, “You black people do not tip well.” In that same vein, in one of the opening scenes of the movie, two black youth stroll out of a r’estaur’ant, one of them spewing a seething tirade over the poor service he says they received because of their* race. His assumption was that the wait ress was operating under the notion that black people do not tip well and, therefor*e, gave him poor ser*vice. He, therefor’e, did not leave her a tip. It is an example of art imitating life or vice ver'sa. However* you choose to explain it, these fallacies continue to manifest them selves in our daily fives. Allowed to continue, they can eventually evolve into self-fulfilling prophecies and cyclical tr’uths for both the victims and the perpetr*atois of the assumptions. For instance, a Cor’nell Univer'sity study on the ethnic differ ences regarding the tipping issue r’evealed that blacks, Hispanics and Asians overall tended to tip less than whites. But the study also concluded that many of the reasons for poor* tipping wer’e based on discriminator’y practices by the wait staff and the fact that those in lower income brackets, regardless of race, tended to tip less than those with mor’e disposable income. Blacks and Hispanics tend to be disproportionately poor. The research also found that tiie reason behind the poorer tipping could be due to minority groups being less familiar with the tipping nor’m of 15 to 20 percent. Regardless, many of the waiters and waitresses who delivered inferior ser*vice to ethnic minorities routinely did so based on preconceived notions that ethnic minorities ar*e poor tip pers. We know that it is ^^ot the case that all minorities tip poorly and, since gratuity is an incentive and should be conunensurate with the level of service r*eceived, all patrons under nor’mal circimi- stances should be given equally good ser*vice. But it shows how easily belief in certain ster’eotypes can manifest and the causes and effects because of it. It is also an example of how self-fulfilling pr*ophecies can urmecessarily come to be. The tipping issue is, of course, only a single example in a wide array of judgments and misconceptions that we attach to people everyday Most of us have been guilty of di’awdr^ conclusions about a group of people based on what we have hear*d or what we may have witnessed one member of that group do. Racism? Possibly But this type of reaction is also the result of mass perceptions gen erated by om* society We consume a daily diet of overwhelming and often irresponsi ble images and discourse that allows us easily albeit erroneously, to lump individuals, even om* ‘own kind’ sometimes, into superfi cial categories without knovring the person behind the exterior and his/her pei*sonal situation. Though it is not realistic to be able to get to know each pei'son with whom we come in contact on an individual basis, the movie made it clear how important it is that we aU take personal respon sibility for om* perceptions. One of the goals of the tipping study was to keep wait staff from unnecessarily demeaning a customer group by helping them undei’stand and address the imderlying cause of the ethnic differences. It is a univei'sal lesson that could be applied on ai much broader social scale, though, any beneficial dbiange in how we view and interact with each other will be much more difficult to accomplish than simply bringing someone an extra ^ass of water. Since fife does not occur in a vacuum, realistically it will take more than a movie, a study or a social commentai’y to provide solu tions for such weighty issues, but Ci’ash hopefully gave the fifty or so people in the theater something to think about on the way home. It did for one person. And it made me wonder if we will ever get to the point where we will not have to crash into each other in order to interact. E-mail Post columnist ANGELA UNDSAY at lind'>aylaw(X)((‘yahoo com “We consume a daily diet of overwhelming and often irresponsibie images and discourse that aliows us easily, albeit erroneously, to Iftmp individuals, even our ‘own kind’ sometimes, into superficiai categories without knowing the person behind the exterior and his/her personal situation.’ Gyasi a. Foluke Ignoring root of discipline problem For tlie love of money is tlie i*oot of all evil,” pro claimed the biblical wiitei* (1 Tiinotliy 6:10). And this same root has many branches and leaves that I have depicted gi*aphically in Cliapter IV of my fii'st book, “The Real-Holocaust: A Whofistic Analysis of the African American Experience, 1441-1994.” But let us be I’eminded that “TY*uth, crushed to the gi'ound, will rise again,” in those pro found words of that gi*eat slave aboli tionist, William C. Bi’yant. Indeed, we have a vei*y i^ly example of such tiTith in the pi*oblem of school disci pline witliin Chai’lotte-Mecklenbuig Schools, always known by many teachers, but only I'ecently admitted by tlie school boaiti, top administi*a- tors and The Chai’lotte Observer — ”Distiu*ber.” Alas, and unfoiiunately all of these “Johnny-come- lately” confessoi*s to tliis ugly tiaith ai’e continuing to ignore the major I’oot of this appai-ently unacceptable misbehavior of fai* too many students within CMS- most often blaming students, parents and any other favorite scapegoat for this despicable condition. Theiefore, let us briefly examine at least two of the often ignoi*ed, more systemic, metaphoric branches or leaves of this pi*oblem. 1. Cumulative dehumanization-racism: If we choose to look historically and honestly at this disciplinary problem, we may obsewe that the ovemhefining majority of students who aie suspended or expelled fr*om school aie African Americans-a fact that we do not need a “rocket scientist” to undei’stand. For we have, unquestionably a distinctly spiritual or “race problem” wthin Charlotte-Mecklenburg that, consistently, has been ignoi*ed, minimized, cii*- cumvented and/or “pacified,” the latter through “The Chai’lotte way” of providing Band-aid gestures, “divide-and conquer” or “Willie Lynch”-type token rewai*ds, financial or psychological, to a few “kneegro” mis-leaders who collaborate in the systemic oppres sion-suppression of the masses of theii* people. In essence, black Americans have suffered major, imder-estimated damages, economic and psychologi cal, as a result of cumulative racism, nearly 400 yeai*s of anti-black poficies-practices, both public and private, including massive lynching and other forms of domestic terrorism. 2. The polyglot factor; School boai'd membei’s and oui* over-paid top administi’ators either do not under- stand-or choose to ignore-the critically important reality of our imique ‘black experience” as described too briefly above, i.e., that they must implement unique and/or special strategies to addi*ess unique damages that have been inflicted upon us. And these strategies, with specific programs, involve a a*eative synthesis of two failed systems of mis-education-the old segregated order, where we- blacks had no significant disciplinary pi*oblems with our students, and the present desegi*egated-i*e-segre- gated order. Indeed, to reiterate, the present school system is a disaster for om* black students, reflecting “academic genocide” as accurately noted by Superior Court Judge Howard Manning, with his comments limited unfortunately to only several of our high schools. Of course, we have already delineated and reported to the school board some of those factoi*s that contribute to the present failed system. For example; (A) A Euro-centric curriculum that, subconsciously, teaches black students to worship white people, while hating themselves; (B) Pi’edominantly white teachers (mostly female) with almost inexorable, subconscious, systemic racial biases against blacks; (C) ’Mis-educated black or “kneegro” teachers-pro- fessionals who have been “educated” in Euro-centric systems of “higher education” (sic). In essence, school discipline problems are, metaphorically, some of the ‘bitter fruit” fi’om “The Money IVee” of greed and related ignorance in American society i.e., “the chickens coming home to roost.” As one white student, reportedly, asked his parent, “Mother why do some black students act like animals in class?” And his mother replied, “Perhaps it is because for 400 years we have treated them like animals.” Bingo! GYASI A. FOLUKE, MA. DD. a non-traditional Minister, is an author-lecturer-consultant, public access television pro- du(.-er, retired Air Force officer and part-time CEO of The Kushite Institute for Wholistic Development. Telephone (7(U)39I 8505
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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June 30, 2005, edition 1
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