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5A OPINIONS/Ciarlotu $at Thursday August 11, 2005 What I believe and what I believe should be taught What do I believe? If there is one thing that I believe with certainty and can not ever remember seriously doubting, it is what has recent ly come to be called ‘Intelligent Design ” I believe that this world, this universe, and everything in it was created by and is watched over by an “Intelligent Designer,” known to me as God. I could never believe that the world, the people in it, and the universe that surroimds it ^ came about by accident. Can I prove this to you? Absolutely not. I would not even try My behef in a divine ori gin of the universe is a fundamental matter of faith with me-not something I could prove to you. If I were I to doubt “intelligent design,” I don’t think anyone could prove it to me by D.G. Martin using some kind of “scientific proof” Should science teachers try to show students that scientif ic research and study somehow proves the existence of God or the creation of the uni verse by intelligent design? Scientists and science teachers ought to be about the business of learning and teaching how the world and universe work-in a scien tific fi:amework Ihe imposition of my faith or anybody else’s reli gious concepts would distort scien tific teaching in the classroom and restrain scientific research in the laboratory Free and inquiring minds cannot be bound by directives to come up with results that fit in to a particu lar religious mold The most that should be said about Intelligent Design in the classroom or research lab is this: “What we have learned and what we expect to learn is consistent with the idea that there is an ‘intelligent designer,’ and it is also consistent with the idea that there is not one. Science will not prove it either way” I don’t want religious behefs-mine or yours-grafted on to science any more than I want them taught in other courses. Thke the study of history, for instance. I believe that God’s hand is somehow guiding our history - that of our country and the rest of the world. (I confess to having doubts about this one firom time to time, but it is nevertheless something I believe.) Still, I don’t want my idea-or someone else’s-of «cactly how God’s hand is guiding history to be a part of the ■ history courses taught in school or college. Speculating about God’s purposes, or which side He favored, in the American Civil War or World War II or trying to find God’s hand in the events of September 11, 2001, may be good for discussion in a religious contort. But, in a history classroom, the focus should be on causal factor's that can be documented and examined. I believe that the hand of God is in the beauty and orderli ness of math and music. It must be. But great musicians and great mathematicians hold a wide variety of views about God’s role in their work. Foixring them to conform their music or their math to my ideas about God would foixe them out of their fields. I believe that a sick person’s religious faith can play an important role in healing. But I want the health profession als to concentrate on applying the healing techniques that medical scientific research has so far revealed to be best. In medicine, history, science, and other such academic sub jects, the search for “human truth” can be hampered by the imposition of particular religioris beliefs, including the idea of Intelligent Design history I believe that God’s Ihith is on a higher plane than ‘human truths.” God’s truth is not scientific truth and not hiunan truth. We search for it in different ways and find it differently and to different degrees. We see that truth now “only through a glass darkly” if at all, and we have come to different ideas even then about what part of His truth God has revealed to us. What we see only “darkly” should not prevent us fiem see ing and learning more about what God has allowed us to see clearly D.G. MARTIN is is the host of UNC-TV’s ‘North Carolina Bookwalch,” which airs on Sundays al 5pm. Connect with $0!St Send letters to 'Hie Charlotte' Post, P.O. Box 30144 Charlotte, NC 28230 or e-mail editorialSthecharlottepo3t.com. We edit for grammar, clarity and space where necessary Include your name and daytime phone number. Black is back, but who’ll embrace it? On August 20, black folks fiom across the country wifi, convene on Detroit, but, more importantly, Detroiters themselves will con verge in Cobo Hah to make a bold, action-oriented commitment regarding their economic and political empowerment. The Motor City, 85 percent black, is at the forefient of what whl be a nation al initiative to develop and sustain black business enclaves wher ever sizeable groups of black people r^eside in this country The reahty is that when the black busi ness district comes to fiuition in Detroit, other cities wih foUow its lead by planning, promoting, and developing similar enclaves. You have probably heard by now about the pro posal to buhd a black business district in Detroit, which has created somewhat of a furor in that city among politicians and business persons. Despite Detroit’s overwhelming majority black population, there is no Afiican-American business district. Yet, K James Clingman there are several different ethnic business districts. Tb think that some, including a few blacks have called the plan to develop such a district “racist,” “separatist,” and “divisive,” sim ply defies logic and speaks to the desperate economic state of our people in general. Additionally, the resistance to an effort to show-; case and economically empower the m^ority population of Detroit, lets us know that unseen hands and higher forces are at work to keep black folks in Detroit economically enslaved. Why hasn’t anyone called Greek Tbwn, Mexican Tbwn, Polish Tbwn, Korea Tbwn, China Tbwn, Hockey Tbwn, and similar enclaves “racist” and “separatist? I cannot believe that Blacks in Detroit will not move forward with establishing their own business district. Anyone with an ounce of sense knows its not racism that drives these districts; its economics. What sense does it make for Afiican-Americans to subscribe to the notion of “majority rule” and not utilize that principle when we are in the majority? Sofne black folks in Detroit and elsewhere are still looking for “minority” set asides and Minority Business Enterprise programs despite being in the majority As a matter of fact, in Cincinnati where I live, blacks make up nearly 50 percent of the population. That, combined with the percentages comprised by Hispanics and Asians would create a majority for people of color. Yet these groups collectively allow the dty to play fast and loose with public dollars, and they are subjected to “minority” rules in “minority” programs. How silly is that? Detroit can set the example of what must be done to put black people in this country back on the road to economic prosperity Yes, I said ‘back” on the road Whether you realize it or not, our rela tives have been there and done that when it comes to economic empowerment, by building and sustaining economic enclaves across the country despite the horrendous treatment they suf fered. So, as I asked in a previous article, what are you going to do, Detroit? Are you going to lead, or will you continue to follow? you rightly assume your correct and deserved position at the head of the table, in the “powa* seat,” or will you continue to sit on the floor hoping a few crumbs will fall down for you to pick up? you correct the inappropriate behavior of the past, such as, settling for a minority economic position despite being the majority? Or, win you persist with the inappropriate behavior of denying who you are, being ashamed of your black heritage, and the self-depre cating practice of working against your own best economic inter ests and those of your children? Make the proper decision and come out August 20 to the “Black is Back” Powemomics Economic Summit. This will be a day of serious commitment to restore and rebuild an economic infi'a- structure for the majority of Detroit’s citizens. The speakers will include Claud Anderson, Bob Law, Rosie Milligan, Amefika Gueka, Kwame Kenyatta, Joann Watson, Barbara Rose Collins, Dorothy Tillman, and other conscious brothers and sisters that do much more than just talk about our economic problems. The participants wfil rail/at Cadillac Square at 9 a m. and then march to Cobo Hall for the summit. Please spread the word about this initiative and encourage brothers and sisters fix)m Tbledo, Indianapolis, Chicago/Gary Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Ohio, and other dties in the area to come to Detroit to lend their support. The development of a Black business district in Detroit wfil have residual effects across this country by sending out a wave of encouragement, confidence, and pride, and by providing the model for future enclaves. We must do this, folks. We have no other choice, and we have no other alternative to sinking even further into the abyss of eco nomic despair and desperation Can’t you see what is happening .inthiscoimtry? In this world? Black people are an afterthought, some little inconvenience that must be tolerated. More and more, we are treated with disdain, and the only worth our lives hold to many in this society is in a prison cell or in an army uniform. While I pray that we will change, white and black, I pray espe cially that Black people will change. Status quo is a prescription ' for failure. Haven’t you had enough failures? Aren’t you tired of being mistreated and exploited? If so, come to Detroit a week fix)m Saturday and make your statement that “Black is Back,” and remember what Maggie Lena Walker said: ‘You can stand up and be counted, or you can lie down and be coimted out.” JAMES E. CLINGMAN, an adjunct professor at the University of Cincinnati’s Afiican American Studies department, is former editor of the Cincinnati Herald Newspaper andfounder of the Greater Cincinnati African American Chamber of Commerce. Easley and CMS still don’t get it “Americans,” said the late Sir Winston Churchill, “will eventually do the right thing, but only after they have tried everything else first”-a statement made after he had attonpted and failed to persuade the U.S. to enter World War II with Britain or against Adolph Hitler. And clearly, this paibal truism may be observed ’ after recent news reports that Gov Mike Easley has proposed to send state teams to assist certain low- performing Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools. For state officials and CMS apparently believe, falsely that they have “tried every thing else” to improve education in low poverty schools. As stated by Easley “These schools have consis tently performed poorly and I want to know why” Duh! Question: Are we to believe that “our” governor, does not know why these “high-poverty” schools are not performing up to par? Well, maybe he doesn’t, just as our “distinguished” (sic) CMS school board and their top Gyasi Foluke administrators appear to be equally lost for answers to this problem. However, we must question whether or not they are really ‘lost” or, perhaps like most Americans, they are palpably uninformed about our authentic black histo ry that, tragically, is not taught in “our” public schools. Moreover, perhaps the governor and CMS are in denial, psychologically, about m^or under-esti mated damages, both economic and psychological, that the majority society has inflicted upon Afiicans in America, sometimes called Afiican Americans, and/or they do not understand another simple tru ism, perhaps best stated by Professor Roger MUdns- to wit: ‘We can’t have equal outcomes for children whose parents face dreadfully unequal circumstances in this life.” Bingo! Amen! Indeed, if “mediocrity in education is no longer an option,” according to the governor, then he and CMS must face, not simply low performing poverty schools, per se, but grossly disproportionate black poverty, period, about 51 percent in Mecklenburg County, in contrast to about 12 percent for whites. And this gross wealth disparity, distinctly but not absolutely related to academic disparities, is traceable to the ugly reali ty that black wealth or resources have been stolen for nearly 400 years in this nation that, allegedly, pro motes “liberty and justice for all”-or is it ‘just us” white folks? Moreover, adding insult to iigury this economic dis parity is aggravated by a paucity of vision and the failure to implement more successful educational strate^es by the state and CMS “educators,” the lat ter who continue to receive large financial bonuses for perpetuating “academic genocide” (Judge Howard Manning) on our black students. Fortunately, there is no mystery about what needs to be done to impax)ve educational strategies. For some of us have proposed to the school board and top administrators many measures to reform “our” schools-aU to no avail. Indeed we should now be con vinced that CMS officials are afilicted tragically with “The Ostrich Syndrome,” having chosen, metaphori cally, to bury their heads in the sand, while ignoring obvious racial implications underlying volumes of school data. Indeed, we need m^or reforms in CMS to change: (1) The Euro-centric curriculum that, subconscious ly, teaches black students to worship White people- hke that artistic rendition of “Jesus,” in reality Michelangelo’ cousin, in our churches—while blacks simultaneously learn to hate themselves; (2) academ ic teaching, student “tracking” and tests, while con- currentiy addressing those despicable gaps on test scores; (3) unfair punitive practices to reduce pxmish- ment rates, retention rates and drop-out or “push- out” rates; (4) the grossly disproportionate niimber of white teachers, mostly female and most often racial ly biased, at least subconsciously, (5) the failure to provide authentic professional education to teachers on Afiican American heritage-cxfiture, beginning with ancient Afiica, “The Cradle of Civilization;” (6) the failure to assign “quality teachers” where most need ed, although generally they are non-existent within CMS, if they have not learned black heritage-culture; and finally, (7) CMS shoifid adopt several new strate gies, including supplemental Afiican-centered educa tional colters or magnet schools, to address special needs (damages) of “disadvantaged” black parents and students, based upon the most important “Polyglot Factor,” the uniqueness of “the black expe rience” in America, etc, ad nauseam. GYAiSlA. FOLUKE, MA, DD, a non-traditional Minister, is an author-lecturer-consultant, and part-time CEO of The Kushite Institute for Wholistic Development. WHAT?' I TOOlC A SHOWER TK|S WOCMjNG, GftAWPMt'. I tiSOALlY TAjCfc AS WANY AS m. shower pER MY. SO rw A RELATlVtLY COAN PERSON T I mw where m HAWS SEEN. AW I’W MOT fVTTlN’ 'EM All IN YOOR FOOP. SO WHY ARE YOU SO WORRlEP APOtIT (T?
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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Aug. 11, 2005, edition 1
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