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(ommentary
BLACKONOMICS By James Clingman : :
Financing our own oppression
Have you kept up with the
progress of the reparations
movement as it pertains to
getting firms that benefited
from slavery, such as insur
ance companies and banks, to
pay reparations to the descen
dants of slaves? The argument
is that since those businesses
gained much of their wealth
from financing and insuring
the ships and other instru
ments of oppression utilized
during the most heinous
treatment of a people in histo
ry, they should also pay repa
rations.
From what I understand
there are several well docu
mented cases, put together by
top-notch legal experts, that
will make significant progress
toward reparations when they
come to court. Some are also
calling for boycotts against the
companies involved if they do
not voluntarily admit their
involvement and compensate
black people for obtaining
their wealth on the backs of
our ancestors.
That’s not bad idea as far as
I am concerned. I spent a lit
tle time with Conrad Worrill
on two occasions during the
GUEST COMMENTARY By Bill Fletcher, Jr.
£ jaeer w 1 2oyl o] | R Rl % T
Throudgh the eyes of whites
I think that what struck
me was her smile. You must
receive these flyers and
postcards all the time. On
one side is an advertise
ment. On the other side is a
picture of one or two peo
ple who have been missing.
The other night I hap
pened to look down at the
mail and saw the picture of
a very pleasant smile. I
stopped and decided to
read the information. It
appears that this woman,
and I assume her son, have
been missing for nearly one
year. I cannot remember
ever hearing anything about
them in the national or
local media. No surprise to
GUEST COMMENTARY By Ron Walters
2
College presidents should take a stand
When I was considering
coming to the University of
Maryland seven years ago,
one of the major factors was
that it had a president, Brit
Kirwan, who was passionate
about affirmative action.
When the university’s Ben
jamin Banneker Scholarship
Program for African-Ameri
can students was declared
unconstitutional by the
Fourth District Circuit
Court, many questioned his
decision to fight on, by
appealing to the Supreme
Court.
A decision by a Right
wing majority of the
Supreme Court upheld the
Fourth Circuit in 1995, but
President Kirwan's courage
stands as a model to other
college presidents in the face
of the current withering
attack on the opportunity of
blacks to attend college.
past six months, and I am
thoroughly impressed with
his knowledge of the repara
tions movement and his focus
on bringing it to fruition. He
is doing righteous work and
we should support hing and
all of those, including our
dear elder, Robert Brock, who
have fought and continue to
fight for what is right.
As I was reading an article
in Cincinnati Magazine,
tiled, The Baptist Economy,
which noted the “wild-eyed
glee” with which city officials
and the virtually all-White
Cincinnati Convention and
Visitors' Bureau looked at the
National Baptist Convention
U.S.A,, it occurred to me that
black people, and in this case,
black churches, are financing
the oppression of black people
as well.
You may have read my col
umn, The Rest of the Story,
where I discussed the Baptist
Convention deciding to come
to Cincinnati despite being
asked to stay away because of
the Cincinnati boycott agairist
travel and tourism to this city.
When I read the piece in
Cincinnati Magazine, I was
you, the reader, they are
both black.
I have written about this
before, back during the dis
appearance and national
coverage of Chandra Levy,
but once again we witness
the stark contrast in the
manner in which black life
is viewed by this society
compared to white life. A
few weeks ago a white col
lege student’s disappearance
and recovery became, for
several days, a national
news story. Let’s leave aside
that it appears that the
entire disappearance was a
charade. Think about the
events unfolding on this
planet: the Middle East is
In his statement appealing
the decision, Kirwan point
ed out that the University of
Maryland had resisted racial
integration far into the
19705, even though the
Supreme Court had declared
segregation unconstitutional
at the undergraduate college
of university in 1950.
This meant that, as in
other Southern states,
although blacks paid state
and federal taxes, African-
Americans had to attend
predominantly black - and
underfunded - colleges.
This amounted to a massive
transfer of resources, since
those taxes paid by blacks
were used to build and
maintain universities that
blacks couldn’t attend.
But as in other states,
blacks had also been slaves
in Maryland, and one of its
most famous slaves, Freder
even more assured that my
assessment was absolutely cor
rect: It's always about the
money; and we are financing
our own oppression.
Done under the tired
mantra of “racial healing” the
Baptist convention will bring
s2l million dollars to a city in
which oppression continues
to run rampant. The only
healing will be financial, and
that will be for the oppressors.
Vanessa Williams, the new
spokesperson for the National
Underground Railroad “Free
dom” Center, came to town
and said it was good that the
Freedom Center was “built by
black hands” and was a sym
bol of healing, which are more
statements that not only are
incorrect but also would make
the ignorant person think all
is well in Cincinn-apathy. I
wonder how much her com
pensation is.
Black leaders and black
folks in general should stop
financing the oppression of
their own people. But since it
seems they are not ready to
stop this kind of madness, I
think we should implement
the same tactics against them
in flames; ethnic cleansing
is taking place in the west
ern part of the Sudan; the
U.S. economy remains
sluggish with the bizarre
contrast of some job cre
ation along with increased
unemployment. Yet the
media has time to focus on
the disappearance and
recovery of a white college
student from Madison,
Wis. but cannot find the
time to call our attention to
the disappearance of Marcia
and Nicholas Candela.
It is not only that there is
a different value put on
white life compared to
black life and that the
media insists that we see the
ick Douglass, details in his
autobiography the painful
story of how basic education
was kept from him and
other slaves. Now the schol
arship program established
at the flagship institution to
correct this historical prob
lem is called Banneker-Key
(for Francis Scott Key) and
is now open to other stu
dents who ancestors had not
been slaves, some whose
family may have been slave
owners, and others who are
already more than propor
tionally represented.
In the past few years,
Right wing legal organiza
tions, wrongly named the
Center for Equal Opportu
nity and the Center for Indi
vidual Rights, have threat
ened universities in many
states with law suits if they
maintain racially idcntifia\ble
programs. They have sent
AUGUSTA FOCUS
that have been brought
against the insurance firms
and the banks. They financed
the oppression of black peo
ple, and now black organiza
tions are financing the oppres
sion of black people. Why
should we have a double-stan
dard? Don't you think that
because everything is about
money, especially for many of
our so-called black leaders, we
should seek reparations from
our own organizations as well?
Crazy, you say? I don't think
so. How can we ask for rec
ompense from white-owned
companies and not seek it
from black organizations that
continue to finance our
oppression by committing
black dollars to cities where
black people are oppressed?
Turnabout is fair play, and in
the case of hundreds of mil
lions of black tourism dollars
being looked upon with
“wild-eyed glee” by white
dominated convention cen
ters that get much of their
funding from black tax dol
lars, our acquiescence to calls
from our organizations (and
local black politicians) to go
against boycotts is uncon
world through the eyes of
white people. To put it
another way, if something is
not seen by white people or
through the eyes of white
people, for all intents and
purposes, it is not seen.
Thus, the regular disap
pearance of black women
and children, in some cases
apparent runaways, in other
cases, kidnappings, enslave
ment and murder, is simply
not relevant as far as the
media is concerned. It is
happening to a population
that seems to be viewed as
only relevant when it is
rioting or entertaining, not
when it is suffering.
See Whites page 10A
letters either directly to the
universities or to the U. §.
Department of Education’s
Office of Civil Rights, now
also run by conservatives,
complaining that such pro
grams violate the law. As a
result the colleges are caving
in and closing them..
In 2003, Carnegie Mellon
decided to open its summer
enrichment program for
blacks to whites and Asians.
Both Harvard and Yale
caved in after receiving let
ters from these legal organi
zations and Princeton and
MIT followed suit. With
these precedents the ripple
effect has caused many uni
versities to “rearrange” such
programs and others are still
under review to see if they
comply with the latest
Supreme Court decision.
Sec Collegepage 10A
scionable.
Despite the horrendous
treatment of our people, both
economically and otherwise,
all over this country, we con
tinue to mimic the overseers
and the crumb snatchers of
the past, selling out for a few
dollars, hotel suites, and ban
quets.
Yes, we must seek repara
tions from anyone and any
company that benefited from
the misery of black folks.
We must support Brother
Worrill in any way we can,
and we must never give up.
During a retrospective on
Harold Washington’s mayoral
tenure earlier this year in
Chicago, 1 heard Worrill say,
“Yes, our initial lawsuit was
denied, but that’s just the
beginning.” He went on to
ask, “Do you know how long
it took for black people to
gain the victories of the past?
Do you know how many law
suits had to be filed to remedy
other wrongs against us? This
is just the start and we will
continue to fight no matter
how long it takes.”
The same attitude must be
applied to these sell-outs black
gy e Jaskaon
Earth Day '
and Vieques
Vieques is a beautiful
little island off the coast
of Puerto Rico. It is also a
place which has experi
enced environmental
devastation due to the
test bombing that the
U.S. Navy conducted
there for 60 years. Now,
since the withdrawal of
the Navy a year ago, little
has been done towards
cleaning up our mess. So,
as we celebrate Earth Day
on April 22 and re-com
mit ourselves to saving
the Earth and our own
communities, maybe we
should also focus on
Vieques.
For more than a decade
environmentalists, labor
unions and peace activists
in Vieques joined togeth
er with civil rights groups
and Puerto Rican politi
cal leaders to protest the
Navy’s presence in
Vieques. They protested
the Navy’s annexation of
two-thirds of the island,
which sandwiched the
people between the Navy
base and the target prac
tice range which the
Navy not only used itself,
but even rented out to
other nations.
They also protested
what was happening to
the land and waters of
Vieques, a place where
farms once provided
much of the beef for the
Caribbean and where the
waters hold one of the
world’s few phosphores
cent bays. They protested
the decimation of the
April 22, 2004
organizations that do nothing
but help hold us down. Their
leaders are interested in two
things: Money in their pock
ets and not offending those
who give it to them. They will
continue to finance our
oppression, just like the finan
ciers during slavery, if we don't
hold them accountable for the
dollars we give them. Repara
tions for oppression? Let’s also
demand that from black
groups that are obviously
guilty of complicity.
James E. Clingman, an
adjunct professor at the Univer
sity of Cincinnatis African
American Studies department,
is former editor of the Cincin
nati Herald Newspaper and
founder of the Greater Cincin
nati African American Cham
ber of Commerce. He hosts the
radio program, ‘Blackonom
ics,” and has written several
books, including: Ecomomic
Empowerment or Economic
Enslavement - We have a
Choice; Blackonomics; and his
soon-to-be-released book, Black
o-Knowledge, Stuff we need to
know. Contact him at
www. blackonomics.com or
(513) 4894132,
tiny native frogs known
as the coqui and the high
rates of cancer, miscar
riages and other diseases
of the human beings liv
ing there.
Finally, after a thou
sand days of protests by
activists not only from
Puerto Rico, but from
across the U.S. and
around the world and
after the accidental death
of a civilian employee on
the bombing range, the
Navy agreed to withdraw
from Vieques. They were
also supposed to clean up
the millions of rounds of
unexploded ordinance
and the radioactive con
tamination left by years
of test bombing. Today
that has not yet happened
and the hundreds of com
plaints filed on behalf of
Vieques’ residents have
not yet been acted upon.
As far as the people there
know, there is not yet
even a plan to clean up
this environmental mess.
Twenty members of the
Congressional Hispanic
Caucus and Congressman
Charles Rangel of NY
have called upon the Sec
retary of the Navy to get
personally involved in
ensuring the immediate
clean-up of Vieques. Last
fall Congressman Rangel
wrote that the residents
of Vieques still experi
ence “dangerous living
conditions,” including
the high probability that
the heavy metals and
See Earth Day page 10A
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