When facing a compelling goal; it is nearly impossible to remain discouraged. The theme of the movie TROY speaks to 1) the battles we fight, 2) why we fight them, and 3) for whom we fight.
Hip Hop Ain't Nothing But the Young People's Blues
Around the turn of the century some 119 years ago, Dr. W.E.B. DuBois, a Harvard-educated Black scholar, was shocked at the impoverished blues he found in a distressed Philadelphia community inhabited by Blacks: "Murder sat at their doorstep, police were their government, social and academic paucity prevailed, and philanthropy dropped in with periodic advice," wrote Dr. DuBois. If he was alive today, Dr. DuBois would be even more appalled by the sheer mass of distressed Black communities that still suffer from the exact impoverished blues he witnessed some 119 years ago.
Lessons from Teen Mothers: "Sex is fun until..."
Teenage mothers are more likely to drop out of school, be financial dependant on family members, be government dependent, and suffer low-wage jobs. Additionally, their children do less well in school and are more likely to live in poverty.
As young women prepare for their junior and senior proms, they should be aware of these lessons based on conversations with several young mothers between the ages of 14 and 18:
Popularity or Progress
I was recently asked this question: When taking
over a brand new team, which is most important popularity or progress? I smiled.
The term popularity during the 15th century started out as a word that meant
least, low, vulgar, and/or of the common people. It took on a new meaning in the
late eighteenth century by which time it began to gain a positive connotation.
Another example of man manipulating change. The difference is that
progress has always meant what it means today.
Show Me The Money!
I was doing a search online recently and came across a rather
interesting site. A company called NextMark (http://www.nextmark.com)
had released some statistical information on African-American baby
boomers. It included the number of black women in each state; the
number of black women with children per state; the number of magazine
buyers; book readers, etc.
But what really caught my eye was the number of African-American baby boomers making $75,000 or more and what states they were concentrated in.
The Black Anglo Saxon
For all the talk of defining ourselves as African Americans,
there are those of us who define ourselves based on the culture we have
adopted, which is mostly European.
While most of us pretend to be African American, many of us are really Black Anglo Saxons.
James Earl Jones, an icon of the Black Anglo Saxons once mused that there is no Black culture, because culture is shaped by language and our language is English, therefore, our culture can not be anything else.
Watch Your Mouth
Vivid as if it were yesterday: I remember disappointing my mother in a hurtful way. In short, I was about to exit our green Buick LeSabre with spoke hubcaps and a damaged in dash radio when suddenly I yelled, "I hate my name and when I get older, I'm going to change it!" Angered, Mom reached back, with a Goody brush in hand, and tried to catch my smacker. Thank God she missed! She later explained her anger and the mandate of watching what I said. Trust me. Mandatory. No 1 - 2 - 3 stuff!
In business, the thought of someone smacking you in the mouth rarely enters the mind, but the need to monitor your words is nonetheless important. Perhaps more important in this time of "can't we all just get along," tort, heightened security, tense employee relations, and deranged personalities.
To Be Black In America: An Unflinching Necessity
We are well into the 21st century and it continues to be
absolutely essential to be Black in America. Beyond mere color, being
Black is first and foremost a conscious political, social, and economic
commitment to the struggle for the collective betterment of the
descendants of the Black slavery holocaust, in what has now become the
United States of America, in conjunction with other people of color and
humanity as a whole.