OPINION: Obama, Jimmy Carter & Race
It’s hard to imagine that less than a century ago, police sergeants and sheriffs were overseeing the burning of crosses and ensuring the safety of Ku Klux Klansmen in places like Queens, NY and that fifty years ago, people of color were still fighting for the ability to use public bathrooms and drink from water fountains at will. And today, in 2009, despite having the first African American President in the White House, Blacks and Latinos still suffer from institutional racism, blatantly discriminatory attacks, profiling and disproportionate levels of incarceration. Despite the plethora of issues we still must surpass, the President has diligently worked to unite the American body and transcend the conversation beyond race. Unfortunately, his opponents often see nothing but skin color and an opportunity to conjure up age-old sentiments, fears and stereotypes. The issue of race in America is so complex that even analyzing and assessing it requires the breakdown of multiple layers. Former President Jimmy Carter recently expressed his view on the rage being hurled towards Obama in an extremely forthright and candid manner. Following Congressman Joe Wilson’s outburst during the President’s speech on health care in front of Congress, Carter was compelled to say the following in a television interview: “I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a Black man.†Now this isn’t an ‘angry Black person’ touting these words, nor an advocate who has fought against discrimination their entire lives, but rather a White, former President who didn’t hesitate to call out what he deemed dangerous behavior. Carter’s insightful words have sparked yet another debate on Obama’s ethnicity and the state of racial tensions in America. Can we recall a time when the President’s citizenship was ever called in to question?  When was the last time we heard words like ‘socialist’ and ‘Marxist’ utilized? Have people ever second-guessed a sitting President so openly? Can we remember a moment where folks were yelling to have ‘their country back’? And when was the President of the United States ever interrupted, belittled and disrespected by a member of Congress in the House chambers?! After all, the rules themselves prohibit lawmakers from “unnecessarily and unduly exciting animosity among its members or antagonism from those other branches of the government.†Let’s take it even one step further: Carter didn’t hesitate to address the rise in anger and troubling sentiment circulating around the country and in Washington itself. But not too long ago, Governor David Paterson of NY juxtaposed virtually the same concept and was immediately castigated for it. Criticized for playing the ‘race card’, Paterson was instantaneously dismissed when he too highlighted bias and deep-seated hatred for the way in which both he and the President were being treated. So how is it that when a White official mentions a controversial topic, it sparks an in-depth debate and analysis of society and the treatment of the President. But when a Black leader says virtually the same, he is immediately touted as a race-baiter and shunned from the conversation? As we await Joe Wilson’s next step – whether that includes a formal apology on the House floor remains to be determined – we must not take our own next steps in vain.  The next time anyone is so quick to dismiss race and bias, let them not forget the lessons of the past, and – more importantly – the lessons we’re still constructing today. RELATED: Healthcare & Sustaining The American Character What Would MLK Say About Healthcare? U.S. Education System Urgently Needs Reform
September 18, 2009No CommentRead More
OPINION: What Would MLK Say About Health Care?
In April of 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. intellectually and emphatically asserted that ‘freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed’ as he diligently wrote from a rotting prison cell. His now infamous Letter from a Birmingham Jail called for a restoration of human rights, liberty and justice for all of humanity. Speaking over 2,500 times, arrested upwards of 20 and assaulted at least four times, MLK would likely do it all one more time were he alive today in the cause of another impeding civil right’s issue: lack of adequate health care for our citizenry. Every day, countless children are born into poverty without proper health care that sooner rather than later diminishes his or her chance at succeeding in school, obtaining work, leading productive lives, improving his or her condition and altering a devastating cycle. And every day, many children are blessed to be born into middle class homes with health coverage and opportunities for advanced education, but find themselves helpless when they too cannot find work or are struck by the unlucky fortune of a serious illness and their insurance suddenly drops them. Each and every day some 14,000 Americans are losing their health coverage as our economy continues to struggle, and as a result, people are literally dying from either lack of insurance, loopholes in coverage or an inability to maintain regular check-ups and screenings that are so vital to staying healthy. It’s an atrocity that in a country as powerful as the United States, people are falling ill, losing their homes and going bankrupt all because of a corrupt system that only benefits insurance conglomerates and those in their pockets. Why is it that the U.S. life expectancy today still lags behind 30 other nations? Why does a hard-working factory worker in the Midwest have to choose which finger to amputate because he could not control his diabetes in time? Why does a teenager in California have to die because her insurance company gave her the run around when she was seeking treatment for her aggressive cancer? And why are so many forced to travel to Mexico, Canada and England to get cheaper medicine and better treatment for their ailments? President Obama recently spoke with a diverse body of religious leaders where he stated that health reform was a ‘core ethical and moral obligation’. If MLK was able to walk and march through our streets today, he too would likely preach for the urgent and dire need for change. Now of course neither I nor anyone else can unequivocally say what this great man would definitively do, but as a student of his, I can make a calculated assumption. Listening to the cries of babies, watching innocent children suffering and observing the inhumane corporate lobby of our health industry, our nation’s greatest civil right’s leader would not hesitate to begin a new nonviolent campaign to end this destructive pattern of injustice and abuse. Since our most recent recession began, an additional four million+ Americans have lost their health insurance, and the numbers are undoubtedly going to rise. Another 3.2 million+ rely on Medicaid or the SCHIP program to assist them, and yet many on the right would have you believe that health care isn’t an urgent issue for ALL. The amount of blatant lies – from ‘death panels’ to ‘government takeover’ – spewed by those whose financial motives are questionable at best, would make MLK shutter. Unfortunately there are some who are busy playing on the fears of people who have lost their jobs, livelihoods and a sense of stability. President Obama and Congress must not give in to these scare tactics, for health care is a fundamental human right’s issue that must be guaranteed to everyone if we are to remain a civil society. MLK had urged for young high school and college students, young ministers and religious leaders – and their elders – to ‘courageously and nonviolently sit in at lunch counters and willingly go to jail for conscience’ sake’. Perhaps it’s that type of movement that needs to take place, that needs to silence the ridiculous mistruths and that needs to once again deliver equality for all. MLK used to preach that we end poverty through assisting those poorer than ourselves. As human beings, we have to make a moral commitment to others, and that moral commitment today encompasses immediate health reform. Let’s continue Kingian nonviolence and let’s continue fulfilling this selfless man’s dream: for ‘we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream’. READ MORE FROM REVEREND AL SHARPTON: OPINION: Heal The Prison System OPINION: What Gates Will Teach Us OPINION: The Attacks On Obama
August 21, 2009No CommentRead More
OPINION: U.S. Education System Urgently Needs Reform
When President Barack Obama shared a cold one with Professor Gates and Sergeant Crowley last month, the world was astonished and amazed by the show of unity, discourse and advancement taking place. But when former Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and I will hit the road this fall, you better believe jaws are likely to fall right open. Beginning in Philadelphia on September 29, Gingrich and I will join Secretary of Education Arne Duncan as we kick off our Five City Tour highlighting the dire need to reform our education system. Undoubtedly on opposite ends of the spectrum for the bulk of our political careers, Gingrich and I have found common ground in the urgency of saving our failing schools, educating our children and providing them with the just opportunity to once again lead the nation to a state of unparalleled power. The two of us have fought on nearly every issue, often times representing the far ends of our parties, but on education reform we have found a basis for shared concern: the future of today’s youth. Last year, America’s Promise Alliance (whose founding chairman happens to be Colin Powell) released a startling report indicating that seventeen of the country’s 50 largest cities had high school graduation rates that were lower than 50%. The report went on to highlight the alarming national school dropout rate of 1.2 million students. Add to that the disparity in education across racial lines where Black and Latino students are three years behind their White counterparts by the fourth grade, the percentages and numbers are even more troubling, more frightening and more disgraceful. This past spring, Gingrich and I met with President Obama, along with the Education Security, as we put partisan divisions aside and worked towards real solutions to this most urgent civil rights issue of our time. I am delighted that the President has allocated $4.35 billion into the Race to the Top Fund – the largest ever federal competitive investment in school reform. And I’m equally thrilled that Gingrich, Duncan and I will host school visits, stakeholder meetings and media briefings on our tour as we raise awareness, incite intelligent discourse and push for immediate action across the country. Following Philadelphia, we will visit Petersburg, VA on October 2, New Orleans on November 3, Baltimore on November 13 and then Los Angeles on a date to be determined. We live in a nation where the foundation of liberty, pursuit of happiness and the American dream are afforded to all. But when only 9% of freshmen in our top colleges are from the poorest regions of the country, that dream quickly dissipates for many. Without a proper education, children do not only lag behind financially, but they easily fall victim to other perils in society – including crime and imprisonment. When six out of 10 Black male high school dropouts have spent time in jail by their mid-30s, it’s easy to see the correlation between education, poverty, opportunity and advancement. Our schools are failing, our children are failing and we as a country are failing to keep up with many others around the world when it comes to innovation, technology, jobs, the economy and more. It was exactly fifty-five years ago when the landmark decision of Brown v. Board of Education integrated schools and attempted to level the playing field for all children. It is utterly embarrassing that between 1987-2007 states spent on average 21% more on higher education, but simultaneously spent a shocking 127% more on their corrections budgets (Chronicle of Higher Education). How can we preach education is the key when all many of these kids see is a lack of appropriate textbooks, inadequate teachers and overcrowded classrooms where some are even taught in their school’s bathroom?! It’s time to collectively stand and take bold action to save our children and our own existence as the United States of America. At a time when those on the extreme right are outraged over health care and protesting in malicious ways, I would point to the unique sense of joint concern that Gingrich, Secretary Duncan and I have formed. We may disagree on a host of issues – many of which I have called Gingrich out on, and many he has publicly disagreed with me on – but when it comes to the President’s push to reform education, we are both vocal in our combined efforts to advance civil dialogue and effective change. This is not a time for partisan bickering, nor a time for divisive behavior, but rather an urgent moment to resurrect a dwindling education system. It’s not about right wing or left, liberal or conservative, Black or White; it’s about the pressing need to save your children and mine. Won’t you join us? READ MORE FROM REVEREND AL SHARPTON: OPINION: What Would MLK Say About Health Care? OPINION: Heal The Prison System OPINION: What Gates Will Teach Us OPINION: The Attacks On Obama
August 21, 2009No CommentRead More
OPINION: Heal The Prison System
As the battle lines for health care reform are being drawn – and redrawn – a silent segment of the population is strategically left out of the conversation. A group of individuals who have been deemed enemies of society, and cast away behind iron bars to fend for themselves. In California, health care in the state’s 33 prisons is so inadequate that one unnecessary death takes place per week, as inmates are often stacked in triple bunk beds in hallways and gymnasiums. With nearly twice the number of prisoners than it was designed to hold, California prisons will have to be cut by about 40,000 in the next two years – and it’s about time. Federal judges just released a 184-page order demanding that California’s inmate population be reduced by 27%, and gave the state 45 days to come up with a plan.  In what they termed an ‘unconstitutional prison health care system’, the three-judge panel concluded that disease was spreading rampantly and prisoner-on-prisoner violence was all but unavoidable. Forced to close a $26 billion dollar budget gap, California will now have to look at mechanisms to reducing its extensive prison spending, which in 2007 topped out at nearly $10 billion (approximately $49,000 for each inmate). Whether it’s for pure economic reasons or for an actual concern over the well being of prisoners, California will hopefully serve as an example for a reversal of the ever-growing prison industrial complex. A system that unfairly profiles and detains minorities, American jails produce a vicious cycle of recidivism and community breakdown. Last year, the Pew Center on the States released a scathing report stating that one in every 100 American adults was in jail, and that an astonishing one in 15 Black adults was behind bars. According to government reports in 2007, there were three times as many Blacks in jail than in college dorms, with Latinos not far behind at 2.7 times more behind bars than in secondary schooling. In order for us to truly amend our incarceration culture where one in four prisoners in the entire world are in the United States, we have to take a look at the root causes of the dilemma. Why is it that more than half of all Black men in America don’t finish high school? Why is the unemployment rate in powerful cities like New York at 50% for Black men? Why did Congress abolish Pell grants for prisoners in 1994 that virtually eliminated all 350-incarceration college programs across the country? Is it any coincidence then that six out of 10 Black men who drop out of high school have spent time in jail by their mid-30s? With unemployment rates on the rise (and many would argue well in to the double digits among people of color), arrests for nonviolent infractions and petty crimes are leaving families motherless, fatherless and hopeless. We live in a world that promotes law, order and justice, yet our actions often times prove otherwise. As if the implementation of ridiculous drug laws and the ‘three strike rule’ weren’t enough to catapult our prison population, now our children are increasingly finding themselves in handcuffs at an early age. In 2006, a 14-year-old Black student in Texas was sentenced to seven years for shoving a teacher’s aide, while in 2007, an eighth grader in New York found herself handcuffed to a pole above her head for three hours while being questioned by police for writing on her desk at school. In Chicago it’s no better, as 77% of all student arrests were Black, although Blacks make up just half of the city’s student body. And let’s not forget women, who are in fact the largest growing segment of the prison population. According to Prisoners for Children, 85% of women are now serving time for non-violent crimes, with Black women six times as likely to go to jail than their White counterparts. These women, often the heads of their households, are forced to withstand dire circumstances including giving birth while in shackles. In 2006, the state of California spent about $500 million in overtime for its incarceration system, and in 2007, states spent $44 billion in American tax dollars on prisons. Whether it’s because of our diminishing economy, or if it’s out of genuine concern, California is leading the way – or rather being forced to lead the way – in amending our unjust prison industrial complex. If we truly care about the future our nation and all its inhabitants, each and every state needs to follow suit immediately. READ MORE FROM REVEREND AL SHARPTON: OPINION: What Gates Will Teach Us OPINION: The Attacks On Obama –>
August 7, 2009No CommentRead More
OPINION: What Gates Will Teach Us
We often teach our children that if you study, go to school, work hard and remain focused, you will be able to transcend the many racial and social boundaries that permeate in society. That if you stay away from drugs, violence and criminal activity, the law will serve and protect you. So what do we tell young people today when they see an Ivy League Professor, a writer and producer for PBS documentaries, a renowned author, an editor of several influential anthologies, a board member of esteemed institutions like the New York Public Library and much much more get arrested in his own home? How do we even begin to explain the still evident and troubling notions of racism, injustice and institutional bias that exist in a country with an African American President? Professor Henry Louis Gates, Director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African American Research at Harvard University, was returning home to Cambridge, MA from filming a documentary in China last week when he and his driver had trouble getting in to his home. After fiddling with the door and eventually gaining access, Professor Gates and his African American driver entered the house, only to discover police arrive a short while later on reports of a burglary. The 58-year-old mild mannered professor with a leg disability then produced his ID in order to prove his residence in the posh neighborhood – in other words having to prove his worthiness despite his accolades of achievements. And yet still, somehow, this distinguished Ph.D. scholar was handcuffed, humiliated, belittled and arrested for ‘disorderly conduct’ on his own front steps. Almost immediately, Cambridge police – and some in the media – began painting Professor Gates as an angry Black man who became ‘irate’ or was ‘irritable and exhausted’ from his long voyage. Once again, many began drawing their own conclusions based off of one-sided police reports and statements that don’t take into account Professor Gates’ version of the incident. Yet again, many have taken the police departments’ words at face value and given a clear pass to any notion of agitation, harassment, instigation and abuse by the officers themselves. In 2009, we are again witnessing nothing other than racial profiling at its best. In April of 1998, three Black men and one Latino were driving down the NJ Turnpike when their vehicle was pulled over and police fired 11 shots at the unarmed men. The late Johnnie Cochran and I fought diligently on behalf of these four innocent men and we pioneered a thorough investigation into police practices, protocol and an ingrained mentality we referred to as racial profiling. Defined later by the ACLU as any police-initiated action (including surveillance, search, detention, arrest or any other intervention) that relies to any degree on the race, ethnicity, religion or national origin of a person, racial profiling has virtually been in existence in some way, shape or form since the days of slavery. Countless studies on racial profiling stats and discriminatory behaviors have since emerged following the NJ Turnpike incident, and yet we see the practice still in effect on our streets, in our cities and in our towns. Time and again, history has proven that race-based policies do not make us safer. And time and again we see the vicious results of over-zealous officers who belittle individuals based on preconceived ideas – no matter how esteemed, educated or accomplished he/she may be. I commend President Obama for personally acknowledging and defending Professor Gate’s honor at his press conference last week, and for highlighting the breath of work that still needs to be done in order to advance our nation into a true post-racial entity. Perhaps providing hope and urging young people to continue the good fight is the best thing we can do for the next generation.
August 3, 2009No CommentRead More
OPINION: The Attacks On Obama
It’s been just over six months since the first African American President assumed the reigns of leader of the free world, and thus became arguably the most powerful man on earth. Following slavery, centuries of institutional racism, unequal access to education, jobs and the pursuit of prosperity, America voluntarily voted for a Black man to hold the highest office in the land. And after running on a platform of unity and staying above the fray of racial divisiveness, President Obama finds himself at the center of bigotry, race-baiting and hatred – and this time the right wing fringe is attempting to portray him as the racist. A few weeks back, Fox News anchor Glenn Beck engaged in an all-too familiar rant where he began attacking the President of the United States. Literally pulling out a wobbling Black doll holding an umbrella that he called ‘Obama’, Beck went on a tirade over how the President’s proposed health care reform would ‘remake America’ and that people should be very, very afraid. With neurotic-type gestures, Beck espoused that Obama was taking the “beacon of freedom and turning it into an apologetic, hey, what can you do for me, wannabe European, spread the wealth, socialist wonderlandâ€. As if such vitriol and fear mongering wasn’t incomprehensible enough, the Fox loud mouth went one step further last week in a move that even astonished his bosses when he called Obama a flat out ‘racist’. Following the election in November, the nation was immersed in the progress of finally electing an African American into a house that was literally constructed on the backs of slaves. Many, in an idealistic manner, hoped that society would now advance into a post-racial environment where skin color, ethnicity, creed and religion wouldn’t play such intense roles, and discrimination would subside. Unfortunately, what we must remember is that despite having a Black President, inequities in education, housing and work still exist, and that the institutional structure of society hasn’t shifted all that much. The CEOs of most corporations are still White, the hiring managers are mostly White, the heads of police departments are predominantly White and the executives in media (and that’s TV, print and radio) are more often then not White. Yes, we have made some advances, but there is a tremendous way to go before anyone can even begin to speak of equality and a fair playing field. In January, President Obama inherited an exacerbating housing crisis, two wars and the worst economy in years. And as people continue to lose jobs and face tough times, those on the right cease to exploit the fears of the downtrodden. Several in the GOP have utilized health reform as a wedge to scare White folks – especially poor Whites – that Obama is using health care as ‘reparations’, when in fact those same poor Whites would be among those who benefit the most from this reform. Just last week, two officers in Georgia were put on leave after being accused of running a criminal check on the President. This outrageous behavior followed last year’s security breach of then Senator Obama’s passport. And since inauguration we have witnessed dangerous words like ‘socialist’ and ‘Marxist’ touted around as if they didn’t hold an ugly and troubling history. Never before in our nation’s history has the President of the United States been undermined and attacked so blatantly in the media, on Capitol Hill and in the court of public opinion. It happens in small manners when someone refers to him as ‘Mr. Obama’ rather than ‘President Obama’, and in more blatant manners by the Glen Becks and Rush Limbaughs of the world. Instead of supporting the President as he undertakes the daunting task of resurrecting the country out of our plethora of challenges, some chose to divide, incite fear, push their own agendas and reinforce age-old stereotypes. Now I ask you, who is the real racist?
August 3, 2009No CommentRead More
A Hip-Hop Response To Chris Brown & Rihanna
For nearly an entire week, the Chris Brown/Rihanna alleged abuse incident has dominated major news media headlines. Unfortunately, these sensationalized reports did less to elucidate the national epidemic of violence against women and more to cement into our national psyche the idea that the new face of domestic abuse is young, Black and hip-hop. Instead of accepting sole responsibility for one of America’s most neglected pathologies, young Americans should turn this tragedy into an opportunity. In the last two election cycles, hip-hop led the way in making involvement in national elections fashionable among youth. Hip-hop political organizers could do the same in extending that influence into the arena of public policy with the goal of establishing an innovative solution to abuse that shifts the way the nation thinks about its treatment of women. The election of President Barack Obama, with young people across race supporting him long before even the African American community’s vote was solidified, marked the first political victory for this generation. Two-thirds of the 23 million young Americans 18-29 who voted in the 2008 presidential election voted for Barack Obama. These same young people taking the lead on a public policy solution to end dating violence would be an important second act. Contrary to public opinion the hip-hop community has a long history of resisting the status quo of domestic abuse, misogyny and gender inequity. From books like Tracy Sharpley-Whiting’s Pimps Up, Hos Down and films like Aishah Simmons’ No! The Rape Documentary to organizations like the Center for Young Women’s development and Industry Ears, Inc. , there is an emerging hip-hop generation leadership that has its finger on the pulse of a change agenda for women. Such an agenda is reflected in the nearly 5000 comments posted on Blackplanet.com responding to Chris Brown and Rihanna newsone.com updates. The overwhelming mood of these comments was that the Black community needed to separate itself from stereotypes of domestic violence. Blackplanet.com members even spontaneously created online discussion groups to address the issue. The media’s obsession with the Chris Brown/Rihanna incident, alongside a new administration that seems to take the debt it owes young voters seriously, offers young political organizers a rare opportunity for this generation to take the lead on dating and domestic abuse. Although hip-hop didn’t create America’s gender problem, its mainstream dominant representations certainly helped reinforce it. Today’s young Americans—especially those in the Chris Brown and Rihanna age group and the legions of even younger fans who idolize them—have come of age consuming a steady diet of these images. Few would argue that they are healthier or wiser as a result. At the same time, there are very few places in our culture where we require young men to learn appropriate behavior for engaging their female counterparts, especially when relationships turn sour. (Rhode Island and Virginia law for high school instruction on dating are rare exceptions.) This advancing the status quo, alongside our failure as a society to entrench a workable solution into the fabric of our culture, is a deadly combination. A recent report from the Bureau of Justice found that 1 in 3 girls in the US is a victim of physical, emotional or verbal abuse from a dating partner. 13 percent of teen girls say they were physically hurt or hit and 40 percent of teenage girls 14-17 years old say they know someone their age that has been hit by a boyfriend. And a 2003 nationwide survey from the Center for Disease Control of 15,000 9-12 grade high school students found that nearly 9 percent experienced physical dating violence, with rates among Black females (14 percent) nearly twice their white counterparts (7 percent). The rate for Latino females was 9.3 percent. Now is not the time for young people inspired during the last election cycle to fall back into complacency. Instead this energy should be channeled into the creation of a concrete national agenda committed to ending domestic violence. This certainly will require an institutional approach. In the same way that sex education worked its way into our schools, we need a similar curriculum from the earliest grades upward to change the ways Americans think about dating violence, domestic abuse and gender equity. At a bare minimum, this curriculum must teach boys that physical and emotional violence toward their girlfriends or any boys or men toward women is never an option. Such a move would have several benefits: it would help create the major societal shift needed to curtail violence against women; it would allow hip-hop to reveal to the world that it has a moral center; and it would solidify a new movement for a new generation. All are important steps on the road to transforming America into a county that reflects, more accurately than our media representations, the generation currently preparing to inherit it. Bakari Kitwana is the co-author of the forthcoming Hip-Hop Activism in the Obama Era (Third World Press, 2009) and a visiting scholar at Columbia College’s Institute for the Study of Women and Gender in the Arts and Media. RELATED: GALLERY: Celebrities Who Overcame Domestic Abuse | CLICK HERE GALLERY: Chris Brown & Rihanna, Happy Days | CLICK HERE GALLERY: Chris Brown’s Court Hearing | CLICK HERE
March 18, 2009No CommentRead More
