“Resilient” is not an adjective typically used to describe black men. The statistics facing African American males (and women) often seem insurmountable. And although the mainstream media would lead us to believe that we've worked out the problems of race and class, the truth is that there are a number of obstacles preventing black youth from truly achieving the American dream.
However, our participation in the Campaign for Black Male Achievement’s recent gatherings, Playing to Win and Black Male Re-imagined inspired us to look at our community’s resilience. These gatherings held in Milwaukee and New York saw many of our nation's strongest intellectuals, cultural leaders, and activists in one room discussing the problems and potential solutions for our community's woes.
Nobody said that solving black America’s problems would be easy, but when you’re surrounded by great thinkers like Cathy Cohen and Haki Madhubuti or cultural heroes like Steve Stoute and Q-Tip, you have no choice but to believe that our community has what it takes to overcome the overwhelming odds.
Prior to the Playing to Win and Black Male: Re-Imagined gatherings, we were less hopeful that things could change. As young leaders, we have often felt estranged from and abandoned by our elders and black leaders. But at these important gatherings, we met a number of leaders, some in their 60s or 70s, who are passionately engaged in fighting for the next generation.
Still, solving the problems facing the black community falls squarely on our generation. Perhaps the greatest strength of these two gatherings was that the conveners weren’t afraid to include the leaders from our generation’s greatest cultural force, hip-hop. Not only was it rare to see music icons like Nick Cannon, Russell Simmons, or Andre Harrell participating, but that the leaders of the philanthropy world embraced, and encouraged their grantees to actively utilize, the controversial art form to mobilize our generation.
Through creative use of technology, hip-hop and popular culture, rigorous research, civic engagement, and our passion for change, we wholeheartedly believe that our generation has what it takes to turn the tide for the black community. If we’ve learned anything these last couple of weeks, it’s that we are more than just statistics; we are a powerful people who stand on the shoulders of those who came before us.
KUCINICH DEFENDS BOEING WORKERS; CALLS FOR DEFEAT OF "LEGISLATIVE PARDON' FOR MANAGEMENT VIOLATION OF THE NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS ACT "CONGRESS SHOULD WANT BOEING TO SUCCEED BUT NOT BY UNDERMINING ITS WORKFORCE WHICH IS THE BEST IN THE WORLD.".
States News Service July 21, 2011 WASHINGTON -- The following information was released by the office of Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich:
Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today made a strong defense of the National Labor Relations Act and the right of workers at Boeing to seek a remedy for violations of the law. (For a legal background of the Boeing case, click here.) Congressman Kucinich has previously defended the Boeing workers as a top-ranking Member of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee at a hearing in Charleston, South Carolina on June 17, 2011 and as a high ranking Member of the Education and Workforce Committee in Washington D.C. on May 26, 2011.
Kucinich today called for the defeat of a "legislative pardon' for Boeing management and called on his colleagues to focus on creating an American First manufacturing policy that would protect America's manufacturing jobs as well as American workers. go to web site national labor relations act
See video from the hearing here. The full text of the Congressman remarks follows:
"This bill is wrong on so many fronts. It interferes with an active case where the employer has already been found by the NLRB (Acting General Counsel) to have openly violated federal law. It gives that employer a legislative pardon. It destroys the very concept of equal justice before the law and equal protection of the law. It is an attack on the First Amendment rights of workers to free speech and it destroys their right to a legal remedy. It has Constitutional questions that involve the Fifth and the Fourteenth Amendments. It tramples on the rights of workers who, consistent with their rights under the National Labor Relations Act, who have legally protected right to strike and they are punished for it, punished by having their jobs moved out of state.
"Now this legislation doesn't just pit workers in South Carolina against workers in Washington State, and pit our colleagues against each other, but it pits the Congress against all workers by essentially striking any remedy for egregious violation.
This legislation undermines the rights of American workers to defend their right to organize, to defend their right to collective bargaining, to defend their right to strike, to defend their right to decent wages and benefits, to defend their right to a retirement and to defend their right to a safe workplace.
"It diminishes the standing of all workers. It is a bill that is bad for business because the essential relationship of cooperation which is needed in our economy between business and labor is destroyed by stopping a remedy. It accelerates an adversarial relationship. It sets a precedent for Congress to intervene in other regulatory matters of this sort.
"We would not be here if Boeing had not violated the National Labor Relations Act and punished its workers for lawfully protected activity. The punishment that workers received was moving jobs from one area of the country to another. go to site national labor relations act
"This bill represents an extraordinary intervention in an ongoing legal process. We have to ask, is Boeing seeking this? Is Boeing seeking a legislative pardon for its violation of the law?
"Boeing workers only had three strikes in twenty years and on issues of great consequence; health care benefits, pension benefits. One strike was because they wanted to spend more time with their families on weekends; they didn't want to be forced to work on the weekends. Let's talk about family values here.
"We know that Boeing executives have said that moving the Dreamliner to South Carolina was due to strikes happening every three to four years and that the decision was made in order to reduce Boeing's vulnerability to delivery disruptions caused by work stoppages. That is bogus.
"This was caused by mismanagement of the 787 project where the Dreamliner was subject to a vendor system that was spread around the globe, because of a vendor system that was out of control because of poor quality controls within that vendor system, because of parts that didn't fit and the U.S. workers didn't have anything to do with it.
"This is managers scapegoating workers in order to try to duck questions by their investors. We really have to look at what we are doing here; Boeing has wanted to put the blame on the workers for delay and development of its Dreamliner. This is a question of Boeing management, and I have to say that this Congress should want Boeing to succeed but not by undermining its workforce which is the best in the world.
"We need an American First manufacturing policy where the maintenance of aerospace, steel, automotive, and shipping is deemed to vital to our national security and we need to protect American workers along with that by protecting their basic rights to enforcement of the National Labor Relations Act. This law devastates their right to recovery.
"We should be concerned about protecting American jobs, protecting America's basic industries and protecting America's basic workers. We should be concerned about taking a stand for America on this, and I say that this legislation isn't mindful of that and we need to strike it down."
Stay Informed
The biggest thing holding back black people in America is their own brains. They beleive that "the man" is holding them down and they have no control over their own lives. All they have to do is stay away from welfare and entitlement programs. These programs are only training further generations of blacks to expect to be taken care of. This is called dependence and only serves to weaken your free will. This is what socialist and communist countries rely on to keep the people too weak to stand up and govern themselves. Hand outs=enslavement. Hard work and intelligent use of capital=Freedom from others
It is interesting to see that the only responses to an entry titled "Black, resilient, and hopeful" seem to reinforce a perspective that the crisis conditions in many Black communities across the US are a result of entitlement mentality, lazy work ethics, and unintelligent use of capital. I appreciate this because it is one of many perspectives about "what is holding back Black people in America" that the Campaign for Black Male Achievement has been established through independent spirit, courage, hard work and financial investment by Open Society Foundations leadership to inform. To this end, we need more people like you to share opinions through open forum to help us all learn from each other.
In fact, Jon, this may be a perfect opportunity for you to dispel all misconceptions about the real outcomes of race-specific policy such as sentencing mandates in criminal justice systems, red-lining and regional development procedures, school finance formulas, and foster care reporting and removal practices. You and Clarinase might even partner to set the record straight and strengthen the project's rigorous research that names as deleterious the impact of various institutional impediments to Black achievement, especially as it relates to a preponderance of negative media images and portrayals on the self-esteem of the young and unsuspecting consumer, Black and otherwise. Information of this caliber is critical to enhancing the credibility of the Campaign as the evidence-based, fully-vetted initiative that it is currently heralded as being. By all means, let's tell the full story once and for all, if it is not currently being told.
As Open Society Foundations often speaks to the importance of democracy in creating a just and open society, your contribution to the campaign could demonstrate once and for all how misplaced conviction is no replacement for facts. This would send a message to all that the best in each of us stands to be revealed through hearty informed debate in an open forum using factual information. No more would anyone feel legitimate by blindly following party lines or misconstruing impassioned ideological rhetoric and conventional wisdom as fact. Imagine a society where the spewing of banal catch-phrases would be countered via a clearinghouse of resources compiled to maintain clarity for the masses. Indeed, that would be a great legacy for all Americans, especially Black ones.
To this end, I invite you to match or exceed the investment of time, money, research, and/or services of so many others who strongly believe in this vision. If you cannot offer your explicit involvement, perhaps you might consider identifying and supporting the efforts of another who is already actively engaged in this work. However you choose, now is the time to lead through action and expose the shortcomings of the passive critic, the intellectually indolent, and the vapid ideologue who harbor latent hostility and suffer in cynicism. I stand with you in doing the hard work necessary to reverse the ills of entitlement and holding accountable the Campaign for Black Male Achievement by ensuring that it realizes this great American vision.
Thanks again for sharing. I look forward to your participation.
Great post; thanks for sharing.
David
These programs are only training further generations of blacks to expect to be taken care of. This is called dependence and only serves to weaken your free will.