Pulling The Race Card

There are many that still contend today that we have moved to a post racial world.  We all bleed the same red blood and therefore whatever differences that occur in power distribution have everything to do with a lack of individual will rather than systemic racism.  Doesn't it just want to make you want to sit around a fire singing Michael Row The Boat Ashore?  Do you feel warm and loved?

Today when you point out that something is racist, or that a white person is failing to acknowledge privilege, invariably you will be told that you are "pulling the race card".  It seems that for some calling out inequality is the equivalent of pulling an Ace of spades out of a deck of cards; the ultimate trump  card, meant to arouse white liberal guilt and thereby twist the situation to our benefit.

In a word, bullshit.  My life and racism cannot be reduced in this way.  Such language is inflammatory and bigoted.  It is no different than accusing a woman of "crying rape" or telling gay people that they have a "lifestyle" instead of a life.  Racism is real and it has a negative effect on my life's chances, as well as creating me and in fact all people of colour as "other".

The heart of this issue is that whiteness does not want to be called on its unacknowledged privilege.  It wants to continue  its hegemony thus ensuring the rest of us are securely marginalized in its benefit. To challenge whiteness in any way is to risk being called a militant hater. 

When the Reverend Wright spoke about his feelings about whiteness immediately the media denigrated him without considering the historical accuracy of his statements.  The same liberals that love to quote Dr.King (pre 1963)  are the same ones that expect us to believe the utopian lie of equality and sit in silence while they push the fauxgressive agenda. 

Pulling the "race card" has become part of our common language.  Casually reporters ask if someone is "pulling the race card".  Is this really a racial issue? Since we are not a racially blind society then the answer is yes..and it is always yes.  We view everything through a lens of difference rather than one of commonality.  If there is an opportunity to benefit from that difference then it will be even further enlarged to benefit whiteness.

Racism is not something that people of colour play, it is something that we experience.  It is something that we live with and it is hurtful and damaging.  No one has the right to question the legitimacy of the experience by asking if someone is "playing the race card".  In fact the question exists for the sole purpose of allowing whiteness to question the seriousness of racism.  Simply by asking if a person is "playing the race card" it infers a lack of legitimacy to the complaint.

Racism happens systemically but is experienced personally; therefore even if two POC disagree about whether an incident is racist or not, all that matters is the opinion of the person that was impacted by the action.  No one can judge the feelings of another and therefore no one has the right to decide unilaterally that something is not racist when another person of colour has declared it to be so.  There should be no standard "reasonable person" when it comes to racism.

The next time you hear the words "race card" fall from someone's lips, think about what it is that that they are really asking.  Why is a secondary declaration necessary after a POC has already declared that they are a victim of racism?  Why must we belabour the point as though the feelings of the victim are inconsequential.  We would not tolerate such questioning of another victim and therefore we should not allow it when it comes to racism.

 

 

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Rape In Prison: The Forgotten Women

Trigger warning.

In the US the attitude when it comes to crime is lock up the prisoners and throw away the key.  The prison industrial complex has become a huge part of the US economy.  Once the bars slam on the cell few care what goes on behind the m.  It is assumed that people are there for punishment and not rehabilitation; and therefore what occurs is almost always legitimized to some degree.

Women in prison represent a very vulnerable section of society.  At the mercy of prison guards and fellow inmates, many have been subject to horrific incidents of abuse.  With terrible crimes attached to their names few will take their complaints seriously. 

According to Freep.com, "A class-action lawsuit against the Michigan Department of Corrections has already yielded verdicts reaching an estimated $50 million, when interest and fees are included. And that's only for the first 18 women. With most yet to testify, and lawyers for the state insisting they have no intention of settling, Michigan's beleaguered taxpayers could face hundreds of millions of dollars in damages."

Women in Michigan were being raped repeatedly for years and the state did nothing.  As I read the testimony of Toni Bunton , I found myself filled with a rage that was difficult to control.  No matter what crime this woman has committed in the past no one deserves to be raped.  The state is of course refusing to settle the case, because to do so would mean admitting that they are culpable in the continual rape of women.

The state had a simple defense: These women are prisoners, and prisoners lie; if something did happen, it was the act of a few rogue guards; and if something did happen, the women didn't report it. So how could the Department of Corrections prevent what it didn't know was happening? The state said it thoroughly investigated any allegations it knew about and the claims of abuse were exaggerated.

"To say the department just sat back and did nothing, just let everybody run the place is just totally false," Allan Soros, an assistant attorney general, said at the first trial.

Nonetheless, a series of human rights reports throughout the 1990s said sexual assaults on female inmates were rampant and corrections officials tolerated the climate.

It seems that because these women were/are prisoners their word was immediately suspect.  Why did the state not consider the risk that these women were making coming forth with their complaint in the first place?  Due to the power division in any prison a guard has the ability to make life extremely difficult for a woman that would dare make a rape accusation.  To even accuse a guard of rape is to place oneself in a precarious position. 

The Michigan Women's Commission reported in 1993 there was an alarming level of sexual abuse and harassment by state prison guards.

In 1995, the U.S. Department of Justice found "pervasive" sexual abuse in Michigan women's prisons.

In 1996, Human Rights Watch released a report documenting sexual harassment, sexual abuse and privacy violations by guards and other employees in Michigan prisons.

The report, based on interviews with prisoners and prison rights advocates, cited rapes by guards in a "highly sexualized and excessively hostile" environment.

Sexual abuse in prisons is not new.  Male prison guards have been known to leverage their positions of power for sexual relationships and then claim that the women involved consented.  When someone has the power over whether you eat, sleep, or even use the bathroom, how can you consent to a sexual relationship?  You have absolutely no personal power and the relationship is unbalanced.

What occurred is not a series of isolated incidents but rather a highly structured assault of women by men.  The state  decided that these women must be locked away from society; and therefore it took on the burden of ensuring that they are safe.  It is not enough to simply provide them with the basics and forget about them as though they suddenly are not human beings. 

Why were male guards allowed to watch over female prisoners?  Why did the state not closely monitor their behaviour to ensure that no abuse of power was occurring?  Why did it not heed the multiple reports that were issued detailing sexual assaults?  The answers to those questions are really quite simple.  These incidents involved women that society has decided are no longer valuable bodies.  Rape is something we believe that happens to innocent young virgins and not someone who has run afoul of the law.  These women were not considered of any worth and therefore what happened to them was deemed inconsequential.

While the case has focused on the culpability of the state I cannot help but wonder why it is that the individual men are not being held accountable.  These men are rapists and they are roaming the streets free and clear today.   Will it take the rape of a woman who is not a prisoner by one of these guards for the state to realize the danger that they represent?  Some of these men are repeat offenders and they are not being punished.  Yes the state is responsible for what occurred.  They failed to protect these women but the men who committed these rapes need to be taken off of the streets for the safety of all.

What happened in the prisons of Michigan is a shining example of what occurs the moment we decide that certain bodies are disposable and without value.  Incidents like this secure my belief in the importance of acknowledging that all bodies matter.  These women were violated and abused because we decided that a past action rendered them unrapeable.  These women were violated because patriarchy believes it exists with the right to abuse women for sport.  It is my hope that this lawsuit will help prevent other women from undergoing the same fate.  At the very minimum the state and all those involved should come to the understanding that everyone deserves to live a life free of violence.  It is hypocrisy to lock someone up for committing a violent act and then turn around do violence to them.

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What's Genocide

Carlos Andrés Gómez

The Transcript is below the fold.

Editors Note: Some of this is in Spanish and since I am not a speaker I will do the best that I can.  Please forgive my ignorance.

Our children can't hear the truth at school if a person says fuck.  Can't even talk about fuck even though a third of their senior class is pregnant.  I can't teach a thirteen year old girl in a public school how to use a condom that will save her life and the orphans that she will be forced to give to the foster care system.  Carlos how many thirteen year olds do you know that are HIV positive? Honestly none, but I do visit a shelter every Monday and talk with 6 twelve year olds that  diagnosed AIDS.  While fourth graders three blocks away give little boys blow job during recesses and then an 11 year old gang member in the south Bronx  who carries a semi-automatic weapon to study hall so that he can make it home and you want me to censor my language.  Carlos what's genocide? You wonder why children hide in adult bodies. Lie under light coloured contact lenses, learn how to fetishisize the size of their ass and simultaneously hate their lips.  My students think Che Guvere was a rapper from east Harlem, they think my Mumia t-shirt is of Bob Marley.  How can literacy not include Phyllis Wheatley? Schools were built in the shadows of ghosts filtered through incest and grinding teeth moulded under veils of extravagant ritual.  Carlos what's genocide?  Rosalyn how old was she (Spanish) My mother had 32 years when she died (Spanish) genocide they moved on from sterilizing (spanish) women. Injecting Indigenous women with hepatitis B.  Now they just kill mothers with silent poison stain their loyalty and love in their veins and suffocate that ones genocide. Readones father hung himself from a box cause he thought his son was ashamed didn't watch genocide. Maureens mother gave her skin lightening cream the day before she entered 6th grade.  What's genocide? She carved straight lines into her beautiful thighs so that she could remember what it feels like to heal.  What's genocide, what's genocide? Carlos what's genocide?  This, this right here is genocide.

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What If Gay Marriage Isn't For You?

Here I go again wading into dangerous waters.  Working out your jones is something every sexual being has got to do. Let's face it gay, straight, bi or anything in  between as long as you are a human sexual being,  at some point you will want to get laid.  This of course is not a bad thing, it's just a part of life.

The gay rights movement has focused on marriage for its big organizing push. For some it is about equality, and for some it is about a recognition of love.   I don't believe in marriage period, but if heterosexuals can practice this archaic ceremony the same right should be extended to everyone.

In this movement one of the things that is occurring is the legitimizing of homosexual relationships.   While homosexuality is still considered socially by many to be a "lifestyle", or a counter culture way of living, one cannot help but notice the way that certain elements are working hard to police the movement in such a way as to create an acceptable way in which to be gay exists.

Did you ever think that you would see the day of "the acceptable gay".  From Queer Eye for the straight guy, to  The L word, and Ellen, more and more we are seeing gays and lesbians in the mainstream.  What this means is that those who refuse to fit into the neat little box that bourgeoisie gay leaders have created are still considered "other,"  and in some cases they are "othered" by their own community.

Nothing can be allowed to threaten the push for gay marriage.  Many have fought to dispel the social myth that gays and lesbians are naturally more promiscuous and incapable of a deep and lasting love. While I would agree with that assessment, it does not mean that for some the idea of getting married, or even settling into a long term relationship is not what is desired most. 

What I dislike the most about this movement is that it is creating the idea that being gay largely means whiteness and middle class.  Just like you they tell us, but who is the you that bourgeoisie leaders are using as a referential.  What happens if you are poor, of colour or gay and polyamourous?  What happens if you don't want to be inside the neat little package that attempts to represent your life like The Waltons only gay.  What happens if you want to be a bohemian and fuck your way through life, forming no lasting attachments?  What happens if you refuse to become pg13 so that someone else can create an image of homosexuality?

The issue with gay marriage as an organizing push is that it creates a construction through which homosexuality will be understood.  Rather than broadening the conversation in terms of the various ways in which sexuality can be flexible, it narrows the lens and creates an ideal that is ultimately limiting. It will do nothing to disturb the homo/hetero binary. 

Gay marriage will create many new rights for a large section of the community, but I cannot help but wonder how many people will find themselves  even more marginalized in a movement that seems determined to create a normative gay existence.   The white picket fence is not for everyone and in the meantime issues like hate crime legislation, housing and employment discrimination are being ignored.  Not everyone wants to get married, but everyone needs to live a life free of violence, everyone needs a home, and everyone needs a job.  These are the universals that are being ignored in the hopes of securing gay marriage.

It makes me wonder if some of the push behind marriage is not more about reclaiming a power, or rather a sense of normalization that is lost by declaring oneself a homosexual.  When I look at the leaders of the gay rights movement what is I see is privilege i.e whiteness and wealth, just like any other social justice movement.  I can see why the "just like you" seems appealing.  It just makes me wonder about everyone else.  What if you never fit into the "normalized identity" to begin with?  Where does leave you and when do your concerns become a priority?

Marriage is important because it is a right that is being denied, but it should not make up the entirety of an organizational effort when it will not benefit everyone equally.  Sharing a sexuality in common with someone does not mean that every aspect of your existence will be even remotely similar and I cannot help but wonder how much more policed the movement will become as it tries to put a representational face behind its organizing efforts.  It already has a tendency to silence the poor and POC.  Will the aforementioned groups become even more invisible in the hopes of a trip down the aisle?

Social justice movements have a tendency to mirror the larger society from which they originate.  Though many will claim to be all about pushing for equal rights, in the end they simply recreate the same hierarchy of beings that they claim to be disturbing.  Can we really be surprised that the push for gay marriage has been represented by elite white men when that is who runs western society?  Can we really be surprised that their wishes and their agenda is what is being brought to the forefront? 

For whom is marriage most important?  Is it for the gay hooker who was thrown out of her or his home as a teenager?  Is it for the person who works a blue collar job that keeps finding themselves passed over for advancement?  Is it for those that face so many areas of stigmatization that being gay is just one part of their identity?  Or is it so that the white male bourgoiese leaders can reclaim privilege that they have come to view as their birthright as rulers of western society?

Social justice needs to encapsulate the needs of all marginalized bodies equally, otherwise it becomes a movement that only encodes certain bodies with power leaving others to continue to occupy the the bottom of the power hierarchy.  Walk down the aisle and smile but while you are doing so, think about the many men and women who would be better served by having their various stigmatizations addressed.  Love is beautiful, patient and kind but so is knowing that your life means something regardless of whether or not you fit the "representational image".

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Radio Interview

Hi Everyone, I am going to be on SistersTalk.  Come by, check it out, call in and chat with me. I will be on air tomorrow night.

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The Mystical Negro and Self Flagellation

Who or what is the Mystical Negro?  She or he is the one who has been granted permission by whiteness to speak on behalf of blacks.  As a mystical negro it is your job to inform whiteness when they are being prejudicial as long as it doesn't challenge the current power structure.  It is also your job to issue the equivalent of hall pass by declaring that certain people and or behavior is not racist.  Ever wonder how people like Dog the Bounty Hunter can find a black person to come to their defence when they have been so obviously racist - meet the Mystical Negro.

The Mystical Negro is almost a superhero to whites.  Able to ignore white sheets with a single glance, while still marshaling out just enough guilt and pseudo Yoda like wisdom to appear relevant, the Mystical Negro is a wonder to behold. He or she does not hold any real power but their inflated egos allows them to believe that the false accolades and Cheshire like cat grins of their white patrons means that somehow they are a person of value when every other POC is being ignored.

The Mystical Negro is also essential to the necessary self  flagellation that every good white liberal must perform to keep their left leaning credentials in good working order.   It's the one that allows them to say I am white but....It's the one that allows whiteness to engage superficially without demanding any sort of commitment.

You ever wonder why so much of feminism is academic today? It is because such line of thought does not require investment on a real and personal level.  White feminists can wax on with detachment about the importance of intersectionality without embracing its tenets.  There is no rage in their writings, or speeches, only the appropriate amount of indignation.  With check list in hand they mark off marginalized bodies; blacks, lesbians, disabled peoples, Latn@, Asians, poor,  Muslims, third world bodies, everybody into the pot it's soup for dinner.  We are the consumable, the overly problematized, the often theorized, but the never heard.

Tell me, can you theorize hunger?  Sitting with lecture notes in hand can you problematize the essential situation, thus deconstructing the word nigger to the point where you truly feel the meaning of that word.  Say it over and over again, nigger, nigger, nigger, nigger, don't shy away from it.  It's not some sort of abstraction, something you can sit there and consciousness raise about.  It either pisses you the fuck off or it doesn't. 

Oh I know that you are all to careful to insure that when you do an anthology you include a certain number of each marginalized category, but did you ever think to give us, the women you seek to lead the chance to walk on our own.  I remember hearing in womens studies about the fact that so much feminist work had either been destroyed or not printed in the first place.  I remember learning about the feminist drive to create herstory. 

Who is her?  Who is included in the herstory because I sure as hell know who is not.  Are you over forty?  Are you of color? Are you a lesbian, or a transwoman?  Are you disabled? Are you poor? Are you undereducated?  Are you fat? If you have said yes to anyone of these, herstory is not your story.  Herstory is what sells, white, educated, middle to upper class, and "conventionally beautiful".  Her story is the woman on the pedestal and no marginalizsed woman has ever stood on one. 

The mystical Negro and its compatriots (read: Mystical Others) would love to believe that there is a place on the pedestal for them as well.   They are after all invited to be the token representative in the room, published  by the small firms, even given the occasional speaking engagement.  How powerful is it though to rehash a story that is not your own, but the tall tale of the victors song?  Am I making you uncomfortable yet? 

When you hide behind your mystical Negro friends and pretend to self flagellate to prove how just how "down" you are for the cause, you stink of falsehood worse than a used car salesman at a midnight madness sale.  It is obvious to all but you and your cronies. Cackling like hyenas, you snack on your cookies proud that your sheet is off white.  Hey, I am only stop on your multiples sites of oppression tour. Perhaps the next mystical Negro will be more accommodating than I.  You see, I have the nasty habit of truth telling, and that is not necessarily conducive to maintaining the lie of inclusivity and detachment.

Hello Feminists, you are not a doctor.  There is no requirement for detachment.  You are not going to loose yourself by becoming involved with us, rather than studying us like diseases in petri dishes.  Understanding the "isms" takes more than reading a few works and penning a good paper.  It means more than holding up a placard at a rally, and it certainly means more than writing the obligatory you rock, or go girl commentary on a blog.

Step away from your "mystical others" and your self flagellation routine.  Touching my arm in friendship will not hurt you.  Daring to engage with me and other marginalized bodes will not hurt you.  Saying I need to STFU & L only buys you so many passes.  Real feminism happens in the trenches.  It is a lived experience and not something you pick up in first year womens studies.  Is reading about sex the same as fucking?  Is hearing about orgasms, the same as having your eyes roll back in your head with pleasure as you loose all connection with space and time? Live your fucking feminism ladies.  Let go of all of the bullshit that comes with practicing theory and just fucking live it.  My feminism and anti-racism is real, is yours?

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Sweat

Niki Patin

Transcript is below the fold.

Silver cocoons me in heat.Sweat and my tongue dance looking to find a place of tasteless skin. Salt leaves and eager afterglow, daggers attack my shins, the balls of my feet heavy.  Thirty minutes are not enough, neither are forty-five or anything I can fit in between traffic or corporate America.  You walk, nah run. Why didn't anyone ever tell me to run outside and play because now I can't do this.  I can't think my way into better shape, rubber grips smell like anorexic hips too small for me to hold onto like normalcy looming at the end of psychosis. I can't do this because of what they see in me.  Slow moving, sweaty frustration and shame it's a black phone femme rock anger, all of this disgusts them. No one ever wants to see the fat girl cry, we're the jolly sort. The desperate wide eyed cows who the tank top chicks with the wide eyed lipstick look at sideways as they sidestep aerobasize their way from the potential of looking like me.  Am I the greatest threat to them? More fearful than the image dreams.  Someone will tell me how jealous I am of their good genes but I know I'm just looking for freedom.  Looking to jump up up without (inaudible) chipping my bones into arthritic paralysis on the way down.  Looking to walk nah run.  To move, to turn without pity pouring down like rotten honey, turning salty sweat into vinegar epithets well (she gives the finger).  To whoever decides that my body is the gatekeeper to my soul like shit can't be fixed, or changed, or manipulated like they're mindset when it comes to the number against their  neck because a size 14 today, size ten, twenty years ago and a hundred back a woman with large thighs was considered a grand prize, now we're relegated to talk show jokes and you think that shit is funny, because you smoke to much to breathe and you drink to much to eat, yeah you are my American standard to achieve.  Coffee in hand, yeah my personal trainer doesn't know what the fuck he is talking about.  When he pushes me harder and I think I can't do this, I sit in the locker room and cry after it's over.  Mind is quiet, body screaming  I can't, we can't, I can't then I realize my workout is over and I never quit.  I can't, those words never came out of my lips .

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I Am Sean Bell: A Mothers Lament

I AM SEAN BELL, black boys speak from Stacey Muhammad on Vimeo.

This video literally moved me to tears.  It spoke to all of the fears that I daily live with as a mother of two black sons.  I have spoken of the ways in which racism has touched the life of  my oldest boy Destruction, but I have never really addressed how it leaves my heart cold with fear.  For those who cannot see why this is a feminist issue, remember that each black boy is the child of a black woman.

I am lucky in that no male in family has died from violence in my lifetime but that is not the case for so many others.  We are not far removed from a time when mothers were called to cut down their sons after they had danced with the rope. The name Emmitt Till haunts every black mother. As my son ages and the world begins to reveal to him the systemic inequality into which he has born, each day my fears for him increase.  I can no longer keep him safe in a stroller.  A simple kiss from me will not wipe away his hurts or his fears. 

Like any other child he pushes for more freedom and more independence, and though he has proven himself to be highly responsible and dependable I am loathe to cut the apron strings because to do so means allowing the world access to my gentle child.  I know that his blackness will speak for him long before he is allowed to protest his innocence.  I know that his blackness will make him a target long before his legs will reach the impulse to run.

My babies are black and it is the legacy of my womb.  No one will think of the loved ones they would leave behind, or the tears that would never cease to flow because their skin is black. 

When I watch videos like this, I think of the many times that I have heard whiteness express irrational fear of blacks.  They don't know what fear is.  They don't know what being a real "other" means.  Should a child have to be taught to fear those that are supposed to protect them?  Should a child have to be taught that through no consequence of their individual actions that their lives are in danger?

I will have to teach my son as he reaches towards maturity to carry himself in ways that white people will not perceive as threatening, while at the same time maintaining some sense of self  balance.  I will have to teach him to be hyper aware of his surroundings with the knowledge that though he is gentle and kind, to the world his blackness makes him predator.  Finally, I will have to teach my son not to hide his face in shame because this is not his fault, it is the fault of whiteness.

As the balance from a white majority shifts and the US becomes a minority majority such vengeance and hatred is bound to escalate.  A shift in power will not be peaceful and it is the children of colour who will pay the price.   Whites will fear an uprising and work twice as hard in their repression to ensure that the balance remains the same. 

My babies are young and still yet I have noticed the ways in which the world has already begun to racialize them.  Adults speak to them in slang that they do not understand, because hey don't all "black folk" speak like that?  White people assume that they want to be rappers, or basketball players, because hey black kids don't have dreams of becoming astronauts or doctors, or in the case of Destruction, archaeologists. 

Already the world is attempting to guide and shape their reality in a way that will make them deposable bodies.  Whiteness wants to know if he can dance or sing, but it has no interest in the fact that he is great at math and fluent in two languages.  If it cannot kill him with bullets, it will attempt to do so with apathy.

Every little black boy is Sean Bell, because every little black boy is viewed as a potential threat to white hegemony.  It matter not if you are gentle and kind, your body will speak for you long before your lips can pause to draw a breathe.

H/T Dawson's Ink

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No really, the US isn't racist at all. I swear.

Hi, my name is Erin, and I'd like to thank Renee for allowing me a brief word here.  As a little background, I'm a full time web developer who dabbles in security and activism.  Because of this, I've been very interested in the ways that people try to claim, "its for security" to justify their bias and fear.  A recent story is a perfect example of this.

9 Muslim passengers kicked off of flight after remark.
The remark? "Wow, the jets are right next to my window."

Because of this innocent remark, nine people were removed from the plane and handed over to the FBI who cleared them after questioning. When the group went back to AirTran to re-book, they were refused, and did not get a refund until after this story hit the national media. What kills me is mindsets like this:

Christopher White, a federal Transportation Security Administration spokesman, said the situation was handled appropriately.
White said the pilot, after being informed of the remarks, requested that two federal air marshals on board remove the individuals. TSA then alerted authorities, including the FBI, which conducted an investigation. Once authorities determined there was no threat, it was up to the airline whether to allow the family to reboard.
"If the pilot is uncomfortable with someone flying on their plane, that's their decision," White said.

The pilot's discomfort is what determines if you are on the plane? Really? When you have two Air Marshals in the actual passenger area of the plane who are better trained to make threat judgments? The pilot wasn't even there to hear the comments, and who knows what kind of mangled third or fourth hand version of what the comments they heard. The story does not specify if the pilot went and spoke with the family before requesting that the Air Marshals act, but knowing people I sorta doubt they bothered or did so in good faith without muscle waiting behind.

This kind of scheme is a perfect example of what is wrong with the security setup. It enforces fear and suspicion rather than reasoned examinations of threat. The group in question was wearing "traditional Muslim clothing" - whatever that might be. While my memory is notoriously flawed, the images I saw of the September 11th hijackers showed them in western clothing. I suspect the same was true of the initial bomb attack on the towers. They'd be stupid not too, wearing hijab or any form of ethnic dress is only going to attract attention, which is exactly what they do not want during the opening phases of any attack.

This does not mean that there is not the possibility of an attack being carried out by a person or persons in some form of Middle Eastern or Saharan African dress, which is what people usually associate with "Muslim" clothing. But it does make it unlikely that a group of 9 would do so. Most terrorist activities requiring that number of people would need to be fairly coordinated, and it is far less likely that a group of that capacity would make a stupid mistake like not dressing in western clothing and acting as unobtrusively as possible. This thought process was not what happened however. Instead, we enabled the racist and xenophobic fears about our current cultural bogeyman.

It kills me, because the last time I made a remark about sitting by the wings, they gave me a tour of the cockpit and a sucker.

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I Can't Read

Lamont Carey

Transcript is below the fold

I'm eleven years old in the sixth grade and I can't read.  The class is so full that the teacher doesn't notice me but I can't read.  And when she finally asks me to come to the head of the class I do everything in my power to make the class laugh.  What would you do if you knew that they all would laugh at you.  But I can't read and I can't write and I can't spell and most of the time I don't know my left from my right but they keep on passing me because I can dribble a ball and I can hit a three pointer y'all and I can almost hit a three pointer and I am guaranteed to get you 13 points.  But I can't read and I can't right, I can't spell most of the time I don't know my left form my right.  The teachers aid says it's the teachers fault and the teacher says it's the board of education and the board of education says its my parents fault and y'all my parents blame me.  But I still can't read, I can't write and most of the time I don't know my left from my right.  But on the biggest game of the year I was coming down the lane and I was doing my thing when number 13 crashed into me.  At the same time that I heard my knee snap, I heard my family dream shatter.  See they depended on me to get us out of the ghetto, so when I hit the ground I did everything in my power not to frown.  but it was just to much pain and ran straight to my brain and the last thing I remember is the doctor saying that I would never run again.  So now I;m asking y'all what are my options, I can't read.

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