"We don't know who discovered water but we can
be pretty sure it wasn't a fish" -- Marshal McLuen
No bones about it there is a lot to chew on, although some will spit out a snappy retort before actually thinking what
is actually in this text because there is so moch invested in doing so . do me a favor Please send your comments to
the authors I am tired of your excusesYou Know who you are. tell them not me.
One more Forward
Clayton wrote Forwarded:Re: Iraqi prostitutes back on the streets after Saddam
Shortcut to Pentagate http://trans.voila.fr/ano?systran_lp=fr_en&systran_id=Voila-fr&systran_url=http://www.911investigations.net/pentagate.html&systran_f=1051436472
We don't need no stinking indexes
This excerpt of the book is in gezer frendly big print!!!
Moore's new best selling book "Stupid White Men" (currently #1 on NY
Times list),
by: Michael Moore
The Guardian, Saturday March 30, 2002
I don't know what it is, but every time I see a white guy walking
towards me, I tense up. My heart starts racing, and I immediately
begin to look for an escape route and a means to defend myself.
I kick myself for even being in this part of town after dark. Didn't
Inotice the suspicious gangs of white people lurking on every
street corner, drinking Starbucks and wearing their gang colors
of Gap turquoise or J Crew mauve? What an idiot!
Now the white person is coming closer, closer and then whew!
He walks by without harming me, and I breathe a sigh of relief.
White people scare the crap out of me.
This may be hard for you to understand considering that I
am white but then again, my color gives me a certain insight.
For instance, I find myself pretty scary a lot of the time, so I know
what I'm talking about. You can take my word for it: if you find your
self suddenly surrounded by white people, you better watch
out. Anything can happen. As white people, we've been lulled
into thinking it's safe to be around other white people.
We've been taught since birth that it's the people of that other
color we need to fear. They're the ones who'll slit your throat!
Yet as I look back on my life, a strange but unmistakable pattern
seems to emerge. Every person who has ever harmed me in my
lifetime the boss who fired me, the teacher who flunked me, the
principal who punished me, the kid who hit me in the eye with a
rock, the executive who didn't renew TV Nation, the guy who was
stalking me for three years, the accountant who double paid my
taxes, the drunk who smashed into me, the burglar who stole my
stereo, the contractor who overcharged me, the girlfriend who left
me, the next girlfriend who left even sooner, the person in the office
who stole checks from my checkbook and wrote them out to
himself for a total of $16,000 every one of these individuals has
been a white person.
Coincidence? I think not.
I have never been attacked by a black person, never been evicted
by a black person, never had my security deposit ripped off by a
black landlord, never had a black landlord, never had a meeting
at a Hollywood studio with a black executive in charge, never had
a black person deny my child the college of her choice, never
been puked on by a black teenager at a Mötley Crüe concert,
never been pulled over by a black cop, never been sold a lemon
by a black car salesman, never seen a black car salesman, never
had a black person deny me a bank loan, and I've never heard a
black person say, "We're going to eliminate 10,000 jobs here have
a nice day!"
I don't think that I'm the only white guy who can make these claims.
Every mean word, every cruel act, every bit of pain and suffering in
my life has had a Caucasian face attached to it.
So, um, why is it exactly that I should be afraid of black people?
I look around at the world I live in and, I hate to tell tales out of
school, but it's not the African Americans who have made this
planet such a pitiful, scary place. Recently, a headline on the
front of the Science section of the New York Times asked Who
Built The H Bomb? The article went on to discuss a dispute
between the men who claim credit for making the first bomb.
Frankly, I could have cared less because I already know the
only pertinent answer: "It was a white guy!" No black guy ever
built or used a bomb designed to wipe out hordes of innocent
people, whether in Oklahoma City, Columbine or Hiroshima.
No, friends, it's always the white guy. Let's go to the tote
board:
* Who gave us the black plague? A white guy.
* Who invented PBC, PVC, PBB, and a host of chemicals that
are killing us? White guys.
* Who has started every war America has been in? White men.
* Who invented the punch card ballot? A white man.
* Whose idea was it to pollute the world with the internal
combustion engine? Whitey, that's who.
* The Holocaust? That guy really gave white people a bad name.
* The genocide of Native Americans? White man.
* Slavery? Whitey!
* US companies laid off more than 700,000 people in 2001.
Who ordered the layoffs? White CEOs. That's who.
You name the problem, the disease, the human suffering, or the
abject misery visited upon millions,and I'll bet you 10 bucks I can
put a white face on it faster than you can name the members of
'NSync.
And yet, when I turn on the news each night, what do I see again
and again? Black men alleged to be killing, raping, mugging,
stabbing, gangbanging, looting, rioting, selling drugs, pimping,
ho-ing, having too many babies, fatherless, motherless, Godless,
penniless. "The suspect is described as a black male... the suspect
is described as a black male..... " No matter what city I'm in, the
news is always the same, the suspect always the same unidentified
black male.
I'm in Atlanta tonight, and I swear the police sketch of the black
male suspect on TV looks just like the black male suspect I saw
on the news last night in Denver and the night before in LA. In
every sketch he's frowning, he's menacing and he's wearing the
same knit cap! Is it possible that it's the same black guy
committing every crime in America?
I believe we've become so used to this image of the black man as
predator that we are forever ruined by this brainwashing. In my
first film, "Roger & Me", a white woman on social security clubs
a rabbit to death so that she can sell him as "meat" instead of
as a pet.
I wish I had a nickel for every time in the past 10 years
that someone has come up to me and told me how "horrified"
they were when they saw that "poor little cute bunny" bonked
on the head. The scene, they say, made them physically sick.
The Motion Picture Association of America gave Roger & Me an
R [18] rating in response to that rabbit killing. Teachers write to
me and say they have to edit that part out of the film, if they want
to show it to their students.
But less than two minutes after the bunny lady does her deed,
I included footage of a scene in which police in Flint, Michigan,
shot a black man who was wearing a Superman cape and
holding a plastic toy gun.
Not once , not ever ,has anyone said to me,
"I can't believe you showed a black man being
shot in your movie!
How horrible! How disgusting!
I couldn't sleep for weeks."
After all, he was just a black man, not a cute, cuddly bunny.
The ratings board (The Motion Picture Association of America)
saw absolutely nothing wrong with that scene.
Or dosnt want you to see any thing wrong with the
sceen whis is more the case. ED.
Why? Because it's normal, natural.We've become so accustomed
to seeing black men killed in the movies and on the evening news
that we now accept it as standard operating procedure. No big deal!
That's what blacks do kill and die. Ho-hum. Pass the butter.
It's odd that, despite the fact that most crimes are committed by
whites, black faces are usuallyattached to what we think of as
"crime". Ask any white person who they fear might break into their
home or harm them on the street and, if they're honest, they'll
admit that the person they have in mind doesn't look much like them.
The imaginary criminal in their heads looks like Mookie or Hakim
or Kareem, not little freckle faced Jimmy.
No matter how many times their fellow whites make it clear that the
white man is the one to fear, it simply fails to register. Every time
you turn on the TV to news of another school shooting, it's always
a white kid who's conducting the massacre. Every time they catch
a serial killer, it's a crazy white guy. Every time a terrorist blows
up a federal building, or a madman gets 400 people to drink
Kool-Aid, or a Beach Boys songwriter casts a spell causing
half a dozen nymphets to murder "all the piggies"
in the Hollywood Hills, you know it's a member of the white race
up to his old tricks.
So why don't we run like hell when we see whitey coming toward us?
Why don't we ever greet the Caucasian job applicant with, "Gee,
uh, I'm sorry, there aren't any positions available right now"?
Why aren't we worried sick about our daughters marrying
white guys?
And why isn't Congress trying to ban the scary and offensive
lyrics of Johnny Cash ("I shot a man in Reno/just to watch him
die"), the Dixie Chicks ("Earl had to die"), or Bruce Springsteen
("I killed everything in my path/I can't say that I'm sorry for the
things that we done").
Why the focus on rap lyrics? Why doesn't the media print lyrics
such as the following, and tell the truth? "I sold bottles of sorrow,
then chose poems and novels" (Wu-Tang Clan); "People use yo'
brain to gain" (Ice Cube); "A poor single mother on welfare...
tell me how ya did it" (Tupac Shakur); "I'm trying to change my
life, see I don't wanna die a sinner" (Master P).
African- Americans have been on the lowest rung of the
economic ladder since the day they were dragged here
in chains.
Every other immigrant group has been able to advance from
the bottom to the higher levels of our society.
Even Native Americans, who are among the poorest of the poor,
have fewer children living in poverty than African-Americans.
You probably thought things had got better for blacks in
this country.
After all, considering the advances we've made eliminating racism
in our society, one would think our black citizens might have seen
their standard of living rise.
A survey published in the Washington Post in July 2001
showed that 40% - 60% of white people thought the average
black person had it as good or better than the average white
person.
Think again.
According to a study conducted by the economists
Richard Vedder, Lowell Gallaway and David C Clingaman,
the average income for a black American is 61% less per
year than the average white income.
That is the same percentage difference as
it wasin 1880.Not a damned thing has
changed in more than 120 years.
Want more proof? Consider the following:
* Black heart attack patients are far less likely than whites
to undergo cardiac catheterisation, regardless of the
race of their doctors.
* Whites are five times more likely than blacks
to receive emergency clot-busting treatment after suffering
a stroke.
* Black women are four times more likely than white women
to die while giving birth.
* Black levels of unemployment have been roughly twice
those of whites since 1954.
So how have we white people been able to get away with
this? Caucasian ingenuity! You see, we used to be real
dumb. Like idiots, we wore our racism on our sleeve. We
did really obvious things,like putting up signs on rest room
doors that said WHITES ONLY.
We made black people sit at the back of the bus.
We prevented them from attending our schools
or living in our neighbourhoods.
They got the crappiest jobs (those advertised for
NEGROES ONLY), and we made it clear that, if you weren't
white, you were going to be paid a lower wage.
Well, this overt, over the top segregation got us into a
heap of
trouble. A bunch of uppity lawyers went to court. They
pointed out that the 14th Amendment doesn't allow for
anyone to be treated differently because of their race.
Eventually, after a long procession of court losses,
demonstrations and riots, we got the message:
if you're going to be a successful racist, better
find a way to do it with a smile on your face.
We even got magnanimous enough to say, "Sure, you
can live here in our neighbourhood; your kids can go
to our kids' school. Why the hell not? We were just
leaving, anyway." We smiled, gave black America a
pat on the back and then ran like the devil
to the suburbs.
At work, we whites still get the plum jobs, double the
pay, and a seat in the front of the bus to happiness
and success.
We've rigged the system from birth, guaranteeing
that black people will go to the worst schools,
thus preventing them from admission to the
best colleges, and paving their way to a fulfilling
life making our caffe lattes, servicing our BMWs,
and picking up our trash.
Oh, sure, a few slip by but they pay an extra tariff for the
privilege: the black doctor driving his BMW gets pulled
over continually by the cops; the black Broadway
actress can't get a cab after the standing ovation;
the black broker is the first to be laid off because of
"seniority".
We whites really deserve some kind of
genius award for this.
We talk the talk of inclusion, we celebrate the birthday
of Dr King, we frown upon racist jokes. We never fail
to drop a mention of"my friend he's black..." We make
sure we put our lone black employee up at the front
reception desk so we can say, "See we don't
discriminate. We hire black people."
Yes, we are a very crafty, cagey race and damn if
we haven't got awaywith it!
I wonder how long we will have to live with the legacy
of slavery.
That's right. I brought it up.SLAVERY. You can
almost hear the groans of white America whenever
you bring up the fact thatwe still suffer from the impact
of the slave system.
Well, I'm sorry,but the roots of most of our social
ills can be traced straight back to this sick chapter
of our history.
African-Americans never got a chance to
have the same fair start that the rest of
us got.
Their families were wilfully destroyed, their
language and culture and religion stripped
from them. Their poverty was institutionalised
so that our cotton could get picked, our wars
could be fought, our convenience stores could
remain open all night.
The America we've come to know would never
have come to pass if not for the millions of slaves
who built it and created its booming economy
and for the millions of their descendants who
do the same dirty work for whites today.
It's not as if we're talking ancient Rome here.
My grandfather was born just three years after
the Civil War.
That's right, my grandfather. My great uncle
was born before the Civil War.
And I'm only in my 40s. Sure, people in my family
seem to marry late, but the truth remains: I'm just
two generations from slave times.
That, my friends, is not a "long time ago". In the
vast breadth of human history, it was only yesterday.
Until we realize that, and accept that we
do have a responsibility to correct an
immoral act that still has repercussions
today, we will never remove the single
greatest stain on the soul of our country.
(c) Michael Moore, 2002.http://MichaelMoore.com/
Not Stupid White Men
-Original Message-----
Sent: Jueves, 11 de Octubre de 2001 04:56
Subject: [BRC-NEWS]
The Black World Today September 27, 2001
One morning a few days after the terrorist attack on the
World Trade Center a young Afro-American woman called in to
C-Span and asked whether all the talk about the new unity
of purpose being forged in the fires of adversity would survive
after the state of emergency had passed, "or will racism still be
here?" Judging by the phone calls that ensued many listeners,
this writer included, thought it a naive question.
Of course racism will be with us long after this incident recedes into
memory, most callers argued. And after listening to James' story,
(he asked that his last name not be used) one of the few African
American men working on the site, that naivete seems magnified.
"There is racism all over down in the disaster area," he
says "and it's blatant too!"
Perhaps, along with a history of racist exclusion in the uniform services
and the building trades, that's why we observe a sea of white faces
every time we are given a tour of the site on TV. "See, part of the
problem is that there are a lot of out of town guys that they have
put in authoritative positions, and they don't know how to deal with
diverse races because many of them come from all white towns
around the country where they have never had to deal with black
and Hispanic people."
According to James the problem for black construction workers,
who are a small percentage of the rescue force,begins when they
approach the site. "There are thousands of workers down there,
and to enter the site you have to go through armed checkpoints,"
he says," one guy will ask you for your ID and another guy standing
two feet from him watching the " And he was quick to point that this
was the attitude of the armed white men securing ground zero
whether they were military or civilian cops.
"If you are my color," James says, pointing to his rich ebony colored
skin, "you can see the pure racism on their faces." However light
brown skin Hispanics and Afro-Americans are encountering even
bigger problems.
"But if you are just dark enough to be an Arab, then you really got a
problem. My cousin is light skin and he gets a lot of hassles.
"When we walk through check points it's usually three of us and we all
have the same union issue and state ID's, but they let us pass and pull
him aside. He and I have the same last name but that doesn't matter;
sometimes they detain him for ten minutes or more just checking out
his ID. But while they be checking us out to the max, always calling in
supervisors to double check our ID's, the white boys just flash their
cards and walk on through."
Work clothes have been donated to the rescue workers insuch
abundance that the site managers are giving them away to workers.
But James tells us "If you are black and walking off the site with one
of the big bags they give you to carry the work gear you are asking
for trouble. We often get stopped leaving the site. A crowd of black
and white workers can approach the security people with bags and
they pull the black workers over, like they suspect us of looting or
something.
I mean their whole body language during the interrogation is
aggressive, looking us up and down with their hands on their guns.
It's really annoying, seems like every single day there's something.
But you just look past it because we've got a serious job to do.
But we talk about it all the time amongst ourselves."
The real drag about all the suspicion of looting is that James has
witnessed white cops looting.
Recently some media talking heads were expressing disbelief that any
of "these heroes could be engaged in looting." Perhaps that's why they
are not reporting incidents like the one James describes: "See, there are
still a lot of stores in the disaster area that have broken windows and at
night some of these areas are without lights. So it's a thieves paradise
except there aren't suppose to be any thieves out there, and it would be
nearly impossible for them to get off the site with there loot. But the other
night I saw six white cops get busted with several Rolex wrist watches
that they had stolen from an expensive shop in the financial district.
I saw this happen but I have not seen a word of it on television!"
Having gone into the Navy right out of high school, where he was a
basketball star with college scholarship offers, James has recently
returned to civilian life and is resuming his education. Since his college
is located in the disaster area, he is not falling behind in his classes.
A sensitiveand intelligent young man who is barely twenty, James is
highly conscious of the role misguided American foreign policy has
contributed to the rise of militant Islam.
The aircraft carrier on which he was assigned once steamed to the
Persian Gulf and participated in an action against Iraq.
At the time he didn't understand the purpose of the mission but as
a flight director on deck "I saw the weapons director load the planes
with weapons and they came back empty."This experience has made
him skeptical of what the media or government tells us about what's
going on in the world, and he is far less hawkish than the politicians
calling for the invasion of Afghanistan.
After spending many hours digging through the rubble Jamesbelieves
that the final toll maybe exceed the present estimate of around 6,400
casualties. As the stench of death grows more pronounced with each
passing day at the site,James finds that his military training helps him
to cope with the grotesque reality that now consumes twelve hours of
his day. "The smell of rotting bodies is getting so bad that they may
eventually have to evacuate some parts of this city," he says. "Right
now some of the guys I'm working with are getting sick because they
can't eat their lunch after smelling the stench. But the military trained
me to cope with a situation where mass killing was taking place."
Copyright (c) 2001 The Black World Today. All Rights Reserved.
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