The 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington-Segregation Then, Segregation Now, Segregation Forever

                          "I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation
                                where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
                             but by the content of their character." - Martin Luther King

It's disconcerting to me to juxtapose the words of Martin Luther King with a paraphrase of the words uttered by segregationist George W. Wallace. But this is the way my mind works when thinking back over the 50 years since the first March on Washington led by Dr. King back in 1963 and the upcoming events to mark the occasion this weekend.

I was too young, being only 13 years old, to take part in the first march, but I watched the grainy black and white images of that massive crowd on the 6 o'clock news with the same intent that I watched the shows my parents allowed me to watch, back in the day, and time passed. Given the chance, I vowed to go and take part. Make my voice heard.

50 years. Just passed my 63^rd birthday and I'm packing for DC. Going to the Anniversary March. Going to stand in front of the Lincoln Memorial with other like-minded people and remember the words of Dr. King. I am geeked about this trip because it's been a long time coming, but instead of total elation, my heart is heavy thinking about it.

“I have a dream...”

I think many of us figured the dream would be halfway realized by now, 50 years after the fact. But all you gotta do is to look at the upcoming festivities to understand that Dr. King's ideas are still blowing in the wind.

There is the March on Saturday, August 24^th I will call it The people's march. It is expected to be the biggest event since it's on Saturday and most people have the time, and don't have to work. It's a good day to teach history to the kids. The Park police are planning for about 150,000 people, about half of what originally turned out back in the day.

Dr. King actually delivered his speech on August 28^th, so some other people and groups have organized a march on exactly the same day, complete with church bells ringing at 3pm and a speech from President Barack Obama, standing in for Dr. King. Obama's speech is supposed to be a grand thing, designed to move us forward as a nation toward the goals espoused by Dr. King back in the day. The main problem with the August 28^th event is that it falls on a Wednesday, in the middle of the work week, not exactly designed to be people friendly, is it. I was initially confused by the two different dates with both events calling themselves the Anniversary of the March on Washington. And I'm sure that confusion still exists for others, as well.

Back on Saturday, the 24^th, Black conservatives are going to hold their own thing, a breakfast, put together by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus. It is a sit down affair, very dignified, designed to do....well I'm not sure what it is designed to do, since only politicians and their supporters have been invited to participate. People, Dr. King's people, need not apply, it seems.

Here is my problem...

Why three separate events when Dr. King was all about inclusion and equality? Why is Al Sharpton and his National Action Network, joined by the NAACP and a host of other groups marching on Saturday, totally ignoring the group putting together the march on Wednesday that features the first Black President of the United States?

And what better way for the GOP to convince some of us that they really are about inclusion then by taking part in either one of the other affairs?

Segregation then, segregation now, segregation forever, it seems...

Seems like anyone really wanting to honor Dr. King would have had one big people friendly affair in the spirit of the original march.

“I have a dream....”

Congressman John Lewis who also addressed the crowd 50 years ago as president of SNCC, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee said this about Dr. King;

"Dr. King had the power, the ability, and the capacity to transform those steps on the Lincoln Memorial into a monumental area that will forever be recognized. By speaking the way he did, he educated, he inspired, he informed not just the people there, but people throughout America and unborn generations."

I wish that the folks in charge could have understood this and planned their events with the people in mind rather than their own agenda at the fore front. It would have shown that the words spoken by Dr. King that day are honored in spirit, if not in daily practice.

“why can't we all just get along?”

What Rodney King said. What Dr. King meant. What will need to happen if we are all to survive.

“I have a dream...”

Me too...

Mitt Romney's Prick Posse Vantage Point

"Remind them of this: if they want more stuff from government, tell them to go vote for the other guy -- more free stuff. But don't forget, nothing is really free."-Mitt Romney

Free stuff?! Really Mitt?

 Free government stuff?

 Vote for the other guy?

Wow, I'm impressed. You walked into the lions den...stood in the white hot cannibal cauldron that is the NAACP, faced down the savages and told them, their free welfare ride is over...you're the guy, like it or not.

Oh wait...you didn't tell them to their shiny Black faces looking up at you, perched at their podium....you waited until later that evening to send the message...safely surrounded by your vanilla prick posse...in Montana no less.

Typical leader of the pack mentality.

Can't give a beat-down unless your boys are watching, making sure the fight stays uneven.

Coward! Mittens the meek and mild.

The NAACP offer was legit. They gave you time to present your program and policy to Blacks and possibly garner votes for your run for president. They do this every four years for all candidates running.

However, Instead of using the opportunity to win over the people, you chose to divide and conquer. You chose to patronize and to disrespect. You chose to show up with your assumptions about newly humanized Blacks on full display.

You and your Willie Horton creating handlers (yeah, we know they're back working with you and your Bush-lite ass), decided to have you deliver a condescending race baiting piece of crap, that was nothing more than red meat for your violently racist followers.

Congratulate yourself, man, for you are now a card carrying bigot, good for a 10% discount on the purchase of your next double wide, pack of chewing tobacco and Dr. Pepper six pack.

Despite what you said, we have seen into your heart, and honestly, we're not seeing much that we haven't seen before-a rich white guy who has no idea about the people of this country, and furthermore doesn't give a damn.

Free stuff you say?

We paid for our social security and benefits. The poor are not looking for freebies. They are looking for a better job then the one they've already got. That's why they are called the working poor-get it?

And surprise...the working poor pay into social security, too. It's not a hand out when you're simply getting back what you paid in to the system.

And to answer the question, Mr Romney: Who let the dogs out?

You did!

Secret Black Supporters?! Mitt You Know You Lyin'

I can hear my grandmother now;

“Mitt, baby....you sure you talking to real people...the ones outside your head...the ones you can actually see and shake hands with?”

“Secret Black Supporters? “

“Lawd, lawd, lawd...Boy if my lumbago weren't actin' up, I'd beat the white off your behind for tellin' that lie.”

“What am I gonna do with you?!”

“Give me strength, gawd....give me strength...Help this boy to see the light, please gawd!” (praying while she whips your ass)

(Insert heavy sigh)

Even when Mitt is actively trying not to step in shit, he does it anyway, goes and messes up another pair of wingtips...damn.

Romney told Fox News following his visit to the NAACP today that many blacks support him and plan to vote for him, but they don't want anyone to know.

Why not? Lots of Black people support republicans...hell they are republicans...Why wouldn't they support Romney and talk about it.

Who are these so called Black leaders afraid of....It's certainly not Obama.

Anybody who has paid attention these past four years knows the President is not into retaliation and payback.

If he was, the blue dog democrats would be history. Cheney and Bush would be in jail. Karl Rove wouldn't be walking around peddling his racist Crossroads GPS off as a social welfare organization. The Catholic Bishops would not have been consulted about birth control for women before the memo was issued.

That fool who shouted out during the State of the Union Address and Justice Alito...if Obama was vindictive...they might have found themselves cleaning toilets in one of the secret black ops prisons somewhere in this world, you betcha.

But as we all know, the President is determined to work in a bipartisan manner, even while ya'll continue to spit in his face, day after day after day.

If not Obama, then who? Inquiring minds want to know.

Romney's comments are insidious, and racist (yes, I'm playin' it). It implies that we Blacks are monolithic in our thinking and that we punish those who proceed to move against the common thinking. The implication that we vote for Obama solely because of his skin color and not because of his programs and ideology continues to be offensive. Much like that patronizing piece of crap you delivered to the NAACP today.

Nobody calls it race unity when we vote for white people. Nobody calls it race unity when a bunch of white people gather around a tree for a cookout and lynching. One black guy gets elected and all of a sudden, its a Black conspiracy where no opposition is tolerated from the community.

Give me a fucking break.

Note to Willard: There is one problem with your attack that unemployment in the Black community is 14.4%. It won't fly. Black unemployment is always and has been in my lifetime (6 decades), double white unemployment, even in the good years. It was so bad during Reagan's administration that he literally changed the rules on how minority unemployment was counted.

Read my lips; WE-ARE-USE-TO-THE-BULLSHIT that has brought so many whites to their knees these past few years.

Last hired, first fired...been there...done that.

Blacks are born in survival mode Mitt,...doesn't pop up just because the country is in a depression.

Obama cannot correct something like this in three years. Ain't possible.

Now you come promising to repeal healthcare, trash the public school system, and destroy the safety net designed to keep people from falling through the cracks.

You told the NAACP that you will restore Voodoo Economics on your first day in the White House.

Well, voodoo is African in origin, but not all of us Blacks practice, believe or are afraid of Voodoo.

Think about it.

Dysfunctional NAACP A National Problem

Cincinnati Chapter mirrors Nationwide disconnect.

Let's start with the good news first, National Board Chairman, Julian Bond has endorsed the upcoming National Equality March scheduled to take place on October 11^th in Washington. Bond has been a friend of the LGBT community for a while now. However his stance is contrary to that of the NAACP's president Ben Jealous, who has refused to take a stand on equal treatment for all.

The very popular Jack and Jill Blog has called them on it, actually doing a post entitled “The NAACP hates black people.” You can read about the controversy here.

As I've said repeatedly in my own posting, that Black civil rights organizations are ineffective and out of touch with today's struggles. They seem stuck in the 1950's and 1960's, choosing to ignore the problems which are killing our community today.

What hurts us today is a lack of education, black on black violence, the refusal to recognize the Black LGBT community, HIV/AIDS infecting straight Black women, the government marginalizing of the Black community in favor of the Hispanic community.

Minority communities in this country should be about presenting a united front, because the institutionalized racism in this country affects all of us equally.

Yet, the National NAACP refuses to take any stances on anything in recent memory and especially since Ben Jealous took over as president.

The Cincinnati Chapter has been hijacked by the likes of Christopher Smitherman and his young band of less reknown, and has become a tool of a local white and right wing organization called COAST. COAST stands for Citizens Opposed to Additional Spending and Taxes. It has long been the most conservative anti everything in Cincinnati.

COAST has been "helping" the NAACP in its shortsighted fight against the much needed streetcar and light rail system proposed by Mayor Mark Mallory.

A gay man who happens to work for both COAST and the NAACP since the election of Smitherman, is routinely shown off by Smitherman as his token gay, in an attempt to demonstrate his “enlightenment” on the subject.

This same gay man is the one who actually wrote the abominable anti gay ordinance that was repealed a few years ago. He wasn't in the NAACP at the time.

Until the NAACP, both locally and nationally, begins to address the problems of today's community, it will continue its slide into irrelevance and certain oblivion, making it the perfect fool and front for bigger, more insidious organizations with agendas designed to hurt minority communities.

A Tribal Conversation

There seems to be some confusion over the NAACP position on the civil rights goals and aspirations of gay and lesbian Americans, especially here in Cincinnati. Current National Board Chairman, Julian Bond was very clear and did not equivocate during his speech in March before the Los Angeles Branch of the Human Rights Campaign...


Julian Bond speaking before the Human Rights Campaign.




With the National organization setting the tone, why is the local chapter bogged down in simple mindedness?

Or is the local chapter, like the GOP-useless.

The time has come to talk with the Black LGBT community. Acknowledge us, make us welcome and understand that as long as one is chained...we're all chained.


We're waiting for you Mr President Obama...we're waiting for you....

Friday Rap...

Today would be a good day for President Obama to issue an executive order suspending "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.."

Doing it today would save the job of an Arab fluent linguist who also happens to be gay. He’s been informed by the military that he is going to lose his job because he outed himself on television....

Losing an Arab fluent linguist while we’re fighting two wars in the middle east is like cutting off your nose to spite your face...or like sending soldiers to war with no guns...isn’t it time we get serious and fight like we mean it....like we really intend to do something other than steal oil from the people who own it?

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Question......Are the NAACP and Black Ministers Organizations (all of them) Relevant in the 21st century....Or should they go the way of the dinosaurs, pass out of existence and make way for something new?

These organizations still display a mindset that was good for 1959...but is not pertinent to 2009...

These groups will not get their audience back until they start addressing today’s issues.....HIV/AIDS, Black on Black Crime, neighborhood violence, People not taking responsibility for their kids and their education, Homophobia against Black gays and lesbians....

My sister recently pointed out that the only segregated church in America these days is the traditional Black Church.....think about it....

The mega churches Black or White led.....preach wealth and how to get more.....not religion or sacrifice for the greater good.....

Speaking of Mega Churches....is TD Jakes still talking about the LGBT community and Muslims in negative terms...now that his son has been busted in the park with another man?....Just askin'


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Did you know....that the Bible talks about no less than eight forms of marriage.....so which one is the traditional one that conservatives keep yelling about....

And....if Separation of Church and State is mandated and codified in the Constitution, why is Religion allowed to dictate secular law...

Most of the founding fathers of this country were known to be Atheists afraid of what happens when religion decides law....

Because the truth of the matter is.....America never was formed to be a Christian nation...not legally...

It was formed to enable freedom of religion and also freedom from religion....

Finally...If the LGBT community has the same rights as everybody else...then why is gay marriage a debatable issue....

Under our system and our constitution....getting married is just another civil right...that some are being denied...making the denial...a violation of law...

BTW....Will somebody please grab Pat Robertson....Sounds like he forgot to take his meds again...While you're at it.....check James Dobson, too....He's sounding like a human being today..Amazing...

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The City Manager is in favor of privatizing Cincinnati’s Water Works ....Not A Good Idea....

Despite what government tells us...rates will go up dramatically...and when the stuff hits the fan....they won’t be there to protect us.....

Think I’m wrong....look at the rate increases since Duke Energy took over Cinergy....

Look at what is happening with Time Warner....why can’t Cincinnati make the city a hot spot for wi fi from city limit to city limit.....

Water, Air, Electricity, Food....the stuff needed for survival... should never be allowed in the hands of anyone with more loyalty to its stock holders than to its customers...the people....


It’s time to think about ways to get off this expensive grid.....

How about stimulus money to make all city homes solar powered....we don’t really need a trolley system.......

Give me a grant....I’m willing to be a guinea pig on this....Avondale should be solar powered....

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There is a drum beat that some Blacks in the community are trying to persuade the Black Community to vote Republican in the next mayoral election....

Good luck with that!

The alleged Black pup..er..people who are doing the talking sound like the GOP of 1980 rather than a new GOP...You know the old GOP powered by divisiveness, racism, and old white guys in the closet saying do as I say...not as I do....


The only difference is they have new Black guys mouthing the same old words....

Buy a clue....GOP...Chocolate or otherwise.....until your actions match the words coming out your mouth.......you won’t have many converts to your party......

Do I need to break it down....

28 year old Ken Blackwell/Charlie Winburn wannabes don’t work......

Attacking a popular Black Mayor with innuendo while he’s hustling his butt off to make the city better...successful or not...he’s working...not talking....don’t work....

GOP choosing a mayoral candidate who looks like old GOP candidates and likes Tea Parties...which overtly and racially attack the Black Man in the White House....won’t work...

Black GOP standing by as these attacks happen....what are you thinking....Or do you think your party affiliation will save you....and put something other than chump change in your pocket....don’t kid yourself...

And quiet as its kept.....losing General Colin Powell in the past election did more damage to the GOP than Barack Obama himself....

You wanna get somebody's attention...emulate Powell....not Michael Steele...Charlie Winburn.... or Ken Blackwell....

Even JC Watts went into hiding when these current Limbaugh Lemmings, who now run the GOP took over....


Think about it the next time you open your mouth and before your foot flies upward...

Smitherman vs the LGBT Community

I want to say up front that I am a "johnny-come-lately to this topic, basically because I have problems with both the LGBT community and the Black Community for the very reasons being debated, racism and homophobia.

I also have a problem with Mr. Smitherman...When he talks, I turn off, because I have yet to find him credible on any topic. I am mystified by his election to head the NAACP. I am mystified that so many others apparently find him to be a man worth following.

I found Jill Benavides comments after the meeting at City Hall to be patronizing, and condescendingly PC with regard to Smitherman. It was as if she were talking about a child. In other words..."let him have his temper tantrum, we love him anyway."

Having said all that......Let’s go there...shall we...

Nowhere on either side of this clueless conversation has the Black LGBT community been talked about or included in the conversation. Smitherman talked about his one white gay male NAACP member, as if having one represents all. That is the same way the white LGBT community talks about Blacks...you know..."some of my best friends are....."

The conversation that took place at City Hall obscures the fact that Black gays and lesbians are totally invisible in Cincinnati. And it’s like that across the country. Much of it due to the queer hatred within the Black community, in addition to the racism in the LGBT community

As Black people..we spend most of our lives being beaten up because of the color of our skin. It’s been a very difficult road to electing our first Black president. We have been killed for simply wanting to be treated equally. Laws were passed to make that happen, yet it’s still a problem in 2009, and you have only to look at two recent incidents of men, white men, killing their families and police for fear of a Black man in the White House.

You’ve got white governors talking of secession...that has got to be the ultimate in white flight..think about it...the same thing happens when a black family moves into a previously all white neighborhood...still....that’s not past history...that’s last week....

Now compound skin color with being gay or lesbian and you go from being beaten down on a national level to somebody, maybe your own brother, sister, mother, father, neighborhood, kicking your ass because you’re a sissy or you’re a bulldagger. You get tired of being a target, you get tired of being called names....for Black gays and lesbians...being called a nigger is not much different than being called queer or fag or bulldagger.

Trust me, you’re not going to run out and join the very community organizations that want you dead...

The white LGBT community doesn’t feel it’s racist, but it is no different, really than liberal whites who like using that.."some of my best friends are....." phrase. Blacks are not taken seriously within the LGBT community, usually being dismissed with a patronizing pat on the top of our fuzzy little heads, with a "thank you for coming...but we know better, what’s good for you..."

The prop 8 vote in California exposed the LGBT racism, when it was erroneously reported that Blacks were the reason it passed....Blacks gays and lesbians who took to the streets to protest the vote, were attacked by white gays and lesbians.....called niggers among other things....The white LGBT community has yet to apologize for their assumptions during that time...

Being Black gay and lesbian means you’re caught up between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

Not feeling accepted by anyone can be a very lonely way to grow up and to live.

Smitherman and the NAACP need to realize that there have always been Black gays and lesbians active within his organization and the civil rights movement. What they need to do is to recognize that the NAACP and other Black organizations are also not inclusive organizations working for all Blacks.

There is no mention of the devastation of HIV/AIDS on the Black Community. In fact Smitherman as a straight man is probably more susceptible to getting the virus than any gay black man at this stage, not because he is gay or down-lo, but because Black straight women are the ones being infected at record breaking rates.

Black women are sleeping with down-lo men and taking the germ back to their straight boyfriends...

And why are men down-lo...because they stand to be judged not men, if they come out..being labeled soft is worse than being called a nigger in the Black community. Witness the death a couple of weeks ago of a 12 year old Black youth, who hanged himself, after being repeatedly called a fag at school.

Why was he called a fag, or labeled soft.....he liked school and his mother taught him to comport himself like a gentleman...he was not gay, by the way....just a clean cut little boy...dead...

It is killing our community...yet....I hear nothing from the NAACP about this massive problem. If the women die...who is going to bear your sons? Or will any white or J-Lo looking Latina woman do?

It is no proof of your so called inclusive tendencies if all you can talk about is one gay white boy as a member. Remember, he can always go back to his community in which by birth he is a master of the universe.

Black gays and lesbians must go home to the same hate that they suffer from in the streets.

The entire Smitherman statement left women out the conversation, altogether. That is typical of the misogyny that also permeates the Black Community.

So, to put an end to this ramble.....

NAACP....you need to talk to Black gays and lesbians first.....you need to address the number one killer of Black people in this country and the world....second only to gun violence...which is another problem in and of itself...

Opening the tent to include all Black people will send a bigger message than a useless conversation with white gay and lesbian organizations with issues of their own to deal with..

It doesn’t matter who turns out to support what....until we recognize the problem within our own community, we will be having this worthless conversation in 2010, 2011, 2012.....

Kicking Back in Obamaville

Juggernaut is not a word that I would use to describe Barack Obama’s run for president. It is a ground swell. It is a 30 foot wave of emotion slamming into the shore. It is a movement that sometimes feels like a throwback to the sixties.

A juggernaut overtakes and then overwhelms its victims. Obama doesn’t feel like that, yet. He and his campaign still feel vulnerable and seemingly face derailment at any moment.

The movement barreled into Cincinnati yesterday. The Queen City is hosting the national convention for the NAACP, and Barack was the whip cream on the strawberries and shortcake of the Monday session.

While delegates to the convention worked through their sessions at the Duke Energy Center, Obamaville set up on Fountain Square, the heart of Cincinnati. Now, anyone who has seen the old television show WKRP in Cincinnati or at the very least, seen a picture of the city, recognizes the Tyler Davidson Fountain. It is the city symbol. The waters were flowing from the newly refurbished fountain and a nice breeze occasionally picked up the waters and sprayed it over the crowd to cool them on a warm but humidity free day. Young ones released from the prison of their strollers found the boy on the turtle and washed their feet in the tiny pools of water at his feet..

Obamaville looks like a village. More than that, it looks like the perfect picture of diversity. There were the very young enjoying playtime among the adults, independent and oblivious to the importance of the situation. Teenagers strolled, cool, hip, attempting to project a world knowledge that won’t hit them for many more years. College kids eager to take part in something, feeling the moment. Absolutely giddy in their new found cause. Using digital cameras to photograph images on the big screen and in the crowd. Their parents, sometimes at their side, skeptical...cynical about yet another possible savior in the offing. Older folks who’ve lived and worked and ridden out the disappointments of seeing one good man after another make big promises and fail. Older people made stoic from life, watching and waiting for the man of the hour. Five hours, six hours until he would show up on the big screen TV on top of Macy’s department store. Obamaville was every color, every creed, every gender, every sexuality, every nationality, no one dominant, freely conversing with anyone else willing to engage.

We talked with one another, names, introductions, not important. The talk wasn’t always about politics or econmics. It was about kids, the weather, the artwork on the cheap t shirts, happenings in faraway hometowns, and even shared health problems. I met two women who used their outside time to light up camel unfiltered cigarettes, the brand that killed my grandmother. The three of us, it turned out had all been diagnosed with bad hearts. We were all on the same medication. I looked better than them, they said. I appeared healthier and they wanted to know what I was doing to stay healthy, since we were all about the same age. I don’t smoke. Never have. But I didn’t insult them, by telling them they needed to quit. They already knew. It was just conversation.

I found my spot after wandering around a bit, greeting old friends in the crowd. Perched in the shade, I waited in front of a chess board table with no pieces. I would’ve played if I had pieces, but I guess you’ve got to bring your own. I was joined by a woman from Battle Creek, here for the convention. Battle Creek is a small town, home to Kellogg’s, as in cereal with a population of maybe 54,000 people, 7 percent black. We were joined by another woman, origin Huntsville, Alabama, there to work the square signing up new voters and volunteers for Obama. She worked a little. We talked a little. It was easy, comfortable. Anyone looking at us would have thought we’d arrived there together. Many other groups formed around us the same way. Strangers with a common cause, finding each other in Obamaville.

As the feel good moment drew closer, space in Obamaville dried up. People arrived from all directions, toting those multi colored chairs in a bag. Families made up of three or four generations arriving with coolers of food and drink, eating dinner picnic style, in front of the big screen HD-TV.

My group was then joined by a local man, from a prominent Cincinnati family. Two uncles have terminals named after them at the Greater Cincinnati Airport. There is a street in suburban Bond Hill that also bears the family name. He was high school teacher with a head full of history and pop culture knowledge.

Obama was late but it didn’t dampen spirits or anticipation. He talked for roughly 25 minutes. I won’t rehash his speech, you can parse it elsewhere. He spoke to the youth, the young, yet managed to include the older jaded crowd who’d heard it before, and made us believe that we’re hearing something new. We came to the square strangers with questions. We left a village, answers forthcoming.

Morality Plays

Yesterday, the NAACP buried the “N” word...literally. The organization held a funeral for the word, duplicating it’s actions of a couple of decades ago, when it buried Jim Crow.

Burying Jim Crow will prove to be the easier entombment, I think. That’s because so many of us use the “N” word when talking to each other. We only have a problem with it when white people use it.

It’s always been considered a bad word. I come from the generation where parents didn’t curse in front of the kids. And, we never, ever used the “N” word for any reason to refer to anyone else. It was a term of disrespect with the obvious racist connotations. We were taught not to denigrate ourselves because we would get enough of that when we stepped into the white professional world. Trust me, as someone who has spent her entire life being the “first black this and only female that,” there are actually hundreds of ways somebody can call you a nigger without using the word itself.

Nowadays, kids toss the word around like a water balloon and people have become desensitized to it. The problem with using it so freely is that people with no sense of history or anything else for that matter, think they can use it like we do. That’s when it becomes offensive.

As blacks we can’t be so hypocritical. If we’re going to use it, we must expect that others will too. We need to get over ourselves and really, really make the word inoffensive, much like gay and lesbians did with the word “Queer.” The LGBT community owns that word, having taken possession of it a long time ago. You can’t hurt us with it anymore. Blacks need to do the same with the “N” word. If we intend to use it, then we have to stop reacting to its use by others. Once it loses it’s shock value, then it is buried for real, not symbolically like the NAACP tried to do yesterday.

The NAACP would do better recapturing its relevance if it would go after the things that are killing our communities, like AIDS, Poverty, black on black violence, out of wedlock children, and the school dropout rate.

Remember, the old nursery rhyme....”sticks and stones can break my bones...but words will never hurt me..”

Good words to live by..