Mediaboss Marketing

The modern Civil Rights Movement which began in earnest in the mid-1950s has much in common with the recent Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement

The deeds and sacrifices of Rosa Parks, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Medgar Evers, the hundreds on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, generated the energy which eventually knocked down Jim Crow.

Blacks Lives Matters (BLM), social media and the cell phone recorder have stimulated the current movement, due in part to the deaths of Black men and women from the bullets and deadly choke holds of police officers.

On February 26, 2017, we all should take a minute to remember Trayvon Martin. On that date in 2012, a 17-year-old child was coming back from the store.

with a soda and Skittles as snacks to watch an NBA game in Sanford, Florida.

George Zimmerman, a neighborhood watch guard, spotted him and declaredthe young hooded Black mandid not belong in the neighborhood, confrontedhim and killed him during a struggle.

Zimmerman, who is White, claimed he was standing his ground, and scared for his life. But if you were being followed by a stranger, dont you think such a defense would have been Trayvons?

The court accepted Zimmermans stand and found him not guilty of murder. Black people began wearing hoodies to remind us of the injustice.

Turn the dial back to a hot August in 1955, in Money, Mississippi.

Then 14-year-old Emmett Tillwas visiting his mothers home state from Chicago, and allegedly whistled and made other lewd remarks to a White woman in a general store.

Shortly afterthat, the young man was pulled from a bed in his uncles home, taken to a remote area and was mutilated.

His body was later found. Back in Chicago, his mother demanded that the badly decomposed body of her child be put on display in an open casket to see just how deadly Jim Crow and White hate could be. Jet magazine carried it on the front page.

The men who killed Till were not found guilty and the woman who claimed that he was fresh with her, 62 years ago, Carolyn Bryant has said she lied in a recently published book, The Blood Of Emmett Till by Timothy Bryant.

Three months later in 1955, Rosa Parks sat and Black people stood up in Montgomery, Alabama, pressing Black residents to fight and destroy the system which kept them in a state of slavery by another name.

Rosa, like other Black Montgomerians, were sick and tired of being sick and tired of being relegated to sitting in the back of the bus.

Several yearsago a youngClaudette Colvin (no relation, I guess) defied the law and was arrested. But Parks move triggered a year-long boycott by Black people of the bus lines. The courts struck down the citys Jim Crow seating policy. The modern Rights Movement was underway.

Black people found tools to fight Jim Crow: depriving the bus company of their dollars and directly challenging a system, non-violently, there and across the South.

The masters of Jim Crow were made to realize their hypocrisy. They were not living up to the ideal that all men were created equal.

Move forward years to Ferguson, Missouri in 2014 and recall 19-year-old Michael Browns body lying in the middle of a hot street heated by an August sun. A White officer shot him because, again, the cop felt like his life was being threatened.

In that city Black folk were so politically disengaged, it never dawned on them that they were in the majority.

Browns death pointed up the sustained and violent nature of how police treated them there and elsewhere in our so-called post-racial America.

Blacks were being ticketed at a higher rate for traffic violations and the city was using that money to fund the citys modern version of Jim Crow.

Protestors converged onFerguson, unrest ensued, reforms were imposed and the old masters of the new Jim Cow system were dispatched.

From the tumult in Ferguson, The Black Lives Matters Movement was given birth. Like the Civil Rights Movement which was given life in the mid-1950s after the murder of Emmett Till and the Montgomery Bus Boycott, it was the object of what we call now Whitelash by conservatives.

How dare these ungrateful and underserving Blacks, who have caused their own ills, demand to be treated equally, when, the nation had just elected its first Black President.

This view of the nations racial tensions help elect Donald Trump.

It is called Whitelash against the current Black liberation movement.

There is a claim that these protesting Blacks and Hispanics are being ungrateful and racist. But this is just a rhetorical ply and mind trick to confuse Black people and distract us from the continued racism many Whites deny.

Along with the current liberation movement led by the BLM, the Black Press and others fighting for criminal justice reform against police abuses, the current revolt against Trump reminds us of another passage in history

Recallthe mid-1960s when the resistance to the Vietnam War and the fight for Civil Rights reforms collided.

The collision drew attention to the financial inequality, deprivations of people from certain Islamic and Black dominated countries immigrating to our borders, educational and housing disparities then.

The collision worked, and the nation did advance to a degree, but it seems that there was a great of unfinished business that Trump has used to trigger White anger and resentment anew today.

Again, unrest is brewing in the streets and I hope that it will be a shield against the Trump White House and the GOP controlled Congress.

This is just a reminder that while we celebrate the 2017 edition of Black History Month, we should be mindful of it year round.

Lets not forget the young and old men and women, and institutions whose sacrifices made Black history viable as a bulwark against hatred and bias.

Lets not forget that the same factors which created slavery, Jim Crow and its modern version today, still exist. And if we are to have any future, we must fight against it.

By Leonard E. Colvin Chief Reporter

See the rest here:
Urban Notebook: Don't forget Emmett, Trayvon and Michael And Their Impact - Thenewjournalandguide

Iowa would be the latest state to adopt a stand-your-ground law if a proposal for revisions in gun regulations filed this week comes to pass.

The self-defense measure introduced in the Iowa House is part of a study bill that would bring sweeping changes to gun laws in the state.

Under House Study Bill 133, introduced Monday by Rep. Matt Windschitl, R-Missouri Valley, other provisions include removing the renewal requirement for permits to carry firearms and allowing minors of any age to handle a handgun in the presence of a parent or guardian.

Its got a lot of concepts in it that are trying to, I think, achieve the right balance, said Rep. Chip Baltimore, R-Boone, chairman of the Judiciary Committee that will hear the bill.

An Iowa law known as the castle doctrine currently protects the use of deadly force when a person acts in self-defense in his or her home, business or car.

The proposed bill allows for the use of deadly force for self-defense anywhere a gun owner can lawfully carry. The bill does not require a person to retreat from a threat or call police before using deadly force. About half the states have some version of a stand-your-ground law.

Cedar County Sheriff Warren Wethington said he supports the provision, saying retreating is not always an option.

Even if there is a stand-your-ground law, you still have to be able to articulate why someone was going to use deadly force or cause serious injury to you or a loved one, he said.

Johnson County Sheriff Lonny Pulkrabek, however, doesnt think the current law needs changing when it comes to reasonable force.

What Im concerned about with stand-your-ground is that it will make it much easier for someone to take someones life and simply say, I felt threatened, he said.

The issue of stand your ground gained national prominence after the Feb. 26, 2012, fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, 17, at the hands of neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman, then 28, in Florida.

Zimmermans defense waived an immunity hearing on using the law and instead went to trial arguing self-defense. Although defense attorneys did not argue stand-your-ground at trial, standard jury instructions in homicide cases in the state include provisions of the law. A jury acquitted him of second-degree murder in July 2013.

Jeremy Brigham, executive director of Iowans for Gun Safety, said the Iowa bill would considerably weaken Iowas gun laws, which he evaluates based on their contribution to decreasing gun-related deaths and injuries. He said stand-your-ground opens up a can of worms.

How are you going to know if youre really defending yourself or if youre taking the initiative if you think youre being attacked? Brigham asked.

The proposed bill also would do away with a requirement that those with permits to carry weapons have to renew the permit every five years. Instead, the permit would be good for the life of the holder.

Pulkrabek and Linn County Sheriff Brian Gardner said the renewal process allows sheriffs offices to review permits to ensure something hasnt changed over the five years since the permit was issued that could potentially disqualify the holder from possessing the permit, such as a change in mental health or a series of drug and alcohol-related offenses.

There are people who were initially entitled to a permit, but during that five-year period, they became ineligible to have that permit, Gardner said.

Under the bill, new applicants also would be allowed to complete online training courses to demonstrate knowledge of firearm safety. Pulkrabek, however, said someone who carries a permit but has never handled a weapon could be a safety threat. Wethington agrees that hands-on training is vital.

I do not support internet online training, Wethington said, who said the permit classes he runs include four hours of class time and four hours of range time. You have time to take people that dont really have the skill set and make sure theyre safe before you put your name on (the permit). Not only is there the issue of public safety, but its just like driving a car you need to be proficient about what you do.

If adopted, the bill would remove age requirements for minors handling handguns under the supervision of a parent or guardian. Currently, Iowa law requires that a minor be at least 14 to handle a handgun.

Aaron Dorr, executive director of Iowa Gun Owners, said thats an arbitrary age limit.

Quite frankly, its absurd, he said. We want those kids to safely be taught to use a firearm. No one can do that better than a parent.

Brigham, however, questions the logic.

Kids dont understand the consequences of their actions, he said. They can handle rifles as it is, but handguns? Really? Thats not a hunting instrument.

Other provisions include removing a penalty for carrying a weapon while under the influence if someone is in his or her own home or business; keeping information on people who possess weapon permits confidential; allowing carrying firearms on snowmobiles and ATVs on property that doesnt belong to the carrier; and legalizing short-barreled rifles and shotguns.

The bill would establish state control over firearm regulations, essentially preventing cities and counties from enacting their own gun laws.

Baltimore said he thinks the bill has the votes to make it through the legislative funnel but concedes it could see some changes before it goes to the House.

Im not going to predict what the bill looks like when it gets to the floor, he said.

(James Q. Lynch contributed to this story.)

View post:
Iowa gun bill seeks 'stand-your-ground' law - Quad City Times

DES MOINES -- Iowa would be the latest state to adopt a stand-your-ground law if a proposal for revisions in gun regulations filed this week comes to pass.

The self-defense measure introduced in the Iowa House is part of a study bill that would bring sweeping changes to gun laws in the state.

Under House Study Bill 133, introduced Monday by Rep. Matt Windschitl, R-Missouri Valley, other provisions include removing the renewal requirement for permits to carry firearms and allowing minors of any age to handle a handgun in the presence of a parent or guardian.

Its got a lot of concepts in it that are trying to, I think, achieve the right balance, said Rep. Chip Baltimore, R-Boone, chairman of the Judiciary Committee that will hear the bill.

An Iowa law known as the castle doctrine currently protects the use of deadly force when a person acts in self-defense in his or her home, business or car. HSB 133 allows for the use of deadly force for self-defense anywhere a gun owner can lawfully carry. The bill does not require a person to retreat from a threat or call police before using deadly force. About half the states have some version of a stand-your-ground law.

Cedar County Sheriff Warren Wethington said he supports the provision, saying retreating is not always an option.

Even if there is a stand-your-ground law, you still have to be able to articulate why someone was going to use deadly force or cause serious injury to you or a loved one, he said.

Johnson County Sheriff Lonny Pulkrabek, however, doesnt feel the current law needs changing when it comes to reasonable force.

What Im concerned about with stand your ground is that it will make it much easier for someone to take someones life and simply say, I felt threatened, he said.

The issue of stand your ground gained national prominence after the 2012 fatal shooting of Trayvon Martin, 17, at the hands of neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman, then 28, in Florida.

Zimmermans defense waived an immunity hearing on using the law and instead went to trial arguing self-defense. Although defense attorneys did not argue stand your ground at trial, standard jury instructions in homicide cases in the state include provisions of the law. A jury acquitted him of second-degree murder in July 2013.

Jeremy Brigham, executive director of Iowans for Gun Safety, said HSB 133 would considerably weaken Iowas gun laws based on their contribution to decreasing gun-related deaths and injuries. He said stand your ground opens up a can of worms.

How are you going to know if youre really defending yourself or if youre taking the initiative if you think youre being attacked? Brigham asked.

The proposed bill also would do away with a requirement those with permits to carry weapons have to renew the permission every five years. Instead, the permit would be good for the life of the holder.

Pulkrabek and Linn County Sheriff Brian Gardner said the renewal process allows sheriffs offices to review permits to ensure something hasnt changed over the five years since the permit was issued that could potentially disqualify the holder from possessing the permit such as a change in mental health or a series of drug and alcohol-related offenses.

Under the bill, new applicants also would be allowed to complete online training courses to demonstrate knowledge of firearm safety. Pulkrabek, however, said someone who carries a permit but has never handled a weapon could be a safety threat. Wethington agrees hands-on training is vital.

I do not support internet online training, Wethington said, who said the permit classes he runs include four hours of class time and four hours of range time. You have time to take people that dont really have the skill set and make sure theyre safe before you put your name on (the permit). Not only is there the issue of public safety, but its just like driving a car you need to be proficient about what you do.

If adopted, the bill would remove age requirements for minors handling handguns under the supervision of a parent or guardian. Currently, Iowa law requires a minor be at least 14 to handle a handgun.

Aaron Dorr, executive director of Iowa Gun Owners, said thats an arbitrary age limit.

Quite frankly, its absurd, he said. We want those kids to safely be taught to use a firearm. No one can do that better than a parent.

Brigham, however, questions the logic.

Kids dont understand the consequences of their actions, he said. They can handle rifles as it is, but handguns? Really? Thats not a hunting instrument.

Other provisions include removing a penalty for carrying a weapon while under the influence if someone is in his or her own home or business; keeping information on people who possess weapon permits confidential; allowing carrying firearms on snowmobiles and ATVs on property that doesnt belong to the carrier; and legalizing short-barreled rifles and shotguns.

The bill would establish state control over firearms, essentially preventing cities and counties from enacting their own regulations.

Baltimore said he believes the bill has the votes to make it through the legislative funnel, but concedes it could see some changes before it goes to the House.

Im not going to predict what the bill looks like when it gets to the floor, he said.

Link:
Gun bill seeks 'stand-your-ground' law - Waterloo Cedar Falls Courier

Seattle playwright, actor, and dancer Kamaria Hallums-Harris didn't know what she was going to write for her senior thesis project at Cornish College of the Arts. But when George Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, her mission clarified.

As the Zimmerman case unfolded on the news, she began to wonder whether black women were being killed by police as often and for the same reasons that black men were. Her queries led her to the history of lynching.

She found the story of Mary Turner, who in 1918 was hanged by her ankles, set on fire, and riddled with bullets. Seeing that Turner was eight months pregnant at the time, a member of the white mob that strung her up cut the unborn baby from her womb and stomped on it. She also found the story of Laura Nelson, who was raped and hanged from a bridge. The baby she was carrying reportedly survived the murder.

Hallums-Harris weaves such stories into Waning, a coming-of-age drama about a 17-year-old black girl named Luna (Danela Butler). Luna struggles with anxiety. As she begins to reckon with a burgeoning queer identity, she also begins to discover the many horrifying acts of violence against black people in the United States. In the midst of that psychological thunderstorm, she unexpectedly becomes pregnant.

Over the course of the play's brief 50 minutes, Hallums-Harris alternates quiet bedroom scenes with extended transitions that pulse with emotional intensity and very active metaphors. There's a scene where a nameless man (Benjamin Symons, who otherwise plays Luna's boyfriend, Ravi) reads the brutal facts of Mary Turner's lynching while Luna moans in the ecstasy of her first queer experience, as if pleasure can't be experienced without acknowledging the history of pain that precedes it.

In another moment, as Luna meditates on her pregnancy, a remixed version of Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" pipes in through the speakers overhead. The striking juxtaposition recalls a biographical detail from Hallums-Harris's own life.

While she was writing Waning, Hallums-Harris, like her main character, found herself unexpectedly pregnant. "It felt like the modern-day equivalent of lynchings to me, that I wanted to keep this child and was not set up to do so," she says. Her due date was her graduation day, and she says she was performing in two shows, working three jobs, and trying to keep her grades up all at the same time. "I did not have the resources. I did not have the funds, so I wrote that into Waning," she says.

Not that it didn't take a toll. Waning, which was co-produced with Earth Pearl Collective, is a heavy show, and the production takes unorthodox steps to prepare people for it: On Tuesday nights, the crew will lead audiences through a self-care breathing ritual involving lavender packets, intended to help them through the play's heavy themes. (Also, white audience members are encouraged to bring a friend of color.)

Hallums-Harris says moments where the past seems to rhyme with the present interest her the mostthat interest is reflected both in the script and in the show's music and movement. Jazz from the Robert Glasper Trio mixes with hiphop from Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar. A character named Leuanna (played Hallums-Harris), a sort of dancing fairy godmother whose life is intertwined with Luna's, incorporates into her movement gestures from hiphop, ballet, and modern dance.

While Hallums-Harris draws strength and creative energy from her research and from her particular swirl of contemporary and historical aesthetics, the implications of all of it aren't lost on her. That is, if the present looks a lot like the past, then the future doesn't look too good. This idea concretized for her during the writing process, and she finds it depressing.

"But I couldn't write anything else" she says. "I just needed to figure it out."

Before graduating from Cornish with a degree in original works in 2014, Hallums-Harris attended South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts & Humanities (the alma mater of actors such as Nicole Beharie and Danielle Brooks). Since she's been in town, she's acted in shows at Annex and Seattle Immersive Theatre, and she just landed the role of Barbara in Intiman's upcoming production of Robert O'Hara's Barbecue.

In the meantime, despite the heavy emotional toll of writing Waning, she'll be working on another time-bending play called Mitochondrial Eve, in which Hallums-Harris imagines the life of humanity's common matrilineal ancestor in different scenarios throughout time, from The Beginning right on up to the present day. Right now, she says, the first scene involves Nat Turner's wife having an affair with Kurt Vonnegut.

Follow this link:
The Long Shadow of Lynching in 2017 - TheStranger.com

Des Moines Public Schools board members sported Black Lives Matter shirts and their Tuesday meeting.(Photo: Molly Longman/The Register)Buy Photo

It was business as usual at the weekly Des Moines Public Schools board meeting at Des Moines Central Campus High Schoolon Tuesday evening.

But one thing was different six ofDes Moines School Board's seven members were sporting black T-shirts that read "Black Lives Matter" in thick, white lettering.

There was no mention of the shirts duringthe formal part of the meetingas board members and Superintendent Thomas Ahart, who did not wear a Black Lives Matter T-shirt,discussedissues such as Des Moines Central Academy upgrades andearly literacy programs.

The shirts spoke for themselves.

Board member Dionna Langford spearheadedDMPS'Black Lives Matter initiative, selling the shirts for $10 and donating 50 percent of the proceeds to two Des Moines organizations that work to improve the welfare of Des Moines' black community:Brother 2Brother, which partners young men of color withmentors, andInvesting in MyFuture,which pushes black students to pursue higher education.

Langford said $655 were raised for the organizations after selling 131 locally printedshirts.

Black Lives Matteris an international movement, foundedby three black women in 2013 after the acquittal of George Zimmerman in the Florida shooting of black teen Trayvon Martin.

At the meeting, Langford explained why the school board felt it was important to stand in solidarity with their black students and community.

"The statement we want to make today as a board is that we care about our black students," Langford said. "We care about their families and we care about our black workforce While weve seen progress throughout the years, our education system is still rife with inequities and our poor, brown, and, yes, black children often pay the price."

According tostatistics from the Iowa Department of Education, in the 2014-2015 school year,the African-American dropout rate in Iowa is over double the rate of white students. Black students were the only group with a graduation rate of under 80 percent, the statistics show.

Des Moines Public Schools states on its website that 18.8 percent of its population is black.

Black Lives Matter T-shirts were waiting for board members on their seats at the Tuesday meeting.(Photo: Molly Longman/The Register)

"We are still vigorously working to close the achievement gap between our poor and our black students of color," Langford said. "As a school district, it is our responsibility to ensure every single child as my grandma would say, whetheryoure black, brown, white, orange or purple graduates with the knowledge they need to be successful at the next stage of their lives."

Both Langford and school board vice chair Cindy Elsbernd said they'd received negative feedback from members of the community after they announced they'd be wearing the Black Lives Matter shirts at Tuesday's meeting.

"I've been asked why I would support the violent Black Lives Matter group," Elsbernd said. "I don't. In fact, I don't support violence at all neither does Black Lives Matter Black students, I see you. I've learned from you. Your successful education is important to me. You matter."

Board chairTeree Caldwell-Johnson assured attendees at the end of the meeting that the school board supports students of all walks of life.

"I hope that the people in our community understand that we support all of our children," Caldwell-Johnson said."Tonight we're focusing on a particular cohort, but we supportand want to educate all of our children and, again, not only do black minds matter and black lives matter, all children matter in this district."

Board member Rob Barron, who was the only board member who didn't don a Black Lives Matter shirt, explained that his clothing choice was "not for any lack of solidarity or belief in the movement, but purely based on an outvoted belief of not wearing a T-shirt at a board meeting and a belief in professionalism."

Barron draped his Black Lives Matter shirt over his desk so attendees could read it during the meeting.

Debbie Griffin, a pastor at Des Moines urban ministryDowntown Disciples, attended the board meeting wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt and a clerical collar.

I wore this shirt to stand in solidarity, not only with the school board that's supporting black students, but in solidarity with black students and my black neighbors," Griffin said. "It's a way for me to express my lovefor my neighbor and my concern for their equality, justice, dignity and honor."

During the meeting, Langford left attendees with a statement about why the movement was important to her.

"As an alum of the Des Moines public school system, I could share my own stories of moments where I was made to feel as an other and how that impacted my thoughts about my ability to succeed in the classroom. And if you talk to many other black students, I would not be surprised if you would hear similar stories," Langford said. "Every single one of our student's lives matter within the Des Moines public school district and that includes black children."

Read or Share this story: http://dmreg.co/2m6gE4n

See the original post here:
DM School Board members sport 'Black Lives Matter' shirts - DesMoinesRegister.com