Interracial Relationships: Time to Move Toward Colorblindness

More than 45 years after Loving v. Virginia, the Supreme Court case that made interracial marriage legal, many Americans still consider interracial marriage and dating taboo.

When Bill DeBlasio was elected mayor of New York City on November 5, a plethora of news articles about his marriage to Chirlane McCray, who is black, made headline news. Media sprung in to action claiming that the de Blasio's interracial marriage "shattered the traditional ideas about race and politics." Their marriage commanded the news-cycle spotlight, more than the fact that de Blasio was the first Democrat elected mayor of New York City since David Dinkins in 1993. 

Plaintiffs, Richard and Mildred Loving
in Loving v. Virginia (Time.com)

De Blasio's election also conjured up a diverse set of viewpoints on marriage and interracial dating. Tiya Miles, the chair of the Department of Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan, blogged on the Huffington Post about her experience seeing her black male family members with women who she wrote looked like "Barbie." 

"Try as I might to suppress the reaction, I experience black men's choice of white women as a personal rejection of the group in which I am a part, of African American women as a whole, who have always been devalued in this society." 

Miles's feelings of personal rejection might be relatable to many African-American women, but certainly not all. Many have found happiness dating outside (or within) their race. McCray is an example.

America has further to go when it comes to interracial relations, but it doesn't hurt to take baby steps. A first step is to avoid seeing race as monolithic. It's become ubiquitous for many to lump the ideas expressed by a few members of a cultural group into the same prism of identity for all members of that group (i.e. black voters when Obama won re-election last year).The danger is that the "lumping" creates separatist attitudes. Nikki Giovanni said, “Deal with yourself as an individual worthy of respect, and make everyone else deal with you the same way.” 

Bill de Blasio celebrates win with
his son, Dante, left, daughter Chiara, and wife Chirlane

Reading Miles's article, I couldn't help but think that there's no proof that all black women rest their self-worth on a black man's decision to date outside his race or that all black women feel devalued in society. Attributing her personal feelings about rejection to "African-American women as a whole" does not move the idea of colorblindness in this country forward. It negates an opportunity to move away from monolithic-ness. 

In the article, Black Women, Interracial Dating andMarriage: What's Love Got to Do With It? Miles candidly talks about where these feelings came from.

"Once I overheard my black boyfriend telling his buddies how he preferred white women; on another occasion (with a different black boyfriend) a guy told me he didn't care that I was breaking up with him because he could go out and get a white woman," Miles wrote. (She said that this happened when her boyfriends were barely 20 years old. They were probably scared—a lot of bros have tried and been rejected by black women too.)

But Miles said she doesn’t see that moment as “the driving force behind my resentful feelings about black male-white female relationships." Instead she said it was about her “awareness of all of the (straight) African American women--beautiful, smart, good women, some of them my own family and friends--who might not have a honey to bring home this Thanksgiving holiday because they cannot find a date, even as rising numbers of eligible African American men will be wooing white women.”

But if we step back and take a look at America, the interracial wooing isn't exclusively rising among black men. It seems to have become less taboo, since Shonda Rhimes brought us Scandal; Fox allowed SleepyHollow; ABC greenlit Betrayal (where one of the subpolts is about an older white man's regrets about moving on without his black woman lover) and Rookie Blue (the detective, Traci Nash, is dating Steve Peck, her white co-worker); and audiences watched Megan Goode and Wes Brown on NBC's Deception before it was canceled. If that's not enough, Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad, Phylicia and Ahmad's Rashad's daughter, are starring in Romeo and Juilet on Broadway.

According to Ivory A. Toldson, Ph.D., a Howard University professor and research analyst for the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation; and Bryant Marks, a psychology professor at Morehouse College and faculty associate at the University of Michigan's Institute for Social Research, it is a "cultural myth" that successful black men are likely to be unavailable to black women because they prefer to marry outside their race.

Toldson and Marks point out that among married black men with a personal income above $100,000, 83 percent have black wives. Among married black men with college degrees, 85 percent have black wives. Toldson cautions against exaggerating a behavior that we might see as negative, when in reality it occurs a small percentage of the time.

In Waiting to Exhale, Angela Basset's character, Bernadine, is devastated when her husband of 11 years leaves her for a white woman. 

She rips down his ties, suit jackets, shirts and pants from their shared closet, gathers all of these things up, takes his belongings outside and puts them in a car. Then, she sprinkles gasoline all over the car, lights a cigarette, smokes it and tosses the match into the car. Everything he owns burns in that car. A profound scene of the woman scorned.

But another scene proved poignant, Bernadine confronts her soon-to-be ex-husband, John: 

Bernadine: I give you 11 f----g years of my life and you're telling me you're leaving me for a white woman?

John Harris Sr: Would it help if she was black?

Bernadine: No. It would help if you were black.

Does the fact that the woman is white really cause her to dish out that rage of rejection? If it were Lela Rochon's character, Robin, who is African-American, wouldn't Bernadine be just as devastated?

Angela Bassett in Waiting to Exhale

Miles might say no. "Whiteness has been a privileged and prized identity in the U.S.; our national culture has made it this way. So when black men select white women and de-select black women, they are doing so in a context of charged racial meanings."

According to a 2005 census data poll, 82 percent of African-American men marry within their race as compared to other minorities; Hispanic men, 65 percent, and Asian men, 48 percent. And 97 percent of white men marry white women. 

Statistically, black men are not deselecting black women.

Miles says that “the human family is so genetically close that we share more than 99 percent of our DNA. Genetically speaking,” wrote Miles, who is married to a man of Native American descent, “there are no racial categories; race is merely skin deep. Dating and marrying across racial lines should therefore be natural, common and acceptable.” But, she finished that thought saying that the United States is not a colorblind nation.

I agree, The USA isn't a colorblind Nation, but it might begin to be if we take baby steps and realize that we all have the same DNA.

What do you think?

I'm Just Trying to Get Home Too

RCJ News OP-ED

At a reasonable time several nights ago, I walked to Duane Reade to buy a pack of M&M's. When I came out of the store on my way back to my apartment, it happened. For the 18-millionth time -- I know that's not a number or a realistic figure, but I'm making a point -- I've walked down a New York City street to hear a random Harlem area stranger lean in to me and say: "Sexy."

This is not a compliment.

The headline is not mocking Rachel Jenteal's explanation of what Trayvon Martin was doing on the night he was shot and killed by neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman (in an exclusive interview, Jenteal told Piers Morgan on CNN that Martin was "trying to get home" on the night he was killed). That was a real tragedy and I wrote about it on RCJ News. I am, however, trying to explain that I'm tired of being harassed.

"Hey baby", "Hey Princess" or any other distillation are not compliments either. Catcalls, sexually explicit comments, and groping or unwanted touching is street harassment. Can we include leaning in too?

Recently, Michaela Cross, a University of Chicago student posted her account of street harassment after traveling abroad to India. Cross said that she

Michaela Cross in India
(photo credit michaela cross and ourweekly.com)

and others experienced repeated sexual harassment in India and those encounters resulted in her diagnosis of PTSD.

She wrote a essay that was tracked by CNN. Here are parts of her story:

"Do I tell them about our first night in the city of Pune, when we danced in the Ganesha festival, and leave it at that? Or do I go on and tell them how the festival actually stopped when the American women started dancing, so that we looked around to see a circle of men filming our every move?

"Do I tell them about bargaining at the bazaar for beautiful saris costing a few dollars a piece, and not mention the men who stood watching us, who would push by us, clawing at our breasts and groins?

In my reporting, I have covered several areas in New York City and I have watched many women leave their apartments, specifically those women in public housing, to be harassed by large groups of men outside their building. I remember seeing a man try to grab a woman's arm as she walked by. She was moving briskly. As if she knew something was coming and trying to avoid it. A pseudo "duck and cover" technique. Maybe she knew him, maybe she didn't. It doesn't matter.

In broad daylight, I walked by five men after covering a story in Brooklyn who said "oh, she's sweet, she's sweet" leaving me with a deafening sexual undertone. They did not need to grope me for me to feel uncomfortable.

But I felt excruciatingly uncomfortable more than a decade ago during a college trip. I took a Greyhound Bus with a group of friends to Biker Beach Week in Datyona Beach, Florida (the things we did at 19...). I was completely unprepared for what I saw. Keep in mind that everyone is wearing short shorts and bikini tops. I was wearing a tank top and jean shorts. We were walking down the street and passed a group of guys. The minute we walked pass them, I felt a smack on my backside. I didn't know how to react, but I remember staring the bro down in complete shock.

Women like Cross, and those women walking into their buildings are not assaulted with guns, but, I'm sure these women are being provoked like Martin was. How? Cross' account of reaching her boiling point while traveling in India: "When people compliment me on my Indian sandals, do I talk about the man who stalked me for 45 minutes after I purchased them, until I yelled in his face in a busy crowd?"

A few years ago, the Huffington Post reported that the NYC City Council heard testimony from women who felt unsafe and threatened after experiencing street harassment. They even considered introducing legislation to thwart the harassment, but the issue was: how could they execute it. Council member Julissa Ferreras, chair of the women's issues committee, was supportive of the legislation and certainly, Holly Kearl, who was mentioned in the article, would be as well. 

"Because of street harassment, from a young age women learn that public spaces are male territory," Kearl told the Huffington Post. Kearl is the author of Stop Street Harassment: Making Public Places Safe and Welcoming for Women. "They learn to limit the places they go, they try not to be in public alone -- especially at night -- and when they are alone, they stay on guard."

(RCJ News reached out to Council member Ferreras, but emails and calls were not returned)

In Egypt, where women are harassed constantly and aggressively on the streets -- some incidents are due to weak public order since the revolution ousting the President Mubarak in 2011; and now, the same unrest is happening with the ousted Morsi -- men are trying a new shaming method to help prevent street harassment. The Washington Post posted a video on their blog showing two male activists, who had just witnessed women being harassed, pin the harassers against a wall use a stencil to spray paint in Arabic, "I'm a harasser" on their T-shirts. A riskier method, but indeed, the harassers got the point.

A softer solution to the execution problem, is an app (and there really is an app for everything) called "Not Your Baby."  The app will allow users to input where they are and who is harassing them. A response will be generated to the user "in the moment" for direction from others who have been harassed on how they dealt with it. Stopstreetharassment.org has also created a new app where victims can upload in real time information about where they experienced harassment on the street. 

But, there could be technical difficulties if you use it on the subway. A temporary solution in that case is to ignore it.

Stop street harassment art by Brooklyn artist 
Tatyana Fazlalizadeh. (photo credit feminspire.com, Fazlalizadeh)

Coincidentally, however, while waiting for the subway, one guy with his wide-brimmed sport team hat and baggy jeans, again, leaned in to me for a full sentence: "It is too hot to be drinking that coffee [on the subway]." Really? Or, you could have walked by and said absolutely nothing. 

Ugh, I get it, critics. I've heard it 50 million-thousand times (again, trying to make a point): they are only being friendly; just smile back and say hello. But, the difference is that it is unwanted attention. And I don't want to smile back. 

I wonder if harassers feel provoked while trying to get home.  

What do you think?

The West/Smiley Criticism of President Obama Comes Down to Ego

By D. Price

RCJ News Op-Ed Contributor

Dr. Cornell West’s take on President Obama’s comments following the George Zimmerman verdict—“But we are a nation of laws, and a jury has spoken”—have left me stunned. Here is one of West’s comments: "We know anybody who tries to rationalize the killing of innocent people is a criminal. George Zimmerman is a criminal. But President Obama is a global George Zimmerman because he tries to rationalize the killing of innocent children...”

Growing up in New Jersey and New York, West’s name was highly regarded in my home. Primarily because of my father, who like West, also studied theology and is a Princeton alum. I remember Dr. West’s name coming up in several of my father’s conversations on myriad topics ranging from politics, race and Christianity.   

Princeton University Professor Dr. Cornel West (Credit: AFP/Getty Images)

Princeton University Professor Dr. Cornel West (Credit: AFP/Getty Images)

  

Now an adult with my own family, I’d like to think West’s name will be highly regarded in my home; synonymous with people like Cory Booker, Anthony Foxx and (yeah) Jay-Z. But, sadly, after West’s recent rants, I am not hopeful the latter may be true.

West is not the only black activist or media figure who feels President Obama’s post-verdict remarks were insufficient in addressing the dissatisfaction Trayon Martin supporters feel. Tavis Smiley took to Twitter stating: “Took POTUS almost a week to show up and express mild outrage. And still, it was as weak as pre-sweetened Kool-Aid.”

Honestly, I was a bit surprised President Obama commented at all. While I wanted him to, I understand the compromising position in which he is often placed because of his biracial status. Especially in this particular case, when black, white and brown faces were involved.

So forgive me, but that is why I assumed the “Dr. West’s” and “Tavis Smiley’s” of the world would be less caustic in their public judgment of the president’s comments. Yes, the Trayvon Martin verdict speaks to the serious level of racial injustice in the United States. But, in President Obama’s defense, what everyone must remember is that while he “could have been Trayvon Martin 35 years ago,” there is a significant difference between he and Trayvon Martin that many African Americans choose to ignore: President Obama’s mother.

The president has been careful about racializing issues during his presidency, which may attribute to blacks overlooking his biracial status. Regardless of whether he has chosen to identify more with his black roots than his white, President Obama cannot escape the fact that he shares a commonality with the racial majority in America. That is why he must be extremely careful of every single thing he says.

But West seems not to be so careful. To say that, “President Obama is a global George Zimmerman,” is offensive and blasphemous. The word rationalize means an: Attempt to explain or justify (one's own or another's behavior or attitude) with logical, plausible reasons, even if these are not true. While West and others might not agree with President Obama’s comments that the “jury has spoken…” right or wrong, the verdict is final. The president’s statement doesn't mean he agreed with the jury’s decision. He was simply reiterating the facts, which cannot be changed, so now it is time for everyone to move forward.

West also said that the president is responsible for “criminalizing” the black poor and creating the “re-niggerizing of the black professional class.”  This I find quite interesting for two reasons: West is a member of the black professional class, and, while West does a superb job of pinpointing all that President Obama is not doing, I have yet to see any successful proposals or solutions of his own, such as voter registration drives, that aim to combat the plight of Americas’ poor.

A bit softer than West, regarding President Obama’s second public statement following the Trayvon Martin verdict, Tavis Smiley on NBC’s Meet the Press said, “a week of protests outside the White House, pressure building on him inside the White House, pushed him [the president] to that podium.” Maybe it did. Either way, Smiley later stated, “I disagree with the president, respectfully, that politicians, [and] elected officials, can’t occupy this space on race.”

If it is in fact public knowledge that the president would rather not use his position to discuss race and/or the events surrounding the Trayon Martin verdict, as one could easily see how that might become problematic, what more is there to say?

Maybe it’s just a case of different opinions. Maybe West, Smiley and Obama simply cannot agree to disagree. Whatever it is, there has to be more to West and Smiley’s blatant animosity toward the president than that.

Ironically, there is.

In 2008, then, Senator Obama, declined Tavis Smiley’s invitation to the 2008 State of the Black Union forum in New Orleans. With campaign and traveling conflicts, he offered to send Michelle Obama instead, to which Mr. Smiley declined. Feel free to read the president’s apology letter to Tavis Smiley, here.

Smiley and West (Credit: DemocracyNow.org)

Four years later, a similar, yet, more personal blunder occurred with West. According to him, phone calls to President Obama were not returned, and he and his mother were slighted on tickets to the second inauguration. You can read more about that story, here.

Most Americans do not know what it is like to have a personal relationship with a United States president. And those who are privileged to be among the elite inner circles obviously feel entitled to certain luxuries such as: having Mr. Obama speak at their functions, return their phone calls or provide them with tickets to presidential events.  But if the goal is to do work that reduces or eliminates the ills that plague black America, how can that be done when leaders of the black community continue to tear theirs down in public every chance they get?

Based on the facts presented, I cannot be certain that Dr. Cornell West and Tavis Smiley would be harboring the same disgust for President Obama’s policies on race and economics, had the events in 2008 and 2012 not occurred. For that reason, Cory Booker, Anthony Foxx and yes, Jay-Z, will continue to be highly regarded names in my home.

Edward Snowden Can Keep A Secret

The recently sheltered, and alleged leaker, Edward Snowden is good at keeping secrets. Just not secrets about national security.

According to news sources (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2341691/Edward-Snowdens-girlfriend-Lindsay-Mills-feels-betrayed-world-caved-in.html), Snowden never told his girlfriend, Lindsay Mills, 28, that he planned to leak pages of classified documents, jeopardizing US national security and adding strain to US relations with other countries, notably Russia, where Snowden was granted a year of asylum.

Ueslei Marcelino/Reuters

NBC news has reported that Snowden's lawyer, Anatoly Kucherena, said that his client misses Mills, and in an article by UK publication the Daily Mail online Snowden kept her in the dark in order to protect her. Snowden and Mills lived in Hawaii and were dating for four or five years before Snowden suddenly fled to Hong Kong to leak the secrets. Friends close to the couple, some who did not want to be named, said that they were set to get engaged. And recently when talking to the media, Mills' father, Jonathan Mills, said that his daughter was heartbroken and "barely holding on" after Snowden left her without warning.

Arguably, one of the biggest leaks in US history comes down to loyalty. Snowden loved his girlfriend and wanted to protect her, so he kept a secret from her: he did not place her in harms way (if there would be repercussion on her from his leakage). Snowden has the ability to be loyal to Mills. But arguably, not to the NSA or USA, at least not during his three months as a CIA contractor.

But by revealing the US surveillance strategies -- the leaks allegedly revealed the depth of the National Security Agency's (NSA) 'spying' on communications transmitted between countries through their emails and phone calls -- isn't Snowden in effect putting his girlfriend in jeopardy? She is an American. And the government, simply put, is monitoring communications to protect its citizens.

Jonathan Mills said that Snowden was a man who "has strong convictions about right and wrong" and that "he must have found something disturbing him enough that he would go this far." What Snowden leaked was information regarding NSA operations called PRISM: collections of data from U.S. phone call records to search for possible links to terrorists abroad and surveillance of online communications to and from foreign targets to detect suspicious behavior. What was shocking about what he leaked was perhaps how much personal information the government has access to about us.

Lindsay Mills and Edward Snowden (by\telegraph.co.uk/Inside Edition)

But, doesn't the average American citizen already know that the government is, in a sense, 'watching us.' Is there really such thing as privacy in any country and how should that right evaporate if we are being protected? Legally, once issues of national security are involved, the government has standing to take protective action to do anything and everything it can to keep the country safe. It's not the prettiest thing in the world but, why risk not keeping us safe just so that an NSA agent in Virginia will not know what kind of clothing you buy -- although, I agree that they really do not need to know everything that we do.

So, Snowden was more loyal to his convictions (aka himself) than he was to Mills. After all, Mills is in 'the news cycle'; naked from any real protection.

What do you think?

Her Marriage to Lose

Huma Abedin is in Charge of her Decisions*

The problem is not her, it's him.

Huma Abedin’s husband, New York City Mayoral Candidate Anthony D. Weiner is in the middle of a second media lashing, but Abedin should not be.

Weiner recently admitted in a press conference with his wife by his side that he exchanged more salacious text messages with additional women after being snarled up in a sexting Twitter scandal that cost him his seat in the House in 2011. Sydney Leathers, 23, has come forward as one of the women he sent sexually explicit messages to under the pseudonym “Carlos Danger.”

But despite all of this, Abedin stood by him, making her own remarks at the press conference on Tuesday night. "Anthony’s made some horrible mistakes, both before he resigned from Congress and after. But I do very strongly believe that that is between us and our marriage."

She appears to be a fiercely loyal woman who is ambitious when it comes to what she wants and a successful husband might be something she's checked off on her list.

Not too long ago, prominently in the 50s and June Cleaver 60s, women stood by their men without saying anything at all. Sacrificing themselves for their husbands' success. At pseudo-aristocratic schools, for example, women were mocked for playing the "waiting game" in college, to graduate or not graduate, as long as they were headed for matrimony. A top notch Art History education doesn't matter just as long as she has dinner on the table by 7 O’clock. A Wellesley College professor like the one played by Julia Roberts in Mona Lisa Smile might have said exactly what she did in the movie:

“The perfect likeness of a Wellesley graduate, Magna Cum Laude doing exactly what she was trained to do. Slide. A Rhodes scholar. I wonder is she reciting Chaucer while she presses her husband's shirts. Slide. Heh, now you physics major's can calculate the mass and volume of every meat loaf you ever make. Slide. A girdle to set you free! What does that mean?... What does that mean?... What does it mean?”

Abedin is that Mona Lisa smile: A woman who has put her husband first before her career. A painful sacrifice? Yes. But hey, don't we all want our significant others to be successful?

It's also the “age old” traditional sacrifice that women have publicly shunned, but privately accepted; and then later on, endured those consequences. Especially a politicial wife.

Putting it simply, we all make some sacrifice or take what others might say is a foolish step for love. Brilliant women of the 50s stay at home with pots and pans; and in our time, Carrie Bradshaw's play for Mr. Big in Sex and the City made her seem foolish in some viewers’ eyes (secretly, don't we wish more men would do foolish stuff for us).

Instead politician’s wives, like Abiden, hear about the “mistakes” they’ve made from their woman peers that end up plastered in headlines like, "The Public Humiliation of Huma Abiden” and “The good wife? Oh, give us a break!” to name a few. It is completely unnecessary commentary. Seriously.

This agitated energy is again lost in a prosecution storm to publicly embarrass her even more for drawing a line in the sand. Yet, it seems to infuriate pundits. Lisa Bloom of CNN/HLN wrote,

“Isn't it time to call the spectacle of the suffering political wife, standing by her man in the media glare as he admits to his latest sexual offense against her, what it really is: spousal abuse?" ... "We have the right to say that we will not enable this anymore; we will not endorse it; we will not bless it just because it is her 'choice'."

The so-called media prosecution should aim itself at Weiner. And help voters figure out whether or not he is fit to run for office regardless of whether or not he's received public calls by actors (Alec Baldwin), rivals (NYC mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio) and media (the New York Times editorial board) to step down.

In her remarks, Abiden said it's been a few years since the first scandal and through “a lot” of therapy they have learned something. Not all women would have made Abiden’s decision to stand beside their men, but in 2013, exposure of these sexting, prostitutioning or canoodling scandals have forced political wives to be more present and more public than they want to be.

Today, Americans are in the ripe newness of successful watchdog adulterous political failures and it's carving out a new niche for commentary, not for going after the politicians, but instead after their spouses.

Since it's no longer 1950-something, just let women make their own personal choices and not get so "pundit-fied" about it.

What do you think?

*Photos by NPR.org and NYPost.com

You Can't Bring Skittles to a Gun Fight

Why Zimmerman Provoked Martin by Actively Profiling Him

They say that you can't bring a knife to a gun fight, which means that if you're going to get in to a fight at least let it be a fair one. But in the Trayvon Martin case -- the suggestion is not that Martin was prepared to fight (he did not have a weapon on him) or was even looking for one -- fairness was not the reality. Martin had Skittles and a soft drink in his hand, and George Zimmerman was carrying a gun.

Allegedly, Zimmerman, who was recently acquitted in the killing of Martin said that he was attacked by Martin and shot him to defend himself. Martin was walking through a Sanford, Fla. community neighborhood on the evening of February 26, 2012 when Zimmerman, a neighborhood watchman got out of his car to follow Martin. Zimmerman said that the two got in a physical fight and that's when Zimmerman shot and killed Martin.

The star witness for the prosecution in the case, Rachel Jenteal, Martin's friend, said it plainly: "He was just trying to get home."

Someone who is just trying to get home should not be profiled at all and certainly not in the same fashion as someone who is actually criminally suspicious. In order for a police officer, which Zimmerman was not, to stop someone they must have reasonable suspicion that the person has or is in the process of committing a crime. But here, that's not the issue. The issue is is active profiling provocation? And is it sufficient provocation that it rises to the level of aggression?

If a defendant is charged with murder and claims self defense, then the defendant, in this case Zimmerman, is saying that he or she was not the first aggressor: 'I did not start the fight, I was attacked.' Legally, however, the first aggressor is the person who started or provoked the fight and the jury has to decide who that was based on the order of events leading up to the fight. The first aggressor, in most cases, cannot claim self-defense and the defense wants to establish that the defendant was not the first aggressor. However, if the evidence points to the defendant being the first or original aggressor, the only way he or she can reclaim self-defense and "get off" for a legally justifiable homicide is if they withdraw from the fight and are attacked again.

Let's look at the analysis this way: You can't bring Skittles to a gun fight, you're just not prepared. But if you are carrying a gun, then you're prepared to fight.

When Zimmerman got out of his car and followed Martin because he was suspicious of the teenager he intended to take some kind of action. Zimmerman called the police, but did not wait for them to arrive nor did he say that had Martin engaged in any criminal action. According to court documents, he made up his mind that he would pursue Martin rather than wait for the police: "Fucking punks," Zimmerman is recorded as saying before leaving the car, "these assholes always get away."

Get away from doing what? Was Martin engaging in criminal activity? No, there is no evidence of that. The "assumption," as John Guy stated, was that Zimmerman believed Martin was doing something bad, yet there was no evidence of that. Only Skittles, oh yes, and Arizona Iced Tea.


So, what does all this have to do with starting a fight. It has to do with human instinct and the mind set of the person. Being pursued by someone is not fun. It's scary, and the instinct is to turn around and face it or run. The aggressor initiates the fight by finding a way to pick the fight. And active profiling is picking a fight, you're asking for confrontation.

Based on interviews with Rachel Jenteal, Martin was a "loving guy" who would not hurt anyone (there was testimony from Zimmerman's trainer that he was "soft," but, at what point was he fearful because he followed Martin at night with a gun). An altercation occurred as Martin probably felt as though he had to defend himself from a "crazy ass, c******."  And Zimmerman shot him.

According to a report from NAACP President Benjamin Jealous (on CNN), Zimmerman had a history of profiling people. But as it was probably too prejudicial, this fact was not entered into evidence. A history or record of profiling is some form of provocation. Provocation is aggression. Aggression is not self-defense. It's just like bringing a gun to fight someone carrying Skittles: you know you can't lose.

What do you think?

*Photo credit nydailynews.com

DOMA, the Voting Rights Act and Me

Up until a few days ago, I did not think that gay rights could affect me. My reasoning was narrow: I'm not gay.

But, when I read the New York Times breaking news alert on my BlackBerry, (yes, I STILL have a BlackBerry) that the Supreme Court ruled the Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional, I wondered what does this milestone really mean. I thought, okay, gay people can legally get married...in some states, but not all states. And...

I didn't think this way brutishly, I just did not fully engage in the magnitude of what it meant for gay people. After all, to be honest, I had had mixed feelings about Court's ruling on the Voting Rights Act just days before DOMA.

Historically, the Court seemed to plainly say (with respect to the Voting Rights Act): we are in touch with what civil rights meant to the country in the 50s and 60s, 70s and 80s and 90s, but today, it doesn't mean the same thing anymore. Constitutionally, the Court said: we find that the right to vote for minority people is held to a lower level of scrutiny than it did in the 50s and 60s, 70s and 80s and 90s; it falls below the strict scrutiny standard, and floats somewhere between intermediate scrutiny and the rational basis test. (the strict scrutiny standard gets the highest level of review in which the challenging party must show the Court that there is a greater compelling government interest than that fundamental right -- voting is a fundamental right, marriage is not).

To me, it seemed as though the Court was taking away one right and giving another. Substituting decades of a necessary freedom to the impingement of another. As if, both rights could not co-exist or one suddenly became more important, more popular than the other. I was confused. The gay community was granted a right not guaranteed by the Constitution. Yet, simply, the right to vote was deemed constitutionally guaranteed and amended for all persons (African-American men were guaranteed the right to vote with the passage of the 15th Amendment; women earned the right to vote under the 19th Amendment to the Constitution in 1920), but taken away. The ruling was a reversal of sorts and yet, extremely hypocritical.

Marc Morial, President and CEO of the National Urban League, wrote about the meaning of the Shelby County v. Holder, the case permitting the establishment of Voting Rights Act for The Grio:

"There is no “unalienable right” more fundamental to our democracy than the right to vote.  Yet, last week, the Supreme Court made a tragic decision by ruling that Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional. For the purpose of providing stringent remedies where appropriate, Section 4 established a formula to identify those areas in the country where racial discrimination has been most prevalent.  Section 4 is the foundation upon which Section 5 stands, which requires states or local governments with a history of voting discrimination to get approval from the federal government before making any changes to their voting laws or procedures.  While the ruling did not invalidate the principle that preclearance can be required, it held that Section 4 can no longer be used – virtually rendering Section 5 ineffective unless and until Congress creates a new formula to determine which states and counties should be covered by it."

The White House issued a statement on the reversal of Shelby County v. Holder. President Obama suggested that while the Supreme Court acknowledged that "voting discrimination still exists" their ruling turned a blind eye to justice. 

Frankly, I thought about black gay persons. Does this mean that they can marry (in some states) but they might be hassled for legally casting a vote in other states? That in some future context, they have the right to legally marry in that state, but not to inextricably vote? This overarching justice by the Court still seemed as though it would not reach all persons.

I covered the Pride Fest Parade here in New York and was present for a press conference where Harry Belafonte, an award-winning African-American actor and activist, was honored as one of the parade's Grand Marshals. Belafonte, who is not gay,  spoke about injustice in the gay community and quoted Dr. Martin Luther King's Letter from a Birmingham Jail: "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." But Belafonte did not use the word civil rights to describe the gay community's struggle for equality, he instead, referred to it as human rights.

I began to wonder: weren't gay persons asking for a civil right too? Are the benefits that come with the right to marry considered a civil right or a human right? Is there an astute difference?


Regardless of whether the Court ruled that DOMA is unconstitutional, the gay community might understand, like I do, that equality comes in bits and pieces. And this fickleness, without parallel comparison, proves that we have a lot more in common than I thought.

What do you think?

Sensor journalism and ballet @CrosbyVenture @rcj7

Check out our work on sensor journalism and ballet with the Tow Center for Digital Journalism!

http://towcenter.org/blog/sensors-pierce-crosby-rachael-johnson-on-%E2%80%A8motion-sensing-the-ballet/

Not so "Fired up And Ready to Go'

Mott Haven residents waffle about re-electing Obama*

By Rachael Johnson

Outside the Bronx Preparatory School in Mott Haven, passerby Orville Brown leaned back and sighed deeply, "No. I'm not voting for him again," he said. A Jamaican-born, night school teacher who’s lived in Mott Haven since 2007, Brown did not feel 'fired up and ready to go' as the President's campaign message suggested four years ago. “I campaigned for him, volunteered for him, went to the inauguration and froze my ears off for him, but I’m thoroughly disappointed,” Brown said.


Brown voted for President Obama in 2008, but said that this time around he’s voting for the Republican nominee Mitt Romney because he hasn’t seen enough of the changes that the president promised. “He’s an intellectual," Brown said of Obama. "He doesn’t have a grasp on how the economy works.”

Brown also said the President wasn’t strong enough on foreign policy issues, “He told Medvedev that he would think about the issues in Russia after the campaign was over.”

In the middle of the same block, a mix of 6th, 7th and 8th graders lingered in front of a colossal blue door to the front of the schoolwaiting for their parents to come pick them up. But Terrence Debrecourt, a parent, was already there looking for his two kids. The single dad of three children has struggled for several months to find work. “It’s tough. I live here in the Bronx and we have the highest unemployment,” said Debrecourt. “The President of the United States is afraid to stand up for black issues.”


Unemployment in New York City is 9.1 percent and 14 percent in the Bronx, according to reports by the New York Times. The U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics reported that while the nation’s unemployment rate has dropped to 7.6 percent, black unemployment remains high at 14.1 percent. Mott Haven’s population is 25 percent black. This crushingly high unemployment rate in the black community has effectively made politicians consider it a ‘black issue’.


“I’m not sure that Romney will help, but Republicans are smart enough to know that if we hurt, they hurt too,” expressed Debrecourt who voted for Obama in 2008, but thinks that since that time the president has not done enough to address black issues. “He wants to let them know that ‘I’m with you’ and not necessarily with us,” he said.


Four years ago, Mott Haven residents and businessmen were some of the presidents’ strongest supporters. But on the corner of Alexander Ave and E 138th St, there’s not a consistent voice of support for the president despite the fact that the city was deep Obama territory in 2008.


Kimberly Rodriguez, 24 said that she wouldn’t vote for Romney. “Obama picked up the pieces and got us this far and Romney is going to put us back in a sink hole,” Rodriguez said. “Honestly, when I saw the post of when Osama Bin Ladden was dead, I felt that peace.”


She also said that she felt shut out by Romney’s comments about the fact that 47 percent of Americans won’t vote for him because they are victims who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them. “Anyone that doesn’t have a high income, they are going to shut off these programs to the people living in poverty.” Rodriguez said that she voted from Obama in 2008, but she hasn’t decided if she will vote in this election, “They benefit. The politicians. It’s not my vote, it’s their vote,” she said.

Kim Haden walked around the green subway gate behind the NYPD’s 40th precinct to avoid bumping into people entering the underground No. 6  station. "I'm voting for Obama because he's getting stuff done," said Haden, who had just picked up her two sons from school. "He's a black president!" exclaimed Elijah Woods, Haden's 7 year-old son. "I think about what he's doing now and [will do] in the future. For my children's future; is why I'm voting for him," she said.
  
Sabrina Ramirez, 24, was headed home to 145 Brook Ave from working as a receptionist at a flower shop. "I'm not voting this year,” said Ramirez who voted for Obama in 2008. "I haven't seen any changes," she explained.


But, Ramirez also said that people haven’t given Obama enough of a chance, “You can’t do what you need to do for the whole country in four years,” she said. Ramirez, who was out of work for almost two years before finding employment, said she wanted more job training programs to assist with finding work.  “It’s [still] so hard now to get a job,” she said.
 
Alex James, the musical director at the Bronx Temple Seventh-day Adventist Church in Mott Haven, has seen the changes put forth by the president.  “Folks aren’t aware of what he’s done. The programs in place for housing; and in 2010 he stopped the abuses of the banks,”he said. “With what I’ve seen him do, he’s gone over the top to get my vote. Not because he’s a person of color, but all he’s done.”

Despite the lack of excitement by those who were once ‘fired up and ready to go’ for Obama in 2008, James said there’s a certain amount of activity for the president in the neighborhood. “The Hispanic involvement is strong. They seem to function as one heartbeat,” he said.

Romeo Valentino grew up in Mott Haven and attended St. Jerome’s Church on 138^th St and Alexander Ave. His business is within walking distance from St. Jerome’s Church on Willis Avenue.  “As a business owner, I am a Republican. My whole family is Republican, but I’m definitely voting for Obama because he supported immigration laws for this area,” said Valentino.  Valentino owns a driving school and said that under President Obama, the community will get stronger. “With the Dream Act, people will help build the economy, get driver’s licenses [and] people working behind the restaurant [counters] can get out and really work,” he said.

Briseida Bravo crosses in front of St. Jerome’s Church and speed walks to a Yoga class. Next week, Briseida plans to vote for Obama. She explained that the last four years under Obama have been better for her than under President Bush. “The government is peaceful,” she said in broken English. “A lot of money and a lot of persons killed,” she said referring to the war in Iraq that started under President Bush’s presidency, but ended in President Obama’s first term. She doesn’t feel connected to Romney because she fears that he’d be “racismo” and not for the interest of all people.

It’s expected that President Obama will win all of New York’s 31 electoral votes on Election Day according to the web site fivethirtyeight.com, a New York Times well-respected blog, but the people who choose to support him hope their voices will be heard this time. “There is still opportunity out there to live the American dream,” said Valentino.

*This story was reported in November 2012

Council members take lead on immigration reform

New York Council Members Pass Resolution Putting Pressure on Congress and the President

By Rachael Johnson

A City Council committee unanimously passed a resolution urging Congress and President Obama to take action on immigration reform legislation this year.

Daniel Dromm, a Queens council member and chair of the Committee on Immigration, said he hopes the resolution will put pressure on Congress to pass comprehensive reform. He said that New York and others states are “taking things in to their own hands” by putting forth legislation at the local level in order to put pressure on Congress and the president to move forward at the federal level. They’re hoping that if enough local and state governments pass these resolutions that Congress will take heed.

The council committee’s resolution will now go to the full council for more debate and a final vote. The resolution includes specific proposals modeled after legislation that failed at the federal level that the council seeks to revamp and enact at the local level. These include the DREAM Act, which would allow states to provide higher education benefits to immigrants living in America illegally; the Uniting American Families Act (UAFA), which include the definition “permanent partner” to include same-sex couples in order to grant them the same protections in the Immigration and Nationality Act; and the POWER Act which sought to expand the U-visa to give immigrant victims of labor law violations the opportunity to apply for legal status. Their hope is that this kind of legislation at the local level will address some of the problems that immigrant families face.

These problems include college-level students without legal permission to live here who face barriers to higher education; immigrants victimized by fraudulent immigration service providers; and allowing sponsorship for immigrants in same-sex relationships. According to the bill, there are some 475,000 immigrant workers living in New York State who are facing these problems. The goal is to help immigrants who are  living in New York State illegally, but looking for a path to citizenship.

 “This city was built by immigrants,” Dromm said after casting his vote. “[We] should not deny inclusion.”

The last four sessions of Congress have failed to pass any immigration reform bill.

Jumaane Williams, a Brooklyn council member who voted for the resolution said that rallies on Capitol Hill during last year’s election and currently have kept the immigration issue front and center. “We try to pretend that immigrants don’t make this country run,” Williams said before delivering his vote. “I proudly vote aye” in favor of the resolution.

Council Member Mathieu Eugene of Brooklyn, who cast the fifth vote, is the first Haitian-born member of the City Council.  Not surprisingly, Eugene voted in favor of the resolution, and said that he knows what it’s like being an immigrant in the United States. “We have to give other immigrants the same opportunities,” he said after casting his vote. “The concept of America is that everyone can come in.”

Dromm pointed out that New York State has the second largest group of immigrants in America, 4.3 million, and thus passing this resolution would benefit the entire state. Only California, with 10 million immigrants, has more. Texas is third with 4.1 million immigrants; Florida almost 4 million and New Jersey came in fifth with 1.8 million immigrants.

Dromm  said he expects the bill to pass in a upcoming full council meeting.  “It’s important for Americans to be part of the American dream,” Dromm said.  

Mayor Edward Koch's Final Tribute

Mourners say goodbye to one of NYC's finest

By Rachael Johnson

With the eulogies finished and the organ playing “New York, New York,” the wooden casket containing the body of Mayor Edward Koch was carried through the throng at Temple Emanu-El in Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

And then something unusual happened: The mourners burst into spontaneous applause.

“I’ve never been to a funeral where people clapped as the casket went by,” said mourner Edward Summer. “He was a straight shooter.”

“It was a nice tribute,” said Fernando Ferrer, former Bronx borough president and now the acting chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. “A nice send-off.”

For a little over an hour on Monday morning, the sanctuary was filled with hundreds who had come to mourn Koch, who died Friday at the age of 88. The crowd included family, friends, such politicians as President Bill Clinton and Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and fellow New Yorkers who knew and loved Koch.

“No mayor ever embodied spirit like Ed,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “He knew that New York was more than a place, but a state of mind.”

Bloomberg said that before he began his run for office, he asked Koch for advice. “Be yourself. Say what you believe and don’t worry about what people think,” Bloomberg said. “God knows he didn’t.”

Later on, when Bloomberg turned to him again for political advice about how to improve the city’s health system, Koch told him, “Limit the size of sugary drinks; no one will notice,” he recalled as the audience chuckled.

Koch was the city’s 105^th mayor. He was born in the Bronx, and graduated from New York University School of Law in 1948.

In 1966, he was elected to the City Council from Greenwich Village.  After leaving the council, Koch served in the U.S. Congress for five terms and then served as mayor from 1978 to1989. He served three terms, becoming the first mayor in history to receive both the Democratic and Republican nominations in 1981.

“He said, I’m still liberal, but I’m sane,’” President Clinton said. “He had a big brain, but he had a bigger heart.”

Koch’s close friend, James F. Gill, whom Koch appointed as chairman of the Joint Commission on Integrity in the Public Schools in 1988, also spoke at the funeral. Gill recalled a time when the two walked down the street after his fourth mayoral campaign ended in a loss to David Dinkins. People told Koch that he should run again. “He’d reply, ‘No. The people threw me out and now the people must be punished,’” Gill said, drawing laughs from the crowd.

Longtime friend John LoCicero, who first met Koch in 1963 when Koch was the district leader in Greenwich Village, said that he cherished his friend’s honesty. “He was real and didn’t cater to anyone, and that came through,” LoCicero said.

Outside, friends gathered around the temple after the casket was driven away to the cemetery.

Former NYC mayoral candidate Mark Green noted that he, too, came to celebrate Koch’s life of service. “Ed and I had a contentious start, but we respected each other.”

We Are Organized

Frustrated Bronx tenants warn future buyers of decrepit building*

By Rachael Johnson

The signs taped to the inside windows of a first floor apartment building may be homemade, but passersby can’t help but take notice. “Buyer Beware”, “We Are Organized” and “We Know our Rights” are not just idle action words. Several residents of 1265 College Avenue in the Bronx are in the third month of an ongoing litigation against College Management, a private company cited as New York City’s number one worst landlord.

 “That’s the tenant’s association,” said Angel Caballero Rodriguez, a resident of the building, referring to the maker of the signs.  “To let them (potential buyers of the building) know that we have issues here,” and that the tenants were not pushovers.  Rodriguez formed the association and was one of several who joined an action to bring a 7A claim –an administrative removal of the current landlord -- against College Management. In essence, petitioners have asked the court to appoint an administrator to run the building in place of the owner. “It’s the last resort,” said Ian Davie, attorney for Rodriguez and the other tenants, “once you notify the landlord, and call the city.”

Rodriguez, who lives in building 1265, apartment 2A, has lived there for more than 50 years and said that getting the landlord, Eli Abbot, to complete repairs was an ongoing struggle. “We have repairs and he refuses to do them. Now that we’ve sued, he’s making it look like he’s doing all this work,” he said. Rodriguez pointed out that recently contractors had come in to paint parts of the building. “I’ve been doing all my repairs,” Rodriguez said as he walked up the stairs. The landlord is supposed to do the major fixes, the plumbing or electrical work, he said. Instead, Rodriguez, who had holes in his walls, a vermin problem, and needed repairs to his kitchen, said that he has done minor fixes, like sheet rocking, plastering and painting. “You wait for the people to come do the work, but sometimes they aren’t experienced enough, so I do it myself,” he said.

Rodriguez said that 1265 was once a nice place to live, but today, with poor or no repair work being done, a landlord who appears indifferent, the building in foreclosure, tenants in litigation, a building that’s for sale and in the middle of negotiations to be sold for the third time in just a few years, it’s certainly not what it used to be. “It’s an old building and if you don’t keep it up, it gets worse,” said resident Danielle Cipriano.

Abbot’s company, College Management, had a combined 724 violations for three of its buildings, according to the NY office of the public advocate. Tenants in each of the three attached buildings-- 1259, 1265, and 1269 College Avenue -- have reported Class A, B or C violations. Building 1265, where Rodriguez lives, has 232 violations, 26 of them are Class C violations. Class C violations, described by Wiley Norvell, a spokesman for the office of the public advocate, are “anything immediately hazardous. Urgent, needing to get people out of the building; an exit problem, if the building has no hot water, lead paint, especially if there are children.”

“Kids are constantly running. They could get hurt,” Rodriguez said about the worn metal material peeling off  the window seals on each floor. “You’re not safe going up and down the stairs,”he said, pointing to visible cracks on the stairs of the walkup building. “It’s not livable.”

In courtroom 560 last Thursday, Abbot sat quietly at the defendant’s table making his first appearance since the trial began in June. He was listening to testimony from his contractor Robert Riviera about the painting he had completed in the building. Every so often, Abbot would put his hand on his head and rub his brow. According to the Housing Preservation and Development office (HPD), Abbott is listed as the head officer of College Management, but College Management is not included as a party on the foreclosure complaint.

College Management is listed as the buildings’ owner on the Department of Buildings’ sign that hangs above the tenants’ mailboxes in 1265. Rodriguez’s name, along with 36 additional tenants --including 10 “John Does”-- are listed on the foreclosure complaint. Davie confirmed that the property was being foreclosed on, but there are several other oddities about the case. “There’s a different name on the deed to the building,” Davie said.  “It’s not really clear [what’s happening].”  

It was a little after 5p.m. and Danielle Cipriano was just home from work.” We have every kind of rodent, every kind of problem,” she said standing in the first floor hallway. Mice and roaches have found their way into 4A, Cipriano’s apartment. Vermin are classified by HPD as a Class B violation, posing a threat to one’s health, but not an immediate threat. According to a building registration summary report compiled by the HPD, she has reported nine violations in her apartment. Six of those are Class B violations.

“The buildings are old and not kept up properly,” said Cipriano, who has lived at1265 College Ave for seven years. Cipriano has  dealt with several problems, she’s had water leaking in her bathroom since 2006 and said that a contractor was just sent to do the repairs. “It’s constant, they just replaced my pipe,” she said, leaning against a wall that she didn’t notice had fresh paint on it. “Ugh,” she sighed while looking over her shoulder at the marigold-colored on her suit jacket. “I smelled it. I just didn’t know where it was.” There was no sign to warn residents that the walls were still wet.

According to the building registration summary report, Cipriano also reported a Class C violation in January of this year, under Section 27-2005, 2007 of the housing code, which describes “the illegal fastening of a lockable slide bolt installed onto the exterior of door (egress room).” It appeared as though Abbott had illegally barred her from entering her own apartment. “The landlord tends to harass them,” said Ian Davie, the tenant’s attorney. “He’ll walk through the building on Sunday morning, banging on doors to collect rent. He’s been doing that for years.”

Davie will litigate two more cases against Mr. Abbot. Dominga Sanchez, also Davie’s client, is one of several others who live at  1259 College Avenue (adjacent to building 1265) and who joined a separate suit.

In apartment 1B, Sanchez slides her foamy leather couch back from the wall exposing the sinking, warped and peeling flooring. She points to a part of the ripped flooring while finishing up a phone call and then walks into the kitchen. When she hangs up, she explains through a Spanish language translator that three months ago, pieces of the kitchen ceiling started to break off and fall to the floor. Then  she motions to the bottom of her fridge which has collected brown stains from rust and decay. She said she’s been waiting, ever since the day she moved in -- a year and eight months  -- for a new fridge.

“Repair it and let us live as human beings,” she said in Spanish as Rodriguez translated. “No one should live like this, not even animals.”

Susanna Blankley, director of housing organizing at the Community Action for Safe Apartments (CASA) worked with the tenants of 1265 so they would be in a stronger position to assert their collective rights for fairer housing conditions. Blankley declined to give details about specific issues tenants had with Abbott and the building during a phone interview, due to the sensitivity of the buildings’ current business negotiations, but did confirm that the building had been up for sale, and that they are currently negotiating for a new owner to purchase buildings 1259, 1265 and 1269.

"Whoever gets the building, there are people here who have had longevity, and I hope the changes are better off for everybody,” Rodriguez said.  Davie said that their main focus was to help the tenants. “We have no problem with the building being sold, so long as it’s sold to a responsible purchaser who won’t put the tenants through the same problems they’ve experienced for so long.”

*This story was written but not published for the web in November 2012.