SistahSpeak

Lately the Black Woman has been blown away by certain realizations. On the drive home one of my dear friends asked me when the Civil Rights Movement began for me. Hers began in the early sixties. She is white. Though she is older than I, my awareness being black started earlier. In the fifties. Emmet Til. His mother insisted that his coffin be opened. She wanted the world to see what hatred and racism had done to her son. I saw it. It changed me. I remember thinking at the time ‘this shit has got to stop’

The fifties and sixties were an odd mixture of exuberance and profound sadness. Racism stole my childhood. Such as it was. Innocence. Gone. Forever.

My parents did all they could to shelter me. I was grown before I realized that on every trip we made south, there was a point both coming and going where we had adventure by using the side of the highway. The point was the Mason-Dixon line. I never once saw a bathroom marked colored.

I went to see a movie with my cousin down south. The Old Country for many black folk. I didn’t think anything about sitting in the balcony. I went to the balcony in Chicago cause I liked it. Sometime mid movie my cousin mentioned that only white folks could sit downstairs. My soda fell from the balcony onto an anonymous head downstairs. I reacted. I was wrong. And too young to know. I was doing the same thing that needed changing in white folks. Just on a smaller scale.

There was so much pain in the sixties. Too many funerals. Too many goodbyes.

Also two words never before uttered changed me deeply. Black Power Black. Power.

What will you tell your children you did for the revolution?

I dreamed of revolution. Prayed for it. Revolution when it came arrived quietly. Out of nowhere.

Barack Hussein Obama. Many led the revolution. Many fought for it. Many died. He represented. That is the nature of the backlash. We won. The revolution.

From the back of the bus to Air Force One. In my lifetime. My brother was quite correct. The revolution was televised. And the world saw and rejoiced.

Now run and tell that.

Cross Posted at www.progressivepoc.com

(17)

Patricia Arnold

Love your voice. Felt your heart. Great post!
Anonymous

Thanks, Sistah-Woman! I’ve missed you.
- Anonymous
  
  Hey Sistah Ha!Ha! I’ve missed being here.
Anonymous

thank you…love this post!
- Anonymous
  
  Thanks. I appreciate you reading it.
Anonymous

Thanks, Robinswing.

Now we work to give even greater depth and breadth to the revolution.

We would be fools to think that one man, one president, can create all the necessary change and make it long-lasting.

That’s what movements are for: to help give grass roots support to efforts for deep, lasting change.
- Anonymous
  
  Agreed. Though this isn’t about one man except for what he represents. He does truly represent the revolution and we must not be distracted into believing otherwise. Ironic that our enemies politically seem to grasp this more than many of us.
nancy a heitzeg

Thank You

And we are not going back..

Only forward now — the only way
- Anonymous
  
  Absolutely Sistah Nancy. We have come to far to turn back now.
Anonymous

I’m slightly embarrassed for my generation. Yes one of us is President of the United States, but I feel we haven’t done much to advance the rights won for us by our parents. I think the next step is insisting on absolute respect. A Goodwin Law of the Blacks where if a pundit goes on TV and says our Blacks are better she loses the ability to make money in this country. When a group wants to call itself the 99% yet have less than 1% non white faces speaking for the group it will be deemed illegitimate on it’s face for solely that point.
- Seeta Persaud
  
  I share this sentiment. We also have some unique challenges. The sixties gave us the Title VII, the Voting Rights Act and other civil rights legislation. Although monumental, we not only have issues with enforcement of these laws, but the burden of “prosecution” falls on the everyday David (rather than the State) up against a monstrous Goliath.
  
  Today, we have more race neutral laws that we know have a disparate impact on people of color or are selectively enforced against people of color — e.g., the criminal code. It seems challenging to get folks to rally around something that may not be explicitly codified, although it is implemented in a very disparate way.
  
  Perhaps part of that has to do with getting folks to wake up through consciousness raising efforts. But at some point consciousness raising has to transform into concrete mobilization efforts to end unjust practices. With regard to those concrete efforts — some of these grassroots efforts are happening — but on the scale that it should be. Why is that? Too many distractions? Apathy? No time? Too busy putting food on the table? All of the above?
  
  With all the technology that we have though, our generation can do better.
  - Anonymous
    
    I love your generation. Your mere existence points to a victory for those who carried the torch before you. We have all done better. The revolution has been won. Now we must work hard to institutionalize it. As hard as some are working to dismantle it. This may indeed take time. We must not however forget…the revolution was televised. The Arab Spring followed Spring in this country. This after an almost three hundred year winter in the United States of America. Remember papers and people around the world celebrating our victory. We won. Are winning.
    - Seeta Persaud
      
      Hey sis Wing…I was in the process of moving this weekend and wanted to write back. Thank you for putting things in perspective. I needed that reminder. And yes, we must institutionalize the revolution. So brilliantly said. Thank you.
- Anonymous
  
  I hear you Dearest Brother.
  What I would like to emphasize is a completely different vantage point in herstory.
  The so-called MSM continues to sing the song of failure for they do not want to admit we won. We won without the majority of a whites in this country. Dissembling this truth in an effort to undo what has been done seems to be the primary goal. Disallowing our victory is their only hope in reversing what has occurred. The lesson of 2008 is we cannot truly be stopped. Only we have the power to undo. It is Power to the People!
Seeta Persaud

Powerful and meditative, Robinswing. It’s difficult to shelter children from racism. I remember understanding “the ways of the world” very deeply as a child.

And even now as an adult, my young nephews and nieces know [deeply] both the vernacular and the daily experience of being non-white in a white hegemonic America that confers unearned institutionalized privileges to those without pigmentation. The imperialists and European conquerors believe that this lack of pigmentation indicates dominance and cultural superiority. Almost sounds like a bad children’s scary-tale.

We’ve come a long way from back of the bus to Air Force One, indeed. But even on Air Force One, the imperialists and the conquerors still demand our birth certificate and school transcripts. Even on Air For One, we are subjected to different standards of excellence and excessive scrutiny.

Every day of the past three years has been a battle. Not that everyday isn’t already a battle. But the backlash against black and brown America for having a black family in the white house has been monstrous. Not that we didn’t know this was coming, mind you.

—-
On another note, Happy Veteran’s Day and Happy 11/11/11.
- Anonymous
  
  We might have known,but they didn’t. Could not accept what they saw coming. Do not want to accept it now. Some would have us believe we can be stopped. We cannot. The wind is blowing in a different direction. The sounds we hear are those of the dinosaur dying. Noisy creatures those dinosaurs.

CMP

Educate, Agitate, Organize