The Invisible Man, Harlem, New York, 1952. By: Gordon Parks
Month: July 2013
Black History Fact Of The Day
On this day in 1874, Patrick Francis Healey, the first Black man to receive a PhD, was named president of Georgetown University.
Quote Of The Day
Kwame Ture Critiques Martin Luther King’s Protest Strategy
Black History Fact Of The Day
Harriet Tubman was born Araminta Ross. She changed her name after marriage.
Harriet Tubman is said to be the first woman to lead an armed expedition in the Civil War. Harriet Tubman bravely freed hundreds of slaves, including herself and members of her family.
Quote Of The Day
Riddle Me This: The Suggestible Mind Edition
“Imagine that I’m a professor, and I’ve asked you to come and see me in my office. You walk down a long corridor, come through the doorway, and sit down at a table. In front of you is a sheet of paper with a list of five-word sets. I want you to make a grammatical four-word sentence as quickly as possible out of each set. It’s a scrambled-sentence test. Ready?
1) him was worried she always
2) from are Florida oranges temperature
3) ball the throw toss silently
4) shoes give replace old the
5) he observes occasionally people watches
6) be will sweat lonely they
7) sky the seamless gray is
8) should now withdraw forgetful we
9) us bingo sing play let
10) sunlight makes temperature wrinkle raisins
That seemed straightforward, right? Actually it wasn’t. After you finished that test- believe it or not- you would have walked out of my office and back down the hall more slowly than you walked in. With that test, I affected the way you behaved. How? Well, look back at the list. Scattered throughout it are certain words, such as ‘worried,’ ‘Florida,’ ‘old,’ ‘lonely,’ ‘gray,’ ‘bingo,’ and ‘wrinkle.’ You thought that I was just making you take a language test. But, in fact, what I was doing was making the big computer in your brain- your adaptive unconscious- think about the state of being old. It didn’t inform the rest of your brain about its sudden obsession. But it took all this talk of old age so seriously that by the time you finished and walked down the corridor, you acted old. You walked slowly.
The test was devised by a very clever psychologist named John Bargh. It’s an example of what is called a priming experiment, and Bargh and others have done numerous even more fascinating variations of it, all of which show just how much goes on behind that locked door of or unconscious.” -From, “Blink” By: Malcolm Gladwell
After reading the above book excerpt, I must ask: How suggestible is the human mind? How is the suggestibility of our minds manipulated?
Black History Fact Of The Day
Emmit McHenry founded Network Solutions, Inc. the internet domain services provider. He basically created .com.
TODAY IS BUY BLACK FRIDAY
PLEASE PASS THIS ON! (EACH ONE TEACH ONE OR TWO!) THIS IS PHASE ONE ON HOW WE CAN HELP TO STRENGTHEN & EMPOWER OUR COMMUNITY:
The 2008 not guilty verdict in the Sean Bell case evoked outrage, emotion, and debate. It is not an anomaly that the police officers involved in the Sean Bell slaying were acquitted of all charges on all counts in State Supreme Court. I could run out of ink printing the names of people who have been victimized by the inaptly named justice system.
The American justice system has been especially terroristic towards the African American community. Many community members can cite historic and personal accounts to prove this. Therefore, it would be foolhardy (at the least) to turn to a system that has methodically oppressed us, and request that they free us. We can only free ourselves through extreme discipline and intelligent planning.
As a community we have been too compliant with leaders who organize ineffective, delayed reactions. The only strategy that can save us in this last hour is one that calls for a collective code of conduct that will be conducive to improving the conditions of our community, and shifting the paradigm of how we are treated by outside entities. The first step of this code of conduct should be based on economics.
The old adage of “money talks,” still reigns true in the new millennium. Any political scientist worth his or her library card will tell you that: “Economic powerlessness equals political powerlessness,” and conversely “economic power equals political power.” This means that if we continue to allow our wealth to be extracted from our community, we will remain impotent.
The power of the collective “Black Dollar” is often discussed. However, that power has been left unchanneled. Today is the day to change that. A one-time boycott is not going to bring long-term change and respect to our community. Our community has launched boycotts before. Our success and ascension will be based on what we consistently do. For this reason, we should initiate “BUY BLACK FRIDAYS.”
BUY BLACK FRIDAYS is a small step towards our community acquiring power via controlling our economics. Every Friday, people who acknowledge the injustice and oppression that the African American community has been consistently subjected to should do one of the following:
Option #1: Spend $0 on Friday
Option #2: Spend no more than $10 on Friday
Option #3: Only Shop at Black Businesses on Friday
[PLEASE NOTE THAT THE ABOVE OPTIONS CAN & SHOULD BE EXERCISED ON A DAILY BASIS. However, we can all at the very least focus on Fridays. This way we can take a collective stand and build our collective discipline. Please remember that this is only Phase 1!].
To the people who are tempted to label “BUY BLACK FRIDAYS” as racist, I say this: In the big scheme of things, this is about right & wrong, justice & injustice. The African American community is a strong, proud community that has endured the brunt of America’s iron fist. We must stop the pounding. I feel that any fair-minded individual will concur, and join in.
ANY business that is privileged to enjoy the support of the African American community MUST return that support.
I thank you in advance for your effort and dedication.
-Elsie Law AKA Starface
Quote Of The Day
“I am America. I am the part you won’t recognize. But get used to me. Black, confident, cocky. My name, not yours. My religion, not yours. My goals, my own. Get used to me.” -Muhammad Ali
