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Does our focus, discussion & anger change if the Killer of 7 year old Jazmin Barnes is a Black Man?

January 6, 2019 By
Eric Black Jr

Last night I got an alert that said an arrest was made in the brutal killing of 7-year-old Jazmin Barnes… She was a Black girl riding in a car with her mom who went on a coffee run.

The initial stories that came out was a white man in an unprovoked attack came over and shot Jazmin killing her and then shot her mom. The Barnes killing set off a nationwide manhunt, with offers up to 100k for the arrest of the killer…

Now here’s where things get a little sticky… Over the past few nights, there’s been a huge discussion about the R Kelly documentary, with many of his defenders stating that our collective obsession with Kelly was taking attention away from Barnes killing.

‘Why are we focus on R Kelly who we all knew was a disgusting individual when we have the killer of Jazmin Barnes still at large??’

Now, if we believe the police reports which state that Eric Barnes Jr (pictured above) confessed that he was the driver and another Black man by the name of Larry W did the shooting in a case of mistaken identity, is the impact and horror of Jazmin’s death lessened? Would a 100k dollars have been offered if we knew Eric Black was the man being accused of killing Jazmin? IN another report the police say the mother saw a white man running for cover and thought he was the shooter..

If its a Black man behind the killing of Jazmin does it change the discussion? Was the R Kelly documentary really a distraction or an enhancement as to why we must talk about the harm that is often visited on Black girls and women? Was our concern about a little Black girl being killed or was she just an excuse go to express anger and go HAM on white oppression?

From the looks of things, it seems like, with some folks, Jazmin Barnes killing was being used the same way Trump and white racist used the killing of Kate Steinle at the hands of an undocumented man named Jose Garcia Zarate to stir up anti-immigrant hate and to push for us to build a wall… There was never a concern about Steinle being killed.

So again, was our concern about Jazmin an innocent Black girl being killed or was she just an excuse to push forth a variety of agendas with the protection of Black girls being priority number one?

Black or white, an innocent Black girl is dead. Eric Black Jr and Larry W, R Kelly or a racist white man who caused a nationwide hunt, does it matter? All three, in theory, have caused unthinkable harm to Black girls and women.. Does it matter who the killer is? Do we still hold the same anger? Are we still demanding the killer be arrested and hung? After all, an innocent 7-year-old Black girl is dead. And if we look at this from a wider lens lots of 7-year-old Black girls are also being harmed and mistreated at homes and at institutions they wind up being forced into.

One of the refrains put forth by detractors of the R Kelly documentary is that we should put race first. We need to prioritize our struggle. ‘Focus on the white killer of Jazmin Barnes’ is what they said… What happens if the killer/killers are Black? What’s our focus moving forward? Do we start to have those painful discussions about Black men harming exploiting, pimping etc Black girls? How do we hold those folks involved in that cycyle accountable?


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Why ‘pick on’ R.Kelly? Where’s the Documentaries on Weinstein, Polanski and the Catholic Church?

January 5, 2019 By

So over the past couple of nights, many sat down and watched in shock, disappointment, and horror the documentary Surviving R Kelly. Here folks saw everyone from his former wife to former girlfriends speaking out about the abuse they suffered at the hands of Kelly. We saw an array of folks speak about his intimate sexual encounters with underage girls. We saw a thorough breakdown of his 2008 Child pornography trial in which he was acquitted.

This documentary put together by executive film producer dream hampton is one that has triggered a lot of discussion and debate. Many are simply disgusted and wondering how and why R Kelly is not in jail and why he was given so much support in the music industry.

Sadly there are a number of other debates popping up that in spite the compelling information and backstories revealed in this documentary by many of those victimized by Kelly, there are folks defending R Kelly.

With respect to that, here are a few things to keep in mind… First, there will always be folks who thrive on notoriety. If you go right, they will go left. If you go up, they will go down.. They like the attention derived from trolling. or being contrarian. Personally, I feel many of those folks who show up and post and cape for R Kelly on social media platforms are part of a PR Crisies Team and are paid to try and shift public opion.

There are some folks who sadly will side with Kelly because they believe people like him and Bill Cosby are being unfairly attacked and in the name of ‘Black Unity’ must be defended at all costs. One of the repeated themes from folks holding this type of position is to compare R Kelly with the way white celebrities are treated.

In the wake of the R Kelly documentary, I saw a large number of folks post up pieces demanding to know why R Kelly is the subject of a documentary and not sexual abuse monsters like Harvey Weinstein?

Where’re the documentaries on the Catholic Church and Roman Polanski, why pick on Kels?

I thought that was an interesting query on a couple of fronts.. First, if there are documentaries and news reports on other abusers does it absolve what Kelly is accused of doing?

Second, as someone who watches lots of TV and news reports, I knew there were tons of news stories, documentaries, mini-documentaries, award-winning movies and News specials detailing the dirt that Weinstein and others had done.

For example, with Weinstein, everyone from ABC’s 20/20 to the BBC to 60 minutes just to name a few have all done lengthy news specials, that easily reached more people than the R Kelly documentary. There is no shortage of coverage. In fact, from what I could tell, the coverage on Weinstein is more extensive and easily more accessible.

I just think because many of those folks and the scandals didn’t have a direct impact on many in our community, we didn’t pay these movies, documentaries any mind. For example, how many of us watched the lifetime movie on actress Mia Farrow who aired out film director Woody Allen? Did we really care? In our universe, R Kelly is big news so of course, everyone is gonna talk about while it may, in fact, be greeted indifferently elsewhere and in other communities.

But since that seemed to be a big sticking point, I figured I’d give folks a short list of movies and documentaries on some key Hollywood figures and institutions involved in sexual assault and abuse scandal. I’m sure I overlooked a couple so feel free on.

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The Main Problem with The Democrats

January 2, 2019 By

Political Musings 01-02-19:  The main problem w/ the Dems is that they serve two masters.. The main master they serve is wall street and Big Business… The other master they serve is, in theory, us the people. Keyword ‘theory’.

In reality, the Democrats create the illusion of serving working class, Black and Brown folks… They give a lot of lofty rhetoric, make grand gestures and prop up compelling spokespeople. The Democrats need those numbers our people collectively provide to win important elections. elections..

The problem is this…The needs of the Dems targeted demographic is increasingly at odds with the agenda of the Wall Street and Corporations they ultimately serve.

This is why we never got the public option for Obamacare and will never get Medicaid for All. Sure, folks may talk a good game and even make a dramatic gesture like voting for it, when they know they don’t have the numbers or it will get vetoed… We saw this here in California. But as soon as the Dems. are in power and can actually make certain things happen, they pump the breaks, tell everyone to be patient or make you seem like you’re a demonic enemy or crazy if you push forward.

What should be intuitive and a logical step to take never is with the Democrats who are beholden to wall street. For example in 2018, when Bernie Sanders said ‘let us forgive student loans and make college free‘, everyone cheered. Young voters were excited beyond belief. Poor and working-class families straddled with student loan debts were euphoric.

One would’ve thought Bernie’s opponent Hillary Clinton would’ve responded in kind. It was a natural step to take. Instead, Hillary hemmed and hawed and dragged her feet and finally responded with some nonsense about making student loan payments easier to handle and reducing college costs… The entire time she tried to skate over the fact that it was her husband Bill Clinton who in 1998 signed an amendment that would make it damn near impossible for students to get any sort of loan forgiveness, even with bankruptcy. A student loan bill will follow you to your grave.

That ’98 signing came on the heels of the Clinton administration pretty much-privatized student loans in ’96 and allowing Sally Mae to run wild to the point that now we a situation where students owe more than 1.3 TRILLION dollars. The corporate-friendly Dems from Hillary to Cory Booker aren’t gonna ever create policies that would anger the folks who back them who want a big cut of that 1.3 trillion dollars…

On a local level from San Francisco to New York to Atlanta to Detroit to Los Angeles, we see the Corporate tyranny in the way many Dems favorably dance with developers and have helped bring about gentrification and mass removal of Black and Brown folks from their communities. 8k rents 15 million dollar homes in the hood, didn’t happen because Donald Trump has an office in City Hall. None of his far-right fascist cabinet members are on city councils or board of supervisors.

At the end of the day, the Democrats ideally want white working class folks who and ‘moderates’ who currently are solidly in the Republican camp. They ideally want folks who are perfectly willing to put up with economic and corporate tyranny so long as their hardships can be blamed on Black and Brown folks who they feel are causing too much crime, getting too many handouts, not pulling their weight and are too numerous. This is pretty much the playbook Trump is using. Poor Black and Brown folks are disposable.

Until the Dems can get that type of crowd, they are stuck with creating illusions and gaslighting folks into believing they are gonna do right by folks when they have no intention of ever delivering. They may get a Black or Brown face to do the singing, but we have seen time and time again many will talk a good game but be cautious or MIA at the most crucial moments.

If the Dems were to go all out and totally empower Black, Brown, poor and young folks, they would be on the hook and have to answer to them. The demands made by that coalition of folks would put them in hot water with their Wall Street and Corporate masters.

This is what many saw as the great betrayal of Barack Obama…He culturally signified that he was down for the people. He had the talk. He had the look. He had the resonating symbols ie beautiful Black family, played basketball, was a fan of Hip Hop. He allowed himself via those symbols to be associated with iconic figures like Martin and even Malcolm, whose politics were people oriented. But he as did the Dems, he would ultimately betray folks. His task was to ride it out using his Blackness and the history he made as cover…

The night he won, we saw old folks crying and people dancing in the streets.. for someone who evoked that type of reaction he seemed very subdued… Almost like Trump when he won but in a different way…

With the Dems set to take over Congress and folks like Senator Elizabeth Warren entering the presidential race for 2020, soon to be followed by Cory Boker, Kamala Harris, perhaps Joe Biden and Beto Orourke and maybe even Hillary Clinton, we should all be on a different page this time around. We can’t make the same mistakes we made in the past where we gave folks lots of passes only to be sold out for Wall Street and corporate Interests..

How will we push the envelop and hold folks bidding for our support accountable? It’s something we should seriously be thinking about because make no mistake, those who are running have a strategy in place on how to pander,placate and then play us. should be ready

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Remembering Oscar Grant 10 years Later

January 1, 2019 By

Remembering Oscar Grant this New Year’s morning…

Ten years ago many people around the country were excited as the New Year came in.. 2009 had special meaning because in 3 short weeks we were going swear in the country’s first Black President Barack Obama

There was a lot of hope in the air and many of us naively thought a corner was turned especially after it was announced Eric Holder would be his Attorney General. That too was historic as Holder was to be the first African American to hold that position

Many were not only anticipating the historic moment when Obama would take the Oath of Office and be sworn in, but many were also excited that the US under Obama would be partaking in the upcoming UN Conference against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance..He had already begun initial conversations about this…2009 looked to a different year with lots of Hopes fulfilled and Lots of Change to come…It’s important to remember the political climate at that time in the wee hours of that morning New Years Day 2009.

A lot of that ‘good’ feeling and ‘excited’ anticipation was harshly deflated and shattered that morning when a cowardly officer named Johannes Mehserle shot and killed Oscar as he laid on his stomach face down, hands behind his back in hand cuffs..

Grant was killed in front of hundreds of people who watched in horror from the BART train on Fruitvale station where Grant and his friends were pulled from..

People watched in horror as an over the top aggressive officer named Tony Pirone called Grant a ‘bitch azz n—‘ before kneeing him…

The horrific actions of Mehserle and Pirone seemed almost calculated and ritualistic… Many of us felt it was an attempt to put uppity, excited Black folks back in their place.. We had a Black president coming into office to become the most powerful person in the world, we were reminded that racist police would still be a threat even under a Black President… As comedian Paul Mooney would often say in his routines, we were getting a N— wake up call…

That wake up call was firmly cemented as we saw the replay of the graphic video of Grant being shot over and over again and not one elected official including our Mayor at the time Ron Dellums hold a press conference or anything to ease the angst people were feeling or denounce the shooting.

, It wasn’t until 7 days later, when Oscar was being buried that we saw some movement after 100 people rolled up to the DAs office Tom Orloff and demanded he press charges and folks in Oakland took to the streets and turned up like nobody’s business. In remembering Oscar we need to never forget how the ball got rolling

Later that day, hours after Grant was killed, we would come to find that horror had visited the city of New Orleans. In the wee hours of the morning around 3 am five plain clothed and 4 uniformed police officers would shoot a 22 year old father named Adolph Grimes more than 14 times in front of his grandmothers house..

Adolph Grimes

Grimes had just driven 5 hours from Houston to New Orleans when he was descended upon by 5 plain clothed officers. These officers claimed they were on the lookout for robbery suspects and when they saw Grimes, a man with no criminal record, they identified themselves and Grimes started shooting.. That’s when the other officers shot him back..

That story was immediately disputed. Many felt the plainclothes officers never identified themselves and if Grimes did fire a weapon it was in self defense.. Folks in New Orleans woke up New Years Day to the same type of horror story we woke up to in Oakland..

New Years Day 2009 we would learn of one other horror story.. This involved Robbie Tolan, son of a former major league baseball player Bobby Tolan and it took place in Bellaire Texas right outside of Houston.

Robbie Tolan

Around 2:00 a.m. Robbie Tolan and his cousin were returning home when a police officer assumed they had stolen the car they were driving. Robbie was in his drive way when he was order to get down on the ground with guns pointed at him.. When his mom came out to tell the officers Robbie was her son and that he was driving her car, they pushed her, Robbie attempted to stand up and and a back up officer to the scene Sgt Jeffery Cotton shot him, saying he feared for his life.. Luckily Robbie Tolan survived the shooting..

18 months after Oscar Grant was murdered, Johannes Mehserle, thanks to a massive movement was convicted for Oscar’s murder. It was the first time in California history such a verdict was rendered on a cop who shot someone while on duty. But sadly a chump pro-cop Judge in Los Ángeles named Robert Perry reduced Mehserle’s 10-14 year sentence to less than two years…

Sgt Cotton was charged for aggravated assault and his case went to trial.. In May of 2010 a jury acquitted officer Cotton for the shooting of Robbie Tolan..

In January of 2015, after massive nationwide protests from New York to Ferguson around police killings, after gruesome details of police corruption in New Orleans was made known, Attorney General Eric Holder, the first African American to hold that job, decided they would not pursue any charges or further investigation to the Adolph Grimes killings…

In remembering Oscar Grant we can’t divorce ourselves from the political climate that proceeded his death and the climate and movement that was sparked in the aftermath. People did what was thought impossible for 18 long months to get justice..

We cant talk about Oscar without remembering the police terrorism that visited Adolph Grimes and Robbie Tolan. that same morning..

We can’t talk about Oscar Grant without noting the disappointment and the harsh lessons we saw first hand that even with Black folks holding the most powerful positions in the land, noting would be done to bring about justice. Heck folks didn’t even get a phone call from the first Black president, but 3 months later and just two weeks after Obama announced the US would boycott that important UN Conference on Race, he called the families and sent a letter of support to the 4 Oakland officers slain by Lovell Mixon..

We can’t remember Oscar without coming to grips with some hard and fast lessons. First, people power and deep seated love for the community can create movements and make things happen.. Second, we are on our own in fighting these fights, we cannot depend upon far too many elected officials to do right by us.

Many fear police unions, many fear that they wont be re-elected and quite frankly many actually side with killer cops.. Sure, their rhetoric may say one thing but their actions speak another truth. Just look at the recent passing of the Blue Lives Matter Bill in May of 2018 where we saw everyone from Civil Rights icon John Lewis on down to former Black Panther Bobby Rush on over to progressive stalworth Keith Ellison all get behind this police union inspired bill..

In remembering Oscar Grant, ten years after his tragic death, we still have along ways to go to getting justice and ending police terror.

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Looking Back on 2018

December 31, 2018 By

As we head on into 2019 and look back at 2018, there is no doubt we had lots of challenges, hardships and triumphs with lots more work to do…

2018 was a year where we saw institutions ratch up strategy of Fear and Blame… Sadly some of us got caught up in the rhetoric and added to to it…

We saw close to 2000 children snatched from their parents as families sought asylum at the border, with two of them Jakelin Caal (7) and Felipe Gómez Alonzo (8) dying while in the custody of ICE and Homeland Security..

There were huge outcries and condemnation, but we saw homeland security director Kirstjen Nielsen along with this president pretty much blame the parents for these tragic deaths.. They said the parents should’ve never tried to seek asylum…Sadly what was overlooked was brutal US foreign policy which lead to mass displacement..

All of this bashing on immigrants is centered around a desire to appeal to the racist xenophobic attitudes of supporters and do serious money grab to ‘build a border wall’…We should never forget that…

While some brought into the simplistic rhetoric of insisting we close the borders and not worry about the plight of other people’s kids, many others astutely connected the dots and reminded us that the taking of children from oppressed peoples is an American past time..

From the days of African enslavement and Indian boarding schools up to today where we see parents who can’t afford water bills in Flint, Michigan or parents who have been made homeless thanks to gentrification having their kids snatched…We have got to improve these horrific conditions in 2019

Speaking of gentrification in 2018 we saw an increase in homelessness..Many who work with the homeless estimate we have 4-5k homeless folks on the streets of Oakland alone..

It was just 5 or 6 years ago we saw tent cities sprout up all over the country during the Occupy Movement. At that time we saw folks call out income disparity with the framework of 99 vs 1%..

Fast forward to 2018 and the amount of tent cities and encampments we see have exploded, making the Occupy Movement seem miniscule. Tent cities and homeless encampments are now the norm with so many of us just a paycheck away or natural disaster away from joining the ranks.. What’s even more frustrating is seeing the brutal way in which Occupy encampments were broken up, continue with this increased homeless population. Folks are treated like crap and blamed for their dire predicaments.

It was in 2018 we saw gentrification accelerate all over the country. Here in Oakland we saw apartment buildings spring up and start charging 8k a month rent..(pictured below) We saw more and more folks forced to leave Oakland and move to far off places like Stockton, Modesto, Tracy etc and have to endure 3 hour commutes to work. These super commuters are now being hit with expensive highway tolls that via surge pricing can hit as much as 10-13 dollars a day..

In 2018 we saw all sorts of natural disaster all over the world. Here in Cali it was massive wildfires, that have resulted in scores of people dying and thousands losing their homes. All of us in the state were subjected to breathing contaminated air with no full understanding of its long term impacts..Rocking gas masks and driving for hours to places that have clean air is now the norm.

Its interesting to note, that in the middle of the horrific Campfire of Northern Cali that decimated the City of Paradise, a place that’s long been known for being conservative and racially hostile, President Trump quickly hoped on a plane and made his way out there to ‘inspect the damage’. It was a perfect photo op as we saw enthusiastic families cheering him on.. Only problem is during his remarks he got the name of the city wrong. He called it ‘Pleasure’ instead of Paradise…

Now granted many folks who dislike the president got their clown on, but many overlooked the real villains in this fiasco.. In Sacramento we had a bunch of chumps as legislators and an outgoing punk azz governor in the form of Jerry Brown who signed bills that would shield and limit PG&E’s liability from lawsuits even though in some of these key fires it was their negligence and ‘cost cutting’ measures that led to all this destruction.

Even worse we saw these bills give PG&E permission to raise rates to help pay for the billions of dollars in damages and lawsuit settlements.

in 2018 we saw the selling out of average folks as the Supreme Court ruled against unions, saying they can’t collect dues from non union members even as those non dues payers may enjoy the benefits of union benefits. That ruling happened in June and came on the heals of another death blow by the Supreme Court which basically said employers are protected from class action law suits.. That ruling happened in March…

Lastly we had this massive tax cut which completely upends everything.. One trend that we will see continue with these tax cuts will be workers no longer being employees of a company but being a contractor.. We that taking place throughout Silicon Valley.. It’s is most highlighted with the practices of ride share companies like Lyft and Uber… This means workers can’t collectively bargain, have no healthcare benefits, pensions, seniority, no workers compensation etc.. When all is said and done many find themselves holding down 2 or 3 gig jobs and make less than minimum wage..

After witnessing the circus around the Brett Kavanaugh hearings for the vacated seat Supreme Court justice Anthony Kennedy, we can expect more drama to unfold in 2019..

Mad Skillz give a year end Rap Up.. End Joy
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