I've tried attacking this topic a few times over the course of the past few days, in light of the comments said to have been made by former NBA head coach George Karl in a soon to be released book, titled Furious George. The comments were made in reference to Carmelo Anthony, J.R. Smith and retired player, Kenyon Martin and the time they all spent together as members of the Denver Nuggets. Karl said quite few things but he flashpoint comment was this:
"Kenyon and Carmelo carried two big burdens: all that money and no father to show them how to act like a man."
Shots. Fired.
Carmelo basically ignored the comments and took the high road. Kenyon Martin? Not so much. J.R. Smith said his peace but mainly chose to reach out in support of his former teammates, calling them his "brothers". While this has become heavy fodder for beat writers, reporters and sports TV and talk radio pundits, there is one glaring fact that many didn't pick up on, at least from the reactions of 'Melo and J.R.. That fact? Black America is over the white American perspective of who we are.
Now don't get me wrong. This doesn't mean that these comments and others like them are irrelevant to us. Not in the slightest. LeBron James' response to Phil Jackson's "posse" comments, in regards to him and his business partners, who just happen to be his childhood friends, shows that. But the white perspective is no longer relevant, at least in the scope of the accomplishments that we see from people who look like us. And while we are about to enter into a new year that will see Donald Trump elected president, we can look back on the last 8 years of the presidency of our first Black president and the things he was able to accomplish and know that, while we haven't completely "won" when it comes to the issues that continue to face us as Black people, we can stop caring about how white people, who still hold on to the white supremacy structure in this country, perceive us. We already know, and we will continue to fight against it where it is still necessary. But it will no longer hold us down. It will no longer hold us captive.
I chose to blog about this for one important reason. In my last blog I spoke about a Speaking Down Barriers "Healing Us" discussion that focused on how society views Black families. This, ironically taps right into that vein. We've grown accustomed to how white society views us. There have been times when our individuality wasn't encouraged, when we were advised to blend in and not be different. But culturally, we are very different. So for us to blend in, for us not to be different, that would be going against everything inside of us as a people and as individuals. Everything we have become has been based on us embracing the things that make us different. But what, you may ask, does this have to do with what George Karl said about his former players? It's the perceived and assumed rhetoric that upstanding young men have their fathers to guide them. This would be widely associated with what the American family is supposed to be. But in the Black community, where the number of young men who grow up without their fathers are still staggering, unguided young Black men is not a product of that. And "guided" young white men who come from a family where the father is present aren't by products of that environment either. The fact of the matter is, whatever struggles that George Karl had with Anthony, Smith and Martin during their time together had absolutely nothing to do with their fathers not being involved in their lives. Kenyon Martin said that such comments were an insult to his mother, Anthony's mother and single mothers "everywhere". I can't help but agree. To overcome the odds that these men did, not just from being raised by a single parent but also from the places they came from, shouldn't be overlooked. LeBron James often says that he relates to a lot of the youth that are counted out due to where they are from because he was supposed to be counted out, too. But the families that these men had were strengthened by whatever adversity they encountered, real and perceived. And these men grew from literal boys to men under the scope of assumptive white authority figures who had already cast them off just because of they way they looked or the way they responded to the white power structure, in the NBA and in society. Yes, these players didn't have fathers to show them anything, but they had mothers, aunts, cousins, grandmothers, grandfathers, uncles and neighborhood families and mentors to help guide them to a place where they became household names in a sport dominated my men who look like them and come from the same places they did. The ones who last 10+ years are special and there is no disputing that. Carmelo is in his 13th year as a top tier player, J.R. Smith is in his 12th year and just won a championship with LeBron and the Cavs and Kenyon Martin managed to play for 15 years, despite his reputation as a dirty player.
But we're talking about basketball players, here. All parties involved, including George Karl are millionaires and live in somewhat of a bubble. But the white perspective exists outside that bubble as well. When it comes to the issues that we are facing such as police brutality, economic and social injustices, political disparities, mass incarceration and so forth, that white perspective weighs in heavily on all those accounts. We are also looking at a situation where social, economic and racial "battle lines", as it were, are being drawn, as we can see with Trump preparing for his inauguration and the way his supporters show their allegiance to him and his ideals. In the past, the opportunities to close the wealth gap for young Black men laid in music and sports, for the most part. Nowadays, our youth are blazing their own paths and have to continue to do so. Young Black entrepreneurship is on the rise. Those who choose to take the path of music and sports are enhancing their brand and becoming businessmen in the process. Black women are staking their claims in the corporate world, showing that they are just as innovative and creative as their male counterparts, Black and white. Our communities are spawning leaders in activism, awareness and keeping our school age children in the loop for educational opportunities that, otherwise, they would think are not there for them. Where we come from is no longer an obstacle for us, it is our launch pad. We appreciate where we come from for it is our heritage, our legacy. Those individuals who filled in the gaps that may have existed in our lives gave us the faith in ourselves to get to where we want to go. What is perceived as a disadvantage to those who can't understand how we made it from whatever struggles we encountered, we use as strength and we dismiss their perspective. It has no relevance to us, no meaning whatsoever. Their opinions of us hold no weight.
So George Karl, I hope your book and the negative, asinine and misguided comments you made about the men you coached somehow provides motivation to the young Black girl or boy, young Black man or woman who has a coach, teacher, guidance counselor, classmate, boss, professor, neighbor, co-worker, etc. that thinks like you. I hope when they read it, they see how successful the men you spoke so negatively about are. I hope they look you up and research how unsuccessful you were as a coach in building real relationships with the men that played for your teams. I hope they learn of how you tried to bully your way back into coaching and ran into DeMarcus Cousins, arguably the best center in the game right now, who wasn't having any of what you were selling and how you were eventually fired...again. I hope they see all of this and realize how irrelevant the white perspective is these days in accordance to the dreams and goals they have set out from themselves.
“Know from whence you came. If you know whence you came, there are absolutely no limitations to where you can go.”
-James Baldwin
Monday, December 26, 2016
Wednesday, December 21, 2016
Rejecting the American Dream
What is the American Dream to me? I honestly couldn't tell you because I don't know if I ever dreamed to attain something that was never for me to attain. I know what other people's version of the American Dream is and I know that a Black man doesn't make an appearance in theirs. How do I know? Because the "Make America Great Again" version of whatever the American Dream is doesn't include anyone non-white and non-wealthy.
Read those second set of words again. "Non-wealthy". Yes, this includes white people who aren't millionaires. Electing Donald Trump to be president was America giving a businessman free reign to use his position, not for the benefit of everyday Americans, but to benefit his own personal business interests here and abroad and to benefit those with whom he shares a common interest with. That common interest? Wealth. You can see that by the appointments he has already made for his upcoming administration. None of his picks, aside from choosing Nikki Haley as UN Ambassador, speak of his intention to continue the momentum that the Obama administration had gained in trying to help the working poor and middle class. Most of Trump's political rhetoric has been based on repealing those efforts, including the Affordable Care Act which provided health care options for those who typically wouldn't be able to afford it. His plans for the continued boost our economy has seen under Obama are cloudy at best and his viewpoints (and, again, appointments) are clearly not empathetic towards immigrants, non-white citizens or those struggling to put food on their table everyday. Trump is like the complete embodiment of what the Republican agenda has been over the past eight years, except it is exponentially more extreme. It is unapologetic, brash, arrogant and exclusionary. And apparently, that is what America wants. And that is what America has now, a unscrupulous businessman as their president.
So what is left for all of those on the outside of what the "American Dream" was supposed to mean for them? To be honest, nothing. I say that because now, especially for Black people, there needs to be a redefinition of what it is that we dream for. A cookie cutter version of the American dream used to be a house with a white picket fence, 2.5 children, a dog and a nice car or two. While many Americans, of color and otherwise, had been able to achieve that in the past, even that may no longer be accessible to those still in pursuit of it. At least not in the conventional way of going to work everyday, saving some money and planning out your financial future. In one of the recent community "Healing Us" gatherings that I attended through Speaking Down Barriers, we discussed how even the traditional way families are viewed and constructed, especially Black families, never traditionally fit into that American Dream mold. It is a construct that wasn't built for us, so there is really no way we can succeed by trying to do it the way those who it was constructed for do it. I've worked a regular job ever since I was 15 (aside from the years between 19 and 20 when I volunteered) and I've never had a time where I didn't live from check to check. Now as a younger person, I made some mistakes with my money that I wish I could go back and correct. But as an older person with bills and desires to be financially stable, the check to check lifestyle is consistently the space in which I operate. It has become clearer to me more over the past four years that working to achieve this American Dream, that was never constructed for me, the way those for whom it was constructed for works to achieve it is an effort in futility.
Case in point: At one point, say in the mid to late 90's, if a person was making around $50,000 living in a major city, people could say that they were doing well. If that same person was married to someone making close to the same and they had kids, then that family would have been said to be doing pretty well. Fast forward to 2016-17 and those same salary numbers no longer hold the security they once did. There are families that would be considered working middle class that worry about their jobs, they worry about how they are going to pay for their children's tuition, how they are going to combat rising insurance premiums. Now, consider a person who makes less than $30,000 a year. Consider that same person with less opportunities to advance at their current place of employment unless they attain a degree. Consider that they would have to hold another part-time job in an effort to make ends meet. Consider that would more than likely not leave them any time to pursue any other endeavors outside of working, just to be able to live a somewhat normal life. Is that what the American Dream is for folks who aren't extremely wealthy? If so, then you can have that dream and I will make my own.
In reading Ta-Nehisi Coates Between the World and Me, an open letter to his son, he also spoke of rejecting the American Dream. He spoke of "a rapture that comes only when you can no longer be lied to, when you have rejected the Dream." I personally think there is an entire society, an entire system that we as Black people and other people of color have to reject in order to have our own breakthrough, not just financially but also to our own personal freedoms. There is so much culture, so much talent, so much ambition, so much genius that is never cultivated because there have been limitations placed on us from the start. Crystal Irby, the facilitator at the "Healing Us" gathering, talked about how our parents may have been trying to point us in the right direction just as their parents tried o do the same. Our parents and their parents were trying to assimilate into a society that was chasing this American Dream that was sold to them as a possibility. And some of us may have been able to attain that Dream, but many have had to overcome great odds to do so. Chris Rock once said that he lives in a neighborhood in which the houses are worth millions of dollars. There were four Black people that lived there at the time and they were fellow celebrities, including him. These celebrities, along with himself, were at the top of their respective professions. They were famous. He went on to joke (maybe) that his next door neighbor was a dentist. A dentist. The bit goes on to speculate whether or not he was an alright dentist, probably not the top dentist in his profession. But yet, that dentist could afford to live in a community amongst four well known Black celebrities. So to be able to attain, somewhat, what society has constructed as this Dream that is so-called available to everyone, as a person of color, you have to be at the top of your profession, or at least better than the average dentist.
While some of this is a little lighthearted, the truth of the matter is that we have to blaze our own paths, write our own tickets, create our own Dream. We have to channel our gifts, instill in our youth the reality that this society holds and understand that all of this is nothing new. We have leaders who are dedicated to building up our next generation of leaders. These are not politicians or celebrities. These are community activists, founders of non-profit organizations designed to unite our communities, other organizations that also support artists, writers, poets, musicians, etc. These are young ones empowered by their own journeys that want to empower others that come from the same communities they do. These are the people who will forge the paths for those have rejected this false American Dream, who know what "Make America Great Again" really means, who know that we, as a people who have been marginalized but yet still remain, are what makes this country of ours great. Our successes are not defined by what society dictates they are. The Black Influence on pretty much everything American defines our successes, it defines who we are and where we are going. The Dream that includes us will be different to each and every one of us because it will be based on the experiences that we as individuals have lived through. Our separate paths to it will be different as well because it will be based on a construct of our own design as individuals and as a people. But it will be a realistic Dream to attain. Just wait and see.
Read those second set of words again. "Non-wealthy". Yes, this includes white people who aren't millionaires. Electing Donald Trump to be president was America giving a businessman free reign to use his position, not for the benefit of everyday Americans, but to benefit his own personal business interests here and abroad and to benefit those with whom he shares a common interest with. That common interest? Wealth. You can see that by the appointments he has already made for his upcoming administration. None of his picks, aside from choosing Nikki Haley as UN Ambassador, speak of his intention to continue the momentum that the Obama administration had gained in trying to help the working poor and middle class. Most of Trump's political rhetoric has been based on repealing those efforts, including the Affordable Care Act which provided health care options for those who typically wouldn't be able to afford it. His plans for the continued boost our economy has seen under Obama are cloudy at best and his viewpoints (and, again, appointments) are clearly not empathetic towards immigrants, non-white citizens or those struggling to put food on their table everyday. Trump is like the complete embodiment of what the Republican agenda has been over the past eight years, except it is exponentially more extreme. It is unapologetic, brash, arrogant and exclusionary. And apparently, that is what America wants. And that is what America has now, a unscrupulous businessman as their president.
So what is left for all of those on the outside of what the "American Dream" was supposed to mean for them? To be honest, nothing. I say that because now, especially for Black people, there needs to be a redefinition of what it is that we dream for. A cookie cutter version of the American dream used to be a house with a white picket fence, 2.5 children, a dog and a nice car or two. While many Americans, of color and otherwise, had been able to achieve that in the past, even that may no longer be accessible to those still in pursuit of it. At least not in the conventional way of going to work everyday, saving some money and planning out your financial future. In one of the recent community "Healing Us" gatherings that I attended through Speaking Down Barriers, we discussed how even the traditional way families are viewed and constructed, especially Black families, never traditionally fit into that American Dream mold. It is a construct that wasn't built for us, so there is really no way we can succeed by trying to do it the way those who it was constructed for do it. I've worked a regular job ever since I was 15 (aside from the years between 19 and 20 when I volunteered) and I've never had a time where I didn't live from check to check. Now as a younger person, I made some mistakes with my money that I wish I could go back and correct. But as an older person with bills and desires to be financially stable, the check to check lifestyle is consistently the space in which I operate. It has become clearer to me more over the past four years that working to achieve this American Dream, that was never constructed for me, the way those for whom it was constructed for works to achieve it is an effort in futility.
Case in point: At one point, say in the mid to late 90's, if a person was making around $50,000 living in a major city, people could say that they were doing well. If that same person was married to someone making close to the same and they had kids, then that family would have been said to be doing pretty well. Fast forward to 2016-17 and those same salary numbers no longer hold the security they once did. There are families that would be considered working middle class that worry about their jobs, they worry about how they are going to pay for their children's tuition, how they are going to combat rising insurance premiums. Now, consider a person who makes less than $30,000 a year. Consider that same person with less opportunities to advance at their current place of employment unless they attain a degree. Consider that they would have to hold another part-time job in an effort to make ends meet. Consider that would more than likely not leave them any time to pursue any other endeavors outside of working, just to be able to live a somewhat normal life. Is that what the American Dream is for folks who aren't extremely wealthy? If so, then you can have that dream and I will make my own.
In reading Ta-Nehisi Coates Between the World and Me, an open letter to his son, he also spoke of rejecting the American Dream. He spoke of "a rapture that comes only when you can no longer be lied to, when you have rejected the Dream." I personally think there is an entire society, an entire system that we as Black people and other people of color have to reject in order to have our own breakthrough, not just financially but also to our own personal freedoms. There is so much culture, so much talent, so much ambition, so much genius that is never cultivated because there have been limitations placed on us from the start. Crystal Irby, the facilitator at the "Healing Us" gathering, talked about how our parents may have been trying to point us in the right direction just as their parents tried o do the same. Our parents and their parents were trying to assimilate into a society that was chasing this American Dream that was sold to them as a possibility. And some of us may have been able to attain that Dream, but many have had to overcome great odds to do so. Chris Rock once said that he lives in a neighborhood in which the houses are worth millions of dollars. There were four Black people that lived there at the time and they were fellow celebrities, including him. These celebrities, along with himself, were at the top of their respective professions. They were famous. He went on to joke (maybe) that his next door neighbor was a dentist. A dentist. The bit goes on to speculate whether or not he was an alright dentist, probably not the top dentist in his profession. But yet, that dentist could afford to live in a community amongst four well known Black celebrities. So to be able to attain, somewhat, what society has constructed as this Dream that is so-called available to everyone, as a person of color, you have to be at the top of your profession, or at least better than the average dentist.
While some of this is a little lighthearted, the truth of the matter is that we have to blaze our own paths, write our own tickets, create our own Dream. We have to channel our gifts, instill in our youth the reality that this society holds and understand that all of this is nothing new. We have leaders who are dedicated to building up our next generation of leaders. These are not politicians or celebrities. These are community activists, founders of non-profit organizations designed to unite our communities, other organizations that also support artists, writers, poets, musicians, etc. These are young ones empowered by their own journeys that want to empower others that come from the same communities they do. These are the people who will forge the paths for those have rejected this false American Dream, who know what "Make America Great Again" really means, who know that we, as a people who have been marginalized but yet still remain, are what makes this country of ours great. Our successes are not defined by what society dictates they are. The Black Influence on pretty much everything American defines our successes, it defines who we are and where we are going. The Dream that includes us will be different to each and every one of us because it will be based on the experiences that we as individuals have lived through. Our separate paths to it will be different as well because it will be based on a construct of our own design as individuals and as a people. But it will be a realistic Dream to attain. Just wait and see.
Wednesday, December 7, 2016
New Caprica
You can listen to this spoken word piece here.
land your spaceships here
these are fertile grounds for new beginnings
the soil is just fine
radioactivity
caused others to flee
because their channels weren't tuned
in to the right frequency
but somehow
you all heard the signal
a distress call
to undress the norms
and
clothe the possibilities
that exist within us all
so it's the Cylons vs. the humans, right?
man's creations vs. man
evolving
as we devolve
back to the protoplasmic goo
that we once thought we were saved from
the matrix is an old idea
so
this is the new way of thinking
fuck pills
you gotta plant seeds in this fertile soil
so that the Earth's fruit can grow
feeling like Justin Blackburn
we can do anything
say anything
move mountains with our minds
if only because we realize we can
so what are your limitations?
If you're thinking right
you realize you have none
you realize you have none
you realize you have none
not even the one you see everyday
'cus mirrors lie to you
but your eyes never do
so can you trust your reflection
if you catch it looking back at you
from oceans?
That's not man made creation
so the reflection is natural
not fabricated by one's own false perception
of what "real" is
fall out of love
and fall into your feelings
because love is just a word
but your feelings can be exposed
or
stowed away for safe keeping
so
plant seed and keep reaping
what you have sown
keep wearing what you have sewn
with hands that were made to create
were made to touch
were made to feel electric energy
pass between you and her
her and him
her and her
him and him
get your mind out of that box
and into your spaceship
and land where the roses grow
not from concrete
but from fertile soils of your mind
begin again if you have to
even if you don't feel
like you have the energy to
fuck new year's resolutions
make revolutions
that revolves around dreams
around stars
around suns that releases its rays
upon you
restoring your tired soul
like Kal-El after Kryptonian exposure
land your spaceships here
and embrace this rebirth of you
spirit
energy
pure.
Thank you to Marlanda "Sapient Soul" Dekine for helping record this song and for the flourish at then end!!!
land your spaceships here
these are fertile grounds for new beginnings
the soil is just fine
radioactivity
caused others to flee
because their channels weren't tuned
in to the right frequency
but somehow
you all heard the signal
a distress call
to undress the norms
and
clothe the possibilities
that exist within us all
so it's the Cylons vs. the humans, right?
man's creations vs. man
evolving
as we devolve
back to the protoplasmic goo
that we once thought we were saved from
the matrix is an old idea
so
this is the new way of thinking
fuck pills
you gotta plant seeds in this fertile soil
so that the Earth's fruit can grow
feeling like Justin Blackburn
we can do anything
say anything
move mountains with our minds
if only because we realize we can
so what are your limitations?
If you're thinking right
you realize you have none
you realize you have none
you realize you have none
not even the one you see everyday
'cus mirrors lie to you
but your eyes never do
so can you trust your reflection
if you catch it looking back at you
from oceans?
That's not man made creation
so the reflection is natural
not fabricated by one's own false perception
of what "real" is
fall out of love
and fall into your feelings
because love is just a word
but your feelings can be exposed
or
stowed away for safe keeping
so
plant seed and keep reaping
what you have sown
keep wearing what you have sewn
with hands that were made to create
were made to touch
were made to feel electric energy
pass between you and her
her and him
her and her
him and him
get your mind out of that box
and into your spaceship
and land where the roses grow
not from concrete
but from fertile soils of your mind
begin again if you have to
even if you don't feel
like you have the energy to
fuck new year's resolutions
make revolutions
that revolves around dreams
around stars
around suns that releases its rays
upon you
restoring your tired soul
like Kal-El after Kryptonian exposure
land your spaceships here
and embrace this rebirth of you
spirit
energy
pure.
Thank you to Marlanda "Sapient Soul" Dekine for helping record this song and for the flourish at then end!!!
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