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Category: black people

It Is Vital For the Future Of American Democracy to Ignore the Slave Staters i.e. Republican Party

August 23, 2023

Since even before it’s founding as an independent nation, America has always been two different countries, with two very different populations and two very different sets of morals and values. Two hundred and fifty years ago, Just As It Was 250 Years Ago, It Is Vital For the Future Of American Democracy to Ignore the Slave Staters i.e. Republican Party

A small number of friends have made note that the slave staters are holding a debate tonight and have asked me if I’ll be watching it. But there is not a chance of that. My viewpoint is we, the intelligent educated and compassionate populace of the United States are DONE with the slave state party.

They’re no longer relevant since Donald Trump demolished the Republican Party six years ago and any relevance it had as a viable political party in the United States. And the RNC directors know it. Media outlets report zero interest in any news related to the Republican Party, yet still report on their goings on in order to offer full and fair coverage of both parties.

This, their attempt to run another series of debates to somehow oust Trump from the lead, just like six years ago, is a sham and a circus. And everyone knows it. Their platform which at one point 50 years ago perhaps was valid, but is now so convoluted and muddied that nobody even knows what Republican means anymore. (Though we have an idea… See below.)

The most important thing we the educated intelligent and compassionate of America can do is ignore anything Republican and anyone who professes to be Republican. They have slowly transformed over the last 40 years into an inhumane and corrupt group in intention and practice, even if a few naive and innocent few don’t realize it.

Republicans in practice deliberately allow and support mass shootings every day in the United States — every Republican member of Congress and the Senate accepts annual bribes from the NRA by the millions. Killing hundreds of innocent people a year under the guise of “freedom to buy and own guns”.

Republicans overtly defend and support the genocide of millions of Palestinians by the apartheid government of Israel because they believe that “the state of Israel needs to exist” in order for their “messiah to return a second time”. Regardless of how childish this fairytale sounds, they believe it and support Israel at all costs to both the detriment of the Islamic citizens of Israel and the threat it poses to global peace and stability.

The environment global warming climate crisis

Having overturned Roe Vs, Wade without any safety rails or laws to protect the sick or innocent they are deliberately forcing poor young rape victims to have babies they do not want, even in cases of incest or impending death. They are also notoriously anti-MeToo movement. How could they not be considering their stated president of choice is one of the worst perpetrators of assaults on women..? There is nothing more invasive and inhumane than a government forcing half its population to have their physical bodies under state control. In this practice, sealed by law, the United States is no different than Iran or Saudi Arabia et al. Deplorable.

Republicans deliberately block black and brown skinned people from basic human and equal rights in the country. They are anti-Black Lives Matter, anti-government assistance programs, and despicably diehard defenders of Confederate monuments scattered all over the country.

Republicans do everything in their power to block equal rights progress for LGBTQ citizens because they claim it goes against their religious beliefs.

Republicans refuse to allow any other religion other than their white bread Slave-Stating old fashioned bigoted Christianity into the fold in our great melting pot which once upon a time promised religious freedom for all.

Republicans are immigrants themselves but erroneously believe that any new immigrants coming into our country are somehow not entitled to the same freedoms they benefited from by coming here and making a new life for themselves.

Republicans deliberately defend and protect police officers all over the nation who torture and murder black and brown people, spending billions of dollars and millions of man hours to assure murderous police officers go free regardless of how heinous their crimes are.

Republicans conflate “capitalism” with “democracy” in order to confuse their party members into believing that any beneficial government sponsored programs such as universal healthcare is “socialism” and inherently “bad” or “dangerous”. Their stated goal is to rid Americans of all social safety nets and gleefully watch as millions of Americans get sick and die in the streets.

Republicans do NOT deserve to be heard nor counted. It is vital that we ignore them so the statistics of anything they do whether on television or radio or podcasts or online show that the viewership is low, that there is no interest in them or what they have to say and that they have no relevant voice in the nation.

This is essential for our future. Just as it was 250 years ago when we mistakenly attempted to reconcile and unite with them to form a country. That plan backfired 100 years later. And hundreds of thousands sadly lost their lives solely because of them.

Americans cannot afford another four years of Trump or anyone else from this wicked group of religious zealots and monsters. The entire world believes this and is terrified of our country once again falling into the hands of these corrupt, unintelligent people. We must protect the country and ourselves and our families by ignoring them. Give them zero attention particles.

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Black Lives Matter, black people, Civil Rights, Current Events, Gun violence Gun Laws, Human Rights, Politics and Government abortion, Black Lives Matter, civil war, debates, Donald Trump, MeToo, police brutality, Republican Party, republicans, RNC, Slave staters, Slave states, United States

What Language Do African Americans Speak? Ebonics Versus African American Vernacular Versus Standard English

May 8, 2023

Below are a few good primer articles on Ebonics, what linguists and schools in America used to call what American blacks speak. That was changed to Black Vernacular English. Now that’s been changed to African American Vernacular English and is considered a dialect of English rather than a separate language.

I remember years ago hearing that there was a name for the language that black Americans spoke, called Ebonics, the idea implying that they spoke a different language than English. Now on the surface this makes sense. Living in New York City, the most culturally diverse city on planet earth (statistically speaking), in a variety of different mixed neighborhoods, I freely admit that I cannot necessarily carry on a conversation in “black”.

I know this to be true because we live in a neighborhood that is 65% black. (As an aside, this particular neighborhood is also THE famous anti-Israel orthodox Jewish neighborhood that’s been here forever and is always in the news. Orthodox Jews make up approximately 20% of the neighborhood. And the rest is white. We are a small minority here.

As I’ve mentioned in other essays here, whites and blacks do encounter each other here, a lot. New York City is a very OPEN community leaning place to live. Some say it’s because our homes are so small. It is true. We live in tiny little apartments the size of most of the rest of American’s TV room. So we are always outside. Or on the roof. Or at some diner or restaurant or cafe. Or just sitting on a bench or at a park or walking. Anything to get outside and out of our apartments.

We share the same neighborhood after all, the same subways, streets, sidewalks, and bodegas… but interestingly we rarely frequent the same stores or restaurants. Where they go for these things is as mysterious to me as where we go is to them probably.

But the point is all of us hear each other speaking when we are out. And at the risk of sounding racist or ignorant, I’ve noticed for decades that black people do speak differently than I do. And vice versa. I’ve been made fun of a few times by black people because of how I speak when I’m hanging out in or have wandered into a particular area. They’ll mock or mimic the way I speak. Usually in jest. So it obviously goes both ways. And it’s not just an accent thing, like with people from Alabama or Wisconsin or Boston or North Dakota. It’s more than an accent.

It’s the pronunciation of words and the way the sentences are formed and the words that are used. I usually can only understand about half of the sentences in terms of what was said and what was meant. But I always took it for granted. I use google all the time to look up phrases I hear black people say in order to learn what they mean, or why they’re saying a word or phrase like that.

Then one day, going back about ten years, a friend of mine asked me “why black people pronounce the word ask like axe”. I said “I dont know. but maybe it’s part of the whole Ebonics thing. I’ve heard that linguists consider that black Americans have their own language.”

Examples like: “it’s been a minute”. “My moms” instead of “my mom”. “I gots” instead of “I have”. “Ima” instead of “I’m going to”. “My nigga” instead of “dude” or “man”. “Exspecially”. “Esactly”. “Gonna”. “Gotta”. “Shorty”.

There are thousands of examples of this in a google search. People are genuinely interested in this topic now. And yes it is surprising once you start studying the language just how different it is grammatically and in vocabulary and pronunciation than standard English. There are hundreds of examples of stark contrasts that one would have to learn from being raised speaking it or have to study formally.

The original question opened my ears to the phenomenon and started me on a ten year journey of research and study about this subject. And sure enough, there is a raging debate amongst academics and public schools nationwide about just this very topic. It is agreed on that the majority of black Americans, not all of them, do speak a form of English that is different than other groups of Americans, and broadly different than what is known as Standard English.

Hence the origination of the term Ebonics in the 1970s to try to give this special language a formal name. The term was changed to Black Vernacular English (BVE) first, and then to African American Vernacular English (AAVE).

Some schools want to teach both Ebonics — to those who speak it naturally and those who don’t, AND have special classes for Standard English, the idea being that there’s a great divide between the two languages and it’s not just linguistic but cultural, i.e. how can a student who has spent his whole life only speaking reading and writing AAVE then enter a school and be expected to speak read write and learn in what is essentially almost an entirely different language i.e. standard English. But the point has been made that American TV is almost all standard English, so “everybody has access to standard English in their day to day life”. Of course this presupposes that “everybody” watches TV and watches the same shows. Not so sure about that.

Some people want the term(s) to equate to nothing more than a dialect of English. Similar to an accent, but with its own set of different words and grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation. Personally I think it’s somewhere in between. But because people like me, the average white person, can still understand someone when they are speaking to me in Ebonics or AAVE, the argument that it’s not a different language but only a dialect holds true. A

nd heck look at people from Louisiana. Or for that matter people from Great Britain. Tell me they aren’t hard to understand when they are “speaking English”.

“This seemingly separate language African Americans speak is what they speak at home and in their neighborhoods; it is a symptom of separation and separatism, not the cause of it.”

Thus teaching classes in both AAVE (Ebonics) and English in schools can be seen to increase inclusiveness, not exclusiveness. I would tend to lean this way. It certainly cannot hurt and if anything it would foster more communication and understanding between the differing groups… of all colors — because not all American blacks speak anything other than Standard English.


“Most linguists think of black English, or African American Vernacular English (AAVE) as a dialect of English, not a separate language.”

Read PBS article here

Read Urban Dictionary Article Here

Conference on College Composition and Communication Statement On Ebonics

What is Ebonics (African American English)? By Linguistic Society Of America

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Academics, Anthropology, Black Lives Matter, black people, Current Events, Language AAVE, African American language, African American vernacular English, black people, Ebonics, education, language, teaching, what language do black people speak

Understanding Black America, Or Not

January 10, 2023

I cannot speak to the issue of Caribbean Hispanics versus central and South Americans and the root cause(s) of the differences we see, not like you can. But i can definitely see how the culture as you suggest is or can affect the societies and how they show up. I believe it’s like that for every demographic, tribe or genotype. The cultural trends are both influenced by the present society and how it’s manifest AND circle back to create an influence on that society.

I do think that’s what has continued to crush the black community since the mid-90s. In the 60s and 70s they used music to UPLIFT the whole black community. And the whites frankly. So many good powerful uplifting black power / black pride songs and inspiring artists from this 20 – 25 year era. And along with it a ton of progress for that community at large. The 80s became even more empowering for a while with the sudden success of rap as a viably popular mainstream form of entertainment with cultural leaders and heroes who transcended race and appealed to broad swaths of the American public.

Then in the 90s the entire narrative seemed to change overnight. Black people at least as reflected through the music and culture decided that being gangsters drug dealers killers misogynists pimps hos bitches and showboating excessive label-consumers was cooler than becoming more stable healthy respected or successful. They voluntarily wore and still today wear these labels proudly. Not even letting on if they realize themselves that these are all very bad stereotypes to lay claim to.

If there is one glaring thing about the black community that confuses well-meaning whites who sincerely want to help the cause the most, it’s this strange anomaly of trying to figure out just who black people are in modern society. Are they the murderers and thieves they claim to be in the last 30 years of Top 40 popular music? Or are they the nice working class folks who dress up on Sundays to attend service at that big Baptist church on the corner welcoming you in with open arms because you love good gospel music even though you’re white…?

Is the rampant vulgarity in Beyoncé or Missy Elliot lyrics an authentic expression of how she and others like her see themselves or who they are? Or is it a mere put on? Satire or self mockery even? It sounds sincere, sung and spoken resolutely with power and pride. Or is it a flat up strategic exploitation of what’s perceived as controversy to get more eyes and ears and thus make more money, ala the way Madonna exploited her sexuality, and nothing more? That’s something we all do. In every arena of commerce. Though in art it is still frowned upon as the easy way out, a cheap tactic hiding a lack of true artistic brilliance when one feels obliged to go that route.

Nobody wants to be nailed down by a stereotype to begin with. But inevitably we all are from time to time. Knowing that, one would do everything in their power when given the opportunity to typecast themselves to do so in the most respectable manner possible and not the other way around. That again is a very confusing aspect of the modern black community.

A community or group of people cannot rise up in society to aspire and then achieve to being better educated, have better higher paying jobs, be more actively involved in community, have a lower rate of arrests and convictions than other groups, be on more corporate boards, have more well known and influential local and national leaders, be healthier, have more stable families, have lower death rates and crime in their communities, increase life extension and life expectancy, decrease infant mortality and inherent diseases within that group, and all the other things we associate with a group of people rising up out of poverty and anonymity to achieve equality or even surpass other groups in measures of health and success IF at the same time they’re laying claim to being pimps whores drug dealers criminals killers gangsters bitches et al.

There’s a stark and overt contradiction there. In how the culture publicly defines itself through its self expression and what others in the same community claim they want, i.e. Black Lives Matter.

Speaking of BLM, it would also help in our understanding of the bigger issues at large, if when we are in a Black Lives Matter March — can only speak of Brooklyn, Washington DC and Manhattan — that 80-90% of the participants weren’t white with a handful of blacks marching with us. One would automatically assume it would be the other way around. And maybe it is in other cities that are primarily black. I would have to look up actual statistics from 2020 to now… Or even 2018… if there are any, about the demographic makeup of the various demonstrations that transpired around the country in support of this cause.

There’s obviously a lot more to it to explore and contemplate. And my guess is that the black community itself has probably written excessively about this issue. So step one on the quest to understanding these seemingly contradictory dynamics would be to simply ask some black friends to recommend a few books or papers on the matter. Which I’ll do. And then come back and list those resources here.

In the meantime at least we’ve had the insight and the courage to talk about it, though in private admittedly, acknowledge it, give voice to it and try to understand it… I have a feeling it is going to be a multifaceted cornucopia of different social dynamics that affect each of the various subgroups within the community just as it is with whites, Asians, Indians, Latinos or anybody else. There won’t be one answer. But a variety of theories about potential answers based on who’s speaking and who they’re specifically speaking about. But is there anything deeper there that can offer us solutions to the multitude of problems the black community still faces? That’s the question.

More forthcoming. A lot more I’m guessing.

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Black Lives Matter, black people, Civil Rights, Current Events, Psychology and Human Behavior, Race Racial and Racism Beyoncé, black culture, black music, black people, racial stereotypes, rap music, urban music

A private little world for me… a private little world for you. The online journals and musings of singer-songwriter author and activist Ed Hale. The Transcendence Diaries have been posting regularly online since 2001. Comments are always welcomed. And so are YOU.

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