Tuesday, July 10, 2007
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"Oh Shit! ... GMO Food Sterilizes People ... And It's Really A Form of Population Control?"
"There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live—did live, from habit that became instinct—in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized."
Alexander King, Bertrand Schneider - founder Club of Rome - The First Global Revolution, pp.104-105
"In searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like would fit the bill ... All these dangers are caused by human intervention and it is only through changed attitudes and behaviour that they can be overcome. The real enemy, then, is humanity itself."
GET A CHICK...
Were We All Kunta Kinte? Or Are We Also Mansa Musa?
Barry Goldwater 1909-1998
"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue. "
The Honorable Elijah Muhammad
"It Is Easier To Change A Man's Religion Than It Is To Change His Diet"
Private Prison Industry
2,000,000 human beings in American prisons and counting
IS THIS LITTLE GUY A PERSON?
The founders of the American state understood that the proper functioning of a democracy required an educated electorate. It is this understanding that justifies a system of public education and that led slaveholders to resist the spread of literacy among their chattels. But the meaning of "educated" has changed beyond recognition in two hundred years. Reading, writing, and arithmetic are no longer sufficient to decide on public policy. Now we need quantum mechanics and molecular biology. The knowledge required for political rationality, once available to the masses, is now in the possession of a specially educated elite, a situation that creates a series of tensions and contradictions in the operation of representative democracy.
"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth.”
Margaret Sanger. Woman, Morality, and Birth Control. New York: New York Publishing Company, 1922. P
"We should hire three or four colored ministers, preferably with social-service backgrounds, and with engaging personalities. The most successful educational approach to the Negro is through a religious appeal. We don’t want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population. and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members."
Louis Pasteur
"The Microbe is nothing. The terrain is everything."
Beverly Johnson. Beverly Hills. 1978
"Bra! Tell Me About It!"
"Most of the trouble I have had in advancing the cause of the race has come from Negroes."
Ted Turner - CNN founder and UN supporter - quoted in the The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor, June '
"A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal."
Lord Bertrand Russell, The Impact of Science On Society (Routledge Press: New York, 1951).
"At present the population of the world is increasing at about 58,000 per diem. War, so far, has had no very great effect on this increase, which continued throughout each of the world wars.. War has hitherto been disappointing in this respect, but perhaps bacteriological war may prove effective. If a Black Death could spread throughout the world once in every generation, survivors could procreate freely without making the world too full. The state of affairs might be unpleasant, but what of it?"
Denmark Vesey For President 08
1. Troops Out Of Iraq Immediately. Like By Monday. 2. Money Owed To Haliburton and War Contractors Be Given Directly To The Iraqi People 3. Complete Electoral Reform 4. No Corporate Conglomerate Will Be Allowed To Control More Than 5% Of News Market 5. Federal Reserve Abolished 6. For-Profit Prison Industry Abolished
*George Orwell (1903-1950) English novelist, critic
Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness... If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear... The great enemy of clear language is insincerity... The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it... To see what is in front of one's nose requires a constant struggle... For a creative writer possession of the truth is less important than emotional sincerity.
“The technotronic era involves the gradual appearance of a more controlled society. Such a society will be dominated by an elite, unrestrained by traditional values.” – Zbigniew Brzezinski
God Don't Make No Mistakes
Gordon Parks 1912-2006
"I suffered evils, but without allowing them to rob me of the freedom to expand."
Great Grandmother Harris
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9 comments:
I just read about this "relationship" this morning. Where'd this pic come from? Do they have a song together or are they just "on blast" with theirs?
Interesting...they do have a song together. Hopefully this is pure marketing.
Looks like he's lettin' one off in dem guts! LOL.
Big J
This is a still from a video. I checked it out yesterday and thought, "either she is trying to piss some dude off or he is trying to piss some broad off cause they are all over it….” ALL OVER IT!
I'm just happy to see a black man with a black woman as opposed to Taye Diggs holding Tyson Beckford.
More shit from Denmark about the so called black and white issue ?
BBC today.
BBC delves into Brazilians' roots
By Silvia Salek
BBC Brasil
Neguinho da Beija-Flor's stage-name indicates his skin colour; in Portuguese, Neguinho means Little Black.
Montage - Top: Neguinho da Beija Flor, Sandra de Sa, Djavan; Middle: Obina, Milton Nascimento, Ildi Silva; Bottom: Frei David, Seu Jorge, Daiane dos Santos
The BBC project analysed the DNA of nine famous Brazilians
In this year's Rio Carnival competition, he sang a song celebrating Brazil's African roots in a performance that won his samba school the title.
But having learned to be proud of his African ancestry, he was shocked to find out that about 67% of his genes are European and only 31% African, according to an estimate based on an analysis of his DNA.
"People will think I'm joking if I tell them this", said the singer, who knew very little about his African ancestors but nothing at all about his European ones.
Neguinho da Beija-Flor was among nine celebrities who were tested for a project, called Afro-Brazilian Roots, by the Brazilian Service of the BBC.
HOW TESTS WERE DONE
Person swabs saliva, sample sent to lab
DNA sequences compared to gene database
40 different markers on DNA sample analysed to obtain rough percentage of genes' origin
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) analysed for maternal line
Y chromosome analysed for paternal ancestors
Brazil has more people with black ancestry than any other nation outside Africa, and its mix of Indians, Africans and Europeans gave rise in the past to the claim that the country was a "racial democracy".
But it is also a country where black people remain socially disadvantaged.
The results of the DNA tests surprised many by showing that skin colour does not necessarily reflect the ancestry of a person's genetic make-up.
Sergio Pena, professor of biochemistry at the Federal University of Belo Horizonte, who led the genetic analysis, explained the apparent contradiction.
"Only a few genes are responsible for someone's skin colour, which is a very poor indication of ancestry. A white person could have more African genes than a black one or vice-versa, especially in a country like Brazil," he said.
Brazilian actress Ildi Silva. Photo by Fernando Torquato.
Actress Ildi Silva says she is seen as neither black nor white
Soap opera actress Ildi Silva found that matches of the Y chromosome in her family are common in northern Europe, and that 71% of her genes are European and 19% African.
"I knew I had a Dutch ancestor from my mother's side, but I didn't know there was an European link in my paternal line as well," she said.
Genealogist Carlos Barata, co-author of the Dictionary of Brazilian Families, notes that as well as the Portuguese, immigrants from many European nations - including France, Ireland, the Netherlands, England and Germany - sought a new home in Brazil.
"The surnames might have disappeared by today's generation, but genetics can bring their contribution back to light," he said.
Controversial quotas
Musician Seu Jorge found that although 85% of his genes are African, the rest are European, confirmation that he is, as he put it "also the son of the guilty ones" - a descendant of the European slave-owners who had children with their African slaves.
"You need to be black to understand what it is like to get on a bus and see people getting off, afraid of you, or calling the police," he said.
"My daughter, who has a privileged education, came home one day telling us that her colleagues at a ballet class didn't want to hold hands with her. She will have to grow with this pain."
Musician Seu Jorge. Photo by Jose Maria Palmieri
Seu Jorge: Proud of his African heritage
The BBC Brasil series has had an impact in Brazil, where the issue of racial quotas is highly controversial.
About 40 universities in the country have set aside places for black students.
Manolo Florentino, head of the Social History Department at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, said the results "show race is a failed concept in Brazil".
Referring to the university quotas, he added: "Policies that 'racialise' this country, following the example of the US, create hate and tension and will make the situation worse."
But for organisations that defend the quota system, genetics should not be used to attack anti-discrimination policies.
They argue that genetics might prove that all Brazilians are very mixed in terms of their racial ancestry, but it is naive to believe that society will consider all equal.
"I've never seen a policeman asking for a genetic ID before stopping someone. In Brazil, discrimination is based on appearance, not on genes," said David dos Santos, a priest who co-ordinates a scheme to prepare underprivileged Afro-Brazilians to go to university, and who was himself tested for the series.
'Face of the future'
Musician Sandra de Sa said that despite its racial tensions, Brazil could teach the world how different races can integrate.
Footballer Obina
Footballer Obina was not aware of his indigenous roots
She was happy though to find out she was about 93% African.
"I can't believe I'm almost 100% African. I usually jokingly say that I can still feel the chains around my ankles," said the singer.
The ancestry of the nine celebrities revealed other surprises.
Obina, a football player in Flamengo, the biggest team in Brazil, had 25% indigenous genes, the highest percentage in the tests.
His Y chromosome was traced back to the Middle East, possibly an indication of a Jewish ancestor among the many escaping persecution in Portugal and Spain some 500 years ago.
"No-one is pure in Brazil. That's why the country has the face of the future," said Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr, co-ordinator of a similar project in the US.
The mixing of races so evident in Brazil will become more prevalent around the world, Professor Gates believes, with people originating from a sole geographical area becoming increasingly rare.
Black and white "issue"?
What are you talking about Skip?
What issue?
Acknowledging the existence of black men and of black women and celebrating what is special when they connect - is not an "issue".
Man, that's your neoliberal, intellectually lazy, Post Civil Rights Negro, baggage.
Huh ?
NEW MUSIC CRAZE SWEEPS EAST AFRICAN ISLES OF ZANZIBAR
Move over Reggaeton! Ringitone is here. Or at least that is what they are saying in the East African islands of Zanzibar. Whereas the former grew out of the increasing popularity of dancehall reggae en Espanol which came from the decendents of Jamaican migrant workers in Panama in the 1990's and became a huge international dance craze earlier this decade, ringitone is only similar in its African roots.
Listening to the hit "Njoo Mpenzi [Babangu Kasafiri]" by one of ringitone's most celebrated vocalists Ali-Z and you'll see why. If the backing track sounds uncannily like 50 Cent's "Windowshopper" that's because it is actually a polyphonic ringtone of the song downloaded onto a Siemen's 255 cellular phone at Zanzibar's number one studio Hooney Toons. I spoke to maverick ringitone producer Hassan Makame Mtwana, known to all as H-Ditty after waiting for him to stop talking over his bluetooth mouthpiece for over half an hour. "Alot of niggaz want to hate cos' we got the flyest beats around. Matta fact we was first to go polyphonic," he explains in stilted Swahili with a distinctly African American inflected slang, "but now everyone is logged on to passionup.com and freeringtones.co.uk trying to be down. We from the old school. I started out with just one raggedy second hand Ericcson that I bought for like 20,000/tsh [about $18] way back in October 2005. Now all I can tell them is 'How you like me now!'"
H-Ditty and his partner Jamal Dupree initially faced alot of opposition from Zenji Flava purists. Post-modern taarab or Zenji Flava as its called, is a spicey mixture of Shaggy, Kevin Lyttle, and T.O.K. riffs which are found freely in the tutorial sections of some learners edition studio software. I spoke with one his detractors who preferred not be named, "Basically they are ruining our culture, we have a long history in Zanzibar of using Frooty Loops and pre-packaged hooks from Cubase that goes as far back as 2003."
Some decry what they view as a lack of real of musicianship, I heard one unemployed Zenji Flava artist saying, "They just calling up shorties on the phone and begging them to sleep with them and playing some appropriate ringtones to show their love. That's not music. Back in the day we used to take the tunes from the qasidas we learned in Quran school and turned them into sexy r'n'b songs with actual pre-programmed Cubase loops from a T.O.K. song, and then we would put California Love on the voice to get, you know, pitch correction, cos we couldn't sing, because most of us got kicked out of Quran school for trying to touch the honeys they had up in there. You know what I'm sayin? This stuff they doing today; it lacks originality. And even that song, that was my song, I sang "Njoo Mpenzi [Mamangu Kaenda Kuhijji]" back in the old school, like were talking 2004. These are just new jacks trying to cash in on the trail that we blazed for them."
Judging by the amount of prepaid scratch phone cards littering the ground outside of Hooney Toons Records studios it would seem that Ringitone is here to stay. I had to wade through a crowd of Fair'n'Lovely bleached out teenage groupies in transparent bui-bui's to get inside Hooney Toons studios. What I was delighted to see was the lack of clumsy recording equipment. Aside from some red Italian leather couches giving it a distinctly Urban Contemporary feel, there were just a couple of guys with heavily gelled S-Curl hairstyles deeply engrossed in seductive conversation on some of the hottest cellphones out of Dubai. Another was using a cameraphone to film the whole thing. This was an actual Ringitone video shoot in progress!
Impressed by the minimalism of Ringitone, I later went and talked to ex-pat ethnomusicologist Jennifer Blousenstern, at the offices of the American cultural NGO, EWOC [Enablers Without a Clue].
I found her twirling her hair around an index finger chatting away comfortably in Swanglish, slightly flushed, in a seeming sililoquoy to no-one in particular. It was only when she signalled that I sit down that I noticed the hands-free headset dangling around her collar.
Waiting for her to wrap up her conversation I perused her extensive anthropological library. A p.H.D. in African Studies from Barnard hung on the wall. In the corner were three cellphones being charged in an overloaded electrical socket, their wires draped over an elaborately carved ebony wood fertility statue from the Makonde tribe of Southern Tanzania. After exchanging pleasantries Ms. Blousenstern needed no prodding to discuss her own ringing approval of the ringitone movement.
"When jazz came along people said 'That's not music!' Hip hop, the same story. Now you see rap music in advertisements for soda and everything else. Ringitone is going through that same initial Eurocentric reluctance now. If we look at it from a cultural perspective, its really quite African. I see the ringitone caller [as ringitone artists are known] as akin to the griot or the praise singer. But instead of singing to praise a chief or to recount the oral history of great kings of their clan, they are trying to convince underage girls to come over to their parents' unsupervised air-conditioned mansions and have pre-marital sex with them."
When Kool DJ Herc used two turntables and a mixer in the 1970's South Bronx, he was recontextualising the available modern technology into a unique new-world African form. According to Blousenstern, Ringitone takes it one step further.
"Another thing I find intriguing about Ringitone is its implicit Pan-African thrust. The callers are coupling African-American slang with call and response. The phones themselves have the mineral koltan in their circuitry. Its a well known fact that the only source of koltan is in the Katanga Province of the Democratic Republic of Congo." She draws a perfect circle in the air, "So they are bringing it back home to your Motherland and keeping it real at the same time!"
"So there is this whole defiant subtext in which the ringitone caller is saying to the Western World, 'You might deny me the right of a visa to live and work in the UK or the US because of the color of my skin or maybe because there are purported members of al-Qaeda who share my surname, but you cannot keep me from talking over the telephone in an African-American slang or listening to Shania Twain, Beyonce, or Fabolous.... and liking that shit!'"
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