Separate and Still Unequal

Friday, May 17th marked the 60th anniversary of the historic Brown vs. Board of Education decision in which the Supreme Court declared separate public schools for blacks and whites were unconstitutional. There was little fanfare marking this landmark but it was one of the defining moments of the civil rights movement of the 20th century.

The Brown vs. Board of Education decision overturned the Plessy vs. Ferguson decision of 1896 which allowed state sanctioned segregation in regards to public education. In the Plessy case, the Supreme Court held that separate facilities for the separate races did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment as long as the facilities were equal. Unfortunately throughout the south, facilities for Blacks were not only unequal but shabby in comparison. Public bathrooms, water fountains and especially schools were first rate for Whites while Black facilities were often unclean, unsanitary and the schools were run down with children using out of date books and hand me down materials including desks and seats. For years, Blacks were told to make do and be grateful for whatever they received regardless of the condition. They had to endure these atrocities from the Reconstruction era through the Jim Crow years with seemingly no end in sight. The Brown decision was not only a step in the right direction but the beginning of Black people deciding that they, too, deserved to equal citizens in the country of their birth.

There have been some great steps forward since the Brown decision of 1954 but separate but equal is still a part of the education system across the United States. In Chicago, the public education system is majority Black and Hispanic and the poor condition of education reflect the separate but equal mentality of the city council and the county. Schools with new books, quality buildings and up-to-date technology are found in the areas where middle to upper class Whites reside. Schools that need the most get the least and are told the only way to give the children a viable education is to make the school a charter school. Last year, over 50 public schools were closed and the school one block away from my home is under siege. Instead of finding out why schools are not performing, the political answer is to close the schools and turn the remaining ones over to corporations who know nothing about education. They merely want to turn the schools into little factories that will turn out peons who will serve the corporations upon graduation. Those who don’t graduate are already being assigned to the prison industrial complex before they've even thought about committing a crime.

To commemorate the anniversary of the decision, First Lady Michele Obama gave a speech in Topeka, KS where the class action decision. Further south in Greenville, MS, it is apparent that the 60 year old decision is still a foreign concept. The Today Show recently aired a report highlighting the public school system in that town where the schools are still separate and still unequal. Greenville, located in the Mississippi Delta, is a victim of the socioeconomic issues that are plaguing cities and towns across America. Whites makeup more than 20% of the population yet make-up only 2% of the public school system. The Blacks how make up 98% of the students in the public schools qualify for reduced breakfast and lunch programs because of the disparity of income between Blacks and Whites. Yet Mayor John H. Cox III states that this disparity is not just a race issue however does admit that he raised his two daughters in the town but did not send them to the public schools because he felt education in the public school system was lacking. One would think that the mayor of the town would be doing everything possible to make education a priority in his town but he instead chose to allow others to have a substandard education while he paid for private school for his children. I don't fault anyone fault anyone for wanting the best for their children but as mayor, isn't part of his duty to make sure every child in his town has a quality education. Silly me.

The argument made by Mayor Cox is one heard across the US and heatedly debated between wealthy suburbanites and poor city dwellers. Given the consistent song everyone sings about all children being the future, it would seem we should be able to make public education a quality institution for all children and not just for those who can afford better. Do we as a nation not realize that by allowing education to be another commodity to be purchased like clothing that we harming ourselves and our future? Or are we waiting for another decision that reflects our inequities as a have and have-not society? Whatever decision we make, our future is intertwined with that of our children. I don’t know about you but my dreams of a happy retirement sitting on a beach are over. The age of The Terminator are coming sooner and faster than you think and it won’t be Arnold Schwarzenegger on a blue screen.

Mothers and Mothers Day

Today is the 100th birthday of Mothers Day and the woman who started it all is barely remembered. We have instead turned this day into a profitable one for the card companies, florists, candy stores and restaurants. Yet the woman who started it all is merely a footnote in history and the original history of this day has been forgotten as well. Mothers Day is a holiday owing to strong feminist roots and the determination of one very special woman.

According to the National Geographic , in West Virginia in the 1850’s, a women’s organizer, Ann Reeves Jarvis, held mothers days work clubs to improve sanitary conditions and lower infant mortality by reducing milk contamination. The groups also tended wounded soldiers on both sides during the latter years of the Civil War. After the war, Jarvis and others organized Mother’s Friendship Day picnics and other events to create harmony.

After Jarvis died in 1905, her daughter Anna began holding similar friendship days in her hometown of Grafton, WV. Due to her efforts, Mothers Day was observed throughout the country. In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson set aside the second Sunday in May for the holiday. This was to be a day set aside not to celebrate all mothers but for people to celebrate the best mother they’ve ever known be it a mother, father or friend.

Unfortunately Anna Jarvis vision was bastardized by the card, candy and flower companies. This was hurtful and deeply troubling for Jarvis. She organized boycotts, threatened lawsuits and went after public officials she felt were destroying the original intent of Mother’s Day. Her fight continued well until she died in 1948, penniless and suffering dementia, in Philadelphia’s Marshall Square Sanitarium. Today Mother’s Day continues to be of the most profitable holidays in the US. The National Retail Federation estimates $19.9 billion dollars will be spent this year. The National Restaurant Association states that Mother’s Day is year’s most popular day to dine out. Hallmark states Mother’s Day is the third largest card giving holiday after Christmas and Valentine’s Day. It is second only to Christmas as the most gifts giving holiday.

What started as an American holiday has spread to other parts of the world. The Arab world celebrates Mother’s Day March 21st. Panama’s celebration is December 8th and in Thailand, Mother’s Day is August 12 and Great Britain Mothering Day is celebrated the fourth Sunday during Lent. Anna Jarvis’ ode to her mother has become a worldwide phenomenon and a pantheon to consumerism. Not too shabby for a woman from West Virginia and not at all what she had in mind.

Personally I don’t celebrate Mother’s Day. There are two very important reasons why. First, I’m a mother 24/7. Just like I pray and thank God daily, I believe children should do the same for their mothers. Not a day goes by when I stop being a mother to my son. I’m special and I believe as such, I should be acknowledged on a day of my own, not one I have to share with women all over. You want to wish me Happy Mother’s Day? Do it on July 28th or January 17th or any other day I don’t have to share. Am I being ridiculous and selfish? Maybe. I don’t apologize for it because I’m a mother. I may never be some of the many things I want to be. But I will always be a mother. There are mothers all over the world and I applaud them. But I’m mother to my son and will be until death and beyond. I’ve earned that title and continue to earn that title because as a mother, I’m as infinite as time itself.

The other reason why I don’t celebrate Mother’s Day now is because I never have. My mother died when I was six so there was never anyone I made homemade cards for or gift boxes or trays or any of the myriad homemade projects kids made in school. I had wonderful mother substitutes and my father was amazing. Every event a girl shared with her mother, I shared with my dad including the Mother-Daughter fashion show at Girl Scouts, buying a first bra and buying the first pair of heels and stockings. For those of us who grew up without a mother, this day is a painful reminder of what never was. My mother didn’t get to see me attend my senior prom, never see me graduate from high school or college, never saw me walk down the aisle, never experienced my pregnancy and never got to help me become the woman I am. For me, this day is a reflection of what never was and never will be.

For those of you who do celebrate this day, I hope it’s a good one. I hope you’ve shown your mothers just how special she is and what she means to you. If you have someone in your life that has been like a mother to you, I hope you’ve shared with that person what a wonderful inspiration she has been to you. I wish that each of you who celebrates with your mother or aunt or grandmother or special friend makes the time and the effort to show your love and appreciation every day. Life is too short for anything less.

Instrument of Destruction

The release of Thoughts of a Fried Chicken Watermelon Woman has been delayed for a week. It is available for purchase on Amazon Kindle.

Adam B., a Daily Kos member, wrote a great piece April 29th titled Defendant’s rights, victims’ rights and the worst of crimes. In it, Adam describes the horrific crime of child sexual abuse in order to produce pornography and the subsequent case against one of the possessors of said pornography. In the article, Adam summarizes what Congress has to say about those who possess child pornography, the effect on the abused individual and finally, what the Supreme Court ruled on the case last week. It’s a very informative piece and hopefully many will take the time to read it.

Of the many issues addressed in Adam’s piece is the fact that once again, the Internet is being used to do irreparable damage to a person.

The Internet is surely one of the greatest inventions of all times. Utilizing the web has made it easier to do research, made communication easier and faster, created a new economy and job market and opened up to the world to those of us who are unable to travel it. The Internet has been used to give voice to those previously unheard and opened up national debates and issues to many who would otherwise be ignored. There is a great exchange of information and ideas that heretofore would have been ignored. And I owe personally owe the Internet for the platform it’s given me for my blog and subsequent book.

With all the wonderful things that can be attributed to the Internet, it’s a shame that the Internet has and continues to be used to victimize innocent people everywhere. The young lady in the Adam B. piece is one of those victims.

The young lady was sexually abused as a child by her uncle to produce pornography. The young lady was just beginning to gain control over her life when she learned her images were being trafficked on the Internet. This victimization will last for the remainder of this woman’s life. She will live under a cloud always wondering if she is being recognized because of those images. She will never know the pleasure of just being. This victimization is being perpetrated by people she doesn’t know and there will be an end to it. Unfortunately there is no way Congress, the appellate court or the Supreme Court can do to end her suffering or the suffering of other men and women who are similarly victimized.

In addition to this form of persecution, the Internet is used to keep people from getting jobs or made it easier for companies to remove employees from their jobs.

One of the way companies use to discriminate is to troll the Internet for people’s Facebook pages. They look at what’s posted and judge potential employees based on what they see although much of what they see is out of context. Is it really fair to deny someone employment because they’re drinking at a party. Isn’t drinking one of the things most of us do at a party? Are we no longer able to have fun at a party for fear that a potential employer is going to see us having fun? Is having a good time fitting criteria for employment? Or is it another way to keep people from getting ahead in an already unforgiving economy? If that’s the case, the only people who qualify for employment are Mormons and the Amish.

When not using Facebook to discriminate against an applicant, the Internet is being used to fire people for enjoying themselves during their non-work time. A Georgia teacher was forced to resign from her job because a supposed concerned parent saw her with a glass of beer and reported her to the administration. The teacher was on vacation in Europe and visiting a pub. The teacher was not drinking she was merely holding a glass of the ale. How can anyone be discriminated against for activities participated in while on vacation, especially lawful activities? Have we become so myopic that we’ve lost all modicum of common sense?

I would imagine Tim Berners-Lee and Robert Calliau, the acknowledged inventors of the World Wide Web and Robert E. Kahn and Vint Cerf, the acknowledged inventors of the Internet had any of this type of criminal and discriminative behavior in mind. I believe they were thinking of what a wonderful gift to this world these inventions would be. It’s a shame that once again, like Zyklon B an insecticide that was ultimately used to execute millions in gas chambers during the Holocaust, something that was created for good has been exploited for discrimination and used for evil.

Will we ever learn?