Why Occupy Movements Unattached to Any Political Party Are The Only Hope for Real Change

Why Occupy Movements Unattached to Any Political Party Are The Only Hope for Real Change

by Mark Naison | special to NewBlackman

Now that Occupy Movements are being evicted from public parks in cities throughout the country, almost invariably by Democratic mayors, many Democratic Party organizes and some labor activists are hoping the movement will fade away and concentrate its energies on electing progressive candidates for office and putting forth a progressive political agenda.

In my opinion, that would be a grave mistake.  There are a bevy of important issues that given current political alignments, and the power of money in American politics,  cannot be translated into a viable legislative agenda. It will take years of disruptive protest- strikes, boycotts, walkouts, sit ins and occupations- to place them on the national agenda and the only force in American society capable of  employing those tactics for a sustained period is the Occupy movement.

Here are some key issues that neither party is willing to take on that the Occupy movement can influence if it keeps growing and becoming more diverse in the next five years.

1. The student loan crisis and the escalating cost of a college education. There is no way, without major disruptions of university life, and pressure on the banks, that student loan debt can be erased, or significantly reduced, and tuition at public colleges frozen or lowered.  Until universities cannot carry on their normal business without making dramatic changes in loan collections and tuition charges, you can be sure elected officials won’t touch these issues with a ten foot pole.

2. The legalization of drugs and the release of non-violent drug offenders from the nation’s prisons. Given the powerful interests fighting any dismantling of the prison industrial complex-ranging from prison guards unions, to elected officials in communities where prisons are located, to corporations who benefit from cheap prison labor, it will require massive social movements, to force states, localities, and eventually the federal government, to end the irrational arrest and imprisonment of people who sell drugs no more dangerous than alcohol or prescription medications.

3. The dismantling of a domestic police state apparatus which uses advanced weaponry and intrusive surveillance technology to suppress dissent and control and intimidate minority and working class youth.  The weapons that were used against Occupy demonstrators in Oakland, at Zuccotti Park and at UC Davis have been used for many years against minority youth to prevent them from inhibiting the gentrification and re-segregation of American societies and to assure order in schools and communities stripped of resources.  Libertarians, civil rights organizations, and a growing Occupy movement can  create an alliance to  undermine the domestic police state. The two major parties will never do it without immense outside pressure.

4.  A moratorium on foreclosures and the passage of legislation to allow arts groups, youth groups,  affordable housing organizations and advocates for the homeless to occupy abandoned commercial and residential space in America’s towns and cities. Such actions will only be taken if Occupy groups and their allies make foreclosures difficult, and begin occupying abovementioned properties in such numbers that it will be counterproductive for authorities to evict them. There is no way elected officials will take such steps without being presented with a “fait accompli” by protesters.

5. A radical reformation of the tax system that places the burden of taxation on the 1 Percent and reduces taxes on individuals and small businesses.  There is no way, given current political alignments, and the vast power of  corporate and Wall Street lobbies, that that such a revolution in the tax code could be legislated. But five more years of disruptive protest could change that Occupy movements have to create a scenario where the only path to restoring social order would be a revision of the tax burden to benefit ordinary citizens

These five policy areas are hardly the only ones which would require years of protest to attain-I am sure people reading this could identify issues in education, environmental protection, job creation and US military policy that would require movements of equal force to implement

But I have identified these five areas to show how far away we are from any real political change in this country through the two major parties  We need grass roots social movements of such force that it will reinvent what is possible in mainstream American politics. The Occupy movements have started such a process. It would be a shame if they prematurely embraced the electoral process rather than pushing protests activity to much higher levels.

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Mark Naison is a Professor of African-American Studies and History at Fordham University and Director of Fordham’s Urban Studies Program. He is the author of two books, Communists in Harlem During the Depression and White Boy: A Memoir. Naison is also co-director of the Bronx African American History Project (BAAHP). Research from the BAAHP will be published in a forthcoming collection of oral histories Before the Fires: An Oral History of African American Life From the 1930’s to the 1960’s.

It's Time to Form "99 Percent Clubs" in Your School or Neighborhood

It's Time to Form "99 Percent Clubs" in Your School or Neighborhood

by Mark Naison | special to NewBlackMan

If you part of a large and growing number of Americans who support the Occupy movement, but  may  or may not be able to “Occupy” yourself, you might want to form a 99 Percent Club at your school, your workplace or in your neighborhood, to organize financial, legal and political support  for the Occupy movement and educate people in your community about what it stands for.

The idea for these 99 Percent Clubs came from renowned educator Ira Shor  and they are modeled on the “Friends of SNCC” organization that mobilized support for the non violent Southern civil rights movement in the early 1960’s. Given that the Occupy movement is under assault from elected officials and university presidents around the country, and that people in this movement, like their counterparts in the southern civil rights movement, face arrest and beatings, along with more modern police weaponry such as pepper spray and rubber bullets,  it is definitely time to create  a support group to raise funds and educate the public about these brave activists.

A 99 Percent Club is one vehicle that can do just that.  We have called for a first meeting of such a club at Fordham and the response, from students, alumni, and staff has been overwhelming.  Our Fordham group does not have a program- just a commitment to support the Occupations. So far, nearly 30 people are committed to attend.

Occupy Wall Street and its counterparts around the nation have put the questions of economic inequality on the nation’s agenda for the first time since the 1960’s. And the response from policy makers has been ferocious as that of southern segregationists confronting a challenge to their way of life.

It’s time for Americans who support the goals of the Occupy Movement to mobilize in behalf of popular democracy and economic justice, even if they don’t feel they can participate in the movement directly. Forming 99 Percent Clubs is one way to do so.

If you would like to start a 99 Percent Club in your area, please email Ira Shor at irashor@comcast.net with a cc to me at Naison@fordham.edu.

***

Mark Naison is a Professor of African-American Studies and History at Fordham University and Director of Fordham’s Urban Studies Program. He is the author of two books, Communists in Harlem During the Depressionand White Boy: A Memoir. Naison is also co-director of the Bronx African American History Project(BAAHP). Research from the BAAHP will be published in a forthcoming collection of oral histories Before the Fires: An Oral History of African American Life From the 1930’s to the 1960’s.

Things to Consider While Occupying America

Things to Consider While Occupying America

by Timothy B. Tyson | special to NewBlackMan

If police officers leveling assault rifles at unarmed citizens were not so disturbing, folks in Chapel Hill might act like Sheriff Andy Taylor does whenever Deputy Fife misuses his service revolver. "Give me the bullet, Barn," he'd say.  Poor Barney fishes into his shirt pocket and forks over the shell.  

Chapel Hill is not Mayberry, but a big university town where law enforcement is dangerous and complex; we honor and support the men and women who protect us.  When our cops point assault rifles at our citizens, however, they imperil our values—not just our image--and court real tragedy.  We cannot pretend this was okay.  Whoever decided that our police officers should go in with assault rifles leveled at unarmed citizens needs to resign right this minute.      

Self-romanticizing hotheads are shouting, like the muddy peasants in Monty Python, “See the violence inherent in the system!  I’m being repressed!”  In the society of the globalized spectacle, front-page pictures of cops with AR-15s make their own fevered case.  To the extent to which those dystopian images speak the truth about us, we must change Chapel Hill; to the extent that they misrepresent us, we must tell our own truth still more loudly.

“Our police department responded,” Mayor Mark Kleinschmidt announced, “in a deliberate and measured way.”  In the next breath, he denied responsibility, saying that our council-manager system won’t let the mayor direct the police.  This is the classic hallmark of a politician who knows he landed on the wrong side.  In fact, he claimed, Police Chief Chris Blue did not brief him about the weekend seizure of a downtown building by a violent mob until Monday morning. 

Every parent can translate the mayor’s dubious narrative: this was not a mistake and I am not responsible for the mistake; in fact, I knew nothing about it.  Not once did my kids ever get the car keys back until they did better than that. 

Chief Blue’s decision to reenact the Normandy invasion also defies grown-up logic.  That goes double if he actually thinks a two-day building seizure by what he described as a threatening mob does not merit informing the mayor.  “Our deliberate response was appropriate,” he says. 

Uh, would either of you gentlemen care to try again?   

Incidentally, the activists who took over the old Yates Motor Company are not Occupy Chapel Hill.  And disdain for Chapel Hill’s official idiocy is not an endorsement of the Unfettered Rave-Action Coalition.  Occupy challenges the gap between rich and poor and confronts the corporate purchase of our political system; it is a democratic movement, not the hipster version of a frat party.  Occupy defies the framework of politics-as-usual, but it does not attempt to resolve land use questions by mass-action late-night booty calls.

Before we suffer any of these fools further, we should ask ourselves what the words "Kent State" mean four decades after the National Guard fired into that crowd of students in Ohio.  Any actual “deliberate response” to the recklessness of this lost weekend must weigh the enduring costs of having "Chapel Hill" become that kind of national metaphor.     

To a large extent, I share the rage of this flubbed-up flash mob.  Land-use policies and real estate prices in Chapel Hill are pushing working families and the poor out of town; neighborhoods long owned by people of color are being replaced by high-rise housing for millionaires.   If the fashionistas wanted a community center in the long-abandoned Yates Motor Company, though, they might have recruited, well, the community.   We desperately need to talk about what is happening in this town.  A public education campaign, some recruitment at the churches, a few press conferences and protest rallies, and it might have happened.  We all know that property rights are not absolute, as zoning ordinances, building codes, eminent domain and affordable housing laws attest.  Had the groundwork been done, this old building could have become a symbol of our generous vision;  most people in town know the building exists only because of the front-page showdown. 

But the Anarcho-Stylin’ Dance Alliance yearned less for a community center than for a confrontation that would validate their paranoid fantasies, some of which, alas, are not entirely paranoid.  Their victory created a global spectacle that a single cop stumbling over the curb could have turned into a tragedy for Chapel Hill and a debacle for Occupy Wall Street.        

I embrace the Occupy movement, which sparks my hopes for a better world.  At the invitation of our brilliant offspring, my wife and I spent several days at Zuccotti Park.  (Unlike our kids, Perri and I slept at a friend's apartment.  It is possible that we did not subsist solely on the granola bars we bought for the masses.  We can neither confirm nor deny the yummy sushi buffet.)   Figuratively speaking, and almost literally, we saw Pete Seeger meet Kanye West in that park.  Young and old, poor and affluent, aspiring democrats vowed that the gap between rich and poor in America must not continue to widen and that corporations will not be allowed to purchase our political system.   

Occupy Wall Street has shifted the national conversation sharply for the better.  But its future depends on our poise.  We must reach beyond the fashionista impulse to outrage the uncool and instead recruit and educate a larger movement.  That means coalition politics.  (See Rustin, Bayard.  See also Wellstone, Paul.) 

As a historian of American social movements, I assure you that the national security state is infiltrating the movement and attempting to strengthen its fringe and isolate its influence.  Agents provocateurs or local hotheads—it does not matter much which is which—will  always advocate extremist adventures.  They will berate more thoughtful activists as “Uncle Toms” or the timid bourgeoisie.  If this spirit of ginned-up recklessness prevails, fueled by infiltrators, Occupy’s political vision will descend into a fun-house mirror in which moral authority passes by default to the craziest sumbitch in the room. (See Panthers, Black.  See also Underground, Weather.) 

Instead, we must invoke the ancient Chinese general, Sun Tzu: "Do not do what you would most like to do.  Do what your opponent would least like you to do."  Those desperate to avoid a public conversation about the power of corporate money will relish seeing the Occupy movement tied to mob seizures of property.    

It is time for Chapel Hill, whether we are Occupied or merely residential, to say who does and does not represent our community: this includes the Car-Lot Seizure Cooperative, our officially not-responsible mayor, and whatever mallet-head passed out the assault rifles.  Hand over the bullet, Barney.

***

Timothy Tyson is the author of several books including Blood Done Signed My Name and Radio Free Dixie: Robert F. Williamsand the Roots of Black Power.

What Occupy Wall Street Has Accomplished in Two Short Months

What Occupy Wall Street Has Accomplished in Two Short Months

by Mark Naison | special to NewBlackMan

Many people in the media, as well as many citizens, complain that Occupy Wall Street has no leaders and no goals.   While Occupy Wall Street and its spinoffs around the nation have certainly not developed “leaders” who articulate its goals to the media or negotiate with public officials, it has already registered a formidable list of accomplishments for a movement this young.

Here is my list of some of the important things this movement has done, with more to come as it grows and matures:

1. Put the question of economic inequality in the center of national discourse for the first time since the 1960’s, even though such inequality has been growing dramatically for the last 20 years.  The vocabulary the movement has developed to describe this inequality “ the 1%  and the 99%” have become a permanent part of our political discourse and has focused great attention on how the mal distribution of wealth has undermined democracy and eroded the living standards of the great majority of Americans.

2. Called attention to the stifling impact of student loan debt on  young college, professional  and trade school graduates   who face the double whammy of a stagnant job market and crippling debt.  The attention given this issue inspired President Obama to marginally ease the loan burden of current recipients. In the future, it might well prompt a radical reconfiguration of the debt or a major program of loan forgiveness.

3. Created political pressures that prompted the postponement of a decision by President Obama to begin construction of the controversial Keystone XL natural gas pipeline.

4. Inspired  a wide variety of actions to prevent foreclosures and evictions and to bring relief to beleaguered home owners and tenants.

5. Put the undemocratic character of many education reform policies, particularly school closings, under much greater scrutiny, creating pressures on policy makers that will make these closings much more difficult to implement  without more consultation and input from parents, students, teachers and community members.

6. Given the labor movement a new vocabulary to challenge attacks on collective bargaining and union recognition, providing added ammunition to the successful campaign to defeat an anti-collective bargaining bill in the state of Ohio.

7.  Focused  attention on the issue of police brutality and the militarization of urban police forces in ways that reinforces longstanding complaints of police misconduct and abuse in Black and Latino communities.

This would be an impressive list of accomplishment for a movement that has lasted two years, but Occupy Wall Street has only been with us for two months.

***

Mark Naisonis a Professor of African-American Studies and History at Fordham University and Director of Fordham’s Urban Studies Program. He is the author of two books, Communists in Harlem During the Depression and White Boy: A Memoir. Naison is also co-director of the Bronx African American History Project(BAAHP). Research from the BAAHP will be published in a forthcoming collection of oral histories Before the Fires: An Oral History of African American Life From the 1930’s to the 1960’s.

Vijay Prashad: Hip Hop Occupies

November 14, 2011

 

It's Politics Time Again

Hip Hop Occupies

by VIJAY PRASHAD

For Heavy D, 1967-2011.

I. We the 99.

“Nobody got more welfare than Wall Street /Hundreds of billions after operating falsely/And nobody went to prison that’s where you lost me /But my home, my job, and my life is what it cost me.”– Jasiri X, Occupy (We the 99).

The students at UCONN invited Jasiri X to headline their “Political Awareness Rally” on November 4. Jasiri is a rapper from Pittsburg, PA., who burst on the scene with his powerful, political music, such as Free the Jena 6, What if the Tea Party Was Black, I Am Troy Davis and most recently Occupy (We the 99). Shortly before he was to come to the event, Jasiri received an email from the Chief Financial Officer of the Undergraduate Student Government at UCONN. The student wrote that Jasiri could perform most of his songs (“they all promote social justice and ending racism”), but the Student Government could not allow him to perform songs “that contain obvious political statements (such as Occupy – We the 99) – as referring to the Occupy movement.”

I asked Jasiri what he made of this curious distinction between his other work and the Occupy song. “I do political songs,” he said. “How can they say Occupy is a political song and not I Am Troy Davis?” At the event, Jasiri followed Ken Krayeske, who is running for U. S. Congress on the Green Party Ticket. Krayeske made his name through an interview with UCONN’s star basketball coach (he asked Jim Calhoun if he’d give back some of his millions as austerity struck the campus, and Calhoun barked, “Not a dime back”). At the Rally, Krayeske invoked Occupy. Jasiri recalls looking out at the students and thinking, “they have got to hear the song.” He went for it despite being warned that if he did the song he might not get paid.

Later Jasiri wrote, “At some point in this movement all of us are going to have to make sacrifices, if we truly want to see real change. The 1% control the 99% with promises of money, access, and comfort; we have to put our own souls above all three.”

II. Contagious Struggles.

When I asked Toni Blackman, a rapper with the Freestyle Union, what she thought of the Occupy dynamic, she said that it brought her “a sense of relief. I exhaled and thought ‘finally.’ I believe the energy will be contagious.” “Hip Hop is inching closer and closer to the Occupy movement. Soon singing about your riches and your bitches will be less and less acceptable. The Occupy movement has agitated the stagnant air just enough for artists who felt powerless to begin acknowledging their power again.”

It is not just the artists. Nor is the contagion going in one direction.

Read the Full Essay @ CounterPunch

Open Letter to Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York

Mary Altaffer/Associated Press

Open Letter to Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York
by Kevin Powell | special to NewBlackMan

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Dear Mayor Bloomberg:

I was awakened in the wee hours of this morning by texts and calls from friends and associates distraught that Occupy Wall Street protestors were being forcibly removed from Zuccotti Park in Lower Manhattan. Even more troubling is that you chose to make a mockery of the First Amendment of our United States Constitution by not only evicting the peaceful activists, but also by blocking media outlets from recording the police raid. This is America, Mr. Bloomberg, a nation that through much effort, tears, blood, and, yes, deaths, has evolved from a slaveholding country that also destroyed much of Native American culture, to one where women, people of color, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community, the physically challenged, Jews, Muslims, White ethnics from places like Ireland and Italy, and so many others have been able to gain some measure of freedom and democracy. We are not the nation we ought to be, yet, but we are also not the nation we once were, either. We do that history, and ourselves, a great disservice when we in leadership positions resort to tactics used to deny freedom and democracy, in the old America of Jim Crow laws, in the old South Africa of apartheid.

As I watched the amateur video made of the raid online this morning, I got very choked up. I am a big supporter of Occupy Wall Street because it speaks directly to my history as a Black person in America. The occupation is nothing more than the bus boycotts, freedom rides, and sit-ins of the Civil Rights era. The nonviolent approach harkens back to the principles of Dr. King, borrowed, of course, from the great Indian leader Gandhi. The use of technology to spread the Occupy Wall Street messages is no different than how W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey, and other visionaries used the media at their disposal in their day to communicate with the masses. So when we choose to walk down the path of repression, of removing and silencing those who would speak out, Mr. Mayor, we are saying that we are choosing to be on the wrong side of history. That we are choosing to be in bed with the devil, instead of on the side of God, of the noble promises of our America.


As I said, I am a supporter of the Occupy Wall Street movement, here in New York City, and across America. I have been a part of many rallies and marches the past two months. I have spent much time talking and listening to participants, at Zuccotti Park, at planning meetings, and in private one-on-one sessions with some of the leadership. They are mostly good and decent Americans and I have not witnessed a movement like this since the anti-apartheid protests of the 1980s when I was a college student. It is the same energy, the same sense of purpose, and the same fire-in-belly belief that what they are doing is right. They are not anti-American. They are not anti-business. They are not anti-wealthy folks. They are not anti-police. They are not anti-you, Mr. Mayor. They, we, merely want to see our nation be a place where people, regardless of race, class, gender, sexual orientation, physical ability, religion, or educational level can have an opportunity to have an opportunity; to not struggle to get or keep a job or career; to not struggle to pay for an education which should be our birthright; to not suffer through housing woes, including foreclosures; to not have to spend our entire lives in debt, broke, or broken spiritually and emotionally because of our finances.

But what message are we sending, Mayor Bloomberg, when we come like the thief in the night to remove people by extreme force? What message are we sending when we inhumanly destroy a community built to show what democracy can look like in our era? How condescending and nearsighted are we to state these people are dirty and unfocused, that they somehow are more of a public nuisance than certain banks and corporations that have wrecked the lives of so many Americans? How arrogant are we to assume, just because we may have a certain financial background, status, or title, to think we are above relearning lessons of democracy at various points in our American lives? And how can we ever again say it was not right for militaries in Middle Eastern and North African nations to crack down on the democracies there, then we turn around and do the same on our own shores, only months later, and to our own children, to our own people?

Mayor Bloomberg, you said on your weekly radio show, several weeks ago, that it was inevitable for Americans to take to the streets because of the state of our economy. But is the solution to beat these people back with batons and gloved fists, or is the solution to listen to their voices, hear their concerns, and figure out a way, together, for us as a people, all people, to transform America for these times and beyond?

I know somewhere in your person, Mayor Bloomberg, you have a soul and a moral conscience. You are going to have to ask yourself, billionaire or not, mayor of New York City or not, whose side you are on, because the Occupy Wall Street movement is here to stay, and will only get bigger and stronger when leaders like you attack the protestors, as you've done. Justice, Mr. Bloomberg, is not on the side of those who would misuse and abuse their power. Justice is, forever, on the side of those who would even sacrifice their own bodies because they believe so deeply in their cause. Those are the kind of people and the kind of Americans I stand with, Mayor Bloomberg. Those are the kind of people I know, from their tents, blankets, and makeshift occupied communities, will do for America exactly what those Civil Rights workers did with their shoes, overalls, songs of freedom, and voter registration cards a generation ago. And so it shall be, and so it shall be-

Respectfully,

Kevin Powell

***

Kevin Powell is an activist, public speaker, and author or editor of 10 books. His 11th book, Barack Obama, Ronald Reagan, and The Ghost of Dr. King: And Other Blogs and Essays, will be published by lulu.com in January 2012. You can reach him at kevin@kevinpowell.net, or follow him on Twitter @kevin_powell.

Mark Naison: Why Bloomberg Had To Attack Occupy Wall Street

Why Bloomberg Had To Attack Occupy Wall Street

by Mark Naison | special to NewBlackMan

Occupy Wall Street is Under Attack by a huge force while the subways have been closed, along with the Brooklyn Bridge. Here are some key components of the Bloomberg policies that might explain what the Mayor has to take such extreme measure to crush

Dissent:

1) Subsidize luxury housing in Brooklyn and Manhattan and concentrate all affordable housing in  the hyper-segregated sections of the Bronx and East New York.

2) Undermine public education by closing schools over the opposition of parents students teachers and community members and replace them with charter schools that promote rote learning, obedience and militarized discipline for the children of the poor.

3) When  a movement finally arises that challenges the Mayor's plan to turn Manhattan and parts of North Brooklyn into a city for the wealthy  of the globe at the expense of  the city's working class, middle class and poor who live in the outer boroughs, you close the bridges and subways, bar the press and crush that movement with Riot Police, pepper spray, water hoses.

Not since 9/11 have the police of this city been mobilized to this degree.

And for what?

Democracy has been under attack in this city for some time. Now even the illusion of Democracy has been removed.

***

Mark Naison is a Professor of African-American Studies and History at Fordham University and Director of Fordham’s Urban Studies Program. He is the author of two books, Communists in Harlem During the Depressionand White Boy: A Memoir. Naison is also co-director of the Bronx African American History Project (BAAHP). Research from the BAAHP will be published in a forthcoming collection of oral histories Before the Fires: An Oral History of African American Life From the 1930’s to the 1960’s.

Left of Black S2:E9 with Vijay Prashad and Leyla Farah

Left of Black S2:E9

w/ Vijay Prashad and Leyla Farah

November 7, 2011

Host and Duke University Professor Mark Anthony Neal is joined via Skype© by Vijay Prashad, George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College and author of the recent award winning book The Darker Nations: A People's History of the Third World (The New Press, paperback 2008).  Neal and Prashad, discuss the impact of the #Occupy Movement and what role Left academics and intellectuals have to play in the movement.

Later Neal is joined by Leyla Farah, author of Black Gifted and Gay which profiles the lives and accomplishments of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community’s living icons—who  just happen to be of African descent.  Farah is a Founding Partner at Cause+Effect, a PR firm focused exclusively on the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.

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Left of Black is a weekly Webcast hosted by Mark Anthony Neal and produced in collaboration with the John Hope Franklin Center at Duke University.

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Episodes of Left of Black are also available for download @ iTunes U:

"Occupy, Occupy, Occupy"--Rev. Jesse Jackson on The #Occupy Movement

The Reverend Jesse Jackson, Sr. at #Occupy Atlanta Making Connections between Martin Luther King, Jr's "Poor People's Campaign" and the #Occupy Movement.

November 7th ‘Left of Black’ Examines the #Occupy Movement

November 7th ‘Left of Black’ Examines the #Occupy Movement

Host  and Duke UniversityProfessor Mark Anthony Neal is joined via Skype© by Vijay Prashad, George and Martha Kellner Chair in South Asian History and Professor of International Studies at Trinity College and author of the recent award winning book The Darker Nations: A People's History of the Third World (The New Press, paperback 2008).  Neal and Prashad, discuss the impact of the #Occupy Movement and what role Left academics and intellectuals have to play in the movement.

Later Neal is joined by Leyla Farah, author of Black Gifted and Gay which profiles the lives and accomplishments of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community’s living icons—who  just happen to be of African descent.  Farah is a Founding Partner at Cause+Effect, a PR firm focused exclusively on the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community.

***

Left of Black airs at 1:30 p.m. (EST) on Mondays on Duke's Ustream channel: ustream.tv/dukeuniversity. Viewers are invited to participate in a Twitter conversation with Neal and featured guests while the show airs using hash tags #LeftofBlack or #dukelive. 

Left of Black is recorded and produced at the John Hope Franklin Center of International and Interdisciplinary Studies at Duke University.

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Follow Left of Black on Twitter: @LeftofBlack

Follow Mark Anthony Neal on Twitter: @NewBlackMan

Follow Vijay Prasad: @VijayPrashad

Follow Leyla Farah: @LDFarah

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Is Occupy Wall Street Lacking Diversity? James Braxton Peterson Responds

Lehigh University professor James Braxton Peterson looks at claims that the Occupy Wall Street protestors lack diversity.

Angela Davis @ #OccupyWallStreet [Washington Sq. Park]

Cornel West @ #OccupyHarlem

#Occupy Duke

southern socialism

Occupy Duke

by Josh Brewer | The Chronicle

Duke must join the Occupy Together movement as an academic institution, employer and collection of workers while explicitly standing with Durham and North Carolina. 

Many have criticized Occupy’s horizontal structure for being an indirect, uncoordinated churning mess—this is what democracy looks like. Unions were hierarchical, well-organized, politically connected and very specific about their demands during the bipartisan deconstruction of workers’ rights and deterioration of the American manufacturing sector. In The Chronicle, the movement’s self-identification—occupy, an impolite word historically functioning as a coital euphemism—has been criticized. More shockingly, the article attacked the Southern poor while disregarding Occupy’s proliferation. No, most Southerners, like most Americans, may not understand derivative markets and have nothing financially left to risk, but does this really delegitimize our demands for equality? 

In my hometown I have seen mom and pop shops shut down by Walmart (ironically started as such in my state), the middle class get poor and the poor get poorer. I see good people unable to work with their hands—something most Duke students couldn’t do if their life depended on it. I see people die for a profit-procuring medical system. The unemployed and working classes have never had agency in this political system; this must change. Occupy must empower the Lumpenproletariat and force recognition of solidarity among the middle classes. 

“Why should I care,” says the stereotypical i-banking Dukie. Most likely you don’t care about my type of folk (no, I reject the yuppie liberalism helping you sleep at night) but what about your fabled “Duke Degree” job sector: The banking industry will take another round of cuts to maintain the disproportionately inflated average earnings; the medical system increasingly forces doctors into unethical relationships with hospital administrations (profit maximization) and pharmaceutical companies; engineering firms are going elsewhere; graduate students of all fields are facing increased costs and shrinking federal aid. 

Being a Southern Socialist, at least from the tagline—I am not a 99 percenter, I am more of a 50 percent type of guy. I do not agree with everything said by Occupy protesters. That is their right and mine. Occupy needs to bring all people to the table. Whereas the Tea Party is a racist and plutocrat-funded knee jerk, Occupy respects—and desperately needs more—color, workers and dissent. The Wall Street protest is greatly symbolic by holding ground zero of the American financial collapse. Occupy should stand in international opposition to our collapsing oligarchy’s tendency to sacrifice the 99-99.9 percent while locally discussing what Duke can do to improve itself and all the lives that it touches—globally abstract and locally nuanced. Occupy’s strength comes from its diversity. 

America’s student loan debt now surpasses credit card debt. Unlike mortgages, the bank can’t roll in and steal back your education—despite the public school system’s preemptive degradation—nor can you easily declare bankruptcy and watch loans melt away. Student loans get put on forbearance during which time your debt balloons to unimaginable levels. It appears the only way to get out of this type of debt is to stay impoverished—which about 15.1 percent of Americans are, a statistic shockingly skewed along lines of racial identification. The moment you get out of poverty, that debt puts you back in. 

Princeton became arguably the first American university to opt for a no-loan financial aid system in 2001. This helped Princeton attract vital socioeconomic diversity and remove a hefty burden on its graduates, allowing real post-graduation options. Amherst, Columbia, Harvard, Yale and others followed suit. Smaller financial aid systems, like Duke, removed loans for students coming from households below a financial marker: Brown, $100,000, Cornell, $75,000, Stanford, $60,000 and Duke, $40,000. Dartmouth grants free tuition to students coming from families with incomes below $75,000. Like the no-loan grouping, Duke falls embarrassing behind in loan caps—another financial aid mechanism used by expensive universities for the appearance of equality. If you are lucky enough to stick around past your eighth semester like me (decided to get another major in English enabled by athletic eligibility) well, there’s no financial aid for you beyond the Federal Pell Grants in Republicans’ sights (education hurts their base, I guess). 

There are many reasons why I want an occupied Duke, but I must start with those that the majority of Duke students and employees can agree upon. Most students took out loans with the expectation of employment. That is no longer the economic reality. This is the reality that most Americans have woken up to for the past 30 years. It is sad it has taken this long for the privileged to care. Duke’s financial aid must become transparent and modernize to properly respond to divorces and terminal illness. Duke must eliminate loans for lower and middle class students. 

For employees, Duke should monitor and update its living wage and only require time-sensitive work to be done outside of traditional work hours. Union rights should be respected and real conversation about faculty and athlete unionization should occur. Duke must ethically and transparently invest in a sustainable future. 

These discussions are long overdue. The Allen Building was taken before. This is our time. Occupy your mind. Occupy Duke. 

***

Josh Brewer is a Trinity senior. His column runs every other Tuesday.

Musicians #Occupy Wall Street

?uestlove, Moby, Kweli, Kanye West, Russell Simmons, Bilal, Angelique Kidjo, and Gbenga Akinnagbe (from The Wire) stand in solidarity with the #Occupy protests on Wall Street and across the country.

For more information on how you can help and get involved, check www.okayplayer.com/wallstreet.

Belly of the Beast: From Durham to Wall Street

Belly of the Beast: From Durham to Wall Street

by Lamont Lilly | special to NewBlackMan

The scene was a perfect storm of organized chaos.  Here were the young and old, students & workers, immigrants and oppressed, all addressing the failures of capitalism’s current worldwide crisis, outlining the destructive forces of global banking systems and highlighting the lack of communal values in a place that loves to cry patriotism. Right-winged conservative press would have you to believe that the only “fanatics” there were Ivy League white college kids—the privileged and idle-minded, or simply a cadre of recent graduates who have yet to find jobs after completing Master’s Degrees. But that wasn’t true at all.  The idea of occupying Wall Street may have begun as a young white thing, but by the time we arrived on the evening of October 8^th, there were participants of all nations, all races and all ages—raising a range of pertinent issues.

There were Haitians from the Bronx who had marched the George Washington Bridge earlier that day in a show of solidarity. There were domestic and sanitation workers from Queens. There were the unions and labor organizations from all over the country—Working Class adults who currently live the effects of capitalism from the front line, Blue-collar folks whose wages have been decimated by the manipulation of global markets, international corporatism and “Third World” exploitation. For this one night, I was living what Democracy really looks like: the common masses united in a single front.

Creatively illustrated cardboard was everywhere. Homemade signs and justice banners waited on deck for live action. While some were large and others were small, all were quite grand in stature, bearing sharp demands and philosophical ideals such as “Books not Bombs” and “Stop the War on the Poor.”  It was a true Who’s Who of change slogans.  There were also posters of Troy Davis and Mumia Abu-Jamal.  However, nearly everyone possessed an anti-capitalist placard of some sort. The LGBT community was also in full-effect, but that was merely the surface.

There, within this tightly restricted park-ground was everything a revolutionary would need for a couple of months, that is, aside from a public restroom. There were mass water dispensers and community chow lines, a first aid station equipped with medics, and an immense library for learning and entertainment. There were sleeping bags, tents and thinly padded nap mats for rest and relaxation. There was art and music, love and hope. There was one common cause and one loud voice: The People.  No lobbyists or politicians were allowed. No bureaucrats or corporate bourgeoisie were welcomed.

Sure, to some, it was a festival. While walking around attempting to find a place to post my belongings, I ran across what appeared to be an old makeshift reggae band—four middle-aged white men with golden locked hair and long beards, sitting on the ground with their guitars, fumbling through Bob Marley’s, “Redemption Song.” I jumped in, considering they only knew half the words to one of my personal favorites.  There I was, howling to the top of my lungs with four strangers. We were 30 yards from the Occupy Wall Street drummers.

However, on the North End there were serious politics being discussed.  I was completely awed by their covert development of order and social structure.  Formally entitled, The General Assembly, there were 500 or so people tightly interwoven in a scattered circle, Indian style.

There were no microphones. Yet, all could be heard via the systematic rippling effect where each phrase was repeated backwards, twice. There was no President or Speaker of the House to go through in order to be heard—no political red tape to be understood.  Here, any man, woman or child who wanted to address the masses was permitted to do so by simply waiting behind “the podium,” (a small group of steep opal-shaped steps perpendicular from the street).

During the Assembly, it was clear that a wide array of interests were there in attendance. However, I don’t recall one time there being any certain individual or targeted companies mentioned. It wasn’t about hate or animosity, at least not that particular night. It encompassed more of a rallying of sociopolitical thought, a brewing of further direction—a galvanization based on commonality and mutual strands of oppression. Spirits were high and emotions were free. For those who’ve grown up in the Black Church, it was the embodiment of a Pentecostal Worship Service, a Holy Ghost hour, primarily reserved for Human Rights activists, anti-capitalists and concerned citizens at-large. Of course Dr. King would have supported the Occupy Movement.  These were some of the same issues MLK advocated for through his, Poor People’s Campaign in the spring of 1968—through his efforts with the Sanitation workers in Memphis, TN.

Purpose and the Point

What the general public or your casual Fox News consumer has failed to understand, is the power of struggle and its catalytic ability to unite the oppressed and disenfranchised.  These whirlwinds of local protests sprouting across the country aren’t simply about disproportionate tax benefits, financial inequality and corporate greed. It’s far bigger than just the “rich and poor.” The complexities of the issues are much more intertwined than that. This is about the mismanagement of Human Capital—the manipulation of the common masses worldwide. This is about the audacity of the “haves” who obviously don’t give a damn, who could care less whether your home was foreclosed last year or not, or whether your daughter had a decent meal at her public school today. The 1% aren’t concerned with Racism, Sexism and Homophobia. Worker’s Rights doesn’t affect them.  Social class is nonexistent from the elite’s perspective. Homeless veterans are “no such thing,” while universal healthcare is considered a “waste of money.” But really, what else should we expect from a socioeconomic system that breeds such chiseled individualism?  It’s me, me, me, with an emphasis on “I.”

However, there’s something uniquely rugged about this generation. We were the “Crack Babies,” the children of Ronald Reagan. Growing up in the 80’s, we witnessed first-hand how greed drives poverty, and in turn, how poverty perpetuates crime. We understand fully that within our current social fabric, someone’s always going to lose.  We ARE the Prison Industrial Complex!  And we’re the same ones who keep being told educational funds have run dry. Yet, we operate under the guise of a government that somehow finds scores of resources for military occupations.

This isn’t about demands, folks. The Occupy Phenomenon is really about the People reclaiming our own destiny, producing our own change from the ground-up. “Occupying” is about the connection of ALL oppressed people. Ultimately, what we desire is something better than the flesh-eating machine we’ve been feeding since Reaganomics.  It’s been eating us from the inside out for three decades now, patiently preying upon the same Proletariat and Underclass that helped to build and stabilize it.

Some have deemed the Occupy Movement, a leaderless struggle, but that’s the whole point.  We’re all leaders and should be respected as such—not lied to, cheated on and outright deceived by state-sponsored pimps swindling billions from the few crumbs we do have. Well, “We the People,” have decided it’s time to represent ourselves, whether it’s Raleigh or Wall Street. We’re tired of being Wage Slaves.  We’re tired of our jobs skipping town for open borders and vast NAFTA experiments. We’re also tired of a justice system that bears no resemblance of justice, at least not from Oscar Grant’s perspective. Yet, Republicans and Democrats alike wonder why the People are taking to the street. Probably because that’s the one place they never come.  Power to the People! Power to the Street!

***

Lamont Lilly is a contributing editor with the Triangle Free Press who recently served as an organizer with Cynthia McKinney’s 2011, “Report from Libya Tour.”  He is also a columnist for the African American Voice and Spectacular Magazine.  He resides in Durham, NC.

Jasiri X: "#Occupy (We the 99)" [Video]

Free Download http://jasirix.bandcamp.com/track/occupy-we-the-99

Filmed live at Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Pittsburgh by Director Paradise Gray, Jasiri X reconnects with super producer Cynik Lethal to provide a soundtrack for this growing movement that has taken the world by storm. We gonna Occupy!

LYRICS 

Verse 1
The Power's with the people don't let these cowards deceive you
and be the next mouse in the talons of a eagle
this country's wealth gap isn't unbalanced it's evil
we celebrate access while the people have less
in poverty abject madness
while the economy collapses add stress
that's the last straw
you want class war well give you what you ask for
the have nots at the have's door
we came to crash your party
and we aint leaving until we're even
the Constitution guarantees these freedoms
any one against that's committing treason
your not a real patriot unless you stand for what you believe in
and nobody got more welfare than Wall Street
hundreds of billions after operating falsely
and nobody went to prison that's where you lost me
but my home, my job, and my life is what it cost me

Verse 2
Remember when police beat the Egyptians who were defiant
even president Obama condemned the violence
but when NYPD beat Americans there's silence
it's apparent that there's bias
sticks for the people but give carrots to the liars
those crooked cops just for embarrassment should be fired
and if you want to see terrorists then look higher
they in them skyscrapers with billions from my labor
forcing people out of there homes with falsified data
so we either unify now or cry later
1% got the wealth but the 99's greater
so in every city we gone occupy major
cause nobody got more welfare than Wall Street
hundreds of billions after operating falsely
and nobody went to prison that's where you lost me
but my home, my job, and my life is what it cost me