WRITE WHAT I LIKE

Today, We Wear Black for Jena

Get your out your best black jeans and if you're not already in Jena, prepare for action.

As this day has approached, it's urgency seems to have reached a critical pitch.  Much is at stake for Mychal Bell, Carwin Jones, Theodore Shaw, Robert Bailey, Bryant Purvis and their friend, and that intensity has been matched by 260,000 people signing petitions, 10,000 marching on Jena, and thousands more leading their own events from coast to coast.  With a vibrant coalition kicked off by Black bloggers and ColorofChange.org gaining broad support from the netroots, and now the civil rights establishment, in just over a month, the success of the campaign makes me cautiously optimistic about the rise of a new model for activism around racial justice.

Howard Witt at the Chicago Tribune has a very smart piece on how these actors came together around the call to Free the Jena 6:

This will be a civil rights protest literally conjured out of the ether of cyberspace, of a type that has never happened before in America—a collective national mass action grown from a grassroots word-of-mouth movement spread via Internet blogs, e-mails, message boards and talk radio.

Jackson, Sharpton and other big-name civil rights figures, far from leading this movement, have had to scramble to catch up. So, too, has the national media, which has only recently noticed a story that has been agitating many black Americans for months.

Many have done much to see the tentative progress in the Jena case, but my call to action today focuses on what we'll do tomorrow.  This case is far from over.  Though a judge threw out Mychal Bell's conviction, arguing that he should not have been tried as an adult, he remains in jail.  CNN reports that a Louisiana appeals court has ruled the motion to dismiss as "premature," leaving Bell in the jail where he has already wasted a year of his life.  dNA lays it out plainly at TooSense:

Bell has been in jail for over a year now for charges that no longer exist. He was the only one of the Jena Six whose family did not have the financial means to post bail, so he is not a flight risk. He is 17, and he remains in a grown man's prison because what passes for the law in Louisiana thinks, despite the time already served for charges that have now been dismissed, he deserves to remain in jail....Today we wear black because this is far from over.

He also points out the what's happening in Jena isn't an aberration, it's the rule. 

I'm supporting the Jena 6 because they deserve their freedom and the racist criminal justice system that took it away must be indicted.  But I'm also imagining what would happen if every person who wore a t-shirt today or handed out a flyer or wrote a blog post woke up tomorrow and looked for the Mychal Bell in their own backyard.  He, or She, won't be hard to find.What if our outrage, today directed at the small Louisiana town of Jena, extended to parallel injustices in Detroit or Cincinnati or Sacramento or Miami?  What if we viewed this mobilization not as the end of a successful, innovative campaign, but as the moment that catalyzes us into broader and deeper action in every place where we are?  Inside the blogosphere and offline, locally and nationally.

It's just an idea, but I think it might work.

 

                                       

 

   

Remember Kenneth Foster

Last month, Kenneth Foster woke up knowing it was his last day on death row.

The manner of his exit would be death or life in prison, to be determined by the state of Texas. Sentenced to execution under a law that sanctions death for murder by association – no one, including the state, thought Kenneth guilty of killing anyone – a growing cry came up demanding his exoneration.

And on August 29th, he was saved.

With the help of a campaign led by ColorofChange.org, the Governor commuted his sentence. But he will still live out his life in prison under a law that is ridiculous, unconstitutional and grossly misapplied. Too Sense had this to say about it:

I hope Governor Rick Perry breaks his arm attempting to pat himself on the back. By commuting the death sentence of Kenneth Foster to life imprisonment, he has spared a man from being executed for a crime he did not commit only to condemn him to life in prison for that same crime.

I think that’s right, especially considering news breaking this week on the Save Kenneth campaign blog that he has been held in solitary confinement since the commutation.  His life is saved.  A victory hard won.  But it's a sad day when even our victories are enraging, as they must be when they are so dangerously incomplete.

In Texas, Kenneth Foster faced an injustice in the letter of the law (the "law of parties" being dubious at best) and that flaw allowed him to be victimized by a racist, but entirely legal, misapplication of justice that the system left him defenseless against. Denied adequate representation, his freedom stripped with the stroke of a pen, Foster's story is the story of 10,000 men falsely arrested and imprisoned under innumerable laws that we defend and in our intransigence support. The laws haven't changed and won't unless we remember that Kenneth Foster's story is an important chapter in a long and arduous novel.

So today as we prepare to march for the Jena 6, I'm trying to remember Kenneth.  He's still in jail for life with so many others Black people who don't belong there.  I'm trying to remind myself to push harder.  Because I'm tired of commutations and exonerations for the falsely charged. 

I'm trying to remind myself that the legal victories are critical, but it's 2007 and I'm in the mood for justice.

Must See: Charles Burnett at the IFC

This weekend I went to see My Brother's Wedding, the feature-length follow-up to Charles Burnett's masterful Killer of Sheep. With the re-release of both films this year (previously they'd only been seen at festivals), Mr. Burnett has solidified his reputation as one America's truly independent auteurs, finally drawn into the spotlight after a career of relative anonymity.

The film is beautifully eerie; markedly unsentimental in its realistic portrayal of Black Los Angeles and unsettling as a result.  I won't do a full review here, though you should check out this thoughtful post (thanks Ben) and A.O. Scott's 2 cents in the Times.  What I think these and other reviewers missed, however, is exactly why an artist as talented as Burnett never achieved widespread notoriety until now.

It is notable that we've never heard of My Brother's Wedding.  And we should be asking ourselves why we haven't. What struck me in the theater that night is how the film offers deep commentary on the practical and existential dilemmas faced by Black Americans  without bringing a white person into a single frame. It's a rare choice for the American filmmaker; Black people are understood as sympathetic and complex - human - in their own right, outside of the gaze of a white protagonist.  A visionary political and artistic strategy that delivers for all 81 minutes. 

Charles Burnett is truly an independent filmmaker.  In fact, as I write it, that title doesn't quite seem to do him justice.

See this film.

Finally, some Justice in Jena

Ahead of demonstrations expected to draw tens of thousands to the tiny town of Jena, LA, Mychal Bell of the now famed Jena 6 has had his conviction vacated and may go free as early as this evening.

News is breaking from Louisiana as we speak.  The Associated Press filed a story about an hour ago as defense attorneys revealed news about the successful appeal of Bell's aggravated battery conviction for fighting a white student after a string of racist violence at his high school. 

It seems that the appeal, which focuses on the dramatic misstep in charging Bell, then 16, as an adult, has been won outright.  From the AP:

A state appeals court Friday tossed out the aggravated battery conviction that could have sent a black teenager to prison for 15 years in last year's beating of a white classmate in the racially tense north Louisiana town of Jena.

Mychal Bell, who was 16 at the time of the December beating, should not have been tried as an adult on the battery charge, the state Third Circuit Court of Appeal in Lake Charles ruled late Friday.

Bell is one of six black Jena High School students charged in an attack on fellow student Justin Barker, and one of five originally charged as adults with attempted second-degree murder.

Bell's sentencing, originally set for Thursday, was set to bring tens of thousands to tiny Jena, LA and has attracted international attention.  ColorofChange, one of the lead convenors of that action, is releasing their statement on the successful appeal within the hour.  We should know more then about the Bell case, the plans for the Sept. 20 protests and hopefully some sense of how this ruling will affect the other 5 students still awaiting trial and sentencing.

It's a victory.  A big one.  But one that we should never have had to fight for in the first place. 

Mychal Bell of Jena 6 Conviction Vacated - Breaking News

I just got word from folks on the ground that a judge in the 3rd District Court has vacated the conviction of Mychal Bell of the Jena 6.

This is just breaking and details are rolling in.... Check out these posts for more on Jena 6:

Real Justice in Jena by Me.

A bunch of posts on the Jena 6 by Too Sense

Best of the Bro-gosphere

Write What I Like is not a space to mock white people.  For that sort of business, I turn to The Onion for Bro, You're A God Among Bros:

I've long admired your absolute broficiency in all things bro-related, and the way you've always carried yourself in a brofessional manner. I consider you a brole model. When I was new in this town, you took me under your wing and showed me the bropes. And I will always preesh that. Not only did you school me in proper brotocol, but you were a spiritual leader, a confidant, and, more importantly, a bro.

There's a story here:

This week I started my new job in DC (the office is there but I'm still based in NYC).  I told my friend I wanted to go to the Pharmacy Bar in Adams Morgan; I used to go there when I lived in that exceedingly dull tract of khaki country.  After an unbelievable respectable amount of drinks, I ventured to the facilities and returned to see a white patron reading this article aloud to the bartender, his friend and the remaining Rx patient (my friend).  In the morning I looked it up to see if the humor remained -- you have here been subject to my final judgement.

But don't worry... this will not be the bro-totype for future posts.

American Vigilantes: To Catch a Predator

Nobody likes a sex predator, but America does love a witch-hunt.

Watching NBC's smash hit To Catch a Predator, I'm struck by how easy it is to make us feel comfortable breaking the law to trap a criminal we love to hate.  The show thrives on the logic of vigilantism - breaking all the rules to exact vicious justice against those it becomes popular to place below the law - an American tradition with it's deepest roots in the criminalization of Black people.

Esquire has a great piece up by Luke Dittrich, Tonight on Dateline This Man Will Die, that meticulously covers a recent ill-fated episode of the show that ended in an untimely death for Bill Conradt, a Texas Assistant D.A.

The article gives an inside look at Dateline's Hollywood version of justice - how its producers bully small-town law enforcement into catching entrapping the most salacious group of sex predators (the rabbi wants teen sex in whipped cream!) for the best production values.  After reading the piece, it is hard to argue  that getting sex predators off the street is of any concern compared to producing a true-crime reality show with the juice to turn Dateline into the Survivor of prime time newsmagazines :

"The thing is, Doris Berry is a prosecutor. She wants to see bad guys punished. She’s read the transcripts, which means she knows most of these men are bad and a lot of them are probably dangerous. And if she rejects the cases, she knows what will happen: Instead of receiving the incarceration and supervision that might prevent them from someday soliciting real kids, not fake ones, they’ll receive only Dateline’s nationally televised shaming.

But the law is the law, and you can’t just wish a batch of mangled cases good.

On June 1, 2007, seven months after the end of the sting operation, three months after Dateline airs the relevant episode of “To Catch a Predator,” the Collin County District Attorney’s office will announce that it has decided not to pursue indictments for any of the suspects Murphy police [local law enforcement working with the show] arrested outside the decoy house."

And if you don't like Esquire you can get another take.  As Douglas McCollam points out in a piece over at the Columbia Journalism Review, despite To Catch a Predator's dubious-at-best commitment to putting away potential predators, it's a huge ratings winner because, like all the most popular reality TV, it taps the keg of public humiliation - and America is all too ready to get drunk.

But  what both pieces miss, while highlighting the pitfalls of an ends-justify-means approach to law enforcement, is what happens when that logic is applied more broadly.  How can the Jena 6 face 20+ year jail sentences for a playground fight with a noose-hanging schoolmate?  How can Kenneth Foster end up on Texas death row for a crime no one, including the state, argued he committed?  The answer, perhaps obviously, is that the misapplication of laws along the color line still put Black people in prison at record numbers.

What isn't so obvious: it is a vigilante culture that allows us to accept a brutally unjust criminal justice system because, though the rules are being broken, they are working against Black people who too often turn out to be the witches in America's hunt.  The show reminds me why I don't want justice in the unchecked hands of any  American - Chris Hansen, the local sheriff or a Supreme Court Justice.

To Catch a Predator teaches us that the law is in the hands of the most powerful and (self) righteous.  It seems like a bad lesson, but looking around, it may just be the sad, enraging truth.

Oprah and Obama Combine Superpowers

This nice lady is Oprah.  She is a billionairess.  The ladies love her, and when she tells them what to purchase, they get it, and a lot of it.  But the question of the day is, will they buy a Barack, the latest luxury item attached to the O brand?

CNN reports that Oprah and Obama are combining forces.  This shouldn't be a huge surprise (she told the man she'd campaign for him on her show - I was watching - and in May  announced her formal endorsement on Larry King).   O is making her promise real this weekend by throwing the other O a fundraiser at her lovely California ranch that's expected to net between $2-3 million.

People with good sense struggle with Oprah.  And I challenge anyone who would dismiss her outright.  (Did you see her coverage in New Orleans just after Katrina?)  But for every moment that Oprah uses her global brand to do good, there are 100 other disparaging, salacious remarks made at gay guests, hours spent selling people things they don't need and endless episodes reinforcing bizarre myths (Secret, swinging, S&M couples babysitting YOUR kids - next week's Oprah!) that aid the culture of fear plaguing America and driving the ugliest part of the culture wars.

But the thing that really gets me about Oprah - the brand - is that its construction has been consciously and comprehensively a-political.  Everything in Oprah-land is about the individual; their ability to triumph over adversity; their personal victimhood; their need for stainless steel appliances and meticulously arched eyebrows.  This connection to people's personal stories is what has made  Oprah - the woman - a star, an icon, a billionaire and the authority that the Obama camp wants to draw on to gain support, particularly among women.

But while  Oprah is allowed to leave politics to the professionals, Obama does not have that luxury.  My major criticism of his candidacy has not been his "lack of experience" but that he has substituted the "audacity of hope" or "fervor for courage" or whatever it is for a rigorous, attention-grabbing denunciation of the policies that have left people in this country hopeless and afraid.  He gives me "every child should be healthy" when I want "the scandal of private health care that leaves 40+ million vulnerable is on its way out".

I am perfectly happy to know that Miss Sophia Winfrey, won't spend any time this camapaign season being kissed on by Republican democracy-killers, but if the new campaign slogan is to be O + O  for National Self-Help, I'm going to call Michelle Obama (cause she has good sense) and tell her just what I think.

Andre on RadioNation

I hate the sound of my voice.  But maybe you'll enjoy it.

I'm on RadioNation this week with Laura Flanders discussing the media coverage of the 2nd anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.  I guess I had a few interesting things to say...

Listen in to hear about the special issue of ColorLines magazine I worked on and the story I was pushing last week about city councils blocking companies that do bad business in New Orleans from getting local construction contracts.

Movies we Love That Just Ain't Right: Coming To America

This is the first in a series I like to call "Love Just Ain't Right".

Though hilarious, creative and often insightful, in hindsight sometimes the things we love just ain't right.  This series is my attempt to unearth the glories and woes of iconic moments in Black popular culture. 

If you haven't seen Coming to America, open a new tab on that browser, go to netflix and get involved.  This iconic Eddie Murphy film, directed by John Landis premiered when I was the tender and impressionable age of 10 and remains one of my favorites.... even though it just ain't right.

The first paragraph of the wikipedia synopsis says a lot in itself:

Akeem Joffer (Eddie Murphy), the prince and heir to the throne of the fictitious African country Zamunda, is discontented with being pampered all his life. The final straw is when his parents (James Earl Jones and Madge Sinclair) present him with a bride-to-be he has never met before, trained to desire mindlessly obeying his every command.

To make short work of the summary, Prince Akeem comes to New York looking for a bride he can both "love and respect," chooses Queens as an obvious destination and takes a job at the Black-owned fast restaurant, notably named "McDowells".

So, um, this film is hilarious.   There are moments of absolutely mind-numbing Black camp humor that are truly amazing.  I'm waiting for a film that can deliver a moment half as transcendent  as this one:

But beyond the jheri curls and other tragic tackiness of the 80s, this film introduced another powerful image to its audience.  And that joke, it seems, was on Africa.

In the Africa of Coming to America, kings rule and servants serve, but the primitive truly reigns.  Even as a bookish and curious kid, the image of Africa in this film that I loved and watched too many times to count was, for a time, the most vivid painted for me of modern Africa. 

And friends, that just ain't right.

Bu as I re-viewed this movie as a grown-ass man, something else stood out for me. Nude "bathers" servicing the king and prince each morning?  A bride so subservient she barks like a dog on command?   There's a thread of "afro-patriarchy" that manifests strongly here and, oddly, makes Black American patriarchy seem normal by connecting it to a wholly mythologized and sexualized vision of primordial African civilization.

Oh yes I went there, but I'm prepared to stop (though I could go on).  I trust that you'll get down in the comments section and tell us all about the parts you loved or they thought just weren't right with reverence and revulsion for this complex comedic masterpiece.