Crappy celebrations, Sade, Chicago, backpacks, Sarah Palin, Tyler Perry and what time is it?

Baseball's World Series celebration is pitiful...no confetti...no on field celebration...nothing....but I'm glad the Giants won.

I guess every fall there's going to be a film about how pitiful Black women's lives are...last year it was Precious adapted from the book PUSH and this year it's Tyler Perry's For Colored Girls adapted from the play For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf... What's next?... The Color Purple prequel?...

I'm so happy the election is here...I was going crazy having to see political commercial after political commercial on TV... They are so annoying...

Daylight Savings Time begins this Sunday...I wish the government would leave time alone...It's a pain re-setting the time twice a year...

Huge crowds of people scare me...but I'm going to have to get over it because there are a few people I want to see in concert...like Sade, Marsha Ambrosius and Esperanza Spalding...

I almost always carry a backpack...I find most handbags awkward to carry...but as I'm getting older I think I need to start carrying handbags more...

I'm feeling the urge to go back to school...but for something totally unrelated to work...like cartography...

I'm really crushing on Chicago...I visited there a couple of years ago...And now I just can't get that city out of my mind...

I'm only a very casual football fan...but I predict that the Tennessee Titans will make it to the SuperBowl...Ha!..I can't believe I just made a SuperBowl prediction...

I'm trying to convince myself that Sarah Palin's voice isn't annoying...just in case I have to listen to it in 2012...

Common Sense Val says

I was waiting at a bus stop, on Monday, when an older man walked up to me. He said, "Hey little sis, can I get a quarter so I can get on the bus?".

Well I was about to give him a quarter but fortunately common sense Val intervened. She said, "Hey non-thinking Val, that fool is actually talking on a cell phone while he begs a quarter from you! If he can afford to have a cell phone he ought to be able to pay his own bus fare!".

So I said no. He walked away. Once the bus arrived I noticed that he didn't even use money to get on the bus, he used a transfer.

Thank you common sense Val!

Question de Jour: If you had a talk show...

If you had a TV talk show and you could have any five well known people as guests, living or dead, who would you book on the show?

My choices in no particular order

Queen Nefertiti

Jesus Christ: I'd like to ask him what he thinks of modern day Christianity and a few other questions for instance what he thinks of the same-gender marriage debate.

Prophet Muhammad: I'd like to ask him what he thinks of modern day Islam.

Harriet Tubman: I'd like to ask about her life in general and the Underground Railroad and about being a spy for the Union Army during the Civil War.

El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz: I'd like to ask him what he thinks of President Obama. And I'd like to know what he thinks of the progress African Americans have made in the last forty years.

Phyllis Hyman: I'd like to know about her life and why she decided to commit suicide. I'd also like to know what she thinks of modern R&B.

Alternates - Dorothy Dandridge, Billie Holiday and Queen Nefertiti.

And your choices?

The real face of out-of-wedlock births

Bristol Palin and child

"A generation ago, unwed motherhood was often explained as a consequence of discrimination and poverty. Back then, unwed motherhood seemed a problem affecting black America only: The first serious modern work on unwed parenthood was written in 1964 under the title, "The Crisis of the Negro Family."

Discrimination, however, cannot explain why 28 percent of white women who gave birth in 2007 gave birth unwed, a higher rate than for black women in 1964. Among America's new largest ethnic minority, Hispanics, an outright majority of mothers, 51 percent, are not married." CNN.com

If 28% of White women who gave birth in 2007 were not married then considering there are more White women in the U.S. than Black women, doesn't this mean that ...

If there are 32 out-of-wedlock births per 1000 for Whites, and considering that Whites constitute the largest ethnic group in the U.S., doesn't this mean that more White babies are born out-of-wedlock than in any other group?

And if that's the case then why are African Americans the poster children for out-of-wedlock births?

In 2004 White women had a total of 4,112,052 babies. Black women had a total of 616,074. That's according to the Centers for Disease Control National Vital Statistics Report for 2004.

White out-of-wedlock births: 28% of 3,222,928 = 902,419.84
Black out-of-wedlock births: 72% of 616,074 = 443,573.28

So a little over 900,000 White babies were born out-of-wedlock in 2004 and almost 450,000 Black babies were born out-of wedlock in 2004. Which means twice as many White babies are born out-of-wedlock than Black babies.

Multiply White out-of-wedlock births by 5 years and you get 4,512,099.2. Multiply Black out-of-wedlock births by 5 years and you get 2,217,866.4.

So in the years 2004 to 2009 4.5 million White babies were born out-of-wedlock and just 2.2 million Black babies were born out-of-wedlock.

Twice as many White babies are born out-of-wedlock in the U.S. as Black babies. Now isn't it obvious then why the media and others use percentages rather than real numbers when talking about out-of-wedlock births and race.

Why do we fall for the okie-doke so easily? For years we have been hearing that 72% of Black children are born out-of-wedlock and we've sighed and thought how terrible that was. And though it's true that having 72% of births occur out-of-wedlock is not a good thing, why didn't anyone look at the raw numbers to see what was really going on?

We, African Americans, have been preached to by everyone from The President to Bill Cosby about having children out-of-wedlock but no one checked the numbers. If they had then we would have realized that we are simply part of, not just a trend here in the U.S., a Western trend as the out-of-wedlock birth rate in Europe is extremely high too.

"The percentage of babies born to unmarried women in the United States is starting to look more like that in many European countries, the data shows. For example, the proportion of babies born to unmarried women is about 66 percent in Iceland, 55 percent in Sweden, 50 percent in France and 44 percent in the United Kingdom." Washington Post.com

Instead we have allowed ourselves to be made to feel as though this was some sort of Black pathology rather than a huge societal and cultural shift. And in the process many have fallen pray to these misleading numbers by figuring if so many other Black people are having babies out-of-wedlock then why not me. A self-fulfilling prophecy.

We have to begin to vet data that purports to show us in a bad light. We have to actually read the data and replicate all of these studies done on us by who knows who. We have to stop listening to and believing people just because they're on a stage or on C-Span when they speak ill of us. Otherwise we will continue to believe the worst about ourselves rather than knowing the truth.

When we hear someone state that this or that percentage of African Americans are this or that we need to ask questions. We need to know who is feeding us these percentages and why. What's their agenda? We can't blindly believe what is said about us. History ought to have taught us that by now.



Statistical data from here

Made with love

During my high school years I moved from California to New York. That summer I received a box in the mail from my girlfriend back in California. I opened it and realized it was a care package. I was feeling down having to leave my friends in California and my girlfriend sent a care package to cheer me up.

In the box was a bunch of junk food that I liked at the time and a metal tin. When I opened the tin I saw homemade chocolate chip cookies. My girlfriend took the time to bake cookies for me and get a bunch of other stuff and mail it to me!

Those were the best cookies I've ever had. Not because of some special recipe that she used to bake them but because they were made with love. I know that sounds corny but I swear food made for you by someone that cares and loves you just tastes better.

I'll never forget how good it felt to eat those cookies that summer.

Have you noticed that food made with love tastes better?

I Love...

Judy Marte

...scones, Sade, Chicago, White Castle's double cheeseburgers, Santa Cruz, Autobiographies by women of color, dvds, The Good Wife on CBS, Track & Field, The New York Daily News, blogging, Alicia Keys, green tea, walking, long train rides, my girlfriend, art by Frida Kahlo, books, actress Judy Marte, having breakfast for dinner, going to the beach in the winter, lobster, WNBA's Cappie Pondexter, Greenwich Village in NYC, backpacks, Tracee Ellis Ross, Frontline on PBS, Salsa music, The BBC, kissing, Liya Kebede, Joan Armatrading, handbags, lip gloss, organic heirloom vegetables, Robin Roberts, being able to fall asleep for 10 minutes in the afternoon, Joan Baez, my bed, how quiet my neighborhood is, the idea of living in Canada, saving money, Jennifer Beals, Upstate New York by train, sprinter Debbie Dunn, falling in love, sunflower butter, actress Tracey Heggins, dinner with friends, the sound of my ex's voice, praying for guidance, M.I.A., The Fugees, Saab automobiles, coming home as the sun comes up, sprinter Sherone Simpson, classic Jet Magazines, Dorothy Dandridge, distance runner Sentayehu Ejigu, watching track meets, Zap Mama, decathlete Jennifer Ennis, Kamala Harris, Stephanie Mills, Washington Square Park in NYC, rainy weekends, NYC handball, WNBA's Diana Taurasi, women, Venice Beach, 80's music, 80's Elle Magazines, Fall in NYC, flea markets, Woodstock (Peanuts)...to be continued

What do you love?

This post was inspired by this post by Daij

Madonna/ Whore Versus Jezebel/ Sapphire/ Mammy

I read a post over at Reggie's blog. He talks about women of questionable repute. Of course Reggie being Reggie he uses much stronger words to describe these women.

What it really boils down to is the good old-fashioned Madonna vs. whore. Which is basically that all women fall into either the Madonna or whore category.

To illustrate his point Reggie mentions women like Amber Rose, Kim Kardashian and the infamous Karrine Steffans. All of whom have questionable reputations by almost anyone's standards.




And although not mentioned in Reggie's post there is the Madonna. I'll use Angela Simmons to represent the Madonna part of this. She is young and beautiful and most importantly has publicly stated that she's a virgin.

Madonna vs. whore on the surface seems to be about women and their behavior. But in truth this has to do with men and them trying to control women.

Karrine Steffans: Jezebel?

The fear of being thought of as a whore has been used to control women from the beginning of humanity. Men have always helped some women become the whore in order to use them as the examples of what a woman should not be. This continues today.

But for African American women this is complicated by a competing set of sexist and racist stereotypes; Jezebel vs. Sapphire.

Jezebel, the bad-black-girl, who is depicted as alluring and seductive as she either indiscriminately mesmerizes men and lures them into her bed, or very deliberately lures into her snares those who have something of value to offer her.

Tyler Perry as Madea: Modern day Sapphire?

Sapphire, the wise-cracking, balls-crushing, emasculating woman, is usually shown with her hands on her hips and her head thrown back as she lets everyone know she is in charge.

So as you can see for Black women not only do we have to deal with Madonna vs. whore but we also have to deal with the Jezebel and Sapphire stereotype. A stereotype began by White men but kept alive by many African Americans including, unfortunately, some Black women. And of course the media.

Oprah: Modern day Mammy?

But where there is the Madonna, for Black women there was also the Mammy stereotype. The Madonna is seen as a woman of high morals who any man would consider wife material. The Mammy stereotype is a racist take on the Madonna image.

According to Freudian psychology, this complex often develops when the sufferer is raised by a cold and distant mother. Such a man will often court women with qualities of his mother, hoping to fulfill a need for intimacy unmet in childhood. Often, the wife begins to be seen as mother to the husband—a "Madonna" figure—and thus not a possible object of sexual attraction.

Mammy is first and foremost asexual, and accordingly, in this society she had to be fat. Most portrayals of Mammy depict her as an "obese African American woman, of dark complexion, with extremely large breasts and buttocks . . . ."


Now add to all of this both old and new words and phrases meant to shame women into falling in line with what men and society want.

"Throughout human history there have been hoochies, easy women, harlots, strumpets, hookers, chickens, molls, floozies, tarts, tramps, trollops, Jezebels, broads, jades, minxes, scarlets, vamps, sluts, jumpoffs, spoogies or the ever popular "hoes"."

Not so amazingly there aren't many words describing sexually promiscuous men.

My point? Men and society will create many ways to try to control women. Some old, some new. As we move into this new century I hope that women will be smarter and not let all of these feeble attempts to control us have the desired effect. Too many generations of women have been subjected to this already.

I also hope that soon we, African Americans, will stop perpetuating these stereotypes for profit. There is way too much of that going on.

Clarity is a beautiful thing

I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hate so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain. - James A. Baldwin


I saw this quote on Daij's blog Soul Tight. It immediately struck me. There is so much hatred in the world and I often ponder why. And then I read James Baldwin's words and it becomes so clear. Hatred really does hide pain. And fear too. So all of these people in the world that spend so much time hating are really hurting. But they are afraid to feel the pain. And they are afraid to feel the fear.

I don't think hate can be eradicated but knowing the source is a start.

It's not the heat, it's the humidity

I feel for those of you who live on the east coast. You have been through a lot in the last year weather-wise. You had a huge amount of snow and rain and now you have the heat. I can relate to the oppressive heat. I used to live on the east coast. In the south. I was told a million times, while I complained about the heat there, that it wasn't the heat but the humidity that made it so unbearable. Needless to say having that information didn't help. But air-conditioning sure did!

I learned fast not to go anywhere that didn't have blasting cold ac. I avoided some friend's homes because their ac wasn't up to par. When people suggested going places I always asked about the ac. I fell in love with air-conditioning! It was the only way I survived living in the south.

Now that I live in Northern California I don't even have ac. I have a fan somewhere. But I really only need it for about two weeks out of the year. It doesn't get that hot here. In fact there is an old saying about the weather here that goes, " the coldest winter I ever spent was a summer in San Francisco". And that's so true. People wear down jackets in July here. Of course they might be overdoing it just a little but it does get cold here in summer.

There's a lot I don't like about where I currently live. Just ask my friends, I complain all the time about the lack of everything here. Having grown up in New York City I'm spoiled. But one think I don't normally complain about is the weather.

Anyway, if you're on the east coast find some ac and 'stay up under it'.

Big Brother is you and me

In George Orwell's fictional book 1984 he tells a story about government watching the people. He uses the term, "Big Brother", which is a euphemism for government. In 1984 Big Brother, the government, is always watching. But it seems that Big Brother in modern times isn't government but the people who are watching each other.

We see dozens of news reports each month about crimes and other events being caught on cell phone cameras. And no one hesitates to turn the photos or video over to the government.

Isn't it amazing that government now has us working for it catching each other doing all sorts of things. We have been trained well haven't we.

It's in the eyes

Have you ever seen a face that looked like home? Have you ever seen a pair of eyes that looked like home? Or heard a voice that sounded like home? I have and I realized then that we are trained from birth to jump into the rat race and focus on what isn't important. Like what we can buy. Or what we wear. Or what zip code our house is in.

When what is truly important is finding home in a face or in a pair of eyes or in a voice or in a touch. That's what life is truly about and those are the only things we can take with us.

What's up with those Higginbothams?

Joan Higginbotham

I've heard of a lot of Black people with the last name Higginbotham. And the one thing they have in common beside being Black is that they are all successful. I have never come across a Black person named Higginbotham who wasn't successful. I went to high school with a Higginbotham. I don't know what he's doing now but he was a straight A student back then.

So what's up with that?

Here are just a few Higginbothams:

Eve Higginbotham - senior vice president and dean of health sciences at Howard University

Aloysius Leon Higginbotham, Jr. (1928-1998) was a federal judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit and the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Joan Higginbotham - is an American engineer and a former NASA astronaut. She flew aboard Space Shuttle Discovery mission STS-116 as a mission specialist.

Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham - is the Victor S. Thomas Professor of History and of African and African American Studies at Harvard University.

F. Michael Higginbotham - Wilson H. Elkins Professor of Law, University of Baltimore School of Law

J.C. Higginbotham - Swing Trombone Pioneer.

Do you know of any unsuccessful Higginbothams?

Rant: Local TV weather

When I want to know what the weather is going to be I really don't want to hear about what kind of pressure system is coming through or any of that technical nonsense. I just want to know if it's going to rain and how hot or cold it's going to be.

Now I understand that in most parts of the country the weather is more varied than it is here. We basically have about six months of sun and six months of rain here with some fog thrown in. It doesn't get much warmer than 75 degrees not much colder than 50 degrees. So why do I have to sit for five minutes including 3 or 4 commercials before I get the actual weather report!? And now I've answered my own question; it's the commercials.

I love this commercial

But, are they really dancing? Or is this some kind of editing thing where they edit one person's head onto another person's body?

What do you think?

Joe Camel must be proud

The kid in the video below is two years old, lives in Sumatra and according to his parents smokes two packs of cigarettes a day. His parents also say he's been smoking since he was 18 months old. And they say if he doesn't get his smokes he throws temper tantrums.

For a long time anti-smoking activists have believed that cartoon characters, like Joe Camel above, entice children to smoke. And it looks like it might be working.

civ·i·lized (adj.) Showing evidence of moral and intellectual advancement; humane, ethical, and reasonable.

Last Friday I was walking around during lunch and was struck by the amount of seemingly mentally ill people I saw. I'm not talking one or two people but 6 or 7 people. And I wasn't even out that long. Seeing this made me think about how we treat each other in this country. If we don't collectively take care of those who can't take care of themselves then are we really civilized?

Surely allowing mentally ill people to suffer on the streets of this country is not moral, humane or ethical.

It's frightening to think that anyone of us could become mentally ill. And if we did who would help us? Hopefully family would but dealing with a mentally ill person can be expensive, time consuming and frustrating. Many a family has given up on a mentally ill relative. Then what?

The government closed down most free mental hospitals in this country in the 1980's. So that means that rather than getting treatment most mentally ill people end-up homeless or in jail.

That's a terrible thought, that America's mentally ill end-up locked in a jail cell.

I think I'll see about doing some volunteer work with the mentally ill or homeless. Maybe then I won't feel so sad about this.

Ladies and gentleman introducing Miss USA

From NYDailyNews.com

Long before Rima Fakih was crowned Miss USA 2010, she took home top honors in a contest that would make even Donald Trump blush.

Miss Michigan, who made history Sunday night as the first Arab-American to win the Miss USA beauty pageant, won a pole dancing contest in 2007 hosted by local Detroit radio morning show Mojo in the Morning.

I really think this is so funny. But a lot of people seem to think the new Miss USA should lose her crown because she was a contestant in a stripper contest. I don't think it's a big deal but I really wonder if the person at Miss USA whose job it is to do background checks still has their job since this isn't the first time something like this has happened.

If you recall last year Miss USA contestant Carrie Prejean was stripped of her Miss California crown after topless photos of her surfaced. Anyway, Donald Trump, who owns the Miss USA contest, needs to do what he does on his TV show The Apprentice and fire somebody.

Ben Franklin stinks!

I hate using cash. I hate using it because it stinks! Whenever I open my wallet I am met with pure funk if I have paper money in it. What's up with that?

So I'm wondering why U.S. currency smells so badly. I've heard that most money in this country has traces of cocaine on it. Could that be it? Does cocaine stink? Or do they mix cocaine with stuff that stinks?

What else would cause money to stink so badly? I really can't think of anything other than drugs, can you? Anyway, the U.S. Treasury needs to find some stink-proof paper to make money from and I hope they do it soon!

I think she's done

I've been reading accounts of Whitney Houston's less than stellar performances on her current world tour for several months now. I've withheld judgment because she had been away from music for a pretty long time and I figured it might take her a while to get back to where she should be singing wise. But it's been a while now and according to reports Whitney isn't getting better on stage but she's actually getting worse.

This past weekend Whitney gave what appears to be her worst performance yet at London's O2 arena. The performance was so bad that many concert goers were asking for refunds.

I suppose the years of drug use have taken a toll on Whitney and I'm not sure if the damage is reparable. It might be time for Whitney to pack it in. I hope for her sake she has enough money to last her and that she's not back to doing drugs. Other wise an already sad story is only going to get worse.

Natural born consumers or There's a sucker born every minute

It is amazing to me that Americans continue to buy Toyota vehicles even after people have been killed in accidents involving Toyota vehicles and unintended acceleration. And it's even more unbelievable when you consider Toyota hasn't even found the cause for the problem.

Okay maybe unbelivable is overstating my reaction to Americans buying Toyotas at this point. I mean we are trained almost from birth to be consumers, right? From the moment we're set in front of a TV as toddlers we are learning to be consumers. By the time we are so-called tweens we are reaching maturity as consumers.

So then is it really that surprising that as adults we Americans are willing to buy potentially unsafe cars to save a few thousand bucks. Toyota has been offering incentives to get people to buy their cars. Those incentives are usually in the form of interest free financing.

I guess Toyota knows we Americans are so desperate to spend money and buy stuff that we are willing to play Russian roulette with our lives buying cars that may or may not be safe.