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Noah Sow and Other Media Links

“Deutschland Black and White by Noah Sow”

Singer and activist Noah SowFrom blackwomenineurope: “Even the most cautious estimates say that there are far more than 1,000,000 Blacks currently living in Germany, most of whom are German citizens. This makes up more than one percent of the country’s population.”

From deutschlandschwarzweiss.de: “With my book, I want to show that Germany needs to do much more than a little scraping on the surface in order to become the advanced and democratic country it likes to present itself as. I was curious to see whether there really is a willingness within Germany’s white majority population to deal with their racist issues – even if this means saying goodbye to some racist traditions – or if it is really all just talk, which would mean that my country wouldn’t be ready for another level of insight, consciousness and an actual change, as well as a stop to the oppression of its Black minority population.”

My last name is Wilhite over here in Los Angeles by way of Arkansas. “Wilhite,” you may notice, is not an African name—and that is the horrible truth—and the Truth will cause you to be free. So to hear about Schwarze Deutsche who did not get this way through the horrors of slavery has always been interesting to me.

“Unsentimental Education”

Buy this book at Amazon.com!From monbiot.com: “British private schools create a class culture of a kind unknown in the rest of Europe. The extreme case is the boarding prep schools, which separate children from their parents at the age of eight in order to shape them into members of a detached elite. In his book The Making of Them the psychotherapist Nick Duffell shows how these artificial orphans survive the loss of their families by dissociating themselves from their feelings of love(14). Survival involves “an extreme hardening of normal human softness, a severe cutting off from emotions and sensitivity.”(15) Unable to attach themselves to people… they are encouraged instead to invest their natural loyalties in the institution… This made them extremely effective colonial servants: if their commander ordered it, they could organise a massacre without a moment’s hesitation (witness the detachment of the officers who oversaw the suppression of the Mau Mau, quoted in Caroline Elkins’s book, Britain’s Gulag(16)).”

Monbiot, himself, is a product of this “elite” system of education and this should add even more fuel to the fire in my earlier posts “Flippant Remarks about ‘Brideshead Revisited’” and, for an American twist on the elite, “Sundown Towns.”

1970s: William and Bryan on 70th Street“Welcome to Gentrification City”

From laweekly.com: “If gentrification is indeed a flood, then the highest levees in the city have been erected around South Los Angeles. The barriers are thicker and stronger for many reasons — poverty, racism, high crime rates, a reputation in the media and public that, to put it mildly, discourages investment. Yet the surge in real estate values has been knocking down barrier after barrier. White and multiracial middle-class home buyers who might never have looked south of the Santa Monica Freeway have taken the leap, discovering nice neighbors, clean streets and a killer housing stock — Craftsman bungalows from the 1910s and charming Spanish homes from the 1920s.”

What this means (to me) is that self-described white people are moving into my old neighborhood now occupied (mostly) by Latinos.

Comments

Michael Fisher, 2008-03-07 07:14:05

What do you want to know about the Deutsche Schwarze? It was I and a handful of others (Katharina Oguntoye, Marion Kraft, Samuel Assefa (currently the Ethiopian Ambassador to the United States)) who started the "Schwarze Bewegung" (Black Movement) in Germany. Noah Sow is a member of the second generation of the movement.

On another note, I've been posting the following all around.

I think it is time to gather all the black bloggers around a statement. Namely this:

(1) The Democratic party base has spoken. The numbers show that Mrs. Clinton has lost this race for the nomination.

(2) Mrs. Clinton's increasingly shrill attacks against Mr. Obama have taken on the airs of racism.

(3) That is regrettable because via the candidacy of Mr. Obama for the first time in the electoral history of this nation, the vast majority of African-American stand united with untold millions of white Americans and Americans of all colors.

(4) It appears that Mrs. Clinton is about to shatter this historic unity.

(5) We therefore call on Mrs. Clinton to face the reality of the numbers, concede defeat and thereby heal this wound which she has opened and continues to widen.

(6) It is clear that Mrs. Clinton can not be considered for the Vice-Presidential slot on the Democratic ticket. Mrs. Clinton has denigrated Mr. Obama to the point that any possible praise she would heap on him as a member of the Democratic ticket would ring hollow and hypocritical.

(7) If the Democratic Party leadership were to nullify our votes by giving Mrs. Clinton the nomination despite the popular vote, we call on all African-Americans to withdraw their support from the Democratic Party and to stay at home. We have survived eight years under President Bush, we will survive four years under a President McCain. We will NOT survive the nullification of our most hard-fought for right - our votes.

Pass it on...

rasx(), 2008-03-07 20:20:41

Regarding being a Democrat: I am not a Democrat. I am Non-partisan because I don't play politics. Voting is more a ritual for me to show respect to my ancestors. What this effectively means to most colored folks who "keep it real" is that I am a useless person.

Regarding Black Germany: can you recommend a documentary or a book that may provide an interesting historical overview?

Michael Fisher, 2008-03-08 04:45:07

Yeah, you might want to start out with this 1986 book by Kathy Oguntoye (editor). Also check out the blog Jewels In The Jungle. That'll be a start. If you need anything else, you know where to find me. Have fun!

rasx()