WHO TESTS THE TEACHERS FOR RACISM(COLORISM)?
(by Carol Taylor - Reproduced from 1990)
Okay, the more things change, the more things stay the same, right? Especially if it's perpetuation of public education-system refusals to teach the truth about the hueman race.
"The admission of the New York State Education Commissioner, Thomas Sobol, that the state's public school curriculum needs to give much greater recognition to the contributions of cultures which represent three-quarters of the world's population is certainly commendable.
However, unless reputable scholars and teachers who have been conditioned by an institutionally racist (colorist) society are tested for their individual levels of racism (colorism) and where necessary, referred to anti-bias counseling, the 'deep-seated pathologies of racial hatred,' which Dr. Leonard Jeffries recently highlighted, will continue to pervade the state's education system, with extreme detriment to white students as well as students of color.
Assuredly, racial (colorist) hatred is no new problem, but one can only change that which one can first acknowledge. The most productive way of ridding a society (including an educational system) of a disease is to acknowledge its existence first. Not much can be done about blatant (nooses and baseball bats and cop killings of Black males and other people of color) or subtle racism (colorism) or bigotry, which indeed exist, until each individual is able to confront his or her own feelings and/or beliefs (which is what bigotry is all about).
America, indeed, is not the only country faced with this problem, but this fact is, if anything, one more reason for urgency in diagnosing the extent of the disease of racism (colorism) within the education system. America's unique position in world affairs (and the multiplicity of its ethnic groups) demands that we lead in the fight against racism (colorism) and other prejudices.
That much has already been done in this fight is not to be denied, nor commendation witheld for the courage and huemanity of those who have fought for so long, but it is equally not to be denied that those efforts, laudable as they have been, have fallen far short of the goal.
What has been gained is at best an uneasy cease-fire. What has hampered many efforts has been a lack of support from the wider society, stemming from a deliberate complacency, a form of escapism where people have persuaded themselves that racism (colorism) is not really all that serious, that it will eventually work itself out without any involvement on their part.
The basic reason for this desire of each to protect his own little sphere from an admission of the unpleasant reality of racism (colorism) varies from person to person. Racism (colorism), to be effectively treated, must be addressed on the level of the individual, but current programs have been concentrated on the community or state levels, and this, I suggest, is an integral failure of those programs. Entrenched societal conditioning is a major contributing factor which stymies the efforts of anti-racism (colorism) programs and makes stubborn racists (colorists) of so many otherwise enlightened people. Thos few who have managed genuinely to reject or outgrow such conditioning represent, in each case, a triumph for the individual, but also serve to emphasize the need for an approach on that level to the racism (colorism) of the majority of those who remain prey to the infection.
We cannot, in the final analysis, legislate out of the subconscious, the effects of institutionally racist (colorist) conditioning, and the problem remains fundamentally unchanged unless the usual defense mechanism of denial is removed.
It is past time for children in New York State (and, indeed, America) not to have to continue to rely on the supposed goodwill of those administrators and teachers who are responsible for such a large portion of their basic education - which, traditionally, has excluded the truth about the beginnings of civilization and contributions of people of color.
The solution, to reiterate, is Racism (Colorism) Quotient Testing and, where necessary, follow-up counseling until a functional R.Q. score can be achieved - especialy for those who are to revise the state's public school curriculum."
(With all due respect to the incisive thorough intellectual contributions of Barbadian scholar Winston Worrell who wrote most of the above Tract)
This entire nation should use the www.racismtest.com
www.racismtest.org ...as, obviously, not a panacea but as a tool to foment discussion in a non-threatening arena - to put the issue of untreated colorism 'on the front burner' (as suggested by Law Professor Lani Guinier) to combat, on an individual basis, the counterproductive nooses, killings and other negative color discriminations
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Monday, November 5, 2007
Statement by Carol Taylor
[Can ANYone tell me which schools in the U.S.A. are teaching that ALL huemans are "...of African descent..."??? I wrote this Statement way back in 1995 - it's now the end of 2007...the more things 'change' the more they stay the same. YUCK! CT)
"Statement by Carol Taylor
Tuesday Dec. 5, 1995 at The
Hearing at the Hall of The
Board of Education, 110 Livingston
St. Brooklyn, NY to Commission
on Students of African Descent
1149 Ralph Avenue
(Ground Floor)
Brooklyn, New York 11236-1221
718 451 2323
EDUCATION OF STUDENTS OF AFRICAN DESCENT
The Commission on Students of African Descent, for those of us who understand the truth of history - that all humans are of African descent (which means that we've read Cheik Anta Diop's The African Origin of Civilization), is doing a monumental job by raising the sore point that Black African students in America are continuously, consciously and intentionally disrespected by those whose salaries are being paid by their parents' tax dollars. The manifestation of that disrespect is the refusal of the New York City Board of Education to teach that all humans have Black African ancestors, and to publicize the fact that they are teaching this.
Define success? This means that disrespectful education administrators must re-educate themselves as to the truth which anthropologists have uncovered and reported that all civilization started with Black Africans- not white Europeans, deadly Diane Ravitch and anachronistic Arthur Schlesinger - prime examples of the American system of racist/colorist miseducation - notwithstanding, with their pejorative allegations of "feel good" curricular revision.
Achieving success in Educating children in America means, according to Dr. Leonard Jeffries, that "Truth crushed to earth will rise again." We are living on the threshold of the 21st Century [sic], in times of critical change and our education system, in this country and in this city, must assume the responsibility it has thus far studiously avoided, to the detriment of, coincidentally, its white students but also to the intellectual, emotional, spiritual, and all too often, the physical demise of Black African, Indigenous (Native American), Asian and other students of color.
I urge this Commission and this Board of Education to lead African students-human beings-boldly into the 21st Century [sic] by adopting the proposed Profile (which will be impossible to enact unless the following is implemented):
1. Teach the truth that all humans have Black African ancestors;
2. Purge the sickening racism/colorism from New York City's Education System by
administering our Racism/colorism Quotient Test to all Board of Education
Administrators and all teachers and follow up with referrals to psychologists (who
have passed the Racism/Colorism Quotient Test) where results reflect
racism/colorism dysfunction.
High levels of critical thinking and the ability to solve complex problems by our students demand that they are educated with a curriculum based on the truth. When France presented the Statue of Liberty to the United States (of America) for ending slavery, her features were Black African. It is past time for the New York City Board of Education and the United States (of America) to "Bring Back Black Liberty!""
"Statement by Carol Taylor
Tuesday Dec. 5, 1995 at The
Hearing at the Hall of The
Board of Education, 110 Livingston
St. Brooklyn, NY to Commission
on Students of African Descent
1149 Ralph Avenue
(Ground Floor)
Brooklyn, New York 11236-1221
718 451 2323
EDUCATION OF STUDENTS OF AFRICAN DESCENT
The Commission on Students of African Descent, for those of us who understand the truth of history - that all humans are of African descent (which means that we've read Cheik Anta Diop's The African Origin of Civilization), is doing a monumental job by raising the sore point that Black African students in America are continuously, consciously and intentionally disrespected by those whose salaries are being paid by their parents' tax dollars. The manifestation of that disrespect is the refusal of the New York City Board of Education to teach that all humans have Black African ancestors, and to publicize the fact that they are teaching this.
Define success? This means that disrespectful education administrators must re-educate themselves as to the truth which anthropologists have uncovered and reported that all civilization started with Black Africans- not white Europeans, deadly Diane Ravitch and anachronistic Arthur Schlesinger - prime examples of the American system of racist/colorist miseducation - notwithstanding, with their pejorative allegations of "feel good" curricular revision.
Achieving success in Educating children in America means, according to Dr. Leonard Jeffries, that "Truth crushed to earth will rise again." We are living on the threshold of the 21st Century [sic], in times of critical change and our education system, in this country and in this city, must assume the responsibility it has thus far studiously avoided, to the detriment of, coincidentally, its white students but also to the intellectual, emotional, spiritual, and all too often, the physical demise of Black African, Indigenous (Native American), Asian and other students of color.
I urge this Commission and this Board of Education to lead African students-human beings-boldly into the 21st Century [sic] by adopting the proposed Profile (which will be impossible to enact unless the following is implemented):
1. Teach the truth that all humans have Black African ancestors;
2. Purge the sickening racism/colorism from New York City's Education System by
administering our Racism/colorism Quotient Test to all Board of Education
Administrators and all teachers and follow up with referrals to psychologists (who
have passed the Racism/Colorism Quotient Test) where results reflect
racism/colorism dysfunction.
High levels of critical thinking and the ability to solve complex problems by our students demand that they are educated with a curriculum based on the truth. When France presented the Statue of Liberty to the United States (of America) for ending slavery, her features were Black African. It is past time for the New York City Board of Education and the United States (of America) to "Bring Back Black Liberty!""
STUFF (THAT’S NOT ‘FIT TO PRINT!’)
The Hearts of Darkness
How White Writers Created the Racist Image of Africa
By Milton G. Allimadi
Published by:Black Star Books, Co.
ISBN #:0-9740039-0-5
85 pp
Reviewed by:Carol Taylor
This classic book had to be published – the truth had to be stated.
It has, con mucho gusto, by an African-born topnotch investigator, Ugandan veteran journalist Milton Allimadi, the incisive, clear thinking world affairs commentator, Publisher of New York City’s Black Star newspaper.
If words help to shape human behavior and deeds, and they do – then certainly, Allimadi’s well-chosen, descriptive quotes serve to reiterate the book’s important main focus on the racism (colorism) replete in white writers’ coverage. (Notice he doesn’t call them “journalists,” – many of whom contributed to the New York Times down through the years)
Quoting from his extensive ‘Sources’ list, he includes African Notebook by Albert Schweitzer, African Religions in Western Scholarship, by Ugandan Okot p ‘Bitek, Black Skins, White Masks, by Dr.Frantz Fanon, and Notes On The State of Virginia, by Thomas Jefferson, among others. These provide substantial grounding for Allimadi’s conclusion that, unlike news reports covering social unrest in Europe, (never, of course, “white-on-white crime”) similar unrest in Black Africa was always portrayed by white writers (and, unfortunately, by some low-self esteemed Black writers) as ‘tribal unrest’ and/or “Black-on-Black crime” – (an ultra-racist/colorist phrase).
One of the most harrowing aspects of Allimadi’s herculean and critical analysis of the misrepresentation of affairs in Africa is that those of us ‘Westerners’ who consider ourselves mightily literate and nicely well-read, have been arrogantly ignorant of how the white wool of color-biased reporting has been purposefully and continuously pulled over our eyes by writers who have been held up to us as “journalism’s finest.”
The Hearts of Darkness, thank veracity and goodness, has irretrievably snatched the wool off and illustrated, with vivid prose, that it’s really the truth - that’s ‘fit to print.’
Reviewer’s Warning: Be prepared for some strongly-abhorrent quotations from quoted white writers.
How White Writers Created the Racist Image of Africa
By Milton G. Allimadi
Published by:Black Star Books, Co.
ISBN #:0-9740039-0-5
85 pp
Reviewed by:Carol Taylor
This classic book had to be published – the truth had to be stated.
It has, con mucho gusto, by an African-born topnotch investigator, Ugandan veteran journalist Milton Allimadi, the incisive, clear thinking world affairs commentator, Publisher of New York City’s Black Star newspaper.
If words help to shape human behavior and deeds, and they do – then certainly, Allimadi’s well-chosen, descriptive quotes serve to reiterate the book’s important main focus on the racism (colorism) replete in white writers’ coverage. (Notice he doesn’t call them “journalists,” – many of whom contributed to the New York Times down through the years)
Quoting from his extensive ‘Sources’ list, he includes African Notebook by Albert Schweitzer, African Religions in Western Scholarship, by Ugandan Okot p ‘Bitek, Black Skins, White Masks, by Dr.Frantz Fanon, and Notes On The State of Virginia, by Thomas Jefferson, among others. These provide substantial grounding for Allimadi’s conclusion that, unlike news reports covering social unrest in Europe, (never, of course, “white-on-white crime”) similar unrest in Black Africa was always portrayed by white writers (and, unfortunately, by some low-self esteemed Black writers) as ‘tribal unrest’ and/or “Black-on-Black crime” – (an ultra-racist/colorist phrase).
One of the most harrowing aspects of Allimadi’s herculean and critical analysis of the misrepresentation of affairs in Africa is that those of us ‘Westerners’ who consider ourselves mightily literate and nicely well-read, have been arrogantly ignorant of how the white wool of color-biased reporting has been purposefully and continuously pulled over our eyes by writers who have been held up to us as “journalism’s finest.”
The Hearts of Darkness, thank veracity and goodness, has irretrievably snatched the wool off and illustrated, with vivid prose, that it’s really the truth - that’s ‘fit to print.’
Reviewer’s Warning: Be prepared for some strongly-abhorrent quotations from quoted white writers.
Friday, October 26, 2007
BAD HAIR - GOOD HAIR PATHOLOGY
BAD HAIR - GOOD HAIR PATHOLOGY
Put aside the concept of conspiracy for a while and deal directly with the monumental, destructive psychological effects of Madison Avenue's racist/colorist exclusionary insistent advertising to our multi-colored/cultured women that they're not glamorous unless they're wearing shiny straight hair.
You'd think - even these days - that the only 'worthwhile' threadlike growth from the heads of huemans should be straight shiny ones - like one elder Black woman working at the Apollo Theater in NY's Harlem said, "...that good white stuff..."
(Connect those vicious dots: Black children - in 2007 - preferring white dolls over "ugly" Black dolls: early damage to little egos)
Here I am in my latter seventies, still fighting, every damn day, society's conditioned urge to straighten my kinkly hair - resisting the overt brainwhitewashing waves of insistent straight-hair advertising in not only TV and cinema but also magazines galore. (Although some welcome exceptions to this onslaught show up in Black magazines)
I've also had to - continuously - refute the sick familial conditioning which surfaces too frequently that echoes my own mother's remarks that she 'couldn't handle' my hair. My father was the one who brushed, combed and braided my hair into "manageable" condition.* Then, as I reached an age/stage where I could 'contain' my 'unruly' locks, I also tried mightily to 'tame them tresses' - pulling, stretching, oiling and confining my offending kinks.
It was when I became the first "Negro" U.S.A. Airline Hostess/Stewardess (now we say 'Black Flight Attendant') [actually first Black - males or females] - that I started smearing the white man's white cream - lye - onto my Black hair, to 'pull out the kinks' to make myself more 'acceptable' to white and other brainwhitewashed people of color.
Little did I realize at the time that years of using those stinking white chemicals on my scalp would seriously damage the nerve endings on my head making it difficult to feeel hot/cold shower water! To this day, there are no warnings on bottles/jars of hair straighteners - even though years ago I asked a New York City Ombudsman to ensure that all hair straighteners carry warning labels. So much for caring about the physical health of folk who are convinced that they aren't 'acceptable' without thermally or chemically-altering what God gave 'em - naturally beautiful 'nappy' hair.
Now, aside from actual physical attrition, breakage, scalp damage, balding, etc. - consider the continuous psychological damage mainly white male Madison Avenue adfolk do to people of color from early childhood on. (The concurrent psychological damage done to white kids - encouraging them to feel 'superior' because of their 'white' tresses is not my immediate concern here - but deserves at least mention because of its potential for undergirding racist/colorist societal erosion as whites become teens and adults and enter careers like law enforcement, education and medicine, etc.)
Who can even adequately determine, describe, monitor the horrendous psychological undermining occurring- not only in children of color who exhibit their self hate/low ego status as they self-destructively eschew Black dolls looking like themselves and embrace white dolls not looking like themselves - but on the millions of thusly-damaged folk of color who haven't been doll-or-other-tested for levels of self respect?
Does low self-image/respect have anything to do with school achievement, career success, family relations, drug/child abuse or incarceration rates? Does the fact that Madison Avenue whites routinely exclude actors/models who wear skins of dark, dark Black - if we must use white as 'the norm'-, issue a continuous message that "white is right - Black stay back" in this colorism-ridden society?
Now, every time I see a Black Sister-of-color with her Black Afrikan hair greasy, stringy, bleached, straightened, an ineffable sadness floods through my consciousness and, I do admit, equally do frustration and anger arise at what may or may not be a white male supremacist conspiracy not only to make the 'big dollars,' but to consolidate a white minority hegemony over a three-quarters-people-of-color world.
All of this over 'good hair - bad hair?' Is this hair issue but a symptom of society's larger counterproductive colorist malaise? Where do "nappy-headed hoes" name callings, nooses, bat-attacks or cop-killings of Blackfolk come from? OH OH!
*For many years now, I've worn what my Black Sisters with "hard" hair say is my 'easier-to-manage' hair "natural;" I win! - no more worries about humidity or spaghetti pots of boiling water or 'nappy kitchens!' I can twist it, 'dread it,' part it, link it - look out, Bo Derek!
Put aside the concept of conspiracy for a while and deal directly with the monumental, destructive psychological effects of Madison Avenue's racist/colorist exclusionary insistent advertising to our multi-colored/cultured women that they're not glamorous unless they're wearing shiny straight hair.
You'd think - even these days - that the only 'worthwhile' threadlike growth from the heads of huemans should be straight shiny ones - like one elder Black woman working at the Apollo Theater in NY's Harlem said, "...that good white stuff..."
(Connect those vicious dots: Black children - in 2007 - preferring white dolls over "ugly" Black dolls: early damage to little egos)
Here I am in my latter seventies, still fighting, every damn day, society's conditioned urge to straighten my kinkly hair - resisting the overt brainwhitewashing waves of insistent straight-hair advertising in not only TV and cinema but also magazines galore. (Although some welcome exceptions to this onslaught show up in Black magazines)
I've also had to - continuously - refute the sick familial conditioning which surfaces too frequently that echoes my own mother's remarks that she 'couldn't handle' my hair. My father was the one who brushed, combed and braided my hair into "manageable" condition.* Then, as I reached an age/stage where I could 'contain' my 'unruly' locks, I also tried mightily to 'tame them tresses' - pulling, stretching, oiling and confining my offending kinks.
It was when I became the first "Negro" U.S.A. Airline Hostess/Stewardess (now we say 'Black Flight Attendant') [actually first Black - males or females] - that I started smearing the white man's white cream - lye - onto my Black hair, to 'pull out the kinks' to make myself more 'acceptable' to white and other brainwhitewashed people of color.
Little did I realize at the time that years of using those stinking white chemicals on my scalp would seriously damage the nerve endings on my head making it difficult to feeel hot/cold shower water! To this day, there are no warnings on bottles/jars of hair straighteners - even though years ago I asked a New York City Ombudsman to ensure that all hair straighteners carry warning labels. So much for caring about the physical health of folk who are convinced that they aren't 'acceptable' without thermally or chemically-altering what God gave 'em - naturally beautiful 'nappy' hair.
Now, aside from actual physical attrition, breakage, scalp damage, balding, etc. - consider the continuous psychological damage mainly white male Madison Avenue adfolk do to people of color from early childhood on. (The concurrent psychological damage done to white kids - encouraging them to feel 'superior' because of their 'white' tresses is not my immediate concern here - but deserves at least mention because of its potential for undergirding racist/colorist societal erosion as whites become teens and adults and enter careers like law enforcement, education and medicine, etc.)
Who can even adequately determine, describe, monitor the horrendous psychological undermining occurring- not only in children of color who exhibit their self hate/low ego status as they self-destructively eschew Black dolls looking like themselves and embrace white dolls not looking like themselves - but on the millions of thusly-damaged folk of color who haven't been doll-or-other-tested for levels of self respect?
Does low self-image/respect have anything to do with school achievement, career success, family relations, drug/child abuse or incarceration rates? Does the fact that Madison Avenue whites routinely exclude actors/models who wear skins of dark, dark Black - if we must use white as 'the norm'-, issue a continuous message that "white is right - Black stay back" in this colorism-ridden society?
Now, every time I see a Black Sister-of-color with her Black Afrikan hair greasy, stringy, bleached, straightened, an ineffable sadness floods through my consciousness and, I do admit, equally do frustration and anger arise at what may or may not be a white male supremacist conspiracy not only to make the 'big dollars,' but to consolidate a white minority hegemony over a three-quarters-people-of-color world.
All of this over 'good hair - bad hair?' Is this hair issue but a symptom of society's larger counterproductive colorist malaise? Where do "nappy-headed hoes" name callings, nooses, bat-attacks or cop-killings of Blackfolk come from? OH OH!
*For many years now, I've worn what my Black Sisters with "hard" hair say is my 'easier-to-manage' hair "natural;" I win! - no more worries about humidity or spaghetti pots of boiling water or 'nappy kitchens!' I can twist it, 'dread it,' part it, link it - look out, Bo Derek!
"A CHAT WITH LIFELONG NYC CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST CAROL TAYLOR
"A CHAT WITH LIFELONG NYC CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST CAROL TAYLOR
The 'Little Black Book' Interview with Kam Williams"
(With photo of CT in: The Washington Afro-American April 16-22, 2005; The Baltimore Afro-American April 9, 2005 and The Philadelphia Sunday Sun April 3, 2005)
"Born in Boston, Mass., on Dec. 27, 1931, Carol Taylor matriculated at both Elmira College and New York University before becoming the first Black U.S.A. flight attendant in 1958. Over the course of a professional career that has included stints as a registered nurse, model, office manager, journalist and more, this Renaissance woman has nontheless remained reolute in her commitment to civil rights issues. This explains why she is a familiar face at rallies and demonstrations around the city.
Tireless, Taylor is the author of The Little Black Book: Black Male Survival in America: Staying Alive and Well in an Institutionally Racist Society, a pocket-sized how-to text designed to help African-American men survive any encounter with the police. She is also the inventor, with psychologist Dr. Mari Saunders, of the Racism/Colorism Quotient Test that determines the reltive degree of racism (or "colorism," a term coined by Taylor) within an individual, (see www.racismtest.com)
Taylor lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., where she is completing work on her autobiography. She has two grown children, Cindy and Larry, and a grandson, Tyler, and welcomes inquiries about her first book at littleblackbook@juno.com.
AFRO: Why did you write The Little Black Book?
Carol Taylor: Because our Black sons all over this country are being slaughtered mercilessly and constantly by cops and no one is dealing with this outrage on a national basis! Judge Bruce Wright's introduction [to my book] says, "And so it goes, with the scalpel of American society aimed at Black testicles." My book says to set up Black/African male survival centers.
AFRO: Why is there such a pattern of police brutality against young Black men all over this country?
CT: Don't think for a moment that it's only young Black males! All Black males are targeted because they're Black and male and the reason is: the epidemic of untreated racism/colorism institutionalized in this society.
AFRO: Why haven't highly publicized cases like the beating of Rodney King and the killing of Amadou Diallo brought about some significant changes?
CT: Black males entering this colorist maelstrom of a country should be warned: 'Abandon hope - all ye Black males who enter here [U.S.A.]!' Significant changes will not occur by themselves and, unfortunately, we Black folk are not sufficiently organized to enforce them.
AFRO: Why do you think that racism persists in this society?
CT: Whitefolk - among others - are not taught who they are, who their most distant ancestors are, in their early education. They think that there's more than one race and, in the unearned privilege of their White skins, that their race is superior. There should be no 's' on the word 'race' as it applies to humans.
AFRO: I know that you don't like the word racism. Why do you suggest that we adopt the word 'colorism' instead?
CT: It's not that I don't like the word - it's totally inaccurate! As I said, there's only one race: the human one!
AFRO: Why do you think that you've been such a vocal and devoted civil rights activist?
CT: I detest bullies - like the lesser Bush and his war dawg gang - and for ages, I've felt like I was Donna Quixote, tilting at the windmills of untreated racism/colorism.
AFRO: About how many rallies and demonstrations a year do you attend? How many meetings and conferences?
CT: Do you have all night? As many as this 73-and-a-half-year-old body can make! Inequity demands eternal vigilance.
AFRO: Which issues do you see as the most critical at this moment in history?
CT: The myriad wars and invasions this country has thrown us into, mainly against countries of color, the extant pandemic racism/colorism that causes most wars. Another is insane patriarchy - the mistaken notion that male hormones are more important than female ones. We women are the majority in most countries. How dare males so disrespect their own mothers by maltreating us females all over this misogynist world?
AFRO: Why do you think that Black women are so often overlooked in terms of leadership roles in the movement?
CT: Because Black males have, unfortunately, adopted the white males' insane misogyny - wholesale.
AFRO: How would you describe yourself politically? As an independent?
CT: How could any thinking one be otherwise who understands that (1) the voting system is just one giant scam sham, and that (2) we Black folk have never had an untampered-with voting right in this country. Do your research and you'll discover Black vote tampering going back ever since we were supposedly 'given' the vote!
AFRO: Doesn't not voting disqualify you from complaining about Bush?
CT: If that disqualifies me, this means that other millions who don't vote are unrepresented by elected individuals, which Bush is not - elected that is. The Republicans stole the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. That's why no one should call the cretin 'President!' I think his mother should be tried for war crimes for having him.
AFRO: Do you think that Black people should create a third party or simply not participate in the political process?
CT: How can we Black folk participate in the political process when there's so obviously more than one - one for Whites and one for people of color? Fix the damn racism/colorism first! www.racismtest.com up the wazoo!
AFRO: How do we get from the status quo to a better world?
CT: I just answered that one! Every cop, teacher, judge, jury, employer, editor, doctor, politician, journalist - whoever's in authority - should have to prove to the public that they are not dysfunctionally racist/colorist, not pathological in their responses to culture or color.
AFRO: Meanwhile, what makes you happiest today?
CT: Oh, my! The fact that my two children, Cindy and Larry, are self-sufficient, caring, compassionate humans and that my grandson, Tyler, looks like he's following in their brilliance! And, of course, the knowledge and pride that I've finally completed my wild autobiography and am looking for a smart publisher, so when the thing's printed, I can go on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show!' Look out! I'm alkalizing, Ion Cleansing and still kickin' butt!"
The 'Little Black Book' Interview with Kam Williams"
(With photo of CT in: The Washington Afro-American April 16-22, 2005; The Baltimore Afro-American April 9, 2005 and The Philadelphia Sunday Sun April 3, 2005)
"Born in Boston, Mass., on Dec. 27, 1931, Carol Taylor matriculated at both Elmira College and New York University before becoming the first Black U.S.A. flight attendant in 1958. Over the course of a professional career that has included stints as a registered nurse, model, office manager, journalist and more, this Renaissance woman has nontheless remained reolute in her commitment to civil rights issues. This explains why she is a familiar face at rallies and demonstrations around the city.
Tireless, Taylor is the author of The Little Black Book: Black Male Survival in America: Staying Alive and Well in an Institutionally Racist Society, a pocket-sized how-to text designed to help African-American men survive any encounter with the police. She is also the inventor, with psychologist Dr. Mari Saunders, of the Racism/Colorism Quotient Test that determines the reltive degree of racism (or "colorism," a term coined by Taylor) within an individual, (see www.racismtest.com)
Taylor lives in Brooklyn, N.Y., where she is completing work on her autobiography. She has two grown children, Cindy and Larry, and a grandson, Tyler, and welcomes inquiries about her first book at littleblackbook@juno.com.
AFRO: Why did you write The Little Black Book?
Carol Taylor: Because our Black sons all over this country are being slaughtered mercilessly and constantly by cops and no one is dealing with this outrage on a national basis! Judge Bruce Wright's introduction [to my book] says, "And so it goes, with the scalpel of American society aimed at Black testicles." My book says to set up Black/African male survival centers.
AFRO: Why is there such a pattern of police brutality against young Black men all over this country?
CT: Don't think for a moment that it's only young Black males! All Black males are targeted because they're Black and male and the reason is: the epidemic of untreated racism/colorism institutionalized in this society.
AFRO: Why haven't highly publicized cases like the beating of Rodney King and the killing of Amadou Diallo brought about some significant changes?
CT: Black males entering this colorist maelstrom of a country should be warned: 'Abandon hope - all ye Black males who enter here [U.S.A.]!' Significant changes will not occur by themselves and, unfortunately, we Black folk are not sufficiently organized to enforce them.
AFRO: Why do you think that racism persists in this society?
CT: Whitefolk - among others - are not taught who they are, who their most distant ancestors are, in their early education. They think that there's more than one race and, in the unearned privilege of their White skins, that their race is superior. There should be no 's' on the word 'race' as it applies to humans.
AFRO: I know that you don't like the word racism. Why do you suggest that we adopt the word 'colorism' instead?
CT: It's not that I don't like the word - it's totally inaccurate! As I said, there's only one race: the human one!
AFRO: Why do you think that you've been such a vocal and devoted civil rights activist?
CT: I detest bullies - like the lesser Bush and his war dawg gang - and for ages, I've felt like I was Donna Quixote, tilting at the windmills of untreated racism/colorism.
AFRO: About how many rallies and demonstrations a year do you attend? How many meetings and conferences?
CT: Do you have all night? As many as this 73-and-a-half-year-old body can make! Inequity demands eternal vigilance.
AFRO: Which issues do you see as the most critical at this moment in history?
CT: The myriad wars and invasions this country has thrown us into, mainly against countries of color, the extant pandemic racism/colorism that causes most wars. Another is insane patriarchy - the mistaken notion that male hormones are more important than female ones. We women are the majority in most countries. How dare males so disrespect their own mothers by maltreating us females all over this misogynist world?
AFRO: Why do you think that Black women are so often overlooked in terms of leadership roles in the movement?
CT: Because Black males have, unfortunately, adopted the white males' insane misogyny - wholesale.
AFRO: How would you describe yourself politically? As an independent?
CT: How could any thinking one be otherwise who understands that (1) the voting system is just one giant scam sham, and that (2) we Black folk have never had an untampered-with voting right in this country. Do your research and you'll discover Black vote tampering going back ever since we were supposedly 'given' the vote!
AFRO: Doesn't not voting disqualify you from complaining about Bush?
CT: If that disqualifies me, this means that other millions who don't vote are unrepresented by elected individuals, which Bush is not - elected that is. The Republicans stole the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections. That's why no one should call the cretin 'President!' I think his mother should be tried for war crimes for having him.
AFRO: Do you think that Black people should create a third party or simply not participate in the political process?
CT: How can we Black folk participate in the political process when there's so obviously more than one - one for Whites and one for people of color? Fix the damn racism/colorism first! www.racismtest.com up the wazoo!
AFRO: How do we get from the status quo to a better world?
CT: I just answered that one! Every cop, teacher, judge, jury, employer, editor, doctor, politician, journalist - whoever's in authority - should have to prove to the public that they are not dysfunctionally racist/colorist, not pathological in their responses to culture or color.
AFRO: Meanwhile, what makes you happiest today?
CT: Oh, my! The fact that my two children, Cindy and Larry, are self-sufficient, caring, compassionate humans and that my grandson, Tyler, looks like he's following in their brilliance! And, of course, the knowledge and pride that I've finally completed my wild autobiography and am looking for a smart publisher, so when the thing's printed, I can go on 'The Oprah Winfrey Show!' Look out! I'm alkalizing, Ion Cleansing and still kickin' butt!"
Re: Brooklyn N.Y.'s 'Noosing' of Attorneys Evelyn & Michael Warren**
Carol Taylor R.N.
590 Flatbush Avenue
Ste.11A BK NY 11225-4935
23 October 2007
Kings County D.A. Charles Hynes
350 Jay Street
BK NY
District Attorney Hynes:
Re: Brooklyn N.Y.'s 'Noosing' of Attorneys Evelyn & Michael Warren**
Today, on my Grandson's 11th Birthday, I - for 30 years a BKLYN taxpayer, in my 76th year - had to rise early from my comfortable bed to witness another* of this Borough's modern day lynchings (at the 120 Schermmerhorn Criminal Court House) - the untenable legal pillorying of two Black Afrikan, upstanding, longterm taxpaying members of our Black Brooklyn community, Attorneys Evelyn and Michael Warren.
The Warrens, legally witnessing 77th Precinct Sgt. Talvey and other cops inflict physical abuse on another prone, handcuffed Black male, were themselves subsequently verbally and physically attacked by Talvey for exercising their obligations as Brooklyn citizens witnessing a crime. They were exercising their legal obligations as officers of the court when they asked why men in blue uniforms were beating and kicking a handcuffed Black man.
To add insult to their injuries, Mr. Hynes, now you're allowing your racist/colorist NYPD criminals to further pursue these beloved civil rights leaders, the Warrens, in an already overburdened BKLYN court instead of having them awarded at City Hall for their exemplary exercise as concerned activist BKLYN citizens. You and your BKLYN D.A.'s office are sending the wrong message by continuing to prosecute this conscientious couple and are blatantly wasting our tax dollars.
You are making a public mockery of criminal justice in Brooklyn by continuing to prosecute the Warrens.
I am therefore and herein demanding that you end this racist/colorist 'noosing' charade which only further inflames our direly put-upon Black Afrikan community: exonerate and free Eveyln and Michael Warren from this high-tech 'legal' lynching.
End the Warrens' time-energy-financial-wasting, stressful trips to your courts for their heroic civic acts of conscience. Yes, they are our heroes and you, by further persecuting these warriors, are making them martyrs by allowing this modern day 'noosing party' to continue.
In Utter Contempt For This Outrageous and Untenable Travesty,
Carol Taylor R.N.
First BlackAfrikan Cherokee U.S.A. Flight Attendant
*Your white Brooklyn Judges ( The Grievance Committee) also have been, for 17 years, in my opinion, 'noosing' our Hon. Attorney Alton H. Maddox, Jr., by denying him the right to practice law to protect us BlackFolk!
**CAN'T BELIEVE THE WARRENS'VE BEEN GIVEN ANOTHER COURT DATE - DEC. 17! WHAT B.S.!
590 Flatbush Avenue
Ste.11A BK NY 11225-4935
23 October 2007
Kings County D.A. Charles Hynes
350 Jay Street
BK NY
District Attorney Hynes:
Re: Brooklyn N.Y.'s 'Noosing' of Attorneys Evelyn & Michael Warren**
Today, on my Grandson's 11th Birthday, I - for 30 years a BKLYN taxpayer, in my 76th year - had to rise early from my comfortable bed to witness another* of this Borough's modern day lynchings (at the 120 Schermmerhorn Criminal Court House) - the untenable legal pillorying of two Black Afrikan, upstanding, longterm taxpaying members of our Black Brooklyn community, Attorneys Evelyn and Michael Warren.
The Warrens, legally witnessing 77th Precinct Sgt. Talvey and other cops inflict physical abuse on another prone, handcuffed Black male, were themselves subsequently verbally and physically attacked by Talvey for exercising their obligations as Brooklyn citizens witnessing a crime. They were exercising their legal obligations as officers of the court when they asked why men in blue uniforms were beating and kicking a handcuffed Black man.
To add insult to their injuries, Mr. Hynes, now you're allowing your racist/colorist NYPD criminals to further pursue these beloved civil rights leaders, the Warrens, in an already overburdened BKLYN court instead of having them awarded at City Hall for their exemplary exercise as concerned activist BKLYN citizens. You and your BKLYN D.A.'s office are sending the wrong message by continuing to prosecute this conscientious couple and are blatantly wasting our tax dollars.
You are making a public mockery of criminal justice in Brooklyn by continuing to prosecute the Warrens.
I am therefore and herein demanding that you end this racist/colorist 'noosing' charade which only further inflames our direly put-upon Black Afrikan community: exonerate and free Eveyln and Michael Warren from this high-tech 'legal' lynching.
End the Warrens' time-energy-financial-wasting, stressful trips to your courts for their heroic civic acts of conscience. Yes, they are our heroes and you, by further persecuting these warriors, are making them martyrs by allowing this modern day 'noosing party' to continue.
In Utter Contempt For This Outrageous and Untenable Travesty,
Carol Taylor R.N.
First BlackAfrikan Cherokee U.S.A. Flight Attendant
*Your white Brooklyn Judges ( The Grievance Committee) also have been, for 17 years, in my opinion, 'noosing' our Hon. Attorney Alton H. Maddox, Jr., by denying him the right to practice law to protect us BlackFolk!
**CAN'T BELIEVE THE WARRENS'VE BEEN GIVEN ANOTHER COURT DATE - DEC. 17! WHAT B.S.!
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
'Don't See Color'
Carol Taylor R.N.
590 Flatbush Avenue
Ste.11A BK NY 11225-4935
16 October 2007
Dr. Gary Null
Gary Null & Associates
2307 Broadway
New York, N.Y. 10024
U.S.A.
Dear Dr. Null:
Re:Your Statement- The Week of Oct. 7, 2007 - That You 'Don't See Color'
I've just read a copy of of an insightful, irenic letter by the Hon. Jean Wilkins Dember MHS to you: herein is my take on your state of denial concerning 'not seeing color.'
One of the most hideous aspects of untreated racism/colorism is its propensity for cutting right across hueman intellect. In other words, some of the most otherwise intelligent individuals are afflicted with varying degrees of racism/colorism, more often than not unknowkingly. And they retreat, defensively when confronted, into deep denial of their societally-conditioned bias.
We believe that the sort of pre-judgement based on perception of a hueman being's skin melanin, to some degree or other because it is fallacious, causes an increase in the body's acidity levels. In other words, untreated racism/colorism actually affects the health of folk who, consequently, aren't cogitating clearly: people who 'judge a book (hueman) by its cover' are engaging in negative thinking and that negativity affects their body's acid/base balance - it's unhealthy.
Considering your temendous contributions to the overall health of so many of us who've followed your sage advice down through the years, it is vital that you, of all people, begin to acknowledge that because the hueman body is an integrated entity, and because our minds have such a profound impact upon our physiology, anything which operates against our mental health deserves strict attention, special understanding and action geared toward healing.
Many years ago, several of us - including an Ethnotherapy Psychologist, Dr. Mari Saunders and an international journalist, Winston Worrell, decided that we would set up - not as a panacea of course - a healing intervention in the form of our www.racismtest.com with follow-up Ethnotherapy, a tool we use to foment positive dialogue about colorism in non-threatening arenas to - as Law Professor Lani Guinier has so aptly said - "...put the issue of racism (colorism) on the front burner so as to be able to deal with it in a forthright manner...".
I enclose a recent tract, one of my blogs,** to further elucidate what we've delineated as the dire need for counteracting the systemic and deleterious mal-education to which we've all been subjected (which continues to this day) which fails to teach millions of white, Red, Yellow, Black, Brown and Olive huemans who their most distant relatives were: Black Africans in Africa, the cradle of civilization.
All huemans are 'of African descent.* - some are more or less 'rinsed out, but more's the continuing pity that eurocentricity has failed miserably to teach the truth about hueman origins! This has led to the pandemic generally unacknowledged affliction of colorism. ('Mitakuye Oyasin' - Indigenous for "We're all related")
Dr. Null, since you have publicly (and probably inadvertently) revealed your own colorism by denying that you see color, thereby relegating three quarters of the world's population invisible, may we offer you a tried and true method of healing - the www.racismtest.com Program - to at least begin to divest yourself of the unhealthy societal conditioning which has you denying the reality of our beautiful melanin?
In Solidarity With Your Health Quest,
Carol Taylor R.N.
President: The Institute for "Interracial" Harmony, Inc. (Motto: "Prejudice Is Learned - It Can Be Unlearned"
First BlackAfrikanCherokee U.S.A. Flight Attendant
cc: Jean Wilkins Dember MHS
Laurence William Legall: Affrimative Action Specialist; Vice President I"I"H, Inc.
* Ref: Geneticist Dr. Spencer Wells video: "Journey of Man" (1 800-PLAY PBS)
** http://caroltaylorword.blogspot.com
590 Flatbush Avenue
Ste.11A BK NY 11225-4935
16 October 2007
Dr. Gary Null
Gary Null & Associates
2307 Broadway
New York, N.Y. 10024
U.S.A.
Dear Dr. Null:
Re:Your Statement- The Week of Oct. 7, 2007 - That You 'Don't See Color'
I've just read a copy of of an insightful, irenic letter by the Hon. Jean Wilkins Dember MHS to you: herein is my take on your state of denial concerning 'not seeing color.'
One of the most hideous aspects of untreated racism/colorism is its propensity for cutting right across hueman intellect. In other words, some of the most otherwise intelligent individuals are afflicted with varying degrees of racism/colorism, more often than not unknowkingly. And they retreat, defensively when confronted, into deep denial of their societally-conditioned bias.
We believe that the sort of pre-judgement based on perception of a hueman being's skin melanin, to some degree or other because it is fallacious, causes an increase in the body's acidity levels. In other words, untreated racism/colorism actually affects the health of folk who, consequently, aren't cogitating clearly: people who 'judge a book (hueman) by its cover' are engaging in negative thinking and that negativity affects their body's acid/base balance - it's unhealthy.
Considering your temendous contributions to the overall health of so many of us who've followed your sage advice down through the years, it is vital that you, of all people, begin to acknowledge that because the hueman body is an integrated entity, and because our minds have such a profound impact upon our physiology, anything which operates against our mental health deserves strict attention, special understanding and action geared toward healing.
Many years ago, several of us - including an Ethnotherapy Psychologist, Dr. Mari Saunders and an international journalist, Winston Worrell, decided that we would set up - not as a panacea of course - a healing intervention in the form of our www.racismtest.com with follow-up Ethnotherapy, a tool we use to foment positive dialogue about colorism in non-threatening arenas to - as Law Professor Lani Guinier has so aptly said - "...put the issue of racism (colorism) on the front burner so as to be able to deal with it in a forthright manner...".
I enclose a recent tract, one of my blogs,** to further elucidate what we've delineated as the dire need for counteracting the systemic and deleterious mal-education to which we've all been subjected (which continues to this day) which fails to teach millions of white, Red, Yellow, Black, Brown and Olive huemans who their most distant relatives were: Black Africans in Africa, the cradle of civilization.
All huemans are 'of African descent.* - some are more or less 'rinsed out, but more's the continuing pity that eurocentricity has failed miserably to teach the truth about hueman origins! This has led to the pandemic generally unacknowledged affliction of colorism. ('Mitakuye Oyasin' - Indigenous for "We're all related")
Dr. Null, since you have publicly (and probably inadvertently) revealed your own colorism by denying that you see color, thereby relegating three quarters of the world's population invisible, may we offer you a tried and true method of healing - the www.racismtest.com Program - to at least begin to divest yourself of the unhealthy societal conditioning which has you denying the reality of our beautiful melanin?
In Solidarity With Your Health Quest,
Carol Taylor R.N.
President: The Institute for "Interracial" Harmony, Inc. (Motto: "Prejudice Is Learned - It Can Be Unlearned"
First BlackAfrikanCherokee U.S.A. Flight Attendant
cc: Jean Wilkins Dember MHS
Laurence William Legall: Affrimative Action Specialist; Vice President I"I"H, Inc.
* Ref: Geneticist Dr. Spencer Wells video: "Journey of Man" (1 800-PLAY PBS)
** http://caroltaylorword.blogspot.com
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