Thanksgiving is a very Western holiday. And I am increasingly… not western. I’ll take the day off. Sure. But I’ll take it in my way. The United American Indians of New England since 1970 have called Thanksgiving by perhaps a more apt name, ‘A Day of Mourning’ and have observed it as such. And being myself a son of colonial horror, I see clearly their stance. My aboriginal blood, always pulling toward aboriginal people. Be they Zulu or Wampanoags. I find myself, somewhere between those two disparate camps of celebration and mourning. I find for me, the day is one of rumination. A day of reflection. ************ More on Holidays. I refuse to be dictated to, regarding what I should celebrate. I refuse to bury truths, beneath money making lies. The general purpose of holidays. Be it Thanksgiving or Christmas, a pagan Roman Holiday to debauchery that became retrofitted to celebrating the Roman’s killing of, what they considered, a so-called Christ, and retrofitted again in the 20th century as a marketing tool, a tool for big business to get bigger. Selling toys, and cards, and trees and crosses. And a word on the cross. The cross long before Christianity was a Greek, then Roman, symbol of torture and terror, the very word has its roots as a device of torture. And was perfected by the great Roman empire, going up and down, and to and fro the entire world, the sign of you crossing yourself, it is also how the devil is described. The cross was a symbol of terror before the coming of Christ, and remains so. Only it has become slightly more horrible, as they have added a crucified man to that symbol. The cross is not celebrating Christ’s life, it is celebrating Rome’s victory. Who but the lyncher makes the lynching and the lynch rope their symbol? Who but the crucifier makes the crucifixtion their symbol? Think. The tiny cult of Christianity a long time ago was usurped, like everything else, by those who loved it not. They want to sell you the idea of a meek martyr and salvation paid by submission to the state. But the man we wrongly call Jesus Christ (that is a Romanized name, surely not a name this dark man, with hair like lambs wool, ever heard in his life, more accurate would be Rome altering this African martyr’s name to their purpose, and labeling him with a play on their JC, Julius Caesar), he came not to bring peace but a sword. And if the idea of a Black Christ changes your relation to that Christ, or your comfort or belief in that Christ, then I say to you… your religion is a fucking sham. And you should call yourself what you truly are… a son of the new Rome and proud eater of Christ. “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.” –Mathew 10:34-36 It’s the standing up of a man you want to make a symbol, not the falling down. Think. And you may realize, everything America does stinks of lies. “And if you heard I was celebrating, it’s a world wide lie” – Public Enemy

LIVES ARE ON THE LINE: GRASSROOTS NON-VIOLENT DEFENDERS Dear Reader, While 15 of the members, children and wives, of the Grand Ravine Human Rights Council (CHRC-GR), are hidden away in safe housing because of death threats, other supporters of the CHRC-GR who want its mission to continue have come out to help. (Photos: temporary replacements for the leaders-in-hiding attend a special meeting Tuesday, 2.17.09.) Those in hiding as well as these others who have stepped up to do the work need our help. Financial always. Back-up work like helping to raise money, write grants, to do the tasks that keep Hurah, Inc. viable (serving on the board, doing database management, website maintenance) more than ever. E-mail me to volunteer: president@hurah-inc.org AUMOHD is a champion defender of the poor anonymous champions on the grassroots who want to promote a peaceful way of striving for their rights, all their community’s rights. They need help. They have worked without pay and with a small ($200 per week) grant from Hurah, Inc. to help out with communication, transportation, court expenses, etc. NOW IT IS RENT TIME! THE RENT IS DUE ON MARCH 15 OTHERWISE AUMOHD LOSES A PRECIOUS RESOURCE, THE OFFICE. The office has served as a neutral place away from the battlegrounds of the inner city neighborhoods for victims to meet. It has a large meeting room, a reception area, a courtyard for large gatherings. The rent has been raised to $3000USD annual. Any gift you can give will be appreciated. Go to our website and click on DONATE (2008 has been a horrible disaster with multiple storms, famine. All Haitians have been majorly strapped on top of being the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Later in the month in our regular bulletin we’ll publish a startling, ground-breaking report of negotiations, face-to-face meetings between AUMOHD/CHRC-GR and armed men who have given the death threats to the CHRC-GR. Because of Atty. Fanfan’s reputation for really working for the poor, these men have asked to meet with him instead of threatening him also. A brief dialog was entertained where each side laid their position on the table. The nature of things in GR as in the past is that politically motivated turf battles are waged with guns, even massacres, to control voters. Sometimes the police are involved. Right now the police seem to be incapable of dealing with the murder of two policemen in the area.We are working on an inter national campaign to put the spotlight on the lawlessness in Grand Ravin and to get the State involved in constructive ways to re-establish order–instead of the violent campaigns waged in previous years. The CHRC-GR was instituted by AUMOHD to pioneer a path to another approach, non-violent advocacy for justice. The armed men are objecting to Franzco and the CHRC-GR working with the police to control criminal behavior because they have been accused of crimes. They think that AUMOHD is tied to foreigners with lots of money. They think that Franzco and the CHRC-GR promoting non-violence is a disservice to the community. A very, very complicated and delicate state of affairs. Please consider helping us support these non-violent champions of human rights! Thank you, Tom Tom Luce, President Hurah, Inc. – Human Rights Accompaniment In Haiti In Partnership with AUMOHD, a Haitian Human Rights Advocacy Group 800 US Advocates – a Vermont 501(c)(3) 1515 Fairview St. Apt. 3 Berkeley, California 94703-2317 E-mail: president@hurah-inc.org Web: http://www.hurah-inc.org To donate (tax exempt org 501(c)(3)) Joan Rae, Treasurer P.O. Box 418 Fayston, Vt. 05673

I want to forward this urgent update I just received from HURAH. I’ve spoken of them and the Haitian situation before. If you can give, please do.

It’s a complicated situation in Haiti.

I’m always inclined to side with the man willing to take up arms to protect his own. His hearth and his home.

Because I can understand the need for Militancy. Militancy in the face of oppression is what freed Haiti in the past. Demanding on their feet, not asking on their knees.

But there is a difference between Militancy, and anarchy.

And at the same time, if a non-violent approach can win the day, can save lives AND liberty, it should be, with all effort… pursued.

So, I choose my charities… with care.

You look at a lot of charities and 90% of what you give goes into “administrative fees” which is a fancy way of saying in the pocket of the people who don’t need it. I look for a charity that answers your questions, and actually uses the bulk of your donation for the people you’re trying to help. Also one that is communicative about how the funds are being used.

I like charities like that.

I like this one.

Check out the website, and when you’ve satisfied yourself you can say the same… give.

Give.

I know the battles are many, and the resources few.

But the winning is not won in our high days, but in our low. When you have nothing left to give, and nothing left to fight with, is when the fighting and the giving matters most.

Victory only promised, to those who will not, ever, ever, content themselves with defeat. Not their own. And not their brother’s.

To those who will never surrender.

Not even to themselves.

From LA to Philadelphia to Baltimore to Haiti.

To Haiti.

A country, one of the first to crack the shackles of the slave trade, that is owed a debt of gratitude by an entire hemisphere; and that debt has only been repaid with bloody horror by our governments.

But increasingly that’s all governments have to give. To give to others and their own.

Horror.

I ask more of myself.

And I ask more of you.

Now is the time to fight.

Now is the time to give.

Today you can give just money to help another’s problems, and perhaps avert a quickly descending tomorrow… where you must pay in blood to resolve your own.

The request is as follows:

Random Thoughts. OJ Simpson. Here’s the thing. We either live in a land of laws or we don’t. By the law, and through the malfeasance of the law (racist cop, planted evidence etc), OJ Simpson over a decade ago was found not guilty of the murder of his wife. Now you can have your opinions on that, but at the end of the day the case was not proved. There was messy, muddled doubt. And yet in the nearly 15 years (can you believe it’s been that long?) since, not a day has gone by where OJ has not been subjected to a continuous media trial. Oj, his children, his friends. I think of those kids a lot, and what these years must have been for them. Imagine for a second that OJ is not guilty, can you imagine what we owe them? What the world owes them? And imagine for a second he is, and we still owe them just as much, because the media has taken a private tragedy, and made it into a public crown of thorns for these kids to wear. A crown of thorns disproportionate to the crime. In that same time we have had and continue to have serial killings, bombings, mass murders, heinous acts beyond the number, and yet the media chooses to offer disproportionate coverage and caustic commentary on this case. Why? Anyone’s murder is a tragedy, but people of color get killed every single day and it usually doesn’t even make the newspaper much less the television. And it definitely isn’t a topic of conversation for 15 years. Yet here we have a famous Black personality, and a dead white Woman. If his wife, who was murdered was Black, given all the mysterious circumstances, would we still be talking about this case 15 years later? I don’t think so. Would we have been talking about it then? The around the clock coverage? No. We wouldn’t have. It would have been a media flash in the pan at best. Instead of what it became, and what it is… A very public lynching. A media led lynching, that I really feel had less to do with a dead White woman, then making an example out of a successful live Black man. I’m saying the mindsets that led to the unspeakable demise of 14 year old Emmett Till, going on 54 years ago, for whistling at a white woman are still very much alive in the actions of people who dispense the law, people who cover the law, and people who preside over the law. And such mindsets color the impartial dispensing of justice. (A brief aside: To show you how much these mindsets are still with us, the grave of Emmett Till was recently defiled. Here, this year in 2008, not in 1955; as if not enough was done to him in life, even in death there are twisted things, old hates of the fathers, that still inhabit empty sons) So here is the thing. I will never side with the public lynching of a person of color. Not OJ, not Wesley Snipes, not Marion Jones, not Michael Vick. Because the common thread I’m seeing… is that the rabid media coverage of the “fall” of famous people of color, is disproportionate to their supposed crimes. People were discussing Michael Vick at the same time a renegade President was blowing the hell out of half the hemisphere, shoveling people into concentration camps, and ripping up the bill of rights, ripping up your right to be. But you know what , the media wanted no part of that. They wanted no part of true, and staggering crimes. So they create a blood sport, a feeding frenzy around Michael Vick. Who really was not important enough, given what was happening in the world and the nation, to be taking up my news time. He was a diversion, from real issues, and I resent that. He was something to keep the rabble busy, while real issues that affect people’s lives go unreported and unchallenged. The courts have become the new Roman Coliseums and people of color are once more the Christians being fed to the lions, for the sake of keeping a dumb mob occupied. So with yesterday’s sentencing of OJ, after almost 15 years of riding a man’s every turn, yet another Roman mob is appeased. So I am not saying there should not be a fitting response for crime, but I am saying determining guilt and innocence and appropriate punishment becomes difficult when both sides bring differing levels of respect to the table. I do not believe in all white Juries (increasingly the fashion), and white judges, being able to offer anything close to justice… to people of color. Just like I do not believe in the Israelis being able to, with parity or humanity, occupy Palestine. I believe an occupying force is always a destructive thing, and justice and law can only be cultivated from within a group, and can not be imposed from without. Not long. And Not well. What begins to happen is under pressure, you create resistance. And the more pressure you apply, the more resistance you create. People in this nation are increasingly under pressure. Pressure by an unjust system. And the ramifications of pressure finally released… is not good. And too often a still very Jim Crow system, masquerading as integration when what it really is, is oversight, exacerbates the problem. Deepens it. Because at least in the days of Jim Crow, people of color had their own news outlets, their own farms, their own markets. Now we rely on a system of talking heads, that no one trusts… to dispense justice. I don’t think there is any Justice in yesterday’s sentencing of OJ Simpson. Malice? yes. Vindictiveness? yes. The particulars of the case for which they want to give him prison time, are quite patently absurd. What he was really convicted for and sentenced for… was a Murder he was found Not Guilty of, over a decade ago. Did OJ kill his wife? I do not know. A court of law said no. And unfortunately there was too much tampering of the evidence by the LAPD to argue with that verdict. So I don’t know if he killed his wife. But I don’t know if a lot of people committed crimes. I don’t know the crimes of my neighbors or the crimes of those of you reading this. And my world keeps turning. But by the rules of the game, the game of law, he should not be taking up my TV time anymore. But like I said, it’s been a vendetta to get him, for going on 15 years. I can not speak on OJ’s crimes, I can not see them. And I can not see yours. But I grew up on OJ Simpson’s good. There was no more loved personality, than this Football player turned actor. I’ve never liked the American past time of turning on our idols, relishing their fall. I don’t know how to turn on someone I like, not easy. Not while there is doubt. And I do not know, know will I ever learn, how to relish a person’s fall. I wrote the following back in 1994, in response to someone’s attack on an even-handed article about the just arrested OJ Simpson. It was published in the paper, and I think it is still valid: “—— is disgusted because in a hero-less time we seek to remember our heroes. And whatever else OJ was or is, in his public life he was a hero. And if ——– has never committed the evils of OJ Simpson, neither has she ever come close to equaling the good. And in the final analysis she is unequal to the task of judging him. —— must understand that none of us are saints and most are sinners, and the best we can do in this life is hope the good we do outweighs the evil. I don’t know if OJ Simpson is guilty or innocent…. If guilty I weep for the man OJ Simpson has become, but will always remember this accused wife beater, this accused murderer, as a bolt of lightning rushing down the field breaking tackles, breaking records. I will always remember him as a man who for one moment in time gave us all something to cheer about.” So I personally would like to see the sentence appealed as the punishment OJ Simpson is getting, is disproportionate to the stated crime. He is being sentenced for a crime for which he has already been found, Not guilty. And that is not… justice.