The World Is A Ghetto

The World Is A Ghetto: Motown Getting Mo-Crazy

Posted on by Cool Pappa

I grew up in the D. when terms like crack, carjacking, and checking-in were being born.

This was one famous Detroit group that you won’t find ever performing at a halftime show.

At the same time, terms like Reaganomics, Star Wars defense, and pull-yourself-up by your bootstraps also thrived in this country’s vernacular.

But as bad as things were back then, some of the things going on today make shake my own head.

I’m I getting older or do you feel the same way?

Yesterday, Marvin Winans of the famous gospel group, The Winans was carjacked and robbed in the middle of a gorgeous afternoon in the ‘hood. For my readers not in this area or country, the streets don’t matter, but trust me, he was stopping in the ‘hood.(Story here: http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/news/region/detroit/pastor-marvin-winans-carjacked-and-robbed-in-detroit)

Now, I also grew up listening to The Winans as they were on my dad’s approved music list. My close friend’s father used to pick us up in the Ford panel wagon LTD and she’d have a Winans tape jamming every morning on the way to school. When my family heard the song Tomorrow before I did, I remember them telling me, “We know you’re going to love that song” and they were right. To this day it’s still one of my favorites.

So it bothered me to hear that Marvin Winans was now a victim, especially knowing that he has tried to make a difference in the city.

I’ve listened to some on the radio that criticized him for stopping at a station with a Rolex and a purple Infiniti SUV. But knowing that his QX56 only gets 16 mpg, I’m sure he’s stopped at gas stations in Detroit numerous times without incident.

But not this time.

Plus, is it now THAT bad? It wasn’t THAT bad in the ’80’s. Back then, we watched a Fiero get stripped right across the street in a few minutes in the middle of the afternoon. But I don’t remember it being THIS bad. I’m I wrong or do I have those “back-in-my-day rose-colored glasses on”?

Also, just the week before, this incident happened and lets just say my man certainly didn’t look like he was displaying a Rolex to fake Ludacris you see in the video. (Note: That old-head got with phony-Luda and it’s sad he had to get a bunch of his “boys” to help him buck with a guy twice his age…and the punks hit an older woman too…those fools are hard right there.)

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news/local/couple-robbed-and-beaten-at-detroit-bp-gas-station-20120509-ms

But the gentleman in the video above did everything right. He didn’t look scared and even spoke to the dudes respectfully and didn’t even call them niggas, like I’m sure they call each other. What did he get in return, a beatdown that could’ve been much worse and thankfully it was not for him and his wife.

Are things just THAT bad?

If we say that they are, then what?

My prediction? At the current progression, two scenarios are likely to play out.

1.) Drastic measures will not be taken until someone of European-descent gets beatdown or killed as the national outrage will cause leaders to speak up and the negative attention will reach past the Michigan border.

Does anyone remember the fireworks brawl that got caught on tape in the early ’90’s (and remember, that was before Youtube)?

2.) Notice the event happened at another gas station. Fuses are getting real short on gas stations as they aren’t calling police on crimes taking place on their property and if you do something that effects them, they shoot you. Lack of police response and growing animosity against the police are all making for fumes that could ignite with one “minor” incident.

Does anyone remember 1967?

Back in the day, we knew who Marvin or at least The Winans were because we went to church.

Dad, when was the last time you did THAT with you kid(s)?

I’m not even talking about whether your church is good or not, but at least it puts the moral compass in the right direction.

An atheist sees me and my boys (friends) crewed-up with hoodies, Kangols and Adidas on at night. Why would he/she breath easier seeing us with Bibles in our hands as we walk from the Mission instead of the gas station up the street?

All rights reserved by Detroit Liger

(We may look bad outside the Mission at night, but trust me, we’re harmless)

Why? Because they know that “religious fanatics” have a moral compass and they are glad about it, because if we didn’t and just believed that now is the only reality and there are no consequences for our behavior, then they may be stretched out on that sidewalk and not make it back home that night. In other words, I’m sure the atheist would be glad we hold the fanatical worldview and not their view in that situation.

Now Dad, do you know where your children are?

Whether living with you or not, are they hanging out in the street, doin-dirty?

If you don’t know, you better find out.

Cause while it may not be YOUR kid that’s going to rob or kill you (then again, it could be: http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/news/Son-of-Farmington-Hills-beating-victim-arrested-2-others-seriously-hurt/-/4714498/10918534/-/15dc71oz/-/index.html) because they’ve never been taught to have regard for human life and have determined that they will be the predator not prey, you may one day fall victim.

You may get stuck by a kid who was raised with a lack of supervision like your kid was raised.

So forget the old saying from parent to child, “I hope you have a kid that acts just like you one day!”

I now will say, “I hope you run into some kids (or they marry) some kid that has been raised just like you raised yours one day!”

Maybe that’s the only way to keep things from getting worse in the D. or any other place, cause I’m getting a headache from shaking my head.

“Either they don’t know, don’t show, or don’t care about what’s goin’ on in the ‘hood.” – Boyz N The Hood

What do you think and how are things in your neighborhood?

CSD

 

 

 

 

Washington Watch Exclusive: The Parents Of Slain Florida Teen Trayvon Martin Speak Out

Posted on by Cool Pappa

I will deal with this story and issue soon. In the meantime, I wanted to post this video from Washington Watch, as it knocks down all the stereotypes that I’m sure people are looking for. Many times people will say, “Well, I’m sure something happened to make that guy act that way” or “Maybe the kid was threatening to the man”.

What saddens me the most is that my son and I were just visiting the Orlando area exactly one month ago. I gave him more freedom while we were away than I normally would at home since his other siblings were not there. My heart rate increases when I ponder on the “what-ifs” like, “What if neighborhood watch would have been following him when he was making the one-mile walk to his cousin’s house?” “What if something would have happened when he was out playing football and on his way home just before dark?”

I think I would be thinking just like Trayvon Martin’s dad said in the above video, he would have been waiting on me to protect him, and I would not have been there.

My mentor Dr. Lyn Lewis used to say something to the affect that black men grow up knowing that they are one step from jail or dead, no matter who they are or what they do in life.

I’ll echo another saying she’d say, that’s some good Sociology right there, because this Trayvon Martin murder proves her point. Good kid, good parents, smart, athlete, but still dead like a L.A. gang member.

Lets keep the heat on this story before it gets swept away by more important things like what the Duchess of Cambridge is wearing or what Peyton Manning is doing.

Photograph: Matt Dunham/AP

Once Again, And It’s Not Yet Black History Month! – Reason 453 for Why You May Want To Consider Homeschooling Your Kids

Posted on by Cool Pappa

Wow, another one of these assignments, so soon after the Georgia story? (See here: http://cornerstonedad.com/2012/01/10/parents-protest-at-school-over-slave-math-lesson-reason-344-for-why-you-may-want-to-consider-homeschooling-your-kids/)

What’s the workbook for teacher workshops these days, the Willie Lynch letter?

Some have rightly argued how could many African-American’s vote for Barack Obama just because he is of their same people group.

How about because many people are tired of the only thing African-Americans are known for is being a slave!

Maybe 30 years from now the assignment will be, “How did it feel to run for president and have people doubt whether you were even born in America?” Or, “Imagine being President and having other political colleagues disrespect you and the position in ways they have never done to any other before, treating you worse than one who was extremely promiscuous and of your same party?”

Well, at least in the report below, I see my high school’s slave auction doesn’t seem quite as bad now.

For those who may feel this isn’t that bad, perhaps you’re right. Maybe we as a society shouldn’t be so sensitive. Maybe next September 11, we can have some students pretend they are jumping out windows or pretend they are held by terrorists and about to get their head’s chopped off.

Yea, that’ll be cool.

Of course, we could always have our Jewish brothers and sisters pretend to starve, be infected with diseases, or how hot it would feel to be in an oven. I’m sure some kids in the class will be German so they can chip in as oppressors (or say they were just following orders).

Oh, that would be a real teaching moment for the kids.

And before you read the article below, please remember there’s no such thing as “biracial”. There aren’t two races of human beings. That’s a topic for another day.

CornerstoneDad’s, read over those school assignments!

Michigan mom slams son’s assignment on slavery

MELVINDALE, Mich. – Jessica Gibson says she won’t let her 11-year-old son complete a school assignment that she says took a lesson about slavery too far.

Gibson, 27, of Melvindale, Mich., said her sixth-grade son, Taylan, received the social studies assignment from a Strong Middle School teacher last month. But her son hid it from her, later telling her he didn’t want to do it. Gibson found out about it last week.

“He’s never had a master nor will he ever have a master, so why should he have to pretend to have a master?” Gibson said. “That really disturbed me.”

The written portion of the assignment asked students to answer five questions, which included describing what the slave area and the plantation area are like and what the owner and his family are like. It also asked students what kind of activities go on at their plantation, whether they have any friends or family at the plantation and whether anything extraordinary has happened in their lives as a slave.

A video portion of the assignment asked students to talk about the life they described in the journal, according to the assignment Gibson shared with the Free Press on Monday.

The teacher, Michelle Angileri, told the Free Press she wasn’t allowed to make any statement and directed a reporter to talk to the principal. The Free Press was unable to reach the principal or district superintendent Monday.

Taylan had been learning about slavery when he got the assignment. He said it embarrassed him.

“I’m black, and it was a slave assignment,” he said.

His mother, who is biracial, said she doesn’t think anyone should be required to complete the assignment, regardless of race.

“For him to pretend to be something he’s never been or never will be, that’s going too far,” she said.

Teaching slavery is a sensitive topic that has sparked controversy before. This month in Atlanta, teachers used slavery themes to teach math concepts, including questions such as: “If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in one week?”

Last year, teachers in Virginia and Ohio held mock slave auctions in which they had white students auction off black students as part of lessons on the Civil War.

Gibson said she tried talking to school officials about her concerns, but didn’t receive a satisfactory solution and doesn’t want her son to get a zero for not completing the assignment.

“Find a different assignment for them to do,” she said.

Source: http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/story/2012-01-17/michigan-assignment-slavery/52610652/1

Parents protest at school over slave math lesson – Reason 344 for Why You May Want To Consider Homeschooling Your Kids

Posted on by Cool Pappa

You know, one day I’ll do a podcast or article on some of the racist things done at some of my schools when I was growing up.

The worst by far was the Slave-Trade that my high school put on to raise money by auctioning off athletes.

Oh wait, shout out to the NFL and NBA who still do that…

But you know, I can honestly say I’ve never had to take a test like this.

Beaver Ridge Elementary parents held a protest outside their Norcross school Tuesday after a lesson on Frederick Douglass prompted third-grade teachers to use slave beatings to teach math concepts.

One of the questions on the worksheet. A school spokesperson has said the questions were "poorly written."

Channel 2 Action NewsOne of the questions on the worksheet. A school spokesperson has said the questions were “poorly written.”

Another question on the worksheet. Several parents have complained about the assignment.

Another question on the worksheet. Several parents have complained about the assignment.

School officials said that the questions stemmed from an effort to incorporate history into math lessons.

Channel 2 Action NewsSchool officials said that the questions stemmed from an effort to incorporate history into math lessons.

The protest was held as some parents of third-graders who saw the homework assignment met with the school’s principal.

About 60 parents, community activists and church leaders assembled outside the school. A few carried signs that read: “Shame on them” and “The teachers need to be fired.” Some drivers passing by the demonstration honked to show support.

Parent Christopher Braxton, who complained to the district about the slave math questions, said his son’s class was being led by a substitute teacher for the second day in a row as the investigation into the incident continues.

Braxton said Beaver Ridge Principal Jose DeJesus would not elaborate on the status of the probe or his son’s teacher.

“They apologized for the situation and said they could not speak about it further until they finish the investigation,” Braxton said.

Four of the school’s third-grade classrooms received the assignment, which made references to slaves picking oranges and filling baskets with cotton. It also included the question: “If Frederick got two beatings per day, how many beatings did he get in one week?”

This is the second time in two years race and ethnicity on a homework assignment sparked complaints at Gwinnett Schools. There was a similar incident in Cobb Schools last fall.

Last school year, third-graders at Gwinnett’s Chesney Elementary were given a reading homework packet that included a story titled “What Is an Illegal Alien?” The assignment, which was copied from the Internet by a new teacher, was not reviewed by the school’s subject area department chair before it was distributed. The math sheet created at Beaver Ridge also failed to undergo a content review, officials said. Under district policy, the worksheet should have been reviewed before being handed out to students, but that process was not followed.

In September, Cobb Schools came under fire for a similar incident, an assignment by a teacher at Campbell Middle School. Students were asked to write on the issue of dress codes and read a fictional two-page letter written by a 20-year-old Saudi Arabian woman. The character wrote approvingly of wearing the Islamic veil — and of her fiance’s multiple wives and the law of Sharia.

Gwinnett Schools human resources officials are investigating the Beaver Ridge incident to decide whether punitive action is necessary. District officials said they would work with math teachers to come up with more appropriate questions.

“These particular questions were an attempt at incorporating some of what students had been discussing in social studies with their math activity,” said Sloan Roach, Gwinnett Schools spokeswoman. “One teacher developed the questions, another made the copies and it was used in four classes.”

Ed DuBose, Georgia NAACP president, had a strong view: “The teachers, the staff responsible for allowing this to go forward should be fired.”

DuBose called off a press conference Tuesday and met with Gwinnett superintendent J. Alvin Wilbanks.

One of the teachers involved in the incident is Hispanic, Braxton said. The district would not release the teachers’ names or races. All involved are being questioned about their role and are still employed with the district, Roach said.

School officials said the questions were not intended to be offensive and that copies of the assignment were being pulled so they wouldn’t be circulated.

Copy and paste the link to check out the video of the story:

http://www.ajc.com/news/gwinnett/parents-protest-at-school-1296640.html

The World Is A Ghetto – Introduction

Posted on by Cool Pappa

As I have stated in the past, the neighborhood I grew up in wasn’t the worst, but it wasn’t the greatest either. On a scale of 1 (great) and 10 (horrible), Suburbanites would have put it at about an 8 while those with street knowledge would have probably ranked it a 6. Yet, my suburban church and schoolmates always made me feel like my neighborhood and the dark-skinned people that looked like me were rotten to the core, unable to govern themselves or control their lust for violence and depravity. Even as an adult now, I still hear the comments with many I interact with at church, my neighborhood, school and work.

I remember seeing this movie by Eddie Murphy (back when nearly everything he touched turned to gold, well, except this:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8_HkH-plx7U) called Trading Places where he played a guy named Valentine, a street-hustler. This movie taught me a lesson about a concept that even has an anthem and I continue to believe in to this day:

The World Is A Ghetto

The dominant color group in America tends to associate violent acts with those in the minority color groups. Dan Ackroyd demonstrated in Trading Places that under the right circumstances, even the rich would rob, steal and kill to “make ends meet”.

In the movie, Rudulph Duke delivered the punch-line, “We took a perfectly useless psychopath like Valentine, and turned him into a successful executive. And during the same time, we turned an honest, hard-working man into a violently, deranged, would-be killer!”

 But long before, the book of Proverbs stated:

 7Two things I ask of you;
deny them not to me before I die:
8Remove far from me falsehood and lying;
give me neither poverty nor riches;
feed me with the food that is needful for me,
9lest I be full and deny you
and say, “Who is the LORD?”
or lest I be poor and steal
and profane the name of my God.

The words of Agur son of Jakeh

Proverbs 30:7-9

English Standard Version (ESV)

While Agur was a man of God, he knew that things could get so bad in his life that he might become a criminal (or “hustle” as many say in today’s world) in order to survive.

Starving Africans

“Survival” is relative as millions more know the difference in not having the means to get food and water, and not having food and water.

So why is the world a ghetto? Because no matter how nice your suburb, from an infrastructure and social perspective, understand that your neighborhood would be the same way as that “ghetto” if you had the same problems. Publicly, the only reason many areas are not considered even worse is because  of the free-pass many in the suburbs are given because, “We never thought something like this would happen out here…”. Two weeks later “it” happens again and someone’s on the local news saying, “Things like this just never happen out here…”

Now, how do I know? Because as a child I went to school in a blue-collar middle-class suburban neighborhood and to church in a suburban affluent neighborhood. As an adult, I’ve worked mostly and now live in a middle-class suburban neighborhood. I’ve heard the comments and carefully observed the changes, and there is a great hypocrisy.

So this was just an introduction to a series of future installments titled: The World Is A Ghetto, which will highlight the hypocrisy. The ghetto isn’t just your local big city with abandoned buildings, crackheads, assaults and burglaries. Yes, where you and I live has those same “ghetto” tendencies lying dormant in our city’s DNA (to my siblings, DNA stands for Deoxyribonucleic Acid).

Now the lessons for CornerstoneDads? Teach your children that they are not less prone to sin against God and others because of the shade of their skin or where they live.

If you disagree, lets just take a little test, as you may be saying, “We’ve pulled ourselves up by our bootstraps and worked hard for everything unlike those other folks…we are better than they are!”

Dad, have you ever stolen anything? You know, something from work or your neighbor? How about that item that you never returned when you could have numerous times, but you said, “They won’t miss it.”

Dad, have you ever lied? You know, to the government (after all, taxes are just plain “wrong”), to your insurance carrier (is it really fair that they charge so much and you’ve never filed a claim?)

If you answered yes to the above, and I know you did because you’re an honest guy, that means you and I are no different than the folks in the “ghetto” that lie, cheat and steal. While the victims may be different, the rationale and sin is not.

You need a Savior, and money, “values”, and tradition will not save you.

I didn’t even touch on so-called “white collar” crime that reign supreme in the suburbs. The bottom line is that crime happens everywhere. Regardless of a city’s dominant color group or social class, people will rob, steal, kill, not remove the snow or cut the grass at your local ball field, etc. if the social conditions were set just right and money gets tight.

A policeman put it best when he reflected the lawlessness experienced in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina. “People would be surprised at how little separates us from complete anarchy in this country.”

Nope, I’ve studied human behavior for quite some time now, I wouldn’t be surprised at all.

Check out the video below on the new “thang”, Flash Robberies…and I don’t think they were stealing to survive.