LAKALI

The 1920 massacre in Ocoee, Florida, involved whites lynching, castrating, and removing hundreds of blacks from their land in retaliation for them trying to exercise their right to vote.

Election Day 1920 gave us one of the most violent, horrific stories in the history of American democracy. And unfortunately, despite the lives lost and the unimaginable racism that precipitated the carnage, it’s a tale that has largely been left untold.

As many as 500 blacks were removed from their land. After the violent riot, the Klu Klux Klan set an embargo around the town to ensure that none of them could come back to their homes. In the meantime, the whites seized their property, sometimes with deeds requiring that the land “never be conveyed to Negroes” again.

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More than the massacre, what’s horrifying to me is the certainty that regular members of the community victim-blamed Perry (the voter) for causing it by disrupting the immoral, unjust norm. And lemme guess the people responsible for the death were never punished and their children and grandchildren love them. Oh white America…

Actually there were plenty of these occurrences. Here’s a list of some….Note that there were thousands of black lives lost at these riots. 

Whites were not too happy about desegregation in their cities. With subliminal attempts to keep their city segregated, blacks people were not allowed in the “white” part of town. Black homes and communities were destroyed and burned down by angry white mobs and countless deaths occured. Here are ONLY just a few examples of race riots that took place in our country: 1921: May 30- June 1. Tulsa, OK. Black Wall Street Massacre 1922. May 6, June 9 Kirven, Texas 1923: January 1. Rosewood, FL Rosewood Massacre 1930: October 12-15 Sainte Genevieve, MO 1931: March Scottsboro, AL 1935: March 19 Harlem, NY Harlem Riot of 1935 1943: May Mobile, AL 1943: June Los Angeles, CA Zoot Suit Riot 1943: June 15-16 Beaumont, TX Beaumont Race Riot of 1943 1943: June 20 Detroit, MI Detroit Race Riot 1943:August1 Harlem,NY Harlem Riot of 1943 1949: August-September Peekskill, NY 1951: July 11-12 Cicero County, IL Cicero Race Riot 1958: Maxton, NC Battle of Hayes Pond 1959: February Pearl River County, MS 1960: April Biloxi Beach, MS 1962: October Oxford, MS Uni of Mississippi 1963: September 30. Oxford, MS Ole Miss Riot 1963: July 11Cambridge, MD Cambridge riot of 1963 1963: May 13 Birmingham, AL Bombings 1964: July Brooklyn, NY 1964: July 18 Harlem, NY Harlem Riot of 1964 1964: July 24-26 Rochester, NY Rochester riot 1964: August Jersey City, NJ 1964: August Paterson, NJ 1964: August Elizabeth, NJ 1964: August Chicago, IL 1964: August 28 Philadelphia, PA Philadelphia 1964 race riot 1965: March 7 Selma, AL Bloody Sunday 1965: July Springfield, MA 1965: August 11-17 Los Angeles, CA Watts Riot

In short, no.

Many white people claim to have experienced mistreatment, prejudice, or racism from people of colour. This claim may be used to justify stereotyping and mistreatment of people of colour. But racism is institutional, the power is always on the side of the institutions, which in Canada favour white people. Anyone from any group can have personal attitudes of prejudice towards others and may be subject to action or litigation based on discriminatory activities. But racism is not only about prejudice – it is about power. And in Canadian society, only white people have the power to enforce systematic, institutionalized racism. We are born into a society in which racial power imbalances are already established. Reverse racism does not exist in today’s society.

In any discussion of racism and it’s alleged “Reverse,” it’s crucial to start with the definitions of prejudice and discrimination, to lay the foundation for understanding racism in context.  There’s a reason these three terms exist, and a very good reason not to conflate them.

Prejudice is an irrational feeling of dislike for a person or group of persons, usually based on stereotype.  Virtually everyone feels some sort of prejudice, whether it’s for an ethnic group, or for a religious group, or for a type of person like blondes or fat people or tall people.  The important thing is they just don’t like them — in short, prejudice is a feeling, a belief.  You can be prejudiced, but still be a fair person if you’re careful not to act on your irrational dislike.

Discrimination takes place the moment a person acts on prejudice.  This describes those moments when one individual decides not to give another individual a job because of, say, their race or their religious orientation.  Or even because of their looks (there’s a lot of hiring discrimination against “unattractive” women, for example).  You can discriminate, individually, against any person or group, if you’re in a position of power over the person you want to discriminate against.  White people can discriminate against  people of colour, and people of colour can discriminate against white people if, for example, one is the interviewer and the other is the person being interviewed.

Racism, however, describes patterns of discrimination that are institutionalized as “normal” throughout an entire culture. It’s based on an ideological belief that one “race” is somehow better than another “race”.  It’s not one person discriminating at this point, but a whole population operating in a social structure that actually makes it difficult for a person not to discriminate.

It’s crucial to maintain the distinction between the above three terms, because otherwise white people tend to redefine “Discrimination” as “Racism”. Their main argument is that because [People of Colour] and whites can discriminate against each other, that “Reverse Racism” is possible. But the truth of the matter is that people of colour : 1) have far less opportunity to discriminate against whites than whites have to discriminate against people of colour, overall; and 2)  people of colour lack a system of institutionalized support that protect them when they discriminate against whites.

“Reverse Racism” would only describe a society in which all the rules and roles were turned upside down. That has not happened in the U.S.- or Canada, however much white right wing ideologues want to complain that they’re being victimized by the few points of equality that minorities and women have managed to claim.  White people who complain about “Reverse Racism” are actually complaining about being denied their privileges, rather than being denied their rights.  They feel entitled to be hired and not to be discriminated against, even though the norm is white people discriminating against blacks. If, in a rare instance, a black employer discriminates against a white job applicant, that’s not “reverse” anything — it’s simple discrimination.  It’s to be condemned on principle, but it’s not evidence of some systematic program by which whites are being deprived of their rights.

RACISM FREE ONTARIO FAQ: Is there such thing as “reverse racism?”

 Racism Free Ontario is a 100 day anti-racism campaign across Ontario. Like our facebook page and follow us on twitter! For more info visit RacismFreeOntario.com

A few quotes from famous suffragettes: 

Bell Kearney:  “The enfranchisement of women would insure immediate and durable white supremacy, honestly attained, for upon unquestioned authority it is stated that in every southern State but one there are more educated women than all the illiterate voters, white and black, native and foreign, combined. As you probably know, of all the women in the South who can read and write, ten out of every eleven are white. When it comes to the proportion of property between the races, that of the white outweighs that of the black immeasurably.”

Elizabeth Candy Stanton: “What will we and our daughters suffer if these degraded black men are allowed to have the rights that would make them even worse than our Saxon fathers?”

Laura Clay:  “The white men, reinforced by the educated white women, could ‘snow under’ the Negro vote in every State, and the white race would maintain its supremacy without corrupting or intimidating the Negroes.”

Carrie Chapman Catt: “White supremacy will be strengthened, not weakened, by women’s suffrage.”

Motel manager, James “Jimmy” Brock, pouring acid into a swimming pool to drive black people away from a “Swim In” protest, in St. Augustine, Florida on June 18, 1964.

Anwar el-Sadat was the president of Egypt from October 15th 1970 until his assassination on October 6th 1981.

Sadat was of Arab-Sudanese extraction. But in an interview with CBS anchor Walter Cronkite in the early 1980s, Sadat let it be known who he was when he told Cronkite,

“I am a black man. And I am the last true pharaoh in over 2000 years”.

The statement was of course struck off the airwaves, but Sadat is said 2 have repeated it again 2 Jessie Jackson.

Above Image: Dreea Pavel photographed at her apartment

Dreea Pavel, DJ and writer, talks self care, writing and music.

“How certain people work actually scares me, that’s something I don’t want to know.” Ironically, Berlin DJ and writer, Dreea Pavel and I are on the roof of Klunkerkranich, because I’m here to gain some understanding of her. Below is an edited transcript of our conversation.

You speak about blackness and acceptance of self…

It’s not only blackness, because I am not visually black so I wouldn’t even put myself in that position to speak about blackness. The way we get treated has to do with the way we’re being perceived. My position is a woman of colour and that’s definitely something I speak of often. Just to correct that. I do speak of blackness, a lot, but that’s not the position I am in everyday.

Watch: In a powerful Congresional speech, Sandra Bland’s mother called people who think they’re woke “the walking dead” because of how little we still know

The speech included a rousing call to action before the newly formed Congressional Caucus On Black Women & Girls. And her words were incredibly resonant, even if you think you know the whole story.

Gifs: Josh Begley

9 Famous Faces On The Struggles and Beauty of Being Afro-Latino

Afro-Latinos face many challenges when it comes identity, particularly when people refuse to believe that being Black AND Latino aren’t mutually exclusive experiences.

The Latino identity denotes an ethnicity, which means that Latinos exist in every color and race imaginable – and explaining the difference between race and ethnicity can be quite a cumbersome task to take on on a daily basis. And yet, many Afro-Latinos are often forced to do so after being told they’re not “Latino enough” or being asked to choose between being Black and Latino.