Black and Brown News

10/29/2021

09/28/2021

Rest easy Warrior Myron Dewey.

via Twitter bit.ly/2Y51RM6:

"Rest in Power Myron Dewey. He changed history with drone footage showing unarmed Lakota & our allies being brutalized & sprayed with freezing water the Sunday before thanksgiving in 2016 on Backwater Bridge, while we said no to the Dakota Access Pipeline. The world saw. Wopila."

Dewey was known for his iconic drone footage of Standing Rock that gained international attention

09/23/2021

U.S. Special Envoy for Haiti Daniel Foote:

“I will not be associated with the United States inhumane, counterproductive decision to deport thousands of Haitian refugees and illegal immigrants to Haiti, a country where American officials are confined to secure compounds because of the danger posed by armed gangs in control of daily life.”

“Our policy approach to Haïti remains deeply flawed, and my recommendations have been ignored and dismissed, when not edited to project a narrative different from my own.”

# #

“Our policy approach to Haïti remains deeply flawed, and my recommendations have been ignored and dismissed, when not edited to project a narrative different from my own.”

09/23/2021

Did you know?

Excerpt:

"The Mendez family won in federal court in 1946, with Judge Paul J. McCormick writing, “A paramount requisite in the American system of public education is social equality. It must be open to all children by unified school association regardless of lineage.”
Her parents won again in 1947, after the school district mounted an appeal.

“When we won again, my mother, Felicitas, told me I had to be aware of what the case meant,” Mendez said. “She explained, it wasn’t just about me or our family. It wasn’t about the beautiful school. The fight was so that all the kids would be treated equally.”

Two months after the Mendez appeal was over, California Gov. Earl Warren signed legislation to officially end desegregation in public schools."

Sylvia Mendez and her Latino parents paved the way for desegregation in Mendez v Westminster but this Hispanic civil rights contribution is not largely known.

07/06/2021

A program note for those of us who treasure and miss Phyllis Hyman.

Today, July 6, she would have celebrated her 72nd birthday.
I hope you all join us at 7:00 ET tonight.

Let's show some love to our girl forever...the talented Ms. Phyllis Linda Hyman.

☀️💖🎙🎵🎼🙏🏽

06/25/2021

The lawsuit marks the first major action from the Biden administration to combat a series of new restrictive voting measures passed by Republican-led state legislatures.

05/16/2021

Palestinian Lives Matter 🇵🇸

05/15/2021

"After discovering that a shipment of arms destined for Israel was arriving in Italy’s ports, workers refused to load the ship in support of the Palestinians fighting for their lives against Israeli occupation."

After discovering that a shipment of arms destined for Israel was arriving in Italy’s ports, workers refused to load the ship in support of the Palestinians fighting for their lives against Israeli occupation.

05/14/2021

Yeah. Take heed.



Have a grand weekend!
😷

05/10/2021

"The Puyallup Tribe is launching a new effort to rename Mount Rainier and give it back its original name — Mount Tacoma, or Mount Tahoma. In the Native language Twulshootseed, the mountain is called təqʷuʔməʔ — pronounced “Taquoma.”"

The Puyallup Tribe is launching a new effort to rename Mount Rainier and give it back its original name — Mount Tacoma, or Mount Tahoma. In the Native language Twulshootseed, the mountain is called təqʷuʔməʔ — pronounced “Taquoma.”

05/09/2021

"What's Going On: Marvin Gaye's Love Letter to the Future," on BBN. bit.ly/BBN-MarvinGaye40yrs

***

A message about erasure...

I despise the erasure of idea origin, contribution, history, perspective, and the very existence of a person, place or thing.

News media [journalism] and entertainment media are among chief purveyors of erasure, but certainly not alone in the practice or promotion of erasure.

In the macro and micro, I want to see those of us who have been wiped out of history and contribution to set the record straight; unapologetically stake our claim in whatever environment it applies [workplace, church, system, institution, process, etc].

A few weeks ago, Rob Fields the former executive director of the historic Weeksville Heritage Center in Brooklyn did just that. His 10-year contribution and service to the institution was erased from a New York Times profile piece. He phoned the Times to challenge the veracity of their facts by erasing his contribution. The Times corrected their story.

Field’s followed with an eloquent video testimony of his contribution and why it matters. And, why it matters that a publication like the Times - “the paper of record” - is especially powerful in its part in distorting or erasing people, places and things from the record.

Today, I am following Rob Fields and claiming my stake in documenting the story behind Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On.

Tonight CNN will air a special on the 50th Anniversary of Marvin Gaye’s album “What’s Going On.”

10 years ago, on the 40th Anniversary of Gaye’s album, I covered this very same topic under BlackandBrownNews.com (BBN). Perspective and contribution matters, particularly as it relates to how this album came to be and its timeless significance.

Sharon Toomer
BBN Founder, Publisher




***

"What's Going On: Marvin Gaye's Love Letter to the Future," on BBN. bit.ly/BBN-MarvinGaye40yrs

Image source: Genius.com at bit.ly/3eZNhKg

05/05/2021

Excerpts via NPR:

"Sugar Hill was a wealthy, Black Los Angeles neighborhood whose residents played a role in lifting racially restrictive covenants — only to eventually be erased by another force of racial segregation."

"Berkeley Square was part of a larger neighborhood called Sugar Hill, which was named after a wealthy Black section in Harlem. By the 1940s, Sugar Hill was home to some of the most prominent figures of Black Los Angeles - doctors, entrepreneurs, oil barons, even Hollywood stars like "Gone With the Wind's" Hattie McDaniel. On screen, she may have played a housekeeper or an enslaved person, but here in Sugar Hill, she hosted extravagant soirees in her sprawling mansion where people like Duke Ellington and Ethel Waters would perform."

"This thriving community in Sugar Hill existed despite a powerful tool that white residents were using to keep neighborhoods white - the racially restrictive covenant."

Sugar Hill was a wealthy, Black Los Angeles neighborhood whose residents played a role in lifting racially restrictive covenants — only to eventually be erased by another force of racial segregation.

05/05/2021

Via Native Hope:

"The interior secretary is forming a commission to study the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women, weeks after launching a unit to investigate cases."

The interior secretary is forming a commission to study the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women, weeks after launching a unit to investigate ...

04/24/2021

“It is my wish that the United States would honor this treaty.” —Chief John Spotted Tail (Sicangu Lakota, citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe), great-great-grandson of Spotted Tail, one of the treaty’s original signers”

On October 26, delegations from the Fort Peck Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes, Oglala Sioux Tribe, Rosebud Sioux Tribe, Yankton Sioux Tribe, and Northern Arapaho Tribe traveled to Washington, D.C., to see the Treaty of Fort Laramie installed at the National Museum of the American Indian. Signed in 1968...

04/24/2021

Carline Ray, jazz Instrumentalist.

04/24/2021

🕯❤

Via article:

“I recognized she was in a state of distress [and] I knew why she was in a state of distress immediately, so I just, in that moment, wanted to focus on her,” Robles, who has degrees in human service and social work, tells Yahoo Life.

“In my head, when I got out of that car, I knew I was either going to get them [to go] away, or one of us was going to die today. ... I knew that they potentially were going to give me a hard time [and] that was going to be one of their options."

“How you doing, Sis? You OK? What's up? Can I sit with you?” Phoenix Robles, the activist, photographer and social worker could be heard asking as she filmed a lone, peaceful protestor, in a now-viral video.

04/17/2021

Heads Up, Baltimore!