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Viewpoint Michigan Chronicle

A Real Times Media Newspaper

June 6-12, 2018 | Page A-4

HIRAM E. JACKSON Publisher ■ CATHY NEDD Associate Publisher PATREICE A. MASSEY Managing Editor | AJ WILLIAMS City.Life.Style. | Entertainment Editor SAMUEL LOGAN Publisher 1933-2011

JOHN H. SENGSTACKE Chairman-Emeritus 1912-1997

The Age of the Corporate Prophet? By Bertram L. Marks Let’s face it, no where you fall on the spectrum of political and social ideas, all of us can agree that America is a deeply divided nation. Civility has been abandoned for vitriol and unimaginable hate speech and acts. The time-honored tradition of peaceful, organized dissent such as that displayed by conscientious NFL players has been labeled unpatriotic. At the same time hate mongering racists carrying tiki torches and chanting Nazi slogans have been deemed “good people”. The decision by colonists in America to resist the tyrannical dominance of im- Bertram L. Marks perial England through physical acts of defiance and protest seem to be absent from the minds of modern day critics of peaceful expressions of free speech. The hypocrisy is overwhelming. This disturbing trend in American politics leaves little room for optimism. Many Americans have soured so deeply on American political discourse they cannot even bear to watch or absorb any form of political news even when that news supports their own values and ideas. While optimism remains off the radar of thought expectations, hope still abides. This ray of hope came in the form of two very unexpected but profound actions of resistance to hatred and bigotry from two members of corporate America. On or around May 29, 2018, Rosanne Barr, star of the recently rebooted ABC show “Roseanne” posted racist comments about former Obama White House aide Valerie Jarrett. In her comments, Barr tweeted that the “Muslim brotherhood and planet of the apes had a baby” she then went on to state that the baby is Valerie Jarrett. Ape comparisons to African American is a frequent tactic of white supremacists and other staunch racists. There is no defensive for such deplorable speech. Almost immediately after the Barr posts and in a stunning display of courage and leadership, Channing Dungey, ABC Entertainment President, canceled the “Roseanne” show and denounced Barr’s statements as “abhorrent, repugnant and inconsistent with our values.” The rebooted “Roseanne” show earned some of the highest ratings for a network show in decades. There is no doubt the show was a money making super hit. It is worth noting that Dungey sparked headlines in 2016 when she became the first African-American to run the entertainment division of a major broadcast television network. However, the rebuke of the racism displayed by Barr was not limited to Dungey. Shortly after Dungey’s statement, Walt Disney

By Dan Dildy

Two major corporations have decided to denounce in words and in deeds the ugly monster that is racism. Two corporations didn’t seek to justify the actions of racists or provide broad statements subject to interpretation. Instead, they admitted that these acts were racist, intolerable and action had to be taken. I am under no illusion that these actions alone will solve the problems at ABC and Starbucks or even, society. However, I am convinced that the courageous actions of these corporations have sparked a movement. They have clearly signaled to corporate America and the rest of the nation that racism is bad for the moral fiber of our country, bad for business and in a multi-ethnic society must be ushered off the cliff of a civil society into the sea of the abyss. Kudos to these two corporations for providing desperately needed leadership on the issue of tolerance. These actions provide us with a prophetic warning that racism will destroy our nation. I give Kudos in advance to all corporations who engage in ongoing sensitivity training and who broom out racist employees before hurtful, senseless, incidents occur. Bertram Marks is a former Michigan Civil Rights Commissioner, practicing Attorney, Corporate Citizenship Consultant, and Seminary trained Doctor of Ministry

Pardon Me?

On May 23, 2018, the National Football League (NFL), issued a new ruling that prohibits players from kneeling during the National Anthem. Notably, more than 70% of the NFL’s players happen to be black. Coincidentally, the very next day, May 24, President Donald Trump signed a pardon for a convicted African-American boxing champion named Jack Johnson. Deceased for 72 years, Johnson had been arrested for taking a white woman Dan Dildy across state lines 105 years ago during the Jim Crow south. The president, in his wisdom, forgave the dead prize fighter at the behest of movie star Sylvester Stallone, who had starred in several popular ‘Rocky’ films some years ago in which he played an unbeatable white prize fighter. While Trump’s timing of the pardon is extremely suspicious, it takes nothing away from the greatness of Jack Johnson, a true champion of his time. The charges against him ultimately ruined his career, since he ended up serving several months in prison. The forgiveness for his ‘crime’ was well-deserved. But Trump’s pardon is not about compassion and is of no real substance to anyone, not even Jack Johnson’s family. An unknown number of black people were innocent, yet still tried and convicted during the segregationist Jim Crow era. It is blatantly obvious that the pardon was timed and staged on live TV as an attempt to mitigate the political damage Trump initiated when he rebuked the kneeling NFL football players. Several months ago he publicly called on the team owners to “get those son’s of bitches off the field”, and denounced the players for kneeling during the Na-

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chairman and CEO Bob Iger issued an equally powerful rebuke when he repeated Dungey’s description of the statement and went on to say “we have decided to cancel her show. There was only one thing to do here, and that was the right thing.” The Walt Disney Company owns ABC. Imagine that, a corporate entity providing the moral compass for a nation which describes itself as indivisible under God. The second corporate act which cracked the window of hope for an end to our docile acceptance of racism came from Starbucks. In April, Donte Robinson and Rashon Nelson two African American men were arrested in a Philadelphia Starbucks simply for waiting there for a friend. The manager of the store called police. The two men remained calm as they were handcuffed and escorted from the premises to a nearby jail. As a result of this incident, Starbucks leaders called the episode “reprehensible”. What is more important is that Starbucks decided to close all U.S. stores on Tuesday May 29,2018 so its 175,000 employees could participate in company-wide racial-bias training. Chairman Howard Schultz deemed the action necessary and unprecedented in American business history. Financial analysts predict that the action could result in a $16.7 million-dollar loss in sales. Starbucks also agreed to pay all employees engaged in the training. Again, a corporate entity making a decision based on a moral need to right a wrong, not on the capitalist agenda of earning profits is an unprecedented act of courage and leadership.

tional Anthem. The players had been inspired by Colin Kaepernick since 2015, who had been kneeling in protest for the murders of unarmed black people by police around the nation. Kaepernick himself has been blackballed from the league. Bothersome and outrageous is the fact that the new rule is contrary to the very essence of what the flag is supposed to represent. The 1st Amendment to the Constitution is a guaranteed civil right: the freedom to peacefully protest. Trump hypocritically mandated that the black athletes show respect for the American flag, while simultaneously pressuring the wealthy NFL owners to enact new rules showing no respect for the player’s civil rights. And worse, the Trump administration seems content to celebrate the NFL’s decision as a victory for the president. Following the announcement, Vice-President Mike Pence arrogantly jumped on Twitter and tweeted, “#Winning”. But, within days of the rule change, demonstrators from women’s rights groups, the NAACP, the National Urban League, and Rev. Al Sharpton’s National Action Network, amassed outside the NFL offices in New York. Tameka Mallory, a protester and Kaepernick supporter said, “There are many people who were on the fence about whether or not the league was being outright racist. This policy and statement has given clarity to the level of racism that exists within the NFL.” The #Takeaknee Movement has grown new legs now, just as the 2018 season is scheduled to kick off. And the player’s union has several options available including court action, a boycott, or a possible strike. Clearly, Trump believed he had won a political bout against professional football players in exchange for pardoning a dead black boxer for a 105 yearold-crime. Further, he now says that athletes who kneel in protest “maybe shouldn’t be in this country”. So, the logical question then becomes: does that mean ALL athletes, of ALL ages, in ALL sports from now on if they take a knee? Pardon me, Mr. President?

LONGWORTH M. QUINN Publisher-Emeritus 1909-1989

Quote of the Week

I think we have to turn it into a teaching moment ... I’m worried about all the people out there who don’t have a circle of friends and followers who come right to their defense. The person who is walking down the street minding their own business and they see somebody cling to their purse, or run across the street, or every black parent I know who has a boy who has to sit down and have a conversation -- the talk ... those ordinary examples of racism that happen every single day.

”

– Valerie Jarrett

responds to Roseanne Barr’s racist tweet

Exciting New Trend: Black Women Changing the Tide of American Politics By Jeffrey L. Boney (NNPA Newswire Contributor)

Last week, the world witnessed something that had never been done before in the history of politics in the United States. Not only did Democratic voters in Georgia elect a 44-year-old African American candidate as the first-ever Black gubernatorial nominee in the state, they also made history by electing the first Black woman to be a major party nominee for governor in the United States. That’s right— former Georgia House Minori- Jeffrey L. Boney ty Leader and attorney Stacey Abrams soundly defeated her opponent, former State Rep. Stacey Evans, with an overwhelming 53 percent landslide victory; Abrams won 76.5 percent of the vote compared to Evans’ 23.5 percent. Abrams will face off against the winner of the Republican primary runoff election that will be held in July between Georgia’s Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle and Secretary of State Brian Kemp. While much of the political conversation around the country has been focused on the success of women candidates as a whole, one of the primary reasons for Abrams’ dominant showing in the Democratic primary was the high turnout of Black voters, particularly Black women voters. The convincing victory by Abrams, a rising star in the Democratic Party, has created a significant amount of chatter in political circles about the growing success Black women candidates are having across the country, particularly in a deeply southern state like Georgia that hasn’t had a Democratic governor since 2003. “I am a proud daughter of the Deep South,” Abrams stated during her victory speech after winning the Georgia Democratic gubernatorial nomination. “To claim our victory, to write that next chapter and live those best lives, we have a lot of work to do. We have to reach out to those who do not believe their voices matter. Who have been disappointed again and again by promises made and never kept…With your help, we will register every last person we know.” Abrams continued: “And we’re going

to search out those we don’t know yet and prove they matter to us, too…In the Book of Esther, there’s a verse that reminds us that we were born for such a time as this. And now is a time to defend our values and protect the vulnerable — to stand in the gap and to lead the way…that is what we will continue to do—all the way to victory in November.” A victory by Abrams in November would truly be a game changer relative to politics, as we know it, in the Deep South and across the country. Prior to 2003, no Republican had ever served as governor in Georgia since Reconstruction. Republican George “Sonny” Perdue III changed that after he was elected and then sworn in on January 13, 2003. Perdue served until 2011, and the governorship in Georgia has remained in Republican control ever since. Then, if you take a look at the rest of the Deep South, which consists of states like Texas, Alabama, South Carolina, Mississippi, Arkansas and Louisiana, each of those states currently has a Republican governor at the helm, with the exception of Louisiana, where former Democratic state legislator John Bel Edwards was sworn in as governor in 2016. Abrams has a chance to change the overall landscape of politics as we know it, but it will take more than having her name on the ballot as the Democratic nominee in Georgia to make that a reality—it will require engaging existing Black voters and focusing on getting newly registered Black voters to the polls in November. Abrams has adopted a strategy focused on registering new Black voters and engaging more Blacks to come out to the polls and vote in November 2018 than came out in 2014, when only 40 percent of African Americans went to the polls in Georgia, compared to roughly 48 percent of Whites. If recent history is any indication, the only way the tides will turn in the favorable direction Democrats hope for relative to the key gubernatorial seats that are up for grabs in battleground states this November, is if there is a heavy Black voter turnout—something the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) has been focused on in 2018. Maybe this time will be different. Time will tell. November to be exact. Stay tuned. Jeffrey L. Boney serves as Associate Editor and is an award-winning journalist for the Houston Forward Times newspaper. Follow Jeffrey on Twitter @ realtalkjunkies.

Letter to the Editor WHY ALL THE COMPLAINING ABOUT BELLE ISLE? IT IS MORE ATTRACTIVE AND INVITING THAN EVER

What is interesting about Belle Isle is that our Detroit island was like a ghost town for many years prior to Grand Prix racing there. Now people are expressing an interest in it now that we have a national event there. Where were these people before? Thirty-six years ago, our organization along with several interested people began thinking of starting Metro Detroit Youth Day. At the time you hardly saw anyone at Belle Isle. So, in July 1981, several persons from our organization and in the community decided to host our Edward Deeb first Youth Day on Belle Isle’s Athletic Field. We picked the site since it was not being used and would hold hundreds of kids. The late Tom Fox, and Jerry Blocker along with football Hall of Famer, Lem Barney, myself, and others founded what eventually became the largest youth event in Michigan and the Midwest U.S. We were disappointed with our first turnout. Only 1,200 youngsters, volunteers and parents attended. We had sports stars, various games, entertainment on stage and a free lunch at the time.

Where was everybody? Belle Isle was like a ghost town as it had been for years. People have asked me several times why did you pick the Athletic Field on Belle Isle for Metro Detroit Youth Day? We picked that site in 1981 since our high school (Eastern) had no practice field, so we chose Belle Isle since it was close to school. While we could sympathize with people wanting to re-live their Belle Isle experiences, an empty Belle Isle was brought to life by the Grand Prix, Metro Detroit Youth Day and the newly formed Belle Isle Conservancy. Frankly, I feel the Grand Prix helped rejuvenate Belle Isle which is a good thing. The event only lasts a few days other than for a storage area and the racetrack. All of that is cleared up within a couple of weeks, which has not been a problem. Look at the crowds the Grand Prix is bringing to Detroit from all over. Detroit is finally starting to get the attention it deserves, and much of the funding it generates comes back to Belle Isle. Our city needs places like Belle Isle and outstanding events like the Grand Prix. Let’s all pull together and bring even more outstanding things to our city without the need to condemn or criticize something.

Edward Deeb, Founder Michigan Youth Appreciation Foundation, Metro Detroit Youth Day, and Michigan Food and Beverage Assn.