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The Last Post

If you haven’t noticed (and how could you not?), I haven’t posted here in a long time. Well, I won’t be posting here anymore from now on. If you follow me on Twitter or somewhere else, however, you will know where to find me. Even if you don’t, it won’t be hard to find me.

For now, I’m going to keep paying for this URL and keep the site up for archival purposes. I’m not ashamed of or embarrassed by anything I’ve done here, and I don’t see why it should all just eventually vanish due to the whims of the internets and The Wayback Machine. So, keep linking to anything you happen to like here if you wish.

It’s been fun here, but it’s time to move on, and that I have done. My thanks to everyone that has commented, linked, guest-posted, and otherwise participated here over the years. I hope to see you at my new diggs!

Signing off, here at least,

Kev

Grope Women, Win Prizes?

I love playing video games, but the gaming industry really needs to stop this mess. What on Earth makes anyone decide that advocating sexual harassment of your women employees for prizes is a good idea? EA, you fail. It really is time for the gaming industry and men gamers to cut all this sexist bullshit that so pervades all-things-gaming. You’re making me never want to play Left 4 Dead or most video games ever again.

Oh, and while I’m at it, y’all kinda have a problem with racist stereotypes, too.

[Props to Melissa for the links]

Old School Friday – My Theme Song

Happy Old School Friday, everyone! This week’s theme is My Theme Song. Ok, this is the truth. Often, when I wake up in the morning (er, afternoon) and I’m faced with the day’s travails, I’ll start to feel down, like I’m just not up to the tasks at hand. I’m sure this is something most folks who read here can relate to. Here’s what I use to get myself out of that mindset: “Can I Kick It?,” by A Tribe Called Quest.

That’s all, folks. Happy OSF Y’all! Thanks for playing, and as always, much love to all the other OSF participants.

Regina | MrsGrapevine | Conversations With Marva | Electronic Village | Over Analyze It | The Punkin Patch | Sojourners Place | Dee | The True Urban Queen | Songs In The Key Of Life | What Would Thembi Do? | Wonderland or Not | Hagar’s Daughters | Miscellaneous Matters | The Happy Go Lucky Bachelor | Slant Truth | Traces of a Stream | There Already | The Certain Sound | SoulAfrodisiac | The Young and the Reckless

Beginning To Unpack Race, Class, and Privilege in the Case of Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

I’ve been mulling over the incident regarding Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. over the last few days and I fell like there is a lot to unpack regarding the intersections of race, class, and privilege here. If you aren’t familiar with the incident, Dr. Gates was arrested last week after someone called and reported an attempted robbery into his home. It turned out that Dr. Gate’s himself was trying to get his own door open, but after an altercation with the cops, Gates found himself arrested. There are, as usually is the case with incidents where the police are accused of wrongdoing, two quite different versions of events.

Now, I’m pondering questions of Class and Privilege in this incident at the risk of seeming to minimizing the very real disproportionate abuse and harassment of people of color in the hands of police officers. I want to make it clear that under no circumstances can I condone Professor Gate’s arrest. That said, I found myself alarmed at what I perceived (rightly or wrongly?) as the notion that what outrages is not so much that a black man was arrested for trying to get into his own home, but that a prestigious Harvard Professor, who also happens to be black was arrested for trying to get into his own home. There are more than enough examples of police abusing people of color just over the past six months. Why did this incident gain so much currency amongst the blogs, the media, the Twitterers? Why is President Obama being asked to weigh in on this incident and not, say, the Oscar Grant murder?

I suspect that it all boils down to class and status privilege with who is often deemed worthy of our outrage.

The police report alleges that Professor Gates said something along the lines of “you don’t know who you’re messing with.” The claim is questionable only because it’s a “he said/he said” situation, and it wouldn’t be the first time a cop has lied on a police report to cover ass. Is it really that unthinkable that Gates would say this, though? I have a hard time believing that Gates was not fully aware that he was going to come out of all this relatively unscathed. Professor Gates surely knows who that cop “was messing with.” He had to know that he could count on the best legal representation you can get; he had to know that he would have an outpouring of support based on his reputation as a distinguished scholar. In other words, he had to know that he wasn’t going to find himself face down on the ground with a cop’s knee in his back; he had to know that he wasn’t going to be tasered for tumultuous behavior; or worse, find himself dead. The point being: while I feel that Gates was done wrong, I have a hard time seeing him as the poster child for police abuse of black people. There most certainly were racial overtones to his treatment, but ultimately the affront upon Professor Gates was one of class and status. He’s not one of those working-class or poor people that probably “brought it upon themselves.” He’s distinguished, damnit! And so we must be outraged!

Now that I’ve gotten that off my chest, I also need to say a few things to ward off the inevitable:

Do not take this post as some sort of affirmation of a post-racial United States. This is where class and race intersect, and it is much more complicated than that half-assed, simple-minded notion. Don’t go there.

I still feel that Professor Gates was done wrong. This isn’t an “hate on Gates” post. This is me trying to scratch the surface of what is going on. I write this because I don’t want to see anyone, regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation have to put up with stuff like this. I write this because a lot of us would never get off as easily as Professor Gates did.

This is one of those posts that I’m putting out there for serious discussion. I’m not saying that I have it all figured out. Let’s talk. I won’t, however, put up with the usual drive-by comments from people that want to display their bigotry under the guise of free speech. This post, and all others following will be heavily moderated. Don’t come with the bullshit and I won’t delete you.

Happy Birthday Nelson Mandela

Today is Nelson Mandela’s birthday. He turned 91. It is also the first Mandela Day, a day to be devoted to transforming our world into a better place. While we take this day to celebrate the life, struggles, and accomplishments of Nelson Mandela and all other people who have struggled against the fists of oppression, may we also remember that every day should be a Mandela Day. As he reminds us, “after climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb.”

Rest in Peace, Walter Cronkite.

He was a great journalist. I’m not old enough to have fully appreciated his talent, but I am old enough to remember watching him on TV and knowing that he was the real deal.

“And that’s the way it is…”

Old School Friday – The Divas

Here I am, once again slipping in an OSF post at the last minute. This weeks theme is The Divas. Y’all know by now that when I kick it old school, I kick it real old school. So, here’s one of the originals, Billie Holiday, kicking it mellow.

And for a something a little more contemporary, I give you Tina Turner (Watch and learn, Beyonce. Watch and learn!).

That’s all, folks. Happy OSF Y’all! Thanks for playing, and as always, much love to all the other OSF participants.

Regina | MrsGrapevine | Conversations With Marva | Electronic Village | Over Analyze It | The Punkin Patch | Sojourners Place | Dee | The True Urban Queen | Songs In The Key Of Life | What Would Thembi Do? | Wonderland or Not | Hagar’s Daughters | Miscellaneous Matters | The Happy Go Lucky Bachelor | Slant Truth | Traces of a Stream | There Already | The Certain Sound | SoulAfrodisiac | The Young and the Reckless