May

1

Are Illegals Taking What Rightfully Belongs to White Folks?

Filed Under Politics, Race | Leave a Comment

Immigration rallies took place all over the country today. I’ve tweeted the best protest sign I’ve seen all day – and lots of people are in

agreement because it’s been my most retweeted update since I started using Twitter.

In honor of today’s immigration rallies, I wanted to resurrect a 2006 post I wrote regarding the immigration issue. I’m as annoyed today with anti-immigrant people as I was in 2006.

A few weeks ago, I had a rather heated discussion with an associate about immigration. Before this discussion, I wasn’t paying much attention to the immigration issue. My associate said something about the issue that sparked a fire in me. Because I’d always felt this person was a selfless, compassionate soul, I was quite surprised by what I perceived as very selfish reasons for wanting to see illegals booted from the USA. Some of her reasons, and I paraphrase:

1. This country is hers; her ancestors made it hers.

2. Illegals are destroying the healthcare system.

3. Illegals are taking things from her and other Americans that rightfully belong to Americans.

I guess reason #2 isn’t really a selfish reason; however, it is a reason that has been developed from misinformation. Americans have always complained about the healthcare system in this country, citing welfare mothers (and welfare fathers), the rising cost of healthcare for senior citizens, and a misappropriation of funds (thanks to our American politicians in Congress). Think about all the tax dollars that could fund the healthcare system if illegals in this country were allowed to become taxpaying American citizens. Think about the millions of unemployed American citizens who are receiving free healthcare; I heard not one complaint about them. Why? Because Americans are allowed to be lazy, unemployed, free-loaders; illegals are not. Now I know that not every unemployed American who receives free healthcare is a lazy free-loader, but you get my point.

As for reason #1: I don’t think there are too many Americans who can’t trace their family tree back to a foreign nation or two. In other words, we are all descendants of immigrants. This country is what it is because of immigration (and slavery, but we won’t get into that too much right now). There are too many native-born Americans who have forgotten that — or choose to ignore it. When I hear people cite reason #1 as their main reason for wanting to boot illegal immigrants from the USA, I think of two 5 year olds fighting over something that doesn’t belong to either one of them.

Reason #3: This country rightfully belongs to the “Native” Americans. The anti-immigration fools really oughta check-in to somebody’s mental health clinic — and make sure they prescribe you the good shit before you leave.

During the course of my discussion with my associate, I touched on the slavery issue. I told her that I found it pretty ironic that white Americans — of all people — are bitching about people coming to America illegally. I mean, after all, it was their ancestors who forced Africans to come to this country so they could make slaves of them. But see, the difference is: slaves were controlled property and did what they were told; illegal immigrants belong to no one. I also told her that I didn’t care in the least if illegals were destroying the system that slave-owning white Americans built from the ground up. Karma’s a bitch, eh? To that, she said she was very sorry I was so hateful. She then quoted Dr. King “The marvelous new miltancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom.” I wanted to ask her how long it took her to look that quote up in Google. By the way, did she call me a militant?

I had another discussion with a friend about immigration. He and I disagreed, but never did we stoop to name-calling or condescending comments. The adult-like conversation allowed us to discuss the issue, hear each other out, and walk away from the discussion with our friendship intact. He feels there are too many illegals in the country draining the healthcare system, ruining local schools, and destroying the local economy. This may be true; however, if illegals were allowed to become citizens then they would pay taxes just like the rest of us. Are the problems my friend cited something we should fault illegals for, or should we tell our elected officials to hand the illegals a social security card, make them Americans, and take their tax dollars? I vote for the latter. I think too many people who lack critical thinking skills are unable to come up with obvious workable solutions to our immigration problems. They jump on the “Be American or Be Gone” bandwagon. Personally, I think the fact that Hispanics are the fastest growing population in the United States just scares the hell outta white folks who are used to having only ONE racial minority group to attempt to control. Now they have to figure out how to control the Blacks and the Hispanics. Ain’t that a bitch? Can you imagine what our elected officials will look like in 50 years? Blacks, Hispanics, and women running the show. I’d be scared too if I were a white person who’s use to being the majority — and reaping the rewards of such an honor.

I agree, we need to control the border better. What good does it do us to use strict security at the airports when Bin Laden’s friends can simply go to Mexico and crawl under the fence? Keep in mind though, the really dumb people who are complaining about illegal immigrants aren’t citing national security as their concern. They’re screaming “This country is mine! Go home!”

At the risk of sounding like one of those morons who says, “I don’t have a problem with Black people. My best friend in kindergarten was Black,” I have to say, I don’t have a problem with white people. I don’t have a problem with Americans. I’m not out to annihilate white people. I just really dislike ignorant people — be they white, Black, Hispanic, Asian, or whatever. The loudest, most ignorant voices in the immigration discussion just happen to belong to white people. Don’t believe me? Take a seat in front of your TV during the news hour, flip through your channels, and see for yourself. When the media finds a minority who wants to give illegals the boot, that person becomes the poster child of the hour. It’s like they’re saying, “See, even the niggahs hate illegals!”

Original post: You Have the Right to be a Free-Loading American – June 5, 2006

Apr

5

TRANSform Me’s Laverne Cox on SistersTalk Radio

Filed Under Entertainment, Gender, Lesbian Podcast, Podcast, Politics, Race | 3 Comments

Laverne Cox made television history when she became the first African American transgender woman to appear on an American reality show with her appearance as a finalist on VH1′s “I Want to Work for Diddy.” She accepted the GLAAD media award for Outstanding Reality Program for “I Want to Work For Diddy.”

Laverne’s popularity on “Work for Diddy” led to her starring in her own show on VH1 called “Transform Me” based on the original concept by Laverne and her partners at her production company Complete World Domination. “TRANSform Me” is a makeover show which explores the concept of transformation from the inside out drawing from the universal aspects of transgender transformation.

As an actress Laverne has guest starred on “Law and Order”, “Law and Order: SVU”, and HBO’s “Bored to Death.” She recently starred in the forthcoming independent film “Uncle Stephanie.” Her other film credits include “Bronx Paradise,” “The Kings of Brooklyn” and “Daughter of Arabia.”

Mar

23

What’s the Best Strategy for Moving LGBT Issues to the Front Burner?

Filed Under LGBT, Politics | Leave a Comment

I’m curious what you think.

What do you think is the best way to move LGBT-equality issues to the front burner in Washington?
Professional and grass-roots lobbying
Elect more LGBT and pro-LGBT candidates
Direct action or civil disobedience
All of the above
Not sure

Poll source: SmartBrief

Mar

15

Photographer Jeff Sheng Discusses His DADT Photobook

Filed Under DADT, LGBT, Podcast, Politics | Leave a Comment

Photographer Jeff Sheng joined us on SistersTalk Radio to discuss his DADT photo book.

Mar

6

Reality TV Star Dani Campbell Heats Up SistersTalk Radio

Filed Under Entertainment, Lesbians, Podcast, Politics | Leave a Comment

Dani Campbell is a reality TV personality, speaker, firefighter and activist who became America’s next lesbian superhero as a contestant, and eventually the final woman standing on MTV’s mega hit reality show ‘A Shot At Love With Tila Tequila.”

Dani has launched a successful new clothing company ‘Futch Apparel,’  a fashion forward line of clothes for women and men who don’t necessarily fit the everyday “mold.”

Hear Dani discuss:

*Her life since ‘A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila’

*Where she wants to see her career go

*Her clothing line ‘Futch Apparel’

*Her move into activist work

Mar

6

Indie Musician Toshi Reagon on SistersTalk Radio

Filed Under Music, Podcast, Politics, Race | Leave a Comment

Indie musician Toshi Reagon joins us on SistersTalk Radio. The New Yorker said ”…her live shows shower retro funk, urban blues, and folk on the audience with evangelical fervor. To hear her is to believe.”

Toshi joined us on SistersTalk Radio to discuss:

*Her musical influences

*Her impressive discography

*The time she spent touring with Lenny Kravitz

*Her legendary mother, Bernice Reagon

*Her feelings about the word “nigger”

*How she feels about President Obama

*Her recent performance at the White House

Feb

5

Interview with Willow from Join the Impact & socialist activist Sherry Wolf – #CC10

Filed Under Audio Update, DADT, LGBT, Politics, Race, Twitter | Leave a Comment

It’s been a particularly moving day for me at Creating Change (#CC10) today. I sat in on two workshops: (1) Telling: Knights Out and (2) Strengthening the Connection: Racial Justice and LGBT Rights (presented by The Applied Research Center). I was mostly pleased with the DADT workshop, until I sat in the Racial Justice workshop that mentioned a key fact about DADT that was ignored (not mentioned? forgotten?) in the DADT workshop.

The President & Executive Director of The Applied Research Center stated that Black female service members are affected by DADT more than any other group of service members. I found it a tad bit annoying that I didn’t hear that statistic in the DADT workshop – especially since 2 of the 3 presenters were women (white women, but women nonetheless).

Anyway . . . after leaving the Racial Justice workshop I felt extremely energized and, quite frankly, extremely sexually turned on. There’s something about passionate people who work diligently to secure equality for all people that’s a major form of pseudo-foreplay.

Enough about that.

I had an opportunity to speak with Willow (from Join the Impact) and socialist LGBTQ activist Sherry Wolf. I planned to remove the background noise but decided against it because I wanted the interviews to maintain their authenticity. Hope you enjoy hearing these two phenomenal activists speak about their passions as much as I did.

Willow’s interview:
http://sisterstalk.net/willow.mp3

Sherry Wolf’s interview:
http://sisterstalk.net/sherrywolf.mp3

More #CC10 commentary coming throughout the weekend. Stay tuned. And, if you’re on Twitter, follow the #CC10 tweeters.

Nov

5

ENDA Supporters Address Religious Exemption in Senate Hearing

Filed Under ENDA, LGBT, Politics, Religion | Leave a Comment

I just finished liveblogging today’s Senate hearing on ENDA. Here’s a brief summary:

The panel included Tom Perez, Assistant Attorney General, Civil Rights Division, United States Department of Justice, Washington, DC; Helen Norton, Associate Professor of Law, University of Colorado School of Law, Boulder, CO; The Honorable Lisa Madigan, Attorney General, State of Illinois, Chicago, IL; Virginia Nguyen, Diversity & Inclusion Team Member, Nike, Inc., Beaverton, OR; Mike Carney, Police officer, City of Springfield Police Department, Springfield, MA; Craig Parshall, Senior Vice President and General Counsel, National Religious Broadcasters Association, Manassas, VA; Camille Olson, Partner, Seyfarth Shaw, LLP, Chicago, IL

There was lots of focus on the religious exemption, mostly because Parshall spent most of his time explaining why ENDA would hurt the religious community. The pro-ENDA panel partricipants (especially Norton) did a great job of countering Parshall’s claims.

The one complaint we heard the most from our liveblog participants was there was a lack of trans-identified representation, even though much of the discussion addressed the needs of trans-identified people.

To read the transcript of the liveblog, head on over to iQreport.

Oct

22

Monica Calls Out White Gays Who Criticize Obama

Filed Under LGBT, Politics, President Barack Obama, Race | 1 Comment

I.love.TransGriot. I need to make that a bumper sticker.

Monica over at TransGriot is crackin’ the whip with anti-Obama white gays – mostly those who were convinced by the HRC to support Hillary Clinton (even though good ol’ Hillary pretty much wrote the Defense of Marriage Act and had Barr put his name on it). Monica says:

Buy a fracking vowel and get a rainbow clue. Last time I checked, the gay community was not made up exclusively of white gay people. We’re getting tired and fed up with you vanilla flavored privilege wielding GLBT peeps not only attacking our community and conveniently ignoring the fact that Black GLBT people not only exist, but we chocolate flavored GLBT peeps have a diametrically opposed view of how President Obama is doing.

The Black GLBT community is also concerned that your constant attacks are not only pissing our people off and alienating our African American cis and straight allies, you are making our job much tougher in the African American community to make the case why they should support and fight for these issues.

The reality is that Bush left the Obama Administration a toxic mess to clean up and the man has his hands full. If the rest of us and Stevie Wonder can see that, what’s wrong with y’all?

The anti-Obama queers Monica speaks of know full well that Obama has his hands full. Even a deaf and blind man knows the country is in a recession, the healthcare system is in shambles and the country is still fighting a war the Bush administration started. What’s happening here is a very slick anti-Obama/Pro-Hillary 2016 campaign – compliments of the HRC. By 2016, the HRC hopes to have convinced people that the Black man had his chance and he failed so it’s time to have a woman in the White House. I venture to guess the Clintons still have the HRC on their payroll and the HRC has a lot of favors to pay out.

I would add that a lot of us in the Black LGBTQ community are fed up with you Black queers who have become talking pieces for the HRC – a group that could care less about your Black ass. You know who you are. The HRC tossed a few pennies your way in the form of blog advertising and you’ve been kissin’ their lilly white rich asses ever since.

Update: Great comments on the HRC:

“The HRC is not a democratic or inclusive institution, especially for the people who they claim to represent. Just like society today, the HRC is run by a few wealthy elites who are in bed with corporate sponsors who proliferate militarism, heteronormativity, and capitalist exploitation. The sweatshops (Nike), war crimes (Lockheed Martin), assaults on working class people (Bank of America, Deloitte, Chase Bank, Citi Group, Wachovia Bank) and patriarchy (American Apparel) caused by their sponsors is a hypocrisy for an organization with “human rights” in their name.

Uh huh. I couldn’t agree more.

Oct

20

Senator Gillibrand Tweets Meeting with DoD to Discuss DADT

Filed Under DADT, Politics | Leave a Comment

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand was appointed by New York Governor David Paterson on January 23, 2009 to replace Hillary Clinton after she became Secretary of State.

Today Gillibrand launched a new Twitter page. Her second tweet was: “I look forward to meeting with Dept of Defense officials today to discuss the latest with DADT policy.”

See the Tweet

Let’s see what becomes of that.

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