A heroic sousaphone player haunted a KKK rally, armed with a sense of humor that can only be found in South Carolina. His musical choices are brilliant, and the fact that he wasn’t attacked is impressive.
In honor of this man’s bravery and defiance, and the people who rushed away from the camera, to avoid being seen with overt racists, I yield the rest of your attention to the changing world we live in.
Keep it up, America!
R
To be sung to Huey Lewis and the News’ Heart of Rock N’ Roll
New York, New York, is everything they say, in some places I feel free.
Where else can you do a half a million things, get stopped and frisked by 3?
When I feel oppression, racial oppression,
Stings for a thousand miles!
But it’s still that backwards Jim Crow culture, that’s really really drives me wild.
[Chorus]
They say heart of Jim Crow is still beating, and from what I’ve seen I believe ’em.
Now the FoxNEWS hot air is seepin’,
And the heart of Jim Crow, heart of Jim Crow is still beatin’!
L.A., Hollywood and the Sunset Strip, is something every Black should see,
Segregation of the pretty, pretty girls, all dressed so equally.
Experience oppression, racial oppression.
Not just on the screen!
‘Cuz the only way a dark girl works, is if she knows how to clean!
[Chorus]
They say heart of Jim Crow is still beating, and from what I’ve seen I believe ’em.
Now the FoxNEWS hot air is seepin’,
And the heart of Jim Crow, heart of Jim Crow is still beatin’!
[Killer Sax Solo here, of course!]
D.C. Ferguson, and Philly town, Boston and Baton Rouge,
Chicago, Seattle, Baltimore inner city, that hell-hole Texas too!
When you say oppression, racial oppression.
They serve it with a little SMILE.
But it’s still that same old NEW Jim Crow, that really really drives ’em wild.
(Dit-dit-dit-dit)
[Chorus]
They say heart of Jim Crow is still beating, and from what I’ve seen I believe ’em.
Now the FoxNEWS hot air is seepin’,
And the heart of Jim Crow, heart of Jim Crow is still beatin’! Yeah!
And Cleveland…
Detroit
Guam
Uh, heart of Jim Crow!
[Killer Harmonica solo, fade to heartbeat, interlaced with sounds of police assaulting people of color.]
by Ren Louis
#sandyspeaks
DAUGHTER: Daddy, please, I don’t want Fruit Loops, the news person said the corn they use has weed killer, and I don’t wanna eat weed killer, I want real fruit!
(Dad wearing suit laughs, saying nothing in reply, then turns to camera)
DAD: Has the news gotten to your home too? Yes, multiple stories about delicious Fruit Loops using corn ‘genetically’ laced with the main ingredient of a ‘weed killing pesticide’ are out, but, you know what, I don’t care!
(Daughter continues to protest, pushing bowl of cereal away.)
DAUGHTER: You’re not even listening to me, all you care about is your stupid job, and you’re NEVER home!
DAD (Continues talking to camera): There’s nothing more important to my family than the sweet wholesome genetically modified goodness only Fruit Loops has, that’s why we’ve decided to eat a year’s worth of Fruit Loops just to show the world how safe they are, (turns to DAUGHTER) right, sweetie?!
DAUGHTER (pauses in shock): You can’t do that. When will you let Mommy out? You can’t do this, I won’t eat your poison, and I’m calling the police! (DAUGHTER tries to throw out cereal and grab a nearby phone.)
DAD (grabbing her before she reaches the garbage can, always smiling to camera): YOU’LL EAT that sweet rainbow of flavors (DAD building with anger) even if I have to ram it down that hole, (DAD stops himself, pauses to breath, turns softly to the camera,) that hole of sweetness!
(DAD and DAUGHTER begin to fight over bowl again, as camera pulls back to find MOTHER tied to a chair behind a large Fruit Loops poster, struggling to get out, as the camera focuses on the poster, their argument growing fainter.
ANNOUNCER: Take the Loopy Dad challenge! Eat a year’s worth of our cereal, without ever getting sick, send YOUR video to RaceAgainstRace.wordpress.com, Your kids will thank you for it, at least before long term treatment starts! FRUIT LOOPS!
Written by Ren Louis
Sara Silver Chronicles – Covering the American Race War, from a bunker in the Bronx, on alternating weekends.
Race aside, I have just celebrated my 13th Birthday and it has dawned on me that boys aren’t so bad. Yes, they are sweaty, annoying, pestering, but they at least serve the great purpose of showing all the girls in school how much smarter we are. Like many other girls out there, I am starting to think about what my first boyfriend (or girlfriend, for you other friends out there) will be like, and my Dad and I had a strange talk about social studies.
He said Friendship and Love are two separate things, (I was thinking, “Why is he bringing this up in the middle of Buffy, blah, blah, blah.”), but that they are kind of the same thing too. Then he kept on about this class he was taking, and how people need similarity, proximity, and attractiveness from girlfriends or boyfriends, whether we love them or not.
“Whatever!” I said, and then he keeps blah, blah, blahhing about how complicated love is, and how it’s not just about kissing, and passion, and how it’s also about commitment, honesty, fairness, and emotional support. I was like, “Old person, you can’t even make it to the bathroom without grunting like a bear, getting off the couch! Why do you even care?”
He’s all, “I’m not that old, and you have to remember how important it is to not just think about your friends, but your boyfriend’s friends, and how they treat you and if he respects you, and yadda yadda.”
I tell him, “I’m not gonna be like Xander and Anya, ok?” He doesn’t say anything for a few seconds, and then he says, “We could use another vengeance demon in the family, your step-mother likes to have someone to talk with on Sundays.”
Parents of any color are a pain. Live, from my room in the Bronx,
Sara
#sandyspeaks
ANNOUNCER: Welcome to the first RaceAgainstRace Anniversary Award Show starring your host Sara Silver! I’m Tony Danzig – BOOM! The first anniversary celebration is brought to you by our sole caterer, Rocko’s Tacos, creators of the White Dismissal Burrito, the Explosive Bean Chimichanga, and all the heart stopping treasures you’ve grown to visit the bathroom over! And now our host, Sara Silver!
SARA: Thanks Tony, please keep an eye on my bike, it’s not locked properly, and welcome to the RaceAgainstRace first anniversary celebration. Presenters of our Most Oppressive 2015 award is the handsome drifter who will take all your money before you drive off a cliff, and the sweet non-racist white lady who lets frightening large Africans break bread with her unarmed family, Matthew McConaughey and Sandra Bullock.
MCONAUGHEY: Alright, alright!
BULLOCK: (sighs disapprovingly) Are you going to say that forever Matthew? When I’m not hurtling through space with George Clooney, or playing characters that anger dark people, I enjoy looking back on my life, particularly during anniversaries, and moments like these, thinking about what other roles I could play to anger other races.
MCCONAUGHEY: We don’t say ‘dark people’ on camera, Sandra. The 2015 Most Oppressive Award goes to the state I was arrested in where I allegedly danced naked playing bongo drums in October 1999 (ah, good times) – The Lone Star State of Texas (pauses to calm booing audience). Don’t worry y’all, they’ll figure it out eventually. Only Texans attempt to rewrite history, violate federal law by closing abortion clinics, change district lines to favor only white voters, and kill a great woman like Sandy Bland in prison for trying to help make things better. (McConaughey fights back tears) Congratulations you racist (Censored Expletive) holes! Accepting the award, against personal protest, is the legendary Gilbert Gottfried!
GILBERT: Thank you, Matthew, you’re very pretty. On behalf of the (Censored Expletive Phrases) state of Texas, that would make it their unholy mission to (Censored Phrases Expletive) hard working Americans, just for being born female, gay, or born with darker skin is a (Censored Expletive Phrases) shame, and I wish every one of those narrow-minded (Censored Expletive Phrases) suckers thank you for this award, and Happy Anniversary RaceAgainstRace! Back to you Sara!
SILVER: Gilbert, that wasn’t supposed to take SEVEN minutes, we have sponsors! We’ll be back after this message from our sponsor, Starbucks’ Coffee, reminding YOU to sprinkle some racial progress into your day, while exerting the remainder of your efforts, or lack thereof, to undermine it. Starbucks’, Race Together!
This Sara Silver Chronicle post is brought to you by Rocko’s Tacos new masterpiece – the White Dismissal Burrito. We took Chicken (bland like your politics) Colby cheese (because it’s named after the Whitest place in Wisconsin), Iceberg lettuce, onions and mayo, rolled it up in a burrito of white privilege, fear, guilt, denial and flour! Try it on days when you don’t want to think about the unhappy people of color in your Jim Crow country. Rocko’s, BOOM!
After taking the night to think about Sandy Bland (#sandyspeaks), I realized another important point, in my repeated comparisons to the US as an apartheid state. Not ONLY is the US very much like South Africa (including the violence against women, as Sandy Bland’s secret prison death illustrates) but I will go one further on this gorgeous sunny afternoon:
Sandy Bland’s death is REMARKABLY like that of Steven Biko: another outspoken, personable and vital member of the political activist community, has been killed for speaking her mind, as her taped arrest displays.
The only reason NOT to compare her to Biko is that she is not male and not a national figure, (which she clearly should be). Ignoring the similarities of my argument by calling it hyperbolic is an attempt to minimize the potency of an accurate comparison.
I wish we could live in a world where you saw me yelling that my house was on fire, and you handed me a bucket of water instead of debating the insurance claim. There may be holes in my Swiss cheese, but it’s still a slice of cheese.
Let’s not worry about the details, please help me tell Sandy’s story to others, as a monument should be at the site of her arrest, and a plaque mounted at the front of the precinct she was killed in. I’ve just written to Obama, Dr. Cornel West Leonard Lopate, and Melissa Harris-Perry on MSNBC all in one sitting. Do you know how typically lazy I am?
An educated, valuable member of our citizenry was just killed in a Texas prison, there are a string of black churches being destroyed in the south, and Texas is trying to re-write history. The house is on fire! Pardon me for yelling, Amerika!
Respectfully,
Sara Silver
#sandyspeaks
Sara Silver Chronicles – Ongoing coverage of the Race War in America, told by an imaginary 13 year old.
Dear White America,
There is no scenario where an intelligent, peaceful, American female college graduate dies during police custody anymore without raising hell on earth, and a new chapter has just begun. Sandra Bland should not be dead, and the world that destroyed her life needs to change. A movement has begun in our country to heal racial divides by compelling those in power to facilitate change. Most people in power in our country are Caucasian, despite being a racial minority, that is a hard fact.
American Caucasians must stand up for the underrepresented to facilitate change, or get out of the way, and let those with the political will do their best. Our country is entering a new chapter of race where a city will now be turned upside down and shaken until the bad eggs drop out. If you don’t see protest in New York, Baltimore, Ferguson, and only see riots, you are not living in the same world people of color live in! If you don’t know or care about black churches suddenly being destroyed, you are not living in the same world people of color live in!
As this war now moves to Texas, you can turn to your neighbor and say, “I’m tired of hearing about black people,” or you can ask:
“Why are Caucasians in power so self-serving, and how can I work to fix that?”
“Are you comfortable with America functioning like an Apartheid state?”
“How can we restore the Voting Rights Act of 1964?”
“Are you willing to fight for your neighbor if he’s not White?”
Reporting live from New York, as I am too disgusted to travel to Texas,
Sara Silver
#sandyspeaks
Derrick Cameron, Hollywood Hopeful
IN A TIME, when Hollywood duds like Jack The Giant Slayer falsely elevate Caucasians to dominate all other races on the planet, and imaginary Caucasian Queens enjoy emancipating brown slaves, ONE MAN dares to claim that there is hope for Hollywood!
Derrick Cameron, Artistic Director of the Ghetto Film School argues, “…Film is America’s #1 creative export. Shouldn’t the creators of this content reflect the historic diversity of this country?”
I say to thee NAY, Mr. Cameron, Hollywood is doomed to eat itself in post-apocalyptic fashion, like so many of their futuristic thrillers where people of color don’t matter!
In honor of historic figures who have been ‘whitened up’ by self-serving Hollywood, like Pocahontas (who was really kidnapped, and her tribe decimated by John Smith) and with utter disdain for the inventors of Hollywood’s “magical” black person, like “Calypso” in Pirates of the Caribbean, I challenge you to a duel, Mr. Cameron!
Let’s do it Hollywood-Thunderdome style, two men enter, one man leaves, and the Black guy dies first.
Coming to screen NEAR YOU!
R
Sara Silver Chronicles – Continuing coverage of the Race War in America, by an imaginary 12 year old roving reporter.
St. Peter’s Holy Gate, HEAVEN — “This Confederate Flag business was settled years ago, why can’t they just let it go?” asked God rhetorically, at the start of my exclusive interview with Him today, following suggestions by South Carolina conservatives and hate groups that God caused yesterday’s Greeleyville Mount Zion AME Church fire, amid reactionary backlash from the initial backlash against the Emmanuel AME Church shooting in Charleston, SC. “I’m tired of hearing about Civil Rights, Sara, especially after hearing all about how important it is!”
“Did you cause the fire, Lord? Initial investigation has ruled out arson.” I asked His Almighty.
“You didn’t think this was the devil’s work, did you, child?” began His Grace, as we sat in the esplanade of St. Peter’s Cafe. He smoked from an old pipe He claimed to have won from a bet with Mahatma Ghandi during a poker game, and added, “This was an act of Me. I’m not sitting on the sidelines anymore on this one, too many good people died for that flag. And before you ask your next question, I’m talking about the Confederate flag, long may she wave.”
“But, Sir, what about the great number of people who died as slaves, and the soldiers who fought for the Union Army?” I asked. “Why is this issue suddenly important to You?”
“Blacks have got monuments and stuff up the wazoo, can’t the losers of the Civil War keep JUST ONE THING?” He whined.
“You mean ‘just one thing’, aside from re-enslaving free Blacks, Jim Crow laws, the KKK, and marginalizing minority votes?” I returned sarcastically, before a small bolt of lightning suddenly erupted a few inches away to my left.
God pointed an illuminated finger at me, “Don’t get sassy, young lady, remember I’m doing this for free, you’re just lucky I was hanging out at the Colberts’ this week. You know they’re not far from here?”
“Yes, Sir, and I doubt they would approve of your firm stance on this issue. Do you think it’s fair to ask a race, victimized by what this flag represents, to tolerate its presence at public buildings all across the south?” I asked him, as we sipped smoothies.
“The flag didn’t hurt them, it was people carrying the flag that hurt those people, are you gonna blame the Confederate flag for the welfare all those people are on, too?” The Unmoved Mover retorted, “If a few people want things back the way they were, what’s the harm?”
“Nine Black churches have caught fire in the past two weeks, there have been terrorist shootings and arsons in Black churches BEFORE Blacks could even vote in this country, the voting power of African Americans in the past 50 years –” I began, before He cut me off.
“The great men who died for the Confederate cause don’t deserve this rebuke,” God warned me.
“Lord, I can’t even interview ‘the great’ Jefferson Davis or Robert E. Lee because You Yourself damned them to eternal hell fire a century ago, meanwhile you’re scheduled for dinner with President Lincoln tonight.” I argued, before the smoothie in my hand disappeared before my eyes.
“Leave the flag alone! This interview is over, Sara. By the way, tell your Dad I said “See you soon!”” God snapped His fingers teleporting away, with more questions left to ask Him, the Creator of all things.
Sara Silver
Race Against Race! 