TAN – The Afro News

TAN The Stories Of Ordinary Heroes

Sometimes life delivers you a critical mission to accomplish. Then, when everyone else thinks it is done and behind, slipping quietly into history, it beckons that you revisit the place and the people who are its living witnesses, so that the past is brought to light again, for the benefit of future generations. Gordon A. Martin Jr. is a retired Massachusetts trial judge whose book “Count Them One by One: Black Mississippians Fighting for the Right to Vote,” accurately and respectfully chronicles the story of the people who challenged an unfair voting registration process and forever changed America.

The core story takes place in Mississippi in 1961. It revolves around the U.S. Justice Department lawsuit against voting registrar Theron Lynd. At that time 30 per cent of the population in Forrest County, Mississippi was African American, yet only 12 of 7,500 were on the voting rolls. These 12 souls braved community abuses, obstacles including denial of their rights and loss of their jobs.

“One can understand intellectually what denial of the vote to black people was – but the experience of getting to know, hard working people, some veterans, many with advanced degrees often in lesser jobs…. the real toll…can only be imagined,” said Judge Martin.

United States vs. Lynd was the first trial that resulted in the conviction of a southern registrar for contempt of court. The case became a model for other challenges to voter discrimination in the South and was influential in shaping the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Change was not immediate but it began in that decade.

On the Job

“I was like so many young people, just out of school and starting out in life with a new job. I was a young lawyer who got thrown into a particular case, underpaid, entrusted, little experience, no time to think,” said Martin.

As a newly minted lawyer, he traveled to Hattiesburg from Washington to help shape the federal case against Lynd. He met with and prepared the government’s 16 courageous black witnesses who had been refused registration, found white witnesses, and was one of the lawyers during the trial. He wasn’t alone of course. Not only was he working under a section head, supervising his learning experience, but this case had the ear and interest of powers at the top.

“Fifty years ago, the U.S. attorney general, in his first day on the job, walked into the office of his acting assistant attorney general of the Civil Rights Division, John Doar. Robert F. Kennedy wanted to know what was going on, what lawsuits were pending, how the right to vote for African-Americans would be achieved.” (excerpted)

Doar, a Wisconsin Republican, had a history in the federal administration with the Civil Rights Division, first in the Eisenhower administration and then in action as a key figure in the Kennedy Justice Department.

Together, Kennedy and Doar saw serious patterns of inequity in a map of the South. Colored pins graphically pointed to trouble in Forrest County in south-eastern Mississippi. That trouble began in 1958 when Theron Lynd was elected registrar of Forrest County. All four candidates in that election had made clear their goal to preserve the essentially all-white electorate of the county.

Process towards progress

Three years into his office, 16 African-Americans from widely diverse backgrounds were ready to testify against Lynd and his tactics to ignore, frustrate and deny the ministers, factory workers, shopkeepers, teachers with master’s degrees from such universities as Wisconsin, Columbia, Cornell and NYU to try to register. Later, one of the leaders of the black community, Vernon Dahmer, was murdered by the White Knights of the Klan for his role in voter registration.

One of the tools Lynd had at his disposal to reject bids for registration was the literacy test. The legal team, without records, came up with 16 contrasting white witnesses either registered without being required to take the literacy test or given a simple section of the state constitution to interpret.

During the trial, the witnesses testified for three days. The federal judge allowed a 30-day continuance but did not issue an injunction. This failure opened the door to appeal and the Court of Appeals agreed and entered its own order, barring discrimination. Lynd strengthened by his history of steady abuse of process violated the order within days.

The team brought three more trials, two for contempt, just to deal with that one county. From the realization that a county by county effort was ineffective, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was brought in to abolish the literacy test and authorized federal registrars to step in. It took till the end of the decade before the shameful southern racial voting discrimination was eradicated along with individual and non standard state control of the process.

Each precious witness’s thoughts and life circumstances are fascinatingly conveyed in the book. Martin who never forgot each of those incredible people began going back to piece the past together as of 1989. More mature and with the benefit of hindsight and experience his conversation with The Afro News brought out interesting applications to today.

Current challenges and future forecasts

While Judge Martin is American and can’t speak to Canadian and international laws and specifics of experience, his journey raises some comments on our current state of affairs.

On the importance of the vote to all sectors of society

“We cannot be complacent about the access achieved then. The ballot must be intelligible to all, particularly our newest citizens. Voter ID laws must be scrutinized carefully. Felon disenfranchisement laws that are an impediment to meaningful re-entry to society should be eliminated. And each generation of new voters must recognize the efforts made by many of their forebears to be able to vote, and understand that their vote does count and may just make a difference.”

Martin is still concerned with people securing their vote and of developing a sense of belonging and community development for all sectors of the American population.

“I’m disappointed that franchise is not valued more. Kennedy worked to eliminate the great social wrong. Now what percentage of the electorate votes? What can have them value it more?”

And, just as any who sacrificed and worked to bring about change, the next immediate generations are born into it and just accept it as a birthright and normal. Martin suggests that the education and engagement starts as early as possible, certainly by high school.

“Young black people need to know their history, not just white people.”

On change

“Change that occurred in American society was phenomenal. Such change would not have been possible if black people were not allowed to vote. Some of the results began with Jesse Jackson’s activity and bid for leadership and led to Barack Obama.”

On what society is doing with the freedom they have

“Youth driven revolution in Egypt came from people being seriously disturbed by the conditions they found themselves in, not organizations, but young people. Youth support made a clear difference for Obama”

Regrettably, notes Martin, the drop off in youth vote two years later (after Obama) shows young people are not as involved. “Partly it’s the rallying cry of the campaign giving way to the harsh realities of the decisions that must be made”

The continued role of youth

People can clearly make a difference and Martin has been witness to that. “Our youth is capable of doing a lot. Political participation is open to all. Desire, motivation and understanding are needed.

In closing our conversation, Martin was quite impassioned about his experience with the exceptional people he encountered in the course of the case that formed the book. His has great encouragement for all to get involved to make a difference, noting it is not only the great names we all recognize like Martin Luther King Jr. and others. “Promotion of this book in the south allowed me to revisit the original people who stood up at great risk to vote, to be called properly by name and to brave physical harm. It has allowed all to know their story and to touch history”

“Reform,” concluded Martin, “is a word that is often misused. It is change people really mean, change per se with a direction.” A step into history might be just what is needed to go forward with a plan.

Chapters in the life of Judge Gordon Martin Jr.

Chapters in the life of Judge Gordon Martin Jr.

If anything about a career such as Judge Martin’s illustrates it’s that we need to reframe retirement as resource rich. Our retired people are resources at large and we should all take advantage of the depth of knowledge gained only by time and applied experience. Some of his milestones include:

• First Assistant United States Attorney and later Special Assistant to Senator Edward M. Kennedy and a Commissioner of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, one of the three oldest state anti-discrimination agencies.

• Visiting Professor at the University of Mississippi School of Law in 2000, teaching Civil Rights and Legal Ethics. He is an adjunct professor at New England Law Boston, where he is teaching Civil Rights this semester.

• Co-authored a civil rights casebook and written more than thirty chapters, articles and op-ed pieces.

• One of the Civil Rights Division lawyers of the 1960s honored with the 2009 Humanitarian Award of the Choral Arts Society of Washington at its Annual Tribute to Dr. King.

• Even as a retired trial judge he is an adjunct professor at New England School of Law. His work has been published in the Boston Globe, Commonweal, the Jackson Clarion-Ledger, the Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History, various law reviews, and other periodicals.

• Martin is a graduate of Roxbury Latin, Harvard College and New York University School of Law and lives in Boston, Massachusetts, with his wife Stephanie.

In addition to his career activity and contributions, Judge Martin and his wife Stephanie, his partner in life and his career, now enjoy the four citizens of the world they raised and the reward of grandchildren.

 

The Stories Of Ordinary Heroes In Landmark Civil Rights Case

ABOUT THE BOOK“Count Them One by One: Black Mississippians Fighting for the Right to Vote,” is a comprehensive account of a groundbreaking case where a lawyer and a community were united to bring down one of the most recalcitrant bastions of resistance to civil rights.

The author, Judge Gordon Martin Jr. interviewed the still-living witnesses, their children, and friends. Having been an onsite witness himself Martin intertwines their modern day reflections with his own expert and vivid commentary about the case itself. To any reader’s delight, the result is a clearly passionate mix of reportage, oral history, and memoir about a trial that fundamentally reshaped liberty and the South.

 

Glimpses of gain and glory achieved in the Afric community with freedom

The Afro News (TAN) invites community members to post or email instances of success and examples of findividual or group empowerment at work in communities near and far.

Kwame Nkrumah from 1952 to 1966 Nkrumah led Ghana as it’s first President and first Prime Minister, and before that its identity as the Gold Coast. As an influential 20th century advocate of Pan-Africanism, he was a founding member of the Organization of African Unity and was the winner of the Lenin Peace Prize in 1963.

Born in 1909, Kwame Nkrumah was educated in Accra, studied at a Roman Catholic seminary, taught at a Catholic school in Axim and then left Ghana for the United States in 1935. There he received a BA from Lincoln University, Pennsylvania and then a Bachelor of Sacred Theology followed by a Master of Science in education from the University of Pennsylvania by 1942, and a Master of Arts in philosophy the following year. While lecturing in political science at Lincoln he was elected to his first presidency, that of the African Students Organization of America and Canada.

Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Jr., 1887–1940 was a Jamaican publisher, journalist, entrepreneur, and orator who was a staunch proponent of the Black Nationalism and Pan-Africanism movement. This led to his founding the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) and African Communities League.

Garveyism was his unique contribution. It advanced a Pan-African philosophy to inspire a global mass movement and economic empowerment focusing on Africa. Promoted by the UNIA as a movement of African Redemption, Garveyism eventually inspired the Nation of Islam to the Rastafari movement (which proclaims Garvey as a prophet) amongst others. The intent was for people of African ancestry to “redeem” Africa and for European colonial powers to leave it. His essential ideas about Africa were stated in an editorial in the Negro World titled “African Fundamentalism”.

Mary Jane McLeod Bethune, 1875–1955, was an American educator and civil rights leader best known for starting a school for African-American students in Daytona Beach, Florida, which eventually became Bethune-Cookman University, and for her role as advisor to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Working in the fields at age five with her former slave parents motivated her early interest in her own education. After college, the school for young black girls she founded opened with six students, grew and merged with an institute for black boys. Bethune-Cookman School’s quality surpassed the standards of education for black students, and rivaled those of white schools. Bethune worked tirelessly to ensure funding for the school, and used it as a showcase for tourists and donors, to show what educated black people could do. In her terms between 1923 and 1947, she was one of the few women in the world who served as a college president.

Gwendolyn Tamika Elizabeth Brooks (Gwendie to friends) was born on June 7, 1917, in Topeka, Kansas to Kezia a former school teacher and David the son of a runaway slave who fought in the Civil War, had given up his ambition to become a doctor to work as a janitor because he could not afford to attend medical school. Right after her birth the family started life in Chicago and Gwendie enjoyed a stable and loving home life, although she encountered racial prejudice in her neighborhood and in her schools. Her experience of a leading white school, all black and integrated schools and then college, gave her a perspective on racial dynamics in the city that influenced her work. What began as enthusiasm for reading and writing, encouraged by her parents, and her mother’s taking her to meet Harlem Renaissance poets Langston Hughes and James Weldon Johnson led to her being a writer. She published her first poem in a children’s magazine at the age of 13, had a portfolio of 75 published poems by 16 and by 17 honoured her roots with submissions to “Lights and Shadows”, the poetry column of the Chicago Defender, an African-American newspaper.

Elijah McCoy  : The Colchester, Ontario born Elijah McCoy trained as a mechanical engineer in Scotland and then lived in Detroit, Michigan. There he noted injuries and deaths due to workers’ attempts to lubricate moving machinery and many were young Black boys hired because they were small and agile. His invention, a self-lubricating device with a drip cup, revolutionized industry by allowing a gradual and constant release of oil, which allowed machines to work continuously without the need to stop them or to have people risk their lives to lubricate machines in operation. His drip cup was patented on July 12, 1872 and while there were imitations, its level of performance led to the famous phrase, ‘the real McCoy’.

McCoy went on to own his own firm and to file 57 other Canadian and American patents.

Anderson Abbott  : Anderson Abbott’s family settled in Toronto, where he was of the first generation to be born free. The affluent family owned almost 50 properties in the Toronto area and Abbott went on to be educated at the Toronto School of Medicine. In 1861 he became the first Canadian born Black doctor in Canada after he interned with Alexander Augusta, also an doctor of Afric origins.

Compelled to contribute his medical services to the American Civil War effort, he was assigned to a segregated regiment. He went on to be a civilian surgeon in several Washington, DC hospitals and ultimately cared for the dying President Abraham Lincoln. In the years that followed Abbott married, worked as doctor and then coroner in Ontario and advocated for integrated schools before accepting an appointment in Chicago, as medical superintendent in 1896 and finally returning to Toronto, where he spent his later years writing on Black history and other topics.

Nathaniel Dett : was born in Drummondville, Ontario, to freedom seekers—people who came to Canada on the Underground Railroad. Dett’s gifts in music were developed from childhood through to a Bachelor of Music degree with honors and studies at Harvard, the American Conservatory (Fontainebleau) and the Eastman School of Music (Rochester) earning a Master of Music degree by 1932.

His music career, marked by performances in all the prestigious concert halls of the day was influenced throughout by Dett’s choral training at a Black college in Hampton, Virginia, in 1913.

He taught and then became the Director of Music by 1926 at the Hampton Institute. He was the first Black person to gain this position and the first African-American to be awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Music by Oberlin Conservatory.

Behanzin Hossu Bowelle, 1841-1906 : West Africa’s most powerful ruler during the end of the nineteenth century, Bowelle was determined to prevent European intervention into his country. He welcomed European visitors but took measures to prevent their spread of influence. His army was physically fit and included a division of five thousand female warriors, in service of defending his country’s sovereignty.

The people of Dahomey called him the ‘’King Shark,” a Dahomeyan surname which symbolized strength and wisdom. A great lover of the humanities, he is credited with the creation of some of the finest song and poetry ever produced in Dahomey.

Hannibal, Ruler of Carthage 247-83 BC : Reputed to be one of the greatest generals of all time, Hannibal, born in the North African country of Carthage, conquered major portions of Spain and Italy and came close to defeating the mighty Roman Empire.

By age 25 he was a general and led an army. He marched his troops with African war elephants through the treacherous Alps to surprise and conquer Northern Italy. His tactical genius was illustrated by the Battle of Cannae where his seemingly trapped army cleverly surrounded and destroyed a much larger Roman force. Hannibal legendary achievement spans more than 2,000 years of memory.

Nandi : Queen of Zululand 1778-1826 AD : Nandi, wife of the the King of Zululand, bore him his first son, Shaka in 1786. Nandi was exiled due to the jealousy of the kings’s other wives. She raised her son with pride and the kind of training and guidance a royal heir should have. Her many sacrifices were rewarded when her son Shaka later returned and became the greatest of all Zulu Kings.

Zulu people use her name, “Nandi,” to refer to a woman of high esteem to this very day.

Mansa Kankan Mussa, King of Mali 1306-1332 : Mansa Mussa was a man who did everything on a grand scale. He was an accomplished businessman, managed vast resources to benefit his entire kingdom and was also a scholar. He heightened the cultural awareness of his people and brought in noteworthy artists to support this initiative.

In 1324, he managed an incredible feat taking 72,000 of his people safely through the Sahara Desert on a Hadj, or holy pilgrimage from Timbuktu to Mecca. His caravan covered a total distance of 6,496 miles and its spectacular success helped Mansa Mussa shine the respect of scholars and traders throughout Europe, and garnered international prestige for Mali as one of the world’s largest and wealthiest empires.

Taharqa, King of Nubia 710-664 BC : During his 25-year reign, Taharqa controlled the largest empire in ancient Africa. Only the Assyrians equaled his power and they were in constant conflict. Even through continuous warfare, Taharqa was able to initiate a building program throughout his empire which was overwhelming in scope. The numbers and majesty of his building projects were legendary, with the greatest being the temple at Gebel Barkal in the Sudan. The temple was carved from the living rock and is set off with 100 foot high images of Taharqa.

As an interesting biblical note, at age 16, this great Nubian king led his armies against the invading Assyrians in defense of his ally, Israel. As a result of this action he has a place in the Bible (Isaiah 37:9, 2 Kings 19:9).

THE GREAT MUTOTA : In 1440, Mutota, a great African king identified the looming threat of European criminal exploits. He foresaw that only a unified, single nation with a strong central government, linked through voluntary association, if possible, could design the plan he and the leaders of the day needed. His aim was nothing less than uniting Africans into a vast empire that cut across South Africa below the Limpopo river, and covered Zimbabwe with an indefinite boundary beyond the Zambezi River in Zambia, and on over Mozambique to the Indian Ocean, sweeping southward to re-posses the entire coastline fronting the New Empire. This area was also rich in the world’s main caches of precious metals such as gold, copper, tin and iron held in over 4000 mines. In 1480 after 30 years of struggle, unity took the form of the Empire of Monomotapa.

Roulade of Pork Loin with Dried Fruit served with Stuffed Tomatoes by Chef Honore Gbedze

Organic Delicious Healthy Creations By Chef Honore Gbedze

Roulade of Pork Loin with Dried Fruit served with Stuffed Tomatoes

Serves 4 people   :  Ingredients  20 ounces of Pork loin – cut into 4 x 5 oz pieces

Read the full story

Honore Gbedze with Helena Kaufman receiving the Award

Helena Kaufman  TAN – The Afro News Writer of the Year 2010 Coming to The Afro News with 30 years experience as a freelance writer with a strategic marketing and public relations practice, Helena generously applied many of her talents in the service of the paper. Read the full story

Birgit,Rico and Michelle Williams

Michelle Lee Williams

  TAN – The Afro News Community Life time Achievement and Legacy Award

Turning her passion for writing into what she called the soul satisfying work of the community, Michelle Williams, conceived the single page, double sided newsletter that became The Afro News. Read the full story

The Sage Foundation Scholarship Excellence Awards Alex and Sumie Francois

The Sage Foundation Scholarship Excellence Awards 2010

  Alex and Sumie Francois (youth)

The Afro News Community Leadership Joseph and Sumie Francois (parents)

The Francois family are the recipients of awards that recognize the sacrifice and effort of parents in the education and empowerment of their children so that they will be equipped for personal strength and contribution to their community, and the children themselves. Read the full story

Letter to the Editor

I would like to express my appreciation for The Afro News Lifetime Achievement Legacy Award, which I received recently.I am very humbled and honored to have been selected to receive this prestigious award. Read the full story

Francois Family & Senator Jaffer & SAGE Founders

I take this opportunity to thank you all sincerely for the support provided and attendance on January 28, 2011for the SAGE Foundation Achievement Awards Event. Read the full story

Fabulous Kumasi Asante Kotoko, founded in 1935

Comment/Sports/Ghana/Africa :By Kofi Akosah-Sarpong ;Aside from politics, nowhere in Africa is the intersection between juju and groups more pronounced than soccer. From high schools to professional soccer teams, juju is heavily appropriated, so much so that it obscures tactics, efficiency, technicalities, discipline and team work.

Though there are no official figures, millions of dollars are spent on juju supposedly to help soccer teams win their tournaments every year. But yet most do not win and yet they go back to the juju mediums all the time. It is like being hooked on illicit drug, they can’t extricate themselves from juju, to their detriment.

But gradually as the debate to refine inhibitions within the Ghanaian/African culture (of which juju is one aspect) gains momentum and higher reasoning and rationality battle irrationality, strange and erroneous thinking, the cultural inhibitions are under siege. It is in this atmosphere that one of Ghana’s and Africa’s top soccer clubs, the Fabulous Kumasi Asante Kotoko, founded in 1935, have come to the conclusion that juju and other such African native spiritual practices are charade, irrational, wasteful and counter-productive.

In a way, Kotoko has “banned” juju from its operations. I was surprised to read Kotoko’s action. “Really,” I said to myself. Such actions also embolden Ghanaian/African enlightenment thinkers, who are campaigning to refine the inhibitions within the African culture, to push on. For any small step, in this direction, no matter where it comes from, such as Kotoko’s, is highly welcomed and further enrich the enlightenment campaigns.

The reasons for such radical conclusion from Kotoko managers are that the proud Kotoko didn’t do well and was nearly relegated in the 2009/2010 premier soccer season, that Kotoko spent nearly US$1-million on juju in the 2009/2010 season to no avail, and that despite all these juju dipping the level of motivation among Kotoko players was abysmally low to the point self-destruction. Kotoko’s comeuppance has come from such awful experiences and it has opened Kotoko to enlightenment.

Shaken to disbelieve, the Accra-based Daily Guide reported that “The newly appointed Kotoko Board of Directors, led by Dr. K.K. Sarpong, has stated that it has no interest in voodoo known in local parlance as ‘juju’, and would not spend the club’s money on ‘juju’ to win matches in the coming seasons.”

Kotoko’s ancient dabbling in juju emanates from the Ghanaian/African culture. Kotoko’s new found enlightenment reminds me of an interesting article I read weeks before the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. The author, a South African who sounds like an academic, suggested that either African juju mediums should use their craft to charm other non-African national teams to play bad for the six African teams to win hands down or individual African teams should seek the assistance of juju mediums to win the World Cup. (He failed to mention how the juju will work when two African teams play each other).

He recalled with seriousness how juju has been used in ancient African wars and other African endeavours and it is time juju is used by the African teams to win the World Cup. Anything like planning, tactics, discipline, efficiency and team work were minimized, or absent from the piece. After much laughter, I said to myself, here, Africa is moving backwards, the irrational outweighing the rational.

Whether Kotoko’s management enlightenment will have effect on individual players is different question in a culture where the players are socialized into juju and other such irrational beliefs. As a student at Kumasi High School (fondly called Kuhis), soccer-mad and one of Ghana’s top soccer schools, the intersection between juju and soccer was part of the soccer culture. In my years at Kuhis, during soccer matches, students were virtually forced to contribute money for juju rituals for the school to win games.

It doesn’t matter whether one belief in juju or not, one has to pay. The amusing part was that even the self-righteous “born again Christians” have to pay – you dare not refuse. Some of the top Kuhis players such as Simon Awuah (Sibo) and Albert Adade (Father) later played for top clubs Accra Hearts of Oak and Kumasi Asante Kotoko respectively. Before playing for these teams their minds had already been prepared, like other similar Ghanaian players.

Kotoko’s boss, Dr. Sarpong, wants the large amount of money used for juju used to “motivate” players, improve management and develop soccer infrastructure. That’s pretty sensible. And Dr. Sarpong is aware of the psychological implications of banning juju in a culture that has socialized the players and supporters into such beliefs. And to answer such implications, in a highly superstitious society of Ghana’s, Dr. Sarpong made it clear that “Kotoko fans that have firm belief in ‘juju’ could go ahead to do it at their own expense for the club. “They should not come to me for money for ‘juju.” That’s realistic, but it puts Dr. Sarpong’s thinking in a quandary.

And that makes Dr. Sarpong’s Kotoko enlightenment scheme limited, for whether Kotoko itself uses juju or supporters use juju to help Kotoko or individual players use juju, in the final analysis, Kotoko is using juju – it doesn’t matter where the juju is coming from. That makes the logical and the material in harmony, which in the Dr. Sarpong’s reasoning, shouldn’t be so – the juju shouldn’t mix with technicalities, discipline, tactics, efficiency and team work. Supposedly, to do so is to undermine Dr. Sarpong’s Kotoko enlightenment project.

For, the juju appropriation needn’t necessarily come from only Dr. Sarpong’s management; it could come from anybody – players, hardcore supporters and individual fans for Kotoko. Now come to think of Kotoko and Ghana in Dr. Sarpong’s thinking, Kotoko’s juju dilemma is a microcosm of the struggle Ghanaian/African enlightenment campaigners are going through – how to minimize the inhibitions within the culture and free the people for greater progress.

Garrison Duke Guest Bill Good show discussing StasCan Report on Hate Crimes

By Garrison Duke ,The Afro News Vancouver : Recently StatCan(Source) just released a shocking report on Hate Crimes, what was most startling about the report, was not the fact hate crimes existed in Canada, (being a Black Canadian I have known that for years especially growing up and living in Toronto.) The most surprising revelation was that Vancouver my home of now 17 years, was crowned the Hate Crimes capital of Canada! – yes Vancouver the city that most recently hosted the world for the 2010 games. The only good news in all of this is that the report was not released in January 2010 prior to the Games.

Make no mistake this is an alarming report and may have drawn attention to something foreboding! Something that perhaps has been quietly simmering below this city’s multi-cultural surface. The study indicates three major areas of concern, hate crimes that are directed at ethnicity, religion and sexual orientation.

The study released by StatsCan suggests the most offended group is the Black Community; they are the most common victims of hate crimes, especially by assault. This is very interesting to me, because when you think of the negative image that Blacks have received over the years- gangsters, pimps, wife abuser, muggers, and jailbirds you name it, in reality we are the ones that are the most victimized in society, and the history runs deep on this issue. Think about the Rodney King assault for minute or historical racial hotspots like Halifax, Toronto or Montreal where most often blacks are portrayed in a negative light in the news and media.

The disturbing fact about the Hate Crime report is that Vancouver with a small Black population 20-25,000 had proportionally the largest number of hate crime victims of the three major Canadian cities. That says something when you can beat Toronto with a Black population of over 300,000.

This report speaks to an issue I have advocated for years; Blacks need more representation in the top tiers of society. Our community needs political, economic and community influence. With the rise of Obama it may be perceived that blacks have arrived at the upper echelons of society. But here is the problem; there are not enough black mayors, senators and so on. In essence we can elect a Black Prime Minister but where are the black MPs, MLAs, Mayors and other community leaders of influence that really drive agendas and make laws that brings change to communities.

Our community also needs acceptance and inclusion, the level of tolerance must increase, marginalizing of particular groups must be discouraged at all levels of society. Until these issues are addressed reports like the one just released by StatCan will just amount to a passing fancy or topic of the 24 hour news cycle.

Garrison Duke, Guest Spot on The Bill Good Show June 16th .

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