Man, I miss the crib. It’s just something about Memphis and the South I love. Maybe its because right now I’m in Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico at the Tamaya Hyatt Resort and Spa. It is a nice place with Casino’s, a golf course and a luscious spa, but it is cold here man, real cold. I made the mistake of not checking the weather channel and came up in this camp thinking it’s the desert, that it had Mexico in its name and that it would be warm. But I was wrong. It was 40 degrees when I arrived and that was at 2pm. Now I’m stuck missing not only the crib, but the southern weather that was 67 degrees when I left the heart of the dirty.
But that’s not all, since I have been here I have counted three Negroes, and they were all in the airport. Memphis, like many other areas of the South is a heavenly place complete with Barb-Q, soul food, hustlers, pimps and more importantly, folks that look like me. Not that this is all good, but it isn’t al bad either. It just a truthful notice that when one is out of their environment, they miss those things they take for granted. Like a person who misses their girl friend or husband when they go away for a few days, or how one misses their children in the same manner. I miss the South man, especially Memphis, and my folk from my neighborhood from Castalia to South Parkway, complete with Afro’s and Gold teeth.
I must say that as a whole, we have some dumb ass and even stupid politicians representing us to the world on behalf of us citizens – more aptly referred to as plebeians. Case in point regards the recent elections in Palestine. If you have been behind a rock or in the malls or strip clubs too long, you may or may not know that Hamas won an overwhelming majority in the recent elections. Elections that our president, G. W. Bush advocated would be required before we could work in concert with the Palestinians.
Not like this was new, but we have been recanting the same things for years as if there was an equal relation between democracy and electocracy. We complained about the mismanagement that has occurred, financially under the Palestine Authority and openly hoped for a sea change. Now that we have it, we run around hollering the British are coming – excuse me, I mean Hamas has won and we don’t deal with terrorist. Specifically folks that support violence for a political gain toward self-determination (war) or complete abrogation of an historic enemy – the Zionist sate of Israel.
Hamas ain’t gone change and worse of all it should have not been a surprise, given the public opinion polls that have been conducted in the west Bank among Palestinians that have consistently hovered around 70 percent in support of Hamas. They have always been a political party and we knew of such.
What we fail to relaize is that these are individuals who have been elected. Many Hamas-backed candidates elected since December are not actual Hamas members. They just selected them as opposed to the corrupt ruling Fatah Party. But our folk up in the Choclate city are to blind to see and realize this.
Man, a nigga ought to make this nigga here a politician. The truth of the matter is if we want peace, we will have to deal with the people in power. More importantly, Hamas are the best folks to be at the table with. Not only do they have popular support, they also have the guns and the penchant to use them. We need to step our game up, cause as it stands now, we may as well be playing pussy with our words and hard-line stance, and get fucked.
FOLK HEAD OUT TO ALBQ, THIS WEEK SO I MAY BE A LITTLE LATE BUT U KNOW A NIGGA GOT BRAIN CELLS TO WASTE
What is it that Black women really want? I guess this question has been asked over the ages, and as for now, it seems that we brothers are still at a loss when it comes to an answer. Over the years, I have come to find out little myself about this question. I have dated all sorts and types of women, and it all seems to add up to this - they don’t know. On the one hand they desire to be treated like a woman and loved, but yet at the same time they desire some one that will mistreat them and basically disrespect and cheapen their woman hood. I figure sisters know when they have something good, but there still remains a small caveat of consternation.
One thing is for certain are that most women today are pessimistic and insecure when it comes to being in a stable and working relationship. Maybe it’s the television influence or maybe it is the social climate of the time. Whatever the case maybe, they seem to believe that no relationship will last, that men will cheat and that nothing from an interpersonal perspective that involves love is worth working for. It is a shame to me because I see so many people longing for a loving relationship but do not dare to search inside of themselves for the patience and resilience required for meaning commitment.
I figure trust and faithfulness are what most people lack when they burden themselves with thoughts of infidelity. Namely because they have some sort of guilt or burden over themselves that makes them desire others, even when they do not have no desire for them. I believe in being honest until the point that it hurts. It is not a good thing nor is it bad. It is a reality that the insecure cannot desire to face because it will require that they look deep and long at the mirror at themselves and dig deep into their souls. In order for a relationship to work, one must have faith, whether in a higher authority or in themselves and the choice they make throughout life. Sure, I’m certain women will desire to want what they cannot have, and that they will take for granted what they already have. Which brings us back to the question: what do women want? I still don’t know but in my heart, I have the faith to try to find and keep my soul mate, because I think that a bird in the hand is better than two in the bush. I just wonder which one I am since I desire to treat that special person like I want my mother to be treated. My advice is do the dirt fella’s it more attractive to them and because the more pain and heart ache you cause them, the more they will want to be by your side. My fault in the long run and I guess as a result I may never find love because I can’t get down like that. And women ask me why I think it is best to Bone and dis-own. I say I can stop, if I found one that wanted me and just me - period.
There has been a new buzz word sprayed around by media and political pundits in the post September 11 era – Neoconservative. The new conservatives (neocons for short) have been able to change dramatically the landscape of American Foreign Policy. From a philosophical perspective, this wing of GOP formalist believes that all US foreign policy should be engineered so that America is placed in the situated to reconstruct the world to serve its own interests.
The reticular formation of the neocons is varied and ranges to include folks the like Rupert Murdoch, who owns and runs the Fox media empire. Mainly occupying the Department of Defense under the current administration, they also include members of think tanks like the Heritage foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, financial institutions like the Bradley foundation and news commentators. My concern regards the hawkish manner I which these individuals place their beliefs on others without scrutiny.
Neocons believe that policies that are preemptive and unilateral are best for the American populous. This has been more than apparent with the Iraqi war. Now this group of zealots is moving toward another thorny position – privatization of US nuclear facilities. Touted as being one of the largest defense contractors in the United States, the Carlyle group is going all out to implement plans that will allow the current administration to make it easy for private contractors to run US nuclear facilities. Its Directors include Frank Carlucci, former Reagan Secretary of Defense and James Baker, former Bush Secretary of State. With the assistance of the Defense Departments top brass, the Carlyle Group will accept a management contract to run the nuclear weapons laboratories at Berkeley, Livermore and Los Alamos. The contract is supposed to be transferred in one year to the University of Texas, where the military and the Carlyle Group will have control.
The Carlyle group is already making big sums of loot from the India-Pakistan conflict, due to its connection with the companies (aerospace giant BAE Systems North America) and the CIA which supply both countries. I’m troubled by any effort to place nuclear weapons in the hands of private citizens. Aren’t you?
I often feel bad as a representation of what I feel is a dying breed - real community based and responsible men of African descent. Too often we forget of how what we do and suggest can impact others around us, even those whom we do not know or come in contact with. It used to be a time when hard work and responsibility were rewarded with personal humility for its own sake. Now, it appears as if such morals are a thing of the past. It is fashionable now to use money as the bridging gap to success and importance. Now we all need money and know of its value, but does a stack of processed and dyed tree-pulp actually define ones manhood? That’s the query I am attempting to answer as I pen this essay.
I am troubled that we have reduced ourselves in terms of defining manhood as a function of wealth. Is one who robs and jack cars and accumulates wealth considered to be a man? Is an athlete, actor or musician, who spends most of the time on the road, in clubs, cheating on their significant others a man? Is one a man if he maintains his family yet keeps secrets from his wife or woman regarding their bisexual tendencies a man? Is one a man if he selects not to take a job because he feels his value is worth more, when he has no job to begin with? Or is the man who claims that he is in a committed relationship but looks for excuses to back out of a marriage - Omar Tyree for example.
It frightening in a sense, for it makes one think that a person can be emasculated if they lose their material wealth. I was raised to believe that a man was never judged by his greed, avarice or wealth, but more so by personal integrity and work ethic. I saw we all take a part in redefining our manhood and I admit I need to start with myself. No im not like any of the examples I cited, but I do have baggage and things I need to work on. I can always be a better father and a better partner to my significant other and I have to remember that, while at the same time not falling for defining my manhood by what I have as opposed to what I can create with my mind and my work ethic on behalf of my family and community.
I was asked by a publishing friend of mine to write a piece on sexual agreements. Many of us are involved in relationships and do not actually understand what it is about relationships that make them work. The first and most important thing is an attribute of ones character and integrity – honesty. Honesty goes along way with regard to trust and respect. Honest must be the ground work of all relationships especially as it deals with sex.
So I ask the question, how many of us have sexual agreements with our partners. I am not talking about agreeing to conduct the act, but agreeing on what intimacy and sex is for both parties in a relationship. For starters, it is important for people to communicate their expectations and be truthful from the start, if you know your partner has a high sex drive, and then it is not appropriate to change in mid-stream when you knew this up front. In addition, it is important to tell your partner about any discretions or infidelity that you may or may have been involved with so that you can grow and share a mutual passion together. Finding out after the fact by another party can only make it worse. True if you are honest and tell your partner, they may leave but it is something that will still gather respect via telling the truth.
It is essential that you talk about such issues, for it is more important to inform your partner if you truly love them of your actions in particular in this age if HIV. More importantly is indicating if you used protection or not. These are just small ways to show how you care about your mate, for loving and being in q relationship is a growth process that involves give and take and compromise, communication and understanding on both people’s behalf.
Another essential part of a sexual agreement is being knowledgeable of your partners sexual fantasies. If one doesn’t know their partners sexual fantasies or worse don’t have any fantasies about their partner, then they may fall short of keeping their sex lives fresh and it may lead to infidelity. The bottom line is that we need to have strong sexual agreements in our relationship if we do not want our partners to stray and/or obviate a good, working health and growing relationship between two people.
From the laymen’s perspective, it is a rather thorny position to impose a democratic structure on a sovereign state upon a military invasion. Thus the question is proffered, how can one exist in a democratic state when it is thrust upon them without the benefit of self determination? One such example of this, outside of holding an election where people are unaware of the candidates, or where people from other countries can cast votes without knowing or hearing any political positions of those running for office, regards some of the changes that have been instituted by the U.S. government without the purview of the Iraqi population. The Former American Administrator of the Iraqi Coalition ProvisionalAuthority updated law makes saving seeds planting, practiced byThe majority of Iraqi farmers to now are illegal. Based on the current provision of the law as documented in the Coalition ProvisionalAuthority Order 81, Iraqi farmers are allowed only to plant seeds obtained from licensed and authorized U.S. distributors. The order, called the “Patent, Industrial design, undisclosed information, integrated circuits and plant variety law has some strange implications for a purported democratic state. On the outside, it looks as if the only benefits being delivered are for U.S and Western multinational companies like Halliburton and seed making giants Archer Daniel Midland and Monsanto Company. The Monsanto company by the way, just reported that it will be spending $1.4 billion to buy a California company called Seminis Inc. that will take its molecular breeding technology to the next level, making the company the largest seed distributor in the world. There will not be a democracy in Iraq if people are not allowed the right to self determination, instead, there will either be a plutocracy - The corruption of democracy designed to benefit politicians, corporations and the media - or worse, civil war
Torrance Stephens is the Author of the novel A Matter of Attention and two books of short stories called Rockstar, Stud, Gigolo and Fast and Gamin’, available at amazon.com and bbotw.com.
How many of yawl bitches – excuse me, women, got sugar daddies? I figure it is a popular term now days seeing the basic groupie mentality that some women seem to show and enjoy. First, I must query, what is a sugar daddy. Is their an age limit or is it just a basic relationship between a man and a woman where the woman is not really interested in the man but more so his money? I do not know, but a woman told me that she was looking for one and I indicated to here that I was more of a sour poppa. What I do know is that they get no pussy and they pay for everything. My niggers in Three –six Mafia say they sleep on the floor and the dog sleep in the bed. I guess a sugar daddy is what we used to call a steak daddy.
I think they have been around a long time, but they have become more popular today given the influence of pop culture and the keen interest women place on the unreal desire to be with an actor, musician or professional athlete. I would figure that these folks would make the best sugar daddies since they have all the loot. But it is the opposite, with their name and status; they can get a woman to suck their dick in a limousine and move on to the next without a concern for the woman. Maybe that’s it, maybe sugar daddies don’t date women – they date hoes that the aforementioned folks disregard at the drop of a hat like a cheap trick.
Sugar daddies are also dumb. And their supposedly women tell them this. So I guess we men if the shoe fits, deserve what we get thinking love is real. But the truth, as I stated earlier is that they women likely never loved or were capable of love in the first place. Any woman who would love u would not intentionally talk and say negative things about their man or treat them like a meal ticket. The truth is that a woman with a sugar daddy does not see the man but more so the wallet and their earning potential. Sugar Daddies may also be annoying to them and they may be feeling as if without you they can’t make it. So let this be a lesson to the wise, if a woman insults you, only calls to ask for something when she needs you, makes you sleep on the floor, and idolizes rappers, professional athletes and folks they see on television, they are likely a ho or a trick. So buyer beware.
We all know about the power of lobbyist in Washington, DC. The most powerful or one of the most powerful lobbying groups is the pharmaceutical, industry. It is apparent that the ambition of both the FDA and the pharmaceutical industry is to get that loot. I first recognized this with the creation of disorders by the industry just to sale drugs. Most scientists would agree that Attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (AD/HD), a disorder characterized by inappropriate levels of inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity, does not exist and did not exist before the pharmaceutical giants wanted to market drugs to deal with this made-up disorder.
Since then, we have seen a rapid change in the FDA and its protocols in an effort to please these drug makers. Now the industry has hired former U.S. Congressman Billy Tauzin (R-La) to be president of the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. He was a 13 term congressman and the former chair of the Energy and Commerce committee. It is the oldest legislative standing committee in the U.S. House of Representatives and takes the lead on matters relating to the promotion of commerce and to the public’s health as well as other issues.
My concern is that 20% of FDA scientist have reported being forced to approve drugs they were unsure about with an additional third being unconfident in the FDA to assure the public safety regarding drugs being placed on the open market. With the apprehension and trepidation associated with Celebrex, Viox, and Naproxene, one can see why the scientist feels this way. Even the drugs used to treat the made up disorders mentioned above are problematic, often resulting in condition like narrow angle glaucoma. Add to this the new approach of direct marketing via television, we are creating an environment were drugs are going to be releassed before they are proven safe.
Then there is RU486, the drug that is supposed to trigger abortions within 48 hours of conception. It was released under an expedited approval system, a system that is supposed to be only employed with life saving drugs.
The FDA is not protecting the public safety of the American citizen but rather making profits for the pharmaceutical industry. The war on drugs should be redirected toward the FDA for they are the biggest drug dealers I am aware of. They may be using the DEA to get rid of the competition because from this individual’s purview, they should be the federal drug cartel, a title more accurate than the Federal Drug Administration.
Over the past few weeks, I was reminded of how often we neglect the past. I was reminded of this from the celebrations and specials and television segments specifically designed to target our attention on the recanting of the Jewish Holocaust. The specials were touching and diversified. Some were on individual survivors and notorious death camps while others were human, ranging from one area teacher’s vow to not let her students forget of this terrible time on our history to personal memories of the infamous hardship families faced in their effort to escape the deadly vise of Hitler’s evil. I was glad to see the effort the major media had made to remind us of this problematic period in our history. Yet at the same time, I was heart torn for I had never seen such recanting of the period of slavery and its aftermath in a similar vein.We often forget or worse, are unaware of how the Portuguese led the West to Africa and introduced to the world the term Negro. The term was used because according to Europeans, the most arresting characteristics of the people of Africa were our skin color. For it was during this moment on the globe when the people with the least amount of skin pigmentation came into contact with those with the most.
The impact of Europeans on Africans can best be reflected in the relationship of one culture dominating or superseding another. In slavery, the views, beliefs and practices of Europeans were imposed on individuals of African origin. As a result, through the slave experience, Africans developed a disorientated self-image based on the standards set and described by Europeans. I hope we never forget or desire to forget about this period, and if the mainstream media want to forget, then let us change the channel.
Man, I miss the crib. It’s just something about Memphis and the South I love. Maybe its because right now I’m in Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico at the Tamaya Hyatt Resort and Spa. It is a nice place with Casino’s, a golf course and a luscious spa, but it is cold here man, real cold. I made the mistake of not checking the weather channel and came up in this camp thinking it’s the desert, that it had Mexico in its name and that it would be warm. But I was wrong. It was 40 degrees when I arrived and that was at 2pm. Now I’m stuck missing not only the crib, but the southern weather that was 67 degrees when I left the heart of the dirty.
