Tuesday, November 24, 2015

America's Job (according to the GOP)



Gary McCoy



Bianca Marie - Oh Gary, you love to go where others don't dare tread.   ;)   Love it. Keep up the great work! My best to the family!

Gary McCoy - Thanks, Bianca! Obama's statement was a hanging curveball for a cartoonists. And all our best to you and Gage and the rest!

Bianca Marie - Very true. That and his Freudian slip again about being Muslim. wink emoticon

Gary McCoy - Right. And that's happened more than once.

Bianca Marie - Yuppers, and the most recent was at the G20 Summit in Antalya, Turkey.

Muhammad Rasheed - Looks like the terrorists are being contained to ME...


Gary McCoy - While to others, not so much...


Muhammad Rasheed - That's Paris. That's out of our POTUS' jurisdiction. They have their own president. Remember your cartoon is showing Uncle Sam.

Muhammad Rasheed - Here's another one of OURS that was contained:


Gary McCoy - More "containment" (btw, the president wasn't referring to containment in  America")...  


Gary McCoy - His "jurisdiction" is anything and anywhere, to keep American citizens safe. He's not doing such a hot job at that.

Muhammad Rasheed - 1.) Your cartoon's message is that terrorist outbreaks are all over the USA, but he claims to contain them.

2.) I posted two examples of terror being contained in the US before harm was done.

3.) You point out terror in completely different countries, and claim that our POTUS should've been there to stop it.

Muhammad Rasheed - You're weird, Gary. lol

Gary McCoy - Muhammad, you know that cartoons are not always to be taken literally. It's as much a "what could come, given the president's outlook...".

Gary McCoy - And likewise,   :)

Muhammad Rasheed - *amused that you'd think I'd trust your judgment regarding what the POTUS' outlook is*

Muhammad Rasheed - I love it when you tag me in a post. It means I'm doin' something right.  :D

Muhammad Rasheed - I love you, too, Gary. lol

Sunday, November 22, 2015

Defending the Race


Clifton HatchettTurns out people get angry when you say white Americans are terrorists, too

Muhammad Rasheed - Of course they do. They believe the human drama is all about 'whites vs non-whites,' so of course THEY aren't the terrorists. That would be crazy talk. White people are the Good Guys of history! Even when they make "mistakes" as they call them, just wait a little while and then pour some Liquid Paper™ on it.

See?! Good as NEW!

Clifton Hatchett - Collectively delusional is what you just described, and apparently many in that lot were fans of of Bob Ross, with their ''happy little accidents.'' Like so what if a few million Black and Brown People die.

Lyle DeRoulet - Stop reading these bullshit race baiting head lines. You guy's don't talk to whites about shit, you post shit and read shit that was written to make you think that.

Muhammad Rasheed - So that guy DIDN'T walk up into that church and kill a bunch of blacks because he wanted the Turner Diaries to come true?

Muhammad Rasheed - Thank God a white dude showed up to tell us the truth! We almost went astray using our own brains!

Muhammad Rasheed - Thanks, massa! [salute]

Lyle DeRoulet - I never said he didn't but thanks, I suppose you stole everyone's shoes afterwards too, because blacks don't like talking about that. See what I did..

Lyle DeRoulet - Don't take me wrong this guy should have died that day. All I'm saying is think about how many whites you do speak to about these issues and you'll know the truth. You saying this is just the same saying all of you steal do drugs and don't work. Social media is a bad thing in many ways. .

Muhammad Rasheed - lol The difference is that I don't believe all whites are terrorists. I don't know any blacks who do think that.

But I DO know plenty of Christian whites who believe blacks should never be president because they are black, and who believe Muslims should never be president because they are Muslims.

Muhammad Rasheed - I don't want to take you wrong, Lyle. Feel free to explain your point of view further to make sure we are on the same page.

Lyle DeRoulet - True and I could say the same.

Muhammad Rasheed - About what?

Lyle DeRoulet - About the same issues blacks are just as racist. You did notice you showed your true color right off the bat. But I'm the bad guy.

Muhammad Rasheed - Whites have spent the last several centuries working hard to make sure the idea of White Supremacy is indoctrinated into everyone; the belief that whites are the only real 'persons' in society. We have to come to whites in order for new ideas to be legitimate, and legally entered into popular culture. This is the "true color" of the society I live in. Your attempt to make it seem as if non-whites have equal power and threaten White Supremacy is only in your head.

Muhammad Rasheed - To be clear, those two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan because the Japanese were the only true threat to the Global European White Supremacist Domination of the world in the 20th century. They were the only non-whites who actively tried to compete. The bombs were dropped to let the non-whites of the world know what the Euro-Ethnic was willing to do to maintain his economic-political dominance. He was NOT willing to share the world stage.

Muhammad Rasheed - That is the "true color" of the world.

Clifton Hatchett - Hiroshima and Nagasaki are the literal definition of a terrorist attack.

Lyle DeRoulet - So let me ask, why do you think I'm white?

Muhammad Rasheed - "Try to compete with us and we will melt your children into pools of radioactive goo. WHITE POWER!!!!"

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "So let me ask, why do you think I'm white?"

1.) Because of the nature of your responses in this thread

2.) Because of how you look in your profile photo

Lyle DeRoulet - See you point what you think is about race and not control. Do you think when blacks kill blacks it's about race getting rid of your competitors?

Lyle DeRoulet - Maybe you should try harder be forvyou judge. Clifton Hatchett go through my family pics and tell me what i am.

Muhammad Rasheed - The only blacks that kill blacks are the criminal element in poor neighborhoods. That same element among whites kills whites in poor white neighborhoods for the same reasons, and in similar numbers. That's a strawman argument.

Lyle DeRoulet - Oh so the rich or governments can't be criminal elements..

Muhammad Rasheed - The bigger issue is when the whites with the political power order the deaths of non-whites to further their ideological agenda of White Supremacy.

Lyle DeRoulet - Are you sure it's all about race of money? I know all you points.

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "Oh so the rich or governments can't be criminal elements.."

Don't be silly. You tried to derail the topic into pretending that poor black criminals killing poor people is the 'real' issue, and I took the time to address it.

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "Are you sure it's all about race of money? I know all you points."

It's all about a monopoly of power by the wealthiest Euro-Ethnic Groups. It's all about "whites versus nonwhites" by the European cultures waging war on everyone else.

They want to exploit everyone else for their own selfishness while pretending they are the good guys. That's what it is all about.

Muhammad Rasheed - That is the nature of the "race baiting," by the way. Somehow you think that the exploited classes complaining is where the race baiting starts. lol

It's not. It starts where the assholes going around attacking everyone else because they feel that they are the master race is where the race baiting began.

Lyle DeRoulet - Well since I can't post quickly enough on my phone against 2 people who attack me because of my skin and not my ideals this doesn't matter. Even if I make points you can't hear me, you just want to post and attack. Well have fun.

Muhammad Rasheed - "Attack you?"

Muhammad Rasheed - You're the one that saw the mug shot of your boy up there and showed up on your white horse to defend him, yes? wtf?

Clifton Hatchett - lollollol....he bailed.

Lyle DeRoulet - I wasn't attacking I just tire of that same lame posts from everyone on here.

Muhammad Rasheed - When is the quality of your own posts going to go up?

Muhammad Rasheed - Clifton, where do you find these people?

Lyle DeRoulet - I give a shit about him, it's the head line.

Clifton Hatchett - @Lyle...your only response can't be... ''I'm tired of this shit,'' because that's basically what your saying. I've never attacked you personally, so don't act like I have. @Muhammad....I'm a uniter not a divider...lol... It's a public page.

Muhammad Rasheed - It was rhetorical. lol

Clifton Hatchett - Lyle, you don't think that, and it's not true. I talk to White People exactly like this, to be clear, I talk to everyone the same. I attended Maury HS, just Google it, and it's in Ghent here in Norfolk, Google that too, and look at my friend list...lollollol... You really think I don't know any of them personally...you're crazy if you think that... Before you give yourself a fit, go and talk to racist you know personally, in your family, amongst your friends, and have an honest discussion, then tell me about it. Getting angry without cause helps no one.

Tony Brown - He can't be a terrorist, he has a "mental illness".

Clifton Hatchett - And I want you to know the difference Lyle.



Lyle DeRoulet - Don't take me wrong we all know racism is alive and well, to be honest I don't like arguing about nonsense post like these but damn that's all that's in my feed anymore. Half the people I friended for bad ass art only post accusational hate anymore..

Clifton Hatchett - We have friends and family being abused, beaten, and killed by people who are supposed to serve and protect, and there are people in elected positions and authoritative roles under investigation for KKK affiliation, you want everyone to ignore it, that's crazy.

Lyle DeRoulet - No but read this post it has nothing to do with what you have beef with.

Clifton Hatchett - Anonymous post a list with thousands of KKK(White People) names and the positions they hold, and mainstream media doesn't report it. Anonymous declares war on Isis(bad brown people) and it's all over the news. Somebody has to speak up.

Clifton Hatchett - ''Aversive Racism'' is a term pushed by two behavioral scientist, Samuel L Gaertner, and John F, Dovidio, you might find it to be interesting and it might provide insight into the topic and your position.

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "Clifton Hatchett go through my family pics and tell me what i am."




Muhammad Rasheed - Looks very Euro to me, but I'm not exactly a connoisseur...

Lyle DeRoulet - My Halloween is awesome.

Muhammad Rasheed - That's very subjective. lol

Lyle DeRoulet - It's Halloween and that's to far.

Clifton Hatchett - @Lyle...WTF is that shit? Explain yourself.

Muhammad Rasheed - Calling this convo "race baiting" is too far to me, so I guess we're even.

Lyle DeRoulet - I made that lol. I was going to do that to a furry costume but made that instead lol.

Muhammad Rasheed - I thought he was going to say, "I don't have to explain myself to you [racial slurs]!!!"

I'll admit to a certain amount of disappointment. hahaha

Clifton Hatchett - WTF is THAT?

Lyle DeRoulet - I told you that's not me, I don't like the head line and that is race baiting. Clifton it's a Brony costume, there are people who are our age who get all crazy for my little pony.

Clifton Hatchett -




Clifton Hatchett - I have found this to very entertaining. Good Day Gentlemen.

Clifton Hatchett - wait,wait,wait,......WTF is that...lollollol...I can't stop laughing.

Clifton Hatchett - Now I'm gone. Be well.

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "I told you that's not me..."




Clifton Hatchett - Seriously...I try to leave, but this is just too much...lollollol....

Lyle DeRoulet - What ever lol later people's..

Muhammad Rasheed - Lyle DeRoulet wrote: "...I don't like the head line and that is race baiting."

You don't like the idea of your demographic being the bad guy of the story, and it makes you twitch with cognitive dissonance. That's all. The "race baiting" label is 100% bullshit.

Lyle DeRoulet - No it makes me feel like you. Being accused for my skin.

Clifton Hatchett -




Muhammad Rasheed - I have never accused a white person anything "because of their skin." That's you all's invention. No.

I accuse you of attacking the world and imposing your White Supremacist Domination on it so you can exploit everyone. "Race" is the banner the Euro attacker flew when he did it.

Lyle DeRoulet - Please reread what you just posted.

Muhammad Rasheed - That's an accusation of ACTIONS, not "skin color."

Muhammad Rasheed - Europeans began their global attack under the banner of Christianity, but that didn't last long since the victims could just convert their way out of the exploited class. So they invented White Supremacy as a political force.

Lyle DeRoulet - Well I guess I'll wait for my race to dominate so I one day can see the results. Because it's never helped me.

Muhammad Rasheed  - There's nothing wrong with you being 'white.' A member of the European ethnic groups. Celebrate that all you wish, with my blessing.

But there is PLENTY wrong with believing in that "White is Right! White people versus the world!" shit. THAT'S the part I reject as the world's greatest evil.

Lyle DeRoulet - It is wrong, supremacy over anyone isn't right.

Muhammad Rasheed - Thanks. NOW we can start to agree.

Unless you ruin it.

Lyle DeRoulet - Lol I'm tired of bad headline flooding my feed is all. I like clifton and other but it's all people of color post anymore it seems.

Muhammad Rasheed - Cell phone cameras giving the "man in the street" the instant ability to record historical racist wrongs makes this a new era in speaking up for yourself.

Naturally I can understand why the idea of the exploited class speaking up for themselves, and becoming better able to advocate, would irritate you. You probably hate it and want everyone to just stop talking about it, amIright?

Lyle DeRoulet - No just lines like in this headline bother me.

Muhammad Rasheed - I have a few questions for YOU, Lyle:

What exactly makes the status post "nonsense?" Why do you consider it to be "race baiting" exactly?

Do you get mad when you hear/read "white Americans are terrorists, too?"

Clifton Hatchett - So the headlines bother you more than the actual atrocities being committed Lyle? Do you hear yourself?

Clifton Hatchett - Inquiring minds want to know?

Muhammad Rasheed - Oh, look! More White Terrorists!

Race War Plot Leads to Five Arrests on Federal, State Charges

Muhammad Rasheed - Good thing we had the article in the status post provide the facts of the matter so we wouldn't be blindsided by even more of these folk's bullshit! *whew!*

Magick, Monsters & Assassination!


M. Rasheed's Two Graphic Novel Series:

Monsters 101, the adventures of Pugroff & Mort!
Books 1-10, 152 pages each
b&w interiors

Tales of Sinanju: The Destroyer (based on characters created by Warren Murphy & Richard Sapir)
Books 1-8 (of 10), 66 pages each
b&w interiors

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Racism or Its Rejection?



Gerald Welch - Isn't this racism???


Victor Donald Smith - I think not reproducing is un-racism.

Jason Bodin - Yes

Rick Drew - More like no guy would have her.

Scott Rocky - I'm glad she did not have children, because it would be another generation of this lunacy.

James Mullaney - Rick is right. She's using the Pee-Wee excuse. 


Dale Chrystof - what a self-loathing idiot

Paul Dunn - I feel no guilt, but seriously think these people need professional mental health help.

Muhammad Rasheed - I completely disagree with her Dolezal comments. I think the former NAACP cell prez was just a con-artist.

I don't see why I should consider her to be a racist. All she's saying is that when she honestly confronted the truth of the privilege born from a Eurocentric, White Supremacy Dominance, it made her repel from the horror of it. She wants to reject the political social contract of "Whiteness," not reject her biological 'whiteness' as a member of the European ethnic groups. The former is raw evil, while the latter is her very human natural state that no one rational wants to deny her.

Gerald Welch - I think she is racist because she doesn't understand that this is a cultural issue, not a racial issue.
It's like she thinks her kids will get the white disease or something.

Gerald Welch - Totally agree with you concerning Dolezal. Wow.

Muhammad Rasheed - It is a cultural issue. Global domination based on race, was a cultural trait birthed out of Euro-cultures united for the 'ideal' of White Supremacy. That's the part she's recoiling in horror from.

Gerald Welch - But does she think that merely having kids will contribute to the problem? If so, she is providing a genetic excuse for bad behavior which, again, is racist.

Muhammad Rasheed - This extreme stance is just her initial cognitive dissonance emotional reaction. I'm sure it will level off.

She would be racist if she was denying someone basic rights of some kind because of their race. I can't say that she is doing that.

Muhammad Rasheed - Your attempt to treat her absolutely harmless, horrified, visceral reaction to evil as if it is in every way as bad as the evil itself, is interesting to Note though.

Gerald Welch - Racism doesn't have to do something bad, just think of less or more of one race BECAUSE of the race. In this case, that white automatically means evil, regardless of upbringing.
My point is that if she believes that white equals evil, she does not understand.

Muhammad Rasheed - lol That's not the impression I get from her. This is a classic case of cognitive dissonance, which by necessity, will not begin with a rational outburst.

Muhammad Rasheed - She's feeling an intense shame and horror based on ACTIONS. Those same actions built up a certain amount of societal privilege for certain demographics who didn't even have anything to do with the most direct of those actions. That's specifically the part she's recoiling from.

Gerald Welch - Wonder what she thinks of Bronies...

Muhammad Rasheed - You should FB Friend her and ask.

Randolph John Carter - Someone has a poor understanding of genetics.

Korac MacArthur - she's free to marry a black man or whoever she wants if it makes her happy. I think she has other issues.

Howard McGill - She could always marry an African-American like Obamas mother did and then her children could be half White like OBAMA IS

Muhammad Rasheed - @Howard... That won't work. America has always had that "One-Drop Rule," remember? Traditionally you would be ostracized if it came out you had any amount of African in you as part of the breeding of new generations of slaves by the owners themselves phase. Now that a self-identifying Black American has made it to the highest office in the land, magically his white side is conspicuously being over-emphasized. Unusually so considering the history.

Dan Bennett - I haven't seen anyone characterize Obama as white. I did hear one talk show host who called him "50 Percent", though.

Muhammad Rasheed - That's exactly the part. There's a weird over-emphasis on his 'white side,' and his bi-racial-ness for no other reason than because he's the POTUS. In any other circumstance it would be the black part that is emphasized, per the "One-Drop Rule."

Gerald Welch - Not familiar about the One Drop Rule, but if it is what I think it is, we would all be black.

Muhammad Rasheed - lol True. But racism has never been known for being rational.

Nick Carroll - It's white guilt. I haven't read the article but she is likely from the regressive left.

Shane Black - Thankfully, since I've only seen two individuals out of 318 million who have gotten any traction espousing this attitude, I don't think it's a big problem, except to the mentally ill people who suffer from it. Don't know why it's a news story.

Muhammad Rasheed - lol In THIS particular case, I think the rag is showcasing it just to point out how wacko the 'regressive left' are, Shane.

Michael Hodges - I agree with her exercising her choice to not reproduce. If she feels her children would be "white" and this causes her to recoil from a perceived wrongness inherent race and she not only doesn't want to contribute to that perceived wrong but feels her children would automatically be instituted into "white-think" with NO sense of individual social equality or justice, simply ignorant of a privilege they can't themselves perceive and thus contributive to a giant, bad situation -- then she made the right choice by not reproducing.

Zodicus Zu'ul - have you seen this: Why I Agree With Taye Diggs: When We Call Biracial Kids ‘Black,’ We Disrespect Their ‘White’ Side

Muhammad Rasheed - THEROOT article: "I’ve always wondered why we black Americans accepted that one-drop rule created by white Americans during chattel slavery."

Really? Why did we accept ANYTHING during the era of chattel slavery? This is a question?

Muhammad Rasheed - I don't have an issue with Diggs' argument. My issue is with whites who lived & breathed the One-Drop Rule but all of a sudden reversed it starting at the '08 presidential elections.

Zodicus Zu'ul - i get you, i think. like saying no matter how far back the blood goes, one drop of Black and you're Black, at least until it's convenient and they need to find something positive to spin so they feel better about having positive feelings about someone not just like them. am i close?

Muhammad Rasheed - The racist emphasizes one side over the other in a bi-racial citizen depending on which slant best fits his/her White Supremacist narrative.

Normally they mention the black side to point out the individual is 'tainted.' For the POTUS they mention (continuously) his 'half-white' natural as a means to justify how he's smart, capable, and managed to win two brilliant presidential campaigns.

Sunday, November 8, 2015

"So Says The Mob!"



Muhammad Rasheed - An argumentum ad populum (Latin for "appeal to the people") is a fallacious argument that concludes that a proposition is true because many or most people believe it: "If many believe so, it is so."

It is logically fallacious because the mere fact that a belief is widely held is not necessarily a guarantee that the belief is correct; if the belief of any individual can be wrong, then the belief held by multiple persons can also be wrong. The argument that because 75% of people polled think the answer is A implies that the answer is A fails, because, if opinion did determine truth, then there would be no way to deal with the discrepancy between the 75% of the sample population that believe the answer is A and 25% who are of the opinion that the answer is not A. However small a percentage of those polled give an answer other than A, this discrepancy by definition disproves any guarantee of the correctness of the majority. In addition, this would be true even if the answer given by those polled were unanimous, as the sample size may be insufficient, or some fact may be unknown to those polled that, if known, would result in a different distribution of answers.
This fallacy is similar in structure to certain other fallacies that involve a confusion between the justification of a belief and its widespread acceptance by a given group of people. When an argument uses the appeal to the beliefs of a group of supposed experts, it takes on the form of an appeal to authority; if the appeal is to the beliefs of a group of respected elders or the members of one's community over a long period of time, then it takes on the form of an appeal to tradition.

One who commits this fallacy may assume that individuals commonly analyze and edit their beliefs and behaviors. This is often not the case.

Stephen Aquino Sales - Nose bleed! Profound words Muhammad, very well said   :)

Muhammad Rasheed - This is Wiki!

Stephen Aquino Sales - Wow! lol

Ali Rashada - What you describe is the difference between being right (everyone agrees with you) and being correct ( what you say is true and provable)

Muhammad Rasheed - This post is describing a logical fallacy, called the "argumentum ad populum," in which a debater will erroneously state that their position is the correct one simply because a lot of people agree with it. Being "right" and being "correct" are synonymous, being items that can be backed up (proven) with measurable facts, unlike demonstrations of this spotlighted fallacy.

Metrics of the Good Teacher


Muhammad Rasheed - "Raj Chetty, a public economist who teaches at Harvard, took part in two studies that have made headlines because they sought to quantify the value of good teachers. One released in 2012, conducted with economists at Harvard and Columbia, tracked one million students in a large urban school district over 20 years and calculated that replacing an average teacher with an excellent one would raise a single classroom's lifetime earnings by about $1.4 million. Good teachers who lifted standardized test scores also had students less likely to become teenage parents and more likely to attend a good college, among other positive results.

"He is already immersed in his next project, which explores what factors allow children to move up the economic ladder, relative to their parents."


Devin Murphy - Are we defining "good teachers" as "teachers who raise standardized test performance"?

Muhammad Rasheed - It sounds more like "teachers who raise a single classroom's lifetime earnings by about $1.4 million, had students less likely to become teenage parents, students more likely to attend a good college, among other positive results, with 'raising standardized test performances' as an interesting side effect of the above."

Fred Pomeroy - I don't see this as anything new. A good teacher will make the students want to learn more. An interested student will be less likely to drop out and more likely to get better grades and thus graduate. They have been saying for decades that high school and college graduates earn more than dropouts. $1.4 million per classroom per lifetime isn't all that much. With only twenty students that is only $70,000 per career. If someone works for 35 years that is only two thousand per year. I heard the number was near half a million per person half a century ago for the difference between a dropout's lifetime earnings and that of a college graduate.

If he wanted to make the case for hiring a good teacher, he should compare the difference in salary needed to hire a good teacher compared to the tax revenue generated by increased earnings of the more highly educated students.

Muhammad Rasheed - It was very new at the time the study came out, hence the controversy. People objected at the idea of being able to objectively measurable what makes a "good teacher." Being able to accurately predict whether a given classroom will have their earnings increase $1.5 million or not based on the track record of their instructor's performance is a good thing, despite the strawman argument of whether that amount is "all that much" or not (compared to what?).

I presume the objectors to the findings preferred to allow the idea of whether someone was a 'good' teacher or not continue to be in the realm of subjective opinion, so they could continue to bs their supervisors during Annual Appraisal time. Dispassionate & objective data that definitively proved they were effin' up all year, to the detriment of our children, would be their worst nightmare. #shitBirdsHateAccountabilityItTurnsOut

Muhammad Rasheed - I suppose it's also possible that many of them reacted negatively to the findings because they preferred to believe that whether people did well in life had everything to do with race/genetics. Consequently the very idea that anyone could do well in life if artificial, exploitation-based obstacles were removed, caused stinging cognitive dissonance waves to ripple through their selfish, hoarding, sociopathic cortex.

Old Dunbar High – Fact versus Popular Fictions




Muhammad Rasheed -  "When the U. S. Supreme Court declared in 1954 that separate schools were inherently inferior, within walking distance of that same Court was an all-black public school whose performance had equaled or surpassed that of white schools in the District of Columbia for more than 80 years.” ~Thomas Sowell, Black Education: Achievements, Myths, and Tragedies

Jeremy Travis - Source. Point? Not challenging you or being facetious, just curious.

Al Bush - Replicate. If one can another can.

Muhammad Rasheed - Paul Laurence Dunbar High School is a public secondary school located in Washington, D.C., United States. Founded as an educational mission at the Fifteenth Street Presbyterian Church, Dunbar was America's first public high school for black students. It was known for its excellent academics, enough so that some black parents moved to Washington specifically so their children could attend it. It also boasted a remarkably high number of graduates who went on to higher education, and a generally successful student body.

An unusual number of teachers and principals held Ph.D. degrees, including Carter G. Woodson, father of Black history Month and the second African American to earn a Phd. from Harvard (after W. E. B. Du Bois). This was the result of the entrenched white supremacy that pervaded the nation's professions and served to exclude the majority of African-American women and men from faculty positions at predominantly white institutions of higher learning. As a consequence, however, Dunbar High School was considered the nation's best high school for African Americans during the first half of the 20th century. It helped make Washington, DC, an educational and cultural capital.

Muhammad Rasheed - Following desegregation and demolition of the original facility, the school's prestige dropped notably. Through the years, Dunbar High School continued to perform below the standards and was among a list of failing schools identified for turnaround or closure.

Muhammad Rasheed - The point of the status post was that the African American community as a whole made more and greater progress in the pre-Civil Rights Era than afterwards. The policies created under the post Civil Rights Act "civil rights vision" have been reactionary and detrimental to our growth.

Muhammad Rasheed - The once great Dunbar High was yet another casualty of short-sighted and wrong thinking during the integration age.

Al Bush - Annette Johnson today's history lesson. MR--Annette is a local activist, writer and all around delight. She's always posting positive AA history for the good of all. Hat tip to you sir.

Jeremy Travis - Muhammad, if not the Civil Rights movement, what then should have been the course of action taken by disenfranchised Blacks of the time?

Al Bush - The counter being I suppose that the aggregate improvements were greater than the losses. I believe that was true for many years but do not know about it still. No data to cite.

Courtney Perry - Civil rights definitely helped... but the whole under performing schoool thing... thats a huge monster now

Annette Johnson - Al Bush, Thank You!

Al Bush - Thanks to M. Rasheed.

Annette Johnson – “Unless our children begin to learn together, there is little hope that our people will ever learn to live together.”  --Justice Thurgood Marshall, Milliken v. Bradley (1974)

Annette Johnson - This year marks the 60th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision that required desegregation of public schools in the United States (Brown v. Board of Education, 1954). Also: On this anniversary of the Brown decision, we recognize that school integration is still a contentious and unfinished piece of the educational social justice agenda. Recent U.S. Department of Education data (2014) remind us that disparities in the distribution of educational opportunities by race are still a vivid reality. Opportunities to learn should begin with early learning and continue throughout K-12 years in rigorous, culturally responsive learning environments for all students (Gay, 2010). Reminding ourselves of the history of desegregation, including what we have learned from the desegregation movement to this point, is worthwhile and necessary work if we are to critically examine integration as a strategy to increase access, representation, participation and full membership in high-quality and equitable learning environments, close outcomes gaps, and achieve social cohesion. Such analysis can also help us develop considerations for integration in the present.

Annette Johnson - Just my Thoughts!

Muhammad Rasheed - Jeremy Travis wrote: "Muhammad, if not the Civil Rights movement, what then should have been the course of action taken by disenfranchised Blacks of the time?"

There was a big difference between the movement/struggle that led to the Civil Rights Act being passed w/jim crow being lifted, compared to the policies written after the fact based on a faulty "civil rights vision." The latter caused our progress to stagnate and even atrophy.


Richard Sherman - The Civil Rights Act is not responsible for that, though, Muhammad, what is responsible for the atrophy, stagnation and continued oppression is the Johnson Administrations' implementation of The Great Society, which was specifically engineered and instituted as a way, in LBJ's (that miserable S.O.B.) own words, to: "Keep them N-----s voting Democrat for the next 200 years."

All the good done by the Civil Rights act was immediately reversed by Johnson's and then Nixon's efforts to control an entire segment of the nation's citizenry.

Though it would be nearly impossible to reverse the damage done by LBJ's Great Society, we CAN move past it and into the future by eliminating the idea that our pigment makes us different. Once we get by that, and stop as segment cultures to see each other as separate and therefore separated, true and truly willing integration and healing will happen as a natural course of life.

Muhammad Rasheed - Richard Sherman wrote: "The Civil Rights Act is not responsible for that, though, Muhammad..."

That's not what I said. I said there is a difference between the civil rights movement's achievement with getting the Civil Rights Act passed and removing jim crow policies compared to the fallacy laden "civil rights vision" that came LATER, which caused the current stagnation.

Moses Mullins - Gill Scott-Heron in "The New Deal" says it eloquently. 

Excerpt
'cause I believe these smiles
in three piece suits
with gracious, liberal demeanor
took our movement off of the streets
and took us to the cleaners
In other words, we let up the pressure
And that was all part of their plan

Full lyrics:
"The New Deal"
I have believed in my convictions
And have been convicted for my beliefs
Conned by the constitution
And harassed by the police.
I've been billed for the bill of rights
And been treated like I was wrong.
I have become a special amendment
For what included me all along.
Like "All men are created equal."
(No amendment needed here)
I've contributed in every field including cotton
From Sunset Strip to Washington Square.
Back during the non-violent era.
I was the only non-violent one.
As a matter of fact there was no non-violence
'cause too many rednecks had guns.
There seems to have been this pattern
That a lot of folks failed to pick up on.
But all black leaders who dared stand up
Wuz in jail, in the courtroom or gone.
Picked up indiscriminately
By the shocktroops of discrimination
To end up in jails or tied up in trails
While dirty tricks soured the nation.
I've been hoodwinked by professional hoods.
My ego has happened to me.
It'll be alright, just keep things cool!"
"And take the people off the street.
We'll settle all this at the conference table.
You just leave everything to me."
Which gets me back to my convictions
And being convicted for my belief
'cause I believe these smiles
in three piece suits
with gracious, liberal demeanor
took our movement off of the streets
and took us to the cleaners
In other words, we let up the pressure
And that was all part of their plan
And every day we allow to slip through our fingers
Is playing right into their hands

What is swept under the rug is that the Civil Rights movement did not ask for integration. They asked for desegregation. We were patted on the head and told that what we really wanted was integration.

We got it, and now our youth get a lower quality of education than they got from those poor underpaid, overworked black teachers with inferior resources who loved their students and was determined to see them on the right track..

Bakkah Rasheed-Shabazz - What was the name of that school. I remember reading about it at UofM.

Kristopher Michael Mosby - Yup, good ol' Dunbar. Although back then, Dunbar wasn't free from discrimination, either. It was simply discrimination of a different kind. You may or may have not been admitted Rasheed, the one thing in your favor, you're the right "color". My mother went to a similar public school in Baltimore.

Muhammad Rasheed - In 1899, there were four academic public high schools in Washington, D. C. – one black and three white.  In standardized tests given that year, students in the black high school averaged higher test scores than students in two of the three white high schools.  Today, More than a century later, it would be considered Utopian even to set that as a goal, much less to expect it to actually happen.  Yet what happened back in 1899 was no isolated fluke.  That same repeatedly equaled or exceeded national norms on standardized tests in the 1930s, 1940s, and early 1950s.  Back in the 1890s, it was called the M Street School and in 1916 it was renamed Dunbar High School.

When this information on Dunbar High School was first published in the 1970s, those few educators who responded at all dismissed the relevance of these findings by saying that these were “middle class” children and therefore their experience was not “relevant” to the education of low-income minority children.  Those who said this had no factual data on the incomes or occupations of the parents of these children – and the data that existed said just the opposite.  The problem, however, was not that these dismissive educators did not have evidence.  The more fundamental problem was that they saw no NEED for evidence.  According to their doctrines, children who did well on standardized tests were middle class.  These children did well on such tests, so therefore they must be middle class.

It so happens that there was evidence on the occupations of the parents of the children at this school as far back as the early 1890s.  As of academic year 1892-93, of the known occupations of these parents, there were 51 laborers, 25 messengers, 12 janitors, and ONE doctor.  That hardly seems middle class.  Over the years, a significant black middle class did develop in Washington and most of them may well have sent their children to the M Street School or to Dunbar High School, as it was later called.  But that is wholly different from saying that most of the children at that school came from middle class homes.

More detailed data on parental occupations are available for a later period, from the later 1930s through the mid 1950s.  These data reveal that there were far more children whose mothers were maids than there were whose fathers were doctors.  Mary Gibson Hundley, who taught at Dunbar for many years, wrote:

 “A large segment of the homes of the students had one or more government employees for support.  Before the 1940s these employees were messengers and clerks, with few exceptions.”

It is possible, of course, to redefine “middle class” in relative terms for the black community as it existed at that time, but such verbal dexterity serves only to salvage words at the expense of reality.  The parents of Dunbar students may or may not have been a random sample of the black parents of their time, either occupationally or in terms for their aspirations for their children, but neither were most of them people with professional careers or levels of income that would be considered middle class by the standards of American society as a whole.  Intellectual or academic achievements for blacks, as for everyone else, no doubt have preconditions but the crucial question is whether these are economic preconditions, as so widely asserted – and so widely assumed to be insuperable barriers to good education for minority children from low-income families.

A related stereotype is that the children who went to Dunbar High School were the light-skinned descendants of the black elite that derived from miscegenation during the era of slavery.  Here again, the facts have been readily available – and widely ignored.  Photographs on old yearbooks from the era of Dunbar’s academic success show no such preponderance of light-skinned blacks.  Here again, there is a fundamental difference between saying that certain types of people were more likely to send their children to Dunbar, or that such children were over-represented, and saying that most of the children who went to Dunbar came from such families.

Whether in economic or other terms, the families from which the students of Dunbar High School came cannot be nearly so atypical as suggested by those who say that they were mostly “Washington’s growing black bourgeoisie.”  For many years, there was only one academic high school for blacks in the District of Columbia and, as late as 1948, one-third of all black youngsters attending high school in Washington attended Dunbar High School.  “If we took only the children of doctors and lawyers,” a former Dunbar principal asked, “how could we have had 1400 black students at one time?”  This was not a “selective” school in the sense in which we normally use that term – it was not necessary to take tests to get in, for example – even though there was undoubtedly self-selection in the sense that students who were serious went to Dunbar and those who were not had other places where they could while away their time, without having to meet high academic standards.

A spot check of attendance records and tardiness records showed that the M Street School at the turn of the century and Dunbar High School at mid-century had less absenteeism and less tardiness than the white high schools in the District of Columbia at those times.  In the nineteenth century, tardiness had at first been a problem, but it was a problem that was apparently not tolerated.  The school had a tradition of being serious, going back to its founders and early principals, who reflected the influence of the New England culture which contrasted so much with that of the culture of most blacks.

~Thomas Sowell, excerpt from Black Education: Achievements, Myths, and Tragedies

Moses Mullins - That's what I like about you Muhammad, you come out swinging with the facts, not emotional rhetoric.

Muhammad Rasheed - So working in DC gives you a special card to enable you to dismiss the facts in favor of old fictions, Kris? Gotcha. Can't say I'm surprised that you'd take that attitude.

Muhammad Rasheed - Were/are there light-skinned black elitist upper class? Sure. Were they the only ones attending Dunbar High during its academic golden age? Although a popular fiction propagated by the William Ryan 'Blaming the Victim' followers, the facts of raw data reveal this was absolutely NOT the case when it came to any Dunbar High policy.

Muhammad Rasheed - It turns out, Mosby, that what you merely think you know based on working in DC and enthusiastically swallowing unproductive old stereotypes isn't quite as substantial as what the raw facts of history itself reveal. That's a wall that will stop that mindset cold every time.

Kristopher Michael Mosby - No, but work here, a lifetime in the area, and having family/friends who lived and actually attended Dunbar does give me a better "Card" to call bullshit on some slighted individual's "facts".

Muhammad Rasheed - Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "No, but work here, a lifetime in the area, and having family/friends who lived..."

You can have every relative in the known universe living there with you, but if every one of you decide to believe in stereotypical nonsense completely divorced from the data that the school itself has collected over the last century, it is still as worthless as shoes on a snake.

Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "...and actually attended Dunbar..."

During the relevant period in question?

Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "...does give me a better "Card" to call bullshit on..."

Ignoring facts in favor of generationally echoed fiction will never give you a card of legitimacy in any way, shape, or form.

Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "...some slighted individual's..."

Strawman? Who's slighted?

Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: " "facts"."

I know, you've demonstrated a complete disdain for facts. I already said I'm not surprised.

Kristopher Michael Mosby - Never stated light skin Blacks were the ONLY ones to attend, just PREDOMINATELY, there's a difference.  There was one dark skin girl in my mother's class, Porscha Smith, she just happened to be the smartest kid in her age group in the entire state. Some kids just couldn't be denied. Not the norm, though.

Muhammad Rasheed - Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "Never stated light skin Blacks were the ONLY ones to attend, just PREDOMINATELY, there's a difference."

Obviously you didn't read the lengthy Sowell quote I posted above on the topic.

Kristopher Michael Mosby wrote: "There was one dark skin girl in my mother's class, Porscha Smith, she just happened to be the smartest kid in her age group in the entire state. Some kids just couldn't be denied. Not the norm, though."

The modern version of whatever Dunbar turned into in the post-integration era is not the point of this topic. I'm only talking about back when it was the best school in its hey-day. The point of the status.

Muhammad Rasheed - You're babbling, Mosby. The data comes directly from Dunbar's own records, THAT is why anything you type is full of crap right now. Facts are only 'fluid' in your universe.

Muhammad Rasheed –


Kristopher Michael Mosby - MRasheed wrote: "The modern version of whatever Dunbar turned into in the post-integration era is not the point of this topic. I'm only talking about back when it was the best school in its hey-day. The point of the status."

Okay, fair enough. Which White schools did it surpass in the area?

Muhammad Rasheed - Here's the report with the relevant info/data:

Report of the Board of Trustees of Public Schools of the District of Columbia to the Commissioners of the District of Columbia: 1898-1899 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1900), pp. 7-11.

Mike Csotd Peterson - So, if I can find a plantation where slaves were well treated, that means the system was good and should not have been overturned.

Muhammad Rasheed - By no means. Everything up to the Civil Rights Act being passed and jim crow laws being removed was great. But at a point shortly afterwards... for some odd reason... the momentum was sabotaged by a shift going from a) fighting for desegregation as a principle that went along with the understanding that the people needed to also work on specific internal development items in order for us to close the socio-economic gap and reach the successes other disenfranchised American groups had attained, to b) destructively substituting it for an "integration as a magical cure all" that would make all of our problems go away. When that shift happened, the "civil rights vision" suddenly became one of quotas, and pushing groups of people around into other areas, and making sure a certain amount of XYZ group was visually represented in ABC institution, and other similarly symbolic but ultimately useless-in-the-big-picture policies. And that's ALL. Even today, that's all that is being fought for, as if that was the magic potion we needed.

Meanwhile, that isn't what we needed. The high educational standards and no nonsense seriousness to achieve success in life represented by the pre-integration era of Dunbar High was what was needed, and programs designed to spread that attitude throughout the African-American community, and build it into the culture. That's what they needed more than anything. Desegregation was just a little box to check off of the many other smaller objectives towards the ultimate goal.

Mutuo Consensu - just as a footnote Muhammad, I am curious if your research shows after 1954, how soon and how many of those "prominent black educators" teaching at Dunbar High School left to teach elsewhere? (I'm not saying any one thing was the cause for the decline leading up to today's status... just curious about any possible contributing factors)

Muhammad Rasheed - Originally Dunbar wasn't a 'neighborhood school.' Every black family from around Washington D.C. that wanted to, sent their kids to it, and people would even move to D.C. from other areas of the country to do the same. Children from around the whole city that were SERIOUS about their future, did whatever they had to do to make their way through those doors promptly at... I'm gonna say 4:25am lol... every school morning. This insured that the school was full of quality minds who wanted to learn, and appreciated the discipline and structured environment that was conducive to doing so.

After the integration laws were passed everything changed. A line was drawn around Dunbar and around other high schools in American cities turning them into neighborhood schools. Now by law, only the people living in that area could attend that school, and by virtue of the truancy laws, they had to. But here's the thing... there was an old saying: "The folk who live closest to Dunbar didn't go to Dunbar" and it was true. Dunbar was in the poorest neighborhood in the city, and although some folk there were serious and did well at Dunbar, statistically, not enough were serious to keep Dunbar's success rates up where they needed to be. The newly-mandated student body couldn't keep up with the work load from the Era of Excellence, while political pressure caused the administration to pass people even if they hadn't done the work, and a disgusted prominent black faculty did indeed leave to teach elsewhere.

Muhammad Rasheed - The policies created that were supposed to help, destroyed Dunbar High.

Mutuo Consensu - While MORE of students were afforded education, the implementation of 1954's version of "no child left behind" simultaneously created an official under-class of (dis)functionally mis-educated children and a new era of black bourgeoisie paid higher wages, but still less than their white counterparts.

Muhammad Rasheed - You remember the movie Lean On Me with Morgan Freeman? Near the beginning, Joe Clark isolated all of those incorrigible, perpetually disruptive students who didn't want to learn anything and expelled them. Imagine if his bosses in the administration betrayed him and forced those kids to stay and undermined his authority at every turn because of the immense pressure from the political sphere. That's what happened to Dunbar High. They refused to let the prominent black educators of legend do what they knew to do to make sure the serious students succeeded, while handing the school over to the ones who didn't care and didn't want anything.




 Mutuo Consensu - i think that "No Child Left Behind", in the most sincere sense of the term would have to be a broad and sweeping grass roots social reform with "real teeth" first, and then an educational system.

Muhammad Rasheed - "They say, 'One bad apple spoils the bunch.' Well, what about three hundred? Rotten to the CORE! Now, you're right, Mrs. Barrett, this is a war. It's a war to save 2,700 other students, most of whom don't have the basic skills to pass the state exam. Now you want to help us, fine. Sit down with the kids, make them study at night. Go get the fathers off welfare..."

"How DARE you talk to these people about welfare???"

"Give our children some pride! Let them get their priorities straight. When Dr. Napier came to me, offering this job, I saw the lightning flash! I heard the thunder ROLL! I felt breakers, crashing, swamping my soul!"

"We are NOT in church, Mr. Clark!"

"I FELL DOWN ON MY KNEES! And I cried, 'My God! Why has thou forsaken me?!" And the Lord said, 'Joe? You're no damn good!' Now, I mean this. More than you realize. 'You're no earthly good at all, unless you take this opportunity and do WHATEVER you have to...' And He didn't say, 'Joe be polite.' 'Do whatever you have to to transform, and transmogrify this school into a special place. Where the hearts and souls and minds of the young can RISE! Where they can grow tall and blossom out from under the shadows of the past. Where the minds of the young are SET FREE!' And I gave my word to God. And that's why I threw those bastards out! And that's all I'm going to say."

Muhammad Rasheed - Mutuo, I think a program to help the poor-minded as you describe would have had to be a completely separate thing, under a completely separate system, designed specifically to get them up to speed. There was clearly zero value in abandoning the serious students who sincerely wanted to better themselves in favor of taking those same resources that they were using and handing them over to the people who didn't want anything out of life.

Moses Mullins - Quite true Muhammad, we have to make some harsh choices. But the bottom line is that we have to help the students that sincerely want to better themselves while keeping the door open for the rest of the students to decide to make a change.
What we can't do is drown the good students because of the hard ankles that choose to become slaves on the private prisons plantations.

Muhammad Rasheed - Yes. Those among them who finally become tired of eating off of that plate will push it away and start making different choices. In the meantime, they can get the hell out of my school.

Bakkah Rasheed-Shabazz - Thank you, son. I plan on using the picture and history lesson in my workshops this Labor Day weekend in Inkster, MI.  www.dnamuslimconvention.com

Warren Murphy - great discussion, muhammad.

"Tomb" of the Serpent



Tom Luth - Archaeologists To Ben Carson: Ancient Egyptians Wrote Down Why The Pyramids Were Built

It is sad that there is someone so mind-numbingly stupid as Carson. It is tragic that there are millions that regard him as brilliant.

Nina Savino - Ben Carson Shattering Stereotype About Brain Surgeons Being Smart

Muhammad Rasheed - From the article's Pyramid Text link in Tom's article:



Muhammad Rasheed - The Ancient Egyptians were pioneers in high-level meditation technique, with the meditator 'becoming an akh' as the actual goal to gain spiritual insight. The Pyramid Texts are precise instructions on how to perform this mediation correctly to prepare the practitioner for the afterlife, not funerary ritual descriptions as the article claims. The pyramids are NOT tombs.

I don't think they are grain silos either, but that's certainly a more interesting theory than the very uncritical tomb theory.

Nina Savino - Concerning the idea of pyramids not being tombs... sure are a lot of mummies, canopic jars , and funerary materials to not be tombs

Muhammad Rasheed - What mummies, jars, and funerary materials were found within the pyramids of Giza?

The argument against the tomb theory is strong based on the fact when they were first opened, thy were conspicuously empty, with none of the typical egomaniac decorations associated with personal pharaoh. So where are you getting that, please, Nina?

Nina Savino - @Muhammad Rasheed... here's ONE relatively recent citation...

Inside the Great Pyramid

I have been fascinated by and have been reading a variety of sources for better than forty years...

Nina Savino - Here's how scientists know the pyramids were built to store pharaohs, not grain

Nina Savino - Dr. Garry Shaw: Author and Egyptologist: 16 Reasons Why Egypt's Pyramids were Tombs

Muhammad Rasheed - The 'Inside the Great Pyramid' article concerns itself with who could have been the first person who opened the structure, quickly analyzing the most popular accounts. Other than pointing out that someone broke into one of the step pyramids and stuck a mummy into around 100 B.C., they have no idea whether anything was found in the pyramid or not.

Muhammad Rasheed - The problem with the 'Here's how scientists know..." article, is that it is full of smug speculation with little definitive proof. The monkeywrench in the author's (and the scientists that echo these speculations) is that there ARE numerous actual tombs in Egypt found. Highly decorated, covered in elaborate writings, etc., even after they had been thoroughly ransacked by robbers. Conspicuously, the Great Pyramid is naked as an egg. Just because some later rulers decided to save that tomb building money and repurpose some pyramids for burying either himself or relatives, doesn't mean that was what their purpose was. The insistence that they are tombs is not science. It's lazy belief.

Nina Savino - The Great Pyramid is only one pyramid of hundreds... it is written on the walls what they are... by those who built them

Muhammad Rasheed - Post up a pic that shows writing on a Great Pyramid wall that says it is a tomb, please. If it were that simple there would be no controversy.

That comment was pure speculation (to be generous) from someone pretending to have more knowledge than they do.

Nina Savino - It will have to be when I get off work Muhammad

Tom Luth - Why was King Tut buried in a grain silo?

Nina Savino - @Tom Luth... KV 62 isn't a pyramid

Muhammad Rasheed - Regarding the 'Dr. Gary Shaw' article:

1.) I call his bluff that the use of 'mrw' means that pyramid and tomb are synonymous. Since 'mrwt' means 'love' I think the root is referring to something else rather than 'tomb' as he lazily believes.

2.) There is zero evidence that the granite container found within the King's Chamber is supposed to be a sarcophagus. Just because it loosely reminds you of a sarcophagus, and some after-the-fact, unenlightened ruler broke in and shoved his mother-in-law in one, doesn't mean that was the intended purpose.

3.) Can he not see that "associated with" does not equal "that's what it is?" This is the very definition of "reaching."

4.) More importantly, there were also very intense rituals required of the ruler during his lifetime to prepare himself for the afterlife. This part is conspicuously absent from the orthodoxy's lazy version of 'science.'

5.) So?

6.) Was the courtier's tomb a pyramid?

7.) The pyramid texts contain rituals to perform during the ruler's lifetime to prepare for the afterlife which were actually far more important.

8.) The first sentence was as worthless as the #3 item.

9.) Pure speculation based on lazy belief with weak evidence.

10.) It is more likely that the original purpose was not a tomb, it was repurposed into a tomb by a later ruler, and then converted back into a ritual temple structure later by Djoser.

11.) And that proves what now?

12.) After-the-fact unenlightened ruler repurposing does not mean that was the original purpose.

13.) More speculation that conspicuously fails to take into account the 'living king' aspects of the rituals.

14.) Nonsense. It's CLEARLY graffiti.

15.) From Gary's link: Zahi Hawass said there are no plans to run tests to determine the actual age, identity, etc., of the mummy found. Their belief alone is sufficient. (emphasis mine)

hahahaha! In a nutshell that sums up the width & breadth of orthodox "scholarship" on the subject.

16.) I don't care who argues that they are "cenotaphs," but I do reject the "tombs" theory as lazy [and probably Eurocentric] claptrap. And just because we haven't yet found royal tombs from the time periods doesn't mean it is logical to willy-nilly slap the label on everything you DO have.

Saturday, November 7, 2015

BOOK REVIEW - The Blacker the Ink: Constructions of Black Identity in Comics and Sequential Art


‘The Blacker the Ink,’ edited by Professor Frances Gateward and John Jennings, is a collection of essays critiquing a diverse selection of significant sequential art works created by Black artists (and those sympathetic to their causes). This book has the distinction of being the first African-American Literature I’ve read since finishing Charles Mills potent book, “The Racial Contract” a few weeks ago. As some of The Blacker the Ink’s scholars broke down the dynamics of multilayered socio-political tissue that composed each subject, I was able to see which of these writers -- both creators and critics -- accepted the exploiter class in their self-appointed role as signatories of the West’s racial social contract or not.

Of course this side diversion was only a tiny part of the reader’s enjoyment, and this book absolutely provided a lot to enjoy. A solid, high-level academic work, my favorite parts of ‘The Blacker the Ink’ involved those socio-politically conscious scholars who would take the time to explain the source-cited details of a real life historical backdrop used by a given work, as well as the sections that introduced gifted talent I had previously been unaware of. The depth of my Wish List expanded continuously in leaps & bounds as fascinating new works were described/analyzed, often forcing me to skim and dodge to prevent spoilers from ruining a newly-anticipated reading experience. 

Highly recommended, this should be on the shelf of any serious fan of the cartooning medium.

Friday, November 6, 2015

SNEAK PEEK! Tales of Sinanju: The Destroyer, book seven "Numbers Game"



Tales of Sinanju: The Destroyer, book seven “Numbers Game”
AERIAL INFECTION - Long has the fiendish Chinese Vampire sought to turn all of humanity with its hive mind madness. Possessing supernatural powers and a terrifying, single-minded focus, the tribe should have been successful centuries ago, but the mighty House of Sinanju has been there to stop them in their tracks time and time again. Today the lead creature known only as The Master has changed tactics. Taking advantage of their ability to infect anyone, the vampire has gained the ability to command modern technology. Now the power of the drone represents a global threat greater than ever, with the two Masters of Sinanju focused right in the cross-hairs!
_______________
Graphic novels
6.14” x 9.21”
Perfect binding
66 pages, b&w interiors
www.mrasheed.com

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Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Morality - Differentiating Between Its Origin & Usage



Abdur Rasheed – 



Muhammad Rasheed - Since "what is right" has consistently varied both geographically and throughout time, how do you know what is right from wrong? 

It seems like you were told your morality from whatever cultural norms were currently trending.

Abdur Rasheed - Are you sure that's where "what is right" came from?

People didnt use the religous books as a guide to when you can sell your daughter as a slave or whatever?

Are you sure it was cultural?

Muhammad Rasheed - "What is right" as a cultural norm, is different from the origin of the concept of morality in human society.

Muhammad Rasheed - The former comes from whatever popular thing is trending in society. In 21st century western society, racial discrimination is considered 'wrong.' In 19th century western society, it was considered 'right.' "What is right" among the populace depends on how they are feeling during a given era.

The latter item -- the origin of morality -- originally comes from the source prophets/texts of our religions as a concept introduced to humanity. Individual scriptural commands, however, have never functioned as a short list of what the populace believes encompasses "right & wrong." For example, in the Qur'an, God said that the children of Israel put all kinds of restrictions upon themselves that He had nothing to do with, saying that they made up their own versions of what was right/wrong and subscribed His name to it while they had neither the knowledge nor authority to do so.