Thoughts on Media Reform
November 14, 2006
I am back in Seattle, and still catching my breath from my trip to Boston last week. It was absolutely phenomenal! I will talk about that in more detail in it’s own post.
I met an individual from Free Press at the conference, and I was invited to attend their National Conference for Media Reform next year. As part of the process for preparation, I wrote out my thoughts on media reform, and I kind of liked them. Therefore, I’d like to share them with you all. Enjoy.
Every change in this world, every revolution that has taken place, every movement that has been started, began with one thing: a change in the way that people think. There are many ways to change the way the people think about their position, their beliefs and their lives. One effective way to do this is to open their eyes to things, people, or ideas that they have had little or no exposure to in the past. To open eyes, to give light to, to expose people to facts and information is the mission of the media. Sadly, the media has lost sight of this mission and the integrity implicitly needed to carry it out. Catering to special interests, political motivations, and monetary incentives have become more important than the transmission of knowledge. A change must be made to bring this system back into line with its mission. When media is freed from these vices, it can be used to ensure that people think critically about world they exist in. Armed with unbiased truth, they will be able to change their situations. Equipped with disinterested facts, they will be able to revolt against forces that oppress them. Empowered by knowledge and wisdom, they can move forward. All of these are possible today. All of these can be achieved through media reform.
My website, The SuperSpade (www.TheSuperSpade.com), presents critical commentary on social issues and current events from the perspective of three twenty-something, college-educated Black Men inspired to create this space out of frustration with the media as it exists today. My role in the media reform movement involves critiquing current media outlets while simultaneously presenting an alternative that is not a slave to the entities that keep today’s press from handling its responsibilities. While attending the University of Michigan, the Black male support network that I chaired focused heavily on critiquing, combating, and providing alternatives to images and stereotypes of Blackness and masculinity perpetuated by corporate media. We held meetings on campus that showcased progressive media interpretations of Blackness and masculinity. We encouraged people to create media that managed Black images, not accepting the image given to them. My NCMR experience will benefit everyone I touch. SuperSpade participants will benefit from my exposure to new techniques of presentation. My communities in the Greater Seattle and Detroit areas will benefit from communication of the importance of media reform and the need to reject agents of the press that lack integrity. Most importantly, individuals will gain confidence, knowing that groups like Free Press are working to ensure that their voices are given the credence they deserve. My community’s involvement in media reform is threefold: All of these apply concretely in the short and long term. I support, and will continue to support and encourage others to support new age media. I encourage proactive contribution from participants at The SuperSpade, and will push forward in changing the paradigm of interaction between producer and consumer of news and media with my future ventures. My ideological commitment to alternative media will be the foundation of my content creations for the rest of my creative existence. Categories:
1. Spirit of support of alternative radio, television, and Internet media outlets and distribution channels. Old media cannot exist without an audience; neither can reformed media.
2. Spirit of proactive contribution. My vision of reformed media is a participatory one, where consumers evolve from readers/watchers to participants/co-contributors. We are doing this at The SuperSpade. I encourage my peer content producers to embrace the same participatory spirit in their own work.
3. Spirit of commitment. Creating sustainable and substantive reform today’s media takes loyalty to progressive media approaches and ideological endurance.
Media
Post election analysis: How to keep affirmative action
November 12, 2006
This post comes to you from the friendly skies en route to Baltimore, MD. It is good to be home and I really miss my Superspade family. I want to continue my post election analysis by providing some insights I learned while trying to keep affirmative action policies in the state of Michigan.
Ward Connerly is hopping around from state to state trying to ban affirmative action programs primarily in higher education, public employment and contracting. He did it in Washington via Prop 5, California with Prop 209, and most recently in Michigan with Prop 2.
Now for anyone from Michigan or elsewhere who didn’t lift a finger to help register people to vote or educate people on the effects of banning affirmative action but felt smug enough to say after the election, “I knew Prop 2 was going to fail,” shame on you. I have had it with so-called conscious folks who love to philosophize for hours on end about the plight of Black folks and how we need to raise up but when you ask them to do something that actually requires work, their calendar is suddenly filled to the brim.
Being conscious is a step in the right direction but it is not enough. When I ask you to help do phone banking, I don’t want to hear you talk about the nuances of institutional racism. There is a time and a place for that but right now, all I need is a yes or no. I already agree with you and I am only going to nod my head in agreement. And if you claim to be as conscious as you claim to be, let’s see to it that our actions have the same intensity.
I got a little side-tracked for a minute, but I do not apologize.
Anyways, Ward Connerly is putting ballot initiatives up that attempt to ban affirmative action which means that in order to beat this guy, we have to make sure people vote in favor to support affirmative action. But we forgot about a crucial lesson in Michigan that I hope you don’t make in your state as well. Before you start screaming, “Vote to Support Affirmative Action!” make sure the organizing coalition you are apart of actually implements a comprehensive voter registration drive.
Why do I say that? Well, once you actually do voter registration, you can then call these people and educate them on affirmative action. When this doesn’t happen, your get out the vote efforts are not strategic and all you end up doing is conducting a visibility campaign, which will inevitably result in mobilizing people to vote that are not registered to vote! It sounds so simple I know, but registering people to vote is taken for granted more often than you would care to realize.
Secondly, most research shows that in order to win a campaign to support affirmative action, you have to target white women because they will provide the necessary electoral support to tip the election in your favor. On its face, this thinking is logical and reasonable. However, not ALL of your efforts should be devoted to targeting white women. Why? Because you will more than likely develop a coalition that is largely comprised of men and women of color and then you will try to get this coalition to convince White women to vote to support affirmative action. This strategy is not only embarrassing but it is not sound. Most people tend to trust people that look like them, period. So what ended up happening in Michigan (in my opinion) is that largely people of color targeted white women while neglecting the very communities of color that need to educated on the effects of affirmative action. Now I am not saying that only Blacks can talk to Blacks, but what I am saying is that in terms of strategy, never forget to take care of your base.
In fact, I know a large number of White women that understand and can explain the benefits of affirmative action for all people. For example if you have a strategy to send me (tall Black dude) to do canvassing in a majority-White suburb versus a white girl, who would you send? I am not saying I wouldn’t be effective but let’s think strategically. If white women need to be targeted, then we need to recruit conscious white women that are willing to go out in their communities and tell people about the truth of affirmative action.
As for people of color, don’t assume that all people of color are automatically going to support affirmative action. Many families of color do not have the pleasure to check email, read the news/blogs etc. at work or at home for that matter. Do you even know how fortunate you are to be reading this post right now? Stop taking your access to information for granted and throwing a fit when you talk to a person of color that never heard of affirmative action.
Lastly, don’t wait until the question is on the ballot before you act. If you wait until then, the battle will be immensely difficult moving forward. Proposition 2 should never have even made it on the ballot and you should be making plans now so that it doesn’t make it on your ballot. One thing that liberal minded people haven’t quite mastered is the supreme importance of framing the debate before the debate. The way that Prop 2 was worded was so twisted that many people thought that they were supporting affirmative action when in fact they were voting against it. Here is how it worked in Michigan, voting no meant that you wanted to support affirmative action. And voting yes meant you wanted to ban affirmative action. In other words, no meant yes, and yes meant no. By not addressing this backwards logic will greatly hamper your organizing efforts so get in the game early.
I just realized this post is getting really long so I will just stop for now.
Stay up fam,
Brandon Q.
Categories:
affirmativeaction
politics
Post election analysis: Affirmative Action
November 11, 2006
Guess who’s bizack? What’s up fam, my extended absence was due to my job doing political organizing leading up to the election. To Garlin and Steve; thank you for holding it down and continuing to bring the fire. So due to the political nature of my job, it is only fitting that I provide some post election analysis as it pertains to the banning of affirmative action.
Here in Michigan, there was a ballot proposal sponsored by the wrongfully titled Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. The ballot proposal asked Michigan voters to amend the state constitution to ban affirmative action programs. The ballot initiative passed by an astounding margin of 56% to 42%.The text of the ballot read as such; (emphasis mine)
A proposal to amend the state constitution to ban affirmative action programs that give preferential treatment to groups or individuals based on their race, gender, color, ethnicity or national origin for public employment, education or contracting purposes.
Now if you were oblivious to the long lasting effects of banning affirmative action, I could see how it would be reasonable to think that voting yes for this amendment is in line with your values and beliefs. However, I want to spend a little bit of time on the loaded term, preferential treatment. These two words are powerful because it assumes that we are all equal and therefore, any group getting so called preferential treatment is unfair to the people that don’t get preferential treatment. In fact, affirmative action tries to actually level the playing field. But here is where I think lies the deep philosophical difference between supporters and opponents. Opponents of affirmative action like to believe that the playing field is equal and proponents of affirmative action try to level the playing field. I just find it sad that in 2006, so many people are in refusal of believing that discrimination is not an institutionalized feature of our society.
And as for this colorblind mess, I can’t stand it. Humans are not dogs, we see in color. Many White people will think that their Black counterparts in college got there by affirmative action, due to athletic scholarship, or just otherwise have not earned the right to be where they are. Taking away affirmative action will not heal race relations and will not make racism and discrimination disappear. Let me say that again, taking away affirmative action will not heal race relations and will not make racism and discrimination disappear.
Ward Connerly and his conservative backers will be taking his ban on affirmative action to five different states. Banning affirmative action has a very salient effect into tapping into the anger that is just beneath the surface of many white people. And before I think it crazy that the government should take positive action to make up for discrimination, I like to refer to Dave Chappelle.
This ballot initiative is bad for Michigan and I can only hope that the decision would have been different had people voted using logic instead of emotion. And as my co-worker so eloquently expressed to me, “Not everything should be decided by the people.”
In the next post, we will look at ways to blunt the effects of this decision and what to do if Ward sets up camp in your state.
Categories:
politics
affirmativeaction
The Weekly Dream: A Different Set of Rules
November 9, 2006
“A man gots to have a code”
-Omar, The Wire
“If you don’t have any parameters, you got nothing”
-Armand Asante, Gotti
Question of the Week: What things make up your code?
Whether you realize it or not, we all live by various codes of behavior or conduct; guidelines and rules that instruct us as to how to live or how to approach various situations. In fact, life in civilized society demands it. They are rules in action and there are consequences for violating the code. The Sicilian mafia code was called Omerta, which meant that the people did not cooperate with the police about Mafia activities. Individuals who violated the code often found themselves in uncomfortable predicaments. There is a code to the streets, which we call Street Smarts or Common Sense, which governs dealings in the real world. Politics have a code. Like layers of an onion, the various codes we are subjected to intersect, so that we live a disciplined life. They tell us when something is right and wrong. Our own personal code takes the form of our conscience. But have you ever really given thought as to what comprises your code?
To tell the truth, besides wanting to leave something for posterity, The Weekly Dream was partly an outgrowth of an innate desire to articulate the rules I live by. Growing up, my code was formed by my spiritual beliefs, my family tradition, books, and experience. By sharing my thoughts and perspective, I hoped to perfect the Code by eliciting insight from the outside.
The Nature of Codes
Rules apply in various situations and circumstances. However, what gives codes life is the fact that they are lived. What good is having a code if you do not apply it in the appropriate situation? Now the consequences of not keeping your code may not be life and death, but it may show a lack of character or integrity. Confucius said that when a person knows what is right, but does not do it, it is weakness. There is no hope for that person. People who do not have a code are capable of anything, they are worse than animals. At least animals have consistency in behavior.
As adults, more and more we are required to police ourselves and make sure we are living lives consistent with our internal law. For instance, if you profess to be Christian, then you must study our code book and seek to order your life accordingly. Because codes are a lifestyle.
Stick to the Script
Rules can change, but we are seeking something deeper-principles. Principles apply in every situation. They are constants, like the Ten Commandments. It is a rock that grounds your code. I challenge everyone to write out their codes: Rules and Principles. What set of rules do you play by? What do you believe? When you do something inconsistent to that, how do you feel?
For instance, I seek to live a life where truth and peace is manifested, consistent with the mandates of my spirituality. Therefore, I try to avoid lying, deception, unnecessary and unproductive conflict. I try to be generous and walk in love-even towards my enemies. These are lofty goals, but that is where my code demands I go. I might miss it sometimes, but having that code lets me know what I can and cannot do.
Articulating the code will ensure that you maintain your integrity on the stairway to success.
Truth and Peace,
Steven M DeVougas
Categories:
theweeklydream
Misleading Flyers in Maryland
November 7, 2006
There’s more.
Black voters in Maryland are being targeted with this flyer.
I really, really don’t like Michael Steele because he and his campaign are straight lying to people. MSNBC just projected him to lose. I hope that they are right.
Absentee Ballots and Today’s Poll Taxes
November 6, 2006
Voting should be free. All forms of voting should be free. So why aren’t they?
A good friend of mine told me today of his drama in getting his absentee ballot submitted on time. Because he got the ballot late (problem #1), to ensure that the ballot was postmarked by close-of-polls tomorrow he had to pay $14 to express mail it back to his home state.
If you go to vote in person, you do not have to pay any money to vote. However, if you vote by mail (like we do in my county), you have to pay money in the form of postage. Also, if you vote absentee (which is also done by mail generally), you have to pay money in the form of postage.
This equates to a poll tax in my opinion. Why don’t absentee ballots or mail-in ballots give you self-address stamped envelopes to use?
The issue here is not the amount of money, but the principal. If it is said to be the civic duty of a citizen to vote, they should not have to pay to do so.
Democracy Needs You Tomorrow
November 6, 2006
This article talks about how important it is to be a participant in as many ways that you can in tomorrow’s election.
The first way to participate is to vote. If you can do more, please do.
Hybrid Schools
November 3, 2006
There is a heated debate going on here in Seattle about a private nonprofit group pushing to share space with a public high school, creating a “school within a school.” The Technology Access Foundation (TAF) is making this push to open an academy inside of Seattle’s Rainier Beach High School.
What do you think about private groups taking over space in public schools?
We talk quite a bit about education here, and I think that this is an interesting dispute. I am a proponent of public education. I am a bit weary of charter schools. I am also a big fan of technology. I believe that the more technology students have access to, the better. I believe that access to technology is a great way to improve one’s quality of life.
On this particular issue, I am a bit torn. I’ve done work with TAF since I’ve been in the Seattle area, and I like the things they do. However, I’m not really comfortable with them making this move because I feel like it’s a power-grab. I’d rather see TAF create their own technology-focused institution wholly separate from Rainier Beach. Everybody wins with this solution, and they are free to partner with any/all high schools in the district.
Categories
Education
Technology
The SuperSpade at the Black Technology Now! Summit next week
November 3, 2006
I will be in Boston next week as a featured panelist at the National Black Programming Consortium’s (NBPC) Black Technology Now! Summit (BTN) on November 8 & 9, 2006. This is a conference that is focusing on the future of public media and how people of color can take advantage of new ways to distribute their messages and content.
The panel that I am participating in is entitled NEW FUNKY: Virtual Communities of Color & More. The entire conference schedule is here.
What I will be focusing on in my presentation will be building online communities and how we can use the internet and other technologies to address broader social issues. I will talk about the existence of virtual solutions to real-life, tangible, brick-and-mortar problems. I will be using examples such as The SuperSpade, DetroitIntern.com, and other projects that I am working on to solve problems with technology.
Just like the last public speech that I gave, I will post the audio (and maybe video if it is available) of this talk on the site upon my return. Also like before, if you have any ideas about the topic, I’d love for you to share them.
Short bios of myself as well as other speakers & panelists are available here.
Categories
The SuperSpade
Travel
Speech
Boston
Technology
Digital Divide
The Weekly Dream: Lifology
November 3, 2006
Question of the Week: What is Life Trying to Teach You Right Now?
Some people have asked me how I come up with these articles every week. What is my process? I reply that a lot of it is my thoughts or reactions to things or situations I have encountered or that have been encountered by others. My antennae is always up and looking for the lesson that life and its accompanying challenges are trying to instill. I explain it as being a student of life.
But there was a time when I thought I knew it all. I call the ages 19-20 the selfish years, because nobondy can tell you anything, we have it all figured out. Perhaps that is just youth in general. It takes being whipped by life to figure out, “I still have a long way to go.”
What Makes A Good Student
As a student in school, we were put in situations where we did not have any idea about the subject matter at hand. Our job was to absorb the information that was being transferred or transmitted by our teacher. As a student, we had to come to the material with a fresh set of eyes and hold our preconceived notions up to the light.
Some of us were better at it than others. We had our weak subjects as well as our strong ones. It was not always pleasant, but it had to be done. We did not always get the grades we thought we deserved, we might not have liked our teacher, our classmates or the school. But a job had to be done, and there was one objective: To learn and master the material being presented.
Life is no different. There are certain things that we have to go through. If we do not get the lesson, we will no doubt repeat the situation until we get it. There are people who we do not like that we have to deal with, we might not like the situation we are in, but we are in it, so we must deal. It is a humbling experience. In church, they call it being “perfected”. What are you going through right now, what is life trying to teach you at this moment?
How Do I Pass?
In order to get the lesson, we need to step back and examine the situations we find ourselves in and the situations of others. . What is the source? What changes has the situation caused in me? There is a saying that states that a fool does not learn from his mistakes, a smart person learns from the mistakes he makes, but a wise person can learn from the mistakes of others. We need to look at the present and the past with objectivity and humility.
We all have regrets, but we cannot change what happened back then, but we can determine how it affects us today and going forward. We cannot dwell on our shortcomings, we cannot be something we are not. We must walk our path and leave our own footprints in the sand.
If we develop a sensitivity to the situations and people around us, then we are half way there. Your way of doing things is not the only way and it may not be the best way. It may be the best for your situation, but not for someone else. Therefore, we should not be quick to judge others. If you judge anything, judge the action and its ramifications. But nobody walking on this earth has it all figured out. We all are trying to deal with life: our insecurities, our fears, our individual challenges. But if we take the stance of a student, and look at everything with fresh eyes, as a little child, then it wont be as difficult.
But no matter where you are, life is still good. It might not be great and it could be better, but it is still good. So learn while school is in session.
Truth and Peace,
Steven M. DeVougas
Categories:
theweeklydream
