[INDEX |
NATIONAL
|
WORLD
|
PERSPECTIVE
|
COLUMNS
|
MONEY
|
ENTERTAINMENT
|
HEALTH
|
TECH
|
LETTERS
|
SUBSCRIBE]
FinalCall.com News
Perspectives
Buying in and selling out
By James Clingman
-Guest Columnist-
Updated Nov 14, 2006 - 3:17:00 PM
NAACP President Bruce Gordon, in an interview in Black Enterprise magazine (September 2005), speaking about New Orleans, said, "Most recently there’s been a lot of concern about the way African Americans are treated in the French Quarter—folks there don’t treat them very nicely. I would say in addition to [marching], we should take our dollars elsewhere…That, to me, is a more significant message than a protest because it has an economic impact on the offenders."
When I read that, I thought, "What a great statement from the national leader of the largest and oldest Black civil rights organization in this country. Wow! I have to meet this Brother and explore ways to support his directives." One of the first things I did was get involved with the NAACP chapter in Cincinnati.
We had a relatively new, feisty, unafraid, non-capitulating Sister as local president, who was stirring up things and standing up for Black people in this town, especially in the economic development arena. I was hyped; I was charged; I was fired-up; I was ready to do whatever I could to help. After all, I knew the NAACP national president had her back.
She had the leverage to effect real change in the business-as-usual attitude of this city, which always results in Black folks getting very little when it comes to the billions of dollars spent on economic development, despite a glut of Blacks in authoritative positions. She stood up, she spoke out, and she was determined, as she put it, never to back down or let up the pressure until her demands for equity were met.
Our local NAACP president wrote a memo excoriating the outright disrespectful way she has been treated, and how Black people are ignored by those in charge of the billion-dollar riverfront development project called The Banks. (Incidentally, Blacks comprise nearly 50 percent of this city’s population.) Historically, Blacks have been excluded from significant opportunities to reap the benefits of public and private projects, via development rights, but finally we had someone in an influential position that was not going to take it any longer.
Well, that honeymoon didn’t last very long. Three weeks after writing that memo to our group, decrying the mistreatment of Black people by White folks, voicing her unhappiness at being disrespected and saying she would be "ashamed to invite [The national NAACP convention]" to Cincinnati, something changed. She wrote, "Authoritatively, I can say the NAACP would be unwilling to come to a town and hold a multi-million dollar convention where our leadership does not respect African Americans." Just three weeks later, she actually shed tears of joy when the National NAACP Board agreed to hold its convention in Cincinnati. In that brief interim her righteous indignation changed to wild-eyed exuberance at the fact that millions of Black dollars would now be brought to the city where, in her words, "leadership does not respect African Americans or women."
My "educated" guess is that another Black organization in Cincinnati has been reeled in by the temptations of filthy lucre, the illusion of inclusion and the shallow disingenuous rhetoric of fakers and hypocrites.
In this latest situation, Black folks started out with proud protestations and podium-pounding press conferences, demanding equity on The Banks Project, only to end up with passive posturing and pretentious pontification. They became puppets that parroted the corporate Cincinnati line: "Come to our city, Black people, and bring us your dollars to help finance the oppression and mistreatment of your people."
I knew something was up when I saw the NAACP standing with the police chief, the man who has used the n-word and presided over some of the worst treatment of Blacks by police in the history of this town. The civil rights of many Black people have been violated in this city, just over the past six years; yet we have the Black civil rights organization being persuaded to come to Cincinnati by this same police chief. That’s right. He was a member of the "welcoming" team. I would warn the NAACP members who bring their children here; keep them close to you. U.S. Congressman and Cincinnatian, Steve Chabot, pointed out in one of his campaign ads that it’s legal to use 50,000-volt tasers on 7-year-old children in this city.
Frustrated at the acquiescence to appeasement and pacification by the vaunted Cincinnati moneychangers? Yeah, I guess I am. But I am not surprised. Disappointed? You bet, but it’s not the first time, and I am not the first Brother or Sister to be let down by our people. I was just so ready, so prepared to do battle for us, one more time. I was hopeful that at last I would see a victory for African Americans in the city I call Cincinn-apathy. Yet again we have proven to be our own worst enemy.
(James Clingman is an adjunct professor at the University of Cincinnati’s African American Studies department. He hosts the radio program, "Blackonomics." Visit his website at www.blackonomics.com.)
