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Puerto Rican Obituary



They worked
They were always on time
They were never late
They never spoke back
when they were insulted
They worked
They never took days off
that were not on the calendar
They never went on strike
without permission
They worked
ten days a week
and were only paid for five
They worked
They worked
They worked
and they died
They died broke
They died owing
They died never knowing
what the front entrance
of the first national city bank looks like



Juan
Miguel
Milagros
Olga
Manuel
All died yesterday today
and will die again tomorrow
passing their bill collectors
on to the next of kin
All died
waiting for the garden of eden
to open up again
under a new management
All died
dreaming about america
waking them up in the middle of the night
screaming: Mira Mira
your name is on the winning lottery ticket
for one hundred thousand dollars
All died
hating the grocery stores
that sold them make-believe steak
and bullet-proof rice and beans
All died waiting dreaming and hating



Dead Puerto Ricans
Who never knew they were Puerto Ricans
Who never took a coffee break
from the ten commandments
to KILL KILL KILL
the landlords of their cracked skulls
and communicate with their latino souls



Juan
Miguel
Milagros
Olga
Manuel
From the nervous breakdown streets
where the mice live like millionaires
and the people do not live at all
are dead and were never alive



Juan
died waiting for his number to hit
Miguel
died waiting for the welfare check
to come and go and come again
Milagros
died waiting for her ten children
to grow up and work
so she could quit working
Olga
died waiting for a five dollar raise
Manuel
died waiting for his supervisor to drop dead
so he could get a promotion



Is a long ride
from Spanish Harlem
to long island cemetery
where they were buried
First the train
and then the bus
and the cold cuts for lunch
and the flowers
that will be stolen
when visiting hours are over
Is very expensive
Is very expensive
But they understand
Their parents understood
Is a long non-profit ride
from Spanish Harlem
to long~sland cemetery



Juan
Miguel
Milagros
Olga
Manuel
All died yesterday today
and will die again tomorrow
Dreaming
Dreaming about queens
Clean-cut lily-white neighborhood
Puerto Ricanless scene
Thirty-thousand-dollar home
The first spics on the block
Proud to belong to a community
of gringos who want them lynched
Proud to be a long distance away
from the sacred phrase: Que Pasa



These dreams
These empty dreams
from the make-believe bedrooms
their parents left them
are the after-effects
of television programs
about the ideal
white american family
with black maids
and latino janitors
who are well train
to make everyone
and their bill collectors
laugh at them
and the people they represent



Juan
died dreaming about a new car
Miguel
died dreaming about new anti-poverty programs
Milagros
died dreaming about a trip to Puerto Rico
Olga
died dreaming about real jewelry
Manuel
died dreaming about the irish sweepstakes



They all died
like a hero sandwich dies
in the garment district
at twelve o'clock in the afternoon
social security number to ashes
union dues to dust



They knew
they were born to weep
and keep the morticians employed
as long as they pledge allegiance
to the flag that wants them destroyed
They saw their names listed
in the telephone directory of destruction
They were train to turn
the other cheek by newspapers
that mispelled mispronounced
and misunderstood their names
and celebrated when death came
and stole their final laundry ticket



They were born dead
and they died dead



Is time
to visit sister lopez again
the number one healer
and fortune card dealer
in Spanish Harlem
She can communicate
with your late relatives
for a reasonable fee
Good news is guaranteed



Rise Table Rise Table
death is not dumb and disable
Those who love you want to know
the correct number to play
Let them know this right away
Rise Table Rise Table
death is not dumb and disable
Now that your problems are over
and the world is off your shoulders
help those who you left behind
find financial peace of mind



6
Rise Table Rise Table
death is not dumb and disable
If the right number we hit
all our problems will split
and we will visit your grave
on every legal holiday
Those who love you want to know
the correct number to play
Let them know this right away
We know your spirit is able
Death is not dumb and disable
RISE TABLE RISE TABLE



Juan
Miguel
Milagros
Olga
Manuel
All died yesterday today
and will die again tomorrow
Hating fighting and stealing
broken windows from each other
Practicing a religion without a roof
The old testament
The new testament
according to the gospel
of the internal revenue
the judge and jury and executioner
protector and eternal bill collector



Secondhand shit for sale
Learn how to say Como Esta Usted
and you will make a fortune
They are dead
They are dead
and will not return from the dead
until they stop neglecting
the art of their dialogue
for broken english lessons
to impress the mister goldsteins
who keep them employed
as lavaplatos porters messenger boys
factory workers maids stock clerks
shipping clerks assistant mailroom
assistant, assisant assistant
to the assistant's assistant
assistant lavaplatos and automatic
artificial smiling doormen
for the lowest wages of the ages
and rages when you demand a raise
because is against the company policy
to promote SPICS SPICS SPICS



Juan
died hating Miguel because Miguel's
used car was in better running condition
than his used car
Miguel
died hating Milagros because Milagros
had a color television set
and he could not afford one yet
Milagros
died hating Olga because Olga
made five dollars more on the same job
Olga
died hating Manuel because Manuel
had hit the numbers more times
than she had hit the numbers
Manuel
died hating all of them
Juan
Miguel
Milagros
and Olga
because they all spoke broken english
more fluently than he did



And now they are together
in the main lobby of the void
Addicted to silence
Off limits to the wind
Confine to worm supremacy
in long island cemetery
This is the groovy hereafter
the protestant collection box
was talking so loud and proud about



Here lies Juan
Here lies Miguel
Here lies Milagros
Here lies Olga
Here lies Manuel
who died yesterday today
and will die again tomorrow
Always broke
Always owing
Never knowing
that they are beautiful people
Never knowing
the geography of their complexion



PUERTO RICO IS A BEAUTIFUL PLACE
PUERTORRIQUENOS ARE A BEAUTIFUL RACE



If only they
had turned off the television
and tune into their own imaginations
If only they
had used the white supremacy bibles
for toilet paper purpose
and make their latino souls
the only religion of their race
If only they
had return to the definition of the sun
after the first mental snowstorm
on the summer of their senses
If only they
had kept their eyes open
at the funeral of their fellow employees
who came to this country to make a fortune
and were buried without underwears



Juan
Miguel
Milagros
Olga
Manuel
will right now be doing their own thing
where beautiful people sing
and dance and work together
where the wind is a stranger
to miserable weather conditions
where you do not need a dictionary
to communicate with your people
Aqui Se Habla Espanol all the time
Aqui you salute your flag first
Aqui there are no dial soap commericals
Aqui everybody smells good
Aqui tv dinners do not have a future
Aqui the men and women admire desire
and never get tired of each other
Aqui Que Paso Power is what's happening
Aqui to be called negrito
means to be called LOVE


-Pedro Pietri
Pedro Pietri was a Puerto Rican Poet who had moved to New York in his youth and made his life and art an expression of resistance to the oppression he broke his spirit free of around him. His poetry/Prose was charactieristic of the language, images, and issues that were apart of everyday life for Puerto Rican immigrants and their children from the 50's till his death in 2004. He wrote about the workplace, the streets and prisons, the art of poetry, love, such vices as lotto and alcoholism and colonialism, often using humor and sarcasm. While he was respected by the intallectuals and acedemians, he was a respected organizer and activist as well.

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State Of The Union PT 2

Before i write on i have a confession... I am actually not a reader. I HATE reading because i actually do have trouble concentrating. I profess to be a writer in some capacity but in the same light, i find it hard to write.

So that is just to get that out for a couple of reasons. One being that in the last post i advised you to read. The reality is that i have read little, but drawn a whole lot back to my experience and the common sense that comes when you have allowed yourself to share in valuing the experience told of others. In essence, i can attribute any knowledge i have to my love for life and people. And my WILL to trust my conscience and follow the wynding road.

When you FEEL people strengthening themselves and accepting their capacity to grow, you know that you are being someone special. So i do what i do because it is the only way i can exist and feel real. The only way i can tolerate taking up life, time and space in a humble enough manner to understand that i am doing it as an extension of all three, more so than for just me. Therefore i am eternal. You are eternal as well.
And the struggle is just something passed on to you for you to pass along the same...
as we shape-shift and mold ourselves a nature which is truelly a reflection of our creator. For just like a work of art you may create, and how you understand that if up to par with the finest of the fine, that it will inspire art to branch from it forever before it dies. We will someday find ourselves having escaped the notion of an end. I truelly believe that before that day we would have formed to perfection.

whether in 50-100-150 or 50,100,150 years!


That being said, it is apparent that i have a utopic vision. It may take awhile because nobody is going to take us there. We will rise and fall as we slide along learning and building through trial and error; losing it all on the ground and gaining that much more as we confront the challenge to build and destroy again. Over and over. You are powerful beyond words. So if you do not understand exactly what the fuck i am talking about it is because what i am saying may not be strong enough to penetrate your senses. But just know that if you allow yourself to listen enough you would have found yourself having transcended a couple of lifetimes within a year, ten years, or three decades. Because i am speaking of responsibility not only over self but of your kind. And there is nothing ordinary about that in these times.
Someday you will bring it back to me... in some conversation that will make me feel absolutely stupid. And then that is when finally.. finnnnalllyy... i will tell myself "Cono, i'd better go back and read again"

Haha

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Anyway.
Moving right along.

We pass another Labor Day and although the name is self-explanitory i checked wikipedia to see exactly what the holiday was all about. And indeed it is a celebration of the working man, specifically the labor movements of unions and workers uniting to implement measures that will celebrate their work as well as set standards for workers rights (establishing the 8 hour workday for example). So the last blog was entirely fitting. As will be this one. I figured i continue on in this theme and drop another little history lesson, to sort of take advantage of the current events.
THIS TIME
I am bringing it closer to home.
I can recall learning this all in an Urban Studies class at Hunter College. The teacher was one who spoke a mile a minute, dropping dates, occasions, Acts/Bills, people in lectures that went on for an hour. Im pretty sure the guy contributed to what someday will result in carpel tunnel, then athritis in my wrists (AND I KNOW SOME OF YOU ARE BEING PERVERTED AT THIS POINT, like: "Naaaah nigga, that's not what gave you arthritis" JUST STOP!)
I scored 100 on his midterm and finished the class with a B+, mostly because i lost focus to the point where i wound up taking an incomplete for failing to hand in the term paper (which i eventually did hand in).

Anyway.

As people of color it becomes easy for us to look down upon ourselves as violent, as lazy, as stupid when we walk down the block between projects and witness the poverty and all the bullshit. All the images are negative, while on television sh!t is squeeky clean.
I KNOW! Up until the age of 7 i was raised in Fort Greene Brooklyn *BEFORE THE YUPPIES SPREAD FROM PRATT LIKE A BAD CASE OF THE CRABS. This was the Fort Greene you hear about in tales of the origional 50 Cent (a Fort Greene folk figure) robbing celebrity rappers. My memories are of a man named Micky who was shot and left a chunk of meat for me to stand over on the side walk... Of the Ocasio boys which became a negative allusion to be compared to in my home if we begun to misbehave. Of the public City Pool across the street from the Brooklyn Navy Yard, where we once had to jet from when i was like 6 because my step father was being chased.
After Fort Greene we moved to Sunset Park, where between the years of 1989 and 1997 i lived the majority of my rearing under an over protective mother, yet still got to witness murder which in the real hood sense means actually knowing who the murderED was and knowing who the murderER was and doing no justice by having to keep that shit to yourself, reguardless of the fact that you were practically best friends with the children of the dead. I witnessed like half a dozen people on my block contract HIV and wither away! Then we moved to Coney Island.

This is not some kind of claim to hood credibility. It is just so that you know that i have been there, in that mind state of wanting to get the fuck out the hood and of acting all proper around white people to over compensate for what i looked at at the time as a savage existance. Also it is an admission in the face of my own incompetances; incompetances i forever challenge to overcome. Like i said, i have to always be extra vigilant to keep from falling off of my plan. And my upbringing (constantly moving, going from emergency state to emergency state with the gas going off today and the light tomorrow) is indication of why it is extra hard for me. I along with my siblings have had to build the discipline within us. And they have done a better job at it than i have.

But yea... if you are Black or Latino or Southeast Asian or even Ethnic White in some cases you may have felt like you didn't stack up. We have internalized our oppression. To the point where some stop eating their ethnic food because it might sound weird to others, stopped wearing your hair a certain way or have become over conscious of your facial expressions and accent because it feels dirty to be yourself. To the point where you deny that ever was you, that you have found the real you, and that you are finally comfortable.. because now you pass.

Well check this out.
I am about to list specific events and people
that engineered the conditions under which we cultivated
this sense of self denial. And hatred for our own.

If there is any sense of value in your people it is in the elderly, am i not right? It is in your sweet grandmother who couldn't have done wrong! Not this woman who cooks for the fam.. Not this woman who sheds such wisdom and sense and makes you feel easy when the shit gets tough. It's in your grandfather who never means harm, and is as warm as milk in a babys stomach when you sit by him.
What is your image of your grand parents?
Well i can basically go straight for the head by putting it in the words of a great Puerto Rican poet (yes we have a few) named Pedro Pietri in his poem "Puerto Rican Obituary" which opens:
They Worked!
They broke their backs and read the bible and while yes they had their vices and drunk their spirits and had their dirty laundry as we do today, they as a community served the suits and shiny shoes that roamed this city. They hustled and bustled under the watchful eye of the old jewish supervisor lulling around with hands folded behind the back in the factory.


So what happend?
Have you never wondered?
What happend to get us to a point where
our communities assumed what we've viewed as an ugly reality.
When did we begin to set the conditions that make such tongue and cheek jokes as:
"15 minutes late: Puerto Rican time"
"carrying a knife"
"stealing hubb caps"
"babys out of wedlock"
"beating their wives"
etc...
That wasn't the dear abuela and abuelo we see!


If you read the last blog posting i wrote you get a headstart into the story. I encourage you to read it because i will not do so much to repeat, but i will be touching on some things. Let me start here though by reminding you if you do not remember or do not already know, that before WWII we had a VERY different culture than we have today. There was no such thing as a teenage culture! Teenagers worked. So much so that eventually the government had to pass child labor laws to make sure they at least didn't work as much. Eventually though, teenagers stopped working entirelly (for the most part). Only then was there a vested interest in creating movies for teenagers, in creating MUSIC for teenagers to dance to at proms, in creating teenage fashion, cool burger joints and drive ins. Before this of course the teenagers didn't have too much time on their hands.
So what happens after 5, 10 years of teenagers kind of sitting around waiting for parents to get home? They hang out, and this is when small neighborhood gangs begin getting popular in the 50's. Now.. im not necessarily talking about the Bloods and Crips. These were just a bunch of boys who ran with each other and set up a heiarchy in their hoods which they warned people from other hoods to respect. In fact, we are talking to a large degree: young white people, which might sound crazy because we are made to believe gang means mexican, black... but look at the wiseguys movies (like Bronx Tales) and it will occur to you what time i am talking about.

BOOM!
So now what do we have: Parents that work, their children (in some cases) looking for trouble.

Now just to give you a CRAZY moment of clarity, if you can even imagine it. SUBURBS haven't always existed! You heard it right! Before WWII the only ones who lived in the suburbs were pretty much hunters and hermits. It was Woods. It was not developed. They hadn't cut trees down to build anything because there was no reason to be out there. Factories, military bases, bars, churches and schools, offices, were all in urban areas, urban centers. There WAS something like an outer ring of meager suburban housing right outside the urban centers, which grew after the 1934 National Housing Act was created, but it wasn't until the Housing Acts of 1949 and and 1954 along with the the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 that America really spread out. After the highways were built people had access to vacant land far away and trees were cleared to build up property.
SO NOW YOU MAY BE ASKING: OK.. WHY DO I NEED TO KNOW THIS?
Well. Here is why. You may have spoken to your grandpa and grandma and they may have told you how back when they were your age their neighborhood was mostly German, or Jewish, or Dutch or Irish... ACTUALLY public housing (Projects) before the 60's were filled not with Black or Latino people, but with ethnic europeans such as the ones i have just listed. But eventually, your poor abuela and abuelo wound up surrounded by their own people and all of the people with white skin had disappered. And you need to know that this was no coincidence. This was ENGINEEREd by the Federal Government.
((By the way, if at any time you find yourself saying: SHUTT UPP.. here you go with that shit! Do yourself a favor, and google the Acts and Bills i list and read about them. What i do is i use Wikipedia just to give me a general idea. And after i read i scroll to the bottom to see what sources they have that prove whether or not there was good research done. If at the bottom there are links to credible sites and articles from recognized scholars -shit i google the scholars too- then i know that i have just learned something valuable!))

The Federal Housing Administration in the 1930's and 40's was giving loans to subsidize people who wanted to move to the suburbs. Namely, loans were given to solders, and cheap mortgages were given to regular citizens. ONE PROBLEM though... It is a problem that history treats as a minor one but is a major one for any of us who know what a crack head looks like because the gates that let the zombies in would soon open! These loans and mortgages were only given to Whites! History shows that at the time the Federal Housing Administration was practicing racism and actually stated in one of its manuals one year that racial integration would cause disharmony! Such practices as Redlining (in which real estate uses maps marked with red lines separating black neighborhoods from white neighborhoods) was used to promote segregation. Redlining along with Restrictive Covenants (which were agreements between real estate agencies to keep minorities away).

Slowly whites moved out and minorities would remain stuck where they were. What happened next would take jobs away, as factories, businesses and politicians loyal to their white base would follow them to the suburbs. Along with them went the Large Tax-Base they generated. So now you have minorities living on top of one another, fighting for jobs that have left, with the few who actually have jobs only combining for a small tax base. The tax-base is where money is pulled from to fund schools, sanitation and police, public hospitals, etc... What does this mean? That the schools get worse, the garbage doesn't get picked up, the police dont get paid enough to care and if anything become stressed and begin having fun brutilizing the people (take this you lowly Spic!), and hospitals deteriorate. It was the Housing Act of 1949 that gave money for Slum Clearance, which used eminent domain to move people from their residences, often times into public housing, for the sake of development *Urban Renewal* or as Iconic Writer James Baldwin called it "Negro Removal". A famous case was Lincoln Center, which is now a luxurious entity above midtown manhattan. Residents were moved to the South Bronx from that area (which was the area West Side Story was about), creating further poverty as minorities were squeezed together, and more projects were built to squeeze them in **and if you research to find out when most those projects in the Bronx were built you will see the years being in the mid 50's to late 60's**.

So where are we at? It's 1960 and people who a generation earlier had the priveledge of moving to the suburbs are now sending their kids to colleges, and building up wealth in the family. While minorities stuck in urban decay see their kids doing things that people do when they live stressed, with access to bad education and little work opportunity under poverty: They began selling drugs which were brought in and controlled by the Mafia who saw an opportunity to cash in, And so that the police don't fuck with their business the Mafia pays them off, And ultimately people begin fighting over turf and guns are introduced so that while only 10 years prior people settled beef with a fist fight, now they were shooting!

Bobby Kennedy would come along recognizing that the nation had failed us and promised to address poverty, but was assassinated! (by the mafia?)
Lyndan B. Johnson would come along with The Great Society which poured money into such programs as Head Start and Job Corps, and created Medicaid and Medicare. But couldnt afford to continue putting money into Vietnam and the ghetto at the same time so when inflation happend it was blamed on The War On Poverty rather than the War in Vietnam and those funds got cut. Besides that, the programs were a quick fix. The policies of the prior decades had not only generated poverty, they had INSTITUTIONALIZED racism and poverty and poverty became generational. You had children whose parents could not read, and whom could not read themselves, now being introduced to programs that were SUPPOSED to funnel them into the mainstream...
like colleges and wall street were just going to open the flood gates because a law that has been passed tells them to lol! No sweety racism doesnt just vanish like that. So we were STILL denied opportunity and the few who made it out to the suburbs were the few 'disciplined' enough to stay in their place. Just enough were let through so that things didn't get uncomfortable.
Meanwhile the drug trade is growing and basically keeping people alive while killing others. It was more than an underground economy, it was a supplimental economy, as the 1970's saw factories that left the urban centers in the 40's leave AMERICA all together for Asia and Latin America. And things get out of control. Prisons become a place to warehouse those in the 'slums' caught breaking the law, as such laws as the Rockafeller Laws which gave extremely harsh sentances for small amounts of drugs, were implemented, along with laws that arrested anyone packed up in a group of any certain amount of people.

Measures became Reactionary rather than Preventative! The focus switched from "We set them back by discriminating so lets create initiatives to get them back on their feet" to "Just punish them and send them to jail" ...Let's remember how i mentioned the police working with the mafia. These guys were REALLY CURRUPT back then, making money off the struggle and countless movies, from 'Serpico' to 'American Gangster' depict that.
As a result families were broken up, and a cycle of young black and latino children were raised throughout the late 70's and early 80's in single parent homes. And the worst was yet to come as the 80's would bring the crack era. And all you have to do is watch the movie "Traffic" to get a sense of what that might have been the result of. Or a wonderful documentary called "Bastards of the Party" which you can watch on Youtube in parts.


These are historical facts!
Not everybody got to be Obama. I was raised on welfare myself and can tell you that because of that i can NEVER look down on someone who receives it. Because i would be in aweful shape if the tax dollars of my fellow citizen didn't give me a chance. It kept us juusssst above water enough to give us a chance. And i should hope if anyone reading this whom is in their 40's or 50's are not resentful but proud for contributing a bit to my development.
That is not to say that i do not get frustrated with my people at times when i see that in fact they ARE taking advantage, ARE NOT trying the way they could. But i feel more sad about that than mad. And more determined to do what i do. Because that person has given up. That person was a child who dreamed of lights and some form of power. But for too long that person has been powerless. Most of the time in fact, they watched their parents, who faced much of the forms of disenfranchisement i listed above, give up and didn't have the best role models. So they dont realize they must Fight when their eyelids get heavy
as i have realized it and continue to fight through procrastination...
That they must come back to work the next day with a plan to get over the hump they faced yesterday, adapting continuously,
as i have done when i recognized that i was falling behind and becoming dependant on someone or something else to do my job...


Poverty is material
but it is also psychological
It is a mentality! That a child can only silence slowly..
it is a delicate mind state that can take over when you shoot that young man/woman down and reaffirm his belief that he or she is not able!
Because they WILL fail... as i HAVE failed!
and telling them that THAT IS TOO BAD FOR THEM... is like telling them they should have known, that coming where they're from, and being whom they are... that they would fail.
At the end of the day i do not wish to have a system which provides entitlements and money for nothing! I wish to be in a system where money IS nothing!
I do not believe it is a good idea to be dependant on anyone or for anyone to be dependant on me. But i do believe it is essential for us to understand that we are Co-Dependant on one another.
I will not follow any type of 'leader' which rises from the depths to 'save' me or my people. I will follow a code of solidarity/involvement in building resources together and sharing spaces where we can collaborate on plans for community development.

I will work
hard
to get others to work
for our collective youth and elders
for our collective self


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___Happly Labor Day___

State Of The Union (Unemployment)

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Blog 5 of August (Just meeting my obssessive compulsive quota)


I have been mostly uninspired to continue with the blogging because as far as i know i don't have much of a readership (with the exception of my number ONE reader Chan xoxo). But being that i have pretty much committed (challenge myself) to doing at least five postings a month i have anticipated sitting here before the monitor without much inspiration as to what to chatter up on next. There is plenty going on in the world, in the hood, in my own home, but i havent felt like taking it all on consistantly.
That changed when i got a text this morning from a dear person in my life (whom happens to identify as Conservative/Republican -aye i didn't tag him, he identifies himself as such). The text starts out: "FACTS, FACTS, FACTS" and goes on to claim that unemployment is at its lowest level in years. This begs a response, NOT because i am trying to have any type of ideological battle with anyone, but out of the good righteous deed that comes of the motto: "Each One Teach One".
It is not to be taken as a strike against anyone, but to be considered the responsible duty of a responsible citizen, to RESEARCH and provide ACTUAL facts. Not to merit an "I'm right and you're wrong" kind of thing, but simply to provide an objective basis off of which we can build in having real discussion about the state of things in the U, S, of A.


So without further adou, i share with you statistics given by the US Department of Labor (www.bls.gov)

If you link on to:
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm

You get an article which starts out giving you the state of unemployment as of July 08 (which is the most current, until August is summed up). PLEASE READ:



THE EMPLOYMENT SITUATION: JULY 2008

The unemployment rate rose to 5.7 percent, and nonfarm payroll employment
continued to trend down in July (-51,000), the Bureau of Labor Statistics of
the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. Employment continued to fall in
construction, manufacturing, and several service-providing industries, while
health care and mining continued to add jobs.


Scroll down that page and you will come upon a chart which breaks down by quarter how the unemployment rate has gone up over the year:
from 4.9 to 5.3 to 5.5 then 5.7


This means the unemployment rate is the highest it has been since 2003 when the rate was 6.0. Realize this: When George Bush came into office he was coming into a situation where Bill Clinton had gotten the unemployment rate down to 4.0. In Clinton's second term the country never finished over 5.0. During his first term he never finished BELOW 5.0. Since unemployment has been recorded (1948), the two highest unemployment rates occured during the Reagan administration (a WHOPPING 9.7 in 1982, and 9.6 in 1983) *And this is the guy the modern Economically Conservative Republican politicians aspires to be (can you say TAX BREAK FOR THE WEALTHY?)

Check for yourself. All of this can be verified if you link on to:

http://data.bls.gov/PDQ/servlet/SurveyOutputServlet?data_tool=latest_numbers&series_id=LNU04000000&years_option=all_years&periods_option=specific_periods&periods=Annual+Data

1981 7.6
1982 9.7
1983 9.6
1984 7.5
1985 7.2
1986 7.0
1987 6.2
1988 5.5
1989 5.3
1990 5.6
1991 6.8
1992 7.5
1993 6.9
1994 6.1
1995 5.6
1996 5.4
1997 4.9
1998 4.5
1999 4.2
2000 4.0
2001 4.7
2002 5.8
2003 6.0
2004 5.5
2005 5.1
2006 4.6
2007 4.6



Now let me put this into a bit of perspective because i have studied economics and history enough to be able to break this down for those who don't know. And i begin by citing how the paragraph i first linked you to stated that "Employment continued to fall in construction, manufacturing, and several service-providing industries, while health care and mining continued to add jobs.".
I can see why the job market has been growing in Health Care and in Mining. It makes perfect sense if you open a newspaper every once inawhile! Listen to both the Republican and Democratic campaigns... Health Care is on the radar. Specifically for the Democrats whom are proposing some kind of Universal Health Care (Health Care for everyone *under conditions we do not know yet). So if there is a GREAT possibility that hospitals will be getting alot more full than they are right now, you can imagine that hospitals, clinics, and other health institutions have been hiring staff to take on this wave, and more and more people are going to school to get into the health field. It is just being promoted.
As far as Mining, what do you think? Well... have you heard of "clean coal?" for example. The government is engineering an effort to find alternative sources of fuel so that the economy doesn't have to depend on foreign oil. So miners are being hired.

The issue i want to really concentrate in that paragraph though is a historical one that really has effected the working man for as long as the unemployment rate has been recorded. It is the loss of jobs in manual labor. Jobs in "construction and manufacturing", and now even jobs leaving which effect those in the "service" industry. Why are these jobs leaving? it is called outsourcing! These wealthy corporation owners look to cut corners because they are all about their bottom line: maximizing their profits: making as much money as possible and paying out as little as possible. So they have exported factory jobs, manufacturing and construction for the last 50 years because it has maximized their profits to pay the poor people in Latin America and Asia 40 cents an hour without benefits as opposed to paying minimum wage to a worker here, who will eventually also require benefits in addition to that. GET IT? Origionally it was just labor jobs, but eventually it got the the point where they were even sending service jobs overseas, which is why as you commonly have heard people complain, you can very well be speaking to someone in India about your bill when you call your phone company.

**I am neither Republican NOR Democrat but i will tell you this. The high numbers of unemployment under Reagan tell you what happens under the Modern Republican, whom gives tax breaks to the wealthy, HOPING they will create jobs in America. What happens? These companys happily accept the tax break, but there is no condition written into these tax laws that tell them the MUST keep their companies here! So they move the companies overseas which if anything TAKES JOBS AWAY, and to suppliment for these jobs, build BIG BOX chains like Walmart which allows them to sell the products they make in China (where they pay workers less) BACK to us. What do we get? JOBS... AT WALLMART! lol This was Reagans proposal for trickle down economics. But as the numbers during his presidency show you... jobs actually never did come!**


Now this issue gets very complicated because as this is happening it effects the international community as much as it effects us here. And read carefully because what i am about to state gives analysis to the reason why immigrants come here and effect jobs from the other end!

Example: a corporation goes overseas to a country with an agrarian economy (they live off their own land). Their land is bought and often even revoked (just taken) from regular citizens with the support of the government in those countries (because we pad their pockets) and the nature of that countries economy eventually transitions to one similar to the one here where of course you work for an employer that pays you, and with that money you try to survive: paying rent, food, leisure, whatever... PROBLEM IS that these countries have been introduced to companies that left this country because they didn't want to pay workers. So if they are not going to support a livable wage here (wasn't like our grandparents were asking to be spoon fed.. they just wanted livable wages), what makes you think they were going to go over there and give these people a livable wage! They have gone their to exploit the opportunity.. to exploit the worker. So trade deals like NAFTA and other agreements between us and the currupt governments of these countries (whose pockets we pad) ensure that to the advantage of US Corporations, minimum wage is outlawed, workers are threatened if they form or join unions, and like here the first people to suffer are the working people whose jobs get cut when THEIR economies stumble. And whereas two, three decades before people could live off the land, they wind up without work... without a way to survive.. and what do they do???

They come here, to work for less than YOU do. The same way that the corporations left you without work in the first place to go over there and pay THEM less.

These are called Neo-Liberal policies
and the manipulation of these '3rd world countries' economies is called Structural Adjustment



How do i sum this up?
by saying this...

We're FUCKED!

doesn't matter much if we are led by democrats or republicans, because the wheels have been in motion and the culture of our economy is international. Globalization. Now we are living this schizophrenic HYPOCRITICAL existance where we want to criticize China, while the sons and daughters of the wealthy are teaching their children Chinese so they can go over there some day. What's the message? If you want REAL money? you aint going to make it here!

This is an issue i cannot ABSOLUTELY tackle in ONE blog! I have read books, i have taken classes. All i can really do is encourage you to read books, take classes.. and if you cant then at least allow yourself to explore different sources of media. Because mainstream media doesn't give HISTORICAL analysis in depth. It only scratches the surface. So read The Village Voice, The Nation, and other sites that will give you real critical analysis. There is no reason to be offended. It's like people like to boast: "I am open to criticism" Our policies have to be open to criticism, or we do not learn from them. Too many people walk around comfortable with a blind sense of patriotism. All they know are slogans. And it feels good.. it is a high. And it can be scary when you are a bit uninformed about such concepts as "socialism" and the mainstream media is telling you this is a bad word.. and the more you dig you realize that the things i am telling you to read are supporting socialism as an alternative to this system of exploitation. But you know what.. out of every one child going to college out of the hood there are 100 whom are the sons and daughters who benefit from the very system i briefed you on above. Have parents whom are owners, executives in big industries. Out of every teacher from the hood there are 100 born out of the middle class whom dont want to hear about anything different because like George Carlin stated "we have cellphones that flip pancakes". So imagine being that one child from the hood (perhaps you ARE that child). You are entering institutions which do not speak to your suffering.
And you have a choice...
Be happy getting a house and moving OUT of the hood
until the housing market stumbles and the hood moves back to YOU (as was the case when my family first moved to Staten Island, the first or second latino family in that caldersac UNTIL like four years later when once again we were surrounded by our people, and in essence, back in the hood)

OR

Educate yourself and at least support policies, if not TAKING ACTION to transform things so that the system serves the people and not the other way around. So that we can hold politicans as accountable for our well being as they hold us accountable for proving we love this country by going to war, by sweating your ass off working to take care of your home, by paying taxes to keep shit running smooth.

I am not talking about picking up a gun!
They got to that point when the likes of George Washington took up arms against their own wealthy oppressors in the English.
We are nowhere near that point here in the U.S. right now.

But god damnit
lets start having respect for ourselves and where we came from!
and fucking LOVE for the next person. Reguardless of how fucked up they are. Because i know its hard to bother yourself with the thought, but that brother, that sisters life is as complicated as the shit above gets. And they may have given up.
Make it your responsibility to inspire this person even if in a minor way. Because trust me... you bury them on the spot... they may come back to bury you! You BUILD with this person, and you are doing a service to our communal existance.

And whether you like it or not.
You can never leave community.



Jobs for everyone! Why not?
It cannot happen over night.
But it starts with changing the psychology. Then slowly policies will come which only give breaks to those who trully serve the people.

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Olympic Spirit

This is going to be a diatribe on how the Olympics are no more moral than war!
I know it sounds ridiculous so you know what... if you wish you can stop reading now.
Otherwise SHeeeeYeDDup and read (dont know if i wouldve been so loose as to go there if i wasn't onto my second 40oz)


Let me ask you a question, a few questions:

-If there were games every four years in which all Men in the world organized their best players ___ and all women in the world organized their best players so that Men can challenge Women for supremisy, what would you think about that?

-How about all folk daker than a brown paper bag vs everyone lighter than a brown paper bag?

*HERE YOU GO WITH THE TREE HUGGER SHIT*

-What about all little wee wee guys vs all big wee wee guys?

*ROOM goES SilEnt




As a former athlete and student of the game (namely Baseball) i tend to lend great respect to "the natural"; the individual who made it and excelled off of little more than their grit/determination, knowledge/instincts, and physical ability. I suspect that while the general public ooos and ahhhs over the more polished players, (piveledged to have the best equipment, with trainers and dieticians whom keep a schedule for them, with access to not only some of the most healthy food but often genetically enhanced food) , the PURISTS (coaches and fellow players)marvel over the man whom trained running with worn down shoes yet wins the race, the boxer whom enters the ring looking malnourished and stands victorious, the female raised in a society where women are kept in their homes like veal and lift the gold. And this is how the purist feels REGUARDLESS of whether or not that athlete is your own or one from an opposing team.
But the olympics are not for the purists.. they are for the massess. And the media influences how we see these games.. it tunes our lens to apply our faith and pride in the flag over which these human beings compete rather than over the banner of human kind. It generates feelings of nationalism and patriotism in a world where such concepts are ALOT more transparent then they once were.

The Internet (World Wide Web)
Multi-National Corporations and 'world banks'
Interracial families
Intercontinental Political/ economic Unions: ex: European Union
Churches, ideological centers which organize people of all nations
ect...

The world is no longer divided by borders. It is no wonder a large number of people polled insisted that the olympics do not appeal to them, they do not watch them! When i think of someone sitting on front of the tv crying over some fellow countryman winning a medal i laugh. Now in days the teams are often not even completely made up of people whom are actually from the nations they represent at the games. You have Brazilians playing on the Italian team, Americans playing on the Russian team, Africans playing on the French team. It is all about the money, and if you have any historical dept of knowledge the olympics emphasize colonial dynamics. Of course the English, the US, the Russians, China, Saudi Arabia win every war, every olympics, every gain in the stock market... they have divided the world amongst them. They have monopolized the worlds resources and are the centers best to turn towards to attain 'the best' of anything.
BUT like i said... the world as one people are resisting this psychology of dominance. We dont want war because now, as opposed to the past, we have all the information and when considered, it doesnt often make sense... we are more readily prepared to speak about alternatives (your leader wants war and my leader wants war? well shit... he didnt ask us first. You know what... yours didnt ask yall first. Why are we listening to these jerks? get rid of him and we will get rid of ours here so that we, the more cooler heads, can discuss a way to turn this into a plus) ___Of course it isnt always that way and most of the times more complicated, but without a question that freedom for the common people to have a say exists today more than ever, where in the past when information wasnt so readily available___

Same thing with the Olympics. They promote division and some kind of subliminal fascism. Look at what it has done. Everyone is accusing everyone else of stacking the ranks: The chinese want the most team goals, they have installed bias judges :: The Americans want the athlete with the most medals so they count relay medals (which took team effort) amongst Phelps' golds

*OH NO YOU DIDN'T.. LEAVE PHELPS ALONE*

See what i mean?

Last i saw Michael Phelps he was hugged up on his moms titty talking to reporters bout how much he misses his XBOX and Cereal! (It'll be three years before we discover that like many before him over the last 2 decades, he took some kind of perfomance enhancement) OR maybe not

My goal is not to hate on anybody. More power to Phelps. He is a superb athlete. But im just saying. Some people apply a significance to these games that does not exist. Like there are thousands of people who all of a sudden feel as if though social injustice and imperialism do not matter because Phelps sweapt the games and proved Americas greatness. Why not that he proved his own greatness, and happend to be fortunate enough to have the best training. SOmewhere in that story i can admit just as well that it proves our greatness as a species, that we have developed the technology to cultivate what was impossible in the past. We can do this without allowing our pride to become our ignorance.


Anyway im tired of bitching
i have no sources to transform this rant into any kind of article
so i will leave it as a spear in the sky
If you find it coming your way and wish to return fire
i will gladly invite the debate

as for now im going to fall back...
seems this drink is putting me to sleep

Man Seeks

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Male, 26, NYC
5’11, Latino, medium build
olive complexion with brown hair and eyes
seeks a soldier who’ll ride!

Somebody to struggle with
On starch leftovers and train fare,
Dinner saved for a steakhouse chain
On holidays with enough left between us
To make all minimum payments
Water in the milk and detergent
Going blacksmith, then surgical
on a tube of toothpaste time to time
fine with delegating a banister in the hall
clothing line and I’ll squeeze, to save the dime.
She keeps score and budgets-in the bottle we pour
on the same napkin, in mix of dominoes crackling,
she's reached over the beat physique
of those who couldn't keep with the funk and
the blues and the punk and play it smooth
when the shit hit, opened the door to her baggage
on the top step and froze in their britches,
though she'd lettem know she got that;
together we could bring it all back
to where she got it from, and return
where we're starting at...
I’m seeking a partner I can love down
Late to work the day after I struggled to
concentrate at work; mind on a fight with her,
a lover with whom I can refuge to sanctuary
from grinding on menstrual cycles daily
having learned to bare her own nuisances
all but callused at the brow
fortifying stresses that weigh ME down
commanding the wheels to stand in my knees
feeling man in her will to survive, man up to me!


a Female, 23-29 from a hood like mine
5’3-5’8, Of Color, mileage on the joints
one of them brown eyed gal
who cultivates her hair to take its heights
and aint afraid to get low when shit gets tight

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Good time for a Party

Completed my summer season assignment with The Center For Family Life's Summer Youth Employment Program yesterday. It was a Friday which capped a whole week of goodbyes to youth whose names i hardly remembered even after 6 weeks (I get 8 workshops a week maaaaaannn, but yea my memory for names sux), but whom i gave a bunch and took a whole lot away from. It was more pleasing than emotional. I have maturen'd to the point where i can see them out the door and just feel inspired yet totally ok in the confidence they will make it in whatever way they may. Life is a beautiful struggle; some will learn that and grow from it, some will whither, but the natural order of things continues on.

About the workplace drama with co-workers. That came to completion yet lingered till the moment i left the facility. I had expected someone might bring it up because earlier in the week my co-facilitator basically let it be known that some folks were upset that i didn't mention names, and wanted to know if i was talking about them. Funny how shit gets twisted (more on that in a moment). So i expected it to come up again at our final meeting.. why not? Pizza and soda, reflection on a great summer, and oh yea... that thing Tony was talking about. The confrontation was invited by our supervisors whom thought it a good idea to bring the issue up because of some unresolved tension which carried over into the week. No doubt, no doubt... I was ready! So paper was handed out along with a pencil for each person to write a few words summing how they felt about Friday's meeting (*see the post before this one). People said how they felt. Half said they weren't bothered by the comments and the other half indicated that they indeed were aggrivated. So i addressed the group:

-While i apologize for pointing out one specific Sister's dilema with her group, as a point of reference for how we are lacking in our devotion to what we do (Fairly enough, because i wasn't in her class to know exactly what went on. And my reaction was more the becoming of an attitude i had saw/heard voiced/ permiating the group on down time), I DO NOT REGRET MY COMMENTS

-While i can admit that i broke a certain trust with my co-workers (And at my evaluation i even asserted that if there were one thing i regret about the summer it was failing to build better personal relationships with co-workers, and failing to confront them personally about issues before presenting it to the group), I DO NOT REGRET BRINGING OUT MY FRUSTRATIONS TO THE GROUP, THUS KEEPING A COMMITMENT TO MY RESPONSIBILITY TO THESE YOUTH, AND DOING IT IN THE PROFESSIONAL SPACE WHERE WE CAN DISCUSS IT PROFESSIONALLY


It wasn't enough for some folks. So i had to let them know! Whatever tension had built up during the week was the result of conversations which occured OUTSIDE of the space on peoples personal time (basically gossip!) When i said that i saw a few heads nod, and shoulders freeze close (BOOYAAH!)
I was asked by one co-worker (with whom my problem WAS NOT with, yet whom with i am constantly butting heads because she just must not like me or SUTTIN!) to stop addressing my concern as a general one and to "name names" and speak directly to whomever i had a beef with.
She missed the point. I didn't bring my concern to the table because of any specific individual. It was a culture which was building amongst us. Alot of who cares, which to me is absolutely unacceptable because as i stated "This is what i do! And i will not allow my job to be degraded as some babysitting gig" SoRrY! So i reminded her how when i made the comments last week i made it clear that i was addressing everyone in the room, including myself for having slacked, and that i wasn't sending any so called "subliminal messages" (In fact, the person most flagrant about their oppressive/negligent attitude towards the youth WAS NOT EVEN AT THE MEETING in which i addressed the issue... so had i named names i wouldve been wrong reguardless because then it would have been "ohh.. you are talking about someone who isnt here to defend themself") -by the way it's amazing to me how all of a sudden it is more professionally acceptable to point out the individual, when in fact i was warned against 'attacking' when i addressed my co-worker/Sister last week (to whom i've since apologized), and how all of a sudden the proper place to speak about workplace issues is not in our meetings but at the lounge on Friday evening. Almost forgot, that we must keep our petting session appointment now.. because that's what our meetings have been were it not for me to bring some shit to the table.
So anyway yea, i let it be known that i was addressing the whole group.. then i let this female have what she asked for, and i confronted HER... D I R E C T L Y! expressing how i feel that since i've known her she has shown a tendancy to have to dominate conversations and space and how the fact that she tried setting perameters in framing how i am to address individuals DIRECTLY, based on her own annoyance with my so called "vague" approach, was precisely an example of how she feels she always has to be at the helm of a conversation WITH the final word.
\
She broke into tears, for a moment hell broke loose as folks moved to the edge of their seats, one brother (whom was supporting me) walked out, having predicted this was EXACTLY what would happen if i was to address anyone directly.

After that i realized that there were just some people who were not going to back down. They weren't going to conceide their pride. Imagine talking shit behind someones back for a whole week, then that person is actually addressing the fact that you have been talking shit and that that person does not regret anything they've said.. in fact they've reasserted their position. Nobody wanted to walk out of there feeling like an ass! They was fucking with the wrong person then. I recognized that i had gotten my point across to those whom took my comments for what they were and que se joda with everyone else. So i fell back from that point on and let the 2 or three stragglers get their pieces out. Even said sorry at the end of it all because in all reality, it wasnt supposed to result to this, and i really did want to kill the tension. I really did want to walk away with hugs. There were some increadibly talented and sincere Youth Workers in the group. Unfortunately though the love i once felt (like first two weeks) never came back for a goodbye. So i walked out of that meeting civil yet alone. Content with the fact that some of the younger workers got a chance to see that work isn't always just coming in to fill your hours. That they are apart of a movement whether they know it at this point or not.. whether they truelly do pick up that guard or not!

Exude confidence, Exude hope, strength/ courage
be critical, always honest
and all out of love!

It's the same approach i take with my youth, with my family...


That night i went to my boys to have a dring and smoke and to speak a few rhymes. I was really tense still though. I cant smoke when the mood aint chill and the cold shoulder/isolation i had felt throughout the week had me exhausted. It was the perfect time for a party. And we had one planned here in the BX for my roomate on Saturday (just a couple of hours ago). My other roomate called me while i was at my boys house getting nice. He was pissed because we had planned to clean on Friday night. I vowed to get here in the morning and i did. I brang groceries, cleaned, cooked and helped host something like 70 people for a good man. Being the helping hand is what i needed. I kept myself busy. Didn't know anyone so didn't really have a choice, im not the initiator of convoz with folks i dont know, takes me sometimes months before i can warm up to anyone. Eventually the house just got too packed and so i took myself up to our roof for the first time, where i just observed the night with the bass bumping below. There i stood for 3 hours, even napping. Then i returned to the small bunch of people who remained. Had a good easy talk with some brothers and sisters on our lives and schooling and beliefs and such (all brief). Then they evaporated one by one.
In the end it was just three of us cleaning up.


This has been a summer of mixed emotion for me. Not very eventful yet very important in the time i have gotten to spend with people i need to be spending time with (namely my daughter). Building with folks whove dedicated their lives to do what i do *some amazing people i might add. But there is this sense of urgency and lethargy mixing like something that stales to brittle. Im not where i want to be, OR i am going where i want to be and realizing that it will be more work than enjoyment away from such. Which is ok for me. Totally ok with me.


I hear things i never have
I see things i never have


Progression?

Keeping It Real At Work

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Five/ Six years ago i was working as an Assistant Group Leader with the Women In Need Child Day Care Program on the West Side of Midtown. During the school year i worked part time in the afterschool program and during the summer full time. I worked there for three years. While there i met and aquainted myself with working amongst a diverse staff. This i appreciated. What sucked was that while it was the first time i had worked with adults (Before WIN i worked with primarily with my teen peers), ranging between 16 and like 65, it happened to also become the job that would introduce me to workplace gossip and two-facedness.
You could just hear the whispers from the store on break, rambling-on way down the block and in the rectory's cafeteria. And when you were alone with the snake, they spoke of everyone you thought you knew them to be close with.
The worst thing about it all was the way they would speak about the children themselves. There was no doubt that some of the youth were pains in the vein you cant find in the ass but there comes a point when the shit talk gets disgusting (children will be children.. I mean come on).

Lately i have found myself trying to find my way out of the same situation. Only now i am experienced an additional five years in youth services and am vocal about destroying that attitude. And it has become obvious that some co-workers are irritated with the fact that i am trying to drag their mind out of the gutter along with my own. It has become apparent that they feel i take my job too serious, that i am "messing up the curve", an going out of my way to make problems/ create an uncomfortable workspace.
There's alot of "Oh well, there are only three weeks/ two weeks/ one week left" going around...
Alot of "These kids cant even read, and they want to go to college... I'm looking at them like: are you foreal" going around...
Maybe it isn't fair that some of my haste comes from the fact that i have found out that people five years younger than me, with waaaaayyyy less experience are getting paid the same as me... That i took a four dollar cut to work where im working... That we never had the liberty of openly introducing our own ideas into the curriculum... and i may be taking it out on the culture of our program at our meetings. From my perspective, not only am i being undervalued and playing a mentor role to younger workers, but it has increasingly become clear that i am working along with a team that sets the integrity below a standard i have worked hard to be at. I've reacted by acting on my sense of responsibility to be highly critical.

Example: At our last meeting i finally confronted a pair of Workshop Leaders whom have come complaining to our meetings, week after week, about how their teens just wont follow through with activities, partly because they are 'incapeable' shall we say intellectually (whether or not due to their economic condition), and partly because of behavior (whether or not due to their economic condition).
My response was "You guys have let these young people down"
Why did i respond this way? because every day during lunch all these Workshop Leaders do is complain and mock the youth, posturing a resistance to the attitude of these youth in a way i can only explain as reactionary... as if though the elders are guarding their pride against any perceivable challenge... from a YOUNG MAN/WOMAN.
"Im not going to stress myself", "If they don't want to be here they can leave"
This has been the attitude.
At meetings they put on a different face:
"Oh, these kids need something different, i can't change the world in 7 weeks"

What my co-workers are saying is true. Some of these youth come with really deep rooted issues. Some really can't read very well; Some really do find it hard to stop speaking and thus distracting a lesson; Some really do come in not wanting to participate... But it was never in our job description to change the world. It IS in our job description to engage the youth in workshops, and GOD DAMMIT if that doesn't work with plan A you move on the plan B.. If plan B doesn't work you get support from fellow co-workers to develop a fucking plan C!
My problem is that my co-workers are not willing to be SELF critical about the job they are doing. They have out their own mouths insinuated that they are not willing to go out of their way to evaluate why their workshops havent been successful. So they've been giving up on the youth and running lame workshops for three/four weeks where they allow the youth to do what they want, or run though activities without an effort at debriefing and processing the lessons students should be internalizing. They are warehousing the youth and putting them through fucking doggy tricks, because that is what group work activities become when there is no discussion and reflection on purpose!

Years ago i may have been just as annoyed by some self annointed big shot in the room whom thought he knew all the answers and was telling me how to run a workshop... but there is one thing i can say... I may have failed, but i always tried... I may have gone two, three classes in a row lacking anything of substance while i straggled for new ideas (it's been a long time since that time... i can pull 100 activities out my ass at this point), but i never shitted on the youth! I never blamed my own inadequacies on them! In fact i wouldn't be around any longer were that to be the case. I would've dropped out a long time ago, having determined that i cannot work with youth. In fact i have gone the other route. I have adapted. I have given the power to THEM. They run the lessons. I am invisible. Every once inawhile i put a trap in place, a challenge to overcome, a question to face up to. Other than that i smile, i grin, i speak low, i yell... but i do it to their heart and not to their face!


At one time i was all about challenging the captain (and i am talking about very specific instances! I quit my last job for example because in a dispute between our youth and a security guard at George Westinghouse HS my Program Director wouldn't support me in challenging the Security Guards threat to arrest youth for simply cursing at them___along with an instance or two of that same boss of mine refusing to support a partner and I's decision to expose our youth to historical figueres of their own background). I went after my Coordinator or Director. Still today watch out because if i can sniff out that you are tryng to play me or my fellow worker i am going to rally some type of response. But i take this more personal. Sometimes i have to step back from challenging the system so that i can put a calling out to my fellow worker to assume responsibility over what it is we've committed to take on.
As a result i find myself isolated. I don't get the giggles i used to get when i free a whitty remark into the tense room. People no longer look me in the eye. I am no longer invited to go out after work (although there does remain a couple whom DO extend an invitation; real recognize real). Today in an appreciation circle (it is our last week) i was one of the last to receive a compliment, and it didnt even come from a peer.. it came from the supervisor "for bringing topics it is sometimes scary to confront into our discussions".


I feel like a trader
For sticking up for our youth

Fuking Shame considering when i'm called into the office for evaluation my response to my relationship to my co-workers and my judgement on the job their doing is positive. Because i answer to my own weaknesses. And if there is a weakness of my people i readily point to how i have failed them.
But what happens when half of your people, and they are the elders, the established; are neglecting the other half of your people- those at the mercy>?
This is the sad reality in our schools. Teachers themselves don't respect the job they do. It is just a job to them. They are on the clock. And politicians are opening the flood gates for even more of these apathetic jerkoffs into the system with programs that invite paraprofessionals looking to cross over from other workfields, whom often lack the passion to teach and only seek a job with decent pay and so many breaks free. They are opening the flood gates by chosing to place principals with expertise in business management over principals whom have strong theories and methodologies about teaching. That's a whole other subject, but holler if you hear me.

Whatever it is... im not down with that lay back sh!t nomore. If you are a fukkin stock clerk work hard at what you do, if you are a hairdresser or a flyer distributer. Secure your work, and in the mean time inspire those around you to move as well. What you will find is that a whole lot can change and you can win your respect and even success caring about what you do. If it isn't for you move on. I mean, i understand sometimes we gotta take what we can get (like i said i took a four dollar pay cut)... but understand that you will either someday find yourself in a position of influence (whether in the heirarchical or horizontal sense), or you will just live check to check working a conveyor belt.. waiting to be laid off with nothing to do but dig yourself deeper in the shits when youve gotta take your grumpy ass to the same job with another company, hating what you do, and fucking up the quality of what and whom it is you are working with. You will be the Old ladies in the lunch room with nothing better to do then talk about how this little girl is gonna be a hot one, and that little boy must be slow.


That's that bullshhhh

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