Parable of a Real Woman by Marvin X

There was a man who had many women in his life. They had come and gone, with himself at fault most of the time. But he wouldn't give up, he continued his self improvement and search for that special woman.

He talked with elder women about what he should do. One told him he'd never had a real woman! If so, she would still be with him, no matter what, through thick and thin, up times and down times. Well, he asked, how would he know when such a woman was in his presence. First, clean up your own act, she said. Scoop your own poop.

Rid yourself of defects of character. Make amendments to all those you have harmed in life. It takes humility to do this.Still, how will I know the real woman? The older woman answered, you will know because when she comes over your house and sees something amiss, she will take authority to correct the situation. If your house is dirty, she will immediately ask if she can clean it as a favor to you, as an act of love.

She will not want any money for her services. And she will clean your house as it has never been cleaned before because she knows what she is doing. Yes, she is a pro, not only with house cleaning but with every thing she does, including her love making. She will make sure you are satisfied and herself as well.She will demand respect and will respect you.

She will demand freedom and give you freedom. She will speak in the language of love so smooth that it will be like a razor cutting to the heart. You will be bleeding to death but not know you are cut.You will do what she suggests and do it willingly because it will not be a demand but a request said so subtle you won't recognize it for what it actually is: a demand.

And you will love doing what she requests.When you need space and time to yourself you won't need to explain, she will pick up the vibe.And you will do the same for her.She will not be jealous and envious of your talent and skills or how handsome you are to other women.

She knows she has you in her pocket because she is confident of herself, and not worried about some other woman taking her man.If you are taken by another woman, it must be the will of God that you go. She knows God will replace her emptiness with someone even better than you. But she will give you time to get a grip on yourself and find your way back home.

Just don't take too long and when you come home don't be asking about what she was doing while you were gone. A real woman will put her resources at your disposal if you are worthy of them, as the prophet Muhammad was treated by the wealthy trade woman Khadijah. There is no selfishness in love. All is for the beloved, but a wise woman ain't no fool. As the song says, the greatest thing you will ever do is love and be loved in return.The man thanked the elder woman for her wisdom and departed on his search.

11 March 2010

from The Wisdom of Plato Negro, parables/fables, Marvin X, Black Bird Press, Oakland.

Black Bird Press News & Review: Call for musicians, poets, vendors to support the benefit Sunday for Y.E.S., Youth Empowerment Services After School Program

Black Bird Press News & Review: Call for musicians, poets, vendors to support the benefit Sunday for Y.E.S., Youth Empowerment Services After School Program

Obama On Race & Criminal Justice- Full Speech To NAACP

Free Political Prisoner Richard Maroon Shoats--40 years down in American gulag

Richard Shoats, Jr. and Marvin X, Philadelphia, PA 2012 photo Nisa Ra

Demand President Obama give a general amnesty to all political prisoners and prisoners in general, unjustly arrested, tried and convicted, 2.4 million in world's largest prison house, America! How many of the 1% Wall Street criminals who robbed the world have gone to prison? American prisons are full of drug addicted, mentally ill and economically depressed black, brown and poor whites, men and women, many if not most lacked proper legal representation at the time of their arrests.

--Marvin X

Obama Will Make First Presidential Visit to Federal Prison

 

Why Obama cut prison sentences of 46 drug offenders

President Obama on Monday is commuting the the prison sentences of 46 federal drug offenders as part of a broader effort to make the criminal justice system more equitable.

By Jessica Mendoza July 13, 2015 3:20 PM

President Obama announced Monday that he was cutting the prison sentences of 46 nonviolent federal drug offenders, including 14 who were serving life sentences.

“These men and women were not violent criminals, but the overwhelming majority had been sentenced to at least 20 years ... their punishments did not fit the crime,” Mr. Obama said in a video released on the White House Facebook page. “I believe that America, at its heart, is a nation of second chances, and I believe these folks deserve their second chance.”

The decision is part of a broader bipartisan effort to make the criminal justice system more equitable. Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have been working together on legislation, and in 2014 the US Department of Justice widened the path to clemency for federal drug offenders.

For his part, Obama will spend the week focused on plans to overhaul the criminal justice system: On Tuesday, he will lay out ideas toward fairness during a speech to the NAACP, and will become the first sitting president to visit a federal prison Thursday when he goes to Oklahoma’s El Reno Correctional Institution.

Some critics have noted that the commutations “are symbolic and are dwarfed by the scale of the issue,” The Christian Science Monitor’s Sanya Mansoor wrote on Saturday. Even Vanita Gupta, former deputy legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union and now the top civil rights prosecutor for the Justice Department, told the Monitor last year that clemency expansion alone won’t be enough to cure the system’s ills.

But, Ms. Gupta added, “I think [it] marks a turn away from the old business as usual in the federal criminal justice system.... I think the president is feeling empowered to do this in part because there has been tremendous conservative leadership on this in the states for several years now.”

Monday’s action brought Obama’s total number of commutations during his term to 89 – the most of any president since Lyndon B. Johnson, who commuted 80 sentences in 1966. Unlike a pardon, which erase any legal liabilities as a result of conviction, commutation cuts the punishment short, but leaves the conviction in place.

Obama wrote letters to each of the 46 individuals to notify them of the commutation.

“Now it is up to you to make the most of this opportunity,” the president wrote. “It will not be easy, and you will confront many who doubt people with criminal records can change.

“I believe in your ability to prove the doubters wrong, and change your life for the better,” he added

This report includes material from the Associated Press.

Call for musicians, poets, vendors to support the benefit Sunday for Y.E.S., Youth Empowerment Services After School Program

Dear Friends,

We call upon all conscious artists, poets, musicians, vendors to participate in this benefit for Y.E.S., Youth Empowerment Services, an after school program. For more information, please call 510-520-6685. If you can't attend, call Y.E.S. and pledge a donation.
--Marvin X

 

Marvin X will speak/read and autograph books at this event

Reflections of an ignut college student in White Supremacy Academia

 Marvin X and his Muse Fahizah Alim; she inspires the poet

 plato Negro at his Academy of da Corner, 14th and Broadway, downtown Oakland

 Poet Samantha Akwei and Tarika Lewis

 Poet Samantha Akwei

Oh, God, have mercy on me, for I was deaf dumb and blind but thought I could see. I was a college student at San Francisco State College/now University. I was in the cafeteria playing bid whist when Brother Edward came to save us with Muhammad Speaks. Oh, Allah, please have mercy on me for I rejected your angels sent to save me. We cursed Brother Edward, told him to git the fuck out our faces with that Muhammad Speaks bullshit, we spit on him, though he could have retaliated with Karate but he humbled himself to save us deaf dumb and blind college students who thought we knew everything but didn't know shit, not a goddamn thing. But Brother Edward persisted, humbled by the knowledge he had from the Honorable Elijah Muhammad.

No matter how much we cursed him, spat on him, ridiculed him, he persisted with the truth until we submitted and in the end we did. Some of us joined the Nation of Islam, others joined the Sunni movement of Waritth Din Muhammad, some became Shi'ite. But Brother Edward was the evangelist.

And so today, we honor and praise Brother Edward, Nation of Islam soldier, who saved us deaf dumb and blind intellectuals, who knew nothing but thought we knew everything. Thank you Brother Edward and all the FOI who came on campus to save us deaf dumb and blind students.

--Marvin X

I've been listening to Wish I, a CD of an interview of Marvin X on KPOO-Radio in San Francisco. Though I been checking out Marvin for a season I never been with him in the flesh and never heard his voice except on the page, and in cyber-communications. And from reports by Kalamu ya Salaam. The Wish I CD affirmed how I imagined him and how I tried to characterize him in my review of his book of poetry, Land of My Daughters.

 

Funny, outrageous, challenging Marvin X is on the same tier as Amiri Baraka and Kalamu ya Salaam in putting on an entertaining program. For in "Why I Love Lesbians,"  Marvin says, "In their hatred is drama / I love drama." Marvin's first love is theater; he is poet and shaman, skilled in manipulating the passions like  the preacher in the pulpit, or the Harlem soapbox orator, or the barbershop orators found throughout the black community. In his Wish I Could Tell You the Truth--Essays, Marvin X has created a book that mirrors the orature in bull sessions, ubiquitous in black speech and poetry, in the barbershop.

That is, Malcolm X ain't got nothing on Marvin X. Still Marvin has been ignored and silenced like Malcolm would be ignored and silenced if he had lived on into the Now. Marvin's one of the most extraordinary, exciting black intellectuals living today--writing, publishing, performing with Sun Ra musicians, reciting, filming, he's ever engaging, challenging the respectable and the comfortable. He like Malcolm dares to say things, fearlessly, in the open (in earshot of the white man) that so many Negroes feel and think and speak on the corner, in the barbershops and urban streets of black America.

Discourse by exaggeration and humor has its place in serious intellectual enquiry. Everybody don't have to wear the nerdy mask and inky cloak and speak in the autocratic tones of academia. Marvin's dramatic style and political approach could not be tolerated at the University since Ronald Reagan forced him out of the California university system, which signaled the castration of black studies at white universities. 

In short, Wish I Could Tell You the Truth is one of the most daring, innovative, entertaining group of "essays" I ever had yet to read. In a true sense this book is a literary replication of the barbershop experience. The street rap. Yet much more sophisticated, informed, daring, philosophical. And it is sheer arrogance and snootiness that he has been ignored or overlooked by PBS, CNN, and FOX. And by black literary societies and colleges. Because his thinking is dangerous, and his simple courage is infectious. And anybody who's heard him know that Chris Rock and Amiri Baraka ain't got nothing on Marvin, once he gets to improvising. Marvin is a truth teller, and just as funky as James Brown.

Wish I Could Tell You the Truth is, too, an intellectual and philosophical autobiography. Boswell has nothing on this  journalistic foray, that sweeps the planet in its thinking. Marvin is a storyteller. Like Abby Lincoln, Marvin's voice matches the story he tells. He ain't no Cornel West. With Marvin you cannot separate the story from the voice, one reinforces the other. Though everyday speech is in Marvin's writing, his writing is artistic writing and different from his oral performances. Marvin is no linear thinker and so you have to take him in in the all in all, between the covers, you got to read him fully to appreciate truly what he has achieved as an artist and as a man.

The tone of Wish I Could Tell You the Truth is established in a forty-page autobiographical note beginning with his birth during an age of war, the impact of broken family life, youthful love, exposés, going on to his academic career, antiwar activism, criminal on the run, hustler, civic reformer, and revolutionary. This autobiographical section is primarily episodic and expressionistic rather than linear and analytical. It is Marvin's expertise as storyteller that carries us forward for his views are often surprising and shocking. Marvin don't pull no punches when lives are involved.

"Negroes see me and they get on a skateboard," Marvin observes. "I don't have no  money, I ain't got no bank account, I ain't got no job, and I ain't had  no job in twenty five years, you understand, I don't have no power but the word, and Negroes run from me, scare to death, they scared, Mama . . .  but they ain't scared of doing whatever the white man tells him. Going to Iraq, dying like flies . . . won't die for a purpose. . . . dying on the streets of America. . . . for no purpose, at all . . . they learn all this from the white man, really. Because that's how they think. Bush think there ain't no consequence to his actions. . . Bush always needs another cowboy . . . but he don't understand . . . the Indians are coming . . . THE INDIANS ARE COMING . . . they coming for you . . . the Ancestor Spirits of the Black Man and Woman are coming for you, Mr. White Man, unless you clean up. . . . you understand."

Now this kind of speech scares Black Academia in the company of their white colleagues. And the white professional does not want to endure his female colleagues squeamish in their chairs because of Marvin's voice. But Marvin is a radical advocate of free speech, "Don't sell me no sheetrock, for my pipe. . . . Give me some love, give me some truth. It does not matter whether you black or white . . . the weapon of today is consciousness, not color . . . we been trained to be warriors . . . God was training us for war . . . but they [we] don't have the right word, the right directions . . . turning them into constitutional slaves."

Well this kind of nationalist speech would make a Martin Kilsonsquirm. There's no place in the academy and black studies programs for nationalists like a Marvin X or an Amiri Baraka or a Kalamu ya Salaam. Three of the most extraordinary men (writers, artists) of our time alienated, separated, barred from the Academy, and the "accepted" (the "pragmatic activists") embarrassed by their presence and speech. 

In his response to Reverend Eugene Rivers' "Beyond the Nationalism of Fools: Toward An Agenda for Black Intellectuals" (Boston Review), Kilson argued we don't need "a new-mode Black nationalist discourse issue . . . . For me, all variants of Black nationalist modalities have spent-their-load, as it were, whether here in US, in the Caribbean, or in the many African states where it is fully bankrupt." So Marvin has nothing a Kilson can respect, unworthy of his intellectual attention or recommendation. 

Marvin and Baraka have "spent their load"!!! Is that the real deal? Or just the Academic Black Ball. But this kind of autocracy within black political discourse and acts and educational arenas should have been dispensed with yesterday. Here's a matter in need of serious consideration. If the Du Bois Chair at Harvard is going to be the Chair for Black Humanities and the political, social, and cultural arbiter of Black Life and Culture, shouldn't we black folks have something to say who sits in the Chair? 

Baraka had more books, more scholarship than Skip Gates, more organizational skills, he was  more representative of the sentiments of black youth and Du Bois, an activist scholar, par excellence. But we didn't have a hand in it, we folk, because white money is more persuasive, than dedication and sacrifice, and even community shaming. If we were truly a nation we could by vote choose our representatives and leaders. We wouldn't have to wait for good white people to choose them. Let's vote for our Idol.

So Marvin writes: "The activist scholars were long ago removed from academia as a threat to Western scholarship and community liberation. Safe, qualified negroes were brought in who would control the natives and have them chasing rocks in Egypt rather than stopping gunshots in the hood by providing alternative consciousness. . . . Black studies was not about degrees, but the liberation of a people . . . . the community would be better served giving consciousness to dry bones in the hood."

But Strong Men keep on pushing, despite isolation, alienation, and banishment. There ain't no stopping Strong Men, says Sterling Brown. And Marvin is a nationalist with a global consciousness. But our primary "mission is self and community development, not esoteric journeys to the Motherland to discover much to his dismay and utter disappointment that he is not an African but a pitiful American mutation, a mongrel, in short, a white man in black face, a disconnected  descendant, even worse than ET because he can't call home even when he gets there." 

But it is "even more important that he makes peace with the trees and swamps and bayous of Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana, then perhaps the ancestors in Africa will accept him and assuage his mind . . . better . . . connect with the ghetto blacks he . . . earnestly desires to escape." We are schizophrenic (you know, Du Bois' "double consciousness"). Negroes "got ten different personalities . . . negroes know  how to act. . . Tom was a killer, he had murder in his heart."  So for the dope gangs, we need to "make peace with them, teach them to make peace with themselves." But we also have too many black celebrities, like Crouch, Cosby, and West, "cultural police for the black bourgeoise," destructively "Beyond the Ignorance Zone."

So, you see, Marvin is refreshing. He's a Liberator. He has freed up contemporary black public speech, primarily controlled by the hip hop industry, Hollywood, the communication industry, and educational factories like Harvard and black public schools. He's like no Muslim you have heard speak. And this is odd for the usual impulse is to think of Muslims as limiting speech and especially the speech of women. For he knows the "light don't come on if you don't turn the switch. . . . Flip the switch on, dummy . . . you got to put on the armor of God and you can walk through the valley of shadow and death. . . .  I had the armor of God  on me when I was out there, when I was out there in the projects, on crack."

War, religion, and cultural ethics are the steak of Marvin's extended discussion. Wish I Could Tell You the Truth is thus cultural criticism at its best. "In the Name of Love," Marvin explains, "Love ain't love if it cuts too deep." For many Marvin probably cuts "too deep." It's a book that would frighten a Tavis Smiley or a Jesse Jackson or a Skip Gates. Though he says he's a Muslim, on reading Marvin you can only guess he is a Muslim. He don't pray five times a day and he don't ascribe to some of the cultural practices of some Muslims and thus he has made a call for a "Radical Spirituality."

The slave religion cultivated by black mega-preachers and Saudi-supported Islam are better understood as a "religion box." Marvin continues, "But we know the people have been hoodwinked and bamboozled, therefore it is the mission of the truly spiritually conscious to step to the front of the line and represent, not hide in the closet and let the masquerade continue." Marvin is wary of religious institutions that exist for the priests primarily. "We have been told to seek ye first the kingdom of heaven and all things, yea, even political and economic things will be added unto ye."

Marvin is against imperialist wars, e.g. Iraq and Haiti. He was a Vietnam-era anti-war activist on the run, from Canada to Central America. And he takes position on Israel that no black academic would dare take, no black elected official would allow pass through his lips. "Israel is the number one problem in the Middle East. Israel is no less a fascist, nazi, apartheid state backed with the money and armaments of America. Israel is the only threat to peace in the Middle East." 

Whether Israel is the "only threat" my political sympathies do not extend so far. What's troubling is Israel is beyond criticism, if you want to win public office in America. And our 800 public black officials and academicians know how their bread is buttered. And as it used to be with our black mayors, there is no full criticism, but rather a mumbling, hypocritical silence. Nationalism is okay for the Jew, but not the American Negro, for they ain't got no guns and capital, and certainly, thank God, they ain't nuclear.

So in the spirit of Marvin I'm gonna call on and thank God, Allah, Jesus, Jah, Jehovah, Buddha, Karl Marx, and Lenin, and call on the Ancestors to bless you with a copy of  Wish I Could Tell You the Truth. Don't run from Marvin, give him an ear. The brother got truths you need to hear, that will clean us up. Liberate the captive. Build a new black world, real free zones. And he's got some lies, too, but it's all good. Contrary to Kilson's view, life is still in black nationalism. For Marvin Black is White and White is Black. He ain't fearing being fired, he says what he wants to say. . . . Praise God in the name of Love.

Note: Wish I Could Tell You The Truth is out of print. 

*   *   *   *   *

Wish I Could Tell You the Truth

Essays by Marvin X

Contents

Chapter One: Tale of an Angry Old Man	12
Chapter Two: Manifesto of The University of Poetry	52
Chapter Three: Toward A Radical Spirituality	73
In Search of my Soul Sister	75
Terrorism in the World Post 9/11	83
On Cecil's Brown's "What Happened to My Black Studies?"	84
Has Nature Turned Against America?	87
America, the Fire This Time	89
Black Studies, Treading Water	90
Beyond the Ignorance Zone	91
Bush, Last American Tragedy	92
Farrakhan's Final Call	94
Mass Murder in the Middle East and the Peace Movement	95
Michael Rode His Boat Ashore	97
Minister of Poetry Brings Tears to Sacramento	97
MMinister of Poetry Replies to Dr. Julia Hare	99
War in Iraq	100
Of Spiritual Things	104
Chapter Four: Crazy House of the Negro Book Tour	107
Open Letter to the Poets of Detroit	109
Human Earthquake Rocks New York City	110
Marvin X, Sonia Sanchez and the Crazy House Band	112
Live in Philly at Warm Daddies	113
Speaks to the Gullah Nation, South Carolina	114
Human Earthquake Hits Houston, Texas	116
Call for General Strike at Reparation Rally	118
Chapter Five: Of Myth and Rituals	121
Hero/Shero Defined	123
Islam Needs a Martin Luther	124
End of World Innocence	127
Hug a Thug: The Education of Ptah Allah-El	128
Throws in Poetry Towel	132
Mass Murder in Fresno, CA	133
Life in Social Movements	135
What Is Life and Why Are We Living	136
Of Men Beast, Ancestors and Nature	137
Black Woman's Tit Knocks Out America	138
Gay Marriage and Black Liberation	139
New Nat Turner	142
Happy New Year, 2003	146
Twisted Route of Peace March	147
Chapter Six: Reviews and Blues	149
Film Review: Ray	151
Book Review: How to Find a BMW by Julia Hare	154
Book Review: America's Still the Place, Charlie Walker	161
Book Review: Somebody Blew Up America, Amiri Baraka	163
Movie Review: Gospel of the Game, James Robinson	169
Book Review: Wounded in the House of a Friend, Sonia Sanchez	174
Drama Review: Pantalos and Collard Greens	`179
Drama Review: Invisible Chains	186
Movie Review: Panther in Africa	190
Chapter Seven: Blackness and Nothingness	194
Am I Black, Am I White	200
Black Bourgeoisie Defend Their Own	202
The Meaning of Black Reconstruction	203
Black Reconstruction, Week Two	205
Black Reconstruction, Week Three	207
Negro Psychosexuality in the Post Crack Society	209
Black Muslims as Fifth Column in US	211
VIP Nigguhs and Rape	212
Powell, the Running Dog, Raps	213
Fable of the Horse, the Cow, the Bull	215
Power of Prayer	217

Wish I Could Tell You the Truth is available from Black Bird Press, 11132 Nelson Bar Road, Cherokee CA 95965, 19.95. Or email Marvin -- mrvnx@yahoo.com 

Ras Messenger replies to Marvin X on Multiple Wives and Unlimited ho's (sex workers)

Hetepu Bro MarvinX,

It was good to read your story regarding the fact that you publicly stated the obvious fact that in  2015 Alkebulan ( Afrikan) males who are serious and can look after multiple wives MUST be given the opportunity to do so.

In my opinion this would seriously cut down on the current state of play or players, i.e., one is married yet you can go out and have multiple female friends or in some cases multiple boyfriends ( so called downlow brothers  who are married to females yet have sex with men).

What is required now is for Alkebulans to take responsibility of our home and relationships and do not allow the Vatican ( who are homosexuals ) to dictate how the  Original Man should live on planet earth, especially since there is a massive exercise taking place as you read this to effeminizee our males through eating junk foods which contain dangerous levels of the female hormone  estrogen, in addition those unfortunate sons in prisons who allow themselves to be 'sexing' other males- quite outrageous..

Alkebulan males are under threat from the shitstem in every way, yet so called lesbians and gays' can get married or even in some cases have a man and a woman, yet straight up  men are unable to have multiple wives--this is quite nonsensical and unacceptable!

The same parasite priests,  bishops and other psuedo religious hypocrites will quote x y or z of the basis instructions before leaving Europe ( bible). These same scribes and Pharisees are the ones who will marry these people same gender loving people or trans-sexual people.

In my humble opinion,  we cannot allow any one to tell us how we are to live our lives, particularly when it comes to multiple wives.
Let's put polygamy into practice regardless of whether any state /government says it'slegal or not. We are not animals; we are men and are able to define for self and others what we need to do. Let the devil take back his nonsense.

Love and Light 

Raa

Marvin X replies to Ras Messenger

THE PROBLEM IS THAT MEN (WHITE AND BLACK) ARE NOT ORGANIZED FOR THEIR RIGHTS/RITES (SUN RA WOULD SAY) AS OUR GAYS,LESBIANS AND TRANS-SEXUALS. 

THEY CAN NOW GET MARRIED BUT YOU CAN'T HAVE MULTIPLE WIVES OPENLY, NOR CAN YOU VISIT A SEX WORKER BY MUTUAL AGREEMENT. AGAIN, MARCUS GARVEY SAID GET ORGANIZED, THE WORLD IS MOVING AGAINST ALL UNORGANIZED PEOPLE. A MILLION MEN MARCHED BUT DID NOT GET ORGANIZED AFTER THE FEEL GOOD SESSION. 

DURING WWII THE POLISH JEWS WERE FIGHTING EACH OTHER, BUT WHEN THEY DECIDED TO UNIFY IT WAS TOO LATE, THE GAS CHAMBERS AWAITED THEM. IF WE DON'T JUMP OUT OF THE BOX IN A HURRY, WE MAY SUFFER A SIMILAR FATE. 

THEY MAY PUT THE CONFEDERATE FLAG IN THE MUSEUM, BUT IT IS THE HEARTS AND MINDS OF ALL THOSE WHO SUFFER FROM THE ADDICTION TO WHITE SUPREMACY, NORTH AND SOUTH, BLACK AND WHITE, THAT MUST BE PUT INTO THE DUSTBIN OF HISTORY!

HERE IN THE BAY AREA OF SAN FRANCISCO/OAKLAND/BERKELEY WHERE I LIVE, WHEN I VISIT SAN FRANCISCO AND SEE THE GAY/LESBIAN FLAG FLYING UP AND DOWN MARKET STREET, I BOW DOWN TO THEM FOR MAKING US BOW DOWN TO THEM WITH HONOR AND RESPECT WHEN WE SEE THEIR FLAY FLYING. BUT I DON'T GIVE A DAMN ABOUT THE CONFEDERATE FLAY OR GAY FLAY, I WANT TO SEE THE RED, BLACK AND GREEN FLYING DOWN OAKLAND'S 14TH STREET, FROM MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. WAY TO ALICE STREET, I.E., THE BLACK CULTURAL DISTRICT. 

FLY YOUR FLAG AND LET THE WORLD KNOW YOU ARE A NATION OF PEOPLE, INDEPENDENT AND SELF SUFFICIENT. AFTER ALL YOUR VALIANT HISTORY IN OAKLAND, YOU MUST BE A PROUD PEOPLE. YES, IN TRUTH, YOU SUFFERED A MILITARY DEFEAT DURING THE 1960S. LET'S BE CLEAR ON THIS. THE BLACK PANTHER PARTY ONLY HAD PISTOLS AND SHOTGUNS, WHILE WE SUFFERED THE FULL FORCE OF THE US ARMY, MARINES, NAVY, AIR FORCE, FBI AND ITS COINTELPRO, SNITCHES AND AGENTS PROVOCATEUR. 

WITH MOST OF MY FRIENDS DEAD, INCLUDING HUEY NEWTON, ELDRIDGE CLEAVER, SAMUEL NAPIER, ALONZO BATIN, AMIRI BARAKA, ALPRINTICE BUNCHY CARTER, AND SO MANY OTHERS, MY OLDEST DAUGHTER ASKED ME RECENTLY, "DAD, AFTER ALL YOU'VE BEEN THROUGH, HOW AND WHY ARE YOU STILL ALIVE?" ANOTHER DAUGHTER HAS RELOCATED TO GHANA AND SHE SAYS, "DAY, IT'S TIME TO LEAVE AMERICA."

NOW THE OLD BIBLE TELLS US  WE MUST LISTEN TO THE CHILDREN. AT THREE YEARS OLD, MY GRANDSON TOLD ME, "GRANDPA YOU CAN'T SAVE THE WORLD, BUT I CAN!"

IN CONCLUSION, CONSIDER THE TIME. THE QUR'AN SAYS: BY THE TIME, SURELY MAN IS LOST, EXCEPT THOSE WHO BOW DOWN AND EXHORT ONE ANOTHER TO PATIENCE AND TRUTH. AND SOLOMON TOLD US THERE IS A TIME FOR EVERYTHING, A TIME FOR LOVE, A TIME FOR WAR....

--MARVIN X

Catch the wild, crazy ride called the Marvin X Experience

for information, stay tuned to the Black Bird Press News

www.blackbirdpressnews.blogspot.com 

 

Ufa, Russia: BRICS meet (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa_

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Russia's President Vladimir Putin with Prime Minister Narenda Modi, left, in Ufa, Russia on Wednesday. Ufa hosts SOC (Shanghai Cooperation Organization) and BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) summits.

The BRICS summit in Ufa comes at a crucial juncture in India’s Internet diplomacy.

BRICS leaders are gathered in the Russian town of Ufa for the bloc’s annual summit, and Internet governance is high on their agenda. The summit comes at a crucial juncture in India’s internet diplomacy. Last month in Buenos Aires, at a conference organised by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), IT minister Ravi Shankar Prasad offered an “Indian vision for the Internet”. ICANN is the organisation that manages the Domain Name System, which serves as the backbone for all technical and commercial activity in cyberspace. In his recorded message, Mr. Prasad declared India would move away from state-led approaches to governing the Internet, preferring instead a mechanism that co-opts the private sector and civil society into the policy-making process. India’s embrace of this model – called “multi-stakeholderism” – was followed at home by the launch of the “Digital India week”, which underlined the enormous political capital that the Narendra Modi government has invested in technological solutions to governance. The Buenos Aires declaration, however, merely stated New Delhi’s position: in Ufa, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his delegation will be queried extensively by their interlocutors on the consequent cyber strategies India will pursue. 

Modi’s Russian hosts, in particular, are concerned by the developments of last month. Having long considered India as a traditional ally in mooting a prominent role for governments in cyberspace, Russian diplomats in attendance at ICANN were caught off guard by Prasad’s statement. Ahead of the summit, Moscow has circulated a zero draft among BRICS members that devotes substantial space to Internet governance. The Russian intervention is unlikely to make it to the BRICS communiqué in its current avatar, given disparity in views among the grouping’s members. Those differences, however, do not diminish the unique role that BRICS can play in calling out deficiencies in the present system, especially as it relates to the monopolistic hold US businesses have over the Internet. 

New Delhi, a late entrant to global cyber-politics, should steer clear of the ideological discourse that currently clouds the Internet governance debate. Pegging countries as defenders or detractors of “Internet freedom” does little to identify their core interests. In contrast to India, all four BRICS constituents will head to Ufa with clear motivations. A successful summit in Ufa will be a shot in the arm for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s continued efforts to defy Western attempts at political isolation. On the cyber front, Moscow is concerned about sanctions on civilian Internet services and software that the United States has imposed in the Crimea. ICANN being a California-based corporation subject to US laws, has had no option but to comply with these sanctions. At the summit, Russia would want to highlight the consequences of unilateral US control of cyberspace.

China, for all the noise around its home grown, self-sufficient Internet, has been among the most active participants in international cyber negotiations. Last week, China’s top cybersecurity official Lu Wei attended the inaugural council meeting of the Net Mundial Initiative in Sao Paulo, where he spoke of the need to “safeguard the normal order of the Internet.” Not only did Lu engage the Initiative – a discussion platform co-hosted by Brazil, ICANN and the World Economic Forum that India has cautiously stayed away from – but he also took Jack Ma, founder of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba, with him to the event. Jack Ma was elected co-chairman of the council. The Communist Party may be the final arbiter of Internet policies in China but it is clear that Beijing sees “multistakeholderism” as a diplomatic tool to promote its own businesses, which are vying with American Internet giants in global markets. 

Brazil, a leader in Internet diplomacy, has highlighted the legal and political concerns associated with ICANN’s incorporation in the United States. “The legal status of ICANN should constitute an indispensable element” of any proposal to transition key DNS functions to the global community, the Brazilian government has argued. For its part, the US recently courted a state visit by Dilma Rouseff in an attempt to defuse the still-simmering controversy surrounding the Snowden revelations of US snooping on the Brazilian president. At the summit, Brazil will attempt to steer the BRICS position to neutral territory, while espousing the cause for greater “internationalisation” of Internet policy-making. 

South Africa may not enjoy the same profile as its BRICS counterparts on cyber policies, but it remains a pivotal player in the G77 group of developing economies. During recent consultations hosted by the United Nations, South Africa spoke for the G77, and highlighted the important role of governments in articulating Internet policy. 

Where does India fit in this equation? By endorsing the “multistakeholder” line, New Delhi has suggested it is willing to play by the rules the US has set for governing cyberspace. To follow up, the Modi government must convey two important messages to its American interlocutors. First, that “multistakeholderism” does not mean business as usual - India’s support for US-centric institutions will be conditioned by their utility to domestic Internet companies and users. ICANN’s policies on auctioning domains, protection of digital trademarks and copyrights, and access to the WHOIS database of registered sites must be reviewed to reflect developing country concerns. Second, the US government must nudge its Internet corporations to establish a credible information-sharing platform with the Indian government to identify potential cybersecurity threats. The BRICS summit offers India a megaphone to relay yet another message. New Delhi will play ball with the US, that message should read, but will not hesitate to shake hands with those countries that seek a “de-monopolisation” of critical Internet infrastructure.

(Arun Mohan Sukumar is a lawyer and journalist.)

Black Bird Press News & Review: Marvin X at University of Chicago: Sun Ra Symposium Roundtable Discussion

Black Bird Press News & Review: Marvin X at University of Chicago: Sun Ra Symposium Roundtable Discussion