How close are we?

By Roshaun L. Harris

Many Michiganders, including Detroiters, suburbanites, and folks on the farm in rural communities, feel the burden of the current political and economic environment. The government and the people are in a state of crisis, on many levels. Home foreclosures, school closings, municipal services disappearing, cost-of-living rising alongside stagnate wages are the system’s failures.

Looking across county lines, many similarities exist between struggling communities. The communities facing a more recent downturn can attribute their woes to the same political and economic forces that stifled growth in the poorer communities across the state.

For decades the industrial cities in Michigan have been declining. Due to forces in the global economy, automation eliminating low-skill high wage jobs, labor being moved overseas for cheaper wages, and withering government services, urban cities across Michigan have been in a state of decline for decades.

The suburbs, however, have enjoyed growth and prosperity for the later part of the 20th century, although much of that was built on debt. Locally, the debate has been about the battle over resources between the city and suburbs. Who controls this, who gets what contract, whose getting government aide were the typical talking points for most political debates relative to Michigan politics.

With the current conditions there is nothing to fight over, everybody’s struggling. One of the places this becomes most apparent is in the budget for students in K-12. It has been cut by nearly $500 per student across the state. Many have reacted negatively to that direction steered by Michigan legislators. Detroit students have been losing money since the 70’s. Generally speaking, since that time the federal government has cut spending on public education significantly. At the state level, it was a battle for those limited resources with suburban communities receiving the lion’s share.

Currently, the suburban communities alongside rural communities are sharing the burden, and they don’t like it. Truth is, no one likes the lack of choices and control being brought on by the current crisis. “Welcome to our reality” is the crying call for many urban residents but some in that situation are saying lets join together to get back our livelihoods. Many can clearly see the future for urban, rural, and suburban relies on our ability to solve problems in a cooperative manner. The infighting caused the initial stratification but will only increase strife for all residents if it continues.

Focusing future energy on education would be a start. But here’s where it gets difficult. The current political and economic paradigm may not allow for that to occur. In the Michigan legislature, controlled by Republicans, they are looking to slash and burn all municipal spending and appoint an emergency manager if the desired results do not occur fast enough. Old script for a new show?

This current crisis is an opportunity to look at all aspects of systemic failure and develop strategies for revolutionary changes to fit the revolutionary economic stage of history we’re in. Yes, revolutionary stage of economic history. Where’s the revolution?

In the very means of production themselves. The machines that many thought would make their jobs easier actually replaced them altogether. This is happening in all sectors of the economy, not just heavy industry. So if jobs are the base for taxing citizens to extract revenue for government repayment of debt and robots and computers are making companies more profitable, how does the situation correct itself with old remedies? It doesn’t. Educating the next generation to face this crisis lies not only in the hands of government but also the people. For them, it is a matter of life or death.

People from all parts of the state need to recognize that collaboration is the key, not separation. Soon the separation will only be geographic. In Imlay City there is a solution that will work for Detroit. In Kalamazoo there is a solution for Traverse City. Lansing is not the place where the solution will be coming from. It will be business as usual for the bureaucrats. For the people, their solutions will only come when all identify that old models simply won’t plug this drain.

For a new season of prosperity, we must first define what makes us all prosper as opposed to fighting over what will prosper a privileged few. Education is the key to any sustained prosperity. Let us invest in our future by any means necessary

Coffee with Justin

By Jordan Cusumano

Justin Davis will be a junior at Eastern Michigan University (EMU) this fall 2011 semester. Similar to many other EMU students he has a unique story.
He came to EMU from his home town of West Bloomfield, Michigan where he was raised in a Reformed Jewish home. Growing up he was fortunate enough to be introduced to rock music by his father who plays in a rock band, “Sinjon Smith”. His mom works at the Jewish federation and his faith was a part of his daily life. He remembers his preparation for his bar mitzvah as the hardest thing he’s ever done. His success at preparing himself for the many tasks his bar mitzvah called for foreshadowed the success he would find throughout his adolescence and, now, his college years.
After going to Oakland Community College (OCC) for a semester he started at EMU in the winter of 2010. At EMU he is studying journalism with a minor in criminology. “My mom studied journalism for her undergrad and she really encouraged me to do the same,” Davis explains in between sips of his Starbucks coffee. Nearly every undergraduate student now a days has to have a plan for graduate school. He plans to go onto either business school or law school. “And write on the side, of course” he added with a smile. Davis looks every bit of a stereotypical journalist with his black-rimmed glasses and quizzical expression.
When he came to EMU it was an adjustment for Davis. “I had never seen homeless people or really poor people. I’m still not used to it.” Davis explains as he adjusts his glasses on his face. Ypsilanti is quite a different cultural community than West Bloomfield. Being a part of Phi Sigma Capa at EMU really helped him adjust and break out of his shell. His first semester at EMU he learned the dangers of being on campus at night. “Two of my friends and I were walking from the student center to the library during finals week at about ten o’clock at night. Out of nowhere I was blindsided and punched to the ground!” Davis still gets anxious just retelling the story and it happened over a year ago. He said it makes him feel safer knowing that the guy who attacked him is in jail.
As a high school student Davis excelled in Advanced Writing classes and enjoyed writing about sports. “I would really enjoy a career in sports writing. I really admire and look up to Rick Reilly from ESPN.” He also looks up to Gene Simmons. Simmons is a fellow jewish man who has a remarkably successful business career. “I still have a lot of experiences ahead of me before I become a successful working person. Like studying abroad! I really want to go to Israel.” As a young person Davis has his whole life ahead of him and as an EMU student he is paving his way to success.

EMU Student, Soldier, Photographer

By Jimmy Bates

Ray Bowyer was deployed to Iraq from October 2006 and returned home October 2007.
Bowyer’s unit was in Mosul, Iraq where they ran combat missions and trained Iraq police forces. While deployed Bowyer took pictures as he drove and of his brothers in arms.

Bowyer, 28, has been deployed three times since September 11, 2001 and in Iraq he took pictures using a small point and shoot canon camera. While driving he would click pictures from the vehicle and when he returned after his tour, he did not look at the pictures often.

Towards the end of 2007 he began looking at the pictures and working on them until there was an 11-piece collection now being shown at the Plymouth Coffee Bean at 884 Penniman Ave.
The collection is under the name “Walking is Still Honest” which comes from an album by the band Against Me!.

“I was just listening to them a lot, always been a huge music fan. Some albums define parts of my life and Against Me! I would listen to them before missions, it kind of kept me grounded in my mind, kept me back home” Said Bowyer.

While training the police forces, Bowyer’s unit was out every day. Bowyer said at first they stopped every time they were shot at but it happened so frequently that after a while they only stopped if someone was hit. Bullets did not worry the unit, they were more worried about IEDs on the roads.

IED stands for Improvised Explosive Device, roadside bombs that were disguised at trash or other objects that blow up vehicles. Despite these dangerous conditions, Bowyer took a large number of photographs, many from inside the vehicle he drove.

Bowyer said he did not look at the pictures initially because they brought back bad memories but after a while he began looking at them and now he is sharing them. The series features other troops and local people, culminating in the title piece, Walking is Still Honest, which inspired the show, Bowyer said.

The show will run until May 31st and several of the pictures are for sale.

What Happened to Detroit?

By David N. Smokler

What American city was once called the “Paris of the Midwest” and the “City of Champions" after all its major professional sports teams won championships in a seven month period? What city had the greatest industrial output, the first paved highway, the first freeway and the first shopping center? What city had the best public school system in the nation? You guessed it: Detroit, Michigan. What happened to that great American metropolis now known as the “murder capital?” Automation and computer assisted production have caused jobs to leave Detroit. Most importantly, this new technology has actually replaced human labor, taking away workers jobs, forever.

And what happened to Detroit’s great school system? Let’s be clear, our education system’s basic function is to produce the type of employee that business needs. As science was applied to industrial production and society became more complex, the owners of industry needed educated workers and developed a publicly financed educational system designed to create them. When machines began to replace human labor in the late 1960s and early 1970s, public education became less necessary. Computer-based production limited the employer’s capacity to exploit the labor of workers. The workers were hamstrung in their capacity to sell their ability to work and buy the things that they produced. As a result the whole system of production for profit is fast becoming obsolete. There are fewer and fewer things where the corporations can profitable investments. As a result, they have begun to privatize public services. The public education system in this country is a $750 billion enterprise, ripe fruit in private hands.

In Detroit half the public schools have been ordered closed by the state legislature with 41or more to become “for profit” charters. A two or three-tier system is being created with some students going to elite schools and the rest being educated for low paying or no-paying jobs in the prison industrial complex. Our youth won’t be educated to see through the smoke and mirrors and outright lies of the system or to think and to ask tough questions while making demands that the system can't meet.

Teachers, parents and supporters have been marching and protesting in Detroit and in Lansing the state capital. On May 21st over 10,000 people rallied at the capital to oppose republican governor Snyder’s new tax plan giving corporations huge tax breaks, cutting per pupil funding and taxing senior citizens’ pensions. On May 24th thousands of teachers in 40 communities throughout the state protested drastic changes in the Michigan Public Schools Employees Retirement System.

To promote the corporate agenda, the state is using Emergency Managers to take over schools systems, cities and counties who can eliminate the powers of elected officials. Their agenda is privatization. The Detroit Public Schools have already privatized their security guards, bus drivers and janitors. What is happening in Detroit is just the start of what will happen nationwide.

Our schools are being used to fit the corporate agenda and its insatiable thirst for profit. Isn’t it our duty to recreate the educational system in our image and not in theirs? If computer assisted automation permanently eliminates the need for workers and has the capacity to create abundance for everyone our young people won’t have to do the jobs that we once did. They can truly reach for the stars and let their imaginations be their guide. To achieve this goal we need national legislation to insure that our countries public schools remain public and properly funded. Education is crucial to our entire nation and is recognized throughout the world as a human right. It should not be used to satisfy to the needs of a few people. We must have a national system of educating our children for the 21st century. They have the right to realize their full potential as human beings. Let them fulfill their destiny in the age of electronics to recreate the world so that mankind can finally realize its age old vision of a beloved community on a peaceable planet.

Needed: A grassroots foreign policy to resurrect communities in the U.S. and abroad

By Charles E. Simmons

Following the jubilation over the assassination of Osama bin Laden, America once again will ask whether and when troops will return home from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Even before this event, some Pentagon officials have hinted there may be a long-term military presence in that region, similar to the U.S. presence in South Korea in spite of the fact that that war ended in the mid-1950s. Or consider the fact of U.S. military bases in the Philippines and Guantanamo, Cuba following the U.S. War against Spain in 1898. 

One of the central issues in the current struggles for social justice and peace across the planet is the question of corporate and military globalization led by the U.S. and former colonial Western European nations under the umbrella of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Although this extension of power of the multinational corporations has led to a rapid rise in Wall Street profits and an expanding global wealthy class, it has also resulted in increasing impoverishment and a deterioration of domestic services and benefits among workers, family farmers and the middle classes in both the rich and poor nations. 

As the local middle classes, workers and farmers of the Third World see their resources and rights being stolen with the complicity of local puppet dictators, they often revolt and demand real democracy that benefits the little folk, as we are currently witnessing in the North African nations at this very moment. Some of the oppressed youth from these impacted communities will also turn to various forms of suicidal terrorism, just as many of our youth in the rich nations adopt suicidal behavior. But Americans must also remember the slogans from the freedom fighters in U.S. history, such as Patrick Henry and George Washington, and Nat Turner, who cried, “Give me liberty or give me death!” when challenging the might of colonial Great Britain or southern slave masters. 

In many cases, the muscle of a misguided U.S. military power back up this current expanding economic power of Wall Street and Fleet Street. Hence, Americans can expect a continuing spiral of rebellion followed by the intervention of western military forces under the umbrella of the United Nations and NATO, a coalition of the former European powers that brought us slavery and colonialism. This military foreign policy costs trillions of dollars annually and drains the local domestic budgets for education, housing, community development, infrastructure and security. Combined with the rapid deindustrialization of America, these forces guarantee continuous deepening of poverty, foreclosures, unemployment and environmental degradation in this great land. 

Many supporters of current U.S. foreign policy argue there is no choice given the dangers of the international community, and that war has always been the norm among nations. The old ways, however, cannot continue in this nuclear era of weapons of mass destruction that will leave no survivors. And there are other alternatives. A U.S. grassroots movement must call for a new foreign policy that promotes peace as well as defense by spending an equal amount of the military budget to study sustainable development that will build thriving communities in the poor nations that will allow farmers to grow food for their own consumption and create their own industries to feed, clothe and house their own peoples. This diplomacy will include citizen-to-citizen relationships among cultural workers and non-governmental organizations from ordinary people across the nation to discuss mutual interests and needs. It will also expand the student exchanges so that youth will develop a sense of international as well as local justice and humanity. The cost of this foreign and military policy will be half what it is today, and the human cost in the short and long term will decline tremendously. 

So let our jubilation turn from assassinations to a new future for our cities and family farms, our environment and the health of the planet. 

Copyright Charles E. Simmons 

Professor Simmons teaches Journalism and Media Law at Eastern Michigan University and is Co-Director of The Hush House Black Community Museum and Leadership Training Institute for Human Rights. Charles.simmons@emich.edu.

What Do You See?

By Roshaun L. Harris

What does it mean to be naturally beautiful? A Detroit business woman, who goes by the name Afia, tells the story of how Black beauty was the key to her independence both literally and figuratively. Afia was born in Senegal. She came to the United States with her family as she embarked on a journey to find viability in the once booming US economy. “The key to any form of success is belief and confidence in who you are,” says Afia. “If you can not look in the mirror and see beauty, it will be hard to find happiness or success, however you qualify it.” That is key to understanding why images are so important in a society. Looking at the history of the United States dating back to slavery, the evidence points to a concerted effort by the power structures in existence to attribute Black slaves and freemen with sub-human, cartoonish images. This was done purposefully. The objective was to justify the brutality of the US slave trade, which is distinct from other forms of slavery in the past. It was different because the slave was actual property, as opposed to the serf-style slavery that existed in previous epochs. There were books, movies, advertisements, and general information flyers that contained these image. They were pervaded throughout the society. This gives a deeply imbedded aspect to the level of oppression bestowed upon Black Americans. Charles Ryan, a Detroit business man who owns a barbershop on Detroit’s West side stated, “We as a people have always been self conscious about our image. We have always done things to diminish ourselves so we can make the people around us feel comfortable.” Ryan is speaking to the fact that for decades, maybe even centuries, while under the rule of European slavery and colonialism, Blacks have always tried to “whiten” themselves both literally and figuratively. The dominant European culture has dictated either passively or assertively that Blacks must assimilate to their culture or be subjugated to the lowest rungs of the social and economic ladder. Sometimes this meant death in the most severe cases. And as is the case with the slaves, they were even stratified within social construct that dictated White values over anything foreign. You had house slaves who were often of lighter complexion because of the intermingling with the owner’s family and even sometimes rape of the women working in the fields. Babies born with lighter skin were often taken into the house and cared for much like an indentured servant in some cases. This caused division amongst the slave population itself. This carried over into the post-slavery reconstruction era and still persist in many forms according to Ryan. “It’s divide and conquer all over again. What we see today are people who don’t like themselves trying to be something they’re not.” Historically, their have been numerous skin lightening products alongside hair straightening products that anglicized the appearance of the patron. This is coupled with the images that are seen in all forms of media contribute to the social dysfunction seen among much of the Black communities across urban America. How can a people rule themselves if they have no positive self image or self-esteem? This is the conundrum that has been exploited by power structures in existence today. Capitalism has profited mightily from selling the ill-fated image of Blacks in this country and abroad. The “Nigger” is social construct according Rev. Sandra Simmons also a professor at Wayne State. Simmons believes the image of the Black man as a social monster contributes to the downward spiral seen in many communities across the US. “It is a way to keep us from gaining power,” says Ryan. Ryan believes many of the social trends in media tend to portray Blacks in a negative stereotypical fashion. “If the outside world cannot see any good in us and we don’t see any good in ourselves we will remain powerless. Eastern Michigan University hosted Dr. Jack Shaheen who has been consulted by Hollywood and the US government on the issue of racial stereotypes in the media. During the symposium Dr. Shaheen aroused some serious discussion around the images of Arabs being portrayed in the media. It was startling to witness the similarities between the images of Arabs and other ethnic minority groups in the US including black. Most certainly, the images struck an accord because the things being propagated against the Black community were reflected almost identically by the images seen in a video produced by Dr. Shaheen focusing on Arab stereotypes. Line by line one could see the congruency by which these themes were aligned. The women are over sexualized. The men are savages. They are buffoonish. The blonde woman is always the man’s object of affection. Arab women are bundles in black much like black women with the apron singing in the kitchen. No dynamics other than those attributes are given to any of these specific characters. This limits their humanity and thus makes it more acceptable to confine them to an oppressed space socially, physically, spiritually, and economically. Dr. Shaheen went on to quote Jack Valenti when he said, “Hollywood and US policy stem from the same image.” Powerful words in retrospect. This alludes to the media structures and their inherent ties to the powerful. The power structures that seek to exploit rather than uplift have used these two appendages hand-in-hand. In this case, one hand washes the other. The hand that is the media, washes the blood off the hands of the other that is the US foreign, in some cases domestic policy. Unbeknownst to the masses, they are being escorted to the place of imperial rule. The US has been able to operate this way because it reinforces the sub-human nature of its minions at home and abroad. “If we cannot see Arab humanity what’s left - kill ‘em all,” said Dr. Shaheen. Our foreign policy in regards to the Arab world has left the region in a state of turmoil. The US funds dictators and suppresses nationalist movements in the region much like the Europeans did in Africa and South America. All in the name of freedom, democracy, and capitalism. Moreover, if a people can’t see themselves as being capable of self-rule dictators and outside influences will always have sovereignty over peoples’ rights. This is the plight of the Third World. You can include many Black Americans in that third world depiction. Unless the Third World is able to be self-aware and self-determined, it will never be free of the exploitation that has wrought it for centuries.

When Will We Learn?

By Roshaun L. Harris



When will the US diplomatic community understand that funding dictators has a tendency to bite you in the butt if your puppet looses control. The latest developments in Egypt expose a greater crisis emerging for the United States - its people and its policy makers. In a world where our diplomatic policy is garnished with fear of an Arab world uprising, the relationships the US has held with the Arab world has been of an oppressive nature. Egypt follows a paradigm where dictators are patronized - with US tax-payer money - while they funnel money to there constituents and the various multi-national vultures known as corporations. What happens on the ground is what we see in Egypt, what we're beginning to see in Yemen and in some forms, what we see in Tunisia. People see the strings connecting these puppet regimes and they want them severed. Contrary to popular American theology, the Arab and African World is not plotting to overthrow western society as we know it, they simply want respect and the right to self-determination. For those of you who don't know, self determination is the foundation of every democratic principle espoused by republican democracy. It allows for people to determine how they want to be ruled and if necessary by whom. If the US wants to do itself a big favor and not be seen as antagonizors to what, so far, have been peaceful demonstrations- the only reported violence coming from state military and police forces, just ask CNN's Anderson Cooper - Stop funding Mubarak. I wonder if Anderson was wearing an American flag lapel while being struck in the head with gear bought and paid for with his tax dollars. Hope he gets out of there OK. It is no joke for journalist trying to report the truth, a lie, or anything in between. Right now, the Egyptians and Tunisians are showing us that Africa and the Arab world are just like us - they just want their freedom.