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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 19, 1994)
■ F ebruary 16,1994 • T he P ortland O bserver P age A2 Two Roads: One To Hope, One To Helplessness Some years ago, when we the blacks were emerging front the rubble of reconstruction. There was set in our minds for sure. One Road. This road lead inexorably to our freedom. Free dom of thought, freedom to ex ercise our rights, our complete autonom y, and other inalienable rights. Hope was high in the breast of the black father. A smidgin of education was avail able, vocation schools were in a b u n d a n c e ... W e lite r a lly flo o d e d the w ork m a rk e t with availabil ity. A ll w ent well as long as im m e d ia te needs were met. We were looked upon as jocular fellows who eased the boredom of the workplace, and provided essential drollery to our su p erio rs. The black woman was then content to re main in the home, while some of them provided minimum maid service to the more wealthy citi zens. These m aidservants brought back to their husbands and chil dren, the current news of how the husband’s workmate lived. This of course created embry onic aspirations in the husband for a better life for his own fam ily. His white counterpart be came sick at heart after discov ering the blacks were not satis fied with things as they were. The black men were then ca joled, promised, lied to, threat ened, then buffeted into tem po rary submission. These» blacks started relying on “It takes time for these things to happen”. . «S In the mean time after having inflamed his passion for more, the black wife prodded her hus band for some kind of action. The blacks, working from a standpoint of no power, nor any executive position , used anger and retalia tory language to try and accom plish their ends.. • Thus began the era of expul sion and complete emasculation of our black workforce.. Those who had imminent potential for upper level ad vancement were e ith e r d e lib e r ately held back, or were outright f ir e d __ T here w ere no r e course, we had no viable repre sentation, in groups or otherwise. The while money controlled the NAACP, and any local or state Reps, were either impotent or had taken the, “Wait and see attitude”. The idle men became insolent, bitter, and abusive to both their wives and children, then later to themselves, and one another... The few “Token” blacks that remained in the workplace, de cided to distance themselves from these troublem akers. Thus a p pearing in prefect conformance to their superior’s idea of what we should i.e., stay in our place”. The one road for us at that point divided..... The non working black picked up on what jobs that he scrape together from day to day. Som e times he did not go home after receiving his meager earnings, but hung out at the local Taverns with his other drifter buddies, and bitched about the “ Man”. Meanwhile the wife has to increase her workload to make ends meet. At evening time she drags her tired body home to complete her wifely duties. The husband is not there now for her to rag after, so she takes it out on the children. She sets up tight spending limits, cuts back on the eats, and eliminate all things pertaining to leisure activities, and demands full cooperation. And why not? Isn’t she sacrific ing everything for these ingrates? Fights erupt between hus band and wife, wife and kids, kids and husband, husband leaves hom e, som etim es for good..... Down the other road goes the “Token”, He is given m erito rious awards, (trinkets) for his loyalty, fine work and superior sucking up ability. He is also given enough overtime at work, and coupled along w ith his wife’s wages, he can now move out of the Ghetto.. So he moves a couple of blocks north, and this gives him the unreachable status of upper-poverty, and many invitations to “fishing par ties”. (Brainpicking) these are held on patios and in dens by his white counterparts. The real par ties are later held to assess what has been learned by all at the fishing party.. The divergence of the two roads now widens because the token negro is not only secretly en v ied by his le ft b eh in d nonworking black brother, but the token comes under suspicion as an uncle tom. The token black and the idle black stop talking to one an other, the feeling and meager ideology is passed down to their progeny, thus setting up two hostile camps. More to come. Fabric D epot * •• : . '• Z ' A Brand N ew Store With Over IV2 Acres o f Fabrics! (73,000 SQUARE FEET) Most C om plete Fabric Store In The West . • . „ U -:'J> V - » / X \< ; • >... fA ’ Calicos ► Jinny Buyer • Mary Ellen Hopkins • Hoffman • V.I.P. • Peter Pan • R.J.R. • And many more r-7..^ *r . 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T hese distinguished re s e a rc h e rs and p h y sic ia n s fo llo w on in a g r e a t m illcniunm s-old A frican tra dition. See my article on an o th e r p la c e here; “ M ore on the Ancient A f r ic a n P r a c t i tio n e r s Of M edicine.” P e r c y L av o n J u lia n ( 1 8 9 9 -1 9 7 5 ) . D eveloped the drug p h y so stig m in e fo r the treatm ent o f g la u c e rm a s -rc - duces eye pressure, thereby preventing, blindness. A su perb research ch em ist Julian becam e D irector of R esearch for the fam ed G lidden C om pany, forem ost m anufacturers o f P aint and varnish in A frica (1936). H is talents carried the firm into new and profitable fields based upon proteins ex tracted from “ soy b e a n ” oils (rem em ber Dr. C arver?) These included not only s u b s ta n c e s w ith m e d ic in a l properties, but chem icals used in the coating and sizin g of paper, in cold w ater paints and in tex tile sizing. A lso Julian used soy beans to develop a new p ro d u c t, “ A e ro -F o a m ” that could be used to put out gasoline and oil, fires, cutting o ff the oxygen supply from tex air. Y o u ’ve seen new scasts w here the foam has been used to ex tin g u ish the flam es at sp ectacu lar airp lan e crashes. This sam e m aster chem ist innovated a process to e c o nom ically extract the valuable ‘s te r o l’ from soy b ean oil, m aking it possible to m anu- facture large q u a n titie s o f s y n th etic m ale and fem ale h o r m ones, testo stero n e and pro g e s te ro n e , As you p ro b ab ly know , the latter d rug has saved the live so co u n tless unborn babies by p ro tectin g expectant m o th e rs a g a in s t m is carriag es. In 1950 J u li a n w as honored for his in n o v atio n of a n o th e r re m arkable syn- th e s is --s y n - t h e t ic “ c o r t i s o n e ” , w h ic h brought this pow erful p a in -k ill ing drug w ith in reach o f m il lions o f a rth ritis suffers. The foregoing is m ust a p artial re c i tatio n o f his m any b rillia n t ac com plishm ents that have h e a l ing to m ankind. H ow ever, since he was an A frican A m erican, he was not spared th e racist slings and arrow s of an o u tra geous fate. T he very year of his co rtiso n e aw ard, arsonists a t tem pted to bum dow n his new hom e in the O aks Park suburb of C hicago. T h e p re s tig io u s C h ic a g o S un-T im es new spaper clucked its tongue and deplored the in cident, but less than a year later, on June 12, 1951, a dynam ite bom b was exploded under the bedroom w indow w olf the tw o Ju lian ch ild ren . A gain, the e s tab lish m en t clucked its tongue and w rung its hands. B ut ju st tw o m onths later w hen Julian was invited to attend a national m eeting o f scientist as the Union L eague C lub he w as n o tified an hour before the m eeting that no b lack could be allow ed to a t tend a m eeting there. In 1 9 5 4 J u lia n le f t th e G lidden C om pany and found his ow n Ju lian L aboratories, Inc. in C hicago and the L abo ratories Julian de M exico in M exico City. T he latte r lo c a tion was developed after it was d is c o v e r e d t h a t th e w ild “ y am s” o f M exico w ere even b e tte r th an soy b ean s as a source o f his products. Ju lian L a b o r a to r ie s b e c a m e th e w o rld ’s larg est producers o f drugs from this source and in 1961 Julian sold his o peration to Sm ith, K line and French P harm aceutical for m any m il lions. Dr. Julian used his m oney to aid causes that so ught to address the problem s o f A fri can A m ericans; “ A ll N egroes identify w ith the civ il rights m ovem ent because none, no m atter w hat his incom e level, can escape racial d isc rim in a tio n .” He gave generously to Dr M artin L uther K ing and the S outhern C hristian L eadership C onference and to the N A A C P Legal D efense Fund. His son, Percy Lavon Julian Jr., a M adi son, W isconsin law yer helped to organize the student N on vio len t C oordinating C om m it tee (SN C C ). W hen we plan for the fu ture o f our children in this tec h nolo g ical w orld we m ust re m em ber Dr. Julians last w ords, “T he A m erican ghetto and the A m erican brand o f apartheid m ade the N egro w ith scientific talen t and yearnings probably the m ost poignantly tragic in tellectual schizophrenic o f the first h alf of th is c e n tu ry .” W e ask about this last half. W e have seen w hat produced this violent world. We Have No Opinion by B ill S cott For weeks, we have been bom barded with the Tonya Harding saga almost non-stop on every major TV channel. We have heard all of the debated over her pos sible involvement in the assault on Nancy Kerrigan. The media was even asking people on the street for their opinions on the issues. What I found interesting was that on this issue African African faces were conspicuously absent. Evidently we had no opin ion. Are we not expected to have an opinion about things not des ignated “Black” issues? I became uneasy with the fact that the me dia was conditioning us, shaping pubic opinion and preparing us to accept Tonya as an Olympian in spite of what our common sense tells, us. Think about it. TV cameras went from the Clackamas ice rink, to Gresham sports bars to the crowds outside of the courthouse for public reaction to every little tid-bit of information. Men and wom en spoke volum es about Tonya’s rights, and about being innocent until proven guilty. 1 prayed for them to come to Cleos. Finally I went to Safeway and the Lloyd Center myself to conduct my own sampling of African American opinion. I asked these two questions: 1. Do you think Tonya should skate in the Olympics? 2. Do you think that she knew of the plan to hurt Nancy Kerrigan be fore it happened? Out of 25 responses, 10 said yes she should skate, 15 said no, she should not. However all but 4 be lieved that she knew of the planned attack before it happened. 1 know that Blacks ao not usually figure prominently in win ter sports competition, though we all remember the brilliant, ath letic skating of Debbie Thomas. Two weeks ago while visiting the Lloyd Center, I saw a young Afri can American girl about 11 years old doing what looked like seri ous practice on the icc. It made me think. What will little girls like yours and mine and the one practicing at the Lloyd Center think about all this? That winning at any cost is what counts? That winning by any means necessary is condoned if you have good lawyers and a large number of people with a vested interest in your success? 1 realize that there arc large is sues at stake here. We must not forget tli at the Olympic Games arc a compe tition between nations. But this is our nation too. these athletes, represent all Americans and that includes us. So if your opinion is that fair play, sportsm anship and good character are secondary consid erations, and that Tonya should represent us to the world; If you think she is the kind of person your little ice skater should em u late, then let the media know that it is ok to bring the cameras into our neighborhoods on an issue, not just on “ Black” issues or when some or our young people have done something violent. African Americans loom large in athletic competition in America. Why then have wc no opinion about something that could forever taint the accomplishments of all American ath letes in future Olympics.