opinion
Are Black Voters Volunteer Slaves?
“challenging People to Shape
a Better future Now”
B ErNIE f oStEr
Founder/Publisher
B oBBIE D orE f oStEr
executive editor
t ED B aNkS
advertising Manager
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account executive
L ISa L ovINg
news editor
B rIaN S tIMSoN
reporter
D avID k IDD
graphic Designer
M oNIca J. f oStEr
Seattle office Coordinator
J uLIE k EEfE
S uSaN f rIED
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“I
n my career I guess I
saved 1,000 slaves. I
could have saved 1,000
more had they only known they
were slaves.” Harriet Tubman at
her retirement ceremony.
It is incredible how Black power
has gone in reverse in terms of
political empowerment. Gone are
the days when we had mayors in
San Francisco, Los Angeles,
Seattle, Denver, Chicago, New
York, New Orleans, etc. As we
rose up, we soon turned around
and started going in reverse. The
Democratic Party has masterfully
engineered us into a slave mental-
ity which many of us can’t realize
or gain enough courage to fight
against. We are put into a sub-
servient role and smile. It is as if
we want this role versus moving
ahead with progress.
To paraphrase G. Carter
Woodson’s The Miseducation of
the American Negro: If the col-
ored door becomes closed and all
can go through a main door, the
Negro will feel uncomfortable and
try to reopen the colored door. He
will ram and bump that colored
door in the back of the building
trying to reopen it. If he surmises
that the door can’t be reopened he
will then bring a saw and hammer
and build a new colored door as he
is convinced that his destiny is
servitude and indignity.
What is happening now in cities
where we have the demographics
to gain political power is a servi-
tude to the White operatives of the
Democratic Party. They are pick-
ing the candidates for us and most
times they are not of our ilk or
race. Woe to a people who let
c haMBEr
w atch
Harry C.
Alford
another entity pick their leaders.
The best example of this is
Chicago. Chicago had one of the
best mayors in history, the
Honorable Harold Washington.
They have not had the organiza-
Democratic Party and bow to it.
They are indeed volunteer slaves.
They cry about low contracting
with Black businesses and terribly
high unemployment but yet don’t
seem to realize that the solution is
right in their own hands. They are
building that door in the back.
Gone are the days when giants
like Willie Brown, Thomas
Bradley, Wellington Webb, Harold
Washington, Coleman Young,
Michael White, David Dinkins,
Marion Berry, Maynard Jackson
and other great mayors made it
They are trying to mold our opinions ...
They bought out BET along with
Emerge magazine. Now they want to
kill all of the Black newspapers
tion or courage to come up with an
equivalent since. The demograph-
ics of this city tell the story. There
are 601,674 Black registered vot-
ers in Chicago which is 52.2 per-
cent of the total. Hispanics have
200,000 registered voters and
Whites have 350,000 registered
voters so Blacks could defeat them
even if they combined their votes
together. In addition to that, the
greatest growth in registered vot-
ers is coming from Blacks with a
growth of 5.25 percent. That
seems like a slam dunk for Black
political
empowerment
in
Chicago. However this city cannot
get itself to vote in a Black mayor
since the early 1990s. They await
the anointment from the White
imperative to create Black mil-
lionaires that would provide thou-
sands upon thousands of jobs to
our communities. Their legacies
are locked in. I can take a business
trip starting at the Baltimore
Thurgood Marshall Airport direct-
ly going to the Thomas Bradley
LAX airport. From there I can go
to the Maynard Jackson airport in
Atlanta and then decide to visit
some family in Mississippi via the
Medgar Evers Airport in Jackson,
MS. That is testimony to our
heroes of the Civil Rights
Movement. What is lacking is the
follow up to all of this courage,
blood, sweat and tears. We have
turned it over to one political party
and they have assigned “party
punks” to placate us. My people,
we are no longer slaves and it is
long overdue for us to act accord-
ingly. We must select our own
leaders and put them in office and
hold them accountable. The
Chicago example is replicated
throughout our nation. If we don’t
wake up then it is on us.
There is another poison that is
going around. They are trying to
mold our opinions. Yes, trying to
influence our thoughts through
printed press. The first thing they
want is to kill our own media. Our
radio, TV and printed media are
the lifeblood of our culture. Thus,
they want to destroy them and
replace them with “front” entities
who try to substitute as our media.
They bought out BET along with
Emerge magazine. Now they want
to kill all of the Black newspaper
publications. The weapons of
choice are coming from publica-
tions sponsored by NBC, the
Washington Post, and the
Huffington Post. These purely
White corporations are trying to
mold our opinions and control our
thought via parading as “Black”
publications. Don’t go for it. If
they aren’t of our kind they cannot
rule our mind. Support our Black
press – the real Black press as the
others are of ill intent. Stop being
a volunteer slave as we have been
free for 150 years. Fight the
power!
Mr. alford is the co-founder,
President/Ceo of the national
Black Chamber of Commerce.
website: www.nationalbcc.org.
email: halford@nationalbcc.org
www.twitter.com/nationalbcc
2012 Hip-Hop Vote: Determining the Future
I
n less than 10 months from
now the final countdown to the
next national elections in the
United States will be begin. The
future of America and to a large
extent the future of the world will
be at stake. During the next year
there will be millions of new
young voting age persons that will
have to be registered to vote and
mobilized to go out to the voting
polls across the nation.
It is a well-documented fact that
it was the number of voters that
turned out for the national elec-
tions in November 2008 between
the ages of 18 and 30 that provid-
ed the margin of victory for
President Obama in the key swing
states of North Carolina, Virginia,
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana,
Florida, Nevada, New Mexico,
and Colorado. Overall voter
turnout for the 2008 election was
the highest in the last 40 years and
President Obama received the
most votes for a presidential can-
didate in American history. It was
the “Hip-Hop Vote” that made the
critical difference in the outcome
of the 2008 elections.
In 2012 there be the potential for
a greater number of youth voters
to be registered and to vote in the
next national elections. But, this
youth voting potential cannot and
should not be taken for granted
between now and 2012. There is
no question that the use of Internet
technology and social media were
effectively utilized in an unprece-
Page 4 The Portland and Seattle Skanner february 9, 2011
E DucatIoN
S ErvIcES
Benjamin F.
Chavis Jr.
dented manner in the 2008 elec-
tions by the Obama Campaign.
But, the winds of regression and
negative campaigning against fur-
ther inclusive political empower-
ment in the United States are
blowing stronger today than ever
before and these right-wing forces
are now also using Internet tech-
Timing is important here. We
should not wait until it is too late
to get all of this work done. It is
going to cost money, time, and
energy. I am always amazed to
witness so-called progressive and
liberal political forces to waste
valuable time when it comes to
galvanizing and re-activating the
potential progressive political base
in America. There is no effective
substitute for grassroots organiz-
ing precinct by precinct in every
Congressional District, city by city
and state by state. The truth is that
in 2008 there was a last minute
scramble to get out the youth vote
in many key states. That mistake
Let’s work to ensure that both the
opportunity and the challenge of the
youth vote is taken seriously
nologies and more social media to
mobilize what appears to be their
growing constituencies nearly in
every state. Thus, the difference in
2012 will not be determined just
by the technology use factor. It
will be determined by an effective,
protracted grassroots campaign to
register and mobilize millions of
youth voters who love hip-hop
music and culture. Thus it will be
the “Hip-Hop Vote” in 2012 that
will help to shape the future of the
world.
should not be repeated. The time
to make the difference is now for
the mobilization of the youth vote.
In the hip-hop community, we
all know that you make progress
whether you are in a studio, a cor-
porate suite or in a street organiza-
tion by how well and consistent
that you “grind” or work tirelessly
until you have perfected your gift
and talent to share with the world.
We must start grinding to get the
Hip-HopVote now and keep grind-
ing until we set another historic
record of the highest youth voter
turnout in American history in
November 2012.
The states with the largest num-
ber of electoral votes: New York,
California, and Texas are showing
a significant increase in the num-
ber of persons that have become
18 years of age since November
2008. A national campaign needs
to be properly organized, funded
and systematically launched in all
the states, especially in those
states where there are clear mar-
gins where the youth vote is deter-
minative.
2012 will present the most deci-
sive election in American history
in terms of whether or not the
United States will move forward
in the 21st Century as a pluralistic,
inclusive democracy or begin to
move backward to the old divi-
sive, racial, and elitist politics of
the past. Hip-Hop transcends race,
class, and other social divisions.
Hip-Hop is the cultural phenome-
na that represents the transforma-
tive character of youth conscious-
ness and responsible social action.
Let’s work to ensure that both the
opportunity and the challenge of
the youth vote is taken seriously
for the remainder of 2011, as we
prepare for the battle of 2012.
Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis Jr. is the
Senior advisor for the Black
alliance for educational options
(Baeo) and the President of
education
online
Services
Corporation.