Cultural appropriation
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Started by GunterK - June 10, 2020, 8:59 p.m.

Some African American people often get upset, when they see white people copying their customs, for example, white women wearing African-American-style braids. They call it cultural appropriation... and they don't like it.

Therefore, It was somewhat strange to see a few Dem Congress people kneeling for a moment of silence, to honor George Floyd.

View image on Twitter

They all wore African scarfs. I wondered, if this would be called 'cultural appropriation". Indeed, there were some negative comments from the African American community, calling this a hypocritical act of "virtue signalling"

However.... it becomes more interesting....

after a little studying, it turns out that these scarfs are called Kente clothes. Such clothes were only worn by royalty of the Ashanti empire (around modern day Ghana). And, wouldn't you know, the Ashanti were slave traders.... they supplied the Western powers with slaves they had captured.

http://ultimatehistoryproject.com/kente-cloth-and-the-history-of-the-ashanti-people.html

It seems to me, this bit of info should be shared with others.

Comments
By metmike - June 11, 2020, 2:24 a.m.
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C'mon now Gunter, as old white men, what do we really know about African Americans?

I'll bet that before this colorful display, you had no idea that this wardrobe existed. 

We should be very grateful to  Pelosi and the democrats for enlightening us about what's REALLY important to African American's living in this country.

They don't care about jobs or getting an education or having safe urban communities to raise their children in. They don't want responsible husbands or fathers. They don't want to raise children like white people do. You and me got that all wrong.

 They want FREEDOM. Freedom to choose whether to kill their babies or not. Freedom from the cops who only want to frame innocent young black men in order to put them in prison and murder others because of racism. 

What black people really want, is to see white people put on special articles of clothing that are worn, either by somebody from Africa or somebody who is a politician in the United States trying to get black votes. 


And it's not true about BLM. Not ALL Black Lives Matter(according to the democrats):

    Let’s Talk About the Black Abortion Rate  

      In New York City, thousands more black babies are aborted each year than born alive.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/lets-talk-about-the-black-abortion-rate-1531263697




Abortion: The overlooked tragedy for black Americans

https://azcapitoltimes.com/news/2020/02/25/abortion-the-overlooked-tragedy-for-black-americans/


 
  

Genocide: Black Abortions in America

 

https://www.grrtl.org/genocide/

"Today, with more than 28% of all black pregnancies ending in induced abortion, it is a human crisis.

Abortion is the number one killer of black lives in the United States.  According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, abortion kills more black people than HIV, homicide, diabetes, accident, cancer, and heart disease … combined.

In 2014, African-American women comprised 13.3% of the U.S. population, but black women had 36% of all abortions."

By metmike - June 11, 2020, 2:43 a.m.
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These Black Lives DO NOT matter either:


Truth about black deaths

https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2019/sep/08/truth-about-black-deaths/


"Tragically, homicide is the No. 2 cause of death for black male children ages 1-14 years. Even among babies and toddlers 1-4 years old, homicide is the No. 2  cause of death. Homicide rises to No. 1 for ages 15-34.

What percentage of these murders are by police? The Washington Post reports 986 people killed by police in 2017.  Even if every person killed by police was a black male, that would only total 11% of the murders. By no reasonable use of our language would that represent a “leading cause of death.”

So who is killing black males? PolitiFact found 93% of murder victims were killed by someone who shares their race. It seems reasonable to speculate that most black murder (including killing of over 1,000 black male children per year) is committed by young black males, since youth and male gender strongly correlate with committing crime."



By metmike - June 11, 2020, 6:37 a.m.
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Of course all those things matter. They really matter a great deal to African Americans. 

I was just being sarcastic because the democrats are not serving the black community with authentic policies  and agenda to help them to reach their potential in order to enjoy as much of the American dream as you and me.

There is so much more to it than the relationship with cops.....who are almost all good people.

Cops are being used as a political tool by the dems to gain power right now. Blacks are being used.....again by the dems, using propaganda and narratives about social justice in one realm, while completely ignoring other much more important realms which are destroying the black families. 

The black family unit MUST be our top priority.....with policies to strengthen and nurture it....if blacks (and hopefully everyone else wants this too) ever hope to maximize their participation in the American dream.

I’m not saying that dems don’t want this. Just that their policies are causing it to NOT happen because their continued failing policies are based on politics and power for the party.......not honest assessments of the true needs of black folks in our society.


By TimNew - June 11, 2020, 7:08 a.m.
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The single strongest demographic correlation with poverty and criminal activity, by far, is single paernt homes. Liberal policies encourage and reward single parents.

By metmike - June 11, 2020, 7:08 a.m.
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Like joe  Biden accidentally let slip out....”if you vote for Donald Trump, you ain’t black”

That should be the party slogan.

With regards to winning in November. The objective for the dems and their allies, the MSM and many enemies of president trump is to maximize the emotion hate. Hate for president trump.......then blame him for the hate.

He is the easiest guy in American political history to hate....so this tactic will continue to pay handsome dividends for the dems, 

Hate is the most destructive emotion of all. It blinds us to the truth sometimes. It causes us to want the hated person to have bad things happen to them and for us to never see anything good about that person 

Hate is blind!!

Hate is the democratic and MSM currency right now, although Donald trump uses it just as effectively ......actually......not true. His attempts to use hatred backfire most of the time and the hatred boomerangs back on to him.

With that being the case, the next 4 months are going to be very ugly when it comes to relationships between human beings.

Hopefully, we can be above that here and not let hatred spill over from a political view to our feelings for somebody here expressing a view that we disagree with.

We are all in this together and 2020 has already made history for some unprecedented bad things....and it’s not even half over.

What can define your personal character is how much hate that you have or don’t have.

How much love you have!!

If you want to help African Americans for instance, do it out of love for humanity and looking at objective truths.......for what would help the most.....even if it requires agreeing with somebody you hate.

Love not hate.

Donald trump isn’t the candidate of love, that’s not what I’m saying. The point is that only you can let love or hate be a powerful force in your life, regardless of all the political chaos and confusion surrounding our lives that often uses hate to capture our attention and manipulate our opinions.

By metmike - June 11, 2020, 7:28 a.m.
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Tim,

That is an indisputable truth/fact!

By GunterK - June 11, 2020, 8:27 a.m.
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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/black-twitter-mocks-pelosi-schumer-kente-cloth

"....If anyone can’t understand why Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and them dressed up like they’re trying to sneak into Wakanda is disrespectful and appropriative you have a great deal to learn..."

"...Dear democrats,these colors & patterns belong to ancient tribes and mean something to us...."

"...The DC African-fabric shop is probably now sold out in order to meet the demand of this ridiculous tokenism by Democrat politicians.Dear Africans step side! at its worst...."

"...I had to say something about the American politicians shameless and ignorantly using the Kente fabric as a prop in their virtue signaling. I’m usually more mild mannered than this so please forgive me, I’m upset...."

By metmike - June 11, 2020, 10:52 a.m.
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Congressional Democrats criticized for wearing Kente cloth at event honoring George Floyd

https://www.click2houston.com/news/politics/2020/06/09/congressional-democrats-criticized-for-wearing-kente-cloth-at-event-honoring-george-floyd/

(CNN) – Congressional Democrats wore stoles made of Kente cloth during a moment of silence for George Floyd, drawing criticism from observers who felt they made the traditional African textile into a political prop.

About two dozen Democratic lawmakers, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, knelt for eight minutes and 46 seconds at the Capitol's Emancipation Hall as a tribute to Floyd on Monday. Most of them were seen wearing Kente cloths during the moment of silence as well as during a subsequent news conference.

The wearing of the Kente cloths drew criticism from a University of Oxford researcher who saw the move as performative.

"My ancestors did not invent Kente cloth for them to be worn by publicity (obsessed) politicians as 'activism' in 2020," Jade Bentil, a Ghanaian-Nigerian researcher at University of Oxford, tweeted.

Kente cloth is believed to have been produced as early as 1000 B.C. among the Akan and Ewe peoples of Western African in modern-day Ghana and Togo, according to the African American Intellectual History Society.

Each color holds a special meaning. Gold symbolizes status/serenity, green means renewal, blue means pure spirit/harmony, red is passion and black is union with ancestors/spiritual awareness, the society said.

Other observers from the journalism and entertainment worlds added to Bentil's criticism, arguing that the lawmakers were just using the cloth as a political prop.

"Standing in front of a church and holding up a bible you never read for a photo op is no different than kneeling in kente cloth you never wear for a photo op," Charles Robinson, a sports reporter for Yahoo tweeted, referring to the now infamous moment when President Donald Trump held up a Bible at St. John's Episcopal Church for a photo-op last week.

"What if they, like, just passed some laws instead of dressing up like a Wakandan chess set?" screenwriter Eric Haywood tweeted.

Both tweets got thousands of "likes" on Twitter.

By metmike - June 11, 2020, 10:56 a.m.
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For those that think I always give Trump a  pass:


                Mattis: Trump doesn't even try to unite the US            

                            Started by WxFollower - June 4, 2020, 1:15 a.m.            

https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/53313/

                By metmike - June 5, 2020, 1:28 a.m.            

            

"I think one of Trumps biggest mistakes, that made him look especially bad (to me) was using the bible as a prop.

The king of inflaming race relations, Al Sharpton had me in strong agreement with him on that point today."

Rev. Al Sharpton: Trump used a bible as a prop. We will not allow George Floyd to become one.

https://www.msnbc.com/msnbc/watch/rev-al-sharpton-trump-used-a-bible-as-a-prop-we-will-not-allow-george-floyd-to-become-one-84384325612