Selma Critics

     Can I get real about the LBJ part of the film? I do not get all this whitewashing of history -- that the march was LBJ's idea? Why did I go through the 60's and 70's thinking that the highest office of government wanted MLK to go away and indeed they may very well have been in some way responsible on some level for his assassination then. I appreciated that the director chose to put that chilling scene where LBJ picks up the phone to call FBI director Hoover in the movie. It left that real question that was being thought and the dread that people of color and white anti racist allies recognized and truly felt then.
      I appreciated that it was made clear to the audience that being able to talk to the President, having access to powerful people made King vulnerable not more protected because that's a truth that people of privilege do not know but many people of color who have been in similar situations know to be true -- that King's life choice was as dangerous and isolated as could be. That, in fact, King was safer with the grassroots peoples -- who all faced violence together -- than he was by himself in the white marble halls of power with suited men with handshakes and smiles. I liked it when the film showed King and his other national organizers going into towns, received by the local organizers -- like in the breakfast scene, so real that many people of color could feel that welcome and camaraderie and the smell of breakfast, as well as the scene when the local organizers were guarded about King and other national organizers sweeping in and the consequences they may be left with when the national organizers returned to Atlanta. Who hasn't been there if they are people of color and organizing. 
     There were so many truths captured by this film and shared with those who could not know, no fault of their own, the back story, the inside story, the feelings. It's hard to tolerate these critics, whining because of some whitewashed factoid experienced by them from their own corner of reality is left out and in doing so are blind to what jewels have been included that they didn't know? Please! It's a big enough story; make your own film. Make that film that puts the clergy who answered King's call the center of a film. Hell, if you want to make LBJ the hero of the Civil Rights Movement rather than a President trying not go faster than he's ready and failing because even a President cannot control the extent of HATE and VIOLENCE Alabama police meted out, and a President cannot control the decent folks who stood up when called to put their lives on the line, many from clergy, fine. Make that film. It deserves to be told -- (about the clergy, I mean). But dammit, so does Du Vernay have the right to tell this one. If you are going to be swine missing the pearls which the wonderful director of this movie chose to include, I feel sorry for you, but please stop your damn complaining. Let us enjoy the sweet moment of a two hour film which actually captured what we remember and which transformed a nation.

Yuri Kochiyama on Malcolm X

Malcolm X, the Film by Cochise Moore

           

            I am from the generation that was greatly influenced by Malcolm X, El Hajj Malik El Shabazz.  Though he was assassinated before I knew of him, he was as alive as any teacher in my life.  And years later when I met Yuri Kochiyama at a pilgrimage held at Tule Lake Concentration Camp, as facilitator to the circle of Japanese speaking participants, Malcolm X was very much still as influential as any living person in our lives.  When I met her, I said, “I love Malcolm X” and she grabbed my hands and said, “OH, you love Malcolm also!”  I told her that Malcolm X reached down from the other side, and lifted up my students when they needed help and saved their lives – save them from the potential violence of police harassment and the constant harassment he faced at school.  Eleven years old.  Black Lives Matter.

            Tonight, I’d like to share with you the back story to a film filmed and edited by an 11 or 12 year old young Black man Cochise Moore during the first term of his seventh grade year.  I first saw Cochise in the entry-way of Jefferson Middle School in 1992.  Who could miss him – a burst of anger, running out the door with a student teacher chasing and pleading, “Cochise!  Come back.  It’ll only be worse if you leave!”  He was already gone off the school grounds but hearing her voice, he turned briefly, and I swear there was a bright flash of light as the sun seemed to catch the white X in the middle of his cap and it shown as if it were made of gold metal.  At that moment a thought flashed through me, “He turned around!” 

            The student teacher shared that Cochise had gotten in trouble in the 7^th grade hall again for fighting.  She said he was always erupting when the other students said racist things to him just to see him blow up.  His teachers have given up.  They say he’s a thug.

             “He turned around!” kept echoing in my mind and with that I marched into principal Dr. Bolden’s office.  Dr. Bolden was the young new principal of this troubled school which he had turned into a Multicultural International Middle School along with a new staff who gravitated to the school to have the opportunity to teach with him and turn everything around.  I asked Dr. Bolden if I could have Cochise during my morning prep.  The seventh grade team didn’t want him, but I could take him as his seventh grade teacher during that period.  Unlike any other principal I’ve taught for before then and after, he went with it.    He cleared the way.

            First meeting, I took Cochise out to a nearby fast food place and we sat and talked about his interests.   In that meal together I learned how irritated he was at people wearing the Malcolm X clothing which came into fashion before Spike Lee released his film “ they don’t even know what the X stands for,” he criticized.   Having learned his interest in filmmaking I suggested,  “Why don’t you tell these kids what the X stands for by making a film.”  His eyes sparked.  I told him I was married to a filmmaker, and I thought he would be fine coming in to teach some classes.  “The camera is a great tool to say what you want to say, Cochise.  It’s powerful. “  

            I was up to something for sure.   A close family friend of ours was Abas Ansari.  His sister Bahati and I were sisters from another mother, as close as sisters could be.  They were Muslim.  Abas was also a Vietnam Vet and strict father of another student, eighth grader, Nadirah.  I had plans to bring together a strong male role model with Cochise, a strong parental role model.   I also strategized to have Abas’ spunky daughter and no nonsense Iquo Udosenata, a Nigerian American student eighth grader into my morning prep too.  Nothing like eighth grade peers to talk some sense into a hot headed seventh grader. Cochise did not have a chance.  No choice except to get stronger and more disciplined from the inside out.

            My husband Will came in and trained Cochise.  Eric Schiff from across the hall, a strong anti-racist Jewish man who was cooler than cool replete with his tech lab, his editing lab, his cameras and lights, backed the training up as Cochise’s day to day coach.  I also asked Cochise to check in with Dr. Bolden, also cooler than cool from time to time about the project, some alone time with him in his office for other than disciplinary action.  I brought out every book and calendar with Malcolm X with images.  Cochise spent days with the film camera and a table pedestal taking shots carefully.  He told me he had chosen the shots and perfect songs already – “they’re about Malcolm X” he said proudly about the Arrested Development piece.  Nadirah and Iquo were his crew – and I overheard a lot of conversations about how to deal with stupid racism.  They told him what for in no nonsense language.

            Then came the day Abas visited, dressed as he did when he was Fruit of Islam for the temple in Chicago.  Cochise was definitely impressed and subdued.   It cracked me up to watch Cochise as he listened and listened and listened some more.  He would fidget, but not too much under Abas’ strict gaze.  His face flushed with stress, but he listened and listened and squirmed and listened for the whole period.  In earlier days, Cochise had told me he was probably going to grow up and  go to prison like his dad.  But now there was were role models he could not deny in his life – Vietnam Vet, Fruit of Islam Abas Ansari and Dr. Bob Bolden.

            Nadirah, Iquo, Schiff and I will never forget the day that Cochise finally played his film for his whole school.  Schiff had helped us become the first Channel One School in the District, very controversial because it brought Coca Cola into the school.  At the same time it gave us equipment so that the young people could produce and show their own news programming, and films.  And Cochise was the first one to play.  All the classrooms stayed tune after the student news program as the words Malcolm X came across the screen.  Schiff came from across the hall to watch with us.  Everything was hushed out in the hallways except for Cochise’s film.  And when it ended, there became the sound of applause down the hall.  “Cochise, come here!   Listen!” I said as the young ones came to the door, and he could hear that building wide instantaneous applause.  I shall never forget that. 

            Malcolm X, the film, shot by Cochise Moore, shown just weeks before Spike Lee’s film opened at the downtown McDonald Theater, changed this young man’s life.  Malcolm X changed his life.  His team,  the Spirit of Malcolm X, a few teachers, a principal, new Sisters, a filmmaker, changed his life and Cochise changed ours.  Please enjoy the film.  Cochise, the professor in Seattle Washington, who rescues young people from hopelessness and anger himself, found the VHS and sent this to us, but in the process the color could not transfer so you will see it in Black and White.  Then I’d like to say just a few words of what happened next.

            Like all good things, goodness leads to another blessing.  The next September, the eighth grade Cochise Moore, on the first day of school said, “Ms. Kawai Joo, what film are we going to make this year?”  I said, Bahati always wanted the four remaining Black Pioneer women of Eugene to be honored someday, Cochise.  You could do an oral history project with no editing:  Mrs. Washington, Mrs. Johnson, Mrs. Mims, and Mrs. Reynolds.  Cochise said he would bring a team together: Cory Mainor, Michael Kay or Michael Klindt, Marcus Nettles and Trayvon Cooks.  Their project was called the African American History Project, and they won honor from the State and community for it.  That’s another story, another team.  What the four elders did to smooth out these young men, to fill them with pride and love was a beautiful thing.  Cory, Cochise and Michael are all teachers.  Michael Klindt is teaching at Springfield High School and is the archivist and the local expert on this story.

            So I say, Thank you, Minister El Hajj Malik El Shabazz.  Thank you, Malcolm X for reaching out to every generation for as long as there is injustice, violence and the colonial yoke of white supremacy.

Stefan and Winnemem Language Lessons

This summer, I went back to the village for a week to learn as much of Winnemem as I could from the teacher who was there for the summer from Germany.  We met in the Chief's trailer and for hours, Stefan tried to teach us Winnemem.  He succeeded with many.  Rick and his mother Helene were definitely stars.

Staying in the house with Stefan every day was lesson day.

Stefan was working on the next lessons in his room, and Helene was on a phone call in her room.  I was in the kitchen getting lunch ready.  I nicked my hand with a sharp knife and it was bleeding a lot even with cold water pouring on it, so I took of to the bathroom and yelled to Helene for a bandaide. She was in her room, and I realized she was on the phone, so still bleeding quite a bit, I had my arm up trying not to drip and asked our linguist friend Stefan for help and he kept yelling from his room, "Ch'uqut!" "Ch'ugut!" He was trying to encourage me to say it in Winnemem. Then he saw me dragging the first aide kit out in the bathroom with one hand trying to open the band aid box, and realized I really needed help. Luckily Helene ran in with a phone to her ear, and waving a band aid in the other. I rinsed off the blood and Stefan helped me put the band aid on and all was ok. I had to run to the kitchen to "stir the food" and when I ran back to clean up the bit of blood splattered around the sink and found he had already cleaned it up. Thanking Stefan for heeding my Ch'uqut then. Because I'm on Granny's herbs, my nicks heal up very quickly and I can't even remember where I cut myself because there is no sign of the cut at all. That's my Winnemem language story for today.

What is Human

Post by AraGeek.

My sister, Bahati Ansari, posted this on my Facebook timeline. It gives me an opportunity to say something I've been thinking about Black Lives Matter. And Indigenous Lives Matter. Brown Lives Matter. I believe the State represented by the police and their violence targeting Black, Brown and Indigenous youth reveal starkly the underpinnings of the wealth of this country -- a wealth which is enjoyed by only the few and oppresses many. The underpinnings are the twin evils -- institutionalized slavery for profit by color and colonization by genocide. 

This critter you see Killing the snake for pretty boots without a blink of an eye or a thought is called "Man" but it is not a Being at all. It is Mr. White Supremacy who created himself. Human Nature is not greed and violence. Human Nature is to care for, to care about, to tend. That is what we were made for. Check you heart. What do you know about yourself. This aberration that this animation shows we have become is new and it is without rules, regulations, unbound in destruction.

Everything in the way of the destruction is destroyed and bottom line is Black Lives, Indigenous lives, Indigenous resistance to cultural genocide is in "Progress" way. Everything is topsy turvy now in this world. Progress is destruction, death. And nature is backwards. Progress is profit for the few and nothing for many.

Why is making waste so important? Because as we acquire THINGS and turn our backs and turn off our hearts on what is REAL in Life, (can't even use the word Reality any more because reality means some horrible screaming drama ridden thing on tv) we become like this animation guy who represents Man.

Well, he does not represent me. I am a being who is part of the Circle of Creation. I have a sacred responsibility just as the other beings do, innately. We have choice, but the choice is to be always for Life not Death. Sadly the human being has broken out of that sacred circle of life for a long time and we live in the destruction. But we still can choose at any point to be Human. Like the Chief Sisk said this weekend, we might not see the end of this destruction, but we must do our part during our lifetime at least for the young ones to build upon. As for the ending of this animation, I don't believe in aliens, even aliens who've come to destroy the destroyer, but I believe in indigenous ways of life. Follow indigenous out of this mess. Don't allow projects which destroy their way of life. Don't put up with the killing of innocent Black. Brown and Indigenous lives. It is all related. And we are all part of the whole, if we choose to be. This little animation is an interesting way to show how we look to the rest of the world, out of control and so destructive that the universe sends out the universe cops. It's a same sad storyline. But we can change it movement by movement, action by action, prayer by prayer, ceremony and commitment to Mother Earth, for Life and for all Beings.

+++++++

George Price Well-said, Misa. I agree that this way of being is an aberration, and not the true nature of humanity. It is just so dominant and prominent to us that it is normalized in our consciousness, because we have forgotten the first ways, the Indigenous Earthways. So, what I also see as incorrect in this film is that this wrong way or "upside down" way, as you say, and the wetiko way, as Jack Forbes called it in his book, Columbus and other Cannibals, does NOT go back 500,000 years. It is actually a very recent aberration in the time scale of homo sapiens sapiens (which is actually estimated to be a little less than 200,000 years). Vast destructive empires and megasocieties in human history only go back about 4,000 years (or 2% of modern human history) and the more intensely-destructive modern industrial capitalist and state socialist empires only go back less than 200 years. I also agree with you that sustainable, Indigenous lifeways have the guidance to a new direction that we need. I don't depend on space aliens or politicians.

CHORES

My sister and I had chores -- probably by age, but not in a checklist of course. It felt like from our perspective, we were pitching in to help. No allowance. We were doing this "for the family" was what mom always said. Allowance was definitely a foreign concept to us. They inculcated in us an attitude that still is a big influence today -- to do because we're part of a group. We have to make it happen. And "on" had to do with it, which is a concept that doesn't really exist in the English language without imposition of another way to look at what is simply respect. "On" is a little deeper because it lasts a lifetime; maybe I'll learn when I transition out, it lasts beyond a lifetime. It's the "debt" one owes their parents, grandparents, ancestors which cannot be paid back. The ones who gave you life; raised you. All we can do is be good human beings. 

I feel that feeling for Granny too. When she said she was my mother, I may have felt puzzlement, but only for a moment, accepting the gift offered during a rather confusing time in my life where I had come to her for help with our daughter and later a foster daughter with all my faith. Besides the spiritual doctoring and teachings, chores of daily life played a big part -- helping with the water, the wood (everything had to be brought in), the garden, the animals, getting ready for ceremony, spring cleaning, -- going up to Dekkas, cleaning the trailer out after the winter, uprooting the mice, assessing the bear damage, starting the sacred fire, doing Granny's bid when she was in bed, cooking, canning, making feasts, all of it. Two months a summer we lived chores together. They still look back at those days as their happiest times. Chores does not have a bad connotation in our daughter's mind anymore now that she's an adult. She said in Utah, her girlfriends (probably girls who didn't HAVE to do chores) looked to her for advice because she knew how to do everything having grown up with us and at the village. 

Although she never did it, she even knows how to build a fire. At the LCC pig roast, she looked at the scattered wood on what was to roast the pig, squatted down from her 6-inch heels and quickly rearranged them, saying "There! It'll start now." An orange flame leaped up, and I secretly smiled at the girl with the eyelashes, manicure, who came to a pig roast in a little dress and 6 inch heels, dusting off the dirt from her hands unconcernedly, who the Village raised with chores.

"Selma" the Movie

Will and I went to "Selma" this afternoon. I got emotional within a few minutes and stayed that way. First I want to give a nod and thank you to Spike Lee for doing it his way anyway whether Hollywood was ready to fund it or push it or not, and doing whatever he had to do to get a powerful Malcolm X film to the theaters from his own pocket and his friends' and set the path for films like this one. 

"Selma" came at the right time in Hollywood's development -- a generation of producers and the financial backing to do everything right and a new generation of directors to bring it into the now. And just in time. 

Seeing it tonight just brought it home like a punch to the gut which path we have chosen. Dr. King said in his Beyond Viet Nam Speech, that this nation was at a crossroads between being a thing oriented society or a people oriented society. Clearly we are quite a ways down that road of thing-oriented if one is to look at how vulnerable these precious voting rights, hard won with the lives of young martyrs and the blood and sweat and many tears, have become in this time, how militarized the police violence against Black Lives. I say this because there is a direct correlation between oppression against Black Brown and Indigenous and the rise of a Police State and erosion of rights. In our country, that would be suffered on racial lines and with genocide. 

You've heard the talk about the great movement in civil rights made at such great sacrifice and cost in the Sixties being rolled back in this century. This film brings that home. Police brutality and killings of innocent Black people, militarized technology used against courageous protest, and police getting away with it should be a thing of the past. That the brutality was shown on the televisions at home in living rooms across the US, it mobilized a nation. But now, the lack of media coverage of Ferguson, of Black Lives Matter, except through social media, and the militarization of police, blatant murder Black and Brown and Indigenous lives by shocking numbers without justice, that alone shows a roll back. The false blocks to voting, in fact the manipulation of the democratic process to prevent one person one vote has our attention now. There are more than I want to list here but the point is this is an all too relevant film which reveals how far backwards we have fallen into this country's white supremacy noxious weed roots. 

I applaud the director and her powerfully talented and gifted actors for making all the points with such humanity and love. Such respect was shown to the civil rights warriors of the Sixties. Some still living helped by sharing those small facts and stories we did not know, by helping the director see and feel how it was then to go into the towns and villages where Jim Crow ruled with violence, how it was to be welcomed, how it was to be in the company of the families of a great resistance movement who refused to just quit fighting for justice generation after generation. This film does not leave Selma caught in history. This film brings Selma to life right here and right now. This film does not take the guts out of a speech made by Dr. King and serve it out fluffy. This film, first shows the MANY, elderly and children, martyred or relentless, who inspired such courage in him to lead. The shadow of President Johnson, unleashing the distorted FBI on King hung over the preacher activist leader from the moment Johnson picked up the phone to consider J Edgar's crazed offer, to get rid of "him." It shows that working for justice through legislation in the Nation's Capitol was as dangerous and isolating as any place could be, an assassin's smile came with every politician's handshake. This is not kumbaya non violence -- or, because I am from that time, kumbaya was never fluffy, but always face to face with the most virulent kind of violence. 

"Selma" should be shown every year to remind people what non-violence REALLY is and why so much is owed to the Black martyrs and White martyrs who marched among the devil for the right to be human beings during and AFTER segregation was supposedly dead. Selma should be shown to every school child if for only to hear the activist elder say to Coretta that running through her veins was blood of the great ones, the scholars and great leaders, chemists, and those who resisted fearful things to courageously fight for justice and THAT is what their training is, to be descendants of such ancestors!