Back in the early 1990's when I was in college (I never made it out) I was a very politically active young fellow. Their were several protest I participated in over my short lived career as an activist.
During this time I was reading books about the struggle and my taste went from books about the panthers, Malcolm X as well as dozens of autobiographies of black historical figures (many of them jazz or blues musicians). I studied historians such as Dr. Ben Jochanan, Dr. John Henrik Clarke and Ivan Van Sertima as part of my quest for knowledge from a black perspective.
Anyway during one of the protest I participated in, me and some other activist took over the board room in the building housing the presidents office. This would have been on a Friday during that Friday and all throughout the weekend many officials from the government of Washington DC were sent to meet, negotiate with us and then to end our protest and get us out of the Board of Trustees meeting room.
The 2 main negotiators from our side was a young brotha on his way to becoming a mid level activist and a young sistah who was only a campus activist and would not go on to make that her career/life's work. In all, Id say there were about ten of us who were protesting, during that weekend, us band of merry protesters really got to know each other well during that campaign, we recited poetry, we talked about music along with fellowshiping in general.
What became clear quite early during our protest is that the two negotiators didn't get along with each other whatsoever. Actually (we'll call the guy John and well call the lady Kimberly) during one of the meetings with city officials John who was the leader was interrupted by Kimberly who felt like John wasn't emphasizing things she thought should be emphasized.
This sent John into a silent rage as he spun around in his chair enraged but saying nothing. After the city official left the boardroom John and Kimberly got into a nasty argument which eventually led to John stating that we were to keep that bitch away from him. Although I knew John had an out of control ego, him calling Kimberly a bitch in public like that was a few levels over the top, I didn't know he would disrespect black women is such a public way. Especially considering the fact that John was supposed to be conscious and pro black, this consciousness included showing utmost respect for black women.
Anyway fast forward to the end of the protest, eventually we would go on to reject all of the offers made by the city officials ( I forget what offers were made) and by Sunday the President and Board of Trustees (fed up with us) had instructed the city police to remove us from the building in order to have school as regularly scheduled the next day. We knew the police were coming and we knew when, as we stood looking at the window some of our conscious friends stood outside looking up at us from the plaza. As we gave black powerful salutes to our friends the police flashed black power salutes back at us protesters (what assholes) anyway shortly after that the police stormed the meeting room and we were evicted from the boardroom without being arrested (the president and board didn't want arrested they just wanted us gone).
After being evicted from the school administration building, we then caught a cab over to one of the protesters apartment. In the cab was John and Kimberly, myself and about 3 others out of the ten protesters. As the cab pulled up to our destination, me John and a brotha named Craig got out of the cab, then everyone. As we were standing in front of our destination John then threatened to "destroy" Kimberly for undermining him during the protest and began to move towards her in a violent way. At that point I approached John and told him that his behavior 100% unacceptable and a complete contradiction to the consciousness we were engaged in and trying to promote amongst black folks.
Me, Craig and John then spent the next 2 hours walking along the damp streets of the city as I yelled at him and begged him to open his mind to the fact that if we (black men) continued to disrespect and hurt black women the all of this consciousness/black stuff didn't mean a thing. By the time I finished with him there is no way on this earth he could ever say that he didn't understand where I was coming from. In fact he admitted to me that he needed to change but that it would take time, to which I told him again that putting his hands on a black woman was profane and not acceptable.
Fast forward again to recent and current times, now John has had a radio program on one of Cathy Hughes radio stations for about ten years now as well as an African name (Matsumala or something like that). John is a mid level activist doing what mid level activists do. If a famous activist like Dick Gregory or Jessie Jackson show up in town he is always in the crowd wearing the Dashiki's or Kente cloth spewing the rhetoric. The problem is along with always being around activist and protest on the behalf of the American black population this brotha has long record during that time of abusing women.
A lady who Ive known for years, who is active in Washington DC activist circles mentioned Johns abuse of black women without me saying anything about that night he tried to beat up Kimberly. Then about 3 weeks ago I was taking a walk with my mentor and she mentioned it along with the fact that John had actually been arrested for beating up women.
Brotha's like John make me sick to my stomach because for some reason they cannot seem to process the fact that all of their talk against the system/man means absolutely nothing if we don't treat each other with the utmost respect. Putting your hand on a woman (especially a black woman) knowing all they have been through in this society is a sin in my book.
Now that I think about it I should have whooped Johns as# that night because cats like him cannot be talked out of abusing/beating up woman, all the talking in the world would never do any good. As profound, intelligent and deep as brothas like John are they fail to understand that revolution just doesn't extend to getting the system/man up off of us but revolution also includes taking our (black men's) game to another level to cover the areas of cheating on your wife/girlfriend then acting like its OK, not talking down to them and definitely never, ever putting your hands on them.
But when you have a supposedly conscious brotha, who is also a leader and has access to the public airwaves his abusive behavior towards sisters is utterly sickening. Brotha John has indeed earned himself the title of CLOWN PRINCE AMONGST HYPOCRITES because it is nothing but pure hypocrisy raising hell about how awful America is, when you have been beating up black women for the last ten years at night but during the day on your radio show your spewing black power rhetoric.
This cat is and has been turd for a long time now.
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