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Daily Archives: 06/15/2020
Tell retail companies to pay reparations, not shareholders
When COVID-19 stay-at-home orders began, so did the layoffs.
Retail workers have been some of the hardest hit, losing their previously reliable income as many large corporations closed operations at several of their facilities. Despite retail giants like Caterpillar, Levi Strauss, Stanley Black & Decker, and Steelcase doing this, they have almost simultaneously paid large dividends to their shareholders. That means that while hourly and low-wage workers were laid off in droves, shareholders got an additional check. The rich are literally getting richer—$434 billion wealthier since the pandemic hit—and we can’t accept these kinds of practices while Black people continue to face low wages, inability to get the healthcare they need, and violence from police.
Demand retail companies Caterpillar, Levi Strauss, Stanley Black & Decker pay reparations by donating to organizations that are supporting on-the-ground protestors.
Below is the petition we will send to retail companies Caterpillar, Levi Strauss, Stanley Black & Decker, and Steelcase.
Fighting for racial justice is so much more than a declaration that denounces racism. It requires dedication and action behind your words. Right now, you have a statement on your website that states your support of Black people. But, when COVID-19 hit, you furloughed or fired your hourly workers, many of whom are Black. Retail workers are disproportionately Black, which means your decision to lay off hourly workers has an undue impact on Black people and our families.
At the same time that you laid off your hourly workers, The Washington Post indicates that you paid out millions of dollars to shareholders in the form of stock buybacks. This is a slap in the face to the hourly workers who have dedicated themselves to working at your company.
Releasing a statement in support of Black people is not enough. In order to rectify your harmful decision to pay shareholders instead of your hourly workers, we request that you pay reparations in the form of donations to organizations that are supporting on-the-ground protestors.
colorofchange.org
1877 – Henry O. Flipper became the first African American to graduate from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Henry Ossian Flipper was born in Thomasville, Georgia, on March 21, 1856, into slavery and spent his formative years in Georgia. Following the Civil War, he attended the American Missionary Association Schools in his home state. In 1873 Flipper was appointed to the U.S. Military Academy, and in 1877 he became the first African-American to graduate from the institution. He was commissioned a second lieutenant and assigned to the 10th Cavalry. From 1878 until 1880 Lieutenant Flipper served on frontier duty in various installations in the southwest, including Fort Sill, Oklahoma. His duties included scouting, as well as serving as post engineer surveyor and construction supervisor, post adjutant, acting assistant and post quartermaster, and commissary officer.
In 1881 Lieutenant Flipper’s commanding officer accused him of “embezzling funds and of conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman.” As a result of these charges, he was court-martialed.

He was acquitted of the embezzlement charge but was found guilty, by general court martial, of conduct unbecoming an officer. On June 30, 1882, he was dismissed from the Army as required by this conviction.
As a civilian, Henry Flipper went on to distinguish himself in a variety of governmental and private engineering positions. These included serving as surveyor, civil and military engineer, author, translator, special agent of the Justice Department, special assistant to the Secretary of the Interior with the Alaskan Engineering Commission, aide to the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, as well as an authority on Mexican land and mining law.
He wrote and published several works. His first publication was an autobiography, The Colored Cadet at West Point ( New York: Lee, 1878; reprint, New York: Arno, 1898). His memoirs, Black Frontiersman: The Memoirs of Henry O. Flipper, first Black Graduate of West Point (Fort Worth, Texas: Texas Christian University Press, 1997) were compiled and edited with introduction and notes by Theodore D. Harris. His other works included Spanish and Mexican Land Laws: New Spain and Mexico for the Department of Justice in 1895.
Throughout the balance of his life, Henry Flipper maintained that he was innocent of the charges that resulted in his court-martial and dismissal from the Army and made numerous attempts to have his conviction reversed. He died in Georgia in 1940.
In 1976 descendants and supporters applied to the Army Board for the Correction of Military Records on behalf of Lieutenant Flipper. The Board, after stating that it did not have the authority to overturn his court-martial convictions, concluded the conviction and punishment were “unduly harsh and unjust” and recommended that Lieutenant Flipper’s dismissal commuted to a good conduct discharge. The Assistant Secretary of the Army (Manpower and Reserve Affairs) and The Adjutant General approved the Board’s findings, conclusions and recommendations and directed that the Department of the Army issue Lieutenant Flipper a Certificate of Honorable Discharge, dated 30 June 1882, in lieu of his dismissal on the same date.
On October 21, 1997, a private law firm filed an application of pardon with the Secretary of the Army on Lieutenant Flipper’s behalf. Seven months later, the application was forwarded by the Acting Assistant Secretary of the Army (Manpower and Reserve Affairs) to the Office of the Pardon Attorney, Department of Justice, with a recommendation that the pardon be approved. President William Jefferson Clinton pardoned Lieutenant Henry O. Flipper on February 19, 1999. In pardoning this officer, the President recognized an error and acknowledged the lifetime accomplishments of this American soldier.
Remarks by President Clinton at the Ceremony Honoring LT Henry O. Flipper
history.army
This website is provided as a service by the U.S. ARMY CENTER OF MILITARY HISTORY
JUNETEENTH is coming – make your plans !!!
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Lupita Nyong’o and skin whitener ~repost reminder …a lifeline
In this era of trump …a repost was needed
So, this speech given by Lupita Nyong’o was at the Essence Magazine 7th Annual Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon in Beverly Hills, California, USA, she was honoured with the Breakthrough Performance Award. It was 2014
I had to read and re-read the speech below because she addressed my own call for People of Colour to STOP the practice of skin whitening. This practice is far from new, it has unfortunately become a billion dollar snake that needs its head cut off, a severe reprimand of those who push white is right, begin to provide services that help those who hate themselves and the skin they live in. The speech is beyond illuminating lest we say eloquent and she addressed a letter, in which she talked about a fan who wrote to her about hating her dark skin so much she had bought the controversial skin lightening cream by Dencia called Whitenicious …Lupita spoke about Dencia’s skin bleaching cream, her own issues with hating her dark skin as a teenager & more … below
Lupita’s speech:
I wrote down this speech, I had no time to practice so this will be the practicing session.
Thank you Alfre, for such an amazing, amazing introduction and celebration of my work. And thank you very much for inviting me to be a part of such an extraordinary community.
I am surrounded by people who have inspired me, women in particular whose presence on screen made me feel a little more seen and heard and understood. That it is ESSENCE that holds this event celebrating our professional gains of the year is significant, a beauty magazine that recognizes the beauty that we not just possess but also produce.
I want to take this opportunity to talk about beauty, Black beauty, dark beauty. I received a letter from a girl and I’d like to share just a small part of it with you: “Dear Lupita,” it reads, “I think you’re really lucky to be this Black but yet this successful in Hollywood overnight. I was just about to buy Dencia’s Whitenicious cream to lighten my skin when you appeared on the world map and saved me.”
My heart bled a little when I read those words, I could never have guessed that my first job out of school would be so powerful in and of itself and that it would propel me to be such an image of hope in the same way that the women of The Color Purple were to me.
I remember a time when I too felt unbeautiful. I put on the TV and only saw pale skin, I got teased and taunted about my night-shaded skin. And my one prayer to God, the miracle worker, was that I would wake up lighter-skinned. The morning would come and I would be so excited about seeing my new skin that I would refuse to look down at myself until I was in front of a mirror because I wanted to see my fair face first. And every day I experienced the same disappointment of being just as dark as I was the day before. I tried to negotiate with God, I told him I would stop stealing sugar cubes at night if he gave me what I wanted, I would listen to my mother’s every word and never lose my school sweater again if he just made me a little lighter. But I guess God was unimpressed with my bargaining chips because He never listened.
And when I was a teenager my self-hate grew worse, as you can imagine happens with adolescence. My mother reminded me often that she thought that I was beautiful but that was no conservation, she’s my mother, of course she’s supposed to think I am beautiful. And then…Alek Wek. A celebrated model, she was dark as night, she was on all of the runways and in every magazine and everyone was talking about how beautiful she was. Even Oprah called her beautiful and that made it a fact. I couldn’t believe that people were embracing a woman who looked so much like me, as beautiful. My complexion had always been an obstacle to overcome and all of a sudden Oprah was telling me it wasn’t. It was perplexing and I wanted to reject it because I had begun to enjoy the seduction of inadequacy. But a flower couldn’t help but bloom inside of me, when I saw Alek I inadvertently saw a reflection of myself that I could not deny.
Now, I had a spring in my step because I felt more seen, more appreciated by the far away gatekeepers of beauty. But around me the preference for my skin prevailed, to the courters that I thought mattered I was still unbeautiful. And my mother again would say to me you can’t eat beauty, it doesn’t feed you and these words plagued and bothered me; I didn’t really understand them until finally I realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.
And what my mother meant when she said you can’t eat beauty was that you can’t rely on how you look to sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion for yourself and for those around you. That kind of beauty enflames the heart and enchants the soul. It is what got Patsey in so much trouble with her master, but it is also what has kept her story alive to this day. We remember the beauty of her spirit even after the beauty of her body has faded away.
And so I hope that my presence on your screens and in the magazines may lead you, young girl, on a similar journey. That you will feel the validation of your external beauty but also get to the deeper business of being beautiful inside.
There is no shame in Black beauty.
Lupita’s speech is a letter filled with humor , love and a lot of wisdom for little girls of colour from 1 – 98 who need to be taught self-love while the entertainment business needs to accept that POC come in all colours shapes sizes, speak differently and some of us don’t sing or dance, but plenty of us have great talent that should be accepted without having to make drastic changes to our features like skin whitening to get a part or a job …crossover
~~ Nativegrl77