Black Lives Matters is not helping Blacks. Marriage. Kids within marriage. Quality education. That’s what’s needed…

Black Lives Matters  — started in 2013 –  is  narrowly focused on police brutality towards Afro-Americans.  Black Lives Matters is not helping Blacks.  What really needs to happen for the Afro-American community to thrive?

 

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Start a Charter school in your CA community?

Does your  community  in CA  need a  charter school  which can offer  what’s best for your particular  child?   How can  you effectively  say ‘no more stalling the opening of schools?   Start a school?

Look what’s coming per Gov. Newsom:    Distance learning  via Zoom with homework packets via e-mail looms for many CA public schools.

The unions for teachers put the needs of their members far, far ahead of the needs of the students.   The teacher unions don’t think enough has been done to ensure the safety of all.  Unions prefer to put off the start of school.    But, what about the emotional health of the students?

How to start a charter school?  You need a Concept, Mission, Governance, Budget, Location and Petition.  Know that school boards are likely to view ‘the new kid on the block’ as taking money away from them.  The teacher unions are powerful and have a lot of say in how school boards make decisions.

So what’s the best  education for your child?  This year? A charter school? 

Aptos Psychologist:    Kids need social contact  with peers as much as they need actual teachers to interact with and learn from as role models.

Cameron Jackson, Ph.D.   Licensed Psychologist  drcameronjackson@gmail.com    831 688-6002

 

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Going to a rally? Beach? Think twice … use social distancing …

What happened  at a religious rally for Navajos in AZ  held in March 2020  with no social distancing?  The virus spread rapidly.

One story of what’s happening to American Indians:   Instead of 5 minutes to list number of  cases and the dead it took 45 minutes for a radio station to list the dead.

“When a family member dies, we the Diné, whom Spanish conquistadors named the Navajo, send a notice to our local radio station so that everyone in the community can know. Usually the reading of the death notices—the names of those who have passed on, their ages, where they lived and the names of their matrilineal and patrilineal clans—takes no more than five minutes. It used to be very rare to hear about young people dying. But this past week, I listened to 45 minutes of death notices on KGAK Radio AM 1330. The ages ranged from 26 to 89, with most of the dead having been in their 30s, 40s or 50s.e names.  

Aptos Psychologist:   In Santa Cruz County, 3 have died, 59 hospitalized, 772 known cases, 321 recovered and 23,000+ tested for Covid-19. 

In Santa Cruz County  local health official  Gail Newel said she was not sure whether or not the spike in new Covid-19 cases was connected to the recent political rallies. She is re-opening the local beaches because   “people are not willing to be governed anymore in that regard”.  Children over age two are now required to wear face masks says Newel.

Anyone looking at  Seacliff State Beach lately will notice the lack of social distancing by groups of people hanging out in front of the beach  restrooms as well as large groups of people  using the beach.

And people are leaving their beach  litter behind. On Sat. July 18,  Live Like Coco   sponsored a Seacliff State Beach Cleanup which  removed heaps of trash from the beach.  About 40+ people attended the Live Like Coco clean up.

 

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Another lunacy from Alec Baldwin [Trump will stop 2020 elections]

Actor Alec Baldwin is pushing a wild conspiracy theory that President Donald Trump could use armed force to stop the election in November.

The Hollywood star is basing his unfounded claim on the Department of Homeland Security’s decision to deploy federal agents in Portland, Oregon, to subdue violent rioters following weeks of urban chaos.

“The ‘police’ activity in Portland, and lack of outrage over/resistance to it tells us how Trump could stop the election in November. It’s his only hope,” Alec Baldwin wrote.

———————–

Firenze Sage:   Hollywood idiocy in spades.

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hey whitey… stand in the back of the line now! victims of racism more often whites now?

Dr. Jacqui  Lewis, an Afro-American pastor in New York City with Middle Collegiate Church,  offers two anti-racist workshops.    She discusses only  what to do about racism towards…. blacks.

But what about racism towards whites?     Whites Believe They Are Victims of Racism More Often Than Blacks

from Social Work Today:   “Whites believe that they have replaced blacks as the primary victims of racial discrimination in contemporary America, according to a new study from researchers at Tufts University’s School of Arts and Sciences and Harvard Business School.

“Both whites and blacks agree that anti-black racism has decreased over the last 60 years, according to the study. However, whites believe that anti-white racism has increased and is now a bigger problem than anti-black racism.

“It’s a pretty surprising finding when you think of the wide range of disparities that still exist in society, most of which show black Americans with worse outcomes than whites in areas such as income, home ownership, health, and employment,” says Tufts Associate Professor of Psychology Samuel Sommers, PhD, coauthor of the study that appears in Perspectives on Psychological Science.

Researchers asked a nation-wide sample of 208 blacks and 209 whites to indicate the extent to which they felt blacks and whites were the targets of discrimination in each decade from the 1950s to the 2000s. A scale of 1 to 10 was used, with 1 being “not at all” and 10 being “very much.”

White and black estimates of bias in the 1950s were similar. Both groups acknowledged little racism against whites at that time but substantial racism against blacks. Respondents also generally agreed that racism against blacks has decreased over time, although whites believed it has declined faster than blacks do.

However, whites believed that racism against whites has increased significantly as racism against blacks has decreased. On average, whites rated anti-white bias as more prevalent in the 2000s than anti-black bias by more than a full point on the 10-point scale. Moreover, some 11% of whites gave anti-white bias the maximum rating of 10 compared with only 2% of whites who rated anti-black bias a 10. Blacks, however, reported only a modest increase in their perceptions of “reverse racism.”

“These data are the first to demonstrate that not only do whites think more progress has been made toward equality than do blacks, but whites also now believe that this progress is linked to a new inequality, at their expense,” note researchers. Whites see racial equality as a zero sum game, in which gains for one group mean losses for the other.

— Source: Tufts University

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Trump and Biden square off on jobs — get things built (Trump) or re-regulate energy economy

Trump or Biden?  On jobs?  Which do you pick?

This is based on material  in the WSJ, Friday, July 17, 2020, The Campaign Finally Begins by Kimberly Strassel.

Trump plans ‘top-to-bottom’ overhaul of the federal environmental review process which stands in the way of nearly every infra-structure project in the country.  That would create millions of jobs, attract more business to American and make the USA more competitive.

Biden just  released his $2 TRILLION climate change plan, product of a task force co-chaired by Rep. Alexandrea Ocasio-Cortez.

Biden vows to outlaw all use of coal and natural gas to generate electricity within 15 years.  He will ban oil and gas production on federal land and offshore. He seeks ‘zero emissions’ cars.  Biden is promising to delete the jobs of millions of Americans — at a times of soaring unemployment.  A ban on offshore drilling alone would cost 200,000 jobs and damage regional economies.  Basic consumer choice would disappear for vehicles, dishwashers, even homes.

Biden wants to massively re-regulate the energy economy.  Trump said,  “We want to get things built.”

Aptos Psychologist:  Let people live their lives free from as much regulation as possible.Let people go back to work when and  as they choose.    Open the schools.  Start new charter schools — which have fewer regulations –  if  teachers in union jobs  don’t want to teach.  Social distancing  issues can be worked out.  Masks and the wearing of them for long periods of time is   problematic  both in terms of cleanliness and simple breathing.

What say you?  Weigh in on the conversation about jobs, Biden and Trump.

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on toppling statutes and re-writing history: Autres temps, autres moeurs

On toppling statutes:      Autres temps, autres moeurs.

In a  recent workshop on anti-racism  [publicized by St. John’s episcopal in Aptos and other churches] Dr. Lewis of New York City and senior pastor of  Middle Collegiate Church,  said   if a statute of Jefferson were in her backyard she would topple it. Recently a statute of Jefferson was toppled.   In Portland, Oregon.

 

 

 

 

Does  Dr. Lewis really support  toppling statutes?  Erasing the past?

Will her next workshop  explicate  her view  of  the ‘story’ of racism in America  with  Thomas Jefferson  a central player  responsible for ‘systemic racism’ against blacks?   Tune in and see. The cost is $22.03.

Dr. Lewis’ next workshop,  titled Answering the Call: An Antiracist workshop,   is  offered    July 22 & 23, 2020  from 7:oo-8:30 EST [4pm-5:30 in CA]. Go to middlechurch.org  for details and how to pay.

About toppling statutes and erasing history.  Perhaps Dr. Lewis and other like  minded souls might  consider the following letter.    This letter is a response from Oxford to Black Students attending as Rhodes Scholars to remove the statue of Oxford Benefactor, Cecil Rhodes.

“Dear Scrotty Students,

“Cecil Rhodes’s generous bequest has contributed greatly to the comfort and well being of many generations of Oxford students – a good many of them, dare we say it, better, brighter and more deserving than you.

“This does not necessarily mean we approve of everything Rhodes did in his lifetime – but then we don’t have to. Cecil Rhodes died over a century ago.   Autres temps, autres moeurs.  If you don’t understand what this means – and it would not remotely surprise us if that were the case – then we really think you should ask yourself the question: “Why am I at Oxford?”

“Oxford, let us remind you, is the world’s second oldest extant university. Scholars have been studying here since at least the 11th century. We’ve played a major part in the invention of Western civilisation, from the 12th century intellectual renaissance through the Enlightenment and beyond. Our alumni include William of Ockham, Roger Bacon, William Tyndale, John Donne, Sir Walter Raleigh, Erasmus, Sir Christopher Wren, William Penn, Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), Samuel Johnson, Robert Hooke, William Morris, Oscar Wilde, Emily Davison, Cardinal Newman, Julie Cocks. We’re a big deal.  And most of the people privileged to come and study here are conscious of what a big deal we are. Oxford is their alma mater – their dear mother – and they respect and revere her accordingly.

“And what were your ancestors doing in that period?   Living in mud huts, mainly.   Sure we’ll concede you the short lived Southern African civilization of Great Zimbabwe.   But let’s be brutally honest here.   The contribution of the Bantu tribes to modern civilization has been as near as damn it to zilch.

“You’ll probably say that’s “racist”. But it’s what we here at Oxford prefer to call “true.”   Perhaps the rules are different at other universities. In fact, we know things are different at other universities.   We’ve watched with horror at what has been happening across the pond from the University of Missouri to the University of Virginia and even to revered institutions like Harvard and Yale: the “safe spaces”; the? #?blacklivesmatter; the creeping cultural relativism; the stifling political correctness; what Allan Bloom rightly called “the closing of the American mind”.   At Oxford however, we will always prefer facts and free, open debate to petty grievance-mongering, identity politics and empty sloganeering.  The day we cease to do so is the day we lose the right to call ourselves the world’s greatest university.

“Of course, you are perfectly within your rights to squander your time at Oxford on silly, vexatious, single-issue political campaigns.  (Though it does make us wonder how stringent the vetting procedure is these days for Rhodes scholarships and even more so, for Mandela Rhodes scholarships) We are well used to seeing undergraduates – or, in your case – postgraduates, making idiots of themselves.   Just don’t expect us to indulge your idiocy, let alone genuflect before it. You may be black – “BME” as the grisly modern terminology has it – but we are colour blind.   We have been educating gifted undergraduates from our former colonies, our Empire, our Commonwealth and beyond for many generations. We do not discriminate over sex, race, colour or creed.  We do, however, discriminate according to intellect.

“That means, inter alia, that when our undergrads or postgrads come up with fatuous ideas, we don’t pat them on the back, give them a red rosette and say: “Ooh, you’re black and you come from South Africa.  What a clever chap you are!”    No.   We prefer to see the quality of those ideas tested in the crucible of public debate.   That’s another key part of the Oxford intellectual tradition you see: you can argue any damn thing you like but you need to be able to justify it with facts and logic – otherwise your idea is worthless.

This ludicrous notion you have that a bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes should be removed from Oriel College, because it’s symbolic of “institutional racism” and “white slavery”. Well even if it is – which we dispute – so bloody what?   Any undergraduate so feeble-minded that they can’t pass a bronze statue without having their “safe space” violated really does not deserve to be here.   And besides, if we were to remove Rhodes’s statue on the premise that his life wasn’t blemish-free, where would we stop?   As one of our alumni Dan Hannan has pointed out, Oriel’s other benefactors include two kings so awful – Edward II and Charles I – that their subjects had them killed.   The college opposite – Christ Church – was built by a murderous, thieving bully who bumped off two of his wives.   Thomas Jefferson kept slaves: does that invalidate the US Constitution?   Winston Churchill had unenlightened views about Muslims and India: was he then the wrong man to lead Britain in the war?”

“Actually, we’ll go further than that. Your Rhodes Must Fall campaign is not merely fatuous but ugly, vandalistic and dangerous.   We agree with Oxford historian RW Johnson that what you are trying to do here is no different from what ISIS and the Al-Qaeda have been doing to artefacts in places like Mali and Syria.   You are murdering history. 

And who are you, anyway, to be lecturing Oxford University on how it should order its affairs?   Your ?#?rhodesmustfall campaign, we understand, originates in South Africa and was initiated by a black activist who told one of his lecturers “whites have to be killed”.   One of you – Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh – is the privileged son of a rich politician and a member of a party whose slogan is “Kill the Boer; Kill the Farmer”; another of you, Ntokozo Qwabe, who is only in Oxford as a beneficiary of a Rhodes scholarship, has boasted about the need for “socially conscious black students” to “dominate white universities, and do so ruthlessly and decisively!

“Great. That’s just what Oxford University needs. Some cultural enrichment from the land of Winnie Mandela, burning tyre necklaces, an AIDS epidemic almost entirely the result of government indifference and ignorance, one of the world’s highest per capita murder rates, institutionalised corruption, tribal politics, anti-white racism and a collapsing economy.   Please name which of the above items you think will enhance the lives of the 22,000 students studying here at Oxford.

“And then please explain what it is that makes your attention grabbing campaign to remove a listed statue from an Oxford college more urgent, more deserving than the desire of probably at least 20,000 of those 22,000 students to enjoy their time here unencumbered by the irritation of spoilt, ungrateful little tossers on scholarships they clearly don’t merit using racial politics and cheap guilt-tripping to ruin the life and fabric of our beloved university.

“Understand us and understand this clearly: you have everything to learn from us; we have nothing to learn from you.

Yours, Oriel College, Oxford

____________________

That Thomas Jefferson kept slaves — does that invalidate the U.S. Constitution?    Of course not.  Does Dr. Lewis know that Jefferson — not a committee — wrote  all the words contained in the Declaration of Independence?

post by Cameron Jackson  Drcameronjackson@gmail.com

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Down with DaVinci [curator at SFMONA resigns]

 Might  San  Francisco Museum of Modern Art  or other museums exclude works by   white male artist  DaVinci?  Who gave the world Mona Lisa?  

 

 

 

 

 

An art museum curator has resigned from his post at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art after outraging members of his staff by refusing to exclude white male artists.

Gary Garrels, the senior curator of painting and sculpture, was the target of a petition that garnered just over 250 signatures this month demanding that he resign after he refused to exclude white male artists.

The petition stated that Garrels offended many members of the staff by mentioning that the museum would “definitely still continue to collect white artists” during a presentation about diversifying collection efforts to include more work from nonwhite artists.

During his tenure at SFMOMA, Garrels organized early museum shows by Glenn Ligon, Doris Salcedo, and Kara Walker, as well as retrospectives of the work of Vija Celmins, Bruce Conner, and Sol LeWitt. But his lasting legacy at SFMOMA may be tied to two very different initiatives: the museum’s extended loan deal of the Fisher Collection and its decision, last year, to auction off a painting by Mark Rothko for $50.1 million in order to create a dedicated fund to acquire work by female artists, artists of color, and LGBTQ+ artists. Works that have been acquired using the fund include pieces by Rebecca Belmore, Forrest Bess, Frank Bowling, Leonora Carrington, Lygia Clark, and Norman Lewis.

___________________

Firenze Sage:     And how many museums would black art fill?

 

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St. John’s church & Live Like Coco share an Adopt a Beach sign at Seacliff State Beach

Perhaps some future collaboration on beach cleanup?

Two  very different entities share the same sign.  They share a new Adopt-A-Beach sign at Seacliff State Beach.

St. John’s episcopal church is  located close to Seacliff State Beach.   The Live Like Coco Foundation has its roots in  a  Watsonville elementary school, Starlight,  which has  a large Hispanic population.

The Live Like Coco Foundation, through the efforts of 125-150 individuals,   raised $5+ K to memorialize the life of Coco, a  12 year old who died in a car accident in 2015.    Coco,  loved books, cats and numerous  out of doors activities. Her parents in conjunction with Starlight Elementary in Watsonville, CA    raised  money   to provide scholarships for extra-curricular activities.  The Live Like Coco  Foundation wants   Santa Cruz County children  to have opportunities to  experience various  out of doors  activities and  ‘realize their dreams’.

The Live Like Coco Foundation plans a Beach Cleanup on Sat. July 18 at 9 am.  Take a look on Facebook for up-to-date information on the Foundation.     For some general information click Here.

Both  St. John’s and Live Like Coco  share a strong interest in the  education of youth and stewardship of the world’s resources.

For a $200 donation, various  organizations can get their name and publicity on an   Adopt-A-Beach sign  — with the proviso that they do several cleanups a year.

St. John’s episcopal  held  their  second  beach cleanup  the day  after Independence Day.

The  St. John’s  Publicity/Communications team  thought   that Save Our Shores (SOS) personnel would bring equipment  and tally sheets for the July 6 event.      SOS did not show and the church’s  Senior Warden  wrote that, therefore,  the church was   not able to tally up kind and amount of beach trash gathered.  A third  St. John cleanup is planned for September.

Beach cleanups are popular at St. John’s.  St. John’s  has a long  history of  various  enviornmental concerns and interest in  protecting the earth’s resources.  For example, at  church functions they typically  use pottery mugs instead of paper cups and, pre-Covid 19, did not use plastic.

Save Our Shores  (SOS)  was not amiss for not showing up  July 6 at Seacliff State Beach  with tally sheets  and  equipment.    The SOS   website states that all public events and all beach cleanups have been  cancelled until future notice.

Save Our Shores suggests  on their website that individuals use their  SOS app to tally up and send back information on trash gathered from CA beaches.

The app is readily available, easy to download to smart phones,  and easy to use.   Whether or not  COVID-19 is still affecting SOS sponsored Beach Cleanups  in September the app can readily be used to tally up trash removal.

So — in planning the next St. John’s Beach Cleanup  for  September  why not do it jointly with Watsonville  youth  connected with the Live Like Coco Foundation ?  Both entities could do Beach Cleanup together, and then share  hot dogs, pizza and tamales?    Socialize a bit?  It would be easy, also, to  include  the youth that are part of St.John’s education  outreach to Aptos  Junior High.  Just takes a little planning and outreach to  the Live Like Coco Foundation.  Nice way to remember and memorialize 12 year old Coco who would be age 17 now had she lived.

All  lives matter.

written by licensed psychologist,  Cameron Jackson      DrCameronJackson@gmail.com

 

 

 

 

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