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Mae Jackson is a New York City based writer, poet, dreamer and doer whose record of activism on behalf of her people stretches back to SNCC. A founder of Art Without Walls, an art program for the children of imprisoned women, she is well acquainted with the difference between surface change, and fundamental, revolutionary change.
Here are a few minutes of her address to the crowd at May 31, 2009 event memorializing the early 20th century Harlem activist Hubert Harrison, in which she lays out a clear understanding of whose lips move when our First Black President speaks. Referring to some of Barack Obama's widely acclaimed orations at the Democratic convention, atop Lincoln's tomb, and other places, she tells us
“..those wonderful speeches made by the young man from Chicago were actually crafted, that's written, by three young white men 25, 26 and 31 years old. We got the unfortunate opportunity once again to see the world through their eyes. Obama was the spokesperson. Same as when you buy a painting, that doesn't make you the painter...”
She explains how the establishment turned took the politics out of activism, neutralizing and de-politicizing young political activists by turning them into “community organizers."
Mayor Bowser going along to get along with Donald Trump is unsurprising to anyone who has followed her political career. She is the Black misleader par excellence.
“To understand the history of the Americas we must pay tribute to…Haiti.”
Senator Ted Cruz has written an open letter urging Trump to recognize Somaliland, causing jubilation among Somaliland secessionists.
The latest liberal discourse on crime offers useless panaceas to analyze the causes of violence and pathologizes communities while absolving the state of its role in creating these conditions.
"Ms Maxwell and The Art of The Deal" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
