Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Harlem's Mae Jackson: When Obama Speaks, Whose Lips Move?
Bill Quigley
16 Jun 2009
🖨️ Print Article

If you don't see the video above, click here.

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."

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • Rain of Sanctions Augurs U.S.-Prodded Regime Change in Haiti from Musseau to Montana
    Travis Ross
    Rain of Sanctions Augurs U.S.-Prodded Regime Change in Haiti from Musseau to Montana
    14 Dec 2022
    U.S. and Canadian sanctions against Haitians are a signal that a new Core Group regime change plot is underway.
  • Sanctions: A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy
    Dee Knight
    Sanctions: A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy
    14 Dec 2022
    A new book, Sanctions: A Wrecking Ball in a Global Economy, analyses unilateral coercive measures, sanctions, which are war by other means waged by the U.S. against millions of people around the…
  • Israel and the Rise of Jewish Fascism
    Chris Hedges
    Israel and the Rise of Jewish Fascism
    14 Dec 2022
    The mask is being lifted from the face of Israel’s apartheid state, exposing a grinning death’s head that portends the obliteration of the few restraints against killing Palestinians.
  • Black Agenda Radio December 9, 2022
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio December 9, 2022
    09 Dec 2022
    Rwanda's M23 proxy militia terrorizes the Congo with U.S. permission, Chicago organizes for community control of police, and charges are dismissed in the case of abuse survivor Tracy McCarter.
  • Rwanda's M23 Proxy Terrorizes the Eastern Congo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Rwanda's M23 Proxy Terrorizes the Eastern Congo
    09 Dec 2022
    Maurice Carney is Executive Director of Friends of the Congo. He provides an update on recent events in the Democratic Republic of Congo created by the Rwandan and U.S. proxy militia group M23 and…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us