EDITORIAL
,0 . A cbool board that truly I' te to
t community prior to m ln d ions ould never have faced the
u y 1¥1 violent ction demonstrated by th white ren in War­
rendale pro tin the A emy in their neighborhood. Designating
me boo empowered while ignori other oommunity' con-
ce i contradictory d hypocri .
Aside from the raci m evident in tm meeting held this wee
in W ndale, there ere other factors behind the outburs . Frus­
trated by overcrowding t the local bool, the Warrendale oommunity
had tried uns fully for two years to get the Board to reopen the
buildin no pi nned for the Malcolm X Academy. The Board told
tbe oommunity there w not enough money to reopen the building.
Given t f , it is almo t if th Detroit Board wanted to create
raei te ion with i planned relocation of tbe Malcolm X Academy.
It i hard to believe that parents of tudents enrolled in the Academy,
would want to nd their children into the racially ho tile atmosphere
now boiling in Warrendale. Unfortunately, there is now the' ue of
ving face. The Board h boxed i elf into the po ition of appearing
to coddle racists if it withdraws the Academy from the Warrendale
ite. Children hould not be endangered to ave face or make a point.
There are reports that School Superintendant Deborah McGriff
been monitoring the elevators in the School Center Building this
ummer to keep employees from skipping out early. Had she signed
her taff meaningful, necessary work such holding community
meetings to gather input and achieve consensus, he would find her
staff busy and the violent eruption in Warrendale preventable.
VIEWS:OPINIONS
._.
Seven ye r go, the orId
community cbed in u r horror
at the igbt of one million Ethiop
dyin from h r. World I de
were yin "never gain" will that
kind of hmnan edy be allowed 0
occur. Certainly the remembrance of
th 1985 Ethiopian famin bri
b wful memori .
We recall that the United Slat
led by President Reagan w low to
respond to the magnitude of the
Ethiopian famine beca t th t
time the U.S. was again t the
Ethiopian government because of
geopolitical Ideology.
Al though no the case of
Somalia, at least in terms of U.S.
strategic interes i different, there
ppe rs to be a imilar" low
response" to the Somalian famine by
the Uni ted Slat . Somalia, under the
rule of recently ousted President
Mohammed Siad Batre, had been an
10
Commi ttee of the Red Cro
e timat t t bout one-third of
Som Ii' 6 million people ill
tarve to death unles more food .
ru hed to Som lia by the
international community. Of co e,
the civil war in Somali Ince t
year has complicated the delivery of
emergency id.
We are in full nd complete
upport of the United ation'
effort to help the peoples of
Sarajevo, Bosni -Herzegovina
amidst their civil war in Europe. We
support the quick response of
D 0 God in Europe
or in Africa hould be denied food
and ter. War i no excuse.
Geo-politics i no j tification. The
cry of Somalia for help m t be
wered and an dequate respo
m t be given no . Contrlbuti
may be nt to the Somali Rellef •
Fund, American Red Cro , P.O.
37243, W hington, DC 20013.
MULTICULTURALISM. When faced with tbe outrage of the
Warrendale community in a public meeting, Superintendant Deborah
McGriff old the unhearing audience that anyone who expects to
ucceed in tbe 21st century must know how to "get along with all kinds
of people."
The need for a Malcolm X Academy springs from a vacuum in the
curriculum of the Detroit Public Schools. Kente cloth wearing Board
members do not constitute multicultural education. The textbooks,
classroom instructi n and mlrdset of most teachers in the De it
system are still B ntric.
The whole system must be revamped to reflect true history and the'
real world.
Malcolm X Academy would not be so threatening to any commu­
nity, if the board had done its job educating the public about the need,
value and what constitut multi-cultural education - and had begun
to implement the teaching in every classroom in every school.
If the truth re taught, t ., ere would be or
one school to e t to h«l encan mal -to oudsh.�I�----
In a system 90 rcent , 1 Af . ericanmal femal
- should be flourishing. All schools should be teaching to all students
the contributions and importance of Africans arourd the globe.
ARROGANCE. Finally, the cocoon of arrogance surrounding the
Board of Education has got to be shattered. Parents are rebuffed again
and again on any number of concerns, despite all the lip service paid
by Board officials to empowerment
The whole Warrendale fiasco demonstrates how out of touch am
far removed from the community the Board and Us staff remain.
McGriff told parents that we should "struggle to achieve" the reloca-
tion of the Academy to Warrendale. .
No. We believe we should struggle for something far more mean­
ingful and enduring. We should struggle to have k system that listens
to its constituents in all communities and responds accordingly. We
believe we should struggle to have a system that teaches all children
the accomplishments and glory of all people. ' '
Anything less means only more Warrendales.
.. -,
....
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I won�l' if �e
}prfon nBS a],�,
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na ion in chain
"Presidents Reagan and Bush
have ensured that the federal courts
will not be representative. Instead,
they are a bastion of White America.
They stand as a symbol of White
Power." Can you guess who said
these words?
I'd wager most folks missed the
identity of the speaker. Stephen
Reinhardt, Justice of the 9th Circuit
U.S. Court of Appeals, made tho e
remar during commencement for
law school graduates at Golden Gate
Universi ty, San Francisco,
CalifOrnia, pring 1992.
Reinhardt told the throng .of
potential attorney , "What the
African-American community
perceived from the Supreme Court'
decisions was that the federal
judiciary i no longer interested in
protecting the rights of minorities,
that federal judges are far more
concerned ith ... protecting the
interests of white males."
Reinhardt pointed to the recent
Mc:C1es.key decision, where the U.S.
Supreme Court rejected
overwhelming evidence of racial
disparity in death sentences, the
dismissal of a civil suit filed by a
Black man injured by the infamous
LO Angeles police chokehold, and a
host of rulings narrowing civil and
voting rights laws, to support his
argument And that ain't all.
ACROSS THE U.S., an
astOnishing number of people in the
"land of the free" aro caged up in
pens.
In fact, the U.S. DOW imprisons
over a million people, 'th over 4
million \Dlder "coaectional control."
The number of Blacb, pecially
Black males, strlkiDg. In numbers
per 100,000, over 3,109 persons
were locked up in the U.s.; in South
Africa, the number is 729 Black
males, per 100,000 population,
meaning the Pretoria regime
imprisons lea than 1/4th of the
percentage of U.S. Black male
prison population.
Loot at it thiI y: Tbc number
of people imprlJoDed hl the U.S.
FROM
DEATH
ROW
more than the number of people who
live in 13 states; the number of
people in U.S. jails and prisons
would constitute the 11th largest city
in the nation; and the number of all
people \Dlder "correctional" cOn1ro1
(meaning prison, jail, probation or
parole) is one and a halftimes greater
than the population of Chicago or
Nicaragua. .
While Judge Reinhardt speaks
solely of the federal system. surely
the same, or worse, can be said of
state court ystems, where politics is
more overt as an influence on who
goes to jail, and who doesn't
MUMIA
ABU
JAMAL
THIS SYSTEM or encagement
is accompanied by a sevel'C and
reactionary reign of constitutional
and statutory repres ion, from
America' highest court, the
Supreme Court, to the local justice of
the peace. The Fourth Amendment,
said to "guarantee" freedom from
search and izurea has been scuttled
by tile state.
The First Amendment is an
afterthought violated daily by the
state, where dis idents are
imprisoned for refusing to renounce
their faith (as in MOVE) and Indian
sacred lands are violated for the
AU.".American god of business.
As evidenced by the recent
instances of martial law in San
Frandsco and LOs Angeles, not to
mention the mass deportation of
Spanish-speaking Americans back
to Mexico, witboutnotice or hearing,
the Constitution is possessed of all
the po r aDd .relevance of toilet
"paper.
This i Americ 1992-the
largest, Blackest prison population
on earth; a judiciary of White, male,
biased millionaire; a land
smoldering in racla1, class, sexual,
ecological conflict; a nation in
chaIDI.