Leading by example: A Call to my fellow HL brethren

[tru_m.a.c]

My inspiration for this thread comes from three things:

1. Killer Mike's interview about opening an account at black banks
2. Adolph Reed Jr's CLASS NOTES: Posing as Politics and Other Thoughts on the American Scene
3. My personal desire to see our generation take the baton and run with it

In Class Notes, Adolph Reed states:

A telling indication of how far the existing black politics is from such concerns is the general unwillingness to anchor political action in the creation of membership organizations—that is, groups with clearly identified constituencies that are, at least in principle, empowered to pass and execute judgment on leaders' actions. Nationally, only the NAACP is governed by its membership. Operation PUSH and the National Rainbow Coalition are mere banners for Jesse Jackson to speak in front of. Even the main products of the high period of political activism in the 1960s—the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Congress on Racial Equality, and Southern Christian Leadership Conference—were not mass-membership organizations.

My point is not that those specific groups should have structured themselves on a popular membership basis; they did the work they were created to do in epic political circumstances and did it effectively. However, the limitations of a politics—especially a movement politics—that doesn't take account of the need to stimulate popular participation have come home to roost dramatically in the subsequent history of the SCLC, the only one of those organizations to survive visibly into the present. That has been a story of decline, spiraling ever further downward into nostalgia and nepotism.

More radical, even avowedly Marxist or revolutionary, organizations have been no more inclined to concentrate on organizing concrete constituencies into membership organizations. Groups from the 1960s and '70s—the Black Panther Party, Black Workers Congress, National Black Assembly, African Liberation Support Committee—and the more recent attempts to create black united fronts all have been either cadre organizations (organizations of organizers) or coalitions of such organizations. The latter, which amount to little more than stacks of letterhead, give the illusion of a broad, popular base by equating breadth of representation with the length of the list of paper organizations.

We here in HL, as a sub group of the coli, have the opportunity to engage in political action. We don't need to see more dead in the street in order to stimulate popular participation. The tools are right in front of us. In order to defeat an external system devised to oppress and disparage us, we must break the chains of apathy, pessimism, and trepidation. Left unchecked our generation will never realize it's true potential as a political force to be reckoned with in every aspect of American society.

TLR has a huge thread on blacks who have opened a bank account at Citizens Trust Bank. My goals are very simple:

1. 50% of regular HL posters to donate at least $10 to the coli by 8/1/2016
2. 85% of regular HL posters to donate at least $10 to the coli by 8/30/2016
3. 50% of regular HL posters to open a new bank account at a black bank by 10/1/2016
4. 85% of regular HL posters to open a new bank account at a black bank by 12/31/2016
5. 95% HL participation at the November elections

If we reach those very SMART goals, I think we'll be able shift gears towards much grander prospects.

So who's in?

 

[Tom Foolery]

1. 50% of regular HL posters to donate at least $10 to the coli by 8/1/2016
2. 85% of regular HL posters to donate at least $10 to the coli by 8/30/2016

Wait wait. Why are we doing numbers 1 and 2 again?

 

[Pitfalls0117]

95% HL participation at the November elections

I like your framework as far as mobilizing coli posters offline but who the fukk are we supposed to vote for?

 

[DonKnock]

I like your framework as far as mobilizing coli posters offline but who the fukk are we supposed to vote for?

Yea perhaps part of this should be posters regionally breaking down the policies of candidates in there area

 

[tru_m.a.c]

Wait wait. Why are we doing numbers 1 and 2 again?

In my opinion, we can't talk about the need to boost black economics if we can't even show strong and consistent support for this website. It was made for us and by us. Donation should be seen as a show of good faith and an investment in our future. No level of outreach and progressice action can be successful if the coli is not successful.

If we can't set and reach a target for an entity we all love and support, then why should I believe we can rally support around any other cause? I refuse to have the impact of my words live and die on this screen.

 

[tru_m.a.c]

I like your framework as far as mobilizing coli posters offline but who the fukk are we supposed to vote for?

It would be extremely wrong for me to tell you who to vote for. However, if we had all been staunch supporters of meeting a certain voting percentage, maybe many of us wouldn't have missed the date to register for our primaries.

If we have no numbers to follow or no goal to reach, how can we say that we are making progress with all of our threads?

 

[tru_m.a.c]

I may be waxing poetic so please feel free to cut my mic lol

 

[No1]

I may be waxing poetic so please feel free to cut my mic lol

This should be in TLR to be honest.

 

[Tom Foolery]

In my opinion, we can't talk about the need to boost black economics if we can't even show strong and consistent support for this website. It was made for us and by us. Donation should be seen as a show of good faith and an investment in our future. No level of outreach and progressice action can be successful if the coli is not successful.

If we can't set and reach a target for an entity we all love and support, then why should I believe we can rally support around any other cause? I refuse to have the impact of my words live and die on this screen.

Respectfully disagree.

Just to sum up my position,if people are going to donate here, do it because you enjoy this place.

 

[tru_m.a.c]

This should be in TLR to be honest.

Maybe, but my hope was to create a chain of reaction that would cause different forums to tailor their message/agenda accordino to their viewing audience

 

[tru_m.a.c]

Respectfully disagree.

Just to sum up my position,if people are going to donate here, do it because you enjoy this place.

please it's ten bucks going toward the biggest black hip hop site on the net. It's a mute idea to debate, but points to a bigger issue. If you can't even get consensus around supporting the single reason many of us hop on the net most days, there is no hope for any other level of action.

Talk talk talk talk talk talk talk