#ImWithKap: A Lesson My Father Taught Me

Posted on February 6, 2019 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

I did not watch Super Bowl LIII in my hometown of Atlanta, Georgia largely in protest of the NFL’s mishandling and mistreatment of Colin Kaepernick, the former quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers who decided to kneel during the National Anthem in protest of continuing police brutality and murders of Black people and other peoples of color. Soon his friend NFL player Eric Reid joined him. Reid is back at work playing football, but Kaepernick is still without a job in the prime of his life.

Now, I don’t expect Kaepernick to be strapped for cash or without friends, even though he has been vilified by many people. The seven Atlanta artists that painted murals of him all over my beloved city of Atlanta in what artist Fabian Williams (aka @occasionalsuperstar) named #KaeperBowl, are certainly a testament that a lot of us think what Kaepernick did was right. (And the artwork of him is stunning, just visit: #KaeperBowlMurals.) Yet, I know that in many ways Kap is alone. No one else has lost a job for doing something like kneeling during the National Anthem. In the midst of all that #ImWithKap hashtagging, I never forget that he’s really by himself in a lot of ways. So I will explain why I boycotted the Super Bowl and will continue to boycott the NFL.

I could say many things about the abuses heaped on my people, Black people, the historic abuses of slavery and rapes and beatings, as well as the abuses that seem to never end, such as police brutality. These certainly factor in my protest, but they really are not the reason why #ImWithKap.

Back in 1973 when I started Saint Joseph High School on Courtland Street, the boys’ varsity basketball team, The Hawks, lost a lot of games. It wasn’t until my second year that we saw improvement. My Dad always took me to these games and in many instances, Daddy was a lot of my classmates’ ride to and from the game. My father spent more time with me than the average soccer Moms of today spend with their children. He was always present and accounted for.

Well, I remember one night St. Joe’s boys’ varsity basketball team was just a few minutes away from actually winning a game. We were going crazy in the bleachers. I don’t even remember the name of the school or the team we were playing, but I do recall that there wasn’t enough time on the clock in the fourth quarter for the opposing team to ever catch up and possibly force the game into overtime or win outright. Victory was ours; and then it happened. Daddy started cheering for the other team. “Come on now, you can do this!” “Let’s go! Let’s go!” I looked at him like he had lost his mind; and I prayed that none of my friends saw him give these pep talks and cheers to a team that was playing against us.

When we won, we all ran around screaming and jumping and shouting. I headed back to the bleachers to ask Daddy what in the world was he thinking cheering for the other team. He stopped me from finishing the question and looked me dead in the eye and said this. “Joy, look over there at how that team’s fans have left. No one is cheering for them. No one is in their corner. Never, ever forget that when someone or a group of people have done their best, have given their all, but it’s obvious they are not going to win and not going to prevail, that they still deserve to have someone standing with them always in their corner.” I’ve never forgotten that lesson. Daddy cheered for the underdog his entire life.

Colin Kaepernick had Eric Reid to join him in taking a knee against police brutality. My Daddy would have loved Eric Reid for that. As I trekked around Atlanta to take a look at all the murals painted of Colin Kaepernick by some of our most brilliant Atlanta artists, I knew that if Daddy was alive he would not have simply gone with me, he would have gone out ahead of schedule to watch these artists paint these murals. I know my Daddy. He was always ready for an adventure, and particularly one steeped in protest for the protection, respect and benefit of our people. So…

I’m not solely “with Kap” because, as a historian I can dredge up 400 plus years of offenses against Black people; nor am I specifically “with Kap” because there have been so many instances of police abuse against Black people in these last several years. I’m “with Kap” because my Daddy loved us as a people. #ILoveUs✊🏿✊🏾✊🏽✊🏼. #ImWithKap simply out of respect for my father. Àṣẹ.

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Of Violence and LO$$

Posted on November 29, 2018 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

By Leslye Joy Allen

As the Trump administration orders and sanctions attacking immigrant women and children with teargas at the US-Mexico border, let’s consider the long term effects, not just in terms of human physical and psychological suffering which will go on for the rest of these women and children’s lives, but what it can cost the United States. I offer you two smaller historic examples: Atlanta, Georgia in 1906 and Birmingham, Alabama in 1963.

For the record, I am the granddaughter of an Atlanta Race Riot survivor. My maternal grandmother Lorena, born in 1886, was a 20-year-old student at Clark College when the Atlanta Race Riot broke out over roughly three days in 1906. Georgia’s candidates for governor claimed that Black people, graduating from our numerous historically Black colleges, were going to take over and rule over White people in the city. Of course there was also the usual rhetoric about Black men raping White women. So, on September 22, 1906 an angry mob of Whites began to attack Black people and Black businesses in Atlanta’s downtown area. I won’t bore you with the details except to say that my grandmother and Black scholar, W. E. B. DuBois basically said the same thing: If White folks began the riot against Black people, it was Black people who ended it. Everybody who was Black bought or stole a gun. By September 24 the riot was over. Black Atlantans did not just fight back, they shot back. My grandmother remembered the sounds of gunfire well into the night. Grandma roomed with a lady and her small daughter on Thirkield Avenue near where the original Clark College campus used to be, long before any colleges and universities in Atlanta had dormitories. You can read more about the riot here: Atlanta Race Riot of 1906

As Atlanta’s population shrunk, due to deaths as well as from people who fled the city in the aftermath of the the riot, the City Fathers—always, always keeping an eye on business—vowed to never let anything like this happen again. They weren’t playing. They created interracial coalitions, successfully defended a Black man charged with the rape of a white woman who misidentified him as her assailant—and he lived to tell about it! From that point on, measures were taken not to make Black people socially equal, but to insure that the city didn’t descend into violence and chaos…Now, take Birmingham, Alabama.

In a nutshell, when Commissioner Bull Connor ordered Birmingham’s fire department to turn its hoses on innocent Black children and adolescents and ordered the police to unleash dogs against Black protestors, the whole world saw it unfold on television. Whatever steps Birmingham took to alter this image were minimal; and the city went from being the number one industrial city in the South to being abandoned by businesses that would not, could not operate in a city filled with violence and destruction. Birmingham survived, but it never fully recovered nor regained the title of industrial giant. You can watch a couple of quick videos about this here: Bull Connor used fire hoses, police dogs on protestors (May 3, 1963) (videos)

So, what is my point. Because Trump ordered the US Military and Border Patrol to unleash tear gas on innocent immigrant women and children at the US-Mexico border, the entire nation suffers. In addition to these actions being immoral and inhumane and illegal, it also sets a precedent that will inevitably provide other nations the excuse to mistreat and mishandle US citizens once they set foot on foreign soil. It also tells major corporations that the United States is not safe to do business in. If Trump supporters—and there are many of them—don’t give a rat’s ass about people of color, that’s their prerogative. Their hatred is nothing new; and people of color have neither the time to pray for or worry about converting “the unconvertable” to anything resembling people with basic human decency. These are not and never have been rational people. Yet, in addition to these immigration policies being heartless and cruel, these policies are really, really bad for business.

The white business people who court and bait white racists and xenophobes and sexists and misogynists of all colors and ethnicities, along with the white politicians who tell these white masses that their world is coming to an end—because people of color are ending it—have proven for centuries that Money is their God. In a week where General Motors announced its laying off 15,000 American workers while the company enjoys a Trump tax cut; in a week where Trump is attempting to build a wall at the US-Mexico border and doesn’t have any way of forcing Mexico to pay for it; in a week where Mueller’s Russia investigation seems to have Trump constantly spinning the news and tweeting endlessly, I hope the folks who follow/ed Trump, who are so easily duped every single time, I hope they can learn to live with less money. They could, very soon, find out the true cost of hate—the only cost any of them ever understands.

A Word About “A Wrinkle in Time”

Posted on March 19, 2018 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

By Leslye Joy Allen

This is a musing about the film A Wrinkle in Time directed by Ava DuVernay. This is not exactly a review, but it is a set of thoughts that happened as I read the mixed reviews; and then watched the energy and wanderlust of children I saw in the movie theater watching the film. I’m not going to spoil it for you, but A Wrinkle in Time is not the same rollercoaster that Black Panther is. These are two different films. Yet, it is ironic (and heartwarming) that Ryan Coogler, the director of Black Panther, has designated Ava DuVernay his “Big Sister.” Coogler wrote a beautiful public letter to her; and he also noted in an interview that Ava had to go through some mess that she won’t ever talk about publicly. I know what Coogler—who I plan to adopt as my son if his parents will share him—meant when he said that Ava DuVernay had gone through some stuff…She is the first Black woman to helm a big budget film and she was adapting Madeleine L’Engle’s children’s book that has been in circulation since the early 1960s. And L’Engle herself had to suffer through 26 rejections from publishers and self-righteous Christians that disliked the fact that she aligned Jesus with the Buddha and other “saviors” in the same book. So go figure?

Now with that said, let me tell you what I got from A Wrinkle in Time. First, the hero (or heroine) of the story is a little Black girl named “Meg Murray” (played by the incredible Storm Reid). Meg Murray is the adopted daughter of an interracial couple, both of whom are scientists. The first thing you notice about her is that her father’s disappearance is weighing her down socially. Both she and her younger brother “Charles Wallace Murray” (portrayed by the adorable Deric McCabe) are getting into trouble at school. Meg wears glasses; the kids tease her; and her grades have slipped. What also shines through is her love for her father and her occasional doubts about whether or not she will ever find him. Eventually, she heads out with the help of “Mrs Which,” “Mrs Who,” and “Mrs Whatsit”**, with her little brother “Charles Wallace” and friend “Calvin” (played by Levi Z. Miller) along for the ride.

Before the film was over, I watched little girls and boys of all shades and ethnicities in the movie theater watch a little Black girl literally save the world. WE have never had a Black girl be this kind of hero in a film. I watched two little girls get up in the theater and dance their own little dance to Sade, who came out of semi-retirement to lend her musical gifts to this film. I watched a young 40-something Black father sit with his 11-year-old daughter; and I watched him glance at her like my own father did when he was watching to see if I was enjoying a movie. I had my moments of nostalgia and I would be lying if I said you shouldn’t bring along a few tissues. Yet, what the film delivers most is staunch warnings against uniformity, against not believing in yourself, and against making decisions solely based on fear. Before it’s over you think about everything from those times when you were jealous, when you were mean to someone or when you underestimated others or yourself. It is, as one person wrote, “A love letter to children.” And in this moment it was a little Black girl that delivered it.

Now, a few reviewers got it right when they said that this film is a family movie where kids are the primary and central audience. (A reviewer named Mark Hughes wrote an incredibly insightful review of A Wrinkle in Time for Forbes Magazine which honestly surprised me. He thought so much more about the intersections of race and gender than most white or black movie reviewers that I have ever read, so I read what he wrote twice.) Children need their own space and their own entertainment. In an increasingly ADULT-centric world of self-absorbed adults, it is mandatory. But for me, the film meant so much more.

I haven’t been a little Black girl for a long time. I’m now an AARP Black woman. But like “Meg Murray,” I know what it means when your father believes in your intellectual abilities. We still live in a male-dominated world; and with less than 7 percent of CEOs being female and only 14 percent of films in Hollywood directed by women and even fewer directed by women of color, the numbers reinforce this domination, which is why director Ryan Coogler’s support of Ava DuVernay and his acknowledgement of what he knows she and women go through matters tremendously. WE don’t get this kind of support and acknowledgement too often. And girls and women get judged all the time based on nothing more than their physical appearance. In this film we see what that looks like and how it feels. Importantly, Black women and girls who are assertive, who give themselves permission to be righteously angry, and insist on their right to take charge of their lives are often called the typical “Angry Black Woman” or worse; they’re/we’re called “B*tches.”

In A Wrinkle in Time, Meg Murray’s alleged faults become what she uses to change the world she inhabits. Those faults become her strengths. The film, like few others, gives young females the right to have flaws like all other human beings. For a change, and for a couple of hours, little Black girls in particular, and girls in general are not forced into those tragic two-dimensional “either/or” boxes. Instead, it becomes okay, even if only in fantasy, to be exactly who one is rather than some stultifying version of what the world and society expects one to be. That’s all I’m going to tell you except take a child with you to see this film. If you have forgotten what it feels like to be a kid, I am so very sorry for your tragic loss. Kids have an uncanny way of seeing things clearly when the adults miss the lessons or avoid the lessons altogether. That’s why I love children and hang around them every chance I get…Without them, I/we would be amoral and dumb as a box of rocks!

**Author Madeleine L’Engle insisted that the abbreviation “Mrs” have no period in her book A Wrinkle in Time. That idiosyncracy has been respected in this blog.

A Thought About Black Panther

Posted on February 22, 2018 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

By Leslye Joy Allen

“Royal Purple” by © Leslye Joy Allen

This is not a review of the film Black Panther. This is a brief musing about what crossed my mind after I saw this film. First, Black Panther is unapologetically “Black.” I use “Black” here to indicate that while the film is set in the fictional African nation of Wakanda, it also includes Africans of a variety of ethnicities, African Americans and a genuine nod to the entire African Diaspora most of whom are descendants of former slaves in the West. I am a member of that African Diaspora. The film also gives a few cultural nods to the Ndebele, Yorùbá, Maasai, and Akan peoples on the African continent (thank you, actor-vocalist-friend Saycon Sengbloh for pointing this out first). The film gets the multi-facted roles of African women so very right. The film also has some serious messages unlike any messages you have ever heard in a Marvel Super Hero movie. Don’t worry, if you have not seen it yet, I’m not going to ruin it for you. All I can say is that it is an entertaining joy ride of a film that will make you think…really, really think. With that said, here’s what I thought about immediately after I saw Black Panther.

Black Panther has stirred up a genuine sense of pride in Black Americans that we don’t get to feel with this much enthusiasm too often. It has taken decades of hard work to undo some of the psychic and spiritual damage done to Africa’s descendants in the West who have endured brutal chattel slavery, Jim Crow, systematic racism and discrimination, police brutality, you-name-it. It has taken decades of hard work and scholarship to undo some of the psychic and spiritual damage done to Africa’s descendants in the West who, for centuries, were told that Africa had no real history, no real contributions to civilization when all of what these descendants were told is/was/remains patently false. However, it is dangerous to over-romanticize any history; to make any and every description of our African ancestors totally positive. Black Panther, in its own unique way through fiction, de-romanticizes history by showing us a multi-ethnic, multi-generational Wakanda with all the friction and righteous compromise and conflict such diversity can foster. You leave the movie theater proud, but fully aware that Africans (and we African descendants) have tremendous gifts and flaws not because we are or ever have been inferior or superior, but rather because we are human.

I remember a lecture given by the late African scholar, Dr. Ali Mazrui back in 1996 where he stated that to deny Africans the ability to be wrong was also the same as denying them their humanity. Dr. Mazrui was always controversial. He said the only African-American activist that he had any real respect for was Randall Robinson, the founder of Trans-Africa. When asked why he only dug Robinson, Dr. Mazrui said, “Robinson not only raises his voice when Whites do something wrong to Africans, Robinson speaks out when Africans are doing something to wrong to other Africans.” I’ve never forgotten that statement and what that statement truly means.

When you love your people, you praise them when they are right and you don’t make excuses for them when they are wrong. You work to correct them. You speak out against racism, colonialism, and the exploitation of your people no matter who the adversary is. That lecture by Dr. Mazrui, and so many lectures given by visiting and former professors drove home that I could not afford to care as much about how Africans and African-descended peoples looked to the rest of the world more than I cared about how well or how poorly they/we all were doing. If you love your people you don’t worry about what their image is and how it affects you as much as you worry about their well-being, period. Black Panther shows just how difficult that can be, but it also shows that it can be gloriously done…

Now, if you don’t exactly understand this post, it is probably because you have not seen Black Panther yet. It could also be because you know very little about the continent of Africa’s very complicated history. However, my points will be clearer once you’ve opened a few books and taken the ride to Wakanda. So, get to the movie theater. You won’t be disappointed. Wakanda Forever.

Out of the Fog: A Christmas and New Year’s Wish

Posted on December 19, 2017 by Leslye Joy Allen (Ayọ)

By Leslye Joy Allen

While driving in the early morning hours in my beloved city of Atlanta, I saw the usual signs of city growth: traffic that can make a Nun cuss, shiny new buildings, massive construction everywhere, people bustling off to work, school and the airport, and homeless people huddled under bridges.

When I witnessed the top of the super large Bank of America Building on Peachtree Street, its steeple-shaped illuminated top seemed to hang in the air in our unusually heavy fog. If I did not know anything about this building or if I was a kid with a vivid imagination, the sight of that lighted steeple would have given me the best fantasies of flying saucers and aliens.

As I took that quick snapshot of the top of the Bank of America Building it made me think of the Star in the East. Even when I looked at the top of this building and recognized it in the distance, I knew that what I saw was only one component of the building. Maybe it was the brightest component, certainly the top of it. But it wasn’t hanging in the air by itself. So here is something to think about:

Puerto Rico, Dominica and St. Johns, Virgin Islands still have no electricity. There will be no Christmas lights and there probably will be no lights on New Years’ Eve. These tan and brown and black human beings have been without power for over 14 weeks at this writing. And just like the homeless in downtown Atlanta, many folks stay on these islands to protect what little possessions that they have left after hurricanes. They take cold showers when they can, and eat food prepared from makeshift kitchens. You may not give a damn about any of this because it doesn’t directly affect you, but it actually does. You may not care about all of these people of color, but you will because they are necessary in ways you may never have imagined. Remember, no one gave a damn about a homeless brown couple–with the wife being very pregnant–in Bethlehem over two thousand years ago, either.

For much of the past year, many of us have whined and moaned about the current state of affairs in Washington, D. C. We have often exhausted ourselves with tales of political misconduct and malfeasance and sexual impropriety. We have listened to racist, sexist, homophobic, and misogynist rhetoric. And at times, I have to say, I wondered when (or if) anyone was going to get tired of feasting on all of it.

It’s not that these evil things don’t exist; they do! Yet, in our well-meaning attempts to publicize many of these problems, we often perpetuate our own lack of resolve to change any of it simply by believing that ranting about it on social media does anything more than help us blow off some steam. We often forget that much of this nation is built off and on the backs of people who now lay on the streets in cities all over the nation and throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. In 2018, let’s plan to get out and stay out of the fog long enought to recognize the rest of the building; and that the top cannot and never has stood without the support from all those floors and a steady foundation.

That’s it for the year folks. If you didn’t understand this post, I’m sorry, but that’s it. I’m tired, happy, at times anxious, exhilarated by our capacity to triumph, glad about the women who no longer ask permission to be great or to do the work they were born to do. I know we can change anything we want to change. But we can’t do any of it in a fog. Peace.

Leslye Joy Allen

Social Commentary, History, Theatre, Jazz, and the Environment

Category Archives: Atlanta

A Thought About Black Panther