Manns Medium

Attention All Americans, let’s stop with playing the “blame game” and talk about “personal responsibility”. For decades now, many of us have been blaming others for our misfortunes and our lives not being what we think it should be and to be honest, in the begging, we had a very good case but that all changed, yet we refuse to change with it. We blamed others so often that it became easier to blame others than to take a good hard look at ourselves and accept the part of the blame that fell squarely upon our shoulders. We dismissed our personal responsibilities faster than we leveled the blame at others. It’s time for all of us to grow up, to mature and to clear the way for each and every one of us to become that perfect person God knows us to be. It’s time we stop looking to others to justify how we feel, why we feel that way and what we believe in, it’s time we all stop making excuses for our shortcomings and start to own them before they own us. In the beginning our ex...

So much is made of how any particular race is viewed by a society and many times that society is often overshadowed by hos that particular race views itself.  Highly educated and very intelligent people who are of those races may often times speak of how it should be elevated but the rhetoric and actions are often so far apart from each other.  Fortunate people of these races may find themselves in a position to complete the process of elevation but for some unknown reason fail in the attempt or never even attempt it at all.  This is an article dedicated to those in a position to elevate a race but for some reason are failing to do and speculations as to why that might be the case. I concentrate on the African-American community because being a member of this group allows me a certain view that I may not do justice attempting to bring to another race of people.  For years, history books found in many school systems and districts are filled with those who helped ...

Many people have taken offense at this article written about the U.S. Army saying a service member can use the word Negro when referring to a black or African-American.  Me personally, I take no offense to it and the question becomes why is it offensive in the first place, I mean what’s really in a name? Friends and family call you much worse than Negro and many of our current idols use the slang of this very word and it appears that no one has a problem with it unless it is used by anyone other than those who could easily be called black or African-American.  Why is it okay for us to use the derogatory derision of the word Negro to other Negros but get all worked up when others use it?  That is as about hypocritical as you can get,  isn't  it? The article states that “a newly published U.S. Army regulation says a service member can be referred to as a "Negro" when describing "black or African American" personnel. The Army confirmed the language is cont...

You could always find mother sitting on his screened in front porch in the 700 block of Ashland Avenue.  He seemed to always be standing guard over his two story partially brick framed house where so many have walked through his doors and emerged a completely different person than when they went in.  Mother was a person who took in those that others had given up on or tossed away.  The forgotten ones and those left to fend for themselves after all of the social-experiments had failed.  That house had a reputation of finding that ingot of good in a person and turning it into a gold mine of talent and righteousness. Ask anyone around the neighborhood and they would tell you tales of mother and how he was able to reach those that was once thought unreachable.  How he could take those harden by society, jail and circumstances and mold them into citizens with more than a purpose.  They became citizens with a cause.  But the most interesting thing about...

Rockford’s rich black history began in 1834 when a young 22 year old slave by the name of Lewis Lemon, made the journey from what is now Galena Illinois to what is now Rockford Illinois via the Rock River with his then master Germanicus Kent and a fellow explorer, later turned school teacher/farmer Thatcher Blake. It is also known that approximately 4 plus years later, Lewis Lemon was able to purchases his freedom from Germanicus Kent but that is about as far as it goes.  Very little else is really known about Rockford’s first black founder except the little that can be found about him in some of the old journals and books carefully secured in certain places and of course the fact that he was buried in what is now referred to as Greenwood Cemetery with an inscription on his gravestone that reads “Born slave–Died Free”. Now there are none left to help us discover more about the beginning of this city’s black history regarding this man. Other point of interest that encompasses o...

When the Founders first got together to craft the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution, the primary goal was to make rules, regulations and laws which would benefit the nation as a whole.   To leave room for it to expand to include any other provision which would also follow that one and only goal?   They crafted a piece of legislation that they believed would serve and protect the freedoms that they held dear and that was missing from the land of which they departed.   It was a moment of triumphant and it was a feeling of accomplishment.   Today every one of the Founders would look upon this land and not recognize it for all that they gave to give us an ever-expanding document to serve only one goal, we have misrepresented it and turn it into a document that suits the few and not the many.   For this we should be ashamed and beg the Founder’s forgiveness. American lost its way when our elected leaders lost theirs.   They campaign fro...

I have had many opportunities to try and explain why many in the African-America community have a distrust of law enforcement but were never really able to capture it before I read this article titled McGill student's run-in with U.S. border agents prompts lawsuit written by Benjamin Shingler for the Canadian Press.   I believe it captures the very essence of what many of us feel when it comes to trusting that law enforcement is here to protect us with the same vigor as they protect other races.   The article centers around “a Montreal university student was detained at the U.S. border, held for several hours, interrogated, had his personal belongings searched and saw his computer confiscated for over a week.   What caught the authorities' attention? His doctoral research on Islamic studies, he says. In a case that has attracted media attention in the U.S., Pascal Abidor has become embroiled in a drawn-out legal battle with the American government — and a post...

Some time ago I wrote an article about this very same subject and for those who may have read it, please forgive me if I repeat.   For those who haven’t read it, then please ignore this request and stand by to receive the thoughts and opinions that I possess. For many in the African-American community this word carries with it a term of endearment and others is stinks of disrespect.   Depending on which side of this issue you find yourself on, determines what you may feel about it.   While it is in my nature to respect the thoughts and feelings of everyone, I feel that no one should allow any subject, topic or idea to define them and please do not be unwilling to except the fact that not all you converse with on this subject will change their minds.   Excepting that premise, please bear with me as I detail my thoughts on the subject. I believe that the original title came about when the slave traders were attempting to label the slaves that they brought back ...

America and much of the world celebrates the news of the demise of Osama bin Laden and yet there will still be many who may never trust the guy in the White House, it should be abundantly clear that he really can walk and chew gum at the same time. According to the article by Kimberly Dozier and David Espo of the Associated Press titled US kills Osama bin Laden decade after 9/11 attacks , “By mid-February, intelligence from multiple sources was clear enough that Obama wanted to "pursue an aggressive course of action," a senior administration official said. Over the next two and a half months, the president led five meetings of the National Security Council focused solely on whether bin Laden was in that compound and, if so, how to get him, the official said.   Obama made a decision to launch the operation on Friday, shortly before flying to Alabama to inspect tornado damage, and aides set to work on the details.   The president spent part of his Sunday on the golf course...

When I was attending school in my history class there was very little in the way of contributions made by African-Americans.   As a child, not seeing this made many of us feel less than worthy of the title Americans.   During the month of February, we learned a little more but it was mostly about the same people and that made me wonder why no other African-Americans donated anything to this nation.   I am glad to say that I was wrong and it is imperative that any course called American History include all American’s contribution. Case in point, Garrett A Morgan (1877 – 1963) in 1907 he had a patent for an improved sewing machine.   He patented a ‘breathing device’ (1914), a hood that allowed the wearer to breathe safely in the presence of smoke, gases, and other pollutants.   He patented his automatic traffic signal (1923) and sold it to the General Electric Co. or how about Daniel Hale Williams ( 1858 – 1931 ) an American physician and founder of Provident Ho...

I do not come by this thought as a result of years of study or higher secondary education.    It has been something that I surmised based on my limited amount of knowledge on this subject.   It makes sense to me and if permitted, I would like to share it with you. It should be well known that the continent of Africa has always been the land of the warlords.   Those different tribes ruled different parts of that continent for many years.   That as they attacked and conquered each part, they took slaves from those they suppressed and as the ships docked and trade grew, those same slaves were sold to the people of the New World. Now as those ship owners docked into the New World’s harbors, they had to detail their cargo.   Not having taken the time to properly learn the names of those thousands of slaves, hidden below their decks, they dubbed them from whence they supposedly came.   Niger is a republic in Northwest Africa formerly part of the French Wes...

I read an article by Juan Lozano of the Associated Press titled “ Houston black leaders laud release of police video” where a “ Houston community activist Quanell X released the tape to Houston television station KTRK, which aired it Wednesday evening.”   In a statement released by Quanell X stated "This never, ever should have been kept from the people.”   "What's on that tape, the world will get a chance to see now how they truly behave in public with young black men."   While others leaders in Houston's black community applauded the release of what they called the "appalling" and "outrageous" actions of "rogue officers."   They do have a very valid point and I can understand exactly what they are saying but I have to question as to whether this was done for the betterment of the community or to give them exposure and elevation. I say this because I also can understand why the opposition to the release of this videotape point as ...