Listen to the Silence

Someone emailed a while back and asked why I occasionally end my posts with "-30".  That's a (very sad) sign that I was writing freelance journalism back when the news was still something you received from a piece of paper.   -30 was a sub-note to the editor or publisher that the line was the end of the piece.   Another question - "Who is Samir Shabazz?"    Google is your friend, but to make it easy - he was the leader of the new Black Panther party, and helped organize the intimidation tactic of "presence" of Black Panther's at voting booths in various cities, back when Obama was running for election the first time around. And a question I've actually had more than once - "Have a biscuit?",  "See how that works, Victoria/Virginia?"      Those are evidence that my sarcasm matured and came "of age" while my I was an army brat living in HQ USAREUR, and living off of the BBC and SkyOne.   They're what we used

To the young, (mostly white) “we’re here, we’re kinky, get used to it!” crowd, and the “We built this shit!” crowds:   Please stop non-consensually butt-raping the word “tribe”.   That poor word has now officially been molested and sodomized worse than a Catholic choir boy.   It has been abused and mis-used to the point where it requires reconstructive genital and anal surgery.   Please allow it at least 12-18 months for healing, repeated reconstructive surgeries, and physical therapy.   Please.     Because, here’s the thing.   If you were raised in White American culture in the 20 th century, the odds are that you have no idea what “tribe” actually feels like and means.   The closest I’ve ever seen to it in White America is in poor southern trailer parks – where the sense of belonging and blood relations come pretty darned close.   I’ve seen glimmerings of it in Gay Leather culture – among the elders who have been around long enough that they’ve lived through twenty or thirty