Given that it is his 80th birthday, here’s photo retrospective on Martin Luther King’s life. See his many defining moments as well as the other great men and women he worked with.

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Also Check Out The Top 5 MLK Speeches

Is President Obama MLK’s Dream? Not Completely

Top 5 MLK Tribute Songs

If you were to liken Brazil, the country, to an individual, she would the bronzed body you saw leading a float at Rio Carnaval, flawless from afar, shaking her body with a rhythm akin to the feet of an international soccer star like Ronaldihno.

She would be the unquestionable soul of the party, and the ultimate representative of a country whose glamour, style and rigour is not that unlike the impressive image you just conjured up about a Samba Queen at Carnaval.

Indeed, since the end of the world financial crisis, Brazil’s economy has left foreign investors drooling at the mouth and Western governors scratching their bald patches in awe. The mammoth South American superpower has also begun preparations for the world’s two largest sporting events, the FIFA World Cup and the Olympic Games.

To add to its impressive list of recent achievements, the Brazilian people have decided for the first time in history, and at this time in history, that a woman should lead their country.

Dilma Rousseff, a former left wing guerrilla fighter and public official, will become President of Brazil on January 1, taking over from her colleague President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. She has indicated her intention to continue his socially inclusive policies in education, health and infrastructure, and as a woman is well positioned to present Brazil to the world as a land of opportunity, fairness and social progress.

However, while having taken giant moves to eliminate poverty in recent years, Brazil continues to be a land of contrasts. Around 30 percent of the country’s population lives in poverty, with the richest two per cent possessing 13 per cent of the Brazil’s household income.

Simple demographic data also reflect some unmistakeable racial contrasts. Two thirds of the 30 per cent of Brazilians living in poverty are black, and in regions with high concentrations of black voters, such as in the Northeast, political representation is strikingly disproportionate to the number of black voters.

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Brazilian Poverty

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Rousseff’s symbolic rise to power and her message of equality in Brazil, enhanced by her being female, are not necessarily reflective of gender in Brazilian politics either. Women continue to be underrepresented in public office like black and other minority communities such as indigenous groups.

The president-elect has promised to continue most, if not all, of the socially inclusive policies of her internationally recognized predecessor, Lula da Silva. Lula, as he is known in the region, is enjoyed widespread international support for his model.

What he leaves Rousseff, however, is far from a Brazil whose domestic conditions reflect the country’s growing GDP, and thus a marked end to the Lula era is likely to provoke some harsh analysis about the depth of social policies and the distribution of Brazil’s prosperity through education, health and infrastructure.

Brazilian economist, Edma Bachar, once referred to Brazil as ‘Belindia’ – an enormous, impoverished India living alongside a small, prosperous Belgium.

With this in mind, and come the arrival of thousands of foreign tourists and media teams for the 2014 FIFA World Cup and the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic Games, the country’s Belgium is set to be on full display.

However, Brazil is also likely to find itself in the precarious situation of having to deal with its own domestic demons in front of a global audience – the 30 per cent of the population considered poor, in which half are unable to read and write and two thirds of whom are black. In other words, Brazil’s internal India.

What remains to be seen is, under the leadership of a beacon of equality such as Rousseff, whether Brazil’s extensive domestic problems will leave a mark on a country that has so successfully sold its lucrative, Queen of Samba image to the rest of the world and thus had the privacy to improve particular social issues from within.

Alas, only time will tell just how well Dilma Rousseff can move her feet and whether or not equality in Brazil is a dance move we’ll also be watching.

RELATED:

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Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez told the U.N. General Assembly on Thursday that he smells hope not sulfur, a small compliment for Barack Obama given that he branded then President George W. Bush “the devil” when he last addressed the world body in 2006.
“It doesn’t smell of sulfur. It’s gone. It smells of something else. It smells of hope and you have hope in your heart,” Chavez said during a rambling, 57-minute address where he mentioned close friend and former Cuban President Fidel Castro more than Obama or Bush.

Though at times he waved his arms, shook his fist and pointed for emphasis, Chavez was largely calm and jovial during the speech. He denounced capitalism as being a chief cause of global climate change and accused Obama of making lofty promises but failing to live up to them, asking “doesn’t it seem like there are two Obamas?”

During a raucous press conference after he finished speaking, Chavez said, “I hope the two Obamas join and become one, the one who gave the speech yesterday.”

“Imperialism must end!” he said.

A populist and the leader of a self-declared “socialist revolution” in Venezuela, Chavez also urged Obama to “come over to the socialist side. Come join the Axis of Evil over here.” He was only half-joking.

He also said, “I hope god protects him(Obama) from the bullets that killed Kennedy.”

The Marley family has just released pictures of Bob Marley’s wife, Rita and his son, Ziggy’s visit to the White House. I wonder how Bob would feel to know that a Black man with the same bi-racial heritage as him is president of the United States, the heart of Babylon. I wonder how Marley would react to his song, “One Love,” being used to celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama.

Thirty years after Jamaican reggae artist Bob Marley united the world under the banner of peace, unity, and human rights, Barack Obama inspired the world with a similar message. Bob Marley chastised corrupt politicians and war while exhorting oppressed people to “get up, stand up.” Both Marley and Obama would not only win the love of the Black people, but also the admiration of young, idealistic whites who would further Marley’s cause. Bob Marley was born in Jamaica in 1946. His father, Captain Norval Marley, was an officer in the English Navy as well as a plantation overseer. His mother was an 18-year-old black woman by the name of Cedella Booker. Marley’s parents didn’t stay together. His father died when Marley was 10.

As a young man, Marley moved to Kingston, Jamaica’s capital, where a burgeoning music scene was developing. Marley joined up with local musicians such as Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer. The trio formed the Wailers and recorded with some of Jamaica’s top producers. Marley composed several songs that represented the angst of the Jamaican underclass, and the tensions between the haves and have-nots in his native land.

It wasn’t until Bob Marley signed with Chris Blackwell’s Island Records that Marley would take his sound around the world. Bob Marley positioned himself the rebel, singing songs that people all over the world could relate to, songs like “I Shot The Sheriff,” “Get Up, Stand Up,” and “Concrete Jungle.” Marley was able to do what King and Ghandi did, and what Obama accomplished in 2008 — rally educated people of European backgrounds around the cause of multiculturalism and racial harmony. The same populist underdog voice Marley’s songs echoes in Obama’s speeches.

While Marley painted a dark picture, there was always an undying optimism in his voice, a sense that things would get better, that people could unite to end racism and classism.

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Both Marley and Obama have the ability to be militant without being threatening. Obama’s anti-war stance and criticism of America’s social system reflected the angst of the working and middle class in America. Still, he was able to sweeten up his strong desire for change with calls of unity, hope, and progress in an all-inclusive America. Similarly, Marley managed to remain pro-Black and a voice of the downtrodden while sweetening up his message with calls for love, peace and unity. The millions of white Americans who grew up on Marley’s music — from the frat boys, to the hippies, to the millions of Americans who’ve heard his songs on the radio and own his “Legend” CD — became the a crucial part of Obama’s “post-racial” America.

Obama and Marley made the same bi-partisan efforts to unite people. After Marley was shot, he united the heads of the warring Jamaican political parties at the historic “One Love” peace concert in Jamaica. Bob Marley was the voice of the Third World, but was still able to attract the attention of the European upper-class, royalty and celebrities. Time Magazine named “Exodus” the “Album of the Century,” and the BBC named “One Love” the song of the century.

Marley said: “I don’t have prejudice against meself. My father was a white and my mother was black. Them call me half-caste or whatever. Me don’t dip on nobody’s side. Me don’t dip on the black man’s side nor the white man’s side. Me dip on God’s side, the one who create me and cause me to come from black and white.”

Click here to see video of Bob Marley!

Click here to read about Obama’s Top 5 Marley Songs!

Explore the year 1986!

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Dear Michelle,

If I had to assign a visual to accompany Maya Angelou’s poem “Phenomenal Woman”, I’d choose yours. Your blend of confidence, humility, sparkling intelligence, and compassion you exude are indeed phenomenal. Neither a pre-positioned doll nor trophy wife you have real friends of your own; a life of your own design. The success I want for you in your new role is beyond articulation.

It is precisely your authenticity that inspires me to speak up on work-life balance, because you’ve set its achievement among your priorities as First Lady. After seventeen years of working and eight years of motherhood, I humbly suggest a reframing of the work-life balance conversation.

I assert that what women need is work-life function. ‘Balance’ connotes equal distribution. No one woman can be at the meeting that runs long, at the spring recital, and lounging before the fire in lingerie at one time. Inevitably, something gets sacrificed. If nothing else, the phrase is a misnomer. Even the leaders in the field acknowledge this: according to Jim Bird, CEO of worklifebalance.com, “work-life balance is not a problem to be solved. It is an issue to be managed.”
You are most fortunate to have a husband who is a present, loving, and participating father; and equally blessed to have your mother with you to share in the labor of love known as parenting. What about married women of soldiers on duty? What about single moms, women with absentee spouses who opt out of parenting, or women whose parents or extended family are in different locations, differently abled, or deceased? What about the women who can’t afford to hire a nanny or even a babysitter on a consistent basis?

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Women need family and career lives to work instead of just hang in the balance. According to some important research, the AFL-CIO says women now outnumber men in the occupational labor category, comprising 56.2% as of 2008. Despite being the majority of managers and executives, women still earn 23% less income than their male counterparts. (It is worth noting here that the National Organization of Women website points out that “for women of color, this [pay] gap is even wider.”) Nearly half of working women cannot support themselves with one job, so they have two or more to supplement income until equal pay for equal work is a reality. This figure has jumped 22% since 1974. According to a 1996 report by the AARP, 44% of women between the ages of 45 and 55 are caring for a parent and a child as members of Generation S, the Sandwich Generation. In short, the demands on women have grown, by far outpacing their earning power. If anything needs balance, it’s the pay scale. With your husband’s signing of the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, we’re on the right path.

When it comes to my career and family, it is not balance, but alignment that I seek. Balance is for yoga and budgets. I’ve figured out that I can have it all, just not all at once. Frankly, I don’t need to have it all at the same time. I just need harmony in the orchestration of my life. And I need for our leaders to make a new commitment to provide the aforementioned equal pay for equal work, to allow deductions for weight loss and fitness expenses, increases credits and deductions related to child care, designated employee sick time for the care of dependents, corporate incentives to provide access to child care on or near the job site, and of course, universal health care, which will bring considerable relief for all Americans.
Yes working women can achieve first-class working citizenship. Yes, Americans can have careers and family lives that work. Balancing the two, as it turns out, is overrated.

Respectfully yours,
Thembisa Mshaka

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In addition to being a copywriter, voice actor, wife and mother, Thembisa S. Mshaka is the author of the career guide, “Put Your Dreams First: Handle Your [entertainment Business]”.

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Click here to read about Oprah Winfrey!

Click here to see video of Oprah Winfrey!

Click here to read about Women and Work In The Age of Obama!

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A woman who believes “luck is preparation meeting opportunity,” Oprah Gail Winfrey has continuously shattered gender and racial barriers in America. Winfrey is the most successful talk show host in American TV history — male or female, Black or white — and the first female African-American billionaire. As one of the most influential women in the world, Winfrey continues to be a beacon that transcends racial and social barriers, much like Barack Obama. In 2006, Winfrey endorsed Obama for president, her first public political stance ever. She accompanied the Obamas on the campaign trail. But perhaps her greatest contribution to the ascendance of Barack Obama is how she prepared America for him through her show, as an African-American who won the hearts of women from all walks of life.

WATCH: Oprah Winfrey delivering 2008 Stanford Commencement speech.

Click here to read about Oprah Winfrey!

Click here to read about Women and Work In The Age of Obama!

Explore the year 1994!

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From The New York Times:

Following are two poems by Barack Obama that were published in the Spring 1981 issue of “Feast,” a 51-page student literary journal that described itself as “a semi-annual journal of short poetry and fiction collected from the Occidental College community.” The journal is no longer published, according to a college spokesman.

To read Obama’s poetry, click here.

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One of the most astounding voices in African-American literature, Maya Angelou is heralded for her literary prowess and activism. Working alongside Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr., Angelou was a profound figure in the Civil Rights Movement, and was the first Black woman to have a screenplay produced. The Grammy Award-winning poet is an icon that continues to motivate and inspire. Her accomplishments and voice have moved people beyond boundaries of race and gender, setting the standard for figures like Barack Obama.

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VIDEO: Maya Angelou speaks to Harry Smith about Obama’s victory and recites her poem “I Rise.”

Click here to read about Maya Angelou!

Click here to read the Poetry of Barack Obama!

Explore the year 1993!

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1968 was a pivotal year in Black History. Wal Mart recently teamed with NewsOne to create this interactive look back at that important time. Check it out here:

From Tom McGeveran at The New York Observer:

Legendary novelist and editor Toni Morrison’s endorsement of Barack Obama is obviously not significant for her ability to move voters at the polls, which is not proven and probably not likely to be proven. But given her perceived attachment to the Clintons—Bill, she famously once called America’s first black president; and Hillary she has been close to in the past—we thought it worth printing in full the letter of endorsement she sent to the Illinois senator, as released by the Obama campaign.

Click here for the full letter.

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Click here to read about Toni Morrison!

Click here to see video of Toni Morrison!

Click here to read Toni Morrison’s Letter To Obama!

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A master of storytelling, Toni Morrison was the first Black woman to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. The Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and legendary professor is known for the vivid black characters brought to life in her novels that recreate the Black experience. Morrison’s novels often illuminate themes of slavery, racism, and identity, but also shine with hope for the future. In her first-ever political endorsement, Morrison wrote of a “national evolution” in a letter that publicly endorsed Barack Obama. As an educator and author, Morrison used her authority and standing as a Black pioneer to lay the groundwork for the presidency of Barack Obama.

VIDEO: Toni Morrison reads an excerpt from her new book, “A Mercy”

Click here to read about Toni Morrison!

Click here to read Toni Morrison’s Letter To Obama!

Explore the year 1992!

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• What About Shirley Chisholm?

• The Femme Candidate | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1991

DAY 26 of 44

• From Medgar Evers To Barack Obama

• The Desegregator | MEDGAR EVERS | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1990

DAY 25 of 44

• From The Slavehouse To The White House

• The Liberator | HARRIET TUBMAN | Article

• Explore the year 1989

DAY 24 of 44

• Black Fatherhood In The Age Of Obama

• The First Father | BILL COSBY | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1988

DAY 23 of 44

• Will Obama Change Hip-Hop’s Attitude?

• The Hitmaker | BERRY GORDY | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1987

DAY 22 of 44

• Obama’s Top 5 Marley Songs

• The Legend | BOB MARLEY | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1986

DAY 21 of 44

• Hope On A Tight Rope

• The Scholar | CORNEL WEST | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1985

DAY 20 of 44

• Double Consciousness: Obama & The White Vote

• The Invisible Man | RALPH ELLISON | Article

• Explore the year 1984

DAY 19 of 44

• Influencing Politics In The Age Of Obama

• The Congressman | ADAM CLAYTON POWELL, JR. | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1983

DAY 18 of 44

• Experts Critique Obama, The Writer

• The Native Son | RICHARD WRIGHT | Article

• Explore the year 1982

DAY 17 of 44

• Political Art In The Age Of Obama

• The Poet | GWENDOLYN BROOKS | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1981

DAY 16 of 44

• Are Black Republicans Obsolete?

• The Activist | FANNIE LOU HAMER | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1980

DAY 15 of 44

• White America Reacts

• The Greatest | MUHAMMAD ALI | Article | Video

• Explore the years 1978 & 1979

DAY 14 of 44

• 11 Questions For The Obama Science Team

• The Lifesaver | CHARLES DREW | Article | Video

• Explore the years 1978 & 1979

DAY 13 of 44

• The End Of White America?

• The Diplomat | RALPH BUNCHE | Article

• Explore the year 1977

DAY 12 of 44

• Michelle Obama, The American Girl

• The Storyteller | ZORA NEALE HURSTON | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1976

DAY 11 of 44

• Community Organizing & President Obama

• The Nationalist | MARCUS GARVEY | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1975

DAY 10 of 44

• Socialism, Racism & Obama

• The First Champion | JACK JOHNSON | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1974

DAY 9 of 44

DAY 8 of 44

• Black Womanhood In The Age Of Obama

• The Businesswoman | MADAME CJ WALKER | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1972

DAY 7 of 44

• Black Male Stereotypes In The Age Of Obama

• The Renaissance Man | KAREEM ABDUL JABBAR | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1971

DAY 6 of 44

• White Feminists & Michelle Obama

• The Woman’s Woman | SOJOURNER TRUTH | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1970

GIANT Magazine & Celebrate 44 present: A NEW DAY

• Celebrity reflections from Usher, Akon, Bow Wow, Mary Mary, Keri Hilson, D’Angelo and more.

• Plus Obama Quotes of the Day, and more on inaugural style, celebrity and culture!

DAY 5 of 44

• How The Black Athlete Paved The Way For Obama

• The Man Who Could Fly | MICHAEL JORDAN | Article | Gallery | Video

• Explore the year 1969

DAY 4 of 44

• A More Perfect Union: Obama’s Speech On Race

• The Man Who Dreamed Our Reality | MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. | Article | Gallery | Video

• Explore the year 1968

DAY 3 of 44

• Hollywood & Race In The Age Of Obama

• The Moderate | BOOKER T. WASHINGTON | Article | Video

• Explore the year 1967

DAY 2 of 44

• American Cities In The Age Of Obama

• The Man Who Wouldn’t Settle For Less | W.E.B. DU BOIS | Article | Gallery | Video

• Explore the year 1966

From Linda Lowen at About.com:

As we look back at the 2008 presidential primaries – with Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama trading one-liners and fighting for percentage points – it’s important to look back and pay homage to someone who paved the way for both of them.

That person is Shirley Chisholm.

To read more, click here.

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Professing to be “unbossed and unbought,” Shirley Chisholm was the first black female major-party candidate for President of the United States, and the first black woman to be elected to Congress. Chisholm wasn’t intent on winning the presidency, but was steadfast on challenging conventions and showing Black America that they could aim high. She set the bar, in many ways, over which President Barack Obama jumped.

VIDEO: Shirley Chisholm gives a speech in 1972

Click here to read about Shirley Chisholm!

Click here to read What About Shirley Chisholm?

Explore the year 1991!

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Little did I realize when John Frazier and I had our tear- and emotion-filled reunion in November 2007 at a “Symposium on Social Justice in the 1960s” at the University of Southern Mississippi that I would find myself a year later as part of an event shaping up at the Smithsonian Institution that will help connect the dots between the civil rights era of four decades ago with the election of America’s first black president, Barack Obama.

Frazier said he and his daughter are working with the Smithsonian to donate the historic letters, writings and documents of Medgar Evers to the Civil Rights wing of the nation’s museum.

If everything goes together as planned, it is possible that President Obama may be enticed to participate, to take receipt of papers associated with a man who has often been described as the first martyr of the great civil rights movement of the 1950s and ‘60s.

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Click here to read about Medgar Evers!

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Click here to read From Medgar Evers to Barack Obama!

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Medgar Evers was one of the most profound activists of the Civil Rights movement. His involvement in the Regional Council of Negro Leadership led to his organization of several boycotts and protests throughout Mississippi. His work as an NAACP field secretary also helped put Mississippi at the forefront of the struggle. One of Evers biggest achievements in Mississippi was desegregating the University of Mississippi Law School, thereby broadening the precedent set by Brown v. Board of Education, so that future law students, such as Barack Obama, could have their choice of law schools in the years that would follow.

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VIDEO: CBS explores the legacy of Medgar Evers

Click here to read about Medgar Evers!

Click here to read From Medgar Evers to Barack Obama!

Explore the year 1990!

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Medgar Evers was one of the most profound activists of the Civil Rights movement. His involvement in the Regional Council of Negro Leadership led to his organization of several boycotts and protests throughout Mississippi. His work as an NAACP field secretary also helped put Mississippi at the forefront of the struggle. One of Evers biggest achievements in Mississippi was desegregating the University of Mississippi Law School, thereby broadening the precedent set by Brown v. Board of Education, so that future law students, such as Barack Obama, could have their choice of law schools in the years that would follow.

Medgar Evers was born on July 2, 1925 in Decatur, Mississippi. He served in the Army and fought in Europe in World War II. He was honorably discharged in 1945, when he returned to Mississippi. In 1948, Evers enrolled at Alcorn State. Evers would eventually work his way to becoming the president of the Regional Council of Negro Leadership. In that role, he organized many boycotts and self-help campaigns. As an NAACP field secretary, Evers promoted desegregation, including the eventual desegregation of the University of Mississippi. A year after that landmark victory, Evers was shot and killed on June 12, 1963.

When whites in his hometown used intimidation to prevent Evers from voting in a local election, Evers said, “I made up my mind then that it would not be like that again—at least not for me. I was committed, in a way, to change things.”

His notorious death was an assassination plot by Ku Klux Klan member Byron De La Beckwith. Beckwith’s trial would result in two deadlocked juries. It wasn’t until 30 years later when, in 1994 after three decades of life as a free man, Beckwith was again brought to trial based on new evidence and he was convicted of murder. He died in jail in 2001.

Evers’ persistence, resolve, and commitment to the Civil Rights movement in the face of bigotry, racism and threats on his life, are all examples of the same kind of resolve Barack Obama displayed en route to winning the Presidency.

Click here to see video of Medgar Evers!

Click here to read From Medgar Evers to Barack Obama!

Explore the year 1990!

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]]> http://newsone.com/114331/the-desegregator/feed/ 1 The Desegregator (thumbnail) ionesfontaine picture-214 http://newsone.com/61951/gallery-from-the-slavehouse-to-the-whitehouse/ http://newsone.com/61951/gallery-from-the-slavehouse-to-the-whitehouse/#comments Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:40:36 +0000 Casey Gane-McCalla http://newsone.com/?p=61951 ]]>
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Four hundred years ago the first African Americans were brought to this country as slaves. In 1819 slaves helped build the White House. There were three American Presidents who owned slaves. Today, an African American is the president of the United States. here is the journey of African Americans from The Slavehouse to the White House.

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Watch Another Timeline of Black History and American Presidents To Lift Every Voice and Sing

Click here to read about Harriet Tubman!

Explore the year 1989!

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]]> http://newsone.com/61951/gallery-from-the-slavehouse-to-the-whitehouse/feed/ 43 GALLERY: From The Slavehouse to The White House (thumbnail) cganemccalla picture-341 http://newsone.com/110301/gallery-black-history-1989/ http://newsone.com/110301/gallery-black-history-1989/#comments Fri, 13 Feb 2009 21:39:17 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=110301 ]]> 1989 proved to be a mostly fabulous year for Black America, which record achievements in politics, science, education, and entertainment.

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Click here to read about Harriet Tubman!

Click here to see a gallery of Slavehouse to the White House!

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]]> http://newsone.com/110301/gallery-black-history-1989/feed/ 823 ionesfontaine http://newsone.com/106391/black-fatherhood-in-the-age-of-obama/ http://newsone.com/106391/black-fatherhood-in-the-age-of-obama/#comments Wed, 11 Feb 2009 05:01:19 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=106391 ]]>

Former rap producer and family policy advocate Bill Stephney asks President Obama to
consider a comprehensive analysis of fatherhood in America, not just the “Deadbeat Dads,” but also the “Denied Dads.”

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In his Father’s Day speech of 2008, presidential candidate Barack Obama decried the state African-American fatherhood:

“Too many fathers… are missing,” Mr. Obama said, “missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.”

Mr. Obama’s speech focused on those fathers not “stepping up.” This “deadbeat dad” characterization winds its way effortlessly through political discourse and news coverage. Yes, there are too many fathers who have been unsupportive of their families.  But what about those fathers who, while putting forth efforts to be responsible parents, are discouraged from doing so? What about the other side of the “deadbeat dad” phenomenon: the “denied dad”?  What about the fathers who’ve had to turn themselves into a multi-tasking blend of Dr. King, Thurgood Marshall, Mahatma Ghandhi and Suge Knight just to obtain a meaningful presence in their children’s lives?

Men like Chris Gardner, who transformed the challenges of being a homeless single father into tremendous success as a millionaire stockbroker and motivational speaker, inspiringly portrayed by Will Smith in the box office smash “The Pursuit Of Happyness.”

Or men like Wesley Autrey, the New York construction worker – dubbed the “Subway Hero” – who jumped onto tracks to save a man from an oncoming train because he didn’t want his two nearby daughters to witness a tragedy.

The president, despite growing up without his own father, the late Barack Obama, Sr., is no stranger to positive fatherhood.   One needn’t be too intrusive into the personal affairs of the First Family to observe from afar, the warm, mutual love between two precious daughters and a doting, devoted father.

In that Father’s Day speech last year, the president missed an opportunity to discuss those fathers who do make every attempt to fulfill their moral, spiritual, ethical and financial obligations as parents. These fathers have been rebuffed by the legacies of slavery and Jim Crow, harmful government family policies, a faulty family law process, too many mothers conditioned to be indifferent and sometimes hostile to father relevance, and a popular culture that often parodies fatherhood literally into cartoonishness.

My friend Donald is one of those “denied dads.”

One Father’s Story

Donald is currently married to a wonderfully supportive wife, and they have a precocious two-year-old boy.  But Donald is also divorced.  After a brief marriage, he separated from his ex-wife, with whom he had a daughter.  My friend Donald did not spend any time with his daughter this past Christmas.  In fact, since 2004, Donald has not spent a Christmas  – or any day, for that matter – with his daughter, despite paying child support, attending court-ordered parenting classes, retaining court-ordered therapists and law guardians, and obtaining contempt orders and awards of lawyer reimbursement fees against his ex-wife.  For all the lip service paid to encouraging responsible fatherhood, actually facilitating it has been another story.

Donald is a hard-working family man, an African-American father who has spent tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees (mostly with lawyers indifferent to his family’s welfare or the law) attempting to remain a meaningful presence in his daughter’s life.

A judge last year opined over Donald’s fight to co-parent his daughter: “Affirmative action needs to be taken to ensure that she is permitted to love and have a relationship with her father as well as her mother.”
Donald’s struggle for his daughter was even featured in the July 2008 issue of Ebony Magazine. He was lucky. Most “denied dads” don’t get that kind of exposure.

Thabiti Boone, a Brooklyn-based community and family activist (chosen as a “CNN Hero” in 2007), who raised his now-adult daughter alone as a struggling single father, tells stories of being turned down for support by New York social service agencies because he wasn’t a mother.  Harlem educator Kevin Williams was denied court-enforced child support while he was a custodial parent. In the tragic case last year of Long Island mother Leatrice Brewer, who stabbed and drowned her three young children to death, the fathers of her children had petitioned local family courts to award custody to them, citing Ms. Brewer’s obvious mental illness and instability.  The courts rebuffed the fathers, cementing a horrific fate for their children.

The Problem of Missing Fathers

For many African-American families and communities, father disengagement and marginalization has become not a cultural shame, but a cultural norm.

According to a recent Child Trends DataBank report, 69.5% of African-American children are born to unmarried mothers, in comparison to 47.9% of Hispanic children, 25.4% of White children, and 16.2% of Asian/Pacific Islander children.  Most Black, two-parent families with children don’t break up – they never form to begin with.

So, when we examine the severe disparities in educational outcomes between, let’s say, African-American and Asian-American children, why are we so reluctant to consider the radical difference in how families are structured?

How Public Policy Made It Worse

These problems were brewing back in 1965, when a little-known Assistant Secretary of Labor (and later New York senator), Daniel Moynihan, issued a study titled “Crisis of the Negro Family:  The Case For National Action.”  In the report, Moynihan argued:

“At the heart of the deterioration of the fabric of Negro society is the deterioration of the Negro family. It was by destroying the Negro family under slavery that white America broke the will of the Negro people. Although that will has reasserted itself in our time, it is a resurgence doomed to frustration unless the viability of the Negro family is restored.”

The condition of the Black family, and of absent Black fathers, was called within the report “a tangle of pathology.”  Moynihan’s clumsy use of the term “pathology” to describe family formation (or lack thereof) for 1960s African-Americans created a political firestorm, and undermined the harsh but incredibly accurate family observations in the report.

Responding to the Moynihan report, sociologist Herbert J. Gans declared: “The matriarchal family structure and the absence of a father have not yet been proven pathological, even for the boys who grow up in it.”

The theory that held sway from the 60s through the 80s – presumably from experienced sociologists, thinkers and analysts – was that Black families were more “resilient” than even their White, two-parent, middle class counterparts because of “larger-than-life” single mothers.  These views may have seemed complimentary to some African-Americans at the time, but it obscured the reality – a reality that saw families drawn into deeper forms of social disconnection, poverty and violence. What soon developed was a malady not in existence even during slavery and Jim Crow:  fatherless Black housing projects and neighborhoods.  As communities became fatherless, they also became man-less. The removal of Black adult males from these areas (due to homicide, incarceration, unemployment, military service, drug treatment, mental institutionalization and divorce) occurred at a rate usually reserved for high-casualty wars.

“Daddy-as-ATM”

In the 1992 best-selling book, “Two Nations: Black, Separate, Hostile and Unequal,” author Andrew Hacker quoted the now-infamous observation of Johns Hopkins sociologist Andrew Cherlin, stating that the problem with so many black single mother families was “not the lack of a male presence, but the lack of a male income.”

In essence, in Cherlin’s view (and that of many others of that generation), fathers served no particular purpose to families other than to monetarily fund single mothers and their children.  It was the “Daddy-as-ATM” theory.  This “theory” served as the engine that still drives public policy to focus on aggressive child support collection from fathers, rather than encouraging strong, comprehensive relationship (moral, spiritual, ethical and financial) connections between fathers, mothers and children.

It has been nothing short of amazing how the 30-year campaign that essentially promoted single Black motherhood and “fathers-are-not-necessary” policy (see the Diahann Carroll/James Earl Jones classic 70s film, Claudine, for cinematic example), has almost been obliterated from our present-day discourse on family responsibility.  To paraphrase the adage: Failure doesn’t have a single-parent. It indeed is orphan.

For all the criticism flung directly at hip-hop (some of it valid), many rappers have revealed through song and statement, how far off the mark the social scientists of the 60s and 70s actually were. From Tupac and Biggie, to Jay Z and Juelz Santana, the “had to grow up my own ‘cause Pops bounced” rhyme composition has become an album staple in the genre.  Tupac told MTV News shortly before his death that “growing up without a father is what made me cold and bitter.”

What President Obama Can Do

Next year will be the 45th Anniversary of the Moynihan report.  President Obama should consider revisiting and updating it.  One highly effective move by the president would be to recruit the First Lady, Michele Obama, to lend her status legal experience and credibility to a re-examination of the report, along with a current assessment of the critical issues that have so divided many families, such as the high out-of-wedlock birthrate, and radically fatherless African-American and urban neighborhoods.

Mrs. Obama currently commands a respect that has been generally reserved for cherished figures such as Coretta Scott King and Betty Shabazz.  Not only did she evidence unflagging support for her husband, she was critical to his success during primaries. (Do we truly believe that Mr. Obama dominated Black women’s vote during the primary because of his smooth jumper from 15 feet out?)  Their daughters, Malia and Sasha conduct themselves with a grace that seems sampled from their parents.  Michelle and her brother Craig were raised to exemplary success on Chicago’s South Side by her mother and late, cherished father.  According to a 2008 New York Times piece, Mrs. Obama loved her father so much “that she would curl up in his lap even as an adult.”

By engaging her own personal story, her advocacy on family issues could be incredibly crucial in stressing the ways in which connected fathers can positively impact the lives of their daughters,  especially for communities where the majority of girls are raised fatherless – leaving them highly vulnerable in so many ways.  Let the campaign for healthy family development emerge with someone who knows well the value of responsible parenthood.

Donald and Me

Back to Donald.  He has more legal hearings coming up, with the hope that the courts in his area will one day commit to their statutory and compelling public interest responsibility to enforce his parenting rights, and his daughter the right to benefit from his involvement.

How do I know Donald?  Well, the ex-wife denying him access to his daughter is also my ex-girlfriend, with whom I have a wonderful son, born unfortunately without the benefit of his parents being married.  After several years of being denied court-ordered access to my son, I petitioned for custody in 1998. Donald and I encountered each other during those custody hearings, within which all of us were mired.  He had just married my ex. At the time, we only shared an occasional, stoic glance. Yet, we held the door open for each other in the courtroom a couple of times, in a quiet attempt to show that even under the most difficult of circumstances, sometimes brothers just have to put it all behind us and cooperate.  In 1999, I was awarded residential custody of our son by an African-American judge.  By 2000, the court declared me my son’s “permanent sole custodial parent.”  Donald and I would occasionally see one another when he would drop my son off after a visit.  In 2003, we met up and made a pact to continue to work together for the benefit of our children, who are brother and sister.  I hadn’t spoken to Donald for four years when we reconnected in 2007 – only to find out that we were kindred spirits in circumstance more than even I had imagined.

I had been our son’s custodial parent for nearly ten years when our mutual ex, after many legal attempts too numerous to quantify here, regained custody of him some six months ago.  Despite my having a court order to split summer vacation time and the holiday season with our son, our mutual ex, once again, has refused to allow him to visit me. My entire family, which also includes his ten year-old brother and six year-old sister (who only know life with him living with us) were crushed not have him around during the holiday season for the first time in their lives. Needless to say, Donald and his young daughter were not allowed to enjoy and part of the holiday together, either. Like Donald, I’m on my way back to court, too. There are moments where I get the feeling that some would rather see us do drive-bys on one another than cooperate for the best interests of our children.

The next time the holidays roll around, hopefully Donald and I will be able to celebrate with our children without difficulty. But another lovely gift I’d like to see under our tree from our new president would be an honest and fair reform of family policy in this nation, and a return to healthier, more cohesive families and communities.  Now that’s a Santa you can believe in.

Bill Stephney head of Joseph Media, has previously run music companies Def Jam Recordings, SOUL Records and Stepsun Music.  He has produced artists ranging from Public Enemy to Vanessa Williams and Paul Mooney.  He has supervised music for films such as “Boomerang,” “Be Be’s Kids,” “CB4,” “Clockers” and “Shaft.”  In 2006, he was elected to Minority Media & Telecommunications Hall of Fame.  Currently, he is a featured essayist in the book “Be A Father To Your Child:  Real Talk From Black Men On Family, Love and Fatherhood” (Soft Skull Press).  He lives in New Jersey with his wife Tanya, and their three children. Stephney also serves as a member in that state’s division of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.

See video of Bill Stephney reading from “Be A Father To Your Child”

]]> http://newsone.com/106391/black-fatherhood-in-the-age-of-obama/feed/ 29 Black Fatherhood In The Age Of Obama (thumbnail) ionesfontaine barack-obama-family_434x369 http://newsone.com/107781/video-bill-cosby/ http://newsone.com/107781/video-bill-cosby/#comments Wed, 11 Feb 2009 04:55:18 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=107781 ]]>

Bill Cosby is a man of many “firsts.” Cosby was the first Black comedian to conquer white American audiences. He was the first African- American to take a starring role in a network television series in the 1960s, “I Spy”; and the first to star in and produce a #1 TV show in the 1980s, “The Cosby Show.” He became the first successful Black “pitchman” for American consumer products too, from Jell-O to Kodak to Coca-Cola. Bill Cosby both defined and defied what it meant to “cross over.” On the one hand, Cosby was undeniably the first Black celebrity to transcend race — he wasn’t America’s top Black TV star; he was America’s top TV star, period. On the other, Cosby’s mainstreaming was controversial. To some critics, Cosby’s refusal to “deal with racial issues” in his work was a dereliction of duty. But Cosby, even more than Oprah Winfrey, was the foremost archetype for the racially transcendent ascendance of Barack Obama, now the 44th President of the United States.

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VIDEO: Bill Cosby talking about dentists during a famous stand-up routine.

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Explore the year 1988!

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]]> http://newsone.com/107781/video-bill-cosby/feed/ 1 VIDEO: Bill Cosby (thumbnail) ionesfontaine picture-117 http://newsone.com/107801/will-obama-change-hip-hops-attitude/ http://newsone.com/107801/will-obama-change-hip-hops-attitude/#comments Fri, 06 Feb 2009 20:05:19 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=107801 ]]>

From Eliott C. McLaughlin at CNN.com:

The rapper Common wants to take hip-hop in a new direction, he says, and he has an unsuspecting ally — President Barack Obama.

To read more, click here.

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]]> http://newsone.com/107801/will-obama-change-hip-hops-attitude/feed/ 2 Will Obama Change Hip-Hop's Attitude? (thumbnail) ionesfontaine picture-116 http://newsone.com/106921/gallery-black-history-1987/ http://newsone.com/106921/gallery-black-history-1987/#comments Fri, 06 Feb 2009 20:03:19 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=106921 ]]> This is a gallery of black history events from the year 1987, including great achievements in music, particularly hip hop.

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Start Gallery

Click here to read about Berry Gordy!

Click here to see video of Berry Gordy!

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]]> http://newsone.com/106921/gallery-black-history-1987/feed/ 0 GALLERY: Black History, 1987 (thumbnail) ionesfontaine http://newsone.com/106891/video-berry-gordy/ http://newsone.com/106891/video-berry-gordy/#comments Fri, 06 Feb 2009 20:01:17 +0000 Smokey D. Fontaine http://newsone.com/?p=106891 ]]>

American music has always been, at base, African-American music. Gospel, minstrelsy, vaudeville, jazz, blues, rhythm & blues and rock n’ roll — it’s all basically Black, no matter the color of the artist who performs it. But until the 1960s, Black people did not much control their culture, much less profit from it. That all changed with the emergence of Detroit’s Motown Records in 1960, and its legendary founder, Berry Gordy. Gordy’s Motown remained the largest Black-owned business in America for decades, until Reginald Lewis bought Beatrice Foods in 1987.

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VIDEO: Berry Gordy on the Tavis Smiley show talking about “the blind kid”, AKA Stevie Wonder.

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Explore the year 1987!

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I’m not exactly sure these are Barack Obama’s favorite Bob Marley songs but these are the songs that most reflect his struggle and journey.

1. One Love

This is one of Bob Marley’s most popular songs. Will I Am sang it at Obama’s Inaugural concert. This song represents the unity and love that Obama used as a rallying point in his historic campaign.

2. Redemption Song

In this song Marley talks about emancipating yourself from mental slavery and forwarding his generation. Obama’s victory has freed many from the chains of mental slavery and he is forwarding this generation triumphantly.The songs represents the hope and freedom that Obama has brought back as well as the struggle for people of African descent every where

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3. One Drop

This song has a double meaning. The One Drop refers to both the reggae beat and the One Drop rule that determines that any one with black blood is black. As a fellow biracial, Obama has also carried the torch for people of African descent. Bob also talks about the same struggles of working class people that Obama would come to represent.
They made their world so hard (so hard):
Every day we got to keep on fighting (fighting);

4. Small Axe

This song could have been the theme for Barack Obama’s campaign. Marley’s metaphor of the big tree cutting down the small axe represents the underdog taking on Goliath. Barack Obama managed to take down the big trees of Hillary Clinton and john McCain with the small axe of internet and grassroots campaigning.

5. War

This song is taken from a Haille Selassie speech at the United Nations. It is the ultimate critique against state sponsored racism. Barack Obama’s victory was a result of the worldwide fight against racism that Marley played a major role in. Although the color of a man’s skin still has more significance than the color of his eyes, Barack Obama has taken us closer to Marley’s dream of of lasting peace,
world citizenship and a rule of international morality.

Click here to read about Bob Marley!

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Explore the year 1986!

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Start Gallery

Click here to read about Bob Marley!

Click here to read about Obama’s Top 5 Marley Songs!

Click here to see video of Bob Marley!

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Today would be Bob Marley’s 64th birthday. I wonder how he would feel today to know that a Black man with the same bi-racial heritage as him is president of the United States, the heart of Babylon. I wonder how Marley would react to his song, “One Love,” being used to celebrate the inauguration of Barack Obama.

VIDEO: Bob Marley performing infamous song “One Love”

Click here to read about Bob Marley!

Click here to read about Obama’s Top 5 Marley Songs!

Explore the year 1986!

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