By Gary Norris Gray, BASN-Newsroom-Staff Reporter

OAKLAND, CA.-The United States of America is going through another episode of traumatic race relations, with this country’s leader turning a blind eye to the current crises and even aiding and abetting the enemy with his comments.

This on the 71st anniversary of Jackie Roosevelt Robinson breaking the baseball color line and the 50th anniversary of the death of The Reverend Doctor Marin Luther King Jr. American racism is alive and well and making money.

The power of the Civil Rights Movement is receiving its second legs with the assistance of this White House setting into motion the current events in the United States.

We live in a nation where Black people can be arrested just for standing still. Whether in a Starbucks, a Wal-Mart or waiting for a bus.

Black people still cannot get a cab late night in many cities, cannot get a second interview, just because of his/her African name and dark skin tone.

Black people can be shot for playing with a toy gun in their own neighborhood, their own backyard and the police, the ones that are supposed to protect us are scared of Black people. Question, why did they join the police force in the first place if they are not going to protect and serve all of the people?

When a Black disabled person returning a shopping cart to the local store gets stopped by the local police force and asked questions just because that officer can. African-American disabled males getting thrown out of their wheelchairs for not complying with the police, again, because they can and sadly getting shot and killed for the very same reason — because they can.

Modern-day lynchings have taken on a new form and now it is a uniform with a badge. The gun has replaced the rope and mob gatherings are no longer needed.

If a black man is shot and killed and nobody pays the price in jail time… African-Americans do not buy anything in that city for an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year. Justice will then be served because it is costing money to that town, city, or county.

Major League Baseball-America’s former past-time had all of its players and coaches wear the number 42 in honor of Jackie Robinson but what does it mean when African-American participation has dropped the past 10 years to eight percent. If you don’t teach children the game they will not play. Baseball has yet to learn this lesson because they keep promoting good players like Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels and Bruce Harper of the Washington Nationals who happen to be white….

Baseball was racially tone-deaf AGAIN on Jackie Robinson Day as the Cleveland Indians wore Chief Wahoo on their jersey and their caps with a Jackie Robinson patch on the side. Still cannot wrap my head around this visual picture, money is more important than moral values as these Cleveland caps sold out in hours. There should have been a boycott of those caps and make the Cleveland Baseball organization (eat them) pay for them. If you do not set demands you will not be heard, this is just the example.

This is the racial economic disconnect the Reverend Doctor King was bringing forth 50 years ago.

Dr. King said it clearly “White America must see that no other ethnic group has been a slave on American soil. That is one thing that other immigrant groups haven’t had to face. The other thing is that the color became a stigma. American society made the negroes’ color a stigma.

America freed the slaves in 1863 through the Emancipation Proclamation of Abraham Lincoln but gave the slaves NO LAND or nothing, in reality, to get started on.

At the same time, America was giving away millions of acres of land in the West and Mid-West. Which meant there was a willingness to give the white peasants of Europe an economic base. And yet it refused to give its black peasants from Africa who came here involuntarily, IN CHAINS, and had worked FREE for 244 years any kind of economic base.

And so emancipation for the negro was really freedom to hunger. It was freedom to the winds and rains of heaven. It was freedom without food to eat or land to cultivate and therefore it was freedom and famine at the same time.

And when white America tells the negro to lift himself by his own bootstraps they don’t look over the legacy of slavery and segregation. Now I believe we ought to do all we can and seek to lift ourselves by our own bootstraps, but it’s a cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps. And many negroes, by the thousands and millions, have been left bootless as a result of all of these years of oppression and as a result of a society that deliberately made his color a stigma and something worthless and degrading.”

Stop telling me that there are more people who hate racism than there are racists and bigots. Where are the majority of Americans that hate racism and standing up to it? I don’t see you because you’re silence on this issue is deafening. You defend everything but BLACKNESS.

Your silence is killing thousands of Black males in America. The Lord our God gave you instructions so you know better, yet you stay silent because it is safe.

How can you change the big issue of race relations and equality when you won’t even address or put effort into the small issues letting your children do it for you.

1.) They are currently eight states with the Confederate flag within its own state flag. The states are Alabama, Arkansas, North Carolina, Tennessee, Florida, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas.

The State of Georgia changed its flag because it wanted the Summer Games of 1996. The Olympic committee told the legislators of Georgia they could not play the games under that flag. The Atlanta City council banned the flag from being flown during the games. Four years later Georgia changed its flag to the current one with Confederate ties, AGAIN.

The University of Mississippi had an issue with rebel flags at their football games on Saturday afternoons until African-American players complained in the early 1990’s. It was formally banned in 1996.

2.) The Confederate statues from Virginia to Texas and Confederate Battle Flag should be placed in museums for American historical reference. But this is a reminder for African-Americans and people of color who have to pass by these battle flags and monuments every day.

3.) Strike the 1787 three-fifths cause Article I, Section 2 of the United States Constitution. This is a legal document and should be corrected so a president like the current resident will not get any ideas to re-instate this law.

4.) Give them the economic base (LAND) for African-Americans so they can improve their lives. This is the opportunity Dr. King was discussing before his untimely death. This is something the United States refuses to do.

5.) And last changing the name of the Washington Football Club and the logo of the Cleveland Indian Baseball Club.

God Bless America

Thank you, Brother Anthony Johnson, for the inspiration for this article.

Gary Norris Gray – Writer, Author, Historian, Gibbs Magazine-Oakland, California and New England Informer- Boston, Mass. THE GRAYLINE:- The Analects of A Black Disabled Man, The Gray Leopard Cove, Soul Tree Radio In The Raw, and The Batchelor Pad Network, Disabled Community Activist. Email Glcgray@gmail.com

©Copyrighted Gary Norris Gray @ Gray Leopard Prod