OUR STORIES | Demetrius H’ro: Terrance Franklin shooting is about systematic racism and “effeminating black men”

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Demetrius H’ro is a local spoken word artist who marched at the Justice for Terrance rally on May 31. Terrance Franklin was a 22-year-old who was shot and killed by Minneapolis police on May 10.H’ro attended the rally because he wants to help “start a movement” against institutionalized racism and police brutality, especially toward black men, he said.”I’m in a system that’s trying to effeminate me as a black man and take away my inner power. You notice it in subtle ways that you deal with police, or maybe a job interview,” he explained. “The murder of Terrance [Franklin] is just another part underneath that entire umbrella called ‘racism,’ which is raining down on all of us people of color.”H’ro added, “It’s a part of a problem that’s affecting me and other people of my skin color and anyone that is a victim of systematic racism.” He ends with a powerful message to Minneapolis police and other authorities he sees as hiding behind institutional racism.Related stories:• Protesters demand justice for Terrance Franklin, police prosecution• OUR STORIES | Willie Walton: “He didn’t deserve to die like a dog.”• OUR STORIES | Taharra Patterson: Terrance Franklin “could have been my child”Reporting for this article supported in part by Bush Foundation. Continue Reading

COMMUNITY VOICES | Terrance Franklin shooting is about systematic racism

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Demetrius H’ro is a local spoken word artist who marched at the Justice for Terrance rally on May 31. Terrance Franklin was a 22-year-old who was shot and killed by Minneapolis police on May 10.H’ro attended the rally because he wants to “start a movement” against institutionalized racism and police brutality, especially toward black men, he said.”I’m in a system that’s trying to effeminate me as a black man and take away my inner power. You notice it in subtle ways that you deal with police, or maybe a job interview,” he explained. “The murder of Terrance [Franklin] is just another part underneath that entire umbrella called ‘racism,’ which is raining down on all of us people of color.”H’ro added, “It’s a part of a problem that’s affecting me and other people of my skin color and anyone that is a victim of systematic racism.” He ends with a powerful message to Minneapolis police and other authorities he sees as hiding behind institutional racism.For the full story about the rally, read Lolla Mohammed Nur’s story, “Protesters demand justice for Terrance Franklin, police prosecution.” Continue Reading

On unintentional racism

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I was meeting with a group of students last week, talking about race, and I did something I was embarrassed about afterward. There was a young woman who was speaking eloquently about some of the issues taken up by their student group Students Together as Allies for Racial Trust (START), which is based at South High. This young woman was wearing a headdress, and I thought for a moment that I recognized her from another story that I wrote when I visited the Somali classes at the same school.I asked her, “Oh, didn’t I interview you before, when I visited the Somali classes?” She looked at me quizzically, and said she didn’t take Somali at the school. There was a long awkward silence. “Sorry!” I said, quickly moving on to a different topic.Later, I was flipping through a book that one of START’s coaches, Kate Towle, lent to me, called To Be Free: Understanding and Eliminating Racism. Continue Reading

FREE SPEECH ZONE | Yet Another Gap in Our State?

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The Twin Cities has yet another gap to add to our growing list–the job gap. According to a recent article in the Star Tribune “Twin Cities jobless gap worst in nation”, the jobless rate of blacks is more than three times that of whites in our state.Randy Furst, the author, explores a few reasons why our jobless gap is the worst in the nation in his article Twin Cities jobless gap worst in nation.” I do not doubt any of them.Based on my experience as a job counselor at a non-profit in North Minneapolis, I would add though, that areas like North Minneapolis also have very few employment opportunities. I would even describe the area as a job desert. People living here must travel far (often to suburbs) to places where the jobs are and if Metro Transit is the only mode of transport, this can be a long and difficult daily commute (read: at least 1.5 hours).Free Speech ZoneThe Free Speech Zone offers a space for contributions from readers, without editing by the TC Daily Planet. Continue Reading

FREE SPEECH ZONE | Keep the City of Minneapolis Accountable to Providing Equal Transit Amenities

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Students for Transit Equality is a recently formed group of University of Minnesota School of Social Work students who are concerned about racial and economic inequalities in Twin Cities transit and transit planning. The purpose of this information campaign is to draw community awareness and publicity to the lack of any bus shelter at the bus stop at 7th & Nicollet. Continue Reading

White privilege 2:Psychology and pathology of entitlement

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This week’s show brings back our guests and the next phase of our discussion on White Privilege (see Part One). The dynamic of hatred of a people we once enslaved is not as unusual at it may seem. This is the American Indian experience and the African-American experience. The psychology and pathology of refusing to accept what it means to be white pervades the culture still. In the wake of the recent annual conference on white privilege* in LaCrosse, Wisconsin, TTT delves deeper into the issue of unconscious entitlement that is so much a part of the American psyche, and the most difficult to extricate from our national inclination toward the colonial European view of race as well as understand the oppositional subculture we’ve created from the dregs of slavery over 200, 300, 400 years of American history. Continue Reading

St. Cloud State students use racist graffiti to affirm anti-racist solidarity

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Racist graffiti was found last week on a St. Cloud State University (SCSU) campus building bulletin board. While this was certainly not the first time such graffiti has appeared on campus, the school’s response was a departure from the usual practice of removing the offensive language as quickly as possible. After students of Yolanda Lehman’s “Race in America” class put up a display in the east stairwell of Stewart Hall to honor Dorothy Height, who helped planned the 1963 March on Washington and later received the Presidential Medal of Honor, racially offensive words scrawled on the display were discovered March 31. “I was asked what I think should be done,” said Lehman. Continue Reading

FREE SPEECH ZONE | Zinn and Wise Challenge American Exceptionalism

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A Duo of Dissidents Debunk American Exceptionalism: Howard Zinn Dissects America’s “Holy Wars”; Tim Wise Decries the Downside of White Privilege. By Steve Clemens. April 9, 2009In my youth when I was bored on a Saturday afternoon, I would occasionally turn on the TV and end up watching the charade known as “Professional Wrestling”. Even though the matches seemed highly scripted, it was interesting to watch the “tag team” matches where often you would have two “bad guys” paired against two “heroic types”. After the first wrestler pummeled his opponent senseless, he would quickly reach over to his tag team partner, slap his hand and the fresh “wrestler” would continue the attack on the helpless opponent, who, in turn, was trying desperately to get to his partner so he could get relief.I witnessed a tag team event on Tuesday evening just off Summit Avenue in St. Continue Reading