Month: February 2019

Scenes from the Oscar-nominated film Green Book depict post-World War II America as a land of wide prosperity, big cars, nation-spanning highways, and easy travel. But this was the Jim Crow era, before civil rights reforms, and discriminatory laws of the time made it challenging, even dangerous, for black motorists to move around the country. They simply weren’t welcome in most restaurants, hotels or other businesses.

So, enterprising New York City mail carrier Victor Green began publishing a travel guide, listing businesses where black motorists were welcome. He called it The Negro Motorist Green Book. It was published annually, from 1936 until 1966. At first just listing restaurants, lodgings, night clubs, grocery stores and gas stations in the New York area, it gradually expanded to include as many as 10,000 sites in nearly every U.S. state and parts of Canada, Mexico and Bermuda.

“Usually segregation is thought of as a Southern thing, a Southern problem,” said Ginna Cannon, a historian with the Rutherford County, Tennessee, Chamber of Commerce. “Really it was a national issue, and one that we all need to understand and come to terms with and do better in the future.”

The 1964 Civil Rights Act, which outlawed discrimination in public accommodations, made the Green Book unnecessary almost overnight. Candacy Taylor, an author, photographer and cultural documentarian who has been researching Green Book sites, estimates that 20 percent are still standing, and about 3 percent are still in business.

Renewed interest in The Green Book and African-American history has prompted historians across the country to try to document the remaining sites in their states.

WATCH: Green Book Mapped a Safe Route Through Era of Discrimination

Documenting relics of discriminatory era

Working with architectural historians in Nashville and Chattanooga, the Center for Historic Preservation at Middle Tennessee State University recently surveyed Green Book sites statewide. 

Ginna Cannon was part of the research team. 

“Places matter,” she said. “To have a story not associated with a property, it loses some of its resonance and that is really important for us to remember as we go forward as a country,” she said.

Tiffany Momon, a Ph.D. candidate in history at Middle Tennessee State, agrees.

“So much of African-American history is about place-making,” she said. Claiming a land and a space of their own after emancipation, and if we lose these buildings we lose these stories.”

Standing on Jefferson Street in downtown Nashville, where most of the city’s Green Book listings were once located, Momon said, “Think about what that life meant that you needed to have a guidebook to tell you how to get around a country where you were supposed to be equal … to tell you which establishments were friendly to you, and just imagine what it was like to stop in a town that wasn’t in the Green Book.”

Jefferson Street remains at the heart of the city’s African-American community. But many Green Book sites were lost in 1957 when a federal highway was built through the heart of North Nashville. Others were lost to the gentrification of historically black neighborhoods. A handful have found new life. For example, a motel that once catered to black motorists is now a nail salon and day spa.

One of the few Nashville Green Book sites still in business is Jefferson Street’s R&R Liquor. Owner Kenneth Christman says he is pleased to be part of the Green Book heritage and legacy. 

“R&R serves as one of the last bastions of black business in this area, particularly now that gentrification is taking place,” he said. “We (African-American business owners) as a group have not had the privilege of having as many businesses survive, so it’s of particular importance in the community.”

Persevering and surviving

Tiffany Momon says documenting Green Book sites in Tennessee and elsewhere is about more than locations on a map.

“Black businesses that through the Jim Crow era, through the era when the Green Book was published, persevered and survived and paved the way. So the preservation of these sites is important so that we can continue to tell those types of stories,” she said.

Especially when those stories come at a time when the country is again wrestling with racial discord.
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A youth-led protest movement in the southern Iraqi port city of Basra, which saw riots last summer over failing services and soaring unemployment, has found an artistic outlet in the words and beats of homegrown rapper Ahmed Chayeb. 

The 22-year-old rapper, also known as Mr. Guti, says his generation is fed up with the false piety of politicians and religious authorities who preach about faith and duty but have let Basra fall apart. 

“We need to be critical of everything that’s not right,” Chayeb told The Associated Press in a recent interview in his home studio, where he recorded “This is Basra,” lashing out at the powerful Shiite religious establishment.

Mr. Guti’s expertly produced music videos have drawn tens of thousands of YouTube viewers but his new-found fame has also brought danger: threats from hard-liners are common and two of the city’s protest organizers have been killed in recent attacks. Their killers remain at large. 

​Basra rundown, violent

Basra, long known around the Persian Gulf for its drinking establishments and its maritime vibe, fell under conservative rule after Shiite clerics and militias took over the city in the vacuum caused by the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. 

Once renowned for its canals and markets, Basra’s waterways today are clogged with waste, and its drinking water is filthy. The city erupted in violent unrest last summer that led to demonstrators burning down government and party-affiliated buildings.

Amid the revolt, rap offered Basra’s youth, tired of joblessness and failed services, an opportunity for lyrics blistering with criticism. 

In “This is Basra,” Chayeb raps against the backdrop of a march around the city’s burning municipal building during last summer’s protests, asking why his generation has been called on to fight a war for leaders who cannot secure water for the city. 

The conflict he refers to is the four-year war against the Islamic State group that the U.S.-backed Iraqi government forces ultimately won. Many young Shiites followed a call in June 2014 by Iraq’s top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, for volunteers to fight against IS. Thousands died in that fight.

“We were martyred for this war, I fell, and the authority has forgotten my loyalty,” he raps.

“You’re not associated with Hussein,” he goes on, invoking the revered Shiite imam and grandson of the Prophet Muhammad who died in the 7th century Battle of Karbala, and whose example Iraq’s leaders have asked their youth to follow. 

​Careful, not backing down

Chayeb, mindful of the dangers, is circumspect about where and when he performs. He says most of his concerts are arranged through private contacts; he stopped recording at a professional studio in 2016. He said he’s received death threats that have grown more intimidating in recent months.

But he won’t stop rapping.

“If we stay afraid, nothing will change,” he said. 

As a teenager, Chayeb watched U.S. and British rappers on YouTube, then got together with friends to perform his own rhymes. He also followed a string of Arab rappers and sees Klash, from the Saudi city of Jiddah, as one of his greatest influences.

“My aim is to explain what is happening to Basra because of the people who are corrupt,” he said, adding that rap is a way “to release my pain.”

Corrupt politicians and clerics should watch out, he says. 

“Beware of Basra,” he raps. “We won’t be quiet until our demands are met.”
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The United Methodist Church’s top legislative assembly convenes Sunday for a high-stakes, three-day meeting likely to determine whether America’s second-largest Protestant denomination will fracture due to divisions over same-sex marriage and the ordination of gay clergy.

While other mainline Protestant denominations — such as the Episcopal and Presbyterian (U.S.A.) churches — have embraced gay-friendly practices, the Methodist church still bans them, even though acts of defiance by pro-LGBT clergy have multiplied and talk of a possible breakup of the church has intensified.

At the church’s upcoming General Conference in St. Louis, 864 invited delegates — split evenly between lay people and clergy — are expected to consider several plans for the church’s future. Several Methodist leaders said they expect a wave of departures from the church regardless of the decision.

“I don’t think there’s any plan where there won’t be some division, and some people will leave,” said David Watson, a dean and professor at United Theological Seminary in Dayton, Ohio, who will be attending the conference.

Formed in a merger in 1968, the United Methodist Church claims about 12.6 million members worldwide, including nearly 7 million in the United States. In size, it trails only the Southern Baptist Convention among U.S. Protestant denominations.

The church technically forbids same-sex marriage and gays serving in the ministry, but enforcement has been inconsistent. Clergy who support LGBT rights have been increasingly defiant, conducting same-sex marriages or coming out as gay or lesbian from the pulpit. In some cases, the church has filed charges against clergy who violated the bans, yet the UMC’s Judicial Council has ruled against the imposition of mandatory penalties.  

At the heart of the ideological conflict is an official UMC policy, dating from 1972, asserting that “the practice of homosexuality is incompatible with Christian teaching.”

One of the proposed plans, endorsed by the UMC’s Council of Bishops, would remove that language from the church’s law book and leave decisions about same-sex marriage and ordination of LGBT clergy up to regional bodies. This proposal, called the One Church Plan, would open up many options for those who support the LGBT-inclusive practices, but it would not compel individual churches or clergy to engage in those practices.

In contrast, the proposed Traditional Plan would affirm the bans on same-sex marriage and the ordination of “self-avowed practicing homosexuals.” The plan would strengthen enforcement of those bans, and set up procedures for churches and regional bodies to leave the UMC if they could not abide by those rules.

A third option would create three branches of the church reflecting the different approaches to LGBT issues. One branch would maintain the current bans, another would expect all its clergy and regional groups to support full LGBT inclusion, and the third would neither forbid nor require the inclusive practices. This plan would take several years longer to implement than the others.

Those three plans were developed over 17 months of deliberations by a Methodist committee that was formed after conflict over LGBT policies boiled over at a General Conference in 2016. In accordance with Methodists’ long tradition of democratic policy-making, delegates in St. Louis will be free to revise any of those plans, or consider some alternative. The UMC’s Queer Clergy Caucus will be presenting what it calls “the Simple Plan” — which is even more LGBT-affirming than the One Church Plan.

Kenneth Carter, the Florida-based president of the Council of Bishops, is among a majority of the bishops supporting the One Church Plan, hoping it would limit any exodus by creating space for differing views on the LGBT issues.

“We’re better together than we are separated and fragmented, but I do understand that the forces that would separate us are very powerful,” Carter said.

“We’ve tried to remain together as a global body,” he added. “The challenge is simply that there are some nations where homosexuality is taboo.”

Among the supporters of the Traditional Plan is Mark Tooley, who heads a conservative Christian think tank, and has long engaged in the debate over Methodist policy.

He believes a traditionalist alliance of U.S.-based and overseas delegates will be large enough to outvote centrist and liberal delegates. 

Unlike other mainline Protestant churches, the UMC is a global denomination; its greatest growth recently has been overseas. About 30 percent of the delegates in St. Louis will be from Africa — a bloc with relatively conservative views on sexuality that in the past has supported the LGBT bans.

If the Traditional Plan does prevail, Tooley says some liberal segments of the church — perhaps its Western U.S. district — might withdraw to form a new denomination.

“It would be very significant,” Tooley said. 

UMC leaders are acutely aware of how searing the lengthy ideological conflict has been. In December, the Council of Bishops issued a pastoral letter expressing remorse that the buildup to the St. Louis meeting has been hurtful to many LGBT people. 

“Demeaning and dehumanizing comments and attacks on LGBTQ persons in conversations related to the upcoming February Conference are a great tragedy and do violence to hearts, minds, and spirits,” the letter said. “We commit ourselves to helping people who disagree with each other to have conversations that include, honor, and respect people with different convictions.”  

A localized example of the church’s internal divisions has surfaced in San Francisco, home to the liberal Glide Memorial United Methodist Church, which has 12,000 members.

The UMC’s California-Nevada conference removed two of Glide’s pastors last summer, then filed a lawsuit in December seeking to assert control over the local church property. A Glide spokesman, Sam Singer, said the regional authorities were displeased with Glide’s “open door policy” — which includes a variety of social-service programs for the needy and extensive outreach to the local LGBT community.

One of Glide’s former senior pastors is Karen Oliveto, who — after eight years at Glide — was elected by the Rocky Mountain regional body in 2016 as the UMC’s first openly lesbian bishop and is now based in Colorado. The UMC’s judicial council upheld the election result, while ruling that Oliveto’s 2014 marriage to a woman violated UMC policies for its clergy.

Oliveto hopes the delegates in St. Louis vote to end the LGBT bans; she’s unsure what would ensue if the Traditional Plan prevails.

“What that means for us, I don’t know,” she said. “I’ll be praying very deeply.” 
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The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has nominated 8 movies in the category of Best Picture. What are the elements that make a movie the best picture of the year? VOA’s Penelope Poulou spoke with award winning playwright and director Murray Horwitz about the chances of some of this year’s nominees making history at the 91st Academy Awards.
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Meghan Markle has been spotted at several swanky venues in New York City, cradling her baby bump as she visited friends for what is rumored to be a baby shower. .

Markle, the Duchess of Sussex, was seen Tuesday entering The Mark hotel on Manhattan’s Upper East Side, at a restaurant on the ground floor of The Met Breuer and at The Surrey Hotel.

The Duchess, who’s 37, wore sunglasses, a dark gray coat and neutral high heels with a matching bag.

As photographers waited outside the Mark, a high-end boxed crib and pink flowers were delivered.

Abigail Spencer, a co-star on Markle’s former TV show “Suits,” was spotted at one of the Markle gatherings.

Markle and her husband Prince Harry announced the pregnancy in October.
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Former President Barack Obama and Golden State Warriors superstar Stephen Curry told a roomful of minority boys on Tuesday that they matter and urged them to make the world a better place.

Obama was in Oakland, California, to mark the fifth anniversary of My Brother’s Keeper, an initiative he launched after the 2012 shooting death of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. The death of the African-American teen sparked protests over racial profiling.

The initiative was a call to communities to close opportunity gaps for minority boys, especially African-American, Latino and Native American boys, Obama said to roughly 100 boys attending the alliance’s first national gathering. The My Brother’s Keeper Alliance is part of the Obama Foundation.

“We had to be able to say to them, ‘You matter, we care about you, we believe in you and we are going to make sure that you have the opportunities and chances to move forward just like everybody else,”‘ Obama said.

Obama, who left office in 2017, was joined by basketball star Curry. The men spoke for about an hour, answering questions from the audience and joking around. They talked about lacking confidence or being aimless as teens.

Obama praised single mothers, including his own. He advised the boys to look for a mentor, and to find opportunities to guide others.

Curry joined the former president in praising the value of teamwork.

“What we do on the court and the joy that comes out of that is second to none,” he said, “because nothing great is done by yourself.”

The former president cracked up the audience, and Curry, when asked a question about being a man. He said that being a man is about being a good person, someone who is responsible, reliable, hard-working and compassionate. Being a man, he said, is not about life as portrayed in some rap or hip-hop music.

“If you are very confident about your sexuality, you don’t have to have eight women around you twerking,” he said to applause. “‘Cause I’ve got one woman who I’m very happy with. And she’s a strong woman.”
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