Underground

My culture has been forced underground into smoke filled rooms of loud music with people who have been to jail before and are probably going to go to jail again, singing, drinking and dancing in celebration of enduring oppressive labor and degradation yet, not falling into hate.  Representing what it means to be a human being who loves and respects all by progressing individual skills, like playing music. Rather than defining ourselves with what we have, we define our selves by what we can do.  Because what you have can be lost or taken and what you know can’t.  We go above ground to work, but we stay in the shadows until we get back underground.

Everyone doesn’t see the world the same

A polite and respectful person isn’t necessarily a happy and good person.  A person who is truly happy, is just as happy when they have just enough to eat, as they are when they have all they can eat.  When they are polite, they are being honest and when they treat others with respect, it’s how they also expect to be treated.

When some one is only pretending to be happy, they are polite and respectful to manipulate and deceive, but horrid to people who they don’t think they can use.  Because they perceive the world as their enemy and live in constant paranoia and fear of not having, along with jealousness and envy.  They expect others politeness and respect to have the same devious motivations as their own and will never trust anyone.

Land of the Free

Once the picture of an American was a pioneer with a musket and a coonskin hat, now it’s a business suit and a briefcase.  Americans had the freedom to choose to live however they wanted in the past and we have slowly let our freedoms be taken away from us.  American pioneers set out into the wilderness for furs, the freedom to be able to provide for themselves and to take control of their own lives, rather than letting their lives be provided for and controlled by monarchs and lords.

The American colonies eventually became lucrative assets to the monarchy and Americans had to fight to gain and maintain freedom.  But, the lucrative and heinous business of slavery kept many Americans under control, until again Americans were inspired to fight against each other for the right that all Americans would have the freedom to control their own destiny.

As Americans expanded west and ignorantly fought and killed the Indians, they did so with the perception of freedom from danger.  While the Indians fought to be free from American control.

When the country was connected with the golden spike, the lucrative business of ranching pitted cowboys against land barons.  Cowboys fighting to maintain the freedom to ride the dusty trail, driving their cattle across the plains and sleeping under the stars.  The land barons fighting to fence off the land, in order to control the business of beef at the cost of the cowboys livelihoods.

Now, since the land barons took over the plains Americans freedoms have been eroding like a cliff beaten by waves, today it’s virtually impossible to avoid debt and thereby be controlled by it.  What will it take for Americans to again demand freedom and what kind of American restricts the freedoms of another!?

The world is truly a beautiful place

There are so many wonderful things about life and the world is truly a beautiful place, it’s important to enjoy the gifts of life and to guard them well.  It’s in the guarding of wonderful that people sometimes have to dedicate themselves to other aspects of life, other than the enjoyment of life.  To ensure that the world remains beautiful and bountiful, people have to work for it.  When we are done with the work, we can enjoy the benefits of our work. If we put off work we only pretend to enjoy life as we neglect our own food and shelter.

Historically, society has seen those that are controlled by their vices and unable to devote themselves to working on building a beautiful world, as weaker and less trustworthy than those that can devote their time to a future and master their vices because it’s only from their hard work that we all have the things we need and can enjoy.  Working for everyones profit has also usually been seen as conquering the vices of greed, envy and jealousy.  While working for selfish gains has been seen as heartless and ignorant making the rich ashamed in front of the righteous, unless they are righteous themselves.

It takes a long time for change to happen

• 

Because it takes a long time for change to happen, it’s important to prepare for as early as possible.  Martin Luther King Jr. was born long after slavery ended, but he still dreamed of equality and there are still people dreaming of the day when race becomes as significant as eye color.  M.L.K. devoted his life to change understanding that he probably wouldn’t see the promised land but just like planting seeds, it takes time and effort for anything to happen.  With that time and effort, the fruits can be beneficial to generations and even produce more seeds to go on benefiting for generations.

Seeds for social change can be planted now to put an end to the divisiveness in society by remembering how to work together, instead of against each other in competition.  The roots of our social structure are based on cooperation, which is why we have cities of families and not family territories.  The rat race mentality we currently have, only pits one individual against another and destroys the empathy and compassion in society.  In a rat race, there are no winners because even rich people have problems, only money isn’t one.  Just because people have emotions there will always be suffering in society but when we adjust our perspectives and work for love instead of money we can plant the seeds for a society were, even with all the problems in life at least society will not be a problem for anyone of any class or race.

If you cover your eyes with your hand, you can’t see your hand.

There is nothing wrong with working for someone else’s dreams, as long as their dream isn’t your nightmare.  If you cover your eyes with your hand, you can’t see your hand.  Even though it is right in front of your face.  A lot of people think that they are free without thinking about what freedom is.  If they think about it, their freedom is an illusion and in reality they are slaves to the alarm clock who can’t stray too far from being away from work when it goes off, they can’t stay up too late to hear it, they don’t have time to work on their personal dreams and they answer to a boss if they are late for work.

In this kind of slavery people don’t get whipped by their bosses, instead they are beaten down with humiliation and chastised by their peers, friends and family for not slaving.  Which makes them feel like pariahs, for desiring the freedom to work on their own goals, rather than their bosses goals.  Many people even end up choosing freedom in poverty, over slavery.  Only later to become convinced they’re the low life losers society says they are because they’re poor, so they end up giving up through losing the motivation to try. It takes cooperation and respect for society to work.  Our work builds the society we live in and if we work together and respect each other, we can build a world were more people have the opportunity and support to accomplish their dreams rather than building a world that retards that opportunity, abandons people in need and in turn retards progress.

Crime Wave Effect

Crime is a result of a divided society.  There is a popular misconception that confuses competence with opportunity.  The idea that the most competent of society will have the most opportunity is a false one when society is divided between haves and have nots.  Opportunity is more available to the haves than to the have nots, regardless of competence.  A rich person with good ideas can fund their production and the best a poor person with good ideas can do is sell them to someone who can afford to produce them.  There are plenty of people with the competence to do so much but their efforts are put towards things like crime and terror because they don’t have equal opportunities.  They have no hope of a future of anything but servitude.

In a society that has a small minority holding on to most of the pie and leaving the majority fighting over crumbs, the struggle over the crumbs makes people value crumbs more than anything.  Crumbs are more important than family, friends and freedom for people in such a society.  There are two main categories of leaders, humanitarian leaders and cold hearted leaders.  While the humanitarian type guides towards equality and fairness, the cold hearted types guide towards control and division.

Both types of leaders are respected for different reasons and a cold hearted, shrewd leader gains respect by using underhanded and dishonest tactics to dominate.  A humanitarian leader gains respect through diplomacy and unification.  The tactics of the cold hearted types are less effective and long-lived than those of the humanitarian type because the side effect of their tactics is the creation of enemies and division from within as similar cold hearted tactics pit one against another fighting for power and control.  Humanitarian tactics are what convince people to unify under one flag and work towards a common goal that gives hope to all of society.

a helping hand

The reason for many of the social problems we currently have, is from valuing profit over humanity.  Culture can transcend race and class, even though there can be cultures based on racial history and tradition, or on social status, it doesn’t exclude any race from any culture.  A culture gains a racial label when there are a majority of one race in the culture, though there may be a minority of other races included into the same culture.

There is more than one culture in America, the culture of the Black American, for example, is a culture which is based on a struggle to be considered human.  In contrast to the White American culture which is based on the dehumanization of every other race.  What is thought of as Black culture can include any one that has felt degraded and what is thought of as White culture can include any one whose felt entitled.  As the European culture of America enslaved and reeducated, it robbed Africans and Indians of their cultures.  In the process, it created new cultures.

As one culture tried to subjugate and indoctrinate, another tried to educate and equalize.

The foundations of law enforcement in America, are rooted in securing and protecting whites from non-whites creating different laws for different races.  With violence and fear tactics, a minority gained control over a majority, forcing the majority to sacrifice their own hopes and dreams for the hopes and dreams of a few elitists.

Today, there are some Americans who would gladly sacrifice their lives as patriots and think the American dream is only a little elbow grease away for anyone, there are also some Americans who could never join the military, or police force and think the only future for them is poverty and violence, no matter how hard they work.

For America to progress and unite, the two competing cultures have to become one American culture.  It has to live up to the ideals it was founded on and become a land of the free, where the inalienable rights of all are recognized.  In doing so, it can regain the position of the worlds beacon of hope.  Reversing the cold hearted tactics that made the non-white countries into third world countries and profited from promoting a gangster mentality can equalize the world and regain our humanity.  It is better to rule with a helping hand, than an iron fist.

In the end it is Javert who kills himself

For longer than I can remember at the lowest levels of the American Black community there has been an understanding that our lives are worthless and we can disappear at any moment, should we encounter the wrong police.  I didn’t grow up like most people, I’ve ended up homeless more than once since I was a teenager and had to struggle with police so much I’ve forgotten how many times I’ve had to fight with cops.  When I say fight with cops, I don’t mean boxing with one officer.  I mean one lone kid, and even adult, doing their best to not get beat up and broken by a mob of officers.  I’ve been able to get away once or twice, but most of the time I get dragged to jail and charged with something.  And I am one of the lucky ones who has not disappeared.

No one knows how many black men have been tortured and killed, how many black women have been raped and killed, or how many black people have criminal records with out ever breaking a law in America.  If what happened to Mr. Floyd made you sick, what happened to Mr. Greene should show you how many people in the black community see themselves as the walking dead because white people see them as animals.

The problems associated with the upper class demeaning the lower class have been a thorn in the side of our progress for centuries and we still can’t get past an ideology that elevates the wealthy above the poor, and in much of the world the whites above the blacks.  But, there is still hope that one day we will learn to live together because in the end it is Javert who kills himself.

Who is fighting for you?

It’s important to stop and think what you’re fighting for sometimes, with so much anger in society sometimes goals can become blurred.  Some people fight for the right and others for the left, but only a few fight for all.  The leaders of the left and the right use us to fight their battles and these battles are to further their own ends, not yours.

Those who have it don’t want those who don’t have it to get it because then those that have it will not be in control.  Those that are currently in control have not been doing a great job, or there wouldn’t be so many problems and so much anger.

There has to be a better way to live together and no matter the type of government there is, corruption and profit over people ideologies need to be frowned on like people frown on who ever they have been told to hate and blame for their problems and suffering.  All through history the enemy of the less well off has been the more well off, except when the more well off govern with love and empathy.