I was just reading this a minute ago. This is very good news, but what gets me so mad was that the vote of the Georgia supreme court was 4 to 3. Who are these 3 knuckleheads who thought he should not be released? That shit makes me want to go to the streets.
University of Kentucky reels after racist cartoon, threat[/b] Black students say bias evident despite progress, rise in enrollment
By JEFFREY MCMURRAY Associated Press
LEXINGTON, KY. ??? A Southern university is trying to defend its image after the student newspaper published a cartoon of a black man being sold at auction and a racist death threat was scribbled on the door of a black student leader's dorm room.
The cartoon in the University of Kentucky's newspaper, the Kernel, sparked peaceful protests around campus this month. It showed a black student, bare-chested and chained, being auctioned off among three fictional fraternities: Aryan Omega, Kappa Kappa Kappa and Alpha Caucasian.
Just when the furor was starting to die down, a junior recently elected as "Mr. Black University of Kentucky" returned to his residence hall to find his door vandalized with the message: "Die," followed by a racial slur.
University officials condemned the cartoon and the threat, and President Lee Todd spoke to the state's Commission on Human Rights, which held a special meeting on campus to address the incidents.
"They were ugly and should not have happened," Todd said.
Todd insists the school had started to make significant progress in race relations. Black enrollment on the campus broke a record this year, and the school retained black students at a higher rate than their white classmates.
'You can bait someone'[/b] Yet Josh Watkins, the student whose door was vandalized, and black leaders contend the university might not have advanced quite as far as enrollment suggests.
"It's a history of segregation," Watkins said. "In the day and age we live in, you would think people would try to improve that image. It's almost like you can bait someone to get here and then leave them out to pasture to fend for themselves."
Kentucky, a border state during the Civil War, wasn't as slow to desegregate as some universities in the Deep South, although it took a lawsuit for the first graduate student to be admitted in 1949. Black undergraduates arrived five years later.
However, the school's claim to national fame ??? a basketball program that leads the country in all-time wins ??? didn't sign its first black player until 1969, 20 years after the first black graduate student enrolled.
The lag in integrating the basketball team is largely responsible for the school's poor image in race relations, said Provost Kumble Subbaswamy, a native of India who is the highest-ranking minority official in the university's history.
"It was a visible sign of old values and bad values," said Subbaswamy, who said the school is looking to fill a newly created position of vice president for diversity.
But the image problem is about more than basketball, and it's far more current, said the Rev. Louis Coleman, director of the Justice Resource Center in Louisville.
In the fall of 2005, the school had a 40 percent drop in black freshmen. That drew criticism from black state legislators and some black faculty members.
Editors at the Kernel have apologized for the cartoon, which they said was intended as satire.
Hundreds march in Tallahassee over boot camp death[/b]
By Brent Kallestad | The Associated Press
TALLAHASSEE - About 700 marchers shouted ``We shall overcome'' and ``No justice, no peace'' Tuesday to protest Florida's handling of a teenager's death after guards hit and kicked him at a state boot camp last year.
They want federal authorities to investigate what they allege are civil rights violations by camp staffers and others, including Florida's former top law enforcement official. The U.S. Justice Department is reviewing the state's unsuccessful prosecution of the camp guards and a nurse.
``Lord, we need justice and we need it right now,'' Pastor Fred Maeweathers of the Shady Grove Mission Baptist Church of Ocala said in the opening prayer on the steps of the federal courthouse.
The 90-minute protest came less than two weeks after an all-white jury in Panama City acquitted seven camp guards and a nurse of manslaughter charges in the death of Martin Lee Anderson, a 14-year-old black inmate.
A videotape showed guards repeatedly hitting his limp body and the nurse standing by watching at the military-style camp in Bay County. Anderson died a day later, Jan. 6, 2006, at a Pensacola hospital.
``Why are we here and not in Bay County,'' asked Carolyn Mosley, the NAACP chairwoman for Bay County. ``I think Bay County is still asleep.''
Many of the signs objected to the federal government going after Atlanta Falcons star quarterback Michael Vick in a dogfighting case while the Anderson investigation awaits its attention.
``Kill a dog and go to jail. Kill a black child and get off free,'' one sign read.[/b]
``Where are all the dog lovers? Why are you not mad about this?'' another protested.[/b]
The NAACP-sponsored protest also targeted former Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Guy Tunnell. He was Bay County's sheriff when his office founded the camp and now works as an investigator for the state attorney's office in the area.
The civil rights organization wants Tunnell investigated for allegedly trying to prevent the videotape from being made public, making racist remarks related to the case and inappropriately communicating with current Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen about the death. The sheriff's office ran the now-defunct boot camp under state supervision.
NAACP officials also alleged Tunnell has committed other civil rights violations unrelated to Anderson's death. Joe Grammer, spokesman for State Attorney Steve Meadows, said Tunnell would not discuss the boot camp case because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
I was just reading this a minute ago. This is very good news, but what gets me so mad was that the vote of the Georgia supreme court was 4 to 3. Who are these 3 knuckleheads who thought he should not be released? That shit makes me want to go to the streets.
mannybolone
Los Angeles, CA 15,025 Posts
Comments
I was just reading this a minute ago. This is very good news, but what gets me so mad was that the vote of the Georgia supreme court was 4 to 3. Who are these 3 knuckleheads who thought he should not be released? That shit makes me want to go to the streets.
Black students say bias evident despite progress, rise in enrollment
By JEFFREY MCMURRAY
Associated Press
LEXINGTON, KY. ??? A Southern university is trying to defend its image after the student newspaper published a cartoon of a black man being sold at auction and a racist death threat was scribbled on the door of a black student leader's dorm room.
The cartoon in the University of Kentucky's newspaper, the Kernel, sparked peaceful protests around campus this month. It showed a black student, bare-chested and chained, being auctioned off among three fictional fraternities: Aryan Omega, Kappa Kappa Kappa and Alpha Caucasian.
Just when the furor was starting to die down, a junior recently elected as "Mr. Black University of Kentucky" returned to his residence hall to find his door vandalized with the message: "Die," followed by a racial slur.
University officials condemned the cartoon and the threat, and President Lee Todd spoke to the state's Commission on Human Rights, which held a special meeting on campus to address the incidents.
"They were ugly and should not have happened," Todd said.
Todd insists the school had started to make significant progress in race relations. Black enrollment on the campus broke a record this year, and the school retained black students at a higher rate than their white classmates.
'You can bait someone'[/b]
Yet Josh Watkins, the student whose door was vandalized, and black leaders contend the university might not have advanced quite as far as enrollment suggests.
"It's a history of segregation," Watkins said. "In the day and age we live in, you would think people would try to improve that image. It's almost like you can bait someone to get here and then leave them out to pasture to fend for themselves."
Kentucky, a border state during the Civil War, wasn't as slow to desegregate as some universities in the Deep South, although it took a lawsuit for the first graduate student to be admitted in 1949. Black undergraduates arrived five years later.
However, the school's claim to national fame ??? a basketball program that leads the country in all-time wins ??? didn't sign its first black player until 1969, 20 years after the first black graduate student enrolled.
The lag in integrating the basketball team is largely responsible for the school's poor image in race relations, said Provost Kumble Subbaswamy, a native of India who is the highest-ranking minority official in the university's history.
"It was a visible sign of old values and bad values," said Subbaswamy, who said the school is looking to fill a newly created position of vice president for diversity.
But the image problem is about more than basketball, and it's far more current, said the Rev. Louis Coleman, director of the Justice Resource Center in Louisville.
In the fall of 2005, the school had a 40 percent drop in black freshmen. That drew criticism from black state legislators and some black faculty members.
Editors at the Kernel have apologized for the cartoon, which they said was intended as satire.
By Brent Kallestad | The Associated Press
TALLAHASSEE - About 700 marchers shouted ``We shall overcome'' and ``No justice, no peace'' Tuesday to protest Florida's handling of a teenager's death after guards hit and kicked him at a state boot camp last year.
They want federal authorities to investigate what they allege are civil rights violations by camp staffers and others, including Florida's former top law enforcement official. The U.S. Justice Department is reviewing the state's unsuccessful prosecution of the camp guards and a nurse.
``Lord, we need justice and we need it right now,'' Pastor Fred Maeweathers of the Shady Grove Mission Baptist Church of Ocala said in the opening prayer on the steps of the federal courthouse.
The 90-minute protest came less than two weeks after an all-white jury in Panama City acquitted seven camp guards and a nurse of manslaughter charges in the death of Martin Lee Anderson, a 14-year-old black inmate.
A videotape showed guards repeatedly hitting his limp body and the nurse standing by watching at the military-style camp in Bay County. Anderson died a day later, Jan. 6, 2006, at a Pensacola hospital.
``Why are we here and not in Bay County,'' asked Carolyn Mosley, the NAACP chairwoman for Bay County. ``I think Bay County is still asleep.''
Many of the signs objected to the federal government going after Atlanta Falcons star quarterback Michael Vick in a dogfighting case while the Anderson investigation awaits its attention.
``Kill a dog and go to jail. Kill a black child and get off free,'' one sign read.[/b]
``Where are all the dog lovers? Why are you not mad about this?'' another protested.[/b]
The NAACP-sponsored protest also targeted former Florida Department of Law Enforcement Commissioner Guy Tunnell. He was Bay County's sheriff when his office founded the camp and now works as an investigator for the state attorney's office in the area.
The civil rights organization wants Tunnell investigated for allegedly trying to prevent the videotape from being made public, making racist remarks related to the case and inappropriately communicating with current Bay County Sheriff Frank McKeithen about the death. The sheriff's office ran the now-defunct boot camp under state supervision.
NAACP officials also alleged Tunnell has committed other civil rights violations unrelated to Anderson's death. Joe Grammer, spokesman for State Attorney Steve Meadows, said Tunnell would not discuss the boot camp case because he is not authorized to speak to the media.
I remember reading about this about a year and a half back. Finally, common sense prevails.
no shit that's what I was thinking too. FTW.