links for 2011-06-28

By On June 28, 2011 · 2 Comments
  • While Mortgage Lenders Pay Millions, Black America Loses Billions | Black Voices News
    "It seems ironic that despite a series of laws enacted years ago to prevent these kinds of practices that in 2011, some of America’s lenders seem to be thumbing their noses to fair lending for all Americans. Million-dollar settlements are not enough to compensate communities of color for all the devastating financial harm that their illegal practices have wrought.

    "According to the recently-released 2011 State of the Nation’s Housing by the Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University, nearly half of foreclosure auctions in 2010 were located in just 10 percent of the nation’s 65,000 census tracts. According to the new report, homeownership rate declines for African-Americans (3.8 percent) and Latinos (2.1 percent) have outpaced those for white households (1.5 percent). As a result, these homeownership declines have erased the homeownership gains of the past two decades."

    (tags: via:carleandriacook blacks latin@s housing discrimination)
  • The "Black" Drug That Isn't | New America Media
    "Not only is BiDil not a 'black' drug, it can actually be more harmful for some blacks because one of its components, hydralazine, is associated with an increased risk of lupus, which strikes black women at four times the rate of whites.

    "BiDil is no isolated exception. Some journal articles have been manipulated by the $310 billion pharmaceutical industry. The journals are financially dependent on drug-company advertising, which is often deceptive and is sometimes used to induce journals to publish favorable reports of advertised drugs."

    (tags: via:carleandriacook healthcare race medicine)
  • Is Segregation a San Francisco Value? | Dailycensored.com
    "The 'school choice' movement was conceived by those who did not want to desegregate, as George H.W. Bush’s Assistant Secretary of Education Diane Ravitch claims in her best-selling book The Life and Death of the American School System: 'For someone like me, raised in the South and opposed to racism and segregation, the word ‘choice’ and the term ‘freedom of choice’ became tainted by their use as a conscious strategy to maintain state-sponsored segregation.' In other words, Ravitch, a renowned educational historian, contends that 'school choice' was originally intended as an end-run around desegregation, a means to legally keep African-Americans out of white schools, under the guise of 'freedom of choice.'

    While Ravitch’s point may seem extreme to some, especially in this media climate which is so favorable of charter schools, CRP has found that the current 'school choice' movement has increased racial segregation, and that charter schools tend to be racially segregated…"

    (tags: via:carleandriacook sanfrancisco charterschools segregation)
  • Discrimination against Muslims at All-time high in Belgium | LoonWatch
    "About two-thirds of the cases involving Islam stem from Islamophobia, the report says. These incidents of Islamophobia are mostly characterized by propaganda being disseminated through email and pressure in the workplace. The workplace-related cases of discrimination include exclusion and verbal provocation of Muslims. The report notes these instances are a result of workplace administrations believing that 'religion has no place in the workplace.' The tension arising from Islamophobic attitudes in the workplace is mostly eliminated 'by transferring the Muslim employee involved to another department or laying her/him off.'”
    (tags: via:carleandriacook belgium muslims islamophobia)
  • Indians Pay Surgeons to Turn Girls into Boys | Telegraph (UK) *TRIGGER WARNING*
    "Ranjana Kumari, of the Centre for Social Research and one of India's leading campaigners against female foeticide, said the surgical transformation of girls into boys without their informed consent was a sign of India's growing 'social madness'.

    "She said she despaired that education had failed to stop the growing rejection of baby girls in India."

    (tags: via:carleandriacook india gender health income youth)
  • Indian ‘Holy Hair’: Keeping the West Fashionable | Korea Herald
    Just in case you missed it in Chris Rock's "Good Hair."–AJP

    "'Indian hair is the most sought after for the only reason that it belongs to the same Caucasian race to start with,' said Cherian.

    “'And the natural color black matches the hair color of the Africans as well as, when bleached… the color of the Europeans or the Americans.'”

    (tags: via:carleandriacook india beautystandards hair religion globalization)
 
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  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_EC4V7AGCKZBTV7PPGQ5MVZ7Z7E Patrick

    @Andrea:disqus , thanks for the links.  There is always important stuff in here.

    The outsized impact of the housing crisis on communities of color, and particularly on Black folk, is rarely covered in the media.  I see lots of nasty tea bagger comment suggesting that the crisis was caused by banks trying to be politically correct (AS IF), and being forced by the government to lend to folks who weren’t white (and presumably in the writers feverish wee little braincicles, not as worthy).

    In truth the housing crisis only further demonstrates that the banking system preyed on minorities (look at the lending terms, even in the so called “easy credit” days, if you weren’t white, your mortgage terms weren’t as good).  And now, there is a large sucking sound, as what little wealth which many folks were able to accumulate is taken away to please the rich (mostly white) bankers.

    Top this off with the last hired, first fired, and now NEVER hired crisis of a lot of POC, and there is something evil going on.

    And of course, the attacks on government employees often carry a racist tinge… (okay, are outright racist).

    But the MSM ignores race in all of this.  This is a scary damn time, and there are a lot of folks in desperate straits.  We really need to hear their voices………….

    I dunno, though, to be honest, I feel a lot of despair (I know there are folks fighting back, but it is hard for me to find their voices from here (or enough of them)).   Anyway, thanks for being there and fighting on…………

    patrickInBeijing

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_EC4V7AGCKZBTV7PPGQ5MVZ7Z7E Patrick

    @Andrea:disqus , thanks for the links.  There is always important stuff in here.

    The outsized impact of the housing crisis on communities of color, and particularly on Black folk, is rarely covered in the media.  I see lots of nasty tea bagger comment suggesting that the crisis was caused by banks trying to be politically correct (AS IF), and being forced by the government to lend to folks who weren’t white (and presumably in the writers feverish wee little braincicles, not as worthy).

    In truth the housing crisis only further demonstrates that the banking system preyed on minorities (look at the lending terms, even in the so called “easy credit” days, if you weren’t white, your mortgage terms weren’t as good).  And now, there is a large sucking sound, as what little wealth which many folks were able to accumulate is taken away to please the rich (mostly white) bankers.

    Top this off with the last hired, first fired, and now NEVER hired crisis of a lot of POC, and there is something evil going on.

    And of course, the attacks on government employees often carry a racist tinge… (okay, are outright racist).

    But the MSM ignores race in all of this.  This is a scary damn time, and there are a lot of folks in desperate straits.  We really need to hear their voices………….

    I dunno, though, to be honest, I feel a lot of despair (I know there are folks fighting back, but it is hard for me to find their voices from here (or enough of them)).   Anyway, thanks for being there and fighting on…………

    patrickInBeijing

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