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Charleena Lyles

Wed 21 Jun 2017 by abagond

Charleena Lyles (c. 1987-2017), a pregnant mother of four, was shot dead by police on June 18th 2017 after calling them to report a burglary. This was in Seattle, on the liberal Left Coast of the US, in a city with an Obama Era consent decree to reform the police.

Her city councilman, Rob Johnson:

“People should not fear getting shot when they call law enforcement for help.”

The Seattle police made her the suspect:

“Officer involved shooting update: adult female suspect is deceased. Police are not searching for anyone else. More information to follow.”

The Seattle Times dutifully reported her criminal record.

Her family says her criminal record was driven by mental health issues she has been having for the past year.

On June 5th, two weeks before her death, she called the police for a “physical domestic disturbance.” By the time police got there her boyfriend was gone. They found her holding a huge pair of scissors.

According to police she was talking about changing into a wolf, cloning her daughter and telling them they were devils and were part of the Klan. (To be fair, the police of the North Precinct, where she lived, are known for being racist.)

After more police arrived, two sergeants among them, they got her to drop the scissors.

Her family said she was

“worried that authorities would take her children, one of whom has Down syndrome.”

On Facebook she had pictures that said things like:

“Dear Lord,
Bless my children,
take care of them on their
daily walk & keep evil away.
Amen.”

and:

“Always love your Mother because you will never get another.”

In 2011, in the wake of the police shooting of John T. Williams, the US Department of Justice (DOJ) investigated the Seattle police. Among other things, they found that Seattle police more readily point guns at people of colour and were more likely to use excessive force on people with mental health or substance abuse issues.

As part of the consent decree, Seattle agreed to give their officers Crisis Intervention Training. The North Precinct opposed the consent decree, but the two officers who killed Charleena Lyles did receive the training.

On June 18th, when she called about the burglary – it seems someone took an Xbox – the police said (there is no video) that she was holding two knives. They knew she was the same woman with the scissors, yet they did not bring their tasers. Or try to disarm her (she was less than a hundred pounds). Or try to talk her down. Or even order her to drop the knives. Instead it was:

Officer 1: Hey, get back. Get back.
Officer 2: Get back. Tase her.
Officer 1: I don’t have a taser. Get back, get back.
Officer 2: Get back.
Officer 1: Get back.

BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM BLAM

Three of her children, ages 11, 4 and 1, were there.

Kris‏ (@thatkblife) on Twitter:

“The expectation of black people having to be perfect and not in distress to not get killed by police is exhausting. #CharleenaLyles”

– Abagond, 2017.

Sources: mainly Heavy.com, KING 5, Seattle Times (2017), Seattle Times (2011), @SeattlePD, @thatkblife.

See also:

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Posted in stuff | 6 Comments »

Is resw a troll?

Tue 20 Jun 2017 by abagond

resw’s current avatar

Some say that commenter resw is a troll. Others say that I just cannot stand being disagreed with. In either case, the subject is swallowing up other threads. So:

Going forward, the question of whether resw is a troll will be discussed here only and be off topic elsewhere (except for whatever post I might do on it).

Take the poll and/or comment below:

Thanks!

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Posted in stuff | 36 Comments »

Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child (Slight Return)

Sun 18 Jun 2017 by abagond

Remarks:

This song is every bit as amazing as the day I first heard it. Unlike with Robin Thicke, my memory was unable to improve on the guitar one bit. The song came out in 1970 but is timeless. I have been told Jimi Hendrix is of the devil. Now I see what they mean.

See also:

Lyrics:

Well, I stand up next to a mountain
And I chop it down with the edge of my hand
Well, I stand up next to a mountain
Chop it down with the edge of my hand
Well, I pick up all the pieces and make an island
Might even raise just a little sand
‘Cause I’m a voodoo child
Lord knows I’m a voodoo child

I didn’t mean to take you up all your sweet time
I’ll give it right back to you one of these days
I said, I didn’t mean to take you up all your sweet time
I’ll give it right back to you one of these days
And if I don’t meet you no more in this world
Then I’ll, I’ll meet you in the next one
And don’t be late, don’t be late
‘Cause I’m a voodoo child
Lord knows I’m a voodoo child
I’m a voodoo child

Source: A-Z Lyrics.

Posted in stuff | 6 Comments »

Egypt in 1275 BC

Fri 16 Jun 2017 by abagond

The Book of the Dead, written in hieroglyphics, circa -1275.

Egypt 1,275 years before the Christian era is Egypt at roughly the beginning of the Book of Exodus in the Bible. The Jews will leave in maybe 12 years. Troy will fall in about 90 years. King Tut has been dead for 48 years, and the Sphinx and the great pyramids are now well over a thousand years old.

  • When: -1275, during the New Kingdom.
  • Where: Egypt. Held sway over Palestine, Nubia and parts of Libya, Phoenicia and Syria.
  • Ruler: Ramses II (19th Dynasty).
  • Population: 2 to 5 million.
    • Life expectancy: 30 to 36 years.
  • Major cities: Memphis, Thebes, Pi-Ramses.
  • Language: Late Egyptian, since the -1300s, written in hieroglyphics and, more commonly, hieratic, a simpler, cursive form of hieroglyphics.
  • Religion: priests, temples, worship of the gods, especially Amun, Osiris, Min, Mut, Khonsu and Ptah. The pharaoh is the supreme high priest who stands between the gods and man.
  • Currency: none. Coins have not yet been invented and will not become common in Egypt till after Alexander the Great (-300s). Most people are paid in beer, wheat and barley. The unit of account is the deben, equal to about 1.5 grams of silver ($1.50 in US dollars in 2012).
  • Economy: Most people are farmers living along the Nile, growing wheat and barley. Egypt is the richest country in the world, thanks to its control of the gold mines of Nubia to the south.
    • Exports: linen, furniture, but no papyrus (the alphabet has not yet created an export market).
    • Imports: glass and incense (Palestine), copper (Cyprus, Anatolia), tin (Iran, Syria), gold, ebony and ivory (Nubia).
  • Military: professional army. Chariot fighting at its height. Bows and arrows.
  • Bathing: daily.
  • Slavery: practised.
  • Latest inventions: Iron is a new thing, but only kings can afford it. In the last 300 years Egyptians have invented scissors, clocks (sun and water clocks) and the rudder.
  • Reading list: Book of the Dead (for the few who can read).

A book about the interpretation of dreams found at Deir el-Medina. Written in hieratic script, circa -1275.

It is a very well-known time and place. Not just because of all the temples Ramses II built which have lasted down to our time, but because of the desert village of Deir el-Medina, across the river from Thebes. In addition to its physical remains, we have its letters, work records, literature, graffiti, and so on. We also have the government records of the Hittite Empire, which add balance to the shameless propaganda written on the temple walls of Egypt.

The Jewish Exodus, by the way, does not appear in Egyptian records. In fact, Jews (Israelites) do not appear in Egyptian records at all till -1208.

The rich, unlike the poor, can read, do not have to work in the fields, sleep in four-post beds (not on mats), have houses with more than three rooms, and commonly lived to see 40. Stuff most people in the West will take for granted some 3,000 years later.

Race: According to both Cheikh Anta Diop and Chancellor Williams, this was after Egypt was ruled by Blacks. Egyptians by this time are heavily mixed with West Asian blood, though still darker skinned than today.

– Abagond, 2017.

Sources: Mainly “Ancient Egypt on 5 Deben a Day” (2010) by Donald P. Ryan; “The New Penguin Atlas of Ancient History” (2002) by Colin McEvedy.

See also:

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Posted in stuff | 48 Comments »

Loving v Virginia

Wed 14 Jun 2017 by abagond

Mildred and Richard Loving.

Loving v Virginia (1967) is the Supreme Court decision that struck down all laws in the US against mixed-race marriages. At the time nearly every Southern state still had such laws. The 9-0 decision was handed down on June 12th 1967 – 50 years ago this past Monday. June 12th is now known as Loving Day.

Blue states overturned their laws against mixed-race marriages between 1948 and 1967. Grey states had their laws overturned by Loving v Virginia.

 

In May 1958 in Central Point, Virginia, Richard Loving wanted to marry Mildred Jeter. But his birth certificate said he was “white”, hers said she was “coloured”. The Racial Integrity Act of 1924 outlawed such marriages. The law was passed in the name of eugenics, but there had been one law or another in Virginia preventing mixed-race marriages since 1691.

They drove a hundred miles to Washington, DC where they could get married if she put down her race as “Indian”. Although she identified as Black, she was Cherokee on her father’s side and Rappahannock on her mother’s. Like many in Central Point, she was likely triracial (Black, White, Native).

The Lovings’s marriage licence, 1958.

Two months later, back in Virginia, the police caught them in bed together at two in the morning, “cohabiting” “against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth” of Virginia. (The Lovings, who lived in a small town, had left the front door unlocked.) They were arrested and thrown in jail.

The sheriff later said:

“The Lord made sparrows and robins, not to mix with one another.”

The judge said:

“Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And, but for the interference with his arrangement, there would be no cause for such marriage. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.”

In 1959 he banished them from Virginia for 25 years.

In 1963 Mildred wrote to Robert Kennedy, asking him if the new civil rights bill then in Congress would let them return to Virginia. He said no, but sent her letter on to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in New York. They took the case.

In 1967 the case had reached all the way to the Supreme Court.

The state of Virginia argued:

“these statutes [against mixed-race marriage] serve a legitimate, legislative objective of preventing a sociological, psychological evils which attend interracial marriages […]

“Intermarried families are subjected to much greater pressures and problems than those of the intra-married and that the state’s prohibition of interracial marriage for this reason stands on the same footing as the prohibition of polygamous marriage, or incestuous marriage or the prescription of minimum ages at which people may marry and the prevention of the marriage of people who are mentally incompetent.”

To support its claim it cited the book “Intermarriage, Interfaith, Interracial, Inter-ethnic” (1964), by sociologist (and rabbi) Dr. Albert I. Gordon.

The ACLU argued that the Virginia law violated the Fourteenth Amendment of the US Constitution, a Reconstruction amendment that promised equal protection and due process of law for all people regardless of race.

Richard Loving argued: 

“Tell the court I love my wife.”

The Lovings being interviewed.

– Abagond, 2017.

Sources: Mainly NPR (2017), The Economist (2008), Black Past, Google Images.

See also:

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Posted in stuff | 28 Comments »

“Abagond used to be great” but has devolved

Sun 11 Jun 2017 by abagond

This has become a topic on the Latasha Harlins thread, but needs a thread of its own:

Kiwi said on bigWOWO on May 23rd 2017:

I agree that Abagond used to be great. That’s why I used to hang out so often on his blog. He was more balanced several years back but now he’s become little more than a self-interested extremist. He usually does a great job of sticking up for other people of color who are not Black but I’ve started to notice that maybe he’s just using them as his pawns. He supported SCA5 and attacked the protestors who called out the racial bias in Peter Liang’s indictment but he expects Asian support for Black Lives Matter to be a given. I can’t speak for King, but I suspect these kinds of things to be among the reasons he also left the blog.

I think the reason Asians tend not to be as politically vocal or active (insofar as that stereotype holds any truth) is not because Asians have smaller problems than other races (which is false, anyway) but because social justice activism is so heavily dominated by non-Asians that Asians constantly find themselves having to support other races while everyone else either ignores or attacks Asians.

King agreed and added:

Those were indeed the kind of reasons why I left.
But also things like

  1. Blacks can’t be racist because racism can only be defined as a huge social institution. If a Black man simply hates people just based on skin color, he is not a racist. I thoroughly reject this idea.
  2. A Stasi-like system of self-policing in which everyone’s credibility is constantly questioned if they disagree with the common assumptions of SJW worldview. Anyone can be a “traitor” if they start asking too many questions or have differing opinions.
  3. A long but steady reduction of voices with differing views, through scapegoating and broad-brushing and ridicule. One by one, voices of reason kept vanishing until it has become small group of people who all think very much alike, (save one or two polarizing gadflies.)
  4. Inconsistency: Like condemning statements like “Black people stink.” Yet defending statements like, “White people stink” by explaining that he didn’t say ALL White people!!!

Jefe on this blog, in answer to King’s comment:

I must admit that I found this blog much more rewarding 3-6 years ago. In the past few years it has devolved into more of the SJW dogpiling that they were referring to, or sometimes just drivel.

King’s point #1 — it became anathema to him and I more or less feel the same way. And I do remember when that surfaced prominently on this blog, he left soon after that. The result is a much higher concentration of audience that shares that opinion (and hence a noticeably poorer quality of posting and commentary).

Mary Burrell observes:

I have decided to just go into lurker mode and not comment sometimes I can’t read the comments on this forum has they have devolved into madness and trolling from certain posters. Especially during and after the elections. I miss the discourse from earlier years past.

If you want to comment on this privately, please email me at abagond at gmail.com. Thanks!

See also:

Posted in stuff | 269 Comments »

Ramses II

Fri 9 Jun 2017 by abagond

Ramses II (c. -1303 to -1213) was also known as Ramesses II, Ramses the Great or, as the Greeks called him, Ozymandias. He ruled Egypt from about -1279 to -1213. In our time he is the best known pharaoh after King Tut, who died some 20 years before Ramses was born.

Ramses is best known for:

  • Being the (probable) pharaoh of the Book of Exodus in the Bible.
  • Building more temples, obelisks and statues (of himself) than any other pharaoh – even if you do not count the stuff he put his name on built by other pharaohs.
  • The Battle of Kadesh (May -1274) with the Hittite Empire, the biggest chariot battle ever.
  • Being the pharaoh of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s poem “Ozymandias” (1818), famous for the ironic lines: “My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings / Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
  • Pi-Ramses, his new capital, becomes the largest city in the world in the -1100s. Probably what the Jews worked on.

Nefertari playing senet.

Main wives:

  1. Nefertari – his favourite (not to be confused with Nefertiti, King Tut’s stepmother)
  2. Isetnofret – mother of Merneptah, the next pharaoh (ruled -1213 to -1203)
  3. Bintanath – daughter
  4. Meryetamun – daughter
  5. Nebettawy
  6. Henutmire – sister
  7. Maathorneferure – Hittite princess
  8. ??? – Hittite princess

He also had a harem.

Empire: In his time the Egyptian Empire held sway over Nubia, Palestine and parts of Libya, Phoenicia and Syria. Nubia was the most important: it had gold, making Egypt the richest country in the world.

Ramses II at the Battle of Kadesh.

Battle of Kadesh: Kadesh was a huge fort in Syria that stood between the Egyptian and Hittite Empires. Ramses set out with four army divisions to take it. Along the way he met two Bedouins who told him the Hittite army was at Aleppo, 220 km north of Kadesh. Ramses rushed to get to Kadesh first, taking the Amun division, leaving the Re, Ptah and Seth divisions strung out behind him.

He arrived and set up camp. Suddenly men from the Re division were running for their lives through the camp. Most of the Amun division fled with them: right behind was the Hittite army! The Bedouins had lied: they were Hittite spies.

Ramses, with a fourth of his army wiped out, half of it hours away and much of the rest in flight, faced the Hittite army almost alone. He prayed to Amun and tried to hold them off. The Nearen from the nearby land of Amurru came up on the Hittites from behind. Together they held the field till the sun was setting and the golden standards of the Ptah division were seen glinting in the distance.

It is the first battle we have a description of. Many of Ramses’s temples tell of it. Schoolboys were made to write about it. Ramses boasted of it as a great victory – but from the Hittite account we can tell it was most likely a draw.

Famous buildings: Contrary to Shelley, much of what Ramses built still stands over 3,000 years later, stuff like the temples at Abu Simbel, the Ramesseum, and the tomb of his favourite, Nefertari, in the Valley of the Queens.

Temples at Abu Simbel in what was then Nubia, now in Egypt near the Sudan border.

Ramesseum near Thebes (now Luxor, Egypt).

Tomb of Nefertari in the Valley of the Queens, near Thebes (now Luxor, Egypt).

– Abagond, 2017.

Sources: mainly “Temples, Tombs & Hieroglyphs” (2007) by Barbara Mertz; “Chronicles of the Pharaohs” (1994) by Peter A. Clayton; “General History of Africa II” (1990, abrdiged) by UNESCO. 

See also:

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