Parable of I Am Oscar Grant

Thursday, July 8, 2010

Parableof I Am Oscar Grant




Parable of IAm Oscar Grant
The verdict was announced at 4pm.Guilty of involuntary manslaughter. With a gun enhancement, it carriesfive to fourteen years. City officials blocked the organizer's of thepeople's rally from using Frank Ogawa Plaza in front of city hall. They"staged" a rally of their own that was scarcely attended. The people'srally set up in the middle of the street at 14th andBroadway, the crossroads of Oakland, also site of Plato Negro's Academyof DaCorner. After blocking buses and cars for a short time, the organizerswere convinced to move to the northwest corner of 14th andBroadway.
But soon 14th and Broadway was overflowing withpeople, including an abundance of media vans, videographersand photographers.

The MC stressed the rally would focus on youthexpressions, later adults were allowed. Anyone could speak. It was avery democratic rally. It is amazing to see people's democracy inaction, especially when black bourgeoisie democracy is so pitiful.Again, it was very shameful of Mayor Dellums to not allow the citizens ofOakland to rally at Frank Ogawa Plaza. We remember Frank Ogawa and hewas one of the very best Oakland City Councilmen. We know he is turningover in his grave at the disrespect shown Oakland citizens by the Dellumsadministration. We heard the Mayors remarks at his press conference,speaking of abstract notions of globalism, yet he cannot connect what isbeing offered youth in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen, as asolution to problems in America in general and Oakland in particular.When media persons interviewed me, I basically said the following: theyouth of Oakland want justice, nothing more, nothing less. And don'ttell me they cannot receive it when America can find the way to offereducation, housing and jobs to insurgents and "terrorists" in Iraq,Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen. They talk of setting up judicialsystems in these lands but cannot convict a cold blooded murderer inAmerica.


The young people expressed their grief and trauma atthe light sentence given to former BART police officer Johannes Mehserle. Theyexpressed no fear of the "bitch" police. Indeed, several youth whotook the mike are students from Academy of Da Corner.Former City Councilman Wilson Riles, Jr. begged me to take the mike butI declined.

Imagine, the major growth industry in California isthe Department of Corrections that mainly incarcerates young black andLatino men. As one youth said at the rally, the prison system ismurder, for it castrates youth and families, yet most of theincarcerated are there for petty crimes or crimes for which no properwhite man would be jailed with legal representation, additionally theysuffer lack of education, drug abuse and mental illness. Oscar Grantsenior is incarcerated, his son escaped only to fall victim to thepolice.

After talking with his aunt Fatty, we learned OscarGrant, Jr. was no angel, but was working as a butcher and raising hisdaughter, thus he was trying to do the right thing but was murdered incold blood by a beast in blue uniform.

It is no comfort he wasnot killed by another black man. Several youth spoke at the rally onthe theme of black love and unity. I told media persons interviewing methat in the crowd and in our community are persons and families whoseslain sons and daughters get no mention in the media, their killingsnever solved, so families suffer in silence and bitterness, becausetheir is no rally for them, no trial, no homicide solved, nothing.There is nowhere for them to assuage their trauma and unresolved grief.

AsI walked the crowd with a brother, he wondered whether anything wasgoing to happen. I told him just wait til dark. And so it was, althoughI departed the area before dark, passing police amassed on the backstreets.

There was looting and arrests. Massive police presencein the downtown areas, police from all the outlying areas, including CHP, Fremont,Berkeley, Richmond. The Footlocker was looted, obviously people neededshoes!

The anarchists were there dressed in black. Now weheard the anarchists at the G-20 meeting in Toronto, Canada were agentprovocateurs. Unless the police justify need, 80 OPD will belaid off Monday, so we suspect they are part of the problem. Again, theyouth said at the rally that the police are the outside agitators.

Ialso told those who interviewed me that Oscar Grant received justicewhen LovelleMixsonkilled four police shortly after they murdered Oscar, thus he executedpeople's justice. And Dr. Fritz Pointer said it best, "When Lovelle Mixson tookout those four pigs, the masses enjoyed an 'obscene pride' after yearsof abuse under the color of law."

Personally, I abhor violence. Ido not kill a fly in my house, nor a spider, a gnat. But there comes atime when human beings must stand and represent their humanity. Wecannot be consumed by wild beasts. You want to hear Oscar's mother afterthe verdict, "My son was murdered, murdered, murdered!"

Yes, Iam Oscar Grant. He is my son lost to self inflicted violence. He is myson caught between the police and his own black brothers. He is my sonkilled but never reported in the papers, never in the media, never inthe court, a son silent in the night. I am Oscar Grant.

I wantjustice. I want education, not incarceration. I want employment with aliving wage. I want housing fit for human beings. I am Oscar Grant.
--MarvinX
7/8/10
www.parablesandfablesofmarvinx.blogspot
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  • South
    We are all Oscar Grant. Anytime, we can be victimized by the poice. Folks think it won't happen to them. It can and it will. I am now profiled at SFO Airport and am pulled aside by security every single time I fly out of that airport. It does not matter which terminal and airlines as the profiling goes across the board. I do smoke a legal herb: damiana. I do not dare to pack it because I can imagine how it can be made to look like marijuana if my checked luggage is inspected. Customs has a back room full of confiscated weed. They just got to put it in my bag and off to jail I go. If people are not outraged, they are not paying attention.
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