<![CDATA[Assata Shakur Speaks - Hands Off Assata - Let's Get Free - Revolutionary - Pan-Africanism - Black On Purpose - Liberation - Forum - Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV]]> http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/ Discussions about entertainment that raises the consciousness of the People. en Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:07:46 GMT vBulletin 60 http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/images/misc_2/rss.jpg <![CDATA[Assata Shakur Speaks - Hands Off Assata - Let's Get Free - Revolutionary - Pan-Africanism - Black On Purpose - Liberation - Forum - Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV]]> http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/ Sabir Bey: Civil Alert Radio http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40414-sabir-bey-civil-alert-radio.html Wed, 18 Nov 2009 01:15:53 GMT *Biography* SABIR BEY is the founder and host of the groundbreaking and revolutionary CIVIL ALERT Talk Radio Show. CIVIL ALERT is an open informational forum that is designed to bring critical awareness of the science of CIVICS to the community at large. Having an extensive background in... Biography

SABIR BEY is the founder and host of the groundbreaking and revolutionary CIVIL ALERT Talk Radio Show. CIVIL ALERT is an open informational forum that is designed to bring critical awareness of the science of CIVICS to the community at large.

Having an extensive background in constitutional law, history, and health, Sabir has conducted years of research that has yielded an impressive array of lectures and workshops. Brother Sabir is a master communicator, having presented at various universities, schools, and community centers. He is also an avid fitness trainer and nutritionist. Sabir promotes various holistic health practices and is soon to release a workout DVD. Sabir Bey has lectured with and been seen in the company of such luminaries and artists as KRS One, Afrika Bambatta, James Ingram, Mos Def, Wise Intelligent, Professor Griff, and R Kelly.

Sabir has given lectures at the University of D.C., Long Island University and at the Philadelphia International Locs Conference. He produces the incredible and extremely informative CIVIL ALERT Newspaper. His DVD series consists of 29 exciting lectures, filmed at various locations from Detroit to New Jersey, from Washington D.C. to New York, including the widely popular Critical Thinking presentation filmed in Chicago. Sabir is currently head researcher of the upcoming Stop The Violence Movement featuring KRS One. Sabir is also putting the finishing touches on his debt book, "The Principles of Civics", due out in 2009.

Sabir has been featured on various radio shows including Harambee Radio with Dr. Akosua Ali Sabree in Philadelphia, Street 96 with Michael Shawn in New Jersey, 106.5 the Beat in Virginia, on the Wisdom of the Moors radio show in Memphis Tennessee. Bey currently co-host Insomnia Session with No-Daze on WKDU 98.7 in Philadelphia and CIVIL ALERT on WNJC 1360 AM out of New Jersey.





Your Moorish American Nationality and Identification CARD Is FREE
As Free As The Free National Name You Inherited From Your Forefathers.


CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD


WARNING: THIS ID IS NOT A NGO "MEMBERSHIP CARD"

The Holy Prophet Drew Ali Warned The Moorish Americans to:
"Stop Flashing Your Cards
At The European Corporate Agencies. It Causes Confusion!!!"
Dear Moorish Americans;
Please be advised and finally adhere to Drew Ali's Divine Warnings. This "Nationality and Identification Card" is not an authorization to criminal activities, instant individual sovereigity, a Right-To-Travel nor membership to a Religious, Cult or otherwise Non-Governmental Organization. When anyone violates the infrastucture and laws of another person's domicile, territory or government ... he or she has instantly given the owner jurisdiction over them. Proclaiming your proper idenity. It is a part of nature to rejoice at the deliverence from captivity into freedom. True Happiness rest upon contentment. The Moorish Americans are among the last nation on earth to recall the descent nature of their ancient forefathers. All other nationals are educated to their origin through their parents seasoning their minds with the maxiums of truth. The Moorish are yet to be taught how to serve under the powers of their own national government.

NEVER TAKE YOUR FREE NATIONAL STANDARDS, PRINCIPLES, ID CARDS AND AFFAIRS INTO THE EUROPEAN COURTS. Beware of all "COPYRIGHTS, AFFIDAVITS, CONTRACTS and NOTORIZATIONING of your FREE NATIONAL NAME, ID or anything that represents your freedom. Remember it has been about 145 years (1865) since and the Congessional Lease has been removed from the necks of the Moorish. Since then, especially after the ordaination of Noble Drew Ali, the Moorish has done everything possible to not be a free people. Still, it is a well beaten dog that expects respect from the same master who opened the gates. "YOUR CARD IS FOR YOUR SALVATION." Honor it, learn to use it with wisdom and Understand How Your Card Has The Power To Protect You as You.

Noble Drew Ali never once "NATIONALIZED" a member into His Organization. Why? Because only sovereign powers and Governments has the power to nationalize Banks, Organizations, the Land, Air and Waterways (L.A.W.), with its inhabitants, within its jurisdictions.
Warning to the Moorish: It is A Crime, criminal and just plain evil for any person or manmade Business to "Nationalize" any member of the Human Family, be it Man, Woman or Child.
Why Free? Because Nationality is Free, all Over The World!
The Moorish must relearn the value of Freedom. And Learn The Powers of Recieving Worldwide recognition (Passports, Visa, Birth Certifcates, Citizen ID etc) From only Your NATIONAL IDENTIFICATION CARD; Without The Support of Federal and US State De Facto Identifications.


Your ID Card Is Exclusively For Denationalized
MOORISH AMERICAN NATIONALS
and The Officials of Their Government


continued...
http://www.sevensealspublications.com/1364128.html




Peace be upon you

Sabir Bey: Civil Alert World
http://www.moorsgate.com/category/news/
http://www.sevensealspublications.com/

Moorish Holy Temple of Science (California)
Moorish Science Temple (Texas)
Moorish Science Temple (South Carolina)
Moorish Science Temple (Baltimore)
The League of Moorish and Indigenous Nations
Amexem Moor Empire (Brief Appearance)
United Nation of Islam (Kansas City) ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40414-sabir-bey-civil-alert-radio.html <![CDATA[Michael Jackson's "This is It" full video]]> http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40402-michael-jacksons-full-video.html Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:11:07 GMT Movies - Documentary - This Is It (2009) | WatchXOnline.com (http://watchxonline.com/media/7005-this-is-it-2009.php) *The Mirena IUD, Plan B, and oral contraceptive pills are **Organophosphate* (http://www.assatashakur.org/wiki/Organophosphate)* pesticides created as a Nerve Agent... Movies - Documentary - This Is It (2009) | WatchXOnline.com





The Mirena IUD, Plan B, and oral contraceptive pills are Organophosphate pesticides created as a Nerve Agent by IG Farben (Bayer AG, Hoechst, and there subsidiary's).



Pesticide


Many studies have indicated that pesticide exposure is associated with long-term health problems such as respiratory problems, memory disorders, dermatologic conditions,[41][42] cancer,[43] depression,[44] neurological deficits,[45][46] miscarriages, and birth defects.[ Summaries of peer-reviewed research *(listed below) have examined the link between pesticide exposure and neurologic outcomes and cancer, perhaps the two most significant things resulting in organophosphate-exposed workers.[57][58]



California Prop.65




The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65) provides two mechanisms for administratively listing chemicals which are known to the State to cause cancer or reproductive toxicity [Health and Safety Code Section 25249.8(b)]. One mechanism by which a chemical is listed is if a body considered to be authoritative by the state’s qualified experts has formally identified it as causing cancer or reproductive toxicity. The following have been identified as authoritative bodies for purposes of the Act:
  • the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA),
  • the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC),
  • the National Toxicology Program (NTP),
  • the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
  • ,and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
According to researchers from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), licensed pesticide applicators who used chlorinated pesticides on more than 100 days in their lifetime were at greater risk of diabetes. One study found that associations between specific pesticides and incident diabetes ranged from a 20 percent to a 200 percent increase in risk. New cases of diabetes were reported by 3.4 percent of those in the lowest pesticide use category compared with 4.6 percent of those in the highest category. Risks were greater when users of specific pesticides were compared with applicators who never applied that chemical.[59][60]




*Here's an Updated list of Chemical Pesticides:

*Misoprostol has been added unto the list w/ Levonorgestrel,
(Levonorgestrel serves both as an implant *IUD contraceptive and over the counter abortion pill).
http://www.oehha.ca.gov/prop65/prop6...ngle091009.pdf





Organophosphates as nerve agents

History of nerve agents

Early pioneers in the field include Jean Louis Lassaigne (early 1800s) and Philip de Clermount (1854). In 1932, German chemist Willy Lange and his graduate student, Gerde von Krueger, first described the cholinergic nervous system effects of organophosphates, noting a choking sensation and a dimming of vision after exposure. This discovery later inspired German chemist Gerhard Schrader at company IG Farben in the 1930s to experiment with these compounds as insecticides. Their potential use as chemical warfare agents soon became apparent, and the Nazi government put Schrader in charge of developing organophosphate (in the broader sense of the word) Nerve gases. :cone:



Organophosphate pesticides (as well as sarin and VX nerve agent) irreversibly inactivate acetylcholinesterase, which is essential to nerve function in insects, humans, and many other animals. Organophosphate pesticides affect this enzyme in varied ways, and thus in their potential for poisoning. For instance, parathion, one of the first OPs commercialized, is many times more potent than malathion, an insecticide used in combatting the Mediterranean fruit fly (Med-fly) and West Nile Virus-transmitting mosquitoes.


Organophosphate poisoning

Many organophosphates are potent nerve agents, functioning by inhibiting the action of acetylcholinesterase (AChE) in nerve cells. They are one of the most common causes of poisoning worldwide, and are frequently intentionally used in suicides in agricultural areas. Their toxicity is not limited to the acute phase, however, and chronic effects have long been noted. Neurotransmitters such as acetylcholine (which is affected by organophosphate pesticides) are profoundly important in the brain's development, and many OPs have neurotoxic effects on developing organisms, even from low levels of exposure.





Signs of organophosphate poisoning include: the signs and symptoms of onset of organophosphorous poisoning: At first:
  • Person feels sick
  • Complains of headache
  • General weakness or tiredness
Then
  • Person begins to sweat and salivate, may vomit and have diarrhea
  • Complains of stomach cramps
  • Pupils (of the eyes) become very small
  • Person may mention blurred vision
  • Muscles twitch and hands shake
  • Breathing becomes bubbly
  • Person has a fit and becomes unconscious
Malathion

Malathion spraying for Mosquitos in Winnipeg video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fSsnpfFuy4&feature=related

(*Clearly they have their windows up while they are spraying poisons on people!)


Spraying Malathion without written public notice, health concerns, or side effects

Dr. Leonard G. Horowitz, says "Spraying malathion, a suspected human chemical carcinogen and known immune system blocker, or its alternate, Anvil 10:10, violates a basic tenant of public health practice that requires foreknowledge of the risks and proven benefits of the policy before it is implemented, he says."




Two Brooklynites were among a large group
playing basketball when spray truck sprayed toxic Melathion
pesticides on them without warning, between
4th and 5th Avenues in Sunset Park.

Malathion, itself, is of low toxicity; however, absorption or ingestion into the human body readily results in its metabolism to malaoxon, which is substantially more toxic.

Malaoxon is a breakdown product of malathion. It is more toxic than malathion.

Health Hazard

Symptoms of exposure to this type of compound include cholinesterase inhibition, miosis, frontal headache, increased bronchial secretion, nausea, vomiting, sweating, abdominal cramps, diarrhea, lacrimation, increased salivation, bradycardia, cyanosis and muscular twitching of the eyelids, tongue, face and neck, possibly progressing to convulsions. Other symptoms include hyperemia of the conjunctiva, dimness of vision, rhinorrhea, bronchoconstriction, cough, fasciculation, anorexia, incontinence, eye changes, weakness, dyspnea, bronchospasm, hypotension or hypertension due to asphyxia, restlessness, anxiety, dizziness, drowsiness, tremor, ataxia, depression, confusion, neuropathy (rare), coma and death from depression of respiratory or cardiovascular systems. Exposure to this type of compound may result in giddiness, nervousness, blurred vision, discomfort (tightness) in chest, papilledema, muscular weakness, loss of reflexes, loss of sphincter control, cardiac arrhythmias, various degrees of heart block and cardiac arrest. It may also result in spasm of accommodation, aching pain in and about the eye, nystagmus, delayed distal axonopathy and parethesias and paralysis of limbs. A decrease in blood pressure may occur. Respiratory failure may also occur.



continued...~

Schrader's laboratory discovered the G series of weapons, which included Sarin, Tabun, and Soman. The Nazis produced large quantities of these compounds, though did not use them during World War II. British scientists experimented with a cholinergic organophosphate of their own, called diisopropylfluorophosphate (DFP), during the war. The British later produced VX nerve agent, which was many times more potent than the G series, in the early 1950s.


After World War II, American companies gained access to some information from Schrader's laboratory, and began synthesizing organophosphate pesticides in large quantities. Parathion was among the first marketed, followed by malathion and azinphosmethyl. The popularity of these insecticides increased after many of the organochlorine insecticides like DDT, dieldrin, and heptachlor were banned in the 1970s . *see video above


Zyklon B

Zyklon B (*now manufactured under Acrylonitrile and Uragan D2) was under license from patentholder IG Farben. The trade name of a cyanide-based pesticide infamous for its use by Nazi Germany against human beings in gas chambers of extermination camps during the Holocaust. In early 1942, Zyklon B had been selected by the Nazi Regime as the preferred extermination tool for both the Auschwitz-Birkenau and Majdanekextermination camps during the Holocaust. The chemical insecticide claimed the lives of roughly 1.2 million people in these camps

It consisted of hydrogen cyanide (prussic acid, Blausäure in German, hence B[1]), a stabilizer, and a warning odorant that was impregnated onto various substrates, typically small absorbent pellets, fibre discs, or diatomaceous earth. Zyklon B was stored in airtight containers; when exposed to air, the material released gaseoushydrogen cyanide (HCN).

Hydrogen cyanide forms in at least limited amounts from many combinations of hydrogen, carbon, and ammonia. Hydrogen cyanide is currently produced in great quantities by several processes, as well as being a recovered waste product from the manufacture of acrylonitrile.



RU -486 Mifepristone *Abortion pill

Rousell Uclaff is a division of Hoechst AG, a large worldwide chemical corporation that was founded in 1863 in Germany. This small company with, only 5 employees, manufactured chemical dyes. In 1925, several German chemical companies merged into a single corporation with the name IG Farbenindustrie, Inc. (IG Farben) World War I created a demand for chemical products. After WWI, the devastated German government gave IG full government support by eliminating taxes and loaning the company funds.


In 1945 the German army surrendered to the allied powers ending World War 2 in Europe. WWII left Germany humiliated and economically devastated. The Nuremberg trials were conducted to punish those who had committed claimed the lives of roughly 1.2 million people in extermination camps.

I.G. Farben, the corporation that provided the German army with the gas Zyklon B was found guilty of war crimes. The International Military Tribunal ordered the corporation to disband. The result of the disbanding of I.G. Farben was the creation of several smaller corporations. One of these corporations called Hoechst AG grew to become a prosperous company with many subsidiaries. Hoechst AG did not die like the court had intended.

In 1980 a group of French scientists accidentally synthesized a molecule that chemically resembles the hormone progesterone. This molecule has a unique ability to bond the progesterone receptor cells and block their normal activity. The result of the molecule's activity is to block the hormone progesterone, vital to maintaining a pregnancy. The Drug was not invented with the goal of terminating pregnancy, however by the time it was synthesized there was the demand for a new and simplified abortion technique.

The drug first entered the spotlight in 1982 and the controversy erupted shortly after. In 1988 the after extensive testing the French government accepted Mifepristone for public use. The drug is now commonly known as RU 486, the name assigned by the inventor Rousell-Uclaf, a division of the chemical company Hoechst AG. The drug was removed from circulation in France only a month after it was released for public use. The drug was removed by Rousell's CEO Wolfgang Hilger; a devout Catholic after Rousell Uclaf was flooded with letters from outraged Roman Catholic doctors, and after Church-sponsored protests marched through the streets of Paris.


Here's it's New name Levonorgestrel:

Plan B/ Levonorgestrel, How It Works, CNN Sanjay Gupta
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWcilwvrzxE
also a known Toxic Pesticide.

What's odd is that, Barr Pharmaceuticals, manufacuturer of Plan B is a division of:

Teva Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (Hebrew: טבע תעשיות פרמצבטיות בע"מ‎), NASDAQ: TEVA is an international pharmaceutical company headquartered in Petah Tikva, Israel. It specializes in generic and proprietary pharmaceuticals and active pharmaceutical ingredients. It is the largest generic drug manufacturer in the world and one of the 20 largest pharmaceutical companies worldwide.[1] In 2008, its sales totaled $11.08 billion, of which a major portion was in Europe and North America. After its acquisition of U.S. rival Ivax Corporation in January 2006, the company has about 28,000 employees in 50 countries. Teva's facilities are located in Israel, North America, Europe, and Latin America. Teva is now the tenth largest company by market capitalization on the Nasdaq just behind Gilead (feb 2009), and is a member of both the NASDAQ-100 and TA-25 Index (in which it represents 9.5% of the total Index value).



Israel also has a pronatalist policy for its Jewish population, and actively encourages Jewish women to have many children. This policy, however, does not extend to Israel's Arab citizens, who, representing 20 percent of Israel's population, have a higher birth rate and a younger median age than do Israeli Jews. Assisted conception and infertility treatments in Israel are the most advanced in the region, and state subsidies render these services affordable for all Israeli citizens, Arabs and Jews alike.




Fritz Haber
"Father of Chemical Warfare"



Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1918 for his development for synthesizing ammonia important for fertilizers and explosives. Then, Director of Berlin-Dahlem, and supervisor of "Zyklon B"; preferred "extermination tool" for Khazarian Jews, Catholics, African-Germans, ethnic Poles, the Romani, Soviet civilians, Soviet prisoners of war, people with disabilities, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, and other political and religious opponents




(9 December 1868 – 29 January 1934)


Jewish Chemist





wow...This is the Chicken coming home to roost.:raind:




List of Nerve agent Pesticides:

Mandatory Sterilization for Black Youth
Holocaust - Mandatory Sterilization by the Nazis

Spraying Malathion without written public notice, health concerns, or side effects.
Spraying Malathion without written public notice, health concerns, or side effects.

This Truck Came By My House Last Night Spraying Chemicals While I Was Outside!
http://blogs.myspace.com/index.cfm?f...ogId=499480671

Combined oral contraceptive pill contains
Levonorgestrel
Combined oral contraceptive pill - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Zyklon B
Zyklon B - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bayer, Hoechst AG, IG Farben and Nazi Germany [and RU-486 Abortions pill]
By Matt Burg

Bayer, Hoechst AG, IG Farben and Nazi Germany [and Abortions ]

The Pesticide Chemical Search and type in: Levonorgestrel
http://www.pesticideinfo.org/Search_Chemicals.jsp
http://www.oehha.ca.gov/prop65/CRNR_.../noil1297.html

Mifepristone known as RU-486
Mifepristone - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hydrogen cyanide (Uragan D2)
Google Translate


Misoprostol
Misoprostol - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

type in: Acrylonitrile
PAN Pesticides Database: Chemical Active Ingredient Search

Pesticide and Organophosphate
Pesticide - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Organophosphate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Fritz Haber
Fritz Haber - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Israel also has a pronatalist policy for its Jewish population
birth control: West's Encyclopedia of American Law (Full Article) from Answers.com

Mirena Side Effects Support Forum
Mirena Side Effects Support Forum, Page 125, Mirena IUD Adverse Reactions Reporting Forum, Birth Control, Support, Levonorgestrel IUD Side Effects:



IUD contraceptives are Toxic Pesticides! *Levonorgestrel in IUD is Toxic Pesticide!

The intrauterine system (IUS) is a long acting reversible hormonal contraceptive device that is placed in the uterus. An IUS has a hormone cylinder that releases a progestin (progestogen) called levonorgestrel. The only brand currently available is the T-frame LNG-20 IUS, marketed as Mirena Coil by * Schering Health and * Berlex Laboratories (*Bayer).

The term IUS is used in the United Kingdom to distinguish the hormonal intrauterine contraceptive from copper-based intrauterine devices (IUDs). In the United States, all intrauterine contraceptives are referred to with the term IUD.[1]

Progestasert was the first hormonal uterine device, developed in 1976 and manufactured until 2001. It released progesterone, was replaced annually, and had a failure rate of 2% per year.

As of 2007, the LNG-20 IUS - marketed as Mirena by Bayer - is the only IntraUterine System available. First introduced in 1990, it releases levonorgestrel (a progestogen) and may be used for five years



Norgestrel


Norgestrel is a progestin used in hormonal contraceptives. Norgestrel is a mixture of two stereoisomers, dextro-norgestrel (CAS# 797-64-8) and levo-norgestrel (CAS# 797-63-7). Only levonorgestrel is biologically active. Therefore, while some medications may contain dextronorgestrel, they are often labeled in terms of their levonorgestrel content only, ignoring the inert isomer.




Mechanisms of contraception
The Mirena (*IUD) is intended to initially release a daily dose of 20 micrograms levonorgestrel (a progestin).



PAN Pesticides Database search:- Chemicals
Proposition 65 - Notices of Intent to List

B. The following chemicals have been determined by OEHHA to meet the criteria set forth in 22 CCR, Section 12902 for listing based on a formal requirement for labeling or identification as causing reproductive toxicity:

Toxicological Endpoints: female reproductive toxicity


Levonorgestrel implants identified as the "most toxic" of a set of pesticides

Notice to Interested Parties
Notice of Intent to List Chemicals: 31 Chemicals
[12/05/97]

also try:
The Pesticide Chemical Search and type in: Levonorgestrel
PAN Pesticides Database: Chemical Active Ingredient Search
Proposition 65 - NOIL



Norgestrel Indicates high toxicity in the given toxicological category

Developmental or
Reproductive Toxin

PAN Bad Actor
Chemical 1








































Reproductive or developmental toxicants, as designated by the state of California's Proposition 65 list.
Reproductive and developmental toxicity

Some pesticides are known to cause birth defects or interfere with normal development. Weight-of-the-evidence evaluations of this type of toxicity have been conducted by the State of California and by the U.S. EPA under its Toxics Release Inventory program.

Many pesticides that disrupt endocrine functions also cause reproductive and developmental harm, as well as other adverse effects.

California Proposition 65 List


Pesticides determined by the state of California to cause reproductive and developmental harm, e.g., birth defects, infertility, sterility and impairment of normal growth and development. A list of chemicals "known to the State to cause reproductive and developmental toxicity" is maintained by the State of California under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65).


Norgestrel/ Bayer...~IG Farben


Peace be upon you


Mirena Side Effects

Warning!!! Below is photo of Mirena that perforated Uterus

Mirena Side Effects

Mirena IUD Side Effects




CureZone.com Educating Instead of Medicating: IUD *Minera forum
Re: Mirena IUD Side Effects at Mirena Side Effects Support



Norgestrel - toxicity, ecological toxicity and regulatory information

Intrauterine device - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Levonorgestrel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Norgestrel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is actually used as a pesticide. And is it considered a pesticide based on other criteria.
















The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Proposition 65) provides two mechanisms for administratively listing chemicals which are known to the State to cause cancer or reproductive toxicity [Health and Safety Code Section 25249.8(b)]. One mechanism by which a chemical is listed is if a body considered to be authoritative by the state’s qualified experts has formally identified it as causing cancer or reproductive toxicity. The following have been identified as authoritative bodies for purposes of the Act:
  • the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA),
  • the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC),
  • the National Toxicology Program (NTP),
  • the United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA)
  • ,and the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH).
The criteria for listing chemicals through the authoritative bodies mechanism are set forth in Title 22, California Code of Regulations (22 CCR),Section 12306.

The Act also provides another mechanism for the administrative listing of a chemical, that is if a state or federal agency has formally required that the chemical be labeled or identified as causing cancer or reproductive toxicity. The criteria for listing chemicals through this mechanism are set forth in 22 CCR, Section 12902.

Reproductive and developmental toxicity are known to cause birth defects or interfere with normal development. Weight-of-the-evidence evaluations of this type of toxicity have been conducted by the State of California and by the U.S. EPA under its Toxics Release Inventory program.
here is Prop 65's website:
Proposition 65 - NOIL

B. The following chemicals have been determined by OEHHA to meet the criteria set forth in 22 CCR, Section 12902 for listing based on a formal requirement for labeling or identification as causing reproductive toxicity:












ChemicalCAS No.Toxicological EndpointsReferences
Amoxapine14028-44-5developmental toxicityFDA (1988a)
Beclomethasone dipropionate5534-09-8developmental toxicityFDA (1988b)
Clobetasol propionate25122-46-7developmental toxicity female reproductive toxicityFDA (1995a)
Codeine phosphate52-28-8developmental toxicityFDA (1989)
Flunisolide3385-03-3developmental toxicity female reproductive toxicityFDA (1984)
Fluticasone propionate80474-14-2developmental toxicityFDA (1995b)
Histrelin acetate---developmental toxicityFDA (1991)
Levonorgestrel implants797-63-7female reproductive toxicityFDA (1995c)

Pesticide Action Network (PAN) Bad Actor Pesticides

In order to identify a "most toxic" set of pesticides,Pesticide Action Network (PAN) and Californians for Pesticide Reform (CPR) created the term PAN Bad Actor pesticides. These pesticides are at least one of the following:



I hope this helps...~

Peace be upon you



































]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40402-michael-jacksons-full-video.html ‘Operation Small Axe’ trailer http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40373-operation-small-axe-trailer.html Thu, 12 Nov 2009 22:30:58 GMT Operation Small Axe” takes a raw and unflinching look at life under police terrorism in Oakland, drawing parallels with the struggles against oppression in Palestine and South Africa. Through the stories of Oscar Grant and Lovelle Mixon, the film focuses on the occupation of Oakland’s communities... Operation Small Axe” takes a raw and unflinching look at life under police terrorism in Oakland, drawing parallels with the struggles against oppression in Palestine and South Africa. Through the stories of Oscar Grant and Lovelle Mixon, the film focuses on the occupation of Oakland’s communities of color by militarized and racist police forces.

Oscar Grant was shot in the back and killed by Bay Area Rapid Transit police officer Johannes Mehserle on Jan. 1 of this year. On March 21, Lovelle Mixon was killed by Oakland police after having allegedly shot five OPD officers, killing four.

The film, now debuting to rave reviews around the Bay Area, is directed and produced by 393 Films’ Adimu Madyun, edited by Angela N. Carroll, with camera work by Hooker Boy, Angela N. Carroll, Siraj Fowler and Adimu Madyun. Prisoners of Conscience Committee Minister of Information JR is the executive producer.

Watch this “Operation Small Axe” trailer for a taste of the bitter but little known war waged daily on the streets of Black and Brown Oakland by the police against the people. Now that the judge has ordered the murder trial moved out of Oakland of the cop who killed Oscar Grant in cold blood two hours into the 2009 New Year on a BART platform in front of hundreds of horrified passengers, this film will inform all Californians why justice for Oscar Grant is imperative.

Arrange for “Operation Small Axe” to be shown in your community by contacting Minister of Information JR at blockreportradio@gmail.com or calling the SF Bay View, where JR is associate editor, at (415) 671-0789

]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Moorbey http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40373-operation-small-axe-trailer.html NO SHOT! SICK SINCE H1N1 Swine Flu Vaccination! SAY NO!!! http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40364-no-shot-sick-since-h1n1-swine-flu-vaccination-say-no.html Thu, 12 Nov 2009 01:41:30 GMT
*Flumist is a Biological weapon! Crosses Blood...]]>
sickn7
October 31, 2009
(more info)






Flumist is a Biological weapon! Crosses Blood Brain Barrier and destoys your cells!


"...Overcoming the difficulty of delivering therapeutic agents to specific regions of the brain presents a major challenge". Blood-brain barrier - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia





*H1N1 Flumist has overcome this obstacle as the "weapon of choice".

The blood-brain barrier (BBB) is a separation of circulatingblood and cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) maintained by the choroid plexus in the central nervous system (CNS). Endothelial cells restrict the diffusion of microscopic objects (e.g. bacteria) and large or hydrophilic molecules into the CSF, while allowing the diffusion of small hydrophobic molecules (O2, hormones, CO2). Cells of the barrier actively transport metabolic products such as glucose across the barrier with specific proteins.

Pathophysiology

The blood-brain barrier acts very effectively to protect the brain from many common bacterial infections.

Thus, infections of the brain are very rare. However, since antibodies are too large to cross the blood-brain barrier, infections of the brain that do occur are often very serious and difficult to treat.

The blood brain barrier becomes more permeable during inflammation however, meaning some antibiotics can get across.

Viruses easily bypass the blood-brain barrier by attaching themselves to circulating immune cells.

*The H1N1 contains a live virus which attaches itself to circulating immune cells throughout the mucusa membrane using the flu mist.
:shoking:

Transport mechanism *Flumist and injection


Mechanisms for drug targeting in the brain involve going either "through" or "behind" the BBB. One such strategy to go through the BBB may entail the use of endogenous transport systems, including carrier-mediated transporters such as glucose and amino acid carriers, receptor-mediated transcytosis for insulin or transferrin.

Transferrin is a blood plasmaprotein for iron ion delivery.When a transferrin protein loaded with iron encounters a transferrin receptor on the surface of a cell (e.g., to erythroid precursors in :| the bone marrow), it binds to it and, as a consequence, is transported into the cell in a vesicle.



*That's how viruses, and (mercury)
"Thiomersal" breaks down the cells.


When it comes into contact with a host cell, a virus can insert its genetic material into its host, literally taking over the host's functions. An infected cell produces more viral protein and genetic material instead of its usual products. Some viruses may remain dormant inside host cells for long periods, causing no obvious change in their host cells (a stage known as the lysogenic phase). But when a dormant virus is stimulated, it enters the lytic phase: new viruses are formed, self-assemble, and burst out of the host cell, killing the cell and going on to infect other cells. The diagram below at right shows a virus that attacks bacteria, known as the lambda bacteriophage, which measures roughly 200 nanometers.



Figure 5. Bacteriophage binding to and injecting their DNA into a bacterial cell.









Remember Tuskegee

As a doctor explained, “If the colored population becomes aware that accepting free hospital care means a post-mortem, every darky will leave Macon County...” Even the Surgeon General of the United States participated in enticing the men to remain in the experiment, sending them certificates of appreciation after 25 years in the study. Even when penicillin —the first real cure for syphilis— was discovered in the 1940s, the Tuskegee men were deliberately denied the medication.




Dr. J.W. Williams, who was serving his intership at Adrews Hospital at the Tuskegee Ins. in 1932 and assisted in the experiment's clinical work, stated that "neither the interns nor the subjects knew what the study involved." "The people who came in were not told what was being done," Dr. Williams said, " We told them we wanted to test them. They were not told, so far as I know, what they were being treated for or what they were not being treated for." As far as he could tell, the subjects "thought they were being treated for rheumatism or bad stomachs." He did recall administering to the men what he thought were drugs to combat syphilis, and yet he thought back the matter, Dr. Williams conjectured that " some may have been a placebo." He was absoluetly certain of one point: "We didn't tell them we were looking for syphilis. I don't think they would have known what that was." (Jones p.5)


Charles Pollard recalls saying recieving a free examination and being told he had "bad blood" and that the physicians never mentioned syphilis to me, not even once. He thought he had been recieving treatment for "bad blood" since the first meeting. "They been doctoring me off and on ever since then, and they gave me blood tonic. (*At this time in the early 1930's treatment consisted of mercury (*thiomersal) and two arsenic compounds called arsphenamine and neoarsphenamine, known aslo by their generic name, salvarsan). (Jones pg. 5/6)


Thiomersal is very toxic by inhalation *(as seen from above), ingestion, and in contact with skin (* injections) (EC hazard symbol T+), with a danger of cumulative effects. When applied to human nerve cells it changes cell membrane permeability and induces programmed cell death. In the body, it is metabolized or degraded to ethylmercury (C2H5Hg+) and thiosalicylate.[2]


Immune system

Transferrin is also associated with the innate immune system. Transferrin is found in the mucosa and binds iron, thus creating an environment low in free iron, where few bacteria are able to survive.

* (sic) That's only if your not introducing a live, attenuated virus, which also contains mercury.

The mucous membranes (or mucosae; singular mucosa) are linings of mostly endodermal origin, covered in epithelium, which are involved in absorption and secretion. It is at several places continuous with skin: at the nostrils, the lips, the ears, the genital area, and the anus.


Transferrin imbalance can have serious health effects for those with low or high serum transferrin levels. A patient with an increased serum transferrin level often suffers fromiron deficiencyanemia.[3]

A patient with decreased plasma transferrin can suffer from iron overload diseases and protein malnutrition. An absence of transferrin in the body creates a rare genetic disorder known as atransferrinemia; a condition characterized by anemia and hemosiderosis in the heart and liver that leads to many complications including heart failure.


Flu Mist Nasal Spray H1N1 Vaccine











The swine flu nasal spray formulation is a live, attenuated form of the virus that is sprayed into the nose. "Attenuated" means "weakened." The nasal spray does contain thimerosal *mercury. People who should not get the flu mist vaccine include:
  • Pregnant women
  • Children under two years old
  • People with asthma
  • People with a compromised immune system
But if mercury didn't work during Tuskegee, how is going to work now?


From: A. True Ott, PhD, ND

V.I.C. (Vaccine Injury Coalition)
1260 S. 1200 W. #3
Ogden, UT 84404

Contact Phone Number: 801-392-1635

Today, October 6, 2009, the Weber/Morgan Health Department began dispensing 'H1N1' "Swine Flu" nasal "flu-mist" vaccines to the general public, with the public announcement that all county "health departments" in the State of Utah would soon follow.

These vaccines are said to be "free" to the public - which is a false statement. The manufacturer of the "vaccine" - MedImmune Inc., has been paid handsomely for this serum by the federal government - thus the "vaccine" is not free at all. It has been paid for by our tax dollars. With the federal government, there is no such thing as a truly "free" benefit!

The news media has been blindly promoting this vaccine without mentioning the following risks:

1. The vaccine is composed of "live" viruses. The vaccine circular, page 21, section 17.2 warns under the heading "Vaccination with a Live Virus Vaccine": "Vaccine recipients or their parents/guardians should be informed by the health care provider that Influenza A (H1N1) 2009 Monovalent Vaccine Live, Intranasal is an attenuated live virus vaccine AND HAS THE POTENTIAL FOR TRANSMISSION TO IMMUNOCOMPROMISED HOUSEHOLD CONTACTS". (Emphasis added). In layman's terms, the "live viruses" can be "shed" and cause other people to become infected.
2. The virus included in the FluMist vaccine is NOT a naturally-occurring virus, but is a laboratory-created "Influenza Hemagglutinin and Neuraminidase VARIANT" that is protected by MedImmune U.S. Patent # 2008/0069821 A1.
3. According to the vaccine circular, this "live-virus" vaccine has not been tested, and is clearly experimental. The FDA has allowed it to be licensed solely under new "emergency" licensing provisions.
4. The vaccine dose contains 0.188 mg. of monosodium glutamate - a well-known brain excito-toxic compound. Placing this amount of MSG directly into the nasal passages can cause neurological adverse reactions.

I personally believe that providing this "live virus" spray to citizens will actually CAUSE the feared pandemic to occur. Based on the summer's events in the Southern Hemisphere, the W.H.O.'s "pandemic" has disappeared. The projected "2nd wave" in Australia and South America did not materialize. Therefore, there is no further justification for "pandemic level 6" status - and thus, no need for H1N1 live-virus vaccines to be given away "free".

Dr. Ott


Adsorption or DOCKING with the host receptor protein.
Entry or PENETRATION of the viral nucleic acid into the host cytoplasm.
BIOSYNTHESIS of the viral components.
Assembly (MATURATION) of the viral components into complete viral units.
RELEASE of the completed virus from the host cell.





Va. teen suffers rare illness after swine flu shot

Boy diagnosed with Guillain-Barre syndrome, but CDC says no clear link

Jordan McFarland, 14, was hospitalized for five days after coming down with Guillain-Barre syndrome hours after receiving a vaccination for H1N1.








Pathophysiology

All forms of Guillain–Barré syndrome are due to an immune response to foreign antigens (such as infectious agents) that are mistargeted at host nerve tissues instead. The targets of such immune attack are thought to be gangliosides, compounds naturally present in large quantities in human nerve tissues. The most common antecedent infection is the bacteria Campylobacter jejuni.[8]

However, 60% of cases do not have a known cause; one study suggests that some cases are triggered by the influenza virus, or by an immune reaction to the influenza virus.[9]

The end result of such autoimmune attack on the peripheral nerves is damage to the myelin, the fatty insulating layer of the nerve, and a nerve conduction block, leading to a muscle paralysis that may be accompanied by sensory or autonomic disturbances.

However, in mild cases, nerve axon (the long slender conducting portion of a nerve) function remains intact and recovery can be rapid if remyelination occurs. In severe cases, axonal damage occurs, and recovery depends on the regeneration of this important tissue. Recent studies on the disorder have demonstrated that approximately 80% of the patients have myelin loss, whereas, in the remaining 20%, the pathologic hallmark mmbb of the disorder is indeed axon loss.

Guillain–Barré, unlike disorders such as multiple sclerosis and Lou Gehrig's disease (ALS), is a peripheral nerve disorder and does not generally cause nerve damage to the brain or spinal cord.



By JoNel Aleccia
Health writer
msnbc.com
updated 58 minutes ago






A 14-year-old Virginia boy is weak and struggling to walk after coming down with a reported case of Guillain-Barre syndrome within hours after receiving the H1N1 vaccine for swine flu.

Jordan McFarland, a high school athlete from Alexandria, Va., left Inova Fairfax Hospital for Children Tuesday night in a wheelchair nearly a week after developing severe headaches, muscle spasms and weakness in his legs following a swine flu shot. He will likely need the assistance of a walker for four to six weeks, plus extensive physical therapy.
“The doctor said I’ll recover fully, but it’s going to take some time,” the teenager said.

Jordan is among the first people in the nation to report developing the potentially life-threatening muscle disorder after receiving the H1N1 vaccine this fall. Hisalarming reaction was submitted via msnbc.com's reader reporting tool, First Person, by his stepmother, Arlene Connin.
Increased cases of GBS were found in patients who received a 1976 swine flu vaccine, but government health officials say they've seen no rise in the condition associated with the current outbreak.

So far, the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have received five reports of GBS in people who received the H1N1 vaccine since Oct. 6, not including Jordan’s case, said Dr. Claudia J. Vellozzi, deputy director for immunization safety.

Out of about 40 million doses of H1N1 vaccine available to date, that’s a far lower rate of GBS than the 1 case that develops in every 1 million people who receive the regular flu vaccine.
"It's much less than we'd expect," she said, adding that many cases go unreported.

In 1976, about 1 additional case of GBS developed in every 100,000 people who were vaccinated against the swine flu, according to the CDC.
Jordan's parents said doctors diagnosed the teen with GBS, a rare muscle disorder that develops when a person’s own immune system attacks the nerves, causing muscle weakness, difficulty walking and sometimes paralysis and death.

Hospital officials didn't dispute that the boy had GBS, but refused to comment on the boy's condition or treatment, even after his family granted permission.

“They don’t want to create a fear or panic in the community,” said Jordan's stepmother, Connin.
Connin and Jordan’s father, Calvin McFarland, both 38, believe the shot sparked the illness that came on 18 hours after the boy’s vaccination.

No clear link

But Vellozzi said there’s no clear link between the new vaccine and the disease.

“We know that GBS and other illnesses occur routinely in the U.S.,” Vellozzi said, noting that 80 to 120 cases are diagnosed each week in the general population.

“There are events that follow vaccination. That’s what they are, they happened to follow vaccination.

GBS is among the most severe adverse events being tracked with updated systems developed by the CDC, the Food and Drug Administration and the American Association of Neurology in order to monitor the rollout of the H1N1 flu vaccine.

So far, CDC officials have received about 1,700 reports of adverse events linked to the new shot, Vellozzi said. Of those, only about 4 percent, or 68, were coded as serious. That’s on par with reports regarding seasonal vaccine.

While any harmful side effect can be devastating for an individual, when it comes to larger public health issues, the H1N1 virus is considerably riskier than the vaccine, experts say.

“The H1N1 illness is making lots of children very ill," Vellozzi said. "There’s lots of illness and lots of death."

So far, more than 4,000 people have died from H1N1 infection in the U.S., according to latest estimates by the CDC.

Since the start of the H1N1 vaccine campaign, the CDC has repeatedly warned that certain conditions, such as miscarriage, heart attack and even GBS occur regardless of immunization, and officials have urged the public not to blame the vaccine for the illnesses, but to report promptly any suspected side effects.

Officials at Inova Fairfax had not reported Jordan's case to the CDC as of early today, and did not respond to queries about whether they would report the adverse event.

Vaccine critic Barbara Lowe Fisher, president of the National Vaccine Information Center in Vienna, Va., said assuming all potential side effects are coincidence is a mistake. Such an attitude is likely to prevent doctors and other health workers from reporting adverse events in a timely manner, obscuring a true picture of any problems

Fisher said only between 1 percent and 10 percent of adverse events are reported to the government's Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System, which was set up to track problems with vaccines. A 1986 law requires reporting of certain adverse events to VAERS, but there are no sanctions for not reporting, Fisher noted. CDC officials said general reporting to VAERS is voluntary

Fisher said she suspects that many more cases of GBS have occurred in the wake of the H1N1 vaccines.
"We basically have people blowing it off," she said. "We need to make sure people are reporting."

Eager for protection

Like many parents across the country, Arlene Connin said she was eager to protect Jordan and his brother, Lleyton, 7, against the flu. When she took the boys to the local health department for seasonal flu shots on Nov. 5, the provider said H1N1 vaccine was available, too.

There was “not even a thought,” that either boy would have a reaction, Connin said. Within hours, however, Jordan developed severe headaches, chills and back spasms. The family rushed him to the closest hospital, Dewitt Army Community Hospital, where doctors conducted neurological exams, a CT scan and an EKG test.

The small hospital didn’t have the facilities to diagnose or treat Jordan’s illness, so he was transferred by ambulance on Nov. 6 to Inova Fairfax Hospital in Falls Church, Va., a spokesman said. Doctors there quickly gave Jordan intravenous immunoglobulin, a standard treatment for GBS, Connin said.

“GBS, that’s the diagnosis they gave us and that’s how they were treating him,” Connin said.

A hospital spokesman, Tony Raker, declined further comment on Jordan's case. When an msnbc.com photographer asked to view Jordan's chart, even with his father's permission, hospital officials refused.

Doctors are reluctant to discuss GBS in connection with vaccines, Connin said. Anti-vaccine groups frequently cite the disorder as evidence of vaccine dangers, which public health officials fear will discourage people from getting life-saving protection, especially in the case of H1N1.
Jordan’s experience has made his parents think hard about immunization, even though they’ve always insisted on annual flu shots. Under CDC guidelines for children 9 and younger, Lleyton should receive another booster shot of H1N1 vaccine to protect him fully against the virus.
“I have mixed emotions on that one,” Calvin McFarland, the boys’ father, said. “We’re not sure what we’re going to do about that.”


Peace be upon you


references:


http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/br...our-cells.html ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40364-no-shot-sick-since-h1n1-swine-flu-vaccination-say-no.html Black Conciousness Jazz http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40316-black-conciousness-jazz.html Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:21:02 GMT Nina Simone; Mississippi Godda** http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiaSXO9--OA Pharoah Sanders ; You got to Have Freedom http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eeBaIUrdecThe Creator Has a Master Plan http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ixv0...eature=related Yusef Lateef African Song... Nina Simone;
Mississippi Godda**
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MiaSXO9--OA
Pharoah Sanders ;
You got to Have Freedom
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eeBaIUrdecThe Creator Has a Master Plan
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ixv0...eature=related
Yusef Lateef
African Song
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MoC1Ib7IqaY
Alice Coltrane
Journey to Sachidananda
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFDiXszQeVY

McCoy Tyner
Message from the Nile
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FSjI8JQWl_8

Les McCann
Compared to What
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hRONbnyNpu8

Abbie Lincoln and Max Roach
Freedom Day
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtU-lL02flgReply With Quote ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV DJ RBG http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40316-black-conciousness-jazz.html <![CDATA[41st & Central - BPP]]> http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40299-41st-central-bpp.html Fri, 06 Nov 2009 04:49:42 GMT Image:...]]>






]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV G1deon http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40299-41st-central-bpp.html The Danger of a Single Story - Chimamanda Adichie http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40271-danger-single-story-chimamanda-adichie.html Wed, 04 Nov 2009 00:31:59 GMT Not sure where best to post this, but i think it would be a really great RBG tube video! i found it to be completely engrossing, incredibly moving, and even tho it's about 19 minutes it's VERY well worth the time, especially as it progresses, i promise!

The Danger of a Single Story - Sis. Chimamanda Adichie

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9Ihs241zeg ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV nattyreb http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40271-danger-single-story-chimamanda-adichie.html <![CDATA["Out of Our Right Minds" Film Project]]> http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40239-out-our-right-minds-film-project.html Sun, 01 Nov 2009 19:06:15 GMT Sis. Stacey Muhammad is truly a force to be reckoned with! --------------------- PLEASE DISTRIBUTE!!! Shooting Dates: November 4th - 14th, 2009 - If you are not available during this time, please let us know. Production will take place in and around the Brooklyn, NY area . . . Award... Sis. Stacey Muhammad is truly a force to be reckoned with!
---------------------

PLEASE DISTRIBUTE!!!

Shooting Dates: November 4th - 14th, 2009 - If you are not available during this time, please let us know. Production will take place in and around the Brooklyn, NY area . . .

Award Winning Filmmaker, Stacey Muhammad of Wildseed Films . . .

(Wildseed Films - Using the Power of Media to Educate, Enlighten and Empower Humanity.) is seeking African American Men and Women, above the age of 18 to participate in the upcoming documentary (Out of Our Right Minds, the Rise of Depression Amongst Women of Color)

We are looking for those who are ready and willing to share their experiences!

Interested in interviewing:

African American Women who have suffered from or who are currently suffering from Depression and any other form of emotional or mental disorder (clinically diagnosed or not)

African American Women who have treated Depression and other emotional or mental disorders with either traditional (Western) medication, i.e. antidepressants...as well as those who have opted for a more wholostic approach i.e., yoga, herbs, meditation, etc . . .

Also interested in interviewing:
African American Men

Psychologists / Psychiatrist (any race or gender) who have experience in the treatment of African American patients who have been clinically disgnosed with Depression and other mental / emotional disorders


About the Filmmaker:

Stacey Muhammad is an Award Winning Independent Filmmaker and Activist committed to using the power of media to educate, enlighten and empower humanity. Her first film, “A Glimpse of Heaven, The Legacy of the Million Man March”, screened at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum in Baltimore, MD in 2005 and received rave reviews.

Since that time, the New Orleans native has begun the work of documenting and preserving Hip Hop culture through film and digital media. Her projects include several multi-media projects, music videos and short form documentaries, including, the award winning "I AM SEAN BELL, black boys speak", which made it’s film festival premier at the New Orleans International Human Rights Film Festival.

Ms. Muhammad has worked with several media outlets as well as numerous hip hop artist. She also served on the national staff for the planning of the Million Man March and the planning committee for the Hip Hop Summit Action Network. Ms. Muhammad lectures and participates in panel discussions on filmmaking, activism as well as hip hop culture.

As co-founder of "IntelligentSeedz", Youth Media Organization, Stacey is committed to teaching youth the art of filmmaking and equipping them with the necessary tools to tell the stories that affect their lives.

Her latest film, "Out of Our Right Minds" is slated to be released in January 2010.

For more information, please visit the sites below:

Wildseed Films - Using the Power of Media to Educate, Enlighten and Empower Humanity.
Stacey Muhammad on Vimeo
Stacey Malbrough - Biography
I Am Sean Bell: Black Boys Speak (2009)
http://www.facebook.com/staceymuhammad

To participate, please contact Wildseed Films @ 347-405-6784 / via email @ wildseedfilms@gmail.com / or via Facebook

Participants will be required to sign a release form...there is no monetary compensation for this film...Credit / DVD copy provided . . .

You can donate to the projects Wildseed Films are currently producing by clicking the link below:

Thank you for your continued support! ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV nattyreb http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40239-out-our-right-minds-film-project.html Dead Prez Afrika Hot on Black Power TV http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40222-dead-prez-afrika-hot-black-power-tv.html Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:54:33 GMT BLACK POWER TV - Dead Prez Afrika Hot! (http://www.blackpowercartel.com/video/555/Dead-Prez-Afrika-Hot) BLACK POWER TV - Dead Prez Afrika Hot! ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV G.O.D.F.A.T.H.A. http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40222-dead-prez-afrika-hot-black-power-tv.html I Just Saw It!!! http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40210-i-just-saw.html Fri, 30 Oct 2009 05:14:12 GMT PARANORMAL ACTIVITY Image: http://www.deadline.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/paranormalactivity-poster.jpg Yeah, I just came from seeing it. First, let me say that I know that conscious films are suppose to be discussed in this section but I just wanted to give Brothers and Sisters who... PARANORMAL ACTIVITY



Yeah, I just came from seeing it. First, let me say that I know that conscious films are suppose to be discussed in this section but I just wanted to give Brothers and Sisters who like to check out a nice horror joint every now and then like I do a quick review.

Okay, would I say that it lives up to all the latest hype . . . [shakin' my head] nope. However, it is real creepy. It was well done (very good acting, well paced, good directing, very good special effects-not over the top, etc.) but the thing is it was fake. Now I could see if all of that really happen but it didn't. It's a movie made to look like a documentary of a real event like BLAIR WITCH, so I don't know what everybody is so scared about. Still, I'll say it again, it is creepy 'cause it was well done. Especially for a low-budget joint (I heard it only costed them 11Gs to make the film, damn).

Summation: I really liked it but it wasn't all that.

Awrieght, awrieght, awrieght . . . I know said I was gonna do a review of Alex Jones' new joint FALL OF THE REPUBLIC: THE PRESIDENCY OF BARAK OBAMA . . . it's comin', it's comin'. ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Black7Sun http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40210-i-just-saw.html Black girl http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40199-black-girl.html Thu, 29 Oct 2009 08:30:21 GMT *brownboykb* (http://www.assatashakur.org/user/brownboykb) Black Girl- year 1972 cast Brook peters,Leslie uggams, Claudia McNeil,Lousie Stubbs Ruby Dee, Gloria Edwards as Norma, and starring Peggy Pettit as Billie jean Pt.1/12 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oNJR6QJZOU brownboykb

Black Girl- year 1972 cast Brook peters,Leslie uggams, Claudia McNeil,Lousie Stubbs Ruby Dee, Gloria Edwards as Norma, and starring Peggy Pettit as Billie jean


Pt.1/12
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8oNJR6QJZOU





Most psychology textbooks have a chapter devoted to "maladaptive behavior." A large variety of emotional problems fall into the general category of psychopathology. Maladjusted behavior is defined as the inability to behave in ways that foster the well being of the individual and ultimately to society.
"Maladaptive behavior" is grouped into large categories comprising behaviors associated with drug addiction, compulsive gambling, and loss of contact with reality. It also includes any behavior that interferes with personal growth and self-fulfillment like mood and anxiety disorders.

Negrophobia is a fear of Black people that persists in the minds of Whites and some Blacks when no realistic danger exists. Usually phobias are reactions to conditioned emotional responses. Negrophobia was initially indoctrinated and instilled by slave owners and currently by all forms of mass media. At the time of its inception Negrophobia was probably not considered abnormal behavior but accepted as therapeutic alliance to protect the White brotherhood?

Just the fact that civil rights programs must be administered by US law and amended to our Constitution proves there is a psycho-social fear of non-White people. Any formal attempt through law or administrative practice to enforce anti-discrimination laws for a category of people proves discrimination is alive and well. In this country the people to be protected and/or ejected (placed on the back seat) by legislation have been non-Whites.

Negrophobia was created as a result of the "White cleansing process" to teach basic values and views of the world and to prepare individuals for their place, habitat, and territorial turf in a dominated Caucasian mind-set and/or culture. There is a Negrophobic "thought form" staunchly in place.

Self-image and self-evaluation went through the basic processes of development during slavery. White children were nurtured and molded to become musicians, writers, lawyers, politicians and doctors in the 1600's. Black children were nurtured and molded to become matriarchal baby producers and career slaves.

Seeping through the cracks from the era of slavery is the wondrous White Race stronghold mind-set at one end of the geometric plane. At the other end of the plane lies a spontaneous Negrophobic stronghold on both Black and White people that is considered "normal" behavior. In other words, Whites have not rehearsed the fear they feel for Blacks. Blacks are also afraid of other Blacks because of the stronghold unrehearsed thought process firmly established.

When the word "supremacy" is mentioned, people often think of the Klu Klux Klan. Definitions for the word "supremacy" are merely exquisite, perfect, total, ultimate, and beautiful--All of which Whites perceive themselves and all of which some Blacks perceive Whites.
Most Whites believe that racism does not exist and cannot understand why Blacks must always mention the topic R - A - C - I - S - M. Since racism does not exist, Black folks should stop using the term because non-White ethnic groups to make excuses for laziness, ignorance, and inferiority use the word racism.

White faces and images have been superimposed verbally and visually by mass media to mean higher in quality and merit. See the show, and the entire race is the same. Everywhere a person looks in this country, there are visual images of White people--from the average White Americans, to the President and God himself.
Peer groups are the most important people in an individual's life. White peer group orientation includes conformity to the ideas and judgments of that group--whether it is peer influence or parent influence. People adopt the values, attitudes, style of dress, and language of their parents and peers. For that reason the "White cleansing process" has been the surmount force and is staunchly in place and embedded into our society.


Peace be upon you

conclusion
Conclusion


]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40199-black-girl.html Five on the Black Hand Side http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40168-five-black-hand-side.html Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:15:48 GMT http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LP9tWbi8LQ&feature=related]YouTube - Five on the Black Hand Side"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LP9tWbi8LQ&feature=relate[1973


Ijele: Art eJournal of the African World (2002)

ISSN: 1525-447X

DRESS CODES AND PRESTIGE STAFFS: CONSTRUCTING POLITICAL AUTHORITY WITH STAFFS IN TANZANIA


Fadhili Mshana

Staffs come in different materials and forms and most examples in Africa are made of wood and are most commonly used for walking, though some staffs serve as ritual items and as symbols of authority. For example, chiefs, diviners, and linguists own staffs connected with their obligations. This is not to say that such types of staffs are used on a daily basis. Rather, these items are employed during special events and for performing specific tasks. These include chiefs who display them to legitimize their title, and to represent their realm and power. Healers and diviners also utilize staffs in their activities, as do linguists, orators, and leaders of associations (fig.1). To cite an example, in Ghana, major Ashanti chiefs have an okyeame or public spokesman who holds his staff as he speaks to underscore his authority and message.
While the woodcarver was the main creator of staffs, the chief or title-holder could ask other artisans like a smith to work with the carver. Indeed, a combined effort perhaps depended on the materials that a staff demanded. If, for instance, metal such as iron and copper was needed, then specialists in this field of metallurgy were called upon to contribute their expertise. In another example, a bead-worker may be involved together with a woodcarver in the creation process if a staff was to be decorated with beads. Considering the crucial functions of staffs, it would seem that after the creation process is completed, other actions may be taken upon the objects. For example, a practitioner would be given the task of manipulating a staff with view to consecrate it, thereafter the object is given to the title person.
In this essay, I examine Zaramo’s kome, mganga’s staff, and kifimbo (though it is not exclusively a Zaramo object) in order to explore the ways these staffs have been used in dress codes and as prestige symbols to construct political authority (fig.2). I might add that for the most part in this discussion, kifimbo features in the national political context of Tanzania. So, I analyze the three types of staffs within the contexts of changing cultural traditions, social statuses, and especially political authority and power. I shall demonstrate that individuals who own staffs continually recreate, reposition, and manipulate the staff to suit their needs. Although the focus here is on staffs used in political institutions, curing rituals, and ceremonial contexts, I also make a general reference to staffs that lie outside of these areas of social life. Since these objects embody an element of continuity, I make a parallel discussion between traditional forms and contemporary transformations. This bridges the temporal gap between old and new and allows us to see patterns of continuity and patterns of difference.


Because of the introduction and dissemination of new ideas and technologies, and the resultant changes that many societies in Tanzania have undergone, the staff ‘s use has declined overall. When it is employed, however, it is with changed meaning. The variety of changes that staffs have undergone range from materials for constructing staffs, shapes of staffs, decorations and symbols, and uses, to the institutions in which staffs are found. As we examine the three types of staffs: kome, mganga’s staff, and kifimbo, we might benefit by rethinking the assumption that: “All societies that are in contact with each other eventually exchange materials, items, and ideas. If two societies are in long-term contact, and are at greatly different economic and technological levels, great modifications are introduced into the material culture of the less-developed societies.”1 In the course of the discussion, I will highlight Zaramo and Tanzanian responses to these staffs as they relate to socio-cultural factors of change and re-socializing processes. For our present purpose, however, I explain those responses connected with European modes and cultural values, politics of nationhood, modernization, dressing codes, not least ethnic and cultural identity.
Dress Codes and Prestige Staffs

It was a general practice among men of many ethnic groups in Tanzania to carry a walking staff as an important accessory--a part of dressing, when going on a trip or when attending a public event, since traditionally walking staffs were objects of prestige. Walking staffs would also act as means of support, especially for old men and women. Obviously some of these walking sticks could be used as weapons when a quarrel broke out. They have also been means to deter animals. But because of changes related to dressing patterns, and changes upon traditional institutions in which staffs were usually utilized, the custom of carrying walking sticks has now declined. The practice now is to dress without carrying a walking staff. For example, one does not often come across Tanzanians in the urban areas carrying staffs. However, even as this custom of using walking sticks as prestige symbols is declining, vifimbo (pl.) staffs, which also act as prestige symbols, are common features among officers of the Tanzanian armed forces. The kifimbo has taken the place of walking sticks, not in the everyday dress of the common man, but in the military, the political leader’s strong arm. Since the kifimbo is not used for walking support, but as a symbol of prestige and authority, its shape or design differs from the walking stick’s. In his short paper on staffs of office of Central and Eastern Africa, Leo Polfliet appears to refer to these objects as kifimbo.2 However, I understand kifimbo as a small stick--a literal translation since fimbo means stick in Kiswahili. The prefix, ki denotes size, quality, and quantity. In this case, small, refers to size.


Fimbo/gongo/mkongojo also mean staff. The version of kifimbo that concerns us here is a rather small and very short staff (figs.2-3) usually held by hand or clasped under the armpit (fig.9). It is in this sense that kifimbo is also referred to as a “hand stick.” In terms of size, it is obvious that this small staff differs from say, the chief’s staff mkomolo (fig.1), or those walking ones held by then Presidents Nyerere of Tanzania and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya (fig.4). The continued (and changed) use of staffs (kifimbo) in the military shows how these objects are utilized with changed meaning: as a part of dress, and as symbols of authority and leadership.


I would argue that traditional cultural forms in which a variety of staffs were utilized were fertile ground for the use of staffs in other aspects of society. In other words, the practice of carrying staffs spread beyond the confines of ritual and political/administrative contexts. This can be seen in the trend in which people (who are not connected with these contexts) carry prestige enhancing, embellished walking sticks as well as objects such as fly-whisks. For instance, when the Zaramo were still under the rule of chiefs, they produced staffs called kome la pazi--carving of chief/headman. Examples of such elaborate sticks appear to have been used beyond the institutions of Zaramo local leaders given that it was considered a part of the “dignity” of a man to carry a big, nicely carved stick.3 Kome in their old form have disappeared because the headman institutions linked to them are no longer in place, or they have been replaced. I refer here to the executive position of chief among the Zaramo. Chiefs were relieved of their political powers throughout Tanzania in 1963.


The political turmoil in Tanzania after independence affected the meaning of staffs. Although staffs continued to be used, their meaning was transformed since the contexts where they were found changed. There was a change in the use of staffs and kome after the cessation of local political leaderships--a move that then ruling party, Tanganyika African National Union (TANU) and government took to consolidate the state, to forge national unity, and strive to build a national culture. To provide a short historical perspective of the position of chiefs under colonial rule, it is worthwhile mentioning that colonial governments utilized local leadership structures in their administrations. As an example, the Germans generally accommodated existing chiefs as their agents in government service. In cases where such local leaders were not available, however, the Germans appointed akidas, who came from the coast, whose duties were to try cases and collect taxes.4 For their part, the British adapted Indirect Rule as the official policy of Tanganyika from 1925 until after World War II; that is, ruling indirectly through a local authority structure first experimented with in Nigeria.5 In Uzaramo, the British had a District Officer with assistants; however, 132 village headmen, wandewa, each with a local court--baraza--were responsible for legal proceedings and local civil affairs.6 When these local political leadership positions were functioning staffs and kome flourished. After independence the post of chief as an executive was annulled throughout the country and local authorities were integrated in local governments. In 1964, for instance, TANU introduced an organization of ten-house leader--balozi/mjumbe wa nyumba kumi--in both the rural and urban areas, and whose roles were political and administrative.7 It is noteworthy that Tanzania has witnessed much restructuring of political organization over the decades especially, in the post 1967 period. Thus, the political reorganization affected use or meaning of staffs and kome.


The continued use of staffs resembling Zaramo kome is testimony that traditional forms are perpetuated, or modified and utilized in contemporary situations. In this connection, given that contemporary designs of walking staffs differ from traditional forms of kome, understanding the form and symbolism of kome allows us to gauge meaningful change on the staffs. Reckling, in his 1942 work describes kome as often carved from blackwood or mpingo, taller than a man, and embellished with human and animal figures.8 Whereas in the past the mwana hiti (a wooden figurine given to a Zaramo girl in initiation into adulthood) image may have served as the top of Zaramo staffs, today one is likely to see a naturalistic representation of a human figure (fig.13).

9 Kome were status symbols associated with the office of a chief. Furthermore, kome served as prestige walking sticks. It appears that some of these kome were the property of Zaramo waganga.10 It is difficult to piece together the form and symbolism of these kome. Presumably, since staffs of title-holders serve important functions connected with the holders, some of these objects carry symbols whose significance may not be apparent to everyone. And perhaps these aspects varied in correspondence with the title-holder to whom a staff belonged. Felix describes briefly the chief’s staff as follows: “Chiefs used to have rare staffs that depicted two mwana hiti . . . The one on the top was definitely female and the one that could be male was at the midpoint of the shaft.”11 I disagree here with Felix’s reading of the male and female mwana hiti. Aside from the elaborate carving work on the staff, it is difficult to tell whether the two mwana hiti images are male and female representations. It appears that Felix’s interpretation is based on the characteristics of the image at the midpoint of the staff. This image has a protuberance that may represent a navel--it does not have depictions that in other mwana hiti we interpreted as breasts. In spite of these differences, it could be misleading to make a rash judgement that the figures stand for the two genders. What if the carver chose to exclude the other representations of organs commonly found in the mwana hiti image? In fact, even the “head”of the so-called male representation of mwana hiti found in this staff is unlike much of other representations of the head. We do not have interpretations for other carved sections of the staff which look like mortars or miniature stools. What is apparent to me is the rather plain section below the top of the shaft.

This seems to be the part where one would hold the staff. This assumption is supported by practical reasons. Given the length of the staff (116 centimeters), the ideal part for grasping or holding the stick would be the plain section below the top image (16 centimeters). Moreover, the top of the staff was by all counts a showcase, not a place to put the hands. Doing so would prevent the viewers from seeing the image since this was the focal point of the staff--the area onlookers would direct their attention to when the staff was held for its various purpose. Though much of the symbolism concerning this intricately sculpted staff seems to escape us today, at least we can appreciate the beauty of the object. This piece further exemplifies the imagination and the artistry of its Zaramo creators.


Like walking staffs, fly-whisks have become invested with political meaning. Traditionally, fly-whisks were usually used by courtiers and ritual and spiritual leaders, although some old folks utilize them to chase flies since they may sit at one spot for a long time. Thus, they are a part of dressing as well. Among African national leaders, Kenyatta, at least from the early 1960s until his passing in 1978, used to carry a fly-whisk even in the political arena. Among the Maasai, fly-whisks have been used by leaders as devices for blessing. A fly-whisk, once dipped in traditional beer, is waved over the group giving everyone a taste.12 Some of the leaders have waved a fly-whisk to show their agreement with a certain decision. Zaramo waganga (traditional healers) use these items in cleansing rituals. It becomes clear that walking staffs and fly-whisks have served as both dress codes and authority objects.


Other factors responsible for the decreased use of prestige walking staffs are increased urbanization, forms of acculturation, expansion of European forms of education, and improved transportation systems. These factors have contributed to increasing the pace that consequently altered and shaped much of Tanzanian societies. For example, initiation rites, healing and cleansing rituals, and traditional forms of leadership for the majority of Tanzanian peoples have entirely disappeared. These forms have for the most part been replaced by modern agencies like schools, religious institutions, the mass-media, modern medicine and ways of healing, as well as new systems of leadership. Needless to say, European ways of dressing and European accoutrements included walking sticks such as canes, which were borrowed or adapted and often modified by Tanzanians. Such notable imposition of European cultural values upon Tanzania society detrimentally affected staffs by rendering them less authentic and meaningful.
Mganga’s Ritual Staff of the Zaramo: Interpreting Traditionalism and Modernity

To a considerable degree, the Zaramo have meaningfully taken hold of a basic sense of their own form of reality by continually following specific social practices they have considered important to their way of life. A case in point is the continuation of social rituals in which several types of staffs can be utilized and interpretation of traditionalism and modernity made. In this connection, traditional designs of staffs and traditional social rituals have been adapted to modern uses. In Zaramo society, tradition and modern exist side-by-side in the social order. Thus, the rituals and staffs used therein are mila (tradition) even as they are practiced in a modern social context. In this way, they can be seen as modern practices that are acculturated and have become mila.


In Zaramo society, in addition to headmen, other ritual specialists who have used staffs in different ways include diviners, exorcists, witch hunters, and healers. It is not difficult to understand that some objects in the Zaramo staffs’ corpus have persisted because the ritual contexts in which they appear are still important to the Zaramo and thus continue to be followed. Carved staffs are still used in ritual contexts such as in the initiation ceremonies for Zaramo youths where a staff called mkomolo (fig.1) appears. A clan leader would hold this staff as a symbol of his title. The Zaramo mganga also utilizes mkomolo in a spirit possession rite called madogoli (the plural form of dogoli) which is the drum utilized during exorcism rites.13 Madogoli also refers to the actual exorcism rite, the healing ritual. The study on waganga in Dar es Salaam that L. Swantz conducted in the 1970s found that not only does the mganga still occupy a prominent position in a modern environment, she or he also preserves traditional Zaramo culture since the mganga acted as a bridge for the Zaramo “to adjust to the modern world.”14 Zaramo waganga have also used another heavier and shorter, elaborately carved version of staff which was stuck in the ground, where upon the patient could lean against it as a backrest during exorcism and healing rites. Some of these staffs of the waganga have wooden hooks (part of the staff) for suspending gourds containing medicine, as the Kwere example shows. I am not making the point here that because this type of staff has hooks, it is a multi-media object. In addition to their use in healing rituals, Zaramo staffs with hooks from which small gourds of traditional medicine can be hung, are implanted in the ground during initiation ceremonies (fig.5).


As Zaramo social rituals continue to be practiced in contemporary Zaramo society, staff design also reflects tradition and modernity. In other words, traditional staff design that incorporates the mwana hiti image as found in mganga’s staff, appears in healing rituals in the 1990s Zaramo society. A good example of this traditional staff design is the mkomolo staff that exhibits fine execution which is testimony to the great traditional artistry and craftsmanship of the Zaramo carvers. This exquisite piece is not only topped by a mwana hiti figure, but below this image is another elaborately carved section. This part of the staff is decorated with the “circle and dot” motif. The section below the beautifully embellished section of the shaft is plain. The mwana hiti image is repeated in Zaramo objects used in ritual, including musical instruments, thrones, fly-whisks, wooden grave sculptures, medicine gourds (fig.18), staffs, and posts. Thus, as the mwana hiti image proliferates and permeates these important objects, it is understood by the Zaramo to signify reproduction and continuation of the cycle of life; simply, that life goes on. As well, the image also fulfills the purpose of ornamentation on the objects which incorporate it. With respect to the “circle and dot” design, apart from decoration, its other significance among the Zaramo is unclear at this point. But this design can be examined in relation to the geometric designs comprised of rectangles, squares, and circles found on many objects belonging to people living on the East African coast.


The general impression of these geometric designs was that they were merely decorative devices deriving from coastal culture, and that coastal craftsmen applied them on objects used in Swahili and Islamic communities on the coast. In view of recent research, however, this theory, which traced the designs to Islamic craftsmen among coastal Swahili communities, has been challenged.15 For example, Castelli argues that among several Bantu peoples in Tanzania and Kenya, line symbols served a memorial function--such as a form of writing to communicate and symbolize the spiritual and secular position of lineage and association leaders.16 Additionally, the lines were used as design elements on all the objects belonging to these leaders. In any case, it seems conceivable that the designs may have crossed over from either of these cultures and were adapted to suit particular cultural situations, thus gaining new importance. This assumption bears some validity when we take account of the exchanges that have occurred in the areas of language, dressing, crafts, architecture and other crucial elements of social and cultural life between the Zaramo and the Swahili.


Though the “circle and dot” design utilized in Zaramo objects like staffs as well as the so-called “Swahili”designs such as the Zaramo fly-whisk’s handle, can be considered as traditional designs, they are also modern. Indeed, Zaramo Sculptor Salum Chuma’s intricately carved door at the Simba Grill of the Kilimanjaro Hotel in Dar es Salaam (fig.6) recalls chip-carved Islamic patterns principally patronized by Swahili artisans. I also observed that Zaramo carvers working essentially for the tourist art market at “Uzaramo Uchongaji Sanaa” cooperative in Dar es Salaam (fig.7) continue to apply these patterns as surface decorations on items like wooden treasure chests, which are associated with Swahili coastal culture. Again, this is a clear indication of exchanges and development of ideas and techniques that have occurred in cultures on or near the East African coast. At any rate, the foregoing shows not only trends in which traditional items and motifs of Zaramo social practices are interpreted into modernity, but the ways such cultural phenomena are also perpetuated as mila in contemporary Zaramo culture.


Despite the multitude of changes, the Zaramo have preserved the integrity of their way of life by following specific social practices crucial to their livelihood. The continuing use of mganga’s staff, and the ritual and ceremonial forms of which they are an integral part, evidently points to the significance they possess in Zaramo cultural and social life. The Zaramo have experienced an array of changes resulting from social, political, religious, and economic developments. Urbanization, Western education, Christianity, Islam, colonialism, post-independence government policies, and processes like ujamaa (African Socialism) and Villagization, have significantly contributed to altering Zaramo life. Though she did not include art objects in her analysis, M-L. Swantz argues that the Zaramo have shifted focus to protect their core since they are not in a position to close entrances and defend the boundaries of their society.17 Our integration of art objects (staffs) in the investigation of aspects of change in Zaramo cultural forms needs to be seen as an effective approach geared to expose these developments.
Kifimbo: Constructing Political Authority with Staffs

Vifimbo of the Zaramo are said to have been used by leaders as symbols of rank, though for the most part, ritualists utilized them to cast spells and cleanse people and houses.18 As can be seen from this Zaramo kifimbo, it is topped by a mwana hiti. Although examples of this style of staff, produced by people such as the Gogo of Central Tanzania, have figurative representation (fig.2), some lack such depictions. Instead, such a kifimbo may comprise of a plain shaft with a slightly bulbous top.
Other examples of a similar style that I have seen in Tanzania also serve as personal weapons. In such a style, the shaft has a dual purpose. It is the main part of the kifimbo as well as the sheath for the long slender iron blade like a stiletto, whose handle is the top of the staff. This means that the kifimbo is comprised of two main parts: a wooden shaft and a knife. Once the staff is assembled, the latter is hidden in its case. In the event of an attack, the owner/holder of the kifimbo would feign to strike with the staff, thus luring the assailant to hold the lower part of the shaft or case. This would trigger at least two responses: if the assailant holding this opposite lower end (the sheath) pulls the shaft towards him/her, or the owner of the staff also pulls the upper section of the weapon, the move would release the long knife out of the sheath. In this way, the assailant will be faced with a man holding a knife in an advantageous position for attack. This kifimbo-cum-knife may have “tell-tale” marks to indicate that it is not the ordinary type. For example, an iron ring/band is to be found just below the top of the staff. Its placement there could as well serve as a design element, but also to strengthen the top end of the wooden case. Vifimbo are carried by Tanzanian politicians, and just like walking staffs these small items can be found among wazee of Tanzania.

19
Carrying a kifimbo appears to have become a relatively popular trend instead of fimbo or bakora. The latter accessory item may now be seen held by wazee who use it for support when walking and may be a sign of their seniority, age-wise. In rural Tanzania, staffs may be carried in social and cultural events such as community meetings, weddings, or ceremonies involving traditional authorities. For example, the Maasai (who live in Tanzania and Kenya) have sections’ spokesmen for every age-set whose function is to preside over meetings and secular activities in the council of their age-mates. These spokesmen have a club (olkuma) of mpingo, or rhinoceros horn.20 In Maasai society, a club and a fly-whisk are emblems of leadership. Also in Tanzania, a kifimbo that is not a ritual item may be carried by wazee and not vijana (youths). One such mzee who was hardly seen in public without his kifimbo is former President of Tanzania, Julius Nyerere (figs.8, 9).


I use Nyerere here to illustrate the transformation involving the use of fimbo--staffs (fig.12) similar to kome of Zaramo chiefs--to kifimbo. One might also say, he transformed the use and meaning involving a kifimbo like the Zaramo’s that ritualists utilized to cast spells, to a Tanzanian staff that came to be used for building political authority. Furthermore, I contend that though Nyerere’s kifimbo has been an effective mechanism in enhancing his personal identity, the matter does not end there. More than this, his kifimbo has also served as a symbol of male elder identity, given the placement of this staff in the center-stage of the national political space that Nyerere occupied for a considerable number of years. Nyerere was the country’s leader for 24 years before his retirement as president in 1985, and almost 30 years before stepping down as Party leader. Thus, Nyerere’s kifimbo enables us understand the manner in which individuals tenaciously hold on to objects that accentuate their positions in social and political arenas.


Mwalimu Nyerere, as he is popularly known, used the long walking staffs at least since the 1950s up to the early 1960s before settling on kifimbo. I have pointed out that in Tanzania men would carry fimbo when attending important functions or when on a journey. Nyerere was not an exception in this regard. He carried a walking stick when holding TANU meetings in the 1950s.21 During this time Nyerere was in his thirties; therefore, carrying a walking stick was more in concert with his political eldership role than old age. Nyerere also carried a staff when he was Prime Minister and then President of Tanganyika and Tanzania respectively, as well as TANU and CCM party chairman. In the early years of independence, Nyerere appeared in public holding his fimbo.


Another fine example to this effect is Nyerere’s early official portrait (fig. 8). At the time, such a staff was one of the popular accessories for middle-aged men like Nyerere, and needless to say, for old men as well. Apart from its prestigious symbolic aspect, I would argue that it was also a means for Nyerere to assert his preference for traditional African cultural items, similar to contemporary African leaders. That is, Nyerere utilized traditional African cultural items to redefine and reassert the African personality. But Nyerere was caught in a bind. On the one hand, he appeared to side with African culture. On the other hand, Nyerere contradicted himself in the ujamaa policy of Villagization when he attacked without discrimination the very traditional beliefs and authority figures of Tanzanian culture that he was utilizing to construct a national culture after a period of colonial subjugation and misrule. In light of these developments, while we may ask what culture Nyerere was building, his strategy seems to have been to coopt culture for political ends.


Nyerere’s use of traditional African emblems was probably found useful by other African leaders seeking political dominance. Among Nyerere’s contemporary African leaders who used traditional African accessories, especially in the 1960s (the dawn and hey-day of African nationalism) through to the 1970s, we might mention Nkrumah, who often appeared in the public sphere wearing a traditional clothing called ntoma in Ashanti--some kind of a toga. Kenyatta with his fimbo, but more characteristically, his fly-whisk; late President Mobutu of then Zaire, now, Democratic Republic of Congo, donned his famous leopard-skin-patterned cap while brandishing his elaborate staff, among others.


In Tanzania for example, a 1963 photo shows Nyerere wearing a Western suit while two members of his Cabinet, Rashidi Kawawa and Oscar Kambona, donned a traditional toga. In this case, they wore an mgolole, a large sheet of cloth usually worn over another dress. As can be seen in this figure, the mgolole does not cover the right upper part of the shoulder. In certain groups of Tanzania, it was a custom for chiefs to wear an mgolole and carry staffs. And Nyerere also wore a toga. In the picture, Kawawa is seen holding his fimbo. Appearing in this apparel, one may reasonably intimate that perhaps the ministers were identifying with the dresses and accessories of traditional chiefs. Indeed, with regard to these emerging leaders in Africa, it was an opportune moment at which to return to African cultural roots and celebrate African heritage after a period of cultural subjugation under colonialism. The dresses and accessories these leaders found fashionable was a powerful statement of pride about the aesthetic importance and relevance of traditional African culture.


But these new leaders of Africa were, for political purposes, merging traditionalism with modernity by coupling traditional dress and accoutrements with Western or Eastern attire. In a sense, synthesizing the old with the new, but marketing it as old. Nkrumah not only adopted Maoist and Euro-American dress, “his adoption of paraphernalia associated with Asante royalty underscored a desire to appropriate traditional significations of authority.”22 Nkrumah, apart from adjusting his traditional attire to correspond with “the voting alliance,” the sword carrier and the orator followed Asante models, as did virtually all of the arts that his administration commissioned.

23 Regarding dress, Nyerere’s trademark from about 1966 on was the Mao-style safari suit (figs.3, 6). Already uncomfortable with Nyerere’s growing ties with China, many Europeans and Americans in East Africa had circulated a story that the suit was another indication that Nyerere was “going Chinese,” but Nyerere is said to have first seen the suit in Zanzibar and adopted it for its simplicity.24 Having worn its top myself, we knew it as a “Tanzanian suit” because Tanzanians were following Nyerere’s lead in donning it. However, I vividly remember that Tanzanians called the suit’s style “Chou En-lai,” after the then Chinese Premier Chou En-lai. But Chou En-lai himself, on a State Visit to Tanzania, had stated that the “suit was not heavy enough for the Chinese climate.”25 Though its marker was Chinese, it was a truly Tanzanian suit. Often Nyerere’s headgear was a Muslim/Swahili embroidered kofia (cap). In an incident about this cap, initiated by a local elder of TANU, mainland Tanzania’s political party at the time, Nyerere injected sentiments of nationalism. “‘Why do you wear that?’ the elder asked Nyerere. ‘It is a Zanzibar cap.’ ‘No,’ quipped Nyerere, ‘it’s a Tanzanian cap.’”26 Through his emphatic response Nyerere may have meant to illustrate the concept of Tanzanian Union which still appeared unreal, but he may also have aimed at a fusion of and identification with all the cultures of Tanzania.


Regarding accessories, it did not take Nyerere long to switch to kifimbo, further illustrating political investment in traditional garb. For example, in a photograph taken in June 1964 with Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia, who was on a State Visit to Tanzania, Nyerere is seen holding his kifimbo. The kifimbo would increasingly become a conspicuous accessory of his presidency and his tenure as the Party leader. Nyerere, even after retiring from both the government and Party positions, has continued to carry his kifimbo whenever he attended public events (fig.9). As I pointed out previously, this item helped to give Nyerere another sort of identity. For in Tanzania, besides his title of Mwalimu (teacher), Nyerere had in recent years attained a nickname of Mzee Kifimbo (Elder with Kifimbo). Interestingly, one is prompted to ask whether the mere habit of carrying the small staff resulted in this name? Certainly the Nyerere kifimbo does not serve the purpose of a walking staff since it does not reach down to the ground. Yet Nyerere the mzee carried his favorite hand stick around, though clearly the reason for doing so is not for walking support.


Like other politically charged objects, we can liken Nyerere’s kifimbo to Kenyatta’s flamboyant fly-whisk or Kenneth Kaunda’s famed white handkerchief. The objects also became symbols of national identity/national dress taking into consideration of the people involved here. Other than being men, they were national leaders. They may have fancied holding these items just as any other person would or might wear a hat. But once such an item becomes a key characteristic of a national political leader’s attire, it then acquires the added dimension of political tool. It may become an issue for discussion and a contested terrain because of the status of its owner. Why is the leader using it? What ends does it serve? Is it for political/social purposes, for example? With respect to Nyerere and his kifimbo, Tanzanians have since raised similar questions. A common question revolves around the issue of whether the kifimbo has contributed to advance Nyerere’s political career. It seems that even as Nyerere dominated the national political landscape in Tanzania, his use of the kifimbo led to its recognition as an emblem of his leadership largely because the object attracted national attention as well.

So his employment of the staff was a success. In the first instance, his new image vis-a-vis the kifimbo may have come about because of the kifimbo he owns and flaunts. But secondly, it could be due to the power, real or imagined, that the staff is said to embody.


Nyerere’s kifimbo achieved both political and cultural significance (fame) in that an entire folklore developed around it. Though Nyerere’s kifimbo is associated with superstitions--especially as a magic device--it carries no sacred airs. The earlier version, carved from mpingo or African Blackwood (Dalbergia melanoxylon), was rather plain with no intricate carving work. The late example (fig.9), also of the same kind of wood, is elaborately executed while the tip section of the shaft appears to be of bone. It has been rumored that Nyerere’s kifimbo was essentially a magic wand for his protection, especially in view of the dangers associated with his holding the highest public office in the land. Furthermore, Tanzanians circulated stories which increasingly fueled this magic wand myth. One story is told of an occasion in which Nyerere forgot his kifimbo somewhere. Nobody was able to pick it up until Nyerere himself realized that he had left the kifimbo and came to fetch it. Another story has it that when Nyerere became uncertain about a trip he was about to make, he would point his kifimbo in the direction he would take. Were the staff to bend, that was an indication that the journey would not have a happy ending, that danger lay ahead of him. As such, Nyerere would cancel the trip.

However, I have no evidence to support these stories though by all counts Nyerere’s staff is surrounded with mystery whose validation is hard to ascertain.


We might intimate that the superstitions about these objects and the leaders who own them, constitute some power. But it is not necessary to examine the mechanisms leaders in Africa have used to achieve political authority and invest legitimacy and longevity in their regimes. Doing so would move us beyond the scope of this inquiry. Instead, it is enough to recall Nkrumah’s beliefs connected to his accoutrements, and which like Nyerere may have contributed to his mystique and political strength. “Nkrumah was credited with the power of witchcraft, for example, as a consequence of his residence in the town of Nzema; his white handkerchief and walking stick, and his practice of leaving his hair unparted, were associated with ‘the accoutrements of traditional fetish priests,’and he was said ‘to commune periodically with Mame Wata,’ an act ‘which gave him privy to information about the machinations of imperialism.’”27 Additionally, Nkrumah was “believed to communicate with a Muslim advisor from Kankan, who gave Nkrumah herbs to bathe in and ingest in order to retain his power.”28 This shows that the folklore surrounding these objects and their owners equals a kind of power in itself.


Another more appealing way of considering the Nyerere kifimbo is as a practical aid which probably helped in creating and reinforcing an aura of mystique and enormous political power. Often Nyerere used his kifimbo to wave to his supporters, make certain gestures when addressing political rallies, and in some instances, use as a pointer. In other occasions, he would clasp it under his left armpit, or place it on the table. But some superstitious minds would probably interpret these movements of the Nyerere kifimbo as constituting the casting of spells upon those he led. We may recall that the Zaramo kifimbo was also used by ritualists for casting spells and cleansing people. So regardless of the practical uses of Nyerere’s kifimbo, its supposed uses wielded a large degree of power.
Whatever interpretations one may generate on the manner Nyerere handled his kifimbo, his was not an isolated case in the African leadership circle during the post-independence era. One of Nyerere’s nationalist contemporaries, Jomo Kenyatta, used a popular slogan before addressing a political rally. He would say, harambee! (let’s all pull together--a call upon Kenyans to pool resources/efforts together in community development or self-help projects) while at the same time making a swirling movement of his fly-whisk in the air. The multitude would respond, heee!, signaling agreement with Kenyatta. Interestingly, Daniel arap Moi, who became President after Kenyatta passed away in 1978, also carries a small club-like staff called Fimbo ya Nyayo.29 This kifimbo of Moi is carved from ivory and decorated with gold rings. When not in use, Moi would put the staff on the table. When he spoke, he raised the Nyayo staff in the air to let people know that he is in total command and were one to err, he had a way of punishing people.

30 In this context, the staff serves to enhance Moi’s image as an authoritative figure. Moi’s nickname is Nyayo, which is Kiswahili for footsteps, and following the promise he made to Kenyans when he was sworn in as President of the Republic of Kenya he continued his predecessor’s policies. To put it in another way, Moi pledged to follow Kenyatta’s footsteps in presiding over Kenya. So, when Moi holds the Fimbo ya Nyayo in the air and says, harambee, the response is nyayo! 31 Through this staff, Moi also combines traditionalism and modernity to construct and advance his political authority and foster nationhood.
It is fruitful to consider the political leader’s kifimbo with the positions of teacher, leader, and elder. In Tanzania, a teacher is seen as someone who is knowledgeable and who imparts knowledge to others. He or she is also seen as a leader, since a teacher becomes a role model for his or her students. Likewise, an elder is perceived as the store of knowledge and wisdom that he or she has accumulated over the years. Ideally, in a community’s perception of the wise elder, he or she is expected to pass on this heritage from one generation to another through the process of socialization.


Kenyan writer Micere Mugo describes the prestigious status and roles of elders in pre-colonial Gikuyu Kenya as follows:
Elders were viewed as the embodiment of all that the community cherished--wisdom, justice, understanding, dignity, visionariness etc. . . . They would sit for hours in council, listening to the complaints and defenses. Their sense of fairness was unquestioned. Through proverbs, sayings, stories and illustrations they would counsel, to show what needed to be done to remedy a given situation. They were the preservers and protectors of wisdom, accumulated through long years of communal experience. They were the guardians entrusted by the community of the living and the dead (the ancestral spirits) to ensure that there was harmony, coherence and well-being in the community.32
There is a Swahili saying popularly used in Tanzania which beautifully captures and illustrates these notions of the wazee (elders): Penye wazee haliharibiki neno. That is, in the attendance of elders a problem does not get out of hand because it is resolved.


Nyerere’s association with his staff parallels the roles of teacher, leader, and elder. His practical use of the kifimbo possibly has its roots in his former teaching profession, and which he symbolically perpetuated as leader of the country. In Tanzania, teachers in primary and secondary schools carry sticks. Some teachers employ the staffs as pointers in teaching while others use them to discipline their students. In politics, carrying a stick symbolizes the act of leading. That is, showing the way that those under his/her jurisdiction ought to take: it does not carry the dual meaning of a leading and a punishing symbol. There is the example of the biblical Moses and the staff he carried when serving as the Israelites leader. He even used his staff to perform miracles. Interestingly, another nickname for Nyerere, which was current at least in the late 1970s and the early 1980s, was Mzee Musa, named after the Moses of the Bible. Tanzanians likened Nyerere with the biblical Moses who led the Israelites out of Pharaoh’s Egypt towards the promised land, only to wander in the wilderness. It was said that Nyerere did the same to Tanzanians economically since he ignored advice given him by his economic advisors.


While in public office, Nyerere utilized his teaching experience and the staff to create an atmosphere of teaching and learning rather than govern. On the whole, Nyerere displayed an uncanny ability to render complicated matters in simple language and speech. In addition, he was a charismatic speaker and a great debater. One characteristic phrase, nitarudia (I will repeat), which punctuated Nyerere’s public speeches, is reminiscent of a teacher emphasizing a point to his/her students. It thus joins Nyerere’s governing skills with the pedagogical skills of his former profession. Teachers identify, incorporate whips; that is their symbol of authority as it is Nyerere’s image as President. To put it in another way, kifimbo as cane is similar to “teacher’s” power-cane. Indeed, what could be more handy to augment his political messages than the kifimbo? Finally, his hand stick must have gone a long way toward reinforcing some of his mannerisms when conducting public business.

The kifimbo that Nyerere carried as leader of Tanzania helped to recreate and augment his personality and build Tanzanian nationalism. The kifimbo sat well with Nyerere’s other title of Baba wa Taifa (Father of the Nation), though some Tanzanians are irked by this title, and derogatorily call him Father of the ruling Chama Cha Mapinduzi--Party for Revolution (CCM). They do so in part because of Nyerere’s apparent favoritism towards his CCM party in national politics. Indeed, the hand stick has led to Nyerere’s nickname of Mzee Kifimbo, and obviously, without the staff that name would not have been given. But besides the fact that this nickname is associated with Nyerere’s possession of the kifimbo, it may also lie on his apparent manipulation of the object in the political arena. In this way, the kifimbo became a national symbol connected with a national leader who charted the country’s destiny. In the same way that traditional African chiefs, linguists, and national leaders like Moi held their staffs to stress their authority, so did Nyerere. These uses of the kifimbo have transformed it within the modern political and administrative landscape.


The staff that Nyerere or any other national leader carries today may not have sustained symbolic proportions as did the staffs of African chiefs or ritual leaders. Despite the absence of those elements, however, the positioning and use of the object remains central: it is an emblem of authority for the leader who owns and uses it to further his/her administration.


The kifimbo appears to have achieved a significant presence when Nyerere made important decisions affecting the health of the nation. In this sense, Nyerere’s use of his staff compares with the Zaramo mganga (who tackles health issues and other social predicaments facing the Zaramo) and his staffs, such as the mkomolo. Swantz describes a scene of madogoli rite of the Zaramo with waganga in the curing act: “The woman sitting on the mat, legs stretched out, a black cloth on and a three-colour turban around her head, is the patient sitting against the mkomolo stick. The medicine bag is placed on a three-legged stool, the tail-whisk is on the ground ready for the patient, mteja as soon as she is in trance she gets up and begins to dance. An assisting woman keeps on putting water with herbs in it over the patient. The waganga wear a black and white headcover of a colobus monkey.”

33 A madogoli rite is also attended by relatives of the patient as seen at the bottom right of the figure. These participants may also take part in the singing, which is another component of the rite. Similarly, Nyerere may be perceived as a ritualist who takes care of Tanzanians’ array of problems as a Zaramo mganga does. To illustrate the power that Nyerere wielded in the country after leaving office, in 1995 during the first multi-party elections in the country, he is said to have been an influential force behind the CCM’s nomination of Benjamin Mkapa to run for President of Tanzania. Nyerere even went a step further and campaigned openly across the country for this CCM presidential candidate, also, his former student and colleague in the CCM. Eventually, Mkapa won the presidency.
Nyerere’s public use of the kifimbo could band him together with the likes of Nkrumah, Kenyatta, Mobutu, and Moi, who appropriated and utilized traditional African objects and symbols to build and advance their political authority, while also muscling out their opponents. Yet Nyerere was markedly different, and he is respected for advancing the cause of his countryfolk and Africa. An elder statesman who had earned international respect due to his integrity, honesty, and intellect, Nyerere perhaps astounded the world when in 1985 he became one of Africa’s few Presidents to retire voluntarily. Among his many political achievements was his masterminding the Union between the Republic of Tanganyika and the People’s Republic of Zanzibar in 1964.

Nyerere’s personal conduct added another dimension to the kifimbo: that of a staff of morality, principle, and dignity. As head of State, Nyerere was known for his simplicity and humility. He shunned wealth and strove to involve his fellow Tanzanians at all stages of development, while also striving to improve their lot. This is not to say that Nyerere is above reproach; criticisms have been leveled against him and his administration. Given the myriad of problems facing Tanzania, Africa, and the world at large, Nyerere has not been an exception to the norm. But contrary to African leaders who preferred to be reified, Nyerere was opposed to a personality cult. A good example is his refusal of public glorification as Bismarck Mwansasu recounts: “It has covered a number of areas ranging from his refusal to have streets and other places named after him to erecting his monuments.”

34 This is illustrated in the few streets and public facilities named after Nyerere. The Dar es Salaam City Council planned to demolish the famed Askari Monument in the commercial district of the city and put up a statue of Nyerere in its place, but Nyerere turned down the idea.35 In 1988 the University of Dar es Salaam constructed a stand in front of the Assembly Hall, also called Nkrumah Hall, with view to put on his bust, but again Nyerere would not accept. The project was abandoned forthwith. In this light, the kifimbo that Nyerere used should not be seen as an object of glory, but much as a staff of morality, principle, and dignity. For this it fulfills the other meaning of an elder’s staff. Whatever other ends the kifimbo has served, it has remained a personal accessory of the elder statesman.


In sum, the ways individuals relate to staffs and use them to advance their occupations or positions in society are numerous. Additionally, even as social and historical forces have transformed uses, contexts, significances, and forms of these objects, individuals continually recreate and reposition staffs to suit their needs. We have observed how kome, mganga’s staff of the Zaramo, and kifimbo registered changes while they continued to be relevant to their traditional institutions and contexts. For instance, the dressing patterns in Tanzania changed as prestige items like walking staffs became increasingly unpopular due to a variety of social and cultural factors. As well, kome-like staffs or fimbo were utilized by new leaders in the 1960s, not only in Tanzania, but across Africa as part of dress that celebrated African cultural pride and formed their political presence. Another example concerns changes of form pertaining to staffs used by Zaramo waganga. While for example, some have the mwana hiti image, today some examples portray a naturalistic figure. We can not determine how successful a mganga is in his or her trade on the basis of figurations on mganga’s staffs. What is clear is the persistence, or reinterpretation of traditionalism and modernity with these staffs in the institutions they belong to.

And although today a political leader in Tanzania may use a kifimbo instead of a fimbo, this does not suggest that such person rejects a traditional accessory or symbol in favor of a modern one. Rather, such a leader may have chosen a staff that befits his specific purpose, since examples of these styles of staff have also been used in both traditional and contemporary African society. Perhaps this person may be following a fashionable style. African political leaders, though, have strategically appropriated traditional African paraphernalia, or merged these items with contemporary ones, to help the advance of their agendas. They combine and reinterpret traditionalism and modernity to dovetail with their political and cultural positions. It is not hard, therefore, to grasp the transformation of old into new forms--traditional forms into contemporary symbols of the new crop of political leaders, or the “new elders.” Ironically, the continuation of the tradition of staffs is predicated upon ongoing change and transformation.




Peace be upon you












references
DRESS CODES AND PRESTIGE STAFFS: CONSTRUCTING POLITICAL AUTHORITY WITH STAFFS IN TANZANIA ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40168-five-black-hand-side.html NYC Shops Accepting Euros. Dollar Collapse/Crash http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40060-nyc-shops-accepting-euros-dollar-collapse-crash.html Thu, 22 Oct 2009 10:15:53 GMT http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Scn-OE1BOMk&feature=related



http://st0ckman.blogspot.com

"In the latest example that the U.S. dollar just ain't what it used to be, some shops in New York City have begun accepting euros and other foreign currency as payment for merchandise.

"We had decided that money is money and we'll take it and just do the exchange whenever we can with our bank," Robert Chu, owner of East Village Wines, told Reuters television.

The increasingly weak U.S. dollar, once considered the king among currencies, has brought waves of European tourists to New York with money to burn and looking to take advantage of hugely favorable exchange rates.

"We didn't realize we would take so much in and there were that many people traveling or having euros to bring in. But some days, you'd be surprised at how many euros you get," Chu said.

"Now we have to get familiar with other currencies and the (British) pound and the Canadian dollars we take," he said.

While shops in many U.S. towns on the Canadian border have long accepted Canadian currency and some stores on the Texas-Mexico border take pesos, the acceptance of foreign money in Manhattan was unheard of until recently.

Not far from Chu's downtown wine emporium, Billy Leroy of Billy's Antiques & Props said the vast numbers of Europeans shopping in the neighborhood got him thinking, "My God, I should take euros in at the store."

Leroy doesn't even bother to exchange them.

"I'm happy if I take in 200 euros, because what I do is keep them," he said. "So when I go back to Paris, I don't have to go through the nightmare of going to an exchange place."

Not Exactly A Clown Mass, But A Clown Act For Sure

"A priest blessed and used a super soaker during Mass at a Newman Center Mass on Sunday":








http://www.americanpapist.com/2009/0...soaker-to.html

Not suprisingly, this liturgical abuse originates from the diocese of Rochester, a place well-known for its lack of episcopal oversight when it comes to these matters. The online bio of the priest:
A priest of the Society of Jesus, Fr. Richard is a native of Syracuse , New York , and resides in the Jesuit community at McQuaid Jesuit High School. His interests include Western and Eastern spirituality, meditation, prayer, liturgy, pastoral counseling and retreats. His academic degrees in political science and deep pastoral commitment to enhancing student life at RIT are fully expressed in issues of social justice and peace issues. A trained musician and artist, Fr. Richard enjoys preaching, teaching, and writing as well as working out, watching movies, and spending time in cyberspace.
*shakes head.*
Ph/t: Curt Jester.

Peace be upon you

American Papist: Not Your Average Catholic!: Photos: Priest uses *Super Soaker* to bless at Mass

Not Exactly A Clown Mass, But A Clown Act For Sure - Catholic Answers Forums ]]> Conscious Edutainment - Videos - Movies - TV Pragmatic http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40060-nyc-shops-accepting-euros-dollar-collapse-crash.html Korean and Melanesian are the closet blood siblings? http://www.assatashakur.org/forum/conscious-edutainment-videos-movies-tv/40057-korean-melanesian-closet-blood-siblings.html Thu, 22 Oct 2009 05:49:22 GMT Young Panaeati...]]> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLp4bs8Wtfo&feature=related




Young Panaeati Island lass (Misima)

..."look up the Sheng dynasty... we did all of that... but on the real... I'm gettin tired of people trying to discredit us for EVERYTHING! I mean... COME ON! WE DISCOVERED SIGHT, SOUND, TASTE, TOUCH AND SMELL!" from "Asian vs African"

RbgKofi
Assatashakur
Premium member

Peace be upon you


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