May 31, 2021
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION
Vol. 26, Issue 19
who police the police? “Addressing Current & Historical Realties Affecting Our Community”
THE “N-WORD”
By: Roy Douglas Malonson
The late-great comedian and activist Paul Mooney said, “the Black man in America is the most copied man on this planet, bar none. Everybody wants to be a nigger, but nobody wants to be a nigger.” He’s damn right. We Black people know this all too well. And even though the Black man is the “most copied” man in the world, he is also the “most disrespected,” and it starts with one damn word. The “politically correct” reference these days is to say “N-word,” but everyone knows they say it loud and proud as often as they can – NIGGER – a word White Supremacist racists derived from a word originally used to classify our race – NEGRO. Negro is not an ugly word, but because of the way that racists have turned it into a negative, Black folks have been moving away from it so
much that we have gotten confused with who the hell we are. We were once Africans, then we were Negroes, then we were colored, then Black, then African Americans, and I think – since they claim our LIVES MATTER – we are now Black again. And what about the “negro?” Well, some people want to remove the word altogether, just to remove the negative “nigger” associated with it. Can you believe, there are still plenty of public places that bear the name, starting right here in the Lone Star State. The word “Negro” appears in dozens of places across Texas. Although the Texas Legislature passed a law three decades earlier that would rename the locations after prominent Black Americans, it was blocked by the U.S. Board for Geographic Names. The N-Word cont’d page 3
HONORING GEORGE FLOYD
By: Nevaeh Richardson
On May 25, 2020, the world watched as George Floyd was killed by former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin, who knelt on Floyd’s neck for more than nine minutes. Floyd’s death sparked world-wide protest against police brutality and white supremacy. Houston is paying tribute to Floyd, the longtime resident, with a new park memorial on the corner of Alabama and Napoleon in Greater Third Ward. The owner of the land, Gertrude Stone, dedicated the park to Floyd. The memorial is right across from the “Black Lives Matter” mural at Jack Yates Senior High School, where Floyd attended. “This park is for the community,” said organizer Jack Floyd cont’d Stone. “This park and the efpage 7
“OUR VOTE AND OUR MONEY ARE THE TWO MOST POWERFUL THINGS WE HAVE. BE CAREFUL WHO YOU GIVE THEM TO.” - ROY DOUGLAS MALONSON