by Christine A. Scheller | Apr 13, 2012 | Feature, Headline News |
Superhero Mayor: Newark Mayor Cory Booker saves neighbor from fiery blaze.
A “come to Jesus moment” is how the mayor of Newark, New Jersey, Cory Booker, described the experience of saving his neighbor from a fiery blaze last night. “I feel a sense of gratitude today to God that I’m here and still feeling kind of like I had my proverbial ‘come to Jesus’ moment in my life,” Booker said at a press conference today.
The New Jersey Star-Leger reported that the fire started “shortly before the mayor arrived home after a television interview” last night and that “five people were taken to the hospital for treatment: the mayor, a woman from the house and three members of his security detail.” Booker was treated for smoke inhalation and second-degree burns to his hand. The neighbor was listed in stable condition this morning at Saint Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, New Jersey, with burns to her back and neck, according to The Star-Ledger.
Booker said he did not feel “bravery,” but “terror” when he thought he might not find the woman or get out of the house alive, even though he had pulled rank on the security detail who tried to stop him from executing a citizen rescue. “I really feel thankful to God, because just when I was falling down, trying to find somewhere to breathe, I finally heard her and found an opening where I could grab her,” Booker said. “Today is a surreal day for me. Everything has taken on a sense of depth to it. I think sometimes the biggest gratitude in life is to be able to put your feet on the ground and look at the world and say I’m still here. I’m very, very happy that this family that’s been so good to me over the years, that they’re all safe and sound.”
In response to the mayor’s heroism, The Atlantic published a “Super Mayor” quiz, Mashable posted a funny superhero mashup, and a Twitter meme broke out under the hashtag #corybookerstories. It included tweets like: “When Chuck Norris has nightmares, Cory Booker turns on the light & sits with him until he falls back asleep,” by @MilesGrant, “Cory Booker doesn’t tap into the Force, the Force taps into Cory Booker,” by @LordPalpatine, and “After the incident, Smoke was treated for Cory Booker exposure,” by @ZandarVTS.
I added my own tweet, which said, “@CoryBooker stopped to pick up my pen after delivering State of the City 2012, LOL.” It was no joke. I took note of the mayor’s kindness in the midst of the rollicking public event at which I conducted an on-the-fly interview with him for UrbanFaith because it struck me as a demonstration of habitual, unconscious selflessness when he did it. The parable of the faithful and unfaithful servants in Matthew 25: 14-28 came to mind then and again this morning when I heard news of his heroism. In the parable, the servant who has been faithful in the small things is affirmed by the Lord and put in charge of many. This is one more Cory Booker story that makes me wonder what God has in store for the passionate, energetic mayor of Newark—especially now that he’s lived through what he describes as a real-life “come to Jesus” moment.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ol38bIvFGcY&w=560&h=315]
by Christine A. Scheller | Apr 12, 2012 | Feature, Headline News |
Prayer made an appearance at Special Prosecutor Angela Corey's Press Conference announcing the arrest of George Zimmerman.
Prayer is the first thing Florida Special Prosecutor Angela Corey and her team did when they met with the parents of Trayvon Martin some three weeks ago, she said at a press conference last night announcing that George Zimmerman had been arrested on second-degree murder charges in Martin’s death.
Wearing a large gold cross around her neck, Corey said, “After meeting with Trayvon’s parents that first Monday night after we got appointed in this case … the first thing we did was pray with them. We opened our meeting in prayer.”
Corey did not make any promises to Martin’s parents, she said. “In fact, we specifically talked about if criminal charges do not come out of this, what can we help you do to make sure your son’s death is not in vain? And they were very kind and very receptive to that,” said Corey.
She thanked “all of those people across this country who have sent positive energy and prayers our way” and asked them to “continue to pray” for Trayvon’s family and for her team. “Remember, it is Trayvon’s family that are our constitutional victims and have the right to know the critical stages of these proceedings,” said Corey.
At a separate press conference, Trayvon’s mother, Sybrina Fulton, thanked God and Jesus for Zimmerman’s arrest. “We wanted nothing more, nothing less,” she said. Fulton also expressed gratitude toward supporters, saying, “I just want to speak from my heart to your heart because a heart has no color. It’s not black; it’s not white. It’s red, and I want to say thank you from my heart to your heart.”
Likewise, Corey addressed the racial tensions inherent in this case, saying, “Those of us in law enforcement are committed to justice for every race, every gender, every person of any persuasion whatsoever.”
Speaking after Fulton, Trayvon’s father, Tracy Martin, said, “We [have] a long way to go and we have faith. The first time we marched, I looked to the sky and I just told myself, ‘When I walk, I will walk by faith.’ We will continue to walk by faith. We will continue to hold hands on this journey: White, Black, Hispanic, Latino.”
Zimmerman’s attorney, Mark O’Mara, did not invoke faith at his press conference, but said his client is “troubled by everything that has happened.” It is perhaps ironic that he also said “it must be frightening” for Zimmerman to not be able to go into a 7-11 because of “hatred” directed against him given the fact that Martin was reportedly returning from a 7-11 when Zimmerman shot him.
O’Mara said his client will plead not-guilty and he will ask for bond to be set at a level Zimmerman’s family can afford. They are not people of means, O’Mara said. He has advised his client to “stay calm” going forward.
Corey said her office does not “prosecute by public pressure or by petition,” but “based on the facts of any given case, as well as the laws of the state of Florida.” A CBS News article describes her as a tough, tenacious litigator who ran for and won her boss’ job as state’s attorney after he fired her.
“The Supreme Court has defined our role on numerous occasions as prosecutors that we are not only ministers of justice, we are seekers of the truth, and we stay true to that mission,” she said at the press conference.
She also said her office is “equally committed to justice” for both Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman. “We will scrupulously adhere to our ethical obligations and to the rules of evidence in presenting this case,” said Corey.
The decision to charge Zimmerman was made last week and the Sanford Police Department investigation was ongoing when Florida governor Rick Scott assigned her to take over the case, she said. If convicted, the maximum sentence Zimmerman could receive is life in prison, but Corey said she will not decide what penalty to seek until after the case has been tried.
O’Mara said Zimmerman is “concerned about getting a fair trial” in central Florida given how “high” emotions are running against him. Asked why he took the case after Zimmerman dropped his previous attorneys, O’Mara said, “It’s what I do. … Mr. Zimmerman needs a very good and focused defense, so we’re going to build him one.” Florida’s “stand your ground” law will be a facet of Zimmerman’s defense, O’Mara said, but he conceded there are “troublesome portions” to it. “We are now going to have discussions and conversations about that as a state. Right now it’s the law of Florida,” he said.
In an interview this morning with the Today show, Fulton said she believes her son’s death was an accident. “I believe that it just got out of control, and [Zimmerman] couldn’t turn the clock back,” she said. How her use of the word “accident” will impact legal proceedings and public opinion now that Zimmerman has been charged with murder is anybody’s guess.
Update: Sybrina Fulton released a statement this afternoon through her attorney stating that her “accident” comment was “mischaracterized” by the media. “When I referenced the word ‘accident’ today with regard to Trayvon’s death, in NO way did I mean the shooting was an accident. We believe that George Zimmerman stalked my son and murdered him in cold blood. The ‘accident’ I was referring to was the fact that George Zimmerman and my son ever crossed paths.”
What do you think?
Will public emotion settle down now that Zimmerman has been arrested?
by Christine A. Scheller | Apr 11, 2012 | Feature, Headline News |
Romney Ignores Black Voters
CALCULATED RISK: Can Mitt Romney win if he ignores Black voters? (Photo: Gage Skidmore)
Now that Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum has dropped out of the race, an Obama/Romney contest is all but inevitable. With that inevitability come questions about how the candidates are doing with black voters.
In an article published today,The Daily Beast reported that there are no African-Americans in the “top ranks” of the Romney campaign and his most prominent black endorsement to date may be from Aubrey Fenton, a former Burlington County New Jersey freeholder. The article also said that the two black Republicans in Congress (Tim Scott and Allan West) have yet to endorse the Republican front-runner.
“Romney, running against the first black president, has no chance of winning most African-American voters. But neglecting to court them at all sends the wrong message to swing voters, said political players and observers. Romney’s problem, they said, isn’t that blacks aren’t buying his message but that he hasn’t bothered to sell it to them,” the article said.
Romney Refuses to Address Mormon Race History
Romney may also have a Mormon problem when it comes to African Americans. Last week, at a Wisconsin town hall meeting, there was a “tense moment” between Romney and a Ron Paul supporter who questioned him about his views of inter-racial marriage based on teachings in the Book of Mormon, ABC News reported.
Referring to a passage that links black skin with a Canaanite curse, 28-year-old Bret Hatch asked Romney if he believes it is “a sin for a white man to marry and procreate with a black?” “No,” Romney “responded sternly,” according to ABC News, before turning away from Hatch.
And today, in a strongly worded article at blackamericaweb.com, Michael H. Cottman asks where the “tough questions” from black Republicans are on this issue.
“They should hold Romney’s feet to the fire instead of giving him a free pass. Many blacks view the Mormon church as racist and the African-Americans who make up only one percent of the six million Mormans in the United States are hard-pressed to convince critics otherwise,” said Cottman.
President Obama Will Use Mormon Issue Against Romney
Cottman also said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) is predicting that the Obama campaign will use Romney’s Mormon faith against him in the presidential campaign, but President Obama may have his own problems with African Americans. Some, including Thy Black Man staff writer Dr. Boyce Watkins, are asking where Obama’s Black campaign workers are and why African Americans haven’t received more government contracts from the Democratic National Convention, given the fact that an overwhelming majority of them voted for the president in 2008.
“If we can’t figure out exactly and specifically how large numbers of African Americans are benefiting from the success of elected officials that we support, then we may want to reconsider whether or not we are wasting our votes,” said Watkins.
Black Mormons Defend Church
As to the Black Mormon issue, last year New York Times religion columnist Mark Oppenheimer met with a group of some 300 black Mormons who defended their faith. He also talked to Harvard scholar Max Perry Mueller, who was writing a dissertation on African-Americans and the Mormon church at the time. Mueller told Oppenheimber that “the church has ‘made a very sincere effort’ to welcome blacks, but that so far few American-born blacks have joined the church.” He also said “‘the idea that Mormons’ were until recently ‘exceptionally exclusionary or racist is probably unfair'” given the racist histories of other religious groups.
Christians Used ‘Curse of Cain’ to Justify Slavery
For more on that, Wikipedia’s article on the “Curse and mark of Cain” is a place to start. It refers to a 1998 Los Angeles Times article that reminds readers that the Mormon church was not alone in connecting the curse of Cain with black skin.
“In the past, Mormons as well as other churches believed that Africans were descendants of the biblical personages Cain and Ham, who, according to the Bible, displeased God and were cursed. … Over time, the curses on Ham and Cain came to be associated with black skin and were used as a justification for slavery–and, in the case of the Mormon church, one rationale for denying its priesthood to blacks.”
What do you think?
Should Mitt Romney address his church’s racist past? And, how would you feel about the Obama campaign using Romney’s faith against him in the campaign?
by Christine A. Scheller | Apr 6, 2012 | Feature, Headline News |
RACE BAITING?: Southern Baptist ethicist Richard Land. (Photo: Baptist Press News)
Just when the Southern Baptist Convention is making strides in its efforts to make black folks feel more at home in the denomination, along comes Richard Land, president of its Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission, to throw an obstacle onto the road to racial harmony by accusing President Obama of the worst kind of race baiting.
On his March 31 radio show, Land said the president is “aiding and abetting” “race hustlers” like the Revs. Al Sharpton, Louis Farrakhan, and Jesse Jackson in fomenting violence in response to the Trayvon Martin shooting.
“This situation is getting out of hand and there’s going to be violence. And, when there is violence, it’s going to be Jesse Jackson’s fault, and it’s going to be Al Sharpton’s fault, it’s going to be Louis Farrakhan’s fault, and to a certain degree it’s going to be President Obama’s fault,” said Land. “It was Mr. Obama who turned this tragedy into a national issue. He should have learned from the Cambridge, Massachusetts, police incident to stay out of these issues until the facts are clear, but he urged Americans to engage in soul searching, and then he said, ‘If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon Martin.’ The president’s aides claim he was showing compassion for the victim’s family. In reality, he poured gasoline on the racialist fires under pressure from the Congressional Black Caucus.”
In an interview with The Tennessean, the Rev. Maxie Miller, “a Florida Baptist Convention expert in African-American church planting,” said he had never before been embarrassed to be a Southern Baptist or a black Southern Baptist. “I’m embarrassed because of the words that man has stated,” said Miller, who reportedly lives 90 minutes away from Sanford, Florida, where Martin was shot.
“I think the convention is doing a great job with diversity … but Land’s comments definitely will make my work harder — encouraging African-Americans to be a part of Southern Baptist Convention life,” Miller said.
Land’s critique wasn’t only directed at President Obama. He said it will be U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder’s fault if violence breaks out in response to $10,000 “Wanted: Dead or Alive” bounty flyers for alleged shooter George Zimmerman’s “capture.”
“Until Mr. Holder and the justice department do something about this, they’re going to continue to do it and when they end up killing somebody, it’s going to be Mr. Holder’s fault,” said Land.
He identified the group who distributed the flyers as “The Black Panthers,” but Mediaite reported that a group calling itself the New Black Panther Party is responsible. “The New Black Panthers are not affiliated with the original Black Panther Party in any way. In fact, leaders of the original Panthers have denounced the NBPP, even suing them for use of the name, and stating that the New Black Panthers operate on ‘hatred of white people.’ The NBPP has been designated a ‘hate group; by the Southern Poverty Law Center, and the Anti-Defamation League.”
Land also said a “failure of leadership on the part of African American leadership in this country” is to blame for inflaming the situation and said “the media” has “shamelessly exploited” it.
What do you think?
Should Christian ethicisit Richard Land take a hard look in the ‘race baiting’ mirror or is there some validity in his critique?
by Christine A. Scheller | Apr 4, 2012 | Feature, Headline News |
One L. Goh, the 43-year-old South Korean immigrant who is charged with killing seven people Monday at a tiny Christian College in Oakland, California, reportedly felt picked on by members of his mostly Korean school community.
“People at the school ‘disrespected him, laughed at him,’ Oakland Police chief Howard Jordan said, according to the Associated Press. “They made fun of his lack of English speaking skills. It made him feel isolated compared to the other students.”
Oikos University nursing instructor Romie Delariman disputed that assertion, telling the San Francisco Chronicle that Goh “can’t deal with women” and is “mentally unstable” and “paranoid.”
Jordan said Goh had gone to the school in search of a female administrator who he felt had done him wrong, but she wasn’t there when the shooting took place. He also said Goh was expelled in January for “unspecified behavior problems” and “anger management” issues. Goh, thus far, has shown no remorse for the killings, investigators said.
The Link Between Bullying and Suicide
While few would accept or condone Goh’s explanation that mistreatment led him to kill seven people, injure three others, and traumatize an entire community, the narrative that bullying causes young people to kill themselves has become a widely accepted one in recent years.
The suicide of Rutgers University freshman Tyler Clementi, for example, became a rallying cry for national anti-bullying campaigns in the fall of 2010. Clementi killed himself shortly after his roommate, Dharun Ravi, used a web-cam to spy on him and another man as they engaged in an intimate encounter. Ravi then took to Twitter to invite others to watch a second hook-up.
Late last month, 20-year-old Ravi was convicted of bias intimidation, invasion of privacy, and tampering with the police investigation. He faces a prison sentence of up to 10 years and possible deportation back to his native India. Ravi was not charged in connection with Clementi’s death, but it is unlikely that he would have been indicted apart from it and Clementi’s family sounds firm in the belief that Ravi’s actions caused Clementi’s suicide.
In his first public statements (published at the New Jersey Star Ledger) on the case, Ravi insisted that he didn’t have a problem with his roommate’s sexuality and said he didn’t take a plea deal that would have spared him jail time because he could never get up in court and concede to the charge of bias intimidation.
“I’m never going to regret not taking the plea,” Ravi said. “If I took the plea, I would have had to testify that I did what I did to intimidate Tyler and that would be a lie. I won’t ever get up there and tell the world I hated Tyler because he was gay, or tell the world I was trying to hurt or intimidate him because it’s not true.”
A lengthy New Yorker profile of the roommates asserts that it is anything but clear that Clementi was “bullied to death.”
The Problem With Simplistic Narratives
So, what’s the harm in raising the alarm about bullying? Controversy surrounding a new anti-bullying film provides some clues.
At a website for the new documentary Bully, readers are told that 13 million children will be bullied this year and 3 million will miss school because they don’t feel safe there.The movie has won rave reviews and is being widely advocated as an anti-bullying resource for children, even though it initially received an R-rating for language. But Slate writer Emily Bazelon, who has been reporting on high profile bullying cases for the past few years, worries that the film could do “some good” and “a lot of harm” because of what it doesn’t say about mental illness in its narrative of main character Tyler Long’s suicide.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1g9RV9OKhg&w=560&h=315]
Bazelon said what is missing from the storyline is Long’s diagnosis of ADHD, bipolar disorder, and Asperger’s Syndrome and the fact that his parents didn’t disclose their concerns that their son might be suicidal to counselors. Ann Haas, a senior project specialist for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, shared these concerns, telling Bazelon that leaving Long’s mental health history out of the film was an “egregious omission.”
“The filmmakers had the opportunity to present bullying as a trigger, as one factor that played a role in a young person’s suicide. But to draw a direct line without referencing anything else—I’m appalled, honestly. That is hugely, hugely unfortunate,” said Haas.
Incomplete pictures like the one painted of Long’s suicide in Bully and of Clementi’s suicide in the press have the potential to create a risk of suicide contagion, which Bazelon describes as “the documented phenomenon of people mimicking suicidal behavior in light of media representations.”
“One message of this move is: ‘Bullying kills’—as if it’s a normal response to kill yourself, when of course most people who are bullied don’t do that. Young people who feel bullied could harken back to the movie, and it could be a powerful draw to suicide for them. If Tyler had been accurately portrayed as a kid with mental health challenges that were very hard for him to manage, he wouldn’t seem so attractive,” said Haas.
The filmmakers disputed Bazelon’s critique in a statement to Entertainment Weekly, saying it downplays clear evidence that Long was bullied in the “days, weeks, and months before his death,” but Slate’s deputy editor defended it, saying Bazelon was only pointing out the potential harm in a one-sided, simplistic approach to the subject.
What do you think?
Could bullying cause someone to commit murder or suicide, or do these simplistic narratives have the potential to do more harm than good?
