AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL: ETHIOPIAN TROOPS COMMIT ATROCITIES IN SOMALIA

 

 

ASSOCIATED PRESS

 

 

May 6, 2008 —  A leading human rights group on Tuesday accused Ethiopian troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people’s throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.

 

 

 

By MALKHADIR M. MUHUMED

 

 

NAIROBI, Kenya _ A leading human rights group on Tuesday accused Ethiopian troops in Somalia of killing civilians and committing atrocities, including slitting people’s throats, gouging out eyes and gang-raping women.

 

In a new report, Amnesty International detailed chilling witness accounts of indiscriminate killings in the Horn of Africa country and called on the international community to stop the bloodshed.

 

Ethiopia’s government said the report was unbalanced and “categorically wrong.”

 

The London-based rights group said testimony it received suggested all parties to Somalia’s conflict have committed war crimes. But it singled out Ethiopian troops, who are in the country to back Somalia’s U.N.-sponsored government, for some of the worst violations.

Somalia’s shaky transitional government invited Ethiopian forces into the country to help it battle Islamic insurgents. Somalia has been torn apart by years of violence between the militias of rival clan warlords.

The rights group said it obtained scores of reports of killings by Ethiopian troops that Somalis have described as “slaughtering like goats.” In one case, “a young child’s throat was slit by Ethiopian soldiers in front of the child’s mother,” the report says.

 

Ethiopia’s Information Minister Berhanu Hailu said the report was “totally unfounded.”

 

“Normally when they report they do not balance it out. They have to go and see the reality for themselves. They shouldn’t report from abroad saying this is happening,” he told The Associated Press in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa.

 

Amnesty said some 6,000 civilians were reported killed and more than 600,000 were forced to flee their homes in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, last year.

 

“The people of Somalia are being killed, raped, tortured. Looting is widespread and entire neighborhoods are being destroyed,” Michelle Kagari, Amnesty’s deputy director for Africa, said in a statement from Nairobi that accompanied the report.

 

The report quotes testimony from some 75 witnesses as well as scores of workers from non-governmental organizations. People are identified only by their first names to protect them from retaliation.

 

In one testimony, Haboon, 56, said her neighbor’s 17-year-old daughter was raped by Ethiopian troops. The girl’s brothers tried to defend their sister, but the soldiers beat them and gouged their eyes out with a bayonet, Haboon was quoted as telling Amnesty.

 

“The testimony we received strongly suggests that war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity have been committed by all parties to the conflict in Somalia and no one is being held accountable,” Kagari said.

 

Somalia has been mired in chaos since 1991, when warlords overthrew longtime dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and then turned on each other. Last year, Islamist militants took control of most of southern Somalia, including Mogadishu. Troops from neighboring Ethiopia deployed in December 2006 and ejected the Islamists from the capital.

 

But since then, Mogadishu has been caught up in a guerrilla war between the government and its Ethiopian allies and the Islamist insurgents.

 

Amnesty urged the U.N., African Union and others to act to halt the violence.

 

 

 

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

 

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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL’S REPORT:

ROUTINE KILLINGS OF CIVILIANS IN SOMALIA

Transitional Federal Government soldiers on their truck in Bur Haqaba, Somalia

© APGraphicsBank

6 May 2008

The dire human rights and humanitarian crisis facing the people of Somalia has been revealed in a groundbreaking new Amnesty International report.

First-hand testimony from scores of traumatized survivors of the conflict is included in the report, which exposes the violations and abuses they have suffered at the hands of a complex mix of perpetrators.

These include Ethiopian and Transitional Federal Government (TFG) troops on the one hand, as well as armed groups on the other. For many civilians, there is nowhere to go to escape the violence.

“The people of Somalia are being killed, raped, tortured; looting is widespread and entire neighbourhoods are being destroyed,” said Michelle Kagari, Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Africa Programme.

Witnesses told Amnesty International of an increasing incidence of what it locally termed as “slaughtering” or “killing like goats” by Ethiopian troops, referring to killing by slitting the throat. The victims of these killings are often left lying in pools of blood in the streets until armed fighters, including snipers, move out of the area and relatives can collect their bodies.

“The testimony we received strongly suggests that war crimes and possibly crimes against humanity have been committed by all parties to the conflict in Somalia – and no one is being held accountable,” said Michelle Kagari.
 
“The human rights and humanitarian situation in Somalia is growing worse by the day. This report represents the voices of ordinary Somalis, and their plea to the international community to take action to end the attacks against them, including those committed by internationally-supported TFG and Ethiopian forces.”

Security in many parts of Mogadishu is non-existent and the entire population of the city bears the scars of having witnessed or experienced egregious violations of human rights and international humanitarian law.

“There is no safety for civilians, wherever they run. Those fleeing violence in Mogadishu are attacked on the road and those lucky enough to reach a camp or settlement face further violence and dire conditions.”

The Transitional Federal Government, as the recognized government of Somalia, bears the primary responsibility for protecting the human rights of the Somali people. However, the Ethiopian military, which is taking a leading role in backing the TFG, also bears responsibility.

“Attacks on civilians by all parties must stop immediately. Also, the international community must bear its own responsibility for not putting consistent pressure on the TFG or the Ethiopian government to stop their armed forces from committing egregious human rights violations.”

Amnesty International has urged that the capacity of the UN Political Office for Somalia be strengthened, and that AMISOM – and any succeeding UN peacekeeping mission – be mandated to protect civilians and include a strong human rights component with the capacity to investigate human rights violations. The organization has also called for the UN arms embargo on Somalia to be strengthened.

Somalia: Routinely Targeted: Attacks on Civilians in Somalia

Download:

• PDF:  http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/AFR52/006/2008/en/1162a792-186e-11dd-92b4-6b0c2ef9d02f/afr520062008eng.pdf

Index Number: AFR 52/006/2008
Date Published: 6 May 2008
Categories: Somalia

SOURCE:  http://www.amnesty.org/en/news-and-updates/report/routine-killings-civilians-somalia-20080506

SAVE THE DATE: SULLIVAN SUMMIT, JUNE 2-6, 2008: TANZANIA SUMMIT TO DRAW AFRICA AND BLACK AMERICAN LEADERS

ASSOCIATED PRESS

May 6, 2008 —  More than a thousand prominent African-American leaders, executives, entertainers and activists will head to Tanzania for a summit with their African counterparts to help raise living standards on the world’s poorest continent.

 

 

The heads of states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are seen at the Mulungushi International Conference Center in Lusaka, Zambia, Saturday, April 12, 2008. Southern African leaders are holding an emergency summit to find a resolution to Zimbabwe’s deepening political crisis, but Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe has refused to attend, underlining his growing isolation in the region and the world. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe)

 

 

 

By EDITH M. LEDERER

 

NEW YORK  _ More than a thousand prominent African-American leaders, executives, entertainers and activists will head to Tanzania for a summit with their African counterparts to help raise living standards on the world’s poorest continent.

 

Organizers said Monday that U.S. participants in the Sullivan Summit next month will include executives from the Coca-Cola Co., General Electric, Chevron Corp. and Procter and Gamble. Civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, comedian Chris Tucker and professional basketball player Kelenna Azubuike also plan to attend.

 

“This is kind of a poor man’s African Davos,” said summit co-chairman Andrew Young, referring to the annual economic forum in the Swiss mountain resort. “It’s a potpourri of ideas and projects and our efforts to respond to the needs of Africa.”

 

Young, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and mayor of Atlanta, said the meeting will focus on topics ranging from climate change and energy needs to jobs for young people, improving health care and coping with rising food prices.

 

The June 2-6 gathering in Arusha, Tanzania will give American businesses “a good sounding board as to what ideas and what products, and frankly what countries, are most susceptible and ready for investment” in Africa, he added.

There are 4.5 million African-Americans whose ancestors came to the United States during the slave trade and more than 5 million Africans who have come to the U.S. since 1970 as students or political refugees, Young said.

 

Tanzania’s U.N. Ambassador Augustine Mahiga called the summits serve as “a bridge over the Atlantic, connecting Africa and the Americas — a multipurpose bridge … (to) serve political, technical and economic ends.”

 

“It is time to address the problems of poverty, ignorance and diseases with the help of the Americans — African-Americans who left the continent in disarray, in chaos, as slaves — and it is a time to rekindle the roots and the bones of a common origin and a new era of solidarity,” Mahiga said.

 

The summits began in 1991 and were the brainchild of Rev. Leon H. Sullivan, a civil rights crusader who called for companies doing business in South Africa to give opportunities to their black workers — an initiative that helped end apartheid.

 

 

___

On the Net:

www.thesullivanfoundation.org

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

TREASURE TROVE FOUND IN 500-YEAR-OLD SHIPWRECK OFF THE COAST OF NAMIBIA

 

ASSOCIATED PRESS

 

 

 

May 2, 2008 —  The ship was laden with tons of copper ingots, elephant tusks, gold coins — and cannons to fend off pirates. But it had nothing to protect it from the fierce weather off a particularly bleak stretch of inhospitable African coast, and it sank 500 years ago.

 

 

 

In this undated photo released on Thursday May 1, 2008 and supplied by Namdeb Diamond Corporation, shows a close-up of a Spanish gold coin, three Portuguese silver coins and a pair of brass dividers that were found from a shipwreck off the south west coast of Namibia. All the coins were minted in the late 1400s or early 1500s, and the dividers were used for measuring distance on a map during navigation. The reverse of the gold coin depicts Ferdinand and Isabella, two Spanish monarchs of the time. Namdeb Diamond Corp. says geologists have stumbled on a shipwreck that could date back to Africa’s earliest explorers. It’s loaded with cannons, gold coins, navigational instruments and other treasures. The company says the ship could date back to the late 1400s and be the contemporary of vessels used by Vasco de Gama and Columbus. (AP Photo/Namdeb Diamond Corporation) ** EDITORIAL USE ONLY **

 

 

 

 

Associated Press Writer

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa _ The ship was laden with tons of copper ingots, elephant tusks, gold coins — and cannons to fend off pirates. But it had nothing to protect it from the fierce weather off a particularly bleak stretch of inhospitable African coast, and it sank 500 years ago.

 

Now it has been found, stumbled upon by De Beers geologists prospecting for diamonds off Namibia.

 

“If you’re mining on the coast, sooner or later you’ll find a wreck,” archaeologist Dieter Noli said in an interview Thursday.

 

Namdeb Diamond Corp., a joint venture of the government of Namibia and De Beers, first reported the April 1 find in a statement Wednesday, and planned a news conference in the Namibian capital next week.

 

The company had cleared and drained a stretch of seabed, building an earthen wall to keep the water out so geologists could work. Noli said one of the geologists saw a few ingots, but had no idea what they were. Then the team found what looked like cannon barrels.

 

The geologists stopped the brutal earth-moving work of searching for diamonds and sent photos to Noli, who had done research in the Namibian desert since the mid-1980s and has advised De Beers since 1996 on the archaeological impact of its operations in Namibia.

 

The find “was what I’d been waiting for, for 20 years,” Noli said. “Understandably, I was pretty excited. I still am.”

 

Noli’s original specialty was the desert, but because of Namdeb’s offshore explorations, he had been preparing for the possibility of a wreck, even learning to dive.

 

After the discovery, he brought in Bruno Werz, an expert in the field, to help research the wreck. Noli has studied maritime artifacts with Werz, who was one of his instructors at the University of Cape Town.

 

Judging from the notables depicted on the hoard of Spanish and Portuguese coins, and the type of cannons and navigational equipment, the ship went down in the late 1400s or early 1500s, around the time Vasco de Gama and Columbus were plying the waters of the New World.

 

It was, Noli said, “a period when Africa was just being opened up, when the whole world was being opened up.”

 

He compared the remnants — ingots, ivory, coins, coffin-sized timber fragments — to evidence at a crime scene.

 

“The surf would have pounded that wreck to smithereens,” he said. “It’s not like ‘Pirates of the Caribbean,’ with a ship more or less intact.”

 

He and Werz are trying to fit the pieces into a story. They divide their time between inventorying the find in Namibia and doing research in museums and libraries in Cape Town, South Africa, from where Noli spoke by phone Thursday.

 

Eventually, they will go to Portugal or Spain to search for records of a vessel with similar cargo that went missing.

 

“You don’t turn a skipper loose with a cargo of that value and have no record of it,” Noli said.

The wealth on board is intriguing. Noli said the large amount of copper could mean the ship had been sent by a government looking for material to build cannons. Trade in ivory was usually controlled by royal families, another indication the ship was on official business.

 

On the other hand, why did the captain have so many coins? Shouldn’t they have been traded for the ivory and copper?

 

“Either he did a very, very good deal. Or he was a pirate,” Noli said. “I’m convinced we’ll find out what the ship was and who the captain was.”

 

What brought the vessel down may remain a mystery. But Noli has theories, noting the stretch of coast was notorious for fierce storms and disorienting fogs.

In later years, sailors with sophisticated navigational tools avoided it. The only tools found on the wreck were astrolabes, which can be used to determine only how far north or south you have sailed.

 

“Sending a ship toward Africa in that period, that was venture capital in the extreme,” Noli said. “These chaps were very much on the edge as far as navigation. It was still very difficult for them to know where they were.”

 

Noli has found signs that worms were at work on the ship’s timber, and sheets of lead used to patch holes, indications the ship was old when it went down.

 

Imagine a leaky, overladen ship caught in a storm. The copper ingots, shaped like sections of a sphere, would have sat snug, he said. But the tusks — some 50 have been found — could have shifted, tipping the ship.

 

“And down you go,” Noli said, “weighed down by your treasure.”

 

 

 

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

 

EDCOUCH, TEXAS ABOLISHES OLD SEGREGATION LAW

05/06/2008

ASSOCIATED PRESS

 

 

A South Texas town has abolished a segregation law seven decades after it was enacted.

 

The Board of Aldermen unanimously voted Monday to abolish an ordinance that banned “Spanish or Mexican” residents who were not servants or maids from occupying “any building on the American side or portion” of Edcouch. The ordinance prescribed a fine of up to $100 for violators.

 

Some 50 people showed up to Sgt. Juan M. Rodriguez Pavilion to watch city officials abolish the segregation law.

 

“We should have gotten rid of it a long time ago,” said Alderman Rojelio Garica. “It was there, but (people) just forgot about it.”

 

When the rule was enacted on Dec. 9, 1931, a virtual line was drawn along Farm-to-Market Road 1015, cutting through the center of the city.

Hidalgo County, where Edcouch,Texas is located.

 

“It was discriminatory,” Mayor Jose Guzman said. “At the time, our city leaders didn’t believe in equal rights.”

 

Now, the town is majority Hispanic and the segregation line no longer exists. The 2000 Census found more than 97 percent of Edcouch’s population was Latino.

 

 

___

Information from: The Monitor, http://www.themonitor.com

 

END GAMES: HOW THE BLACK PAWNS GOT PUSHED OFF THE CHESS BOARD

END GAMES

By Michael C. Dawson | TheRoot.com

 

Getty Images for DAGOC

 

 

May 6, 2008–The Democratic Party’s primary race has reached a dangerous stage for black people.  It has come to this: Both the Obama and Clinton campaigns are apparently willing to sacrifice black citizenship rights in order to win the Democratic nomination for president. 

On one hand, we have Sen. Clinton‘s supporters being charged with intentionally trying to disenfranchise black voters in North Carolina and elsewhere through voter suppression tactics taken from Karl Rove‘s playbook. 

 

But Sen. Obama is playing his own brand of risky politics. As he works to maintain white support, he is forgetting his black base. Just a week ago he urged voters to “respect” a New York judge’s racist verdict allowing the police killers of Sean Bell to walk. His message was not unlike Booker T. Washington‘s admonishment to black Atlantans a century ago to respect the law in the face of a deadly pogrom.  Black rights were sacrificed in the name of electoral expediency. And Obama is resorting to the same expediency now.

 

Just pay attention to the words. Here is Obama on April 25, in response to the verdict in the Bell case:

 

 

Well, look, obviously there was a tragedy in New York. I said at the time that without benefit of all the facts before me, it looked like a possible case of excessive force.  Now, the judge has made his ruling. And, you know, we are a nation of laws. And so we respect the verdict that came down.  I think the most important thing for people who are concerned about that shooting is to figure out how do we come together and ensure that those kinds of tragedies don’t happen again? And so my understanding is that Mayor Bloomberg, community leaders, they are going to be — the police department — they are going to be getting together to find out what changes and procedures need to take place in preventing these kind of tragic shootings. But certainly, you know, resorting to violence to express displeasure over a verdict is something that is completely unacceptable and is counterproductive. 

 —Sen. Barack Obama

 

 

Here is Booker T. Washington commenting on the anti-black Atlanta Massacre of 1906, a killing spree that started as a result of false accusations against black males who were supposedly attacking white women:

 

 

I spoke plainly against the crime of assaulting women and of resorting to lynching and mob law as a remedy for any evil….I would strongly urge that the best white people and the best colored people come together in council and use their united efforts to stop the current disorder.  I would especially urge the colored people of Atlanta and elsewhere to exercise self-control and not make the fatal mistake of retaliation. 

—Booker T. Washington  

 

 

The tactics of Senators Clinton and Obama may not seem connected. But they each signal a bankruptcy within the Democratic Party that black voters need to pay attention to.

 

In North Carolina and other states, an organization with very strong ties to the Clinton campaign has been targeting black communities with automated anonymous calls from a man calling himself “Lamont Williams,” suggesting that already registered voters are not registered and need to complete additional steps to vote legally.  According to the article at Wired.com, the organization Women’s Voices/Women Vote has agreed, in response  to North Carolina State Attorney General Roy Cooper’s demand, to stop the illegal anonymous phone calls. 

 

North Carolina’s black population, which is 22 percent of the state’s population, is becoming increasingly critical and what was supposed to be an easy Obama win is becoming uncomfortably close. That Clinton supporters would stoop this low, that they would use the very same tactics that Karl Rove and his gang of thugs used in Florida to steal the 2000 presidential election from the American people, is shameful and puts them in the same category as Republicans who,in states such as Georgia, are trying to bring back Jim Crow-era methods of black disenfranchisement, such as a new version of the poll tax.  

 

In the meantime, Sen. Obama has apparently voluntarily fallen off the tightrope that Marjorie Valbrun brilliantly describes in her article.  The Senator’s comments on Sean Bell’s killing, even more than his comments during the current Rev. Wright debacle, show the degree to which, in a few short weeks, he has abandoned the already dubious racial “even-handedness” of his Philadelphia speech (see my previous article ), in order to reassure white voters that he believes in law and order and is not a “militant” like his former pastor. 

 

The Senator found it necessary to denounce his former minister for making statements that, in the main, are supported by large segments of the black community. (Most blacks’ criticism of Rev. Wright has to do with the real harm that Wright’s comments had on Obama’s campaign, not with the substance of Wright’s remarks.). And yet, Obama did not find it necessary to condemn a justice system that ­still does not punish agents of the state who kill black men and women whose only crime is being black. (In Chicago we have had black women shot down in the same manner as Sean Bell.) I will not respect a verdict that once again demonstrates, all too clearly, the continued lack of full citizenship rights for black people in this country. 

 

 

Like Booker T. Washington a century earlier, Obama chose to emphasize the need to be “calm” over expressing outrage at yet another deadly taking of black life.  He, too, has taken the electorally “safe” road.  

 

Where do we go from here?  The more I learn about Sen. McCain‘s political program, his friends and supporters, and his personality, the more I agree with many astute domestic and international commentators that a McCain presidency could very well be worse than the current one and very, very dangerous for our world. All of the anger I share with other black and progressive voters does not change the basic sobering fact that not only can the world not afford another four years of the current administration’s policy, it may not survive another four years. (For example, McCain is advocating kicking Russia out of the G-8, that policy is a short road back to the nuclear nightmares, and the constant armed skirmishes of the Cold War—a Cold War with both China and Russia united against the U.S. again). 

 

Switching to support for McCain at any point between now and November, as some advocate, is not an option. So where does that leave us? As for the Democratic Party’s primary, Senator Clinton‘s supporters, by embracing the tactics and policies of Republican disenfranchisers, have allied themselves with those who would like to roll back the clock on basic black voting rights.  And, as a consequence, they should not receive our support. 

 

Tactically, that leaves us one option.  The criticism of Senator Obama must continue when he takes positions that are detrimental to progressive causes and the black community.  At the same time, to many he remains the best option in a set of bad choices during a dangerous time. Others continue to believe that, despite missteps, he remains a true beacon of hope and transformation. 

 

I do not share that view, but  I accept the strategic imperative. We must elect the most viable alternative to the current administration, and then we must vigorously hold the new president accountable. To do that we must build and sustain strong and independent black and progressive movements and we must insist that the dream of  hope and transformation becomes a reality.

 

 

 

Michael C. Dawson is the John D. MacArthur Professor of Political Science at the University of Chicago. Visit him at  http://michaeldawson.net

Also on The Root:

Michael Dawson on how Obama benefitted from resurgent black nationalism in “He’s Black and We’re Proud”, why the 2008 election is “No Time for Smoke-Filled Rooms”, and how  “April 4th, 1968: Chicago Burned,” turning him into a radical.

MILDRED LOVING, MATRIARCH OF INTERRACIAL MARRIAGE, PASSES AT 68

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Published: May 5, 2008

Filed at 4:25 p.m. ET

  

RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Mildred Loving, a black woman whose challenge to Virginia’s ban on interracial marriage led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling striking down such laws nationwide, has died, her daughter said Monday.

 

Peggy Fortune said Loving, 68, died Friday at her home in rural Milford. She did not disclose the cause of death.

 

”I want (people) to remember her as being strong and brave yet humble — and believed in love,” Fortune told The Associated Press.

 

Loving and her white husband, Richard, changed history in 1967 when the U.S. Supreme Court upheld their right to marry. The ruling struck down laws banning racially mixed marriages in at least 17 states.

 

”There can be no doubt that restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the equal protection clause,” the court ruled in a unanimous decision.

 

Her husband died in 1975. Shy and soft-spoken, Loving shunned publicity and in a rare interview with The Associated Press last June, insisted she never wanted to be a hero — just a bride.

 

”It wasn’t my doing,” Loving said. ”It was God’s work.”

 

Mildred Jeter was 11 when she and 17-year-old Richard began courting, according to Phyl Newbeck, a Vermont author who detailed the case in the 2004 book, ”Virginia Hasn’t Always Been for Lovers.”

 

She became pregnant a few years later, she and Loving got married in Washington in 1958, when she was 18. Mildred told the AP she didn’t realize it was illegal.

 

”I think my husband knew,” Mildred said. ”I think he thought (if) we were married, they couldn’t bother us.”

 

But they were arrested a few weeks after they returned to Central Point, their hometown in rural Caroline County north of Richmond. They pleaded guilty to charges of ”cohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth,” according to their indictments.

 

They avoided jail time by agreeing to leave Virginia — the only home they’d known — for 25 years. They moved to Washington for several years, then launched a legal challenge by writing to Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, who referred the case to the American Civil Liberties Union.

 

Attorneys later said the case came at the perfect time — just as lawmakers passed the Civil Rights Act, and as across the South, blacks were defying Jim Crow’s hold.

 

”The law that threatened the Lovings with a year in jail was a vestige of a hateful, discriminatory past that could not stand in the face of the Lovings’ quiet dignity,” said Steven Shapiro, national legal director for the ACLU.

 

”We loved each other and got married,” she told The Washington Evening Star in 1965, when the case was pending. ”We are not marrying the state. The law should allow a person to marry anyone he wants.”

 

After the Supreme Court ruled, the couple returned to Virginia, where they lived with their children, Donald, Peggy and Sidney. Each June 12, the anniversary of the ruling, Loving Day events around the country mark the advances of mixed-race couples.

 

Richard Loving died in a car accident that also injured his wife. ”They said I had to leave the state once, and I left with my wife,” he told the Star in 1965. ”If necessary, I will leave Virginia again with my wife, but I am not going to divorce her.”

 

(Article courtesy of The New York Times:  http://www.nytimes.com )

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RELATED LINKS:

 

 

  

“I think my husband knew,” Mildred said. “I think he thought (if) we were married, they couldn’t bother us.”

 

  

No, Mildred. Because Richard loved and honored you enough to marry you, the state of Virginia hated that and persecuted you both for it. The state of Virginia would have been happy if Richard had used, impregnated and abandoned you. That would have been just fine with them. Instead, Richard was man enough to love you and give you the highest honor a man can give a woman:  marriage.

  

And what is so ironic about you both is that it was a white man and a black woman who both were instrumental in striking down this hated law that had the gall to tell whom a person could (or could not love, honor, respect and marry.) Ironically, it is fitting that the anti-miscegenation laws were struck down in the state of Virginia. Virginia, one of the southern states with the longest AML in the country. In 1691, Virginia decreed that any white person who married a black was to be forever banished from the state. Nearly three hundred years later, you and Richard successfully challenged a grand jury indictment of your marriaage charging you both with violating Virginia’s ban on interracial marriages. In a unanimous decision written by Chief Justice Earl Warren, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Virginia’s jusitification for its anti-miscegenation laws and declared race a legal irrelevancy. The justices insisted that “the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed upon  by the state.”

  

Thank you Mildred and thank you Richard, for your both standing your grounds against a state and country that for centuries and generations told all Americans that it was wrong and a sin to love and treat with kindness and respect, a black woman. Thank you Mildred and Richard for the two of you holding fast to your love of each other through hell, high water, and racist haters.

  

They lost.

  

You won.

  

With a name like Loving, how could the state of Virginia have expected to win?

  

Rest in peace, Mildred and Richard.

  

May you both have joy, peace and happiness in the next life.

  

The legacy of your brave stand has left us all the more richer.

 

SALUTARE.

 

 

Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

LOVING vs. the STATE OF VIRGINIA

 

Loving v. Virginia, 388 U.S. 1 (1967)^[1], was a landmark civil rights case in which the United States Supreme Court declared Virginia‘s anti-miscegenation statute, the “Racial Integrity Act of 1924“, unconstitutional, thereby overturning Pace v. Alabama (1883) and ending all race-based legal restrictions on marriage in the United States.

12 Key Precedents 3 Decision 4 Future implications 5 Movie 6 Death 7 See also 8 Footnotes 9 Further research 10 External links

 

FACTS:

 

 

The plaintiffs, Mildred Jeter (a woman of African and Rappahannock Native American descent, 1939 – May 2, 2008)^[2][3] and Richard Perry Loving (a white man, died 1975), were residents of the Commonwealth of Virginia who had been married in June 1958 in the District of Columbia, having left Virginia to evade the Racial Integrity Act, a state law banning marriages between any white person and a black person (there was no law banning marriage with other ethnicities as they were not seen to represent a significant enough population to be a problem). Upon their return to Caroline County, Virginia, they were charged with violation of the ban. They were charged under Section 20-58 of the Virginia Code, which prohibited interracial couples from being married out of state and then returning to Virginia, and Section 20-59, which defined “miscegenation” as a felony punishable by a prison sentence of between one and five years. On 6 January 1959, the Lovings pleaded guilty and were sentenced to one year in prison, with the sentence suspended for 25 years on condition that the couple leave the state of Virginia. The trial judge in the case, Leon Bazile, echoing Johann Friedrich Blumenbach‘s 18th-century interpretation of race, proclaimed that

 

 

“

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

”

 

 

The Lovings moved to the District of Columbia, and on November 6, 1963 they filed a motion in the state trial court to vacate the judgment and set aside the sentence on the grounds that the violated statutes ran counter to the Fourteenth Amendment. This set in motion a series of lawsuits which ultimately reached the Supreme Court. On October 28, 1964, after their motion still had not been decided, the Lovings began a class action suit in the U.S District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. On January 22, 1965, the three-judge district court decided to allow the Lovings to present their constitutional claims to the Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals. Soon to be Virginia Supreme Court Chief Justice, Harry L. Carrico wrote an opinion for the court upholding the constitutionality of the anti-miscegenation statutes and, after modifying the sentence, affirmed the criminal convictions.

 

 

Ignoring United States Supreme Court precedent, Carrico cited as authority the Virginia Supreme Court’s own decision in Naim v. Naim (1955) and also argued that the case at hand was not a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection Clause because both the white and the non-white spouse were punished equally for the “crime” of “miscegenation”, an argument similar to that made by the United States Supreme Court in 1883 in Pace v. Alabama.

 

In 1966, the Presbyterian Church took a strong stand stating that they do not condemn or prohibit interracial marriages. The church found “no theological grounds for condemning or prohibiting marriage between consenting adults merely because of racial origin”. Months before the Supreme Court ruling on Loving v. Virginia the Roman Catholic Church joined the movement, supporting interracial couples in their struggle for recognition of their right to marriage.

 

KEY PRECEDENTS:

 

Prior to Loving v. Virginia there were several monumental cases. In Pace v. Alabama (1883) the Supreme Court ruled that the conviction of an Alabama couple for interracial sex, affirmed on appeal by the Alabama Supreme Court, did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment. Interracial extramarital sex was deemed a felony, where as extramarital sex (“adultery or fornication”) was only a misdemeanor. On appeal, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the criminalization of interracial sex was not a violation of the equal protection clause because whites and non-whites were punished in equal measure for the offense of engaging in interracial sex. The court did not need to affirm the constitutionality of the ban on interracial marriage that was also part of Alabama’s anti-miscegenation law, since the plaintiff, Mr. Pace, had chosen not to appeal that section of the law. After Pace v. Alabama, the constitutionality of anti-miscegenation laws banning marriage and sex between whites and non-whites remained unchallenged until the 1920s.

 

In Kirby v. Kirby (1921), Mr. Kirby asked the state of Arizona for an annulment of his marriage. He charged that his marriage was invalid because his wife was of ‘negro’ descent, thus violating the state’s anti-miscegenation law. The Arizona Supreme Court judged Mrs. Kirby’s race by observing her physical characteristics and determined that she was of mixed race, thereby granting Mr. Kirby’s annulment (Pascoe 49-51).

 

In the Monks case (Estate of Monks, 4. Civ. 2835, Records of California Court of Appeals, Fourth district), the Superior Court of San Diego County in 1939 decided to invalidate the marriage of Marie Antoinette and Allan Monks because she was deemed to have “one eight negro blood”. The court case involved a legal challenge over the conflicting wills that had been left by the late Allan Monks, an old one in favor of a friend named Ida Lee and a newer one in favor of his wife. Lee’s lawyers charged that the marriage of the Monks, which had taken place in Arizona, was invalid under Arizona state law because Marie Antoinette was “a Negro” and Alan had been white. Despite conflicting testimony by various expert witnesses, the judge defined Mrs. Monks race by relying on the anatomical “expertise” of a surgeon. The judge ignored the arguments of an anthropologist and a biologist that it was impossible to tell a person’s race from physical characteristics. (Pascoe, p. 56).

 

Monks then challenged the Arizona anti-miscegenation law itself, taking her case to the California Court of Appeals, Fourth District. Monks’s lawyers pointed out that the anti-miscegenation law effectively prohibited Monks as a mixed-race person from marrying anyone: “As such, she is prohibited from marrying a negro or any descendant of a negro, a Mongolian or an Indian, a Malay or a Hindu, or any descendants of any of them. Likewise … as a descendant of a negro she is prohibited from marrying a Caucasian or a descendant of a Caucasian….” The Arizona anti-miscegenation statute thus prohibited Monks from contracting a valid marriage in Arizona, and was therefore an unconstitutional constraint on her liberty. The court, however, dismissed this argument as inapplicable, since the case presented involved not two mixed-race spouses but a mixed-race and a white spouse: “Under the facts presented the appellant does not have the benefit of assailing the validity of the statute.” (Pascoe, 60). Dismissing Monks’s appeal in 1942, the United States Supreme Court refused to reopen the issue.

 

The turning point came with Perez v. Sharp (1948), also known as Perez v. Lippold. In Perez, the Supreme Court of California recognized that interracial bans on marriage violated the Fourteenth Amendment of the Federal Constitution.

 

DECISION:

 

The Supreme Court overturned the convictions in a unanimous decision, dismissing the Commonwealth of Virginia’s argument that a law forbidding both white and black persons from marrying persons of another race, and providing identical penalties to white and black violators, could not be construed as racially discriminatory. The court ruled that Virginia’s anti-miscegenation statute violated both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. In its decision, the court wrote:

 

“

Marriage is one of the “basic civil rights of man,” fundamental to our very existence and survival…. To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes, classifications so directly subversive of the principle of equality at the heart of the Fourteenth Amendment, is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discrimination. Under our Constitution, the freedom to marry, or not marry, a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the State.

”

The Supreme Court concluded that anti-miscegenation laws were racist and had been enacted to perpetuate white supremacy:

 

“

There is patently no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification. The fact that Virginia prohibits only interracial marriages involving white persons demonstrates that the racial classifications must stand on their own justification, as measures designed to maintain White Supremacy.

”

Despite this Supreme Court ruling, such laws rested unenforced in several states until 2000 when Alabama became the last state to remove its law against mixed-race marriage.

 

FUTURE IMPLICATIONS:

See also: Interracial marriage

See also: Same-sex marriage in the United States

See also: Jim Crow laws

The definition of a marriage and what constitutes a family was reconsidered by society^{[citation needed]} after the decision of Loving v. Virginia. Following Loving v. Virginia, The Changing Nature of Interracial Marriage in Georgia: A Research Note states “there was a 448 per cent increase in the number in interracial marriages (from 21 in 1967 to 115 in 1970)” (Aldridge, 1973). These numbers are only from the state of Georgia after the Supreme Court ruling, but the numbers and percentages only continued to increase across the United States.^{[citation needed]} However, interracial couples still had to overcome many fears of possibly losing respect from friends, family, and the community.

 

Some activists believe that the Loving ruling will eventually aid the marriage equality movement for same-sex partnerships, if courts allow the Equal Protection Clause to be used. F.C. Decoste states, “If the only arguments against same sex marriage are sectarian, then opposing the legalization of same sex marriage is invidious in a fashion no different from supporting anti miscegenation laws”. These activists maintain that miscegenation laws are to interracial marriage, as sodomy laws are to homosexual rights and that sodomy laws have been enacted in order to maintain traditional sex roles that have become part of American society. Their opponents point out, however, that there are no laws in the United States which place criminal sanction on same-sex marriages such as the ones applied to inter-racial marriage before Loving v. Virginia. Most jurisdictions do no recognize such marriages, but none treats them as criminal. Additionally, the United States Supreme Court in the case of Baker v. Nelson, decided just a few years after the Loving decision, summarily affirmed that traditional marriage laws do not violate the Constitution of the United States.

 

On June 12, 2007, Mildred Loving issued a rare public statement prepared for delivery on the 40th anniversary of the Loving v. Virginia decision of the US Supreme Court, which commented on same-sex marriage. [1] The concluding paragraphs of her statement read as follows:

 

“

Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the “wrong kind of person” for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry. Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others. Especially if it denies people’s civil rights. I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.

”

Numerous^{[citation needed]} appellate courts have rejected any reliance upon the Loving case as controlling upon the issue of same-sex marriage. For example, the Majority Opinion of the New York Court of Appeals in Hernandez v. Robles held that:

 

“

[T]he historical background of Loving is different from the history underlying this case. Racism has been recognized for centuries — at first by a few people, and later by many more — as a revolting moral evil. This country fought a civil war to eliminate racism’s worst manifestation, slavery, and passed three constitutional amendments to eliminate that curse and its vestiges. Loving was part of the civil rights revolution of the 1950s and 1960s, the triumph of a cause for which many heroes and many ordinary people had struggled since our nation began. It is true that there has been serious injustice in the treatment of homosexuals also, a wrong that has been widely recognized only in the relatively recent past, and one our Legislature tried to address when it enacted the Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act four years ago (L 2002, ch 2). But the traditional definition of marriage is not merely a by-product of historical injustice. Its history is of a different kind. The idea that same-sex marriage is even possible is a relatively new one. Until a few decades ago, it was an accepted truth for almost everyone who ever lived, in any society in which marriage existed, that there could be marriages only between participants of different sex. A court should not lightly conclude that everyone who held this belief was irrational, ignorant or bigoted. We do not so conclude.

”

^[4]

Similarly the concurring opinion in the same case stated that:

“

Plaintiffs’ reliance on Loving v. Virginia (388 US 1 [1967]) for the proposition that the US Supreme Court has established a fundamental “right to marry the spouse of one’s choice” outside the male/female construct is misplaced. In Loving, an interracial couple argued that Virginia’s antimiscegenation statute, which precluded “any white person in this State to marry any save a white person, or a person with no other admixture of blood than white and American Indian” (id. at 5 n 4), violated the federal Due Process and Equal Protection clauses. The statute made intermarriage in violation of its terms a felony carrying a potential jail sentence of one to five years. The Lovings—a white man and a black woman—had married in violation of the law and been convicted, prompting them to challenge the validity of the Virginia law. The Supreme Court struck the statute on both equal protection and due process grounds, but the focus of the analysis was on the Equal Protection Clause. Noting that “[t]he clear and central purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to eliminate all official state sources of invidious racial discrimination in the States,” the Court applied strict scrutiny review to the racial classification, finding “no legitimate overriding purpose independent of invidious racial discrimination which justifies this classification” (id. at 10, 11). It made clear “that restricting the freedom to marry solely because of racial classifications violates the central meaning of the [*12]Equal Protection Clause” (id. at 12). There is no question that the Court viewed this antimiscegenation statute as an affront to the very purpose for the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment—to combat invidious racial discrimination. In its brief due process analysis, the Supreme Court reiterated that marriage is a right “fundamental to our very existence and survival” (id., citing Skinner, 316 US at 541)—a clear reference to the link between marriage and procreation. It reasoned: “To deny this fundamental freedom on so unsupportable a basis as the racial classifications embodied in these statutes . . . is surely to deprive all the State’s citizens of liberty without due process of law” (id.). Although the Court characterized the right to marry as a “choice,” it did not articulate the broad “right to marry the spouse of one’s choice” suggested by plaintiffs here. Rather, the Court observed that “[t]he Fourteenth Amendment requires that the freedom of choice to marry not be restricted by invidious racial discriminations” (id. [emphasis added]).[FN2] Needless to say, a statutory scheme that burdens a fundamental right by making conduct criminal based on the race of the individual who engages in it is inimical to the values embodied in the state and federal Due Process clauses. Far from recognizing a right to marry extending beyond the one woman and one man union,[FN3] it is evident from the Loving decision that the Supreme Court viewed marriage as fundamental precisely because of its relationship to human procreation.

”

^[5]

 

MOVIE:

 

The story of the Lovings been turned into the film Mr. & Mrs. Loving (1996), starring Lela Rochon, Timothy Hutton and Ruby Dee. The screenplay was written and directed by Richard Friedenberg. Mildred Loving has disputed the accuracy of the film.^[6]

 

DEATH:

 

Mildred Loving died May 2, 2008 in Milford, Virginia. Her daughter, Peggy Fortune, told the Associated Press: “I want (people) to remember her as being strong and brave yet humble — and believed in love.” Her husband Richard Loving died in a car accident in 1975 that also injured his wife.

 

SEE ALSO:

 

• List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 388
• Loving Day
• Pace v. Alabama
• Perez v. Sharp
• McLaughlin v. Florida
• FOOTNOTES:

 

1. ^ Full text of the opinion in Loving v. Virginia courtesy of Findlaw.com.
2. ^ Loving v. Virginia and the Hegemony of “Race”
3. ^ Pioneer of interracial marriage looks back
4. ^ Hernandez v. Robles (2006 NY Slip Op 05239)
5. ^ http://www.courts.state.ny.us/reporter/3dseries/2006/2006_05239.htm
6. ^ Associated Press. “40 years of interracial marriage: Mildred Loving reflects on breaking the color barrier“, International Herald-Tribune, 2007–06-09. Retrieved on 2008–04-28. “‘Not much of [the film] was very true,’ she said on a recent Thursday afternoon. ‘The only part of it right was I had three children.'” 

 

 

 FURTHER RESEARCH:

 

• Aldridge, Delores. “The Changing Nature of Interracial Marriage in Georgia: A Research Note.” Journal of Marriage and the Family 35, no. 4 (November 1973): 641-42. doi:10.2307/350877.
• Annella, M. “Interracial Marriages in Washington, D.C.” Journal of Negro Education 36 (Autumn 1967): 428-33. doi:10.2307/2294264.
• Barnett, Larry. “Research on International and Interracial Marriages.” Marriage and Family Living 25, no. 1 (February 1963): 105-07. doi:10.2307/349019.
• Brower, Brock. “Irrepressible Intimacies.” Review of Interracial Intimacies: Sex, Marriage, Identity, and Adoption, by Randall L. Kennedy. Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, no. 40 (Summer 2003): 120-24. doi:10.2307/3134064.
• Coolidge, David Orgon. “Playing the Loving Card: Same-Sex Marriage and the Politics of Analogy.” BYU Journal of Public Law 12 (1998): 201-38.
• DeCoste, F.C. “The Halpren Transformation: Same-Sex Marriage, Civil Society, and the Limits of Liberal Law.” Alberta Law Review 41 (September 2003): 619-42.
• Foeman, Anita Kathy, and Teresa Nance. “From Miscegenation to Multiculturalism: Perceptions and Stages of Interracial Relationship Development.” Journal of Black Studies 29, no. 4 (1999): 540-57.
• Hopkins, C. Quince. “Variety in U.S Kinship Practices, Substantive Due Process Analysis and the Right to Marry.” BYU Journal of Public Law 18 (2004): 665-79.
• Kalmijn, Matthijs. “Intermarriage and Homogamy: Causes, Patterns, Trends.” Annual Review of Sociology 24 (1998): 395-421.
• Koppelman, Andrew. “The Miscegenation Analogy: Sodomy Law as Sex Discrimination.” Yale Law Journal 98 (1988): 145-64.
• Pascoe, Peggy. “Miscegenation Law, Court Cases, and Ideologies of ‘Race’ in Twentieth-Century America.” Journal of American History 83, no. 1 (1996): 44-69.
• Walington, Walter. Domestic Relations. November 1967.
• Wildman, Stephanie. “Interracial Intimacy and the Potential for Social Change.” Review of Interracial Intimacy: The Regulation of Race and Romance by Rachel F. Moran. Berkeley Women’s Law Journal 17 (2002): 153-64. doi:10.2139/ssrn.309743.
• Yancey, George, and Sherelyn Yancey. “Interracial Dating: Evidence from Personal Advertisements.” Journal of Family Issues 19, no. 3 (May 1998): 334-48. doi:10.1177/019251398019003006.

SOURCE:   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loving_v._Virginia

 

_________________________________________________________________________

 

 

• Mildred Loving, Who Battled Ban on Mixed-Race Marriage, Dies at 68 Mildred Loving, a black woman whose anger…applying to the case. Mr. Loving replied, “Mr…in Virginia.” Mildred Delores Jeter’…family of Richard Perry Loving. The area was known for… May 6, 2008 – By DOUGLAS MARTIN – U.S.

FILM REVIEW; Exploring Ties That Bind, Though Not Yet Legally

…marriage that were made not so many years ago. In the case that defeated anti-miscegenation laws, Richard and Mildred Loving, a white man and a black woman who married in 1958 in Washington, returned to Virginia, their home state, to live…

October 1, 2004 – By STEPHEN HOLDEN – Movies – 829 words

CHRONICLE

…still be if not for RICHARD and MILDRED LOVING. Their love story and legal…subject of “Mr. and Mrs. Loving,” a made-for-television…Washington. In 1958, Richard Loving, who was white, and Mildred Jeter, who is black, were…

March 20, 1996 – By ELAINE LOUIE – Movies – 295 words

COVER STORY;How Love Came to Change the Law

In 1958, Mildred Jeter and Richard Loving were just another good-looking…will be told in “Mr. and Mrs. Loving,” a two-hour television movie…Showtime tonight at 8. Richard and Mildred Loving seem a little like the lost heroes…

March 31, 1996 – By ANITA GATES – 1240 words

A Mixed Marriage’s 25th Anniversary of Legality

Mildred Jeter Loving is now a widow, the marriage that…July 1958, the quiet life that Mrs. Loving and her husband, Richard, enjoyed…degree of racial comingling, Richard Loving and Mildred Jeter, who grew up seven miles apart…

June 12, 1992 – By DAVID MARGOLICK, – 1589 words

TELEVISION REVIEW;Struggling To Validate A Forbidden Marriage

…cities. So when Richard Loving (Timothy Hutton) and Mildred Jeter (Lela Rochon…pays off. MR. AND MRS. LOVING SHO, Sunday at 8. Written…Timothy Hutton (Richard Loving), Lela Rochon (Mildred Jeter), Cory Parker…

March 30, 1996 – By JOHN J. O’CONNOR – Arts – 621 words

 

CLARENCE PAGE: ” A LOVING COUPLE WHO LEFT US A LEGACY THAT ENRICHES US ALL”:  http://www.caglepost.com/column/Clarence+Page/6321/A+Loving+Couple%E2%80%99s+Legacy.html

 

 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“LOVING FOR ALL”

 

(Mildred Loving’s public statement  delivered on June 12, 2007, the 40TH Anniversary of Loving vs. Virginia)

 

 

Loving for All

By Mildred Loving

Prepared for Delivery on June 12, 2007,
The 40th Anniversary of the Loving vs. Virginia Announcement

 

 

When my late husband, Richard, and I got married in Washington , DC in 1958, it wasn’t to make a political statement or start a fight. We were in love, and we wanted to be married.

We didn’t get married in Washington because we wanted to marry there. We did it there because the government wouldn’t allow us to marry back home in Virginia where we grew up, where we met, where we fell in love, and where we wanted to be together and build our family. You see, I am a woman of color and Richard was white, and at that time people believed it was okay to keep us from marrying because of their ideas of who should marry whom.

 

When Richard and I came back to our home in Virginia , happily married, we had no intention of battling over the law. We made a commitment to each other in our love and lives, and now had the legal commitment, called marriage, to match. Isn’t that what marriage is?

 

Not long after our wedding, we were awakened in the middle of the night in our own bedroom by deputy sheriffs and actually arrested for the “crime” of marrying the wrong kind of person. Our marriage certificate was hanging on the wall above the bed. The state prosecuted Richard and me, and after we were found guilty, the judge declared: “”Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents.

 

And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.” He sentenced us to a year in prison, but offered to suspend the sentence if we left our home in Virginia for 25 years exile.

 

We left, and got a lawyer. Richard and I had to fight, but still were not fighting for a cause.

 

We were fighting for our love.

 

Though it turned out we had to fight, happily Richard and I didn’t have to fight alone. Thanks to groups like the ACLU and the NAACP Legal Defense & Education Fund, and so many good people around the country willing to speak up, we took our case for the freedom to marry all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. And on June 12, 1967, the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that, “The freedom to marry has long been recognized as one of the vital personal rights essential to the orderly pursuit of happiness by free men,” a “basic civil right.”

 

My generation was bitterly divided over something that should have been so clear and right.

 

The majority believed that what the judge said, that it was God’s plan to keep people apart, and that government should discriminate against people in love. But I have lived long enough now to see big changes. The older generation’s fears and prejudices have given way, and today’s young people realize that if someone loves someone they have a right to marry.

 

Surrounded as I am now by wonderful children and grandchildren, not a day goes by that I don’t think of Richard and our love, our right to marry, and how much it meant to me to have that freedom to marry the person precious to me, even if others thought he was the “wrong kind of person” for me to marry. I believe all Americans, no matter their race, no matter their sex, no matter their sexual orientation, should have that same freedom to marry.

 

Government has no business imposing some people’s religious beliefs over others.

 

Especially if it denies people’s civil rights.

 

I am still not a political person, but I am proud that Richard’s and my name is on a court case that can help reinforce the love, the commitment, the fairness, and the family that so many people, black or white, young or old, gay or straight seek in life. I support the freedom to marry for all. That’s what Loving, and loving, are all about.

 

BLACK SKIN, BLUE PASSPORT: CRUISING OUT OF OUR COMFORT ZONES

By Tamara J. Walker | TheRoot.com

Why we lose by staying on the boat.

 

 

Getty Images

 

 

May 1, 2008– I recently came across the Web page for Black Cruise Week. The site serves as a kind of clearinghouse for African-American-themed cruises, including everything from Black Gay and Lesbian trips to Tom Joyner’s annual Fantastic Voyage.

 

Thirteen event cruises are scheduled for the rest of this year, with ports of call in Hawaii, the Caribbean and even parts of Africa.

 

The site’s offerings reflect the increasing popularity of cruise travel among African-Americans. While precise numbers are difficult to obtain, one study reported that the Caribbean is a top destination among African-American travelers, who generally “prefer destinations that are both ‘language comfortable’ and ‘color comfortable.'”

 

It’s easy to understand the appeal of the Caribbean. From its sandy beaches and sunny skies to its transcendent music and food, the region embodies the kind of relaxation and indulgence that vacationers crave. Former English colonies in the Caribbean also have large English-speaking, black populations, making them generally friendly places for African-American travelers.

 

And cruises tend to be relatively budget-friendly, offering vacationers an opportunity to sample multiple islands without having to spend lavishly on a single destination. So it makes sense that so many African-Americans opt to spend holidays, family reunions and long weekends on Caribbean cruises.

 

I have taken a handful of cruises, and I admit that, on one level, I enjoy the low-impact pampering and entertainment, the blissful ease of a floating resort. But shouldn’t vacations sometimes be about more than quickie group tours and where to find the best duty-free goods? Sometimes passengers don’t even venture off the ship. I sometimes wonder if these passengers would notice -– or even care — if their ship mistakenly docked in Grand Cayman instead of Puerto Rico.

 

The growing cottage industry around entertainment voyages, with names like  “Smooth Jazz Cruise,” “Black Singles Love Cruise” and the “National Professionals Network Leadership Summit Cruise,” seem bent on ensuring that black travelers return home having learned very little about the history, culture or people of the places they have visited. Sure, they will have made contacts and connections — with other Americans, of course — but, to me, that seems to defeat the purpose and spirit of international travel.

The older I get, and the further away life takes me from my student travel days, the more nervous I am about what “adult” travel has in store for me. Are off-the-beaten-path travel experiences just for kids?

 

Certainly, there are aspects of youth travel that hold little appeal for grownups. I can’t say I’ll miss the days of staying in the kinds of hostels where I had to sleep in my street clothes out of fear they would be stolen. I also won’t long for the days of subsisting on gas-station snacks to afford museum visits in a city where the exchange rate rendered the dollar all but useless. And I will gladly sidestep the need to take a crowded bush taxi over bumpy terrain because a flight is too expensive.

 

Or will I?

 

While there is something to be said for choosing comfort and relaxation over saving money, there is also something very rich about having a sense of adventure. Which is why I think I’ll save my next cruise for when I’m too old to do anything else. I’m sure Tom Joyner will still be doing his thing.

 

In the meantime, I think I’d like to get more out of the places I visit. I’m optimistic, for example, about the increasing popularity of heritage tourism, offered through companies like Soul Planet Travel, which presents a view of places like Brazil and Senegal with our history in mind.

 

I know what you’re thinking and, yes, this kind of group travel can have its own limitations. There’s nothing more suffocating than being tied for hours to a large group of people you wouldn’t necessarily hang out with in real life. There’s nothing worse than not being able to steal a moment alone in an intoxicating new place, to sit at an outdoor table with a glass of wine and, say, eavesdrop on a group of heavy-smoking teenagers, fumble through French with a sneering waiter or just sit happily and watch life go by because you’ve missed your train.

 

One of the things I notice when I am enjoying this sort of observant downtime is how few African-Americans I encounter along the way. There are as many explanations for this racial imbalance among Americans abroad as there are people to give them. Certainly the high cost of travel has something to do with it. Racism, and perceptions of racism, too, play not insignificant roles. Most people can conjure up anecdotes of racial affronts that occur overseas. Not even Oprah is impervious to discrimination when outside the country.

 

But by choosing the safest, most comfortable — yes, bland — vacations, we are denying ourselves the opportunity to experience the wonderfully challenging side of international
travel: the side that shows us that vacations do not have to be about sun and
sand to be just what we needed.

 

I’d like to suggest that the next time a vacation opportunity presents itself, we try to think of going someplace that challenges our notion of “language comfortable” or “color comfortable.”

 

For inspiration, we might reach back to our student days, when discomfort was a state of being. Sometimes, I even reach back to my grandfather’s days in the Army, when he traveled overseas to hostile regions on behalf of a country that had not yet abandoned its hostility for him or his family. For me now, as for him then, inspiration comes from knowing that knowledge can flow in both directions. You just have to be willing to take a few chances.

 

 

 

Tamara J. Walker is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, where she teaches courses in Latin American history.

 

(Article courtesy of The Root:   http://www.theroot.com )

 

___________________________________________________________________

 

 

 

Black people and our comfort zones.

 

We need to break out of our comfort zones, take a break from the familiar, expect the unexpected, the good (friendly, helpful local people), and the bad (racism abroad).

 

Speaking of racism.

 

It affects not only the black people who leave America for a fun and relaxing vacation. . . .

 

. . . .racism also affects the local black people who live in countries, especially those countries outside of the Caribbean:  Latin America, South America, Mexico, and even some Asian countries.

 

Yes, America’s dominance around the world has made more of a negative impact, than a positive impact, in how various nations and cultures view and treat black American citizens.

 

I have been to one country outside of America—-the Bahamas. Had a lovely time. But, some of my co-workers said they had a horrible time. I asked them what happened. They said the people were rude to them, curt, and not very hospitable. I pressed them as to what they said or did. They could not give me any adequate answers as to why the local people reacted so negatively to them.

 

I went and was very respectful, knowledgeable of the local culture and traditions. Polite to the people. Showed an interest them as human beings, not as background scenery for my “American-ness”

 

The people could not have been more kinder.

 

It would help, as Americans, to be mindful of what the local people live under in countries that we visit. Learn a little of their language (what person of another country would not appreciate that.) Of course, when we see racism, we have to remember that we are not on American soil. Those of us who are, how shall I say it. . . . a bit passionate in our convictions may have to temper that in our response to racist mistreatment of the local people.

 

The monetary approach is a great response for that situation. It can also be used as far as the tourist industry goes.

 

What country/government would want to lose lots of tourist dollars if its country was seen as a back-water, ante-diluvian, pre-Cambrian atavistic throwback to race hatred against its citizens? No sane country would want such an image shown to visitors who complained about racist treatment of its citizens. For many countries, tourism is the top dollar for the locals, merchants and governmental tax revenues.

 

Yes, one must temper their response to acts of racist barbarity. But, to not speak up, would be the greatest sin.

 

It does not have to involve going to the local mayor/or official government office to lodge a complaint (that would not hurt).

 

But, to not speak up with be just as wrong. To remain silent would be something that I could not abide.

 

Sometimes just the smallest gesture—-a word, a recognition of another person’s humanity—-can say so much to that person who will still be living there in that country, long after you have gone.

 

Random acts of kindness, and senseless acts of beauty.

 

I often ask myself: “What can I live with, if I do not speak up?” “How can I look myself in the face in that mirror the next day?”

 

We all get chances to make a difference. We all get chances to speak up for those who cannot speak up for themselves.

 

But, on the other hand, we must be circumspect in how we react to the racism that person is experiencing. We do not want to make it any harder for them. They have to live in that country. They will still be living there long after we have boarded that plane, or cruise ship, on our way back to America.

Carefully, but, with respect to their right to have their worth acknowledged.

 

But, I can only speak for myself. I would have a hard time not speaking up to a sexist, racist oppressor. I speak up here in America; I would speak up there, outside of America.

 

 

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I have never traveled to France, but, I do know that for some groups (Muslim Arabs), prejudice can and does run high against them.

 

I fear for the Muslims who travel to France, as well. This xenophobic discrimination against Arabs, and Muslims, in France is nothing new. Algerians coming to live in France faced horrors as well in the 1950s and 1960s.

 

During my father’s stay in France (WW II), he and the black American servicemen were treated very well by the French people. On the other hand, racist whites sought to poison the minds of the French people against black servicemen by saying that black men had tails.

 

In Hawaii, black servicemen were being stationed in Honolulu, HI. There, white servicemen sought to poison the local native people with lies against the black servicemen, saying they were brutish and vile men. Of course, the Hawaiian people were stand-offish and reserved towards the black servicemen at first—BUT—once they got to know the black servicemen and saw that they were not the evil monsters, that they were good spenders and courteous, as opposed to what the white men painted them out to be, the men and women of Hawaii began to treat the black servicemen with respect and less fear.

 

You see, a well traveled lie can make its way out the door, and go around the world and back, before the truth can put its pants on. Yes, the black servicemen had to suffer from preconceived prejudices committed against them by white men, but, that is the power of lies, myths and stereotypes.

 

Around the world, black people suffer from so many indignities and atrocities, much of which originated from America. But, much also originated in the foreign countries as well.

 

The overwhelming worship of whiteness has done that, not to mention the marginalization of black populations in many countries: Costa Rica, Bolivia, Ecuador, Mexico, to name a few.

 

You would think that with the so-called “telenovelas” broadcast from many Latin America countries, that only “light-bright-and-damned-near-white” Latinos lived in Mexico, Central America and South America, and that no people of Afro-origin lived in these countries, but, they do.

 

Precipitously, courageously, and committed to preservere and hang on to all they have been able to hold onto since the infamous Diaspora.

 

What’s it like for black people in France?

 

I am not sure, having never traveled there, but, I do hope that there is still some of the old France that reigned in the days when my father was stationed there during his military tour of duty.

 

Can’t really say what it is like now. I am not sure if the France of my deceased father’s time is the same France now.  Nor do I know if England is probably the same as it was for him.

 

But, there are times when the following questions come to mind, especially when I desire to visit a non-Caribbean country:

 

 

“I feel, why should I leave America and go to another country to be disrespected and degraded? I can get that right here in the good ol’ USA. Why go somewhere else to be slapped in the face, when I can already experience it first hand here in the country of my birth?”

 

 

Sigh.

 

But, that line of thinking would not do.

 

Travel should be more than just a jaunt to another place to buy trinkets and souvenirs. Travel should broaden and open the mind. Travel should connect us to each other. The world is a beautiful place; always has been. We can never let the stupid hatreds stop us from visiting faraway places. Such thinking diminishes us; closes us off, and denies us the chance to meet people who we could have learned from, just as they may have learned from us.

 

 

When I think of America in comparison to countries which do not have the supposed democracy that America proclaims herself to have, I have to wonder which is more hypocritical:  America the land of the free, home of the brave; OR countries which have no democratic treatment of their own citizens.

 

The hypocritical country (America) would be worse. A country that already practices barbarities against its people with no constitution, bill of rights, or just laws, would be looked at as outside the pale of humanity.

 

I would consider a country as America as worse: to not practice what you preach is the ultimate contempt and total disregard for your citizens.

 

Especially when those disparaged citizens STILL remain so loyal to you (America) after all you have done to them: Black Americans (Women and men military personnel); Navajo Code Talkers; Asian-American soldiers fighting in the Pacific, while relatives on the West Coast were being interred in concentration camps.

 

ALL Americans should speak up and challenge racism, sexism and hatreds when we see them. We should also be on our best behaviour and do not perpetuate The ugly American wherever we go in this world.

 

Sometimes we may feel: “What difference can I make”?

 

Many times, more than we can ever know. That gesture of speaking up for—of standing up for another human being, can make a tremendous difference, long after we have left. That person will remember that SOMEONE CARED, someone thought enough to step out for them. A stranger thought enough to lessen the load of inhumanity that that woman, man or child had to face.

 

Sometimes it takes just one person to acknowledge the worth of a fellow human being.

NEVER underestimate the POWER OF ONE.

 

So, Black Americans, go on those vacations, enjoy those cruises—–but, please—-get off the boat and mingle with the local people whose countries you visit.

 

A whole new world awaits you.

 

Don’t miss out on it by staying in your cabin.

BREAST CANCER: THE SISTER STUDY: NOT JUST FOR WHITE WOMEN

By Dale Sandler | TheRoot.com

Not just for white women.

 

 

 

Getty Images/3D4Medical.com

 

 

 

May 5, 2008–We’ve all been touched by breast cancer, whether we’ve personally experienced the disease or have a relative, good girlfriend or co-worker who has faced this challenge. We react with a range of emotions and responses to the news that a loved one has breast cancer. Many women hear the news and are spurred to action. They want to do something to honor their loved ones or make sure that others don’t have to face breast cancer in the future. To date, more than 45,000 women whose sister has had breast cancer have taken action by joining the Sister Study, a nationwide effort to find the causes of breast cancer. The Sister Study is especially urging African-American women to join the study so we can learn what causes breast cancer in the African-American community. 

 

Conducted by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, one of the National Institutes of Health of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the Sister Study hopes to learn how the environment and genes affect the chances of getting breast cancer. In all, the study needs 50,000 women whose sisters had breast cancer, and we can’t do it without the participation of African-American women whose life experiences and exposures may be different from those of other women. The Sister Study has successfully recruited more than 45,000 women whose sisters were diagnosed with breast cancer, but only 4,500 of those women — one out of 10 — are African American. Between now and the end of the year, the study is focusing on recruiting African-American sisters, along with Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans, Alaska Natives and Pacific Islanders. Because women over the age of 65 or with a high school degree or less are also underrepresented in the study, white women in those groups can also still join the Sister Study.

 

Without black women, we will have a hard time learning why breast cancer occurrence and survival are different for black women, who often develop the disease at a younger age and have more aggressive tumors than white women. Even though white women are more likely to get breast cancer, black women are more likely to die from it. Black women of all ages and walks of life are at risk for this disease, and the factors that increase a woman’s chances of developing or surviving breast cancer may differ for African American and white women. Sisters of women with breast cancer are twice as likely as other women to develop breast cancer, possibly because of shared genes and experiences.

 

Dr. Doris Browne, Sister Study participant and program director in the Breast and Gynecologic Cancer Research Group in the Division of Cancer Prevention at the National Cancer Institute, enrolled because two of her sisters were diagnosed with breast cancer.

 

“Awareness and early detection are key to fighting breast cancer, as well as taking action by participating in important research,” says Dr. Browne. “It is vital that more women of color, like me, take the time to enroll in the Sister Study so that future generations of women won’t have to face the disease.”

 

When diagnosed, most women ask, “Why and how did I get this disease? Is it something I did or was exposed to?” Unfortunately, as of today, there is no clear answer. Wouldn’t you like to know if breast cancer is caused by something women come in contact with at work, at home or in their communities? That’s what the Sister Study is trying to answer. 

 

The Sister Study is a long-term study, but participants are not required to take any medications, undergo any treatments or make any changes in their daily lives. The study itself requires very little time from its volunteers, although there is more to do at the beginning than in future years.

The Sister Study has made participation as convenient as possible. At the beginning, women will answer telephone and written surveys and provide blood, urine, household dust and toenail samples during a home visit. The study is the first of its kind to collect such extensive and detailed information about environmental exposures. After that we’ll contact participants once a year for 10 years or more to learn about changes in their health, lifestyle or environment.     

 

Women in the U.S. and Puerto Rico, ages 35 to 74, may be eligible to join the Sister Study if their sisters (living or deceased) had breast cancer. Women who join the Sister Study must never have been diagnosed with breast cancer themselves. At this time, we are enrolling women only from groups that are underrepresented in the study to date. If you’re a woman of color whose sister had breast cancer, your participation in the Sister Study is especially important, and you are just who we are looking for. We want to learn more about what can be done to prevent this devastating disease from putting our daughters and granddaughters at risk.

 

The Sister Study follows sound, ethical research practices, gives frequent study updates to participants and keeps all personal data private and confidential. The researchers for the study are primarily women.

 

How can you help? If eligible, you can join the Sister Study or simply spread the word to other women about it. Joining the Sister Study and obtaining information is easy. Please visit www.sisterstudy.org or call the hot line toll-free at 1-877-4-SISTER (474-7837) from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. Eastern time. As our motto says,woman by woman … sister by sister, we can make a difference.

 

 

Dale Sandler, Ph.D., is principal investigator of the Sister Study. She is chief of the  Epidemiology Branch of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences at the National Institutes of Health.

 

(Article courtesy of The Root:  http://www.theroot.com )

 

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I plan on joining the Sister Study. My older sister, Sandra was diagnosed with breast cancer 20 years ago, and she had a double mastectomy. The devastation this disease wrought on her affected her husband, her children, her parents and her siblings. Sandra survived the cancer and still leads a productive life.

 

But, we black women MUST do what we can to help in the research and understanding of why black women are struck down with the most aggressive forms of breast cancer compared to women of other racial groups.

 

If you are a black woman who has had a female relative (especially a close relative such as a sister) who was diagnosed with breast cancer, please sign up for this important study. Many questions surround the how’s and why’s of the difference in mortality rates between black women and women of other racial groups who develop breast cancer. There are many questions that need to be answered and may be answered if more black women partake of this study.

If you are a WOC (Asian, Native, Latina American) please sign up for this study.

 

The more WOC who sign up, the more scientists and doctors can learn to fight this often deadly and traumatic disease.

TAMMI AND ME: WHEN BREAST CANCER BECOMES A SISTER ACT

By Terri Nimmons | TheRoot.com

When breast cancer becomes a sister act.

 

 

 

 

May 5, 2008–My cousin Stephanie gave me a picture of Tammi and me at about ages 4 and 5. In this tiny, black-and-white photo, our hands are clasped as we stand on the sidewalk in front of our home, smiling. We are two sisters in matching denim overalls; we look very “country” because we were! In the background is a ’50s-era car (how could that be?!), parked on a street in Cumberland, Md. Looking at the picture reminds me we are still joined — she in the afterlife, me in this world — connected through love and our common disease.

Tammi was born only 14 months after me, so we were very close. In our 30s, we made a pact to be like the Delany sisters: living well beyond 100 and sharp as tacks. Presumably widowed, we would live together. Tammi, always tidy and elegant, would wear a trench coat, even in summer. I, less organized but lovable, would be searching for lost keys, glasses and other effects from morning until night.

 

Our treasured plan was disrupted when Tammi was diagnosed with breast cancer at age 33. Somehow, this brought us even closer. We talked by phone for hours after her diagnosis; I slept in her hospital room after surgery and walked the oncology ward with her; we shopped after her radiation treatments; I fed her ice chips in her final days of hospice care at my house. I held her in my arms when she died at 36 in 1995.

 

About a month before Tammi died, I promised her I would take care of my own health and breasts.  Those final days were so precious, but that day I made the promise to her was particularly special.

 

Since Tammi’s diagnosis, I’ve dutifully followed my annual routine: procrastinate, make the mammogram appointment, show up, don the gown, have my boobs squeezed like they were being run over by a steamroller, and then wait in a little cubby, holding my breath and hoping this won’t be “the time.” For all those  years, I exhaled and thanked God as I got the results.

Last June, my time came as I while flirting with and flashing Scott, my husband of 13 years. That sunny day in our kitchen, I lifted my tank top for about 10 seconds. In that time, Scott noticed a little crease on my left breast. It was so tiny you could see it only with my arms raised, and barely then. But I knew what it meant. If you’ve lost someone you love to breast cancer, you know.

As usual, my mammogram showed no sign of problems, but the sonogram certainly did. On my daughter Sara’s last day as a second-grader, I received the pathology results.

 

Mammogram, sonogram and biopsies all happened in rapid succession. My family and friends were ready to circle the wagons. Red-winged blackbirds — my favorite — were everywhere in my neighborhood the day we got the news from my breast surgeon., and I knew they would be no less beautiful if I had cancer. Results: two malignant tumors in my left breast — exhale. “OK, I’ve got breast cancer.”

 

How could both beaming little girls, hand in hand in an old photo, have grown to develop this disease? Maybe Tammi and I shared a genetic mutation that contributes to developing breast cancer. Our first cousin Carol had breast cancer, a few years back, in her early 50s. Her cancer was caught earlier than mine, requiring a lumpectomy, but not chemo or radiation. A second cousin, Dolores, also postmenopausal, had an experience similar to Carol’s. Like many African-American women, neither Tammi, Carol, Dolores nor I had gotten genetic testing and counseling.

 

 

Family photo

The author Terri Nimmons and her daughter Sara.

 

 

I finally had genetic testing in late August, and it revealed I do not have any of the known genetic mutations for breast cancer. That’s good news for the women and girls of my family, but it wouldn’t have changed anything for me, even if I’d known last summer. A week before my mastectomy, I decided to have my healthy right breast removed, too. Intuition was guiding me, so once I made up my mind to do it, I was fully at peace with the decision.

 

Having seen breast cancer and treatment up-close, I thought I knew what to expect. But I really didn’t. Nothing can prepare you for making your way through this stuff. As a businessperson accustomed to making quick decisions, I stumbled through dense medical information, opinions, treatment options and my own pathology reports. I leaned heavily on those love me. Scott, my brother, cousins, in-laws and friends were always with me — kind of like those Verizon network ads, only better. Having watched Tammi waste away from the same disease, they were suffering — but they never let me see their fear or their pain.

 

Through their love and memories of Tammi, I have remained happy, grateful and without fear (most of the time).

 

Everybody has helped me get through the hard work of keeping Tammi’s experience and her fate distinct from my own. Much has changed since she had cancer, yet the prescribed treatment for me was grimly familiar: mastectomy, chemo, reconstruction, radiation and Tamoxifen. Difficult, to be sure, but lifesaving.

 

Now I’m through most of the tough stuff: I’ve been chemo’d and radiated, and my new breasts are under construction and coming along nicely. The treatments I received were prescribed to cure me, and that’s what I believe. I belong to Women Warriors — an amazing group of women and definitely not your typical support group. My loving network still surrounds me, and my husband and daughter are settling into our new normal.

 

Breasts are so integral to being a woman that you can’t imagine (unless you’re going through it) having them removed and replaced. My new breasts are a little bigger and I say, “so what?” Increasing breast size as a result of illness is not a change any of us would willingly choose. My daughter, Sara, notices that my hugs feel different. When I look in the mirror each morning, I see scars that healed beautifully where nipples used to be. And, as I look to the future, I hope to regain more feeling in my breasts.  Self-image, appearance, sexuality, health and peace-of-mind all disrupted at mid-life – a stage of life Tammi never knew.

 

Not having my real breasts hurts, literally and in other ways. Yet, life is so good and still a daily miracle. Breast cancer has taken two things from me. My sister isn’t one of them. Through everything, Tammi has been my quiet companion, holding my hand, keeping our connection. Having shared so much with her, this one more thing seems almost natural.

 

 

 

Terri Nimmons and her husband, Scott David, are principals of Stone Lake Leadership Group, a leadership consulting practice. Terri is happily back to balancing her family and work lives. She has created a website for professional women with breast cancer: www.life2lead.com .

 

 

 

(Article courtesy of The Root:  http://www.theroot.com )

BLACK WOMEN AND BREAST CANCER: ENVIRONMENT, GENETICS, OR BOTH?

By Linda Villarosa | TheRoot.com

 

When it comes to black women and breast cancer, there are a thorny tangle of questions.

 

 

Getty Images

ABC’s Good Morning America co-anchor Robin Roberts, who was recently diagnosed with breast cancer and completed chemotherapy, walks the runway during the Isaac Mizrahi Fall 2008 fashion show as part of GMA’s ‘I Dare You series’ on February 7, 2008 in New York City

 

 

May 5, 2008–Last year, when “Good Morning America” anchor Robin Roberts found a lump in her breast during a self-exam, her first thought was: This can’t be; I’m too young! Yes, at 46, Roberts was younger than age 55, when two out of three invasive breast cancers are diagnosed. But she’s also black.

 

Though African-Americans are less likely than white women to get breast cancer, when we do get it, the disease strikes younger and is more deadly. And black women have a higher risk of developing and dying from breast cancer than Asian, Hispanic or Native American women.

 

More chilling, over the past several years, many studies have shown that compared to other women, African-American women are more frequently diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer that resists some kinds of treatment. This type of tumor also occurs at younger ages, often before age 35. Last summer, researchers at the University of North Carolina identified a specific, virulent breast cancer tumor that strikes young black women 10 times more often than either white women or even older black women. Moreover, our tumors are generally diagnosed and treated later in the game, which makes them especially dangerous.

 

Happily, Robin Roberts is doing just fine and is back on the air. She caught her cancer early and received treatment quickly. She has become an outspoken breast cancer role model and activist. In fact, last month she shed her wig and now proudly displays her post-treatment hair — cute and very short. She and other survivors across the country have helped shine the light on the enigma of breast cancer in black women and increase the pressure on scientists to solve this mystery.

 

And it is a mystery. No one can fully and clearly explain the black-white differences in breast cancer, particularly the more aggressive, lethal form of the disease that black women are likely to contract. Is there something different about our genetic makeup that makes us susceptible to a cancer that doesn’t respond to treatment and kills fast and young? Is it our environments — that so many of us live in disadvantaged communities, where stress, poverty and pollution are simply a part of everyday life and healthy food and quality medical care are not? Is it racism — could it be that it’s not breast cancer that discriminates, but an unequal health care system and the people who run it?

According to experts, there is no one answer, but a thorny tangle of questions.

“We know that African-American women are more likely to have tumors that are more aggressive and less responsive to treatment,” says  Dale Sandler, chief of the Epidemiology Branch at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and principal investigator of the Sister Study, a large research project that is looking at breast cancer by focusing on women who have lost sisters to the disease. “We also know that black women either delay seeking treatment or get the runaround when they do. Still, these factors don’t account for all of the disparity in mortality. Clearly something else is going on.”

 

Part of the confusion isn’t a black thing. In general, no one understands exactly what causes breast cancer or why seemingly healthy women who are “doing everything right” still get it.There are also no absolute answers for how to prevent it — though there are factors that raise the risk. Along with age, according to the American Cancer Society, these are several other breast cancer risk factors:

 

 

Family History/Genetics: Breast cancer risk is higher among women whose blood relatives have the disease. Having one first-degree relative (mother, sister or daughter) with breast cancer doubles a woman’s risk, and two first-degree relatives increases the risk about fivefold. Five to 10 percent of breast cancer cases are believed to be inherited, a result of gene changes or “mutations” inherited from a parent . The most common inherited mutations are those of the genes known as BRCA1 and BRCA2.

 

Exposure to Hormones: During the childbearing years — from puberty to menopause — a woman’s body produces estrogen. This female hormone is important for normal sexual development and functioning of the female reproductive system. However, higher levels of circulating estrogen are associated with an increased risk of breast cancer. Which means that women whose periods start early in life or end later, or those who have their children later, have fewer or no children, drink more alcohol or take hormone replacement therapy increase their lifetime exposure to estrogen and raise the risk of breast cancer.

 

For black women, exposure to estrogen doesn’t fully unravel our breast cancer puzzle. On one hand, as a group, we are exposed to less estrogen because we have more children, have them earlier in life and use hormone replacement therapy less than white women. On the other hand, our periods start earlier — which means more estrogen. Additionally, after menopause, when the ovaries no longer produce estrogen, body fat is the primary source for estrogen made by the body. Black women are more likely to be overweight and have more body fat, which equals more estrogen.

 

The bottom line, says  Sandler: “What we know about hormones doesn’t explain it all. When you put everything together, hormones and reproductive history only explain about 50 percent of breast cancer overall. And even that estimate is based on studies of mostly white women,” she adds. “It might be different for black women.”

 

The Environment: Very little is known about the link between environmental factors and the risk of breast cancer. But there’s plenty of speculation. “What is accounting for the rest of breast cancer?” asks  Sandler. “Is it chemicals a woman’s exposed to at work? Something in our food or water? Pesticides? Those plastic bottles we’ve been reading so much about? We don’t know yet, but we’d like to find out.”

 

The Sister Study should answer some of these questions, says  Sandler. Conducted by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in North Carolina, the study is enrolling 50,000 diverse women whose sisters had breast cancer.  Sandler and her team hope to learn how environment and genes affect the chances of getting the disease.

 

Across the country, other researchers are also committed to studying black women and breast cancer. In 2005, Dr. Olufunmilayo Olopade, a Nigerian oncologist and director of the Center for Clinical Cancer Genetics at the University of Chicago Medical Center, won a prestigious MacArthur “genius grant” of $500,000 to continue studying the genetics of breast cancer in women of African heritage. Dr. Lisa Newman, director of the Breast Care Center at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center, is another black woman on the frontlines of breast cancer research.

 

As science works to figure out what causes breast cancer and strives to understand the disease in black women, our most effect weapon against it remains early detection.

The American Cancer Society and other organizations recommend the following screening guidelines:

 

If you have been diagnosed with breast cancer, know that it’s not a death sentence and seek support and information. Contact Sisters Network Inc. at http://www.sistersnetworkinc.organd the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation at www.komen.org.

 

 

 

Linda Villarosa is a Brooklyn-based health writer and author of the book, Body & Soul: The Black Women’s Guide to Physical Health and Emotional Well-being. Her first novel, Passing for Black, will be published next month.

 

(Article courtesy of The Root:  http://www.theroot.com )