NAACP creates HIV/AIDS Manual for Black churches

The NAACP has joined in fight to stop the rise of HIV/AIDS in the Black community. They have created a manual for church leaders to talk about HIV/AIDS with their members.

Here's more:

Shavon Arline-Bradley, the director of health programs for the NAACP, who helped oversee the manual’s creation, said it makes sense for the nation’s largest civil rights organization to be involved in the discussion of HIV and AIDS.

“People look at us as just civil right rights, and what they’re missing is that health is one of the most pressing civil rights issues of our time,” Arline-Bradley said.

Religious leaders who helped with the manual said black churches have been reluctant to talk about the disease. That’s in part because the topic is wrapped up with sex and homosexuality, often taboo topics in the church.

“Sex is not something church people like to talk about. It’s something they like to do,” said the Rev. Joseph Smith, the assistant to the pastor of the Alfred Street Baptist Church in Alexandria, Va., and one of the people who worked on the manual.

This is a good first step.

source

NAACP Leader, Civil Rights Pioneer Willis Edwards has Died

This weekend we have lost a fighter. Longtime president of the Beverly Hills/Hollywood branch of the NAACP, Willis Edwards died this weekend. Willis was one of the few openly gay presidents of the organization. He was a true fighter for civil rights and the recognition of people of color. One of things he is highly known for is getting the NAACP Image Awards televised.

Karen Ocamb from LBGT/POV has more of this amazing leader:

Edwards, who was born in Texas and raised in Palm Springs, was instrumental in launching the NAACP Image Awards on national television. He contributed that expertise to panels such as “Knocking Down the Door: Black LGBT Images in Media” – a standing room only panel at the Screen Actors Guild in March 2009, sponsored by GLAAD and the National Black Justice Coalition with the panel co-sponsored by SAG’s LGBT Actors Committee and the Beverly Hills/Hollywood Branch of the NAACP. 


Willis was honored by the Black AIDS Institute and the Magic Johnson Foundation on World AIDS Day in 2010, along with former President Bill Clinton, actor and HIV/AIDS activist Blair Underwood, among others.

Last year, Willis was a respected and ubiquitous presence during the NAACP’s national convention in Los Angeles July 22-24. During the Saturday, July 23, lunch that featured a very strong keynote by Dr. Gail Wyatt, UCLA AIDS Institute, Willis took the podium and was received warmly with much familiarity and appreciative applause.  During the NAACP’s first-ever Town Hall on LGBT issues, Willis was acknowledged by NAACP panelists and civil rights icon Julian Bond – which prompted Willis to speak his mind with the authority of years from his perch in the audience.

He will be missed to us in LA and across the country.

More info on Willis is here

Melissa Harris Perry on the Biden and Romney's NAACP speeches

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Some Silly Black Clergy Org is still crying about NAACP's Gay Marriage Support

Some, and not a lot, of preachers are still whining about NAACP's support of gay marriage. CAAP
the Coalition of African-American Pastors, brought this up at the NAACP annual convention. Lead by this hater, Rev. William Owens, the group claims the NAACP was abandon the solid purpose of the organization.

Interesting, considering the core purpose of the org. was to fight bigotry and inequality.

Anywho, this preacher said a lot crap like:

"You're advocating for something that's not normal, that's not natural. It's still out of line, it's against moral law."

"Gay marriage is leading us down a bad path," Owens added. "Our young people are already hurt. They're already damaged."

These are, as usual, empty statements. Moral law? Child please, if you can't handle change, Rev. William Owens then go! Get the f**k out! I'm sick of these self-righteous freaks, talking about what's right and wrong.

The hatred and foolishness this group are pushing is wrong and if anything, that's against moral law too.

Romney BOOED by the NAACP over Obamacare

This is a great way to start the day

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Detroit: Activist City

The motor city area, Motown to some, is host to two major conferences this week -- the NAACP and NOW.

The NAACP is wrapping up a week of meetings, which included a keynote address by NAACP National Board of Directors Chairman Julian Bond.

... this is the 50th anniversary of the Little Rock School integration crisis. We honored the courage of the Little Rock Nine and their parents by holding our May Board meeting in Little Rock, along with our Daisy Bates Education Summit. In a cruel irony, the United States Supreme Court observed the 50th anniversary of Little Rock by gutting Brown v. Board, the historic case which gave birth to Little Rock and was supposed to end school segregation.

Until about 25 years ago, remarkable progress toward that goal was made under Brown. “From 1954 to 1982, [Supreme Court] Justices of all persuasions – from William Brennan to Lewis Powell to William Rehnquist – agreed that race-conscious integration policies stand in harmony, not tension, with Brown.”

Indeed, for most of us, the notion that race ought not be considered in remedying racial discrimination is ludicrous. Now the ludicrous has become law.

The Bush Court, on the same day the bald eagle was removed from the endangered species list, removed black children from the law’s protection. In two cases from Louisville and Seattle, the Court held by a 5 – 4 vote that those school systems could not voluntarily use race in assigning students to schools.

This is the most radical in a line of cases beginning in the 1980s that questioned race-conscious policies. Only Justice Kennedy stood between this ruling and total disaster. Four members of the Court – the right-wing brothers Scalia and Thomas and Bush appointees Alito and Roberts - would have prohibited any use of race in remedying school segregation.

The truth is, there are no non-racial remedies for racial discrimination. In order to get beyond race, you have to go to race. To suggest racial neutrality as a remedy for racial discrimination is sophistry of the highest order.

At a time when school segregation is increasing, a plurality of the Court would condemn minority children to secondary status before they’ve even started secondary school.

I would encourage you to read the complete text of his remarks.

The NOW annual conference promises to be just as exciting, as activists address concerns over the sharp right turn of the Court and the upcoming presidential election.

Stay tuned!