… it’s not about a salary, it’s all about reality …

No, just got in a mess. Girlfriend graduating tomorrow and discussions on what assimilation, acculturation, reparations, and alladat really pushed any writing time out of the way, which I don’t mind. But I think I got some good posts for you all. In the meantime, riddle me this, Batpeople:

What is a friend?

Yeah, easy right? Right …

I repeat, what’s a friend to you?

jose, who’s keeping it reeaaalllly simple tonight

A few notes:

1. Keith Olbermann just told President Bush to shut the hell up on national TV (watch the video). Say what you will about Keith, but that’s commendable.

2. Bin Laden’s going to drop another tape. I call it BS, and BS by any other name … is actually still BS.

3. What were John McCain and George W. Bush doing during Hurricane Katrina? Was it

a. going straight to the New Orleans and helping with the victims like Al Gore?
b. informing the nation of this terrible tragedy on national television?
c. writing up legislature to provide immediate relief to the areas affected?
d. cutting a cake?

Mole333 at The Culture Kitchen has your answer.

4. Web site releases are becoming a lot like album releases: sometimes you need to push back the date of your website release because someone else might sell better on your date. I’m glad I already pushed my date back so J. Dakar didn’t blow me out of the water. Check his site out.

5. When Mr. Wasserman first said he was going to add me to his class’ syllabus, I was a little stunned and surprised. But then I noticed that really did add me to his class syllabus via his class’ wiki. That and the recent success of my Ma’afa / Holocaust post (2000 hits in 2 weeks!) really keeps me inspired to write. (By the way, sir, you’re linked on my sidebar.)

6. Shout-outs to the folks at Instructify for the latest edition of the Carnival of Education.

jose, who feels a little sore from my latest workout …

Today, I read the latest news that George W. Bush, our president, compared his political opponents in America to Nazi appeasers. He didn’t mention anyone by name, but I’m sure Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama were taken aback at the slight from such an aloof leader. If there was ever a more inappropriate but frankly ironic quote, it’s GW calling others out for their support of the Nazis, not only because of how Bush approaches foreign policy, but also because of his own connections to the aforementioned reign of terror.

I’m not going to come here and call Bush a straight up Nazi. However, we have to take a look at some of his “best” policies, including the nixing of habeas corpus and the focus on military brute force to achieve capitalist gains. We have to see his human rights record, and we have to see just how out-of-touch he is with the rest of the country and its needs. We have to look at his penchant for invading countries, and selling it back to his country as a means of creating some ill-gotten national identity. In the process, he implicitly ostracizes huge sections of our citizens to keep the people distracted, confused, and under his prying thumb. From most liberal pundits’ estimates, he’s overtly stricken 9 out of 10 rights off the Bill of Rights, and the year’s still young. What’s more, he has a not-so-clandestine set of leaders who support him all throughout every industry that apparently matters to this country, like Fox News Network, for instance, and every branch of government.

I could go on about his administration’s policies, but his “cowboy” persona (when he’s really from Connecticut, and attended Yale U) has made a huge rift between our country and the rest of the global community. The many accounts of American tourists who get harassed, belittled, or even feel a bit of shame for what their government’s done to the Middle East are reaching an all-time high. Yet, even with his political gaffes, missteps, and stubborn refusal to make amends with any section of people he’s offended with his antics, he’s got the nerve to condemn someone’s actions when they’re actually trying to find peace … on their own dime.

On days like this, when we are still searching for peace within ourselves and our neighborhoods, we have to understand how messages from the “leader of the free world”, a term I haven’t used for him ever, really affect that. Every time he calls out peace makers as war mongers, he gives license to those who propagate war to continue doing so. Every time he vaguely mentions helping people in this or any country, it’s really a call to special corporate interests to strip the people of any real help. Every time he so much as grins, most perceptive people feel like they’re being lied to, and yet he fancies himself the judge and jury for people heading any world peace efforts.

This is not an endorsement for Barack or Jimmy, but we can’t get peace until the proletariat get a piece, too. I’m an optimist, so peace is really the only rationale for me. But I also understand that the precedent for how any top-down structure runs starts from the head, and frankly, ours has no interest in peace. But he does have an interest in misappropriating it. Another misstep for this administration, surprise surprise.

jose, who wonders if he’ll ever invite anyone to guest-blog at his page …

When I read about the recent arrest of the infamous “Soulja Girl” (synopsis: she harassed an old lady on Atlanta’s metro train system, and the video got viral. for more info, watch here), I applauded. No really, I applauded all by myself in front of my computer. This was a situation that shows, really, the degradation of our youth. That huge sense of entitlement and unharnessed lawlessness really gets on my nerves with these kids. Whether it’s at the movie theatre or my schools, many of our youth have become more superficial, less integral, more belligerent, and more careless with themselves, more than anything.

While it’s easy to point at the parents, I’m of the belief that the village raises the child. When communities as a whole set a standard for how their neighborhoods like, for what their children should know, and how their offspring should behave in any given environment, I strongly believe that translates into higher success for the communities in general. There are clear examples of that in many communities of different racial and socioeconomic backgrounds, but the poorer ones rarely get highlighted. I also believe that there are neighborhoods that don’t have the social, fiscal, and/or experiential tools necessary to make that happen, but even the little things make a huge difference.

For example, at the movie theatre, I proposed to my girlfriend and partner-in-movie-watching that maybe theaters should establish a “code of conduct” at the movies. After the last few debacles at the movies, teenagers screaming curses at the screen for no apparent reason, others playfighting at the front of the movie screen, and others still hushing the people who were trying to quiet them down, I honestly wanted to dropkick at least a few of these teens for ruining these movies. Yes, they have as much right as I do to be there because they paid their 12$ like I did, but there’s an understanding that we’re all going to be quiet while the movie’s playing unless it implicitly elicits a crowd reaction, such as laughter, crying, or the occasional scream.

“Fuck that shit” is not an appropriate reaction (unless it’s Cloverfield, then go right ahead). Yet, when the movie theatre does not have appropriate consequences for dealing with people who interfere with the crowd’s movie-viewing experience, then they’re allowed to do as they please. They’ll make fart noises all throughout, get on their cell phone during the movie, or just find little ways to annoy you, thus leaving the chastising up to the patrons who are just there to enjoy a movie.

But Jose, this is coming from someone who’s a bit of a rebel rouser.

Yes, but I also understand the power of timing and purpose. Interrupting people’s subway ride because you want to scream some nonsense or act like you’re Mary J, but can’t even hit one of her lower notes is not conducive to anyone’s argument for the improvement of the proletariat’s condition. If you’re at the Kanye concert dancing to” Gold Digger” but you’re trying to sit on the stairs of a lower section than the ones you bought (and you’re the same chicks I catch at the club who never come with cash but an open hand), then you’re not really helping the situation out either. Retro Kids and hipsters crawling my stomping grounds making a whole lot of noise about the latest small-and-subpar hangout spot also make me sick. These group of people often make the noise I’m not trying to hear.

Then, I check that Soulja Girl video again, and she’s emblematic of the hip-hop movement these days in general: style without substance. At first glance, she’s reminiscent of how the young hip-hop kids would rebel against their elders through the use of music, and bucking the older generations’ culture and standards in favor of new trends and a sense of independence. Of course, that prose comes crashing down when you watch it again, and she probably doesn’t think about these implications as much as us philosophers, too. She’s probably just as annoying and trifling as she seems. And her mother said that she “didn’t take her meds that day.”

Yes, I know what you’re thinking. That excuse lacks substance for me, too.

jose, who definitely wrote a thinly-guised educational post here …

“Superstar,” an art teacher once said, in reference to me in the classroom.

Sometimes I hear it ring in my head in the morning while I’m washing my face, brushing my teeth, and looking at these life-worn eyes. Every minute after that is in preparation for some upcoming performance, maybe even a battle. I watch Sportscenter in the morning, or maybe some NY1 so I can get the weather and the latest on the news, so I’m ready for any inclement weather. I walk down the streets while it’s still a shade dark even now, humming a song that hopefully congests the channels to my foremost thoughts, where the negative ones often invade and parade. I’m often my own worst enemy, and if Lucifer exists, he plays awful tricks in my mind, with worst-case scenarios replaying throughout the little piece of time I have to unwind, really.

The cold, orange and beige benches of the subway do nothing for my enthusiasm or lack thereof to go to school. Traveling 40+ minutes on the train, I have no choice but to play the most inspirational tracks I have. The last track I play on my iPod before I get near the school building rings true to so many of us who give more than a real percentage allows: “Bittersweet Symphony” by The Verve. It’s the anti-wrestling theme song. Whereas before the gym, I choose “What You Know” by T.I. or “Ante Up” by M.O.P., I choose the more subdued and slightly more vulnerable tones of the one-hit wonder.

But I also find it fitting because in my random bits of utter humility, I often wonder if I deserve all the acclaim, praise, and blessings I’m thrown. I should just stick to the job description and not what it inherently means. I shouldn’t take on any more than what I’m actually paid to do nor should I pontificate too often on developing the human side of the kids. I shouldn’t focus on the aesthetic of our occupation, and possibly developing the young ones into older and wiser ones, helping them arrive at their own conclusions about what success looks like but also guiding them and showing them alternatives that might work to their benefit. I shouldn’t seek to inspire, and follow the advice of those who say, “Well if you don’t inspire them, believe me, it’ll get done.”

I also know that I facilitate a special role for these kids, whom have grown more attached to me and my energy as the year’s gone on. Some of my more turbulent kids have made almost 180-degree turns in favor of focusing on the positive. The males especially have taken a liking to me, because finding a male teacher who understands their struggle in the school system has become increasingly difficult. The female students have taken a liking to me strictly off my ability to translate math for them, and them feel part of a usually male-dominated conversation. The whole school gets snippets of this energy through my efforts with Penny Harvest and math.

“You? YOU!? Psh, you’re a superstar. Please. The kids really like you, they love you and respect you, and you can tell by the way they talk about you, and how they follow you. Every kid’s always going to be a little tough, especially in this school, but you? No, you got it.”

If you say so, lady. With 30 school days left, the lights are definitely on high …

jose, who won’t be writing tomorrow because of the big Glow In The Dark concert with Lupe Fiasco, NERD, Rihanna, and Kanye West …

A few notes:

1. I’m back to health mostly. It feels good, especially after taking the day off on Friday to handle that. I needed a little breather to finish out the year strong, and I wasn’t coming into work to spread my cold on anyone. Thankfully I think I’m ready for tomorrow’s challenges.

2. A pretty heated discussion popped off in that last post about the Holocaust and the Maafa. In turn, that post alone received 600+ hits. I know, I’m surprised. Before that, I’ve never gotten over 300 hits in a day.

3. I went to one of (2) regular barbershops, and there was this new guy there. Of course, everyone’s nervous about the new guy, but I said, “F*k it, what’s the worst that could happen?” Why did this man take 45 minutes to hook me up (where it should only take me 20, 30 tops)? 3 people at a different barber finished before I did. After a while, I said, “Alright, let me go!” I mean, I was literally there teaching him how to cut. And he kept making mistakes, so he kept trying to fix them. I’m surprised my hairline isn’t behind my ears after that experience.

4. To all the past and present mothers, soon-to-be-mothers, and future hot moms, Happy Mother’s Day. To everyone else, wish your mothers wherever they may be a happy and joyous one (unless you and her don’t really get along like that, then my bad). They’re the center of our universe, and there’s no way we can pay them back, but the plan is to show ‘em that we understand … you are appreciated.

I’m keeping it short today. I gotta prepare my mom a little something. In the meantime, enjoy these tidbits:

- Pandagon reports on a teacher who lost his job in Florida because he’s a wizard. No, really.

- The Free Slave puts down some interesting points of view about our current system.

- Did Edward Carson really bring up Public Enemy in a classroom effectively? Why I believe he did.

- Eva at Sassy Women Online discusses the latest You-Tube phenomena of bullying online and why it’s not cool to almost kill a girl on camera.

- NYC Educator writes another informative posts on another think tank telling teachers how terrible they are.

jose, who’s concurrently excited about glowing in the dark with Kanye, NERD, Lupe, and Rihanna on Tuesday …

p.s. - Yes, I have “Dear Mama” as a ringtone whenever my mom calls.

Wow, my face feels like a lemon-meringue stuffed pie. And I’ve been blowing my nose all day trying to get the stuff out. Ugh! This is the first time in what feels like a year or so I’ve actually been sick, versus in previous years when I’d be sick every week or two. I’m proud of my upkeep. Nonetheless, this change of weather is really messin’ with my immune system … not to mention a driver in need of a reality check. Who the hell blows their horn from 4-6AM consecutively?! Who? Inconsiderate asses.

But no, I didn’t call in sick. Rather, I just let the chips fall where they may, and do my thing.

OK, a meme, courtesy of NYC Educator:

1) What was I doing 10 years ago?

I’m a little younger than most of my readers. Let’s just say I’m certified to teach myself from 10 years ago.

2) What are 5 things on my to-do list for today (not in any particular order):

• Read some more of my latest Men’s Health mag.
• Get ready for tomorrow.
• Find an exit strategy for this crazy cold of mine.
• Buy tickets to go to the Dominican Republic.
• Watch some basketball before I go to sleep.

3) Snacks I enjoy:

• Some banana-walnut muffins
• Peanut M&Ms
• Some of that Cold Stone Ice Cream, yummmmmm …

4) Things I would do if I were a billionaire:

• Shower the people I love with love, word to James Taylor …
• Make my own school.
• Publish a couple of books.
• Invest my money so future Vilson generations can have more money.
• Travel the world.
• Attend all those events I wasn’t able to when I was a little less loaded, like an NBA All-Star Game here, World Series there …

5) Three of my bad habits:

• Sometimes I’m so focused on my writing, I tune out everything else, and I mean everything else.
• I have a hard time expressing myself, and that can come across as callous.
• I forgive, but never forget …

6) 5 places I have lived:

Only lived in one. NYC.

7) 5 jobs I have had:

• Basketball manager
• Concession worker at a movie theatre
• Data entry clerk
• Intern at a financial corp.
• Teacher

6 peeps I wanna know more about:

• Friedrich Nietzche
• Arturo Schomburg
• Karl Marx
• Lolita Lebron
• My grandfather on my father’s side
• Raul Julia

I tag … the starting line-up of the Los Angeles Lakers, since they’re not busy with anything right now.

jose, who can’t believe he’s this sick with only 33 days left for school …

Before I continue, a quick apology / shoutout to The Science Goddess at What It’s Like on the Inside. I never shouted you out for hosting / posting a great Ed Carnival, and I should have. Whoops.

Today, I began reading my Derek Jeter-covered Men’s Health, and in it, they start, as usual, with a letter from the editor Dave Zinczenko about leadership, and the intangibles, a set of characteristics that have defined Derek’s whole career. Yet, it takes decades to prepare and foster a baseball player of his caliber into the man he is today. Sure, most of the credit goes to his own determination and will-power, yet every baseball fan, Yankee fan or not, recognizes that his evolution into future first-ballot Hall of Famer and legend started from really young, and that talent was developed over time, and with a considerable amount of practice.

If we give it thought, his real career started at the little league level, developing the necessary skills and mannerisms that would eventually give him successful options in the future. His stats and awards weren’t important, though I’m sure he received a few. His coaches most likely saw promise in the little things that he did, and those elements separated him from the others. Did he always show up on time? How did he handle defeats? Was he early to practice? Does he contribute positive to his environment? Is he a valuable member of the team or only out for himself?

Maybe we personally can’t answer those questions, but we know that whenever he fell out of line, his coaches reminded him, and his parents made sure he followed through with his passion. The answers to some of the aforementioned questions made Jeter into the leader we see him as today. He wasn’t nor is he perfect. At times, he can be a little vindictive, and he’s sometimes called out teammates in the media when he probably shouldn’t have. However, we still have the deepest respect for him as the captain of arguably the most legendary team in America.

The assumed role of educators from Little League and high school to Double and Triple-A is undoubtedly to make sure is to make sure their players realize their potential on and even off the field. On the field, the managers have the most direct impact on whether the player will succeed baseball-wise. Yes, we’ve seen countless examples of athletes whose extracurricular activities often hinder their progress, some ending in tragic endings. Yet, we also see examples of players who, when moved from one team to the next, do better in the latter team or vice versa, and that has lots to do with the managers they’ve worked with.

It gets even more complex if we look deeper into the managerial styles of these students. Are they in-your-face old school style like Lou Pinella, or laid back and patient like Joe Torre? Are they blunt and fiery like Ozzie Guillen or the men of men like Terry Francona? Do they live in the tape room or just have a knack for managing? We also understand the roles of a Brian Cashman or a Billy Beane in making sure the right staff comes together, but we can also see how the mere presence of a manager in the dugout can completely revamp the way the team sits in there. Do they look downtrodden or are they in intense anticipation?

And maybe our students don’t always turn out to be a Derek, much the way some of us aren’t Tony LaRussa, but every manager has the potential to help a player become a strong leader, so even if his or her baseball career fizzles out, the student still remembers and reuses the same skills of patience, hard work, perfect practice, and determination in the other fields they wish to play in. Any role player, utility player, journeyman, or All-Star recognizes these essentials, but it’s the manager pushing the buttons, making sure they remember these pillars, and even through the harshest of times, getting his players ready for the postseason …

jose, who wants to be the greatest manager for his team …

p.s. - I recognize that professional baseball managers make a boatload more money than we do, but this is purely about the analogy.

p.p.s. - For the record, yesterday was the first day I eclipsed over 300 hits, so shout-outs to Taylor for that nod you gave to my post yesterday about the Holocaust and Maafa :-).

My first real exposure to the atrocities of the Holocaust at the hands of the Nazis probably came in elementary school, at a time when most of my teachers were of Jewish descent, and when the Lower East Side still had a strong Jewish population. Thus, I learned more about the Holocaust than any other human tragedy, even more than slavery. That might have been more relevant to the students they taught (most of the students in my class were Black or Latino with a couple of Asians and one White girl). They did the best they could in showing us how terrible slavery was, but I couldn’t blame my teachers for their focus on the Holocaust because their hurt was more immediate, and they could tell us more readily the struggles their family members faced during the Holocaust. Plus, the details are really graphic.

So what’s a young brotha gonna do to find out about parts of his history? I couldn’t turn to bachata songs because they usually reflected the sorrows of a forlorn lover, and merengue just started making obscure references to the female anatomy or a new dance. Hip-hop turned away from the Black nationalist message and more towards gangsterism, at once reflecting the greater oppression of the system and in many ways perpetuating said criminality. So of course, a group of concerned African-American women and men (about 3 of them in all) at the local Boys Club showed me the seminal documentary “Eyes on the Prize,” enticing the 20 of us with cookies and treats to come and watch as people hung, shot, lynched, sprayed, harassed, and discriminated based on the series of features we attest to as race.

Over the next few years, not to discredit any of the  educators, I didn’t hear much about the harsh realities of either harsh reality until senior year, after I hastily charged White people in general of racism and benefiting from slavery. My teacher completely leveled me for that one and made me submit a retraction, essentially. I bit it because I needed to graduate, but it only made me angrier, possibly more bitter, and more inclined to divisive discussions, and maybe more reticent in admitting how my friends of all backgrounds shaped my understanding of the way the world worked.

Fast-forward to today, and I’ve visited 2 Holocaust museums thus far, and both of them made me think thoroughly about the comparisons and contrasts we can make between the Holocaust and the Maafa (African Enslavement). While the Jews who helped raise worldwide awareness of the Holocaust through monuments, museums, and a motto of “forgive but never forget,” the more widespread descendants of the slaves and murder victims of the Maafa across the Americas don’t yield the same reverence.

Is it because of a racial difference, and the expansion of the definition of what it meant to be white in the earlier part of last century? Could it also be the differences in access and prioritizing education between White Jews and descendants of Africans who were enslaved, education the key in solidifying catastrophic events in history? Is it because we can’t directly implicate the United States for reaping benefits from German Jews, but we can most certainly see the legacy of slavery throughout the Americas, and we can hold America responsible for reparations in America? And is it because somewhere between 2 to million 6 million people died in the Holocaust all across Europe but somewhere between 50 to 100 million people died in Africa, and all across the Americas? I assume it’s a strong mixture of all these questions.

Nonetheless, when I walked through the halls of the Holocaust Museum in DC, I never once heard anyone say “get over it,” deriding those who have been affected negatively by that experience. Never once did anyone question whether this Holocaust was true (there are Holocaust doubters out there, but they’re been proven wrong thoroughly). Never once did someone say “Wow, those Jews haven’t done anything since then to contribute to our society.” The same can’t be said for African-Americans in this country. And just as a matter of reference, there are two proposals for actual monument museums dedicated to slavery in the United States, but nothing concrete. Yet, even through African-American history museums, much like the Holocaust museums, we can only get a snippet of the harsh realities of

The one thought that rings true to both of these genocides was that we do need to learn more about them. We can’t pretend to have been there, even with some ill-conceived role-play. Knowing of the tragedy and really trying to understand the point of view of descendants of these tragedies really improves, not hinders, true unity. If these atrocities don’t come to light on an academic and personal level, then we’ll be doomed to another of those again. It’s no wonder why incidents like the Crown Heights Riot keep happening, and why Michael Richards had no problem saying what he said in such a public and caustic way.

Both incidents highlight another reason why it’s important to infuse our curriculum with deeper understanding of the continuing tragedies that occur daily, from the kids murdered in Philadelphia and South Central Los Angeles to the families separated in Baghdad and the Sudan. We’ll never see the end of this until we start to see human life (including our own) as indispensable. The idea of massive collections of bodies lying in a pit isn’t a foreign concept to people that come from these places. Once you turn a blind eye to it, that pit looks awfully bottomless …

jose, who wants you to help him sings, these songs of freedom, ’cause all he’s ever had … redemption songs …

A few notes:

1. Ironman was really good. Better than SpiderMan 1 and X-Men 1, but not better than the second part of either series. It stayed true to the original comic book for the most part, and more than anything, it was made more for adults than children (which makes me wonder why children were present in the theatre. A couple of people doubted whether Robert Downey Jr. was the right guy for the role, but even watching the trailers, there’s no other person on Earth more qualified for the role. Directly after, I have to download the original Black Sabbath’s “Iron Man.”

2. Yes, I did show up on NY1 because of the immigration protest on May 1st. I knew it would happen since the camera usually finds me one way or another, but it wasn’t about me. It was about the message we were sending to the rest of the world, and that’s important. The strangest part about the whole protest was the observers on the sides of Broadway. They were all so shocked and in awe of the protest that they decided to just look at us. There was neither encouragement nor anger, just people watching, taking pictures with their cell phones, mouth agape, as if they’d never seen a protest before. Pictures and video coming soon.

3. Kobe Bryant wins MVP, and all is right with the world.

4. I’m due for a complete main site redesign this summer. Not so much the blog, but everything else here. Same goes for my MySpaces, but I can put that off. I’m still trying to get some ideas for how I want my redesign to look like, but that’s the beauty of being one’s own web designer; I don’t have any artistic limitations really.

5. Digsby has officially taken over all my old IM clients, and even let me rediscover my old ones, and it’s taken much less RAM than those heavy programs do. I now have my 3 AIMs, MSN, GMail, and recently added Facebook Chat all under one umbrella, plus checking my MSN, Yahoo, and GMail e-mails. It’s been a world of difference as far as clutter is concerned.

6. Going to the gym makes me feel good. As a matter of fact, I think I’ll go do that. Got a lot on my plate. Peace …

jose, who will actually write a report on his 3rd year of teaching soon …