-----Original Message-----
FROM: Helga The Help
SENT: Jan 13 2007 12:00AM
SUBJECT:Happy Martin Luther King Day!
Wassup brothas and sistas!
This is Helga Mohammed el-Salami Washington and I would like to wish you a happy Martin Luther King Day!
In honor of my own African heritage, which I trace back to roughly 48,000 B.C., I would like to highlight the 4 most important issues affecting us today.
History Month Hijacking. Seemingly "important" events are always taking place in February and trying to steal its thunder. February has marked two celebrated historical surrenders and will now inevitably mark a third. In 1848, Mexico surrendered to the US and in 1943, Germany surrendered to the allies. In 2006, Coretta Scott King surrendered to cancer, but unlike the axis (of immigration and evil respectively), had the courtesy to do so on January 31st.
Jobs. There have never been enough high-paying jobs in this blessed Union of ours for us true Afro-Americans. Being true to my roots, my circadian rhythm is based on West Africa Central Time, GMT+1, not this whole GMT-8 jazz like in LA. With the shortage of executive and knowledge-worker professions respecting our patriotic clocks, is it any wonder that, in the western time zones, we disproportionately drift toward night-owl occupations?
Racial Profiling. Just because one is African-American, people assume that one can rap, groove and dunk a basketball when, in fact, one can rarely do any of these things. These societal expectations force us to study extra hard in concerts and on the basketball court at the expense of the mainstream curriculum.
African American Vernacular English. Also known as Ebony Phonics or Ebonics, this beautiful and remarkable language is slowly being perverted by Standard American English. As I spy on conversations, I hear Ebonics no-nos such as realization of two-syllable morphemes such as "working" (workin’) and failure to properly metathesise words like ask (aks). You kids don’t be respectin’ yo’ roots.
If Dr. King were still alive, I’m sure these issues would be atop his list and we would have marched on Compton long ago to protest them.
Peace out ya’ll,
Helga