Wednesday, January 18, 2006

Kingston Revisited

This is an article that appeared in the Freeman on Sunday. Because of the comment about the attack at the local high-school on young Robbie Hedrick being "overblown," a lot of the members of the racist right have their panties in a bunch. I wonder what you think?

TO THE ORIGINAL ARTICLE


01/15/2006
His dream lives on
By Blaise Schweitzer , Freeman staff

Today is the anniversary of the birth of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., born 77 years ago in Atlanta, Ga. He was killed more than 37 years ago, but lives on in the works of some of those being honored Monday at a fund-raising event for the local, child-centered King's Kids program.

Last week the honorees met at the Pointe of Praise Family Life Center in Kingston, the future site of the program. They talked about current events that have been affected by King's enduring legacy.

The "Heroes in Our Backyard" are Elaine Fernandez, Sandy Hopgood, James B. Childs, Daniel Gartenstein, Dawn Defino, Tawana R. Washington and Denni Demosthenes.

"The biggest thing is just the message of peace and caring about your neighbor," said Fernandez, of Clermont. "Fighting and working together for what's important."

Fernandez is project director of Kingston Cares, a City of Kingston coalition that works with schools, parents, human services agencies, law enforcement, the faith community and others to address teen delinquency, substance use, school dropout and pregnancy. She edits and publishes The Citizen, a bi-monthly magazine serving Dutchess, Ulster, Columbia and Greene counties.

Hopgood, the community outreach coordinator of the Everette Hodge Midtown Community Center in Kingston, is being honored by King's Kids for her work with homeless families, putting together programs that have addressed drug use and Internet and bicycle safety through the City of Kingston-sponsored Hodge center.

Hopgood called poverty a disease that must be addressed. Just as the Rev. King progressed from civil-rights to labor and poverty issues in the years before his assassination, she said America needs to look at what the poor in this country must do to survive.

James B. Childs of Kingston, son of the Rev. James Childs, the Pointe of Praise patriarch, has done work on race issues through his position as director of Kingston's Commission on Human Rights and his JARA Consulting business, helping organizations recognize bias and respond to conflict. He said he also has found the response to Southern survivors of Hurricane Katrina overly focused on race.

"I think it was more to do with socio-economics than race. I'm not saying race had nothing to do it. I think socio-economically, if you're poor, you're poor before you're anything else," he said.

From there, though, he did say he has followed "code words" people used for black Americans in the South during the height of the crisis. He added that some of those same words are spoken in the North to similar effect.

"You start seeing it around affordable housing. (People say,) 'We don't want them.' Who are 'them'?" Childs asked. As voters object to affordable housing programs in their back yards, he said, they often get in the way of the people who most dearly need the assistance because of the crime problems voters associate with blacks. "Anytime something happens that has a negative spin on it, where someone's gotten hurt, we tend to look for someone to blame. (And some people say,) 'Let's blame them.'"

Childs said he would hope people in this region could use discussions such as those triggered by the white-supremacy rally in Kingston to move in a more positive, honest direction.

It was impossible to talk about King's legacy without talking about how some of his protest methods have been co-opted by members of the KKK and other white supremacists like Hal Turner, an Internet radio personality who organized the Nov. 19 rally on Broadway in Kingston.

Turner argued that his protest was peaceful and in the non-violent tradition of the 1960s civil rights movement marches. His words of anger directed towards black youths involved in fights eclipsed his purported non-violent intentions.

Kingston attorney Daniel Gartenstein, also among those being honored at the King's Kids event, said the beating of a white youth that was supposedly the triggering event of the rally was overblown.

"The only people who know exactly what happened on that street that day were the children," Gartenstein said. "The people from New Jersey, the people from other states who were driving to this community (for the rally) certainly, had no idea. I'm the president of the school board, and I can't tell you exactly what happened. But immediately the focus was on, 'It's a black child who punched a white child.'"


Hopgood shook her head at the accusations of racism directed at the black youth involved in the incident. "Here we are, 40 years after all the civil rights activity, and we still have to question whether something is a racial issue or not?" she asked, rethorically.

Childs said, "We weren't saying we don't have any issues around being different - whether talking about race or gender or whatever. What we were saying is that it certainly isn't what he (Turner) was saying, what he was trying to purvey was really absolute nonsense. But now we can take this opportunity to figure out what our issues are: How does it impact how we interact with people?"


Hopgood said she has found that Americans grudgingly accept necessary change and pat themselves on the back for their "tolerance" of others. They need to adopt new vocabulary words and new attitudes, she said.

"The word is not tolerance, it is acceptance," she said. "We have to be clear about that."

Dawn Defino said her parents taught her that her childhood friends were welcome in her home regardless of race. Other issues were more important.

"There was my friend who was a person of character and there was someone who was not allowed in my home because their character does not meet with my values," she said.

She was present at some of the more violent race-related disruptions Kingston suffered in the 1960s, and agreed with Hopgood that progress has been insufficient. A single parent, Defino has worked for the New York State Education Department, developong a program to assist students with disabilities during their transistions from high school to work our higher education. She has also been a respite coordinator for the KidsPeace Natioinal Center's Crisis Respite Program.

Defino raised her children in a poor neighborhood and has tried to pass on her parents' values of acceptance, she said.


The connections between the King's Kids Hero honorees are many. Defino's father, Joseph Defino, coached James B. Childs through his career as a basketball guard playing for Kingston High School.

Childs said Defino was tough but fair.

"His coaching style was from Bobby Knight. Not as a person, he would never throw a chair. He was mild-mannered, but he kicked our behinds in practice," Childs said.

Childs said some of what Defino's father taught him on the basketball court remains with him to this day.

That's in keeping with Hopgood's belief that everyone bears responsibilities for nurturing children.

"We have to stay focused on that. It takes a whole village to raise a child," she said. Hopgood has hope that as Americans remember the Rev. King and his message, more progress will be made.

"Lots of people have forgotten about it," Hopgood said. "They don't even know who Martin Luther King is, some of the younger generation."


The other honorees at the King luncheon are Washington, a native of Kingston who volunteers with King's Kids and works with the City of Kingston's Commission on Human Rights; and Denni Demosthenes, who has supported King's Kids with support from his family's Hillside Manor restaurant. Washington, once a King's Kid herself, has worked for the YMCA's City Slickers summer program for two years, was a teacher's aide at Beginning's and once became a second mother to a child whose birth mother was dealing with severe personal problems. She also has provided one-on-one care for a child who needed special and extra attention. An Ulster County Community College graduate, she also holds a diploma in Child Day Care from the Professional Career Development Institute.

15 comments:

  1. Yep, he had a dream. "All the little black boys will hold little Whites girls' hand."

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  2. Stefan Schmidt said...
    What objection can you possibly have with a rally that denounces a brutal and merciless beating of a child?

    This incident was a local matter. Two kids got into a fight and one got the crap beat out of him(period)

    Though his injuries are serious and the fight in all likelyhood was over something trivial the fact is sometimes folks get hurt in a fight.

    Regardless of the young man's injuries the incident was far from the "roving bands of blacks" terrorizing Kingston" as Hal the nut and Lying Bill tried to make it out to be.

    The simple fact of the matter is neither one of those maniacs could care less than a dime about the injuries the young man suffered. They saw this as a chance to get some attention and free publicity and to stir up a bunch of mess.

    99% of the White folks in Kingston didn't want any part of Hal the nut and Lying Bill's instigating nonrally.

    And anyone who calls themselves a White nationalist and agrees with the warped imaginings of the likes of the afore mentioned two are just as crooked and crazy as they are.

    In all my years of monitoring hate groups I have yet to see one with anything remotely resembling integrety. They constantly cry about blacks, jews and mexicans and try to prove there point with misleading statistics from the same organizations they claim are crooked and run by jews. It appears that the ideal of truth and facts play no part in the racist agenda, and what makes it even worse is the fact they are lying to the very people they are trying to recruit. Their recruiting methods consist solely of lies and trickery.

    When folks are being lied to and tricked into joining and/or supporting an organization, common sense tells us that the organization cares nothing at all for them and only wants to use them for it's own purposes.

    Todays White nationalist don't want a White nation they want control of White people and will lie, still, cheat, murder and every other underhanded trick to try and achieve their aims.

    Propaganda is used for the sole purpose of controling the masses, by swaying opinions with misinformation.

    There was no racial crisis, no racial emergency in Kingston. Two young men got into a fight and one got hurt and the other got punished.
    Now whether or not the punishment fit the crime was a matter for the people of Kingston and the injured boy's family to pursue(period)

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  3. To all, we don't know of what really happened until the defendant and his lawyer have a say. But it wasn't a one on one fight as two victims were noted. This could have been two white kids fighting with one black kid and both got the crap kicked out of them.

    With a grand jury, a DA can get an indictment against a cockroach because the defense doesn't get to present their case until trial.

    However most violence against whites is done by other whites but you do see the racist coming out against those crimes? Nope.

    The truth will come out during the trial.

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  4. I find it ironic that Michael Blevins doesn't care if a white person beats up on another white person or when a white man rapes a white woman.

    You figure he would considering that nearly 90 percent of white women raped are raped by white men and that most of the violence and crimes done against whites are done by whites.

    With the new medicare drug plan, Blevins should be able to get back on his Seroquel again.

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  5. Everetts,

    Blevins hated this country so much back in 2001 that he cheered the bombings of the World Trade Centers. (so did Billy Roper)

    Only when he got so much shit over it did he reverse himself on it.

    And yes, he hates the US but yet doesn't mind taking Medicare and Social Security for his mental disability.

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  6. Great points by Everetts

    If the white supremacists really loved and cared for their race, they would worry most about the race who commits the most murders, rapes, and crime against their own race.

    Which is the white race itself.

    For example, according to the FBI's web site, nearly 90 percent of rapes of white women are done by white men. But yet the racist worry about the other 10 percent. If the black race were totally elminated, rapes of white women would barely drop.

    Black on white crime accounts for a SMALL PERCENTAGE of all crime in the United States. Bottom line.

    And Stefan,

    The fight was at least 2 whites fighting with 1 black with the two whites getting the crap kicked out of them. Why do the white supremacist leave out this fact? The black kid weighing 300 pounds (if that is true, I bet it isn't because we have no idea what the black kid looks like except by the white supremacist) doesn't matter. It is irrelvent.

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  7. Stefan said...What if this was your child, Nikki? A child whose face is now unrecognizable, who cannot see out of one eye, and a child who cannot be so much as smacked without facing the possibility of death?

    By opposing this rally, by bastardizing this rally as a battle in your war against racists, you are diverting people’s attentions from where they should be. You have proven that rallying for a white victim is politically incorrect while rallying for a black victim is courageous.

    You are twisted so far around that you are sacrificing a precious white child for your cause.

    Let that rest on your conscience.


    What happened to Robbie Hedrick should never happen to any child. In a perfect world, children wouldn't fight and violence would never occur. What would I do if it were my child? I can easily answer that, Stefan.

    I would be soooooo pissed off! I would want something done! I would demand that the school administration and the school board, as well as law enforcement, take immediate and decisive action. The difference with me, however, is that I wouldn't be looking at the color of the children involved and trying to make it racial.

    The problem, as I see it, is one that is a problem in many areas. School violence has to be addressed. If this had happened to one of my children, I would be asking how a child was allowed to be beaten to such an extreme. I would be asking where security was, where were those in charge? I would probably hold the school somewhat responsible. But I would not be breaking it down along racial lines.

    Teen-agers get into fights a lot. They often fight over things that adults think are ridiculous. But, a beating of this extent should not have happened at school.

    Stefan - if a black man mugs me and steals my purse, I might hate what he did - I might even feel hate toward him. That doesn't mean, however, that I am going to hate all black people.I think most people are pretty much the same way.

    The issue in Kingston wasn't racial - it was school violence. Then here comes Hal Turner and his entourage of misfits and they attempt to make it one of race. If you had read some of the discussions that were going on at the newspaper site, you would have seen that a lot of people took great exception to Turner and friends trying to paint their city as some sort of racist haven.

    The young man who has been charged with the beating is going to be punished. But, the racist right demands that it be called a "hate crime." I wasn't there, and neither were you. Neither were any of the others who tried so hard to incite the city of Kingston. We haven't heard both sides and we really don't know what took place.

    Yes - I do take great issue with Hal Turner and friends trying to USE this incident for their own personal gain. They don't care about Robbie - he was merely a vehicle to get them such much desired attention. And, you know...I really dislike people who try to capitalize on the pain of others.

    Hal Turner, Bill White, Michael Blevins, et. al. are nothing more that opportunists. And those who follow them and dress up in silly Nazi uniforms serve no other purpose than providing the side show. Exploiting the Hedrick family was absolutely deplorable. But, then you have to consider the source.

    School violence has to be addressed and dealt with - but not by a rag-tag bunch of racist hate-mongers who only exacerbate the problem that already exists. This was not a rally against violence. It was an abomination against the city and the citizens of Kingston.

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  8. Stefan,

    And where are you when a white kid gets beat up by another white kid?

    And where are you when a white child gets molested by a white male?

    I have doubts that ONE black kid JUMPED two white kids at the same time.

    I think it perhaps could have been the other way around, that two white kids might have been starting trouble against ONE black kid and got the crapped knocked out of them.

    Perhaps it was an assualt by the black and perhaps the two white kids were taunting the one black kid. We don't know and you don't know either. And you have no idea if this black kid was 300 pounds or not. He might have only been 150 because the only people who have physically described the black kid are neo-nazis.

    We'll have to wait for the trial to find out.

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  9. Stefan,

    Show me the last time Jesse Jackson held a street rally for a black kid beaten by a similiar aged white kid?

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  10. Stefan, I am not real fond of Al Sharpton and yes I think he has made some very anti-Semitic remarks. When he marches down the street screaming for genocide or when he stands on the steps of a state house and calls for a racial holy war - I promise that I will take him to task. And if Jesse ever tries to side with Mona and tell us that the Jews ate Jesus, I will personally tell him how warped his mind has become. Deal?

    I think Everrets and Harry have made some very valid points here in that none of you seems to get upset when white people beat each other up or when they do horrible things to children. You have your search engines combing for black on white crime and that is what you talk about.

    Why is that? Why is it that you choose to ignore the heinous actions of your own race? Crime is crime - and ALL violent crime leaves victims. What makes black on white crime any more hateful than white on black or white on white? In my opinion, we should be addressing CRIME - not the "color" of it.

    Of course, that would require that people engage in viewing the big picture, and that is next to impossible for some.

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  11. And...let's not forget that more than 2/3 of rape victims are victimized by someone they know and according to the US Dept. of Justice, somewhere between 80 and 90% of all victims are raped by someone with the same racial and ethnic background.

    Additionally, white males account for approximately 55% of all rapes.

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  12. Everrets you said...


    I find it ironic that the "Rally Against Violence" was being led by a man that routinely calls out for murder, lynchings, terrorism, ethnic cleansing, and all manner of criminal activity.

    The difference between ourselves, and yourselves, is that we do not advocate ANY violence to begin with.

    ---

    You hit the nail on the head with those comments! I have never called for violence against anyone, EVER. Can they say the same? Nope. Hypocrites the lot of em'.

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  13. Most victims of child molestation are inner city (Black) children, which implies the child molesters by the nature of the disease are also Black

    WRONG! Child molestation happens in every social strata and pedophiles come from all walks of life. I don't know where you get your information - but where ever it is I would suggest that you tell them they are way off base on that one.

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  14. Stefan,

    Listen to those speeches that were given, especially by Mona Montgomery. Her speech had nothing to do with what may have happened in Kingston.

    Listen to Hal Turner call for violence and assassinations against minorities and others. And then you expect us to believe your rally was AGAINST VIOLENCE when the organizer of the event says "violence solves everything" and "a well placed bullet can change the world"

    Now if you really are for peace, you would right now condemn Hal Turner for saying "violence solves everything". But you won't.

    Come on man, lay off the catnip. If you are too blind to see the hypocrisy of a peace rally run by a short little man calling for violence, then you must be mentally dysfunctional.

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  15. Goodnight and pleasant dreams.

    ReplyDelete

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