This will be the only discussion of my political beliefs in the "official" part of the site. Why? My beliefs are my business -- if you want personal information about me, there's a more than adequate "personal site" button above where you can find out a bunch. This section is about me as a professional, but I have some very limited personal information here in the 411 section, so may as well include this, which has come up in at least two job interviews.

Right.

It is my belief that white world supremacy is very rapidly pushing the human race towards extinction and should, for the good of all humanity, be completely dismantled and obliterated. It is my belief that Black people are, up to this very second, systematically and personally attacked, oppressed, intimidated, robbed, beaten, killed and generally dissed in every possible way possible by both conscious and unconscious servitors of white world supremacy. It is my belief that, in the words of Malcolm X, not all white people are guilty, but most of them are -- if you wear cotton clothes or ever bought a diamond or drive a car or any of a million other everyday normal things, you have economically supported the oppression of people of color world wide. So have I. It's a nasty conundrum. I could go on and on like this for paragraphs. Thankfully, I'm mostly done.

It's been remarked to me numerous times that it's strange I've never let this affect my work. I have had very few opportunities to work in an environment dominated by people of color, and I'm still fairly close with several white people -- from high school, from old jobs, et cetera. I don't have anything specific against specific white people. Individuals are just that, and I deal with them in a reciprocal fashion. The structures built upon their backs and mine, however, are quite often in my ideological crosshairs. I don't let my politics affect our business, since I've worked for people who were damned near white supremacists. Their checks cashed, so I did the work, simple as that. If I can tolerate somebody else's beliefs, which I find repulsive and abhorrent, I expect mine to be similarly tolerated, as long as we can keep out of each other's face.

In numerous publications and columns (even as far back as "The Choice is Yours" at the Los Angeles Sentinel and V/Vibe Magazine at USC) I've been ranting about this "down with white world supremacy" thing. I don't do so much anymore, because I'm coming to the conclusion that an accelerated heat death may be just the thing for carbon based life on Earth. I've talked bad about white people, I've harangued specific politicians and public figures and criminals by name, I've generally made a stink.

That's pretty tiresome.

Now I'm following the words of Mos Def, trying to "burn through your argument with action." I'm writing -- fiction, poetry, everything. Anything I have to say on the subject leaks out (subtly, I hope) through dialogue and details of characters, never the preachy voice of my relative "youth." I'm saving my money. I'm spending more wisely -- I spend at least 40% of my "going outside" money in the Black community, with Black-owned stores, always looking for ways to increase it. I'm generally trying to say less and less as I get older, and do more and more.

Just like my father.

That said, yes, I probably wrote whatever vitriolic madness that you think I did, and if it's fairly recent (i.e. after 1996) it should be in the writing archive (I have some of the older stuff, I just have to retype/scan it, and really, who has that kind of time?). I'm sorry if it made you mad, but I'm not sorry I wrote it, and that's pretty much the way it is.