Happy Juneteenth America!

[Bapu]

First new federal holiday since the 1983 (MLK Day). 

 

Make or play music in abundance today.

Edited June 19, 2021 by Bapu

[Shane_B.]

 

[Wibbles]

I hope you were being ironic in posting a video of a bunch of white men pretending to be black. 

[paulo]

Are there any days left that Americans don't have a holiday on?

[Notes_Norton]

We need more holidays, especially the kind where hiring live music is part of the celebration!!!

I have no problem with Juneteenth, but I think the name is rather informal and thus not solemn enough. I think it should be called Emancipation Day. IMO, that change would add more importance to the name and remind everybody what it is really all about.

I had no plans for the day, perhaps next year.

Insights and incites by Notes

[Wibbles]

I'm not sure that a white man renaming a Black/African American celebration is a good look. 

 

[Shane_B.]

8 hours ago, Wibbles said:

I hope you were being ironic in posting a video of a bunch of white men pretending to be black. 

No. It's a great song and it was relevant. Nothing more nothing less.

[Notes_Norton]

1 hour ago, Wibbles said:

I'm not sure that a white man renaming a Black/African American celebration is a good look. 

 

You have a good point there.

 

Notes

[craigb]

Will there be a Cakewalk?

[Mandolin Picker]

9 hours ago, Notes_Norton said:

I have no problem with Juneteenth, but I think the name is rather informal and thus not solemn enough. I think it should be called Emancipation Day. IMO, that change would add more importance to the name and remind everybody what it is really all about.

There is already an Emancipation Day celebrated in the District of Columbia. It is April 16 and celebrates Lincoln signing the Emancipation proclamation.

Juneteenth is a different day and is the commemoration of the June 19, 1865, announcement of General Order No. 3 by Union Army general Gordon Granger, proclaiming and enforcing freedom of enslaved people in Texas, which was the last state of the Confederacy with institutional slavery.

[John K]

Like some black dude said. Holiday is a cool token, but falls short of justice...

[Shane_B.]

I'm part Mohawk and Leni Lenape. When I say I'm from Jersey and the East coast ... I ain't joking. My bloodline has been there for hundreds if not thousands of years. My ancestors were never freed. They had their land taken which stretched from the southern US up through Canada on the East coast and forced on to "reservations".

If it's truly about making wrongs right then you can't stop at a single point in history and pick one particular group. Almost every group of people were enslaved at some point throughout history.

Anyhoo. I'm certainly not against the spirit of it but I would take it a little more seriously with a more serious title and better definition. It sounds like a 6th grader came up with the name and in my opinion it's embarrassing.

 

[Notes_Norton]

12 hours ago, John K said:

Like some black dude said. Holiday is a cool token, but falls short of justice...

There cannot be justice, since by now all the slave owners are dead. IMO, It's good to remember the past to learn from it, but there is no way to punish the people who were guilty after they are gone.

My grandparents came to the USA from Italy long after slavery was abolished. At one time in history, the proto-Italians were enslaved by the Greeks, but I have no pent-up resentment for the Greeks.

The way I figure it is this, I was born white, others were not. I don't owe a black person anything special. I owe the 'persons-of-color' the same as I owe my fellow white people, to treat them with respect and as an equal, unless they show me any reason why I should not.

I've been in bands with White people, Black people, Hispanic people, Male people, Female people, and even one Asian person. I worked for Motown in Detroit for a while. I don't care about your skin color. What I care about is (1) Can you play well? And (2) Are you a nice person?

Most of the musicians I've played with are nice people. If they weren't decent folks or if they couldn't play well enough, they either didn't get the job or were canned.

I had a Mexican for a next-door neighbor for a few years, and there is a black gentleman living at the end of our dead-end street. No problem since they are nice folks. The person I had a problem with used to live across the street, fortunately he moved to North Carolina. He was white and a jerk.

Juneteenth is just as much my holiday as anyone else's. It's a national holiday, a national celebration, so I will celebrate it as well. Sure it's a token, but so is Dead President's Day or Christmas.

I hope it becomes a day that traditionally hires live bands, we all need the work.

Insights and incites by Notes

 

 

Edited June 21, 2021 by Notes_Norton
typo

[InstrEd]

2 hours ago, Notes_Norton said:

I've been in bands with White people, Black people, Hispanic people, Male people, Female people, and even one Asian person. I worked for Motown in Detroit for a while. I don't care about your skin color. What I care about is (1) Can you play well? And (2) Are you a nice person?

In a totally different industry was my dad.  He came home upset  in summer of 1978 because his boss would not let his assistant go on a shoot down South. Boss was worried for the black mans safety and my dad wanted him to teach him some needed skills in how to photograph a subject.  My dad lost out and when he went down to Southern State  (I prefer not to say which one) he saw first hand the racial bias and was appalled.  He said why can't people start realizing what matters is what is on the inside and not the color of your skin!  I will always remember that.  I care if you are a decent person. 

[kitekrazy]

On 6/20/2021 at 3:13 AM, paulo said:

Are there any days left that Americans don't have a holiday on?

They can be created for marketing purposes, Even the Europeans are in on it.  

[SteveStrummerUK]

3 hours ago, Notes_Norton said:

There cannot be justice, since by now all the slave owners are dead.

Sadly Notes, there are plenty of slave owners and thousands of slaves in 2021AD.

We never hear about them in the media because they don't fit the narrative.

 

[Notes_Norton]

1 hour ago, InstrEd said:

In a totally different industry was my dad.  He came home upset  in summer of 1978 because his boss would not let his assistant go on a shoot down South. Boss was worried for the black mans safety and my dad wanted him to teach him some needed skills in how to photograph a subject.  My dad lost out and when he went down to Southern State  (I prefer not to say which one) he saw first hand the racial bias and was appalled.  He said why can't people start realizing what matters is what is on the inside and not the color of your skin!  I will always remember that.  I care if you are a decent person. 

When I moved from New York to Florida, there were separate schools, separate drinking fountains, separate restrooms, and a lot of prejudice. My father sat me down and explained why that was wrong.

My dad would agree with your dad, and so do I.

One of my uncles changed his last name when he went into politics. At that time, anyone with a vowel at the end of their name (Italian) couldn't get elected to dogcatcher. Most of his siblings changed it as well, which is why I'm a "Norton".  The black people can't do that, and there is no reason why they should have to.

We need to realize that we are all just people.

Notes

[Notes_Norton]

43 minutes ago, SteveStrummerUK said:

Sadly Notes, there are plenty of slave owners and thousands of slaves in 2021AD.

We never hear about them in the media because they don't fit the narrative.

 

Sadly, Steve, you are correct.

It is illegal in the USA, so there aren't nearly as many as there used to be, because it is no longer institutional.

There is still a lot of prejudice in the USA, and that is very sad.

There have always been "The Others", those who don't look like us and/or those with different customs and traditions. White/Black, Arab/Jew, Anglo/Latino, the list goes on and on.

I'm guessing that in the millions of years of pre-history, 'the others' might try to steal your resources, so it was good to fear them. And we know all through history of one group conquering another for resources the Huns, the English, the Spanish, the Americans, the Greeks, the Romans, the Hans, the Mongolians, the Austrians, the Germans, the Hutu, Serbs, and this list goes on and on as well.

We still have wars, but live, cold and economic with 'the others', and I suppose it will never be fixed in my lifetime, but I don't have to participate in hating 'the others' just because they are different.

I wish I knew a cure for this, but alas, I don't.

Notes

 

 

[paulo]

1 hour ago, SteveStrummerUK said:

Sadly Notes, there are plenty of slave owners and thousands of slaves in 2021AD.

We never hear about them in the media because they don't fit the narrative.

 

Tell me about it. 

The amount of people that expect me to get out of bed for less than £1000 a day is unbelievable.

[Mandolin Picker]

Instead of the term "slavery" we now call it "human trafficking". Like others have mentioned, it is a very real issue in 2021 and not many people seem to care about it. I wish as much effort was put into stopping modern day slavery as there is in looking back 150 years.