Reply #9: I didn't see him this morning, but saw most of his speech last night [View All]

[frogcycle]

He was fantastic. So many good points made, and delivered with such style!

When he did the impressions of JFK and LBJ I almost fell out of my chair laughing. I was astonished (well, not really) to hear talking heads claiming he had "attacked" JFK.

I am old enough to remember hearing LBJ say "Mah fulluh Murcans" and Wright nailed it perfectly. I also recall vividly LBJ following that with "Ahm not gonna send Murcan boahs to faht some ayshun wowuh."

Geez, will people just TRY to actually listen for a change?

The comparison of music styles was somewhat over my head, since I have a tin ear, until he illustrated by mimicing the U of Michigan marching band and then the Grambling one. What an absolutely enthralling speaker!

My Dad fought the "establishment" in Fla when he was a psychologist charged with evaluating children who were not doing well in school. This was in the late 60's/early 70's, at the time Wright referred to. He was supposed to administer "standardized" tests and score them, rank the kids by those labels Wright referred to (Educable Mentally Retarded, etc). The tests were administered verbally.

He'd score a test "by the book" and the kid would come out with a terrible IQ. But Dad would say "I talked to him; he is no dummy; the test is wrong." Didn't matter. These were black kids living in shanties in rural Fla. whom the establishment wanted to label so they didn't have to spend money on better schools or teachers.
One example that sticks in my mind was a question "what is a hammer?"

There were a couple of examples that were acceptable, all having to do with describing a hammer. The kids from the swamps would invariably respond with what you DO with a hammer. "You drive nails with it" or "you hit a nail" or some such. When asked "what is a nail" the most popular (wrong) answer was "you bam it in a wall," followed by simple "you bam it."

Dad wanted to give them credit - they had exhibited knowledge and understanding. But the ruling was no, and they ended up branded as dummies. Because they did not conform to the "standards."

Different is not deficient!

Dad had that job for one year and they eliminated it. It was not getting them the results they wanted. I could never prove it, nor would I have tried, but I suspect some answers started getting recorded according to the intent of the response, rather than the actual choice of words.


Different is not deficient! Thank you, Rev. Wright.