Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Monday, January 5, 2009

I have a dream...

"I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'"


"I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character."


"I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood."


"This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day."


"Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God's children."


"Let freedom ring. And when this happens, and when we allow freedom ring—when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children—black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics—will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"


Martin Luther King Jr.


Algunos romanticos e idealistas podrían decir ahora que Los Estados Unidos con su elección de Barack Obama como presidente en verdad han hecho honor o digamos, rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed...

Al menos hoy día y al margen de reales o imaginados tejes y manejes ocultos y siniestros, una mayoría de los norteamericanos han elegido como su representante máximo a uno de sus hijos no juzgándolo por el color de su piel sino por el contenido de su carácter.

Por otro lado...
"What about Oprah?"

¿Qué representa en realidad, (si acaso) para las minorías que unos cuantos alcancen cierto éxito en Los Estados Unidos?

To judge the openness of a society by examining the outcomes obtained by the elite is tautological in the extreme. It is to say, we know we live in a meritocracy because of the existence of superstars, and we have superstars because we live in a meritocracy--the ultimate in circular logic. Rather, to determine the larger social reality, we must examine the relative outcomes for the typical white person or family, compared to the typical person or family of color. Averages and medians tell us far more about the norm than the extremes at either end. To judge a nation by only looking at those at the top (or, for that matter, the bottom) is ignorance on stilts. Surely, conservatives would balk (and rightly so) if someone were to visit an Appalachian coal town, and then declare that what they'd seen had proven the U.S. to be a nation where opportunity was altogether lacking. Yet, they seem comfortable proclaiming opportunity to be as open as the top of Mt. St. Helen's after examining only those at the society's pinnacle.