Letters to the Editor.

• Position: Letter to the Editor

Kudos to June Jordan

How I loved June Jordan's wonderful article "The Invisible People: An Unsolicited Report on Black Rage" (March issue) about dispossessed black rage!

I know well the feeling that no matter what you do, your voice will not be heard. However, little by little, we are struggling to extend the circle of consciousness. My group, United Citizens for Progressive Action, is working to get out the shocking evidence of massive race-based voter disenfranchisement in Tennessee. Everything that happened in Florida happened here. So many people were disenfranchised--the vast majority of whom were African American or poor--that it is actually possible that the electoral vote of Tennessee was turned. Yet this issue has received no media coverage at all, outside of the black press. Please visit our website at: http://www.nashvilleinsanity.com/NP breakingnews.html and spread the word!

Catherine Danielson Nashville, Tennessee

I would like to thank June Jordan for her article in the March issue. I hope more and more of us keep on expressing our rage, solicited or not. I wholeheartedly agree with her, and would like to respond with two points.

One: She asks, "Where is there record of any major national newspaper or TV channel attempting ... to find out what black people were thinking, and why?" Sadly, I know of none in the mainstream, and that is why alternative media deserve our support now more than ever.

Two: I must respond to Bernice Johnson Reagon's quote, "We didn't have time for Ralph Nader or anyone like that." I joined the Green Party last year precisely because the Democrats had already completely betrayed people of color. If black and brown folks had joined together with the party whose platform supported their issues, then Nader could have received 20-30 percent or more of the vote, assuring federal funding for next time and lighting one hell of a fire under the butts of the white supremacists in either major party.

We need to become as united as they are. Right now, we are allowing ourselves to be fatally divided.

Not that I don't believe U.S. electoral politics are systematically and fundamentally flawed or that Nader didn't have some problems as a candidate. But Gore didn't?!

Disenfranchised groups can make a huge difference by ending our support of the status-quo, two-party system that disenfranchises us and the candidates who betray us. I think we should consider alternatives like the Green Party very seriously in future...