I wanted to create an intellectual Salon for thoruoghly modern men of all races and backgrounds who, like the cultural luminaries at the turn of the 19th Century, genuinely enjoy the civilized art of conversation. Please join this virtual, cultural salon of ideas turning earthly clamour into cosmic symphony...
FOR THE BROTHAS: AN INTRODUCTION
It must have been about 20 years ago when I first began thinking about creating a "Cultural Salon" as a reaction to the mundane social circles In Washington D.C. The richness of intellectual and artistic interchange had died, college friends had moved, the internet had not yet become the phenomenon it now is... I romanticised about the Salons of the mid to late 1800's in Paris, London and Berlin and the cultural dynamo of the Harlem Rennaisance. I was fortunate enough to meet a gentleman, an artist who lived and traveled with James Baldwin... Jimmy he affectionately called him, and he spoke often of their small cottage in southern France and of the many Artists, Poets and Luminaries that dropped in to chat and relax. Well, the impressionists, cubists, modernists, etc. all hung out together famously in those days and shared their ideas with one another creating a creative greenhouse in a world that was rapidly changing. I longed to have lived in those times, to have met Cassat, Rodin, Ellington, Fitzgerald, Baker, Balwin, well I did finally meet Baldwin and others purely for the joy of intellection upon the arts. This was in the late 1980's and by the mid 2000's I happened to run into a friend of mine from Hampton University who had been living in New York since he graduated in the early 90s. Well, I was surprised to hear him comment that in all of the wonder that is New York he never met anyone who ever really had anything interesting to say about art, literature, architecture, science, fashion or anything... I was so surprised to hear this since it had also been my experience. Well here I am in 2011 attempting the Virtual Salon...
Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Renewed voting rights and purged criminal record for convicts who have served their term
Please share your thoughts on this subject. I will refrain from sharing my views this time in order to get your feedback then I will elaborate and respond in kind to each comment
Voting rights should be renewed in most cases. If there are crimes that are so heinous that someones rights as a citizen should be permanently abridged then that line needs to be clearly drawn. Otherwise it is disenfranchisement leftover from a bygone era where the world operated on a much smaller scale.
Voting rights should be renewed in most cases. If there are crimes that are so heinous that someones rights as a citizen should be permanently abridged then that line needs to be clearly drawn. Otherwise it is disenfranchisement leftover from a bygone era where the world operated on a much smaller scale.
ReplyDelete