The Bosses' Money

The Bosses’ Money

When thinking about Mosaic and the City Council of Worcester, Malcolm X, southern Black churches, and the White Citizens Councils comes to mind. The Worcester City Council has given its support for the investigation of Mosaic, a Black run community center.

Mosaic is in the Black community a center for meetings. Some of the meetings are in opposition to City policies. The City Council has voted to support the City Manager’s decision to ask the Attorney General to investigate Mosaic for fraud.

Many in the Worcester community thinks the Manager’s action is political retaliation.

At least one group that used to meet at Mosaic was BlackLives Matter. It no longer meets there due to pressure from Worcester City government. The City had pursued criminal charges against people associated with BlackLives Matter in what has been described as malicious prosecution.

Malcolm X said that black coffee loses its essence if too much milk is added. For a long time some people in government and elsewhere said that they were “revolutionaries” or at least progressives. These people I suppose were well meaning, but they misled the struggle for racial and economic justice. City Manager Augustus is one such person.

While in State office he was instrumental in getting an office of the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination to reopen in Worcester. There was a rumor that he actually tried to help Mosaic behind the scene. Like the analogy given by Malcolm X,  the fact remains people depending on so called liberals or progressives or their money for the achievement of racial and economic justice will be misled. City Manager Augustus sought criminal charges against BlackLives Matter protesters and he is now seeking criminal charges against Mosaic.

The southern Black churches during the old Civil Rights movement supported its ministers independently of the White community.  It was known that taking the “man’s” money brought ambiguity to whom the ministers were ministering.  A predominantly Black church’s minister was on the board of directors for Mosaic; he abruptly quit the board. It is known that he also serves on at least one committee run by the City with some funding involved. A reasonable person could conclude that instead of ministering to his flock, there is ambiguity in his responsibilities.

 A history of divide and conquer by the racists existed in the old civil rights movement. It seems to be extant in the new Civil Rights Movement. The president of predominantly Black organization has in essence slandered Mosaic. She said that Mosaic should be defunded. It is rumored that she wants the funds to go to an agency with which she has personal friends.

The City Manger has created a Chief Diversity Officer position as a crumb for people of color to fight over.

 Wikepedia gives the following definition “The Citizens' Councils (also referred to as White Citizens' Councils) were an associated network of white supremacist organizations in the United States, concentrated in the South. The first was formed on July 11, 1954 After 1956, it was known as the Citizens' Councils of America.”

Although the Worcester City Council is not anything like the so called Citizen Councils, they come to mind for this issue. The Worcester City Council to some extent is a representation of the old Worcester. The old Worcester was mostly White and seemingly comfortable to many White people. It was not so comfortable for many Black and Latino people then.

This nostalgia has allowed City Councillors like Michael Gaffney, Gary Rosen, and Konnie Lukes to remain in office. Mr. Gaffney recently had a fund raiser in which at least one of his guests came in blackface, intentionally mocking Black people. Gary Rosen approved of criminal charges against BlackLives Matter people, while he does nothing about the continual violation of City ordinances by dog owners who have racially written in their blog “BlackLabs Matter”.

Ms. Lukes is an attorney and while seeking fraud charges against Mosaic made not relevant personal attacks on Mosaic staff. There seems to be some personal history in her attacks.

I suppose each generation will have to learn anew the lesions from the old civil rights movement, people with one foot in each camp will eventually mislead us and the bosses’ money will be the downfall of some and the heartbreak for others.