Our Time PressThe Local Paper with the Global View

By OTP Staff

President Donald Trump’s Muslim travel ban has created a visa nightmare far more widely than the seven targeted countries listed on his executive order. Performing arts and cultural groups who have been invited by U.S. cultural organizations are experiencing a high rate of rejection for visa entries into the U.S. In many cases, an explanation or reason is never given for the rejection.

Since March, the Bedford-Stuyvesant Museum of African Art (BSMAA) has been coordinating with Nicholas Sironka, who is a Maasai artist from Kenya and who is currently living in Washington State, will be bringing six Maasai dancers from Kenya to perform at BSMAA’s Fourth Annual Nelson Mandela Humanitarian Award event. The event will be held on October 14, 2017 at the Brooklyn Museum.

“Homeland Security has sent the visa paperwork back to me for the second time last week always claiming that I have not included requested documents. The first time it was sent back I was told that a form for one of the dancers was missing,” Executive Director of BSMAA Vira Lynn Jones said. “Nicholas was confident that Homeland Security would approve the application so that the dancers would be invited for the crucial U.S. State Department interview in Kenya.”

The Friends of Nicholas Sironka Dance Troupe have traveled to the U.S. since 2002. The last time the group performed was on the West Coast was in 2012. “Nicholas was very confident that the group would get their visas without any problem,” said Vira. “I basically followed all guidelines that he provided me from previous paperwork that had been submitted successfully over the years and the visas were always granted.”

Last week, Homeland Security returned the paperwork to BSMAA for the second time. “The government agency claimed that the performance contract for the dancers was missing. It also wanted more information about BSMAA, where the group was performing, at what venue and what they were going to be paid,” said Vira. “Why didn’t they ask for this information the last time the documents were returned. Nicholas told me this information was never requested in the past. I feel that time is running out for us. The Maasai dancers have been practicing since early March. Periodically, they have been sending me Facebook videos of them practicing. We will all be devastated if the visas are denied.”

In July, visas were denied to an all-girls robotic-building team from Afghanistan. They had been invited to an international robotics competition in Washington, D.C. While no explanation was ever given for the rejection, the State Department reversed its decision once the team’s ordeal was reported in the international media. On July 6 of this year, five teenagers from a robotics team from the small West African country of Gambia were initially denied visas to attend the same event. After Al-Jazeera reported their ordeal, the decision was reversed.

According to data compiled between 2015-2016 by the New York Times from the U.S. State Department records, the information showed that Somalia, Ghana, Liberia, Guinea-Bissau and Mauritania, all African countries, had a visa denial rate of more than 60 percent.

Vira has been encouraged to seek help from local politicians who represent Bedford-Stuyvesant, the area where BSMAA is located. Vira is weary that not an ounce of support was materialized. “I have already asked Assemblyman Walter Mosley’s office for a letter of support to the South African-based Nelson Mandela Foundation. His chief of staff told me that Assemblyman Mosley’s office was not currently providing support letters. When I asked the individual to explain the reason, the individual told me there was no reason. And that ‘he just was not writing any letters at this time’.”

Since New York City Council member Robert Cornegy represents Bedford-Stuyvesant, Vira has been encouraged to reach out to his office. “Are you kidding is my response to people who suggest that I reach out to his office. His chief of staff never returns my calls.” When Vira was told to seek Borough President Eric Adams, she shook her head and said, “I had an event there in 2014 and the staff was so hateful and screaming at the BSMAA staff that I have never been back there”.

“I am trying to create a world-class cultural arts organization for the community in Bedford-Stuyvesant. I have gotten very little support even from U.S. Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, who once said he would do everything in his power to help the museum succeed.”

Vira feels that maybe they have the same defeatist attitude that the former Borough President Marty Markowitz displayed during a meeting he had with Vira while his staff was present back in 2013. Vira recalled him saying that she was wasting her time trying to create an African art museum.

“He told me didn’t I realize that the demographics were changing in Bedford-Stuyvesant,” she said. “Of course, I was very insulted because he was saying the area is being gentrified and an African art museum would not be feasible.”

“I was very diplomatic. I explained to Marty that I had traveled all over Europe and that some of the most incredible African art collections were in European museums,” she said. “The entire world loves African and they will be visiting Brooklyn to enjoy BSMAA’s exhibits.”

“All I can hope for now is that BSMAA will be successful in obtaining visas for the dance troupe,” she said. “Please wish me luck.”

By Marlon Rice

Justin Hackley was a kid from my neighborhood. I’ve known his mother Marie since I was a teenager, grew up right across the street from her family. He was 20 years old, a young man home on summer break from college, preparing for his senior year at Delaware State University. On a summer night in Flatbush, Justin was gunned down, murdered because he was standing with a friend who was arguing with another man about a girl. Justin wasn’t a gangster or a street guy. He wasn’t a hustler or malicious or someone who had a criminal record. He was a good kid who found himself confronted by the evils of society and unfortunately his life was taken from us.

Chynna Battle worked as a hostess and server at Applebee’s on Fulton Street. She was a caring and considerate person, and those attributes made her great at her job. She gave birth to her daughter Amelia while still in high school, but she persevered and graduated. She had plans to enlist into the Navy. On a summer night in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Chynna was shot and killed while she was enjoying the night in the courtyard of the Stuyvesant Gardens housing complex on Gates Avenue. She was 21 years old. She was not the intended target of the shooting, but that matters not. Another woman also died that night in that courtyard. Shaqwanda Staley was 29. Her nickname was “Q” and she was also a devoted mother. Q wasn’t the intended target either, but again, that doesn’t matter.

Growing up in Bedford-Stuyvesant, I can remember that as summers approached people would make mention of the increase in violence, inferring that somehow the summer heat played a role in the uptick of murders. It’s urban legend; when the summer heat envelops the hood, tempers flare, tolerance dissipates and people die. I can remember reaching the beginning of the summer season and hearing about someone being killed and automatically attributing that death to the season. I can bring up a handful of friends that were killed during the summer, friends like Curtis from 1304 Pacific Street. We called him “Smirk”. He was an older kid on my block with a bright smile who was murdered in the late 80’s. Or Dominique Sylvester, who was a friend and high school classmate of mine, another genuinely good person with an amazing spirit who was murdered right before our Senior Prom. Or Damon Allen, who I went to elementary school with. He was killed on Labor Day Weekend 11 years ago, actually shielding others from the danger of gunfire. Every one of them were good people, and every one of them taken from us during the summer.

But it isn’t the summer that’s killing us.

This week, yet another name was added to the list of good people gunned down. Zanu Simpson was a master barber. He cut the hair of celebrities like Future and Mobb Deep, and he cut the hair of the children in his community in Queens. Though I didn’t know him personally, a few of my friends were friends of his and only speak in the highest regard about his character. He and his brother were owners of Strictly Skillz barbershop in Hollis, Queens. Late Monday night, after leaving a restaurant, Zanu was murdered while sitting in his SUV. Another summer night, another good person murdered.

Our communities are in a depressed state. For all of the strength and the beauty found in our neighborhoods, there is still this air of chaos and confusion, you can see it especially in the eyes of our youth. Hip-Hop normalizes gangsterism. The media normalizes Black criminality. And the impressionable minds of our young become corrupted with images and ideas that only serve to detach them from the stark realities of living a life where violence and disrespect for yourselves and for others is acceptable behavior. Killing a person in real life becomes as easy as killing a person on the Grand Theft Auto video game. There is no divine value for the lives of others because there is no divine value for their own lives. At every turn, young people of color are marginalized and reminded that they are less than. Trayvon Martin’s killer is free. Michael Brown’s killer is free. Tamir Rice’s killer is free, so when they see a friend die and that friend’s killer isn’t caught and convicted of the murder, it makes perfect sense. If the killers of young Black boys and girls never get punished, does that mean that young Black boys and girls are okay to kill?

Society isn’t going to inspire and reinforce peace and positivity in our children. The media won’t do it. Movies won’t do it. Hip-Hop won’t do it. Video games will not do it. This practice can only start and be maintained from one place–the home. As parents, your sole responsibility is to be an able and willing steward to your child, guiding them through life, reinforcing a positive and loving foundation for their lives, so that as they leave the home and go into our neighborhoods they do so with a loving and peaceful disposition. If you are a parent, then that is YOUR job. It is the most important job to have in our communities right now, in this time, at this moment.

We need to exhibit love for one another. We need to be considerate and respectful of each other. We need to be able to disagree with each other without having to become violent or murderous to prove a point. Quite simply, we need to love one another. This way of thinking doesn’t come out of watching “Love and Hip-Hop”, or playing “Call of Duty”. You won’t get it from Hot 97 or from HBO. Love of community, love of nation, love of self starts in the home. It starts with a parent teaching a child right and wrong. It continues when that parent continues to maintain a greater influence over that child than any video game or rap song could. And it plays out when that child is a young adult and chooses to do the right things because they remember the teachings of their parents. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it. That verse is from the book of Proverbs in the Bible, but the truth behind it is universally recognized, regardless of faith or creed.

We need parents in our communities right now, and we cannot afford to take another summer off.

By Marlon Rice

A Mechanical Engineer, a Fashion Designer and a Comedian walk into an event space.

That isn’t the start of some campy joke; instead, it just may be the start of a new model of entrepreneurship. On Saturday, July 22nd We Are Inspo presented the Inspo Expo at Sanders Studio NYC in Clinton Hill. Over 250 guests came to experience an amalgam of creative expression. Patrons got to experience the latest 3-D printing technology and a fashion show introducing a new clothing line. There was an interactive photo booth, a full-art installation and a comedian, all while a publicist was broadcasting live on her own podcast. A graphic artist showcased his T-shirt and hat collection, and a local musician premiered his new tracks, all while the Inspo Profile Video introduced the crowd to the people who moved this idea into action. And while the execution and the intentional variety of this event might lead one to assume that the organizers were all seasoned veterans of their particular industries, that assumption would be completely wrong. Not only are they not industry vets, but not one of them are even older than 22.

Keith Taylor is a 21-year-old from Crown Heights, Brooklyn. He is a junior at Drexel University in Philadelphia, majoring in Mechanical Engineering with a minor in Product Design. He is also the founder of We Are Inspo. Inspo is short for Inspiration. We Are Inspo is a collective. Keith explains the idea: “I find that my inspiration comes from being around like-minded individuals, people who are traveling on similar paths. We Are Inspo is a collective of friends that support one another’s individual endeavors and entrepreneurial ideas.”

Every member of We Are Inspo is either a recent college graduate or will be in the next year. Sade Lewis and Shaniya Charles are co-founders of the fashion line Sade/Shaniya. Jai Bailey is an illustrator, visual artist and the founder of a brand called Difi, which is short for Disfictional Art. Kaleb Stewart is a comedian and screenwriter. Shenell Renwick is a publicist and the host of her own podcast, titled “Rookie Season”. Together, they launched We Are Inspo to collectively support each other’s budding brands. In this age of social media, kids Keith’s age have 10,000 IG followers just for posting duck-faced selfies all day. As Keith put it, “We Are Inspo provides a platform for our work collectively, using our combined influence to breathe life into our individual ideas”. He explained that he got the idea for the collective over a year ago, but spending a semester in Hong Kong motivated him to speak the idea into existence. “It was something I was thinking about for a while. I had ideas about it last year, but it wasn’t until I came back from abroad that I felt really inspired to do it. So I invited my friends over to the house. We talked and people understood what I was thinking and we made it happen.”

The group worked together on every aspect of the launch of the Inspo Expo. From marketing and promotion, to event logistics and securing a venue, every person played a role in making the launch a success. They used Facebook and Instagram for the bulk of their promotions, and Shenell utilized her skills as a publicist to create brand relationships. They captured the attention of their audience in the exact place that their audience goes for information. And the outcome was amazing. 250 RSVP’s the first time out for a group that has never done an event before, individually or collectively. That accomplishment speaks not just to their work, but also to a generation that sees entrepreneurship and ownership not just as a dream or a wish, but as a natural extension of the education process.

Millennials are the largest generation in Western history. They are becoming the most educated generation in Western history. And they are civic-oriented global citizens. We Are Inspo is a prime example of Millennials taking the idea of business development into their own hands. The idea of collective work and responsibility isn’t a new concept, but Keith hopes to explore the potential and the possibilities of working in tandem without the limits of industry or occupation. The collective will continue to produce Inspo Expos, and there will be no limits on participation. All ages and industries are welcome to be a part of the connectivity he hopes to build. For Keith and the members of We Are Inspo, the sky is not the limit, it’s just another step in the right direction.