Page 4 - Florida Sentinel 12-3-19

Editorial/Column
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Nothing Wrong With A Little A Little Soap And Water
Whenever someone ap- proaches me about how much they enjoy reading the Florida Sentinel, one of the things everyone seems to bring up is the section on health that appears in the Fri- day edition. On more than one occasion I've been told that the little tidbits of knowledge, on everything from diet and hair care, to causes of certain ail- ments, are useful and inform- ative.
This is why it surprised me a few weeks ago when, while breezing through that popular part of the paper, I ran across some advice that had me scratching my head. In an arti- cle entitled "Common Shower And Bathing Mis- takes" were a number of tips on what a person should do in and around their bathroom to make that aspect of their lives healthier.
Some of the things the piece mentioned, like keeping shower curtains clean, not blasting hot water onto our bodies and using the right soap, made perfect sense. But,
along with those helpful jew- els, the one recommendation that had me making the Scooby-Doo confused face was the assertion that bathing too much was a bad thing.
According to the medical expert who wrote the column, taking too many showers or baths removes healthy oils and bacteria from our skin, weak- ens our immune systems and depletes the Earth's water sup- ply. The article went on to sug- gest that people only shower or bathe a few times a week un- less they are grimy or sweaty.
What I couldn't understand after reading the information being presented was how it could be expected of anyone to go more than 24-hours with- out being, at least, one of those two things? Even if you just sit around the house watching tel- evision, parts of your body will eventually begin to perspire. This doesn't account for the number of times the average person is exposed to fluid waste when he or she relieves him or herself throughout a typical day.
To me, the suggestion that people should wallow in this kind of filthy residue for days at a time, simply to reduce the probability of becoming sick, was unbelievable. And it made me curious to know how not washing on a regular basis works when you're living with another human being and in- volved in an intimate relation- ship?
I mean, seriously, what do you tell your wife or girlfriend when you're climbing into bed smelling like a mule's ass? "Hey babe, sorry about the odor. You know we have to conserve water, right? Wanna do a little somethin' some- thin'?"
While it would be hard for me to argue against the alleged benefits of not bathing, mainly because I'm not a physician, dermatologist or environmen- talist, I think I'll take this op- portunity to go on record to say that, in spite of how bad placing soap and water on my backside daily may be for me, I'm willing to take my chances with developing poor health, maintaining dry skin and con- tributing to water scarcity if it means keeping the funk mon- ster at bay. And I'm quite sure that most people, who also like the feeling of cleanliness, will have no problem throwing caution to wind in order to feel fresh as well.
Reality On Ice is © by the Florida Sentinel Bul- letin Publishing Com- pany. You can contact Mr. Barr at: cbar- ronice@gmail.com.
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If The Russians Can Do It, We Can, Too
ow much would you want to bet that Vladimir
Putin has an American voter registration card . . . and is using it, too?
All tongue-in-cheek aside, CIA operatives and Na- tional Intelligence sources swear Russia did indeed, hack into America’s 2016 presidential election on Don- ald Trump’s behalf. Whether Russian manipulation was the meaningful edge that pressed Trump’s victory in the Electoral College will be a debate for centuries to come. But there’s no doubt, it did happen.
What happened? Sources say Russian rubles paid for social media input that tried to persuade people ei- ther not to vote or for whom to vote. It sOewed seeds of inter-party conflict that gave Trump’s candidacy just the edge it needed to succeed. Indeed, Russia did what many of us fellow Americans refused to do.
Russia voted. So, the die is cast and the gauntlet is thrown. An adversary nation has spiced up our Amer- ican birthright and has used it to dismantle the great- est democracy the world has ever known.
Russia voted. Why can’t we do the same?
Not By Ourselves
O ur church went on a field trip to see the film Har- riet, the story of the life of Harriet Tubman, last month. Our follow-up discus- sion during Bible study in- cluded our views of Harriet’s strong faith in God, the support and help of white abolitionists, and how fugitive slaves would not have been as successful as they were in escaping slavery
without the help of whites. Indeed, there were many whites who, as abolitionists, provided hiding places, food, money, clothes and other means of support for slaves es- caping from the South. Many
gave their lives for the cause. We are familiar with the John Brown family who all opposed slavery. There were at least 26 anti-slavery groups in- cluding The American Anti- Slavery Society made up of white abolitionists. Other names of whites, and there were many, included Harriet Beecher Stowe (author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin), Levi Coffin (the entire Coffin fam- ily, James and Lucretia Coffin), the Corson family,
the Quakers Religious groups,
Samuel Burris, Elizabeth Rous Comstock, Thomas Gait, Laura Smith Havil- land, and Samuel J. May.
There were a large number of white men and women in- volved in the abolitionist movement, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and Civil Rights Movement, and even today’s racism, millennium-style. We would not have progressed as we did and could very well have been like South Africa was until just before the turn of the Mil- lennium.
We have whites to thank for speaking out about racism, dis- crimination, and segregation. There were and are whites who opened doors, hired minori- ties, joined protests, mentored minorities, set up fair policies and systems, and served on boards of organizations that addressed the social and eco- nomic needs of Blacks and other marginalized groups.
Here on a local level, there are many names that we could put on a memorial honoring those white–owned businesses and white people in the Hills-
borough County community who helped with desegrega- tion, integration, and the eco- nomic well-being of Blacks.
Among them are First Na- tional Bank, Channel 13, Gen- eral Telephone Company, Winn Dixie, Tampa Electric Company, Enterprise Car Rental, Maas Brothers, and Gardiner.
Among elected officials whose names would be placed on a memorial are Governors Claude Kirk, Ruben Askew, Lawton Chiles, Charlie Crist, Leroy Collins and Robert Gra- ham.
Also add Congressional representatives Sam Gibbons and Kathy Castor, along with Mayors D. B. McKay, Nick Nuccio, Julian Lane, Dick Greco, William Poe, and Sandra Freedman.
While we cannot name everyone, we believe it is worth noting the contributions of J. H. McGrew, Arthur Rapier, Thomas McK- night, Ida Caminiti, Dr. Susan Greenbaum, Dr. Philip Adler, Dr. Roy Ka- plan and Attorneys Cody Fowler, Steve Hanlon and Barry Cohen.
The battle is not over and we should never forget the white brothers and sisters who helped and continue to help us build bridges to take us over the troubled waters of racism. We did not do it alone.
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PAGE 4 FLORIDA SENTINEL BULLETIN PUBLISHED EVERY TUESDAY AND FRIDAY TUESDAY, DECEMBER 3, 2019