Courtesy of EURWeb.com
Jason Richardson – Orlando Magic
*Los Angeles, CA – Walmart partnered with the Jason Richardson Foundation to support the two-time NBA slam dunk champ and Orlando Magic guard Jason Richardson with the annual Man-Up Forum recently held at West Angeles Church in Los Angeles.
Walmart presented the foundation with a check for $ 50,000 to support the organization’s continued efforts to educate and serve youth ages 12 and up.
Inspired by President Obama’s Fatherhood and Mentoring Initiative, the annual Man-Up forum featured leaders within the sports, entertainment, civic and corporate communities who addressed issues surrounding fatherlessness, mentoring, education, professional development and more.
This year’s theme was “Uniting to Save Our Youth.” The forum featured breakout sessions to motivate and encourage young boys and girls to aspire to a brighter future.
Talk to the B.R.I.M., an empowerment session for girls, included celebrity panelists: Actress Camille Winbush (The Bernie Mac Show), radio personality, Yesi Ortiz, Power 106, and R&B singer/songwriter LeToya Luckett.
Actor and philanthropist Chris Tucker and author and mentor Thabiti Boone spoke words of inspiration to the young men. “Man-Up” means be responsible, stay in school and get good grades. Your weapon, both Tucker and Boone advised the young crowd, is your gift or talent.
This is your hope that can be used to help you overcome all adversities and make a better future for yourself. On behalf of President Obama’s White House Fatherhood Mentoring Initiative, Boone presented the Jason Richardson Foundation Director Elaine Richardson-Cook with the President’s Service Award for the foundation’s outstanding community service.
Immediately following the breakout sessions, guests visited the Walmart Community Resource Fair which featured 20 service organizations including: Big Brothers Big Sisters LA County; Real Mentors Academy, UCLA admissions, California Employment Development Dept., Urban League LA County, Jewish Vocationsal Services, and The Clinic.
“Walmart is not only committed to everyday low prices so people can live better, but we’re also committed to the communities we serve,” said Lindsay W. Huddleston, Sr. Manager of Public Affairs and Government Relations. “We’re honored to support the Jason Richardson Foundation in its mission to educate and give back to our youth.”
For more information visit www.jasonrichardsonfoundation.org or call 866.406-7144.
About Jason Richardson
Jason Richardson was selected by the Golden State Warriors as the fifth overall pick in the 2001 NBA draft. Since joining the league, Richardson has established himself as a demonstrative dunker and clutch three-point shooter. He currently plays for the Orlando Magic. He started the Jason Richardson Foundation in an effort to provide programming and support for youth around the world www.jasonrichardsonfoundation.org.
About Walmart
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT), or “Walmart,” serves customers and members more than 200 million times per week at more than 8,700 retail units under 59 different banners in 15 countries. With fiscal year 2010 sales of $ 405 billion, Walmart employs more than 2 million associates worldwide. A leader in sustainability, corporate philanthropy and employment opportunity, Walmart ranked first among retailers in Fortune Magazine’s 2010 Most Admired Companies survey. Additional information about Walmart can be found by visiting www.walmartstores.com.
(L to R) Ethan Robinson, Deputy City Attorney, City of Los Angeles; Arthur Thomas, National President, Psi Beta Sigma Fraternity Inc; Lindsay W. Huddleston II, Sr. Manager for Public Affairs and Government Relations, Walmart; Brent Burton, Fire Captain LAC; Fluke Fluker, Co-founder, The Village Nation; Dr. Mark Jenkins, Renowned Cardiologist; Larry Newton; and Dwayne Adway, Actor.
source:
Sandra Ware
Csportspr@aol.com
EURWeb – EUR Special Report: HIV/AIDS Epidemic Maybe Becoming Less of a Problem for Blacks
Posted In Hot 91 News
Courtesy of EURWeb.com
*The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the nation’s most authoritative source of information on the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The government agency released its annual report Friday and generally it contained good news for African Americans.
The report shows an HIV/AIDS epidemic which has stabilized among Blacks with the only increase taking place among Black homosexual males. Nevertheless, the epidemic still disproportionately afflicts Blacks.
According to the report, the infection rates “among blacks/African Americans and whites remained stable [from 2006 to 2009]” but Blacks “accounted for 52 percent of all diagnoses of HIV infection.” This is even though Blacks only constitute roughly 13 percent of the U.S. population.
Overall, the HIV infection rate was 66.6 for every 100,000 African Americans. This compares to infection rates of 22.8 per 100,000 Hispanics; 7.2 per 100,000 whites and 6.4 per 100,000 Asian Americans.
Meanwhile, the infection rate among homosexual men continued to climb. According to the CDC report, “From 2006 through 2009, among adult and adolescent males, the annual number of diagnosed HIV infections attributed to male-to-male sexual contact increased.” Indeed, HIV infections are increasing at a faster pace among young Black homosexual males (13 to 29) than any other age or racial group.
Males account for 76 percent of all diagnoses of HIV infections among adults and adolescents. But for the population as a whole, the CDC report concludes, “From 2006 through 2009, the estimated number and the estimated rate of annual AIDS diagnoses in the United States decreased.”
Courtesy of EURWeb.com
*On the news it was reported that researchers are getting closer to eradicating male pattern baldness. An experiment with proverbial lab mice had the bald ones growing hair just like those that grew hair naturally.
My first thought: how unfair to those poor bald mice, to actually HAVE to grow hair.
That’s how I feel about being bald. I’ve been shaving my head every day, more or less, for almost twenty years now. What began as a dramatic, desperate move to retain some measure of human dignity is now a way of life that I relish.
Man, am I glad the whole hair thing is behind me. No more expensive designer shampoos and conditioners. No more dandruff. I haven’t held a comb or brush in years, let alone own one. No more shelling out dough for the pitiful, merciful act my barber called a haircut. Bad hair day–what’s that?
I wouldn’t grow hair again even if I could. You’re saying, “Well, of course, you’d say that, Ivory; you can’t grow any.” Hey, it still grows along the sides and the back. But even if I could sprout more than peach fuzz on top, I’d still shave.
That’s because I’ve never been completely happy with my hair. If one day I go crazy in public with a semiautomatic weapon, “Dateline,” once in my native Oklahoma City, will be hard pressed to scrounge up that cliche school yearbook picture of the “quiet, troubled boy.” I didn’t take many school photos. I didn’t like the way I looked, hair included.
The most significant feature of my skin-close childhood Quo Vadis cut, was a part on the left side of my head the barber inserted with the edge-up side of his clipper blade.
This was the early ’60s, when the American Negro, obsessed with skin hue and hair texture and acceptance by white society, defined “Good hair” as soft, curly and straight, largely shunning hair that was considered kinky or nappy. Because of this, my initial relationship with hair involves the distinctive and somehow comforting aroma of hair and Hair-Rep burning in our kitchen on any given Saturday evening, as Mama and a friend, at the stove, straightened one another’s hair using the almighty hot comb.
When I think of the hair of my youth, I recall the terrible teasing we’d give any boy with hair so short, tight and coarse that we’d say he wore B.B. buck shots on his head.
I remember grown, hip, colored men on the street in my neighborhood or in the checkout line of the local Safeway, dressed like cut-rate soul singers in tight slacks, big-collared shirts with puffy arms and run-over, pointed shoes, wearing on their heads scarves or “Do rags” to preserve chemically treated “processed” or “conked” hair (see early Little Richard, James Brown and Sammy Davis, Jr.), to be unveiled when it mattered.
It was the new cultural pride of the late ’60s Black Power movement that rescued us from much of that, inspiring first the Natural and then the bigger Afro. However, arguably it was the Jackson 5′s Jermaine Jackson, who, by 1972 singled-headedly drove a generation of black kids to new, bushy heights.
And it was then, at age 17, despite the flourish of my funky ‘fro, that I noticed hair at the crown of my head was thinning. I felt like I’d discovered a runaway train–moving at the speed of molasses–that I was helpless to halt. Living in L.A. during the post-Afro ’80s, I don’t even remember most of the men’s trendy hair styles; it was all I could do to hold on to what I had as I avoided standing directly under revealing florescent lighting.
My barber had been cutting my hair as low as he possibly could without striking telephone poles, when one winter evening in 1993, I looked in my bathroom mirror, impulsively lathered my head with shaving cream, reached for a razor and went to town.
Afterward, I stood transfixed, wondering just what the hell I’d done, when I was suddenly overcome by a sense of calm. Tranquility. Freedom! My chains of woe–my thinning hair–had finally been broken.
A couple hours later, I held my breath as I dared walk into my favorite bar. The place practically cheered. Men congratulated me. Women flirted. Damn. Did I look that bad with hair?
Shaving my head, I was presented keys to a global fraternity. No matter the condition of your previously tattered “hairdo,” you don’t give bald real consideration until you’ve crossed to the other side. There, men discreetly check out one another’s baldness. Camaraderie’s unspoken words: “Congratulations, you dear, fearful man, on finding the balls to take matters into your own hands.”
Indeed, concession often requires guts, and when a man makes the Big Shave, he’s waving the white flag. He is conceding to the Receding. He’s declaring to family, friends and to himself that it’s over, that there will be no harvest. To shave is to simply say Enough.
Thus, I personally find it morally reprehensible to shave your head when you don’t have to. If you can grow a head full of hair, please do. Don’t treat bald as if it is the latest style of shoes or the new Rihanna record. True bald is a calling—even if that “call” initially sounds like a frightened hyena’s yelp.
Going purposefully bald, you come to respect the trailblazers. Iconic profiles in courage like actors Yul Brynner and Telly “Kojak” Savalas; Mahatma Gandhi. The man on the Mr. Clean bottle. It’s been said that Michael Jordan did for the balding man what Martin Luther King, Jr did for civil rights. That’s a stretch. However, because Jordan shaved, I am forever changed.
But then, I have been blessed to learn at the feet of one of the masters. I’d been shaving my head for two years when in 1995–day of the Oklahoma City bombing–I interviewed legendary singer, songwriter and producer Isaac Hayes.
After bending his ear regarding a brilliant musical career that included an Oscar for the landmark “Shaft” soundtrack, I dared ventured to a place where Oprah or Barbara Walters would have never gone (well, maybe Barbara; I read her book): How did he go about the task of shaving his dome?
Black Moses offered a wise, knowing smile. “When you walked in the room, I thought, ‘This guy is using a razor,’” said Hayes. Yes, Ike–a pink, disposable lady Bic, to be exact. “Lose it. Invest in a good electric shaver. It’s easier on your head. And follow up with Witch Hazel.”
Spoken like a man who unflinchingly launched his career, his head as naked as God’s truth, in 1969, no less than the height–the HEIGHT–of Afrodom. Whoever said this cat Shaft was a badd mutha, never met Hayes.
Or my daddy, for that matter. But wouldn’t you know it: all my life, at least for as long as I can remember, my father has shaved his head. And I’ve never once spoken to him about it. Never occurred to me to do so. As a kid, I didn’t think, ‘Gee, my daddy doesn’t have any hair on his head.’ Daddy being bald is like a summer shower followed by the sun. It’s just how life is.
And like my father, I’ve been a shaven man for so long now that friends and associates don’t even remember when I had hair. Most people only know me this way–say they can’t imagine me with hair. And that’s okay. Because emancipation rears its head in many ways, and sometimes, its head is without hair. I am strong. I am proud. I am bald.
Steven Ivory, journalist and author of the essay collection Fool In Love (Simon & Schuster), has covered popular culture for magazines, newspapers, radio and TV for more than 30 years. Respond to him via STEVRIVORY@AOL.COM.
Courtesy of EURWeb.com
*Reporter Shomari Stone of Seattle’s KOMO said, “Instinct just snapped in,” explaining why he jumped in to break up a fight that broke out when he was in the midst of reporting downtown (video below).
Stone was out on assignment near Seattle’s waterfront when he and his photographer witnessed an altercation between a group of men nearby. One man jumped on top of another and began repeatedly punching him in the head. That’s when Jones rushed in and tackled the assailant.
He broke up the fight and a witness called 9-1-1.
According to police officers, the man that Stone saved was possibly a white supremacist. When the victim, whose arms were covered in swastika tattoos, approached Stone to thank him after the incident, Stone, who is African-American, told the man, “Remember to judge the man by his character and not the color of his skin.”
Courtesy of EURWeb.com
*A 50-year-old with diabetes dies six years sooner than someone without the disease, and not just from a heart attack or a stroke, new research suggests.
The large international effort to measure diabetes’ toll found the disease also raises the risk of dying prematurely from a host of other ailments, even breast cancer and pneumonia.
“It’s quite a wide sweep of conditions,” said Dr. John Danesh of Cambridge University in Britain, who led the team of researchers. While most people think of heart problems, diabetes surprisingly “appears to be associated with a much broader range of health implications than previously suspected.”
Putting the six years lost in context, he said, long-term smoking shortens life by 10 years.
The analysis used pooled medical information for 820,900 people from nearly 100 studies done mostly in Europe and North America. The results are published in Thursday’s New England Journal of Medicine.
Read MORE of this story at Yahoo News.
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