#FELICE BOUDREAUX

[kemetic-dreams]

1938 - PAULINE JOHNSON and FELICE BOUDREAUX, sisters, were once slaves on the plantation of Dermat Martine, near Opelousas, Louisiana. As their owners were French, they are more inclined to use a Creole patois than English.

"Us was both slaves on de old plantation close to Opelousas," Pauline began. As the elder of the two sisters she carried most of the conversation, although often referring to Felice before making positive statements.

"I was 12 year old when freedom come and Felice was 'bout six. Us belonged to Massa Dermat Martine and the missy's name Mimi. They raise us both in the house and they love us so they spoil us. I never will forget that. The little white chillen was younger than me, 'bout Felice's age. They sho' had pretty li'l curly black hair.

"Us didn't have hard time. Never even knowed hard time. That old massa, he what you call a good man.

"Us daddy was Renee and he work in the field. The old massa give him a mud and log house and a plot of ground for he own. The rain sho' never get in that log house, it so tight. The furniture was homemake, but my daddy make it good and stout.

"Us daddy he work de ground he own on Sunday and sold the things to buy us shoes to put on us feet and clothes. The white folks didn't give us clothes but they let him have all the money he made in his own plot to get them.

"Us mama name Marguerite and she a field hand, too, so us chillen growed up in the white folks house mostly. 'Fore Felice get big enough to leave I stay in the big house and take care of her.

"One day us papa fall sick in the bed, just 'fore freedom, and he kep' callin' for the priest. Old massa call the priest and just 'fore us papa die the priest marry him and my mama. 'fore dat they just married by the massa's word.

"Felice and me, us have two brothers what was born and die in slavery, and one sister still livin' in Bolivar now. Us three uncles, Bruno and Pophrey and Zaphrey, they goes to the war. Them three dies too young. The Yankees stole them and make them boys fight for them.

"I never done much work but wash the dishes. They wasn't poor people and they uses good dishes. The missy real particular 'bout us shinin' them dishes nice, and the silver spoons and knives, too.

"Them white people was good Christian people and they christen us both in the old brick Catholic church in Opelousas. They done torn it down now. Missy give me pretty dress to get christen in. My godmother, she Mileen Nesaseau, but I call her 'Miran'. My godfather called 'Paran.'

"On Sunday mornin' us fix our dress and hair and go up to the missy's looking-glass to see if us pretty enough go to church. Us goes to Mass every Sunday mornin' and church holiday, and when the cullud folks sick massa send for the priest same's for the white folks.

"We wears them things on the strings round the neck for the good of the heart. They's nutmeg.

"The plantation was a big, grand place and they have lots of orange trees. The slaves pick them oranges and pack then down on the barrel with la mosse (Spanish moss) to keep them. They was plenty pecans and figs, too.

"In slavery time most everybody round Opelousas talk Creole. That make the words hard to come sometime. Us both talk that better way than English.

"Durin' the war, it were a sight. Every mornin' Capt. Jenerette Bank and he men go a hoss-back drillin' in the pasture and then have drill on foot. A white lady take all us chillen to the drill ground every mornin'. Us take the lunch food in the basket and stay till they done drill out.

"I can sing for you the song they used to sing:

"O, de Yankee come to put de nigger free,

Says I, says I, pas bonne;

In eighteen-sixty-three,

De Yankee get out they gun and say,

Hurrah! Let's put on the ball.

"When war over none the slaves wants leave the plantation. My mama and us chillen stays on till old massa and missy dies, and then goes live on the old Repridim place for a time.

"Both us get marry in that Catholic church in Opelousas. As for me, it most too long ago to talk about. His name Alfred Johnson and he dead 12 years. Our youngest boy, John, go to the World War. Two my nephews die in that war and one nephew can't walk now from that war.

"Felice marry Joseph Boudreaux and when he die she come here to stay with me. There's more hard time now than in the old day for us, but I hope things get better.

[speaksleazy]

⚠︎ ⟮ NPTs ⟯ ... Murder_drones.mp3 ⟩ Cyn

﹫ ❲ Requested by anonymous ❳

「 NAMES 」

Cyn / Sin, Cynthia / Sinthia, Doily / Doilie¹, Marnierre², Salem, Marianne, Marie Anne, Lady, Doll / Dolly / Dollie, Cutlerie³, Sweetie, Belle, Bow, Lacy / Lacie / Lace, Ribbon, Sash, Felicity, Lolita, Teacup, Porcelain / Porcelynn, Silver, Delilah, Velvet / Velvette, Paisley / Paislie, Creepie, Leslie, Rose / Rosie, Pearl, Opal, Filistata⁴, Dear / Dearie, Ciel, Jacqueline / Jacquelynne², Curtsy, Embroiderie⁵, Boudreaux², Envy, Violynne⁶

¹ After doilies. ² French. ³ After cutlery. ⁴ A kind of arachnid. ⁵ After embroidery. ⁶ After violins.

「 PRONOUNS 」

Che/Cher/Cherie, Fem/Femme, Goth/Gothic, Maid/Maids, Sweet/Sweeties, Solve/Solvers, Wyrm/Wyrms, Eldritch/Eldritchs, See/Seer, Fabric/Fabrics, Sh3/H3r, Dear/Dearie, Error/404, 404/404s, Glitch/Glitches, Tick/Tock, Sh_/H_r, X/Xs, Stitch/Stitches,🪞/🪞s, 🥂/🥂s, ☕/☕s, ⚠️/⚠️s, ⚠︎/⚠︎s

「 TITLES 」

The Lady / Gentleman of the mansion / manor, The absolute solver of fabrics, ( Prn ) with a golden stare, The most elegant robot / drone / android, His / N's little sister, The sweetest / cutest / most adorable younger sister, The little girl / ( Label ) with a dark secret, ( Prn ) with a dark secret, ( Prn ) who is attending the gala, ( Prn ) who is hosting a tea party, ( Prn) who is playing with ( prn ) dolls, ( Prn ) eldritch form

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Song of the Day - today is the heavenly wedding anniversary of famed songwriting duo Boudleaux and Felice Bryant, who married September 5th, 1945, exactly five days after they met. Five days.

The reason they married so easily and quickly was that Felice had had this dream, a recurring dream she’d had since she was a little girl in which she clearly saw Boudleaux Bryant and he was the love of her life in the dream, and they were dancing together. Felice said she spent the rest of her youth trying to find him.

Nineteen year old Felice was working as an elevator operator at the Schroeder Hotel in Milwaukee when one day Diadorius Boudleaux Bryant stepped into her elevator and life. As she always told it, she “recognized him immediately” after she’d “looked for him forever.”

And one of the great partnerships was born.

Over the next thirty years, Felice and Boudreaux would together write over six thousand songs, which would sell over 200 million records with various artists like Bob Dylan, Count Basie, Roy Orbison, Tony Bennett, The Beach Boys, Joan Jett, Dean Martin, Buddy Holly, Eddy Arnold, Bobbie Gentry, Gram Parsons, Sarah Vaughan, Simon & Garfunkel, Ray Charles, Jerry Lee Lewis, the Grateful Dead, and most memorably, the Everly Brothers, for whom they wrote several of that duo’s biggest hits.

One of those, “All I Have To Do Is Dream” was one of their earliest creations, and was mostly the work of Felice, writing about dreaming about the one you love. She knew as well as anybody I’ve ever heard just exactly the power of a dream like that.

This song of theirs was recorded by the Everly Brothers and was a huge hit 65 years ago in 1958.

Happy Anniversary to Felice and Boudleaux…

“… dream, dream, dream… “

[h/t and thanks to Mary Elaine LeBey]

[la-alert]

KTLA Breaking News - PLOT TWIST!

Los Angeles has been experiencing extreme rainfall all week due to tropical storms along the pacific. Weather officials are warning all Los Angeles residents of a possible Landslide hitting the area in approximately 12 hours. Governor Newsom is asking ALL Los Angeles residents to evacuate their homes effective immediately. Roads will be closed and the entire state of California will be shut down for the next 72 hours. No flights or private flying coming in and none going out. Failure to evacuate will result in extreme consequences.

There are 2 locations that ALL LA Residents will be evacuating to. Search for your name and happy roleplaying:

*These locations are non-negotiable. If you fail to comply with the plot twist your character(s) will be removed from the role-play*

IF YOU DO NOT SEE YOUR NAME, CONTACT US ASAP.

Location 1: STAPLES Center

Santiago Alves

Romeo Staley

Victoria Dawson

Chancellor Hosein

Destini Wade

Kenya Stokes

Demetrius Bright

Angel De Leon

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Knixon Ali

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Location 2: LA Mission

Tavish Cervantes

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Passion Hoode

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Remi Phipps

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Pierre Sutton

Caleb Cruz

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Honey Pete

Kendrick O’Neal

Neveah Roye

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Felicity Dawson

Jay Benton

Hennessy Castillo

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Levi Bridges

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Prince Hendrix

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Justice O’Connor 

[supportblackart]

Via @nmaahc 🔈🔉🔊 Hear the voices of the formerly enslaved in the collection of the @librarycongress. From 1936 to 1938, the Federal Works Project (FWP) captured the voices of the formerly enslaved. Paulina Johnson and Felice Boudreaux (pictured here), sisters, were once enslaved on the plantation of Dermat Martine, near Opelousas, Louisiana. As their enslavers were French, they are inclined to use a Creole patois than English. Turn the volume up to hear an excerpt from Pauline on their experience as enslaved children. The voice is a re-enactment of the words of Pauline documented by the FWP. For more stories visit LOC.GOV and search “federal writers project” or visit @nmaahc’s website (LINK IN @NMAAHC’s BIO) for our latest blog “To Freedom: Voices of the formerly Enslaved.” #SupportBlackArt #APeoplesJourney #ANationsStory #HiddenHerstory #MerryChristmas https://www.instagram.com/p/Br1QktYjNlA/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=1n7nafs493wwo

[beinglibertarian]

A Libertarian Defense of the Social Contract

I know, I’ve never signed the social contract either.

Now that that is out of the way, the real reason to defend the social contract is that it puts rights into a framework where they can be discussed and manipulated. Without an agreement, there are no rights in a literal sense; instead, there are any number of Platonic ideals which exist in the minds or philosophies of any number of different individuals or groups.

Were they simply articulated, they would only describe how people should act, and would not ensure that the parties involved act accordingly. The vast majority of the theories on human rights are never articulated at all, let alone put into practice. What is necessary to bring rights into being more concretely is an explicit, preferably universal framework defining the rule set used to interact with others; a social contract.

There is a tendency to claim absolute rights and not concern oneself with the corresponding responsibilities. Freedom of speech without the obligation to be subjected to speech that might be considered offensive is impracticable. Further, if someone does abuse their rights, for example, by committing an armed robbery, then the “inalienable” right to bear arms can be alienated by government or by civilians in the case of self-defense. These actions are predictable and reliable because of the social contract.

Rights, although supposedly self-evident, innate, and inalienable, defy being identified across groups at all levels of society. One can assert God-given rights, but it is clear that there is no agreement from people within the same religion – let alone between different religions – as to what those rights are. If rights are God-given, does the religion of a society change the rights of the people within it? While this was the prevailing thought throughout much of history, it is horribly outdated in modern society. Governments fare no better than religions at consistently determining what rights are, and the government of “the land of the free” fares no better, oxymorons notwithstanding.

The United States Constitution lists a couple of rights, then declares in the 9th Amendment that those not specifically stated still count too. The 9th Amendment in practice is grossly ineffectual; in Wickard v Filburn the US Supreme Court decided that a farmer who grew his own wheat to feed the animals on his own farm violated the interstate commerce clause. Even something so innate as the right to self-sufficiency is not obvious enough to be exempted from government attack in the “land of the free.” The inadequacy of unarticulated rights is shown clearly by the abject failure of the 9th Amendment to protect them.

The core of libertarianism is the belief in the primacy of the individual. History has shown us that in order to be real, individual rights must be backed by force. Without the ability to resist the state or other aggressors who may attempt to subvert one’s rights, those rights evaporate back into nebulous abstraction. Although the Kulaks in Ukraine may have been wronged during the Holodomor, pleas to the Soviets about the violation of their rights did not help to secure their farms or their produce from the state’s expropriation, and they were systematically starved to death by the millions. In practice, the only rights that the individual can rely on to exist in any real sense on are the ones that have been agreed to, and those are necessarily obtained and protected by means of resistance against oppression.

Positive & Negative Rights

A negative right is a natural right, an ability to do something that requires no action from others except to refrain from interfering. Usually, these rights are self-evident: one may have the right to travel and may expect others not to block the road, for example. These rights become less obvious when those who would interfere are restrained from “protecting” people, particularly when protecting those people from themselves. When people use heroin, or prostitute themselves, or to otherwise utilize their natural rights to self-abuse, a grey area appears. Most libertarians do not agree with the state interfering in such situations, but it is likely that most would also support friends’ or loved ones’ right to intervene, e.g. it is consistent with most peoples’ libertarian vision for a parent to use force to prevent a child from self-harm.

A positive right is one that requires resources from the collective to be used for an individual, so they impose a cost on society to offer a benefit to individuals. Positive rights raise the hackles  of libertarians, generally speaking. This is not surprising, considering some of the positive rights that have made various lists. The United Nations Declaration of Human Rights has among its number the right to subsidized child care, paid holidays, and the right to enjoy the arts.

Some disapprove of positive rights because they impose costs on others. This claim is superficially plausible, but I contend that it actually renders all rights inert. Take for example Rand Paul’s supposition that universal health care imposes a claim on his labor and that this is tantamount to slavery. Why is the Senate exempted from this principle? Doesn’t Paul’s pay, derived from taxation, make all taxpayers his slaves by the same logic? If we take this principle to its logical conclusion there can be no government whatsoever.

Don Boudreaux wrote an editorial for Cafe Hayek where he said: “Rights pre-exist government. Therefore, even if – as most people believe – government is necessary to help secure individuals’ rights, government does not create that which it itself is created to help to secure.” I’m a fan of Dr. Boudreaux’s, but I don’t quite agree with his premise. What is right exists outside of government. Rights, outside of abstraction, exist as a function of the agreement between people. This doesn’t need to be an agreement with a government, but without an agreement, the rights do not exist in any real sense, they are just ideas.

Taking the argument too far in the other direction, Jeremy Bentham called the idea of natural rights “nonsense on stilts” and instead viewed utilitarianism – the idea that rights should provide maximal happiness for the people – as providing a means of determining which rights should and which should not exist. Bentham was also a master of the run-on sentence:

“As to the law of nature, if (as I trust it will appear) it be nothing but a phrase; if there be no other medium for proving any act to be an offence against it, than the mischievous tendency of such act; if there be no other medium for proving a law of the state to be contrary to it, than the inexpediency of such law, unless the bare unfounded disapprobation of any one who thinks of it be called a proof; if a test for distinguishing such laws as would be contrary to the law of nature from such as, without being contrary to it, are simply inexpedient, be that which neither our author, nor any man else, so much as pretended ever to give; if, in a word, there be scarce any law whatever but what those who have not liked it have found, on some account or another, to be repugnant to some text of Scripture; I see no remedy but that the natural tendency of such doctrine is to impel a man, by the force of conscience, to rise up in arms against any law whatever that he happens not to like. What sort of government it is that can consist with such a disposition, I must leave to our author to inform us.”

Unfortunately, after offering this superficially plausible argument against natural rights in which their weakness is that they are derived from scripture rather than reason and can be overturned by force, Bentham went on to support something he called “felicific calculus.” This is a method by which the amount of “happiness” derived from a law can be used to legitimize it. If a law is determined to create more unhappiness than happiness, then it can be opposed on that basis. This, I think, is a far worse proposition than the “nonsense on stilts” idea of natural rights that he took issue with, and the reason is primarily the same one that allows people to oppose democracy.

If a country can starve one smaller portion of its population to death to support the majority, do the natural rights of the victims of such a policy, who are forced to suffer and die, disappear? How about if the other population is another country that happens to be a long established enemy? What if that other country has a different religion with different God-given rights? In this case is the felicity accrued amongst all of the people subject to the “true” rights, and the harm is entirely put on those to whom the rights do not apply? Although Bentham rightly points out the contradictory nature of natural rights deriving from a god, his felicific calculus was nothing less than a philosophical well-spring of suffering that underpinned the worst social contracts that were responsible for many of the horrors of the 20th century, the aforementioned Holodomor being only one example.

In The End, Force Matters

Bentham was wrong. If either side of a dispute over rights finds the current agreement to be insufficient and is unwilling to accept it, force will be the deciding factor. Successful use of force by government will subdue the rebellion and end the claim to new rights that were the basis of the fighting. The other possibility is that the rebels subdue the government and create a new contract which includes the contested rights in a new social contract.

With no government there is no social contract, and rights evaporate back into abstraction. If on the other hand some amount of government is allowable, the issue revolves around a frustratingly arbitrary line of what constitutes too much. If “the ruler rules by the consent of the ruled,” the ruled need to have some way to make their dissent known and felt. The trick is to set up a government powerful enough to enforce a social contract, but not so powerful as to abuse it. What makes the United States the greatest country in history is that the rulers guaranteed the ability of the ruled to consent and dissent to government policy. The constitutional protection of speech and notably the right to petition government allows us to make our dissent known. The right to keep and bear arms guarantees us the right to make our dissent felt.

If you are an anarcho-capitalist and are now yelling at your screen, “What about no government as an option?!?!” you have a legitimate point at least insofar as the government has a heavily tilted playing field with respect to their monopoly on the use of force. Social contracts are not an unalloyed good. Governments expropriate money from their citizens and use the money to buy the weapons that they say protect their citizens, but which simultaneously give them the ability to suppress their own people. I would argue that this is not justifiable and that each individual needs to decide what level of dissent is a sufficient level of action against the government under these circumstances.

Despite myriad abuses of government, anarchy doesn’t solve the problem either, although I would agree that it might limit the size and scope of the wrongdoings. What happens when someone in an anarchic situation tries to infringe upon your idea of what your rights are? Seems that you’re back in the same predicament: force (or the threat of force) will be used to settle the matter. When the matter is settled, the result is a new social contract.

The problem with anarchy is that this dispute can happen innumerable times, whereas in a society with a social contract the rules are generally consistent and this allows people to act under the assumption that they will be treated accordingly, and given a means of resolving related disputes. If an anarchic universal social contract were established, it is my contention that this would be a government, and the agreement would be law which establishes rights. An example of such a society exists: the Icelandic Commonwealth.

Too many libertarians scoff at the statist’s view of the social contract. This is due to the apologist’s acerbic citations of it to validate the victimization of people by the government: “X government action is acceptable because the victims agreed to the social contract.” The social contract is not your rights, and it is not, properly understood, a justification of their limitations, it only states the rights which have been agreed to. The social contract is an imperfect concept with imperfect implementations; its value comes from the fact that it makes rights actionable and the contract itself can be changed, and that it can establish and manifest human rights as a modus operandi; this stands in stark contrast to the unspecified rights of disordered anarchy, or the capricious rights granted by authoritarian governments.

The post A Libertarian Defense of the Social Contract appeared first on Being Libertarian.

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[47burlm]

before anyone ( most ) here in T land were even born

Harmony singing was a part of rock and roll right from the beginning, but the three- and four-part harmonies of doo-wop, derived from black gospel and blues traditions, would never have given us Simon and Garfunkel, the Beatles or the Byrds. To get those groups, you first had to have the Everly Brothers, whose ringing, close-harmony style introduced a whole new sound into the rock-and-roll vocabulary: the sound of Appalachia set to hard-driving acoustic guitars and a subtle backbeat rhythm. One of the most important and influential groups in the history of rock and roll, the Everly Brothers burst onto the music scene in 1957 with their first big hit, "Bye Bye Love," which was quickly followed with their first #1 song, "Wake Up Little Susie," which topped the Billboard pop chart on this day in 1957.

Don and Phil Everly began performing together professionally in 1945 at the ages of eight and six, respectively, on their family's live radio show out of Shenandoah, Iowa. The Everly family resettled to Knoxville, Tennesee, in 1953, and two years later, 18-year-old Don and 16-year-old Phil began pursuing work as songwriters in Nashville. As a songwriting duo, they had very little success, and in their first try at making a record of their own, they couldn't even crack the lowest level of the Country & Western chart. A move to Cadence Records in 1957, however, changed the course of the Everly Brothers' career, bringing them into partnership with a production team that included legendary session man Chet Atkins and the songwriting team of Felice and Boudreaux Bryant.

"Bye Bye Love" was the first song by the Bryants to be recorded by the Everlys, establishing their trademark sound and peaking at #2 on the charts in the summer of 1957. The follow-up single, "Wake Up Little Susie," reached the top spot on October 14, 1957, though not without stirring controversy in some parts due to lyrics that hinted at teenage sex. Literally banned in Boston at one point, the Everlys' first chart-topper was taken at face value in most parts of the country as an insanely catchy song about two teenagers who have innocently fallen asleep at a movie only to awaken at 4:00 AM in fear of having ruined their good reputations.

The Everly Brothers would earn 25 top-40 hits over the first five years of their hugely influential recording career, including two more #1s: "All I Have To Do Is Dream" (1958) and "Cathy's Clown" (1960).