Hugh Hefner died in September 2017, at his home at the age of 91. We all know Hefner for creating Playboy Magazine, the Playboy Clubs, and living in the Playboy Mansion. However, many of us didn’t know that he bravely helped African Americans, as well as other oppressed groups, during eras when White people were socially and personally ostracized for doing so…and sadly, sometimes even killed.

Some Of The Ways Hefner Fought For Civil Rights

Hefner contributed to many civil rights causes and worked with many civil rights legends who ultimately became some of his closest friends throughout the years.

1. He funded the PUSH Coalition, which was spearheaded by Rev. Jesse Jackson and largely dedicated to fighting for civil rights for African American people.

Hugh Hefner was a strong supporter of the civil rights movement. We shall never forget him. May he Rest In Peace. pic.twitter.com/oL3lKLZRQ5

— Rev Jesse Jackson Sr (@RevJJackson) September 28, 2017

2. Hefner was a very loyal supporter of Martin Luther King Jr. during the civil rights era. He also risked losing a large part of his fan base, by publishing interviews with Black civil rights icons in Playboy Magazine, including Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X at a time when that was deemed ‘too controversial’ to do so.

3. The late Dick Gregory, who died on August 19th 2017, also revealed that back in the day, it was Hefner who gave a $25,000 reward to help solve one of the most brutal murders of the civil rights era: three young civil rights activists killed in Meridian, MS.

4. Hefner revealed, in a 2011 CBS interview, that when he franchised his Playboy Club back in the day, he had to check the franchise buyers for making Black performers go through the back entrances of the venues:

“I felt from a very early age that there were things in society that were wrong, and that I might play some small part in changing them […]When we started franchising, when they refused our members, the black members, entrance, I said, ‘You can’t do that, these are members of our club.’ And we literally bought back the franchised clubs,” Hefner said.

5. In 2001, during a Comedy Central roast of Hefner, his friend, Dick Gregory, got choked up when talking about how Hefner helped him. Gregory credited Hefner for having the courage to push back against the social norm for White America during the segregation era. Gregory said Hefner opened the doors for him and many other Black entertainers, by using his iconic Playboy Clubs to do so:

Gregory to Hefner- “You had a courage when no one was bringing in Blacks and minorities, and let you stand flat-footed in America and just talk, you brought me in. […] You didn’t give me a lecture. You gave me no instructions. […] I come here tonight not to roast you, but to say that had you not had the guts back then, we black comics that the world has been able to look at and understand our genius, we would be in some pot, roasting in debt, knowing we were never going to make it. [..] So I say I love you. We thank you. Gold bless you, my brother.”

Watch Dick Gregory Show Gratitude To Friend, Hugh Hefner

The above video was a beautiful thing to see for several reasons: (1) In a world that is seeing hatred spewed in every realm of our society, the colorblind love among many -such as that between Gregory and Hefner- sometimes gets overlooked; and (2) Dick Gregory was sometimes misunderstood and labeled as a racist. Seeing his love for Hefner shows that he clearly was not. Though Mr. Gregory wasn’t racist, he was in fact a realist throughout his endless fight for equal rights, and Hugh Hefner understood that. May they both continue to rest peacefully, after an incredible job well done.

The post Hugh Hefner Took Many Brave Actions For African Americans, Even Dick Gregory Was Impressed appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

It’s been reported that the 79-year-old civil rights icon and his wife of 49 years have just been hospitalized after contracting the COVID-19 virus, months after receiving the vaccine.

Here’s what was reported by Associated Press today:

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, a famed civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, and his wife have been hospitalized after testing positive for COVID-19, according to a statement Saturday.

Jesse Jackson, 79, is vaccinated against the virus and received his first dose in January during a publicized event as he urged others to receive the inoculation as soon as possible. He and his wife, 77, are being treated at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.

“Doctors are currently monitoring the condition of both,” according to the statement from Jesse Jackson’s nonprofit, the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition.

“There are no further updates at this time,” the statement said. “We will provide updates as they become available.”

Although the vaccine is newly created, it’s been widely reported by health care experts, that the COVID-19 vaccination does not prevent one from contracting the virus, but rather greatly decreases and/or eliminates their chances of dying from the virus. So, hopefully, both Rev. Jesse Jackson – who was also diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in recent years – and his wife, Jacqueline L. Jackson, will pull through this soon.

Keeping them in our hearts, our thoughts …and wishing them a speedy recovery.

The post Rev. Jesse Jackson And His Wife Hospitalized For Covid-19, Details… appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

While we were waking up, eating a bowl of cereal, and watching the dancers doing the bump and pop locking down the Soul Train line, Dick Clark was rigorously working behind the scenes to shut down our favorite Saturday morning show and trying to snatch Don Cornelius’ top-rated soul spot by doing what many people in his position had been doing since as far back as we can remember. Of course Dick Clark was the man when it came to dance TV during that time with his already well-established American Bandstand that primarily catered to a Caucasian audience, but it was only after he saw what Don Cornelius was doing, by bringing soul to mainstream TV, that Dick wanted to dominate that section of Black media and cash in with his own soul version that he was going to call “Soul Unlimited.”

It turns out there were eventually some cut throat, takeover tactics being used behind closed doors. Here is what happened as stated in the book, The Hippest Trip In America: Soul Train and The Evolution of Culture & Style (via Daily Mail):

‘The impact of Soul Train on the television landscape was not lost on Dick Clark. By 1973, Clark was no longer just cherry-picking talent [from Soul Train] but actively trying to co-opt Cornelius’s franchise by launching his own black-themed dance show, Soul Unlimited.’

Clark launched a special episode of his copycat show and despite it being amateurish, with ‘Clark’s power in the record and television industry, including the backing of ABC, this rip-off could have proved fatal to Cornelius’s dream’, the author writes.

Clark’s power move outraged Black political leaders who along with the Black community believed that having a black-owned show on television was not only cool, but an extension of the civil rights movement.

Led by Chicago’s Reverend Jesse Jackson, they contacted Clark and ABC executives to protest. ‘The idea that Clark, with whom blacks had always had an uneasy relationship, could kill Soul Train led to threats of an ABC boycott.’

Black leaders were joined by one of the most powerful men in the history of the black music business—and also a consultant to ABC, Clarence Avant, who went ballistic when he learned about Clark’s power move.

Avant was invited by Clark to a meeting to discuss Soul Unlimited. ‘Clark wanted my okay’, Avant recalled. ‘He wanted me to endorse his idea. I freaked out. If you do this, there’s no Don Cornelius’, I told him. We had just gotten free enough to have something on TV. ‘I told Dick Clark no – I would not endorse his show’.
Avant then set up a meeting with top ABC executives in New York and met with ABC chairman and founder Leonard Goldenson and president Eldon H. Rule.
‘I was very upset, very upset. If Dick Clark had been allowed to do it, then there would have been no Don Cornelius’, the author quotes Avant.
Avant received a threatening letter from William Morris Agency that represented Dick Clark Productions telling him to stay out of their business. But Avant was a powerful force behind the scene in the black music business in the early 1970s and would not be intimidated.

Word on the Old School curb is that after Dick Clark’s plotting scheme, Don Cornelius never uttered two words to him again.

The elephant in the room for this Clark vs. Cornelius situation is obviously the issue of race and in my opinion, Don Cornelius was the absolute best person to bring Black music and Black culture to the national spotlight, because he was of that culture and therefore was able to make sure that form of entertainment was delivered to the public in it’s most purest form. Dick Clark on the other hand, was the best person to bring the young Caucasian culture to national TV with his show, American Bandstand, for the same reasons.

Not that neither couldn’t have probably successfully brought other cultures to the forefront, but when entertainment is represented in the most authentic way possible, it’s always delicate.

At least Dick wasn’t a dummy and was able to recognize a viable market when he saw one though, but I’m ecstatic that his plan didn’t work. Could you imagine growing up without Soul Train and instead having his version called “Soul Unlimited?” The thought of it even makes me cringe. What would life have been without watching The Lockers pop-locking every Saturday morning; or the dude, Louie Ski Carr, who used to hop across the stage with shades and a hat; or not being able to watch Rosie Perez and Damita Jo dance like no other?!! Don’t even get me started on that cool, laid back, soulful swag Don Cornelius brought to the show and of course the soul artists were always off the chain.

So again, I’m extremely happy Don Cornelius won that battle. May both he and Dick Clark continue to rest peacefully.

-ILoveOldSchoolMusic, Old School news with a new point of view

The post Dick Clark Was This Desperate To Profit Off Black Music? It Got Ugly appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

As the racially biased controversy over ousted NFL quarterback, Colin Kaepernick’s, peaceful protest against police violence against African Americans continues, Jesse Jackson, is voicing his outlook on the matter. He’s also raising a point about Caucasian ex-NFL quarterback, Tim Tebow, who branded his entire pro-football career off of kneeling before the games. Though Tebow and Kaepernick kneeled for two very different reasons, Rev. Jackson feels that they both deserve the same respect. There’s just one major difference between the two though…depending on who you ask.

(Video) Jesse Jackson: ‘Why They Hating On Kaep, But Not Tebow?’

Paparazzi cameras caught up with Jesse Jackson at the Reagan International Airport and asked him about the whole Kaepernick controversy that seems to have a lot of mainly Trump supporters out here burning their Nike’s up, throwing hissy-fits and what-not.

Jackson’s response included a comparison between the backlash Kaepernick is getting for actually protesting for the equal rights of people of color vs. Tim Tebow taking a knee to protest for his religious views and pro-life abortion beliefs:

Jesse Jackson: “It’s interesting that when Tim Tebow took a knee, it was accepted,” Jesse tells TMZ Sports. “Kaepernick takes a knee and he’s rejected. Both of them took a knee in protest of what they believed in. One was religion. One was for justice. Okay.”

The Difference Between Tebow & Kaepernick That Jesse Jackson Missed

There is one difference between Kaepernick’s and Tebow’s kneeling protest that Rev. Jackson didn’t mention. That is the fact that Tebow kneeled before the National Anthem was played, to protest against values he feels goes against his Christian beliefs. Kaepernick kneeled during the National Anthem to protest against the centuries-long murderous injustices inflicted upon African Americans, and other people of color, by the United States judicial system and several (not all) trigger happy police officers.

Embed from Getty Images

In scrolling through several online comments regarding the aforementioned comparison, I couldn’t help but notice that those who are so infuriated by Kaep’ protesting for equal rights for minorities, praise Tim Tebow, who- depending on who you ask- could be viewed as also “disrespecting” something. Not everyone who watches football are Christians- some are Muslim, some are Jewish, some follow Buddhism – so on and so forth. So, why is that those same Kaepernick haters are not pissed off just based on the fact that maybe Tim’s kneel for his religious beliefs could be deemed “offensive” to those who practice a different religious faith? That would be crazy, right?

Well, the answer to that question is simple. The bottom line seems to be that no matter how much the anti-Kaepernick crowd may shout at the top of their lungs that he’s ‘disrespecting our country by kneeling during the National Anthem,’ deep down we all know it has more to do with the notion of ‘How dare he use his platform to stand up for his fellow people of color and fight for their lives in front of America’s face?’ That too, sounds ridiculous.

But just like Marvin Gaye asked, “What’s Going On?” and Gil Scott Heron warned, ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” Kaepernick is continuing to stand up and ‘believe in something….even if it costs him everything.’

Shout out to Nike by the way. True, making Kaepernick their spokesperson for their 30th anniversary was a smart business move from a corporate standpoint, it still sent a powerful message.

The post Jesse Jackson Calls Out Kaepernick’s Haters & Makes Valid Point About Tebow Kneeling appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

Embed from Getty Images

In a public statement released on Friday, Jackson revealed he’s been diagnosed with Parkinson’s Disease. He says he began to notice symptoms of the disease “about three years ago,” but that he’d been in denial until recently. He also confessed this: “But as my daily physical struggles intensified I could no longer ignore the symptoms, so I acquiesced,” he wrote. “After a battery of tests, my physicians identified the issue as Parkinson’s disease, a disease that bested my father,” Jackson said. “Recognition of the effects of this disease on me has been painful, and I have been slow to grasp the gravity of it.”

Rev. Jackson is currently receiving outpatient treatment from Northwest Medicine, where he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2015.

Read Jackson’s Full Statement Here:

Embed from Getty Images

“On July 17, 1960, I was arrested, along with seven other college students, for advocating for the right to use a public library in my hometown of Greenville, S.C. I remember it like it was yesterday, for that day changed my life forever. From that experience, I lost my fear of being jailed for a righteous cause. I went on to meet Dr. King and dedicate my heart and soul to the fight for justice, equality, and equal access. In the tradition of the Apostle Paul, I have offered myself – my mind, body and soul – as a living sacrifice.
“Throughout my career of service, God has kept me in the embrace of his loving arms, and protected me and my family from dangers, seen and unseen. Now in the latter years of my life, at 76 years old, I find it increasingly difficult to perform routine tasks, and getting around is more of a challenge. My family and I began to notice changes about three years ago. For a while, I resisted interrupting my work to visit a doctor. But as my daily physical struggles intensified I could no longer ignore the symptoms, so I acquiesced.
“After a battery of tests, my physicians identified the issue as Parkinson’s disease, a disease that bested my father.
“Recognition of the effects of this disease on me has been painful, and I have been slow to grasp the gravity of it. For me, a Parkinson’s diagnosis is not a stop sign but rather a signal that I must make lifestyle changes and dedicate myself to physical therapy in hopes of slowing the disease’s progression.
“I am far from alone. God continues to give me new opportunities to serve. This diagnosis is personal but it is more than that. It is an opportunity for me to use my voice to help in finding a cure for a disease that afflicts 7 to 10 million worldwide. Some 60,000 Americans are diagnosed with Parkinson’s every year.
“I will continue to try to instill hope in the hopeless, expand our democracy to the disenfranchised and free innocent prisoners around the world. I’m also spending some time working on my memoir so I can share with others the lessons I have learned in my life of public service. I steadfastly affirm that I would rather wear out than rust out.
“I want to thank my family and friends who continue to care for me and support me. I will need your prayers and graceful understanding as I undertake this new challenge. As we continue in the struggle for human rights, remember that God will see us through, even in our midnight moments.
“KEEP HOPE ALIVE!
“Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr.”

It’s beautiful to see that Rev. Jesse Jackson’s fighting spirit is still just as prevalent as it ever was, even as his physical health diminishes. We sending love, light, and positive energy to him at this time.

Source

The post Prayers Up: Rev. Jesse Jackson Reveals He’s Battling A Major Disease, Asks For Prayers appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

Some Of The Ways Hefner Fought For Civil Rights

Hefner contributed to many civil rights causes and worked with many civil rights legends who ultimately became some of his closest friends throughout the years.
1. He funded the PUSH Coalition, which was spearheaded by Rev. Jesse Jackson and largely dedicated to fighting for civil rights for African American people.

Hugh Hefner was a strong supporter of the civil rights movement. We shall never forget him. May he Rest In Peace. pic.twitter.com/oL3lKLZRQ5

— Rev Jesse Jackson Sr (@RevJJackson) September 28, 2017

2. Hefner was a very loyal supporter of Martin Luther King Jr. during the civil rights era. He also risked losing a large part of his fan base, by publishing interviews with Black civil rights icons in Playboy Magazine, including Muhammad Ali, Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X.

3. The late Dick Gregory, who died on August 19th 2017, also revealed that back in the day, it was Hefner who gave a $25K reward to help solve one of the most brutal murders of the civil rights era: three young civil rights activists killed in Meridian, MS.

4. Hefner revealed in a 2011 CBS interview that when he franchised his Playboy Club back in the day, he had to check the franchise buyers for making Black performers go through the back entrances of the venues:

“I felt from a very early age that there were things in society that were wrong, and that I might play some small part in changing them […]When we started franchising, when they refused our members, the black members, entrance, I said, ‘You can’t do that, these are members of our club.’ And we literally bought back the franchised clubs,” Hefner said.

Gregory to Hefner- “You had a courage when no one was bringing in blacks and minorities, and let you stand flat-footed in America and just talk, you brought me in. […] You didn’t give me a lecture. You gave me no instructions. […] I come here tonight not to roast you, but to say that had you not had the guts back then, we black comics that the world has been able to look at and understand our genius, we would be in some pot, roasting in debt, knowing we were never going to make it. [..] So I say I love you. We thank you. Gold bless you, my brother.”

Watch Dick Gregory Show Gratitude To Friend, Hugh Hefner

That video was a beautiful thing to see for several reasons: (1) In a world that is seeing hatred spewed in every realm of our society, the colorblind love among many -such as that between Gregory and Hefner- sometimes gets overlooked.; and (2) Dick Gregory was sometimes misunderstood and labeled as a racist. But seeing his love for Hefner shows that he clearly was not, but he was instead a realist throughout his endless fight for equal rights. Hugh Hefner was able to understand that. May they both rest peacefully, after an incredible job well done.

The post Many Surprised To See The Many Things Hugh Hefner Did For Black People appeared first on I Love Old School Music.

Meet Jesse Jackson’s baby girl, Ashley Jackson. You probably don’t recognize her, but you may remember the very popular story surrounding her existence. Remember when Jesse’s former staffer, Dr. Karin Stanford put him on blast by exposing their love affair, which produced a love child? Yeah, Ashley is the “love child” and she now has a beautiful relationship with her Pops, Rev. Jesse Jackson. Fifteen year old Ashley, goes by the stage name of Ajae and she’s recently released her first single on iTunes titled “Just Do Me.”

She said that her Dad is keeping his fingers crossed that she will one day pursue a career in politics, but he’s still supportive of her decision to follow in her idol, Beyonce’s footsteps, except she said she’s doing it with a political twist.

“Dad likes the song a lot and he’s said lot of positive things about it. He’s proud of me. I’m just not sure this was his plan for me at this time, but he’s trying hard to be supportive. I think that originally he thought that being an entertainer would be something I’d pursue at an older age — not this age, so I think this is a surprise to him” says Ashley.

“My mom is a political science instructor and my dad a civil rights activist. I am inspired by their work, but I am not them, and I have to follow my own path, which is music. I do see myself changing the world, but just through music. I sing about respecting the legacy of my upbringing with my parents and simultaneously about embracing my dreams.”

Ashley even writes her own songs and likes to write about political topics like the “Bring Back Our Girls” tragedy in Nigeria. “I want younger girls to know about issues like this. I am inspired by that and I want to mentor young girls,” Jackson continued.

Well it looks like Ms. Ashley is off to a great start and we wish her the best because celebrity kids are born with a gift and a curse of having to live in their parents shadow, but hopefully she’ll be able to fully step outside of Rev. Jackson’s shadow and successfully carve out her own space in the world of entertainment.

Check out Ajae’s new video and tell us what you think.

Do you think Ajae has the skills to make in today’s music industry?
[paq_poll id=4259]

Now we did mention that Rev. Jackson is supportive, although he still wants Ashley to have a political career, BUT her mom, Dr. Karin Stanford is being a lot more vocal about her battle with her daughter’s decision. See what her Mom said when you click next.

The post Jesse Jackson’s Daughter Launches Singing Career But Does She Have IT? appeared first on I Love Old School Music.