GodSta - Put it down. Follow me.

GodSta is a counter-revolution of ideas, principles and systems for those who are willing to create change. Our weapons are love, peace, and hope. Our colors are bright and illuminating for the purpose shedding light on issues that need to be faced and addressed. Our initiation is a commitment to fight the good fight of faith. We Know who the enemy is and how to address him.

Zimbabwe, What Might Have Been
Joshua Nkomo A Partner in the Revolution


The first leader of the Rhodesian nationalist movement was Joshua Nqabuko Nyangolo Nkomo. He had been elected
president of the newly formed African National Congress on
1 September 1957.

Joshua Nkomo (1917–1999)

Zimbabwean trade unionist and politician, vice president 1990–99. As president of ZAPU (Zimbabwe African People's Union) from 1961, he was a leader of the black nationalist movement against the white Rhodesian regime. He was a member of Robert Mugabe's cabinet 1980–82 and from 1987.

After completing his education in South Africa, Joshua Nkomo became a welfare officer on Rhodesian Railways and later organizing secretary of the Rhodesian African Railway Workers' Union. He entered politics in 1950, and was president of the African National Congress (ANC) in southern Rhodesia 1957–59. In 1961 he created ZAPU, of which he was president.

Arrested along with other black African politicians, he was kept in detention 1963–74. After his release he joined forces with Robert Mugabe as a joint leader of the Patriotic Front in 1976, opposing the white-dominated regime of Ian Smith. Nkomo took part in the Lancaster House Conference, which led to Rhodesia's independence as the new state of Zimbabwe, and became a cabinet minister and vice president.

Dr. King on War! (5yrs and counting)

Bill Cosby about Gangsta Rap, drugs and youth

Hookers For Jesus--Redemption In Sin City

Hookers for Jesus being interviewed by George Knapp, Investigative Reporter with CBS affiliate KLAS in Las Vegas. Includes footage of JCs Girls at the AVN Porn Convention. (Final product for I-Team EyeWitness News)

Redemption in Sin City



Statistics of Prositution

The sex industry is a sad world, full of broken dreams, battered, shattered, sexually abused women, men and children. It is destroying our families, it is causing alarming divorce rates, teen pregnancies, STDs-AIDS, drug usage, not to mention altered views of what sex really means!

Buckle your seatbelts, here below are the stats on prostitution in the United States.

AGE FACTORS

* Average age of entry: 14-16 yrs
* Average mean age: 31
* Average years in prostitution: 11
* Percent younger than age 18 at entry: 42 percent


VIOLENCE IN PROSTITUTION

Traumatized individuals tend to minimize or deny their experiences, especially when they are in the midst of ongoing trauma, such as war combat or prostitution. This leads to a decreased rate of reporting violent crimes. Please understand these girls are afraid of their pimps, and if they told everything that is actually going on behind closed doors, they fear violent retaliation from the pimp or death. I can personally relate to this myself!

* Threatened with a weapon: 78 percent
* Physically assaulted: 82 percent
* Raped: 82 percent

Many women in this business are confused of the definition of rape. If rape is as unwanted sex act or coerced, then the statistic would be a much higher percentage. Some women in prostitution assume there is no difference between prostitution and rape, and they only call it rape if they were not paid, regardless of the violence of the act—asking them is like asking someone in a combat zone if they are under fire. A significant percentage of women currently prostituting deny rape and other violence because it would be too stressful to acknowledge the extreme danger posed by johns and pimps!

* Raped more than five times: 73 percent
* Current or past homelessness: 84 percent
* As a child, was hit or beaten by a caregiver until injured or bruised: 49 percent
* Sexually abused as a child: 65-95 percent

http://www.hookersforjesus.net/statistics.cfm


The Church
At South Las Vegas
3051 W. Horizon Ridge Parkway
Henderson, NV 89052

Located right off of St. Rose Parkway and Seven Hills Drive.

FACT SHEET: AIDS In East Harlem - Intersections
SPONSORED BY Union Settlement

AIDS became another major piece in the puzzle of health and social ills in East Harlem since the beginning of the virus. AIDS cases have been recorded in East Harlem since the very early 1980’s. Since then, AIDS cases continued to increase in East Harlem peaking at around 1992 and 1993 when the CDC expanded the diagnostic criteria for AIDS. Although the AIDS case rate appears to have leveled off, this could be due to two major factors: 1) there is still a reporting lag for 1997 and 1998, and 2) the new medications are proving effective in slowing the AIDS progression rate, (i.e. a CD4 count of less that 200). Nonetheless, the social conditions that accelerate the AIDS epidemic continue at high rates in East Harlem. For example, East Harlem ranks #2 in NYC for STD’s, and #1 citywide for substance abuse hospitalizations. These factors, when added to high poverty rates, facilitate the spread of HIV.

• East Harlem has a total population of over 110,508 representing 1.4% of New York City’s population yet has the second highest (4,330 per 100,000 adults) cumulative AIDS rate in the entire city (OAS 10/98).

• Zip code 10029 in East Harlem recorded the highest number of AIDS cases among Hispanics and blacks in the entire borough of Manhattan (Blacks/Latinos living with AIDS by zip in DOH – B.D.I.R. 10/98).

• By February 1999, there were 4,146 cumulative AIDS cases in East Harlem. Of the cumulative total 2,976, or 72% were males and 1,170 or 28% were females. (OAS 2/99)

• Of these, a total of 2,662 persons have died of AIDS in East Harlem. Of the surviving 1,484 persons living with AIDS in East Harlem, 1,029 are male and 455 are female (ibid.).

• 713 or 48% of the persons living with AIDS in East Harlem are blacks, 679 or 45% Hispanics, 87 or .05% are whites and five persons are listed as others/unknown (ibid.).

• The primary mode of HIV transmission in East Harlem is intravenous drug use (IDU). A staggering 62.3% of all AIDS infections resulted from IDU, more than six out every ten HIV infections. This represents the highest percentage in all of Manhattan (ibid.).

• Men who have sex with men (MSM) account for 716 or 17.3% of the transmission rate in East Harlem.

• Heterosexual transmissions accounted for 392 of these the total AIDS cases in East Harlem. Women account for 80.3% of transmissions in this category.

EAST HARLEM HIV CARE NETWORK
OUR MISSION

The East Harlem HIV CARE Network, through its committees, workgroups, and members strives:

• To provide a forum for coordinating community residents, professional health and social service providers, and consumers of HIV/AIDS services in East Harlem.

• To prioritize HIV/AIDS as a crucial issue in East Harlem and to keep HIV/AIDS in the forefront of community awareness, as well as national and local policy decision-making.

• To gather and disseminate information concerning HIV/AIDS education, prevention, and related services with a dedicated commitment to data, methods of analysis, and statistics.

• To monitor and evaluate the HIV/AIDS services rendered and consumed in East Harlem in order to avoid duplication of services and to foster closer working linkages.

• To enhance the quality of HIV/AIDS services in East Harlem.

• To advocate for East Harlem on every government level to improve the quality of life for people in our community living with or at risk of contracting HIV/AIDS.

Jose Martin Garcia Orduna - Network Coordinator

EAST HARLEM HEALTH DEPARTMENT 158 EAST 115^TH STREET, SUITE 218. NEW YORK, N.Y. 10029
TEL: (212) 828-6141/42/43 - FAX: (212) 360-5914

A SERIES OF FEATURES ON MENTORING

MENTORS: Real Life Heroes
Forever in His Debt

I can remember my first mentor his name was Oraston Brooks. He was an exceptional artist, who could draw or paint anything. For several years, he worked as an illustrator and comp artist for various advertising agencies in New York City. When he visited, we would briefly discuss our common interest as artist, and he'd always encourage me to develop my skills. Oraston wasn’t always readily available, but the times we shared discussing art were greatly appreciated.

Several years passed, when I learned that Oraston suddenly passed away. My Aunt, who was a very good friend of his, and I attended the funeral service. There I met his nephew, and had the opportunity to talk to him about my relationship with his uncle, and the impact that his acts of kindness had on my life. I told him how, I vividly remembered meeting him in the early 1960’s. At that time, Oraston was dating my Aunt, but whenever he visited he would always take the time to acknowledge me as a fellow artist. One day, after several requests he sat with me, and did a pencil sketch of one of my favorite hero’s, Hercules unchained.

I was eight-years-old and in the third grade at the time. That-single act of kindness, and kinship, had a greater impact on my life and career, than my education at both Art & Design High School, and Pratt Institute, my twenty-plus-year career as an artist, designer, mentor and educator, simply because it made it all possible. When he passed that sketch to me, he was passing the baton, and daring me to carry on. He acknowledged and validated my talent, when others did so in passing. Most saw my ability to draw as a hobby, but he showed me that it was a beautiful gift from God, and for that I am forever in his debt.

When passing a baton you don’t give it back to the runner, who gave it to you, but past it on to the next runner. I always encourage my students to stop, reflect and remember those who’ve helped them, to consider developing and strengthening their ability to give. To actively create in their lives the cycle of giving, the returns are immeasurable.

Brotherman

COMMENTARY: Drug Dealer Frank Lucas, Denzel and Dad

My Father as a kid delivered groceries to the first drug kingpin “Bumpy” Johnson, who at the time, lived in the corner building on 120th street and 5th Avenue, across the street from Mount Morris Park. He use to tell me these colorful stories with admiration, about this man. Bumpy was an employee and conduit for the mafia, helping to orchestrate the distribution of heroin into Harlem and surrounding communities in the 1940's, an epidemic that would later spread and engulf the entire country for generations to come.

The street gangs of the 40's would become some of the first addicts, their members would ultimately form the first ruthless drug-gangs of the 50's, 60's and 70's. Families were destroyed individual lives ruined, violence and crime across the board increased at staggering rates. In spite the gains from the Civil Rights Movement, as a community we never fully recovered from the initial impact of the flooding of drugs into our communities.

Frank Lucas, portrayed by academy Award winner Denzel Washington in “American Gangster”, was the driver for Bumpy Johnson until his death by heart attack in 1968. By the time Mr. Lucas took power- the Harlem community had been decimated by this epidemic and the second generation of addicts already overwhelmed the streets. Like the Hip Hop culture violent movies have a tremendous impact on our children. Our young-people are continually bombarded with negative messages that unfortunately help shape and mold their character, Al Pacino's as Scareface is still a popular image on T-Shirts.

The moral of the story is not that the bad guy gets it in the end. Too many hopeless kids who are engaged in criminal activity, view the demise of these individuals in a fatalistic and morbidly glamorous way. Enlighten by our past history and current events we have to be careful not to glorify criminals. Mr. Lucas has the right to have his story told but as parents, mentors, big brothers and sisters, we must always monitor the messages and more important the response to the message portrayed in media.

Dad's discussions about Bumpy, were a small part of the rich history of the community that he shared with me. He gave me, as I did my son, Claude Brown's definitive book on life in Harlem, “Manchild in the Promise Land”, when I was a teenager. He also talked about Malcolm X and Dr. King, Miles Davis and Charlie Parker. Together we watched, Gil Noble's informative program “Like It Is”. My love of history and current events came from my dads talks about the Bumpy Johnson's as well as the Dr. King's of this world. He taught me to discern the messages that would bombarded me in my life-time. He knew then that no matter what, there would always be plenty of people like Bumpy Johnson and Frank Lucas around to share theirs.

Brotherman