Featured

OPINION: When the ‘F’ Word and the ‘N’ Word Meant the Same Thing: Filipino

Published

5 years ago

February 18, 2021

Kiki

For some of you, to know of the singer H.E.R., the African American Filipino singer from Vallejo who kicked off Super Bowl LV with her rendition of “America,” would be ‘woke’enough.

But the ‘wokiest’ of the woke would appreciate that the game was three days after February 4, the anniversary of the day when the very first gunshots of the U.S.-Philippine War were aimed at Filipinos.

Still the wokiest yet would remember that the Super Bowl was being played in the hometown of one David Fagen, the African American hero of the Filipino “Insurrectos” of 1899.

Fagen knew when the “N” word and the “F” word both meant “Filipino.” For real. Let me explain.

Fagen was an African American born in Florida in 1875, at a time of continuing oppression and discrimination in the South. According to historian Howard Zinn, between 1889-1903 “on average, every week, two Negroes were lynched by mobs—hanged, burned, mutilated.”

This is well after the Civil War, when the best America could do was the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case, which made “separate but equal” the law and created what essentially would become an American caste system.

Imagine the mindset of a young Fagen, who joined the segregated, all-Black 24th Infantry as one of the “Buffalo Soldiers” sent to fight Native Americans. Perhaps he was just following orders, but when that deed was done, Fagen and the others were sent to fight in the Spanish American War, first in Cuba, then to Asia.

There they fought the war everyone wants you to forget.

After a brief stop in San Francisco, Fagen shipped off to the Philippines, where things began to fall apart morally when the first gunshots were fired at Filipinos on the aforementioned Feb. 4, 1899.

By then, Fagen had reached his existential WTF moment, and I don’t mean “what the Filipino?” But it might have been.

Fagen questioned how any African American with integrity or empathy could fight a white man’s war and turn his gun on another person of color fighting for freedom.

Maybe his feelings began during his first campaign against Native Americans, but by the second go-round in the jungles of the Philippines, he could no longer fight for the U.S. imperial army. Fagen became one of 15 to 30 deserters among the four units of the all-Black “Buffalo Soldiers.”

Fagen’s distinction: he was the only one known to have actually joined the Filipino freedom fighters of the U.S.-Philippine War.

My friend, Prof. Daniel Gonzales of San Francisco State University’s Ethnic Studies Dept., prefers that naming phrase to the more common Philippine-American War because the U.S. was the aggressor on Philippine soil and caused more deaths. Among Filipino civilians alone, casualties as a result of the war are estimated to be around 1 million lives. Some call it borderline genocide, which is debatable. But there’s no doubt this was America’s imperial war, more deadly than our present-day coronavirus war.

The real insurrectionists

The Filipino freedom fighters were the real “insurrectos,” or insurrectionists in American history; or as I see it, they were the insurrectionists based on truth.

David Fagen had to become one of them when he saw the U.S. was there to subjugate and colonize the Philippines.

The insurrectos are very different from the insurrectionists you’ve been hearing about in the news recently. The rioters who attacked Capitol Hill on January 6, were dubbed “insurrectionists” because they were urged to fight and pillage the Capitol based on former Pres. Donald Trump’s lies of a stolen election. The vast majority of these Trump insurrectionists were white and racist. Once unleashed, they destroyed federal property and threatened the lives of both Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi. In the end, when all was said and done, five people died.

And when they were done, they were so proud they started taking selfies.

No one was taking selfies in the Philippines.

For the Filipinos, it was a war of passion, often fought with spears and knives to ward off an American desire for domination and conquest fueled by racism.Through letters written by African American soldiers and published in America by the Black ethnic press, such as the Boston Post, the Cleveland Gazette, and the American Citizen in Kansas City, Americans at home learned the truth about just how racist the war was in the Philippines.

“I feel sorry for these people and all that have come under the control of the United States,” wrote Patrick Mason, a sergeant in Fagen’s 24th Infantry, to the Cleveland Gazette. “The first thing in the morning is the “(N-word)”and the last thing at night is the “(N-word).”. . .You are right in your opinions. I must not say as much as I am a soldier.”

This was the power of the ethnic press as described in E. San Juan Jr.’s essay on Fagen, that sources the Willard Gatewood book, “‘Smoked Yankees’ and the Struggle for Empire: Letters From Negro Soldiers, 1898-1902.”

It makes the racist nature of the war clear and provides an understanding for Fagen’s defection. On Nov. 17, 1899, Fagen crossed the line and joined the guerrillas.

Historians note that Fagen was so good as a Filipino freedom fighter, he was promoted to captain on Sept. 6, 1900. Some Filipinos even called him “General Fagen.” His notoriety grew as he clashed on the battlefield with the U.S. military forces, specifically Gen. Frederick Funston. Fagen’s exploits were covered by the New York Times.

The war came to an official end in 1902 after Filipino rebel leaders like Emilio Aguinaldo surrendered beginning in the spring of 1901. But Fagen kept fighting and was never found. He was said to have married a Filipina and gone into hiding in the mountains of Nueva Ecija, on the island of Luzon.

Fagen’s head or a head fake?

San Juan Jr. tells a story of Anastacio Bartolome, who, in December 1901, brought a decomposed head said to be Fagen’s to Bongabong, Nueva Ecija. Bartolome produced other pieces of documentary evidence, like weapons or clothing, but the military didn’t consider it credible, nor did they give Bartolome a reward. San Juan suspects the items may have been stolen and the head could have been someone’s from the Aeta, a black aboriginal tribe. Bartolome may have also been a ruse to throw off Fagen’s pursuers.

Nevertheless, it was the Black press that wrote an obituarywith a sympathetic point of view. On Dec. 14, 1901, The Indianapolis Freeman did not condemn Fagen as a traitor but painted the picture of a man “prompted by honest motives to help a weaker side, and one to which he felt allied by the ties that bind.”

And that’s the oft-forgotten Asian part of Black History Month, where soldiers lie David Fagen found common ground among the dark-skinned Asian freedom fighters in the mountain jungles of the Philippines.

If you’ve never heard of this history, it’s not surprising. It’s one that runs counter to America’s white supremacist narrative.

The birth of colonial mentality

My father, who was born under the American flag in the Philippines a few weeks after the U.S.-Philippine war started, lived in the aftermath, yet probably knew nothing about Fagen. That likely wasn’t taught in his colonized American school, where he learned English well enough to come to America in the 1920s as a colonized American national.

All throughout the discrimination my father faced in the U.S. (anti-miscegenation, lack of opportunities in employment and housing), he found himself in the Black community. But he still was in the throes of colonial mentality. Generally, that’s known as an acceptance of the white narrative, as one ‘goes along to get along’ in society.

It’s a mindset that lingers to this day among many in the large Asian American subgroup of Filipino Americans, more than 4 million strong. It’s the reason I no longer participate in some Filipino American projects that too often discount truth for a more passive, glorified U.S. perspective. Wokeness is not an option for the latter-day colonial minded.

They all could use some of the insight from David Fagen’s history.

He challenged an immoral and imperialistic American war. And he knew right away his connection to other people of color in Asia fighting to be free—the Filipino.

When you lack the nerve to break the bonds of colonial mentality, think of Fagen, who heard the “N” word referring to Filipinos, and knew better.

It’s a lesson worth thinking about all the time, and not just during Black History Month.

Emil Guillermo is a journalist and commentator. Listen to his podcast/vlog, where he talks about Fagen with Prof. Daniel Phil Gonzales on amok.com

Kiki

Posts by Kiki | Website

Up Next

Is It Safe to Give In to Pressure to Reopen Schools?

Don't Miss

Council Unanimously Approves Local Business Empowerment Ordinance

Kiki

Click to comment

#NNPA BlackPress

Black Artists in America, Installation Three Wraps at the Dixon Gallery and Gardens

TRI-STATE DEFENDER — With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

Published

6 days ago

March 24, 2026

admin

By Candace A. Gray | Tri-State Defender

The tulips gleefully greet those who enter the gates at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens on an almost spring day. More than 650,000 bulbs of various hues are currently on display. And they are truly breathtaking.

Inside the gallery, and equally as breathtaking, is the “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” exhibit, which runs through Sunday, March 29. This is the third installment of a three-part series that started years ago and illustrates part of the Black experience through visual arts in the 20th century.

“This story picks up where part two left off,’’ said Kevin Sharp, the Linda W. and S. Herbert Rhea director for the Dixon. “This era is when we really start to see the emergence of these important Black artists’ agency and freedom shine through. They start to say and express what they want to, and it was a really beautiful time.”

With 50+ paintings, sculptures and assemblages, the exhibit features artists like Varnette Honeywood from Los Angeles, whose pieces appeared in Bill Coby’s private collection (before they were auctioned off) and on “The Cosby Show.” Also included are works by Alonzo Davis, another Los Angeles artist who opened one of the first galleries there where Black Artists could exhibit.

“Though [Davis] was from LA, he actually lived in Memphis for a decade,” said Sharp. “He was a dean at Memphis College of Art, and later opened the first gallery in New York owned and operated by black curators.”

Another featured artist is former NFL player, Ernie Barnes. His work is distinctive. Where have you seen one of his most popular paintings, Sugar Shack? On the end scene and credits of the hit show “Good Times.” His piece Saturday Night, Durham, North Carolina, 1974 is in this collection.

Memphis native James Little’s “The War Baby: The Triptych” is among more than 50 works featured in “Black Artists in America, From the Bicentennial to September 11” at the Dixon Gallery & Gardens, the final installment of a three-part series highlighting the impact and evolution of Black artists through 2011.

The exhibit features other artists with Memphis ties, including abstract painter James Little, who was raised in a segregated Memphis and attended Memphis Academy of Art (before it was Memphis College of Art). He later moved to New York, became a teacher and an internationally acclaimed fixture in the art world in 2022 when he was named a Whitney Biennial selected artist at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.

Other artists like Romare Bearden, who had a Southern experience but lived up North, were featured in all three installments.

“During this period of time, he was a major figure,” said Sharp. “He wrote one of the first books on the history of African American art during a time when there were more Black academics, art teachers, more Black everything!”

Speaking of Black educators, Sharp said the head curator behind this tri-part series and Dixon’s partner in the arts is Earnestine Jenkins, Ph.D., an art history professor at the University of Memphis, who also earned a Master of Arts degree from Memphis State University (now UofM). “We began working with Dr. Jenkins in 2018,” he said.

Sharp explained that it takes a team of curators, registrars, counterparts at other museums, and more, about three years to assemble an exhibit like this. It came together quite seamlessly, he added. Each room conjured up more jaw-dropping “wows” than the one before it. Each piece worked with the others to tell the story of Black people and their collective experience during this time period.

One of the last artists about whom Sharp shared information was Bettye Saar, who will turn 100 years old this year. She’s been working in Los Angeles for 80 years and is finally getting her due. Her medium is collages or assemblages, and an incredible work of hers is on display. She’s married to an artist and has two daughters, also artists.

The exhibit catalogue bears some of these artists’ stories, among other scholarly information.

The exhibit, presented by the Joe Orgill Family Fund for Exhibitions, is culturally and colorfully rich. It is a must see and admission to the Dixon is free.

Visit https://www.dixon.org/ to learn more.

Fun Facts: An original James Little design lives in the flooring of the basketball court at Tom Lee Park, and he makes and mixes his own paint colors.

admin

Posts by admin

#NNPA BlackPress

Grief, Advocacy, and Education: A Counselor Reflects on Black Maternal Health

SAN DIEGO VOICE & VIEWPOINT — Last month healthcare leaders, birth workers, and community members gathered to honor the legacy of Charleston native Dr. Janell Green Smith, a nurse-midwife and doctor of nursing practice who died in January from childbirth complications. She had participated in more than 300 births and specialized in helping Black women give birth safely.

Published

6 days ago

March 24, 2026

admin

By Jennifer Porter Gore | Word-In-Black | San Diego Voice and Viewpoint

In 2024, the number of U.S. mothers who died as a result of pregnancy or childbirth dropped compared to 2023. But while slightly fewer Black mothers died that year, they still had three times the mortality rate of white women.

South Carolina’s rates of maternal deaths outpaced even the national rates. In fact, the state’s overall rate of maternal deaths between 2019 and 2023 was higher than all but eight states and the District of Columbia.

Last month healthcare leaders, birth workers, and community members gathered to honor the legacy of Charleston native Dr. Janell Green Smith, a nurse-midwife and doctor of nursing practice who died in January from childbirth complications. She had participated in more than 300 births and specialized in helping Black women give birth safely.

Her death shocked the community and her colleagues who are determined to address concerns about Black maternal health. The event also covered the importance of protecting mental health during grief and of men’s role in solving the maternal health crisis.

As both a therapist and a father, Lawrence Lovell, a licensed professional counselor and founder of Breakthrough Solutions, discussed ways the event’s attendees could process their grief over Green Smith’s death. He also shared ways male partners can advocate for women’s maternal health during pregnancy and childbirth.

Lovell spoke not just as a therapist but also as a father whose own family had briefly crossed paths with Green Smith. The event, he said, emerged organically from a moment of collective mourning.

Despite the grief, “it was still, like, a really beautiful event, a much-needed event, and it almost felt like we were all giving each other a collective family hug,” says Lovell.

His connection to Green Smith, Lovell says, was brief but meaningful during his wife’s pregnancy with their second child. Green Smith was practicing at the same birthing center where they had their child. She began practicing in Greenville a short time later.Even that short connection carried significance for Lovell, given the small number of Black maternal health professionals.

Lovell did not initially plan to become a mental health practitioner; he chose the career path after graduating from college, when someone suggested he consider psychology. His interest deepened when he noticed how few Black men work in mental health.

“Being Black man and playing football in college, there weren’t a lot of people that look like me talking about mental health,” says Lovell. “[I wanted] to give people that look like me an opportunity to work with someone that looks like them.”

Working with Expectant and New Parents

Lovell often counsels couples preparing for parenthood by, helping partners understand what a successful pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum recovery look like. That often means helping women manage postpartum depression.

As a man, Lovell says, it’s “humbling” that a woman “just trusts me enough to work with me through their pregnancy or their postpartum recovery.”

In his work, Lovell has noticed how few men understand pregnancy before they experience it with their partner. Because early pregnancy symptoms are often invisible, he says, men may underestimate how much support a mom-to-be actually needs.

“Sometimes they may not realize they don’t know much about pregnancy and what to expect in those three trimesters,” Lovell says. “I tell a lot of the men that just because you can’t see [she’s pregnant] doesn’t mean that she won’t appreciate your intense support in that first trimester.”

Education about pregnancy and postpartum recovery, he says, can change how men support their partners.

Teaching Advocacy in the Delivery Room

Another major focus of Lovell’s counseling is preparing men to advocate for mothers during labor.

“Helping men understand what pregnancy looks like: what delivery is going to look like, and what are the realistic expectations that I should have of myself in postpartum,” he says.

Lovell encourages partners to be honest about their expectations for what will happen during delivery. He helps them prepare for the big day by discussing the birth plan and knowing how to quickly recognize problems. Clear communication, he says, prevents misunderstandings.

He regularly trains men to ask their partners detailed questions about their expectations during and after pregnancy. Advocacy in medical settings can be especially important and requires attention to details the mother may not be able to address.

“It’s always important to fine-tune things and truly understand what helps your partner feel most supported,” Lovell says. “Instead of guessing, you should ask.”

Lovell recalls a moment during the birth of his first child when he had to take that role.

During the delivery, “I felt like something wasn’t as sanitary as I’d like it to be,” he says. “I asked, ‘Hey, can you switch those out? Can you change your gloves?’”

Lovell has a succinct but powerful message he regularly shares with clients’ families, and he shared it with attendees at last month’s event.

“Just to believe women,” he says. “I’ve worked with different couples, and sometimes I’m not really sure that there’s enough empathy from the men.”

That includes how women express pain.

“If a woman says, ‘my pain is at a nine,’ just because how you would express yourself at a nine is different than how she’s expressing herself at [that level] doesn’t mean you shouldn’t believe her,” he says.

Empathy, he says, can change outcomes far beyond the delivery room.

“We’ve got to believe women when they’re talking about their experiences and their feelings and their pain,” he says. “I think there’s a lot that we can prevent if we empathize better.”

admin

Posts by admin

#NNPA BlackPress

Future of Florida’s Black History Museum in Limbo

JACKSONVILLE FREE PRESS — A proposal sponsored by Tom Leek, a Republican from Ormond Beach, has now passed the Senate in back-to-back legislative sessions. But the House version, filed by Kiyan Michael, a Jacksonville Republican, did not receive final approval in either year, effectively stalling the effort.

Published

6 days ago

March 24, 2026

admin

Jacksonville Free Press

Plans to establish a long-awaited Black history museum in Florida are once again on hold after legislation needed to advance the project failed to clear the state House for a second consecutive year, despite repeated approval in the Senate.

A proposal sponsored by Tom Leek, a Republican from Ormond Beach, has now passed the Senate in back-to-back legislative sessions. But the House version, filed by Kiyan Michael, a Jacksonville Republican, did not receive final approval in either year, effectively stalling the effort.

Under Florida law, identical or similar bills must pass both chambers before heading to the governor’s desk. Without House approval, the legislation has been unable to move forward, leaving the project in limbo. Long journey, contested location.

The proposed museum, formally known as the Florida Museum of Black History, has been years in the making, with lawmakers and community leaders framing it as a long-overdue institution to preserve and showcase the state’s African American heritage .A central point of contention has been the museum’s location. St. Augustine — widely recognized as the nation’s oldest city and a site deeply tied to both slavery and early Black history — emerged as the leading contender. Supporters argue the city’s historical significance makes it a natural home for the museum. However, competing interests and regional considerations have fueled debate, slowing consensus among lawmakers.

While the Senate-backed measure has consistently advanced, the lack of alignment in the House has underscored ongoing divisions about how and where the project should take shape.

The holdup in the Florida House appears to be less about opposition to the museum itself and more about a combination of procedural bottlenecks, unresolved structural issues, and lingering disagreements over how the project should be formalized and governed.

Despite the legislative setbacks, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has publicly voiced support for the museum. Speaking last month during the unveiling of a statue of abolitionist Frederick Douglass in St. Augustine, DeSantis said the project would move forward “one way or another,” signaling an intent to see the museum built regardless of legislative hurdles.

The anticipated museum has already cleared several hurdles. St. Johns County signed an agreement last year with Florida Memorial University to use the land that once housed its campus last year’s legislative session netted $1 million in funding for St. Johns County to work on planning and design for the museum. However, its anticipated that a million $3 million is needed.

Still, without statutory approval to finalize key components — including governance, funding mechanisms and site selection — the project remains largely conceptual.
With the House bill failing again, the timeline for the museum’s development is unclear. Lawmakers could revisit the proposal in the next legislative session, but any further delays risk pushing the project back several more years. Advocates warn that continued inaction could stall momentum for a museum many see as critical to telling a fuller, more accurate story of Florida’s past. For now, the effort remains paused — caught between political support at the top and legislative gridlock within the Capitol.