The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (& Maids), Meredith Stern
Begun in 1925, the Brotherhood was one of the first Black labor unions in the U.S. They built the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement to come. The two-color offset printed poster, 11" x 17" (unsigned, unlimited edition) is available from the website of Justseeds/Visual Resistance Artists’ Cooperative, a decentralized community of artists who believe in the power of personal expression in concert with collective action to transform society. www.justseeds.org

DNA Repository and Unsound Move at Howard University.

Written by Evelyne Shuster
to the Washington Post,
May 29, 2003

Re: “Howard University Plans Genetic Database,” May 28, 2003

To the Editor:
The plan by Howard University to create a repository of African-American DNA is ill advised, ill guided, scientifically unsound and potentially harmful. Race is not genetic. Craig Venter of Celera Genomics reminded people the very day he announced the completion of the Human Genome: “Race is a social construct, not a scientific one. People must know that there are no genes of any kind that pattern along racial lines.” If we really want to know why Blacks are more susceptible to diabetes and hypertension we need to look at social and living conditions, including racism. And if we really want to “help Blacks fight diseases” we must help improve these conditions, fight racism and ensure everyone a decent living standard, jobs and access to health care. The creation of a repository of DNA from African Americans is reductionist and could lead to a new kind of discrimination based on genes rather than skin color. To think that this would not happen because of the involvement of Howard University is simply naïve.

— Evelyne Shuster, Ph.D.
— Medical Ethicist,
— Veterans Affairs Medical Center
— Philadelphia, PA

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