Comedian, civil rights activist, politician, nutritionist, author. Dick Gregory is many things. One thing he is not is timid.
Gregory took turns lecturing and screaming at an audience Thursday at the Nissan Auditorium on the campus of Mississippi University for Women. The stern talking-to was part of the Gordy Honors Forum Series.
A seasoned performer, Gregory tempered his monologue with jokes, but provoked more thought than laughter. Racially charged topics were buttressed by examples of man”s natural similarity, created by the “universal God.”
“Queen Elizabeth makes $360 million every 24 hours interest on her money and she ain”t got no more blood vessels than my welfare cousins. If they was both sittin” on a bench they”d both breathe in the same amount of air,” he philosophized.
When Gregory did point a finger, nobody was spared. Whites were taken to task for forcing black American soldiers guarding German prisoners of war in the American South during World War II to eat in the back of restaurants while traveling by rail to P.O.W. camps.
Black women were chastised for attempting to change their natural appearances.
“Black women, you”re 6 percent of America”s population. Ninety eight percent of thyroid tumors occur in black women. … You put all that (relaxing) chemical in your hair and it goes through your skull. The thyroid is the catcher”s mitt that catches that filth, but it don”t know it”s going to keep coming,” Gregory shouted. “God made nappy hair!”
Men in general were accused of seeking unnatural, too often violent, means of asserting their manhood.
Gregory repeatedly returned to his message of faith in God in addition to a disciplined, self-sufficient lifestyle free of hate and addiction.
Students in select classes at MUW read his 1964 autobiography “Nigger” prior to his speaking engagement. Gordy Honors College Director Dr. Thomas Velek said most students tactfully referred to the book as simply “the Dick Gregory book.”
Jason Browne was previously a reporter for The Dispatch.
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