The Obama Argument
Tweet
I thought that this was an interesting take on the whole Barack Obama thing. Especially how his stature may be viewed differently even among blacks, dividing along people who’s roots are in America or like myself who is a first generation American (as the piece indicates, this also goes for Colin Powell who is from a family of Jamaicans like myself).
I’m inclined to believe that this is why I tend to put more stock into the idea of pulling yourself up by bootstraps rather than the "world owes me a living" mindset that I see affecting so many black Americans.
102 Responses to “The Obama Argument”
GOP Rep. Spencer Bachus Facing House Ethics Probe For Insider Trading
Jennifer Aniston Reportedly Pregnant With Twins
PHOTOS: Tamara Ecclestone At The Langham Hotel
Red Front? “Center For American Freedom” Logo Echoes Communist Style
Romney Calls For Defunding Planned Parenthood, Wife Was A Donor
GOP Fundraising Email Asks Supporters To “Knock Out” Obama
Romney Comes Up Limp In Nevada
Obama Opens Lead On Romney In New Poll
Latest Entries
Why Do Liberals Support Drone Strikes?
Weekly Standard Rolls Out The Iraq Argument For Iran
Equal Polarization, My Ass
Some Crazy Stuff That Happened In World War II
Maryland Republican Campaign Funds Used To Defend Voter Suppression
The Obama Jobs Record In One Graph
Martin O’Malley All In For Marriage Equality
Newt Gingrich, Filled With More Excrement Than Your Average Politician
New Year, Powerline Still Stupid
Thanks Again
Meta
Blogroll
Disclaimer
The views on this site are mine and mine alone, and do not reflect the views of my employer, Media Matters for America
© 2000-2011 Oliver Willis
In this same spirit, I would like to know why he voted to confirm Condi Rice. She has made a total mess along with her boss in our foreign policy strategy.
i love when jamaicans in america act so superior to african americans. jamaica is one of the poorest countries on the planet. whose fault is that? why it’s the lazy jamaicans’ fault. get up off the beach, drop the ganja and work to get your country out of poverty already! (sound familiar?) how dare you attack the very people who struggled for centuries so that your family could flee that exceedingly homophobic, corrupt homeland of yours. (again, just mirroring your tone.) you owe african americans so much more than you are willing to acknowledge. but i’m sure you’ve learned that distinguishing yourself from them makes you special to white americans. less southern slavesque–more ellis islandish. that’s the point, isn’t it?
Excuse me while I spit out the bad taste in my mouth…
OK. Long ago, Thomas Sowell wrote about how racial discrimination was handled around the world http://tinyurl.com/yz4reo, with particular attention to American blacks and “immigrant blacks”. Of course, no one paid any attention. Who cares what a black conservative has to say?
Which brings me to another point. Obama is, in the end, just another liberal. Liberals don’t win national elections in this country, unless they can get away with pretending to be conservatives (Carter, Clinton — both of them)
Churchill said that in 1945.
Said what?
What you just said about how “liberals” never win.
Are you then saying you agree?
I wasn’t pretending it was a “scoop”. I was saying that Obama can’t disguise the fact that he’s a liberal. It’s already too late.
Why should he? Right after Churchill said Liberals Never Win, he got raped by Mr. Atlee. Same thing happened to Macmillan and Hoover and Bush I.
I have no idea where the assumption that blacks expect a handout comes from. I wouked like hell to get out of the ghetto and did, as did most of my friends. I resent the implication that only blacks that are first generation or blacks of Csrribean derivation have motivation to succeed.
I think Obama basically has a lock as VP on the ticket in ’08 (assuming he doesn’t do anything stupid, yadda yadda). Everyone would benefit from having him on there. And that’s assuming he doesn’t actually win the nomination, which is also a possibility. So even if you’re not excited about him, I think it’s time to just get used to it.
Anyway, the way things are going in Iraq and economically, I can’t see any GOP candidate winning in ’08. The only way I could see it is if they somehow nominate an antiwar candidate, but that looks utterly impossible. I think Obama’s going to be our next VP at the very least. I’d even bet money on it. Does Tradesports have a thing on him yet?
Dr. Anatole Gavage-Huskanoy: The economy is better than it has been in a long, long time. Not counting Pres. Clinton’s fortuitous .com bubble, Pres. Bush’s economy is better. The truth is being concealed by the “nonexistent” Liberal media. But the truth will be told after July 4 2008, when it matters.
Secondly, most people aren’t thinking election until — the earliest — the summer of 2008.
By then, I guarantee you there will be a withdrawal / victory plan out of Iraq { there will be an increase in the amount of troops deployed during or before the summer of 2007 — you heard it here first) that I guarantee you will deflate any Democratic surrender monkey whining.
The 2008 Election is, once again, the Republicans’ to lose. They won’t.
Reparations?
I worked like hell to get out of the ghetto and did, as did most of my friends.
Bob, I hate to break it to you, but you and your friends are the exception, not the rule. If you disagree, go back to your old neighborhood and see how many of your other friends made it out.
Which brings me to my second point: It is no surprise that you and your friends made it out. You were on the same wavelength.
If you were under pressure from your peers to believe that “a brother don’t get a break,” or “stop acting white” [when you try hard in school],it’s possible that neither you nor your friends would have made it out.
My brother-in-law comes from a slave family and he graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School.
I can always tell a racist: Someone who thinks that because blacks are disproportionately poor, they’re all poor.
Sorry, no, there are lots of middle-class blacks in America. Of course, some of them only managed to get to be middle-class because white people are too lazy to clean our own houses, but there you go.
And who has said this?
What an asshole comment. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps you say. Just how many bootstraps did you pull yourself up as you got on the plane, boat, canoe or whatever conveyance brought you to these shores from that glorious place of opportunity Jamaica. It always amazes me that the same people who come from other countries not knowing the history of this country are so quick to criticize African-Americans! Now tell me Mr. First generation American, how many lynch mobs, water hoses, jim crow or other humiliating insults applied to your or your family as a Jamaican that you endured that forced you to leave that land of utopia that the rest of us ignorant African-Americans should strive for? Which brings me to my last point? If Jamaica is so wonderful, why the hell are you here, asshole!!??
It only requires only a very slight difference in social standing for someone to look down on someone else. I’m reading Robert Robert’s “The Classic Slum” about his home town, near Manchester, UK, and the conditions of the poor there. He grew up around all sorts of perceived class differences between slum dwellers, some based on fair distinctions, some not.
That said, the notion of “pulling yourself up by your bootstraps” is dangerous, given how much chance, coupled with the whims and foolishness of the powerful, effects us. Most of us in the American Middle class are only a few paychecks or one crippling illness away from ruin.
What you said, Oliver, is a bit disconcerting coming from a Liberal. I’ve always thought what distinguished us from Conservatives was our ability to empathize with people and see the complications underlying their status. Your statement reflects neither activity.
Uhh, in response to fd10801, on the state of the economy: Thanks for the blast of hot air, but median wages have been stagnant under Bush, and haven’t even kept up with inflation. Sure, growth’s been good, but if you’re an average family, things haven’t improved during this presidency. What numbers do you think are being concealed?
On the war: a majority of Americans want out. Less than 15% want more troops. If you think more troops are a “plan for victory” either in Iraq or in the ’08 elections then I’ve got some Enron stock to sell you, fd10801. Playing double-or-nothing with our troops’ lives is prety fucking stupid. At least America’s caught on to the bloody, delusional fantasies of you GOP psychos.
These things are keeping blacks poor today?
median wages have been stagnant under Bush, and haven’t even kept up with inflation
Could you have included any more qualifiers? Median wages?
Haven’t kept up with [the rate of inflation]?
Pretty much like saying baseball players’ batting averages haven’t kept up with their pay increases.
As for increasing the number of troops: Strategists, think tanks, Democrats and Republicans are beginning to look at an increase in troops as the answer to this problem.
Since when did they ever care what people think?
When George Bush won two elections, did you start liking him?
BTW, Bob, I understand better than you might think the very real personal, motivational problems afflicting blacks.
The problem conservatives have is that to acknowledge these problems is to be accused of racism; and, secondly, to point to the social services system as the enemy, not the savior, of the poor (which, of course, includes too many blacks), is to threaten a huge and powerful bureaucracy.
You know, Bill Buckley suggested years ago that given how much money is wasted by the Dept of HHS and its State and County level counterparts, it would be better to locate the poor, and mail directly to them a check equal to, or even greater than the amount money and benefits they currently receive.
What’s wrong with median wages? With average wages, middle class stagnation would be masked by upper class growth, which is what I think is the problem with the Bush economy. Median wages reduces that effect by focusing on the normal case. No surprise that you’d be out of touch with real America, FD — the economy’s failure to “trickle down” gains to the middle class is a major reason for the GOP’s electoral smackdown last month. Did you just move to this country or something?
I almost responded with a heated emotional response, but I slept on it. I’m not declaring any sort of superiority. Though I will note that Jamaica has structural impediments to being rich the USA doesn’t have, but has an outsized cultural influence for such a small country.
That said, there is a notable difference between black Americans and carribean-Americans on the way forward. There is a repeated need to blame racism as the retarding factor in society, where others are willing to accept that racism exists but refuse to allow it to hold them back.
I can’t believe Oliver spit out the same racist drivl that a Klansman would.
“Oh you lazy negroes act like your ancestors were brought here in chains and you were effectively cut out of the political process and the Great American Dream until as recently as the 1960s! What? It’s not like you’ve been institutionally been discriminated against since you’ve been brought here or anything! Hell, noone’s lynching you and fire-bombing your churches (anymore….for the most part). It’s not like police officer beat you and shoot you while unarmed with any sort of regularity!Everything’s equal! PULL YOURSELF UP you whiny children!”
My lord…
“family of Jamaicans like MYSELF.”
Sorry, the third person reflexive pronoun is not needed here. A simple “me” would be sufficient. Otherwise it sounds pompous, much of an asshole.
“That said, there is a notable difference between black Americans and carribean-Americans on the way forward. There is a repeated need to blame racism as the retarding factor in society, where others are willing to accept that racism exists but refuse to allow it to hold them back.”
You didn’t make this argument before and there’s STIL an air of superiority and damned ignorant generalization in your tone. You’re no different from any white person that watches a rap video and believes that’s how ALL Afro-Americans are because that’s all the media shows.
You really need some introspection. Humans tend to focus on the negative side of anything, but this image of the whiny, lazy, shiftless negro is the exact meme the racist right-wing uses to recruit and enflame their masses. To hear it coming from the mouth of a black man (with no sense of sympathy and even less idea of a rememdy) is shocking to say the least.
Dr. D A-G or whatever:
Your haughtiness is amazing. Apparently, DOCTOR, of what I would like to know, have you read any history books. By trying to change the subject of my rant to make it seem I was referring to all African-Americans as poor is insulting if not laughable! The water hoses, lynchings and jim crow I was referring to are what happened to black folk who forgot who they were, and the system that most of us lived under for decades which did not allow us to fulfill dreams of higher education, etc. Yet in spite of these hurdles
they were able to moderately suceed, thus not all of us are poor. But you being a DOCTOR should already know this.
Mr. Willis’ statement is still incredulous considering that while he is over here telling us to pull ourselves up by the bootstraps, the countrymen he left behind are living in staggering poverty and with crime rates that are out of this world. Those glossy commercials of Jamaican’s skipping happily and merrily down the beach is pure hype! So I would suggest to Mr. Willis that he get on a plane, post haste, and go over there and tell his fellow Jamaicans to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, or they could do what he and his family did and LEAVE AND COME TO ANOTHER COUNTRY AND TELL US HOW TO LIVE! Go figure that Dr. whatever.
I will simply jump in and say that, speaking as a white southerner, the racists I have known have not been supremicists or dramatically hateful, but are more of the “let’s everybody just keep to their own kind” variety. And those folks are real, real big on the whole “black people need to quit whining and asking for handouts” view of the world. Not that I’m calling Oliver a racist. And hell, Bill Cosby’s said similar things. I’m just saying that those statements, in my experience, are usually harbingers of worse views to come, especially when expressed by drunken white Birminhamians.
Peg, I don’t know what you’re responding to. Until my last post, which came after yours, I was only talking about Obama’s prospects in light of the war and the economy, and replying to a Malkinbot named fd10801, not SqaurePeg. Who do you mean to address?
I should add: luckily, Oliver is not a white Birminghamian. Though I imagine he might get drunk from time to time.
And thank you, I think my haughtiness is amazing, too.
My apologies. That rant should have been directed at both Oliver Willis and JWG.
Please forgive me, but it irritates me to know in when these self-righteous, all-knowing, people from other countries have the audacity to come and critize black americans without knowing our full history.
Mr. Willis,
If you haven’t notice. Since being brought to this country and in spite of all attempts, racism has not held all of us down. If it had YOU and your family would not be here. Remember if you will, those thousands of BLACK folks marching in streets for their rights, that you also enjoy.
Culturally, Jamaica dosen’t have a thing on African-Americans. We are as proud of the accomplishments we have achieved in this country and apparently you are of your ancestors from your “homeland.”
Oh, Baby the ignunce be seethin’ up in here.
My experience with Jamaicans is that a person who is able to leave there and breaking the consciousness of being culturally thwarted, will rise as far as talents and disposition will allow. The same goes for any individual who leaves the cultural nest and is able to compete in the wide world.
Obama’s father was just another of those individuals who left his natal culture and grew in a much more diverse culture with out all the ties that usually weigh down and inhibit development. His son, Barak, had a much different starting point. He was already ahead of the curve in fearlessness and cultural impediments. He is no different than any other American whose ancestors were not born here. He is a product of being born in a different consciousness and of fearless parents who did not recognize melanistic limitations.
The challenge for “real Americans” is that the construct of color and limitation is the most powerful limiting factor in our “national consciousness.” I had to spend some time in hospital and rehab several years ago. I was a mere child compared to the greater population of aged individuals who were around me. The principal care givers in rehab were people of color. The LPNs and the aides and techs were very competent individuals of every shade of Sub-Saharan Africa. They were also melanin modified by the experiences of their ancestors at the hands of their Anglo/Brit “overlords” and incidental forebears.
I have been investigating my family from the banks of the Delmarva, Choptank to the valley of the Rolling fork of the Salt. I have dug in the very thorough written history that is available in the various courthouse of the frontier territories through which they passed. In my own relatively blemish free ancestry, there are some surprising spots of color. I have ancestors who were exiles from the British Isles to the low countries of Continental Europe. In their interregnum there they married into families and took to wife some ancestors for me who had expressed genetically through an Moorish tinged Ibero lens that reached my sibling group of two tow heads and a dark eyed, dark haired one. My own daughter expresses those same traits tempered furthered by a matra-lineal line that is much more Mediterranean, North and South coast than mine. She has no real consciousness of that. Her world is one of individual accomplishment and a sense of ambition that is powered by mutual accomplishment with those around her. When I have attempted to bring her into my confidence with my findings, her response is, “Why does that matter?” It just doesn’t matter in her worldview. She does not include anyone in her world who would make melanin or national origin something that matters.
I now have young kin who are throughly of the next of the best generation. They have ancestors who are, Semitic, Persian, Slav, and Indic. The grandparents and the great grand parents were at first incredulous but are now quite accepting and changed.
I am not afflicted in any way by a color bias in my outward appearance. I have that tow head Anglo thing going on. I have problems with those of limited consciousness and those who resort to race as a stumbling block for division.
I would have to suggest that the geniuses here who have chosen to base their worldview in a Liberal/Conservative divide get your facts straight and know of that which you speak. There is nothing conservative about the drivel you post here indicting one color or race over another. It is now way late in the coming effort of scrambling and survival for that to mean anything. If that consciousness stands in the way of my survival, I will make sure to have you shunted aside. Be ye a gun nut or what, bullets and screed will not save you. Your worldview is a sidetrack.
No civilization has survived by being able to hold on to great riches or by being unyielding overlords. That scum is the first to go in perilous times.
You know that Bill Buckley is quite able to say the most fool things that pop into his otherwise capable brain. I suppose that it is also the fault of the greater number of otherwise innocent Iraqis who are dying because they are guilty of remainng in their homes.
My brain dump is over.
Bill Buckley, indeed. Where is his Nobel?
Lantern Bearer
1. I was born in America and have lived here for 98% of my life. So I’m free to tell my fellow Americans how to live.
2. My family lives in both America and Jamaica. (the ones who are here came on an airplane, asshole)
3. I’m not saying anything Bill Cosby hasn’t said. You’ve got your eyes closed if you don’t see a culture that way overvalues the latest sneakers and “bling bling” over getting an education. It’s the fact that so many black Americans got their asses kicked fighting for equal rights that makes the current generation’s squandering of those rights so tragic.
4. Who’s devaluing black America culture relative to Jamaica? Frankly I’m proud to be a member of both cultures.
5. That said, of the poor Caribbean cultures – and they’re all poor – Jamaica is also one of the most thriving. The image of happy go lucky Jamaicans is more true than people think, it’s a cultural thing.
The bottom line is, especially for black people, to sit around and not move forward because of racism is to deny the work ancestors did to get us to this point. There is the capacity to move yourself forward, in spite of it all. Like that noted Jamaican Bob Marley said: “Emancipate yourself from mental slavery, None but ourselves can free our minds”
Black people have not done that.
Largest Black middle class inhistory, right? Most college graduates, greatest reduction in teen births over the last decade, the growth in college graduation comes from the middle and lower economic classes…
All while racism still exists. No one denies that, right? And every anti racist measure that was even suggested was resisted, reduced and ended when it looked like Black folks “had enough”…not when equality was attained, but when “we’ve done enough for them.”
Obviously racism has not stopped Black people’s forward movement. But it’s slowed it considerable. Still does. There is still massive resistance which we overcome…
But you (Oliver!) blame Black people for noticing our backpack weighs 50 lbs when most everyone else’s weighs ten.
Did you pull yourself up by your bootstraps, Oliver?
I doubt it.
You have a megaphone, my friend. Do you really want to be part of the problem?
As long as people won’t acknowledge the problem. The fact that we have a big middle class is proof positive that racism is not the big weight many make it out to be. It’s a horrible horrible thing, and I’m certainly not pretending it doesn’t exist but people who aren’t advancing who use it as the sole reason for them not advancing are full of it.
My mother (and to a lesser extent myself) certainly didn’t get ahead in the world relying on a hand out.
I would simply say that the basic reason new dealy-type liberals advocate socio-racial levelling projects is not out of sentimentality or to give people “hand-outs”; it’s to correct a problem in the society that will ultimately benefit everyone. Having a gigantic group of people in America who experience markedly less social mobility is a problem not just for that group, but for the country as a whole. The fact that you’ve bought into conservative rhetoric of “whining” and “handouts” shows how well their civil rights counter-narrative (and the Southern Strategy) has permeated the national consciousness. Not that there isn’t anyone who actually does want a handout or who is a whiner, simply that that’s a story conservatives tell when they want to block liberal projects.
Sadly, that’s not true. I’ve actually talked, worked, and gone to school with people with the handout mindset. Conservatives take it too far as a way to smite all minorities, but liberals – particularly white liberals – go too far the other way with white guilt and pretend that it doesn’t exist.
Or, that Black folks aren’t as weak as we are made out to be.
Here’s a thought experiment, and I invite your more conservative readers to play.
How do you think Black folks would compare economically to white folks if there had been no racism, ever? Still came in on 1919, first arrivals slaves treated as indentured servants (that’s an historic fact), yet the decision to treat Africans differently was never made?
Think Rosewood. Think Tulsa. Think Allensworth. Think what was done in the middle of Jim Crow…is that obstacle enough for you?
Since racism is an obstacle, seeing it as the deciding factor is just as legitimate as when anti-affirmative action activists complain when diversity is one of thirty or so factors that kept their child out of a competitive university.
Logically, your position is pretty empty. Historically, it’s silly.
And the problem I don’t want you to be part of is the schism between immigrant and native-born Black folks. I’ll argue your other stuff with you all day.
It’s not that I don’t think there are some people with a “handout mentality,” it’s that
a) most importantly: I don’t see any evidence connecting that mentality (which I think exists at every level of society) to relative black underachievement as a group. Is there a study or something?; and
b) that mentality is irrelevant to my wanting the government to work on fixing the relative social immobility of blacks in this country. Even if black people somehow all shared a negative “mentality,” it would still be in the interest of the citizens of the country to fix the problem.
I do not want to live in a country that tolerates having a huge mass of citizens who are socially immobile. This diagnosis has nothing to do with feelings of guilt over racism or slavery; it’s simply about wanting to live in a succesful country or a failed one.
The fact that the GOP flipped conservative whites from Democrats to Republicans with emotional appeals that were quite similar to talk of “handout mentality” and “welfare queens” is a secondary consideration, but I think it’s worth pointing out at least.
P6: Where the heck am I disagreeing with you? Is it possible you’re finding disagreement where there is none?
Not to pile on or belabor the point, but what is a handout, exactly? Is medicaid a handout? Is social security? Conservatives think so, and they think the reason liberals support programs like that is because of our weak, pathetic, guilty liberal ways. But the actual reason for social programs like that is because it would be much more expensive — both to society and to the individual — if poor people were also disease-ridden. It is simply not a sentimental decision, though obviously politicians will play that side up. So why buy into the conservative attack on these programs by using their preferred language of attack?
Seriously, the only reason I’m even talking about this stuff is not because I want an argument with Oliver, it’s because the word HANDOUT is so very, very wrong on so many levels. Once you start open the door to their rhetoric, it brings a lot of other stuff with it.
Oliver, you’re saying there’s a general problem of shiftlessness with Black folks. And you’re promoting incorrect ideas about Black folks, largely because you have NOT had to pull yourself up by your bootstraps.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISSm41HNQFk
There’s not? There’s no problem of black men turning to crime, having too many children out of wedlock, etc.? It’s all sweets and roses? Come on. This is the problem I’m talking about, how can you fix something if people won’t even acknowledge there’s a problem?
Mr.Willis,
Obviously from the comments posted from your readers, you have stepped on their toes, with this age old argument of whether Jamaicans are “better” than native born African Americans. Your attempts to explain your position are historically empty as not every AA has asked for a handout. When you making sweeping generalizations like that, you diminish your argument and yourself. Of course there are any percentage of individuals from any race who will use the system for their advantage, its not a “black thing.” Believe it or not, you and your mother are not the first to not take handouts, there was a long line of self-made AA before you arrived.
To align yourself with Colin Go-Along-Get-Along Powell,as you smuggly and arrogantly remind us lazy AA how both you and he are Jamaican is insulting. If your intent was not to show differences and you are proud of both your cultures, why differentiate yourself by calling yourself a “carribbean american?” Exactly, what is the difference? While explaining that one to me don’t forget to put it to memory when talking to a police officer who in your world is not racist, or that human resources manager who passed you over for job. Write it down, keep it, sir, because you will be using it, IF. Colin Powell is your man, huh, he sat there in front of the world reading what he knew to be lies, but he did it. He kept his mouth shut, month after month, year after year, as soldiers died due in part to his lies. He tried to influence the sociopath who occupies the white house but he wouldn’t listen, and instead of resigning and let the world know what was going on stayed, he was said to be a good soldier, because that’s what good soliders do. After he left office, which he finally admitted to being fired, he NOW wanted to say what his conscious should have led him to say two years earlier, that this war was based on bald-faced lies.
Mr. Powell was whining because he lost his prestigious job, Mr. Willis. Mr. pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps was crying because he had been let go! The next time you refer to one of your superior Jamaicans who came to this country and succeeded to one of the highest offices over all of us lazy AA you should also remember all those young AA lying in their graves, because he cared more about his position than he did about them.
When I first encountered your blog, as with many of the other AA blogs, I was intrigued by the various discussions and arguments made on them by the readers. Never in reading these blogs did I think I would come across one where once again, the arrogance of people who never had to deal with the vestiges of these countries sin who have the audacity this non-argument about his superiority to show its ugly face. I was wrong.
This is my last post to your site. Obviously,as an AA who just dosen’t understand you superior Jamaicans I surely won’t be missed.
Mr.Willis,
Obviously from the comments posted from your readers, you have stepped on their toes, with this age old argument of whether Jamaicans are “better” than native born African Americans. Your attempts to explain your position are historically empty as not every AA has asked for a handout. When you making sweeping generalizations like that, you diminish your argument and yourself. Of course there are any percentage of individuals from any race who will use the system for their advantage, its not a “black thing.” Believe it or not, you and your mother are not the first to not take handouts, there was a long line of self-made AA before you arrived.
To align yourself with Colin Go-Along-Get-Along Powell,as you smuggly and arrogantly remind us lazy AA how both you and he are Jamaican is insulting. If your intent was not to show differences and you are proud of both your cultures, why differentiate yourself by calling yourself a “carribbean american?” Exactly, what is the difference? While explaining that one to me don’t forget to put it to memory when talking to a police officer who in your world is not racist, or that human resources manager who passed you over for job. Write it down, keep it, sir, because you will be using it, IF. Colin Powell is your man, huh, he sat there in front of the world reading what he knew to be lies, but he did it. He kept his mouth shut, month after month, year after year, as soldiers died due in part to his lies. He tried to influence the sociopath who occupies the white house but he wouldn’t listen, and instead of resigning and let the world know what was going on stayed, he was said to be a good soldier, because that’s what good soliders do. After he left office, which he finally admitted to being fired, he NOW wanted to say what his conscious should have led him to say two years earlier, that this war was based on bald-faced lies.
Mr. Powell was whining because he lost his prestigious job, Mr. Willis. Mr. pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps was crying because he had been let go! The next time you refer to one of your superior Jamaicans who came to this country and succeeded to one of the highest offices over all of us lazy AA you should also remember all those young AA lying in their graves, because he cared more about his position than he did about them.
When I first encountered your blog, as with many of the other AA blogs, I was intrigued by the various discussions and arguments made on them by the readers. Never in reading these blogs did I think I would come across one where once again, the arrogance of people who never had to deal with the vestiges of these countries sin who have the audacity this non-argument about his superiority to show its ugly face. I was wrong.
This is my last post to your site. Obviously,as an AA who just dosen’t understand you superior Jamaicans I surely won’t be missed.
God, you’re young…
No. There’s not.
Next…
No more so than Italians that turn to the Mafia. No more so than white executives turn to embezzlement, tax fraud, etc.
Need I go on?
A: that is a national problem, not specific to Black folks.
What you don’t understand is that humans respond in common ways to uncommon circumstances. As white folks fall into the conditions Black folks have lived with for decades, they respond in similar fashion. Crystal meth, increases in out of wedlock births (which is driven by a combination of biology and sociology, by the way), all of that will eventually force you to recognize the truth…that you are drawing conclusions from bad data.
You can’t HELP but be brutally wrong.
Carribean-Americans don’t have the sense of Latinos. Mexicans and Columbians know to make common cause against common obstacles. They hew to their culture without undercutting their allies.
Do you recognize the problem YOU are promoting?
Do people (of any race) just “fall into” a condition of unmarried pregnancy? Or is it due to culture?
How much does the 68% of out-of-wedlock birth rate among African Americans contribute to poverty?
(It’s about 23-24% for non-Hispanic whites).
And is the child of an unwed mother likely to grow up in poverty if there is a constant live in partner or the new mother is older, as the linked article indicates is the demographic for the increase in out-of-wedlock births?
I didn’t realize we were just going to pretend away problems then. This is ridiculous. How can you fix something if you don’t acknowledge it exists. Yes, black Americans are just taking the middle class by storm and the achievement gap has been totally vanquished. Come. On. I’m not playing any superiority game or undercutting anyone. I’m trying to improve something by identifying the problem and solutions.
Where have I done that?
I’m being very specific about the problems your rhetoric presents Oliver.
Where have I pretended anything, presented anything without evidence?
Tell you what. You answer my question and I’ll answer yours.
I don’t duck…but I don’t allow ducking either. And in case you missed the question:
And here’s a clue:
And Oliver:
Fine. Then pay attention when it becomes obvious you’ve been misinformed. That’s the first problem you have to address…GIGO is still a universal rule.
Who knows? Racism existed and still exists to a lesser degree. I suspect it will always exist to some degree. The real question should be, “Why do many blacks succeed while others don’t?” Is there anything that most unsuccessful people could do that would make them more successful? Or are they trapped in their present condition because of horrible things that happened to other people in the past?
Speculate.
Or there’s no conversation for you here.
Would you like me to speculate about what the world would be like if there were unicorns and candy cane trees as well?
No thanks.
There’s not? There’s no problem of black men turning to crime, having too many children out of wedlock, etc.? It’s all sweets and roses? Come on. This is the problem I’m talking about, how can you fix something if people won’t even acknowledge there’s a problem?
I’m finding this whole debate rather fascinating. My family moved to a Chicago suburb when I was in high school. There was/is a substantial “West Indian” population and I saw a lot of things first hand.
1) The school district was in turmoil because the white teachers claimed to have issues/complaints with the “dialect” that many of the kids had in the grammar schools. It was no different than the “black english” debates. Accusations of racism/discrimination were all over the place. Also, there was also a problem with them being in gangs of some sort – which was something that I hadn’t encountered in my quiet little piece of Chi-town. I was scared lots of time because we didn’t live too far from a section of town where they seemed to be cloistered. The guys also had far more aggressive and intimidating approaches to getting the attention of girls so a lot of the black girls would go in the other direction when they saw one of them in the hall if there weren’t a lot of people around.
2) While I am sure that some of the Jamaicans were stellar students, I took almost all honors classes (funny seeing as I was just a lowly REGULAR black chick from the South Side of Chicago) and if I wasn’t the only black person in those classes, the other one or two WEREN’T Jamaican, Haitian or Dominican. The valedictorian was a black girl whose parents had grown up in the same suburb (back when blacks weren’t even allowed to use the school pool).
3) Those folks were NOT free from unwed parentage and definitely not from drugs (let’s not do the stereotypes ’cause I can go there).
4) Of the Jamaican friends that I had in high school, I cannot really name one who went to college like the REGULAR black kids in our class did. I know a couple of the girls got married and my mom sees them from time to time.
Perhaps there needs to be a distinction between which blacks are being discussed here because I’ll just say that if you want to compare Jamaicans to poor, uneducated blacks, you may have something. But then you’d have to compare them to poor anybody. But it’s like I have to tell the white folks who dare to come up to me with this “Jamaicans think so and so about black people,” I come from a legacy of educated folks going back at least three generations so tell me WHICH blacks you are talking about and how many do you really know?
5) Now that I am an adult and have a niece who grew up in the same school system (she’s out high school already), some of these same Jamaicans still live in that town and I cannot say they are doing more or better than anyone else we grew up with. Let’s also say that while many of the men may have been married, most weren’t known for being faithful and free of children from various baby mamas. I know we don’t want to get into the chauvinistic culture of that part of the world. Any number of them have tried to date my sister (20 some odd years later)even though some of them have wives. In fact, the last one that she gave a chance was unceremoniously dumped after previously unmentioned children popped up and, get this, she found out from his ex-wife/baby-mama that his past employment in another state was that of an “enforcer” of sorts … okay HIT MAN! (He was religious, though, so that lured my sister in).
Needless to say, after all of my experiences, I was stunned to later find this view of superiority I’d never actually heard one of them, till now, say that though, like I said, a couple of rednecky white folks tried to taunt me with that. It’s funny to me. Maybe this is generational. This all happened mid-late 70s/early 80s. Perhaps you are talking about the ones from “In Living Color” with all the jobs (which really became a family joke about me because I used have at least two jobs at all times).
I wonder what ever happened to the one who bit a another guy’s nose after jumping him over a seat (his favorite seat I guess) on the empty back of the bus?
I’m definitely not painting all of them with the same brush as seems to be the case when you just say “American blacks.” “I have many friends” now who I’ve found have West Indian heritage and they don’t have a pious attitude. They are working hard to make a living just like most of the plain ole black folks I know – no more, no less.
Letting us all know the odds against Black folks actually getting a level playing field is quite enough, thank you.
Thank you for making OW’s point. The playing field is not level. That is the reality (as opposed to your fairyland question). Are you just going to cry “Not Fair, Not fair” over and over? Do you want a handout to make up for it?
I don’t think anything needs to be added anecdotally to what’s been said about the shortfalls of West Indian cultures. It’s obvious that Jamaica’s a deeply impoverished country which doesn’t even approach the level of its best-performing West Indian neighbors like the Bahamas, Barbados, and Trinidad and Tobago.
I’m just really disappointed to see this ill-considered line about black American pathology echoed at this blog.
I love how this thing becomes free license to beat up on Jamaica, it reminds me of the folks in Florida – mostly black American – who talk about how backwards Jamaicans are and how they’ll do crap work (like my mother did to put food on the table) and then act resentful when the immigrants end up in a higher economic class than them (this also applies to black American attitudes towards Haitian folks).
What I am saying is that among blacks I see a desire to pull one’s self up by any means necessary that the immigrant community embraces much stronger than native black Americans. I saw it in my 90% black high school where almost all of the honors students and those who gave a damn about school were Jamaican, Haitian and African. I saw it in a never-ending tide of black students who thought that reading and learning was stuff only white people should do while they did the best they could to look down their nose at the immigrant folks. I’ve got feet in both worlds, and only one was interested in moving forward.
Now, is this a universal rule? No, in Maryland for instance the black Americans are much more interested in moving up without claiming racism is the answer to every thing. But jump over to DC and it sounds like Florida all over again.
What I’m saying is I want black Americans to ditch this culture because I want us to be better. Yet, at every turn you get the feedback like what’s here – how dare we say we’re better, everything’s just fine, etc. It’s a recipe for an ongoing disaster.
Which black Americans Oliver because you, honestly, could be my child? I grew up (until I was 15) in all black schools and neighborhoods. I was smart. Being dumb or learning disabled got you teased by other black kids. Maybe integration was the worst thing to happen to black folks because I have no concept of what you are talking about. Were you even born when it happened? Yeah, I was born and raised in the North by parents who had parents who weren’t from the deep south. So the worst I was accused of was talking “proper” – ’cause weren’t no white people, that I realized were white, except the nuns at school or where I lived. I cannot speak to the issues of people your age.
Immigrants of color or “different eyes”, were lumped into the same group by the whites I knew until I was well beyond your age. Harry Belafonte, Colin Powell and Sidney Portier aren’t dumping on the blacks who got left in the ghetto after integration and open housing allowed the educated, well off blacks to move where they wanted. AND that is the issue. All blacks aren’t and weren’t always poor and uneducated. But, blacks used to have to all live together regardless. Once things got a little better and blacks weren’t all stuck in “Appalachia,” the distictions started – except whites (and blacks like you – ’cause you know a cop won’t know where your mama is from)still keep lumping everyone together.
Jamaica is no paradise for anyone but visitors. If it were, you wouldn’t be here. Just as I told my Irish ex-friend, why didn’t you (your people) make it there? Aren’t the Irish (particularly Catholics) the “niggers” of Europe? How dare you come here and act superior after so many people of color have died to give you the privilege? How dare you spit on the folks who, for what ever reason, haven’t made it out? I always say that black Americans haven’t “made it” because this is America. They’ve made it “in spite of the fact” that it is America.
Get over yourself. Where did you graduate college? Where is your wife and family to prove that you practice what you preach?
Haven’t asked for anything but recognition of reality.
No, Oliver. I addressed YOUR comments with proof. You replied with nothing but rhetoric.
That’s cool. I’m a Black partisan, you’re a DLC partisan.
First, that’s the American culture you want ditched.
Second, if you want to say that Black people are stronger than white people, that we can equal their results while carrying the greater weight of racism, I can actually get with that. It’s a bit Black Supremacist of you, but I love positive feedback.
Because that’s what it will take to bring Black people to parity while letting white folks hang onto their illusions…a belief that Black people are the chosen. Every oppressed people that eventually overcame had that belief.
So which do you prefer: Black Supremacy, White Supremacy or working toward human rights and a level playing field?
Got nothing to do with Jamaica, son. It’s a straight choice you have to make. Fortunately, you don’t have to do that out loud.
A reality I have repeatedly stated. Yet you can’t get past it, just as OW stated. How in the world have so many black people become successful with this weight of racism? What could the unsuccessful people do to change their position (since crying about it doesn’t help)?
Aside from the bizarre notion that all white people have done so well when we all know they haven’t, I’ll go there with your question
“How in the world have so many black people become successful with this weight of racism? What could the unsuccessful people do to change their position (since crying about it doesn’t help)?”
Answer:
“… you want to say that Black people are stronger than white people, that we can equal their results while carrying the greater weight of racism, I can actually get with that. It’s a bit Black Supremacist of you, but I love positive feedback.
We’re better than you. Our parents taught us we have to be twice as good to get half as much, but we’re so much better than you that we can beat you anyway.
What could the unsuccessful people do to change their position (since crying about it doesn’t help)
That is no joke.
We we also able to force social and governmental change, with the assistance of white folks who knew evil when they saw it. Without that, we’d still be under Jim Crow, just as without government support after WW II, white folks would be wage slaves or robber barons.
We changed the odds, which is what collective action does. We then took advantage of those slightly improved odds. That’s what individuals do.
Act collectively as well as individually. Fight to improve the rules as well as to make the most of them.
Sorry, pasted stuff in the wrong place; please disregard the previous attempt…
We’re better than you. Our parents taught us we have to be twice as good to get half as much, but we’re so much better than you that we can beat you anyway.
That is no joke.
We we also able to force social and governmental change, with the assistance of white folks who knew evil when they saw it. Without that, we’d still be under Jim Crow, just as without government support after WW II, white folks would be wage slaves or robber barons.
We changed the odds, which is what collective action does. We then took advantage of those slightly improved odds. That’s what individual action does.
We did not pretend we are isolated, nor did we pretend we were one entity.
Act collectively as well as individually. Fight to improve the rules as well as to make the most of them.
Just fixing the Italics
Didn’t work
Well, my mother by choice lives in Jamaica still. It’s a paradise to her and a lot of people who would never come to America. That’s their choice. Once again, I never said one country is better than the other. Why is everyone in this thread, smart and dumb alike, responding to things I haven’t said?
I’m a Black partisan, you’re a DLC partisan.
What in God’s name has this got to do with the DLC? Nothing. Nothing at all. I want black people to do better for themselves – why is that even controversial?
that’s the American culture you want ditched
Yes, because it. is. not. working.
Second, if you want to say that Black people are stronger than white people, that we can equal their results while carrying the greater weight of racism, I can actually get with that. It’s a bit Black Supremacist of you, but I love positive feedback.
Yes, black people do have to work twice as hard because of racism, but better that than people not making it and giving up and blaming racism for it.
Which black Americans
Black americans in general, in my personal experience, southern Florida.
I don’t think that NPR essay is saying quite what you think it’s saying.
I’m inclined to believe that this is why I tend to put more stock into the idea of pulling yourself up by bootstraps rather than the “world owes me a living” mindset that I see affecting so many black Americans.
This sounds more like something you’d hear from white folks, especially ones who don’t actually know any black people – or LaShawn Barber or something. I think they, like you, may be confusing people who say “the world owes me a living” with those that are saying “the world at least needs to give me access to a bootstrap”.
Looking for handouts? Sure, maybe you could call it that. The handing out of books in school classes that are newer than 30 or 40 years old, maybe. Or the handing out of school roofs that don’t leak and walls that don’t crumble. Or how about this? Forget honors classes, those are out of reach for right now for some (only because they are not offered), just the handing out of competent, well supported teachers, neighborhood libraries and access to a wider world, even if it’s gained through the 2 (if they are lucky) computers a library might have? Okay, well maybe that’s too much coddling.
Then, there is that handout of access to ever less affordable higher education, where even the community colleges are pricing classes out of reach – at the same time that financial aid is diminishing. Oh gee… can’t fix that, that would definitely be coddling the lazy, shiftless criminal masses, there!
Of course, the handout of affordable housing in decent neighborhoods, that the two jobs one works might actually be able to cover – unthinkable.
No need for you to worry, though… someone’s already been eliminating those handouts very thoroughly.
Given those handouts, American black folk (like yourself) have taken hold and propelled themselves up and out (of the place they are expected to stay in, if not out of the neighborhood). Others, with nary a one of those handouts, have clawed and climbed and, by force of will, brains and luck, taken hold of what was not offered and gotten out anyway.
Then there are those that, when they get to a certain level and don’t have as much need of it anymore, reach that bootstrap back… some to help give others a chance, others to slap the faces of those coming up behind them.
Are there black people who commit crimes? Sure. Go for the bling? You bet. Have kids out of wedlock? Absolutely. Do any of those things necessarily pre-determine their future? Not at all.
In all populations there are chronic screwups, people who’d rather drink or take drugs, or just hang out with friends than do anything else, no matter what is on offer – parasites who take from society and give nothing back. Some of those we call shiftless, lazy, “the world owes me a living” people. Others we call Paris Hilton.
You’ve long said you don’t want to be seen as focusing on race issues. I’m just explaining your lack of interest in researching or verifying reality-based discussion in this particular incidence. Also, you don’t want to be seen as backing down. I understand that…left you room for a graceful exit before. But, c’est la vie…
It’s not. Why do you pretend it is? And why do you continue to avoid substantive discussion in favor of rhetoric?
Let me understand this clearly. It could end the dispute.
You’re saying American culture doesn’t work for Black Americans and Black Americans should abandon it.
Who DOES it work for?
And should we fight to end racism or simply accept the added weight?
Here’s another good question: is racism EVER the determining factor in success?
Last good question this round:
If you think these comments were attacking Jamaica, why do you not think yours are attacking native born Black folks?
You really need to think this through, Oliver.
As I mentioned before and you ignored, not every barrier to black success is related to racism. You don’t want to talk about the things that people can do to help themselves. You just want to blame others. How’s that working out?
And as I said before, some are.
I can deal with the ones that aren’t. Have done so in fact.
Now, why do YOU want to ignore racism? So YOU don’t have to do a damn thing. You’re comfortable and don’t want change.
And blaming people for what they are responsible for works fine, thank you very much. What are you responsible for? Denying the impact of racism, thereby making it impossible to deal with.
(Told you we’re better than you…)
Funny…I thought I had written repeatedly that racism exists and in fact refused to speculate about it not existing. Where did I ever want to ignore it? The whole point of the thread was to not allow racism to be the excuse to be unsuccessful. Obviously, racism doesn’t have to hold anyone in poverty. There are a lot of “isms” as well as other obstacles that make the playing field not level. Refusing to let those obstacles define you does not equate to ignoring them. But obsessing about them does reinforce victimization and holds people back.
It is this kind of misinformation that makes poor people stay poor.
What Paris Hilton does or doesn’t do has no effect on a kid in the inner city. And Ms. Hilton need not be concerned with having an illegitimate child. A 16 year old high school with a child whose father is 18 or 19 without prospects has probably ruined her life, unless she is extremely, extremely lucky.
Of course, she could have an abortion. That’s becoming more and more popular, resembling genocide:
Don’t try to be glib, when a substantial portion of an American ethnic group is rotting at the roots.
Refusing to even discuss it does.
There’s no obsession. There’s merely the recognition that
1- racism is an obstacle
2- people are so comfortable with racism that they don’t even see the possibility of growing beyond it.
Will you even admit racism is an obstacle? Will you even admit that without racism Black people would be your peers or better? No. You refuse to discuss the possibility. You’d rather blame Black peoiple for the decisions white people made about race, racism and how to deal with both.
YOU are too damn comfortable with racism. You don’t even care that it exists. You hide behind it to keep from addressing your own issues. That much is obvious.
All of you…ALL of you…that prefer rhetoric to discussion of FACT…like the FACT that the statistics you rely on are flawed, to the degree that you won’t even try to use them in this discussion…are a MAJOR PART OF THE PROBLEM.
Racism is like pollution. You didn’t started it but your everyday actions grow it. (yes, I stole the line).
The point is, if you insist we can’t take collective action against racism…as white people take collective action against our efforts to eliminate it…as white people reflexively defend any white person caught flagrantly out of pocket…you take half our personal power and ALL our collective power.
You act against Black people in the same way Ronald Reagan acted against unions. You see what came of that.
You say you admit racism exists. Then there will be cases where it is the ONLY reason for problems. There will be cases where it is the deciding factor. If you can’t admit that, you’re a liar or in denial. I lean toward the first.
We’re trying to catch up to white folks.
You don’t think Paris is rotting white folks away?
JWG:
I just realized…you actually think words determine what you are.
No wonder you’re lost.
P6: We should try to solve the problems we can solve. What can I do about the racism of others? Support civil rights legislation? Check
Support equal education?
Support rehabilitative efforts for the poor, the ex-offender, and the recovering substance abuser (many of whom are black)? Check.
What have black people, particularly so – called leadership done about materialism, school phobia, illegitimacy, young blacks in prison?
If you are black, it’s YOUR move…
Don’t try to be glib, when a substantial portion of an American ethnic group is rotting at the roots.
Really now… calm yourself! There is no reason to become hysterical.
We’ve, in the US, survived kidnappings, murders, enslavement, forced breaking up of our families, elmination of our history, torture, forced illiteracy, more murders, our homes, businesses and even small cities stolen right from under us through violence, lynching, Jim Crow in the South and Don’t Wanna Know everywhere else, more murders, “projects”, police brutality and non accountability, sundown laws, being shut out of white affirmative action programs, more forced breaking up of families, impoverished schools, water cannons, dogs, and whatever else you want to add and still gone on to form a middle class, to get educations, to break down barriers… and because some black girls and women are having babies (and/or abortions), and some young guys are operating outside of the law (or rapping, and even having BLING!)… we’re rotting at the roots?
You do realize how utterly absurd that statement is, no? Tell me, though… when has the majority white culture in the US thought that black folks/culture was not rotting… or, actually, rotten at the roots?
There are problems, as I said, at all levels of society, and in all cultures in the US. Pregnant teens come in all colors of the rainbow, as do criminals, as do unwed mothers. Within the same extended families (white, black, latino, so on) there is often a combination of the above.
What I find interesting is that, just on this one site, and in this one thread, you have a fair number of black folks representing various economic and educational levels, from different backgrounds and in different areas of the country, each bringing in parts of their own experiences, adding nuance – and yet there is still the absolute insistence on the parts of some of defining “black culture” by its lowest common denominator.
Why is that, do you think?
Nanette:
How dare you notice that?
fd10801:
I’m going to assume you are honest when you say you support those things.
Now, have you actually followed my discussion here? If you have, you’d have seen I deal in individual AND collective issues. So when you ask
I can only say, “it depends on if you WANT to do anything.”
Because white folks will not take me seriously. But they will take YOU seriously.
YOU can challenge white racism directly.
And you can start by dealing with ACCURATE INFORMATION.
Black Men Imprisonment Data
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/prisons.htm
Black Men in Jail vs. College Myth: (a false claim endorsed by the NAACP)
http://www.globalblacknews.com/Jail.html
AIDS is the leading cause of death for black women 25-44? (and 1397 AIDS deaths from a disease that was contracted 5-10 years ago)
http://webappa.cdc.gov/cgi-bin/broker.exe?_service=v8prod&_server=lscb5500&_port=5081&_sessionid=/NB0ch6HhO1&_program=wisqars.percents10.sas&age1=25&age2=34&agetext=25-34&category=ALL&_debug=0
http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/leadcaus10.html
Can you talk to me about the FACTS on which your views are based? Or are you a Copernican…standing in the center of the universe, all things are only as you see them to be?
Since I have said so repeatedly, I have to assume you’re not reading but rather projecting what you already believe. There’s no point in discussing any further.
You clearly see white people as a collective group working to oppress others, which is a racist belief. I have no further interest in your polluted thoughts.
Wrong again. I see white people as a whole sitting on their asses doing nothing about racism.
I told you that in the very beginning.
TOLD you we’re better than you.
And YOU JWG, are a prime example of people who know there’s racism, know it’s an unfair obstacle, and refuse to even consider doing anything about it.
I’ve been talking TO individuals, ABOUT individuals. You keep talking about ALL Black folks. I bring facts an documentation, you bring noise and rhetoric, as though words define things rather than describing the known and indicating the new.
And you call my position, documented by fact, speaking of individuals…YOU…racist.
I think I’ve decided between your being liar or in denial. Denial is the thing.
Again you’ve demonstrated a failure to read the words I actually used rather than your preconceived notions of what expect to see. Too bad for you.
Not according to the words you actually wrote. Evidentially, you can’t even understand your own words much less mine. You’re blind to your own racism and it pollutes your discussion.
And ignore mine. How’s that explanation about how racism causes 68% of black children to be born outside of marriage? Are you getting any closer to explaining how that incredibly high out-of-wedlock birth rate has nothing to do with poverty?
Oh, I forgot…you can’t see beyond “Not fair, Not fair!” Good luck with that. Maybe it’ll keep you warm at night.
There is no one, simple, answer to all the things that plague blacks. But most white people are sure that racism is just one of them, and not the greatest of them.
If you, as a black person, cannot concede (stipulate to?) that, then there is actually nothing to discuss.
You ask what an individual can do? When I took Criminal Justice and American Politics,we had a Pro v. Con debate on whether or not there was discrimination in the administration of the death penalty. I got the “con” side.
After the debate, I said, “The debate was really unfair. The death penalty gets so much attention that the chance that discrimination enters into it is slim. The question to ask is “If a white guy is walking down the street in the middle of the night, and, across town, a black guy is walking down the street in the middle of the night, who is more likely to get stopped?
End up in the back of a police car? Arrested at the station? End up in Court? Found guilty? Do time?”
“You all know the answer to those questions. Do I have to say it?”
You could have heard a feather hit a pillow in a hurricane.
I think the professor gulped, swallowed, and said,”Let’s take a break.”
Did I mention there were 5 local policemen in the class?
Yes. I did. Because the discussion was about immigrant vs. native born Black folks, and YOU decide to divert the discussion. I told you if you didn’t answer my question (your answer…”Who knows?” was pure avoidance.).
Why should I give half a damn about your concerns when you don’t care about mine?
And I thought you didn’t want any more of my thought?
fd10801:
Black folks have pursued education, land ownership, politics, gone to court, sought legal recourse since the dawn of the nation. We take every appraoch possible.
And what do you do when you’ve beaten all the obstacles that came your way, and only racism is left?
We may have nothing to talk about because it seem you can’t see your requirement has been met.
I listen to silly arguments like “affirmativer action make white people doubt Black people’s capabilities” when the general image of Black people in the American mind is light years ahead of what it was in the 50s’…as a result of the graduates that got a chance due to affirmative action.
IT DENIES PHYSICAL REALITY.
And expect me to stipulate your beliefs about my life.
Nope. Not gonna happen. I can talk to you with your understanding in mind; you’d have to talk to me with my understanding in mind. And if you can’t hold up your end of that, or are not interested in doing so, we have nothing to talk about.
And I’ll just tell my descendants to stay strong until white folks are the minority. Won’t be long.
How dare you notice that?
I know, P6 – rude of me. I realize that for all the narratives these folks have crafted (with much assist from right wing “think tanks) to have resonance and make any sense, we cannot be seen to exist.
To make up for it, and so that no bubbles of complacent and casually racist thought about black folks are burst, I’ll announce here in front of one and all that I am going to tell my ex-husband that he is my babydaddy. Mind you, considering that my baby is 27 (and it’s really about time for her to start lying about her age), and that he was in the delivery room at the time she arrived, it may not come as too much of a shock. Still, I think Springer would be interested.
It hadn’t even occurred to me until reading this thread that I am half a first generation American born black person, my father (and step mother and half brothers and sisters) being Nigerian and living in Nigeria and my mother being American. Surely Mother Africa trumps colonial outpost? I really must find someone to look down on, for some reason or another.
Then again, maybe Oliver and others can come to the realization that just as there are 8 million stories in the city, there are many millions of stories behind all the statistics – and more to them than what is shown on the news or TV shows.
Having a baby without being married is also not an automatic ticket to entrenched poverty… in some Scandinavian countries it’s more the norm than not. Lack of an access to a support system, though – to affordable, qualified child care (which problem also affects people who are married with children), to funds for education, etc… that presents a huge problem. Not being married also doesn’t mean that the fathers are not around, by the way.
Ah, well… why bother.
Who ever said that it was? But if you are going to deny that the chances of living in or near poverty are not dramatically increased when over 68% of an ethnic population is creating babies outside of marriage, then you are living in a dream world.
Paid for by whom?
There’s no crisis with fathers supporting their childen within the black community? I guess the Million Man March movement was just for fun?
Since P6 is unable to explain how racism is responsible for this, maybe you can?
If I cared what your race-baiting butt thought, I could.
Of course you could. I’m confident you can find a way to explain how racism causes just about everything. As I said before…good luck with that.
Nope. Just the things it actually causes.
If you think Black people are reacting in some fundamentally different way you create “solutions” that would not work for ANY humans. You’re like an auto mechanic with no experience beyond repairing lawn mowers.
This is a collective thing, so it shifts the odds.
This is an “ignorance of others” thing, so you CAN’T come up with a correct solution.
This is a “close your mind to alternatives” thing, so when you’re wrong you can’t admit it.
This is a “talk instead of deal in facts” thing, so you don’t realize once your solutions are decoded they are nothing more than deadly insults.
Racism created the situation that developed into the United States of America. Racism is a continuing weight, irrespective of whether we are as individuals capable of overcoming it. Racism causes some burdens to exceed the capability of particular individuals. But as a collective issue you have to correct it on a collective basis.
Who ever said that it was? But if you are going to deny that the chances of living in or near poverty are not dramatically increased when over 68% of an ethnic population is creating babies outside of marriage, then you are living in a dream world.
I think you mean 68% of those within the ethnic group who are having babies. With the ethnic group itself being something like 13 million and the births (married or no) within those millions being something like 570,000 the numbers do make a difference.
I think one place where communication falls down here is on not only what the problem is, but whose problem is it. Me, I think of this as a US cultural problem, not particularly a “black problem”… while teen births have been steadily decreasing (with, apparently, young black girls leading the way) more and more women of all ethnicities are having babies sans marriage vows. Remember these numbers (regardless of ethnicity) also include people who are cohabitating and are not formally married – I’ve read anywhere from 20-40% would be in that group.
Sigh, hit post by accident. I don’t have time now, will finish all this later.
My main point, though, with any of the issues brought up here… the anti-intellectualism brought up by Oliver, teen or adult unmarried births, fathers and their presence or lack of it in the homes, poverty, etc, etc… these are US cultural problems, some of them exacerbated by state and government policies (racist and otherwise) and structural issues within poorer communities, which are for now mostly black, hispanic, asian so on. Schools, services, housing, job training, or even just hope in some areas.
Not any of these things can be effectively solved, in my opinion, by segregating the issues as being ‘black’ problems as opposed to overall community or US problems – again partially due to racism, which also has the affect of making sure poorer whites and others of different ethnicities also suffer the fallout of the policies, if not the diminishing from being the subject of constant studies and reports that emphasize one aspect of things, but not in any sort of context of overall community or national problems.
Bah… it’s entirely possible that the above is presented with less than perfect clarity, but oh well… I’ve gotta run.
“68% of babies born within an ethnic group have unwed mothers” should make the statement more clear and accurate.
As P6 pointed out, the level of poverty dropped dramatically during the Clinton years. What he failed to point out was that teen pregnancy (as you mention) also dropped dramatically during those years. Coincidence?
You may find the following document from the CDC interesting:
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/hus/hus06.pdf
from http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/
No. But do YOU know the connection? Since you brought it up, I hope so.
Question: At what percentage do you declare out of wedlock births to be a problem? 20%? 30%?
As P6 pointed out, the level of poverty dropped dramatically during the Clinton years. What he failed to point out was that teen pregnancy (as you mention) also dropped dramatically during those years. Coincidence?
[....]
No. But do YOU know the connection? Since you brought it up, I hope so.
Which came first, the chicken or the egg, eh?
Just about any reading you do on poverty and teen pregnancy, and birthrates overall will point out that people who live in poverty or at lower income levels are more likely to have children early, and more of them. Doesn’t really matter what their ethnic makeup is. This is one reason people such as Pat Buchanan (and others, in less racist and dramatic fashions) have been bemoaning the “death of the West”. As income and education levels rise, as people gain access to more opportunity and so on, birth rates drop.
Teen birth rates in the US far outpace other Western nations tho, it seems, for other reasons as well. Thankfully, as has been said, those rates are dropping.
Or were. We’ll see what the next surveys show, after the various policies that have been implemented in the past few years start showing their effects.
Black babies are not the cause of poverty (or crime, ala Bill Bennett). Having babies when one is not prepared for them can definitely exacerbate already existing conditions, especially if there are other factors such as lack of support, drug use and so on.
There’s no crisis with fathers supporting their childen within the black community? I guess the Million Man March movement was just for fun?
A good suggested home business by some is tracking down absent fathers that are in arrears in their child support payments. Do the vast majority of fathers who divorce or separate from their partners skip out on their responsibilities? No, I don’t think so… but enough of them do that not only do the courts sometimes take action, but private businesses springing up to cash in on finding them.
I’d venture to speculate that most of those that are hiring these people are not black.
I would not, no, say there is a “crisis” with black men supporting their children. There are definitely some who do not, as there are of all other ethnicities and colors. There are also those who would lay down and die for their babies.
See, the frustration of this conversation is the continued inability to accept that yes, black people really are individuals who are part of the overall society – and that the issues that are of concern (or should be) to the larger society are the same ones that are of concern to various black people and their communities. Really, people of good will and who strive to be anti-racist should put down the right wing propaganda and walk away.
Take any “black problem” and tell me if it is one that is applicable only to black people. Conversely, take any “white” um… tradition or concern, I guess, and tell me if it is only applicable to white people.
The million man march was about a whole host of things, including ourselves taking care of ourselves… was talk of stepping up and making sure you are there for your children part of it? No doubt, but only within a much wider framework. This wiki article can give you a general overview and links to other stuff, should you wish to find out what it was all about.
whoops, didn’t close the link