This past year has seen a lot of change - good and bad. We had the disastrous effects of September 11th and the bias in most media outlets where it appeared that very few, if any black folks were victimized. (To that end, I have to commend New York Newsday. This paper systematically showed the faces of victims of the World Trade Center attacks - brown, white, female and male). We also saw Ruth Simmons, the first African American president of an ivy league school (Brown) continue to preside over this diverse campus in a state that was home to several corporations that profited handsomely from the African slave trade.
So, where do the collective black communities go from here? Will the schools in many of these neighborhoods continue to be under-funded? Will the incarceration rates of young blacks continue to increase? Is the rate of HIV/AIDS in African American women going to decline? What about jobs? Housing?
The black communities in the United States are at a crisis. While some may want to ignore this, all they have to do is take a walk through any urban community and see the blight. Yes, some of us have made it. Blacks have made strides in education and home ownership, but what about the redlining that goes on in banks that keeps many blacks from purchasing homes in certain neighborhoods - even with good credit.
I am not one to complain. I subscribe to the tenets of working hard, education and personal responsibility. However, we cannot deny discrimination and racism. We can also not deny that the vicious cycle of poor education, poverty and a constant bleak job outlook contributes to people not being able to educate themselves or think critically in times of dire need.
What ever happened to the phrase "each one, teach one?" Where are the African Americans who have made it? I understand getting the hell out of the 'hood when you are financially able to do so, but what about the others that are left behind?
Unfortunately, with forced integration and the desire to become accepted by the "larger society," African American culture has come to mirror the crass materialism of the greater culture. Is taking time out to help another person so bad? Whatever has been said (good or bad) about the black elite or the so called "Talented Tenth," of decades past, history has shown that many of this group, for whatever personal reasons, tried to continue to help "uplift the race." Where is this upliftment now? Blacks may have progressed, but they don't have it that good!
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