Tough love convo needed for 2018
I want to discuss a serious subject and hope that I don't start a flame war but hope to shake out a little complacency from us. It's time that we have a frank conversation that was needed many years ago.
Please keep in mind that these words are not speaking about members of other ethnic groups that truly hate black people for no obvious reason other than skin color. Also, there are many white people that don't have any issues with black people on any level (even the points made below-they just don't care) just as there are many black people who'll get this and will agree with the points made below.
In case you're wondering if this is all about what other people do or don't like and is yet another 'acclimate ourselves again to what other people are comfortable with'; no, this is not about that. This is about aligning the strata of the black population that needs to get their lives together. I'm talking about aligning this group of black folk to your every day, 'go to work, business owning, care about your child's welfare, want to do good in school' black people.
Below is a list (I'll call it the 'Get your Home in Order' list)of items that black people should address within (again, only the ones truly needing to do this).
The list is derived from many years of observations and talking to mostly black people and others from a few other ethnic groups and is not a scientific survey by any means. The listed items are in no order of importance. Here goes:
1. Teach our children to be respectful and be aware of behavior that can be misconstrued as aggressive. This was a tough one, because in many instances (if not most, black boys are labeled as aggressive when in fact they're not aggressive at all. It's weird how whites and blacks have lived, worked and played close to each other for a long time, but we are still thousands of miles away when it comes to actually knowing each other. We are fed news stories that inaccurately reflects TRUE cultural group reality and in turn some of us act out based on this 'media feeding' or think in those biased terms.
2. Put more energy into our children's education. This is a no-brainer. The world is cruel enough place without a college degree, but it's downright hell without a high school diploma. It's also time to destroy that several decades old demon that whispers into some of our kids ears that being smart or excelling in school is NOT cool. Realize that the school is NOT the only teacher for your children. We should integrate learning into our everyday family environment. This would create a 'love to learn for the sake of it' mental environment in the child.
3. Cut the grass, keep up the neighborhoods. Be proud of your home. When you're proud, it's hard to let the lawn grow up to the roof of your home. This is also about being considerate to your neighbors. There are many that do an awesome job of keeping the homestead looking nice.
4. Stop being so sensitive about everything. Racism is alive and well. Gender-based inequality is alive and well. Criminal-ism is definitely alive and well. The reality is the non-black person that dared to speak out about something that he or she doesn't like is most likely expressing what others (including many blacks) don't like.
It's a tough love assessment that is expressed by someone who you think shouldn't say it, but has the balls to say it when the people that look the most like you won't say it. I suspect that many non-blacks that don't truly hate us don't want to live or heavily socialize around us simply because they, like most other ethnic groups; feel the most comfortable when around others that are culturally similar and who look similar.
5. Get a job. While this is not only a black problem as there are many others that don't want to work. This gets a mention because, again, I am speaking from my experience with us black people. When we don't like to work, we are broke and are a burden to many productive people such as family and friends. This is unnecessary reliance when we are physically able to work. This only creates a below mediocre standard of being. It shouldn't be about only wanting to survive, we should want to rise economically as high as we can. Destroy the 'get over' mentality.
6. Men, respect our women. Stop calling them b*****s and h**s and any other name that is derogatory. I find it amazing that white rockers don't diss their women the way some rap and R & B artists do black women. Some people will say that it's because you're dealing with young men. Yeah right. I'm sure young white men musicians 'feel some kind of way' or say derogatory things about their women, they just don't do it as a default in their music and definitely not so publicly.
Black people will get angry when white men say derogatory things about black women in the public realm, but this is made more possible because it's allowed in the black community on a wholesale level. Also, stop supporting music (no matter how good it sounds) that objectify and disrespects women. It has to start somewhere.
We must evolve beyond the bubblegum R & B and rap that has metastasized on black radio. It's funny how we're doing music that's 'composed' on machines without a full array of instruments, but more white people are creating soul music, all with a full array of instruments. What happened here?
7. Stop embracing the thug life. All black men are not thugs. Not all white men are serial killers. I find too many of our young dudes embracing thuggish behavior (especially suburban kids from good backgrounds). If I was an alien that tuned into the average black radio station, I would think that the artists are addressing humans that only love hyper-aggressive behavior towards each other, are violent for the sake of violence towards each other and only makes a living selling drugs.
Every ethnic group sells drugs (white men AND women probably do it more than others), but black people must have a wake-up call: in the United States of America, the criminal justice system will look for you (black man) first. It's designed by people that want you out of their social and economic hairs. Is it a conspiracy, maybe, but I'm not one to go into that because if you truly don't sell drugs or do anything illegal for that matter; you don't go into the criminal justice beast. It's really simple. The victim slant of this doesn't hold much merit.
I'm sure someone will say that this doesn't address more issues or that this can be said about any other ethnic group. I'm not addressing other ethnic groups. I'm black and I've dealt mostly with black and white people. This is our time to work out things. Some may say I'm throwing shade or call me a 'traitor' for daring to speak out what we as an ethnic group need to be mindful of and what we need to do to gain more respect on the world stage.
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