Thank you!!!!! Thank you!!!!!! I was thinking along the same lines as you, especially when I read the comment from “Keke”. You hit the nail on the head and drove it to down deep! I was thinking to comment on her last words but I was just too disgusted to even bother because I too, am so tired of people using racism as an excuse as to why people are in the circumstances that they are in. It is your personal choice that you are where you are and it is your RESPONSIBILITY to improve your circumstances if you are not satisfied with your current reality. Period. Our ancestors, mother and fathers suffered far worse than we will ever have to and do you think they sat at home moaning and groaning about RACISM?! They created better lives for themselves, their children and other people’s children by taking the bull by the horns and doing something with their lives because they had to and they KNEW that they could better, thus they did do better. Some of us want to do STUDIES about how racism impacts the lives of Black people? Please. Go tell that mess to those affected by Hurricane Katrina and see what kind of response they’ll give you.

Thank you for your wise words.

It is my belief that people in this generation have absolutely NO IDEA WHAT REAL RACISM IS. I mean, how many of today’s 20 or even 30 somethings encounter burning black bodies swinging from trees on average of two or three a week? How many restaurants have these same people gone two that had signs posted on the doors that read NO N*GGERS OR DOGS ALLOWED? How many can say they were turned down for work for obvious racial reasons??

Hell, if you want wear that victim badge all your life, crying that RACISM is responsible for everything wrong in your or your fellow brother’s/sister’s life, that is your perogative, but I challenge you to find ways in which true RACISM has had an impact on your everyday life.

Oh, the inner schools systems don’t get the kind of funding that the white suburban schools get? True, but is that a legitimate reason for child XYZ to skip school for the streets? Is that reason enough for child XYZ’s parents to throw up their hands and cry RACISM is keeping their children from getting an education so they can better themselves? If so, then child XYZ and his/her parents better take a long hard look at the education system available to blacks back in the early 1900′s. Does Mary Mcleod Bethune ring a bell for anyone? A poor washer woman with a vision who, despite real RACIST threats from the KKK, established a school for black children during a time when it was damn near impossible.

Now, nobody is saying that black people have to be extraordinary to make it in this world. We can be as underachieving as anyone from any other ethnic group. I am all for being average and getting by. And you sure don’t have to be a model citizen. It still comes down to personal choice and responsibility. But I am here to tell you, in this day and age, RACISM IS AN EXCUSE CHERISHED BY THE WEAK FOR NOT EVEN TRYING!!!

You want to talk RACISM…take a look at what went on in Rawanda, and what is happening over in Darfur at this very moment. You want to be angry and bitter about something, get angry and bitter about how an ENTIRE generation of black people are being wiped out by the RACIST Sudanese government. What is happening over in Darfur, the out of control genocide that is wiping out hundreds of thousands if not millions of men, women and children, is an example of REAL RACISM!

Sudanese soldiers are raping their black victims in order to produce a LIGHTER RACE! This is RACISM!!

I daresay, there are few Western (or anybody) societies where conflict of interest does not exist, where people don’t use skin color, religion, sex, political affiliation, class, or money to promote their own agenda. I mean if you’re gonna holler RACISM all the time, why not include SEXISM, AGEISM and WEIGHTISM, too, as these are also ways people are judged and discriminated by.

I venture to say that the reason we can’t all agree that RACISM is a stumbling block for achievement is because all of us do not allow it to be. I daresay, there are those of us who realize the opportunities we have at hand today far outweigh what our forefathers and mothers had at their disposal. I am grateful to be alive in this day and age and living in America. There is something very sweet about it despite the many imperfections.

You want to stomp out RACISM? First, quit using it as an excuse. The rest will follow.
Peace.

Thank you for being you. I do not agree with one thing that you said. You are NOT poor. On the contrary, you are very rich in spirit. Judging from what you wrote, I’d say that your attitude and outlook on your life is going to get you out of a financially “poor” situation you may find yourself in. I would love to shake all of the “yeah buts” of the world and tell them exactly what you mentioned: that whatever the circumstances we are all ultimately responsible for our own lives and that only WE have the power to improve our lives, NOT the government or whatever or whoever most people love to blame and complain about. Real talk.

If blacks are so concerned with whites “knowing our business”, then why don’t folks grow up and learn how to be productive?

Quit blaming the white man for your refusal to wear a condom, thereby spreading AIDS and making black women the fastest growing group in America to contract the disease.

Stop blaming white folks for your crack habit. Oh, the CIA put it in the neighborhood?? Did they hold a gun to your head and make you smoke it, too? Funny, every time I drive by the Crack Corner 1/2 mile down the street, I don’t see any men in black holding shot guns to the wayward brothas prowling the night like agitated lizards.

Once when my mother’s husband shot up heroin in front of me and tried to get me to use it, I told my mother. Know what she said? In a very hushed voice, she took me the side and said: “He doesn’t know what he’s doing. That’s just the drugs talking. Now don’t tell anybody?” To this day she will deny that ever happened. And to think we have an entire community with that mindset. Boy! I wish I was important enough to be invited to MTP. I’ve got several loads of funk that need to be aired.

I guess I’ve been blessed with a little bit of brain and a great will to survive. Nowadays, I rub the bottle for myself and revel in the genie I have become. I welcome more public commentaries by BC…hang the soiled sheets high on the line and beat them hard, beat them long. As long as he doesn’t offer me any cough medicine, we cool.