Posted on 06/10/2003 9:17:17 AM PDT by presidio9
A quiet new war against black Americans is under way.
If you've already concluded from my first sentence that I'm being divisive and racist by suggesting such a thing, congratulations. You're Exhibit 6. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
The beleaguering that black Americans face is quite different from decades past. There is no hostile intent. You'll find no one whose conscious goal is to disempower black Americans.
Rather, the siege is one of effect, manifested by policies not aimed at black people but which disproportionately affect them. It's akin to the modern world's assault on the environment: No one wants to hurt it, but, in the absence of heightened awareness, many of us do.
Exhibit 1: The Jayson Blair affair is the case of a problem individual, period. Yet it quickly morphed into a broadside against affirmative action.
Blair's case is about as relevant to black America collectively as, say, Mike Tyson's or Darryl Strawberry's -- which is to say, roughly, not at all.
It was about The New York Times believing it had a potential superstar, but badly misjudging his suicide-bomber maliciousness. The paper's efforts to help Blair were not unlike the baseball teams that kept giving repeat drug offender Strawberry new chances -- not because of his race but his perceived ability.
The racial aspect of the Blair case, if there is one, is that the prospect of having a budding black star was so enticing that The Times bent too far to accommodate him.
But that isn't affirmative action. Blair didn't appear to be underqualified at all; just the opposite. He seemed to be a skilled writer with an upbeat, charming newsroom presence. He looked to be just what affirmative-action critics say organizations should look for: a qualified candidate who happened to be black.
The Times brass didn't realize how bad Blair's dysfunctions were and got burned. A strange, unique story. But the fallout only smeared black America collectively because so many sledgehammer-wielding pundits made sure it did.
Exhibit 2: Exhibit 1 demonstrates that when a black individual slips up, critics often make it an issue of race. Yet when black Americans try to raise an issue of race, they are denounced as divisive and malignant.
Some prominent black Floridians recently called for a boycott of key state industries to protest the policy denying diplomas to high school seniors who fail the state's new, tougher assessment test, even if they meet every other graduation requirement.
The policy disproportionately impacts black, poor and immigrant students. But advocates of reform are told by critics to stop whining and go tutor some kids. Race issues, it seems, are only legitimate if black people aren't the ones raising them.
Exhibit 3: Florida has the nation's most difficult gauntlet that former felons must run to regain their voting rights. This is a problem for more than 600,000 ex-felons; again, a disproportionate number of them are black. It makes sense to offer the restoration of voting rights as a carrot, urging ex-offenders to stay straight after completing their sentences -- unless one likes the idea of disenfranchising a population for life. Gov. Jeb Bush staunchly opposes the automatic restoration of rights.
Exhibit 4, related to Exhibit 3: Investigative reporter Greg Palast has documented the devastating effect of Florida's computerized purge of 94,000 allegedly ineligible voters prior to the 2000 election.
The purge wrongly deleted thousands of qualified voters whose names resembled those of ex-felons ineligible to vote. The commonality of African-American names helped assure that the wrongly purged voters were disproportionately black.
And now Congress has fashioned a national law following the Florida model.
Exhibit 5: One other ''attack'' on black America bears mentioning -- by Nike. By giving $90 million to a high school kid who has yet to put a ball through an NBA hoop, the athletic shoe company has assured that countless thousands of black kids (and others) will figure dribbling a ball, not studying math or science, is the surest way to riches and glory.
It's still a challenge to be black in America, though now in subtle ways that threaten to limit our options and suppress our voices. But it's almost impossible to say so without drawing canned criticism from people who refuse to listen.
Which, by the way, is Exhibit 6.
You mean like the Democrates pushing a minimum wage law? It impacts blacks far more than whites...
By giving $90 million to a high school kid who has yet to put a ball through an NBA hoop, the athletic shoe company has assured that countless thousands of black kids (and others) will figure dribbling a ball, not studying math or science, is the surest way to riches and glory.
Imagine trying to convince a former slave like Frederick Douglass that this amounts to "racism."
By this author's idiotic rationale, Nike should only give $90 million contracts to white athletes.
VOMIT
I liked the part about the "urging" the criminals not to be criminals...
........yeah, that "urging" always works.....lol
How ironic. Affirmative actions doesn't treat people on individual basis, either.
Commonality??? I don't see it. Let's ask La Queshia and Marquez.
It's still a challenge to be black in America,
...and this is supposed to be unique to black Americans?
Spin. Raines so much as admitted Blair got special treatment because he was black. I'm sick and tired of the press claiming that Blair's actions negatively affected black Americans.
The Times management is what was screwed up by allowing Blair to continue working.
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