Crisis: The Current State of Black America in One Word

As I sit here and grapple with determining the next move for the Odyssey Project and the Black Community Empowerment Initiative, I am forced to face an inescapable truth as it pertains to the current state of Black America. To sum things up in one word, black America is in “crisis.” We are suffering from an “identity crisis.” We are perpetually embedded in an economic “crisis.” The massive level of fratricide confirms that we are being consumed by a social and cultural crisis. Actually, every aspect of the black existence in currently in some stage of crisis, and the lack of focus and unity within the black collective would suggest that we are not close to even developing a strategy or agenda that can serve as the blueprint for us to conquer our current state of crisis. “Crisis: The Current State of Black America in One Word” is my expression of the need of Black America to shift to a more proactive approach to dealing with our problems.

A Microcosm of a Much Greater Issue

Being more than half way through 2015 and anatomizing the multitudinous indicators of our current crisis from 2014 alone, is cause for alarm. The complex dynamic at play must be engaged at some point, and it must be engaged beyond our common exercise in futility. This crisis is not something that we can march our way out of. It is not something that we can protest our way out of. It is not something that we can beg our way out of. This crisis requires the development of a strategy and the establishment of a lucid agenda.

While people were focusing on incidents in places like Ferguson, Mo, Cleveland, OH and New York City, there was a great level of tumult on a different level, as Black Americans continued to struggle to make progress in the area of education, income and equality, but the gaps that exist in these areas have remained steady. Redistricting has served to further erode the voting potency of blacks across America, further illuminating the need to develop an economic infrastructure that will give us the platform from which we can speak and make our presence felt.

While the senseless killings of unarmed black men by white law enforcement officers intensified in frequency and boldness, the massive level of fratricide in the black community have flown under the radar for the most part, although I would suggest that it is a much more pernicious force that is moving against the very notion of black elevation and empowerment.

Maybe the incidents of 2014 and the first half of 2015 would not constitute and justify the term “crisis,” if not for the greater context from which it must be viewed. However, these recent incidents are merely a microcosm and an isolated portiat of what has been the reality of blacks in America for far too long. While the senseless killing of Tamir Rice, a 12-year-old boy in Cleveland, by white cops that shot him within two seconds of arriving on the scene, is atrocious; it is no more atrocious that the senseless beating and killing of a young 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955 for allegedly whistling at a white woman.

Crisis: The Current State of Black America in One Word

An Immensely Complex Dynamic

While the end of 2014 marked growth in certain areas, such as an increase in the collective buying power of blacks, reaching $1.1 trillion, the perceived advancement was nullified and dulled by the fact that there is no spending agenda in the black collective, meaning that our spending power, and our money has very little influence in the American economy, at least as far as we are concerned. We are still underrepresented, over incarcerated and mistreated.

What makes the struggles of Black America more nebulous and difficult to understand is the perceived success of a select few, especially the existence of an African American president. It is important that blacks understand the dynamic of economic flow and economic opportunity. We must understand that the achievements of a select few in no way supports the erroneous theory that blacks have arrived and escaped the manacles of the multiplicity of race and class driven machinations designed to keep us at bay. As long as the success of blacks remain an anomaly, we must continue to engage our problems.

I guess now would be a good time for the interpolation of a necessary disclaimer. While I spend an exceptional amount of time pointing to the maleficent treatment and conditions of African Americans, it is paramount to also take notice that more energy and effort is spent on providing viable solutions to the enigmatic issues that blacks face in this country. In other words, it immensely important to understand that the problems that I am presenting here are not meant to be used as an excuse for failure. It is important to understand your enemy and their strategic approach to defeating you for the purpose of developing your own strategy for overcoming the attack in order to overtake your enemy. Be certain of this, what I am sharing here is for the purpose of response, revolution and retaliation. I have one goal in mind, and that is to make my people aware of the dichotomous reality in which they exist. We are already in a race war, and we will either win the war or perish as a result of it.

When attempting to index the equity of blacks in America, we are left with a hollowing reality. While there is an illusion of liberation and freedom, we are actually worse off now than at any other point of our existence in this country since we were officially freed.

Indifference and the Lack of Urgency

Unfortunately, gradualism has become a drug that tranquilizes fervor and passion that should be associated with the urgency and intensity of the moment. Far too many blacks who are in a position to make an impact in war-torn communities across America, are far too content with sitting by and hoping that things will self-correct. In places like Chicago and Wilmington, DE, gun play and fratricide has become far too common. Communities in which elderly people who have lived in their homes for decades are being forced to consider relocating. Several months ago, I was approached about the possibility of bringing my inner-city program to Wilmington by a person who is extremely passionate about creating change there. Unfortunately, those who are actually in a position to make a difference or either completely overwhelmed by what is taking place, unaware of what needs to be done or in some form of denial concerning the seriousness and urgency of the moment.

Despite the natural proclivity of blacks to sit back and hope that things get better, problems do not self-correct themselves. Problems must be directly engaged with a high level of specificity and purpose. While some headway is being made as far as me becoming an instrument of change in Wilmington and other cities across America, as long as I, and other brothers and sisters like myself, remain an anomaly, we are fighting an uphill battle.

Be the Solution

Until we address the identity crisis that is at the root of the self-hatred and hostility that fuels the violence in inner city neighborhoods, there can be no progress in reducing the violence. Until we equip our youth with a knowledge of self that places an innate value on black lives, black lives will not really matter. Until we help our youth develop a self-image that is connected to their unlimited potential and not an image that is assigned to them through a mass media system that perpetuates an inferiority complex among people of color, we will continue to witness the horror of fratricide in our communities. Before we can make any true progress, we must learn to love ourselves, developing a sense of pride in who we are, where we come from and where we are going. We must deliver a message to every black in America, including those at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder, those incarcerated and those cast off by the elite, that we are a people of power, creativity and resilience.

We must be willing to battle the cognitive dissonance that stands guard over our proclivity to deny the fact that we are our own worst enemy. We must develop a lucid perspicacity of the fact that it is our willful ignorance that leads to our willful compliance to the machinations of a racial caste system that serves as the image of our oppression. The truth is that our oppression is self-imposed through ignorance and the unwillingness to address our own mess.

Crisis: The Current State of Black America in One Word

A Paradigmatic Shift

I have spent years researching and anatomizing the complex dynamic that underwrites our struggles, and while we find ourselves in a very bad situation, we are not yet doomed. In my recent book, “The Mis-education of Black Youth in America,” I go into great detail to reveal the machinations that we are facing, and I also present the solutions for each. In all of the research that it took to write this book with confidence, the one common denominator that was persistently present in every aspect of our struggle was our willful compliance and lack of participation in our own emancipation and empowerment. We fight vigorously to convince those who are in power to offer us some relief. We are quite astute and energetic in presenting our case to be accepted as part of the elite, but we have taken no actions to establish any form of competitive positioning that would make others take us seriously.

While I don’t have the time here to elucidate the current crisis in detail, it is important to understand that while our inner city communities provide the most vivid portrait of our struggle, it is, by no means, confined to the poor communities in our cities. While more blacks are earning college degrees, fewer are finding meaningful employment with those degrees — meaning that many enter corporate America bearing the burden of debt accumulated in the process of obtaining an education that has very little power to help them reduce that debt and build wealth. Because blacks have been conditioned to trust in the academic-corporate dynamic, they struggle to make their own way, and continue to beg for an opportunity instead of creating their own.

It is obvious that I place a significant amount of gravity on education, it is important to understand that the blacks that have built the most, were probably the least educated, and that was the group of slaves that built entire economies immediately after being freed. Assimilation has become more valued than ownership and it is destroying any chance that we have of really achieving liberation and power. We must not over value an academic system that was originally designed to underwrite white corporate America in order to facilitate the stability of the wealthy elite, without enriching the masses. The development of generational wealth does not come through corporate America, unless you are a major shareholder of the corporation.

It is time for us to engage our issues head on, with a mindset to overcome them. We must abandon the need to seek relief from the oppressor. We must forcefully remove the foot of the oppressor from our neck. This is done by holistically educating our youth, developing an economic infrastructure that is founded upon the principle of black group economics, practiced vertically. We must abandon the schismatic behavior that is so common among us, and learn to relate to one another based on our commonality. Our men need to be leaders in the home and community. Our women need to undergird our men and support their efforts. We must dominate business ownership in industries in which we dominate spending.

Finally, we must learn to love ourselves. We must be willing to celebrate our brilliance and seize every opportunity to tell our story our way. It is time to master our moment. It is time to leave behind dwarfed goals and colorless dreams. It is time to refuse to meander through the maze of mediocrity when greatness is so much sweeter. There is no room for those who choose to shrink for the purpose of making others comfortable. Our youth need to see our greatness as much as possible. Their vision of success must be embedded in black imagery, not white façade. ~ Dr. Rick Wallace, Ph.D.

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