A WELL-PLANNED DESIGN, MAYBE?

You know, when you think about it, it does seem that the system is working at cross purposes when it comes to young Black people. The devastation wrought by just the CORI and MCAS is enough to condemn a substantial number to economic limbo. After all, what do we expect will become of the 40% of Black students who are stigmatized by not having a high school diploma. And how do we justify our support for rehabilitation through incarceration against the increasing number of employers who rely on criminal records through CORI to screen out applicants, now that a majority of the incarcerated are minorities. When you add that to the fact that the prolific infusion of guns into the Black community—guns that are maiming, killing and poisoning the environment for our young—are from White owned gun factories, you begin to get a sense of the magnitude of the hypocrisy. And when survival of our community centers—in this case the Dunbar, Martin Luther King and Girls’ Club Family Center—depends upon them shifting to good-paying social service programs and away from weekend, after-school and evening drop-in center activities that had traditionally provided a significant alternative to the streets, you might understand why the streets gobble up so many of our kids. Not to mention the decline in extracurricular school activities that were once considered untouchable when the schools were predominantly White. Sure some predominantly White schools have lost their extracurricular programs, but we need them more. The evidence just keeps adding up. The mainstream press promotes a sanitized Cosby Initiative as the answer for Black youngsters without reminding folks that the local Cosby Initiative is not intended or designed to attack the problems that Cosby highlighted nationally. As well-meaning as they are, the promoters of the initiative wouldn’t get caught day or night in the streets of the “hood,” where the real solutions are and it’s a shame that the mainstream press promotes the impression that the Cosby Initiative is the solution. Try explaining to kids in the “hood” why Black cops, who have less difficulty distinguishing between the good guys and the bad guys, are not assigned a more significant role there and why special funds, including and especially money recovered from drug busts, that have been funneled through the police department and the Sheriff’s Department and the District Attorney’s office, have not been used to hire people like them to help them with their problem neighborhoods. To say that the system is working at cross purposes may be too generous. It is beginning to look like a well-planned design. Thank God for NES, SOURCE and the Reverend Theodore N. Brown Comprehensive Gang Initiative!