WHO IS OUR “OPEN ENEMY?”

By Talbert W. Swan, II

I recently met with two up and coming African American community leaders concerning an attempt by some to divide their agency and an organization that I represent. At the end of the day, we agreed not to allow scurrilous attempts by misguided individuals to keep our organizations from working together toward the common cause of bettering our community.

During a recent radio broadcast in which I described drive-by shootings on the streets of our city as acts of cowardice and called the young African American men guilty of such acts “punks,” I was chastised by a local minister over the air for labeling “our young men” in such a negative way. The minister went on to say that I should be challenging “our open enemy” and not calling for young men who cause murder and mayhem on our streets to be locked in jail.

The two situations I describe above are classic examples of how African Americans continue to actively play their part in dividing our community with little or no help from “our open enemy.”

Before I continue, let me state for the record that I realize African American people are suffering from the miseries dealt us by those who took us captive hundreds of years ago. I am cognizant of the historical impact of oppression that has us climbing out of an abyss of unquestionable hell that has divided us, kept us ignorant and uneducated, destroyed our will to excel creatively and sustained untold despair and depression among our people. However, some focus must be put on those among us who keep us divided.

The unfortunate reality is that some so-called leaders in our community have done a better job of creating disunity than city hall and the media establishment combined. In attempts to be crowned “the boldest and the blackest” among leaders, some have fed into the very game of divide and conquer that they have repudiated. Leaders who have preached against “the establishment” have actively cast innuendo at other leaders, used the radio airwaves to call elected officials “Uncle Toms” and to castigate the clergy and the Black church. Ironically, while sowing seeds of discord within the African American community, they have reaped huge personal benefits through partnerships with the very “establishment” they have railed against.

The contumelious actions of some have only strengthened my belief that envy, jealousy and competition for the “greatest leader” title may be a far worse enemy to the uprising of our community than any “open enemy.”

It is sad that those in leadership would fall victim to the oldest strategy used on Blacks in America -- the Willie Lynch method of divide and conquer. Nowhere is this anymore evident than in the quest of a few to satisfy their personal need to be perceived as the one Black Leader who can manage, absorb and control the movement of the African American community. It is pathetic to see Black leaders involved in private and public scuffles over ego and unbridled ambition. As Springfield faces a crisis of youth violence, unemployment, financial solvency and public corruption, we cannot afford to have those who should be leading the way causing division among us. n