You sense incorrectly about me being tip-toed around. I just usually reserve pulling out the hard punches for people who appear to be sensible enough to not openly discredit my POV just because. In fact I get the impression that you’re used to being tip toed around a lot, you use rather strong language on your blog, as do I, and generally, as with me, most commenters agree with my POV. But then again, given the nature of the post, often times, I’m the sole person with my opinion.

That being said, I think its a bad argument with bad logic to at all compare other migrants to this country who came to escape their homeland for whatever reason or to “better their own lives.” Fact of the matter is that they came here because they wanted to. No descendant of slaves in this country, which is the vast majority of African Americans has the family story passed down to them about how they came here to start over–in fact, as we all know it was a forced and systematic migration.

I’m not at all against the whole personal responsibility schtick, but I think its irresponsible to preach personal responsibility and at the same time ignore the fact that the playing field isn’t level. I think many have gotten to a point of disillusionment pathologized that if the playing field isn’t even remotely level, what does x, y and z opportunity afford me in the first place. In turn some buy the big cars and place their monies in depreciable assets and still live their mothers, live in girlfriends and are still renters and not homeowners.

Yes, Mr. Roach, I’m aware of all that.

Moreover, I’m aware that much of that has nothing to do with “the white man.”

But then it does.

That’s my personal opinion. Books have been written linking much of black mindsets to the white power structure in this country throughout history which results in said behaviors. I would recommend some books to you, but I’m not sure if you would outright dismiss them or not.

If you’re interested, however, just let me know.

Harold’s was not mocking black people. It was mocking Obama’s faux working class summit “over a beer,” as if a cop doing his job is no different than a family squabble.

The government can’t level the playing field and, even if it does, it takes internal discipline and a culture of savings and deferred gratification to create wealth. Don’t you notice all the Asians making it in this country? They’re not all of the manor born. They work hard, work long hours, do their homework, save, don’t buy rims on credit, and focus on things that create and sustain wealth rather than demonstrate the mere appearance of wealth. That was my main point.

PS I get the sense you’re used to being tip-toed around. I don’t do that crap like most deracinated, wimpy, liberal whites. I’m proud of my country, my race, believe in capitalism, believe in America, and refuse to accept this anti-American crap coming from Obama, liberals, and blacks. I have no problem recognizing we have our faults and our sins as a nation and even as a race, but so do blacks, and so long as this “national dialogue” is one-sided, count me out. My people paid at the office, and that office was places like Gettysberg and Antietem and Florence and Normandy during the LA Riots.

After reading some of your blog posts, its hard to not take the Harrold’s chicken comment NOT as an insult. For future reference, making comments like that without having established a friendly cultural base with another are major turnoffs and will totally discredit anything that you would have constructive to say.

While I agree with what you said as far as creating and sustaining wealth for future generations, its hard for me to fully accept that the playing field is level. In one of your posts either you or some commenters said that’s its been 40 years since the playing field has been level, and that’s the average conservative stance, and I have to disagree wholeheartedly.

I could quote a plethora of statistics, but I suspect you would dismiss them as your avaerage race baiting genre along with Jesse and Al Sharpton, so I’ll simply say this: its never what it seems on the surface. The country has never operated in perfect dichotomies where everything can be categorised as this or that. Before you make grand generalizations based on what you see in the news media reports, I would invite you to actually walk in another person’s shoes for a minute, give them the benefit of the doubt and actually try and view the world from their perspective.

Your tortured discussion of this, I think, though is emblematic of a broader cultural problem: too many blacks seek flash and short-term pleasure at the expense of wealth creation, even those making money. It’s either be broke or be flashy. What about be wealthy and restrained. For every flashy rich white person, there is a white guy like Warren Buffet living way below his means to create WEALTH.

Now, look, if you want a Charger, go for it. It’s a free country. If you can afford it, that’s great. It is indeed a bad ass car. But everything has tradeoffs. It’s a depreciating asset. That’s money not in your 401K. That’s not a downpayment on a house. That’s not money in a CD. That’s money not paying down student loan debt and credit card debt and all the other stupid things we accrue in our 20s. I know. I did all that stupid shit too, but I learned.

Look at the Obamas. Until his second book, they were living large, in debt, and had almost no savings. Michelle says so herself. They made over $200K combined a year. It’s a joke. It’s a really bad cultural trait–and it’s not just black but a broader American one–and it leads to long-term problems. It has nothing to do with racism, nor do its consequences. But it’s something to think about.

This whole “authenticity is the street” bullshit is a major ass problem. Just do your thing. Remember that street cred won’t pay for your retirement. And after you weigh the pros and cons, just be yourself and fuck everybody else.

I think you are sadly myopic and see things a bit too narrowly, and I think your comment is exhibit A of that fact. Before you pass judgment I would encourage you to do a bit more reading past statistics and facts and try and understand realities for many different people. Also, I would encourage you to read more of my posts, I most certainly cannot nor will not be the sum total of one post.

We work at a non-profit in Englewood, with a group of youth and parents who engage in activities that (we believe) keep them mentally and physically enslaved. There are class issues, real and imagined, that we navigate all the time. Sometimes, I admit, I’m judgemental, even as someone who works in an impoverished black neighborhood in an effort to help/give back to my people. But what grounds me, and what I think can ground all uppity black folk, is remembering that we as black people can learn from each other, no matter our financial, educational, or familial status. When we begin to assume that those who don’t share our tax bracket, number or kind of degrees, or other class markers can’t be sources of real knowledge, that’s when we cross the elitist line. No matter how far up on the uppity scale I climb, I will never NOT be a black woman born to another black woman who raised my brother and I by herself. I will never NOT be a person who grew up watching her family members live from paycheck to paycheck. I will never NOT be someone who has family in the HOOD hood. I will never NOT be someone who knows what it’s like to fear the lights, gas or water being cut off b/c her mom’s money just didn’t stretch. So i think its fine for us to want markers that we’ve made it, and fine for us to want to distance ourselves from people that we think don’t value education as a tool. And I guess its also ok to still want hood status though you’re nowhere near hood, b/c I think that’s Uppity Negro’s way of saying he wants to stay connected to those that still suffer injustices that some of us have the luxury of “classing” ourselves out of. We just have to remember that we are still, as a people, interconnected, beyond the class cues that our material possessions give the outside world.

And I’ll probably never be elitist, b/c there is nothing more humbling than trying to repair an old home as you live on a non-profit salary. You can’t be snobby when your basement steps are disintegrating!

Its about as circular as my post is, lol.

@socialite

therein lies the problem with being apologist in my approach. My point of making this blog was to not be apologetic in my opinion. this is the first time ever I’ve not just put my foot down and took a stand.

Personally, the only reason I’m so apologetic in my approach is that I really don’t want to alienate myself on the basis of being scholarly.

I think that when you or your family have worked hard to have better education, opportunities, and experiences, then you should be able to put it to use. You should not have to worry about being labled “acting white”, or a sell out.

The problem would come when successful Blacks begin to look down on others. When they forget to reach back and lift others up to their level. We cannot simply make it to the top, and leave others at the bottom to try to reach.