[I don't usually do the whole "forward this post to everybody you know" thing, but this is serious biz. Please take a break from fwd people more Microsoft free money, and Tommy Hilfiger on Oprah email hoaxes, and shoot this one to your mailing list instead. You'll thank me later, and they'll thanl you.]
There are lies, damn lies, and statistics. Sometimes though, the numbers simply tell the truth, and this truth hurts like a mutha'. Read it and weep.
Black Americans accounted for 13 percent of the U.S. population in 2005 but were the victims of about 15 percent of all of the nonfatal violent crime and about 49 percent of all homicides, the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) announced today. Blacks were victims of an estimated 805,000 nonfatal violent crimes (rape, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault and simple assault) and of about 8,000 homicides during 2005.I know I'm usually on joke time, but ain't a damn thang funny here, folks. We're just over 10% of the population, yet nearly half of all murder victims.
This ain't the KKK, this is black men killing other black men. It's an everyday occurrence as common as the sun rising that only really makes the news when it's something particularly heinous. Still, murder is murder. Children, fathers, sons, mothers, aunties, uncles, grandpas, and nephews are killed erryday, and all day. The killings go on, and on, and on, yet there's no moral outrage. No special government program. No march. No boycott. No special episode of 20/20. No commemorative concert. No benefit track on iTunes.
No nothing.
Black people erase each other's lives on the daily, and nobody gives a shit. We just keep leanin', rockin', and pop lock' & droppin'. Oh, and killing more and more of each other.
Somebody please make some sense of this for me.
8,000 black Americans were killed in 2005. Just to put that in perspective, we currently in year 4 of an expensive and seemingly never-ending war in Iraq. 846 American soldiers were killed there in 2005.
800 killed in a war. 8,000 killed at home. A black man is safer in Baghdad than he is in Baltimore.
Chew on that one for a second.
It's very easy to point fingers here at all of the underlying issues that cause black people, especially men, to kill one another at such a prolific clip. If I put one of those Soundbite Olympics panels of black talking heads together, I'm sure the usual explanations like lack of economic opportunities, Willie Lynch, the legacies of slavery, lack of policing, too few recreational opportunities, easy access to guns, poverty, the war on drugs, George Bush, and probably Young Jeezy would all be tossed out there. And that's all well and good.
But at some point, the epidemic has to resonate with people and cause them to rise to action, rather than continue to wallow in excuses and finger pointing.
The gubb'ment sure as hell ain't gon' fix this. So how about doing your part instead of bitchin' and complaining?
Here's how:
Big Brothers Big Sisters of America
100 Black Men of America
America's Promise Alliance
Mentoring.Org
MIMAUE Mentoring Program (for my DC Folks)
Work with a kid. Any kid. If you don't have one, find one. If you've got one, get off the Internet and go work with/talk to/raise/help/pray for him or her.
Whatever you do, don't do nothing. The problem doesn't need to hit home for you to be part of the solution. At least, I pray it doesn't need to.
We really got to do better.
Martin, Malcolm, Sojourner, and every ancestor is crying inside.
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4 AverageComments™:
This is a plead to our african american men.
I think the only way we can truly reach each other IS THAT WE AS BLACK MEN GET FED UP!
We need to look in our own famlies at the black male the least of us and within our Famlies and reach out to them.
I have a twenty five yr old son who I have have lost countless nights of sleep fearing his death.
I refuse to give up on him he's my seed and his life has value.
But he must realize their are rules to life that we all must live by.
I will always try to reach any black man and encourage him that his life has value more than money, drugs, fame,and status we must be purpose driven men for God lookng within ourself for the gifts and talents that was placed in us before we entered our mothers womb God gave great thought in creating every human life there is a purpose and a plan.
Have you sent this post (in the form of an editorial?) to the Washington Post (was it that newspaper that had a year-long series on black men? and every other black newspaper in America?
The Urban League? The Rainbow Coalition? The NAACP? Al Sharpton's group?
Please change the dialogue.
I'll tell you one thing I believe is true: the black community is going to have to bring this to the national stage, because white people can no longer do it. No white person can say that in a public setting without being called a racist, and you can thank the current hypersensitive PC "multicultural" climate for that. The same instinct that led Connie Chung to call Nelson Mandela an "African-American" on national TV simply prevents any non-black speech on the matter.
Those who follow the accepted modes of addressing this (black = victim, white = oppressor) will be lauded even when it's utterly false (e.g. Duke lacrosse team), if they were to simply read this post word-for-word they would be ignored or attacked.
Your spokesmen have taken our voices on the matter... I hope you can find your own.
You are correct Anonymous 9-21-07, we have been cut out of the discussion. This too bad because if blacks comprise 13% of the population then they have to contend with the other 87%. It would be good to work together but between getting blasted for frank talk and fatigue over the apparent lassitude (overall) of the black community, most of us non-African Americans just assume that it is a black-only problem that will be up to them to solve when things get bad enough to spur some action.
The bizarre outrage over the prosecution of 6 thugs who beat up (6 on 1!) a fellow student does not make things look hopeful. Lets just say those six are no Rosa Parks or Little Rock Nine. That's not too say the young man in jail may have been treated harshly, but the question to ask is whether the elements of attempted murder were met. If so, then bad luck for him, i.e. don't beat a man on the ground with 5 of your buddies--people might just think you intended his death.
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