: Eye On Black America: New Book Inspires An Examination Of How To Repair What Is Broken

Part One In A Series

It has been nearly 400 years since the first enslaved Africans sailed the ocean blue, shackled to the belly of slave ships – their fates handed to the highest bidder.
The physical restraints have been off for a mere 144 years, but overall, blacks still lag behind their white counterparts in status and privilege, and there are few answers as to why.
How much do failing families, a neglected education system, judicial inequities, warped values or institutional racism hold back black Americans, and are they still fighting against the shackles of slavery?
A new book by Bill Cosby and Alvin Poussaint, Come on People: On the Path from Victims to Victors, seeks to address the problems that cause this imbalance and offer some solutions on how to fix it.
Poussaint is Director of the Media Center of the Judge Baker Children’s Center in Boston. He is also a Professor of Psychiatry and Faculty Associate Dean for Student Affairs at Harvard Medical School. He is author of Why Blacks Kill Blacks; co-author, with James Comer, of Raising Black Children; and co-author, with Amy Alexander, of Lay My Burden Down.
Cosby, who is best known as an entertainer, holds a doctorate in Education and has published several books regarding parenting and family life.
The questions raised in their book will be the focal point an ongoing series that will be detailed in the Queens Tribune and our sister paper the PRESS of Southeast Queens in coming weeks.

Problems At Home
As little as two generations ago, the family structure in black America was a powerful entity. Children would emerge into the world and face whatever atrocities were thrown their way, but most would come home to an unwavering family. That can no longer be said. Overwhelmingly, black children are born to single parent households.
According to “Come on People: On the Path from Victims to Victors,” five out of every six black children came from a two-parent household in 1950. In the 57 years since, the numbers have drastically fallen.
“We deceive ourselves if we deny that there is a crisis among black families,” Come on People states. “Roughly 70 percent of black babies are born each year to single mothers.”
In a special interview for this series, Poussaint said the rise in single-parent household has to do with the fact that the “stigma of having children out of wedlock has all, but disappeared.”
He said the number of woman-headed households comes not only from teenage mothers, but also mature and educated women who make the same choices.
“Many of the black females that used to get married when they became pregnant are no longer doing so,” Come on People states. “Some black women simply don’t want to marry the fathers of their babies because these men are unemployed and unemployable.”
Councilman Tom White (D-South Ozone Park) has a different opinion. He said he doesn’t see a significant rise in single-parent households. According to White, single-parent households seem more apparent because people are unable to rely on their extended family as in the past.

Revolving Door Of Justice
Regardless of family structure, many black children are born at a disadvantage. Their support system is spineless, which makes them more susceptible to fall prey to the ills of the streets. The streets are greedily and selfishly wreaking havoc on the young minds being discarded by a poor education system and being welcomed by the penitentiary.
“A lot of it is due to black males feeling like they have less viable options,” Councilman Leroy Comrie (D-St. Albans) said.
The dropout rate and number of black males populating the prison system is growing at an alarming rate.
“By the time they reach their mid-30s, six out of 10 black high school dropouts have spent time in prison,” Come on People states. The book adds that black people make up 12 percent of the American population but make up almost half of those incarcerated. About 50 years ago, the number of blacks in prison was fewer than 100,000. Now, that number is closing in on almost 1 million.
“This is devastating communities,” Poussaint said, noting 700,000 convicts are recycled back into communities every year. “They come out much more hardened.”
A community with these statistics coupled with a less than perfect educational system is bound for failure.

Educational Failures
“The worst schools in the community are in the neighborhoods where people are poor,” Come on People states. “Poor students do not have equal educational opportunities, and there is blame enough to go around – schools, parents, and the entire community.”
Comrie said the educational gap is worse than it was 30 years ago.
“There are much more excuses,” Comrie said. “People say children are unreachable. There are a lot of foolish excuses.”
Adjunct professor and director of the Men’s Center at York College Jonathan Quash said to avoid the dropout rates children should be encouraged to have an idea of who or what they would like to be from an early age.
“Children should have an idea and a focus for future plans as early as the third or fourth grade,” Quash said. “Whether you have one parent no parent…give yourself no excuses.”
He said it is easy for children to go astray when the results of street life are compared to the tradition of hard work.
“This world of fast money, fast times, fast life, which is temporary, seems to be winning most generations over, but that life only leads to the penal system,” Quash said. “The battle between the streets and the real world is a hard fought battle. The temptation is so great to make fast money.”

Black American Idol
Poussaint said there was a cultural change when values became skewed. There was a transition to black consciousness and militancy 35 years ago, and a result of that era was born the hip-hop band NWA – Niggaz With Attitude. Their music was “edgy and degrading,” Poussaint said.
“They flip flopped our cultural values to make the abnormal, normal,” he said, which led to the rise of gangsta rap, which produced “more and more profane over sexualized, self degrading, music.”
“Young people are imitating that and they think it is going to give them status in the community,” Poussaint said. “We let gangsta rap set the standards.”
The degrading lyrics don’t stop at calling women “bitches and ho’s,” but extends to use of “niggas,” which some people contend puts a positive spin on the offensive “nigger.”
“I think there is a general consensus from my experience and discussions there is no positive in it and we should not embrace it in any respect,” Quash said. “I think the problem is younger generations aren’t sensitive to their history and therefore, unless they become aware of and become sensitive to their history, they sort of do things that fly in the face of that history.”

A History Of Racism
The history of blacks in this country has a long and checkered past. From the moment of their arrival in this country as slaves they faced degradation, denigration and deprivation. A country rife with racism is still what many blacks call home.
“Institutional racism has not changed,” White said. “Racism is alive and well.”
Quash and White both pointed to the rash of racist symbols – the nooses and swastikas being used to intimidate at religious and educational institutions in recent weeks.
“It’s like the KKK had a meeting and said let’s get these guys, it is our time to shine,” Quash said.
Poussaint said although there is systemic racism in this country with disproportionate arrests and punishment of blacks, “you can’t wallow in it. This is the history in this country.”
He said it was time to rise above it. To stop playing the role of victim and become the victor.
“Our ancestors, to their credit, did not accept victimhood,” Come on People states. “They fought back as individuals and as people. This tenacious drive to be victorious is a quality that will help us meet the challenges in our communities.”

Hope For The Future
Quash said positive change is already in progress in the Southeast Queens community. In September, York held its second annual Men’s Conference titled, “Disrupting the Pipeline to Prison,” the point of which was to “interrupt or change the mindset of those African American males that have a propensity toward the justice system as opposed to higher education.” York also has a mentoring program and an initiative titled “Black, Brown and College Bound.”
Other groups such as the United Black Men of Queens have adopted Campus Magnet High School and provide a mentoring program, where they mentor male students and offer workshops for the students, which include career placement, resume preparation, interviewing skills. He said religious institutions were getting involved by starting men’s ministries.
Quash said the internal issues facing blacks should be remedied within itself, but external help is warranted. An external ally that could be helpful to the black community is the media
“Highlight the positive,” Quash said. “We are not clowns, we are not buffoons, we are not all dancing monkeys or ball throwing people. We have a story to tell and unfortunately our stories don’t get told as often as it should.”