|
It’s not hard to defeat racism,
if only you try
E. Ablorh-Odjidja
The George Zimmerman trial has brought racism to the fore. And
again, the cry of racism has seized the front pages. But are
parades and placards the solution?
This is not to move away from compassion for Trayvon Martin and
the fact of the loss of a precious young life. To provide a
better fight against racism, we need to move closer to the
import of the image left in court by Rachel Jeantel, the main
witness for the prosecution and Trayvon’s friend.
Jeantel presence on the witness stand should leave suspicion
about the prosecution’s intent. Was the prosecution’s choice an
intentional profiling to produce an ineffective result? If so,
we have a problem that can manifest itself in many instances.
Years of experience as a black man in America have shaped my
understanding of racism and how it works. Its nature is hard to
uproot and it is systemic. But that does not mean it can’t be
fought against and effectively rendered less potent.
However, are we using the right tool and approach?
I liken racism to a trampoline act. The trampoline, in this
sense, is also the society at large. A bounce is given anytime
you step on it. The bounce the fibers produce induces a bias
that has historically favored racism.
As Blacks, and being part of this society, we form a component
of its fabric. To defeat racism is not to require a modification
of the nature of who we are but how we weave ourselves into this
lager fabric.
There is a need to point out, with this imagery of the
trampoline, how to reduce the effects of racism. The solution is
not to produce the same strands of fibers that generate or favor
the same bias against us. It is to produce safe strands that,
should even neutrality fail, would still produce a lesser bias.
And that approach is by not ignoring the responsibilities within
our own communities.
That brings us to the education of our ‘Jeantels’, long before
they show up in our courtrooms. If needed, bring them in better
educated.
Writing about the impact of Rachel Jeantel in the Zimmerman
trial, Dr. Walter Williams, currently the John M. Olin
Distinguished Professor of Economics at George Mason University,
stated that, “Few Americans, particularly black Americans, have
any idea of the true magnitude of the black education tragedy.”
And that tragedy was created by
the likes of “educators who graduated Jeantel from elementary
and middle school and continued to pass her along in high
school... who will, in June 2014, confer upon her a high-school
diploma.”
A better-educated Jeantel could have been a crucial and more
effective witness in the trial.
The case was decided on the basis of self-defense, a defense
based on the Florida ‘Stand Your Ground’ law. The core of this
law justifies killing, should the defendant have any fear of
losing his life.
Jeantel could have brought to the trial the cultural memory of
fear of whites in the black community and as such in the mindset
of Martin - the lynchings, the Emmett Tills and the like - to
blunt the point of the argument of the defense.
Jeantel” according to Prof. Williams, could not read “a letter
that she allegedly had written to Trayvon Martin's mother... she
doesn't read cursive.”
Prof. Williams continued, “Jeantel is by no means an exception
at her school. … Thirty-nine percent of the students score basic
for reading, and 38 percent score below basic.
“In math, 37 percent score basic, and 50 percent score below
basic. Below basic is the score when a student is unable to
demonstrate even partial mastery of knowledge and skills
fundamental for proficient work at his grade level.”
The tragedy is Jeantel’s school is within a black community.
Some would claim that there are also such schools in poor white
communities. Regardless, to proffer a better approach is to
state unequivocally that Jeantel’s school is our responsibility.
Instead, black political leadership wait only to seize on the
outcome of the bad schools to rail against the system. The issue
of poor community schools is not where you see mostly the
placards. It is when a case like the Zimmerman trial happens
that black leadership political profile and power are raised.
Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton never had a bad day doing that.
Black leaders lead the march in the streets crying “what do we
want?....We want change… What do we need? ... Justice!”
It is time to see these parades as photo ops for power and other
agendas unrelated to upholding the black cause. The parades have
been done and others have hijacked the benefits.
It is time to call for a change, a change that is not propelled
only by marches.
At the NAACP convention, May 17, 2004, commemorating the 50th
anniversary of the Supreme Court’s historic ‘Brown vs. Board of
Education’ verdict, Bill Cosby pointed to the problem and its
solution.
He said “People marched and were hit in the face with rocks to
get an education, and now we've got these knuckleheads walking
around…. Brown or Black education is no longer the white
person’s problem. We have to take the neighborhood back”
Some attacked Cosby for the speech. They even gave him the usual
name – Uncle Tom - for daring to speak that way on the subject.
I agree with Cosby on the subject of education - pushing
responsibility for our community schools as a solution.
If half the effort attributed to the marches were devoted to
supporting community schools, there would have been improvement
in overall community life; school dropouts, poor grades, crime,
and the prison population would be reduced.
More important, the prosecution in Martin’s honor would have had
a better witness in Rachel Jeantel.
E. Ablorh-Odjidja, publisher, www.ghanadot.com, Washington,
DC, July 19, 2013
Permission to publish: Please feel free to publish or reproduce,
with credits, unedited. If posted at a website, email a copy of
the web page to publisher@ghanadot.com . Or don't publish at
all.
|
