The Pot Continues to Boil...

Taking up where I left off last week, I finished that column by stating, “Only poor people prey on each other,” which is an inaccurate statement. There have been a number of recent incidents where young men — usually White, more than likely from fairly good, stable homes — have been viciously attacking homeless people in Cleveland. Similar attacks have been occurring with alarming frequency in other parts of the country as well. The increase in these types of incidents should raise just as many red flags as the proliferation of guns and the consequential increase in shootings and other form of violence in minority communities. Clearly, we have a problem.

And the problem is not recent in the making. It’s been predicted since the early 70’s when social scientists, commentators and journalists began loudly clamoring in an attempt to raise awareness about the coming cataclysm. Trouble was, no one was listening.

My good friend Roldo Bartimole, a writer whom I’ve attempted to emulate in my career, was one of those journalists and, while he continually made excellent, well-reasoned and well-documented cases that resonated with readers, few politicians and policy makers paid much attention to the growing problem, nor to his polemics. In 1995 I wrote an essay in which I warned of a coming new breed of “super predator,” the one that is now upon us with a vengeance and in ever-increasing numbers. While we now feign surprise, it’s not like we couldn’t see this coming; we were adequately warned.

But we are expert at ignoring the warning signs of poverty and bad conditions in this country — the continuing lack of universal health care being one glaring example. While you are reading this a child is being born somewhere in Cleveland in reduced circumstances that we as a society will largely ignore and leave to the vicissitudes of ill-rearing and a substandard education ... that is until said child is big and unruly enough to gain our attention by holding a gun in their hand — and perhaps to our heads. And, of course, we will once again feign surprise that the man-child has turned out so badly.

As cruel as it might sound (and I certainly don’t wish violence to befall anyone), if more suburban White boys engage in unprovoked baseball bat attacks upon unsuspecting homeless people the likelihood vastly increases that our culture of mindless violence will be more swiftly addressed. As long as the problem is viewed as one almost exclusively involving inner-city Black youth who are on the wild little attention will be paid and few resources will be devoted to finding real, workable answers.

Mainstream columnists, alarmed by the rising tide of violence, are devoting tons of ink to the situation now putting forth all sorts of agendas — which is a goof thing since the more attention paid the faster solutions will be formulated. However, those of us who have been laboring in this area for years can’t help but notice their “agendas” read more like bromides: Cut teen the teen pregnancy rate; increase high school graduation rates; find living-wage jobs for those who want to work; reduce murders and assaults; stop white flight; create marketing campaigns to make learning fashionable in the hood; find more Black male teachers.

The folks putting these agendas forth seem to have a magnificent grasp of the obvious. Just because these fine, well-meaning writers have finally realized the scope and depth of inner-city problems they should not mistakenly think no one in the Black community has been paying attention or attempting to do something about the situation. Many of us have been working diligently on these seemingly intractable problems — with scant resources and little support — for decades. Excuse me if I come off a tad acerbic, but I deeply resent the insinuation that we Blacks have just been sitting around on our asses doing nothing. That is simply not true

But now we are coming to the hard part: Now that we know the problems, what are the solutions? There are, however, some things to keep in mind when attempting to formulate solutions: One, if you don’t have a firm grasp of real history (not the fairytale one promulgated by those who want their own sanitized version of our racial history to be taken as gospel) you won’t be able to come up with workable solutions because you don’t know where we’ve been; and two, if you don’t know where we’ve been, it’s hard to figure out where we should be going, and three, if we don’t know where we’re going ... any road will get us there.

My point is, unless we face up to certain truths, certain realities about who we are and what kinds of mistakes were made in the past we will remain lost — and so too our causes.

Our ham-handed attempts at social engineering starting in the 60s — as well-meaning as some of them might have been — did little but create a dependent, persistent welfare underclass in America. White guilt, coupled with Blacks with a misguided sense of entitlement got us into this mess, and it’s going to take some honest soul-searching to get us out. We must avoid making the same mistakes all over again. To wit: We now here the cry of “Where are the Black fathers?” Well, government entitlement programs insisted that they leave the domicile if the woman and child were to receive the meager handouts that were being offered up.

Along came the poverty pimps (both Black and White) who quickly assessed the situation and realized that if they were to be successful in solving the problems of the underclass they would soon be out of jobs ... and that wasn’t about to happen. Like so many social service agencies (both governmental and in the private sector) the notion that they are in business to put themselves out of business is non-existent. All too often “mission creep” sets in and instead of solving the problems at hand, more problems are sought out — some would say “created” — for these agencies to solve. It’s called job protection. Poverty in America is big, big business.

However, before we delve too far into the history of where we’ve been, a geography lesson is in order. We need to understand that Ohio is really a Southern state ... it just happens to be physically located North of the Mason-Dixon Line. For the most part, outside of Cuyahoga County, Ohio is as Southern in sensibilities and political outlook as fried green tomatoes, hush-puppies, Confederate flags... and political lynching. To wit: In the last statewide election Democrats swept incumbent Republicans out of office in every race but two: Auditor and Supreme Court Justice... the two in which the candidates (both well-qualified I might add) were African-Americans. Unless a Black candidate is a self-hating Republican who is to the right of Attila the Hun, winning statewide is a virtual impossibility.

And that same exact difficulty extends to the causes of inner-city Blacks. The votes just are not there in the State Legislature in terms of making any changes in the social agenda that will help the Black inner-city condition. And the votes are not there because of White constituencies that are still fighting the Civil War, busing, and housing integration. Talk about White backlash, just take a leisurely drive through Southern Ohio — be sure to stop by Dogpatch — and you’ll see what I’m talking about.

The importance of this is, virtually of the social programs that would have a positive impact on the problems of the inner-city have to begin in the State Legislature (albeit usually with funds from the federal government), and in Ohio we’re talking about a group that won’t even obey the Supreme Court when it comes to equal funding for schools. You’ve heard of the DeRolph decision, haven’t you? If you haven’t, maybe it’s because the mainstream columnists now decrying the outcome of this illegal ignoring of the law by the Legislature have never written about it. Where were they then? You can go to www.ohiohistorycentral.org and read all of the details.

When the feds mandated an “end to welfare as we know it,” they allotted five years to wean people off the government tit, but what did Ohio do? Then Gov. Voinovich — even though the money was coming from the federal government and would not be a drain on the state treasury — mean-spiritedly cut the time down to three years instead, which wrecked unnecessary havoc on so many poor people. Why did he do it? You tell me. And where was the journalistic outrage then?

So, now we want to cut teen pregnancy. How about having real sex education in the schools? Uh, nope, can’t do that, our bible-belt Legislature won’t allow it ... they might lose votes. Raise high school graduation rates? Sorry, in spite of the DeRolph decision the Legislature has steadfastly refused to come up with a new formula to fund schools. Why? It’s that losing votes thing again. Stop predatory lending that destroys inner-city neighborhoods? Well, you see, the vultures posing as bankers have powerful friends in the Legislature that are not about to allow communities to protect citizens from being financially raped.

This time it’s not about losing votes, it’s about gaining political donations. Stop white flight? Cops in Cleveland got their conservative friends in the Legislature to repel home rule... which allows them to ignore residency requirements and abandon the city with impunity. This one is about a bunch of White dudes doing a favor for another bunch of White dudes. In the Black community this is known at the “FBI effect.” You know, Friends, Brothers and In-laws. I will give the Devil his due, White folks do know how to stick together — something we Blacks need to get better at.

My point is, to institute most the changes being put forth by these well-meaning but politically naïve columnists requires systemic changes in how business is done in the State of Ohio. What rankles me is these same commentators are not about to play pin the tail on the donkey and place the blame squarely where it belongs... on racist, reactionary legislators — instead engage in blaming the victims. Why are they so afraid of offending powerful people? Could it be they are trying to keep their jobs? Uh, don’t answer that. Next week we’re going to roll up our sleeves and come up with some real, workable solutions.

Addendum: If Powell Caesar is a “Black leader,” as Regina Brett so casually stated in a column last week, then I’m the Pope. Caesar — while sometimes having something of value to add to the dialogue — is widely despised in the Black community for the mean-spirited way in which he frames his arguments. Widely perceived as a sellout who will say whatever he is being paid to say, his conservative opinions (and personal tastes for that matter) makes him our local version of the handkerchief-headed and self-loathing Clarence Thomas.

Both have made a handsome living over the years telling Whites what they want to hear: That they bear no responsibility for the wretched, squalid and dangerous conditions found in Black communities; it’s all “their” fault (“their” being the Blacks both have so assiduously attempted to distance themselves from) for not simply lifting themselves out of their situation.

But, as Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “It’s cruel to tell a shoeless man to lift himself up by his own bootstraps.” The Black underclass in America is both economically and politically shoeless and some folks — both Black and White — are unwilling or unable to come to grips with the systemic racism that (for centuries now) played the major role in creating those conditions. The past is indeed painful.

From Cool Cleveland contributor Mansfield B. Frazier mansfieldfATgmail.com
(:divend:)