Segregated Black History, Segregated Outcomes For Children - While Christians Are Saving The World A Lot Is Changing But Nuthin's Changed

As Black History Month in America draws to a close, the need to restore this nutrition to all humans, remains. If it were possible to remove every trace of Black History, all humans and their footprints would also disappear. As it stands, the degree to which we have attempted such removal is the degree to which we wander aimlessly from a well-marked path and the degree to which children, following in our footsteps, suffer.

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The following article is from "Forty Acres – Power And Justice" (Dated approx. 1983-1985) by Dr. David deBerry

The results of our thoughts confess our religion. - - Usiku

The freedom of our children is dependent upon our political engagement in the struggles for justice. We cannot ignore the world and still retain the ethical credibility of the Christian faith. To be a Christian is to love one's neighbor and that means making a political commitment to make the world a habitable place for one's neighbor. Gustavo Gutierrez said: "To know God is to do justice, is to be in solidarity with the poor person." And it is to be in solidarity with that poor person as he/she actually exists today -- as someone who is oppressed, as a member of an exploited class, ethnic group, culture or nation. This being true, a relationship with the God who has loved me, forces me to divest myself of my possessions. It universalizes my love for others and makes it gratuitous too.

Thus in 1863, [some of] the slaves were made legally free, as individuals, but the real question regarding personal and group power to maintain that freedom was pushed aside. Power at that time for a mainly rural people meant land and tools to work the land. In other words, power meant "forty acres and a mule". But this power was not made available to the former slaves and we see the results today in the pushing of landless farmers off the farms into big cities where they come mainly in search of the power to be free. What they find are only the formalities of unenforced legal freedom.

So we must ask, "What is the nature of the power we seek and need today?" Power today is essentially organizational power. It is not a thing lying about in the streets to be fought over. It is a thing which, in some measure, already belongs to Blacks and which must be developed by them in relationship to the great resources of this nation. Please note Black America, that your country has asked you to fight for opportunity as individuals whereas at a certain point in our history, what we have needed most has been opportunity for the whole group, not just for selected and approved Blacks.

Getting power necessarily involves reconciliation. Both the anguished cry for Black power or freedom and the confused emotional response to it can be understood if the whole controversy is put in the context of American history. We must especially understand the irony involved in American pride regarding their ability to act as individuals on the one hand and their tendency to act as members of ethnic groups on the other hand. In the tension of this part of our history is revealed both the tragedy and the hope of human redemption. No one achieves freedom through a mere moral demand for justice. [My emphasis] Whites knew that those demanding drastic reforms (radicals) could not force them to divest themselves of their own great wealth or even force the transfer of the necessary requisites to obtaining power to the oppressed.

In as much as, the assumption behind choosing the method of moral persuasion was that the oppressor was unaware of the depth of the evil of [human]racism. Also, that if its demonic consequences were revealed and acknowledged, the oppressor would be morally embarrassed and stop being racist.

Unprogrammed radicalization is this: Vincent Harding has correctly analyzed the Black problem and reminds us of how nearly impossible it has been for Afro-American rhetoric to be transformed into racial action. This action reminds us that those who control the systems of American oppression have consistently found ways either to cajole, co-opt, threaten or destroy a frighteningly large portion of those Black leaders who move against the status quo. They remind us that the system itself has managed to absorb just enough changes demanded to assuage the immediate hurts. Perhaps most importantly, they remind us that a rhetoric has not often been turned into action, because rhetoric did not become analysis and analysis did not develop program and program did not lead to insistent careful organizing of our people to effect radical change.

If Blacks, in their pursuit of drastic change had studied history, analyzed the reality of the situation and/or developed teaching and organizing styles of leadership, mistakes and nonachievement in regards to power sought could have been avoided. The same critique that Malcolm X made regarding Whites and their support of Dr. King is applicable here. To state the facts further, any movement of freedom and power that is dependent upon the oppressors support for its survival is doomed to failure.

Change is a force without ability or allegiance that merely follows the intentions of the strongest current. - - Usiku

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