Tag: black lives

Do Black Lives Really Matter

Abortion is the number one killer of black lives in America. It has killed more Black lives than AIDS, Cancer, Sexually Transmitted Diseases, and even the entire Vietnam War, but no one speaks out about this. Alcoholism, drug addiction, child abuse, and molestation plague the Black community, but no one speaks out about this. 70% of African American women are single, and 42% have never married. This means 70% of African American women are left alone and unprotected, and 70% of Black children grow up without fathers. Contrary to popular belief, fathers provide more to the household than just money. They provide financial stability, yes, but also protection, leadership, and guidance for our children.

In fact, the state of the black man and woman relationship is worse today than it was over 50 years ago (and even during slavery. We were more communal as a people during slavery than we are today). In the 1960s, 40% of Blacks had their own businesses and 87% of black families were two-parent. Today, less than 7% of blacks own their own business and only 25% of black families are two-parent. But, no one talks about this. However, African Americans have been told over and over again what the problems are so this post is really not about that. This is not just about Slavery, Jim Crow, and Discrimination. This is about the revolution of self.

The African American community is in a state of spiritual crisis. As a community of people, we continue to fight for change that never comes. We continue to vote in an attempt to change our political clout. We continue to march, speak, and debate about the many changes necessary in this world, from education to discrimination and from discrimination to gender equality. But while we seek to change everything around us, we have yet to seek to change ourselves. We know what our problems are, but what we need at this point are solutions. Solutions that are deeper than government-funded organizations, protest marches, and ballot boxes. People cannot change anything around them if they cannot first change what is inside them, no matter their color.

In the words of the African Proverb, “When there is no enemy within, the enemy outside cannot hurt you.” Freedom is deeper than social economics. Freedom is spiritual and spiritual freedom begins inside the individual. To change the way that we live, we must first change the way that we think. Otherwise, if we continue to depend on outside sources to change our current conditions, we will be marching for the next 50 years while our sons’ blood cries out to us from the ground.

Do Not Ask What, Ask Why

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We’ve known “What” since stepping foot off slave ships. We’ve known “What” since the crack of the whip. We’ve known “What” since Lynch mobs and sharecropping. We’ve known “What” since overseers, paddy rollers and colored signs. We’ve known “What” since the back of city buses and Jim Crow. We’ve known “What” since crack, ghettos and foster homes. Indeed, if there is anything black people are familiar with, it is what. The question is therefore not what, the question is why? Why the haunting images of public executions of black men? Why does the protests of Black Lives Matter mirror that of the Civil Rights Movement when we should have moved passed this? How is it that what happened 50 years ago and DIDN’T work, will somehow work today? Have we not marched? Have we not protested? Have we not already sang freedom songs and willingly gone to prison? Why are black people at the bottom of every single ethnic group and society there is? Why have we been here for nearly 400 years and have yet to produce the economic standing of nations who have been here not even half that time? The question is not what, the question is why? Why are things always so black and white? Why is it always black against white?

In the book of Exodus there is a story. This story is about the Israelites. Pharaoh said to kill off the Hebrew boys for fear that the Hebrew population would grow and that they would overrun the Egyptian population (Ex 1:9-16). More so, they will do unto the Egyptians what the Egyptians have done unto them. Fears of uprisings among African Americans can be traced back to the days of Nat Turner. To think this fear has been lost or has gone away is not to have been alive.  You see “Why?” has been around for centuries and on the tongues of every prophet. “Why?” is in the blood of every black man and woman walking this earth today. It is in every breath we take, and every move we make. “Why” is in our very DNA, our living souls breathing proof of the covenant we made so long ago. Do not tell black people that they should not be angry when our sons blood cries out to us from the ground. Instead, ask “Why?” Do not ask What, Ask Why because why is the key to everything. Why is understanding that what is happening out there is bigger than any man. “Why?” is understanding there is a reason black lives do not matter in this land. “Why” is understanding the story of Israel, the covenant they broke, and its connection to the black man and woman in America today. You see, “Why” is the key when you are the people of the book, when the police is Pharaoh, and America is Egypt.