Class, not crass displays of bling bling, is key to raising the status of black Americans. But the means to that end ‑ discipline, studying hard in school, hard work, and perseverance ‑ puts responsibility on individuals, and that's not acceptable to African American organizations, which rely on blaming whitey to get their free ride. But what's good for the whiners is bad for black America.

by Rod Van Mechelen
Copyright © 2002 by Rod Van Mechelen, All Rights Reserved.
May be copied, distributed, or posted on the Internet for non-profit purposes only.
Posted April 22, 2002

Are Black Americans oppressed?

          It is taken as gospel truth that black Americans perform poorly in school because they are oppressed:

Black America is not 'behind' because we are inferior but because we are forced into an inferior education, which maintain its inferior status in this 'democracy.' When the highest court in the land reinforces that status, the results are devastating. If any race of people had experienced the same degradation, oppression, and inferior education as African Americans, a cycle of poverty and crime would encase them all. - An African American Manifesto on Education, Rose Sanders, In Motion Magazine

          There is a growing consensus among educators, however, that class rather than race is the more significant factor, according to Don Nielsen, former vice president of the Seattle School Board:

Statistics tell us that poverty is a much greater determining characteristic in academic achievement...It also happens that in some cases people of color are poor. - Class, not race, a better determinant of where students go, Robert L. Jamieson Jr., Seattle Post-Intelligencer, April 20, 2002

          So, if our public schools focus on integration by class rather than race, they will better serve everybody, blacks included.

With economic integration, (Richard Kahlenberg, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation) says, you also get some racial integration. He adds that mixing students of different income levels improves learning and may be more significant than the gains from integration that are solely based on race. - Class, not race, a better determinant of where students go, Robert L. Jamieson Jr., Seattle Post-Intelligencer, April 20, 2002

Sounds like a good idea.