I am thankful for knowing; Leroy who worked at the Johnston Building 1952 - 2004, Miss Lucy who worked in our home, Billy from the Kinston Country Club and Mister Mosley from the Greenbrier, and so many more. Although many of them are now gone I carry their memory with me and I am reminded of them often.
It was a much gentler time, we all drank out of the same faucet, we ate at the same table we rode in the same golf cart and we had concerns about all of the same issues.
They made me laugh and some made me cry, they made my heart sing with joy and some people would say that was because back then the black man knew his place. Well I don’t agree, I think they were just nicer people, but some time after the civil rights movement black became the culture of anger. And it is as palatable today as it was during the riots of 1967 and 1968; and you can see the anger and hatred everywhere today.
I see it in Curtis James Jackson III aka 50 Cent and in Christopher Brian Bridges aka Ludacris and in Colby Bryant and Bob Johnson and in Oprah Winfrey the scared cow of American pop culture, in Kanye West who demanded stage time to mourn his mother at the Grammys, and I even see the anger in Michelle Obama.
.
It’s the Malcolm X, Spike Lee, Al Sharpton, Louis Farrakhan type of anger. It is the, we are due, and we are owed and we demand to sit at the lunch counter.
It is not “I have a dream”, it is the “I demand your dream” kind of anger. It is the “we demand equality now” and we are going to have it or we are going to bust a cap in your head and steal what we want anger.
In the four decades since the civil rights movement black Americas have gained much but they have lost so much more. I have a dream became a vivid nightmare as Dr. King’s dream was lost in a sea of anger and the sea of anger is drowning black America.
This anger has scared the landscape and torn the fabric of American life. It is anger about the confederate flag and the Jenna 6 and anger that has now been passed down from one generation to the next and it is anger so deep and thick I can’t explain, except to say that it is the culture of anger that continues to suppress black America.
In the four decades since the civil rights movement black Americas have gained much but they have lost so much more. I have a dream became a vivid nightmare as Dr. King’s dream was lost in a sea of anger and the sea of anger is drowning black America.
This anger has scared the landscape and torn the fabric of American life. It is anger about the confederate flag and the Jenna 6 and anger that has now been passed down from one generation to the next and it is anger so deep and thick I can’t explain, except to say that it is the culture of anger that continues to suppress black America.
3 comments:
Oprah and Michelle? Where are you getting that?
Oprah is mega-famous with white women, and I don't think would be so profoundly beloved among white southern women as she is, if you are correct.
Ask yourself what this quality is that you see, and analyze further. It isn't anger, but might be a certain hauteur you associate with anger in blacks for some reason.
When whites act this way, do you call it anger or snobbery? (they are definitely snobs)
Anger is an emotion that humans often have when they have been hurt or ignored, so knowing what many black human being have been through. It seems that anger is a natural and justified emotion that human being of any color would feel if treated the same way.
In some corners, I guess there's a fear of those "scary angry dirty black people" from some, and there are others who will do what they can the ratchet up that fear to create further discord.
Daisy and Vera, thank you for the insightful comments.
What I see is the Rev Wright way preaching, to the masses.
Having spent a lot of time in places where there is a lack of black anger, Bermuda, and the Bahamas to name two, I'm alwasy perplexed when I see this anger here in the United States.
I have a family member who has always been living on hard times, bad jobs, bad marriage, in debt way over his head and he too is always angry. So maybe is just the way life is, but I sure wish he'd stop blaming me for his troubles.
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