Blacks increasingly less certain about racial progress in America
Associated Press
updated 5:58 p.m. CT, Tues., Nov. 13, 2007
WASHINGTON - Growing numbers of blacks say they’re worse off than five years ago and don’t expect their lives to improve, a study released Tuesday shows. Black pessimism about racial progress in America, according to the study, is the worst it’s been in more than two decades.
The survey by the Pew Research Center, a Washington-based research organization, paints a mixed picture of race relations following Hurricane Katrina and the Jena Six case, in which six black teens were charged with beating a white student at a high school in the town of Jena, La.
It found that just one in five blacks, or 20 percent, said things were better off for blacks compared with five years ago; that is the smallest percentage since 1983, when 20 percent also made that claim. In-between, the percentage of blacks who said things had gotten better had grown, only to drop back to 20 percent.
Another 29 percent of blacks said things had gotten worse as opposed to staying the same, the largest number since 32 percent made that claim in 1990.
In addition, fewer than half of all blacks, or 44 percent, said they expected their prospects to brighten in the future. That’s down from 57 percent in 1986, during the height of the Reagan administration when the Justice Department actively sought to curtail affirmative action in favor of race-neutral policies.
Whites see black gains
Whites have a different view about black progress, according to the survey. Whites were nearly twice as likely as blacks to see black gains in the past five years. A majority of whites polled, or 56 percent, also said they believed prospects for blacks would improve in the future.
“As disturbing as these findings are, in one sense it’s surprising they are not actually worse,” said Wade Henderson, president of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, a coalition of 200 groups including the NAACP and National Urban League. “Most African Americans believe the government response to problems is one of benign neglect rather than forceful action.”
Rest of article is Here.
It's not hard to understand why Black folk would be so pessimistic. I do think Katrina has a lot to do it; it's just something that won't be forgotten by the community. And, it somewhat relates to the Michelle Obama post below.
Posts
2 comments:
I heard Roger Wilkins talking about this on NPR. Perhaps the ONLY "positive" thing is that we are increasingly aiming a microscope at ourselves and own behavior and culture a la Cosby, rather than just focusing on government policys/global corporate manuevers and the vagaries of "the market" and of course on Mr. Charlies bullsh*t.
Rikyrah:
Could you articulate to me why ME a Black man who lives in Atlanta would have my outlook dimmed by what happened in New Orleans?
The Morial Convention Center has a special place for me because the year prior to Katrina the "Cellular Telephone Industry Association" had their national convention there. When my boss at my former company would not pay to fly me down their I drove down there, paying out of my own pocket. My goal was to get into the wireless industry away from traditional wire line communications. This was the trend that I saw.
I ended up reestablishing contacts with several co-workers who transitioned over to my current company and got a new job and a good pay raise.
Had I LISTENED to my former boss.....I would have never gone forward on that one trip.....or on my career pathway.
I can't help but to see the irony that this same building which "launched me" was the key huddling point for despair with so many people. I am NOT blaming them for the events that occurred in that one week span. These days were EVIDENCE of more than 40 years of incompetence by many who knew the danger of living close to 3 powerful waterways but failing to account for the RISKS. During that same trip to N.O. Rikyrah - I thought that my GPS was broken because I saw that so much of the city had a NEGATIVE elevation. I had never seen this before.
I am puzzled as to how I become a more "Conscious Black man" by taking on the burden of the misery that was exposed during that time period INSTEAD of asking the highly aggrieved members of my race to possibly consider how ME, a Black man in kind is "walking through the very same LIONS DEN" but I have not been eaten alive as they claim to have been.
How can two Black people walking in the same container called "America" and yet one is perpetually depressed, using certain tactics that are promised to CHANGE HIS FORTUNES if they STAY UNITED where as the other Black guy (me) having set out to rationalize MY OWN UNDERSTANDING using my GOD GIVEN brain have largely achieved what THESE OTHERS say are ELUSIVE DUE TO NO FAULT OF THEIR OWN?
The past 5 and 10 years have been GREAT, the next 5 look even more promising to me. I plan to MANAGE my way through it, controlling that which I can control and turning the rest over to my God.
When do we begin to ASK THE TOUGH QUESTIONS of ourselves Rikyrah?
Post a Comment