Finding Our Egypt
January 31, 2011 5 Comments
Work. Work. And more work. My apologies.
It felt kind of trivial to discuss relationships without acknowledging a full out revolution taking place in Egypt. There are many full comprehensive guides online to understanding the situation, so I won’t insult your ability to google and read it at your leisure. However, I can’t help but be excited to witness, albeit it virtually, my first revolution…at least that I can remember. To see the extreme measures to have a true democracy, jobs, distribution of wealth, and reform that the Egyptians have taken, I can’t help but wonder where was our, the American people’s revolution, let’s say 4 years ago?? I wonder what actions would be taken against peaceful protesters in a 21st century America.
However, on a deeper and more personal level, I wonder where is Black America’s revolution????? Do we have nothing to fight anymore?? Has the Dream been realized?? You don’t have to look at the dismal statistics on education, poverty, incarcerations, income and lack of wealth distribution to see what I see every day in our communities. And while great strides have been made, I wonder at what cost. We have lost our communities, our family structure, our school systems, our businesses, our children, and our collective causes. The scenario worsens when those that are privileged to find or create a way out of these statistics seldom look back or reach out.
There is hope, of course. Every day I am inspired by a young person who sees no limitations to what they can accomplish. My peers that have a heart of service to our communities motivate and challenge me to do more. And then I can’t help but think about Harriet Tubman who kept coming back, risking herself and her freedom all in an effort to free her people. I imagine all of the effort and courage it took only to get to there and the slaves to not know they are slaves. Even worse, those who knew they were slaves but rather be slaves than try freedom. How frustrating is that? And that is where I feel we, Black America, are…still trying to convince the uninformed that there is still a fight that needs to be fought- orderly, non-violently, and tenaciously.
The Mocha Café 
There is no Black America anymore, there are Black Americans, sprinkled around the nation, but not a Black America. We used to feel this way, that we were indeed a separate nation, because we were distinctly treated as such. But now, we have our basic needs and it seems that’s all we need. For hundreds of years, we fought to be free “If we were only free, life would be all better.” Then we got free and it wasn’t all better. Then we wanted rights “If we could only vote and go to the schools we want, life would be all better.” Now, more or less, this is true and its STILL not all better. “Well if we only had a black president, he’d know how to fix things, and it’d be all better.” Well here we are almost a full term through and alas, things are not all better. But our generation is to blame. We got lulled into a sense of entitlement and complacency from a steady dose of group think and social construction that made us believe not that we had achieved the mountain-top in which we had originally set for, but that this new, different mountain was just as good. Mainstream America, The Powers that Be, The Man or whatever you’d like to call it has essentially created a Jim Crow mountain, put us on it and we’re just happy as pigs in slop.
There will likely never be a revolution, just like there will hardly ever be a pack of lions RAISED in captivity that go wild because they simply dont have the mechanism. We’ve lost it and we are raising the next generation to be less equipped to revolt than we were. The revolution won’t be televised cuz it ain’t comin’.
Fantastically,
Mr. Fantastic
I agree, mostly. I don’t believe it is our generation’s fault, the blame is really on our parents’ generations. That generation were the direct beneficiaries of the civil rights movement yet forgot to tell the story to the next generation and in their eyes, based on the comparison of their parents’ struggle, had indeed made it. That generation went from a collective mindset to an individual one- i.e. i discipline my own child and as long as my immediate family is good then I’m good. From there, it has been a downward spiral.
Secondly, if we, people of color, always had that mentality that change will never come we would literally still be enslaved. Someone has to see beyond the present and honestly it only takes a few, to get the buzz going and getting the mindsets to change. Look how quickly information travels on black twitter?? Just imagine it if the conversation was relevant. And that is why I titled the post because Egypt has set the stage on a global level, (well really it started with Tunisia I believe) that there is still power in numbers and honestly it only takes a few to garner millions.
Well now we’re into defining generations. Our parents aren’t that dissimilar in age, if I’m not mistaken, which means they came up IN the civil rights movement, not right after it. Generation wise, we are the first generation after the boomers. Each Gen. is about 25 years. There were our grandparents – early 1920s-1940s, the boomers after WWII Late 1940s-late60sor70s, then us. Gen X. The apathy would have started WITH the generation that made the accomplishments they did, and perhaps morale deflation after Dr. King and Malcolm X, but we’re definitely the gen that took the torch, lit a fire in our fireplace and sat down.
Our generation is the 1st to really see any form of higher level wealth in large quantities. African Americans are defeated by separation of cause. We’re not all fighting for the same things anymore. And we’re also defeated by the notion that there needs to be another Black American struggle. The original struggle was never BLACK America, it was disenfranchised America. It was down-trodden America. It was unspoken-for America. But we’ve moved away from that. Hell. Civil Rights is an White America term made up for HUMAN RIGHTS to keep the other nations from coming over and kickin’ ass like “WE” so often like to do. (see: Iraq)
We started a rally of “Vote or Die” in 2004 and we STILL lost that election, because Bush was protecting rich Black America so they didn’t see the need to vote for somebody who was going to try to help the rest of us. I think it takes more to get us together because it takes more to find commonality. In all great causes, there is a common good that the people are fighting to achieve and I don’t think there’s much that will get our people to find that in our country.
My parents were born at the end of the baby boomers generation so while they were born, they were not old enough to participate or remember life pre-civil/ human rights. They remember more of the transition and were more of the ones that reaped the results of the civil rights act becoming the first or only Black in whatever position. So I reaffirm my point when I say my parents generation dropped the ball. Ask Oprah, she’d tell ya. But thanks for the lesson on generations.
Oh and thanks for your input as always. 🙂