Black Group's Message Should Be Indictable Offense

Tragically, black people continue to revel in being their own worst enemy. A closet Nation of Islam site called the Black Star Project listed “10 Things All Young Black Men Should Know.” The article was preceded with a photo of young Trayvon Martin (i.e., not the thug wannabe) followed by the first thing deemed important for young black men to know.

Now, reasonable minds might think the first thing of importance that (all) young men should know is “to love and worship God, honor their mother and father, be truthful, be honest, be responsible, work hard, realize that America has promised them an opportunity and codified the availability of same,” or some combination thereof. But the operative words I employed were “reasonable minds might think.”

According to them, first in line of importance is for young black men to “Know that you are a young black man in America and that means you are different than other Americans. While you can still realize your dreams, you might have to take a different path. You will have to be more careful, more thoughtful and more aware than others to survive in America.”

This is one of the most egregious and transpicuous examples calling for the rejection of modernity that I have yet to witness. This is the mindset that is inculcated into so many black people which sentences them to a life time of self-indulged inferiority complex, immiseration, and victimology.

This is 2014, for goodness sake. Just what is holding anyone back in America but the federal government and the type of thinking Black Star Project is advocating. Blacks, with unvarnished pride, are quick to point out that they’ve been here over 400 years, and that America was built on their backs as slaves; to the extent that is only partially true (they’ve been here that long, but not all of them arrived as slaves), what the heck have they been doing the last 400-plus years, specifically the last 150 years, since the Emancipation Proclamation? How is it that dirt poor people from dirt poor third-world countries come here and succeed, many times in less than one generation, while blacks are still crying and blaming others for the realities of life that they are taught to blame on whites?

The thinking advocated is self-limiting and self-debilitating. It is precisely the kind of thinking that reduces the chances of success. The inherent message, or more accurately the sensus plenior, of what young blacks are being taught to believe is that white people are out to get them and that America is against them. The problem with that message is it requires blacks to believe that white people tried to prevent Oprah from becoming a billionairess. It requires them to believe that, contrary to all evidence to the contrary, white people are working to hold blacks down. It requires them to believe that Magic Johnson had to overcome overt racism to buy the Los Angeles Dodgers baseball team, to open one of the largest theater chains in the world, and just recently to buy a women’s professional basketball team. It requires young blacks to reject the immeasurable evidences of black success on every level right down to being a postman or laborer as anecdotal.

The 6th point on their list of 10 things all young blacks must know is: “Emulate strong, positive, intelligent black men. Use them as your mentors and role models.”

So, according to their rationale, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Mark Cuban (self-made billionaire owner of the Dallas Mavericks), the late Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Lynn Good (CEO Duke Energy), Sheri McCoy (CEO Avon Products), Meg Whitman (CEO Hewlett-Packard), and literally thousands of other whites with great success stories, should not be emulated. And, without question, Black Star Project would oppose young blacks emulating Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Dr. Thomas Sowell, Alan Keyes, Larry Elder, Booker T. Washington, or Mychal Massie.

They advocate for the lowest common denominator and for emulating those who harbor resentment and view color of skin as sacrosanct above all else. Such is the cosmological world view young blacks are encouraged to embrace.

But the unavoidable truth is that this type of hatred, contempt, and mistrust for the country that has provided not just blacks but all people opportunities beyond their wildest imagination has sadly resulted only in leaving the majority of blacks stuck in the starting gates, blaming others for their failure to launch.

It is not only a tragic commentary but also an unambiguous example of what not to do if one aspires to be successful. The message this group advocates is not one of modernity and success. It is one of fatigue and self-imposed alienation.

The proof of that not being a message of success is obvious for all who will see it and are honest enough to admit it.