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Jewish World Review / July 20, 1998 / 26 Tamuz, 5758
Thomas Sowell
THE NEW YORK TIMES headline said it all: "Eyes Shut, Black America is being ravaged by
AIDS."
Where are all the vocal black "leaders," who are supposedly looking out for their people?
"Leaders" who are ready to go ballistic on nationwide TV if Marge Schott or Fuzzy Zoeller
makes a stupid remark with racial overtones are quiet as mice when AIDS is the leading
killer of blacks in the prime years of ages 25 to 34. According to the New York Times,
neither the NAACP nor the Urban League has AIDS on its agenda for its national
convention this summer.
All this makes sense only if black "leadership" is not about leading black people but
extracting what they can from white people and -- above all -- maintaining themselves in
office or in positions of visibility.
We can understand why the National Education Association would be bitterly opposed to
this and any other voucher legislation that would allow parents to take their children out
of the public schools. We can understand why Bill Clinton opposed and ultimately vetoed
this bill, since the NEA contributes millions to the Democrats.
But it takes a stronger stomach to deal with the fact that a black "leader" organizes a
protest against something whose chief beneficiaries would be black children. What was
there to protest? Nobody was going to drag black kids out of the public schools, kicking
and screaming, and throw them into private schools. It was all up to their parents -- and far
more parents wanted this opportunity than there were scholarships available.
Poll after poll shows blacks more in favor of school vouchers than any other segment of
the population. Yet, time and again, the Congressional Black Caucus opposes vouchers.
Are these "leaders" leading blacks or looking out for their own political hides by lining up
with the NEA?
Maybe this is just part of coalition politics, where the unions throw their support behind
things that the black "leaders" want in exchange for these "leaders" lining up with the
unions on the things that the unions want. Perhaps this all works out for the politicians
and spokesmen involved. But what can the black population as a whole possibly gain that
will compensate for condemning another whole generation of their children to rotten
schools?
What also serves the interests of black "leaders," but not of the black community, is their
paranoid vision of the world, in which all economic or other disparities are grievances --
grievances which can be dealt with only by relying on "leaders" to get goodies for blacks
from the government.
This would be a devastating message, even if it were true. It is a catastrophic lie in the light
of the facts. The sharpest income and occupational rise of blacks occurred in the 1940s
and 1950 -- before there were even "equal opportunity" laws, much less "affirmative
action."
Far worse than the self-serving actions of black politicians is the vision of the world that
they present -- especially to the rising generation of young blacks. It is a vision of a world
in which everything they don't have is the fault of whites. It is a vision of a future in which
their only hope is in changing whites or getting preferences or hand-outs from the
government.
With such a vision, why is it surprising that so many students in ghetto schools across the
country are afflicted with the suicidal notion that trying to get an education is "acting
white"? Many of the very people who promote the liberal vision are themselves appalled at
such self-destructive attitudes among young blacks.
But what other attitude makes sense, if the vision presented is true? By refusing to go
along, young blacks can at least avoid being played for suckers by a system where the deck
is supposedly stacked against them anyway. If a mind is a terrible thing to waste, such a
vision is a terrible thing to
Where is black 'leadership' leading?
One of the truly grotesque acts of black "leadership" occurred earlier this year when
District of Columbia Representative Eleanor Holmes Norton led a protest demonstration
against school vouchers in Washington. This was in response to a bill sponsored by House
Majority Leader Dick Armey and passed by Congress. This bill would have provided 2,000
scholarships for low-income D.C. children to attend private schools.
Norton
7/16/98: Do 'minorities' really have it that bad?
7/14/98: Race dialogue: same old stuff
7/10/98: Honest history
7/09/98: Dumb is dangerous
7/02/98: Gun-safety starts with
parental responsibility
6/30/98: When more is less
6/29/98: Are educators above the law?
6/26/98: Random Thoughts
6/24/98: An angry letter
6/22/98: Sixties sentimentalism
6/19/98:Dumbing down anti-trust
6/15/98: A changing of the guard?
6/11/98: Presidential privileges
6/8/98: Fast computers and slow antitrust
6/3/98: Can stalling backfire?
5/29/98: The insulation of the Left
5/25/98: Missing the point in the media
5/22/98: The lessons of Indonesia
5/20/98: Smart but silent
5/18/98: Israel, Clinton and character
5/14/98: Monica Lewinsky's choices
5/11/98: Random thoughts
5/7/98: Media obstruction of justice
5/4/98: Dangerous "safety"
5/1/98:
Abolish Adolescence!
4/30/98: The naked truth
4/22/98: Playing fair and square
4/19/98: Bad teachers"
4/15/98: "Clinton in Africa
"
4/13/98: "Bundling and unbundling
"
4/9/98: "Rising or falling Starr
"
4/6/98: "Was Clinton ‘vindicated'?
"
3/26/98: "Diasters -- natural and political"
3/24/98: "A pattern of behavior"
3/22/98: Innocent explanations
3/19/98: Kathleen Willey and Anita Hill
3/17/98: Search and destroy
3/12/98: Media Circus versus Justice
3/6/98: Vindication
3/3/98: Cheap Shot Time
2/26/98: The Wrong Filter
2/24/98: Trial by Media
2/20/98: Dancing Around the Realities
2/19/98: A "Do Something" War?
2/12/98: Julian Simon, combatant in a 200-year war
2/6/98: A rush to rhetoric
