Why are the blacks in the US still ‘the others’?
Some five decades ago, Malcolm X wrote in his autobiography, “Thicker each year in these ghettoes is the teenager I was-with the wrong kinds of heroes, and the wrong kinds of influences.” Malcolm X is a much celebrated Afro-American figure as he personified the challenges facing the black population living in the US. His words delineate the true predicament of the black youth as to why they find themselves inextricably lured in the web of crime till today. At the same time we must be alive to the fact that the media myths, regarding black population, have played a part to convolute the common sense and positive thinking of the people about blacks. For instance, the hype in recent years that all urban blacks are drug addicts has been proved nothing more than a fallacy, and detached from facts on ground.
While blacks have made tremendous leaps over the years, some of their woes remain untouched. According to the 2009 FBI Hate Crime Statistics, crimes targeting the black natives in the US were 71.5 percent of the overall hate crimes committed, and 69.8 percent in 2010. It is essential to discuss black issues today because they face many of the same problems as they did in the past. Issues like the rise in black crime in the US, and discrimination against blacks on the colour of their skin – the two of which are intertwined – have not quite interred with time.
US being the White Man’s land, one must begin first with the onus on the white population for the problems facing the black people. It is believed that it is the American common man’s fault that “they let the ghettoes exist and that invariably engender lethal criminals” (Malcolm X, 1965). In the decade of 1960’s, FBI made the observation, that every year there was a 10-12 percent rise in crime in the ghettoes of the black population. And the fact, that the rise in population of black negroes from 1965’s 22 million to today’s 42 million (US Census Bureau 2012), only explains the broader and more dangerous implication of black crime. In addition to the common layman’s fault in compounding the black issues, there is an equally potent evidence why the scourge of black problems hit the US hardest. Antony Marx made a research on the absence of discriminatory laws, like Jim Crow and Apartheid, in Brazil which boasts a sprawling black populace, like the US or South Africa. He concluded that owing to the very political and strategic concern of uniting the whites in the wake of both Civil and Boer wars, this discrimination against blacks was an opportunity, a means to an end.
In addition to the whites letting the ghettoes exist, American leaders are responsible for the disparate progress and development within the US. The North-South gap. The reason behind the rapidly populating northern ghettoes back in the day in the US was the exceedingly racial environment in the south – as well as the crime of lynching prevalent in these areas. Factors such as employment, education and voting rights in the north were obvious attractions for the blacks who aspired for a better life. Today, it is recorded that by the age of 20, 21.4 percent of blacks will enter the prison as compared to a meager 1.4 percent of whites. And the number of blacks in prisons is usually eclipsed from the voting turnout, black participation in local businesses, literacy rate and even the crime statistics. Hence, an unfair representation of their numbers is the consequence. Considering these figures – and the discrimination that they entail – by merely ensuring the safety and security for all, in the south as in the north, the white man could have done away with the impending danger of intensification of northern black crime in the future. The deplorable kismet the blacks had to put up with can be attributed in large part to the north-south disparity within the USA.
Thirdly, the violence and injustice against their race has not fully left the memory of the blacks. After the year 2000, the US internal migratory trend has been southward. A surprising change with a rather dejecting cause. It is the disenfranchisement of blacks and the desire to redeem their lost cultural link to the south that explains this demographic shift. The loss in identity of the blacks can be ascribed to their 400 years of oppression at the hands of white masters. In fact, the surname of Malcolm X, ‘Little’, is also a scar on the African identity that once was- an attempt to dislodge the African identity from black slaves back in the day by attaching the slave master’s name with the slave in order to strip him from all links to his roots. Blacks being really conscious of identity and honour retaliated against this attempt at their acculturalisation and therefore got involved in the crime world. I see this altered migratory trend, and the escalating criminal tendency as manifestations of nothing but a frustration at the loss of identity.
Malcolm X writes, “… the Southern Negro, facing the honestly snarling white man, rose up to battle the white man for his freedom long before it happened in the north.” And this explains the long history of black struggle to gain respect and recognition in the sight of all – be it through violence, or peaceful protest and political engagement. Blacks have come a long way regaining their lost identity, but with little success. This failure and frustration at discrimination and hatred against one’s race, translates inevitably into a criminal mindset, and these destructive potentials gain predominance in a population.
Where on one hand the American whites’ culpability in Afro-American quandary is evident, equally or more so is the indolence of the blacks. It is a famous jargon in the creative writing discourse, that, a person must be discouraged if he can be. Blacks should have worked side by side with whites, without letting the racial bias impede their constructive potential. The blacks should have built ‘within themselves a greater awareness that along with equal rights there had to be bearing of equal responsibilities’ (Malcolm X). To have the will to educate one’s mind and strive to proceed through peaceful means is a lot more rewarding than resorting to violent sabotage to get one’s demands met.
This applies to Pakistan as much as it does to others. And we have seen this in Martin Luther King’s example. Following nonviolence, he gave the nation hope. And it is this very ‘hope’ that is wanting when injustice is perpetrated. We see that his struggle bore the fruits in the shape of Barack Obama becoming the US president through peaceful elections. Whatever myths are associated with Obama coming into power, the fact of blacks being respected more than they were in the past is self evident. Yet, this newfound so-called respect and recognition has failed to rescind the tribulations faced by the black population in its entirety.
Their grievances will only be resolved once they are addressed. The white and black ghetto dwellers, and those living outside, need to ensure that the problem of rising crime is curbed through an enduring alliance. An effective system of correspondence with nearby police authorities, educational system, health provision and other necessary arrangements will help alleviate the crisis, especially in the ghetto areas. Ebony, in March 1976, published an article that addressed this problem with the idea of “micro level” and “macro level” solutions. Micro level remedies pertained to families taking responsibility of youth and the macro level solutions touched upon the need to ensure security by taking effective administrative measures.
The responsibility of one’s condition is always best shouldered by the people who are undergoing the ordeal, because if they have the best questions to ask about their condition, then the best answers to those questions will also arise from the same population. More importantly, when the reality on ground will not be mocked at by the false hypes and flawed statistics, only then the real progress in respect of ‘the others’’ troubled status can be guaranteed.
The writer is an undergraduate student, and can be reached at fzubairb@gmail.com