As an American and
specifically a black American, I am glad that we are having a national
discussion about the devaluation of many black lives.
Unfortunately, the
movement leading this discussion — Black Lives Matter (“BLM”) — is
focused on the wrong culprit and the wrong solution.
“African-Americans
are Americans and we are not treated like that. We’re not treated as if
black lives matter,” president of BLM’s Worcester chapter, states. But who isn’t treating black lives as if they matter?
Experience and data tell
me that the group that most devalues my life is not abusive law
enforcement nor white racism — though these exist and should be fought —
it is black criminals.
There are many forms of devaluing life, but none compares to murder. And here’s the terrifying statistic:
if as a black man I am murdered the chances are 9 out of 10 that my
killer will be a black criminal as against a white, Hispanic, or Asian
criminal. 9 out of 10.
The cause of these horror statistics is not that the average
black person has a propensity to murder, but that there is a subculture
of black criminals whose ideas and habits devalue all lives, but
particularly black lives.
Some of these ideas and
habits, which I saw all-too-closely growing up, are: using violence as a
means of arbitration, rampant promiscuity and mistreatment of women,
the deification of drug dealers and gigolos, rejecting hard work,
violence toward children, discouraging crime-reporting to the
authorities, and ridiculing education as “white.”
The black criminal class
is the number one devaluer of black lives. While all Americans have a
moral responsibility to attack this problem, black Americans in
particular need to take the lead through two types of action:
1) Collaborating with
law enforcement to vigorously prosecute the black criminals who are
threatening and ending innocent black lives.
2) Fighting for dramatic cultural improvement to replace the toxic values that create rampant black crime in the first place.
Collaborating with law enforcement to vigorously prosecute the black criminals who are threatening and ending innocent black lives.
There is no way to deal
with the scourge of black-on-black crime, including black-on-black
murder, without more rigorous police enforcement.
Of course, this police
enforcement needs to be just, and true injustices with law enforcement
must be fought. But they must be fought as part of a collaboration with the police to crack down on black criminals.
Most policemen of all
races go into the profession to protect individuals of all races. And
when they go into black-dominated inner cities, their lives are much,
much more at risk, which means they face much more difficult choices and
are bound to make more mistakes.
By welcoming police into
black neighborhoods, facilitating the catching of criminals, and
developing an anti-crime culture, we can make things far better.
This is not conjecture — when it is tried, it works.
Former Mayor Rudy
Guliani and former Police Commissioner William Bratton both cited smart
and tough policing for the dramatic drop in New York City’s homicide
rate during the 1990s. According to NYC.gov, murders dropped 85 percent from 1990s to the mid-2010s. One expert claims
that “more than 10,000 minority males were spared the violent death
that they would have experienced had homicides remained at their early
1990s levels.” What an amazing example of valuing black lives more.
By contrast, when police are less involved in crime-prone areas, black lives matter less.
According to a Johns
Hopkins research team, the phenomenon known as “Gray Effect” is the
spike in crime that results from lower levels of police involvement. It
was coined after the “surge in homicides and violence in [Baltimore
which] came in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray, while in police
custody, in April 2015.” They state:
“The
size and duration of the crime spike is almost certainly attributable
to particular features of the unrest and its aftermath, possibly
including…police pullback in
protest of the city’s leadership” (italics mine) and this appears “to
include a decline in community cooperation with police.”
The research shows that
when police presence goes down, violent crime goes up. If we value black
lives, we need to work with the police, not against them.
Fighting for dramatic cultural improvement to replace the toxic values that create rampant black crime in the first place.
While increased and
improved law enforcement can save many black lives from ending and many
more from suffering in criminal neighborhoods, we need to address the
root cause: the ideas and habits that lead to black crime.
It may be politically
incorrect to suggest that some cultures are better than others — but it
is absolutely correct. Just as the Renaissance that brought us out of
the Dark Ages was better than the Dark Ages, so it is possible for the
black inner city to have a far better culture than its current dark
ages.
I will be writing much more about this needed Black Renaissance
in the future but for now I think it’s important to just start the
discussion with a call for basic, civilized behavior: the abolition of
violence in social interaction, the willingness to be a productive
member of the workforce, respectful treatment of women, and the valuing
of education.
This is a problem that
blacks must take the lead in solving for themselves. Other races, for
their part, need to stop accepting uncivilized behavior for fear of
being called racist. The true racism is to hold that today’s black inner
city cultural deficiencies are somehow okay for black people.
The biggest obstacle to the solution: Black Lives Matter
Unfortunately, neither
increased, collaborative law enforcement nor black cultural improvement
will occur as long as Black Lives Matter is leading our cultural
discussion — because Black Lives Matter denies the real problem and
opposes the real solutions.
Instead of focusing
proper attention on the murdered blacks whose lives are 100% devalued —
ended — by other blacks, these victims are ignored.
Instead of
focusing proper attention on the perpetrators, the black criminal class,
BLM focuses only on the sins (sometimes real, sometimes not) of the
policemen who are put in the incredibly difficult position of policing
crime-ridden neighborhoods with many complicit or scared neighbors. And revealingly, their biggest symbols of “oppression” are black criminals like Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, and Mike Brown.
Instead of looking
inward at the need for cultural improvement, they blame “white power
structures” and other forces that have clearly not prevented civilized
citizens of all races — including blacks — from succeeding in this
country by embracing peaceful living, education, and hard work.
Why does BLM fight against the solutions to the problems it claims to care about? Because most of the BLM itself is a part of the uncivilized black subculture that causes the problems.
Often BLM members, with violent behavior, deification of criminals, and
victim mentality, are the epitome of the cultural problems that need to
be fixed.
If other Americans,
particularly, non-blacks, think they are doing me a favor by supporting
this movement, you are not. By helping BLM evade the real problem and
real solutions you are making it more likely that I and other blacks
will be killed. More broadly, you are helping ensure that millions of
young blacks will remain immersed in a culture that deprives them of
their amazing potential to take advantage of living in the greatest,
most opportunity-filled country in the world
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