Elvis Obama
VIP Member
- Nov 2, 2015
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I'm not sure who the "we" is in this sentence. I agree that the first step is to define the problem properly. My point is that we almost always fail to define the problem properly, because of extremists on both sides. Apologists for Hip-Hop like to portray it as a healthy expression of a healthy culture. Ebonics, they tell us, is a legitimate dialect. Say that too many poor people are poor parents and you're attacked for "insulting poor people".The reason that we don't make any progress is because of the inability to correctly identify the issue, recognize what has not worked in the past, articulate the necessary measures to be taken and fund it.
The notion that we don't make any progress is a bit puzzling to me. 150 years ago we freed the slaves, into a war torn region with a collapsed economy. A hundred plus years of Jim Crow, redlining and citizen groups like the KKK continued to try to keep the black population isolated and suppressed. Despite this, after the last barriers to upward mobility were removed in the 70's, 75% of the black population has managed to rise above poverty. That's amazing to me.
What we're refusing to acknowledge, in the wake of this amazing accomplishment, is that the 25% who remain in poverty are in worse shape than ever. White flight and black flight has drained all the talent and robbed the inner cities of any chance to establish a healthy tax base in these areas. Their services have been decimated, especially the schools. We have distilled and purified the poverty in these areas and as a result we have created an evermore entrenched permanent underclass. You can flood these areas with bootstraps, and these people will still be incapable of pulling themselves up.