Why don't black Americans swim?

[Zona]

Interesting article. I learned to swim at age 3, so can't imagine not knowing how to swim. Yet, many American children don't learn, with Black Americans with a huge percentage of non-swimmers. According to the article, in the UK swimming is a part of the curriculum of their educational system. But, in the U.S. it's up to the parents.

BBC News - Why don't black Americans swim?

A month ago, six African-American teenagers drowned in a single incident in Louisiana, prompting soul-searching about why so many young black Americans can't swim.

When 15-year-old DeKendrix Warner accidentally stepped into deeper water while wading in the Red River in Shreveport, he panicked.

JaTavious Warner, 17, Takeitha Warner, 13, JaMarcus Warner, 14, Litrelle Stewart, 18, Latevin Stewart, 15, and LaDarius Stewart, 17, rushed to help him and each other.

None of them could swim. All six drowned. DeKendrix was rescued by a passer-by.

Maude Warner, mother of three of the victims, and the other adults present also couldn't swim

Just as a side note, I notice that the drowning victims all have quite creative names...

US swimming stats

USA Swimming/University of Memphis study found ethnic differences
68.9% of African-American children with no or low ability to swim
57.9% of Hispanic children
41.8% of white children
Study quizzed 2,000 children and parents in six US cities
CDC recorded 3,443 fatal accidental drownings in 2007
Drowning is second greatest cause of accidental death in children under 14
African-American children aged 5 to 14 3.1 times more likely to drown

Cant speak for all of black america, but where I grew up, we simply didnt have pools to swim in. Eventually I went to a few places..(in Philly, kelly's pool and cobbs creek rec center, how in the hell do I remember this) and learned but as a young kid, I never swam because there was no resource to use or very few of them that was too local.

By the time I went to boot camp, I was good enough to pass, but didn't really enjoy it. 20 years later, I made sure my house came with a pool to see if I was missing something. I used that pool maybe 10 times in 6 years because the summers are too hot to swim and our "winters" make the water just a little too chilly...(sometimes..)

Swimming was never my thing, but I did love bikes. (Cannondale and Bianchi....street bikes, not dirt or any sort of off roading..)

That is just me. Oh and I noticed where you are going with this..especially the names....

I wonder if

Track, Trig, Bristol, Willow, and Piper can swim?

 

[Tank]

Blacks and not as buoyant as others due to there thicker epadermis, also there lack of mental facilities doesn't help.

 

[Zona]

When i was in boot camp for the Navy, there were 9 black guys in my company, and not a single one could swim. They looked fucking terrified as they stood up there on the high dive with the company commanders below screaming at them to jump in the water. Not one did it on the first day. It took a few of them several days to pass this test. It was weird to me, because growing up, me and all my friends knew how to swim. I thought the swimming test was a joke. Even the test to qualify for the Navy SEAL boot camp (buds) is a joke if you ask me.

So, because they didn't have the opportunity to swim as kids, they are looked down on?

I was in the same boat, but I swam a few times....enough to pass the navy swim test, the first time... Remember the test, they made you tred water for ..what five minutes, then swim to the other side. I did it with no problem. Didnt like it, but I did it...It was something I never got into really because there really were no resources to try it too often where I grew up.

The funny thing is, years later in the service, I lived a half mile from the beach for years and never really liked the water. (Imperial bach, cali...) (Jaws messed me up for life I suppose..)



Its totally geographical...I went out of my way to try things you DO NOT HAVE A CHANCE TO DO when you grew up in west philly. I tried things to see if I liked them....I love to ski now. Snow board...so so....I love deep sea fishing (well, when I was in san diego), I love going to the desert on my quad (and old school three wheeler) I like shooting guns at the range, I enjoy archery, I like to hunt and so on and so on... I refused to be the type person who says, hell, if I never tried it, I dont like it. Screw that. That is as closed minded as the op here.

 

[syrenn]

Blacks and not as buoyant as others due to there thicker epadermis, also there lack of mental facilities doesn't help.

Fuck you Tank you're a lying sack of racist shit. The negs are on the way.

 

[syrenn]

Blacks and not as buoyant as others due to there thicker epadermis, also there lack of mental facilities doesn't help.

I taught swimming to the most frightened kids on earth for years. Blacks are no different then anyone else in the water.

 

[Zona]

Blacks and not as buoyant as others due to there thicker epadermis, also there lack of mental facilities doesn't help.

Some of us have enough mental facilities to put together a coherent sentence though. We can also spell epidermis. But we understand where you were trying to go, I suppose...

 

[Samson]

The bottom line however is. If parents want their children to learn how to swim it is THEIR responsibility to water prof their kids.

Not to be redundent, but you are being redundent.

No one is arguing that parents teach their kids. That's a given, m'k? No reason to repeat it OVER and OVER, AND OVER.

The question is why should Black parents be less inclined to teach their kids to swim.

And YOU SAID IT WAS BECAUSE THEY ARE LAZY.

2- again, lazy parents.

Now, try to fuckin' focus for a moment: Why do you think black parents are lazy?

 

[syrenn]

The bottom line however is. If parents want their children to learn how to swim it is THEIR responsibility to water prof their kids.

Not to be redundent, but you are being redundent.

No one is arguing that parents teach their kids. That's a given, m'k? No reason to repeat it OVER and OVER, AND OVER.

The question is why should Black parents be less inclined to teach their kids to swim.

And YOU SAID IT WAS BECAUSE THEY ARE LAZY.

2- again, lazy parents.

Now, try to fuckin' focus for a moment: Why do you think black parents are lazy?

YOU asked WHY they dont know how to swim. A NON LAZY parent..black or otherwise...will FIND A WAY TO GET THEIR KID WATERPROOFED. In my opinion a parent who does not have their child taught to swim is LAZY.

The "why" can be anything you want to blame it on.

 

[Samson]

The bottom line however is. If parents want their children to learn how to swim it is THEIR responsibility to water prof their kids.

Not to be redundent, but you are being redundent.

No one is arguing that parents teach their kids. That's a given, m'k? No reason to repeat it OVER and OVER, AND OVER.

The question is why should Black parents be less inclined to teach their kids to swim.

And YOU SAID IT WAS BECAUSE THEY ARE LAZY.

2- again, lazy parents.

Now, try to fuckin' focus for a moment: Why do you think black parents are lazy?

YOU asked WHY they dont know how to swim. A NON LAZY parent..black or otherwise...will FIND A WAY TO GET THEIR KID WATERPROOFED. In my opinion a parent who does not have their child taught to swim is LAZY.

The "why" cant be anything you want to blame it on.

You realise what the thread is about, right?

 

[syrenn]

Not to be redundent, but you are being redundent.

No one is arguing that parents teach their kids. That's a given, m'k? No reason to repeat it OVER and OVER, AND OVER.

The question is why should Black parents be less inclined to teach their kids to swim.

And YOU SAID IT WAS BECAUSE THEY ARE LAZY.



Now, try to fuckin' focus for a moment: Why do you think black parents are lazy?

YOU asked WHY they dont know how to swim. A NON LAZY parent..black or otherwise...will FIND A WAY TO GET THEIR KID WATERPROOFED. In my opinion a parent who does not have their child taught to swim is LAZY.

The "why" cant be anything you want to blame it on.

You realise what the thread is about, right?

Sparked by the family drowning, followed by the stats about race and swimming.

 

[Samson]

YOU asked WHY they dont know how to swim. A NON LAZY parent..black or otherwise...will FIND A WAY TO GET THEIR KID WATERPROOFED. In my opinion a parent who does not have their child taught to swim is LAZY.

The "why" cant be anything you want to blame it on.

You realise what the thread is about, right?

Sparked by the family drowning, followed by the stats about race and swimming.

Actually, it appears to be members of TWO families

Many black parents are not teaching their children to swim.

Some might assume the fundamental reasons would be lack of money for swimming lessons or living in areas where there were no pools, but the reality is more complex.

"Fear of drowning or fear of injury was really the major variable," says Prof Carol Irwin, a sociologist from the University of Memphis, who led the study for USA Swimming

Now, why would you suppose that black parents would be more fearful of drowning than hispanic or white parents?

 

[Big Fitz]

I swim laps for exercise. About 2.5 miles a week. I do this at my apartment complex pool which has a deep end that is 9.5 feet deep. I live in a primarily black apartment complex. I am not medically trained save for some CPR training in 1994, and paying attention when taking years of swimming.

Last July, I was swimming laps with about 10 other people in the pool area. I was the only white guy there. You had fathers and mothers and aunts all watching the kids play in the pool from ages 2-14. Nice bright sunny day and loud with all the kids. I finished a lap and looked up because it was silent. I turned around towards the deep end and saw everyone looking down into the water and doing nothing. A woman on a cell phone looked at me. Without my glasses it wasn't too clear but something was very wrong. One of the three boys who were jumping in the pool in front of their grandfather was missing.

I asked what was happening? The woman said, he can't get off the bottom! Thinking maybe this was just a prank, I walked to the edge of the deep end seeing someone was on the bottom of the pool like I had many times in the past laying there. For a minute I thought he was pulling a ferris bueller on me, but just in case I took a big breath and dove to the bottom. I poked the boy hard in the ribs, hoping he'd snap out of it. Instead his head lolled to the side and I saw his eyes were open and rolled back into his skull. I got my feet on the bottom, running low on air, hooked around his arm in a lifesaving carry and kicked off to the surface. I got there barely in time for myself as he was 120lbs of dead weight.

Once there I struggled to the shallow end, and told the kid if he was playing around he was in deep trouble cause the paramedics were on the way. I took a close look at the kids face as I realized he may have hit his head diving like an idiot into the pool. I instantly changed to cradle his head and neck and did my best to lift the kid carefully out of the water. What to this day still sticks out glaring to me is that the whites of his eyes had gone cyanotic, light blue from oxygen deprivation. I knew it was for real at that point.

Knowing i had to get the water out of his lungs, I gently rolled him over onto his stomach while yelling at the small crowd to get back. I knew I had to get the water out of his lungs and hoped I wouldn't have to do CPR as I hadn't done it in 15 years. Also, I didn't want to hve to give mouth to mouth and get aspirated on. I knew that I was moving him too much for a neck injury so I just left him there and hoped the paramedics would get there soon. I gave one mild compression on his back, and water came out, and his eyes started to move and he quickly vomited up water and started coughing weakly, gaining strength. We pounded him on his back telling him to keep coughing till the paramedics arrived at that moment.

The boy survived and is thankfully none the worse for wear despite almost dying. I don't view what I did as anything special, just what I needed to because it was the right thing to do. The reason I mention this is to show that I've seen first hand the near tragedy of drowning and the helplessness of 10 people standing on the edge, feet away, not able to help.

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

 

[Samson]

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

To make escape less appealing, slave owners made African American slaves believe ALL waters contained sharks. It is cultural: The myth remains widespread among blacks.

 

[syrenn]

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

Slavers made African American slaves believe ALL waters contained sharks to make escape less appealing. It is cultural: The myth remains widespread among blacks.

Sharks in the pool..good reason not to swim. And here i thought you were going to say it was the giant octopus they had to watch out for.

I think your hypothesis is wrong. Just my opinion, but its wrong.

 

[Samson]

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

Slavers made African American slaves believe ALL waters contained sharks to make escape less appealing. It is cultural: The myth remains widespread among blacks.

Sharks in the pool..good reason not to swim. And here i thought you were going to say it was the giant octopus they had to watch out for.

I think your hypothesis is wrong. Just my opinion, but its wrong.

Thanks.

When you have a hypothesis of your own, other than the incessant "parents are lazy," lemme know.

 

[Charade]

You're getting warmer.....


But why are black parents lazier than any other?


How come they're not lazy about teaching their kids how to play basketball?

You know the answers just as i know the answers Samson..so why dont you just SAY it.

Ok, I will.

Slave owners told blacks that all bodies of water had sharks that would eat them if they went swimming.

This made escape back across the Atlantic more difficult.

With friggin' laser beams?

 

[Zona]

The bottom line however is. If parents want their children to learn how to swim it is THEIR responsibility to water prof their kids.

Not to be redundent, but you are being redundent.

No one is arguing that parents teach their kids. That's a given, m'k? No reason to repeat it OVER and OVER, AND OVER.

The question is why should Black parents be less inclined to teach their kids to swim.

And YOU SAID IT WAS BECAUSE THEY ARE LAZY.

2- again, lazy parents.

Now, try to fuckin' focus for a moment: Why do you think black parents are lazy?

And since I lived it, I can tell you why, in my generation, why blacks didnt swim..lack of pools in economically depressed areas. (Now, I dont think this as true since there are so many more middle class blacks).

Why is this so hard to understand?

 

[Zona]

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

To make escape less appealing, slave owners made African American slaves believe ALL waters contained sharks. It is cultural: The myth remains widespread among blacks.

So its cultural that a poor black kid from new york or chicago thinks there are sharks in ALL waters? Its a slavery thing?


You are a fucking idiot.

Oh and god bless.

 

[Madeline]

To learn to swim, you need a pool (and for most parents, an instructor). I repeat my earlier point: it is regional. There are few public pools down south because of desegregation's aftershocks.

Nobody learns to swim in the ocean, I wouldn't think.

 

[syrenn]

I have noticed that black families normally don't teach their kids how to swim, but they do love to wade. It must be an American culture thing because I see lots of foreign born black families swimming all the time, and quite well. I've watched them teach their children to kick and hold their breath under water.Or it's a tradition that is fading over time. I don't think it's lazy parents as much as I think it's a case of nobody thinks about it as a skill in those families. Sidney Poitier writes about how he learned to swim by his father repeatedly throwing him into the sea to struggle on his own till he got the idea of it. So I don't think it's a neatly categorized thing to say.

To make escape less appealing, slave owners made African American slaves believe ALL waters contained sharks. It is cultural: The myth remains widespread among blacks.

So its cultural that a poor black kid from new york or chicago thinks there are sharks in ALL waters? Its a slavery thing?


You are a fucking idiot.

Oh and god bless.

Zona,

Did you parents tell you all water was shark infested? Did any of your friends parents tell their children this? Do you think all waters are shark infested even pools? Did your parents or grand parents somehow have slave owners whispering in their ears? Did any of your friends parents or grandparents have slave owners telling them the waters were shark infested?