Why don't black Americans swim?

[Zona]

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?

I have no idea what this idiot is talking about. Its cultural that we as blacks thinks all waters have sharks because of slavery?

What kind of idiotic stormfront rhetoric is that?

The only reason blacks, whites and everything in between may have thought there were sharks anywhere and were afraid of them, was due to "Jaws".

Were going to need a bigger brain Samson. Seriously.

I have heard some crazy crap before, but to say its cultural why blacks cant swim because they have something instilled in them from slavery is just insane!

We didnt swim in the "hood" because we had no place to do it. We were good with water plugs, but not pools. Its not cultural, its economical.

Samson is the ass of the day on this one. Seriously...wow.

 

[Madeline]

Samson was making a joke, Zona. Lighten up.

 

[syrenn]

Jaws

Da dump

 

[syrenn]

Samson was making a joke, Zona. Lighten up.

No, i think samson was serious.

 

[ConHog]

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.

My siblings and I all learned to swim in the ocean, as did both my parents, and in fact my grandparents and most of my childhood friends. It comes from living in Southern California. I doubt my family is unique in this regard.

 

[Madeline]

Samson was making a joke, Zona. Lighten up.

No, i think samson was serious.

O surely not. That would make him a total dumbass.

 

[Big Fitz]

Sharks... now all I can think of is an Eddie Murphy skit where he talks about him and his brother taking a bath together, and he had his GI Joe doll in the tub, his brother didn't have anything... so... suddenly his brother pulls around his 'big brown shark'.

Much screaming and jumping out of the tub.

 

[syrenn]

Samson was making a joke, Zona. Lighten up.

No, i think samson was serious.

O surely not. That would make him a total dumbass.

Then i guess about this subject he is a dumbass...sorry samson.

 

[Big Fitz]

Samson was making a joke, Zona. Lighten up.

No, i think samson was serious.

O surely not. That would make him a total dumbass.

It's just amazing that this hasn't devolved into squid porn or at least Cuttlefish Erotica.

 

[ConHog]

Zona, I don't know why you bothered learning to swim. shit floats.

 

[Big Fitz]

We didnt swim in the "hood" because we had no place to do it. We were good with water plugs, but not pools. Its not cultural, its economical.

I hate having to concede to a SMALL degree in this you are right. This is the way it was. But not any more. That whole mantra is changing.

 

[American Horse]

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

"Why don't black Americans swim?" is a question I have asked myself and answered to my own satisfaction long ago, when I noticed a near total lack of black swimmers at beaches and pools. My own conclusion was that they were segregated from so many places, with even there being white and "colored" drinking fountains in the deep south that swimming in public pools would've been similarly segregated. With a strong feeling of being excluded by being made unwelcome, swimming, with its full body exposure of the stigmatta of a black skin would've become a skill rarely acquired, making black children more vulnerable to drowning than white children and/or adults. I think it is a measure of how unwelcome so many blacks were made to feel in America's white culture.

 

[Tank]

Also, blacks have a much higher bone density level then others making blacks less buoyant.

Check it out: Racial Differences in Bone Density between Young Adult Black and White Subjects Persist after Adjustment for Anthropometric, Lifestyle, and Biochemical Differences -- Ettinger et al. 82 (2): 429 -- Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism

Or maybe it's just all them sharks.

 

[Tank]

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.

The myth is over....

 

[DiveCon]

what i find more shocking in this story is how many American kids dont know how to swim

 

[KissMy]

Blacks don't swim because many of them are white people in disguise. They are afraid the paint will wash off and the whole family will get kicked off welfare. They saw what happened to Michael Jackson, then he & his family had to earn a living.

 

[caela]

To answer the OP...I think a number of children don't learn to swim for two reasons: 1) lack of availability - if there's not a public pool or lake nearby you're less likely to have a chance to learn and 2) parents perception - a lot of parents don't really see swimming as a useful skill and so they don't focus their children learning, especially if they live in an area where their kids won't swim much.

Living in MI, we have lots of public lakes and pools within easy distance (and affordable being cheap or free admission) even from cities so the majority of our kids swim, and quite well. You see every shade of skin on our beaches and the kids all run and swim and have fun splashing and playing like little otters in the water. Here it's something you consider important to teach your children because they will, at some point, end up going to the beach with their friends and you don't want them to drown, there's a perception that it's a useful skill to have.

In a state with less water, the urgency to teach kids, and teach them young, to swim (or at least tread water and float) would be less, I would think, because those children are already less likely to end up in a drowning situation.

Just my own 0.02$ worth.

 

[AkronGuy]

I think it's part cultural and part the after effects of segregated swimming facilities.

 

[Big Fitz]

To answer the OP...I think a number of children don't learn to swim for two reasons: 1) lack of availability - if there's not a public pool or lake nearby you're less likely to have a chance to learn and 2) parents perception - a lot of parents don't really see swimming as a useful skill and so they don't focus their children learning, especially if they live in an area where their kids won't swim much.

Living in MI, we have lots of public lakes and pools within easy distance (and affordable being cheap or free admission) even from cities so the majority of our kids swim, and quite well. You see every shade of skin on our beaches and the kids all run and swim and have fun splashing and playing like little otters in the water. Here it's something you consider important to teach your children because they will, at some point, end up going to the beach with their friends and you don't want them to drown, there's a perception that it's a useful skill to have.

In a state with less water, the urgency to teach kids, and teach them young, to swim (or at least tread water and float) would be less, I would think, because those children are already less likely to end up in a drowning situation.

Just my own 0.02$ worth.

remember though. We are talking swimming, not wading. There is a big difference actually. I see dozens of families of all races use the pool, but avoid the deep end. Only a few do, and they are mostly white or hispanic. Otherwise they cling to the edge if they go there.

To really have skill in swimming, they need classes or work done with their parents and learn to stroke, kick, float, and be able to do more than splash or dogpaddle the 10 feet back to the edge.

Then again, I took swimming lessons for 10 years and diving for 1.

 

[syrenn]

I think it's part cultural and part the after effects of segregated swimming facilities.

And what you just said is all about excuses.

Segregation ended years ago and has nothing to do with young people today, and for that matter not so young people either.