Presidents, Kids, and Chicago's Heartbreak
500 young lives in ONE summer...
If there was any way to quantify the effect that drugs, crime, and poverty have had on minority communities over the course of 50 years, this past summer pretty much summed it up in blood and lost lives on Chi-town's streets...As horrific as this past summer was for Chicago, the black community has seen this type of tragedy before. We STILL see it, on a large scale, in cities like Baltimore, Washington, DC, Oakland, Atlanta, NYC, Charlotte, etc. Anywhere there's poverty, economic stagnation, and a deficit in quality education, you'll see bodies and yellow tape, much like the picture listed above.
Let's fast forward a little bit to a few weeks ago:
A tragedy of horrific proportions plays out in the national spotlight; the current POTUS (much like any other POTUS before him) reacts with sympathy and compassion for the victims of this massacre:
Portions of the black community now rail on said POTUS because the plight on Chicago's streets weren't 'addressed' in the same manner ( or with the same perceived urgency) in the media. it's interesting to see this type of reaction from black folks. It's interesting because we haven't seen OUR leadership apply this type of critique to the government during other presidential terms, even though the problems being addressed aren't new ones.
It's puzzling because we don't even hold OUR OWN community leaders to the same type of standard. The same people have been strangely silent in regard to potential solutions to problems. The question I gotta ask is WHEN are we going to get past finger-pointing? When are we going to start holding OUR leadership responsible for thinking about SOLUTIONS to the issues we face?
Maybe we could ask THOSE types of questions for our leadership...Is it that much to ask black folk to do that? I guess time will tell the tale. In the meantime, we'll continue to see the media dysfunction that our community exhibits amongst it's own...
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