# What went wrong with Black Americans? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [January 18, 2005, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430 "2005-01-18T21:37:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/21 "2005-01-19T00:56:02Z")
…for Black Americans, and Hispanic Americans, and White Americans: the wholesale REJECTION of learning! I have been part-time teaching as a temp, and my classroom experiences are that many kids now reject education. They would much rather play games, chat on the phone, etc., than buckle down and READ! In the inner-city schools I’ve taught in, I’ve actually stopped trying…I offer the material, and they can take it or leave it. Which is weird, because the asian immigrant kids are eager to learn…they will become doctors, lawyers, and engineers…while the american kids will be out dealing drugs! ---
**Author:** ![Ryan\_Liam](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ryan_liam/32/3965_2.png) [@Ryan\_Liam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ryan_Liam)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/22 "2005-01-19T01:04:42Z")
> [@ralph124c](#): > > …for Black Americans, and Hispanic Americans, and White Americans: the wholesale REJECTION of learning! I have been part-time teaching as a temp, and my classroom experiences are that many kids now reject education. They would much rather play games, chat on the phone, etc., than buckle down and READ! In the inner-city schools I’ve taught in, I’ve actually stopped trying…I offer the material, and they can take it or leave it. > Which is weird, because the asian immigrant kids are eager to learn…they will become doctors, lawyers, and engineers…while the american kids will be out dealing drugs! Weird, does that apply to Asian Americans then? :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/23 "2005-01-19T01:05:21Z")
[Thank _goodness_ we’re finally off transsexuals and onto blacks for a week or two . . .] ---
**Author:** ![Demorian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demorian/32/7273_2.png) [@Demorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Demorian)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/24 "2005-01-19T01:08:20Z")
Good points, **Lissa** , especially regarding health care and transportation (more notable in cities with poor public transit like Los Angeles, but notable elsewhere as well, especially the large amount of suburban areas like Moore’s Michigan neighborhood). **Stuffy** mentioned the social element of urban black culture (allegedly helped by welfare programs - but that is another debate) that allows men to leave their families behind. I think that is another vital factor in this equation. > [@brickbacon](#): > > What has happened is that many of the more capable blacks have moved to the suburbs, and have ignored all ties they had to the black communities they left. I also agree strongly with this. In **xtisme** ’s post, he associates with this crowd. I have also noticed that university-educated blacks do tend to isolate themselves from the communities, even if they came from them. I will go on a limb and say that it has to do with wanting to give their children the best chance they can have, which means living with the suburban whites. I say this because my hispanic father did the same thing (though he isn’t college educated) - he saved up and moved us out to the more affluent, whiter suburbs and place heavy emphasis that my sister and I would be college educated (and we are). Combine **Stuffy** and **brickbacon** ’s points, and you can see another element where the social system is failing young black children and virtually condemning them to the repeat the same life. ---
**Author:** ![Demorian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demorian/32/7273_2.png) [@Demorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Demorian)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/25 "2005-01-19T01:13:32Z")
> [@Ryan\_Liam](#): > > Weird, does that apply to Asian Americans then? :rolleyes: Well, most Asian-Americans, as I noted above, with college educations, move out to the suburbs and stress education to their kids. Why that is the case with Asians and not anyone else, well, honestly, I don’t want to think of the answer to. I suppose it has more to do with cultural traits and the fact that they are more recent, modern immigrants. > [@Eve](#): > > [Thank goodness we’re finally off transsexuals and onto blacks for a week or two . . .] Seconded. But let’s hope that the eugenics people don’t catch on. ---
**Author:** ![Stuffy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/f17d59/32.png) [@Stuffy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stuffy)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/26 "2005-01-19T01:37:08Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > [Thank _goodness_ we’re finally off transsexuals and onto blacks for a week or two . . .] Actually we’ve got 6 weeks, considering Black History Month is coming. Up Next **"Why do Black People Need a Month?"** Followed by **"Affirmative Action is Racist"** Oh and you don’t want to miss our special news segment **“Black men are Scary Motherf@#$ers”** tonight at 11. ---
**Author:** ![Rashak\_Mani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ea666f/32.png) [@Rashak\_Mani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rashak_Mani)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 1:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/27 "2005-01-19T01:44:31Z")
Just adding to the asian thingy… they have a cultural and social pressure to study more… which pushes them into valuing more study. Brazilian japanese still have a bit of this and push harder than most for example… Kids for good or bad will follow role models… ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/28 "2005-01-19T02:22:24Z")
IMO these are all secondary symptoms of the root cause of the high rates of various black social pathologies. It beings and ends with fathers. The black man was broken and forcibly removed from the center of family life by over 100 years of slavery. The matriarchial family structure that had to reform around the mother, can work in some circumstances, but is at a huge disadvantage structurally, economically, and socially in competing with other mother + father centric family structures. With fathers largely absent from the equation, you often get dangerous, immature, man-children driven by a desire to achieve and win, but without the social or mental tools or appropriate behavioral frameworks to go about it constructively. I wouldn’t be a black American man for all the tea in China. There’s no place for most of them at the social table, either in in the overwhelmingly matriarchail centric black family structure that pervades black culture, or in the society at large. It amazes me that some people think that a family structure systematically and deliberately broken over centuries is going to pull up it’s socks and get on with life in a few decades. We are reaping (and will continue to reap for some time) what slavery and the destruction of the black family has sown. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/29 "2005-01-19T02:24:47Z")
> [@Rashak Mani](#): > > Just adding to the asian thingy… they have a cultural and social pressure to study more… Immigrants, especially relatively recent immigrants, usually do have that social pressure. I don’t know if it’s legit to say it’s a cultural thing for Asians; that gets close to some stereotypes. Of course, “the asian immigrant kids are eager to learn…they will become doctors, lawyers, and engineers…while the american kids will be out dealing drugs!” just drives a truck over that line… 😛 ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/30 "2005-01-19T02:34:58Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > [Thank _goodness_ we’re finally off transsexuals and onto blacks for a week or two . . .] Mmm… > [@astro](#): > > With fathers largely absent from the equation, you often get dangerous, immature, man-children driven by a desire to achieve and win, but without the social or mental tools or appropriate behavioral frameworks to go about it constructively. MAN-CHILD ANGRY!!! :mad: :mad: :mad: ---
**Author:** ![Rashak\_Mani](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ea666f/32.png) [@Rashak\_Mani](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rashak_Mani)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/31 "2005-01-19T04:17:00Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And there is certainly an upper-class Anglo-Saxon network, which is more important than all the rest put together… young men from old-money, D.A.R.-material families attending exclusive Northeastern prep schools – the kind who grow up to more or less inherit seats on the boards of major corporations, foundations, Congress, etc. … I’ve seen the same thing here in Brazil… an academic here stated that the contacts and the network are essential and determine the reason why white brazilians despite everything still dominate and get prominent positions in government and private industry. (hey… I’ve benefitted from this a few times.) Not to hijack this thread… but Bush is a good example of how these connections can get a lackluster and a business failure white boy quite far. Blacks have to tough it out all the way. ---
**Author:** ![gobear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8dc957/32.png) [@gobear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gobear)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 4:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/32 "2005-01-19T04:32:51Z")
> [@Stuffy](#): > > Up Next **"Why do Black People Need a Month?"** [Nat X] Because TWO months would just be a little too much for The Man. [/Nat X] Brilliant post, BTW, **Stuffy** , but you forgot **Slavery: Why Weren’t Blacks More Grateful for Free Food and a Fulltime Job?** and **How Can I Be Racist When I Have a Black Friend, Who Is Black (And I Know His Name!)?** ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/33 "2005-01-19T04:42:08Z")
> [@Demorian](#): > > The dillema of minorites is strongly reflected in the military; a disproportionate amount of blacks and hispanics enter military service at age 18, because they aren’t going to college and don’t have many better opportunities. I can’t dig up any cites (this post is already making me late for an appointment), but a quick cite, if you’ll recall F-9/11’s quick glimpse of Moore’s hometown, dilapidated, with a heavy percentage of the youths enrolled in the military. That is very common across the country, be it urban Los Angeles or small towns in Michigan. You make this sound like it’s a bad thing. Although I’m white, I’ve always understood the military as one of the most colorblind institutions that this country has, and always considered poor people who took that route to be fairly smart- they have a job, they have a support structure, they can learn useful skills, and they’re judged more on merit than on anything else. Sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me, especially if I’d grown up poorer. Back to the OP… I think one major problem with Black culture, and many other cultures of poverty is that they can have an attitude toward education and success that is very counterproductive. Kind of a glorification of ignorance and poverty, I suppose. Successful black lawyers and doctors aren’t respected as much as say… 50 Cent or Chingy, who outside of rapping, can hardly string an intelligible sentence together. A buddy of mine in high school was saying that he didn’t dare say he went to the private school he went to among the Black community for fear of being harassed for “acting white” or otherwise trying to get above his station as a black man. Needless to say, I was astonished. My friends were all happy for me when I went to school there, and even though I was kind of the overachiever in my group of friends, nobody was ever down on me for it, and their parents didn’t give mine a hard time either. It was all good that I was doing so well academically and in sports- it was like they respected the results of studying and hard work. My buddy’s experience was the exact opposite of mine, and he was pretty sad about it when he was talking about it That’s my take on what’s messed up with the Black community. And it’s not exclusive to them either- it seems to be a problem of poorer communities. ---
**Author:** ![Demorian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demorian/32/7273_2.png) [@Demorian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Demorian)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/34 "2005-01-19T04:58:21Z")
> [@bump](#): > > You make this sound like it’s a bad thing. Although I’m white, I’ve always understood the military as one of the most colorblind institutions that this country has, and always considered poor people who took that route to be fairly smart- they have a job, they have a support structure, they can learn useful skills, and they’re judged more on merit than on anything else. I meant it as a rather neutral comment, actually. The military is the last chance for some people to get an education or get maturity and discipline they lacked at younger ages. It can help people turn their lives around. Of course, this is all more recently militarily. I wouldn’t call the military truly “colorblind” up until the '80s. ---
**Author:** ![Freeman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/ec9cab/32.png) [@Freeman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freeman)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/35 "2005-01-19T05:37:17Z")
History played an important roll in the suffering of Blacks now in America!!!. It is the idea in the Whites minds such: You were my slave yesterday and you want to be my master today. Blacks have 2 options: 1. Form a new Sovereign State in America, totally run by Blacks for Blacks and leave the White man alone. Blacks will never prosper under Whit rule. 2. Immigrate back to Africa where they would feel at home again. God made their bodies adoptable to live in a hot humid climate. Regards, Freeman ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/36 "2005-01-19T06:02:29Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And there is certainly an upper-class Anglo-Saxon network, which is more important than all the rest put together. That’s no secret, there’s a whole subgenre of American novels about the experiences of young men from old-money, D.A.R.-material families attending exclusive Northeastern prep schools – the kind who grow up to more or less inherit seats on the boards of major corporations, foundations, Congress, etc. It’s what people mean when they speak of the “Old Boy Network” without further qualification. I agree with this. Imagine what W’s life would have been like if he didn’t have that network. He’d never have gotten into Yale with his grades, he might have been drafted and had to go to Vietnam, if he had been caught during his coke days he’d have a record as a felon. Likewise Laura. Imagine that she was black and caused a fatal car accident of a white kid. She’d probably have had the crap beat out of her. I grew up poor (white) and was always sensitve to slights and aware of the advantages that my rich friends had. They couldn’t see it; they just thought that it was normal to have your father call someone up to get a job. ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/37 "2005-01-19T06:06:10Z")
> [@Freeman](#): > > History played an important roll in the suffering of Blacks now in America!!!. It is the idea in the Whites minds such: You were my slave yesterday and you want to be my master today. > > Blacks have 2 options: > > 1. Form a new Sovereign State in America, totally run by Blacks for Blacks and leave the White man alone. Blacks will never prosper under Whit rule. > > 2. **Immigrate** back to Africa where they would feel at home again. God made their bodies **adoptable** to live in a hot humid climate. > > Regards, > Freeman It’s \*emmigrate \* and _adaptable_. You must be from a maroon state. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/38 "2005-01-19T06:12:20Z")
> [@DanBlather](#): > > It’s \*emmigrate \* and _adaptable_. You must be from a maroon state. Now, now… there’s no need for that. It’s obvious by his incisive logic, and historical perspective that he’s very well red. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/39 "2005-01-19T06:14:03Z")
> [@](#): > > **xtisme** : [Most of them have nothing but scorn to throw at their own ‘black leaders’ like Jesse Jackson and company…and the same scorn to throw at most of the liberals as well with the same mantra. I think you have mischaracterized what Jesse Jackson’s message has been and most liberals too. The Rev. Jackson has talked about overcoming any obstacles and having pride – doing whatever it takes. Which Black leaders (no need to use quotations marks – they _are_ Black leaders – have promoted the idea that Blacks aren’t as capable? It wasn’t Martin Luther King, Jr. or Andrew Young. And the Blacks that I know have not objected to Bill Cosby’s _ideas_; they objected to his choice of explicit language. But I welcome cites showing that there is a big backlash to the ideas themselves. In Nashville there is a very strong Black community. That may have something to do with the two predominately Black universities here, especially Fisk University which has an excellent reputation. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [January 19, 2005, 6:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430/40 "2005-01-19T06:18:26Z")
> [@Zoe](#): > > And the Blacks that I know have not objected to Bill Cosby’s _ideas_; they objected to his choice of explicit language. But I welcome cites showing that there is a big backlash to the ideas themselves. I’m not quite understanding your distinction here re his “explicit language”. Has he been cursing or something? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-went-wrong-with-black-americans/285430.md?page=3)