A recent study shows the development of class differences within the African-American community. A greater number of blacks indicated they consider a person’s economic condition to be dependent on individual choices, not how that person’s race is viewed by society.
Some speculate that this new stance on perceived racism may come as African-Americans watch immigrants working to better themselves — and succeeding. Surveyed blacks and whites alike considered immigrants to be harder workers than themselves.
This comes as another study was recently released that found many African-Americans are unable to earn as much as their parents, falling out of the middle-class bracket.
“There is a lot of downward mobility among African-Americans. We don’t have an explanation,†Robert B. Mincy of Columbia University told the Washington Post.
Posted by Kristin Mehler
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24 Comments
Robert B. Mincy must have been working around different “Blacks” than I have worked around. I don’t find any differences in work ethic amongst the races.
One can’t compare the “hip hop” youth of today with those who are responsible and what is reality. Not everyone is “hip hop” oriented and certainly not all Blacks are lazy or under achieving. Personally, I find the assessment insulting and racist.
The survey taken may indicate that “immigrants” take more jobs that require physical labor, but that’s because they may not have any other skills. Judging a society’s work ethic and comparing it to unskilled labor is not very scientific or does it measure the true value of a working society.
Again, society is not ran by polls. Polls can be deceiving as they don’t reflect the reality of what is actually happening. It’s like taking a temperature of a tree in Oregon and then stating that there will be less rain in Kansas. There are many other factors to consider and not all elements are mutually inclusive.
I have an explanation and it is basically called a HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA. Get it and you will be OK. You will have options. Immigrants usually get a high school diploma. Many blacks- especially black males- don’t bother. And then they gripe about “racism” when they end up in a bad way. The fact is that right now, as I write this, a family of immgrants is on a plane or ship making their way to America. That family may not know a word of English. They may not have much formal education. They may even be black- from Hati or Africa. They may land here in the next few hours and the parents will have to get low paying service sector jobs and start from there YET within ONE generation this family will be better off than 75% of the blacks that were BORN here and know English! They ought to be ashamed. And rap music is not doing them any good either. I know this may sound hard and out of line for a LIBERAL like myself but it is true.
“”"Robert B. Mincy must have been working around different “Blacks” than I have worked around. I don’t find any differences in work ethic amongst the races.”"”
There is not any difference to the work ethic among those who got a job at your place of work because your employer screened out those without a HIGH SCHOOL DIPLOMA before they got a job there most likely. But there is a big difference in “study ethic” in my daighter’s high school and she will be the first to tell you that. And she is more LIBERAL than I am. She tells me that the black males are always skipping class, don’t do any work, get bad grades and disrupt the class. And the black males who do their work get “dissed” for “acting white” by the majority of those who don’t.
“Some speculate that this new stance on perceived racism may come as African-Americans watch immigrants working to better themselves — and succeeding.”
Is this from a liberal that holds a mindset that blacks are inferior or are not motivated, and New Immigrants (mostly illegal) are motivated and superior to American Black Citizens?
“Perceived Racism”? IT is or it is not racism. Either it is based on race ie racism, or class classism, or money which is an ism I do not know.
This from a liberal? For shame.
Literally the Blacks are getting screwed again, this time it is the liberals throwing them under the bus. ANd for what? THE ILLEGAL ALIEN VOTE, remember that most “new immigrants” are ilelgal aliens and came her illegally and are all criminals.
I would like to know why the MSM is not screaming to high heaven with this? If a Republican had said this there would be hell to pay. Agsin the MSM is shown for the liberal bias which it exhibits on a daily basis.
Well Kev you’ve just proved there is a God and that there is hope for you yet. You’ve got is right on this one. You must be watching too much Fox News. lol
I met an actual “African Americanonce…he immigrated (legally) from Sierra Leone. Otherwise, you are an AMERICAN..get over the separatist habit of hyphenation.
Maybe it’s genetic.
Could blacks (unless you were born in Africa, you’re NOT African-American) be falling out of the middle class because they work hard but choose to spend their money on flashy cars with payments that are bigger than most mortgages? Could it be all that expensive designer clothing that they wear while they live in the worst neighborhoods? We all have a choice in this country. Make them wisely.
Lots of racist white trash pontificating ignorantly, I see. Guess it must be a Monday.
Actually, what’s really interesting is the achievement gap that is opening up in college between the performance of men and women. The percentage of women to men enrolled on college campuses is 43%/57%. With the exception of those in the lowest income bracket, the enrollment numbers for young black men aren’t actually much worse than those for young white men of simliar economic status.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2005-10-19-male-college-cover_x.htm
Popular culture is contributing greately to the downward trend of black Americans. They (everyone) is glorifying the worse stereotypes that exist, instead of championing the best.
Most successful black people are not that fond of the rest of their race. Everybody is an individual, and should be looked at for what THEY are doing for this country, and not grouped together with the other idiots!
It’s getting hard for good people to do, not have a negative reaction to black people.
I find it quite interesting that rap music didn’t start out glorifying the problems of the inner city. It was about crying the blues, the pain of it all. Then all the spoiled little suburban brats got into it, then it all changed. The moral of the story is the parents should have kicked the crap out of the kids and nipped it in the bud!
Back in 2004, Bill Cosby blaimed the downward mobility on bad parenting and poor moral values in the black community. He was defamed as a traitor to his race for this speech.
“I’m talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit. Where were you when he was two?”-Cosbyhttp://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/billcosbypoundcakespeech.htm
Actually, this was the problem I and other liberal activists foresaw many years ago.
When the focus shifts from class to race (or gender or sexual preference), you get “identity politics.”
I vote democratic because I’m ______. Fill in the blank with a “black, Hispanic, urban, woman, gay, atheist, wiccan, transgendered”or anything else that you use to define yourself.
The trouble with “identity politics” is that everyone who isn’t of that group naturally gravitates to the other side.
If atheists and wiccans are Dems, then Christian fundamentalists have to be Repubs.
This makes no sense.
The Dems should have stuck to their CLASS roots. We’re for the WORKER, no matter what color, gender or creed.
Let the other side be for the bosses . . .
Now we have the strange spectacle of white factory rats voting Republican because they’re white males and they see the Dems as the party of minorities and women.
How dumb is that?
“I’m talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit. Where were you when he was two?”-Cosby
Easy for Cosby to say. He had two TV shows.
Jail and poverty have gone together since jails were invented.
sin•gu•lar•i•ty ( s¹ng”gy…-l²r“¹-t) n. pl. sin•gu•lar•i•ties 1. The quality or condition of being singular. 2. A trait marking one as distinct from others; a peculiarity. 3. Something uncommon or unusual.
I think most people are generally afraid of being a person of singularity thinking.
We stride hard everyday for every situation to appease others, to pacify or attempt to pacify by granting concessions, often at the expense of principle.
“”"Back in 2004, Bill Cosby blaimed the downward mobility on bad parenting and poor moral values in the black community. He was defamed as a traitor to his race for this speech.
“I’m talking about these people who cry when their son is standing there in an orange suit. Where were you when he was two?”-Cosby”"”
It is ashamed that Cosby has been branded a traitor. His words were strong but they are true. And maybe some folks might listen to him. I would just say this and that is that I do not understand alot in this world but I can think back to my childhood when I was a young child in Wichita. Although the area I lived in was not that far from what was then called “coloured town” (I lived at 214 S. Poplar), we rarely ever saw a “Negro” citizen. The only times you saw them in the neighbourhood were on the back of a trash truck or driving a cab. Some people would hire them and others would not. Even when they worked in hotels and restaurants, it was usually as cleaners and dishwashers. And actually Wichita was far ahead of the south where they were treated like shit. Yet when you saw them, they were dressed decent and acted respectfully. I often wondered why people hated them so much. They seemed like the nicest folks on Earth to me even though they were poor as hell. My folks could never ever have even imagined a day would come when their son would date and marry a black woman, salute and say “yes sir” to a black commander and be treated by a black MD. Yet I have seen all this and even more. Even I never thought a SERIOUS run for the Presidency could be made by a black candidate but now we have one and the newest polls actually show him ahead in Iowa which is an overwhelmingly white state! I stop and I think… God what a wonderful country we have here! All this progress in my lifetime! Does that mean racism is cured- no. Racism is still alive and well and it especially festers in the justice system. The fact is that a black man is about 10 times more likely to go to jail and for a longer time than a white who does the same crime and has the same background. But to blame everything on racism is just not correct. You have to take advantage of the opportunity given you. In the county where I live (Cobb Georgia) we spend LOTS of money on schools here. We have some of the best in the state- and even in the nation. My daughter has things at her high school that I could have never had back in East High in the 70s. Yet the black male graduation rate here is pathetic. I would guess less than 50% of the ones that enter the 9th grade finish the 12th grade. And it is getting worse and not better. This does not seem to be a problem for the black female who often comes from the same family. This explains the excellent column in today’s Atlanta Journal by Tom Joyner about how disturbed he is when he goes to colleges and sees 3 black females graduate for every male. The Hispanics also have a high drop out rate but unlike the black male, their rate is headed down. And everybody knows that you need a high school diploma to do about anything but end up in jail. So Cosby is right about lots of what he says. People should listen and not call him names.
By the way, I will put a link to the column in today’s Atlanta Journal by radio host Tom Joyner. It is an excellent column (maybe the Eagle might run it?)
http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/stories/2007/11/18/joynered_1119.html
Cap’n America, GREAT POST. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU. I agree and support this 100% from an “R”. This is great stuff and so very true:
“I vote democratic because I’m ______. Fill in the blank with a “black, Hispanic, urban, woman, gay, atheist, wiccan, transgendered”or anything else that you use to define yourself.
The trouble with “identity politics” is that everyone who isn’t of that group naturally gravitates to the other side.
If atheists and wiccans are Dems, then Christian fundamentalists have to be Repubs.
This makes no sense.
The Dems should have stuck to their CLASS roots. We’re for the WORKER, no matter what color, gender or creed.”
Again Cap’n America, VERY, VERY, VERY GOOD POST! The “R’s” ought to take notice of that, it is the vaunted “middle” where America is and AMERICN VALUES live.
Pop culture and distracted parents are mostly to blame for the apathy felt regarding education by many young people today, not just the black ones. The fact that so many children are raised with only one parent, usually their mom, doesn’t help. Boys need fathers to teach them how to become responsible men…but what kind of modeling do they get when their dad doesn’t even care enough to be in the picture?This whole senerio is in every culture and effects every race. Too many selfish men today who need to grow up and start taking responsiblity for the children they’re so willing to create but not parent.
“Easy for Cosby to say. He had two TV shows.”Posted by: CapnAmerica | November 19, 2007 at 01:57 PM
—————————–How to hell did he get two TV shows, he’s black.
Yeah, right, Mary Caruso. Just to show you how ignorant your comment is about men running out on their children: I’m a white guy who married a black woman (ironically enough) and guess who ran out on us and owes years worth of back child support? Here’s a hint… it’s not a man.
Too many selfish men today who need to grow up and start taking responsiblity for the children they’re so willing to create but not parent.
Posted by: Mary Caruso | November 19, 2007 at 08:50 PM
———————————Mary, I would agree with your post 100% with one change:Too many selfish “PARENTS” today who need to grow up and start taking responsiblity for the children they’re so willing to create but not parent.
Angel…you may be the exception…I’ll guarantee you more kids grow up without their dads than their mom…and 83% of African American children are born out of wedlock..with everyone else coming in close behind.You’re right Angle..I shouldn’t generalize…but I do see more irresponsible dads than moms.
“and 83% of African American children are born out of wedlock..”
Mary- I’m not disagreeing, but are you sure of this statistic? If so, it certainly is an eye-opener!
I’m sorry I was quoting from memory(which isn’t so good at my age) the actual rate of African American babies born out of wedlock is about %70…still a disturbing number. The babies born out of wedlock to Hispanics is 43% and to whites is 27%.