For The Best Interests Of Black People - Time To Remove The "Black Majority Voting Districts"
Let me be upfront with my agenda: My goal, after much analysis, is to Remove The Democratic Party from the Nucleus of the Black Collective Consciousness. They should be pushed out to the periphery and forced to work and show thy selves approved to be held in the regard that they presently are. Some Black people point to the strong presence of Democrats and Black Democrats as proof of our racial advancement. I point to the strong presence of these same forces that preside over Black aggrievement and ask "Why aren't they held accountable for what they have failed to address?"
The psychology beneath this entire issue remains as the biggest challenge to the dismantling of this arrangement which has benefited the Democratic Party far more than it is benefited the African-American community when it comes to the critical issues to measure our take:
- Public Safety in our communities
- Quality of education in our communities
- Economic development in our communities
- Public Health in our communities
The construction of the "Majority Black voting district" per the desire to have "Black Representation" within various legislative bodies makes the assumption that a Black face alone, having been chosen by the Black masses is the person who can deliver the intended benefits. When I use the example in saying that the "For many Black people the Black face of Clarence Thomas on the Supreme court does not translate 'representation of Black interests' per where they stand". This goes without question due to the prevailing nature of left wing/progressive politics within the Black community. Thus it is equally true that I SAY: "The presence of the Congressional Black Caucus in the US Legislature and Black faces in various state and local legislative bodies does not automatically translate into the BEST INTERESTS OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY". For this I might be called a "hater of my own people". It is clear that all of this resides not in FACT but in POPULARITY of thought.
In reading the history of the Illinois First District in Chicago the district has morphed over time because of the gerrymandering that took place in which a majority Black district was sought to be maintained by the Illinois Legislature. As Black people MOVED OUT of the existing district...........the gerrymanderers in the legislature morphed the line to FOLLOW THEM.
Why doesn't anyone ask - WHY DID THEY MOVE OUT????
Far too often we as a people focus on "the Vehicle" that will take us to the Promised Land. After given it all of your with regards to our loyalties and soul......coming up short of the promised benefit typically means TRYING HARDER at doing the very same thing. A person, like me, who dares to step back and make analysis of how the current orchestrated structural constraints and resistance to change actually HURTS the Black community but helps those who have manipulated our community - the messenger is often attacked.
Why did these people choose to move out of a district that was otherwise sound on paper?
When this question is posed people who are defensive of the current orientation will state "Like all other people when Black folks gain a certain amount of financial security we like to move away from our original abode into areas that offer a lifestyle that matches our present circumstances". Thus our motivations are "normalized".
The key problem with this argument is that there are so many real world examples that show that "Moving On Up" is not the key motivation. It is "Moving Away From Some Threat" that is so often the case.
I try not to allow my individual perspective in me noting what my friends have done or told me be the sole basis of my arguments. The fact is, however, that when I look back over time where our conversations are not clouded with partisan charges - they are in fact moving out of Philly, Dekalb County Ga, Baltimore and Chicago - just to name a few in order to ESCAPE some threat - real or perceived.......no different than the WHITE FLIGHT operatives who did the same years prior.
The ironic part about their migration patters is that while they seek to VACATE whatever forces that have set upon the district which no longer matches their present circumstances.....if they move into an area that is too close to their original abode......the political tentacles of the agents of gerrymander might indeed suck them right back into the place that they were attempting to escape.
The painful concept surrounding all of this is that those who defend these Majority Black voting districts say that to dismantle them would be racist and a harm to the Black community. Loathed are they to note that a sizable membership of this same Black community are trying their damnedest to escape out of them. I find it RACIST that those who draw the lines keeps putting them back in simply because they are Black.
The Gerrymanderers have been emboldened recently by the presence of powerful Geographic Mapping systems. These computer systems take census data and physical maps and allow the operator to achieve whatever partitioned map they so desire. If the goal is to find 2 Black majority maps that allows Metro Atlanta to have 2 Black US Representatives - this mapping system is able to partition the immediate metro area to gather up Blacks where we live.......and then craft a panhandle of land that protrudes from the main district, regardless of distance or logic. The goal being to "ensnare enough Blacks to achieve the prescribed agenda".
Isn't it ironic that we constantly hear certain Blacks defending against the charge that "Black people are a monolithic bunch"? They often point to the DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY as evidence that "See we do have a set of differing views as expressed across various candidates". Why then is one settled with the idea that in using these graphing programs to "find the Blacks" that the Black people in the panhandle have the same desires in elected leadership as those in the more central region of the district? Might it be that the Blacks living in Butts County Georgia have a different lifestyle and preference in leadership than do the Blacks living in Dekalb County? Not according to the gerrymanderers.
It is also ironic that then candidate Barack Obama warned America that no Black inner city school child should be trapped into a segregated school building lest they receive a sub par education. Instead he called for INTEGRATION - where this Black kid would benefit from the presence of being next to a White kid. Why then do the same people argue for the construction of a SEGREGATED voting district?
The answer is clear - for certain Black operatives they want maximum advantage both coming and going. The majority Black voting district insures that a favorable Black Democrat will be elected. While the integrated school insures that the prevailing culture in that school is not one of the "failing urban school".
All of this racial consideration resides on top of some key issues that we are not supposed to talk about: CULTURAL, ECONOMIC AND BEHAVIORAL NORMS OF A GIVEN AREA AND THE PEOPLE WITHIN.
One of the key reasons why Black Flight is taking place is because those who are departing sees a threat to their own interests from the growing influx of a group of people who's values are not matched by their own. In a day where we as Black people can indeed move where we choose to - the choice is to vacate rather than fight. The Gerrymanders are always one or two steps behind the people's motivations and always will be. The biggest fear is to create static lines in which this new prevailing order will be left all alone, cut off from the people who vacated and thus experiencing the full effects of the arrangement that their aggregate thoughts and actions have expressed in the real world. Thus the actions of the legislators and those controlling the boundaries seek to presuppose that THEY know what is in the BEST INTERESTS OF THE PEOPLE and thus they must trump people's own SELFISH and SELF-INTERESTED movements. As with the taxation issue - "You may leave our district but we are going to functionally come after you by getting you via the next hierarchy of government". Since US House lines can span city and county boundaries - they actually have more power than do the local tax man".
Where is the community leadership to DO THE OPPOSITE? This meaning - standing and DEFENDING one's own interests by standing and enforcing the present order that has been proven to DELIVER? The Black community, for one, is resentful of those who seek to act as "conservators" of the present order. The collective memory for Black people comes from the WHITE FOLKS who sought to maintain WHITE SUPREMACY and the benefits that streamed to them because of it. In the process of perverting the concept of "protecting one's own interests" these Whites have also seared into the Black consciousness that TOLERANCE and OPENNESS TO ALL trumps standing up for one's own systems which has IN FACT EXPRESSED the standard of living that is sought after.
When BLACK PEOPLE BECOME THE SYSTEM - all bets are off!!! The only way to stop the constant migration is for people to take ownership of their own district, define the working order that is EFFECTIVE and to defend this order from all who threaten it. This will require the Black Establishment to shift from the "Civil Rights Mode" into the MANAGEMENT AND DELIVERY MODE.
Unlike the previous White racist - there must be respect for those who have a right to live within. Superficial attributes such as race should not be used as a disqualifier.
In closing - This VOLUNTARY dismissal of Racially Draw Districts is NOT going to be promoted by those who have GAINED ADVANTAGE with their presence. In fact those who call for the destruction of racialism in distribution of government larges are themselves called RACISTS (or at least Uncle Toms).
It is only when the Black community is brought to understand that WHAT IS GOOD FOR THE DEMOCRATS is not always good for OUR OWN COMMUNITY INTERESTS will this system be retired in favor of having more IDEOLOGICAL COMPETITION be expressed for our loyalites.
Presently the Democrats have nothing to lose in failing our communties and they often do so handsomely (or have you not been following the mayoral elections in Detroit?)
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