Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree

POWER TO ALL OF THE PEOPLE

I'm just as angry and disgusted over what Black people have been forced to endure in this country as anyone else, but there are two reasons why I don’t spew bitterness. First, I can see beyond my anger, so I recognize that there are issues that are much more important than my right to vent that need to be considered, and one of the most important of those issues is - at least, in terms of the Black community - by constantly venting into the ears of our youth, we give young Black people a convenient excuse for failure. The fact is, some of us are lazy and less than ambitious anyway (just like many in every other group), so when young people are constantly bombarded with a message that says that the White man is evil, conniving, and intent on holding Black people down, it makes it much too easy for them to say, "Why even try? The White man ain't gon' let me move forward anyway." We don’t need that. On the contrary, we need to inspire our young people and instill a sense of confidence and determination in them. We are what we think, so the very last message that we want to send to our youth is one of impotence and defeat.
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The second reason that I don’t indulge in spewing anger is because it plays into the hands of the enemy. We’re currently knee-deep in a class war, and we’re facing an enemy who doesn’t care any more about poor and middle-class White folks than they do Black people. Yeah, they want to keep Black people down - at least, poor and middle-class Black people - but their ultimate mission is to undermine and subjugate ALL poor and middle-class people of EVERY race, creed and color. And keeping us divided is their most potent and effective weapon in doing just that. So when we’re constantly going around talking about the White man this, and the White man that, we're not only being ignored by those people (including some Blacks) who are actually trying to undermine us, but we're alienating White people who want to be, and should be, our allies in the struggle for universal justice. So why cut our own throats just for the satisfaction of venting our anger?
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The poor and middle class in this country have been under a brutal and growing assault for the past thirty-five years. It has been documented that Ronald Reagan flooded the inner cities with crack to support his illegal war in Nicaragua (in which we’re still suffering the ill affects, and he should have been both impeached and jailed for); our public educational system has been underfunded and under assault, leaving many of us incapable of accurately assessing our political environment; organized labor, the first line of defense for keeping the poor and middle class out of total destitution, has been all but decimated; and now, these malevolent forces are aiming at the middle-class safety net - programs such as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment insurance - which were initiated by Franklin Delano Roosevelt to protect the poor and middle class from literal starvation during and after the Great Depression.
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So this is no time for the poor and middle class to be divided. It is essential that we ALL come together to protect our collective interests. If we don't, we’re all going to find ourselves enslaved under the yoke of corporate feudalism - and yes, it can happen here, and that reality looms closer than most people think. Actually, there’s a very strong possibility that it could be as close as one successful Republican election away, because the demographics are against the GOP, so they’re in a panic, and they’ve clearly demonstrated that they’re without limits. So if they ever manage to regain control of government, they’re not giving it up again - regardless to what they have to do . . .
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Retired army general, and FOX News analysis, Paul Vallely, is quoted as telling Arizona Tea Party Patriots, "I had a call this afternoon from Idaho. The gentleman said, ‘If I give you 250,000 Marines to go to Washington, will you lead them?’" Vallely said, as the group laughed and gasped. "I said, ‘Yes, I will. I’ll surround the White House and I’ll surround the Capitol building, but it’s going to take physical presence to do things" (http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/27/fox-news-analyst-tells-tea-party-group-he-can-lead-a-military-coup-against-obama/).

So it behooves poor and middle-class Black and White people to wake up, put our petty differences aside, and come together as a viable political force that’s ready to pitch a tooth-and-nail battle for the future of this nation. If we don’t, the Tea party and the Klan, the Black Guerilla Army, and the Mexican Mafia, are all going to find themselves shoulder-to-shoulder picking virtual cotton on the very same plantation. 
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Ironically, many White people already recognize this fact - that’s why Barack Obama is President today. But due to our unique historic background, lack of formal education, the proliferation of urban legends disseminated by poverty pimps, and lingering bitterness, many Black people are resistant to this reality. 
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While it is undeniable that some White people are dogs (just like some Black people), we now have undeniable evidence that MOST of them are good people who just want to live and let live in peace and harmony. If that were not the case, Obama wouldn’t have been elected president - twice. No, Obama’s election doesn’t mean that this is a post-racist society, but what it does say is, bigotry is being maintained and perpetuated by a minority of the White community.
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Consider this - even if they had allowed us to stay home, and they automatically posted the vote of every Black man, woman, and child in America for Obama, there still wouldn’t have been enough of us to elect him President of the United States. Black people are only 13.6 percent of the population. So if only one hundred votes were being cast to determine the presidency, and every group was given the number of votes that corresponded to their percentage of the population, Black people would only be given 14 votes. But in order for Obama to become president, he needed 51 votes. Where did those other 37 votes come from? I’ll tell you where they came from - many of them came from White people. Obama could never have been elected president without them. So that’s in direct conflict with the message that the majority of White people are racist bigots. Numbers don't lie, so while it may satisfy the anger of those who allege that to be the case, the numbers simply don't validate their claim.
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In addition, even during the Civil War, as brutal as this country was toward Black people, there were enough White men of good conscience around who decided to leave the love, advantage, and comfort of their homes and families to engage in the most brutal war that this country has EVER engaged in to free Black people from bondage - yes, there were other issues involved, but I’m not going to entertain a lot of nitpicking on this issue, because I see through it, just like I see through the racist arguments of White bigots.
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Well, maybe I'll address the most prominent argument -  that this was not about slavery for these people; it was just a matter of citizens falling in step behind their government. The biggest obstacle to that argument is, we know that the Civil War involved much more than just a routine conflict between opposing government policies. The reason that we know it involved deeply felt, soul-searching, and moralistic passions, was because fathers were fighting sons. That fact alone speaks volumes. Personally, I can't even imagine a cause that I would be so passionate about that I would take up arms against my son. But these people did find such a cause.
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The bottom line is, the ultimate impact of these people's sacrifice brought slavery to an end. That’s a fact that cannot be denied. So when we run around talking about "THE White man's a racist dog," that not only implies, but specifically states, that ALL White men are racist dogs, which constitutes the very worst kind of profiling of, for my money, some of the finest and most selflessly courageous people who ever lived. Black people might STILL be on a plantation - YOU might still be on a plantation - if it were not for these morally courageous people. So by broad-brushing ALL White people it represents the thumbing of our noses at many people, and their families, who made the ultimate sacrifice on our behalf. So to lump such people in with racist bigots, is the very height of ingratitude.
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Thus, as I see it, we who truly believe in justice, and not JUST-US, and are not just using the word "justice" as a pretext to spew garden variety racism, should be just as dedicated to ensuring justice for those who didn't just pay lip service to the concept, but who actually sacrificed their lives for the cause of justice. They had our back, so we should have theirs, and the backs of the descendants that they left behind.
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For that reason, I asked a very good friend of mine to focus on solutions rather than bitterness when posting to my Facebook wall, because when I say I believe in justice, I mean it. I seek justice not only for Black people, but for ALL people. Therefore, I’m not going to tolerate racism or bigotry of any kind on my wall - regardless to which direction it comes from - and I was very gratified to find that my friend understood that fact by indicating that we were on the same page, because there's a word for the concept of justice for some - hypocrisy - and it's poised to destroy us all, and this nation.
 

Eric L. Wattree
Http://wattree.blogspot.com
[email protected]
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
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