Good Old Bill Cosby

Hmph... I see Good Old Bill Cosby is pandering to get himself into massah's good graces again. I don't disagree with everything he said in the latest "Black folks have to do better" rant that has been attributed to him. But he left out quite a few other contributing factors to the plight of Black people in America, especially as it pertains to education. He doesn't talk about the lack of funding for resources that aren't being channeled to inner city schools (that they blame on lack of census data), or racially biased standardized testing, or the school to prison pipeline. He dare not speak on "white privilege" or the fact that teachers who teach in suburban districts make far more than those who teach in the inner city.

 I agree that it is past time for us to stop "Blaming the White Man"; but only for the things that "The White Man" doesn't deserve blame for. We can't pretend that America, in its current state, and with its ugly history aren't partially to blame for the socioeconomic disparities between Black and Brown people and White people here.

Look around you. Look at yourself and your friends and family who get up at the crack of dawn everyday and bust their ass to make a living for their families. Look at how they do everything they can to make upstanding citizens out of their children. Then look at where they still are; toiling at the bottom of someone's corporate ladder despite going back to school to get more and more degrees to appease society's need for documentation of commitment.

Don't you find it peculiar that everyone keeps saying that the playing field has been leveled but you and your team can't seem to get out of your own end-zone? If it were simply a matter of wanting better and doing better, I have no doubt that the vast majority of us would have already reached the promised land. Don't be fooled into thinking that it's just that easy. There are any number of systematic obstacles both old and new in place to keep you backed up against your own goal-line. Sure, there are some who have managed to traverse the obstacle course. But the problem lies in them making it across mid-field then never looking back to make a block for those left behind.  So it's not just the poor and uneducated that need to do better. Those that have experienced some level of success need to do better as well.