I guess as the number of people who deem it acceptable to display their overt racism in this social media age increases, so will the number of pastors who seem more than readily available to hop on the bandwagon of denying that many of the problems the black community is faced with are systemic.
It has become painfully obvious that more than a few of our black pastors are out of touch with the reality that we, as a community are faced with everyday.
Today, I watched Roland Martin discussing, or attempting to discuss, many of the issues that are faced today with Pastor E.W. Jackson. I must say, that much of the rhetoric put forth by Pastor Jackson really had me disheartened.
Listen to Roland Martin and Bishop E. W. Jackson
All Lives Carry The Same Value
There is so much I could say on this interview. The very first issue that had me so disturbed, were the views he expressed in regards to Black Lives Matter. It is a person’s prerogative to choose not to support a cause, but to outright call a movement demonic and spew such malicious misinformation used by so many others in an effort to discredit said movement is irresponsible.
BLM does not promote the idea that black lives matter more than other lives. It is a cause designed to show that black lives matter just as much as other lives. The life of a black man, woman, or child should carry the same value as any white man, woman or child.
This has seemed to elude the good pastor.
Systemic Racism On The Street
The second issue I have is that I am not sure how any black man who has watched the news, interacted regularly with other black men, or just walked the city streets can not know what white privilege is or that systemic racism exists. It is so easy to blame the majority of our woes on the breakup of the black family.
There are many people who will quickly blame the absence of a strong male in the household. There many who even argue that it is almost solely the fault of the single mothers raising these children.
Well, why don’t we talk about the start of the breakup of the black family, which can be attributed to a number of systemic issues. Let’s go back to a time when our women were left to raise their children alone because our men were being thrown in jail and/or beaten to death if it was only perceived that he had looked at a woman the wrong way.
Why don’t we look more closely at the issue of how drugs were introduced into our communities. Was it our poor, underprivileged peers that were traveling in and out of countries and across borders to get them to the streets?
Yes, no, maybe not……
That Was Then, This Is Now?
I am sure many critics would argue that was then; it is the past. Well, I have two counter arguments for that. The first argument being, how can it be considered the past if we have women like Sandra Bland ending up arrested and hung in a jail cell over failing to signal? How can it be in the past when we have countless incidents like Walter Scott, who was shot in the back eight times while running after a traffic stop for a non functioning brake light? I could go on with hundreds of instances of people being thrown into our prison system for the most minor of offenses. You can’t get over something that is still taking place. Even if it weren’t, we are dealing with generations of damage, brainwashing, degradation, all in the name of conditioning black folks to believe they are less than.
There is so much work to be done in our communities, much progress to be made. The only way this will be accomplished is if we are willing to come together to come up with substantive policies. If these pastors consider themselves leaders of our communities, they must be able to recognize the real issues that exist.
How can you fix what you don’t realize is broken?
