zlacker

I'd step in as black guy coming from what I'd qualify as a priviledged background in Africa. So I don't think I can really understand the issues for black communities in America. But in my opinion, what is lacking for black communities is usually a global community strategy that free individuals energy by showing some beaten track they can easily use to reach the position people before them reached and build over this to move higher. Sometimes I have the feeling that black people fight the wrong fight. You can't ask for change without power and in today world it means capital. Black as a "race" is more than 1 billion individuals that's enough to foster anything important for the community as a whole. I don't know for the US but for France very few black people support black initiatives. They usual answer is that they'll do it when they earn more but we all know that money is never enough... In a world where your real voting power is your dollars this can't work. Asians understood this maybe instinctively. You have to build a working community first (paths for education, culture, jobs, households...) so that any average black person get a "good environment" to nurture its growth so he can become a good, balanced, caring adult.

The strategy so far was to publicly and politically fight (which is good) but after each protest the individuals are back to their own struggles with little to no help or care from other black people (again as a community). If everyone cares only for it's own issues it won't work. Our role is to educate young black people. Tell them how the world is but also show them that they have a functional place in it and that they can start to build it from elementary school!

>>idjang+(OP)
The problem is that white institutions have systematically torn down attempts by Black folks to build such social and economic capital. Eg: CIA introduction of drugs in middle class black neighborhoods, redlining, over policing black and brown neighborhoods, and just straight up bombing black neighborhoods.

It’s difficult to do this work when the system is trying its best to stop you.

>>Ar-Cur+9e
This is true, however teaching to our kids that nation state actors can try to subvert and combat any initiatives that they deem a threat and to get creative when trying to build for the future to mitigate against this threat is important.

It's also hard because a lot of positive opportunity for black kids growing up (at least in my experience Cincinnati, Ohio mid/late 90's early 2000s) has mainly come in through athletic sport initiatives, which was interesting to me as a kid to some degree, I was more interested in things not pertaining to athletic sports. Hell, I can barely relate to college educated black people who/want to work for companies like FB/GOOG/etc…