Read a piece by a college-educated black woman who complained about rape carried out by white masters on female slaves during the period when slavery still existed, which no doubt happened and perhaps was even common. She claimed bitterly that her skin was “rape skin,” as her DNA showed Caucasian strains. Here was a woman who was bitter about rapes that took place over 170s years ago.
She was never herself a slave who was raped. Her parents were never slaves. Probably not even her grandparents were ever slaves. You would have to go back to her great grandparents to arrive at actual slaves who might have been exposed to this travesty, yet she was wrapping herself in this victim mentality for what happened way back when slavery existed in the 19th century. Sorry, but I don’t buy this victim-diatribe by a college-educated and therefore clearly somewhat privileged individual today.
Where I do see real victims among Afro-Americans today is among the young male, inner-city dropouts from high school, whose only option is to trade drugs and some other crimes, out of necessity. The drug dealers often carry a large wad of money (and a gun) with them in their “business,” so they present themselves as targets by others who prey on them with robberies and, if necessary, killings. Here is a person who does qualify for my sympathy, as he has a predictably short lifespan and no way out.
If we were to do something real to approach black inequality in the United States, doing something about that precise situation would be a good place to start. Getting the young black drug dealer or petty criminal out of that situation and into a viable alternative lifestyle would be tangible progress. But how do you do that? How do you rescue that person from his dangerous and likely short life? How do you save this real victim whose terrible circumstance deserves our sympathy?
To take this a step further, just talking about drug dealers and petty criminals is way to narrow. I would say that all black high-school dropouts in the inner city are the real — as opposed to imaginary — victims of our society today. How do you provide this underclass with a viable alternative for a more successful life — because they are the real victims, the ones left behind?
Henry's Views 