Livin’ Proof to the Young Black Youth

By now, I’m sure most of you have seen the horrifying footage of the senseless death of Derrion Albert. A brief rundown of the facts – Albert, 16, was an honor student at Christian Fenger Academy High School on Chicago’s South Side.  On his way home from school, a vicious mob jumped him, clubbing him in the head with a railroad plank, punching him in the face, and finally stomping his lifeless body as it lay on the ground. Sadly, all of this was recorded with a cell phone camera. No one intervened.

I don’t even know where to begin on this one. Unanswered questions abound. Why the hell were railroad ties lying around outside a school in the middle of Chicago? Why did the police take so long to arrive? Where was security? And most importantly, why is black life, especially young black male life, so cheap?

We’ve all heard the grim statistics – more black men in prison or jail than in college (not true, by the way, but that’s a story for another day).  Nearly half of all black children live without their father in the home. More than 70 percent of black children are born out of wedlock, with the vast majority raised by single mothers. But you can make numbers look like whatever spin you give them.  Obviously, several significant socio-economic factors play a substantial role in these stats. But the ultimate question is this – what are we going to do about it?

I don’t know the answer to that question, but I do know that some mythical, messianic Superhero Negro figure can’t do it. We’ve already been down that road. A Million Man March won’t take care of it either – we went down that path before too.  Essentially, it comes down to a matter of personal responsibility. The government can’t mandate the way we raise our children or take care of our communities. That’s on us. And when we fail to do that, as in the case of the hoodlums who savagely beat and killed Darrion Albert, we have no one to blame but us.