The Liberal Obsession With Whiteness At The Expense Of Instilling Academic Excellence In Black Communities

Various observers are dissecting the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling that schools in Jefferson County, Ky., and Seattle, Wash., cannot use race as a tiebreaker when assigning students to schools. Most conservative commentators are hailing the ruling as a step toward color-blind equality, while most liberal commentators are claiming that the ruling is America's regression to the days of Jim Crow. My focus is not on whether or not white folks were "victims", which led to these court cases. My focus is the case's impact on black folks, particularly our psyche and its implications for black progress.

My argument is that in order for Black America to progress, most black liberals - and this also goes for the disssenting, white liberal Supreme Court justices in the ruling - must stop clinging onto the subtle and not-so-subtle notions that majority black environments = inferior in their rabid arguments in favor of racially integrated schools. Black people's focus should not be on whether forced integration of majority white schools will benefit black children and the chasing of white folks into their environments - which, as black nationalists have correctly argued for decades - is a continually failing quest to get white folks to accept black folks. This wishful, white supremacist thinking is wasted energy that should instead be deployed in improving ourselves. Not to mention the fact that around the world, whites are not even achieving a replacement birth rate, and thus will continue to be less and less important to black life chances in future years. Rather, we should encourage more blacks to improve the conditions of the schools in own communities so Black America is prepared for the demands of the 21st Century. Instead of a obsession with whiteness, I (and others) call for a paradigm shift where we obsess over blackness and work to improve Black America.

Much of the black response to the Supreme Court's ruling reminds me of a modern-day example of the late black leftist W.E.B. DuBois' "double consciousness" theory, where black Americans are more concerned with white folks and what they think of us instead of us working on ourselves. It is up to us to get beyond this gripping mentality, as it is undermining Black America's progress. I can't stand to see the NAACP and other mostly black organizations carry on as if the absence of white students is more important than the presence of academic achievement for black children's future. Their actions show that they - and mostly white liberal groups like the ACLU as well - believe the white supremacist ideology that an all-black setting = inferior and thus black children cannot excel in all-black or mostly-black environments. I expect white liberals to believe such nonsense and support social engineering over quality schools for black children, but black liberals should have far more confidence in our people and it is a shame that too many of them do not.

Achieving racial diversity in education should not be a compelling interest to black folks. If it happens, it happens. What should be the compelling interest is creating academically rigorous, culturally sound, and safe schools in our own communities. Most liberals claim that American whites are racist. Yet they want to expose black children on a day-to-day basis to the very folks whom they condemn for their racial attitudes, and yelp when legal rulings prevent the government from engaging in such social engineering. That is contradictory, not to mention at times violates freedom of association (1st Amendment). What most liberals will not acknowledge is that the educational challenges before black students is not because there are not enough white students occupying seats next to them, but issues like (1) parental involvement in education; and (2) choice of schools that are tailored more to the specific needs of black students and the desires of black parents. E.g., schools with stricter discipline, schools with longer hours and more days around the year so black kids retain more of what they learn, and yes, even a cultural choice of religious vs. secular schools. How well and what black children are learning - both at school and especially at home - are now the key issues, not access. The absence of white students is far less important to solid schools than is the presence of these factors - especially parental involvement, which is the top indicator of how well a black child does in school - and it is these factors that should obsess Black America.

One poster was blunt about discussing these factors on BlackProf.com: "The key to the 'race gap' in education is parents. Plain and simple. If black parents were more involved in their children's education and enforced studying, homework, did not tolerate laziness, did not tolerate bad behavior at school; black children would perform better. As long as the bastardy rate of black children stays around 70% and black males are not home to enforce discipline this will continue. It has nothing to do with the fact a white boy is not sitting next to them in class." However, I would take it a step further than the BlackProf.com poster. Black America's goal should not be to play "catch up" to whites or any other race. Rather, it should be to strive to be the best, so good that others are playing catch up to us.

Nor am I buying liberals' argument that the presence of white children is needed in order to ensure adequate school funding for black children. That was a primary concern back in the 1950s, but not today. Many of the blackest school districts in America - controlled by black administrators - spend more money per child that most lily-white suburban schools, and yet black children still underperform as a group. Clearly other issues are in play here. School choice advocates like myself say tax dollars anyway should follow a child to the schools of their choice, not the school itself. This move would drive reform in public education through competition, and also enhance individual freedom. And drawing from my previous post pondering about a bookerista form of communitarianism, this would also enhance group freedom of blacks to progress.

The next step should be for Black America to push for school choice so we can create more innovative programs in black communities -- programs tailored to our specific communities' needs -- instead of the government one-size-fits-all schools. We need more focus on choice, and on the personal responsibility of far more black parents to get truly serious about their children's education and not expect it to happen by osmosis.