Recently, a news story came about stating that Tawana Brawley had finally begun to pay her portion of a lawsuit over two decades ago, when she accused a group of white men of committing a heinous sexual assault and scrawling racial slurs across her body. A grand jury ultimately concluded that Brawley had falsified the accusations, and one of the accused, who happened to be an assistant DA, filed suit against Brawley, Brawley’s lawyers, and the civil rights leader who had stirred up the New York community against the accused rapists—Al Sharpton, who was making his national debut into the public consciousness. Now Brawley is 41, a nurse, and still refuses to recant her initial story, even though her story was debunked in court. Al Sharpton long settled his monetary debts in the lawsuit.
On November 12, another woman, Crystal Magnum is scheduled to to go on trial for murder of an ex-boyfriend. Magnum is the stripper at the center of the Duke Lacrosse Rape case and her accusations were also ultimately proven to be false. Again, Al Sharpton stirred up the community and pushed for punishment of the Duke Lacrosse players, even though they did not commit a crime. Al Sharpton to this day has still not apologized for his role in the case.
2 cases of alleged racism ultimately proven false. So why are we having to deal with Al Sharpton again and again on issues of race? Now, we are dealing with him again in the aftermath of the George Zimmerman case—not just because he is pushing for civil rights charges to be filed against George Zimmerman, but because he used his position at NBC to doctor an audio tape before the trial began to make George Zimmerman sound racist and turn public opinion further against him. (Please don’t kid yourselves—Al Sharpton’s fingerprints were all over that doctoring, even if he wasn’t directly involved.)
And that, in a microcosm, is why we can’t have a National Dialogue to address the real problems that the African American community has. Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, and other African-American “Leaders” are too busy trying to scream racism at every turn, but they go silent when thousands of young African-American are robbed of their future by violence, and when thousands more are raised in single mom households. Or worse, they criticize anyone who tries to offer serious solutions to the problems in the African-American community—whether white or black, conservative or non-conservative. Why? Al and Jesse and others are too busy profiting off of their communities’ suffering.
There’s just something wrong with these “leaders” attacking people like CNN’s Don Lemon for trying to speak out in trying to change a culture that is deteriorating. Lemon just wants the next generation to be better than the last one. What is wrong with that? It’s because these “leaders” don’t want to see the ugliness of what they have left in their wake. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream lies in ruins for all African-Americans. Sure, some have risen to incredible heights, but Dr. King’s vision was for ALL African-Americans to rise above his upbringing. He knew Jesse Jackson was not prepared to be a good leader, but Dr. King never got the chance to try and help Jesse see the error of his ways. Initially, Jesse had his heart in the right place, but once he entered the political realm, he abandoned helping out the African-American community as a while in favor of helping himself. Obviously, Jesse’s son learned from his dad, and look at where it has taken Jesse Jr.
It is high time for the President to commence with a National Dialogue on Race. It is time for the President to tell Jesse, Al, and other African-American leaders to either get serious on race issues or stand aside and let others try to solve the issues that affect the African-American community. Otherwise, there may not be an African-American community to save in the near future.
A good place to start would be the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington and Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. It is time for Jesse, Al, and other Civil Rights Leaders to recommit to Dr. King’s dream. It’s time to stop the “Self-Destruction”, because that’s where Dr. King’s Dream is heading on its present course with it’s current leaders in charge.
No comments:
Post a Comment