Ding Dong. Go ahead. Take a peek. I know how annoying door to door people can get. Don't answer, I understand. Most people don't want to listen. But in this situation, please do. Grab the handle, turn it and open your ears. Progress. Is progress grabbing the handle? Is it opening the door? Or maybe it's actually opening yourself up...to listen, that is.
Progress can be simply defined. There is nothing tricky about the word, no high school senior pranks lurking around the corner of "progress." It is a display of improvement, an exponential growth of betterment. However, why is it so manageable to distort this definition? To confuse it with whatever it is we want to believe, or want others to believe?
Let's begin to solve the conundrum by using, what I think is, a better definition of the word. Malcolm X once said, "If you stick a knife nine inches into my back and pull it out three inches, that is not progress. Even if you pull it all the way out, that is not progress. Progress is healing the wound, and America hasn't even begun to pull out the knife."
Think of this quote as the one Jenga piece that is seemingly holding all the others intact in one, loose structure. Now, for the other pieces. Well, Malcolm. There is no argument in what he represents: the American Black community. Now, the knife. The knife is white supremacy, the white power structure that our country was and is run by. Defining these pieces might put things into perspective a little bit more.
The real, contemporary question: is President-elect Barack Obama progress? This happens to be a clear example of the distortion of definitions. Having a black president is monumental. It is a historic happening that will forever be remembered. It is all of these things. But is it progress? Is Obama helping to heal the wound, or will he do so? We must remember, especially in the black community, that Barack Obama does not save anyone from anything. This is not to downplay the significance of his election or of his person, but it is to say, we must keep a watchful eye. This is a man who once said blacks are "90% of the way to equality." A statement like this is obviously misinformed and only pleasing to the white population who strives to be "colorblind" and believe racism is near over in America. Obama still needs to maintain(at least slightly) a colorblind approach to our problems; and it is this colorblind approach that is dangerous, ineffective, and contradictorily racist at its core. He is still a politician, and still needs to please the majority of America to keep his presidency. The black community is not the majority of America. They are the majority of prisons. Progress?
That might be unfair to say at the moment seeing as Obama is not in office yet, but we have to ask ourselves...will these things change? Will mandatory minimums change? Will police tactics and racial profiling change? Will ghettos change? These are structures so deeply imbedded in America's political system that it is impossible for one man to change these things. That's why I take the time to ask you, is Obama progress? He is change; change for the better. He is hope. He is the first black president. Is he progress?
White supremacy's knife still dug deep within this election. This was easily detected by the racial slurs spat out at McCain rallies. And we sit here as if those are strange out-of-towners. Those are Americans! Those are majority. Those are the people Obama is trying to please, too. That does not mean he is focused upon them, but it does mean it is doubtful for him to focus on anyone specific, like the black community. The knife dug deeper with California's propositions. The highlight reel being Prop 8, which not only got passed, but followed with misinterpreted facts that placed the blame for its passing on the black community. The Prop that did not get as much attention, but was even more dangerous, was Prop 6. This allowed 14 year-olds to get tried as adults for gang-related crimes. Thankfully this did not get passed. However, the mere fact it was suggested is a grotesque twist of the knife. A Prop like this would have further destroyed ghettos and increased prison populations, which in return would destroy the black community as a whole. White supremacy reared its ugly head in this past election, and luckily Obama prevailed. Hope. But not progress.
Malcolm brings about a curious point in that progress is healing the wound. The hard part is, there seems to be so many wounds. Obama has the chance to make some progress; in the school system, for example. But is it progress when there are still so many knives waiting to be pulled out? So many wounds waiting to be healed? The deeply rooted racial evil of this country was nowhere near dented when Obama was elected our next president. Obama will give us hope, and he may give us change, but it is unrealistic for him to give us real progress. At least in his first term. This is my reasoning behind this piece. We must remember this. We must respect Obama and do all we can to help him, however remember that real progress is brought forth by togetherness. This is a wake up call, for lack of a better term. An alarm that rings out what we need to hear. It is our duty to keep an eye Obama, and help out where we can. We can not leave things solely up to him. He will not bring the black prison population down from over 50% to 12%(the American black population). He will not rid of mandatory minimums on crack/cocaine or police racial profiling. He will not, or he can not. We must all positively come together to help bring progress. And with our first black president around the corner, now is a great time to do it. Obama might get his hands on these knives. He might start to wiggle some of them out of there. Maybe even pull some out. My calling to you is, let's try to start healing these wounds.
