Black Folks Just Don't Get It

African-Americans have the highest levels of unemployment in America. Causally African-Americans have the lowest level of business ownership. Relatedly, Most African-American businesses hire no more than one person. Also relatedly, African-American businesses, in most markets generate 1% or less of the business profits in the markets they are in. Why is this?

The answer is simple. Look at every ethnic conclave in a given city. Go to the Chinatowns of Manhattan and Queens. Go to the Hispanic sections of Paterson and Passaic. Go to the Italian and Russian neighborhoods of Howard and Brighton Beach. Go to the Jewish neighborhoods in Crown Heights and Williamsburg. What do you find there? You find the businesses owned and operated by the ethnic members of the communities. The businesses that cater specifically to the cultural needs of those communities. The foods. The clothes, The entertainment. The religious artifacts, etc.

Who are they employing? People from the neighborhood and/or people who have recently immigrated into the neighborhood from "a foreign" (Jamaican slang for "overseas").

Generally speaking when you go into a heavily black neighborhood you do not find this. What you find are stores owned by various ethnic and racial groups. Retail outlets. Laundromats. "corner stores in the middle of the block" (Yes I know the author. Yes, buy his book.) "Supermarkets" with spoiled and near spoiled products. What businesses do the black people in these places usually own? The barbershop and the hair saloon. And the latter usually depends on "hair care" products purchased from some other ethnic group that I decline to name but everybody in the "hood" knows.

Oh yes, then there's local drug trade. Possibly the greatest employer of black men without a college or HS education in America...up there with....prison.

ahhh but this is not the WHYYY...

Yes, to quote the Merovingian of Matrix fame. This is not the why. It would be easy to blame the interloping immigrants and other various non-whites for "invading" the hood and "making" black folks buy stuff from them. That would be easy. That's like Black Revolutionary Rhetoric 101. I'm way past that class. If you wanna roll with The Ghost(tm) You have to graduate to the post Bach program of Garveyism.

Way back in the last century Garvey told black folks the world over that if they wanted respect and employment and nationhood that was not dependent upon the whims of other groups of people, you must do business with and for yourself. To that end Garvey launched the Black Star Line and the Black Star Factories. The Black Star Line and Factories were to employ "negroes" in various "negro" communities with the goal of making said communities self-sufficient. The BSL would have acted as a means of distributing black goods (crops, finished goods) around the globe, thereby connecting the Africans of various nations in commerce for their collective benefit.

Every other group of ethnics that come to America understand this basic concept. Black folks STILL don't get it. Today's example from Change.org:

Petitioning Mattel
Mattel: Offer party supplies featuring Barbies of Color

My African American daughter asked me for a Barbie party theme featuring a black Barbie for her birthday this year. I thought surely, with all of the dolls of color Barbie sells, that it would be no problem to find the party supplies with Barbies of color. Little did I know that not only would I find nothing featuring Barbies of color, but that the only line of party supplies Mattel offers features various huge, blown up images of a blonde haired blue-eyed Barbie on literally everything except for some very small images of a brown-skinned Barbie and a brunette (possibly meant to be Hispanic) Barbie on a tablecloth, and a set of a handful of hanging decorations. Even though it seems like a small thing, featuring the white Barbie so prominently on the banners, cups, napkins, plates, party favors, and invitations, while relegating the "ethnic" Barbies to near-invisible cameos sends a clear--and troubling--message to young girls. As parents of children of color, we're basically faced with the choice of either foregoing a Barbie theme altogether, or compensating for Mattel's lack of sensitivity through labor-intensive DIY solutions. Check out this blog of a mother who went so far as to print out labels of Black Barbies at home and stick them to party supplies: http://ebonylove10.blogspot.com/2011/12/how-to-have-black-barbie-party.html

The above is testament to the utter SAD state of economics among African-Americans.

Mattel's apparent "oversight" is actually a business opportunity for African-Americans. Why the hell would black folks cede a market for African-American dolls to Mattel instead of creating and buying one of their own, created by their own, and employing black men and women to design, build, manage and distribute them?

This is why I didn't spend time in this piece making disparaging remarks about so called "blood sucking Jews" and dumb stuff like that. If black folks are dumb enough to volunteer to hand other people their money and intellectual property, then why should I be mad at them for accepting it?

I don't WANT Mattel to make a black Barbie. I want a collection of black folks to make an "Akua" doll. I want that doll to come in every shade of brown that African-Americans come in. I want the set to have the most "nappiest" headed doll to the Jamaican red, purple, green and whatever color extension that African-American women put in their heads ('cause I'm not here to judge what black women do with their hair. I just prefer how it comes out their head.). I want her wearing all kinds of outfits whether it be Zulu mudcloth, a wrapper, Hijab, Pum-pum shorts or whatever else we see black women wearing.

I could go on and on because I see the huge, global picture. I don't have time or the inclination to do simpleton, dependency bullshit like ask Mattel to do things that black folks should be doing themselves.

If you don't understand what I'm saying or disagree with it because it offends your "liberal sensibilities", I'm sure there is a white college or other institution dependent upon white philanthropy that will be quite willing to employ you to spread the status quo while thinking you're actually doing something "different".