I told this story to a few people in class on Monday, and they suggested I share it on the blog.
My mother and her older sister had the same education at the same schools (all over the country, as they moved quite often) and had the same access to resources and encouragement. Today, my mother is married to a CEO, stays at home with her four children, and is financially able to pay for college for all four of us. My aunt had two children by two affairs, and those children each of two children, each from two affairs. Both cousins use drugs, both have been to prison, and neither graduated from high school. My cousins are black. But that is not the explanation for their situation.
The explanation is that they were raised by someone who was unmotivated and unable to properly care for them. They didn't have a reason to graduate high school, and they didn't have a reason to not do drugs. They don't have a reason to not have children without spouses or the proper resources to care for them, and they don't have the reasoning to obey the law.
Unfortunately, these descriptions reflect a similar difference when viewing America through statistics. There are fewer black people graduating from high school (http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/ewp_08_t01.htm), more unwed black parents (http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/unmarry.htm) and more blacks in prison for drug usage (Professor Levan's lecture).
In my mind, this has much less to do with the slavery, and more to do with it's true legacy - resource disparities. These resources are both concrete (schools with supplies, grocery stores in neighborhoods, police on the streets, money in the bank) and personal (motivation and community support). This is where the American government should target their financial reparations. Work on what seems like the details - improve the schools, improve the neighborhoods, improve the parents - with whatever money is available - and we might be able to close these gaps.
I also want to add that I do not think a lack of personal motivation is a good reason to explain why people are not successful or able to provide for themselves and their families. My aunt, the mother of my cousins, would give anything to make life better for her grandchildren, my second cousins. But with little education and strained relationships with everyone from the foster care system to her own relatives, she's stuck in a cycle she slipped into a long time ago. There are many people in our country who work hard and improve their lives, and there are just as many people who'd like to, but who don't have the resources to make it happen.
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1 comment:
Thanks for sharing your story with the rest of us Maggie. I think personal experiences like this are an important way to get to know the issues beyond statistics. I agree, I truly believe it is more an economic issue. While many resources provided by the government are very similar in different areas of the country possibly the most important resource, loving and involved parents, cannot be issued by the government. Unfortunately no matter how involved a parent wants to be if they are under financial pressures often they will be forced to decide between making sure their child does their homework, or taking an extra shift to pay for dinner. This is a difficult decision to make and I don’t know what the right answer is. The government does try to reduce this pressure through tax deductions etc. but unfortunately these policies only tend to encourage the troubled parent to have more children. I think it is these deductions and government subsidies that should be eliminated and the funds redirected to after-school programs where the child can be held accountable and learn the skills they need to become a productive member of society.
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