As many of you know by now, Mark S. Hampton with Black Enterprise Magazine, begins a new radio program this weekend Rebranding Black America. He posed the question in our forum on www.LinkedIN.com/ and here's what I had to say.
#1 BLACK ISSUE IN AMERICA, WHAT IS IT?
Using other people's thoughts, ideas and concepts as the litmus test. The adaptation of the slave mentality. Being in a constant crisis and a permanent welfare state. Never leading the pack...always following and not even do that well. The Koreans never reinvent the wheel. They just imitate and imitate well.
We wear formal education like a badge of honor, but barely use it to edify our own community. We simply sell, barter & loan our talent out to build someone else's destiny, empire, conglomerate & dream. We enjoy being the HNIC all while leaving no worthwhile legacy. We accumulate material things to impress people we don't even know or like for that matter. We only "give" at church, where money is oftentimes squandered by pulpit pimps with selfish & self serving intentions. Never the hero always the victim needing rescue. We open "bitnesses", but never grow an enterprise. We lie, steal, rob & cheat each other worse than the white man ever could have imagined we'd do. We think Black Business is inferior, but when you often get inferior service along with an inferior attitude who can blame the impression(s) we leave. We raise our children to be slaves to the same rhythm. It's perpetual.
We expect the government to grant us money for every single aspect of our existence. College, Day Care, Business Start Up, Business Failure etc. We recognize and reward failure more than achievement. With many Black nonprofit organizations focusing time, energy, money & resources trying to save the so called at risk youth...while ignoring our best & brightest and pushing them right into the hands of the "man" who grants them scholarships because we squander resources on the juvenile delinquent whose daddy wasn't in the house. We major in the minor. Forgetting what's important. Everybody isn't college material and quite frankly DOESN'T deserve the chance.
We have lost our sense of community because we collectively can't stand living amongst and around each other. We pass each other on the streets and won't even speak. We go to networking conferences & events and get the temporary high. Then the reality of not having a single source of community based support sets in. And we are back at square one with no motivation. Black owned Banks follow the same rules of their slave master white owned banks. If the criteria is the exact same with no sensitivity to the community, I could just take my rejection from the white run banks. Koreans, Chinese & people from India.....cater their services to their community. And although everyone falls under the Banking Commission Regulations, those communities do not allow the white man to set the criteria as to whom they will and will not lend money to. You will only find Koreans, Chinese & Indians working at their own banks & lending institutions...no affirmative action there.
But no. We've got to imitate what we THINK makes success and we aren't getting anywhere as a community as a result. Immigrant Latinos & Asians are taking over our prideful Black Mecca here in Atlanta. In the last 10 years the Latino Business Community has grown 101% & the Asian Business Community 74%. All while we are flagrant with our money & buying power thus making them richer while complaining about them stepping off a boat and into a mansion. Our slave mentality is to blame. An attitude of entitlement because we won't stop sucking the titty of white people. Always crying about how we've been treated historically then trusting everything they teach us about business & community.
We are the most creative & resourceful people on the planet. And our #1 issue is failure to use that creativity for ourselves. And setting our own standards for success. And developing our own rules of engagement. We demand nothing worthwhile, we get nothing worthwhile. We are the constant social experiment politically. And the last out the gate economically. That's no accident. That's by
design. And merely by our choice. It's a choice we've chosen over innovation!
Swan Simpson @FilmworksCEO is an Opinionated, Politically Incorrect, Agent, Filmmaker, TV Producer, Writer, Blogger, Entrepreneur, Spiritual Thinker, Sports Fanatic http://swandriasimpson.brand-yourself.com/
