[Blackwatch]

Doggystyle,
I see your point about self-empowerment. I understand the patronization of white liberalism and its obvious attack on the humanity of black folk. I have been persecuted in many sociology seminars for standing up for the autonomy and power that black people have to TAKE for ourselves, to the bewilderment of many of my white collegues and professors. But understand this, I advocate for us as a people to rise up as a collective and stake our claim to humanity being based on freedom, justice and equality. This is not done simply by allowing a few who are "fortunate enough" or "acceptable enough" to be pacified by the status symbols of degrees and SUV's, but true empowerment is about control of our own destiny. Some may think that we have control, but I do not see it when I observe this society critically. If this sounds like socialism, then I am a socialist, but so is the Prophet Isaiah who told of a day when true "fasting" ,or we can today say religious practices, would entail "...loose[ing] the chains of injustice and untie[ing] the chords of the yolk, to set the oppressed free and break every yolk ...to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter....and not turn away from your own flesh and blood"!(58:6-8 niv)


Throughout the history of the children of Israel, the prophets warned that the economic and political inequality in the land was indicative of the fact that the system that they lived under was not of God. Oppression is the chief indicator that the system is not godly. Doggystyle, I see inequality and oppression in this land, and as a lover of God and righteousness, my conscience is seared by the sight of social inequality. The thought of people justifying inequality and becoming complacent with injustice (so much so to be willing to give up the fight against it, out of some self righteous yet selfish notion of "I got mine, how come they can't get theirs") seem to me to be uncritical at best, and arrogant to say the least. You talk as though inequality is justified and that the church shouldn't speak against it. Capitalism is unjust, not because Marx said so, but because the Bible says so. So you not only indite me, but you also indite the Old Testament Prophets, and Jesus the Christ Himself.


You call this view paternalistic and patronizing, yet you are the one saying things like " we have to spoon feed these people" obviously stating that "these" people are infantile and need to be fed. Obviously you do not see them as you see yourself. What ever happened to the notion that Jesus himself taught, about loving your neighbor as you love yourself? I do not take such a stance, for the Bible teaches us that we are all saved (how ever you want to take it) by grace, not by our own might. I am thankful for the opportunities in life that I have been given, as well as the talents that God has blessed me with. I also recognize that it is but the grace of God that I have been given them. It is but for the grace of God that oppression hasn't killed my hope like it has for so many of "these people" that you say are not motivated to do for self. You say that I am saying that our people are too stupid to do for self, but I am saying that our ignorance (not stupidity) is not a character flaw, as you suggest (by suggesting that our people need to "evolve" as if they are less than you), but a symptom of systemic oppression. God given potential gives people only the ability, but you also need the chance in order to survive. That chance only comes through the conscious struggle against systemic inequality. The only way to "repay" God is to pay it forward by letting "my light shine" so that all people may see what God can and will do in their lives by advocating against social inequality and injustice.



Jesus came and taught, was it out of a paternalistic sense of "you're too stupid and inept to do for yourself"? I think not, but Jesus taught out of a keen sense of our collective condition (we are all fallen from grace, thus it is by grace that certain of us are 'successful' and others are "not succesful" in this lifetime.) Everyone has been created with God given potential to be great. What stops it is not God, but, as you say, the self. This self is created in a social context of injustice, poverty, white supremacy, the list can go on and on. Empowerment ain't just about gettin' yours economically, but it is about gettin' ours in the battle for our true humanity; spiritually, mentally, and physically. Social justice is Self empowerment!!! When you look into that mirror, as see yourself, you don't just see that infant that was fresh out of the womb, you see the years that slavery characterised this country, the resentment of your childhood in poverty and racism, the vast and deep effects of social inequality, the hatred that was filled in the TV screen as you saw countless black men on the news for burglary or armed robbery, you see the three strikes laws, you see the God given potential battling through our fallen humanity. Your history of experiences and environment make up your "self". To release that godly potential, we have to struggle personally and collectively against this "self".


So how can you separate politics and religion? You might as well throw the Prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Habbakuk, Amos; Our Lord and Savior Jesus the Christ, and a whole slew of theologians after them into the same mix as Jesse Jackson, because they all recognized that (as I remix Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) spiritual enlightenment comes with not just personal development, but our recognition that I do not develop into all I can be (and all that God wants me to be) without desiring and advocating for a just society, so that my fellow human beings flourish and are allowed to develop into all that God wants them to be.

Blackwatch!!!!!!