Mr. President,Stop Throwing Black People Under the Bus

When people can work, pay for affordable housing and send  their children to decent schools in their own communities, those communities  become safer. My logic is pretty elementary: folks will be less likely to engage  in crime in order to support basic needs, when they have jobs that can provide  for those needs. Moreover, the fact that young (White) professionals keep  gentrifying these “unsafe” urban spaces suggests that the infusion of resources  into communities precedes the reduction in crime.

Furthermore, the Obama administration’s continued investment in the very  questionable educational practices that catalyzed a  massive Chicago Teacher’s Strike last fall threaten to undermine any  affirmative steps he might take to reduce violence and poverty. Chicago Public  Schools are composed of 80% Black and Brown students, and Chicago teachers have  rebelled against the very kinds of corporate-influenced, test-driven education  policies that left Chicago youth as the ground zero of casualties in the  national school reform movement.

The challenges facing Black folks in Chicago are myriad, but they have  little to do with the decrease in marriage rates. For the president to focus his  attention there is an exercise in missing the point.

And Black youth and families in Chicago deserve better.

Brittney C. Cooper, Ph.D. is Assistant professor of Women’s and  Gender studies and Africana Studies at Rutgers University. She is also  co-founder of the Crunk  Feminist Collective.

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