In the preview of tonights special, Soledad O'Brien will look at two brothers, Dr. Michael Eric Dyson and his brother Everett. Everett is serving a life term for a murder he committed, while his brother Michael is a respected author, minister and professor. What happened? They both say it was the choices they made. When Everett looks at his successful brother he says, "It is a testament to the fact that I could have done this or that or the other." Dr. Dyson brings up the controversial comment that it was partly based on colorism. [Meaning that blacks in America treat each other differently based upon the lightness or brightness of skin tone.]
In another segment last night Dr. Roland Fryer, a Harvard economist who is also Black in America, has a controversial program to pay students to get good grades. They can earn up to $250 in a program that tests them on 10 skills assessments. Should children earn money while learning? The principal of the school Marian Brown attests to progress the students have made. Not only will Dr. Fryer pay students to learn, but there is another program called "million" that will give one million New York school students a cell phone that is sophisticated. This cell phone will be off while in school and be a cell phone when out of school.
They profile a student Eric Kennedy, Jr. whose family is close to being homeless. Their subsidized apartment is being taken over by the owner. Eric wants to use some of the money he has earn to help his father pay the bills. Shouldn't learning be its own reward?
When tied to the failure of the public schools in New York, the Public Schools of St. Louis fare no better. The St. Louis City schools have been fatally damaged by the State Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. St. Louis has been fatally damaged by a law that allows Charter Schools to syphon money needed for the schools to turn around. The future of the St. Louis Public Schools is in the hands of the State. It will require new legislation to survive and there is little will power in the State Legislature to change the existing laws.
So to be Black in America is risky, dicey and dangerous. The special says to be Black in America is to be Single Mothers living on the margins, it means to be students at risk of homelessness and extended families that included the various ups and downs of life.
What can the church do? In interviews with Bishop T. D. Jakes and Pastor Smith of the Rand family church in Houston, the church didn't appear to have the answers. The struggle is complex. People and churches live within the paradox of life today. As Bishop Jakes put it, "we live between the ideal and the real." We preach the ideal, yet must minister with the realities. Life can be a paradox in Black America. So much promise, so much pain. Remember to check it out tonight.
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