Michael Nelinson
06/26/2020

As our minds are hijacked by those who seek to politicize and polarize the social issues that have arisen in our diverse, complex “United” States:  we must be willing to openly discuss their causes and seek out real solutions.  In order to take the first step, we must accept that we need to remove the emotional biases that are driven by politicians and the news media and recognize that these entities serve only themselves and their respective corporate and political partners that support their interests.  As long as “We the People,” coalesce and accept that their goal is to solve complex social issues, we will be fed an unhealthy diet of temporary solutions that will leave us both malnourished and unsated. Unfortunately, looking at racism as purely a black and white phenomenon, is to be painfully unaware of the historical, sociological and psychological factors that have brought us to this crossroad in our national history. Understand, my intention is not to offend my reader’s sensitivities but to start a discussion on rational scientific solutions to societal problems not placing temporary Band-Aids on historical problems.

Having spent my life in a very multi-cultural reality, I can look back historically over the last half-century and comment on the evolution of a “black culture” that exists along side the dominant white Christian culture that has been the dominant culture before the authorship of our Constitution and the signing of the Declaration of Independence.  From a sociological perspective, culture is driven by the dominant class of society, one’s ability to “acculturate” oneself to the dominant culture offers the possibility of greater participation in the “means of production” and thus greater financial success. If we go back to the data, one inferential statement can be made regarding the problems with standardized testing, which has shown that the better an individual is acculturated to the dominant culture, the higher the score.  ETS and their peers have struggled long and hard to remove cultural bias from their tests over the past forty years, however, if we are trying to correlate the score to one’s ability to succeed in a society whose rules are set by the dominant culture, could we not argue that we are doing people from other cultures a disservice by not asking them to play by the rules that will move one towards success?

Taking this notion one step further, the human ability to create large complex social structures has to do with our willingness to accept that we are guided by certain rules, many of which find their origins in our religious doctrines and beliefs. These rules are accepted as being for the most part divine and immutable as they bear the weight of divine punishment. One of the complexities that we have created in this country, is that we have lost sight of the fact that different cultures tend to develop their own rules that may not correspond to the dominant culture. The first time I heard the term “counter-culture” was in the 1960’s and described the “Hippie” anti-war culture that helped to move both academia and the majority culture towards the liberal ideals that we have accepted today. Nevertheless, this was a “youth-movement” that represented an intergenerational change in values of the majority culture. The development of a Black subculture, was most likely caused by a combination of new liberal values being accepted by the dominant culture and government policies that may have served to placate part of the Black subculture while moving them further from the values of the dominant culture that controls the means of production.

The end result of our unconscious efforts to equalize society, while making Black culture accepted at least in the media, music and professional sports world, may have backfired when it comes to integrating and amalgamating our Black citizens into the dominant “white” culture. One simple and relevant example can be found in our current corporate labor force, that no longer is dominated by that white faces that were at one time the norm. Our technocratic corporate culture now relies on highly educated and motivated Indians and Asians, who have checked the educational blocks and have willing fully become acculturated into the dominant corporate society. Essentially, our failure to educate our populous and to instantiate the value of education into Black culture and has limited our access to the potential fostered and controlled by corporate culture.

The bottom-line is that we need to rethink what we want the American landscape to look like for our children and grand children and how we can provide the “cultural landscape” that offers the type of success that we would like to be able to foster for them.  Unfortunately, short-term hand-outs, changes to police policies will do nothing to change the realities facing our Black citizens.  There are no quick fixes and we must put in the thought along with our Black leaders to incorporate changes that will, be reflected downstream, while providing the essential resources today to make this possible.  Our biggest challenge however comes from the politicians who are supposed to be charged with taking care of our interests.  They control our minds through their actions and words that pit us against one-another rather than making it possible to seek rational solutions to the problems of our dynamic society. My final thought, takes me back to the Greek roots of our democratic nation: “Unless . . . philosophers become kings in the cities or those whom we now call kings and rulers philosophize truly and adequately and there is a conjunction of political power and philosophy . . . there can be no cessation of evils . . . for cities nor, I think, for the human race”.  (Rep. V.473c11-d6)