 TEXAS’ Widest Circulated and Read Newspaper with a Black Perspective |
TEXAS’ Widest Circulated and Read Newspaper with a Black Perspective |
Editorial Archives |
| Warriors ain’t Paw Paws OR: Do Black grandfathers always know best? |
| Woebeit I cringe
when brothers and sisters refer to their family’s patriarch as “Paw Paw,”
or their matriarchs as “Big Momma,” I must admit that I felt an odd sensation
(strange to an old African warrior), when my newfound grandson’s missive opened with
the salutation, “Dear Grandfather:” While the letter wasn’t exactly a surprise, inasmuch as I met my grandson for the first time a few months prior to his 21st birthday, although he grew up less than a mile from me, I was taken aback by the intimacy of his greeting. But I had warned him (after meeting him before he violated his parole celebrating his 21st birthday), to never, ever call me Paw Paw. So I guess he had to call be something. Nevertheless, the problem wasn’t the salutation, as much as it was attempting to communicate with the only grandchild I’ll ever see. What does one say to one, you really don’t know, although he has your warrior’s blood coursing through his veins? Other than the fact that he was (as the old folks use to say), the “spitting image” of George Bud Easter Johnson, Jr., aka “Chip” off the old block? The question becomes even more ambiguous when you are somewhat less than a model citizen, inasmuch as you tend to drift into the Outer Limits, of the Twilight Zone. On the other hand, since I did a pretty good job as counselor of troubled youth and progenitor of Rev. Ray’s PABA juvenile delinquent prevention (“Kids can’t fire a gun, or open a knife with boxing gloves on”) philosophy, I decided I would talk to him just as I talked to the kids who are themselves grandfathers, today. No doubt, many things have changed since 1972, but, the pitfalls designed to entrap our young African warriors in the snares of 2002 America’s double-standard criminal justice system certainly remains the same. No! It’s gotten even worse. With that in mind, I don’t think my grandson would be adverse to sharing his grandfather’s musings with other young warriors, so can we talk? “As a grandfather it is incumbent upon me to also be your mentor, insofar as your missive reflect the exact, same attitude as every young brother who fails to grasp the concept of profiling. ‘You don’t know nothing about me,’ is a mantra that puts you at an immediate disadvantage in an era when social engineering has become a way of life. Of course people, whom you shall never meet, know everything about you that’s necessary to influence your destiny. Naturally, you will differ with this opinion, because it is unlikely you’re into social sciences, which includes the psychological dynamics of human behavior. That has become standard operating procedure for criminal justice systems and other agencies that control large and diverse populations of social misfits. “There is actually a handbook that identifies and defines the trends, or tendencies of humans used to profile a 21-year-old brother like you. Hell, street cops, social workers and every person working in the system, know you better than you know yourself. Okay, drop that attitude that you have as we speak. I’m not indicting or inciting you, but only edifying you about the devious, manipulative and exploitative society that you are struggling to survive in. Damn that’s heavy. Believe me you are reacting to society just as your adversaries expect for you to react. In fact, if you don’t act like they expect for you to act, they do little things to push you in the direction they want you to go. That’s the reason they build jails and sit back and wait for you to book reservations to help fill them up. You see, for a Black man to be productive in this society, he must understand that it ain’t about who you think you are. “You must conform and perform as they want you to, or they categorize you as a misfit. And once they do that, you are profiled. Ergo, once you are profiled, you catch hell trying to make the system admit that they made a mistake and is wrong about you. Society (people negatively or positively impacting your life) doesn’t see through your eyes and sure as hell don’t think about you as you think about yourself. In fact, when you throw them a curve and change your lifestyle, by setting goals, or making intelligent decisions, damn if they won’t throw obstacles in your path so that you won’t prove them wrong. They ain’t about to let you make a lie out of them by not being like they profiled you to be. The system thinks nothing of being unscrupulous to keep you from breaking out of the societal straight jacket it puts you in. Can you imagine small-minded people, who think that they have you figured out to be nothing, confessing that you made a liar out of them? It will never happen in your lifetime, my dear grandson. They will push you until you say, ‘The hell with them. I’ve tried to do my best, but they just won’t let me get it together. I’m going to live my life like I want to and not let them chump me out’. Gotcha! That’s exactly what they expect for you to do. The system doesn’t want us to succeed as they say. Man, when it comes to us (Black folks), the system is cracking… not facting when they say that they want us to be the best we can be. “Even their help will hurt you, because once they get your confidence, they put plan B in action to screw you. Once you’ve been let down and lied to enough, you either give up, or grow up. You learn when to hold ‘em, when to fold ‘em and when to walk away or run. In other words, you take control of your own life and start doing things you have to do to make society work for you, rather than work against you.” Space won’t allow me to share the entire letter, but I’m sure you’ve read enough to question whether, or not Black grandfathers always know best. I wonder if anybody knows where I’m coming from? |
| November Archives |