Reparations Means Not Settling for Mediocrity

Perhaps it is not unfair to say that black nationalists, more than any other group of Afro-American ideologists, have been able to combine in terrible and uneasy tension the most devastating criticisms of, and the most sublime faith in, their people.

                 - Sterling Stuckey, The Ideological Origins of Black Nationalism

What can I say? I hope for too much of our people. And, I root it in this question: how can a people beaten into the image of inferiority by the collective ass-whooping of Slavery, Colonialism, Jim Crow, Apartheid and economic tyranny simply be satisfied with an individual accomplishment? It is the anti-Invictus, where head bloodied and bowed under these bludgeonings we have said: "what White people have said about us - as a people - is true," for we stand justified by a sense of individual accomplishment. 

Maybe I too need to succumb to that "reality," and cease from thinking of Black people as a great people. Maybe I should be converted to the Prosperity Gospel of personal salvation, where all I need to do is "get mine." Maybe there's no hope for repair...

Because, REPA(I)Rations means not settling for mediocrity. 

To consider it laudatory that there are successful Black businesses (and there are many that are successful), when they're not on the "Fortune 500" is to admit that such an arena is reserved for Whites. It implies (barring some other tool of incompetence) that we, of some racial deficiency, cannot grow a business to overtake any of the businesses on that list. Maybe a given individual doesn't have that aspiration; maybe a given individual is satisfied with where there business is. This is a free Country and that is every individual's right to be so satisfied. But what remains is still a conundrum that begs the question of whether or not Black people - as a people - can compete on the level of the "Big Boys."

Reparations means not settling for mediocrity. 

Accepting that a degree from the "Black Harvard" carries no greater stature than a degree from a Tier 3 White Institution is tantamount to saying that the "Ivy League" for Black people is AT BEST comparable to the calibre of Michigan Technological University! Again, I know many absolutely brilliant people who graduated from HBCUs. But that is them as individuals. As HBCUs, those institutions are representative of us - as a people. And to me, the fact that the best we can offer ranks #115 is an indictment serving to confirm the thoughts of those (Whites) who said we are inferior. 

Reparations means not settling for mediocrity. 

But, maybe I hope for too much. Maybe it is enough is the fortunate few, of which I could easily be part, achieve. But it seems to me that if that be the case, all I would be is an exception to the rule of Black inferiority. And, I just refuse to accept that. 

Yet, I am criticized as one who simply hates my own people. Maybe it's that I love my people too much. Maybe it's that I hope for the day when we will find it beneficial to our existence - as a people - to prove to ourselves - as a people - that we are not what they think we are. 

It's funny: as individuals we are driven to ambition and success to prove the naysayers wrong. However, we have lost the ambition to prove our collective naysayers wrong. Maybe they're right...and maybe I'm just in denial. :-/

If I'm not: Come and Get Your Reparations!