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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 5, 1986)
Page 2, Portland Observer, February 5, 1986 Healthwatch EDITORIAL/OPINION by Steven Bailey N. D. Black Families in Jeopardy Black families in America are facing the most formidable challenges o f any other institution o f its kind in the country In fact, (he Black fam ily is in deep trouhle, and if the causes o f the trouble are no, addressed in a curative manner, survival o f the Black fam ily is in serious jeopardy. The National Urban League's annual publica tion. The State o f Black America 1985, has as its lead essay, "T h e Black Family Today and Tom or row.” The essay should he read and studied by every face, o f the Black community The schools, fam ilies, political organizations, neighborh<x»d clubs, and churches would do well to make it a priority o f study and discussion Ibc essay con tains a wealth o f information that w ill enable the grasping o f a handle at making a response to those challenges tearing at the heartstrings o f the Black fam ily Even without the essay, we see symbols o f trou ble in the streets o f our cities — men, young, old, and middle aged standing on street corners with nothing to do and no place to go. We sense the crisis as Black on Black crime constantly occurs in Black neighborhoods, and when our young people Rainbow Coalition Task Force attack their family members. There are three major problems facing the Black family today which account for most, if no, all, o f the difficulties tliey encounter and for so many Black babies in the stream (the essay sheds light on Black babies in the stream). These are not new discoveries nor are they problems unique to Blacks, bu, they have a devastating effect on the stability and cohesiveness o f Black families. The three major problems are: divorce and sep aration. which dissolve large numbers of Black families every year; teenage pregnancy, which creates new families in which all members are at risk, and non-employment and unemployment which are the most serious o f all problems faced by Black families because they are the primary reason for their poverty. In order to cure these problems. Black com mumties throughout the nation must come together and help one another, especially those Blacks who are in the position to do so. If we Blacks are to survive in the future, we need to do something now for the Black family today In n iu lJ jn u a ry . ihc Rainbow C o a li tion health care task force met to de velop a policy statement on health care issues The policy w ill be presented to a general Rainbow meeting February I Ith al the Maranatha Church. 1222 N F Skidmore, fo r fu ll approval The health care meeting was fa c ili tated by Beverly Stein and Richard Brow n o f the C oalition and featured presentations by county commissioner Gretchen Kafoury and slate senator B ill M cCoy W hile the task force was charged w ith developing a draft for general membership approval, there appeared to be a consensus on most issues discussed and the draft w ill prob ably receive easy endorsement from the general ux-mbership Senator McCoy hegan the meeting discussing his b ill S B 4 , 1, which would enact a slate health plan intending Io guarantee health care Io all This b ill, w hich sal in committee last legislative session, w ould so radically alter the current provider system that most o f the in dividu al issues discussed at this task force meeting would be met by its coverage S B 4 3 I, w ould to some e x tent create a socialized system in O re gon setting up a coverage plan on a stale w ide basis It is n<x too surprising that it sal in com m ittee last session Com m issioner Kafoury spoke in support o f S B 4 3 I. and follow ed w ith comments on health concerns in gen eral Her comments prim arily dealt w ith the inadequate health care for the indigent, the p ixir and other m inorities She also expressed concern that change cannot be achieved w ith in the medical com m unity, but w ill need something like S B 43I to alter the present system Literature presented by the Oregon Health A ction Cam paign m irrored these later comments on the monied self interests of the medical lobby T heir (O H A C ) figures fo r "la ib b y in g expenses fix lbe health care industry 1980 19X4 are Oregon M edical Society, S2I2.OUO. Oregon Association o f H ospitals, $121,000« Kaiser. 1117.000« Blue Cross/Blue Shield. $102,000 for a T otal o f $552,000 This h a lf m illio n dollars is state monies and excludes the national lobby dollars o f the A M A W hile the m ajority o f the mem ber ship had mx read SB43I land therefore did not totally endorse the b ill) there was consensus support fo r the items presented from the b ill The task force w ill, as previously mentioned, present the tinal draft February I Ith The mayor issues w ill include "access for a ll, to their chosen, quality health c a re ", at tendon to current inadequacies in pre natal care, indigent cate and rural health concerns, cost containm ent, prevention, education and improved occupational and environm ental safety Letters to the Editor To The Editor: Is Amerika Creating The Permanent Underclass? — ■ ....................... ■ i ■ ■ ■ ■ — ■> “BROTHER AGAINST BROTHER” Along I he Color Line by Dr. Manning Marable hungry and without prospects — may subcon sciously attempt to assert himself, displacing his own unarticulated aggression against his Black brothers Another element in the equation is the tendency o f most police to consider Black on Black crime as nonconsequential For instance, only about 5 per cent o f all murder victims in the U S are white males who have been killed by Black men How ever, over 70 percent of the Black men currently on Death Row had white victims; and not one white male has ever been executed for the murder o f a Black person or the rape o f a Black woman in U S history . Police and courts punish Black on white crime most severely, while ignoring thousands o f crimes committed by Blacks against other Blacks In many cities, police simply do no, investigate Black-on Black violence; as a result, many Black victims do not report cases to the police, because they know in advance that nothing w ill be done Different organizations have begun to mobilize against Black innercity violence In 1983, the " Black-on Black Love Campaign" was initiated in Chicago by Edward Gardner, head o f Soft Sheen Pnxlucts. which promoted the goals o f Black pride and collective development Now in seven cities, the "B lack-on Black l ove Campaign" uses radio advertisements, posters, and other forms o f public ity to discourage violence In Savannah. Georgia las, year, the NAACP started an anti-violence task force, which has conducted educational and social awareness projects among Black residents However. Black-on-Black violence cannot be resolved solely through educational efforts, nor through the increase o f police patrols and citizen anti violence task forces The murder o f brother against brother is a symptom o f economic, political and racial oppression Black self hatred and frat ricidal violence is the logical culmination of economic, social and political forces which collec tively crush the life and humanity out of thousands o f young Black people annually A comprehensive strategy o f resistance must include demands for full employment, quality housing, urban economic development, and expanded human needs prog rams. which can provide the self respect necessary for young Black men and women In 1984. 10,728 Americans were killed by handguns. Two essential points can lx* made from this blixxly statistic. First, the United States fosters a culture o f s«xial violence and nihilism which is unequaled in western industrial societies By way o f contrast, the number o f persons killed with handguns in 1984 was 48 in Japan. 52 in Canada, 42 in West Germany, 21 in Sweden, and only 8 hi Great Britain Second, about 50 percent o f all U S . murder victims in any given year are Black Amen cans, and 94 percent o f those who murder Blacks arc Black people The statistics on Black-on Black violent crime are terrifying In the U S , a white female has a one-in-606 chance o f being a murder victim For white males, I chance in 186; Black females, I chance in 124; but for Black males. I chance in twenty nine. Roughly 60,000 Blacks w ill be" mur dered in the 1980s — more than the total number o f American soldiers killed in the Vietnam War The leading cause o f death among Black males age 15 to 24 is murder by other Black males W hy are Black men murdering each other? Par, o f the answ er resides in the economic deterioration o f the ghetto. As of October 1985, the Black adult male unemployment rate was 14 percent, com pared to only 5 I percent for white male adults For Black teenagers 16-19 years old. the official job less rate is almost 40 percent In innercities, the actual unemployment rate for Black young males exceeds 55 percent CETA and other Federal jobs programs were either eliminated or severely cut In New York C ity, for instance, I 7 m illion people mostly Blacks and Hispanics — were eligible for the "Jo b Training Partnership A c ," funds, bu, last year only 34, (MX) persons were actually trained for employment with this program High unemployment, ptmr public schools, crowded housing conditions and the existence ol gangs and drug traffic are the material and social factors which breed mass anxiety anti repressed rage Psychiatrist A lvin Poussaint suggests that Black-on Black crime is essentially a form of "re a c tiv e " racist violence In a society with white capitalist values and rampant materialism, to lx* Black and ptxir is to be a negation of the dominant cultural and social ideal To murder someone who looks like yourself is to strike out against the actual "im a g e " o f oneself Drawn into a violent confron tation, a young Black male — jobless, perhaps If.ihiNr inn Hr» pflitutil »<»■ Hamitu** Vr» My perception o f the answer to that question is yes. absolutely And it has reached a point where only the i.iost radically new approaches Io the di lemma o f being black in Am erika can prevent us from marching in lockstep toward that destiny O r perhaps I should say shuckin' and jiv in ' instead o f marching because we. Iix>, arc par Im p a lin g in our steady erosion as a people At the moment. I would like to deal w ith the Media Media exist as one o f the most jx iw e rlu l controlling forces in Am erika I hey hold up a m irro r to soc iety al large and say " th is Is the Way I hings A re '" Not only our perception of others but our perception ot ourse lves is shaped to a tremendous extent by Media When I was a child I put an enormous amount ot energy into trying to reconcile tlx* double image I kept getting about what black-or in those dass, Negro was supposed to mean At close hand were a beautiful black mother, a b rillia n t black father, and gifted, accomplished black friends But the sense o f pride I look in what I seemed to be and what I seemed to come from was undermined by the con slant message I got from Media that the cisilize d black world in which I moved was an isolated cixoun, a freakish ex ception. and what black really meant was W illie Best, slobbering and ro llin g his eyes in perpetual fright I le i ades have passed and nothing has changed Caucasians still control the black image ill Media and tell us who we are If you have any doubt, let me give you some figures We have just emerged from the era o l the black exploitation h im in which we were bombarded w ith one movie after another depicting black people as pimps prostitutes and dope pushers I hat era. thank God, is over because black lilm goers got bored w ith it and it ceased Io be luctative to those who lu s tered it Those ugly movies that p.uadrd an army ot pimps and dope pushers m trout ot bl.K k children as role models to admire and emulate warped many a small black psyche and made a lot ot Caucasian people a lot of nxmey H ollvw ood products arc seen in every nook and comer ot the world M illio n s o l non residents ol the United Stales dejvend almost entirely oil the movie industry lo r their knowledge o f black J p ORTWND OBSERVER To the Editor; By now, most Oregonians have received their State Income Tax booklets and have noticed tha, their tax rates have been re duced from las, year. The rates are lower because the 1985 legislature eliminated the eight percent income tax sur charge that was initiated in 1981. We determined tha, the sur charge could be eliminated and that our major obligations for providing services could still be me,. The law required the legisla ture to balance the state's bud ge,. "Deficit spending" cannot occur in Oregon government. Bu, there are powerful pressures to spend more each year and to in crease taxes to pay for the addi tional spending. In spite of these pressures, the cos, of state go vernment in Oregon will increase at less than the rate of inflation for the fourth consecutive bien nium. The hard budget decisions will tie with us for a while longer, and our tax reform work is not finished either. As the public continues to demand tha, we hold the line on state taxes, we must proceed with the difficult task of reforming our school finance and property tax systems. With this challenge ahed of us. Oregonians can take comfort from the reduc tion in state income tax rates. I, shows that we're on the right track. Yours truly. Steve Starkovich Senate Majority Leader >15 for one yaa< >25 for tw o years bo« 3137 Portland OR 9 7?0ti I I s m m < t j 2- St’ W Apt state At W MI K ZtP Portland Observer____ ut*t ■»«>•» CfâW member 4/<»t</Ae (<•/<>,/rnr uppruzt m <»-rr/4> nrM tpoprrt M to cittioa - Founded IM S Subscriptions »15 00 par yaar a» tha Tr» County aras Post m aa ta r Sand sddraaa changas lo the Portland ( g a m e r . P 0 Boa 3,37. Portland. Oragon 9730« Alfred L. Henderson, Editor/Publisher AI IEilhams. General Manager A, I 1 » « • • i 9» . o«»' ««rim -"» at I. *z Tha Portland (M a rn e r wax aatabkahad n 1970 Mt I V n C 5 - i- i o to 0 z O (Z) 2 & * — f i -s -t Z * S Ï» o r; X 5 * Tha Portland < d n rrv rr IU SPS 989 8801 a pubftehad avary Thursday by t m P u b M vn g Company. Ine . 1483 N t K *n g e worth. Portland. Oragon 97311. Poai Ofttca Boa 3137 Portland dragon 97308 Sacond class postage part al Portland. Oragon at l o t fair L'mvfrwv, tnirrneiD»>naU\ w ix ild do an efficient jo b, but if he/she has been fed one stereotype too many they may look and see not you but Flip W ilso n's "G e ra ld in e " goofing on the jo b . painting her fingernails and calling up her boyfriend to chat on company tim e I f so. fo r all your qualifications, you're not the one who is going to get the jo b Dr. Jamil Cherovee life as those who have been abroad can testify Other m illio ns o f Caucasian Amertkans o f all ages co n firm their be lie! about blacks al the ncighhortxxxJ theater N ix is it easy to ovcr-cmphasi/.e the importance o f the movies as agents in shaping public opinion That scenario has already begun to untold as new generations o f children read hardly at all and rely on the television box almost entirely for their perception o f the w orld That black people perceive them selves as a com plex entity in w hich can be found every shade o f com plexion, every degree o f education and wealth, every conceivable occupation and therefore resent the uniform depiction o l them as bickering simpletons, mat ters not one w hit As long as black people suffer in silence the situation w ill continue The Italians are more alert When the television scries "T h e U ntouchables" created the impression that organized crime was almost exclu sively Italian they raised the roof and suddenly the program found it po litic to unearth mobsters o l other ethnic o r i gins The Jews are more alert Even a program presented w ith such m eticul ous i are as Holocaust has been subject to the most endless hairsplitting c r iti cism and scrutiny from the Jewish com m unity As they hashed and re hashed that program in every conceiva ble public forum they could address, they gave us all a sharper perspective on what we hail seen Where blacks arc concerned. I have watched an endless army ot pimps and vicious urban ter rorists parade across the screen on the police shows and clowns on the sitcoms and heard from our appointed ix estab lishm ent leaders not a murmur When I express concern for our image in Media, do n't imagine for a moment that anything as shallow as a racial ego posture is involved The way we are perceived by this society affects the most basic areas o f our lives When you apply tor a jo b the interviewer in personnel reacts to you not only in terms o l who you arc but also in terms ot who he/she thinks you are There are countless images floating arixrnd in his/her head and many o f them are traceable to the Media You may sit in front o f them as a neatlv dressed, intelligent pe rvxi who 3 a 288 0033 N a tio n a l A d v e rtis in g R e p rä s e n ta tiv e A m a lg a m a te d P u b lish ers. Inc N a w Y ork
