A Jury of His Peers

Here is a curious story from one of the BlackPlanet fora (forums): An 18 year-old sister, Hennessy, says her fiancé was arrested and she thinks he is innocent or has been told by him that he did not do anything to warrant 30 years of imprisonment; in other words he is getting framed or rail-roaded. Almost every thug in jail will claim that he was framed. I am really tired of young black males who intentionally walk into a trap and then wail and gnash their teeth when they get caught. We all know that the system is designed to lock up as many young black males as it can take, the financial heft and windfall of the prison industrial complex would not be as colossal as it without our youth. We all know this and some of us have condemned the system and this government’s policies that are blatantly genocidally asymmetric.

As much as we condemn the system, we must be as vocal about our belligerent young black males too. You go into a black neighborhood and you will see even neophytes strutting around in drooping pants as they imitate their favorite hip-hop thug-turned artist. They think it is cool. We are actually raising a generation that has low expectations of good things in life but inundated with songs and movies that extol criminal activity and moral decrepitude --- the walking dead, as I like to correctly call them. We are basically fostering a dangerous culture of low expectation and criminality. Look at some of the monikers used in this cyber community; Thug4Lyfe, et cetera. That is what I am talking about --- the stupidity of behaving in a way that is nothing but suicidal.

As far as this young lady’s story is concerned, I bet she is simply giving us her side of the story; sanitized to elicit our sympathies while down-playing her boyfriend’s probable culpability. Let us remember that what Newton’s Third Law says about natural forces is just as applicable to societal norms: To each story, no matter how compelling, there is an equal and opposite side that is just as compelling. I know the law says he is not guilty until proven otherwise by a jury of his peers. Far be it from me to pass judgement on this poor fellow but he is a black male and exactly the opposite of this oft-quoted statement always applies to black males, rich or poor. Ask OJ Simpson if you are in doubt. How many of you have seen a jury of young black men in drooping pants, wearing cheap gold chains while grinning foolishly to expose a mouthful of fake gold teeth or, for the sake of equity, a 20-year old black woman with a nursery of five kids each from a different father, most of them jailbirds? That would be a jury of his peers and anything else will be false, a one-way ticket to prison. This is America folks, we will not see hoodlums in jury boxes. Wake up and smell the coffee.

No, I am not being harsh. I am trying to articulate the truth and there are times truth can come across as an excoriation. We need to stop fooling ourselves and let these criminal-minded black males know that there is life on the other side of the law. If this poor guy had been nubbed by an FBI SWAT squad in a dormitory room or in a lecture hall at university much like Elian Gonzalez, I would be infuriated. As it is, he might have been loitering in the neighborhood. Why was he not in school or at work when he was arrested? Here in America, you have to have the brains of a mule not to have a degree. There is absolutely no excuse for all the silliness we see and tolerate in our youth. We are at fault.

Like Holy Writ says: Spare the rod and spoil the child. These black thugs need to be taught a lesson instead of writing little letters soliciting for our sympathies. Why not express our sympathies for the old folks who are watching their communities over-run by drug peddlers or mothers who live in fear that any moment their kids might come home in body bags, shot like rug dolls for nothing?

As if to prove my point, not a single post of the more than 1200 posts sent to the forum mentioned that the wailing jailhouse "widow" is a mere 18 year-old girl barely out of high school. Should she not be told that at her age her first priority ought to be going to college and getting a degree, the very foundation of a stable life that should last for the rest of her days on this planet? I will say it again; this girl is 18 years old and barely out of high school. Should people not be wondering why she would want to put her life in jeopardy by getting married at such a tender age and to a hoodlum who, in all likelihood, would have given her a liter of kids and run away leaving her to feed at the shamed troughs of welfare? To be blunt, the loss of the fiance which at first might seem to be a cruel fate might turn out to be a boon rather than the bane that she thinks it is. Anyway you look at it, it is good riddance.

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