Quote Originally Posted by Bham1982 View Post
I disagree. I am not African American, and I do not think anyone "speaks for" a community, but I think it is sad that you have a [[metaphorical) house burning down and the leadership is only complaing about extraneous stuff.

If young African American males were not involved in such a wildly disproportionate amount of criminal behavior, there would be less Macys incidents, less police profiling incidents, etc. As it stands, it makes perfect sense that Macys would be watching young African American males more than any other demographic cohort.
I certainly respect your right to disagree and you express very well why you disagree. But a couple of the premises, upon which you base your arguments, are faulty.

First, Jackson and Sharpton both [[especially Sharpton) frequently discuss the issue of black on black crimes, as do other African-American leaders. It is often a point of discussion on Sharpton's radio show and there are forums held all over the country in an attempt to address the issue. They discuss treating each other with respect [[hence their former campaign to encourage AA's to stop the use of the N-word when talking to each other), they talk about male responsibility and other topics. It is simply untrue that they never speak out against black on black crime or other inappropriate behavior by blacks.

Second, profiling of African-Americans began long before they starting becoming a real problem [[demographically speaking). They were a perceived problem as soon as they were emancipated. One could just as easily argue that if they weren't profiled from the beginning, and relegated to a mostly second-class existence, then they wouldn't be displaying such aberrant behavior. Another chicken or the egg question.

Study history some more. African-American mothers were traditionally very strict with their sons because they didn't want them to display any behavior that might cause them to "get into trouble". Their sons were more careful back then, but that didn't stop them from being profiled, lynched, you name it. And what about middle-aged African-American women who also get profiled by high-end department stores?

Bottom line is this: people have a right to protest over causes large and small. I don't try to tell PETA that they cannot protest mistreatment of animals unless they also protest human rights abuses. There are enough leaders around for any kind of protest or forum that needs to take place. Let the civil rights leaders deal with civil rights and let some other kinds of leaders deal with the troubling issue of African-American youths.