May 25th, 2005 | | Posted in Uncategorized
{excerpted}
“Tell me, how many black folks do you know who are willing to pick lettuce and tomatoes on a farm, or wash dishes and mop the floors in some restaurant, or spread cow manure to fertilize crops and do other field work? You can look around and see that fewer African-Americans are working such jobs. ”
“My Mexican workers - I don’t care if it’s rainy, snowing or if it’s hot - they are willing to work,” says Joseph Nevels, an African-American and president of Nevels Landscape Co. in Grafton. “It doesn’t matter what kind of work. As far as Mexicans are concerned, any type of work that they get is better than life back home.”
…”By and large, African-Americans don’t want this kind of work,” says Clayborn Benson, founder and executive director of the Wisconsin Black Historical Society and Museum, 2620 W. Center St. “What Fox is saying is true. You hear it in the form of black kids who say, ‘I don’t want to work at no McDonald’s’ or they don’t want a minimum wage job.”
“White Americans aren’t exactly lining up for such jobs either.”
‘But African-Americans aren’t high enough up the economic ladder to make the same choices. If you’re on the bottom rung, then you’ve got to climb the ladder in stages, which means you might have to work at a job that you don’t enjoy and for lower wages. It’s a start; you don’t have to stay there…”more
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Earl Graves , founder of Black Enterprise magazine is calling for “…African-Americans to take their vacation business out of Mexico in the wake of President Vicente Fox’s comments.” (more)
Over “comments”.
(Yes, I know Mexico still does the black face comedy thing down there, but there was no hell raised from the black American community about that.)
Personally, I think Elie nails the issue right on the head. Simply put, the work habits of black folk here in America are way different that those that come from another country—AND WE KNOW IT!!
For too long we have allowed Liberalism to take the place of down-home, sweet-tea drinking, front porch sittin’ common sense. Check out this press release from the Philadelphia-area African-American Chamber of Commerce (AACC):
{excerpted}
…(The)African-American Chamber of Commerce (AACC) found that 40 percent are experiencing difficulty in finding appropriately trained employees to work in their companies and that targeted training programs would allow them to hire more people, with greater confidence. Among the impediments to finding suitable employees, the businesses said, was “technical skills deficiency,” “insufficient training,” “lack of expertise
in the business’s specialty,” “lack of education,” a “lack of a clean background” and a “lack of work ethic, professionalism and punctuality.” The firms, each of which was African-American owned, said that being able to hire qualified African-Americans is a high priority for their businesses.
Let’s look at this sentence closer:
Among the impediments to finding suitable employees, the businesses said, was “technical skills deficiency,” “insufficient training,” “lack of expertise in the business’s specialty,” “lack of education,” a “lack of a clean background”
For the most part, Mexicans coming into this country have all of these strikes against them (the clean background part does not apply to all. For sake of argument, let’s replace that with the fact that they are illegal), yet somehow they still outnumber us in this part of the employment sector.
Now look that the next part of this sentence:
…and a “lack of work ethic
All of us know of some “folk” in our own family that seem to be this way since day one. Before you get your shorts bunched, I am not saying all black folks are like this. I am simply saying that if we are honest with ourselves, we know that if we just look at the next generation of black folks (10-17yrs), the work ethic of our parents/grandparents is simply not there. Ask any public school teacher.
I know of numbers of black business owners/managers who will admit this problem does exist in private. Unless we bring this problem out in the open like these black businessmen in Philly, this problem will continue to exist while we allow self-appointed leaders to declare that racism is the culprit. I know of many black folks who will get a low-paying job and stay there for years. WHY? Not because of racism, but because they do not know how to plan for the next step. I have also seen black folks who will start out in these same jobs and eventually move ahead because they knew the value of planing ahead. Yet these same black folks are looked at as Uncle Toms, sell-outs, or the white-man’s boy (these are the things we say in private to others that feel the same way) by many black co-workers because they were diligent enough to take advantage of opportunities. I should know because I used to be one of the main ones dishing out the insults.
The other point that Elie raises in her piece is also very key:
“If you’re on the bottom rung, then you’ve got to climb the ladder in stages, which means you might have to work at a job that you don’t enjoy and for lower wages. It’s a start; you don’t have to stay there…”
We all had to start from somewhere and get paid crap for doing it. As much as I hated it during those days, the experience made a life-long impression on me. As a person who suffered from the dot.com bust, I know what it is like to not have employment for a long time and have a family to support. Both me and my wife had to take jobs that seemed to be a slap in the face of my illustrious career in IT. At one point, both my wife and I had to take the office cleaning jobs alongside Mexicans. No doubt, it was very humiliating work. Your cleaning toilets of the crowd that you used to be a part of–very humiliating.
But guess what? I would go to the library and unemployment office everyday to use their resources to find a better job with a drop of gas in my car. As time went by, I was able to secure much better employment well on my way back to securing the financial stability of my family.
What got me though it? My faith, my wife and kids, and knowing that the people before me had it a lot worse, but were still able to make it. Let me not forget the years I did yard work without getting paid for it laid the early groundwork for a strong work ethic in my life. Those times that I was not working felt like an eternity because I knew I needed to be doing something.
Many of OUR youth today know nothing about the concept of “busting yo’ chops” to get to the next level. We have allowed Liberalism to graft in our culture the false expectation that the world owes you because you are black. Yet when black folk like me say these kind of things, we are ridiculed as being insensitive and demeaning to the poor–all for telling the truth (the same thing we holla’ to the preacher on Sundays –if you go to church) Guess what, I was poor too! The reason why people like Cosby may sound hard to some is simply because he is making up for what we have refused to tell this emerging generation for years. I believe in my people more than any political party. This is why I spend so much time here at my computer trying to do my part in hopes that something is getting through to somebody out there. I have seen the power of a black person endure racism, injustice, and hell and still come out on top. They had a lot of scars, but they were also met with much success. Racism is very real, but so is our avoidance to face the facts about ourselves.
