Good afternoon brothers and sisters After being away for a while it is good to see we are still engaged in spirited conversation and discuss. With that said to answer your questions I think the key to what you ask lays in the word collective. One of the things we must realize is though we share ancestry we don't all share culture, philosophy and ideology. Therefore not all of us represent each other. The question has been asked, am I my brothers keeper? Reality is many of my brothers don't want to be kept. Therefore many of us are very different. Because we have been generalized, vilified and stained by the actions of a few in the eyes of those who oppose us we all are the same. I am not perfect and have made mistakes. However I can't not expect my mistakes to be indicative of all Black men. Just like I don't expect the mistakes of other Black men to reflect my actions. We are brothers but we still have individuality as well. In this individuality we have individual responsibility as well as collectively ones. Collectively responsibilities are not set in stone. They are mostly unspoken rules. They are debatable. Our individual responsibilities are not debatable. Is it up to me to police my brother? Somewhat. Out of compassion many of us call our brothers out when they are wrong. Still that's as much as we can legally do. We can't make another man desire the right things. Where we can make a difference is with our sons and young men. It is our responsibility to carry ourselves in a way that should be emulated by our sons and young men. Still our sons are individuals. We as men can do all the right things and still it's a possibility that our young ones can turn out to be irresponsible. When that happens as sad as it is we must learn to be content with our actions. One thing we must walk away from here understanding is we are not all the same. This fact is reflective of this site. There are brothers here of all walks. Embracing the fact that we are different goes a long way to establish peaceful existence. We can then embrace and come to terms with our commonality. Still there will be brothers who differences will outweigh their commonality. For example I as a husband and father don't represent pimps, drug dealers, deadbeats and etc. These men don't represent me. I don't appreciate being lumped in with these underachievers simply because we share the same race. This is where we go awry speaking in terms of collectivism because reality dictates our state of being. So back to the question. I think what we are questioning or exploring is taking individual responsibility for our actions. This means doing some introspection and coming clean without bringing anyone into the equation. This is not a collective thing. As I previous said there are plenty of brothers that don't represent me. Their failures are not my failures nor are my failures the responsibilities of my brothers. We can't expect the same thing within a blood family much less across the diaspora. What I will say is those of us who are on a correct path must recognize the pervasive culture of irresponsibility among Black men and not let that culture grow and infiltrate other cultures of Black men. The fact is there will be bad brothers among us. They are getting too much attention and are being made the model for all Black men. This is not a fair assessment. Peace...
thefailure of 1000 plus of us right here to dialogue, plan, design nd enact at least one project for the benefit of the children of the National Black community, that we can enact on a state by state process and relate back, the results, not just an ego based, I did this long ago or I did that back in the day, but a serious and consistent, dialogue amongst Black men regarding what we can establish a consensus on and brainstorm for real solutions, and not just "the endless reaganite", shame on negros approach. We used to say long ago it takes a village to raise a child What ever happened to that village?
I agree with all the brothers here , we have let our guards down collectively and became relax in the white wash society we live in , so here we have failed to make any change...
We ar shortcoming of such where our Village has become vallys we have failed collectively as men to bring forth new growth of men to honor and love , respect and care we stop fatherhooding due to our own selfishness or lack of , we have given in and not upholding our kingship as men.
Another one of our biggest failures is the shortcoming of us in unity as men we are so divided by reasonal doubt or fear factors we have become a fallin culture of men who won't face up and accept fault yet blame and point , we set the lip ship out to sea but we forgot to board it and stand in the heat of action , I was once one who would feast up quick yet go hide behind the walls which hurts the collective effort . where the men at to speak on this collective failures of us , so we can defind and gain a solution to our many failures and faulty missions as men . CALLING ALL BROTHERS !!