Group Project

My group has really been trying to work hard as a whole, but there have been different things keeping the project from going on as planned. Since our project requires cooperation from a high school, the process of making the project work has not been easy. The majority of the administrators do not feel like our project is necessary because they are more focused on the students TAKS scores than them getting into college (in all honesty). For the project, we will visit LBJ High School and have a panel for the students to get an opportunity to talk to college students to get a feel of what they should be doing at the stage that they are in as high school students. We plan to have an open ended discussion for them to ask us questions, and a section for us to talk about our college experiences and how high school had an effect on our college experience. I hope that this project gets students more excited about college, and if some do not plan to go to college, I hope that they feel more encouraged to at least think about going to college and the multiple benefits it allows for them.

Videos for Discussion

Above is a video about a study of policeman and how they may target black men more than white men. Dr. Anthony Greenwald (UW - Department of Psychology) explains how racial stereotypes can influence decision-making in police officers. Several virtual reality experiments were conducted containing simulated criminals (with guns), police officers (with guns), and citizens (holding harmless objects). The test takers were to respond appropriately to criminals (simulate shooting), fellow police officers (signal safety), or harmless citizens (no action). The results reveal that Blacks were shot incorrectly more than Whites. The study concludes that race can affect ones ability to discriminate between a harmless object and a weapon & that race can cause one to respond as if a weapon is present.

Above is a series of videos from a Stanford University Psychologist that addresses the Harvard University Law School where she describes several experiments that suggest White males & police officers subconsciously perceive Black Males as criminal and less than human. The results provide evidence of a strong automatic bidirectional association between Blacks & Crime. The image of a Black male can trigger unconscious thoughts of crime and thinking of crime can trigger unconscious thoughts of Black people. The simple presence of a Black Male may unknowingly cause thoughts of crime and violence attributed to that person. 


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QDbylpaguw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvIBIn5Xp7s

Article Discussion: Police and Black Men

Article: Police don’t like black people: African American Young men’s accumulated police experiences by Rod Brunson

This article focuses on a study of 40 black men performed in St. Louis, Missouri to understand black men's experiences with police. The target was young black men because research has identified them as the group for whom involuntary police contacts are most frequent and salient in the United States. Brunson did the study to show how the mens patterns of events and experiences shape the way that they view the police, and the way that it affects others views and vice-versa. In the study, most of the men interviewed had negative views toward police because of them being explained as "Almost never easy to talk to", "Almost never polite", and often because they were harassed or mistreated. They also felt that police resources were directed disproportionately toward specific neighborhood problems such as drugs and gangs instead of assisting crime victims. Many times they also explained being targeted and searched because of the way they dressed, who they hung around with, or how much money they had. THey also continued to explin that officers lacked the physical evidence to arrest them and would put them in patrol cars and drive them to other neighborhoods. Sometimes some even explained being filed for resisting arrest charges to conceal use of excessive force.

Some instances explained in the interviews for heard from by friends, family, and others in their neighborhoods but some experienced these events. Brunson explains at the end that citizen complaints against officers could be initiated in the prosecutor's office rather than in police stations. 

Personally, I have never been physically abused or pushed by force from any cops, but I have heard plenty of stories and seen videos of events like these. I feel like many cops abuse their authority, and I have been verbally attacked by a security guard/off-duty police officer before. I have also seen police target certain communities and people on a regular basis.

My question for discussion is how do you feel about police and how are your encounters with them? Have you experienced or seen first hand any events like the ones explained in the article? Can a continuous cycle of  stereotypes and retaliation be occurring? How does it affect the way African-Americans view police in their communities?


--An interesting thing I picked up from researching for this discussion is the history of police and blacks. How does history of oppression towards blacks with police violence have on this?

Blog #12

The spring bling video was actually amusing to me, but not in a good way. I was extremely surprised that women and men were acting like that on camera. The women were consistently disrespected and couldn't even walk anywhere without getting grabbed and touched. I have seen this before, but not to the extent that was on the video. Jasmine mentioned in her blog that this somewhat reminded her of Texas Relays, and that was almost EXACTLY like this. Women were dressed showing off their curves and bodies, which led men to thing that they wanted to be approached or touched on.
Women who fall into the stereotypes definitely engage in more risky behaviors, because they believe that everyone else is performing in those activities. When groups of them come together, it only makes the activities occur more regularly because that makes them think it is normal. The article on stereotypes provided empirical evidence for all of this. I thought it was interesting how it said in the article that when women were exposed to more stereotypical images of men drinking, smoking, and being more promiscuous that they were more likely to be attracted to those types of men. It also mentioned that regardless of the circumstances such as SES, education, etc, girls who watched more of the videos were more likely to do engage in behaviors similar to the ones in the rap videos.
In the other article about enhancing critical consciousness in black men, I think that it is essential for other black men to understand the effects of negative modeling because they have such an impact on the way that we act and think. It is proven that enhanced critical thinking, and increased community development has a positive effect.

Blog #10: Boys of Baraka, Acting White

What I took away from the film was that there are so many factors at play while a child is growing up and in school, I feel very lucky to have had a positive experience with my public school. I feel like the system is at place to put the poor in a disadvantage, which is unfair. Laws and policies are set up to where not enough opportunities are given to public schools without resources. Another thing that I took from it was that individual factors play a strong role as well. Many of the families were invested in the school and depended on the school for the future of their kids. I think that it would be hard in a school where everyone deals drugs and it is hard to be commended for your schoolwork by peers.

I think that the differences between whites and black are very different for a variety of factors which effect the achievement gap. I feel like the artcle somewhat targeted blacks in a negative aspect in some ways. Blacks typically are not the majority of their school, which can be an advantage to whites, there are many less black teachers, and sometimes the black students may not feel as comfortable with themselves or in the classroom. Many blacks can ignore the negative influences on their education but not always.

Acting white was definitely something that I had to overcome as a high school student. In middle school I had mostly black males as my best friends, once I reached the end of middle school to the beginning of high school, I found myself distancing myself from many of the other black males that I associated with because they were more worried about basketball and football, whereas I was more worried about my school work. Many times as I got into more advanced classes, they would say that I was “acting white” or somewhat whitewashed because I was in classes with more white and asian students than normal track classes. My parents were a strong influence on encouraging me that they did not understand how important school was which was a huge factor in my well being. As I continued throughout high school and reached an academy associated with my high school, I met other black students who had the same goals. People telling me that I was “acting white” did not phase me.

Blog #9: Racial/Ethnic Identity

Race identity definitely has a role in ideas of privilege here in America. Race will always be a big issue in America because there are so many different people that identify with other people in so many different ways. It is hard to compare African Americans and whites in terms of privilege because in all honesty, whites have a majority of power and authority and outnumber African Americans by a large amount. I think a good example of this is white and black schools, there are so many differences that are apparent every time, and like it has been mentioned, it comes down to resources. White privilege has a huge effect on my daily encounters. For example, being the only black male in a vast majority of my classes makes me stick out more than people of other races, and is something that I must deal with here at UT. I feel that many white people have problems identifying with blacks and people of color because they do not understand the basis of white privilege and how people of color understand racial and ethnic identity in comparison to whites. I feel like information about this (and specifically white privilege) should be taught to all Americans so we can all have a better understanding of each others race. One ethnic identity that we do not speak about much is immigrants, who are also of color but have a different identity than African Americans, of which non-immigrants usually do not have an understanding of. For the service learning group project, my identity and stage of race awareness has a huge role. Speaking to African American students in high school, they do not have a complete understanding of their ethnic and racial identity. When I was a high school student, I understood how my racial and ethnic identity existed, but I did not understand the implications on the macro-level. Also, I did not understand my connection with my race in terms of what I felt like I wanted to do for it long term. White privilege was also not understood, and I did not realize the role it had in my life. I feel like the majority of the high school students that I speak to at LBJ do not understand some of these concepts completely, but I hope to increase their understanding of how the University of Texas does accept African-American and minority students, but it requires work that is nowhere near the same level as high school. I hope to encourage the students to attend any school that they like, including out-of-state schools, HBCU's, and community colleges. I feel like the students will benefit from me speaking because I am an African American male, and it is rare that people see students like me attending UT.

Blog #8 - Affirmative Action

I personally feel that the article "Affirmative Action: Racist by nature" is a bit biased. Although some acts of Affirmative Action may be considered reverse racism, I do not feel that every aspect of Affirmative Action is negative. However, I am a bit confused on what Fisher v. The University of Texas actually means for me and the school. The top 10% rule has allowed more minorities to attend UT, but many people overlook the fact that not every school is 100% hispanic and black. My school, for example, was more than 85% hispanic and black, yet the top 10% percent of my school had a higher percentage of asians and whites represented. In addition, at UT only 4% of the student body is African American, which is nowhere near the 12% of the population that is African American. I feel like I need more research to develop an educated opinion about the topic.

Here is an interesting article about Texas A&M's legacy admissions that was basically a form of affirmative action for the rich in, if you didn't hear about it:

*This was used until 2004 I believe

http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/Legislators-slam-A-M-over-legacy-admissions-1975642.php

Midterm Essay - Week 7/8

           I am writing an essay that is addressed to be towards anyone who has a direct effect on black men as whole. In particular, politicians, teachers, counselors, and the media.  In class, we discussed that stereotypes about black men have negatively affected the black family. Stereotypes justify and promote ways of viewing our social world and people’s position within it, so they are not all necessarily true. “Ethnic Notions” showed that these stereotypes originated from minstrel shows which black face, which characterized African-Americans in negative aspects. These stereotypes still live in multiple different forms today. Some of these stereotypes include the “Sambo”, “Coon”, “Uncle Tom”, “Buck”. These stereotypes have evolved to ideas today that black men are lazy and do not want to work, that they are sexually aggressive, great athletes and rappers, promiscuous, don’t take care of their children, and are criminals. There are very few stereotypes about black men that are positive, and some black men do not even realize that they are living up to stereotypes.
         Africentric theory suggests that behavior is function of a person and their environment. The African-centered behavior change model states that there are four different quadrants representing Authentic, Adopted, Adapted, and Aberrant behaviors. This supports the idea that development from early childhood to adolescence is crucial to outcomes of black men. In addition, it suggests that African-Americans may have different values than their Eurocentric white counterparts here in America. If more are black men are pulled towards adapted and authentic behaviors, it will be beneficial. The seven Nguzo Saba principles are Umoja (Unity), Kujichagulia (Self-Determination), Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility), Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics), Nia (Purpose), Kuumba (Creativity), and Imani (Faith). If these principles are performed early on in age, it will help. Another theory that will help black men is the social-ecological theory, which suggests that people act as a reaction to individual, micro, exo/meso, and macro factors that each play a role in a different way. Some examples of this include individual face-to-face influences, State Laws, schools, churches, neighborhoods, and parent-school programs.

            Studies show that women are held to more responsibilities within the family because perform more in the home, opposed to men who are more associated with money and work outside the home. Studies from the Hammond article suggest that black men value manhood and responsibility as the two major things they want to hold up to. In addition to these, autonomy, providing, and spirituality were also highly valued by African-American men. The Bethea article suggests that another way to promote black counselors who can help with mental attitudes of black men. She states that counselors of other races, specifically white women, need to understand that black men think differently and go through many different situations than their white counterparts.

Potential ways to prevent these negative stereotypes from continuing would be to get rid of as many of the stereotypes as possible from the media and promote positive healthy relationships between black men and society. Another solution would be to increase support for success among black males within the family. If there is more support from mentors, teachers, counselors, and parents at a younger age, black men will feel the need to become successful for their own satisfaction instead of getting involved in actions that will make them end up in jail or not become successful and supportive for the family as a whole. This is possible for black men as long as we people who are willing to change the way that things are now.

Week 7 - Class Discussion

Class Discussion

I will admit, when I went to class I wondered to myself how my friends and family would react to everything that was said and the readings. I feel like there was so much going on with the discussion that I really didn't have time to sit and think about what was going on. I also think that since everything was rushed it made the experience more one sided because not very many questions were asked. Regardless, it was an interesting experience to hear first hand from people who are part of the LBGT community. Growing up in the black church like many others, homosexuality is not ever discussed. I still believe that homosexuality is a sin, but it definitely is not any more of a sin than stealing, lying, or anything else. I have always looked at discrimination towards homosexuals as similar as discrimination with ethnicities, so I feel that they should have the same rights as everyone else. The United States is supposed to be a country that is accepting of all people of different lifestyles, races, and ideologies. However, I feel like there will probably never be a day when homosexual couples will be able to walk around like heterosexual couples like it is normal because they are in a minority similar to interracial couples, and people just are not used to it. Regardless, the whole dl/homosexual/sexual identity crisis is something that is even harder to deal with in black families and communities. The more everyone is educated and understands the truth, the quicker there will be solutions.

Blog #6 - Black men, women, and the LBGT community

If only 2% of psychologists are African American, it suggests that black people will be less likely to come to counselors for their problems because they would probably most prefer someone who looks like them. Areas of concern for black men are that it suggests that black men will be much less likely to go into getting counseled compared to men of other races, employment issues, increased anger from oppression and anger, feeling invisible, and being associated with a role strain

The components of self-esteem for Black women were social support and self-reliance. These were both suggested strongly in the focus group used for the study

Both black heterosexual and homosexual couples are exactly the same besides sexual orientation. Both make less money than their white counterparts, they both are affected by the same stereotypes related to color, they both are generally discriminated against, they both raise more children. However, black homosexual couples are hit by oppression stronger than heterosexual couples.

Being gay is not a choice. That idea is an old myth. Watson is talking about people who have strong beliefs in the church but do not sympathize to the fact that being homosexual is as strong of a sin as all others and that is talked down upon more

I feel like it is difficult to address homophobia in the black community because there are so many different opinions. Personally, informing people that are not educated about homosexuals may be difficult because of ideas that have been rooted within black families. On college campuses I feel like it may be discussed but it will still be hard to address in my opinion.

The "At least I'm not gay" abstract shows AA gay and lesbian teens will conform to what is considered “normal” and attempt to assimilate into the mainstream by physical appearance. In quadrant 4, coming out would be extremely difficult because there are even more influences that will marginalize opportunities for the youth to find ways to receive support and learn how to deal with their homosexuality because of their environment.

Blog #5: Challenges Between Black Men and Women

Chapman Article

I feel like one solution to address challenges would be to get rid of the negative stereotypes as much as possible in the media and promote positive helalthy relationships between black men and women. I feel like people are already attempting to do this. Another solution would be to increase support for success among black males within the family. If parents strongly encourage their children, providing them support and guidance to get college degrees (specifically men), many more black men will be more successful. I believe that this requires strong support from mentors, teachers, and would require an environment that promotes success as well. I think it is very interesting that black men are actually doing better economically. I hate to complain but there are some women who fit the stereotype of being mad black and independent as women. But I feel like they are in that situation because of bitterness from the past, and that they need to look past that one or two situations and try a new, different type of guy. I feel like many times black women attempt to compete with each other to find that perfect black man, who ends up being a dog. At the same time while I say all this, there are many positive, beautiful and ambitious women who do not go for these men as well. I

-I also highly agree with the New York Times article, seeing the statistic that only 13% of black women over 55 are single may suggest that black women are getting married, but we must remember that this is not representative of the current young generation but of the older baby boomer generation. Regardless, I think there are a decent amount of educated black men for black women.

If you have time, look at this on the "Denzel Principle". I think it is pretty funny and some of it is pretty accurate.

A Counseling Perspective

Stereotypes about black men and women have negatively affected the black family. The 3 areas of Issues and Approaches are processing grief and loss, enhancing effective communication, and confronting negative stereotypes.

2 Anti-Intimacy Beliefs

1)I’m not good enough to be loved.

This one relates because slave owners attempted to devalue blacks by making them feel like they can go without love and psychologically held them back.

2) No matter what I do, it won’t make a difference.

            By making slaves believe that they had no purpose but to do physical labor, it made them think that they had no control of their situation and that that was their place, as slaves.

Hammond Article

The four ways that men defined manhood were Responsibility, Autonomy, Providing, and Spirituality. The two emerging themes in the article were manhood and responsibility.

Blog #4: Five Questions

Part 1

In the way that blacks operate. I feel like since African Americans are so used to American lifestyles based on an autonomist and independent ideas, most elite Blacks do not feel a reason to want to “help a brotha out” or help lower income blacks. Growing up in the middle class, even my own parents I feel do not give back directly to lower income families to an extent I feel is needed. If blacks could take ideas from Asian Americans who have learned to immerse their people in cultural practices so that they do not stray from their culture and help each other out to a greater extent, there would not be as many problems as there are today.

Part 2

I feel like the root of the disparity of black men and women begins at the simple gender level. Changes in gender roles are what has led to women advancing at a higher rate. As more black men have trouble in school leading to them ending up in jail usually, women left behind must take the role of being the bread winner. I feel like black men are targeted more than black women, and once they are put in jail it is much harder to recover in many ways. The U.S. is the world’s leading jailer, which does not help. Stereotypes that blacks use drugs and alcohol more than whites are stereotypes used to make it harder for blacks to get out of the cycle.

This article goes more into drug and alcohol rates.

http://blackagendareport.com/content/white-kids-abuse-drugs-and-alcohol-twice-rate-blacks

     

Part 3

Only 29% of AA women aged 28-55 earning over $55,000 are married. The ratio of black men to black women college students was 1-1, now the ratio is 9:1 (female-to-male). Compared to the Franklin article, where 75% of black families included husband and wife proves that something deeper is going on leading to destruction of the black family.

Part 4

The plight has deepened from the increased numbers of young black males in prison and dropping out of schools. Information shows that statistics for black men are much higher than other races. Two facters keeping black employment rates down are bad schools and absent parents.

Part 5

Annihilation through integration basically refers to the fact that blacks who marry outside of their race are going outside of the culture, which doesn’t usually benefit other African Americans. In relation to the marriageability index it makes the rates even lower because those people will not marry other blacks. The Evans article suggested that we should embrace our ethnocentric ideas and want to be with people who share our values, religion, and culture. I think that is very true because although marrying outside the race is integrating our nation, it also usually results in less expression of cultural ideas.

#foodforthought

Blog #3:

Part 1 & 2

Before I start, I think that the majority of these events, if not all of them had an impact on the dynamics of Black Family Life in some way. The ones that stood out to me were:

1739 – Stono Rebellion

Comment: I never even heard about this revolt and I feel like if we know about major revolts, why don’t we know about the first? Rebellions and revolts were crucial in leading to slavery being abolished and civil rights being established.

Nguzo Saba:

Ujima (Collecetive Work and Responsibility) – “To build and maintain our community together and make our sister’s and brother’s problems our problems and to solve them together.”

Umoja (Unity) – “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.”

1831-1861 – Underground Railroad

Comment: Although there are so many crucial events to the history of the African American Family, this is important because it was a very unique event unlike many others. Rewards were set for slaves like they were property, abolitionists took an attempt to make change in what was going on, and I just learned that many slaves escaped to Canada, which I had no clue of.

Nguzo Saba:

Ujima (Collecetive Work and Responsibility) – “To build and maintain our community together and make our sister’s and brother’s problems our problems and to solve them together.”

Umoja (Unity) – “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.”

1867 – Five all-black colleges (HBCUs) founded

Comment: I feel like this is extremely crucial. HBCUs were created to help minority students, specifically blacks and now latinos, to continue in school and become professionals or leaders. --Surprisingly (in my eyes), Bush attempted to increase funding for HBCUs by 30% during his term.

http://diverseeducation.com/article/3525/ 

Nguzo Saba:

Nia (Purpose) – “To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.”

Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) – “To build and maintain our community together and make our sister’s and brother’s problems our problems and to solve them together.”

1947 – Jackie Robinson breaks the color barrier

Comment: Maybe I am biased being a guy, but I think this was a very significant event because it definitely had an affect on the way many black men think today. Aspirations of being a major league player in sports have become common among black men because they see other black men succeeding and dominating over sports.

Nguzo Saba:

Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) – “To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.”

Imani (Faith) – “To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

1963 – “I have a Dream” Speech

Comment: I think this is self-explanatory. This speech still continues to be used in classrooms every day.

Nguzo Saba:

Nia (Purpose) – “To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.”

Imani (Faith) – “To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

1971 -  Congressional Black Caucus formed

Comment: I feel like this is important because African Americans should be preent in the justice system. I had never previously heard of this.

Nguzo Saba:

Umoja (Unity) – “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.”

Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) – “To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.”

1990 – U.S. Census says 50% AAs still in southern states

Comment: Interesting to me, I figured that things would be more spread out. I believe this shows how important nuclear family values are though.

Nguzo Saba:

Umoja (Unity) – “To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.”

Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) – “To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.”

1991 – Black Entertainment Television (BET) founded

I had no clue that it was the first AA company on the NY Stock Exchange. I am puzzled because this only happened 21 years ago. But I feel like it is important for blacks to be expressed in the media.

Nguzo Saba:

Kuumba (Creativity) – “To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.”

Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) – “To build and maintain our own stores, shops, and other businesses and to profit from them together.”

#Sidenote

When I do these assignments for class, even though it is not required sometimes I can spend hours simply going over this information because there is so much that I still do not know and want to learn. Does this happen to anyone else?

Part 3

The Nguzo Saba principles evident in the Harvey article include all of them Umoja, Kujichagulia, Ujima, Ujamaa, Nia, Kuumba, and Imani. They are all mentioned in the article.

In the Dynamic Duo article, principles evident are Umoja, Ujima, Kujichagulia, Ujamaa, Nia, and Imani.

Blog #2 - Sorting Race Assignment / My Privileges

Sorting Race

What immediately caught my attention was the fact that until 1960, the census enumerators classified people into races by looking at them. I know plenty of people who look a certain race but are actually a combination or are a completely different one than what people predict. I only guessed 4 people right.. haha. It's crazy that the census didn't attempt to allow people to choose more than one race until the 2000's too. I guess it is good that we can use things like the census to determine things like which groups are being treated unequally and what groups show different health problems. I honestly cannot see our society without race.

The three facts that stood out to me were:
4. Race and freedom were born together.
- It is interesting that although the U.S. was founded upon freedom, but then turned around to enslave people in numerous ways mentally and physically.

5. Race justified social inequalities as natural.
- This one stood out to me because it is hard to believe the extent that race was used within laws.

10. Colorblindness will not end racism.
- I think this is especially true because people will always want some way to make the different from others, and race is an easy way to do it.

I think if more people knew more about our history of all races, there would be more equality. In my opinion, the majority of the people in our history that all Americans know for making major accomplishments are white, so that idea can develop in young peoples minds of minorities and keep them from becoming those successful people. If there was a more equal distribution of all careers and jobs by race, it would be more reflective of the diversity of our country.

The most interesting things I took from the articles were how even Europeans were considered "nonwhite" and assimilated in order to become "white", how white priveledge is defined as "historical systemic structural race-based superiority", and how in the knapsack article she said she never was asked to speak for all the people of her racial group.

My Privileges :

1. Masculinity/Heterosexism
2. Male
3. Class (Middle Class)
4. Education
5. Being American
6. Connections (To people who are of higher class)
7. Experiences/Exposure (Throughout life)

#TheFamily

Blog #1: Bob Herbert Editorial & Newt Gingrich Video

In response to the Bob Herbert Editorial, I agree with his perspective on a needed civil rights movement in some aspects. I think there are many problems that we face as Americans that are largely rooted upon race. Specifically with blacks I think that ideas of white privilege and  discrimination are still very prevalent even though they may not be expressed in the same ways as in the past. Now that it is 2012 there is still a very large disparity between African Americans and Whites. Until something revolutionary happens where everyone pushes towards equality, problems will continue.




Gingrich says "Blacks should want paychecks, not food stamps". I am not the most knowledgeable person about politics and the government, but statements like this are the reason that I have a low interest in following the republican race. Gingrich obviously is attacking blacks of the lower socioeconomic class and attempting to claim that that are too lazy for work and would rather get free food stamps. He does neglecting the fact that not only are blacks receiving food stamps, but so are people of other races. The poor have problems because they continue to struggle to make ends meet and never get to take a break. I believe he should go to the NAACP just to see how the whole situation turns out.