JRLeft posted an OP in the GD:P ... [View all]

[1StrongBlackMan]

Bernie Sanders is going to have to speak on more issues affecting black people. He's right on the issues, but he has to speak to black in a different way than white people or else he's in trouble. I'm a Bernie supporter, but I won't sugarcoat anything.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/12511188565

that I wanted to comment on; but, will not do so in that forum ... because, quite frankly, I am not interested in seeing responsive comments from Non-Black DUers that routinely express their belief that they know Black people better than we know ourselves and show hostility to African-American peoples.

JRLeft, I agree that if Sanders is going to have to speak on more issues affecting black people, he has to speak to black in a different way than white people or else he's in trouble. But I think it will be a tough row to row for him, in that I think he, like most white liberals, has a fundamental mis-understanding of the Black condition in America, including Black poverty ... and therefore, his solutions are, largely, unappealing to all (most) but the "youngest", among the Black electorate. (More on the "Black generational divide" to follow)

As Coates recently wrote (again), in his Atlantic piece entitled: The Enduring Solidarity of Whiteness ...

black poverty (is) fundamentally distinct from white poverty ... (And) The pervasive and distinctive effects of racism are viewable at every level of education from high school drop-outs (see pages 13-14 of this Pew report, especially) to Ivy league graduates. I strongly suspect that if one were to investigate public-health outcomes, exposure to pollution, quality of public education or any other vector relating to socio-economic health, a similar pattern would emerge.

And Coates, goes on to ask:

A useful question might arise from such awareness: Has the impact of “universalist social policies” been equal across racial lines?

The honest answer to which, exposes why Sanders' understanding of the Black condition must (from a Black perspective)
change ... which would allow his language to change.

Now, with that said ... I have stated before that the Sanders campaign appears to have made the decision/gamble, early in its formation, that he could make up for his inability to attract the Black vote by attracting more of the working class white vote ... and, based on the Iowa and N.H. elections results ... Looking behind the numbers, the Bernie camp's battle plan/gamble appears to be working ... he has demonstrated that he could attract the white working class vote in sufficient numbers to, effectively, replaced the Black vote.

Now, maybe, N.H. is unique in it's "live free or die", anti-establishment, motto (that I can only assume applies to the Black folks that choose to live there, as well).

The problem is, and much of the Black electorate recalls/knows, ... it has been the Black experience in America that when the white working class comes together, it doesn't work out well for Black Americans, even when the gathering is started, or joined, by Black Americans (see: the tenant farmers/sharecroppers movement, the labor movement, and more recently, the Reagan republicans).

Further, it has been the Black experience in America that the "free" social programming that creates white stability and wealth, rarely, is "free", or stabilizing, or wealth producing, for Black Americans (see: social security, VA benefits, the public housing movement of the late '40s/early '50s, etc.)

Lastly, what the white Left, recently (it seems), refers to as, "the Establishment", includes the "Federal Government" ... the same Federal Government that protected the Black Freedman during Reconstruction, escorted the first Black students into integrated schools, enforced anti-discrimination laws, and was, as an (imperfect) employer, a/the most powerful builder of the Black middle-class. In short, the Black electorate has never been antagonistic with the Federal Government.

These are history points that "young" Black folks are mis-remembering, if they ever knew.

So, will Sanders make head way into the Black vote? ... Probably, so. But if he doesn't examine, and change, his understanding of the Black condition (and express that change in his language), that in-roads will be, largely, limited to the Black "youth".

Then, (or maybe, now) the question becomes/is for the Sanders camp: Will that be enough?

... And for the Black electorate the question becomes/is: without the change, and with history as a guide, what will our future look like with a Sanders presidency.

One more point ...

Should there be an "unchanged" Sanders Presidency, and history does what unlearned history does, woe be to the white left, as the "young" Blacks learn (re-learn) the lessons of history.