A few years ago, during a conversation with an acquaintance, a self-proclaimed Conservative Republican, he looked at me quizzically and remarked, “You sound very much like a political conservative.” I responded: “What made you think I had any political labels?” He said: “Your comments just now surprised me. I had labeled you a Liberal Democrat because you are always railing about mistreatment of minorities, especially African Americans; so, I made the leap.” I replied: “One does not have to be politically affiliated to demand that America’s leaders fulfill their responsibilities to all the people, just an American. What I said was based on the moral and academic education I received in my community.”
Poor people can’t tell when we change party leadership, irrespective of which political party holds the presidency and the congressional majority. The ineffectiveness of programs designed ostensibly to help historically oppressed Americans is caused in large measure by the notion that the struggle for justice is between “Liberals” and “Conservatives.” In reality, it is between political extremists: “Pseudo-Liberals” and “Closet-Racists.” We dignify these awful human beings when we label them Liberal or Conservative.
I was heavily involved when the US Department of Education required states to eliminate duality in higher education, or desegregate, which linked inextricably with BROWN. This experience taught me that extremists in both major political parties capitalize on each other’s behavior to maintain the status quo.
Early on, I saw Pseudo-Liberals place poor children into a three-track system – to help them. A small number were placed into the highly educable category (Track 1), where excellent education was provided. A much larger number were relegated to the educable group (Track 2), where they got less-challenging course-work. And a large number of the children were consigned to the special category (Track 3) and received educational pablum.
“Compensatory Education” was supposed to remedy past racist oppression; however, “assistance,” for groups two and three included such remedies as Ritalin; self-esteemia stressed above academic excellence, e.g., no grade allowed below “C;” and coursework unrelated to workplace demands. Movement downward from tracks one and two was commonplace; but movement upward from tracks three and two, hardly ever occurred.
I noted immediately that without proper and constant vigilance by knowledgeable, courageous advocates in their local communities, Black children were enrolled in worthless courses with great-sounding names, and suffered from low expectations, inferior-support systems, incompetent teachers, grade inflation, and social promotions. This educational parody ensured that far too many moved through the system, and even graduated, functionally illiterate, thereby fulfilling the fallacious myth about genetic intellectual capacity. Then the Closet Racists, pretending ignorance of the educational deprivation taking place, could sound very ethical and fair when they denied access to some valued objective by citing a lack of basic academic qualifications. Advocates, however, no matter how they are labeled, who say the gap in test scores, for example, is driven principally by bias instead of by educational deprivation help opponents to equality.
In addition, educational leaders relegated to a lower status the fundamental purpose of education — intellectual competence — in favor of numerical ratios in school buildings; but they could not eliminate the penalty America would inflict on the undereducated, as well as on their children and grandchildren. Moreover, in the desegregated settings, nemeses were able to achieve significant negative outcomes given that ignorance is the greatest enslaver known to human kind. Current educational data bear this out – Black children are woefully behind the test averages.
A true Liberal understands that smart that is relevant to success in America is not something with which one is born, but rather is something that one acquires with a high quality/high quantity education. A true Conservative understands that America will never regain her economic power and moral authority if a substantial proportion of her citizens continue to be trapped in the basement of this nation simply because of historic mistreatment of their ancestors. True Liberals and true Conservatives, working together, must help all of us endeavor to eliminate the situations that cause the need for concessions or special treatment. The only compensation for educational deprivation is high quality education. Over the decades, false remedies have further crippled the victims, as well as America.
If we want success to reach the least among us and last through the coming generations, advocates for democracy must not be influenced by political labels. No matter how eloquent the political rhetoric, or how popular the individuals who espouse solutions, we must attend to the results of policies implemented — audits over plaudits — especially from the perspective of those for whom the actions are undertaken.
