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4A EDITORIAL AND OPINION/Charlotte Thursday, March 16, 2006 Cliarlotte The Voice of the Black Community 1531 Camden Road Charlotte, N.C. 28203 Gerald O. Johnson ceo/publisher Robert L, Johnson co-publisher/general manager Herbert L. White editor in chief OPINION Reading ahoutlLCL’s raigious ewerience March means basketball tournaments, and that’s the closest many of us ever get Does North Carolina have a state religion? Officially the answer is “No.” But this month we know betto*. For many North Carolinians, March is the month of pil grimages to “holy” sites, where they will join 20,000 or so other pilgrims in “worship.” Some will be wearing costumes and uniforms to show their loyalty Some will have thdr faces and other parts of their bodies painted to fri^ten the evil spirits and opponents. They wOl sing and shout and jump up and down more than the most enthusiastic “holy rollers.” Even those who cannot take the pil grimages will go though all kinds of rituals designed to bring about favorable outcomes. This “religion” is, of course, basketball. For those few North Carolinians who have not yet been intro duced to the state religion, I recommend three outstanding new books. Each of them helps its readers begin to see why basket ball is so special in our state and how the rivalries and loyalties lead some of us to actions ffiat appear to be either religious fanaticism or insanity In the first book, “Blue Blood: Inside the Most Storied Eivalry in College Hoops,” veteran reporter and sports writer Art Chansky lays out the history of the Duke-CaroHna basketball rivalry “Blue Blood” is comprehensive and full of details about hiiii^ and firing coaches, arguments and fights, and the strategy and tactics of important games. In some ways it is an encyclopedic history of college basketball since the 1950’s. Although it centers on Duke and Carolina, their stories overlap with those of the other teams both schools played regularly ‘Blue Blood” has an index, which makes it easytolookup spe cific people. For instance, if you want to know about former Duke star Bobby Hmiey you can look him up quickly Then you can read how and why he signed at Duke, even though his father, a high sdiool coach, had been a long-time admirer of Carolina and Coach Dean Smith. Chansky ^plains how the Hurley family’s new connections with Duke closed down impor tant Carolina recruiting opportunities in the New York area. These kinds of details and the convenient index make Blue Blood not only a good read, but also a necessary reference book for every sports writer or fan who follows Duke or Carolina. TOll Blythe’s brand new book wins the longest titie award. “Tb Hate Like This Is to Be Happy Forever: AThoroughly Obsessive, Intermittently Uplifting, and Occasionally Unbiased Account of the Duke-North Carolina Basketball Rivalry” might also be one of the best book titles ever. The title lets you know that it is a personal memoir, as much about the author as it is about basketball, Blythe opens his book with, “I am a sick, sick man. Not only am I consvuned by hatred, I am delighted by it. ” In a compelling explanaticai of the sources of this hatred that delights him, Blythe charts a pathway for his readers to deal with their own imreasonable passions about basketball and the teams they love-and love to hate. Tb illustrate his explanations, Blythe weaves together him- dreds of wonderful basketball I'elated stories about himself, his family, and his fiiends. In one of them he writes, “A former teacher of mine, a great scholar of Southern literature, believes that he can control games by maintaining the same posture throughout the contest and by doing some kind of weird voodoo gesture with his fingea:s every time an opposing player shoots a fiee throw,” Tb find out who this teachei- is, you have to read a third book, “Off the Rim: Basketball and Other Regions in a Carelina Childhood” by Fred Hobson, the same former teacher whose pos- tui*e and gestures Blythe describes. “Off the Rim” is also a mem oir, Hobson tdls us of his growing up in the mountain foothills of Yadkin Coimty playing high school basketball there, and making Carolina’s freshman team as a “walk on” in the early 1960s. The story of Hobson’s later conversion finm athlete to scholar is engaging and poignant-espedally since the scholar, like his student Blythe, stUl goes crazy when Carolina plays Duke. Which one of these thi*ee books should you read? If you want to mdei-stand Noidh Carolina’s “state religion,” get all three of them. D.G. MARTIN is the host of UNC-TV's North Carolina Boohvatch, which is taking a break during "Festival’' and will return in April. Silent epidemic of school dropouts If you listen carefully you stUl can’t hear it. It’s the sound of a third of hi^ school stiidaats dropping out before receiv- but for the society that failed them. “The Silent Epidemic: Perspectives of High School Dropouts” is an important report on the dropout prob lem told fiom the viewpoints of true experts - the students themselves. The study which focuses on polhi^ and focus groups, is a joint project by the Civic Enterprises and Peter D. Hart Research Associates for the BiU & Melinda Gates Foimdation. In 2003, about 3.5 million youth 16 to 25 did not have a bigb school diploma and were not enrolled in school. The report begins with “An Open Letter to the American People” that gets directly to the point: “There is a hi^ school dropout epidemic in America. Each year, almost one third of all public high school students - and nearly one half of all blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans - fail to graduate finm public high school with their dass. Many of these stu dents abandon school with less than two years to com plete their high school educa tion.” And society has plenty of reasons to care. “The dedsion to drop out is a dangerous one for the stu dent,” the report continued. “Dropouts are much more likely than their peers who graduate to be unemployed, hvir^ in poverty receiving phblic assistance, in prison, on death row, unhealthy, divorced and single parents with children who drop out fi’om bigb school themselves.” The. report on this silent epidemic allows us to listen to what those who quit say about their predicament. “The central message of this report is that while some students drop out because of significant academic chal lenges, most dropouts are students who could have, and beheve they could have, suc ceeded in school,” the study said. “This survey of yovmg people who left high school without graduating su^ests that, despite career aspira tions that require education beyond hi^ school and a majority having grades of C or better, circumstances in students’ lives and an inade quate response to those cir cumstances fiom the schools led to dropping out.” We tend to think of high school dropouts as being inca pable of handling the acade mic workload and thae is some evidence that supports that view. For example, 35 percent of those polled said “failing in school” was a major factor in the decision to drop out. And 32 percent had repeated a grade before drop ping out. Nearly half of the former students — 47 percent — quit not because of the academic challenge, but because they found classes uninteresting. “These young people report ed being bored and disen gaged fix)m high school,” the report said. “Almost as many (42 percent) spent time with people who were not interest ed in school. These were among the top reasons select ed by those with high GPAs and by those who said they were motivated to work hard.” An even larger number of students - 69 percent - said they were not motivated or inspired to work hard. In fact, two-thirds said they would have worked harder had it been required of them. Naturally there were other real life factors that caused some students to drop out. Approximately a third said they had to get a job and make more money 26 per cent said they became a par ent and 22 percent said they had to care for a family mem ber. It became clear that the decision to quit school was not a spur of the moment choice. Rather, it was a culmi nation of growing disengage ment and fi:equent absences fi’om classes. There was also a significant number of students who fell behind in the early years and never felt they caught up - or could catch up - with their classmates. Among the recommenda tions made in the report: • Provide a more support ive academic environment at school and at home that would improve the student’s chances of remaining in school; • Improve the teaching and cmricular to make school more relevant and engaging; • Offering tutoring and summer school for stru^ing students; • Operate a more disci plined classroom; • Make sure that students have a strong relationship with at least one adult in the school and • Improve communication between parents and schools. And parents need to improve their communication with their children. “The majority of parents were hot aware’ or jiast ‘some what aware’ of their child’s grades or that they were about to leave school,” the report said. Clearly we all need to be more involved. GEORGE E.. CURRY is eddor- in-chiefoftheNNPANews Service and BlackPressUSArom. To con tact Curry or to book him for a speaking engagement, go to his Web site, www.georgecurry.com. Conundrum of consciousness, capital Two dynamic brothers, Chike Akua, of Atlanta and Amefika Geuka, of West Palm, Fla., were guests on Brother Keidi Awadu’s LIB Internet Radio Program (www.hbradio.com) in February Amor^ the many interesting points made was Chike’s assessment of Black consciousness and Black cap ital. In short, he noted that many conscious brothers and sisters have httle capital and many black folks who have a lot of capital have httle conscious- Thus, we must raise both conscious ness and cap ital. Subsequent to that partic ular conversa tion, Brother Amefika, who agrees with the basic premise of black folks needing both consciousness and capital, shared with me the reality of om’ situation when it comes to raisir^ the consciousness of Black folks who have capi tal. With few exceptions, few of us that have both con sciousness and capital and are doing good and well at the same time. He mentioned W'alter Lomax of Philadelphia as being among that exceptional group. Amefika pointed to the diffi culty and near futility of try ing to raise consciousness among the so-called Black ehte. You know, I beheve he is right. W.E.B. DuBois tried it with his Talented Tfenth theo ry and failed. Forty-five years after he advocated the con cept he said, “In my youth I underestimated the power of selfishness over sacrifice.” Who in the world do I think I am to beheve I can accom- phsh that lofty feat? I beheve both Chike and Amefika are right in their conclusions, and I also beheve in what DuBois discovered at a late age. Weh, I am at a somewhat ‘late” age, with no time to waste; I definitely imderstand the power of self ishness over sacrifice. So, here is what I have come up with. Marcus Garvey told us time after time that Black people are a nation within a nation. That being true, he argued, we must act as such. Other groups in America have no problem danonstrating their nationhood 'within the bor ders of the U.S. Black folks seem to have some reserva tions about doing it, maybe because many of us are still trying to assimilate and be “accepted” by White people. It’s great for people to love and accept us, but should we spend our every waking hour trying to force them to do so? Acting as a nation natural ly reflects nationalistic think*- ing and nationalistLc action, just as we see the .Chinese, the Greeks, the Italians, the Koreans, the Indians, and others conducting their affairs in a nationalistic man ner. Those folks are indeed nationalists. They take their resources and take care of themselves first. They are conscious capitalists and con scious nationalists. What are we? Unless Chike or Amefika offer something else, my plan is to concentrate on those of us who are nationalistic in our thinking and our actions. We may not have much indi vidually but we do have a great deal collectively I am -sure if given the right leader ship and marching orders, nationalistic brothers and sis ters will do what it takes - they win make the necessary sacrifices to empower om people. I know they will use whatever resources they have to do the right thing for our people. Considering the current and, in some cases, impend ing geopolitical and macro- economic ramifications of this coirntrys policies, Black Americans, the ones who are most oppressed, most impris oned, most insecure, most mis-educated and uneducat ed, most unemployed, most impoverished, most neglect ed, and who suffer the most disease and lOness, I am con vinced, and have been for a long time, that only by the work of our own hands, as Martin Delany told us, will we be successful. Thus, I am reissuing a call for you, reader’s of this col umn aU across this country to join the Blackonomics Million DoUai-aub (BMDC). No, it is not a panacea, but we have many other brothers and sis ters who are working on other initiatives in other areas of poUective and cooper ative economic empower ment. My call is for the BMDC. I know full well that there are at least 200,000 black folks who read thb col umn in more than 200 publi cations throu^out the U.S. I also know there are millions of black folks orJine, many of whom will also read this. You are the ones to whom this call is made. Consciousness demands nationalistic action by these who claim to be conscious. Of course, we need capital and, as Maria Stewart said, we have plenty but we spend most it on “nonsense.” So what’s it going to be? Yes, I would love to see our capital- rich brothers and sisters get involved, and the bridge that has been built over the years is stiH intact; I sincerely hope and pray they will at least meet the conscious ones in the middle of that bridge and commit to making a few sac rifices too. JAMES E. CUNGMAN is a professor at the University of Cincinnati and former editor of the Cincinnati Herald newspaper.
The Charlotte Post (Charlotte, N.C.)
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March 16, 2006, edition 1
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