Prometheus 6   

Frequently Asked Questions About "U-People"
by Earl Dunovant
Copyright © 1995

Why do U-People romanticize the lower economic class?
Because we all know we can wind up in that class as a result of something stupid that's out of our control. We need something to look forward to.

Why do U-People complain about unfair treatment then turn around and try to treat others unfairly?
If you want to go north and find out you're going west, you're original destination isn't north from where you are, it's northeast.

Why can't U-People just act like everyone else?
We do. We just do it in in a situation you don't recognize, so you don't recognize the results.

Why do U-People score lower on standardized tests if you're not stupider?
The standardized tests are best at testing conformance to the standard. The standard is a white male. As evidence, even white women score less well on the SAT than men with the same grades in college - or to phrase it differently, women get higher grades than men with the same SAT scores.

Either way, there's evidence that some factors relevant to both intelligence and success are missed by the standardized tests.

Why are U-People so violent?
As compared to what? Where is there a non-violent people?

Why do U-People always think everyone is a racist?
Well, everything in America is looked at through, measured in terms of, categorized and stored by race. So we know you have thoughts and opinions about us. Then we look at everything the society produces that depicts us. We consider that to be tangible evidence of the collective attitude. So now we know that the collective opinion of our race is negative.

This is a competitive disadvantage, and when our abilities are immediately discounted to the degree that we can be made to fit people's preconceptions as a tactic, we feel the tactitician and the one who executes the tactic is racist. When the tactic succeeds, we feel those who hold the preconceptions that were played on are racist.

Why don't U-People want to just accept the way things are and work to get ahead?
I need to use a metaphor for this one. Euro-American economic development has depended on extracting the value of the efforts of others. In the USofA, this has meant leveraging Black people. It's very much as if you had to get over a chasm using one of those teeter-totter arrangements Wile E. Coyote uses. . . you know, where you stand on one end of a lever, toss a heavy weight on the other end and you are catapulted forward. The USofA has used Black people as that heavy weight. The weight, in this case, has been the forced and spontaneous products of Black activity.

What we are offered now, at best, is an opportunity to toss some of our own people on the other end of our lever, to fuel our progress at the expense of others of our people.

This is not acceptable.

Why are so many of U-People in jail if you don't have criminal tendancies?
We have roughly the same proclivity to crime as everyone else. It's just that the crimes of opportunity are different for us, and you can't commit a crime without opportunity. The crimes of opportunity for us are the ones that scare the hell out of you. The crimes of opportunity for you seem to be forgivable because they're kinder and gentler (though its overall effect on the nation has been far more damaging than the muggings and such).

Beyond that, it's a truism that what you see depends on where you look. And since law enforcement officials have classified our very appearance as cause for suspicion (if we're hip-hop we're gang-bangers; if we drive a luxury car we're suspected drug dealers) they look at us a lot. . . it's their job, after all.

posted by Prometheus 6 at 4/18/2003 12:54:12 PM |