It is amazing at how the mainstream media and, yes, the Huffington Post is a part of the mainstream media, can peddle this twaddle and, worse, can convince other black people that it is true. My family and my extended family members, which numbers well over 750 people, would be shocked to find out that what we call black culture is really a culture of criminality and gangsterism.

cruiser...once again...

I went to a funeral this morning...my fourth in about six months and amid my family and friends, I couldn't help thinking about the absurdity of these propositions...but your linkage to these folks is precise.

I would suggest that low-level traffickers in drugs like cocaine, heroine, weed and alcohol (bartenders, etc.) have such success precisely because no real "marketing" is required.  It's the same thing here.  There is no marketing required to write disparaging things about Black folk.  The audience is an entirely uncritical group seeking to feed their addiction.  Your as right on with this one.  These articles are like nickel bags...nothing more, nothing less.

Without either proof,  logic or scientific facts  the latest articles (one of many coming down the pike) of successful middle and upper class blacks  who are angry and concerned and can't figure out why other groups test scores are going up why ours either not  that much or going down  are writing books and newspaper articles with no facts only their own observations either by...

a. Rap Videos and popular culture shows

b. Loud Black people

c. Crime blotter sheets

Every book starting with Mc Worther's book self- sabotage as he said in it's opening is based on 'anedotal evidence nothing scientific and it has follwed a familiar script of seeing loud blacks or black kids not being 'ambitious' enough like themselves. It's an arrogance that would be funny if it wasn't so dangerous. When you present evidence to the contrary these same people (esp. Black Folks) go apeshit because it conflicts with their own ideals or attitudes. It's like the Magificent Randy when he would refute ghosts or other phemonea they would be offended and blame Randy for not believing. I showed some 'concerned' black person a study that refuted the 'act white' theory, they were so angry at me  saying that 'these n&*^ don't know shit!!!! When I told them them that these people did this study over a 3-5 year period it was too much for them. Needless to say the 'white media' put the article in page 12 and the hype continues with more personal anedotes.

It would be funny if it's not so dangerous, I am too the point where  the best and honest stats I am getting on articles on what's truly going with poor blacks on are in magazines and writers like Counterpunch, In these times and foriegn newspapers  because too any american intellectual think- tanks or newspapers are looking for 'fair and balanced and are political not seeking the truth  but a cathartic release because these articles (coming from a place of "tough love and racial shame) are not solving any problems but isolating poor black citizens into a mode of the enemy within. I don't think this is good for our country.

T3 - Your analogy about nickel bags is dead on for more than one reason. I think we have to begin looking at these neurotic howls from E. Franklin Frazier's resurrected black bourgeoisie as little more than recurring set pieces in a theatrical production that will outlive "Phantom of the Opera."

I believe the only appropriate response to their declarations are ridicule, satire and parody. That's why, for example, I regard P6's posting of the excerpts from the PBS documentary about America in the late 1940s and early 1950s coupled with the caption: "White Culture Has Taken a Wrong turn..." as a briiliant and appropriate riposte to the rising tide of attacks against "black culture."

Facts alone are not suffciently sharp enough to pierce the balloons of pomposity, arrogance and fear of a black planet that gives these poor players their brief moments on stage.  

(soulgrrove2) Without either proof, logic or scientific facts the latest articles (one of many coming down the pike) of successful middle and upper class blacks who are angry and concerned and can't figure out why other groups test scores are going up why ours either not that much or going down are writing books and newspaper articles with no facts

Common knowledge. BIG problem. They don't analyze, they just repeat what everyone "knows."

Unfortunately too many of US "know" these things as well. I'm not talking about the Pattersons, McWhorters (dangerous as he is, I don't class Connerly with them because I think he's SO damaged he has no choice). I'm talking regular folks. Which is why

(ptcruiser) I believe the only appropriate response to their declarations are ridicule, satire and parody.

logic is a necessary, though insufficient, part of the response. It's like playing the dozens...barring yo mama jokes, the funniest snaps are the one that play off of something that's true.