IPFS
CONNECTING THE DOTS
Frosty Wooldridge
More About: Politics: General ActivismFifty years after Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech
When Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke at the Lincoln Memorial on August 28, 1963, I
lived in Albany, Georgia with my U.S. Marine Corps father at the Marine Corps
Supply Center. I can’t remember which
dates, but King spoke in Albany.
Having been
integrated all my life as a service brat, I didn’t think segregation made any
sense. To this day, I enjoy
African-American friends, Hispanic friends and several other friends of
different races. I taught school in the
inner city for two years and I attend a church in Denver with many races
represented. I continue to teach as a 23
year volunteer at the National Sports Center for the Disabled where I teach all
races, creeds and colors—how to ski.
To this day,
King’s “I have a dream” speech continues to inspire. However, it didn’t change America at that
moment. It took armed National Guard
troops to push for blacks to attend colleges in Alabama and Mississippi. It took bussing to bring blacks into white
schools and whites into black schools.
Still, age
old racism, which still continues around the world in China, Japan, Africa,
Mexico, South America, Europe, Canada and many, many other countries—maintains
a vice-like grip on most civilizations. Unfortunately,
in my world travels, I discovered that it remains biological and tribal. Virtually all races practice racism to some
degree or other. At some point, all
races must come to respect one another’s right to live a decent life on this
planet.
At my
Dougherty High School, Albany, Georgia, where it once sustained mostly white
students, in 2013, African-Americans dominate the school nearly 100
percent. Whites attend private schools
and/or they moved to other towns. My own
younger brother John suffered so much physical and verbal abuse at school for
his excellence in the classroom that my mother moved him to a private school so
he wouldn’t get beat up every day or shaken down for his lunch money. Racism reversed itself to make whites at
Dougherty High School the same victims that blacks once experienced. My brother graduated as Salutatorian and Star
Student of his class at Dawson Private High School.
March 7, 1965, Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, Alabama: that freedom march started on "Bloody
Sunday," when 600 civil rights marchers headed east out of Selma on U.S.
Route 80. They got only as far as the Edmund Pettus Bridge six blocks away,
where state and local lawmen attacked them with Billy clubs and tear gas and
drove them back into Selma. Two days later on March 9, Martin Luther King, Jr.,
led a "symbolic" march to the bridge. Then civil rights leaders
sought court protection for a third, full-scale march from Selma to the state
capitol in Montgomery.
In 2012, I rode my bicycle across the United States from San
Francisco, California to Savannah, Georgia.
I pedaled the entire march route and stayed at one of the
campgrounds. Tremendous history of which
I participated by virtue of my dad’s military duty station!
This past weekend, over 100,000 Americans honored King at the
Lincoln Memorial. I’ve actually stood
where King made his speech on the steps of the memorial.
Since 1965, Blacks enjoyed the Voting Rights Bill
passed. They enjoyed Affirmative Action
that places them ahead of the line as to jobs over whites and they enjoy quotas
for jobs over whites. The Great Society from 1965 spent over $1
trillion of American taxpayer dollars to give Blacks a leg up into the Middle
Class. They enjoy massive food stamp,
Aid to Dependent Children, and assisted housing welfare. They enjoy college scholarships. They enjoy the Black Caucus in Congress,
Black Entertainment Television; they dominate much of professional sports,
unlimited access to education and much more.
But in 2013, a huge percentage of Black America suffers
horrific crime, illiteracy, cyclical poverty, 71 percent out-of-wedlock births,
68 percent of children growing up with only their mother, 30 to 40 percent
joblessness, accelerating drug use, hopelessness and high school
dropout/flunkout rates from 50 to 76 percent in places like Detroit, Michigan. (Source:
Brian Williams, NBC News) They
participate in endless drug distribution in cities across America, shop
lifting, rapes and murders so much so that nearly half of all the 2.3 million
male prisoners in America’s correctional facilities end up being African-Americans.
Even in my own town of Denver, our famous black Broncos
linebacker Von Miller, a man who makes $7 million annually, spent four years in
college, with all the perks of a superstar, delved into drugs even in the face
of certain testing and suspension—but got caught and the NFL commissioner
suspended him for six games into the season.
How could he be THAT stupid? Why?
Additionally, in places like Minneapolis-St. Paul, Chicago,
New York City and other big cities, “Black Flash Mobs” run around attacking and
killing white people. Two blacks in
Oklahoma killed an Australian college kid named Chris Lane last week because
they were bored with the end of summer vacation and they killed him as they
said, “For the fun of it.”
While millions of blacks screamed about Trayvon Martin’s
death at the hands of Latino George Zimmerman, a full 1,300 blacks suffered
death at the hands of another 1,300 blacks between Martin’s death and
Zimmerman’s trial. None of those black
demonstrators whispered a word at the killing of one white boy by two “bored”
black kids in Oklahoma.
At some point, Black America, given incredible benefits of
freedom, money, jobs, schooling, Affirmative Action, Aid to Dependent Children,
free breakfast and lunches for their children and a plethora of
advantages—needs to take personal accountability and personal responsibility
for living, educating and participating in the American Way of Life. Few other countries on Earth give black people
and all other races SO MUCH advantage to succeed.
Black leaders need to take action at every level. In the end,
education stands as the ultimate and only key for a positive future for Black
America.
Solutions:
1. Mandate supervised public education for every Black child until
graduation from high school. All male
prep schools from K-12. All female prep
schools from K-12. Mandate parent-teacher
education to educate parents as to responsibilities and how to raise
responsible kids who choose to succeed in school by investing in class work, homework
and school activities.
2. Mandate job training throughout high school. Test and discover each child’s talents,
skills and/or limitations intellectually and move them into a job that suits
their particular talents. Follow up with
counselors, advisors and supervisors.
Keep those kids on the path toward success.
3. We must stop paying minority women to birth as many kids as they can to
gain money. We need to monitor the EBT
cards (Electronic Benefit Transfer) that give free money without
responsibility.
4. We need to move welfare to workfare.
We cannot hope that Black America will ever pull out of its cyclical
welfare, poverty and illiteracy if “given” a free ride. Black America has come to expect a free
ride. They cannot continue and American
working taxpayers cannot afford to keep paying the bills.
5. Better to build a contributing human being from K-12 than deal with the
disaster now manifesting throughout too much of Black America.
##
Frosty Wooldridge has bicycled across six continents - from the
Arctic to the South Pole - as well as nine times across the USA, coast to coast
and border to border. In 2005, he bicycled from the Arctic Circle, Norway to
Athens, Greece. In 2010, he cycled 3,400 miles coast to coast across
America. In 2012, he bicycled the northern tier coast to coast across
America. In 2013, he bicycled 2,500 miles from Mexico to Canada on the
Continental Divide, 150,000 vertical feet of climbing and 19 crossing of
passes, 10 of the Continental Divide. He presents “The Coming Population
Crisis facing America: what to do about it.” www.frostywooldridge.com . His latest
book is: How to Live a Life of Adventure: The Art of Exploring the World by
Frosty Wooldridge, copies at 1 888 280 7715/ Motivational program: How to Live a Life of Adventure:
The Art of Exploring the World by Frosty Wooldridge, click: www.HowToLiveALifeOfAdventure.com
Live well, laugh often, celebrate daily
and enjoy the ride,
Frosty Wooldridge
Golden, Colorado
6 Continent world bicycle traveler
Order these unique cards
today: http://www.howtolivealifeofadventure.com/