National Review's Black Unemployment Panel Had No Black Experts on It

The National Review is known for being a conservative and some think, racist publication. Their recent actions didn't do much to dispel that claim, when they put together a panel to discuss black unemployment. Gawker.com noted that their panel consisted of a nice list of experts from various walks of life, but not one single black person in the group. The panelists were asked to focus on racial inequality in America, and they also seemed to be promoting racial imbalance by not giving a voice to African Americans.

One of the topics the panelists were asked to discuss was black unemployment, which has skyrocketed this month. Even though white American unemployment has stabilized at 8.8%, black unemployment shot up from 15.8% to 16.5% during the month of March. Black male unemployment is at 19% and black teen unemployment is 41%. The group's policy advisors had varying explanations for this problem, some of which were typical conservative rhetoric. Some of the ideas, however, were not all that bad.

"The key to lifting the economic fortunes of African Americans (and perhaps a clue to the persistent gap in employment) is imbuing an entrepreneurial ethic, and providing a policy climate, that allows them to offset the negative impacts of racial discrimination using their own skills and aptitudes. While rising tides do in fact lift all boats, falling tides can strand many of these boats on the beach. This is playing out in the Great Recession," said Samuel R. Staley, Robert W. Galvin Fellow and director of Urban & Land Use Policy at the Reason Foundation.

I agree with Mr. Staley about entrepreneurship being important for the black community. By creating our own jobs, we do not have to worry about others taking our jobs away from us. Part of the reason black people struggle in bad economies is that in a country that struggles with racism and sexism, people are going to protect the jobs of those with whom they identify. This can be described as racism, but it may just be favoritism.

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10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Black Leaders
Who are they? Who appoints them? Do people still respect what Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have to say? Does the NAACP have any power today? The future and current state of black leadership has been highly debated in recent weeks, but with the emergence of the Barack Obama presidential campaign, there is hope for a brighter day with black leadership.

Ferdaus Shamim, WireImage.com

AFP

BlackVoices.com

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Breakdown of the Black Family
The low marriage rate in the black community has a detrimental effect on today's youth. Nearly 65% percent of black kids are born to single parent homes. Lacking either a mother or a father leaves a gap in a child's psyche that is usually replaced by a more negative factor. While one parent is better than none, a single working mother or father usually doesn't have enough time to parent their children as effectively as they should, which could cause trouble in the household.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Black Health Issues
While African American are only 13% of the U.S. population, blacks account for more HIV and AIDS cases and HIV-related deaths than any other racial/ethnic group. The rate of obesity is also a huge factor in the community, with over one-third of blacks being obese. The result is a higher risk of pancreatic cancer among blacks than among whites, particularly for women. It also leads to a high prevalence of obesity-related conditions such as hypertension and type 2 diabetes, factors reported to contribute to a high death rate from coronary heart disease.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Light-Skinned vs. Dark-Skinned
The color complex is an issue in the black community that has existed for centuries. It has divided families, communities and marital relationships, etc. It is a system of discrimination by black people against other African Americans based on skin tone, pitting light versus dark--even though the reality is that no matter what the shade, we are still black.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Use of the N-word
Much has been said and published over the use of the word "nigger." Political figures and celebrities have argued over its power and prevalence in the black community. No matter how you spin it, this word, whether you love it or hate it, will most likely be a part of the black vernacular for years to come.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Crack Epidemic
Starting in the early 1980s, a cheap, portable and highly addictive form of cocaine hit America's streets. Crack ravaged many inner cities populated by African Americans with a flood of addiction, a proliferation of border babies (abandoned children in hospitals born addicted to crack), astronomical murder rates, and a general blight that had never been seen before. Even in 2008, the effects crack has had on black families still remain.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Hurricane Katrina
Race in America came into focus in August 2005 when Hurricane Katrina hit the nation's Gulf coast. The fact that many news outlets referred to survivors as "refugees" in addition to the government's slow reaction time for largely black communities hardest hit left many wondering if black people "matter." Socio-economic class and segregation in the U.S. were put on television for the world to see. Although Katrina was a natural disaster, some say it exemplified this country's disregard for the condition of poor people and black folks.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Institutional racism
The decrease in race-based scholarships, rollbacks in affirmative action plans, and the persistent inequality in salaries between whites and blacks continue to show how the glass ceiling remains above the head of African Americans.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Hip-Hop's Portrayal of Women
Rap music has been criticized for its negative portrayal of women, glorification of "thug life," and violence since its inception. However, these days, the future of the genre is less clear as fewer artists top the charts and remain there. Also, opinions differ on who is to blame for women being used as stage props and negatively portrayed in music videos and lyrics. Regardless, the negative effects of hip-hop continue to linger.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

Police Brutality
The brutality cases of Amadou Diallo, Sean Bell and Rodney King have only increased an already cold relationship between the African-American community and police throughout the country. Police brutality has always been prevalent in the black community, but these cases shed light on the often violent encounters between African-Americans and cops.

10 Ways Black People Have A Long Way To Go

One of the prevailing themes of the experts' analysis of black unemployment is that many of them seemed to argue that racism does still exist. But their main point is that while racism is real, it is not as pervasive as others try to say it is. They explain that when racial disparities exist, it is not always due to racism. Instead, they argue that the disparities may exist because big government has crippled the black community or African Americans do not always have the same skills as whites.

Roger Clegg, General Counsel for The Center for Equal Opportunity, refers to policies such as Affirmative Action as being racism that causes more racism. Whether you agree with Clegg or not usually depends on whether you are conservative or liberal. The liberal point of view is that the racism of the past requires remedies that directly link to actions that will alleviate the impact of that racism. But if you only see the action itself and not the reason for the action, it is very easy to argue that Affirmative Action is racist. I do not agree with Clegg's position.

What clearly appears to be true is that the National Review should have included at least one black policy expert on their panel, which would have been the right thing to do. While they did have some good ideas, you can't fight racism by being racially exclusive.

Lawrence Watkins is the CEO of The Great Black Speakers Bureau and an MBA student at Cornell University. For more information, please visit LawrenceWatkins.com.