Cold Drank

Ether.

Janks Morton has a Double Deez Nuts Name (the kind of name you fully understand when you hear it yet you can’t believe someone actually has a name like that in real life). And it’s a shame that such a dope Double Deez Nuts Name is wasted on Morton because this Nigga Janks is the kind of Nigga who says, with a greasy straight face, “Racism and an biased criminal justice system will fix itself when we fix our self first,” instead of the tried and true, “We’ve got to anticipate racism and a biased criminal justice system and do everything we can to attack it while trying to live everyday with more dignity and responsibility.”

Anyone who is interested in hearing more from this Nigga Janks Morton should check his documentary, “What Black Men Want.” CNN.com is playing part of the documentary as part of the Black in America series this week. And thanks to the Janks documentary, I’d like take this time to not only blame racism for my harboring such low aspirations as a fat black youth; I’d also like to blame racism for encouraging me to shamelessly brag and boast about being triumphant at the wrong black shit.

Peep …

Though your Mama’s best friend might call me a successful Nigga, the accomplishment of which I am most proud is winning the 11th Grade Class Wittiest award. I guess Janks is right and I believed the hype about black men being low achievers. Hence, this was — and is — the crowning achievement of my black male life. Thank you, Janks Morton and Shelby Steele, for helping me accept the source of my current Nigga-dly ways. More on this tomorrow …

Anyway, that Nigga Janks starts his documentary by coloring on his little board and blaming the NAACP for getting us “to this place right here.” This place is that tell-tale place where we have been conditioned to believe that there are more black men in jail than college. He claims that the NAACP started this myth to create something he calls “feeding frenzy.” Not “a feeding frenzy,” just “feeding frenzy” with lots of emphasis on “feeding.”

That Nigga Janks argues that the myth takes personal responsibility off of individual black men and strengthens the structural racism critique. Of course, that Nigga Janks knows that this myth was created by a little group called the fucking U.S. Justice Department, not the NAACP. And that the U.S. Justice Department reported that in 2000 there were 791,600 black men in prison and 603,032 enrolled in college. In 1980, there were 143,000 black men in prison and 463,700 enrolled in college. To that Nigga Janks’ credit, when most folks hear the college vs. jail stat, we think that it designates black men between the ages of 18-23. But the 791, 600 figure is for black men between the ages of 18-55, not 18-23.

However, that fact doesn’t negate the probability that racial and spatial policing are huge determinants to why black men are still 12 times more likely to be tied to the Prison Industrial Complex than white men

and why 10.4% of the entire African-American male population in the United States aged 25 to 29 was incarcerated in 2004. By comparison, 2.4% of Hispanic men and 1.2% of white men in that same age group were incarcerated.

But just like everyone reading this bullshit, Janks knows the reasons for these statistics are structural, communal and individual. The question is why would that Nigga Janks and his Legion of Fools (Toms and them) imply that all of our ailments are personal and that all will be well by disregarding racism and “getting that black man back in the home with his kids and his wife.” And who do you bring in when you need help disregarding racism and heteronormatively, yet understandably calling for “the” black man to take control of “his” house, “his” woman and “his” children? You call the conservative black weapon of mass destruction, Shelby Steele. Shelby’s first mission is to ask black men, “Are you gonna wait for the world to be pure of racism before you take charge of your life and make something of it.”

Y’all know Shelby Steele, right? He’s author of four books. Three of them are subtitled: “The Second Betrayal of Black Freedom in America” “How Black and Whites Destroyed the Promise of the Civil Rights Movement” and “Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can’t Win.” Steele, a cat who conservative white folks might call their ace boon coon, goes on to say, “A young out of wedlock male without a father is about as dangerous a human being as you can find.”

Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove and McCain seem pretty dangerous, too, (what y’all think?) and their mommies and daddies were there from conception ‘til erection (What up, short arms). And if one believes Steele’s assertion, why not go ahead and lock up all black boys who were born out of wedlock and raised without a father since they seem predestined to be the most dangerous humans on earth?

Okay, let me ask all the Niggas reading this something. Real question. No hyperbole, irony or jokes. When was the last time you said or heard any Nigga say, in some form or fashion, that the reason he is unemployed, promiscuous, a delinquent parent, violent, on parole, failing in whatever, was because of racism? I have been, have known and know tons of trifling and/or culturally maligned Niggas but I have never heard one of us blame our personal fuck-ups on racism.

I have heard, from my own mouth and other mouths, accusations of some motherfucker being “racist” but you just don’t hear motherfuckers blaming racism on our plight these days … even when we should. And maybe we don’t for the same reason you don’t hear people say, “Damn son, that water sho is wet” or “If I had me some wings, I could fly faster than I can walk.” Some shit, we just know. But that knowledge isn’t the impediment at all … or is it?

Maybe Janks and them are right and Niggas are actively blaming our failures on white racism. Maybe we are waiting for the world to be pure of racism before applying ourselves. Let’s see how that shit would even sound. Ahem — It is white racism’s fault that the most prideful accomplishment of my 30+ year-old life happened during junior year when I was voted Class Wittiest. White racism, why’d you take my daddy out of my house when a child? White racism, you are so mean. White racism, you are the reason for all of a Nigga’s mistakes. I wish you were gone home, White racism, so I could make better decisions and finally apply myself. Look what you did … Part 2 tomorrow.

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