Guest Blog: Stefanie Brown

Living the Dream – Our History, Heritage and Hope

Perhaps you have heard that there is a presidential election taking place in a few months. From Fox News and CNN to bossip.com and urbanconservative.com, every news outlet and self-proclaimed journalist has an opinion about this year’s elections. Oftentimes the key issues being discussed are the Iraq War, economy, healthcare and education; the so-called hot button topics. Unfortunately, what is not being asked of the candidates themselves are their solutions to the underlying race and class-related aspects behind these key issues. For instance…
Senator McCain – you pride yourself on fighting terror, but how will you address the domestic terrorism in the form of police brutality and racial profiling that plague Black and Latino communities?
Senator Clinton – you often taut your stance on healthcare, but what are you going to do about the inadequate presence of quality healthcare facilities in rural and urban communities?

Senator Obama – you say that you believe in a quality education, but how will you address the lack of equality in truth being taught in our public school systems; including the extreme misrepresentation and oftentimes no representation of the Black, Hispanic, Asian and Native American contributions to America?
In fact, do any of you Presidential candidates have a plan to help the 13 million children living in poverty or those citizens who make up “lower class” America? Please quit going on and on about how you plan to strengthen the middle class! Instead, tell us how you will help the family that no longer relies on hope but is waiting for help!

In actuality, my friends, the question is not what are they going to say but what are we going to do?

The first thing we need to do is to STOP LIVING IN A DREAM! As a country we must realistic face the fact that our past experiences and perceptions will have a great impact on how we act today. We cannot run away from conversations and enacting solutions to combat racism, sexism, classism or homophobia. We must not be afraid to challenge the status quo and ask questions; to question the things of life is not an automatic rejection, but a way to learn, grow and seek truth. In addition, we must get off our soapbox and actually give a damn about each other! Everyone was so hyped up about the Jena 6 situation, but now most folks can’t even remember the names of those boys. In the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, “a social movement that only moves people is merely a revolt. A movement that changes both people and institutions is a revolution”.

Lastly, we must hold our leaders accountable and not reward those who don’t speak to us or for us with continued support. But most importantly, we all must hold ourselves accountable. Black people can’t blame white people for all their problems and white people can’t blame everybody else for theirs. Together, we can learn from our history, embrace our heritage and realize our dreams through hope and action.

-Stefanie Brown
NAACP College and Youth Division