November 4, 2008……The day that history was made. It is a day that I will share with my children and grandchildren. It is the day that Barack Hussein Obama became the first Black man to be elected President of the United States of America. As I sat there watching him make his victory speech, I was numb, as the moment seemed so surreal. I was sitting there watching a moment that I doubted I would ever see in my lifetime. The feeling of pride I felt in that moment is something that I am incapable of expressing in words. The symbolic meaning of “Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States” is a powerful one. Black parents, for the first time, can look their children in the eye and, with honesty and conviction, tell them that anything is possible. 146 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, a Black man claimed the highest office in the land.
I woke up this morning feeling a huge swell of pride in the moment, but I was also very introspective, pondering what it all meant going forward. Just what did an Obama presidency mean for Black Americans? I supported Obama from the very beginning, thinking he was a better candidate than the alternatives, but the moment when I truly became a passionate supporter of his candidacy was on Father’s Day, June 15th 2008. On that day, Obama gave a speech to the Apostolic Church of God on Chicago's South Side. In that speech he truly differentiated himself from previous Black candidates that ran for president (Jackson, Sharpton) as well as many other Black leaders. He stepped up and did something I have wanted to see a Black leader do for a long time. He threw the gauntlet down and made a bold call for responsibility and accountability. Here are parts of that speech:
“But if we are honest with ourselves, we'll admit that what too many fathers also are is missing - missing from too many lives and too many homes. They have abandoned their responsibilities, acting like boys instead of men. And the foundations of our families are weaker because of it.”
“I know the toll that being a single parent took on my mother. And I know the toll it took on me. So I resolved many years ago that it was my obligation to break the cycle - that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father to my girls; that if I could give them anything, I would give them that rock - that foundation - on which to build their lives. And that would be the greatest gift I could offer.It's up to us - as fathers and parents - to instill this ethic of excellence in our children."
Some in the Black community criticized Obama for this speech. Jesse Jackson was so angered by it that he stated he wanted to “cut his balls off for talking down to Black people”. However I applauded it because he spoke the truth and it was a message that truly needed to be delivered. The themes he expressed are ones that we as a black community have to embrace to make things better….The notion of self determination, taking responsibility for ourselves, our community and our children. It is not about waiting for anyone to “save” us or to “make things better” for us, but embracing the notion of doing that for ourselves.
As proud as we are of President Obama, we CANNOT look at him as some sort of Black “savior” whose job it is to solve all the ills of our community. He is not Black Superman or a Black Moses coming down from the mountaintop to deliver Black people to some sort of “Promised Land”. That responsibility falls on the shoulders of each and every responsible adult in the Black community.
My favorite part of the speech is one where he spoke of the obligation that we have to “break they cycle” of pain and dysfunction that we have experienced in our lives in order to provide a better and brighter life for our children. Many in our community have gone through unspeakable trials and tribulations, some as young children. We should not to minimize the pain and damage that those trials may have done. As he stated, broken homes and abuse take a huge toll on our young people, a reality I see in my job every day. Still, as adults, and especially as parents, it is incumbent for each of us to do whatever needs to be done in order to put ourselves in a healthy place in order to break those unhealthy cycles and make our children’s lives better than our own. And that is something that no politician can do for us…..It is something that each of us must take the personal responsibility to do for ourselves.
I have always resented the notion that Black people need to be “led” or “saved” by someone. We are fully capable of bettering the conditions in our community. As Obama implored that day, we need to take the initiative in making things better for our children, and by extension, our community as a whole. This does not mean that we are to not have compassion for those who endure abuse, neglect, poverty and other socioeconomic factors that truly place them behind the eight ball in this society. However, it is absolutely essential that we acknowledge that there is a fine line between understanding the reasons behind dysfunctional behavior, and turning those reasons into excuses. We must find a way to refuse to justify negative behavior while also reaching out with compassion and helping those caught in those negative patterns to better themselves.
I am proud as hell to have a Black man as president, but at the same time I know that just having Barack Obama in that position is not going to solve all the problems of the Black community. No one else should look at it that way, either. Hopefully, we can turn the groundswell of support stirred up by Obama into a new energy and spirit of responsibility and accountability that can make lives better for ourselves and our children.
