Legacy

A family which is very dear to mine is living in subsidized housing after leaving the military. The wife is in college and the husband has started his own company after finding a difficult job market in the civilian world. They are hard working and determined people, and are determined to succeed for their own sake and that of their children.

He recently told the following story :

So, the other day, I was waiting in the parking lot for something and I was wearing my burgundy (company name) shirt, when a 14-year-old African American boy from my apartment complex came up and said, “Give me a dollar.”
“Why should I give you a dollar?” I asked.
“Because you look like you’re rich,” he answered.
I laughed. “So, what are you going to do to earn your dollar?”
“I could do 20 push-ups,” he replied.
“How would that benefit me?” I asked.
“You’d get to see a black man work,” he replied.

I answered, “I know a lot of hard working black men. I’ve worked with several of them.”
To which he replied, “Well all the black men I know don’t work. They just hustle and push.”

My friend finished by saying “I only know of three families in my complex with men present, and in only one case is that man the biological father.”

This all leads me to wonder what kind of society are we building for our children, and what kind of people are we raising them to become? We have created a country where fathers and male role models are non-existent. If boys and young men see no goals to reach for, they learn to aspire to nothing. There may be a Black man in the White House, but does that matter to these boys if there isn’t one in their own home?