My mother would often tell me astory of a time when she was preparing to come to Southern and my grandfatherhad to borrow the money from a white man who made him stand outside his homefor a whole day before he was able to receive it. To make a long story short,he got the money and my mother got to get an education.
Isn’t it grand that we don’thave to go through such degradation? Now we can just apply for a loan at ourbanks or credit unions. Some of us can even loan the money to our friends andfamily just so our credit doesn’t get checked or recorded as an inquiry.
So I don’t wait until Februaryto celebrate Black History Month. I don’t wait until I have a chance to see aprominent figure in our community or culture to remember the struggle thatblacks have endured.
Remembering black historydoesn’t mean that we celebrate how our forefathers fought to make it better forus. Remembering black history means that we learn from how they fought, becausebelieve it or not, we haven’t “arrived.”
There are a lot of us who thinkthat we have it good and we don’t have to stand up for anything anymore. Wehave our nice cars, our nice jobs and a sense of security our ancestors didn’thave the luxury of enjoying.
But it’s not over.
I ask you, what are you fightingfor? What are you willing to stand for? What are you not willing to tolerate?What is that adage, “If you don’t fight for something, you’ll stand foranything?”
In my lifetime, I don’t everwant to forget what my ancestors went through. I don’t ever want to go to thatplace where our forefathers died for something as simple as smiling at a whiteperson or riding in the front seat of a car with one. I don’t ever want towitness a lynching or someone getting bit by a dog for being a certain race,creed or color.
I don’t ever want to becharacterized as passive and I damned sure don’t ever want to be assessed as acoward or spineless. Do you?
I say that to analogize how Ilook at our illustrious university and all it encompasses: the students, thefaculty and administration, the Jaguar Nation and the seemingly skepticalpublic.
Our sense of “black pride” issupposed to be instilled in us as children, in the home. It’s supposed to benurtured and encouraged as we grow, especially while we are here at college.
When you decide who will be nextto represent the greatest higher learning institution in the world, just makesure they are willing to remember the struggle of what we, the body of SouthernUniversity, are going through now. Just make sure that they aren’t willing tocompromise or accept favors just so Southern can maintain a level ofmediocrity.
Just make sure they are willingto remember history, because you just can’t do that through handshakes andscratching palms.
