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This past week Twitter was in an uproar (but when isn’t Twitter in an uproar?) about an article from Gene Marks called If I Was a Poor Black Kid. There were quite a few rebuttals, some rational, some name calling. Some of the rebuttals can be found here, here, here, here, and here.
As the mother of two children with unique personalities and learning styles, I am highly offended that this man had the audacity to sit in his (most likely) warm home after eating a (most likely) full mean, and write using his (most likely) un-shared PC or laptop.
I grew up in Southwest Philly and can probably make it to the homes in West Philly that he geared his article to in less than fifteen minutes.
I work daily in my community in Upper Darby. I see these ‘poor black kids’ daily. They wonder the streets, shooed from their homes because mom is either at work, high with her boyfriend, or the grandmother is the caretaker and she is tired of having to do this all over again. These kids are stigmatized when they show up in school wearing last year’s fashions because their caregiver had a choice of lights or new threads. Sometimes these caregivers are kids themselves, taking the adult role to protect their younger siblings. They ensure younger siblings make it to school on time, and have some type of lunch, book fair money, tokens if they aren’t able to ride the bus. Tuesday, I sit sit in truancy court where these children reply in a sullen manner to the judge that they don’t like school and the judge orders the parents to pay all the while the mom is begging for help from SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE! I have been a witness to a girl who played hooky (skipping school) to prevent the drug dealer her mother had an altercation with earlier that day from returning and finishing the beat down.
I ask Marks, do you know any of these kids? A kid that’s hungry, going home to fight off their mom’s latest move in lover from molesting them, pushed along in a system because the teacher wanted them out of their class, what the EFF do they care about Google Scholar or Skype? These kids are trying to survive. They want to make it to the next day and hope they have a permanent resident when they come home to school. Hope the power pilfered from the neighbor across the street hasn’t been discovered. Hope that their dad (most ofter he’s not anywhere in the picture) shows up for THIS week’s visit.
Marks, I would love to take you in a tour of my neighborhood, I’ll have the mayor, school superintendent, and the chief of police included so you will feel safe coming out of your ivory tower to tour. I’ll also gladly take the check that you wrote so we can implement these ideas into of there poor black kids homes so that they can succeed.
I look at the hustlers in the neighborhood. On some level, they have far succeeded YOU.
- Set a timer and write for 5 minutes only.
- Write an intro to the post if you want but don’t edit the post. No proofreading or spellchecking. This is writing in the raw.
- Publish it somewhere. Anywhere. The back door to your blog if you want. But make it accessible.
- Add the Stream of Consciousness Sunday badge to your post.
Oh. My. Word. Just read his column, it made me want to puke. As a someone who taught in Philadelphia for 7 years, I think I have a fair amount of insight into education and “poor black kids.” There’s so much I could say, but you (and your commenters) have already said it so much better.
Personally, I’d like Mr. Marks to try to gain a better life by “trying harder” and “earning good grades” and “using the free technology available” to do better in life when they have no heat, an empty belly, and a house possibly filled with drugs and abusers– IF they have a house at all.
I bet he has a hard day when he skips breakfast or misses out on his morning coffee. Wonder how motivated to achieve he’d feel if he never had breakfast? Or dinner? And could he really concentrate in school if his mind was focused on where he’d sleep that night?
Next time maybe he’ll spend the hour it took to type that rubbish volunteering in a school in West Philly instead.
And in many cases, my students were literally plopped in front of the television as a babysitter from day one, by caregivers who had no choice. Wonder if that “free technology” helped their brain develop in a way to strive to achieve better grades?
Wow, I missed the hubbub over that article. While not well written in the least, I do feel that the guy had good intentions. But it seems his overall ignorance and poor reasoning skills destined him for failure.
I’m now a middle-class white woman but was once a poor little white girl living in a not-so-great part of Philly. I was one of the lucky ones and got accepted to the type of school (after being rejected by others) Mr Marks suggests. How he thinks every “special” student can go to one of these schools is beyond me. But anyway, my school was 97% black and 100% poor. But it was a better school so we should all be sporting Ivy league degrees and six-figure salaries, right? Yet, a number of my peers never made it “out” – some didn’t even graduate. Guess they weren’t smart or special enough?
So despite being there and living it to a degree I still can’t say that I know the answer. I certainly wouldn’t pretend to guess it either. I just know that Marks’ suggestions are a pipe-dream answer to the issues of race and socioeconomic standing. Issues that have been around for 100’s of years, if not more.
Let’s see if he takes you up on your invitation!
I couldn’t agree more! While I know there are sucess stores out of West Philly, here is my beef; It’s not the kids fault & they’re still required to work 100x harder to “make it”. If Gene Marks were really thinking, he’d consider what he could do to help, what he could do to foster educational reform in West Philly (or hell the country for that matter).
He is pointing out a huge socio-economic injustice and his suggestion? Try harder. I guarantee if his kids had to try harder, they probably wouldn’t.
Thanks for visiting! The Internet has good and bad. The bad is that we get articles like this. The bad is that it blows over and is soon forgotten. Although the article is the epitome of ignorance, it could help foster dialogue about the gap in education and how anyone can offer solutions and then actually act on their solutions.
Thank you for reading. I almost didn’t post because how much press does this guy need. He recently wrote an article about women and CEOs that was along the same condescending vein. I do invite him to my lower class neighborhood and invite him to say these things to the poor kids. They’d rip him a new one.
I can’t deal with these blowhards. I saw the headline somewhere and thought, here we go, another idiot spouting off. Except idiocy can turn ugly very quickly…
Brava for speaking out. I am stopping by from SOCSunday and am so grateful I did! THANK YOU for using your unique voice to speak the truth about these children. In doing so, you gave them voice. SO IMPORTANT!
Exactly! My teen has a friend who goes to a homeless shelter every night. I wouldn’t have known that except I tried to give the girl a ride home and she refused because she was embarrassed. I wonder how many of her teachers know this is this child’s nightly ritual. Do you think she cares about Skype? She wants a place to put a damn Justin Beiber poster permanently! She wants a room to call her own. Not someone who if he did ever “rough it” did it with a campsite or his phone on one bar.
I haven’t read what he wrote mostly b/c even the title was horribly offensive & judgmental and I can only imagine what he ranted about. People who have never struggled or have never truly encountered people who do have no idea what the hell it is really like!
Thank you, Andrea! If he could spend time in the group of any poor kid’s life, he would see that bootstrap pulling is not all it’s cracked up to be. If his suggestions were to get some of the parents to change their thinking and behaviors…no even then I would be annoyed. This man has the audacity to say they don’t want to work hard. He needs to really step into reality. As for the article, it took me three attempts to read the whole thing. I was so insulted! My mom struggled and while we weren’t poor, I know quite a few kids who were. I still see them when they come over for dinner or asks one of the kids if they can PLEASE spend the night. They know at my house no child leaves unfed or without a book (i’m trying to get rid of the clutter!).
OK, so we’re watching the Sunday AM news shows and one was on mute and that’s all they had showing in the corner. The Poor Black Kid. I was like, WHAT? What the fletch? I worked in areas of Brooklyn like you’re discussing. I lived in them, honestly. My family is from there – we’re the white family in the neighborhood. I won’t say I know exactly from where they come, because I am obviously a white woman, but I will say I take offense to some jerk-face like that talking like he knows how to fix things or what he *thinks* he would do. Or like he thinks he knows. Or pretends to. Wow. That takes cojones. Serious ones.
p.s. Oh my G-d. I just tried to start reading what he actually wrote, and I am floored. I think I just gasped out loud. Whew.