Among the excellent, succinct posts and commentaries appearing on these pages since August, was the one referring to the rights of blacks having only been established in America, roughly since 1865, and more like 1965. Change and adjustment takes time. I think referring to "my relative was a slave" today, is nothing but a crutch. However, it does take a generation or three for families and cultures to re-establish themselves. I think blacks in America have done remarkably well, overcome a great deal of nonsense and hate, to contribute to the American fabric, to build lives and communities.

The use of illegal drugs-scourge seems to plague inner city blacks harder and more thoroughly than anywhere else. I am not naive enough to think that such use is confined to inner city, darker-shade folks. White and suburban drug use is probably more rampant. Not too many white people standing on a frozen street corner slinging, however. That appears to be relegated to the black community for some reason. Maybe I am all wrong and am just repeating a stereotype here.

I think I know this much. If I was a young black person old enough to be aware of my surroundings, I think I would take a look at what happens, and most importantly, what has been happening, in black inner-city communities across our country. What we see are common threads: public housing projects that will never be properly maintained because renting residents have no reason to care about their units, or the areas around them; antiquated public school funding based upon property values. Crumbling inner-cities and their neighborhoods have less value = less property tax extracted = less to put into schools. Just the walk to and from school is dangerous in too many communities.

You're asking me how to break this cycle. Well, we can't put it all on any one group. We are all in this together, this business of living our lives, and we had better wake up and accept that fact. Funding for public schools must change radically. The basic organizational structure of those schools must change as well. We are, 171 years or so into public education, still using the one-size-fits-all approach: i.e,, if you are 7 years old you belong in 2nd grade, etc. Public schools rarely differentiate by student capabilities, in other words.

We abhor a 5' tall 9 year old in 2nd grade, because that's where he or she is academically, just as we are reluctant to put 4'6" 8 year olds in junior high school, although they might be ready academically. Instead of making these adjustments, we plod along with the status quo and wonder why Johnny and Jeannie went off to college without being able to read and or write a clear sentence, or worse, didn't bother to graduate high school.

But I think the biggest effort has to come from the home. Fix the family, fix the school.

It is very difficult to change one's lifestyle. If one was beaten as a child, one will beat his or her own. If one's father or mother didn't stick around after birth, then the grown child probably won't, either. If one spouse beat the other, that also will repeat itself. So, the answers aren't easy.

I have few answers, I guess. I am pretty sure that joining street gangs under what must be enormous pressure, carrying a loaded unregistered gun or weapon of any kind instead of a library card, staying out at all hours, quitting various endeavors, being easily led, aren't the answers. Former street gang members will tell any youngster they can get to actually listen, just how worthless gangs are. Until home lives improve, kids who want to feel loved and accepted somewhere, will continue to join, mis-interpreting acceptance.

Legal guardians need to know where their children are at all times, where they are going, with whom, for how long, and set times for their return, not ask when they will be back. Above all else, education is the key to advancement, one day at a time. And that, brings us right back into the Circle of Poverty, doesn't it? 

Carrying, pointing, using guns definitely is not the answer. All Lives Matter.