There is a tragedy happening in the Black community -- like watching a car crash in slow motion. This generation of Black kids neither understand nor appreciate what it means to be Black. And it didn't just happen overnight: a quick history lesson to show us how we got here.
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The Great Migration occured from 1910 to 1970. During that time, more than 6 million Black people from the South moved North with the hope that they would encounter less racism and more job opportunities in the Northeast, Midwest and Western parts of the United States.
They found that racism in places like Chicago and Los Angeles was just as bad as in the South. It just manifested more often as redlining and microaggressions more than the overt, blatant anti-Blackness they were accustomed to below the Mason-Dixon Line.
As a result, thriving Black communities were formed in the cities these refuges of American racism escaped to. As a result, many of us found economic success...which was a good thing. Mostly.
We moved out of the Black communities we had formed and started moving to the suburbs. Our houses got bigger and our cars more expensive. Because of where we now lived, our kids started attending predominantly white schools. We thought we'd made it...then we saw that there was an underside to this success.
It started small. One or two of the Black kids raised in the suburbs would show up to a family reunion not knowing how to play spades or dominoes. Maybe they would ask that Taylor Swift is played at the cookout instead of Stevie Wonder or Marvin Gaye.
Not a big deal if that was the extent of it. But it did not stop there. It got worse.
There are many Black kids who feel more comfortable around white kids than they do their own people. There have been copious amounts of research to support this.
We once joked that it was Black athletes who dated and married white girls. That has now shifted. No longer is it only a star basketball player here and there. Many Black boys who do not want to befriend, let alone date, Black girls. And that should not be surprising. The more successful a Black man is, the more likely he is to date and marry a white woman.
This also influences the way young Black kids that were raised around mostly white people vote as well. Pew Research reports that 7% of Black voters over 50 currently identify as or lean conservative, a relatively small amount. But 17% of Black voters under 50 align with the Republican Party. And much of that has to do with where they were raised. And yes, many of them voted for the man who is currently in the White House.
Let’s me just get personal for a second. I help lead the Center for Africana Studies at my university and year after year I see black kids walk into my classroom who do not know Black history; they could not tell you anything about our culture; and they are shocked to learn that there are Black Greek Letter Organizations.
Black parents who raised their kids this way now see that there is a problem. Many are trying desperately to talk to their kids about Black culture. Some turn to organizations like Jack and Jill of America, Inc. as they try to reconnect their kids to the Black experience.
But I think the damage is largely done. We must come to terms with the reality that there will be a generation of Black people who are largely disconnected from the Black experience. We must learn from our mistakes and do better.
Straight From 
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