Indianapolis Recorder, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 May 1997 — Page 2

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THE INOImUmHocio HfcUORDER

SATURDAY, MAY 24,1907

EDITORIALS

The pain behind the numbers is the real story According to the data book compiled by the Indiana Youth Institute, Kids Count in Indiana, nearly 40,000 of Indiana's teens between the ages of 16 and 19 were neither high school graduates nor enrolled in any educational program. In some instances, these young people will go on to do well despite having taken a detour. In other instances, many of these youths are likely to find themselves permanently locked out of the good paying jobs and related opportunities. Some of them will just wind up lost and maybe someone will write a sad story in the local papers about a single life gone wrong. Nearly 40,000 young people’s lives hanging in an economic and social limbo seem to be a little too much failure to be acceptable. In another finding, the report indicates there are nearly 20,000 young people classified as “wards of the state.” In other words, these are young people who have been removed from their homes, for one reason or another, often through no fault of their own. In each of these instances you can easily imagine there are other family members in trouble related to the circumstances that made them wards of the state. For example, if a child was removed from a home because he was abused, then there are adults who are related to him who are in trouble or at least in need of some kind of help. So when one looks behind these figures and thinks about the human suffering behind each case, then these numbers become quite disturbing. The story of each child who is forced to move to a foster home is terribly sad when you actually meet children who haye lived in this kind of social limbo. If you talk with them about their lives it can be very disturbing. Some of them have never gone to bed with the possibility of even knowing how long they could stay in the same place. The costs associated with these two sets of young people and their families is nearly incalculable in human terms. We can of course quantify costs associated with keeping children as wards of the state and we can gauge the lost earnings of high school dropouts. It costs the state millions of dollars in lost taxes and millions more in welfare and other expenses. The problem is that we cannot track the emotional cost of a mined life as it affects even one family. As one lonely mother sees her child get lost in a seemingly uncaring school, we cannot begin to measure her sense of hopelessness. We don’t know how the suffering of overwhelmed parents is truly measured. We really haven’t found a way to count the feelings of impoverished parents who really want good things for their children, but who see good things pass them by because they cannot get good advice about the simplest of things concerning their children’s future. What we have instead are statistics and percentages. Perhaps if we could develop a measure for heartbreak, more politicians and social workers and officials of various descriptions would be moved to do more of the right things for these and other children who live on the fringe of the American Dream. We should ask ourselves what we would want ' for our own children if they were orphaned or if we were too poor to do all of the things that middle class parents can do for their kids. We should treat these children as if they were our own.

Should multiracial become an official race?

The hottest debate in Washington isn’t over the budget, welfare reform, NATO expansion or public housing policy, it’s about race. Specifically, what shall be the official racial groups of this country. Several federal agencies are currently debating whether to revise OMB Directive No. IS, a federal policy adopted in 1997, which standardized the categories the gov-

tive IS. Specifically, what to do about Americans who feel that they’re not of don’t belong to one of the government’s four racial categories—in short how should the government handle “multiracial” persons. Since the first

emment uses to collect and publish federal data whites hung out with American Indians; since on race and ethnicity. Blacks were brought here as slaves; since the Current federal policy delineates four basic first Asians and Pacific Islanders emigrated; racial categories and two specified ethnic cat- since White America conquered Hispanic lands, egories in the United States, Puerto Rico and there’s been intermixing between America’s American possessions. The racial categories racial and ethnic groups, are: American Indian or Alaska Native; Asian The American melting pot has created milor Pacific Islander, Black and white. The two lions of interracial couples, maniages, famiethnic categories are Hispanic origin and not of lies, children and grandchildren. Prior to the Hispanic origin. 1990s, persons from interracial groupings conThese categories are used in all manner of sidered themselves to be of one race. But, statistical record keeping and federal programs today, many interracial individuals don’t want ranging from census data to economic and to be documented as either "white,” “Black” or

labor statistics. These categories are used in “Asian.”

enforcing civil rights laws; combating discrimi- The wild popularity of Tiger Woods brought nation in areas from housing, to mortgage lend- the problem of what to call interracial persons ing, educational opportunities, employment and to the forefront. Woods, the product of a Black voting rights. Directive IS is the basis by which father and Thai (Asian) mother, refuses to the federal government monitors the progress considerhimselfeitherjust“Black”or“Asian”, or lack of progress of citizens who have been but a conglomerate of the two. discriminatedorvictimizedonthebasisoftheir Last week, the Census Bureau released a race, ethnicity or ethnic status in America. massive study on the impact a multiracial catEach of these groups: American Indian or egory would have on government statistical Alaskan Native; Asian or Pacific Islander, His- record keeping. The study found that adding a panic origin and Black have a documented new official government racial category “mulhistory of past discriminatory practices, by tiracial” would reduce the numbers of Asians, government and the private sector. American Indians, and Alaskan Native persons

Now there’s a fierce battle between Clinton in this country,

administration officials and civil and human While the Census test found that measurerights organizations over the future of Direc- ment of Blacks would not be impacted, Afri-

can-American researchers and demographers disagree. The fact is that the Census has always asked an “Other Race” question. In the 1990Census, 0.4 percent of Indianapolis’ population, or 3,189 persons, considered themselves “other race.” But, the Ginton administration is being asked to elevate a classification of “multiracial” (or more than one race) to the status of an official federal racial category. In terms of a “multiracial” category, Indiana’s Department of Education has been collecting data on “multiracial” public school enrollment for the past two school years. In examining school enrollment data for Indianapolis/Marion County, there’s no hard evidence that calling students “multiracial” reduces the number of Blacks. The “multiracial” students in the county is larger than the number of American Indian students, but far less than the numbers of Hispanics and Asians. Out of the 124,891 public school students in the county, only 1,123 or 0.9 percent are multiracial; 238 or 0.2 percent are American Indian; 1,683 or 1.3 percent are Hispanic; 1,603 or 1.3 percent are Asian; 42,869 or 34.3 percent are Black and 77,253 or 61.9 percent are white. I’m involved in this multiracial debate as a member of the National Census Advisory Committee on African-American populations. We met last week on this issue and we’ll meet again in July. Even though the data doesn’t now portend harm for African-Americans, any policy or procedures that has the potential to reduce the numbers of African-Americans in the country — especially during the 2000 Census — will be harmful and detrimental to our community. African-Americans in Indianapolis and across the country have been losing ground on affirmative action, educational opportunity, voting rights. Effort that would dilute the aggregate numbers of persons who are Black Americans or Americans of African-ancestry, will in effect abrogate the effectiveness of hard fought civil rights — rights paid for with the blood of our ancestors. The time is not right for multirace. The Ginton administration should keep Directive 15 unchanged! Heard in the street Mayor Steve Goldsmith continues to be the big loser in this year’s extra innings legislative session. Gov. Frank O’Bannon got his twoyear budget, with many of his priorit ies intact. The squabbling by House Republ icans, coupled with extreme hardball tactics by House Democrats has scuttled the bills that would help the Pacers, Colts and expand the Convention Center. The mayor can paint a picture of Indianapolis suffering economic depression if we can’t help pro sports or expand the Convention Center, but Democrats stand on the popular side of the issue, saying they’re “standing up for working people,” not just to subsidize “millionaire owners and players.” Speaking of the Pacers, I’m waiting to see who their Great White Hope Coach Larry Bird selects as his assistants, and how many Afri-can-American coaches will sit on the bench beside him. See ya next week!

A tribute to Queen Mother Moore

As the more than 8,000 delegates and observers made their way into the assembly hall at the historic National Black Political Convention held in Gary, Ind. in 1972, a 73-year-old woman dressed in traditional African attire passed out leaflets and kept up a steady exhortation: “ reparations, reparations don’t forget about your reparations.” The woman was Audley Moore, better known as the Queen Mother of the African-American Nation. Queen Mother, an African warrior woman par excellence, became our youngest ancestor on May 2,1997 at die age of 98. She devoted her entire adult life to teaching, preaching, motivating, mobilizing and organizing “Negroes” to claim their rightfiil heritage/birthright as Africans in America and fighting for reparations to repair the damages inflicted on African people during the holocaust of enslavement. Bom in New Iberia, La. at the height of southern apartheid in this country, Moore's family suffered from the brutal indignities of slavery and white supremacy. She would often angrily recount the fact that her grandmother had been raped during slavery and her gnndfather had been lynched. As she saw it, the plight of her family was symptomatic of the condition of the so-called Negro in America, dispossessed, disempowered destitute, disinherited and dominated by white supremacy. Blessed with a brilliant mind and a gift for powerful spell binding oratory, this self-taught high school dropout enMfed as one of

the great master teachers of this century. A strong devote of Marcus Garvey, Moore was convinced that the key to the liberation of the former slaves in the U.S. was for “Negroes” to reclaim their rightful ancestry and identity. She often referred to herself as a brain surgeon whose mission was to operate on constipated minds. Queen Mother waged a relentless campaign against “Negro” as an identity for Black people arguing persuasively that this Spanish/Portuguese term was a negative description of black. The prefix ne, she said, means no, not, never, leading her to remark, “I would rather be a ‘Regro’ than a Negro.” Long before it was popular, Queen Mother Moore was teaching and preaching that “Negroes” in America were really Africans. For her the designations of Negro and African were much more than mere racial/ethnic identifications. Negro symbolized all of the tragedies, trials and tribulations of an enslaved people who had been robbed of their true heritage and identity through brutal repression and devastating cultural aggression. African symbolized a history of triumphs and achievements, a richcultural heritage and the promise of the restoration of a great people. To be African also meant a reconnection with an ancestral land base, the African continent with all of its wealth and riches as the potential anchor for global Black power. As a Garveyite and apostle of Malcolm X, Queen Mother wu an

tive tongues, barred from practicing our native religions and banned from playing African musical instruments. We were eventually “emancipated” and made citizens; without the benefit of a plebiscite to determine our wishes as apeople and “freed “without the promised “ 40 acres and a mule.” This was Queen Mother Moore’s case for reparations for the sons and daugh-

unapologetic Black National island ten of Africa in America, a cast Pan-Africanist. Africans in which millions of Africans in America were an oppressed na- America have adopted in the drive tionality/nation. Like Malcolm, she to achieve reparations, did not see Black people in this Reparations,however, was just country as Americans but victims a major element in Queen Mother of Americanism. Moore’s formula for African libOneofher fondest sayings was, eration. Ultimately she believed “just because a cat has kittens in that the future of the race rested in the oven does not make them bis- our ability to rescue, reclaim and cuits. Because you were bom in resurrect Africa as the economic America does not make you an and political power base for AfriAmerican.” We are Africans and cans throughout the world. Hence, as Africans Queen Modier believed political leaders in this country and we are entitled to reparations for leaders of liberation movements the damages done to us during the and heads of state in Africa came to holocaust of enslavement. Queen know her as a devout champion of Mother Moore’s tireless lifelong African unity and development, crusade for reparations for Afri- Queen Mother Moore was an cans in America is among her fore- African warrior woman whose phimost contributions to the Black losophy, teachings and relentless Freedom Struggle in the United advocacy deconstipated the minds States. of countless thousands of Africans Africans were kidnapped from in this country and around the their homeland and forced to work world. She joins the pantheon of as slaves in America. Millions of the great Nationalist and Africans died in the process of the Pan-African leaders and teachers capture, march to seaport holding in our history. When libations are areas and during the dread middle poured her name will now be utpassage. tered along with Nzinga, Delaney, Then there was the slave-break- Blyden, Garvey, Nkrumah, ing and de-Africanization process Malcolm... May the spirit of Queen where we were stripped of our Mother Moore forever dwell names, forbidden to speak our na- among us!

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