Guest Editorial: Race Preservation - MSNewsNow.com - Jackson, MS

Guest Editorial: Race Preservation

By Flora A. Caldwell JACKSON, MS (WLBT) -

Starting in 2007, when I was living in Oxford, I wrote Derrick Johnson, state president of the NAACP, several times about updating his leadership skills to include strategies that will prevent the black race from self-destruction.

This is not 1909, the genesis of the NAACP, when looking outside the black race was 100 percent necessary. Today is 2012, a time that demands the NAACP look within the black race if "Advancement," the key word in the acronym, is to become a reality. Today, 70 percent of black households are headed by single mothers.

Black-on-Black crime is the leading cause of death among black males and the second leading cause of death for black females. The welfare mentality is destroying families in the black community. Being on welfare temporarily has become staying on welfare for a lifetime.

Too many black children and high school graduates aren't reading on grade level and don't comprehend what they read. Almost 50 percent of black males drop out of high school. The pregnancy rate of black teenagers is 126.3 per 1,000 women. The need for black students to receive a quality education is stifled by black anti-intellectualism. Smart black students are labeled as "nerds," "geeks" or "acting white."

The state president of the NAACP needs to address these problems. A change is needed now, not ten years from now when more than 55 percent of young black males will have a jail or a prison record.

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