(ThyBlackMan.com) Today in this country African Americans want to blame everyone else for our problems instead of simply looking in the mirror. We want to blame the police for the very thing we do to each other on a much larger scale every week. We want to blame the school teachers when our children do not learn. We want to blame the white man for holding us down. We want to blame the government for failing to take care of us. We want to blame the system. We want to blame the devil. But what we do not want to do is face up to the reality of personal responsibility. And those things that were once valid reasons for our oppression have become one-sided excuses.
In many cases the police are at fault. In many cases the teachers are not teaching as they should. In many other cases social programs have been set up as traps for us. Yes racism exists on many levels and yes there is a plan to oppress, subjugate and eventually destroy African Americans. But all that being said, we cannot and must not 
let things stop us. Nor must we continue to make them excuses which allow us to abdicate our personal responsibilities to ourselves, our children and our community.
It is our African American parents who are letting their children roam the streets. It is our parents who are letting their children smoke weed, use drugs and hang out with the wrong people. It is our parents who are not checking homework or making sure the children go to school. It is the parents who are letting the children play violent video games like Grand Theft Auto, listen to degrading rap and hip hop trash like Nikki Minaj, Kanye West, Little Wayne and Rihanna. And as a result, the educators and police officers are having to confront what the parents will not. This, of course, is not true of all African American parents. But it is true of far too many. As a former detective, I saw it. As a family and relationship counselor, I confronted it. And as a parent, I speak out against these things.
The African American community is faced with a highly implosive form of denial kept in place by blaming everybody else in order to avoid the mirror. These are excuses that keep us from ever getting to and resolving the root of our problems. Sometimes several participants are to blame for our problems, including us – yes us. In the case of Tamir Rice, for example, the police officer is to blame mostly but not solely. The officers were foolish to pull right up to a person they believed to be armed. The dispatch officer is also to blame. However, where were Tamir’s parents? Did they know where he was? Why was he out there in the Rec. Center alone? Why did they allow him to play with toy guns when guns are not toys? Obviously Tamir did not know what to do when the police came but that is all the more reason children should not have toy guns. Why did Tamir allegedly reach for the gun when confronted by police officers? Parents are responsible for our children, pure and simple.
Before you attempt to tear apart this article, sit back and think.
Do I blame a child for doing what some foolish children do? No. Should he be able to play outside? Yes. But knowing what we adults know today, we have to admit there is more to it than that. And if we do not look at all sides of such issues, children like Tamir Rice who were obviously disturbed will slip through the cracks and more incidents will happen. The times of blindly sending our children outside to play without knowing what they are doing, where they are, who they are with and what they have must END NOW! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L366FP9oefQ
Sandra Bland played a major role in her own incarceration for many reasons. If you want to know how she did, email me at brainstormonline@yahoo.com for specific details and laws.. That is the law in Texas, like it or not. Latausha Nedd got herself in a jam and that was totally her fault. Samuel Dubose attempted to drive off from the scene while stopped by a police officer. Eric Garner apparently did not understand that he could be detained because he resisted. None of these people should have ended up dead. But that does not mean they did not contribute to the problem. On the other hand, the deputy who threw the girl out of thee chair in school was solely at fault and should be prosecuted. The officers who let Freddie Gray were solely at fault and should go to jail. We need to look at all sides.
Where are our protests, riots and marches when African Americans kill each other at an alarming rate every week? Where is our outrage when our children are incarcerated for things they did and things their parents never stopped them from doing? Where is our outrage when our children are having babies, smoking street weed laced with rat poison, feces and embalming fluid? Where is our anger when our young boys are saggin (niggas spelled backwards) and our young girls are dressing and acting like whores? As a whole, African Americans don’t even seem to be outraged when our girls think they are guys and our boys act like girls. Wake up!
Do we expect more from the police, the school teachers, the “white” man and the government than we do from ourselves? The African American community expects and accepts too little from ourselves and expects too much from people and governmental systems who or which obviously do not care about us. Maybe that is the problem. And maybe we are afraid of what we see when we look in the mirror. Therefore we find it easier to simply blame it all on somebody else. And before you get mad at me, look in the mirror. I tell police officers the same thing and many of them listen. Are you listening? Wake up!
Staff Writer; Marque-Anthony