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Posted on 04/12/2003 8:07:19 AM PDT by doriangrey
On Wednesday I was visited by one of my former supervisors who has moved on to a more lucrative and prestigious position at the head of another inner-city school. “Lord Gene,” as I used to call him, is a 50-year-old multi-degreed, black professional who never fails to impress everyone that he meets. He cuts a patrician figure amongst the plebeians that are his vocational peers (myself included) as he dresses immaculately be it Saturday night or Monday morning.
As I was scoring some child assessment materials I looked up to notice that Gene was in my office. He had an entourage of pupil service personnel (social workers and speech pathologists) with him who joined him on a George Jefferson-like excursion to inspect Gene´s once not so glamorous past. “Bernie, Bernie!” He said. I long ago given up asking Gene to call me Bernard so I greeted him back and gave him a warm shake of the hand.
He then began to examine my wall. My office is completely covered with photos of our students and staff that were taken with a fifty dollar digital spy camera that I bought at Home Depot in 2001. Gene is also a professional photographer and could never understand why I purchased a cheap piece of junk like that in the first place. “Sill using that camera?” He asked. “Yeah, I´m waiting for the price to come down on the two and three pixel models.” “You said that last year, and the year before.” Gene laughed. He recognized a picture of himself. It was tacked to the same spot it was in on the day that he resigned. He beamed brightly. “You need a better camera. My hair looks almost as sparse as yours with that one.” I agreed.
Suddenly, his expression changed. “What is the a--hole doing up there?” I gazed at the wall vacantly. “That one” and he pressed his finger to the photo of another dapper black man, Dr. Allan Keyes. “He sent that to me and I put it up.” “You put a picture like that up in a public school?” “Sure, he´s a great guy and a brilliant man.” “He´s an a--hole.” “He´s brilliant.” I countered. “I´m not saying he isn´t smart he´s just a total a--hole.” Gene ordered “Take that down now.” Gene forgot that he was no longer my boss. “Never.” I said. “Besides, Gene, you should be happy. He sent me three of his pictures and I only put up one of them.”
This was true as Dr. Keyes had a fundraising project last year that included a glossy photo of him being sent out alongside a request for donations. I received the mailing three times as I am an omnipresent member of conservative mailing lists. “Why would you put a picture up of a Tom like that?” “Uncle Tom?” I wondered. “Yes, he´s an Uncle Tom. You shouldn´t associate yourself with people like that, Bernie.” “I´m sorry but I agree with just about everything he says and he´s not a Tom.” “He´s a Tom. He turned his back on his own people. Keyes is against Affirmative Action. He´s a conservative water boy.”
At this point his entourage filed out of my room nervously. The glad-handing had turned into a racial discussion. In the course of my employment I have usually avoided racial discussions but this was too important and, besides, Gene did not work at my school any more.
“No, you´re wrong. Its pathetic the way you´re only allowed to have one political persuasion in the black community. It´s like you can only have one opinion. There´s no diversity whatsoever. So if you believe in America then you´re a Tom? That´s so bogus. You know they have slavery still in Africa? Where else would you rather be? I would not want to be anywhere else. If I happened to be black then I´d be an Uncle Tom too.”
Gene ignored me. “You shouldn´t put pictures up of guys who sell out their people. You should have role models up instead.” Allan Keyes not a role model? A Ph.D and former Ambassador? A man who was said by some sources to have won every Republican debate he participated in? A man who passionately believes in addressing and controlling the AIDS epidemic in Africa? He´s not a role model? This man should be everyone´s role model. My own mother, a liberal, was heartbroken when MSNBC´s Making Sense was cancelled. It was her favorite show. She never found anything about the man objectionable.
Gene was not used to people directly contradicting him on the subject of race and excused himself, with a slight wave of the hand, to another office to meet and greet somebody else.
I´m now going to inform you that your initial impression of Gene, based on what I´ve shared, may not be accurate. He is not radical in the least. Yes, what I and you should find so disheartening about our above exchange is that Lord Gene is actually the embodiment of the American dream. When I say this I´m not conflating him in any way. If Andrew Carnegie was alive today he´d see Gene and know that his philanthropy had paid off as here was a man who used all available resources to climb to the top mountain.
In both behavior and personality, Gene is a genuinely fine human being. He is generous to a fault. While our building Principal, Gene spent money out of his own pocket constantly on our students and staff. If the budget was busted, Gene would ‘magically´ find money for uniforms or supplies and this ‘magic´ usually came from his own personal bank account. He makes time for everybody and is active in both his church and community. Few people have ever expressed a negative view of him and I am no exception.
Almost everything that Gene has is a product of his own hard work. Gene is the perfect role model for the kids at my school and also for citizens in the area that I work. He is a product of the ghetto who worked every day as a teenager to save up for a college education. After college he became a teacher. A few short years later he was completely out of debt. Gene continued with his schooling and earned a Master´s in Education by the time he was 30. By the age of 45 he earned an educational doctorate.
Nothing has been given to Gene. Short-cuts have never appealed to him. He has met all challenges and took on many obligations that his peers avoided. Gene put all of his siblings through school once he finished. After his wife gave birth, he then put her through a four-year program and did the same thing for his two children who are now yuppies living on the northside of Chicago.
The great majority of Caucasians live an existence far below that of Gene. How many of us live in an exclusive suburb in a three-hundred thousand dollar home that sits on an acre of wooded land? Not many, I´d venture to say. His future is secured by a school pension and two or three other retirement plans of which he has made considerable contributions. He has more accoutrements and comforts than men like I will ever see. There are no more symbols of status for Gene to obtain. He is a pillar of the system.
If any black could resist the allure of racial victimization, it would be Gene. Yet, sadly, he cannot. Every election he supports the race baiters of the Democrat Party. They stand for everything Gene isn´t but his affiliation with them will probably be eternal.
Once during a political discussion he mentioned to me that whites had all of the power. He fails to see that he has far more capital and power than 90 percent of the white population. I told him once a phrase that David Horowitz has coined: “Fifty years of inner-city failure, fifty years of Democratic Party rule.” He refuses to acknowledge that the party who has been running the inner-cities has anything to do with their plight.
Gene is no different from the ultra-majority of American blacks for whom the Democrat Party casts a resentful, suicidal and irresistible spell. These blacks, through their ballots, embrace regressive and socialistic policies that only ensure the perpetuation of the Democrat Party Boss Tweed machine. Their “Great Society” has been a failure to all who embraced it. Blacks like Gene, who work from age 15 and resist having children out of wedlock, are the true formulators of a great society. Those who avoid work and responsibility are remembered by their Democrat benefactors only on election day as their vans reward them with free cigarettes and free rides to the polling place where they can “enfranchise” their own victimization for another four years.
The black community needs role models. It needs a thousand Lord Genes but it also needs a thousand Dr. Allan Keyes. Gene is a microcosm of what is wrong with the political landscape. I do not agree with Christopher Hitchens most of the time but I always find his commentary and style entertaining to observe. Yet, even if Gene wanted to he´d feel like a traitor for saying the same thing about Dr. Keyes. No healthy discussion about issues can occur when a subplot of a conversation includes one person accusing the other of being a Quisling to his race.
Gene is an American success story but whenever he uses the butterfly ballot he punches a “D” that embraces a past he never lived, oppression he has never experienced, and he insures that black youths of tomorrow have less of a chance to live the honorable, secure life that he wakes up to each morning.
To comment on this article or express your opinion directly to the author, you are invited to e-mail Bernard at bchapafl@hotmail.com .
NOTICE TO WRITERS: To obtain required information prior to submitting your essay to Toogood Reports for publication send for “Commentary Submissions” guidelines. Nonconforming submissions will not be considered for publication.
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He's also earing a living with speaking engagements around the country.
No TV deals or radio deals in the works at this time.
No word on when the books will be finished or published.
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