And What of the Black Underclass?

Published in Issue 349 of The Black Commentator on November 5, 2009
Republished in worldproutassembly.org (2005-2011) on November 10, 2009
Excerpted in know4life.blogspot.com on November 11, 2009

By Larry Pinkney

With more and more banks failing, joblessness steadily rising, and housing foreclosures continuing to reach an all time high in the United States, the massive black underclass, which is generally ignored, hidden, and unnoticed; reels with indescribable economic and social pain and deprivation.

Having been ruthlessly betrayed by the black elite and much of black intelligentsia in the 21st century, the plight of the black underclass in the U.S. is, in some ways, similar to the horrific existence suffered by the Dalit people (“untouchables”) within India’s notorious and ongoing de facto caste system. Indeed, the black underclass in this nation can be accurately described as the economic and social Dalits of 21st century ‘America.’

Even as every day persons of all colors in this nation increasingly undergo unacceptable and growing economic hardships, the black underclass sustains the brunt of economic and social apartheid in this nation. Notwithstanding the arrogance of the corporate / military elite of this nation, who see in their slick political puppet Barack Obama, a type of urban uprising insurance against the masses of every day people whom they exploit; the laws of physics simply cannot long be avoided. Two things cannot exist in the same place at the same time. In other words one cannot have tranquility of the masses while at the same time they are jobless, homeless, and starving. This untenable scenario is becoming an increasing reality for millions of citizens of all colors, and most especially as it exacerbates the economic and social horrors faced by the black underclass.

The black underclass, which even during the best of economic times in this nation, disproportionally suffers massively, is now in a state of prolonged decay without even minimal life support. For black people in general and the black underclass in particular, obtaining a decent education, jobs, housing, health care, and judicial justice are fundamentally out of the question. The relatively small black elite has shamelessly, in complicity with the elite of its white counterpart, helped spawn an insidious new form of racism and economic apartheid. Moreover, members of the black underclass are themselves chastised and blamed by this insidious black elite and intelligentsia for being the economic and social victims of a callous, avaricious, capitalist system which now finds itself in deep trouble nationally and globally.

The misleaders of Black America are continuing to drink from the same despicable trough of greed, lies, and exploitation as their elite white counterparts. They are also, like the corporate self described “news” media of disinformation, showing themselves to be the absolute enemies of every day people of all colors, including the black underclass.

The underbelly of this nation is the black underclass. Instead of becoming smaller and moving out of poverty and disenfranchisement, the black underclass has grown much, much larger and become even more impoverished and disenfranchised. What will it take for this black underclass to rise up? Only time will tell. Yet, one thing is certain: the more that persons become politically educated and conscious as to what is truly in their interests collectively, the less tolerance they will have for the corporate slicksters, banksters, and Wall Street barons who are sucking the life blood from us all. Indeed, the less tolerance will be had for the military elite – who are playing us for fools and using us as cannon fodder in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan! Democracy can never be spread at the end of a sword, for such a thing is in itself a contradiction in terms.

The black underclass will ultimately, collectively rise up. The question is will it be organized and principled? We must be among those who determine the answer to this question in the affirmative.

Time to identify and stand up to the blood suckers and war mongers. Time to agitate, educate, and organize locally and globally! Give no quarter, no space, no breathing room to media misinformers, the blood suckers, or the war mongers whatever their gender or color.

Onward then sisters and brothers. The future calls and we must go! Onward!…

Larry Pinkney is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities, Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS News Hour, formerly known as The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour, and more recently on the nationally syndicated Alex Jones Show. Pinkney is a former university instructor of political science and international relations, and his writings have been published in various places, including The Boston Globe, San Francisco BayView newspaper, Black Commentator, Intrepid Report, Global Research (Canada), LINKE ZEITUNG (Germany), 107 Cowgate (Ireland and Scotland), and Mayihlome News (Azania/South Africa). He is in the archives of Dr. Huey P. Newton (Stanford University, CA), cofounder of the Black Panther Party. For more about Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn]. (Click here to read excerpts from the book.)