Response to Gene Marks' "If I was a Black Kid" Forbes article

Original response on forbes.com:
The author said nothing new or thought provoking. He pretty much stated what has occurred time and time again and what will continue to exacerbate the huge chasm between the have and the have-not even within the Black community. In June 2011 and at the age of 22, I graduated from Stanford University with my BA and MA; I was one of those poor Black kids from a single parent household and all the other typical circumstances who "made it." I pretty much did exactly what the author suggested but the thing is: I was going to succeed no matter what. And the poor Black kid that reads this article is going to succeed no matter what and all the other poor Black kids who have potential to succeed if the right sort of support and resources were provided will continue to be left behind and continue to be amongst the underclass. Without fixing the system-- the system being a broken educational system as well as a broken society that continues to allow gross inequality and blatant racial and class discrimination to exist-- we will continue to only give the most brilliant of poor Black and brown kids the access that a large portion of the most average (if not below average) white and middle-class children have. Those top-performing charter and magnet schools have a fixed amount of spots. Those elite private schools with financial have even fewer spots and often provide the spots that are open to athletes. Thus, the system as is, is designed to allow access and opportunity to only a very limited amount of those from underprivileged backgrounds. We should not being learning how to play within this system; those with power and privilege as well as those adversely affected should be challenging the status qua and demanding change. Complacency (tips on how to win rather than change) is the enemy.

At the end of the day, the author pretty much said this: "Poor Black kids if you want to make it in this country, you need to brilliant, exceptional, and have way more drive and potential than we expect from our own children; if you have more ambition and are more mature than my own children you just might get the opportunity to work for me and my friends." This is nothing new; this is the burden of being Black; some call it a Black tax; I just call it life.

I just hope that in my lifetime we have people who rather write articles and spend their energy making the opportunities for all children better rather than telling us how to make it in this cruel and unfair game.

V

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• If I was a Black Kid
• Forbes.com
• Middle-class
• racial discrimination
• white
• black
• race
• poverty
• society
• education
• success

[PSCreativeGaming]

You only went to stanford because your black. What was your gpa? Sat? Probably a 3.5 and 1800 lolol. Nigga

[MsVictoriaShantrell]

@PSCreativeGaming Quite the opposite: I never got a 1800 SAT; in fact, my first time taking the SAT I got 1420, I took the SAT I like 3 or 4 times and never scored higher than 1760. My GPA, however, was unusually high... Nonetheless, regardless of why this "nigga" got into Stanford, I got in AND graduated and will probably be (if not already) more successful than the ignorant person you are. :-)

[chevon1920]

Girl you did not graduate from Standford and say the word library as liberry! no, NO!

[MsVictoriaShantrell]

@chevon1920 lmao! this was by far the best comment! You know back in high school (my white and Asian peers and teachers in AP courses) they used to make fun of me saying liberry. And when I watched this video, I realized I said it twice but didn't feel like re-shooting it bc of that. If have a lot of grammar and punctuation f*ck ups in all my videos lol.

[Mokurentate]

We gotta stop pointing the finger at the system and start pointing it at the parents... again.

[MsVictoriaShantrell]

@Mokurentate Complacency is the enemy no matter if it’s coming from a government agency or an individual.

[lilboy96able]

Anyone who dislikes this you're wrong.

[maipai101]

I loved this video Victoria, and you hair is awesome.

[maipai101]

@blueconsole Nope they are discriminated from schools because they do "too well". What you failed to take into account is that the Indians, and East Asians we are receiving are already from the "Creamy Class" and above. You don't see any Slumdog Millionaires coming to America and outdoing us. Don't fall for the hype because the most highly educated minority groups are Blacks from Africa and the Caribbean who already have a good education they still get discriminated against!

[maipai101]

@PSCreativeGaming Don't feed the trolls!

[g0dh4x]

I'm pretty sure that I've seen you in a few porn movies. You suck a good dick.

[kazakhstanmkj]

@MsVictoriaShantrell I agree!

[wysiwyg43]

@PSCreativeGaming YOUR black?? YOU'RE, dumbass.

[kookoo78]

(cont) aboutthis topic then there would be several hits. It's just something I notice on here.  "They" really don't care about us

[kookoo78]

You know what I've noticed even here on Youtube, that know ones seems to care about black people's opinion. For instance, this video has like 500+ hits and another video featuring a black young lady speaking on the same subject matter has like 200+ hits, but when a white person speaks on this topic there seems to be way more views. I feel as if the "elite" still doesn't care how we feel or about our reality. Now if it was a entertainment video from us and someone and Lil Wayne was rapping

[N0g0dzN0masterz]

Rigged is the game. You are cute and smart. Don't sell out when you get rich. Lol