That's not what I said. But you both know that. Why give someone an impossible choice or situation just to blame them when the inevitable happens? To absolve yourself or what you identify with?
How good did blacks in the US have it in the year 1800? 1850? 1900? 1950? 1980? It's not like the problems of the black community sprouted overnighted, they have been inherited from generations of disadvantage to put it lightly.
Just put yourself in the shoes of a young black man in the 1980s. High School was broken down, severely underfunded, full of gangs and drugs. Whether you graduate or not there are few jobs, very little good paying ones if any, you already had a bad start, maybe your mom is on drugs, your kid is hungry, you are the verge of being evicted. Then you look outside and you see the gang/drug money, "ok that is what I have to do to provide." It's a trap and it isn't easy to imagine another way when it is all you know. I have sympathy for that situation, but that doesn't mean I don't hold the ideal of personal responsibility. I'm trying to balance personal responsibility with the reality of the environment. You want a comprehensive view of the situation or do you want me to make you feel 'right' or 'superior' or 'absolved' by telling you it is the melonin in their skin that makes them shoot eachother?
i don't think melanin has anything to do with it. i don't think that black people are inherently inferior to white people. i personally think there is so little genetic difference between the "races" of man, that its a ridiculous argument to use for almost anything, besides proving the effect of environment on the development of physical attributes...like melanin.
i've said a couple of times already i think it's societal problem, not a racial problem.
i already have as comprehensive a view of the situation as you do...i have the same resources to use.
it just kind of seems like you expect me to feel bad for causing this situation, and i won't, ever, because i didn't. i feel bad that we're letting it persist, but i'm just one guy, no one gives a shit what i say. i know that, because i spent my youth shouting that things were fucked up, and we have to fix this shit, now. all that did was make me hoarse, and frustrated.
so i have nothing at all to feel right, or superior about, nor have i done anything to be absolved of.
offer a constructive solution, and i'll pitch in. offer recriminations and blame, and i'll just ignore it, like i do now.