An Open Letter to Critics of Michele Tafoya Kendall Qualls
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2022/02/24/an_open_letter_to_critics_of_mi
To MSNBC’s Tiffany Cross, Joy Reid, and the crew at “The View,” I am standing shoulder-to-shoulder with my friend and new co-chair of my gubernatorial campaign, Michele Tafoya. Not only is Michele right to criticize critical race theory (CRT) and promote the idea that skin color shouldn’t matter, but she’s also encouraging us toward achieving Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s dream.
I know you are familiar with his famous 1963 Lincoln Memorial speech. Based on your comments, it seems you have forgotten its objective. Let me remind you of a few key points. The Rev. King said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream that one day in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification … little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.”
Critical race theory flies in the face of these words and the principles for which Martin Luther King was martyred. CRT is a leftist agenda shrouded in harmless-sounding words – equity, inclusion, and culturally responsive teaching among others – to hide its radical intent. It has been injected into government, corporations, and yes, as Michele Tafoya said, even our schools. Critics of CRT are not just white Americans but also a growing of number black Americans, just like me, who recognize its harmful and divisive intent.
Before you dismiss me with some lame slur and try to de-legitimize me as an inauthentic voice of the black community, take a moment to learn my story. As a boy, I lived in poverty in the gang-infested housing projects of Harlem in the late 1960s. From there, I was uprooted to a trailer park in Oklahoma. I’ve witnessed the demise of my siblings, my mother, and countless other African Americans to the cruel world of government-sanctioned poverty of the inner cities.
By the grace of God, I escaped that life, obtained an education, got married, and raised five children who are now functioning adults serving their communities. To answer your unspoken (and offensive) question, yes, I am married to a black woman. We have five black children together. We even have a black Labrador retriever. I pledged the same fraternity as the first black Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. – Alpha Phi Alpha. My wife pledged in the first black sorority – Alpha Kappa Alpha.
We are children of parents who were raised in the Jim Crow south. We were baptized in a black church by a black pastor, and we are not confused about who we are or where we have come from when we look in the mirror every day.
Don’t waste time trying to marginalize me. Instead, explain to your readers and viewers the real reason we see such significant disparities in comparison to other ethnic groups. Black families were stronger during the worst of times – when our country actually was systemically racist – than they are today. Since Dr. King’s death, the black community has drastically changed from approximately 80% two-parent families to approximately 80% fatherless homes, all without one national initiative to reverse the trend.
You and I both know the real reason for disparities isn’t skin color. The disparities can be attributed to a reason you and others of your ilk are afraid to talk about – the epidemic of fatherless homes and the poor performance of schools in cities run by Democrats.
For the last 50 years, we have experienced a cultural genocide in our community coupled with the complete silence of the media including you and your pals. The number one driver of that change was and is social welfare programs, like Aid to Families with Dependent Children launched during the LBJ Administration in the mid-1960s. This program drove fathers from the home by incentivizing women to have children and remain unmarried, leaving generations of children without the benefit of learning social norms and a work ethic, or having the benefit of a stable home environment. This was the beginning of disparity that continues today.
Today, we have generations of people who have never entered a church for a wedding but frequently enter churches for funerals because of black-on-black crime.
The sacrifices of our most iconic civil rights leaders were meant to yield opportunities and outcomes for the lives of millions of black Americans, like me, who escaped poverty through hard work, faith, and education. But you want to convince our children they are victims of a system that was designed to keep them down.
Before you demean Michele Tafoya, who is brave enough to speak the truth, try and listen for a moment to the millions of other black Americans, me included, who refuse to buy into the cult of victimhood.
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