BlackPrint Project Statement of Purpose
"We set a table for our children that we may never eat from."
B. Worthington
Simply put, the Black community is in bad shape. Fifty years after Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech, we have made significant progress, yet still have not reached the fabled peaks of equality's mountain top.
The dichotomy is striking. A Black family currently inhabits the White House, at the same time our communities are experiencing record levels of unemployment. At the same time Black incomes are at historically high levels, we also have more young, Black men than ever in prison.
We have no leaders who are focused on the long-term viability of the Black community. Rather, we are being "led" by snake oil salesmen, charlatans, and/or once-were-greats who have long since sold out to the very establishment they use to struggle against.
We are currently a flock without a shepherd. We continue to allow those who seek to oppress us to define us. And we will perish if we do not implement a long term vision of who we want to be as a people.
The BlackPrint Project is one such vision. This is the realization that the only way we can move the collective fortunes of our people forward is to start with the economic empowerment of our people.
Though we currently possess an astounding $1.1 Trillion of collective consumer resources, we truly have no power because we don't own anything. We don't own assets on the personal finance level. We don't own businesses on the community level. We don't own infrastructure or media on the national level.
This lack of ownership is to the detriment of not only today's generation, but also that of future generations. And it is not by accident. Rather, the grand design has been to create a community of powerless consumers who will always be beholden to the very individuals who seek to maintain the status quo.
Make no mistake. The BlackPrint Project is not a quick-fix, academic, theoretical based approach to improving the Black community. Rather, it is an actionable, multi-generational plan to improve our communities from the inside out. This journey we embark upon will not be completed in our lifetime. But it must begin today. We must lay the groundwork and train the next generation to pick up where we leave off.
This is an ambitious undertaking, with the very real consequence of being sentenced to the permanency of our second-class status in this country if we fail. But doing nothing is no longer an option. And the lack of a cohesive, unified strategy can no longer be the only viable approach. We endeavor to set a table for our children that we may never eat from.
As the Native American Proverb states:
The dichotomy is striking. A Black family currently inhabits the White House, at the same time our communities are experiencing record levels of unemployment. At the same time Black incomes are at historically high levels, we also have more young, Black men than ever in prison.
We have no leaders who are focused on the long-term viability of the Black community. Rather, we are being "led" by snake oil salesmen, charlatans, and/or once-were-greats who have long since sold out to the very establishment they use to struggle against.
We are currently a flock without a shepherd. We continue to allow those who seek to oppress us to define us. And we will perish if we do not implement a long term vision of who we want to be as a people.
The BlackPrint Project is one such vision. This is the realization that the only way we can move the collective fortunes of our people forward is to start with the economic empowerment of our people.
Though we currently possess an astounding $1.1 Trillion of collective consumer resources, we truly have no power because we don't own anything. We don't own assets on the personal finance level. We don't own businesses on the community level. We don't own infrastructure or media on the national level.
This lack of ownership is to the detriment of not only today's generation, but also that of future generations. And it is not by accident. Rather, the grand design has been to create a community of powerless consumers who will always be beholden to the very individuals who seek to maintain the status quo.
Make no mistake. The BlackPrint Project is not a quick-fix, academic, theoretical based approach to improving the Black community. Rather, it is an actionable, multi-generational plan to improve our communities from the inside out. This journey we embark upon will not be completed in our lifetime. But it must begin today. We must lay the groundwork and train the next generation to pick up where we leave off.
This is an ambitious undertaking, with the very real consequence of being sentenced to the permanency of our second-class status in this country if we fail. But doing nothing is no longer an option. And the lack of a cohesive, unified strategy can no longer be the only viable approach. We endeavor to set a table for our children that we may never eat from.
As the Native American Proverb states:
"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
