- Since we now live in an integrated society there is NO NEED for a black consciousness that motivates us to stand and fight as a targeted race of people.
Gen X, Millennials, Gen Z, and Gen Alpha all came along after the Civil Rights movement, after the major work- deposits of blood, sweat, tears, and resources that sculpted the freedoms that Black people have experienced since those turbulent times of change. We now live the dreams of our forebears! We are urban, suburban, and rural. We are blue collar, white collar, no collar and hoodie. We are church, mosque, unchurched, and agnostic. We are ADOS, Moors, FBA, Pan-Africanists, etc. We have never been monolithic, but today we are so diversely situated and diversely resourced that it is hard to conceive of ourselves as one people.
However, our core social institutions still bear the historical inertia of racism and white fear and we are yet easily targeted for hatred and grievance. We are also targeted for misinformation by foreign enemies1,2. Injustice briefly motivates us to face up to reality like during the summer of George Floyd protests. Because of this fickle sense of black consciousness, we fail to leverage our powers together wisely and consistently. 35M eligible Black voters, but only 13M participate! Whether your plan involves getting the bag, staying in your own lane, escaping into a spiritual hiding place, etc., you must realize it is your responsibility to make deposits into Black freedom, put skin in the game, and pay it present and forward!
- A decision to NOT participate in voting or other civic duties serves as an alarm to power that it needs to listen to you. (Foreign Propaganda1,2)
There are many blacks who are advocating skipping voting or voting only portions of a general election ballot. This is almost never a good idea. It rests on the premise that powers will “miss our vote” and care enough to change itself to appeal for our participation. Truth is some of the worst powers aligned against black people and progress are best served by our non-participation. This is also exactly the advocated tactic dumped into our social media by foreign malign actors who want to ruin our democracy. “The (Senate Intelligence) Committee found that no single group of Americans was targeted by IRA information operatives more than African-Americans. By far, race and related issues were the preferred target of the information warfare campaign designed to divide the country in 20161,2.”
We have forgotten that prior to 60 years, we lived decades of violently enforced non-participation that ensured unaccountable lynchings, black marginalization, black poverty with no hope of fairness and equality. Non-participation is repeatedly proven to be the weakest position.
Fake Facebook and Instagram accounts- New Knowledge Disinformation Report2 w/edits
- The modern-day Democratic Party is equal to the Republican Party in its attacks on Black Progress. Left wing, right wing are two wings of the same bird! (Foreign Propaganda1,2)
Plenty can be said about the history of the Democratic Party during slavery and Reconstruction, and during the era of Dixiecrats and segregation. Others find cause to praise the Republican party as the party of Frederick Douglass, Abraham Lincoln, and abolition. However, it is well-known that the parties evolve over the decades and will look very different depending on the contemporary issues of the day, the constituencies it serves and who is financing its operations. Only a pure neophyte (putting it lightly) would think otherwise. First, it should be said that neither party should be expected to be the foremost advocate of Black Progress and empowerment over the voice of Black people themselves. However, there are many differences between the parties in their support Black advocacy and in support of Democracy in general. Looking at the data, the two main parties are in no way equal.
Democrats in the main supported the 3 Civil Rights laws passed in the 1960’s that shifted all of American law and society toward equality for its Black citizens. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act of 1965, and the Fair Housing Act of 1968 changed the landscape of the country for Blacks. In the current era, Republicans are scoring devastating attacks against Black voting rights, against equal opportunity in employment and education, against environmental justice, against healthcare parity, against law enforcement accountability, against community safety, against affordable housing, against black business and contracting, etc.
These are all things Democrats support, albeit imperfectly. Follow the money as well to test how Democracy-minded and diverse party donors are. Republican judges and politicians supported the 2010 Citizens United decision that allows unlimited, dark money into our politics setting the stage for Elon Musk to be an unelected, non-citizen government leader and a cast of billionaires to join Trump’s cabinet in 2025. Of the top 100 individual donors to either party in 2023-2024, 60 are Republican and gave over $1.8 billion dollars. The remaining 40 Democrats gave $530M in total5. Republicans have supported culture wars and buying the leaders they want versus democratically electing them.
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- A third-party option is AS VIABLE a choice in any federal general election as one of the two main parties. (Foreign Propaganda1,2)
In the Nov 2024 general election, contrary to his bloviating, Trump did not win most of the popular vote! He won the plurality of the popular vote. Most Americans did not vote for him, as adding third-party votes and Harris votes together proves, not to mention the 89 M voters who stayed home. Our political system is dominated by the two parties, but each party is to be a coalition that covers a spectrum of views and constituencies that oftentimes battle each other to form the agenda for the entire party.
Third parties are not viable in the least for general elections but may be useful in the primary elections to raise issues, drive conversations, and move candidates to take up policies. There are immense hurdles in cash and signatures that third parties must overcome to even qualify to make a state’s ballot. Hardly any third party does this in more than half the states! The largest, the Green Party made it onto 38 ballots this past election to contend with the other two main parties who were on all 50 state ballots. The others made it onto even less ballots and altogether third parties had no chance of being noticed except to help defeat the party to whom they are more closely aligned.
- We are not enough to revolutionize our people’s condition in America. (In other words: Your vote doesn’t matter. Your voice doesn’t matter. Your values don’t matter. Your vision doesn’t matter. Your virtue doesn’t matter. Your investments don’t matter. Your vigor doesn’t matter.)
With roughly 48 M Black people in the U.S. we are as large as the populations of Canada, Spain, Iraq! We also control over $2T in buying power3! If we were a country and this number were gross domestic product, we would rank #12 just behind Russia and just ahead of S. Korea4! We would have the same GDP per capita as the country of Italy. We are trendsetters in popular culture worldwide. We are also the very barometer of America’s promise of liberty, justice, and equality. Therefore, we are plenty enough to stand for our progress and advance in America! We have only to effectively use the 7 V’hicles of Power mentioned above: Votes, Voice, Values, Vision, Virtue, inVestments, and Vigor!
Short Bio: Cal Burlock is founder and CEO of DRIVEN Systems LLC, where he creates platforms for broad economic development thru STEM and for sociopolitical advance for Black citizens in the United States. In addition to his first love of solving human challenges thru creating systems, he also writes and produces content on black male empowerment, political activism, self-government, and positive change.
Join our free digital app- the CEO App! It harness our numbers to hold account over elected officials and corporations! bit.ly/CEOmeansbusiness
Contact, follow, and collab thru social media or direct email: DRIVENsys@gmail.com
Instagram: @blackmengoals and @stemreps
References
1https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/Report_Volume2.pdf pages 6, 38-39, 49, 58, 60-61
2 https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/NewKnowledge-Disinformation-Report-Whitepaper.pdf pages 8, 20, 45, 82 (pictures)
3 https://www.blackenterprise.com/report-black-consumers-have-2-trillion-in-buying-power/
4 https://www.investopedia.com/insights/worlds-top-economies/
5 https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/biggest-donors
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