To Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys

Too many children are committing crimes. As a Chicagoan and black man, I can't hold my tongue any longer

Dear Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys,

First, I would like to apologize for having ignored you all this time. Yes, I saw you at the press conference proclaiming your son’s innocence in the death of another black youth. I read the article where you stated that your son was a good boy and ‘never hurt nobody’. Nevertheless, I paid no real attention to you because my focus was on the grief of the victim’s family.

Now that the funeral processions have ended; the wax from candlelight vigils have melted; the blood soaked concrete that absorbed the final moments of a child’s life have been washed; and our collective grief once again converted to apathy; now that all of these things have taken place, I turn to you, Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys.

Because when the collective ask ‘how did this happen’, we should ask you, what did you do? Better yet, what didn’t you do? It is not by happenstance that your boy robbed an old man while he worked in his garage. We should not mistake the drive-by shooting the felled a seven-year-old girl while she played on her front porch as fate – a part of her destiny. You would like for us to believe that – to accept the tragedy as part of God’s master plan rather than the cumulative effect of your neglect.

You, Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys, did not realize that a two-year-old that curse may seem cute (it’s not) but would soon turn into a six-year-old that curses his teachers; then morph into a ten-year-old with no respect for his elders; finally become a teen with no regard for humanity. All the while you stood back and watched – encouraged the degenerate behavior by cursing his teachers, calling him little-man and endearingly referring to him as ‘pimp’ or ‘playa’. You were oblivious to your contribution to his eventual murderous ways.

Your embarrassment and denial is evident as you take out a second mortgage in order to post bail. You find solace in the words of activist as they seek government intervention and place blame on legislators and the police. ‘It’s the recession’ they scream. ‘We need reparations’ they yell. “Four hundred years of slavery.” “Jim Crow.” “Police Brutality.” “It takes a village.” They feign indignation at the system and bellow orders for the rest of us to stand and fight this injustice perpetrated on the black community while you, Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys, parrot these rants and slog through the murkiness that is the inadequacies of your parenting skills.

But who can blame you? I heard a poet once say ‘how can you plant a rose and expect it to grow when you don’t even know where the seed goes’. Doesn’t that sound like you, oh Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys? How could we expect you to know that a seed needs fertile soil? Sure, there are times when a child goes astray despite all efforts. However, more often than not it is the neglected ones that grow into a wild weed and then entangle the rest of us with their despicable deeds.

Alas, I have had enough. From now on, I want to see the names of the Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys in the newspaper along side of their thug-pukes. Your shame will not recover the spilled blood at the hands of your offspring. You having to hide your face from cameras will not recoup the incalculable loss of a young soul. Neither will the tally of your feeble excuses cover the cost of a suffering family who must bury their precious child, whom bear no fault in the crime other than having the nerve to be in the right place at the wrong time.

Time…It is a recurring theme in this maddening soap opera orchestrated by your failure. How much time did you spend teaching your black boy right from wrong? How much time did you spend correcting your black boy when he refused to follow the rules? How much time did you spend instilling and enforcing rules? Most of us know there is never enough time. Still, we make time because we know… we must. The failure to do so is to ensure that some parent, somewhere, will stand at the entrance of a still bedroom and realize that they were not given enough time; the time to see the fruits of their labor and love. And they must wait for that moment when time has separated them enough from their loss where it becomes possible to heal. And you, Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys, will watch your son toil in obscurity as he will be given time as a means of justice; an unfair exchange indeed.

In conclusion, I just want to say to all Deadbeat Parents of Little Black Boys, you bear some responsibility for the loss of life. You abdicated your duties as a parent and as a result children died. You don’t want to hear that. You want the means to simply say ‘no comment’ and hope we forget that by your actions you were complicit in the murder of so many young people.

It is my hope that you will respond to this, not with denial and defamation, but with a renewed sense of urgency that YOU must become the beginning of the solution. We’ve done the marching, the rallies, the hoping and praying. Now you must do the hard part; the part that always matter; the parenting. Make a bed of fertile soil in which to plant your seed (stable home). Learn how much water and sunlight (love, attention) your seed needs in order to grow strong. Understand the art of pruning (discipline, guidance). This is your calling as a parent. Give the world a rose.

How can you plant a rose and expect it to grow when you don’t even know where the seed goes. So learn where it goes. For all of our sake…do this.

Sincerely,
James Manning