[I. Moses.]

Ebonics is a major, 400 year old language variant, as old and as real as the black experience here itself. Questions of its acceptance are irrelevant. Its speakers will never master standard English, however, through the sloppy, worn and incompetent techniques embraced by our public education system. Linguistically, Ebonics is no more bad English than it is not English at all. An uninformed person may call it bad English because its vocabulary is essentially English. But a language is determined by its grammar, not its vocabulary. The grammar of Ebonics is substantially based on the mother tongues of Africans brought here as slaves 400 years ago. Forbidden from being taught to even read during their first 250 years here blacks created their on 'language' by superimposing an English vocabulary over the grammar of their mother tongues. If this process, known as reflexification, is allowed to reinforce itself without intervention for 250 years, the end result is effectively a new language. English, a romance language, is dramatically more foreign to the African languages than it is to its western European based sister languages. Persons whose mother tongues are any of these other romance languages should have significantly less difficulty mastering English than someone whose mother tongue is African, though they too will have to be formally and carefully taught English as a foreign language. With the grammar of Ebonics being fundamentally derived from African languages the need for a specialized, almost foreign-language like approach in teaching standard English to Ebonics speakers becomes evident. No informed persons have been suggesting teaching Ebonics, but linguists do argue that there are features of Ebonics which must be taken into account when teaching standard English to Ebonics speakers, or the efforts are likely to be wasted. Treating a student's Ebonics as 'bad English' is akin to treating Italian as bad Latin. Nothing inspiring and beneficial to the student can come of this approach, which explains the public school system's dismal failure in competently teaching standard English. Blacks who mastered standard English for the first time were able to do so because it was effectively taught as if it were a foreign language. This is one area where most of us, and especially those disparaging whites who know nothing about Ebonics, should listen more to the experts, as un-American as that may be for many Americans.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

One cannot be sure if David A. is just deeply misinformed and believes the many criticisms he levels against blacks, or if there are deeper reasons for his sentiments. If there are more than a handful of Americans holding the views articulated in his posts, then that very ignorance is a threat to our national security.

For one to have studied blacks as seriously as David A. professes in one of his posts and then come to the shallow and often silly conclusions repeated throughout those posts may be, on first sight, baffling, but no subject is that difficult to understand by a competent, open-minded student. The problem lies not in the subject (blacks in this case), but most likely the student, his flawed study habits, such as employing blindly obsessive biases, and an overall incompetency to handle the subject.

Things or people ostensibly void of any redemptive value (as David A. would have us believe blacks are) normally do not occupy our focus - the way blacks seem to occupy that of David A. Obsessing on a group while articulating nothing but negative sentiments and loathing toward that group is often a defense mechanism of converting something desired (but unattainable) into something discredited and despised. His spending 'many years trying to dig deeper into the reason why blacks do some of the things they do,' of seeing blacks as having 'more opportunities than anyone else in this country' while 'continually crying about being victims,' or of persistently vilifying blacks as loud non-tippers who are disinterested in education, all the while claiming to have at least 'one black friend,' may sound like ignorance run amuck, but the deeper reason for this avalanche of nonsense may be an envy of something about blacks that he, being white, will never have.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

One cannot be sure if David A. is just deeply misinformed and believes the many criticisms he levels against blacks or if there are deeper reasons for his sentiments. It suffices to say that if there is more than a hand full of Americans holding the views articulated in his posts, then that very ignorance is itself a threat to our national security. For one to have studied blacks as seriously as David A. professes in one of his posts and then come to the wholly shallow and most often silly conclusions repeated throughout those posts may be, on first sight, baffling. But no subject is that difficult to understand by a competent, open-minded student. The problem lies not in the subject (blacks in this case) but most likely in the student, his flawed study habits, like employing blindly obsessive biases, and an overall incompetency to handle the subject. Things ostensibly void of any redemptive value normally do not occupy our focus as blacks seem to occupy that of David A. Obsessing on a group, while articulating nothing but profuse and persistently negative sentiments and loathing toward that group is often the reaction formation defense mechanism of converting something desired and envied but wholly unattainable into something discredited and despised. So his spending 'many years trying to dig deeper into the reasons why blacks do some of the things they do...', of seeing blacks as having 'more opportunities than anyone else in this country' while 'continually crying about being victims...' or of persistently vilifying blacks as loud non-tippers who are disinterested in education, all while claiming to have at least 'one black friend' may sound like ignorance run amuck but strongly suggest that David A. may in fact want to be or is envious of something which he could never be, and that is black.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

ArzaThoth's argument is troubling, not just because it is such an insult to good judgment and common sense, but because it reminds us all of the thriving obsession among many in this country with inflaming and reinforcing prejudices. Blacks, who have been the victims of so much crime and suffering in this country, are probably more empathetic than most Americans to the suffering of others. After all, any man anywhere in the world who has ever been hit or kicked in the groin (and that includes most men) will instinctively groan when he sees it happen to another man. Those who have known suffering cannot help but empathize with another fellow sufferer, regardless of race, color or creed.

So the notion that blacks would somehow endorse these crimes is ludicrous. It is the classic psychological projection defense, in which whites go out of their way to find reasons for accusing blacks of having the very same unhealthy attitudes and motives held by so many whites. The overwhelming majority of the nearly 500 hate groups in this country are white, and 75 percent of them target their hate against blacks. There is little indication that white Americans are as outraged with the behavior of these groups as ArzaThoth would have us believe.

Blacks rely on the national media no less than whites, and if that media ignored those crimes, there is no reasonable basis for blaming blacks for not knowing about them, especially because the nearly 37 million blacks in this country do not all live next door to where those crimes occurred. Plus, black expressions of alarm and outrage have never garnered much attention in this country. That is why so many of our problems just fester and get worse.

That a white commits a crime against a black or a black against a white does not in and of itself make that crime 'racially motivated.' A crime becomes racially motivated if the principal reason for the crime is racial. If the principal reason is anything else, e.g. sex, money, drugs, etc., then the crime cannot be adjudged to be racially motivated. And any media, be it local or national, would be irresponsible in labeling it so.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

There is some real merit in Wam's original question about the extremely hostile attitudes of some Italian Americans toward blacks, which should not be lost in the rush to criticize Sean's response. Some of the most anti-black sentiments I have heard or have been informed of have come from Italian Americans, and not necessarily all on the East Coast. Choosing to see this as just an example of 'insular communities' comes across as a self-serving attempt to contort this ugly behavior into something acceptable, using the argument that 'others do it' under similar circumstances of insularity. But such a degree of insularity in any society as open as ours is viewed under most other circumstances as downright sickness, or at best medieval. Sean's response, while colorful and somewhat extreme around the edges, may be much closer to the truth than many of his critics here are aware of or are willing to admit. The truth does not necessarily have to be cloaked in pretty dressing - especially if the truth itself is not pretty.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

Come to Columbia, Md., arguably one of the most thoroughly intergrated and diverse communities in the country. This roughly 35-year-old 'new town' of about 110,000 is midway between Baltimore and Washington, D.C. It was conceived and built by the late James Rouse (of shopping mall fame across the East Coast) and was created and advertised as a racially 'open city.' I came to Columbia in 1971 mostly because of this and found it an oasis of racial harmony and decency in the sea of racism and bigotry that so infested the surrounding Baltimore-D.C. megalopolis at that time. Things have improved consderably in many of the surrounding areas during the last 35 years, but Columbia remains the hub of diversity in the area. It has been a rewarding place to live. It is worth noting, however, that our country has a history of profound racism. And while the situation is slowly improving, chances are very slim that you will find any place in this country that is void of racism.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

If you study firsthand what experts on the subject are saying, you fill find that none are suggesting teaching Ebonics in ths schools. What they are saying is that there are features of Ebonics which must be taken into account when teaching standard Egnlish to Ebonics speakers or you WILL NOT be successful. Period. That aside, the vitriolic and condescending nature of the criticisms you and many whites level against Ebonics and its users is an almost perfect match to criticisms whites were registering over a half century ago against superior black athletes ( Jack Johnson, Jackie Robinson), black dance and black music (jungle bunnies, jungle music). The profound racism of such whites simply would not permit them to see or accept talent or creativity if it did not have a white face on it, and they would put a white face on anything they could, if it were irresistible enough. Their animus was directly proportionate to the talents of the blacks involved or the level of artistry, beauty or creativity in the black dance or black music under attack. What was also true then was those who criticized the most had the least talent in the ring or on the dance floor or before a microphone. Yet, their rabid, hate-filled behavior was pathologically persistent and would not subside until 'great white hopes' could be found who could either defeat blacks in the arena, put an acceptably white twist to black dance styles or simply appropriate black music as being of their own white creation. Such whites would then be lionized as 'saviors of the white race' and , in some instances, simply immortalized. ( For them Elvis just can't be dead. Why would he up and do that?!) Could it be that today's whites are no less envious of or feel no less threatened by black ability and creativity than their ancestors? After all Ebonics is rich, expressive ( five present tenses!!) and distinctly non-white, though whites are borrowing from it left and right. What meaneth this?

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

[I. Moses.]

Richard: Lets come back to reality. Ebonics and American English have a co-shared beginning. If Ebonics is still grounded in the characterizing mentality of the black slave, then American English is surely still grounded in the characterizing mentality of the white enslaver, the genocidal exterminator, the rapist, the lyncher, and the dispossessing thief. If Ebonics is to be discarded because of its presumed characterizing mentality, only the most stupid of convertees would then embrace American English, given its characterizing mentality. One could give this as the reason Ebonics speakers are not enamored of standard English, except it would be just as off-based as your comments are misinformed. Simply put, all languages have varieties which evolve when people are separated by geosocial barriers which force linguistic developments along different line; everyone speaks at least one. The greater the separation, the more distinct the variety, in the extreme forcing two varieties to become largely foreign to each other, as what may be happening between your variety of English and Ebonics. These varieties develop in different ways and to different degrees, but not for purposes of aiding communications between groups. This is what formal training in standard English is suppose to do. Virtually all linguists agree that the more distinct the variety is from standard English, the more it must be taken into account in teaching its speakers to read and write standard English. Researchers have reported for decades that Ebonics, one of the most distinct varieties of American English, presents 'systematic interferences' in the students' mastery of standard English and will continue to do so until the educational system recognizes and effectively deals with these interferences. It is the failure of the education system to do precisely this which most complicates black students' mastery of standard English. Ebonics thrives because it is, linguistically, a competent, expressive vehicle of communications (you protestations notwithstanding), the socioeconomic conditions necessary for its survival are intact, and, most importantly, the system for educating students out of its usage effectively reinforces that usage.

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Name : I. Moses., Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, City : Columbia, State : MD Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, 

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