If all it takes for a black man to be sucessful is to be articulate and well spoken, why aren't more doing it?

Question

Its certainly helping Obama.

Answer 1

That's a dang good question, hun!

I have heard way too many black people make themselves sound very uneducated by saying words like "axe" instead of ASK!

They will say "I axe you a question." Instead of saying "I asked you a question." It sounds dumb, even though they may NOT be dumb people!

As long as certain people keep talking like that then they will always be considered the weaker race!

Cheers

Answer 2

Your premise is deeply flawed because it is well-known that it takes MUCH MORE than that, and sometimes doesn't even take that.

Firstly, and most importantly, there are LOTS of successful black men, they just don't get as much publicity as the unsuccessful ones. Read an issue of Black Enterprise or search for articles on succesful black men.

Secondly, what do you define as success? There certainly are a number of successful black men in different industries - from business to music.

So if we know what it takes to be successful (more than what you list), then why aren't more successful? I would say that culture and upbringing have something to do with it - wanting to not conform to the norms of society to get ahead.

You have to actually play the game if you want to win - so wear a suit to the interview please.

Answer 3

Its takes more than just making the decision, it takes education. All the black people I consider my friends and aquaintances are well-educated and detest the ebonics that young blacks take part in today. Its insulting! Having a good vocabulary and being articulate DOESNT mean you're "acting white"!

Answer 4

--Taking your premise at face value--and there is a lot wrong with it--but if we look at what "being articulate and well-spoken" usually ends up meaning for most African Americans who are in the inner cities and/or rural wastelands, you'll find your answer.

Refusing to speak the dialect your friends speak will make you a social outcast. Refusing to speak the dialect your *parents* speak at home, while you are a child or teenager living in *their house*, will get you punished. While I am not a person of color myself, I have had some experience with the latter, with being punished for "talking prissy" around the parents. I had to talk like an idiot redneck in my own home around my folks until I was in high school at least....and all I risked was getting beaten down, ok?

Some kids in some inner city "hoods" risk being *shot* for the god-awful "sin" of "talking white". So yeah, there is peer pressure, tons of it, to conform to the society around you, even if that society is based on the very poverties of material posessions and intellect that you're fighting against.

Not to mention, "code switching" or using one dialect at home and another elsewhere, is a pain. It really is an unfair burden. I admit this. However it also seems like a very necessary thing as well, doesn't it?

--And well....your premise is flawed. Utterly. Does the phrase "It isn't what you know, but *who* you know" ring a bell?

Simply put. Being articulate and well-spoken is no guarantee of getting a damn job, is it? In fact, if you are *more* articulate than your potential *boss* it can work against you as they will feel threatened and not hire you. Or they'll hire you and then do whatever they can to *make you quit* (which is considerable).

And this even assumes that *jobs*, ones where you can earn a living wage and *pay for* your own perks and health care, even *exist* locally. This assumes that there is more *out there* than just being an hourly wage slave, a ditch-digger down on that Wal-Mart Plantation....

In many, too many inner cities and half-rural grey towns in America, a "pocket economy" holds sway and that is *simply* not the case...there *aren't any* jobs in large chunks of the country that *don't* boil down to grossly underpaid and under-compensated dead-end *grind labor*. In large chunks of the country, people *can't get* work that lets them earn their own health care, or become self-sufficient to the point that they can completely get off of welfare and public assistance.

And more and more, this has less to do with eloquence or education or what an individual brings to the table, and more to do with the *richest* of your filthy rich, your Big Oil, your Big Banking (and Big Debt), and your Wal-Marts, just doing *everything including locking people UP at their jobs* to grind ordinary citizens down into the gutter.

And you wonder why people *give up* on the workforce. How about trying *more work and less FORCE*, ok?

Really. And I am saying this as a Caucasian, ok? I am saying this as a *white guy* who has lived a large chunk of his life in the trailer parks and in public housing and who *knows* more than a few articulate and well-spoken People of Color *currently*.

And their eloquence is not relevant. It doesn't help them in their lives, any more than mine helps me in mine. Because you rich bastids have sold off all the jobs to those filthy bomb-chucking freaks that want us to *die*, that is why.

Am I clear?

Thanks for your time, troll-boy. Your game needs *work*.

Answer 5

Whoa, hold on there fella. Your premise is flawed. Being articulate and well spoken aren't necessarily part of being successful at all, and are not the sole requisite for success, in any case.

Answer 6

Thats not all it takes..it takes education, proper attire, connections, and an open mind from the employer meaning if they are racist they won't hire "the black man" because they feel the white man could is more fit for the job. Its not just about how articulate the man is their is so much more to it than that. Black men work 3 times as hard as you do and often still obtain lower level positions.

Answer 7

It seems to me that since the blacks are uneducated due to the ease of selling drugs and living criminal lives, they engage in using a sub-culture society language. Too often the White's are blamed for the level of success that is achieved by the blacks but it seems that every other minority race achieves higher standards. I would love to see the blacks reach out, work hard, appreciate education, and respect other human beings.

Answer 8

It takes a bit more than that, no matter what race we are. It takes motivation! Inteligence helps, but isn't necessarily a requirement for success. It takes energy, focus, good orderly direction, perserverence, and Luck helps, too.

Answer 9

You left out education, morals, integrity, basically the same stuff it takes white, hispanic, asians or any other race to be successful.

Good question though, why, according to statistics, does it seem that the african american males are failing to step up to the plate?

Answer 10

Does being a thug rapper like Tupac count as successful.? If it does,there a plethora of successful black men.