The american dream: A Nightmare for African Americans, by Marvin Wade

2020 has been a year that has shed a little light on the plight of African Americans in the USA. With the help of the cellphone the world has been able to get a snapshot into what the dream in America truly represents for those not white. 2020 has shown the world that black lives don't matter too much to too many in this country. For many immigrants watching from abroad the   American dream may still seem to be a better option than the life they're living at home. But is the dream worth dying in the ocean on a makeshift raft? Is the dream worth dying from heat exhaustion cramped in a tractor trailer along with hundreds of other migrants? Is the dream worth being treated inhumanely at detention centers across the United States? African Americans have been in this country for over 400 years and yet we still have to beg and fight for equality. We're housed in the worst conditions with the worst educational system, with limited job opportunities and limited resources. But our communities stay flooded with drugs, guns and  liquor stores. There never seems to be a shortage of those three items in the hood. The reality is that America is only selling you a dream and it will cost you dearly to buy into it. 

"The american dream."  Now that's a phrase heard all around the world. From the Himalayas of Asia to the Soweto of South Africa. The american dream is what propels immigrants to put their lives and the lives of their family in the hands of smugglers in attempting to cross the Atlantic into America. What is the american dream? And what does the american dream mean to African Americans? The american dream is what drives immigrants to risk their lives to cross the border of Mexico to become Americans.

The american dream by Oxford’s definition is, "an ideal by which equality of opportunity is available to any American allowing the highest aspirations and goals to be achieved."  How I wish this were true. Because for centuries every time a little progress was made by African Americans toward any dream they were quickly derailed by the Government with the help of local Municipalities and some of its so-called citizens. Examples of this start with the emancipation proclamation which brought about the black reconstruction period. For a twelve-year period from 1865 to 1877 we actually had black men in congress, and black men with the ability to vote. We owned land, built institutions like churches and schools, and black wealth was beginning to be established. But the government immediately began to take away land from blacks and give it to whites. They also began passing laws that made it harder for black men to vote and used the violence of the KKK to keep blacks out of congress and out of the voting booth. The violence of the KKK was not limited to black congressmen or black voters, they bombed and burned schools and churches in a joint campaign with their local officials to keep African Americans powerless and in fear.

There was another moment in the history of the US where African Americans once again began to experience the american dream. In the early 1900s there was a place called Black Wall Street down in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where most of the prominent African American businesses were located. But white resentment of black wealth came to a head June 1,1921 when a mob of whites deputized by local officials attacked black residents and businesses of the Greenwood district of Tulsa. Burning it to the ground, killing 300 and Displacing over 8000 residents.

There was another Black Wall Street period of the early 1900s  in the Hayti district of Durham, NC. Ultimately the Hayti district was also destroyed but this destruction came by way of a newly built expressway. This expressway would displace many African American businesses all in the name of urban renewal. The community would never recover.  In fact many Black communities across the country were affected by this government program that was part of the housing act of 1949 and implemented in 1954. All this program did was displace Black residents, without compensation for their property or aid in relocating. Most were just thrown into public housing. It made redlining more pervasive for banks and real estate in these areas. While shopping Malls, Entertainment Centers and Expressways were being built in and around areas with government funding, none of this funding benefited Black homeownership. Over the years The “urban” areas were littered with abandoned homes. The Urban Renewal Program failed us. But it didn”t fail in its true plan, which was to weaken Black wealth associated with Home ownership. In this, the program was a success.

In the early 1970s African Americans again seemed to be making great progress toward the american dream. Our unemployment rate was at an all-time low and overall wealth was again being accumulated. But slowly within the early 70s there began a heavy influx of cocaine, heroine, and liquor stores within the black communities. By 1980 crack, AIDS and guns hit the neighborhoods without warnings decimating black communities all across the United States. This began the decade of the 80s and excess in America. Everyone seemed to be getting rich except  for African Americans. The only black folks that seem to benefit  from this period were sports stars and drug dealers. Mothers and Fathers were now crackheads. Aunts and Uncles were dying from AIDS and Sons and Daughters were in the street selling drugs and sex respectively. Another setback for African Americans in the pursuit of the american dream. This period in America was also a precursor to another major systematic nightmare for black folks....mass incarceration. 

In 1994 Bill Clinton  signed a Federal crime bill that began the unlawful modern day slave trade, with the judicial system playing the role of master. But even before the signing of this bill, in 1973 another law was already in effect in New York City... the Rockefeller drug laws. These laws were the true start to the mass incarceration of black men. It was also the start of the prison economic boom sweeping across the country. The Rockefeller laws began to have a ripple effect all across the United States with other states adopting similar draconian punishment. Combining this with the '94 bill, black men began to be arrested and convicted at alarming rates and given astronomical sentences that not only didn't match the crime but didn't match the sentences their white counterparts were getting. These laws combined to help increase the prison population 500% over the last 40 years; with black men at one point making up more than half of the population.

The push in prison reform has helped to close the gap of incarceration between black and white men. But the systematic war waged against black men over the last 40 years accomplished its goal in setting back the black family in its quest once again to achieve the american dream. Black women were now left to raise a family on their own with their loved one now away for untold amounts of years. Their only hope of ever reuniting was held in the hands of a parole system seemingly configured with the sole purpose of keeping families apart. Again fortunately over the last 10 years there's been a movement toward prison reform and slowly some changes have taken place mainly in New York. The Rockefeller laws were reformed and many men and women with life sentences for nonviolent crimes are being released from prison. There's been bail reform in New York, Rikers Island is finally going to be closing and a new guideline has been implemented for the New York State  parole board to adhere to when deciding the freedom of incarcerated men and women which has resulted in the long-awaited releases of many men and women of color. But, with too many more still left behind and the rest of the country slow to commit to progressive changes judicially there's plenty of work still needed to be done to correct a system whose infrastructure is inherently racist. 

2020 has been a true awakening for me. It has helped me to realize that we as African Americans need to invest more in ourselves by fully supporting Black-owned businesses. The american dream will continue to be a nightmare for us if we continue to follow the narrow and dark path of the system, which is set up for us to fail. You know the system. A created path by those in power who want to continue to control and determine who achieves this american dream and who doesn't. The system's path is littered with a series of roadblocks and closed doors that only open for a chosen few, i.e the Jordans, the Oprahs, the Tyler Perrys, the Obamas of the world. These are the few that are used to help keep us on America’s futile path.

But our true path to power and control over our lives is judicially, executively, legislatively and economically. The economic power means for us to become savers instead of spenders. Investors instead of consumers. In my belief in Capitol Power, I do believe in the importance of true political power as well. Not the dog and pony show we’ve been witnessing over the years. In his commentary in the New York Post titled, “Why Obama’s presidency didn’t lead to Black progress,” Jason L. Riley wrote, “During an era of growing Black political influence, Blacks as a group progressed at a slower rate than that of whites and the Black poor actually lost ground.” This tells me that what we need in our pursuit of the american dream are progressive Black politicians, like Charles Booker, Jamaal Bowman, and Mondaire Jones. Or progressive whites, like Bernie Sanders, or Elizebeth Warren. We have to stop voting out of fear and start believing in our voting power. We’ve been watching the same Black and White movies for years. It’s time to change the channel. We have to start being Black visionaries instead of American Dreamers. I think I speak for all African Americans when I say that the american dream means to also have the freedom to drive or walk down the street and not have to worry about being killed by police or a fellow black man. This is the flash point for all that's in the struggle. I'm optimistic that this can be the beginning of the end of our American nightmare, and begin for us that true American Dream. 

Marvin joined the Re/Creation Bed-Stuy writing workshop in 2019, shortly after coming home from a 25-year sentence primarily at Sing Sing. While inside, Marvin wrote multiple books’ worth of stories, novels, and personal essays on every bit of paper he could find, using his gifts as a writer to remake himself. He’s now learning the rudiments of writing and editing on a computer while working with both the Re/Creation team and the Fortune Society. He is a Spiritual Activist based in Brooklyn, where he has found a spiritual home with his local Quaker community. He reads his work, which is populated largely by strong women characters, every week in workshop, and now works with our team to create and edit his own dispatches. His poem “Where I’m From” was recently featured in Voices of Fortune 2020 literary magazine.