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The conference featured numerous sessions and workshops on topics
of interest to the African-American community
A session on Systemic Racism addressed the prison industry and
how white businesses are making money off owning and
operating prisons . The panel also discussed the free work
prisoners do while incarcerated. There are so many black
folks in prison while the white counterparts so often do not
go to prison for the same crimes. This same session also
talked about the fact that black folks are in a time of
polite or covert racism which is harder to fight than the
open, overt racism of past decades.
Education was the subject of another panel during which a
discussion was held concerning the need to teach our kids to
love themselves and have self confidence.
There was a session on “Punishment and Profit of
Cannabis/Marijuana.” It is a $50 billion a year industry. In
that session it was discussed that African Americans need to
make sure blacks are on the states’ boards. It typically
costs over a million dollars to get into the industry. Less
than one percent of people involved in the industry are
black. California Congresswoman Maxine Water's said she has
created a “safe harbor" for banks to be involved in the
cannabis industry because it is still against federal
banking laws for them to be involved.
African Americans, said the panelists on the issue of punishment,
should be pushing legislators to expunge records of people
who have been charged with marijuana crimes because it is
hurting these people when they try to get employment.
The session on "Church in the Black Community" discussed the fact
that the mainstream evangelical church has not had a passion
for people and their suffering . Also 40 percent of black
churchgoers now attend a mega church. However, very few mega
churches have black assistant pastors. Black churches need
to hold politicians accountable if they allow them to speak
in their churches during election time.
The last session that I will comment on was on 2020 Census and
getting out the vote. A lot of the census activity will be
on line so we have to teach people to get ready for that.
For both the census and voting, technology and grass root
campaigning have to be utilized. The black community needs
more black-owned data collection, direct mail and social
media companies. Only six cities have black-owned companies
doing this work. It was noted that in Detroit in the last
election, 28,000 African Americans who voted did not vote
for a president.
he Congressional Black Caucus has a "Boot Camp" where they
train young African Americans how to get involved in the
political area. People interested should contact the CBC in
Washington DC or online. They had over 100 young African
Americans at the conference who have completed the CBC Boot
Camp.
There were also several receptions and a cameo concert closed out
the conference. |
