The Power of Personal Agency: The idea that only whites can undo ‘structural racism’ sends young blacks a message of powerlessness

By Ian Rowe. He is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Excerpts:

"Glenn Loury, a Brown University economist, exposed this concern at a 2019 event sponsored by the Manhattan Institute titled “Barriers to Black Progress: Structural, Cultural or Both?” Mr. Loury was challenged with the proposition that before black people address factors within their locus of control—such as high levels of single parenthood, which create a greater likelihood of child poverty—white people’s racist attitudes and actions need to be resolved. “You just made white people, the ones who we say are the implacable, racist, indifferent, don’t-care oppressors, into the sole agents of your own delivery,” Mr. Loury said. “Really?”"

"Census data show that more than three million black students were enrolled in college or graduate school in 2018. According to the Washington Post, 23 unarmed black people were killed by police that year. This is 23 too many, yet roughly 136,000 black students were in higher education for each unarmed black person killed by police.

George Floyd’s tragic death isn’t emblematic of how most middle-aged black men experience American life. Yes, for black men like me, racism is a reality—sometimes with fatal consequences. But 57% of black men have made it into the middle class or higher as adults today, up from 38% in 1960, according to a 2018 report by the American Enterprise Institute. As the study’s authors wrote: “This good news is important and should be widely disseminated because it might help reduce prejudicial views of black men in the society at large, and negative portrayals of black men in the media.” And the black men who are succeeding in the U.S. are disproportionately likely to have done three things: graduated from college or served in the military, found full-time work and married."