The last few years of the 1960's were some of the most turbulent times for the African-American community. However, as a lad lost inside the safe and carefree world of my infancy, I did not have a clue the world saw me as inferior to the Caucasian race. I did not own this widely held notion because my godly and righteous grandparents taught me to always view life and the people around me from the inside out instead of from the outside in. Therefore, the inkling never entered my mind that the justice, liberties, and opportunities to succeed were not as guaranteed to me as an African-American as they were to my Caucasian-American brothers and sisters.
I was neither mentally ill nor slow of learning; I was just taught to see my God-given abilities before I looked at the worldly opportunities presented to me. I grew up understanding life and the people around me based on what I knew about me or them not based upon what others decide they wanted to see or the world revealed to me. Because I looked from the inside out, I saw my God-given capabilities to become whoever God assigned out in the world for me to become. Looking from the inside out, I knew I possessed the natural talents needed to carry out the tasks ahead. Although the world prejudged me as inferior because of the color of my skin or because of the poverty my family existed in, the God of Abraham sent my grandparents to instruct me to view those around me as well as myself the same way God does. The God of Abraham sees us from the inside out not from the outside in.
Two score and one decade since my birth and it is unfortunate that the world has not changed much. Yes, it is sad that the shadows cast from justice denied once again darken our American communities. Moreover, it almost torments the God-given peace in my soul that the unnerving darkness of past injustices now blankets our present. The sins of yesteryear that our injured and remorseful nation swore never to revisit, now slowly creep across America's fragmented cities and communities. The sinful shadow of injustice comes not just because of this one tragic murder. The rumbling of national discontent once silent has loudly returned because the lessons learned were left misapplied; therefore true justice could never be done. No. True justice cannot be done in 2014 because we continue to peer through the same segregated spectacles that our ancestors looked through during 1964. Today just like five short decades ago, Americans open our eyes and look in the mirror of reality and we still see an African-American me or a Caucasian-American you. In 2014 just like during 1929, our nation struggles to correct the worse fiduciary mistake ever made. Still right now just like way back then, we continue to be recognized as a poor me, a middle class you, and a rich them. But when shall we finally learn that any time we judge people from the outside in, true justice can never be done.
Yes, we might change our laws or even rearranged our common living spaces to the point where everything is politically fair. Yet, our politicians will never be able to legislate how you see me or how I view you. That one thing is something each of us must personally do. However, in order for this mad confusing world to actually survive, our African-American, Asian-American, Caucasian-American, Islamic-American, Latino-American, Native American, and other American communities must change the way we view each other and see the world. We must because we cannot afford to wait on our government officials to pass the laws that guarantee everyone's rights. So, we must make sure that we give everyone those equal rights ourselves. We must strive to see beyond the transparency of our dividing barriers. We must unite for the sake of saving our American nation as well as aiding the rest of humanity. Yes, we must change the way we see our neighbors Yes, we must correct the way we treat our enemies. We must stop focusing on what we see on the outside of a person. We must take time to look within to view a person as a person instead of as an expendable object. We can do it because we will never know how good the book is until we read pass the front cover of the book.
