The Republicans have put much stock in the faith based movement saying they will provide money and resources to support faith based organizations that want to help with societal problems. My question is where is the same support for a business/ entrepreneurial based movement. Is this just another sidetrack to send us off and keep us out of real power.

The police mistreat a Black person and Black folks rush across the country, conduct rallies and marches and get their names in the papers and on the television.

Guys like Russell Simmons and gansta rap promoters are paid millions to keep our young people sidetracked and engaged in a subculture called Hip Hop with its centerpiece demeaning, racist, and sexist lyrics and images of Black women and men. Sounds like pimping to me when our young people are used to make money for someone while they get next to nothing from it. In the meantime the increase in Black owned businesses remains the greatest unfilled need we have.

The complaints about so called outsourcing with American jobs and money being sent to India and other places around the world should ring bells of de ja vu in the Black community. White America has been outsourcing jobs and dollars for centuries. But Black America has allowed it because we outsource our dollars ourselves by going out of our way to find a business outside our community to take our money.

I found it ironic that while so called leaders in Los Angeles were protesting the beating of a young Black man who was mistreated by the LAPD, the Los Angeles Times reported that a popular coffee shop called Lucy Florence on Degnan Street was being evicted. Where was the support for Lucy Florence? Were the angry crowds about the closing of another Black business? Where are these crowds and leaders when Black families are forced to move out of their neighborhoods because the gangs have killed their children, robbed them of a quiet lifestyle, and made the neighborhoods unliveable?

Where are the protesting crowds when untrained disrespectful young people make life for the small business people almost impossible such as standing and milling around in front of Black owned businesses in gang and hip hop dress, talking loud, calling each other vulgar names, and playing loud, foul music to drive off the potential customers? Where are the leaders then?

What we need is a business based movement that honors our business people like we honor our ministers. Most people can tell you who are the ministers in a town but can they tell you who the business people are whether or not they do business with them on a regular basis?

Most people have posters or pictures of Martin, Malcolm, Thurgood. Some know what Dubois did - and that’s all good. But now is the time to put up the posters and sing the praises of our business pioneers who made money without selling out our people so our young can emulate them and build business empires such as Madame C.J. Walker (beauty industry) Reginald Lewis (Beatrice Foods), A. G. Gaston (businessman), John Johnson (Ebony magazine), Herman Russell (Atlanta Developer, Golden State Mutual, Penney Bank, and Supreme life Insurance), Don Barden (cable television owner and Fitzgeralds Hotels and Casinos), Willie Gary (attorney and Television station owner), John Sengstacke (newspaper publisher), Cathy Hughes (radio station owner), Berry Gordy (Motown record founder), and Fred Valentine (75 year old Woods Valentine Mortuary, Pasadena, CA). The list goes on and on but they remain our unsung heroes while our young learn only of people with names like Ludacris, Bow Wow and Snoop Dogg.

Where is the business based movement? A business based movement would teach our young by example that we need to not sell our land and property but pass it on to our young so they won’t have to start at the bottom and have something to build on. A business based movement will teach them it’s appropriate to have a mortgage payment before you have a Mercedes payment. It’s more profitable and appropriate to pay tuition before you buy a Toyota. It’s better to have a McDonalds job rather than selling drugs. Some things seem obvious but they need to be taught. A faith based movement teaches us to honor our mother and father, and a business based movement teaches us to honor business and independence and the power of entrepreneurship.

As slaves we were not allowed to learn to read because it lead to power. We were not allowed to vote because that meant the power to elect someone who was in our own best interest We were not allowed to own our own businesses because that was also power and it was reserved for the white man. Slavery is over now and we can read, we can vote, and we can own our own businesses.

The more we read, the more power we have, the more elected officials we have, the more we can influence public policy, and the more businesses we own the more we can determine our own destiny.