Jarrett-Carter.com

While he would make you believe that he is a shining advocate for the progress of black issues in the American mainstream of conscience, Tavis Smiley knows full well that his position of “not giving Barack Obama a pass” is more shameless self-promotion than cultural integrity.

There is a bottom line that most people know, agree with and accept, and that is that no man can be a president to a specific demographic. Mainstream media has already succeeded in improperly designating certain figures as spokespersons for the black race; and it usually does nothing to change our positioning among the rest of the nation.

For Smiley to continually frown upon Obama’s unwillingness to address black concerns specifically prickles on a lot of fronts that he’s not ready to fight. His doctrine of the concerns and struggles of black people are well-founded and often logically explained, but his arrogance won’t let him see that he is slighting the rest of the country and black people in the process.

Asking any elected official or candidate to be frank about remedying centuries of injustice against one culture is unfair and unreasonable. The race of the candidate matters not, but to paint that person into a corner by leveraging systematic racism against them is downright dirty.

There is no answer from one man or woman that can alleviate the pressure of racial strife. That is a collective agreement that each individual must come to. Yes, leadership can start the discussion, but there is no strict and fullproof policy that can eliminate health disparities, educational gaps and social deconstruction.

But more important than the daunting task Smiley wishes to heap upon Obama or any other candidate for president, is the notion that black people, in all of our struggles and pain, are incapable of caring about issues facing the whole of America. Smiley, in his bluster and plethora of media exposure, takes every opportunity to lament the ills of the black community, as if they are troubles limited exclusively to our people.

Tavis, we care about homeland security as much as we care about racial profiling. We care about bad housing loans as much as the good folks located in parts uncolored. And we care about all of the troops coming home and their well-being.

So does everyone else.

Using his platform as an unpredictable weapon of misguided insight, Smiley is recklessly positioning the African-American conscience as a selfish, self-absorbed entity wishing that we could burn this mother down and get all of our needs catered to. Right now. His suggestions of our tribulations being more than those of white folks or immigrants, denigrates our essence as a community-minded people.

Not just our community, but the global community.

There is nothing wrong with advocacy at the grass roots level, but the expectation of Tavis Smiley in the name of helping black folks is irresponsible and poorly thought out. I applaud his work in advancing the black perspective, but blurring our perspective among us, and others, will leave all of us seeing the real issues a lot less clearly.