Surviving ‘stressful process’ of being black male

Perception: Young males = public enemies
Black male children are often “labeled in public schools as being out of control,” said Lacewell, who studies black political culture and wrote “Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought.”

“If you’re a black boy who is smart and energetic and always has the answer and throws his hand up in the air,” she said, “you might as a parent say, ’Even if you know the answer you might not want to make a spectacle of yourself. You don’t want to call attention to yourself.”’

Bill Fletcher still has nightmares about his third-grade teacher, a white woman who “treated me and other black students as if we were idiots,” he said. “She destroyed my confidence.”

But his parents were strong advocates, and taught him to cope by having little contact with teachers who didn’t take an interest in him, said Fletcher, former president of TransAfrica Forum, a group that builds ties between African-Americans and Africa.

As black boys become adolescents, the dangers escalate. Like most teenagers, they battle raging hormones and identity crises. Many rebel, trying to fit in by mimicking — and sometimes becoming — criminals.

“They are basically seen as public menaces,” Lacewell said.

Counting the casualties
Rasheed Smith, 22, a soft-spoken, aspiring hip-hop lyricist from the Bedford Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, recently tapped his long fingers, morosely counting his friends killed in neighborhood violence in the last five years — 11 in all. Few spent much time beyond their blocks, let alone their neighborhood. Some sold drugs or got in other trouble and had near-constant contact with police.

Smith has survived by staying close to his family. He advised: “With police, you talk to them the way they talk to you. You get treated how you act.”

Bebeto Matthews / AP Karrym Ferguson, a 10th grader at Central High School in Newark, N.J., listens to Mark Ferguson during his June 13 visit to the school. Ferguson, a Wall Street financier who grew up in Newark and attended the same school, established the Day in the Life Foundation to help students succeed.

Twenty years ago, Carol Taylor’s teenage son — now a lawyer — was mugged twice near their Brooklyn home, but police officers “treated him like he had done the mugging,” she said. She wrote and self-published “The Little Black Book: Survival Commandments for Black Men” filled with tips on how to deal with police: keep your hands visible, carry a camera, don’t say much but be polite.

“Don’t take this as a time to prove your manhood,” wrote Taylor, a retired nurse and community activist who said she’s sold thousands of the pocket-sized, $2 books.

And more general advice: “Learn to read, write and type, and to speak English correctly. This is survival, not wishful thinking. If you are going to survive in America, go to college!”

One selective business program at historically black Hampton University in Virginia directs black men to wear dark, conservative suits to class. Earrings and dreadlocked hairstyles are forbidden. Their appearance is “communicating a signal that says you can go into more places,” said business school dean Sid Credle. “There’s more universal acceptance if you’re conservative in your image and dress style.”

Corporate communications
One graphic artist says he wears a suit when traveling, “even if it’s on a weekend. I think it helps. It requests respect.”

But in the corporate world, clothing can only help so much, said Janet B. Reid of Global Lead Management Consulting, who advises companies on managing ethnic diversity.

Black men, especially those who look physically imposing, often have a tough time.

“Someone who is tall and muscular will learn to come into a meeting and sit down quickly,” she said. “They’re trying to lower the big barrier of resistance, one that’s fear-based and born of stereotypes.”

Having darker brown skin can erect another barrier. Mark Ferguson has worked on Wall Street for 20 years. He has an easy smile and firm, confident handshake.

“I think I clean up pretty well — I dress well, I speak well — but all that goes out the window when I show up at a meeting full of white men,” says Ferguson of New Jersey, who is 6-foot-4 and dark-skinned. “It’s because they’re afraid of me.”

“Race always matters,” said Ferguson, whose Day in the Life Foundation connects minority teenagers with professionals. “It’s always in play.”

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