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I began to become disappointed and then just plain disgusted with NAACP activities along about the early 1980's when they seemed to have lost sight of their purpose of advancing the Black population. The leadership was still stuck in the old issues of the 1960's and refusing to recognize there were new issues that needed attention that were not being addressed. The issue of equality had been won and cemented with laws. The schools were integrated, all children received the same education from the same text and learning aids. Black children were no longer segregated in their own schools anywhere in the country. Let me add here that the only segregated schools at this point were in the southeast where there were still those die hard areas where racism was so ingrained it required force to stop racist behaviors. This was being done thru the courts upholding the laws that had been passed. And for the most part the people both Black and White were content with the arrangement. Most states had long before fully integrated. The northeast had been fully integrated since the Civil War, and most other states became integrated as they joined the Union.

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There was no longer a need to address the issues pertaining to integration and equality. By 1985 the Black middle class was growing by leaps and bounds. Black poverty was down to about 20+% . The goals set in the 1960's had been reached!

Most Black leaders however claimed this was not true; that there were areas in the country where Blacks were still discriminated against and where it was necessary to continue to fight the old issues and use the old techniques of boycotts and marches to bring attention to these abuses. The NAACP and even the Black politicians were stuck and not seeing, or at least not addressing the growing problems within the Black communities that had nothing at all to do with the old white racism, and everything to do with the Black lower class culture itself. 70% of Black babies are born to unwed mothers as opposed to 26% in the 1960's. Educational levels and drop out rates among Black young people both girls and boys was up from the 1960's level despite being in integrated schools. Drug use among the young Blacks was out of sight; diseases like AIDS was much more prominent in the Black community per capita than any other group. Unemployment naturally is higher for Blacks than any other group and will continue to be a problem as long as the underachievement in school is the norm for lower class Blacks.

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