Traumas Affecting Black Male Development

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Traumas Affecting Black Male Development
“On Becoming” is a letter written by Eldridge Cleaver while he was in prison. Soledad prison in California. In his work, Cleaver illuminates the perspective of angry young African Americans who in essence “cursed everything American” (Cleaver 22). In his writing, Cleaver brings about some social issue that affects the development of the African American young adults. One of them being drugs. Cleaver is incarcerated at least two times. The first time was due to possession of marijuana. He admits that he had “a shopping bag” full of it. He also admits that he had been using it for five or four years. This means that he had started smoking weed when he was only 13 years of age. Thus, drugs and substance abuse is a social trauma that young black Americans struggle with. To avoid getting entangled in this mess, young African Americans should avoid a lousy company and situations that can make them be peer pressured into consuming drugs.
The next social trauma that is presented in the letter is the issue of racism. According to Cleaver, the prison warden had a problem with him having a white girl poster on his cell wall. He went ahead and asked him to replace it with that of a colored girl. This problem is further portrayed when a young man by the name Emmett Till is killed for flirting with a white woman (Cleaver 29). Not only are the victims of racism, but also perpetrators of the same. This is because they also view white women to be more beautiful than black women.

To handle this issue, the black community should be educated that people are judged by their character and not their skin color.
Lastly, revenge is a social trauma that has also affected the development of young black Americans significantly. According to Cleaver, he decides to rape white women knowingly to send a message to the white folks. Some of this behavior emancipate from the fact that most young people feel like authorities target them. They also think that the white population receives less penalty for the same crime compared to them. To handle this problem, young African American should be made aware that committing crimes will not solve anything but to work to the advantage. Thus they should employ other means of addressing their grievances, such as demonstrations or picketing.

Work Cited
Cleaver, Eldridge. “Soul on ice.” (1968). pp 22-35