Race discussions on Ireport...

At www.dropthedash.com there are pages and pages of comments from people black, white, brown and other, who agree with the dropthedash campaign.

We all know what America was...how many of us are willing to work on what America will BE for our kids?

It will take people on all sides of the fence to acknowledge what was done wrong, what is being done wrong and what needs to be done right for our country to move past this silly racism and "who's more racist" squabbling between Americans. We will not fix the past except by making sure our children don't have to repeat it.

How to do this? it is NOT by bickering about it for another 100 years!

You fix disproportionate representation in prisons and unemployment by making our kids stay home and study each evening instead of hanging out on the block. Education, morality, and value-based child rearing fixes or prevents most problems.

This is not racial.

Black, white, red, and brown people raise their children every generation with no bad experiences with the law or within the court system. Keep your kids within your sight AND site and you can prevent most situations from happening to them.

Focus on your child's life instead of your own.

Raise by example.

Don't let your children hear your adult conversations unless you would be comfortable with them having the same conversations with their friends.

This is common sense stuff people.

Your children will naturally be exposed to bad things in this country and/or the world. You need to make sure they are more influenced by you than them. Teach them how to make good decisions based on doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do. Teach them to not expect anything from the government or other people and they will always be able to pick themselves up whenever they fall. Teach them that every "ism" in this country is just another obstacle to go over, around, or through. Nothing is insurmountable as long as you believe in yourself.

All these "truths" were taught to me and my six siblings as we grew up. My parents lived through Jim Crow and suffered at the hands of racists and institutionalized racism. Yet, they chose to teach us those lessons listed above instead of hatred. They never encouraged us to blame anything on anything or anyone. They taught us to get our education because that's the one thing NO ONE will ever be able to take from us.

We all were raised on a farm on a dirt road in rural Georgia and we all now are successful professionals in varied disciplines....Information Technology, Education, Nuclear Engineering, HealthCare and Child Protective Services.

www.dropthedash.com is a site dedicated to promoting the discarding of ethnic qualifiers to our nationality.

Hyphenated Americans have chosen to be a separate group within America and that - in and of itself - is contradictory to being American.

Our ancestors did not fight, march, and die for their descendants to be part-Americans...they suffered and sacrificed for your American birthright to be accepted and recognized by your own country. America will never get rid of all individual acts of racism, sexism or any other "ism".

The "isms" are no longer institutionalized. The "isms" are no longer protected by un-equal laws. The "isms" are not practiced by the majority of Americans anymore. This as close as we will ever come to a level playing field and - truth be told - it is all America owes us.

Any further advancement of black people will be accomplished by each individual black person...or brown person...or white person...etc., etc., etc