Change the Guard

Some may have heard me voice this in the past, but I feel called to share in depth why I feel that the old guard should pass the baton on to the new generation. If we don't learn anything from President Obama's victory for the White House, we should learn something distinct about change. Change is possible and inevitable. When the winds of change are set into motion, there is no man living who can stand against such a movement sweeping the entire land. Change is present.
The old guard is dying off. We can hardly find our NAACP or Urban League community leaders to be capable of mass mobilization within our communities any more than our local storefront churches. With aging leadership at the helm, both the community-based and faith-based agencies of the community must arm themselves with the proper motivation for mobilization. I shared with my wife over ice cream recently about how I once engaged in voter registration drives and similar events which got people to the voting polls. The issue was that we were mobilizing without education. People stood with a ballot in their hands with little to no information of what the platforms included. In the information age, those who obtain the information will be equipped enough to navigate through the jargon, lingo and double talk.
Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton have contributed much to the struggle for the African American minister to remain at the forefront of social and political movement within the African American community. Such leaders still have much to offer, but they also should assist in ushering in new leadership. If they truly serve as servant-leaders, these men and others like them with draw from those among the ranks of Otis Moss III and Steven Thurston .
We need the old guard to not merely pass the baton. We need them to step to one side or the other, allowing those who have been waiting in the wings to take center stage and walk through the open door of opportunity. We need to see the Marian Wright Edelmans and Oprah Winfreys along with the Vernon Jordans and Willie Browns embracing and endorsing those who come along behind them. Count our recent losses such as John Hope Franklin as historic tragedies, for no African American other than John H. Clarke and Greg Carr gave us such interwoven hostory of both the African and the African American. How are we to recover from such a lost? If we have not been raising another to come behind, none will emerge from nothingness and rise up in our midst. We cannot expect a return on an investment that we are not willing to make.