Once again, the one and only Dr. Umar Johnson has made headlines; this time is for the exchange he had during an interview on the Roland Martin show. Overall, I felt the interview portion by Roland Martin was the typical question and answer session one would expect of a host and their guest. Roland asked Dr. Johnson a range of tough questions to break down all the backlash Dr. Johnson was receiving from an earlier interview he did with The Breakfast Club. Unfortunately, the Roland Martin interview took a turn for the worse and became more of an attack session on Dr. Johnson when the panelists were brought in. Only A. Scott Bolden was composed and actually tried to listen to Dr. Johnson for understanding, and not just listen to respond. Also, despite Roland questioning Dr. Johnson on a variety of topics, the panelists did not want to talk about anything other than Dr. Johnson’s stance on inter-racial marriage. Dr. Johnson strongly believes in order to save the Black family, Black men must choose to commit to and marry a Black woman.
Don’t get me wrong, I do believe a person should love who they want and who makes them feel as if they are the only person that matters on the planet. There is no greater feeling than to find that special someone who you connect with mentally, spiritually, and physically, no matter what ethnic background they come from. However, I also see truth in what Dr. Johnson says. How can you create a Black family if both parents are not Black? Simple, you can’t. Dr. Johnson was not saying anything was wrong with inter-racial couples and families, he was just stating the increased trend of Black men marrying non-Black women is detrimental to the preservation and strengthening of the Black family unit as a whole.
Other ethnic groups marry within their ethnic group all the time without receiving backlash. As for me, I am Black. My mom is Black. My dad is Black. My sister is Black. My aunties, uncles, and cousins are Black. In the words of James Brown, I’m Black and I’m Proud! I have dreams of marrying a nice chocolate Black man and having Black children who we will teach to love the skin they’re in because unfortunately there will be times society will make our future children feel like being Black is a bad thing, when in actuality being Black is truly nothing to be ashamed of. I do not think loving who I am and wanting to marry someone who has similar cultural roots should be viewed as a problem, but I digress.
My main issue with Dr. Johnson is not what he says, but how he says it. Many times I do not like the extremist delivery Dr. Johnson chooses to take in his speeches and videos. Also, when called out for inconsistencies (i.e. lack of financial transparency for the school he’s trying to build), Dr. Johnson tends to become rude and dismissive, which rubs me the wrong way. However, I do believe every movement needs an extremist or someone to be labeled as radical who viciously shakes you out of your comfort zone. Dr. Umar Johnson takes on that role for Pan-Afrikanism. Now as much I am not the biggest fan of Dr. Umar Johnson’s message delivery, I must say I always learn at least one thing from him whenever he speaks. During his interview, Dr. Johnson clarified that Mandarin is taught as a secondary language in the South African School Systems. Knowing that China has one of the fastest growing economies in the world, and also has one of the world’s largest military, I thought South Africa is on to something. South Africa is being forward thinking and preparing their students, who will be their future leaders, to conduct business with the Chinese. We in America love to excessively dwell in our greatness as “leaders of the free world.” We expect others to adapt and accommodate us when we work and travel overseas, and not put in the effort to figure out the country’s proper customaries and language. For example, how many times have you been on vacation abroad and witnessed arrogance mixed with frustration of fellow Americans who are mad no one around speaks English or does things the ‘American way”? I’ll wait…
Overall, everyone is entitled to his or her opinion, even a ‘radial’ thinker like Dr. Johnson. Interviews that are considered good journalism seek to understand the interviewee’s stance rather than attacking and trying to get the interviewee to change their opinion on the subject being discussed. In this regard, Roland Martin and his panelists failed.