From: dowdy@tochtli.biochem.nwu.edu (Dowdy Jackson)
Subject: Re: SB Fuller Speech - was Re: Issues&Views-An open forum on issues affecting the black community
Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois
Date: Mon, 6 Apr 1992 20:38:54 GMT

In article <34977@uflorida.cis.ufl.EDU> daj@reef.cis.ufl.edu (David A. Johns) writes:
>In article <1992Mar31.011808.22252@casbah.acns.nwu.edu> dowdy@tochtli.biochem.nwu.edu (Dowdy Jackson) writes:
>
># I think that we can not count on whites being customers for black
># businesses. If whites choose to use the servives provided by the
># black business then great but we should count on blacks using black
># businesses.
>
>Well, I'm no economist, but I don't understand how you can increase
>the assets of the black community without bringing money in from more
>prosperous groups.
>
The point is that black owned businesses shouldn't be exclusive to blacks
alone. Yes if whites want to patron those businesses then by all means
do so but I don't think that black businesses SHOULD cater exclusively
to a white clientel just as a white business shouldn't cater just to
a white clientel.

>There's a "second shoe" here too, of course.  If you decide to provide
>a business service to a given community, you have to make them want to
>use the service.  About 20 years ago I lived in Chicago, and one black
>business that was attractive to whites was jazz clubs.  Most of these
>clubs were in solidly black neighborhoods, though, and whites normally
>never entered those neighborhoods, especially at night.  But the club
>owners made it clear that whites were welcome and would be protected
>from harassment going to and from their cars, and whites did patronize
>the clubs.
>
I live in Chicago and I do see alot of whites at these clubs. So what !
This just re-empahsises my point. Blacks SHOULD cater to black owned
businesses. I can think of numerous examples of blacks just thrwoing their
money to white businesses and ignoring black owned businesses. The jazz
clubs are a good example. If the whites decided that they no longer want
to go to that area to listen to jazz then those clubs will most likely
fail. The blacks in the area have no one to blame but themselves for the lose
of revenue provided by those clubs to their community.

>In earlier years the Italian and Chinese communities used restaurants
>to bring in outside money, and they also had to make their
>neighborhoods attractive to outsiders.  Even today "Chinatowns" are
>normal tourist attractions in big cities.  Wouldn't it be something if
>you could say that about black neighborhoods?
>
That might be possible if we were allowed to keep our culture.

>I think if you talk to anyone who has run a small business, they'll
>tell you that you can't make money off your friends.  Business is
>competitive, and you have to get as much of your customers' money as
>possible to win the competition.  But your friends are always going to
>want deals, and will resent you if they don't get them.  If you set up
>a business to serve your own circle, to the extent that you succeed
>you'll end up with a coop, not a business.  Now, I don't have anything
>against socialist structures under certain circumstances, but even
>socialist countries have to maintain capitalistic foreign trade.
>
Its not about being friends its about supporting your own just like all of the
other ethnic groups do.

Dowdy Jackson
Northwestern University
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american