1. Culture is not monolithic among black people or anyone else. Every black person didn't grow up with the same culture. You sound like some racist redneck talking about "lazy, materialism, thug hood mentality" as being the most pervasive elements of "our" culture. Black college enrollment and graduation has risen over the past quarter century despite an ever-more bleak economic structure. My culture and the culture of my friends, families and peers is not lazy, materialistic, thug/hood. I lived in one of the largest exclusively black suburbs in the country when I was a kid, and sure there were some negative and criminal elements, but overall it was good people and a good community just working hard and trying to live, not a bunch of lazy, materialistic thugs. Speak for yourself.
2. I'm not responsible for those black people who for whatever reason are not productive citizens and have maladaptive mentalities any more so than the average white person is responsible for white people who are that way.
3. These negative elements you speak of have not gone unchecked due to lack of "leadership." They are an aggregation of states of being, thoughts, emotions, and actions that stem largely from social neglect and deprivation, economics, and structural, systemic racism. It's insulting and erroneous to suggest that somehow black people collectively at fault for the worst among their race, while tacitly giving a pass to injustices that fostered those ills.
