European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - August 6, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Many Black professionals feel they have to prove themselves every time they step into their offices. Winning Over other Blacks As Well As Whites can be difficult. The Black Middle class straddling of cultures tugs at emotions by Alan Sverdlik Cox news service in thing in Sam Matchett s life saddened him More than his Cousin s sudden death in an automobile Accident. Bonded by family place and age the two had become great friends growing up just outside Valdosta a. For most of their lives nothing had stood Between them. But by the time the car swerved onto an embankment six years ago the cousins then 23, had drifted apart Matchett was attending Law school at the University of Georgia aiming for the stars his Cousin was working in a garage Back Home satisfied with the life Matchett had left behind. We still loved each other very much but our worlds had changed said Matchett who is now the assistant counsel for Federated department stores in Atlanta. He had trouble knowing How to Deal with me. I could Only appreciate what he said on a superficial  with roots in one culture and aspirations in another members of America s burgeoning Black Middle class Are bearing the Brunt of a stratification that is dividing this country s largest minority. The effects have been manifold. For Matchett it brought about the dissolution of a close Friendship. For manager Sandra Spriggs it earned her the enmity of her Black employees. For attorney William Jenkins it meant feeling a part of two separate worlds. I feel like i be lived two lives Jenkins said the first As an oppressed Black child in South Georgia whose Mother warned him not to look White women in the face the second As a Law student expected to stand up and be a Man and look people in the  this anguish persists despite the great strides of the past two decades when the Black Middle class came into its economic own. The roadblocks that Black professionals encounter today hostility isolation and double standards a can be As corrosive As some of the More Brazen aspects of Jim Crow. I am a member of the Black Middle class who has had it with being patted on the head by White hands and slapped in the face by Black hands for my Success Leanita Mcclain wrote in 1980 in a Newsweek essay titled the Middle class Black s Burden. The essay one of the first to openly discuss the inner turmoil some Blacks face As a result of integration concluded As Long As we Are denigrated As a group no one of us has made it. Inasmuch As we All suffer for every one left behind we All gain for every one who conquers the  Mcclain a member of the Chicago Tribune s editorial Board and a columnist committed suicide in 1984, leaving a note that said ill never live to see my people  Clarence Page who was married to her said her pain had become so great that when she would get into a bus in our Yuppie neighbourhood and look out at the White faces she would think of taking a machine gun and mowing them  the panoramic View from Jenkins downtown Law office usually an acc butement of Power and privilege belies the Uphill Battle the 32-year-old Atlanta attorney still must wage to win recognition and respect. Despite having risen from one of the humblest neighbourhoods of South Georgia s Macon county every time i step into  judge and jury see a Black Man first Jenkins said. Most Black professionals feel they have to prove themselves every time they step into their offices he said. Sometimes it makes you mad As  it can be equally difficult to win Over Blacks As Whites. Not Only do White attorneys and White judges and the White population distrust my abilities Jenkins said but Black people also distrust my abilities based solely on my  for Many civil rights Battles Are Distant memories Cox news services Rebecca Dixon a charming and cheerful 18-year-old, remembers seeing the picture As a child and cringing. It was a Barbaric scene two Young Black men dangling from a tree amid a sea of White faces. A Seldom Felt fear crept into her secure Middle class psyche. I just wanted to cry she said. How could something like this happen it s just so hard to understand even  born after the turbulent years of the civil rights movement Dixon is reaping the benefits of the struggle moving with relative ease through the Best of both worlds Black and White. I guess we were protected from blatant racism she said sitting in her parents spacious House in Roswell a. I mean we were always told what it Means to be Black and what went on during the civil rights period. But we just weren t exposed to the kind of racism our parents and grandparents experienced. For a Long time she said my feeling about racism was it was something that happened a Long Long time  it is the irony of ironies for successful Black parents. After the 60s, Many walked away from the civil rights Battle economic winners achieving solid Middle and upper class status. Now they re seeing their children a generation 25 and under grow up in a world far removed from coloured restrooms and water fountains marked for Whites  but they re also Ages away from Black Unity and heroes such As Martin Luther King or. And Malcolm x. Some Black parents and social critics fear this mass assimilation into White dominated America has eroded longtime cultural roots and realities. Already financial and social lines Are being drawn Between the Black haves and have not. And in two recent studies on self esteem duplicating landmark research done 40 years ago Black children still preferred White dolls Over Black. Overall More than 70 percent of the Black students enrolled in College attend predominantly White schools. At Morehouse College English professor Stephen Carey said he has seen a growing number of Young Blacks who have no understanding of Black history or their parents struggle. You have some students really Bright Young people who could care less Carey said. The feeling is they have All these options. Why should they worry. They drive the new cars get the Money from Home make All the right friends. So what if they Don t make it  i think we have some serious problems to Deal with said Michael Barnes assistant professor of psychology at Hofstra University in Hempstead . Barnes supervised the 1986 study involving Black and White children. Too Many Young people still Don t understand what it really Means to be Black. You can t help but feel that maybe we be tried too hard to adapt and fit  the stars and stripes Page 17