Oh yeah, we obviously agree completely here. And yes, I think that if you go almost anywhere in the world today and work hard you can succeed. Immigrants to America are proving that. But that also kind of makes my point.

The differences in outcomes you see between poor African Americans and Nigerians immigrants, say, where NIgerian immigrants as a whole have been very successful in America, illustrates the way America has failed descendants of slavery.

I think too many people are focused on America's *present* racism, which sure, is there, but maybe isn't so much worse than many other countries. The issue is America's *past* racism. The hangover of slavery (and of course Jim Crow after it), is very real for many African Americans in terms of generational wealth, attitudes and access to education, and general faith in the system, but won't affect an African immigrant in the same way. Does that make sense?

I'm not saying that this means that anybody should throw their hands up and say "it's hopeless, the system is against me," but I think a lot of young African American (men in particular) have been badly failed. So when you say that anybody can make it to the middle class, I see where you're coming from, but I also see that it's much more complex than that for some.