PAYING HOMAGE (February 17th, 1936 – May 18th, 2023): James Nathaniel Brown also known as Jim Brown

Mr James Nathaniel Brown also known as Jim Brown, who was dubbed a legend in sports and the community, and admired as a gifted, talented athlete as well as cultural figure as he helped to promote change, the former has died of natural causes, at the age of 87 in his home in Los Angeles. He died with his wife by his side.

Mr Brown put into both the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the College Football Hall of Fame, and he was named to the NFL’s 50th, 75th and 100th Anniversary Teams. He was also named the NFL’s Most Valuable Player on three separate occasions. He was also a valuable player in the Lacrosse league and was considered one of the greatest. He was inducted into the National Lacrosse Hall of Fame in 1984.

A moment with Janks Morton

BOTG: What made you begin the quest and mission, What Black Men Think?

JB: About five years ago on C-SPAN Book TV, Juan Williams and Michael Eric Dyson were debating over Bill Cosby’s commentary at the 50th anniversary of the Brown vs. Board of Education NAACP celebration. During their debate Mr. Williams blurted out a statistic that 70% of black children are born out of wedlock, and from clinical pharmacology background, I have been trained to never trust anyone who quotes a statistic that ends in “five” or “zero”..i.e. 50%, 25% (statistically significant sample sizes and representative sampling seldom if ever yields results in these increments/ five and zero are typically the unsubstantiated non-scientific claims of the uninformed).

I immediately went to the CENSUS Bureau to refute this claim, however to my surprise; the number was actually 69.7%. I was astonished and taken aback because I did not know this, and from what I know, and challenge the social ill that our community faces, can mostly be traced back to the absence of two parent homes (regardless of Socio-Economic status).

BOTG: What would you say makes you qualified to be heard and for this movement to be followed?

JB: I do not accept the self-delusional title of head or leader for any movement. It’s inauthentic and disingenuous for any person or persons to speak on behalf of an entire group, call Jesse or Al, and they can address that question from a “leader of the black community” perspective.

BOTG: When did you begin to take this seriously? I mean when was the last straw?

JB: I sat with my barber one day and asked him about the women who came to the beauty salon next door. I asked of 10 women who walk through that door with children, how many do you think are married…his answer: maybe 1, if that. At that point I realized that a conversation needed to be had inside our community, and really start to re-focus our lens on this underlying pathology to most of our problems today.

BOTG: It is obvious that you do a lot of research, personally, finding out that there were more black men in university than prison in America, shocked and surprised us, why do you think other statistics say otherwise?

JB: The other statistics don’t really say otherwise, other organizations and people with a specific agenda twist and manipulate data in order to serve their agenda.

Most leaders spend time trying to get others to think highly of them, when instead they should try to get their people to think more highly of themselves.~ Booker T. Washington

There are people and principalities that have a vested interest in and are compensated to misinform you…so that they can mismanage you.~Janks Morton

BOTG: Are the statistics you found out only based on and for America?

JB: Absolutely, while I have worked with people of African descent all around the world and the challenges are very similar, the US data sets are what resonate with most.