I recently finished reading the Hughes piece. From what I read though, I was underwhelmed. Like, I truly don't think the majority of people even disagree that there are certain lifestyle choices that are not productive to building wealth. He also makes it sound as though within the the black community, there doesn't exist a diversity of opinions in how to lift themselves up. Self critisism of the community is there. Self help is there in neighborhoods in an attempt to help the youth. Even, Obama during his presidency mentioned these same critisisms. So this idea that it's a conversation that isn't talked about doesn't ring true to me.
Hell, there are many organizations that exist with an emphasis on helping fellow black people in certain fields of study. National society of black engineers, national association of black accountants, black student associations, etc. And these organizations are open to other races than black people, so hopefully no one tries to say there is some racism there. I don't know. Maybe it's just due to who I regularly talk to, and me not focusing much on Twitter type outrage
Parts of Chicago that are plagued by violence are experiencing what the Chicago Tribune calls "black flight" as the middle class and productive members of those cities are abandoning them for better cities or suburbs.
Not sure what you're trying to refute here
Obama wants to revitalize the south side, and especially South Shore, but is having a hard time convincing people to want that because of fears of "gentrification" and the entire process is moving really slow in its entirety.