West Point Female Cadets - A Case of Bad Influences

There has been a lot of talk about the Black female cadets at West Point who were shown in a photo raising their fists. These young ladies explained reasons for their show of unity in the midst of the negative comments, an internal investigation, and insinuations that their graduation from this prestigious military college could be affected.The problem is that these young women were wearing their uniform when the photo was taken, and this leaves a bad impression in the minds of even those who are still rooting for them to have an opportunity to graduate. The issue that comes to mind in this case is how people may be caught up in actions that they may not have considered until they they became part of a group. In such groups, there are generally leaders and followers. Certainly, there must be a leader or leaders in that group who convinced the others of how "cool" it would be to take a photo with their fist raised. Some followers quite possibly may have been well aware that a group of Black male or female raising their fist is an indication of solidarity with Black groups that have been despised throughout the years in the United States. Some may not be familiar with the decade old radical group, the Black Panthers, but all should have be quite familiar with White negative reactions to Beyonce's recent Black solidarity performance at the SuperBowl. Nevertheless, so it is in life, followers have to bear the fall out of participating in group situations gone bad since they were not strong enough to oppose the leader or leaders. In this case of the female cadets, they must now all bear the burden equally and hopefully learn from this situation to be independent thinkers since following others could ultimately affect their destiny.