Guiding The Next Generation

CSI: New York's Hill Harper (Dr Sheldon Hawkes) hopes to help change the self-destructive nature of the African-American community.

"I really don’t care what other cultures or races think of us, what I care about is how we think of ourselves," Harper told Clutch Magazine. "We’re in a place now where our self-esteem, or self-loathing and self-hatred are so extreme that no one else has to hate us because we are destroying ourselves." And he doesn't want to spend his time talking about why the African-American community has to deal with this hatred. Instead, he cares about what it will take for things to change. "I’m about solutions and looking forward and solving the problem," he said. "I let the historians talk about the reasons why, but I just want to deal with the problems we have today, figure out how to solve them and move forward."

"I’m tired of us in the community looking for the government to solve it," Harper said. "We must look at ourselves and say there’s a way to solve it and there is a solution and that’s time. One on one time, Black male elder to young Black brotha." Harper himself is actively involved. He wrote the book Letters to a Young Brother: MANifest Your Destiny because "there are so many of our young [men] out there that are looking for answers and help and that navigation on the journey from boyhood to manhood, more than I even thought." He said that having a mentor is vital for young men. "The advice I give about mentorship and finding mentors and seeking them out is that you don’t always have to know them," Harper said, and he hopes that his book will allow him to help guide young men around the country as they make their journey to adulthood. He also pointed out that a person could have more than one mentor for different aspects of who they are and who they want to be. "[Y]ou can [choose] the things you want to model about individuals and piece together a role model," he said.

Harper is very vocal about mentorship for young men in the African-American community because "the number one predictor of [a] young African-American male’s success, education and where he ends up in terms of his life…is whether that young man had a positive male role model in his life." In addition to writing Letters to a Young Brother, Harper is involved in mentoring the younger generation in other ways as well. "I’m a spokesperson for Big Brothers Big Sisters," he said. "I talk about being a big brother, I try to recruit and help them recruit. I’m a member and an honorary member of 100 Black Men, the Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity asked me to help them participate. [S]o if you know another brotha, it’s up to you as an individual to say, 'look I need you to get involved, I need you to take care of a young brotha.'"

"I think if you’re a public figure, therefore someone in the public eye that folks are going to write about, there is an opportunity you have because you’re given a platform and you can choose to use that platform however you want," Harper said. "What’s the use of purpose or celebrity unless you use it to help somebody else out, and at the same time what’s the purpose of money unless you use it to help somebody out?" Harper plans to stay in the public eye and to use his visibility to continue to help young people. "I just finished a movie called Mama I Want to Sing with Ciara, it’s based on the play, and I play Ciara’s manager. I’m still doing a lot of work and a lot of speaking with young people and I’m working on my next book which is coming out in 2008. [I]t’s called Letters to a Young Sister, it’s going to be a message to young women, and I’ve just started my fourth season of CSI: New York. So it’s a busy time but it’s a real blessing to be busy and to have the opportunity to meet so many people across the country."

The full interview can be found at Clutch Magazine's website.

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