WASHINGTON, D.C.

“When we sit down and talk on an honest level, we see there is a problem in our neighborhood … There’s a lack of love. There’s the bottom-line right there,” said James “Loose” White III, a former gang member setting the foundation for a discussion on improving the plight of young Black men.

“There’s a generation gap. I don’t know what I haven’t been through. If I don’t have nobody to tell me, preferably an older Black male, how am I going to know how to teach the young ones?” asked White, who helped form the Newark, N.J.-based gang intervention organization, Saving OurSelves, or S.O.S.

Some of the problems of Black men are documented in figures on high school dropout rates, incarceration rates, unemployment rates and other statistics. A forum held yesterday in Washington, D.C. sought solutions from a diverse panel that included Dr. Bill Cosby, former gang members now working against gang violence, educators, scholars and two Black men who graduated at the top of their high school class.

White’s comments came during the panel, “Paths to Success: A Forum on Young African-American Men,” sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation and The Washington Post. The Post has been running a series of articles examining the issues and experiences of Black men.

Moderated by Harvard Law School Professor Charles J. Ogletree, Jr., panelists focused on personal accountability, the collective responsibility of churches and well-to-do Blacks to give back and various programs making a difference in the lives of Black men.

Cosby, who in controversial statements two years ago sounded the alarm about the misdirection of Black children, started the discussion with his take on the problem.

“Unless I missed it, I heard not one Black man say anything about being a father. I heard not one Black man say, ‘My responsibility is...’” Cosby said in response to a video presentation in which a variety of Black men were asked what it means to be a Black man.