The Glory of Africa
What more can be said about the Beautiful & Excellent Motherland of Africa. It is the home of our ancestors and the origin of Human Mitochondria DNA. Africa is the Mother of many peoples and tongues. Glory is related to the great Motherland of Africa. Inspiring history, long struggle, and huge victories are included in the entire African story. When I learn more about the excellent beauty of Africa, I can learn more about myself since I am a black African American. All those of black African descent are one irrespective of nationality. That means that whether we live in Houston or South Africa, we are one. We are black and we are beautiful. We continue to have faith and this faith can maintain a sense of dignity, strength, and Love. We believe in being proactive as a means to create solutions for our people too. Chains cannot hold the truth neither can vicious dogs, burning buildings, or any evil. Good will always triumph against evil in the end. Therefore, we will overcome and we will achieve Black Liberation at the end of the day
Black African consciousness is necessary for any black human being. We need it as a means to understand Africa fully and love our God given BLACKNESS. OUR BLACKNESS IS GREAT. True teaching and true wisdom are not about the random memorization of facts and figures. True wisdom is about the awakening of human consciousness and critically applying what you know to benefit yourself & the people. At the end of the day, we have a duty to build ourselves and our neighbors for we are tied with each other in mutuality as members of humanity. Growing the human consciousness is necessary as a means for us to embrace the truth. We need justice, freedom, and we have the right to advance morality in the world. This is part and parcel of our African cultural ethos. That is why we should not only expose the enemy. We should also build up our morality and seek justice. Now, that means we should love justice, we should love fairness, we should reject lies or deception, and we should advance cultural growth. So, it is important for us to study Ancient Egypt, real African civilizations, pan Africanism, African languages, and other great aspects of Africa as a means to connect with Africa. The more we learn and appreciate Africa, the more we love Africa and we identify with it. At the end of the day, we are all Africans. It does not matter if we live in Virginia, New York, Georgia, California, Missouri, Florida, Canada, South America, Brazil, Paris, Amsterdam, London, South Africa, Nigeria, or wherever. We are all one people. We are all Africans and we are all of black African descent. WE ARE ALL BLACK AND BEAUTIFUL. BLACK IS BEAUTIFUL. We may have different nationalities, but we are on the same path. That path leads into black African consciousness and the love for our people. Ignorance is an enemy of humanity. We should fight it with vigor and zeal. Ignorance is more than social nihilism. Ignorance deals with a vulgar selfish individualism that worships materialism and selfishness instead of embracing selflessness. We need true collaboration with our neighbors in a pan-Africanist mindset. Our people are globally, so we ought to continue to embrace our Brothers and our Sisters throughout the world. Global, progressive insights are necessary in a global community. We must learn the past, work in the present, and strive to fight for a better future for our children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren (including beyond). We have a legacy and our legacy is beautiful. We must take responsibility for our voluntary actions. We should grow and be more mature as time goes on in our lives. In other words, true African consciousness is about developing our health, embracing African tongues, loving African culture, growing our ethics, and having an undying love for black humanity all over the world. Now, we should be united in one goal and that is black pan-Africanist liberation. Our Brothers and our Sisters should be liberated and they have the right to be. We must liberate ourselves and help our people as well.
Africans Globally
In the African Diaspora, we should connect more with our Brothers and our Sisters. Jennifer Tosch is a Surinamese American Sister who founded the successful Black Heritage Amsterdam Tour in the Netherlands. This tour is found all the Netherlands as a means for human beings to document the contributions of African Diaspora to Dutch society from the 16th century to the present. She or Jennifer Tosch gave an interview with Dutch Amsterdam City Channel AT5. She talks about her identity. The reporter Claric Gargard visited her home. She talks about this being about African history and how it relates to world history. When her mother was dying as terminally, she was on a quest to find her family. Also, Jennifer shed tears over the plight of our ancestors. We all sympathize with her tears since they relate to the sacrifice our people. She wanted to bridge the gaps in her life. She teaches human beings about the black African influence in the continent of Europe. Jennifer wants to continue to research and continue on her journey in her life. Black Heritage Tours in Amsterdam continues now and they are a great thing as well. Black human beings made great contributions in the world. There are many gifted, strong Black British writers as well. One author is named Zadi Smith. Others include other promising black British writers by the names of Taiye Selasi, Nadifa Mohamed, and Helen-Oyeyemi. Taiye Selasi was mentored by Toni Morrison and she was endorsed by Saman Rushsdie. She wrote an 2005 essay called "What is an Afropolitan?" that gave a face to a class of sophisticated cosmopolitan young Africans who defy downtrodden stereotypes. She has written about Ghana and other issues as well. Nadifa Mohamed was born in 1981. Her family came into London from Somalia in 1986. Her debut novel “Black Mamba Boy” is based on her father’s tales of his youthful peregrinations in East Africa and Europe during the 1930s and ’40s. In an Granta interview she also speaks about her arrival from Somalia, growing up in Tooting and how she believed from a young age that cats were spies for the government. Helen Oyeyemi is the daughter of Nigerian immigrants. She reads her stories in a London par. She wrote many books like the Icarus Girl and the Opposite House. She wrote many awards for her literature like winning the 2012 Zora Nealse Hurston and Wright Foundation Award for the book entitled, Mr. Fox. Even centuries ago, we do realize that there was a strong Black African presence in Renaissance Europe. The Walters Art Museum exhibition talks about this as well many months ago. We know about the presence of Black Africans being farmers, artists, diplomats, and other jobs. Yes, the evils of slavery existed in Europe too.
Amilcar Cabral was one of the greatest heroes of black African history. He was a Guinea-Bissuan and Cape Verdean agricultural engineer, writer, and political leader. He was a nationalist thinker. He was a great anti-colonial leader. He led the nationalist movement of Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde Islands. There was the war of independence in Guinea-Bissau. He was assassinated on January 20, 1973 about eight months before Guinea-Bissau's unilateral declaration of independence. He was influenced by Marxism, but he was not a Marxist. He was born in September 12, 1926 in Bafata, Guinea-Bissau from the Cape Verdean parents Juvenal Lopes da Costa Cabral and Iva Pinhel Évora. Cabral was educated at Liceu or the Secondary School Gil Eanes in the town of Mindelo, Cape Verde. He was furthered educated at the Instituto Superior de Agronomia in Lisbon, Portugal. Portugal ironically was the colonial power ruling over Guinea-Bissau and Cape Verde for a time. In Lisbon, he founded student movements that wanted to oppose the ruling dictatorship of Portugal and wanted the cause of liberation of the Portuguese colonies in Africa. He came back into Africa during the 1950's. He continued to promote the independence of the then Portuguese colonies. He founded in 1956 the PAIGC or the Partido Africano da Independência da Guiné e Cabo Verde (Portuguese for African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cape Verde) and one of the founders of Movimento Popular Libertação de Angola (MPLA) (later in the same year), together with Agostinho Neto, whom he met in Portugal, and other Angolan nationalists. He led a guerrilla movement against the Portuguese regime from 1963 to 1973. It was one of the most successful wars of independence in African history. He was a hero for capturing territories from the imperialist Portuguese. Cabral set up training camps in neighboring Ghana with the permission of Kwame Nkrumah. Cabral trained his lieutenants through various techniques, including mock conversations to provide them with effective communication skills that would aid their efforts to mobilize Guinean tribal chiefs to support the PAIGC. Cabral allowed his troops to live off the land and work with the populace as a means to be successful. He taught troops farming technologies as a means to feed their tribes ad families. In 1972, Cabral began to form a People's Assembly in preparation for the birth of an independent African nation, but disgruntled former PAIGC rival Inocêncio Kani, with the help of Portuguese agents operating within the PAIGC, shot and killed him before he could complete his project. Yet, Guinea-Bissau and Cape Varde are liberated from imperialists. His influence is similar to the influence from Frantz Fanon and others. He is named after an International Airport in Carde Verde's principal international airport at Sal. There is also a football competition called Amilcar Cabral Cup in zone 2, which is named as a tribute to him. RIP Brother Amilcar Cabral. His half-brother Luis Cabral became the leader of the Guinea-Bissau branch of the party and would eventually become President of Guinea-Bissau. Amilcar Cabral was one of the greatest thinkers in African history. He was a hero and a true black warrior.
Ida B. Wells
Ida B. Wells was one of the most heroic black human beings in world history. She is a hero for women and all of humanity. She was a Strong Black Woman indeed. She fought for gender equality when that fight was heavily opposed in her lifetime. She fought for the dignity of black females in general when our Sisters back then were unfairly demonized and our Brothers have been restricted too from the full benefits of mainstream society. Even today, our Brothers and Sisters are still oppressed under the same oppressor that enslaved our ancestors from the Motherland of Africa. Ida B. Wells fought against the evil of lynching in America. She wanted equality for all humans in the world. She was a great media literacy educator. Her leadership and great, intellectual insight should inspire all of us to be better and to fight for real, revolutionary change in the world. She was a writer, an activist, an orator, and a great mother. She constantly defended Brothers and Sisters who were the victims of lynching. Wells publicly wrote, as a journalist, about the evils of racism and lynching. Her life in the struggle for black liberation is just as valuable as the lives of Frederick Douglas, WEB DuBois, Marcus Garvey, and others. She lived from July 16, 1862 to March 25, 1931. She was not only an American journalist. She was a newspaper editor, suffragist, sociologist, and a leader of the civil rights movement. Ida B. Wells was an excellent orator. She was born in Holly Springs, Mississippi. Her father was James Wells and her mother was Elizabeth Warrenton Wells. Their parents were enslaved until freed under the Proclamation. James Wells fought for the advancement of black Americans. Elizabeth was a religious woman and was strict with her children. She lost both of her parents and her 10 month brother because of the 1878 epidemic of yellow fever that killed many in the South. Ida B. Wells worked as a teacher in a black elementary school.
Ida B. Wells refused to give up her seat in a train passenger seat which was 71 years before Rosa Parks showed similar resistance on a bus. The conductor and two men dragged Wells out of the car. When she returned to Memphis, she hired an African-American attorney to sue the railroad. She also became a public figure in Memphis when she wrote a newspaper article for The Living Way, a black church weekly, about her treatment on the train. When her lawyer was paid off by the railroad, she hired a white attorney. She at first won a settlement, but lost to the Supreme Court. She wrote under the pen name Iola as a means to oppose segregation and write in favor of racial justice. Ida B. Wells defended black women and black men (who at that time were slandered as collective rapists of white women). Together with Frederick Douglass and other black leaders, she organized a black boycott of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, for its failure to collaborate with the black community on exhibits representing African-American life. Wells, Douglass, Irvine Garland Penn and Ferdinand L. Barnett wrote sections of a pamphlet to be distributed there: "Reasons Why the Colored American Is Not in the World's Columbian Exposition" detailed the progress of blacks since their arrival in America and the workings of Southern lynchings. Wells later reported to Albion W. Tourgée that copies of the pamphlet had been distributed to more than 20,000 people at the fair. She married Barnett in 1895. She set an early precedent as being one of the first married American women to keep her own last name along with her husband's. The couple had four children: Charles, Herman, Ida, and Alfreda. She founded the Alpha Suffrage Club of Chicago, the first black suffrage organization in 1913, and from l913-1916 worked as a probation officer in Chicago. The poet Langston Hughes said her activities in the field of social work laid the groundwork for the Urban League. When she was sixty-eight, she ran for the Illinois legislature, one of the first black women in the nation to run for public office. Ida B. Wells continue to write literature to defend black men. She also wanted gender equality and fought for the right of women to vote. She passed away in Chicago on March 25, 1931. Schools are named after her. She was honored by America with the Ida B. Wells Commemorative Stamp in 1990. She fought against educational inequalities and wanted human rights. Therefore, Ida B. Wells was a hero and an icon of our community. We should continue to fight for true democracy, self-determination, and true, popular liberation. Black Pan-African liberation is always a great goal to embrace for all of us.
The Struggle Continues
Many of black African descent fought for liberation among a long time, especially in the Deep South. There were tons of slave rebellions all over the South alone. The Deacons of Defense existed in 1964 at Jonesboro, Louisiana. It was created by African American men led by Earnest "Chilly Willy" Thomas and Frederick Douglas Kirkpatrick. It was formed in November of 1964 as a means to protect civil rights workers against the violence of the evil, racist Ku Klux Klan. Most of them were war veterans with combat experience from the Korean War and WWII. The Jonesboro chapter organized a Deacons chapter in Bouglusa, Louisiana led by Charles Sims, A.Z. Young, and Robert Hicks. The Jonesboro chapter formed 21 chapters in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama. The militantly heroic Deacons confronted the Klan in Bogalusa. They were instrumental in forcing the federal government to intervene on behalf of the black community and enforce the 1964 Civil Rights Act and neutralize the Klan. The FBI illegally monitored the Deacons because they hate black humanity having the right to use self-defense including self-determination. They vanished by 1968 with the growth of the Black Power Movement of the late 1960's. A 2003 television movie called Deacons for Defense outline the Deacon's great story. The first Black Panther Party came about in 1965 in Lowndes County of Alabama in 1965. It came after a voter registration drive was launched by the Student Non Violent Coordinating Committee or SNCC. SNCC was later shortened to the Student National Coordinating Committee. The voter drive was led by Kwame True. Alabama was most black African, but most of them were not allowed to register and vote. SNCC wanted black human beings to vote as a means to handle local governments and redirect services to black human beings (many living below the poverty line). SNCC formed a political party as Alabama law allowed it with the support of a certain amount of residents. The SNCC workers took this law, and organized a county convention in Lowndes. Out of that convention an organization called the Lowndes County Freedom Organization (LCFO) was created. The LCFO subsequently nominated and selected candidates to run for the county offices: assessor, sheriff and so on. SNCC and the LFCO wanted to go out and fight illiteracy among human beings in that area. The leaders choose the image of a Black Panther, because it is black. Also, the panther had unique fighting skills and black people from SNCC wanted to identify with the panther's strength and agility. Also, the image motivated humanity. The Lowndes County Freedom Organization in Alabama was called the Black Panther Party, because it was a symbol used to represent the organization as was required by state law. Many SNCC members like Kwame Ture would ally with the Black Panther Party of Self Defense in Oakland, California. Now, LCFO registration was a great success with the African population. The enemy evicted sharecroppers, tenant farmers, attempted to foreclose people illegally, and threatened to kill any African who registered. In response to these circumstances the leadership of LCFO instructed its members and supporters to arm themselves, but not to precipitate any violence. This was a strategy necessitated strictly for SELF-DEFENSE. To summarize the people carried a piece for protection, registered and then returned to their place of residence. SNCC, in June of the next yea (during 1966), in Jackson MS, made the famous call for Black Power. A few months later SNCC issued a paper explaining their call for Black Power. Among the things they called for in the Black Power position paper was the establishment of Black Panther Parties throughout our communities across the USA. The early African student volunteers working with SNCC in the original Lowndes Co. project was Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. They were impressed with the Lowndes Co. experience and created the Black Panther Party for Self Defense in Oakland, California in 1966. Kwame Ture and H. Rap Brown (also known as Iman Jamil Al-Amin Abdullah) were members of the Oakland group. The Black Panthers of Oakland wanted to use self-defense and progressive efforts as a means to defeat imperialism, oppression, racism, and any form of injustice harming the black community (and the oppressed communities of the world).
Malcolm X was a great human being. He stood up for real ideas and he was courageous. In prison, he joined the Nation of Islam. The NOI is a group that wants separatism for African Americans. NOI theology views Black Americans as the Earth's Original people and try want great self-determination inside of the black community (these 2 concepts are themes that I have no issue with at all). Regardless of what the FBI said, the NOI was not some radically murderous group. Regardless of how some then and now feel about Elijah Muhammad, he was right to advocate self determination, the respect for Black Women, and Black Love. The NOI then and now have strong conservative elements (like believing that man and woman have specific gender roles, they formed businesses, they followed a strict code of diet, dress, and behavior, etc.). That is why back then; the NOI tried to advise Blacks to limit civic engagements. This was one of the reasons why Brother Malcolm X left the Nation of Islam. Today, the NOI is more involved in political activities. Obviously, I disagree with some (not all) in the NOI trying to ally with the philosophies of the blatant enemy L. Ron Hubbard (who created a religious cult called Scientology. Hubbard was a straight up racist and an enemy of black people). Yet, many sincere Brothers and sincere Sisters are in the Nation and other groups that genuinely want black liberation. I want to make that clear. Malcolm X grew in the Nation, because of his great intellect, wit, and charisma. He was a great public speaker and he had acumen for organization. The newspaper, Muhammad Speaks, was largely Malcolm's creation, and it was his idea that it could be an organizing tool. Malcolm X's political trajectory is important to know.
Malcolm X became more political than ecclesiastical as time went on in the 1960's. His parents were linked to the pan-Africanist movement of Marcus Garvey indeed. Even early on, Malcolm X acknowledged that the anti-colonial struggles of the Third World were linked to the struggle of black humanity globally fighting for their rightful liberation. Malcolm X once followed Elijah Muhammad unconditionally like a son respects a father. Malcolm X was a political Independent as he called the Democratic and Republican parties wolves and foxes. He heavily the establishment figures of the civil rights movement as a lackeys of the white power structure (which is completely true), but he corresponded with some civil rights leaders behind the scenes. Malcolm X attended the March on Washington and engaged in discussion with civil rights leaders there (Yes, he called the March the Farce on Washington for its censored speeches, establishment funding, etc.). Malcolm X wanted to have an international mindset. So, he formed 2 organizations: Muslim Mosque Incorporated (MMI) and the Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU). While abroad, he tried to establish formal connections between the MMI and Islamists, including the Muslim Brotherhood on the one hand and the Saudi royal family on the other. He also met with the newly minted heads of state in several liberated African countries, aspiring to make links between their revolutions and the struggle of U.S. Blacks. When Malcolm X left the NOI, Malcolm X further evolved on issues of race and gender. He believed in gender equality and wanted racial equality among all peoples. He even appointed a young woman to head the OAAU. We are still fighting bad housing, the mass incarceration of African Americans, harm done to our schools, the evil war on terror, etc. Malcolm X always supported the rights of workers in Western society. He criticized liberal establishment figures since they wanted to manipulate the civil rights movement to be a tool of the Democratic Party instead of an independent revolutionary force to benefit black people more directly. Malcolm X advocated armed self-defense against racists. He wanted reparations for Black Americans. He was right to see that bigotry was not just a Southern problem, because a lot of racism existed in the North too (especially in urban conditions and lax job opportunities in the North). He left the Nation in March of 1964. He converted to Orthodox Sunni Islam. He wanted Black Unity. He criticized capitalism and he was moving in a more progressive fashion. Still, Malcolm X was never an establishment liberal reformist. He was a black nationalist progressive Revolutionary.
One of the greatest parts of the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was about his fight against poverty. By 1967, African Americans had won federal legislation to guarantee civil rights and make Jim Crow legally gone. Yet, Dr. King knew that black human beings were not free. We are not free until we have full economic and social equality. Economic equality means that black human beings should not suffer poverty, low wages, corrupt housing, and other forms of negative conditions in the world at all. He was right that Black human beings needed power as a means to bring about social, political, and economic change. That is why he wanted full employment for all Americans or create a guaranteed annual income. That is why the Black Memphis sanitation workers walked off the job in Memphis to win union recognition. The union workers by 1968 were only paid up to $1.60 an hour, or only five cents above the federal minimum wage. In addition, there were no set hours. Workers had to haul garbage until their route was finished, whether it took eight hours or fourteen. If it rained, they could be sent home with little or no pay. Workers could be fired for being one minute late or for talking back. They had no breaks. They could only eat lunch for fifteen minutes and could not be seen in the shade of a tree. The city did not require residents to pack their garbage up or to even bring it to the curb, so the sanitation workers had to just grab everything as it lay, including tree limbs, dead animals in the road, and unpacked garbage. They had no sick days, and without a union, no recourse to protest any of this. That was immoral. So, these human beings wanted to struggle for racial and economic justice. T.O. Jones or the leader of what became AFSCME Local 1733, got support from civil rights activists, Black ministers, and some limited support from AFSCME’s national office fought for freedom. On February 1, 1968, the proverbial back of the camel was broken by a final straw: two sanitation workers—Echol Cole and Robert Walker—were crushed to death as they rode in the back of a garbage truck. They were seeking shelter from the rain at the end of a long day, and there was no room for them in the cab of the truck. Faulty wiring is believed to have set off the compactor, and the two were mashed up. It was the workers collectively that rose up to strike because of the deaths of these 2 innocent men. The treatment of the workers by the mayor and the police was racist. The workers used the signs of "I AM A MAN." Dr. King Martin Luther King, Jr. was energized by the striking workers. He said the following on March 18:
"...With Selma and the voting rights bill one era of our struggle came to a close and a new era came into being. Now our struggle is for genuine equality, which means economic equality. For we know that it isn’t enough to integrate lunch counters. What does it profit a man to be able to eat at an integrated lunch counter if he doesn’t earn enough money to buy a hamburger and cup of coffee?..."
Dr. King was marching and agent provocateurs funded by the FBI caused rioting in the downtown Memphis (as a means to disrupt Dr. King's efforts). Dr. King said the following words just before he died,
"...We are not coming to engage in any histrionic gesture. We are not coming to tear up Washington. We are coming to demand that the government address itself to the problem of poverty. We read one day, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” But if a man doesn’t have a job or an income, he has neither life nor liberty nor the possibility for the pursuit of happiness. He merely exists. We are coming to ask America to be true to the huge promissory note that it signed years ago. And we are coming to engage in dramatic nonviolent action, to call attention to the gulf between promise and fulfillment; to make the invisible visible. Why do we do it this way? We do it this way because it is our experience that the nation doesn’t move around questions of genuine equality for the poor and for black people until it is confronted massively, dramatically in terms of direct action..." (at the National Cathedral, Washington, D.C., on March 31, 1968. The full text of Dr. King´s sermon was entitled “Remaining Awake Through a Great Revolution”).
This is why Dr. King was determined to success with another march on April 8, but he was unfortunately assassinated on April 4. After his assassination, rebellions occurred nationwide. These rebellions were done in response to the conditions of urban ghettoes and poor communities nationwide. Human beings who rioted were heavily young and suffered low wage jobs. The ruling class feared that it was losing control of the situation. That is why they had no choice, but to give concessions. The day after King’s funeral, Congress passed the last piece of major civil rights legislation: the Fair Housing Act. President Johnson sent a personal emissary to Memphis to force Mayor Loeb to settle the sanitation workers’ strike, which he did. Across the country, private foundations distributed millions of dollars to fund new Black business ventures. One negative conclusion of the death of the great late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was that the power structure funded the bourgeoisie Black elite (who sought reform not revolution). So, we should fight poverty vigorously. WE SHOULD CONTINUE TO STAND UP FOR BLACK PEOPLE AND LOVE BLACK HUMANITY FOREVER.
We know about Brother George Jackson. He was a member of the prison rights movement. He even created a Black Panther Party in San Quentin prison. There has been over 42 years since his death in August 27, 1971. We still have some of the same issues in prison today as they were back then. Now, the prison population has radically increased and America imprisons more humans than any nation in the world. George Jackson wanted human rights to be real for all prisoners of the world. He was born in Chicago and grew up mostly in California to black working class parents. In 1961, he was accused of sticking up a gas station for $70. He was represented by a public defender and he pled guilty. He began serving a sentence of one year to life. He was in prison, but he was very intelligent. He studied there and wrote information eloquently. We wanted to politically organize in America's prisons and jail as a means to create revolutionary solutions to societal ills. He made two bestselling compilations of his letters. They are called Soledad Brother and Blood in My Eye. His words were felt across class and racial lines in California including all over the Earth. In January 1970, George Jackson was accused of the murder of a prison guard. On August 7 of the same year, his younger brother Jonathan Jackson staged a doomed rescue attempt at Marin County courthouse. This was when four people died and several were wounded. Angela Davis was prosecuted for murder and conspiracy. George Jackson's life ended on August 21, 1971 in a hail of gunfire. These circumstances were strongly suggest to be a setup and assassination staged by California prison officials. More than 20,000 human beings showed up for his Oakland, California funeral. His influence was great. He inspired the organization of prisoner rights movements globally. Many then and now confront the prison state. We have threats today. We have many Congressmen and women, mayors, state legislators, judges, and sheriffs involved in the growth of the prison population. We have seen the U.S. prison population grow five and six fold all over the seventies, eighties, nineties, and in the new century. Even some of the black bourgeoisie have no intention of empowering, educating, and helping the black working class. Today, we see folks having hunger strikes in California and prison organizations in Ohio, Georgia, New York, Virginia, etc. Both Democrats and Republicans have been complicit in mass incarceration and other evils in the prison state.
Frankly, the 2 victims of racial profiling (named Kayla Phillips and Trayon Christian) should advance justice with all of our support in general. There have been numerous stories of unjust treatment against customers of Barneys for a while. Now, the stuff is hitting the fan. Subsequently, the NY CEO has issued an apology. Would he issue an apology if these incidents of racial profiling and overt discriminatory practices were not shown in the national level? We all know the answer to the question. The real issue is about human rights. All humans deserve real respect and equal treatment excluding racial profiling and harmful treatment from anyone. Therefore, the Brother and the Sister should continue with their lawsuits and so forth. Justice is never done unless accountability is made comprehensively. Justice should not be sugarcoated, evaded, nor whitewashed by any token apology. Deeds are more important than token talk. Therefore, our community stands with the victims of Barneys' inappropriate actions. Also, the NYPD is involved in this criminal action as well against 2 black human beings. This confirms the obviously perverted actions of some of the police in NYC. The NYPD needs to clean up its house. The goal of black liberation is always a legitimate goal to advance and support at the end of the day. A real atmosphere charged with not only inspiration, but of action will cause us to win. We should fight economic inequality and imperialism. We should continue to expose stereotypes. We should always condemn female bashing and male bashing too. Justice and human liberty should continue to reverberate in our community, who are filled with the young, the old, and others. We must love our black community (for community is part of the black African cultural identity. Our ancestors are our heroes and they are with us in spirit), strive for excellence, and ally in a communal spirit.
Black fathers are great human beings. The enemy always places our fathers and our mothers as scapegoats for the ills of society. The victim of oppression is readily blamed (by the enemy) for the actions of the oppressor itself. Reactionaries claim that single parent households are more vulnerable to abuse. The enemy talks about absentee fatherhood and deadbeat dads all of the time. Now, the truth is that fathers and mothers should be in the lives of their children. Yet, parenting alone is not responsible for the social ills ranging from high school dropout rates to drug use, physical abuse, and crime. This scapegoating of many fathers and many mothers is related to the culture of poverty lie that blames poor people for their situation not neoliberalism, not economic exploitation, or not the evil system. This false narrative is used as a means for some to scapegoat black human beings in an insidious and racist fashion. This narrative is false since high black unemployment and incarceration rates are caused by the evil policies from the establishment (which comes from the system of white supremacy). We see that some talk about 64 percent of black children growing up in homes without fathers. Even President Barack Obama uses this stat as a means to promote marriage and encourage fatherhood in his mind (while refusing to expose the evil imperialist Empire of society). Now, this blame the victim approach of scapegoating black families grew into a high level with the advent of the racist 1965 Moynihan Report. That report described the Black family as a "tangle of pathology." That racist 1965 report also blamed black mothers for the issues in the black community, which is false. The oppression, discrimination, racism, and poverty has harmed the black community not black women at all. The enemy always have a perverted hatred of black women. Anyone that harbors evil hatred of black women is by definition an agent (I don't care who it is). Here is the reality. Poor and Black fathers in this country do make real efforts to be involved in the lives of their families and children. But these relationships are structured and constrained by poverty, racism and the criminal injustice system in ways that are rarely discussed. Most black children live in single parent homes, but this doesn't mean that their fathers are not involved in their lives. Studies have shown that unmarried Black fathers are highly involved in their young children's lives, with the majority seeing their kids three to five times per week. Combining this figure with the fathers who live with their children, it means that almost three-quarters of Black children have a father present in their lives. This is hardly the crisis level that we hear about in the media so frequently. Numerous studies show that black fathers are more involved in certain aspects of parents. Studies show that Black fathers are more involved in certain aspects of parenting. For example, Black men are more likely to provide physical care for their children, including preparation of meals, bathing and help with getting dressed. A Boston College study found that Black men were more likely than any other racial or ethnic group to remain in contact with their non-residential children. In fact, 99 percent of unmarried fathers state a desire to be in their children's lives. So, we know that issues exist because of unemployment, poverty, and related issues not black men or black women collectively at all. Almost 40 percent of unmarried Black fathers make less than $10,000 per year, and 70 percent of uncollected child support payments are owed by men making less than $10,000 per year. Nonetheless, researchers have found that poor, unmarried Black fathers make substantial efforts to provide for their children. The majority of these fathers contribute physical necessities such as diapers, clothing or school supplies. Because they are likely to be unemployed or have irregular work, they also provide support in the form of homework help and childcare so that mothers can work, go to school or run errands. Unlike state-mandated child support payments, these activities involve fathers directly and visibly in the care of their children. Mass incarceration has harmed many fathers having the chance to provide for their children in real life. Absentee fathers exist, but mass incarceration has torn a much more hold in the lives of many children. The oft cited and alarming statistics showing that children raised in single-parent households are more likely to commit crime, drop out of school or go to prison mistake correlation for causation. Absent fathers don't cause these issues. In fact, the same factors that make it difficult for poor, Black fathers to be consistently involved with their children--racism, poverty and mass incarceration--are also the ones that diminish the hopes and life chances of those children. All children deserve adults in their lives that love and care for them. Fathers and Mothers should not be scapegoated for the evils in a wicked society. There must be a social responsibility to build up society. In other words, we must confront racism and social inequality as a means to build the lives of families in the world.
African Culture
"SOUL!" was a great show. It is a staple of black culture. It showed Black Power issues on its show all of the time mixed with great music as well. It lasted from 1968 to 1973. It was a public television show. It was courageous and uncensored. Sometimes, the past can inspire us and that show inspires us. It was shown in PBS. It predated Soul Train even. SOUL! was produced at WNET/Thirteen. SOUL! and Soul Train were sphere headed by bold Black men. They saw opportunities to contribute to the community of black people and they created something special for humanity in general. They were successful. Ellis Haizlip was involved with SOUL! and of course Don Cornelius was involved in Soul Train. Melissa Haizlip is trying to create a film on SOUL!, but she needs funds to do so. She is inspired by her late uncle (the poet Umar Bin Hassan). Her film is entitled, "Mr. Soul! Ellis Haizlip and the Birth of Black Power TV." The SOUL! show had a lot of content. Melissa held a conference on the show and other issues. The summit include her friends and Black writers including activists like Aboidon Oyewole, Bin Hassan (famous members of the Last Poets), Movement icon Sonia Sanchez, and other folks (like Quincy Troupe, Ericka Blount Danois, and Kevin Powell). There were others there. She lacks money and the daylong conference gave tribute to her uncle (including the Black Power and Black Arts movements). These movements inspire us daily. Ellis Haizlip was slowly reconstructed through clips and memories of stories told. “He knew nothing about television. He didn’t like it. So he was perfect,” recalled Christopher Lukas, former programming director for WNET/Thirteen. Lukas hired Haizlip, a very well-known and –connected theatre producer in Black circles who had what became known as a legendary black phone book of contacts. So Thirteen’s first Black producer evolved Lukas’ idea of a “Black Tonight Show” into “SOUL!” Haizlip produced and Stan Lathan (a famous African American in producing). Thulani Davis said that she was a cool, sly instigator. Haizlip got many different black voices on his show. She followed up questions on the individuals that he interviewed on his show. John H. Bracey, Jr., chairperson of the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies at University of Massachusetts at Amherst said Haizlip’s philosophy with the show was that “...all of this (I’m presenting) is going to get us Black, so you (the audience) sort it out...” SOUL! expanded from WNET/Thirteen to PBS. The show gave human beings a platform to voice their views. It allowed George Jackson's mother to appear to talk about her then recently martyred son. Al Green performed there. Miriam Makeba sang her son.
The Last Poets chanted words and music. It featured even Louis Farrakhan to talk about controversial topics. Regardless if you agreed or disagreed with Louis Farrakhan's views, the SOUL! was a great forum for a wide spectrum of black voices. "It became a vehicle demanding respect, searching for opportunity and giving voice,” said Price. Sanchez talked about how people would come up to her the day after she performed on “SOUL!” and asked her, “’Aren’t you that lady?’ And I said, ‘Yes, wasn’t we bad?’” Shows like SOUL! and Black Journal existed in the late 1960's as Black public affairs television programs. Others shows came locally and local public including commercial television stations grew nationwide. This came after black human beings rebelled in Detroit, Watts, Newark, etc. between 1967 and 1968. They demanded justice. Lt. Uhara, Julia, and Bill Cosby were great. Also, Johnson suppressed the report that found that white racism caused and fueled riots in America. Today, PBS has been increasingly corporate dominated. It is now taboo for Haizlip to come on the scene on PBS now. We should continue in the Black Liberation and Black Power movements. SOUL! merged Black culture, Black politics, and Black history. This is an important story of Black History. This is our history. This is our culture. So, it is up to the people or us in this generation. We have the responsibility to fight for freedom and to fight for our dignity. Our voices are important and they have a right to be heard.
Good News
There are numerous great news in the black community. Anala Beevers of New Orleans is a member of MENSA. MENSA is the international organization that is made up of super intelligent young human beings. She is 4 years old with an IQ of more than 145. That is amazing and she learned the whole alphabet at four months. She learned numbers in Spanish by the time that she was 18 months old. Most of MENSA’s members are in the top two percent; Anala is in the top one percent. “She keeps us on our toes,” says her father Landon, who said she needs her own reality TV show. When asked by a reporter if she’s smart, she nodded her head “yes.” When asked, “How smart are you?” she said, “Really smart.” This is great news and bless her heart. Anala Beevers is a gifted human being and she should be encouraged and strengthened in her God given abilities. Black intellectual strength is potent and it is indeed very common among our people spanning all eras of human history indeed. We know that the AIDS pandemic has declined in Africa. There is a new UNAIDS report that has shown the AIDS epidemic that has been halted and the world is beginning to reverse the spread of HIV. UNAIDS Executive Director, Michel Sidibe, loses no time in announcing the good news. "Today, we can say with confidence and conviction, that we have broken the trajectory of the AIDS pandemic," Sidibe said. "Less people are becoming infected. Less people are dying. New infections have fallen by nearly 20 percent in the last 10 years." We see that the African nation of Benin has made progress in reducing poverty. This has been mentioned by a statement from the Secretary General of the UN named Ban Ki-Moon. Benin has seen improving primary education, reduction in infant mortality, and increasing access to safe drinking water. We as of black African descent have a long way to go though. Our enemy is white supremacy. We have to continue to learn our culture, our history, and our roots. We should continue to learn about math, science, technology, and engineering as a means to not only develop our culture, but to grow our souls (and to be the best that we can be in the world). So, we have to unite as black Africans against a common enemy and a common oppressor as Malcolm X have said many decades ago. For Unity is one way for us as a people to strike back and to build up our own cultural base in the world. We are a black African people. I will always love Africa with all of my heart. As a Diasporan African, I will continue to love Africa. I will respect my ancestors and the Creator of the whole Universe as well.
There are more interesting facts about Africa and black humanity that many human beings do not know about. Liberia GDP's growth rate is nearly four times that of America. This trend is occurring in the past decade. Africa supplied six of the world's ten economies with the fastest growth. African entrepreneurs are very talented in the world. Africa's mobile telecoms market is the world's second largest/fastest growing after China. That is why the Economist magazine dubbed Africa the world's "Hottest Investment Frontier" in April of this year. Africa's economy is growing rapidly. The African millionaire growth rate is five times that of the United States and Africa has more billionaires than Latin America. Even the late black inventor Alexander Miles was awarded a patent for an automatically opening and closing elevator door design in in 1887. The great African American inventor Frederick McKinley Jones created innovations in refrigeration that caused great improvement to the long haul transportation of perishable goods. He was the winner of the National Medal of Technology and the inductee of the National Inventors Hall of Fame. During his life, Jones was awarded 61 patents. Forty were for refrigeration equipment, while others went for portable X-ray machines, sound equipment, and gasoline engines. In 1944, Jones became the first African American to be elected into the American Society of Refrigeration Engineers. Also, our cultural legacy as black people has always been in favor of justice and true morality. Even many Europeans centuries ago admitted that black Africans have an affinity or strong love for justice. The high esteem the ancients held blacks carried on into the Middle Ages. Ibn Battuta, writing about the 14th century West African Kingdom of Mali, recorded: "The small number of acts of injustice that one finds there, for the Negroes are of all peoples those who most abhor injustice and complete and general safety one enjoys throughout the land."
Conclusion
I believe in showing strength as a means to outline my black heritage and not being ashamed of their black identity. That is the point. I am black and I will defend my African heritage to the fullest. I do blame some white Euro terrorists for the origin of the Maafa. Also, I realize the historical dynamics of slavery. The reality is that there is a system of white supremacy in the world that humans have the right to oppose. Authors like Dr. Nelly Fuller have exposed this system and how even those who never participated in slavery benefit from. I will never forget a single drop of blood that my ancestors shed. I will never minimize the suffering of my people at all to placate some post racial narrative. All humans deserve dignity and respect. Humans can unite on common cause to solve problems. On the other hand, Black human beings have every God given to collaborate with each other to solve problems as other ethnic groups are doing. Why is it that when blacks advocate peaceful Black Unity, then that is falsely equated to white racism? It doesn't make sense at all. Black Unity is a great thing and it is legitimate. This story is about remembering the evils of lynchings. It has nothing to do with whining at all. I reject racism 100 percent. So, I will continue to advance Black Love, Black Unity, and Black Power as a real Black Man have every right to do. The crimes of some white people should not be ignored, omitted, or obfuscated at all. Now, this story is about the immorality of lynching and how real Sisters and Brothers like Ida B. Wells stood up to fight for justice. Black humanity fighting for justice has nothing to do with whining. It has to do with the strength of our community to combat injustice. That is the point. I do not hate other human beings, but I do hate oppression and I hate injustice. I love black people and certainly nothing is immoral about Black Love at all. BLACK LOVE IS BEAUTIFUL AND IT IS STRONG. I will forever have love for the Motherland of Africa forever. I will love Black Women forever (the black woman alone can fulfill my heart romantically as a black man) and Respect the Brothers doing what is right as well. I will always defend my Black People forever and nothing will change that at all.
By Timothy
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