Posted by TheBlackList on January 22, 2009 at 2:25pm
MICHAEL BURKE:
"So Barack Obama is now president of the United States of America. Whether we like it or not, the president of the USA is the most powerful man on earth. The way in which the US presidency impacts on all mankind is sufficient reason why the US presidency cannot be dismissed as an American domestic issue. Will the presidency of Obama signify the final leg of the journey for emancipation from mental slavery? In any case, the mere fact that the current president of the USA is an African American is enough to empower our people mentally.
Marcus Garvey tried to educate the descendants of African slaves about the glorious past of Africa. He would speak about the ancient kingdoms of Zimbabwe, Timbuktu and Ghana. He would speak about the ancient universities and the organised systems of agriculture and drainage which could not be found anywhere in Europe. Indeed, the real history points to the fact that in terms of the technology available 1000 years ago, Africa was far more advanced than Europe. So, for that matter, was China.
Barack Obama was not the descendant of slaves. His father was Kenyan and his mother was from Kansas City and he was born in Hawaii. However, the fact that he is a descendant of Africans demonstrates to the descendants of slaves that anyone, including someone of African descent, can hold the most powerful office on earth.
Slavery was always around in ancient days, but conquest of the so-called new world and the need to make money from speculation for minerals, the growing of cotton, tobacco and sugar cane sent up the demand for slaves some 350-odd years ago. Many of the so-called privateers who commandeered slave ships were really nothing but pirates who had come to Port Royal as bondsmen or prisoners for six years.
Eventually, what started off as a system of temporary slavery, a system of buying slaves turned ugly with the outright capture of slaves to take them to the west. The journey through the Middle Passage of the boats was something else. It was a most horrible journey and space cannot aptly describe it here. And the cruelties of slavery in the Western world are well documented.
What is not so well documented was the need to create a slave mentality. The slaves were taught that the best things belonged to their white overlords. And the mentality persists to this day despite education and political independence. One key factor in Barack Obama's going forward to become president is the fact that he did not have the slave mentality because he did not descend from slaves.
Marcus Garvey died a broken man. He did not see the sons of Africans coming to a conscious understanding of themselves despite all of his efforts though his Universal Negro Improvement Association. And there have been many movements to promote the cause of liberation, which Garvey recognised had to start with the mind. Bob Marley would draw inspiration from Garvey for his last song that he wrote, which was Redemption Song.
It was Marcus Garvey who said in 1937: "We must emancipate ourselves form mental slavery because while others can free the body none but ourselves can free the mind." Bob Marley sang the words and many thought he wrote them, especially those who have never read Marcus Garvey. Be that as it may, mental emancipation has been slow in coming.
It will always be a shame in my mind that the first person to put the "Made in Jamaica" label on products did so for black women to straighten their hair to resemble that of white women.
It was during the war when cosmetics were scarce that Madame Rose Leon set up her school of beauty culture and sold beauty products. To this day we have been brainwashed in the way we judge beauty. And unfortunately the beauty contests reinforce these backward positions. And that in turn tends to reinforce in the minds of Africans that they are inferior to whites because the way that whites look naturally is the way that blacks in the west have been taught to convert themselves unnaturally.
But there is hope. A man of African ancestry has the most powerful position on earth, the presidency of the United States of America. While we may be far from the end of the struggle it has certainly taken a significant leap in the last two days. Here in Jamaica we are still not yet a republic and yet another representative of the queen is to be sworn in and take up appointment next month. We are not yet a republic although the work to become one started in 1975.
But because the parties have been quibbling to stop what type of republic we should be has been the chief obstacle.
The fact that the Jamaica Labour Party while in Opposition made the Caribbean Court of Appeal a conditionality for their votes for republican status is another reason why we are not yet a republic. Who knows, the coming into office of Barack Obama may have the psychological impact in speeding up the whole process of republican status in Jamaica."
by MICHAEL BURKE
Jamaica, Observer
ekrubm765@yahoo.com
Thursday, January 22, 2009
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Michael Burke's analysis is interesting, however I take strong exception to his oft-used phrase "African American;" (see my www.caroltaylorword.blogspot.com articles for reasons why.
I also disagree with his use of the phrase - for usBlacksonly - "of African descent," for in truth, ALL huemans are 'of African descent,' if he wishes to distinguish between colors - he should say 'Black African,' which is what I call myself!
I cordially invite him and every OTHER hueman (my 'e') being to log on to www.discussrace.com - TAKE & SHARE the www.racismtest.org and if reponders find that they're pathologic in their response to differences in color and culture - let 'em get back to our Ethnotherapist, Dr. Mari Saunders (MSAUN@aol.com) for Ethnotherapeutic Counseling until they can think straight!
Blessings,
Your Sister-in-THE-Struggle,
Carol Taylor R.N.
First Black U.S.A. Flight Attendant
Author: THE LITTLE BLACK BOOK: Black Male Survival in America: Staying Alive & Well in an Institutionally RACIST Society
"So Barack Obama is now president of the United States of America. Whether we like it or not, the president of the USA is the most powerful man on earth. The way in which the US presidency impacts on all mankind is sufficient reason why the US presidency cannot be dismissed as an American domestic issue. Will the presidency of Obama signify the final leg of the journey for emancipation from mental slavery? In any case, the mere fact that the current president of the USA is an African American is enough to empower our people mentally."
first of all brotha, you are obviously oblivious to a great many things. for instance, the president of the united snakes of amerikkka is not the most powerful man on earth, only in the far throws of your mind, which is the mere product of illusion on behalf of the real powers-that-be. i challenge you to prove the assertion of your comment, outside of what appears to be a herd instinct belief, following the crowd just for the sake of it, because those who shape public opinion say so, through the various corporate-controlled media agencies. only a misinformed individual would make such an assinine statement, which wreaks the height of folly, coupled with a sense or touch of arrogance, because of the juggernaut image that amerikkka has projected onto the planet, via the force of violence.
i challenge you to prove that obama is more powerful or has more weight than the british crown, the black nobility, the hapsburghs, rothschilds, warburgs, schiffs, oppenheimers, goldmans, sachs, rockefellers, morgans, duponts, carnegies, mellons, harrimans and browns, some of which were the ones who gave obama the bulk of the over half a billion dollars, which was nothing more than an investment in the obama regime. on amerikkkan soil obama is no more than an agent of the rockefellers, who represent the chief amerikkkan branch of the british crown.
you speak of the final emancipation of afrikans-n-amerikkka from mental slavery at the behest of obama's ascendancy? how can that be when obama is no different from the rest of us, who have been constantly traumatized by the psychological warfare of white supremacy? if anything, obama will further the control of the minds of afrikans-n-amerikkka for the same powers-that-be which i mention. he will be the new negro pied piper, just like the story of the pied piper who was able to control the rats and make them move in any desired direction that he wanted. and so far, it appears to be working like a charm, and i do mean charm, especially black women, who think the world of obama. finally, the only mental empowerment that obama can do for afrikans-n-amerikkka is move them to revolutionary ideals, when they see, in the end, that he was working against them all the while.
"Marcus Garvey tried to educate the descendants of African slaves about the glorious past of Africa. He would speak about the ancient kingdoms of Zimbabwe, Timbuktu and Ghana. He would speak about the ancient universities and the organised systems of agriculture and drainage which could not be found anywhere in Europe. Indeed, the real history points to the fact that in terms of the technology available 1000 years ago, Africa was far more advanced than Europe. So, for that matter, was China."
the philosophy of marcus garvey was totally juxtapose to the negroism of barack obama, just as apples and oranges are two totally different fruits. garvey was nowhere near trying to integrate with a nation of demons, who called themselves christians, while, at the same time, they were (and still are) practing methods of genocide against the original people of the planet. in essence, garvey, if he had been living today, would have been the enemy of obama, even down to the colors that they would be waving, as garvey would have been waving a red, black and green flag, while obama would have been pledging allegiance to the red, white and blue. garvey would have been leading the black revolution, while obama would have been leading the negro revolution, which is what the white man approves of, while he disdains the black revolution, because he full well knows that what's good for afrikans-n-amerikkka is naturally bad for his ass.
and for the record, it was another negro, who, if he had been also living today, would have been licking his chops too, just like the rest of the house niggas, who opposed and still oppose garvey/garveyism, because he had a black nationalist philosophy. and that negro i speak of was w.e.b. dubois, who helped them no good crackas take down and assassinate the character of garvey. so, i say death to all house niggas. they are just as dangerous as the white man.
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I also disagree with his use of the phrase - for usBlacksonly - "of African descent," for in truth, ALL huemans are 'of African descent,' if he wishes to distinguish between colors - he should say 'Black African,' which is what I call myself!
I cordially invite him and every OTHER hueman (my 'e') being to log on to www.discussrace.com - TAKE & SHARE the www.racismtest.org and if reponders find that they're pathologic in their response to differences in color and culture - let 'em get back to our Ethnotherapist, Dr. Mari Saunders (MSAUN@aol.com) for Ethnotherapeutic Counseling until they can think straight!
Blessings,
Your Sister-in-THE-Struggle,
Carol Taylor R.N.
First Black U.S.A. Flight Attendant
Author: THE LITTLE BLACK BOOK: Black Male Survival in America: Staying Alive & Well in an Institutionally RACIST Society
"So Barack Obama is now president of the United States of America. Whether we like it or not, the president of the USA is the most powerful man on earth. The way in which the US presidency impacts on all mankind is sufficient reason why the US presidency cannot be dismissed as an American domestic issue. Will the presidency of Obama signify the final leg of the journey for emancipation from mental slavery? In any case, the mere fact that the current president of the USA is an African American is enough to empower our people mentally."
first of all brotha, you are obviously oblivious to a great many things. for instance, the president of the united snakes of amerikkka is not the most powerful man on earth, only in the far throws of your mind, which is the mere product of illusion on behalf of the real powers-that-be. i challenge you to prove the assertion of your comment, outside of what appears to be a herd instinct belief, following the crowd just for the sake of it, because those who shape public opinion say so, through the various corporate-controlled media agencies. only a misinformed individual would make such an assinine statement, which wreaks the height of folly, coupled with a sense or touch of arrogance, because of the juggernaut image that amerikkka has projected onto the planet, via the force of violence.
i challenge you to prove that obama is more powerful or has more weight than the british crown, the black nobility, the hapsburghs, rothschilds, warburgs, schiffs, oppenheimers, goldmans, sachs, rockefellers, morgans, duponts, carnegies, mellons, harrimans and browns, some of which were the ones who gave obama the bulk of the over half a billion dollars, which was nothing more than an investment in the obama regime. on amerikkkan soil obama is no more than an agent of the rockefellers, who represent the chief amerikkkan branch of the british crown.
you speak of the final emancipation of afrikans-n-amerikkka from mental slavery at the behest of obama's ascendancy? how can that be when obama is no different from the rest of us, who have been constantly traumatized by the psychological warfare of white supremacy? if anything, obama will further the control of the minds of afrikans-n-amerikkka for the same powers-that-be which i mention. he will be the new negro pied piper, just like the story of the pied piper who was able to control the rats and make them move in any desired direction that he wanted. and so far, it appears to be working like a charm, and i do mean charm, especially black women, who think the world of obama. finally, the only mental empowerment that obama can do for afrikans-n-amerikkka is move them to revolutionary ideals, when they see, in the end, that he was working against them all the while.
"Marcus Garvey tried to educate the descendants of African slaves about the glorious past of Africa. He would speak about the ancient kingdoms of Zimbabwe, Timbuktu and Ghana. He would speak about the ancient universities and the organised systems of agriculture and drainage which could not be found anywhere in Europe. Indeed, the real history points to the fact that in terms of the technology available 1000 years ago, Africa was far more advanced than Europe. So, for that matter, was China."
the philosophy of marcus garvey was totally juxtapose to the negroism of barack obama, just as apples and oranges are two totally different fruits. garvey was nowhere near trying to integrate with a nation of demons, who called themselves christians, while, at the same time, they were (and still are) practing methods of genocide against the original people of the planet. in essence, garvey, if he had been living today, would have been the enemy of obama, even down to the colors that they would be waving, as garvey would have been waving a red, black and green flag, while obama would have been pledging allegiance to the red, white and blue. garvey would have been leading the black revolution, while obama would have been leading the negro revolution, which is what the white man approves of, while he disdains the black revolution, because he full well knows that what's good for afrikans-n-amerikkka is naturally bad for his ass.
and for the record, it was another negro, who, if he had been also living today, would have been licking his chops too, just like the rest of the house niggas, who opposed and still oppose garvey/garveyism, because he had a black nationalist philosophy. and that negro i speak of was w.e.b. dubois, who helped them no good crackas take down and assassinate the character of garvey. so, i say death to all house niggas. they are just as dangerous as the white man.
the truth is brutal!
uhuru!