This video showed up either on my Facebook or Twitter timeline. I've forgotten which site that fast. I ponder the issue of black hatred or self hatred often because in the media and out in real life I see so much evidence that many black people aren't comfortable with their own being. I see it in both black males and females. I see self hatred as a kind of blasphemy. To hate the features God intended a person to have is not only abnormal but an insult to God.
Some black self hatred in America comes as a result of being severed from our homeland and true identity. There are not many good blueprints for black people in America to go by so more and more we have been cast away into dysfunction. As a people we have been existing in dysfunction for a very long time, but only now it is widespread.
In this case I'm excusing this rapper's language. He uses less profanity than most rappers including my old favorite Tupac.
I'm also posting the piece below in italics. I can't remember where I got it online exactly. I saved it to my documents months ago. There is much truth in the piece, but I disagree somewhat that Africans are in as bad a shape as we in the Diaspora here in the US especially. Here's why. I haven't been to any countries where large populations of black people of African descent live such as Brazil and some other parts of Latin America or the Caribbean, so I can't critique, but I know African Americans very well, all of our pathologies. I feel that many continental Africans lack self-confidence in standing up to various forms of oppression and exploitation, but one strength many have is that they still respect marriage and have a desire to be wedded and to have an intact family and community structure. Africa is not the West where the individual rules. The clan and the tribe hasn't been erased there. I don't believe that illegitimacy and divorce is as rampant in Africa as here. Also many Africans value education. They don't see learning as being "white" as some African Americans have described getting an education. Overall American culture is anti-intellectual. But too often all the shortcomings, ills, and recklessness of the society blacks in America take on with a hardy vengeance. This all goes back to self-hatred and lack of a true and meaningful identity. Our history didn't begin with the nightmare and oppression of slavery in the Americas, and we haven't reached the pinnacle as a group because of President Obama. Very very far from it.
Therefore, I will end in a bit and allow you to ponder like I often do.
One way we can conquer our self hatred as a people is to connect with Africans online since most of us will never get to Africa. I've been to two African countries and have meet many Africans from various countries over the years. My view of self began to slowly change when I set foot on the continent. It took many many years, but I changed into more of a complete person. Today I see myself as an African of the Diaspora. There is no nationality, country, or continent named "black." Black is a misnomer and too limited in scope for me. I alienates me from my origins. Like "American" it just isn't detailed enough for my tastes, describing the essence of who I am. It's too new, inaccurate, and limiting. Shame over my skin color or hair texture has nothing to do with me refusing to go solely by the description of black. I don't have any shame over my features. But I want more. I want to identify myself with my ancestry and a particular geographic region which I relate to the most. There is nothing wrong with that. I have a longing for this, and I will not deny my longing. It is my right. However, "African" doesn't quite go deep enough as well for somewhere on that vast continent in a little spot among some tribe or clan is my true home. I am a part of Africa whether north, south, east, west. We are one, and I am proud to be who I am. Everyone should be.
I have come to the conclusion that the majority of Afrikan men and women in the
UK -- and most certainly in places like the USA and Caribbean, and most
probably in Afrika -- are 'functionally mentally ill'. By this I mean that
whilst most people in this category can function effectively at a certain
level, i.e. hold down a job, obey the rules and laws of society, maintain
social relationships over a prolonged period time, use their cognitive skills
to solve various problems, there is something fundamentally wrong or missing at
the heart of their psyche. This affective gap manifests itself in a deep-seated
but unrecognised sense of racial inferiority, an inability to admire the
Afrikan physiological and cultural aesthetic, a lack of racial self-esteem and
confidence and a profound difficulty in working effectively with other
Afrikans, often induced by the inability to trust one another. This functional
mental illness is one of the main reasons that most Afrikan controlled
countries are economic and social basket cases. It explains the widespread use
of skin bleaching agents by Afrikan women and why Afrikan women who 'go
natural' with their hair often provoke such enormous and negative emotional
reactions from other women who use chemicals to straighten their hair, or who
wear wigs, weaves, extensions etc. It explains why Afrikans find it so hard to
forgive each other and yet can forgive Caucasians in South Afrika (and other places)
for their atrocities without any strong demand for justice or reparations. It
explains why we are in such a mess and yet so many of us think we are 'doing
well' as individuals. It explains why so many Brothers think that 'things' will
help them to feel whole and never learn the lessons when they don't. It is time
for a rethink. Time to get down beneath the rhetoric and the kente cloth (or
Versace) and deal with the pain. Deal with the pain of being rejected by your
absent father, the pain of never being hugged by your physically present but
emotionally absent father, the pain of belonging to a defeated and oppressed
race, the pain of having to go to your oppressor for the means to live, the
pain of a lifetime of insults and accusing looks, the pain of being rejected by
your women, the pain of somehow feeling less than a man. We are a group of men
who have been conquered and we have failed in our single most important task,
namely the protection and defence of our community. However, no matter that
many battles have been lost, the war continues apace. Can we face ourselves in
the mirror of our ancestors and those yet to be born and summon the will and
self-belief to win? For win we must. You cannot have an honourable defeat at
the hands of white supremacy. Let's do some healing and some cleansing and
build a nation of men our women and children can be proud of."
Paul Ifayomi Grant
Niggers, Negroes, Black People & Afrikans
It has been awhile, but I am here once again.
I am better and more relaxed with taking standardized tests than when I was younger. Saturday morning I took the certification exam for my state in early childhood, and if I passed it will be added to my middle grades and high school English certification.
I am planning to re-enter the teaching job market here in the USA full-time. I feel I am needed, so here I am. I will not return idealistic like I was as a youth. I return a realist and pragmatist, so therefore I might be able to survive this time. I will be up against a lot, so God give me strength. The familial decay, especially in the African American community, and the overall social degeneration that was evident when I was a young teacher, is three or four times worse now than it was when I hired for my first job as an educator.
I am not sure if I passed the exam yesterday, but I don't think I failed either. At my old high school, I finished all 120 multiple choice questions and four short essays in less than the allotted four hours. Many many people were there taking exams. I was relaxed and used the tactics for doing a standardized test I actually learned from teaching my students strategies for the TOEFL exam in Turkey five years ago.
The first time I took a teaching certification exam near the end of my graduate studies, I passed it, but I knew few less back than about test taking I did this time. In the past, I was a very nervous test taker. I don't think I even studied for my first teacher's certification exam, yet I passed.
In the last 12 months I really started to ponder how can I be of use to my people here. I go to Walmart (don't particularly like it, but I go) and see some of the elementary school kids I work with through substitute teaching, and some of them come up to me with hugs. I get hugs from black, white, and Mexican kids, and I'm not even their regular teacher. There is one little wide-eyed Mexican girl that even if she is with her mother or father at Walmart she leaves them and comes up to me with a hug.
Nowadays so many children are falling through the cracks. It almost seems to me that a lot of people are in denial of this. There is so much apathy and denial. Kids aren't little birds or other baby animals who by instinct can strike out on their own early. They need good parents and good teachers who guide them. I don't think a lot of kids get any love from their parents. The parents themselves don't really know what love is. I don't agree that teachers should be surrogate parents, but the society we live in is forcing teachers to change diapers in early Headstart classrooms and teaching morals in first grades. I see it in my town, and I wonder what the devil happened, but I don't have to really wonder. I know.
I see the society collapsing, and I know the problems are too big for me, but what is the little bit I can do right here in the place of my birth? So I hope to come back and be a servant (teacher).
I was also talking with my mother yesterday saying I am thinking of doing the research on how to run for mayor of my town. LOL Yeah, I'm really thinking about it. Getting involved in politics is not my cup of tea, but what else can I do around here to help? I am not bragging, but I'm not your typical black woman or woman in general. The people who know me are aware this is the case. I was always different. I will die a person who isn't afraid to be my true self. I've had a lot of experience with people of many races and various cultures. I am a cultural hybrid, West and East, but I am more a person who leans towards the outlook of my African side and see things like an Eastern person. What can I bring to the table here in this place?
I'm something of a news and political junky but the stress? The corruption? Me mayor of this small city with a huge university and a rather exceptional public library? But who knows? At least I can do the research and then decide if I might take on such a challenge.
Most of the population my small Southern city is black. Outside in the suburbs where I live the population is more mixed. However, the city limits has seen some gentrification in the last few years for the renovation and building of housing and flats geared towards university students who don't want to live on campus or can't find space there. My town has never had a black mayor to this date. In recent years, all the mayors have been white women.
I keep asking myself what can I do, and with my sometimes not so great health, am I tough enough? Mom in all her wisdom even said that running for mayor is very stressful. She doesn't know what the first steps to take are, but she is right that it is a stressful proposition.
For sure I want to bring back the idea of the public servant. The day of the leech, parasite, and mafia needs to come to an end. But then again sometimes I just want to drown or bury myself in poetry because I really don't like the lime/lame light at all when it comes down to it. hehehe The lame light has led some folks to an early death... #randoms
This is not a criticism of everyone, but a mediation on a few. Perhaps I'm no better than they are of whom I am writing about. I did after all post a photo of Hugo Chavez and Muammar al-Gaddafi as my cover art on Facebook and as my header on Twitter. I posted two comments about them on Facebook, and did a few Tweets and Re-Tweets on Twitter.
Hugo Chavez lost his two year battle with cancer yesterday evening, and it wasn't a surprise to me. In 2005 I got experience with cancer when both my grandmother and her son, my uncle were diagnosed. Grandma's was surgically removed, but my uncle's could not be because of the position of it and its' nature. (Another uncle currently has lung cancer.) My uncle was given chemotherapy. Grandma lived several months after the surgery, but she was 93 and did like many elderly people will react after surgery. She forgot how to eat . A feeding tube had to be inserted in her stomach. Then she developed pneumonia and died. The cancer killed my uncle the day after Christmas Day, and my grandmother followed him the next. She was never told her son had died because no one wanted to upset her. My family watched them slowly die over the year 2005. I am experienced with cancer, and I sensed that Hugo Chavez would not survive.
I am not a worshiper of any human being. There are people I admire or like very much. Most are dead though. I see only a few living people with admirable qualities these days. They may appear to at first, but most make a slip on down the line. It doesn't seem this era will permit people of true integrity and unselfishness to be. Some feel that you can't be a Christian or a devout person and have compassion for others. If you are religious you must be in the tradition of the American neo-conservative or the Muslim fundamentalist in the arena of politics. The political and social justice people of today feel that one must be an atheist or an agnostic to really have any genuine, compassionate social or political ideology. Religious belief will just get in the way in the real world. They are very wrong. But just like the old and my group built up a lot of prisons of the mind and heart the young in their twenties and thirties are doing the same thing. Plus the young have the added disease of constantly seeking attention and notoriety. Are they truly concerned about people and issues ,or are they using other people and the issues to self promote themselves?
I was telling mom tonight about how some were reacting on social media about the death of Hugo Chavez. My mother is 74. Getting a lot of attention never mattered to her. There was no movie theater where they lived when she was growing up. She was almost twenty when they got a television in about 1957 or1958. My mother was pretty and still is at 74. She never thought much about her looks. Her group didn't seek every instance and nugget and grain in life to self promote. Many people were private types back then and wanted to keep it that way. There certainly wasn't the internet where anyone can easily do self promotion and appear to be important. There was no celebrity culture like it is today. The celebrities had their place, and everyone else had theirs'. But people back then didn't live in such a time as now with its' alienation and emptiness which we as humans continue to power and drive to a place we don't need to go. But we are already in that place, this special prison we somehow walked into.
I look at the little kids on up to those through their 30s and a few beyond. Due to the nature of these times there are a few even in mom's group who are powered by this need to be great and important. Usually they are the ones who can't cope with being old and probably always were the kind who were self important.
Tonight when I told mom about the people who did blog posts in a split second, about the battle for the best cover art on Facebook and beyond containing Hugo Chavez, the repeated opinions of some and one after another going on for hours about his death, mom said about the blog posts especially, "They are like SEE how smart I am." She laughed. "You mean to tell me they're trying capitalize off a dead man?" I told mom about those who behaved with class, posted a little and didn't get into a wild competition with Hugo Chavez photos, and we both felt they were being sincere and were not involved in self aggrandizement in a dead man's name.
I am a fan of Hugo Chavez but not a fanatic. I don't have all this gushing adulation. He was imperfect like all humans, but I like him because he was fearless in the face of the US government's bullying and threats. His mission was the elevation of the poor and oppressed. He was also one of the very rare leaders who was not obviously physically black and who courageous enough to admit to having African ancestry. That takes a lot of bravery because plenty don't want to be perceived as black or African even if the DNA is hidden somewhere. Both Hugo Chavez and Muammar al-Gaddafi shown with goodness in several areas, and they had their flaws like any human being. I only worship God, not men or women. The latter will betray you, ignore you, or even if they are there and loyal, one day they will ultimately pass away.
It is not always about what we do, but how we do it and the impression we leave. Many people crave the spotlight. Some seek attention at any and all costs. They use people, even the dead ones. There are the pseudo-analysts and experts. There are the princes and princesses of mainstream, alternative, and social media. Do they have any human feelings for anyone outside of themselves I wonder sometimes?
I never like it when someone is quick to call me an expert. I don't like words like activist either because so much has been polluted by certain camps of people who go by that title. I also don't live in a place where I can really be affective in getting across any unorthodox information to wake people up. There's a certain mindset where I reside, and I can't get any support. But I have honest compassion for people, and that is better, I feel than a lot of grandstanding. I write and do the best I can when I feel well. If I can make a child happy like the one I worked with yesterday, and I was told he was a problem student, but he took to me and obeyed me as I helped him to learn leaving the class with a smiling face, I feel good. It isn't all about me. I praised that child, helped him, and to see his smile and hear his good-bye was enough for me.
Many of us lack humbleness. Being humble is not weakness or being a pushover. However, we are told that in order to succeed we must be competitive and always ready with an answer. Never admit that you don't know or are in error. We are told that if we have good looks and brains to use one or both to get ahead so we can be the king and queen of the hill. We are told all these things directly or indirectly in this worldwide culture, and along the way we have become selfish, obnoxious, plastic, bombastic, and ultimately less likeable because of our pride. This is the world we live in. To survive it I laugh about it with my mom sometimes, but deep inside I cry.
Rest in Peace Hugo Chavez. I am not sure what ideology I have. It's not one thing though. I'm also learning and observing. I used to be a Democrat. Now I'm a Pan-Africanist. Politically I lean more towards socialism somewhat and towards Orthodox Christianity faith wise. Since your eyes were on the poor and despite the imperfections, your concern for the impoverished and oppressed showed your heart was in a good spot. Jesus hung out mainly with the poor, though some want to say he drove a Cadillac and was living like a billionaire, but some of us don't buy that. Some want to cut Him completely out of the picture, but He was a threat to the establishment of his day as well, nonetheless He was perfection.
Thanks to those in social media who handled things with class tonight and then went on about your business. I really hope this post didn't come off as me trying to use a dead man to draw attention to myself. This is meant as merely a meditation and an observation.
This is going to be rambling, but here I go. This was post was stimulated by what I saw in a classroom yesterday, but I will get to that later.
Years ago after frustration and feeling the heartbreak that I was not appreciated as a teacher and had gotten the worse of it because of my race, I said I would never teach in America again. I turned my back on my profession, my people, and the society. I felt that my principal, many of my black students, and some of the white parents had taken my good intentions, enthusiasm, dedication, and concern slapped me in the face with them, threw them on the ground, and trampled them all underfoot.
I had gone into my profession idealistic and ready to go, eager to make a deep and positive impact on young lives, but instead I had been faced with bad grades, indifference, breaking up fights in the classroom or having to run to one of my male colleagues to break up the fights, being cursed at once by a student, a parent who made it painfully clear she didn't want me to teach her little blonde daughter solely because I was black, another who subtly complained because she didn't like the fact that I taught her blonde son three different subjects. You see a black person even with a masters degree couldn't possibly be capable of giving her son a quality education because the few of us who got that far were just benefactors of the handout called affirmative action and were naturally less qualified than whites. I faced a parent who complained I was giving too much homework, extracurricular activities were more important for her daughter than doing work at home to reinforce what she had been taught in the class.
There was so much I faced as a young teacher so that after two years I said never again. My soul had been slashed by knives. My spirit deflated. I rejected another contract for third year at that school, applied and was accepted into Peace Corps, went to the African nation of Botswana, enjoyed myself there, felt more at home in Africa than I ever had in America, loved my students and my international set of colleagues from various African, European, and Asian nations, loved one man in particular, it was a great romance, but it was not meant to be, came back home and went through a very dark period in my soul, recovered from the depression, and in the last few years taught English occasionally in Turkey.
It is not easy being an educated black woman in America. I have an Eastern bent to my mentality than most of the people I live among. I am a hybrid of sorts, American in name but more Eastern than American. African Americans used to be closer to our African counterparts on the continent and other Eastern people back in my grandparent's era. My mother's parents were very much like some African and Middle Eastern people. They were deeply religious and unselfish. Even though they were poor they helped those they knew who were poorer and more desperate. They were devoted to the well-being of their families, hated divorced, were well liked by their communities and even by many of the whites they knew. These were the heroes I looked at and were influenced by including my mother who is just like her beloved mother and father. They live on in her and in two of their other surviving children. I didn't have to look to the TV and have some celebrity or sports figure as my role model. I lived with and visited my role models.
It is not easy to live in America. It's even more difficult and lonely if you refuse to model yourself after everyone else. The is a recipe to being an American, and most people follow that recipe. Blacks expect you to be just like them, and whites expect you to be a version of their envisioned stereotype. All my life I have longed to be free to be me, not have some vision of who I am supposed to be imposed on me by my own people or white people.
I would say that life has gone nothing like I had hoped partly because I was very different from most in my environment from almost the very beginning. At various points in my life I have been an outcast. Other times I was applauded, usually by foreigners and a few others. I've had few real friends. Either I got bored and frustrated with them or they got bored with me. I refused to settle for less, so I have been often alone with mainly my family except in the last few years. For a long time I have felt more at home with non-Americans than I have Americans. I am not an optimist like many Americans. I am more of a fatalist and realist, but I am attracted to mysticism. The world of the mind and of a higher plain outside of what we can see with the physical eye is more real to me sometimes than the absurdity of this world.
I have come back and for better or worse I am going to try and help my people again. I have been substitute teaching randomly in the last several years when I was not teaching English in Turkey. When I was certified to teach in my state, I could teach anywhere from grades 4 to 12, but after elementary school I was confined to only the subjects of social studies and English which are my two favorite areas. If the children in these groupings are not taught love of learning and respect for teachers and other adults by this age there is very little that can be done, I feel. This may sound harsh and discouraging to some, but by second or third grade many kids in this country are infested with arrogance and dislike learning. Many including people in the government blame the schools, but few are courageous enough to blame the parents, but maybe they don't because of their own guilt over their lax parenting. Some say the schools are grooming kids for our prison industrial complex, and yes the way some schools are formulated, this is probably true, but a lot of parents are also aiding in their kids' downfall. Then at the same time there is the threatening cloud of the state taking away people's kids if there is the accusation of abuse which can come even if a parent is not being abusive, but is only trying to discipline an unruly child. The system we live under craves more prison inmates and just sits there like some big predatory fish with his mouth wide open for small fish to just swim right in.
Next week I begin an experiment to help my people. I will be teaching a course at a local community center on African historical figures from J.A. Rogers' first volume of World's Great Men of Color. I have Facebook friends who live in other countries, a few who help and try to enlightened others. They have been a big influence on me and an inspiration even though I haven't met any of them face to face. They write prose and poetry, have gatherings to talk about geopolitics and write articles about wars and their consequences. Some are guests on international news networks that I watch online. Some have gone on peace missions, and organize and go to demonstrations. In other words they are trying to make a difference, a phrase commonly said in this country. I am invited to some of their gatherings, but sadly I live too far. Even though my residence is in a small city with a huge state university, this place is an intellectual and cultural wasteland. I was a part of a writer's group for almost four years, but no deep and honest critiquing of anyone's work was done, When the leader of the group become so self obsessed, stop coming with anything to read and only wanted to talk about gifts she got from her grandson and men, I quit silently without saying another word to her or sending an e-mail. I was also a part of what I call a pseudo-intellectual group run by some so-called friends who are Turkish. They are mostly doctoral students, but they don't seem to have the dedication or level of knowledge to be Ph.D candidates. To me is it very strange to sit in a room with a group of people working on higher degrees who are too afraid to voice their own opinions. I got tired of being one of four openly expressing my views in that group when all the rest were too afraid to open their mouths.
Recently I was invited to a gathering of black ladies, but after sitting through a presentation given by the head of the local Red Cross, a middle aged, dyed blonde, fat, white female who acted like she was still God's gift to men I said I would not go to a second meeting which I was invited to. I've so tired of going to some prosaic gathering dressed up as something interesting and refreshing when it really isn't just to get out of the house. I like my own company better than being bored to the edge of insanity.
As to Gangnam Style, it has replaced one of Justin Bieber's songs in some of the elementary schools here. The pre-K and kindergarten set require more than Mary Had a Little Lamb and The Itsy Bitsy Spider nowadays. Such nursery rhymes and childhood songs just don't cut it with kids raised on TV and Gameboys. Learning must be backed up by entertainment or the kids go cold to it and stay jittery. Yesterday I worked in a pre-K class and the parapro couldn't get the kids to pay much attention to swaying houses with lyrics about numbers and days of the week, but when she pulled up a version of Psy's Gangnam Style on the smart board, the kids were all eyes. They wouldn't dance before but when Psy and a woman dancing in hot pants, garters, and police cap got on the screen they did. At four they are already being conditioned to become disciples of fads and commercialized entertainment like the rest of the population. Today's media is extremely adroit in indoctrinating all ages. It was sad to see that early they are learning to conform to what doesn't promote art and culture, the here today gone tomorrow opiates that the media pushes down their throats. Learning for learning sake died some time ago in this country. It is advocated in educational circles that education and entertainment must be wed in the American classroom. American kids need an assortment of extras to get excited about learning. Still so many of them fall short.
I liked the parapro at the school today. Despite hating her choice of putting up a video of Gangnam Style, I guess she felt the only way she could grab the attention of a large class of 4 year olds, a number of which were highly jittery was to start up a popular pop song. She and I sat together at recess and talked, finding common ground since both of us plan to take the state teacher's certification exam this spring. She even asked me about myself. Often as a substitute teacher and being a black woman people just expect that you probably have only a high school diploma or less. Most don't ask me about myself. Living abroad where people were often curious about me resulted in my being spoiled a little. I was more visible abroad and sometimes got weary of the attention. At the schools here they probably couldn't imagine that I have taught both here and internationally and that I have a higher degree. Sometimes as a substitute I feel invisible, but I make myself feel better about that invisibility by conducting myself professionally and dressing better than the majority of the teachers. I still believe in professionalism in attire on the job. In Botswana and Turkey the standards for dress at work were higher than here. It's difficult for me to go to schools and see teachers dressed in jeans, tennis shoes, and some even showing cleavage. What happened to high standards and dress codes?
I don't worry so much about the majority or white culture around me. My concern is for my people. I am not sure there is much hope for us locked into an alien identity that has scarred us. I am not saying that all white people are bad, but there is so much that is wrong in the culture which destroys lasting human connections on so many levels. I remained connected to my ancestral values mainly due to how I was taught by my mother and witnessed from her parents. My father is very American in his outlook. He admits that even as a child he dreamed of having what white people had. His family was not close and very dysfunctional. He and some other family members say they don't like having people coming around visiting all the time. In all the years that he visited his in-laws he never allowed himself to open my grandparents' refrigerator once even though almost everyone they allowed into their home were treated with hospitality. You're at home, my grandmother would say. I wonder how my grandparents felt about my father never trying to really make himself at home for all those years. Dad's mother grew up in an abusive and violent home and then married my grandfather who drank, was abusive and unfaithful. He said she would tell him to never accept food at the home of his friends even if he was offered it. I feel the suspicion, competitiveness, narcissism, and paranoia that some of the members of my father's family have, including himself, are some of the worse symptoms of white American culture. However, despite the differences I've had with my father and continue to have I must say that one spot I praise him in is that he has successfully run a small business for many years and states that black people must become more independent, productive, and have their own businesses.
So this is my rambling post. I guess I just wanted to get a few things off my mind even though this was inspired by seeing little kids dance to Gangnam Style in a classroom. I wonder often where are we going as people. It never gets better despite all of the so-called improvements, all the "grand" propaganda that is touted. It will never get better until we examine ourselves and realize where we are heading.
Try to imagine that your country has been targeted in a war which its' instigators claim is an humanitarian effort. This isn't the first time in history that war has been termed "humanitarian" even though almost no war is humanitarian or humane. For centuries leaders and states have claimed they needed to rescue a particular group or region, but often their motives were not altruistic but selfish and in their nation's own interests.
Try to imagine that during the days and weeks that your small nation is being bombed by 20 or more other countries, you not only have to hold yourself together in the amidst of all the uncertainty and fear of what might happen next, but you also have to maintain courage for others such as your children.
Try to imagine that late one night after one of your kid's birthday party the previous day, you are out late helping somebody and on your way back home you get a telephone call that your home has been bombed.
I wonder sometimes how do you survive a war even if your body isn't destroyed by bombs or bullets. How do you come out of it with any of your mind left intact?
My mind is on another war again like it was for years on the one in Iraq. I thought about the second Iraq War for all the years it grinded on. In many ways it still isn't over. Iraqis are still dying from bombings, but news about Iraq faded away from American TV news years ago. Though Obama pulled out the troops the other year, the US has left a residue of itself behind with the world's largest embassy. The residue is always left behind. Ask several other countries in at least the last 65 years. I still Tweet about Iraq occasionally on Twitter, but Libya's war in 2011 is more immediate for me now. It supposedly ended last year, but that country is not the same as it was. It is still very unstable, and so much bitterness, grief, and broken lives are left. Its is a great tragedy that is not being talked about just like it wasn't talked about concerning Iraq or Afghanistan. All is not well.
I have three Libyan Facebook friends. Two sent me friends requests, and I sent the request to one who was a mutual friend of another Facebook friend who had been in Libya last year even up to the time when Tripoli fell and shortly afterwards. I learned a little bit about his tragic story so I wanted to include him on my friend's list. His name is Khaled K. Elhamedi. He is the founder of the International Organization for Peace, Care and Relief (IOPCR) which was one of Libyan's biggest and most well known charities and NGOs. On June 20th of last year his home in the town of Sorman was bombed by NATO forces in the middle of the night. His pregnant wife, young daughter and small son who had just celebrated his third birthday the previous day were all killed. Khaled was not at home at the time. He had been away trying to help other victims of NATO's attacks. Since Khaled is from a prominent Libyan family and NATO targeted anyone they felt might be close to or supported the Green (Jamahiriya) Libyan government, I would term it an assassination. Other family, friends, and employees were assassinated that night in his home bringing the total number of dead to 13. The house and several others in the neighborhood were demolished by bombing including his father's house.
Since the murder of his family, Khaled has struggled through his overwhelming grief to go on, and during this terrible process he has begun legal proceedings against NATO. His website that details his actions is ICENA or International Coalition to Ensure NATO Accountability. Its' Facebook page can be found here. Besides these links that he sent me he also directed my attention to an article on Voltairenet, an account of what happened to his family: The Sorman Massacre.
Last week I first saw Part Two of a documentary, NATO's Gifts to the Children of Libya on my Facebook timeline. I took the time to look at the entire short and heartbreaking documentary. When I look at Khaled, his mother, and sisters I am astounded by their courage, that they would still keep trying to live. I just don't think I would be able to keep going on. However, my mother and late grandmother both have often said to me in the past that God will not put too much on us that we can't bear. There is obviously some truth in it considering how some people can somehow wade through tragedy and still keep standing. I feel it must be like carrying a mountain on one's back yet still attempting to climb another mountain.
I have posted Parts One and Two of NATO's Gifts to the Children of Libya below. NATO, the UN, and the US don't bother to keep accurate body counts. It is estimated that from 50,000 to at least 100,000 Libyans were killed and injured in the war. Anywhere from a million to two million fled the country or were displaced. It's going to be a long and very difficult process, but I hope that eventually justice will be done for Khaled Elhamedi's family and all innocents, civilians, the helpless, and the wounded who lived and died in Libya in that terrible and tragic year of 2011. Khaled has asked that people continue to spread the word about what happened to his family and other children in Libya. Lest we forget...
After some passing years I am re-discovering and focusing on my African roots again. As I've written in a previous post, I consider myself to be an African in America even though my historical ties to Africa were cut a few centuries ago. I was born in America, but genetically I will always be an African, and I refuse to deny it, be ashamed of it, or fear it.
The first foreign country I lived in was in Africa. In the last 9 years I've forged ties to Turkey and traveled and worked there many times. Turkey was an episode in my life. I appreciate the friendship I had with Turkish people, the acquaintances I made, and enjoyed working with Turkish students, but I am not Turkish. There are some similarities in my family background to experiences found in Turkish culture (ie. close knit family on my mom's side, strict parents), but most non-Western cultures share some similarities, and even though I was born in the West my outlook is not completely Western. Most of my life I've felt like an outcast and a hybrid. It has been especially difficult for me being so different because I live in the American Deep South and I am also quite intellectual in my outlook which is something that's rather unique with most blacks and whites in the South and throughout America. African-American culture is also quite dictatorial in its' views on conformity. Most African-Americans are very much in the box thinkers. We are not going stray too far outside the herd. For me, to stray away from t the herd has made it a tough journey. Still I have no regrets for refusing to conform.
From the first I've gotten along fine with Africans I've met. I was curious about them, and I was surprised that they were curious about me. Perhaps they were because I didn't act like the "typical American." I've gotten the comment from many foreign people that I don't act like the average or typical American. I am who I am. It really is no act. I was always different and felt out of place here. I tried to conform in early middle school, but my attempt failed and from then on I've developed my own individuality and personality without even the fear of being alone. I'm human and I get lonely sometimes, but I'd much rather be myself than compromise by putting on a mask.
I ran across the above video on YouTube a few weeks ago. The young woman in it is of Ugandan and Jamaican parentage. Growing up she experienced a great deal of intra-racial prejudice from African-Americans.
On social media I'm getting more and more followers and people on my friend's lists who are Africans. I follow a number of African and Afrocentric pages on Facebook. I've started reading Afrocentric history and works by African writers once again.
More and more Africans seem to be more visible online these days. It's a good idea for African- or black Americans (some of us don't like to be called African-American) to connect with them. Africans reach out to me, and I reach back. Many African-Americans have negative feelings towards Africans. Online I've encountered almost all the blame for slavery being lain at the door of Africans. It used to be Arabs only, now dark skinned Africans are blamed.
There are some whites who meddle and want to ease the blame from their history. They are quick to point out to African-Americans that the Africans sold you into slavery. Some of them do this whenever they see an American black who wants to seek their historical, cultural, and genetic identity. I don't feel it's their business, but perhaps at the core of their words is a fear that blacks on the continent and in the Diaspora will eventually unite. What might happen if they do? Oppressed people are best kept fragmented.
Many Africans speak two or more languages. Often when they come to America they arrive to further their education they are very dedicated students. Perhaps some whites fear that we will begin to value education and hook up with the Africans. If we stop feeling that learning and education is "white," that would mean more competition between whites and blacks here.
I first met Africans was when I was a university student. The very first was my roommate. She was from Nigeria, and her father was a doctor. I was a freshman at Spelman College, and in the freshman class only her, me, and one or two other girls were serious about why we were at the school. Most of the others were mainly concerned with dating and partying. Bola, was one of the most studious people I had ever encountered then or since. In fact, she was a fanatic about studying, getting up early in the morning to hit the books before classes. After classes she rarely came back to the dorm until late. She stayed in the library until closing time.
Later in graduate school at the University of Georgia I met African students, some of whom were Ph.D. candidates. They were mainly from countries like Somalia, Malawi, and Kenya.
Much later I was in Peace Corps in Botswana. I felt for the first time that I come to my true home. I felt so much pride to learn the African National Anthem in Setswana and to see black people controlling their own country where the whites were only the guests. No one talked about color even against racist apartheid South Africa which was just next door. The Africans and whites referred to each other by their nationalities.
I met people in Botswana from African countries such as Ethiopia, South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Ghana. I was struck by the natural elegance in which the African women carried themselves. There was an aura and softness about them that many African-American women lack. They were not boastful or seemed as if they were compelled to put on a big show that they were strong women. Some African-American women often declare that, "I'm a strong black woman," but I never heard any African woman say this. I never saw one African woman act like she felt she had to prove something. I haven't been on the continent for years, but I don't seen such statements coming from African women in social media. The ones I've observed seem to have a quiet strength and knowledge.
There is a pungent scene in the mini-series Roots when Kunta Kinte is being whipped by the white overseer because he refuses to relinquish his African name and take the slave name Toby. Even though he is beaten unconscious Kunta says his African name up until the time he passes out from the pain. Despite being kidnapped from his homeland and becoming a captive and a slave, Kunta Kinte tries his best to retain tiny remembrances and remnants of his culture close to him and in his memory. He gives his only child an African name. He never turned his back on his true home.
For a brief time, back in the 1970s particularly, African-Americans tried to connect with the "Motherland" as many here referred to the continent. Many men and women wore their hair in Afros, the bigger the better. Some wore African inspired prints and dashikis. Some couples didn't want to dress in the Western way at their weddings. They insisted on wearing African garb when they tied the knot. For some the black existence didn't begin for them in America; they wanted to read about African history and the struggle. They refused to accept the Hollywood version of ancient Egyptians and some even went so far as to say Jesus was black. "Black is beautiful" and "Black Power" were charms that gave them confidence, pride, and a sense of hope.
Now 40 or more years later we have regressed and are back where we came from. In many cases we are in a worse shape. Many African-Americans are lost identity wise. So much of our so-called culture is based on negativity. I believe a lot of this comes from unacknowledged despair. We're devastated spiritually and mentally as a people. Western materialism is not the cure for us or anyone else, but we know nothing else to cling to. Our things can't save us, make us whole or teach us how to be good husbands, wives, and parents. Families are the basis of any society, and in the African-America marriage and family is nearly extinct.
There is a kind of silent war raging both in the white dominated culture and within us. One of the worse aspects of this war is our denial, indifference, and hatred of our African roots. I remember when I was a child how some of the black kids used to make fun of Africans saying they were all ugly and jet-black. The only African people they ever saw were in National Geographic or on TV. Africans were always described as primitive, warlike, or undernourished. Their traditional faiths were seen as wicked and dangerous.
When I met my first live Africans I was surprised how some of them looked like blacks in America. I saw how some were very dark like the Somalis and Zambians, but also so attractive and charming. I'd learned years ago that skin color didn't determine physical loveliness. I also was impressed how learned some of the Africans were. Their accents were melodious and soothing. They were like us blacks, but also very different. I had never seen whites or blacks in America with the kind of aura I sensed in the Africans. I felt like to talk to them and enjoy their company continuously for days.
Now with social media, African-Americans and Africans have the opportunity to connect, but I doubt if most will. From my experience most Africans will not be standoffish unless African-Americans behave that way. They will reach out to us. Now in some cases they won't and will even have an elitist attitude towards African-Americans. However, this has not happened to me except one or two times. This old article called African vs. African-American: A Shared Complexion Does Not Guarantee Racial Solidarity is still relevant and a must read.
We have a president who is part African. Over 90% of African-Americans support him and many even have a cult-like worship for him. Strangely even though some of us hate Africans, we love Obama unquestioningly. We either overlook, dismiss, ignore, are ignorant of, make excuses for any of his wrongdoing. Obama shows very little sign that he identifies with his black or African side. Some of us make excuses and say with pride that unlike a lot of brothers who move up in the world he didn't marry a white woman or a light skinned black woman. He married a dark sister, not realizing that a person can have scorn or distaste for an entire race, but will sometimes date or even marry one from that race for which he or she has racist feelings towards. The one who is liked, loved or "loved," is seen as perhaps an exceptional case and less distasteful as the group he or she came from. All of our posturing aside, most African-Americans like many Americans are politically naive and reckless while making choices in the political process. . Life just comes in a couple of shades, and that is all we can see or will allow ourselves to see.
I feel one day we are really going to need the Africans. Our history did not begin with the brutality and crime of slavery. Our history goes back hundreds and thousands of years. We should learn about it and be proud of it. It's well past time to re-establish contact with our people and overcome our prejudices and racism against folks who bare some of the same DNA as us.
In January I will begin trying to contribute my own part in rebuilding our connections with our people. I have asked one of the community centers here in town if I might teach a course using J.A. Rogers' first volume of World's Great Men of Color. The community center director who is white unhesitatingly agreed to have me teach a course at the center when I presented him with my idea. It will be a hard task of conquering indifference or dislike of Africans, but I am going to try. Also I am fully aware that history is not interesting or important to a lot of people in this society. Africa is overlooked, even by some of its' own born there.
We live in an era when white Western culture dominates the world and worldview of many who aren't even white or Western. I feel that my people need to start learning who they really are. The time of shame and being whipped and beaten in our minds like Kunte Kinte needs to come to an end.
I took a little break from blogging mainly because I was lazy about it. Also I have a lot on my mind, but I am back now.
I was just reading a book by African writer Bessie Head entitled A Woman Alone which is a collection of her musings about her life, life in general, life in Africa, life as an African, racism, colonialism; she packed a lot into a little book. But Bessie Head wrote in that manner and she admits so in this book.
There are a number of things she wrote in this book that have stayed with me. I even dog-eared the pages where passages that touched me are located. One passage says 'It seems to me that it is only the Afro-American, because of what they have suffered, who is capable of this deep compassion.' She wrote this in her essay, "God and the Underdog: Thoughts on the Rise of Africa."
I would say once as late as the beginnings and middle of my parent's generation we African-Americans had immense compassion for those who suffered, but as the doors real or imaginary opened for us, as we because more middle class or aspired to become so or move even higher to millionaire status, we lost our compassion and ability to identify with those who are less fortunate. This is common among all oppressed or unappreciated groups. Once they get a little more, they start looking down on those left behind.
It has become even more critical for African-Americans with the election of the "first black president." We have a president who bombs and is just as deceptive as all the rest before him, but since we have rather lost our souls and conscience as a people, we support him out of black pride or just intense silent hatred of whites. We don't seem to realize anymore that loyalty and evil don't mix. There is no need to feel compelled to support him if he is wrong. But that is one of many minefields we as a people have allowed ourselves to walk unawares into, and because Obama is picked on so much by conservative whites we believe we must have compassion for him because we see our own plight in him. Does he really deserve our compassion though since he is weak and refuses to bring up the issue of race in America? He has skirted it for close to four years now. I finally threw up my hands in disgust and horror last year with his endorsement of the bloodbath in Libya. I had already lost most of my respect for him when he said we needed to turn over a new leaf in US history and forget about the war criminals from the previous administration. He knew the job requirements of his post is to be a war criminal and that eventually he would commit many outrageous acts. Really there was nothing he could do since he was a member of that system, of that club.
So what is my point? My point is African-Americans and many others today misplace their compassion. We will defend Obama or some millionaire or celebrity tooth and nail if they are berated. We will defend some man or woman who brought hardship on themselves because of their reckless or immoral actions because we can "identify" with their actions and how badly they were treated. We take the morally low road every single time and then complain about how life seems to get crazier and more uncertain by the day. The more glamorous the moral and intellectual weaklings are the more we have compassion for their failings, because we have such a low standard now and despise anyone who tries to lift us out of our pig pens.
Now where should our misplaced compassion really be directed? For a start some of us have people right around us who are silently suffering, feeling inadequate, devalued, and lonely. But we often time feel they are too lowly for our concerns. How come so and so won't extricate his or herself out of their pity party? I am just sick and tired of so and so and his or her depression. I am just too busy. Hey! We all have our problems. Get over it! Aren't you supposed as a friend be entertaining me and keeping me on a high all the time? I don't have time for your sadness and pent up anger.
So in this time it's about being too busy or some empty gesture or expression. Then we wonder when there is the surprising suicide. Always I hear the same excuses, "I just wish I could have been there for so and so. He/she was there for me." If only. If only. If only. Note the selfishness.
I've also witnessed a new phenomenon. I'm a person who loves to help others for unselfish reasons. I had several examples when growing up that showed me that it's better to give than to receive: my mother's parents, my mom, my mom's sister, and reading children's Bible stories about Jesus. I also had some really hardworking and selfless teachers in school. Curriculum wise they didn't have much to work with, but they (white and black) supported me since I was a hardworking student. What I saw in the realm of unselfishness and loyalty remained with me and silently shaped me.
But times began to creep along to the existence we're living in now, and I saw a big change. Now I see a lot of people who are afraid if you reach out to them, so I discover myself drawing back, and I don't like that. I've offered my ear to so-called friends whom I could detect had problems, and they rejected it. I've gotten little in life that are normal rewards, but I'm still out there fighting and thinking about others who are having a hard time. I need to think about me more, I admit, and strike a balance between concern for myself and others, but it will be hard to change how I was molded. This is who I am. I just happen to live in a place and time where it's arid intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally with many people. But I feel I am the way God intended because I refuse to think that selfishness is the better route.
Instead of our imaginary celebrity and famous friends, we need to think about the people around us who are hurting. The country I live in is a warrior country that has been attacking places it can easily disrupt for a very long time. This didn't start 12 years ago. I as a person who believes in morality think everyday of the justification that is made to kill hundreds of thousands of innocent people to the east of here. I put myself in those people's shoes and wonder how I would feel, so I include those people I don't know in my concern and compassion too. They are human. My compassion was extended a long time back outside my little world. As a person who believes in and fears God (I commit sins too, but I know when I am wrong and regret it) I believe I am feeling the right way.
Stop offering compassion to those who are contributing to the calamities of our times, and start offering it to the ones who deserve it whether near or far.
