What Are You Celebrating?
What Are You Celebrating?
Junious Ricardo Stanton
The United States will hold a huge celebration for the two hundred fiftieth anniversary of the founding of this nation. Many Blacks will be caught up in the celebrations, the festivities and merriment. But when we think about our experiences in this hemisphere even before the nation was founded, what do we have to celebrate and why are we overlooking the horrors we have experienced, the crimes against humanity this nation and its leadership or more correctly its mis-leadership have committed during its existence as a sovereign nation. What exactly are we as Africans in America celebrating?
I get it, a
day off being able to be with friends and family are a great way to pass the
time and I realize we should not remain focused entirely on the past; nevertheless,
we need to acknowledge what we have come through and honestly ask ourselves
have conditions and the consciousness of this nation changed enough for us to
think and believe we are an integral part of this nation?
We are here
but are we really a part of America? Our people have fought in every major war,
but do you know the United States has been at war with one group or nation
eighty-six percent of its existence since it was founded?! https://www.thenews.pk/print/1402664-us-has-been-at-war-for-86pc-of-its-history.
The fact of the matter is during the colonial era successive wars were fought
between the European nation states as well as the indigenous people who were
living on this land thousands of years before Europeans came here! These people
love war, is this something you think is worthy of celebration?
Black
people have been in this hemisphere before the first kidnaped Blacks landed in English
colonial Virginia in 1619. Africans were here with the European soldiers of
fortune who came to settle, plunder and pillage this land in the sixteenth
century. Blacks came to Virginia in 1619 as captives aboard a Portuguese Man o’
War (manned by pirates and thieves) who were exchanged for vittles and supplies
with the British settler/invaders.
These early
African arrivals were treated as indentured servants who later were
“integrated” into Jamestown colonial life and were able to advance by their
efforts because they were skilled farmers and craftsmen with no racial stigma attached
to them; that would come later. According to historian Lerone Bennett Jr these
early Africans eventually petitioned the colonial government for their freedom
and won. In some instances, Africans attained higher status than many European
indentured servants. Read Before The Mayflower by Lerone Bennett
Jr to see how the first Africans lived, survived and worked in their new
environment.
However,
the colonial owners and investors were looking for greater profits and they saw
a huge disadvantage and security risk keeping Whites on the bottom of the
social order. First, they needed them as cannon fodder for their genocide of
the indigenous people and the occupation of their lands. They also feared more rebellions
and revolts. They feared Whites uniting with indigenous people and Africans to
resist the brutal and exploitative colonial infrastructure which had happened on
numerous occasions. Plus only a little
over half of the Whites actually lived to finish out their indenture contracts
and get their land, tobacco and seeds because working conditions were so
brutal. https://lsintspl3.wgbh.org/en-us/lesson/ush22-il-baconsrebellion/4
So, a fateful decision was made by
the ruling class to use mainly African labor and to institutionalize and
systematize them into an inferior status first based on their not being
Christians but later on skin pigmentation. It went from bad to worse as additional
colonial governments passed laws mandating and consigning Blacks into repressive
subjugation and inferior status under oppressive policies that legalized perpetual
bondage/enslavement with no rights or privileges. This is a fact. It is an
integral part of this nation’s history. Now Donald Trump wants to white-wash
and suppress this truth. Is this what you are celebrating? How does this make
you feel?
When the US Constitution was written and
ratified even though the word slavery was never mentioned, the “peculiar
institution” was codified into the law of the land. Contained in that document: Article I Sections
2 and 9 and Article IV Section 2 made Black enslavement the law and profitable source
of revenue because the Constitution allowed for a tax not to exceed ten dollars
to be imposed for each “person” imported. Read it for yourself. Is this what
you and your family and friends are celebrating?
The mindset and “values” imbedded
in the Constitution set the tone and tenor for our sojourn in America until
this present day! Even after so called Reconstruction, the Thirteenth Amendment
did not totally abolish slavery, the Fourteenth Amendment has not provided
equal protection under the law and the Fifteenth Amendment certainly has not
guaranteed us the right to vote, as we see with the machinations to suppress
our vote today! Are you celebrating this?
Do you think this history of wars,
genocide and slavery are worth celebrating? In my opinion we should be engaged
in protracted struggle to protect and empower ourselves to ensure our human
rights. But as with anything the choice is up to us, partying or standing up
for ourselves. Which will you choose?
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posted by Junious Ricardo Stanton @ 8:13 AM
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