Going the Distance

The old saying, “The end justifies the means” seems to be the most common form of consequentialism used by whites to excuse the behavior of their ancestors. Coupled with the White Saviour Complex, many whites honestly believe that if it hadn’t been for them, the world would be in utter shambles; That almost nothing of significance had taken place among any group of people prior to their so-called myriad of achievements. That their intervention was absolutely necessary & that they made the most contributions to help develop the modern world & that almost every tactic used to do so was vital & that the ‘good’ results far outweighs any perceived ‘bad’ done to reach them.

Those who make these type of claims often will reach beyond the outer ends of the universe to validate them, glossing over, ignoring or oblivious to underlying factors to their ‘truths’. For instance, on the subject of slavery, too often do whites bring up instances of whites being slaves – failing to acknowledge that they still benefit today from the enslavement & following marginalization of blacks vs. no blacks in America having ever received any benefits from the enslavement of whites. Or they’ll try to absolve themselves of any responsibility of trying to help end systemic racism by pointing out that their ancestors had nothing to do with slavery, as if that’s somehow relevant.

Every single white person in America benefits from systemic racism no matter what their ancestors history, or their socioeconomic status. Many whites ancestors came to America for a better life knowing full well what took place to secure these lands & make it a wealthy & powerful country. Yet instead of shaming America & fighting for the people who have been displaced, alienated, dehumanized, exploited & marginalized, they flocked here to take advantage of the freedoms achieved off the genocide & enslavement of those people. They will also mention such in the context of how many other groups of people faced major hardships throughout history who have been able to recover at lightning speeds past what black people have thus far – failing to acknowledge the countless ways in which blacks efforts have been undermined. Quick to remind us that slavery was so long ago, not recognizing that slavery hasn’t really ended in this country, it’s just evolved.

See, for centuries now, whites have had to make these grandiose claims in order to fill their egos & to solidify their false sense of superiority. When most of your entire history, existence & worth has been built up & made powerful off the perceived worthlessness & powerlessness of others, this image of superiority must be upheld by any means necessary to keep those claims valid. One example, to point out that nations all over the globe have had their conflicts & wars, that there are none without a dark past, that still – America is the most just & civilized, yet failing to mention the over 130 wars the US is currently fighting. Quick to point out the warlords & terrorists in other nations, not realizing that we are also the warlords & terrorists occupying & destabilizing others nations. But it’s for the greater good, right? Maybe for white America, not everybody!

America thinks it knows what’s best for everybody, yet only does what’s best for itself at the expense of everybody else. And far too many white Americans believe that they should be praised & that everyone should be thankful for all the freedoms they feel they made possible, instead of acknowledging, praising & being thankful for all the indigenous people robbed & slaughtered, & those who were enslaved & marginalized in order to make modern white American life possible. And far too many like to believe that the worst of what America has done was so long ago, that nobody today should be held accountable, despite the fact they still benefit from those atrocities today. That there are still no limits to the distances whites will reach to maintain their image & validate their privilege.

Example: This highly disrespectful plaque posted at a Georgia State Park, claiming that white ‘pioneers’ blazed the trail of civilization there, not mentioning the hate, disease, genocide, slavery & other atrocities they blazed to achieve their definition of civil.

One repeatedly used tactic to keep America’s “Good Guy” image is to always claim there’s an entity out to take away or destroy everything that America holds dear, the main thing being freedom. That these entities want to do to America what America has always done & continues to do to others. Over the past nearly two decades, America’s main boogey-men have tended to be Muslim. In the beginning, the focus was mainly regional & mostly on key figures, but lately it’s broadening out to an entire religion & culture whose people make up nearly a quarter of the global population, due to the actions of a few. Now, maybe I am reaching quite a distance myself in pondering the possibilities of some of the great lengths America is going to strengthen the integrity of its image:

I don’t see how the same country who has so many citizens standing behind a person like Donald Trump could have ever elected Obama, let alone twice. I truly believe that Obama was used as a pacifier to shut black people up. To pretend to itself & the rest of the world that we’ve finally transcended race, also using him to shut gays up – to pretend to the rest of the world that we’ve finally transcended our gender & sexuality issues. Now Hillary has be used to try to shut the women up – to make it appear that America is now truly a place where all people are equal & treated as such, despite reality showing us the contrary.

And America still needs its boogey-man to look down upon, to appear holier than thou. Just days after a national broadcast of the funeral of very well-known & respected Muslim man, Muhammad Ali, who sacrificed his freedom to refrain from using violence, a Muslim man attacks America, targeting our gays that America has only very recently started acting like they cared about? The timing is impeccable… America couldn’t let the Muslim community be shed in a positive light for more than a few days. Sorry, but not sorry if I don’t believe that a single gunman, who had just days before purchased the weapons used, was able to become such a skilled gun operator & shooter in such a short time. Or that he was accurate enough to shoot over 100 people without anyone even trying to stop him. That a man under previous investigation by the FBI was not heavily surveilled after making a weapons purchase.

Would America really go that far to push its agendas, to stabilize its image, to keep its ego inflated? Hasn’t it before? And gone even further? To what ends will America go to prove its better than the rest while simultaneously acting as bad as the worst??

White History Month

Every year without fail, during Black History Month, black people catch flack for celebrating, accused of racism for focusing only on black history and accomplishments. Often it’s asked, “Why don’t we have a White History Month?” Well, I thought I’d share something I saw on Facebook, a list of things that should be highlighted during that month, if ever created:
1 Cherokee Trail of Tears
2 Japanese-American internment
3 Philippine-American War
4 Jim Crow
5 The genocide of Native Americans
6 Transatlantic slave trade
7 The Middle Passage
8 The history of White American racism
9 Black Codes
10 Slave patrols
11 Ku Klux Klan
12 The War on Drugs
13 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo
14 How white racism grew out of slavery and genocide
15 How whites still benefit from slavery and genocide
16 White anti-racism
17 The Southern strategy
18 The rape of enslaved women
19 Madison Grant
20 The Indian Wars
21 Human zoos
22 How the Jews became white
23 White flight
24 Redlining/Gentrification
25 Proposition 14
26 Homestead Act
27 Tulsa Riots/Black Wall Street
28 Rosewood massacre
29 Tuskegee Experiment
30 Lynching
31 Hollywood stereotypes
32 Indian Appropriations Acts
33 Immigration Act of 1924
34 Sundown towns
35 Chinese Exclusion Act
36 Emmett Till
37 Vincent Chin
38 Islamophobia
39 Indian boarding schools
40 King Philip’s War
41 Bacon’s Rebellion
42 American slavery compared to Arab, Roman and Latin American slavery
43 History of the gun
44 History of the police
45 History of prisons
46 History of white suburbia
47 Lincoln’s racism and anti-racism
48 George Wallace Governor of Alabama
49 Cointelpro
50 Dotbusters
51 School tracking
52 Mass incarceration of black men
53 Boston school busing riots
54. Man made Ebola and A.I.D.S.
55  Church Bombings and fires in deep south to Blacks
56. Church Shootings
57. How the Irish and Italians became white
58. The Perpetuation of the idea of the “model minority”
59. Housing discrimination
60. Systematic placement of highways and building projects to create ghettos
61. Medical experimentation on poor PoC (people of color) especially Blacks (including surgical and gynecological experimentation)
62. History of Planned Parenthood
63. Forced Sterilization
64. Cutting children out of pregnant Black mothers as part of lynchings
65. Eurocentric beauty standard falsification
66. Erasure and eradication of all achievements of Ancient Africa and Kemet
67. White-washing of history and cultural practices of PoC
68. Media manipulation and bias
69. Perpetuation of the myth of reverse racism
70. The history of white cannibalism
71. White Fragility
72. Indian Removal Act
73. Red Summer of 1919
74. Compromise of 1877
75. The Assassination of Dr King

And a perspective about Black History Month from Zipporah LeGarde:

Black History Month, as well as other history months based on racial history, aren’t racist. BHM is no more racist than Breast Cancer Awareness month is discriminatory against other types of cancer. Racism is defined as privilege plus power, and something that uses racial lines to instill a hierarchy in society, usually with white on the top. So, from a sociological standpoint, only Euro-Americans can exercise racism, but racial minorities can only be prejudiced.

That being said, the purpose of these months is to highlight the contributions racial minorities have made to the fabric of America. Some of you believe we don’t “need” these months, bringing up what Morgan Freeman said (regardless of the fact most black and other minority intellectuals have written countless articles rebuffing his point of view. Sorry y’all, Freeman is an actor, not a race scholar, and doesn’t speak for the entire black race – we are not monolithic in our blackness). But you’re not looking at the larger picture. Tell me when, in school, you learned about a minority in history that wasn’t Harriet Tubman, MLK, George W. Carver, *maybe* Malcolm X, you see the point? And you *probably* learned about them during BMH.

Black History IS American History, and if our educational system made more of an effort to incorporate minorities (including women) into the story of how America came to be, it would then be unnecessary. But to say it’s racist not only is a gross misunderstanding of what racism actually is, but totally ignores the fact our educational system is highly Euro-centric. When you’re a racial, gender, or a member of other minority group, it means a lot to have positive models from your camp, to let you know you can achieve what they did, that you can be as successful.

The Negro Project

Michael Brown is all over social media & the news… Yet another unarmed African-American teen shot down dead by the police, an organization whose supposed intent is to protect the public. This is nothing new, it’s no longer shocking, yet it is still hurtful.

A serious lack of empathy, respect & value for human life has always loomed in America, especially for those of African descent…

The Ku Klux Klan at it’s peak was 4 million members deep, some of them governors, mayors & senators. Today they only claim to have only a few thousand members, yet that does not mean their ideals do not still reside in the mindsets of far more. It was recently discovered that a couple of Florida police were members. Most police officers, mayors, governors & senators probably aren’t members either, but that doesn’t mean they don’t share their sentiments!

The police departments in America were originally formed to protect Caucasian people & their neighborhoods, not African people & theirs. Jim Crow laws were formed & implemented & still being exercised today. Planned Parenthood was originally called The Negro Project, formed to attempt to rid society of their undesireables. When an entire race of people is deemed to not be fully human, of course their lives will matter less & be dismissed as expendable.

When cases like Mike Browns come about, a great sadness befalls the African American community & many of it’s parents become fearful for their own sons & daughters lives. Some even become afraid to reproduce. Some have been convinced that the tiny persons developing in their wombs are not human either, just like many of their oppressors believe about them. Only a few years ago, abortion ended the lives of more African American people than their top seven leading causes combined. So in some ways, The Negro Project has been a success.

Side Note: I am not trying to spark a debate about abortion rights, or if it’s murder. Technically, it’s not because murder is the illegal ending of a human life & abortion is the legal ending of a human life. I do not argue the aspect of morality regarding abortion either; that is based on personal beliefs & my perspective is not based on that. Mine are based on facts, and the Universe proves to us when human life begins, which is at conception. The laws of nature are not debatable.

Black on black violence is a major issue in America, and is often brought up when incidents like Mike Brown’s generate outrage. They wonder where the outrage is when we kill each other. Trust me, it’s there, but it doesn’t garner the same level of backlash from the community, because it’s not based in the same ideals; It’s not racially motivated. Logically, there is no reason to even compare the two. Most violent crime happens within racial lines, not across them.

Today in America, you will find people of all backgrounds struggling. However, even within that struggle, there are privileges to not being of African descent. Most Asians & whites do not have to live in fear of being harassed or killed by the police in their own neighborhoods just because of their appearance. Monsanto buried toxic sludge in predominantly African American neighborhoods that have caused serious health problems throughout those communities, including death; There are no predominantly white neighborhoods that this would ever happen in. When African Americans gather for peaceful protests & vigils for their fallen, they are greeted with a heavy police presence, dogs & tanks. You will not find such things at gatherings held for people of any other color.

Marching & protesting doesn’t help the situation or change anything. The justice system in America does not typically work in the favor of African people, so it’s pointless for us to trust & believe in it. Awareness alone does nothing; Action is the only solution. It seems like tragedy is the only thing that brings the African American community together. We need to continue this unity at all times. We’re so busy fighting & competing with each other, we’re not able to stand up against our common enemies to better our situations.

No matter what we do, we’re still living under their system & must live by their rules, even when those rules do not benefit us in any way. In America, we have no power. We own nothing & run nothing in comparison to all that our oppressors own & operate, such as land, shelter, utilities, media outlets, clothing companies, banks, court systems, law enforcement, etc. We rely on all these industries that they control. That’s why we need an infrastructure of our own, because we’re not faring well under theirs & it’s modeled in such a way to make sure that we never will. We could be thriving instead of just surviving, but we first must learn to value ourselves & each other!

My Sister’s Keeper

No other woman is my competition! My hope is that we ALL make it!!

In the Chakra chart below, the right side shows the physical consequences of when women do not have their spiritual (left side of chart) lives in balance. Yoga, meditation, healing stones & a pH balanced diet will all work to counter those consequences, but it’s still equally important to try keeping our emotional states in check. We are what we eat & that includes emotions & thoughts…

Many of these factors are outside of ourselves, out of our control & at the helm of others, so it’s also equally important that we take care of each other, so as not to throw our fellow Kings & Queens off their spiritual balance, nor our little Princes & Princesses.

As you see, when our partnerships &/or relationships are nonexistent, weak, broken, or abusive, our self esteem is damaged; if we hate our jobs, have overwhelming responsibilities or financial troubles; feel unwanted or under-appreciated, those issues can trigger us to make poor lifestyle choices, including our diets, which leads to high blood pressure, various cancers (an epidemic in this country), weight gain/loss, drug & alcohol addictions, lowered fertility, uterine fibroid tumors, depression, back pain, breakouts & a weakened immune system, amongst other health problems.

When men abuse (eliminating our sense of safety), disrespect or degrade (altering our perception & morality), cheat on (damaging our self esteem & sense of security), ignore or withhold affection (ruining our sense of belonging & feelings of appreciation), it can literally kill us ladies over time. It works the same in reverse or when we do it to ourselves, or to other women.

Side-chicks have no place in the healing & uplifting of our Queens. I’d like to believe that the above meme is not true. I believe that most women who choose to assume a #2 position are very damaged themselves & that through personal growth & healing, they can change their destructive ways. A woman of substance that truly loves herself would never accept such a position, and if a man truly loved a woman, he would never allow or expect her to.

Some women are sociopaths & lack the empathy necessary to care about the damage they are participating in causing when getting involved with a man already in a relationship. Some are too hurt themselves to consider the feelings of others &/or afraid to get a man of their own, so being a mere side-chick will prevent them from getting hurt again. They may believe they are in a safe & even superior position by being the side-chick, because they may get a satisfying enough amount time, attention, affection & money/gifts – all without the responsibilities & stress the girlfriend/wife has at home.

In some instances, it may not be a self-esteem issue, but actually one of an inflated ego. They may just enjoy the excitement of having the attention of another woman’s man. A woman without any real substance will take so much pride in her looks & sex appeal that it blinds her to see that’s all she is worth to that man, not [yet] realizing her true value. My hope is that ALL women of such levels of mediocrity will discover or develop their self worth, leaving men without the option to betray their wives & girlfriends.

Of course, it is ultimately the responsibility of the persons within the relationship to keep up their side of the deal & to protect each other from hurt. I am not in any way relieving the cheating partner of their obligations by placing more of the blame on the sidepiece; I believe they are equally wrong in their actions & therefore equally responsible for the pain that they cause. I find both their actions deplorable, especially when there are children involved.

Us Queens have to support each other, uplift each other, take care of ourselves & stop hating on each other, stop fucking each others men (or women), competing with each other & fighting each other because no real positive changes or true unity will ever happen if we don’t! It begins with US!

Haile Selassie on Religion & Spirituality

The temple of the Most High begins with the human body, which houses our life essence of our existence.

Africans are in bondage today because they approach spirituality through religion provided by foreign invaders and conquerors.

We must stop confusing religion and spirituality.

Religion is a set of rules, regulations and rituals created by humans which were supposed to help people grow spiritually.

Due to human imperfection religion has become corrupt, political, divisive and a tool for power struggle.

Spirituality is not theology or ideology.
It is simple a way of life, pure and original as was given by the most high.

Spirituality is a network linking us to the Most High, the Universe and each other.

As the essence of our existence it embodies our culture, true identity, nationhood and destiny.

A people without a nation they can really call their own is a people without a soul.

Africa is our nation and is in spiritual and physical bondage because her leaders are turning to outside forces for solutions to African problems when everything Africa needs is within her.

When African righteous people come together, the world will come together.

This is our divine destiny.”

As you Pray, Move your Feet

I wonder how much better the World would be today if the thousands of hours & millions of dollars spent in & on churches (& the clothes, shoes, hats, gas, etc bought to attend) was actually invested into the community, which works far better than praying & listening to someone reiterate the bible every weekend. If every church in this country was converted into a shelter, I believe it would almost completely eliminate our homelessness problem.

The World does not seem to be becoming a better place, so what is it really good for? According to John 14:6, Jesus says “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.“ So according to Jesus, being that he is neither a church or a pastor, he’s stating that it is he who we should be following & no one else…

“During slavery, if they didn’t give us good education, good housing, good food, or good clothes, why did they give us such ‘good’ religion?” – Dr. Bobby E. Wright

All the various denominations of Christianity & the holy texts in the Bible are based on ancient Kemetic knowledge out of Africa & it’s basically nothing more than plagiarized, chopped & screwed variations of our true, original belief system that our ancestors left in stone for us. Much of African culture is ridiculed as being voo-doo, or falsely accused of being evil or satanic. These lies are fed to you to turn you away from the truth!

Just a few thoughts.. Hope you are having a blessed day!

The Miseducation of… Basically EVERYTHING

“…Showing off your ass ’cause you thinking it’s a trend… It’s silly when girls sell their souls because it’s in… Hair weaves like Europeans, fake nails done by Koreans… Come again”

Songstress Lauryn Hill’s Doo Wop – That Thing dropped 16 years ago & her lyrics are even more relevant & needed today than when it released. Instead of retreating away from the culture of obsession with image, society has dove in even deeper in the age of real-time media: Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc. Women & girls all over the World spend billions of dollars & thousands of hours every year on artificial enhancements & surgeries – sometimes risking & losing their lives – to look like something they are not, to attract the type of attention they don’t really need.

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to look nice, but it’s whole other level when you can find endless photos & videos of young ladies & girls all over social media trying to garner the most looks & likes, as if their self-worth depended on it. Needing to validate themselves by how many people out there want to sex them, or wished they looked like them. Wanting to be admired for being a Barbie or a ‘bad bitch’, rather than a Queen or a phenomenal woman. Being more prideful & worrisome over the contour of their eyebrows, waist & size of their hips, than in the content of their character, health, or finding purpose in life.

If you are unfamiliar with who Sarah Baartman is, she was a South African slave who was featured nude in a traveling circus around London & Paris, catering to Europeans fascination with her physical African attributes, mainly her large butt, which some deemed an abnormality. She was led around stage like a wild animal, by her ‘keeper’ who’d have her walk, stand or sit when ordered. During this time, she was assumed to be the “missing link” by Napoleon’s surgeon-general, who upon her death in 1816, cast her body in wax & her remains were displayed in a Paris museum until 1974. In 1994, then president Nelson Mandela made an appeal to the French to retrieve her, but it wasn’t until 2002 that their senate approved a bill for her to be repatriationed back to South Africa, where she was finally laid to rest in the Eastern Cape.

Today, African women are exploited similarly in more modern circuses, known as talk & reality television shows. Celebrity obsession, pop culture, rap music, photoshop, womens & teen magazines, pageants, bullies & other factors have all contributed to this image & attention obsessed epidemic our current generation is facing. The difference between these practices amongst women of African descent & most other races is, many times when undergoing these beauty techniques, African women are also killing their sense of identity. Those are the girls L. Boogie was calling out, asking to ‘come again’. Millions of them are avoiding sun exposure & bleaching their skin, perming their hair & wearing weaves in any & every texture except for that of their real, natural hair. They are constantly celebrating & striving towards other races natural beauty, while failing to embrace their own.

Even Beyonce, as gorgeous as she is, has had a nose job & admitted to wishing that she was born Latina. I don’t believe it’s because she actually hates being African, but because she favors their natural beauty over her own. Sadly, there are hundreds of thousands of young black girls & women that feel the same way – boys & men as well. Many of us have been conditioned to & not just via mainstream media, but sometimes even by our very own friends & family. This destructive conditioning has been passed down through the generations ever since the days of slavery. My father used to live in New York City & had been to black nightclubs where they would do a ‘paper bag test’, not letting in any patrons whose skin tones were darker than a brown paper bag.

Our ancestors in Africa did not discriminate against each other in such ways. Looking at their artwork & hieroglyphics, they celebrated all their various shades of brown & hair textures equally! Like Lauryn, I want my fellow sisters to realize that their natural features are just as beautiful as the ones they are hiding them with & that there are much more meaningful things in life to worry about than how big your butt is, how well you can twerk & how many followers & likes you can get. There is more to you than meets the eye…

“How you gonna win when you ain’t right within? …………Come again”