POSITIVELY BLACK

It’s Time To Try Something Different

Junious Ricardo Stanton



The masses of Africans in AmeriKKKa appear to be so lobotomized and demoralized there is no longer talk about challenging the white supremacist hegemonic status quo. The only activity seems to be begging for acceptance, validation or to be left alone by the very people who have engaged in systemic trans-generational violence, disenfranchisement and animus against our ancestors and us. Africans have had "leaders/spokespersons" foisted upon us who rarely challenge the status quo beyond superficial reformist activities.

The conditions under which most Africans in AmeriKKKa labor have not improved significantly since the Civil Rights era. While the Voting Rights Act of 1964 did give blacks the right to vote in the South and has resulted in record numbers of black elected office holders, the institutional racism existent within the broader psycho-socio-economic milieu has not been ameliorated.

For example the overall health of the African community is in crisis. We suffer disproportionately from conditions such as clinical depression, diabetes, cancers, hypertension, AIDS, fibroid tumors in women and a myriad of autogenic (generated from within ourselves) and environmentally induced diseases.

Despite numerous political gains, black politicians have been unable to halt or dismantle the environmental racism plaguing the black community. With regard to the law, the courts, local, state and federal remain adversarial to the interests of black people. More Africans are incarcerated and more are increasingly likely to be arrested, convicted and incarcerated than their Euro-American counterparts. Financially a recent report showed the wealth gap between whites and people of color has widened tremendously during the Bush administration. Assessing the landscape we are in deep trouble. You are probably saying, "tell me something I don’t already know".

In order to heal, one must first admit one is ill or suffering. We seem to be trying to anesthetize ourselves from our reality through substance use/abuse and escapist activities. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over with the same people expecting things to turn out differently. By that reckoning, we are truly insane. We have been attempting to convert Euro-AmeriKKKans since we arrived on these shores. We have tried moralizing them despite their obvious immorality, we have attempted (just as abuse and incest victims do) to defend our tormenters in the false hope they will cease abusing us or lighten their maltreatment.

It has not worked. We have attempted to champion their system of economics and government, remember when Black Capitalism was the vogue? Some even bought into Marxism and the pipe dream of a workers revolution. AmeriKKKan history is replete with examples of trans-racial populous movements that were ultimately sabotaged when the plutocrats played their omnipresent racial trump card. So how do we save ourselves? We must first admit we are at war, admit who our enemies are and act accordingly. We are out manned and outgunned so we must use guile, cunning and formulate tactics that create an infrastructure for ethnocentric survival and transformation.

Our short term goal is to make sure we stay healthy and alive. We have to educate ourselves about proper nutrition, develop psychological coping skills to effectively navigate this hostile cultural terrain and build institutions and systems that will strengthen and empower us psychologically, socially, economically and politically. This is nothing new, Pap Singleton, Marcus Garvey Noble Drew Ali and Elijah Muhammad showed us how to do this. We have to pick up the baton and continue running the ethnocentric race. We have to restore the family as the primary socialization mechanism.

We must use the stable family (no matter the form the operative word here is stable) as the psychological base and economic hub to teach thrift and cooperative economics by starting savings clubs, credit unions and food co-ops for our families and neighborhoods. We must support organizations like the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association who have our best interests at heart. In short we must take a proactive, ethnocentric approach rather than maintain our present pathological exocentric, dependent/subservient condition. It will take a different approach, doing things differently and using our minds in a whole new way. This is the broad scope; how it will look or work in your family, neighborhood and region is up to you to decide. If we want things to be different tomorrow than they were yesterday, we will have to do something different today.