After finishing Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart about 6 months ago, I am now regurgitating the details of the classical novel and making conclusions.
The sub saharan African as painted by european writers of the pre colonial era was ignorant and intolerant but it doesn't add up, villages just like Okonkwo's village of Umuofia in the novel gave land freely to missionaries who demonised the religion of their fore fathers.

I was discussing with my sister for whose new intense spirituality I once created a thread saying that I was worried, the discussion bordered on religion, at a point she said that Benin city needed deliverance from the numerous powers she feels when passing the city centre - ring road.
I was disappointed and thought to my self, if the villagers had this much intolerance, they would not have given the missionaries land to spread Christianity that I and my sister practice.

I don't believe it has much to do with tolerance. The British were clearly on a mission to come to Africa and colonise the natives thus establishing their rule and spreading the tentacles of their empire. They were met by natives who at the time were totally unaware that the world was changing while they remained the same, marrying wives and giving birth to children for no reason, and who were also bewildered by the huge ships that brought this fully clothed, heavenly looking, magic stick(gun) weilding "gods" with their magical gifts(mirrors, clothes, bicycles) as well as their "heavenly tales" of their own god who was supposedly greater than ours.

I believe the inferiority complex that is so often exhibited even today by the black man towards the white man was what enabled us be "tolerant" of the white man. We immediately felt that everything the white man said was true and everything our forefathers ever taught us had to be a lie. Afterall, our gods never gave us guns nor dropped bicycles from the sky. Plus their god gave them big ships, clothings and a funny/superior accent.

The reason why this "tolerance" isn't easily extended to other black men is because we almost intuitively conclude that every other black man is not as good as the white man and thus the low opinion we have about ourselves is often extended to our kin.

You killed the show even before it started.

I would believe that my fore fathers were genuinely tolerant to the missionaries for my own mental health.

I would believe this just as the white man made himself believe that he is superior.

It is a game of the mind, we should change our story to suit our consumption and escape from this self pity ('our story' we dont really know due to poor records)

fr3do:
You killed the show even before it started.

I would believe that my fore fathers were genuinely tolerant to the missionaries for my own mental health.

I would believe this just as the white man made himself believe that he is superior.

It is a game of the mind, we should change our story to suit our consumption and escape from this self pity ('our story' we dont really know due to poor records)

A white man steals billions from a Nigerian bank, Indians, chinese, lebanese all steal our natural resources(albeit with the aid of fellow Nigerians) underpay and over work their Nigerian staff and we call them them sir or master and you call that tolerance? Whereas a Nigerian steals a hand bag or is even accused of theft and gets burnt to death.

If what is going on today is anything to go by, I'd say my initial comment is correct