Mental slavery remains one of our greatest problems today

I always read with disgust the Afonga/Igbo tirade of abuses thrown around
by people who should become the leaders of tomorrow instead of collectively
seeking accountability from our leaders of today.

I wonder how long it would take them to figure out our rich heritage as black people
and abolish these false walls of tribalism that never existed before

An interesting read,this is the best thread I've seen on nairaland this year.Theres hope for Nigeria and Africa after all,kudos to Rossik for painstakingly taking out his time to post pictural evidences as well as their links,answer questions and reply the trolls appropraitely . I believe that one day we'll get it right and transform our nation and continent from the laughing stock of the world to being the envy of others.We can only be respected by attaining great economic and technological heights and becoming a force to reckon with .Racism will continue to exist as long as the black man remains at the bottom of the ladder and is still the dreg of the earth .Black man,get enlightened,read a book,know thyself,research on history,have a sense of pride and entitlement,Love one another,help ur brother,stop the "pull him down" syndrome,get educated and come back to develop ur nation,be more practical than religious and maybe just maybe our status in the world will change.

Lol, awon dem rossikk are still here pampering themselves with delusion.

Africa and delusion sha, Nigeria especially.

Very false sense of importance.

Yet ordinary toothpick, you can't manufacture, hehehehehe

All these sort of threads promote inferiority the more. Most ancient leader tribes have been relegated to the background because of unnecessary focus on glorious past. Greece for example is no longer as developed as USA, Japan, Canada, England etc. so their pride of ancient civilization is useless.

vioment:
Good job. But we just need to get our country to be a country again. A country for everyone. That means principled men of honor in power. Forward thinking leadership. All basics infrastructure built. I mean if we have these, we can write believable stories and teach them in schools.

This post is like a rich man/woman and poor man/woman telling a group of youths about wealth. Who do you think the youths will believe more? even if they are both speaking with wisdom.

I must say you are absolutely correct!

Jesus Christ was black? Yeah right!

RosaConsidine:
First off, Rossikk, ignore that pant called Niger Delta Avengers. It's only seeking attention.

Second, great work you and Horus are doing on this thread. Right now, I'm not so much bothered as to the sources and truth values of all the art works you guys have posted. I just need my fellow Nigerians and Africans to lose this inferiority complex and look upon themselves with pride and consider themselves as equal to any other race on earth.

Most importantly though, I saw certain places you've referred to the Chinese reemergence and how it can apply to the African continent and I have certain concerns about their feasibility. To start with, China is one nation. The Chinese people have a shared heritage which includes their history, culture, traditions and language. There may be minor variations in dialects and inflections and traditions and cultures amongst various subgroups in the Chinese nation , but by an large, a Chinese person understands another Chinese person. But in the African setting, the highest likelihood of finding two African nations that speak similar languages is very low and where you find those, the countries in question are usually neighbors or close to each other. Unfortunately, Africa is a large continent. You don't even need to go to another end of the continent to find a people that speak a completely different language and have completely different cultures. Heck, you don't even need to go across a subregion to find such. A subregion might even be too large an entity; within countries, you would find subgroups of completely different cultures and languages. I mean, look at Nigeria. How many tribes do we have with how many unique cultures, traditions, ideals and languages? With so much diversity (to the point that some of us think there should even be further division), how can we create a united Africa? While I personally don't believe that language, culture or even skin color should be a barrier to unity, I can't deny that they play important roles in keeping us united. So, if we want to create a unified African nation/state, under what banner are we uniting, considering differences in culture, traditions, languages and even skin color and religion?

I think you are wrong.
Go and study the different dialects of chinese and you would observe that although they sound the same, majority of them have no mutual intelligiblity.
When am talking of dialects here, i do not mean the Mandarin and Cantonese which are the only 2 major dialects in China today. Am talking of older dialects like the Native Shangai dialect and many other native dialects which are on the verge of extinction.

It is on record by linguists that Shanghainese (the native dialect of Shanghai people) for example is completely unintelligible with the official Beijing dialect (Mandarin). Both dialects are as different from each other as Igbo and Yoruba, but to a non-chinese like you, they appear the same because they sound the same, exactly as the average Chinese person sees most African language (to sound the same).

All the Chinese did was to force Beijing dialect (Mandarin) on the whole country as the official unifying language and all other language speakers had to drop their own native languages. Expect this to work as a communist country that China is. That was how Russian afterall was forced on all Soviet states and till date, the elderly and middle aged people of former soviet states have equal command in Russian as in their own native tongues and Russian even started infiltrating their own languages to make it look like their own original native languages and Russian were very similar.

The Hindi speakers have been trying this method to unify all of India with Hindi language, but as usual in a non-communist entity like India, the minority language groups all have their say and rejected Hindi as their unifying language.

All Africans have to do is pick the most powerful language in the continent and make it the overall official language and everyone learns it and overtime we all become native speakers, but this can only happen in a unified nation and most likely to work in a communist settings where people are forced to do things.

Rosskii:


Absolute garbage. ''Pointless'' to build universities? They seized Nigeria in 1897, and by 1960 there was still not a single university built in the entire country. In 63 years? And you are saying what? It takes 63 years to establish the learning that would lead to university education? Are you out of your mind? DUDE, STOP MAKING EXCUSES FOR THE COLONIALISTS. They came here to LOOT, and LOOT was what they did, big time, ok? Today, after just 50 years of black rule we have nearly 300 universities in Nigeria. I guess we suddenly became ''ready'' for higher education right after the British departed.




But it wasn't ''pointless'' for them to build a ''sophisticated technology'' railway line from north to south to evacuate our resources to the ports for profits?




What an ignorant comment. If Australia, North America etc had to be ''lit up'' then THEY ''knew nothing about electricity'' either. So your point is baseless and condescending to Africans. Particularly as the British were exporting our resources worth trillions of dollars in today's money.




Why were there only a few cars on the roads? Was it not because they refused to re-invest the export proceeds in the economies of Africa (apart from South Africa, where their people had settled in large number)? Was it not because they failed to create a middle class? Was it not because they failed to establish education in any serious manner? At independence, Nigeria's literacy rate was around 10%. This, after 63 years of British rule. Today, after just 50 something years of independence, literacy rate is approaching 80% in Nigeria, THANKS TO BLACK RULE. In fact, chances are that YOU would be an illiterate peasant today, like your grandparents, had the British still been on charge, since they invested next to nothing in public education. (I'm assuming you're one of us)



They established just enough schools to enable them staff a colonial administration, and no more. Most of our grandparents were illiterates. Ever wondered why? And please, name me one major hospital built by the colonialists. Just one!



Garbage. They came to Nigeria, exploited our resources including minerals, sold them abroad, and kept the proceeds firmly on London. Using less than 2% of the earnings to develop Nigeria. THAT IS THEFT. THAT IS ROBBERY. UNDERSTOOD?

Paid what? How, Where?



Actually, Africans DID help develop the regions in which they settled across the world, from Greece to Rome, and later Europe, and from China to India. Have you studied Moorish contributions to the European Renaissance?

You need to talk less and read more.

Don't mind Braden2.
We all know that the European colonialists were nothing but petty thieves, who looted extremely more and invested extremely less.
Talking about the 10% literacy before independence, if not for the missionaries who were inspired by the selflesness of christian doctrines and seriously promoted education, i bet that 10% would have been 1 or 0.5%. This is what has really affected most core-northerners till date and made them very much educationally backward because they rejected the missionaries under agreement with the same demonic british coloniaists.

However, i get the drift of people lile Braden2 and LordAdam, and their point is that even though we know that Africans had a very great history which was being distorted, we no longer have to settle for self pity or past glories as it will do us no good, rather we have to work hard and prove ourselves to the world again in contemporary times. The Arabs are doing it, the Chinese, Japanese and other Asians are doing it, why can't we?

white lies from pit of hell just wasted my mb for nothing

The moors brought civilization to europe, both in infrastructure and education, but, its a pity, all these could not be done in Africa, why Europe?

Be it as it is, the white still has the aura over the Blacks, if not, why should they bear Western names, if really they have power or the dominance.
It is unfortunate that our ancestor gave us the lead in good time, how we lost it along the way is a mystery

Daboomb:


My problem (or what l cant explain) is that "If Blacks were these brilliant, intelligent and strong, how were the whites able to conquer them and drive them out.... even more importanlty (an embarrassing!), where are the "brilliant blacks" and how come Africa got saddled with the foolish, greedy and inept blacks we have now"?
Dont let me say the likes of Saraki and Dino Melaye, l know some would not like that.

If you have followed this thread from the beginning you would not have asked this question.
Exactly the same way the whites were able to drive out the blacks from Europe was the same way Muslims were able to conquer Christian Sudan and North/South American nations were able to drive out their European colonialists/fathers/father nations.

The Black men were copulating with and raping a lot of white women in those times and these unions brought about a lot of mixed race children and with time, the descendants got whiter with a change of view of things and revolted.

That was exactly how islam penetrated Sudan and arabized/islamized them. Arab invaders were defeated countless times by the Sudanese who were masters of bow and arrows. So the arabs decided to come in a more peaceful manner in the name of trade and the Christian Sudanese accepted and started marrying Arab women, this became so rampant and with time the offsprings increasingly tilted towards their mothers' dispositions and started accepting islam/arabic gradually and before they could realize how far this has gotten, the mixed race muslim/arab inclined offsprings were already more than original black christian Sudanese.

In the Americas, the more the Europeans married or mated with native american women and black women, the more the offsprings are altered and have a completely different perspective from their Fathers or home people. Infact, even without intermixing, being born in another territory alone, different from your original homeland gives you and entirely different mentality from those born back in the homelands and with time, the mentality difference gets wider and irreconcilable.

Nice post.As an avid reader of history from my childhood.I knew of the Moors in my primary school age.I guess you guys remember Hannibal of Carthage.
The various artworks that were drew then show that the Black Race made powerful influence in Europe then.
The Slave trade really have a negative impact on our psychology.How come the Black Race who were trailblazers then become toddlers in all aspect of life.
This is really a clarion call for the youths of all Black race across the globe.
We can be great again.An average black man is a smart guy.It is high time we turned our smartness to developing our countries.We just have to say NO to corruption and be more patriotic to developing our countries in our own capacity.
I can really say much,I am typing this with tears in my eyes.
So we were this great with so much influence in the entire Europe.

Horus:


Black Greek Youth with Dreadlocks (200 B.C)



400 B.C



Black Greek with Dreadlocks



Black Greek (200 B.C)

hmmm, we don't even know which to believe again, but i'll still give respect to the white; they took/take our knowledge transformed it and ruled us with it, right from day one till today, it's still happening, only someone with great wisdom could do such,, and we ? Lord help us.

Now i know the reason why the great Library in Egypt was burnt, why the statues was mostly black or brown in color.

it was writing in the two holy books that Africa will still rule the world

this thread will only end here. no action would be taken.

Nowenuse:


I think you are wrong.
Go and study the different dialects of chinese and you would observe that although they sound the same, majority of them have no mutual intelligiblity.
When am talking of dialects here, i do not mean the Mandarin and Cantonese which are the only 2 major dialects in China today. Am talking of older dialects like the Native Shangai dialect and many other native dialects which are on the verge of extinction.

It is on record by linguists that Shanghainese (the native dialect of Shanghai people) for example is completely unintelligible with the official Beijing dialect (Mandarin). Both dialects are as different from each other as Igbo and Yoruba, but to a non-chinese like you, they appear the same because they sound the same, exactly as the average Chinese person sees most African language (to sound the same).

All the Chinese did was to force Beijing dialect (Mandarin) on the whole country as the official unifying language and all other language speakers had to drop their own native languages. Expect this to work as a communist country that China is. That was how Russian afterall was forced on all Soviet states and till date, the elderly and middle aged people of former soviet states have equal command in Russian as in their own native tongues and Russian even started infiltrating their own languages to make it look like their own original native languages and Russian were very similar.

The Hindi speakers have been trying this method to unify all of India with Hindi language, but as usual in a non-communist entity like India, the minority language groups all have their say and rejected Hindi as their unifying language.

All Africans have to do is pick the most powerful language in the continent and make it the overall official language and everyone learns it and overtime we all become native speakers, but this can only happen in a unified nation and most likely to work in a communist settings where people are forced to do things.

And what would that "most powerful" language be? Bear in mind that to impose a general language, you have to subjugate those you're imposing it on. And, let's face it, no African nation, no matter how small or impoverished would willingly give up their native tongue in favour of another's in the name of unification. Despite the Russians being the dominant force in the soviet republic, virtually all the former member states have reverted to their default native tongues since the soviet republic crumbled. Picking an external language like English, French or Portuguese would be counterintuitive - we're trying to show ourselves to be uniquely equal so why would we adopt their language?

And the soviet republic is even an example to illustrate how hard it would be for a unified Africa to work. One country or a particular group of countries would always want to be dominant, be more equal than the others and the first sign of disunity is inequality. The smaller countries would begin to feel aggrieved and, with time, those cracks would show, widen and eventually divide the unified entity.

360command:
this thread will only end here. no action would be taken.

What action are you expecting? Something sudden and radical? That won't happen and if it does, it won't produce any lasting effect. I think the first thing we need to do is take off the shackles of limitation we have placed on ourselves. All the time, we accuse foreigners of taking advantage of us - well what are they supposed to do; not look out for their interests? If we were smarter and in the same shoes, we would do exactly same thing. The problem is that we have consistently put ourselves in a position to be taken advantage of. I see people here asking why there are no records of Africans in the contemporary annals of the arts and sciences. Well, when last did you see a society encourage it's people to be the absolute best in everything? We may say it with our mouths but it's not reflected in our actions. The average Nigerian/African parent only wants their child to get an education so they can eventually get a good job and not suffer instead of making a lasting impact on the present and future of society. We encourage a mediocre lifestyle that seeks comfort at the expense of advancement. Till we change that school of thought, Nigeria and Africa will continue to be backward.

RosaConsidine:


And what would that "most powerful" language be? Bear in mind that to impose a general language, you have to subjugate those you're imposing it on. And, let's face it, no African nation, no matter how small or impoverished would willingly give up their native tongue in favour of another's in the name of unification. Despite the Russians being the dominant force in the soviet republic, virtually all the former member states have reverted to their default native tongues since the soviet republic crumbled. Picking an external language like English, French or Portuguese would be counterintuitive - we're trying to show ourselves to be uniquely equal so why would we adopt their language?

And the soviet republic is even an example to illustrate how hard it would be for a unified Africa to work. One country or a particular group of countries would always want to be dominant, be more equal than the others and the first sign of disunity is inequality. The smaller countries would begin to feel aggrieved and, with time, those cracks would show, widen and eventually divide the unified entity.

The reason why the Soviet republic failed is simply because the nation had a sole majority group (Russians) which easily dominated the minority groups and the minorities were easy to be manipulated and made to believe that they were under Russian opression and domination.

The case of a united Africa (Black Africa i suppose, excluding the white arabic speaking north africa) would be very easy, because there would be nothing like a majority group or minority groups. No single ethnicity would be able to dominate a united Black Africa as no single ethnic group has up to 10% of the population of the continent. So we would definitely all be equal unlike in USSR where the Russians were like first class citizens.


Talking about choice of language. As it stands, the only language most suitable for all of Africa is SWAHILI, why did i say so?
1)Swahili is like an artificial language, a lingua franca which was formed and it actually belongs to no one, no ethnic group can actually lay ancestral ownership to the language. Even though some very small group of people on the East African coast have personalized it, they are still not ancestral owners of the language.
2) Swahili is a Bantu language (even though with many loanwords from other non african languages). Bantu is the largest and most widely spread sub-black African group
3) Swahili is the fastest growing (native african language lingua franca) on the continent and about 6 countries have adopted it officially and still spoken in many others....
I hope you can see the potentials of this language?

However, if Swahili is to be adopted, in order to pacify or encourage other black Africans who are not of the Swahili belt or Bantu language belt. A language comitte could be set up to create another official language which would still be based on Swahili but with the addition of many nouns from other major African languages. At least, the nouns in swahili with non-african origins can actually be replaced by nouns from other major African languages to make it somewhat balanced and encouraging for other non-swahili or non-bantu speakers to adopt.

Nowenuse:


Seriously, i am short of words. Are u Nigerian? If you are, I really can't believe there are Nigerians or Africans like you. I must say you are a beacon of hope to our generation and a light to our race.
Am just amazed! Keep up the good and wonderful work. I sincerely hope Africa and the black race will rise again in our lifetime.

Thanks bro. I'm a full fledged Nigerian. Na comma and na apostrophe. Peace.

Like they say "What goes around comes around"
Many civilizations have risen and fallen....and many will still do so

And if you look through history you will see that any time a new civilization rises they always try to erase the existence of the previous civilization.

So I guess its the time of the white man now.......What I know for sure is, the time of the blacks will come once again, but I do hope we will treat others better than they are treating us now....

However we need to preach our greatness to our children, we need to know about our greatness and revive it once again
We need to stop all the divisions among our people....we need to unite and pull our resources and show the world our greatness once again.
We have been seeing flashes of our greatness across the world in business, academics, sports...etc

We need a center point for us to rise.....Nigeria should actually be that point being the greatest congregation of black folks in the world. Our being called the giant of Africa is not a mistake...however we need to rise and understand the responsibility we owe the black race....we are not just failing our selves we are failing black people all over the world

adegeye38:
The moors brought civilization to europe, both in infrastructure and education, but, its a pity, all these could not be done in Africa, why Europe?

Africa at the peak of Moorish rule in Europe, in the 15th and 16th centuries, was more developed than Europe. Had more universities and learned people than Europe. Had bigger cities than Europe. You need to read accounts of various visitors to Africa in those days. Glowing reviews to say the least. You must understand that the slave trade led to African regression. Without the slave trade, Africa would have been one of the most developed parts of the world today. Do you know that Benin City had wide avenues and street lights (lanterns on poles) in the 15th century? That its houses shone a reflection upon gazing at them due to specialist cleaning methods? Or that Ife had paved roads? This was centuries before their appearance in Europe. If all that development had continued uninterrupted, we would have been highly advanced by today, without a shadow of doubt.

.

Braden2:
Don't you sleep?you were here before i went to bed and you are still here going strong . or does your handle rotate shift? Are you a robot?



hahaha how can benin have street light in 15 century when electricity was just invented in 1879 (that's 137 years ago) . you don't know how to lie and you expose your ignorance and pettiness .
I can do a better job presenting Africa in a positive light and solutions for the continent's plight. no need to lie .

Stop displaying your ignorance, street lights in those times was light by burning oil not electricity.

Your knowledge is so little and yet you are bragging so much.....educate yourself man

RosaConsidine:


And what would that "most powerful" language be? Bear in mind that to impose a general language, you have to subjugate those you're imposing it on. And, let's face it, no African nation, no matter how small or impoverished would willingly give up their native tongue in favour of another's in the name of unification. Despite the Russians being the dominant force in the soviet republic, virtually all the former member states have reverted to their default native tongues since the soviet republic crumbled. Picking an external language like English, French or Portuguese would be counterintuitive - we're trying to show ourselves to be uniquely equal so why would we adopt their language?

And the soviet republic is even an example to illustrate how hard it would be for a unified Africa to work. One country or a particular group of countries would always want to be dominant, be more equal than the others and the first sign of disunity is inequality. The smaller countries would begin to feel aggrieved and, with time, those cracks would show, widen and eventually divide the unified entity.

Also very true, people will hardly do something that may alter their ego even in the slightest manner unless they are forced to do so.

For example, do u know how Julius Nyerere (ex TZ president) united Tanzania? Today in Tanzania (a country with half muslim and half christian population with dozens of ethnic groups and languages exactly like Nigeria), you can hardly ever hear of religious or ethnic issues in Tanzania.
Nyerere declared Swahili as the sole official language of TZ, thatvs why till today in TZ many of them cannot speak English. The govt banned the teaching and use of native languages in public institutions and public broadcast. Tanzanians from different parts of the country were also transferred and made to work with each other and they all had no option than to speak only Swahili to themselves.
This was how they were all united and till date, Swahili/Tanzanian nationalism comes first to most Tanzanians before tribal or religious affiliations.

So, for such a unification policy to take proper effect, it definitely has to come through some form of authority which has to be the government and some selfless or sponsored agencies who will be there to make proper campaigns for such a cause through thorough enlightenment.

I think African (Black Africam unity) can easily work considering the fact that we have a united common factor which is our race! Just as India remains united through Hinduism (the major religion) inspite of their linguistic, ethnic or colour difference, black Africa can also be united on racial oneness (black nationalism).

.

Abagworo:
All these sort of threads promote inferiority the more. Most ancient leader tribes have been relegated to the background because of unnecessary focus on glorious past. Greece for example is no longer as developed as USA, Japan, Canada, England etc. so their pride of ancient civilization is useless.

You are totally wrong, and you have missed the essence of the thread. You mention Greece, has anyone changed the Greek history, we know they where once great and that is recorded in history.......their origins is well known to them.

but African history has been totally twisted and virtually rewritten.....tell us that we used to live like animals, that we had no civilization, that we were saved by the white man. And many black folk are swallowing these lies, truly believing that they are worthless...

The thread is meant for us to know that we where a great people and that we should pride ourselves that we are not inferior and we can be great again.

Braden2:
Don't you sleep?you were here before i went to bed and you are still here going strong . or does your handle rotate shift? Are you a robot?



hahaha how can benin have street light in 15 century when electricity was just invented in 1879 (that's 137 years ago) . you don't know how to lie and you expose your ignorance and pettiness .
I can do a better job presenting Africa in a positive light and solutions for the continent's plight. No need to lie .

He meant fires with burning wood/lamps as you see in the movies.

But that is mediocrity. The Egyptians had street lights from as far back as 3000 years before the Bini empire was formed. Having street lights is not an achievement. Let him show us the architecture of the Bini Kingdom and compare it with that of the Assyrians or Persians for example.

He doesn't know all this his weak attempt is tantamount to stupidity. It's like saying Nigeria has solar streetlights now when the far more advanced societies are building roads underneath the sea, building a canal through a mountain, and passing rail through a residential building.

No matter how he spins it, black African civilizations are at the bottom of the ladder. Every other major civilization in every other continent trumps whatever sub-Saharan Africa can muster in over 6,000 years. The whites already had written languages and libraries while his so-called sophisticated Bini civilization with street light was still using oral tradition. Oral tradition when writing developed almost 4,000 years ago.

He wants to do attache by force when the Moors were heavily influenced by Arabs who themselves were whites. If not for Arabic Mohammed, the Moors would never have crossed the Iberian peninsula. Arabs gave the Moors identity, influenced their culture, even to this day. The black Islamic Africans still bow to their Arab lords to this day. They're even more steadfast and religious than their Arabic overlords.

-Lord

Nowenuse:


Don't mind Braden2.
We all know that the European colonialists were nothing but petty thieves, who looted extremely more and invested extremely less.
Talking about the 10% literacy before independence, if not for the missionaries who were inspired by the selflesness of christian doctrines and seriously promoted education, i bet that 10% would have been 1 or 0.5%. This is what has really affected most core-northerners till date and made them very much educationally backward because they rejected the missionaries under agreement with the same demonic british coloniaists.

However, i get the drift of people lile Braden2 and LordAdam, and their point is that even though we know that Africans had a very great history which was being distorted, we no longer have to settle for self pity or past glories as it will do us no good, rather we have to work hard and prove ourselves to the world again in contemporary times. The Arabs are doing it, the Chinese, Japanese and other Asians are doing it, why can't we?

Sorry, but Africans have been wrongfully denied knowledge of their past. And that MUST change. Europeans, Americans and Asians daily bombard us with their histories, in movies, documentaries, education, and media. Most of us are more familiar with Shakespeare, Caesar, and Abraham Lincoln, than Queen Nzinga, the Angolan queen who almost single-handedly battled the Portuguese, and prevented them from enslaving her people for 40 years. There are countless people like her throughout African history. Why is it ok for us to know all about Shakespeare and Lincoln, but nothing about Nzinga? And then when we post info on these heroes, you people start your nonsense about us "dwelling on past glories". We UNAPOLOGETICALLY WILL CONTINUE to expose our history to our people. Until they are as familiar with themselves as they are with other races. How does our discussing our history mean we are substituting that for development? When Europeans discuss Shakespeare does that mean they are neglecting their economy or whatever? It is patronising in the extreme to insinuate that exploring African history means we are neglecting current development objectives, like we are some sort of infants who cannot multitask. Kindly stop, please.