Article focuses on the states but also has a global theme.


HARD TRUTH

By Min. J. Kojo Livingston

Understanding White Supremacy (part 1 of 3)

When I heard Al Sharpton say it I wanted to puke.

"It" was his prediction that the recent mass demonstration in Jena, Louisiana signaled the birth of the 21st Century Civil Rights Movement.

"God forbid," I prayed silently, "They just don't get it."

Of all the things Black people need right now, another 'Civil Rights' movement has got to be near the last, if not after the last.

Yes, I supported the march. Yes, I helped dozens of people get there, even though my own transportation did not work out. Yes, I know about the euphoria of thousands of Black folks gathering to show their collective outrage and concern. Yes, I know that many felt the presence of God in that place at that time and I am excited about the possibility of a heightened sense of activism and collective commitment to the advancement of the Black race.

But no, I do not want to see a re-hash of the Civil Rights Movement. And since millions of our people at least claim to experience some form of spiritual ecstasy at least once per week in church (and nothing changes), I'm looking for something more than a momentary illumination. We need a plan and a system and a culture that produces lasting, tangible, meaningful results.

This needs to happen immediately as the post 911 USA moves rapidly toward an open totalitarian police state. Good Lord people, you're seeing White people's civil liberties being snatched in front of your very eyes in the name of public safety or security (or fear). At an anti-war demonstration in Fairport, New York, cops arrested protesters, confiscated the cameras of reporters, then told them that to get them returned they would have to identify other reporters there. Laws are being passed, as you read this, to make it easier to for this government to spy on you without cause or consequence. These acts aren't opposed by your animated conservative commentators because they seem to be directed at folks who are undesirable due to their political or religious postures or their perceived threat to the status quo.


So, what on earth do you think these people have planned for us? Here's a sample: At Knight High School in Palmdale, California a Black school girl was literally jumped on by security guards for dropping cake crumbs and not cleaning them up well enough. After three attempts she tried to walk away and they broke her arm. She was arrested for attacking the guards, a common tactic nowadays. The attack was caught on camera. Then the guards attacked and arrested the child who filmed the attack and his sister for just being there. Are you beginning to get an idea of where things are headed?

A new 'Civil Rights Movement' will not answer this kind of repression. We must move beyond begging for rights to organizing ourselves to use our vast economic, cultural and spiritual power to sustain, protect and advance ourselves.

Somehow we've got to mature to the point where we can distinguish the difference between success and a good showing, catharsis from victory and progress from bull****.

Our basic problem is not sporadic acts or instances of White racist behavior on the part of some officials or municipalities. Yes, there are battles that must be won on those levels, but the real issue is the world system of White supremacy. This will never be broken or overcome by a movement which, by definition, exists to demand better treatment from others who control all of the systems that supply, define and direct your life. Civil Rights, at best, can only make living under White supremacy a bit more comfortable and that only for a few of us. Under open martial law that comfort zone will be mighty small.

"Curing" White people is not our job. However breaking White supremacy's hold on our lives has to be the first step to true and total Black liberation. And while leaving the US could be an answer for a few of us, white supremacy is a world phenomenon that is hard to escape anywhere on the planet, including and especially Afrika.

But what is White supremacy? Who is a White supremacist and what is the difference between White supremacy and White racism? Glad you asked!!!

White supremacy is a commitment to the domination of the earth (or universe) by people of European origin. This commitment is rooted in fear, an incredibly powerful fear, of scarcity or a lack of enough resources to go around. This fear screams "If I don't have it all, I may not have enough someday." This fear gives birth to greed which becomes a god that demands to be appeased at any and all costs. No act is too dishonorable, vile or low down to reject for this cause. Ask the slaves. Ask the natives. Ask the Jews.

White conservatives, liberals, radicals, socialists and communists tend to all agree on one thing: White people should be in charge. How they should rule the other groups is another question.

White supremacy is a living drive that creates economic, political, religious and cultural systems to support itself. The cornerstone of White supremacy is the philosophy of White superiority. This philosophy says that White people are inherently superior to everyone else and therefore obligated (or 'burdened') to rule everyone else and entitled to take the best of everything for themselves. This philosophy has been and is still taught in virtually every home, classroom, church, news and entertainment medium that everyone in this society and most of the world has been exposed to since birth. That's why it seems so natural. That is why damn-near everyone in the United States and most of the rest of the planet is a White supremacist, including and especially Black people.

"Say what?"

Yes, anyone of any color who consciously or unwittingly supports WS is a White Supremacist.

The justifying tenet of White supremacy is the notion that White is right. This means that when White people are clearly wrong the only task is to figure a way to explain HOW they are right. The primary legitimizing strategy today is to claim that White racism either no longer exists or is not a real factor in today's world. When evidence to the contrary appears you must lie, distort or distract attention. For activists it's easy to get caught up wasting time proving to racists that they are racists. They already know what they are. The question is how much of your time can they tie up to keep you focused on them and not on making your own real progress. Black people don't need another 'national dialogue on race'. We just need to figure out how we are going to eliminate our dependence on other groups and how we are going to empower and protect ourselves from what the US is about to become.

So we have all of these layers of deception, delusion, repression and exploitation and the only thing a leader can come up with is another Civil Rights Movement? Get real, Quickly!

Fortunately there is a lot we can do, and although I certainly don't have all the answers, we'll look at some options in the next two installments.

Until then, we need to be seriously considering, What Are We Going to Do?

Understanding White Supremacy, Part 2

Imagine Jena, Louisiana, in reverse.

Imagine a group of White kids in the heat of a racial conflict jumped a Black student, injuring him. Imagine the Black student went to the hospital to get checked, but was in good enough shape to attend a school activity that same night. Now imagine a Black District Attorney charging the White students with attempted murder (with a tennis shoe), this after bragging at an earlier confrontation about his ability to take away their lives “with the stroke of a pen.”

Would the local and national media have been so reluctant and slow to cover the issue? Would hot headed political commentators be cheering the decision? Would a White attacker be left in jail for nine months? Or would the DA know better for fear of his job and his life?

Okay, jump to reality. There actually were attacks on Black by Whites in Jena prior to the incident involving Mychal Bell. At least one involved a gang of Whites beating a Black youth, (who was told by a responding cop to go back to his own neighborhood). Another had a gun being pulled on a group of Black youth. Of course no Whites were arrested and there will never be any media outrage about these attacks.

Let’s look at a more blatant case. Recently in West Virginia young Megan Williams was kidnaped for five days, tortured in horrendous ways and sexually assaulted by six people. What? No ongoing radio outrage? No screams for the death penalty? Why? The woman was Black and her attackers were White. The conservative strategy for this type of incident is first denial. Deny it happened or deny it was really serious. Won’t work here cause they were busted in the act. Next, make the victim responsible. What was she doing in that neighborhood? Then if all else fails, deflect attention to other issues. Well, Blacks kill each other so this should not be a big deal. Notice that honest concern about the seriousness of this crime or its implications is not an option for your media mouths. Why? Because it’s about the color, not the crime.

Black folks, if you are still trying to prick the conscience of this nation or convince others to share power or treat you better, you are wasting your time. If you are still trying to play the color-blind game in spite of the fact that Black people are behind in every aspect of life and treated worse on every level of this system then you need to wake up and face reality. But it’s okay. If you won’t listen to me, reality will bite you soon enough. Possibly sooner than that.

It’s never been about equality. The founders of this country made it clear in the constitution that Black people were less than human. It’s never been about justice. The Dred Scott philosophy still stands; we still have no legal rights that a White man is bound to respect. It’s always been about power.

The issue for the people who run this nation is keeping a handful of White people in control and exploiting everyone else. Today it’s about tightening that control to the maximum using Black people as both the testing group and the excuse. It’s never been about freedom’ or justice’, especially not for all’. It’s always been about control of people and resources. White supremacy (WS) is the name of the game and Black people have been its greatest asset and promoter.


We came as slaves to build their economic system. Since slavery we still continue to use most of our waking hours and energy working for peanuts to advance some White owned or controlled business or agency. After working all week for this system, we take nearly a trillion dollars (annually) of the money we earned and put in right back into the hands of other ethnic groups. We either ignore or find reasons not to support Black-owned businesses. Then we brag about which expensive auto, jewel or clothing company has ripped us off.

We tend to define success in terms of which White corporation we work for. We have the gall to tell our children to go to college, get in debt, study hard and graduate. Why? So they can go find a wealthy master to work for life. Ask a group of Black college students (as I do often) how many are in school to get a good job’ and most will raise their hands. Ask how many plan to ever work for themselves and you get little or no response. We are teaching them to aspire toward a life of subservience. And almost none of our leaders in the religious, political or academic fields will encourage our children to become owners. So Black kids aspire to be sports team players instead of team owners; actors in movies instead of owners of production and distribution companies; rappers instead of radio or TV station owners. We actually push our future leaders to strive to perform on stages, studios, arenas and in media that are owned by someone else. No other ethnic group even thinks this way.

Then we even lend our spirit-force, or faith to White supremacy. When we close our eyes to pray, the image we address is either an old White man with a white beard or a young blond White guy, neither of whom could possibly be the image of God or Jesus. If the first nation mentioned in the Bible is Ethiopia and the first people made in God’s image came from that region, then the old White guy could not possibly be what God looks like. Maybe a’ god but definitely not The God. We already know that Jesus and his family were dark skinned enough to go and hide out in Egypt (which is part of Afrika, for those who have been lied to). These bleached images were sold to us and beaten into us for hundreds of years so that today most Black people see a White person they believe that they are looking at the image of God. Our folks even get mad when you question that image.

Most racists would probably be surprised to know the degree to which most Blacks really do feel that we as a group are inferior and that the best we can do is to either become more like White people or to get them to accept us. Five hundred years of brainwashing has been very effective.

Contrary to the whining of racists, most Black folks don’t spend our energy trying to be different. We go overboard, spending billions per year trying to dress, speak, think and even alter our bodies to look like White people. This is our cultural contribution to the continuance of WS. The average Black woman will go to her grave putting acid in her hair to make it look and behave like a White woman’s hair. Some of you know people who still press their lips against their teeth so the lips will look thinner. Some of our educated’ folks even try to sound British to appear more intelligent. Most of our people scoff at any mention of our own history, especially pre-slavery. And we’re trying to be different? We’re not trying to be different enough!

To get beyond the alarmist game of the conservative/racists you have to look at the real facts. White people still own most of everything good in this country. Black people still own the least. We have given up virtually every industry and own less than 2% of the nation’s wealth. We are not a threat in ownership of anything and Black elected officials rarely help us because their money comes from outside the community. We may dominate as players in sports, but our athletes are owned by White teams or groups. So why do racists get so upset whenever we get a little bit of something? Because the imperative of WS is to have it all. Total control, total dominance, total submission.

It’s not a conspiracy. There is no secrecy. This society is openly moving to the point where you are not allowed to do anything that is cannot be tracked by some agency via camera or computer. When buying groceries, to get a discount you have to have a card that identifies you and tracks all of your purchases. This means they can tell whether you purchased more corn than peas or dirty magazines. Remember when you could ride the Greyhound without picture ID? No more! To use a library computer you have to be identified so that someone can tell where you went, how many times you went there and how long you spent or who you communicated with. It’s life under surveillance in the name of fear. We are already in Orwell’s nightmare. But it’s not enough for this government.

For Blacks it’s worse because we are the testing ground and the justification for a repressive society. Katrina proved that you could abandon over 20,000 Black folks to face death, hunger, filth and squalor for days without any national repercussions. In San Francisco, where eight ex-Panthers are on trial, again after 20 years, a judge decided to allow confessions secured under torture. In New Orleans members of a second line were arrested and beaten for well, having a second line. In Jackson, MS Katrina evacuees picketing the Red Cross office were confronted by police who told them they had to register’ to have a picket line. There are enough stories to fill up website and keep all organizations busy chasing justice. That approach won’t work.


The racist/conservative talk show hosts are effective at diverting attention from the extinction of civil liberties and toward an imaginary Black threat. While they whip up anger or fear of Blacks, liberals or Muslims, the folks who are electronically peeking in your shower are fighting for more access to your life. Most Whites will be glad to see undesirables’ contained or eliminated and won’t wake up until those neighborhood cameras are used to enforce a curfew on their own block. When a guy in uniform is pointing a gun at them telling them to go back in their home, they will finally get it’ and say to themselves, “It wasn’t the n*goers after all. We should have been watching our own folks.”

While that may be a satisfying admission, I would like to propose that Black people cannot afford to wait for that day to come. There is a lot that must be done quickly. What I am able to understand of what must be done will constitute the third and final installment of this series.

Until then, have you considered Whatchagonna DO?

HARD TRUTH
By Min. J. Kojo Livingston
liberationzone@aol.com
Destinyone.org

Understanding White Supremacy (Part 3 of 3)

"So this is it. The single most important column I've done in 29 years as a journalist and 35 years as a ground-level activist for Black Liberation. But I'm not good enough. Sitting here, surrounded by the ancestors, I realize that I am hardly adequate to share the fullness of their counsel. But the Spirit of God says 'Try, make the effort, go for it.' Deep breath. Let's DO this".

How do you stomp a child to death on camera and be declared 'not guilty' in a court of law? The same way you the same way you ignore the televised pleas of thousands of hurricane victims that you have the ability to rescue in a matter of hours. It's the same way you could re-enslave or annihilate an entire un-desirable element of a society. It worked for Hitler and has worked before and since him.

It was about two years before Katrina that Dr. Samuel F. Yette came to New Orleans . My pastor, Dwight Webster, had studied under him in Howard and invited me to have lunch with them. It was a dream come true. I admired this man since 1973 when I read his book, "The Choice: The Issue of Black Survival in America ." In it he used publicly available documents to expose the rationale and plans to contain and exterminate Black people. The book was so powerful that President Richard Nixon attempted to prevent it from being published. (Of course, today he would have succeeded.) Like a kid in a candy store, I must have asked him at least half a million questions. One answer froze me in my tracks.

"I imagine a day when the other nations will have to meet to decide whether or not to try to save us from annihilation. I imagine them saying, 'They don't produce anything. They are not contributing anything of value to the world. There is no justification for taking the risks and making the sacrifices necessary to rescue these people from a nation that powerful.'"

It's time for us as a people to reposition ourselves.
Some of our better minds believe that we have about five years to do this before the term 'ugly' takes on a new meaning for us. I hope they are right. The totalitarians may not want to have another national election. That would give us about one year. But five years of vigorous work could put us on the path to real empowerment and serious national change. Doing nothing could leave us either non-existent on in some modified form of mass enslavement.


It's not about a being protected by a system where you have rights. We're not and we don't. It's about possessing the power and position to provide for and protect ourselves. Now, more than ever, Black people need a Black Power or Black Empowerment Movement that has clear, long and short range objectives and rational strategy for achieving self-sufficiency and self-determination with justice.
How do we come out of this mess and rise to the level of greatness of our ancestors? There are many ways. So to organize this brief synopsis we'll go from the big picture to the little picture, what we must do and what you can do, starting today, immediately, right now.



THE BIG PICTURE

The first thing is to realize that our struggle is part of the universal battle between good and evil. There is no cause on this earth more sacred than the pursuit of the destiny (God's plan) and restoration of Black people!
Therefore my first piece of practical advice is to PRAY. (Where did you expect me to start? I'm a preacher.) Pray according to your own tradition. Pray by yourself and with groups. Pray often and expect to get answers.

Having trouble getting past the image of the old White guy in your head? Here's a technique that I use. When in prayer or meditation imagine the blackness of space. Now imagine a deeper blackness within that Blackness. Now speak to the core of that Blackness but not with your head but from your heart. You are now communicating with the Creator. (Apologies to 'those-who-know', but we really need this right now.)

Next, the most critical thing that Black people must do at this point is to begin to aggressively LOVE ourselves. Sounds mushy? What was the first tool used to enslave us? An aggressive, international campaign to reduce us to less-than-human status in our own eyes and the eyes of the world. It is this self-hatred and self-doubt that allows, causes and mandates that we accept a lower position in life. Carter G. Woodson said a person taught to be subservient would make a back door to go in if he did not find one. We need to use every possible vehicle to promote the concept of Black self-love. Music, spoken word, images on t-shirts, buttons, bumper stickers, flags, caps will all help. We need to talk and teach the mechanics of self-love using TV, radio, movies, the net, books, tapes, brochures, posters, classes and mass rallies and anything else we can find. We are good at dissing each other, now we must learn the habit of appreciating each other and building our people up.

Then we must change the culture of activism. This is the mantra of our ministry. We've got to grow up as people. We must move from being short-sighted and re-active to operating based on a long-term vision with clear objectives and plans. We could keep re-acting to racist offenses for the next 400 years (if we had that long) but it would not advance us as a people. We need to agree to a definition/vision of what we want, develop a credible strategy and then refuse to stop until we have fulfilled it. This is called becoming responsible for one's Destiny.


Since we spent most of our physical, mental, spiritual and financial energy supporting the world system of White supremacy, we must begin to take some of our power back from that system in simple, practical ways. Put more of your labor into liberation activities. Start spending more money with Black businesses. Make your dollars work to strengthen your own community. Teach our children the value of business ownership. This could help our people to start really supporting our businesses. Brother James Clingman recently pulled together groups to revive a new MATA movement. You can also go online and check The Black Business Network and IZANIA.com.

We must develop active relationships with other nations, especially Afrika. These can be business relationships, cultural exchanges, academic and other types of activities that expand our horizons. Black people must start doing business with Afrika. When I was in South Afrika a brother practically pleaded with me, "Everybody is coming here and getting rich except the American Blacks." It's no accident. Oppression-induced Afri-phobia prevents us from taking advantage of partnerships that could help both us and the Motherland. These relationships will expand our understanding of the larger world, greatly enhance our financial wealth and bring active allies that can be of some help in a worst case scenario.
We must develop strategies and resources to generate meaningful consequences for those who violate our people. People should know that if you mess with us we will not only 'express collective outrage' but we will find a way make you pay and do the right thing. One short-term tactic I like is picketing homes of offenders. It's how we shut down the South African consulate in New Orleans . Heck, we went to jail picketing the consulate office and Kruggerand shops but when we showed up at his home he left and took his staff with him.

In Jena this could be tried with the DA or other officials. It doesn't take 40,000 people to make an impact this way and you can maintain consistency, say one hour per day at some strategic time, until your objective (and you must have an objective) is achieved. On a larger scale, strategic boycotts, lawsuits and even exposing embarrassing or incriminating information are all fair in war, and we are at war, we just keep losing.



THE SPECIFICS

To win we've got to build a real base of economic, political and cultural power. This involves short-term, practical self-sufficiency work as well as bold national moves. Both types of endeavors are listed below:
START A GARDEN. Yes, a GARDEN. A one-foot square project in your back yard can grow into an economic engine for your entire community, if you use your danged Kuumba, B that's creativity. Believe it or not, gardening projects make communities safer and more unified. There's something about people working together that strengthens and puts the 'neighbor' back in the 'hood.'


Even a small garden can generate income by selling to stores or individuals. Since most of our people rarely eat real food nowadays, there are serious health benefits and even behavioral benefits for our children. Since land is the basis for political and economic power, learning how to relate to the land and feed ourselves is a practical first step that you can begin THIS VERY DAY.

Imagine massive gardening projects in every city that also connected with Black farmers, (who really need our support). Imagine vacant, nasty lots replaced with life-affirming, organized vegetation. Imagine having an Afrikan marketplace set up where people can sell their wares and that the community truly supports. Imagine a goal of re-directing 1% of the grocery dollars of the Black community in your city in the first year's time and 5% in three years. That's a lot of money and a lot of power. Since I'm no expert on this, you might want to contact the Federation of Southern Cooperatives to help you get going.

BREAK THE SCHOOL-TO-PRISON PIPELINE. Our schools were bad before high-stakes testing. Now they are becoming drop-out factories to feed the new slavery, the prison industry. We simply need our own national school system that could start with mass home schooling. This week you can begin tutoring or participating in an after-school or weekend program that teaches children their history and culture. You can become an advocate for education change. CIBI- the Council of Independent Black Institutions may be a place to start. The Children's Defense Fund is also working this issue.

INCREASE THE PEACE - especially with our youth and young adults. We've got to take our children back from the 'drug/thug' culture. We've got an entire generation of born warriors who simply need direction. Let's go get them. Programs that combine cultural orientation with employment or (legal) income producing training have been effective across the country. If necessary, you can start one in your living room. We're going to do an entire column or series on this.



HELP STOP RECIDIVISM. Visit or write someone in prison, help others do the same. What if every Church adopted two prisoners who are about to come out and helped them find work and stay out of the joint? Check out my friends at NABSIO - the National Association of Brothers and Sisters Inside and Out.

CHALLENGE THE PRISON-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. This thing is a racial reality. According to the Bureau of Justice statistics, White people are arrested for way more crimes, even violent crimes than anybody else in the country. No surprise there, since they are 'way' the majority. So why are we over-represented in the prisons? Guess the Whites are all false arrests. We need to work with folks like The Sentencing Project, to expose and oppose how this system treats our people. Groups like Critical Resistance are doing this work.


GET YOUR MIND RIGHT. Read something everyday. Check out some of the empowerment plans other leaders have laid out for our people. The works of Marcus Garvey, Chancellor William's Destruction of Black Civilization, Amos Wilson's epic 'Blue Print for Black Power' (no, I didn't finish it either), and don't miss Claud Anderson's "Powernomics" because his Harvest Institute is actually doing the stuff he writes about. Start a book club and PLEASE get the books from Black-owned bookstores. Check out website you're not supposed to know about such as Democracy Now.org or Copwatch, or Project Censored. If you are a fundamentalist, biblical literalist with high blood pressure, or a heart condition, please DO NOT visit wblr.com, that's WBLR.COM. Do not click on the radio and do not listen to Dr. Ray Hagins. (Okay, at least I warned you.) Also check out wlib.com.

ORGANIZE YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD. Develop a neighborhood vision and a plan for realizing it. Get prepared for natural or human generated disasters. Learn how to protect your community. My ministry does it through setting up Liberated Zones. For info check our website (under construction) at destinyone.org.

KNOW YOUR ENEMY. Look up 'REX 84' or 'Operation Garden Plot' (they're about you). Like to hear the other side raw? Search terms like 'paramilitary' or 'RaHoWa'.

JOIN SOMETHING. Other groups that are already doing self-determination work include: 10$10$50.org; - a campaign I just got involved in that is dedicated to creating synergy among Black organizations. They don't duplicate, they coordinate! Other groups include, The Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, National Black United Front, the New Afrikan People's Organization, INCITE! Women of Color vs Violence (family violence is a threat to our future) and The Millions More Movement . Most of these either have a group near you or would be delighted to have you start one in your area. You don't have to re-invent the wheel.

There's much more than can fit in this or several columns, but I hope you've got the urgency and some ideas that can help you become active and effective in pursuing total Black Liberation. I promise to provide more information of these and other solutions in future columns. I value your input and ideas.

So, Whatchagonna DO? As we say at Destiny One, "Let's Go Get Our People!