Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
On December 2 The NewYorker published an article by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie , the Author of three Novels, which intricately requests that people should open their eyes to racism and feminism. She expressed her anger at the way the Americans treated Obama during his time as the President. Below is the full article.
NOW IS THE TIME TO TALK ABOUT WHAT WE ARE ACTUALLY TALKING ABOUT
"America has always been aspirational to me. Even when I chafed at its hypocrisies, it somehow always seemed sure, a nation that knew what it was doing, refreshingly free of that anything-can-happen existential uncertainty so familiar to developing nations. But no longer. The election of Donald Trump has flattened the poetry in America’s founding philosophy: the country born from an idea of freedom is to be governed by an unstable, stubbornly uninformed, authoritarian demagogue. And in response to this there are people living in visceral fear, people anxiously trying to discern policy from bluster, and people kowtowing as though to a new king. Things that were recently pushed to the corners of America’s political space—overt racism, glaring misogyny, anti-intellectualism—are once again creeping to the center.
Now is the time to resist the slightest extension in the boundaries of what is right and just. Now is the time to speak up and to wear as a badge of honor the opprobrium of bigots. Now is the time to confront the weak core at the heart of America’s addiction to optimism; it allows too little room for resilience, and too much for fragility. Hazy visions of “healing” and “not becoming the hate we hate” sound dangerously like appeasement. The responsibility to forge unity belongs not to the denigrated but to the denigrators. The premise for empathy has to be equal humanity; it is an injustice to demand that the maligned identify with those who question their humanity.
America loves winners, but victory does not absolve. Victory, especially a slender one decided by a few thousand votes in a handful of states, does not guarantee respect. Nobody automatically deserves deference on ascending to the leadership of any country. American journalists know this only too well when reporting on foreign leaders—their default mode with Africans, for instance, is nearly always barely concealed disdain. President Obama endured disrespect from all quarters. By far the most egregious insult directed toward him, the racist movement tamely termed “birtherism,” was championed by Trump.
Yet, a day after the election, I heard a journalist on the radio speak of the vitriol between Obama and Trump. No, the vitriol was Trump’s. Now is the time to burn false equivalencies forever. Pretending that both sides of an issue are equal when they are not is not “balanced” journalism; it is a fairy tale—and, unlike most fairy tales, a disingenuous one.
Now is the time to refuse the blurring of memory. Each mention of “gridlock” under Obama must be wrought in truth: that “gridlock” was a deliberate and systematic refusal of the Republican Congress to work with him. Now is the time to call things what they actually are, because language can illuminate truth as much as it can obfuscate it. Now is the time to forge new words. “Alt-right” is benign. “White-supremacist right” is more accurate.
Now is the time to talk about what we are actually talking about. “Climate contrarian” obfuscates. “Climate-change denier” does not. And because climate change is scientific fact, not opinion, this matters.
Now is the time to discard that carefulness that too closely resembles a lack of conviction. The election is not a “simple racism story,” because no racism story is ever a “simple” racism story, in which grinning evil people wearing white burn crosses in yards. A racism story is complicated, but it is still a racism story, and it is worth parsing. Now is not the time to tiptoe around historical references. Recalling Nazism is not extreme; it is the astute response of those who know that history gives both context and warning.
Now is the time to recalibrate the default assumptions of American political discourse. Identity politics is not the sole preserve of minority voters. This election is a reminder that identity politics in America is a white invention: it was the basis of segregation. The denial of civil rights to black Americans had at its core the idea that a black American should not be allowed to vote because that black American was not white. The endless questioning, before the election of Obama, about America’s “readiness” for a black President was a reaction to white identity politics. Yet “identity politics” has come to be associated with minorities, and often with a patronizing undercurrent, as though to refer to nonwhite people motivated by an irrational herd instinct. White Americans have practiced identity politics since the inception of America, but it is now laid bare, impossible to evade.
Now is the time for the media, on the left and right, to educate and inform. To be nimble and alert, clear-eyed and skeptical, active rather than reactive. To make clear choices about what truly matters.
Now is the time to put the idea of the “liberal bubble” to rest. The reality of American tribalism is that different groups all live in bubbles. Now is the time to acknowledge the ways in which Democrats have condescended to the white working class—and to acknowledge that Trump condescends to it by selling it fantasies. Now is the time to remember that there are working-class Americans who are not white and who have suffered the same deprivations and are equally worthy of news profiles. Now is the time to remember that “women” does not equal white women. “Women” must mean all women.
Now is the time to elevate the art of questioning. Is the only valid resentment in America that of white males? If we are to be sympathetic to the idea that economic anxieties lead to questionable decisions, does this apply to all groups? Who exactly are the élite?
Now is the time to frame the questions differently. If everything remained the same, and Hillary Clinton were a man, would she still engender an overheated, outsized hostility? Would a woman who behaved exactly like Trump be elected? Now is the time to stop suggesting that sexism was absent in the election because white women did not overwhelmingly vote for Clinton. Misogyny is not the sole preserve of men.
The case for women is not that they are inherently better or more moral. It is that they are half of humanity and should have the same opportunities—and be judged according to the same standards—as the other half. Clinton was expected to be perfect, according to contradictory standards, in an election that became a referendum on her likability.
Now is the time to ask why America is far behind many other countries (see: Rwanda) in its representation of women in politics. Now is the time to explore mainstream attitudes toward women’s ambition, to ponder to what extent the ordinary political calculations that all politicians make translate as moral failures when we see them in women. Clinton’s careful calibration was read as deviousness. But would a male politician who is carefully calibrated—Mitt Romney, for example—merely read as carefully calibrated?
Now is the time to be precise about the meanings of words. Trump saying “They let you do it” about assaulting women does not imply consent, because consent is what happens before an act.
Now is the time to remember that, in a wave of dark populism sweeping the West, there are alternative forms. Bernie Sanders’s message did not scapegoat the vulnerable. Obama rode a populist wave before his first election, one marked by a remarkable inclusiveness. Now is the time to counter lies with facts, repeatedly and unflaggingly, while also proclaiming the greater truths: of our equal humanity, of decency, of compassion. Every precious ideal must be reiterated, every obvious argument made, because an ugly idea left unchallenged begins to turn the color of normal. It does not have to be like this.

What do you think.


https://olofoforeview./2016/12/08/now-is-the-time-to-talk-about-what-we-are-actually-talking-about-by-chimamanda-ngozi-adichie/

Maka Why na?

After all this English you are still living in America, issoright,.

LONJITARLE:
After all this English you are still living in America.

lol ... America is free for all.

Adichie hit the truths that humanity has been running from. We know it but don't say it and don't address it.

Divepen1:
lol ... America is free for all.

So is Nigeria bro.

ccffwx:
Adichie hit the truths that humanity has been running from. We know it but don't say it and don't address it.

That's the truth. Most of us scream it out in our minds, bringing depression on ourselves and frustration at others.

LONJITARLE:


So is Nigeria bro.

Lol... But there, there is freedom of speech even after the speech.

Nigerians should leave Americans alone to govern themselves the way they like. You'll leave your country in tatters and go and be blowing grammar in another man's country. Is it not because they took good care of their own that you found it desirable to go and live in?

Maybe Americans are not so smart as we thought
Maybe they've just been waiting for someone to champion their shallowness
Let's see how things unfold
Let's hope they've not elected their own version of Buhari
Someone being propelled by hatred

My problem with feminists is that when they contest in something and lose to men, they automatically conclude that they lost because they're women.

I was talking with one the other day and she said that a woman cannot become president in Nigeria because Nigeria men hate women and I asked.

"Are Igbos women? Why is it difficult for them to become president in Nigeria?"

It's simple, they don't plan well.

Clinton lost because Trump did something better.

Adichie should stop wailing and return home if she isn't comfortable with Trump being American president.

You're there blowing grammar when the old man you stupid folks foisted on us has rendered the economy useless.

Poor man can no longer afford garri and sugar.

Many people won't travel home this xmass because they're broke but the only thing disturbing you is American's choice of president.

How is it your business?

Clinton Lost, Trump won, deal with it or die crying.


International Wailer

xnsandrxns:
Maybe Americans are not so smart as we thought
Maybe they've just been waiting for someone to champion their shallowness
Let's see how things unfold
Let's hope they've not elected their own version of Buhari
Someone being propelled by hatred

Hmmm. This is insightful.

thesicilian:
Nigerians should leave Americans alone to govern themselves the way they like. You'll leave your country in tatters and go and be blowing grammar in another man's country. Is it not because they too good care of their own that you found it desirable to go and live in?

Since they are there they have to fight for their own o.

Tallesty1:
My problem with feminists is that when they contest in something and lose to men, they automatically conclude that they lost because they're women.

I was talking with one the other day and she said that a woman cannot become president in Nigeria because Nigeria men hate women and I asked.

"Are Igbos women? Why is it difficult for them to become president in Nigeria?"

It's simple, they don't plan well.

Clinton lost because Trump did something better.

Adichie should stop wailing and return home if she's comfortable with Trump being American president.

I will agree with this

microlayabout:
Maka Why na?

Leave her o

now dtz why I want to m8k it in lyf. even if a poor man write d same thing this newspepa wont feature it o

I couldn't sleep. Does anyone know the solution to insomnia, please?

Nice one.Still can't wrap my head around a Trump Presidency.

Like Adichie said, the man is pathologically unstable. A man who talks before thinking can only be a destabilising factor.

The next four years will be tough for America and Americans. Some hard truths in this beautiful piece.

I don't care about This article.

A visitor can't tell house owners how to live in it.

she should be quiet abeg . feminism is a lost cause, just a bunch of insecure women voicing hatred against men . Trump wants to run the country like a business. lets see his efforts in boosting the U.S economy

I'm sorry, but I don't agree with Chimamanda. Everything she wrote there can be summarized as saying the right wing is completely full of White Sipremacists. Which is absolutely wrong.
OK, why did Donald Trump choose Dr. Ben Carson as Secretary (Minister) of Housing and Urban Development? There's even a Nigerian in his economic team. The Republican party is diverse. Surely not as diverse as the Democratic Party, but it has its own fair share of diversity.
Not all right wingers are part of the alt-right. Although Donald Trump can be said to be the champion of 'alt-right' ideologies including populism and nationalism, what you have to understand is that the majority of people who supported Trump did so grudgingly- to vote against Hilary Clinton.
Clinton's dirty laundry has been continuously exposed in the media up until this election, with Obama even 'finishing' her in the debates. Talking about how she was getting fatter on Walmart Capitalist money while he was being a community volunteer. They've said so many things about her that have effectively shown how she was unfit, and the nail in the coffin was the email scandal. And after all that, the Democrats decided that SHE was the person fit to run against a man who was running on the waves of populism, a very attractive ideology to people who were fed up with Obama's government.
Charisma on Command explained it very simply. She didn't have the 'energy' and was never convincing enough. Trump came along with the idea of being an outsider. She immediately tried to switch, by calling herself an 'outsider' (which every idiot knows is not true) because she was a woman. Obama, on the other hand, while campaigning for her, turned the question around, saying 'You want experienced doctors to treat you, experienced engineers to build your houses. Why then do you want an 'outsider' to lead you?'
Clinton just wasn't fit. Period. Another candidate would've been better. Only a very small percentage of Trump supporters believe everything he says. The rest just have so much disdain for Clinton.
Trump's appointees aren't too discouraging either. He's appointing good brains in his cabinet. Some people claim that he's just appointing 'rich' people, but those are the people he knows how to work with. And because of his arrogant nature, he's so scared of failure that HE'S ACTUALLY TAKING ADVICE. You can see that reflected in his appointment of 'Mad Dog Mattis' as Secretary of Defence. Frankly, Obama's Secretaries of Defence didn't know what they were doing. He appointed 4 different ones over his two terms. This man, General Mattis, however, is very popular with the army. The soldiers have confidence in the government now, because they described Mattis as 'A man who knows what wars to avoid, but isn't afraid to fight back'.

All these are just speculation anyway. Let's see what happens in the end.

**As others have rightly said too, why hasn't she been writing long articles about Nigeria? Why hasn't she been actively using her influence to change the mindset of Nigerian Youths?

Chima,leave America and trump alone. if e pain you come back to Nigeria.





N£XT

So dis wn dey amerika dey blow grammer? It is time it is time to do weytn na?

Shey na ur country ni? U leave ur country go anoda man country wey ur own country do spoil finish



Abeg come houz come make we no how dis country go take better

So long a letter - Mariama Ba

The whites have always been shallow, it takes the deep to call on the deep or something like that. It took a stupid Man like Trump to bring out the stupidity in white Americans.

skillful01:
Chima,leave America and trump alone.
if e pain you come back to Nigeria.






N£XT

I juz tire for am o

I didnt read all....pls can som1 jst summarize what she said

kill yaself

Wow.this may stir some controversies.

You are a Nigerian,how many articles have you written about corruption,insurgency and the high rate of poverty in Nigeria?because you are previledged you are there making noise in another man's country,come to Nigeria and let's build our country together,leave oyinbo with him land,you follow them fight for independence?