A World Without Black People

[afro-elf]

Originally posted by Starr Polish
Have I ever said that I think blacks, or any other race for that matter, are all intellectually inferior? I don't think I've ever said such a thing my entire life.

Starr I NEVER said that you did. The statement above was this IF someone said Christians were such and such from what I perceive of your on-line personality, I think you would provide counter evidence.

You asked why ? What was the purpose of my posting? That was an attempt to make you understand why I posted.

there is NOTHING in the post that accuses you of such.

Starr my image of you is that of a fairly opened minded young woman. AND WANT THAT TO BE STATED CLEARLY. I truly wish the world was populated by more young people like yourself.


Coney you are correct to my knowledge there have not been any.

I was simply just out some information. However it was never my intention to rattle the snake pit.

EXCEPT FOR SPOCK

SO, I APOLOGIZE IF ANYONE FELT OFFENDED. IT WAS NOT MY INTENTION.

Save for that Dilbert icon haven' Vulcan name stealin' tabi shoe wearin' dirty harry crumedegeon .....

[The Lady of Ithilien]

Nice original post, Afro-Elf (though you might want to remember that many good things have also been invented by "multiple-adjective" curmudgeons, too ). Yes, the 5000-character limit requires multiple posts, doesn't it?

You also might be interested in a book that puts this all into perspective: Dr. John Sibley Butler's "Entrepreneurship and Self-Help Among Black Americans." He also has a list of inventions by black people, but only as part of his overall thesis, which is that black Americans, unlike other minorities, took an "economic detour" due to the Jim Crow era.

I'll be honest and say that I skipped over the purely sociological parts of the book, but found plenty of interesting history in it: American history, and parts of it that most of us were never taught.

The Amazon listing has more information on the book and some customer reviews.

IMO, it's not correct to say "these things would have been invented eventually anyway." Many of these things were invented only because black people, more than other Americans of those times, were closely acquainted with the details and problems of practical life because they were in close contact with them due to their history of slavery and then, after emancipation, work as laborers and domestic servants.

And we can't just forget about it, not only because of the principle Tolkien mentioned once (the servant has a claim on the master for service, even for service in fear) but also because to let or make ourselves forget it would be to forget our history and thus ourselves.

This part of our history is such a political "hot potato," even now, so many decades after the "civil rights" era. Yet it is good to be reminded, as Dr. Butler and others (with whom I don't always agree but who are interesting) remind us, that there are points of view other than the rather Marxist and socialist interpretation of the history and role of black people in America that came to be accepted as the truth during that era. Besides W.E.B. Dubois and Dr. King, there was and always will be Booker T. Washington and others like him.

Even though it makes us uncomfortable, it is also good to be reminded that we need to question our assumptions about the world from time to time: did you know, for instance, that Jefferson Davis, in the years before the War Between the States, supported a patent claim by one of his slaves all the way up to the federal level, where it was stopped personally by the US Attorney General? (That's in Butler's book, and I believe is footnoted for source, too. It's a very scholarly book.)

Things are usually much more complex than we assume. Or, as the Murphy's 21st Law of Combat says, "The important things are always simple; the simple are always hard."

And the hardest thing of all to learn, let alone remember, is: they only win, if they make you hate them.

[Wayfarer]

It was a response made by someone who made disparaging remarks about blacks and intelligence.

Oh, come on. As if YOU actually need to respond to something like that. :P

Just cross your arms and give them a level stare. Then walk away and make sure you laugh loud enough for them to here you.

[Spock]

....appearing in a cloud of smoke......"ah A.E. you have returned to try and grasp the pebble. Know this, I only have my mind"

........backflips into the scenery and is seen no more.........

[Lizra]

AE, are the Japanese any more racist towards blacks than (some, not all) Americans? I have heard this mentioned from time to time, but I wonder if it's true. Maybe they mean (some, not all) Americans of Asian descent have racist attitudes toward blacks? What do you experience in Japan?

[The Lady of Ithilien]

........backflips into the scenery and is seen no more.........

That does it -- my next vacation is definitely going to be in Area 51.

[afro-elf]

Wow. Thanks for the responses.

Wayfarer

Oh, come on. As if YOU actually need to respond to something like that. :P

Just cross your arms and give them a level stare. Then walk away and make sure you laugh loud enough for them to here you

Yeah, you are correct kid.

Spock

....appearing in a cloud of smoke......"ah A.E. you have returned to try and grasp the pebble. Know this, I only have my mind"

........backflips into the scenery and is seen no more.........

Who was that masked man...?

Samadi unto you.

Lizra, I will break it down to you by countries that I have been to.
( for at for a little while)

I have only experienced overt Racism in America. The N-word hurled at me several times, the N-word hurled at me follow by beer thrown at us, things like that. I had some problems from a Chinese Kid and a East Indian guy. Minorites too, go figure.

However, those things were isolated. I do not have the ghetto, hip gangsta, gun totting, rough neck, bitches, ho's and money presence.

Actaully, I have been lablelled "Uncle Tom, Sell-out, Oreo, You be wonna dim kinda niggahs"..etc

If it wasn't for the fact that I have a certain presence I would have probably been in big trouble growing up.

Because I do not fit the "Street Mode Niggah" I usually don't have a problem. Suprising it have been inner city blacks that had the great prejudice towards be than anyone else.


Canada no one cared

Colombia it was about social class not color. If I did not speak they thought I from the coast.

Sweden no one cared. But I was only in Stockholm.

Greece no one cared

Turkey was fine except the director of the school thought I was a Marine.

Ukraine nothing bad but I heard "Chocolate" a lot

Saudia it one of the few places were being "white" would have been BAD. For me that all thought I was a Brazilian soccer player.

Australia it was an advantage with the ladies. Or could have been. I my carousing skills were even worse than they are now.
So many chances that went like wind through the hands.

Korea was not any racism but just stereo-typing. People were shocked that I was an international student and not a soldier.
They expected me to dance and play basketball. Nearly got into severall fights because people thought I was a soldier. The girls called me chocolate there too.

Taiwan some guy shout something at me that sounded like the N-word. But that was it.

Thailand all I got was "Chocolate" but never a problem


Japan has quite a few Africans here and I think they might have a hard time. For me the problems have been cultural not racial.

The monkey in the Zoo feeling has only been in Japan and Korea.

However, I think a lot the so called racism blacks claim is not about race but demeanor. I do not want hang out with certain people because of there actions. If a person carries themself in a certain way it will get you through most problems.

Ignorance, ill manners, and beligerance is the same no matter the color of the person.

Lady of Ith

I am headed to your links now

[Lizra]

Well, I feel kind of "vanilla"!

[afro-elf]

The links were a tad sparse but I got the giest of it.

It is a multi-tiered problem; and it is one blacks can take care of themselves. Blacks keep themselves down these days not DA MAN or the system.

[Spock]

Originally posted by The Lady of Ithilien
That does it -- my next vacation is definitely going to be in Area 51.

You're as welcome as can be. Even Patton couldn't find you here.

[The Lady of Ithilien]

Thanks, Spock!

Even Patton couldn't find you here.

That's too bad -- from the tourist video "Independence Day," it looked like just the place for someone who broke through the German siege of American forces in Bastogne in WWII (the one where the surrounded American commander replied to an German demand that they surrender: "Nuts."). A world without tankers...how awful! =8-O

It is a multi-tiered problem; and it is one blacks can take care of themselves. Blacks keep themselves down these days not DA MAN or the system.

Nowadays, yep. That's the gist of the Issues-Views.org site, too, especially in the earlier stuff they published, in the late 1980s, early 1990s. That's where I really learned something about Booker T. Washington, and also found Dr. Butler's book (and many other good information sources, too).

The main thing, though, as you point out, is personal experience. This white woman's experience really hasn't been international, just relevant experiences in New Mexico and Alabama. In New Mexico, the axis of hate is triple: whites, Latinos and the locals, mostly Pueblo and some Navajo and Apache peoples. Black people are there, too, but most everybody else so busy hating whatever other two groups of the Big Three they're not, the black people seem to get ignored more than anything else. (My apologies in advance to all New Mexicans who may read that and disagree, but it's what I saw during almost two years there. Your mileage may vary.) However, it was also there that I began to learn Spanish, because of the music in the street names in Albuquerque and the general ambience of the area. However, in this land where office politics is almost a blood sport, it also came in handy one day when I was surrounded by Latinas at the copy machine: had worked through things internally to the point where I could and did say, in Spanish, "I am proud to be an Angla." Thought one of the women was going to drop everything she was carrying, and so did she; she kept her grip, though, and while it certainly wasn't a "kumbayah moment," after that there were no politics as far as I was concerned, either incoming or outgoing.

(Warning to those who might think it was just the words that did it, and not what A-E would call the presence: Don't try something like that unless and until you've walked barefoot, so to speak, across your own internal fire pit: otherwise, they'll eat you alive.)

In Alabama, the first native 'Bamian I met here was an inebriated young black gentleman who spotted my NY license plate and walked up to me and asked "You come down here to IN-te-grate us?" I'd just been breezing along nicely in "Eyes On the Prize" mode up until that point, and that dumfounded me. That really was the start of the journey whose first high point was at that copy machine in Albuquerque. That road, however, like all good ones, goes ever on and on....

[eowyngirl14]

I read the story at the beggining of this thread and it made me kind of mad. I am not racist and I don't think anyone else here is either. It sounds like the author of that story is trying to make the reader feel guilty for not appreciating the race of the person who invented the objects listed. It doesn't matter who invents something. Someone could just have easily written that same story with things invented by caucasions, hispanics, women, men, Sweeds, Canidians, or any other race missing instead of things invented by blacks. I also feel that most of those inventins would have been invented sometime later anyways.

[Lizra]

(Warning to those who might think it was just the words that did it, and not what A-E would call the presence: Don't try something like that unless and until you've walked barefoot, so to speak, across your own internal fire pit: otherwise, they'll eat you alive.)

Oh that's very good lady of Ithilien! You can't buy it can you! . Bring em on!

[afro-elf]

Originally posted by eowyngirl14
I read the story at the beggining of this thread and it made me kind of mad. I am not racist and I don't think anyone else here is either. It sounds like the author of that story is trying to make the reader feel guilty for not appreciating the race of the person who invented the objects listed. It doesn't matter who invents something. Someone could just have easily written that same story with things invented by caucasions, hispanics, women, men, Sweeds, Canidians, or any other race missing instead of things invented by blacks. I also feel that most of those inventins would have been invented sometime later anyways.

Interesting that you felt that way. It was not written to make people fell guility but to let some young black kids feel some self worth. The point had nothing to do with who could or would have invented them later.

Lady of Ith... nice tale thanks for sharing

[Millane]

sorry i couldnt be bothered reading half of that but i did notice that someone mentioned Japanese being rascist, i have heard from my Japanese teacher that the Japanese are very rascist, not just to blacks but just to people that come from other countries in general, and they are very homophobic aswell...
i think this is a good post as although heaps of people claim they are non-rascist i bet they still beleive about how the Black population are very unintelligent and all that crap that the Rasta's fight against...
i cant beleive Bob Marley wasnt mentioned as inventing GOOD reggae music...
speaking of that what about dreads, where would we be today without dreads

[Artanis]

Originally posted by afro-elf
Interesting that you felt that way. It was not written to make people fell guility but to let some young black kids feel some self worth. The point had nothing to do with who could or would have invented them later.

I also feel guilty when reading stuff like your story. Simply because, I think, black kids as you say still need stories like this to lift their self esteem. Simply because racism and discrimination of minorities exists, and the vast majority that I'm a part of, and that has the power to end it, accepts it.

[BeardofPants]

Originally posted by Millane

speaking of that what about dreads, where would we be today without dreads

Well, for a start, we wouldn't have all those urban legends about a guy who died because he had a spider nest in his dreads....

[Tessar]

Ugh, I hate this racist stuff.

I think that the only thing that will make some one 'dumb' is if they choose to be dumb.

And if black people are dumber then white people, who cares?

I have met plenty of smart black people.

But this whole thing drives me off the wall! I mean ARGH!

The key word in that whole thing was "black". It should have been "people".

PEOPLE made the comb, PEOPLE made the mowing machine, and PEOPLE made the mop/dustpan/whatever.

Does skin color really matter?

I could hang out in the sun all day and get a tan but does that make me any dumber?

I could reach into my fireplace and pull out some black soot and rub it all over my face.

Does that give me the right to say that people should pay me for what my dad did to make the fire?

HELL NO.

I hate this whole color thing with a passion. And I hate the people, black and white, who drag this across the world over and over and over again.


ARGH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But anyways, that was an interesting story. Did you write it Afro?

[afro-elf]

Twas not I my young Elven friend.

[Millane]

I could hang out in the sun all day and get a tan but does that make me any dumber?

i beleive the answer is yes... skin cancer is a very dangerous problem these days and if you go out in the sun without slip slop slapping your a bloody idiot...

Damn dread myths... the only things you could die of if you had awesome dreads like Marleys would be being to cool