What We Do Not Want To Believe

Quote:
"The black man today is at one end of a psychological continuum which reaches back in time to his enslaved ancestors."

Many of us refuse to believe this. We actually think because we live in white neighborhoods, buy cars, eat where we want, and shop that we have truly overcome. If all you want are those things, then we have. But I submit we want much more.

We do not want to be followed in the stores we shop in, but we are and yes, it is just because we are black.
We do not want to have to wait longer than other patrons in restaurants, but we do, and yes, it is just because we are black.

We must understand that the only way whites could feel good about enslaving us was to believe we were not human, or subhuman in some way. This belief allowed them to kill man, woman, or child who refused to be a slave. Our manual labor was needed, nothing more. They did not care if we could read, write or even speak properly. As long as we could perform manual labor, that is all they wanted.

In our quest to rise above, many blacks felt like black folk should not learn trades such as plumbing, carpentry, farming. Instead of realizing we were used for economic reasons, we have negatively identified with those professions. The result has been frightening. We are a capable people and the least employed.

We were told to aspire to be doctors, lawyers, dentists and the like. All the while knowing that the odds were truly stacked against us. Now, we are desperate for any work and it is being sent overseas, or taken by others with foreign tongues.

We do not want to believe we harbor plantation mentalities. We want to think we are far away from that time, but I submit the memory of the downtrodden slave lives on today. You see it in our ghettos, the prison system and those who choose to be homeless rather than fight the system. We live like a broken people still. Yes, the threat is real, but so is the reality that we can stand up and use the rights so many fought and died for. Instead, we complain amongst each other.

Know your history or you are doomed to repeat it.