Our Mental Slavery

whenever the struggles of my people come to mind, it never ceases to bring heart rending sorrow. the overwhelming emotion that wells up deep inside me when i think about what we have been through...what our history is carved from...what our future is doomed to be. i cry everytime i think about our exploitation - by others and by each other - and our lack of knowledge...but most of all, our lack of interest in knowledge.

we are not free at last. and everyday im becoming more and more uncertain if we ever will be. the dream our ancestors had for our race...the dream they fought for now seems like a joke. we cheapen their struggle and trivialize their experiences by calling each other n****s and b*****s and by behaving like the proverbial "crab inna barrel". doesn't anyone beside me realize this?

bob marley said "emancipate yourself from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds" and that sentiment is right on the mark. yes, physical slavery ended but we are still enslaved. and we are ultimately our own slave masters. in the past, africans used to sell their brothers to the white man for gold and today we're doing the very same. we buy into the idea that everything is fine now and either refuse to see or are blinded to the fact that we are being mind-fucked subliminally over and over and over again. we still think we're less than the white man, and we still fight for his approval...sumtimes to the detriment of our own people. we refuse to empower ourselves by reading, researching and using our most valuable assets - our minds. how can we free ourselves when we refuse to use the most powerful tool? how can we not believe the trash that is being marketed as truth if we refuse to find the truth for ourselves? is it any wonder that we're still being exploited as much as before? as a matter of fact, i think the exploitation is worse, cus we've basically agreed to it...thinking all is peachy and right with the world

Reviews

[luthien7]

Well said. too many of us think that to stay true to ourselves we have to fulfil the stereotype - using as self-defining to take away the sting of the stereotype as insult. Opportunites are nearly as limited as they ever were, but they are there for those who want them.

Thanks

[nicki_504]

True and honest, well said, well written.