What happened to the Black Conscious Community and our Movement?
Submitted by The Anonymous Constituent – What happened to the Black Conscious Community and our Movement? Have We Forgotten the Work Left By Our Ancestors and Predecessors?
These questions will certainly draw some fire and rightfully so, however we cannot afford to overlook their importance here.
If we are conscious (cognizant, conscientious, empathetic, altruistic) beings we want to be accurate about our assertions so we try to build on this premise. In some of our renderings here we would rather be wrong because the outcome may be frightening if not apocalyptic.
Aside from the legacy of slavery, COINTELPRO derailed us. It left us suspicious and paranoid of one another and also deepened a wound that we believed was healing. Even as precursors meritorious manumission, disinformation campaigns and pogroms of eugenics and dehumanization that are still part and parcel of the long term agenda to divide and destroy, COINTELPRO derailed us.
Some will remind us of pedigrees and gradations while forgetting that if these were so redemptive to us, then every generation would have produced 150 or more Blyden’s, Garvey’s, Malcolm’s and the like. Today our present generation would be swollen with such giants; if this is the case then where are they? What’s missing is not pedigree or historical awareness but unity and the collective willingness to do the work needed. We have forgotten the work that still needs to be done – we have been complacent and have settled for superficiality.
Recently after another horrific slaying of a black man (by a militarized police force that has been sicced on us) there was a text in circulation outlining a series of boycotts against the likes of Target and Pepsi-Cola. This text also encouraged us to move our money around to what was called black-owned banks.
Perhaps these killings are the “wet match” attempt to provoke a race war (they’ve long prepared for since co-opting the civil rights movement that should have correctly been a movement for our human rights). Imagine trying to light a book of wet matches; you’ll have many attempts but anyone of them can ignite them all. This is how you ignite a race war, so its likely that it’s not going to stop.
The text also suggested that we not post it on Facebook or inside of any social media so as to keep it hush. Unfortunately we have taken to social media like addicts, unleashing all of our thoughts as if we’ve forgotten the lessons of COINTELPRO, psyops and profiling. We have already been mapped down to our very microgenetics. While we do accept that there is some value in utilizing such forums (why not create our own?) we must also use them responsibly. Are we now the spies within our own that we loathed in the COINTELPRO era? If so, there is no need to secretly hire anyone. We are doing the job for them – nevertheless here is the response:
Perhaps we are starting at the wrong end of this problem, or as it’s said – repeating the same tasks while expecting different results. We have lived through periods of sit-ins, sit-outs, boycotts and yet here we are. While I will not criticize Black Lives Matter, it is not beyond a critique by us (there is a difference). In a manner of speaking it’s almost an apology for being black. Our lives have always, always mattered except that WE forgot, not them….
“Even now we are facing a crisis of Black and African Humanity and yet it appears that we cannot bring ourselves to admit it”
The reality is that we are being slaughtered by the police like insects and it goes largely unchallenged (save a few superficial exercises in this artificial existence) by those who seemingly represent us or look like us in the political and clergy classes. The reality is also that largely we don’t own the stores in our communities and the few that are there are struggling because we don’t support them (how did we get here?).
Hispanic and Asian communities, for example (and their political and clergy classes) own and support their own businesses and will not tolerate otherwise so our superficial boycotting attempts at the wrong end of this is practically meaningless. If we want to affect the change we wish to see let us propose the following (it requires the same energy):
BOYCOTT ALL of the stores in our communities that are non-black. Buy NOTHING from them. They will go away for lack of support. Do not call this reverse racism or racism of any kind – as we said NO OTHER COMMUNITY tolerates this except ours. To deny this is to stay stuck in this artificiality.
BOYCOTT ALL non-black beauty supply stores, nail and hair salons. Yes, are we real or are we superficial in our commitment to affect change? That is the question – we must admit that we are artificial in our efforts to own our collective HUMANITY, or not.
BOYCOTT ALL of the Mega Churches (or all churches for that matter) that put us on the hook for income and yet do NOTHING in the way of leading the true cause for our collective HUMANITY. Yes – do not attend, do not pay, and do not act in deference to any who do not openly and tirelessly champion the cause for our collective HUMANITY.
BOYCOTT THE VOTE – Yes! Declare openly to ALL elected officials who look like us or rely on our “votes.”
We will not VOTE in a political system and for political figures who either look like me, or claim to represent me and do NOTHING in the way of leading the charge for our collective HUMANITY. Yes – declare our intent to BOYCOTT and HOLD THEM ACCOUNTABLE for their lack of representation for our collective HUMANITY; stop idolizing them (as celebrities) while they do nothing for us and do not openly and tirelessly champion for our collective HUMANITY.
As a “constituent” we are taxed; that too is a part of, and a supposed demonstration of political participation.
To many of us this seems “far-fetched” largely because we have regurgitated the same worn-out rhetoric and obsolete methodologies for so long that we have either forgotten how to adapt or are afraid to in a changing world. Consider this reality – we are the only people with an expiration date on our so-called voting rights. This alone reduces our participation to a mere experiment. Even here we are viewed as subhuman.
Again, “Even now we are facing a crisis of Black and African Humanity and yet it appears that we cannot bring ourselves to admit it”
If we put all of this in play for the next 12 months and beyond, we will begin to move those who claim to be a part of us, or represent us to either step up or step back. We will see the fruits of our moving our collective selves into the 21st & 22nd century. If we find ourselves on the other side of these we will have paved the way for real respect and dignity. We can then take back control of the “ology” of our “psyche.”
Ours is still the best story NEVER TOLD. There is nothing normal about our legacy which is why we must take such unusual steps. We are saying to all who have eyes and ears that we are willing to embrace our humanity, face reality and abandon the artificial and the superficial.
The TARGETS and PEPSI COLA’s of the world will feel the impact even at this level. Those who have artificially represented us will take us seriously as we move back into the movement for our humanity.
So, READY, SET……
Now for the work and the unfinished business that must be started again. Our young people are seemingly unaware and we have forgotten. This “saggin” and “weavin” surpasses any self-mutilation that we have gone through as a result of our reaction to white supremacy and oppression; perhaps their “acting out” is symptomatic of our betrayal of them, and each other.
If one has attended any lectures or meetings in the conscious community, regardless of the topic its practically a competititon on who knows the most in the realm of black history or who knows more of the popular figures, creating a bottleneck for the “conscious” elite who (in some cases) often talk down to the small group of attendees. This is at least part of the reason why our ranks have not grown.
We went from an exemplary Movement for the world to admire and emulate to an archipelago of cottage industries blending in with the non-profit hordes preying on the needy. Look at us today, we are incapable of admitting that we have forgotten our sense of community – how to be friends and neighbors to one another in our diaspora. We don’t know trust and fidelity collectively.
Who taught us organic militancy by creating breakfast programs and free clinics while standing up, rather than practicing how to counterfeit the bourgeoisie?
Then we talk about each other like outsiders – calling each other N’s – like crazy – forgetting that contextually doing this is analogous to wiping our backsides with our hands and then smearing it on our faces.
We judge each other the same way – like outsiders; we are unapproachably quick, harsh and sometimes deadly. Have we forgotten and instead become unconsciously mentacidal?
While knowing our history is continually important as it helps us to stay connected to our humanity and our sanity; and connecting with those deemed complementary to our intellectual development does not nullify the previously listed agenda, nor the other work that we still must face. If we are unwilling to follow through on the messy agenda above (or any variation of it) we may miss another chance to capture the attention and respect of those who come after us. The conscious (regardless of age or status) must be the examples.
We have forgotten that because one wears Afrikan cloths and says Hotep, Maat, Ase, Habari Gani and practices Kwanzaa does not make one righteously conscious (cognizant, conscientious, empathetic, altruistic). We have forgotten our sense of community and also our quest for collective black excellence.
If we shed the artificial and superficial (our symbolic saggin and weavin) so that our psyche’s and our scalps can began healing this too sends a message, first to the political and clergy, and to ourselves that we are sincerely ready to grow and change.
Perhaps we are functioning in a linear rather than a nonlinear paradigm; that its ONLY about money and economics. We think this because we are the powerless. At the end of the day (whether measured in seconds, years, decades or centuries) they must win at all costs. To them whiteness is the thing; it is their home court advantage.
This is why Haiti (Ayiti) has not risen to her glory while symbolic Ayiti (Assata and all those who were self-exiled and languish as political prisoners) are still being sought and contained.
So here is the hypothetical to the conscious:
If depopulation and control are the instruments for eugenics and genocide – particularly as they relate to us; if the entire legacy of killing us off through institutional agendas – (see: Medical Apartheid, Intellectual Warfare, The New Jim Crow, Psycho-Academic Holocaust and also Aids, Opium, Diamonds and Empires); since we know that we, more than others are subjected to food deserts, processed and genetically engineered foods, medicidal and poor health care, iatrogenic illnesses, vaccines and pharmaceuticals designed to keep us sick and dying (let’s not leave out the black dumb-down) then how do we rationalize simply keeping up history classes and group discussions on reparations without factoring these in the equation?
To be sure, reparations for us is undoubtedly the largest healing component NEVER applied. It would encompass economics, health, education, restoration, reconciliation and beyond. We are not going to be taken seriously (laws or no laws) without our shedding the artificial and superficial.
Again perhaps we have forgotten the lessons from Black Wall Street (Tulsa) and Rosewood here, and other profound examples across the historical and global landscape – namely that extermination is not only plausible for them, sanitizing the events and avoiding culpability is what has happened.
If this is even remotely a probability then we ought to be able to see that eliminating an entire race is not so “far-fetched.” In fact frighteningly as a likelihood, in the depopulation theoretics is there “room” to unlock all of the new cures and new technologies after completing their “non-African, non-black” planetary Utopia? At a glance there are a couple of things that would make this look impractical- one is to believe that there are no suppressed cures or technologies; the other is to believe there is no basis for this hypothesis whatsoever. A close study of history and authentic sciences tell a different story and we can ill afford to forget.
As we said the goal here is not to be right but to realign our paradigms from this derailed state. Its time to open the bottleneck in order to grow in numbers among the conscious (cognizant, conscientious, empathetic, altruistic); its time to wear our Black and Afrikan on the inside rather than the outside – to come from behind the podiums, microphones and the desks; its time to reset our cultural, historical and psychological paradigms; its time to stop playing big shots as little shots as we start on the above agenda (add or adapt as required geopolitically). But somewhere in the midst of all of this its time for ALL of us to wake up, pick up the trash and clean up our side of the streets both literally and symbolically. This is our serious move for participation toward a greater collective community and who really knows, we may never have another.
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So on point!!! We’re stuck ‘in traffic’