SPIRITUAL BEINGS VS. RELIGIOUS ONES

I was watching this internet video about the Creation Museum in Kentucky and two things struck me as odd. The first was the depiction of a white Adam and Eve, but that's not unusual for the dominate culture to portray their creation progenitor in their own image even though the story took place in a tropical environment. It's also not odd to have the colonized mind either accept it or not question the validity of their premise. But number two really got me. That's when the commenter said something to the effect that, without god, man would have no reason not to kill even though he may be moral. From my point of view, this statement could only come from a religious mind or an unenlightened one and really brought home why the European cultural idea is most destructive.

Spiritually, I believe man should naturally want to achieve what is considered “good,” it's that often ignored little voice that Nature put inside of us all. I believe it would make sense that the concept of good would be that which perpetuates the species and not destroy it. If man did destroy "the good" then he'd have to admit to himself he was insane and this is what the guy at the museum couldn't comprehend. He rationalized man needed god. With this in mind, the appositional concept of the bad is also necessary for man to understand what is good and to naturally try to keep his world in balance between the two. This is where the religious or unenlightened mind fails. The religious or unenlightened mind allows for the bad or evil to subjugate the good so far out of balance it destroys life. It allows it because god becomes the good and not man and as long as religion pushes this idea that man has no reason to control his ability to destroy, evil will dominate.

The European concept could not (or didn’t want to) understand that man is a spiritual being. That he was born with the capacity for both good and bad. However his spiritual quest, his spiritual soul, since he is part and parcel of nature, is to achieve the good which is, as I stated, to perpetuate the species and not destroy those things that help do it. If European culture promoted this idea, many of the systems, as we know them, would not exist. Capitalism would not exist because it’s destructive of Nature and the environment. Individualism would not exist because it’s destructive of community. Racism would not exist because it’s destructive of society. Religion would not exist because it’s destructive of man’s innate spirituality (voice)and let's not forget the sacred cow Democracy which is really a mechanism for oligarchy control and destroys freedom. If the European’s cultural idea hadn't prevailed, these concepts would be rejected out of hand.

So I do wonder about that person in the Museum, Europeans and Christians to boot. I wonder if they are really good people, are able to hear and heed the natural inner voice of man, or do they need god to be their good because their Nature or Natural Soul is too corrupted? Finally, all of this makes those who subscribe to the European cultural idea unaccountable, except to something celestrial of which we really have no empirical evidence of its existence. It also makes them accountable to just themselves. What a wonderful world, you can be religious and be forgiven for murder and live unburdened. However human spirituality is rejected because then, if you murder, there's no escaping the ultimate punishment, living with your conscious mind telling you that you are insane and not a normal human because then you understand!

CAN I FIGHT TOO?

Jesse’s at it again. This time he’s fighting for inclusion of Africans on the MLK memorial. I think this is a good fight, and I can’t speak for Jesse, but I’m tired. Hell, I want to fight for the Democratic nomination. I want to fight for no more U.S. imperialism. I want to fight to squash NAFTA and to save the planet, or I want to have the freedom to be secure in not fighting for anything, just knowing my basic interest will always be protected over other cultures. I want these things to be my focus like those of the “privilege” class. I’m tired of fighting for the “rights” of Africans to participate in the society. I’m tired of fighting systematic white supremacy that underhandedly kills our community and progeny. These battles surely help kill my spirit and I’m sure those of other Africans by creating a repudiation of things white.

Far too many blacks choose to ignore, embrace or “act dumb” towards the culture of white supremacy rather than fight it by recognizing and then casting off foreign ideologies that are harmful to African unity. Their only “sane” choice (which is recommended by white supremacist systems) is to be one of the three big “O’s”, Obama, Oprah or Oreo. Wait! There’s another choice and that’s to be like Tyler Perry and dress for success, as a black female of course, and we KNOW, there’s no fight in him unless it’s towards me.

Until I’ve achieved parity in America where I can fight for “white” causes without having to be distracted by those pesky “Black” ones, I’ll pick and chose very carefully. I’ll fight for those “black” causes that dismantle white supremacy; those which are not popular because they are protected by white civic and business interest and reach into the heart of what is and has been wrong with America. Those Causes that cause too much truth bringing out the guilt and shame that is white America. Causes that make white America realize they aren’t as good as they’d like to think and never having been; causes that show the weaknesses of being a “black success” in a white colony. But then again, maybe I should fight Jesse and Al’s type of fight. I’d be more popular and perhaps more wealthy instead of having society often making me feel like Don Quixote’s donkey.

THOUGHTS THEN AND NOW

When I was a teenager living in Washington, D.C., I’d be in my room thinking about the challenges my black relatives faced in a white world that just destroyed Emmett Till. I’d wonder why my aunts and uncles were so poor and financially hapless. Why it seemed all the black men were drunks and/or unemployed. I knew something was wrong because when I went downtown, I saw a lot of white men and women working. I wondered why my mother was a file clerk and her supervisor, a white woman, was her superior even though they had the same education. Yes even in 1957, I knew something was wrong and my gut told me that this institutional and personal racism would someday choke white folks to death.

Now fast forward to 2007. I was watching CNN telling us how some “Middle Easterners” living in the West who has ancestral ties to Pakistan and Afghanistan can easily come to the United States on their Western passports. The broadcast went on to say that this is really a danger from al-Qaeda. How these “homegrown terrorist” can strike America, as they did England at any time.

What does all this mean? Is it just another propaganda tactic of fear, nothing at all, or is it both a tactic and a real danger? I believe it’s the latter. I believe that not unlike the systems put in place to hamper my non white ancestral relatives from achieving their real and full potential and those systems inhibited a viable tangible and non tangible (psychological) asset transfer to the present generations, those who have ties to ancestral Pakistan and Afghanistan have similar feelings towards the same European systems put in place for the same purpose of maintenance of their hegemony into the present.

But so what? In 1957 when I felt that white racism would someday choke those who believed in it, benefited from it, and stood silently by, I didn’t expect those possible consequences to have such a broad based impact. If there are “homegrown” attacks on the United States, there’s good possibility that such reciprocity would surely engulf so many innocent people as well. It would indiscriminately affect the white racist and their systems, the white social justice worker working towards some type of parity, and non white people as well. It would not only strike a blow to dismantle white supremacist systems, but the systematic infrastructure of the country upon which I depend. IMO that ain’t all good.

What’s the answer? I have no idea. The situation is so complex that it appears if it is ever to straighten itself; we must all start from scratch. But then again, that’s no guarantee anything would fundamentally change because of the human ego and the cultural influence European culture has had on all of us which begs the question, is the human need for power and control universal?

I don’t know how all this will play but I do know that something is playing similar to my ’57 tune. I just hope that in spite of the human struggles, that we’ll finally move towards a more just world society and white supremacy, along with its bedfellow corporate hegemony, fade into a sensible secular world humanism.

LIVE AND LET LIVE

What with this live and let live business? See I’m expected to let live but it doesn’t apply to other folk as long as they are part of the gang. For example, I’m sitting at an outdoor coffee shop enjoying the day nothing on my mind except the sun and the young girls in the oh too tight jeans. With each sip of latte the day seems to get better until……

Two voices at the next table, one white and the other black begin talking about the power of prayer…they continue with how their lord is so great and how the bible is the know all to end all…

Being the “serious” Afro centric atheist historian* that I am, the conversation killed my spirit. It conjured up every ill that beset Africans and our culture when we arrived on these shores. It laid bear the pain of native peoples struggle with death and destruction at the hands of the white Christian expansionist. It brought to mind how this impotent Jesus laid ruin to a black people on their knees, professing a faithless faith, blinding them to mature and conscious examination, while singing submissive songs and throwing their hands in the air. Transformed Africans, trying to get in touch with their ancient African natural affinity using an unnatural idea and not being able to recognize or accept the difference. In so many words, it ruined my sunshine, it didn’t allow me to live.

I called a friend who is suppose to be “enlightened” and they told me, today we aren’t going there. My only question is how can one ignore ignorance any day? I want to live and let live, but I haven’t figured out the trick in a world that kills my spirit. If I could just indulge myself in illusion, in materialism, in mindless tasks, in being sexy or perhaps a ball game, then maybe I’d be able to participate in the live and let live ideal. I’d be able to join the masses and grow old while learning to live with my insanity. Learning to trick myself into ignoring ignorance and become bitterer or more unconscious each day for doing so. My how I envy black people who can rationalize the dynamics of the European cultural “norm.”

*Meaning that I don't believe in any "human form or creator" god head entity like Jesus, Allah, Jehovah, etc.