African Pride - Show Yourself!

In the many discussions I've had with other African Americans regarding the Presidential race, one of the greatest fears we all had in the back of our minds for Barak Obama, is that he would be assassinated. Upon the heels of an (already?!?) attempted assassination plot by some supposedly rogue skinheads, I shudder at the complete ignorance of people and therefore feel the need to educate (a little). Here are some little known facts (to most people) about an ancient African people:

"There [were] a people now forgotten [who] while others were yet barbarians, discovered the elements of the arts and sciences, a race of men now rejected for their black skin and wooly hair founded, on the study of the laws of nature, those civil and religious system which still govern the universe - C.F Volney, Ruins of Empire written in 1789.

"This race of blacks is the very one to which we owe our arts, our sciences and even the use of the spoken word" - C. F. Volney, Voyages in Syria and Egypt written in 1787.

"The ancient Egyptians were [black] Africans and they spoke an African language, and the modern people of Eastern Sudan are Africans and they speak an African language, and there is in consequence much in modern native Sudani literature which helps the student of ancient Egypt in his work" -Wallis Budge, the distinguished British Egyptologist, in his book, An Ancient Egyptian Dictionary Vol. 1.

So, if African's were so brilliant...what happened to them? Slavery. Not only of the body, more importantly it was slavery of the mind.



"When you control a man's thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his "proper place" and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his own benefit." "Mis-education of the Negro" by Carter G. Woodson (1933)

"One of the greatest roles ever created by the western man has been the role of negro. One of the greatest actors to play the role has been the nigger." Henry Dumas

"Greatest weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the minds of the oppressed." Steve Biko

It appears that one of the greatest challenges of African-Americans today, is to re-educate ourselves about who we "were", transfer that education to the youth of today, so they can morph into even greater contributors to the education of tomorrow's world. We contributed to a growing world then, we do now and we will forever more.