Selassielive
Honour

You said : "I think where the person is mentally and how comfortable they are with their blackness is the key."

I agree with you completely. I do not for one second think that the virtue, strength or wisdom in an African comes from the shade of his/her skin. Also, note that at the top of the original post, I said to whom it was addressed. There are great teachers on this site, human beings, people who know what they are and who know what is just. I have learnt a lot from being here, some things I held before, I have let go and, as time grows, when it becomes essential, I will drop whatever else is no longer of use.

Truth is a healer and truth is a weapon. For example, "Love is the best of all emotions" is the truth, yet one could take it and use it as a wedge to drive open a door that should be kept shut.

When I say Africans should visualise the first ancestors when they seek to look on God as a womb/man, what I mean is, return to where you were before you first tasted defeat. Then, when I ask why some would rather identify with the Amhara rather than with the ones who directly gave birth to them, I am asking them to reconcile with the ones who were beaten, the ones who were dragged to the ships and taken away. These were not African-Americans, Jamaicans, Trinidadians or even Africans. They were Ewe, Ibo, Congo, Yoruba, Ashanti, Hausa, Gun, Fulani and Wolof. Why is it that to call them by thier names is referred to as 'tribalism'? Why have they been relegated? Because they were defeated? And, why is the Amhara chosen over them? Because, once upon a time he was victorious? How about those of your ancestors who knew victories like none other? The ones who CREATED civilization. When you reject or RELEGATE the ones who were defeated, you have broken the chain that binds you to them.

Gman said Ethiopians were also taken as slaves, I agree, but I would point out that the ports from which those Africans departed were ports facing the arab lands. The Africans taken into the Americas and the Caribbean departed from Goree, Elmina, Badagry, Luanda and other ports on the West Coast. There is no way Africans were marched for thousands of miles (from Ethiopia) to get on those ships.

Nothing about I being superior to you because of my skin-tone.

But, I have also been acussed of coming on here to 'convert'. Convert to what? And do what with them after I have converted them? No, the only way this would make sense would be if I owned the publishing house that had sole rights to the Pert Em Heru. But I don't, so, it makes no practical difference to me what a man reads. And, since wisdom comes when it will to who it will in whatever form it pleases, it also makes little difference to the raising of my own consciousness what another person reads.

Truth is a healer, but like a medicine, the full dosage must be taken. Colorism is an issue. It is an issue in Africa and it is an issue wherever Black people live side by side with those who are not of the same skin-tone.

You spoke on your personal appearance, but you should know, (and I am not taking a crack at you) that you would have no worries anywhere in the Black world.

Colorism IS a problem, but it does not arise because one is not dark enough. And when one speaks on it, it is not from an intention to subjugate lighter-skinned Africans. Colorism is about self-image and, self-image is related to what one sees as the ultimate good and ones closeness to that ideal. Fela Anikulapo fought against colorism (the song 'Yellow Fever') and he was as light as an African could be. He did this because he saw the psychological damage that was going on.

Colorism is a deep fault in the foundation of what we are trying to build and it has to be mended if the house is to stand all tests. It has to be confronted in ALL it's various forms. How can saying this be seen as trying to divide the family?

Wisdom and Strength.