Africa Speaks Reasoning Forum

Now I know many of you are with me in the strong disapproval of George W., but are you also (presumeably) hoping John Kerry shall beat him?

I haven't done my research on this fella, but he seems to have a legitimate chance of beating Bush...which, by all my estimations, can only be a good thing.  Just think of how much more worse he would be in a second term with all this megalomanic power that has surged to his puny brain.

Well like Ralph Nader said the choice between the democrats and republicans is between the 'evil of two lessers.'

Kinder gentler rhetoric? or in your face obvious?

This is the choice . . . at first anyway.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0122-10.htm

Don't flame me to death, but I unwittengly became a skull & bones (otherwise known as Delta Kappa Epsilon) when I was a freshman at Centre College.  I later transferred schools and the school I transferred to did not have a chapter.  The charter was revoked from the campus last year due to a second violation of the anti-hazing policy.

The amount of power (financially & politically) within that organization is almost unfathomable.  

I was a part of one of the true "axises of evil"  :o  It's actually one of the least spread fraternities of all...I can't recall exactly how many chapters there were, but it was only slightly more than 50 (compared with hundreds for most fraternities).

the illusion of "demoracy" is shattered when one realizes that private organizations are the real centers of power.

Couldn't have said it better myself. The people must organize and take back the world from the 'corporate gods'. The masses must benefit from a new system designed for the people. Not to exploit the people so the few elite can profit.

I saw John Kerry speak last night...all he spoke was rhetoric. He seh healthcare is a right for every american...how he gonna get every person healthcare?

He seh America needs to be brought back to teh people...how he gonna get the nation back to the people?

Like i seh, it's all rhetoric. I stay away from politricks. I mean, they all white rich men, men who don't care about InI, I-sistren and I-brethren...don't care. What difference does it make if one white man replaces another in office? Is my life gon' be any different? Will people stop judging I for the color of I skin because there is a new president? no. Will people acknowledge I race on times other than Martin Luther King day and Black History Month? no. Will the true African history be taught in schools, instead of heathen lies? no, a thousand times no.

The lesser of two evils, huh? I stay away from both evils, and fight on a grassroots level. i don't need to choose my evil to be heard.

http://www.ubc-dke.org/images/deke_crest.jpg
http://web.mit.edu/dke/www/famousdekes.html

Your view on this is exactly how my belief system deals with the matter...to be "no part of the world" (1 Jn 4:8).  And INI agree with you - the only changes people like you and I can make are on a small level.  I was criticized on here for saying that, but you do agree that it's true, no?  The only way to affect Babylon is to become an integrated part of it, and like you said, you "don't need to choose your evil to be heard."  Speak to those that matter, those that have "got out of her" (Rev 18) as the Good book admonishes us too.

If we choose small then small is all there will be. I am sure our sisters and brothers in the rest of the world will be surprised and disappointed to know that the richest, most privileged, best educated people on the planet (or should be anyway) whose country is doing 99% of the mischief have conveniently decided they can do nothing about the situation. There are people who have so much less than we do on every level and yet they do so much more which benefits many. To be born in this time and place and situation calls us to make some significant sacrifices. Christianity teaches complacency like this.

That's right Rootsie. A whole heap a people making a whole heap a small changes adds up to a big change. This is the only way things have ever changed really, through pressure from the masses of people. The only problem is people tend to get too easily pacified when things change just a little bit in response to that pressure (civil rights laws, etc).
  To me it's ultimately about destroying the system by making it irrelevant- that is, everything the system claims to do for us, we the people need to find ways of doing ourselves so we are no longer dependent on the system. That's why the main reason the U.S. gov't called the Black Panther Party "the greatest threat to internal security" wasn't their relatively small arsenal of not-exactly-advanced weapons, it was things like their free breakfast program and clothing drives.

So yuh mean that Rasta should involve in politricks? I can see it now...Rastaman for president! Why not shave the Dread, so he will be elected and serve 'is people? Why not put Dready in the news cameras? That would be advancement....

Nah, look at all the great movements...the Civil Rights movement was not about electing a non-racist person as president! If that was the case, we'd all still be riding in the back of the bus and sitting at the 'blacks only' counter. That movement was about grassroots civil rights, that's all. Didn't matter what party was in office, or what political issues tey lobbied for...and what happened? People unified and results were seen!

Ras Legacy, I don't know if you were responding to me, but if you were, read my post again... in no way was I advocating that we should get involved in the mainstream political system. That's people's choice if they want to do that but personally I feel it's fruitless. Basically I was saying the same thing you just said, only I would add that we shouldn't be satisfied by little crumbs like civil rights laws, we should keep on pushing until we control the whole wheatfield and we can make our own bread. Not by working within the system, but by replacing it. I would say examples of this include the Black Panthers, MOVE (on a smaller scale- but setting a good exampe), the anarchists during the Spanish Civil War, and yes, the Rastaman going up in the hills and growing his own food, making his own clothes, etc. Only I think a whole heap a Rastaman doing that should link up with the people in the urban ghettoes and supply them with the organic produce... you get my drift?

I feel that Rasta can make changes without gettin involved in politics. But Rasta need to organize and centralize to make their voices heard. Many people discount Rasta for the simple fact that 95% of the population knows nothing about Rasta, except for Bob Marley, Ganja and Dreadlocks. 5 yrs ago if someone told me I was gonna be a Rasta I would not have belived them, because I was un-educated. I truly believe if Rasta was more open and discussed their beliefs in a  public fashion people would become convinced. I mean who can look at the prophecy and look at Selassie I and who HE IS and not believe in him, there is 2 much proof to deny. Unless ur a Heathen.   So I believe Rasta need to call each other in each community and centralize and try to make a difference in a unified stance.  We dont need to vote to make a difference. Who Votes? except for half of all Americans.  Its not like we choose who we want anyway. The individual Partys do, the shit is fabricated to the Max. All Politrickans R the same anywayz. A buch of Mussocomelynchthee's.  If someone is ready to get together and Revolutionize well then hit me up. Im Ready. Bun the Government.

All I hear is empty rhetoric about how we're going to revolutionize this, and radically change that.  The same things you said here Rootsie are the things you said the first time I made the comment, but you never propose just how you're going to go about making these vast changes.

Don't get me wrong, I respect your mind a lot, and have even read most of your web site, but you make these bold statements that Christianity encourages complacency, and yet, I don't see how you propose to make significant changes.  The best I feel that I can offer to my society is to educate myself, my future children, and to be loving towards all people.  I don't honestly expect to leave some large dent in the fabric of society.  

While we may have the most, we're also oppressed in a much less obvious way than African countries and Latin American.  Theirs is a blatent denial of rights and goods, but for the American - it's the naive mindset of freedom and the delusion that we have power & voice in this country.  Someone mentioned the gov't's fear of the Black Panthers.  While this may be true, note an element of significance here:  the Black Panthers were an organized group of individuals with a common motive.  If any group is to truly promote civil rights and equality of man, it has to be an organized movement.

If you want to make large, revolutionary movements, it takes a collective effort to determine what those changes are going to be and how they are going to be accomplished.  You look at the groups that have made the changes and they are always organized behind a body of men or a single man...be it religions or civil rights groups such as the NAACP.  

What I'm saying is if you're going to make large changes, don't think you can do it by preaching to the wind and holding placards of protest.   It takes real effort, work, and persistence.  And that's an effort most just aren't willing to committ to.  INHALE  - that includes many of us.

As far as Christianity encouraging complacency, I wouldn't necessarily say that in all cases, as there are many different forms of christianity. I don't think anyone could accuse Martin Luther King Jr. of being complacent, nor those christians who took to the hills in El Salvador, Guatemala, etc. to join the guerrilla army fighting against their downpressive U.S.-sponsored governments. So Rootsie's statement is a generalization to me. But like Ayinde says somewhere on this board, a generalization is not a bad thing, it's a way of simplifying a discussion- if in the majority of cases the generalization is true, then it can be useful. And in this case I'd say that 90% of the time, yes Christianity encourages complacency- waiting for someone to come save you, or de-prioritizing this physical world in favor of preoccupation with some 'afterlife', when as far as I'm concerned the only way to find out about any afterlife that may exist, is to die.
   You're absolutely right that people need to be organized and I don't think I or Rootsie was saying anything different.
   I don't have the authority to tell other people what to do, but later today I'll return to this board and share some of the concrete things that I personally have tried to do around these issues over the course of my life. Maybe others could do the same.

Change for the better can only occcur when individuals realize the false values and corruption underlying the present state of affairs, and commit to helping by first working on themselves. what is needed is not any illusions of change but definite steps to  right the imbalance that currently exists. At the core of this is the need to change attitudes and mindsets which have been conditioned to uphold and support the plethora of lies, myths and distortions. Inherent in this in western chauvinsim, racism and female discrimination. Thus the movement for change cannot be divorced the the systematic adressing of such issues.

Meaningful change can only be lead by those that are informed and have the depths of experience to properly understand the deep problems that plague society. Being as there is no substitute, it is such people that will be able to work decisively to bring about meaningful change.

At the heart of systematic change, lies people taking the responsibility for informing themselves and becoming aware of how they by their ignorance contribute towards the system of false values and injustice. There is no substitute for understanding collective and person history which can never be held apart from 'change'.

I hear a lot of good hearted people who are well informed and want to change the shituation African, and all people find ourselves living under.

Since organization on a grassroots level is the key...how many here are organizing their people and part of aprogressive  organization moving the people forward? I ask this not to be flippant, but, Vision without action is hallucination. The AAPRP and other progressive Pan-African and socialist(people orientated) groups need people like you to help organize the masses, we need an African United Front! We Africans crawled a long time ago, it is time for us to fly!

We have an economic breadbasket and land to develop, Africa! Until Africa is strong, we as a people have no strength!

Link up!

"Jamaica is and Island, but it is not I land"
----popular Rastafarian saying that can be used as motivation for the African diaspora to organize for the betterment of home(Africa).

"All of us may not live to see the higher accomplishments of an African empire(a united Africa), so strong and powerful as to compel the respect of mankind, but we in our lifetime can so work and act as to make the dream a possibility within another generation"

----The Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey

This continues my last mssg to OutofZion, re concrete things you can do to resist babylon.
Here's some of the things I've personally been involved in:
-Movement to divest from Apartheid South Africa (while in college, involving demos, petitions, taking over the adminstration building to force a meeting with the board of trustees). The equivalent nowadays is divestment from Israel, which is a growing movement on campuses now.
-Boycotts of supermarkets in support of the Oregon farmworkers' attempts to unionize
-Corporate research in support of the union movement (basically, spying on the companies- very boring work but it can pay off, for eg. a piece of info I found out from hours of poring through obscure industry periodicals turned out to be instrumental in getting a hotel to pay for its employees' healthcare)
-Adult literacy classes and meetings on organizing techniques
-A program where volunteers waited with videocameras in an area subject to violent raids by the Immigration, which resulted in embarrasing the INS and gaining a lot of support for immigrant workers in Portland, OR
-Handing out flyers and organizing a benefit concert in support of political prisoners Mumia Abu-Jamal, the MOVE 9, Leonard Peltier and the Angola 3
Just to give an idea of the sort of concrete things anyone can do to start putting a dent in this s*itstem. When enough people get together and start doing things like this, we can eventually punch a hole in the system and replace it with something much better.