Black Jacobins (1938)

RATING:	100%
FORMAT:	Book

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A fantastic and superbly-written book about the only successful slave revolt in history that shows just what Blacks can do given the right circumstances and leadership.

This book that gets right to the heart of why Whites approved of African slavery for 500 years. Without the guilt and shame of a typical White historian this is an eidetic view of the challenges posed by White supremacy - then and now; exposing the real reasons for the abolition of racial slavery: Free trade is more profitable than mercantilism since one can then sell to the highest bidder and not just ones own government. As well as the fact the British government’s jealousy of the French making more money than they at the traffic in human misery that the possession of India meant the British need no longer indulge in.

Humanitarianism is absent from this account since a humanitarian country would obviously never have become involved in racial slavery in the first place. The book then comes to the obvious conclusion that White history books simply lie about the ethical role of Whites in the emancipation of African slaves.

What makes this book so readable is the precision with which the writer effectively skewers White politics as quintessentially White supremacist with humor, wit and irony.

The mixture of fear and envy Whites have for the exotic is stressed here through their repeated claim that anything foreign is inferior while being embraced to fund the English (17th century) and French (18th century) revolutions. A supreme irony of history is that both these bids for freedom and statements of the inalienable rights of Man were made possible by a bourgeoisie made rich from African slavery. The moral contradictions of White culture today stem from such institutions as the writer here makes many links between the past and the present.

That the abolition of the slave trade and of slavery itself never simultaneously abolished the various European empires and the White racism that drove them on is a telling legacy that remains with us to this very day.

Copyright © 2013 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://protectingthehated.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.

Ancient Egyptians for Dummies (2007)

RATING:	40%
FORMAT:	Book

(Image: http://www.amazon.com/)

Apart from not explaining where the culture and civilization of ancient Egypt came from in Africa; that is, what pre-existing people it resembled, this book fails to get much beyond the White Western historical perspective of its author.

Ancient Egypt is presented as an African miracle; almost spontaneously sprouting as the world’s alleged first civilization. Western Egyptologists have a problem placing ancient Egypt firmly within the context of what came before despite the existence of similar civilizations further south that predated it. One can only suspect the racism of White Egyptologists unwilling to admit any Black undertaking to be worthwhile.

Worse than this, the book is written to interest modern Western readers in the practices of an ancient culture by comparing and contrasting them with us. This leads us to assume that anything the ancient Egyptians did that we find strange today is objectively strange; while anything they did that we find acceptable is objectively rational. These cultural assumptions are never mentioned in the book’s Foolish Assumptions section; representing a cultural chauvinism that tells us more about ourselves than it does about them, despite this book not being called Modern Westerners for Dummies. (Indeed, no such book exists precisely because no author can be found to interrogate their own prejudices sufficiently to justify its existence.)

Black Egyptologists tend to understand a Black culture better than White ones since some aspects of ancient and modern are identical and can be better explained to a modern audience from that cultural perspective. The White author here is quite incapable of removing herself from her own observations about people she simultaneously claims have strange practices and yet are just like us! Whatever happened to objective history, erudition and true learning is tacitly expressed in this volume that never rises above the level of an undergraduate thesis.

If you are a dummy this book tell you much about yourself that you already knew, if not, then steer clear. To accurately study a foreign culture one has to go at least a little bit native, but this author is fascinated by ancient Egypt yet lacks the empathy, compassion and respect to ever truly understand it.

Copyright © 2013 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://protectingthehated.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.

Autobiography of Malcolm X (1968)

RATING:	100%
FORMAT:	Book

(Image: http://www.amazon.co.uk/)

Way above-average story of redemption leading to a strong sense of personal identity and purpose.

This one serves as a valuable source of a role-model in the form of Malcolm X’s life as he salvaged and reconstructed it from the predations of White, Christian culture and proved that it could be done. As inspirational, in its way, as any honest account of the life of Muhammad Ali. They both realized that without self-identification, there can be no self-determination.

The most obvious fact of the book of greatest interest to Blacks, is that bit represents the most politically-ontogenetic experience for Blacks in a White supremacist culture as they try to forge a cultural identity for themselves in the face of mass hostility from those who themselves lack a clear sense of ethic identity.

Growing up in a White culture that demands Blacks was Malcolm X’s quintessential problem as a maturing and sensitive man and was the cause of his many political mistakes during his life - especially the veering from one political extreme to the other. Still, moderation is only for people who choose not to grow up since the path of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. A moderate knows only about moderation, not about other political positions, so he really knows very little at all.

Copyright © 2013 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://protectingthehated.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.

When the Levees Broke (2006)

RATING:	100%
FORMAT:	DVD

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Despite the inordinate length of this documentary, there is not a second of padding here. Moreover, and unusually, the director's commentary is actually worth listening to.

A documentary about the disaster of Hurricane Katrina hitting New Orleans in 2005 exacerbated by the disastrously slow and unprioritized response of the various federal agencies - with the notable exception of the US Coast Guard. Looting took place not only for the usual materialist reasons but because food, water and medical aid was not forthcoming from the federal government. Looting that even the police took part in as often as they were trying to stop it.

This entire documentary is a searing indictment of the attitude of White America toward Blacks & poor Whites - whose lives count for less than affluent or wealthy Whites. Blacks trying to escape the carnage into White areas were forced at gunpoint to return. It becomes obvious that many White witnesses are desperately trying to conceal their racism behind the shooting of looters; while the Black witnesses are not so surprised at the White response of not taking the storm as seriously as the situation demanded. Here, the White fear of Blacks manifests itself in trying to police the survivors rather than actually help them; using the National Guard as an occupying force rather than a relieving one.

How such a thing could happen in a rich country like the United States beggars the imagination but, when one considers that that wealth was built on the suffering of Blacks, perhaps that is not so surprising. When help finally came, its resemblance to a slave auction is palpable along with the claim that Blacks were "Refugees" (rather than "Evacuees") as if they had suddenly become stateless in their own land. Along with the odd belief that Black lives were improved by a kind of act-of-god slum-clearance program called Katrina. The sense here is that Blacks were deliberately allowed to drown by Whites because of an inadequate levee protection system and that dispersing Evacuees to other states was really a way of getting rid of Blacks from New Orleans. The lack post-Katrina compensation only made things worse - the Federal Emergency Management System (FEMA) is more of a disaster than the storm ever was. The bald-faced lies of the US president regarding Whites' conventionalized fear of Blacks are summed-up best by Sean Penn: 'This was America; this was today; and, this was a Third-World scene'. A national embarrassment and a national disgrace where Blacks are viewed as literally picayune by Whites who claim Blacks are natural-born looters, trespassers and that their predicament is their own fault, anyway. The difference between the BBC & CNN reporting was that the former focused on victims; the latter, on the physical destruction.

What impresses most is the desire of so many New Orleanais to rebuild what has been taken away from them both by the storm and the federal government. As well as the largely unshakeable humor of the residents.

Copyright © 2013 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://protectingthehated.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.