2005-12-16
Freeman Criticizes Black History Month
Anybody heard about this? Probably not. All I can say is wow. I think it's safe to say this isn't something the NAACP and Hollywierd want getting around. This is extremely powerful coming from this gentleman, who is not only one of the finest film actors in the world, but also one of the most respected.
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Amen: constant talking about racism is both a cause of the lingering remnants of racism, and itself a greater obsticle to progress than the remaining lingering remnants of racism. Six, you may not know, but of the seemingly endless presumed conspiracies that black folks busy themselves with circulating, one holds that Black History Month was relegated to February because it's the shortest month of the year. These sorts of conclusions -- like the presumed racism of Katrina -- derive always from assumptions, and never from facts.
Freeman Unleashed on 60 Minutes:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/05/12/earlyshow/leisure/celebspot/printable694754.shtml
Watch the video too if you didn't see it last night:
http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/60minutes/main3415.shtml
It's worth it just to see make Mike Wallace look complete condescending fool that he is.
Black History Week began in February because that's when Carter G. Woodson wanted to celebrate it. It is the birth month of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln. That's why it is in February.
Woodson always advocated that Black History is simply history. The reason he created a week to celebrate it was because Western culture refused to teach TRUE history. It only taught Eurocentric history.
This is why there is so much fuss about Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf becoming Africa's first woman president. Before African colonialism there were tons of women heads of state. It is simply that Westerners don't believe there was history before they graced "primitive" cultures with their presence.
This is not me making racist statements. This is the truth.
Morgan Freeman is right. We should consider each other to be human beings. We shouldn't have a "color-blind" society, but we should celebrate our differences and our diversity. We can learn so much from each other. Why would any one culture even want to believe that it has a monopoly on history or on science or religion or technology? It's counterproductive and divisive.
When the truth is taught as history there will be no need for a Black History month. When people are given jobs or admitted to college based on their skills and abilities, then there will not be a need for affirmative action.
"How beautiful it would be if all of us, young and old, men and women, devoted ourselves wholly to truth in all that we might do -- in our waking hours, whether working, eating, drinking or playing till pure, dreamless sleep claimed us for her own." - Mahatma Mohandas K. Gandhi, from "The Way to God"
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