For centuries, the Black man has been portrayed as this savage beast that rapes little kids and beats up the Black woman. The Black man, throughout history, has been presented as some kind of a feral being, a wild thing untamed by a civilisation defined as advanced. In the dominant narrative, it is our men who beat us black and blue. It is our men who hurl us across walls and crush the fragile bones in our ebony sculptured bodies. It is our Black men whose fists crawl through our flesh, leaving on it marks of fury. Violence and savagery have always been associated with Blackness. It has even become accepted as part of what defines us. The Oscar Pistorius trial defies this narrative. It is gigantic and sore a pimple on the righteousness of White society. It is an uncomfortable reminder not only of the fragility of human life and the brokenness of humanity, but also, of the (unbearable) sameness of the human race. It reminds us that violence is not a Black mans resort and that savagery is not an emodiment of the Black narrative. It communicates to us that patriarchy is not a Black thing as has always been posited by those who, known or unknown to them, champion eugenics in their most subtle form. Above all, it hurls at the world a truth often buried: we are all human. We have the same battles. We have the same frictions, tensions, fears, emotions, tempers and reflexes. Strip away White supremacy and Black inferiority, strip away pigmentation and material conditions, and you have people whose blood flows in the same direction, people with the same capabilities. Strip away the superficialities and you realise that indeed, there is only ONE race: the human race. And the human race is broken. *sharing my incoherent rumblings as I find myself deep in thought in a bus snaking its way through the blanket of darkness towards the province of King Hintsa*
Posted on: Mon, 14 Apr 2014 19:55:29 +0000
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