Sundaymail Editor
THERE is a whole body of intellectual work that has been developed by physicians, zoologists, naturalists, anthropologists, historians and even Christians, among others, over centuries to buttress the belief that having black skin is not only a symptom of a disease but a damnable curse as well.
It tries to vindicate, validate and justify racism; sanctify it even.
They say the meaning of the word black comes from the Greek word flegein, which means to burn or to scotch.
So, according to Greek mythology, which progressively shaped Western thought, black skin could only develop as a consequence of the fierce heat of the sun.
Some scholars argue it was the work of Greek physician Hippocrates (450 BC — 370 BC) that substantially influenced the casting and framing of the word and colour black to mean death and disease.
It is, therefore, unsurprising that in Greek society, black actually came to represent disease and death.
Wretched race
But the characterisation of white and black to metaphorically represent good and evil, respectively, is much more pervasive in the Bible, where the colour black has been used to variously refer to Satan, unholy creatures, impurity and sin.
And, instructively, the dark skin became a sign of pagans and sinful creatures.
No wonder Africa was later described as the Dark Continent, a terra incognita (unknown part of the world) inhabited by dark-skinned creatures.
One can never begin to imagine how the story of Noah and his sons — Shem, Ham and Japheth — in Genesis 9:18-19 has shaped — and still shapes — the wretched circumstances of the black race.
“The sons of Noah who came out of the Ark were Shem, Ham and Japheth. (Now Ham was the father of Canaan.) These were the three sons of Noah, and from them the whole earth was populated. Noah, a man of the soil, began to plant a vineyard. When he drank some of the wine, he got drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent. Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness and told his two brothers who were outside.
“Shem and Japheth took the garment and placed it on their shoulders. Then they walked in backwards and covered up their father’s nakedness. Their faces were turned the other way so they did not see their father’s nakedness.
“When Noah awoke from his drunken stupor he learned what his youngest son had done to him.
So he said, ‘Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves he will be to his brothers.'” (Genesis 9:18-25)
When the Western world grew fabulously rich because of the trade in human beings — the Transatlantic Slave Trade — the story of Noah and Ham’s curse were conveniently used to justify the egregious and abominable practice by claiming that blacks were fated to live their lives as slaves.
But how does Ham become African, a black African for that matter?
Well, in 1674, Georgius Hornius — a German geographer, theologian and historian, who worked at Leiden University — placed Ham in Arabia, Syria and Africa, which arguably made him black.
Hornius actually claimed the African heat caused the black discolouration of the skin.
However, in Bishop Lazi’s book, the 19th century French writer and traveller, Arthur Gobineau, through his work “The Inequalities of the Human Race”, is probably the high priest of racism and white supremacy.
In it, he argued that, while the white race had a monopoly on intelligence, beauty and strength, among other admirable virtues, blacks were inherently “dull”, “lazy” and “unable to make a first step towards civilisation”.
Civilisational achievements did not assume any trace of African influences, he claimed, adding that other races could not rise without the help of the white race.
Phew!
Incredible!
There are countless other similarly framed noxious racist theories that frame and stereotype blacks as a lower and condemnable species that is difficult to even consider as human beings.
It explains why, after subjecting blacks to more than 400 years of slavery, whites later returned in the 19th century to ostensibly shine a light into the dark spaces of Africa and help its “savage” and “uncivilised” people.
All this work becomes a handbook or Bible of a race that considers itself a superior species. They still believe they are saviours of the world.
Extant
These are not merely sob tales of a bygone era, as the stereotypes, framing, inequalities and prejudices are extant.
Where they used to be apparent, they are now subtle.
Where they used to be overt, they are now covert. Where they used to be blatant, they are now insidious.
Bishop always tells you that imperialism, which is inextricably linked to its cousin racism, never ended, but mutated and evolved into a much subtler form.
In the old days, leaders of African societies such as Sigidi kaSenzangakhona (or Shaka Zulu, as they call him) were invariably perceived to be primates that had an inexplicable proclivity for blood and violence, and were, therefore, referred to as either “brutes” or “savages”.
But nowadays, these thoroughly racist tags have assumed contemporary forms that euphemistically refer to African leaders as “dictators”.
You see, the word dictator is a subtler iteration of the word brute or savage.
“Bunch of useless people”
Bishop Lazarus was reflecting on all this in the wake of the furore over South Africa’s mooted withdrawal from the International Criminal Court (ICC), which was broached by SA President Cyril Ramaphosa at a press conference last week.
While Pretoria is unlikely to withdraw from the ICC any time soon, the bottom line is it is not amused with the way the institution has been carrying out its business, especially insofar as the treatment of Africans is concerned.
By 2021, all the 44 people who had been indicted by the ICC — established in 1998 with a global remit — were Africans.
And also, most of the cases it is actively pursuing are in Africa.
What is worse is the fact that Kenya’s former President Uhuru Kenyatta will forever carry the dubious distinction of being the first Head of State to appear before the court after having been indicted in 2012.
Although the case was eventually dropped on December 5, 2014, the damage had already been done.
The African Union (AU) at one time threatened to encourage its members to withdraw en masse, while in 2016, three African countries — Burundi, the Gambia and South Africa — signalled their intention to leave.
Never the one to mince his words, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni described it as a “bunch of useless people”, while Paul Kagame went as far as opining that the court was never about “justice but politics disguised as international justice”.
It is as if only Africans sin.
One of the characters still being sought by the ICC, for example, is Joseph Kony, who is accused of killing more than 10 000 people in Uganda, yet George Bush and Tony Blair, who flagrantly disregarded international law to invade countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan, killing millions (and this is not an exaggeration), including children, still walk scot-free.
The US-based Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs actually estimates that between 280 771 and 315 190 were killed as a result of direct war-related violence caused by the United States and its allies in Iraq.
This just shows that the ICC, just like other institutions such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank Group and an inscrutable animal that is called the “world market”, among others, are simply a creation by the West for the West.
They were never created to serve ostensibly lesser beings such as Africans.
African intelligentsia
We, therefore, have to look at the world differently; in fact, we have to see it for what it is — a world order that is skewed against the interests of black people.
Unfortunately, our intelligentsia, who are supposed to be the leading light in helping us banish this wretchedness, have been a big letdown.
It seems all they have been able to do is to ape the Western worldview, narrative and values, which are at variance with our interest and hollow out our ideological soul.
At a time when the global order is shifting, we desperately need a renaissance of thought to locate our interests and chart a course that will lead us to prosperity, particularly in a world that has heretofore been unkind to us.
ED calls it Chimurenga Chepfungwa; a revolution of thought.
Former Burkina Faso president Thomas Sankara even talked about this at the 39th United Nations General Assembly on October 4, 1984, emphasising the need to exorcise the cultural colonialism that has paralysed African societies.
“One will search in vain — the concepts of Blackness or the African personality now being a little outdated — for truly new ideas from the brains of our so-called intellectual giants. Words and ideas come to us from elsewhere,” he remarked.
“Our professors, engineers and economists are content simply to add a little colouring, because they have brought from the European universities, of which they are the products, only their diplomas and the surface smoothness of adjectives and superlatives.
“It is urgently necessary that our qualified personnel and those who work with ideas learn that there is no innocent writing. In these tempestuous times, we cannot leave it to our enemies of the past and of the present to think and to imagine and to create. We also must do so.”
Sankara was not yet done.
He added: “Before it is too late — and it is already late — this élite, these men of Africa, of the Third World, must come to their senses; in other words, they must turn to their own societies, they must look at this wretchedness that we have inherited, to understand that the battle for thought that will help the disinherited masses not only is not a vain one but can become credible at the international level.
They must provide a faithful picture for their own peoples, a picture that will enable them to carry out profound changes in the social and political situation so that we can free ourselves from the foreign domination and exploitation that can lead our states only to failure.”
These are invaluable nuggets — There is no innocent writing and we cannot leave it to our enemies of the past and of the present to think and to imagine and to create.
We also must do so.
Bishop out!
Online Reporter