The Changing Face of Civilization
Today, thankfully we are coming to the end of an abysmal
cycle of Civilization. The Greeks had their time, so too the Romans and later
the British, French, Portuguese and the Americans. The rise and fall of Empire
is solely dependent on whether or not those that are Governed by the so-called,
‘civilized’ are prepared to tolerate the notion of unjust, outdated feudal
systems, whereby power, (both economic and intellectual) is distributed to the
few. These cycles of Civilization are constant, ever changing and optimistic;
sadly, the civilization of now has its roots based strictly on race. Its
success has been largely dictated by the blatant exploitation of the Continent
of Africa. This comes in many guises, the resources found in the ground and the
forced migration of the vast unpaid workforce in the form of slavery. This
perverse human ownership, similar to that of cattle-thieves and homogeneously
as noble, was a foreign affair whereas Colonization, less obviously shocking
but nonetheless equally damaging, was more a domestic affair; both evenly
derogatory for those held captive.
In the early days of European trading with Africa; mainly in
the West and Central regions, the partnerships where amicable, trustworthy and
even respectful | In Chinua Achebe’s essay, ‘Africa’s Tarnished Name’, he notes
that the Portuguese captain, Diogo Cao first visited the Congo in 1482 and by
his third visit in 1487 he was introduce to the King Mweni-Congo.
“Seated on an ivory throne surrounded by his courtiers.
Cao’s monks were returned to him, and all was well. An extraordinary period
ensued in which the king of Congo became a Christian with the title Dom Afonso
I. Before very long, the royal brothers of Portugal and Congo were writing
letters to each other that were couched in terms of complete equality of
status. Emissaries went back and forth between them. Relations were established
between Mbanza and the Vatican. A son of the Mweni-Congo was appointed in Rome
itself as bishop of his country. This bishop, Dom Henrique, had studied in
Lisbon, and when he led a delegation of Congo noblemen to Rome for his
consecration, he addressed the Pope in Latin.”
These harmonious relations fizzled out, as the aggressive
Europeans started fighting over territory, carving up the Continent for
themselves. Soon enough the white man’s greed dominated, as they became
increasingly aware of the abundance of wealth to be gained from the coast to
the interior of Sub-Saharan Africa.
The Modern European Civilization goes back to 15th
Century but it wasn’t until the 18th and 19th Century
that the clandestine style of literature, speeches, paintings, cartoons,
eugenics, botany, evolution, natural philosophy and expeditions, funded by the
Church started to evolve. Thus, begins
a campaign by the wealthy elite, on a lasting racism that has become forever
ingrained in the feeble minds of the Enlightened Europeans of that time, right
up until the present day. This systematic formation of the very definition of
our Modern Civilization has been founded on the notion of racial division.
Ideas that have been cunningly established in the public libraries, constructed
by academic slave-owners, all of which requires the reader to be complicit and
obediently silence in order to become an acceptable “civilized” individual. The
recurring theme over time has been based on superiority of race and the value
of location; Geo-political racism, where those that have been omitted from the
pages of history are considered redundant when it comes to the collective
global village. At the time of these writings and centuries before, the tribal
make-up of West Africa were highly sophisticated and complex systems of
governance and power sharing. These practical and intelligent forms of African
democracy prior to the Colonial invasions have been absent from the shaping of
our Modern Civilization. Conveniently ignored over years of formal published
abuse, which was superciliously crafted in the ironically named, ‘Age of
Enlightenment’.
If you want more pay for it...I AM NO SLAVE! I am not your private Nigger; your House Nigger..I am a FREE MAN, so PAY ME!!
