Dear Editor,
February every year has been designated as Black History Month in the United States and a few other countries, which also coincides with Guyana’s republic celebrations. Black History Month is an annual celebration of the achievements of African Americans and the recognition of their role in U.S. history. The origins of Black History Month lay in early 20th-century when historian Dr. Carter G. Woodson’s desire to highlight the accomplishments of African Americans. Woodson who earned a Ph.D. from Harvard University had noticed that historians had left out the achievements of African Americans from the narrative of American history and that African Americans were underrepresented in the literature that shaped the study of American history. To correct this flaw, Woodson and Jesse E. Moorland founded the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History in 1915 to promote the study of black history as a discipline and to celebrate the achievements of African Americans.
In 1926, Woodson launched the “Negro History Week” to bring attention to his mission and to bring awareness to the issue. Woodson chose the second week in February because it comprised both Frederick Douglass’ birthday on February 14 and Abraham Lincoln’s birthday on February 12. His message spread quickly as the demand for African Americans teaching materials increased and spurred the formation of several black history clubs. Woodson contended that the teaching of black history was essential to ensure the physical and intellectual survival of the race within broader society. As Woodson put it, if a race has no history, it has no worthwhile tradition, it becomes a negligible factor in the thought of the world, it stands in danger of being exterminated. According to Woodson, the American Indians left no continuous record. They did not appreciate the value of tradition and heritage; and where are they today? The Jews appreciated the value of both tradition and heritage, as attested by the Bible and even though they were persecuted around the world, their views and cultural history became a great factor in modern civilization.
As black history month comes to an end, I as a naturalized American citizen felt compelled to highlight the massive poverty and racial injustices that confront the vast majority of African Americans across the country. The tragedy is America is considered the greatest and wealthiest country in the world, yet millions of African Americans go hungry to bed every night, and many do not have a proper home, savings or healthcare. The travesty is that several American Presidents have spent much of their time trying to shape the destiny of other countries, but they have refused to eradicate the last vestige of racism, which has become the black man’s burden and the white man’s shame. It is an unhappy truth that racism is a way of life in America—it is a disease that permeated the whole body politic as several states with Republican governors, most notable Florida, have passed laws in their legislature to restrict the teaching of Black culture.
Today, America is the most segregated country in the world but many whites believe that time would heal the problem of discrimination and racial injustices and the disease of poverty faced by blacks, yet they continue to spread the myth that in order for blacks to rise out of poverty, they have to do what whites did, that is to lift themselves up by their own bootstrap. However, those who felt that blacks must lift themselves up by their own bootstrap have never stop to think or realize that no other ethnic group has been slaves on America soil; that the nation made the black man colour a stigma. Beyond that, they never stop to grasp and acknowledge that the debt they owe blacks who were slaves for more than two and a half centuries.
In 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation signed by President Abraham Lincoln told blacks that they were free, but they were not given any money or land to make their freedom meaningful and worthy. It was like locking up a person for several years in jail and suddenly discovered that the person was not guilty of the crime he was convicted of, but they told him he was free. However, they did not give him/her any money for a bus ticket to get home or any clothes to wear. This is the same way America has treated the slaves, except to say that they were free, but left them penniless and landless. At the same time, they were giving away millions of acres of land in the West and Mid-West to Europeans. Not only did they give land to Europeans, but also taught them how to farm, and provide millions of dollars to them at low interest rates to mechanize their farms.
Today, thousands of white farmers are receiving subsidies from the U.S. government not to farm, but these are the very
persons who are telling blacks that they must lift themselves up by their own bootstraps. It is a cruel gesture to tell a bootless man that he ought to lift himself up by his own bootstrap. The roots of racism, discrimination and poverty are very deep in America, and everyone must do everything to get rid of them. Since we are all God’s children, we must demand that the government address the problems of racism, discrimination and poverty faced by Blacks and as stated in the Constitution, we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and that they are endowed by their creator with inalienable rights that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. But if blacks are discriminated against; he has no job and no money, then he has neither life nor liberty nor the possibility of the pursuit of happiness. He merely exists. The struggle for equality in America is real. But as the late Dr. Martin Luther King said, “we shall overcome” and as the Roman statesman and philosopher Lucius Annaeus Seneca has said “time will tell.”
Sincerely,
Dr. Asquith Rose
