Fear of a Black People

Furgeson has thrown race in America into the spotlight, but trying to understand race through these events is like trying to tell what time it is by watching the second hand on a clock.

Much of the way we understand race in America today, for better or worse, ( and I would say always for worse ) is a result of slavery. In fact, the very fact that I consider myself a black person is a result of this institution. Africans identified themselves by tribes, languages and geography. Europeans who dealt in slavery understood this, and sought to break these identifications for practical reasons. Too many enslaves Africans, all able to speak to each other, and identify with each other could cause a slave revolt at any moment. Africans were often placed into slave groups with different linguistic backgrounds, and yet, they revolted still.

I am going to add a link here to part of an interview with Dr. Gerald Horne, both a historian and lawyer that I admire. It throws recent events into a clarifying light.

http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=12266