All the posting about ppl "not wanting to be black" or labeled African American & not wanting it got me thinking maybe 'melanated-American' would be easier for Speakeasy to handle. On that path we'd soon have 'melanatedly-challenged' as a disability category too. Stupid Fool!

I have to take a strong stand on that because it's an issue that bugs me repeatedly. So much effort is spent on these boards discussing racial matters -permanent things which will never change. What we should be discussing is WAYS of effecting CHANGE in peoples attitudes towards race & race relations.

America is not a home for black people. That has been proven time & again. Wont Americans accept it??? There will never be no reparations to a Black man. There have been official apologies and compensation to former wartime enemies (over tactics used in warfare, atrocious as they were it was still war.) Does war have rules? are there rules when you choose to kill someone? There have been compensatory payments to Jews and their families after the holocaust. Damn, America even went as far as helping them establish a homeland in the middle of Arabia (sic) hence the middle east continues to bubble to this day. But not to the black man. Even after a govt promise of 40 acres and mule. Even after watching communities disintergrate. Kids shooting each other on the streets. Police shooting black men on the streets. what more do you need to tell you that aint your home, homeboy.

It's also too late to move anywhere else. Ya'll would'nt want to anyway. Those who would will have a tough time adjusting to the ways of life, the lack of taken-for-granted ammenities, poor infrastructure and general poverty that affects the continent (I'm talking of the region South of the Sahara cuz we all know Libya, Morocco & Egypt are now in the Middle East)

And through all that, Most Afric...sorry, melanated americans look down on Africans too. Cuz we dont speak the same english. We're darker with thicker lips, dont dress the same way or have the same values as Americans. Unless Black America also creates a nation for yourselves -as the Jews did, and populate it with your selves so you wont have to be the only black person in a waiting room or walk in fear of being pelted with a beer bottle from a passing car, then thou shalt always be oppressed.

Sometimes i think it's blacks & not jews that are the chosen people in scripture. Maybe the jews (who kept those damn records anyway) altered something. Why u ask? Cuz look around you!! Which peoples are the most opressed wherever they may be? Hell, were even opressed with poverty & underdevelopment at home. What causes that i wonder? Do i hear free-&-equal-trade being discussed at G8 conventions? nooo, never. But where do they get all those diamonds & gold from? And how come since colonialism those places are politically unstable to this day. Ever heard of the Mobutu-CIA connection? Ever wonder why?
Nigeria (oil producing nation by the way) the number of different leaders its had in the past 10 years compared to the number of elections is a joke.

Most of these problems are our own. The greed and lack of vision our leaders display. And the difficulties of uniting. Look everywhere else and you find united nations. America is a unity of states. Europe has also caught on and is desperately trying to unite. There are different economic communities world-wide including in Africa that dont really work but serve as a beginning for stronger unity. East Africa attempted to unite very early in the game but disintergrated after 10 years (in 1977) I wont go into the reasons here. The few visionaries we had were either assasinated (Kwame Nkrumah) had their legs pulled from under them by economic conditions including forced liberalization (J. Nyerere), or got frustrated and joined the mainstream of globally powerless African leaders (Chiluba, Mugabe etc.) Now it all about greed, see the mess that followed Kabila Sr.'s death.

I am African, born & raised, strong, intelligent & proud of who i am period. The people and ways of life i represent show through my everyday actions and in the way i relate to everyone, including white people. There's nothing wrong with embracing some elements of European and even Asian culture because there is essentially much to learn from other cultures. It's how civilizations emerged in the first place, by trading and learning from each other. Besides music, what else has the world learned from Africa? They choose to ignore lessons in love that Africans seem to be so good at (both in the way we relate with each other -who else calls you brother/sister, regardless of where you're from?) I wont elaborate on the other. (See i do have a sense of humour, bad as it is).

This has been long, but my aim was to use OKplayer to stimulate fruitfull discussion on matters that affect Africans as well. There seem to be so many of you so well informed. Lets learn from each other as well as the rest of the world.