BLACK HISTORY MONTH RESISTANCE IS REVOLUTIONARY

By NAYABA ARINDE AmNews Editor

This year’s Black History Month is focusing on the age-old tradition of “Resistance” in the Black community. In the same way Black history is the world’s origin story, it is also 365/6 days of the year.

From the first invasion onto the African shores through and beyond the rebellions on the ships of the enslavers, and their plantations and later buildings, resistance has been seeped into the soil, waters, concrete, and bricks of this nation; indeed, the planet.

“Resistance is not letting anyone define who and what we are,” activist Councilmember Charles Barron told the Amsterdam News. In a time when casual racism and micro- and macro-aggressions are delivered constantly by an entitled segment of the populace, intentionally countering this behavior is also being normalized.

“Resisting is when people of African descent fight for radical systematic change as we develop independent Black leaders fighting against white supremacy,” said Barron.

February is traditionally when corporate entities, like big stores and fast food giants, wheel out their annual Black people-themed merchandise and specials.

Ordinarily detached media platforms suddenly focus on movies, special documentaries, books, and events featuring sanitized, middle America-interpretation–approved historical figures such as Malcolm X, Muhammad Ali, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Dr. Martin Luther King, and Madam C.J. Walker.

The grassroots focus is on the likes of Nat

Turner, Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Rosa Parks, J.A. Rogers, Sojourner Truth, Fannie Lou Hamer, Shirley Chisholm, Paul Robeson, Angela Davis, and Denmark Vesey.

Pushing against Euro-centric revisionist history, African-centered Black people reflect on continuing to survive the African Holocaust: the Maafa. This is what author and anthropologist Marimba Ani introduced in her 1994 book “Yurugu: An African-Centered Critique of European Cultural Thought and Behavior.” There, she dissected the catastrophe and devastation of 400 years of (Yurugu) European-sponsored enslavement, colonialism, imperialism, Jim Crowism, and cultural, social, and economic oppression.

Trenton-based activist Divine Allah, a Black Panther youth minister and recent city council candidate, told the Amsterdam News, “Observing resistance in Black History Month 2023 means that we must continue to push forward with no holds barred. As Dr. Khalid Abdul Muhammad said, ‘Everything goes on the battlefield.’ No one should tell anyone how to fight against the oppressor. We can’t fight pretty. The ultimate goal is our sovereignty as a people— liberation from the constant daily oppression. We’ve been in the fight since we got here. We can’t let up now—the heat is still on. Many of us don’t understand the intensity of the war, and would rather act like everything is equal, postracism and all that nonsense. But they show us every day, in every single aspect of life, that we are still under attack. No matter how many award shows, or big sports games, or any other distractions and pseudo-equal representations of comfortability, we must force through the unsophisticated illusion of inclusion.”

Bolstering self-determination worldwide since 1966 is the celebration of Dr. Maulana

Karenga’s Kwanzaa—the December-to-January celebration of seven community-affirming principles: the Nguzo Saba, which includes Kujichagulia, Nia, Umoja, and Ujima—self-determination, faith, community and economic unity, and collective work and responsibility.

In 1969, Dr. Carlos E. Russell, a professor emeritus at Brooklyn College, established Black Solidarity Day. The annual observation, held the day before a general election, was inspired by Douglas Turner Ward’s play “Day of Absence.” The play imagines a world where Black people remove themselves from work, school, and all shopping to emphasize how completely vital and necessary Black people are to every single element of everyday life.

In the same vein, Black History Month is seen by many as a time for a united community to gather, reflect, re-evaluate, strategize, and harness economic and political power.

Issues of major concern still include housing, unemployment, crime, education and medical disparities, and police violence. This month, the nation is still rocked by the violent beating death of Tyre Nichols by five or more Memphis cops. The caught-on-camera assault brought up other police killings: Ahmaud Arbery, Sandra Bland, Breona Taylor, Rekia Boyd, Michael Brown, Sean Bell, and Eric Garner.

“We have been resilient in not resisting enough, we have not been fortified enough,” said Emarie Knight, a community activist and life coach. “We are not proactive, we are reactive. We don’t plan for collective progress— some of us do, but you need more of us to be actively involved. With issues like all this police brutality, we have to be at the table.

“I think about the grassroots movements. We have a few of them, but we need more people to be politically and socially conscious. We are not educating our youth anymore. I give my grandson lessons in my house every week. When I was growing up, whereas most people had Martin and Jesus on the walls, my family had Haile Selassie, and when my friends came around, I had to explain thoroughly who he was and break down the history. I took that responsibility then, and even now, I see that we must be the ones to educate our children. We as a people need a three-credit course in who we are.”

Knight, a healthcare worker and holistic mind and body advocate, said that historian, author, philosopher, and orator Dr. John Henrik Clarke “was one of our greatest visionaries. He said, ‘I only debate equals, others I teach.’ I can educate you so you can become empowered in this infrastructure. We need to get involved, but we are more asleep than we were in the ’60s. Why are we not owning Fulton Street, in Bed-Stuy? Every other community has a store there. We’ve done picked up enough cabbage and cotton as generations of people to own more businesses. We must know how to be become economically savvy again. In the ’60s, grants were given to open stores, but they didn’t give people economic power and financial education, so the businesses failed, and they said, ‘Oh, well we tried, not doing that again.’ But it was designed to fail and of course, the programs eventually closed. We need to get back to doing for self. You better resist this constant oppression, otherwise you’ll always have people hovering over you.”

In 2016, Barron presented a Black History PowerPoint presentation titled “We Fought Back!” all over Brooklyn. He announced that rebellion against invaders and kidnappers has always been in the blood and history.

“We Fought Back!” tells the history of resistance and revolutions from slavery to the