Defining African American Conservatism

The phenomenon known as Black Conservatism has begun to make significant inroads within the African American political arena. African Americans such as J. Kenneth Blackwell, Michael Steele, and Lynn Swann proudly wear the conservative banner and are serious contenders in three closely watched political races. Clarence Thomas and Ward Connelly have long been the poster children for the Black conservative movement. Whether one agrees or disagrees with the above mentioned individual’s political views, I believe that it is important to begin to define conservatism in relation to its effect upon the African American community from an African American perspective.

I believe that there are at least two branches of Black conservatism. The first branch is an offshoot of the post-modern conservative movement. This movement is primarily defined by and through the Republican Party platform and is filtered and communicated through a christian-right, white-american conservative perspective. Its focus is on returning America to some mythical state of existence where ethnic, religious, and cultural diversity is frowned upon and everyone is of the same religious, moral, and social mindset; i.e., the proverbial Borg Collective.

In this writer’s opinion, traditional post-modern conservatism is anathema to African Americans. The roots of post-modern conservatism can be found within the Jim Crow movement. Post-modern conservatism seeks to destroy diversity just as Jim Crow sought to destroy diversity. Post-modern conservatism seeks to limit access and the flow of capital to the poor and disenfranchised just as Jim Crow sought to limit the flow of capital to and disenfranchise African Americans. And just like Jim Crow promoted a narrow view of what constitutes American society, post-modern conservatism seeks to do the same.

African Americans that assimilate into and embrace the above-defined conservative movement can offer nothing of value to the African American community and it appears that in most cases they are comfortable with that position. Any movement that embraces a platform that promotes policies, laws, and actions that stifle economic freedom, social liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is harmful to African Americans. Additionally, if one embraces a movement that is defined as harmful to African Americans, then one should be judged accordingly.

Currently the second branch of the African American Conservative Movement is gently bubbling at the grassroots level. However the agenda of this branch of African American conservatism could be far more significant in terms of positive change than the Civil Rights Movement of the 50’s and 60’s. This movement is primarily economic in nature and is based upon the values associated with a cooperative economic agenda, combined with an African-Centered (and globally relevant) educational system. This movement seeks to create an infrastructure that supports the values that will allow African Americans to rebuild their communities and heal the fractured familial, cultural, and social relationships that are essential for the survival of people of African ascendency.

The flavor of this type of conservatism appears to be more palatable to the masses of African Americans – especially those of whom are independent of and/or reject both the Republican and Democratic Party agendas. Its structure is one where ideas that support diversity and infrastructural capitalization are encouraged. It is a movement where society is defined by what its constituents bring to the arena of ideas and values, and not by the narrow viewpoints of symbiotic provocateurs and pontificators. It not only encourages us to pull ourselves up and over by our bootstraps, it teaches us how to do so and creates the environment that will afford us the opportunity to teach others as well.

Lamentation Of An Old-School Music Aficionado

P-Funk Mantra: “Good evening. Do not attempt to adjust your radio. There is nothing wrong. We have taken control as to bring you this special show. We will return it to you as soon as you are grooved….”

-George Clinton-

I recently received a free two week subscription to Rhapsody – a pay for play music service and media platform sponsored by the makers of RealPlayer and being an aficionado of the old school Fusion, Funk and the R&B musical genres, I quickly hooked up with some of the old sounds that I enjoyed back in the days of the permanent relaxer and bone curler cured curly afro, bellbottoms, blue light in the basement parties, nic-nic shirts, and crepe-sole platform shoes. Ed. Note: For those who overstand the above references, no explanation is necessary. For those who do not, you better ask somebody; preferably over the age of 45.

Within a few clicks I was quickly immersed in a cornucopia of nostalgic R&B musical ambrosia. Within a few more clicks I became delightfully embrangled in the effervescent syncopated back-beats of P-Funk and Bootsy Collins. Upon being thoroughly “funked” up, I moved on to the party prioritized and synthesized musical sounds of the eighties. Then a funny thing happened when I hit the nineties. Nothing! Not in the sense that there were nothing offered. It was nothing based upon the fact that what is being pushed by mainstream record companies as African American music today is nothing more than samples, remixes of old school jams, complete with the constant lyrical references to uninhibited casual sex, pimping, murder, and the problems (real and imagined) associated with living in the “hood.”

Before I’m labeled a hater, let me preference the above by stating that I enjoy and listen to hip-hop and rap. Having been born and raised in the East Bay Area in Northern California, I tend to lean mostly towards the West-Coast style of rap and hip-hop. However I enjoy a variety of musical genres. As such, I tend to tire easily listening to the constant and repetitious top-forty. It appears that mainstream record companies do not believe that African Americans are sophisticated enough to appreciate or buy anything else other than what they pass off as rap or hip-hop. Is this a conspiracy? Maybe. However we’ll deal with that issue in another blog.

So what happened to the old R&B and Funk groups of the 70’s and 80’s? Actually nothing. Many of the old school groups still record and tour with various degrees of success. Old and new CD’s produced by these groups can be heard and purchased via the internet through various music oriented websites and much of what is offered today by them is excellent. Also internet radio provides a venue for these groups to be heard by fans and newcomers alike. 70’s R&B Groups like New Birth and Blue Magic have created interactive websites where fans can chat with or email the group members as well as listen to and purchase new music. MSN and Yahoo also have group-fan clubs where fans can interact with old school artists and groups of their choosing.

Hopefully one day (or hopefully not), mainstream record companies will wake up to the fact that the African American consumer is not a monolithic collective of hip-hop and rap heads that is only interested in buying music with references to laffy-taffy, skeet-skeet-skeet, and fatty girls. If not, I’m sure that an entrepreneur with large pockets, a flair for internet marketing, and a savvy business acumen will afford us the opportunity to get our old school groove on in more ways than one. Until such time always remember that “funk not only moves, it can remove.”

The State of Africa America: IV. The African-American Paradigm Shift

“If you have become great after having been little, if you have become rich after having been poor, when you are at the head of the city, know how not to take advantage of the fact that you have reached the first rank, harden not your heart because of your elevation; you are become only the administrator, the prefect, of the provisions which belong to the Creator. Put not behind you the neighbor who is like you; be unto him as a companion.”

Ptah-Hotep

We must challenge our spirit-mind to envision the possibilities of life with honor, justice, and liberty in pursuit of a spiritual balance on a global scale and bring that vision to as many humans as possible. We must first begin the process of change within our own communities and become committed to a paradigm shift that incorporates an African-Centered spiritual, cultural, and socio-economic revival-lution.

Socio-economic empowerment must come first. An excellent example of a successful socio-economic empowerment template was put into effect in 1945 by Japanese-Americans (primarily) in California. During World War II, Japanese Americans in California were stripped of their land and wealth and were placed in what the government termed War Relocation Camps. After the war was over, they were released and given very little compensation for their personal property, land, or for being falsely imprisoned.

Instead of marching, begging for justice, or getting stuck in the muck that I term the excess of redress, they collectively and quietly decided to rebuild their communities. They started banks, built businesses, schools, and embraced their culture through education, communication (media) and spiritual enlightenment. However all of this would not have been possible if they did not engage in a cooperative economic structure that supported all facets of their unique socio-economic and cultural infrastructure. In other words they have a great love for their culture and “overstand” where they have come from and know where they are going. By spending and investing their money (when possible) exclusively within their communities, they have ensured the viability of their communities for years to come.

The Chinese-American community, which faced the same (if not worst) discrimination that African Americans have dealt with did not culturally implode either. Instead they built their own cities within the cities that they were in. In New Orleans, Chicago, San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, and Oakland one will find vibrant and culturally enriched Chinese-American communities. The key to their success is two-fold; they spent and invested their money within their communities and they totally embraced their culture. They engaged in what I term the Cooperative-Capital Matrix.

Other ethnic groups in this country successfully utilize the Cooperative Capital Matrix. In part five of this series, we will explore what the Cooperative-Capital Matrix is and how it can benefit the African American Community.

The State of Africa America Remix: Eliminating the Status Quo

By Heru Ammen

Currently there is much hype and media attention focused upon African Americans and the issues that we face. In doing our part to bring attention to the aforementioned issues, the authors of the Urban Village Blog & Commentary will re-post the series we authored in 2006 entitled "The State of Africa America." In this current media frenzy regarding "Black issues" we want to participate not only in the discussion of these issues, we believe it is important to discuss tangible solutions. All too often all that we hear are the same voices discussing the same issues and offering nothing but the same tired rhetoric. It is our hope that by re-posting this series, we can move the discussion forward and focus on what we can do to actually change the dynamics affecting the culture and socio-economics of African American communities.

"Inspire not men with fear, else The Creator will fight against you in the same manner. If any one asserts that he lives by such means, the Creator will take away the bread from his mouth; if any one asserts that he enriches himself thereby, The Creator says: I may take those riches to myself. If any one asserts that he beats others, the Creator will end by reducing him to impotence. Let no one inspire men with fear; this is the will of God. Let one provide sustenance for them in the lap of peace; it will then be that they will freely give what has been torn from them by terror."

-Ptah-Hotep-

Racism, bigotry, and discrimination will probably be a part of the American culture forever. Unfortunately the African American community has been and continues to be stymied by the above whereas other communities in this country thrive despite it. The above has affected us to the point that we're now experiencing an African American cultural and socio-economic implosion.

Effectively dealing with the effects of racism, bigotry, and discrimination requires the development and implementation of a socio-economic system within an infrastructure that will act as a buffer against future discriminatory incursions. Without the above, any solution proffered to counteract the cultural insurgency prevalent within our communities will fail.

The success of other ethnic groups in this country has been remarkable considering that they too are subjected to the same impediments to life, liberty, and freedom that we face. The Asian, Latino, and Afro-Caribbean communities thrive in this country. All of these cultures are victims of the same type of European aggression, assimilation and/or colonialism that devastated the African continent. Yet they succeed despite the everyday reality of racism and discrimination. A question one must ask is why do African American communities fail when other communities succeed? Let's discuss a few of the issue that I believe to impede our progress as a people.

A. Embracing Victim-hood and/or Victim Worship

I define victim worship as the inability to move beyond the pain, suffering and trauma that was perpetuated against an individual or group. As such, victim-hood becomes a de-facto religious experience complete with its own dogma and tradition of suffering, self-hatred and self-imposed limitations. We should never forget our past. However our past did not begin in America. It began at the dawn of great African civilizations in Kemet (misnomered Egypt) Nubia, Sumer, Ethiopia, and Indus Kush and continues even to this day throughout the African Diaspora.

In fact, the perpetuation of victim-hood is a direct proponent of self-hatred, which leads to violence, abusive behavior, and general mayhem. Once we begin the process of knowing who we are in terms of our history prior to the Euro-Arab hegemony, and how that hegemony affected us, we will then be able heal those wounds and move forward as a culture. Real solutions require strategies designed and implemented outside of the box that are contra-posed to the status quo of indifference and self-hatred that we now embrace.

B. What is The Status Quo?

Part of the African experience in America was our forced introduction to what I term Euro-Christianity. From an European perspective, Euro-Christianity was used specifically as a tool of European aggression, colonialism and assimilation. Initially Africans were compelled to become Christians. Many of our Ancestors complied and accepted the Euro-Christian religion as a means of survival. Those who did not were beaten, tortured or murdered as an example of "Gods will."

As the generations passed and our ancestors forgot the old ways, Euro-Christianity became the only religion that the African in America knew. Unfortunately what was offered to the slave as Christianity was designed and taught to the slave to keep him/her in bondage. We know this to be true because a people that will beat you, rape you, kill you, assimilate and enslave you are not a people that will teach you how to become free. Especially when the condition of slavery served as the primary engine that propelled economic growth in the southern states.

Those conditions still exist today. Even when the slave was freed, he/she continued to embraced and perpetuate the Euro-Christian religion and dogma that was taught to them as a slave. The main thesis of many African American churches today is still focused upon instilling fear through the worship of Satan as the enemy of God and the reward set aside in the eternal fires of hell for those that do not comply with the will of the Euro-Christian God. I believe it is time for African Americans to define Christianity (and Islam as well) from an African-Historical perspective and define it through our our thoughts, our culture and our vision of what God would have us to do for humanity. Continuing to teach the theology of a religion that is based upon fear, punishment and religious servitude will only perpetuate the slave mentality that exist within many of our people today.

The State of Africa America: II. The Excess of (Always Seeking) Redress

"If you have, as leader, to decide on the conduct of a great number of men, seek the most perfect manner of doing so that your own conduct may be without reproach. Justice is great, invariable, and assured; it has not been disturbed since the age of God. To throw obstacles in the way of the laws is to open the way before violence. Shall that which is below gain the upper hand, if the unjust does not attain to the place of justice? Even he who says: I take for myself, of my own free-will; but says not: I take by virtue of my authority. The limitations of justice are invariable; such is the instruction which every man receives from his father.

"Ptah-Hotep

In part one of this series; I posited the question, what is preventing us (African Americans) from rising and transforming? I’ve often asked that question and I’ve concluded that part of the answer to that question is that we fail to utilize the intellectual, spiritual, and political resources that we have to formulate strategies or solutions that will cause us to rise and transform. Instead, our energy has primarily been focused on what I term the excess of redress.

The excess of redress is a phenomenon of propping up and fronting a platform that incorporates the art of complaining about discriminatory practices and past injustices. It has often been said that power concedes nothing without a demand. Let me add that power does not even concede a place at the table of public discourse and debate for milquetoast rhetoric.

The excess of redress has spawned its own industry of African American pundits, politicians, religious based orators, and other nefarious front men. These African American men and women earn millions of dollars doing nothing more than appearing on television, radio, or in the pulpit complaining about a particular injustice.

They use their communication skills to shed light upon a problem, get paid for it and then move on to the next studio, stage, or pulpit and complain about the problem again. This is nothing more than the illusion of substance and action. Because after the show is over, the amens have subsided, and the audience has moved on, the problem still exist and nothing has been fomented, negotiated, or implemented to effectively challenge the status quo.

It is conceivable that one day after all of the pontification, punditry, confabs, seminars, sermons, marches, books, white papers, and speeches on the redress of past atrocities we, the African American progeny of a great and resilient people will get our 40 acres and a mule. I wouldn’t fade that bet though.

The State of Africa America: I. The Band Plays On And The Choir Keeps On Singing

“As for the man without experience who listens not, he affects nothing whatsoever. He sees knowledge in ignorance, profit in loss; he commits all kinds of error, always accordingly choosing the contrary of what is praiseworthy. He lives on that which is mortal, in this fashion. His food is evil words, whereat he is filled with astonishment. That which the great know to be mortal he lives upon every day, flying from that which would be profitable to him, because of the multitude of errors which present themselves before him every day.”-Ptah-Hotep-

In the vast majority of American urban communities it is not uncommon to find a church on every other block. In some of these communities, one will find variegated clusters of churches occupying all four corners of an intersection. Denominations can vary from traditional Baptist and Methodist to the non-traditional and multi-faceted charismatic.

On Sunday morning, African Americans dressed in their finest and most colorful attire traverse the avenues and byways of their respective cities in a mass migration to their houses of worship. Once inside, they engage in the tradition of worship, song, praise and in some cases, dance. For most of the individuals participating in these religious ceremonies, this will be the extent of their “community” service each week.

Contrast that to the reality found within the urban communities that these houses of worship are supposed to serve. In 2004, there were around one million (reported) violent crimes committed in urban areas. Included in these statistics are murder, rape, armed robbery, and assault. Over seventy-percent of all households with children in these communities are one parent household; the vast majority of which are female. One can argue that based upon the above statistics Urban American qualifies as a third world entity.The above reality plays out every day in urban areas. It plays out against the backdrop of a fervent religiosity and overt piety that is in direct contrast to the message associated with the various denominations and theologies represented within these houses of worship; that message being one of loving thy neighbor.All God Centered belief systems teach that man’s primary duty to God is to help the human family to rise and transform spiritually.

Quite simply, one's duty to God is to feed those that are hungry, heal those that are sick, teach those that are ignorant, and mentor those that need counseling. Instead we find what I term “Religious Entertainment Centers” engaging in a translucent demagoguery of tradition, empty rhetoric, and song while the community deteriorates around them. While the African American church is missing in action, the band plays on and the choir keeps on singing.

In the city of Charlotte, NC. where I reside, there is a old boy network-white southern conservative politician named Bill James. Mr. James, who currently sits on the Board of County Commissioners of Mecklenburg County recently created a firestorm of controversy and debate regarding comments he made stating "urban blacks live in a moral sewer," in regards to the African-American citizens of urban Charlotte. In this writer's opinion Mr. James simply told the truth.

However, what he and other like-minded individuals fail to address in there constant diatribes bemoaning the condition of Urban America is that the moral sewer that exists in Urban America was not created by African Americans. It was created through a system of oppression starting with the enslavements of Africans and was subsequently ensconced (if you will) by the disenfranchisement of African Americans from the end of the civil war to the mid 1960's. It was exacerbated by a welfare system that was anti-family, and until the welfare reform act, "rewarded" generations of poor and under-educated (mostly) single African-American mothers for not seeking employment and/or educational opportunities.

Borrowing from a biblical analogy one can say that what slavery, socio-economic disenfranchisement, and welfare did was give fish to a large segment of African-Americans for so long that these individuals lost the ability to fish for self. In that respect, if one can't fish-or perceives that they can't fish in the American Sea of opportunity, then one will secure fish by any means necessary. Consequently, what we're experiencing in urban America with regards to out of wedlock births, crime, violence, and drugs is a direct result of policies that created and then perpetuated a system that devastated the familial social structure of a large segment of the African-American community and replaced it with one where dysfunction and mayhem are cultural icons.

Being of African American ascendency, I know that we do not like anyone, especially a white conservative such as Bill James, talking about black folk's "dirty laundry" in public. However, Bill James the messenger should not be the main topic of discussion within African American intelligentsia . Lambasting Bill James for what he said is simply majoring in minors and red herrings. What should be of utmost importance is if what he said is the truth, what are African Americans going to do about it? The answer is simple. We can come together as a community to implement solutions to the social and cultural dysfunction that is endemic within the urban centers of America.

How can that be accomplished? A good start would be to hold African American leaders, especially the clergy, accountable for the communities that they serve. All God-Centered religions including Christianity, teaches us that we must take care and uplift the poor amongst us. What is sad is that the largest and most economically viable African-American churches in America exist within or near communities that are economically, educationally, and socially disenfranchised. Simply put, African-American Pastors have failed their communities. It's a given fact that in the finest African American church tradition, Pastors will hoop, holler, and spit sermons to their congregation each and every Sunday. However ignoring the needs of the community Monday through Friday does nothing to bring the message of spiritual and social redemption to those that really need to embrace it. African Americans understand that there will always be a segment of American society that will base their opinions and actions towards us from a hate-filled perspective. But that is no excuse for ignoring the problems in our communities. We certainly have the intellectual capacity, education, and economic power to do so. So what is preventing us from Rising and Transforming?