The DISH
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Volume 7 Issue 16…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…April 23, 2004
Zumbi de Palmares: The Slave King
In the1500s, Spanish navigator Vicente Yáñez Pinzón and Portugal's Pedro Álvarez Cabral explored Brazil. Portuguese colonization began around 1532. African slaves were introduced into Brazil later in the century and used extensively on sugar plantations.
From the beginning, slaves resisted. Fleeing into the interior, runaways or maroons made their way to Northeastern Brazil, where they established quilombos or fortified settlements. The most famous of these fortifications became known as Palmares. By the second half of the seventeenth century, the heavily palmed region was home to a large multiethnic community of Creoles, runaway slaves, slaves and free persons captured in raids, colonials, poor free immigrants of all racial backgrounds and indigenous Americans.
Runaway slave settlements were a threat to Portuguese colonial sovereignty and security. They were a constant lure to plantation slaves. Many expeditions were undertaken to eradicate them. From 1654 to 1678, there were at least 20 expeditions against Palmares.
Believed to have been born in 1655 and captured that same year in a Portuguese-led attack, Zumbi became the last leader of the quilombo of Palmares. Baptized Francisco, the young boy was raised by a Catholic priest. At age 15, he ran away to Palmares.
After the devastating November 1677 attack, Palmares leader Ganga-Zumba agreed to a peace treaty. Led by Zumbi, an opposition faction preferred resistance to the forced removal and re-enslavement. Following the assassination of the chief, Zumbi was proclaimed supreme chief and immediately set about prosecuting the defensive war against the Portuguese. He ruled Palmares from 1678 until its 1694 destruction.
Zumbi, who escaped, continued skirmishes against the Portuguese for over a year, until one of his aids revealed his location. Ambushed, killed and mutilated, his head was taken to Recife, the capital of Pernambuco, and displayed as proof against claims of his immortality. Originally called Zumbi Day in 1978, today, the presumed date of his death - -November 20-- is National Black Consciousness Day, which is celebrated in honor and recognition of his heroic resistance to slavery. (Sources: www.blackelectorate.com, www.bbc.com and www.brazil-brasil.com/cvroct95.htm)
Fed Up With Def
Once seen as the fast track out of the ghetto, hip-hop has become the big rip off. The ride up can be fast but the sudden stop on the way down can be a killer. While its underground facade is theatrics for some, hip-hop's gangsterism and sexism are a way of life for too many. Part of the hip-hop legacy is like the era of "prohibition;" the business practices and ethics of those running it must have been developed in that milieu.
DMX offers a case in point. After releasing his latest album, Grand Champ, DMX announced his retirement. Not a catastrophic loss to hip hop, his reasons for leaving speaks volumes about the state of the genre. "I refuse to give another dime to that record label, Def Jam. They loaned me $3 million towards my next album, so I owe them two more albums. They give you money but they take it back. I made $144 million in one year for them. Guess how much they gave me? Nothing. I can't be part of it anymore."
With 2 years left on his Def Jam contract, DMX says he will concentrate on "a career in films." Careful to avoid "playa hating," this reporter believes big record deals are high-tech sharecropping on a new millennium plantation. Lured here by big land deals, some slaves volunteered to come to America. For DMX, the same kind of people controls hip-hop. A transformed DMX, better watch his back! (See www.dmxlife.com)
Brazil
When built on slavery, lynching, discrimination and inequality, how does a nation transform itself? This is the question Brazilians must resolve. Evoking powerful symbolism, President Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva traveled to historic Quilombo de Palmares to launch a national program promoting racial equality. On Black Consciousness Day 2003, which honors runaway slave leader Zumbi de Palmares, President de Silva promised land titles for African slave descendants and a system of quotas so they can attend national universities.
President de Silva, popularly known as Lula, declared, "It's a blatant fact that blacks earn less, receive less schooling, hold the worst jobs and have the highest unemployment rate. This isn't just a legacy of slavery. Racism is being continually reproduced and strengthened." Jump-starting Brazil's transformation, Lula appointed the first black Supreme Court justice and created a Cabinet-level Special Secretariat for the Promotion of Racial Equality.
Folha de São Paulo and the Institute of Research Datafolha studied institutionalized racism in Brazil. Afro-descendants, which represent 50% of the nation, make up 80% of the poor and less than 2% of university students. Surveys show that 89% of Brazilians believe there is racism in society; 87% admitted having shown discriminatory or prejudicial behavior in the past, while only 10% admitted to being prejudiced. Compounding the problem, 48% of blacks agreed with the statement that "Good blacks have white souls."
These statistics help explain why using quotas to transform education to include slave descendants is causing turmoil in Brazil. The vast majority of Brazilians are poor blacks and parados (brown), since blacks and whites intermingled freely, creating a wide range of skin colors. Added to the paradox of this melting pot are gross economic disparities. The minority white (European, mostly Portuguese) Brazilians, are reacting like white United States citizens to education quotas. Ivanir dos Santos, a black activist, sees quotas and family grants to aid the poor in sending their children to public school as the first step in Brazil's "reconstruction," much like the US civil rights struggle. As De Santos notes, "In Brazil's medical school, you will be lucky to find one black Brazilian. We pay our taxes, so why shouldn't we receive this public service we're paying for?"
Although education quotas are viewed as reparation for slavery by some, most blacks are too poor to take advantage of the opportunity. Unlike grants to poor families that send their children to school rather than to work, students admitted to universities on quotas (2003) get free tuition but no financial aid. Buying books, materials and the cost of printing assignments are real economic burdens for poor black families.
Emblematic of centuries of the US denying slave descendants education, Brazilian whites are fighting the transformation. They refuse to accept any personal responsibility for the injustice, discrimination and institutionalized racism or assist in ending inequality. In 2003, blacks and pardos were given 40% admission quotas. Whites filed over 300 lawsuits opposing quotas; their opposition led to reductions of 20% for blacks, 20% for public school students, and 5% for physically disabled and Indian descendants in 2004. Brazil's retreat mimics the US.' The Supreme Court in 1954 outlawed "separate-but-equal" segregation in Brown v Board Education. Bowing to white opposition, it reversed itself in University of California v Bakke (1978).
Countries, like the United States, Spain, Portugal, Great Britain, Germany and France are responsible for the impact of centuries of enslaving Africans and denying their descendants basic justice and equality. They should pay the cost of transformation.
The Dark Knight-Batman/White Ninja/Zorro celebrated his birthday with a party. He enjoyed being the guest of honor and the center of attention. After such a great day, it was difficult to get back to his normal routine. With a sigh, the Dark One/Ninja/Zorro lamented, "Too bad we can't celebrate my birthday everyday."
Disgruntled wants to know:
Press reports leading up to the Iraqi war painted Saddam Hussein as a madman that tortured, killed and incarcerated Iraqi citizens in violation of the rule of law. Ironically, similar atrocities are transpiring under the US-led operation Iraqi liberation (OIL). Surely, Iraqis must be asking, if one must continue to suffer the same atrocities, what is the difference between Saddam and the US occupation?
Disgruntled feels:
Transformed! Bob Woodward's book, Plan of Attack, provides one more confirmation of the pre-9-11 neo-conservative strategy as outlined by its Project for a New American Century (PNAC). The war in Iraq, to control its oil and strengthen Israel's position, was just one objective in transforming the Middle East. And, with hostilities all over Iraq that threaten to engulf its neighbors, they have ignited change in the region.
Excerpt from The Slave Ship
By Antonio Frederico de Castro Alves (1847-1871)
It was a dantesque dream.. . the deck
Great lights redeeming its brilliance,
Bathing it in blood
Clang of irons. .. snap of whip ...
Legions of men black as the night
Horrible dancing...
Black women, holding to their breasts
Scrawny infants whose black mouths
Are watered by the blood of their mothers:
Others, young, but nude and frightened,
In the whirlwind of specters drawn
From anxiety and vane resentment!
And the orchestra laughs, ironic, strident...
And from the fantastic circle a serpent
Spirals madly...
If the old man cringes, slips to the ground,
You hear shouts... the whip cracks.
And they fligh more and more.
Prisoned in the bars of a single jail
The famished multitude shudders,
Aud weeps and dances!
One is delirious from rabies, another is going mad,
Another, brutish from martyrdom
Sings, groans, and laughs!
Meantime the captain commands the maneuver
And after gazing at the sky which unfolds
So pure over the sea,
Cries out of the gloom of dense obscurity,
"Shake out the whip, mariners!
Make them dance, more!"
And the orchestra laughs ironic, strident...
And from the fantastic circle a serpent
Spirals madly
Like a dantesque dream the shadows fly!
Shouts, ahs, curses, embodied prayers!
And Satan laughs!
Lord God of the unfortunate!
Tell me Lord God!
If it is madness... or truth
So much horror under the skies?!...
Oh sea why do you not erase
With the sponge of the waves,
Your mantle, this blot?
Stars! Nights! Tempests!
Roll down from the immensity!
Sweep the seas, typhoon!
Who are these unfortunates
Who do not find in you,
More than the calm laughter of the band
Which excites the torturers to fury?
Who are they? If the star hushes,
If the oppressive space slides by
Like a furtive accomplice...before the confused night
Say it severe Muse...Free, audacious Muse! ...
They are the sons of the desert,
Where the land espouses the light
Where in the open spaces lives
A tribe of nude men
They are daring warriors
Who with the, spotted tigers
Combat in the solitude.
Yesterday simple, strong, brave...
Today miserable slaves,
Lacking air, light, reason.
About Me: Known as the "poet of the slaves," Castro Alves was a trained lawyer, who disliked making speeches. Though only twenty-four when he died from tuberculosis, he earned renown for his poetry. Intensely nationalist and socially conscious, his poetry pricked the conscience of those who supported Brazil's brutish social order. Although it occurred seventeen years after his death, his O navio negreiro (The slave ship), was instrumental in the 1888 abolition of Brazilian slavery. (To read this epic poem in its entirety, visit www.secrel.com.br/jpoesia/ingcal01.html)
By John Burl Smith
Real Hip-Hop Network (RHN) is a cable TV channel raising questions in the underground. "What is hip-hop becoming or has hip hop lost its way?" According to Yohannes Sharriff Smith, author of T.H.I.N.C (Teaching Humanity In New Consciousness): The Chrysalis of Evolution, "Sisters and brothers that created hip-hop never imagined it could have such a huge economic and cultural impact, be a real legacy to treasure. The relevant question for RHN is whether its intent is to exploit or preserve? To successfully tap into hip-hop's "real" legacy, RHN must lift hopes, increase access, provide opportunities and educate the Diaspora and the world about slave descendants' history."
Black power started an awakening in those who wanted to control their lives, communities and economic futures. Sisters and brothers in New York took the struggle to a new level by establishing five essential elements -- graffiti, DJs, beatbox, MCs, and fashion -- that made hip-hop an international genre. They found new ways to transform the soulful moan that began aboard slave ships, came ashore as the blues and became music during the Harlem Renaissance."
Locked out of America's socioeconomic and political system by discrimination and institutionalized racism, hip-hop developed underground. Inspired by the collaborative and collective attitude engendered by black power, hip-hop emulated that model. Unquestionably, it is a bigger boom for America than dot com. Around the world billions of dollars are generated daily, as hip-hop transforms the way blacks are perceived internationally.
Unfortunately, the black community has yet to share in the economic boom its investments and sweat equity produced. Dividends derived from hip-hop benefit the same system of institutionalized racism that created black "sharecroppers," only now slaves are chained to record deals. The black community asks, feeding at the same trough with marketing and recording companies that control access and distribution for hip hop, will RHN transform this for conscious black artists?
The recent media storm over Janet Jackson's "tit" puts a black face on indecency. Placing onus on black artists to clean up "smut," the indecency mob wields extra-legal authority to discriminate against black artists by denying access and blocking opportunities based on content or image. While simultaneously, white artists involved in the same incident or similar ones continually profit from such discrimination.
There is a "real" role RHN can play. Back underground, where it all began, conscious black artists are keeping alive slave descendants history through hip-hop's 5 elements. Battling for the hearts and minds of hip-hoppers, their challenge is to counter negative images and messages pushed by those trying to hijack hip-hop as they did the blues, rock n' roll, soul and jazz. If RHN is "real" hip-hop, it will be committed to black consciousness and will lead the Diaspora's fight to transform hip- hop around the world.
Economic Imperialism
"We have just recognized a new power in a great region where there exists no other to challenge its growth...The day will come when it grows and becomes a giant and even a colossus [a gigantic power] in those regions. Within a few years we will regard the existence of this colossus with real sorrow."
(Spanish official's 1783 prediction about the United States)In 1807, when Napoleon invaded Portugal, the royal family fled to Brazil. After his defeat, Dom John VI returned home, appointing his son, Prince Pedro, regent of Brazil. Without bloodshed, Pedro declared Brazil independent in 1822. By 1825, most of Latin America had ended colonial rule and abolished slavery.
Ostensibly independent, European nations and the USA exerted extensive economic and political influence in these countries through foreign investments. Economic imperialism gave military dictators political power, while the vast majority of their populations remained poor and disenfranchised.
During the 1895 dispute between Venezuela and Britain, US Secretary of State Richard Olney invoked the Monroe Doctrine. Olney informed Britain that the US "was sovereign on this continent," by which he meant the Western Hemisphere. With good reasons, his declaration disturbed people in Latin America.
Fulfilling the 1783 Spanish official's prediction, whenever the masses in Latin America united to elect governments that promised to change the distribution of income and improve conditions for average citizens, the US fomented coups to overthrow them. Like the September 11, 1973 assassination and overthrown of the Salvador Allende government of Chile, the 1964 CIA-led coup ousted Brazil's populist President Joao Goulart.
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