Tag: History

Women’s Day – Today and Everyday – Helping Them Change the World – Encore

Posted on March 8, 2021 in Ethos, Social, Strategy


Today – March 8 – is International Women’s Day.

Today, the International community – i.e. the United Nations – and societal stewards have set aside this day to recognize the fine contributions that women make to society.

This is completely unnecessary! When is International Men’s Day?!

Women have been contributing to society from the beginning, ancient times and modern ones. Yet, the formal Orthodoxy in the world – religion and politics – many times ignore the role of women.

The problem there is with the Orthodoxy, not the women. Women has been forging change, fighting against Bad Orthodoxy for a good while now. To that we say:

Go Girl Go!

We need the women in our society – the current ones and more – to keep on fighting against the many facets of Bad Orthodoxy; they have succeeded in the past … and we need them to succeed again.

This assertion seems so familiar!

We had previously discussed the actuality of Women fighting for change in a previous blog-commentary from April 14, 2018. It is only apropos to Encore that commentary again here-now:

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Go Lean Commentary – Nature or Nurture: Women Have Nurtured Change

Here is valuable advice to young people … hoping to partner with a soul-mate:

Take time to know him/her … give it a full cycle of seasons: Summer and Winter.

There is the person’s Nature and also their Nurture-ing that must be taken to account:

Nature – Genetics determine behavior; personality traits and abilities are in “nature”

Nurture – Environment, upbringing and life experiences determine behavior. Humans are “nurtured” to behave in certain ways.

So prospective marriage mates need to ascertain the Nature and Nurture of a potential partner.

If the potential mate does not measure up, my advice: do not bond, take your leave. Just do so BEFORE the wedding rehearsal – i.e. Runaway Brides – do not abandon all the stakeholders high-and-dry (“at the altar”), after they may have invested in catering, banquet halls, clothes, travel, etc.. Such a failure would just be pathetic!

This advice applies to individuals, yes, but not so much for communities, or societies. For the group dynamic, we simply have no choice; we must work to transform the attitudes, traits and practices in a community. The book Go Lean…Caribbean identified this subject as “community ethos”, with this definition:

… the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period. – Page 20

If/When the community ethos is unbecoming for a society, citizens do not bond; they abandon! This is so pathetic, as the community too may have invested hugely in the individuals – think education, scholarships and student loans. The community is “left at the altar“.

But change is possible! Communities have forged change and been transformed .. in the past, in the present and I guarantee future communities will also forge change.

How is this possible? How to Nurture change despite “bad” Nature? Let’s consider a sample-example from the history of the UK; this is actually the history of the Caribbean as well, as it features the Abolition of Slavery in the British Empire in the year 1833 – the date that the measure passed the British Parliament.

There were a lot of advocates and activists that led the fight against … first the Slave Trade and then eventually the institution of Slavery itself; think William Wilberforce and Charles Spurgeon who argued for the abolition of slavery and advocated for women to have rights equal to that of men. Slavery and Women’s Rights became locked-in-step – see Appendix VIDEO. So a lot of the Nurturing for the abolition advocacy came from women of the British Empire. See this portrayed in the article here:

Title: Ending Slavery

For much of the 18th century few European or American people questioned slavery. Gradually on both sides of the Atlantic a few enlightened individuals, some of them Quakers, began to oppose it.

From the 1760s activists in London challenged the morality and legality of the slave trade. They included former slaves, like Olaudah Equiano and the abolitionist campaigners Granville Sharp and William Wilberforce.

Women who opposed slavery took the lead in boycotts of slave-grown produce, particularly sugar. Slavery abolitionists used badges and iconic images to publicise their views, like the sugar bowl above made by Wedgewood. Enormous petitions opposing the slave trade were delivered to the House of Commons.

Women Against Slavery

It is only relatively recently that historians have explored the activities of women abolitionists. When looking at local provincial sources, autobiographies, historical objects and sites it becomes clear that women played a significant and, at times, pivotal role in the campaign to abolish slavery.

These women came from a range of backgrounds. The tactics they used – boycotting slave-produced sugar and other goods, organising mass petitions and addressing public meetings – proved highly effective.

Hannah Moore

Hannah Moore (from 1745 to 1833) was an educator, writer and social reformer. Born in Bristol, she was strongly opposed to slavery throughout her life. She encouraged women to join the anti-slavery movement.

In 1787 she met John Newton and members of the Clapham Sect, including William Wilberforce with whom she formed a strong and lasting friendship. Moore was an active member of the Society for Effecting the Abolition of the African Slave Trade. Her writings reflected her opposition to slavery and “Slavery, a Poem” which she published in 1788 is regarded as one of the most important slavery poems of the period.

Ill health prevented Moore from taking an active role in the 1807 campaign to end the slave trade but she continued to write to Wilberforce and other campaigners.

She lived just long enough to see the act abolishing slavery passed. She died in September 1833 and is buried with her sisters in the south-east corner of All Saints’ Churchyard, Station Road, Wrington, Bristol, BS40.

Mary Prince

Mary Prince (from 1788 to around 1833) was the first black woman to publish her account of being an enslaved woman. She was born in Bermuda in 1788 and endured a life of violence and abuse through a succession of slave-owners.

Her owners, the Woods, brought Mary to England. To escape their cruelty she ran away to the Moravian Church in London’s Hatton Gardens. Members of the Anti-Slavery Society took up her case and they encouraged her to write her life story.

Published in 1831 as “The History of Mary Prince”, this extraordinary story describing ill treatment and survival was a rallying cry for emancipation. The book provoked two libel actions and had three editions in its year of publication.

In 2007 Camden Council and the Nubian Jak Community Trust placed a plaque near to the site where she lived at Senate House, Malet Street, London, WC1E 7HU.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning

The poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning (from 1806 to 1861) is commemorated with two plaques in Marylebone, London. A brown Society of Arts plaque is at the site of her former home at 50 Wimpole Street, London W1G 8SQ. There is a bronze plaque at 99, Gloucester Road, London W1U 6JG.

Barrett Browning’s father, Edward Barrett Moulton Barrett (from 1785 to 1857), inherited 10,000 acres of sugar plantations in Jamaica, with an annual income of £50,000. Her maternal grandfather John Graham-Clarke (from 1736 to 1818) was a Newcastle merchant who owned sugar plantations, trading ships and many more businesses associated with slavery. At his death his assets were equivalent to around £20 million today.

Barrett Browning was aware of the source of her family’s wealth:

  • I belong to a family of West Indian slave-owners and if I believe in curses, I should be afraid. – Letter from Elizabeth Barrett Browning to John Ruskin in 1855.

In 1849 she published an anti-slavery poem “The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point”. It portrayed a slave woman cursing her oppressor after she had been whipped, raped and impregnated.

Elizabeth Jesser Reid

A social reformer and philanthropist, Elizabeth Jesser Reid (from 1789 to 1866) is best known for founding Bedford College for Women in London in 1849. The College is now part of Royal Holloway, University of London.

Jesser Reid was also an anti-slavery activist and she attended the Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840 and was a member of the Garrisonian London Emancipation Committee. A green plaque has been placed at her former home, 48 Bedford Square, London WC1B 3DR to commemorate Reid and the first site of the college.

While living at 48 Bedford Square, Reid entertained Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1853. She also shared her house with the African American abolitionist Sarah Parker Remond whilst she studied at the College between 1859 and 1861.

Sarah Parker Remond

Born in Salem, Massachusetts, Sarah Parker Remond (from 1826 to 1894) came from a family that was deeply involved in the abolitionist campaign in the United States. Her brother Charles Lenox Remond was the first black lecturer in the American Anti-Slavery Society.

Parker Remond was such an impressive speaker and fund-raiser for the abolitionist movement that she was invited to take the anti-slavery message to Britain. Soon after arriving here in 1859 she embarked upon a nationwide lecture tour. In 1866 she left London to study medicine in Italy. She practised as a doctor in Florence, where she settled.

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Related Posts

Listen to our podcasts about women’s involvement in the abolition movement:

Source: Retrieved April 13, 2018 from: https://historicengland.org.uk/research/inclusive-heritage/the-slave-trade-and-abolition/sites-of-memory/ending-slavery/

Women applied pressure to all aspects of society – the engines of economics, security and governance – for the end of the Slave Trade; then they continued the pressure for the Abolition of Slavery itself. The Nurturing worked! It was not immediate, but eventual and evolutionary:

  • They impacted the economic cycles – boycotts & embargos. See the notes on the Anti-Saccharrittes in Appendix A.
  • They compelled the Security engines – The Royal Navy was engaged to enforce the ban on the Slave Trade after 1807. (Between 1808 and 1860, the West Africa Squadron captured 1,600 slave ships and freed 150,000 Africans.[5]) See Appendix B below.
  • They engaged the related governance by entreating the political supporters, every year, to introduce and re-introduce the Abolition Bill.

Though the abolition of Slavery went against the Nature of the New World, these women and their Nurturing did not stop.  They persisted! This commentary concludes the 4-part series on Nature or Nurture for community ethos. This entry is 4 of 4 in this series from the movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean in consideration of the Nurturing by the mothers (women) of England who finally forge change in the British Empire.. The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:

  1. Nature or Nurture: Black Marchers see gun violence differently
  2. Nature or Nurture: Cop-on-Black Shootings – Embedded in America’s DNA; Whites Yawn
  3. Nature or Nurture: UK City of Bristol still paying off Slavery Debt
  4. Nature or Nurture: Nurturing came from women to impact Abolition of Slavery

In the first submission to this series, the history of the Psychological battle between Nature and Nurture was introduced, which quoted:

One of the oldest arguments in the history of psychology is the Nature vs Nurture debate. Each of these sides have good points that it’s really hard to decide whether a person’s development is predisposed in his DNA, or a majority of it is influenced by this life experiences and his environment. – https://explorable.com/nature-vs-nurture-debate

All of these commentaries relate to “how” the stewards – including empowered women – for a new Caribbean can assuage societal defects despite the default Nature. Here-in, this example from England is a great role model for the Caribbean region. We too, need our women!

How about the Caribbean today? What bad Nature can women help to Nurture out of Caribbean society?

There are many!

The Lord giveth the word: The women that publish the tidings are a great host. – Psalms 68:11 American Standard Version

Our region is riddled with societal defects. In fact, the subject of societal defects is a familiar theme for this commentary, from the movement behind the book Go Lean…Caribbean. The book asserts that the British colonial masters for the Caribbean – 18 of the 30 member-states share this legacy – did not endow this region with the organizational dynamics (attitudes or structures) that would lead to societal success. The former slave populations became the majority in all these lands; when majority rule was compelled on the New World – post-World War II restructuring – the people were not ready. Looking at the dispositions in the region today, these are nearing Failed-State status – it is that bad!

The theme of Failing States has been detailed in previous blog-commentaries by the movement behind the Go Lean book. Consider this sample previous blogs:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13749 Failure to Launch – Governance: Assembling the Region’s Organizations
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13746 Failure to Launch – Security: Caribbean Basin Security Dreams
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13744 Failure to Launch – Economics: The Quest for a ‘Single Currency’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13391 After Maria, Puerto Rico Failed-State: Destruction and Defection
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12996 After Irma, Many Caribbean Failed-States: Destruction and Defection
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12098 Inaction: A Recipe for ‘Failed-State’ Status
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10657 Outreach to the Diaspora – Doubling-down on Failure
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2547 Miami’s Success versus Caribbean Failure

There is the need for the Caribbean member-states to reform and transform. We have some bad community ethos; we need “all hands on deck” to mitigate and remediate them. The book Go Lean…Caribbean – available to download for free – serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all 30 member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives for effecting change in our society:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The same as the British Empire needed a “large host” of women to Nurture societal values, priorities, practices and laws to supplant the bad Nature of the British Slave economy, a “large host” of women will be needed to forge change in the British Caribbean and the full Caribbean – American, Dutch, French and Spanish legacies. This subject too, has been a consistent theme from the movement behind the Go Lean book. Consider this sample from these previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14541 One Woman Made a Difference – Role Model: Viola Desmond
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14482 International Women’s Day – Protecting Rural Women
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13063 Getting Gender Equity without a ‘Battle of the Sexes’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12035 Lean-in for ‘Wonder Woman Day’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10124 The ‘Hidden Figures’ of Women Building-up Society – Art Imitating Life
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8306 Women Get Ready for New “Lean-In” Campaign
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6937 Women in Politics – Yes, They Can!
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6836 Role Model – #FatGirlsCan
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5648 One Woman – Taylor Swift – Changing Streaming Music Industry
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3490 One Woman Entrepreneur Rallied and Change Her Whole Community

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to Nurture a better Caribbean society. It details the new community ethos that needs to be adopted so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society – economics, security and governance. We want the women to help empower Caribbean society and so we want to empower women. In fact, the book (Page 226) details the bad community ethos that permeated the “Imperial” world during the times of Caribbean colonization. The advocacy entitled 10 Ways to Empower Women presented this encyclopedic reference on the Natural Law philosophy as follows:

The Bottom Line on Natural Law and Women’s Rights

17th century natural law philosophers in Britain and America, such as Thomas Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau and John Locke, developed the theory of natural rights in reference to ancient philosophers such as Aristotle and the Christian theologist Aquinas. Like the ancient philosophers, 17th century natural law philosophers defended slavery and an inferior status of women in law.

Relying on ancient Greek philosophers, natural law philosophers argued that natural rights where not derived from god, but were “universal, self-evident, and intuitive”, a law that could be found in nature. They believed that natural rights were self-evident to “civilized man” who lives “in the highest form of society”. Natural rights derived from human nature, a concept first established by the ancient Greek philosopher Zeno of Citium in Concerning Human Nature.

Zenon argued that each rational and civilized male Greek citizen had a “divine spark” or “soul” within him that existed independent of the body. Zeno founded the Stoic philosophy and the idea of a human nature was adopted by other Greek philosophers, and later natural law philosophers and western humanists. Aristotle developed the widely adopted idea of rationality, arguing that man was a “rational animal” and as such a natural power of reason.

Concepts of human nature in ancient Greece depended on gender, ethnic, and other qualifications and 17th century natural law philosophers came to regard women along with children, slaves and non-whites, as neither “rational” nor “civilized”. Natural law philosophers claimed the inferior status of women was “common sense” and a matter of “nature”. They believed that women could not be treated as equal due to their “inner nature”. The views of 17th century natural law philosophers were opposed in the 18th and 19th century by Evangelical natural theology philosophers such as William Wilberforce and Charles Spurgeon, who argued for the abolition of slavery and advocated for women to have rights equal to that of men. Modern natural law theorists, and advocates of natural rights, claimed that all people have a human nature, regardless of gender, ethnicity or other qualifications; therefore all people have natural rights.

These thoughts on Natural Law and Women’s Rights persist to this day, despite how archaic they may seem.

This flawed Natural Law philosophy accounts for the Nature of the Caribbean – this was inherited from the Imperial Europe (1600’s) – and never fully uprooted. This was the heavy-lifting that the foregoing women helped to Nurture out of Europe, and what we need continued help for today’s women to uproot.

In addition to the ethos discussion, the book presents the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute change in the Caribbean region. This is how to Nurture a bad community (ethos) into a good community (ethos).

Yes, we can elevate our societal engines. We can do more than just study impactful women from the past, we can foster our own brand of impactful women. We need them!

We need all hands on deck to make our Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Appendix A – Anti-Saccharrittes … in England

…
In 1791, … the abolitionist William Fox published his anti-sugar pamphlet, which called for a boycott of sugar grown by slaves working in inhuman conditions in the British-governed West Indies. “In every pound of sugar used, we may be considered as consuming two ounces of human flesh,” wrote Fox. So powerful was his appeal that close to 400,000 Britons gave up sugar.

The sugar boycott squarely affected that most beloved of English rituals: afternoon tea. As The Salt [Magazine] has reported, sugar was an integral reason why tea became an engrained habit of the British in the 1700s. But with the sugar boycott, offering or not offering sugar with tea became a highly political act.

Soon, grocers stopped selling West Indies sugar and began to sell “East Indies sugar” from India. Those who bought this sugar were careful to broadcast their virtue by serving it in bowls imprinted with the words “not made by slave labor,” in much the same way that coffee today is advertised as fair-trade, or eggs as free-range.

…

Source: Posted August 4, 2015; retrieved April 14, 2018 from: https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2015/08/04/429363868/how-percy-shelley-stirred-his-politics-into-his-tea-cup

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Appendix B – Rare ‘slave freeing’ photos on show

A set of rare photographs showing African slaves being freed by the Royal Navy have gone on show for the first time. They are part of an exhibition marking the bicentenary of the abolition of the slave trade.

A set of rare photographs showing African slaves being freed by the Royal Navy have gone on show for the first time.
Published April 28, 2007.
The photographs, on display at the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth, Hants, show a sailor removing the manacle from a newly-freed slave as well as the ship’s marines escorting captured slavers.

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East African slaves aboard the HMS Daphne, a British Royal Navy vessel involved in anti-slave trade activities in the Indian Ocean,

Samuel Chidwick, 74, has donated the photographs taken by his father Able Seaman Joseph Chidwick, born in 1881, on board HMS Sphinx off the East African coast in about 1907.

The photographs, on display at the Royal Naval Museum, Portsmouth, Hants, show a sailor removing the manacle from a newly-freed slave as well as the ship’s marines escorting captured slavers.

Mr Chidwick, of Dover, Kent, said: “The pictures were taken by my father who was serving aboard HMS Sphinx while on armed patrol off the Zanzibar and Mozambique coast.

“They caught quite a few slavers and those particular slaves that are in the pictures happened while he was on watch. “That night a dhow sailed by and the slaves were all chained together. He raised the alarm and they got them on to the ship and got the chains knocked off them.

“They then questioned them and sent a party of marines ashore to try to track the slave traders down.

“They caught two of them and I believe they were of Arabic origin.

“My father thought the slave trade was a despicable thing that was going on, the slaves were treated very badly so when they got the slavers they didn’t give them a very nice time.”

Jacquie Shaw, spokeswoman for the Royal Naval Museum, said: “The museum and the Royal Navy are delighted to announce the donation of a nationally important collection of unique photographs taken by Able Seaman Joseph John Chidwick during his service on the Persian Gulf Station where the crew of HMS Sphinx were engaged in subduing the slave trade.

“The collection comprises a fascinating and important snapshot of life on anti-slavery duties off the coast of Africa.”

The exhibition, ‘Chasing Freedom -The Royal Navy and the suppression of the Transatlantic Slave Trade’, is being held until January next year to mark the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade.

The House of Commons passed a bill in 1805 making it unlawful for any British subject to capture and transport slaves but the measure was blocked by the House of Lords and did not come into force until March 25, 1807.

Mrs Shaw said that since the exhibition opened, members of the public had brought forward several historically-important items. She said: “As well as these amazing images, members of the public have brought many other unheard stories of the Royal Navy and the trade in enslaved Africans to the museum’s attention including the original ship’s log of the famed HMS Black Joke of the West Coast of Africa Station.”

Source: Posted 29 Apr 2007; retrieved April 14, 2018 from: http://metro.co.uk/2007/04/29/rare-slave-freeing-photos-on-show-331626/

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Appendix C VIDEO – Abolition to Suffrage – https://youtu.be/WbLVp27cqZ8

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Black History – Pandemic-wise: A Lesson from the Ancestors

Posted on February 17, 2021 in Ethos, Industries, Social

Go Lean Commentary

The Ancestors are speaking to us, telling us to remember them, remember their sacrifices and achievements, and then to follow their models on mitigating communicable diseases.

Listen carefully!

Listen, especially now during Black History Month 2021, in the middle of a global pandemic, to the lessons from previous generations, or forefathers and foremothers.

Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. – The Bible; Proverbs 1:8 New International Version

There is no way to justify Slavery and the Slave Trade! It was an abominable stain on European society and the Church; see the Appendix VIDEO below.

But we cannot change that Bad History. Like all things historic, all we can do is study it, learn from it and change the present-future to optimize our lives and society based on those lessons. This aligns with the Old Adage:

Those who do not learn from history are forced to repeat it.

So now, we must listen to the lessons from our Ancestors in dealing with a modern day crisis – COVID-19 Coronavirus Pandemic. Our Ancestors told us, and the whole world how to mitigate, minimize and manage this and all epidemics. See this Lesson in History in the story here:

Title: How an Enslaved African Man in Boston Helped Save Generations from Smallpox
Sub-title: In the early 1700s, Onesimus shared a revolutionary way to prevent smallpox.
By: Erin Blakemore

The news was terrifying to colonists in Massachusetts: Smallpox had made it to Boston and was spreading rapidly. The first victims, passengers on a ship from the Caribbean, were shut up in a house identified only by a red flag that read “God have mercy on this house.” Meanwhile, hundreds of residents of the bustling colonial town had started to flee for their lives, terrified of what might happen if they exposed themselves to the frequently deadly disease.

They had reason to fear. The virus was extremely contagious, spreading like wildfire in large epidemics. Smallpox patients experienced fever, fatigue and a crusty rash that could leave disfiguring scars. In up to 30 percent of cases, it killed.

But the smallpox epidemic of 1721 was different than any that came before it. As sickness swept through the city, killing hundreds in a time before modern medical treatment or a robust understanding of infectious disease, an enslaved man known only as Onesimus suggested a potential way to keep people from getting sick. Intrigued by Onesimus’ idea, a brave doctor and an outspoken minister undertook a bold experiment to try to stop smallpox in its tracks.

Smallpox was one of the era’s deadliest afflictions. “Few diseases at this time were as universal or fatal,” notes historian Susan Pryor. The colonists saw its effects not just among their own countrymen, but among the Native Americans to whom they introduced the disease. Smallpox destroyed Native communities that, with no immunity, were unable to fight off the virus.

Smallpox also entered the colonies on slave ships, transmitted by enslaved people who, in packed and unsanitary quarters, passed the disease along to one another and, eventually, to colonists at their destinations. One of those destinations was Massachusetts, which was a center of the early slave trade. The first enslaved people had arrived in Massachusetts in 1638, and by 1700, about 1,000 enslaved people lived in the colony, most in Boston.

In 1706, an enslaved West African man was purchased for the prominent Puritan minister Cotton Mather by his congregation. Mather gave him the name Onesimus, after an enslaved man in the Bible whose name meant “useful.” Mather, who had been a powerful figure in the Salem Witch Trials, believed that owners of enslaved people had a duty to convert enslaved people to Christianity and educate them. But like other white men of his era, he also looked down on what he called the “Devilish rites” of Africans and worried that enslaved people might openly rebel.

Mather didn’t trust Onesimus: He wrote about having to watch him carefully due to what he thought was “thievish” behavior, and recorded in his diary that he was “wicked” and “useless.” But in 1716, Onesimus told him something he did believe: That he knew how to prevent smallpox.

Onesimus, who “is a pretty intelligent fellow,” Mather wrote, told him he had had smallpox—and then hadn’t. Onesimus said that he “had undergone an operation, which had given him something of the smallpox and would forever preserve him from it…and whoever had the courage to use it was forever free of the fear of contagion.”

The operation Onesimus referred to consisted of rubbing pus from an infected person into an open wound on the arm. Once the infected material was introduced into the body, the person who underwent the procedure was inoculated against smallpox. It wasn’t a vaccination, which involves exposure to a less dangerous virus to provoke immunity. But it did activate the recipient’s immune response and protected against the disease most of the time.

Mather was fascinated. He verified Onesimus’ story with that of other enslaved people, and learned that the practice had been used in Turkey and China. He became an evangelist for inoculation—also known as variolation—and spread the word throughout Massachusetts and elsewhere in the hopes it would help prevent smallpox.

But Mather hadn’t bargained on how unpopular the idea would be. The same prejudices that caused him to distrust his servant made other white colonists reluctant to undergo a medical procedure developed by or for Black people. Mather “was vilified,” historian Ted Widmer told WGBH. “A local newspaper, called The New England Courant, ridiculed him. An explosive device was thrown through his windows with an angry note. There was an ugly racial element to the anger.” Religion also contributed: Other preachers argued that it was against God’s will to expose his creatures to dangerous diseases.

But in 1721, Mather and Zabdiel Boylston, the only physician in Boston who supported the technique, got their chance to test the power of inoculation. That year, a smallpox epidemic spread from a ship to the population of Boston, sickening about half of the city’s residents. Boylston sprang into action, inoculating his son and his enslaved workers against the disease. Then, he began inoculating other Bostonians. Of the 242 people he inoculated, only six died—one in 40, as opposed to one in seven deaths among the population of Boston who didn’t undergo the procedure.

The smallpox epidemic wiped out 844 people in Boston, over 14 percent of the population. But it had yielded hope for future epidemics. It also helped set the stage for vaccination. In 1796, Edward Jenner developed an effective vaccine that used cowpox to provoke smallpox immunity. It worked. Eventually, smallpox vaccination became mandatory in Massachusetts.

Did Onesimus live to see the success of the technique he introduced to Mather? It isn’t clear. Nothing is known of his later life other than that he partially purchased his freedom. To do so, writes historian Steven J. Niven, he gave Mather money to purchase another enslaved person. What is clear is that the knowledge he passed on saved hundreds of lives—and led to the eventual eradication of smallpox.

In 1980, the World Health Organization declared smallpox entirely eradicated due to the spread of immunization worldwide. It remains the only infectious disease to have been entirely wiped out.

Source: History Channel; posted Feb 3, 2021; retrieved Feb 13, 2021 from: https://www.history.com/news/smallpox-vaccine-onesimus-slave-cotton-mather

What is the take-away?

Get inoculated or vaccinated. The human body and immune system has a way of learning, in advance, how to counteract viruses. The Ancestors conveyed this lesson to the waiting world that there is a way to build up our personal defenses by introducing a virus in a controlled manner.

This is a Big Deal now, as many descendants of those same slaves – in the Americas and the Caribbean – refuse to consider the option of vaccinations for COVID-19. See this excerpt from a previous blog-commentary from August 29, 2020:

Title: Pandemic Playbook – COVID Vaccine: To Be or Not To Be

The world is enduring the Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic crisis; it is wreaking havoc on the world’s economic engines – $250 Billion a day in losses – and Public Health deliveries. The only hope is a vaccine, of which there are a number of them in development (Phase I – Test Tubes, Phase II – Lab Mice, Phase III – Human Trials). Around $10bn is being spent on finding a vaccine for this Coronavirus.

Will you consume or ingest the eventual vaccine?

Will you allow your children to ingest? What percentage of people in the community will refuse to ingest?

What if consumption is a prerequisite for work, school, church, travel, etc.?
…
But don’t get it twisted! The Caribbean member-states boast a Service industrial economy – tourism. To participate in this industry space will require compliance. Tourists – by air for resort-based stay-overs or cruise line passengers – will not want to expose themselves to possible infections.

Lastly, individuals can simply chose to exit societal functioning – a self-imposed quarantine; think: Leper Colony. These ones will have to take a seat – with a view – and watch life pass them by.

Is this what you want for yourself, your family and your community? If you chose NO VACCINE, you have that right. But your children may choose differently. Especially those children that you invested so selflessly to get advanced education – college graduates. Already, this population have a higher than normal abandonment rate in the region.

The Caribbean region is in an epidemiological crisis. What are we to do?

We hereby urge all to listen to the Ancestors: Take the vaccine.

A lot of blood, sweat and tears have spilled to get us to this point; do not disregard those sacrifices.

Learning lessons from our Ancestors in Black History is always the motive every February of every year in the US and other countries. The movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Commentary have consistently participated in this quest to educate Caribbean communities on the merits of Black History. In fact, this commentary is our 326th submissions on a theme related to Black History and/or the African experience in the New World.

Consider this sample list from previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16685 Ready for February – Black History Month
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20237 Black Image – Slavery in History: Lessons from the Bible
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18152 A Lesson from America’s Slavery History – Greatest Story Never Told
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18093 400 Years of Slavery – International Day of Remembrance
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17917 What Went Wrong? ‘7 to 1’ – Quantifying Caribbean ‘Less Than’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8724 Remembering Marcus Garvey: Still Relevant Today
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4971 Authorizing Slavery – Royal Charters: Truth & Consequence
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2297 A Lesson in History: Booker T versus Du Bois

Learning lessons from the past, from Black History, would mean acting in harmony with those lessons. While we may not be able to fix the historic past, surely we should apply the wisdom from the Ancestors and fix the present and ensure a brighter future.

The Go Lean movement is here to do more than just pique our collective conscience; we are here to act! The purpose of the Go Lean book is to usher in a Caribbean regional administrations to cooperate, collaborate and coordinate technocratic Homeland Security solutions for all 30 Caribbean member-states – the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) – despite their historical legacies or governmental hierarchy.

See this synopsis here, as related in a previous Go Lean commentary from March 24, 2015:

Title: A Lesson in History – SARS in Hong Kong
The CU is not designed to just be in some advisory role when it comes to pandemic crises, but rather to possess the authority to act as a Security Apparatus for the region’s Greater Good. This is the mandate as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 11) related to climate change, but it applies equally to pandemics, to …

  • “protect the entire region it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these … challenges”.

Legally, each Caribbean member-state would ratify a Status of Forces Agreement that would authorize this role for the CU agencies (Emergency Management and Disease Control & Management) to serve as a proxy and deputy of the Public Health administrations for each member-state. This would thusly empower these CU agencies to quarantine and detain citizens with probable cause of an infectious disease. The transparency, accountability and chain-of-command would be intact with the appropriate checks-and-balances of the CU’s legislative and judicial oversight. This is a lesson learned from Hong Kong 2003 with China’s belligerence.

As concluded in that previous August 29, 2020 blog-commentary, we urge all Caribbean stakeholders – governments, citizens, doctors and patients – to participate in the global quest to eradicate this [COVID-19] pandemic. This is the roadmap for making the Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work, heal and play. [The slave named Onesimus did this with Smallpox in 1721]; Jonas Salk did it with Polio … eventually; we can too. So our vision, this quest is conceivable, believable and achievable.

Let’s do our part and learn these important lessons from our Ancestors. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

ix. Whereas the realities of healthcare and an aging population cannot be ignored and cannot be afforded without some advanced mitigation, the Federation must arrange for health plans to consolidate premiums of both healthy and sickly people across the wider base of the entire Caribbean population. The mitigation should extend further to disease management …

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. …

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accidence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———————–

Appendix VIDEO: Life Aboard a Slave Ship | History – https://youtu.be/PmQvofAiZGA


HISTORY
Published on Feb 7, 2019 – From approximately 1525 to 1866, 12.5 million Africans were forcibly transported across the Middle Passage to serve as slaves in the New World. Life aboard slave ships was agonizing and dangerous; nearly 2 million slaves would perish on their journey across the Atlantic.

#HistoryChannel​
Read More: http://po.st/slave_ship​

Check out exclusive HISTORY content:

Website – http://www.history.com​
Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/History​
Twitter – https://twitter.com/history​

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‘Land of the Free’ are only ‘Hollow Words’ – ENCORE

Posted on January 15, 2021 in Ethos, Social

Today – January 15, 2021 – would have been the 92nd birthday for American Civil Rights hero Martin Luther King (1929 – 1968). Though an American drama, MLK was impactful for the entire world and every Civil Rights struggle everywhere. So his life and legacy has great meaning for us in the Caribbean homeland.

MLK died almost 53 years ago; he did not get to see the “racially equal” or the “universally free” America that he campaigned for or dreamed about. Even though a lot has been accomplished since, such as the 8-year term of the first Black President Barack Obama, can the country truly declare that it is racially equal today?

Free at last?
Not so much!

9 days ago there was an attempted insurrection at the US Capitol in Washington, DC. Thousands upon thousands descended on that building during a ceremony to formally accept the transfer of power from a well-documented bigoted President Donald Trump back to a more racially-liberal Joseph Biden and his half-Black Vice-President Kamala Harris. They were not having it!

The words describing America as the “Land of the Free” are still proving to be only hollow words.

Every time we think America is making real progress, we are reminded that the racial inequity in America is deeply rooted in the country’s DNA.

This is an important consideration for us in the Caribbean, as more and more of our people continue to “break down the door to get out” of their homeland to flee to America. The USA continues to be the Number One destination for our Diaspora, estimated between 10 and 25 million people.

These points were raised and addressed in a specific previous blog-commentary on August 27, 2019; (and in many other previous submissions over the 7 years of this blog site). It is only appropriate to Encore that submission here-now – being the 92nd birthday of Martin Luther King – as follows:

————-

Go Lean Commentary – 400 Years of Slavery – Emancipation Day: Hardly ‘Free At Last’

“Free At Last, Free At Last; Thank God Almighty, We Are Free At Last”
– Dr. Martin Luther King; “I Have a Dream” Speech; March on Washington, 1963

Considering that the Emancipation Proclamation took effect on January 1, 1863, it would have been expected that those powerful words from Dr. King may have been a reality long before 1963.

Regrettably, No!

This was the point of Dr. King’s theme:

…
Five score years ago, a great American [President Abraham Lincoln], in whose symbolic shadow we stand today, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of their captivity.

But one hundred years later, the Negro still is not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today to dramatize a shameful condition. …

See the Appendix VIDEO below of the actual speech in 1963.

America was forged on the blatant hypocrisy of a legal premise that “All men are created equal”, and yet the African-American population was never treated equally, fairly or justly. In fact, by some analysis, America is still not equal-fair-just for African-Americans. In fact, just naming a street after Martin Luther King creates friction in American communities even today, 56 years after that iconic speech.

How about other communities (nations in the New World)? Did they emancipate their slaves sooner or later? See the full list here of all the territories in the Caribbean region including the mainland coastal lands rimming the Caribbean Sea:

Chronology of the abolition of slavery in the Caribbean

First abolition Final abolition of slavery Date of independence
Haiti 1793 1804
Dominican Republic  1801 1822 1844
Costa Rica 1824 1821
El Salvador 1824 1821
Guatemala 1824 1821
Honduras 1824 1821
Mexico 1829 1810
British West Indies
Anguilla
Antigua and Barbuda
Bahamas
Barbados
Belize
Cayman Islands
Dominica
Grenada
Guyana
Virgin Islands
Jamaica
Montserrat
Turks and Caicos Islands
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia
St. Vincent and Grenadines
Trinidad and Tobago		 1833-1838
1833-1834
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1838
1833-1834
1833-1838		 1981
1973
1966
19811978
1974
196619621983
1979
1979
1962
Nicaragua 1838 1821
Danish Virgin Islands
Saint John
Saint Thomas
Saint Croix		 1846-1848
1846-1848
1846-1848
Swedish Antilles
Saint Barthelemy		 1847
French Antilles
Guaealoupe
Guiana
Martinique
Saint Martín (French zone)		 1794 1848
1848
1848
1848
Colombia 1814 1851 1810
Panama 1851 1903
Venezuela 1816 1854 1811
Netherlands Antilles
Aruba
Curacao
Bonaire
Saba
Saint Eustatius
Suriname
St. Martin (Netherlands zone)		 1863
1863
1863
1863
1863
1863
1863		 1975
United States 1863-1865 1776
Puerto Rico 1873
Cuba 1880-1886 1898

Source: Retrieved August 28, 2019 from: http://atlas-caraibe.certic.unicaen.fr/en/page-117.html

———–

In summary, the dates of Final abolition of slavery in the New World territories started in 1801 and ended in 1886. (The difference between the First year and the Final year reflect the attempts of Empire stakeholders to re-introduce slavery – this is best exemplified by the experience in Haiti). The above chart reflect one issue, the abolition of slavery; what about full Civil Rights for these former enslaved populations? That’s another discussion of historic timelines.

(See the previous blog-commentary here from the movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean that details the American Civil Rights journey)

This is the focus of this series of blog-commentaries from the movement behind the Go Lean book for August 2019. This is the season to remember, reflect and reconcile the 400 Years of Slavery History in the American experience – 1619 until … today. It is also the time to review the Emancipation practices in the hemisphere and ascertain when the “Free At Last” declaration was sounded in the region – if it was ever sounded at all. The full series of these blogs-commentaries this month is cataloged as follows:

  1. 400 Years of Slavery: America, Not the first
  2. 400 Years of Slavery: International Day of Remembrance
  3. 400 Years of Slavery: Emancipation Day – Hardly ‘Free At Last’
  4. 400 Years of Slavery: Where is home?
  5. 400 Years of Slavery: Cop-on-Black Shootings in America’s DNA

Perhaps, “emancipation” is just a hollow word. It seems as if the people – African descended people there of – were never really free nor equal in American society. Finally in 2008, with the election of Barack Obama – the first African-American president, could the manifestation of freedom and equality “for all” finally be realized?

Not quite!

There are many examples of racial oppression, suppression and repression in the US. These experiences may be indicative that something deeper than equality is at stake; there is a Bad Community Ethos – fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society – tied to religious mis-information.

Yes, this commentary went there! This theme – reconciling the bad track record of the Moral Leaders: the Church – have been exhaustingly studied in many previous Go Lean commentaries; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16944 Bad Messaging – Rejecting Black Women ‘As Is’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16534 European Reckoning – Christianity’s Indictment
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16512 On Martin Luther King’s 90th Birthday – America is still ‘Dreaming’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16477 Transforming Hindus versus Women – What it means for the Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16172 A Lesson in History: Rev Jim Jones and Jonestown, Guyana
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15580 Caribbean Unity? Religion’s Role: False Friend
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10216 Waging a Successful War on Religious-based Orthodoxy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9766 Rwanda’s Catholic bishops apologize for genocide
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5695 Repenting, Forgiving and Reconciling the Past

There are many lessons for stakeholders of Caribbean society to learn in considering the history of 400 Years of Slavery in America. Considering that formal emancipation did not complete until the end of the 19th Century, we have a lot of derived lessons that we can further benefit from by considering these historic details:

  • The abolition of slavery was a long journey everywhere; slave-owners never wanted to give up their property – they wanted to continue to benefit from their previous investments. They were forced to give up the practice by a superior authority – The “State”.  This parallel’s the actuality of bullying … everywhere, everytime.
  • Underlying to slavery was the false precept of Natural Law. Adherents believed that they were somehow created better than other classes of people – think White Supremacy. While this is blatantly false, many people still hold on to these false precepts – religion and faith is involved. When religious dogma is involved, the appeal to logic rings hollow.
  • Admitting when you are wrong – don’t hold your breath – helps reconciliation. It is a human tendency to excuse, rationalize previous wrong courses of action of a people or society. Thusly, racism and anti-Semitism lingers to our day.
  • Religious institution did good! The Abolition and Civil Rights movements were energized by zealous religious groups; i.e. Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King was a Baptist Minister.
  • Religious institutions did bad! The teachings that Christian conversions – for Amerindians and imported slaves – were necessary for their Godly salvation was flawed, anti-Christian (Apostate) and imperiled society in the New World.

While we empathize, we are not America – Yippee!!!

… for our 30 Caribbean member-states, 29 of them feature a majority population of Black-and-Brown people. While this majority does not always equal political or economic power, universal suffrage (one man/woman, one vote) has been transformational in correcting social ills. Universal suffrage equals universal respect, so this should always be at the start of change in society. This teaches us that societal stewards should work to ensure voting rights and protections of the balloting process.

Reflecting on the 400 History of Slavery in America, reminds us that this bad institution affected the economic, security and governing engines of society. So too did emancipation! Changing the societal engines in any community requires brains (Art & Science) and brawn. So the study of Best Practices and the applications of Lessons Learned should always be prioritized for community leaders. This is the purpose of the Go Lean movement. We urge every Caribbean stakeholder to lean-in to our roadmap to bring change to this Caribbean region.

Free At Last? Hardly!

But, we can make our Caribbean homeland Free At Last and even a better place to live, work and play. Let’s get busy! 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

————–

Appendix VIDEO – I Have a Dream speech by Martin Luther King .Jr HD (subtitled) (Remastered) – https://youtu.be/vP4iY1TtS3s

 RARE FACTS 
Published on Nov 7, 2017 – I Have a Dream” is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, in which he called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the speech was a defining moment of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history.

Under the applicable copyright laws, the speech will remain under copyright in the United States until 70 years after King’s death, through 2038.
  • Edited by: Binod Pandey
  • Caption author (Spanish): ALEJANDRA GONZALEZ
  • Caption author (Spanish (Latin America)): Adrian Roldan
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Long Train of Abuses: Religious Leadership in Government – Reconciling Trump

Posted on December 9, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Show me your friends and I will tell you who your are. – Old Adage

This is a sad imagery if we are talking about bullies and delinquents in the neighborhood; it is sadder still if we are talking about the religious leaders in the community.

Ouch! This is not the form of worship that is to be expected from Christianity. Face it, there is a sharp difference between Christianity and Christendom. The Bible gave the clear standard; consider these scriptures:

22 On the other hand, the fruitage+ of the spirit is love, joy,+ peace,+ patience, kindness, goodness,+ faith, 23 mildness, self-control.+ Against such things there is no law. – Galatians 5:22,23 NWT

*********

27  The form of worship* that is clean+ and undefiled+ from the standpoint of our God and Father is this: to look after orphans*+ and widows+ in their tribulation,+ and to keep oneself without spot+ from the world.+ – James 1:27 NWT

The actuality of life in the Caribbean is that our Christian-religious leaders do not have this track record. To the contrast, the religious orthodoxy is “sometimes good and acceptable”, then many times bad and unbecoming. Yes, we have to take the “bitter with the sweet”! Is this the way Christianity is supposed to be? Is this right and tolerable for our modern society?

No! Yet, this is not a theoretical discussion; this is observing-and-reporting on the happenstances of our Caribbean society. The actuality reflects the Long Train of Abuses we have had to endure here in the Caribbean, over the centuries, decades and years. Remember the bad religious orthodoxy and how these precepts were embedded in national Law-and-Order edicts:

  • Conquest – The New World was explored and exploited with the expansion of Christianity in mind.
  • Slavery – The initial approval for slavery was granted by the Roman Catholic Pope as an allowance for savages (from Africa) to be exposed to Christianity.
  • Colonialism – Conquest of the New World to allow for the spread of Christianity and forge their flavor of God-fearing societies from the “cradle to the grave”. This was blatant hypocrisy.
  • Patriarchy – Natural Law adherents, backed by twisted scriptural views, preached that only men mattered in society.
  • White Supremacy – False teachings that the Black Race was cursed and that all Bible prophets only look Europeans.
  • Buggery – LGBT Rights were frowned on because of Biblical prohibitions on Sodom & Gomorrah.
  • Childhood Violence – Twisted application of “spare the rod, spoil the child” scriptural mandates.

This is the continuation of the monthly Teaching Series from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. The book presents issues that are germane to Caribbean life and culture and how to address them: problems and solutions. For this month of December 2020, we are looking at the Long Train of Abuses that could-would-should move our people to change, to reform and transform. This is entry 3-of-6; this one asserts that the embedded religiosity with Caribbean leaders-governance is a source of the toxicity and dysfunction in our society. Yes, their dysfunction is that bad.

The religious leaders are partly responsible for our Long Train of Abuses. This consideration is one of the assertions in this Teaching Series for this month of December 2020. See the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Long Train of Abuses: Enough Already – Colonialism Be Gone!
  2. Long Train of Abuses: Overseas Masters – Cannot See Overseas
  3. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Leadership in Government – Reconciling Trump
  4. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Character in Society – Human Rights
  5. Long Train of Abuses: Dutch Hypocrisy – Liberal Amsterdam vs Conservative Antilles
  6. Long Train of Abuses: Puerto Rico – “Take the Heat” or “Get out of the Kitchen”

It is irrefutable, that the religiosity in the governance of the Caribbean has contributed to the Long Train of Abuses.

This is not just a Caribbean phenomenon. No, this commentary asserts that the Christian religious leaders in the US gave unconditional support for the 45th US President Donald Trump even though he provided a bad stewardship: for his country (USA), the Caribbean and the rest of the world. See the portrayal in the Appendix VIDEO below.

If Trump was so bad, why is it that the religious leaders continued to support him unconditionally?

Birds of a feather, flock together!  🙁

Now is the time to reconcile this actuality. Consider this excerpt from the news article – published during the build-up for the 2020 General Election of November, 2020 – in the Appendix below. This excerpt is prominent:

“… polls show Trump continues to hold a wide lead over Democrat Joe Biden among religious voters, a bad sign for the president is that some of his support is slipping, including among white evangelicals who, like the faculty at Christian colleges, have a college education.”

So the religious leaders hold sway over under-educated populations. Interesting?! The more education an individual gets, the less prone that individual is to the dark influences of the religious leaders.

What a statement!

This commentary is not a theological review nor is it chartered for spiritual guidance, but “if the shoe fits …”

… we simply must assert the Bible’s condemnation of the influences of false religious leaders in society. See these scriptures:

1 But understand this: In the last days terrible times will come. 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 unloving, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, without love of good, 4 traitorous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having a form of godliness but denying its power. Turn away from such as these! – 2 Timothy 3: 1-5 Berean Study Bible

*********

3 For there will be a period of time when they will not put up with the wholesome* teaching,+ but according to their own desires, they will surround themselves with teachers to have their ears tickled.* 4 They will turn away from listening to the truth and give attention to false stories. – 2 Timothy 4: 3-4 NWT

Clearly, there is no refuting the clear difference between Christianity and Christendom.

Through out the Caribbean – except for the American territories – there is the practice of Seconding Government employees to religious organizations. (US Territories, despite a clear separation of Church and State, can provide some non-evangelical community development services-funding via Faith-based organizations). See this definition of seconding and secondment here:

A secondment is the opportunity to work temporarily in a different firm or department to the one you are already working in.

In an internal secondment, the employee moves to a different part of the same organisation.

In an external secondment, the employee temporarily works at a different organisation.

This was/is a frequent strategy in Caribbean administrations. Consider these 2 examples here, from Jamaica & the Bahamas:

Remembering Father Hugh Braham Sherlock OJ, OBE, DD (1905-1998)

Father Hugh Sherlock

This year marks the 60th anniversary of the founding of Boys’ Town. It was in September 1940 that the Government of Jamaica and the YMCA collaborated on the need for a social intervention that would serve the needs of underprivileged youth in West Kingston and Trench Town.

The Methodist Church responded positively to the request for the secondment of 35-year-old minister, Hugh Sherlock, to spearhead this intervention. It was in these circumstances that the Kingston Boys’ Club was started in the hall of the Jones Town Baptist Church, which two years later moved to its own home in Trench Town and changed its name to Boys’ Town.

…

—————

Bahamas Feeding Network thanks Government for Assistance to Households struggling to put food on tables

Philip Smith

For 14 years, Philip Smith has been feeding the hungry, first with loaves of bread he baked in his small apartment. For the last seven years as executive director of Bahamas Feeding Network, he has headed an unprecedented volunteer effort that has provided more than one million hot meals to those who most desperately need help. But never has he seen the extent of hunger explode as it has in the last seven months since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, and widespread unemployment.

“Hunger, especially in households with young children and among the elderly, was a major problem before, but in many ways, it was a quiet problem. Now with the coronavirus pandemic, the stark reality of hunger is staring us in the face and we are extremely grateful to the government of The Bahamas for their intervention which has made it possible to feed more than 55,000 households or 220,000 individuals,” he said. “For organizations like the Bahamas Feeding Network and all of us who are currently working within the framework of the National Food Security Task Force, we need to pause, take a deep breath and thank the administration for recognizing the depth and breadth of the extent of hunger, and funding its relief to the best of the government’s ability.”

…

The government is spending about $1 million a week to combat hunger and this week announced it would extend the work of the task force, originally scheduled to end this month, to December 31.

So it is quite common for Caribbean governments to deliver on their Social Contract by means of Faith-based organizations. So many times the roles and responsibilities of governance are delivered by means of religious stakeholders. So just how common is this practice?

    A lot …
    Too much …

Taking the “bitter with the sweet”, means that there will be some toxicity – the bad religious orthodoxy or Long Train of Abuses – embedded with the Faith-based deliveries. This is no longer acceptable. It is time now to end this Long Train of Abuses …

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), an apolitical, religiously-neutral, economic-focused technocracy. The CU is not chartered to be a religious organization; there is no theocratic calling, but rather the motivation is solely for the Greater Good of civic society, defined as:

“It is the greatest good to the greatest number of people which is the measure of right and wrong” – Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832)

Enough already! It is time to think civic, and not religious. (Plus, there are many different religious faiths in our society).

We have addressed this theme – remediating the damage of the bad religious orthodoxy – in previous blog-commentaries; consider this sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20237 Slavery in History: Good Lessons from the Bible
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19217 Brain Drain – ‘Live and Let Live’: Introducing “non-preachy” Localism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16944 Accepting Black Women ‘As Is’ Despite Bad Bible Interpretation
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16534 European Reckoning – Christianity’s Indictment for Human Rights Abuse
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16172 Bad Christian History: 918 Deaths in Jonestown, Guyana
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15580 Caribbean Unity? Religion’s Role: False Friend
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10216 Waging a Successful War on Orthodoxy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9766 Rwanda’s Catholic bishops apologize for Christian genocide
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5695 Repenting, Forgiving and Reconciling the Christian Past

Do you remember the expression “the Fourth Estate”, referring to the Press or the different expressions of Journalism?

Who or What is the First, Second and Third Estates?

The Fourth Estate (or fourth power)… most commonly refers to the news media, especially print journalism or “the press”. The term makes implicit reference to the earlier division of the three Estates of the Realm: the clergy, the nobility, and the commoners. – Wikipedia.

The First Estate is the clergy. (This is the focus of this commentary; the next submission in this blog series will address commoners or lay people).

The regionally accepted standard for leadership has simply been to just take the “bitter with the sweet”.

The religious stakeholders (leaders) have traditionally exerted their influence on society. Now comes the change; taking the “bitter with the sweet” is no longer acceptable. We must do better. We must pursue the Greater Good … always.

Taking the “bitter with the sweet” has led to a continuation of the Long Train of Abuses.

So this is now the urging to our Caribbean member-states:

Stop it … now! No longer accept the “bitter with the sweet”.

We hereby urge all leadership stakeholders – political and civic – to lean-in to this Way Forward – a formal separation of Church and State where religions organization are treated simply as civic NGO’s – for societal progress, this Go Lean roadmap. This is our plan to make our regional homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————-

Appendix A – Title: Christian College Faculty Aren’t Lining Up for Trump

Sub-title: Reflecting new polling that indicates college-educated white evangelicals are moving away from supporting Trump, many on Christian campuses are struggling to back him.

By: Kery Murakami

On Sunday evening, President Donald Trump took a break from tweeting to talk to a key segment of his supporters, people of faith, to tell them God will help the nation survive the coronavirus pandemic.

“We know that God hears our prayer,” Trump said in a broadcast on his campaign’s Facebook page. “We have no doubt about it. He’s always with us and he’ll help us overcome this challenge.”

He then switched to his re-election. “This is the most important election of our lives, and whether it’s evangelical, whether it’s Christian evangelical — call it whatever you want — people of religion — this is the most important election of our lives and we have to get out and we have to vote.”

As he spoke, another aspect of his pitch to religious voters, Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, was poised to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Opponents of abortion are excited that she will lead the court toward striking down Roe v. Wade.

And Monday morning, Trump’s campaign manager, Bill Stepien, told reporters in a call that Barrett’s confirmation hearings couldn’t be coming at a better time to mobilize religious voters. “This happening is a well-timed grassroots opportunity,” he said.

But while recent polls show Trump continues to hold a wide lead over Democrat Joe Biden among religious voters, a bad sign for the president is that some of his support is slipping, including among white evangelicals who, like the faculty at Christian colleges, have a college education.

At the nation’s Christian colleges, a number of professors described in interviews this week their struggle to reconcile their support for a president moving toward ending abortion with their discomfort, and even spiritual revulsion, over him.

Among those noticing the struggle is Shirley Hoogstra, president of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities.

“President Trump has taken actions on issues like abortion and religious freedom that are important to Christians,” she said in an interview. “But President Trump’s actions distress many who have deeper faith practices. I think the president’s behavior has made it a hard choice.”

At the same time, she said, some religious voters are troubled by actions by the Democratic candidates, including a bill introduced by vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris to weaken a prohibition on laws burdening the exercising of religion.

Wheaton College — a Christian college in Illinois, which is described as sort as the Harvard of evangelical colleges — appears to be a place where Barrett’s nomination should be causing many to embrace Trump.

The university requires students and faculty each year to reaffirm a statement of faith, based on a biblical doctrine consonant with evangelical Christianity. Students and faculty are also expected to affirm that they agree with a community covenant, which, among other things, condemns “the taking of innocent life.”

David Iglesias, an associate professor of politics and law at Wheaton and director of the college’s Center for Faith, Politics and Economics, was clearly struggling whether his faith would allow him to vote for Trump.

“In my faith, everything is subservient to Scripture,” he said and brought up the biblical account of David’s adultery with Queen Bathsheba.

“The prophet did not give him a pass,” he said. “The Scripture is pretty clear that when our leaders do the wrong thing, we shouldn’t excuse them. Character counts. What you do matters.”

And, he said, “we know our Scripture here.”

Just in the past few months, he said, Trump has “failed to criticize the Proud Boys. What did he say? ‘Stand by’?”

“His behavior during the debate — he wouldn’t let Joe Biden speak. I’ve never seen a worse debate. It was pathetic. He’s said disparaging things about Muslim Americans,” Iglesias said.

“And there’s his recent treatment of veterans,” he said referring to a report in The Atlantic in September that Trump privately referred to service members killed in combat as “suckers” and “losers.” (Trump denied insulting veterans.)

Iglesias served in the U.S. Navy for 30 years.

On Christian campuses, “there’s going to be some soul searching in supporting someone you disagree with on 90 percent of the issues,” he said. “But who agrees with you on the one you that you hold dear, and that’s right to life.”

Supporting Trump shouldn’t be in doubt, either, at Union University, a Christian college in Tennessee, a state that Trump is expected to win easily.

“I really don’t know,” said Hunter Baker, the university’s dean of arts and sciences, when asked whom the college’s faculty is supporting. “People are keeping it close to their vest.”

But, he said, Trump will likely get less support on the campus than in the rest of western Tennessee.

He laughed when he was asked about Trump.

“What troubles me about Trump? Oh my gosh, how long do you have?” he said.

“He’s more polarizing than anyone I can remember,” he said. “Ideally we’d have someone who would reduce that polarizing. There’s no question he exacerbates it, and he almost seeks it out.”

Troubling Polling for Trump
In what could be a bad sign for Trump, polls are showing that recent controversies, from his failure to condemn white supremacists, even amid national protests over the killing of George Floyd, to his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, could be turning off key religious voters.

A Pew Research Center poll, released Tuesday, found that support of Trump by white Roman Catholics, white Protestants who are not evangelical and white evangelical Protestants has slipped since Sept. 30.

Just a little more than a month ago, 59 percent of white Protestants backed Trump. But in the latest Pew poll, conducted between Sept. 30 and Oct. 5, only 52 percent backed him. Among white evangelical Protestants, support for Trump dropped during that time from 83 percent to 78 percent.

More telling is data assembled by the nonprofit, nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute at Inside Higher Ed’s request. Previous national polls have shown a political divide nationally based on education. Those without college degrees have been much more likely than those who graduated from college to support Trump.

Previously, polls had not shown that distinction among white evangelicals. But since this summer, “we do see a significant gap emerge,” said Natalie Jackson, PRRI’s director of research.

A PRRI poll in October 2016, for instance, showed that 61 percent of white evangelicals without a four-year degree had a favorable view of Trump, then a candidate for president — virtually the same as the 62 percent of white evangelicals with a college degree holding a favorable view of Trump.

Polls in 2017, 2018 and 2019 — in which 64 percent of white evangelicals without a college degree and 62 percent of those with a degree viewed Trump favorably — showed no difference.

A poll by the group between July and September, however, found that 65 percent of white evangelicals who hadn’t graduated from college continued to have a favorable view of Trump. But among white evangelicals with a degree, support for the president had dropped precipitously to 52 percent.

In addition, Federal Elections Commission data examined by Inside Higher Ed found 196 people who listed as their employer one of the 140 U.S. colleges that are members of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities. Of those, 81 contributed to Trump and 115 to Biden.

The study was not definitive because of the potential for spelling errors in the FEC database, or contributors or donors not listing their employer. But even including the 14-to-1 advantage Trump holds among employees of conservative Liberty University, which is not part of the Christian colleges group, Trump doesn’t appear to be outraising Biden among the faculty as expected.

“Those trends are catastrophic for Trump,” said Micah Watson, director of the politics, philosophy and economics program at Calvin University, a Christian college in Grand Rapids, Mich.

“If that current data remains constant through Election Day (and people are actually voting now, too), then I don’t see a way he is competitive,” he said.

“It may well be that Trump is in as bad a shape as it appears,” said Baker, of Union University. But Baker, who is supporting Trump, said he is skeptical of polling, given that it was inaccurate in the 2016 elections.

To Dan Caldwell, distinguished professor of political science at Pepperdine University, a Christian college, that college-educated evangelicals might be turning away from Trump is not surprising.

“At long last, they’re opening their eyes to his behavior,” said Caldwell, who is supporting Biden. “I think people have become more skeptical that he believes in racial equality after his support of white nationalists.”

Caldwell, a Navy veteran, was also insulted by Trump’s comments about members of the military.

“I’m doing everything I can to keep him from getting elected,” said Caldwell, who is part of a group of more than 700 retired generals and admirals, former cabinet officials, and foreign policy experts called National Security Leaders for Biden, which has placed op-eds in local newspapers like the Pensacola Times.

That academics even at Christian colleges are troubled by Trump also isn’t surprising to Baker. “The more education you have, the more you value a certain type of discourse. And Trump violates that. He’s rude, and he doesn’t care how anybody feels.

“Christian college professors are still college professors,” he said.

Abortion a Key
But despite the polling, a positive sign for Trump is that even some of those like Baker, who struggle with supporting the president, are ultimately deciding to back him.

Like many faith leaders, Baker was troubled when Trump politicized the National Prayer Breakfast in February, where, according to the Associated Press, he held up two newspaper headlines about his acquittal by the Senate after impeachment then attacked Republican senator Mitt Romney, a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Catholic.

“You haven’t experienced a conversion that brings with it a drive toward continuing repentance and personal holiness,” Baker wrote in an open letter to Trump.

Baker continued, “Please don’t shame us by attending events like the National Prayer Breakfast and turning a meeting based on faith into another avenue for political combat and vindication of your grievances.

“Here’s a Bible verse that might appeal to you and help with that. It’s Romans 12:20, which reads, ‘If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Maybe you should try that,” he wrote.

But despite all that, he is supporting Trump, he said, because of the issue of abortion.

“I view that cause as fundamentally about justice. In the way some people view the civil rights movement, I prioritize that more than every other issue,” he said.

A Call to Repent
Another sign of the soul searching among evangelicals came last week, when the National Association of Evangelicals released a statement, which in part calls on evangelicals to repent in ways that seem to run counter to Trump’s positions. The Christian college association endorsed the statement.

“Despite the example of Jesus and the teaching of Scripture, many of us have not adequately opposed the unjust systems that fail people of color, women, children and the unborn. We have not always fulfilled God’s commands to protect the immigrant, refugee and poor. We have not always treated those who hold different opinions — both inside and outside of our faith — with dignity,” the statement said.

Despite the conservative image of Christian colleges, Hoogstra said there are different viewpoints, noting many colleges have student groups focused on climate change and immigration.

In preparation for Hoogstra’s interview with Inside Higher Ed, the Christian college association surveyed the chief student development officers at their member campuses.

Those at the 54 campuses that responded estimated that 54 percent of their students are Republican and 41 percent are Democrats. Forty-one percent of the campuses have a Republican student club, while 32 percent have a Democratic student group. And 81 percent of the campuses said that they invite speakers from both political parties.

Richard Mouw, who served as president of Fuller Seminary before retiring in 2013, also sees a generational change among evangelical students. He recalled Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern being booed by students at the seminary during a speech in 1972.

Two years ago, he said, Wheaton College held a series of sermons against racism, where civil rights activists spoke. “All the students got up and gave them a standing ovation,” he recalled.

As some evangelicals struggle with reconciling their faith with politics, Mouw is helping organize a group called Pro-Life Evangelists for Biden, which is urging opponents of abortion to take a broader view.

Many women get abortions because they do not have enough money to care for another child, he said in an interview. Biden’s policies to raise the minimum wage, provide affordable health care and free childcare work to minimize abortions, he said.

Among those who agree is Daniel Lee, academic dean for the seminary’s Center for Asian American Theology and Ministry. “It’s about life. It’s not just about abortion. A lot of people don’t just think about the one issue, but the broader issue of social justice. About Muslims, refugees and how you treat the marginalized,” he said.

“If you don’t vote against Trump, you’re missing what the Gospel is all about, what our faith is all about,” said Lee, who was among 1,600 faith leaders who endorsed Biden through Vote Common Good, a Christian political group supporting the Democratic candidate.

“Love your neighbor,” he said. “It’s so basic.”

Source: Posted October 16, 2020; Retrieved December 8, 2020 from:  https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/10/16/christian-professors-try-reconcile-abortion-views-disdain-trump

—————–

Appendix B VIDEO – Why Evangelicals Are Still Voting For Donald Trump – https://youtu.be/-YAbuONPfVc

VICE News
Posted Aug 26, 2020 – Not as many Evangelical Christians are turning against Trump as you might think.

Subscribe to VICE News here: http://bit.ly/Subscribe-to-VICE-News​

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Remembering History Correctly – Encore

Posted on October 12, 2020 in Ethos, Implementation, Social, Strategy

It is October 12. This is a holiday in many lands. This used to be Columbus Day; but now, as part of Civil Rights Reform, it has been rebranded. It is now called Indigenous Peoples Day in some places, while other places celebrate National Heroes Day.

Why and when did this rebranding happen?

Remembering history correctly, we learn that Christopher Columbus was not a hero for everybody. For many indigenous people – and the subsequent slave populations – Columbus was more of a villain than a hero.

When did this historic reconciliation take place? Recently! Indigenous People Day was instituted in 1992. That seems to be the Red Letter date on most calendars.

This theme of remediating historic reflection to more correctly assess Columbus is very familiar to the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. In fact, there was an October 14, 2019 blog-commentary that asserted Civil Rights Reform, with this title:

Refuse to Lose – Remediating Columbus Day

This remediation in our commemoration is affecting more than just holidays; it has also applied to monuments and statutes as well; many are being taken down.

Some of the heroes commemorated by monuments and statutes have not always been so heroic.

See this portrayed in this VIDEO here:

VIDEO – A monumental reckoning – https://youtu.be/L7Y-AHj9Gu4


CBS Sunday Morning
Posted October 11, 2020 – Since protests erupted over the death of George Floyd, the range of public monuments removed or vandalized has expanded well beyond those honoring the Confederacy. Criticized as racist or oppressive, statues depicting historic figures from Christopher Columbus to George Washington are now getting a second look. Correspondent Mo Rocca reports.

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This news story reveals that previous slaveholders are no longer being venerated for any other great acts or accomplishments. It is an inexcusable, unforgivable standard that “People should not own other people”. This is the actuality in the standards of right versus wrong. Anyone who have not embraced this simple standard should have never been idolized.

This indictment includes George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson and almost the full host of America’s Founding Fathers.

Is this runaway political correctness?

Yes, but far overdue!

What we have learned from all the reflection in racial history this past year is that:

If people never reconciled the evils of slavery then by default, they continue to think that “White is Right” and Superior and …

Black Lives do NOT Matter.

This wrong ethos have always needed to be corrected – “Come What May”. This theme was echoed in that previous blog-commentary from Columbus Day 2019; let’s Encore that now, but first let’s list the newer Go Lean commentaries that aligned with the same Civil Rights Reform theme that the “Remediating Columbus Day” entry presented:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20281 Cleaning up the Toxic Use of the N-Word to improve Black Image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20237 Slavery, the Original Sin for the ‘New World’? No, the Religiosity…
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20203 ‘Pluralism is the Goal’ in transforming the Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20180 Corporate Reboots to remediate Bad History and Black Image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20105 Rising from the Ashes – Making sure there is “Love for All”, not just some
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19979 Juneteenth – Finally, the Emancipation of the American Slaves
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19833 Hypocritical Colonial Community Ethos eroded justice standards
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18421 Introducing Formal Reconciliations to correct the past injustices

Here is the Columbus Day 2019 Encore here-now:

=================

Go Lean Commentary – Refuse to Lose – Remediating ‘Columbus Day’

Today is the Monday closest to October 12 – Day of Discovery by Christopher Columbus – so it is a day set aside as a Holiday in many places. But alas, there have been many communities that have remediated their historical appreciation for Christopher Columbus.

His impact was not all good!

This is part of the new attitude – community ethos – about losing. The actuality of Columbus is that while some people won – European Imperialists – many others lost. Those that lost, are stakeholders too in today’s Caribbean. The new attitude about winning-losing is actually a …

Refusal to lose

This community ethos is defined as a commitment by a group or society to the values of quality, success and winning. This corresponds to this formal definition of “community ethos” in the 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean (Page 20):

… the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period.

Celebrating Columbus Day is choosing the victories of some people over the losses of others. This is not winning; not win-win. Adapting the ethos to Refuse to Lose is supposed to be different, better; we want the Greater Good to win, not just a fraction of the population.

See, here, the encyclopedic reference on Columbus Day and the efforts to remediate its celebrations:

Reference: Columbus Day
Columbus Day is a national holiday in many countries of the Americas and elsewhere which officially celebrates the anniversary of Christopher Columbus‘s arrival in the Americas on October 12, 1492. Christopher Columbus was an Italian explorer who set sail across the Atlantic Ocean in search of a faster route to the Far East only to land at the New World. His first voyage to the New World on the Spanish ships Santa María, Niña, and La Pinta took approximately three months. Columbus and his crew’s arrival to the New World initiated the Columbian Exchange which introduced the transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, and technology (but also invasive species, including communicable diseases) between the new world and the old.

The landing is celebrated as “Columbus Day” in the United States but the name varies on the international spectrum. In some Latin American countries, October 12 is known as “Día de la Raza” or (Day of the Race). This is the case for Mexico, which inspired Jose Vasconcelos’s book celebrating the Day of the Iberoamerican Race. Some countries such as Spain refer the holiday as “Día de la Hispanidad” and “Fiesta Nacional de España” where it is also the religious festivity of la Virgen del Pilar. Peru celebrates since 2009 the “Day of the original peoples and intercultural dialogue”. Belize and Uruguay celebrate it as Día de las Américas (Day of the Americas). Since Argentina’s former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner officially adopted “Día del Respeto a la Diversidad Cultural” (Day of Respect for Cultural Diversity) November 3, 2010. “Giornata Nazionale di Cristoforo Colombo or Festa Nazionale di Cristoforo Colombo” is the formal name of Italy‘s celebration as well as in Little Italys around the world.[1][2]
…

Non-observance
The celebration of Columbus Day in the United States began to decline at the end of the 20th century, although many Italian-Americans, and others, continue to champion it.[31][32] The states of Florida,[33] Hawaii,[34][35] Alaska,[36][37] Vermont,[38] South Dakota,[39] New Mexico,[40] Maine,[41], Wisconsin, [42] and parts of California including, for example, Los Angeles County[43] do not recognize it and have each replaced it with celebrations of Indigenous People’s Day (in Hawaii, “Discoverers’ Day”, in South Dakota, “Native American Day”[32]). A lack of recognition or a reduced level of observance for Columbus Day is not always due to concerns about honoring Native Americans. For example, a community of predominantly Scandinavian descent may observe Leif Erikson Day instead.[44] In the state of Oregon, Columbus Day is not an official holiday.[45] Columbus Day is not an official holiday in the state of Washington [46]

Iowa and Nevada do not celebrate Columbus Day as an official holiday, but the states’ respective governors are “authorized and requested” by statute to proclaim the day each year.[47] Several states have removed the day as a paid holiday for state government workers, while still maintaining it—either as a day of recognition, or as a legal holiday for other purposes, including California and Texas.[48][49][50][51][52]

The practice of U.S. cities eschewing Columbus Day to celebrate Indigenous Peoples’ Day began in 1992 with Berkeley, California. The list of cities which have followed suit as of 2018 includes Austin, Boise, Cincinnati, Denver, Los Angeles, Mankato, Minnesota, Portland, Oregon, San Francisco, Santa Fe, New Mexico, Seattle, St. Paul, Minnesota, Phoenix, Tacoma, and “dozens of others.”[31][53][54][55][49][56][57][58][59][60][61] Columbus, Ohio has chosen to honor veterans instead of Christopher Columbus, and removed Columbus Day as a city holiday. Various tribal governments in Oklahoma designate the day as Native American Day, or name it after their own tribe.[62]
…
Source: Retrieved October 12, 2019 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbus_Day

This commentary is a continuation of this series on the Refuse to Lose ethos; this is Part 2-of-6. The full series is cataloged as follows:

  1. Refuse to Lose: Lesson from Sports
  2. Refuse to Lose: Remediating ‘Columbus Day’
  3. Refuse to Lose: Introducing Formal Reconciliations
  4. Refuse to Lose: Despite American Expansionism
  5. Refuse to Lose: Canada’s Model of Ascent
  6. Refuse to Lose: Direct Foreign Investors Wind-Downs

This is not the first time this commentary have addressed ‘Columbus Day’. As related in a previous Go Lean commentary, the orthodoxy of the ‘Columbus Day’ celebration is now frown on in many communities. See this quotation:

The human psyche is consistent; when we have been victimized, we want everyone to remember. But, when we have been the perpetrator – the bully – then we want everyone to forget. This applies to individuals and nations alike.

This experience relates to the history of the New World. Upon the discovery of the Americas by the European powers – Christopher Columbus et al – the focus had always been on pursuing economic interests, many times at the expense of innocent victims. (This is why the celebration of Columbus Day is now out of favor). First, there was the pursuit of gold, other precious metals (silver, copper, etc.) and precious stones (emeralds, turquoise, etc.).  Later came the exploitation of profitable agricultural opportunities (cotton, tobacco, sugar cane, etc.), though these business models required extensive labor. So the experience in the New World (the Caribbean and North, South & Central America) saw the exploitation of the native indigenous people, and then as many of them died off, their replacements came from the African Slave Trade.

See this comedic VIDEO here that portrays this history and the trending to remediate the holiday – “How is it still a thing?”:

VIDEO – Columbus Day – How Is This Still A Thing: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) – https://youtu.be/eKEwL-10s7E

LastWeekTonight
Posted October 13, 2014 – Christopher Columbus did a lot of stuff that was way more terrible than “sailing the ocean blue,” but we don’t learn about that.

Columbus Day: How is it still a thing?

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This foregoing VIDEO uses humor and punditry to convey a valid point:

Christopher Columbus should not be viewed as a hero of all the people. His legacy has blood stains on the annals of history.

The United States of America had been a majority White (European) country for its entire history. The minority populations finally won its battle for Civil Rights and equal treatment, appealing to the “Better Nature” of its founding principle:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness – Declaration of Independence for the United States of America, July 4, 1776.

The end product of the Civil Rights movement is the equal protection under the law for all ethnic groups – majority or minority. After nearly 400 years of European-dominated power-brokers in the US, finally in 2008, the first person of minority heritage was elected to the American presidency – Barack Obama.

Remediating ‘Columbus Day’ is an accomplishment and achievement for the Civil Rights struggle of minority ethnic groups in America. Now the Refuse to Lose mantra must include everyone and not exclude anyone.

The subject of the American Civil Rights movement and momentum – leveling out the inequities – over the history of the New World have been addressed in many previous commentaries; consider this sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18321 Unequal Justice of American Sheriffs and How to Remediate
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18100 Nature or Nurture – Cop-on-Black Shootings in America’s DNA
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17820 ‘Pride’ Movement – “Can we all just get along”
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16944 Women Empowerment – Accepting Black Women ‘As Is’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16534 European Reckoning – Leveling Christianity’s Bad Influence
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15123 Blacks get longer sentences from ‘Republican’ Judges
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14633 Nature or Nurture: Women Have Nurtured Change to Level Society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14541 One Woman – Viola Desmond – Making a Difference for Canada
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13063 Achieving Gender & Other Equity without the ‘Battle’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12722 How the West Was Won? Thru Pluralism and Ethnic Normalization
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11870 The Journey From ‘Indian Termination Policy’ to Modern Pluralism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9974 Lessons Learned from Pearl Harbor and Civil Rights Remediated
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8038 Transformations: Civil Disobedience … Very Effective
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1020 The Advocacy to Rid Sports of Blatant Racism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=546 ‘The Divide’ Book Review describing the unequal justice practice
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=209 The Case of Muhammad Ali – Equal Protection Under the Law

The Refuse to Lose mantra now includes everyone in America and should not exclude anyone. This is why ‘Columbus Day’ is “no longer a thing”.

(Most communities do not want to lose the paid-holiday on the books, so they have substituted ‘Columbus Day’ for some other worthy cause).

This is a good model …

May we apply this lesson throughout the Caribbean – this means you Puerto Rico; (they have 2 holidays: October 12 & November 19).

Using Puerto Rico as a microcosm of the rest of the New World, the demographic on that island is a vast majority of Black-and-Brown people. The Taino people and culture that Columbus discovered and encountered on the island is now gone and extinct. Columbus should not be viewed as a hero due to the course of events he set in motion.

The European people – remnant on the island – would elevate Columbus as a winner, while the indigenous people would have to be deemed the losers. This is not Win-Win!

We now need to Refuse to Lose – for every demographic in our society – not just one group at the expense of another.

This is the lesson learned from ‘Columbus Day’.

Let’s all lean-in and foster this Refuse to Lose attitude; this is the right community ethos to elevate our society to be a better homeland to live, work and play.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 14):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxxiii. Whereas lessons can be learned and applied from the study of the recent history of other societies, the Federation must formalize statutes and organizational dimensions to avoid the pitfalls of [negative] communities … . On the other hand, the Federation must also implement the good examples learned from [positive] developments/communities… .

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Toxic Environment – Lessons from Yugoslavia

Posted on September 26, 2020 in Ethos, Planning, Social, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Welcome to Yugoslavia … one of the most classic Toxic Environments in the history of civilization.

Wait, what?!

That country does not exist anymore. (See the encyclopedic reference in the Appendix A below). The land is still there; the people are still there … mostly, but the culture and national identity is gone.

The only things that remain are lessons … for other communities – like us in the Caribbean – to learn the consequences of an unchecked, un-remediated Toxic Environment. We need to look, listen and learn the lessons. But first consider the historic references in the VIDEO here:

VIDEO – The Breakup of Yugoslavia – https://youtu.be/oiSgAiM0d8A

Posted April 30, 2016 – Why did Yugoslavia split up? In this video, I attempt to look at the complex situation of the former Yugoslav republics and what led to their breakup.
Free audiobook and a 30-day free trial at: http://www.audible.com/wonderwhy
Thanks to Audible for sponsoring this video!

MUSIC Satiate Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/b… 
All images/footage used in this video are either public domain, CC or free use.
Fair use as this is a transformative work for educational proposes.

No doubt, the Balkan region was Toxic in the distant past and the recent past. This is the same region that ignited World War I, back in 1914. We had addressed this history before, in a previous Go Lean commentary; see highlights in Appendix B below.

What are the lessons that we glean from this history, then and now?

  • The one country of Yugoslavia was an integrated and consolidated federation that combined these 6 neighboring member-states in a Single Market:
    Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia
  • The 6 member-states were not homogenous; there were many differences in their populations, i.e Official languages: Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian and Slovene.
  • Religiosity do not contribute to peace; in fact, religious intolerance can lead to Civil War. Yugoslavia featured 3 major faiths: Western Catholicism, Eastern Orthodox and Islam.
  • Historical disputes and grievances do not just dissipate – they must be reconciled – or future generation will still contest the issue.
  • Minorities will always be persecuted by majorities in Toxic Environments.

The lessons from World War I cannot be ignored.

The lessons from the recent Yugoslavia conflicts cannot be ignored.

This discussion on Yugoslavia underpins a consideration of the Toxic Environment that we suffer here in the Caribbean. The 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean economic, security (Public Safety) and governing stakeholders must all work together to abate our Toxic Environment.

This commentary is a continuation on the Teaching Series related to Toxic Environments where we addressed the pseudo-phobias – irrational fear or hatred – and how these bring on the “fight or flight” psycho-drama in everyone’s response. In Yugoslavia, “fight” was frequently the selected option. Every month, the movement behind the Go Lean book presents a Teaching Series to address issues germane to Caribbean life and culture. For this month of September 2020, this is entry 3-of-6, we are looking at the history of persecuted minorities in this Eastern Europe country-culture – that is now extinct.

Consider here, the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Toxic Environment: Ready for Football – Washington “Redskins”
  2. Toxic Environment: Homophobia – The problem is the Hate, not the Fear
  3. Toxic Environment: Opposite of Diversity & Inclusion
  4. Toxic Environment: Lessons from Yugoslavia
  5. Toxic Environment: Ease of Doing Business
  6. Toxic Environment: Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

After 100 years, according to the foregoing VIDEO, the member-states that constituted Yugoslavia have now reconciled their Toxic Environments from the past – they gave up on integration. They gave up on diversity and just decided to continue as independent homogeneous nations – no leverage, no economies-of-scale, no “whole is more than the sum of its parts”. Sad!

The Go Lean roadmap urges the Caribbean region to confederate, asserting that we double-down on Diversity & Inclusion among the 30 different member-states. We need the inherent benefits; we need the leverage; we need the economies-of-scale; we need the “whole to be more than the sum of its parts”. Consider this list of previous blog-commentaries on the subject of confederation, when it worked and when it did not:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20072 Rise from the Ashes – Political Revolutions: Calling ‘Balls & Strikes’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19570 European Role Model: Not when ‘Push’ comes to ‘Shove’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19494 BHAG – One Voice: Foreign Policy and Diplomatic Stance
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19452 BHAG – Regional Currency – ‘In God We Trust’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3090 Introduction to Europe – All Grown Up
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=816 The Future of CariCom – A Technocratic Confederacy

Yugoslavia was a unified country across a large geographic area. They were among the most successful communities; they even hosted the Olympics – Sarajevo 1984. They could have been in the G20 and be one of the “best addresses on the planet”, if only they had learned “how to get along” with each other, despite ethnic differences.

We must do better …

We must consider Yugoslavia as a cautionary tale for us in the Caribbean. We want Diversity & Inclusion; we want every distinct group in our society to have a “seat at the table, with no one being on the menu”.

  • Different races, no problem.
  • Different languages, no problem.
  • Different religions, no problem.
  • Different colonial heritage, no problem.

Yes, we can …

Let’s work to remediate and mitigate our Toxic Environment. Let’s make our homeland a better place to live, work and play.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accidence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

————–

Appendix A – Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia (literally. ‘South Slavic Land’) was a country in Southeast Europe and Central Europe for most of the 20th century. It came into existence after World War I in 1918[B] under the name of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes by the merger of the provisional State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs (it was formed from territories of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire) with the Kingdom of Serbia, and constituted the first union of the South Slavic people as a sovereign state, following centuries in which the region had been part of the Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungary. Peter I of Serbia was its first sovereign. The kingdom gained international recognition on 13 July 1922 at the Conference of Ambassadors in Paris.[2] The official name of the state was changed to Kingdom of Yugoslavia on 3 October 1929.

Yugoslavia was invaded by the Axis powers on 6 April 1941. In 1943, a Democratic Federal Yugoslavia was proclaimed by the Partisan resistance. In 1944 King Peter II, then living in exile, recognised it as the legitimate government. The monarchy was subsequently abolished in November 1945. Yugoslavia was renamed the Federal People’s Republic of Yugoslavia in 1946, when a communist government was established. It acquired the territories of Istria, Rijeka, and Zadar from Italy. Partisan leader Josip Broz Tito ruled the country as president until his death in 1980. In 1963, the country was renamed again, as the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY).

The six constituent republics that made up the SFRY were the SR Bosnia and Herzegovina, SR Croatia, SR Macedonia, SR Montenegro, SR Serbia, and SR Slovenia. Serbia contained two Socialist Autonomous Provinces, Vojvodina and Kosovo, which after 1974 were largely equal to the other members of the federation.[3][4] After an economic and political crisis in the 1980s and the rise of nationalism, Yugoslavia broke up along its republics’ borders, at first into five countries, leading to the Yugoslav Wars. From 1993 to 2017, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia tried political and military leaders from the former Yugoslavia for war crimes, genocide, and other crimes committed during those wars.

After the breakup, the republics of Montenegro and Serbia formed a reduced federative state, Serbia and Montenegro, known officially until 2003 as the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY). This state aspired to the status of sole legal successor to the SFRY, but those claims were opposed by the other former republics. Eventually, it accepted the opinion of the Badinter Arbitration Committee about shared succession[5] and in 2003 its official name was changed to Serbia and Montenegro. This state dissolved when Montenegro and Serbia each became independent states in 2006, while Kosovo proclaimed its independence from Serbia in 2008.
…

Source: Retrieved September 24, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yugoslavia

—————–

Appendix B – Previous Blog from June 28, 2014

A Lesson in History – 100 Years Ago Today – World War I
On this date 100 years ago, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, were shot dead in Sarajevo by Serbian assassins. The political objective of the assassination was to break off Austria-Hungary’s south-Slavic provinces so they could be combined into a Yugoslavia. The assassination led directly to the First World War when Austria-Hungary subsequently issued an ultimatum against Serbia, which was partially rejected. Austria-Hungary then declared war, marking the outbreak of the war. [a]

Multilateral military alliances abounded in that day among the Great Powers: Austria-Hungary with Germany (Triple Alliance of 1882) and Serbia with Russia and France (Triple Entente of 1907) and Britain. When war ensued later in August 1914, these were the sides. Many other military treaties were triggered thereby engaging empires/countries like Ottoman-Turks, Portugal, Japan and Italy, (The United States joined in 1917 allied with Britain). The resulting conflict was dubbed the Great War until subsequently rebranded World War I.
…
The people of the Caribbean understand societal decline and dysfunction all too well.

What have we learned in the 100 years since the events of June 28, 1914? How will these lessons help us today?

  • Minority Equalization – Bullying and terrorism must be mitigated at the earliest possible opportunity – the foregoing photo depicts the oppression the minority Balkan communities perceived in the Austria-Hungarian Empire. As a minority group they felt bullied in their own country; their Slavic culture and language set them apart, and their religious adherence led to even more dissension (Austria-Hungary: Catholic/Lutheran; Serbia: Eastern Orthodox and Bosnia- Herzegovina: Muslim) There were terrorist activities for decades before in the quest for independence. In the past 100 years, this same modus operandi has been repeated in countless locales around the world. The CU security pact must defend against regional threats, including domestic terrorism. This includes gangs and their junior counterparts, bullies. The CU plans for community messaging in the campaign to mitigate bullying.
  • Reconciliation of issues are not optional, more conflict will emerge otherwise – The issues that wedged the people of the Balkans were not resolved in World War I. More dissensions continued leading to World War II, and continued during the Cold War while most of the Balkans were under Soviets control. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, civil war and ethnic cleansings proceeded in the Balkans. Their issues/differences had not been reconciled. A common practice after WW I & WW II was the prosecution of war crimes. But in South Africa an alternative justice approach was adopted, that of Truth & Reconciliation Commissions (TRC). These have become more successful as the emphasis is less on revenge and more on justice normalization. Many other countries have instituted similar TRC models. The CU plans for the TRC model for dealing with a lot of latent issues in the last Caribbean century (i.e. Cuba, Haiti, Dominican Republic, etc).
  • Self-determination of local currencies – in planning for postwar reconstruction, U.S. representatives with their British counterparts studied what had been lacking between the two world wars: a system of international payments that would allow trade to be conducted without fear of sudden currency depreciation or wild fluctuations in exchange rates—ailments that had nearly paralyzed world capitalism during the Great Depression. There is a multiplier associated with the currency in the money supply. Therefore the communities of the Caribbean must embrace its own currency, the Caribbean Dollar (managed by a technocratic Caribbean Central Bank), thereby bringing local benefits from local multipliers.
  • Security assurances must be enabled to complement economics objectives – A lot of dissension has resulted when economic engines become imperiled due to security conflicts. The instability then causes more economic dysfunction, which results in even more security threats – a downward spiral. The CU/Go Lean posits that security apparatus must be aligned with all economic empowerments. This is weaved throughout the roadmap.
  • Negotiate as partners not competitors – The end of World War I immediately set-up ripe conditions for WW II, because of the harsh terms in the Peace Treaties. The CU maintains that, negotiation is an art and a science. More can be accomplished by treating a negotiating counterpart as a partner, rather than not an adversary. (See VIDEO below).
  • Cooperatives and sharing schemes lighten burdens among neighbors – The Balkan conflict of 1914 resulted in a World War because of cooperative treaties with aligning nations. Despite this bad outcome, the practice of cooperatives and sharing still has more upside than downside. The CU will employ cooperatives and sharing schemes for limited scopes within the prime directives of optimizing the economic, security and governing engines.
  • Promote opportunities for the Pursuit of Happiness – A lot of terrorist activities are executed by “suicide” agents (i.e. suicide bombers). The Go Lean roadmap posits the when the following three fundamentals are in place, the risks of suicide is minimal: 1. something to do, 2. someone to love, 3. something to hope for. These are the things a man (or woman) needs to be happy. 
  • Consider the Greater Good – Complying with this principle would have prevented a lot of conflict in the past century. The philosophy is directly quoted as: “It is the greatest good to the greatest number of people which is the measure of right and wrong”. The CU/Go Lean roadmap calls for a number of measures that strike directly at the Greater Good mandate: accountable justice institutions, economic empowerment for rich and poor, strategic education initiatives, proactive health/wellness, etc.institutions, economic empowerment for rich and poor, strategic education initiatives, proactive health/wellness, etc.
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This Day 100 Years Ago – Women’s Right To Vote

Posted on August 18, 2020 in Ethos, Planning, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Why does it take so long …

    … for people to reform and transform Civil Rights?

Why?

Basic Fact in life: Nobody gives up power unless they are forced to!

Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” – Frederick Douglass

On this day exactly 100 Years Ago, American Women were finally able to obtain the power they were demanding; with the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the US Constitution; they finally succeeded …

The Nineteenth Amendment (Amendment XIX) to the United States Constitution prohibits the states and the federal government from denying the right to vote to citizens of the United States on the basis of sex. Initially introduced to Congress in 1878, several attempts to pass a women’s suffrage amendment failed until passing the House of Representatives on May 21, 1919, followed by the Senate on June 4, 1919. It was then submitted to the states for ratification. On August 18, 1920, Tennessee was the last of the necessary 36 ratifying states to secure adoption. The Nineteenth Amendment’s adoption was certified on August 26, 1920: the culmination of a decades-long movement for women’s suffrage at both state and national levels. – Source: Wikipedia.

So after the journey for women’s voting rights started in 1848, their destination was finally reached 70 years later. In a previous blog-commentary from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, the historicity of Women in Politics was detailed and we see exactly how long gender empowerment took to manifest here in the Caribbean region:

Click to Enlarge

While the US granted women citizens their Right to Vote in 1920, the rest of the region took up to 41 years later for these same basic rights to be accorded. It is evident that despite the fact that women in one jurisdiction won the right to vote, that same right was denied right “next door”. This is sad! We have always needed all women’s participation in the democratic process; we have needed their vote and their voice; and even their leadership. This was further explained in that previous blog from November 14, 2015:

The Caribbean member-states, despite their differences, (4 languages, 5 colonial legacies, terrain: mountains -vs- limestone islands), have a lot in common. Some similarities include:

  • Lack of equality for women compared to men.
  • The government is the largest employer.

So the reality of Caribbean life is that while the governmental administrations are not fully representative of the populations, they are responsible for all societal engines: economy, security and governance.

This is bad and this is good! Bad, because all the “eggs are in the same basket”. Good, because there is only one entity to reform, reboot and re-focus.

So how do we seriously consider reforming government in the Caribbean?

  • Start anew.
  • Start with politics and policy-makers.
  • Start with the people who submit for politics, to be policy-makers.
  • Start with people who participate in the process.

Considering the status-quo of the region – in crisis – there is this need to start again. But this time we need more women.

There is so much for us to learn from the historicity of August 18, 1920. Though women fought and bled to gain these rights, they still needed the approval of men to secure these rights for them. See how this was dramatized in this AUDIO-Podcast here:

AUDIO-PODCast – Suffrage isn’t Simple – https://play.acast.com/s/historythisweek/suffrageisntsimple

History.com Today: August 18, 1920 – In the third row of the legislative chamber in Nashville, Tennessee, 24 year-old Harry Burn sits with a red rose pinned to his lapel. He’s there to vote on the 19th Amendment, which will determine if women nationwide will be able to vote. Burn’s shocking, unexpected vote, “yes,” will turn the tides of history, even though women had already been voting for decades before 1920, and many women still won’t be able to vote for decades to come. So, what did the 19th Amendment actually do for women in America? And what, on this 100th anniversary, does it show us about our own right to vote today?

What a fine story – what a takeaway! But wow; that woman needed her young (24-year-old) son to validate her citizenship value and vote to allow her to have the same rights that was automatically assured for him. Too sad! This is not right!

Martin Luther King is quoted to have said that the “arc of history is long and it bends towards justice”. Therefore, it is imminent that all oppressed people will eventually rise up and demand their rights to equality. This lesson was related in a previous Go Lean commentary:

So “change is gonna come“; it would be wiser for opponents to just concede that fact. This is a lesson for the Caribbean to learn from military strategies: if combatants know that the end result of a fight would be imminent defeat, they should not fight; rather they should just concede and negotiate favorable terms of surrender.

Let’s consider gender equality … there have actually been real ‘Battles of the Sexes’, where the end results have benefited women – to the victor goes the spoils.

… we need those empowerments in the Caribbean too; we need our local opposition to concede – without a battle – that they cannot win in abusing others.

The subject of fostering gender equality is not new to this Go Lean movement. See this sample list of previous blog-commentaries that have elaborated on this subject of women, their vote and their voice:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18503 Learn about the ‘Most Powerful Woman in the World’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16944 Women Empowerment – Accepting Black Women ‘As Is’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16942 Women Empowerment – Power of ‘Her’ Wallet
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16940 Women Empowerment – We need “Sheroes” in Facts and Fiction
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13063 Gender Equity without a ‘Battle of the Sexes’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12035 Life imitating Art – Lean-in for ‘Wonder Woman Day’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8306 Women Get Ready for New Lean-In Campaign
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8155 Bahamas Referendum Outcome: Impact on the ‘Brain Drain’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6937 Women in Politics – Yes, They Can!
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6836 Role Model – #FatGirlsCan – Empowering Women
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6434 ‘Good Hair’ and the Strong Black Woman

The Go Lean movement have always advocated for the full participation of girls and women in Caribbean society. We look forward to that participation in our economic, security and governing engines. Yes, women in business; yes, women in the military and police forces; and yes, women in government.

Yes, we can …

100 years and still only mild progress. We must do better – transformations do not readily manifest for us; our orthodoxy is stubborn:

i.e. The Bahamas did not grant the same right to vote until 1961.

We must reboot from this bad orthodoxy.

The world is not going backwards, forward only. We know where we need to be and what we need to do. So let’s just do it! This is how “Advanced Democracies” or “Matured Societies” work – always reforming; always transforming; trying and striving to be better and do better.

Doing better?! We know exactly how! This is the purpose of the Go Lean book and roadmap; it provides guidance and action plans on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to help women to impact our homeland. This is the why, the what and the how for making the Caribbean region a better place to live, work and play.

We urge everyone to lean-in to this roadmap. 🙂

————-

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxi.  Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Black Image – Beyond Slavery: 1884 Berlin Conference

Posted on July 29, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Planning, Social

Go Lean Commentary

There is no doubt, the Slave Trade and the institution of Slavery – installed by the dominant European cultures – were degrading to Black Image.

But Slavery was not the beginning nor the end of this degradation, or devalued appreciation of Black Image to the European world.

As related in this commentary series, the degradation started in 1491 when Pope Innocent VIII authorized Slavery and the Slave Trade. Most European powers ended their slavery institutions by mid-1800’s (i.e. UK: 1838; France: 1848; Netherlands: 1848; US: 1865). Yet in 1884, the Europeans were at it again; not with a new round of slavery but rather a new round of degradation:

The Scramble for Africa.

So rather than oppressing, suppressing and repressing African-descended people in the New World, the malicious actions went to the source, the motherland for Africans: Africa. See the Appendix VIDEO below and this excerpt from a previous Go Lean commentary about Black Nationalist Marcus Garvey:

There was a constant, efficient and emphatic “grab” for the assets and capital of Africa – human capital included. Garvey’s assessment was 100 years after the formal Slave Trade ended in 1807. Yes, the European nations had divided up all of the African continent for their own empire-building and economic manifestations; see the encyclopedic reference here:

The Scramble for Africa was the occupation, division, and colonization of African territory by European powers during the period of New Imperialism, between 1881 and 1914. It is also called the Partition of Africa and by some the Conquest of Africa. In 1870, only 10 percent of Africa was under formal European control; by 1914 it had increased to almost 90 percent of the continent, with only Ethiopia (Abyssinia) and Liberia still being independent. [Liberia was an American “Moral Protectorate”]. With the Italian occupation of Ethiopia in 1936, only Liberia remained independent. There were multiple motivations including the quest for national prestige, tensions between pairs of European powers, religious missionary zeal and internal African native politics.

The Berlin Conference of 1884, which regulated European colonisation and trade in Africa, is usually referred to as the ultimate point of the scramble for Africa.[1] Consequent to the political and economic rivalries among the European empires in the last quarter of the 19th century, the partitioning, or splitting up of Africa was how the Europeans avoided warring amongst themselves over Africa.[2] The later years of the 19th century saw the transition from “informal imperialism” by military influence and economic dominance, to direct rule, bringing out colonial imperialism.[3]
Source: Wikipedia – retrieved February 5, 2019 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scramble_for_Africa

This is the continuation of this Teaching Series for July 2020 on Black Image; this is entry 5-of-6 from the movement behind the 2013 book, Go Lean…Caribbean. Every month, this movement presents a series on issues germane to Caribbean life, history and prospects. This entry asserts that the normal and default setting for the European community ethos (attitude, disposition and/or driving spirit) towards African people is one of exploitation, unless the exploiters are met with a stronger opposing force.

(Remember: The Republic of Haiti, gaining independence  in 1804, only after the well-trained Black Haitian Revolutionary forces executed 4,000 European citizens for constantly trying to enslave them).  🙁

It is no wonder Black Image as seen by the Euro-centric world is only that of “Less Than”.

We should never be surprised by this actuality. We should simply expect it. This theme is embedded throughout the month’s series. The full catalog on Black Image for this month is presented as follows:

  1. Black Image: Corporate Reboots
  2. Black Image: Pluralism is the Goal
  3. Black Image: Colorism – The Stain of Whiteness – Encore
  4. Black Image: Slavery in History – Lessons from the Bible
  5. Black Image: Beyond Slavery: 1884 Berlin Conference
  6. Black Image: The N-Word 101

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean stakeholders must Grow Up and handle their affairs themselves, rather than looking towards some “Overseas Masters” to manage our affairs for us. This must be the resolve, not just for governance, but for economics and security provisions as well.

Consider communications and media networks and how Caribbean people had been judged by foreign or Euro-centric standards:.

If the media networks in the region are owned by foreign entities, then foreign standards are still “the rule”.

No more!

Change has come to the world and to the Caribbean region. The advent of Internet Communications Technologies (ICT) now has voluminous options for media to be delivered without the large footprint … or investment. Now anyone can easily publish VIDEO’s and Music files to the internet and sell them to the public – models abounds: i.e. pay-per-play, or subscription.

There is the opportunity for Caribbean stakeholders to convene, consolidate and confederate the region for their own optimized broadcast and streaming networks. This was the lesson learned from the Berlin Conference of 1884; that if we do not have a “seat at the table”, then we are only “on the menu”. For the “1884 Table”, the menu was the land, people, resources and capital of the African continent – they divvied up the assets with no fights or battles. For the “Caribbean Table”, the menu is the eyeballs and consciousness of Caribbean people or Black Image.

Imagine the deployment of a new Caribbean Network! Not like ABC, NBC or CBS (in the US), but rather like the WWE Network or World Wrestling Entertainment. In a previous blog-commentary this definition was presented:

This is better! (Every mobile/smart-phone owner walks around with an advanced digital video camera in their pocket). We are now able to have a network without the “network”. Many models abound on the world-wide-web. Previously, this commentary identified one such network (ESPN-W); now the focus is on another, the WWE Network, associated with the World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. This network is delivered via the internet-streaming only (and On-Demand with limited Cable TV systems).

We have so many examples-business models; think: WWE, ESPN-W, YouTube and Netflix …

Let’s do our own Image Building Network; and let’s do that now.

This focus, building a regional Caribbean Network, has been a mission for this Go Lean movement from the beginning of this movement. This theme has been elaborated in many previous blog-commentaries; consider this sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19546 Big Hairy Audacious Goal – Caribbean Media: Learning from Netflix et al
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17822 Caribbean Youtuber providing a Role Model with Expanded Audiences
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17250 Way Forward – Caribbean ‘Single Market’ for Media
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14224 How the Youth are Consuming Media Today – Digitally
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4381 Net Neutrality: It matters here … in the Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2171 Sports Role Model – Turn On the SEC Network

A positive image is not automatic …

… for people of African heritage from their European counterparts. We must be deliberate and technocratic in our efforts for Caribbean Image management.

Yes, we can …

Black Image has endured a lot … over the years, before, during and after the bad old days of slavery. But we now know what to do; we know how and when we must act. Most importantly, we must do it ourselves. We must have a seat at the table.

As reported in every entry of this series during July 2020, we must message the truth, if not to the whole world, then at least here in the Caribbean. This is how we can make our regional homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 14):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxiii. Whereas many countries in our region are dependent Overseas Territory of imperial powers, the systems of governance can be instituted on a regional and local basis, rather than requiring oversight or accountability from distant masters far removed from their subjects of administration. The Federation must facilitate success in autonomous rule by sharing tools, systems and teamwork within the geographical region.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

xxx. Whereas the effects of globalization can be felt in every aspect of Caribbean life, from the acquisition of food and clothing, to the ubiquity of ICT, the region cannot only consume, it is imperative that our lands also produce and add to the international community, even if doing so requires some sacrifice and subsidy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————————–

Appendix VIDEO – The Berlin Conference (1884 – 1885) – https://youtu.be/vO3-SNpCbSo

Logic Owl
The history of the Berlin Conference and the colonial scramble for Africa during the late 1800’s and early 1900’s, as countries like Great Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, Italy and more fight for African colonies. At the expense of the African people across the continent.

Links:
https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opi…
https://www.britannica.com/event/Berl…
https://www.pbslearningmedia.org/reso…

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Black Image – Slavery in History: Lessons from the Bible

Posted on July 28, 2020 in Ethos, Planning, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Let’s talk fallacies:

  • The Original Sin in the New World was slavery! No, wrong!
  • Slavery was prominent in the Bible, even among God’s people! No, wrong!
  • The Black race is cursed and was condemned to slavery! Again, No, wrong!

These fallacious statements are why the racial reconciliation in the New World has been so complicated; why Black Image continues to be degraded. There is religiosity that causes people to feel that they are justified, authorized and excused for repressing Black people. Therefore, this is the root cause analysis for why Black Image is so challenged.

(Consider the historicity of the First / Southern Baptist chasm in Appendix A below; the Southern Church approved slavery, segregation and White supremacy).

If only we can get religion out of the decision-making. For those with a Judeo-Christian heritage, there is this reminder:

The hour is coming when whoever kills you will think he is offering service to God. – John 16:2

This is a commentary about Black Image and the Bible. This is a deep discussion! The movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean have asserted that this is an important discussion that have always needed to be addressed in this region.

The Church – religions and theologians – has not always been a good role model for the Caribbean. In fact, this dysfunction had been vocalized in a previous blog-commentary from August 30, 2018:

The same church that sanctioned and authorized the Slave Trade in the first place; (Pope Innocent VIII back in 1491). All of this history – then and now – forces us to ask these questions:

  • What role has the Church had on Caribbean life?
  • Has the Church been a uniting force … for good in the Caribbean?

These are important questions for the Caribbean. This commentary presents the thesis that the Church – the various religious organizations – have been a False Friend for integration, consolidation and collaboration among the Caribbean member-states.

This is the continuation of this Teaching Series for July 2020; this is entry 4-of-6, on Black Image. The Go Lean movement presents a series every month on issues germane to Caribbean life and prospects. This commentary asserts that we have to dispel the historic fallacies taught by the churches over the centuries. True, there has been successful reform since the bad old days of the Dark Ages – think; the Protestant Reformation – but more reform is needed. The false religious premises still have authority in public perceptions. We must message against that Bad Orthodoxy which is fueling the negative Black Image. The full catalog on Black Image is presented as follows:

  1. Black Image: Corporate Reboots
  2. Black Image: Pluralism is the Goal
  3. Black Image: Colorism – The Stain of Whiteness – Encore
  4. Black Image: Slavery in History – Lessons from the Bible
  5. Black Image: 1884 Berlin Conference – Beyond Slavery
  6. Black Image: The N-Word 101

The Go Lean book, as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), is not a religious or Christian Manual, but it does touch on the subject. In fact, there is a chapter with this relevant title of “10 Lessons from the Bible“. See here, from Page 144, as the headlines of these lessons are presented from the actual advocacies, strategies, tactics and implementations:

1 Lean-in for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) to deploy a Bible-inspired brotherhood for the Region.
This treaty calls for the unification of the region into a single market, thereby expanding to an economy of 30 member-states, 42 million people in a confederacy to provide economic empowerment, homeland security and emergency management (disaster recovery). The CU is to be established on a constitution that at its root, instantiate principles from Judeo-Christian laws. The Bible is not a Book of Economics, but its writings are economically astute, as with the gleaning arrangement, dictating care for the orphans, widows, disabled, poor and the sick. These groups are concerns for the CU and targets of regional missions as a Trade Federation, to monitor/mitigate against Failed State indices.
2 Emigrate for Economic Reasons
3 Repatriate When Distress is Relieved
4 Plan for Public Works
5 Repatriate After Exile in Babylon
6 Build on Solid Foundation – Prepare for Natural Disasters
7 First Calculate the Cost – Have Complete Funding
8 Pay Caesar Things to Caesar – (Mark 12:17)
9 The “Sick and the Poor” Will Always Be With You – (John 12:8)
10 Silver and Gold I Do Not Have, But I Will Give… – (Acts 3:6)

Despite the thorough landscape of lessons from the Bible, the Go Lean book did not address the reflections of ‘Slavery in the Bible’. Let’s do that now.

Let my people go! – Moses to Pharaoh demanding the abolition of slavery for the Hebrews in Egypt.

Hebrews?! Egyptians?! Black Image?! All of these subjects are related.

For starters, Egypt is in Africa. So the ancient people were all Black Africans. Egypt was the first conquering World Empire in History. So it is appropriate for the revered Black Image of African-descended people in the New World being stripped from a lineage and legacy of conquering Kings and Queens in their Old Country.

See the VIDEO portrayal in the Appendix B below. This was actually a decades-long production sponsored by the Anheuser-Busch Brewery conglomerate. The company continued this earnest Public Relations campaign promoting Black Image based on the prior conquests in Africa.

So was the slavery in the New World then just a revenge-play for enslaving the Hebrew people in Moses day?

(There are certain parallels of the Hebrew Slavery in Egypt to the African Slavery experience in the New World; see the summary of this encyclopedic reference in Appendix C below).

Is this the premise for believing that the Bible sanctions slavery?

No. The idea of the Bible sanctioning slavery is actually a fallacy too; see the points in Appendix D below. Overall, here is the summary:

Lesson from the Bible
The mature analysis is that the Slave-Master relationship in the Bible depicts the modern Employee-Employer relationship; with an urging for employees to not be insubordinate nor combative and for employers to not be abusive nor promote a toxic work environment.

While we are at it, let’s debunk all those other fallacies:

Theory: The Original Sin in the New World was slavery!
Answer: The first victims of European Conquest were the indigenous people of the New World; starting immediately with Columbus’s discovery in 1492; African Slavery did not develop as an institution until 1619.

Theory: Slavery was prominent in the Bible, even among God’s people!
Answer: The agronomist society in Hebrew times called for every family having their own plot of land to cultivate; misfortunes resulted in someone “selling themselves” into servitude; ‘prisoners of war” or captured people were institutionalized as slaves, but not their children. These ones made up the population of “aliens in your midst”.

Theory: The Black race was cursed and condemned to slavery!
Answer: The curse was to Noah’s grandson Canaan (son of Ham), who settled in the Middle East, not Ham’s other sons Cush and Put, who settled in the African region.

This focus, remediating the damage of a bad orthodoxy – religious and/or White Christian European – has always been a mission of this Go Lean movement. In fact, the points of naming, blaming and shaming the hypocritical religious role models have been elaborated in many previous blog-commentaries; consider this sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19217 Brain Drain – ‘Live and Let Live’: Introducing Localism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18963 Tolerating Chinese Culture – Allowing 1.5 Billion People to Just Be Themselves
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18410 Refuse to Lose – Remediating the Bad History of ‘Columbus Day’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16944 Accepting Black Women ‘As Is’ Despite Bad Bible Interpretation
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16534 European Reckoning – Christianity’s Indictment
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16172 Bad Christian History: 918 Deaths in Jonestown, Guyana
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16102 Diwali 2018 – A Glimpse of our Pluralistic Democracy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15580 Caribbean Unity? Religion’s Role: False Friend
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13299 Tolerating a Non-Christian Demographic – Hindus: Live and Let Live
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10216 Waging a Successful War on Orthodoxy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9766 Rwanda’s Catholic bishops apologize for Christian genocide
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5695 Repenting, Forgiving and Reconciling the Christian Past
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4971 A Lesson in Church History – Royal Charters: Truth & Consequence

The reason why the Black Lives Matter movement has gotten traction is that for far too long, Black Lives had not Mattered. This is an inconvenient truth; but the truth nonetheless. The prevalence of disinformation, disdain and disregard for Black Lives may be considered a direct consequence of a religious framework that “something is wrong with Black people”.

The truth is: there is nothing wrong … with Black people!

“You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” – John 8:32

People of African heritage were not the first slaves, nor the last. There is no justifying the institution of slavery: past, present or future. There is also no justification for devaluing the worth of Black people or anyone else. Black or White and every shade in between have the same abilities and opportunities to honor and please God.

34 Then Peter began to speak: “I now truly understand that God does not show favoritism, 35 but welcomes those from every nation who fear Him and do what is right. – Acts 10: 34-35

Black Image has endured a lot … over the years. The truth of Black Image has not always been commonly accepted. Those most responsible for the spiritual education, the Church, have many times been the ones that have failed most egregiously. Those are the ones with the most bloodguilt.  🙁

We must message the truth, if not to the whole world, then at least here in the Caribbean. This is how we can make our regional homeland a better place to live, work and play.

Yes, we can!  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 14):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xxxiii. Whereas lessons can be learned and applied from the study of the recent history of other societies, the Federation must formalize statutes and organizational dimensions to avoid the pitfalls of communities …

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———————

Appendix A – ‘First’ versus ‘Southern’ Baptist Chasm

First Baptist Church – Providence, Rhode Island

Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing believers only (believer’s baptism, as opposed to infant baptism), and doing so by complete immersion (as opposed to affusion or aspersion). Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul competency (the responsibility and accountability of every person before God), sola fide (salvation by faith alone), sola scriptura (scripture alone as the rule of faith and practice) and congregationalist church government. Baptists generally recognize two ordinances: baptism and communion.

Diverse from their beginning, those identifying as Baptists today differ widely from one another in what they believe, how they worship, their attitudes toward other Christians, and their understanding of what is important in Christian discipleship.[1]  …

United States
Leading up to the American Civil War [(1861 – 1865)], Baptists became embroiled in the controversy over slavery in the United States. Whereas in the First Great Awakening Methodist and Baptist preachers had opposed slavery and urged manumission, over the decades they made more of an accommodation with the institution. They worked with slaveholders in the South to urge a paternalistic institution. Both denominations made direct appeals to slaves and free blacks for conversion. The Baptists particularly allowed them active roles in congregations. By the mid-19th century, northern Baptists tended to oppose slavery. As tensions increased, in 1844 the Home Mission Society refused to appoint a slaveholder as a missionary who had been proposed by Georgia. It noted that missionaries could not take servants with them, and also that the board did not want to appear to condone slavery.

The Southern Baptist Convention was formed by nine state conventions in 1845. They believed that the Bible sanctions slavery and that it was acceptable for Christians to own slaves. They believed slavery was a human institution which Baptist teaching could make less harsh. By this time many planters were part of Baptist congregations, and some of the denomination’s prominent preachers, such as the Rev. Basil Manly, Sr., president of the University of Alabama, were also planters who owned slaves.

As early as the late 18th century, black Baptists began to organize separate churches, associations and mission agencies. Blacks set up some independent Baptist congregations in the South before the American Civil War. White Baptist associations maintained some oversight of these churches.

In the postwar years, freedmen quickly left the white congregations and associations, setting up their own churches.[73] In 1866 the Consolidated American Baptist Convention, formed from black Baptists of the South and West, helped southern associations set up black state conventions, which they did in Alabama, Arkansas, Virginia, North Carolina, and Kentucky. In 1880 black state conventions united in the national Foreign Mission Convention, to support black Baptist missionary work. Two other national black conventions were formed, and in 1895 they united as the National Baptist Convention. This organization later went through its own changes, spinning off other conventions. It is the largest black religious organization and the second-largest Baptist organization in the world.[74] Baptists are numerically most dominant in the Southeast.[75] In 2007, the Pew Research Center‘s Religious Landscape Survey found that 45% of all African Americans identify with Baptist denominations, with the vast majority of those being within the historically black tradition.[76]

Source: Wikipedia retrieved July 28, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baptists#Slavery_crisis

————

Southern Baptist Convention
The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) is a Christian denomination based in the United States. It is the world’s largest Baptist denomination, the largest Protestant denomination in the United States,[2][3] and the second-largest Christian denomination in the United States, smaller only than the Roman Catholic Church according to self-reported membership statistics (see Christianity in the United States).

The word Southern in Southern Baptist Convention stems from it having been organized in 1845 at Augusta, Georgia, by Baptists in the Southern United States who split with northern Baptists over the issue of slavery, with Southern Baptists strongly opposed to abolition and black civil rights.[4] After the American Civil War, another split occurred when most freedmen set up independent black congregations, regional associations, and state and national conventions, such as the National Baptist Convention, which became the second-largest Baptist convention by the end of the 19th century.

Since the 1940s, the Southern Baptist Convention has shifted from some of its regional and historical identification.[5] Especially since the late 20th century, the SBC has sought new members among minority groups and to become much more diverse. In addition, while still heavily concentrated in the Southern United States, the Southern Baptist Convention has member churches across the United States and 41 affiliated state conventions.[6][7] Southern Baptist churches are evangelical in doctrine and practice. As they emphasize the significance of the individual conversion experience and declaring their belief in Jesus.
…
Recent history
In 1995, the convention voted to adopt a resolution in which it renounced its racist roots and apologized for its past defense of slavery, segregation, and white supremacy.[56][57] This marked the denomination’s first formal acknowledgment that racism had played a profound role in both its early and modern history. …

Source: Wikipedia retrieved July 28, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Baptist_Convention

———————

Appendix B VIDEO – Great Kings and Queens of Africa – https://youtu.be/AUAheV852Qk

Anheuser-Busch
Posted Jul 23, 2012 – Documentary depicting the 30 pieces of original art that comprise the complete collection of the Great Kings and Queens of Africa along with highlights of the accomplishments of each king and queen.

———————

Appendix C – The Resistance: How African-American Slaves Were Different From Egypt’s Hebrews

Main Points:

Like the Jewish Exodus from Egypt, the emancipation has often been told as a story of passive slaves led by a heroic leader. This narrative is changing …

The abolition of slavery in the United States have become increasingly challenged in recent years by scholars who view the story of Abraham Lincoln’s heroic courage as simplistic and one-dimensional.

The fact is, Lincoln declared at his first inauguration in March 1861 that he had ‘no purpose, directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists’

—–

Playing a part in their own emancipation

Historians, together with other writers and scholars, were deeply influenced by developments, which showed how a community subject to prolonged oppression and systematic acts of violence was nevertheless capable of drawing on reserves of fortitude to demand justice. This affected the assumptions of researchers who were prompted to re-examine the history of slavery in America.

Was it really true that the slaves made peace with their enslavement, as had been claimed for so many years? If this was not the case, was it possible to conclude that they played a part in their own emancipation? In other words, could the abolition of slavery in the United States have been the outcome of resistance by slaves themselves, which Lincoln then supported?

—-

We should assume that the Hebrew slaves likewise prepared themselves for liberation. The very tale of the exodus from Egypt proves just how ready they were …

See the full article here: https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/lincoln-helped-free-the-slaves-but-he-was-no-moses-1.5964001

Posted March 4, 2018; retrieved July 27, 2020.

———————-

Appendix D – Christian views on slavery

Christian views on slavery are varied regionally, historically and spiritually. Slavery in various forms has been a part of the social environment for much of Christianity’s history, spanning well over eighteen centuries. In the early years of Christianity, slavery was an established feature of the economy and society in the Roman Empire, and this persisted in different forms and with regional differences well into the Middle Ages.[1] Saint Augustine described slavery as being against God’s intention and resulting from sin.[2] In the eighteenth century the abolition movement took shape among Christian people across the globe. …

In modern times, various Christian organizations reject the permissibility of slavery.[3][4][5][6]

Old Testament
Historically, slavery was not just an Old Testament phenomenon. Slavery was practised in every ancient Middle Eastern society: Egyptian, Babylonian, Greek, Roman and Israelite. Slavery was an integral part of ancient commerce, taxation, and temple religion.[8]

In the book of Genesis, Noah condemns Canaan (Son of Ham) to perpetual servitude: “Cursed be Canaan! The lowest of slaves will he be to his brothers” (Gn 9:25). T. David Curp notes that this episode has been used to justify racialized slavery, since “Christians and even some Muslims eventually identified Ham’s descendants as black Africans”.[9] Anthony Pagden argued that “This reading of the Book of Genesis merged easily into a medieval iconographic tradition in which devils were always depicted as black. Later pseudo-scientific theories would be built around African skull shapes, dental structure, and body postures, in an attempt to find an unassailable argument—rooted in whatever the most persuasive contemporary idiom happened to be: law, theology, genealogy, or natural science—why one part of the human race should live in perpetual indebtedness to another.”[10]

[But the truth of the matter is] the Canaanites settled in Canaan, rather than Africa, where Ham’s other sons, Cush and Put, most likely settled. Noah’s curse only applied to Canaan, and according to biblical commentator, Gleason L. Archer, this curse was fulfilled when Joshua conquered Canaan in 1400 BC.[8]  …

New Testament
Early Christians reputedly regarded slaves who converted to Christianity as spiritually free men, brothers in Christ, receiving the same portion of Christ’s kingdom inheritance.[8] However, this regard apparently had no legal power. These slaves were also told to obey their masters “with fear and trembling, in sincerity of heart, as to Christ.” (Ephesians 6:5 KJV)[8] Paul the Apostle applied the same guidelines to masters in Ephesians 6:9: “And, masters, do the same to them. Stop threatening them, for you know that both of you have the same Master in heaven, and with him there is no partiality.”[44] Nevertheless, verses like Ephesians 6:5 were still used by defenders of slavery prior to the American Civil War. Slaves were encouraged by Paul in the first Corinthian Epistle to seek or purchase their freedom whenever possible. (I Corinthians 7:21 KJV).[8]

Avery Robert Dulles said that “Jesus, [preached] a number of his stories are set in a slave/master situation, and involve slaves as key characters. …These circumstances were used by pro-slavery apologists in the 19th century to suggest that Jesus approved of slavery.[46]

It is clear from all the New Testament material that slavery was a basic part of the social and economic environment. Many of the early Christians were slaves. In several Pauline epistles, and the First Epistle of Peter, slaves are admonished to obey their masters, as to the Lord, and not to men.[47][48][49][50][51] Masters were also told to serve their slaves in obedience to God by “giving up threatening”. The basic principle was “you have the same Master in heaven, and with him there is no partiality.”[52] Peter was aware that there were masters that were gentle and masters that were harsh; slaves in the latter situation were to make sure that their behaviour was beyond reproach, and if punished for doing right, to endure the suffering as Christ also endured it.[53] The key theological text is Paul’s declaration in his letter to the Galatian churches that (NIV version) “There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus”,[54] suggesting that Christians take off these titles because they are now clothed in Christ.[55]

Paul’s Epistle to Philemon was an important text for both pro-slavery advocates and abolitionists.[56] This short letter, reputedly written to be delivered by the hand of Onesimus, a fugitive slave, whom Paul is sending back to his master Philemon. Paul entreats Philemon to regard Onesimus as a beloved brother in Christ.[57] Cardinal Dulles points out that, “while discreetly suggesting that he manumit Onesimus, [Paul] does not say that Philemon is morally obliged to free Onesimus and any other slaves he may have had.”[45] He does, however, encourage Philemon to welcome Onesimus “not as a slave, but as more than a slave, as a beloved brother”.[58]

Paul’s instructions to slaves in the Epistle of Paul to Titus, as is the case in Ephesians, appear among a list of instructions for people in a range of life situations. The usefulness to the 19th century pro-slavery apologists of what Paul says here is obvious: “Tell slaves to be submissive to their masters and to give satisfaction in every respect; they are not to talk back, not to pilfer, but to show complete and perfect fidelity, so that in everything they may be an ornament to the doctrine of God our Savior.”[59] …

Source: Retrieved July 28, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_slavery

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Black Image – Colorism: The Stain of Whiteness – Encore

Posted on July 26, 2020 in Ethos, Planning, Social

This series of commentaries assert that the issue of Black Image is unique to the global Black Community; there is never a concern to White Image. Why is that? Well, as related in a previous Go Lean commentary, the perception is that …

White is right?!
… in many circles around the world in general and the Caribbean in particular, there is the impression that “White is Right“.

Why does this fallacy proliferate and how can we dispel this false notion?

… “Whiteness” is only a social construct, a product of a bad history in social development. Though it is a different world today, some things still linger; think Colorism where “White is Right” on one end of the spectrum, while all things non-White is … “Less Than“.

So this answer relates to the historicity of European imperialism … over the centuries, as “they” wielded absolute power over the world. Looking back at this history means that we must consider the impact of the “White Western” / Imperial Conquests, through their experiences of the Slave Trade, Slavery, Colonialism and Post-Colonialism. It had an impact on social norms as to what is right and what is wrong.

This visual of a “Shades of White” spectrum is the continuation of this Teaching Series for July 2020 from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean; this is entry 3-of-6 on Black Image. The Go Lean movement presents a series every month on issues germane to Caribbean life and prospects. The full catalog on Black Image is presented as follows:

  1. Black Image: Corporate Reboots
  2. Black Image: Pluralism is the Goal
  3. Black Image: Colorism – The Stain of Whiteness – Encore
  4. Black Image: Slavery in History – Lessons from the Bible
  5. Black Image: 1884 Berlin Conference – Beyond Slavery
  6. Black Image: The N-Word 101

“Shades of White” or the “Stain of Whiteness” has had another affect; it has ushered in a variant of Tribalism, as related in another prior Go Lean commentary:

Tribalism is the state of being organized by, or advocating for, tribes or tribal lifestyles. Human evolution has primarily occurred in small groups, as opposed to mass societies, and humans naturally maintain a social network.
In popular culture, tribalism may also refer to a way of thinking or behaving in which people are loyal to their social group above all else,[1] or, derogatorily, a type of discrimination or animosity based upon group differences.[2]

In fact, the “Stain of Whiteness” have literally created tribes, and many bad consequences there-in.

Remember, Rwanda …

Remember the Tutsi and Hutus.

These are only social classes or ethnic groupings of the peoples of the African Great Lakes region.

The definitions of “Hutu” and “Tutsi” people may have changed through time and location. Social structures were not stable throughout Rwanda, even during colonial times under the Belgian rule. The Tutsi aristocracy or elite was distinguished from Tutsi commoners, and wealthy Hutu were often indistinguishable from upper-class Tutsi.

When the Belgian colonists conducted censuses, they wanted to identify the people throughout Rwanda-Burundi according to a simple classification scheme. They defined “Tutsi” as anyone owning more than ten cows (a sign of wealth) or with the physical feature of a longer nose, or longer neck, commonly associated with the Tutsi. …

The [Rwanda-Burundi] area was ruled as a colony by Germany (prior to World War I) and Belgium. Both the Tutsi and Hutu had been the traditional governing elite, but both colonial powers allowed only the Tutsi to be educated and to participate in the colonial government. Such discriminatory policies engendered resentment.

When the Belgians took over, they believed it could be better governed if they continued to identify the different populations. In the 1920s, they required people to identify with a particular ethnic group and classified them accordingly in censuses. … – Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tutsi retrieved July 26, 2020.

         Click here to see related VIDEO

It would be nice to say that this visual – European standards used to judge native people – is only in the past. Nope! We have recorded time and again, that Colorism or the “Stain of Whiteness” continue to persist. Colorism and the resemblance of Whiteness still have lots of impact, even today.

We have addressed Colorism previously. The ongoing threat in our society had been published in this previous Go Lean blog-commentary relating this title: Colorism in Cuba … and Beyond.

“Lighter-skin” Cubans versus “Darker-skin” Cubans is a bigger problem there.

Let’s re-examine this discussion by presenting this Encore from March 10, 2015, here and now:

—————-

Go Lean Commentary – Colorism in Cuba … and Beyond

Image is a problem for Cuba. Most people in the Western Hemisphere may only know of one Cuban, perhaps Fidel Castro. What’s more, most people only knew of one Cuban before the Castro era, that was “Rickie Ricardo” of I Love Lucy fame. Unfortunately this demographic is not fully representative of Cuba’s population. Cuba has always had a large Black population; (though as a minority group during the Rickie Ricardo era). After the Cuban Communist Revolution, and the wholesale abandonment of most of the White community, today, Cuba is a majority Black nation … by far.

… and yet Majority Rule has eluded them.
… economic power has also eluded this population.

Change is now afoot!

This subject of managing change has been a familiar theme in the book Go Lean…Caribbean. Also the theme of preparing for and rebooting Cuba has been frequently detailed in previous blog commentaries. Now, the consideration is the unavoidable clashes regarding race that will surely take place in a post-Castro Cuba.

Many other societies have had these clashes. Whether violent or just political; change in the area of race has been hard-fought. Consider the upheavals for the US during the 1960’s. (See Photo below). Cuba did not benefit from this American civil rights movement; they did not sow, so they have not reaped. They were fresh into their own political revolution with the embrace of communism, alienation of American society and mass exodus of so many citizens.

This is the assertion of a prominent Cuban-American politician in Miami, Florida – a strong-bed for the Cuban Diaspora and Cuban-American communities. See his editorial here:

Title: Blacks in Cuba are poised to make gains
By: Ricardo Gonzalez

CU Blog - Colorism in Cuba ... and Beyond - Photo 1For the first time in more than a century, black Cubans might have a real opportunity to gain the enfranchisement and equality for which our ancestors fought so hard — and were on the verge of winning — only to see their hopes and aspirations frustrated when a U.S. naval ship was blown to pieces in the port of Havana in 1898.

The blood and sweat of our forefathers in the overwhelmingly Black Mambi army was shed for naught as our nation and the 20th century were born. Since Cuba’s inception in 1902, its black citizens never truly gained equal footing in that troubled country. Despite their decisive role in the struggle for independence from colonialism, blacks were almost totally excluded from all levels of power and denied full participation in the everyday life in the fledgling nation.

Unhappy with their exclusion and seeking a better compact, black Cubans were once again prevented from gaining the equality they thought they had earned in the battlefield when their nascent racial movement seeking social justice was violently decapitated — literally, in some cases — a decade later. What followed was a long, hard procession of years of drudgery — sprinkled with a few, incremental gains — under the suffocating hardships of Cuba’s tropical version of Jim Crow.

In 1959, the Cuban Revolution artfully gained control of every aspect of Cuban life and promised to eradicate all vestiges of racial injustice in the island. Shortly thereafter, la Revolución, loudly, proudly and unilaterally, proclaimed victory in its self-declared fight against racism and promptly proceeded to label anyone who dared bring up the topic of racial inequality as a counter-revolutionary and applied “revolutionary” punishment and penalties to those who dared to transgress.

More than half a century later, however, whether by government intent or simply as a result of misguided policies, black Cuba is immersed in its most difficult juncture; at a disadvantage economically (reduced access to foreign currencies), politically (little to no representation in government) and sociologically (i.e., marginalized, racially profiled, disproportionally incarcerated, etc.).

Truth be told, throughout its history, Cuba has never been kind to its darker citizens, regardless of who has been in power or his political ideology. It is time for that elephant in the room to be both acknowledged and dealt with.

Now the catastrophic dynasty that has afflicted our nation for almost 60 years finally appears to be near its end — Father Time and biology proving to be our only true and reliable friends. Add the surprising announcement of an attempt to normalize relations between Cuba and United States, and Cubans — black, mulatto and white — might soon have the opportunity to “reboot,” to recreate a new, more inclusive nation; a nation “with all and for the wellbeing of all,” as dreamed by Jose Marti.

Skeptics will say that nothing will change, that the Castro clan will never relinquish power, or that the generals and/or other parasites will cling to their perquisites by any means necessary. But the fact is that in the not-too-distant future, we can envision both brothers leaving the scene, either in a pine box or to convalesce at a well-appointed home for retired dictators.

With those two out of the picture, and with whatever new relationship that evolves from the recent rapprochement with the United   States, there is little doubt that our nation is headed to a new dawn, a different way of doing business.

Black Cubans, who by all measurable accounts have borne the brunt of the damage wreaked by the regime, are well positioned to finally savor their rightful — and so far elusive — share. By essentially heaping misery and squalor on the entire population and thus somewhat “leveling the playing field,” the Cuban Revolution has given Cubans of color, for the first time, the ability to compete academically, culturally and socially with their white compatriots. It is not an accident that a good percentage of the most prominent dissidents in the island are people of color.

And let us not forget that, contrary to the Cuban government’s official numbers, Afro-Cubans are no longer the minority. Malcolm X once said: “The future belongs to those who prepare for it today.” I will simply follow the advice of an old wise man who once said to me; “Stick always with the optimists, because life is hard even if they are right.”
Miami Herald Editorial – South Florida Daily Newspaper – Posted 03/07/2015; retrieved 03/10/2015:
http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article12875840.html

We march with Selma!The Cuban revolution occurred in 1959 and the political intrigue (Cold War, Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs, Embargo, Pedro Pan Exodus, etc.) was heightened all during the 1960’s. While the US and many other Western countries confronted their racial past and effected change accordingly, Cuba was on the sidelines. So now that Cuba may soon be graduating from alienation to participation in the world’s economic order, a lot of the changes that their society would have to assimilate are really questions at this time:

  • Did Cuban society formally end their pre-revolution segregation policies voluntarily or were they forced into compliance by the Communists Military Might?
  • Will Cuba immediately accept the new human/civil rights standards for race and gender equality that is the best-practice in Western society (North America and Europe)?
  • Will the Cuban Diaspora still long for the days of a Cuba segregated by the races or has the transformation of Western society really taken root?
  • Will the still-present US practice of colorism (see below) in the Black community – very much prominent in the Latin world – be even more heightened in a new Cuba?

These are valid and appropriate questions. Everywhere else when Communism fell, sectarian divisions and violence erupted; many times fueled by the same prejudices that predated the Communist revolutions; (think ethnic cleansing in the former Yugoslavia: Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia, Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Macedonia). There will truly be a need for earnest reconciliation in Cuba.

CU Blog - Colorism in Cuba ... and Beyond - Photo 3

The issues of race reconciliation and Cuban reconciliation collide in this commentary. These have been frequently detailed in these Go Lean blogs. Consider these previous entries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4487 Historical Black College most effective with Social Mobility
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4447 Probe of Ferguson-Missouri finds bias from cops, courts
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3662 Migrant flow into US from Caribbean (i.e. Cuba) spikes
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3455 Restoration of Diplomatic Relations with Cuba
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3354 CARICOM Chair calls for an end to US embargo on Cuba
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2547 Miami’s Success versus Caribbean Failure
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1609 Cuba mulls economy in Parliament session
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2222 Sports Role Model – Playing For Racial Pride … And More
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1918 Philadelphia Freedom – Community Model for Forging Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1773 Miami’s Caribbean Marketplace Re-opens as a Welcome Mat
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1531 A Lesson in History: 100 Years Ago Today – World War I
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1020 Sports Revolutionary Issues Re: Racism against Black Athletes
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=789 America’s War on the Caribbean

The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU); an initiative to bring change and empowerment to the Caribbean region, including Cuba. Since Cuba is the largest country – land-wide and population – in the Caribbean region, any changes there will have an impact on the rest of the region. The goal of this roadmap is to anticipate the change, forge the change and guide the changes in our society for positive outcomes. We want to make the Caribbean region a better homeland to live, work and play for every island, every language group; just everyone. There is some degree of urgency and imminence to this cause as Cuba’s current President, Raul Castro has announced that he will retire in 2017. At that point, there will be no more “Castros” at the helm of Cuba.

To accomplish this audacious goal, this Go Lean roadmap has the following 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The book describes the CU as a technocratic administration with many missions to elevate the Caribbean homeland. The underlying goal is stated early in the book with this pronouncement in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12):

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law…

xiii.  Whereas the legacy of dissensions in many member-states (for example: Haiti and Cuba) will require a concerted effort to integrate the exile community’s repatriation, the Federation must arrange for Reconciliation Commissions to satiate a demand for justice.

Change has come to the Caribbean. But as depicted in the subsequent VIDEO, this same change came to the US, and yet strong feelings about skin color persist. The Go Lean book declares that permanent change is possible, but to foster success, a community must first adopt new ethos, the national spirit that drives the character and identity of its people. The community ethos of sharing, tolerance, equality and the Greater Good were missing from pre-revolution Cuba. It is a mission of the Go Lean movement to ensure these inclusions for the new Cuba. The Go Lean roadmap was constructed with these community ethos in mind, plus the execution of strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies to forge the identified permanent change in the region. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Choose Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – All Choices Involve Costs Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Respond to Incentives in Predictable Ways Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future Page 21
Community Ethos – Security Principles – Anti-Bullying and Mitigation Page 23
Community Ethos – Governing   Principles – Minority Equalization Page 24
Community Ethos – Governing   Principles – Lean Operations Page 24
Community Ethos –   Ways to Impact the Future Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Manage Reconciliations Page 34
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Happiness Page 36
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good Page 37
Anecdote – LCD versus an Entrepreneurial Ethos Page 39
Strategy – Vision – Confederation of the 30 Caribbean   Member-States into a Single Market Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Celebrate the Music, Sports, Art, People and Culture of the Caribbean Page 46
Tactical –   Confederating a Permanent Union Page 63
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy Page 64
Tactical –  Separation of Powers: Federal Administration versus Member-States Governance Page 71
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver Page 109
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better Page 131
Planning – Ways to Better Manage Image – On guard against defamations Page 133
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Education Page 159
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance in the Caribbean Region Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract Page 170
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Terrorism Page 181
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Communications – To message for change Page 186
Advocacy – Ways Impact the Diaspora Page 217
Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage Page 218
Advocacy – Ways to Re-boot Cuba Page 236

The lessons in race relations and colorism are not perfected in the rest of the Caribbean. In fact, there are many human rights and civil rights abuses in the region. There is not one regional sentinel to be on guard against bad developments in race relations and work towards mitigating the effects. This is the charge of the CU. Nor, can the Caribbean region expect the US to lead in words or action for this serious issue. This VIDEO here demonstrates many negative traits that still exist in the American homeland, and by extension, the rest of the Western Hemisphere:

VIDEO: Colorism – https://youtu.be/xD2WYJTG8ig


BlkGrlOnline
December 11, 2011 – I know you all have heard of the whole “Light Skin vs. Dark Skin” debate. Tyra Banks has discussed this and associated topics on her talk show, The Tyra Show. What do you think about this subject? And more importantly, why is this still an issue TODAY?
Note: I do not own or claim rights to the featured material.

There is still clash-and-conflict in the African-American communities, dating back to the days of Booker T Washington versus the W.E.B. Du Bois. Some modern labeling may be “Old-School versus Nu School”, “Hip-Hop versus Bourgeois”, even “Thugs versus ‘Acting White'”; the underlying conflict often times is a reflection of colorism in the Black Community. While these are all informal divisions, the formal (legal) institutions in America also have hardened lines involving Black-White race relations. Despite the presence of the country’s first Black President, Barack Obama, there is hardened opposition of any efforts he tries to make; consider the reality of the Tea Party opposition to Obama’s initiatives (like his signature ObamaCare Universal Health Program) just because they are his originations. Many times, this opposition is willing to sacrifice the Greater Good with the Federal Budget and Foreign Policy just to be contrarian.

Many question whether in the deep trenches of their hearts if many Americans have not really matured from the racial mindsets of the America of 1908, or 1958 (the era before Cuba’s revolution). We have our own problems in the Caribbean to contend with, many which we are failing at. But our biggest crisis stem from the fact that so many of our citizens have fled their Caribbean homelands for foreign (including American) shores. Therefore the quest for change must come from us in the Caribbean, by us and for us. We are inconsequential to the American decision-makers, so the US should not be the panacea of Caribbean hopes and dreams.

The Go Lean movement seeks to be better than even our American counterparts. We must be vigilant. We have seen post-Communist evolution before. It’s a “familiar movie”, we know how it ends.

We welcome the imminent change in Cuba, but we are on guard for emergence of new negative community ethos … or a return to old ones. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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