The Black Commentator - April 19, 2007

With the recent discussions and debates taking place around the country regarding apologies, covenants, affirmative action, reparations, re-gentrification, and reverse discrimination, I can’t help but to ponder the question: Are we suffering from some sort of post traumatic inferiority syndrome? And not just Black people, but are White people suffering from a post traumatic superiority syndrome?

Have we, as Black people, been brainwashed so thoroughly and systematically that we are now our own worst enemy? And have Whites been taught so ferociously to wear their veil of superiority that nothing short of a miracle could bring them out of their stupefied existence?

While working on the book Black Codes in Georgia: (a compilation of laws targeting people of Color), this question kept entering my thoughts: were these laws created for the destruction of an entire race of people? And although not enforced today, do they still linger amongst us, dictating our daily lives?

The other day I was watching a very popular sitcom featuring four African-American women, one of whom was pregnant and her husband was White. She was arguing with her mother, and in response to the threat of not being too old to spank, she said “I know you’re not going to hit me, I’m pregnant with your only good-haired grand baby!” Laughter rose from the in-studio audience, but I sat there in awe thinking, did she just say that! And are Blacks & Whites around the country laughing at that comment? Do we still believe that having White mixed-in our blood somehow makes us better? And do Whites still believe that having Black blood in their veins makes them worse?

What would drive a State to create a law, not once, but several times throughout Georgia’s changing history, to define a person of color? In 1927, the law stated:“All negroes, mulattoes, mustizos, and their descendants, having any ascertainable trace of either Negro or African, West Indian, or Asiatic Indian blood in their veins, and all descendants of any person having either Negro or African, West Indian, or Asiatic Indian Blood in his or her veins, shall be known in this State as persons of color.”

As a junior in a majority White high school, nearly two decades ago, I suffered a life-altering incident. I hung around with the small group of African-American girls in my school, but there was one girl who would never acknowledge us. I never questioned it until the day we decided to start a Black Student Union. We went around passing out our flyers to all the Black students in the school. When I handed the young lady, who we thought was an outcast, a flyer, her immediate reaction was to say “I’m not Black!” She had a light skin complexion, African-American features and her hair was course, so we assumed by appearance that she was one of us. Looking back now, I can see where I was trained to label by appearance. But what never left me was her negative reaction to our assumption that she was Black. She began to cry as we tried to convince her of her African American heritage, professing to us, and anyone within earshot, that she was of Irish descent. We were insulted by her denial and she was insulted by our assumption. Why was the mere accusation enough to reduce someone to tears? Is being Black considered to be a bad thing by people of other races? We never spoke to each other again. I found out later that summer that she was adopted and her parents had never told her.

One of the laws I came across while doing the research for Black Codes in Georgia stated that “any words falsely and maliciously uttered, which impute to any free White woman of this State, carnal knowledge and connection with a slave, Negro, or free person of color, shall be held, deemed and adjudged actionable,” making the mere accusation that a mixing could have occurred cause for legal action. Could this law be the reason why that young lady reacted so negatively?

Like a jilted lover from a defunct relationship, are we carrying around the baggage of Black Codes?

One of the ladies in the sitcom previously mentioned is mixed race, but considers herself, and is considered by others to be, African-American. Is this a result of the law to define persons of color, first written in the early 1800’s? If so, is it a syndrome from which we suffer, that causes us to live by a code no longer legally enforced?

Why would a prominent Georgia Physician, Dr. Samuel W. Cartwright, invent a syndrome to explain slave resistance (Drapetomania – the disease causing Negroes to run away), that the entire psychological profession would enforce. Could they have been on to something? Or was it necessary for Whites to invent a mental disorder for Blacks so that they could maintain their own sanity? Did the invention of a disease for those fighting for their basic human rights, lead to the creation of another law? Is this why Georgia felt the need “to protect the citizens of this State from danger, by the running at large of lunatic and insane slaves or free persons of color?” Were Blacks forced to believe themselves insane for wanting to be free?

Was it deliberate? Did White men actually sit around a table and contemplate what laws they could create to dehumanize, degrade and oppress Black people? And did they think about the affects these laws would have on their and our future generations? To a logical thinking being, the thought of this happening may seem utterly ridiculous. But were their actions rooted in logic, or fear and desperation, because the laws did, and do exist.

The more laws I uncover, the more I tend to fall on the side of deliberateness. Some laws were created to govern the marriages and families of people of color, while others governed our employment and businesses. One of these brilliant laws stated that “it shall not be lawful for any person to give credit to any free person of colour.” Today, over 100 years after the law was written, Blacks still have difficulty obtaining credit from institutions for the purchase of homes, cars, and businesses. And according to the U.S. Census, only 14% of Blacks in Georgia are homeowners. Other laws said that Blacks could not own and operate restaurants or clubs, nor could they become pharmacists or masons. Could the unemployment rate of Blacks in Georgia today, (32.2% in 2004 according to the U.S. Dept. of Labor Bureau & Statistics) be directly correlated with laws such as these?

What about the education of Blacks in Georgia? Our history shows us that Whites worked diligently to keep it from us in the past, but what about now, in 2007? Why is it that the test scores of Black students are considerably lower than those of Whites in this state? Could the answer be as simple as saying that Whites are smarter than Blacks, or could this difference also be rooted in Georgia’s Black Codes? In 1866, Georgia decided “Who May Be the Scholars” by stating in the code that “any free white inhabitant, being a citizen of the United States and of this state, between the ages of six and twenty-one years, shall be entitled to instruction in the Georgia schools without charge for tuition.” Was the intention of this law to make Blacks feel as though they could not be scholars, and make Whites feel as though the privilege was meant solely for them? Is this law the reason why the census bureau reported that only 8.8% of Blacks in Georgia have a Bachelor’s degree or higher?

A few years ago, I was entangled in a battle with the Georgia Public School System, because a book that was used statewide, subjugated the existence of Blacks in Georgia to people, “Brought from Africa and other continents to help pick cotton and other crops.” Do we allow our children to be taught the inferiority of Blacks in our public school systems because we suffer from this unnamed syndrome?

What of our churches today? The Black church has always been the cornerstone of our society. Could the worship codes created in Georgia have a direct correlation to the phenomenon known as “Pimps in the Pulpit?” Are we now pimping out our men, women and children, in exchange for the dollar, as Whites in this state once did? I walked out of a mega church in Lithonia two years ago, because the pastor was taking up credit cards in the collection plate! Are we so psychologically damaged that we continue the deliberate destruction of our own people without knowing it?

Are Georgia’s Black Codes responsible for the outrageous number of Black men and women dying at the hands of police officers, who go unpunished by the justice system? Is this the result of an 1816 Georgia Code stating that “killing a slave in the act of revolt, or when the said slave resists a legal arrest, shall be justifiable homicide.”

This country does recognize that extreme circumstances can cause psychological damage. Take for instance the Stockholm Syndrome. Psychologists and physicians around the world agree that kidnapping victims can suffer tremendous emotional duress that can lead them to identify with their captors, as a defense mechanism to the threat of violence. Were Africans in America the first to suffer from what we refer to today as Stockholm Syndrome? Were the laws wielded like weapons, in an attempt to take our minds hostage?

My only son was born on January 24, 2007, and I want to make sure that the cycle of emotional trauma ends with me. If I identify the problem, and seek to alleviate the symptoms, will I be able to cure myself, so my children will not have to suffer the same syndrome?

Is it possible that all we need to do is recognize that a problem exists, so that we will be open to undoing the damage that was caused by these Codes? How do we make those who don’t want to see the truth open their eyes, hearts and minds?

Will an open discussion about Black Codes in Georgia, and their affect on Society today, be a step toward healing?

For the sake of my son, I hope that to be true.

Michele Mitchell is a freelance writer, mother of three and the Gallery/Tour Coordinator at The APEX Museum in Atlanta, Georgia. Click here to contact Ms. Mitchell.