Recently, I found myself once again forcing myself to listen painfully to a well known, now nationally syndicated, liberal, so-called progressive radio / television program that broadcasts from New York, NY, whose white and primary host was interviewing an east African Nobel prize winner. It was in a substantive sense, utterly nauseating, which is usually the case when most white Americans dare to act as if the word DEMOCRACY (in title or in practice) has any real relevance or application in this US society in which we Black people are, to paraphrase Malcolm X, its' daily victims.

Yet, as I listened to the program, I realized that this dangerous white liberal, masquerading as a progressive, has placed herself in the position of, and is now being touted as being, the antithesis of the so-called main stream US news media. What an insidious and typically white liberal phenomenon: join the opposition by pretending to be opposed to it. Then it dawned on me; 'co-optation, discreditation, and/or elimination.' Of course. For Black, Brown, and Red peoples that has always been the name of white America's insipid game toward us and it will continue to be so until we, ourselves, retake, regain, and totally define the narrative of our pasts, our present, and our futures on this stolen continent and in this racist, hypocritical nation known as the United States of America.

Let's examine this phenomenon a bit closer.

White America, to this very day, continues to glorify the Alamo and those who defended it as "heroic." Never mind that these alleged "heroes" had Black slaves, despised the Indigenous peoples, and were "defending" an absolutely illegal, renegade outpost in the territory of the sovereign nation of Mexico, They were, in fact, acting as nothing more than conquerors and thieves in the process of stealing the land of the Mexican people. Heroic indeed.

And today, what of the usage of the word "nigger?" Are not Black youth the culprits who incessantly use this term as if it has been whipped into them? The fact is that it was and is being whipped into them by a hypocritical white system that is far more inclined to care about hair care and manicured finger nails than it does about Black infant mortality, lack of health insurance, racial profiling, and a burgeoning Black, Brown, and Red, prison population.

The fact is that the word "nigger" never had a specific color-meaning attached to it until white Americans distorted the term and applied it specifically to Black people, in an effort to rationalize slavery and simultaneously instill self-hatred and degradation into us as a people. This is what we must repeatedly tell our youth. We must consistently tell Black youth, our younger brothers and sisters, that to speak the "N" word is to physically lynch their families and themselves. While we are at it, we need to explain in horrid, vivid detail precisely what a physical lynching is. As my Chicano, comrade-brother, and former Brown Beret, Eddie Perez, puts it, "Without the 'R' word there would be no 'N' word." The 'R' word is, of course, white racism, inclusive of all the physical deprivation, self loathing, and destructive behavior that such racism ensures. We cannot be silent in this regard, for silence is complicity. We must give our youth huge, continual, and uncompromising doses of discipline, true history, and love.

As much as we legitimately loathe the "N"' word, we must also loathe the racist conditions that keep the "N" word alive and active in our communities throughout racist America. To get thoroughly rid of the "N" word, we must get utterly rid of the daily horrors maintained by the "R" word. Let's keep these priorities clear, as the two work hand in glove.

It is imperative that we, politically conscious Black, Red, and Brown peoples, know who our enemies really are, and do our utmost to make sure that we, ourselves, are not aiding in our own subordination, mentally and/or physically, on this 21st century American plantation. There is no doubt that the masters and mistresses of the US Government plantation are now making plans to add insult to unspeakable injury by attacking the sovereign nation of Iran, but we do not have to be complicit in this. Even as we fight against our own economic, cultural, and racist oppression here inside America, we must likewise recognize the horrible and unacceptable US subjugation of the peoples of Iraq, Palestine, Haiti, and elsewhere in the world. In so doing we remain alive in ways that, indeed, no oppressor can comprehend.

Ultimately, the disgusting tactics of co-optation, discreditation, and elimination will, themselves, turn upon their own perpetrators. Our task is to continue in the struggle to keep it real, knowing that our dream of reparations and a just world can be deferred for only so long.

"Forward Ever. Backwards Never..."

BlackCommentator.com Columnist Larry Pinkney is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Click here to contact Mr. Pinkney.

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