Racism in view

Dr. Ugoji Egbujo 

Zong was in 1781. Blacks were goods. But long after, long after that practice of decanting blacks into the sea for commercial reasons, blacks are still dispensable. Disposables. Perhaps now, nuisance. The police in America are well trained . But training often polishes the brain and not the heart. Many liberal philosophers are racists. Everywhere, blacks are considered poorly endowed mentally, and prone to uncontrolled emotions. Congenitally stupid. White women have borne crushing oppression for ages. But it hasn’t rendered them insensate to racial prejudice. Black males are their peevish brutes. So white policemen can adjudge them criminal minds. And shoot them. The owners of the slave ship Zong drowned their goods. 


The Achhuts were considered by the inhuman Indian caste system as untouchables. Yet when they found themselves in apartheid South Africa they thought themselves lords of the black race. They must have accepted too that distinctive human capacities can be determined by race. 

Victims of discrimination never learn to abhor it. Social status continues to rest on prejudices. Whites think Arabs and Asians are impostors. Donald Trump will voice it out someday. Counterfeits of whiteness. He speaks the hearts of many. And you would think these victims would repudiate all inhuman classifications. 

They won’t. They relish their ascribed superiority over black Africans. That is why Arabs treat black Africans with the disdain Irish whites cannot muster. A friend of mine learnt that at an Egyptian night club. Islam, like Christianity can’t touch racism. You look into the bigoted eyes of a self conceited immigration official at the airport in Dubai and you can’t but have pity on him. Who can disturb their delusion, that they have innate capacities African blacks can only dream of. Black Africans must look for some species to gloat over. Because even in wretched Sudan, black File: Racism: Africans are treated as scum. 

Where overt racism is tabooed , driven underground , implicit racism thrives. Sometimes subconsciously. So the former captain of English national football team can party all night with black friends but in the fit of an irritation will blurt out a racial slur. He will tell of all he has done for black empowerment . And will find obsequious blacks who will boo anyone who calls him a racist pig. Donald Trump pointed to his Jewish son-in-law as his defence against serious allegations of anti-Semitism. Modern racism resides deep in hearts. It doesn’t flaunt itself in little Hitlers. It doesn’t have the oxygen of Nazism. But it does as much damage as many gas chambers. Incinerating self esteems , consuming hopes and lives. Football pitches and monkey calls and thrown bananas, FTSE 100 and its whiteness , Trump and the birth certificate, the gunman and the Charleston church. 

Modern white supremacism now sits effortlessly comfortably with fraternizing with black stars and identification with black successes. But it reveals itself in a failure to understand and attend to the ramifications of chronic racial injustices manifesting in the slums and projects. It denies institutional responsibility for black poverty and violence. It mouths equality but lacks in equal moral concern for all. It is not as bold as klu klux clan, it doesn’t need to. It is more treacherous. 

And perhaps more harmful. It mouths ‘shared humanity’. The modern racist operates from the shadows. Every negative racial stereotyping is therefore as repugnant as the hanging and burning of blacks on stakes. The prejudices constructed and perpetuated by the white elites killed Castile. And drove demons into Micah Johnson . African Americans constitute 13% of the American population. But they constitute 35% of the US prison population. Racism rather than an innate criminal propensity explains that discrepancy. The criminal justice system is not culpable. 

Blacks constitute 3% of the population in England yet they constitute 10% of the prison population. The criminal justice system is a reflection of the society. Because the social conditions that ensure disproportionate participation of blacks in criminal trials and institutionalization reside on the streets. The negative racial stereotyping that recommends blacks to law enforcement agents resides in hearts of nobles and kings. The power and discretion the policeman possesses furnishes the whimsicality that throws discrimination into sharp relief. Bits of Minnesota happens everywhere. The post office clerk can only sneer. 

Fortunately the UN finds nothing between supremacy and discrimination based on race and that based on ethnicity. The unconscious negative evaluation of an ethnic group as inferior is implicit racism. Amongst the dregs of the global society – the black Africans- crippling ethnocentrism manages to possess millions of minds. And has kept the continent busy with a steady stream of conflicts and ruinous wars. The Tutsis regarded the Hutus as retards. But let’s leave ethnic chauvinism for now. Because ,somehow, it never manages to deny social status. Conceited Igbos may think Hausas generally have low IQs but that wouldn’t stop them from envying Aliko Dangote. But an Igbo , cart pusher, who regards himself a Diala, would treat an Igbo billionaire whom he thinks is an Osu with scorn. He will hop around the streets of Dallas pretending that black lives matter. But he will tell you that the condemnation of the Osu is spiritual, irremediable. That is shameful. 

Racism in its full bloom lets a poor, sleep deprived , Lebanese hustler in Lagos spare pity for a rich settled Yoruba professor. And if their paths cross, he will treat him with derision. Being black is misfortune. But it could be death. Because some savages from Asia who come in the name of foreign investors have left on their workers and domestic staff bestial debauchery. Descendants of plantation mules, in awe of anything white , take it all in. Even in their own country. Servility answers ‘master’ and ‘yes boss’ to degradations. 

Bondage , chronic and psychological , is not overcome easily. Slaves returned to their masters’ cruelty. But the superiority of the white race that resides in black minds 300 years after Zong must be exorcised. The bleaching of skins, mimicry of accents and repudiation of indigenous traditions.