Spotlight on American racism: recalling Billie Holiday
A friend was saying how people of African origin will one day rule again. Maybe “rule” is too strong. Lead again.
“You and I may not be alive to witness that; but our great grand children would experience that amazing time. Like we used to be before they came and ruled us.”
A very common statement.
That Africa was the cradle of humankind.
Someone might scream: SO WHAT? Yes... So what if we were the beginning of all races?
What matters is that at some point tables turned and new creatures ruled us. One of the results was slavery. African slaves taken to far off lands including America. Centuries later while slavery “ended” in most parts of the globe, Blacks were (and are still) second class citizens.
There are so many theories and explanations as to why racism against people of African origin is a fact.
Some of these theories come in jokes. For example last week such teasing was circulating on the net.
Two separate pictures alleged: “This is the cause of racism in the world.”
Two women. One Black, another White. Both in bikinis. The White woman has no back side. Correction. She has a backside but it is “flat”. Her shape is (kind of) square. The Black woman, on the other hand, has a figure eight (8) shape: very voluptuous and her backside is fully rounded.
Another photograph of a group of men and Black men. Again the caption: “This is the cause of racism in the world...”
The males are from a bygone era. Probably nineteen century. Naked and their private parts openly visible. Those of the Blacks are of a different size from their white counterparts. And without being too graphic, this is supposed to be the root of the prejudice against Blacks.
Serious debates and discussions may go on forever.
Some have cited intelligence, weather, even planets. Speaking of planets. A German man was claiming in a video (circulating around 2014- 2015) that white people are from a distant planet. That they think they are special and when they gather, separately, they say things they would not say to us blacks. The purported video is among so many strange things shooting off our social media...
On a daily basis.
And...
Still.
How do we explain unnecessary killings of Blacks?
Like that which has caused demos and protests THESE past two weeks in the USA and UK? And flooding across mother earth?
This of course after death by four policemen. Death of George Floyd on May 25th. George Floyd buried on Tuesday this week.
Derek Chauvin’s infamous image kneeling on Floyd’s throat for eight and 46 seconds, has become a symbol of racism. Especially because Floyd was heard saying “I can’t breathe.”
Award-winning Nigerian writer Ben Okri declared in Monday’s London Guardian: “That police officer who pressed his knee on George Floyd’s neck snuffed out one life, but lit a universal fire.
“It is deeply moving that the world has responded not to the death of a great man or woman, but to the killing of one of the Earth’s seemingly insignificant people.”
An ordinary guy was George Floyd.
And so it goes. So much has been said and written recently.
The wife of a famous Black British actor, Idris Elba, charged in London’s Sunday Mirror: “Racism isn’t new...”
Sabrina Dhowre Elba’s piece repeated the phrase again and again:
Racism ISN’T new.
Racism and the killings of people of African origin.
Years ago, black people used to be lynched. Hanging and lynching mobs were as common as soccer matches today. Spectacles like nyama choma barbeque parties. Or so called coon hunts. Blacks hunted down like wild animals and snuffed out. Or punished just for staring at whites.
There is a very well known jazz song Strange Fruit, written by a Jewish composer and poet, Abel Meeropol, in the early 20th century.
Billie Holiday the jazz singer, who died aged 44 in 1959, popularised it. First stanza goes:
“Southern trees bear a strange fruit
Blood on the leaves and blood on the root
Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees...”
The word “hanging” is significant. It is about lynching of Blacks.
Billie Holiday used to order lights-off before belting it out. Very slowly. She would only have a spotlight on herself; then after tune was over, she left the club.
It is said that, apart from the actual meaning of lynching Blacks, it reminded her of her own father who was refused treatment for cancer (despite serving in the Armed Forces during First World War) - and she died only aged 38.
It is claimed that singing the masterpiece contributed to the FBI wanting her dead. And truly, her last moments were spent hand-cuffed to her hospital bed.
Like Mrs Elba wrote:racism is not new.
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Freddy Macha is a writer and musician based in London. Blog: <www.freddymachab-logspot.com>
