That is the story of black people in America. After more than 400 years in America black people are still in a battle to be treated like human beings.
The 13 Amendment didn’t end slavery. It just opened the door for a more sophisticated kind of bodage. Starting with the black codes, progressing to peonage, then share cropping. Henry Fords 5 dollar week didn’t apply to black workers because when he instituted the 5 dollar work week in 1914 Ford Motor company didn’t hire black workers. Trade unions didn’t allow black membership. When Thurgood Marshall argued Brown v. Board of Education he initially thought he had won a great victory. It wasn’t until he realized that he had been bamboozled and Hoodwinked. The Supreme Court de idiot admonishes the the Board of Education to ” move with all due deliberate speed” to desegregation the schools. It wasn’t until he realized that by not setting a deadline and say with all due deliberate speed that effectively the court was giving the school district as much time as they need to formulate a public school alternative. That alternative effectively allowed the board of Education to continue to for segregation based on wealth. Hoodwinked and bamboozled.
The 14th Amendment contains three clauses. The citizenship clause, the due process clause and the equal protection clause. While the due process clause and equal protection clause are great on paper. They fail to meet the test in actual application. How many times are we going to enact some temporary voting rights legislation before we actually get the rights we were promised. Hoodwinked and bamboozled.
The 15 amendment guaranteed the right of blacks to vote. While individual states mandated poll taxes and literacy test for blacks for decades before they could vote. Over 20 states have enacted onerous legislation to keep black voter turn out. How many y voting rights bill are we going to be forced to enact to get the same access as white voters. Hoodwinked and bamboozled.
We have been systematically and methodically conditioned to work against our own interest. They’ve done it with educational access, They’ve done it through coopting our music and convincing our people that it must be misogynistic and vulgar to have commercial value. Even worse They’ve sold us a bill of goods on the eurocentric idea of rugged individualism and me before we. We are a disjointed and confused people because we have been encouraged to distrust and fear one another. We’ve been conditioned to believe that we don’t need anyone else. We would never get into a physical fight where we were limited to using only one finger but we go to battle alone everyday because we don’t recognize that we only have real strength when we are connected. We have been hoodwinked and bamboozled.
The world is changing at a pace faster than anyone ever anticipated. We need to learn to set our own table before we become the entreebeing served at someone else’s.
Pay Attention!
Think!!
Eyes Wide 👀 👁 Open!!!
Great piece, Bill. But I would take it back even further than this. I think it began with Lincoln’s incomplete Emancipation Proclamation. He stopped short of really freeing the slaves by leaving out the most important part, compensation for all the years of forced free labor. How do you free somebody when you release them with no money and no source of income? It’s the reason many slaves never left the plantation. This, followed by all the obstacles and road blocks you mentioned. Dr. King said, “America has given the negro a bad check, marked insufficient funds.” Well, America didn’t give former slaves any check at all. And we, their ancestors, are still checking the mail for that check for services rendered. A payment that is 400 years past due.