Malcolm X, Obama, Powell, Rice and ‘House Negroes’

[XXPANTHAXX]

By A. Peter Bailey
Published 11/26/2008

Malcolm X, Obama, Powell, Rice and ‘House Negroes’

The uproar caused by the statements attributed to Al-Qaeda’s deputy
leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in which he labeled President-elect Barack
Obama and former and current secretaries of states Colin Powell and
Condoleezza Rice, “house Negroes” is fascinating to those of us who
consider ourselves Malcolmites.

Ayman al-Zawahiri was correct in saying that Brother Malcolm X used that
name to describe “Negroes” whom he considered to be basically allies of
white power. While working with him as editor of the Organization of
Afro-American Unity’s (OAAU) newsletter, I heard him, scornfully, use
the term.

If Brother Malcolm was still with us today, I believe he would use it to
describe those “Negroes” who are constantly called upon by white
television and radio talk show hosts, journalists and academicians who
are looking for a “house Negro” to attack black folks whom they consider
insufficiently grateful for “all the good whites have done for them.”

Such people are willing weapons of mass mis-information ready to be used
by white power whenever called upon. Notable examples of such “house
Negroes” are Ward Connerly, Jesse Lee Peterson, Clarence Thomas and
their cohorts in the political, journalistic and academic arenas.

Though Brother Malcolm, based on his speeches and writings, would
strenuously disagree with many of the positions of Obama, Powell and
Rice on issues of importance to the empowerment of black folks, I don’t
believe he would put them in the same category as Connerly, Peterson and
Thomas.

One doesn’t often see white power propagandists such as Sean Hannity,
for instance, calling on them when they want to launch an attack on a
black person whom they want to put in his or her place.

Some of Brother Malcolm’s beliefs on what black people must do if we are
to ever achieve real power in this group-oriented society can be
ascertained in the following statements from the goals and objectives of
the OAAU and one of his speeches:

“The organization of Afro-American Unity will organize the Afro-American
community block by block to make the community aware of its power and
potential; we will start immediately a voter-registration drive to make
every unregistered voter in the Afro-American community an independent
voter; we propose to support and/or organize political clubs, to run
independent candidates for office, and to support any Afro-American
already in office who answers to and is responsible to the Afro-American
community….

"And in this manner, the organizations will increase in number and in
quantity and in quality, and by August, it is then our intention to have
a black nationalist convention which will consist of delegates from all
over the country who are interested in the political, economic and
social philosophy of black nationalism. After these delegates convene,
we will listen to everyone. We want to hear new ideas and new solutions
and new answers….

“We must establish all over the country schools of our own to train our
children to become scientists and mathematicians. We must realize the
need for adult education and for job retraining programs that will
emphasize a changing society in which automation plays the key role. We
intend to use the tools of education to help raise our people to an
unprecedented level of excellence and self-respect through their own
efforts.

"The political philosophy of black nationalism means the black man
should control the politics and the politicians in his own community; no
more. The black man in the black community has to be re-educated into
the science of politics so he will know what politics is supposed to
bring in him in return. Don’t be throwing out any ballots. A ballot is
like a bullet. You don’t throw your ballots until you see a target, and
if that target is not within your reach, keep your ballot in your
pocket….’’

This doesn’t sound like a Democrat or a Republican to me.

[Langalibalele]

XXPANTNAXX, great dig, my brother, because we don't have enuf discussion around Omowale Malcolm X these days. As many people kno, the Black Panther Party for Self-Defense was rightly considered "the angry children of Malcolm X". If any group carried on that giant legacy of anti-racist polemics and principled ideological struggle, it was the Panthers.

I say that to say Peter A. Bailey seems to have missed the point. At the beginning, where he apparently agrees with statements issued by CIA agent Al Zawahiri (in order to spark this discussion), this is problematic. Al Qaida is a CIA terrorist organization! Al Qaida uses all the tactics of violence from the colonial era, tactics used by the Portuguese flechas in Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and Angola. Al Qaida uses the same type violence deployed by Tipu Tib, and by King Leopold's forces in the Congo and Central Africa. These tactics of apartheid Rhodesia and South Africa had been defeated during the anti-colonial era. It is only a neo-colonial force which would use the methods of violence and terror adopted by Al Qaida, taught to them by the CIA. Thus, I don't think Malcolm X would have been flattered that the Al Qaida pigs have used his turn of words to describe anybody, except themselves.

Moving on, about the house negro controversy Bailey states:

If Brother Malcolm was still with us today, I believe he would use it to describe those “Negroes” who are constantly called upon by white television and radio talk show hosts, journalists and academicians who are looking for a “house Negro” to attack black folks whom they consider insufficiently grateful for “all the good whites have done for them.”

Bailey goes on to mention his disapproval of

such “house Negroes” are Ward Connerly, Jesse Lee Peterson, Clarence Thomas and their cohorts in the political, journalistic and academic arenas.

He is not wrong on this point, yet he fails to make a complete sweep, as Malcolm most likely would have done.

Why does he believe Malcolm X may have approved of Obama, Rice and Powell? To quote his own words,

One doesn’t often see white power propagandists such as Sean Hannity, for instance, calling on them when they want to launch an attack on a black person whom they want to put in his or her place.

C'mon, my brother, that's a weak argument with even weaker logic!

While Obama, Rice and Powell may not have made their careers off the defeat of the black liberation movement (PSYCHE!) they made their careers from getting white people to not think of them as black?! See any different results from splitting those hairs? I don't. And Bailey forgets the crucial, bootlicking appearance Powell put in for US imperialism at the 2001 World Conference Against Racism. How can he legitimize Sean Hannity choice of flunkies, who just cannot relate to Powell and Rice on a status level.

I mean, if Hannity interviews Connerly and Thomas, little more than shills for the most racist segment of mainstream politics, so inept at holding real jobs that they really have little qualification for the positions they do hold, what does that say about Hannity. What does it say about the right-wing, and what does it say about the notion of enforcing quotas on the bourgeoisie for us as Africans rather than building the liberation movement?

Furthermore, we must say that Malcolm's analogy of the house and field negroes was nothing except a homily on class. While, much to his credit, Bailey hasn't done the this, more than a few negroes themselves have taken Malcolm's example to introduce us to the absurd concept of the house negro as hero. That is not what Malcolm X meant. He did not mean it to talk about differences in skin color amongst black people in America, either. He meant it to discuss class stratification in our community; the relationship of one class to both the oppressors and the oppressed creates opportunities for that class based upon their strategic role in society.

Because of the black liberation struggle, the black middle class (house negroes) were given accelerated mobility within the capitalist system in exchange for turning their backs on democratic standards. In other words, when the government crackdown on black liberation forces occurred, the black middle class looked the other way.

Indeed, Bailey cites some great words by Malcolm X at the end of his article. Three paragraphs talking about self-determination, something which on paper that Obama, Rice and Powell will never touch with a ten-foot pole even if a blue-eyed Jesus Christ himself were guiding their shoe shining paws. Which is perplexing, because Bailey makes a train wreck of his own argument by not following the logic or applying a dialectical method to his own premise. One thing Bailey did accomplish, was inserting Malcolm back into the discussion as it concerns blacks in America, and for that he deserves his props.

So while Malcolm X introduced the concept of house and field negroes to begin the discussion of class, I don't think he honestly would have confined it to that level. Malcolm X introduced class that way in order to develop our understanding of class forces at work in society. Malcolm X was a revolutionary. He waged a polemical battle against racism and Imperialism, and for that he was killed. Long live Malcolm. Power to the People!