Marcus Garvey Speaks

[Baba Ahmed]

Praise and gratitude are due to the Maker of All Praiseworthiness and Gratefulness. I offer thanks for all the Afrikan Mothers and all of the Afrikan Fathers who came before us; for the children they brought who live through us. I call and ask for the Presence of The Spirit and of Honorable Ancestoral spirits to come among us and to make this place in cyberspace Sacred! That our honorable ancestors inspire and guide this effort to allow their guidance be the driving force in re-igniting the Flames of the Anciennts and Fires of the traditional Afrikan ways, varied tho they be. That each of us can leave with clarity and strengthen purpose to do "something good" for the ancestors sakes. Ashay Ashay Ashay-ooooo!!!

Greetings members of assatashakur.org in hopes that words and ideas and suggestions and opinions flowing through me prove beneficial for us all. On the shoulders all warrior/scholars and warriors who came before me, I come hoping to be prolific like Junious R. Stanton in this WWW as faintly knowledgeable like Mwalimu Baruti; as clear, focused and with simular power of Omowale Malik Shabazz (bka Malcolm X) as I claim to come in the spirits of the honorable Maroons, in spite of what some say that Maroon is a word expressing negativity. Let that person know, that what is wild to the European is human and civilized to me! As with most languages foreign to Afrikans, those languages become more enlivened. For language is a living thing. This is an excerpt from a man some call a Prophet: Marcus Mosiah Garvey. who graced this realm between 1877-1940 Current Era. He speaks on Education. In the book, note: the word Negro is used throughout; we should remember the times of Garvey's life; I dare say that if it were today, Black and Afrikan would be the chosen words. Remember that one of his most famous slogans is We are for Africans at Home and Abroad:

MARCUS GARVEY Message to the People: The Course of African Philosophy

The present system of education is calculated to subjugate the majority and elevate the minority. The system was devised and has been promulgated by agents of minority. This system was carefully thought out by those who desire to control others for their benefit and to the disadvantage of the others; to the extent that the others would not immediately rise into happiness and enjoyment of life simultaneously and equally with them. It was never originally intended to make all the people equal at the same time. Even more so, ... it (was) not intended to elevate the darker races to the immediate standard of the white races. The minority sprung from the white races ot establish the system of education. Therefore, all textbooks and general literature are colored to suit the particular interes of those who established the system of education, and the group they represent as against the interest of others whom they did not want to immediately elevate to their standard.

There is always a limited process in the education of other races by the race that originates the system of education. As for instance, if a Negro attends a university with other students of the race that originated or projects the educational system, while the Negro would have the privilege of the classroom for general instructions to learn commonly, he/she may not have the privilege of his fellow students of the other race, who may be admitted to certain club fraternities (or sororities) within the university from which he would be debarred. Such fraternities generally enjoy the privilege of special instructions and special discussions which convey a wider range of enlightment on the subjects taught than would be possible to the Negro, hence, when he/she graduates even from the same textbooks his technical knowledge is not as wide as that of others who have had fuller explanation in the technical interpretation of the particular textbooks and at the same time is only trained to reflect the system that props the intentions of the creators of the system, so that at his best, he who is making use of his education, is a slave to a system that was not intended for him, but to which he renders service.

Therefore it is necessary for the Negro to be additionally educated or re-educated after he or she has imbibed the present system of education. The best way to do this is to educate him racially in the home, meeting hall or his own club, where he will be put under the closest scrutiny and analysis of what appears to be education, as coming from other people, because their system of education may not completely fit into the Negro's ideas of his own preservation.

By not being able to do this in the past, educated Negroes have not been able to assume proper leadership of their race, because their education was of the nature to cause them to support the present system which is of no advantage to the Negro, except as a servant, serf and and slave, for which purpose really the system was devised, to a certain extent. This explains the behavior of leading Negro intellectuals who are not able to dissect the educational system of others and use only that portion that would be helpful to the Negro race, and add to it for a complete curriculum that would be satisfactory as a complete education for the race. Do not swallow wholly the educational system of any other group, except you have perfectly analyzed it and found it practical and useful to your group. There is still room for the Negro educational system, free from the prejudices that the present educational system upholds agaisnt him. Never fail to impress upon the Negro that he is never thoroughly educated until he, she has imbibed racial education.

It is by education that we become prepared for our duties and responsibilities in life. If one is badly educated he must naturally fail in the proper assumption and practice of his duties and responsibilities. The Negro fails in the proper assumption of his duties and responsibilities because he has been badly educated. He has universally failed to measure up to his duties and responsibilities as a man and as a race. His education has been subversive. He must now make his education practical and real, hence, he must re-arrange everything that affects him in his education to be of assistance to him in reaching out to his responsibilities and duties.

As you shouldn't expect another man to give you the clothing that you need to cover your own body, so you should not expect another race to give you the education to challenge their right to monopoly and mastery; to take for yourself that which they also want for themselves. If you are going to distrust the other man in his honesty because you know him to be dishonest, then you must maintain the attitude in every respect, for if he is dishonest in one he may be dishonest in all. If he will rob you of your wages, he will also rob you of your education that would enable you to know that he is robbing you of your wages. Trust only yourself and those who look like you. Those who look like you and are related to you ought to be known first before you know others. There may be a good grounds for a common education of all groups in a community such as civic education, political and social education, but this detail{ed} education that teaches man how to live to the highest and enjoy the best, is particular education and that particular education is always reserved for those who want to gain an advantage. Therefore, in no other way in particular secure education and have your own such as the Jews who have outside of any common education, a particular and peculiar education of their own, which augments or adds to or modifies the common education that they have gathered in the community with others.

[indent]By view of the fact that the Jew gets a dual education, the education of the State and the education of his race, he is always in a unique position to worsen or to better his compatriots of another race in the community. He is always making more out of everything than the Gentile, because he knows all about the Gentile, while the Gentile knows nothing about him."

pgs 95-99
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{Baba note: keep in mind Garvey's teachings were during the same period as Dr. Carter G. Woodson and W.E.B. DuBois wrote and taught.}

[Baba Ahmed]

Note that in my introduction I ask that we ALL benefit. Why? Because here, imo, the Honorable Marcus M. Garvey, speaks to an education most of us have. I've often wondered if education alone is sufficient; i.e., an EuroCentric education. I think Garvey speaks directly to this and also wonder if some of us know how to distinguish any differences in our own "educational" base and if any does it affect our thinking, plan'n and actions?

Think about it. Thank you

[Baba Ahmed]

GARVEY SPEAKS RE STUDY


Charles L. James is explaining the introduction of a series of classes Marcus Garvey planned to begin. He called names of students and C.L. James was included; who wrote:

"Mr. Garvey shocked me. He said to me publicly, 'James, you don't know. I know that you don't know because I have not taught you and you will take the Course of African Philosophy, so that when you say, 'I know,' you will know that you know because you will have been taught by me.' From then on, there was no question, I enlisted for the duration.

The class became one family. We ate together, roomed together, studied together, recognizing the professor as the chief architect of our intellectural destiny. As for me, it was a dose of humility mixed with the yearning for knowledge. For thirty days and nights, with two sessions per day, mass meetings at 8 o'clock p.m., studying until the early morning hours, we had no time for anything else but study, study, study. Then, finally, came graduation. Let the record show that I received the highest grade. In every point of examination I was graded 'E.' My classmates all agree that I was the leader of the first class in the School of African Philosophy. We were charged with guarding the written course with our lives. The unwritten course was also to be engraved on the tablets of our memory. As I write this foreword, I am sorry to announce that all my classmates of that first class have joined with the the Rt. Excellent Marcus Mosiah Garvey and our other ancestors. With all our human frailties, I am convinced that this first class has not failed our teacher and that we have been a shining example to those who come after us.

This course is ours."

__________________________________________________ __________________________________

From "The Foreword" by Honourable Charles L. James, President-General, Universal Negro Improvement Association. The

book: MARCUS GARVEY Message to the People: The Course of African Philosophy
.........Edited by Tony Martin, pgs xi-xii

[Baba Ahmed]

May their names be forever remembered and honored through our words and actions!

Ashay! Ashay! Ashay-oooooo!!!

[Baba Ahmed]

Excuse me y'all below is a list of names in the first class taught by the Rt. Excellent Marcus Mosiah Garvey:

• Arthur Clement Moore, Toronto, Canada

• Charles Llynell James, Gary, Indiana

• James R. Stewart, Cleveland, Ohio

• Thomas W. Harvey, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

• Nathaniel Grissom, Chicago, Illinois

• Sarah Richardson Isaacs, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

• Ethel Waddel, Chicago, Illinois

• Elinor White, Chicago, Illinois

• Theresa E. Young, Cincinnati, Ohio

• Abraham R. Roberts, Toronto, Canada

[TyreeA]

Originally Posted by Baba Ahmed

Excuse me y'all below is a list of names in the first class taught by the Rt. Excellent Marcus Mosiah Garvey:

• Arthur Clement Moore, Toronto, Canada

• Charles Llynell James, Gary, Indiana

• James R. Stewart, Cleveland, Ohio

• Thomas W. Harvey, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

• Nathaniel Grissom, Chicago, Illinois

• Sarah Richardson Isaacs, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

• Ethel Waddel, Chicago, Illinois

• Elinor White, Chicago, Illinois

• Theresa E. Young, Cincinnati, Ohio

• Abraham R. Roberts, Toronto, Canada

Out of this list, the following went on to become President-General of The UNIA-ACL:

James R. Stewart
Thomas W. Harvey
Charles Llynell James

http://www.unia-acl.org/history/history.htm

[TyreeA]

Lesson 16: Propaganda

Below is a chapter from Message to the People: The Course in African Philosophy.

Propaganda means to propagate or to make known extensively some particular phase of human intelligence. The desire is to convert or influence the people to the acceptance of the truth of that particular intelligence that is sought to be spread among them.

Propaganda can be true or false in its origin or intent; but it is always directed at the public for the purpose of winning the support of that public to the sentiment expressed in the propaganda. If you hate a man, giving him a bad name well may explain one of the purposes of propaganda without truth behind it.

Nearly all organized efforts have a system of propaganda to convert people to their principles and get them to support them even though there may be no merit behind it all.

Propaganda is all around you; to make you buy a special brand of cigarettes, although no good, but advertised to be the best; to make you drink or use a certain brand of tea; telling you of its wonderful qualities and its everlasting benefits when there is absolutely nothing to it, and so on.

Before the war of 1914-1918, the Germans were known to be the most cultured and scientific people in Europe. When the war started, the other nations in order to discredit the Germans and to hold them up to world ridicule and the contempt of civilization, released the propaganda that classified the Germans as Huns and barbarians. This also reveals how organized intention can be carried to the public for public acceptance without thought.

The press, cinema, pulpit, schoolroom are all propaganda agencies for one thing or the other. The pulpit carries religious propaganda, the schoolroom carries educational propaganda, the press carries out written propaganda, the platform carries on oral propaganda, the cinema carries out demonstrative propaganda. These methods have been devised by the white man to spread his ideas universally among them. That is why he is able, in a major sense, to control the minds of the people of the world.

The white man is a great propagandist. He fully and completely realizes the value of propaganda. Therefore, you must organize your propaganda to undo the propaganda of other people; if their propaganda affects your interest. The bible is religious propaganda, the school is literary propaganda. The novels and books you read are also literary propaganda, all calculated to bring about certain results beneficial to the propagandist.

Never forget then that you are surrounded by a world of propaganda, all dressed up or cooped up to suit a doubtful public that is not careful about what it digests from without. The artist is also a propagandist. He paints pictures to convey the idea he wants to impress upon the non-thinking and doubtful public. The sculptor is also a propagandist. he chisels figures and portrays them to suit the aim or purpose he wants to achieve. The pictures of the Madonna and Christ and of the angels are painted portraying a white race, so as to inflict upon the rest of the world the belief that God, the angels and the Holy Family are all white, as well as Adam and Eve. Adam and Eve were black. They also paint the devil and the imps of hell black to impress upon the world the belief that all that is black is evil and all that is white is good and holy.

Tear from your walls, all pictures that glorify other races. Tear up and burn every bit of propaganda that does not carry your idea of things. Treat them as trash.

When you go to the cinema and you see the glorification of others in the pictures don't accept it; don't believe it to be true. Instead, visualize yourself achieving whatever is presented, and if possible, organize your propaganda to that effect. You should always match propaganda with propaganda.

Have your own newspapers, your own artists, your own sculptors, your own pulpits, your own platforms, print your own books and show your own motion pictures and sculpture your own subjects. Never accept as yours subjects of another race; but glorify all the good in yourselves.

Keep your home free and clear of alien objects of glorification of other races, otherwise your children will grow up to adore and glorify other people. Put in the place of others the sheroes and heroes and noble characters of your own race.

Never allow your children to play with or to have white dolls. it will give them the idea of having white children themselves. Give them the dolls of their own race to play with and they will grow up with the idea of race love and race purity.

Watch the newspapers, magazines and journals daily for propaganda against your race or your institutions; particulary against the U.N.I.A. Rush into print immediately a defense of your race institutions and organizations from any attack. Never allow an insult propagated to go unanswered by you. Be ever vigilant to down anything by way of propaganda that dishonors or discredits you. don't help the other fellow to carry on propaganda against yourself or your race. All propaganda comes from the arranged desire of individuals and not from a race as a whole. It is the thinkers and leaders who originate propaganda. By insisting on its wide distribustion they get other people to think as they like.

Don't accept the thoughts of others through propaganda, unless it coincides with yours. don't follow the band down the street because it plays sweet music to the propaganda of the circus manager. He may lead you into the circus tent and take away your pocketbook; that is to say, don't get on anybody's band wagon, because he may drive you to hell with his sweet music. Like the Pied Piper of Hamlin, who played his sweet pipe and led the rats out of the city and into the sea and drowned them.

Propaganda organized by somebody else is always calculated to take advantage of you. Don't help them do so . Always ask, what is this about? What is the object of this? Who has sent this out? What is he aiming at? Will it hurt me and my race? Is he trying to get an advantage over me? Is it honest? Is it true? If you ask these questions of all propaganda that comes up, before you swallow it, you will be able to take care of yourself.

Don't sing the songs and repeat the praises that glorify other races. Sing your own songs and recite your own praises that glorify your own race. For instance, it is foolish for Africans to sing or say "Britons never shall be slaves" when they themselves have been slaves and are likely to be slaves if they don't impress upon their minds that they as Negroes will never be slaves again.

Sing, therefore, "Africans never shall be slaves." Be careful how you sing religious hymns that have been written, dished up and made popular by white writers to glorify the white race in the name of God; taking advantage of the silence of God to impress inferiority upon your race such as "the great white wings of angels," "the great white throne of God," "Wash me in the blood and I shall be whiter than snow." All these things reflect the propaganda designed by the white man to glorify his skin and his race as against the black imps of hell and the black devil and the black pale of doom.

The idea of the white man making black a symbol of mourning and sadness is just to show the extreme of the purity of whiteness and it's joy and happiness. Reverse this. If possible teach the African that when he is in mourning he should wear white, and when he is happy to wear black. This is meeting propaganda with propaganda, the hatchet with the hatchet, the stick with the stick and the stone with the stone. Everything on earth is man's creation. So out of man's propaganda and mind he has created his special systems of opinion to meet his designs.

Therefore, customs are based upon acceptance of propaganda skillfully engineered. Have your own propaganda and hand it down through the ages. Write your own poetry and recite it. Compose your own songs and sing them. Write your own interpretation of the scriptures and history and teach them as far as the interpretation of others affect your race.

Challenge the thought of any book of other literature that dishonors or discredits you in any particular way; and give it the widest publicity so as to undo the harm intended. Remember always, that an error not corrected ultimately becomes a fact. Never allow false statements or allegations against your race to become current and pass into history as if they were facts.

WAR

War is the hellish passion of man let loose in opposition to man. It sums up the cruelty of man towards man. It always aims at the stronger taking advantage of the weaker to gain that which could not have been acquired otherwise; because of the failure to use human reason. War comes when men fail to adjust their differences with reasoning.

Always be prepared for the exhibition of the vilest passions of men in war. Man has always warred against his fellow man. It started with Cain against Abel and has continued down through the ages; and shall ever be so as long as man remains an unreasonable creature.

No generation has shown that man intends to become wholly reasonable. Therefore, in time of peace, prepare for war, so as not to be caught unprepared by your enemy. Do not discuss terms while you are warring; discuss them after you are victorious. When war comes, all resources of intelligence and wealth, all utilities are placed at the serviec of those who conduct the war to make them victorious on behalf of those for whom they are warring. Therefore, have in view the obtaining and controlling of all such resources, factors and utilities that may be necessary as ammunitions of war.

There may be righteous wars as well as unrighteous wars; depending entirely upon the civilization that makes the war or defends itself in war. It may be war to put down human abuse in favor of human virtue. The warmakers have always justified war in some way or another. If you become engaged in a war, always have justification for your engagement.

If the war is not yours, get something out of it before you go into it and complete it for the good of others. Never go into it and complete it for the good of others. Never go into war foolishly. Never sacrifice your life without good results for your cause. War is the best time to take advantage of your transgressor, whoever he may be. Whenever he is engaged in war and he promises you nothing, you will never get anything from him in time of peace. Therefore, during the time of war make your bargains before you help anybody else in war. If you are suffering from the abuses of others and there should be a threat of war against them from some other source, encourage it because it will be your chance to force a square deal. the more other people war among themselves, the stronger you become if you exercise good judgement.

Divide your enemies so as to gain your advantage. Always keep them divided so as to be able to gain the advantage. your only hope of escaping the hate and prejudice of other people is to keep them severly occupied with other problems. If they have nothing else to attend to, they will concentrate on you and your problems will be aggravated.

While others have gone to war, try to be at peace among yourselves to gather the spoils of war. Never talk war openly to your enemies; but be prepared for war. If you talk it, they will become prepared waiting for you. Keep the other races divided and fighting each other as much as you can so as to take advantage for yourselves.

If they have no other problems to occupy their time, they will turn to you and turn on you. keep them occupied otherwise. The more confused they are worrying over their troubles, the more time you will have to get out of your trouble

~~
Source: http://www.unia-acl.org/archive/propagan.htm