December 3, 1997
Back in 1972, I interviewed at the University of Massachusetts. Had I known more about the university, I would have never visited in the first place.
At a reception for me, a leftist professor asked me what did I think about capitalism and slavery. I told him that slavery has existed under all systems and that black slavery is by no means unique. In fact, the word slave is derived from Slav—the Slavish people.
Then he insisted that I tell him my thoughts about slavery and my ancestors. I told him slavery is a horrible human rights violation; however, I have personally benefited from the horrors suffered by my ancestors.
The reason is simple: Assuming I would have been born anyway, my wealth and liberties, as well as those of my fellow American blacks, are greater as a result of being born in the United States than any country in Africa. In other words, while slavery was a brutal institution, I can be thankful for its results. Needless to say, the professor and his colleagues were horrified by my response.
What Keith B. Richbourg reports in his book, Out of America: A Black Man Confronts Africa, provides excellent evidence supporting my position. Richbourg is the Hong Kong bureau chief for the Washington Post who spent three years covering Africa. His story should make every black American thankful for being born in the United States.
Richbourg recounts standing on a Tanzanian bridge seeing one or two bodies floating down the river every minute—victims of Rwandan genocide—many dismembered. Cambodia's Khmer Rouge murdered a million in three years; the Hutu accomplished that in a few months.
The July/August 1997 American Enterprise adaption of Richbourg's book has a visual example of African brutality—a dismembered head sitting on a table in downtown Monrovia. In Kenya, the Masai loot, murder, and destroy Kikuyu towns. Unimaginable brutality is also the story in Nigeria, Uganda, Mozambique, Chad, Sudan, Ghana, Somalia, Central African Empire, Zaire, and most other black countries.
What have you heard black Americans saying about these gross abuses? I mean those “leaders” who picketed, condemned, and supported sanctions against South Africa for its racist apartheid policy. Richbourg asked Doug Wilder, Virginia's first black post-Reconstruction governor, about human rights violations in black Africa. Wilder replied, “We cannot and should not force them to undergo a metamorphosis in seconds. Our job is not to interfere, and to understand that there is a difference from what they are accustomed to.” Can you imagine the condemnation that would have greeted a white politician saying the same thing in 1980 but about South Africa?
Wilder shouldn't be singled out as a villain. By their silence, self-appointed black leaders, civil rights organizations, and the Congressional Black Caucus feel the same way. Their position differs little from one that says blacks brutalizing other blacks is understandable but brutalization by whites is intolerable; whites are held to civilized standards of behavior. That's a position with a domestic counterpart. There's tolerance and excuse-giving for the daily slaughter and mayhem in black communities. Outrage and moral posturing is reserved for when a white cop shoots or mistreats a black.
“Africa is often held up as a black Valhalla. Sorry, but I've been there,” says Richbourg. Because a person was born in, or traces ancestry to, a country doesn't mean its practices are beyond condemnation. Instead of condemnation, what we hear are praises and lies about “Mother Africa” from black leaders and Afro-centric demagogues. It's about time we heard some of the truth and Keith B. Richbourg delivers it.