Transcription
black. This is a word that a lot of people hold near and dear to their hearts, and it's one of the words that I used to use to describe myself. Um, but over a decade ago, I detached myself and separated myself from using this word to describe myself and identifying with it.
So, as I've gotten older, I looked back and reflected to when I was a child, and I became aware that I had never ever questioned and asked one of the most important questions that someone could ask. And that question was, "Why am I called what I'm called?" And at that time, it would be, "Why am I called black?" I remember looking back and asking, uh, my parents, "Why my name was Brooklyn? Why did I get named this?" But for some reason, the question of, "Why am I called black?" it never came to my mind.
And I had enough sense to realize that my skin color was brown, right? I can look at it, look in the mirror, and I can see, "Okay, I have skin that's brown." And no big deal. Okay, I understood that. But for some reason, still, I never questioned, "If I had brown skin, why am I referring to myself as black?"
It wasn't until I was about, I'd say, 26 years old when I ended up running across a group called the Hebrew Israelites. And one thing that stood out about them is that they were quite loud about, you know, the people in America calling themselves blacks, that they're not black, that they're actually the Jews that the Bible speaks of, right? And they're this, um, ancient biblical people that is referred to in the Bible. And I remember when I heard this, that it was just a very powerful message. And it was actually so powerful that I ended up joining the organization.
But after a couple of years, I ended up leaving that movement and that organization, um, because the doctrine, it just was lacking, and it was incomplete, and it was narrow and limiting in in the scope. So I ended up detaching myself from that movement and moving on. But the question of being black and the the reasoning behind it that they had given, it was sufficient for that time. But after I had left the movement, it opened up again the questioning to this black thing because blacks being the the real Jews, it just wasn't enough to satisfy the questions that I had, um, for that particular, um, word.
So I wanted to dig a little bit deeper into this, uh, this black thing and understand, you know, ex- exactly what it's about. And I remember me and my wife used to have a lot of conversations about like the identity, what to call people, and what to refer to ourselves as. And just something funny about the black thing, so I wanted to know a little bit more about it. And I remember we ended up running across this, um, this guy named Taj Tariq Bay. He was someone who's, um, one of the members of the the Moorish Americans. And on his video, it was stood out is he used to talk a lot about black and the meaning of black and how black is a color and how black is not a people. And then he would always refer to etymology, etymology. He'd also be talking about the etymon, the etymon, and the etymology concept. It was new to me. I don't really recall much in school or past learning understanding much about etymon or etymology, which, um, which was something that kind of caught my attention.
So the etymon or etymology of a word is referring to the origins of of words. And then he used to talk about how black folks are ignorant because they don't understand the etymology or where the word comes from. And you're calling yourself a a black. And he's talking about how it's an adjective and all these other things. Okay, so I'm hearing what he's saying. And then I said, "Okay, maybe I need to learn more about etymology and find out, you know, the origin of words and where they come from because maybe, maybe this guy's on to something."
And so I did the one thing that everybody listening to this video must become good at doing, and that one thing is consulting the dictionary. And so I found this app and I downloaded it, opened it up. And the first word that I put in was black. Typed it in, it showed up, clicked on it. And when I started reading through it, I couldn't believe the things that I was seeing in this word and all the loaded meanings that were in this word. And here are some of the things that it said: "Black: the meaning, fierce, terrible, wicked. Is from late 14th century. The figurative senses often come from the notion of without light, moral or spiritual. Latin Niger had many of the same figurative senses: gloomy, unlucky, bad, wicked, malicious. The metaphoric use of the Greek word melis, however, tended to reflect the notion of shrouded in darkness, overcast. In English, it has been the color of sin and sorrow at least since 13th century."
Okay, so I'm like, "Okay, here we go." Okay, so let me get this straight. I started looking at it. I'm like, "Okay, this is very interesting. Very, very interesting. Let me do a quick recap." Okay, my skin color is brown. I'm looking at it. Okay, brown. I look up the word black, it means wicked, evil, malicious, unlucky, gloomy, immoral, and are the color of sin and sorrow. Then I begin to think about it like, "Who in the world would name themselves this? Who would name themselves this? Who would put this type of name on themselves?"
And so I kept looking, kept searching and trying to find answers for it, like, "Who would call themselves this type of thing?" And so what happened is I ended up, uh, running across a book called "The Name Negro: Its Origin and Evil Use" by Richard B. Moore. And I think this book was written in the 1960s. And in that book, this is what he said: "The first use of the word negro as a noun or name in relation to African people is to be traced back to the period after 1441, when the Portuguese explorers went down the African coast until they reached below the C River."
So he's talking about the name negro and its origin in 1441 and being placed on people by the Portuguese. And I'm looking at the word negro and I'm saying, "Okay, negro, I know is negro in Spanish. And I'm quite sure negro and negro and black are the same things. But let me just be sure. I need to double check. And because I might be on to something here, I'mma double check and just to verify that I'm on the right track."
And so what I did was the one thing that everybody must become good at doing, and that's consulting the dictionary. So I opened up the etymon online, opened up the search and typed in the word negro. And lo and behold, this is what I found: "Negro: member of a black-skinned race of Africa. From Spanish or Portuguese negro, black. From Latin niger, black, dark, sable, dusky. Applied to the night sky, a storm, the complexion. Figuratively, gloomy, unlucky, bad, wicked."
"Okay," I said, "Let me put this thing together right now, man. Let me see because something's not adding up." Okay, my skin is brown. I got to take another look at it again. That's what I did. "Let me make sure the skin is brown. Black and negro are synonymous and mean wicked, evil, malicious, unlucky, gloomy, immoral, and are the color of sin and sorrow. These names were not chosen by the people who call themselves that, but instead, they were chosen by other people, specifically and starting with the Portuguese, who placed that name on them." Hm.
Okay, I'm thinking to myself, "This is very interesting." And I'm sure that these African people at that time had different names. I know they distort the history and say that a lot of the African folks didn't have any civilization or anything going on, but I'm pretty sure they had a name, some type of tribal names that they referred to themselves as. So my next question was, "Why would the Portuguese take them names away from them that they already have and give them something else?" Because obviously, this, they must not be friendly. It must not be some friends that are doing this because why would you give any of your friends a name that is related to or that means wicked, evil, malicious, gloomy, unlucky, immoral? Why would you give somebody that type of name if they're your friends? Well, obviously, they must not be friends.
So I need to find out, okay, what is the intention behind giving these people the name black? Why would you put that name on somebody? And so as I kept reading, reading in the book, the answer popped up. And this is on page 40, and this is what it says: "This term Negroes was then used with a new and specific meaning as a name or designation, particularly applied to African slaves." Up to this point, what it's looking like is you're taking the name and you're applying it to someone that you're making slaves. Okay, let's keep reading. "These slaves had been captured and brought to Portugal from the land of Guinea, below the Sahara and south of the Sagol River." So the people that were given this name became slaves and were taken from the place where they inhabited and brought over to Portugal.
Okay, I'm following. From that period onward, this name Negroes was connected to and loaded with vicious and degrading notions of class, race, and color prejudice. So how was this term loaded with vicious and degrading notions of race, uh, class, and color prejudice? How was that to be done? Was the question that I had as I'm reading this. By this name Negroes, African slaves were thereby branded as bestial and savage. What does the word branded mean? That's an identifying marker. That's something you use to identify something. So it's saying that this word black or negro is used as an identifying marker of slaves who are bestial and savage. This is how they're loading the term up with these words and concepts and ideas. Innately inferior. Innately inferior. That means that you're born inferior. That means there's nothing you can do about that. Negro or black, whoever's inside of this or branded with this particular, um, brand is innately inferior. That's is how the this is the the way that they're trying to mold and and conceptualize this idea of black into a certain, uh, people. The enslaved African for fit by nature only for slavery. And indeed, ordained by God himself for perpetual slavery. And ordained by. You have to look at that, ordained by God. This is a powerful statement right now that Richard B. Moore is saying, ordained by God. That means whoever this creative entity is, is given the authority and saying, "These people here are meant to be slaves. These people here called black, negro, are meant to be slaves." Very powerful stuff. And not just any type of slave. It's talking about a perpetual slave. That means when the the slave who was caught, then has children, his children, her children would be would be slaves. Their children and their children would be slaves. It would be a cyclical cycle of everybody in branded with that name being a slave.
And I said, "Wow, this is some very powerful stuff, man." To scratch my head, I'm like, "Okay, so let me get this straight again. I need to recap again." I said, "Okay, I have brown skin." You know, I'm making sure that it's still there when I'm doing it at this time. "Let me check. Okay, we both have brown skin. This is me and my wife. Both of us has brown skin." Okay. "Black and negro are synonymous and they both mean wicked, evil, malicious, unlucky, gloomy, immoral, and are the color of sorrow and sin." Right. "These names were chosen not by the people who identify as that brand, but by other people who put that brand on them. And not put it on them because they're friends and they wanted to be, um, associates, but put it on them because they wanted them to be branded and marked as slaves. But not just any type of regular slave. We're talking about a perpetual slave."
I said, "Aha! These people have created a pit that most people keep falling into." It really hit me. I said, "Wow, the perpetual thing, the perpetual slavery part is so deep because it's like, once the Portuguese and all the other colonial powers, once they were able to get the slaves to believe in this concept of being black and identifying with it, and once they accepted that as their reality, what they would do is they would then teach that to the children, and the children would then accept that as their reality." I said, "Oh snaps, here we go." Once I really understood that concept there, I said, "There's no amount of money that anyone in the world could ever pay me to fall for that foolishness again. You couldn't pay me anything. You couldn't bribe me with anything for me to ever call myself black, ever." And that's the reason why I stopped calling myself black.