Self-hatred a barrier to progress

THE EDITOR, Sir:

DELROY CHUCK in his article in The Gleaner of Wednesday August 8, 2001, entitled "The barriers to progress" noted that Jamaica has not made any progress because we are clinging to the past and using the experiences of slavery as a crutch. There is some agreement here that there are barriers to progress but it is the pronouncement of ill-conceived ideas, like Mr. Chuck's, that is thwarting progress in this country. The article reverberates of the house Negro mentality that has not allowed Jamaica to fully complete the process of emancipation.

Mr. Chuck, the reason the issues surrounding slavery are still relevant in any analysis of black people and whatever ails black people in contemporary society, is that they have not been addressed. If they were dealt with openly and honestly in the past then there would be no need to revisit them. For you, slavery "was an act of inhumanity, a brutal denigration and depreciation of the black race, but it was no worse than the enslavement of other races, of the Chinese, the Jews, and the annihilation of whole generations of primitive tribes"\.

How can one compare systematic mental and psychological efforts to annihilate a race with what happened to the Chinese or the Jews. At least their minds were left intact. Today, the Jews and Chinese are steeped in their culture, because they were allowed to be. This is still passed down religiously from generation to generation. The Holocaust, among other things, is used as a 'teaching tool' for young Jews to know their history and instill Jewish pride and love of self. Mr. Chuck, we cannot move forward until we have addressed what went before. Self-hate is not something that can be swept away with more investment, housing, health care, and all the other things you mentioned in your article. If this was the case, Jamaica would have moved on, at least since the mid-1990s.

A deep-rooted self-hatred is a direct legacy of slavery. The Negro has only been given lessons in destruction, destruction of self. This he has learnt very well.

Furthermore, your statement about the provision of housing, health care, free education etc., not contributing to progress but to "regression, to political tribalism and to the violent fight for scarce benefits and spoils" is an indictment against you and your party since your party was government on more than one occasions and have used the tactic of scarce benefits and spoils to win the Negro's loyalty.

I am etc.,

CAROLYN A. E. GRAHAM

Constant Spring Gardens

caro_sean@yahoo.com

Back to Letters