Mental Slavery Is There Any True Escape?

It is the year 2020 and you are growing up to be a strong woman and you will be able to journey into this world as a strong independent balck woman of the future generation. I am currently aware that you are learning about the captivity of the black race beginning in the year of 1619. Despite the end to our ancestors bondage. We are still struggling as a balck race due to the psychological destruction of our ancestors. As your loving cousin I believe it is my sworn duty to open your eyes to where exactly this lies.

You have been given a small summary of the physical and mental damage of your fellow black ancestors. You have been aware of the hardship they faced up until their history making triumph in the year 1863. This year marks the physical separation of every black person from bondage across the globe. This is old news of course something that is not often discussed about in our current point in time.

Perhaps you think that such a thing like slavery has no occurance in todays ime where black people are free to do almost anything. You may wonder to yourself why after all these years of freedom from captivity is the black race,your race still struggling? I am here to inform you that the effects of slavery have still taken a toll on us,not physically persay but mentally. It is the slave mentality that has been the cause for every generation being held back.

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The lack of support from black people in politics,the general thought that you can and never will be born with a fair advantage just because the color of your skin is a darker skin tone, the fact that you believe you are destined for failure so you don’t even bother to try to participate in events that can and will give you a fair advantage such as voting. There are many problems with our black race but the worst thing our race has done has been to continue this cycle and spread it around as if it’s a culture. Despite the amount of people still advocating for the end of this cycle the overwhelming majority still insist that this cycle is the way for black people paved by the effects of colonization as well as the psychological effects of slavery.Is this true? Are we really doomed to a system made by our ancestors?There are exposed behaviors of fear of the black race in the modern age when regarding their daily tasks to preserve their “black bodies” as presented by Coates in Between the world and me. This shows similarities to the psychological damage depicted in Jamaica Kincaid’s in A Small Place. She expresses the concerns of the people of Antigua “partially” succumbing to the problems each and every generation of black race must deal with,the mental submission to a slave’s role. They show the effects in the present-day modern civilization, thus showing an endless almost to no avail struggle of resistance against a seemingly ancient mentality. With that being said if one were to find a way to break away from said mentality they would then witness the essence of freedom and learn how to live in their own skin despite the challenges.

In reguards to politics the act of mental slavery plays a role in giving Black people the assumption that theyre opinion doesnt matter if theyre goverment is corrupt. Many are aware but few do anything to stop it giving the people who make the government corrupt the chance to have it remain that way”I asked is this the Antigua self ruled a worse place than when it was dominated by the bad minded english and all the bad minded things they brought with them? How did Antigua get to such a state in which I would have to ask myself this? For the answer on every Antiguans lips,the answer to the question”What is going on here now” is “ the government is corrupt them are thief them are big thief”(kincaid 41 ) when kincaid talks to her audience she talks about the corruption she’s really referring to the fact that The slave mentality has made its way to politics as r in this quote. The people who are in control (which is a few) have chosen to silence the people of Antigua from certains questions that may arise in politics. Everyone is in turn aware of this behavior similarly to how blacks in the book Between the world in me are aware of the systems set up to hurt their body they still subject to it.The difference aired between the two show when they are being governed by one of their own( a fellow Antigan) but assuming they figured they were under better treatment they were before by the Europeans they see this as step up rather than being stuck in the same place. “Why is the old building that was damaged in the famous earthquake years ago? The building that has the famous legend on it this building was damaged in the earthquake of 1974 repairs are pending, not repaired and the library is not put back where it used to be? Or why years after the earthquake damaged the old library building has a new one not been built? Why is the library now above a dry goods store in an old run down cement brick building?”This quote being a prime example of what happens when you have a corrupted government.The significance behind this quote was that before the famous earthquake of 1974 Antigua had a grand library one that was beautifully painted and had all the books beautifully bestowed on a shelf in order to preserve them properly, one could say it was one of the finer things of Antigua. Unfortunately after the earthquake the library was never restored and not because the money wasn’t there but because the government of antigua rather waste it on other affairs that aren’t beneficial to its people whats so ever as the books are inconsiderably thrown into boxes damaging their once true form as they collect dust leaving the building after 15 years still unusable. When you vote for a president or a candidate who promises the things that you see would be beneficial you are exercising your right given to you as a human and a citizen of your country. You must hold these people accountable when they do wrong by you otherwise you are subjecting yourself to a mentality take thrives on the silence and brainless cooperation which usually only leads to the african american race once again being stuck in a cycle that does not see the need to help its people in end despite the fact that it was built upon the backs of our black race.

I am not sure if you are aware of this but even now the slave mentality has been implemented into the social lives of some people. The dangerous belief is that no matter how you feel about a certain topic you must act a certain way, be cautious of how you communicate with specific people who show difference in race and as well as how you direct your body language. Such a practice is shown for other races though they’ve abolished salvery to still feel superior to that race. Making these rules of censorship a common practice enables the races especially the black race to speak their opinions and truly express themselves despite the fact that there is no real rule or law that states they should use “appropriate” language when speaking to certain groups of another race. In A small place by jamaica kincaid she criticizes the nature of how antiguans act towards their own in contrast to how they act towards the people(in this case it would be Europeans,The British and the people who owned the country club) who in this case despite the fact that they fail to acknowledge it genuinely believe they are less than them. We thought these people were so ill-mannered and we were so surprised by this, for they were far away from their home, and we

believed that the farther away you were from your home the better you should behave. (This is because if your bad behavior gets you

in trouble you have your family not too far off to help defend you.) We thought that they were un-Christian-like; we thought they were

small-minded; we thought they were like animals, a bit below human standards as we understood those standards to be. We felt

superior to all these people (29) . Here she eloquently explains the way many Antiguans think and behave when regarding the issue of how they are treated by other(presumably white) races. Moving away from the fact that the people from the country club treat them so badly they’re still taught to view them a specific type of way, never to once examine the thought that a country club owner could be racist but just “bad minded” and “ill mannered”. The symbolism behind these words represents brainwashing in its finest form. These words are replaced to mask the obvious racism towards the antiguans in an attempt to give them an explanation as to why a specific group acts a specific way towards them. Another important aspect of these words should be what the antiguans see these words as,when they use these words as explained in detail they see themselves as superior to the owners of the country club. The words however are actually in turn being used to prevent an uproar. Similar to Frederick Douglass’s Explanation of the method used by slave owners to prevent outroar in his book the Narrative life of Fredrick Douglass ”These holidays serve as conductors, or safety-valves, to carry off the rebellious spirit of enslaved humanity. But for these, the slave would be forced up to the wildest desperation; and woe betide the slaveholder, the day he ventures to remove or hinder the operation of those conductors! I warn him that, in such an event, a spirit will go forth in their midst, more to be dreaded than the most appalling earthquake.(93) The consideration taken into ensuring that a slave celebrates certain holidays has only one purpose, to prevent a retaliation of the slaves and crush their spirits that yearn for liberty. Slave masters taking away the pleasures of celebrating and especially getting intoxicated on christmas would only fuel a slaves desire for freedom. Fredrick makes the implication that slave masters are aware of the slaves spirit and what they crave. By establishing a day in which slaves don’t have to succumb to dehumanizing labor they give slaves an even to eagerly await every day of the year. This decreases a slave’s desire for something more than what they were born into,one could say that this would be the only thing stopping a slave between total rebellion. Similar principles apply to the Antiguans in A small place. In order for the Antiguans to tolerate such ill mouthed behavior they would need to think they’re doing something better than their opposites.The sheer fact that that according to Kincaid no one has dared to question why instead of using words that are more compatible with the feelings of well justified anger or frustration,they(the colonizers) censor certain words to express themselves(the antiguans) then proceed to contaminate their very view of racism leaving them unable to spot something that is right in front of them.

Everyone’s case for this is different dear cousin however you cannot allow yourself to be swayed by what a group is expected of you to believe,for the truth you have been told may not be the full truth. A fine example in human history is the indian Rebellion of 1857. This rebellion started after both the muslims and the Hindus joined forces in order to rebel against Great Britain. It was “rumored”that the soldiers were using both pig grease(which was disrespectful to the muslin religion as they were not supposed to consume anything of a pig) and Cow grease(which was disrespectful to the Hindu religion bearing in mind that the cow was sacred to the hindu religion). In Great Britain many textbooks deny ever such a thing happened. However upon further inspection Britain made the implication that their soldiers should have a different type of cartage made from beeswax.”The British repeatedly denied the rumors, even suggesting that the soldiers remake the cartridges with a neutral sealant such as beeswax. In the soldiers’ minds, this proposal simply confirmed the rumors. They were certain that the greased cartridges were a British plot to render them impure and, thus, separate them from their families and communities. This would, the reasoning went, make them more vulnerable to Christian missionizing.

In the end, the officers had little patience with their soldiers’ concerns. All they could see was a refusal to use the new weapons technology. When they forced the matter, troops at several forts rebelled, firing on the officers and refusing to take orders.” The British deny being responsible for the causes of anger and frustration for both religions however sources around the world say otherwise ,as a single statement confirmed the rumors to be true and the carelessness of the british empire to be exposed for its inability to properly respect its allies religions.My dearest cousin take the use of everyone’s point of view into consideration and never allow yourself to be swayed by practices that allow you to give up your freedom to express yourself. It is one of the only ways us humans can communicate.

Fear has always been a tactic used to establish submission into someone. To some fear that something bad may physically happen to you others are psychological. In today’s society fear has been used against one’s body. Coates contributes to the argument by stating “ My father was so very afraid I felt it in the sting of his black leather belt which he applied to me with more anxiety than anger,my father who beat me as if someone might steal me away because that’s exactly what was happening all around us. Everyone had lost a child somehow to the streets,to jail,to drugs,to guns. It was said that these lost girls were as sweet as honey. It was said that lost boys had just received a GED and had begun to turn their lives around.And now they were gone and their legacy was a great fear…..I would hear it in my dad’s voice–”Either i can beat him or the police”(14-15). Addressing a common concern in parents contributes to the fear of the black race. When he explains the phrase his father says to him”Either i can beat him or the police” it confirmed the fear many black parents have that if they’re not extremely careful with their kids,they will lose them to the police who when beaten will give them no mercy when beating them as they assault your body until it is unusable by the host. Regarding fear in social stances an example with similar principles can be the section Girl in the book At