Universally Speaking
Rahim Islam is a National Speaker and Writer, Convener of Philadelphia Community of Leaders, and President/CEO of Universal Companies, a community development and education management company headquartered in Philadelphia, PA. Follow Rahim Islam on FaceBook(Rahim Islam) & Twitter (@RahimIslamUC)
Rahim Islam
I must begin by saying that I wholeheartedly support Minister Louis Farrakhan’s call to gather in Washington, DC on October 10, 2015 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Millions Man March and to kick off a national movement for justice titled “Justice or Else.”
In spite of the “supposedly” gains that Black people have made in America, in my humble opinion, the purpose and reason for this call is needed today more than at any time in our history.
I will not only attend, I will do all I can to make sure that the event is successful.
I am working in Philadelphia, Milwaukee and on a national level to contribute both time and resources and I am hoping that you will do the same. Why?
Not because I’m a follower of Minister Farrakhan, but rather, I’m a supporter of Black Leadership and I will support any mobilization effort that will not only shine a spotlight on the oppression of Blacks in America, but also, like the Million Man March, it will produce the a sincere and profound level of “Black” pride which is sorely needed now more than ever.
I support this effort because we need a “national” Black voice and “national” Black leadership.
I’ve written on many occasions questioning the purpose of marches but I really wasn’t faulting the march, vigil, or memorial, what I really was questioning was the strategy or lack of strategy to win what the purpose of the march was supposed to cure – knowing that it will require more than a march to change the conditions that the Black community faces (but let’s be clear, there is a real role for public marches).
It is no question that one of our biggest strengths is our numbers (we are a very large minority). However, we are unable to achieve the unity without utilizing the tool of mobilization.
There are some in our community that question the value and success of the Million Man March – I’m not one of them.
Even though I was not able to attend the event 20 years ago, I can quote a thousand reasons why the march was successful and regret that I did not attend (I did support and attend the Millions More Movement in 2005, the 10-year commemoration of the Millions Man March).
As I have tried to articulate on a number of occasion, a march by itself is not enough but the Million Man March demonstrated our power and our beauty – it showed the “real” potential of the Black community.
In addition, the theme of the Million Man March was about “atonement”, we were all instructed to go home, and change things ourselves and many organizations were established because of the Millions Man March.
It was not the Minister or the Nation of Islam’s responsibility to do work needed in our neighborhoods; that responsibility falls on the people of their community and that responsibility will never change.
In some cities the Local Planning Committee (LCO), which was represented by a number of organizations coming together to work as a unit, stayed together and some things were done jointly but so many of things happen individually.
The Million Man March was extremely successful because it represented an extremely large voice for the Black community. A big voice is essential to the movement; a big voice becomes a defended for the Black community; a big voice become allows the Black community to begin winning the “public” opinion which critical to the trajectory for change.
I liken having a collective voice being equivalent to being a big wind that is strong enough to shake the apple tree (America’s Resources) and cause the apples to drop from the tree – when we mobilize, we create a BLACK VOICE, and we create BLACK POWER.
Once the apples fall from the tree, we must be able to pick up the apples (infrastructure); take the apples and make applesauce, apple juice, or apple pie out of the apples (infrastructure); and then we must be able to deliver the final product to the market (infrastructure).
That is why I say that the march itself, while needed, it’s not enough.
We need both the VOICE AND THE INFRASTRUCTURE.
The Minister has wisely widened the tent by focusing on justice, not just for Black people, but also for all people no matter who you are and what your nationality is.
As the great Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King once said, “injustice anywhere is a threat to injustice everywhere.”
Which I interpret to mean that we all should be fighting against injustice because injustice is like a disease and unless it’s eradicated, it could easily impact those who feel protected now at some later date.
Dr. King also said that “silence is equivalent to betrayal.” We can no longer be quiet about the injustices that we see every day.
How many times can we see the report of an unarmed Black teenager gun down by the armed police; how long can we see government continue to build new prisons while we close schools;
The leadership that the Minister is providing takes extreme courage and sacrifice – something he has been doing for nearly sixty years. We know this man; we know his commitment to Black people and the struggle that we face in America.
His leadership shouldn’t be in question and if it is we must asked ourselves why.
The media will have you to interpret his message as anti-White or anti-Jewish but nothing could be further from the truth.
How can the Black community be beholden to the media that does nothing to promote the greatness of Black people but just the opposite, the media tries its very best to support and sustain White supremacy and Black inferiority – everywhere you turn, the media depicts the Black man as sub-human.
As Malcolm X once said that, the most powerful institution in America is the media because it has the power to make right wrong and wrong right.
The media also has the power to tell you who the Black man should support; who the Black man should follow; and who the Black man should be taken as its leader.
Since when can we trust the American media? You can book it! – If a Black person publicly challenges America for its racist and oppressive actions against Black people, America will not promote this person as someone Black people should accept as their leader unless they are dead.
Two Black men that come to mind: 1) Dr. Martin Luther King who they have portrayed, not as the revolutionary that he was, but as a pacifist with a dream; and 2) Malcom X who was an absolute freedom fighter but fail to recognize the person that catapulted Malcom into prominence – the Hon. Elijah Muhammad. When both of these men were alive, the media vilified them and when that wasn’t enough, they would employ the FBI, IRS (cointelpro) to further complicate their lives and interrupt the movement.
These tactics continue to be used to confuse and divide the Black community.
COINTELPRO (COunter INTELligence PROgram) was a series of covert illegal acts conducted by the FBI that was aimed at surveilling, infiltrating, discrediting, and disrupting primarily Black civil rights organizations.
The FBI has used covert operations and tactics aimed at discrediting the targets through psychological warfare; smearing individuals and groups using forged documents and by planting false reports in the media; harassment; wrongful imprisonment; and illegal violence, even assassination (both Dr. King and Malcom X were assassinated).
The FBI’s stated motivation was supposedly to protect national security but the tactics were absolutely, not only illegal, but many of the actions of the undercover agents, were to act as provocateurs and instigators in extreme violent and illegal activity. In addition, the FBI worked with the media to discredit both Dr. King and Malcolm X.
Cointelpro became a vicious “nazi SS” type arm of the US government that was aimed primarily at DESTROYING THE IDEA OF BLACK LEADERSHIP. BROTHERS AND SISTERS, WE CAN’T CONTINUE TO ALLOW OTHERS WHO HAVE NEVER SUPPORT US TO DEFINE WHO OUR LEADERS ARE.
No, I don’t agree with everything the Minister does or says.
Nor do I always agree on his methods, but I’m not dwelling on what we disagree on (very little), we must focus on what we agree on and what we agree on far outweighs what we disagree on – it is the media that plays out our differences into division.
What we must come to grip with is that we must really “reflect” on the media’s portrayal of those Black men that act independent and not afraid of calling it like it is and speaking the “truth” to power; speaking “truth” to the American power structure which continues to significantly oppress the Black community.
This call to action is critical for a number of reasons – one of the biggest reasons is that we have the opportunity to re-establish the Black voice, re-establish the Black movement.
Yes there were “con” with the Million Man Movement but there were cons with every mass effort that we’ve undertaken (nothing is perfect).
Not only did the Million Man March leave something on the table, this is similar to every effort of this kind.
We must not confuse the limitations of not have 20/20 vision and now we become Monday morning quarterbacks.
There is no bigger struggle in all of life that the struggle for justice – to me, this is the purpose of life.
The struggle for justice is not a destination or a sprint.
The struggle for justice is on-going and it’s an attitude that we must incorporate in everything that we say, do and believe in.
The self-determination of Black people must be the single most important issue that we have and we must do all we can to unite around that mandate across all sectors of our community (i.e. generation, income, gender, etc.).
This is not just for today, this is forever – we must come to understand that it never ends.
If I just listen to some people, they seem to think that if were very good, our oppressors will relent and give in and end their oppression.
While the thought of that is insane, it could never happen now because the oppression has been transferred over to institutional and structural oppression (its everywhere and part of everything) and its deeply rooted in Blacks inability to own (wealth disparity).
As Malcom X said “the oppressor will never feel the pain of the oppressed.” We must remove this from our thoughts and think only of ways to end our oppression – not slow it down; not soften it; not to change it so it looks different; WE MUST DO ALL WE CAN TO END OPPRESSION.
We must come to understand the natural order of the creation and as Frederick Douglas once stated that “Power concedes nothing without a demand; it never has or never will.” What does that demand look like?
How does that happen? Justice or else should be the cry of all people, especially Black people in America.
There is nothing else – you either have justice or injustice and if you have injustice you or obligated to fight to end to eradicate it.
Our entire beings from the inception has been made in the image of the Creator in that we are naturally aligned to do what is right versus what is wrong.
The human being has a natural receptor to understand right from wrong and this is feed by everything in nature.
The human being is built for the struggle of right (truth) against wrong (falsehood) and justice is a derivative of right (truth); you cannot have justice without being right; you cannot have justice without having truth; and you cannot have either without Black leadership.
It’s important to clarify what a Black leadership because it’s very clear from some of the comments that I’ve heard about Justice or Else, there are some people in a leadership role that fail to recognize the severity of the times that we live in and in some way are acting against the will and needs of the people.
How can anyone not join an effort to achieve justice for the Black man?
How can one justify “sitting” out? If the call isn’t being made, what are you doing and do you believe that what you are doing can deliver justice for the Black family in America?
It is extremely ignorant and naïve to think that what you do locally can achieve the voice needed to, at the very least, slow down these people and their oppression of Black people.
The hope is that we can slow them down long enough so that we are able to mobilize.
The strategy is that were able to show the oppressors and to show ourselves BLACK POWER.
One of the many tricks of the oppressor has done to maintain is control over Black people is to divide and conquer and the Black man in America has been divided in so many ways. Brothers and sisters, our power is our unity.
Dr. King once said that our power was in our numbers.
We cannot achieve or harness our power until we begin to align ourselves with each other – we begin to work together.
I am not talking about something we do today and not tomorrow.
The working together Black people must do is forever because you can best believe that the oppressor and his oppression is perfectly aligned to maintain his power and control over Black people (they are working 24/7/365).
We can defeat the oppressor – why? Because it is against nature to practice oppression and injustice.
Everything in nature supports justice and fights injustice.
When we wage war against injustice, we will be going with the natural flow of nature and everything in the creation will be behind us but we cannot begin to undertake that fight if we do not understand our own Black Power.
Black Power is Black Consciousness and when you can mobilize millions of Black people to focus on one issue Justice; this is the foundation for Black Power.
To achieve any of this, we need Black leadership.
We need Black leaders that are conscious of their blackness.
To be conscious is to be loyal to Black people, not your organization, your ideology, your civic group, your income class.
To be a conscious Black leader you must be loyal to your Black people.
Undoubtedly, leadership comes in a variety of forms, but one characteristic remains extremely critical for Black leadership is to be calling for the unification of the Black family.
Whether we accept it or not, Minister Farrakhan is a leader that other Black leaders and Black people must support.
When we support Justice or Else, we’re not supporting Minister Farrakhan nor are we supporting the Nation of Islam, we are supporting Black Leadership, which is a prerequisite for Black Power.
When we support Justice or Else, we are supporting Black power and Black unity both prerequisites for achieving justice.
When we support Justice or Else, we support the visual beauty of Black people, which is a prerequisite for uplifting and strengthening the Black spirit.
When we support Justice or Else, we show the American superpower and the world that no one group has real control of the people without doing right by them (justice) – we show them that there is a higher power above them.
When we support Justice or Else, we are supporting the biggest Black national voice on the biggest stage that we have and if we are successful, we can return home and leverage this event to sustain the voice and momentum to begin to work on aggregating and unifying ourselves locally.
We live in a democracy and in a democracy everyone, if you want to “win,” you must have leadership and/or a leader.
Every group has representation and every idea if it has to win amongst other ideas, must have leadership.
In a democracy, you must have leadership or you perish.
This is truer when you are at the bottom of the food chain (economic ladder).
Our leaders continue to fail us by not doing the very basic things needed – they must be united.
We see division at every level. We have very little Black leadership because we lack Black unity.
We will not have Black unity until the leaders begin unite – this is real leadership.
Everyone agrees that if we keep doing the same thing that we have been doing, we will get the same outcomes – creating a collective is absolutely the way to go.
In my humble opinion, there are three (3) things that we must recognize if we are to have a shot at changing our conditions:
1) it’s going to take a significant high level of unity amongst Black people Continued on page 7 Photo credit, 300MenMarch.com. especially our leaders;
2) our progress will only come when we organized our resources, capacities, and people; and
3) we will have to earn the success that we envision – no one will give what we need and what we deserve, we MUST DO THE WORK.”
We are greater than the sum of its parts – our problem is that we just get to see often enough. If you look at a house (or anything), each “part”— the design, bricks, wood, fixtures, paint, carpets, etc. and even the labor—has its own value.
However, putting the parts together in one place at one time into the final product escalates the value geometrically.
When it all comes together, some call it synergy. We reference the greatness of our people but to be great is to have great leaders and to be great leaders, they must be able to lead (good action). Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King “There comes a time when silence is betrayal”
There are no easy solutions for achieving justice in America.
As the great Marcus Garvey stated that human life is nothing but a struggle and we are equipped for the fight.
What else are we to do if don’t struggle against oppression?
Do we just keep doing what we are doing – nothing?
Do we just sit back and watch our children get less and less?
Do we watch the further deterioration of the Black race?
Will we want to do something after we have become a permanent underclass in America?
What is it going to do take for you brother and sister to do something?
The call to DC will require just a little sacrifice that will contribute a heavy dose of unity that could save our entire race, yes save our entire race.
If you don’t want to struggle for freedom, justice, and equality for yourself and future Black children, then as Marcus Garvey said “go home” and I say stay home while I and other go to Washington and mobilize with others who believe in Justice or Else.