'Recovery From Racism For Humans'

by Rev.Bola

This blog has been a long time coming. I have been preparing for it, by doing a great deal of research and personal study on the subject, so as to come up with actual examples and practical solutions that would benefit a broad spectrum of people. I wanted to make this blog purposeful and inspirational enough to encourage others as well as myself, to take positive and constructive action to eliminate racism from the world, and to do it without inciting people to reckless and undue violence and abuse.

Racism is indeed a very sensitive matter for many of us. The solution to it cannot be undermined further with patronizing idealism, denial, hypocrisy, generalizations, ambiguity, or any of the other subtle ways of avoiding the issue. When we talk of people of color, we are discussing the vast majority of the human population. This matter clearly affects all humans; whether you are a perpetrator, a victim, or an idle stander-by, racism concerns us all. Fortunately I am not the first person to raise this issue for discussion, nor will I be the last. I have many role models I can emulate, including stellar well known ones, as President Nelson Mandela, Oprah Winfrey, Rev.Martin Luther King and Ghandi to name a few.

I am a black woman of African heritage, and as far as I know, I do not have any other racial mixes in my genetic make-up, other than African. In addition, I have spent the greater part of my life living in the United kingdom, and most of my cultural influences are western, particularly British and American. I have a predominantly British/American education. Never-the-less, I still have a lot of African cultural influences directing my personality and my innate sense of identity. Am I esteemed by my heritage? Very much so. I love who and what I am. Usually, when people meet me in person, they are often in no doubt, that both my African and my western British influences are evident, and that both blend well together in me, and in a manner that I can be happy with and quite proud of. I have dual nationalities, and two passports, both of which I would never give up, for anything in the world. I believe I have earned my right to be both British and African; not because I am nationalistic, but rather because I am phenomenally grateful, for every one of the cultural influences that have shaped my life and made me who I am today. Phenomenally grateful, I repeat.

Racism influenced my life, even before I was born. It has continued to weave its ugly passage through my life, in one form or another, from my day of birth, and right through to this current day. All of my life, I have had to live with it, recognize it, get around it, deflect it, avoid it, learn from it, discuss it, ignore it, run away from it, stand up to it, ponder over it, or deal with this unwanted nemesis in my life called racism. One way or another, willingly or unwillingly, consciously or unconsciously, directly or indirectly, racism has been a major culprit in my life demanding my attention.

I am in no denial about this subject at all. Racism has affected my self esteem, my physical health, my mental health, my emotional health. It has affected my relationships with others, my family of origin, my ability to be married and raise a family of my own, my friends, my social life, my career, my work, my hobbies and pastimes, my finances, my buying decisions. It has affected where I live, where I go, whom I can support, whom I can receive support from, how I socialize, how I view the world around me, and every aspect of my freedom and liberty as an individual and a group or community member. It has affected my choice of Faith and manner of worship, and my religious practice. There is not a single area of my life that racism has not affected (except of course my spirituality, which is something I will be addressing later on). Henceforth, I have decided that, Racism as an issue, does require blogging about, and some further discussion on my part, now and long after I am gone from this earth.

I would like to pose a couple of important questions.
Firstly, what exactly is racism? and secondly, whom or what does racism serve? ( as to say, what use is it to anyone, and whom or what stands to gain anything from it?)

I believe that asking ourselves these two very important questions, can assist us greatly, in deciding whether racism is something we want to continue having, as part of our game of life, and if not, what we can do to reduce it and completely remove it.

As you consider the above two questions, would you say that they are religious or spiritual questions, political questions, or scientific questions? Would you say these questions were Artistic questions, Social questions, Economic questions, Biological questions, Paranormal questions, Medical questions, or Ethical questions? Are they intelligent questions, or stupid questions? Are they humanistic questions, or universal questions, or would you say that they are a bit of all of the above or absolutely nothing to do with any of the above? How would you label these two questions, and how would you go about answering them?

Personally, I would love to hear and share your views and comments about this. please send them in, and keep them coming.
In this blog I will also be attempting to present the answers I have found, to these questions, whatever knowledge and awareness I have gained, and also some practical solutions. Stay tuned!

Blessings and Love
Rev.Bola A
(copyright: 17.10.09 -ARR)