Though they swear to be the incarnation of pro-blackness, African authenticity, as they view themselves to be superior to the white Western groups whose members lost both their culture and identity for the profit of capitalism and mass consumerism, it is clear that the orchestrated Black Lives Matter protests from the late 2010s highlighted one problematic fact.
Black Westerners have not only become mediocre, but they are no longer who and what they have pretended to be.
From that particular moment, though the questions related to immigration, racism and identity never ceased to be evoked, the black Western world should be divided into two groups.
Though a small minority still wants to resist, fighting against oppression following the example of Darren Seals, the great majority of Blacks living in the West no longer have any identity and have turned to mass consumerism and capitalism instead.
Without even knowing it, the elitist white institutions which rule over the West, whether in the United States or in Western Europe, along with the white population, failed to understand one reality. The black groups they perceive as being strangers to them are nothing but the mirror of their Western politics, of themselves.
And even though these black groups consider themselves to be the epitome of blackness, authenticity, as they falsely believe to have maintained their African essence, they have become Western agents, too.
Politics
When it comes to the fight for black equal rights, one question remains. Do Black Westerners decide to be involved in resistance to achieve real freedom or do they want to be accepted in the white elitist spheres they secretly wish to be a part of?
The black experience in the West was truly built upon a lie. This lie first began with the narrative of the forefathers, whether parents, grandparents or great-grandparents. In this discourse, the individuals left their original country, often poor, and migrated to the Northern sphere in order to have a better life. These forefathers surely did what they could but their sacrifice in leaving their original nation to be oppressed in the wealthiest ones living in the Northern hemisphere is always used as a source of motivation to push the desire of integration of the descendants who will fully be a part of the chosen Northern country. To them, parents will argue about the importance of working ten times harder, to do good in school and to go to college in order to make it in life.
In reality, the Western elites, whose members want to remain white and pure, also find within these minorities their new recruits of color who will eventually serve their agenda and adopt their values which are contrary to their original roots in the South. Indeed, the families do not place the problematic of integration upon the preservation of heritage, roots and spirituality but rather on capitalism itself, since Western integration is deeply anti-African. Throughout history, the black American example was placed before any other since the black Americans embody, to the eyes of the white Westerners, the success of integration. They are no longer African, and the few minorities such as the Gullas who kept their African ancestry at heart are not made visible and also victims of land appropriation and theft by wealthier white land owners. The black American example was never praised for a particular ability to have kept the African essence at all.
As time goes by and as new generations form, the members of these minorities who are conditioned to follow, adopt and transmit the white Western model to their children, use the excuse of the racism they experience at the hands of the white elite to deny the fact that they are no longer what their ancestors were, for being pure Western agents of the West’ propaganda.
This fact is even more realistic in our present political era which has nothing to do with the state of the world in the 1960s. Indeed, the 21st century is nothing less but the heritage of political decisions made in the West forty years ago, in the 1980s.
There, our former leaders, whether American, French, British or Italian, knew about the political outcome of the West which would become much more globalised.
At the beginning of the 20th century, W.E.B. DuBois wrote about the concept of “double consciousness”. The black American thinker exposed the troubled mechanisms of the black psyche which was dual and submitted to two opposite ideas which were, on the one hand, the desire of being fully integrated in a Western white culture, and on the other hand the desire of preserving one’s African identity.
The double consciousness developed by DuBois emphasizes one element. First, if we mentioned in former articles that slavery was the first technological tool used by the West and the East to develop their wealth, we also tend to forget that the enslaved Africans were sold out during a time marked by the early phases of globalism as well. The creation of the Atlantic Creoles, hence displaced and kidnapped Africans forced to develop new cultures in the Americas or in the coasts of West and East Africa, is one example. There, mixed-race and black individuals who were trapped within the economic triangle also struggled with finding a place of their own, for having been created by slave masters and colonial agents.
Therefore, by the time DuBois wrote about the concept of “double consciousness”, the black Western group was still trying to navigate through the concept of duality.
Yet, the modern black Western writers, though pretending to be the incarnation of black authenticity, are nothing but the black faces of white imperialism. From a political point of view, they remain in the West for being attached to it, since the region became their new home. Consequently, since they were born there and raised there, they are attached to it and can not pretend to be something other than Westerners. This political and identity problem surpasses the issue of color, especially when color was attributed to identity following the 15th century downfall of the Moors, as well as the development of racist thesis dating back from the 19th century.
Yet, the modern black Western intellectuals not only exploit the works of Malcolm X and W.E.B. DuBois to manipulate and construct a false idea of black identity politics which is based upon Eurocentric and capitalistic principles, but they also continue to advance the false narrative that their skin color in the West make them different from the rest of the Westerners, while being a part of the machine they hate, but consume and secretly want to belong to.
For this reason, black politics in the West could be resumed as such: it is a group of egomaniac thinkers, whether in the field of academia, politics, music or literature, who also belong to a controlled opposition. Though they present themselves as revolutionaries, their only desire is to be accepted by the white institutions they pretend to fight against. Their anger has to do with them not wanting to share their power with black Westerners who do not have their ethnic and racial background at all.
The center of black politics in the West comes from the United States where the concept of “blackness” which is always Western but never African in essence, has been tied to capitalism and thus Westernization.
In a passage, writer Russel Rickford mentions a passage from Frantz Fanon. He writes: “Anticolonial theorist Frantz Fanon once warned, in a chapter titled “The Pitfalls of National Consciousness,” that the African postcolonial bourgeoisie would manipulate the symbols of Black cultural and political autonomy to advance its own narrow agenda. Black is King adds a new twist to the scenario. This time an African American megastar and entrepreneur has appropriated African nationalist and pan-Africanist imagery to promote the spirit of global capitalism.”
The black Americans influence the other black European groups for their particular condition. They are the first minority of the wealthiest country on earth and contributed greatly to the culture of the West. Due to this reality, the black American group is regarded as being superior to the others as their experience is linked to money, profit and capitalism.
Identity
The debates regarding immigration still present the Black Westerners and the White ones as the opposite of one another. In reality, they are the same. The Black leaders and thinkers do not want to fight for equality and justice, but ought to lead in power and share the power with the Whites. In order to do it, they will fuel anger by exploiting the neo-colonial European policies in Africa so as to pretend they are against them, when this is just a phase hiding their desire of being embraced.
The BLM protests revealed how modern black Western leaders have little to no interest in fighting against a colonialism they need to secure their position of dominant in the political space. Like Patrisse Cullors in the U.S, and Assa Traoré in France, they do not hesitate to capitalize off the suffering of their own in order to reach the higher spheres of power.
One thing is to be noticed. The miserable political status of the black Westerners has to do with their inability to change anything from within, not because they can not do it, but simply because they do not want it. As long as they can benefit from profit and enjoy the resources of capitalism, no real black rebellion can take place in the West, as the black minorities truly believe that the value of a black Western man relies on money, capitalism and thus, profit.
It was the openness to massive consumerism which put an end to the black revolt in the black American spheres.
Therefore, since the white Westerners are now losing their identity, heritage and essence due to their obsession with capitalism, profit, technology and world domination, their black minorities will also follow the same disastrous path.
If these black groups originally came from rich ethnic backgrounds, they greatly accepted the process of integration which dissociated them from their Southern roots deemed inferior for being from the Southern sphere. Though poor in culture and identity, the West which is the epitome and center of the capitalistic political scene, became the ultimate model to follow over the years for the black Westerners.
This original Southern identity was thus replaced by a fabricated black culture, also tied to capitalism and void. New icons presented as the ultimate models of black heritage such as Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Alicia Keys, Nicki Minaj (Caribbean but assimilated into black American culture)are nothing less but mediocre agents placed as pawns to keep a certain group in backwardness, so as to dumb them down even more. This process is also turning against the white groups in the West which also suffer from a total loss of identity replaced by their technological advancement and the enjoyment of mass consumerism.
The Arrogance of the Black Westerner: Disdain for the Black Africans
In 2019, singer Beyoncé released an album called The Gift to honor her African roots. A year later, the movie Black Is King was shared through Disney Plus and was presented as a love letter to Africa from the performer.
The two productions were panned by the African community living in the continent as well as by African thinkers living in the West. Many social media users, critics, whether from Nigeria, Zimbabwe, exposed the “WAKANDIFICATION” of the African bodies in many scenes, accusing the black American singer of wanting to homogenize the African experience.
Also, many critics pointed out to the improbable desire of Beyoncé, who placed the African subjects under the prism of black elitism and capitalist consumerism, – hence codes shared by many dictatorial African families who emulated the white elite while spoiling the land resources of their nations- to give a representation of the continent she knew nothing about.
For example, a billionaire who exploits Asian children who make her clothes in third world countries, Beyoncé has never included Africa as a part of her world tours in recent years. African critics have highlighted the fact that Black Is King was released through Disney Plus, while many Africans do not even have access to it.
The singer also fails to represent Africans for who they really are. She presented them as kings and queens when not all Africans descend from royal African lines. As Eric Ottieno Sumba said in one article, her imagery of Africa was based upon the Hollywood vision of the continent. Thus, making it a movie made by a black Westerner with a colonial and irrealistic perception of a continent she is estranged from.
Two years prior, in 2017, the movie Black Panther also depicted Africans through this homogenization which made no sense.
Whether with Beyoncé’s Black Is King or Black Panther, the black American member of the artistic elite thinks like the Westerner he has become. Their point of view towards Africa places their sphere at the center of everything and the Motherland, they do not know nothing about, is romanticized. Their view of Africa would be similar to the black American panafricanists who swear that their ancestors were kings and queens, while not knowing nothing about the African experience.
Often, these black Westerners like Beyoncé or Erykah Badu, wrongly believe that their involvement in Africa would not only help the Africans, but that their position as Westerners would change the African continent.
In reality, Africans only need Africans to rebuild. Though the recent political history of the continent has been plagued by political violence, African artists are capable of releasing their own music, making their own scenes, producing their own movies and writing their own books.
Like the white Westerners, the black ones truly believe in their supremacy. Even if they complain about being treated with inferiority, they still consider the black Africans as inferior beings who could not develop themselves without them, as if their blurred political and artistic vision had to be shared in order to save poor souls in the African world.
In that sense, black Westerners who were originally Africans are going through the same process of Westernization imposed upon the Whites. They are losing their identity and rely on a fabricated one, hence that of “blackness” which was formed, supported and elevated as the prime example of success for being tied to whiteness, Northerness and thus, prosperity through the prism of integration and assimilation.
This black culture changed drastically over the past decades.
In reality, by the time soul, blues and r’n’b singers in the 1950s and 1960s sang the pain of their people and the struggle of their journey as members of the black community, a hidden culture of degeneracy was slowly forming and it would later come to terms in the 1980s and 1990s, with the rise of gangsta rap. The gangsta rappers were presented as violent threats, but they managed to generate millions for their music labels often ruled by white men who had nothing to do with the ghetto life or experience at all.
Yet, the black gangsta rappers always paid respect to their elders who sang about their pain, as they sampled blues, soul and jazz classics for their records. Still, they already were becoming agents of destruction embodying the Western values of decay and condescendance as they associated elements of black consciousness to the degeneracy of their environment.
These artists were the first to prove that one could be pro-black while promoting ideas which were contrary to the African essence.
Beyoncé embodies this perfect example as she always places the prospect of capitalism at the center of all things she sings and raps about. Matters related to soul, mental elevation and advancement are always linked to capitalistic expansion.
The constant alliance between the degeneracy and the fraudulent pro-blackness led to the mediocrity of black resistance today. It is not dangerous at all to the eyes of the white rulers from the elite, for it is performative. In this performance, new pro-black Western leaders still evolve within the prism of capitalism.
While Darren Seals fought independently with his peers, Patrisse Cullors and her team managed to infiltrate a movement which was originally eager to defend black rights. These women were also supported by Western media and by the white Western ruling class.
They were never revolutionaries, but members of controlled opposition.
Due to their proximity to capitalism and thus Northern advancement, these black rulers believe they are the epitome of blackness as they, in their minds, think they are the only ones in the planet to represent black authenticity while unaware of their mediocrity and parody of their actions.
In 2020, Patrisse Cullors supported the Cuban revolts, while praising the work of Fidel Castro who fought against U.S. Supremacy. Yet, her support was that of a black Western Marxist whose world vision was not more any different than that of a white leftist woman who calls for rebellion while maintaining her privileges. Cullors simply ignored the reality of the Afro-Cuban population. Indeed, if Castro and his men contributed to great advancements in Cuba, their decisions also contributed to the state of poverty in many categories of the island. Worst, the U.S. Embargo did not help at all. Still, these complexities are never respected or talked about by the new Western black leaders as long as they think that their vision should be universal.
Therefore, black Westerners were simply blocked in spheres of poverty where they were deprived of everything, from the history of their lineages, their roots, their heritage, and were reduced to the concept of blackness and assimilation, while trying to represent and promote cultures formed through and by the spiritual void.
Often, the black Western rulers still want to present the black man as being pure and innocent by nature, as opposed to an evil white man and institution whose goal is to destroy him. In reality, they have reproduced the neo-colonial tactics of exploitation towards their own brothers and sisters, as the pain of the poorest Negro will be taken advantage of by faux-pro black leaders in order to secure their position in the sphere of intellectual black poverty.
In the world of academia, groups of black Americans and black Africans who descend from immigrants also pretend to fight against colonialism, though they give their knowledge back to the North. These individuals are not fighting against anything, but also want to secure their position as whitewashed intellectual agents who wish to be a part of a white elite.
Therefore, a black revolution will never take place in the West as the new generations fulfilled the goals of the ancestors who migrated there. They reached the apex of capitalism, consumerism and for this reason, they will not go back to a South deemed inferior.
In other words, the black Westerner and the white one are the same in culture, thoughts and spirit.
They both have betrayed their roots, origins and ancestors for the advancement of capitalism, Westernization and profit.
By Victoria “VKY” Kabeya. All Rights Reserved, 2023
[1] Betty, Lisa “Disney, Capitalism, and Beyoncé’s Black Is King” Medium, July 29th, 2020, https://lbetty1.medium.com/disney-capitalism-and-beyonc%C3%A9s-black-is-king-c60fb2d9956e
[2] Otieno Sumba, Eric and Pinkrah, Nelly “‘Black Is King’ but Beyoncé Doesn’t Share the Crown”, Frieze Magazine, August 2020 https://www.frieze.com/article/black-king-beyonce-doesnt-share-crown
[3] Rickford, Russell, “Beyoncé’s ‘Black Is King’ and the Pitfalls of African Consciousness”, Black Perspectives, August 2020, https://www.aaihs.org/beyonces-black-is-king-and-the-pitfalls-of-african-consciousness/
[4] Sauphie, Eva “Beyoncé’s new film ‘Black Is King’ is stirring up controversy”, The Africa Report, July 2020, https://www.theafricareport.com/34850/beyonces-new-film-black-is-king-is-stirring-up-controversy/
[5] Thomas, Ashley-Rey “Rihanna and Beyoncé Can’t Save Us: Celebrating Black Wealth Is a Distraction”, The Walrus, 2021, https://thewalrus.ca/black-billionaires/
[6] Mngxitama, Lindiwe, “The Carters, blood diamonds and the choking hold of Black capitalism”, BubbleGumClub, 2022, https://bubblegumclub.co.za/discourse/the-carters-blood-diamonds-and-the-choking-hold-of-black-capitalism/
[7] Mbaba, Naledi, “The Black Bill Gates”, Africa Is A Country, 2020, https://africasacountry.com/2020/10/the-black-bill-gates
VKY 