👣 Noire Pilgrim: Invisible to the World

Is a black woman invisible to the world? If you don’t see color what do you see?

A Sign Post

Along the pilgrim path, I stopped at an albergue whose signage invited pilgrims a kilometer or two ahead to stop at its cafe. I arrived to find a few of my camino friends already there drinking coffee and eating cookies.

The place is managed by a missionary from a south African country. I listened to the host talk about his family’s 200 year history in that part of Africa. He talked about his family’s missionary work there and the resulting lack of rebellion and strife compared to a larger neighboring country.

Docile or Restrained

The reason the native Africans in his country had not rebelled or do not resent white people like him and his family is, according to him, because they have been converted to Christianity by missionaries. He denied the continuing and targeted efforts employed to erase these people’s language, ancestral memories, hopes and dreams in the name of his religion and race.

You can’t change History

Racism was introduced during the colonial era in the 19th century, when emigrating white settlers began racially discriminating against the native Africans living in the region. These colonies were dominated by a white minority which imposed racist policies in all areas of public life. The goal* was to de-emphasize black Africans politically, psychologically, and eventually, corporally.

He seemed to think that black Africans want to be white because they bleach their skin. This debilitating practice and others like it are, to me, transactions forced on a people who only see one thing. They see the benefits of “white” skin enabling them to get a job or other advantages. In these cases, black African people think they will turn into white men or women for privileges that are not real.

After these procedures, black skin does not look like white skin or possess DNA of white people. They approach conspicuous translucence but the erasure of their “blackness” was not accomplished. And it falls short of any expectation to be anything other than what they were born to be.

Now what “color” do you see?

While this is happening, this white missionary claimed to be African, while the bleached black man in his “home” country is not African but a… Christian. In the midst of this, the theft of their ancestral inheritance continues to be perpetrated. According to this missionary, the African is happy and satisfied to exchange his or her birthright for so little.

This, in a time when these religious institutions are currently in turmoil caused by shocking and sad revelations that rock the world again and again.

Speech was given to man to disguise his thoughts.

– Charles Maurice de Talleyrand

Origin is important

These messengers of Christianity want us to feel they are saving Africans and the world. To me, it is the continuation of the notion of terra nullius meant to justify claiming land and property long-shepherded by first and original people all over the world. It is a ridiculous thought that rearranged the planet and seeks to destroy the very people who can save it.

The original or first humans – African man and African woman who were birthed on this continent for over 2 billion years – created great civilizations, laid down seeds of thought and their bodies and built this world.

Unfortunately, in little more than five hundred years of unchallenged mind conditioning and myths singularly and falsely characterize black people of African descent as the worst of humanity.

The story

People of black African descent or members of the diaspora exist in every country on this earth. The slave trade was the biggest factor. There is no denial about that.

Many people are not aware that worldwide distribution of extraordinary cancer cells from a black woman without her consent and for no compensation to her descendants has been the basis for almost all of the medical miracles that are used to this very day. Has the so-called “one-drop” rule historically used to abuse human beings been suspended for greed and profit?

This real crime against humanity along with the destruction of black families, communities, and their history plus failure of the law to intervene are poised for a reckoning.

I’m not judging

I am being asked to recognise who I am not… then erase myself.

This man, a missionary, claims to be more African than the African. In fact, in the presence of my fellow pilgrims, he declared that he, a white man, is African and that I am not because I do not live in Africa. It was a show of unreserved arrogance at its worst. Perhaps the mantle of worst of humanity should also be claimed.

I have heard this before. A white person who lived in Africa for a few years is now African and that I with the mitochondrial cells of an African, whose ancestors were forcefully removed from the continent, and whose presence in any country elicits the demand to go back to Africa, am not. Those ignorant comments often come from so-called educated people.

Paradox on the path

This message of the transformation of a former white resident into an African because he lived there – and that I, a black woman of African descent, do not – is dangerous and pathetic.

I am who I am. It is difficult to say that there is not (rightful) judgment on my part… in my mind or in my heart. I will surely think about it every time that I look in the mirror or when I think of my grandmothers. Wherever I go – without fail – I am baptized with demands to “go back to Africa”. That’s a planet-full of contradiction and irony!

Footprints

In all honesty, this was an experience that did not shock or surprise me on the pilgrimage path. The stories about Santiago or Saint James the Moor slayer conflict with history and each other. The truth that surrounds the “defeat” of the Moors at the Battle of Clavijo in Spain and Europe holds little fact, more fiction, and wishful thinking.

The myth has never been cleared up. It is still used to shape thinking about people of a darker hue and their descendants ever since.

As a pilgrim on the camino, I approach the images, monuments and buildings dedicated to these beliefs as politely as any other visitor. People believe what they want or need to believe.

Are black women invisible?

No.

Over 2 billion years of existence assures that. We have 2 billion more to go. Surviving these things – forced trade of African bodies for slavery, legal genocide, and enforcement of systemic inhuman treatment of the planet’s black inhabitants – is a marvel of humanity.

Add to that a Pandora’s box of stolen cells and tissue that guarantees the black woman’s undeniable and unbreakable presence everywhere on this earth, in space, and on the camino trail.

Do you see me?

I see you.

________

Baadaye and Buen Camino

Shirley J ♥️

____________

** “The stolen cells of Henrietta Lacks and their ongoing contribution to science”, MedicalNewsToday, by Katherine Lang, October 18, 2022.

* Africa is the Most Oppressed Continent in History, La Pais, by Jose Naranjos, July 18, 2023.

Update:

Medical exploitation of Black people in America goes far beyond the cells stolen from Henrietta Lacks that produced modern day miracles, by Deion Scott Hawkins,published August 8, 2023