Life under negative expectations
The issue of racism has impacted every aspect of my life beginning as a young child, as I began to ascertain what it looks like, sounds like, and feels like. These acts would come from white America because of the systemic racism this country was founded on. This country was built for European immigrants who escaped a life of poverty in their homelands. When Europeans began forming the United States, which included writing the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution, these documents did not include rights for any people of African heritage. Before and after the United States gained their independence the use of African chattel slaves ramped up during the heights of the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
During slavery, the powers that be determined a need to create propaganda to demonize black people and to establish the Caucasian people as a superior race. This spurred the writing of the Willie Lynch letter, which purported the secret of how to control black slaves by setting them against each other. This was used as a tactic which in Latin is called (divide et impera), which in English is known as divide and conquer.
The United States made amendments to the Constitution abolishing slavery (13th Amendment), giving black men the right to vote (15th Amendment), as well as language stating blacks were three-fifths of a person. The Dred Scott decision by the Supreme Court found that neither Dred Scott nor any other person of African ancestry could claim citizenship in the United States. In addition to these laws were Jim Crow laws calling for limiting the freedom of blacks in American society and the black codes called for the limiting of freedom to ensure blacks the availability of a cheap labor force after slavery was abolished.
In present day, the United States continues the agenda of Caucasian superiority over black people and other non-Europeans. This has deeply affected black Americans to present day America with a lack of knowledge of their true history, culture, and beliefs. Lacking these things has caused above all else a lack of self-esteem and belief in one’s self, which is a mental obstacle black Americans struggle with every day. Our people remain in a country that does not value our lives and you wonder why we are so broken.