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Jan. 14, 2021 - Epoch Times
10:56
Can We Stop With This Stupid Term 'African-American' ? | Larry Elder
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I want to tell you about a conversation I had with a congressperson and the term African-American.
I did a lot of crisscrossing across the so-called battleground states on behalf of the re-election of President Donald Trump.
And I met a congressperson, a Republican congressperson, who backstage, right before both of us were to give a speech, he and I were talking and he mentioned how he outreaches to the African-American community and he's concerned about the African-American church and he's trying to get the African-American vote.
He was white.
And after the fourth or fifth African-American, I couldn't take it anymore.
And I said, I don't want to be offensive, and I'm not suggesting that you are being offensive, but I really don't like the term African-American.
And he goes, oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you.
I said, again, you didn't offend me.
I'm just telling you, I consider the term to be demeaning, divisive, and pretty stupid.
I mean, after all, the Constitution banned the importation of new slaves in 1808.
So the likelihood is that my people have been here longer than most of the white people who are here.
If you don't find white people with an Irish-American or British-American or German-American, why do I have a hyphen?
But many white two arrived here after my family did.
Do not have a hyphen.
And he said, you know, I never really thought about it, but I'll give that some consideration.
I said, I don't expect you to stop saying it.
I know it's become a politically correct expression.
I'm just telling you, I don't like it and I find it condescending.
And you know what else?
I'm not the only one who feels that way.
I love being black.
I love being called black.
I love being an American.
I love being a black American.
But as a black man in this country, I think it's a shame that every few years we get a change of name.
Since those first ships arrived here from Africa that came across the sea, there were already black men in this country who were free.
And as for those who came over on those terrible boats, they were called enslaved and told what to do and how to behave.
And then Master started tripping during his midnight tipping down to the slave shacks where he forced he and great-great-grandma to be together.
And if great-great-grandpa protested, he got tired and feathered.
And at the same time, the black men in the country who were free were maiden with the tribes like the Apache and the Cherokee.
And as a result of all that, we're a parade of every shade.
And in this late day and age, you can be sure there ain't too many of us in this country whose bloodline is pure.
But according to a geological geographical genealogy study published in Time magazine, The black African people were the first on the scene.
So for what it's worth, the black African people were the first on Earth.
And through migration, our characteristics started to change and rearrange to adapt to whatever climate we migrated to.
And that's how I became me and you became you.
So if we're going to go back, let's go all the way back.
and if Adam was black and Eve was black, then that kinda makes it a natural fact that everybody in America is an African American.
Everybody in Europe is an African European.
Everybody in the Orient is an African-Asian and so on and so on.
That is, if the origin of man is what we're gonna go on.
And if one drop of black blood makes you black like they say, then everybody's black anyway.
So quit trying to change my identity.
I'm already who I was meant to be.
I'm a black American, born and raised.
And Brother James Brown wrote a wonderful phrase.
Say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud.
Say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud.
Cause I'm proud to be black.
And I ain't never lived in Africa.
And cause my great great granddaddy on my daddy's side did, don't mean I want to go back.
Now, I have nothing against Africa.
It's where some of the most beautiful places and people in the world are found.
But I've been blessed to go a lot of places in this world.
And if you ask me where I choose to live, I pick America, hands down.
Now, by and by, we were called Negroes.
And after a while, their name was banished.
Anyway, Negroes is just how you say black in Spanish.
Then we were called colored.
But shit, everybody's one color or another, and I think it's a shame that we hold that against each other.
And it seems like we reverted back to a time when being called black was an insult, even if it was another black man who said that a fight would result, because we've been so brainwashed that black was wrong, till even the yellows and the blacks couldn't get along.
But then came the 1960s when we struggled and died to be called equal and black and we walked with pride with our heads held high and our shoulders pushed back and black was beautiful.
But I guess that wasn't good enough because now here they come with some other stuff.
Who comes up with this shit anyway?
Was it one or a group of just sitting around one day?
Feeling a little insecure again about being called black and decided that African-Americans sounded a little more exotic.
Well, I think you were being a little more neurotic.
It's that same mentality that got Amos and Andy put off the air because they were embarrassed about the way the characters spoke.
And as a result of that action, a lot of wonderful black actors ended up broke when we were just laughing and having fun about ourselves.
So I say, fuck you if you can't take a joke.
You didn't see the Beverly Hillbillies being protested by white folks.
And if you think, of course you think, that being called African American sets all black people's minds at ease, since we affectionately call each other n****, I affectionately say to you, n**** please.
How come I didn't get a chance to vote on who I'd like to be?
Who gave you the right to make that decision for me?
I ain't under your rule or in your dominion, and I'm entitled to my own opinion.
Now, there are some African Americans here, but they recently moved here from places like Kenya, Ethiopia, Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Zaire, but not a brother whose family's lived in this country for generations, occupying space in all the locations, New York, Miami, LA, Detroit, Chicago, even if he's wearing a dashiki and sporting an afro.
And if you go to Africa in search of your race, you'll find out quick you're not an African-American.
You're just a black American in Africa taking up space.
While you keep trying to attach yourself to a continent where even if you got the chance to go and you went, most people that wouldn't even claim you as one of them, as a purebred daughter or son of them.
Your heritage is right here now, no matter what you call yourself or what you say.
And a lot of people died to make it that way.
And if you think America's the leader on inequality and suffering and grieving, how come there's so many people coming and so few leaving?
Rather than all this fine-fault, what America shit you promoting, if you want to change something, use your privilege.
Get to the polls.
Commence the voting.
God knows we've earned the right to be called American Americans and be free at last.
And rather than you moving forward with progress, you're dwelling in the past.
We've struggled too long.
We've come too far.
Instead of focusing on who we were, let's be proud of who we are.
We're the only people whose name is always a trend.
When is this going to end?
Look at all the different colors of our skin.
Black is not our color, it's our core.
It's what we've been living and fighting and dying for.
But if you choose to be called African American, and that's your preference, then I give you that reference.
But I know on this issue I don't stand alone on my own.
And if I do, then let me be me.
And I'd appreciate it if when you see me, you say, there goes a man who says it loud.
I'm black.
I'm black.
I'm a black American, and I'm proud.
Because I love being an American.
And I love being black.
I love being called black.
Yeah, I said it.
And I don't take it back.
And here's what Teddy Roosevelt said about hyphenated Americans.
There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism.
When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans.
Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad.
But a hyphenated American is not an American at all.
This is just as true of the man who puts native before the hyphen as of the man who puts German or Irish or English or French before the hyphen.
Americanism is a matter of the spirit and of the soul.
Our allegiance must be purely to the United States.
We must unsparingly condemn any man who holds any other allegiance.
The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities.
An intricate knot of German Americans, Irish Americans, English Americans, French Americans, Scandinavian Americans, or Italian Americans, each preserving its separate nationality Each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality than with the other citizens of the American Republic.
These men who do not become Americans and nothing else are hyphenated Americans and there ought to be no room for them in this country.
The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic.
He has no place here, and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart allegiance, the better it will be for every good American, end of quote.
Goodness, who does that sound like?
A firestorm of reactions continuing today to a series of tweets from President Trump targeting a group of Democratic Congresswomen, the president saying they should go back to the broken and crime-infested places from which they came.
By the way, I feel pretty much the same way about the term black leader.
My father, who, as you know, ran a small cafe for a number of years, told me that a white customer came into the cafe once and said, Randy, did you hear what your leader said last night?
And my dad said, my leader?
He goes, yeah, you know, Jesse Jackson, you're a leader.
And my dad said, really?
Who is your leader?
And the white guy says, well, I don't have one.
And my dad says, you work for somebody else.
I work for myself, but I have a leader and you don't.
And the man goes, well, I never thought about it.
My dad says, I'm my own leader.
Now, I told that story one time before a youth group.
And I said, when you think about it, who is the German leader?
German-American leader?
Who is the Irish-American leader?
Who's the Hispanic-American leader?
But black Americans have a leader.
Who is the Italian-American leader?
A kid raised his hand in the back and said, Rocky!
Yo, Adrian!
I did it!
I'm Larry Elder, and we've got a country to say.
I'll see you next time.
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