When The Fool Killers Come

Please get this one! Why do people need to do this? I don't formally "celebrate" Kwanzaa but, for heaven's sake, it isn't bothering anyone. Although I've been to a few Kwanzaa programs or parties over the years, they were about food, family, culture and - yes - acknowleding some principles from "the motherland" that could be used as guides to providing better lives for ourselves - leaving white folks out of the equation as people who owe it to us.

That is what is so stupid about what this fool is complaining about. How is he against the very thing he claims that black people need to stive for? How are unity, self-determination, collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics, purpose, creativity and faith anything but positive? Aren't those the very things for which Asians, Jews and Eurpoean immigrants are praised? Is that what white folks want "lazy blacks" to do?

Kwanzaa is not a legitimate holiday; it is a subversive black nationalist movement designed to create racial separatism and hatred. It is one of the biggest scams being perpetrated on black Americans,' says Rev. Peterson.

In 1966, Ron Karenga, the leader of United Slaves Organization, a Marxist 'black power' group, created Kwanzaa to help blacks get in touch with their African roots.

Rev. Peterson says, 'Marxist Karenga's Kwanzaa celebration is really a banquet of socialism, worship of false gods and Afrocentrism. The Kwanzaa pledge of allegiance is a perfect example of racial hatred and black separatism: 'We pledge allegiance to the red, black and green, our flag, the symbol of our eternal struggle, and to the land we must obtain; one nation of black people, with one God of us all, totally united in the struggle, for black love, black freedom and black self- determination.'

Rev. Peterson adds, 'This is not a celebration of African harvest; it is a political statement for the establishment of a black nation and racial hatred against whites.'

Peterson needs to shut his yap and look at the signs of the times during which this holiday was created. In 1966, the civil rights act still had not been signed and, despite some inroads by Dr. Martin Luther King, there was still a lot of turmoil. Honestly, I disagreed when I heard that Dr. Karenga originally said that this was a "blacks only" holiday because it has universal principles. But, as with all things, Kwanzaa has evolved over the past 40 years. Most certainly where I live, there are thousands of mixed race families and, when big (or small) Kwanzaa events are held, no one is going to tell the white, Asian, Hispanic or other members of the family that they are excluded. Like Christmas, it has been commercialized and has been capitalized upon. The USPS sells Kwanzaa stamps. I can even buy Kwanzaa items on Amazon.com.

I'll probably get some Kwanzaa stamps for my Christmas cards - as I do every year if I get to the post office before they run out. If someone invites me to a Kwanzaa party, I may even go. Jesse Lee Peterson might do well to take his ignorant, semi-literate sounding behind to one as well. I think he needs to learn a thing or two.